The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Rams, NFC North, Patriots, and where Colin was right and wrong

Episode Date: December 17, 2018

Colin discusses why he was out on the Los Angeles Rams weeks ago, why the Chicago Bears rule the NFC North, the New England Patriots showing signs of their dynasty ending, and where he was right and wrong over the weekend. Guests include Michael Vick, Ben Volin, Trent Dilfer, and Shawne Merriman. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Or stream us live every day on the iHeart Radio app by searching Herd. Now let's get this party started. You're listening to Fox Sports Radio. Ah, this on a Monday is The Herd, wherever you may be and however you may be listening live in Los Angeles, IHeart Radio, Fox Sports Radio, FS1, one hour from now where Colin was right, where Colin was wrong, plenty of both. Joy Taylor is joining me as always on a.

Monday, which it was, we thought, you know what, we thought this was going to be clinch weekend. Everybody clenches the playoffs. It was chaos weekend. It certainly was. Next weekend, Joy, 14 of the 16 NFL games, somebody will clinch. So we thought this weekend was going to be clinch weekend. It was chaos weekend. It was entertaining, though. It was wildly entertaining.

Let me start with this. Rams looked awful for most of the game and lost. Two months ago, on this show, I peeled back off the Rams. I said, I don't buy this team. Too much glitz. Too much glamour. Too many stars.

No depth. They'll pay a price for this. Everybody was slobbering over Sean McVeigh, smarter than everybody else. What has this team done? They never when a playoff game. Folks, here's the truth about the Rams. They're building a $5 billion stadium, the most expensive stadium in America. And they just brought the team to town.

They are selling PSLs like crazy. They signed stars and overpaid for them so they can sell personal seat licenses and pay some of the bill. It's a lot of sales pitch. It's a lot of glamour. It's a lot of glitz. The Chargers cross town have none of it and have a much deeper roster and a much better roster. Indomacan Sue, no longer productive. Akeb Talib, like him a lot, passed his prime.

Dante Fowler was a bust in Jacksonville and they gave up draft picks for him. Brandon Cooks, receiver, disappears in big games. Third team, three years. Ask yourself, if I'm wrong, and this is not about sales, pitch, and glitz, what have they accomplished in the last two years with McVeigh? Head coach of the year, offensive player of the year, defensive player of the year, special teams coach of the year, all personal accomplishments. No playoff wins, four and five last two years in December.

Why? Because they have no depth. If you overpay for anything in any business, you overpay for employees, you overpay for parts, you overpay for services rendered, you overpay on your lease. If you overpay on stuff, you're going to have to save money elsewhere. They don't have any depth. The chargers don't have the stars across town, but they have depth, three great receivers, four running backs who can play. Rams have one, Todd Gurley. Hurts an ankle, limps a little, they're toast.

I got nothing against the Rams. I think the Rams are interesting. I think they're good. But a lot of this story so far is sales pitch and glamour and oh wow and personal accomplishments. December and January in the NFL, okay, attrition sets in. Who's good right now? The Bears. The Bears have one star player and a bunch of good, cheap young players in depth.

Baltimore. Who are Baltimore stars? They got a lot of depth. Chargers. I mean, their star? Philip Rivers? I mean, Boas is a good player, but he didn't play for like two and a half months.

This is the time of the year when you need depth and that overpaid, marginally productive stars aren't worth it. I think the Rams actually are very lucky. They're in a division where Arizona is in a complete rebuild. And San Francisco lost their quarterback and is in a rebuild. In Seattle, it's in a marginal rebuild, but they're still in a rebuild. Okay. So, so can they turn it around? I think this is their reality. They have a $5 billion stadium. They're brand new to town in a very competitive market with the Dodgers and

LeBron and the Lakers and a lot of college teams and they got to sell PSLs and they got a $5 billion stadium and they overpaid for a lot of guys you've heard of in Domenzou, Akeep Tilly, Brandon Cooks was on the Saints, it was on the Patriots, he was in playoff games, in the end, they got no depth. And people are figuring them out and they become a target. And we're always talking about how great they are and how smart they are. McVeigh is not the smartest young coach in the league Matt Nagy in Chicago is. He's pulling birds out of a hat with Mitch Trubisky.

Here was Sean McVeigh after the game. We've got to be able to figure this out. and figure it out fast because these last couple weeks, we're doing things that are totally uncharacteristic of what good football teams do, what we've done through the first handful of games this season. Everybody's got a hand in this, and we've got to get it figured out fast.

They're not a terrible team. They're going to win their division. They'll probably be at home and win a playoff game. I'm not saying they can't play, but I'm telling you what's going on here. This is a sales pitch. It is giving up draft picks for a busting Jacksonville, Dante Fowler. it's spending massive money for Brandon Cooks

who's never done anything in a big game. Belichick and Sean Peyton bailed on him. I like Akib Talib. In Domen, Sue? He's more brand than football player right now. I didn't do anything. Depth, don't have any. All right, let me shift gears to this.

One of the reasons I like the NFL, more than college football, I learn stuff. Seasons are long. Teams start hot. They have injuries. You learn a lot. lot during NFL season. This weekend is we thought we were going to get all the clinching. It was all the chaos. Let me ask you. Yesterday, the Cowboys get shut out. People are freaking out.

What did we really learn about the Dallas Cowboys yesterday? Dax Limited? We all kind of knew that, right, other than the fan boys. They lost on the road off emotional wins with less to play for and a team with a superstar quarterback. You do realize Las Vegas favored the Colts. It was our bet of the week. Fanboys and pom-pom waivers in the media got shocked. Every pro gambler in America was on the Colts. There was no new discovery here.

Dallas has had one transformational moment this year. That win over New Orleans. Yesterday, shut out by the Colts. Didn't learn anything. that doesn't mean anything. I look for games when I learned something. You know what I learned yesterday in the Colts Cowboys game? That the Colts offensive lines and defensive lines

with a bunch of young guys are way ahead of schedule. Like, this is a rebuilding year for the Colts. We didn't even know if Andrew Luck's soup bone was good. It was rebuild the O line, rebuild the D line, and then they'll have a bunch of cap space. Oh, hell. Yesterday I'm watching that game. I'm watching their own line.

Running lanes wide open. I'm watching their D-line. Big pressure on DAC. That's the only thing we learned yesterday that Indianapolis is ahead of schedule on their rebuild. By the way, the Colts have now shut out and dominated a division leader Cowboys and then snapped an eight, nine game winning streak

with another division leader Texans the week before. Don't get caught up in the shutout. excuse me, but didn't the Colts get shut out three weeks ago? We didn't learn anything in that game. When the Colts got shut out by the Jags, I didn't even talk about it. Why? Andrew Luck suddenly no good? They were on the road against a talented defense, coming off some emotional wins.

They had some nice, before that emotional wins. They went on the road. They didn't match the urgency of Jacksonville. And they went down there and the Jacks got defensive players and pressure and they got overwhelmed and didn't score a thing and who cares? Well, you forget about it. A week later, nobody cared. Nobody cares about this Dallas game.

The Colts had a lousy road shut out three weeks ago. Indy now is the story. They are eight insects. Their O-line and D-line are way ahead of schedule. They've got the New York Giants who looked like yesterday. They kind of mailed it in season over coming up next. Dallas is exactly what we thought they were going into the game. Really good young defensive talent, especially in the front seven,

superstar running back, who needs to play really, really well and give you about 130, 150 yards for DAC to be more effective. But if DAC doesn't get Zeeks 140 yards, didn't, doesn't get Amari Cooper breaking tackles for touchdowns, didn't. the Cowboys had more than average penalties, did. Well, Dax's not going to do much against an aggressive young defense that's way better than anybody thought at this point. The reason I like the NFL, more than college football, I feel like I learn things week to week. It's a week to week league.

Alabama Clemson going to play for the national title again. I'm not learning much. Dallas is fine. They're going to be a playoff team. They're going to host a playoff game. and if it's low scoring and DAC get support, they'll win that game. But if Zeke runs for 80 yards and they have a few penalties and Amari Cooper gets doubled and taken away, then Dallas won't win a playoff game. And what I learned, you don't want any part of Indianapolis.

They are playing with house money. Be very careful about these young teams that are ahead of schedule that aren't supposed to be good until next year. the Colts playing with no pressure, a red-hot quarterback, a coach and a quarterback aligned with tremendously talented rookies and first-year players all over the roster. That's the only thing I learned. Coming up next, Colin right, Colin wrong, 50 minutes from now. Coming up next. It's happening, and this is how it happens.

When dynasties end, this is. how they end. That's coming up next. Sleep can be a struggle. You might toss and turn all night because you're uncomfortable. That's the way I used to sleep. It really is. But the folks at Casper change that. They have a mattress called the Wave. It is different from other premium mattresses. It's got an advanced ergonomic system that aligns your body at 33 points head to toe. And that's the difference for me. The Wave, which I sleep on, has five layers, premium foam. It's got this really soft, velvety, soft top layer and, you know, memory foam, and it just fits my body. And the more comfortable I

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Also have Trent Dill for next hour. Sean Merriman's great final hour of the show, Michael Vic, in 10 minutes. Joy Taylor, of course, joining me on a Monday. So, you know, Christmas is a week out. Like a week from today is Christmas Eve. I'll be here. You'll be here. Then Christmas Day I take off and ski for a couple days. Then we're right back here, Joy, crushing it. We're not leaving forever. No, we'll be back. But this. We have families and stuff too. That's right. We have families. We've got to balance it out. We've got cats and dogs and kids and

wife lost stuff and Joy's very, very busy. So let me just say this. New England. I know what you think. Oh, Colin, that's dumb. Yeah, I was surprised yesterday. I said Friday. I don't think this is much of a rivalry, but Pittsburgh, I thought, was buttoned up down the stretch. Kind of reestablished a running game, which is amazing. They've got, you know, Pittsburgh classic. Big game step up.

You know, if they played Tampa Bay next week, they'd probably lose by two touchdowns. That's Pittsburgh. But a couple of years ago, I started mentioning this. I noticed a trend with Tom Brady. But as he has aged, his December's, he looks tired. He loses zip on his arm. And sure enough, I went and looked it up, and he has his lowest completion percentage month is December, his most interceptions in December, fewest yards per game in December, his passer ratings lowest in December.

And what do I take from this? This is how you age, unless you're on cattle steroids. And baseball, 37-year-old guys suddenly played like they were in their prime. On the tour to France, guys who were older literally could scale them out in like. Superman. But if you're not on cattle steroids, this is how Tim Duncan aged. This is how Tom Brady is aging. He is still good. He's good. And he still has moments of great. But as the season wears on, it's a long season. And by December, Tom could use a couple of weeks off. He could use a buy week. He could really use about six days and not throw in the football.

For the record, Belichick, you do realize he was furious that he had to trade Jimmy Garoppolo. Because Tom Brady has become the kind of player Belichick moves off of. Good, aging, expensive, and you want to get rid of them a year or too early, not a year or too late. Belichick wanted to have Jimmy Garoppolo ready for right now. And this would be Tom's last year. Instead, they have no backup quarterback and an aging quarterback who was no longer pushed by Jimmy Garoppolo. This is not all Brady's fault. Outside of Trey Flowers, their front seven defensively is completely average.

This is not all Brady's fault. Edelman passed his prime, too many drops, gronks and non-factor in most games, Josh Gordon's your deep threat, really? This is not all Brady's issue. For years, he's been taking pay cuts, which means they should have talent everywhere around him. And they don't. But Tom is simply not good enough to squeeze 12 to 13 wins

out of an average roster. I think Tom this year will squeeze 10 wins out of an average roster. But they're not good enough to go on the road and beat good teams. They're not going to go on the road if they had to go on the road and play Baltimore in a playoff game. They're not good enough. They're not good enough if they were in the NFC to go to Chicago and win at this time of the year, December, when Tom is getting worn out. So I think they'll squeeze 10 wins out of this thing. Some of this is on Belichick. Brady's been taking pay cuts forever. Where are the players? Where are they? Devin McCordy's talented. Trey Flowers is good.

where are the players? Where are you spending the money? He's whiffed on draft picks. But New England now is just a good team with a quarterback who's aging who could use absolutely a couple of buy weeks now, some days not to throw, to hydrate, rest, hang out with his kids.

Brady looks like he's looked the last four to five years in December. But now what's around him despite his pay cuts, is really average. And he is simply not at the point in his career where he can carry average. Andrew Luck can. I mean, Patrick Mahomes has the energy for the next seven years to do that.

There are guys around this league that can do that. Tom's not one of them. And this is how dynasties end to the Spurs and the Patriots when your star is not on steroids. Here's Joy Taylor with the news. No, no, no, no, no. Turn on the news. This is the herd line news.

