The Kevin Sheehan Show - Rivera's Year 3 Coming Together?

Episode Date: November 30, 2022

Kevin opened with Maryland's rout of Louisville last night. Kevin talked some soccer, college football playoff rankings then got to Ron Rivera's 3rd year off-season promise. Included in that discussion was Kevin admitting that the conversation about going to Carson Wentz right now isn't crazy. Doc Walker jumped on with his thoughts on the Commanders' 6-1 run over the last 7 weeks. Then it was Hall-Of-Fame Coach Gary Williams who told Kevin why Maryland has had so much early-season success in Kevin Willard's first year. Nick Akridge/PFF was a guest to finish up the show with some Washington player grades from Sunday's win over the Falcons.  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 Cheyen Show. Here's Kevin. No coolly today. Sorry about that. He's on his way back from Minneapolis driving through South Dakota.

That's what he told me earlier as I talked to him. But he did promise to be on Friday. No worries. Doc Walker will be with us in the next segment. And then Gary Williams will be on the show today, along with Nick Ackridge from ProVeyn. Football Focus, Nick, a senior data analyst to PFF, and a really good guest to talk commanders with. They are his favorite team, and he gets to evaluate them a lot for PFF.

I want to start this show, though, with Maryland basketball. Terps blew out Louisville last night in the Big Ten ACC Challenge on the road, 79 to 54. They're 22nd in the country right now. Maryland, by the way, and the Big Ten, this is the last year that the Big Ten ACC thing will happen. It's 24 years. I mean, Maryland, most of those games they played were in the ACC, where they did much better than how they fared in the Big Ten in this matchup between the two conferences in late November, early December. The Terps finish up two and seven as a Big Ten team,

but they were a winning team overall as an ACC participant. But they hammered a bad Louisville team, all right? I understand that. A bad Louisville team on the road by 25, and it could have been worse. But Maryland on Friday night opens up Big Ten play against 16th ranked Illinois at Xfinity Center. The Aligni last night, the Aligni crushed Syracuse, 73 to 44. And their only loss of the year, Illinois, was to Virginia. Virginia beat Michigan last night, 70 to 68 on the road.

Virginia is number three in the land. I mean, Tony Bennett, the program he is built in Charlottesville, But Friday night in College Park is a big, big night for Maryland here early in the season. I know there are a lot of Maryland fans that listen to this podcast because I hear from you always. Show Kevin Willard. I'm going to be there Friday night. Show Kevin Willard in his first season how good X-Finity can be for a big game. And I will tell you that I don't think Kevin Willard knows how good of a home court he can have for a game like Friday nights.

He was at Seton Hall. I talked to him, I don't know, a month or so ago, and I said, you do know how good Xfinity can be. And he said, really? He said, no, we were here with Seton Hall a few years ago, and it wasn't that great at all. And I said, well, no offense, but it was holiday time.

The students were on, you know, winter break, having just finished finals. And, you know, Seton Hall wasn't the, marquee opponent that Maryland has had in their building where they really get pumped up for it. And by the way, Seton Hall won the game, which he reminded me of. He said, we won that game. I said, not only did you win that game, you won the next year when we played up in East Rutherford. I think that's where the game was. But look, you know, we know the reasons that Maryland fans have become somewhat complacent in recent years,

lots of reasons for it. You know, the lack of NCAA tournament success. partially responsible for that. This is not the same sports town that it used to be. It's much more of a pro sports town. And really more than that, it's a bandwagon big event sports city. You know, when Gary had it going, the competition wasn't the same. You know, there wasn't a baseball team here that was good. And, you know, there was a time, and I've said this many times,

and most of you understand this, if you've been around for a while, there was a time when Maryland basketball was the second most passionately followed team in this city. And perhaps to a certain degree in Baltimore as well. Maryland sports are the one thing that D.C. and Baltimore share from a sports standpoint. I don't know really anything else that we share with Baltimore, although I actually really have come to like Baltimore. Baltimore, like D.C. has changed so much in the last, you know, call it 20 years. Baltimore is a great town. But back to the point I want to make.

Friday night is the first of what will become some big, big home games on Maryland's basketball schedule. You wanted better scheduling? How about UCLA on December 14th at Xfinity Center? You wanted a higher pace of play. You've got it. Maryland's playing with pressure. They run. They've blown out every opponent they face this year.

They're averaging over 82 points per game. If they made free throws last night, they were 14 of 25. They would have scored 90 at Louisville. You know, last night was a mismatch from the start. Louisville couldn't handle the defensive pressure, whether it was Maryland's full court pressure or their half court defense. Maryland really moved the ball well offensively, shared it well offensively. They came out with four straight threes to start the second half.

I loved how Jamir Young, the transfer from Charlotte played. He went to Damatha. he's from here. He was great last night. 15 points on just 10 shots from the field, five assists, three steals, no turnovers. He's answered so far what my biggest question about this season was, which was, would they have a good back court? Because they've had some really good guard play and back court play in recent years.

You know, even last year, Eric Iyala and Fats Russell were really good together. Obviously, you know, Iyala, and Cowan and Morsell and Wiggins is kind of a swing player. They've had really good backcourt play. And I didn't know what Jemir Young and Don Carey, the transfer from Georgetown would be together, you know, out of the transfer portal. And so far, so good. I really like Young.

I like his decision-making. I like the way he plays defense. He anticipates very well defensively. I think he's got a good stroke, even though he's shot a low percentage. from behind the arc so far this year, but I think it's a good-looking stroke. But Friday night against Illinois is by far their biggest test.

Friday night, 9 o'clock tip. You don't have work the next day. It's not going to be massive traffic to get there because of the later start. The students need to get there. I love the start so far, and I'm happy for Kevin, who is a guy I think, you know, Maryland fans are really going to like. and I hope Friday night is his first real Maryland experience because we all know those of us who are Terps

and have been, you know, Terp fans and gone to these games, we know how good it can be. It can be a top 10 venue in the country when it is alive and the people are there and they're pumped up for a big game and he's already giving you a start that nobody expected. Seven and O ranked 22nd in the country, some quality wins already so far.

and Friday night is the first of, you know, their 20 big 10 games in a big one to boot. The soccer yesterday, don't come here for the analysis, but I did think that the final 15 minutes or so, including, I think it was the plus nine of stoppage time, pretty exciting. The U.S. on to a Saturday morning Sweet 16 matchup with the Netherlands. The Dutch are slight favorites, but it's important to note that the Dutch are not one of these teams, at least odds-wise, that are considered to be elite and actual legitimate World Cup hopefuls in terms of chances to win it. The odds to win the World Cup right now at My Bookie have the heavy favorites to be the truly elite teams like Brazil, France, Spain. the Netherlands are not really considered to be in that class. So who knows?

Maybe the U.S. has a chance. They're an underdog, a slight underdog, but a good win for the USA yesterday. It certainly seemed like there was a ton of pressure to get through to this next stage. And so maybe this next stage, the pressure is off and sort of the icing is all they're going for now. The 26th World Cup will be here in the U.S. and the expectations will be higher the next go-round. But Saturday, you know, interesting. It won't compete with football for us.

So totally watchable for me on Saturday morning. Speaking of football, the college football playoff rankings last night, no surprise. Georgia won, Michigan 2, TCU 3, and USC 4. Ohio State was 5, Alabama was 6. And I think, you know, what Stanford, Stephen, I talked about a Monday show. I think right now USC has to win or they're out and Ohio State replaces them. And I think TCU is in as long as they don't get blown out by Kansas State in the Big 12th title game.

