The Kevin Sheehan Show - Biggest Underdog of the Year

Episode Date: October 2, 2020

Cooley and Kevin preview Washington-Baltimore. Kevin has 12 Smell Test picks and Cooley has an NFL Lock of the Week. Also discussed, JP Finlay's report that Ron Rivera and other coaches told Dwayne Haskins this week that he better start playing better and soon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You don't want it. You don't need it, but you're going to get it anyway. The Kevin Sheehan Show. Here's Kevin. Redskins looking to come from behind against the Ravens. This for the win. The Redskins in overtime have defeated the Ravens. That's how it ended eight years ago,

the last time the Ravens played at FedEx Field. It was one of those games. It's hard to forget. as Washington won at 3128 in overtime. Of course, the memorable play from that game back in 2012 was the Holody Nata hit on Robert Griffin III that started really the downfall of that particular brief, fleeting, meteoric rise and moment in franchise history.

It's a Friday. It's a football Friday. I'm here. Cooley is joining us as well. He was there that day. do you remember about that day in that game? And that your stepson was really, really good. You didn't play it all. My stepson didn't play at all. Not me.

Oh, Kirk. Oh, you remember. Well, remember the woman at that hotel in New York who thought that I was your son, that you were my son, excuse me. Yeah, and that I was your father, which, you know, we put her at ease pretty quickly. I told her, no, there's not that much of a difference. Certainly maturity, there's a difference. but everything else is much closer than you would think.

Anyway, so my stepson, Kirk Cousins, that's what you remember from that game? Kirk coming in and playing well. It was funny as when you look back at the stats of that game. I remember Kirk coming and playing really well. I think he completed like two throws. That's it. They were just both huge.

They were just both big throws. Yeah, they were. At that point, everyone was excited for Kirk. Nobody thought Kirk was in there to take a job. Kirk was just this fun-loving guy that yelled, you liked that when he completed throws. No, he didn't. or boo-ya. No, you yelled, boo-ya.

Every time he completed, boo-ya! And what was the other thing Kirk did? That was funny when it came in. Any huddle, when you started the huddle, like a normal quarter would get in and say, all right, we got double right, 18 outside. Kirk would start with team.

Double-right, 18. You'd always start with team. Like, he was addressing the huddle. It's a team. Well, let's move off of Kirk, because people are going to think we're sucking up to Kirk, which is typically my move, and I understand that. But this was, he came in and he threw the touchdown pass to Garsohn

and had the quarterback draw on the two-point conversion after Griffin got hurt. But the thing about that ending is after Nodda knocked Griffin out of the game, remember Griffin came back in. He came back in despite the fact that he had not been cleared, and Shanahan was sort of blamed for it, but Shanahan said Andrews is over there. I'm coaching the game. Andrews just put his hands up and as if, to say, I don't know, I guess it's all right that he goes back in. And then Griffin got injured

again. He was hobbling around. And they won the game. Richard Crawford's punt return in overtime. I really remember that in particular that set up the game winning field goal by four bat that we played coming into the show. But it was the fourth win in a row. Remember coming off the by week when Shanahan essentially, you know, at least publicly said that, you know, we're going to start playing to see who wants to be on this team next year. You can't out of that by week. You guys smoked Philadelphia. You smoked, you beat Dallas on Thanksgiving Day. You beat the Giants. And then the Ravens were nine and three on that day coming in. But you guys were back in the hunt for first place in the playoffs, which was amazing. And you pulled

off that win. And then the next week was the Cleveland game. We've all documented that many times. Griffin working out before convincing Snyder that he could play. Snyder going to Shanahan saying, Robert's ready to play. Mike saying to Dan, well, he's not playing. He wasn't cleared by the doctors. And Snyder pleading and Griffin then really distressed that Shanahan wouldn't play him that day so much so that after a win and an impressive performance by cousins, Griffin held his own press conference after a game he didn't play in. And we should have known then that something was up. We wouldn't find out about all the that was going on behind the scenes until much later.

But he came back the following week. You guys went to the playoffs, and then obviously the Seattle game is the game that everybody remembers from that year. But that Baltimore game was incredible. It was such a great and entertaining game. I was saying this morning, Cooley, it was damp. It was December. There was a fog rolling in at the end of a 1 o'clock game

as it's starting to get dark. And it was just, it was a big win. It was a huge win. Yeah, it was a big win. In all fairness, Kevin, that was a great season for a lot of Redskins fans. That was an awful season for me. I know. I hated it.

And looking back, it was selfish to look back on it in the way I am now, but I do. You know, I got released early in that season. Fred Davis got hurt. I signed again, and I thought I was going to be playing. And no one would really tell me why they wouldn't play me. And so I just rode the bench, man. Yeah. It was a hard season for me to sit and watch.

Obviously, I didn't, I wasn't the same. I mean, if I was, they would have played me, but I didn't even get a chance to be in games. I didn't. So me looking back, I just looked back week and week out. I remember certain weeks where I was like, today's going to be the best practice squad day, the best look squad day of all time.

So that was really hard. That was a hard year for me. You played it statistically. It says you played in nine games. You had one reception for eight yards. It's just in general a tough year, Kevin. I can self-love all I want. Not happy looking back on it now.

I was very upset with it when it was. And so for me to be in the moment with the team, it just didn't quite exist for me that year. I can imagine on most teams when guys, especially veteran players that came back with the expectations, of playing and you're not. It's got to be frustrating. I mean, you know, you and I have talked about this over the years. Like this whole idea that everybody's, you know, team first. I mean, that's a nice, you know, a nice, pleasant way to think about the world and about sports. But we all know this.

Like if you're in a company and the company's having success, but you're not contributing at the level that you want to. I mean, you're not completely happy. It's only a human reaction. But, you know, one of the things that you did say to me about that year, and you've said to me in the past, is you did, you know, enjoy watching the Shanahan's put together that offense for Griffin. Well, I appreciated it. Yeah. I was certainly impressed by it. And at that point in my career, I was enamored with football and scheme. And so I was very interested and involved in all the meetings and everything we were doing.

Like, I wasn't, I didn't check out by any means. I went and practiced hard. I mean, I went and said, I'm going to have best day of practice ever. But by Sunday, I was not a happy guy. Right. And then you look the next after the game was like, okay, well, let's, let's go home. I don't even know if I need to shower today. Yeah.

