The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Jared Goff, Clay Matthews, Tom Brady, and LeBron James

Episode Date: September 28, 2018

Colin discusses last nights performance of Los Angeles Rams QB Jared Goff, more proof that Green Bay Packers LB Clay Matthews needs to change how he tackles, what New England Patriots QB Tom Brady must be thinking watching the Rams, and why Los Angeles Lakers F LeBron James is right to be bothered by the LA media. Guests include Greg Olsen, Peter King, Eric Dickerson, and Jason McIntyre. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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You're listening to Fox Sports Radio. Ah, this is The Herd on a Friday. Wherever you may be and however you may be listening, live in Los Angeles. Iheart Radio, Fox Sports Radio, and FS1, Joy Taylor is joining me on a Friday. Good morning. It's a great Friday.

We got our blue on for last night's wild game. In one hour from now, Blazing 5. Hottest start in my life. Winning week, winning week, winning week, this week, best picks I've had. Not sure how the stars are lining up, but another great winning week of blazing five picks in one hour from now. And I got to start with a spectacle last night in Los Angeles. You know, I come on the air and I talk about games. Very rarely do I talk about a game, and it turns out exactly like I thought. And I said, the Rams corners are hurt. The Vikings going to pass the ball. It's going to be a great

wild shootout, a lot of yards, a lot of points. But in the end, Jared Goffs better than Kirk Cousins. is he's going to make a couple of throws. You're going to go, wow, and that's what you saw last night. And the Rams are going to win a close, wild, crazy game with a lot of yards. And that's exactly what you got. And the other reason I could predict that is because this is what the Rams have been giving you every Sunday for the last two years. Yeah. 10 yards of play, 13 yards of pass, multiple weapons.

Folks, this is the best offense. I have seen in the NFL top to bottom, coaching. to punt her to kick her for a decade. This is it. Left tackle, great, right tackle, great, quarterback, running back, tight ends, coach, coordinators. Great, great, great, great. They had six third downs all night. They don't even get to third down. Minnesota had a bunch of yards. They had 16. Late in the game, they had only three third downs all night. By the way, Jared Goff had the highest quarterback rating ever. Perfect quarterback. rating. Let me look this up. This is noteworthy. Yes, he had 158 quarterback rating and the most

pass attempts for anybody ever with a perfect passer rating. And here's what's interesting. So many people in the NFL are calling him a system quarterback. And here's why. Because when he first came into the league, he inherited Jeff Fisher's high school coaching staff, a terrible offensive line, no weapons. And he was on hard. hard knocks and the optics. He looked skinny. He looked lost. He had to learn to take a snap under center and the optics were terrible. And then they brought in Sean McVeigh and they went heavy on receivers and left tackle. And suddenly you're like, oh, but everybody's giving McVeigh all the credit on this team. No. No, it's a 50-50 deal here, folks. McVeigh's not

making those reads and McVeigh's not making those throws. And he did it again. We predicted it. He'd make a couple of throws and you would go, oh my God, that's why he's the number one pick. And he made a couple of perfect throws last night that 90% of the guys who have ever played this position can't make. It just proves nobody can do it alone. Michael Jordan before Scotty Pippen was 0 and 6 against the Celtics. Kobe Bryant after Shaq left and before Gasol, a seven seed and missed the playoffs. Bill O'Roy, right? did nothing in his career for 20 years. He found Roger Ailes, then dominated cable for 25 years.

Everybody understands how good Mahomes is because you didn't watch him on hard knocks, and he wasn't terrible. He sat the first year. And everybody understands how good Carson Wentz is because he had some success in the first year. And we get how good Andrew Luck is. It is not an insult to say system quarterback. All the great ones have a great coach. mostly offense.

Now it used to be defense. But this is the way it works. When you get a super clever, creative high IQ football coach and you put him with a tall, good arm, smart, driven, aspirational, coachable quarterback, this is what happens. This is as good an offense as the NFL has had. And I can't remember the last time. But the media and the fans, because of the optics of hard knocks,

and that Jeff Fisher High School coaching staff, they think this is all McVeigh. No, no, by the way, Andy Reed, he wouldn't putting up these numbers with Alex Smith. It's Mahomes. And by the way, Matt Nagy is super smart, but he's limited because it's Mitch Trubisky. You do not do what happened last night

with most quarterbacks. You don't. You go look at Sean Payton's career. He didn't put up these numbers with the other quarterbacks. He's putting him up with Drew Brees. Kyle Shanahan had his best year as a coach, not with Matt Schaub. It was with Matt Ryan. So I think, you know, Brady, Belichick, Greg Popovich, Tim Duncan.

We all knew Belichick was smart pre-Bradie. We all knew Popovich won pre-Duncan. But when they became legends, they had the guy. So for all the fans and all the media that are sitting around before last night going, you know, it's mostly McVeigh. No, no, no, you put Trubisky in that Rams offense. You put Kirk Cousins in that Rams offense. You put Andy Dalton in that Rams offense. You're not getting that.

You saw those throws last night. This is not a 75-25 McVeilene. It's not. It's a 50-50 split. And this is how it works in the NFL now. You're seeing the formula. Clever, high- IQ coach with a coachable world-class arm talent. I mean, Joe Buck and Troikman told a great story last night

when they first saw Jared Goff and Troy compared it to his early career. You and I watched him at practice and we came out in 2016 out of the practice like, this guy can't throw the ball at all. And now he gets under the guidance of Sean McVeigh. I mean, he's lethal. Yeah, well, that day he couldn't even throw a spiral. It was a tough day watching him. And then he struggled and you thought, well, you know, I don't know.

Surely these evaluators know more than what we know watching him in one day. But I can tell you, Joe, from experience, you bring him. a guy, an offensive guy, I had Norve Turner. He came to the Dallas Cowboys in 1991, and it changed my life. It changed my career. Give them credit for taking a chance on a young, up-and-coming

offensive coordinator and letting him be the head coach, and it has paid huge dividends for what they invested in that first round pick. And by the way, I've talked to Jimmy Johnson about this. He goes, you know, everybody was killing Aikman out of college, because his first year in the NFL, he was terrible. And

Jimmy Johnson said, no, no, no, we saw the talent, just like Jared Goff. We saw the talent, but we had to get him the right guy. Michael Jordan needed Pippin. Belichick needed Brady. Pop needed Duncan. Bill O'Reilly needed Roger Ailes. Like Patrick Mahomes needs Andy Reid, but Andy wouldn't be putting up these numbers without

Patrick Mahomes. And so Aikman's story last night is right on. Jimmy Johnson told me, he goes, we knew Aikman was special. But he needed a left tackle. He needed a running back. needed a deep threat and he needed a mentor because Jimmy's a defensive guy that got him one and you have a Hall of Famer. Let me segue to this though. Let me segue to this. So not just the Rams, but the Vikings wide receiving core. Last night there were five guys who play wide receiver,

five different players who had over 100 yards, Brandon Cooks, Cooper Cup, Robert Woods, Adam Thielens, DeFon Diggs. I'm not sure I've watched a game in the NFL. with more wide receiver talent than last night. And I can't be the only person that's thinking what I'm going to say. The Rams number three receiver is significantly better than Brady's number one receiver. Were Tom Brady and Gronk last night watching that game, you know they were, and you know they were texting each other. And they were saying, can you believe this?

can you believe what's going on? I mean, last night, Rams in Minnesota, that was an auto show. That was an auto show. There were Maseratis and there were Aston Martins and there were Bentleys and there were Lamborghinis and there were Lamborghinis. And those were good defenses and they tore them up. Tom Brady's over here saying, I got a Honda Civic, I got a Dodge Neon, can I get some help over here?

You know Brady was watching that thing last night. And he is bitter. I mean, the leading receivers for New England against Detroit, Chris Hogan had three catches for 31 yards, Cordorrell Patterson had a catch for 17, and Philip Dorset was targeted five times, and he had no catches. And Bill Belichick's blind spot,

drafting in college, has been wide receiver. He's not good at it. And he drafted a receiver once, had Jackson high and he was a complete nutter whiff, he just doesn't do it. He goes and gets his wide receivers from the NFL because Belichick's gunshot, a draft a receiver high, he doesn't do well with it. He goes in the league and finds guys. But I don't remember the ball hitting the ground last night other than when the Rams

punter through the ball. And I wouldn't be surprised if the 49ers are not making a call to get him in their quarterback rotation. I've been saying for years that wide receivers are icing on the cake. The cake is the offensive line, the coach, and the quarterback. But with two rule changes this offseason, we talked about this, Joy, there's been two rule changes. Both were very pro-wide receiver. The catch rule, we haven't had one discussion so far this year, what's a catch?

Instead of the discussions we used to have, which were, what's a catch, the discussion now is, wow, what a catch. That is a massive rule change. and the late hit penalty. So you can't touch a receiver off the line. You now can't hit them. They now got the catch rule flipped toward their advantage. And I always said that wide receivers were icing on the cake. They make the cake better, but it's the cake.

You know what they are now? Wide receivers, due to those two rule changes, are icing on a cupcake. They matter more. They matter a lot. The cupcakes are fine, but the icing. goes a long way to make the cupcake. And you're seeing it right now. We have not had a single discussion

that I can remember in the first month of the season about what's a catch? It's all now. Whoa, what a catch. There's a reason GM's in this league. Remember, Joy, we talked about this in August. Why are wide receivers getting massive money now by smart NFL teams?

This is why. You can't touch the quarterback. You can't touch the quarterback. receiver, you can't hit them and they flipped the catch rule in favor of the receiver instead of in favor of the defense. And since Belichick's arrived in 2000 in New England, they've never drafted a receiver in the first round. They've only taken four in the second round and three of the four were absolute whiffs.

So he's not good at the college-wide receiver thing. He'll go get a Chris Hogan. He'll go get a Wes Welker. He doesn't draft receivers well. They don't. And look, Brady and Gronk had to be watching that auto show last night. I mean, that was just Maseratis and Lamborghinis. That was Bentley's.

And Brady's over here texting Gronk. I got to dodge neon. Well, they're relying on Brady to make it work. And, I mean, when you were watching that game last night, that was a Pro Bowl set of wide receivers. I mean, it was just like great catch, great route, wide open, on the run. I don't remember the last NFL game I was. watched with that many good wide receivers. Possession guys, speed guys. Good Lord.

Did no way Brady and Grunk watch that and don't just go, this is why when Brady lost to Detroit, he had that sound bite. He wasn't angry. He was defeated. He sees what he's dealing with here. God, that was an auto show last night. God, that was impressive. Coming up next, hey, Clay Matthews. Packers, Clay Matthews. I hope you were watching last night. A teaching moment last night for Clay Matthews, who I like. That's coming up next. Eric Dickerson, one of the great Rams of all time.

Peter King shows up today as well. Greg Olson, Carolina Panthers, who's going to move from the NFL to broadcasting very soon, one of the top tight ends in football. A couple different things is that I think sometimes, you know, this is just the way it works. It works this way for pilots. It works this way for school teachers. It works this way for a lot of different fields in our business as well. Virtually everybody, everybody, it doesn't matter what business you're in.

Okay, landscaper, waste management, you have to be retrained at some point to keep up. Like pilots constantly mechanics. I mean, what a mechanic is asked to do today with a car and what he was asked to do 20 years ago, they have to go in for retraining. Mechanics are constantly being retrained. And Clay Matthews has been flagged several times because when he sacks quarterbacks, his takeaway is, you know, what are you doing to the game? And, you know, he does this and he's getting flags and he's freaking out and everybody in the NFL is overreacting.

And that's for a pass rusher. That's called the kill shot. Well, the kill shot has changed, okay? The kill shot for the smart guys in this league, Vaughn Miller and Khalil Mack, is stripping the quarterback of the football. football. That's the new kill shot. That's how the Eagles beat Tom Brady in the Super Bowl. They didn't go for the kill shot. They knocked the ball out of Brady's hands. That's the new kill shot for a pass rusher. You got to evolve. You got to figure it out. That's what

Kalee Mack does. That's what Vaughn Miller does. And last night in that game, and Clay Matthews came out yesterday, he goes, I don't know what's going on here. It's truly unfortunate. I think I speak on behalf of everybody that doesn't like the rule and the way it's being officiated. Dude, planes change, rules change, officials have to evolve, quarterbacks and coaches have to evolve. Pass rushers

now, strip the ball. It's what Vaughn Miller did to win the Super Bowl MVP. It's what Kaleel Mack is doing. And if you watch that game last night, when Minnesota got that ball at the end, how did the game end? What did the kill shot do to end the game for the Vikings? Here it was.

Watch for yourself. Cousin. has his arm hit. Ball is out. I think it is a fumble, Joe, and now it's a matter of who's on it. Rams have it. That's what you do now.

That's what you do now. That's how guys are becoming legends in football. Vaughn Miller said, I don't have any problems with it. Khalil Max, like, I don't got any problems with it. You go for the ball. That's how the game was sealed last night. You go for the ball, not to crunch the quarterback backs ribs because the league's trying to protect the San Francisco 49ers from having to use

CJ Bethard and not Jimmy Garoppolo. The other thing I want to throw your way is that a lot of times people will have great success and not that they don't deserve credit, but timing, time and place means a lot. This is nothing against LeBron, but getting to the finals all those years, yes, LeBron. Yes, LeBron's amazing, but it did help that the Celtics were rebuilding and the West was way better than the East. That is not a knock on LeBron. It's a reality. LeBron has dominated the Eastern Conference for a decade, mostly because he's great and the East is atrocious.

