The Kevin Sheehan Show - Sam Howell I Am

Episode Date: January 9, 2023

Cooley and Kevin today with everything you need on Sam Howell's debut. Their recap of the blowout season finale win over the Cowboys as well with Cooley's "Ehs & Ems" and Kevin's "GameTake". They talked Ron Rivera and Scott Turner's future along with some other NFL too. Then "Stanford Steve" Coughlin jumped on from Los Angeles to preview and pick tonight's College Football National Championship game between TCU and Georgia. Kevin had a few Terps' hoops thoughts after Maryland's big win over 24th-ranked Ohio State yesterday to finish up the show.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You don't want it. You don't need it. But you're going to get it anyway. The Kevin Cheon Show. Here's Kevin. Back to throw it for the first time. Going over. The middle has McClearn.

Ringsing in for the end zone and a score. This NFL stuff is easy. That was Sam Howell's very first throw of his NFL career. And it was a touchdown pass to Terry McClearns, 16 yards. out early in the first quarter, Washington absolutely destroyed Dallas, 26 to 6 in the season finale. To finish this season, Cooley, 8, 8, and 1. Somebody had that at the beginning of the year. I want to real quickly read some reviews from Corey, by far the best DC sports podcast. When Cooley comes on, it's absolute gold. Keep up the great work.

in and day out. Also from Supreme Haas. I'm 27. Haven't lived in the DMV in 18 years. I'm confused why I'm still so loyal to this team. Kevin and especially Kevin with Cooney are the go-to for information and opinions on this misery.

Hail. Thank you, Supreme Haas. And Corey, all of you can rate us and review us, especially on Apple and Spotify, if you get a chance, five stars and a quick one to two sentence review is great. And yes, Tommy will be on with me tomorrow. Cooley is here with me today, and he watched the game, and he's so excited about Sam Hal's performance.

I just want to start there real quickly, because I don't want to bury the lead. What did you think of Sam Hal on his very first game? He did a good job. He was good. I think it was about exactly what I thought it would be as far as what they would do on offense. It's incredibly basic as far as Sam Hal went in terms of throwing the ball. Go to the first touchdown pass.

The West Coast terminology for that play is basic cross. You have a shallow cross and you've got a 10-yard to 12-yard dig behind it, and you're trying to clear out the front side of its corner, and it's a basic cross. Or as they would have probably called it 724. You think that's what they called it? I think they're a number system. You'd start with the open side, which is a tight end. You ran a corner out.

That'd be a seven. Oh, the crosses is a zero. So it'd be 704 X post or however you want to tag the outside guy. That's what I would bet. Somewhere around there. That's how I'll saunders. All right. With the basicness of the offensive approach and perhaps play calling, how did he play?

I played well, Kev. Honestly, you take a, way one pick that he would like back and we can talk about that. But for the most part, I thought he was pretty consistent. I thought accuracy was good other than maybe one screen throw and a deep ball to Terry McLaurin that was underthrow in a little bit that ended up being a pass interference call anyways. And that might have been the intent of what he was trying to do on that throw. But he threw two more deep balls down the right side later in the game. One to Dotson that was dropped. That was a really good ball. And another one to Terry that was an excellent ball.

So I thought, although he didn't make a ton of throws vertically down the field, he made three or four that were essentially pretty good throws. The crossing route stuff that he hit, he hit guys on the move. He hit guys in stride, had a drop from Terry on a third and four crossing route that would have been a conversion. He looked really good athletically. The kid can get out and run. You saw that with the zone read for a touchdown where he's making good cuts,

fearless cuts. Yeah, real fearless. A couple good third and four scrambles where he ends up converting. And the other thing is, shoot, I thought, you know, large a party ran the offense with

good tempo. He looked comfortable in the pocket. He looked like he belonged there. And the moment wasn't too big. And I thought he played well. He was also in a really good situation the entire game where they could stay balanced with the run. Dallas was horrendous. They treated it as preseason game three and played it

70%. And you can see what that gets you in the league. But as far as Sam Hal goes, the moment was huge for him. I mean, he definitely felt nervous. He definitely felt pressure. And I think he performed in a moment where he felt pressure. I would have liked to see him throw the ball more than, what was he, 11 and 19, something like that. Especially as you got into the second half with the lead, but clearly the rivalry of Washington, Dallas is not the same.

It's not just beat Dallas. You don't need to play that game to just beat Dallas. It was evident throughout that Dallas didn't care if they won or lost the game. Even though they kept their starters in, it didn't seem like it mattered to them. But it did, though. It did matter. They were playing for something. They were playing for the division if the Giants somehow pulled off the one over Philadelphia.

That's why they were playing their starters. It was 16-0. in the first quarter of the Philly Giants weren't playing their starters. There was no way. Although what was amazing is when Dallas finally did pull their starter. Exactly. The Giants made a run. Simultaneously, the Giants went 22 to 15 or 22 to –

Did he make the kick or miss the kick? No, it was 22 to 16. They had an on-side kick to get the ball back with a chance to win. And the Eagles did a great job of Philly made kick. But whatever you want to say, So they did have something to play for, but I think that entire team said, eh, the energy wasn't there on the Dallas side of the ball. There was complacency, the energy wasn't there.

I don't want to take anything away from Sam L. And I don't think you need to in this situation. But it wasn't there. Dallas was, they made bad mistake after bad mistake. That's sad. Although, even in a game where it would matter, is their punter just going to drop a snap? You know what I mean?

Yeah. I don't think the punter is trying to drop snaps ever. I think that that was a big part of the result of the game. I do agree with you, and it's going to be one of my criticisms when we get to our game take, which we'll do in kind of a shared format like we've done before in the past. But I wanted to start with Sam Howell because I thought three big picture things. Number one, I don't understand why there was so much concern about playing him. I don't know if this was a guy.

Logan Paulson said last week when Ron was waffling on the decision, he had said beforehand that it was made clear to him that Sam Howell was not ready to play it in an NFL game, no matter how meaningless it was for the team. To me, it was a no-brainer. you don't have QB1 for the future on your roster with the two guys that we watched. Wentz is going to be on, and Taylor Heineke is not your starting quarterback long term. And so there was only one guy that we hadn't seen. Now, I did suggest, and I didn't suggest this to you, but I brought your name up last week,

that if this is one of those situations where you're not going to be able to evaluate other players, you're not going to be able to function by getting the plays and communicating the plays and getting the snaps off before, you know, the play clock gets to zero, zero, zero, okay, and that's kind of what Logan had hinted at, which is why his initial guess was Sam Hal would not play. It wasn't his evaluation, by the way, by the way, I want to make that clear. It was what he was hearing. And look, the actions of Ron initially saying that Taylor was going to start the game

and then changing his mind would indicate that they weren't totally convinced that he was ready to play in an NFL game. So my first takeaway is how silly was that? You know, it's a meaningless game. We see, you know, a backup and third string quarterbacks all the time in week 18, week 17, when it was a 16 game schedule, play for teams that have nothing to play for. And Sam Hal clearly proved in one game. And I think this is really the only thing he proved because it was only one game. And that is, it wasn't too big of an occasion for him.

Whatever concern there was from whomever the concern came from in the organization, it was silly. Number two was this. You kind of combined in Sam Howe, at least from a talent standpoint, the physical abilities that Taylor Heineke doesn't have with kind of the ballerness, the gamerness that Heineke has. I loved how quick and decisive he was as a runner, and you saw that at North Carolina. And then thirdly, my big takeaway from Sam Hal is this. Man did one game. One game. It will be a massive part of the off-season discussion when it comes to the starting

quarterback position for 2023. Sam Hal's name will be. Sam Hal will be. This franchise has been started. for anything resembling a starting quarterback, whether the person looks like one for one game or one quarter. And this one game yesterday for many was enough to say, Sam Hal, you are definitely in the mix and you might even be our guy for the 2023 opener. So thank you Sam Hal for not completely shitting the bed so that we, you know, couldn't consider you. It's perfect for offseason

discussion of the quarterback and what they do with the quarterback, because even though one game for me is not enough to evaluate whether or not he could be a legitimate QB1, that won't make, that won't make any difference in terms of the conversation. Sam Hal is now front and center in that conversation. And my guess right now on January 9th, and obviously, we have the ownership situation and how much Ron Rivera will be able to do and whether or not he'll be here to do it, all of that in play. But if we looked at it as a normal football situation, I would guess that Sam Howell and a quarterback that's currently not on the roster, whether that is a draft choice, whether that is Derek Carr, whether that is Aaron Rogers, that those will be the two quarterbacks in camp. and then they'll have obviously a third quarterback from somewhere.

But that is my guess today as to the two quarterbacks that will be on the roster. Howell, and I don't think Rogers will end up here with that contract. I think Derek Carr is probably too expensive. But maybe a Howl in a Garoppolo kind of a situation or Howl in a draft choice situation. And that will be the competition when we get to August. That would be my guess. But Sam Howell did not look overmatched. It was silly that they were concerned about it if they were.

I know some in the organization were. And thank you, Sam, because you gave us a great sort of off-ramp into the off-season with some optimism about what the starting quarterback could be in 2023 when there was no optimism after last week. before I a couple things with Sam Halvitt right before you know it to be a fun day for us to do is to go through

the last 15 years and talk about all of the potential quarterbacks that we talked about over the last 15 years that could have been a part of Washington's offense I mean how many times how many years it's just year after

year after year after year after year like who's available who's the best backup about there. Remember AJ McCarran? Man, he could have been something from Washington at some point. I mean, remember Andy Dalton gosh, he was going to be... Just a list of guys that... And we do.

It's done every year with Washington. Like, oh, and now it's Derek Carr and Jimmy Gropo, and maybe it was Jimmy Gropo last year. Matt Thapert. Like, it's endless. Maybe it's Baker Mayfield next year. You know, what? The list is a hundred names long

from the last 15 years. How about this name? This was one of my all-time favorites. You got to go get Mike Lennon. You have to get Mike Lennon. Have you seen how big he is? He's 6-7 and, oh, by the way, he's from Northern Virginia. He's a local kid.

You got to go get Mike Lennon. Has he ever started a game and played well in one? I don't think so. Oh, no, you're... No, I don't think he... Maybe. Yeah, it's... Look, this franchise...

had one, you know, six years ago, it had a starting quarterback and it had one there for a few years. And, you know, it's, it's, it was their one chance with cousins to get it right. But whatever, we've been down that path many times before. But you're right. I mean, it would be a long conversation. I mentioned this the other day. I mean, Sam Howell was the eighth quarterback, the eighth to start a game since Ron Rivera got here in 2020. In three seasons, they've started eight quarterbacks. If you count, Garrett Gilbert, who started that game during the COVID situation last year. And then I think it is now 35 different quarterbacks with Sam Howell have started a game for Washington since Mark Rippin was the start to finish 1991 Super Bowl.

ball champion MVP quarterback for this team. So in 31 years, 35 quarterbacks. Cleveland's more, right? Cleveland's got to be more. Yeah, I mean, I'm sure Cleveland's close. Yes. You know, I mean, but even the bad franchises like Detroit and even the Raiders have had runs of good starting quarterbacks.

