The Kevin Sheehan Show - Washington-Atlanta Recap + Cooley

Episode Date: December 31, 2024

Kevin opened with his recap of Washington's thrilling 30-24 overtime win over the Falcons to clinch and NFC playoff berth. His "Game-Take" includes a breakdown of another sensational Jayden Daniels' performance along with the rest of the good and bad from the Commanders' win. Chris Cooley jumped on with his thoughts on the game while Kevin finished with the playoff opponent possibilities for Washington. 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 Sheehan Show. Here's Kevin. It is Jason Daniels. It's Washington. Into the playoffs.

Another memorable ending to what has become a memorable season. Last night's 30 to 24 win over the Falcons in overtime, clinching a playoff berth for the first time since 2020. and clinching an 11-win season, something we haven't had around here in 33 years. Yeah, the 1991 skins, as you all know, went 14 and 2 and won the Super Bowl. How did they do it last night? I think we all know the answer to that one. The show's presenting sponsors always is Wind Donation.

Call them at 86690 Nation or head to Windonation.com if you need new Windon. Cooney's going to be on the show with me today, which is why I waited and we're getting it out a little bit later. He called me last night at the end of the game. We were texting back and forth. He was watching the game. He's going to join me in the next segment. In this opening segment, I'll have my full game take, what I liked, what I didn't like, and more. Sorry, I didn't get a post-game show out late last night.

I just thought considering how late it would have gotten out because the game went long. It wasn't over until 1135, 1140. It just made more sense to wait until today, especially when Chris said he would be available to jump on and talk about the game. So where to start? Well, that's easy. Number five, Jaden Daniels. He did it again.

He loaded the team onto his back and carried the team across the finish line as a winner once again. It's hard to even describe what he's doing. anymore because it just gets so repetitive. It's fun repetitive, but it's repetitive because it's every week he basically does something that amazes all of us. He's not only the greatest rookie quarterback that I've ever seen. He's already an elite NFL quarterback, a top five, top six, top seven worst case quarterback in the game today. This is not exaggeration. It's It's not hyperbole. He's it.

He's one of the few who is so good that no matter how mediocre or subpar everything is around him, he just elevates the team around him. Or if he can't elevate those around him, he just goes out and wins a game by himself. That's the definition of an elite quarterback. The guy that doesn't need much around him to win enough to contend. You know, Mahomes has done it. Jackson's done it, Allen's done it, Burroughs done it in terms of quarterbacks currently. Those are the only four, by the way, that I would consider taking before Daniels.

And really considering what I've watched here over the first 16 games, I don't think I'd trade him for anybody right now. I wouldn't take anybody in front of them. I'm just saying that those four, Mahomes, Jackson, Allen, Burrow, you can easily make the case are worthy of being ranked in front of him because of their career. accomplishments so far. They have more history of being elite. Jaden's history is 16 games of eliteness. So we're projecting a bit with him. But those four would be it for me. You know, not golf, not Herbert, not Hertz, you know, not any of those guys, not even Stafford. I mean, is there anyone else worth even mentioning in the category of Jaden Daniels? He's top five right now. He is.

Things change in the NFL. I know that. C.J. Stroud is not having a great season after a brilliant rookie season last year. Not as good as Jaden's season. We talked all, you know, after the draft, could he be, you know, a guy that has a C.J. Stroud kind of a season? Yeah, he is. In fact, the season he's having is better. You know, Jaden's already beyond Stroud's combined yardage number.

in terms of passing yards and rushing yards, and he still has a game left to play. We hope he has a game left to play. More on that coming up later. Jaden's completion percentage is much better than Strouds last year. He's one touchdown short of Strouds 23 from last year, but again, he's got one more game, and his QBR is so much better than Strouds last year. I mean, Daniels now has 12 touchdown passes in the fourth quarter and in overtime, the most by a rookie in NFL history.

He has five touchdown passes now in the final 30 seconds of regulation or overtime. Two more than any quarterback rookie or veteran has had in any single season since the 1970 merger. Last night, he became just the fifth rookie quarterback since 1950 to lead his team to back-to-back double-digit comeback wins. The last guy to do it, Andrew Luck in 2012. Last night, Daniels became the first quarterback, rookie or not, with at least three passing touchdowns and 100 yards rushing in a prime time game. And of course, I'm sure you were watching last night in the fourth quarter

when he surpassed RG3's single season mark of 815 rushing yards. He finished with a buck 27 last night, 103 of those coming. in the second half and in overtime, he now has 864 yards rushing the most ever by a rookie quarterback. Oh, by the way, he became the first quarterback in NFL history to have two plus passing touchdowns, 200 plus yards, and 65 plus rushing yards in three straight games in NFL history. He also joined Michael Vick as the only quarterbacks in NFL history to record 225 passing yards, three or more passing touchdowns, and 125 rushing yards in a game. He and Vic.

This is debatably the greatest rookie season for a quarterback of all time, and it's a top four to five season overall right now in the NFL this year. Things change in the NFL, and they change quickly and unexpectedly. I understand that. You know, Strouds having. kind of a sophomore slumpish kind of year. It's not a terrible year, and a lot of it has to do with the injuries that they've had. But remember Carson Wentz, leading MVP candidate in year two in his career until he got hurt,

and then after that, his career just fizzled. RG3's rookie year, we all are familiar with that one. The NFL can be fleeting. It can give and it can take away quickly. But I think Jaden is a lock to be the quarterback. of teams here in D.C. that contend for the playoffs more years than not, if, if he remains healthy. That's always the key. Keep him upright and healthy, and he'll lead this franchise, especially under this rookie contract, you know, to a good stretch of contending seasons. Because if he can do it with the team he has around him right now, with the least amount of experience,

that he'll ever have, even better days should be ahead. But look, dreaming of what will be is for, you know, after this season ends. He's led this year's team into the playoffs. They are in the playoffs now. You know, it's no longer, man, they look like a playoff team. They're in playoff contention. Can they finish it off? Yeah, they finished it off.

They're in the postseason. They've won four games in a row. the last two over solid opponents in Philly and in Atlanta. And when they get there to the postseason, you know what you can say about Washington as far as the NFC landscape goes? You can say and not look foolish that Jaden Daniels will be the best starting quarterback in the NFC postseason. You know, the guys that I mentioned, Alan, Jackson, Burrow, Mahomes, they are AFC quarterbacks. Jaden, in my opinion, will be the best quarterback in the NFC playoffs. And so knowing that, knowing that you have the best quarterback in that side of the bracket, the NFC side of the bracket, you've got a chance.

Washington has a chance. We have a chance. They'll be one of those perceived dangerous teams. They won't have the best roster. They won't have the best team, but they'll have the best quarterback. And one capable of doing what he did last night, strapping his team to his back and winning a football game,

even against a team that might be overall better. in the Atlanta Falcons, certainly last week's team, was better. Last night was another one of those jaw-droppers. He was the best player on the field by far. He was the most clutch player on the field by far. He was the number one reason they won the game. Number two, whatever it is, isn't even close. He had to continually overcome the rest of the team,

the rest of the situation last night. injuries up front along the offensive line had an impact on the game. They did. The penalties, so many of them, drop passes, one crucial drop at the end of regulation, a defense that really struggled most of the night. And, you know, let's face it, there were gifts wrapped up and handed to Washington last night by Rahim Morris and by Michael Panix Jr. in his second start. Rahim Morris made maybe the most incompetent timeout and game clock, you know, management handling decisions at the end of the first half and at the end of the game that you will ever see, certainly in a high profile spot. He's being absolutely skewered today as he should be. Michael Pennix Jr. missed no less than three touchdown passes.

