The Kevin Sheehan Show - Commanders-Bears Recap w/Cooley & Kevin

Episode Date: October 14, 2022

Cooley and Kevin today with their recap of Washington's ugly 12-7 win in Chicago last night. Plenty on Ron Rivera's post-game press conference outburst plus nine "Smell Test" picks from Kevin.  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 Cheon Show. Here's Kevin. From the four. Fake toss to the end zone. And it is juggled.

Did he catch it? No, he did not. Incomplete. And that's the way it ended last night in Chicago, Washington, hanging on by a thread to one. win the Thursday night game 12 to 7. Kooley is here with me on the show. We'll go through the overarching theme of the game last night. We will go through Kooley's and Ems. We'll go through my game take. And then we will comment on the Rivera rant. You'll hear it after our first segment here. If you

missed it last night, we'll play it for you. And then we'll react to it. And Kooley's read the story from yesterday as well. So we'll get to that. I've got a smell test a little bit later on nine picks, six college picks, three pro picks, including Cooley, what I would suggest is one of the, I think, craziest point spreads, the biggest sort of head scratching point spread we've seen in a long time in a college game tomorrow. It's one of those point spreads where everybody that doesn't really follow gambling says, I think this is a misprint. This can't possibly be right. So we will get to that in a little bit. Don't forget to rate us and review us, especially on Apple. And Spotify, a quick five-star rating, if you don't mind, and a one-to-two-two-sentence review helps. What did you think about

the game? What is your overarching theme from the 12-7 Washington Commander's first ever road win as the commanders last night in Chicago? My over-arching theme. Since I haven't done a post game with you and forever, I forgot that you always want overarching themes. That was your idea. It was Kirk Cousins. What, Kirk Cusons. You used to talk about our overarching themes? I think so, yeah. I think it was Kirk Cousins that said like the overarching, it was my Kirk Cousin, it was from the Kirk Cousins situation.

Okay. I don't remember it that way, but that's fine. I'm not disputing. Okay. My overarching theme was that was bad football that we watched last night. Yeah. It was bad football. It was bad quarterback play. It was bad decision-making processes. It was balled there.

It was good defense. There you go. It's good defense. But realistically, not good football. I struggled in. There weren't a lot of choices for overarching themes. Everyone listening? That's a good choice, right?

The choice today, most of the thoughts I have, most of the things I've written down, essentially can be charted up to bad ball. You're happy to win any game you want to win, or that you can win, and anybody that's a die-hard Washington fan right now, and I'm not. So we're clear.

We're really clear. I found myself rooting for the Bears in Justin Field. sorry you're not the only one trust me i hear from everybody i just got a text from a really good friend of mine who said man your job every morning it's unbelievable he goes i was rooting for the bears last night i just want this thing to crash and burn so badly that there's no choice then for the league to come in and and take dan and force him to sell the team a lot of people feel that way trust me a lot of people have reached that if they're even paying you attention anymore. But go ahead on the overarching theme being that with some bad football.

Well, just bad ball. Okay. I don't know what else to say. You know, we'll go, I've got notes throughout all of it, but we're going to do the old, and this. And essentially, everything will go into what is bad ball. I don't know how to put it any other way. There's very few positives that you take out of the game from both sides. For Washington fans, you won a game.

And essentially, the season was over if you didn't win that game. That's my overarching theme. That's my overarching theme. I'm going to step on you right there because I don't want you to give my- Your video show stayed alive. I don't want to give you, I don't want you to give my overarching theme. My overarching theme is, this season was, saved last night, you know, at least for now. And saved doesn't mean salvaged, you know,

in context necessarily, but two and four, and I'm not just talking coolly about, you know, because now as a content provider that talks about the team all the time, the season, you know, people, more people will be paying attention. I don't even think that's true necessarily. For them, though, at one in five, you could have legitimately buried them because of the three teams in the division, because there's no chance you're going to get to nine. which is the minimum you're going to have to get to in the NFC to even be in the hunt for a wild card. And at 2 and 4, there's some life.

Not a lot of it, but there's some life. And if they had lost last night, everything was in play. You know, the quarterback change was in play to Sam Howl. Trade deadline stuff was in play. William Jackson, you know, asked for a trade, and the reports are that Washington's going to try to accommodate him. What a disastrous free agent signing that was. And, you know, I was even thinking that, you know, if they had lost last night, in addition to, you know, talking about what's next, with coaching staff, with quarterbacks, etc., I would have really dialed in on, okay, who are they going to move before the November 1st trade deadline?

Like, they have some pieces that, you know, like Gibson right now is a piece. They don't seem to love them as much as I do. I really like Antonio Gibson. I actually think he should get as many touches as Brian Robinson, Jr. But, you know, they might want to trade him, you know, before the trade deadline. So there would have been a lot of that in the conversation. But at two and four, even with Green Bay coming up, now you've got a couple of weeks where Green Bay, Indy, Minnesota, somehow with two of those at home, you know, if you can win a game or two, you're kind of back in the mix a little bit. And Rivera's teams historically have gotten better as the season's gone on.

And that's my overarching theme, is that they saved the season for now. Last night, we would have buried them had they lost. Had Mooney caught that ball and stretched it just breaking the plane and held on to it, that's what today would have been about. And the next couple of weeks, I would have said, let's start, you know, looking, as Doc always says, now it's time to focus on 23, as in 2023. That's my overarching thing. Yeah, they did save the season for the time being,

but they play Green Bay next week, and that gets you the 2 and 5, because they're going to lose to Green Bay next week. And the division is good. I don't know, buddy. But when you combine our overarching themes, when you really combine them and think about them, they saved the season with bad ball.

Right. It just doesn't make sense. The last four weeks, they've scored 8, 10, 17 at 12 points. Yeah. I know. It's not good. I mean, they're not coming along. No. They're not getting better.

They're not an exciting team. They're not. Like, I actually said to you last week, or this week, some of the things in the 7th, in the 21 to 17 lost to Tennessee, you could see where it went, so it's kind of gaining some ground and making some progress.

This game I watched last night on Prime, which I like, by the way. I do too. Was the first game that I've really watched start to finish on television. Yeah. Out of the first six games.

I've watched periodically throughout some. I watch a lot of the Eagles game. I listen to all the Titans game, but this is the first game I watched every play. Pretty much everything besides the commercials, which you can fast forward through if you wait, you know, half an hour after the game. Right.

not very good on offense. Scott Turner is not good. Carson Wentz is not necessarily coming along, and they're not utilizing any of the weapons that they have. And by the way, I actually think, based on last night where we're at right now, Antonio Gibson is better than Robin's. I do, too.

I think, and when you say he has fresh legs, like, no, he's the one that's been playing the entire time, where Herb Street said fresh legs. But I think he's better than Robinson. But they have weapons and they don't use them. They have guys and they don't get the ball to him. They have stuff going on and it's not there. And Carson Wentz, by the way, can't just sit there.

Girl Howitzer's at five-yard route. He is blazing it by dudes at four and five-yard. You could really see standout when you're watching television copy where you're like, you know, let's not sitting in a chest and knocking them backwards. I mean, they can't catch that. He also put one in Curtis Samuel's hands for a touchdown, and he dropped it. And then came back to Curtis Samuel on third down, and he dropped that one. And he dropped that one as well.

Yeah. He also may have had, in a season in which I think there have been some pass rushes that could have been stopwatched in less than a half second before contact. the first all-out blitz where Roquhwan Smith was on him, I think that may have been, you know, like I wanted to say that that should have been off sides because he was there so quickly, except that it wasn't off-sides. But no, he's spooked.

He is expecting on every single play to be hit and hard. And even when that doesn't happen, it is ugly to watch. And he's already, you know, coming in, we already knew, decision-making and accuracy. Those were two issues that were problems recently for him in his career. And then when you throw that he's fearful of the pass rush, which is legitimate, and it's a bothersome thing for him this year, they're 30th in the league in pass protection going into last night.

In the ESPN stat, which is, you know, win rate for pass blocking. And then I throw a lot of it on Turner. At one point I tweeted out, my God, on third down and makeables, like it's not third and 17 this week. They're third in makeables, and we're not running bubble against these six and seven man pressures. Can't we adjust and throw a bubble screen to Terry, which will go for six, seven, ten, maybe 30 yards? I mean, that drove me nuts. By the way, I have to tell you real quickly, there's a, I'm going to read this tweet.

So when I tweeted out this last night, this was my favorite response to any tweet that I tweeted out yesterday. I tweeted out, this is awful. But as long as we're here, meaning watching the game, Scott Turner needs to figure it out on third down versus the blitz. My God, throw a bubble already. And this guy, Dylan responded coolly, quote, our car is flipped over in a ditch, but as long as we're here, we need to figure out how to get the seat warmers to work.

That's a good one, Dylan. And that's exactly what we were watching. It's like, this game is such an abomination, but as long as we're here and the car is flipped over in a ditch, will Scott Turner throw a bubble already? Can we get the seat warmers to work? That was funny. That made me laugh out loud.