By the way, Joy, the Patriots since last year's AFC championship are 9 and 6. That's what they are. I mean, imagine what they would be without Tom Brady. Exactly. And all this talk about how it's more on Belichick than Brady. You look at that roster and what he's been able to do, it would be a disaster without him. Edelman now doesn't get open much and drops the ball. Gronks are non-factor.

They have no deep threat. This is, it's pretty much you cross your fingers that they get a home playoff game. Tom gets a week to rest. That's what you pray for now. We'll see. Well, the 2018 Browns have proven that the word same old might no longer apply to them. I got a big win yesterday. 17, 16 over the Broncos.

They snapped an 11 game losing streak against the Broncos. That dated back to 1991. That was four years before Baker Mayfield was born. The Browns are now 6, 7, and 1, and they are still in the playoff race. Games against Spangles and the Ravens left on the schedule. Yeah, barely, but they are, yeah. I mean, you're alive or you're not. And with the Browns, they're going to take credit for that

because they were two, six, and one when they fired Hugh Jackson, and they're four and two since that. So reaching the playoffs isn't out of the question. They trail the 7-5-1 Pittsburgh Steelers and the 7-and-6 Ravens and the AFC North. And then they're behind a bunch of other teams, the Ravens, the Dolphins, the Colts, and the Titans are in the chase for the second wild card spot.

By the way, I know everybody in Cleveland, they've been so bad for so long. They have a right to get excited about this. But Greg Williams' coaching at the end of that game was unbelievable. And I know everybody wants to. This is what happens in the NFL joy. We've seen this. You bring in a coach who's a loud macho guy,

and he brings energy to a locker room. You saw this with Dan Campbell in Miami. And everybody's like, yeah, I love that guy. Greg Williams made a coaching move. At the end of that football game, I'm like, dude, kick field goal. What are we doing here? It was a bad coaching move. But we've seen this a thousand times in the NFL.

The interim coach, he's old school, he barks and yells, he has a young roster, the kids are fired up. But would you want Greg Williams for the next five years? Well, it's going to start to be a discussion. Yes. If they went even one more game this season, I don't know. He's going to be in the conversation whether they keep him or not. I think obviously they're likely going to look around. Brown, but is Greg Williams the long-term answer?

No. And if he's not, you can't keep him because you have a number one overall traffic in Baker Mayfield. You need to set him up for success. So I don't know what's going to happen there. But if it's the Browns. This is fun, though, to your point, it is fun. Oh, no, it's a good thing.

I don't want any team or any organizer franchise to be a disaster. That's just a dud game every year. Joy, you and I are in the story business. Cleveland's a really good story. Baker Mayfield. Cleveland being a disaster is an old story at this point. So a new one now. Yes, exactly.

So there seemed to be a little deja vu last night when Nick Foles led the Eagles to win over the Rams. It was the same place last year where Foles came in in relief of Carson Wentz and started that run to the Super Bowl victory. And after the game, Foles was asked if he's thinking about the future. And he says he admits he can't help but look ahead sometimes. That part does creep in. I do say there is a human side, but no, I'm very self-aware of those. distractions don't do any good. I really thrive and staying in the moment and just enjoying it.

And, you know, we'll see what happens. But I really just want to enjoy the moment and just being present and all I do, that's why I try to focus on daily. God, he, boy, he's the best backup quarterback in the league. Can we say that? Of course. Yeah. Of course. Yeah. For a couple years, it was Kay's Keenham. And then he became a starter. I think Jacoby Brissette in Indianapolis and Nick foals with the Eagles are the two backups that you can put in for two months and they can win you games. Well, I think him winning the Super Bowl kind of cemented that all. Yeah, that pretty, yeah, that has a way of doing that.

When the backup wins a Super Bowl, you're officially the world's best backup. Right. Well, I don't know what's going to happen with the Eagles for the rest of the season. They're next two games against the Texans and Washington, and they need to win out, and then they need the Vikings to lose one of their final two games in order to clinch a wildcard spot. But, strangeer things have happened. just like last year with the Eagles.

For the record, Philadelphia's got a lot of good players. Now, the secondary is a mess, but I come back to this. Just that receiving core, Ertz, Alshon Jeffrey, Golden Tate, Nelson Aguilar, like Philadelphia, let's not go crazy here. They're not what they were last year, but there's players, Michael Bennett, Fletcher Cox. No, they have a really good roster. Yeah, they got dudes in Philadelphia. It's unfortunate.

Carson Lawrence has got to stay healthy. And finally, speaking of finally, the Wizards announced today that they have acquired Trevor Arisa from the Sons in exchange for Kelly Ubray Jr. and Austin Rivers. Eriza returns to Washington for his second cent there. He helped them advance to the playoffs in 2014. And according to the ringers, Kevin O'Connell, there was talk between the Lakers and the Sons about a deal with the Sons won of Josh Hart not Contavius called Well Pope. Yes, Trevor Arisa is a really good player. there's some other teams I think that could have used him. Like obviously the Lakers would have been a great landing spot for him.

But, man, this story over the weekends. It was a mess. What a disaster. I mean, it was like a Saturday live skit of what a NBA trades going bad. It was a mess. It was a disaster. So, well, it finally got done. So there's that.

Yeah. Plus, Trevor is a nice player. Catch and shoot, dude. Good player. Yeah. Joy with the news. Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping by.

The Hurd Lye News. Well, he made four Pro Bowls in 13 years, and when he came into the league, he was the most dynamic quarterback in the history of the league with his feet. And, again, four Pro Bowls in 13 years, multiple teams. Our friend Michael Vick now joining us on a Monday in the herd. And it's interesting because you played in Philadelphia, Michael. And Joy just mentioned that it's a really good, this is an interesting topic. We know Philadelphia's got players.

We know they've been hurt all year. Yeah. But in Philadelphia, I roll my eyes at this. But according to my buddies in Philadelphia, they're like, Listen, a lot of people in Philly think Nick Foles is better than Carson Wents. I don't. But Nick Foles clearly has a better relationship with Alshon Jeffrey. Whereas Wins, it's Zach Ertz.

What does Foles do, Michael? I can no longer deny it. What does he do to the Eagles offense that sparks it? I think he takes pressure off the offense. I think when Carson Wins is out there, I think Doug Peterson feels the need to be dynamic. open the offense up, you know, spread the ball around, you know, obviously get the ball of Zach Ertz, but I think he has a tough time of incorporating all the guys in the offense when Nick is out there.

I think everyone is at ease. I think the game plan is more simplified. I think they... More detail-oriented. It's more detail-oriented, but not stringuous, not a bunch of different plays where, you know, guys are required to think. I think it's more simplistic. And that's the way it look.

What you're saying is Philadelphia says, listen, we don't have the high-end talent. Yeah. Let's simplify it. Do fewer things better. And with Nick Foles, there's not as much firework show, but it's a easy, put your arms around it, pound the football as much. And that's what you're seeing. The one thing I do know is just in talking to several players and coaches last year after the Super Bowl, when Carson went down, all the guys felt more pressures

than perform. And I think, you know, that helps within itself. You know, you look at guys, you know, feeling like they have to go out and be at their very best all the time. And then when a guy goes down, now it's like, okay, you focus on the things that you really have to do well, scale back on a majority of the offense,

probably some on the defense, and then let guys go play lights out and play faster. That's what it looks like with Nick Foles. has to be the game plan because it was too easy last night. It was way. We didn't see the Philadelphia Eagles look that way all year long. And now it's starting to become frustrating to me because I'm starting to think the same thing.

Like what's the difference in Nick Foes and Carson Wentz? It's starting to stack up as far as wins and in the wins lost column. Right. More wins for Nick. Less for Carson. Let's go to the Rams. You know, my takeaway, whether you heard it or not, Michael, was listen. They're building a five billion.

dollar stadium. They're brand new to the city. You got the Lakers, you got the Dodgers, you got USC football, you got... Sports everywhere. Everywhere. So they went and got some headliners and Dom and Sue, Akib to leave. And I think they overpaid for Brandon Cooks and Dante Fowler. And here's

my takeaway. The Rams have stars, but the Chargers have depth. Yes. And I watch the Rams. Mike, they look tired. They don't have depth. They have one running back. Cooper Cup left. Now they have one receiver they have to rely on.

That's what I see. I see a team that's got a bunch of stars, doesn't have a lot of depth, and January is about depth. You know, they look like a team who started out fast and had a ton of success in a bunch of different areas. And the first quarter of the season is always easy to come out and get off to a good start because, you know, opposing teams don't know how you're going to play it on, you know, what you're going to come out with and, you know, what your scheme is going to look like. after a while you start to create an identity

and things don't change. You just dress it up a little different. Right. So the catching up with the scheme and now you just got to, you got to reboot, you got to go back and look at what did we do well early in the season. What are other teams doing well versus the teams that we're about to play?

And you've got to create concepts based on that. But they got a lot of talent and I think this team should be in a better position. Obviously that game was competitive last night. At the end. Probably one the day should have won, you know, at the end of the day. And these seasons are long, Michael. You know, there's literally, there's the pre- Thanksgiving, then there's post- Thanksgiving,

and then playoffs feel differently. It's inevitable for guys to not feel fatigue at the end of the season. Like you go through, you know, the first quarter, the first half of the season, and, you know, things are going your way. and then all of a sudden, not just rookies, veteran players hit a wall too. You know, I experienced that in 13 seasons. Imagine the guys like Tom Brady, who's, you know, 17, 18 years in. It's just something that you can dodge or get away from.

And you can't win every game. You can try. But at the end of the season, postseason, that's when you got to be at your best. But you have to be well-rested. And you have to have some players who are fresh and can come off, come off the that's what the Chargers, the Ravens and the Bears have.

Yes. When you have to have depth. You have to have depth. Okay, so Dak Prescott gets shut out. Not a great look. Listen, Zique had a good day, not a great day. Amari did okay, but wasn't great.

I mean, I kind of look at it and I think to myself with Dak, Dak need some great performances around him to win games on the road. Yeah, Dak needs help, you know, from everyone, offensively and defensively. certainly not the type of performance you want to put on film, you know, this is late in the season and with the postseason right around the corner. Because people will look at that.

They're going to watch it and they're going to say, we should do this to Dak Prescott because this is what the Indianapolis Coast did. They took Amari out. Took them out the game. They doubled it. They doubled them up and then they find out the areas that you're struggling and you're not so good in and you get exploited. So, I mean, it's blueprints that's created each and every week.

Certainly not the one that you wanted, that the Dallas Cowboys wanted yesterday. But can't take anything away from the Indianapolis coast. They're a really, really good football team. Really good team. And better, I think, at this stage than we thought. Yes. A couple of different things. Number one, you had an interview with Lamar Jackson last week.

He's better than I thought. Yeah. I thought Josh Allen from Wyoming and Lamar Jackson from Louisville needed to sit a year. I thought the same thing. I just thought now. Now, I thought Donald Baker and Rosen could come in, chop it up, be okay. Get overwhelmed at times and be okay. Lamar's doing it, man.

And by the way, not a ton of bad place, not a lot of picks. You know their offensive coordinator. You think the Ravens coordinator is the key here. I think the Ravens coordinator is the key. Marty Morningwick. I think James Urban, the quarterback coach, who we were all together in 2010 in Philadelphia did some of the same things, not at this pace or as much value. but we did enough to keep teams off balance and add it to get positive yards and move to change.

Greg Roman is involved. Yep. You know, so three heads better than one. And, I mean, Lamar's doing everything he's asked to be doing. Yep. And he's making the game way, the game is easy for him. Like, what he's doing, I mean, hand it off or you keep it, you know, short passes. not a lot of passes down the field, not being asked to do a lot.

It's really a game plan that he can probably run for the next couple years and be successful at it and just give defenses fits. Yeah, but by the way, Baltimore plays real defenses. I say this, every quarterback, I mean, Andrew Luck's one of the few I think that doesn't. Every quarterback's got holes in his game. Yeah. So Andrew's hole right now, or not Andrew, Lamar Jackson's hole is experience. Right.

You're not going to give him the whole playbook. By the way, Big Ben's first two years in Pills. Pittsburgh. It was a lot of running. Yeah. They weren't given big... It was balanced. It was... Now you can let them throw 50 times a game. So I think Baltimore is a headache.

I also think when you came into this league, people don't have tape. Right. It took people a year to figure out the Wildcat. Yeah. People don't have enough tape on Lamar. And by the way, I think week to week, Baltimore's figuring out who Lamar Jackson is. Right. And they have them in house.

