The Kevin Sheehan Show - Jayden Full Go + Suter Film

Episode Date: October 2, 2025

Kevin opened with the news that Jayden Daniels has been cleared medically and was a full participant in practice today. Kevin reacted to some of the new injury news today before getting to Steve Suter's "film breakdown" of the Falcons game. Steve wasn't impressed with much on defense but the surprise was his analysis of Marcus Mariota's game. Window Nation founder Harley Magden joined Kevin from Game 2 of the Tigers-Guardians series in Cleveland. For all your football betting needs: DCRELOAD at MyBookie for a 50% Deposit Match Want to spruce up your lawn? FastGrowingTrees.com Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You don't want it. You don't need it, but you're going to get it anyway. The Kevin Sheehan Show. He is Kevin. I also tried to give you an update on Jaden. He has been medically cleared by the doctors to have practiced full today. Dan Quinn earlier today with the news that Jaden Daniels has been medically cleared that he would be a full participant in practice today, which he was.

And while Quinn would not say for sure that Jaden will play Sunday in L.A. against the Chargers. I would assume, barring some sort of medical setback this week, he will. The show's presenting sponsor is always, Window Nation, 86690 Nation, WindowNation.com, if you need new windows. Speaking of Window Nation, one of the two founders of Window Nation, Harley and his brother Aaron, Cleveland Guys,

founded Window Nation. Harley is going to jump on with me in the final segment of the show from Cleveland. from Progressive Field, sight of Game 2 Tigers Indians, Tigers Guardians. So he will be my guest and we'll see how that series is going and we'll talk about a number of things, Cleveland Sports-related and other things. By the way, the baseball yesterday, the game ones were great. The pitching incredible.

The Boston, New York ending, the Yankees down 3-1 loading the bases. with nobody out against Chapman and not getting even one run in. Apparently, that is the first time in the history of postseason baseball that a team has loaded up the bases in the bottom of the 9th with nobody out and not gotten a run and lost the game. Steve Suter film breakdown day today. And wow, did Steve surprise me, because we've already recorded this, with at least one great, on a player that I thought played pretty well. Steve disagrees.

You'll hear that coming up shortly. We'll get to it quickly here on the show. This from Delco Ted to kick it off. Kevin, is it just Bill, or is it Bill Kroski-Marrant, or is it Bill Merritt, or is it Bill Kroski, or is it just Jacori, and he just continues to go on and on, with all of the possibilities of Jacori,

Krosky Merritt and Bill. And he writes, the whole thing seems weird. I was just wondering if you feel the same way. Delco Ted, yeah, the whole Bill thing has been a little bit strange. It's thrown us off a bit. You know, he's new. He's a seventh round pick, so he hasn't really earned the right to be called by just one name. He hasn't gotten to, you know, that status of what's that word called?

mononym, mononym, whatever it is. You know, he's not magic. He's not messy. He's not Kobe. He's not Prince. He's not Drake. Yeah, I think the best way to handle it, and I think what I've been doing recently is I think I've pretty much been saying Bill Kroski Merritt, because that's what he goes by, Bill, his first name, not Jacori, his actual first name. He goes by Bill. That's what he wants to be referred to as his first name. So I think it's Bill Kroski-merit, and I think that's what I've used. But I guess I have gone one name occasionally and just said Bill. Yeah, a little bit uncomfortable for the time being.

But I'll tell you what, if he continues to rush for six yards of carry, basically, we'll call him whatever he wants to be called. This from Carson. Carson writes, Kevin, not sure why you didn't mention it. But didn't you think it was interesting that you know who wasn't mentioned or shown it all during the game on Sunday? Carson, I did notice that. Now, I could have missed it. Maybe you did too, but I don't think we did. I thought there would be something about Kirk during the game.

Not because Washington was the opponent, but because there was a lot of talk during the week leading up to the game about whether or not cousins should be. be starting instead of Penix because of how badly Pennix Jr. played the week before against the Panthers. I did read this today from Dan Gratziano from ESPN. He puts out a column on Wednesdays with some of the other big ESPN guys with just tidbits about the NFL. And he was in Atlanta covering the game on Sunday and was on the sidelines and said in this story, about, you know, cousins and whether or not he was still a potential trade target or a trade possibility. He wrote, Atlanta's not desperate to deal him and is still asking for a relatively high price. The Falcons believe he has valuable as a reliable backup in case something should happen to Pennix.

And having been on the sideline for Sunday's game against Washington, I can tell you, Cousins is one of the prominent voices in, in Pennix's ear between possessions. He's been helpful in Penix's development. Yeah, I don't think he's getting dealt. I think Atlanta wants to keep him, and I think it's too pricey for teams to give up, say, a third round pick and pick up the bulk of the money that is still owed him.

By the way, so Gratziano, being at the game Sunday, ended up with a ton of Washington-related items in his story like this about Jaden Daniels. He wrote from what I was told, he was close to being cleared to play in Atlanta. The team doctors decided last Friday it was best to hold him out. Keep an eye on whether he logs any full practices this week, which would be a strong indication, he's good to go on Sunday. Well, he did log a full practice today, and I think he is a full go on Sunday. He also had this, Gratziano from ESPN did.

Wide receiver Terry McLorne sounded like he could need another week or two to heal from his quad injury, but the commanders will know more as the practice week goes along. Well, the injury report just came out. Terry did not practice today. Quinn said when asked about Noah Brown, John Bates, and Terry, he said, you know, you'll see more on the injury report today. Well, Terry didn't practice. Noah Brown didn't practice. But guess what? John Bates did. He was a full participant in practice today. By the way, as was Sam Cosmi. He's now on that 21 day, you know, off the pup list. So he's got 21. days to work with the team and get activated at some point. But he was a full participant today

in practice. What are we now? Nine months, basically, about eight and a half months since he tours ACL in the playoff game in Detroit. Just looking, by the way, at this injury report. Dorrance Armstrong didn't practice today for illness. Zach Gertz was rest. Von Miller was rest. Tunzel was rest. Let's see. Sanra still didn't practice because of a knee injury. Debo didn't practice because of a heel injury. All right. This just came out. Nick Ballore didn't practice. So some surprises. Sanra Still and Debo for injuries. I mean, tonsils are for rest. Yeah, so we'll have to monitor that. Imagine not going into the game Sunday without Debo Terry and Noah Brown. Wow.

Debo heel did not practice. So I'm sure we'll find out more about that tomorrow. Sanra's still a knee. So two surprises on the injury report. Also this from Gratziano today. I thought this was interesting. He wrote one more commander's note. For you fantasy managers,

wondering about the running backs. They're very happy at the moment using a committee with Chris Rodriguez, Jeremy McNichols, and rookie Jacori Kroski Merritt. He writes Jokori Kroski Merritt, not Bill. But he writes, they do view Kroski Merritt as the most capable one of the three to emerge as an all-around threat out of the backfield. And as he gains more experience, I would expect his role to increase. If you have him on your fantasy roster, I'd hold on because there's a chance he could be the lead back in Washington over the second half of the season. Hmm. All right, one quick soundbite from Jaden Daniels post practice that I wanted to play for you because I thought this was his most interesting answer.

Here it is. Jaden, knowing your importance to the team, if you're able to play. play on Sunday. Will you have to be a little extra cautious to make sure you keep your health up? Or can you even play cautious and still be effective and be your usual self? I just think it's that balance. You find that balance. Obviously, you want to be able to be available for the rest of the games, but you got to be smart. And that's kind of what we talked about. you know, just letting me see another down. But just know if the game is on the line, I'm going to do whatever takes to win.

So that's a different circumstance too. So I think Sunday, when he's back out there, I think what's going to be interesting to see is what he looks like. I mean, he's talking here about playing smart. And he said, by the way, that's kind of what we've talked about, just to live to see another down. of course he also says if the game's on the line, you know, he's going for it, as he should. But there was a part of this Jaden press conference today

where he was asked about, you know, the possibility of having to play with a knee brace. And he said he's not the biggest fan of it. But if that's what he has to wear, you know, he'll do anything to get back out onto the field. But I was thinking, man, if he's out there in a knee brace, it's going to look different, possibly, and he may play differently.

He may end up being with this knee brace more of a distributor, more of a pocket passer. I would imagine that if he's out there in a knee brace, I bet he's not a big part of the run game on Sunday until he gets that brace off. I could be wrong. I just picture these quarterbacks that have worn knee braces in games, and they tend not to be designed, you know, designed.

runners or option runners, you know, in games. It doesn't mean that he can't scramble with the brace. Of course he can, but maybe Sunday with a knee brace or maybe for the next couple of weeks if he's wearing a knee brace, we might see a different style of quarterbacking. I'm intrigued by that. And I'm also concerned about that. Not that I don't think he can just be a drop-back quarterback.