Just missed. That's expected for a young quarterback. I thought he made some big time throws in the game. game as well, including the touchdown pass to Pitts that tied the game. How did they get that situation into the end zone? After a snap went over the head of Bijan Robinson and they lost 22 yards on the play, how do you score on second goal from the 26 when the other team's only goal is to keep you out of the end zone? Doesn't matter. If you're not going to kick a field goal, you have to score. That was.

nuts. God, there was so much to this game. So much to this game. Netting it out, it was a tail of two halves. You know, Atlanta dominated the first half, rolled up 200 yards of offense, 17 points, although it should have been more. The defense was really bad for the first 30 minutes of this game. Bejohn Robinson put on a show. He was unstoppable. Pennix, you know, made some play. miss some plays. It was an Atlanta first half minus some of the misses and of course the Rahim Morris clock handling at the end of the first half, which I'll get into in more detail when I get to my game take. And then in the second half the game completely flips. Washington has five possessions, four in regulation, one in overtime, and they scored on four of them. At halftime, I tweeted out

after that first half. You can't punt and you need Jaden to lead four plus scoring drives. Four scoring drives is what he led. That led to 23 points. They didn't kick the extra point after the overtime touchdown. They were brilliant offensively in the second half, even though they had to overcome a lot in the second half. How about 300 yards close to it?

after half time, 21 first downs in the second half. Two totally different halves. That was kind of the story of the game. The game was tied at the end of regulation, and Washington won the toss, got the ball in overtime, and I don't know if you guys felt the same way, but I'm guessing you did. When they won the toss, I thought, game over. He'll drive him down the field, they'll score a touchdown, and win 30 to 24. Now, I thought that would happen when they got the ball back at the end of regulation in a 2424 game, and it probably should have happened if Zakias, who played great, could have just caught a ball that was right in his hands near midfield. 12 plays, 70 yards in overtime, a drive that took up seven minutes and 18 seconds.

Jaden accounted for 69 of the 70 yards with his arm and his legs in overtime. He rushed for 103 yards after halftime, 127 for the game. He was 13 of 22 for a buck 35 in the second half, two touchdowns. He took the game over. He willed his team to victory. He took a pounding. He got hit a lot. My God, that leg bent back in the first half on that sack was scary and ugly looking.

and yet he was fine. A few years ago, old regime, here comes the cart, he's done. Sigh of relief, man, when he got up and was fine. But man, that replay was scary looking. He ran the ball last night in a way in which if you watched him in college at LSU, when they played Alabama, when they played Florida, when they played Missouri and trailed, it was him taking the game over and moving the ball and scoring any way possible. And he knew that part of the best chance they had was for him to get his wheels moving, to start running. They ran design runs.

They ran option runs. And he scrambled all night long and overcame unbelievable situations at times. I wrote this down early this morning before the radio show because I think that this is kind of a reflection of what they had to come overcome last night. And it's the second straight week in which he and this team offensively have had to overcome so much. Last night, the offense continued, even in the second half when they were maintaining control of the football. They got called for penalties that left them and get this. These are the down in distances that they had in this football game. They had a first and 15.

They had three first and 20s. They had two second and 15s. They had a second and 30. They had a third and 22, more on that play coming up in a moment. A third in 23 and a third and 30. I mean, a friend of mine texted me after I read these on radio this morning and he said, they overcame 210 yards of bad down and distance. Well, they didn't overcome all those,

but that's what they were faced with last night. And yet, they won the game. Last week, five turnovers, they won the game last week. Last night, 13 penalties, 108 yards, and all of those long down and distance situations, and they won the game. that is unusual. You don't win NFL football games with a minus four in the turnover margin category.

You don't win football games typically with 108 penalty yards on 13 accepted penalties against you. I mean, they have done so much to themselves the last two games to lose two in a row. But he cheats what the expectations. are. He is a cheat code. He's an eraser of mistakes. Five turnovers last week? No worries. No worries at all. 3633. 13 penalties this week. First and 20s. First and 15. Second and 30s. No worries. 30 to 24 in overtime. I said last week when they were 10 and 5, they'd be 5 and 10 without them. They're 11 and 5 now. They'd be 5 and 11 without. him. They have a lot to figure out when this season is over because there's not enough around him for them to be a true, you know, Super Bowl contender, like looking like the best team in the

league. They don't look like the best team in the league. It doesn't mean they can't win in the postseason because they have him, and he's going to give them a chance. But man, when we get to those off-season conversations with all that salary cap space, all of those draft choices, it's going to be some fun times. Hopefully it is after more than just a short run in the postseason. I will go through all of the postseason possibilities in the final segment of the show. All right. They have three potential plans. playoff opponents right now. I'll explain how they get to each one of those three and who those three are. All right, let's get to my game take. Pay attention. He's Kevin's Game Take.

All right, what I liked, what I didn't like and a lot more from last night's 30 to 24 overtime win over Atlanta, a game that clinches a wild card birth for Washington. No division title. Philadelphia wrapped that up earlier in the day with their route 41 to 7 over Dallas. So that means another year since 2004. The NFC East has not had a repeat champion. And that streak continues. Last year, Dallas won the NFC East. Philly locks up the NFC East earlier in the day.

But Washington nails down a wild card spot. They'll either be the six or the seven seed. Currently they're the sixth seed. They control their own destiny as far as the succeed goes. In the final segment, I'll lay out the playoff opponent possibilities and talk about whether or not Dan Quinn should play as starters and go for it next Sunday against the Cowboys, a legitimate question to be asked on whether or not he rests players and potentially puts the six seed at risk or if he plays it to win it to try to get that six seed.

I'll have some thoughts on that in the final segment. For Atlanta, by the way, gut-wrenching loss. There were so many points left on the board by the Falcons. They had every chance to win the game last night, and Rahim Morris will be remembered. He's such a good guy from all accounts and a decent coach. But as a head coach last night, he failed his team. He failed his fan base.

If they don't go to the playoffs, it's on him more than anything else. What he did at the end of the first half, but what everybody will remember at the end of the game is one of the most incompetent handlings of timeouts and clock that you will ever see. And it was in a high profile spot and it more than likely cost his team a playoff spot. All right, let's start with the things that I liked. We start with Jaden Daniels. A performance, another A performance. I think out of the 16 games, I've given him an A. at least 11 or 12 times.

Was it an A-plus performance? You could call it that, considering what he had to overcome. This was an interesting game from this perspective, and Ben Standing was on with me on radio this morning, and he mentioned this, and I thought he was right in mentioning it. He said, you know, of all these incredible performances that Jaden's had this year, he felt like this one was a bit unique in that Jaden truly willed his team to victory. There was just not a lot of support from anywhere.

The defensive side of the ball, the offensive side of the ball, penalties galore. It doesn't mean he was perfect because he wasn't. When you handle the ball as much as he does and he's involved in so many plays in terms of yardage gained, whether it says a runner or a thrower, you're not going to be perfect over 60 minutes or in the case of last night, 67 and a half minutes. but he the running in the second half, 14 rushes for 103 yards in the second half. When Ben was mentioning that, for me, it was like a flashback to him as a college player last year. Some of the games that I talked about during the offseason leading up to the draft,

the Alabama game in which he got hurt, he legitimately willed his team into a 28-28 tie before he got hurt. He had 160-some-odd yards rushing in just over, you know, three-quarters or barely three-quarters, another 250 or whatever passing. He did the same thing where he put on an historic performance against Florida rushing for 230-some yards, having over 500 yards of total offense. He did the same in a game against Missouri when they were down last year. And I mentioned so many times in the lead-up to the draft that he was in a position at LSU where they couldn't afford to punt because their defense was just so god-awful. And if they punted, they were essentially coming back onto the field with, you know, the lead either seven points closer or the deficit seven points further

from what it was. And so he would will his team over and over again with runs, with scrambles, with designed runs, with option runs, with throws, with throws on the runs, with just playmaking ability where he was just competing at a level in which he thought it was the only thing that gave them a chance to win, and it was. And that's what we've seen from him recently. But last night, the running in particular, you know, 127 yards total on the ground last night, 103 in the second half on 14 carries. He was just not going to let them lose the game.

24 of 36 for 227, three touchdowns, the one pick. He was sacked five times. I'd have to go back and see how many of those were legitimate sacks. There were a couple of them that were near or at the line of scrimmage. And again, 16 carries 127 yards rushing. Some of the plays that stood out to me. First drive of the game versus the blitz. He was outstanding versus the blitz last night. He throws into the end zone to Ertz. It was the ball that Ertz could have caught. I, I would have called it, and I don't know how statistically anybody referred to it, but to me, that was a catchable ball by Ertz. Look, Ertz was great last night. So was Zekeos. They both had big drops in the game, and they scored on that drive, but that was a catchable ball by Ertz and a really good throw versus the Blitz. The touchdown pass on fourth and goal at the two.

It was a combination play. Read option and RPO, run pass option. It is we're going to fake it, or I might. might give it, I pull it, and now I might run it, but oh, by the way, I've now got a pass as an option to, and the throw he made to Zakias for the touchdown, where there were defenders in between and he had to just kind of sidearm it, you know, through a small opening, incredible throw. Now, I will mention this about the play. On that play, Nick Allegretti was downfield, and it wasn't even close. He was three yards, two to three yards beyond the line of scrimmage.