We're not climbing out of this ditch. We are waiting for a bigger car to come and help us. Yeah, but let's keep on. We don't know when that car is going to be here, but we're cold, so. Actually, damn it. I'd love to get the seawomers to work, but I'm hanging upside down, touching the ceiling. We've got to steering well, he's done. Oh, gosh, dang.

Like, no, they can't. some of the pressures that I've seen this year. First of all, the first pressure that I think we're talking about were Roklyn-on-Fits-Hadim. Yeah. Was an all-out pressure. I know it was. Actually, somebody dropped. Somebody dropped.

So I think it was seven-man. Well, they turned in, well, they bailed with the running back. They went a five-man protection. I'm pretty sure it was a five-man protection. So in the all-out, zero blitz, you got to drop with the, you can't just leave the running back. Yeah. The back went out. Right.

I mean, I could remember that. It could all be on wince. I mean, I don't know. His lot of receiver was wide open. You got to be able to let that go. I think that their answer to a lot of these things is to throw hot. Red 7. Red 7.

Crab cakes in football. That's what Maryland does. Wait. You want, he, he has to. I think their answer is to throw hot. I understand throwing. hot. But do you think he could have thrown hot on that one?

Yeah, you got to throw hot. It's just that they had some vertical route, but sometimes like you'd like your quarterback so his plot receivers is open. I don't know who it was. One of my complaints about this entire broadcast

the only one, they show fucking no replays on Prime. They show the worst replays. Yeah. So, I mean, it's hard to see some of the stuff. but you have like eight dudes at the line of scrimmage. Just like Vince Vaughn looked at Owen Wilson and said Hot Route 7.

Hot route. I mean, maybe alert your slot receiver. If you have something vertical, just kind of look at me. But I am interested in a lot of their third down stuff. I have a lot to talk about with their third down stuff. But it's almost strange when they decide to max protect and keep protection in, and when they decide to send protection out. And the route combinations off of it are just not diverse enough.

It is the same shit every time. I mean, they are the easiest third-down team to play defense against. They're running shallow cross-concept, basic cross-concept, and attack the sticks concept. And off of that, they're running some streams. I did right now. Like, hmm, for the first time in a third down and whatever, Terry McCorn caught a slant. Right.

Yeah. How about those? Do we want to maybe go back to that? Just some slants. Something quick. I mean... You know what you could do? Slint it and bubble.

All day long. We'll call it slubble. Swillet bubble. Let's run the slubble concept. Yeah, blant. We're running nothing but blants and slubbles today. I don't think they do enough of that. And I know that they did a lot of that against Dallas.

And that pass rush was relentless. Well, they did against Dallas was just throw flip screen. Okay. Well, it's a slant bubble isn't a screen. Okay, well, you know what? It's high-low and a slant ball. You can't just throw 20 screens. That was the Dallas idea.

You can. At some point, that doesn't work. Well, you do it until it works rather than getting your quarterback into a position where he's either mauled or he's so worried about getting hit that he throws the ball a million miles an hour at J.D. McKissick, six yards in front of him and behind him. I mean, because some of those throws he's made are just awful. And I knew and talked about it during the offseason, you're going to get some games that are going to be good. you're going to get some games that are going to be terrible, and you're going to get some games within the game where it's bad and it's good. And the accuracy has been an issue for him,

and the decision-making has been an issue for him. But this offensive line is dreadful. As a pass pro. Yeah. The past pros, like, there are times when it looks like Spurrier. Right, with Patrick Ramsey. Like, there's no answer. for picking this up.

Right. Agreed. I mean, I'm not sure what's going on in some of the blitz pick up eating. I would blitz them to death. You know what's so funny? I'd blitz them every down. You know what's so funny is that Tennessee and Dallas didn't really need to blitz them that much. I mean, Dallas got home and Philly got home sometimes with three-man rushes. That's why they're not getting blitz.

Well, I know, but Chicago's defensively has been bad. So they needed, you know, I really thought, the biggest disappointment for me, one more overarching theme. And this is going to get old here after a while is that this was the team to get healthy on offensively. And I know there was no Logan Thomas and no Johan Dotson. And, you know, Tyler Larson was back in there for the guy that dribbled the ball back three times at center, which was helpful. But you had 214 yards of offense in six points against a team that. It's not good defensively. They were 31st in the league against the rush.

They were dead last on third down. I mean, Minnesota had people so wide open last week against them. Minnesota was 12 for 15 on third down. What? They're starting four rookies. Yeah. And so there's an esload of issues. But back to my number one overarching theme, they won the game.

It's a Thursday. night game, we've seen these Thursday night games really suck. They're really bad. How many Thursday night games did you play in? Quite a few. How bad were they? They were hard to prepare for, but I love the Thursday night game as a player,

especially when you got them a little bit later in the season, because you didn't have to put pads on. You kind of went through a couple meetings and a couple walkers, and then you got the whole weekend off. Right. But they were, it's condensed. I mean, everything's very condemned.

I was thinking about it last night, though. I was thinking, I mean, if I was an O.C. Or head coach or somebody, and I know that you can't always do this. And Eber Fluse is new. But I would be utilizing the off-season to prepare every bit of that game plan for the Thursday night game. I would die. It would be done.

How can you do that if the games later in the season? I know that the Bears have made change. changes. Because some coordinators who have been around and some people who have bet, they do the same stuff year in and year out. By the way, Washington played a lot of 3-3 front.

I know it's just 11 guys out there, but played a lot of 3-3 with Holcomb in the middle. I was going to mention to you that their typical 5-man front where in the past, they've had five guys with their hand in the dirt and three-point stances. They had outside

sweat and 2-hill were playing his outside linebackers who was really almost a three-four. It is. You keep saying that, but it's a three-three because there's not another backer in there. Right. True. But if sweat and two-hill are lining up outside and standing up and Colcom's in the middle and you've got a nose tackle in Ridgeway number 91 with Allen and Payne, who were both really good again last night.

We'll get to that here shortly. then it looked very much like a three-four. But they call that their five-man defensive line front. They've run that a bunch here in the last two years. By the way, I did want to mention real quickly, I don't want to lose this thought because you played in this game. You know, Washington and Chicago played on a Thursday night in 2007. You played in this game.

This was the game that followed, unfortunately, the Buffalo game and the week and a half after Sean had passed. And you guys, Jason got hurt. Todd Collins came in, and that was the beginning of a four-game run to the postseason. You guys came back against Chicago with Todd Collins. Did Todd Collins just know the offense better than Jason? A lot better. Yeah, same time.

The problem was that. He knew it much, much better. But the difference was that that was a beautiful. where you're supposed to be, when it's supposed to be their offense, and there was so much timing and rhythm and anticipation on the quarterback part. And Jason hadn't done that. He'd been there a year and a half. Exactly.

And that wasn't what he did is Auburn, and that wasn't what the plan was for Joe with Jason Campbell. Joe's offense was the same terminology in the past game, essentially. It's all numbers. But there was so much more block it up, protect, and you can see guys open. Jason was going to have to develop a little bit more in that offense. ended up having a couple of good years, a good year in Oakland.

Yeah. I like Jason Campbell. I mean, Todd, but yes, I've said this multiple times. We had what we called 787 F shoot pump. Two seven routes on the outside and eight route in the middle that can either bend into the middle or go straight. And then this little, the F would run this little out and up. And if they sucked up on the F, then the eight route would get the ball over the middle about 18 yards.

Year and a half, I hadn't caught that ball. First quarter, I turn around and that sucker is in the air. Like, well, okay. This is what we've been talking about when the defense happened to be this way. He just had, like, Todd just knew it, he saw it. I think Jason would have got closer to that.

Yeah, he was still young. It was his second year. So, anyway, they have some big issues on offense. I know. And if the biggest issue right now is, here's my biggest concern. I don't know if this is true or not, and I don't know how the teaching is or not.

But they have a very limited concept in third down situation, in a real true drop-back situation. It's either the O.C. goes to what he's comfortable with, or the O.C. goes to what the quarterback can understand or what he believes he can read out. That's a problem. They don't believe that Wendt can truly read out of defense. I got to lean on. I don't like what Turner is doing, but I also got to lean on the fact that I've watched enough Wins to see that he is not decisive.

And he struggles getting through progressions. and maybe it is simplified because it went. Look, we talked about, you know, after the Dallas game, it doesn't look like he's even able to, you know, audible, which changed in the Tennessee game. Last night, it looked like there were a couple of times, perhaps, I don't know. But I wanted to mention to you, and I'm looking for the quote right now, I had it up a little while ago,

so I'm just going to paraphrase it. But I did not see this, but prior to the game on the pregame show, Ryan Fitzpatrick is a part of the Amazon Prime pregame halftime and postgame show. And Ryan Fitzpatrick said the problem in Washington is that they stick with what they're comfortable with and they don't adapt to the talent. And that's criticism of Scott Turner, no doubt. Yeah, that would make complete sense to me. I'm throwing a guess from out here in Wyoming,

but it's one of two or three things. Yeah. But you can't run basic cross and shallow cross and mesh concepts on third down as your, like those three concepts as your primary concepts because essentially they're all passed off and worked off the same by a defense. They essentially all work as a high-low

between the middle of the field and the crossing route. And you can pass off the crossing routes and drop into the middle route, and if you don't have any thread over the top in those situations, then you can't really continue to run those all games. Yeah. They're red as a mesh read. They're all red as triangle reads. So if they're passing off all your triangle read plays the same, which everyone's going to do,

they're not very open. Okay. Let's get to our game recap. Your uhs and ums. My overall game take. We'll do that right after. these words from a few of our sponsors. Second down in goal.

