The Kevin Sheehan Show - Scary MNF + More Skins-Browns

Episode Date: January 3, 2023

Kevin and Thom opened with the Damar Hamlin situation from the Monday Night Football game. They talked lots of Commanders-Browns with Thom a bit sore from patting himself on the back. Lots on Rivera, the QB situation moving forward and more.  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 Chean Show. Here's Kevin. Tommy's here. I am here on this Tuesday. Thanks to all of you who have rated and reviewed the show recently.

Some of the ratings and reviews have been outstanding and they've been helpful. Keep them coming, especially on Apple and Spotify. It was, you know, it was certainly a traumatic night as a, As a fan of the sport that we all love, which is the NFL, watching what happened last night to D'Marne Hamlin. And there's no update from where there's been. He is in critical condition, and he is in that University of Cincinnati Hospital. We're going to talk about that on the show today. We're going to talk about certainly what happened on Sunday.

We are going to do a lot of sports on the show today. this from C.L. Big Cilo via Apple Podcasts. Actually, I'm sorry, this from E.B. Schwartz on Apple Podcasts. Love this show, great guests, including football psychic Tom Leverro, who has never been wrong on a Carson Wentz prediction. Looking forward to his book, making an appearance on Kevin's bookshelf in the near future. Thank you, E.B. Schwartz. And from Big Seelow, 980, over the past 20 years, got me through my commute. From Zabe to Sheehan, to Laverro, I've aged with you guys like fine wine. And I, thank God, I have settled in with Kevin Sheehan's podcast with all of the different characters on the show. Thank you very much. Appreciate that.

It was a longer review. I didn't read the whole thing. So if I didn't read it verbatim there, Seelow, just understand we have a time limit on this thing. But thank you very much for the review. Appreciate it a lot. And yes, Tommy at Shelley's one day is a place that I'm sure he would love to bump into you as well. Absolutely. You know what I'm thinking, Kevin?

What? I'm thinking I should organize some kind of gathering at Shelly's because I get a lot. of that. I get a lot of people on social media now say, well, I'd love to meet his shelley's and have a cigar. Don't think I need to organize something. Well, you do have your something. You do have your something every year. But I mean, something separate from that. Just a casual thing. Okay. So wet their appetite, then maybe they'll come back for the D.C. Graves fundraiser. It's always one of the best fundraisers of here in town. Yeah. When I get back from Florida, I'll plan on that. I can't.

do it until the middle of March because I'm in FLA, where I was drinking a Destin Ale on Sunday afternoon following the commander's game, wasn't watching it or listening to it. You didn't watch? Wait, wait a minute. You didn't watch it or listen to it. No, I didn't have to. You didn't have to. Oh, you didn't have to. Oh, you didn't have to. Oh, okay. Well, that's really interesting because I just read the column that you put out today. And by the way, I love Tommy's columns because he's never in doubt, no matter whether he is an opinion you agree with or not, he's never in doubt and he's fearless. And he basically wrote a column that started with. It should go without saying that when the season ends, Ron Rivera should never coach another game for the Washington commanders or whatever the new one, owner will call this team once he or she, wouldn't that be justice, comes in and flushes everything in the building down the drain? And then he proceeds to talk about a game that he didn't even watch. But I mean, why should you don't need to watch the games to write a great column.

You don't need to cover the Olympics and be there. I saw, listen, I saw the game before it happened, remember? You kind of did, but not really. And we'll get to that. that. We will definitely get to that. You definitely saw the game in terms of Carson Wentz. No doubt about that. You didn't, though, I don't think have a sense of what really happened in the game. But we'll get to that in the second segment of the show today. I do want to make one recommendation, because we're going to start with what happened last night in Cincinnati and talk about that a little bit. But I want to recommend that you go to the team 980.com and listen to my third hour of the show, the top of the hour.

I had a very good friend of mine who is one of the best and leading cardiologists in town. He was the team doctor for the Wizards for a long time. He's now consultant to the Wizards and NBA players. And a lot of the athletes in town do a lot of their cardiac evaluation with Dr. Barry Telesnik. And Barry was on with me this morning. just did a phenomenal job. And I don't know, like last night for me and going through it, and we'll talk about this a little bit, but I wanted information from people who really had an idea of what may

have happened. And he... Yeah, and you know, look, last night, one of the things we can talk about, but since you brought it up, I just want to follow up on that. I wasn't particularly crazy about the ESPN coverage. I thought it got a lot better when they went to Scott. And I thought he was great. But for 40, 45 minutes, it was, there's nothing to say everyone's in grief.

And I wanted to hear from some medical experts and some doctors like your doctor. I wanted to hear more information. And I think they felt shorter that. Look, I completely agree with you. 100% and I'm going to say this with this caveat I think a night like that

is a really tough night especially and I think Scott and Ryan Clark and Susie Calber and all the people they did their best but I think where I had a problem with ESPN's coverage

and I again I don't on nights like last night where you're in the fog of who the fuck knows what's going on you know it's easy to hindsight it But in the moment, I will tell you, I turn to the news coverage. I turn to MSNBC, CNN, and Fox.

Fox and MSNBC, the two extremes of the political spectrum, had incredible medical people on talking about this commotion cordis, which we now understand is a distinct possibility of what actually happened to Damar Hamlin. And who knows? The speculation, you know, these were. weren't doctors that were on the scene, but these were, you know, you had doctors, you had EMTs, you had, you had a list of people that could at least speak to what they saw, what the reporting was with respect to, you know, CPR for nine minutes on the field, cardiac arrest, no surgery,

and, you know, there are people, and I'm with you. Now, look, I guess it's a matter of preference. Maybe some people just prefer the perspective of the athlete that played the game and the brotherhood of all of those players and the risks that they take and all of that. For me in that moment last night, I think maybe I was more like you. I wanted the information. I wanted experts to tell me what happened to this guy or at least give me an expert opinion on what may have happened to him. And, Yeah. ESPN,

they purport to be a news organization, a sports news organization, but a news organization. Okay? When you're a news organization and disaster strikes, you've got about five minutes to get your act together. Then you're in a different mode. Okay?

And I just think they never got around to do it. I thought Ryan Clark was very insightful. I thought he was good to listen to. Like I said, I take it stepped up once they went to Scott. Well, Scott was with Ryan Clark. Yeah, I mean, here's what I would say. And look, you've been in it as a reporter, not to make you or me, you know, a part of this story. Because really, I just want to talk about what happened last night and what we saw and what we think, et cetera.

I mean, I did spend literally 16 hours a day on the air for four straight days during the Sean Taylor thing. And I remember that being very much a, what are we going to talk about next? How are we going to fill the time? You know, it's not easy. And for them, you know, last night, but I ended up turning it, not because I thought Scott and Ryan actually were really good together. Because I thought that was the best part of the night. But I'm not objective when it comes to Scott. But I admit.

But I admit I had to turn it because I wanted some information. And I wanted, and I think that's where perhaps, I haven't talked to him yet. I texted him actually right when the injury happened, and he said, I've got the live feed up here, and it looks like this is really bad, like they might be doing CPR on the guy, because they have the live feed. So when we go to commercial, they continue to see what's going on, you know, Scott. And so, but that was the last time I texted with him. And I think he did a great job.

In that particular case, I would have told my producer, I need a cardiologist. I need a neurologist. I need an EM, I need emergency room people. I need, by the way, also, I'd like a league historian to talk about the fact that this is not the first time something like this has happened where, you know, and, I mean, or the possibility of it happening. And it didn't happen last night, as far as we know. I mean, information is still developing in tomorrow Hamlin and he's in critical condition. But, you know, Chuck Hughes died on the field in 1971. This guy, Glenn, Howard Glenn, died in 1960, playing for the New York Titans,

who became, you know, eventually the New York Jets. By the way, I'm curious because I was thinking about this. Do you remember anything about the Chuck Hughes death? I remember when it happened. I wasn't watching the game, but yeah, it was 1971. Yeah. I remember how stunning it was. and now I've since read a lot about it since last night,

and he literally went into the game with just a few minutes left. That's when it happened. Oh, really? Yes. Yeah. The Bears had a 28 to 23 lead with time running out, according to thegrowingtruth.com, which has a pretty good story about it.

Larry Walton, who had caught a touchdown pass from Lions quarterback, Greg Landry earlier was injured. Chuck Hughes replaced him. Literally, he was the last minute replacement. And he died of a heart attack on the field, right? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, you know, Dan...

And it was Dick Butkus who was standing over him and frantically motioned for help to come in from the sidelines. But he could sense that Chuck Hughes was in a lot of trouble. You know, Dan Daly, who used to write for your newspaper, right? And I, you know, I follow Dan on Twitter, and he tweets a lot of really good NFL stuff. I mean, I would consider personally, I would consider Dan kind of an NFL historian in many ways, which is why I enjoy following him on Twitter. And he had, you know, all of that. And I can, I vaguely remember the Chuck Hughes thing, because I remember, I said this this morning, Tommy, on the radio show.