Here was the hardest thing for me because I'm a pretty aware person. I knew that after the injury getting cut, getting signed back, and then them not playing me when they, it essentially looked like they had to have me, just showed every other team in the NFL that I was done. Right. Now, some more to that, I'm glad that I was done after that. And I didn't want to be.

I wanted to play. I wanted to come back after it. But I'd probably, I'd probably have a new knee, but I'd played two more years. Right. Well, your knee's still not right. No, I had like an arthritis.

attack yesterday or something or two days ago. I can't even probably walk right now. It's weird. That's lovely. All right. Let's go away. We're going to get to Washington beats Baltimore if here in one moment. I just wanted to mention one thing. I know you did not watch the Thursday night game and maybe a lot of you that are listening didn't watch it. But there was a moment at the end of the game that if Ron Rivera were watching, and Ron Rivera, by the way, not, you know, he missed practice yesterday or left practice early. Del Rio saying he does expect Rivera to coach on Sunday, but he was feeling the effects of a chemo treatment, so we certainly wish coach well.

But at the end of the game, Cooley, I'll give you the quick sort of setup, all right? The Broncos are up 37 to 28. The Jets have the ball with a minute 48 to go, and they've got three timeouts left, and they're down nine points. They had actually failed at midfield before the touchdown in a two-point game.

They did have the lead at one point in the fourth quarter. Anyway, they go first. four and out, all right? And they turn the ball over to Denver after using one of their timeouts with a minute three left in the game. Denver's got the ball in jet territory up 37 to 28, one minute, three seconds left in the game. The jets have two timeouts left. Now, the jets were intent on calling the timeouts, their final two timeouts, even though if you do the quick math on this, a couple of kneel downs and a couple of timeouts and then 40 seconds, the best that the Jets will do is get the ball back with about 13 to 14 seconds left in the game, needing two

scores. I've seen many teams bail at that point, and it would be fine if they had bailed at that point, because really, you're talking about the miracle of all miracles to get the ball back with 13 seconds left and needing to score twice from 70 yards out. Anyway, so Brett Rippin-Neils, Jets call a timeout with 59 seconds left. Second down. Brett Rippin takes a knee, and the Jets use their final timeout. They're now 57 seconds left. Third down, Brett Rippin takes a knee, and as I just described, they end up taking a delay of game before their fourth down snap. The Jets didn't have any timeouts left after that with 13 seconds left.

Now, on this fourth down, Vic Fangio decides to tell his offense to try to burn the 13 seconds by dropping Rippin back and having them throw a deep ball down the right side line that isn't, you know, they're not trying to score. It's going to go out of bounds, but it'll lead up, you know, six, seven seconds, and then the Jets will have one play. Personally, I think one more knee, you know, maybe a couple of steps back, kneel down with nine, eight seconds left, and it's over anyway. The Jets would have to score in less than eight seconds and then recover an onside kick with a 15-yard penalty to extend the game to have a chance for a field goal. Like, I mean, something that's never happened before. Anyway, by dropping back and throwing, Rip and throws a ball, there was a defensive offside play.

And so now there are seven seconds left and it's fourth down again. And he drops ripping back again with seven seconds left. Now one more knee is game. Even if the Jets score on the final play of the game, it's over. But he drops ripping back again and has him throw a deep ball. down the right side line. And Greg Williams clearly instructed his defense to go after Rippin and knock his block off. That was such a boomer way of describing it. Not his block off. So McClendon comes in, goes helmet to helmet with Rippin, 15-yard penalty,

three seconds left in the game. Fangio is incensed. Rippin takes a knee on the first down. play after the 15-yard penalty, and Fangio instructs his team not to shake hands and to go off the field. And he's pointing at Adam Gase on his way off the field like, you asshole, for doing what you did. Well, to be honest with you, I think Fangio was an idiot for dropping ripping back, especially with seven seconds to go. Like, that was stupid, too. So I put some of the blame on him for allowing that to happen. But, you know, the Jets with really the miracle of all miracles is a possibility with

57 seconds left. They were still taking timeouts. And I was thinking last night, Rivera's probably saying, see, that's why you don't call timeouts because you could end up getting somebody hurt with a late hit and the game can turn ugly. Well, it's an apples to oranges comparison. But anyway, that's how the game ended last night. I saw the end of the game. And then I saw Adam Gaze afterwards. And ultimately, Gaze is right now not in an R&D mode. No.

He's in a S-YJ mode. Yeah. So any possible chance of winning a game that they played pretty well in and they sported points against Broncos. They got to try to win a game. Yeah, agreed. I, they jets came out and said there's,

you know, they're not planning on firing Gaze anytime soon, whatever. uh look if you look at it greg williams is a great job taking over in cleveland a couple years ago i would like greg williams take over right now me too he would take over right now and if there was any chance to save any kind of a season which is probably not but you never know in that division well what do you mean in that division what do you mean titans and holds both look really good no the jet the jets are in the east why am i thinking the jets are that's yeah still waking up here yeah it's okay

Wyoming. No, that division they're out of it. Yeah. All right. Last, um... Bill's hats. Jets are done. Last thing before we get to Washington wins if. J.P. Fenley wrote a story this morning that he's got sources that tell him that Ron Rivera and some other Washington football coaches met with Dwayne Haskins this week to make clear that he understands he needs to play better or things could soon. change. What do you make of that? This sort of goes hand in hand with the Monday morning wake up.

He's looked at tape of Dwayne. He's looked at tape of the defense. He's checked out the standings. Here's the first thing I make out of it. Ron Rivera has been brought in to change the culture. And one of the biggest things with the culture is leaking inside things to the media. Yep. So Rivera fires a lot of people who he thinks part. possibly could could possibly leak things. He's proud to make all these changes where it's going to be team. It's going to be inside.

And in week three, we now have two reports on what's going on with the Wayne Haskins. All credit to JP, I have no problem with what JP's doing. But that meeting that happened with the Wayne Haskins, in my opinion, is a stays in this building meeting. Yeah. period. So that's to me something that I would put on the coaching staff that should never, ever, ever come out. Unless it was Dwayne and then they have to talk to Dwayne about it, which I doubt it was because I would Dwayne want to share that information? Unless it was Dwayne, man, that was what they came here and said they wouldn't do.

