The Kevin Sheehan Show - Vikings Loss: Upon Further Review

Episode Date: November 8, 2022

Kevin touched on several topics in the open including a) Matthew McConaughy's desire to join the Bezos/Jay Z bid for the team, b) the Wizards' win, c) another Ovechkin goal, d) Kevin Willard's debut as Maryland's coach, and e) "Upon Further Review" of the loss to the Vikings, Kevin thinks the criticism of OC Scott Turner might be a little over the top. Additionally, while Ron Rivera was upset over the penalty called against John Ridgeway on Minnesota's first FG attempt, Kevin thinks there's a strategy decision on that play that Rivera and staff got wrong. Nick Akridge/Pro Football Focus jumped on and talked about some of the PFF grades for Washington players on Sunday including how Taylor Heincke played. Kevin and Nick talked NFL and had some Super Bowl predictions at the halfway mark of the season.  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. No Tom today. He was on the podcast yesterday. He had something he had to take care of today.

He'll be back in his normal spot on Thursday. One guest on the show, Nick Ackridge from Pro Football Focus. I've enjoyed our conversations with Nick, both on this podcast and on the radio show. Nick is a PFF data. but he's a huge D.C. sports fan and a huge Washington commanders fan. So he gets into the PFF grades for Washington, even if he doesn't have the responsibility of grading the game himself. Sometimes he does, sometimes he doesn't. But good perspective from Nick, not only on Washington, on the game on Sunday, but on the league as a whole. We will talk to Nick coming up

here shortly. The show today is brought to you by MyBooky. Go to mybooky.orgie. Go to mybooky.orgie. Use my promo code, Kevin D.C., and they'll match your first deposit, dollar for dollar, all the way up to a thousand bucks. Washington right now is an 11-point underdog against the Eagles on Monday night football with a total of 44 and a half. By the way, the next NFL game of the season is Thursday night football, Atlanta and Carolina. I mean, that is one dog of a game. Although, interestingly, I want to see the Falcons. I haven't watched a full game of theirs yet. They're an interesting team. They're a three-point favorite at Carolina at My Bookie. And again, use my promo code, Kevin D.C., and they'll give you free money. They'll double your first deposit. You're not going to find a better place or a safer place to wager.

even if you've got a place, I would recommend using my bookie as your backup spot, as your place to compare point spreads and pricing and things of the sort. But the Atlanta Falcons with Arthur Smith as the head coach in the second year, you know, they are four and five. They're tied for first, although the Buccaneers have the tiebreaker because the Buccaneers beat the Falcons 21 to 15 over a month ago. They actually finish with each other in Atlanta. on the final Sunday of the year,

and that could determine the NFC South champion. But the Falcons at 4 and 5, their five losses were to the Saints by a point in which they had a 16-point lead. They lost to the Rams by 4. They had the ball late with a chance to win. They lost to the bucks on that horrendous roughing the passer penalty by Grady Jarrett on Tom Brady, 21 to 15 by 6. they did get beat up a little bit by the Bengals.

They did, although that was a 28-17 game at a halftime after the Bengals had gotten out to a 21-to-nothing lead. And then on Sunday, one of the wildest plays of the year, I don't know if you guys have seen this play yet, but in a 17-17 game, the Chargers are driving late in the game. They're in field goal range already with a chance to basically walk it off.

Atlanta's got two timeouts left, but they've got a first and 10 at the Atlanta 28-yard line. They're going to have to run some plays, but they're in field goal range. And they run Echler for three yards. Atlanta calls a timeout. It's second and seven. They run Herbert for three yards.

It's now third and four, and Atlanta's done with their timeouts. The ball's at the Atlanta 22-yard line. Now, they could have, if they had wanted to, taken a knee and sent their kicker out there to kick a field goal to win the game. Now, understand this. It's not right now Dustin Hopkins. Hopkins has been hurt, and they signed that Texas kicker, Cameron Dicker. Cameron the kicker Dicker, who was at Texas. And he had already made a field goal in the game. They were in short. short range. They're at the 22s. You're talking about a 40-yard field goal. But instead, they ran Austin Echler, who fumbled the football. It was recovered by Todd Graham, a defensive lineman

slash linebacker for Atlanta. He is running it back up the field as the clock is dwindling down. They're going to be in field goal range potentially or very close to field goal range when he finally gets tackled. Without being hit, he drops the ball and fumbles the ball back to the Chargers. So now the Chargers have it first and ten at the Atlanta 43 with like 30 seconds to go. And Herbert hits a big pass down the middle. They ran Echler again, believe it or not. I can't believe they actually gave the ball back to Echler after he had fumbled it rather than taking a knee. But they sent the kicker in there and he booted the field goal for the game winner. Atlanta in the game, they had a lead.

They had a 17 to 14 lead in the fourth quarter. Their kicker, who's pretty reliable, missed a field goal that would have given them a 20 to 14 lead. I'm interested in watching the Falcons Thursday night. How about that? Even if it is against the Panthers. I want to see, I think Arthur Smith is doing a great job as an offensive-oriented head coach with a guy in Marietta who's barely letting throw the football. I mean, Marriota in the game on Sunday against the Chargers was 12 of 23 for 1229 yards in the game.

That is not, you know, real trust in the quarterback as a thrower of the football. But Marietta, I mean, he had a game in which he threw, I think, you know, like 11 passes in a game or 12 passes. It may have been against Cincinnati. He's been rushing the ball well. It is a dual threat quarterback attack for them. They've got really good backs. Tyler Algier was one of those running backs that I desperately wanted Washington to consider. I would rather have Alger than Robinson Jr.

Algier 10 carries 99 yards in the game against the Chargers Sunday. Cordarelle Patterson was back. They've got pits. They've got Drake London. They've got some offensive weapons. They've got some defensive playmakers. Brady Jarrett having a really good season for them. Plus, you get a preview, you get a preview of Washington's game in a few weeks at home against the Falcons.

So I don't know why I started talking about Atlanta Carolina on Thursday night. I think it's because I just saw the point spread for the Atlanta Carolina game on my bookie. But it should be the lowest rated game of the year of the Thursday night games. I mean, that is a dog of a game. but Atlanta's interesting to me. Man, they've had a couple of dogs of 30. I mean, last week they did have an undefeated team. By the way, the baseball, I think, outrated the football last Thursday night on Amazon.

You know, Amazon's been drawing, I think, 6, 7 million viewers, something like that. But the Thursday night Amazon package has Atlanta, Carolina, this week. Next week, it's Tennessee at Green Bay. I mean, the Packers stink. and then you get the Thanksgiving matchups, and then the week after that, you get a big one, a potential big one in the AFC East, Buffalo in New England. I do think they've got a dog of a game down the road.

I mean, some of these teams, they were expecting to be really good, like the Raiders and the Rams may not be. They play in a Thursday night game late in the year. But anyway, there's other NFL talk coming up here in this opening segment before we get to my conversation with Nick Ackridge. First of all, Matthew McConaughey has thrown his hat into the ring in the Bezos JZ bit. I will repeat what I did on the show Friday. I don't really care who owns the team if they subscribe to this more than anything else, that their number one goal is winning a Super Bowl and that this

organization is going to be about football first and everything else distant from that. So I do get concerned with a Bezos, JZ, Matthew McConaughey bid. McConaughey, as many of you know, has been a Washington football fan, even though he grew up in Texas, and he's a Longhorn. He's a huge skins fan. He's had a relationship with Dan over the years. He's been at a lot of games. I think I told the story. Cooley was in the booth, or in the suite, excuse me, and McConaughey was in there.

And Chris said, what's up, Matt? How you doing? They had met before. and Matt went over to Cooley and said, hey, Chris, Chris, it's not Matt, it's Matthew. Cooley, of course, undeterred, called him Matt, apparently the rest of the night. But I don't have any problem with that as the ownership group. I'm not really concerned about conflicts of interest. I could care less about someone's politics.

Also, Bezos is the lead. I mean, J.Z and McConaughey don't have enough money. They got a lot of money. Don't get me wrong. relative to all of us, but they don't have NFL owner kind of money. They will participate on a very small scale and we'll end up, I would assume, with a small equity position in the team. But Bezos is going to stroke 95% of the check.