You and I did a, you know, kind of. kind of a, you heard it here first, you know, the segment that we used to do on the show on the sports fix years ago. And I remember, I remember two things that I said both on the same day. And you're not going to remember it because you only remember your stuff. I said, somebody's going to kick a 70-yard field goal in the next five years. And somebody's going to die on a football field. I remember that because I've just, it was off of a weekend where there was just like a couple of vicious hits. And it was just the whole nature. of bigger, faster, stronger.

The game has gotten so violent. And I remember thinking, it's going to happen one of these days. Now, by the way, what happened last night is not the way I would have envisioned it. It was a very benign play. It was a big hit that T. Higgins delivered on the tackle to Damar Hamlin. And, you know, essentially what Dr. Telesnik told me this morning is, look, this was a one-and-a-million thing. It was more likely than not, this blunt injury that basically, that basically, basically disrupts the heart rhythm and you go into cardiac arrest.

It's happened with a lot of young people in baseball games and lacrosse games. Yes, it has. And so it's something that doctors are very familiar with. And he said the absolute key is to, you know, CPR and DFB to get the heart pumping again so that the oxygen that gets cut off from the brain and other key organs, that it's not a long period of time. And it would appear as if that's kind of really what we're waiting on to find out how long he was without oxygen to the brain

and to key organs, I think. But who knows? I mean, again, speculation, but at least a doctor's speculation. And so that's like a one in a million. When we've thought about it in the past, it's been the violence of the game. Like some massive hit was going to take somebody out, you know? Yeah. This was not like, in a way, this was like the Dale Earnhardt crash.

Which people didn't think at the time was super serious. Yeah. Yeah, it did not appear to be a life-threatening crash when it happened. I mean, we've seen far worse. That happened in NASCAR. And yeah, usually when we think of this happening, we think of a guy basically getting just, you know, just a missile defender. coming in and nailing a guy who's not even looking, you know, and taking him off his feet.

Chuck Hughes, there were 62 seconds left in the game when Chuck Hughes went down. You know, you would have to think, too, in 1971. Like, Dr. Telesnick-Berry was telling me this morning that, you know, the workups that these athletes get prior to going out under the field. Now, he deals mostly with the NBA and NBA players. and he's like the cardiac evaluation that they go through before a season every year during the offseason. But back in 1971, more likely than not, there was not a lot of preventative, you know, before a season clearing players before a season started. I mean, these guys were coming in off, you know, their other jobs to get into shape during training camp.

Yeah, like I thought about, I, so. So in the moment, like, it didn't occur to me until I actually had talked to Scott and he said, you know, and then they came back and Joe Buck said they've administered CPR for the last, you know, several minutes. And then we heard that it was nine minutes. That was the first time I thought, oh my God. Even the reactions were obviously a different kind of reaction. But I don't know. I guess as a sports fan, you know, 99, well, 99, 99,000 and 99. out of a million. They get up and they thumbs up and then, you know, 30 minutes later, there's the sideline reporter saying he's got, you know, feeling in all of his extremities and he's being taken to the hospital for precautionary reasons. You know, you get that, you know, you get that once a weekend, usually. But that wasn't last night, obviously. It wasn't. Yeah. No, it wasn't. Now, another problem I hadn't, I had. I had.

with the whole event, was the NFL taken 65 minutes to figure out they should cancel the game. They should postpone the game. I mean, once that ambulance left the field, that's when the game should have been postponed. I mean, if you saw those players, it was obvious the coaches weren't going to let their players play, even at that point. Yeah, I don't have major criticism for that. As I was watching it, I was like, of course this is going to be postponed. Like once you realized that he had had a cardiac event that they had administered nine minutes of CPR

and the players had left the field totally distraught and they had witnessed this, you know that there was, you know, you knew, I don't know, I pretty much knew that they weren't going to play the game and they needed to postpone the game. And I thought they would obviously get to that decision. How long it took them to get to that decision? know. Who knows what was going on, who was available. Troy Vincent, you know, came out and said that this report, I guess, that the NFL had instructed the teams to start to warm back up as if they were going to play was totally ridiculous and not true. Well, you know what? I mean, Joe Buck was the one

who reported it. He had to hear from somebody. Well, it doesn't mean that the referees on the field didn't say, all right, you know, I mean, again, fog of craziness, I don't know. I don't know. They did the right thing by postponing the game. But let me just say this. So look, I mean, obviously prayers, sensitivity to what this, you know, sensitivity to what this, you know, Demar Hamlin went through. And all of that's a given in these conversations. But I don't know, Tommy, for me, I think you can have a conversation about a lot of things. Like today in the league office, I would imagine there is the incredible concern over Damar Hamlin.

and the two teams and everything else. And at the same time, they're trying to figure out how to finish the regular season, logistically. And I was thinking about that, you know, not because I was like, oh, this is such an important game. They've got to get back to it. Of course, it's a human thing. I mean, that comes first. That was a life and death situation and still may have ultimately been, you know, something that doesn't go well. You know, fingers crossed and prayers up.

But I think that the NFL, the most likely way to handle this is I think the bills and the Bengals are not going to make up that game. I think they're going to end up doing what they, the NFL told us might happen during COVID, which is some teams may not play 17 games or 16 games. It was 16 games in 2020, right? Because last year was the first year of 17 games. Right. So some teams may not play 16 games. So we will go on overall percentage. And that's how the teams will finish based on your winning percentage.

So I mean, at this point, Buffalo flew back to Buffalo. So they're not playing the game today, obviously, and they're not going to play the game tomorrow. I can't imagine that they're going to play the game tomorrow. Unless there was like a miraculous, and this would be wonderful, he, you know, he's responsive, his very, vitals are great, and it looks like he avoided the absolute worst, and he's going to be okay. You know, we all want that.

Barring that, I don't think they play this game, and I think you end up with the Bills and the Bengals finishing up their season this coming weekend, which means that the Chiefs, all they've got to do is win their season finale against the Raiders, and they would clinch the one seed. Buffalo then wouldn't have a chance to get the one seed, even though they beat Kansas City straight up. And then Baltimore wouldn't have a chance to win the division had Cincinnati lost last night. But I don't see the league pushing back week 18 and canceling week 18. I don't see that at all. I mean, I know there's a weekend between the Super Bowl and the championship games that you could use and just go, you know,

push the championship games and the playoffs up a week. I don't see them doing that. And the only way they could get the game in is to play it by tomorrow. you can't play it any later than tomorrow. We had Pittsburgh play a game during COVID on Wednesday and then play Washington. Remember on that Monday afternoon, you know, after they played Baltimore on a Wednesday? So you could theoretically have them play tomorrow and then play on Monday night. And then for their playoff games have the latest possible weekend playoff games.

There is a Monday night playoff game now. Remember we started that last year. But I think it's going to be that this game is not. made up. That's what I think is the most likely, you know, the league is probably going to announce that I would imagine sometime later today. That would be my guess. Unless the teams, and they get good news and the teams say, Buffalo's flying back to Cincinnati, they're going to play the game tomorrow afternoon and finish up the game, pick it up from where it left off. I don't know. I don't see that happening at this point, though. What do you think?

I don't see it happening either. I think you're right. I think there's, I mean, the easiest thing to do, even though there's no easy solution to this, is the least amount of uproar that you would cause through accommodating playing this game, you just don't play it. And you live with the consequences of not playing it, as opposed to, you know, changing around the whole edifference. self-schedule to accommodate this game. Yeah, and exactly. I think that they are going to say, look, the bottom line is there's absolutely no way to

make this game up. And the players, by the way, went through a very traumatic experience, and they need some time here before playing another game. To have them play two games in five days, essentially, is actually unsafe. You know, they'll probably couch it. way as well. And Buffalo in Cincinnati are going to play 16 regular season games, and whatever their winning percentage is, that's how they'll get slotted. And the biggest, you know, Yeah.

Imagine if this had happened next week, the 17th game, the game they added the NFL. I think there would be a huge outcry if they had, if this had happened in the 17th game. I think there would be much more of an outcry. I mean, I think there would have been an outcry, but I don't think that it would have been justified given the injury. It was a one-and-a-million shot, and it happened early in the game, and it wasn't because of, you know, I mean... I know, but the more you play, the more you increase your chances of that one-and-a-hundred-million shot.

I had another thought. What if this game, I'm just... I'll give you my thoughts. I want your thoughts. What if this game had just been a regular run-of-the-mill Sunday 1-pm game in the 1-pm window between two teams that were not playoff bound? I think it, well, it wouldn't have the impact of a Monday night event, but I think the outcome would have been the same.