It's a really good point. Do you know yesterday, Tommy and I had a conversation where I said to Tommy. You know, one of the things that I've really, and it was off of talking about Haskins Presser on Wednesday and how I thought, you know, he handled himself pretty well. And I said, look, there's a bit of a culture change going on that we can identify right now. And that is, we haven't, there haven't been leaks. You know, there's been a public challenging of Dwayne in the summer with, you know, the leadership from the coach and, you know, a bit of a public challenging, but there haven't been leaks this year. And that's a good thing. And here we go, 24 hours after mentioning that to Tommy, you've got a leak on this. And to your point, this is a total

stays here, doesn't leave the building conversation, unless, Cooley, unless you buy the conversation that Ron Rivera shared with somebody, I'm forgetting who, Tommy brought it up to me yesterday, and I do remember it, where Rivera said he talked to Urban Meyer at one point, and Urban Meyer said the way to get through to Dwayne is to publicly challenge him. But this is not if he wanted to publicly challenge him he could have publicly said it himself rather than having it leaked and to me that's a that's a difference because it the coaches met with de wayne so you're assuming it's Scott Turner and Ron Rivera and whoever else on offense maybe three guys so who who talked to AP Finley I have no idea and now you leave it arbitrary to who maybe discuss

that meeting. I'm with you. If you stand up as the head coach or if you let Scott Turner stand up in his presser as the offensive coordinator and say nothing's for sure here. We are about competition and we need to Wayne to play better. Then it's not a league. I mean, I guess it's not that far from that. But if you want publicly challenged, don't make him read a story that says it was discussed in a meeting. That just hurts trust. Yeah, I totally agree

with that. You know, this report essentially creates the fan and media countdown on Dwayne. Maybe, and if that was done specifically for that purpose, well, they've achieved it.

Because now we know that things could change, soon. Well, the other part of this in the what they construes the constructive part is maybe Duane doesn't know that he needs to play better unless they say it publicly. Now, I disagree with how they said it publicly because I would just say it as the coach. But maybe they left that meeting and he continued to say, look, I did do a bunch of really good things in the game.

I got the bat. No problem on that. I get it. But I did so many good things. I am getting better. And they're like, no, nope. the bad we got to talk about more the good was limited the bad we got to maybe that was their only outlet again i disagree with the way they used the outlet but you think about that as it is i'm with them i just i understand that you might have a moment here in the next two weeks where you have to go win this division but they're going to be one and four after sunday or one and three one and three yeah and if dallas were to really flounder then it becomes interesting

Christine, they're probably going to be one in four after they play the Rams. And then you get a game with the Giants. That to me is his last opportunity if he doesn't play well and you lose to the Giants. All right. But then at that point, you're sitting there saying, didn't play well, we lost the Giants. We won at five. What are we really doing here? Let's let him keep rolling.

Yeah, I just, I literally, it's 24 hours ago. complimenting the organization on no leaks this year. And I don't know what the goal was here, and I don't know if there was a goal, but I think this is not good. This isn't good. You know, look, it's possible that we were in countdown mode anyway on Dwayne. Some people were, but this just makes it official, in my view. I still believed, and I think you did until this point.

I even still believe now because I just don't see him as a playoff team. And even if they are, unless he gets dynamically better throughout the year, and that's the only way they could win a game in the playoffs. I just, to me, is he the centerpiece of the offense or not? And can we find that out in four, five, six games? Because I don't think you can. It's going to be interesting because you know what? On Sunday, my expectation is now that if they're down 23 to 14 with two and a half minutes to go

and Baltimore's facing a third and nine and the clock's running, they'll call timeout. I think he'll do it this Sunday. I think you're going to see more of an urgency to try to win the game. They probably won't have that opportunity. I'm just saying if they do. Well, if he understands in any way, shape, or form that he's got to go win this division. And he does because he discussed it, then you've got to find a way, to hopefully win a game at the end of a game.

You've got to hopefully pull one out. And for everything that we've criticized Dwayne about, he doesn't have any quit. He gets better when his backs against the wall. I agree with that. I'm not going to say that he becomes Joe Montana with his back against the wall. But he makes more throws when his backs against the wall. He has since the first game that he played here.

Right. All right. Let's get to Washington Winsif right after this word from one of our sponsors. All right. Sunday 1 p.m. FedEx Field. Baltimore, by the way, Cooley, now a 14-point favorite. It shot up yesterday for some reason. I'm assuming pretty sharp money on the Ravens to bounce back off that Monday night loss to the Chiefs and pound Washington on Sunday, especially given that ionitis is gone for the year. More likely than not, no Chase Young. By the way, Terry McLaurin ended up on the injury report yesterday with a thigh. He had limited participation in practice. But let's get started. Washington,

wins if, go ahead. They score on defense. They score on defense, okay? Lamar Jackson fumbles or throws a pick, and they end up scoring on defense. And in part, I still think that you give up less than, you give up 24 points or less than score on defense. So you create a number where the offense has to score 17 points. To me, that's it. If you can hold Baltimore to 17, which I don't, I think it's going to be really tough.

They're a team that scores 30 points a game. Yeah. They're an explosive offensive team. They can make any play anywhere on the field with the dynamic offense. But I think if you hold them to 24 and score on defense, to me, that's a chance for them to win a ball game. All right. My first one is Washington wins pulls a massive upset off if they slow down Baltimore's rush attack. I thought, and you made the point that they did a pretty good job on first down.

This is a team in Baltimore last year, not as much this year, but we know that how, capable they are of running the football dynamically with a lot of zone read, a lot of quarterback runs, and their chunk runs, too, man, with Ingram and Edwards, and now also with J.K. Dobbins. And there's a lot of second and twos. There's a lot of second and threes. It's got to be second and six, second and seven. They've got to have some opportunity to put them into third down and throwing situations. It's the only way you're going to get Baltimore off the field is to make him feel like he's got to throw from the pocket on third and eight. I don't think it's possible that they can do it.

I am excited and very intrigued by the matchup because I do believe in this defensive front. Now, it won't have Chase Young, but whether it's this year or next year or the year after, I think it's going to end up being a dominant run-stopping and pass-rushing defensive front. And I'm excited about watching it evolve here over the next year to three years. I thought they did a good job against Kyler Murray at times early in the game. I think they did a good job against Chubb and Hunt on first downs early in the game. I think there were plays made by Allen and Payne and in the front four where you saw guys get swallowed up at the line of scrimmage and there wasn't much running room.