He doesn't need Jay-Z. He doesn't need Matthew McConaughey. Or maybe he does. Maybe the NFL wants diversity, which I know they want. So Jay-Z would certainly fit the bill as far as that's concerned. But I went through my list the other day of the top 10 things I'm looking for in an owner. And number one is, I just want the goal of the organization, the priority, the mantra, the mission statement of the organization to be, we are about winning Super Bowls. Maybe we could just say, we are about competing for and winning Super Bowls.

I don't want an organization when the ownership takes over and says, The NFL is an incredible brand, and Washington's a great market, and football's important here. And we envision this brand associated with Washington that moves us into the media world, the food world, the fashion world, the pop culture world, the music world. I don't want to hear that. Even if it's important that it's true in today's sports, I want those things to matter very little. Winning is the most important thing. We just dealt with 23 and a half years of a guy who was more concerned in eking every single scent out of a very passionate fan base that he inquired, that he acquired, excuse me, did not build.

And then he chased them away with a poor football team, embarrassing behavior, and constantly going after the fan base for every last nickel and penny. and now he doesn't have many of those left when it comes to the relative conversation of the team's financial position compared to other teams. I'm not talking about valuation. I'm talking about, you know, P&L, annual P&L. All right, their revenues are way down compared to other teams. I don't need my chief marketing office. In fact, I don't need a chief marketing officer in the organization. There's going to be a business side, yes.

But I don't want to know who the head of business operations. is. I don't want us to focus on who the PR people or who the chief marketing officer is if there is one. I don't care that we're investing in a Formula One team. I don't care that we're really into pickleball and that the team is going to team up with some pickleball league or buy a pickleball team and play some big pickleball matches at the new stadium. I don't care about Jay-Z's next big album or Beyonce's next big album and using this platform as a promotional platform for that. I want the organization and the new ownership group to be focused solely on winning Super Bowls. Personally, that may be a completely outdated business mantra in team sports, but I am still

convinced that if you win a lot, all the other stuff will take care of itself. You'll be able to pick and choose on all the other stuff because they'll all be coming to you. Win big off on the field. Don't embarrass yourself off it and the world will be your clamshell. If that's how it goes, I think it's oyster. So McConaughey, Kevin Durant wants to be a part of somebody's bid. We'll see. I know that the NFL does not want conglomerates. So Bezos would really be seen as the Bezos group, but really not as a conglomerate. He's going to write the check for $7 billion plus. Okay.

Wizards won last night without Bradley Beal. I didn't talk at all about basketball yesterday. They had an embarrassing loss to Brooklyn the other night by 42 points. The Caps won last night. Ovechkin, another goal, as now the next thing in line after setting the single career number for goals within one franchise beating Gordy Howell's record. Now he is approaching Gordy Howe for number two on the all-time goals list. Caps also won last night, which was a big win for them because they have quite the schedule

coming up. They got the win against Edmonton after losing four in row. A couple of those were overtime losses. But they've got a game against the Penguins tomorrow night. Then they've got two with Tampa and one with Florida. So an interesting week for them coming up. By the way, back to the NBA, the Lakers last night got absolutely torched by the Utah Jazz. The Lakers are terrible.

I mean, I am actually giddy about that. They got beat 139 to 116. They gave up 76 points in the first half. Utah, the most surprising NBA team so far. The Warriors have been the most disappointing, but they got 47 from Curry last night to snap a five-game losing skid. I just think right now they are disinterested in basketball. Maryland won last night. First game of the Kevin Willard era goes to the Terps, 71 to 49 over Niagara.

I had Coach Willard on the radio show this morning, so you can find that at the Team 980.com and listen to that. That was in the 8 a.m. hour. He's great. I have met Kevin, and he's got a wonderful family. they love it here. I think he's going to do a great job. This is going to be a rough year. A lot of transfers, a whole new back court.

No Fats Russell and Eric Iala. Eric Iala, I think, really turned out to be one hell of a Maryland player. But he's got talent. You know, he's got Scott back. He's got Heem Hart back. He's got Jujo Reese back. I can tell you, Kevin Wildard's excited about Juju Reese, who I am too.

I think he's incredibly skilled. I think the problem with Maryland is they're going to have to get really good guard play, and they're going to have to really figure it out with what I would call a lack of size and girth in the middle and not a lot of depth in terms of size. But they have a brutal schedule. I mean, he added Tennessee and UCLA to the schedule, and they also have a tournament coming up in Mohegan Sun, Connecticut, where they're going to play St. Louis, and then either Miami or Providence. They have two early Big Ten games, including a game against Illinois. But I mean, hell. I mean, they've got Louisville and the ACC Big Ten challenge on the road at

Freedom Hall. But my God, or the Yom Center, whatever it's called now. But they have Tennessee in Brooklyn. And then what should be, you know, the Big Ten opener against Illinois is a Friday night. Illinois is a ranked team. And then they've got UCLA coming in like a week later. or a few nights later, where they will face one of the top 10 teams in the country in the Bruins in College Park. That's part of a home and home. I think they're at Pauley next year. But he is scheduling different than Mark, no doubt.

And that was one of the complaints from a lot of us. You know, I think Mark's point was, you know, we did have, you know, a schedule. We were scheduling really for, you know, sort of the key metric numbers where we could get wins, but it would also be valuable in terms of some of the teams they played. played from the A-10 and other quality leagues. But he didn't play a lot of those marquee games unless they were scheduled for him, right? You know, the ACC Big Ten Challenge, playing UVA a couple of times, playing Carolina, some of the others.

And, you know, had never made our way to Maui once. And I think that hopefully will change. But Tennessee, UCLA, and look, Turch played some games up in Brooklyn, some big-time games in Brooklyn, and usually had, you know, a game, a significant game right around the holidays, played Seton Hall twice, you know, Big East teams. Had that Georgetown thing back-to-back years. I'd like to see that thing resume. I don't know that it will.

But Maryland's got a brutal, brutal schedule here in basketball. All right, here's the thing that I wanted to get to here in the opening segment before we get to Nick. So I went back and watched the game from Sunday again, and I had a couple of those kind of of upon further review things. Number one, I think the St. Juice pick six was a pick six. And I didn't say otherwise in my game recap. I just said that maybe it was DPI, but the way they had called the game,

they should have let that one go because they let everything else go. And I think that's very important in officiating in any sport. You know, as a coach or a player, what you want to know and what you want from an officiating crew is consistency. If they're going to call it close, call it close throughout. Call it both ways close. If they're going to let them play, let them play throughout. Don't change all of a sudden in the last three minutes of the game or the last quarter of an NFL game.

And they changed. The boager crew had not whistled that the entire game. And it's questionable as to whether it's DPI in the first place. I mean, I think by the letter of the rule it is, but they're allowing more hand fighting this year. I just think that that is 100% given the way the game's called, given the emphasis this year to allow a little bit more hand fighting, not a legal contact. That's a different thing of emphasis, but allow a little bit more of hand fighting with the ball in the air. I think that that's a pick six game overplay. Now, if they had whistled four PIs already, DPI's already in the game, that's one thing, but they hadn't.

and I know Minnesota fans will say, hell, I mean, Jefferson two or three times, Thielen at least once mugged, no call. Well, that's what they were doing throughout the game. They weren't calling those, but they did. That was game over at that point. That's 24-7, game over. A couple of other observations from the game. The Ridgeway play, which, you know, the jumping,

over the center or making contact with the center, which allowed Minnesota to burn the clock and kick for all intents and purposes. A walk-off field goal wasn't exactly walk-off with 12 seconds to go, but you get the point. Ron Rivera took major exception to this call in his presser yesterday. He said he does not think it was a penalty. I'm going to read to you his quote because the sound we could not find produced anywhere. It might be out there now. But quote, I don't agree with the call. I went and looked at it and looked at it and looked at it and looked at it. And there was, I mean, he didn't hit him with his shoulder pads and didn't hit him with the helmet. He crossed over and caught him with his hip. He was going into the gap, closed quote.

So, I don't, I honestly don't know what to say as to whether or not that was technically a violation of the rule or not. It looked like it was to me, to a certain degree. It did. John Kime, though, tweeted out the following. John, in tweeting out about that play, said that Washington says it wasn't a penalty. You can agree or disagree with them. Only point here is they were looking for it. And why were they looking for it?