Oh, I'm not talking about the outcome for the player, because every stadium... No, I mean, the outcome of, you know, you cancel the game, you postpone the game. No, no, no, I agree with that. Agreed. Okay. And I think in a 24-hour news cycle that didn't exist in 1971 when Chuck Hughes went down with 62 seconds left in the game, and then they finished the game with the last 60 seconds. I think given a 24-hour news cycle, I think like the network that you watched would have all jumped on top of it quickly,

especially on a Sunday afternoon when there's not a lot of news. that would have been, that they would have jumped right on that. Yeah, I think. And work moves quickly in social media now. I mean, people would have known. I mean, once you, once you, if you had said to people, there's a player in the, oh, in the Brown's, commander's game, who's lying on the field and they're giving CPR to, everybody's phone and tablet

would have just went right off. I understand that. I don't disagree with anything you. said. I think where I was going with it was this was Monday night football. It was the biggest Monday night game of the year. I mean, this was a significant game. So there was a massive audience. By the way, it's also the field in which Tua was concussed and there was that serious, serious incident earlier in the year. I think that was a Thursday night game actually. Or maybe it was a Monday night game. I can't remember. I just think that the right now, it's like, at least in

this country, it is the number one story. It is, you know, and it's like, well, what's next? I mean, how are they, you know, everybody's focused in on him, but, you know, it's like, you know, there are people, certainly in social media, which I tried to stay off of a little bit, was, you know, well, they need to delay the season. They need to consider about, you know, there's some crazies out there that actually think the season should actually be terminated. Like, trust me, people. This is an $18 billion business. They're playing games this weekend. Okay? I actually, let me back up on that. I would rather defer to the man that said the tournament, the tournament. They're not playing the tournament. Okay, so I will defer, I will defer to you. Are they going to

play football this weekend or not? Of course they're going to. Okay. Yes, they're going to, well, you know what? What if he dies? What if he dies? Like on Friday, I mean, I hope he's not, look, everyone is praying for the best outcome possible. But if the outcome is not, is the worst, I think they're going to have a hard time playing this weekend. Everybody. Okay. So that scenario, then you bring into the equation, I mean, I certainly am not, people, trust me, I'm not equating this to 9-11. Okay.

I'm just saying that, remember, they didn't play that week, and they extended the season by a week. So if that happened, Tommy, leading into the games on this weekend, I guess it is possible that they could use that two weeks between Super Bowl and championship games and push everything back. I think it would be unlikely. I think it would be unlikely. I think you have to have some kind of significant acknowledgement

of what happens. I think the NFL has to have some kind of significant acknowledgement as to what happened, a dramatic acknowledgement that would be out of the ordinary. You're in player safety. I'm trying to think of... It's such a big issue. And again, like you said, this particular play would not be the kind of play you would point to when it came to player safety so much, but that will be the discussion.

Like you just said, it's a story that's transcended sports, you know, where I'm at, people who don't follow sports are talking about it this morning. So, I mean, they won't understand the need to play. The country will not understand the need to play next Sunday on Sunday. If, God forbid, the worst happens, and this young man passes away. Right, but I guess the larger point here is you're not going to, trust me, you're going to play week 18 at some point, and you're going to play every single playoff game at some point.

You know, your question about what would this, what would have happened had this been week 17? What would, I mean, what would happen if this happens and it certainly could in the future during a playoff game or God, you know, God forbid it never happens again or the Super Bowl. I mean, it's. Well, that's the NFL's worst nightmare. In addition to obviously the family of the player, it's the league's worst nightmare. Here you all the ironic thing. And, you know, I look. By the way, it could happen in any sport.

It could happen in baseball with a line drive. I mean, you know. Yes. I mean, by the way, can I just tell you something? I want you to say what you're going to say, but I don't want to lose this thought, and I'm afraid I'm going to. The first thing I thought of last night when we saw the replay of him standing up and then keeling over, the first thing I thought of was Hank Gathers.

I just wanted to mention that. That was to me. A lot of people did. Still the one image of somebody dying in a game that I'll just never, ever forget. And obviously, if you recall, he had had heart issues and arrhythmia issue was medicated, and it turned out that they had backed off some of the medication, and it was just a horrendous, horrendous thing. But anyway, what were you going to say? Continue.

Well, I was going to say that, you know, this is, I mean, this is obviously, you see all the commercials about flag football, so this is a priority-sensitive issue for the NFL right now, and their worst nightmare would be having death on the field. And, you know, for all intents and purposes, if this young man would, and I really hate to talk about it, would pass away a couple of days after the incident that everybody had seen, I mean, people would just, you know, take it as a death on the field. But last night after it happened, you know, I went into,

and this is why I don't understand about ESPN. I mean, I Googled every, I Googled, you know, all of the high school football desk. Yeah. And found out within five minutes, usually about four or five kids a year die on a football field in high school. Right. In this country. Yes. And that doesn't make the front page, you know, because that happens in a small town, usually, or a small school district or it's a very localized story.

Well, typically. But it's remarkable that it happens. I like it does. So that was, I mean, I think if there are avenues, I would have driven down if I was a news director, you know. And I know it's assuming the worst, but at that point, you've got to, as long as you're sensitive to the event, you've got to plow ahead because nobody knows anything at that point. I agree with you. I mean, you can't just go with, you know, 30 seconds, I'm sorry, 30 seconds of I don't know what to say, 30 minutes. of, you know, what's there to say?

There's plenty to say. I agree with you. And again, I say that, you know, understanding that the people in those chairs put into those chairs unexpectedly, you know, starting with Joe Buck and Troy Aitman, and then they were going back to the studio with Susie Calder and, and, oh, my God, who else? Adam Schaefter. And Adam Schaefter. And it's, I mean, you.

I mean, it's not easy. I'm not, you know, I'm not blaming them. And in some ways, I'm actually, and this is kind of the way I felt, you know, because I think Scott and Ryan did a really good job. And actually, I thought it was, they were much easier to watch than what came before it personally. But again, it's, I'm not objective there. But I think that you've got to have people saying, all right, here we go. We've got, here's some information.

You know, we've got, by the way, we've got this cardiologist. He's an emergency room doctor. you know, at Cleveland General or whatever, he's coming on. Like, I don't know, like a lot of this medical stuff I tend to be very curious about anyway. And by the way, it's not good to be overly curious about this stuff. I'll just, you know, it's not really good to be on WebMD all the time. But I'm, like, I, to me, was, I'm with you. Like, I thought about Hank Gathers.

Then once I heard the CPR thing, I'm like, what happened? What people, people, doctors that deal with this all the time, you know, they knew. They knew what the two or three possibilities were. Now, what they don't know and what Barry told me is,

you know, could there be some sort of pre-existing condition? You know, they don't know that. But the fact that, you know, like he said, the fact that he stood up and then went down was much more indicative of sort of this blunt force versus, you know, something neurological or something, you know, with respect to spine or neck or anything like that. I think we all understand that.

But he also said once he heard that there was no surgery, that they had sedated him, then he knew it wasn't structural. And these are the kinds of things that throughout the night. I agree with you. I was searching for that. And I found it on other networks. I think a lot of the news networks did a decent job. of getting those kinds of people on. And by the way, ultimately, all of those people that they had on,

I understand, could have been dead wrong, but still they're experts in the area. And their opinions much more informed than, you know, and I'm not suggesting that Adam or Scott or Ryan or anybody, because they didn't. They weren't speculating, which I thought was the smart thing with respect to the, you know, what kind of injury. And unless, you know, unless you had specific,

experience with something like that where you could have used that one experience to discuss it. But other than that, it's probably, you know, it's, it's probably a little bit too risky to go in that direction. That's why they should have had people lined up. I agree with you. And the high school stuff. You got to have somebody in their ear saying, we're going to go to this. This is what happened here. Yeah.

You know, we're going to bring this guy on. I didn't stick with it for a while. Switching back and forth. It never did. did. It was to say it was for half an hour. It was literally there's nothing to say kind of thing. And I know, I understand

that. You know, it was a horrific scene. And by the way, for the first You know, it's funny. Yeah, go ahead. I was going to say you talk about a pre-existing condition. When Chuck Hughes died, he turned out he had

premature hardening of the arteries. Sure. Really bad. and that was not diagnosed in 1971 apparently. Right. Yeah, well, I mean, how old was he, Tommy? I forgot. I did read this, and I forget now. 28 years old.

Yeah, I mean, there wouldn't be a reason at 28 without any sort of symptoms to go in and get an EKG and an echocardiogram and a, you know, full-fledged, you know, cardiac workup. I mean, at 28 years old, you know, if you didn't have symptoms. definitely not in 1971. There was something else that I was going to say. You know, the ironic thing about Chuck Hughes is in a game before against the bills, he took a shot to his ribs,

and he stood on the sideline. Then he collapsed in the locker room, and they took him to the hospital. And they said the doctors thought that he had an injury to his spleen. But, you know, an autopsy later revealed that he had an enlarged spleen, that his spleen was probably so painful. It probably triggered what was a first heart attack when he collapsed in the locker room. So, I mean, there were warning signs back then.