Now, seating can move around based on the results. I think Georgia and Michigan, regardless of what happens in the SEC and the Big Ten championship games respectively, they're in. You know, even if they were to get blown out by Purdue or LSU and I don't see that happening. But, even if that were to happen, they're still in. Now, their seating could change, but TCU just needs to, you know, be competitive. A blowout loss, and now, you know, you bring Alabama potentially into play, along with Ohio State. USC is the one team that has to win, the Pac-12 championship game Friday night against Utah. They have to avenge that loss, and I think it's going to be a tough game for them.

I really do. But should be fun this weekend to see how it plays out. The seeding could be interesting. I mean, if Michigan has a super impressive win over Purdue and Georgia barely gets by LSU, could Michigan go to one? And if they went to one and USC lost and Ohio State jumped in at four, could you get a Michigan Ohio State rematch in the semifinals? You know, if Georgia loses to LSU and Michigan wins,

Michigan would obviously move to number one. Georgia would fall to two. I don't think they'd fall to four. Maybe they'd fall to three, and TCU would jump to two. But they're not going to fall the four more likely than not, unless USC won and USC went to three and Georgia went to four. But what I'm trying to get at is if Georgia lost in Michigan one, Michigan goes to one, maybe TCU to two, Georgia to three.

If USC loses, then you've got Ohio State and it's four and you've got a Michigan Ohio State semifinal. I don't know how they would avoid that, how the committee would avoid that. In the scenario I just laid out, Georgia loses, Michigan wins, TCU wins, USC loses. Then you've got clearly the top

three go Michigan, TCU, Georgia, more likely than not. And then Ohio State would be at four, which would mean a one versus four, Michigan, Ohio State. I mean, are they going to really keep Georgia at one? Are they going to jump Michigan with TCU? Are they going to move Ohio State into three and drop Georgia to four? Probably not. All right. Last thing before we get to Doc Walker, Gary Williams, and Nick Ackridge. Giants, skins, Sunday in the Meadowlands. By the way, perfect weather forecast, 48 and sunny.

Can't get much better than that in early December. I still can't get over where we are on this season right now for them. You know, Ron Rivera told us year three was the time for this football team to start making progress towards, you know, a sustained run of success. We heard that during the offseason. And, you know, all of his eggs seemed to be in the Carson Wentz basket when they made that trade. And that didn't work out. You know, the story, of course, I think, are the players that he believes are the foundation for what he thought could be a breakout third season for him. You know, the story of this season, John Allen, Montez Sweat, Duran Payne, even though foundationally he was, you know, probably set to move on after this year, although I think the feeling out in Ashburn is changing. Terry McClorn, Curtis Samuel, Sam Cosmy, Leno, Jr.

You know, he needed all of them to have big years. And then when it came to the quarterback, you know, let's not forget that he talked incessantly about the pieces around Carson. and that he didn't need to do it by himself. But the offense seemed to want to prove early on that Carson could do it by himself to a certain degree. You know, with the play calling, with the number of throws that they had, it certainly wasn't the formula that we've seen

in the last several weeks, which actually kind of started with Chicago to a certain degree. You could even go back to that Dallas game and say they tried to run it more than they had. you know, super early in the season for, you know, three weeks of the season. You know, remember when Rivera and Scott Turner, I forget who said it specifically, one of the two said it.

They said that the addition of Carson Wentz would allow them to open up the playbook a little more, you know, translation, we've got a guy with an NFL arm, and we haven't had that really at all the last two years. and yet recently Rivera said or Scott Turner said about Taylor Heineke, you know, now with Taylor we can get to a little bit more of the playbook than we could with Carson. You know, I think what he's saying there is that, you know, it takes a while and Carson wasn't there yet with the playbook,

that they eventually would get there, hopefully. But Heineke's been in the system, you know, with Scott and with Norve. For, you know, we're talking about three to four years now. So he was much further ahead. That makes sense to me. but I wonder where Wentz is now. Has being out of the lineup allowed him to advance in the offense or not? I have no idea, but I do know this, or I think this.

I don't think it's nuts to consider what this offense would be with Wentz in it right now versus what he was during the first six games of this season. I'm not a believer that the offense would be much better than it is right now if Wents were to return. I want to be clear on that. I'm not advocating for Wence, but I don't think it's nuts to consider it. And many of you have been. I also think, you know, to be clear, the offense isn't very good right now. You know, you love the team's record, of course.

And I'm not saying that I think Taylor Heineke stinks. I think there are limitations there. I don't think he's in over his head, though. I don't. I think he is what he is. I think he's a really good backup quarterback. But, you know, the offense just isn't very good right now. That's not what's leading them right now.

He's at or near the bottom of the league in a ton of statistical categories. He's 30th in passing yards per game average. He's 24th in completion percentage average. He's 24th in QBR. He's 28th in passer rating. You know, the offense ranks 21st in the league during his starts in points per drive. They're 27th in yards per play. There's some good things, you know, since he entered the starting lineup.

They are second in time of possession. They are fourth in the league in three and out percentages, and those are important things. But of course, the six-and-one run has been led by the defense. the running game. And I would give credit to the special teams as well. You know, Joey Sly is 14 to 15 on field goals starting with the Green Bay game. He was a major reason they beat Philadelphia with the 58 and 55 yard field goals. And by the way, his two made field goals last week in the rain were, you know, worth six points. And the final score was 19 to 13. Now, he did miss an extra point that could have been costly.

But he's been good. The coverage units have been outstanding. And Gibson, by the way, has given them some punch on kickoff returns. You know, the other big factor, too, of course, is the number of takeaways defensively. That's been a massive influence during this six-and-one streak. You know, the one thing that has not been great, although, again, I hesitate to say that it's been horrible or that it stinks. Because there have been some timely third down throws.

There have been some timely and effective red zone throws that have been huge. But I don't have a problem with those that say they should be considering Wents right now. It's not unreasonable, in my opinion. With that said, I'd ride Heineke right now. The players like and want him. He's probably more likely than not to avoid the sacks that plagued Wence early on. I say that, and I'm thinking to myself, I'm not so sure about that because with a run-first approach, with the consistency that the offensive line is playing with, more so now than it was,

with the emergence of Brian Robinson, Jr., with the improvement of the defense, maybe Wentz wouldn't take as many of those sacks. You know, by the way, I still believe that the majority of those sacks were not his fault. that was some ridiculously awful pass protection earlier in the season. As a matter of fact, the pass block win rate for the Washington offensive line right now is 27th. It was 30th and 31st earlier in the season. So it's still not great, but it's improved. By the way, that's not a stat that measures the quarterback's impact positively or negatively on sacks.

It's just a pure stat that measures, is the line pass blocking well or not. So it's improved. Still not great. But I'm not for Wentz right now. I'm not. I'm just not one of those people that can't handle the conversation about it. To me, it's a reasonable conversation to have.

We're talking about a great record with Heineke, and that is driving the conversation. But a great record, really, that is due to three to four things before you get to Heineke's role in the record. I don't think they're winning despite him. That's harsh. I do think, by the way, it's best that Scott Turner not be tempted to move away from what's worked for them with Taylor Heineke.

Which, by the way, again, he kind of started with Wentz, you know, in the Dallas game, the Chicago game, Tennessee game. Not really the Tennessee game. They took big shots. Chicago game maybe with Robinson Jr. were back in the lineup. But I don't want that. I don't want once back in the lineup. I don't think it would be much better. I just, I'm not afraid of the conversation, which some of you seem to be, you know, triggered by. I like the way they're playing. I think, you know, it's very

similar to that six and three start in the 2018 year. They were not a good passing offense at all during that, you know, six and three, which became the six and four start when they were behind when Alex Smith got hurt against Houston at home. I think this is what they have to do right now. Run it, stop the run, win the turnover battle. But back to Rivera's offseason claim that year three was going to be the year, just like it was for him in Carolina in his third year. He said Sunday, I don't know if you saw this quote after the win over Atlanta,

asked how they got to this point, this six and one run from where they were earlier. He said, quote, I didn't waver because I've been through this before. This is mirroring what we went through in Carolina. That's what happened. In year three, it came together, closed quote. I went and checked out year three in Carolina because, you know, there's one big difference they had Cam Newton in his third season as a franchise quarterback.