Fields. That's knocked in the air and the commanders come down with it. They do. So deflect it up into the air and a pickoff at the five-yard line. That's Jonathan Allen who comes down with the interception. That was Washington's first defensive takeaway since week one. They got two of them last night, one on special teams. The muffed punt ended up really being the play of the game.

But listen to this, Cooley, because I actually I kind of have a hard time believing this is true. This is not like an ESPN stats and information thing. This is something called OptaStats, but somebody sent this to me. I'm going to assume that it's true. The Bears last night were the first NFL team in 30 years to have three drives in one game where they drove the ball 60 plus yards or more to the five-yard line or closer and didn't score. I mean, it does seem like it would be awfully hard to be at the five-yard line three times and come away with zero points. Apparently they didn't look very hard last night.

They actually made it look really easy. John Allen, though, with that pick, stopped the first of the three Red Zone appearances for Chicago. last night. All right. Let's get to Cooley's and ums and then I'll give you my game take. Go ahead. So I was just going to start with the, um, three stops

inside the five. That's big time confidence boost of that defense. And there's some talent on the defense. But gosh, dang it. I mean, I'm watching this with a buddy

to start. The bears get down there on the first job, and I kept saying, they're not going to score. Chicago doesn't score. They're going to turn it over, and turn it over. And it wasn't Jonathan Allen pick, but he doinked it into the helmet of another. Obada, yeah. It's one thing where the ball gets batted.

It's another when you throw into the helmet of the defensive line. Yeah. There's a big difference between someone jumping and two feet more of arm or three feet more of arm versus the helmet of a D-line. The second Bears stopped down, they got to the one-yard line. I would have kicked a field goal. On fourth and goal from the one? From the one.

I swear to God, I would kick the field goal from the one. Washington can't score. And I don't know if I believe in our offense. And the third stop, we talked about this last night. You had third down with 46 seconds left. I would have run the ball. 52. 52 seconds, first and goal.

at the five. It was 52. After the 40-yard run by Fields. I think it, first of all, I think it was a PI on Forest. It was contested. But at the point the ball got there, but he's holding him before the ball gets there. I think it was, we've seen less called. We've seen less called. Right. I like letting the players play in that situation, though. So I have no problem with the no-call. And then they really got away with one on 14. down, when Mooney dropped a ball that he probably doesn't drop often. It's a good play by St. Juice, didn't you think? I do. I think it was a great play by St. Juist.

But if Mooney catches that at the high point where he has the opportunity to catch that ball, he's in. It's over the goal line where it hits his hands. He dropped it. So, yeah, I mean, three for three, he's still, whatever way you want to look at it. Bad ball or not. It's still three stops inside the five. Right. Bad ball.

I mean, throughout the game, the bear's lack of continuing to run the ball in critical situations was amazing. Yeah, I don't understand why the whole playbook, the whole playbook should have been open to them. This was not last week. Last week was 19 seconds and no timeouts. They had 52 seconds. They could have run the ball in almost halfway

way huddled up and run it again. And then, you know, and then thrown it twice or whatever. I mean, especially given how much trouble they had throwing the football, but continue. Okay, so I'm just going to progressively go through the game as we, but I wanted to start with that, I'm going to bounce back and forth on these is I hate the bear's orange helmets and orange jerseys and the color scheme of the entire game. It was so ugly. The orange is maybe, but

go with black helmets. Yeah, the orange helmets were terrible. What do you think of... You haven't said anything about Washington's new uniforms yet this year. I don't care that much for them. I don't... They're fine. Okay.

But the combination of the burgundy with the yellow, the whole thing was... I mean, it just looked ugly. Yeah. I think the NFL should. should have kicked out those Chicago helmets. What's the best uniform combination we can have in a game? I've got one for you.

I mean, anytime the Chargers wear their powder blues, you know, kind of against the Raiders. Black. Yeah. The Raiders and their whites with the silver in the black, that's a pretty damn good combination. The Cowboys Blues were always a good combination with the Redskins' championship uniforms, the white tops and the Burgundy.

a good one. I think Raven Steelers are good. Brown Steelers are good. Sorry, not Browns. Bengals Steelers, I like. You do? Bangal Steelers? Yeah.

I don't know. I think the Panthers, you know, kind of turquoise uniforms or aqua uniforms, those are pretty good looking. That can be a good mix with, you know, some red on the other side. What are we doing here?

Get back to your us andums. You hate it. You hated the uniforms. I really like Curb Street. I do too. I don't think he's brilliant. I don't think he's incredibly insightful. But I don't, I think he's really easy to listen to, and I like the broadcaster.

I've always liked Herbstr. I've watched quite a few of these Thursday night games, and I really do. I enjoy listening to the game with Herb Street. He makes it an easy listen. they don't show a ton of replays when they do. There's a lot of times where he's right, at least it's easy for him. Early in the game, they had a, I think I wrote this, Mooney ran a dig and Fields turned it down,

and he makes kind of an X, like, this is an open receiver in the NFL. And you can see. I mean, it's easy to see. I wish they'd show more replays and he would do more of that stuff. Maybe it doesn't do it that well. I don't know. I don't need that many times, sorry to tell you, stuff. I don't really care when Chris Collinsworth is like, now you look at the right guard

here and his footwork. This is what it's like, yeah, fine. I mean, great. You're watching the right guard play. Mid-play. That's funny. Oh, yeah. I mean, Collinsworth really digging into the right guard's footwork. That's exciting for the casual viewer. I agree with you on Herb Street. I I think he's been great in everything he's always done. I think he's rejuvenated Al Michaels a little bit because Michaels, I think, had really lost his fastball. By the way, they've called the two worst games of the NFL season so far, the 12 to 9 game last week with Indy and Denver, and the 12 to 7 game last night with Washington and Chicago. But to your point, he does a really good job on replays.

When you were saying that, there is a ball that he turns down on a third down, Fields turns down to Pettis, who's wide open on a crosser in the middle of the field. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Oh, that was the one? Yeah, and he took a shot deep down field to Mooney. Okay, I didn't know that one. Oh, no, no, yeah, that's the other one. He took the deep one on 33 where he's like, got to know the situation.

Yeah, exactly. The crossing route here. Exactly, right. That's the one I'm talking about. It's just, yeah, look at the crossing route here. The crossing route isn't three. The crossing out right there's 20. Right.

Herb Street, eight fields. Yeah, you can. Not as a person, I'm sure. Not as a person, but you could just tell. Well, Cooley. He said, though, over and over again last night, and I think it's a fair thought. I'm not saying that a better scheme is, personally, I've actually kind of liked, I like Fields' ability to be a runner for sure.

He's also, by the way, got a big arm, but he was horrendous last night. The Minnesota game, he was much better. But Herb Street kept saying last night, you know, Luke Getsy, who's been with Aaron Rogers in Green Bay for, you know, the better part of the last decade, that's not why we have a, Herb Street talked about all of the college, you know, the college game meshing with the NFL game like we've been talking about since 2012. And that's really what they need for him.

They need a college offense. They need more zone read, much more dual threat. They need to turn him. into what Philly turned Jalen Hertz into last year when they started running the shit out of them. I don't disagree with that offense. It looked like Ohio State.

Run and run action pass and I didn't think it looked that similar. What Ohio State does. Herb Street did. You don't have guys running six yards open. Well, that's a big difference between Ohio State and the Bears

and the NFL. By the way, that's the most important point. somebody asked me the other day, I don't know. It was actually a couple weeks ago about, you know, the Haskins and remembering your conversation about Haskins before the draft. And you said, you know, I can't tell because every single throw, 70% of his throws are within five yards in the line of scrimmage. And then when he throws the ball downfield, his receivers are open by 10 yards.

Like, how can you really tell? And that's the problem at Ohio State and Bama and places like that. the talent so overwhelmingly, you know, overwhelming that it's, you know, you don't have to throw somebody open. You don't have to throw with anticipation because they're there. They're just sitting there waving their arms. I'm here. Nobody's within 10 yards of me.

Just throw it up high and let it land in my lap. But anyway, continue. So just continuing on the broadcast, the replays that would, it was like more. and there was a couple of them. I think there was one where there was an illegal contact on Washington or something, but Jonathan Allen hit fields and he was kind of falling into field. They didn't call that on Jonathan Allen. But they showed the replay of Allen hitting fields,

and you're like, could we please see what happened with the illegal contact? Right. The actual part of the play that created the first down for the Bears. Yeah, Alan stumbled. A lot of it, it was like, I'd much rather, yeah, and neither team was really, the Bears went up-tempo a little bit later, but now their team in the first half was really up-tempo. You have 40 seconds as a broadcast

to show them walking to the huddle and show them sitting in the huddle and all of the pre-snap stuff. Just give us eight seconds or replay. 12. Well, they're not... I don't care what they're doing in the huddle. So that would be my complaint to that broadcast.