Because Ridgeway did something similar on an extra point when it wasn't called, and the Vikings alerted the officials so that they were watching for it on the field goal. And it was probably, Kime says, a worse infraction on the extra point than it was on the field goal attempt. So if they didn't call it on the extra point, Ridgeway probably felt like it was okay to do it there.

Good smart move by Kevin O'Connell and the Vikings coaching staff to alert the officials, hey, like this is, you miss this call. And so they were looking for it going in. which meant that if it was even close, they were probably going to call it. But here's the point I want to make. And I think it's a significant point about the decision that Washington made to try to go hard at blocking the kick in that situation. I don't know if Ridgeway committed the infraction or not. Maybe Ron Rivera gets a letter saying, we got that one wrong.

And Ron Rivera and the staff, I don't think, knew that Minnesota alerted the officials to the fact that Ridgeway had committed an infraction that. they had missed on a PAT earlier. But the point that I would like to make is a 22-yard field goal in the NFL is a 99% 99.5% probability. I mean, when's the last time you saw a 22-yard field goal missed? The chances of blocking a field goal like that, because the ball's going to come out high, it's not coming out low because it's a kick of distance, is slim and none. So you are sitting there, you have held Minnesota to the field goal attempt because on the third and fourth, the two-minute

warning, cousins threw the fade to Jefferson and St. Juice did a great job breaking it up. So now you're going to get the ball back after this field goal at 20 to 17 with a timeout left and a chance to not only go down and tie the game with a field goal, maybe

win it. Maybe Terry McClorn catches another crazy 50-50 ball from Heineke in the last 30- seconds and you end up having Heineke's sneak one over for the one for a 24 to 20 win. You shouldn't have taken the risk. Blocking a kick from 22 yards out is low, low, low probability. Him missing the kick really slim and none.

What are you taking the risk for on that play? Why would you have Ridgeway do that? And by the way, if he broke the rule on a PAT, it's somebody's job on that team, even though it wasn't called. to say, hey, John Ridgway, 91, could have been called for roughing the center on that PAT. Get a message down to him. He can't be that close. So that is another overall situation where I just think the risk did not match anywhere near the reward. I mean, the chance for the reward was slim and none.

And you took too much of a risk for what was a long, long, long shot of blocking a kick. And you cost yourself a chance to tie the game or win the game. Because at that point, even though they didn't seem to really understand it, Minnesota did. The game was over. You know, anybody that can do math understood that there was one time out left and then after that you had 40 and 40 on a second and third down play of play clock, plus whatever they burned running some plays, which they did burn three or four seconds on the Cook run

and on the Cousins run. The Cook runs and the Cousins run, where they had no, no desire to score. They weren't going to be stupid. So it just shouldn't have been a situation. They should have told everybody, relax. We're not trying to do anything on this. Watch it, because in case there's a fumbled snap or something,

we want to get in there and mess it up so that the, you know, guy can't just pick it up and place it back down and have him kick it again. But my point is, don't take the risk. of being anywhere near the center on that play. You know, because off sides would have been obviously much better. And off sides isn't an automatic first down. If you're going to take the risk, take the risk with the guy off the edge,

because it's fourth and goal. Take the guy, take the risk with the guy off the edge, maybe getting a quick jump to block the field goal. I've had this theory in the past with Cooley on kicks like that, that you just have the guy run off the edge really hard and rough the kicker. Try to take them out. But rough him so that they don't get the kick off, and now he's thinking about that guy before he kicks the next one.

All right, last thing, upon further review, so much discussion from so many of you. And I think it's reasonable conversation. I'm not dismissing the conversation about Scott Turner. I'm not. I think after watching the game again, there are several things that occurred to me. Number one is all of you want, you know, Taylor Heineke's strengths leveraged more.

And I talked about that last year a lot, and I've talked about it this year. You know, personally, I think the best thing to do with him, if you knew he was going to be your starting quarterback for a season, which they did not know last year, because they thought Ryan Fitzpatrick was going to be the starting quarterback for 17 games. And this year, they thought it was going to be Carson Wentz. I just would have designed a different offense. I would have been more of a dual threat attack. I would have leveraged the fact that not only is he athletic, he's got really good vision and he's got good ball skills,

and I would have turned him into a dual threat quarterback. Lots of zone read, lots of read option, lots of RPO, lots of different things for him to really threaten a defense and put a defense into that situation of, is the quarterback going to run on this play? Because just the threat of the quarterback being a runner is really helpful to an offense when he's a lot. legitimate threat. Hell, it works sometimes when the quarterback isn't a legitimate threat. We've seen

that over the years. But I, you know, mentioned this yesterday, I think, maybe last week. It is kind of hard mid-season to say, oh, we're going to scrap the offense that we worked all OTA sessions on, all mini-camp sessions on, all training camp on, because we're going to go with this guy and we're going to change our offense. That just is a little bit easier said than done. The other part of it is, Why isn't there more sprint out? Why isn't there more getting them outside of the pocket? So there are a couple of things. Number one is, you know, on a lot of getting quarterbacks out of the pocket,

you know, sprinting, you know, out, even bootlegs. In many chance, unless you're setting up that bootleg to take a deep shot, you were essentially cutting off half the field. Somebody made a point to me. They said, you know, with Dwayne Haskins, they, you know, they had him sprint out more, they had more quick throws, more bubbles and more sprint out throws with him than they've had with Taylor. Well, I think they knew Dwayne was limited at that point in his career and that he needed more one-reed situations. He needed quick bubbles. And by the way,

I remember specifically the Rams game and the Ravens game where he had all those yards. I thought that they were really very well-designed game plans for what they had at course. You know, that gets us to the whole Haskins thing. Rest his whole. God rest his soul. But, man, you know, quarterback, quarterback, quarterback. And if they really knew deep down when they took over this team that he wasn't their guy, you know, that really is the single biggest mistake they've made. But I digress.

Back to this. So I think it's kind of hard just in midseason just implement a new offense to leverage Taylor Heineke's strengths. Okay? That's number one. Number two is this. watching that game back yesterday, you don't want to cut half the field off for him. And I'm not saying that every, you know, throw or every design to get a guy outside the pocket

means you're cutting off half the field. Several of them are. But they have confidence in his ability to read defenses and, you know, not limit significantly the playbook from a throw standpoint. And so they don't want to limit, you know, this stuff with him in the game versus Wentz or last year him in the game versus, you know, Fitzpatrick. I think maybe on some things in terms of the length of the throat, the number of shots they're going to take, you know, to stretch the field, that changes with Heineke versus Fitz

and versus Wentz. But, you know, they don't want a limited, hey, this guy's really mobile. We're going to sprint him out, cut off half the field. We're going to run a ton of bootleg. First of all, you know what? He doesn't look super comfortable running bootleg. On the two bootlegs that I watched under center, you got to be under center, really, for a bootleg to be effective.

And he's in shotgun too much. But I didn't think he looked super comfortable. He was late on that throat of Terry, a little bit late, and he hit the easy checkdown to Bates on the other one. And that leads me to this point. And that is, they are so much of a shotgun team. They ran some pistol too. I actually like him in the empty set.

I like him in the empty set because it's a lot. all quick game with the empty set. And he's pretty good at looking at, you know, a defense and saying, this guy is going to be open. This is the matchup I'm going to take advantage of. And he gets the ball out quickly. And yes, sometimes there's extra man pressure, but it's quick game out of the empty set. So I kind of like that for him. And he's throwing from the pocket there.

Okay, he is throwing from the pocket. But I kind of like that for him because it makes it forces him to be quick with the decision. and they've got enough guys that you've got good options and good matchups when you go empty set. But on a lot of their runs, they're in shotgun, pistol a couple of times too. I don't know why there's such a heavy shotgun team. It probably has something to do with what he's comfortable with, what Fitz was comfortable with, what Wentz is comfortable with.