And I think at some point in hopefully a very long career. he's going to become much less of a runner and certainly as a dual threat quarterback and much more of a distributor and a pocket passer. But I don't want to see that yet. I want to see the full array of his talent. But maybe we won't get that right away coming off this injury. All right. Let's get to Steve Souter's film breakdown.

We'll do that right after these words from a few of our sponsors. So guys, if you're like me and you've basically been buying and wearing this same type of underwear for years, in my case, boxer briefs, same brand, same type for a long time, well, not anymore for me. I want to tell you about skims for men, something I've discovered recently, the softest underwear I've ever worn. I got a few pairs of the five-inch boxer briefs so comfortable. No matter what you're doing from sitting in a chair in your office to working out, they are so comfortable. They don't bunch up. They were made to recover from every stretch. The fabric is cool to the touch, and it just seems to mold to your body and never loses its shape. This is so different from the

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Simply put, one of the greatest punt returners in the history of college football. He still owns several ACC records and even a couple of NCAA records played for Ralph Regents' teams in the early 2000s at Maryland. A lethal punt returner. He really was. And he's been doing film breakdown of Washington's games. He started with the Green Bay game, did the Raider game last week, and now we've got another game, a 34 to 27 loss to Atlanta on Sunday. So the way we're doing this with Steve, he's going to give us an overview of the game. Then he's going to grade out Marcus Marioita's performance, the quarterback, and then he'll give us his top three and bottom three graded players on offense and defense. So,

Let's start with. What did you think of the game? Yeah, tough game for sure. Man, I guess I have to start. We might end here, too, but overall impressions defensively is not as high as it was watching Week 1 and Weeks 2, or excuse me, Week 1 through 3 for sure. And then I quickly think the death of this team, in my opinion,

is going to be the secondary and they're miscues. It's too often and obvious. It's too easy. confuse the secondary, way too easy to confuse them. And I mean by any type of motion, long motion, short motion, they can mess up in the secondary four of the first, you know, like seven past plays that they need to be efficient in the secondary and pass coverage.

It's too easy. If I was an offensive coordinator, if I was a team watching film on the commanders, I would motion almost every play against the commanders because of that fact. They can't communicate it correctly. And it's astounding to me because I've had several conversations of my highly intelligent, defensive friends. And I've asked, how do they keep messing this up? How can you not know if you're passing off a player, if you're locking on a defender,

if you're going to play inside, outside on two guys, how do they keep getting this wrong week after week? And I've been told, which seems obvious, like this stuff is all ironed out through the week. You should know going in what you're doing in the secondary. Are you passing guys off? Are you locking on? Are you going to play inside out? Are you going to play short and deep?

How are you going to handle motion? And it just seems like throughout the game they changed their mind because they're indecisive. And this was really obvious to be watching the game. They wanted to run some man coverage early on. They wanted to be effective in that regard. But the secondary couldn't handle it. There was a couple early miscues. And then you leaned on zone coverage because you don't want to give up the big

busted coverage because you're not getting that right. Well, the Falcons caught on to that so that they're just calling zone beater after zone beater through late in the second quarter all through the second half, and again, what they want. So it was just too easy for them from a play call standpoint because it was so obvious that you can't cover man coverage because of the motion. So defensively, very disappointing, and that's just from the secondary up front. The worst game I've seen so far that we've broken down from the front guys, especially the A-GAPs. They were not good. And I say A-GAPs, you're one and three techniques.

So that includes pain. That includes, that includes Kinloh, Goldman, guys of that nature, Newton. So Wagner and Louisville had guys on them all game because those guys up front weren't eating up the double teams like they should to allow Wagner to then roam free and Louisville to roam free and try to make plays in a run game. So they were at a disadvantage from that standpoint, the linebacking level, because the defensive line was just letting guys get on them all game and we'll probably get into one more specifically, but really disappointing up front from those guys. So you really didn't play a sound game at any level on defense. And that's why you give up so many points. It's just too easy. And then when you're in position, miss tackles. So it was a rough film to break down defense. So quickly on the offensive side, right, could get into rhythm early that very few plays in the first half because

of the Falcons, you know, went on a long sustaining drive there. But you could tell that it looked like Kingsbury wanted to try to establish one early. It comes out in the sixth linemen that we talked about last week where they ran it 19 times. This is where he got too cute for me. He comes out with the sixth lineman on the first play, and he hands the ball off the Devo in the Jet Suite. I think he thinks Falcons just watch me run this personnel 19 times, and we're pounding guys.

So we're going to come out in the 6-0 linemen, but we're not going to pound it. We're going to try to trick a gear with this little jet sweep with Debo. I don't like that call to start. I think you should try to, let's put the six guys out there and see if you still pound them, even though they know it's coming. So you get behind the chains there, you go three and out, and then you don't get the ball back for a while,

and then you have a really bad possession there. So he couldn't get into rhythm offensively in the first half, and then it was not a great game for Marriota. He made a bunch of mistakes that I watched in Talley. There was no way that could get into a rhythm. Come out in the second half and play bad football offensively. out of the third quarter, you need to establish some of your behind. And then you had penalty after penalty.

I don't know how they, I mean, I know how they got that field goal coming out of half time because Marriott scrambled for 22 yards. But there were no positive plays before that. So you're lucky to get that three there. Well, the first play of that drive was the 16-yard run by Bill. Yeah. Yeah. And then you just shit the bed, right?

Penalty. First and 30. Yeah. First 30, you get that 22 yards to get it back, so you get in the field go range. So offensively, just not effective, not efficient. Somebody was messing up almost every snap, and they just, you know, could maintain. And with that said, still are in the game and still had an offense that could put points on the board. I think this offense can move the ball both ways.

They can move it in the air, and I think they have a really good ground game. So if they can stay into a game where their defense isn't giving up 30, you know, 40 points like they're about to do, I think you have a really strong chance of being the game offensively throughout the season. It's leaning now on the defense. Can you keep them in it? That's kind of how it's spinning to me as I'm watching now in my third game, breaking it down extensively. Interesting on Marioota. I can't wait to hear more about his day from your film perspective. But I want to ask you about what you started with. The defense and the issues related to the defense and the coverage and

particular, although you also said up front, they didn't play well. So we've been talking about this all week, and I think it's really hard from a fan perspective, but you are expert at this. So is this more coaching, scheme, play calling, or is it personnel? It's yes and yes. And it's yes because the coaching, like I mentioned there in the beginning, this stuff about iron out what you're doing in man coverage, you have to figure that out throughout the week. So that is all coaching. How are you not getting these guys on the same page game after game is very, very confusing in mind-bottling? I just don't get it. You should be able to say throughout the week, we're either passing guys off or we're locking. And me, I think you should

be able to do it series by series. I don't understand how that's kind of thing. You should be able to go out on the first series and tell your entire secondary, hey, when we're in man coverage, we'll lock it on this series just to show them something different. And then the next series, you should be able to go out and tell your secondary, hey, we're going to pass off. I don't see how that's that complicated. Now, I know I'm not in the trenches and under the fire, but these are NFL players who have played in the secondary. They're almost their entire lives when they've played football. And how is that you can just put that in their brains. It's just mind-boggling.

So that is coaching for sure. You got ironed this stuff out throughout the week. And then the second part of that question is also, yes. They got nobody that can lock down a man coverage. You don't have a man-coverage lockdown guy in this secondary. So when you do go to man-coverage, like sometimes they want to run, you don't have, somebody's open every time. Somebody's getting beat in the man-coverage every time.

And if it's me, and I made a note to myself, if I'm an opposing quarterback against this defense, and I know I got man coverage, I'm looking for Sandra Stil, and I'm looking for Lattimore. I'm going right at it. Those are my two matches. I haven't seen Lattimore break up a pass in the three games in man coverage where I said, oh, man, he was on that, and that definitely goes with Sanders still. So I'm pinpoint those dudes out pre-snap.

If I know, if I think I have man coverage, I'm looking at them pre-snap, post-nap. I'm going to confirm my read, and I'm taking my shot. So that's a personnel thing. They try to play zone and try to switch it up because I don't think they trust their team in man coverage for the reasons I've already explained. And then if a team is sniffing it out and they're ready to call zone beaters, then it's not much you can do when I'm in zone and you call play that beats my zone. That's not really a personnel. That's a coach thing too.

So he's kind of handcuffed. He is. He wants to play man coverage because he doesn't trust him in zone or he wants to play man coverage because he thinks that's the coverage of a win on the play. and either personnel lets them down or communication lets them down. So they're in a tough spot in the second day. I mean, it's my personal note. This is the death of the team.

