The Pat McAfee Show - PMS 2.0 1472 - BA Day with Bruce Arians, MNF Recap, Peter Schrager, Dan Orlovsky, CEO and Co-Founder of Big Loud Seth England, Darius Butler, & AJ Hawk

Episode Date: December 16, 2025

On today's show, Pat, Darius Butler, and the boys are joined by 3x Super Bowl Champion, and former Head Coach of the Arizona Cardinals and Tampa Bay Bucs, Bruce Arians to recap last night’s Monday Night Football game as the Steelers beat the hell out of the Dolphins in the cold in Pittsburgh, and eliminated them from the playoffs. Joining the progrum to recap last night’s MNF game and look ahead to some of the bigger news stories of the week is ESPN NFL Insider/analyst/host and host of the Schrager Hour, Peter Schrager. Next, 12 year NFL veteran at QB, ESPN NFL analyst/QB guru, Dan Orlovsky joins the show to chat about the Steelers offense, the issues plaguing Tua and the Dolphins, what his biggest takeaway’s from week 15 were, what he thinks Phil Rivers will do next week, and more. Later, co-found and CEO of Big Loud, Seth England joins the show to chat about his career in the music industry, some of the best artists that he’s worked with, the culture he’s established at Big Loud, and much much more. Make sure to subscribe to youtube.com/thepatmcafeeshow or watch on ESPN (12-2 EDT), ESPN’s Youtube (12-3 EDT), or ESPN+. We appreciate the hell out of all of you, we’ll see you tomorrow. Cheers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, beautiful people, and welcome to our humble abode, the Thunderdome. On this BA Day, December 16, 2025, this program begins right now. Football! Ladies and gentlemen, that voice and that cadence you just heard comes from one man, one legend, one icon, a guy who coach football for 47 years, multiple times Super Bowl champion. Our coach, ladies and gentlemen, Coach BA is here. Yeah, me, A. You look incredibly cool today.

Obviously the Cango hat always clean. That particular hoodie alongside your skin type just is popping on this glorious BA Day and there's a lot to talk about the toxic tables here. At Boston Connor and that Ty Schmidt, nine-year NFL event, man who loves rocking blue jeans on BA Day. There is Jay Butler. Go to see you blue jeans, buds.

Great to see you too, man. We've never seen Dee Butt in blue jeans today. He's wearing blue jeans today and it's a blue jean type of day because I'll tell you what, it is magnificent to be a football fan. And last night, the Pittsburgh Steelers dogwalk the same cold dolphins. Now, the Dolphs has been on a four-game win streak. Maybe this is it.

A. Chan's the guy. Mike McDaniel has a team ready to roll. This could be the year where they're able to battle the elements and be a football team whenever football matters. Robert Morris University and Moon Township outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, allowed the Miami Dolphins to come up and practice on their field in the snow, get acclimated to the weather. Was this going to be a different night for this dolphins team

that any time they went north of the Mason-Dixon or below 40 degrees in any type of American temperature Fahrenheit? Fahrenheit, yep. They're Celsius up north and over there. We're talking Fahrenheit here in America. They would get their asses beat. Could this be a different?

Nope. They got their asses beat yet again. This is a sad state of affairs if you're a Miami Dolphins fan because I'll tell you what, we have one amongst us here. Now, obviously, Darius J. Butler grew up in South Florida, so he likes the Dolphins, but he also likes five other teams that are much more successful than the dolphins, so I have nothing but respect for that.

But there is one man from North-Left, Canada, who uses Celsius, and now he's trying to learn Fahrenheit, who has been a Dolphins fan through and through since the day that I met him. This four-game win streak is like, it's not just about two of a player. Well, it's about our offensive line. We are ready for it. We are ready for the conditions. We are ready for meaningful football.

This team is different than what it's been in the past. Don't look now. We're lurking light. We're lurking lad. Well, they go into cold-ass Pittsburgh, and they get their asses beat by a Pittsburgh Steelers team that obviously hadn't been the best in the league, but last night showed maybe they can be a team that can go on a run. They get their first win without T.J. Watt, obviously, he has a freak incident during dry

needling last week that has him missed the game. The record for the Steelers with T.J. Watt and without T. Very, very different. With T.J. Watt, they win games. Without T.J. Watt, they literally don't win games. Two of them, though, they don't win whenever it's cold. Something had to give. Well, Steelers get a win without T.J. Watt.