I mean, Detroit had Stafford. The Raiders had Gannon there for a while. They had Derek Carr for several years, you know, so not that, you know, any of those players were elite superstars, but they were, you know, they were the long-term answers. Washington hasn't had, except for cousins, during the Snyder era, a long-term answer quarterback. Now, we thought our G3 would be, and he had one of the tremendous rookie seasons in the history of the league.

But, you know, the truth was they've had one. Nobody else. I mean, nobody else. Alex Smith wasn't. because even if Alex Smith doesn't get hurt, he was at the end of his career kind of anyway. Jason Campbell wasn't. Mark Brunel wasn't.

Rex Grossman wasn't. McNabb wasn't. Kyle Allen wasn't. Wentz wasn't. Who my Keenum wasn't? Beck wasn't. Haskins wasn't. I mean, I'm sure I'm fitting.

I mean, Fitzpatrick obviously wasn't. I mean, it's just, it's, look, I mean, there are lots of reasons, and it starts at the top as to why they've won just two playoff games during the Snyder era. And really the first one he shouldn't be given credit for because he didn't take over ownership of the team until the summer of 99. So essentially, his ownership tenure has produced one playoff win. You played in that game at Tampa, won. It's been 17 years since they've won a playoff game. The quarterback, the lack of a quarterback's obviously had a lot to do with that.

But, you know, the owner fucked up many times on the quarterback front as well. It's unbelievable that it's been 17 years since that game. 17 years. Freaking unbelievable. 17 years, almost to the day, Cooley. Almost to the day. Almost to the day. Yep.

So the Sam housing, putting out there that he's not ready is at best hedging a bet, if he wasn't ready, we could say, hey, we knew he wasn't ready. That's why we looked like trash. And maybe it's an offensive coordinator, or maybe it's someone on the other, maybe it's the head coach, and just say he wasn't ready. But your initial theory of you've got to prepare and you want to evaluate everybody and I don't care at all about anybody else on the roster that could be evaluated. We've evaluated everybody else on the roster.

Everybody else has got a chance to play. The only reason I wouldn't play Sam Howell in that game is if he truly wasn't ready. I really knew he wasn't ready, and that's only to protect Sam Hal. You would protect the career of Sam Hal by not letting him go out there and just be absolutely abysmal. There's no way based on the way he played that anybody could have said he's absolutely not ready. Could have definitively said this kid can't go out there and play. I do understand some guys are different in terms of being in a game and being in practice. And there's coaching staffs that don't necessarily understand the learning mechanisms of all of their players

and maybe Sam out-learns different than they would expect him to learn or he comprehends different. But whatever happened, he got himself ready to play a game. And the other thing really is until you do really give that quarterback to load and treat them like the guy, it's hard to say that they are actually ready. But I would not have worried about anybody else on the field besides just Sam Powell. If you actually thought that he could be in the running for quarterback, and Kevin, honestly, he's got to be in the running for the quarterback position next year. He's got to be.

If you went out and did end up signing Carr, who is one grade above, of Heineke and Wins, maybe two. No, he's every bit of two. And you're the fan of Carr, and I haven't been, but he's not comparable to Heineke-R-Witz. Did him look better than Carr? Yeah, but Derek Carr has been an NFL quarterback. I mean, at times you've thought he's been close to like top 12 in the league.

You would never say that about Wins. I never thought he was into the top 12, but yes, you are correct. The top 17, 18 in the league for how old is car now? That's not your, that's not the next

long-term answer. The reason they go out and sign car is in some, who knows exactly what happened. He's 31. He's going to be 32. Car's only 31. He's going to be 32.

So he's not old. For some reason, I felt like he was older than him. That's his brother, I'm thinking of. The reason you'd go out and sign a veteran quarterback who is definitively not. like tenure to winning quarterback, even though cars been put into bad situations as well with tons of head coaches and tons of offenses,

is because you're trying to find a way to salvage a year to keep your job for another year. And obviously you want your team to have a chance to win games. I don't want to take that out of the equation. But if you really wanted to build, and you trusted after the first three years, you trusted that you knew you were going to continue to be here, And you'd draft another guy, or you would play howl, or you would try to build.

I don't. I want to interrupt that thought for a second because I don't want to lose this thought. Here's the thing, though. This roster, and I said this last week after they lost to the Browns, I did not anticipate feeling this way at the beginning of the season, but I do feel this way right now. I think they have a really good roster. I think their defense has a chance to be outstanding for the next three to five years.

And I know it's going to be hard to keep everything together and keeping pain is a big deal. And trading for or signing a Derrick car wouldn't leave room to also then go out and sign pain. That's part of the problem with a Derrick car. But I think that their roster minus the quarterback. And you know, you have to add alignment or three because that was a major flaw in which, weakness this year, I think it's ready to be a playoff team like next year. I think, put it this way. I think we said this three weeks ago. If Daniel Jones had been quarterbacking this team, they not only would be in the playoffs, they'd be a threat to win a

game or two in the postseason. And that's just Daniel Jones. Well, maybe they'd be better than that. If you know, Daniel Jones had Sequin-Barkley this year. They had inflating. I mean, they had very little. Washington. Yeah, when you said it, you said it like he had Sequin Berkeley like it was a lot. No, what you were saying is all he had was Sequin

Barclay. That's my point. Imagine the weapons. Like, McClorn and Dotson with a real quarterback at some point, if they ever get it here, that is going to be a dangerous combination. Dangerous. They're good.

They've got to get. the quarterback. I know that you like Scott Turner, but Scott Turner will not be the answer to this. Well, he's going to get fired here in the next. He may be fired by the time people are listening to this. It's not that I like Scott Turner. That's not true. I do like Scott Turner. And I think they're giving him the benefit of the doubt. You're trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. You've been doing it too long. It's more. It's more than that. It's more than that. I think, you know, going back to 2020 and even at times last year, I actually thought there were a lot of games where they got more than what they really should have gotten out of what they had. But it's not like I've ever... There's too many where they haven't gotten near what they should have gotten. I understand.

And the giant game, especially the giant game at home this year, that Sunday night game, to me, the second and 18 dropback where Thibodeau comes in, sack, fumble, touchdown, changes the game, and then not giving the ball to Brian Robinson, Jr., who was averaging 7.4 yards per carry and got it on only 12 touches. I think his biggest weakness has been feeling the game in game as a play caller. Whatever. You guys, all of you people are going to be right. He's going to be gone.

The defense of Scott Turner is he started his eighth quarterback on Sunday in three seasons. None of the quarterbacks were any good. He had a terrible offensive line this year. And by the way, last year there was no complimentary football because the defense was a mess. This year he had the complementary football, and that's why even with bad quarterbacking, you know, or average at best quarterbacking in some of those games in a terrible offensive line, they were competitive. But there was one other thing on howl, because I agree with what you said, you know, you only should have been worried about evaluating how in this game. You know, if there was like legitimate concern, I know we talked a little bit about this on Thursday, why was he the backup during a stretch of? of the season where you were literally moving into playoff contention.

If they really felt that way, it was a little bit irresponsible to have them out there as the backup in some of those games. Just saying, I mean, I would have been seeing what I saw yesterday. Honestly, okay, let's just do this really quick. Let's just do that. Yeah. Do you, well, somebody told Logan. Yeah.

Is it a coach or is it another quarterback? I don't know. I don't know, but can I tell you something? I heard something mid-season that said the same thing. I heard something earlier in the season, midpoint of the season, where the word got back to me, and it was not through a player, that he wasn't anywhere near ready. Now, that was much earlier in the season, okay?

But, you know, it was when, you know, the quarterbacking wasn't great, but it was like not even a decision between him and Heineke because he just didn't, wasn't ready to run their offense yet, which by the way, you know, Carson Wentz was never ready to run their offense this year. But go ahead. Play out the game that you want to play. The game, all I'm saying to you is it's not irresponsible. Potentially it's not irresponsible, but that many people didn't feel that way.

Okay. When he's the backup quarterback. I agree with that. I don't think it was everybody. I don't think it was everybody. The other thing is like, what are you going to do? go sign a fourth quarterback. Because he's not going to put howl on practice squad he's going to get picked up.

You can't release wins. I mean, if they were going to do that, they would have to have a release win. Well, they put him on injured reserve. Yeah, well, you'd leave him on injured reserve, I guess, but that doesn't look good. And everyone knows, and you can't leave him on the injured reserve when you know he's healthy. You knew he was going to be healthy. Because there's another spot for another quarterback. It's irrelevant.

I mean, I'm just throwing it out there. because I just, if they really felt that way, I said last Monday before Ron changed his mind, it's really an indictment on one of two things if he doesn't play in the final. It says that you got it wrong in the draft. If you are fearful, you know, 17 weeks in the season about playing a fifth round quarterback in a meaningless game, it means you got it wrong or you just never coached him up at any point. bottom line is though it doesn't matter at this point we've now seen him play a game and he played pretty well and he's given everybody that cares about this team some reason to be optimistic that maybe maybe

the starting quarterback is on the roster I wouldn't wager on that at this point but I'm intrigued with Hal and I wasn't the biggest Hal guy coming out of college the one thing I wanted to say and we'll get to our complete game take here in a moment. I think he really looks, I always felt this way at Carolina, too. I think he looks small on the field. Think he looks short and stocky. He looks like He's little brother. But he's boxier.

It's a boxier bill. Right? I mean, he's got a way more than Heineke, right? I think he does. Clearly has a bigger arm. He weighs 225. I don't know what He weighs heaneykey weighs. going to guess it's not 225.

No, probably 200. Actually, I'm interested in how much Heineke weighs now. Let me see. 210, he's listed at. Both 6-1, 225 for Hal, 210 for Heineke. All right, should we get to our breakdown of the game?