It may be in part with what Gibson and Robinson Jr. And McKissick are comfortable with. But, you know, when you're in shotgun and all of your play action is coming from shotgun or a lot of it is. Those are pocket throws, you know, and the play action stuff when he's in the pocket throwing, that should slow down a pass rush so that the pocket throws aren't as much of an issue. Now, his size is, and he had a lot of balls deflected on Sunday, understood. But they also add a shotgun, it's harder to run a lot of the bootleg stuff and the keeper stuff. You see that from under center, you know, after you've kind of established the fact that you're going to run some

outside zone with your running back, you know, whether it's Gibson or Robinson, Jr. And then you're going to bring it back what, you know, the Shanahan's call quarterback keeper is what we would refer to as bootlegs with a couple of layers of potential throws. The underneath one to the tight end, the mid-range throw to a wide receiver. And sometimes there's a third level downfield with another wide receiver. And I, you don't see a lot of bootleg at a shotgun. And since most of their runs, including their zone runs, are coming from shotgun, you know, you're not going to be able to sell the bootleg, you know,

when you're turning and just meshing. Rather than with a normal boot under center, you're reaching out on a, you know, an outside zone run and then you're coming back against a defense that's flowing in one direction. You don't get that out of shotgun runs. So those are some of the observations as, to why perhaps. I'm not saying, by the way, that shotgun should be the preference. Maybe they should have him under center more. I thought he looked better under center on some of the play action stuff. I think you can get defenses to really, if you've run the ball a little bit from

under center, you can get them to hesitate even more on some of those fake handoffs and throws from the pocket on play action under center. But they're more of a shotgun team. They were on Sunday anyway. I'm talking about mostly Sunday. I don't have the numbers for the season. But they're more comfortable right now with their quarterbacks. Scott Turner's more comfortable in the shotgun. And so I think some of that has something to do with it. And I'll just add, I think Zadaria Smith and DeNeal Hunter are their best players, Minnesota's best players. And I think some of the, you know, getting them outside of the pocket would have run right into trouble more often than not. So those are some of the reasons. I wanted to point out two other things real quickly.

One is they should, you know, I talked about Curtis Samuel's touches yesterday in my game recap. Give him more touches as a running back. There you can control his touches. He had a 16-yard run. He's had a couple of really good runs. Not to the expense of taking a lot of carries and giving them to Curtis Samuel instead of Gibson, which I would prefer. But he only got one touch for 16 yards.

not go back to that at least another time or two. The other thing, too, is that I think some of you when it comes to Turner don't understand that there are other options for the quarterback that would have turned out better. And there's one play in particular in a 7-0-0 game, 3rd and 9 in Vikings territory. This was the QB draw play where he didn't get anywhere close to it. Well, when I looked at that play again, and I got a friend of mine sent me the play and said, this is what I think the play was, and my friend was exactly right. My friend's also a coach. It was an RPO play.

It was a quarterback draw as the run option, and they had a beautiful screen set up as the pass option to Taylor's left. He made the wrong read on the play. He should have thrown the screen to Gibson. It was set up, and if it doesn't get all nine in a first down, it's going to set up a fourth and one. Worst case. I think it gets the first down and some. They got three receivers out there blocking,

and it is set up, and Taylor made the wrong decision. I mean, that's an RPO. That's a decision that Scott Turner trusts. He's going to be able to read the defense and make the right call, and he made the wrong call. And I would just suggest to you that probably Wentz has made the wrong calls on some of these as well. And not all of this is reflective. The final result isn't always reflective of the play call.

Just remember that. I know I'm defending Scott Turner here with a lot of what I've talked about, but I do think there is some defense of him. I don't think this is all offensive coordinator. I don't. He's been limited, guys. Limited. Bad offensive line and doesn't have a quarterback.

Hasn't had one. I think they're going back to Wence. I think Wence is going to quarterback the game at Houston, unless Taylor comes up super big Monday night. And they, I'm not talking about just winning the game. I'm talking about looking good offensively. You know, if they win 13 to 10 because they get a special teams touchdown and the defense is lights out,

and they end up with 203 yards of total offense, and they're 3 for 14 on third down, it's Wence, even if they win the game. I just think they want to go to Wence. I don't know that for a fact. I do have a strong hunch that if it's not Wentz against Houston, it's going to be Wentz against Atlanta. A lot of it has to do with his overall health.

Obviously, they're not going to put him back there unless he's 100%. But they want to prove to everybody that Wentz wasn't the terrible choice that we all think it was. By the way, how about the whole situation in Indy? My God, Urse is out to lunch. Snyder should actually go public. It would be funny if he and said, I think there's merit to considering a vote on ousting Jim Ursay. I think I could probably scrounge up 24 votes.

That would be funny if he said that. Urse hiring Jeff Saturday. By the way, he said something to the effect of, I'm really glad he was available to do this. What else was he doing? He was working for ESPN. He's coached high school football. That's it. apparently Indy in their game against the Raiders on Sunday

will have nobody on the staff that's ever called an NFL play. Ursay sounded drunk during his press conference yesterday as well. All right, conversation with Nick Ackridge about grades and performances from Washington players Sunday per PFF next, right after these words from a few of our sponsors. Don't forget to rate us and review us, especially on Apple and Spotify, or wherever you can rate and review a podcast. specifically on Apple, five stars. Nice. A quick one to two-sentence review really does help us.

Let's welcome on to the podcast. Nick Ackridge, Nick has become one of my favorites. He does a really good job of analyzing football, specifically the teams that he cares about, one of which is the Washington team that plays here known as the Commanders. He's also a huge Tennessee football fan. Sorry about Saturday. I had Georgia minus the eight for, it went to 10, actually. actually before kickoff. The whole world was on Tennessee. That was the single largest wage I've made this year. And Kirby Smart was way too conservative. I thought they could have scored 40 plus in that game. I mean, I know Tennessee is your team, but they were a bit out class Saturday in their first real big game on the road. Yeah, I only got to watch bits and pieces of it. I was the best man at a wedding on Saturday. Oh, you told me about that, right. So it was kind of a blessing in disguise that I didn't get to see that full game.

But yeah, no, I've also bet on Georgia as a Tennessee fan. I did the same for the Alabama. The whole world was betting on Tennessee there, so it just kind of made sense to bet on Georgia. But, yeah, it's frustrating. But I think they're still in a good past, you know, possibly get to the playoffs. The thing kind of bounced the right way. So it's all the matter. Yeah, it's true.

It's funny because tonight we'll get the college. football rankings out. And, you know, I think the big question actually is, will TCU move in front to Tennessee into the four spot or will Tennessee remain in the top four and TCU be on the outside looking in? Look, I think TCU is going to lose. I think they're going to lose Saturday in Austin against Texas. And I think it'll be a moot point. I did go through this exercise with one of my sons last night. And it is an interesting one. Hear me out for you college football fans and Nick is one. Nick, of course, is a senior data analyst for Pro Football Focus, and we will talk commanders here in a moment.

But let's just say Georgia runs the table. They're in before any SEC title game result. No matter what would happen, they could lose that title game by 80 points, and they would still be in. The Ohio State Michigan winner is number two. So now you get into three and four. If LSU runs the table, and I think they're in trouble this week at Arkansas, actually, that line just is way too short.

short, but let's just say LSU were to run the table and beat Georgia in the SEC title game. Let's see Tennessee runs the table and is sitting there as a one loss team. And Oregon and USC sort of fall off the map. You know, USC loses to UCLA or Notre Dame and then beats Oregon, let's just say, in the Pac-12 championship. So you've got multiple lost teams there. I made the case that you could end up with Georgia, LSU, Ohio State Michigan winner and Tennessee.

Because Tennessee is a one-loss team with one-loss being to Georgia. Would certainly trump anybody else, a two-loss Oregon or SC or a one-loss, TCU for sure. Nobody else really has much of a chance. So you could end up with three SEC teams that way. The other interesting scenario is, let's just say, you know, Oregon or USC is a one-loss team or TCU. It's TCU goes undefeated now they're in. But what if it comes down to an LSU conference champion or Tennessee for the fourth spot?

LSU is a conference champion having just beaten Georgia, but they lost to Tennessee in resounding fashion at home. I mean, who would get in, Tennessee or LSU? These are all the scenarios that I was playing in my head, drunk on Saturday night at a Latic. trying to figure out how you could get back into the playoff. But that's the conundrum right there. I think because, again, I don't know how you keep out a one-loss Tennessee team with, like you said, that one-lost beat in Georgia. I think obviously it's too early because a lot of things can happen. Like you said, I think Arkansas has got a real chance to beat LSU.

The T-C Texas is favored by almost over a touchdown, I think. Yeah. Yeah. So a lot can happen between then, but I'm just going to keep praying. If Tennessee runs a table, I think they have a good shot. I think they have a good chance, too. I just think that LSU is actually a really good football team, and the game Saturday worries me. And I don't know that LSU is good enough to be Georgia.