Right. And they'll continue to add to the playbook. They'll continue to come up with different concepts. And then once the team, once the opposing teams latch on to what they're doing. Then, you know, the offseason to roll around, they'll go scout more offenses that's suited for Lamar's game. They'll come back next year with something different.

He'll learn more in the passing game. Then it becomes a situation on how do we, you know, incorporate more passing game into the run game, or do we even bother with, you know, allowing him to pass more? Let's do what he's comfortable with. And I think, you know, that's the most important thing. right now. They're doing the things that getting them out of the stadiums would have

been and making Lamar successful and not putting a ton of pressure on the offense or the defense. Yeah, I don't want to see him running 18 times a game. I'd rather he's in the 8 to 12, but I think some of this is sustainable. Running over 15 times to me is not sustainable. Yeah. All right. New England, Pittsburgh.

What was your big takeaway from the game? Pittsburgh is a lot better than what we think. You know, Pittsburgh comes to play when they want to play. And you know, aside from beating the New England Patriots, they should have beat the Chargers, you know. They had the Chargers beat.

They had them beat. You know, so this is a team that can put it all together whenever they want. Obviously, New England looked tired. Tom Brady looked like. He's tired. You know, he was into it, but he needed help. And I can't understand why Josh Gordon only had one or two receptions. I can't figure it out.

This is a guy that they bring in to be the marquee player for this team. team to be the guy that can stretch the field and, you know, create, you know, other opportunities in the offense, especially in the run game. They are using that effectively. I don't know why. But the Pittsburgh Steelers did what they needed to do at a critical moment in the season. Yeah, for the record, if you go look at the Steelers this year, when they played the Chargers, it went down to the wire.

They beat New England. So this is what Pittsburgh does. As Joy knows, being from Pittsburgh, the big game. They rise to the moment. Some of this is on Big Ben. I'll be honest with you. Some of this is on Big Ben. He is not as laser-focused as other players in this league.

And he sometimes shows up on Sunday. And it feels like for the first half, he's messing around and he's going off script. And I thought he was really focused late. Yeah. And then they had running game yesterday. And that created the balance that we talked about yesterday on our show that they needed 145 yards rushing. That helps. That pays dividends.

Mike, great seeing you. 13 years for Pro Bowls. Mike Vick, thanks, buddy. Coming up in 20 minutes where Colin was right, where Colin was wrong. And coming up next, Green Bay's new reality. And it's not pretty. It's 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. Great to have you back. So Chicago is going to win their division. I thought it was a big win for them yesterday because they have the better players and the better roster. They were at home, better momentum, a younger quarterback right now. And he appears to be healthier. Aaron Rogers heard again yesterday by the end of the game.

Listen, this is the way it works. Chicago's got a bunch of good young players. Roe Kwan Smith, the rookie linebacker, Tariq Cohen, the running back, Eddie Jackson, Leonard Floyd, Packers, Owen, 7 on the road. They feel like kind of a team that needs to be rebooted. Chicago's not going anywhere. And Aaron Rogers, for a decade, had this window when his division was utter dysfunction.

The Bears were a mess. Detroit was a mess. Minnesota couldn't get their act together. And in that window, Aaron, to his credit, dominated the NFC North and won a Super Bowl. But that's over now. Green Bay's new reality going forward. Chicago is like the Dallas Cowboys. A bunch of good young players, most of them on defense, and they're not real expensive yet.

They have a superstar pass rusher that Green Bay will never be able to block. They won't. Chicago's got the better coach. Chicago's quarterback's never going to make $33 million a year guaranteed. The new reality in that division. I'm not saying Chicago is going to win it every year, but there is a new reality for Green Bay. They are paying their quarterback the most, which will make their roster have to be younger and cheaper. Their quarterback is now 35 years old.

Their quarterback was gimpy yesterday, and I would probably sit Aaron for the rest of the year. Aaron says he doesn't want to be sat for the rest of the year. But Aaron Rogers is becoming Brett Farrve. Got a Super Bowl in the first decade, but then Aaron Rogers and Fav are getting older, more annoying little injuries. They both got very expensive. They were harder to coach. They were still iconic ad libers, sometimes to their detriment.

And they didn't win out of Lambo. The Packers are 0 and 7 on the road this year. This is the new reality. Be very careful. Windows closed. Jacksonville, remember what I told you? I didn't buy Jacksonville. Andrew Luckin-Dishon Watson got hurt.

Their window was about this big. for about 10 games, and they got to the AFC championship game, Tom Brady closed their window. Andrew Luck came back, Deshawn Watson came back, and they got Blake Portals. So right now, Jacksonville has the fourth best quarterback in their division. I'm not saying Green Bay won't be good. Aaron Rogers is good enough to win with very few parts. They have a really nice home field advantage. And if you go look at the Packers over the years, they tend to do a pretty good job drafting.

I'm not saying they're going to be in fourth or third place. forever. But the layup line for the Packers is over. They were in a 10-year lay-up line. The lions were a dysfunctional mess. The Bears were a dysfunctional mess. And Vikings had good ownership, but couldn't get it right. Vikings have a real good coach and a real good roster and a good enough quarterback to win a division. Chicago's got talent everywhere in the best coach in their division and a quarterback who's never going to make 33 million. So the layup line is over. And by the way, Dallas is good. The Rams are good. Philadelphia. Eagles are going to be good. The NFC's better than it's ever been.

So you've got to take advantage to it. Brady, by the way, Tom Brady's had a layup line for 15 years. The best quarterback he's faced in his division is Chad Pennington for like two decades. Do you watch Sam Darnold Saturday? You get Sam Darnold of the Jet some talent. Tom Brady's layup lines over too. Now, Brady really took advantage of it. Brady really took advantage of it. You can't expect Tom to win anymore. Once Darnold gets people. pieces offensively. It's over for Tom. And that could happen depending on how they draft and how

they have huge cap space. But the layup line for the Packers is done. And I've been saying this. Aaron Rogers would never want to be compared to Favre. They've become the same guy. They really have. They chopped it up for 10 years, got a Super Bowl. And I mean, they really did. Their first 10 years, they both have a Super Bowl, both have multiple MVP's, both had 9 out of 10 winning seasons, and both made six Pro Bowls. Their first 10 years looked exactly. exactly the same. All I'm saying is their last five are also going to look the same. Rogers is hurt again. He's 35. Kaleo Max going nowhere. Chicago's players like Dallas are all good, mostly on defense, and they're cheap right now. So now, Chicago's a fun story. Listen, I work at Fox.

We have the NFC. It is very good for us that the Chicago Bears and the Dallas Cowboys, now both have kind of the same team. The Bears and the Cowboys, I think, have, quarterbacks with very low ceilings, Mitch Trubisky and Dak Prescott. But the Bears and the Cowboys are loaded on defense. They also storied franchises with great fan bases. Yes. It's great when they're doing well in the league. It's better for everyone.

You know, it's interesting about Aaron Rogers as if you look at the NFC playoff picture today, the Saints are going to win their division, the Rams are going to win it, the Bears are going to win it. I think the Cowboys are going to win it. Seattle looks like the best wilds. card team to me. And then I think you have the Vikings and the Eagles and the Panthers are all going to vie for that final playoff spot.

Seahawks screwed up yesterday. They had the ball. End of regulation. They had the ball first and overtime. Seahawks just scoot it up. Didn't get a couple of breaks on calls, blah, blah, blah. But Eagles, Panthers, and Vikings are going to battle for that second wildcard spot.

Seattle is in. Chicago is a really fun story here. And, you know, it's interesting. So if you look at Aaron Rogers, and this is one of the things we've said about him, he's not a huge guy. Aaron's not 6.4 and a half, 235. Aaron's my size. He's 6.2, and he's about 210. I'm about 198.

He's not a gigantic guy. And I'll say this. Leroy Butler was on Twitter yesterday saying, if you can't outplay Mitch Trubisky, how good are you? Aaron's only job is to outplay the other quarterback. You're never going to win scoring 17 points. Now, I think that's a little harsh from Leroy on Aaron Rogers, but Aaron decided to take $33 million, despite all those making $10 million a year on commercials.

And this is his new reality, a young football team and a city in Green Bay that's never attracted free agents. Last five years, he's going to still be a pro bowler, going to win games, may win the division again. The layup lines over. All right, coming up next, where Colin was right, where Colin was wrong, Trent Dilfer, Sean Merriman, Ben Vollen, Patriots reporter from Boston. Oh, my word.

The Dynasty is melting. It's 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 IHeart Radio app. Ah, hour two, this is The Herd. Wherever you may be and however you may be listening live in Los Angeles, High Heart Radio, Fox Sports Radio, and FS1. Joy Taylor is joining me. This is an amazing time of the year, Joy.

Bull games, and it's like decent bowl games start up. We got NFL play. You know, next week, 14 of the 16 games next week will have playoff implications. That's incredible. This is, I got to tell you something. They may kick me out of this business. but I'll just sit home and talk to myself September through January.

I will. I won't even have a show. I'll just sit and talk to myself about this time of the year is so good. It's so much fun. I love coming to work. Why would you need to do that? Are you talking about like when you're old? Yeah, I'll just talk to myself.

I'll have my cats and my goofy dog and I'll just talk to myself about football. I'll have my own radio show. I'll put an antenna up on the house. Antenna? Yeah, and just talk to people. Mostly my neighbors. Maybe they have like a like an. elderly sports talk

nursing home sports talk that's a hell of an idea right there yeah I just stumbled on something I want 10% of anyone who does that my idea all right here we go it's a Monday where Colin was right where Colin was wrong where Colin was right best year blazing five

second best year statistically but I feel like it's my best year another winning week three and two we picked the Colts to upset the Dallas Cowboys we pick Cleveland to do something they don't do leave Ohio and win a football game over Denver. And we'd love the Titans over the New York Giants. Still scratching my head over that Rams performance, but we're close to 60% on the year.

And that is good enough to be a professional sports gambler if I wanted to do that. Where Colin was wrong. I completely whiffed on the NFC North. I predicted the Packers would win it and the Bears would be abysmal. Well, the Bears are going to win it going away. And Green Bay is now abysmal. Yeah, I was not close. If you had told me Aaron Rogers for the second straight year was not going to make the playoffs,

I didn't buy it. If you had told me Mitch Trubisky, I mean, I watched Mitch Trubisky last year with John Fox. They looked like a college quarterback that was over his head. Minnesota is the only team in this division I've gotten right, but no team has shocked me and surprised me like the Chicago Bears. That's why I think Matt Nagy is the coach of the year. Where Colin was right? But we did tell you two months ago, the Chargers'

roster was better than the Rams. We've been saying this now for two months. They're stacked. They have three legit star receivers. Two big time running backs, two pass rushers. I talked to a buddy of mine who's an NFL scout. I said, what's their weakness? He goes, I don't love their guards. Like they are good everywhere. And unlike previous charger teams, they don't turn the ball over and give games away. Second fewest giveaways in the NFL. This team Doesn't have the glitz, doesn't have the glamour. This is the best football team top to bottom in Los Angeles, the Chargers. Where Colin was wrong.

Listen, I knew Baker Mayfield could play and win games. I said it as a rookie. Lamar Jackson, shocker. Look, I just thought he relied too much on running. I said, he can't be running around 18 times a game. Now, he's been nicked up a couple of times. And I don't think it's sustainable to run 18 times a game. I think if he can get through this.

season healthy, then next year they'll scale back in the running and develop his passing. But he leads the Ravens in rushing. He is 4-1 as a starter. He's very close to be in 5-0 as a starter. He could have won that game in Kansas City. He has no interceptions in his last three games. He's obviously, as Bobby Petrino told everybody, but he's very coachable. Greg Roman, the offensive coordinator, has been around the league for a long time.

You know, I saw him more as a second, third-round quarterback who you've got to sit for a year. He's been terrific. And now, now, slide, please. RG3 didn't learn to slide. Andrew Locke didn't learn to slide. Please learn to slide in the offseason. You will extend your career. Where Colin was right.

People wanted him to be a wide receiver. No, no, no. He is fast, though. Where Colin was right, listen, we were the first person to show to bail on the Rams. And we said it's a lot of hot dogging on defense. It's a lot of freelancing. I think Todd Gurley is great, but how many, you know, give him the ball 300 times? I like Jared Gop, but he's still young.

And I think there's, you know, I watched this Rams team. They gave up 8.7 yards of pass to Nick Foles. Isn't the secondary supposed to be their strength? Sam Shields and the keep to leave and Marcus Peters and the young safetys. I thought their secondary was supposed to be their strength. And in Domenu and Aaron Donald, you'd never be able to run on them. Everybody runs on them. We bailed on him a couple of months ago.

