The Kevin Sheehan Show - Cooley "Film" On Dallas Game

Episode Date: October 5, 2022

Cooley was on the show today with his "film breakdown" of the Dallas game. He described in detail why the run game worked on Sunday and why they weren't able to get anything downfield in their pass offense off play-action. Additionally, a comprehensive Carson Wentz review. Same for William Jackson, Jon Allen, and Daron Payne. The guys also talked a ton of NFL at the start of the show. 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 Cheehan Show is Kevin. Coolie's here with me on this Wednesday with some recap and some film breakdown of the Dallas game. The show today is presented by My Bookie. My Bookie's got Pittsburgh as a 14-point underdog at Buffalo this week. There is significance to that, which I will explain to Chris and all of you here momentary.

but if you go to my bookie.ag and use my promo code, Kevin D.C., they'll match your first deposit dollar for dollar all the way up to a thousand bucks. So do that. You've got to use my promo code, Kevin D.C. MyBooky is fair, fair pricing, fair point spreads. It's a proven sportsbook. If you're looking for football betting and more, go to MyBooky, single game spreads, money lines, parlay, teasers, the whole nine yards. MyBooky.orgie.org. use my promo code, Kevin, D.C. So do you have any idea with the significance of Pittsburgh's 14-point underdog status this week at Buffalo is? The first time Pittsburgh's been a 14-point underdog in seven and a half years.

No, it's the first time. I know. I have no. Oh, that was a good guess. That was a good guess. It is the first time since the merger of the American Football League in the NFL, which happened in 1970, 52 years ago. It is the last team that has never been a two-touchdown underdog or more to be a two-touchdown underdog.

Pittsburgh was the last holdout of being a 14-point dog or greater. It had never happened to them until this week. I find that incredibly interesting. Like if you told me there's one team in the league that's never been a double-digit underdog, you know, in modern football. I mean, Pittsburgh would have been one of the guesses. They did, because they really have never sucked. I mean, they...

Who else would have been a guess? Um, man. I don't know. You know if you go back to since the merger. The 49ers? There's a long time. Yeah. No, 49ers have had some bad years.

The Rams have definitely had bad years in St. Louis. Uh, the Patriots were not good early after the merger. Oh, they sucked for you. They were 14-point dogs last week. It had to been a long time since they were 14-point-under-dogs. They weren't 14-4-0-Douged. They were 9.5-10, something like that. Okay.

Yeah. But, I mean, who else would be one of those teams that you would think underdogs? Not the Packers, because the Packers have sucked. Dallas? Dallas has won. Dallas had a 1-15 season in 1989. One in 15.

The Packers. The Packers would have been one thought. No, Pittsburgh would have been, you know, after going through this process, I probably would have landed on Pittsburgh. I pulled up their pro football reference franchise encyclopedia, if you will. The worst season they've ever had since the merger. The worst. I think it's 5 and 11. It looks like it was 5 and 11.

They were 5 and 11 in, um, in 1988, they've never really had a fall apart horrible team. That's the worst record they've had. They've had some six and tens. They've had plenty of seven and nines. In 1970, they were five and nine, seven, seven, seven, one, six, and eight. And then it was the run of the Pittsburgh dynasty for Super Bowls through the rest of that decade. It's pretty amazing the success.

that they have had. And all with three coaches. Chuck Noel, Bill Cower, and Mike Tomlin. Amazing. What stability. It is pretty amazing, but this could be the 5 and 11 year. If you know what Kenny Pickett does, I like Pickett, but

you got Bill, Bucks, Dolphins, Eagles, Saints, bangles, the next six weeks. It's not getting easier for them. That's their schedule the next six weeks. Jesus. Wow. Bill's, Bucks, Dolphs, Eagles, Saints, Bengals.

Yeah. And they finish with Ravens, Panthers, Raiders, Ravens Browns. Mike Tomlin, for whatever reason, is one of those coaches that it never implodes on him, ever. Even when he's had bad teams. And he's had, I mean, they went to the playoffs the last two years with teams that you and I would look at and say, that's not a real good football team. Yeah. Tom.

I just, I don't really know if Tomlin gets enough credit. I mean, Steelers fans give them a hard time because they always lose to somebody in the playoffs. Not always, but more times than not, they've lost in the playoffs. Man, Tomlin just can't get past the third round. That's the second round. You're like, they win playoffs games almost every year. That's the other crazy thing. a lot of years they win players.

He really doesn't. I was thinking about this the other day, and I was talking to a buddy about this, who's this huge Steelers fan, and I was saying, I really think if you talk about the way coaches are respected around the league, Tomlin and Rivera seem to be grouped

into kind of the same category. It's just that Tomlin has never had a losing season, and Rivera's had like nine out of 12 or 50-50 or losing seasons. They're not the same dude. Tomlin's better coach. Pittsburgh fans will tell you that, you know, Mike Tomlin does things, isn't a great in-game, you know, manager of time and clock and score and all that. The record just speaks for itself.

The dude is 154, 855, and 2 in the regular season. It's a 643 win percentage. Let me just say right now, Mike Tomlin is headed to the Hall of Fame one day. Because unlike Marty Schottenheimer, who I think deserves to be in the Hall of Fame, I do. And I think Mike Shanahan deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. But Marty Schottenheimer did not get to a Super Bowl and lost in just heartbreaking fashion in AFC championship games multiple times, including the drive and the fumble when he was in Cleveland. Tomlin in his second year won the Super Bowl.

So he has that Super Bowl on his resume. Now, you said he wins playoff games every year. He is not won. Pittsburgh has not won a playoff game since the 2016 season when they lost to the Patriots in the AFC title game. They lost to Jacksonville at home. Remember when Jacksonville had that great defense, but it was like a 45-41 game.

And then Jacksonville almost beat the Patriots. and then in the last two seasons they lost to the Chiefs last year. They got blown out in the wild card round. And the year before, during the pandemic, remember the Browns beat them, they were up 28 to nothing early. So he hasn't won a playoff game since 2016. Ron Rivera's actually won a playoff game more recently than, no, that's not true, my fault. He lost a really close game in 2017.

But you're right. They're not the same guy record-wise at all. And Tomlin's best season, I'm telling you, was the 2019 season when somehow with Duck Hodges, I think that was the guy's name, the quarterback Duck Hodges, and Mason Rudolph, he went 8-8 without Ben Rothesberger. That team was horrible. And not only were they 8-8, if my memory serves me correctly, I'm pulling it up here real quickly, they were basically in the playoff hunt until like the last week. They were eight and five.

They lost their last three games to the Bills, the Jets, and the Ravens. They couldn't score 17 to 10, 16 to 10, and 28 to 10 to get knocked out of the playoffs with Duck Hodges as a quarterback. I mean, he's good. Where's Duck Hodges? Tomlin's really good. No, I think Tomlin's terrific. He's only 50, too. He's only best coach is only.

He's only 50. He was so young when he got that gig in 2007. Have you noticed the other things, speaking of young, how these younger coaches, for some reason, we'll see how it plays out, but they seem to relate really well. I don't know what's different. The 32 to 40-year-old coach, all these hires, get their teams to play. Yeah. Cliff King's.

Like I told you forever, like Mike McDaniel's going to be a head coach for the smartest guys. You just look at him. He looks like a kid out there. I know. I love Kingsbury isn't very good, I don't think. I'm just not exactly sure what Tyler Murray is. I'm not sure either. I actually think I am sure.

That's another question. I mean, Kingsbury wanted Murray when they both came in together. They were excited about that, but I'm not sure what Murray is. But Kingserys had some good things. They were really good last year, and they just couldn't put it together. They ended up losing some games. They were like 11 and 2 last year at one point. I know they were.

And then they completely est the bed down the stretch and had one of the worst playoff performances by a team in recent memory against the Rams. I mean, the quarterback was horrendous. The coach seemed completely over his head.

Where are you on Kyler Murray right now? Absolutely unsure. Don't know if I'd want anybody else in the league on third and four or fourth and four though. I don't know where I am. I've watched them Cardinals this year. I've watched them play a little bit. The Raiders game, he made a couple huge plays, what, three weeks ago to get him into overtime. But he makes them unbelievably dumb plays. I'm still not. I think there was also that deal last year

where he wanted out of Arizona or there was some weird rift with something going on. I never liked that with the quarterback. Well, the contract thing that they put in there about requiring them to do the homework. Yeah. Well, sometimes you got to wear a wristband. What you said, though, about maybe not wanting another quarterback more than Kyler Murray on 4th and 4. Because 4th and 4 can be, or let's just say 4th and 6 can be one of those plays where the quarterback's going to have to probably move around a little bit and create some time. And there's nobody in the... There's no backyard, there's not a better backyard player, two-hand touch player than Kyler Murray in the league. I mean, some of the plays he makes are just incredible. But I don't know if he can see above the line of scrimmage from the pocket

on third and eight. Fourth and four, fourth and five, fine. It's third and eight right now. And you got to deliver from the pocket in a playoff game. He keeps moving backwards. I mean, he does. He does keep moving backwards. But the other thing, they haven't had DeAndre Hopkins this year. Nope. That's true. And that's another huge difference when you don't have your one dude, your number one dude. It's a big difference. They also don't have Christian Kirk. They have some weapons. Right. They have some weapons. Christy Kirk went to Jet. Well, who'd they get?

They got Hollywood Brown. Hollywood Brown. They might be, Cardinals might be good this year when they get. Hopkins back. Hopkins back. Well, shoot, they won. I mean, the big win against the Panthers, really. I understand the Panthers are a good team, but the Panthers are in it.

Baker Mayfield is terrible, too. Who is? And I, like, that dude, Matt Ruhl is not doing a great job. Baker Mayfield's terrible, you said, yeah. yeah he's terrible but that game was fairly tight I actually right I mean it was yeah I actually have something going into fourth quarter

yeah I actually have something about that game that's interesting because there were two somebody told me that there's been a massive debate in Baltimore about Baltimore's decision with four minutes to go in the game on Sunday against Buffalo in the rain and the wind and by the way coolly it is not stopped being cold, rainy, and cloudy since Friday. All right, I just went out real quickly, walk back in, it's pouring.

It's the longest stretch of like Pacific Northwest weather I think we've ever had here. But I want to talk to you about the Buffalo Baltimore ending here in a moment. But one of the things I did notice because I bet Carolina, I had them in the smell test Sunday, laying a point in a half is Arizona scored a touchdown in the fourth quarter in a 20 to 10 game to go up 26 to 10 with seven minutes to go in the game and they went for two. And I was watching the score on my laptop as I was watching whatever the late game was on Sunday. I'm forgetting what it was. Packers, I think I was watching actually Red Zone. And I'm like, well, did the kicker get hurt? No, apparently the kicker didn't get hurt.