I think what we saw on Saturday, Nick, is that Georgia really is when they play well, the best team in America, like when they're really interested, both sides of the ball. Although I'm like, I've become a huge fan of Michigan. And I think Michigan can go to Columbus and win. I do. I might be the only person that thinks that. But I'm interested on what that point spread is going to be. I've been trying to guess it with some friends of mine. You know, last year I was absolutely convinced Michigan was going to be a short dog at home

and the whole world was going to be in Ohio State, and Michigan was, and they won out right. I don't think Ohio State's going to be more than a seven-point favorite at home against Michigan. Yeah, I would guess around like maybe four or five points. Who's at home again? Oh, it's in Columbus. Yeah, it's in Columbus. Yeah. Some great games coming.

five years. Yeah. Yeah, some great games to look forward to. And the PAC 12 is actually really in play for the first time in a while as well. All right, let's talk about, let's talk about, you know, the team in general and then we'll get to the game and maybe some of the grades that you have that PFF has. First of all, I'd ask you, how good is this defense right now?

Yeah, it's pretty impressive. I was a skeptic. kind of going into this game because I think the Vikings do have a really good offense. And the past couple weeks they've played, you know, some not great offenses, even including the Packers. I mean, the Packers team is a complete mess. So I'm a big believer in your defense is only as good as the offense you're playing. And so this was kind of a big test. And I think they played really, really well. So I'm kind of back on the bandwagon that the defense is very good and can carry this team. And you just need hubpar offense to, you know, kind of get wins. Yeah, I mean, I think nobody can run against them, except for dual threat quarterbacks.

I mean, that's been, you know, the issue. And even Jalen Hertz couldn't run against them in the first game. But, you know, they are, I mean, they are elite right now, I think, as a run-stopping team. Is that where PFF has them? I mean, do they have them as, you know, the DVOA football outsider's metric has them as the number one rush defense in the NFL? Where does PFF have them? Yeah, the personal grades you're going to. to be a little skewed because of that because basically teams aren't running as much because

they just can't. So again, you're kind of dealing with a smaller sample size there, which will bring some of the grades down if you know you have one bad snap. Like for example, Jonathan Allen only had 19 run defense snaps. That's just going to, you know, be a too small of sample size to really kind of gauge how well he played. But I think DVOA is a great metric to kind of see how you as a team are, you know, stopping the run and stopping the pass and sort of like that. So I think that's a more accurate way to look at it and, you know, kind of individual grades. All right. We are talking to Nick Ackridge.

Nick is a senior data analyst for pro football focus at PFF underscore Nick Ackridge, spelled A-K-R-I-D-G-E. Okay, you said that they're playing good enough defense if they can just get somewhere in that, you know, mid-range or just below the mid-range, they can, you know, they can win some games. So where are they offensively in your mind right now, and where can they get to? I think right now they're a below-average offense. I think it honestly is bottom 10 right now, and you're just kind of banking on if you can get that Heineke magic. And we got a little bit of it, and I think that quadruple, triple team, Hail Mary in the third quarter is,

might be the last dash of magic that he has left for right now, but you're really, this whole offense is predicated on the quarterback play. And if you get good at Heineke, like I said, in the preseason, if you get good wins, you can win a few games. I think that's kind of where you'll see this team. Just kind of hovering around, you know, a win loss, win loss, win, maybe two wins in a row, maybe two losses in a row. Something like that. It's just going to, you know, I think it's always going to, every game's going to kind of come down to the fourth quarter. And, you know, it's just those kind of little mistakes like the Heinecke interception, the overthrow that Harrison Smith picked off. I think you're just going to need to kind of have the offense kind of treadwold.

water post for a little bit, and then, you know, hopefully you get to bounce it to fall your way in the fourth quarter. What was Taylor Heineke's grade Sunday? He finished with a 49.0, which is kind of where he's been these past couple games, because we've charted him with a lot of turnover-worthy plays. Some of them have not fallen in the defense's favor. He's gotten very, very lucky. Again, we charted that Taylor-Hmerie, that triple team was a turnover-worthy play because if the back judge isn't there setting an incredible screen, that's most likely an interception. So it's been a little rough in our grading system for him, and you'll see sort of some EPA metrics and other metrics that are just kind of going off of the box score.

Stats will have him a little higher than our grade, but it just kind of shows that he's, you can get pretty lucky right now. Hopefully for the commander's sake, that luck kind of continues. But usually when you see those amount of turnover-worthy plays with just a few interceptions, that usually starts to go downhill pretty fast. I mean, that was a moving screen. They should have called that. The referee did not have his feet.

Yeah, the feet were moving on that screen. I mean, Cam Bynum was ready to call a fair catch on the throw and would have had it easily. So over the last, not just two days, but really two to three weeks, you know, I've taken a lot of Scott Turner heat, because I have not, it's not that I'm a massive Scott Turner fan, but I think considering what he's had to work with here, he's actually proven to be okay.

I mean, not great, but, you know, look at the revolving door at quarterbacks the first two years. Some of the limitations they've had, they've had a massive limitation this year, quarterback and along the offensive line. And I went back and watched the game and watched the All-22 yesterday because I was interested to see why they didn't, use Taylor in more sort of movement situations as a thrower in particular.

That's what, you know, a lot of the fans are screaming. Why aren't we, why isn't Washington leveraging his greatest strength, which is his mobility, his legs? How do you answer the Scott Turner question? How does PFF answer it? Yeah, it's an interesting case. I think it's tough because, you know, he's been here for three, four years now and again, We've constantly had these offenses that have been, you know, average to very below average.

And you can just point to the offensive coordinator and say, well, that's his fault. He's got to go. But like you said, you have to look at what he's working with. And it's a real problem right now. His offense does not play to the strength of Taylor Heineke. It's a lot of intermediate deep routes. And that's just not Heineke's strength. He doesn't have the arm for that.

He doesn't really have the height for it. And we've seen some of that with the batted balls and, you know, some of the overthrows that he has to literally get over the offensive line. But I think that is the biggest criticism is that he doesn't play to the strength of his offense at times. I've said in the past, just kind of quick screen, easy screens to Gibson, Samuel, McLaurin. Just get them the ball and let them, you know, create 9 to 10 yards that puts you in favorable situations.

He has a tendency to kind of, you know, when it gets to a first down is an incomplete, so you're in second to 10, it's just a simple run play, gets you three, four yards. and now you're at third and six, third and seven, and that's not an area you want Heineke to consistently play, and that's why we see the offense really kind of, you know, fail in the first half and just not really get much going. But I think he just needs to play more to the strength. And we saw when you can use Heineke on that zone read,

you can use his athleticism to get him out in space and make people miss. And he's a great athlete. So I think that is the biggest and the fairest criticism of him. but overall, I think he is, like you said, has done good enough for what you've given him. Because, again, we've had Heineke, Went, Garrett Gilbert, we've had all of these different quarterbacks, and it's very, very tough to judge an offensive quarterback based just on what he's had a quarterback. Yeah, and I talked about it in the open of the show, because in going back and watching the game, there are a couple of things that strike me just about what they've done.

and it's not just with Taylor, but it seems to be even more with Taylor. He's not under center a lot, which means, you know, it's harder to run, you know, sort of the bootleg in the keeper game unless the quarterback's under center. He's in the shotgun a lot. He's actually in the pistol occasionally. And they like to run the ball from the shotgun, and they like to play action from the shotgun. And, you know, play action should be a quarterback and an offensive line's best friend.

And he actually has made some good throws for, from the pocket. But I think unless you really drastically change the offense or you're going to go to dual threat quarterback stuff, which, by the way, I'm totally with you. I think it's easier said than done. I think when you spend all offseason installing an offense and then, you know, because you think Ryan Fitzpatrick's going to be your quarterback for 17 games, and then you think Carson Wentz is going to be your quarterback for 17 games, you know, and then all of a sudden

you've got a guy that really, you could really excel in a lot of the dual threat zone read and much more RPO stuff, even if it's kind of those zone read RPO combos in a play, which they had one the other day. I don't know if you just implement that offense in October because your quarterback situation has changed and end up being successful. I'm not saying that it can't happen, but that would be the one reason I think Scott Turner might say, look, if we knew he was going to be our starting quarterback for 15 games last year, or if we knew that he was going to have to come in and play six or seven games,

because we would have had a second offense, but that wasn't the plan. What do you say to that? Yeah. No, I think it's a very good point. You see a lot of teams, their backup is a similar version to the start a quarterback. Like the Ravens are a example, like Lamar Jackson and his backup. They're carbon copies of each other. You don't have to change the offense to do it.