You can only be a yard beyond the line of scrimmage legally. That was an ineligible receiver downfield. He was not an eligible lineman downfield. He was not an eligible receiver on the play. He lined up at guard. They got away with one there, but it was a really good throw by Jaden. Second drive of the game, second quarter, third and four slant against the blitz to Zakeas. Then he had a second and 11 slant to Zakias.

That was before he ended up throwing that pick. He had a read option keeper for 25 yards on a second quarter drive that was just, when he pulls it and there's just a little bit of daylight, he's amazing. And how about the move on one of those read option keepers where he took this step like he was going to go outside and he cut it back? And he threw that little opening before they can get to him. There was so many scrambles in the game and so many escapes. The first and 20 in the third quarter on their opening drive, the escape, and then he throws to Ertz, and Ertz makes one of the best yards after catch plays of his career here, certainly.

The third and five scramble for nine yards on the first drive in the third quarter. How about the fourth and one under center? You pretty much know on third and short, fourth and short, when he's under center. here comes quarterback keeper bootleg and he scrambled for four yards and a first down there. You know, third quarter, still that first drive. The touchdown pass to Ertz was outstanding. So much patience, so good in the pocket, so good outside the pocket. And it was, he, Ertz is definitely a favorite of his, you know, all season long. And before the Philly game last week, I thought it was really important that they have Ertz,

especially after they had lost Noah Brown. The bigger targets in Brown and Ertz have been go-toes for Jaden all year long. Ertz has been a very important player to this team. I know culturally, leadership-wise, of course, but on the field as well. That was a big-time catch, big-time throw. Second drive, third quarter,

there's a first-and-10 scramble for 13 yards, then there's a second-15 scramble for 18 yards. These down in distances, I think it's important for them to stay ahead of the chains, but it's not like they're doomed if they don't. The fourth and five poised to find McNichols underneath, and what a great play by McNichols to lunge and get that first down. And then look, on the final drive of regulation, third and ten, he makes a throw to Zakias, midfield.

They're going to go win this thing with a field goal, and Zakias dropped it, right in his hands. Yeah, and then we get to the final drive, the overtime drive. I mean, the guy accounted for 69 of the 70 yards. They start with first and 15 after a false start. He scrambles for 7. He finds Ertz for 10. Then he keeps it on a 7-yard read option keeper.

Then on 3rd and 2, he drops back and then finds an opening and is flushed, and he scrambles for 16 yards. Simmons had, Justin Simmons had no chance. Jesse Bates had no chance. Then you had the pass, you know, on the boot throw to Chris Rodriguez for 12 yards. And then how about the run to get them down to second and goal, you know, at the Atlanta two yard or third in goal at the Atlanta two when he just kept it. And there was the first, run on a read option keeper where he got slammed. And then that one that got him down to the two-yard line, I mean, he was bounced around. He was a running back. I don't love the quarterback counters. I don't love the designed runs. Quarterback draws are fine. But, man, Kingsbury ran a lot of designed runs in this game. A lot of option runs in the game, a lot of scrambles. 16 carries, I think matches right the season high from the opener against Tampa. And then, of course, the

touchdown throw to Ertz. I think they would have gone for fourth and goal. Quinn intimated that when he was asked about it in the post game. A tie benefited them in the same way that a win benefited them. Now, the tie would not have put them in a six-seed spot. They would have been behind Green Bay for the six-seed, so going for the win was important, but a tie would have clinched a playoff berth.

there's a lot of cases to be made. I think when Quinn answered this question and said, well, I'm not going to tell you that. And then he said, but you know how aggressive we've been. It's an indication they would have gone for it. And I think with Jaden in those situations, you go for it. You know, you had that team on its heels. They were tired.

You had taken a timeout so that Jaden could catch his breath, you know, before that third and goal touchdown pass. But what a really good throw and catch by Zach Ertz and a great throw. Jaden, an A in the game. I mean, maybe closer to an A plus because of the circumstances. Second on the list of things that I liked. How about them just staying on the field in the second half?

I mean, do you realize what the difference was in play count, in time of possession? Washington had the ball for 53 plays in the second half, 53 and a half, and overtime, okay, and the seven and a half minutes of overtime. Atlanta had the ball 24 snaps. Washington had 28 minutes and 17 seconds time of possession. Atlanta, nine minutes, one second time of possession. Washington's best defense was not its own defense. It was their offense and what they did in the second half.

Atlanta had three plays in the third quarter. I think I tweeted at one point, it had been an hour of the game, and they had only run three offensive snaps. It really got them out of their rhythm, which they were in. Washington's offense in the second half, keeping the ball away from Bejohn Robinson and company, was massive. You know, they didn't touch the, they had nine total snaps Atlanta did until the four and a half minute mark

when they were down seven, 24 to 17. Washington was seven of ten on third downs in the second half, two for two on fourth downs. and I think the biggest call of the game, if not the biggest play of the game, was third and 22 on the first drive of the third quarter down 17 to 7 when there was an illegal contact call on number 51 Malone. I'm telling you, third and that long and super long away from the play. Jaden was still in the pocket. I think it was against Ertz. It was definitely a legal contact. It wasn't, you know, one of these blatant illegal contacts or whole. but you won't get that called a lot on third and 22. That was a significant play in the game. Massive.

Washington keeps the ball and then basically doesn't give it up for the next two hours. And they would have been punting down 17-7 from deep in their own territory. Atlanta would have had good field position and a chance to go up by either 13 or 14 or 17 at that point. That was a massive play. So staying on the field in the second half and obviously in overtime, crucial in the game. Rahim Morris' clock management bungling, you just have to thank him with a nice little New Year's card or happy holidays card because what he did was so damaging to his own team. And I know that he admitted that he probably blew it at the end. I don't know that some of these coaches that blow it and then admit it

actually really still understand it. His first big mistake was at the end of the first half. They throw a ball to Mooney with 46 seconds to go. He cuts it up field. They've got three timeouts left. He gets down to the Washington 24-yard line. They have not really been stopped. Bejohn Robinson and Tyler Algier are running right through Washington's defense.

This was my number one concern going into the game. And the play action and some of the time that Pennix had because the running game was working, this was set up for them to score a touchdown before the end of the half, but they were playing for a field goal. They took all three timeouts with them into the locker room, and they kicked a field goal with two seconds to go. As I've said many times, and I've used to do this with Cooley all the time when we would talk about clock management.

If you're trying to score on offense, is it better to have more plays to score or fewer plays to score? Well, of course the answer is more plays. Well, their handling of the final 40 seconds gave them far fewer plays. After not calling a time out after the Mooney catch, the snap took place at 20, the next play ended at 16. In 30 seconds, they ran one play. one play. You guys know what 30 seconds is. 30 seconds can be up to six plays, you know, five seconds each. If it's six or seven seconds, it's at least four plays. He didn't call a timeout in the most obvious moment to call a timeout. Just didn't do it. And because of it,

they ran a total of three more offensive plays and kicked a field goal. Interestingly, on third down, they had London wide open and Pennix missed him. He missed a bunch of throws in this game. And if he had scored a touchdown on that throw, that would have been one of those, yeah, we handled it perfectly. We scored with five seconds to go. No, they ran three plays after the throw to Mooney. It could potentially have been another five to six plays of offense, which meant they could have continued to run the football. blew it there. The end of the game is so obvious. I'm sure you guys know it at this point. It's, you know, 24 to 24 Washington, you know, punts miraculously. I thought they'd go down the field and score on a field goal to win the game because that's what they do. That's what he does. But Zakias dropped the ball.

So Tressway gets a great pun off. They start at their own 19 with 40 seconds to go, two timeouts. And they get a big chunk play to Darnell Moon. Now I'm waiting to see the All-22 to see if he may have stepped out of bounds first and came back in. It seemed like maybe a few Washington people on the bench were pointing to that. But you have to call a time out. You call a time out with 33. That play ended at 33 seconds. They took the next snap at 16 seconds.