Johnny Carson for 30 years dominated late night TV. It's not that Johnny Carson wasn't great. He ran unopposed. There's like nine talk shows at night now. Cable broadcast. He ran unopposed. ABC put news on. He was the funny guy you watched at night.

He was the only thing on television. By the way, Nick Sabin's great. Part of his greatness is he coaches against gym teachers. The SECs never had a drier 10-year run of coaching excellence. By the way, Belichick and Brady, do you think they'd have all those home playoff games and all those buys? No, the Miami Dolphins, Adam Gase, is the sixth head coach Belichick has faced from Miami alone. The bills, the jets, the dolphins have taken turns over the last 15 years being the first or second most dysfunctional team in the league. When you look at this Rams team, I don't know if they'll have a 15-year run, but it is interesting.

Arizona's in a rebuild, San Francisco's in a rebuild, and Seattle's in a rebuild. And they've got Indomacan Su and Aaron Donald, and the three of the worst offensive lines in football are Seattle, Arizona, and San Francisco. And so you start looking at the Rams, and Arizona's got a rookie head coach, some front office controversy, a terrible offensive line, and a rookie quarterback. And then you look at Seattle, and they've been unraveling for three years. Pete Carroll's 67. They're going to lose Earl Thomas to the Chiefs, reportedly. They're in a major rebuild, and they have a bad old line. And you look at San Francisco, they're rebuilding, and Jimmy Garoppolo now just had his second major injury.

There's the adult film star dinner. People are questioning his judgment. CJ Beatherd's the guy. One more injury, and Jimmy Garoppolo is officially injury prone. So I'm not saying the Rams are going to be Alabama or they're going to be Belichick or LeBron. But time and place is really important for legends. It really helped Saban and Belichick and LeBron and the late Johnny Carson that they ran unopposed in certain years. I mean, how many times have Brady and Belichick had a buy in the first?

round of the playoffs and two weeks to prepare at home against somebody else in the AFC. It's a lot easier to win in cold weather in Foxborough two weeks to prepare than going on the road to Pittsburgh and you go from the last week to go into Pittsburgh or the last week going to Peyton Manning. It matters and the Rams got all the momentum now. They got the brilliant coach. They got the respected defensive coordinator. They have a ton of money. They got a new stadium. They have their left tackle. Their quarterback. They're running back. Their defensive line. They're corners. They got a lot of. of money, first or second

richest owner, a brand new stadium, a city that attracts free agents, they've drafted pretty well. I mean, this puppy is rolling. Joy with the news. No, no, no, no, no. Turn on the news. This is the Heard Line News.

So the Vikings entered the season as one of the favorites in the NFC, but they've stumbled out of the gate with a one-two-and-one start. But despite this, Kirk Cousin still has plenty of confidence that the wins will come. When I met Adam and Steph in April, we threw on the field. I said, these guys can play.

You know, so I don't know that that was going to change regardless of how we did in the first four games. I mean, I think that, you know, certainly we can move the football, and we just got to turn into wins. By the way, it used to be that if you wore a hat, it had a logo on it. But all the hipsters now are wearing hats with nothing on it. Kirk Cousins is a hipster. Well, he's wearing a hat, a plain shirt. black hat and there's nothing on it. That's the new thing, right? I mean, yes, they sell hats with nothing on it, sometimes too.

I think it's just, it's very odd to me. I grew up for 50 years that you put a logo on a hat. You wear the Detroit Tigers. You know, you'd put your favorite sporting gear Nike company or something. People now wear hats with no emblem. I just, I'm having a hard time imagining Kirk Cousins as a hipster. Maybe he needs, he needs, he definitely needs a mustache for sure. And he's got the logo jacket on. So he needs to replace that with like a vintage sweater maybe. Yeah. And like a pipe or something.

Anyway, look, the Vikings are going to win some games, obviously. But I'm just not a huge Kirkkirk guy. He's a he's now 4 and 20 against teams with a better record than 500. And again, nobody's saying he's not solid. But last night, final drive, plenty of time, all the timeouts, great weapons. that anybody in America think, oh, he's going to lead him back into overtime. That's what I'm saying. I think he's a franchise quarterback, obviously.

He's good, but I don't think he's ever that guy that's going to take you to the next level. All right, so the Baker-Mayfield hype train. We've been talking about it for months. And if anyone knows about the contagiousness of something, it's Jarvis Landry. And Jarvis said he's known for a while that Baker has what it takes to play in the NFL. Since the day they drafted him, you know, obviously understanding the potential. and the things that he can do and what makes him special. And having the guys around him, you know, with the trust level at a premium, you know, to make the plays as well.

One thing I know about him, you know, he's walking like he's talking. And that's something that I appreciate and I respect about him. And he's continued to do. It's that walker talkie, you know. And he definitely has that attitude and charisma. And, you know, that is contagious. Contagious. Contagious.

Contagious, bro. Look, he's the number one overall pick. Of course he should. Jarvis and I agree. He should have been starting from the beginning. I agree, Jarvis. Yeah, I mean, he's clearly capable of playing in the NFL. I would like to remind everybody that thinks I hate Baker-Mayfield.

I told you, three guys of all these quarterbacks, Darnold Baker and Rosen, were capable of playing as rookies and winning games. As long as you gave him help. This is not shot. I know what Brown fans think I thought he was going to be a bust. I said a thousand times. Baker can play. I just don't see him as Breeze and Russell Wilson,

which people are calling him the next this and that. And I'm like, you've got to be kidding me. Well, we do that with everyone. We do that with every rookie that's coming into the NBA. Oh, is this the next LeBron? Is this the next Gary Payton? Is this the next Jason kid? Like, we do that with every rookie that comes in the NBA.

We have to compare him to something. And we do it with every rookie quarterback in the NFL. They have to match something that we already seen. It doesn't necessarily mean they're going to be that. Drew Breeze is. really can be argued as one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time. He's certainly the most accurate. So it's unfair to put those expectations on Baker right now.

But he should be able to go in and play. That's why they drafted him number one overall. Yeah, if you're a number one draft pick. The only reason he didn't start is because they had Tyrod Taylor. Yeah. If you're a number one pick, even at quarterback, like Sam Darnold, I thought should have got number one. Sam Darnold should play as a rookie.

Sam Darnold, I'd prefer he sit until Thanksgiving. But if you're a number one pick and you can't start even at, quarterback. You're probably the wrong guy. The wrong pick. You're the wrong pick. Finally, speaking of a high pick, Lonzo Ball returned to the court and practiced with contact for the first time yesterday. And so naturally, Lonzo

was asked if you had any nerves when he was sharing the floor for the first time with LeBron. Are you nervous at all to actually be on the floor? No, I'm never nervous to play with nobody. Yeah, I mean, just another person at that end of the day. You're not got it. That correct answer.

Of course. he should not be nervous to play alongside LeBron. Of course not. Look, first of all, if you're a professional athlete, you think you are the best anyway. That's how you got there. That's the separation between every other great athlete and a professional, is that you believe that you could be a professional. So of course, Lanzobal

shouldn't be nervous to... I can see if, you know, you're playing against Michael at the end of his career and you're a rookie coming in. If you're playing against LeBron and his announced last year I'd be much more nervous to have to guard LeBron than play with LeBron.

Right. There's no reason Lanzo should have any kind of emotional feeling about being in the floor of the first time. I wouldn't want to get humiliated by LeBron, but I'd love to pass to LeBron. Yes. That'd be fun. He should be excited. Yes, of course. Enjoy it with the news. Well, that's the news.

And thanks for stopping by. The Heard Lye News. One of the good guys and one of the great players, 12 NFL seasons, three pro bowls came out of the University of Miami, and he was a first round pick. About 10, 11 years ago. He's banged up now. he's going to be a tremendous broadcaster if he chooses to do that via the Coward Global Satellite Network, Carolina Panther tight end Greg Olson. You know, I was saying, Greg, good to talk to you and see again.

I was saying I was watching that game last night, and it was like an auto show. I've never seen more receivers. Good Lord, Thielen, Stefan Diggs, Brandon Cooks. And before the season, the NFL flipped the catch rule. And it used to, the last 10 years it's been what's a catch? And now it's like, oh, what a catch. It feels like the league now is very tight-end wide receiver friendly in the last couple of months. Have you noticed it watching games over the last month?

Yeah, I think if last night, if they could bottle that game up, I think the NFL could take that game and replicate it every weekend across all cities. I think that's what they're trying to get, right? I mean, we can talk all we want about defense and defensive players and pass rushers and all that. At the end of the day, they don't want you sack on their quarterback, and they want you throwing for 400 yards. That's entertaining, nor people have talked about that Thursday night game, then they've talked about games in a really long time.

So that just shows people want to see high prolific offenses, they want to see young quarterbacks play well, they want to see teams score a lot of points, throwing the ball. I mean, there's no mistake that the rules are set in a way to have a night like last night. I don't think anybody could argue that. By the way, Cam has had a sneaky good year. They get him Norv Turner, and his efficiency, numbers have been very nice. What's Norve doing with Cam? Because the Cam I'm watching now in the

first month looks really comfortable. He's completing a higher percentage. There's more precision routes. What are you seeing with Cam? Is it the same thing that he finally got the right coordinator? I like hearing you say nice things about Cam. That makes me feel good. But no, I think he's playing really good. I think, listen, the hardest thing I think to quantify, and listen, you've been around, you've seen a million people, you've talked about for hours, the day. The hard thing about Cam is it's hard to quantify what his impact is, right? Because when you want to compare quarterbacks, you want to compare everyone, everyone wants to compare. Passing yardage, completion percentage, and touchdowns. But when you put up Cam's passing yardage from his career,

it might not match the Aaron Rogers, the Tom Brady, the Drew Breeze. But all of a sudden, now you factor in rushing yardage, conversions on third down with his legs, both in short yardage situations or attempted pass that becomes a scramble late. Red zone backs. He's arguably the biggest red zone running threat in the entire league for the last decade. He has more touchdowns than more rushing touchdowns than anybody in the league since he's come in, the most that of any quarterback in the history of the game. There's so much more to him than just passing, completion percentage, yardage. Oh, he only throws for 175 a game. Yeah, but when you factor in all those other things he does, that's his impact. And I think it's hard to not throw that in when you're

comparing him to these other guys. Yeah, it's hard to quantify some of Cam's greatness. When they do that stuff at the goal line and he does that RPO and he slides over and he there's no question he he's literally like a defensive end running at you as as an outside linebacker he is a there's just certain guys that have wow moments and I was saying this last night before the game I said everybody thinks it's McVeigh and not Jared Goff and I said I watched golf in college and I said just trust me he's going to make a couple throws tonight being last night and you're going to go oh wow when you were watching last night I mean I think you're I think Goff is a really special player, but McVeigh is so heralded that everybody's like, well, it's

McVeigh's offense. I think Goff is incredibly special. What do you see from him? Yeah, I think we've seen, though, even from veteran guys, let alone young guys in their second, third year, just still kind of growing. I think it's a combination of the both. I think there's a lot of stories of young guys most of the time, but even older veterans that have had success and all of a sudden now they're in a different offense for better or worse.

and they either drastically improve or they see a decline. I think the same thing with no question now with a young guy, right? Of course, you're not drafted as high as he is in the draft if you don't have the physical tools and the skill set. But now all of a sudden you put him with a young quarterback, and there's more than just, I mean, a young, often head coach, there's more to it than the X's and O's. There's the relatability factor.

You see his energy on the sideline. The young kids, I've heard you talk about it. I've listened to your show a lot. You talk about culture and environment and putting those leaders in front of people that they can relate to. That's real. And you see McVeigh running around with a very young team, young offensive skill players, a young quarterback, chest bumping, running up and down the sideline. Guys relate to that. And oh, yeah, he draws up great plays. So I think it's a combination of you got to have the talent. You got to have the people to draw up great plays. I think if you took some bad offense in this league and all of a sudden a McVey or a Norv Turner becomes their coordinator, are they drastically the number one? I don't. I think it's a mix of the two. And they're fortunate that they have a great mix of young talent. veteran talent on both sides of the ball, and obviously a head coach who is very ahead of his time,

ahead of his years, so to speak, and two years has had a huge turnaround. By the way, I was good to see the Eric Reed got picked up by the Carolina Panthers. You know, I say this all the time on this show. I said, some of our coaches in the NFL and owners and GMs have got to get comfortable with being slightly uncomfortable. And athletes today want to talk about politics, and they want to talk about social justice, and we've had the anthem thing. And my thing is, listen, man, this is the new world.

That athletes have a right to an opinion. And these owners and these GMs, you've got to get comfortable with being slightly uncomfortable. And I love what the Panthers did with Eric Reed. But you've been in this NFL when it was more rigid, and now you're in an NFL where players have a voice. And I'm seeing slowly but surely these owners, you guys have now a new owner. and it looks like he is much more comfortable, perhaps, with what's happening in the sport. I like to see that. You've been in the locker room, the old style, the new style.