The kicker hadn't missed a bunch of kicks. Cliff Kingsbury just thought that, you know, a 28 to 10 lead was better than a 27 to 10 lead. And with basically only two possessions left in the game for Carolina, the funny thing is, Carolina, for those of you that aren't following along, when you're up 16, you kick the extra point because there's no way you can make up 17 points with two scores. There is a way you can make up 16 points with two scores. 17 is much better than 16. Cliff Kingsbury apparently... I was watching this game, too. So like seven and a half minutes left in the ballgame. Yeah. I mean, there's... Caroline's got a chance for two possessions, basically. And he gave him a change. Right comes up for... What did you say?

what did you say I said it's Frank Reich and quarterback you can get it done yeah I guess but I didn't understand that nor did anybody I mean maybe the kicker was throwing up on the sideline

and was sick and there's some legitimate reason for it but the funny thing coolly is Carolina went right down the field and scored and of course went for two and they didn't get it but can you imagine if it had been 26 to 18 at that point maybe he would have looked up at the scoreboard and said, why'd I go for two on the last one?

It'd be much better if it weren't 26 to 18, or it'd be better if it were 27 to 18 instead to 26 to 18. But let me get to the Baltimore game, because this is apparently a hotly debated topic in Baltimore this week. The Sunday game between, I would have loved to have watched this game. Did you watch this game? You were watching Dallas, Washington, weren't you? Yeah, I was.

I would have loved to have watched this game. Me too. So the score was tied 20 to 20. Four minutes to go in the fourth quarter. The Ravens are in the midst of a 14-play 93-yard drive that took nine minutes in 29 seconds, started at their own five-yard line. Their fourth and goal at the Buffalo 2, tie game. And just so you know, some context around this, wind, rain, you know, bad conditions throughout the Northeast, as you probably saw, you know, in Philly and, etc. during the games on Sunday.

Fourth and goal from the two, a solid two, you know, two yard line. It wasn't a one and a half, you know, it wasn't a one in three quarters. It was two yards. And Harbaugh went for it and cited analytics as the reason that he went for, which he always does. I mean, he's a heavy, you know, two point, fourth quarter, two point conversion, fourth and fourth down analytics guy. Let me try to say that again. He's a very heavy two-point analytics, fourth-down analytics guy. Last year, he went for fourth downs eight times.

They only converted two of them, and two of them were in similar situations, and the point that they didn't get by kicking, or the points that they didn't get by kicking essentially cost them the game. But he's sticking with it. Now, the next-gen analytics had it as a 1.7% difference in win probability to go for it versus kicking the field goal. So I'll ask you first if you think he made the right call by going for it. By the way, the result was an interception in the end zone,

which meant Buffalo got it at the 20 instead of an incompletion where Buffalo would have gotten it at the two-yard line in a tie game. That interception was significant. An incompletion would have been much better. But he threw an interception. Buffalo ate the entire clock remainder of the clock, and kicked a walk-off field goal at the end of the game to win 23-20. Do you think Harbaugh made the right call?

No. Why? Watch the end of this game as well. Well, first of all, the interception does change the analytics. The 3% chance that you throw an interception on any given play down there really changes the analytics. Put them on the 20-yard line, you're like, no. Not going for it there. But I do think it's interesting because before that,

This has been common throughout the league, but more common, like, around midfield in the fourth quarter to go for it to try to feel a game. Like, I'll just win now. But you're not necessarily just winning now if you go for it and you score. You still give up the ball with four minutes left and plenty of time to go down and score a touchdown. Miami did it two weeks earlier. And I always think, you know, they did. And I always think, you know, it's completely changed the mindset of a drive when all you

got to do is go down and get a circle. This put Buffalo in a no hurry situation whatsoever. They don't have to rush. They don't. You know, so to me, in that situation, you take points. And a lot of times, Buffalo even down three knows this drive has got to end up resulting in three points. So sometimes they'll still manufacture a drive and at times make calls to make sure they're

getting the three points to tie the game to go to overtime. The one analytic, in my opinion, that changes this a little bit in Baltimore's favor is the same, as we talked about with Kyler Murray, there is not a better dude on fourth and two than Lamar Jackson. That changes your probability, in my opinion, of scoring a touchdown on fourth and two. To me, the problem is why you give him the ball back if you, like, you're going to give him the ball back in a tight situation. Granted, he did think they were going to give him the ball back on the two.

again, I think this is a 50-50-ish deal, but I sure like holding the lead there. I sure do like holding the lead. So, in my opinion. So, I don't think that you can, this could be hotly debated. I don't hate the idea that he went for it. I also don't hate the idea that he went for it

when he goes for it every time in that situation. It's like if you're going to, you're hitting 16 and you're hitting 16 every time. The analytics they hit 16. You're hitting it every time. Even if seven comes up, I hate the 16-117 showing, but I'm going to hit it because I hit it every time. That's what I do.

Yeah, I mean, I think. So I don't hate it as much. You know that's what he does. And he's also, I talked about this with you, I think, like two weeks ago with the dude in San Diego. Yeah, right. Staley. Like, the mindset is we're an aggressive team. We're going for it.

I believe in us. I believe in our team. and it's not just to Harbaugh's point, it's not just that one particular moment that's changing the season for them. It's every moment that's accumulating throughout the season is making them a better team, and a team that believes that they can get any fourth and two

in any situation, because that's what they do. They go for it, and so they're better in week 14 than they were in week four because that's what they do. Are you done? Yeah, I'm done. Okay, so a couple of things I want to introduce into this conversation. Let me not bury the lead. I think either decision.

I'm not really super passionate one way or the other that one was right and one was wrong. Here's the one thing I do get hung up on, and that is that the percentages, the analytics on two-point conversions, on fourth downs, are not, you know, they're historical. And, you know, you've got to include in your decision-making process context. You know, it's rainy, it's windy, and by the way, in this particular case, and this is what I really wanted to, you know, put into your mind, is you know what the play call is going to be on fourth and two. And for me, if I've got Lamar Jackson and you tell me, we're going to throw the football on a condensed field on fourth and goal at the two against a good defense and on a wet field and a windy, rainy day, that introduces some doubt into my mind as to what the, the, the true percentage chance of making it is. Like, I don't think personally that that's a 50-50 chance that they're going to score and fourth and goal in two

if you're going to call a pass play on a condensed field with bad weather with Lamar Jackson. If it's fourth and goal from the one and you're going to use Jackson or from the one and a half, you're going to use Jackson in a run-pass option, of course. I mean, just like with Kyler Murray, you know, running around and making a play, you expect him to make a play. but they knew they were going to call a pass play,

and I just think that that lowered the probability of making it. The two-yard line, too, you know, is in their favor in terms of making that decision because you've actually forced Buffalo during that game, which is why context matters, to punt in that game, Buffalo never punts. And in that game, they had punted three times already, including the possession before, which was a three-and-out possession for them. So, you know, the two-yard line, I kind of, of understand that. Now, it ended up being at the 20. And if you told me the choice is they get it

at the 20 if you don't make it, or you can take the three-point lead. I might take it at the, I might take the three-point lead. But I'm really not passionate one way or the other. I just don't like when somebody just, by the way, it's not a great analogy hitting 16 when you have to hit 16. That is a defined, you know, mathematical probability thing that introduces no context, unless you're counting cards. Okay, 16 against, you know, a 7, 8, 9, you know, face card, 10, you have to hit. It's painful, but you have to do it because the probability is if you don't, you're losing anyway.

You have to assume 10. In this particular case, there's just so much context. There's so much subjectivity around it. So, I mean, Harbaugh's been wrong in a lot of these things. And if he's going strictly by the numbers, that's a mistake. stake. If he's only going by, you know, what his analytics, fourth down guy, two-point conversion guy is telling him that the historical numbers say you've got a 1.7% increased chance to win the game if you go for it here, and he's not considering all of the context. That's dumb.

But part of it for me is, let's just say the guy said, fourth down and goal from the two, you know, is a 72% conversion rate or is a 68% conversion rate. And that's what ultimately, with the time left in the game, whatever. But fourth and goal from the two, if you're going to throw it, to me, is not any better than 50-50. Maybe less than 50-50. That's my feeling on it. And I agree with you. The other part of this analytic is, who are you playing?

What does the rest of those things look like? Yeah. Then here's the other part of this conversation, because I have. this playoff on 122 right now. They motion the back out of the backfield to the left. He kind of hesitates for a second and then turns around and looks at about the three-yard line. There's no chance if Lamar Jackson just throws it to the back

and the slot on the left that they tackle him. It's a walking touchdown. Two, it's a fourth and two. When does Lamar Jackson just straight backpedal in the pocket or drift in the pocket and not try to run? I know. If you're telling me that if he drifts backwards, he can't spin out and move, like,

in and move to his left and start running, and anybody's going to make a play, or he's not going to have a chance to hit open receiver. The fourth and two, if you're Harbaugh, nothing that happened on this play is what you're expecting. You think your quarterback's going to do the exact opposite of what he did here. This is not a good play by Lamar Jackson. So, yeah, I mean, going back to the going for it, because you go for it, because you hit 16s, is you think your quarterback's going to do something different.

Yeah, well, but you also call the pass play, and it wasn't a run-pass option. I understand. I don't hate calling a pass play, because with Lamar Jackson, it's always a run-pass option. Okay, that's fair. That's fair. But it wasn't on this play. I mean, it's always, no, it's always a run-pass option, but he didn't seem interested in running it on this play. No, I understand. And you can hindsight anything. And if I'm Harbaugh, and we're asked about this, and I'm doing the coaches show, I'm going to pull up this clip.

I'm going to freeze frame it a second half into this play. And then I'm going to draw a big circle on the back in the plot and go, we had a play. We had a guy. He didn't throw it. We want him to make that throw. He'll make it next time. How many times has Lamar Jackson not made that throw?

Kev, how many times do I seriously evaluate Baltimore and Lamar Jackson? know. Probably a lot of times he hasn't made that show, but how many times has he made that play on 4th and 2? Probably he's also made that play a lot of time. I'm not asking you to give me the actual answer, but we've both watched Lamar Jackson enough to know that sometimes on past plays, it's not great decision-making over the course of his time. Now, I personally think he's become a much better passing quarterback than you thought he would be initially when you said before the draft he's the best running back in the draft. I know.

To that point, I still believe you would have been the best running back in the movie. I understand that. That was a compliment. I know. Like, everyone thinks that wasn't a compliment. It was a, like, he is a phenomenal runner. But dropping him back on a condensed field against a good defense, they know him much better than we do.