And the next play ended at 12 seconds. So between 33 and 12 seconds, you had 21 seconds elapse with one play called. That is so bad. They should have had in those 21 seconds, no less than four plays, three plays, tops, worst case, three plays, maybe more in that situation, especially if there's a couple of quick throws and you have another time out there. But you would have definitely had three.

place minimum to get the ball further into Washington territory so that the field goal wasn't long. But he didn't call that timeout. They ran one play and there were 12 seconds left and they had second and 10 at the 44. They got another play off that was incomplete. Now there were seven seconds left. They called a timeout with the clock stopped ironically. then Duran Payne jumped in the neutral zone. I didn't think Duran was very good last night.

And then with seven seconds to go, instead of maybe 23 seconds to go, they ran their last offensive snap, and there was a defensive pass interference penalty on Mike Davis, which gave them a chance to kick a 56-yard field goal. You call that timeout after the Mooney catch. You now have 33 seconds to go.

You're at your own four. you have many, many more play opportunities to try to get Riley Patterson a kick closer than 56 yards to win the game and keep yourselves in first place in the NFC South. I like Rahim Morris. Everybody likes Rahim Morris. This will be one that Falcon fans won't forget. He took, he stole a playoff berth away from his own team by not understanding, how to manage the clock at the end of half or game. Next on the list of things that I liked. I thought Zekees was outstanding throughout the game. I think Zekees has been a pretty good player much of the year.

The drop, you know, withstanding, this was the biggest catch day of the season for him. Eight catches, 85 yards. They were all big-time plays and yardage, you know, chunk yardage plays. he had 85 yards in reception yardage, which matched his effort against Arizona earlier in the year. This was against his former team. Olamedi Zakias is on the list of things that I liked. But again, he had a big drop. He's had a couple of those this year.

Remember he had that huge drop in the Baltimore game on a play in which they would have been in scoring position to keep the game within kind of one score? Chris Rodriguez is on this list. 14 yards on four carries on the drive that went into the early portion of the fourth quarter and gave Washington a 21 to 17 lead. It was all him. That first four-yard run, he was nailed at the line of scrimmage, and he got four yards. The touchdown run, A.J. Terrell had him dead to write for a loss, and he scored. He also had the catch in overtime. I think they should have used him on the drive in which they ultimately kicked a field goal. They had first and goal

at the three, they had Brian Robinson Jr. in the game. Why not Rodriguez? It was the drive before that he basically ran the ball in in four plays from the 14-yard line. Do you know how hard that is in the NFL? You usually don't line it up first in 10 at the 14 and run four times into the end zone. He did. I thought Fowler Jr. was pretty good in the game. He had a sack-forced fumble. So did Armstrong. I thought Wagner did a really good job, specifically in in pass coverage. He almost caused an interception on a poorly thrown ball by Penix to Bejan Robinson, but he got a piece of it. I thought Wagner was good in the game. You know, John Allen was pretty decent. You know, played 27 snaps in the game. I thought

John Allen, you know, really showed well, had some pressure on one of the sacks. I thought Chin had a couple of really good and memorable pass breakups. but it was not a good day for the defense at all. Who else? Ertz, I thought, played well, even though I thought he could have come down with that one catch. He had two touchdown catches, had the big, you know, first in long situation that turned into a 37-yard play. Fowler Jr., I mentioned. And Tressway, what a punt after they went three and out with the Zichias drop at the end of regulation.

61-yard punt, good coverage. That was huge. Now, Atlanta still got into range. All right, what I didn't like. We'll start with the penalties, 13 for 108 yards. The most hurtful were in order. Sanra's still lining up in the neutral zone on a field goal. That cost them four points.

Can't do that. Same drive. Mike Davis, dreadful day. for Mike Davis. Man, they missed Lattimore. I mean, who knew? I mean, we knew, but he only played one game. I played two games, right?

The New Orleans game and the Philly game. They really need him back for the playoffs. Because Davis is not the answer. I would have put St. Juist out there even more. Davis was turned around consistently by Drake London or anybody else that he was covering. Davis, that DPI on Drake London, extended a drive. You had that Fowler Jr. hit to Pennix's head. That was definitely a penalty. There was a hold on a punt return that tacked yardage on to the end of an Atlanta punt return. Cosmi's hold at the Atlanta two-yard line was really bad. That was one that Terry McCauley said was. The other one, he said, was a bad call on Cosmy. But it wiped away a touchdown past Zakias that would have essentially, you know, clinched the game. They would have been up 2817 with not a lot of time. left. Instead, they were forced to kick a field goal. And then the defensive pass interference penalty

on Davis on Mooney late that set up the 56-yard field goal attempt from Riley Patterson that looked good. So penalties, number one on the list. They've been a penalized team here recently, too much so. Number two on the list of things that I didn't like, the defense. They just, I know some of you guys consistently and have all year long, you've pushed back on me saying that I'm concerned with the defense, specifically the run defense. If you haven't seen why I am concerned in the last two games, I don't know what you're watching. I think they've got good players on defense. I love Louvo. I love Wagner. I love Chin. They just for whatever reason aren't a good run-stopping team against teams' intent on running the football and talented enough to run the football.

Bejohn Robinson, we talked about this on Friday show, elite running back. He is sick. The vision, the patience, the moves, the ability not to take a square hit. God, he was fun to watch in the first half if you had just been a football fan. Tyler Algier bruised them. Those two average 6.3 yards per carry in the first half. I mean, the defense couldn't stop the run unless they were off the field. And that's when they stopped the run, when the offense dominated time of possession.

And then they didn't cover well in this game. How do you overcome a 22-yard loss on an errant snap in your second in goal at the 26? How do you overcome that? You don't nine times out of 10, but against our defense, they did. I mean, the coverage on the pits play. London was wide open on the play before that. Bad run defense, bad coverage. I think there was some pressure at times, you know,

but some of the time I thought the pressure was because the quarterback just didn't see it. He's in his second start. My number one concern continues to be entering the season finale and then the postseason is defense and specifically their ability to see. stop the run. It is hard to win games that matter consistently when you aren't a good run-stopping team. Washington, in terms of average yards given up on a run, are near last in the league. I'm pulling it up right now. They've got to be dead last now in the league. Rushing defense, average yards allowed. Hold on for one second.

Washington is 30th in the NFL. They give up 4.8 yards per carry. Don't look at the other stuff. And don't, you know, don't just kind of rest on, well, did you see them in the second half against Philadelphia? Yeah, but Philadelphia didn't have Jalen Hertz as a part of their run game. And Philadelphia tried some other things. Look, I thought one of the smart things for Atlanta was they ran against a heavy body.

I mean, Washington had eight in the box on average in the first half, and they were still running. But when they really crowded the line of scrimmage, they threw. They had Pennix throw. I thought Philadelphia didn't throw enough against Washington's heavy boxes last week. I mean, they're loading the box and still getting run on by good teams. Dallas can run the football all of a sudden. They couldn't before their first meeting. Rico Dattle, I think, has three straight, maybe four straight, 100-yard games. kind of started with our game, I think.

So that'll be a concern going into that game, stopping the run. I said on Friday, number one key, you got to stop the run, and they didn't. And I said, if you don't, this is going to be a game that comes down to the end. It'll be a very close game. Jaden can overcome it, and that's what we have going on the other side of the ball. But when you can't stop the run, you're going to be in these games that are going to be coin-flip games. Next on the list of things I didn't like. How about the fact that, you know, the two best players on offense, Jaden Daniels and Terry McCorn just were off all night.

Terry McCorn, seven targets, one catch for five yards. Wow. Give A.J. Terrell some credit. He was outstanding covering Terry. I told you that on Friday that Terrell can play. He can cover. And Terry just, they were just off. You know, the throws were just a little bit off or if they were there, Terry didn't pull them in.

Not a good night between Jaden and Terry. They're going to have, you know, that's going to be a hard thing to overcome in a playoff game, although maybe he can do it. He just seems to overcome everything. Pass protection was a problem much of the night. It was like they had not seen the blitz. I mean, they were confused. They, even when they were, you know, blocking six against five, there seemed to be a free rusher.

That was a problem. I don't know if it was on Jaden. I don't know if it was on the fact that they lost, you know, Biotis in the game and Dieter was in the game again? I don't know. At one point, Collinsworth said Allegretti was calling out some of the past protection stuff.