This is why they probably won't go very far if they lucky enough to get to the playoffs. It's just too easy to pick them apart in the secondary. And that was evident all through the game. You don't have to look any further if you just look up down and just or even if you had a feel. Every third and long, every second and long, falcons got chunks.

and it was just too easy to get back on schedule for them to get back to our first down or be third and one after it was second and eight. And it's because they just, it's too easy to take chunks off of the defense. Yeah, and the only way you can make that back end better is with a really strong pass rush, and they didn't have it in this game, right? Absolutely. The defensive line was very disappointing other than Armstrong. I mean, so Armstrong, we talked about the last couple weeks,

he's usually showing out as the highest grade player or one of them, right, in the top three on defense. He was up there. I mean, he was good, but he wasn't as impactful has been, and he was the only one that was even showing up on film. I mean, the front four, really disappointing. Pain in particular to me was awful. Effort, terrible. I mean, I would, if you put this film, I didn't know who this guy was,

and he put this film on tape in the preseason because he's trying to make a team. He wouldn't make roster. I mean, he wouldn't make the roster off of these 42 steps that he had against the Falcons. And I thought, is he hurt? I was going to ask you, was he on injury report before the game? Did he show up on the injury board after? Nope. The effort was crazy, so easily blocked.

He's a guy that's supposed to, he should expect to get double teams. That's what happened. You're in the trenches. You're the front line. you get a double team, majority of play, but you've got to be stout, show some effort to get off of it. And other than what was it, the second play, or a third play where he had a nice little swim move and he caused the fumble, that was his only physically dominating play, the entire game. He was, I got several notes.

Pain just getting mushed. Pain is just getting driven back eight yards. Pain, where is his effort? Pain, what are you doing? I mean, we could go over all these plays. I have time stamped on so you can see. They're just... Well, it sounds like pain is going to be in your bottom three on defense.

But, you know, it's interesting because I think we talked about this last week or maybe the week before. His biggest issue during his career is his best is as good as it gets. And then it's just not consistent. And then when you get one of those days where he seems borderline disinterested, it can be awful. Wow, I mean, you hit up exactly. Something was going on with him.

This is a great word because I was watching the film dumbfounded sometimes. Like, I just couldn't get over how this guy pain. And I haven't watched them like you watch them. So I'm expecting the pain that I've heard about. And, you know, he shows flashes. But this was rough. I mean, watch this play. Go to the, you know, the Sandysill Pick.

Let's see this. Go to quarter three. 525. That's when the Sandor still picks. Now first, Zanders still gets really lucky. This isn't...

Panics throw the terrible ball here. London is wide open above it. Right. So they're very fortunate to get this pick. But watch pain. This rush is ridiculous.

I don't think I've ever seen a D-tackle get washed. So far out of a pocket. Yeah, I see it. And now if you can barely... I mean, he is giving no effort. This guy just, like, pushing him like a shopping cart that easy around the mall.

And then, now, I mean, I'm reading into this a little bit, but if you just watch the play all the way to the end, he has no care to celebrate with the teammates. You only get a split second of it, but once the play's over and not... Yeah, he's heading to the sideline. He's headed to the silent. He has no involvement. and that was to me telling, like, what's going on with this guy?

Yeah, this is, this is, like, pointing out this play, this is different than his previous worst. Maybe he was, something was wrong, perhaps. Yeah. I mean, it was, so last week, he was one of my top three guys. I know. You put a different jersey on this dude. I would have never guessed it was pain watching the falcons.

There's no way. Yeah. I mean, he was just, I have. eight or nine plays that looked similar to that where he's just getting abused. So that was frustrating to watch. Let's get to the quarterback. Let's say, I'm very interested in this now because I thought that he played pretty well. I didn't think it was the Raider game, but I thought he did a lot of good things,

but it sounds like you did not think that Mario had a good game, so have at it. So he was up and down. He has the most, let's see, if my offensive chart, he has the most plays where I gave him credit if we're doing something above and beyond or making a good decision in a bad moment. Yes. But then he has the most of this is, this is on you, Mario, this is on you. You can't do that. And I mean, just start from like the first possession, right?

He doesn't give, he doesn't give Luke a chance on that third down. It's just a bad ball, right? Third down, he's trying to throw a long shot to Luke, but it's just a terrible ball. He has no chance. So you need to throw a better ball out of your NFL quarterback, give him a shot. let's go I'll give you another example like Q, go to quarter two

and then go to 1342 I hate this plate this way drove me crazy is this the read option where he made the bad decision? No, but that's one of this one of this one's a little different what I'm 13, 42, yeah

so yeah watch so this is what's fresh this is up to the QB so I'm very upset about this play because I this is the third and one before you do the Devo, fourth down, and you get the conversion, right? So this, you run this play in practice, but how do they botch this so much pre-snap? And then it's got to be a Mario-Ota because he's in charge of the cadence. You're going to bring Ertz in motion, and then Erch shuffles.

Now, see, here's the issue. And I don't exactly know, maybe this is Earth's fault. Maybe Earth isn't supposed to shuffle here, but the timing of this gets all screwed up because of Mariotas' cadence. So he shuffles, then Mario to snap, then Earth isn't in position to get out of the way. So he bumps Roderick is, he slows his momentum down, and the whole play is screwed up. So this wasn't a zone read. This wasn't a zone read with Mario Deuter reading the end, you don't think? No, no, I don't.

Okay. I think this is a give all the way. Because, well, okay, you know what? Let's take it back. Even if it is a read, because I have that down, too. even if this is his own read, then it's very important to have this pre-snap movement work. Right.

Because now I think Mariotta is frozen because he doesn't know if that D.N's coming down. But the D.N. sees Earth coming at him. So he's going to shuffle. He's going to break down to the end. He's bracing for impact. He thinks Earth is about to block him. Well, that is going to, if he thinks he's going to get blocked, that he's not going to be diving down

Robert Rodriguez to make a play. So you are clouding up everything here just because of your pre-snap movement was inefficient. Yeah, and you think that was Cadence impacted, that it was Mario-Ota. Yeah, oh, yeah, it's Cates related.

So either Mario-Otta forget that Erch shuffles or Erch shuffled when he's not supposed to. So could this be on Earth? Sure. But pre-snap stuff usually always ends on the quarterback's shoulders because you're in charge of when you snap it.

So for me, if they practice this all week and the coaches tell Urch to shuffle here when you get to the tackle and then time it upright and then they come out here and they blow it on third and one, which is a very important down. They're fortunate to get it on fourth down the next play. But on third and one, this is very important. And you put yourself in a position to fail before you even snap it. Yeah. It's so interesting because I was going to ask you about.

this play. This was the zone read that I thought Mario-Ota made the wrong decision on. Because if he does keep it, he probably scores. And he maybe accidentally has Ertz out there leading the way. But if he pulls it and it is a zone

read, it looks like it's a walk-in touchdown. Yeah, I don't disagree with that at all. Yeah. So either way, it's on Marioada. Even if it's a pre, even if it's pre-even if it's a give all the way

they screw it up and they're not going to get the first down because of the motion and the cadence and if it's a pull he screws it up by not pulling it would have been a touch with your point got it so that's on Mario Yoda either way you look at it right yeah so then let's go to quarter to

so the rough and excuse me the intentional grounding that's all on Mario right it's a it's a middle screen to Devo they get the they get the coverage they want I think they want man coverage that if that's 6.58. Quarter to 6.58.

Got it. I kind of like this play design. I might tweak it now that after I've watched it to not cloud this up. So what happens is they motion running back out of the backfield and they get manned coverage. Linebacker leads. But it's a middle screen back to Devo.

They get all the eyes. They get the movement. They think you're going to throw the swing, but you're not. You're going to try to throw it back into the middle of Debo. But the linebacker that's running out with the running back on the swing, gets into Mario's vision, and he thinks it's blown up. He's like,

oh, I can't get it to D-Bell. Linebackers in the way. Well, he should know this is a screen pass. He should know his linemen A are going down field, and B, I don't even have a backside read. I got nobody to throw it to. So if you're going to throw this away, you don't have it,

then you throw it over the running back head out of bound where you're already looking at. You can't do this because you don't even have a receiver out here. So that's all Mario does not knowing the whole play. Yeah, that's all Mario does. one option there. He could have thrown it to Debo. Yeah. Yeah. If he stayed with it, yes, he popped back open. Right. But he just

made it, makes a decision too quick. He's like, guys in the way, I'm getting off it. But that's like, what are you getting off it, too? You don't have a receiver backside. Nobody backside is running around. I mean, maybe you could argue I can't tell this guy is that, oh, the other running back is that. Is it Rodriguez? Yeah.

Yeah, so Rodriguez is he's leaving the backfield, but he's leaving the backfield to go maybe block because he thinks Debo has a ball and run. He's not a receiver option. So maybe you could put that on Rodriguez. Maybe he is a late checkdown that never ran his route. Don't you think on bubbles and even RPO's that if a defender, you know, sniffs it out, if a defender jumps a bubble screen or sniffs out the past part of an RPO, that a quarterback instinct. and really, you know, just instructionally, needs to know you cannot throw the football.