Sure. All right. We'll do that right after these words from a few of our sponsors. Pay attention. Here's Kevin's Game Day. All right, my game take today, which will be a dueling game take on the season finale with Cooney, is brought to you by MyBooky. Go to MyBooky.orgie. Use my promo code Kevin D.C. And they will double your first deposit, dollar for dollar, all the way up to a thousand bucks. You got a national championship game tonight. TCU is a 13 point underdog right now at MyBooky. And all

of the playoff lines are out, Cooley, for Super Wild Card weekend. The 49ers are 10-point favorites over Seattle on the first game on Saturday. The Chargers are one of two road favorites. They're minus one at Jacksonville. I actually thought that was going to be higher. I thought the Chargers were going to be like a three-point favorite on the road at Jacksonville. Buffalo's a 10-and-a-half-point favorite in the early game on Sunday. In the late afternoon game, Minnesota is a three-point favorite over the Giants.

in the Sunday night game, Cincinnati's a six and a half point favorite over Baltimore. I wonder if Lamar Jackson's going to play in that game. I mean, Baltimore's got no chance if Lamar Jackson doesn't play. You don't get. None. And that line will change to what it was. It'll change to 12 if they define that he's not going to play. And then it won't be 12, but it might go to 9. And then in the Monday night game, a week from tonight, the Cowboys,

after looking the way they looked yesterday, are three-point favorites at Tampa in what will definitely be the marquee game of the entire weekend. And they put that one in the Monday night window, which, by the way, if you're thinking about the following weekend, that means definitively that Philadelphia, the one seed, unless there's an upset over the 49ers or the John, or the Giants win. Dallas and or Tampa would play Philadelphia the following Sunday.

They're not going to make the Dallas Tampa winner play on Saturday after playing on Monday night. Anyway, go to my bookie.ag. Use my promo code, Kevin D.C. All of those bets available. Right now, the Super Bowl favorite, Kansas City at plus 340. Remember, if the Chiefs end up playing the Bills in the AFC title game, that game will be on a neutral field. the NFL did avoid the coin flip between Cincinnati and Baltimore.

If Baltimore had won, they would have coin flipped on the game this coming weekend, but that game will be in Cincinnati. The long shot, by the way, in the postseason is Miami at plus 6,200. Who knows who's going to play quarterback for the dolphins. And really, it's the dolphins and the Ravens right now where the quarterback is at issue. All right. let's do this by starting with however you want to title it. You know, if you want to do us and and or something else.

But give me the things that you thought were good in the game and the things that you thought were bad in the game. And then I'll do mine. Well, the things that are good in the game is, one, Howell, you cannot overlook the fact that he did play really well in the game. I thought he was consistent throughout other than the one pick. He had a ball laid on a slant.

We talked about a couple of the other ones, but the one pick is bad. He doesn't see Malie Cooker on a run action. Also, they're running on the pick down in the red zone. They're running Terry McLaren on like an in-and-out. And Diggs is over the top of Terry McLaren. And Terry, the Diggs falls off of that as well deeper into the end zone. The one reach should have just been an easy in-and-house

from Terry. I mean, it's not just Millie Cooker that he misses. I think Trayvon Diggs has a chance to pick that as well. Yeah, right. So that's a miss for a young kid. Really, you'd want that safety to step up. And the thing is he'll even step up further if you're looking hard at Terry McLaurin on the shorter route. There's a potential that he'll step up more, but because you're staring it down, everyone falls into it, should have just been throw the tape. Other than that, you know, the scrambles, the move of the offense, the third down, a couple third down conversions. I thought he played really well.

I thought a couple of beat balls you threw her really well. So I think Sam Howe is a big, mm, or positive. Do you have a grade for him? Do you have a grade for him? B. Okay. B plus. Based on, based on whatever it is.

I don't know. It will be a little bit different if we watch the film, but I've watched it. I watched it on Tendents this morning. just the offense again. No, impressive. Okay. You know? What else is a...

The defense was awesome. Yeah, it was. And not just the run defense, which was absolutely outstanding, where Dallas couldn't get anything going on the ground. Amazingly, after Chubb just gashed them the week before, the past defense was actually very good as well. And some of the young players in the secondary,

making plays, driving on balls, breaking things up, It was really good on the back end, contesting balls throughout the entire day. I got Dak look bad. I know that offense, and they talked about it on the broadcast, has been prolific since he's been back. That is a question mark for me. Me too. At this point in his career, he is a guy that is going to throw risky passes.

They're going to, at times they fall into throwing the ball too much. And I think that there's a huge question mark on Dak Prescott. Me too. Not that he's their guy or not, but just that he's got to, is he a quarterback that can take you to a Super Bowl and win games for you week in and week out. And I don't know. I really don't.

I don't know if it is, if he is. But that's that the defense was awesome. The special teams was outstanding in this game. Well, except for the kicker. The kicker. Well, except for Joey Fly, who missed. Two field goals in an extra point. In an extra point.

He shanked a field goal. 31 yards. Do you want to change your opinion on the special teams? because field goal kicking and P. Okay, let's put it this way. Let's put it away. The playmaking, and this isn't even, here, it isn't even this. It's ugly on Dallas. They drop a punt.

Yeah. But in any game in a regular season that matters, when the punter drops when you pick it up and you got a chance to score from the 15, and then they botch a punt and you got a chance to score, you're essentially winning a game with two turnovers on special teams. True. You're almost winning any game with two turnovers on special teams.

And really, when you watch this game, they should have been 50 to 0 or 50 to 7 or 50 to 14 this wasn't a game the other thing I really like from this game I thought Patterson was really good running the football. Me too. Better than Williams. I thought Patterson was exceptional

running the football. I continue to like Johan Dotson. I think he's really going to be a good player. Terry McLaurin is great. He did have that one drop on the third down across the middle of the field but he's great. the Kendall Fuller pick. By the way, you have two botched special teams plays and a pick six.

That should be a 28 points. Yeah. So, again, really impressive. I thought, for the most part, here's what I didn't. Here's what I did and didn't like. If this was a game of meaning and you had to win this game, and you had Sam Hal, and this was your guy,

I thought there was good balance for Sam Howe. I thought that he was essentially in better positions. I liked the run balance with Patterson and getting Williams involved in how they manage things. I didn't like it because that's not what I needed to see, and that's not what I wanted to see. I want to see Sam Halpe play and execute. But I would say the balance that that Scott Turner put out in this game

really kept them consistent. It kept the offensive line in a position where they could be tactile. Really what? What was there two sets? Three sacks and a few pressures. I mean, there were some breakdowns, I thought, in Passpro. No, and there were a couple that were immediate breakdown, but for the most part, there was still some balance,

and they were able to protect how. They ran it 41 times and threw it 19 times. I'm totally with you. That's on my list of things that I didn't like. I wanted to see Sam Hal throw it more. Who cares about winning? It would have been better if they lost, although it only cost him two spots in draft order.

But it potentially could have a lot of spots. More. It didn't, though. But I agree with you. Like, I wanted to see him throw it more, but they went with kind of this, you know, heavy run emphasis and, you know, and trying to make some plays off of that.

And they did well with it. But anyway, continue. I think that's large in part how I feel about this game. Okay. Without going deep into Patterson, without going deep into, I mean, we talked about how a little bit, more.

And again, I would like to emphasize it one more time, though. I was really impressed with all the past breaksups on the defensive side of the ball with young guys. You know, the kid Butler looked really good. Agreed. They said they were excited about playing. They are a team. Oh, here's another thing I don't like that I think should change the last thing.

That's Milne can not be your punt return. He had the second biggest punt return he's had all. year. He had a 16-yard punt return, but no, he can't be your punt returner next year. No. He just, that's, you just, he can't be your punt returner. And he can't catch his ball and say, you're like, gosh, why don't he just take an extra four? Why don't you catch and get six? Right. All right, let me, uh, let me go through my list. All right, things I liked. It's number one for me was the defense. It was, it was maybe the most dominating defensive performance of the year without a lot of their starters.

You know, coming off one of the worst defensive performances of the year last week. I mean, there was no John Allen, there was no St. Juice, there was no Cam Curl, there was no Jamie Davis, there was no Smith Williams, and the defense played lights out. I am so with you on Dak Prescott. There is something not right. And I could see, look, they're favored at Tampa and the world's going to be betting Tampa on Monday night. Tampa's not very good, but I don't think Dallas can win more than one playoff game.

I just don't see it with Prescott. I mean, he came into this game. We talked about he had thrown like seven or eight interceptions coming into this game in the last four games. And he not only threw a pick six to Fuller, he threw a pick six ball on the snap before it. Fuller could have had two pick sixes. I mean, only one. But I thought that Dak Prescott had one of the worst games that I've seen any, like, legitimate starting quarterback, not named like Nathan Peterman, have in a long time. Listen to this.

I mean, Dallas came into this game. Top three or four in scoring. Top three or four in yards. Washington held Dallas in a game that they, look, they're playing all their starters. You know, they were certainly going to play the first half to try to win the game just in the event. event the Giants pulled off some stunner. They held the Cowboys to six points, 182 total yards, the fewest for them as a team in over two years. Dallas had 10, three and outs. I've never heard of anything like that. I'm talking about with a legitimate

offense and a legitimate quarterback. I'm not talking about, you know, you're playing the third string quarterback in week 18, and he stinks. and, you know, they had 10, 3 and outs. And by the way, if you count the pick 6, it's really 11 3 in outs because that was a third down play. They punted 10 times, 10. They missed on two fourth downs. So imagine they had punted on those. There would have been 12 punts.

Actually, one of those fourth downs was the punt that the punter dropped. You know, that's not counted as a turnover, coolly. That's counted as a fourth down stop. Now, if he drops the ball and fumbles it and it's recovered, it's a turnover. But really, the result of the play is a turnover for all intents and purposes. But the Cowboys were four for 18 on third down. They averaged 2.8 yards per play. 2.8.

This was a prolific offense over the last two months coming in. They were completely shut down. And I just thought Dak honestly had. the worst day, it was the second worst passing yardage day of his career. He was 14 of 37. I mean, seriously, in today's NFL, have you heard much about, have you ever heard of 14 at a 37? For 128 yards, the throws that he was making, especially in the first half, were so god-awful. They were high, they were low, they were off, they were late. He was heroic. He was heroic. But I don't want to take away from Washington's defense in making him look that way.

But it was really surprising how bad Prescott was. But Washington, the players, by the way, that stood out, you mentioned a couple of them. Sweat, pain. For me, Kaleek Hudson, I thought really stood out. I thought Mayo stood out. I thought Danny Johnson in some of those past breakups. Kendall Fuller, Forrest, the dude wearing number 79. I can't pronounce his last name.

I think it's Samoan or Hawaiian that they just called up. You did look good. Yeah. I'm sure I'm missing some of the players. I thought Chase Young, I think he, the really good news about Chase Young's three games, he looks right athletically. He looks like Chase Young athletically. I'm not sure he's entirely where he's supposed to be on every play,

but for right now the good news, he doesn't appear to have lost any of his athleticism. I don't know. It was just, it was like the Houston game. I mean, Dallas looked like Houston did when Washington played them. Like there was no chance that they were going to win that game. It was a complete shutdown. And I think overall, this season, the emergence of this defense that played at like a top three to five level in the conference, top five to ten level in the league, you know, the traditional numbers, yards allowed, which is how you end up being ranked defensively, which I think is a, a, a. stupid number to use, but they end up third in the league in defense in terms of ranking. First in the league in 2022 in third down defense. You know, they held teams to 31.9% on third down after being 31st in the league a year ago. By the way, the next best in the league was Denver at 34.1%.