To me, I don't know, 50-50 at best. But then again, if we don't get it, Buffalo is going to take over at their own two, and we just held them to a three-and-out. So we've got a chance to get it back anyway with great field position and a chance to kick a field goal again. So again, I don't hate the decision. I'm really, I'm very 50-50 on Harbaugh's decision, but I just think a lot of context has to go into that. and dropping him back on fourth and goal from the two when you have him as a quarterback, I don't think that's,

if you tell me that that's going to be the call before, maybe I'm not doing it. If you tell me that's going to be the call and you show me the play, I'm definitely doing it. Because you see the guy wide open, but your quarterback didn't see him. And you should know that sometimes your quarterback doesn't see guys. In 2021, they were 67%.

essentially on fourth down. In 2020, they were 57%. And this is not just fourth and twos, which in whatever I mean, fourth and two, two for eight last year. But they're more like 60%. Yeah. But here's what I would ask is, in the rain, what is Buffalo's drive percentage to go down and score a touchdown

from the 25-yard line? because I'll bet that's under 30%. Yeah, Natasha. You're talking yourself out of it. I want to remind you what your initial answer was. You would take the field goal. I'm not talking myself out of anything. I would have kicked the field goal.

Okay. I'm not talking myself out of that. I'm saying if I kick the field goal, am I afraid to go to overtime by kicking the field goal? Is that the concern? If I'm Baltimore, maybe? because the Baltimore defense is not the Baltimore defense of old or of the past however many years.

They're not a bad defense, but they are not a great defense right now. So maybe I'm afraid of going to overtime. But still, there's four minutes left in the game. So presumably, even if Buffalo, there's a chance you can take timeouts in the right way and get another possession. You're not saying about the two,

this is the last time we'll touch the ball with 4-17. But most times you're never going to say that. I think that's the number one reason more than anything that I am really 50-50 on this, is just that the worst result, you know, if you exclude interception from the, you know, the highest potential results, which are, you know, we don't get it or we do get it, you know, not interception. That's a very low percentage chance is that they're going to take over from their own too. And, you know, everybody's talked about, and I've heard.

heard many people. I haven't watched enough Baltimore this year, so I don't have the answer to this. Everybody's talked about this isn't, you know, the typical Baltimore defense. But I'm looking at the box score. I know Buffalo's a team that rarely punts in games. They only had 326 total yards of offense. They were four for 11 on third down. And a week after running 90 snaps and having the ball for like 43 minutes against Miami, they ran 62 snaps and were dominated in time of possession. By the way, the other part of this, we haven't even mentioned, Baltimore is on a nine and a half minute drive,

and part of the context could have been, we think we've got them completely gassed. And that increases the chances of the fourth and goal, although they had a second and goal at the one where Dobbins got hit for a three-yard loss, third goal from the four where Jackson only got two yards, which set up the fourth and goal from the two. But anyway, whatever. Whatever, I mean, it doesn't, like, I'm, like, I'm,

I'm not talking myself out of anything. I'm kicking the struggle there. I'm not treating Buffalo in the rain like there's Mahomes. Like, he's absolutely going to go down and score touchdown. And then, but I don't hate the decision. I just don't. That's not my decision. You know, they did go right down the field.

And if they had needed to score a touchdown, they had plenty of time to do so, but they weren't going for the touchdown. they were going for the walk-off last play field goal, which is what they got. I'll tell you one thing. The fact that it is Josh. If you don't get the fourth and two, it changes completely the way Buffalo has to go down the field. I know.

No doubt about it. But you said, I'm not fearing them like I would fear my homes. It's a close second. Yeah. Josh Allen and Stefan days. Yeah. No, I'm with you. Okay.

Okay. Before we move on to Washington, one other, one other, I was just amazed by this. So I'm watching The Bucks, Tuesday night game. Yeah. I think if you're playing Kansas City, and I think Todd Bowles is a really good defensive coordinator. But do you think if you're playing Kansas City, maybe you would cover Travis Kelsey? Like, I think, so his first half stat line, seven receptions, for 65 yards. I would bet you,

six of those were third down conversions. The guy, cover Travis Kelsey. They weren't even trying to cover Travis Kelsey. They didn't man him up. I thought a couple weeks ago,

Derwin James, when they played him, locked him down all game. Derwin James is a baller. But you can't just soft zone Kelsey and expect that he's just not going to torch you all game.

Here's a big circle around this guy. Even if we're zone, we better zone. We better play in time. Like, they were giving him easy shot. I'm amazed sometimes at how, like, what people think they're going to get away with. Kansas City is, like, here's the first half stats for the rest of the team.

Smith-Schuster had three receptions for 18-yard. Valdez Scantling had one for 36, and nobody else really had anything. Besides, Edward Fowler had two, like, had the touch. It was all Kelsey. They had no one else. his city's up 2810 or I think what Tampa scored to make it 2817

they have 28 points to essentially Travis Kelsey how about how about the Mahomes flip to Edward Salare on that one touch to us oh my god

how you watch that I turned it off later in the third quarter just because I mean Tampa but

and I didn't he was mad Yeah, you broke up when you were just talking. So say what you just said again. Oh, I said, I knew a guy that had Tampa and he was not happy, so we quit watching the game in the fourth quarter. But you want to talk about a fun dude to watch play a position. Mahomes is unreal.

He really is. He made seven or eight girls in the first half or plays. You're just watching and going, this is not happening. It's just that Mahomes does this every week. he's so much fun to watch and you see it in all the big games of the Senate

but he does he makes these throws and these plays and this stuff he does this stuff week and week out and my gosh Andy Reid

so much fun to watch too he's so creative their red zone stuff is so much fun yeah yeah it was hilarious because I watch most

at one point you see Mahomes like talking and pointing to calcium I'm like this is a diversion they're not doing that

and they use that little motion back and forth the tight end takes the snap and scores yeah I know. I mean, it would be fun to play.

I can imagine it would be fun to play for them. It would be fun to be there. They're a fun, creative, exciting team. Was there a team or a situation or a coach or anything when you were playing that, you know, maybe in conversation with other guys, I don't know, Santana, Clinton, the other guys where you just said, man, it'd be fun to be on that team with that coach or that player? don't even remember. Okay.

What about the Patriots? I really don't. Remember they? Well, yeah, everyone would say it'd be fun to play for the Patriots because you win, but no one liked playing for the Patriots to the bill. But you didn't dislike it. You're just scared of bill. Yeah, one of the reasons I bring that up is because that great 2007 season,

you guys played them. And, you know, you were one of the, you know, teams that they absolutely pumped. 52 to 7. 52 to 7. Exactly. I think. Yes. No, that's what it was.

It was 52 to 7. Yeah, I scored that touchdown late in the game. Garbage play, baby. It was 52 to nothing, and you got a touchdown pass at the end of the game to avoid the shutout. I mean, I got to think that. I don't think Joe Gibbs has ever been beaten that badly, ever. That had to be the worst loss of his career. Probably not.

Probably not. The only other thing I have really from the week, there were some really good games and it was fun to watch football throughout the week. It was sad to watch the one o'clock window of the game I was watching. But the other thing I think is really interesting. Sean McVeigh can't beat Kyle Shea man.

I mean, he has. I think he's three and seven against Kyle. Well, he did win the NFC championship game against him. I understand that. Yeah, that was the one that really mattered. But still, he really struggles against Shannon. He really struggles against their defense.

Their defense is so good. How good is Nick Bosa? He might be the best defensive player in the NFL right now. He might be. He's unbelievable. No, he's just a constant menace. A menace. Start to finish.

A motor. By the way, Joey Bosa has the same kind of motor. He's hurt. it's really fun to watch him. I think he generated the most pressures in a game of any player this year individually. He's dominant, dominant. But here the craziest thing is we've had this conversation about would you take Herbert or Chase Young again. It's obvious you'd take Herbert, but Chase Young is supposed to be Joey Bosa.

I know he is. Or Nick Bosa. I know. He's supposed to be that dominant. That's what he absolutely wasn't. college. And it was such a sure thing that he would be in that top five best defensive ends in the league within two years or three years, and that dominant. Right. And maybe he still will be.

He may. But he ain't Nick Bosa right now. Nope. He ain't Nick Bosa. You know, it's funny about the Bosa. They are so dominant when they play, but they miss a lot of games. You know, Joey Bosa gets hurt every year, it seems like. And, Nick Bosa. And, Bosa missed that second year after the rookie of the year in, Chase Young's rookie of the year was 2020, so Boses was 2019. And then he got hurt, missed pretty much all of 2020. Last year he was dominant again.

This year he hasn't gotten hurt. But the Boses seemed to get hurt a lot. But Chase Young's hurt, so, I mean. Almost like the Watt. It's almost like what? The Watt. JJ and TJ. Oh, yeah, that's true, too.

And by the way, T.J. Watt is right there in the conversation. With, you know, and I'm talking about the edge rushers. Like, to me, Bosa's, Miles Garrett, T.J. Watt. You know, the interior obviously starts with Aaron and Donald. What'd you say? I said Michael Parsons at times right now. Yeah, true. God, you were all over T.J.

before that draft. And he didn't go until late in the first round. And you're like, that's the dude. That's the dude they got a draft. I think he went in the second. No, he went in the first, but it was late in the first. Wasn't it? I think he went in the first round.

Let me look that up. I thought it was late first round. Yeah. Yeah, it was. It was in the first round. Pick number 30. Pick number 30 in the first round, 2017. And that draft, you were,

I mean, obviously Washington ended up taking John Allen in that draft. And that was also the draft. They could have got number two overall from the 49ers for Kirk if they had traded them. But we digress. But you were all over T.J. Watt before that draft. He was my favorite player in the draft. He was your favorite player in that draft. Yes, he was.

Okay. Should we get to Washington, Dallas? Was there anything else from the NFL Sunday that was interesting? Because I'll tell you what, I'm into the last. league is exciting right now. There's a lot going on. It doesn't involve our team, obviously. And I'll tell you, one of the storylines that I think is a really interesting storyline here early in the season is another guy that you really like a lot. And that's the job that Arthur Smith is doing in Atlanta. And by the way, the running back that I loved in the draft this year,

Tyler Algier, had 10 carries for 84 yards for Atlanta. But they rushed for 202. And They're two and two. The Falcons are two and two, and the two games they lost. They should have won the opener against the Saints. They blew a 16-point lead. Or five points. Two games they lost by five points, collected. Yeah.

They play Tampa this week. Probably a bad week to be playing Tampa after the Sunday night game. That was the other- Yeah, Tampa's going to be fine. I agree. But I'm not, I haven't been overly impressed with Tampa at all this year. Until Sunday night, I was impressed with their defense. I mean, that's the NFL for you, though. I mean, Mahomes, you know, you face Mahomes and he can make a really good defense look really poor.

But you know what was, I mean, to me, like one of the box score numbers of the week, Tom Brady and the bucks threw the ball 52 times, rushed it six times. I don't think I've ever seen that kind of disparity in a game. 52 passes, six runs. By the way, the six runs for a total of three yards. Leonard Fournett, three carries minus three yards. They threw it 39 times. And they are such a team that will do, he's basically brought to Tampa what they had in New England,

which is this week we need to throw it 50 times to win, but next week we may have to run it 50 times to win, whatever it takes. No, I agree. I just think there was a couple of situations where it got away from them in the first half where they weren't going to be able to run the ball. True. And then in the second half, you had to throw the ball.