He's only going to come back and assist this defense that was all over the place. Jalen Ramsey gets a little get back. John Hussmith scores a touchdown and goes absolutely crazy. It feels like the Dolphins pieces that moved away from Miami. Certainly wanted to showcase last night that they're thankful for that. The Pittsburgh Steelers said, we are a real team. All you got to do is get hot at the right time, baby. Aaron Rogers is spinning it, D.K. Metcalf's out of control, and they're running the rock better than I think people would have expected, and why not Friermouth and Darnel Mount Washington becoming a great tight-end combo?

Now, on the flip side, the Miami Dolphins fans have to live into misery that their team stinks. And I don't want to say they got their hopes up, and maybe they worked themselves into a shoot, and maybe it was fools gold for the last few weeks. But boy, as soon as that temperature dropped, especially in the second half, this Dolphins team got exposed for the lack of culture and toughness that they have once again. the gentleman's head to the back, one half of the hammer, died. Cowboys, Bubba Gumpino. You were bummed out this morning, and I looked you right in your eyes, and I said, why are you? What did you?

So if you would have won, cool. You're brand new. But you've been here before. Like, why are you bummed out? You believe this team was different, Gumpy? I think you and a lot of Dolphins fans believe that it was different this year. Yeah, I did. And the way the defense started the first half, like they were tackling hard. Jordan Brooks was unbelievable, but the truth

is, your highest paid player also can't be your worst player. At the intersex by Tua was absolute dog shit. Maybe one of the worst throws I've ever seen in my life. It was first in 10. You were driving at that point in the game at 0-0, and then it was all downhill from there. Okay, all downhill from the first quarter.

You know, that's a long, that's a long night. I heard Renegade played and there was no booing. Oh. Let's go to Coach B.A. They played it in the third quarter. Okay. Offense scores touchdown. Go to commercial break.

Let's play Renegade. Places going crazy and defense is going on the field. Good time to use it. And I do wonder if the person, that's in charge of playing is like we got a time right now where we can kind of bring this back we don't know what the future holds good feel we don't know what the fourth quarter holds exactly great feel by the person running the game day ops put that out there and i heard all of pittsburgh oh mama i'm in fear for my life from the law of the law all of Pittsburgh was jacked up

you see the yenzers afterwards when scott van pelt was interviewing cam heyward and the boys They were sticking around. They go work in the morning. Obviously, they'd like to let the world know that the Steelers are up. Let's go to Hammer. Time! AP, Tone, you guys winning the Super Bowl after what you saw last night? Aaron Rogers looked incredible.

The defense was able to get a win without T.J. Watt, and they seemingly suffocated a team that's ass into conditions and made sure it remain that way, Tone. Yeah, it was an awesome night from beginning to, and obviously you talked about the Miami Dolphins going in with their streak of what, I believe, 14 in a row not being able to win, when kickoff is under 40 degrees. There is also now the streak of 23 straight

Monday night football wins for the Pittsburgh Steelers. They do not lose on Monday night football. They do not lose when they're wearing color rush. They do not lose when the end zones are gold. So, I mean, it was just a recipe for disaster for the dolphins last night. Aaron is off of his best back-to-back games all season long. Ken Gainwell, who just made that catch right there, is literally probably been the team's MVP this season.

Sorry, running the ball, catching the ball. he's doing everything. The line was blocking well. The defense stopped the run. I think H.N. And the Dolphins only had 60 some yards rushing and Tua had 60 yards passing going into the fourth quarter before they decided to stop playing defense there. It was a perfect night and the boys are

kind of getting confidence and starting to kind of get a roll here going into the last part of the season. No booing of renegade. That's huge, obviously, for the entire city and the entire, I mean, state of sports, I guess, in western Pennsylvania. Yeah, it's huge. When you're up 21-3, I think is when they played it after, maybe 28-3 after that.

And it's Monday night, and it's cold. And everyone, like, you could just see the Dolphins' defense had given up after they came out. And they were flying around. But then they saw their quarterback look horrendous. They knew they didn't have a chance. Steelers started just pouring it on. It was awesome. Ouse is taking some shots here early from Dolphins fans,

and Steelers fans are pointing out his ineptitude. But it is crazy that in the fourth quarter, they were kind of making a little bit of a comeback. And McDaniel was like, it's first quarter still. Let's not make this too close here. Troy Aitman was like, what the hell is going on on this field right now? Now, granted, a lot of people probably done with it because the game was clearly over long before the fourth quarter began. But during the fourth quarter, dolphins put together a couple drives. Darren Waller was making some plays.