The next... I had... Washington, we talked about this. Washington has zero idea to pick up pressure. They're blitz. Pick up maybe it must be a shit show. Hey, what are we going to do with a double A this week? Double A.

Yeah, I mean, well, that's where both the backers come up in Mugia. Oh, yeah, yeah. No, I knew that. I knew that. So let's just, let's use this, him blocking. You block him. Okay, good, good, good. Sounds good.

I'll block him. What happens if he comes there? Well, no, it's him. You block him. Don't worry about he comes there. That's not he blocking. It's him blocking. It's bad.

It is bad, isn't it? The communication is bad. The scheme's bad. Could be wince. Could be whinth. Could be play calling. Could be. They don't know how to pick up pressure.

Yeah. You don't have to pick up pressure that much if you'll throw Terry McCloren to more slant. Convergent on a third down. slant, I think it's the first one I've seen him catch this year, third down. He is a slant machine. It's hard to cover on a slant around. I don't know what's so hard about that. Right. For Washington, really, the Holcomb stopped on fourth and one, and the goal I stand on and fourth and one was huge. I would have kicked a field goal, like I said, because Washington

couldn't score. I mean, can you imagine? It was inside the one, basically, and on fourth and goal and that was, I think, at the end of a long drive. It really would have said something about that football game last night and about the recognition of how many points it was going to take to win it. If in this day and age, a fourth down analytics and go-for it analytics, inside the one, you send out a field goal kicker to go for it on a drive that I think was like 75 yards. But anyway, yeah. But anyway, yeah.

Carson Wentz has zero ability to make a non-conventional throw. As soon as he's off platform or arm angle, that ball is not accurate. No. As soon as that arm comes down like 20 degrees, 15 degrees to the side, not happening. I mean, and again, you've got to have some touch on these underneath throws. it's got to be more touch. I played with a lot of quarterbacks, and I think it really, the first time this ever happened

was against Philly on Monday night, we're losing. It's in the rain. It's the third quarter-ish, and I were in a five-yard out route, a little thick route. And the ball is on me from McNabb, like 352 miles an hour, just over my head. The guy can't even get my arms up for it. It's like, what am I supposed to do with this?

Right. Those underneath throws with that high velocity are not easy. And if they are not hitting you in the chest, they are tough catching. You, hold on, on the touch thing, they ran, one of the plays they ran last night was, and I don't have this in my game take, but you just reminded me of it. There was a play, it was third quarter, it was right after game. Gibson had run off a big run. And they had run off like two big runs. And they were moving the football.

And they went with like this Samuel in motion. And it looks like they're going to, you know, they're going to give to Samuel. But instead they throw back to a screen on the other side of the field that's set up beautifully for Gibson. And the ball. Oh, there's one man to be. The ball is low. The ball was low. And if it's there and it's, it's.

caught, you know, where it should be caught, it's a touchdown. Yeah. That was actually a... Perfect chance was going to be a good chunk. Yeah. It was not going to be a good chunk. It was a walk-in.

There were three linemen in front. There was one bear's defender. He's able to make the play because Gibson's got to adjust the ball, not be able to adjust to getting, setting up blocks. Exactly. Exactly. Hmm. My son is five years old.

He's watching the game with me. He's not really into watching football that much. shit. He says about Fields number one is bad but he's good at docking. I was dying but he's good at dodging.

He's good at dodging. He's good at dodging. He is good at dodging. He was not good at anything else. No. I really like the Andy Reid commercial where he draws the mustache. I really like that one. Yeah.

Coach, it happened again. Oh, that's a good commercial. We've got a lot of us and ums that have nothing to do with football right now. They had to do with the game. Okay. And Bodie's had to do with the game? Yes, it did. I'm not talking about Bodie.

I'm talking about, you know, broadcast and uniform colors and continue, please. Okay, well, let's get into the rest of them. So the couple of the, the Samuel drop at the goal line, and then the Samuel drop again on the second six. Like, catch the ball. I know. those were big plays in the game I mean

there weren't going to be many points scored and you threw a ball with pressure right into his you know right there it was kind of wobbly but who cares that that's got to be a catch it's touchdown yeah

actually don't like seeing anymore it's for a while but okay well then don't do it here's the rest of what I liked um well here I mean this just goes a bad ball again

uh fourth quarter The bears are sitting at a third and one. They take his back to go to a third and 14. You're like, why are you dropping him back on third and one? Right. Run the ball. I, I, I, I, I, yuck. But, oh, I hated, I hated Chase.

Why is Chase Young wearing sunglasses? I don't know. I don't want to comment. It's nighttime. Yeah. Maybe, yeah, but he took them off later, so there's not an eye thing. Okay. They were off of a fourth quarter.

Oh, you were concerned there was an eye thing? No, I don't know. Okay. One of the things I didn't like, there's a second and eight with the nine minutes and 20 seconds to the third quarter, Mooney clearly drops the ball. It's a five-yard ditch. Get them into third and three situation. They end up going with a toss, and three plays later, they score a touchdown.

Yep. I don't care. I don't care if it's a five-yard game. Anything that puts you into a third-and-three with field instead of a third-and-eight that is clearly an incomplete pass, you use. challenge. I have that on my list. They made their own call on the field and this ended up cost him essentially the drive which became a touch zone. That's right. I don't understand where you don't challenge that place. I agree. I had that on my list because that was a four-yard gain

and it's like, okay, well, it's only a four-yard gain and is it really going to be overturned and we didn't get the challenge last week? No, that ball was clearly out and clearly not caught. And third and seven for that team is, you know, if you can keep the quarterback in the pocket, is like third and, you know, zero chance. Third and three, they just pitched it to Montgomery, and he had his biggest run of the game, and they ended up scoring a couple of plays later on that 40-barter with 12 men on the field. A run, which, by the way, looked like he could have just run to the sideline unabated

and ended up cutting the back to midfield and they couldn't tackle him. He's a good back. They have good backs. He's a good back. One thing I did like with Wentz, man, he KOed Roe-K-on-Smith on a run play. Yeah, he did. Just knocked him out. That was awesome. I'm amazed this dude.

Belis Jones Jr. fumbles a punt, backing up to the nine or eight-yard line, uncomfortable with it. And you let those bounce. Yeah. Like, if you don't got it, just don't get it. But that was the one, I mean, that's the shining moment for Washington. That was the play of the game. It's the play of the game.

I mean, it's crazy. I hated that they had 12 men on the field twice, and they had 10 men on the field once defensively, Washington. Right. I don't think Kendall Ford plays. Like, that's ridiculous. Those are dumb penalties. Unless it's Aaron Rogers,

and you're really the best ever in the history of the league of catching guys at dubbing. It's just a field. He's not even aware of it. And it's not that. They just lined up with 12. You were about to say he's not even aware they're going hurry up. But he's also not, but the field doesn't even aware they have 12 on the field. No, had no idea.

And by the way, that throw he made, that's actually what he's able to do. He's got a gun. He got absolutely blown up as the ball just left his hand, and it was a dime in the end zone. Yeah, was it dime. my last couple thoughts in this game I wrote this down we talked about

a basic cross is not the only third down answer it must have to be other ones yeah I was amazed at 4th and 16 that the Bears

didn't punt they had three time out 234 left crazy I was amazed that they can punt try to back up Washington like it was what was it fourth and 11

and even at 4th and 11 I was sitting there like you really aren't converting this. No. Other than fields taking off and running, you're not, and then

they get the procedure penalty or whatever they. Delay a game. And then the delay of, then at 4th and 16, you just punt it away. Get three-time out. It's a dumb. It was so stupid. By the way, one of the things I hated after they didn't pun it away

was that Washington has literally zero trust in their quarterback, but by the way, they don't have an offensive line that could really, like, dynamically block three run plays for a first down. So they run, run, run, and punt. No, they missed the field goal. They tried the field goal and missed it. Run, run, run, and then Joey Slide gangs the field goal. Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, I guess you're sitting there saying, okay, we're going to go ahead. Right now, eight points. We'll just run, run, run, go ahead, eight points. That's still a 48-yard field goal. You get the first down and win the game. Yeah, I have some thoughts on that. I have some thoughts on that. My take here coming up. Because I think I disagree with that. you would just run,

run, run. I mean, well, yeah, I'll tell you right now. I, when they,

they got a big run on the first play after the, after the, you know, after the fourth and 16 craziness of going for that.

That's right. Robbins had their, yeah, they had their big run. And at that point, it's like, okay, you get them to take

their timeouts, and you keep running the ball because, by the way, that's the best, thing you've done in the second half by far. And you can't risk being sacked at a field goal range here. And what are the chances really at 15 to 7 with no timeouts? They're going to go down the field and score a touchdown and convert a two point conversion. So I was definitely in the very

conservative mode. I'm not saying that a good team wouldn't have, you know, perhaps taking a shot at trying to run something to pick up the first down and end the game. But to me, a field goal, even though it's an eight-point lead with no timeouts, is almost ending the game. I would have been wrong because, well, I don't know if I would have been wrong. They took over at the 38-yard line after the miss field goal versus taking over at the 25 with no timeouts or maybe even inside the 25, you know, if they had a kickoff return. But I didn't mind that. Let me just tell you, though, that Chicago did something that was really smart.