It shows you how different the game is now. Well, yeah, I mean, back then it was, you know, roll Chuck around. He's going to be all right. He's a man. He'll be out there next weekend. Yeah. Yeah. You know, there was, there was, I'm looking for, here it is, I found the story, I meant to have this up.

So, Damar Hamlin had a charity foundation that he had been a part of. And it was, you know, basically, I think a charity donation, hold on, where is it? Oh, it was called the Chasing M Foundation, which purchased toys for children. toys. Yeah. Right. Toys for children affected by the pandemic and impoverished children, et cetera. As of just a few hours ago, $3 million had already been raised for this.

And they went into it. And if I'm right, go ahead. Go ahead. Go ahead with the number. No, I was going to say, I read $2,500. $2,500 is what was in it before. That was the goal. Yeah. And now it's at $3.3 million plus.

Yes, indeed. Absolutely. Okay. Let's get to Ron Rivera needs to be fired right after these words from a few of our sponsors. All right, this segment of the show is brought to all of you by two of our favorite sponsors. The first is MyBooky. Go to MyBooky.orgie. Use my promo code, Kevin, D.C., and they'll double your first deposit dollar for dollar.

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very few places are doing that. They'll do it if you use my promo code, Kevin D.C. That's Kevin D.C. I will tell you there's Washington and Dallas, and I'm going to talk about this in the final segment of the show, what the NFL did with the final weekend of scheduling. Washington, Dallas, if you don't know, is a 425 kickoff on Sunday. Dallas is playing for, you know, potentially the division

and a number one seed potentially throughout the NFC playoffs. although the Giants probably will not play this game. Their position is set as the six-seed. The Eagles are 14-point favorites over the Giants at my bookie. But Dallas is only a five-point favorite over Washington. I mean, aren't we going to see Sam Howell? We better see Sam Howl on Sunday, unless you think that would be shitty to Taylor Heineke

to not start him on Sunday against Dallas. Maybe you think it would be shitty to start them against the Cowboys. But anyway, go to my bookie, use my promo code, Kevin D.C., and they'll double your first deposit dollar for dollar all the way up to $1,000. Yeah, Dallas right now, minus five at Washington for a $4.25 start. Tommy, our other favorite sponsor is Shelly's Backroom. Shelly's Backroom at 1331 F Street, Northwest in the district. My home away from home, I'm on a two-and-a-half-month sabbatical from Shelly's.

down here in Florida. But I miss it. I missed the place. And like I said earlier, that I think I'm going to organize some kind of informal get-together. Am I invited? Yes, listeners. Of course you're invited. Okay, good.

Of course you're invited. Nothing particularly structured or something like that. Just maybe put people out there. I'm going to be there at this time. And let me know if you want to show up and we'll all have a smoke together. because I get that a lot from people, you know? And you'll see, as opposed to my bookie, Shelly's is more of a spiritual reward,

as opposed to a financial reward. Is it really spiritual, though, for real? Yes. Yes. For me, it is. It's a spiritual award. Okay. Absolute reward.

Absolutely. That's funny. When I say my home away from home, I mean it. So. I'll tell you what. For some people, my bookie is a home away from home. And by the way, let me make a spiritual recommendation. Don't make it your home away from home.

That can be really, really risky. Shelly's a lot less risk. Yes. Yes. So we're going to do that when I get back to town. But, you know, that doesn't mean you have to wait. You could go out on your own and check out Shelly for yourself. And please, I recommend that you do.

And bring your friends with you. So they'll be impressed that you were so smart. to take them to the best spot in D.C. Shelley's back room. Okay. You have not had a chance to weigh in on the game. I already did my... I mean, I don't know how you can weigh in.

Wait a minute. What? That's it? That's it? What? You have not had a chance to weigh in on the game? There's no music. There's no, like, 1812 overture?

No. There's no flight at a Valkyries. No, because you didn't watch... There's no... You didn't watch the game. Conquering. There's no conquering hero music for me. Because I am the conquering hero.

Well, you apparently are, but you didn't watch the game. So you're... No, I didn't, like I said, I didn't have to watch. Apparently not. You did, actually. That TV show where they had the newspaper that published the news the day before it happened, that was me. Tomorrow's news headlines today? Yes.

I almost had the score nail that had 2413. Is that what you said it was, 2413? Yes. Wentz couldn't even weasel another three points out of that offense. Well, at least I had the Browns and the smell test. Smell test, by the way, eight and three. Your smell test is hot. I know.

After Tulane's incredible comeback yesterday in the Cotton Bowl. I mean, one quick aside, because I did not spend a lot of time on this, because it was all on the Cleveland game primarily. The two semifinal games on New Year's Eve were just spectacular sporting events to watch, start to finish. And I know I had a rooting interest in TCU. and I know I had a betting interest in Ohio State plus the points, but those were two of the best college football games you will ever see with those kinds of stakes.

And then, you know, these bowl games, which just aren't a big deal anymore, really, but they are to the people involved. The Cotton Bowl yesterday was so thrilling to watch Tulane as a one and a half point underdog. That was it. Rally from 15 down in the final few minutes to beat Southern Cal, 46 to 4.4. It was a great game. And yes, the smell test. Is there any music that you wanted to play for me about the smell test this past weekend or this year in general?

Eight and three, I did have last night a wager, which obviously gets voided because the game got postponed. But all right, so let's, you know, I read your column. You sent it to me this morning, and I read the first paragraph of it in the opening to the show. So I guess let's do this first. Tell me, even though you didn't watch the game or didn't listen to the game, tell me what you thought of the game. I guess that's a reasonable question because you didn't have to watch the game to know that Carson Wentz was pretty awful.

Social media probably told you that. You didn't have to even play the game to know that Carson Wentz was going to be awful. I mean, like, this is what I don't get. I mean, I got to thought this is not like some NFL, you know, film breakdown kind of thing. This is not like you needed some kind of special knowledge to know this. I mean, this is the book on Carson Wentz. Everybody knows this. You saw the Browns defenders.

They were giddy when they found out that Wentz was going to start instead of Heineke. They knew what the rest of the league knew. They knew what everyone else knew. According to what clown he told reporters, once we get him rattled in the pocket, it's over. Coming in, we said, if we can get him rattled, we can get some turnovers out of him. We knew that, okay? Linebacker Reggie Raglan, if you know football, you know Went has a slow release, and He gets the ball out fast, and then this is the killer part.

but this guy played at Alabama with Jonathan Allen and I think Cam Sims as well. Some of the guys I know on the team, they would have preferred Heineke, but they know he gets the ball out. You can see it on film, too. They play different with each quarterback. That's it. So you know what? Let me drop the mic, and you can cue the music now.

First of all, that Reggie Raglan quote, there was a lot of information that a lot of the beat reporters, and I actually got last week that would refute that. After the three games that I guess everybody forgot that were played before the game on Sunday against Cleveland when they went O2 and one. Three games against two playoff teams, three games against two playoff teams, one of possible Super Bowl contender as opposed to the six and nine Cleveland Brown. Right, who had Watson for the last four games and had beaten the Ravens and it played the Bengals tough and, you know, lost a close game. to the Saints coming into it. Oh, my God.

But no, you know what? I'm going to let you do your thing. Do your thing here. No, no, no, no, I don't want to do my thing. I already, I already did. No, I don't have. I mean, I will make you aware of, I will, I will make you smarter about what happened in the game, but it's, I'm not going to change.

I'm not going to, I'm not going to disagree with you on Wence at all. You're, you're 100% right on once. I mean, if that's what you want, congratulations. But it's not like anybody thought he was going to. be great. I didn't hear one person anywhere say that Wence was going to be like this was going to be the difference in the game and in the season. Who said that? No. Well, Ron said he needed a spark. Right. And he got a spark all right. He got actually an out of control fight. This was so predictable, Kevin. It was. He was going to give it up. The Browns knew it. Everybody knew it.

So you haven't heard my take on the game yet. So let me really, really piss you off here. First of all, the Raglan thing, after the 0-2-and-1 run, there are a lot of us that heard the opposite about last week. Not a couple of weeks ago. They loved Taylor, but that there was no problem with Ron's decision to go to Carson Wentz, which obviously was not a good decision. I'm going to go with the Brown's information over the information you get out of the building.

You shouldn't because I don't know why you would do that. But anyway, so Wence was horrible in the game. I mean, last week, and here's where I'll give you, you know, much of the credit. We both said that our expectations were, you know, it probably wasn't going to be much different. You said that you gave a much higher probability to it being a complete disaster with Wence. and I said that that was my lowest probability, my highest probability was we were just going to see a lot of what we've seen recently. I didn't have any elevated expectations. So he was bad in the game.

I gave him a D-D-minus for the game. But Tommy, by not watching the game, you missed a significant part of this. And maybe I should ask you this question first. You didn't watch the game, so I don't know how you can answer this, but you'll answer it anyway. Do you think they would have beaten the Browns if Taylor Heineke had been the quarterback Sunday? Yes. Okay.