That's a big difference. But even if you go back and look in that season, they started one and three, so they were off to a bad start in his third. third season in Carolina as well. And then they started crushing people. The defense was great. The offense led by a dual threat, you know, Cam Newton started winning games big, 35 to 10 over Minnesota, 30 to 15 over the Rams, 31 to 13 over Tampa, 34 to 10 over Atlanta. They went from 1 in 3 to 9 and 3, an 8 game winning streak, where they averaged over 30. per game and one by an average of 15 and a half points per game.

So this year three right now is not the same. It's not. Yeah, there are similarities in that both franchises have some really good young players, foundational players on offense and defense, culture players that are young, and that's a big part of what Ron's been trying to build. And to that end, you know, there are similarities, but I think it's worth noting at least that year three in Carolina

was far different than year three now. They were, I mean, they went 12 and 4. They had that eight game winning streak from 1 and 3 to 9 and 3 where they annihilated people, averaging over 30 points a game and winning by 15 and a half points per game. But this is no less fun for him, I would imagine right now. It's a lot of fun for us. There are many ways to win in the NFL, and the way they're doing it right now, while in my opinion won't produce a Super Bowl Lombardi Trophy or even a trip to one. But given what we've had for so long, if they can eke out three more wins, 10 and 7 overall, a visit to Minnesota or San Francisco for a January playoff game, that would be quite the turnaround from where they were. And at this point, I'd be surprised if it doesn't happen. I really would.

I think they're going to win three of these final five. I think they're going to get to 10 and 7 overall. I think they're going to end up being the sixth seat in the NFC and play the three who will either be probably Minnesota or San Francisco. Imagine that, a January playoff game in Minnesota against Kirk Cousins. or even against Kyle Shanahan in San Francisco, which we've got that game upcoming on Christmas Eve. All right, let's get to Doc Walker next right after these words from a few of our sponsors. On the podcast with me right now is Rick Doc Walker.

Ladies and gentlemen, I'm always honored to have Richard on the show. Of course, he's got his own podcast, which you can get at Patreon by just going to patreon.com slash Doc Walker. You can follow Doc on Twitter at Rick Doc Walker. So here we are. You know, we used to say just get us past Thanksgiving or two Thanksgiving with a chance. And they've got more than a chance right now after going six and one over the last seven and being seven and five. And I want to start by asking you how much of the credit goes to the head coach Ron Rivera. Well, a heck of a lot of it.

And of course, Kevin, thanks for. giving me the shot to fill in an emergency for you, and I'm always honest to do that. If it fails, who do you blame? Ron. If it succeeds, who do you credit, Ron? But he didn't do it alone, and he'd be the first guy to say it. What I think is important is that a guy like Juan Castillo,

who was in his first season as a tight-in coach here, He's been all over the league. He's a hell of a coach. What I am about to say is what I saw this summer, but you can't confirm until you get the results. A cook can never be considered a great cook if the food doesn't taste good. I don't give it crap. How famous you are.

Nate Katz or Chris Harris, that's secondary. Randy Jordan and Jennifer King, the running back coaches. What I'm telling you right now, is that Ron has a heck of a staff that is getting results. Coach Z on that defensive line, and Ryan Kerrigan, Toddler, right out of the crib, pass the fire still in his mouth, and those ends, Smith Williams, I mean, without their defensive stud of the year,

who hadn't played a lick? And it's the best football they played on that side of the ball. So for me, it is really a confirmation that the people that are on his staff, not only are they good friends, but they can get your results and they get people better with a young group. And I didn't even go to the front office. I'll say that for the next time I fill in for someone. Okay, well, I'm going to jot that down.

So the next time I call you to fill in for somebody, I don't forget to ask you about Martin Mayhew and Marty Herney and the rest of them in the front office. Rogers. So let's talk about the... the defense. On Sunday, I did not think that anybody could run the football against this team. And yet Atlanta did, which was really the primary reason they had a chance to win the game at the end of the game. But the defense came up, we know, and they made a great play. I mean, I know you love 94. Pains have an unbelievable season. But were you surprised that they got run on?

and are you concerned about that at all, given that every team they're going to face the rest of the way, it seems like, is a run-first team? No, no, not at all, because the Falcons, first of all, we were scrimmaging ourselves, and they have the closest resemblance for me to Joe Jackson Gibbs, you know, and that group, our offensive group, bugle, see, because it's all my mindset.

They invest in their offensive line, like others don't, they believe that the team is established by both fronts, offensive defensive defense fronts. And if you look at Tennessee, where he got this thing started. Right, Arthur Smith. It works. And you don't have to be great for this to work. We weren't great.

It became great, but it gives you a chance to be in every game if your defense plays like ours and like theirs does. we gave them a chance and they gave us a chance back. So it's really two teams that are really above average, but are still growing and still moving in the right direction. But you love what this team's become. This is what you like, right? You love the physical line of scrimmage, running the football, stopping the run. Don't ask a lot of, you know, don't try to trick people.

so I'm assuming, and we've talked a little bit here and there over the last few weeks, but that you really like what this team has become or is becoming. Don't get it twisted. I love to win. If we could throw it, 55 times a game and win, I'm good. I just don't like to lose. And so all that buffoonery and motion and shotgun and all that crap, being on a two-yard line and being in gun, it doesn't work. That's why I'm not opposed to being imaginative.

Don't put me in that Fred Flintstone box. I won't result. We've been horrible for two decades. So, no, what I love this is because it gives you a result. You shorten the game. You're physical. And you beat people because you're just more physical. And your will to succeed is greater than others.

That's what they're building. That's what I love. And they're doing it with young. I mean, we don't have the over-the-heel game. This is a young group. It's nucleus. You should be ecstatic about the potential, and you're just two pieces away. Or people elevate two pieces are being, taking the question mark out of the quarterback proficiency category

and then being able to get to the quarterback. off the edge with consistency like they can in Cleveland and in Pittsburgh. There's only three teams and Dallas. We don't have that yet. San Francisco too. And San Francisco, but there's four of them. And we don't, and we're not in that four. But I'd like to get in that four.

And I think we're close because the hardest thing for a guy who grew up when you weren't even imagined was the fearsome forcing. And it was Merlin Olson and Roosevelt Greer. Now, you heard about Deacon Jones and Martin, but why it works is when you got those two bulls in the middle, and you've got anchors like we have anchors, failure should never be an option. The hardest part of this thing are the tackles. They're not glamorized like the end, but it's the hardest part. We got that and even have depth at that position. So to fail at this point would be utter, utter failure.

be unforgivable. All right. So you mentioned two things. That leads to my next question. Just give me right now what you're seeing at the quarterback position with Heineke. I'm seeing him developing slowly, not at the pace I need, not at the pace I want. He's not costing them games. I need him to win the game. And by winning the game, he's a fragment away from it on a rollout specifically. The guy's open, him giving the ball. He's holding the ball

and in that second or staff is disaster. Other than that, I have no problem with him because he gives me everything else the others haven't shown yet. But I cannot afford. He's like going through a landmine. You've got to identify

where it's that if you don't step on it, you're fine. But if you step on it, you're dead. And that's just too, I can't live like that every week. I want to be able to count on the fact that I'm not turning the ball over and that I'm hitting people that are open. That's it. I don't care if he has a 95-yard bomb or not,

but I do need the people open to get the ball. I need the people that are open to get the ball. That's it. And other than that, I can't ask him to run. I'm not saying that anymore. It was a perfect example why I liked a kid that went to Atlanta out of Oregon, you know, through Tennessee. Mariotta.

he's a phenomenal athlete. We made two tackles that most people can't make, and he scores. Marriota, he was that close to these athletic league. But our guy's not. That's not what he is. But what he is, though, he's more elusive than the other guy. And he's not going to take sacks at the other guy whose body's shot the last time we saw him.