I don't know if they did it intentionally or not. You and I have talked about this before, I think, in the past. but this is just one of those timeout kind of strategy things that not every coach does well, and a lot of times many coaches really effed up. But on defense, when you're using your timeouts in a trailing position to get the ball back, you can't call a timeout with like 205 or 206 or less because you then give the offensive team a free chance to throw the football without any punishment to doing that, meaning the clock is stopping at the end of the play anyway because of the two-minute warning.

Right. And so one of those things people will always say, you've got to always take your timeouts before the two-minute warning so that you save as much time as you can, which is true. But not at 205, 206 or less. Because if they had called their second- No, you're not worried about saving the six-second in the game. Yeah, because if they had called their second timeout, which they did, they let it run down to the two-minute warning.

I'm sorry, if they called their third timeout with 204 to go, Washington then would have had free license to throw the ball and try to go for the first down. So it's much better what they did. And I didn't have a problem with Rivera being conservative there. And the kicker- But I'm going to propose to you in exactly what you said. At 216 or 209,

if you throw the ball and it's incomplete, you just said you're not worried about the bears going down the field and trying to touchdown and getting the two-point conversion. So why are you concerned with one more time out? Well, no, I'm not saying, I wasn't doing that from Washington's perspective. I was saying that from Chicago's perspective. I was saying that the bear,

the Washington running the ball four straight times and kicking a field goal, even though they had a decent run, there's an opportunity to throw the ball right there. and Dave Allen. I understand what you're thinking. Especially if you believe that Chicago can't score. What I was saying, though, just from, forget the fact that it was Chicago and Washington.

A lot of coaches make mistakes in games when they're trailing and they're using their timeouts on defense, calling a timeout with like 203 or 204 to go. That's a big mistake. Don't ever call a timeout with two minutes and three seconds or two minutes and four seconds, two minutes and five seconds on defense when you're trying to get the ball back because you're trailing. Because now you are giving that team free license to run anything they want, including throwing the football, without having to worry about the clock being stopped because it's going to stop at the end of that play.

That's all I was saying. Now, the other part of this, if they were confident that they could get a first down throwing, then do it. And by the way, go ahead and throw it on first down. And don't worry about their time. But by the way, if you get the first down on first down with a throw, well, they still have three timeouts left after that, or two timeouts and the two-minute warning. Anyway, my point is that I don't think they were comfortable.

Your first instinct, they didn't have any confidence that they could throw and make the first down is exactly what I was thinking in the moment. I don't have any confidence that if they drop back and even in a surprise way, play action on second down and throw it, that they're going to be able to protect well enough. and even if they do that Wence is going to make a good throw and they're going to move the sticks. I'd rather them force all their timeouts, kick a field goal, have an eight-point lead,

and if somehow they flukely score a touchdown, they're still going to have to make a two-point conversion. Anyway, that was my thinking in the moment. Here's the last two things I had, and I'll let you move on. I think these are the last two, but both of them, in my opinion, go back to the indicative of a bad ball. We talked about the three-third down, or the three inside the five stops.

We did not really mention the field's throw on the fake reverse. That was the easiest throw that you and I could go make that throw. I know. It was just horrible. And you're like, this is just hard to watch. And then seriously, the last drive, how is Chicago going to beat you? Driving the ball down the field. Fields.

If we really sit and discuss this, I would bet field scrambling for 39. yards might be the number one answer. No doubt. You know what I mean? Like if you that game show, you've got to list like your five answers, like the number one answer would be Fields Big Scramble. Good answer, good answer. Good answer.

Good answer. Fields scrambling. All right. Let's see what it is. And the number one. Here it is. And Field scrambling for 40 yards. Number one. All right. All right. Next person up. Next person up. You know what's funny, though, Cooley, against Minnesota last week when they were down 29-22. He made some of the best plays, best throws that he's made.

I understand. Yeah, Minnesota's defense is bad. Washington's defense is better. And he was terrible last night as the setup. Okay, go ahead. Okay, I'm done. You're done. I think we'll get to your game take.

Okay, let's get to my game take right now. Game take. My game take is the things I like, the things I didn't like in a few other observations. Some of this will be repetitive, and when it's repetitive, I'll just go through it quickly. I want to start with the fact that I just really like the defensive line play. And it's not just the three studs, Alan Payne, and sweat. And sweat has really played well the last two weeks. But Obata's really good and flashed a lot.

James Smith Williams, Two Hill, Ridgeway, all of us. of them played well. Alan in particular just has played so well this year, had the interception last night. Obviously, he was a little bit lucky. Duron Payne is unblockable at times. Sweat just crushed that rookie tackle all night long. They had five sacks, 13 quarterback pressures, and the truth is, Fields just barely got out of some of those. And he's good at doing that at escaping. But, you know, there were times where they had him. It seemed like, they had them and they just didn't finish it off. But defensively, you know, they've really played more good ball in the last three weeks

against Dallas, Tennessee, and last night against Chicago. I understand Chicago's not a good team. But they have gotten better and it's been led by their defensive front where Allen and Payne in particular are having Pro Bowl seasons. I don't know if they'll be recognized for it if they're on a really bad football team when we get to the end of the year. But I'll tell you this, Duran Payne's going to get paid big time.

And he's an unrestricted free agent coolly. They did not, you know, they did not extend him. This is his fifth year option that he's playing on. But this dude's going to get paid big time in the offseason. Red zone defense, you already mentioned it, plus two in the turnover margin. They got a little bit lucky because, you know, Terry fumbled the ball on that reverse.

and somehow it hit off the Bears player and right back into his chest. But that ball was out. And I think Milne on that first punt return, and this is where we didn't get a replay of it, but I think he fumbled it and just fell on it. But still, the plus two turnover margin for them has been huge. They had one takeaway, dead last in the league, heading into that game last night.

They got two of them. They weren't necessarily forced. But still, they ended up being a significant. significant decider. Obviously, the muff punt was the biggest play of the game. On the list of things that I liked, I just thought that the running game really got it going in the second half. Not necessarily early. McKissick had those two runs at the end of the first half that got him into field goal range with the penalties. And I like McKissick as a runner. Gibson and Robinson Jr. basically touched the ball on 17 of the 25 second half offensive snaps by my rough count. 15 of those were runs for 79 yards, so over 5 yards per carry.

And Gibson also had two catches. I just think, as I said to you earlier, I know they really like Brian Robinson, Jr. And it's way too early, obviously, to have any kind of definitive opinion on Robinson, Jr. I believe them that he's going to be a good back. And I've seen enough to think that he could be a really good back. They really think he is better between the tackles as a thumper, and Gibson's better on the outside. I just think Gibson's having a good season, and every time they feature him, he plays well. And I saw this stat earlier too.

Shit, where is it? Because I had this one up recently. It was a stat that basically, here it is. Washington is averaging 27 and a half points a game when Gibson gets over 50% of the offensive snaps, when he gets under 50% of the snaps, they're averaging 11.75 points per game. I think that's really an interesting number.

That's an incredible stat. And because their four- That's a really incredible stat. Their four-game winning streak last year was with Gibson being featured in a big-time way. Gibson last night, 15 of the 57 offensive snaps, 26% of those snaps. Robinson, Jr., and again, this isn't a knock against him, 47% of the snaps. I just like Gibson. I think that they're a better team with him getting a lot of touches.

I'm with you. I just, and I agree, I would say that Gibson can't, you can't like Robinson more and then literally limit Gibson's touches to eight in the game. Yeah, that's what I think. I also just, the running game in the second half, I think they did run block well. As bad as they are in pass pro, this offensive line, they run block better. and Tyler Larson being in there at center for Nick Martin, he's just a bigger dude. You can just see that.

There's more there's more there with him in the running game and as a pass protector except on those third downs. On the list of things that I liked, I put Cole Turner down here. We haven't seen a lot about him. You know what, you're right. I'm glad you said that. I thought he played well. He only had two catches, two targets, but I thought he blocked.

On one of those Gibson runs, he was really, he did a great job, not necessarily blocking, but kind of screening the one defender out there on the edge. He just looks the part to me, you know? And then... Yeah, I like cool. I said last week he didn't, we didn't talk about this with some of the film stuff, but the game last week did not block well. It was non-existent.

He was better this week. And I like him as a, I think he's got something to him as their outrunner, for sure. They lost Bates before the game started. He got injured and warm-ups. That's why he wasn't out there. Last thing on the list of things that I liked, you've kind of touched on. But my God, I mean, it was just a, it was a blessing that they went for the fourth and 11 and fourth and 16 and that they didn't try to run the ball with 52 seconds left first and goal at the five.