But like even a couple get away, you're down 28-10, you have a chance to go down to score. You've got to go down, you've got to throw the ball all the way down the field to score late in the first half. So they're going to throw it every down then. And then you're down again in the second half. You've got to throw the ball. Look, I know. Watching that game early, I did think they should run the ball a little bit more, but there

were just a couple of deals where it was second and 12 or third. I mean, they long down the distances were, I'm sure that the plan wasn't to throw 50 times. I understand the disparity in run pass when you are in a hole. I understand that. I just don't think I've ever seen 52 to 6. That's my comment. And at the same time, by the way, on the flip side, Kansas City, 37 throws, 37 rushes. And Edwards-Ailare looks great, but the kid, the rookie first. from Rutgers, Pacheco looks awesome. He really looks good. Runs so hard?

Yeah. I like number 10 on a running back, too. Well, sure. I mean, you've got all these, you know, single-digit numbers on positions. I know, but for some reason I like number 10 on a running back. It feels good. I like number, I like four net's number seven. I think number seven looks good on a running back.

Number seven is just a good number in general. Would you have changed your number knowing that single digits are a possible? ability? Hindsight, yes. To what? In the time, in the world I was in? No, I didn't. Because I were 89 in college, and I should have changed my number to 89 after training camp, my rookie year.

I would have been a tight end my whole career, not like maybe he's a fullback. But yeah, I'd have changed. If I had to change the seven, I think I'd have changed to seven. Maybe not. Who knows? I just, it's a number. You know who wore number seven as a tight end in college? Doc Walker.

Doc was number seven as a UCLA tight end in college. It's like a week ago. I should have known. Yeah, I think I did tell you that a week ago. All right, let's get to Washington, Dallas. We'll do that. Start that right after these words from a few of our sponsors. Don't forget to rate us and review us wherever you can do so,

especially on Apple and Spotify. Apple gives you the chance to rate us five stars. That helps us a lot. write a quick one to two sentence review. Cooley, this one from Skins Fan 125. Now that Cooley is back, can you bring back the us and the whims? I just love when you all say it. It was so funny and original.

Please, rate us five stars. Write a quick one to two sentence review. So many of you have written in how happy you are that Cooley's doing what he's doing this year on the podcast, and we appreciate that. Yeah, we didn't do the first couple of weeks as us and mms. But that's because you're not really doing the traditional film breakdown. But if you want to do the us and the ums, we can do that today. But that's up to you.

I'm not coaching you on how to do your... That little segment we created had nothing to do with the film breakdown. It was how we opened the show with something, on our mind. No. Oh, you're wrong. No, you're wrong. It was the Monday morning.

It was the Monday morning recap. That's right. Monday morning follow. That's what it was. Yeah. That's what it was. It was the Monday morning recap of the game, the us and the ms, which is, you know, the equivalent of really like that, really hated that.

Yeah. Was there anything from the game before we get to what you did, the film breakdown that you really liked and then anything that you really didn't like, aka us and mm? So, you get under center, you put a couple tight ends in, and you run zone. And there's a hundred yards rushing in the first half. You have no compliment passing game off of what is a dynamic zone run game to get the ball down the field. And so, well, you rest the ball for 100 yards in the first half, you only score. seven point.

Seriously, Kev, there's no dynamic ability to go with some of the boot stuff or to go with some of the vertical shot that you've gotten in the passing game. In the first half the season, you have it set up. Like, hmm, we have

three pretty good runs in a row from under center. We're going to go run action out of shotgun the next play and have an intentional ground. That got blown up immediately. Why are we going to, why are we going, why are we going gun run or gun action

when you just had three big time under center runs boom boom boom I don't understand that are you going to call it a name are you going to call it you're going to call it stupid again it wasn't stupid

we looked it up I called them idiot whatever yeah well that's a lot better than stupid I know you asked me so you asked me to make headlines for your podcast I never asked you to do that. I never asked you to do that.

Please take that back. You said, hey, Cooley, I really need a podcast. Not true. Continuing to get put on the line, out there on the internet. You know that's not true. Can you say something? Can you say something that gets us out there? And I said, sure, let's do this.

But you told me last week on Friday or Saturday that I called the coach's stupid. Oh, I was wrong. It was idiot. And I said, I really don't care. But I said, you asked me a question, you said, why didn't they keep doing something? And I said, glibly, I don't know, because they're idiot. Exactly.

And that became the headline. So I'll make more headlines. It's amazing that we set it up and I asked you to do that, but I forgot what you actually said. Take it back. So people don't think I actually asked you to make a headline. So what's really funny about it. Wait till I say what, Kevin asked me to say, in the film breakdown the day to make that.

It's going to come up in about 13 minutes. I can't wait to find out because I haven't told you anything. But the funny thing about the running the football in the first half, what you said in your, is I don't understand why real play action off of running the football. Look, you said many years ago, I remember I said to you, do you really need to run the football for play action to work?

And you said, not really. You don't. But when you are running the football really, Well, it makes it easier to run play action, I would assume you would say. And every play action, and you're right on the intentional grounding, it got blown up immediately, immediately. And I'm like, why can't they, in the under center makes sense? Give them the same look with the two tight ends and the zone, you know, come back booting it the other way. I don't, the first half, the penalties obviously killed them on the three drives, but

That was the game plan that you and I talked about on Saturday that they had to employ. So weird. So weird that they just listened to us and changed the game plan completely on Saturday. Okay, get started. Well, I was started. Yeah, well, I know, but in your film. I had begun. All right. Where do you want to start? Wence. Yeah, start with Wence.

Start with Wence, the offense, the running game, why it worked in the, the first half, why it didn't work in the second half, et cetera. Whatever you did. Okay. I'm listening. Let's start. Actually, let's start with the running game because I think that helps build on wins. Got it.

So I love this because I said about the Eagles game and then coming into this game, you've got to go with more 21 personnel. Yep. And at times, for the first time all year, they went with 31 personnel. Now, two tight ends in the back or three tight ends in the back. I mean, you come out and play one, you go 21, you fake a fly sweep, and you go, Joe Gibbs counter-haw. Pull the guard, and you pull the backside tight end, and we're running a counterplay into Dallas

front. You can get it, and come back in the second play, you go zone to two tight ends, to the tight end side, to the left, and you get a good play. And then all of a sudden, we're running some zone stretch stuff, and they are making some play. I mean, full zone to three tight ends. Without a couple of the penalties, really, they're in great shape. The tight ends, Bates and 88, what's 88's name? Rogers.

Rogers, they're not bad. I mean, Logan, Wilson, or Logan Thomas struggles a little bit to block some of his own stuff, but getting enough done. But Bates and Rogers to that letto side, that's, pretty effective. They had some real good stuff going there. One of the penalties was called on

Martin, on his own run, and Switzer really could have helped him out. But even at that, I don't think that was a hold. I think you let go. I mean, he grabbed him a little bit, but it was no impact on the play. Martin. I mean, they stuck with it through the first half. All of a sudden, then Williams has busted one on the left edge. Both the tight ends are

passing off a defensive end stunt and getting up the backers, and you're like, It looks like we practiced it. The only thing I didn't really like about the run game in the first half, and this persisted in the second half, I think throughout the game I counted, but four different times, if not five, they went with a pump screen draw on first and ten. Yeah.

You're like, why are we going to that on first and ten? They threw a lot of screens and a lot of slip screens and outside screens on second and seven, second and eight third downs. But never on first down did they throw that little flip outside screen. So why is the run with the pump, the pump draw run on first and ten? And I don't think any of those plays resulted in more than a two-yard game. But you look at the first half run summary, and it's like McKissick, five for 42, eight-yard. average. Gibson, six for 36, six-yard average. William, three for 23, seven yards, seven. Seven-point-seven. William's good-law player. I love him.

I think he bought himself a few more carries after the way he ran the ball in zone this week. So I like that. You just didn't get any big plays off of it. You got no big compliment plays off of it. But even at that, you come back, you're in this ball game in the second half. And you still run a couple zone plays. But where it's interesting, the end of the second half, they get into a heavy personnel. They run duo for the first time.

They're like, why are we? What is the point of changing what's working? Like, your outside zone run stuff has been awesome, especially to the strong side, to the strength, to the tight end side. Why don't you just keep calling it? It's great. We're having seven yards of carry the first half.

Yeah. Seriously, we're averaging 7.2 yards to carry, and that's including at least two pump drives they got two yards. This is solid. They end up getting back to it once, maybe, and Williams had like 33 yards to the right, really strong run. McKissick did, yeah. But Williams had an 18-yard run, and McKissick had a 33-yard run, yeah. Okay, McKissick has 33. But what's funny is they go this zone with two tight ends to the right, they gash them for 33. They go pump-drawn first and 10, the next play. why go boot pump draw you got all kinds of threat action pass that up and we're going to pump a screen

so i just i thought that was interesting clearly they thought that was going to be something that was going to work well against dallas and i think it would have worked well in the second down situation second and seven second and nine where dallas really thinks hey they don't want to throw the ball down the field they don't want to take them like let's get let's get after them we can sack him here and they buy the screen they get up field they That's where your pub draw works. And the other thing I didn't like is in the second half, they got to more zone out of gun.

Yeah. Like, this game was not out of hand, really, ever. Until later in the, until into the fourth quarter, when you maybe had to start throwing it after Dallas went up 22 to 10. Yeah, right. Right. There was a point where they had to, you know, they had to get out of it. I've got a couple of questions about the running game,

but I want you to finish on that, but tell me when I can ask my questions about the running game. Oh, you can ask your questions after I make one more statement. I thought the receivers did a really good job blocking downfield throughout the day. I thought they were well coached. I thought they blocked well downfield. I thought the scheme was good. I thought the zone stuff was passed off well, and I thought the compliment early in the first half, other than the pump drives were good with the couple counterplays and the couple of track.

Like a couple alternate plays not zone. I thought were good compliment. I didn't like the pump draw, but other than that, I thought, pretty effective. The pump draw, the play that Kooley's describing, I think most of you know, it's when the quarterback gives the illusion or the impression that he's dropping back, and then he turns around and reaches around and puts it in Gibson's gut. And you're saying those were first down runs? All of them were called on first down.

He pumps like he's going to throw the outside screen. So he takes the snap, turns immediately pumps, then takes four steps back, and then hands it to Gibson. Exactly. Or whoever. So a couple of things. Number one, I really like Jonathan Williams. They like Jonathan Williams.