He scored two touchdowns. Darren Waller had two touchdowns last night. If you fell asleep, you didn't know that. And there was a chance of maybe the dolphins steal their way back into this, almost like they were lurking in the game, like they were lurking for the playoffs. But they never ran hurry up. They continued to huddle. There was seemingly no sense of urgency at all. Weren't able to get an onside kick,

and instead the Dolphins obviously get a two-score, or the Steelers get a two-score win. Coach Bea, you obviously coach them in Pittsburgh. You understand what their fans are like. You understand that their fans are expecting a lot. And also they're very loud, and that is a football town through and through. When they see a win like that,

and they see Aaron playing like that, and they say their defense playing like that, I think they think that the Steelers have a chance. What did you see from the Steelers last night? And do you think Aaron and the offense can lead them to a potential run, maybe to even the Lombardi at this. stage. I don't know about to Lombardi, but that's the best I've seen him look all year. And

the stadium was electric, and it always is on Monday night. But yeah, I thought Aaron looked fantastic. Two weeks in a row now. It looks like he's got his hand in this office. It's a big net, because it's a lot of Aaron Rogers stuff, a lot of the dinks and the dunks, and he knows how to get him out of plays. He did a great job last night. And the Miami Dolphins should have stayed in the locker room at halftime. That was the best tackling team I've seen in the first half and the worst when they came out as halftime. think happens there? Do you think it is a fact about getting in the first half you're warm? I think you're coming straight out of warmups. You're playing well. And then it's a reset button at half time

for a lot of things, not only strategy and scheme and you assume the Steelers figure out what you're doing, but also mentally, whenever you do have to go into the freezing cold, you have to embrace it again? Do you think that's a potentially part of it? Or why do you think the Dolphins ass in the second half? And also, why do you think a team's culture can be that you just can't win in cold weather? Like, what do you think that is? Yeah, I think that's a myth. But Not for the Dolphins. Yeah, I don't think it's a myth. 14 straight.

Now, they went into the game with 13, as Tone mentioned. Last night made it 14 straight losses for the Miami Dolphins when the kickoff temperature is below 40 degrees. It's almost like an expected thing that this soft-ass team from South Florida cannot win whenever it's cold. Is there a way to address that? Like, how do you even... If you go back to the Bucks, when the Bucks were in the Green Bay Division,

and they could never win when it was under 40 degrees. And all of a sudden, they broke that one, and they go win a Super Bowl. And they win the playoffs. So it's just a matter of mindset. You know, you know what you got. And I thought the dolphins came out, electric. You know, they're running the ball.

They're tackling as good as I've seen any secondary tackle, you know. And in the second half, the same guys that were flying up to make the tackles, hesitant, little body block. Oh, little business decisions happen. These weren't big backs now. Kenneth Gainwell was not a big guy to run right through a safety for 30, 30 yards, whatever. That's unacceptable. D. Butts, you're from South Florida.

You played college at Yukon, though. Obviously, got drafted to the Patriots, played in Carolina, then you're in Indianapolis. And we have a dome whenever Mr. Erse decided we had a dome. If not, it was window open and roof open. But it was nice when that thing was closed. But the cold weather is a little bit of a different element. Obviously, I don't want to say for the Florida boys, but for Florida boys and Southern boys, there is a lot of conversation about, hey, whenever your bones feel every single hit,

will you be able to get back up for the next plate and the next plate and the next play? play. It's the reason why we all thought Ohio State was going to beat the hell out of Tennessee. Not that Tennessee doesn't get cold. I'm not saying Knoxville doesn't get cold, but that level of cold that it was in Ohio, I think you have to live in it, embrace it, and understand that it's going to suck to kind of get past it.

Why do you think the dolphins have this particular case? And is it fixable, I guess. I mean, it doesn't seem like it's fixable with this regime, with this I guess staff and the quarterback for sure. He's shown who he is in the weather. But I mean, like B.A. You got to play football. And how these guys

came out and they did the dolphins did everything they could do Robert Morris they tried to help they open up their facilities you went out there and practice that's something you rarely see to go out there and practice in those elements because when you're practicing you don't have all those resources available that you have during the game with the heated bench and the heated helmets and the big jackets and all that stuff you don't have that during practice so they tried and they came out flying around b a mentioning corners and safeties coming up making these open field tackles in any weather that's tough so coming up in those elements doing it but I mean if you're like you said you're living in it

It works the opposite way, too. I know when I was in New England, when we would go play the Dolphins late in the season, we always kind of struggled down there late because it's just different. You're dealing with the humidity. You're not dealing with that in December anywhere else. So that's something you just got to adjust

and you've got to be a pro and find a way to figure it out. Steelers Hammer Dolphins last night. Congrats to them. And obviously, we assume this will quiet off the media in Steelers fans. Hammer, Don, Todd, Todd. Resident, you guys believe now in the Pittsburgh Steelers? again. You're all the way back in on what you got going on. Yeah, I don't see why anyone should be complaining this morning after back-to-back wins.