So that's your option. Do you take a guy that body is shot? and hope that he can find you in three weeks? I don't know. Maybe he can. Or do you go with the guy that gives you that edge you're looking for? All you're asking him to do is not drop the veil in his hand. It happens to be nitro-glissor.

If he drops it, we're all dead. That's the problem. I don't want to put you in a Fred Flintstone box here, but do you want to ride with Heineke right now? Is that what your preference is? Well, I'm in one-season mode, if you should know by now, past Thanksgiving. This is winner go home mode. He's my guy.

He's got to win. He's got to continue to get better. I didn't see improvement last week, and that bothered me. I need him to improve like everybody else has improved. Durant Payne has improved. Sweat has improved. John Allen improved over the last two years. Everybody just keeps stepping up.

Now, maybe he and Turner can come together on that, and maybe he will enhance his development by scheme, by doing things that he naturally wants to do, not what you want him to do, but what he can naturally do that fits him. Because that RPO is not running. He's going to get a ball to the back. I know it, you know it, and the defense knows it.

So whereas Mariotta, I was a nervous wreck because I didn't know what was going to happen. He can't be an RPO guy. You're predictable. So do the things that stay in his wheelhouse and you can win with him, no doubt about it. But the moment it fails,

I've got to be able to go to plan B and still keep my hopes alive. How is Scott Turner doing? I think he's doing fantastic. because he's got to deal with the unknown, the uncertainty. He got the ball to 17. My problem with coach was not feeding his beast. If I lose, I want to lose with Terry McClellan with eight or nine catches.

Okay, they were just better. But if he only got one or two, I got an issue. I need Samuels. They have three to four touches. We have so many weapons now. He's got like an assortment of these freaks that he can. attack people with, and I think it's probably hard for him to sleep at night because we've got so many options, but the clearest path is north-south with 8-24-and-41. And so I'm so, I haven't

been as excited about our potential, our weapons. I can't remember this time. Maybe when 86 and Pierre and we had, Deshawn. Deshawn. Deshawn. Maybe that's the last time. time I was, but now I'm more giddy because we have more depth. I mean, I know you've analyzed the whole thing, but I'm just telling you what my eyes tell me right now, I'm on the verge of, I'm so excited about what is potentially about to happen if they just take the next step. It's that close. I mean, I can't remember the last time, you know, they had big games with the giants in

particular late in the season, and you get two of them back to back where the stakes are as high for both teams. So let's finish up with, you know, the matchup this Sunday. How do they match up against New York? Well, you know, it's our worst opponent. In Dallas, I don't have to worry about you being psyched. The Eagles, you better get psyched that you get decapitated and you hate their fans. Those are easy. For some reason, we pop duds off against the Giants. because there's no real hatred. There's no real, the fans are, you know, most of my best friends of the giant fans

have the highest IQ of the whole group. The cowboy guys are nuts, and the, and the fig, we know how a Philly fan is. So the Giants kind of, that's what I don't like about this. If I were over there in a part of their organization, I'd be the jerk, I'd be such a butthole this week, because I've got to generate,

animosity because it's just not there. Our fan base doesn't hate them. There's just no hate. I need hate. I need something. What they went into Philadelphia with, that's what I need, and I don't feel that. How do they match up, though?

They match up well with anybody in football. I mean, and that's a lot. With the 49ers, Cowboys, the best teams, they can match up. The question is, we can't afford to help someone beat us. We're not good enough to spot people points. We don't score enough. Our

defense must be great. That's hard. They're human, but they have no other choice. Because if we break 20, it's like you ought to be able to get $10 off your next meal when you go through the fast food line. We are, if we can get this 28

points, I would be ecstatic, but I just don't know how we do that unless we score on teams. All right. I'll be listening this week. You're on the Team 980, our radio station, with one Scott Jackson, I believe tomorrow. Are you on Friday, too? I think you're on Friday? Yes, I am. With Bigel. With Linnell. And Doc, of course, has his podcast with sally at patreon.com slash Doc Walker. That was an excellent appearance. I appreciate you filling in today. Hey, man. You know, I tell my family, I'm available for my family, unless you call. And if you need me, if you need me in a bite, brother, I got you because I am so honored to be on your taxi squad.

And one day, I'm going to make it. My goal is to be a starter on your team, and that's what I'm after. I feel the same way when you call me. I mean, it doesn't happen very often, but when you do, it's the thrill. It's the thrill. You don't have any time. It's always a thrill. All right. That's amazing. All right.

I'll holler at you later. See you. Later. Bye. Richard Doc Walker, everybody. There's only one. Up next, a Hall of Fame basketball coach. Yeah, you've heard of them.

Gary Williams will be on the show. And we'll finish up with one of my favorite conversations here over the last year. Nick Ackridge, who does a great job for pro football focus. We'll talk some Washington Command. Anders with Nick to finish up the show. We'll get to both of those right after these words from a few of our sponsors. Gary Williams joins us on the podcast right now at Gary Williams-O-2 on Twitter. He tweeted out earlier, TIRP basketball fans are the best.

It's our time to show up. Maryland and Illinois in the Big Ten opener, two ranked teams Friday night at hopefully what will be a hostile X-Finity Center. We haven't talked through the first couple of weeks of this season. So let me start there. What have your impressions been so far of Kevin Willard's 7-0 start, and they're ranked 22nd in the country? Well, I think just look at last night, Louisville has a new coach,

Maryland has a new coach. Anytime you take over a program and I took over five of them, I guess, there's problems. You know, there's a reason why you're there as a new coach. and Louisville's 0 and 7 and Maryland 7 or no, and I think that speaks for itself, the job that Kevin Willard has done in terms of coming in, making sure the key players stayed in the program,

which is really difficult to do with the transfer portal now and some other things. And, you know, just getting them to buy in to a way to play that's really entertaining, a fast-paced, pressing defense, fast-brink, offense looking for the first good shot, that type of thing, which I think most basketball fans really enjoy. Yeah, I mean, we've talked a lot in recent years about pace of play and, you know, getting to 80. And by the way, you know, I was thinking about you last weekend that when they

put up 95 and 88, you know, on two good teams or too expected to be good teams in St. Louis and Miami. Specific to the players, what do you see with this team? What are their strengths? Well, everybody's required from 1 to 13 on your roster. Everybody's required to play really hard on defense to rebound. And then the other side of that is each player has a role to play offensively, given that they all set screens, hit the open man, you know, the basic fundamentals you need for a good offense. And I I think that's what's going on on the offensive end of the court while they're scoring so many points. No one is afraid to shoot when they're open, but yet, you know, the Scots, people like that,

they're supposed to take the most shots because they're the best scorers. And so once you get that into your team, those things hopefully will continue to happen where you get the 80-point games, the 90-point games, because I think you can really be a good defensive team. And still, if the scores 90 to 65, no different than 65 to 40. In other words, it's just a way to play, a style of play that Kevin's doing, and I think it's really entertaining. One of the things Naki told me last week when I had him on radio, and he said being with the team up in Connecticut last week,

and he said it hit him in looking at the team versus St. Louis and Miami, he said, Maryland's got some men. You know, they're all seniors, they're veteran players, you know, Scott and Hart, you know, and then the transfer portal produced Young and Kerry for them. And he said, you know, you don't see that a lot in college basketball. How much, you know, I know they're new together, clearly. And it's not like Carrie and Young in that starting back court have played with Scott and Harton and Juju Reese before. But how much of the experience factor is.

is part of why maybe they're off to this great start. And by the way, I don't think any of us expected this. I certainly didn't. No, and I didn't either. I thought, you know, it takes a year usually to get, you know, the team playing the way you'd like them to play, whatever. But, you know, the one thing about that, having those Cedars come in, they know this is their last shot.