So 2.2% better than the second best third down defense. That's a significant difference. statistically. The biggest disappointment on defense this year, and it's something that they're going to need to improve upon, especially if they don't have dynamic offensive teams because of quarterbacking moving forward is takeaways. They had 18 total as a team this year, and I think four of them came on special teams. So basically 14 to 15 roughly defensive takeaways, that's 26th.

in the league. And if you want to look at a top two to three reason as to why this team isn't in the playoffs with the kind of defense it played this year, it would be takeaways. You know, the first five games of the year, they had two takeaways. Then they had 14 takeaways during that seven game or eight game stretch where they were five and two, five and two during that seven game stretch. Then when they went oh three and one, they only had two takeaways. Well, yes, Yesterday, they had two technically, although the punter dropping the ball really is three. You can just look at that number alone and say, if they had had another five or six takeaways this year, it would have meant another win, and it would have been the difference between

making the postseason and not making the postseason. But defense overall was, it may have been against a team that had something to play for, although I agree with you, it looked like they thought that there was no chance that the Giants would do it sitting all their starters, and they played it almost like a buy week. That may have been part of the reason that the defense was so dominant, but still, I'd be worried if I were a cowboy fan about Dak Prescott in particular. I'd be worried about Dak Prescott, but I would not think twice about that game. They did not show up and play.

Okay, that's fair. And by the way, the fact that they're a three-point favorite on the road against Tampa and Brady, and I know that they aren't very good either, but I think that the odds make agree with what you just said, that yesterday is meaningless to them because they were a three-point favorite over Tampa before the day started in a projected look ahead, and they were a three-point favorite after yesterday. Also on the list of things that I liked, I added Jared Patterson on my list as well. I think every time we've seen him, he's looked good. And, you know, this team has drafted really well on the running back front, you know, from Gibson, you know, to Brian Robinson,

Jr. picking up Jonathan Williams, signing Jared Patterson as an undrafted free agent. You know, J.D. McKissick, unfortunately, I hope he ends up being healthy enough just to play football. You know, when he was healthy in 2020, I thought they got a lot out of him. But they're in a really good spot. Running back wise, and the receivers were on my list as well. Terry and Jehan each had a drop in the game. Terry had a flat out drop. Jehan had one of those deep balls that he could have pulled in. But man, if they can just find a quarterback with those two, with Samuel, with their running backs, and then if they can improve their O-line lookout, it was also one of the cleanest games they've played all year, certainly over the last five weeks. They had two penalties.

That was it. They didn't turn, they had the one turnover, you know, the one interception in the end zone. And then I did put on the list of things that I liked Dax Milne's 16-yard punt return, because it was so shocking. And then Sam Hal, you know, I don't want to get, we've already talked a lot about him. I won't add a lot to it other than to say that I really, really like the fact that he's a combination of a guy that, you know, I don't know what he's going to be as a quarterback, nor does anybody else. However, compared to what they've had here recently, he's got the arm strength and then he's also got the ability to play off schedule. By the way, the 52-yard completion to Terry McCluren was an air distance throw of 60 yards per next gen. Target separation was 0.9 yards.

The completion probability was 20.2%. None of that matters to me. Here's what was interesting to me. It's the longest completion air yards-wise by a Washington quarterback since 2016. I would have thought that Wentz's throw to like Diami Brown in that Tennessee game, which was a 75-yard touchdown pass. Would have been a 60-yard air-yard throw, but it wasn't. Hal put one right on Dotson.

I love his decisiveness as a scrambler. We both talked about multiple times in big games against the Giants in particular, where we thought that Taylor should have run, that he should have been more decisive as a scrambler, and he wasn't, and Sam Hal didn't hesitate. You mentioned the two-third and fours. The Reed Option Keeper, was beautiful. The way he cut, first of all, it was an, it's odd to see on a read option like that, a total cutback the way he did.

Right. No, you don't. You don't see it because they don't want to get killed them at all. Exactly. But I gave him a B plus a minus. That was my grade. I gave it out on radio. You ended up giving him a B plus. So I thought, look, the context for it, first start, you know, missing some pieces on offense, playing a team that has a, a legit first-rate pass rush in particular. And I did think that there was some pass protection issues in this game. I give him a B-plus-A-minus. The things I didn't like Joey Sly, I mean, he ended up missing four extra points this year. He missed five field goals.

If it weren't for the Philadelphia game where he made the 58-55-yard field goals, which was the biggest night of his career, I'd say you've got to look for a new kicker. By the way, Dallas's special teams were horrendous. They had the punter bungle. They had the turpin fumble on the punt return. Their kicker missed a field goal and an extra point. I mean, they were horrendous. I thought pass protection like it's been all year long was at times an issue.

And really my biggest criticism other than Sly is what you said. And I talked about this this morning on my radio show. Yesterday was about Sam Hal. He threw the ball 19 times. Now, I know he had five rushes and I think three of them were scrambles. So it's 22 dropbacks and then three sacks, 25 dropbacks. But I didn't need to see 41 runs and 19 throws. I didn't need to see Jared Patterson and Jonathan Williams combined along with Reggie Bonifin for 34 carries.

I didn't need to see that. But I think, you know, like he has been all season long, I think, and you pointed this out in that first giant game, I think the biggest concern after quarterback limitation was how do we protect our limited quarterbacks? I think that was the biggest offensive concern all year long. And their solution was to run the shit out of the ball, try to be heavy run-to-pass ratio, and then try to hit some of the stuff off of it, even though they didn't really coordinate it very well at times.

I'll agree with that. But, yeah. The only other observation I wanted to make, I had it right here. Oh, one last kind of from the game yesterday, because it was something I saw all year long and I mentioned it multiple times. They almost yesterday had two more punts blocked. There has been, I don't think they got a punt blocked this year. I don't think Tressway got a punt blocked.

But I bet you that there were at least seven to eight, I mean, within a whisker of having a punt blocked, this year. And it was always interior pressure, which by the way, the quarterback pressure was always the interior pressure this year. I'm shocked that we got through 17 games with their punt protection and they did not get a punt blocked this

year because it looked like every single special team's coach for the opponent said, I think we can get to the head coach. I think we can get one this week. They got some issues. I think we can take advantage of it. We can get one. week. They didn't, but they should have. Also, by the way, one thing, too, one of the Sam Hal throws that you said was underthrown and it drew the DPI, I wanted to ask you, do you think that was intentionally underthrown or not?

Well, I kind of mentioned that it could have been. It's hard to say. You'd have to ask Sam Hal. Yeah. That if he was trying to back shoulder him or let him go get it. But I thought Terry had some space to go get it out in front. It was also its first vertical ball thrown. down the field. First deep ball the game. Right. Right.

It was, wasn't it? By the way, he also had a throw to Terry in the red zone that was clearly defensive pass interference against Terry that wasn't called. It wasn't a great throw. But it was clearly DPI and they didn't call it. I thought, you know. Yeah, the slant throw. I don't think he was getting to that ball.

But yeah, that was where he got hooked. Yeah. I mean, that's really what I have from the game. I would just mention a couple of things. Number one, I heard, and I wasn't there for it, but I heard that the Sunny Jersey retirement ceremony went well, that there were no blunders, you know, and that's, that's, that's, you know, always the risk with anything that they do, that Sunny's family was a big part of it. Billy unveiled the jersey. They didn't do it on the field. Frank Herzog, by the way, for those of you that, you know, and that's right, I'm thinking, so I had recorded the podcast on Friday with Tommy and then came the news that Frank was going to, that Frank got invited, which I'm glad he did. And he was in the booth with Bram and London and Julie for much of the game. And apparently was just thrilled to be there. So I'm really happy Frank was there.

I'm happy the sunny thing went off without any kind of. an embarrassment because that would have upset not only me but many of you as well. And I did hear from many of you about as the Dallas fans, which made up, you know, most of you said between, you know, 70 and 80 percent of the crowd yesterday. When they left in the fourth quarter and only Washington fans were left, I heard about the nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, hey, hey, goodbye and pointing to the Snyder. box. And really the big takeaway from this entire season is that, you know, we got a gift. I mean, it was the wish that we had had for years upon years that Snyder would end up either being

ousted or he would sell the team. And the biggest picture takeaway from this season has nothing to do with 8-8-1, nothing to do with them cratering down the stretch and missing the postseason. Really, nothing to do with how we feel right now about the coaching staff. We're going to talk a lot about that stuff. But it's amazing that we are actually sitting here after a season. And we can actually talk about a future that may not include Dan Snyder as the owner. And the 23-year nightmare, it looks like it has a chance to end here. So keep your fingers crossed that that happens. Apparently Dan was not at the game yesterday. That's the second straight week. He wasn't at the game. The reports were that Tanya was. And there you go. Eight, eight and one. For Ron, by the way, I think it's his first, you know, for all of you that obsess, and I say obsess, and I'm not saying I'm not minimizing it. I just think he's been a better coach than many of you believe he's been. Not a great coach, but many of you think he's been terrible. But it's his first non-losing. season since 2017 going 8-8-1. And that makes his record here in Washington, 22, 27, and 1 in

three years. And I think right now it's about what's next and what, you know, Snyder and Tanya, what Dan and Tanya will do. I don't know why they would fire, Dan, why they would fire Rivera and his staff rather than leaving that up to the new owner whenever that happens. but I don't know how long this will take either. We'll see. You have any thoughts on any of the big picture stuff franchise-wise? I think the only reason that you would fire Rivera is if new ownership didn't want to fire Rivera and that had any semblance or any impact on the deal.

Say that again. Say that again. Let's say I'm buying the team right now. I'm going to pay the $6 billion or $5 billion. $6.5.7. I know I also, no, it doesn't matter. I'm just thinking out loud, like, if I don't want to be the guy that immediately fires Ron Rivera,

but then it's seven, and then I'm going to spend another two on a new stadium, so I'm in $9 billion. I really don't care if I fire on Rivera. Exactly. The issue is timing. The issue is nobody really knows how long this. might take. You know, by the way, I'm convinced that he's selling and he's selling the whole thing. I am convinced of that. But, you know, there's always that, that, you know, thing that the guy from

Forbes reported that it could be kind of a staged thing where somebody takes 20% now, 20% next year, 20% the year before takes a majority of it and that a full 100% maybe, you know, is a five-year thing. But I don't know. I don't know what Ron Rivera is going to be able to do. I would say, that the chances that Ron Rivera gets fired between now and an ownership change are pretty slim, but I think that Scott Turner getting fired is a high probability.

I think that that is, I think he is going to be the scapegoat for not making the postseason. That's what I think, with respect to that. So we'll see. Yeah, I don't think they make him a scapegoat by, So I don't think they make him a mistake go by firing him. I just don't think he's good enough as an offensive coordinator. I know you don't.