You know, if you don't get rid of it immediately to the intended bubble screen receiver or to the intended, you know, pass option of the RPO once you pulled it from the running back's gut and decided to throw it, you have to run. You have to make a play with your legs, including, by the way, just going down and not taking a hit because you're going to get flagged for ineligible linemen downfield. Now, I guess you could, you know, theoretically, if you scrambled and you threw the ball away, you know, beyond the line of scrimmage outside the pocket, you know, you could give, you know, the defense the option of taking the down or taking the five yards and then you get the down back.

But quarterbacks need to know in those two specific plays, right, that if it's not there for whatever reason, I got to make a play with my legs. Agreed. And you would think Mario would think Mario would be better enough to know this. All right. More on Marioota. What do you got? Let's see. What else can I give you? Let's see. Two-minute drill, wasn't great. He got away with the, he almost throw a pick there on the two-minute drill. Yeah. Diomac. Yeah. Yep. So he got away with that. I mean, that's a poor decision.

Go to go to the 40 seconds. This one I gave them a little bit off because I want you to the tough guy in me once, and I think Marriott is tough, you've got to stand his pocket and deliver this football, and you might score touchdown. Now, this is a bad snap, which starts, which is the problem with the play. Okay, so you're at quarter two, 40 seconds left. You're a third and eight. You're on your own 35. And they get the play they want here, man. They get a hot route.

Okay, so all fans pick their five, they're blocking, and they're hot off of 55, Caden Ellis. He's a good player. But the low snap, yeah, the low snap right here just messes up Mario's timing, and I'm putting myself in his head. And he doesn't see, I don't think he sees Ellis blitzing because his heads down trying to pick up the football. Right.

So by the time he gets up, he sees his free DNRussia, which is Floyd, and that's in his vision, and now he's thrown off. But if he catches this, if this is a better snap, and he just swings this over to the running back here. Yeah, that's Mick Nichols. Mick Nichols, yeah. I mean, this is, this is a huge play. You're catching them in hot, and all you have to do is beat that safety. I'm not sure it is. I'm not sure it is.

I'm 22, but he's going to have 15. The safety is even going to double earths. Right. Over the middle of the field. Yeah. I mean, you've got a big play here. You're definitely getting the first down. You're probably crossing the 50, and you got, you know, you still have the ball. You got chance to score before halftime. So, I would have loved Marioo to just stand up.

pocket. He's going to take a shot for sure, but just hit that swing. And I'm the plane doesn't start with Marriota, but that's a big play. You've got to eat that. You're hot. You have a built-in hot route. Most offenses do. The built-in hot route is the running back swing here. You got to catch it and throw it. You know what I hated about, you know what I hated about this drive? And now I hate it even more because I'm somewhat, I was wrong about it. And they missed this. play. But, you know, they went from the 8 to the 33 pretty quickly. And on first, on second and 10, they decided basically to get conservative. You know, they handed the ball off to McNichols. He got

two yards and they just let the clock run. And Rahim Moore should have called a time out defensively. And they would have had more time left when they got it after the punt. But I thought that with that run, I'm okay with a second and 10 draw. But you've gotten it out to the 33. You've got to stay aggressive. And that clock, they just let the clock run. And then on third and eight, they took the sack. And I didn't realize what he had on that third night.

If he hits that, then they're down in field goal. They're probably in field goal range. Interesting. And it's all this. I mean, so the snap, I gave the biggest deduction. Sure. That caused, I think, all this. Yes.

But you want Mario to, you want Marioaded it to, to, to, to, to, Say, I'm going to take a big shot here, but I know where my hot is. I'm going to just lob it out there at this point. Yeah. Just get it out there. All right. What else Mariotta was? Let's see here.

So that's about it. Then you come into second half. Let's see. I have a play here. Okay. So on the Luke McCaffrey, offensive pass interference here, that's at 1405 in third quarter. Right. I dig Marioita here too.

because he's got more for a big play. And I don't know why he came off of him other than maybe he's just not confident, but he has cover four. And he has, and I'm pretty sure, this thing is not loading for him real quick, but I'm pretty sure it's more. Yeah, so watch more. He's in this slide near side. Yeah.

He gets covered four here. I mean, he's, he's at a touchdown. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. I know that. And I'm not sure what drives, because he comes off the ball.

So here's like a pre-snap. This is Mario-O saying I'm throwing it out to Debo. I don't even care what Moore is doing because maybe I don't trust him or I don't want to read the rest of the coverage here. If I don't have Debo on the out, then I'm just going to check off of it, which I just think is too pre-snap determined, right? Because, I mean, Moore is leaving. These guys are even right now.

I mean, they're not, I mean, he's gone. if he just stays in his read for another half a second you probably got a TD but he comes back to Luke who can't get that guy out of his back pedal on his hook and he two-hand shoves him so Luke gets dinged for me

because you know off the offensive at the pressure and is blatant don't do that but Mario to miss is another huge play I pointed out this drive because it illustrated or it certainly was an example of why I was frustrated with

something I hate to be critical of, but I just thought they should have run the football more. And when they come out to open up the second half down 17 to 10, you've got the football, and Bill rips off a 16-yard run, and then two plays later, you're at first and 30. I just thought they had an advantage up front running the football. Overall, what did you think?

I mean, the two backs, Rodriguez and Kroski Merritt, were 14 for 106. seven and a half yards per carry. And yet there were 20 called run plays in this game, 33 called pass plays. It's kind of like the Green Bay game, but different because Green Bay just so dominated the line of scrimmage in that game. And they had lost bates. But, you know, we've seen the Trent Scott.

We've seen the heavier, you know, jumbo with him is the sixth offensive lineman that's eligible. I thought that they could have run the football more. What did you think? I agree, but you've got to think, and this is what I'm just, you know, the overall feel of the game is you're watching it. The coaches are watching too, and Kingsbury probably just can't help himself thinking. I'm watching a defense that can't stop the Falcons, and maybe he gets antsy too.

And he does a call, because I agree, they can run the football. I think Washington is very good running the football-type team, and I think they can do it from multiple looks and multiple programs. personnel group, and it's hard, and I agree, coming out of a half time, you're only down 17-10, you're in the game. You could go back to your originally scripted plays, your first play was bringing out six-linmen, bring in Trent Scott again. You could have started that in the third quarter.

You didn't have to rush. You could try to shoot. I mean, you hear all the time, if a team thinks the other team is more potent offensively, what do you try to do? You try to keep the ball out of it. Yeah. So I could have certainly been a plan for them to do that here. And I think they can run the ball.

And they still ran the ball effectively when they tried. Yeah. But sometimes you just put yourself in bad spots, and you're just worrying. And I guess you are scratching your head. Why aren't you just pounding the football? Why aren't you just pound the football? I can't give you an X as an O's reason why they didn't do it. I think it's the mentality slash feel reason.

I mean, it wasn't anybody that says it was the score, it's 1710. It's 1713. It's 2416. Okay, when it gets to 3116 and you're down. two scores in the fourth quarter. That's fine, but you can even still, you know, because it's early in the fourth quarter. You know, you mentioned the first play of the game. You know, they go with the six offensive linemen, and they run, you know, a jet sweep with Debo.

Yes. Because maybe, yeah, it was too cute. I thought there were a couple of those plays. You were, like, show them what they saw on film. You saw me do it 19 times against the race. There's, well, let me show you it two more times, so you think I'm doing it again. And then I hit Debo on that Jet Sleep the fourth time we do it. You don't do it off the first play.

And I don't know if you're going to know more of me on this. You know, Debo didn't, wasn't on the kickoff return team. Right. Was that a tell? Because you're going to give him the ball to first play on offense. Ah. So you didn't be tired or something. Yeah, well, I see.

Next level thinking. Well, with Terry out with Noah Brown out, he was definitely going to get a heavy workload. They just didn't have the ball, as you pointed out. enough in the first half, but he still ended up having a heavy workload, which is obviously the reason they decided, you know, and by the way, McCaffrey's a good kickoff for Turner. Yeah, he's doing well. Yeah. All right, so wrap it up on Marioota.

What did he do well and then give him a grade? So, I mean, he did make plays, like you said. I mean, he wasn't all bad. He scrambled, extended plays, got first down, made some good reads. It was just so up and down, right, the roller coaster of, and he's just so impactful, right? everything he does is important. His interception was bad. That's all on him. Lanes got him cooked.