Their names are bigger than their production. Where Colin was wrong. It's not that the Steelers beat New England. We were wrong on that. But they ran the football. They had no running game last couple of weeks. And it's kind of, you know, listen, I was joking about this Friday. I don't even consider it a rivalry.

But, you know, we're going to have Ben Volan on in five, ten minutes here, a Patriots writer. He thinks the dynasty's over. I think it's close to over. But I got to be honest. who was making the mistakes down the stretch. It was New England. The Steelers were buttoned up down the stretch.

The Steelers made their mistakes on two back-to-back plays in the first half. They were buttoned up after that. They were focused after that. They made the big plays after that. A couple of great catches by young receivers. That game looked the opposite. I thought it would be New England that would make the plays late. New England would not have the penalties late.

and I was wrong. Where Colin was right? I don't think I've ever I know this for a fact. I've never predicted an entire conference as accurately as I predicted the AFC. I had the Steelers win in their division, the Patriots went in theirs,

the Texans win in theirs, and then I said, keep your eyes on the Indianapolis Colts and the Baltimore Ravens. Now, I was not great on the Chiefs. I said they'd be 500 because I'd never seen Patrick Mahomes play a season. So I said, if he's great, my bad.

but by and large, if you look at our predictions in the AFC, we have nailed it down to the wild card teams. We said Baltimore and Indy are going to be way better than Vegas thinks, and they have been way better than Vegas thinks, and the teams leading the division are pretty much the teams we said that would lead the division. Where Colin was wrong. I love Carson Wentz, and I always say, you know,

Nick Foles isn't in his league, but I got to be honest. Nick Foles does something because Carson Wence gets zoned in on Zach Ertz the tight end. But there is something between Nick Foles and Alshan Jeffrey, and they just connect. Whatever that relationship is at practice, personal relationship, I have no idea. Maybe the coaches are more comfortable with Alshan Jeffrey throws from Nick Foles. But, you know, I keep going out and saying Wence is a superstar and Nick's a backup at best. but there is something to be said about what happens when Nick Foles takes over,

and you look at Philadelphia's offense last night, it's 6.2 yards of play with Nick Foles. You get 6.2 yards of play in the NFL. You're not going to lose on a lot of Sundays. Where Colin was right? Matt Nagy, not Sean McVeigh, is the young hotshot coach we should be paying attention to. I like McVeigh, but the media,

You know what, McVeigh's good looking. He's in Los Angeles. He's more glamorous. Well, guess what? The Chicago guy that doesn't have the high perfect model cheekbones is taking Mitch Trubisky, Alan Robinson, Taylor Gabriel, Anthony Miller, and they're sixth in points. And by the way, pro football focus says they're eight best players or all defensive players. Now, I know he's not as hip as McVeigh.

Probably doesn't have the, you know, the cheekbones. but Matt Nagy is the guy that has taken pretty solid but not spectacular offensive pieces and they are sixth in points. And not only that, they've had a tough schedule. You know, at a conference, they had to play Jets' defense is a real defense. Bill's defense a real defense. They play the dolphins in Miami. They had to face New England.

Real team. Matt Nagy, congrats to you. Real team that I'd totally whiffed on. man, good stuff today. Ben Volan, I love, you know I love something. I love when media can be critical of their home team. It's hard to be critical of your home team. You go to a grocery store, you go to your gym, you go to your church,

and everybody's looking at you. That's a local reporter. It's hard to be brutally honest and critical. of a home team as a reporter. Ben Volan writes for the Boston Globe, and he ripped the Patriots apart. I think the dynasty's melting, and this is what happens to dynasties

when your superstar Tim Duncan or Tom Brady are not on steroids. They gracefully age and decline. And I think right now, New England, that we predicted to be 10 and 6, we said they're going to pull back, I don't think they're good enough to win a road playoff game. and Ben Volan, headline yesterday, reality, patriots are on a great football team.

How did it play? His thoughts? He is on the ground every day at practice. And Trent Dilford, too. We are just starting out. Be sure to catch live editions of the herd weekdays in noon Eastern, 9 a.m. Pacific. Welcome back. Now through December 25th, 30% off joy.

Go to 23andMe.com slash the herd, 23m.com slash her, those DNA genetic testing kits, DNA genetic testing kits. Those are fun, actually. It's fascinating to find out that you're from Iceland or something, you know, it's just awesome. I love those things. I always said I really respect reporters who are willing to be critical of the home team. It's harder.

You get a lot of crap at practice. You get a lot of ugly stairs. People shut you out. But Ben Volan, who's been covering the Patriots through the Aaron Hernandez saga and that murder saga through the Patriots, good days, bad days, spy gate, deflate gate. Super Bowl runs joining us via the Coward Global Satellite Network. Ben Volan is joining us.

All right, let's start with an easy one, or maybe it's not. What do you use, what do your eyes tell you, Ben, what's wrong with the Patriots? They have a lot of things wrong, and I think, number one, you have to look at the speed of the team on both sides of the football. Where was it yesterday against the Steelers? No speed on offense, no explosive plays, and then no speed on defense, not being able to get after the quarterback and disrupt Ben Rothesberger. They're relying on Rob Grunkowski, who looks slow out there. Tom Brady's starting to, you know, he obviously never moved around that well, but making bad decisions inside the red zone for the second straight week.

Julian Edelman not looking like himself. This is a slow team that I wonder, Colin, if they overestimated how much Brady, Gronk, and Edelman had left. They really built the team around these guys, and all three of them kind of looked old on Sunday against the Steelers. I could argue, though, Belichick wanted to keep Garoppelow and wanted to bail on Gronk and then Tom and the owner stepped in. Couldn't I argue that Brady is sitting,

Belichick is sitting there, Ben, with a smirk, saying to Kraft and Brady, I told you so, because Belichick wanted to get rid of Gronk and wanted to demote Brady pretty soon. Did he not? I definitely think he wanted to keep Garopolo, and that probably entails getting rid of Tom Brady,

and there were all those reports about how the Patriots had a trade offer on the table for Gronkowski before the draft. So, you know, the whole Patriots mantra, We get rid of a player a year too early instead of a year too late. They're not really sticking to it with their most important players here. Brady, Gronk, and Edelman are, you hate to say it, but they're starting to look a little bit past their prime. And like I said, I wonder if the Patriots overestimated how much these guys all have left. You know, there's been various stories.

They don't get along. They do get along. Let's face it. This is, it's lasted 18 years. I mean, that's three times as long as like a Shaq Kobe, Bradshaw, Noel. you go to 18 years. From this point, it's just gravy. I mean, you've been very, very lucky. But when you, let's just say they're a three-seed or a four, they don't get a home field game. Do you see them capable of winning a road game?

Not in the playoffs. Not the way that this Patriots team is playing this year. The hallmark of the Patriots over the years, their mental toughness and their ability to overcome, and especially on the road. And this team just does not have it. They're three and five on the road. It's the second worst road record under Belichick and Brady. They went two and six. in 2009. That was the last time they had to play in this wildcard weekend. The Patriots still have a good shot at the number two seed. If they went out and if the Texans lose this weekend at the Eagles, then the Patriots go back to the number two seed, a buy and the home game and all that. But no, if they have to go on the road in the playoffs and play a good team, I don't like their chances.

You look at the teams and the quarterbacks. They've lost two, Colin. It's a head-scratching list. Blake Bordels, Matt Stafford, Marcus Marriota, Ryan Tannhill, and then Ben Rothesburg yesterday as well. So the Patriots just have not played well on the road all year. By the way, Darnold looked great in a loss. They don't have any offensive personnel. I had multiple execs texting me during that game going, God, this kid looks like Andrew Luck first couple of years. He's carrying nobody. I wonder what's on the horizon for New England? Because Tom Brady's been taking pay cuts. There should be all these emerging great young stars like Cleveland has, for instance, or Chicago has, or Dallas has when you're not paying your

quarterback a lot. What's the future? Like, who's their emerging star? Do you see a path out of this? It certainly is not looking good for the future of the Patriots right now. And I know every year we want to say, is this the end? Well, here's why I say it is. Your star players are starting to look their age. And as you said, there's no one behind them. They have not drafted well at all. They have given up young players like Garoppolo and Brandon Cooks. Deon Lewis was a guy they could have maybe built around for a few more years. It's not like they have a bunch of guys

in the pipeline right now. They're just kind of an aging team. It's a lot of the same bases on defense as well. Devin McCordy, Dante High Tower, Patrick Chunk. So they maybe have another year left in them after this as far as the current Patriots run, but it certainly does look like it's coming to an end soon. And yeah, the way Sam Darnold

played on Saturday night, he was fantastic. Some of those throws he was making. So hey, maybe the Patriots will finally have a little bit of competition in this division. It's only been 20 years. It's about time. By the way, they're going to draft a quarterback, right? I mean, Ben, they'd have to. It'd be ridiculous not to draft a quarterback, right?

Well, I thought they would draft one last year, and they didn't. You never know with Bill Belichick. I could potentially see them. I think obviously they would love to draft a kid and groom him. And I think they do have a lot of resources, extra second and third round picks this year where they can do some maneuvering. However, you know, maybe they go that veteran stopgap route as well. like the Vikings signing Kirk Cousins for three years.

Maybe someone becomes available, some sort of veteran quarterback, that they can use him as a bridge after Tom Brady and then figure out what they're going to do. But obviously with Brady being 41 and not having a great season, they have to get the next guy ready to go. Good stuff. Ben Volan, Boston Globe, Patriots Rider, never afraid to be brutally honest. I agree with him. I don't see the dynamic players.

I watch the Browns this weekend. I see all sorts of young players, bears, cowboys. I see him. I don't see it with New England. They're getting old. Ben, thank you so much. Thank you, Colin. Trent Dilfer, before the end of the hour, the always outspoken, Sean Merriman. Can I touch on the Sam Darnold thing for a second?

Listen, man, I said for years on Andrew Luck. If you don't see it, I can't help you. If you don't see it with Sam Darnold, they have nothing to work with. Pro football focus rates their running backs, receivers, an offensive line with the Jets. You know, bottom two in the league, bottom three in the league. They have no players. Darnold was spectacular Saturday. It doesn't matter wins or loses.

The kid's unbelievable. He looks a little like Luck, a little like Elway. Now, I don't think he's as naturally gifted as John Elway. I don't think he's going to be as great as Andrew Luck. But in this league, add context. Like Lamar Jackson has a bunch of good players around him, a veteran staff, a lot of smart offensive guys, Greg Roman, Marty Morningweg, defense, a running game. Darnold has nothing.

By the way, Arizona has nothing. and Josh Rosen's getting crushed. Darnel has nothing. He's won four games, two road games. They have no business hanging around Houston Saturday. They got no business being in that football game. They were using their third running back, and they were missing two receivers, two running backs,

and they had a right tackle that was a backup and a backup at center. And they took J.J. Watt and Jadavion Clowney down to the, wire. If you don't see it, just like I said with Andrew Luck, I can't help you. If you don't see it, there's nothing I can do. Joy with the news. No, no, no, no, no. Turn on the news. This is the herd line news. So, Doc Prescott said the Cowboys, 23-0-0-0-0-th, shutout, lost to the Colts yesterday. Quote, definitely hurts. It was the first time Dallas was shut out on a game since November 16th, 2003. That's a 12-0-0 lost to the Patriots. And the loss also snapped the Cowboys' five-game

win streak and cost them a chance to clinch the NFC East. Here is DAC on the shutout. Any competitor never wants to get shut out. I mean, the shutout definitely hurts. The shutout pisses you off, especially when you're down there, and you're down there early in the red zone. You have opportunity to score and you don't. So, yeah, 100%.

We've got to find ways to capitalize and score in the red zone. And that starts there. We do that. We don't get shut out. We can't win like that. Hurting ourselves, simple as that. playing behind the chains, penalties, sacks, whatever it may be,

incompletions. We just hurt ourselves from the beginning all the way to the end, and we never really gave ourselves a chance. For the record, he's great at a microphone. Always says the right stuff. He's ticked off, and, you know, Patriot, or Cowboy fans are ticked off.

So the first thing he says when he comes to the microphone, I'm pissed, so all the Cowboy fans are like, okay, he's owning it, he's mad. So Cowboy fans are mad, he's mad. But I go back to something here. Joy. You only get upset in life if you don't match expectations. The Cowboys were underdogs in Vegas. The people that are upset this morning thought that we're going to go in there with the division

wrapped up, you think, and roll indie. I don't know why they got that. I did not think that the Cowboys were going to win this game. I didn't think they were going to get shut out, but I didn't think that they were going to win this game. This is a classic trap game. Indies at home. Indy has more to play with. You have a decided advantage at quarterback Indianapolis, and Dak and the Cowboys had come off some really, really important wins. This was your classic let-dash. Even their defense, by the way, their run defense.