But the past protection wasn't good enough. The running game outside of the quarterback. I mean, Brian Robinson's numbers aren't bad, but there just wasn't enough. I mean, Rodriguez was great in that one stretch. They still have to get more from everybody but Jaden. If they get Echler back, I think that would be huge for the post-season.

season. Not from a running game perspective, but from an overall offensive perspective. Next on the list of things that I didn't like, that drive in the third quarter that ended in field goal, when they had a first in goal, it went from the third quarter into the fourth quarter. And it's 21-17, and you got a chance to break this game open. This drive was in the fourth quarter. You know, it got down to, you know, four minutes, under five minutes when the drive ended and they kick the field goal because that was the first time that they had touched the ball Atlanta had in a while. That drive, that field goal drive was 10 plays 52 yards, took five minutes and 30 seconds. And Atlanta took the ball after that with four and a half to go.

So that drive was disastrous once they got to first and goal at the three. I would have loved to have seen Rodriguez in there and have him do what he did on the drive before, but they didn't go that route. First and goal at the three. Here's what they produced. Negative 10 yards, two timeouts called on offense, a touchdown pass to Zakias nullified by a Cosmi holding penalty, and then on third goal from the 12, they couldn't account for another free rusher on a five-man pass rush. And so Jaden had to throw it away. That was a hurtful situation because it looked like they were about to take control of the game, go up, 11 with four and a half to go, five to go, and instead it's 2417, and Atlanta goes down the field

and scores. Man, that last drive defensively, they converted a fourth and 11. They overcame second goal from the 26th, just crazy. What else on the list of things that I did not like? There were drops in the game. I've mentioned them kind of. Ertz had a drop. Crowder had a drop on a seam sideline shot. Zakias had that big drop. Jade, numbers and the offensive numbers would have been bigger. Yeah, let's see if I have anything else here. Did I mention McNichols? I thought the effort on fourth and five was outstanding.

I loved Cliff's action in the backfield on a play that ended up being kind of a quarterback power or quarterback counter with three blockers in front, including KJ Osborne, who was in the game a bunch. I'm telling you, man, for whatever reason, they don't love Luke McCaffrey as much as we do. I cannot explain it. But K.J. Osborne in his first game played 19 snaps. McCaffrey played 22. All right. Bryson Tremane. If you don't know who he is, he was number 89. He was in there for 16 snaps in the game. I like McCaffrey. I like him with the ball in his hands. I don't know why he's not a bigger part of what they do. But

some of the Kingsbury, you know, kind of the deception in the running game, especially with the quarterback, is so fun to watch. Crowder dropped another punt return, picked it up, then had a good return, had a very good return in the fourth quarter, a 19-yard return. You know, they're subbing sometimes on offense too slowly, too late. It's costing them in terms of getting ready at the line of scrimmage and getting snaps off on time, and it's costing them in terms of needing to call timeouts on offense. They got to get that buttoned up. I already mentioned the Allegretti down the field on the first touchdown. That was so obvious and not called. There was a holding call on McGarry for Atlanta. They overcame that, but that was a terrible call. Yeah, I think that

pretty much does it. Third and 22, illegal contact, massive play in the game. Huge play in the game. And certainly Rahim not calling a time out after the catch by Mooney at the 44-yard line, probably prevented Atlanta from winning the game, or at least having their kicker kick a more makeable field goal. They would have had multiple plays to gain more yards. They could have run the ball, into much better field position than they had. They had the chunk play on the defensive pass interference. But wow. Look, Riley Patterson was terrible for us in the preseason.

And Mike Tariko made the point at one point during the game that during preseason pregame warmups, excuse me, he was not very effective. But you add three or four plays, and that guy's probably kicking a 44, 45-yard field goal, something like that, which would have been in his range. and it could have been night over, game over, and we would have been sweating out a season finale in Dallas

because Tampa won earlier in the day. All right, I think that's it. The crowd was great. It really popped through the television. Congratulations to Jeremy Reeves. He got engaged after the game on the field. It was a scene, man, and it was fun to watch, and I'm glad they won the game.

I gave out Atlanta as a smell test pick plus four. That game went to plus three and a half, plus three in spots. There was a lot of sharp money on Atlanta. So I was kind of hoping for a 27-24 walk. When they got the ball back at 24-24, I was like, all right, go down, get in field goal range, and let's have Zane Gonzalez knock one through for a 27-24 win. Because I think my prediction was 27-23, but that was when the line was four and a half on Friday. And then it went to four, three-and-half, three even.

But, yeah, memorable, you know, win. memorable season. Chris Cooley next after these words from a few of our sponsors. Hey, guys, prize picks is the place to go to for Daily Fantasy Sports. I have the Price Picks app. I'm one of the over 10 million members at Prize Picks, where billions of dollars are awarded in winnings. Prize Picks has made Daily Fantasy Sports accessible to everybody.

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Again, download the app today and use my code. Sheehan, S-H-E-E-H-A-N to get $50 instantly after you play your first $5 lineup. Prize picks, run your game. This segment of the show is brought you by MyBooky. Go to my bookie.orgie.orgie. And use my promo code, Kevin D.C. And they'll give you a 50% cash bonus on your initial deposit. They have everything you need for this week, including the four-quarter final game.

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MyBooky.ag promo code, Kevin. DC. So I promised you at the beginning of the show, Chris Cooley. We talked briefly last night after the game. You were texting me towards the end of the game. You watched the game. You're not at home in Wyoming. You're still in Florida, right? Spending the holidays with family. Still in Jacksonville, Florida. And how's that going? So I watched the game. It's going great. My in laws are here. They were always in Virginia when we lived in Virginia, and they moved here and leave it to Wyoming. So it's an awesome

spot when you're in Wyoming to come for Christmas or any time in the winter because it's warm. So, you watch the game? I just loved last night that I forgot that I'm watching a football game and I can text back and forth a year, and it was really not until about the fourth quarter when everyone else had left me downstairs

by myself to watch the game. And I'm more like yelling at the TV. They let's not necessarily because of like the true desire to have Washington to win a football game, but I'm just, I watch a lot of football throughout the week. And I was excited about this game all day,

and it ended up being a great day, and I needed someone to talk to. Well, part of it is that you don't even have a TV at your place right now in Wyoming. No, I have two TVs. Okay. Three TVs. Well, you told me that you didn't even have anything set up. I don't have anything that I have paid for. that I can get games on.

Besides, I can watch the NFL, whatever, you can watch on the NFL network on a tablet or your phone. Right. Well, you have my login to the NFL network. I know, and so I can watch that, whatever game is currently being shown on that platform I can watch. So I could watch last night's game at home. I can watch a Sunday night game at home.

Well, you weren't at home. If there's an ESPN game, I have the ESPN app. watch that game. I didn't get it this year. We've been busy. I didn't get it. I've watched very much football. It's fine. I have this week, though. You got to watch a rather big Sunday night game where Atlanta really had to win. Washington had a chance to clinch a playoff berth by winning last night or winning next week against Dallas. So I just went through, you know, my game take. I want to hear yours. Well, it's really two different ball games. You look at it.

the first half and the second half. And I think there's probably a ton of reasons why. It's sad that I think penalties are a big part of it, and I'm not suggesting primarily that they were just bad calls. But penalties are big part of that

first half the ball game for Washington. And they are a team that struggles when you really watch them to create behind the sticks second and 20 or more type of plays. And less, which as crazy as I thought about it towards the end of the game.

Unless earlier in the game, Daniel just decides he's going to run. And then he'd be down a distance, whatever. It did insane. Yeah. But the penalties are ridiculous in the early part of the game. Some of the holds

throughout obnoxious. It makes watching the game hard. I don't know. Like the couple of Cosme holds. Those are, I mean, defining hold is an interesting deal, but defining those holes. Those are coached movements.

They're coaching that. Tell me about that. The Cosme hole. Yeah. And there's one on the center early before he went out of the game that I thought was egregious. The cause me. Egregious. Hold on, egregious in that it was a bad call?

Bad call. Okay. Yeah. The one on Biotish. I'm trying to recall exactly what it was a run to the left on Biotish. Yeah. Okay, let me just give it. This is not a game take, but it's a pet peeve,

and it's really become pet peeve watching other levels of football as well, including high school football. Imagine you're standing in front of me, and I'm trying to block you, as Joe Gibbs would put it that way. If you get, if the back gets around to a little bit, and you try to go off to the side, but you fall towards your back or an emotion, where I'm pushing you forward, I can't really hold you.

It's pushing you because you're choosing to fall sliding off, which is coached as well because when you fall and fall down and push you over, it looks like a hold. It doesn't make it a hold. I need to pull or tug you. I need to see jersey stretched, in my opinion, to see a hold. And I just think football's football. And when I'm taking somebody the direction I would like to take them, I have to push them that direction.