Do you like where all sports are going? Yeah, I think the biggest thing, these conversations have been going on since I've come in the league. I don't think these locker room talks have changed much. The topics change, the hot button issues over the last 12 years of mine have changed. But these anthem conversations have been going on for years in the locker room. They went on 12 years ago when I was a rookie. It was just a different hot button topic at the time. The difference now is those conversations have left the walls of the locker room.

They've gone out into public. Guys are more comfortable speaking about it on camera in interviews, press conferences. They're more willing to take those private conversations. I think people would be shocked at the honesty, the openness, but also the civility of conversations that go on daily in the locker room. A locker room that I mind you, in professional football especially, could not be more diverse, could not have more differing opinions, could not have more strong-willed opinions. Yet, not only can those guys differ in opinion and hold those conversations, they can do it with respect,

they can do it without it getting personal, they can do it without it ever elevating to a point of contentiousness between two people. It's a really unique environment. I just wish people understood that players are capable of doing that. Athletes are capable of doing that, but it seems like no one else is capable of doing that. And I think it's good for people to all of a sudden start hearing these voices. but hearing these voices on both sides, on all sides. Because in the locker room, to be honest, there are differing opinions, and there are both sides.

But a lot of those guys whose opinions differ are the closest of friends, our teammates, they go out there and play for one another. It's a very unique kind of social experiment and one that I think could be represented on a larger level. By the way, Walgreens and P&G, that stuff's behind you right now. You're looking at Greg Olson, 12 years, 3 Pro Bowl. So what are you doing with Walgreens? So that stuff behind you is all stuff I have in my house.

I'm telling you, and that's exactly what I said. For the month of October, all these things you see behind me, brands and products that we all come to know and rely on for the month of October, you can go to your local Walgreens, buy a P&G product like the ones you see behind, buy the first one at full price and get the second one for half off. So for the entire month, you can stock up, all the stuff that you use to look so good. You can go grab yourself something, Colin, and make sure you take care of the household. Greg, you know, Fox has a job opening for you. The minute you want to do a broadcast thing and get out of that tight end thing, we love you, we respect you, you're terrific, and it's great talking to you again. Thanks, Colin. Always like coming on with you.

Thanks. All right, Greg Olson, absolutely great dude. Very thoughtful, very smart. Carolina went out and said, we'll take Eric Reed, and guess what? We're all going to be okay. Isn't it amazing how that happens? We're all going to be okay.

Eric Reed's going to be fine. The sun still came up this morning. Yes. And Kaepernick had a commercial on Nike, and Nike stock when we're all going to be okay. We can differ in opinions. We all love football. Let's just watch it and play it.

We all love it. Blazing fives around the corner. Man, third time in a week. LeBron pushed back at the L.A. media. Did you see this yesterday? Let me defend LeBron coming out next, The Herd. Be sure to catch live editions of The Herd weekdays in noon Eastern, 9 a.m. Pacific on Fox Sports Radio, FS1, and the IHeard Radio app.

Blazing five, blazing five in ten minutes, red hot. Okay, so something happened yesterday again and again and again, this has to be addressed. Okay, have you noticed a trend between LeBron and the LA media? Here's Monday at Media Day. LeBron was asked about balancing basketball and business. Here was his response. Between the movie project, the TV project, the documentary, the HBO show, how do you juggle off the court stuff and on the court stuff and keep it from becoming a distraction potentially

um how long have you been following me huh apparently not long enough there go your answer right there snippy then lebron was asked at practice tuesday about proving himself to the fans here's how he responded LeBron, the LA fan base, how do you expect to earn their respect and earn their loyalty? Who, me? The fan base, yes. Me? Yes, you. Huh?

What do you say the fans that say they want to see you and earn their respect? I'll sign a four-year deal. How much more what you want me to do? Yeah. That's fine. I mean, we talked to them outside of here yesterday. Listen, I signed a four-year deal. I'm here, so, I mean, I know what I bring to the table on the floor.

little testy, a little impatient. LeBron yesterday was asked about wearing a different number at practice, a different jersey number. Here's how he responded. Do you're wearing number six? I've worn six in practice for a long time. I'm starting to figure out a lot of you guys just not recognizing who I am, huh? I have no idea. I've been doing this by the last eight years now. LA Media, do your homework. When super, Superman arrives in your hometown. You don't ask him, hey, what's the S on your chest stand for? Do your homework.

LeBron doesn't need the Lakers. The L.A. media is trying to test LeBron. LeBron, how are you going to balance business? What does it matter? He's been doing that for years. That's why he answered that way. You know, he was in a whole movie. Yeah, for years.

He's been doing this for a long time. He's been wearing the jersey for years. And L.A., the Lakers. have been made to feel special. And they're no longer special. You're just a team. You, over the last five years, the Lakers have won 31% of their games.

Actually, percentage-wise, less. That's the worst record in the NBA. Worse than Philadelphia. He saved you. Superman's flown in, and you're asking him, what's the S stand for in your chest? Do your homework. Players, superstars now don't need the media.

They don't because they have direct access to the fans. It used to be Kobe and Magic and Jordan needed the media to reach fans, advertisers, meets the masses, meet the networks. They tried to sell their personality and sell their sense of humor. And they needed the media. The media was the bridge between star and fans. That's gone. LeBron, our president, shows you this on Twitter.

He can reach his base on Twitter. He doesn't need the media. Presidents no longer need the media. media. Superstars in the NBA don't need the media. They can connect with their fans directly. And so it's funny, watching LeBron deal with the local media, they're trying to test him. Ooh, earn the loyalty.

He flew in. Superman just flew in to save your franchise. It just doesn't apply to free agents anymore. I can see if you are asking these things of, say, someone like Lonzo Ball, who was drafted there. and is young and still has things to prove. Those are appropriate questions for someone. Not knocking at reporters, obviously.

They're just doing their job. But asking Lonzo something like that, that would be more appropriate, I think. Can you imagine? He does have things to prove to the Lakers, the Lakers fans, and the NBA as a whole. LeBron has passed that. Can you imagine if you were a movie studio? And for the last five years, nothing but duds. And then you, Denzel walked in or Tom Hanks walked in,

and you asked him, how can you? you prove to us you're loyal. How are you going to balance your work and your life and your family would do in movies? And you, Tom Hanks and Danzel would be saving your crappy film studio. Like, give them a, I'm not somebody that's a suck up to athletes, but it's like the LA media is waiting for LeBron to put his arms around them, their boys and buddies. No, he flew in to save the franchise. You essentially signed a four-year marketing appearance fee with LeBron James. That's all this relationship is. is you've already defaced two murals.

You're already butchering the media thing is understand your place in the NBA now. You're a city. Now, it's cooler to win here than Memphis because L.A.'s, you know, it's got movie stars everywhere and great weather and palm trees and, you know, it's got the Pacific Ocean and the mountains. Well, the Lakers do have a very historic organization. Yes. You know, but.

But. that's old history. That's in the past. By the way, the L.A. Rams have been in L.A. for an hour, right? It's there a cool place to play. Because the city is kind of cooler than, you know, it's a little more glitzy than Baltimore or Green Bay. Sure, it's Hollywood.

But what does that have to do with the Lakers? Like the Lakers, we care about winning. Like Boston, it doesn't have palm trees. It's just so funny to me. They care about winning. It's a pretty historic franchise. To watch all this push on LeBron, it's like, folks, you should be, he's just, I mean, you're watching what he's doing with the media.

You and I have been confused about this since LeBron got here, though. I maintain that I think it's mostly Kobe fans that feel that are pushing this narrative and not Lakers fans as a whole, but I could be wrong about that. Blazing 5 right around the corner. I think it's the best picks I have had this year, and we've had back-to-back-to-back winning weeks. Want to borrow 40 grand? Want to pay after credit cards? Go to Lendingclub.com slash sports. Lendingclub.com slash sports.

All loans made by Web Bank, member FDIC, equal housing lender. Hour 2. Blazing 5 next. Peter King, too. Eric Dickerson, it's the herd. Ah, hour two on a Friday live in Los Angeles. This is the herd. Wherever you may be and however you may be listening or viewing.

Iheart Radio, Fox Sports Radio and FS1, Joy Taylor is joining me. This is a really good next hour. Eric Dickerson, where the great all-time Rams has some thoughts on that spectacle last night. Peter King will be joining us in five minutes. I go back to what I said an hour ago. Brady and Grunk had to be watching that auto show of wide receivers last night, those Bentley's and Maserati saying, can we get something besides a Dodge neon over here?

That was my first car. It was it? Yeah, a little red. I had an AMC pacer. It caught fire in Las Vegas on a freeway. I'm not joke. I wish I was joking. It got caught fire.

But that was, that was a spectacle. That was as great a collection of wide receiver talent as you're ever, ever going to see. It was so much fun. It got a actually not that. anybody cares. It got a massive number last night, which is surprising because of all the political upheaval in the Senate hearing stuff. All the political networks got huge numbers last night, but football got a huge number. It was a great TV night in America. All right, before I get to Peter King, John Goulet has been with me for a better part of a decade. This is the hottest I've

ever started. Three back-to-back-to-back-to-back winning weeks. I feel these are the best picks I've had this year. And so without further ado, our Blazing Five. That's a hot one. Let's blaze it up. Fire it up. It's Collins, blazing fire. All right. Browns and Raiders.

I'll take the Raiders minus two and a half to win by more than a field goal. Listen, they're not an awful 0-and-3 team. They've let every game going into the fourth quarter. Derek Carr is completing over 75% of his throws. This is a very competent offense, and they've got good backs. They have not sealed up games. And going out to Miami in that oppressive heat in September and losing, to a good dolphin team is nothing to be embarrassed about.

Listen, I like Baker Mayfield. Okay, it's been fun. But the number one overall pick in their first career start, dating back 15 years to 2003 are 0-10. Starting quarterbacks first start. Number one picks are 0-10 in their first starts. Oakland is at home. They're the better team.

They're not an awful 0-N-3. I'll take the Radas to win 2820. Texans at Colts I can't believe Indianapolis isn't favored by more than one point it's Colts minus one Listen Chris Ballard the GM of the Colts told me in the offseason

he goes you know I think our defensive front's a little better than people think they're tied for fourth most sacks in the NFL they don't have a superstar but the Colts are playing very very sound fundamental football up front again it's not perfect they don't have an Aaron Donald they don't have a

Vaughn Miller but they've been surprised amazingly good, and the Texans have given up a league high, 33 quarterback hits this season. That may be the worst offensive line in the NFL and the past defense this year for Houston. What's going on? I got a team that I think feels good about themselves. The Colts at home only having to give up a point, I'm going to take Indianapolis to win this thing comfortably, 3326. Seahawks at Cardinals. This is going to be ugly.

I mean, turn away. Don't watch. Bad offenses, terrible offensive lines, rebuilding football teams. But Arizona is getting a field goal. And at home, they've always been sneaky good. Chandler Jones, over the last three years, you know he actually leads the NFL in sacks? He does. Kaleo Max's behind him.

Vaughn Miller's behind him. And Seattle struggles to block elite pass rushers. Anytime you have two ugly offenses who are really rebuilding, and I'm going to get a field goal with a home team. I'm going to take it. This is going to be really ugly. I'm going to take Arizona. Kind of an upset win, 24, 23.

Josh Rosen wins. Saints and Giants. Giants historically start slow and end strong. I'm getting three and a half with the New York Giants. Like it, I love it. Listen, New Orleans is a different team on the road. This is back-to-back roadies. Over the last seven, eight years, even when Drew Brees,

they've generally been poor. Forget points just straight up in back-to-back road games the second game. And their defense is last or next to last in points per game allowed, yards per game, and takeaways. This is not a defense playing well. And here's what I know about the Giants. Saquan Barclay is the first giant with 100-plus scrimid jar to each of his first career games. He's a real weapon. Now, I wouldn't have taken him with my number one pick.

I would have taken Sam Darnold. But the Giants are going to win this game, and the Giants are getting three and a half at home. I love, love this pick, 2827 New York Giants. Ravens at Steelers. It's been saying it joy since the preseason. Baltimore is the best team in the NFL that nobody's paying attention to, but they're not flashy. They're not the Rams. They're not the Chiefs.

They're not the Steelers. They don't have Brady. They're really good. But they drafted two tight ends and they went and acquired three new wide receivers. And my thing was, just wait until Thanksgiving. This is going to be a Super Bowl level team. but they're not flashy. They're kind of rebuilding their offensive parts,

but defensively, they're top five in points, yards, passing yards, yards allowed per play. That's a big Vegas staff. Baltimore's always good defensively. They're incredibly sound there again this year. By the way, though, sneaky good offensively. Here's an amazing number. Ravens have scored a touchdown on all 12 with a red zone drives,

12 for 12. They're better offensively than you think. Sunday night football. Baltimore goes into Pittsburgh and beats the Steelers. 27, 23. Those are my blazing five picks. By the way, I've got my Baker, Baker, Moneymaker. Okay, last week I took Cleveland and Baker paid off because I didn't know he would play. My bet of the week is the Raiders. I think people are... You know what it is? You got two things converging here. The narrative that Gruden's a dinosaur and doesn't know what he's doing.