You know, you're first in the AFC North. You control your own destiny. No, there's nothing to complain about this morning. And we always complain about Mike Tomlin how he's stuck in his ways and stuff like that. They were three for three on fourth downs last night, and two of those were on the second drive of the game in their own territory. So he was the more aggressive coach last night, which I know all the Steelers fans love to see, which is something that we've been asking for. forever. Yeah, Tony, you also

kind of talked about it already earlier in the year, too. Like, typically that halftime is where the Steelers start to collapse. Like, they have blown multiple, I think it was three different halftime leads. You mentioned, and for them to come out in the second half, and agree, the Dolphins did kind of lose some sort of luster

once they went into halftime. With that being said, Jordan Brooks is so good at football, middle linebacker. Didn't even realize number 20 could look that cool on a middle linebacker. It does. But the Steelers coming out in the second half to me is why I kind of have more belief now. Like I thought it was going to be, okay, it's going to be a grind of a game, maybe 1710. Steelers are going to let the dolphins back in, but somehow they're going to get it

done. Rogers got better as the game went on, and that's what gives me a lot of faith in Pittsburgh. There's a ball to D.K. over the middle where they have the perfect end zone shot of that thing. Tightest spiral of the year, I've said, yeah, that wasn't even it, but that was another one. There's one where he throws it right down the middle, and that thing is like on a line, actual rope laser and the spiral is just so and Aaron built for the cold weather this is the throw I do believe

yes and they'll have an end zone shot of that and it's outrageous the ball that he I tweeted Aaron's spinning it go to the other one there'll be an end yeah this one yeah I mean that's that guy's 40 plus years old right now he'll be able to do that till the day that he dies just like Phil Rivers obviously

and whenever it's that but when Aaron's doing that and the offense is clicking it's like why not the Pittsburgh Steelers especially because Aaron can figure out everything that the defense has going on for almost every single team because he's been there, done that with everything. Yeah, and that's why I felt so good about the Steelers going into the game yesterday, just because, like, I've seen that Rogers last night a hundred times in my life where it's so cold, but it just doesn't bother him.

And obviously, he's not the same guy he was 10 years ago, but to, like, Conner's point, too. I mean, it was so close that entire first half, and then they score a touchdown. and then right from the get-go in the second half, like they blitzkrieged them, and then all of a sudden the game is over. And, you know, I mean, if it's going to keep being cold, like, Rogers is one of those guys who it's just, it's tough to bet against him because he's done it so many times.

Not only can he spin it in the cold. He's also smarter than you are. You see the 12 men on the field last night? I sure did. Yeah, you see it 12 men on the field. The refs didn't even see it. The TV didn't see it. The refs didn't see it.

Nobody saw it. That's Aaron Rogers' football, baby. They got too many people. People out here. You said, oh, that's bullshit. That's bullshit. After replay assistance, they had 12 men on the field. Let's go ahead and move that thing up.

Interesting. Go ahead and continue to do that. I like the replay assist is assisting the super geniuses of football to utilize having too many people on the field. Listen, BA, quarterback whisper, a man who should have been teaching his quarterbacks about this. This is something that should have been happening. Day one. You're only allowed 22 cleats on the ground, on the defense aside. defense aside. You get 23 cleats. You get 22 and a half cleats. You have 24 cleats,

26 cleats on the turf. That's too many cleats. That's too many men. That's a free play for the offense. B.A., I know you love this rule, and you love that Aaron's that smart. Oh, I love that Aaron is that smart, but I hate the rule. What? Come on. You're a quarterback whisper. I know, and I taught the same thing for 27 years. Quick count them, get them. We're not substituting. They try to substitute. We better get a field at five yards. But if the guy is not participating in the play. He's like one foot off the field. He has nothing to do with the damn play. Let it some bitch go.

Say hockey, Bruce. This ain't hockey. What do you think this is? Spirit of the rule. I mean, hockey does it. They're all hanging over the bench, jumping over there. That's what you want. Yeah, that's what you want. That's what you want. You want to lose all control on the sideline.

That's what it has been, though. Like, it's never that there are just 12 guys on the field. Like, it's always a guy running off. And then that's what Rogers made his bones with. Dee, but I don't like that you're just spotlighted. amplifying the quarterback whisper, Bruce Ariens' thoughts here. I assume this is what the defensive guys are saying, oh, I was half an inch on the field.