It's not a hold situation. And it's really making it tough to watch football in a lot of it because they call everything. That crew in particular, by the way, I think leads the league in offensive holding penalties. Yeah, they might. I don't know. The Cosme ones are interesting because he had two of them.

They were both critical situations. Yeah. We're trying to use the defenders. forward pressure to bring him directly straight downward. Like you're chopping a table leg out from somebody. It's really coached as a big chop forward. Like his hands get into my chest inside of where my hands could be. And so I'm going to try to chop his hands down

and if he's got too much pressure forward to fall forward. The first one caused me, it's really close. And I think they'd bring in, who would they bring in last night? The former ref. who is the Terry McCauley. Terry McCauley said that they're bringing McCauley.

Like, I don't think that's a hold. He does get pretty close on grabbing in an arm area, but to me it's not a hold. And then the second one, he fully grabs the jersey in the chop and pulls him down by the jersey. Now,

had that forward pressure not been over, outside of the level of what you can maintain your balance, which the defender was, he wouldn't have fallen. But that's where Cosme is using that, is he's using leverage.

or the person's leverage against himself. Anyways, I thought it made a hard for watching the first half, and they were behind the sticks, and so you really didn't see what they were doing offensively. Their inability to handle pressure early, and Collinsworth went through it 50 freaking times. He's insufferable to me at times, but... Collinsworth, yeah.

But you're going through their ability to handle pressure, when you're turning pressure to a blitz one way over and over and over, and ever is like, why don't they fix that? turn your center the other way once and they'll just bring pressure from the other side. You need to have answers with the back picking them up and the tackle fending out to the outside, which they didn't do and they never picked

throughout the day. So it wasn't just necessarily just one pressure is killed. I mean, they would have just flipped backers if they had it picked up. I want to have promised had a plan for that. But when you don't pick it up, we're going to keep running it and keep bringing that pressure. They struggle with that early in the game.

They struggled with that. They struggled with that. They struggled with that. a lot. I want to stick with that point because I don't want to lose that point. It's been a couple of weeks now, or a couple of games in the last several, where there just seems to be a lack of communication, a lack of execution. Now, they had their backup center in there. He had to come in for Beaudish, and that was a disaster a few weeks ago against the Cowboys. Beautish is, you know, a seasoned veteran, and he's having a very good year.

But it seemed like any five-man pressure, whether it was against five or with a back staying in, they lost somebody. There was a free rusher so many times. So what was happening, in your opinion? Well, I just sat here and drew it, and I want to give it to you. What it really looks like is they're bringing the off-backer, the backer that's not mugged up tight to the line of scrimmage. Well, all you've got to do is just make him the back backer, and then your tackle to that side will take the end who's coming wide.

Well, the backer that kept from off the ball, they kept coming up, kept catching the tackle's attention. The tackle would squeeze inside, and then the end outside would go with the full pressure. You'd let the back come and pick up the backer from linebacker depth, and you'd fan your tackle to the end. It wasn't a hard pressure to pick up. And it's a mixture, I'm sure, of youth.

and they discussed over and over, having different offensive linemen in. But it shouldn't have been a hard pressure to pick up. Sometimes when they're an empty. Your tackle could even post the backer, but he's got to understand. A lot of times you just have to understand that looks like a problem, but there's somebody else to resolve that problem. And I have to trust that somebody else will resolve that problem, and that's the running back.

I can't barely get him and not get the end and then link. Now two guys are coming through to the quarterback. right back. I got to get one of them. What do you do when you're an empty? You just have to bring a back back back into the backfield? When you're in empty, you're going to have to turn your you're going to have to straight set your center. So you'd have to straight set your center back and he'd have to duel, which is go two ways. You'd have to big duel and look two ways. He'll just set for depth. And so you'd have three to his right. If the offbacker was to his right, you'd have three to his right. Guard would pick up the tackle. The tackle would pick up the defense.

defensive end, or the guard would end up picking up the backer, and then the center would end up picking the tackle up to that side. There's a million different ways to resolve these issues. Not a million, but there's a lot of different ways. They just didn't have a plan for it, and they didn't necessarily come up with a plan early enough to resolve it. And I think the other part of it is it's second 15. Like, your plan to handle pressure is second six, where I don't get it.

Yeah. The plan is just to let five figure it out on his own, which he did. over and over again. When you did it over. Oh, God, he's good. It's so much fun to watch the kid play. All right. Yeah, I mean, it's just, it's just that's ending.

Well, so, I mean, the kind of two-half still, they really, I think Pennix did anything incredibly special until that last drive, which I know you want to talk about. But they ran the ball effectively in the first one, Atlanta ran the ball incredibly effectively in the first half. Yeah. And they looked like you could. you couldn't really stop them.

By the way, to me, I'm watching it, it looks like a really physical game throughout. Like, both teams were there, laying some hits. And Atlanta had the better part of that. But you get to the second half, and whatever happened with Kingsbury, with Daniels, with that offense, with that group, I hate talking about, like, half-top adjustments.

Right. But whatever adjustments are made or whatever you fix, controlling the ball in the second half. How long do you think it was that Pennix hadn't been on the field, real time, like 50 minutes? It was almost an hour. That was really hard. It was almost an hour that they had run three plays. And then you put him on the field and he runs three plays, and then it's almost another 20 minutes.

It's like an hour and a half this dude's been on the field for three plays. Yeah, I think I think I figured out that it was three plays in an hour. It was, yeah, the first series of the second half for them, after a long opening drive for Washington, they ran three plays, they went three and out, and then when they came back on the field down 21 to 17, in an hour they had run just three offensive snaps. That's crazy. I mentioned... It's really hard, by the way.

I know. I remember that. I remember playing, especially when you don't get the two-minute drive to go down. Someone takes the ball down at the end of the half and three or four minutes or whatever it is. And then you get the 20-minute half time. And then they come back out and they take a 13-play drive down. You're like, I've been sitting here doing nothing for 50 minutes. Like, I'm going to loosen up.

I know. And they were rolling offensive. It is a challenge for another team, for another offense to prepare themselves in that situation. Yeah. I mean, Washington ran 54 offensive plays in the second half. Wait, 50, I've got the numbers right here. 53 plays in the second half to Atlanta's 24. But Atlanta had only run nine plays up until the four and a half minute mark of the game in the second half.

So basically they had run nine plays in, you know, an hour and a half to an hour and 40 some minutes. It was a 28-minute 17-second to 9-minute one-second time of possession advantage. I know. It's crazy when you can do that. It's unbelievable. Well, they came out in the second half, and I thought Daniels looked outstanding. The run game was awesome. Rodriguez is a hell of a player.

Yeah. The Teos made some big plays. They just, I mean, they just did a heck of a job physically going down the first. field and over and over being effective. I thought Earth was terrific throughout the game. I thought he'd watch him. I thought he blocked really, really well in a lot of situations in the run game. Did a really good job.

I mean, obviously makes some big-time play. The end is outstanding. Let's see what else. Defensively, their safeties, their safetys are really good. Martin and Chin, yeah. Martin and Chin are really good. Fowler is a problem for everybody else. Fowler is another guy that's a big time problem.

And I think until you get to two minutes left in the ballgame or whatever time you get the last penalty that you don't score on, it's all Washington. I mean, this game is over. Right. He was dominant. Then you get that last penalty. Who was the last penalty?

The last penalty was on Cosme, right? Yeah, the one that took away the touchdown that would have made it 28 to 17. and they had to kick the field goal to make it 24-17, yeah. That was the one that McCauley said was the right call. Yeah, it was. He pulled him down by the jersey. I don't have a problem with that one.

I mean, it's a coach deal, and it's amazing how much they'll get away with that versus how much they get called for it. Right. But it's the right call. I had no problem with that call. I thought early there were some. I'm trying to go through. There were some tickey-tech things early, I thought.

Well, I'm curious as to what you thought. of what I thought was maybe in the moment and even after the fact maybe the biggest play and the biggest call in the game. And that was on the first drive, Washington's first drive, before they started to just dominate time of possession and keep the ball away from Atlanta, they had a third and 22 on the first few plays of the third quarter. And Jaden got sacked and they got bailed out within a legal. contact call on number 51 down the field on a play that honestly had nothing to do with anything.