Now, eventually Cleveland wore them down. Eventually, the 80 plays in Arizona wore Washington's defense down. but Baltimore averages 5.7 yards per carry. And before the game last week, Cleveland averaged, you know, in the high fives per carry as well. If, you know, do the math. At 5.7 yards per carry, if they reach their average, they're just going to run it right down their throat, and it's going to be 38 to 10. So they have to slow down Baltimore's rush attack, especially in early downs, first down situation,

so that you create the opportunity potentially for Baltimore to have third in a throwing situation. If you don't stop the run, if you don't slow it down, you've got no chance in this game. What's next for you? Well, as a part of that, Baltimore really has the best backfield in the NFL. Because of the quarterback. Because of the quarterback. Who has 32 carries through three games? He's averaging over 10 carries a game.

10. You know who their leading rusher is. Lamar Jackson, he averages 5.6 yards per carry. He's got like 180 yards. Ingram is still at 4.4 and J.K. Dobbins is a good player. They're the best backfield in the NFL. Gus Edwards is averaging 7.2 yards per carry. Yeah, and Gus Edwards is there. Dobbins is averaging 7.6 yards per carry.

Jackson's averaging 5'7. And Ingram, who's got the second most attempts behind Jackson is averaging 4.4 yards per carry, which by the way it's a pretty damn good average. Let's call it a really, really good average. Yeah. But if you can stop to run a little bit,

Lamar Jackson's getting sacked, man. Yes. In sacks per pass attempt, he's almost at 13%. 13%. other than I think Deshawn Watson he's been sacked more times

for pass attempt by a large margin like the average across the league is like six at best right right the average around six at best Aaron Rogers is sack two percent per dropback so yeah you can stop to run a little bit

and get after him it's huge. I think having no Chase Young really will impact this game. It's crazy. We're four games in and we're talking about a rookie. But having no Chase Young in some of these situations is going to be huge because you've got to change your rush. You've got to change the way you're getting after. Having no ionitis is going to be huge. I think that's why the line shot up so much this week and that's why it's 14 instead of 10. It rarely jumps up because of a defensive player. Well, yeah, but you're two of your best players are. I get it. I get it.

And those are the two players that would change the game for you. I'm just telling you that the line doesn't jump. It was 13, it went down to 12, now it's back to 14. It's just sharp money right now. Look, the sharp money might be

there because they realize the significance of Chase Young, but an odds maker isn't going to drop, increase the line because Chase Young is out. Quarterbacks do that and real truly elite players do it. I don't think anybody's viewing Chase Young at this point is truly elite, even though I think some of us believe that that's where he's headed.

Washington wins if they score when they get in the red zone. That was critical for them in the Philadelphia game, and that's what gave a chance to win the ball game. They've made mistakes in the last couple games down in the red zone. They haven't finished drives. if they can score in the red zone, I think they have a pretty good opportunity. To me, that's going to be massive.

Baltimore is actually not the best in the red zone on defense. They give up a score 83% of the time. And they don't give up a ton of points. They don't give up a bunch of big plays. They're stout on defense. But you get down in the red zone or you get a pick or you get a turnover and you're inside. And let's call it even inside the 30.

If they get inside the 30 or the 35, it's must score. And inside the 25, it's must score touchdown. That, to me, they have to find a way offensively to score at least 17 points. At least, you score less than 17 on offense, which means you're not scoring touchdowns down there. I don't think you win. It's interesting. Do you know that Washington's 11th in the league in red zone offense right now in terms of touchdowns in the red zone?

They're 11th in the league right now. And I'm looking up Baltimore's red zone defense. Baltimore's red zone defense right now is 30th in the league. Interesting. You just hit on something I didn't even think about. That's a matchup at least through three weeks of a strength versus a weakness. Now, I look at Baltimore's defense, and I would bet that Kansas City, even though they scored from distance in that game on Monday night, I'd have to go back and look again to see what Kansas City was in the red zone. But Washington's actually been pretty good the red zone offensively. The chiefs on

Monday night in the red zone were three for three. Yeah. So the chiefs were three for three against the Ravens. So Ravens are 30th in red zone defense and Washington's 11th in red zone offense. It changes a lot of the numbers in three games for your defense when you play Kansas City. You know, is it played out. They're middle of the pack in a lot of defensive categories, but Kansas City put up a boatload of yards and points. Yeah, just like your defensive numbers would be pretty good if you had Washington as one of your first three opponents.

So that leads me to this. Washington beats Baltimore if they shorten the game. And when I say short in the game, you know what it means, but I'm going to add something to this because they need the best defense often is a really good offense and a ball control offense. And I don't know the best way for them to control the ball. I have a feeling Haskins is going to have to make some throws in this game. But Washington right now is dead last in average yards per drive. They're averaging 23.27 yards per offensive drive. 32nd in the league. And it's actually not even close. The Jets are 31st in the league, and they're

averaging two and a half yards more per drive. That's big statistically. So Washington is not moving the football. You know, the points have come on short fields. Their average starting field position has been pretty good. And we remember from the Philadelphia game, they had multiple drives start in Philadelphia territory. They have to possess the ball more. They have to move the football and keep it away from Lamar Jackson as much as they can.

You know, not to mention that more yards per drive gives, you know, increases the possibility at least reaching scoring position. But they have to be better in this area. They are 31st in plays per drive, 32nd in drives per drive, and they are 30th in time of possession. So they really, I think, have to shorten the game with the ball in their hands. and I think their best way to do it against Baltimore isn't going to be to run the football against the Ravens. I think that's difficult, even though Cleveland did it to a certain degree. Houston did not do it. I think Duane's going to have to make some plays,

and they're going to have to figure out a way to keep the ball. What's your next one? Well, in part to that, it's like Terry McLaurin's averaging almost 12 yards after catch. Right. Let's get the ball in the hands of the receivers and get them going. Sims Jr., I think,'s been completely underused on offense. And clearly someone would tell me why if they were in that building, because there's an obvious reason.

I mean, he'd be playing more, catching more ball. Well, he's been hurt, and he hasn't practiced this week, and last week he was limited in practice for a few days. So that may be part of the reason. I mean, that may be part of the reason, for sure. But even early on, he didn't have nearly as many touches as I would have expected. He got a lot of hype going into this season. You're right for a guy that played well for five games last year.