Offensively, they're fine. They're actually, they're fun to watch offensively. So you got that narrative going, and then you have the narrative that Baker Mayfield is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Gruden can actually coach a little bit, and Baker's a kid, and the number's wrong, and so there you go. And with that, we go from numbers to a brilliant writer, broadcaster Peter King, Football Morning in America, Peter King, NBCSports.com. All right, let's join us via the Coward Global Satellite Network. Last night was as much fun watching a football game as I could possibly have, and I know, I know it's too offensive, it's too. Canadian Football League. The showcase of athletes and play calling. I mean, I watched the Rams. I said this an hour ago, Peter, from coordinator to coach, to quarterback to left tackle,

to running back to receivers, to kicker. The Rams are about as stacked offensively as any team I remember in years here. I don't want to be hyperbolic, but what did you see with the Rams last night? Well, the first month of the season has been played for the Rams. and they've scored 33, 34, 35, and 38. And none of those have been fluky games. It's not like they've struggled in any one of them or getting gifts in any one of them. And the thing that I saw last night is,

everybody in the ballpark knew, most likely, that Kirk Cousins, if he got even a short amount of time, if he got 2.2 seconds per dropback, You know, he was going to be able to exploit the Rams secondary because Marcus Peters was wounded. Akeb Talib is out. They have average safeties, far below average backup corners. So you look at it and you say, this is a great situation for the Minnesota Vikings to come in to be able to make some hay. And the Vikings almost made enough hay to win.

But what it showed me is that when the Rams know that they know that they know, need to score in the mid and high 30s, they've got a very good chance to do so even when they're playing a powerful offense with a good front seven. And even though Minnesota's front seven is not played great this year, it's still a good front seven even without Everson Griffin. You know, I said yesterday is that stardom is hard to explain in America. A Kendall Jenner doesn't sing, she doesn't act, she doesn't dance, but in Hollywood, a city of stars, she'd get the biggest crowd. You can't explain a lot of stardom. Tebow was a faith-based backing and became a superstar overnight. I remember when I worked at the other place, the Tebow articles would get

four to five times the readers as the other articles, and it was hard to explain. I watched Baker Mayfield. I've got a college career. He's a little cocky. I had a police video. Cleveland's this kind of cubs of the NFL. They can't win. I got to tell you, he's top 10 in Jersey sales. He's never started a game. Peter, I feel like we're on the precipice of Baker Mayfield becoming must-see TV in this national football league. I could not turn the Brown's Jets game off. I couldn't. And I kind of feel like we're on the precipice of something real special with Baker. Do you sense that? Colin, you know, there's one game really, I mean, there's a bunch of interesting games on Sunday. You know, I really like the dolphins going in.

into New England. Just for drama value. I want to see if the Saints can play well on the road again, second straight week. They should be able to. They should be able to put up in the 30s against the Giants. And always, I love the Steelers and the Ravens, even though both teams are down a little bit, but it's a great rivalry game in Pittsburgh. That's fun. The best game, most compelling game, in my opinion, this weekend is Cleveland at Oakland. Yep. You know, Oakland being 0 and 3, and Cleveland having this guy who every,

he's only played 32 minutes in the NFL, but those 32 minutes, he comes in down 14 nothing, and he ends up winning the game on national TV. Baker Mayfield's afraid of nothing. He's confident. He borders on the cocky, but he's very confident in what he can do.

He doesn't care what, people think about him. I think he's really one of the five or six or eight most compelling figures in the NFL right now. And he's only played 32 minutes. No, I said this. I don't think he's Carson Wentz or Andrew Luck is a talent. I don't think he's Russell Wilson, maybe not Matt Ryan. But interesting? Oh, God. Yeah, he is a fascinating NFL player. And by the way, the NFL's... And you know what, Colin? I think he's better than you think. Because I think the one thing that people don't realize him yet, about him yet. I cover the Browns on draft weekend,

and I remember Elliot Wolf, you know, the number two guy to John Dorsey saying to me that all four of their guys watched him independently. Alonzo Highsmith, Elliot Wolf, Scott McLuhan, and John Dorsey. Dorsey said, I want you to watch all the quarterbacks independently

and then come back and report to me. Middle of February, they all watched all of the games of all the quarterbacks. Every one of them had Mayfield first. and the biggest reason is, has nothing to do with height, you know, leadership, any of that stuff. Every one of them thought, this guy really throws a good, deep ball. And if you play in Cleveland, you're going to need a strong arm. That's the one thing that has been totally underestimated.

Not, you know, the gumption hasn't been the guts, the leadership, all that stuff. Everybody knows that about Mayfield. But this guy, I don't care that he's six feet tall. He can throw the ball downfield in the top 12 or 15 quarterbacks in football right now. Yeah, I said this a couple of days ago. His arm strength has been a little bit of a shocker to me. He's got real zip on the ball. Right now it's a better arm than Darnold, who's a bigger athlete.

Okay, so for years and years, Belichick's worst month has been September. And he kind of sees September sometimes as a little bit of an extension of the third preseason game. He tweaks. He teaches. He's a mentor. I get it. But I got to tell you, I'm watching that Rams Vikings game last night, and I'm like, Brady had to watch that thing. And I got Chris Hogan over here, Corderel Patterson, and I'm watching that auto show last night with Maseratis.

If they lose to Miami, okay, I got to tell you, Peter, it does feel different. It does. If Miami goes in there and beats them, it kind of feels like the dynasty, it's in San Antonio when Duncan retired. They're still good and competent, but they're not the same. I kind of think this weekend tells us a ton about New England going forward. Your thoughts? I think it does, but barring a 38-0 loss, I'm not going to still, I'm not shoveling dirt on this team.

I've seen too many times late in seasons. There's no coach and no team that improves from September to December as much as the Patriots. And so that's why I say, you know, let's wait and see what happens. Let's say at the trading deadline. What if, who knows? What if the Packers fall out of it and they get Randall Cobb? What if the lions fall out of it and they get Golden Tate? And I'm just pulling those names out of a hat.

Demerius Thomas. Who knows? But what if they go out and get a receiver at the trading deadline and Josh Gordon is still standing? I mean, who knows? But I will say this. Here's what feels a little bit different. Every year, the Patriots have basically let high-paid, you know, especially offensive players go. Yes.

This year, it was, you know, Brandon Cooks. And the reason why that is particularly noticeable this year is that there really isn't anybody behind them to take his place. That's right. Chris Hogan and Julian Edelman, when he comes back, they are intermediate slot-type receivers. Brandon Cook's last year accounted for 43% of all of Tom Brady's throws more than 20 yards down the field. Half of Tom Brady's deep balls are gone. Yeah. They're gone.

And they have not been replaced. That's a great. So I blame Belichick. I blame Belichick for basically saying, oh, don't worry. We'll get it fixed. We'll figure it out. And he always does. So we always say, I think he's going to do it.

And maybe he will. But, Colin, you were right. and sort of sounding the clarion call. I'm not burying them if they lose this game, but being three games behind on October 1st, that's a weird, weird feeling for the New England Patriots. You know, I supported Hugh Jackson at the end of last year. I said, folks, the Browns have to, this is symbolism,

show people that you just don't fire coaches. If you kept Hugh Jackson at 0 and 16 and you get a quarterback, quarterbacks need offensive guys. And you may have hired Matt Patricia. I don't think he's a better fit for Baker Mayfield than Hugh Jackson and Todd Haley. I look around the league right now. They made the catch rule has been flipped to help receivers, the helmet rule, the roughing the passer.

This feels like, I was watching that game last night, and you know what I thought, Peter? I thought NBA. Is that the three-point shot has been a revolution for the NBA, where linear ratings are going down, but not the NBA. And I think the NFL has smartly watched its rival NBA and said, you know what? what? We're going to allow celebrations. We're going to bring Eric Reid back in. We're going to be very heavy, wide receiver. I'm watching that game last night, and I think it's symbolic of the league. I think the league office last night watched that game and thought, this is what

we want our league to be going forward. Again, I can be hyperventilating here. But the NFL this year, Peter, has been NBA-ish. It's been very fun and very dynamic. And I think this has been in the works for the last couple of years. Just your thoughts on that. Maybe I'm going overboard, but boy, that's what I saw last night. One of the things I'm writing about for Monday is going to be whether the NFL has gone too far. And I agree with you. That was a very, very entertaining game last night. But I will also say, Terry McCauley, the new NBC rules analyst, the longtime NFL referee who's done three Super Bowls, who said to me, every rule you make in the NFL, and in all sports really, is a balancing act. You don't want the offense

to get too much of an advantage. You don't want the defense to get too much of an advantage. He said he feels like with the emphasis in the roughing the passer area this year, the NFL is becoming more and more like college football. And Colin, I will do the numbers at the end of this weekend. But the numbers so far going into this weekend are that, you know, that, you know, that scoring per game is up quite a bit. And so maybe that's great. But I still think that there needs to be an emphasis on the balancing act of the rules. And you can't allow what Clay Matthews and Kendricks did in week three to be, I'm sorry, in week two,

to be called roughing the passer because then every quarterback is going to feel like he's always playing with the red jersey. And he's not going to get hit unless he's possessing the ball. And I think that's dangerous for defense and a balanced game in the NFL. Good stuff. Peter King. I want you to check him out, NBCSports.com, three-time national sports writer of the year. I've been reading him for a couple of decades. Love having you on. Peter. Have a fun weekend. Thanks, Colin. All right. Speaking of Clay Matthews, I want to show you several pieces of tape in regards to Clay Matthews, and it's pretty striking stuff. We saw a moment last night that, you know, you start looking at it,

and maybe it's time that we have a change on something. I'm going to show you some tape on this. And coming up, I like Kirk Cousins, but boy, there was a moment last night, which defined him. That's coming up. Sunday, it's a great slate of NFL action highlighted by Matthew Stafford and the Lions, taking on Ezekiel Elliott in the Cowboys or Baker Mayfield and the Browns Battle the Raiders. It's all on Fox and the Fox Sports app.

Check local listings for the game in your area. We have great games. There are great games. Can you put that slate up again? So the Cowboy game's fascinating because yesterday, Cole Beasley came out and said, you know, we're wide open. The receivers here, we are open, by the way. So you got a little turmoil there.

But, you know, the Cowboys are funny because they're 31st in their passing offense. And it's funny because Jared Goff was the number one pick. and Carson Wentz is a number two pick. And by the way, Kirk Cousins is a fourth round pick. You watched golf and Kirk Cousins last night. Who looked like the number one pick? Folks, I know my job is to accumulate as many trustable sources as I can. So when I come on the air and have opinions, they're backed not by like message board guy,

but by people that work in the NFL. I got four GMs on my phone. I have six scouts. I have scouting directors, former players. There's a reason for it. Talent evaluators are overwhelmingly right. They really are. They're overwhelmingly right.

Dak Prescott got passed by all 32 teams three times. And people say, what about Brady? Think about this. Since the Super Bowl era, the Super Bowl in 1967 until now. So from the first Super Bowl, Packers, until now, there have been, and I counted this morning, roughly what you would call 30 great quarterbacks. I mean, I'm talking great. Two have been drafted later than the third round.

Kurt Warner and Tom Brady. Stop using the exception to be the rule. Jack Prescott was 135th pick, fourth round for a reason. I watched them in college, and I said coming out, he's a better version of Tebow. He's not a big-time thrower. Greg Kosell was on this week. He gave us an incredibly honest assessment of him. Here it was.

He's not a very comfortable player in the pocket. I would say that there's too much necessary movement that he does, and that results in creating his own pressure at times and losing his ability to make throws. And so I think that it's a combination of a number of things. I could show you specific plays from this week where he missed throws. Yeah, Jared Goff, number one pick last night, did not miss throws. Carson Wentz doesn't miss throws. They're better players.

So talent evaluators, Cole Beasley came out yesterday and he's like, you know, we're open. We have film. We are open. So it's nothing. I think Dak's a franchise quarterback, but I think he's closer to 15 that he'll ever be to 10. And that's okay. You don't want to be chaotic at quarterback.

Dak provides stability. You do not want to be Andy Dalton, as much as I criticize him, create stability. You don't want to be chaotic at quarterback, like the Buffalo bills in the first two weeks. You want to be stable as you look for the next guy. If I was Dallas, I'd keep drafting guys.

Justin Herbert, Oregon, I'd keep drafting guys. And you won't be chaos. with him because DES is stable and mobile and available and he can make some throws. But, I mean, it's like presidents. Ronald Reagan went to Eureka College. That's the exception. Since Reagan, every president's gone to an Ivy League school. Don't take the exception and say, you know, you go to Eureka, you become president.

No, you go to Princeton, Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth, that's, you know, Cornell. That's generally how you become. By the way, all our commissioners right now in all the sports went to Cornell. There's a reason. They're the Ivy League. That's the rule, not the exception. Joy Taylor with the news. No, no, no, no.