It was probably illegal contact. But on third and 20 plus... It occurs. It was on Malone, right? Yeah. So I think that was a makeup call on the first Cosme Holding penalty. Yeah. Because that was the drive.

That was the first Cosby penalty. They go back and they go to Terry and they're like, no penalty. And it wasn't. And so now all of a sudden, it is interesting, though, because Malone is dropping to a hook spot as a linebacker. And it's Earth's clearing through the middle, right? Yeah, I think it was Earth. And they're a coach to bump through those vertical receivers to bump through a contact. It's just the coaching points five yards.

you know a lot of I can't tell you how many times at 9, 10, 11, 12 backers running through my head in that career. That's what he did and I don't think I've ever seen a call like that. Rarely. It was illegal contact.

You can't make that contact to him at 9, 10 yards. What was the exact number? Do you know? I can go back and look at it. It was clearly more than 5 yards and Jaden was according to the referee. still in the pocket. Here, I'm pulling up the play right now.

I don't have the All-22 yet. All right. Well, I thought it was ridiculous, to be honest with you. I thought it was a ridiculous call. Yeah, I mean, what I was going to say is, on third and 20-something, you usually don't get that call unless it's really egregious and really overly physical.

Like, he literally held them up and held them in 10. tackle them. That's not what happened, you know, on the play. Yeah, I'm not seeing it. Hold on this replay, but it happened more than five yards down the field, and Jaden was still in the pocket, I think, when it happened. But my point being, if you punt on third and, on fourth and 26 at that point from your own, you know, 16-yard line or whatever, they're going to get the ball in really good field position and they've already run through you easily in the first half, and they're going to have a chance to go up 20 to 7 or 24 to 7 early in the third quarter. And the fact that they stayed on the field and then never left the field basically for the

rest of the half and the overtime, I just thought that was a major, major call in the game and a huge benefit for Washington. Oh, a massive benefit. I mean, there's a massive benefit. Rahim Morris doesn't know how to save them a minute at the end of the half. It's unbelievable. He's timeout. He completely botched the end of the half, where you could have put more points on the board.

I know. They absolutely had an opportunity to go down and score. It's like, what, they throw to Mooney with like 50 seconds, a 46 seconds left, and they don't snap the ball again until there's 20. And it's a first and 10 from the 24. It's like, I'm not sure in that moment, are we really that over-concerned? Are we really that over-concerned about running the clock to zero when the other team gets the ball? Or are we complacent enough that we forget we have timeouts to call in those situations?

It was one of the two. You can't come up with another way to manufacture using time. Well, it's like what we used to do when we used to do the show together, and I would say to you, so if you're trying to score, is it better to have more plays to try to score or less plays to try to score? It's so simple, and yet these coaches do this all the time. This one's magnified, though, the end of the game situation even more so. But the end of the first half was so bad because if they had called the time, out, Chris, after the Mooney play, they would have had enough time with still two timeouts left

after that to continue to run the ball, which Washington was worn down at that point. I mean, that drive opened with Bejanon Robinson, who is a superstar, by the way, running for nine yards and running for 10 yards. They were at Washington's 24. They could have called a timeout with 40 seconds to go, and they would have had seven or eight plays left with two timeouts to run. And you know what they ran after that point? They ran three plays. That is, that's just, you can't explain that in a proper way that justifies it. It is total mismanagement and you blew an opportunity to be up 21 to 7 at halftime instead of 17.7. By the way, they still had a chance to score. London was wide open on that play before the

field goal in the end zone and Pennix just missed him. He missed him. See, I'm glad, though. I hate when you make that play, and you're like, wow, we're off the hook. You're scored. Yeah, no, right. Yeah, they...

No, you're not off the hook. You have 16 seconds left on a second and seven from the 21 where you can get two first downs from there. What are we doing? That's amazing. That was really, you're a really huge benefit to Washington. Chris, the end of the game could have been worse at the half. Oh, much worse. And not to mention Pennix missed, you know, Bijon Ruff.

Robinson on that deep route where he had Juan Martin beat. He missed London in the end zone another time. He made some big time throws. Don't get me wrong. And I liked panics. And you and I talked about panics coming out. I think he's got real talent and I think he'll be something in the league. But he missed so many big plays. But the end of the game situation, if you're in Atlanta and they are, and I was reading just, they are killing Rahim. And you know, Rahim. I know I love Rahim. I know everybody loves Rahim and he's really a terrific

players coach and he's smart guy. He cost his team the playoffs. When we see this at 1 o'clock in November or October, we talk about it, but you know, there's so many games left.

He cost his team a playoff berth by not calling a time out after that chunk played a Mooney for 25 yards. He took three timeouts into the locker room with him at halftime, and he took one with him into the locker, before overtime. And the one he called, he called with the clock stopped.

It was so bad, so bad. Well, he should have called a timeout in overtime. For defense. Assuming that they kick a field goal, for defense. Yeah. You call one in overtime as well. It's not two. I'm sitting there at four minutes, like, okay, well, they're inside.

I think somewhere around 4-20-ish, they're at the eight-yard line. There's only one first down to be achieved. They have their scored touchdown or kick a field goal. Yeah, right point. You're not going to run out of timeouts. You have two timeouts in that situation. Do you want four minutes left or three and a half minutes left when you get the ball in overtime or one and a half or two? You know, to me, the overtime one was just as a time.

bad because if they kick a field goal, I want more time to go down and score a touchdown. I didn't even mention that. It's a great point. And let me just tell you, it serves two purposes. You're on your heels defensively. You're exhausted. Washington ended up calling a time out because Jaden was exhausted. But to your point, at first and goal, and here's the other part of this, just so you know if you didn't know this, they have to win the game. They can't tie. the game. They needed to win the game. So holding them to a field goal and then coming down and kicking a field goal wasn't going to be good enough. They needed to win to stay in first place in their division. They also needed to win to keep Washington, you know, the opportunity to win a tiebreaker with

Washington, although they would win the division next week. But the point is that they had to win, they couldn't tie the game. And so your point about using overtime timeouts is smart. Once they got to first and goal at the eight, there was just over four minutes to go. They should have used one of their two timeouts, assuming that they would, you know, give up the field goal and get the ball back with some time left.

Yeah, more time left. When you're sitting there going, if you're watching it on first and whatever, first and eight, first and goal from the eight, run the ball. If they're going to call a down out. It's not bad to run the ball from first and eight. Anyway, but if you're Atlanta, your assumption is if you stop them on a run,

they're going to have to start throwing the ball, and you've got incompletion opportunities. But don't let them burn 40 seconds off the clock. Yeah. If Atlanta had stopped that third and goal at the two, first of all, I think Washington would have gone for it on fourth and goal. And Quinn essentially intimated that they would have gone for it. I don't think they would have went for it on fourth and goal. Why would you go for it and fourth goal?

You just needed a tie to be in a playoff. Because. I understand. you understand that Atlanta needs a win. Well, because of a couple of things. Number one, it's just been their nature. Number two, they've got Jaden Daniels. Number three, number three is if you miss, they take over at their own two with

220 to go. And all you need is a tie to win for Washington. Yeah, and still, now they only need a field goal range. I think it would have been a tough call either way. But I'm just telling you, I think they would have gone for it in that spot. I'm with you. I would go for it in that situation. Well, you just changed your mind.

I know. You changed my mind for me. Is that a problem? No, it's not. I didn't change your mind. I'd rather be tied with them on the two. And they've got to go score them because they're going to try to score touch there anyway. Well, no, if they're tied.

They're not interested in a tie. No, if they're, if the game's... Atlanta is not interested in a tie. What I'm saying, though, is if they stop them and it's 24-24, all they need is a field goal to win. They don't have to score touch the time. That's true. Yeah.

I don't know. Now you change my mind again. Well, I'm just telling you, I think he would have gone for it on fourth and goal from the two because with Jaden Daniels, there's a much better than 50-50 chance that you're going to score.

I mean, you just can't stop this. You think so? Yeah. I don't know what much better is, but it's a number. It's a number. He was responsible for it. We didn't use. Just his use of the timeouts is insanity.

Oh, no, that's a good point about the overtime timeouts. He should have been calling him on defense. It would also give in his team a bit of a respite because they looked gassed, as did Jaden. But, yeah. All right, what else? Well, what else? I think we've got to go through the last couple drives, Washington defensively, happened to Washington as well.

Okay. Right, because, let's just put it this way. It was an outstanding second half of football by the Washington commanders. I mean, executed incredibly well by Jane Daniels.