I think within what they were trying to do as a team and knowing their quarterback maybe wasn't good enough and what they had gotten to at that point in the season, what their offense was, I don't know. I'm sure Scott Turner's like, hey, all I could do is run the ball every town. There wasn't stuff there. We couldn't protect. but I don't think it evolved enough over three years to be able to do things that you want to do as an offense. The other real proof with the Scott Turner situation is, does he sign as an offensive coordinator anywhere else in the league? I think, actually, probably is a good, okay, would be a good college officer coordinator.

But does he go anywhere else in the NFL? Let's say the answer is no. Okay, so let's put Scott Turner to the side. That's fine. Okay. I get it. You don't think he would be hired by anybody else to be an OC. I can't disagree with you.

I don't think so. Okay, I'm not going to disagree with you. Usually these OCs are like hot, you know, commodities, and they're not running the 27th ranked offense in the league and the 26th ranked scoring offense in the league. Here's a question for you, though. Okay, let's just say he gets fired in the next, because Ron kind of almost implied that this could be coming.

Charles Leno Jr. said, I thought we did in the Philadelphia game. I thought we had an identity starting in the Philadelphia game. I felt like that was our identity when they ran the ball 50 times. And we started on a win streak after that. At times, we got away from that for whatever reason. I don't know what the reason may be, but that's not my job. If you guys missed the Sam 48 column from the Washington Post over the weekend, commanders players are frustrated with offensive play calling.

nine commanders who spoke on the condition of anonymity to be candid about Scott Turner expressed frustration with the play calling. Let me just tell you, when you see that kind of a story at the end of a year for a team that's not going to the postseason, it's like a nine and ten chance that Sam Fortier knows that Scott Turner is going to be fired. So I think he's going to be fired. Here's my question for you. What do they do?

With the ownership situation, who of, any significance would take this job without knowing what's next for Ron Rivera and the staff, the rest of the staff, and by the way, without an answer to quarterback at this point, who are you going to get? A lot of people will go take that job. I'll go take that job tomorrow's an offensive career. I know you wouldn't. I would hire you tomorrow.

But you go for one year. Here's the only good thing about this job, or one of them. good things about this job. You do have playmakers. There's potential that you're going to sign a quarterback in the offseason and there's potential that it would be Carr. I don't know it would be tough

to go and work with howl and have to bring a young quarterback along the entire way. Not impossible. You have guys that you can get the ball to you. Have guys that you can distribute. Go and try to make a push that you need two offensive linemen and you'd have a couple offensive upgrades.

Probably not. A ton. But if you go and you take whatever that offense is in one year and have great success or have a step up in success, you take the 27th and the 26th and you go to 14 and 13, you're getting a job anywhere else you want and you're potentially a head coach candidate. Whenon gets fired. I think – Or if he were to get fired. I think you're also leaving out the importance of coming to a team that has a potential great defense

and the opportunities that that's going to give you, you know, offensive. It's a balance throughout an entire game and run your game plan through an entire game, yeah. No, I think it's a job that anybody could look at on the rise and say, this is a great stepping stone. I don't know if it's a job that you're going to go out and get a coordinator, an offensive coordinator this year who gets fired from a staff who has done a good job. I can't name one off the top of mind. top of my head, but I think it's an up-and-coming job where you get a quarterback's coach

at some team that a lot of people lack and believe in. You go, look, this guy's got something to him, and that's a huge step up to run your own offense. To run your own offense and to be the guy is a huge step up. And the other aspect of this job that's really, I think, important, is you are in charge of the offense. We're on the defensive-minded head coach. You are literally given the reins to the office. It will not be a hard position to fill. But again, I would say to you, okay, I like the sales pitch on the team that you have, but how do I know that I'm going to get there and I'm going to be hired by Ron Rivera, and that's the staff, and then the new owner is going to come in and clean everybody out,

and even buy me out of my contract? There's too much uncertainty with the team in this kind of situation. That's all I would say. But also mention one other thing. If, you know, there's no concern about the ownership. and if Ron's even in position to make all of these decisions, if they give him the leeway to do it. And I did think about why are Dan and Tanya

are going to give Ron the OK to fire Scott? He's under contract until the year 2024, 2025. They extended him in the off season. What does he make, Cooley, a million bucks a year, a million and a half a year? What do you think Scott Turner makes? I'll bet he's around a million. I think when McVeigh first took that job, it's like around 950 grand.

Okay, so, I mean, it's probably around a millionaire. If I'm Dan and Tanya, it's like, I'm selling the team, I don't give a shit what happens to this team moving forward. No, you're not firing him. He's under contract. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Yeah, good point.

I'm selling the team for $7 billion. I got it. I do not want to spend that $3 million left on his contract. But you know what? Really? It's still a business right now that has been struggling from a cash flow. standpoint on just a standalone P&L.

But why would he want to throw any money away at this point? He didn't care what happens to the team. He should just say, you know what? I'm not letting you make that decision. That'll be for the new owner to make. Unless he's going to be the owner for a lot longer than we think.

Well, it's Ron's coaching staff. And so he can tell him it can't make the decision all he wants, but it's Ron's firing. Well, he's the owner. He can nix it. He can say you're not firing him. So you're just going to... So you're saying he's not going to give him the authority to hire anybody else.

What I'm saying is I actually do think he's going to... Well, I'm trying to find any way to circumvent what you're doing. So I'm just going to make my receiver's coach the coordinator. Anybody else at this time. Ken Zampezi, the quarterback's coach, is going to be elevated to offensive coordinator. But guess what? We're going to have to sign him to an off. We're going to have to increase his pay.

while we're still paying, and I know it's peanuts compared to what he's about to get. I'm just saying, look, I actually think he's going to get let go. I think that's reading the T leaves, the 48th story in particular, some of the comments from some of the players. So I think he, you know, Dan will probably say fine. But really, if Dan's going to sell the team in March or April, if that's going to get finalized, why would he, make any of those decisions or allow his coach to make his head of football operations, Ron Rivera, to make any of those decisions, I would just say, nope, right now there's a spending freeze, hiring freeze, that's all for the new owner to make a decision on. I just think that that's a possibility.

It is. It'd be a great way to set your team back. Well, he doesn't care. Or he does. He wants to set him back. I don't know. What else do you have? Because I do want you to come on later in the week and we can preview the playoff games. What's interesting about the playoff games this week,

I don't think there's like a super attractive matchup. Dallas Tampa is attractive, but neither team's great. And, you know, the dolphins and the Ravens have quarterback issues. you know, the Seahawks get in by winning an overtime over McVe's Rams and the Packers losing last night. My God, that game, you know, look, I said it, and I still think I'm standing by it, that they set it up to really try to, you know, increase the chances of Green Bay getting into the postseason by having Seattle's game go before, and Detroit finding out right before kickoff they had nothing to play for. I didn't expect that they would lay down against a division rival in many ways.

And I think Collinsworth may have pointed this out. Maybe it was Torrico. Did you see the razzled dazzle play that they ran at the end of the game on their final possession, kind of the hitch and pitch at the line of scrimmage? Did you see that play or not? I was done by then. Okay. So, Green Bay, so Detroit gets the ball back up 20 to 16.

and on their final drive trying to run the clock out, they had a second and 17, golf passed at the line of scrimmage to Amman Ross St. Brown, who turned and pitched it to D'Andre Swift, and he picked up, you know, like, I think it was like 14 of the 17 yards to set up third and three. And I think Torrico said, if they were playing for a playoff spot,

do you think we would have seen that call? And I thought it was a great point. Now, it's kind of the way Dan Campbell coaches anyway, but yeah, like they also went for a fourth and one with a minute 15 left that clinched the game. Green Bay was out of timeouts, and it was a long one. It was closer to two, and they threw the pass, which ended the game. I don't know that if they were truly playing for a playoff spot, if they wouldn't have kicked the field goal to go up 23 to 16 and just said, you know what, with a minute 10 left after this kickoff and no timeouts, We got a pretty good shot. But anyway, Detroit did a great job. I mean, Aaron Rogers had Aaron Jones fumble at the end of the first half, threw a ball to Romeo Dobbs right in his hands when they were up. It would have been a big play, probably put him up two scores, and he dropped it.

And then you heard Aaron Rogers after the game, and I'll just say this. If he ends up becoming available with new ownership here, that would be number one on my list. in terms of, you know, personnel. Go get Aaron Rogers to put with Terry McLorn and Jehan Dodson and Brian Robinson Jr. And Antonio Gibson and Curtis Samuel and a top 10 defense in the league. And let's go contend for a Super Bowl next year.

I mean, I don't know that Aaron Rodson. No doubt. No question. And then leave Scott Turner where he is because he's great. We don't need Scott Turner. I would tell Aaron, I would tell Rogers, you tell me who you want the office. We'll hire Nathaniel Hackett. Hackett's available.

We'll bring Hackett here. That was his favorite guy anyway. Isn't it amazing that you're saying that? Anybody in Denver listening to you say that right now would laugh. Okay. I like Nathaniel Hackett, too, though. I like him a lot. I don't know what happened to Denver.

Well, he clearly wasn't a head coach. You know, Norv wasn't the greatest of head coach. coaches. But, anyway, the playoff... No, that would be amazing. You are a Super Bowl contender right now with Aaron Rogers. Well, yeah, with that team around him? 100%. Even if, by the way, the offensive line was this year's offensive line,

you'd still figure out a way with Aaron Rogers two of one-twenty games this year. Huh? You'll also, you'll also have an actual concept out of fucking protect. Yeah. Do you know there are people listening right now? I swear to you this is true. Because when we had the conversation two years ago about Aaron Rogers and Matt Stafford and Deshawn Watson,

and when we had the conversation in the off season, yes, about Russell Wilson agreed, okay, understood that that would not have been a great move. But there are people out there right now saying, are you guys out of your mind? You're going to take on Aaron Rogers' contract? Did you watch Sam Howell play yesterday? they don't have to spend on the quarterback. No, you think you're laughing, but there are people out there.