You know, they can't go into the transfer portal again. You know, they're done, you know, in terms of that. So they figured out, and it says something about the quality of the kid is they figured out that, hey, Kevin Weller wants to play this way. This is the way we're going to play. And we're going to try to win as many games as we can. I think the one thing, when you get to be a senior, you care about winning more than a freshman would in a lot of cases. Because freshman always think, well, we got next year after that. But these guys care about winning.

They've been through some tough times where they've been before they came to Maryland. and the players that stayed at Maryland that you mentioned. They went through probably something that very few people have ever experienced, and that is your coach leading after, I guess it was six games in the season. So, you know, that had to be a traumatic experience because, you know, you buy into a coach and all of a sudden he's not there. So these guys, both the seniors and then the returning players from Maryland have kind of combined in what they hope for this year,

for what they want it to be this year. And, you know, they're trying to get it, that's for sure. All right. What are you concerned about as you've watched them so far? Just, I'm concerned with their size, and I guess that translates into rebounding to against big teams. So far, you haven't seen a team, and Illinois will try to do this,

come in and try to get Maryland's big guys into foul trouble because there's not, you know, no offense to anybody, but there's not a lot of guys on the bench that are those big, strong guys that can come in and, you know, really hold their own. And a big guy coming off the bench, if he can just, you know, rebound and play defense and, you know, make it tough on the other team until you can get the first string guy back in, then, you know, he's doing his job. It's teams are going to start to look at that how to hurt Maryland by getting to their bench, especially with their inside players. What do you think of Reese here in his sophomore year? I think he's improved tremendously. He's certainly developed confidence. I think that was one of the things last year.

He wasn't a real confident player, but I think he is this year. And then the other thing is as he goes along here, he's going to learn how to counter. You know, he's obviously, he wants to go over his right shoulder being left-handed, so he's going to counter that by really being able to go either way once he gets the ball with his back to the basket. But, you know, he's one of those players that is gradually developing a complete game. In other words, next year, you know, face-up jump shots, things like that that maybe he's reluctant to do now, but he'll be part of his game next year.

Do you think, you know, in watching, you know, all of these games so far, you know, they pressure a lot. He runs that 2-21 pressure. They drop sometimes into man-to-man. Sometimes they drop into 2-3. Sometimes I've seen him drop into defenses that I don't even recognize, to be honest with you. And I'm curious as to what you think defensively will be the best in these, you know, in these grinded out games in the Big Ten, especially, you know, not against the Michigan State,

not against Iowa, the teams that like to run and like to play with pace. but the Purdue's and some of the other teams that will want to grind it out. How will they guard some of these teams? What will be the best way? Well, I think you have to keep your pressure against those physical teams who want to grind it out because those teams want to run their half-court offense against you.

They don't want to shoot in transition necessarily. So you keep your press because you're not going to get hurt by it. Now when you get into drop-back defense, I think man-to-man is. Kevin's, you know, defensive choice, if he had his choice, how do you help on the post? I think that becomes because

they play tough and off on the ball. They know when to overplay, they look for steals. They help. They do all the good things, but it's, okay, they throw it into the post now, what do you do defensively? And so you've got to have your double team rules down. You have to have your rotation down after you double team with the other three that have to cover four. and I think that'll be the key for Maryland against those really tough, big physical teams.

Yeah, I mean, when you mentioned size and talked about Reese, that's the thing, you know, against the Michigan's and some of these teams that are big, that's where, you know, we'll see. I mean, and the pressure, and by the way, if they can rebound or if they can turn teams over on the perimeter and generate offense that way. But so far, Gary, when they've had to run half-court offense, I've been really impressed with the way the ball moves and the way they share it. What have you thought watching it? Well, yeah, I'm not concerned. If they can continue to play like that, I'm not concerned at all with their offense because the ball's moving, as you said, players know their roles.

They know certain guys are better shooter than other guys. And, you know, everybody doesn't want to shoot 20 times, which is really important. And the one thing that, you know, is they, when they make threes, I think they're pretty tough. Yeah. And just like a lot of teams, if they don't make their threes, then you've got to find a way to get some of those long rebounds on those three-point shots. Because if you don't, the other team's going to run with them and they can hurt you in transition. So, but it's, it's like any team, you know, you look really good when you're making shots, you know, that type of thing. but they're getting good shots.

That's the key. I don't see anybody taking many shots where they have to adjust on the jump shot or something like that or come down the lane and all of a sudden have to throw it. The thing I've noticed about the players, and maybe this is because of veteran players and whatever is when somebody drives with a basketball,

guys are getting into good position to get that kickout path. They really do a good job of finding that open area because you can be open, but if there's a defender between you and the ball, then you're not open. And so these guys are sliding where they have to get to and be having to create a passing lane for that open pass. Something I mentioned in the open, they missed a bunch of free throws last night. They're right now like a 70% free throw shooting team, so that's one of the things you'd

love to see improved. But I remember you telling me something about turnovers. Like, you know, if you're playing in a style of play where you're trying to score 80 plus points, the turnovers are less significant. And they do, you know, they, they do turn it over a little bit here and there. They did, you know, last week. And I thought they could have scored 100 against Miami if they didn't turn it over. But just real quickly on protecting the basketball when you're playing this kind of style. Yeah, I always thought if we could score 80, then I could accept 12 turnovers as the coach if we could get to 80. And that was, there were the two numbers. I always looked at on the stat sheet because you don't want to take away players' aggressiveness.

You want them, you want to be the most aggressive player. If you're the most aggressive player every time out, you're going to win a lot of games. And I think that's what we are right now. We've been the most aggressive team in all these games that I've seen, you know, so far this year. And if you say, hey, you know, you've got to cut down on your turnovers. Well, certain turnovers, I like guys trying to make plays, especially if they're trying to make a play for another player.

You don't want to get on them in that situation. Now, that changes the last two minutes in the game. Obviously, turnovers become much more important. So in that key time, if it's a five-point game, whatever, you don't want turnovers. But during the course of the game, you want to go. You don't ever want to

take that aggressiveness away from the players. All right. Are we going to have a big crowd Friday night? We better. I'll be very disappointed if we don't, because the team has earned it. You know, there's no saying they haven't done with, you know, they've exceeded everybody's expectations. And I think we, we as Maryland fans, we feel like we're still part of the program or whatever.

We have to show and, you know, support the team. Yeah. I kind of feel like there's a buzz, you know, starting with this team. And, you know, part of it was there wasn't anything expected. So sometimes it'll take some time, as you know, especially in the middle of football season, you know, around these parts. But Friday night's the perfect spot. You know, it's not competing with anything. And it's a big-time opponent in Illinois coming in for the Big Ten opener. And, you know, I want Willard, I want him to feel what it's like when you, like,

you know, you and I both know, what it's like, you know, when you've got a big opponent and a big game, even in November, early December, in that building, because it can be special. Yeah, some of the best coaches in the country told me after we played against them that, you know, moving out a call into Infinity, you always worry about that, but they said, Infinity was as tough as any place they played. So we have to get that back. If you want to be a good team, you have to win at home. And part of that is the crowd. It's really a tremendous advantage in basketball when you have a great crowd.