If he just, Mariotto hikes the ball and looks off to backside safety for a second, then you have to look him off. He just has to look at him for half a second. Then he can just throw that ball up, lofted like he did, Delane. But if you don't do that, then you can't have that ball drift

towards the middle of the field and get intercepted. So that's a big play because you're still in the ball game. Yeah. So those are big time. So you think, think the throw, if it comes quicker and it's to the outside, it's still okay? Because I thought he didn't move that safety. So why did he come back to lane? Right. Well, yeah, he doesn't move the safety at all with his eyes. Right. And if he's come back to lane, it's still complete if he throws it on the numbers, more over the top. Yeah. It's going to be a little tougher catch for

Lane, but he's going to, I don't think the safety gets involved. Gotcha. But again, you could eliminate that right away. Right off the snap, he just makes eye con. contact with that safety. It'll freeze it for three yards, and then it'll have lane and it'll be a touchdown. So that's just another move that you wouldn't think a veteran would make. Unless he's, you know, maybe he read the coverage different off the precept, but I don't see how he could. Safety's deep there in the middle anyway. You could tell he's going to the middle. Just hold him for a second. You can know you're not throwing to your left. Just hold the safety for a half a second. So here's a, you could tell that he, because wasn't it the false, yeah, it was a, it was a

start, right? Oh, yeah. See, let's go to the play. Let's go to the play. Yeah. 655, right? 655 left. I know exactly what Mario is thinking, and I hate that it's on like first down. He knows he's got lame who the speedster that runs straight. And he, this is on first down because he's trying to get his line up there and they hike it on first down or second down or second down. He sees a Falcons defense that is still kind of in a muddle huckle here, not off the ball set. Right. Every safety on the field is seven yards off the ball, and he knows he's got a speedster running the street, and he's got two safety seven yards off the ball because he can't wait to snap it.

Yeah. Because he doesn't want him to get set. He wants to watch this guy take off. Gotcha. I mean, that's exactly what the memory of playing. Yeah, no doubt. I'm seeing that right now. So he wants to get a ball off quick, and he just, and A, D, Bo's,

Debo would have cost it because he wasn't said. That's the penalty. Debo's Lakin set in the slot. So even if they catch his touchdowns, can call back, and that's on D. Yeah, they flagged it. Yeah, they flagged it for the illegal shift, right? But it would have been on Mario. I mean, Mario is responsible for making sure everybody set to.

Yeah, right. That's a quarterback. Right. So I know what he was thinking. He was so angry. Oh, my God, I got Lane going deep, and I got safety seven yards off the ball. Hurry up, give me this ball. and then disaster.

How about the fourth and goal touchdown pass to Debo? The fourth and three. Yeah, good play. That's his good grade, right? I gave him a good score. Is that the one? Yeah. Yeah.

Well, no, I mean, he's got a bunch of other. So, like, let's say, how I'm scoring is, like, you do what you're supposed to do on the play. I'm not going to give you bonus points because you're an NFL quarterback and you throw a curl route. Right. I mean, that's just what you're supposed to do. but I'll give you bonus points on that Debo ball, right? That's an NFL's talent, like above average throw that you drop in. What I like about it is Debo doing something other than an intermediate route

because that's what he does and that's what he's good at. You're getting him out of the backfield, you're getting him on swings, you're getting him on intermediate short routes. You saw that Marriott as one player point out. He won Debo on the out. He didn't have it, and then he ended up throwing it to Luke. So defense is see that too. if I'm guarding Debo or I'm in a zone where Debo's at, I'm probably heavy-footed.

I'm squatting around 10. I'm expecting him to run in or and out. I'm expecting to not go more than 12 yards down the field. So it's good to see them switch it up and you're going to catch somebody off guard there because they're like, oh, Debo's here. I need to watch intermediate routes, and then you catch them on a stutter and go. Well, they got that on the late PI, too, you know, with him down the field. By the way, did you like that two-point conversion?

play? I thought that was pretty creative. Yeah, didn't mind at all. So I do love watching two-point plays, and it's because you practice them so much, at least we did. Every practice, you did whatever you did, you warm up,

you stretch, and it usually started every practice for us. We did calisthenics, you know, a little light warm-up, and then everybody just started yelling two-point. So I like to see the arsenal of two-point plays that teams practice over and over and over again. And it comes in to play more and more now than it used to.

We used to only practice one. Every practice, we practice the same one, every play, because we probably were going to go for two once or twice the season. So you happen more now. So you've got to have a little more than your arsenal. So I do like watching out. But what I loved about this play, and I watched it last night for a little bit,

is, you know, they're showing a zone read. Atlanta believes it's a zone read that Marioad is keeping he actually ducks towards the line of scrimmage like he's a runner, and then he peels back and chucks it. He brings the whole defense up and lets Ertz go wide open. Yeah, you got to sell the fake, and he sells it. It's really, and it's a well-executed play. Yeah.

All right, so what did you give him as a grade? He's got to be C-minus. Okay. Maybe, yeah, it's just too many, maybe even D-plus. He just had too many crucial plays that cost the team, in my opinion, to either stop drives and drives or could have continued drives. He had the opportunity to make plays, and I gave him credit for it. But in the end, just too many mischews mentally. All right.

Well, that sounds like he might be in your bottom three for the offense. So we'll do that. And for the defense. Top three, bottom three graded players by Steve when we come back after these words from a few of our sons. sponsors. More of Steve's film breakdown coming up. But first, if you want to bet on sports, I recommend MyBooky. Go to the Kevin Sheeonshow.com slash my bookie.

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Let's start on offense. Your three highest graded players from the game against the Falcons. Devo, top player. Then I got to go. Tunso actually had a good game for me. and then I'll end it with Rod Rieges. Top three guys. So let's talk about Debo here for a moment.

Like through four games, you know, this was a bit of a controversial trade for them. You know, they gave up a pick for him. He's been banged up a lot in recent years. He's in a- What was the pick,

if you don't mind? They sent a fifth-round pick. Fifth-round pick. To me, it was a no-brainer for a team. talent like that. He's in a contract year, too. So he's not under contract next year. You know, they're kind of going for it because Jaden's on his rookie contract. And when you have, you know, an elite level quarterback on a rookie deal, it's very rare. So they kind of went for it. You know, they traded for Marshawn Latimore in the middle of last season. They traded for

Tunsell. They traded for Debo. I think through four games, you could certainly make the case. Debo's been one of their most valuable players. And yes, he's not a stretch-the-field wide receiver, but I mean, how many ways do they use this guy? There are so many different ways that you can use a player of his talent. What do you see when you watch Debo? Oh, you know, I love him. He's my definition of what I like watching in a football player. My knock on him is, and if I'm being critical, he's a body catcher, and that's going to bite him.

It's already been him early in the TV. He's going to drop passes because he's a body catcher. And I don't know if he can get himself. There have been some very successful bodycatchers through the years. That's just what they do and they don't drop passes. He's a little different. He's going to drop one here and there. I actually made the note on the fourth down.

I like that Mario's ball was high because it forced him to use his hand. He's got good hands. He just doesn't want to use them most of the time. It's just natural form, I guess, to body catcher. So I liked when he had to use his hands. He had another grab, I think. Mario was through the ball a little behind him, and he had to pluck it with his hand.

So it was good to see him use those. But I just love his versatility. I think he has a great trade. A fifth round prick. Give me a break. Yes, absolutely. You can do so much with him. And he's just a dog.

He's a football player. Get on the ball. However you can. I mean, we went over the play where Mario has had the intentional grounding. I mean, that's a play that's specifically drawn up for Devo, middle screen. If he gets it there, who knows what happens? Because he's probably going to break a tackle.

I love the guy. Absolutely good move for them offensively. And I agree. It should have took a shot going for it as they're doing. It just doesn't look like it's panned out what they got on defense. I would say the Lattimore trade isn't working out. He's not locked down. He's making more penalties and he has PbUs.

He's just not effective on defense right now. So they're losing that trade, but they're winning the Devo one for sure. So why did you have Rodriguez in your top three graded offensive players and not Kroski Merritt? It was just really like one big play, right? It's been hard for me to decipher the running back. I would say Bill probably would have been up there, but he got blown up on past protection of one play. It cost the play, right? But then he had another really good blitz pick up where he had to come across the formation

and pick up a blitzing linebacker, so you've got some points back on me on that. They are just, so the three running backs aren't making mistakes, so you're not getting any negative scores for me. It's just who's making more of an impactful play, and I'd say the rivalry has had one, that long, one long run, I think early in the game, yeah, second drive that I gave him a good score on because I thought he did a little bit more than a typical running back would do there. So I'm splitting hairs with those guys.

I mean, they're really, scores are really, really tight. You know, the criticism or the thought is that Kroski Merritt, who by the way, now, through four games this season, okay, four games, he's carried 29 times for 172 yards. It's 5.9 yards per carry. He's only had 29 carries in four games when he's going for 5.9. And Rodriguez has been outstanding, too. But the knock on Kroski Merit as a rookie is, is what it typically is for a young player. Yes, but he's not good in pass pro. At what point do you say, sorry, but at six yards per carry, I'm going to either coach him up.