And by the way, there are other people out there saying, you bring back Heineke and Howe and let them compete it, compete for the job. And then you take that money that you won't have with Wentz, the $20-something million, you keep Duran Payne, you add two offensive linemen, and you can win nine games next year and be a wild card team. If you got Aaron Rogers,

you'd be a Super Bowl contender next year. Here's the thing. I wouldn't have done what Denver did for Russell Wilson. And I've done this show long enough with you that you understand. I know. I think Russell Wilson has done a lot of really great things. That's just not the direction I would go, would have went, would have went in Seattle five years ago,

and Seattle moved on from that. But Aaron Rogers, that's a different deal. You've got to deal with some of his divinness. No, who cares? But he's a different... Anybody that... I'm sorry. I'm sorry. If you were just going to say, let's build on Sam Howe,

and you had a chance to get Aaron Rogers, you're dead wrong. But it could work out in the long term with Sam Hal. It could. You're just wrong right now. It would be great for Sam Hal to, you know, play behind Aaron Rogers for the next two to three years. I mean, Sam Howe doesn't cost anything. I'm not saying, right, right. I'm not going to say that he is or is.

going to be anything. He did a good job in a game, which is nice. But it's not, you can do so many different things with Aaron Rogers. It's not even a conversation. It's not, it's not, it's not, it's just dumb. And you're right, you know, even when Russell Wilson was killing it in Seattle, Cooley always felt that there were certain limitations to Russell Wilson's game, that, you know, he was phenomenal off schedule the best in the league, but from the pocket, he was limited because of size and a lot of other things. I would not, by the way, close the book on Russell Wilson. Sean Peyton looks like he's going to be the coach in Denver. I don't think Sean Peyton would go to Denver unless he felt strongly about being able to make it work with Russell Wilson. Because Sean Peyton would have,

you know, plenty of options in this offseason. Plenty of them. So, you know. And I think Debra's a good landing spot for him. Well, there is, the Harbaugh's on the list. Harbaugh's, I think, going to be on the list for Tepper and Carolina. By the way, what do you, I can't believe I haven't asked you this. Not just on the podcast.

So do you think Sean's going to leave coaching? Like a lot of reporting that McVeigh is going to leave the Rams, that he's going to retire. I don't know. I don't talk to Sean as much anymore. I get the feeling that it's a lot of stress. I don't know. Here's the thing I would guarantee you with Sean, is if he leaves coaching, he'll come back to coaching.

Exactly, yeah. But if it's too much right now and he leaves coaching, he'll come back to coaching. Here would be the other thought is, but I can't really give me. imagine this? What they did in Los Angeles really

doesn't help them continue to build a team. And Sean is one of the only people in the world that I know who could deal with what they did in Los Angeles with all the big names and all the personalities, all the personalities and manage that and keep everyone happy.

But that's got to be frustrating at times with the guys that they have, not saying they're bad guys. but just that many big contracts and that little room to build and does he love Stafford. If he was really looking at it and saying like Stafford is going to be here, he's going to be my guy,

I can do whatever I want. He's got, it's been a great ride for Sean so far. It's also been super tough as far as losing 50 freaking coaches as well. Every year he's got to deal with 9,000 fucking thousand calls including me. It's like, hey, I'll come coach. Like, can I have a job? Can I interview?

Can I do this? Like, every single year has been a new hiring skill or new hiring system for Sean McVey. He's got to deal with all these guys. He doesn't, there's been no draft stuff. It's worked for them in some aspects, but it can't be that much fun. Cardinals. That much administration for a head coach. Cardinals just fired Cliff Kingsbury and Steve Kime, who has actually,

I think he stepped away even prior to the end of the season. He's got issues, personal issues, I think. He did. He's stepping away, too. So the Cardinals have an opening. So the openings are obviously the first one was Matt Rule getting fired in Carolina, Hackett getting fired in Denver, Lovey Smith getting fired in Houston, two coaches, two years in Houston,

and now Arizona. am I forgetting. Am I forgetting anybody? I don't know. I think that's it. Belichick says he's coming back. Belichick's coming back. Yeah. So, by the way, I wanted to just say one last thing. Mike Tomlin, he's never had a losing season in 16 years. He won his last four games to finish nine and eight, and they were damn close to making the postseason. I mean, the Jets had it. chance to beat Miami yesterday. And it would have been better to see the Steelers in the postseason. I would have loved to have seen Kenny Pickett, you know, in the postseason in his

rookie year, rather than seeing a Dolphins team that probably is going to have to start its third-string quarterback. Maybe. I don't know what the quarterback situation is. But my God, whatever Mike Tomlin does as a coach, it works, man, because that team, we've watched it the last few years. It has been a limited team, a majorly. limited team. And they won six out of their final seven games and nearly made the playoffs to

finish nine and eight. The dude is never in 16 years had a losing season. It's amazing Tomlin how good he is. And you know, you just think about that organization, three coaches, three coaches. That's it. And Tomlin, you know, he's only won one Super Bowl. You know, and I guarantee you Mike Tomlin's going to be one of those Hall of Fame conversations. That's going to be a tricky one because they're going to say, well, Mike Shanahan's got two. Tom Flores has two. And Mike Tomlin only has one Super Bowl. Now, maybe he'll get another one before he's done.

But to me, I mean, this is where, like, this is what, and I said this about Rivera the other day, Cooley. I think that a lot of times when people just look at the records, they don't understand. And coaches know, like sometimes coaches will tell you. that the year they went six and ten was the best coaching job they've ever done. Like Mike Tomlin going nine and eight this year and not making the playoffs or going eight and eight a few years ago, might have been the best job he's ever done. That's why when everybody looks at Rivera, I just don't think he's anywhere near as bad as you think he is. You people do.

And I'm not saying that I love him. And if they move on from him, fine. And I think at this point, he's a different coach than he was in Carolina. I think he's more of a CEO. and clearly he's had more of a, you know, he's had a much bigger role in this organization. But when you just, like Ron Rivera, I think most of his players will tell you the year that they were without Cam Newton for like three games and then they won their final few games to win the division, even though he had a losing record at 7, 8, and 1 may have been the best job he did. They won a playoff game and nearly won a second. But yeah, his team had a losing record.

So chalked that up to a losing record season because you want to keep that nethered. narrative that, you know, he only has three winning seasons in the 12 that he's coached or whatever. He didn't have a losing season this year. I don't know why I'm defending Ron Rivera, because I really don't have strong feelings about him one way or the other. You just went through, but what's amazing is you went through Tomlin. And at the last 12 years, Ron Rivera's only had three winning season. I know. I know. But he's also never... He's got two or three, eight, eight and eight, and now, Nate.

He said, I think he had two eight and eight and eight and one, but he's not had, he's only had three winning seasons out of 12 years. Granted, one of those was a 15 and one, and I think what, 12 and 4 and 11 and 5, but nobody keeps the job consistently for 12 years when they've only had three winning years. Nobody. I understand that. I do. And I'm not, and I'm not pushing back on he hasn't won enough.

And that very few, if any, coaches would have been a. afforded the continued opportunities that Ron Rivera had given the losing seasons. But I would just tell you this, okay? Number one is he's never had a season totally implode, never. Number two is he's been to the playoffs five times in his 12 seasons. He's the only coach in NFL history to take two teams with a losing record to the postseason as a division champion. And I think he would tell you the 15 and 1 and 12 and 4.

seasons, I did an okay job. 7, 8, and 1 in making the postseason, and then the 7 and 9, 20, and 2020 season, which started with all that turmoil, and we were 1 in 5, and we came back with Alex Smith, Kyle Allen, you know, and then Taylor Heineke, we had to play in a playoff game, is probably one of the best coaching jobs I've ever done, and we finished that year 7 and 9. That's all I'm saying is that coaches, I think if you talk to coaches, they would be surprised at Ron Rivera's three winning seasons in his 12th. They would say, really?

That doesn't seem right. He's a better coach than that. That's all I'm saying. And I think he's done it. All I'm saying is it's really rare to find somebody that's only one three times in 12 years that's still a head coach. That's 100%. It's actually three. It's now nine losing seasons and 13 because he went five.

100 this year. I think that's what it is. Yeah. Is that what it is? I don't know what it is now. I'll hear. 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 12 seasons. And he's had a losing record. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. 8. He's had 8 losing seasons out of 12. And in two of those eight seasons that he didn't have a winning record, he did go to

the postseason. That's also amazing. And won a game and almost one. two games in 2014, which was the year before 15 and 1. And all of the seasons that he had a losing season in Carolina, his best player, his quarterback, was banged up and missed games. But whatever. I've done this before.

It's boring to everybody. Yeah, whatever. What else? He's going to be there next year. It would be my guess. I think that's my guest to be in Washington next year. That's my guess, too. I think if it were a normal situation, I don't know.

Although at this point, if Dan continued to own the team, Dan doesn't want to pay coaches that aren't coaching for him anymore. You know, we've seen that before. All right, thanks for doing this. I appreciate it. Will you join me later in the week to preview the playoff games? Yep. Are you going to watch a national championship game tonight?

Sure am. Okay. Stanford, Steve. I like watching the ball, especially the playoffs, the playoffs scenario. they get a lot of time to put stuff together. It's a lot of fun. You get to see a lot of fun stuff as far as scheme stuff and what teams are doing. Stanford Steve is there.

As you know, you know Stanford Steve well. Stanford Steve of the Scott Van Pelt show. He's there doing a lot of stuff for ESPN. And I'm going to finish up today's show with a conversation previewing the championship game tonight. That's next right after these words from a few of our sponsors. National Championship game tonight out in Los Angeles at SoFi Stadium, Cinderella, TCU, and of course, Georgia looking to go back to back. My good friend Stanford Steve from the Scott Van Pelt Show is jumping on with us right now. You can follow Steve on Twitter at Stanford Steve 82, and we'll talk about what he'll be involved in tonight for ESPN,

because they'll probably have like 15 different telecasts of the game. But I want to start with this. You were at the Peach Bowl for Georgia, Ohio State, 42 to 41. You obviously watched earlier that day, TCU 51 to 45 over Michigan, two incredible games back to back. I know who's playing in the game tonight, and I know both of these teams won their semi-final games, but you were there for Georgia, Ohio State on the field, and you watched and you know a lot about Michigan and TCU. did we get the two best teams in the country in the national championship game? I think TCU was the better team.

I'm not sure if Georgia was the better teams that night, Kevin. Being on that field and, you know, everybody talks about, you know, the Blue Bloods or the big brand names. Like it was Georgia, it was Ohio State. It was as big as it could get. And the momentum swings that were given. and haymakers that were thrown in that game were just incredible. And only Ohio State could bring the fan base that they have to Atlanta

and match up against Georgia as far as, you know, numbers and crowd noise and stuff like that. But then to see CJ Stroud come out and do what he did, I still can't. It's a week later. I can't believe he was the losing quarterback in that football game. I thought the world of what Ohio State did it as far as a game plan, what they put on the table, and they just didn't have enough other guys at the end to finish the deal. And, you know, you saw that on the last drive with Strouding up getting the run and then trying to get extra yards and just not having the guy that they trusted to separate. That ends up being the difference in the game.

But I, you know, plenty of talk, you know, you have had on your shows about Ohio State quarterback's going. the next level. I just can't talk, you know, highly enough about C.J. Stroud and what he did against that Georgia team. I thought that was by far in a way the most impressive performance of his very young career, and he's going to be in the draft, obviously, at the end of April. Yeah. And most people think it will be Bryce Young. I'll ask you about that in a moment. But that was the best night, because I really thought, you know, when they got into trouble in Columbus against Michigan, he actually got tight in that game. Do you agree with me or not.