And I didn't think it was wrong, but they didn't use them early. It hasn't been an impact. Who else is getting yards? Like McKissick, okay, you got to run the, you said you don't have to run the ball. The Redskins win if they can run the ball. Not the Redskins. I didn't say they shouldn't run the ball. I'm just not sure they're going to have a success against ball.

I would agree. Baltimore is still giving up four yards of carry. Yeah. You got to remain resilient with your running calls. You're going to have to stay balanced and you're going to have to be able to run the ball and you're going to have to be able to run the ball and gain yards. I think their offensive lines done a pretty good job through the first three weeks. I know.

And running the ball, I think they've done a pretty good job. Now, they're only averaging like three yards for carry, but they've taken some negative carries and they haven't run the ball as much as they need to. They've had more four and five yard runs than I would have expected them to this year, nine, eight, nine, ten yard runs. Like Gibson and McKissick are, doing a pretty good job. To me, both of those guys need 15 touches in the game.

Well, at least between the two of them, at least 30 touches. And I'm guessing you'd be around at least 12 runs apiece if you want to win this game. And it might be more. But if you want to shorten the game, you got to be able to run the ball a little bit. And maybe even in third down situations, don't be afraid to run the ball on third and four. Because we haven't been converting those. have you watched I forget how you evaluated Patrick Queen

the linebacker from LSU Baltimore's first round pick because he's played very well as one of their inside linebackers do you remember your evaluation of Patrick Queen? I really liked Patrick Queen because I thought he had a lot of speed I thought

I like that I mean that was a good defense for them last year as far as it goes this year I don't think he's played very well for Baltimore Really? No, I think he's been exposed. I think people have been able to throw behind him.

I think he's been okay. I watched some of that Houston game, and he was a tackling machine. Yeah, there are times when he tackles well, but in coverage, he's really struggled this. That's indicative of a lot of young linebackers. But I said this against Arizona. You don't have to create matchups in the past game against linebackers. I just don't know if we have the players to do that. Last thing for me, Washington beats Baltimore, obviously, this is typical keys to the game, cliche.

They have to be plus two or better against the Ravens to even have a chance. If they do what they did Sunday against the Browns, there's no chance they're going to be up 20 to 17 in the fourth quarter with two to three turnovers at that point and down in that category. It's 40, it's 44 to 6 if they are minus 5 in the turnover margin. They've got to be plus two or better. I think this is one of those games that if you don't get some breaks not only with turnovers for short fields, as you said, a defensive score would be great, but you need a couple of those phantom penalties that take a first and 10, 16-yard run and make it first in 20 instead, which means.

makes it harder to overcome and move the sticks and keep the ball. You're going to need at least one or two of those. This is a big short. Baltimore is the biggest favorite of any NFL team so far through four weeks in the season. And there's a reason for it. I see plus two and then you need one or two of those, really? He was holding against them, against them, that sets up second and 20 instead of, you know, a first down play. No doubt. You're going to need some calls. Yeah. You're going to need some luck in this game.

Yeah, you need some luck in this game. You're going to need some luck in this ballgame. They're outmatched. What else do you have? Washington beats Baltimore if. It's really hard for me to play this game this week with you. Why? Because they're not going to win. Imagine if they did, though. Imagine if Monday we're talking about a shot. upset win over Baltimore. Just play along here for a second, because it's not going to happen. I don't think it'll happen. But if it did, and these things do happen in the NFL every once in a while,

in fact, they happen more than just every once in a while. And I think I told you this on Wednesday. I think this team is much more capable than any team in the last couple of years for this franchise of pulling off something big and totally unexpected. If it happened, first of all, our fan base would lose its collective mind. Secondly, the national guys would start talking about Washington being a legitimate contender in the NFC East, especially if Dwayne played well. And by the way, it'd be impossible for them to beat the Ravens without him playing well,

unless the Ravens just completely soil themselves for 60 minutes. So there you go. There's our biggest Washington wins if. Washington wins if the little media storm this week. with the coaches. Because remember last week it was, well, there's a lot of noise. We hear, we hear all the noise, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Shut up, Chris Cooley. Changed from, we hear all the noise to we'll make the noise. And maybe in this week, he hears it, starts hot. They get the ball opening position. He goes four for four. They go down the field. They score a

touchdown. Baltimore turns it over early. And you get up 14 zero. And you're like, oh, here we go. Here we go. Here we and Duane stays hot throughout the game. Washington wins if Duane gets hot and stays hot and plays confident. It makes throws. Let me amend that from my standpoint. Washington has a chance to win if Dwayne has three of those drives where he's hot, like he did against Arizona, like he did against Cleveland, where he's got three to four drives where he really actually.

executes. Now, the other drives have... The other drives have to end in punt, not turnover. Let me make that clear, too. But if he has, you know, three to four of those, you know, empty set, quick game, slants, big plays, and, you know, a couple of touchdown throws in the red zone, and he doesn't, you know, he doesn't fall apart with turnovers on the other drives. they end up with punts on the others, or maybe a fourth down miss or something turnover, you know, in Baltimore territory, then they've got a shot. They would be in the game.

And you know what, Cooley, through three games, he's had three drives in each of these games where he's looked more than competent. Yeah, he needs six of those drives. Why six? Because you said if we get a defensive touchdown, they just need 17 points. that would be three. That would be three. Well, I think that you need three other drives where you take the ball to midfield, or you have a 30-yard drive and you get close to field goal range.

Rather than three-and-off puns. Yeah, right. True. But, yeah, you can't have three-and-out punts and give Baltimore the ball in good field position. He needs more than three competent drives against this team. All right. We will make predictions. Do you have another Washington-Wins-if? Did you have anything else on this game? No, I think we did a pretty good job. covered it. We'll save our predictions for a little bit down the road here.

I want to get to my smell test right after this word from one of our sponsors. Kevin looks where the John Q public is putting their cash and does the opposite. It's time for the smell test. All right, the smell test this week, if you even want it, for those of you that have been following it and wagering based on the recommendations, I'm going to give it to you, and I've got a lot of plays this week. And I mentioned earlier in the radio show Cooley that there's a thing in gambling called Chase Mode, and it's really a bad thing, but everybody that has ever gambled has experienced chase mode, which is you're on a losing streak and you just start chasing.