I thought Kingsbury, who, by the way, hated that scarf thing had on. It looks like such a dingus. You hated the one thing he had on? I hated whatever he was wearing. Oh, right. Dingus.

Okay. That's what I said. Yeah. He's fine. He was warm. didn't say that. He liked it. He was happy.

I got it for Christmas. So I thought it thought they did a really a job. Until you get defensively, where the Falcons have to go down and score touchdown to win this game, or to tie this game. My gosh, dude. Yeah.

A couple of these situations, you're like, what are we doing? So what? It blew me away that Drake London's going to be that open. The pits is going to be, I mean, London's like just, he's been running this route. He's got this little move. It's at one stick. He gives a stick head nod, and he's spinning dudes around.

Davis can't run with anybody. No, he's not good. They were in Lattimore. Lattimore was out, yeah. And so St. Juice didn't play nearly as much as Davis. Latimer's awesome, but that hurt you big time. Yeah. I mean, they go down and score and, all right, well, that's what I text you.

I was pissed. They go down and score because I got Washington minus three and a half. You did? I was on the other side of that. But hold on that. Yeah, so that's when you text me and said Daniels will go down and get a field going. I said, I can't make three and a half. No, they couldn't.

You know, we talked about some of the calls that went against Washington. there were several calls that went against Atlanta. First of all, that very first touchdown of the game, Allegretti's two, three yards downfield on the RPO, on the read-option RPO touchdown to Zakias. It's clearly ineligible downfield didn't get called. But the holding penalty on McGarry on that final drive, that was one where McCauley came on and said,

that's not holding. So that put them into a first and 20. but the fourth and 11 throw to Drake London. I mean, it's just, I thought that was one of the best throws that Pennix had all night. He threw it before he came out. A terrific throw. Yeah.

That's a 31-yard play on fourth and 11. And then how many teams are going to overcome a snap that's errant out of a first goal at the five? It's a 22-yard loss. they were second in goal at the 26, and they scored. All right. So here's where it gets ridiculous for Washington defensively. Second goal from the 26th at the rookie quarterback,

and at least one receiver who is essentially not coverable through the entire drive. Pressure them and cover London. They can beat you somewhere else. On second 26. Are they really going to throw a go-ball, like, play two. hot. I don't know, man. It's frustrating. And so you give up 13, you're like, they're right back at it. To me, the worst play defensively of this entire drive is to throw the pits from the 13 on 4th down. And I ask you one question. What are you defending from the goal line

to the 13 other than a run-in? Why are our linebackers set at 5 yards about play starts? Right. Bobby Wagner and whoever's number 30, the other inside backers is the safety. Who is, who is it 30, 30? I think it was my, was it Walker. Walker and Wagner, I don't know. And then the, and Pitts runs right around Walker then. Yeah, why are they just covering? Clears Walker and gets inside the safety. Why are they not set on the two?

Start at 10 yards depth. So you see everything. You don't have to drop and feel anything behind you. Why are we dropping to feel whatever depth and spaces behind us to our back instead of starting on the two? Right. And just seeing what happens in front of us. It's insanity that they give this play up. This is ridiculous defensively to give up pits on a go ball down on a seam ball. There's no way you're giving up a seam ball here.

Yeah, it's Percy. But you've got backers having to drop seven yards from... It's Percy Butler that you were... Percy Bowling. Yeah, 35. You've got backers making six, seven-yard drops to space. There is no first down in front of us here. There's no line to protect besides the one line, which is the goal line, to protect the fucking goal line.

I mean, are they really, if we start on the two or one as backer debt, can we not rally and react and tackle to someone in front of us? were you really preventing that short throw or giving them the short throw to run in? I don't think so. No. You got to throw it into the end zone. You've got to throw it into the end zone. I mean, you can throw it short and run, and that's a big risk.

They throw it short and try to run it in. It's not out of the equation by any means, but I'm not saying take yourself out of the play and stand there like a statue on the goal line, but you don't have to go backwards. I guess it's kind of my point in that situation. play before it, they basically did the same thing, and he missed London, who was wide open on the corner route.

He meant the entire time, the entire drive-down, the play before that London catches. Yeah. They're not really playing soft. They're not playing with any depth at any level. Like, their underneath depth should have been tremendous. They should have had to every throw, that throw to London that went, what, 13 yards down the field? Yeah. You should have forced him to make a five-to-six-yard checkdown throw.

to keep it in front of you. You should not allow something over the first level of defense. There shouldn't be a wall. It's 15 yards. Five yards doesn't help them. I don't know. I thought that was a big failure on Washington Barth schematically. That last drive I thought was a big time struggle.

Yeah, I mean, it's a great point to emphasize. I mean, they are second and goal at the 26-yard line. how many teams score touchdowns in that spot, especially when they have to to stay in the game. And the other team, if they just, you know, they can give up anything in play and get a tackle and win the game. And they gave up two throws to the end zone at the end. You've got to be less than 5% odds on that.

Od's got to be under 5. Well, actually, it's probably more than that because of the prospect of a penalty. somewhere, you know, defensively that gives you an automatic first, but it's much, it's certainly lower than 25%. The throw to Pitts is so good. This is what Pennets. I'm not discounting the throw catch. I know. And he's playing, he just lets him run right behind him. Oh my God. That's amazing. Every time you watch that. By the way, Pitts has dropped that ball all year long, too. He struggled.

And he made the catch. Yeah. It should have never been available. All right. There is more with Cooley that I'm going to save for tomorrow's show. He talked about Terry McLaren a little bit more, much more on Jaden, sort of the preference of opponent for Washington in the playoffs. so I will save that for tomorrow New Year's Eve's show.

I know the show is getting long. I will finish it up with a very short segment, just spelling out the playoff possibilities and the three potential opponents for Washington. I'll get to that right after these words from a few of our sponsors. Hey guys, no man wants to lose his hair, but for men, it's actually very common.

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mention my name. They'll come out and give you a free, no risk, no pressure estimate. 86690 Nation, window nation.com. All right, real quickly, and we'll wrap this show up. I know it's been a long show. No smell test pick tonight on the Monday night game. I'll just finish this weekend two and two. I had Chicago on Thursday night. I had Arizona Saturday night as winners. I had the Patriots, not even close. I almost pulled that game. like I did the Browns game yesterday. And I had Washington last night.

So two and two, no play on San Francisco tonight, even though the public is hammering Detroit. I just don't know how Detroit's going to play this game. They have nothing to play for tonight in the NFC North race. And they got a short week to prepare for a game that means everything, Sunday night against the Vikings. All right. So Washington's playoff situation,

They are the sixth seed, Green Bay is the seven seed. The NFC North runner-up will be the five-seat. The NFC South is still in doubt. Tampa wins, they win the NFC South. If they lose and Atlanta wins, Atlanta will win the NFC South. Tampa will be a huge favorite over New Orleans to clinch the NFC South. Washington has three potential opponents when the playoffs start wild card weekend. That will be the weekend of January 11th, January 12th, and then the next.

there will be a Monday night game. As the six or seven seed, I'm pretty sure Washington would not play that Monday night game. They usually save that for a four versus five. But anyway, and the reason they do that, I won't take time explaining it here. But Washington's either going to be the six seed. They will be the sixth seed if they beat Dallas Sunday or if Green Bay loses to the Bears. If Washington loses to Dallas and Green Bay wins, Washington is the seven seed. If they finishes the sixth seed, they will face either the Rams on the road at SoFi or the Buccaneers on the road in Tampa.

If they lose out on the six seed by losing to the Cowboys in Green Bay winning and they're the seven seed, they go to Philadelphia. So there you go. At Rams, at Bucks, or at Eagles. It'll be one of those three matchups, wild card weekend. My preference would be the Rams. My preference would be that they finish as the sixth seed. So I think Dan Quinn should play to win this game Sunday against the Cowboys. Look, you could make the case that playing Marcus Mariotta in the game gives them a good chance to beat a Dallas team that doesn't have C.D. Lamb. But I think that they should be playing to win that game rather than resting people and then having to travel to Philadelphia for what will likely be a brutally cold. game the second full weekend of January.

All right, there you go. At Rams, at Bucks, or at Eagles, depending on what happens in this final NFL weekend. Washington's a three-point favorite over the Cowboys. The kickoff is at 1 o'clock. All right, done for the day. Back tomorrow.