I knew that last year. And I'm glad that he got carries. I thought Gibson ran really hard, too, and you didn't mention really him. So I think all the backs did a good job running ball. Okay. Secondly, I thought the plan initially in the second half was to try to run the ball, but it appeared to me, and I didn't look at this on the All-22 yet, but Dallas came out in the second half, Dan Quinn did, and said,

you're not running for 7.2 yards per carry in the second half. And he really loaded the box. He's aggressive to begin with. I understand that. But on first down runs, the first two first down runs on the first drive of the second half, they actually completed a third and 12 to Samuel and moved the sticks. There was no chance on anything, and I don't even think the outside stuff may have worked. They got aggressive.

And A, am I right about that? And then B, this is something I've asked this week. I don't see the ability, and maybe I'm wrong, for Carson Wentz to run a second play, to run a check with me, to run a can, can, can, kill, kill, kill. Let's get to the bubble because the box is loaded with nine guys. I don't see that ability it doesn't look like to me. So number one, go ahead. I love that question. I love that question.

Because I look at this in some of your zone run stuff, a lot of times you want to check it away from safety or away from like a three technique defensive end or like numbers. And they really didn't do that. It seemed to be more call it and run it. Now, the can can-can in the zone where essentially you're just going to run the other way. Yeah. Could be simply coated into the cadence. So you could call like west right, 80 outside, can with 90 or can with 70, and it could be black and blue or red and blue. So if he goes red 80, red 80, we know the runs onto the right.

and if he goes blue, there's an L in blue, blue 70, blue 70, then we know the runs still left. I didn't hear enough in the cadence, and it's hard on TV, especially when they're on the road. But the way we always flipped those plays, he's a quarterback, really, he would look and make a signal, you remember this with Kirk, where he'd say Oscar, Oscar, Oscar. Yeah.

And he would choose hands, and that means the receivers would know. So I don't think they did have checks in the zone run game. But that also doesn't mean by formation they don't think they are going to get what they want and call it and run it. I mean, and I would say this would have been a problem if they weren't getting positive runs in most of the zone stuff. All right. Let me follow up. Can, can, can the first run, we're going to the second run. We're running to the left instead of the right because the quarterback notices something.

Yeah, we can run the other way. We don't know if he's got that ability. What about kill, kill, kill, and get to the second play, which is... It's the same thing. Whatever the second play is, and let's just say it's something that gets you out of a run and into a bubble because they're going to face a nine-man box and there's no chance you're running against that. I have not seen him, and again, I could be wrong about this. I haven't seen him get to the line of scrimmage and, you know, do what we see most quarterbacks in the league do,

back away and change the play. And I'm wondering if you think he has the ability to do that. Ron Rivera was asked about that after the game on Sunday, and he gave a very vague answer. And it led me to believe that for now, and by the way, I suggested new offense for him, first time in six years. He's got a totally new offense,

because he was with Peterson, then with Reich. And, you know, you see him checking, by the way, the armband as he gets into the huddle. And maybe it's just a process where he's just not there, yet. But it's limiting, isn't it, if that's true? I think it's incredibly limiting. And even more so, I think it's really limiting in a lot of their gun runs, especially comes to his own gun runs, where it's call it and run it. And it's really easy if you, Oscar, Oscar or Can-Can, or all you do is flip your back.

You're back to top to the other side of the quarterback, and immediately we run the other way. And you see that so much at college, and so many times it changes the strength so quickly. They don't ever really change strength offensively. They show strength and they keep it. The only conversion they use to change strength is that fly motion. But some of the gun stuff, man, if you have quarterback, if you have back offset to the left of the quarterback, and now all of a sudden they have three linemen to the right side of the center,

they're like, man, let's just hop the back and go the other way. Yeah. So. But do you think, but do you think, or have you seen, answer the question, Do you think he's got the ability to change the play at the line of scrimmage, yes or no? I don't think physically, mentally, I think he has the ability. Per system, I don't think they're utilizing that ability.

Okay. But maybe they will. That is a big guess. Yeah. I think it's... There's a lot of ways to do such a thing. I know. I understand.

With the cadence. Okay. So. All right. Next. That would be that. And just so we're clear. Can and Kill can essentially be the same.

Got it. Right. We can run the other play or we're going to kill the first play. Right. To me, it's the same difference. You can use it on a variety. Like, a lot of times, though, kill, kill, kill would be we have a pass called. We're going to kill the pass play to run the run play.

Right. Can, can, can, can would be, we could throw the bubble off the run play or we could throw, we can run it to the other side. What made me think of it were the runs. Like, they usually kill the past. Yeah. It didn't go to a run. What made me think of it was early in the same. second half. It just looked like Quinn had made up his mind. They're not running against us.

And yet they, the first two first downs of the second half, tried to run it right into a loaded box. And I'm like, why don't they have something to get out of that? Why can't they run a quick hitch or a quick bubble and not run Gibson into that? You know, I see. I know what you're talking about. But then you go to the McKissick 33-yard gain and they're essentially in that 3-3 front. Yeah, right. They have three downline recovering both guards and center. And they both, they have outside backers with just essentially Van Dresh in the middle. And then number six comes outside of the tight end. I mean, this is good numbers that still run the ball.

So, but if Quinn was going to do that, it would make total sense. And why wouldn't you have done that? Because you're saying, are you going to take a shot or not? If you're not going to take a shot, then you're not going to run it. Right. And they never, and even more, it might be. Your run action, even with your run, isn't good enough, and we don't believe you can get downfield.

We got digs locking down one side, and we got enough pass rush to bracket the other side. Go take a shot. We'll sack you. They needed to create shot, and that would be the complaint I have. When you run the ball that well, you have to find a way to get the ball downfield.

And even if it goes into a one-on-one situation, like it did with Dallas three or four times, and the cornerback's just going to DPI. Right. You still move the ball. You still take the shot. You create the advantage. Yeah.

Well, I was impressed, by the way, they did run the ball, though. And it was way, just so we're clear on this. They have not run. That's as many zone plays as they've run in the three games combined, three previous games combined. Yeah. Better than some of the other duo stuff we've seen. And by the way,

It was so obvious that the tight ends were doing a great job on those zone, you know, those outside zone runs. Those were their most effective runs. No doubt. The only couple they struggled with were really when Logan Thomas got, like one early in the second half, he motions over to the left. He doesn't do a good job utilizing his motion. So he's still inside the outside backer. And then he gets bowled back into the line of scrimmage, and I think it's a two-yard loss. It might have been the first play.

It was the first play in the second. No, no, no, no. It was the first and second half, exactly. And then he gets bullied on the backside of a run and gets slammed into the back from the backside. It's like, you've got to be a little bit more to you in the run game. You're not a big Logan Thomas fan. You know, I like Loew, that's not fair.

I have a ton of respect for what he's doing. But that said, if I'm coaching him in the run game, there's got to be something else. It's got to be more. And for what he's currently doing in the past game, I'm just letting Bates do it. And Bates makes mistakes too. But I'm going to let somebody else do it. Yeah. Okay.

I'm going to give you an overall, and then we can go through some of the stuff. Overall, I thought he lacked poison the pocket. I thought he had happy feet. I thought he rushed throws. I thought there were way too many highball. I thought he spent too much time working on his first thought or his first read. and even when he does that, he's late on a lot of these throws. To me, he still needs to see winners before he lets the ball go.

It was an average decision-making process throughout the game. I thought a lot of times when he had a chance to high-low or throw a swing instead of a spot or throw a spot, he made the wrong decision. I thought throughout the game, he continually made, and I don't know how it's coach, but in my opinion, wrong decisions on if you had two to the right and they had three over two, and you had three to the left and they have three over three, why don't you work the numbers of three over three versus three over two. And he continued to work the three over two side.

So I think the average decision-making throughout that. And then later in the game, more so later, there were shots that you had to take when you're down 12 points in the fourth quarter and when you're down 15 points in the fourth quarter. And they might be riskier shots, but they were shots that needed to be taken in the game, and he didn't take those. You know, early in the game, he struggled.

and I understand, like, he got sag nine times last week. I get it. The protection's not always good. It was better this week at times, but at times it was bad. So I get that he's not comfortable back there, but clearly you go through all this process. He is not comfortable back in the pocket. He also, when he avoids or when he's getting out of the pocket,

I think is going through this process of he used to be able to elude or escape the pocket enough to throw away. ball away, and he is not fast enough to do that right now. Right, like that first grounding he had. Yeah. By the way, it comes after an 18-yard run as an under center, and he starts to roll to his right, and 24 comes up, and he's got a chance to throw that ball away earlier. Well, he's out of the he ducked. He's outside. I mean, Parsons is on him in a second, and he gets outside, and he should have chucked it 50 yards out of bounds in front of the line scrimmage, but he didn't do it. But you don't get there. But that. But that's,

That was a protection issue. You don't realize that you're lacking. That was, yeah, that was bad protection. I'm not, I'm not going to say that it was great protection. But he shouldn't have taken the grounding. Yeah. Don't take the grounding. But what I am telling you is when you, through two years ago or three years ago,

you easily evaded that pressure and rolled to the right and probably scrambled for yards. Right. You still have that sense that that's what you're able to do. Right. He does not have that speed now. Nope. True. Okay, the two interceptions.

Can I just say one thing? Let me just say one thing on that first grounding. They just ripped off an 18-yard run. You're running the shit out of the ball. What are you doing on that call? Why would you put him in harm? Yeah. You're trying to dial up a run-action shock,

but you ran the ball three times under center, and then you went with gun action. Right. Like, stay under center. Go to that two-tight-in set, a wing set, and go outside zone action at them and then either boot or drop back off of it. Yeah, it's just amazing.

I mean, Gibson rips off that long run. You're in their territory. You're moving the football, the game. And not only was it a play action from the gun, it was a very slow mesh developing play action. You know, it was too slow on the mesh fake handoff. But anyway, continue. I mean, he's trying to sell it.

Yeah. You don't need Michael Parsons in your face immediately. Actually, we'll just go to the second grounding. They have run the ball. It's the third quarter, and they do go with that run action at the tight end. And he ends up throwing it way high, like 20 yards over the head of the tight end of the sideline. It's grounding. There's no one in the area.

Right. He would love him to just throw a bounce past at the tight end's feet. just bounce into the tight end. It's over, plays over, dead play. You're talking about when Logan Thomas was kind of leaking out there. Yeah. Yeah, but he wasn't really leaking. I mean, it was just, it was like, something's wrong here.

But at that, like I told you, Bates messed up a couple times. Number six inserts into that. The two tight ends are responsible for the outside backer and six who's just stacked above him. Bates just let him run free. Oh, I do say, let's go to this two tight ends. tight end run action stuff, and all of a sudden our tight ends blow it to a easy pass protection against the linebacker.

You can't give that up. Right. He had a base barely even sees him. This is an OLA. It's because there were several of them. That's tough. One thing I will say before we get to some of the other one and stuff, too, because I have this.