You know, you start chasing with bets that you normally wouldn't make. It's a Monday nighter and you're down a bunch of money and you've got to settle up on Tuesday and you don't even like the game, but you bet it anyway. and you're chasing that lost money. And that's really when things get ugly as a gambler. Anyone will tell you that. I don't feel like I'm in chase mode on October 2nd. I'm 6.14 and 2 on the year.

It's a terrible start to the year. I was 4 and 5 last week, which was the best weekend of the year so far that got me to 6, 14, and 2, 8 games under 500. I will remind everybody that I was 26 games above 500 mid-October. last year and ended up losing for the years. So, you know, these things come in waves, but someone's going to, I guarantee you, will send me a tweet that will say, oh my God, Sheehan, you're in chase mode. I mean, you gave out how many games? You gave out 12 games this week. You're in chase mode after getting your ass kicked for the first month of the season. No, these are actually games that I like that fit the smell test contrarian, you know,

formula of very much anti-public plays along with some sharp money to back it up. Let's start with Saturday. Hold on one second, though. Hold on a second. Yeah. You don't stop doubling down on 11. No, you do. Exactly. That's a much better way to put it. It's double down on 11. You don't, you don't start staying on 16s. No. You play the odds. You play the percentages. I know you is and I've been listening to this forever. You have been listening to it for several years now. Yes. You don't,

you don't quit playing. I know you well enough to know that if there were only three games to play, you would play three games. If there are 12, you would play 12. My only concern about the smell test today, I'm just going to lay it out there flat as could be, you told me you woke up at 2.30 and you're tired.

And I'm just questioning, like you've been on a bender. not just that people might think you're chasing. You've been up all night playing. I did wake up up very early this morning. I had a lot to do to get prepared for the radio show that I did not prepare for last night. And I woke up and I looked at my phone and I saw the breaking news on Trump and the first lady with COVID-19. And so I turned the TV on and then that was trouble. But I don't think that has anything to do with it because I finished the smell test last night. Okay. Okay. But By the way, your analogy is the exact analogy that Scott Van Pelt always gives with his, you know,

winners that he does on his show, which is you don't stop doubling down on 11. You know, you don't stop, you don't all the sudden stop hitting 16 against a 9. You just can't do that. You got to play the right way. If you play the right way and you trust in your philosophy and your system, it will eventually, you know, turn around and turn around. in the right direction. Now, it doesn't guarantee that you're going to win, but, as I've mentioned before, 10 out of 14 years have been winning years. All right, let's get started here, because I got a lot of games to get through. Let's start tomorrow. West Virginia plays Baylor in Morgantown. West Virginia was

terrible last week against Oklahoma State. They couldn't move with football, couldn't score. Baylor in their first game blew out Kansas, 47 to 14. The number is two and a half. The public loves Baylor. Give me the Mountaineers plus two and a half. By the half, by the half, point to get it to plus three, all right? But I'm playing the covers Friday lines, and it's two and a half. TCU is playing Texas. One of the most exciting games of the football season so far was last week when Texas rallied from 15 down calling timeouts on defense and beat Texas Tech 63 to 56 in overtime. I mean, it was a classic last week. TCU gave up a lot of points. Gary Patterson's such a great defensive mind, but their defense looked soft. And so people think Texas that could roll up another

60 plus against TCU. The line opened at 13. It's down to 11.5. There's a lot of sharp money on the horn frogs. I'll take TCU plus the 11 and a half. Texas Tech was on the wrong side of that comeback against Kansas last week, giving up that 15-point lead late and losing an overtime, 6356. They are playing the team that upset Oklahoma last week, Kansas State. Kansas State's laying a very short number at home against Texas Tech. It's minus two and a half. Let down for K State. Texas Tech bounces back. I like Texas Tech plus the two and a half. They are an anti-public play and there is major sharp money on Texas Tech. They're a very good offensive football team. Give me Texas Tech plus the two and a half again by the half point there.

Now, Ole Miss last week really rolled up some points against Florida. I mean, I think Kyle Trask is going to be one of the front runners for the Heisman trophy. He's one of those quarterbacks. Cooley, I picked out early to say that's a future pro when he got in for Felipe Franks last year in Florida as the third stringer eventually he got in and then he just looked like a pro. Like he looks like the guy, you know Sean Mannion, the guy that I really liked at Oregon

State who backs up Kirk in Minnesota. I think he's going to be a pro somewhere. one day, a starter one, somewhere one day. Kyle Trask plays a lot like Mannion did in college. He's a drop-back guy, but he's a good, subtle guy at extending plays. He threw six touchdown passes last week against Ole Miss. With that said, Ole Miss scored 35 against Florida's defense. They are catching six in the Commonwealth of Kentucky tomorrow.

The public loves Kentucky, who played Auburn tough in week one and was ranked last week. I like Ole Miss plus the six in that one. One more college game than we'll move to the pro board. Iowa State is the team that beat TCU last week by rolling up 37 points. They play Oklahoma. Oklahoma had the loss, the big upset loss to K State. Oklahoma opened at minus 10. It's down to 7.

Massive sharp money on Iowa State. This is why I think people like Iowa State. Iowa State can score, and I think everybody's looked at Oklahoma's defense and says it is a terrible defense for a second straight year, and they don't have Jalen Hertz, or they don't have Kyler Murray at quarterback. I like Iowa State plus the seven. I think Oklahoma is in for a much more difficult year than people thought before they opened up as the third-ranked team in the country last week.

Let's go to Sunday where Cooley, I don't know if this has ever happened with me in the smell test. I'm giving out the same team for a fourth consecutive week, excuse me, fourth consecutive. week. The Detroit Lions. They were a winner for me last week at Arizona. They're catching four and a half in the Superdome against the Saints, and they're the right side. The public loves the Saints. Think they will bounce back off their loss to Green Bay. I think Mike Williams is back. I think Detroit's a good team. Detroit should have won week one against Chicago. They blew the 23 to six lead. They had the lead, a two-score lead against Green Bay before Aaron Rogers got hot. I like Detroit plus the four and a half Sunday against the Saints.