And Carson went, Ryan Fitzpatrick, our complete opposite ends of quarterback. as Taylor Heineke. They're best in a pocket, and if they're making quick and, you know, decisive decisions. And Taylor's at his best when he is scrambling, making plays outside of the pocket. So you're right. It's very hard to just kind of completely shift in offense into Heineke's favor. And, you know, he's an incredibly fun quarterback at times when it's working, but it's also very frustrating because of that because, you know, you have an offense that's predicated on these deep

intermediate throws, and it's just, this is not a strength. Yeah, somebody pointed out to me, they said, you know, with Duane, they really got the ball out of his hands really quickly when Scott Turner was calling plays for him. They even sprinted him out on occasion, and he wasn't necessarily the mobile quarterback. And my answer to that is, you know, when you just rely on kind of sprinting out and getting a quarterback on the move, you're also cutting the field in half. With Duane, they probably felt like they needed to simplify it. and cut the field in half and have it be a one-reed kind of situation.

I don't think they feel that way about Taylor. I think they feel like he's totally capable of getting through progressions and they can run their normal offense, even if their normal offense isn't best suited to him. But I think that's part of it, too. But who knows? I don't see it getting a lot better than what it is, which is a couple of really exciting plays, fun plays,

I called them yesterday. And so many people thought it was so condescending, but it was really more in fun. I just said some of those cute plays. I said, he's such a cute kid. I mean, out there playing, running around. But, you know, it's really complimentary because I love kind of overachiever underdog, you know, gamers, which is what he is. But he's also incredibly limited. But I don't see it getting that much better.

I think we've seen what it is. do you agree or disagree? Yeah, I think so. Like I said, kind of like his magic might have run out with that triple team Hail Mary. I think we saw it last year, too, when they were on their winning streak. Everything was breaking his way.

You have the Heineke plays that were working in it. Once that magic runs out, you see where he's limited. And that's kind of the problem with Taylor Heineke. When that magic runs out, it does not look pretty. Do you think that they'll go back to Wents when he's healthy? I think they will. We were saying how they haven't really changed the offense, and I think that they're kind of stuck with Wentz,

and I think that they believe that if you get Wentz back, and even though he's not playing, he's had more time kind of understanding the offense, and they think that maybe you can get good Carson Wentz and kind of keep progressing in that 500 range and sneak into the playoffs. I think you're going to be in the same situation. you know, like I said, just keep winning a game, losing a game, maybe winning two, maybe losing two, winning one in it.

I think you're going to get that either way with you to quarterback, so then you have to play in, you know, the contract situation and the draft pick that you would have to give up for him playing a certain amount of snaps. And if it was up to me, I would keep playing Hineke and just kind of ride this roller coaster. But I think they're very set on let. I agree with you. And I have seen them do this rationalization thing in their own mind, which by the way, in some, in some, some instances they haven't been wrong. I mean, I think they, you know, they, they were like, look, I mean, he was a rookie. We put a lot on him on Jamie Davis. We still like him. He's going to play well. You know, on the defense, they didn't go out and they didn't sign a bunch of defensive players because they thought they still had a defense that could perform at a high

level and they thought it was more about sort of some discipline issues and some really good offensive teams they faced last year in quarterbacks. And I think they've been proven right on that to a certain degree. But on the Wentz thing, it's going to be about, look, our defense is playing lights out. The NFC right now, you might be able to go 8 and 9, 9 and 8, best case, and grab the 7 seed. We're going for it. I mean, we've got, you know, we got games on our schedule. We can win, and I don't know that it'll be any better.

I'm not advocating for it. I don't think it'll be a lot better. I think we saw what Carson Wentz was in those first six games, but it could be better with a defense playing much better football, getting a turnover here or there. But I'm kind of with you. don't know that it's going to be a lot better, but we'll see. All right. Who were the highest graded players Sunday? Because I thought defensively it just looked like there were some

outstanding performances. Yeah, we had Montes-Swett was an 83.0. Jonathan Allen, 82.4. And then Curtis, 82.6, that was the three highest. And then Damon Davis, 74.9, was fourth. So those are the sort of the four highest-rated plays. And Jonathan Allen's grade, his 90s. He had a 91.0 pass rush. Five pressures was just dominating the interior. Offens the Vikings in the pass rush game, it was pretty cool to see. Just out of curiosity, I don't want you to give us all of them, okay, and I understand the sensitivity to that, but where was Duran?

Duran was 67.1. The problem with Duran Payne a lot of times is he's very dominant on the inside, just kind of getting into the backfield. He doesn't really finish those played very often. and that kind of reflection our grading. I think our grades have kind of always been a little lower than where I thought he's play to. That's just because of the whole tackling situation and stuff like that.

And it's very tough to grade a guy that's just supposed to eat up blocks. And that's what he's very good at. And his grade sort of, or Damon Davis's grade sort of reflects how good Duran Payne does, if that makes sense. If he's able to get those blockers, give Davis some free lane, let him make decisions. and that's kind of why you're seeing Jamie Davis take a step up.

Who's getting doubled more, Pain or Allen? Do you know? I think it's pretty even, honestly. They kind of shift them both enough, and both of them are playing almost 95% of the SNAPs. I'd have to look to see who exactly is more, but I think it would be pretty even. Yeah, I think early in the season,

I noticed that it was much more pain than Allen, but I really haven't paid attention to that recently. and I would imagine with the way John's been playing, the teams are trying to double him. Two other players real quickly. St. Juist, what kind of grade does he get for the job he did on Jefferson Sunday? Yeah, he's another one of those players where the grade might not show how well he played because we're not adjusting for the matchup,

because if we did that, you're just kind of open yourself up to a world of other questions. But he finished with a 57.4, and if you kind of think that, into perspective against Justin Jefferson, that's pretty solid. I mean, our grade, your average grade is a 60. If you're just on the field not doing anything, it's a 60. So a 57.4 is just right below average. And if you consider that against Justin Jefferson, I think that's pretty good. And you saw him when he was getting beat, he had one play where he was actually beat and Jefferson had a step. And that was on that slot phase. The other two catches were contested catches that he just kind of needs to do a better job of getting his head around and finding the ball.

But I think he was very good in coverage. He was very sticky in coverage against Jefferson. There were a few times where he was in zone, not against Jefferson, and looked a little lost out there, but just straight man-to-man coverage against Jefferson. I thought it was pretty impressive. Yeah, I mean, I don't know how many times they have essentially gone with sort of star treatment with one of their corners on a receiver. But I think it's pretty telling that the star player, the star treatment,

was handled by Benjamin St. Juist. I don't think there's any doubt they believe he's their best cover corner. What about Luke? Yeah, go ahead. Or William Jackson. They just, they kept kennel floor on one side, William Jackson on the other side. They never had to follow at all. Exactly.

It's impressive to see it. Like he said, they clearly trust him. And it showed he had some really, really good reps against Jefferson. So I think it's really promising. And by the way, you know, the size and the length is obvious. on the corner blitz that Kirk didn't see, he got there in a hurry. I don't know what he runs. I haven't looked that up, but I think he runs much better than most six-three guys

that play the position. I mean, the length and the size are going to close the gap, you know, even if he doesn't have the four-three speed. But he's more than fast enough, and I think you saw that acceleration on that sack was pretty impressive. Yeah, it was a very interesting concept. getting X's and O's wise. They said both corners on a blitz.

They did it a couple times, and it worked out really, really well. Just kind of, like you said, using his speed to his advantage. And he can close down ground very quickly with his long strides. Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, I think one of the things that Jack clearly wanted to do, because we haven't seen a lot of it in recent weeks, he just wanted to speed it up. And I think they really felt they had an advantage inside with the two guards. And Bradbury, who's a smallish center and then got hurt in the game.