Wide receivers need to do a better job creating separation, and they definitely all need to do a better job getting off the press. some of the press covered stuff they're not separating they're not getting up the press they're going to continue to get jammed any corners that can jam and reroute are going to jam and reroute these receivers who's struggling the most because i that was an observation that i that i had written down that i want to ask you about is is anybody open or are they struggling right now our best apparently our best players on the team i thought they were skilled position players tell me well yeah they didn't have great separation throughout the day like there's not an abundant there's a you didn't watch this game and see an

abundance of open receivers and went to having the ability to get it to them but it was bad on all parts

in the pasting the receivers need to do a little bit at work creating separation but is there a

is there a receiver that's struggling more than the others or you're saying all of them are the same Dotson struggles

a lot to get off the press you get your hands on him his speed's done Samuel is little and so He's got to find a way to get off some of the press stuff.

Also, I'll go back to creating separation. Week one, they used Samuel out of the backfield. They used a bunch of that stuff. They created looks where it was easier for a receiver from off the ball to find space. They didn't see any of that. Their compliment play throughout the day was that slip screen. And out of wins, completions, I'll bet you. The first half, you had eight completions.

I'll bet five of them were screens. Oh, I would bet. I bet you through the day, 10 of them at least were just outside slip screen. Yeah, or even. That is not a compliment play to the way you're running the ball. That's like the way they drew up a game plan with the Wayne Haskins against the Baltimore Ravens four years ago. Right. They really didn't think you could get the ball down the field is what it looked like to me.

Right. But the way to get the ball down the field was to use how effective you were and run and play action and boot off of it, which they didn't do, and when they did it, they did it from shotgun, and it was slow developing, and it got blown up, and nobody was getting open, and the quarterback was slow. So continue with once. So the interceptions, the end of the half pick is a heck of a play by Trayvon Diggs. The only thing I'd say, and I know you're trying to get a shot down the field,

get a chance to score, but the only thing I would say is, in a perfect world, you just throw away from number seven. You don't throw up that guy. He's not vertical with a rookie receiver. And I like Dodson. Trayvon Diggs, we'll go play the ball. It's worth the other side. And then the second interception is the third and 15 in the fourth quarter.

And I hate this pick. I hate it, hate it, hate it. Because you know you're going for it and fourth down. Like you know at that point in the game, this is two-down territory. You have to go forward and fourth down. Curtis Samuel runs a 10-yard deep spot or 12-yard deep spot over the middle of the field. They essentially triangle coverage drop to it. And they're not giving up the first down right there.

He did hit Samuel on that same play from the other side earlier in the game, so I know he'd hit it. You can't force that ball in the middle of the field and in the game right there. Logan Thomas checked out, it's 8 to 10 yards. You're a fourth and five. There are times to force the ball down the field, and there are times to not. And even in the situation of the game, you're not throwing that ball into triple coverage. You can't make that tight window throw when it's not even a window. So that pick was all wins.

Yeah. The first one is a shot. I would work the other side. But the second one is you want that one back. Throw your check down to your tight end. If you pull that up and watch it, you'll see Logan just chips and helps on the end for a second. And then he has got nine yards before anybody,

nine yards of space between him and anybody. That ball's thrown to him. He might get the first down. He makes one guy mad. Yeah, you were like at your own 10-yard line or wherever it was. and you say that it's four-down territory because it's 22 to 10. But let me just tell you at that point, when it got to 22-10, in my opinion, the game was over. I mean, it was over because they were not going to score two touchdowns.

Yeah. I'm saying that if it had been fourth and three from the 16-yard line, Ron may have punted. Then you should just throw hellmerie. I know. But the end of the first half, by the way, do you have any – do you have any – issue with them not being aggressive trying to get the ball back and then with the ball from their own 25-yard line, not, you know, essentially playing. One or four left in the half and you run the ball and then you let the clock run out at 26 seconds.

I didn't have a problem with it. Okay. But let me explain to you why. I did not think that they were capable of getting chunk plays to get into field goal range. They were getting the ball to begin the second half. And I think at that moment, the probability was greater. that they would punt and Dallas would add points before halftime than them getting down there in field goal range.

Now, when they did get the first down and called... In a minute with Trisway? Not Trisway with Joey Sly. The, yeah, I did not think with a minute... I think that they needed to run the football to move the football and that I would have, at that point, and I tweeted it out before the drive. I said, don't be aggressive here.

get to halftime 12-7, you get the ball to start the second half, where you can have the kind of drives that you have kind of put together here in the first half except for the penalties. And I thought that that was a risk. Now, when they got the first down, they called a time out, and then they're at the 37-yard line, and I didn't have a problem with the deep shot to try to get in to field goal range. But I think that it was a very protective, very cautious approach to the entire game,

which you and I talked about on Saturday, which is, you know, they needed. to be balanced. They couldn't be one-dimensional. They couldn't drop them back. And I just think against that defense, you were begging for 15 to 7 or 19 to 7 at half if you had gotten aggressive. That was my feeling in the moment I stand by it. But go ahead. All right. Head on out to the field, guys. There's a minute left. We're not good enough to score against them. No, you're not. We're just going to eat some clock here. Exactly.

Like if you're, but Kev, like, go the run play, at least. hurry up and throw your screenplay. Well, but if you hurry up again, now you're giving Dallas on third and seven, let's just say if you fail on that, on third and two. Then run it then. Third and two to use their timeouts to get the ball back if they get a third down stop. By the way, I was surprised they even made a first down. Let's just call the second down play with 40-some seconds left.

Okay. But the problem is, is now you're going to let them call a time out. all right, and they get a stop, and Cooper Rush is going to throw a couple of passes to a wide-open CD lamb while William Jackson is napping, and they're going to send Brett and Matt Moore out there to kick a field goal, and it's 15 to 7 now. I like 12-7 getting the ball to start the second half. Yeah, that's awesome. I forgot, you know, in my analysis of this, that Cooper Rush was going to just smoke you down the field. Well, I mean, because he's been doing it all first half.

as long as Jackson's over. Like I forgot when you punt it to the other 20-yard line that Cooper Rush is going to orchestrate a 40-yard drive to get him into Philgo range in 25 seconds. Okay. Let me introduce this into the conversation. You drop them back. Here comes 11 and the ball's out and it's being returned and he's high-stepping it into the end zone. Let me give you that instead of the Cooper Rush drive. Let me give you this.

If our quarterback in the one in 40 seconds left is going to drop back and panic because Michael Parsons is sending him to throw a pick, then I'm putting high team. I can't trust my quarterback. Well, I mean, I don't know if you can trust any. And that's where we're at. That's where we're at, me and you right now. One and three. We don't trust our offense at all in any, in a big situation. So that's where we're at.

Here's the context. That defense. There are other defenses that they may face. where I would feel totally different. That defense is good, really good. Yeah, and maybe Terry McLaurin on a screen breaks one tackle and gets 30 yards and gets out of bounds. Okay. I'll run a slip screen to Terry. That's a good first downplay. I'll run that and see what happens. Sure. And all I'm saying is run the ball in first down. You know they're not going to call a timeout right there and throw a screen with 45 seconds, not 26 seconds, or 42 seconds. I'm just going to make this easy. I agree with you.

conservative. As conservative as they were, you just down it. Okay. Well, no, no, no. You don't down it. You've got to create the illusion that you might be interested, because if you just take a knee, then they're calling timeouts, and they had three left. That was the other part of the calculus for me. I mean, honestly, though, downing is not bad because you're saying to your team, like, hell of a first half, we're not down 24 to zero. So that's a win for. Oh, my God, we scored for the first time in the first half in three weeks. So, And we're not down by 20 or more. It's 12 to 7. Let's go in. Let's pop the cork. Let's get feeling good about ourselves.

And second half, we get the ball. Let's see what happens. All right. Continue with Wentz. I don't know where I am. You were with the interceptions. You finished up with the interceptions. I finished the interceptions.

Again, I kind of just mentioned, like, high on some throws, late on some throws. They did have a chance down in the red zone in the fourth quarter on a second down. They ran the corner and two in. You could have thrown the first in and probably converted. I think it was like a third and eight or something, or second and eight. You probably could have converted there. You take the shot to the corner out to Samuel.

It's late. It's thrown poorly. It's a bad ball. I had a chance on it. But what crazy thing is is like if it's not late, they have a corner playing the outside in. There's three receivers to the right, the outside in. He's still off five yards.

Like he's squatting and he doesn't have taken the end. But you can't tell me that you know if you're, let that ball go half a second earlier when it needed to be let go, that that corner doesn't pluff off into it and pick it. So it does throw the first in, take the first down, maybe runs it in to the end zone. You can't just pre-determine, I like this guy, and he was rushing to get the ball on that play, like, snap it, snap it, snap it, snap it, and maybe, I don't know, maybe the play clock was running out. You can't see that on all 22. It was. That's a predetermined throw to a receiver that I thought was not a good ball anyways, was late, and if it wasn't

late, potentially gets picked. And the first in, the corner route on the inside works as picks for the first in, which is wide open. You throw the end for five yards. And that's what, like, you go back to this whole thing. Like, if you want to throw the ball short, there are ways to throw the ball underneath and take advantage of the stuff. It's not run, run, run, screen.

If you want to mix in some past stuff, mix in some past stuff. And then I thought, I just thought there were a couple things late that he mixed, missed, like, it could have been 2510 or 2210, and they're going verticals, and he throws it underneath to Logan Thomas, who gets it immediately. And is it Diami Brown? Yeah, Diami Brown. Are you, they're playing a version of Tampa 2. Their safety way overruns the outside, and Diombe Brown is, like, the Tampa 2 backers,

late Vander Esh, like, no one's going to cover it. And you needed a shot. no weight Banderer gets into that and the safety, if it's a good throw in ball leading him more to the middle of the field, is not going to make the play. He might tackle him. But it's a 40-yard play.

In a situation where you had to take shots. Look, I get it. I mean, you made a couple good throws. Let's do the good throws. Right? Like, great ball on touchdowns, Stockton. Same type of throws I was talking about

in the corner route to Samuel that he missed, but there's a good rhythm timing, good touch on the ball. Keeps the angle high where only the receiver can get it. This is a big-time ball. You know, great job on a third and eight in the third quarter, getting a step up, avoid side right, hit Dotson and a honey hole shot. That was big time play.

Made a throw on third down to Samuel that they converted. That was a high ball in the middle, but Samuel comes down with it. But timing's good on that ball. Really, though, I didn't, you're not looking at a plethora of throws here that Carson went to make some saying, man, if we just hit this one thing, it was not executed well throughout the day in the past game, not just wince, but protection, receivers, getting open, play calling in a lot of situations. It really was lackluster. Good word.

You know. I had to look it up today in the pheasaurus. The funny thing about the lackluster is I think it was intentionally lackluster. And if they don't self-inflict with the penalties in the first half, you actually have yourself a game in which maybe they can cover, which, as you know, I predicted. We could just get 13 this week. We got a chance. And we might not win, but we'll cover.