That's where I'll just, not only will I disagree with you, I will strongly disagree with you. Because on Sunday, Carson Wentz was terrible. Terrible, okay? Not only was he terrible. He choked. Like he had passes, Tommy, that you didn't get to see because you didn't watch the game.

Like a little swing passes to running backs, one that he sailed over the running back's head by five feet, and the other one that he threw into the ground barely past his foot. Like he was super, super tight in the game, and he was awful. Now, there's no way that anybody in their reasonable mind if they were watching the game after the interceptions in the first half, the two interceptions would have benched him at halftime. And the reason for that is he actually led the longest NFL drive of the season.

Right before halftime, Washington had a 21 play, 96-yard drive that took 11 and a half minutes, gave him a 7 to 3 lead at halftime with them getting the ball to start the second half. And he converted, he was a part of an offense that converted six times, five on third down, highest of the year in the NFL, and once on fourth down. three incredibly solid throws. Like he actually did what Taylor did in the Green Bay game. Remember when Green Bay, the Packers game where he threw, you know, had three turnovers or two turnovers and it should have been about seven in the first half. And then in the second half, late in the first half, he came to life and they were able to win the game. And that's what happened on the last drive.

Like I went in at halftime thinking they're going to win this game easily. I mean, the Browns aren't very good. Watson looked terrible in the first. first half, but they didn't have the ball because the offense had it two to one time of possession in the first half. 39 plays to 20 plays. They just dominated offensively on that one drive, which is amazing because that's kind of exactly what they've done with Taylor Heineke. They've had these drives and the scored halftime seven to three. Does it sound familiar? It should because that was essentially the score of every Taylor Heineke game. You know, they scored seven or less

and four games, 10 or less than six of the games he started. And so it was the same formula, like they had their formula for, you know, what they had done with Heineke. And they had stuck to not, you know, dropping Wentz back a bunch, you know, and spreading it out. I've actually got a thought on that after watching a little bit more of the game yesterday. But anyway, here's the big difference, Tommy, in the game. Wentz was terrible.

Two drives. The drive at the end of the first half, and they had a drive in the third quarter. when they were down 17-7 for a field goal where he was really sharp. Other than that, he not only was horrendous, he looked like he was lacking in confidence, he looked like he was choking, gagging in a big spot. And the Heineke chance in the stadium started, and you could tell. Now, he got through that initially with that big-time drive. But here was the big difference between the Sunday game.

Here was one of the big differences. I don't want to say it was the big difference. But it was a big difference between the game that Carson started, and as you know, I'm not a Carson-Wenz fan, hated the trade, said it wouldn't work out, did, you know, my expectations were minimal for this upcoming game. The big difference was that there was no complementary football in this game. None. Taylor Heineke, I don't, whoever the quarterback had been during this stretch of 5-2-1,

During that stretch of his starts, there was very complimentary football. You know, the defense was good, the running game was good. Wentz was bad. He was really bad. But Tommy, the defense had its worst outing since week two. It got completely shredded in the second half. Shredded. Three drives, three touchdowns, 222 yards.

Carson, Deshawn Watson became Deshawn Watson again, making big-time plays, and none of it was hard. It was all easy. They dropped two balls on him. Now, why was that the case? Well, they didn't have Cameron Curl. They didn't have Benjamin St. Juice, and they lost John Allen in the first half. And for the first time, they were really horrible since week two on defense. They got no support because how many of these games were Taylor played,

poorly, like D-minus level, but the game was like 16 to 7, or it was, you know, 10 to 10 to 10 or whatever it was in the Minnesota game, 17-7, whatever in the 17-13 or whatever in the Minnesota game, and some of these others, but the defense had led the way. You agree that the defense led the way during the 5-2-in-1 run. Their defense in the running game. Yeah. Okay. We've had that conversation.

On Sunday, the defense, and I said this on Monday, I hate saying this, because the reason, they were in this position to have a chance to make the postseason was the defense more than anything else. The defense was thin, injured, and horrendous in the game. In the game, Nick Chubb had 14 carries for 104 yards. He averaged 7.4 yards per carry. Deshawn Watson in the game only completed Tommy. Nine passes. Three of them were for touchdowns because of Horrible tackling, horrible coverage. He also rushed for 30 yards in the second half. On three straight drives, they rolled up 222 yards and 21 consecutive points.

It's the only time it's happened to Washington all year, except for the Detroit game. Actually, it's the only time it's happened all year, period. No team has scored three straight touchdowns on three straight possessions. And then the running game, which has been a big plus for Taylor throughout, It wasn't that it was terrible because it wasn't. And definitely Scott Turner's play calling leaned on the running game. Thankfully, by the way, because if he had thrown more balls, he would have more interceptions. But, you know, Brian Robinson averaged three and a half yards per carry.

He was 24 carries, yes, but for 87 yards. Like it wasn't like they were running and gashing and the play action was set up easily. And the defense was getting three and outs and short fields and turnovers. No, zero takeaways. Zero. So the big picture in the game, from my standpoint, this is my opinion, is that the number one reason they lost the game was the defense. The number two reason, and I'm not saying it was a distant number two because it was close, was the quarterbacking and the offense in general, the quarterback in particular

because he really was, with the exception of the two drives, super tight. But that kind of game on Sunday was not a game, in my opinion, that Taylor Heineke would have had a chance in. Oh, please. Of course. You can get – I mean, what are you talking about? Just what I said. I don't think he would have had a chance to win the game. That's absurd. This is – okay, no. Okay, go ahead. Well, I mean, the week before, when the defense gave up the most explosive plays without Cameron Curl. Against the Giants. Against the Giants. Hold on. I'm talking about the 49ers.

Okay, I'm talking about 49ers game. Okay. They had no chance, right? Because the defense gave up the explosives. And actually, the defense played much better against San Francisco. You know, it was the turnovers. Remember, well, I guess I would turn it around and I would ask you during this 02 and one stretch and really going even back to the Atlanta game where they needed a fingertip on the ball

to not lose to the Falcons who were terrible, who they could only put up 19 points on, which everybody else was putting up 30 plus on. What would make you believe that they would have won the game with Taylor Heineke based on what we had seen from him recently and then not having a defense play well for the first time all year? The Giants are a playoff team. The 49ers are a Super Bowl team. The Browns stink. Taylor Heineke can beat the Cleveland Browns six out of seven days a week.

He certainly couldn't with the defense playing that way. No, he couldn't have. Oh, yes, he could have. No, he couldn't. He would have given them an answer. Give me the example of the game where the defense didn't play well and he won. At any point over the last couple of years. No, I'm not going to play this game with you. Why not? It's not a game. It's not a game.

Yes, it is a game. What do you mean my guy? Because who's my guy? You are in favor of Carson when starting the game. Oh my God. Hold on for a second. He's not my guy. But you were in favor of him starting the game. What I said was, I'm fine with it. Yep. I'm totally. fine with it. At this point, try Carson Wence because it's certainly not working with Taylor Heineke. They can't score. But that was a ridiculous, that was like, I mean, like, there was like,

like I said in my column, anyone who thinks that Carson Wentz should have started that game basically belongs in the dope museum. Oh, shut up. Whether or not Taylor Heineke thought you could win or not. Oh, God. Taylor, so you would have rather, you, you, this is, this is the problem. It's so funny because I was thinking about this last night. You, it's this kind of ridiculous take that for me now, moving forward,

they can't resign Taylor Heineke. Because I would want, if everybody could be reasonable about what Taylor Heineke is, which is of the 37 quarterbacks ranked by pro football focus, he's number 36, only ahead of Zach Wilson. That's not the argument. That's not the argument.

That's not the argument. The argument was who had the better chance of winning that game? No, no, no, no, no, no. That's not the argument. No, no, I never said, that's not the argument. That's not the argument. You said he would have won the game. You said he would have won the game.

Yes, but you didn't watch the game. And there's no chance. Well, I didn't have to watch the game. Yes, you did. I saw the game before it happened. Did you know that the defense gave up 21 points in 222 yards on three, drives to start the second half? I knew the defense. Did you know that?