Get off my ass. Yeah, I mean, and if it's called, you know, when it happens, like as soon as the ball snap, you see a flag going there. Okay, you call this. Because, and now, you know it. The head coach, they're going to look at whoever's responsible on that defensive side, they're responsible for the subs. Because you do take a risk, especially against a veteran quarterback like this,

substituting when the offense isn't substitutes. And it's always the big boys. You're taught to run. straight off the line, you know, straight down the line, get off the field. And Aaron knew it. He knew it as soon as he snapped the ball that he called him. But I thought we got away with that. So I'm begging for it, begging for it.

It goes. It cuts away. Then 45 seconds later, we see the flag come out. I thought replayed since I thought they were meant to pick up flags. Yeah. I can go back and throw one. So I'm with BA on this one. I'm surprised Bia is on my side.

Yeah, I don't like it out of B.A. Okay. I like the free plays for Super Genius stuff. That's third and three caused the first down. That's a huge. You can't have too many men on the field on third down. Bingo. Like, what are you talking about?

Can't have it happen. Follow up to that. Yeah, replay assist, not allowed to add a flag. Interesting. But if we're allowed to do that now, I think this is good news, not bad news. Okay, if there's something clear and obvious that these refs whose contract is up in May, okay, miss, which feels like they do. Humans. They are.

They are humans, but also some of them ass at their jobs. Some are blind. Okay. Which, we're happy for them, by the way, living a dream out there. Yeah, exactly. Got blind people, ref in the NFL. That's unbelievable that we have that in 2025, almost 2026.

We should celebrate that. But I had no idea the replay assist was allowed to add a flag. I think we were all kind of taken back. Yeah, and it's terrible for the game because it's going to be so subjective now. If there was a pass interference that they didn't really realize was a pass interference and then replay assists, like this is what it opens up. It was never supposed to be a throw the flag type of thing. Like even a hold and off sides.

I mean, shit, the Bucks in the Falcons game, the Bucks damn near lost because the Falcons, and this is in the first quarter, so you can't say they lost the game because of this, but they called and off sides on a field goal, even though the guy got back on sides, and then it was a fourth and four, Atlanta gets the first out of next play, Kyle Pitts is first his touchdown. So that's why it doesn't help. Now, if they did this the whole entire year, yeah, that would be incredible. But there's no way in hell in week 15 that now they're starting. starting to say like, oh, well, replay this just can't actually tell us.

Like, oh, no, they were outside. Oh, no, it was, you know, seven or six men lined up on the line of scrimmage, 12 guys on the field. Like, there's so many calls now that we can go back through and be like, well, why didn't they use it for this when they used it in a prime time game? Again, the first time they use it is in prime time. The first time they used Hawkeye technology this year was in prime time. And it made no sense. And it still doesn't make any sense.

That's why I may. Like, I'm pumped for the Super Bowl. I can't wait to see what happens with this NFL PA and the NFL, because it really is NFL RA. NFL R.A, excuse me. Because, yeah, that's actually awesome. But the repercussions that come from that will be massive when you talk about the game as a whole. That's in May. That contract is up.

And it's a big deal because the last time the refs contract was up, it got full chaos. And it wasn't good for the league. It wasn't good for the sport. It wasn't good for anybody. And the refs took advantage of that. And they utilized their leverage and the contract that they negotiated was we have no accountability. We're not answering any questions. You can't even talk to us after the season.

How about that? We can't be full time. Yeah, we've got other things we've got to focus on. It's not good for anybody to be able to do this. They had all the control because of the fail-marry. That happened on prime time amongst all the other things that happened. So the Ruff's Union is the strongest, right? By far.

But way better than the players union. You got to be close to the Coaches Union, though. You guys get guaranteed cash for like 20 years if you get your deal. We don't have a union, no. It's just life. Man, you don't have a union, you have guaranteed contracts. The players have a union, don't have guaranteed contracts, and then the refs have a union, and they don't have to do anything they don't want to do.

Feels like the players' union's the worst out of all of them. Feels like the NFL is the toughest on the players' union versus all of them. Well, there's the most amount of people, obviously. Guaranteed injuries. 100% chance. Well, how about the refs? There's a 100% chance of failure for you guys, too. every one of you is going to get a call wrong, at least at some point.

I mean, they're so old. They're blowing out knees and ACLs and Achilles and feet these days. Now, some of the old... This past Sunday, too. Okay, shout out to him. And obviously, he wasn't going to let anybody that may be better at reffing than him get a shot at that thing. Yeah, right? Nobody's getting a shot to shine.

Nobody's getting a shot to shine. Speaking of Shine, last night, big for the Pittsburgh Steelers. And we talked about this yesterday. A massive piece of why we all assumed the Steelers were going to win last night, not only because two and the dolphins are terrible in the cold, not only because, here we go, dolphins, they said yesterday. We got hand up, hand up as well. I got to take some ownership of them.