Turn on the news. This is the herd line news. All right, kudos to Todd Haley for keeping it real. If you remember, the Browns used a play that looked a lot like the Philly Special. Yeah. Okay. And then Hugh Jackson came out and said, it's not the Philly Special. We didn't steal it from them.

This is the two-point conversion. The Baker catching a pass from Jarvis Landry. Sure. to tie the game. Well, Todd Haley has come out and said where they play a game from. Absolutely. I have no shame. If plays look good. Hey, Kenny Zampeze has a library of plays. I've never even believed could exist. You know, I don't know how he watches enough tape of other people to have it stored up.

But a great resource. Yeah. Look, even if you didn't know that it was the film, special after all. Who cares? Nothing is new. I remember there's an old college football coach called Bobby Bowden. And I was interviewing. Remember Bobby at Florida State? And I asked him

one time. And he said, he goes, I come home after my Florida State game and he goes, I'll turn on and watch Oregon and Chip Kelly. He goes, because Oregon does a bunch of crazy stuff. And I know other coaches aren't up watching Oregon at two in the morning. He goes, I've stolen more plays from Oregon football. That was when Chip Kelly

was there. He's like, that's what it's all about. And he goes, I watch him with a clipboard. I sit down and write the plays and how they do it and then we practice it and two weeks later we use it. Are you even trying if you're not doing that? Yeah, who's not? We're all borrowing from each other. Letterman borrowed from Steve Allen.

We're all borrowing. I don't get it. But kudos to them because they not only borrowed it, they got it done. They did it the right way. They converted. So it's time now for a fantasy headline sponsored by Draft Kings. Josh Rosen will make his first career start on Sunday against the Seahawks. This game is part of your blazing five.

They're off to an 0-and-3 start. So the Cardinals need a win, badly, but one thing that Rosen has, and he's bringing with him, is his confidence. I am me, and I'm not trying to model my game, or, I mean, I admire quarterbacks,

but I don't try to emulate or act like they do. I do me. I mean, it's got me to this point, so why change? I like him. Cawky, but I like him. He's, uh, I'm so glad that he's starting because he's, he's going to be a good sound bite because he does not,

he is, I'm not, I'm not saying he doesn't care and that he doesn't care about what he's doing, but he really speaks with confidence in that he is, he is a self-assured person. He knows who he is. If he can get protection over the next three years, Arizona's just got to really beef up on their offensive line. Yeah. They're okay in a lot of spots. They're bad up front. If they can solve that, you got a guy for 10 years that's going to throw darts because he's a really good player. And he has a chip on his shoulder because he felt like he should go higher. He went in a perfectly appropriate and respectable place in the draft. He doesn't believe that. So whatever you need to be. To be a little bit. He's

motivated, but Josh Rosen is very much an individual. He was asked if he models his game after any other quarterbacks, and that was his response. I am me. Finally, Clay Thompson obviously wants to ride the Warriors Championship train for as long as possible, and he approaches free agency next summer, but he's continuing to make it known that he would prefer to stay in the bay. It's crazy because we are back-to-back chance, but at the same time, I feel like we're all relatively young, and we can still get to another level and keep winning, not just this year, but years beyond, which not a lot of guys are confident that can do that with their team. So it's such a, I love coming to work every day because I realize this is a special group

and a special time to be a warrior. It's hard to walk away from something that you were here when it started. And, yeah, you just want to stay in the train as long as you can. He's such a smart kid. You know what, man, he's such a smart kid. He could star elsewhere. This is my knock on Jimmy Butler. Jimmy wants to be the best player.

Clay wants to be a great player surrounded by the other great players. And that's Jimmy Butler just let me go. I want to be my guy. And Clay's like, no, this is really historically special. I mean, how great. Like when you can let go with your ego and suppress your ego and say, I want to be surrounded by people who challenge me and it may be better than me. And let go with the ego and not have to be the man.

Want to be just one of the men? Life's great. Well, I look, I. I'm not so sure that this won't be the last year that we see the warriors together the way that they are. I think next year's free agency is going to be incredible. However, it's not just playing with other great players. There's a lot. These are still human beings.

There's a lot that goes into your happiness and your well-being. Maybe he likes living there. Maybe his family is happy there. He makes great money. He's in an organization that probably supports him. As a man, works bad, life's bad. Well, yeah, I mean, that's for anybody if works bad, life's bad. But I'm saying there's a lot of working parts in the entire organization and the culture and going to work every day.

Just because you go to work every day and win doesn't necessarily mean that you're happy. So there's a – everyone's like, oh, I mean, he may end up with the Lakers next year, right? Like, there's a lot of things that could happen. They say that. There's a lot of things that could happen. I'm just saying that when – in this particular situation, and people are confused as to why people are taking less money or saying, and it's at a place like where he's not necessarily the man. And Clay Thompson is a great player.

There's a lot that goes into what you do every day. It's nice when you're smart to work with smart people. Golden State's got a bunch of smart people. I mean, there's a lot of teams in the NBA. I would just not bang my head against the wall. It's nice when your back court mate is Steph Curry, your coach is Steve Kerr. Like it's nice. It's not, he comes to work every day.

It's like grown-ups. You know, I mean, Draymond's crazy, but he's kind of like street smart. So he's like, he's got a Rodman appeal to him where you think he's a crazy guy, but he's a lot smarter than that. I don't know. I find it's hard to leave a place when you drive to work happy. Clay Thompson sounds happy to me. Joy Taylor with the news. Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping by.

The Hurd-Lie News. By the way, Clay Matthews complaining, I can't tackle. I can't do this. I can't play the way I want to play. I want to show you the play last night that sealed the win. It was a rookie for the L.A. Ram sealing the W for Los Angeles. Here's the play. Cousins has his arm hit. Ball is out. I think it is a fumble, Joe, and now it's a matter of who's on it.

Rams have it. Yeah. Super Bowl. Eagles beat the Patriots. Here's the play that sealed it. Second and two. A.M. was one of the guys who got in there, and it's the wingling's only turnover of the game. Interesting.

And it's the first sack of the game. No question. that ball is out. Yeah, went for the ball. By the way, Super Bowl 50, Cam Newton was going to win. Denver did. What was the play by the Denver Broncos Vaughn Miller

that reshaped Super Bowl 50? Here it is. Panthers have a third in 10. It comes pressure, and they've gotten to him. The ball is out in the end zone, and it's recovered by Malik Jackson for the touchdown. It was Vaughn Miller with the strip sack, and Jackson with the recovery.

Strip sack, strip sack, strip sack. Kalee Mack, Vaughn Miller, no penalties. Clay Matthews, adapt, evolve. The new kill shot is stripping the ball. Von Miller and Kalee Mack are having no problems with this new rule. Surgeons, landscapers, you know, pilots, media people, mayors, adapt, evolve, new laws, new rules, new rules, new, regulations.

Strip Sack is the new kill shot in the NFL. Learn it, live it, love it. Greatest Ram ever, Eric Dickerson, next, live in the Hurt. Be sure to catch live editions of the herd weekdays in noon Eastern, 9 a.m. Pacific. Don't be the guy in the room with a sloppy looking untucked shirt. Untucket.com. Untucket.com. Fall winter stuff is in.

Go to Untucket.com. Code Hurd for 20% off. He played 11 seasons in the NFL. He's a Hall of Famer. He's the greatest ram of all time inducted back in 1999. eighth all time in rushing yards. Eric Dickerson, who's feeling pretty good about himself today. You could not, and two years ago.

I was feeling good about myself last week. Two years ago, you'd come on the show, and you would just complain. You'd say, Jeff Fisher's got a three-play playbook, and now that playbook for the Rams is like an encyclopedia. How much fun was that? Well, you swear, I play for the Rams. I'm so happy. I'm still playing. Man, I'm going to tell you something.

you saw what it was two years ago. It was hard to watch. It was a high school offense. It was a high school offense. And, you know, people criticize me for criticizing to Jeff Fisher. But, I mean, when I'm watching Todd Gurley get smashed, and I know the kind of player he is,

the things he can do if you give him the opportunity, and then seeing it the next year when they got Sean Nick Bay, and then seeing it this year just how much better it's getting, I mean, it's just the greatest thing ever. Do you remember Jerry Faust, the coach at Notre Dame? Yes. Okay. There's been two times in my life where I honestly watched a college or a pro team,

and I thought they were literally incompetent. Notre Dame Jerry Faust, the offense he ran, because he was a high school coach. Coach, right. And the Rams, the first year, I thought they don't know what they're doing. And I don't know Jeff. He can coach, but offensively, it's Jurassic. Like, it's just old. When you watched that thing last night, your impressions of Jared Goff,

because there's this narrative that it's all McVeigh, you know, and golf's a nice system guy. I got to tell you, Eric, did you remind you anybody? You see the number he wears? 16. I started calling Jared Montana last night. Those passes were like Joe Montana passes. Seriously, I mean, they were right on the money. The one he threw over, I think it was to Robert Woods, over Anthony Barr's shoulder.

Man, to me, that was the best pet. I know the one he threw the Cooper Cup in the corner of the end zone. Another great pass. And you know it's good when guys are calling you from around the league guys you played against. Man, did you see those passes? Last night you had that. Today, it was guys, my buddy Roy Green called me from Arizona. I didn't watch the game last night.

Man, look at these passes he's throwing. But I'm going to tell you something. Jared played a great game. He played a great game. But I'm going to say this much here. You have to give credit to Sean McVeigh. McVeigh is really the superstar of this football team because he is so good at X's and O's and also being a player's coach.

And it's hard to get both. The guys relate to him because he's young. They're young. Fun, energy. Fun, energy. When they scored that touchdown, I think the one he threw to Cooper Cup, you could tell, we worked on that. That was something we talked about. Yeah, it happened.

You could just tell it was just, it's just fun football. People will, you know, they'll say, oh, Eric, Jared Montana. You never played with Montana, but didn't you have a moment with him? Oh, did I? At the Pro Bowl, I'll never forget it. Me and Roger Craig were there. Roger Craig, the great-ninner back. I'm not running back for the 4-19.

You both made the Pro Bowl. Both made the Pro Bowl. And he threw me a pass. He threw me a couple of passes, you know, in practice. Montana. Montana did. And I'm like, man, Roger, you don't know how lucky you are. I said, man, if I had this quarterback, because the passes was just their right way

it had to be. You know, and it was so soft, not like that, you know, whoa, look out, that bullet. You don't catch it. It doesn't go through you. I mean, Montana had a nice pass. He threw a nice ball. A couple years ago, I was talking to somebody, and he said, like, quarterbacks, Troy Akeman's talked to him.

about this. Some guys have heavy spin. Baker Mayfield's ball has heavy spin. Don't get me wrong. Baker can throw it. But there are John Elway threw a ball that at times was just too hard. Like a bullet. Colin Kaepernick had no off speed pitch. Everything was 98 in the heater. Even screen passes. Kaepernick was throwing a bolt. And Colin's got a good arm. But when you watch golf, there is very much a Montana feel. It is a feathery. By the way, this is why the Rams don't drop the ball. There's no drops with the Rams. The ball is incredibly easy to catch. You know, he puts the ball where it has to be. And you look at those passes

that he threw last night, they were right there. If the ball is eight inches behind the guy, it's knocked down, or it could be intercepted. If it's eight inches past the receiver, it's an incomplete pass. So when I see, people don't realize how, those are split

the session, split second decision to throw that football, and have that precision, any quarterback, you know, even cousins last night, some of the passes he threw, what precision passes, that is hard to do especially with a rush coming on you. Yeah. Eric Dickerson, Hall of Famer, eighth all time in the NFL rushing yards. You know, the new NFL is obviously very much offense.

In fact, they flipped in the offseason, they flipped the catch rule. So we haven't, you and I have not once this year talked about what's a catch. We don't know what a catch. Well, they're all catches now. They're going to give you the catch, which is the way I think it should be because you reward the fans and fantasy players. More points is more fun. Now there's some NFL defensive guys, squawk, squawk, squawk, can't hit the quarterback. But my argument is, Von Miller and Khalil Mack, zero roughing the passer penalties because they're ball strippers.

Their kill shot is get the ball out. Clay Matthews, he wants to knock you out. And the league is just saying, Eric, we're not letting you knock out quarterbacks anymore. But you know what, Kyle, it's not about knocking the quarter. And look, I'm an offensive player. and I really believe the play they called against Clay Matthews, that was a bad call. I mean, what is he supposed to do?

I mean, what are you supposed to touch him and say, boom? Okay, I touched you. I mean, he tackled him, put his hands up. I mean, to me, you can't do anything else. I mean, to me, it's unfair. And I'm an offensive player. It becomes a time where this is football. This isn't Patty Cates.

You're all four, just driving that body into that. I'm not saying drive your body down into him. They try to hurt them. Not the old days where they could body slam you. Oh, yeah, they could. But you know what? They don't take it out in a bit. They don't protect the running backs and receivers like that.