Okay, good. And you think Taylor Heineke, the 36th ranked PFF quarterback out of 37, only Zach Wilson in New York's been worse. And again, I'm not a pro football focus, you know, disciple. I'll admit that. He's second worst and turnover worthy throws in the league. The guy had five fumbles in the last three games, lost four. I'm sorry, five fumbles, lost. lost four of them, and an interception with the game on the line and three of them. Okay, a playoff team in the Giants. They are a playoff team, you're right,

but Washington should have been that playoff team. Taylor Heineke would not have to clean his pants out after every time he came off the field. Completely agree with you on that. 100%. And that was what I said on Monday. There's one big difference. Taylor Heineke has never lost confidence

and has never shit himself. You know, the way Carson went did. There is no doubt about that that is 100% true, but it would not have been enough for him with his limitations. Look, his limitations, the Giants are a playoff team because they beat Washington once and tied them once. Those two teams in terms of rosters, except a quarterback are dead even. Washington's got a better roster than the Giants have. Although I think Daibald's doing a really good job, and they probably got out-coached. They definitely got out-coached in the game when they didn't give, when they didn't give Brian Robinson, Jr., the ball at 7.4 yards per carry,

more than 12 carries, which was another, you know, answer there. It's like they did rush for 160 yards and the defense did hold the Giants to like 240 yards, but you had two turnovers by the quarter. See, so let me finish the thought that I had. This is like, moving forward, I think, first of all, this Heineke versus Wentz thing is stupid. It's irrelevant. Neither one of them is the answer. If you're going to be a team... Of course not.

Okay, good. We agree on that. We've got some common ground. By the way, I think we've had that common ground before. But there are people, there are people that like you feel, Ron Rivera blew the playoffs by not starting Taylor Heineke. They would have beaten Cleveland. I totally disagree. He was the absolute definition of needing everything around him to, to be outstanding to have a chance to win a coin flip game,

which is what we saw for nine weeks. And they didn't have anything on Sunday that was complimentary. So if the deed, unless you're going to tell me that Taylor Heineke would have been Tony Robbins and would have inspired the defense to play much better without Cameron Curl and Benjamin St. Juice and John Allen and that he would have been that much of an inspiration and motivator. No, I don't think, my opinion, I don't think they would have. won the game with Taylor Hineke. I think that's absolutely delusional after watching the game. Oh, no, no, no, of course you do. Why? Of course you do. Why? There's no way to prove. There's no way to

prove that. The only thing we can prove is that they were absolutely 100% wrong in starting Carson Went. Well, here's something you can't prove. You can't prove that up seven to three, if the defense plays as well as it played during that nine-game stretch, that Carson Wentz wouldn't have won the game. But they didn't. Exactly. You can't prove that if they did play the kind of game, that they had played with Taylor Heineke, that they wouldn't have won. You know what? They were up seven to three. Here are the facts. How about a... Carson Wentz was one of the worst quarterbacks we've seen on that field wearing a Washington uniform. That's a fact. He was terrible. And Taylor Heineke at times has been really, really bad.

rough, rough, rough. And still, and never, and still managed to win some games when he's played really, really bad. And that's why of the two, but let me get to the point that I'm trying to get to. I personally from just, if people could just, you know, let's assume ownership situation, football decisions will be made. That's a big assumption, but it's the only way we can have this conversation, that football decisions are going to be made on football time, meaning, you know, free agency, franchise tag, deadlines, etc., regardless of the ownership situation.

I personally would be trying to resign Taylor Heineke. I would absolutely want Taylor Heineke to be the backup on my team. I think he's a high-quality backup quarterback. I do. It's my opinion. It has been for a while. It hasn't changed after watching him this year. Now, the only thing that I'll just mention is the quarterbacking in general has been pretty

bad around the NFL this year. And there are some starters who have started games this year that weren't as good as Heineke. But again, just so everybody understands, Heineke, and again, these analytics and PFF is the one that the league subscribes to in all 32 teams. There are 37 quarterbacks evaluated. You know, Zach Wilson's 37th, Taylor Heineke's 36th. There is a stat called turnover-worthy plays. He's next to last in that category.

I guess next to first, second overall in turnover. And yet still, he saved the season for this coach. No, no. By the way. The defense saved the season. By the way. The defense saved the season. Here's the other thing.

Okay. I'm not making any decision on Taylor Heineke. I'm going to leave that up to the new coach. Oh, I've got a thought on that here in a moment too. But here's what I'll eventually get to it. So I think this idea, you know, the Heineke chants, you know, from the 35,000 that were there, Tommy, that's, I had multiple people tell me that if there were 40,000 there, that would have been a stretch. In part because there were no Browns, well, there were Browns fans there, but they didn't invade the stadium.

I mean, imagine the state of this organization, right? You've got a game for the playoffs. You've got a game for the playoffs. and you had in your stadium, an NFL stadium, maybe 40,000 people. On, by the way, a glorious day. On a beautiful day, right? Beautiful day. It was 60 degrees in sunny.

I would sign him, but I also think you can make the case because, and I've said this many times, I think we have had not only an erosion of the fan base, but the erosion of many of the smarter people in the fan base who don't. don't give his shit anymore. And the whole idea that people would rather have five fumbles and fumble away a game versus having a couple of interceptions, which, by the way, only cost him three points in the game. If we're being truthful here, he was terrible. I'm not, I'm not, there's no way you could ever get me to defend to Carson Wend's performance.

I never want to see him on the field again, ever. But the idea that, you know, throwing picks or fumbling the ball is better if it's, It comes from Taylor Heineke versus Carson Wentz. To me, just speaks to a portion of this fan base that is just so delusional and just doesn't understand good quarterbacking. The big picture is they don't have a quarterback. I guess the Browns players must just be as delusional as them. Yes, they are.

Because, well, hold on, hold on, hold on, let me be clear. Not that Taylor Heineke may not have played a better game or more effectively a quarterback, but that somehow Washington would have won the game. The only way Taylor Heineke wins games is when they get really good complementary football. We've seen that. I mean, come on. I mean, every team in the league has put up basically like 30-something points, you know, unless they were starting Malik Willis against Houston.

Washington got 13 points on offense against Houston. Now, they were clearly the better team, and I'm not suggesting that they didn't try, like they could have tried harder. They couldn't score with Taylor Heineke. The offense was dead. They were 02 and 1. That's why I didn't care one way or the other. Not against the Cleveland Brown.

Oh, God. Okay. Again, again, again, again, again, With a decent quarterback, which Washington does not have, Washington would be the playoff team, not the Giants. Because there isn't that much of a difference between Washington and the Giants. Now, with respect to the Rivera comments after the game, I guess let me net it out. I would hesitate bringing Heineke back because here's the problem. You'll end up drafting a young kid or you'll sign a veteran or trade for a veteran, whether it's Garoppolo or Derrick Carr,

and you'll put them into the game and they'll throw a pick and they'll start chanting Heineke. Like they'd rather see Heineke get hit and fumble or throw three passes that get deflected at the line of scrimmage than see an actual quarterback out there. Again, I'm not comparing him to Wentz, but you might get that. And so I would try to avoid that if I were the next group, although I would love to have him the player and the locker room guy and the quarterback room guy is my backup. Now, the Rivera thing at the end of the game, the press conference, where he, didn't know that they could be eliminated. You know, I talked about it a little bit on Monday. I wanted to get your reaction to that.

Well. Because you deferred in your column on this. Yeah, I said because it's so absurd that this guy didn't know that any negative reaction is possible. I mean, again, I mean, you know, the list of fireball offenses for this guy, I mean, you can go. That just gets added to the list.

What are the list of fireable offenses? Okay. He has totally mishandled the quarterback situation. The most important position in the NFL, and he has made a mess of it. If you believe that he was the one who wanted to bring Carson Wentz here and not the owner. You don't believe that. Okay.

Well, no, I didn't say, I said it's possible. Oh, no. You've said Snyder. No, no, no. Okay. No. I said the ESPN suggested it, and I certainly, it's SMO. But I find it hard to believe that Ron Rivera would be such a wimp that he couldn't stand up to a weakened owner like Skipper Dan and say, no, no, no, no, no.

We're not making that deal. So I find it hard to believe that he would just kowtow to the owner. If that happened, then that's a fireball offense. Okay, so you made it work both ways for you on that one. By the way, I agree with you. The quarterback situation was mishandled in the offseason. Number two, what's the next fireable offense? No, no, no, that's two combined.

That's one combined in the two there. I mean, that's, you know, if he didn't pick him, he should get fired. Oh, right. And if he did pick him, he should get fired. Right. Okay. Again, starting Carson went, a fireball offense. Can I put that in the overall, the handling of the quarterback situation,

overall by Ron Rivera is a fireable offense? That's number one. What's number two? Starting Carson Wentz in a game where he needed to win to make the playoffs. Now, maybe he didn't think they needed to win it to make the playoff. Which apparently he didn't. Yeah, well, I mean, you didn't weigh in on that. I mean, I guess he thought he had some leeway, so why not throw Carson Wentz out there?

Let's see what he could do. After all, we don't have to win the game. Not knowing that they could be eliminated is number three for you, right? Yes. Okay. What's number four? Are there more? That's all I need.

What about the record? What about just the overall record? Well, I mean, yes, okay, the record. Okay. Absolutely. I mean, seven wins. unless they happen to have a miracle against the Cowboys. Seven wins a year for the last three years?