It was uninspired everything about it, except for the fact that that's what we advocated for on Saturday was something that, you know, essentially avoided the disaster of the week before against a defense that was probably better and is better, than the one you had played the week before. And that's a question I have for you. And I'm going to ask it now. I do think some of the last two weeks,

and not that I'm big into defending anybody right now, because it's not been good. But Philadelphia and Dallas in particular, Dallas in particular, they're loaded everywhere. They have major havoc reekers defensively. They're well-coached defensively. You mentioned Diggs. I didn't mention him enough.

He is so improved from last year. There's like no, his recovery time is incredible. And Parsons is an absolute game wrecker. And even if he's not wrecking the game, he's allowing others to wreck the game because you're so focused on him. They're really good on defense. And so my question to you is, what we've seen in the last two weeks has been hideous.

We understand that. could it be that if they can play a couple of teams that aren't as good defensively that maybe it'll look better? Yeah, it could be that. It could be that. I just, here's where I struggle. We're not good enough that we're afraid of good teams. We're now fearing good defenses. Yeah. Not challenging good defenses. And what would be the number one reason you think for what we thought was the right game? plan and they, you know, clearly went away from what they did against Philadelphia and tried to

be more protective. Are they super concerned about the interior of their offensive line? By the way, I don't know if you followed it. Cosmi's out now. They bench Trey Turner early in that game. He was a turnstile. They put in Sadiq Charles. So you're going to have Lucas and Leno at the tackles this week. Ruill is done for the year. They're going to be, they were on their third center Sunday. Why did they see it the same way and protect their team offensively in that game? And do you see it moving forward? And what are the reasons for it? I don't even know what I'm asking. Why so lackluster? Yeah. But here's because your quarterback is not handling pressure very well right now.

And granted, sometimes it's not even a choice. It's just in his face. pressure, but he is not poised in the pocket, and he's not comfortable in the pocket, and he's not the same dude that he was three years ago because he can't evade and he can't allude, but he doesn't have immediate answers when he does have pressure in the pocket, and he's not fast enough to get to one to two to the checkdown a lot of the times in the situation. So you're like, are we going to just get this dude killed back there? Is he going to throw the ball? Like, he's not that guy.

Where I struggle with it is when you're going, when you're running the ball the way they're running the ball, and you want to run boot, or you want to run some of the run action stuff off of that. Those are the easiest protections in the NFL. Like, A Boo is essentially an alt protection for your line. All they've got to do is block down and show run. I literally wrote this down when I watched Dallas with their run-action stuff. Like, watch their line on some of the run-action passes down the field. Like, they come off the ball.

You have an opportunity in a run-action pass to come off the ball and not have to set soft and show them, hey, come rush the quarterback. Make them play run first, and then you have at least a wrestling match for two seconds before you're beaten. After a second of showing run, you've got at least three, three and a half seconds to protect the quarterback. You should be able to protect the quarterback with two tight ends in a run-action path and go seven-man protection with the back, or potentially a tight end out in a six-man protection. You should protect the quarterback with the action. The action itself should help protect the quarterback.

that. And they didn't really get to a lot of it. They really did not go. To anybody that played bad like five years ago, the game, you used to run the ball like four times and then like a play would flash, like a play action pass it would be like red flash like set up. Or it show like, I don't, I don't buy that yet. Let's go something else. They have stuff in my opinion set up. They never got to anything off of. So that's on Turner. Because they're idiot.

That's on Turner because they're not running that. And when they do run it, they're running it poorly because the linemen aren't doing a good job of selling run. And they're running it from gun, which kind of, you know, is a bit of a tell right now. So I, it's too bad because like when you watch the, you know, the Shanahan tree coaches, if they're running that ball the way they were running it in the first half all of a sudden George Kittles coming down the middle for 35. Oh my God. Or on a boot,

it's just an evening. He both Daniels on the outside over the top. Yeah, on a boot, there's, you know, those three levels as you've described and all three of them are wide open. Take your choice. Yeah. What else? We're done with offense. Okay. Are you, you have some defense?

Yeah, you're asking you, too. I know. So we'll get to that right after these words. a few of our sponsors. Let's get to what you looked at defensively. Okay, so we wanted to talk about Payne, Alan, William Jackson, and obviously just defense in general. So I just had some notes on defense in general, which wasn't horrendous, but it still wasn't good enough.

I mean, and that's where they're at. I just, I wrote down, it's hard to play quarters, and I play quarters throughout the majority of that game poor underneath coverage and that's, you know, curl, Holcomb, and 52.

Jamie Davis. So bad. Jamie Davis. But early in the game, Zika Leli is free down the sideline in it. Yeah, I don't know if it's,

like, if it is curl or if it's man, like what it is, but you're like, at some point, someone's got to pick that dude up coming out of the back.

Someone, there. We got, we got to communicate. communication is a key in that situation. There were three plays in a row in the second quarter, or late in the first, where you get big plays, what was like 16, 32, and 16 or something. To, again, I'm done really, I'm like in the Mola Land, 88, I know his name. C.D. Lamb.

Yeah, C.L.L.M. Like, initially, he comes in motion. or he's like he gets in a situation where he's pat-in-a-fifty Jamie Davis is pattern-matching him and he beats him inside him. It's like, I mean, if he comes over in motion

and you're going to pattern match for David Davis, you better give him inside help. Like, we better at least bracket that with underneath coverage. You can't just tell Jamie Davis, like, cover CD Lamb. He did do it once later in the game.

Okay. But it's like, what in the world are we doing here? And then you get another, one where you back to back, and then I literally go back to back to back. They go with the run action where 68 is their fullback. And they go up fake and inside like a blast play.

And 68 turns around and Holcomb like sucks up like he's going to cover 68. And they throw the CD-LAM over the middle for 15 or 60. And it's like, okay, here's over here, 68 or 88. Was it really 68? It was in the backfield? Wow. Yep. second half, they give up a huge play early in the game,

early in the second half to know up around down the middle of the 12-7. The Cowboys would go up of a run-action pass, which, by the way, I think every single drive opener of the second half, they went with a run-action pass, and I think either got play, or either got PI or got the play. It was like, do we understand that's what they're doing? So this one, they go with what is commonly called as a dagger concept or in other terminology, a 94.

inside receiver is running vertical as fast as he can, splitting the safeties or crossing the one safety space. Depends on who it is. Outside receivers running an 18-yard deep in. It's almost never that the vertical route gets thrown. Almost never. And it really looks like they're in a two-man. So Jackson's on the outside playing the dig.

Fuller is on the vertical route on the inside. Essentially, that's the clear-out route. We're trying to clear things out to throw the dig behind it. McCain is the safety, the two-safety over the top. He spins around like he's going to cover deep. over the numbers, and C.D. Lamb is breaking on an end. And Cid O'Fourn can't run with Noel Brown on the go, and they get a huge shot down the middle of the field. You're like, what the fuck?

I mean, that's a big situation. How's your safety getting fun on a dagger concept? That's a pick. Essentially, that guy should be playing a fairly square and playing it, too, and when that end starts to break in, you're driving hard on that theme. could pick it. Yeah, it's tough. Yeah.

Right there. I mean, there were a couple picks they had that ended up being TIs, one on St. Juice, so it's not a smart play on St. Juice. You still think he's at a egg of a player. He's squatting at about eight and a half yard, off the line of scrimmage. He never comes off the spot. The receiver runs into him. He jams, holds him for a second.

Let's go. The ball is forced and throwing, like, Cooper Rush is throwing a pick regardless of the St. Juice touches him because of the pressure. But you got to know when you're sitting at eight and a half yard, I think he thinks he's sitting at five. You can't put hands on it, eight and a half yards. It's a PI, or it's old. I mean, that was an easy fall.

Yeah, I agree. That was tough. And then you give up some shots, and we'll talk about William Jackson later, and shots that shouldn't be given up. Like, one of the PIs on Jackson, Washington is in a cover for defense. Outside with Jackson, the receiver essentially runs a post over the top. Both the safeties come up and play the crossing route, which is what you do.

And then the backside corner, Fuller, cuts to the post on the other side of the field. Fuller actually plays it amazing and cuts to the post. Cooperush never sees Fuller. And you coach those quarterbacks. You've got to make sure in quarters that backside corner isn't going to fall into it when you try to throw the post across the field. Fuller should pick it. He starts breaking on the ball and stumbles and falls down and then inject and holds it or gets PI. If Folo doesn't fall down, he picks it, they're not calling PI.

He just runs the front and picks it. So there's plays like that, you're like, oh my God. Rivera said yesterday, we just can't get any breaks to go our way. That would be a perfect example. No, that would be good. They give up a touchdown late to Gallup later, I guess. And it looks like they have a two-man. I'm not sure exactly what it is.

But you end up with Cole Holcomb one-on-one with Michael Gallup, running a corner-out. And I think when Cooper Rush got outside of the pocket, McCain stepped up like he was going to come tackle him. You're like, no, it looks like you're the two help over the top. I'm not guaranteeing that, but I don't think we want to leave Holcomb on Gallup alone. Just think that's probably not a good idea. What about the Lamb versus Jackson touchdown? Yeah, so William Jackson. So we can just start with that.

I don't understand what happens to William Jackson on the Lamb touch him. This isn't a double move. He just hard sticks the post. It's really a cover three. You don't have inside help as a quarter safety. You have the over-the-top help, which is late. But when CD Lamb sticks to the post, William Jackson just drifts back towards the sideline and literally never makes a break on the ball.

You're like, could we get a little TRY in this play? A little what? A little TRY. Oh, try. Well, you know what? In watching this, it's like it's a Perry Riley play. He's running away from the action. Yeah, but the action is clearly direct to the M.

I don't understand what he did here. I don't understand what happened there. I really don't. Because there are times when inside of that post you get a corner route coming back out to you and it's a three-corner, you want the three-corner to pass that post to the middle safety. There ain't anybody coming back out to him. No. It's a pure lock situation.

Like that's one of those funny ones, too, where I always see like you see guys running the end on, they look at somebody else, like, what the hell? And the other guy's like, dude, that was all you. Shut up. Yeah. Vera pretty much said that that was Jackson, that he was not. No, it was definitely Jackson. But what was he doing is the question.

You know what's impressive about watching this play right now on the All-22? Cooper Rush has a really quick release, and he really throws with great anticipation. That ball is out before Lamb even sticks his right foot in the ground to make the post move. That's actually when that ball has to be out, because if that ball's out any later, the safety in the middle of the field can see it. And then he can go make a play on it. So you're splitting that difference in that third of the field between the sideline in the middle of the field.