Yeah, Dbutton, Gumpfied did that yesterday. That was a bad decision by you guys to do that in the moment we said it. But also, there was a lot of OGs in the building for the Steelers. Joey Porter goes into the Hall of Honor. Ben Rothersberger goes in, Pouncey goes in. Rooney family there. Roger Goodell was in attendance. I mean, it was a huge night in Pittsburgh.

alone, Mike Tomlin and Bill Coward both have never lost on Monday Night Football at home. That's insane. So that is, there's a lot of things that were kind of working for the Pittsburgh Steelers. The OGs back in the building seemingly mean more in Pittsburgh than maybe other places, legitimately. I think the city of Pittsburgh, the Pittsburgh Steelers, try to treat it like a college organization. Now, it's easier to do that whenever you have three head coaches over the last 60 years. So there's a lot of continuity, a lot of familiar faces. but the Pittsburgh Steelers very big on having the alumni still be around.

Hall of Honor celebration last night very special. Do you think that is something that's different than everywhere else is how the Pittsburgh Steelers welcome and keep the alumni kind of into building in close proximity? No, there's no doubt. You know, every year when the rookies come in, we have a dinner, and Franco used to come, Rocky, all the guys would come and sit with the position players that we drafted, pre-agents, draftees, and welcome them to the Steelers and what it was like to be a Steelers. and it was one of the best dinners I've ever been part of.

See, that's a pretty cool thing that doesn't happen everywhere. Let's go to Hammer. Don, Tad. Town, the boys were back. Seven's in the building. Guaranteed Dub is how you felt? Yeah, it was. We talked about it earlier the year when the Super Bowl anniversary happened, and everyone was back in the building,

and that was one of their best games of the season as well. But, like, this was basically the same guys coming back. Kyle was back. James Ferrier did the towel twirl. I saw Casey Hampton there. I saw Keesel there. everyone was there and like I feel I feel like it does mean like the players on the current roster see that when they're there and it just works out better they I don't know if they play harder

but it feels like they might and this is also why like the Tomlin thing and Tony you've always kind of been hey Tom was not getting fired like if anything if he's going to leave he's going to leave on his own terms but like if you do fire a guy like Mike Tomlin it's awesome that this has kind of quieted down these past two weeks like that is what you risk like all of Tomlin's guys being like Pittsburgh kind of, you know, treated him wrongly on the way out, and maybe, you know, stuff like this doesn't happen. Yeah, I think, I'm not going to say it. Cowers guy still come around, you know, like that is the...

Did they fire him? Like, unceremoniously? No, but he did. It was like a... No, Bill retired. Yeah, it was like, I see you later. And then he left the icy light in the fridge for Matt Tom. Yeah, he'd lie out for you. And I don't think him and coach Tom and talked much. I don't think there was a lot of communication between the two. He told us deliberately that he wanted Tomlin to kind of, hey, you figure it out on your own.

I had to figure it out on my own. I don't want to be stepping on your toes or anything like that. Yeah, which is an interesting way to say, like, this is your time. I'm out of this shit. Because being the head coach of the Steelers does come with a lot. Yeah. Comes a lot. I went through that transition with those two guys.

And Bill was ready. And a lot of things personally that were going on at the time. And Mike came in. It's Mike's show. step back it's Mike show you guys run it and uh that's the dealer way it is the other way and uh I'll tell you Mike Tomlin continuing to win look at the odds to win the AFC North here Steelers minus 125 they got Detroit what are they good football team

yeah unless the Steelers just say hey we want to just punch them in the mouth well actually Tony and Nick told me that this game doesn't affect them at all so I'm thinking Aaron sits T.J. Watts sits Cam Hayward sits Connor Hayward sits and the whole Steelers defense sits. Connor Hayward with the tush push. Good to see him kind of getting into pain a couple different times. I like having Mount Washington literally just pick him up and just shove him through there. Zach Frazier's center, different technique than Jason Kelsey and the Eagles.

I don't know if you saw this. They were trying to go over right guard. They were not trying to go directly over center. So Frazier actually, instead of diving, kind of stands, turns, and then they're pushing him to the right. It was basically every single time he was going to the right, almost as if it was on purpose, as opposed to Zach Frazier having to get straight through the Mountaineer. So I found that to be a little piece and interesting piece because now other teams are going to start loading up on that, right?

And then guess what they're going to do? Mount Washington is going to go, boom, I'll throw his ass this way too if you want me to. It's interesting. And then Aaron Rogers is just sitting back there either doing this or this. And we forget he's got a fractured wrist. Yeah. You completely forget that his left hand or his left wrist is fractured in two places. Tough.