The Panthers Coley, I think, are a better team than people are believing. No McCaffrey last week they went in and they beat the Chargers. I think Matt Rule, Joe Brady and company are going to do a good job. I've always been a Bridgewater fan. He's been inconsistent. They're catching a very short number at home against Arizona, and there is sharp money on Carolina. I'll take the Panthers plus three and a half against the Cardinals. I gave out the Vikings last week as a plus three home dog against.

against Tennessee. They very easily could have won the game outright. Kirk Cousins, by the way, leads the league in air yards attempted and air yards on completion. So Mr. Checkdown for all you Kirk people, he's number one in both of those categories. He is airing the ball out and throwing it deep this year to the likes of Justin Jefferson and Adam Thieland. The problem is the Viking defense. Will it hold up against Houston, especially with a shortened practice week for Minnesota? The Public doesn't think so. They're all over Houston. I'll take the Vikings plus three and a half, hopefully get them for a second straight week. This next one is dicey, but the public's all over Cincinnati laying three at home against Jacksonville. Why? Well, they tied Philadelphia last week. They took Cleveland

to the brink with Burroughs 61, you know, attempts on that Thursday night game 3530. They nearly beat the Chargers in their opener. And the Bengals are playing the Jags. I think the Jags, I think the Jags are a capable team. I'll take the Jags plus the three. They've got the 11-day break, too, leading up to this because they played the Thursday night game a week ago against the Dolphins. Speaking of the Dolphins, just take them plus six at home against Seattle. That is the second biggest public play of the day, Seattle. The Dolphins plus six at home against the Seahawks. I like the Browns plus four and a half against Dallas. A lot of public action on Dallas.

And I like the Raiders plus three against the bills. There's a ton of action on the bills. Let me just mention this. I nearly gave out Washington plus 14. There is a lot of public action on Baltimore, a ton. There's also some sharp action on Baltimore as well. All right. Recapping, West Virginia plus two and a half, TCU plus 11.5, Texas Tech plus two and a half,

Ole Miss plus six, Iowa State plus seven on Saturday. On Sunday, the Lions plus four and a half, the Panthers plus three and a half, the Vikings plus three and a half, the Jags plus three, the Dolphins plus six, the Browns plus four and a half, and the Raiders plus three. The smell test brought to you by MyBooky. If you're looking for a place to place to play these wagers, go to mybooky.orgie. By the way, they've got a great contest going right now. It's the $100,000 super contest.

It only costs you a $10 entry. They're giving away $5,000 in cash prizes every four weeks as well. You can sign up at mybooky.orgie.org, and when you do, use my promo code, Kevin D.C., to claim your 100% deposit match all the way up to $1,000. That means if you put $100 in, they'll give you another $100. It's an easy way to jumpstart your bankroll. MyBooky.ag, you can trust their lines, their pricing, and you'll get paid if you win. All right, Coley, what's your lock of the week?

It's amazing. You just pretty much took every NFL game, which I love. I took a lot of NFL games. You're playing two hands. You're playing three hands at the casino. I'm not a three-hand player. I have played two-hands many times, but I don't like to play two-hands. I like to play one hand and be at a table with a lot of fun people. That's what I like. But go ahead. I don't know.

I think that it's four in the morning and there's just not a lot of people. It's just me. It's just me. And well, I was going to say something that probably would have been inappropriate. But a very nice and capable dealer and we're having a nice conversation. And she's sharing with me, you know, you're playing well and you're on a role. And hopefully I'm getting my money back and then giving her a big tip at the end of it, right? It's just that there's glass between you and she's wearing a match.

and you understand about every fourth word she said, but you're nodding like, uh-huh. I haven't, I haven't done the glass thing, but you did. I played blackjack last weekend in in Riverton, Wyoming. Oh, boy. And we had the glass in this, one of our dealers, great dude, wearing a mask. And he's talking the whole time, the whole time. He seemed so nice. For a while, I'd lean all the way up to the glass, like, and he kind of lift his mask so he

could tell me what he was trying to tell me, but then he'd keep talking. I'm like, I don't even hear a little bit. You're on mute. Oh, man. Well. So you and that very nice dealer are on mute, talking to nodding between masks. Yeah. Well, you explained what I was going to get to, which is sometimes there is a bit of a

language barrier. But, you know, when you're at a card table playing. blackjack, and it's just you, and it's four in the morning. And instead of getting a 15th beer, you actually then are ordering coffee. And, you know, you develop a bit of a rapport. And, you know, the rapport is the game and how you're playing and what's going on in the casino. And sometimes, like, when you're in town for a big fight, the dealer wants to know if you're in town for the big fight and what you think of the big fight. Because when there's a big fight in Vegas, Cooley, everybody and every dealer and every pit boss and every marketing rep, they're all talking about the fight.

And they all want to know what you think of the fight. So there you go. And it's four in the morning and I'm hoping to just get on a bit of a roll and then cash out, get a few hours of sleep and be back down for the one o'clock kicks, which of course would be 10 a.m. You know, Bellagio or win or MGM or Mandalay Bay sports book time. All right. Let's get your lock of the week. This is one of these weeks for me where it's, I like a lot of the plays. I think that there's a lot of interesting lines this week, but it's hard for a lock of the week. Like, I like Chicago plus two and a half. I do too.

Against Indy. Indy's been awesome. Chicago's in turmoil, but somehow they found ways in two games to have three touchdowns in the fourth quarter to win games that they should have lost, not just come back, but to win games. But it's like, I don't know. What's Nick Foles going to be? Are they way better with Nick Foles? I don't know. I like the Rams a lot.

against the Giants minus 13. The Giants are horrible. I watch Sean undressed Buffalo's defense. Now, they got down 28 to 3, but it was the second half where he just undressed the bills. Pulled her pants down, spank. And you're like, man, he's got it going. Yeah.

I like New England in the Steve Zabin theory that if you ever get the Patriots on sale, that you should take the Patriots. They're way on sale. this week, but to play in the Chiefs. I like the Patriots, too. By the way, everything you're mentioning were lean, like Chicago, I was very close, but the action was split.

I really like New England personally, but the action sort of split there. So it didn't really fit the criteria. But go ahead. But here's the game I'm going to go with. And I like all those games. And if I were doing this, I actually don't like the Rams, by the way. You couldn't get me to late 13. It's a heavy public lien.