Goulet, you love your Cowboys. The Colts ran the football with a fourth-rounder Marlon Mack. This was an effort game. Now, I still think it's hard to overcome beating Andrew Luck when I have Dak in Indy. But even their defense, just don't let expectations get you angry. No, I mean, it was a dud, but they have, they have Tampa Bay next week, so they'll have an opportunity to wrap up the division at home against Tampa Bay, and then they have the Giants to end of the season.

So see how the rest of the season goes for that. So LeBron had a very rough game against the Wizards last night when the Lakers played another, well, very rare a dud, second night of a back-to-back. He shot five for 16 from the field. Yeah. Missed both of his three-point attempts and half of his six free-throw attempts. He had four turnovers, more turnovers than assists, three assists. He has the worst game of the year probably.

Yeah, and this just came one day after he had a triple double and a win against Charlotte. He was LeBron after the game. We're a team that's built on energy and depth, and we didn't have either tonight. I don't think we're the only team that probably will have a back-to-back like this. We just try to find a way. But tonight, we didn't have our way. The positives of the season is we've gotten better every week since the season starting every month. And if we continue to do that, when April hits, we'll be right where we want to be.

That's a smart quote. They've been better month-a-month. They're a better team every month. That's a great quote by LeBron. Last night was the classic. You could tell seven minutes into that. I was watching that game on a little device, and I'm like seven minutes into it.

John Wall's on fire, and I'm like, Lakers are done. Like the Lakers' body language was bad. They just didn't come to play. No, and when LeBron's playing like that, if you don't have a superstar next to you, that's what's going to happen. I mean, it's a game against the Wizards in December,

I don't think anyone's freaking out. But this is the example of you need a second guy that's going to go out there and dominate and lift everyone when LeBron is struggling like that and he rarely struggles like that. Finally, sticking with basketball, the Knicks are no stranger to mediocrity. They have been for nearly

two decades and fans have long clamored for owner James Dolan to sell the team. Please. So in a profile of Dolan from ESPN's Ian O'Connor, Dolan said he doesn't have any plans to sell the team but he wouldn't rule it out. He said you hear numbers all the time.

I think people have sent feelers out but never any that were pursued. the feelers are around $5 billion, but those things, it's like stock price. It's only important if you're going to buy or sell. I could never say that I wouldn't consider selling the Knicks. And of course, this has sent everyone into a frenzy at the mere idea and possibility that he may actually sell the Nix.

I don't think he's going to sell the Nix. Well, he's a rich guy's kid and he likes his music and he's not, you know, he's a smart guy. He's a bad owner. That doesn't mean he's a bad human being. He's not a good, you know, Joy, it's funny about this. Paul Allen passed away in Seattle. Paul, Iowa was found as an NFL owner, was a great owner. He had money.

He was very supportive, but he stayed away and knew what he wasn't. James Dolan shares some of those qualities, but the difference is I think James Dolan doesn't ever give anything time. Fire a GM. Fire a coach. Get rid of a player. Well, I think James Dolan is very. and rumored to be a little more meddling

than that. And he's impatient. Right. He's impatient. He medals. And more than anything else. Like the Knicks being the franchise that they are and historic and in New York City and a, you know, a basketball mecca, to have a dysfunctional team to the point where free agents don't even want to go there.

Think about this. Here's what's amazing about the NBA. The New York, Philadelphia, and D.C., these are huge. huge eastern markets have mostly been dysfunctional for 20 years, and the NBA is still very popular league. It's probably the second most, second or third most popular sports league in America. They've gotten no favors. I mean, the clippers now are good, and I think they're going to get Kauai Leonard, so the clippers are fine. But the NBA over the last 15 years, their best run teams have been small markets.

I mean, can you imagine in the NFL if Tampa Bay led their division and it was Buffalo? But in the NFL right now, I get Chicago. I get it, Dallas. Well, yeah, I mean, luckily, what the NBA has done is taking advantage of its youth and social media. Yes. And the ability for anyone to be a fan of any player and raising the star. Plus, it's a global game. So that helps the NBA in its popularity widely.

That they could use the Knicks, though. But yes, of course we could use the Knicks. It would be amazing. How amazing would it be if the Knicks were actually a relevant team? Can you imagine if the Cowboys for 25 years were irrelevant? I mean, the Knicks have been irrelevant for two decades, and the NBA is still popular. It's a mess. Joy with the News.

Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping by. The Hurd-Ly News. I said this. Trent Delfare's coming up, so don't go anywhere. You know, I said this yesterday. I was talking to somebody about this. Friday on the show, I said, you're going to see Andrew Luck, and you're going to see

Dak Prescott. And Dak Prescott is going to be driving a Lamborghini to work. He's got a great front seven. he's got an elite left tackle, a superstar running back, a true number one. It's got pro bowlers everywhere. And the defense is better. And Andrew Luck's driving a Camry. He's got one really nice wide receiver who drops it too much for my taste.

But Eric Ebron, his tight end was a semi-bust in Detroit. Marlon Max, a fourth rounder, two rookies on the offensive line, best defensive players are rookie, and they were on full display. And Andrew Luck, seven years in the NFL, has still never had the weapons that Dak Prescott. has and completely dominated him yesterday is that I wish fans and sometimes the media would understand. Bucky Brooks is a former player. Bucky Brooks has a great line.

He says quarterbacks are tractors or their trailers. Andrew Luck is a tractor. He can pull a team. Dak Prescott's a trailer. Good teammates pull him. Here's Bucke Brooks on our show about a year ago. Quarterbacks come in two forms. They're either trucks or their trailers,

meaning trucks, they can carry the team. It doesn't matter what they have around them. They can still find a way to get you to the winter circle. Trailers are guys who have to depend on the rest of the pieces around them to really support them. The overwhelming majority of the league are trailers. It's just, do you have the people around you that can put the pieces in place that allow you to play at a high level?

And yesterday they were parked right next to each other. The truck and the trailer were parked right next to each other. each other. By the way, Zeke had 85 yards. That's not bad, but Dak needs more. Amari Cooper had four catches. That's not bad. Dak needs more. His offensive line was still better than Lux, but one of his stars like Zach Martin's out. And this was a classic example. Add context to it. Lamar Jackson's four and one as a starter. He's got way better coaching and players than Sam Darnel. does. Add context to quarterback

discussions. This was a great example of a Lamborghini park next to a Camry. And what luck has been able to do for seven years in this league, he just finally has an offensive line. Look at his numbers.

They still need a number two receiver. They'll probably consider Levian Bell at running back. Maybe, maybe not. Maybe not fit their culture. They still need, you know, a pass rusher. They still need to be better defensively up front at linebacker.

So we too often have no context to what these guys do. I like parts of DAC, but he entered this league with the best offensive line and probably the best running back in football. Luck has still never had anything

close to resembling that. Trent Dilfer, around the corner. Coming up on New Year's Eve, The Red Box Bowl kicks off between Oregon and Michigan State at 2.30 Eastern on Fox. Then flip over to FS1 as number 17 Utah battles number 22 Northwestern in the San Diego County Credit Union Holiday Bowl at 630 Eastern or catch it all on the Fox Sports app. I'll take Michigan State and Utah. Utah's 11 of 12 bowl games under Kyle Whittingham. He's 11 and 1, which is just a ridiculous. No, that's way better than Nick Sabin or Urban Meyer.

I'll take Utah and I'll take Michigan State. Michigan State's another great bowl team. they've won five of six. With that, we go to a guy who played in this league for a decade and a half, a pro-bowl or a Super Bowl winner via the Coward Global Satellite Network. Trent Dilfer. All right, I look to you for wisdom on these Mondays. Brady's decline.

I don't want to overreact to it, but we got 40-year-old guy. Gronk and Edelman are past the prime. I mean, Gronk's perhaps in his last year. Do you see light at the end of the tunnel for New England the rest of the year? I actually do. And I also see all the things have been talked about. It doesn't look right. They look older than they have in the past. They look slower than they have in the past. But I also think they've also gone through a change schematically. I believe they entered this season really trying to go old school at their offense. And it fit their personnel at the time. Big offensive linemen. Some of the biggest offensive alignment they've had in a long time. A new running back, multiple running backs, but a new guy. Sonny Michelle, that's a really young, a good young player. Not sure what was going to happen at the wide receiver's position outside the numbers especially. So they tried to play a ball control, slow the game down, player of the personnel, and mainly

protect their defense offense. And it hasn't worked when it doesn't really fit what Tom Brady does best. Can he do it? Absolutely. And there's times he looks spectacular doing it. But what he does best and where I think they will go here for the next two weeks and into the playoffs is more of their old spread uptempo offense, where they spread you boundary to boundary with running backs, tight ends displaced outside receivers, and create more space.

And when you do that, it does a couple things. It's what makes them best. One, it gives Bronc more room to work with. It takes advantage of his size more than playing him in a scrum. It allows James White be much more involved in the offense. And what happens there is more run after catch. It allows Edelman to work the middle of field without help defenders where he's great one-on-one. And what I think it will do is it'll allow Josh Gordon now to be the explosive guy.

It'll move from Gromk being the guy that used to go to explosive plays with to Gordon. And they can move them now that he's integrated in the offense from the perimeter inside, which you saw the Steelers do yesterday with Antonio Brown, where they lined them up in the tight-end position or the slot position's great big plays. I think if they go spread, what you'll see is these older guys now take advantage of what they do best. Use their brains, use decision making, use the space on the field, and just say, hey, we're willing to get in the shootouts. And I'll take the Patriots in that situation. Yeah, more James White, less Sony-Michel, perhaps.

Okay, Rams. Are the Rams fools gold? I think they're fools gold because nobody else is great. Again, they have massive holes. They're terrible against the run. Those two great interior defense alignment. they care about is hitting the quarterback. They're out of position all the time. The linebacker level isn't stout. They get bullied around. The secondary is getting run by. I see all the same

stuff. At the same time, they have difference makers on defense. And if they play well offensively and you get ahead of you, then those difference makers can really have an impact. Offensively, they're obviously in a funk. But I give Sean McVeigh a lot of credit. I think he'll be a lot like Bill Belichick and the other great coaches in this league. They'll do a great self-scout this week and they'll go back six, seven, eight weeks and they'll look at trends, what's made them good, what's made them bad. And they'll start morphing their offense back into what the players do best. And I think the Rams can make a run just because they're that explosive offensively. By the way, the two teams that kind of look the same to me are the Cowboys and the Bears where most

of their top players are on defense. In fact, I think pro football focus has the Bears eight best players on defense, and they have quarterbacks that we've briefly elevated, but I think Dak and Trubisky have low ceilings. I think the Bears and Cowboys are the same team. What say you? I'd add the Ravens to that mix, too. I think there's buckets right now. I think depending on what happens tonight, tonight there's a chance for the Saints to just

distance themselves and put their flag in the ground and say we're the only great team in football. If they can do that, then I'd put a bathtub full of teams that could possibly make a run. And then within that bathtub, there's two different buckets. There's the high ceiling, low floor buckets. There's your chiefs. There's your Rams. There's some of those teams.

There's your low ceiling, high floor teams. Those are your Cowboys, Ravens, Bears. I totally agree with you. But right now, nobody's great in the NFL. Everybody has massive holes, not just holes. And we've talked about this, I think, every week. That's what happens. You're paying your quarterback, $25 million.

It's not enough money to spread around to have quality death. But I think the other thing that's going on, too, is there's not a head coach in this league that on a Monday afternoon as they're watching films a Tuesdays or game planning going, oh, we got this one. We know we're better than the team we're playing. I mean, Pete Carroll had to play the Niners this week. And you think the Seahawks are way better than the Niners. I guarantee you Pete Carroll is like, oh, my gosh, I can see 10 ways we can lose this game. Yeah. You know, every coach is looking at it's like, we're not that good.

We have to play a very particular way, a very specific way in order to win. And if we get outside of that formula, we can be in trouble. Explain to me, Michael Vick did earlier. I love Carson Wentz, and I think Nick Foles is a world-class, best backup in the league with Jacoby Brissette. That's what I think he is. Maybe I'm wrong. But when Foles plays and Wentz sits, Alshan Jeffries better. Like, what's going on with Philadelphia?

I think this is a common trend I've seen for years now. What happens is coaches naturally rely too much on their superstar quarterback. There's a natural laziness that goes into the week of preparation. And the conversations go something like this. Do we want to work another two hours on trying to figure out five to eight scheme-driven plays that can give us some free offense or do we just want to trust our dude? Because our dude comes through all the time, whether he's Andrew Luck, Carson, Wentz, on Brady, Drew Brays, yada, yada, yada, yada.