Yeah. It seemed to me that Cornelius Lucas got beat multiple times and badly. I'm just curious as to what his grade was in Pass Pro. Yeah, it wasn't great. He finished with a 38.4 pass blocking grade. And that's mostly against Daniel Hunter, who's a very interesting. He's very, very good, but he's unique. You don't see any of the pass-risk moves he does.

you don't see that copied anywhere. It's a very, very strange and unique sort of pass rushing style. So, yeah, he had his problems out there, and I don't think even if he had caused me out of right tack, but I don't think it would have changed. I think Dinole Hunter is a very, very good pass rusher, and it shows. Hunter and Smith are really, really huge for defense. It's actually at times struggled, but you're right.

You know, I'm curious as to why you think Hunter's style. He's obviously a leaner, longer, lankier kind of dude. as a pass rusher. But man, when he's been healthy, he's been one of the best. But what makes his style different? Yeah, he's an incredible athlete, and he's just weird. Like, I don't know how else to describe it. It's just weird.

Like, a lot of times when you see an outside sort of swim move, they're bat in the hand down and just swimming outside, but he sets it up differently, and he does everything sort of opposite. So it kind of sets it up to make the tackle think that he might be going inside when he's going out. outside. And it's just a very unique and interesting way to rush the passer, and it's worked for him his entire career. I wonder, do you think that Cosme to guard leaving Lucas and Leno at tackles when Cosme's truly healthy and ready to go is the way they'll go?

Or do you think Trey Turner's shown enough here? And they're obviously, you know, still believing in Norwell. I mean, what do you think happens there? I think they go back to Cosme and right tackle. I think they kind of believe in him there. And the PFF grades have been kinder than a lot of fans have thought on Cosme, especially just run block. I think he's an incredible run blocker. And I think Turner has actually played a lot better these past couple weeks. That could speak to maybe just him being healthier now. But, yeah, he's played a lot better. He's had two clunkers against Jacksonville in the first week and then Dallas.

But other than that, he's been really solid. So I think they stick with Turner at right guard and go back to Cosby and right tackle. We are talking to Nick Ackridge from Pro Football Focus, and the best part about Nick is this is his team. Washington is his team. I am curious about one grade for the other team, and that is, you know, I'm a big fan of Kirk Cousins, and I have been from the jump, and everybody that's listening to it knows that I'm a big fan of cousins. And I said something yesterday that I'm sticking by. Statistically, it was far from one of the best games that he's played. but I think it is one of the more memorable games, not because of Washington,

but because of the beating he took, I thought, in that game, and the pressure that was quick. I mean, you already mentioned the 47-yard throw on 3rd and 7, which was really the play of the game for Minnesota. They're down 10 at that point. They're going to have to punt there, and he got buried by Duran Payne and dropped it in the bucket. What was his grade on Sunday? He finished with a 79.0.

We had it with four big time throws. Adjusting completion percent, it was a little off. I think he was a little inaccurate at times. But like you said, he was getting absolutely destroyed by Allen and Payne at time. And he stepped up with incredible throws. I mean, I'm a Kurt Cousins fan. I think the way we kind of handled it was a mess, and we can spend hours talking about that.

But I think he's a good quarterback. It showed. And, yeah, he was very impressive putting the ball and spots it. only his guys can get it and it kind of showed on the Jefferson catches against St. Juice. St. Juice was in perfect coverage, but perfect ball. There's not much you can do. Well, I didn't know that you were a Kirk guy, too. So I'll ask you the question that I got asked a half dozen times last week for various things, including from Ben standing for his athletic story. If he had stayed, what do you think the last, you know, five years would have been in Washington with him at quarterback?

That's a tough one. I think he absolutely is. I don't know if you can make an argument that he isn't the best quarterback we've had the past 15, 20 years. That says more about the state of Washington's quarterback situation. We've past 15, 20 years. But I think he is a very good quarterback. I think he will consistently be in that 15 to 10 range of quarterbacks in the NFL. Now, the question has always been with him.

is if you get a great team around him and he gets to the next level. He hasn't shown that in Minnesota yet. They've had some very good teams. They have a very good offense now. They have a pretty good defense. So you can kind of, this is sort of the year where you should really see it all put together. But I think if he stayed here these past a couple of years, I think you would kind of see them consistently around those eight, nine win ranges

and fighting for playoff spots. I don't think he would see them, you know, the top five picks like they have been in the past. But I don't think he would have ever really elevated the team to the next level. And I think that's always been his biggest criticism. He's just a above average to, at times, great quarterback. And you can win a lot of games with that? But the question is, can you win it all with him? And if you get great Kirk Cousins for a good stretch, I think you could.

And if it hits at the right time, yeah. But I think there's a lot. a lot more questions with that, and I think you would need sort of a perfect team around them. Well, I mean, I think that that's kind of my thought, too, because I think the great team around them then is contingent on because he was going to take up a lot of your salary cap space, as he has in Minnesota. It then is really reliant on you drafting exceptionally well, and having a lot of young players on rookie deals that are significant contributors and big-time players. Minnesota's had bad defensive teams with him, and they've had terrible special teams with him.

The kickers cost them multiple games over the last year and a half or two years. Some of the same things that were here. Now, it wasn't necessarily because of the percentage of the cap that his franchise tag was taking up, but I think that's the issue, which was why my answer, if I haven't given it on this podcast, and maybe I haven't, maybe I did with Tommy last week, is that I think he would have improved. I think with Jay as his offensive coach and play caller that they would have had really good offenses at times, as long as they were healthy.

But the cap would have been the big issue, and them drafting well would have been significant. You know, getting the medium-level free agents to overperform and getting your players on rookie contracts to play at a high level would have determined whether or not they had a chance at 11 and 12 win seasons or whether, like you said, and I think this is probably more accurate, described that they would have been in the race every year and they would have made the

playoffs once or twice with nine or ten wins, but a couple of the years where they got injured and they had no depth because of his salary in the cap space, they'd be at, you know, seven wins somewhere around there, which is exactly what it's been in Minnesota, you know? Yep, that's the case that they're dealing with now and that's what all their fans have been arguing about for the past three, four years is, yeah, he's a really good quarterback at times, but if he's good enough to demand all of that money and then leave you short on other positions. And that's what they've been dealing with.

Who knows? It might finally work for them this year. But I have my doubt. Yeah, well, he restructured. They were able to sign Zadarius Smith. They were able to add a couple pieces. I'll tell you, the Hawkinson edition at the trade deadline, I think, is huge for him. He made such an impact on Sunday. All right, let's take a break.

Nick said he will stick around for one more short segment. we've reached the midpoint of the season pretty much across the board. Not everybody's played nine, but many teams have played nine at this point. And we'll talk about the NFL season to date, and we'll get Nick's Super Bowl pick here at the midseason point. We'll do that right after these words from a few of our sponsors. All right, let's finish up our conversation with Nick Ackridge from Pro Football Focus. We'll go around the league. I do want to mention that this segment, even without Tommy here today,

is brought to you by our good friends at Shelley's backroom, the best cigar bar in town. A real neighborhood feel to the place, great drinks, great food, 1331 F Street, Northwest, Shelley's back room. You'll see Tommy down there, pretty much even money. He's down there a few nights a week. It's got a great vibe, a great feel, great people in there, sports always on. Again, Shelley's back room. 1331 F Street Northwest.

All right, Nick, if I told you in the NFC right now, Tampa Green Bay Rams, three quarterbacks struggling, three teams, struggling. If I said to you, one of them is going to end up turning it around and being a threat when we get to the postseason, which of those three teams does it? I would be a fool to not say Tom Brady. I would be a fool to not say the buck.

I think I mean it's bad Like all three of those teams on offense Look very very bad Like you can make an argument That they look as bad or worse Than the commanders at time And we saw that with the Packers

I don't think the Packers Figure it out I think They have a whole host of problems In the wide receiver They just lost Romeo Dobbs for Probably four six weeks now It's an ankle sprain And the Rams have a lot of problems

On the offensive line I think your best bet Would be on the Bucks mostly because they're in a very bad division. Yes, of course. They can easily get the playoff. And then you're betting on Tom Brady in the playoffs. So I would always bet on him and not against him in that situation.

I'm with you. I mean, the division more likely than not is going to give him an opportunity to get in. I also think that just overall the team is much better. You know, has anybody brought up just how many balls have been dropped by Mike Evans and other Tampa receivers the last few weeks. Mike Evans must have a half dozen dropped balls on big plays. Yeah, it's bad at times. I mean, Tom Brady is right now, I'm pulling it up.