They banged the shit out of that thing yesterday. And he's just, yeah, we're doing this. not even a thought of whether or not he's playing. Not even a single thought of whether or not he's playing. Seemed jovial after the game, too. Feels like as of late, after successful things, Aaron, happy they won, but certainly wants to clarify some things to people,

you know, about what he liked or what he didn't like. Maybe this will shut you guys up about something. Like, there's always something. Last night, it felt like it was a pretty jovial Aaron Rogers after a massive win. Obviously, his moment was Rosal Douglas, West Virginia Mountier Legend, also former Packer. And Aaron told the story about him coming off the Cardinals.

I think he was cut, then he was on practicing. Then he comes to the Packers, and he becomes like a vital piece of the entire team. So it was obviously special seeing him catch up with old teammates. And I thought he was a bad teammate. How come all his old teammates want to come over and talk to him? I don't think I fully understand that. But the wrist thing, it's not even a conversation. Like it wasn't even mentioned, I don't think, last night.

This guy's got a cast on his left hand. He's quarterback for an NFL team. Oh, gee. We would see other people potentially utilize that as an excuse to not play or maybe rest a week. But to your point, Foxy, Steelers can lose the next two games. As long as they beat the Baltimore Ravens in the last week, they go to the playoffs. Now, granted, the Ravens can lose a couple games, and the Steelers will get in automatically. But Troy and Joe Buck were talking about that last night during the game about how Detroit and Cleveland,

Cleveland will always matter because it's Steelers and it's Cleveland, but not really. The only thing that matters is that last one against the Baltimore Ravens. and they get a chance to host a playoff game, Pittsburgh Steelers, and there's a chance that, Oh, mama, I'm in fear for my life from the long arm of the long. So who would they be hosting? Right now, the Chargers. Yep.

Maybe win that game. They can beat the Chargers now. Maybe you win that game. Chargers have a tough road, too. Chargers might, I mean, especially if the Colts continue to climb with Phil Rivers here. Be careful. So we got the Broncos sitting at the one seat. Congrats to them.

Coming into the year, they were Lombardi Darlens in a lot of projections for a lot of people because of how great their defense is. Defense has remained exactly who we thought they were going to be. Absolutely, and Bo Nix is playing his best football right now. Patriots, obviously, congratulations. I think people expected them to have success with Vrable and Drake May this quickly outrageous sitting at the Tutsi. The Jags currently in the lead of the AFC South sitting at 10 and 4.

they got stretched down the road here. They got by his Colts team and obviously they're going to have to finish the job. Will they be able to do that? They look really good. Trevor Lawrence threw five touchdowns and ran for another one and Liam Cohn seemingly not a dipshit at all. He's seemingly a very, very good coach. And this is all without the number two

overall pick that they traded a lot of pieces away and Travis Hunter playing for them and then Pittsburgh Steelers lead the AFC North. And then Chargers, Bill's, Texans, Colts and Ravens. Only real chance is to beat the Steelers and win a couple games here to get into the playoffs and win the NFC North. Colts, though, we can obviously mess around and catch up to a couple of these other teams. You know, the Colts with Philip Rivers at the helm can do anything. And we know that,

including lose by 50. There's a chance that could happen. Certainly. I don't see it likely. No way. Phil Rivers on Monday night hosting the Niners will be his first time in a full Lucas Oil Stadium as Indianapolis Colts quarterback. Because whenever he was the Indianapolis Colts quarterback back in 2020 was COVID. So they had some cardboard cutouts. I think I had a cardboard cutout in her one game? Sure. I think I was sitting in like the, remember they were saying that?

Tonight there will be 24,000 cardboard cutouts of hands. There will also be, I mean, you guys want a Super Bowl doing that year. So you guys certainly did, handled it all the best. But whenever the NFL was trying

to like spice up the announcements, tonight there'll be 150 first responders. They will be scattered throughout the entire stadium. They'll be each sitting in their own section, obviously safe. And there will also be 32,000 and seven cardboard cutouts of super fans

from their fan bases nation or whatever. And it was like, oh, that's really cool. And then they did like a pan of the cardboard cutouts. There they would be if people were allowed to be in public. Then people were stopping. I think that's my cardboard cutout right there. I paid $50 to be a part of. And that was an insane time.