You know, they're going to, they've got some things to figure out with their quarterback. All right, the list of things that I did not like. Third down offense, two for 11 this week, one for 11 last week. And this week, you know, you didn't have down and distance issues. You know, seven of the 11 third downs were like basically five yards or less. There was only one that was third and ten, nothing longer than third and ten. They couldn't protect with the immediate pressures. You'll watch the all 22, I guess.

Maybe we want to do a film breakdown of this game. Who knows? That's up to you. But, you know, figure it out on third down, Scott Turner. Like you said, I mean, he's skittish, obviously, because he's been hit. so much and there's been so much jailbreak kind of, you know, on dropbacks. But you've got to figure it out. I mean, there's got to be the slants, the bubbles, the, you know, the slips, whatever it is. Just let's not have him back there worried about getting hit. And by the way, more times than not

getting hit. It was just the offense much of the night. I mean, that is maybe the only team or maybe one of only two teams, three teams in the league, you're going to beat when you generate 214 total yards and six points on offense. Because the touchdown... They had 86 net yards passing. It's just... It's hard to do. It's hard to win a game that way. Two for 11 on third down. You know, there were some big drops. We already talked about that. There were penalties. Like Cam Sims had a false start in the red zone.

that hurt them. Oh, yeah. You know, you're just, the offense was the biggest disappointment for me, because I thought going into this game, this was a chance for them to get right a little bit because, you know, Chicago was 31st in the league against the rush coming in. They were dead last in the league on third down coming in. And, you know, watching that last weekend, I know Minnesota's good, and they're good on offense, and they have Justin Jefferson and Dalvin Cook and cousins,

who is a quarterback that can absolutely, you know, dissect you with his mind and knows what's going on. But it was just so easy. It was pitch and catch the whole day. And when they weren't pitching and catching, they were running for big yardage. I just thought they had a chance for a big offensive night. So it was a major step back in any sort of, and my optimism was waning, obviously. But this is going to be the struggle. And I personally think it starts more than anything up front. I know you think it starts more with Wentz, but I think that they've got a major problem with the interior of their offensive line. I mentioned this on yesterday's show, and I forget if I've mentioned this to you, you know, per ESPN's next gen, you know, pass blocking win rates, they were ninth in the league last year. They're 30th through five weeks going into last night. I know Wentz is part of the problem.

I know Scott Turner's part of the problem. I know the receivers are part of the problem. I know playing some of the league's really good defenses, Dallas and Philly in particular, have been part of the problem. But it's just, it's not good right now. Also on the list of things that I didn't like. What did you say? There's just too many problems. Too many issues.

The big, the defense I thought was, you know, again, good, but they gave up big plays and they made mistakes. The 64-yard run by Herbert early, there were two missed tackles. Davis and St. Juice. The touchdown pass to Pettis with 12 men on the field caught them off guard. They quick-snapped it and they've got 12 men on the field and they still throw a touchdown pass. That was the best throw, as I mentioned, by far all night for fields. And they gave up, you know, some big scrambles when you knew that that was really the only way they could move the football, including on the final drive. More penalties again last night, seven of them, including two 12 men on the field penalties. They didn't get penalized for the 10 men on the field, as you mentioned.

McLorn had a big illegal formation penalty on a big run by Robinson early. And then Joey Sly missing that field goal. I felt comfortable. He had hit two field goals. I know they were 28 and 38, but 48. He's got a big leg. That was the direction they felt comfortable going in. And I didn't have a problem, as I've already explained, with Rivera's strategy there.

A couple of other quick observations. You totally picked up on something that I was going to mention, which was they should have challenged that Mooney catch because third and seven's a lot different than third and three for that team. I also felt like you did that Forrest could have been called for the DPI on third and goal. That is, you know, we've seen a lot less called in this league. I thought that the Pettus touchdown, the one touchdown that they scored, I'm not sure it would, you know, that it was worth overturning. But because there hadn't been a touchdown scored in like two weeks on Thursday night football.

I don't think they were going to overturn that even if it was like, you know, it wasn't conclusive, but I don't think he had possession of the ball with both feet down. Both feet were down, but that ball was still moving as that second foot pulled up. Yeah, and, you know, and I mentioned, I thought. Wait, yeah, you're talking about the Bears touchdown with 12 men, right? Yeah, exactly. That was not a complete pass. I didn't, I thought it was, they, you know, it's not a challenge.

And the whole, like, Herb Street was immediately, Herb Street immediately said, yep, they got it, touchdown, move on. I didn't think he had him in. Yeah, I know. The, I, I, I, I, I, but, but it was funny because I, you know, they had been talking prior to that play about how, you know, they hadn't seen a touchdown in, in weeks on Thursday night football. And I'm like, shit, anything close.

they're just going to say fine. Let's just get a touchdown on one of these Thursday night games. But I thought the ball was still moving after that second foot lifted up. I also just wanted, I think I already mentioned Tyler Larson, not one bad snap. And I thought he was actually a big improvement over Nick Martin. And Wentz overall, I kind of just thought it was like not, it wasn't as horrible as maybe some people thought, but it certainly wasn't good. It's like a C.

I thought he was either under pressure. or just missed badly. I mean, you picked out that throw to McKissick. That was horrible. I don't understand. He's so skittish. He's so worried. And, you know, he's inaccurate to begin with.

And now he's got in his mind like the clocks ticking after the snap on every play. But I did think, and the reason I want to give him like a C, he had some big time balls dropped, which obviously would have made the numbers look better and the scoring look better. I thought he was tough all night last night. He had a bicep injury coming in and wasn't 100%. He then hurt his finger, which he was bothered by all night long. Then he rolled his ankle on one of those zone readkeepers, which he had to get re-taped.

And he wasn't good, and the offense wasn't good. But, you know, Rivera was asked about the game. Did he think about Heineke? And immediately he said no. And I think I was thinking about, Heineke, given that his injury was, you know, he didn't look 100%, which he wasn't, and he wasn't playing that great. But I just thought that he, and I've seen this before from him, he can be a little bit of a baller and a gamer, like Heineke. He had a game last year in a

driving rainstorm on a Sunday night football game against that 49er defense when he was playing with Indy. And he must have had like three third down runs where he took one big shot after another and kept getting up. I'm not a Wentz fan at all, as most of you know, but I do think that he's not the problem. He's a problem. He's not the problem. Lastly, I was just going to say what you said.

That was one of the worst quarterbacking throwing performances we've seen in a long time from Justin Fields. And the worst throw was the one on that little nifty play action in the backfield with some reverse action. the tight end is just sitting there. And I'm pretty sure all of us could have made that throw, and he sailed it over his head by a mile. Somebody pointed out to me that if, was it James Robert?

No, was Travis E.T.N. in the opener who just dropped the easy touchdown pass from Lawrence and then, you know, fields throwing the easy one over the head of the tight end, that those two plays alone, I mean, you know, it's a bit of a stretch, are the difference between two and four and oh and six. but you could do that every year with a lot of teams. I also wanted to mention that Rochwan Smith is so good. We both loved him coming out of the draft. He has really developed into one hell of a linebacker.

And he wants to get traded. You know, he doesn't want to get traded to Washington, but he is one hell of a linebacker. Washington has faced some really good defensive players this year. You know, Parsons, Simmons, Smith, in the last three weeks. Like special defensive players, which is what I'm hoping that Chase Young will become at some point down the road.

Do you have any other thoughts on that? I did want to play the Rivera rant and wanted us both to weigh in on that. We'll get to play it. All right. We'll do that right after these words from a few of our sponsors. All right, I'll finish up the show here shortly with my smell test. This segment is brought to you by MyBooky. Go to MyBooky.com.

MyBooky.orgie.orgie. Use my promo code, Kevin D.C. And they'll double your first deposit, dollar for dollar, all the way up to $1,000. I did like Washington last night, and I didn't give them out the smell test. I should have. I played them last night. And they covered. It wasn't pretty, but they covered.

But the game of the week, the two games of the week, Tennessee, Bama tomorrow, the biggest college game of the year. Tennessee is a seven-point dog at Nailand, where, by the way, $1,500 to $2,000 just to get into the stadium. Whereas right now, Cooley, for $99, you can get a three-game packaged Commander's games right now through the Safeway Washington Commander's discount package program. Three of the home games left, pick any three and pay $99 and you're in the stadium. Good God. It's really embarrassing what it's become. You've got to pay $1,500 to $2,000 to get into Nailon Stadium tomorrow for Tennessee Bama.

So at My Bookie right now, Alabama minus 7. And then Sunday's big game of the year, the Chiefs and the Bills, that line's still sitting there at My Buckey right now at 3. Buffalo is a three-point favorite at Arrowhead on Sunday afternoon. Go to My Bookie. They've got fair lines, fair pricing. Use my promo code, Kevin D.C., and they'll double your first deposit. So I do want to get your thoughts, and I want to give my thoughts. Ron Rivera, after the game, this was an exchange.

Remember, we had this story yesterday from Pulitzer Prize-winning author and writer and investigative reporter Don Van Nata Jr. And Seth Wickersham, who was also outstanding. The team pushed back throughout the day on a lot of the reporting. You know, they showed the shot of Snyder, you know, there with Jason Wright last night. The chance, by the way, from the few Redskinned fans that were there after the game during the Amazon Prime Post game were sell the team. They were interviewing Brian Robinson Jr. And the chance from probably 25 fans sell the team. It's what everybody has to deal with.