You know, it starts Friday night. Tickets are still out there at Yuc. UMTurps.com. Let's fill up the building Friday night. They've got a great home schedule coming up. I mean, they play a game, by the way. Their next four games are Illinois at home, then they're at Wisconsin, then they play Tennessee at Barclays in Brooklyn,

and then UCLA comes into the building at Xfinity, December 14th, for a massive game. They're big time, big 10 games in January. So start looking at this because, Right now, they are one of the surprise early teams in the country. I saw in the Lenardi Bracketology yesterday. He's already got Maryland as a sixth seed. Before the season, there weren't expectations that Maryland would be a tournament team this year.

So they are off to an incredible start. I hope you're well, and I hope to see you Friday night. Yep, I'll see you there, Kevin, and look forward to it. Hall of Famer, Gary Williams, everybody. Get out to XFennity Center. Friday night. And any students that listen to this podcast, because I hear from some of you every once in a while,

usually it's when I criticize you for the attendance. This is what you wanted. You know, a ranked team on the rise, pace of play, big time opponent early in the season on the schedule. I know it's the Big Ten, but, you know, get out there on Friday night.

All right, let's finish up the show with one of my favorite conversations, really, over the last I don't know, year. I mean, Nick, How many, did we sort of get to know each other maybe like a year ago the first time I had you on? It was something like that, right? Yeah, I think so. I think it might have been either in the off-season or at the very beginning of this year at least. Nick does such a good job on radio as a guest, and he's an analyst for pro football focus.

More importantly, this is his hometown, and he focuses a lot on the home team and occasionally has the responsibility for PFF. for evaluating and grading the players. So we'll get to Nick here in a moment. I want everybody to know that this segment of the show is brought to you by MyBooky. Go to MyBooky.ag. Use my promo code, Kevin D.C. And MyBooky will double your first deposit all the way up to $1,000. Very few places are just giving you a flat out doubling of your deposit.

Even if you've got a place, you know, take the free money from MyBooky and use it as a comparison you know, point spread money line total spot for you. Right now, by the way, the commanders, two and a half point favorites in the Meadowlands Sunday against the Giants. As we discussed on yesterday's show, a lot of respect being shown by the boys in the desert for this football team right now. So with that, Nick, let's start with it. How good is this team right now, in your opinion?

Yeah, the defense is one of the best in the league. I don't think you'll have many people arguing that. I think it's pretty clear what they've done over the past couple weeks, which is completely shut down teams at times. The offense is not great, as we've seen. I mean, it's really tough when you have a quarterback like Heineke, who is limited. I mean, as fun as he is to watch at times, he is limited in what he can do. But, you know, the running game has come to life,

and that's just how they're going to have to win games. It's going to be by scoring, you know, 14, 17 points and, you know, relying on that defense. All right, let's focus on the defense to start. I'm going back to Sunday. Logan Paulson was on my podcast Saturday morning, and he said, I think Atlanta's going to be the one team that might be able to run the football against this bunch. They've got an outstanding offensive line.

They've got a great run scheme. They've got a dual threat quarterback, et cetera, et cetera. And we know what's, you know, kind of coming up here are all. a lot of run-first teams, the Giants, the 49ers, the Browns, and even the Cowboys now with Kellyn Moore calling the games the way he's begun to call these games with DAC at quarterback. What happened Sunday, in your opinion, in terms of why they got run on to the tune of nearly six yards per carry? Yeah, it's the dual threat of Marietta. And it was, it's kind of weird to see because you saw them shut down an Eagles team who has a, you know,

sort of rushing attack that they used their quarterback a lot. But the linebackers were really struggling. They were just struggling to, you know, kind of maintain gap responsibility, stay in their gaps. A lot of times you saw Davis and Bostic, just kind of, you know, forcing themselves out of the gap, making it easier for the offensive line for the Falcons. And they do have a really good offensive line.

Chris Liddstrom, their right guard is one of PFF's highest-graded offensive linemen, specifically for run blocking. So, you know, it was always going to be a tough task. and they kind of killed them on those read options. But in the second half, it was much better. I'd have to see what kind of adjustments they made. But it was a little bit, it was rough at times in that first half. And, you know, the Giants could pose a similar threat.

I mean, we've seen it in the past with Daniel Jones turning into Michael Vick at times the way he can run that read option against just Washington. It seems like it's the only team he really is good against. But, you know, I think it's going to be a similar sort of game. where you're just going to see two teams just run the ball like crazy at each other. Yeah, the Giants, you know, they were missing some pieces against the Cowboys on Thanksgiving Day along their offensive line. And we'll see how the week shakes out if they get some of those pieces back.

But they were not healthy for that game on Thanksgiving Day. But back to Sunday. Defensively, who were the highest graded players? Defensively, it was Kendall Fuller at the top. Johnson Allen and then Cameron Curl with Montes-Swed closely behind them. It was a lower sort of grade. Fuller had the highest with the 79.5. I mean, which kind of matches what we saw.

They were getting run on pretty easily in that first half. But, you know, Fuller's been great these past couple weeks. Like, he's completely flipped the switch. Jonathan Allen was good. He was getting, you know, pushed around on the run game a little bit, not the typical pass rush game we've seen from Allen. overall pretty good response in that second half of the end. You know what's funny is every single time I have you on,

like I, you know, Sunday was different. Don't get me wrong. And I know Duran's had some high grades, but it seems like for whatever reason, and I think you explain this, you know, on one of the discussions we had, you know, that John and Duran are playing such high snap counts that, you know, you end up getting some plays in there

that can bring down the ground. grade. But, you know, Payne had a couple of key pressures, literally almost got to Marriota on that final drive if he just reached his arm out a little bit further with Marietta going down and then had the deflection on the final play. I think you feel the same way, and that is Duran's been a dominant player, and yet sometimes the grades don't necessarily reflect that. Why? Yeah, I've talked about it a bunch, and it's something that's kind of tough for us to grade is he's a guy that is just going to eat double teams and he's really good at it. And for us, if you're successfully just kind of containing a double team, it's just a zero grade for us.

And you can make the argument that we should kind of positively grade that I've done that in the past. But I think it's just the type of position he plays and eating those double teams. And you see it a lot with other people's grades. Like when, you know, Jamie Davis has a high grade or Cole Holcomb has a high grade, because they can hit those gaps cleanly because someone like pain is taking up a lot of space. Other times, he is beating his man, but he's just not finishing the play. There's a lot of times that we have him graded highly for a quick win in the run game, but he's just not making the tackle in the backfield.

So it gets downgraded just a little bit, but it will still be like a net positive for us. So that's kind of another reason. But, yeah, I just think it's tough for, you know, his play style to really be graded highly in our system. I think, you see it a lot, and the coaches keep talking about how well he's played, his teammates keep talking about it. So it's tough for us to kind of give him a higher grade just with the way we consistently grade things. But yeah, he's been pretty dominant. Specific to this team, because you do end up grading this team, you know, I don't know.

How often do you get the responsibility of grading the team that you care about the most? If it's a one o'clock game, I'm usually grading one of the first. the offenses slash defenses. So the past couple weeks, like this past week, I had the Falcons offense against Washington's defense. Okay. Do you hear Washington is a PFF client? I think all 32 teams now are PFF clients.