Yeah. So Ron Rivera, for those of you that don't know, yesterday for the second consecutive year, said QB1 is the problem they still need to solve. All right. So whether or not he will have an opportunity to solve it or not remains to be seen. But yesterday he said that, quote, I think the biggest thing that's been the toughest thing right now is really being able to solidify the QB1 spot. I mean, that's something that we're continuing to work on. You know, he made a snide comment to Ben Standing who asked the question. He said, Ben said that he'll help us look for the QB1.

He said, that's the thing we got to do. He said, I was asked the question about eight or nine weeks ago. What's the difference? Well, that's the one position that we've got to solidify going forward more so than any. else. So, you know, like I said on Monday, Tommy, you know, we are here once again, as we have been since 2017, with the number one priority being the quarterback, you have to find a starting quarterback. With that said, I think you're number one, you know, fireable offense, not a fireable offense. The bottom line is, I have no faith in this group to find a quarterback, none. Okay, two franchises,

and I don't know how many times we talked about this, going back to the day the trade was made, two franchises basically put up warning signs. They were billboard-sized warning signs by basically, you know, ushering wence out of the building at great expense to them with no replacements in mind.

And yet this group was panting and frothing at the mouth to offer draft choices and pick up the entire. full $28 million salary in 2022. As I said at the time, it was desperation. It was a bad trade. It's not the long-term solution. And I said Tommy on Monday, this was a referendum season on Ron,

and the referendum season on Ron was putting all of his eggs into the Carson Wentz basket, and they've all cracked and he's got it all over his face. This franchise, by the way, has been the mark for every other NFL franchise, when it comes to trading players they don't want. The first thing a general manager thinks of, do you think we can call Washington and get them to take this player? Because they'll overpay. Now, not so much when Bruce was here, but they were easy marks.

This player was going to be released. So I have no faith in this group to find quarterback in the offseason. I also do agree with you, and I talked about this at length on Monday. I personally believe that Ron Revevevelde, is not the terrible coach and that his staff isn't the terrible staff that many of you feel that he is. You know, you can give me all of the losing seasons. That's, that's, you know, fair and it's a compelling case. But some of the best jobs he's done were in seasons in which they didn't have a winning record. And, you know, I remember Gary Williams once telling me,

the best job I did was the year we didn't make the tournament. That was the best coaching job I did. I think the best job Rivera did is when they made the playoffs in Carolina with a seven and nine or what was it, six, nine and one record. I think the job he did in 2020 to get that team with Alex Smith on one leg into the postseason and a bad division with a losing record, you know, was a pretty good job. I actually don't think he's a terrible coach. I don't think he's a great coach. Same position I've always had. And I think he's done a very good job of changing the culture of the locker room. I think also, and I said this the other day, Tom, I would have never predicted that I would have said this before the season started.

But I think they are closer to a playoff roster minus quarterback, offensive line, you know, some depth on defense, linebacker, secondary, a punt returner, kick returner, that kind of thing. Then they've been in a long, long time. But with all of that said, you cannot go. You cannot go, oh, three and one at the end of you. your schedule when you are 7, 5, and 1, and you are surging, and three of those games are against the Giants and the Browns. In those three games, you went 02 and 1 with two of those games on your home field, even if it isn't a great home field advantage. That is an unacceptable result to lose to the Giants at home and to lose to the Browns at home. The Giants are a playoff

team, Tommy, because they beat Washington and tied Washington. If Washington had won those games, those coin flip games, then they would be in the postseason and the Giants wouldn't be. There isn't that much difference, although I think Daniel Jones is a difference. I think Daniel Jones is much better than anything Washington has. And I think Dave and his staff are probably, you know, right now, better than the Rivera staff. But to me, the record, yes, you know, sub 500 for three straight years or certainly, you know, there's a chance they could go eight and one. By the way, would there be 1812 overture if they beat Dallas and finish 8, 8 and 1 for me?

Will you suggest that to our podcast producer since I predicted that as my record at the beginning of the year? You know what? I think you just basically got a loony tune. You got a looney tune. That's fine. I'll take anything from you. I think it's totally on the table. If it's a normal situation, you absolutely have to look for a better solution.

but I want to find a better solution. You know, if you told me right now, Sean Payton and Vic Fangio are coming here, I'll go help Ron Pack and I'll help Dust Up Jack pack as well. But Ron is not a terrible football coach, and I've heard that a lot after the loss on Sunday. I'll tell you what the problem with Ron is more than anything else, is that the overall responsibility he has is too much for him. I don't think there's any doubt about that because he's become more of a CEO coach than he has.

I mean, he admitted that to me last year. But the stretch of being 7-5-1 and having everybody in this town saying, wow, what a job they've done. What a job Ron's done? What a job Jack's done? What a job? I mean, the players, you know what, we've got to start giving them credit. for the players in the roster they put together,

but then to lose to the Giants, tie the Giants, and lose to the Browns, unacceptable in that spot. Completely unacceptable. And they beat themselves pretty much in all three of those games, although the defense got torched on Sunday. Anyway. Kevin.

Yes, Tom. If we were doing the podcast and I said to you, well, it's okay that they lost on Sunday because they're still has a chance to make the playoffs. And you said to me, no, no, no, no, no, no. They got eliminated with the Green Bay win. You would like, you would just destroy me. Just make fun of me. You would just, like, ridicule me of how stupid I could be to not know that they weren't going to make the playoffs.

It's really it's mind-boggling. Although I did point out, and somebody sent me, I got to find it here. My memory was that it was Parcells when he was with the Jets, and the guy said no, it was Parcells, actually, when he was with Dallas. There was a Parcells moment at an end of a season where he had no idea that they needed to, that they needed to, it was, he knew that they needed to win out, but he knew nothing else about this, that he was on the verge of being a limit,

even with the win. That's what it was. He thought he was still alive with the win. I think that what Ron said the other day is absolutely, you know, it's mind-boggling to me. I mean, especially given what I just said, he's kind of the CEO. It's, you know, and you could have used it as, hey, guys, hey, just so you know, if we don't win today, we might be done by the time Minnesota and Green Bay finish. so we cannot lose this game. So it could have certainly added to the sense of urgency and motivation for Sunday. So, yeah, I don't understand how he didn't know that.

I don't. But I don't think it's the first time. I think a lot of these coaches, just like Tommy, when I bust these coaches on their game clock management two-point, I just think they're so dialed into like the next opponent and the next play. They don't see things the way we should, but they should, they should. It's not acceptable that he didn't know that.

I couldn't believe it. I tweeted it out when I heard it. I found out after the fact it was Grant Paulson who asked him the question. I can't believe that he did not know that they could be eliminated. Especially, again, taking into consideration, his role was different than it was in Carolina. You know, he's more of a delegator. Jack and Scott have a lot of autonomy. So yeah.

You do think they should start Sam Howell on Sunday against the Cowboys, don't you? Oh, no, no, no, no. No, no, no. No, no, no, no. You wanted them? Everybody got him. Start Carson Went. You know what? First of all, that's such a bad... I'm not talking when I mean, when I see you, I don't mean you. I mean right. Who wanted him so badly? I didn't hear one person that was standing... The coach who picked him. Yeah, but even... The coach who picked them.

Yeah, and by the way, I don't think that, you know, this coach who apparently has so much backbone to tell the owner, you know, we're going to trade for Carson Wentz anyway. I don't think that he would have just, you know, caltowed to the players if they wanted Heineke. I don't think that that was the truth about last week. Maybe earlier in the season, for sure. But... Well, he didn't. He didn't caltow to them, apparently, because according to the Cleveland, players that Washington players wanted Heineke, but they didn't get him.

Yeah, but your idea that he probably kowtowed to Snyder, well, then why didn't he just kowtow to the players if that's what they want to. No, I'm saying, if that's the scenario, if indeed the owner wanted the quarterback, I find it, I can't bring myself to

believe that Ron would have just rolled over on that. So, I look, I think, I think that's funny. And I mean, I would actually in some ways feel sorry for him because I don't, well, first of all, it would be a road game. It'd be the second time he played the Cowboys on the road.

Tommy, by the way. I mean, I know. I know what you're going to say. I know what you're going to say. Tell me. It's unbelievable that they're going to retire signing Surrogerson's number on this day. What did I tell you at the beginning of this year? I told you that this whole scenario could play out and it wouldn't be fair to him.

No, it's not. There's going to be a stadium. full of Cowboys fans. And... Now, even Cowboys fans, I think, will respect I agree. I agree with you. I hope they do. But still, it's not the scene you want.

It's not, at least it's not going to be brutally cold. It's going to be in the upper 30s to low 40s on Sunday. So that's seasonal. I just hope it's a really lovely occasion for him. I just really hope that. Because... But he deserves that and more. Yeah.