It's been miserable for 25 years for all of us, 23 years. And Ron Rivera's gotten a taste of how miserable it can be to be in this organization. And it kind of broke them last night in the post game. Here it is. I want you to listen to the whole exchange. What the league would love is for him to sell the team. He's become a major problem around the league, obviously. That was his quote during the broadcast.

Okay. So I'm wondering, I know obviously you didn't hear that because you're coaching. Right. Throughout today, how did you hear that news? Did it affect you? No, because the truth of matter is it's not important to me. Okay, what's important to me is the guys in the room, and that's something I've been trying to establish.

You know, I'm trying to get beyond all this stuff that's on the outside that's noise as far as I'm concerned. What I'm focusing on is the development of this football team. There's a group of young men in there that deserve better, okay, in terms of they should be acknowledged for what they've done, what they're doing. I don't want to get talking about something that I can't control anyways. I have no input. I have nothing to do with that. What I want to do is everything in that room, and that's what I wish we could just stay focused on. And it's difficult, it's hard, but for whatever reason, we're going to stick to what's interesting and that's playing football for our guys.

No, what's important is these guys, okay? For the last couple of weeks, honestly, I'm going to speak my mind for a second. Honestly, it's been hard. It really has. You lose four games in a row and everybody wants to get you, you know, just get on you. And they've played their asses off. They have. They play their f***es off for everybody.

They come out and they show up. They work hard. All right, they don't complain, okay? They hear all the stuff and they've got to deal with it. I get them. I respect them for that because they're resilient. They come back. Everybody keeps wanting to say, I didn't want anything to do with Carson.

Well, I'm a fucking guy that pulled out the sheets of paper, that looked at the analytics, that watched the tape in the freaking, when we're at Indianapolis. Okay? And that's what pisses me off. Because the young man doesn't deserve to have that all the time. I'm sorry, I'm done. So that was it.

He exited the press conference. I'm sorry, I'm done. And he was out of there. And just so everybody knows what he was responding to there at the end, I mean, Tommy and I talked about it yesterday. But at the very end of the ESPN story, they wrote that, quote, Snyder for years told people close to him that both a new stadium and a true franchise quarterback or silver bullets.

Quote, all my problems will be solved if I can just get a marquee quarterback, he told an associate last winter. This past March, Washington traded second, third, and conditional third round picks to the Colts for Carson Wentz, a quarterback who in 2017 appeared to be on the verge of being a superstar, but whose fortunes have since sunk. It was a stiff price for a soft market quarterback, all familiar marks of Snyder's pension for overpaying and negotiating against only himself. Sources familiar with the deal said that it was Snyder who pushed for Wentz. And commanders football staffers have told people around the league as much. Quote, it was 100% a Dan move, closed quote, says a source

with knowledge of the inner workings of the deal. But in the team's statement to ESPN, Rivera insisted that he had brought the idea of acquiring Wentz to Dan and Tanya, who supported it. Rivera said, quote, they love this game and this team closed, quote, at the time. Hearing that Snyder hopes a marquee quarterback will chase away all of his problems, one owner said and laughed, Carson Wentz. So that was what Rivera was referring to at the end, which, by the way, was not brought up in either one of the two questions. He brought up the Carson Wentz thing. They put out a statement yesterday denying that Dan was involved in picking the quarterback.

And, you know, you heard Rivera saying he went through all the analytics. He went through all the tape out in Indianapolis. And, you know, whatever. Go ahead. You can respond first to this. What did you think of Rivera's rant? I'm sure Rivera did go through everything. I'm sure Rivera did the entire evaluation.

I'm sure that Dan called 32 people that he knows. made up his mind based on whatever anybody else told him. I'm sure that Rivera probably did want Carson Wentz's what is realistically, other than Garapolo, the only answer. And I would bet you that Rivera did take it, and they agreed on it. And finally, I would bet Dan negotiated against himself and traded away a lot more than he had to for Carson Went, who, by the way, is not going to save the organization. For Dan.

Yeah. To sum it up pretty much that easy. I would not take any credit from Ron. I've said all along, if anybody's dealing with Dan, if you want success, you make any idea seem like his idea and start it there and let him have that idea. I'm fascinated that in this situation, that we're going to put out this is 100% my idea from Dan

with everything else going on. But essentially, every time Dan's been done with the coach, he's leaked something to the media in some way and started to take his credit and move in that direction. I think it probably doesn't bode well for Rivera moving forward. Neither does not winning a lot of football games. But every time, you know, Dan's quiet

and Dan's not involved, and three years later, now Dan's picking a quarterback or doing something, that means the coach is done. That's kind of Dan's writing on the wall. But the state of the franchise things is unbelievable. It's like, did you watch the dude in Indy last year? He's not the same dude.

Do you realize why they booted him from Philadelphia, essentially? Because there were too many problems and issues with his leadership, and the talent didn't overcome that. That is not the dude that saved. That's not the silver bullet. That's number 20. Well, Dan wouldn't be able to recognize a silver bullet if it was between. between his teeth and he was looking in the mirror.

I mean, you said to me the other day, what I would do is I'd go to Dan and ask him which quarterbacks he likes and list him one to five and then take number five. I mean, he doesn't know what he's looking at. He went to the Maryland Gaming Association right before, in the summer and told him we have a quarterback. He's not looking at anything. He's watching football games randomly talking to people, having a drink,

Not on television. He's not watching film. All he's doing is talking to people that he knows and gathering whatever information he wants to hear on a quarterback. Yeah, I don't. Look. This is not a huge deal to me. I don't think Rivera needed to walk off with it.

I think he just needed to say, you know, he's the owner of football team, and we agreed on this. If he wants to say that it was him, it was him. but I'm saying right now I was 100% with it too. No, he should, well, at this point, maybe he shouldn't have taken 100% credit for it. Maybe he should have. Yeah, it was all his idea. He should have slough some of it off, but no.

So I'll start with this real quickly, because I got a lot of this from some people. It's like, Jesus, another story about Dan. I mean, is there any credibility to this one? versus any of the others, or is this more? No, this story was written by Don Van Nata Jr., okay, a Pulitzer Prize investigative reporter. Seth Wickersham, this was not, you know, one of those websites or blogs that sometimes we use just to,

because it's creating a bunch of news where, you know, it's probably right, but maybe not right. No, they interviewed 30 plus people in the front offices and so many owners are quoted in this story. Their reputation smothers the reputation of the team. But anyway, I would also just say, like, for Cooley's purposes, because Tommy and I talked about this yesterday, that story wasn't like super revealing or super surprising to those of us

that have been living the day-to-day of this nightmare for 23 years. But it was, there was some new information, and there were plenty of provocative quotes. Back to Rivera. So I would start with this. You know, the way he started that answer, I just got to be focused on my team. You know, none of this stuff has anything to do with me.

It's true, you know. All of this stuff, Ron Rivera wasn't here for the toxic culture. Ron Rivera wasn't here for the incompetent 21 years of ownership before he got here. He knew what he was getting into. But, you know, all of this stuff in the past, nobody's blaming Ron Rivera for things that happened in the past. And I understand that since he got here, it's just been nonstop. And much worse than you could have even anticipated.

I'm sure Joe told him, look, this is a shit show. But if you, you know, if you get the control, you keep to yourself, I think right now he's in a position where he's so desperate, he'll let you do your thing for a while. But, you know, nobody could have anticipated pandemic. Loss of the team name. All of the stories that started the whole, you know, toxic workplace investigations. Six to seven to eight to, I don't know, 12 different investigations ongoing.

By the way, some of which were Rivera's fault. He brought in Ryan Vermillion, which, you know, started the DEA investigation and had the DEA break down the doors in Ashburn and raid the facility. And by the way, this week, Ron's the one that said quarterback. But I know, and I feel because I've watched him every day for two and a half years, I can sense that he just, he goes home and he says to his wife, Stephanie, my God, this never ends here. I just want to focus on football.

that's great, but that's here. And you had to understand that when you came here, that was part of the gig. It's not your fault. It wasn't Jay's fault. It wasn't Mike's fault. It wasn't even Jim Zorn's fault, okay? And just so everybody's clear, a new stadium isn't going to do anything. Winning probably isn't going to matter.

Because first of all, they're never going to win as long as Dan owns the team. And really it doesn't matter whether he picked Wence or Dan picked Wence or it was a combination because everybody is preconditioned, as Tommy always says, at this point, even if it isn't true, it doesn't matter because everything's believable to this fan base. Everything is because most of the time it has been of substance. Here's the thing, you know, Ron, all the best to you because I know that people who are around you, really like you, and really respect you. We've been living this thing for 23 years. We know it's miserable. You've only been here for two and a half and maybe not more than three

in total. We've been living this thing for nearly a quarter century. It won't change until he's gone, period. And your life as the head coach and the head of this organization is always going to include this as long as he owns the team. You should have known that when you came here. Again, nobody could have predicted that it would have turned as badly as it did with all of the, you know, things that happened with pandemic and post-George Floyd and losing of the name and all that stuff. But you've got and you're working for the worst owner in professional sports. Someone who the other 31 owners won out desperately, who the commissioner wants out desperately. who the commissioner wants out desperately.