They protect a defenseless guy, but not a guy that has the ball. I think what the NFL wants to do is they're over-calling it early. Because what they're saying is, listen, we think some of you defensive guys, you're frustrated, you don't get paid as much. This is what I believe they're doing. And they're saying, listen, we're going to over-call it. Because we think some of you are going for kill shots. And those kill shots are taking Jimmy Garoppolo.

for 12 weeks out of the sport. And so when you played in the NFL, what percentage of guys did you actually think kind of wanted to hurt you? Oh, a lot of them. I won't forget we played the Washington Redskins in the playoffs. Yeah. My cousin, Dexter Man, they played for the Redskins,

and he told me, we had dinner the night before. He said, because I want to let you know, we got a bounty out on you. A bounty? Yeah, a bounty. He said, we got a bounty on you. I didn't ask how much. I said, he said, so I just want you to be careful.

And I won't forget the very first play of the game. he came free on the end. Free on me. As soon as I got the ball, he hit me, but he just kind of laid me down. He said, I could have got you, because I could have got you. But, you know. I like that story. So there are bounties.

Of course there are bounties. I don't know about today. I'm sure even today, it hadn't changed. So $500 for the biggest hit? A thousand bucks if you knock a guy out. This is how a lot of bounties would go. You'd have big hits, but mostly if you would take the star quarterback or the star running back out, guys put a pot in.

you might get back in those days maybe $5,000. It could be $10,000. That was the pot for a guy getting knocked out of a game. So that's why the league's doing this because they know those defensive guys have bounties. You're admitting it. I don't know what they're doing that. I just said it in my day. I don't know what they're doing now.

Well, if it's $5,000 in your day, it's $50,000. $100,000 now. So I know I do think the league is aware because a few years ago, Joy, was it the Saints that had the bounty game? Yes, the Saints. Yeah, it was, I mean, so we have tape, we have audio, We have guys like you talking about bounties. Do you think I want a bounty on me?

No, I don't. But what the league is doing is saying, we know there are bounties. And the NFL, the defensive guys aren't getting paid. They're not getting endorsements. They're bitter. I don't think it's about bounties now. It's about Aaron Rogers being out for the entire season. There you go.

The top-nossed quarterback. Even if some of those injuries had nothing to do with getting hits. Sam. It's not fun when all the starting quarterbacks are out. Do we have that Super Bowl 50 thing? This all I'm saying is Vaughn Miller could have laid out Cam Newton.

Here's the sound of Vaughn Miller, that Cam Newton shot. Do you have that? Play it, play it. Panthers have a third and ten. That's how you do it. Oh, you know what's the most important thing? Smart dude. The most important thing is, is that ball.

I mean, look, if you take the ball and you throw that ball in the air, I don't care who, grandma has it. You throw it in the air, everybody's going to the ball. That's the most important. See, Von Miller doesn't get PennLy. Because Von Miller's figured it out.

Go for the ball. But it's the huge moment. Sometimes you can go for the ball. All right, if the guy's back is to you, what do you do? Go for the ball. Go for the ball. Colin, what's that? One last time you played an NFL game, Kyle?

A couple weeks ago. A hammy sore. Hour three, Eric Dickerson. It's the Hurd. Ah, welcome back. Hour three. Live in L.A., it's the herd. Wherever you may be and however you may be listening.

IHeart Radio, Fox Sports Radio, and FS-Wan, Joy Taylor is joining me, hour number three. I don't know why we do this. We don't color coordinate, but it is weird. Steeler Day, we both wore black. We did. And then Ram Day, we both wear blue. Is it because...

You know what it is, Colin? It's because we're winners. So subconsciously, we pick winning colors. A couple of winners over here. That's what it is. Our new set and everything, you look fantastic. By the way, I'm going to have my college football picks. It's the biggest weekend, to me, in a decade in college football, and not because of the games.

Something's going to happen this weekend in college football. is a real thing, and it needs to be addressed, and nobody is talking about it. Because you've got to dig a little deeper than five minutes of prep, but it's a real thing. It's happening in college football, and this is a huge weekend. Two teams have to win for the sport. And I'll get to that in a couple of minutes. So we'll have that. Plus, later and best for last.

Jay Mack has Jason McIntyre's Monday headlines today. That's so much fun. I love doing that. Well, the Los Angeles Rams. You watched it. I watched that. Huge ratings got a big win on Thursday night football. So let me get to it, baby.

Very rarely do I talk about a game. And it turns out exactly like I thought. And I said, the Rams corners are hurt. The Vikings going to pass the ball. It's going to be a great wild shootout. A lot of yards, a lot of points. But in the end, Jared Goffs better than Kirk Cousins. He's going to make a couple of throws.

You're going to go, wow. And that's what you saw last night. And the Rams are going to win a close, wild, crazy game with a lot of yards. And that's exactly what you got. And the other reason I could predict that is because this is what the Rams have been giving you every Sunday for the last two years. Yeah. 10 yards of play, 13 yards of pass. Multiple weapons.

Folks, this is the best offense. I have seen in the NFL top to bottom, coaching to punter to kicker for a decade. This is it. Left tackle, great, right tackle, great, quarterback, running back, tight ends, coach, coordinators. Great, great, great, great. They had six third downs all night. They don't even get to third down.

Minnesota had a bunch of yards. They had 16. Late in the game, they had only three third downs all night. By the way, Jared Goff had the highest quarterback rating ever. Perfect quarterback rating. Let me look this up. This is noteworthy. Yes, he had 158 quarterback rating and the most pass attempts for anybody ever with a perfect

passer rating. And here's what's interesting. So many people in the NFL are calling him a system quarterback. And here's why. Because when he first came into the league, he inherited Jeff Fisher's high school coaching staff, a terrible offensive line, no weapons, and he was on hard knocks and the optics. He looked skinny. he looked lost.

He had to learn to take a snap under center, and the optics were terrible. And then they brought in Sean McVeigh, and they went heavy on receivers and left tackle, and suddenly you're like, oh, but everybody's giving McVeigh all the credit on this team. No, no, it's a 50-50 deal here, folks. McVeigh's not making those reads,

and McVeys not making those throws. And he did it again. We predicted it. He'd make a couple of throws, and you would go, oh my God, that's why he's the number one pick. And he made a couple of perfect throws last night that 90% of the guys who have ever played this position can't make. It just proves nobody can do it alone.

Michael Jordan, before Scotty Pippen, was 0 and 6 against the Celtics. Kobe Bryant after Shaq left and before Gasol, a seven seed and missed the playoffs. This is the way it works. When you get a super clever creative high IQ IQ football coach, and you put him with a tall, good arm, smart, driven, aspirational, coachable quarterback, this is what happens. This is as good an offense as the NFL has had, and I can't remember the last time.

But the media and the fans, because of the optics of hard knocks and that Jeff Fisher High School coaching staff, they think this is all McVeigh. No, no, by the way, Andy Reid, he wouldn't putting up these numbers with Alex Smith. It's Mahomes. And by the way, Matt Nagy is super smart, but he's limited because it's Mitch Trubisky. You do not do what happened last night with most quarterbacks. You don't. You know, Brady, Belichick, Greg Popovich, Tim Duncan.

We all knew Belichick was smart pre-Bradie. We all knew Popovich won pre-Dunken. But when they became legends, they had the guy. So for all the fans and all the media that are sitting around before last night going, you know, it's mostly McVeigh. No, no, no, you put Trubisky in that Rams' offense. You put Kirk Cousins in that Rams' offense. You put Andy Dalton in that Rams' offense.

You're not getting that. You saw those throws last night. This is not a 75-25 McVe-Ve-Leen. It's not. It's a 50-50 split. Joe Buck and Troy Kman told a great story last night when they first saw Jared Gough and Troy compared it to his early career. You and I watched him at practice and we came out. out in 2016 out of the practice.

Like, this guy can't throw the ball at all. And now he gets under the guidance of Sean McVeigh. I mean, he's lethal. Yeah, well, that day he couldn't even throw a spiral. It was a tough day watching him. And then he struggled, and you thought, well, you know, I don't know. Surely these evaluators know more than what we

know watching him in one day, but I can tell you, Joe, from experience, you bring in a guy, an offensive guy. I had Norv Turner. He came to the Dallas Cowboys in 1991. And it changed my life. It changed my career. Give them credit for taking a chance on a young up-and-coming offensive coordinator and letting him be the head coach. And it has paid huge dividends for what they invested in that first round pick.

And by the way, I've talked to Jimmy Johnson about this. He goes, you know, everybody was killing Aikman out of college because his first year in the NFL, he was terrible. And Jimmy Johnson said, no, no, no, we saw the talent. Just like Jared Guff, we saw the talent, but we had to get him the right guy. Michael Jordan needed Pippin, Belichick needed Brady, Pop needed Duncan. And so Aikman's story last night is right on. Jimmy Johnson told me, he goes, we knew Akeman was special, but he needed a left tackle, he needed a running back, he needed a deep threat, and he needed a mentor.

Because Jimmy's a defensive guy, they got him one, and you have a Hall of Famer. Let me segue to this, though. So not just the Rams, but the Vikings' wide receiving corps. last night there were five guys who play wide receiver five different players who had over a hundred yards brandon cooks cooper cup robert woods adam theilin's defon diggs i'm not sure i've watched a game in the nflb with more wide receiver talent than last night and i can't be the only person that's thinking what i'm going to say the rams number three receiver is significantly better than brady's number one receiver. Were Tom Brady and Gronk last night watching that game? You know they were,

and you know they were texting each other. And they were saying, can you believe this? Can you believe what's going on? I mean, last night, Rams in Minnesota, that was an auto show. That was an auto show. There were Maseratis and there were Aston Martins and there were Bentley's and there were Lamborghinis. And those were good defenses and they tore them up. Tom Brady's over here saying, I got a Honda Civic, I got a Dodge Neon, can I get some help over here? You know Brady was watching that thing last night.

And he is bitter. I mean, the leading receivers for New England against Detroit, Chris Hogan had three catches for 31 yards, Cordorale Patterson had a catch for. for 17 and Philip Dorset was targeted five times and he had no catches. And Bill Belichick's blind spot drafting in college has been wide receiver. He's not good at it. I've been saying for years that wide receivers are icing on the cake. The cake is the offensive line, the coach, and the quarterback.

But with two rule changes this offseason, we talked about this, Joy, there's been two rule changes. Both were very pro-wide receiver. The catch rule? We haven't had one discussion so far this. year what's a catch. Instead of the discussions we used to have, which were what's a catch, the discussion now is, wow, what a catch. That is a massive rule change and the late hit penalty. So you can't touch a receiver off the line. You now can't hit them. They now got the

catch rule flipped toward their advantage. And I always said that wide receivers were icing on the cake. They make the cake better, but it's the cake. You know what they are now? Wide receivers, due to those two rule changes, are icing on a cupcake. They matter more. They matter a lot. Cuccakes are fine, but the icing goes a long way to make the cupcake. Why are wide receivers getting massive money now by smart NFL teams? This is why. You can't touch the quarterback. You can't touch the receiver. You can't hit them. And they flipped The catch rule in favor of the receiver instead of in favor of the defense. And since Belichick's arrived in 2000 in New England, they've never drafted a receiver in the first round.

They've only taken four in the second round, and three of the four were absolute whiffs. So he's not good at the college-wide receiver thing. He'll go get a Chris Hogan. He'll go get a Wes Welker. He doesn't draft receivers well. They don't. And look, Brady and Gronk had to be watching that auto show last night. This is why when Brady lost to Detroit, he had that soundbite.

He wasn't angry. He was defeated. He sees what he's dealing with here. Coming up, Jason McIntyre has something fun. It's called Monday's Headlines Today and why this is the biggest weekend for college football to me almost in a decade. And I'm dead serious and not for the reasons you think. I'll take you behind the rope a little bit. Tomorrow is the college football double header on Fox starting in the Big Ten with Jim Harbaugh's number 14.

Michigan Wolverines taking on Northwestern. The number 11, Washington hosts 20th ranked BYU.YU. It all kicks up tomorrow at 4 Eastern on Fox and the Fox Sports app. Take Michigan and BYU. This is a huge weekend for college football and not the reason you think. College football has gotten too regional. I'm occasionally asked by fans, you used to talk so much more

college football and I say, yes, I did when it was less regional. Once a sport gets local a regional as a national host, I can't talk it as much. The last 10 national championship games, let's put it up for our TV audience. I'll read it for our radio audience. Bama, Gorman, Glemson, Bama, Bama, Florida State Auburn, Alabama, Alabama, LSU, Auburn, Oregon, Bama, Texas, Florida, Oklahoma, see a pattern. The highest rated game is the one I didn't read.

2014 Ohio State beats Oregon. No Southern team. That's the highest rated. Folks, the South will always watch any college football. It doesn't matter who you put in big games. They live, breathe, eat, and sleep it. Buckyes, Oregon, SC, Texas, the South loves college football. The West has more pro teams. They will not watch college football unless they have representation either from a Pac-12 or a big 10-team, Michigan, Ohio State that they have played in the Rose Bowl for years and have huge fan bases out here. This weekend you have two games. Notre Dame's in one, Ohio State's in one.

They need to win. It's important. The sport is getting lopsided. I remember telling Doug Gottlieb 15 years ago, 10 years ago, dude, college basketball is dying. It's dying. I watch this stuff. I said the one in Dunn's killing it. People don't know who the players are.