So he is good at pass pro much sooner than later, or I'll just deal with, you know, if we check to a pass and he's in there, you know, hoping that it holds up. Yeah, I, so I mentioned, he had one bit, Pat, but he had another good pickup. I don't think he was a liability in pass row, not for this game, but he also doesn't have the frequency of snap. So it's probably evident more in practice, and that's why you're not seeing him out there on the third down. So that

makes sense. But I would say, if he is your best runner, which you could, you don't have to twist my arm to say he's the best runner of the three. But put it, so when you're doing the six linemen with Trent Scott, why can't Bill be the guy there? Because if you are passing, I got an extra lineman to help with pass pro. Right. And if you are going to pass, it's going to be off play action, which is going to help him in pass pro. So who cares if they think we're running in that formation?

He should be the guy in that formation. We go to six linemen, it should be built. Because if we're going to go, say we're 75% run rate in that formation, great. So let's put our best runner in there to do that. And if it's going to be a pass, he's in a better position to be a pass pro in that

situation. So that should just be a standard for him. He should be the guy in that formation if you want your work your guy in to just be uncomfortable in those situations. That would be an easy fix for me. That's what I would do. I mean, they're both good runners, aren't they?

Yeah, I like Rodriguez. That's why it's hard for me to give I know Bill kind of he's the young guy and he gets a run and he ripped off four yards and he gets up and he's like, give you the ball on the man and you can kind of, you can get caught up in that emotion too.

but it isn't like when you hand the ball if the Rodriguez, you get negative yards and he's not breaking tackles either. It just looks a little different, but it's both effective. They both can run the football. You're in a good position the Washington is from running the football.

You just can't get off schedule like they did to start this game and he just didn't get a rhythm of Kingsbury and what he wanted to do and every other play seemed like somebody was messing up for him, so they couldn't just dial up their normal game playing.

But that's football. You got to be able to you got to pivot. You got to be able to call an audible yourself in your head. Hey, yeah, I wish we were doing this. I wanted to do this, but we can't. And now the score is this.

How do we change up? You got to tell me you have to have plans for that. And if you don't, then you're unprepared as a coach. All right. Three lowest graded offensive players. The three lowest is kind of tough. Everybody was kind of

I can say that. So I'll go with McCaffrey and Ertz bottom two and throw in Chris Moore. He had a drop. Those things are big. You drop a ball.

That's the first down. I thought you were going to have Marioita in the bottom three. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. His score is solo. You're right. So you had Marioita

is the lowest graded offensive player. Yeah, he was my little guy. This is so interesting. And so followed by what, McCaffrey and Ertz? Yeah, all tie. They're all the same grade for me. Okay. So Mariotta McAfree, Arch.

All right. Let's go to defense. Highest graded defensive players, one through three. Highest grade goes to Louvo, and he's up there by far. He is, he's awesome. Through the three games I've watched, Louvo is probably the best player on the defense. Armstrong's number two, and then I got Reeves again, played well.

He rounds out my top three. All right. Do you think Reeves as a replay? They have talked about they really feel... I do not need Harris back in. I don't need them. That's interesting. They talk about it being a big loss, but they love Reeves too.

But you like Reeves more. I mean, I only watched one game Will that was a Packer game. Right. So let's hold out my official on that. It's fine. Yeah.

So, but Reeves, I mean, the only thing Reeves did that was a negative issue for me was that 14-yard touchdown by Robinson. Like, Bejohn's a dude, right? That guy's a dude.

You got to know he's a dude. But Reeve comes in and blows up McLeod on that play. They try to block him with a receiver and he blows him up. And then I think in his head, and I put myself in another player's head, but he's like, I'm the man, I just blew up

McLeod, I'm going to blow up Bejohn, and he doesn't wrap him up. He tries a shoulder tackle him, and that's just foolish against a guy like that. It should have been a four-yard game. He misses the tackle and it ends up being a touchdown. But other than that, he's always in the right place. He got

beat on Bejon on an angle route. Okay, he's one-on-one with maybe the best pass catching running back in the league, and he gives up a 10-yard catch. So I knocked him for that. But he's making plays along the way to where it's not that he's bouncing themselves out. I mean, how about the long... Oh, running him down.

Running him down, yeah. Yeah, dude, that effort is crazy. I got to give you points for that. I know they score the next play, but you don't know that's going to happen. Right. He stops him on this. I mean, walking that dude down, that's crazy. Yeah.

That's his effort. You've got to give some of my points. for that, so I do. And then how about the Falcons, right? So right after that play, Reeves comes out because he just ran 75 yards to try to tackle Dejan, and he does, so he's gasped. So you bring in Savage

fresh off the street and they run a play action right at him, and they put him in a position where he's the guy. He has to decide if he's going to play the run or he's going to cover pits on play action. He's laid on pits on play action because he goes in for the run. And he

what they did. They ran a motion from the receiver, Drake London, and he's coming in towards the line of scrimmage, and I already know what was happening. You could hear, not that you could hear, but I can tell Amos is yelling to Savage, hey, alert, alert, because he's trying to tell Savage, hey, this guy's coming down, cut his split, alert, crack. He doesn't, that's what you do, right? A corner that is outside and their receiver comes in motion, they all yell to their player inside to warn them, hey, you might be getting cracking. here, and I don't want you to get blown up, so he's yelling alert, alert, alert. You see Savage

acknowledge it, he points out real quick, so he thinks it's the run. Then he tries to come down the line of scrimmage to get underneath London, in case it is a crack, he wants to beat him down the line, and then it's too late, it's play action, oh, no, we're all screwed, touchdown. But savvy, I don't know if I'm giving the fact there's too much credit to call play action against

Reeves' replacement on that play, but maybe there is a guy sitting up top saying, hey, Reeves, came out for a play. Let's take a shot at his backup, who we know is savage, who was just off the street. Let's put them in a bind. I mean, that's, if you're thinking that way, that's savvy coaching. You know, one of the guys taking a lot of heat this week, and I'm curious as to what your thoughts are, and that is, we've talked about it before from the last two games, but when Wagner ends up in coverage, it's not been pretty. No, it's not good.

Yeah, so they've gotten away with it, and I think I mentioned it last week. He looks lost in past coverage, and they have done a job of the three games I've evaluated, where most of the time he has no, I'll call it no responsibility. Whether it's man coverage or it's zone coverage, he just stands over the ball, and it really looks like they're drawn on the defense, so he has no responsibility in some cases. So that was eye-opening for me because it's just not standard practice that you're going to have a middle-linebacker that's responsible for nothing all the time in past,

excuse me, in past defense. But that's what they've been doing now. When he gets caught, when he is in man coverage and he has a man-covered responsibility, yeah, forget about it. And when he does have man coverage, it's 11 personnel, but then they bring Bejohn as an example, you know, out of the backfield or into the slot. It can be, but usually if they're bringing Bejon out, onto the slide. They're switching it up.

They're not going to... Bobby's not following him out there. So it's out of the back field. Yeah, well, yes. And then so I don't know if I could pull up the play too, but he gets caught on pitch and man coverage, and pitch runs it down and out on him, and he gets 14 yards.

And then, I mean, I have several plays where I marked where I was like, Wags, what are you doing? Wags, what are you doing? You're lost here. So, I mean, this is eye-opening for me just as a football fan for a guy, that is touted as a Hall of Famer, he probably is.

And I'm watching the all 22s and I get to pick his play apart. Like, has he been doing this for his 15-year career? No, I don't... Not involved in past coverage? Don't you think, like, I mentioned earlier this week, London Fletcher at the end of his career, he was such a great

player, such a grinder, such an Iron Man, the whole thing. But once he got into his mid-30s, he couldn't run anymore. And I and I'm, I think we're seeing the same thing with Wagner, but they don't take him out. He plays every down because... Remember I point that out?

Yeah. Because why? Because he's great against the run. He's also a good blitzer. You pointed that out last week. You've got to find a way to get him from wrath. You've got no other linebacker that can... Okay, I get your point about him being great against the run,

but we're talking like third and 12th, and he's still in. Why? Why is he still in on 3rd and 12? If they run the ball, you're telling me his backup can't help stop a 10-yard rush? Right. You have to have a more athletic linebacker specifically just for pass coverage on that roster. And if you don't, you need to go find one because that's ridiculous. He should not be responsible.

Him and Louvo. Louvre never goes off the field either. 65 plays, both of them. Both have every rep on defense. And, I mean, Lulu can do it. He's a stud. I mean, I was thinking about this last night. If I was drafting, let's say a franchise started tomorrow,

and you get to pick off of everybody's team, right? I don't know if they used to do that, but you could just pick somebody. If I was drafting from Washington's defense, Louvre was my first pick, and I don't know, I have no idea what draft pick he was when he came out, but he'd be my number one pick off of this defense, and then Armstrong would be number two. So it would be my first two picks.

Louvo. Louvo last year. So let me just give you his career in a nutshell. He was basically an undrafted free agent, you know, with the Jets back in 2018. He was basically a special teams player. And then he signed with Carolina and he became a linebacker. And last year, he really started to play well. And then last year was really, you know, his, I'd call it his breakout year.