Do you hear back? Do you guys hear back from Washington on grades? And if so, just give us kind of a sense. I don't want you to disclose anything that's proprietary. But what is typically the feedback you get? from them? I haven't got anything specifically. I'm on the data side.

So anything we hear back from clients, that's not what I'm involved in. Right. There might be, I mean, there's been times in the past where we've had players feel like, hey, that's not my responsibility. We fixed it because obviously our biggest critic is we don't know the play call.

Right. We don't. But we're trying to get it as close as we possibly can. So there was a couple weeks ago, sauce gardener the jet corner goes he tweeted at pff he said this was not my touchdown he charged me for a touchdown so we went back we fixed it um so there's stuff like that i mean we're obviously not going to get everything right it's just not possible um but as for you know washington players saying anything i don't i don't know we've we've dealt with obviously them for the past couple

years now i think they were the last team to sign up for us um like four or five years ago how did christian holmes do for benjamin st june sunday it was decent 55.7 which is a little below average but for a seventh round rookie that's pretty good the passing game wasn't massive for the falcons it wasn't something that they're really going to rely on obviously it's the run game so he kind of struggled a little

at times to kind of help up and run support missed a couple tackles but overall it was decent I mean it's kind of what you could expect from a seventh round rookie corner Who was the highest graded player on offense? On offense, that was Brian Robinson. Brian Robinson. It was pretty obvious from what you saw. I mean, it was just missing tackles,

and that's usually when you get a higher grade for us, you're forcing this tackles, you're taking more than what the offensive line is giving you. And that's what he did. I thought, personally, it was one of the best days for the offensive line. Obviously, they've struggled in pass pro, much of the year. But even, and I think we talked after the Philadelphia game, and maybe we didn't, and maybe I'm thinking about somebody else. But, you know, the yards that Robinson and Gibson

had against the Eagles on Monday night were a lot of, you know, their yards. It wasn't a lot of room to run. I thought Sunday, for the first time in a while, the run blocking, which has been okay, was outstanding. How did you guys see it? Yeah, we have, Cornelius Lucas was the second high player on the offense. He had 78.5, 76.8 run blocks. He was very good there, and his now limited snap count with him and Cosney kind of irritating. But, you know, it was decent. It was better than what they've done in the past. Still lower-ish grades on our side, just kind of right around

average to a little below average. But, yeah, it's kind of been what you've said in the past. I think it's always been more of running back taking a little bit more than what they've given. And we're not seeing these huge chunk. rushes, which that's what you would typically see if being an offensive line is kind of dominated. We've seen these kind of four, five, six-yard gains, which has led to these long drives and these low-scoring games. So I think the offensive line was definitely better last week than they have been in the past, but still need to see a little bit improvement from that

interior. Yeah, I think we talked about the fact that, you know, maybe a couple weeks ago, Lucas has been pretty good on the run, but has struggled in past protection. And I think we're seeing now Cosmi end up with more of those snaps. I mean, it was his job. to begin with, but now I think last Sunday was the first Sunday we've seen Cosme in there more than Lucas was. So Taylor Heineke, how did he play Sunday? Not great. It was one of his typical kind of Heineke games where he made some decent throws and some solid throws where, you know, converted some key third downs. But just a couple of throws it just makes absolutely zero sense of what he's looking at

and what he's trying to accomplish. The interception, I've watched it about four or five times. And I don't know what he thought was happening, unless he just never saw the linebacker or something. But, yeah, it was a typical Taylor Hineken game. He did, you know, like I said, he converted some key plays and just kind of, you know, managed the offense. I know a lot of people don't want to hear game manager,

but he did, he just managed it to enough of a point to get us, you know, enough points to win. And I think that's what you're just going to have to live with these next couple weeks. It's not going to be pretty from him at all, but you just need him to limit the mistake. Where is he, and maybe you don't have this handy, but I know a couple of weeks ago, and I think it was with you, that, you know, after three or four starts, even with the excitement of the end of the Indianapolis game and the throw he made at the end of the Green Bay game to Terry on third and nine, he was still, you know, pretty much, you know, in the bottom two or three quarterbacks in a lot of the PFF categories, is he still there?

Yeah, he's still there for us. It's just the turnover-worthy plays that we chart. He has the highest percentage right now in the NFL turnover-worthy plays. And right now he's getting lucky, and that's not a bad thing to be with a team kind of, you know, in the position of Washington. He's just, he needs to limit those mistakes. and he got paid for it this past week. There's been just times in these past couple weeks where he's just completely misreading things, and he's two in his classic Taylor Heineke balls

where he's thrown in quadruple or triple coverage and whatnot. But, yeah, he's going to, he's lower on our list, and it's just because of the turnover-worthy plays. And it's why it doesn't really match up with some of those box scores, and EPA stats, stuff like that, because, you know, the defense isn't capitalizing on those interceptions that he's. is almost giving them.

All right. So you're a fan of the team. They've won six out of their last seven, five out of their last six with Taylor Heineke at quarterback. We know what we saw from Carson Wentz before he got hurt in the Bears game. What would you be thinking about? Would you consider,

or let me rephrase, would you be upset if Ron Rivera and Scott Turner turned back to Wentz? Right now, I think I would. It's such a tricky situation because I don't think Heinecke is playing well. I mean, we've seen games where he has played really well, obviously the very first game against the Bucks in the playoffs. But we've seen games where he is, can be a pretty good quarterback.

It hasn't been that way in the past couple of weeks. Like I said, he has been getting lucky. I think that they have a short leash on him now. But I think without any sort of notice, I think it would, be pretty harsh to just kind of pull him because, you know, they're winning and he's doing what he needs to do. I wish they would, you know, involve him more in the run game. I think he's a pretty good athlete and they could kind of use that to his advantage. But right now it just seems to, you know, just let him throw it maybe 15, 20 times at most in a game and just hope that

run game wins you. You know what's interesting, Nick is, and Doc just said this because I just had Doc on the podcast. You know, there have been some read option plays. Going back to last year, I remember specifically in some of the short yardage stuff against the Falcons last year. And he doesn't look like he wants to be aggressive. And I don't know if he doesn't read, whether it's the outside linebacker in a 3-4 or the D-N in a 4-3, if he doesn't read it well, or if he's not comfortable. But I agree with you. Athletically, I, I, The stuff we saw from Marriota, now Marriota really looked, I thought, fresh, and I thought his speed and his quickness and his decision-making and his ball handling were excellent.

But for whatever reason, and Scott Jackson, who I work with and have worked with for years, said, you know, as an Old Dominion guy, and Scott went to Old Dominion and called a lot of Taylor's games. He said they just never had that. There's a lot of RPO, but there wasn't a lot of read option with him. And so even in college, you know, the yards he got rushing were more off schedule. Maybe it's something he's just not good at or comfortable with. Yeah, and that's a fair point. I think that would make the most sense as to why we don't see it very often.

There's been plays. I mean, I think Scott Turner is extremely creative in the way he steps up run plays. Me too. Some of the run plays he has. I remember a couple games ago, they basically put on a triple option play. They had an unbalanced line where you had John Bates and the right tackle and Lucas over as the tight end on the left. And they essentially ran a triple option with Heineke Gibson and Curtis Samuel motioning around. And I think if you can keep getting creative like that, I think it just opens it up more because, like I said, it's not like they're really gashing teams.

It's these constant just five, six, seven-yard runs that you're just constantly putting together long drives. And you have to be almost perfect on offense. You can't have penalties. you can't have mistakes like that. So maybe if they open it up a little bit more, get a little more creative with Heineke, I think it could lead to some bigger games and just kind of make it overall a little bit easier

for everyone involved. I think it does a lot of things. I remember Mike Shanahan very clearly telling me, he said, look, first of all, when you play 11 on 11 in the run game, it's a massive advantage. You know, when your quarterback is legitimately a potential runner, you're 11 on 11.