And they stop it. Let's just trust our dude. He'll make plays. We need him to make plays. And then the backup comes in. They're like, whoa, we have to help this guy. We have to do a lot of stuff offensively to get others involved and really help him out. This has to be a coach-driven game more than a quarterback-driven game.

The problem I have with that is that if you go to Bill Wall Street at Joe Montana and Steve Young exactly the same, he was still going to try to help him. Mike Marks, no matter who his quarterback was, was always going to search and grind to find the best games and help them. I think what happens too often is we think these quarterbacks, I've used this a million times. I'll use again, have Superman capes on. Like they literally can do anything. And what they'll all tell you is, no, we'd love some help. We'd love 10 freebies a game.

We'd love you some coach-centric offense to make our job a little bit easier. But sometimes that doesn't happen. So when Nick Bowles comes in, all of a sudden, I'm watching them do some stuff to come out. I haven't seen that the last few weeks. No wonder guys are getting wide open. Imagine if they did that when they had Carson wins. Trend Dill for a decade and a half in the NFL, Pro Bowl, Super Bowl. My coach of the year is Matt Nagy.

I think he's doing more offensively with less. Sean McVeigh is doing some cool stuff, but he's got more to work with. I think they're a great story. But let's talk about Green Bay that lost 0 and 7 on the road this year. Yesterday, Aaron got nicked up a little, 35 years old. been last couple of years banged up he's now very expensive if i said to you next five years for erin rogers what are they going to look like trent depends who comes in there and we talked about us a couple weeks ago this has to be a strong person now this has to be someone who's going to

come in and say you know erin we're doing everything we can to help you we're going to make this more quarterback friendly uh we're going to work our butts off because you can have success uh but you're going to play the game our way and you're going to do this our way um This has to be a staff that comes in and earns his respect, but at the same time demands and pulls a ton out of him. There's so much more in the tank than what we're seeing from Aaron Rogers. It has truly become a frenetic sandbox type offense. He doesn't look comfortable.

He doesn't trust the people around him. He doesn't trust his scheme. This needs to look a lot more like the Kansas City Chiefs and Chicago Bears than it does what you're watching right now. By the way, you said this to me in a text about two, two, three months ago, man, the chargers are good, aren't they? Holy. Trent, backs, receivers, corners. Are they good enough to win the Super Bowl, not having a home game?

If they're healthy, they're just so nicked up and they got to get healthy. Imagine if they get all these pieces together, Tina Allen with the hit pointer now. They've missed score in the last couple weeks. But yeah, they have depth at the skill position. Offensively, on offensive line, they're way, more physical. And that's what I saw early in the year. They're way more physical than they've ever been. And Philip is making better decisions. He's processing faster. Philip was always the guy that read everything deep to short. I mean, he was always looking to pull out the machete on

every play. And now he's pulling out the scalpel. Now he's willing to go into death by a thousand cuts and just nick you to death. And his decision making, if he can maintain that, and it slipped a little bit the other night, but if he can maintain that high level decision making with the offensive talent they have. And then again, a defense that has a difference maker at all three levels. Defensive front, the lineback position, and now the secondary position with Derwin James. You don't have to be great on defense. You just have to have enough difference makers that make big plays at big times. Yeah, and it is a bizarre story where they don't really have a true home field advantage. Trent Dillfer. Great talking to you, bud. Thanks, brother.

All right, good stuff. Sean Merriman outspoken, going to join us last hour of the show. Plus, We do the three word game in the NFL. I can describe every NFL outcome in three words, including the one I did not watch. I have to pick a game every week. I didn't watch. I pick one this weekend. And I haven't talked about it because I didn't watch it. And I'm not going to pretend I did.

Special people in your life. Show them how much you appreciate them. Go to 1-800flowers.com code heard. 1-800flowers.com code heard. Get 12 holiday lights roses for 2999, another dozen, and a vase free. Hour 3 next. Be sure to catch live editions of The Herd, weekdays in noon Eastern, 9 a.m. Pacific. Hour 3, baby.

Here we go. This is The Herd, wherever you may be in. However, you may be listening. Iheart radio, Fox Sports Radio, FS1, show is rolled today. Michael Vick's been on. Trent Dilfer. Ben Volan hammered the Patriots from New England.

14 of the 16 games next weekend can clinch a playoff spot. It's incredible. Playoff teams. 14 of the 16 have playoff teams. That's incredible. This league is on fire. This is the best NFL season of my – I've said this to you, Joy. It's the best NFL season of my life. The good quarterbacks are almost overwhelmingly healthy. We've got a bunch of new quarterbacks I love watching play. Good God. Josh Allen won this weekend. Baker won this weekend. Well, yeah, the rookie quarterback. Lamar Jackson and Donald was great and didn't win. But God, the young quarterbacks are everywhere.

And your dolphins will finish 500. What's new? You know. Every year. One of these years, we'll catch on to the wave. Let me try Wildcat again. That was a good year for us. The Wildcat year.

Yeah, let's do something like that. Change it up. Just a new offense. God, it's just been an unbelievable year. So 15 minutes from now, the always outspoken. Former NFL linebacker, great Sean. Merriman stops by. Best for last.

we sum up every NFL game in three words. But the Eagles beat the Rams in Los Angeles last night. Rams have now dropped two straight, and their cool head coach, Sean McVeigh, knows they need to turn things around. We've got to be able to figure this out and figure it out fast because these last couple weeks, we're doing things that are totally uncharacteristic

of what good football teams do, what we've done through the first handful of games this season. got a hand in this and we got to get it figured out fast. Two months ago, on this show, I peeled back off the Rams. I said, I don't buy this team. Too much glitz. Too much glamour. Too many stars.

No depth. They'll pay a price for this. Everybody was slobbering over Sean McVeigh, smarter than everybody else. What has this team done? They never won a playoff game. Folks, here's the truth about the Rams. They're building a $5 billion. stadium, the most expensive stadium in America.

And they just brought the team to town. They are selling PSLs like crazy, and they signed stars and overpaid for them so they can sell personal seat licenses and pay some of the bill. It's a lot of sales pitch. It's a lot of glamour. It's a lot of glitz. The Chargers cross town have none of it and have a much deeper roster and a much better roster.

Indomican Sioux, no longer productive. Akeeb Talib, like him a lot, past his prime. Dante Fowler was a busting Jacksonville and they gave up draft picks for him. Brandon Cooks, receiver, disappears in big games. Third team, three years. Ask yourself, if I'm wrong and this is not about sales, pitch and glitz, what have they accomplished? Head coach of the year, offensive player of the year, defensive player of the year,

special teams, code to the year, all personal accomplishments. If you overpay for anything in any business, you overpay for employees, You overpay for parts. You overpay for services rendered. You overpay on your lease. If you overpay on stuff, you're going to have to save money elsewhere. They don't have any depth. The chargers don't have the stars across town, but they have depth.

Three great receivers, four running backs who can play. Rams have one, Todd Gurley. Harts an ankle, limps a little, they're toast. Now I got nothing against the Rams. I think the Rams are interesting. I think they're good. but a lot of this story so far is sales pitch and glamour and oh wow and personal accomplishments December and January in the NFL okay attrition sets in who's good right now the bears the bears have

one star player and a bunch of good cheap young players in depth Baltimore who are Baltimore stars they got a lot of depth chargers I mean they're star Rivers? I mean, Boas is a good player, but he didn't play for like two and a half months. This is the time of the year when you need depth and that overpaid, marginally productive stars aren't worth it. I think the Rams actually are very lucky. They're in a division where Arizona is in a complete rebuild.

And San Francisco lost their quarterback and is in a rebuild. In Seattle, it's in a marginal rebuild. but they're still in a rebuild. Okay? So can they turn it around? I think this is their reality. They have a $5 billion stadium. They're brand new to town in a very competitive market with the Dodgers and LeBron and the Lakers and a lot of college teams.

And they got to sell PSLs and they got a $5 billion stadium. And they overpaid for a lot of guys you've heard of in Domenzou, Akeep Tili, Brandon Cooks was on the Saints, it was on the Patriots, He was in playoff games. In the end, I got no depth. All right, let me shift gears to this. One of the reasons I like the NFL more than college football, I learn stuff. Seasons are long.

Team start hot. They have injuries. You learn a lot during NFL season. This weekend is we thought we were going to get all the clinching. It was all the chaos. Let me ask you, yesterday the Cowboys get shut out. People are freaking out. What did we really learn about the Dallas Cowboys yesterday?

Dax Limited. we all kind of knew that, right, other than the fanboys? They lost on the road off emotional wins with less to play for and a team with a superstar quarterback. You do realize Las Vegas favored the Colts. It was our bet of the week. Fanboys and pom-pom waivers in the media got shocked. Every pro-gambler in America was on the Colts.

There was no new discovery here. Dallas has had one transformation, moment this year, that win over New Orleans. Yesterday, shut out by the Colts, didn't learn anything. That doesn't mean anything. I look for games when I learned something. You know what I learned yesterday in the Colts Cowboys game? That the Colts offensive lines and defensive lines with a bunch of young guys are

way ahead of schedule. Like, this is a rebuilding year for the Colts. We didn't even know if Andrew Luck's soup bone was good. It was rebuild the O line, rebuild the D line, and then they'll have a bunch of cap space. Oh, hell. Yesterday, I'm watching that game. I'm watching their own line. Running lanes wide open.

I'm watching their D line. Big pressure on DAC. That's the only thing we learned yesterday that Indianapolis is ahead of schedule on their rebuild. By the way, the Colts have now shut out and dominated a division leader. Cowboys, and then snapped an eight, nine game winning streak with another division leader, Texans the week before. Don't get caught up in the shutout. Excuse me, but didn't the Colts get shut out three weeks ago?

We didn't learn anything in that game. When the Colts got shut out by the Jags, I didn't even talk about it. Why? Andrew Luck suddenly no good? They were on the road against a talented defense, coming off some emotional wins. They had some nice before that emotional wins. They went on the road. They didn't match the urgency of Jacksonville.

And they went down there and Jack got defensive players and pressure and they got overwhelmed and didn't score a thing. And who cares? Well, you forget about it. A week later, nobody cared. Nobody cares about this Dallas game. Dallas is exactly what we thought they were going into the game. Really good young defensive talent, especially in the front seven, superstar running back who needs to play really, really well and give you about 130,

150 yards for DAC to be more effective. But if DAC doesn't get Zeke's 140 yards, didn't, doesn't get Amari Cooper breaking tackles for touchdowns, didn't. The Cowboys had more than average penalties, did. Well, Dak's not going to do much against an aggressive young defense that's way better than anybody thought at this point. the reason I like the NFL more than college football, I feel like I learn things week to week.

It's a week-to-week league. Alabama Clemson going to play for the national title again. I'm not learning much. Dallas is fine. They're going to be a playoff team. They're going to host a playoff game. And if it's low scoring and DAC get support, they'll win that game. But if Zeeke runs for 80 yards and they have a few penalties and Amari Cooper gets

doubled and taken away, then Dallas won't win a playoff game. And what I learned, you don't want any part of Indianapolis. They are playing with house money. Be very careful about these young teams that are ahead of schedule that aren't supposed to be good until next year, the Colts playing with no pressure, a red-hot quarterback, a coach and a quarterback aligned with tremendously talented rookies and first-year players all over the roster. That's the only thing I learned.

The outspoken, former great linebacker, Sean Merriman is coming up next in our three-word NFL game. VicSynex nasal spray uses directed 12 hours cold and flu seasons here. Sean Merriman played for almost a decade in the NFL. He was a defensive player of the year in a multiple-time pro bowler. 40 sacks on his first three NFL seasons he's joining us. By the way, it's been the craziest year. I think I feel like the saints of the best team, Trent Dilfer said this. There's about eight teams I really like, maybe 10, and everybody else.

If the Saints go out and get blown out tonight, I don't know what the hell is going on to this league. I can't figure it out. No. It's wide open. I think the Saints are the best team. Yeah. They are. Chargers and Saints.

Yeah, I agree. I agree with that. I think the Chargers have the best roster. I think, by the way, I think Kansas City is an inch behind. So I would say this. If the Saints win tonight, Saints, Chargers, Chiefs. Do you buy that, Joy? if the Saints win tonight

Saints, Chargers, Chiefs, three best teams? Yeah. I mean, I'm still not going to count the Patriots out in the playoffs. Oh, boy, they looked like crud yesterday. They looked bad yesterday. I think that's your Miami talking to you. Yeah, this is also just Tom Brady

still plays for that team. And I agree with that because it doesn't matter what Tom Brady does right now. You just can't count them out when it's time to go win games. Right now, for them, that wasn't a must-win game. That's true. I mean, it was.