He had the most sacks he had eight. I thought by far and away he was their best defensive player last year, and I argued that he was the second best player on the team ahead of McLaurin behind Jaden Daniels. I don't even think you've seen the best of Frankie Louvo yet this year. He was more impactful, I think, you know, last year, but it's just four games. I mean, it's just four games.

All right, let's get to your bottom three graded defensive players from the game. Bottom three, leading the charge by far is pain. He was F, just terrible, in my opinion. Latimore, and then I got Wagner and Amos tied for third. So it goes, it goes, Dron Payne, Ladimore, Wagner, and Amos. So they ran out the bottom. Tell me, you like Reeves. What do you think about Kwan Martin?

He's not my favorite in the secondary, but he's not. my least favorite. I'll say that. Gosh, man, how can I put this? He's a guy right now. I'll just say that he's a guy right now. He's not too impactful.

He does get caught, making mistakes, eyes in the wrong position. You don't see him win in man coverage. But he's not in the wrong place, which is key most of the time. I don't know. I guess I call him an average.

he's an average guy right now. Yeah, I mean, in my eyes, three games. I just think that he's not a free safety. And he's playing too many snaps, you know, deep. And I don't think he has anywhere near enough range. That could be true. Give me a couple more games. Okay.

Get some more film on him to watch. I don't know if I can say I've seen him miss, like, coming over the top as a free safety and not getting to a position where he should have. I don't know if I can validate your range thing yet, but again, I haven't seen it, seen him have to do it yet. So that's also, right now it's too easy to pick on Sanchez-Dill and Latimore in man coverage that maybe he's getting covered up because he seemed to just going at the other two. All right. And then Amos too. Amos is struggling man coverage. He had a couple penalties. I couldn't see, I mean, I couldn't see he had a holding on pits. Amos did on one play.

It was hard to tell if it was actually holding or not from my all-22. I didn't get to see the broadcast copy. What else? Clear the notepad if you've got anything else you want to mention. Man, I think we hit it pretty good, actually. I don't know if I've got much else here. I would just say, I would just reiterate

maybe my initial thoughts that they need to figure something out. Communication secondary. It's too easy. To be an NFL defense, to be confused on multiple motions, it's too simple. Do they got to fix that, or it's going to be the death of them, for sure? I'll tell you what I did leave out this game, and I'm not breaking any news here, but Bejohn is top three in the league.

I mean, he can do everything, and his balance on every play was evident with the break tackles. That dude's legit. I mean, I've been, I talked about it all last week leading into the game, and then I just said, and I think he's one of the most mesmerizing backs to watch. There is a style to him that's just so pretty to watch him run. I agree. He's top three in the league. He might be the best runner in the league.

What this is, you and me, right, this interaction that we're having over the last couple weeks, what is done, I watch football every Sunday. I'm usually a red zone guy. I'm just watching it, but I'm not following it. My, you know, Saturdays take up my emotion. Right. And I don't focus there. So usually Sunday I'm using to just relax and watch football without any

allegiances anywhere. So I don't get into the players. I don't listen to ESPN all-off season about guys and players. Right. Fancy this and fancy that. So I'm getting to watch some of these guys and break them down for the first time with my own eyes as I would see a player. and that's been enjoyable.

I haven't dissected Bijan like that before I haven't watched him a full game every snap, every play, and saw how good he was. So that's been cool to see. And I can validate it. Same with Jordan Love. I know first week I was very impressed with him.

I mean, I was. That dude. He's a quarterback in the league. So that was that stuff that's opening my eyes through watching this. What did you think of Pennix Jr? Pennix. Pennix timing was really good at this game

in that. put secondary to bind. I like him as the quarterback. For a second year, I was impressed. He had a couple of mistakes. He cost his team a couple times to pick Sandersville. That should have been an easy completion. I don't know how he under threw it like that. He under threw one again. Let's see, it was 1056 in the first quarter. Latimore and Sandor still blow the coverage and he's got an easy touchdown and he dirts the ball over to, I think it's one in order to. or it was a movie, I can't remember.

But he had to miss you. He missed some touchdowns, but I thought he was very accurate. Other than that, I liked him out of Washington. I thought he was one of the most accurate quarterbacks I had seen in a game. So he's,

I think he could be a decent starter for a while. Yeah. All right. Last one. Just, you know, what are the solutions if you can't fix the secondary to a point,

where it's good enough. And by the way, you can't get the kind. Like I said the other day, Steve, I'm like, look, they actually pressured the quarterback well against the Giants and the Raiders, but those offensive lines were in disarray. And if you end up scheming up, you know, with extra man pressure, okay, that's fine. But they don't have a special pass rusher.

You know, they don't have a T.J. Watt. They don't have a Miles Garrett. They don't have, you know, an Abdul Carter, who, by the way, was an absolute beast the other day against the Chargers. So, like, if I gave you these two options, you just err on the side of being super aggressive and in every obvious passing down, you send everybody. Or you play shell coverage, you play too high, you play everything in front of you and you play Ben don't break. with this group, which would be the best of the two options? Man, that's a great question. Are there other options?

No, so I think you're going to like my answer, but half of my answer is your offense has to be better. Yeah, right, of course. Because there's no good way to, I would do the Benba don't break with this defense and hope my offense is putting points up on the board. And then the defense that I'm playing against in my Ben, don't break is going to get a little antsy and they might make a mistake from a play call standpoint

or the quarterback might think you need to do something when he doesn't and throw into your coverage. I do not think that the commander's defense can stand up in-man coverage. I have seen no signs of that either, even when they do it correctly and they all are guarding the guy that's supposed to, somebody gets cooked. They don't have a pass rush like you mentioned. And if you're going to apply pressure, you're going to put those guys even more on an island in the secondary. and I don't think they can hold up. So I don't think long-term that you play

unless you're going to make a move from a personnel standpoint and somehow you land somebody. I don't even know if that's possible right now if you even acquire another player. So for me, it's going to be a bet but don't break with this secondary and try to hope you can call coverage

that tricks a guy. I'll see what, there's something that I didn't get into you with you today, but I actually had a call with a buddy of mine that we went over it because, Washington's running a defense that I have no idea what it is. I've never seen it before, but they've done it multiple times. And to give you a little idea what it is and maybe we'll go into later. But it's a cover three.

Excuse me, it's man covers on one side with a high safety. And then the other side is running cover two. I don't think I've ever seen it before because it doesn't even make sense of why you would do that. because if you have receivers on the cover two side that run across the formation, excuse me, across the field to the side is playing man. There's somebody over there. And they did it a couple of times. If the Wags play where he was guarding Pitts and Pitts had to the down and out for like 15 yards

and Wags was in man coverage with him, that's a play if you want to take your time to look at it. It's weird. They did it against the Raiders and Tucker scored the touchdown on it. and they've done it a couple of times. This is a, it's something that I am having fun tracking, just to see when the WIC calls it and why he's calling it, and I haven't figured out why. Is it a 3 by 1 he calls it?

Is it a 2x2? Because it doesn't make sense. This was great again. Really appreciate it. Such interesting perspective. We'll do it again next week after the Chargers game. Thanks, man. Yeah, man.

Had a good time. I appreciate it. Steve Souter, everybody. he's really good at this, isn't he? And it's so interesting because I remember so many of those times doing it with Cooley where, you know,

I thought I knew what he was going to focus on and who he was going to grade favorably and unfavorably and how many times I was completely floored by what he saw in watching the All-22.

And this was one of those days with Steve. he, I would have never guessed Marcus Mariotta as the lowest rated offensive player. I thought Marcus Mariotta played well. I didn't think he played as well as he did in the Raiders game, but I thought he played well. I thought he had a lot of good plays. They moved the football.

They scored points in the game, and he thought there were just too many mistakes and even mental errors in the game from the quarterback. Of course, you know, we could have certainly predicted what was coming in terms of how he saw the team defensively. And I do think that, you know, even though it's only four games, I think he is pretty adamant at this point after seeing three of them on the All-22 that they're in trouble defensively this year, especially on the back end. All right, one more segment on this show. My good friend Harley from Window Nation is live in Cleveland at the Indians Tigers game. He's going to jump on with us and tell us what's going on there. Not that as you're listening to this, you don't know what happened already,

but we've got other things to talk about with Harley as well. We'll do that after these words from a few of our sponsors. Joining me right now, as promised, from Progressive Field in Cleveland, Ohio, recording this just as the Tigers and the Guardians are getting ready to play game two is my good friend, the founder of Window Nation, Harley Magnin. Harley and his brother are Cleveland people. They're huge Cleveland sports fans. This is day two for you at the game. But real quickly, on yesterday's game, I know you can't appreciate as an Indians fan, as a Guardians fan,

the school bowl, you know, outing for the Tigers, but that was pretty unbelievable to witness. 14Ks over 7 and 2 thirds. I tell what I actually can, because you know what? After the game, I said to myself, that was great baseball.