Yep. No doubt. And I will say this, the way I thought Ohio State schedule was very beneficial. I thought Georgia's schedule was very beneficial. When you look at Georgia's schedule, they come out with a banger, you know, against Oregon. Then there's a lull. They get up for South Carolina. There's a lull.

They get up for, you know, Tennessee, and then they run the table after that. When you look at Ohio State, they were tested. They had Notre Dame, but then you could see going back and watching the tape, too, Notre Dame, Ohio State and Ryan Day, they knew Notre Dame wasn't going to score. That was a totally different concept. But yeah, they were down, but when they got the lead, they ran the ball, and they just didn't, they did not fear Notre Dame's offense at all. It was also early.

It was also early, and we never see the best in the openers. No doubt, no doubt. And when you get to the Penn State game, you know, they face the, some adversity, but their defense, you know, Penn State's right tackle gets out, gets hurt, and, you know, J.T. goes crazy off the edge and doing what he does, and one of the best defensive performances there was in the year. But when you got to the Michigan game, you know, I'm watching the, off, I went to the Maryland game, you know, in college park, and I'm watching Ohio State's

offensive line, and they were impressive. They didn't move people off the ball. I thought they're running back to the great job, you know, with his vision and making plays in that second half. but they were not impressive as a unit seeing in person, and that's what made me really wonder about when they got to Michigan. So then they go to Michigan. What happens?

You mentioned Stroud looked tight. He was tight because for the first time all year, he had guys in his face. You know, they did not do a good job in pass protection. And Michigan did a great job with the two fourth downs in the first half of just getting off the field and getting their offense on the field. And in the second half, they started dialing some things up. They got the lead.

and that's where we saw Stroud look like he never has in his Ohio State career and then come back 35 days later and do what he did against Georgia. I just think a lot of creditors should go to him. And Ryan Day, I mean, their game plan was tremendous. None of their top two running back. They lose Harrison in-game and they still get that close to doing it. I was on the field for the Chase Young, Ohio State, Clemson, Piestable, which is one of the best games I've ever been on the field.

and then to see that happen, and the way it transpired, it's just unfortunate for Ohio State. You're right there to monumental games, and Ryan Day doesn't get the wins, but I don't look down on him as other people just want to bash him for supposedly not winning the big one anymore. I'm not in that camp. I want to get back to the game here in a moment,

but now that we're on C.J. Stroud, and by the way, you mentioned that game. That was really the game for me that solidified in my mind that Justin Fields was worth taking a shot on. Like I was thinking of it from the Washington standpoint. That was his revenge game from the year before, and he came up so big in that semi-final against Clemson. And, you know, it turns out, you know,

it looks like Justin Fields was a pretty good trade-up and selection by Chicago. It's early, but that was the game. So I would ask you, you know, was this C.J. Strouds game where NFL scouts will look at it, and say maybe it is him over Bryce Young? I think so. Now, it's really, really hard.

Everybody wants to compare people, right? Kevin, like, it's just, hey, who does this guy remind you of? Who does this guy? I look at Bryce Young, and I love every single thing about him. His decision-making, his accuracy, I don't think it's talked enough about, for what he does, whether it's on the run, or just putting the ball wherever it needs to be. But he's really, really slight, man. Like there's not a lot of girth in his legs.

And when you look at these guys at the next level, just look what happens. Like, Kyler Murray is a very well put together athlete. You know, he's got a big trunk. His legs are big. He keeps getting dinged up. You know, you just look at the Justin Fields. He couldn't get through this season.

And when I think about Bryce Young, that's the kicker to me is, will you have him for a whole season? And the way the league is, big guys, beat up little guys. It's been that way forever, and it's not changing. And that's the, because the way, what makes Bryce so good is his ability to let things play out and hold on the ball to the last second and get that ball in a window where it wasn't available, you know, a half a second earlier. So when I look at Stroud, I just saw the, you know, obviously everybody's going to talk

about, you know, how comfortable guys are in the pocket. Everybody could throw the ball well when the pocket is there. But what Stroud showed me against Georgia, I thought was pretty high opening. There was some just some guts with throws and the ability and the wherewithal to run the ball when he had to. In the moment, that's the thing. I mean, you talk about that game. I talked about the momentum swing. Like what Georgia did, we'll talk about that.

But Ohio State to have to keep answering and knowing he's got, you know, You know, Stoverton, tight end, that doesn't get talked about. He's the whole team. Yeah, they lost him. They lose him, and they put the Rossi kid in who at the end, he's an H-back, full-back, tight end. And he's at running back on the last, I think it's four drives of the game, just as a personal protector. Like, wherever the blitzer comes, you go throw yourself at that blitzer and keep CJ upright.

And the way they figured that out and to get that close, yes, I was wondering about Stroud, and I'm a believer after C. I mean, not many guys could do what he did in that moment with what's at stake. He was absolutely tremendous. So, you know, if you look at the draft order right now, Washington, well, let me just ask you simply, if you had the first overall pick in the draft and you needed a quarterback right now, you've got to make the pick as a GM, Stroud or Young. man that's um it's i think it's young i really do uh now you told me last year in the championship game i remember i talked to you like the next day or the day after and you said good god is bryce young small and you just said it earlier like you said he is like five ten i mean but does it matter

Oh, that's pushing it. That's pushing it. All right. It's that close. Yeah. So it's between 5-9 and 5-10. I would say so, yes. Yeah.

So you've got to pick somebody. Pick somebody now. I would take, I would take Price Young. I just, the total package. I would too. And like I said, I keep saying, the wherewithal, he's, both guys, I think, don't get credit for the way they process things. And everybody can say what they want about Ryan Day system and this and that.

But when you go back and watch it, it's not a, you know, hey, get the ball and throw here based on what you see in coverage. It's not that. It's way more advanced. But what Bryce has done and then to see him be able to do it. You know, go back to 19, Tua and Joe Burrow had an advantage every single time they stepped on the field because they had to be. elite playmakers, you know? And then you see Bryce this year with not elite playmakers

and still be as effective as he is. That showed me a lot. But I think he knows it too. He knows, you know, the injury. He didn't have to take that hit against Arkansas, which, you know, altered their season. But yeah, I think by the slightest of margins, I think it's Bryce Young. One thing more on Ohio State and Georgia. I mean, you know I liked Ohio State. State. The number seemed, everybody was on Georgia, so I was on Ohio State plus the number. But the thing that I said before the game was I just am so concerned about them defensively. And I think, I know you love Ryan Day and I love that you love what they are offensively and have been offensively under Ryan Day. But I think what their Achilles heel has been for a

couple of years running. Look at what Maryland did against them is they can't stop anybody. No doubt. And they gave up 500 and whatever yards in 42. against Georgia as well. It's a combination of things, too, Kevin. You know, you look at what they have. You know, the kid 33, Jack Sawyer, he was the top recruit in the country at that position, defensive lineman.

And being at media days, you just got a sense of, you know, players talking about it. Like, they wanted to see more, like almost take the governor off, you know, just let it all out. And I feel like that's the case with a lot of their guys. They have top-rated prospects,

come to the program. And T to the moment. kid falls down, Georgia. What is it? 73-yard touchdown path. That can't happen in those spots. And then when you look at the physicality, you know, game on the line, they couldn't stop Georgia.

And you're right. That has been the kicker or the ultimate deciding factor in why they've lost these games. They can't get stops when they need to. And it's kind of mind-boggling because you look at it.

All right, top-rated linebacker, defensive end, defensive back, safety. They have it all. They just can't put it together, and it really shows up in the biggest spots, and that's what burned them. All right. Before we, we're talking to Stanford, Steve, before we get to tonight and just your preview and your pick, what did you think at TCU, Michigan?

I mean, you know I had a rooting interest in that game, and I know you picked TCU. I mean, you had them plus the points, and it was a big piece, pick for you and you liked them a lot of the year. What did you make of that game? I mean, it's over a week and a half, you know, just over a week since that game, but what were your impressions of that one? Well, all months, you know, leaning up to that game, I'm just watching.

And, you know, the story of TCU, right, started slowing games and then, you know, came back in second halfs. And Michigan sort of did the same thing, but in a different way where they just wear it on you with physicality. And I said all, all month leading up to that game, game, the first half was absolutely enormous for TCU's defense. They had to prove that they could hang in there. And then first play the game, 59 yards, Simon Edwards, and it doesn't, and it doesn't look great from the start. But Michigan gets cute. They run the Philly Special inside the five.

We know about the touchdown call. That should have been a touchdown. But TCU gets a pick six. You know, they get some big plays and stops and hold, you know, hold Michigan to a couple field goals. that was absolutely just enormous for them because the way TCU goes about, in their offense, they have answers for everything. They just, there's a feeling out period. You know, whether they go with formation, whether they go with personnel, or whether or else, you know, Duggan wants to try his own read against different guys, it takes a little bit of time for them.

And what their defense did and keeping them in that game and ultimately, happened, what, a two, or was it 14, six at half? Or, well, whatever it was. 21, 26 at half. It was 21 to six, yeah. 21-6. And to be able to do that, now you get Michigan totally out of their game plan where I thought Michigan would just come in against that 335 and just ball them. You know, whether it's inside zone or, you know, just running duo up the middle, you know, first play of the game I mentioned it. They run ISO. First play. We don't really see that again.

and I really thought Michigan's injury schoonmaker to tie down to 86. He gets hurt in the first half. They really, really struggled on the edge. And that's the whole basis of the 335 is you have edge guys. You have guys that have speed. You create matchups out on the perimeter where they can rush, they can hang back, and it really, you know, confuses the quarterback. And TCU played all that.

I mean, they deserve it all. But that played right in their hands. having to lead at halftime and then being able to do things and hanging on at the end, knowing they had a couple tricks up their sleeve on the offensive side. But the first half was huge, and I think it's even more important come tonight in Los Angeles. I really do. Their defense has to show up in the first half. You've mentioned about four tight ends already here in our conversation. For those of you that don't know, Steve was a five-star tight-in prospect,

and the Connecticut player of the year when he went to Stanford. All right, so how does TCU pull off what would be one of the biggest shockers of all time? I mean, it's 12.5, 13, wherever you're getting your number. How do they pull it off, or can they? It starts with Doug and, Kevin. There's no doubt in my mind. He knows he has to play better. And when you go back and watch the Michigan game, they went at them.

They went at that Michigan secondary, and he was not accurate. it. He was overthrowing deep balls. He threw a couple deep balls out of bounds. And that's why I talk about they have answers in their offense. And a lot of that is taking shots early to get coverage where they want it or coverage to back out of it. And then that helps them in the run game because you look at what they did. I think they ran for 263 yards. That's incredible against Michigan. And the way they did it was the back guys out of the box. And then Max is able to read whether they want to read deep or they want to read the outside linebacker, and the running backs did a great job.