Yes, it is. There's no question about that. The game I like this week for my lock of the week is Green Bay minus seven. I know it's a public play, but Atlanta can't stop anybody. And Matt Ryan's turned it over a little bit, and I like Green Bay's defense. I just don't, I don't see how they're stopping Aaron Rogers. To me, I think Green Bay wins by seven either. Now, Atlanta might jump out and have a decent lead, but right now the way Green Bay is running

the ball as well as the way they're throwing, they're playing true compliment offense and with a very good defense who can get after the passer. I don't know of Julio Jones who was banged up a little bit. It's going to play. Do you know the deal on that? Questionable. He's questionable. He's on my fantasy team, so I've been keeping an eye on that.

My lock of the week is Green Bay in the Sunday nighter. Actually, that's Monday. It's a Monday night game. Yeah. I'll, we'll say, you know what? Let's do this. Let's save that. Okay.

And just because you don't like the Rams and you've been on a... I'm a cooler right now. You've been on the snide. I'm going to go with the Rams. Okay. Land 13. And then we'll talk about Monday because I failed to mention that I think I'm going to give out Atlanta plus the points on Monday night.

but I want to wait until Monday to do it because I don't feel good about giving out Atlanta. That line should be more. It should be more, but Atlanta, because they're so capable of scoring, you know, whenever you bet a big dog, and, you know, in this day and age of NFL football, you know, anything seven or higher than seven is a sizable, you know, favorite. And if you're taking the points and you're taking the underdog, one of the things you always want to know when you're taking a bigger dog is that they have the capability of scoring points.

And so that's why, you know, you'd feel safer with Atlanta and not feel good about the giants, even though the giants are a big anti-public play, and you're going against that. But, you know, betting the Giants this week, you know, on a, like on a contrarian, on a contrarian wager, it's painful because they can't score. And you just, whenever you take those big teams, you'd much rather have the big team that can't stop somebody, totally capable of hanging 28 on the board because then the other team and a big 10 point plus things got to, you know, they're going to score 38 plus and you always have a chance. By the way, I have something for you right after a word from a sponsor that I want to share

with you and we'll give our predictions on the Washington game as well, but it deals with over-under numbers this week. We'll do that and finish up the show right after this word from a sponsor. All right, we'll give you our Washington-Baldmore prediction here in a moment. But I can't remember if I said this to you on Wednesday or I said it to Tommy yesterday. I forget. But I mentioned that the over-unders this week, earlier in the week, in looking at the initial lines, I said, this may be the highest number of 55-plus over-unders in NFL history in a weekend. I've never seen it before.

And I made the comment that this could be in aggregate the highest over-under number for all of these games in NFL history. And I've been looking for the data on this, and I just found it. Here it is from ESPN from earlier this morning, from ESPN stats and info, that the average over-under in week four right now is around 50. That would be the highest average weekly over-under in the past 35 seasons. So I knew intuitively that it was just too many numbers that were 54, 55, and higher. And there were other numbers that were already over 50 that it just seemed like I just don't, I didn't feel like I had ever seen it. But the lowest over under number of the weekend was last night at 41 and it sailed over,

you know, 37, 28. You know, you had a 65 point game in a 41 over under number. But, you know, the games that are super high this week, Detroit, New Orleans is at 54.5 right now I'm looking at it. It was at 55. You've got Minnesota Houston, it's at 54 now. That was also at 55. Seattle, Miami's at 55 and a half. 54 and a half. That was at 55. Dallas, Cleveland's 56. New England, KC. was actually higher than this earlier in the week. They're at 53 now. Green Bay, Atlanta's at 56 and a half. I haven't even mentioned Buffalo, Vegas at 52 and a half, Arizona, Carolina at 51. These are college, you know, over 100 numbers. You're not into the 60s right now, but they're just outrageously high. So you have that. And Cooley, you know, scoring is up by an average of 5.4 yards per game.

Did I talk to you about this already, or is this a new conversation? I'm not discussed this. Okay, so a lot of people were posting the following as a reason. They said, well, penalties are down. Well, penalties being down don't necessarily mean or lead to increase scoring. In fact, when you get fewer penalties, typically you get faster moving games and sometimes fewer snaps, which actually more times than not would lead to a lower scoring game. Now, it depends on what the penalties are, right?

if there's more PI and there's there's more PI this year, DPI, defensive pass interference, but there's much less defensive holding. But anyway, here's the reason. There's much less offensive holding, which would change scores. Which would allow offenses, yes, to move the ball more.

But at the same time, the clock's not stopping on a lot of these plays, and it's rolling, and so it's creating a faster game. Aaron Rogers was on Mad Dog Radio on Tuesday. He makes a weekly appearance on the Pat McAfee show, AJ Hawks on that show, a former teammate of Aaron Rogers. And Roger, I was listening to it on Tuesday, and Rogers said the following. He said, it's really weird, man, and it's a lot easier offensively this year without fans in the stands. He said, playing in Minnesota in

week one and playing in New Orleans last Sunday night, it was just a massive difference in operating our offense. And he said the reason scoring's up more than any other reason is no fans. And the fans help defense. They don't help offense. They help the defense. They hurt the offense when you're on the road. And that was his reason for it. No, I would understand that completely, which is why I like Washington even less because there is going to be way less Baltimore fans in the stadium. And yeah, I know where the game's being played. All right. Let's give a final score prediction with maybe a footnote, if you have one.

My final score prediction is Baltimore 31, Washington, 16, three field goals and a touchdown for the Washington football team. I think that Baltimore is too much early. They jump out to an early lead like teams have done against Washington. and it's not, and you're thinking about watching other games at 1 o'clock. I've got Baltimore 27, Washington 17, and the footnote here is that a very good defensive coordinator, Don Martindale, in Baltimore, really confuses a quarterback making his 11th start, and that the conversation next week is once again on Dwayne. Now, they score 17 points and he has a couple of drives here and there, but ultimately he doesn't do enough and he'll probably make a mistake or two.

And we're having this conversation again. And by the way, in a different context now after what Ron Rivera and or what was leaked to J.P. Finley about, you know, perhaps, you know, he better get his act in order or a change could be more imminent than maybe we thought in previous days. 2717, I'm going to take the home team on the cover. It might be a backdoor cover. It might be a late Dwayne to Inman, you know, with 13 seconds left to make it 2717. They got to get your betting on Rivera. He's going to keep playing this week. Yeah, exactly.

All right. Have a good weekend, everybody. Cooley, thanks. We'll be back Monday to recap the game.