I mean, there was an error that got the first run in, but you got to appreciate the suicide squeeze that got the second run in for the Tigers and the Indians had their chances. Gaville Williams, I thought, phenomenal. We got a guy on third with no outs and the bottom of the ninth and an error. We had our chances. We didn't execute. It was a two to one game, and I thought it was great. I actually thought it was a really good game. Actually, three of the four games yesterday were all really good and had that playoff intensity. You actually started to let me know a few weeks ago, man, my team is hot. I mean, that's the comeback from

July 8th, down 15 and a half games. As a fan of a team and a long-time fan of the team, you know, we've never, even though we had some good baseball teams and good Nats teams over about an eight-year period, we never had a pennant chase. We never had, you know, meaningful September regular season baseball. What was that like as a fan following it night in and night out? I'm being from Cleveland and having some pretty awful opportunities to evaporate. You know, I didn't have high expectations. I mean, we needed the Tigers to basically somewhat collapse, and they did. And the Guardians, they had to win almost every game.

And they did the pitching, I think, over that stretch was like we gave up like 35 runs. The next closest was like 80. Yeah. And, I mean, frankly, like I said to you, I'm like, named two people on the team that aren't Jose Ramirez or Stephen Kwan. And I don't think anybody can. So Voitz put on an amazing job keeping this team together. And, you know, we always were sending memes back and forth to my friends from Major League with, you know, that tear off piece on the owner in that movie. Like, you know, we're going to win this one.

Yeah. That's what it felt like. I mean, look, we're free-rolling here, as they say in the gambling world. And I think they win today. I'm going to throw a six-three score out there today. I think we win today. But it's winner go home at this point, right? I mean, you got to, we have all three games at home.

You got to win this one. So you like, you like six three, so you like over two? Did you, did you play the over? I didn't play anything. I don't know what the over is. It's six, it's seven, seven and a half somewhere around there. Okay, yesterday it's six. It just seems so like, you know, I was, but I guess it came in.

So, under, but I would take the over. Six to three tribe wins. and I'm feeling good about a game three. I think we got some great momentum, but who knows? Rank the Cleveland sports franchises in order of importance for Cleveland sports fans. Oh, well, that's going to be Brown to Indians' Cavs. There's no question that that's how it would go, right? But I think it's the exact opposite is the chance for them to win it all, right?

I think the Cavs obviously have the best shot. Indians would probably be next, and I think the Browns are just, doom for life. Yeah. Where does Ohio State rank in that? Ohio State, pretty high. I mean, Ohio State football right now is just pounding on all cylinder. Defense is just dominant. We're feeling pretty good. Browns are obviously struggling. So, you know, Ohio State is pretty big up there right now, but, you know, just in general, I mean, a Brown Super Bowl would be just beyond epic. I mean, you got the Cavs title and that first, you know, Cleveland title since 64 and the Browns, you know, with, you know, a few years ago with Kyrie and LeBron, 2016.

And it's been what, since 48 since a World Series win for Cleveland? You've had opportunities like that Marlon series back in 97. I mean, how if you, let's just say you come back and be. beat the Tigers and you end up making the World Series and winning it. Would you consider that to be a bigger deal than when the Cavs won it? Absolutely. First of all, I doubt that's going to happen. Last year was a big surprise, right?

You know, we blew through and then went to the Yankees and, you know, only took one. But that one game was like an epic win. Right. Don't forget, 2016 was a great year for Cleveland sports. Probably don't have a ton of Cleveland fans, you know, listen to your podcast. But that was the year the Cavs won. And the Indians were up three games to one. the Cubs with two games at home.

Right. And they, with arguably one of the best managers in Terry Francona, and we couldn't get the deal done. In fact, you know, we were losing. And, you know, I was at that game, Raja Davis, it's a good game tying Homer and the 8th.

And then it rains and goes in the extra innings, and we out into the losing. But, I mean, in Indians, with this team, highly, highly unlikely. I think they got some great young talent. And, you know, we got some good decent,

you know, defensive players, but I don't know if you saw this stat, but the Indian Guardian basically had the lowest batting average for a team to make the playoff since 1906. Wow. So put that in perspective. They were hitting, I think, as a team like 2.30-ish, it was the pitching to guys here. And remember, we lost two pitchers to a quote-unquote gambling scandal, right? Our closer, Claude.

We traded away Bieber at the deadline, although he had been injured. you know, he was, you know, that's a prior style young winner. So we pretty much were packing it in, right? They probably would have traded away Clause had he not got into trouble. And their Kwan was on the table for, you know, a deal if somebody came and pony it up enough. Are you good with Dylan Gabriel taking over for the Browns in the London game Sunday against the Vikings? Wow, you had to go there, didn't you? I mean, look, the defense is great.

It's right now, do you know that they're on pace from a run defense standpoint to set an NFL record for yards per carry? Teams are averaging 2.6 yards per carry per rush against Cleveland. Their defense is awesome to watch. Awesome to watch. It was good against Detroit last week, even though they get – It was good against Detroit. Yep. Yeah.

And you saw they held Henry like 23, 24 yards. I guess what I'm saying is, you know, if Junkins could step up and we have a running game, it's going to make the passing game that much better. You know, Dylan, do I think he's going to save anything? No. As I'm watching this, we just dropped the ball and made an error in the first inning, two guys on, so not a great start for the guardians. Right.

Back to football. Look, what do I think is going to happen? I think very few passes. I mean, it's probably going to be a lot more running than normal. maybe you get 25 pass attempts in. Sure, let's see it. Why not, right? I mean, Flack was not the long-term answer, but, you know,

the Vegas had the Browns had four and a half wins coming into the season. We're one in, but is it three right now? One and three. No, should have beat the Bengals. Yeah. Right. And we played a hell of a first half first of the Ravens, and, you know, first half, first of the lines wasn't too bad,

and a big surprise went over the Packers. So I think we get to five or six wins this year, but, you know, who knows, we'll see. But am I excited to see, Gabriel? Not really. Who knew we were going to do a segment on Cleveland Sports, but Harley's into it, and he's also into his new business. Will you tell us about Magnin Motors and what you're doing with luxury and exotic vehicles?

Yeah, so we started Magnin Motors about a year and a half ago. And recently earlier this year, we acquired a much larger dealership group called Marshall Goldman. They've been around since 1978, headquartered out of Cleveland, Ohio, out of all places, right? And there's actually a location in Beverly Hills and a location in Newport Beach. So we actually just rolled them all into the Marshall Goldman brand. And, yeah, we've been around since 78 now. So with that new group, we're one of the top five largest gazette car dealerships. And we've actually done some great partnerships with some athletes, too, like Jalen Hurts, Marlon Humphrey, Jerry,

and we're really excited. I mean, exotic cars, luxury cars, fun. They could be looked at as investments in some cases. But, you know, it's fun. I mean, leaving windows to do cars as it seem logical, but I think there's a really good opportunity out here for us to expand this business nationally. And we're excited for it.

So, yeah, we've got a location in Baltimore, Maryland. About 10 meds from DWI. What's the most expensive car on the business? the lot in Baltimore right now. We got a couple Ford GTs, newer Ford GTs that are about a million price points. Wow. Most expensive car we have in general is a McLaren P1. It's on this site right now for a little over $2 million.

But the average price point, we go anywhere from average price points around 200 grand, but we have cars from $40,000 to $2 to $3 million. Wow. And you get, I'm just curious, how do you, acquire those vehicles? How do you get them into your building and then, you know, put them back on the market?

Great question. A lot of places. We have a lot of relationships around the country, and that was one of the important things when we acquire Marshall Goldman. They've been around for such a long time. They get called on all kinds of vehicles. But other dealers, wholesale, not really much

auction, trade-ins. So we got about 250 cars in stock. right now. That's typically about the average we have with an inventory close to $50 million. But we really try to buy only the best of the best. Low-mile, unique spec, cool colors.

Check it out. Marshall Goldman.com. It's our inventory. What's the oldest vehicle you have? Do you know? That's actually pretty... You have 1959. A really special Porsche

356 GT. It was one of like eight or one at 12 ever produced, and I think it's on the market for about $1.1 million. Wow. Super rare, took in from a private owner, and a super special car. That's, I mean, I'm not a car guy, but when you start talking about old cars and cars that are that expensive, I think it's just interesting, that whole business. And you are, you're doing it, and you are the experts. So anybody out there that's, you know, into exotic vehicles, Marshall Goldman.com to learn more.

All right, go enjoy the game. Sorry to keep you from it. Thanks for doing this. No, no. I appreciate. We're still in the first inning. Just we've got to strike out. But look, baseball, playoff baseball.

It's exciting. So good. So I appreciate you having me on. And look forward to chatting about college football later in the year. We'll do that later in the year. Thanks, Harley. All right. Appreciate you, Kevin. Harley is a serial entrepreneur. Love the way he goes after it.

All right. Done for the day. Back tomorrow with Tommy.