It's an apartment complex. Nobody that's any talent really wants to live there. It's an airport. They land. They want to go to the NBA. College football is getting really regional. Ratings are down again this year. NBA ratings aren't down.

It's global. NFL ratings are down. They're up this year. College football needs Notre Dame. They need Michigan. They need Ohio State. Otherwise, Denver West doesn't watch the sport. They just don't watch it.

I hate to break it to you, but there's big states out here, like California and stuff. Arizona, Denver, San Francisco, Seattle, big cities. College football, let's go to our picks of the week right now. Warning, Colin is about to reveal the outcomes of the biggest college football games this week.

If you don't want to know exactly what's going to happen, turn away now. All right, here are the two big football games. Let's start. Let's go Ohio State, Penn State. You want to do that one first? I don't think this game is close. I think you get one of the great offenses in the country in Ohio State,

and I think this is the best quarterback that Urban Meyer has ever had. Dwayne Haskins, he's going to play on Sundays. J.T. Barrett was a nice college quarterback. Chris Leak at Florida was a nice college quarterback. Dwayne Haskins, he's going to stay for one more year in college and has a chance to be a top five pick. He's ranked top 10 passing yards, most accurate completion percentage. He's a stud.

That's an NFL quarterback. He's not ready yet. He's a young kid, but he's a star. And this offense is ranked number three in the country, and Penn State's defense is 45th ranked in terms of yards allowed. Ohio State's going to have, I know they're on the road, but they're going to have multiple explosion plays. This Ohio State team is one of five that I believe looked like they can win a national championship.

Ohio State has 58 10-plus yard plays. And I do love McSority, the quarterback for Penn State. They're a lot of fun to watch. They will not be able to go blow for blow against the Buckeyes. And I think the Buckeyes, I know it's a roadie, but they'll win 4326. Spoiler award. Yeah, spoiler award. Sorry, I just gave way the end of the game, 4326 Ohio State.

Now, the next big game is Notre Dame Stanford. And by the way, I think Notre Dame needs to win this game, and Ohio State needs to win that game because it's good for college football. Stanford's defense is very vulnerable through the, the air. You're not going to run a ton on them, but they've allowed 200 plus yards of passing in their last three games. You can throw on Stanford, and Notre Dame can throw. Notre Dame's been sneaky good at home, three and one against ranked teams when playing at home the last two years, nine at one at home against all opponents in the last two years. Notre Dame's a good home

team. They really play well at home. And Notre Dame is doing a really good job, and you'll notice this. They looked the part in their front seven defensively. They are big. Those were NFL bodies. Remember, the top two offensive linemen in the NFL last year out of college were Notre Dame guys. Quentin Nelson went number three to Indianapolis or number four, and then the tackle went to the San Francisco 49. The best two offensive linemen in football came from Notre Dame. They've got Morgan offensive lineman.

They're very good defensively in the box. They're allowing only 3.45 yards per carry, and that's Stanford's bread and butter. The rushing offense for Notre Dame is heating up. I think Notre Dame is a complete team. They've made a change of quarterback. spoiler alert. I think Stanford's got their hands full after that Oregon circus. It was a great wild game.

I'm going to take Notre Dame 31 to 20 over Stanford. So Ohio State wins comfortably and Notre Dame wins comfortably. And I think, frankly, that is great for college football. Again, I love college football. But I'm in a business. This is what I do for a living. This is a business. I don't talk about what I just feel like talking about.

You drive the bus. college football is getting very regional. The highest rated national title game in the last 10 was the one game without a southern team, Ohio State, Oregon. The southern part of the country will always watch the college football's big bowl games. The ratings are fantastic. But the rest of the country won't watch

if year after year after year, it's the same southern teams. And I think Ohio State and Notre Dame looked apart and both win this weekend. Joy Taylor with the news. No, no, no, no. Turn on the news. This. is the herd line news.

So we all know that LeBron is here in Los Angeles with the Lakers. That's where he will be playing this season. Apparently Tristan Thompson did not get the memo on that because there's really no other excuse for why he would have said this yesterday. We're still four-time Easter Carpher champions. Until you take us down from that, teams ain't got much of say. Boston, Philly, they ain't got much of say. Boston had home court game seven lost.

Philly? You guys almost got sweat. Toronto, we really know that story. So until someone takes us down, there's not much they can really say. They're not making the playoffs. Cleveland will not make the playoffs. Right now in the east, Boston's going to win the east. Toronto second, slightly over Philly third, Milwaukee 4, Washington 5.

I think Miami is in that 6-7 spot. Indy. Indy's interesting. I like Indy. They could finish 6.5th. Indy is interesting. The Vegas odds have. in order Celtics, Sixers, Raptors, the Heat, Pacers, Bacers, Bucs, Wizards, and Nix.

And who's the last one? The Knicks. So the Nicks are favored higher than... The Tass are tied for the second worst to odds in the east. No, I mean, here's what's amazing. LeBron took this team to the finals. Yeah, we all know that. I think Tristan doesn't know that.

Tristan is the one who doesn't know that. But this is going to be amazing. This will be the third time LeBron leaves a team, and they literally can't win anything. They can't win any games. He's took this roster. The minute LeBron leaves, Vegas has him finishing second to last in the east. That's incredible.

Michael Jordan left the Bulls. They went from 57 wins to 55. That is incredible. And then in complete, on the opposite side of it, it's incredible that nobody is at all concerned about the Lakers this year because LeBron has come there. It's like, do you know what? What's going to happen to the calves this year?

Tristan aside, obviously. No, no, I mean. But, like, you don't think that that's going to translate to the Lakers, first of all. Who are already solid without. They went 35 games, and that's with Lanzo Ball and Ingram being hurt. Right. Big chunks.

So you figure if Lanzo and Ingram are healthier, and all those young guys get better, they'd go from 35 to about 40. Right. And then LeBron's added 11 wins to every team he's been on. So let's just give him 10 because the West is harder, 50. LeBron's going to end up in that 48, 49, 50. I don't think they can win a championship, but these people that are doubting them and think they're going to be a borderline playoff team.

The West is not that good. I mean, it really is. Golden State's great. Houston's damn good. Then it's a bunch of Utah's. Who are you going to trust? Donovan Mitchell or LeBron, game tied, seven-game series. Donovan Mitchell is a great player and is only going to continue to get better.

But I'm going to take, I'm going to take LeBron there. So, Ben Rothensberger admitted a few days ago that he did his part to sell a roughing the passer penalty and the Steelers Monday night went over the bucks. While the Ravens are facing the Steelers this week, and Ravens defensive coordinator, Don Martindale, says he hopes that doesn't become a pattern. Let's don't turn this into the NBA flop fest. Because now the quarterbacks are making a mockery of it

to the officials in the league. Now you're insulting the officials and the league if you do that. You know. I think I'd be a flopper though as a quarterback. Oh, of course. I'd be a flopper. I love popping. Oh, my God.

That's unbelievable. Yeah, I mean, of course you should flop. I mean, it could change the outcome of a game. Duane Wade, you love Dwayne Wade. Duane could flop. I mean, the NBA had to make a rule against flopping because it got so ridiculous. I'm not anti-flop. I'm pro-flopping replays are my favorites.

I mean, look at the, look, it's so dramatic. Look at the, look at LeBron. I've never been, Kobe Bryant. To me, flopping is genius. Look at that, look at that. Look, oh my. My God, it's so, I can't even describe it. That's why I can't you play by by.

I'm like, look, look. It's so amazing. But Ben, Ben really did sell this. Are you wearing a helmet? I am not. There's a whole purpose of you wearing a helmet so that if you get smacked in the head, that your head doesn't get hurt. Joy, there's things in life that are just smart.

And we're all manipulating, we manipulate our children to do certain. Like as a dad, I have to sometimes manipulate my kids as they get older, it's harder. We're all manipulating our boss. We're manipulating our mate. We're manipulating our kids. where life is there to be manipulated. I, for one, have never been a manipulator, but... I tell my wife, I'm very manipulative.

No, look, this is a thing, though. He's not wrong. Like, usually, he sounds kind of like to get off my lawn guy, but this was an inevitable outcome to them over-calling the roughing-the-passer call. These videos are great. They're so great. The flops are amazing. All right, so finally, the Baker-Mayfield Hype train has quickly become contagious,

And if anyone knows anything about contagiousness, it's Jarvis Landry. And Jarvis has said he's known for a while that Baker has what it takes to play in the NFL. Since the day they drafted him, you know, obviously understanding the potential and the things that he can do and what makes him special. And having the guys around him, you know, with the trust level at a premium, you know, to make the plays as well. One thing I know about him, you know, he walking like he's talking. And that's something that I appreciate and that respect about him. And he's continued to do. It's that walk-it-talking, you know.

And he definitely has that attitude and charisma. And, you know, that is contagious. Contagious. Contagious. Walk-it, like he talks it. I like it, though. I like the Jarvis is backing up Baker because, obviously, the team didn't decide to go with him at the beginning of the season.

Like I said that they should have. He really needed those extra three weeks to get ready to play in the NFL. You know who? There's no pressure. on this weekend? The Jets, Sam Darnold. Sam, Josh Rosen, Josh Allen, nobody's talking about these other rookie quarterbacks.

What do you bet they all go three and O? Who's Buffalo play? Rosamplea plays the Packers. Well, Green Bay is not very good right now. What if Josh Allen goes there? That could be, I mean, you're right about Josh Allen. Josh Allen and Josh Rosen, I think,

have the lowest expectations for this week. Because Josh Rosen got four minutes, so it's like it. Two rookies making first starts. Baker and who's the other one? Oh, Josh Rosen. Yeah. So, I mean, four minutes and 30 seconds. So no one has an expectation.

I certainly don't have any expectations of him this week. But I don't know. I disagree with you on Sam Darnold. It wouldn't be a good look for him. Where are the Jets? Who are the Jets playing this week? To have another bad game. Yeah.

Oh, no, no, no, he's going to be awful this week. He'll get crushed by Jacksonville. But all eyes are on Baker. That's for sure. Yeah. Joy with the news. Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping by.

The Hurd Lie News. So last night, Kirk Cousins, Minnesota lost. Kirk Cousins now is 4-20 against teams with a record better than 500, meaning when he faces another elite quarterback, Kirk Cousins is 4 and 20. And last night, there's a reason Kirk Cousins' fourth round, Jared Gough, first round. You can see it. Jared's bigger, he's got a little better arm, and made more great throws.

So it was funny last night when you're watching the game and the worst career records against teams above 500 are Ryan Fitzpatrick, Matt Stafford, Blaine Gabbard, Kirk Cousins, Blake Portals. Stafford's the only one where people go, wow, he's got a great arm. and there has been some dysfunction in Cleveland. But when that game happened, let me ask you an honest question. If you live in Minnesota, you like the Vikings, let me ask you this. So there was two minutes left. You trailed 3831, right?

You can tie the game or you can go for the win. You have the ball. You had time. The punt was awful, so your field goal position was good. And you had timeouts and you had great weapons. It was first and 10 at the 34, two minutes left. Let me ask you, did you really feel like you were going to tie it? You didn't.

So everybody that defends, Kurt Cousins, you had the ball, you had the weapons. You had some offensive momentum. You had the ball first and 10, 30, you had good field position. I mean, you've been moving the ball the whole game. Did you feel like he was going to lead you? Because if that is Breezer Brady, you know what you're thinking? You're on the sidelines

thinking, okay, it's going to be even. We're going to be tied here. Are we going to have 40 seconds left? You're thinking about overtime. The Rams, fans, it didn't feel like in Los Angeles, Kirk Cousins was going to tie it. And this is eventually the play that decided the game. Cousins has his arm hit.

Ball is out. I think it is a fumble, Joe, and now it's a matter of who's on it. Rams have it. We saw it last week. We've seen it a lot throughout Kirk Cousin's career. He's got room to kind of slide up, but he just does not feel that pressure coming around the other side. What can you say? And that's the play.

He just didn't feel it. So it's not anti-Curcouss. and I think he deserved the contract he got because Minnesota has the roster. They've got it all set for about three more years until those defensive players and those receivers either get hurt, leave. I mean, these windows close. So windows last longer in the NBA because players don't get hurt as much. So in the NBA, you know, I mean, Minnesota, if they kept Carl Anthony Towns and Andrew Wiggins, they got about nine years, 10 years here, where these guys are going to be great players.

And if they put the third good guy in, they can win a title. It doesn't work that way in the NFL. Well, even if you have the – you know, Minnesota has this group of defensive players, and they're going to get hurt, they're going to get traded, they're going to leave for free agency. They got three years here to make it work and win a title. So I got overpaying for Kurt Cousins, but you felt it last night. Like that was the moment. That was the game.

You had the field position. You had the weapons. You had the momentum, man. You knew it wasn't going to happen. You just kind of knew it wasn't going to happen. So he has four and 20 against teams that are better than 500. And again, I think he's a franchise quarterback. And I've always said in the NFL, you just don't want to be in chaos.