I'm not saying it doesn't count, but it wasn't a must-win game. When the game is on the line and they got to win football, and I know, I'm speaking from experience, they put me out of plenty of playoffs. They win football games even when they counted out by everybody else. They just know how to win when the game's on the line. Right now the game's not on the line for them. You know, Sean, it is funny. This time of the year, I want to talk about two things.

You know, Jared Goff's arm looks like it's tired. Tom Brady, again in December, his worst month. Take me back to your career, which lasted about eight years. It's December, it's mid-December. Christmas is coming up. How did you feel? Terrible. I mean, you know, just the injuries that I had that kind of accumulated over the years,

built up and built up. And it's funny because after your fifth year or six year, it takes about an extra half a day to a day to feel normal again. Friday morning. Yeah, first three, four years, you find you can come in and Monday and work out and Wednesday you feel completely fine. You might have a little ankle or something like that. When you get past your fifth, sixth, sixth, sixth, and seventh,

year and eight plus years, you don't get healthy until Friday, Saturday. So you walk into the game just barely healthy enough to feel good and go out and play. I can't imagine what Tom Brady is. I don't care. I don't care of his body. Sure. But he can't walk in, even at this point, he can't walk into a game feeling 100%. I can't see it, especially this time of the year. Yeah, that's why I think depth is important. I think the Bears have depth. I think the Chargers have depth. I think Baltimore more has depth. I want to talk to you about the Rams. So I watched them last night.

And about two months ago, I had said this joy listening, I said, I'm going to bail on this team because I see a bunch of big names on the marquee, but I don't see the production defensively. What is happening? Explain this to me, because you know Wade Phillips. Yeah. Did you play with him in Buffalo? No, no.

And with the Chargers. Well, Chargers. Something's up with this defensive line. Explain it to our audience. Now, you know, I always said if you look at Wade Phillips in the history of, you know, of just him being either head coach or defensive coordinator. He's always had two outside guys, either two outside linebackers or two DNs. Go back to Bruce Smith.

To rush the passer. The rush the passer. And Cornelia's been in, but Zave back in Buffalo, you go back in, when he was with us, he said he had myself and Sean Phillips with the Cowboys. He had DeMarcus Ware. You know, they always had a tandem of outside guys to go and base his defense around. It was always about outside pass rushers. Look at the double-digit numbers that these guys gotten over his, you know,

20-year career. He's been a coach. he doesn't have that. His two best guys are an inside. So all they're doing for the most part is rushing up field. Aaron, Donald, the Dominican, Sue. Is that why they're getting gashed against the run? And getting gashed.

Because this defense, the way Phil has been so grateful for so long, has always been based on the outside guys. Now it's these two interior guys. And now they're having to do the work, which caused that wide open gap in the middle. Because Aaron and Indomicon are just going for sacks. Right. And in the process, because that's what I,

I'm seeing. I'm seeing a defense I don't trust. Now it is interesting. The Rams were very good early. Now they're struggling. How do you turn it around? Like have you been on teams? You know, Joey and I talk about this. There's pre- Thanksgiving. There's post- Thanksgiving. Then there's playoff football. And they all feel different. Well, you know, the problem is when you have teams, not put the Cowboys in there, too, you don't want to be going into the playoffs and doing this. You're going to the playoffs and you're starting to hit a wall and you got guys banged up and you're not clicking on all cylinders. That's, that's where the problem is. They've been like that in the past, too. Kansas City.

Kansas City. They've been great early. Great early. And then now you've seen the charges beat them. You've seen them struggle a little bit against the Ravens. And they started to do a little bit of this. And then when that happens, going into the playoffs, it starts to take a hit your momentum. That's what's happening to the Rams.

They were so good early on. And then we're starting to see certain parts of their defense. I think they ranked 20 or 20 or something or whatever. And they got three or four superstars in their defense. They probably can be superstars to any team. That's hard to deal with that many personalities

in trying to figure out what that person is good at and doing it one season like they're doing right now, and they're kind of being exposed. Yeah. So we've asked this to Trent Dilfer and Michael Vick about Philadelphia is a fascinating team. So we know Philadelphia's got a bunch of good players, and we know they enter the season with a bunch of injuries,

and we think we know that Carson Wentz is better than Nick Foles. But Carson Wentz gets hurt. Nick comes in, and our offense was a machine for the first three quarters. explain to me how the backup in Philly, I mean, Carson Wentz was going to be an MVP a couple years ago. We know Carson's 6-5, Rocket Arm, Mobile. But Nick Foles comes in, something happens when he comes in. The offense looks special. You know, Nick Foles is a great spark plug.

He's the guy who you want to play with if something happens. He's not a great player being a starter, in my opinion, and just watching him. He's the kind of guy to go out there and you have fun, he's throwing a ball, and, you know, the huddles, everybody's energized, a locker room. Nick Foote's going to come in and get it done, but he's not a general. He's not a guy that you're going to start from day one on the season, and you can win football games. But now, if Carson wins goes down and he needs to step in because he's fun to play with, he's going coming in and have some backyard football and throwing him around, it's a change of pace for

these guys. But if he had to start this season of game one, he wouldn't be successful. That's kind of what I see with Lamar Jackson. This is fun. He started in week 11. Nobody has film on him. And he's doing stuff. And you can tell defenses are, they don't know what to do with Lamar.

My question with Lamar Jackson is, starts week one, plays to 16, can he stay healthy? Because when I see Lamar, I see a fairly slight guy running. Now, if he stays healthy the rest of the year, that gives him another offseason, tweak the offense, get him more pass friendly. But, I mean, you've seen a lot of these guys. You've seen running quarterback. Tebow, not sustainable, RG3. Is Lamar sustainable? You know, that's really the big question.

I think that's what a problem is going to happen too. When you're a young guy like Lamar Jackson, if you don't understand what's going on out there in the field, and I'm not seeing the playbook, but defenses and other things, you've got one thing you can do to get yourself out of every situation, and that's run the football. That stops at some point in time. It's going to be enough hits.

There's going to be enough people trying to figure you out. They're going to start having linebackers and defensive players and start spying the quarterback so he can't run and they're going to force him to throw the ball, so that's going to be taken away from him. Right now he's a great band-aid. a change of pace from Flacco and that's doing a lot for this organization and they're okay with that because if that can win you some football games and progress you're seeing you know

have some progress during the season. By the way, Sean, he is, he does add juice to the locker room. Oh yeah. He's fine. Flacco was just, I was just done with Flacco. Right. You can tell the team, I mean, you've played with guys, you add them into the locker room and they add juice to the locker room. Yeah, and that's what, you know, that's what he is. With Flacco, it was already, it was already said in stone when Lamar Jackson got drafted that he was on the way out of there it was just a matter of when it was going to happen so you've seen the morale you've seen his body language everything was just kind of going down he just wasn't it wasn't exciting anymore you know mar Jackson getting there now the defense I mean I can tell the defense out of the ball we we love to hey yeah go run the ball you know do this just keep us excited give us something to go out there and play the next series for on defense and we're happy it's crazy right now this is I don't remember a season quite like this. For you, obviously, you played a majority of your career with the San Diego Chargers. So you played with Philip Rivers. I've always thought Philip would get my vote as a Hall of Famer. I watch them on the road. It's so different because

they don't have a home field. I mean, they do, but they don't. You know Charger players here. You know the organization. I mean, what do you make of this Charger team? I think it's the best team roster. I think it's the best team in the league. They are. And I've been saying that. It's hard to say it because people automatically see your homer. You know, you play for the team, you're going to talk good about the organization or whatnot, but that's not the case at all. You know, Philip's been having an MVP type of year the whole entire season.

Why did it take one Thursday night game against Kansas City Chief before somebody say, oh, we're going to put him up there in the MVP talks now? He's been doing well the whole entire season. Why put him up there now? Do you need one game against a Kansas City Chief team that was bad on defense anyway? Did you need him to win a close game in Pittsburgh? No, I think that Philip, people have this thing in their mind about Philip, whether they like him or not, whether he should be a Hall of Fame or not should be. And they've already decided.

And they've already decided whether he's what they feel about him. So no matter how he's, no matter how he plays, no matter what the team does, he's not ever going to get the credit that he deserves. Yeah, you know, it's funny about that. Andrew Luck threw a lot of interceptions early in his career. And there's a lot of people now that have made up their mind, Andrew Luck was a bunch of interceptions. And I'm like, no, no, no, no. He finally now has an offensive line and a decent running game. He doesn't throw them as much.

People tend to, in sports, make up their mind on you. And they just, they won't move off it. And it's the reality in this game is especially for quarterbacks, they just, they grow. Coaches grow. There's coaches in this league. I'll be honest with Chargers, Anthony Lynn is a better coach today than two years ago. I think he's become a better coach. They're much better situationally.

his first couple years in the league he'd never been a head coach and you're like i don't trust him now late in games i'm like i like his play calling i like him yeah when he went for two you know it was like totally i was like i trust him i kind of it's funny we tend to forget in college football if you lose a game people just write you off teams improve over the course of seasons right and i don't know i think i think chargers are an amazing team you still talk to philip at all yeah talk to him all the time he's a trash talker yeah you know he's another one of When he's running off the field in Kansas City, he was waving at the fans. Some of the fans who were heckling him the whole game.

Now, if you're on the opposing team, you don't like it. But if you play for him, I like, if you're heckling my quarterback the whole entire game and he weighs back at you running off the field, we love it. Great. Good seeing you, buddy. Good seen you, too. Sean Mirman. Joy Taylor with the news.

No, no, no, no. Turn on the news. This is the herd line news. So the prounds are a little different this year. They came into the season with a lot of attention, and then they did some losing and fired Hugh Jackson. But they've seemed to turn it around a little bit. They snapped an 11 game losing streak on Saturday against the Broncos that dated back to 1991. Against the Broncos?

They lost to Denver 11 straight times. Back to 1991. That was four years before Baker Mayfield was born. So the Broncos have owned the Browns for a while. Wow. Well, Nick Chubb has an explanation for the spark that's gone on in the past weeks. our energy has shifted into a better place and the guys are all buying in.

We all love playing with each other. We love the people that's coaching us. I think everyone just bought into the new system and we're playing hard for each other. It's going to be an interesting offseason for the Browns because the way that they have been playing since Greg Williams has taken over puts them in an awkward position

where the guys who are there have clearly bought into the situation, but do you think that he's the long-term solution because you need a long-term solution? because you need a long-term solution. Well, he's got the Bounty Gate stuff. You know, I was talking to Jimmy Johnson, you know, legendary Jimmy Johnson coach yesterday,

and he said, I hope they give Greg the job. I know him. He goes, you know, he's got a little baggage and stuff, but he's a grown-up, he's a man. I think the Bounty Gate stuff hurts him. I also thought he had a bizarre coaching move late in this game, not kicking the field goal. That's bizarre.

I don't know. You know, here's what I would warn people. don't live in the moment. Tim Tebow won six straight games. Is he for 10 years the best thing for Baker Mayfield? Well, that's what I'm saying. You don't want to lose the momentum that you've built in this season, especially coming off of, well, I think that the energy and the direction of the organization

is important, especially for the Browns, having been so historically dysfunctional. But like you said, you need a long-term solution. You need somebody there who has proven sustained success or least consistency in that situation because you took Baker Mayfield number one overall and you need to turn the franchise around. So this constant turnover of coaches has to stop at some point, you would think. But he's going to make it difficult because he has at least temporarily turned it around. So there seemed to be a little deja vu last night with Nick Foles leading the Eagles to a win over the Rams. It was the same this place last year that the Foles came in and to,

Fill in for Carson Wentz and started that run to Super Bowl victory and he was looking pretty good last night. And after the game, Bowles was asked if he was thinking about the future and he admits that he can't help but look ahead sometimes. That part does creep in. I do say there is a human side, but no, I'm very self-aware of those distractions don't do any good. I really thrive and staying in the moment and just enjoying it. And we'll see what happens. But I really just want to enjoy the moment and just being present and all I do, that's why I try to focus on daily. Is he the nicest kid ever?

He is very nice. There are certain players in the NFL, you're like, that seems like a nice kid. They also play better with him in there. It's bizarre. It is. I mean, it's, I mean, do people really think that Carson Wentz is not, like, that he's better than Carson Wentz? But sometimes people are just a better fit. Yeah, I still.