And I hope. that thing, whatever it was, Major Tuddy or whatever, I hope it's not present. I hope it doesn't come out and, like, give Sonny a big hug. I think we can give him the day off Sunday. Sam, Hal. They paid somebody. They paid somebody a lot of money to come up with that. That's so funny. They're just, oh, I know what I wanted to tell you real quickly, because I mentioned this, and several of you reached out to me to say, oh, my God, I hadn't even thought of that. Did I share this with you already? I had this thought that Snyder, as we know,

everything he gets involved in, he completely screws up, right? Right. Well, he's involved in the sale, isn't he? Like, how's he going to screw this up? I don't think the NFL will let him. Okay. Or Bank of America? Yeah, I don't think he's got.

Go ahead. Did you see the story? that they're now UK residents? Yes, I did. I saw that. You're going to tell everybody what I told you a few weeks ago that I did not want to tell everybody that I knew, but I had pretty good source? You said that they were moving out at her house locally

and that they were probably going to go overseas. Is that right? Yeah, that they were moving to the UK and that they were going to set up shop there. Okay. Yeah. But, you know, I don't know about whether or not they're giving up, you know, a place here locally.

I would imagine that they would have a place here locally. Who knows? I don't, you know what? Just sell the team. Still, big picture here. Number one, Dan's selling the team, we think. I mean, if you told me we're not making the playoffs down the stretch, but Dan's going to sell the team, of course I would take Dan selling the team.

Number two is this. All the Wentz and Heineke stuff, please. You got to go find a quarterback. And I don't know if this group. is the right group to find it. I don't think it is. All right, a couple of other things just to finish up the show real quickly when we come back, right after these words from a few of our sponsors. Call Windonation for new windows, 86690 Nation or Windonation.com.

Interest free if you finance your windows for five years, plus buy two, get two free. They're the best. If you've been thinking about new windows, call Windonation 86690 Nation or Windonation.com. So as we were getting ready for this final segment of the show, the NFL actually made a statement. There's actually a letter regarding the Damar Hamlin's situation from the commissioner to team coaches, general managers, club presidents, and chief executives. And it reads as follows.

During last night's game between Buffalo and Cincinnati, Bill's safety, Damar Hamlin, collapsed on the field. Demar experienced cardiac arrest. was promptly resuscitated by on-site club physicians and independent medical personnel, all of whom are highly trained in implementing the plans for medical emergencies. Damar was stabilized and transported to the University of Cincinnati Medical Center, a level one trauma center where he remains in ICU. After speaking with both teams and NFLPA leadership,

I decided to postpone last night's game and have our focus remain on Damar and his family. We are in regular contact with both clubs and with the medical team caring for Damar and we'll share additional information as we receive it. Earlier today, the head of player engagement and team clinician for each club received information about mental health and support resources that are available to players and staff, yada, yada, yada. And then here's the part about the schedule. A short time ago, and after discussions with the two teams and the NFLPA,

we advised Buffalo and Cincinnati that last night's game will not be resumed this week. no decision has been made regarding the possible resumption of the game at a later date, and we have not announced any changes to this weekend's schedule. We will promptly advise all clubs of any decisions that are made regarding these matters. If you have any questions in the meantime, please call me or any of our senior staff. That letter was not attended for us. We can't call them if we have questions, but that's the letter that Albert Breer actually posted that came from the commissioner to all the teams.

So what's interesting is that, you know, in saying that they're not going to resume the game this week, he didn't say that this game is totally off the table. He said no decisions been made regarding the possible resumption of the game. Well, that could only happen. It could only happen if they pushed the schedule back. I mean, when would you play this game? game, you can't play it in between the end of the regular season and the first week end of the playoff games.

So unless they're considering moving week 18 back, which is something we talked about in the open, this game's over. They're not going to play this game. And the Bengals will clinch the AFC North. The Chiefs with a win Sunday would clinch the number one seed in the AFC playoffs. And Buffalo would still have a chance by winning on Sunday of Kansas. Kansas City lost to the Raiders in their game this weekend because it would be a winning percentage thing. And so they would finish 13 and 3, and the Chiefs would finish 13 and 4 if the Chiefs lost.

So it seems to me that they're just going to go with continuing the NFL schedule this weekend, Tommy, and not resuming this game, that this game is just going to go in as a no contest. I think probably will. And the teams will end up with 16 games each. there's one thing that I just wanted to mention football related to the NFL. So when the NFL came out yesterday afternoon with the schedule for the final weekend, I had suggested on the podcast Monday that while everybody thought that Green Bay in Detroit could be the final Sunday night game of the year and would be because they're going to want

Aaron Rogers in prime time, I said, well, that just wouldn't be fair to do that to Seattle. Seattle's got to play at the same time. Seattle and the Rams have to play at the same time as Green Bay in Detroit, or it's brutally unfair to Seattle. Well, sure enough, the Rams and Seattle are playing at 425, and the Lions and Packers are playing the Sunday night game. And for those that don't know the situation, Seattle gets into the postseason with a win over the Rams and a Packers loss. the Lions get into the postseason if Seattle loses and they beat the Packers. Well, if Seattle plays before them and they win, Detroit has nothing to play for. Nothing to play for, yeah. And so Green Bay then has a major advantage, which means Seattle's chances are diminished significantly

because Detroit's, you know, some people would say, you don't think they're going to play the game and try to win it against their rival. Well, maybe, but the stakes aren't the same. The excitement over it won't be the same. They will have been eliminated like 30 minutes before kickoff if Seattle beats the Rams. You know what it would be? You know what it would be like? It'd be like the Cleveland Browns with nothing to playing for beating the Washington commanders.

Well, they did. Or, by the way, a Carson Wentz led Washington team beating the Cowboys that have everything to play for. There we go, baby. We better see Sam Hal. would be negligence unless they said no he just can't do it we've been watching them all year he's just we we messed it up he's not a quarterback in the NFL um we better see him but how unfair like when the league went to and i don't know how many years ago it was maybe eight nine 10 years ago to not scheduling any of the week 18 games or the final week of the season week 17 when they had a

16 game schedule until after the second to last week was completely They did it for the purposes of making sure that there weren't competitive disadvantages with the start times of the game. Now, how could they fix this Sheehan? Easily. They're two solutions. They could have just moved the Rams and Seahawks also to Sunday night. They play those games simultaneously because you want Aaron Rogers in prime time. I understand that.

You want the Packers playing for a playoff spot because if they win, they're in no matter what happens. and you want that in your Sunday night season finale. So play the Rams and Seahawks on Fox, which was scheduled for 425, and air it in the local markets of L.A. and Seattle, but play it at the same time. We've seen that happen before with, you know, blizzards and hurricanes where games are rescheduled. Or we've seen that before during COVID. Or what they could have done, which would have made the most sense, actually. And I didn't really figure this out.

I give my son credit for figuring this out. He's good at this stuff, better at this stuff than even I am. And I think I'm pretty good at this stuff. He said, why didn't they just play the Lions and Packers on Saturday night in primetime and then play the Titans and Jags on Sunday night? Because the Titans and Jags, that game doesn't affect any other game. The winner wins the division, is in as the four seed, the loser is out, doesn't affect any other game. They're playing that one in prime time on Saturday night.

play the lions and packers, so they both go into that game knowing they have to win to have a chance on Saturday night and prime time, and then play the Rams and Seahawks on Sunday. Because the truth is, like, if the Seahawks Rams game, you just want the Lions to be in a game in which they're playing to win the game. And then the Seahawks would have the situation where if the Lions won the game, then they're going to play like hell. to beat the Rams to try to snag that spot. And the Packers, you know, are then, you know, and the lines are hoping the Seahawks would lose. So that would have made sense, too, but I would have just played them at the same time

in the 425 window or on Sunday night or on Saturday night. That's what they should have done. But instead, they gave Green Bay a major advantage potentially, which, you know, they probably want to do. and they really screwed Seattle royally. Now, this was never an issue. Before they started to do it this way, Tommy, this happened all the time. You know, start times were already kind of scheduled before the season started.

And so even though it was a competitive disadvantage, if you played an early game versus a late game or late game versus an early game, the NFL didn't care. But they eventually figured it out it's not fair. And so let's make sure that these games are scheduled in such a way where, you know, it's competitively fair, and they made it competitively unfair. I was surprised by that. You have anything else on the show for the show?

I got nothing else for you today, boss. Except I'm fairly disappointed. There was no, like, conquering music for me. Well, how do you know I won't add it in in post-production? I guess I don't. There's no telling, you know what? There's no telling what you do to what I say on this podcast. It's not like I listen to it, you know?

Oh, yeah, because all I do is edit. Yeah, basically, Tommy, it's like, it's, what's the, what's the, what's the, fuck, what's the singer's name, the parody singer? I can't remember. Weird Al Yankovic. Yeah. We just subbed a lot of, you know, weird Al Yankovic for you. And just change everything that, we change all of your lyrics to something more entertaining because you're not entertaining enough. All right.

I'm done for the day. Tommy's done for the day. We will be back together on Thursday, and I think Cooley will be with me tomorrow. Have a good day.