He has ruined a franchise that was so proud and so marquee in this league. You know, Cooley, I tweeted something out yesterday after this story came out and after I had read the whole thing at the end of the day. And, you know, there was a lot in there about like if somehow he can get the stadium, all will be good. I don't think anybody outside of this market, and I would throw the NFC East market, gets into this conversation because I think Philly fans, Dallas fans, and Giants fans,

because they're so close to, you know, Washington and understand what Washington's gone through and play Washington twice a year and they come to, you know, they invade our stadium every year. They understand it. But I don't think the other owners or the NFL commissioner or most NFL fans really do have a grasp on just how little is left of what one.

was. And the new stadium, that's going to bring people back. That's laughable. There's only one thing that's even got a chance of bringing people back. And that is his exit, his departure. So do us a favor, Roger and the other 31 owners, grow some balls and vote them out. You're going to get sued. You're going to get outed for all of the different things that have happened to you. You know, but deal with it because it's much better for the league if he's gone. And my God, it would be great to get our team back after all these years. But I have to say that Rivera, this isn't the first time he's gotten emotional with all of this stuff. I can imagine it wears him down.

You know, on a day of the game, he's got to deal with a story where people are asking him whether or not he made the call on Wencer, was the owner's thing. And you've got this story about how, you know, Dan's hiring private investigators to, you know, to look into six different owners and the commissioner. Like, he's got to deal with this. That sucks. But if he didn't want to deal with this,

he shouldn't have taken this job. Because that's what everybody's had to deal with. All of them. Jay, Mike, Joe, Zorn, Marty, all of them. Spurrier, all of them. Nobody has left here unscathed. The best of men. Hall of Fame coaches, borderline Hall of Fame coaches, star college coaches,

one of the best coordinators that they hired, they've gone every which way, and it hasn't worked out for any of them. And it's not going to work out for you either, I'm sorry to say, even though I know you're probably one hell of a guy and a hell of a leader that your players and everybody respects. but I can see where he gets worn down. But I hope, you know, this idea that he thinks that the media is picking on him, that needs to be shelved because that's just not true.

That's not what's happened here. Nobody's blaming him. Those are my thoughts. Would you like to add to that or not? I think we wrapped it up. Do you want to stick around for my quick smell test or not? I do, but I have we have school office. and we are going to Yellowstone Park for two days today.

And I am family ready to go. With camper? No, we're staying in a hotel. With a pool. Oh, I mean, there's nothing better than going to a hotel with a pool with the kids at that age. That's lots of fun. No, they're fired up. Are you going to fish?

No, the kids don't fish much. I think we're just going to go do a little hike into Yellowstone Falls, and then we're going to stay out of Yellowstone, and then we're going to go drive through Big Sky, Montana, and over to Bozeman where there's a hot spring. Stay there one more night and then circle back. Nice little October vacation. It's beautiful here.

The weather's been unbelievable for the fall here. Have the kids ever seen Old Faithful? They have. Yeah. All right. Enjoy it. Appreciate you doing this. I'll talk to you over the weekend.

See you. All right, let's finish up with the smell test. Kevin looks where the John Q public is putting their cash and does the opposite. It's time for the smell test. Rough week for the smell test last week, three and ten. I want to strangle Lane Kiffin. I don't know if you guys saw how the Ole Miss Vanderbilt game ended. I gave out Vandy plus 17.

It was 45 to 28, clock running down, and Ole Miss is going hurry up at the end. Lane Kiffin knows the points. spread and likes to deliver for his home fans. Trust me on that. He is very aware, I believe, of the points spread. They could have taken a knee and the clock would have run out up 17. They were running plays. And then he said afterwards, because he was talking to the Vanderbilt coach,

and the announcer on the field said, were you talking about, you know, scoring there at the end? And he said, yeah, I was trying to explain to him that, you know, there was a difference with the play clock. And I just felt like, you know, we needed to run one more play. Well, no, you didn't. There was no difference at that point, actually, with the play clock and the game clock. I think the clock would have run out, but he certainly just could have taken a knee,

and the clock would have run out, and it would have been a 45-28 final. But they ran it in and won 52 to 28, and that was one of the 10 losses. I mean, hell, it would have just been a 3-9 in one week instead of a 3-10-1. So tomorrow, Oklahoma tomorrow, is playing Kansas. For those of you not really following the college football season, Oklahoma stinks. Oklahoma's allowed 145 total points in their last three games. They're giving up 48.3 points per game in their last three. They lost last week 49 to nothing to Texas.

Oklahoma's as bad as they've been in a long time in the first year of Brett Venables as the head coach. Kansas, in the meantime, having a great season, they lost their first game last week, a 3831 shootout to TCU, who is a highly ranked team now, highly ranked team as well. Kansas is ranked 20th in the country. I know this seems weird like we're talking about Oklahoma being a major anti-public side. Oklahoma is a nine-point favorite. People thought it was a misprint when it came out early this week. They're a nine-point favorite after being blown out three weeks in a row, giving up 100. 145 points against the 20th ranked team in the country.

And they stink. And they're laying nine. Yeah, I'll take the sooner's and lay the nine. I don't think it's a misprint. Tennessee tomorrow is the biggest public play on the college board in the biggest college game of the year so far. Getting seven at home against Bama, I'll take Alabama, when can you get Alabama, by the way, as the anti-public.

side, very rarely. Michigan State was awful last week, getting blown out by Ohio State. They lost to Maryland the week before. They've lost four in a row. They are really, really struggling. Wisconsin, with their new coach, rolled up 49 and a 49-nothing-nothing shutout win over Northwestern. Wisconsin's only laying seven in East Lansing. I like Michigan State plus the seven. Duke's getting seven at Carolina. Carolina can really score. I give out Miami last week, Lange 3 against Carolina. That line seemed way off. Carolina won the game 27-24. Miami had so many opportunities to score in the red zone, and they didn't. I'll take Duke this week. In fact, I really like Duke as a plus 7, you know, 49-45 kind of game one way or the other. Here's a game that doesn't make

any sense. Utah, who lost last week against UCLA, beaten pretty handily by UCLA, is Lange 3 at home against undefeated Southern Cal, public all over the Trojans. I'll take the Utesling, the three. And then Florida State has lost two in a row, including last week to NC State. They had a 17-3 lead. I gave Florida State out last week, and they ended up losing that game 19 to 17. They're only getting three and a half at home against Clemson. That line is short.

The public likes Clemson. There's short money in Florida State. I'll take Florida State. three pro games. I like the Saints plus one and a half at home against Cincinnati. The public's lined up on Cincinnati. They're one of the biggest plays of the weekend in general. So is Tampa laying eight and a half at Pittsburgh.

Tampa, something's still kind of not completely right with them. I'll take Pittsburgh plus eight and a half. And then the Monday nighter, this is subject to change. But for now, as long as Russell Wilson's playing in the line's four and a half, I'll take the Broncos plus four and a half at the Chargers. There is your smell test for the weekend. Oklahoma minus nine, Alabama minus seven, Michigan State plus seven, Duke plus seven, Utah minus three, and Florida State plus three and a half. On Sunday, the Saints plus one and a half, the Steelers plus eight and a half, and Monday night, the Broncos plus four and a half.

I really wanted to give Washington out last night, but I thought it would have jinxed it. I played them. Plus, actually they laid a point and a half at kickoff. I got it at a point earlier in the day. And they won 12 to 7. Wasn't pretty, but, you know, at least for now, we don't have to start digging the hole to put them into it. They've got 10 days before Green Bay.

I would imagine the Packers, by the way, have a game, interesting game against the Jets. The Jets who are rolling that games at Lambo. Boy, Sunday's card. You know, you got some good 1 o'clock games like Jets Packers, and Ravens and Giants. Interesting 1 o'clock game. And then at 425, Buffalo at Kansas City.

And then the Sunday night game, Dallas and Philly. I actually like Dallas a little bit plus the points. Buy the half point, get it to 7. That should be an intense game on Sunday night. And it is for the division lead, or at least a piece of the division lead, depending on what the Giants do. Actually, if the Cowboys win the game,

and they would technically be in first place at five and one, having beaten both the Giants and the Eagles. All right, that is it for the day. Have a good football weekend. Be back on Monday. There was a report today on ESPN alleging that Snyder is accumulating damaging info on other owners and Roger Goodell is leverage. There he is in the middle.

To avoid being voted out of the league, our Michael Smith reporting before the game. Snyder is the subject of five different investigations or inquiries for sexual harassment, a toxic work environment, financial irregularities. This has been an ongoing story with the investigations and all of that. And the owners have a meeting scheduled in New York on Tuesday. It is not currently on the agenda. Fields under pressure.

Just my feeling, I think what the league would love is for Snyder to sell the team. Not have to go to a vote, but just sell the team. because it's becoming a major problem around the league obviously.