I mean, imagine if they went out. It'll be just funny. You know, this year, like I think here's what's going to be funny. If the Saints get blown out tonight and Nick Foles wins on the way out and they win a playoff game, we're all going to be like, what the hell happened this year? What, this is the craziest year? Because I feel like right now this minute, the Saints are the Best team, and there's about eight really good teams. What if the Saints get shailed and what if Nick Foles wins four straight games?

This year, I wouldn't be surprised because it's so bizarre. They have the Texans at home next week. and then they're on the road against Washington. Well, they're going to win the Washington, so they're going to be at least one-on-one. I mean, they just beat the Rams on the road. No, and it wasn't close. It really wasn't.

They went into a pre-bent offense late. First three-quarters, it was an utter... I mean, I think the Texans, the Eagles is going to be a good game, but you can't just assume the Texans are going to beat them there. And finally, the Lakers dropped the dud against the Wizards last night, and several of the players were quick to point out that, you know, it's a second night of a back-to-back. Might have something to do with it,

but someone who didn't have any issue with the scheduling is Lonzo Ball. And here is his quick reasoning. I'll make the schedule. I just go out there and play. You know, I get paid well, so I ain't got no complaints. Yeah. They don't do, you know, Joy, they don't do nearly as many back-to-back as they used to. No, the NBA has done a really good job of working the schedule around that.

It used to be really brutal. When I was a kid, not too long ago, these guys flew commercial. Not too long ago. They flew commercial. Wilk Chamberlain could be on your plane. I know, isn't that crazy? No, years ago in the NBA, you took the first flight out of a town. So the 6 a.m. flight.

Commercial and coach. And coach. You'd literally be an insurance salesman and be like, hey, there's Kareem Abdul-Jabbar sitting next to me. On a commercial flight. Well, like sitting or like this. I don't even know how that's possible. That's what they did for you. The travel is greatly improved for NBA teams.

And by the way, have you seen those team planes before? I've never seen them I've never seen the inside of a team plane before but from pictures it looks like they've been put it a lot roast beef sandwiches with horse radish they're not flying like the rest of us no they're not doing the crackers and the little

pretzels and a little tiny bag they're doing the back to backs especially when you're doing the coastal road trips it's it's so hard on your body you're not getting any sleep even if even if you are traveling like that like the altitude affects you too there's a lot that goes into these Yeah, as nice as a flight is, if you're a seven-footer, it doesn't matter how nice the plane is.

But Lonzo summed it up pretty well. Yeah. He gets paid well. Joy with the news. Well, that's the news. And thanks for stopping by. The herd-line news. We had Michael Vick on earlier.

You know, it is kind of bizarre because, you know, it'd be like if Andrew Lucks backup came in, Jacoby Brissette and the Colts were way better offensively, and you're like, well, luck's better than Jacoby Brissette, but Jacoby Brissette's a good backup. And I asked Michael Vic, who knows Philadelphia and their schemes well, why is it when South out foals in. We know Wents is better, was going to be the MVP, something's going on here. I think when Carson Wins is out there, I think Doug Peterson feels the need to be dynamic. Open the offense up. When Nick is out there, I think everyone is at ease. I think the game plan is more simplified. When Carson went down, all the guys felt more pressures to perform.

And I think, you know, that helps within itself. You know, you look at guys, you know, feeling like they have to go out and be at their very best all the time. That's what it looks like with Nick Foles. And that has to be the game plan because it was too easy last night. And by the way, Nick Foles has a very good relationship, clearly on the field with Alshan Jeffrey. When Fawls plays, Jeffrey's a big factor. Now, when Wendt plays, Zach Ertz, the tight end, who's a great player,

becomes the bigger factor. Coming up, we'll sum up every NFL game this weekend in three words. That is next in best for last. Well, it's that time. True car. Can easily find you the car you want. Do you know I know somebody who's getting a car for Christmas? First time in my life I've met somebody getting a car for Christmas.

I too know someone who's getting a car for Christmas. You? No. Oh, yeah. Not me either. 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. Sunday, it's a great slate of NFL action highlighted by the Beccaneers. spacing off against Ezekio Elliott and the Cowboys or Pileo Mac and the Bears taking on the 49ers. It's all on Fox and the Fox Sports app. Check local listings for the game in your area. For the record, 14 of the 16 NFL games this next weekend have playoff implications. It is the best NFL season I've ever seen where other sports. College football has given us the same national title game probably. NBA's got one great team. I've never seen a league with this much parody.

It's incredible. And the good news is, Joy, Jimmy Garoppolo comes back next year. I think we have two college kids that can come in and play immediately, and all the young rookie quarterbacks are working. Josh Allen, I didn't think, I thought he needed to sit for two years. Josh Allen's working, so it's good. It's called Best for Last.

Here we go. It's our three-word NFL game. I can describe every NFL game. in three words. Here we go. Chargers, Chiefs from Thursday, legit L.A. contender. Four-game winning streak, deepest roster, in my opinion, in the NFL. They have the longest current NFL winning streak, and Phillip Rivers behind Patrick Mahomes and Drew Brees has the third highest passer rating. They no longer make those dumb charger mistakes. I don't think there's a team that has this many

good players on a roster. I talked to a buddy this weekend to scout and I said, what's their weakness? He said, maybe guard, they are stacked. Browns, Broncos, decisions, decisions, disasters. That was, that was

a mess. Denver coach, Vance Joseph, trailing by four, went with a field goal late. That didn't make any sense. Then Greg Williams called a timeout effectively canceling the Brown's off-sides penalty that would have ended the game and sealed the win. I know everybody in Cleveland's fired up about Greg Williams, but that was a poorly coached

NFL football game. Texans Jets, Darnold's the story. His leading rusher was out, his top receiver was out. He threw two touchdowns, no picks, 100-passer rating behind an offensive line that lost its center and lost its right tackle. That was one of the most impressive losing performances by a quarterback. He has nothing to begin with. He had backups at running back, receiver, center, right tackle against Jadavian Clowny, J.J. Watt, and he almost pulled it out.

Dolphins Vikings, Minnesota what? The dolphins rank 30 in the defense. One o'clock window. Wouldn't you know, Kirk Cousins lights it up? That's always the case. One o'clock window at home, Minnesota looks unbeatable. Cowboys Colts, not since 2003. First time the Cowboys have been shut out since week 11, 15 years ago.

In fact, Quincy Carter, if you remember him, was the quarterback then. You know, DAC was 24 of 39, but it was a lot of DAC and dunk, Dink and Dak. Passer rating was 64, no touchdowns, a lot of underneath throws. Listen, Zeeke had a decent game, but he didn't have a great game. And Amari Cooper, they rolled coverage over. He didn't get the big day. they faced a Indianapolis team that's defensive line is way better than predicted. Redskins Jags, fourth string quarterback.

Yeah, the Redskins signed quarterback Josh Johnson on December 5th. They've gone through Alex Smith, Colt McCoy, Mark Sanchez, and by the way, prior to the season, Josh Johnson had a throw to pass in the NFL in seven years. So good luck with that. Packers Bears, Rogers, New Reality. All right, Bears win the division. First time in eight years. They are loaded on defense with young, affordable players.

Now, Khalil Mack is their star, but first back-to-back losing seasons for the Packers since 1990, 91. Aaron was hobbled at the end of the game. He's now 35. He now makes $33 million a year, meaning this is a team that's not going to be able to keep some of their free agents, which the Packers are prone to do. I think this is Aaron's new reality. They'll win games, may still win the division, but it's going to be a harder last five than his first 10 in this league.

Raiders, Bengals! Oakland beat Pittsburgh? Yeah, last week, Oakland beat Pittsburgh. And yesterday, they couldn't compete with the Bengals for a quarter. They are now 3 and 11 on the season. Buccaneers, Ravens, Joe Flacco, never more. It's over. Now, we knew going into the season, once they drafted Lamar Jackson, we thought, all right, well, Joe Flacko's not going to be here forever.

Well, forever's over. Lamar's 4-1. They're leading Russia. He is indisputedly, inarguably added juice and energy to this team. And by the way, the Ravens are also just a half a game back of the Steelers in the AFC North. Lions Bills finally found a quarterback. Josh Allen's

average an 88 yards rushing in the last four games. That's seventh most of any player in the National Football League. Buffalo's got a defensive staff, a defensive first staff, and I do like a lot of the things they do on defense. But this is nice. No more overpaying

for Ryan Fitzpatrick in September. The Buffalo Bills have found Josh Allen, who by the way, has a little Ben Rathos Burger. Not saying he's been, got a little big tall guy, big arm runs around. Got themselves a little Ben Raffles Burger. Patriots Steelers, time beating Tom. Do you know New England has never made the Super Bowl without a buy? And Joy, currently, they're not in position for a buy. And I thought yesterday, it looked like they needed a week to reboot. They look tired. Edelman now, drops more

footballs than ever. Gronk was barely part of their game plan until late. I'd like more James White. I like Sony Michelle, but I'd like to see more James White. I'll believe it when I see it. Yeah. Titans Giants! Remember the Titans. Okay. 8C. By the way, physically, they're as impressive. If they ever got into a bar fight or a hotel lobby fight, it's one of the most physically impressive teams in the league. Yesterday, they just imposed their will on the New York Giants. They face Washington at home and the Colts at home. Now, they have had no luck with Andrew Luck. He owns the Titans, but they've still got a chance.

Seahawks 49ers! Seahawks blew it. They could have clinched the wild card with a victory. And you know what I'm really excited for next year? Jimmy Garoppolo and Jared McKinnon. So Kyle Shanahan gets his quarterback and his running back next year. The 49ers lose a lot of close games. They've got their tight end.

They've got some receivers I like. They've got a couple pass rushers. Cardinals Falcons did not watch. Falcons blew them out by 30. Game was over in like eight minutes. Eagles, Rams, don't buy the glitz. Back-to-back losses for Los Angeles. They've now lost four of their last five games in December and January.

I think this team are trying to sell PSLs. They wanted some stars. They overpaid for Brandon Cooks and Domen Sues doing his own thing. Dante Flowers they gave up draft picks for. I would not have.

I think they're top heavy. I think you see this like the Golden State Warriors right now, although they have titles, have a great starting five and no bench. When you pay a bunch of stars a lot of money, you have no debt. Now the warrior starters are so good, they'll win anyway.

The Rams pay about seven guys a ton, but they don't, if Todd Gurley gets hurt, they don't have a running game. If Robert Woods got hurt now, they don't have a passing game. And boy, I hope Akeep to leave can fix this secondary because they get beat a lot. Finally, St. Panthers tonight, Cam's last stand. Panthers have lost five straight. They're in-game. Outside of the Steelers games, they're in games. and I don't want to hear any more excuses.

Their own line's good enough. DJ more rookie can play. Christian McCaffrey. I don't want to hear any more excuses. You've got to win this game tonight. With a loss tonight, Carolina would not be eliminated, Joy, but they would need so much help. So I think it is Cam's last stand. I think occasionally you'll see these bizarre stats.

Cam Newton has never had back-to-back winning seasons. It's just a, hey, what? That's the story of Cam Newton, though. Yeah, roller coaster cam. Yeah. And I think you eventually over time, players become sort of their personality. Derek Fisher, a former Laker, former Nick Coach. We'll be joining us on the show tomorrow.

Michael Vic, Ben Volan, Trent Dilfer, and Sean Merriman stopped by today. If you're looking for the perfect holiday gift, the original untuck shirt on tuckit.com, code heard, get 20% off. The perfect length on tugget. on tugget.com code heard for 20% in savings. So it is very interesting to me. When I look at this game tonight, it doesn't feel like it's the be-all end-all.

But if the Saints lose tonight, the league's in utter chaos. Remember who was the hottest teams in the league in September? It was Kansas City, and it was the Rams. They both don't look quite as good. Defense on both issues can't make key stops. who are the teams that struggled early? The Colts and the Houston, okay,

they're now over the last two months playing really well. Sometimes I think, Joey, we forget. These seasons are long. Oh, we do. We forget every year. We do the same thing with the NBA. We panic early. It's a disaster.

Trade everyone. And then after the All-Star break, we're like, oh, and maybe it just takes a few months to get things going. It's the same thing at the NFL. We always forget. The Saints struggled a lot. little the first week or two. They struggle with Cleveland and lost to Tampa in their opener and struggle with Cleveland. But I think if you ask me, who's been the best team the longest?

I would say the Saints. They have been the best team in the league the longest. You just feel like you can trust them more. Yes, I do. And I told you, I feel like the best teams in the league now are some combination of Chargers, Chief Saints. But if the Saints lose tonight, I didn't say that. The Heard hierarchy and Derek Fisher on our show tomorrow. Thanks so much for stopping by on Monday in LA for everybody here. It's been 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, and every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the biggest moments in sports

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