And usually you're 10 on 11, when the quarterback turns and hands it to the running back. He said that's one of the reasons we ran the football so well in 2012 because Robert was a run threat on every single, you know, snap unless he was really under center. And then he said, you know, a lot of the read option presentation ended up being their best play action, which, you know, it just put the defense in conflict.

Is he, you know, sticking it in Alford Morris, his gut. Is he going to keep it on a run? And then all of a sudden, using it as play action really worked as well. And you see that Taylor and Scott Turner, they use it as play action, but if he's not really a run threat, it's hard for that to really be something that ends up putting the defense in conflict. I think that, I mean, I think that's kind of what they might be missing from this offense, but there must be reasons. And I agree with you. I think Scott Turner's gotten really creative. Did you catch, by the way, Sunday? And I don't know if it was the first time. It's the first time I remember seeing it. They had on a given play, they had Curtis Samuel come in

motion in sort of jet sweep fashion, and then right behind him came McClorn on a jet sweep. You literally had two jet sweep action, you know, a dual jet sweep action in the backfield going, and McClorn got the ball on the second guy. coming in that jet sweep motion. And he ended up with like a five or six yard gain, but I don't think I've seen that before. Yeah, I love those sort of run plays. What you see the 49ers and that's a hand often to do is just constantly just send guys

in motion, almost for no reason, just send them in motion, make the defense move, make them question what Gap they're supposed to be in. And Washington has the playmakers to do it. I love what they can do with Curtis Damien. And I see them line him up in the backfield. you see him and Gibson line up in the back field together and just create, like you said, create conflict for the defense, make them

constantly question things. And if you can get Terry from easy touches, we all know how good he is with the ball in his hand, I think you can really hopefully just get more splash plays and it's just what you need from this offense because the constant just 15 play drive

it's just, it's tough to consistently win like that because like I said, you have to be perfect and you can't afford any sort of mistakes. But you would agree with this. I think. It is the right formula for them, given what they have. 100%. Because you can't drop back and try to throw it 50 times with Heineken. You just can't do it. And I mean, as frustrating as it is for someone who works for PFF and analytics company

who is constantly talking about, you know, running isn't as productive as throwing the ball. But, you know, this is what you have to do. And you see it a lot with all of these teams with the quarterback play has not been great this here, do you see a lot of teams that have to run the ball? They just, they have to. They can't, you know, consistently just go first down in completion, second down, incompletion, third down in completion, and now you're off the field with not even a minute taken off the clock. So teams have to do this. It might not be pretty. But I think it's why you kind of see a lot of teams jumbled up in that middle there, just like Washington is. Yeah. And I think, you know, when you said earlier,

you wonder about the length of leash and maybe it's short. I think you did say it was short on Taylor. I just wonder if Scott in Scott in particular is saying, look, we're a different team right now. You know, the offensive lines improved. We're a much better defensive team than we were early in the season. Brian Robinson Jr.'s become a significant part of the offense. We didn't have him.

We can continue with this formula with Carson Wend. and then on top of that have the ability to throw the football, especially if we get down. Because I think they're in big trouble if they get down two scores. And I know they were down two scores to Indianapolis. Okay, I understand that. And, you know, they're kind of living off what was a 50-50 ball, which I didn't have a problem with him taking to Terry McCorn in that spot,

given, you know, the yard line they were on, the clock where it was and needing a touchdown. But if they stuck with the. current formula and put wents in there with right now, and I'm not a wence guy, let me be clear on that, but with a better situation on defense, with Brian Robinson Jr., with a more consistent offensive line situation, couldn't you make the case that they might have more upside? You definitely could. I mean, you see it all the time. Now people are starting to make that case to people that just don't believe in Heineke. You can absolutely make the case because Wence is the better pastor.

He just is. I mean, like you said, you're not a Wence guy. I was never really a Wensk guy. I think he's just way too inconsistent with his decision-making and the way he manages pockets and how he manipulates the pocket and stuff like that. But there is more upside in the passing game, and you will need that at times because, like you said, you're going to go down. at some point.

And, you know, the Colts game is a bit of an outlier because that offense was just as bad as ours. I mean, when you have Ellinger as your quarterback, you're not really concerned with them constantly putting up points. Right. But I think it's kind of be interesting if this team goes down and, you know, Heineke is making some poor decisions and he gets, you know, actually punished for it and, you know, the defense is capitalizing on those.

I think you could see it. I don't know how much it would change just because I don't know. how comfortable Wence is right now. I mean, we saw him in these first couple weeks, and he just didn't look comfortable in the offense, was very skittish in the pocket, and that kind of made the offensive line look a little bit worse than I thought they were playing. A lot of times, I personally got yelled at for some Sam Cosmy grades, because we had him with some pretty decent grades in pass blocking and stuff, but people just see him, you

know, the guy he's blocking getting the sack, but a lot of times it's because Carson was kind of, you know, just stay in the pocket too long, drifting in the pocket. pocket, you know, losing, basically the way he drifts in the pocket is you're losing leverage for the blockers. So it's kind of tough for them. Obviously with more time and he's been able to hopefully get more comfortable in the offense, I think you could piece him upside, but I think it's a risk if you go to him. Look, I do too. I mean, I think it's an interesting conversation and I, you know, I laugh at those and scoff at those that think you shouldn't be having it.

I mean, you're six and one, God damn it. I mean, yeah, but, you know, there have been, you know, instances in the past. I mean, look at what, you know, Jim Harbaugh did with the 49ers when he stuck with Kaepernick because they were a lethal, you know, dual threat team down the stretch when Alex Smith became healthy and they, you know, they made it to the Super Bowl. I just, I think the ante, right now, I think there are two things personally. I think one is the whole notion that Taylor isn't taking as many sacks as Wence. And that's really a comparison to what the team was when Wence was quarterbacking before. And I do think it's a different team.

And maybe he even has a different understanding of the offense. I don't know if we would see more sacks, but you can make the case that he's not going to take those drive-killing sacks instead of running the ball or checking it down. And you've got third and three. You've got third and 16. That's a big problem. And I think the other thing is just the thing that you guys can't grade or define, and none of us can. And that is the intangibles.

I mean, the players seem to believe in him. And you can't turn against the locker room right now when you're, you know, six out of the last seven. Last question for you. Who do you really like in the NFC? Like right now, I mean, I think Washington would have a chance against a lot of these teams. Do you disagree or not? I don't disagree at all because they're the type of team that's going to, you know, just muddy the game up. And it's very similar to the way the Titans play.

I mean, you see the Titans constantly kind of find themselves in the playoffs. And it's just going to be a low-scoring kind of crappy game to watch. But I think they do have a really good shot against some of the teams. We saw them go toe-to-to-to-to-to with the Vikings. We saw them go toe-to-to-to with the Eagles. It's just, I think if they can sneak in, I think they have a real shot against, team that's out there right now. I think maybe the 49ers might be pushing to be the best team in the NFC. But yeah, it's going to be interesting for sure. All right. Great job, as always.

Really enjoy these conversations. Follow Nick on Twitter at PFF underscore Nick Ackridge. It's AKR-I-D-G-E. He's a data analyst for pro football focus, and he's a huge D.C. sports fan. We'll talk again soon. Appreciate this as always. Awesome. Thanks for having me, man. All right. Good stuff from Nick. Thanks to Gary Williams also into Doc Walker. Back tomorrow with Tommy.