He's got quick release, though, don't you think? And he's a big dude. He's 6-3-6-4. He's got a really quick release. Yeah, I think he's got some skills. What else on Jackson? So you asked me to watch Jackson, and I get through most of the first half. I'm like, this isn't bad at all.

first throw against the the boot and it's a receiver running a kind of a comeback and he'd make a good play on that. He's pretty consistent in quarter zone looking for routes and crossers. He makes a good play in the backfield on what's really like a key play on the toss or a corner blitz on a toss.

And then you get to a second in 17 after he makes that play. They run a five-yard out. They put the back outside with Jamie Davis is on him and so William Jackson's in the slot. they're in a five-yard out and he just basically tackles him on the out move. You're like, sweet, first down on second and 17, because you thought you needed to hold a five-yard-out route.

Which also goes back to you and I's theory of like that should be a five-yard penalty. Yeah, I know. Second and 12. Right. Or even a 10-yard penalty, second and seven. Yeah. That was not going to result in the first down. Right.

And then, but after that, I think on the same drive, he ends up having a third-nate stop. He does a good job driving on a whip route underneath and get the almost past break up and force the field goal. But then they come back in the second half, and it's like a DPI on Gallup D. He's actually in decent position, and he's just going to climb up the receiver.

That was the first one that I thought Fuller should have picked. But it's like, why are you climbing the receiver? Like, this is a bad throw by the quarterback. It was bad choice, bad decision, and it ends up working out for. Touchdown was bad. A DPI on Gallup, again on a run-action shot, and you're like, dude, you can't just climb the receiver. It's not that he's getting, he got smoked on the CD-Lamp play.

But the rest of the holding in a couple of PIs was like, you're not even that bad of shape. What are you doing? Right. To play the ball. I loved St. Juice out there last week, and I'm going to stand by that. And I still think that William Jackson's probably the other outside corner. and I've seen not enough at all in Kendall Fuller on the outside

to say that that's where he belongs. And that's over a couple years. So you think that... By the way, you went and got a manned corner out of Cincinnati, and you're like, okay, we're going to play three and four. Yeah. It worked out with Josh Norman when we brought him in. Yeah.

Where we got a cover three, a zone read corner, and playing a lot in man. But, yeah. Look, the problem with Jackson is, is essentially, like, he essentially is probably the number one reason. A big reason they lost that ball game.

Those couple PIs in the post were, like, the three or four biggest plays in the game for Dallas' offense. Yeah. Would you disagree? It's never fair to put it on a player like that. going to do that. I'm not saying that. I got discouraged.

Those points change the game. Yeah. I got discouraged when there was the because I really thought at halftime, I really thought that, you know, they're limited in what they're able to do offensively

and they're limiting themselves, but probably justifiably so. But they're not playing Philadelphia's offense. They don't have to worry about needing 30 points to win the game. And I think they had the game kind of right there within reach. The penalties are really the difference maker in the first half. And that's why it's 12 to 7 and not something like 12 to 10 or 13 to 12 Washington or something like that.

By the way, you didn't even comment, and we haven't talked about, the Obata blocked PAT where he appears to not know the rule that you can pick it up and run with it for two points or pitch it once he was getting tackled, which would have been, you know, a huge two points. But I thought that the real turning point in some ways in the game is you go to the second half and you've got two drives after you force them. By the way, you make them go backwards. They're run-stopping.

I know you haven't gotten to that. It was outstanding all day. And you got the ball at the 40-yard line down 12-7 on your second drive. Yep. And you went, this was the first of two third and 27s in the second half. You know, you had a holding penalty on Sadiq Charles. You couldn't run the football against the loaded box. And you ended up punting it back to them and, um, and Wei, you know, had a bad punt.

And by the way, I thought got run into it at the very least, which would have given him another chance to punt it. But the exchange of field position with them punting from their own goal. line basically, and then you punting from your own 22 and having one of the worst tressaway punch you'll ever see, now they've got the ball at the 40 yard line and they take, you know, they take it down the field and they extend it to 15 to 7. And I thought that was a big stretch because I was like, it's an eight point lead here. And I don't know, I don't know if they can score more than eight points.

No, I was hopeful they could score at least six for the cover, even if they missed the two point conversion. But then, you know, they did, the next drive was the real big third and eight that you talked about where he actually, you know, escaped pressure and threw to Dotson. And they ended up with another third and 27 after the second grounding penalty, but they got a field goal. And then they came back, you know, with, you know, one Jackson penalty after another to finish it out. So yeah, I would say that those penalties really were the nail in the coffin. But I thought that exchange and field position. Because, you know, in that kind of a game, it's like if you can dominate field position,

maybe can kick a couple field goals, even if they're long field goals, and you're going to make them go long distances. And by the way, what did they do? They did make Dallas one dimensional. That's what we said on Saturday morning. Gotta make Dallas one dimensional. And they did. They couldn't run the football.

But their inability to do anything offensively, and then that exchange of field position, I thought tilted the game back into Dallas's favor. So anyway, that's it. No, I totally agree. And you look at Dallas total first downs, 15. I mean, Dallas runs it for 62, and you run it for 142. You just can't have the mistakes,

and then you also have to find a way to capitalize on a couple situations. Well, you're playing. And the whole time of possession was 33-306 to 26-54. I know. You're playing with, the game plan offensively is a very, you know, small margin of error game plan. Understood. To me, that's the kind of game play than they needed to keep it close and have a chance against after what had happened the previous week and playing a really excellent defensive team. But, you know, they stomped all over that margin of error with three straight penalties on offensive drives in the first half and then all the penalties on defense. in the second half. I mean, 11 penalties for 136 yards.

You really, I know it's 25 to 10, and it looks totally lopsided, but that game was not lopsided like the week before. It wasn't. In my opinion. No, it wasn't like the week before, but it just never felt like Washington, watching it live and watching it on film. It never felt like Washington had any control of the game. No.

It felt like Dallas was continually in control of the game. Right. But it was within reach for two and a half quarters anyway. They averaged 3.5 yards per pass, Washington did. I know. My God. No, the last thing we wanted to talk about, by the way, I did have that little philical block in there. But the last thing we want to talk about was Payne and Allen. Look, this is really easy.

They're both great. They both do a phenomenal job with their hands. I mean, in this game, there was a lot of similarities between the two. There's not always, but, I mean, pain. can split a double team. He can get skinny. He can use his hands. He can play in the back field.

Both of them seem to play on the other side of the line of scrimmage throughout a lot of games. They both really, they were demonstrative in the run game. It's awesome to watch these two guys play. They're both studs. I did notice one thing. Oh, and they're tough to move. That was the other thing. They don't get moved out.

They don't get displaced. They did try throughout this game to overload a side with both of them. Yeah. But three dudes on one side of the center, including Allen and Payne, all on one side of the center. It never really seemed to work out. Alan did have the one sack in the game, a really big sack on a third down, where he kind of have a swat, a little swat their hand down and swim over and he gets by. And he also had a batted ball in the fourth quarter that would have been amazing if it could have been a pick six and a batted it up in the end zone. But both were really solid performances for them.

I would love potentially to see them rush one-on-one a little bit more. It seems like they stunt them so much and they have so much cross-action with them. I think that they both have the ability to just take a garden bowl, like find ways to get them one-on-one with a guard and see if we can get a win. Was it my imagination or was paying? There's a clear to find difference when 97 comes in in and 91. But then I wrote, great PAT block.

It would be nice to just get up and run with it. Is it my imagination from Sunday that pain got doubled a lot more than Allen? Yeah, he did get doubled quite a bit more, but it also could be depending on, and they played them in different spots. You know, depends on who plays the one technique or who plays the three technique or where they're checking the run. I mean, I would double Allen just as much as I would double Pay.

I mean, Allen's a problem 101, so I don't think they picked one per se out of the two. Yep. The one thing I do, I have noticed here of late is at least this week for sure. It would be nice to get a little bit more out of Monta's sweat and the pass rush. He's close a lot. That's nice. I know. I understand that.

But, like, sometimes I'm watching it. I'm like, he's winning, and then he doesn't get there. And then you're watching, like, this is a dude out of Temple last week. You're watching that guy. Hassan Reddick. Yeah, Reddick had been bat the ball down out of the quarterback's hand and make a huge play.

And you're watching Michael Parsons win. I know. Winning is nice. You're getting close. Horseshoe's in hand grenade. I know. I understand that. I don't think he has a sack on the season.

Am I right about that? Let me see if I'm right about that. He does not have a sack in four games. Montez Sweat, first round pick, traded back up into the first round. They would have taken him where they took Haskins if the owner hadn't been involved. I like Montez Sweat a lot. I really do, but it's hard to, it's just like, you know, Chase Young last year. You can say, you know, he was getting pressures, but he didn't get home and he didn't change games.

the only game he nearly changed was when he stripped Giovante Williams in the Denver game at the end and gave him a chance and then Heineke kind of went backwards when they were down 1710 but Sweets not getting home and by the way he's got I mean with all the attention on Payne and Allen I mean that's a pretty three of their four

defensive linemen are really good or really talented why isn't he getting home? I don't know I mean it's not like you're just going to double Montez Sweat and focus attention because you have Allen and Payne who are just as much of a threat inside. I literally, it's funny when you do this the way we did it and you've given me things to

look at. And I think that's the thing that we should look at in the next couple weeks is what is Montez sweat doing? But I'm not going to lie to you. And it's been a lot of time watching Montes Sweat because I'm watching Allen's pain. Right. And I was lazy. You know, the other thing, too, is...

But I did notice. I did notice. I didn't... Nothing jumped up. off the film where you're watching something else and you go, wow, look at this guy. I do pay attention to him and I don't think

he gets owned at the line of scrimmage ever. No, no, that's not. That's my only point. No, I'm not saying that. No, I know you're not. I know you're not. But the results would indicate he's not doing anything.

And I know it's funny to say, well, he's gotten close a lot, but you know, that doesn't matter. I also think, you know, he made a lot of plays, you know, two years ago. He made a lot of plays without sacking. I mean, how many blocked and deflected passes did Montess what have in the year, in the first year, in the pandemic year?

I'm going to put so many. And I don't think he has any this year. He might. I just had his numbers up in front of me. He had, by the way, in 2020, he had six blocked passes. He's got two this year. Okay, he's got two this year. I don't remember when they happened.

Maybe I think one of them happened against Trevor Lawrence. You had something else, but I'm going to tell you right now. I got to. I know. We're going to do that on Friday. We're going to do that on Friday. Because this has been great, but we got to wrap it up, and you've got to go and I got to go. But this was awesome.

This was helpful. And the Titans, by the way. You're awesome. The Titans are, they don't have any receivers basically for their game on Sunday, apparently. I had somebody on from Nashville this morning. But maybe, I don't know, nobody, maybe they'll line up number 68 in the backfield and we can get somebody to cover him. I'll talk to you on Friday. Thanks for doing this. Later, buddy.

All right, that's it. Back tomorrow with Tommy.