He has the second most drops of any quarterback in the NFL with 17. Right above him is Trevor Long. I mean, his grade is a 76.2. That's low for Tom Brady, but that's still above, you know, in the top 15 of quarterbacks right now. Yeah, I think if you can kind of just get guys to step up around him and them losing their center, Ryan Jensen is a huge problem. Ryan Jensen is one of the best centers in the NFL. So losing him has been kind of a massive problem for them. But I think they are getting healthy.

And again, like you said, if Evans and Godwin and they can step up and make those big plays for them, I think they're in a good position. It doesn't surprise me that it's the second most drops in the league. It just seems like every time I turn them on, somebody's dropping a perfect, perfectly thrown Tom Brady pass. Of the teams, and we've got a lot of them this year, you know, it doesn't happen every year. There's always surprise teams, but there are a lot of them this year. In the NFC, Seattle, Atlanta, even though they're four and five, they've played much better.

The Giants. In the AFC, you know, you would obviously say the Jets more than anybody else, but you could also look at the dolphins, although I think there was a lot of expectations of what they could be before the season started. but give me sort of your feel for those teams that have overachieved based on preseason expectations. Who's for real and who isn't? Yeah, I think the dolphins are absolutely for real. I think the offense that they're in now played the two of strengths perfectly. Just quick anticipation throws, and he is absolutely destroying you right now with Tyree Kill and Law.

I think they're absolutely for real. I think the Jets are a very interesting team. They're not fun because the way they play is very, They're just going to muddy the game up. Their defense is incredible right now, and you're just going to kind of rely on Zach Wilson. It's similar to Washington. I don't think Washington's defense is at that level just yet, but I think you can make an argument for it. Very similar.

Very similar age-wise, too. Yeah. I think it's just, it's one of those teams that, you know, if the luck falls their way in the fourth quarter, which it has. A lot of these teams, you need to get lucky, and a lot of fans don't like to hear that. they think, oh, we're not lucky, we're good, you know, we deserve it. But you do need to get lucky. You just absolutely do. The turnovers need to fall your way, ballsy to bounce your way.

And right now, props to them, their defense is incredible. And if you can get Zach Wilson to just tap it up a little bit and look competent at times, and I think they can continue. I think in the playoffs, but I don't know if you'd ever really, you know, count on them to really go anywhere in the playoffs. But I think it's a fun and interesting team to look at. What about the NFC teams, the Seattle Giants Atlanta? I put Atlanta in there even though they're four and five,

because every single game they've lost was winnable. Yeah, absolutely. Except for Cincinnati. Yeah, the Giants are similar to the Jets. I think it's a very good defense and offense has done enough to win these close games. And again, I think you can see them sneak in. I don't know if they would do anything. I think they would be, they're still heavily, every team they play,

they're never favored. So I don't think they can really do much. I think the Seahawks blows my mind what they're doing. It blows my mind what Gino Smith is doing. I don't think anybody ever saw this coming. I think everyone thought that they would be a team that's fighting for the first overall pick, and now they're in a great spot to make the playoffs and maybe even do something in the playoffs. If you can continue to get this sort of Gino Smith,

then I think they can actually make some noise in the playoffs. I don't think they're really a Super Bowl contender, but you can't really count them out for the way they've played and have looked at times. Give me here at mid-season your Super Bowl pick. The matchup and the pick? Match up in the pick. I think I would still go chalk with Bill's and Eagles. I think the Bills, Chiefs, and Eagles have all been those three teams that have just looked dominant at times.

Obviously, the Bills just lost to the Jets, but any team can lose to any team in the NFL. seen that for years. I think it is the bill's year. I think they finally kind of get there. And I think, and then as a fan, I hope they win if they're playing the Eagles in the Super Bowl. But I think it's tough to really bet against those teams. I think they're kind of clearly the best three teams right now. I mean, before, you know, this past weekend, and of course, you know, I agree with you, things happen in the NFL every week. But, you know, Josh Allen also got injured. This injury could be interesting to see because it's that UCLA, UCLA in the elbow. It's kind of, I think, what Stafford might be dealing with as well, not to mention a horrible offensive line.

But I think, you know, those three teams, especially the two AFC teams had kind of separated themselves. So you throw Philadelphia into the mix. If I told you that none of those three teams went to the Super Bowl, give me then, I'm asking you to give me from outside the top three, you're next to one in the AFC, one in the NFC. AFC, I think you could see the Dolphins. I think that offense is extremely close. It's very fun to watch.

NFC is tougher. I don't know who is next, really. I mean, if we're just going off of records, it's the Seahawks right now, right? No, it'd be Minnesota off of records. Minnesota. But again,

I think I would go to Tampa Bay as crazy as you that is right now, I think you would go Tampa Bay. I think if they get in the playoffs, I think they're still

one of the most talented teams out there and they have Brady who has still looked pretty good at time. What do you think of the Niners? The Niners are interesting.

Run heavy team. I don't trust Jimmy G. As far as he can throw a ball. I just don't, I don't trust Jimmy G. They've obviously made it there. But I think I would still lean Tampa Bay. I know some Niners fans

might hate that, but I would still lean the box. Just let McCaffrey throw it four or five times a game, and you're fine. The 49ers, to me, and the Cowboys to a certain extent, especially if they were to add OBJ, I don't know if they're going to do that or not, and we don't know what OBJ will look like off the injury. But the 49ers in terms of the roster minus Garoppolo, but you have to consider Garoppolo B's already come up big in some big games that they've had in the postseason. Look, without him in that Rams season finale, they wouldn't have gotten in the postseason.

He made a couple of big throws in the Packer game. He had him in position in the NFC championship game. I'm with you on him as a quarterback, but for whatever reason, in their biggest spots, he's actually delivered. But that roster is nasty. I mean, I think their secondary is average, but their front seven is dominant, as is Dallas's. You know, I think both the 49ers and the Cowboys would be, I think they're going to be threats to Philadelphia anyway. But, you know, health has a lot to do with that. The 49ers need to get everybody back, you know, and I think they will. I mean, it's not like Debo's out forever. It's not

like, you know, Eusecheck is out forever. They'll get some of these guys back. I guess Kinlaw probably won't be back, right? I forget what his status is. All right, what else? What else are you interested in NFL-wise these days that we haven't talked about? I think it's just the whole basically the middle pack. I think it's one of the weirdest seasons where you have you have maybe the Texan and surprisingly the Raiders as kind of the bottom teams right now. And then everybody else is just kind of jumbled together as not really good, not really bad, but they're just kind of there right now.

So I think that's one of the most interesting things because it leads you to a lot of very close and competitive games like we saw in the, the one o'clock's late last week. It's just going to be fun. I'm so with you on the bad team thing. I mean, you might be right about Houston, the Raiders. I mean, who knows, maybe Carolina's headed in that direction. But, you know, all three of those teams have been capable on certain Sundays. I mean, Houston's record, I think, is very deceiving. I actually, you know, in watching them against the Eagles last week, I think Damien Pierce, other than Kenneth Walker, is the best rookie running back in the league and maybe one of the best

backs that we're going to see over the next four to five years. And they're like all of these supposed horrible teams have been very capable in recent weeks. And I guess to me that is usually you know two or three teams are just horrible. And I'm not sure anybody's truly horrible this year. Yeah. And like I said, you can make the argument that the Raiders aren't really that horrible. Right. They're a weird team.

team. But, no, I think it's one of the weirdest seasons because, like you said, everybody can beat anybody. That's been a cliche for years, but I think this year it is very, very true. I think it's a very weird year. You're going to see a lot of teams kind of with a lot of upsets. And a lot of times, it's just going to be fun. It's just going to be plain fun, I think. Great job. As always, I enjoy the conversation. At PFF underscore Nick Ackridge, Nick does a really good job covering The league is a data analyst for Pro Football Focus, and he is a huge DC guy as well. We'll do it again soon.

Thanks, Nick. Absolutely. Appreciate it. All right. That's it for our show. I am expecting a Cooley film breakdown tomorrow. Hopefully we'll get it. I haven't talked to him in a few days.

He was away this weekend. But I will push for that for tomorrow's show. Back tomorrow.