Andy Dalton, Kirk Cousins, assure stability. What you don't want to be is Buffalo for the first two weeks. You don't, like in the last couple years, we've had these teams that are at utter chaos at quarterback. True, the Browns. I mean, last year before Garapolo, like San Francisco, they were just a mess at quarterback. What you want to be, even Dallas right now, DAC offers stability. And what you keep doing is drafting again. guy every year. Even if you pay DAC at the end of the year, you keep drafting guys. Because remember,

even if you got Justin Herbert number one and you're only paying DAC 16 and you're only paying your rookie 10 to 12, that's okay. You can do that for a couple years before you trade DAC or move off him. But you can't be, and Kirk Cousins provides stability. But the ceiling, you can win. Case Keenham. Stability. They can win. But are you going to win a Super Bowl? Are you going to get that last night was a prime example. You had everything. Field position, weapons, momentum, protection. All night did work for you. Two minutes left, you just knew it wasn't going to work.

All right, coming up next, I love this segment. Monday's headlines today, find out what everybody's going to be talking about on Monday. Coming up next, it is best for last. One more herd? The herd streams 24 hours a day, seven days a week within the IHeart Radio app. Search Herd to listen live or on demand whenever you'd like. I'm very excited. I was, the game last night got a huge rating.

So did all the political stuff because of the Senate hearings. And it was just one of those nights. It was a great TV night in America. The politics got huge numbers on all the networks. At Fox, we got a huge number. I will say this. The Thursday night games feel bigger this year. Huge.

Like last night felt, it felt like a playoff game. It was a, I mean, L.A. looked big at night. You had all these stars. You had great quarterback play. Strahan, Howie, Bradshaw, stars. The Coliseum still has that kind of magical feel on a late night when it's 80 degrees in Los Angeles. Last night looked and felt like big NFL football.

It got a huge rating. Colin, the other story nobody's talking about. Last year, the quarterbacks were so injured throughout the league. You had bad Thursday night games, Sunday night, Monday night. So far, the only quarterback that's gone down is Jimmy G. Health is so paramount. I think it matters more than tweets from the Commander-in-Chief and all this other off-field nonsense.

If you can keep the quarterbacks healthy, the level of play is so rated. I mean, the football's outstanding now. I'm just loving it. No, and I also think is something has happened. Remember for a long time where quarterbacks came in, first round quarterbacks came into the league, and there was about a 50% bus rate. Anybody noticed the last three to four years,

the bust rate for first round quarterbacks has gone way down is I think all these seven-on-seven camps, we have a generation of kids now that come into this NFL game. They've been quarterbacking since they were eight years old in these seven-on-seven pro camps. And, I mean, by the way, all five of the quarterbacks now, Lamar Jackson's behind everybody a little bit, but they all look like they can play. They all look, none of them look like they're during the headlights.

Josh Allen's been shockingly good, and that was the guy I doubted. And by the way, the kid at Oregon next year, Herbert, yeah. Is as good as any of these guys. And by the way, he's going to go to a good team because the crappy teams in this league all have their quarterback. So he's going to end up going to a Giants or a Dallas Cowboys. Cowboys. Well, no, if Dallas goes six and ten, Jason, think about this. If Dallas, let's say they go six and ten, they will draft somewhere top 12.

Jets won't be great, got a quarterback. Cleveland won't be great, got a quarterback. Arizona went great, got a quarterback. Buffalo won't be great, got a quarterback. Tell me the teams in the league that are going to be top 10 in the draft. I can give them to you now. They've all got a quarterback. Dallas is the one that I think goes and gets Justin Herbert.

Well, let me add one thing. I'm sure you saw the news about your guy Carr in Oakland, okay? If Gruden wants to get out from under that contract, he can. sooner than people think, a story that could percolate. But offenses are now gearing things toward their quarterback, not, hey, come put this circle in R-Square. Okay, we're going to cater to you. RPO.

Yeah, exactly. And the defenses are going to take some time to catch up. We're going to see high-scoring games. It's so fun, right? All right, here we go. It's Jason McIntyre's Monday headlines. Today, it's our best for last. After almost three hours, Colin apparently hasn't gotten to the point yet.

Quit holding out on us, cowherd. It's the best for last. All right, Jay Mack, Monday headlines today. Let's go. Where do you want to start? You want to start with your Patriots and your guy, Belichick and Brady? So I'm all in on the dolphins this year. 3-0, 3-0 against the spread.

I believe the headline will be after Miami shocks New England. Winning outright, Time 1, Tom Zero. Kind of a nod to his documentary, his Facebook stuff. Listen, right now the Patriots don't look good. I don't care whether you want to go defense, running game, offensive line, skill position players. And the dolphins, you know, Tanna Hills won 10 of 11 games? If he's healthy with Adam Gaze. You know, it's funny, Joey and I talked about this because he spent a lot of time in Miami.

It's not that he's just won 10 of 11 with obviously Adam Gase is an offensive guy. He's completing 70% of his throws with Gase in the last 11 games, and he's got a 3-to-1 touchdown interception ratio. He is the quarterback in the league that we forgot. gotten about. Like we're talking about all these young guys. Tanna Hill's last 11 games with Adam Gase, he's been in the elite quarterback. Another thing. They lost their best receiver, Juice Landry, right? Everybody thought, oh, they'll take a step back.

They just put in guys that are Tyreek Hill-like, super fast, can get loose. You put them in space. The dolphins have a good game plan. I'm telling you. Joy, can you name their receivers other than Kenny Stills? Like, this is a team right now. A lot of unknown stars, and they're getting it done. Well, that was Adam Gase's strategy to get rid of the stars and the big name.

are the big personality. Monday's headlines today, number two, Lions Cowboys. Okay, irrationally, I love this game more than any. I haven't heard your Blazing Five yet, but I think the Cowboys are the best bet this week. I think they bounce back, and the headline will be, DAC Bounces back. Listen, you were already selling the Cowboys here a minute ago.

Remember the opener. They lose badly at Carolina. Oh, this team's awful. Bounce back at home against the Giants. Well, they lose last week in Seattle. By the way, they weren't awful in that game. That statistically, they was kind of close. I think they come home and get right.

Let's be honest, if Isaiah Crowell can run all over Detroit and Matt Breda can run all over Detroit, what's Ezekiel Elliott going to do? I love the Cowboys in this spot. Dac, Ezekiel Elliott, they bounce back and get to 500. Game three, Seahawks and Arizona, which could be really ugly television. Yeah, so I know you're friends with Josh Rosen and his family. Not a lot of tape on him. I think Arizona in a great spot here, they're terrible.

Everybody's selling them. I think they show up stunned Seattle and not to go after Pete Carroll two weeks in a row but the headline will be coachless in Seattle. Listen, I don't want to go too hard on the Seahawks here. I'm just saying this is a great spot for Arizona. Seattle next week, you know who they have next week? Who?

The Rams who just absolutely crushed them last year. Remember 42-7? That statement game by the Rams, I think Seattle overlooks Josh Rosen in Arizona and the Arizona pulls the upset. He's 67. He's got a year and a half left. They had a very odd draft.

Earl Thomas, according to a story yesterday, could be headed to Kansas City. He doesn't want to play there. So Richard Sherman gone. Michael Bennett, who can still rush the pass or gone. Earl Thomas is their best defensive player. Gone. It's Bobby Wagner, Russell Wilson, a rookie running back, Rashad Penny, and Doug Baldwin. It is not there.

Seattle's in a rebuild mode. Third road game. Do you think Pete Carroll, with a year and a half left on his contract, three years ago, and they were in the dynasty, you would have said, hey, Pete, in three years. years, you're going to be in a total rebuild. Seattle's in a total rebuild. You're on the Cardinals here in this spot, right? I like Arizona to win a really. Listen, anytime you get too bad offenses and you give me a field goal for the home team, I'll take it. It'll be like, you know, this will be

a classic 14, 13, 13, hard to watch. Here's one for you. The home dogs are 10 and 4 against the spread this year, Arizona, a home dog. All right, finally, Jason McIntyre, Monday's headlines today. I got to get on my phone here for a sec. Is that cool? We're talking about Baker Mayfield. Okay. Brown's Raiders. By the way, Joy, did you see? see the reaction online. People did not receive that well, but I'm just saying I know a thing or two about a family member having to come out after the game and maybe being on his phone. So that's all.

Quarterbacks are different. I mean, I love this storyline. By the way, I don't go on social media as much as I used to, so I ignore all this nonsense. I have a life, yeah. I think the Browns go into Oakland, shock the Raiders and Baker Mayfield proves cowherd wrong again will be the headline. Why did they pick such a bad photo of you? Yeah, I mean, seriously, I was off.

a nine-hour flight and they ran up to me. Is that a paparazzi shot right there? Yeah. In the airport while you're getting Sparrow Pizza? Yeah, that's terrible. Listen, by the way, this is a good spot for the Browns. Why? Hey, I'm telling you, that defense is very good.

Do you know, they're a rookie cornerback. The kid out of Ohio State, Denzel Ward, he's playing like lights out already. He's been great. The front seven's nasty. Carr has beat up on some bad defenses. They can't close a, I mean, they can't close a window in the fourth quarter, outscored 37 to three. I love Baker Mayfield to go in here and pick up a big, big win.

Uh-oh, he's pulling out a briefcase. Why does this feel like a W-W-E moment? Baker, Baker-Moneymaker, because my lock of the week is Oakland minus two and a half. That's your lock? Yeah. You're locking up an 0-and-3 team, John Gruden, oldest roster in the NFL. Here's, it's funny. I don't bet college football, but college football, I generally take favorites because you just, you have better players.

In the NFL, I don't bet teams. I bet numbers. And what I do in the NFL is I bet against the fans. So the fans are all in on Baker Mayfield. And my golden rule in the NFL is where are the fans going? Fans like quarterbacks and favorites. So I generally take points generally in the NFL and the team getting beat up. For instance, Minnesota got the you know what kicked out of them against Buffalo.

I kept saying yesterday, if you give me seven and a half points, Minnesota was the bet last night. Everybody is bearing Gruden. He's a dinosaur. He's Jurassic. Okay. They went to Miami where it's 92 in September. It's a swamp. They led for three quarters against the three and O team.

They had Denver, which doesn't lose at home in early September. They've won 32 of their last 35. And they led 19 to 7. Oakland's 0 and 3, but they're not awful. They're not awful. They're not the Arizona card. And all they have to win by is a field goal. The last 10, what is it, since?

2003, number one quarterback picks. First start, O and 10. Owen 10. Now, let me add this. So I started a podcast here at Fox Sports called Coming Up Winners, because I'm on fire in the NFL. Colin, I have faded the public the last two weeks and just absolutely cleaned up. You know who the public is on heavy this week?

Who? The Detroit Lions, a road dog. They're betting on Detroit. Why do you think I picked Dallas? I love Dallas. I like Arizona. Be careful. Be careful with the Raiders here.

Okay. This is... Should the Oakland Raiders be favored over anybody, Colin? I can't wait. I am so... You know, it's funny about them. You'll be texting me at halftime and that game... It's in the briefcase again. Once it goes in a brief...

People literally think when Baker came on this show. Remember when we went back and forth? It was great. It was great TV. Got a good rating. Everybody loved it. It got like five, seven million Facebook hits for us. And we make money on Facebook. People don't quite understand... I think the savvy part of my audience does.

Baker's great for my business. Oh, my goodness. People are like, oh, he burned you. We do very well talking Baker Mayfield. Like you get, the best thing that could happen to me is Baker wins and yells, cowards, an idiot. I never make stuff up on the air. I can be theatrical because, you know, I don't want to bore people to death. Baker is a very polarizing athlete.

You know what he is. And he's fun to talk about. And when we talk about him, we get a massive reaction. And I'm not making it up. I do feel that he's overvalued this week. and I don't think he's going to be Russell Wilson or Drew Brees. But he can play, but he's a great, he's a win for. Every time we talk about Baker, it's a win.

No matter what he says about us, it is a win for us. He's an NBA player. He has that swagger. You don't see quarterbacks like Andrew Luck respond to trolls online or tweet at reporters. This is what Baker Mayfield does. This is great for the league. He is going to be number one in Jersey sales by December. I totally agree.

Automatic. He's number 10 now and he hasn't played. When you can be tapped 10 and you literally haven't hit the field. If he wins this weekend, he will lead the NFL, in my opinion, in Jersey sales by next Friday's count if he wins this weekend. Well, we'll see you Monday in L.A. It's the herd. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. And nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. In every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the biggest moments in sports and giving you the real story behind the headline.

and we're going straight to the source the athletes themselves. Their locker room stories, their reactions in the moment, and the stuff nobody gets to hear. Listen to Sports Slice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more,

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on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, guys? This is Clivert Taylor the 4th. And on my podcast, The Cliverts Show, I'm bringing you conversations about all kinds of stuff. Like being an internet famous referee. We're in the middle of a game. This lineback... You know these kids.

This linebacker walks up to me. He goes, hey, ref, my mom wants you to wave at her. What? Time out. Quarterback on office blue of 42. Hey, rep, my mama wants you to wave at her. What? Hey, Ms. Parker.

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If we didn't talk ever again, I was finally. You just understood. That's how personal it got. Wow. Then after that game seven, Marquis come in, he's like, you know I love you, dog. You know, it's all love. This was just playoffs. This was just basketball.

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