That's the one thing about this. They do a great job of getting north and south immediately, and Max does it too. But when I think about this matchup in the injury to Kendra Miller, they really, really need him. Now, if you have Miller and you have Mercado and you have Max, now you've got three different dynamics you could go at. But if they don't have Miller, I don't know if Riccato's a guy that can, and withstand a game against Georgia knowing he's going to get, you know, say 20, 25 carries

because you look at what he does. I mean, the first play, he comes in, they give up the sack, they show the camera, he runs right over to Kendrae Miller. He doesn't know what to do in the past protection. He had no idea what to do, and he's the one that gives up that sack. So they got to be way more tightened up if they could get anything out of Miller. It's a huge plus. And now, you know, seeing Media Day a couple days ago, he's saying he's 50-50.

That doesn't bode well for me in TCU because you need all your weapons at hand. Kendrae Miller is an NFL back. He's going to play at the next level. And if they're without him, look, they got through basically half the game without him because DeMocardo played really, really well. And Duggan played well as a runner as well. I thought really some of the biggest plays of the game were against the zero blitz where Duggan strung it out.

and on that big one found, you know, Johnson for the touchdown, did it a couple of times. But, so, I mean, I don't give them much of a shot, even though I want you to speak to this real quickly. I think most people look at TCU and think little TCU. They got a lot of NFL players on their team, don't they? Oh, absolutely. I mean, just look at the difference makers they have on the defensive side of all. They're back end. Yeah.

And they're not afraid. They have great instincts. You saw that a bunch in the Michigan run game where I'm still trying to go back and watch the tape game. I mean, they have linebackers triggering from five yards deep where they see, you know, a mesh point with quarterback and running back. And those guys are firing. And it's the Winters kid, I thought, did a great job because he's the guy they're going to move around and try and I don't know if he's their. best pass rusher. He led the team in fact, but man, is he have great ball skills and just just wherewithal, man. He knows exactly what the offense wants to do. And that's the idea.

I think Georgia does a great job of moving formations, mixing up personnel. And I think you're going to laugh. I think the Washington injury is huge for Georgia because when you put another kid the size of him and that's what causes so many problems against Georgia's offense, is he's basically another tackle. And look what Georgia did. They had really a lot of trouble getting pressure from the outside because Ohio State tackles are so big. So I think Georgia, with that size, you know, on the perimeter,

that's where they cause it. And now they go misdirection off of that. And then sure enough, you get a little eye candy in the backfield. Now you thought those guys were coming across the formation. Now Bowers is running vertical. And you're like, all right, who the hell is supposed to guard him? You know, so there's a lot of eye candy, but I think the Washington, the Washington injury is huge because they need him to make them balance and they do everything off, you know, 12 personnel, one back, two tight ends. It's enormous for Georgia to have some consistency off as if they have him on the field.

God, it was funny because for a while it was like, where's Bowers in this game? And you were worried they couldn't do it without him. All right, two more, and I'll let you run. Number one is this. you and I talked about Georgia multiple times during the season, and you've already mentioned it. Like, who, going into that Tennessee game, it's like, who did they beat? I mean, you know, the Oregon game was the opener,

and, you know, they kind of fell asleep a little bit and barely beat Missouri. I think it was Missouri. There was a Mack team that scored a bunch of points against them. And then against Tennessee, you Kent State. They mauled Tennessee. Like, that score was not indicative of how one-sided it was. And then, you know, you even look at the Kentucky game was ugly. The Georgia Tech game for a while was ugly.

So which Georgia team are we going to get? And what's your prediction on the game? That's where you've got to go when you look at this is what is Georgia. And I think they really don't want to be put in the predicament they were last game against Ohio State. I mean, they got jumped from the start. And like I said, it's still a credit to what Ohio State game plan was. But I think they have to come out and be the aggressor. You know, Kirby always talks about, you know, we're the hunted.

We want to be the hunter, no matter, you know, if we're undefeated, the whole nine. But I do think PCU is up against it here because of the constant pressure and how deep the roster. Everybody knows about the recruiting Georgia has done. And you saw that be the end-all factor and having more guys at the end against Ohio State. So I look at Georgia as finding a lot of. finding out a lot about themselves, knowing the situation. Kevin, go back to that game. Everybody talks about, oh, if Kirby Smart didn't call the timeout on the fake punt,

the biggest play of the game is the review on Bowers, getting the first down. I know they only got three points off that drive, but they needed those three. And if he doesn't get that, I still don't know how he did it. Well, I think, Cole, I think he keeps himself in bounds. I think at 38, 35, getting the stop and holding Ohio State to the field goal was the crucial spot in the game. Ohio State had every idea, the way they were moving it, they hadn't really been stopped that much.

The fact that they got held to a field goal rather than extending that, you know, with two and a half or three minutes to go to a 10-point lead, was huge. Yeah, but I mean, also too, I think Georgia season's over, if Bowers doesn't get that first down. Yeah. That's fourth down. Ohio State gets the ball. It's still two possessions.

Yeah. You know, like that, that's the one thing. So I think they come, I think Bowers is going to be huge off the get. I think they're going to want to get him loose. You know, hearing Jimmy Knowles talk about facing Georgia's offense. He called it Wheel City. And, you know, there's wheel routes coming from every single guy on the field, no matter where they are on the field.

So I think Georgia's got a couple more things lined up. And I'm also curious if Georgia, I talked to a bunch of, you know, offensive and defensive guys about this 335 concept. And what you want to do is try and spread it, sidelines and sideline. And I wonder, knowing Georgia has multiple running backs, if they go with like a little 20 personnel and put two backs in the backfield and then use Bowers as that slot receiver where he could go back and forth across the formation, I think that is something to look at

that Georgia hasn't shown a lot about. And with Washington not knowing his status, I think that could be something that gets Bowers loose early in this game. All right, your final score prediction is what? Oh, man. The first half, I got it's so, now what is it? First half line is seven now. I think TCU is getting seven.

So it'll be interesting. I think I know all the money and everything is on TCU. I think I saw a three to one ticket count, you know, earlier. blindly, I still go with it. I still think they have the goods to take it. I'm going to say Georgia 31-23. All right, so you got T-C. But I'll take TCU on the plus the number.

What are you going to be on tonight? Where can we watch you tonight? Oh, man, I'm going to be, we got college football live starting at 1 o'clock Eastern, and we go championship, I mean, coverage starts at 1 o'clock Eastern all the way up. And I'm still trying to get used to this time change out here. because everything, you know, the schedules and everything, but we got college football live at 1 o'clock Eastern, then we do championship drive,

then we got college game day leading right into the game. So I'll be going to be on all that stuff. Are you going to doing the same thing you did with McAfee for the last one or not? No, no. I'll be in the truck for this game. Okay. Help it out with the broadcast. Okay.

So I'll be on all the pregame stuff, and then I'll be in the truck, helping the broadcast be as good as we can be. All right. Enjoy it. I'll see you when you get home. Thanks. I appreciate you, man.

Stanford Steve, everybody, at Stanford Steve 82 on Twitter. I'm excited about tonight's game. I like Georgia to win the game. No smell test selection on the game. I thought about giving out Georgia. I know a lot of you have reached out to me to say, Georgia is she in right? I mean, all of the actions on TCU.

That's true. There's also some very sharp action on TCU. At least there was at the end of last week. The line I see it's climbing back up to 13, 13.13.5. It was down to 12.5. The total right now at 63, 62 and a half. A lot of overaction on that. So I kind of like the under in this game, but I don't have an official smell test pick. I was 0 and 1 basically on my smell test picks because I gave out the browns, which did not get it done. And then I gave out Detroit, but only if Detroit was playing Green Bay for a playoff spot. That was my if-bet on Friday, so I did not get the benefit of Detroit covering. So 0-1 with nothing tonight. My prediction on the game, I'll go 3724 Georgia.

It'll put it right on the number, and it'll put it just barely under the total. All right, 37 to 24, Georgia. And I think what should be another entertaining game, I'm hoping it will be. I'll be rooting for TCU, a place that I spent a lot of money on for four years of tuition for my old son. He will be at the game tonight in Los Angeles. That's also where he lives.

By the way, one last quick thing. Big win for Maryland basketball yesterday against 24th ranked Ohio State. loved the bounce back. They were favored in the game. Now, if I were giving out college basketball wagers, I would have given Maryland out yesterday. The public was pounding Ohio State. Terps had really looked bad in their last three Power 5 games.

And they came up big yesterday against Ohio State and College Park, beating the Buckeyes 80 to 73. Man, Jemir Young, 30 points and 11 rebounds for your starting point guard. No assists. They had five guys in double figures. Man, Juju Reese is frustrating. I know he is guys, all right? He's got some skill.

He's got some talent, but there's really a lot of immaturity. He got teed up in that game. It turned the whole game around there late, got Ohio State back into the game when Maryland was up 14. He's got to learn to control his emotions. I mean, I think that's the third or fourth time I've seen him in his two years or just his year and a half year, get teed up for something. very similar. I could be exaggerating that. I know it's happened before at least once he just does

not seem to understand that you can't score on a guy six inches shorter than you and start woofing after the bucket. They're going to call you for that. He's got to mature a little bit. He's got to get a little bit tougher. He's got some skill. He's got some talent. And that's all they have size-wise. But that was a good win for Kevin Willard's team. Man, when they can run, when they can get up-tempo, when they can get you into a more frenetic kind of paced game, it suits their style. When it's grinded out, it can be really, really tough for them, especially if they're not careful with the basketball and they don't shoot it well. They shot it much better yesterday. They were, I think, 46.5% from the field.

They were, you know, made five threes. I mean, it's actually, you know, not that bad. And they didn't turn it over nearly as much as they had. And they rebounded well yesterday. Their guards rebounded exceptionally well. Good win for the Terps. They actually don't have another game until, I think, Sunday at Iowa. But they needed that one in the Big Ten.

They would have fallen to one and four in the Big Ten and said they're two and three and what is a crazy wide open Big Ten. Georgetown had a halftime lead in a big East game over Marquette and then got out scored Saturday, 61 to 37 in the second half. The Caps won over Columbus. They continue to roll. I mean, the Caps right now sitting there in third place by themselves now in the Metropolitan. They've really done a phenomenal job. But the 1-0 win over Columbus was a big one.

and the Wizards played Friday night lost, got blown out at OKC. Not a good game for them. So that's two losses in a row. I got to tell you, and I mentioned this, I mentioned this when they played Oklahoma City the first time. Shea Gilgis Alexander's turned into an absolute superstar. 30 points a game he's averaging. He is really, really sensational.

All right, that's it for the show today. be back tomorrow with Tommy.