That was when Phil Rivers was the Colts quarterback. So he's never experienced a full Lucas Oil. Monday night against the Niners is a massive, massive ordeal. There's a couple of things that we need to chit-chat about. Niners are one of them. Patriots are another one. Seahawks are another one and the Eagles. Three out of four of them in prime time

can all punch their ticket to the playoffs this weekend, B.A.? Yeah, I think the scheduling guru's got it perfect. You know, you got Thursday night, Sunday night, Monday night, big, big games in December. It doesn't get any better than that. Thursday night, Seahawks play the Rams. Seahawks win, they're in a playoffs. Patriots play Sunday night.

At Baltimore. And this is a flex as well. Let's keep in mind, fantastic job flexing a game like this and not just rolling with whatever we're supposed to be there. Shout out to NBC doing that. That's on primetime Sunday night football. Patriots win, they're in. 49ers, Monday night football in Indianapolis.

They win. They're into playoffs. And then Eagles playing at 1 o'clock. They get a chance in the afternoon to kind of punch their ticket. This is the season. Now we are here. People getting into the dance. People falling out.

People looking at the future of people thinking of right now. It's a wonderful time of year. Out of those four, how many of them punched their ticket this weekend, Dibut? Oh, three. Which one does not? The Niners. Yep, agreed. I like that.

Yep, three. Sorry. Shannon. Now, they got an interesting situation going on with Ayuk. Kyle Shanahan has come out, and for a while, Kyle Shanahan was talking about being hopeful that he would be back, hopeful that he would be back. None of us really understood what he was talking about.

and then yesterday his press conference he was like I haven't seen him in like a month literally haven't talked to him or seen him in a month so we've just put him on the he's not going to be on our team are you still hopeful? I was very hopeful yes for a very long time but now we're at the point where like

we only have a few weeks left and we haven't seen or heard from him Coach BA 47 years in coaching 27 I think in the NFL obviously there's going to be business and personal grievances and all that type of shit that happens what's going on with this situation and you think, have you ever seen anything like it?

And how do we get here, you think, for the Niners? Yeah, I think that's the, how'd you get here because there's a point of no return? And a great player played extremely well for you, and all of a sudden, we don't want your ass around, or you don't want to be around, and trades or whatever, you know, the grass ain't always greener anywhere else.

There is around the septic tank, right, to quote Tom more. And so it's like, you don't know what's in front of you. You got a great deal right here in San Francisco. I don't know what you're thinking. Ayuk was Blocker, too. All in, right? If I recall, he was like all in for the Niners and then they're coming. This took me by surprise.

Maybe I hadn't been paying attention to him close enough. But when Shanahan's up there like, I haven't seen him or heard from him. It's like, what does that mean in the middle of a season? I don't even know how we get it. We hope everything's okay, by the way. You first go to like mental stuff and is he okay and is he a good spot. But it's like, this is wild for this good of a player on this good of a team and this big of a run, I think. Yeah.

You see him, you know, posting things or whatnot. This is extremely disappointing because he kind of had a rocky start with Kyle Shannon. He was a high draft pick. Things weren't going well kind of off the field. You thought, you know, maybe immature had to figure some things out. Then he did. Then he started playing great. We all know the contract stuff, the trade, rumors to other teams.

Then they get it figured out. He gets paid. Then he gets hurt again. And for him to not, like, be showing up. And maybe in a few weeks, we saw a story about him voiding like $27 million. Like, you never want to see that with the player because of anything that they can control. Like, you're just going to avoid, you know, 27 million because you're not getting treatment or you're not showing up or being around the facility. Like, that would be a bonehead idiotic move for him if that is, if there is any truth to that.

But I hate this for Ayuk. And then it's like, yeah, you talk about the grass not being green or other places. A lot of other places wouldn't want to take a chance on a guy like this to bring him into the building and maybe throw off, you know, continuity. The other thing is going on. So it's a terrible look right now. I hope it gets all figured out. for Iyoup. This is a tough, tough look right now. Well, and that's the thing. He was the bell of the ball

last off season. I mean, New England, I remember Steelers. Steelers. Everybody. I think there was a story actually about New England reaching out to try and get him. They had a deal in place, had a contract in place. And he basically said, like, well, I'm not doing that, okay? I want to get paid, but I don't want to play for the Gerard Mayo Patriots, which, you know,

understandable looking back on it. But him choosing to stay in Sam Fran, he gets heard, obviously last year very tough. But then for it to go like this is just wild because he chose San Francisco. Like, this is where he wanted to be. Like, how can that much change? It would be great for Brock Party to have him as a weapon down the stretch here. Here's this contract details from Spotrack and from Hembo.

Pre-June 1st release or trade, $29.6 million dead cap next year for the San Francisco 49ers. Post-June 1st, it gets very easy. 8.3 million-dead hit in 2026, $20 million dead hit in 2027. It feels like all eyes are headed towards the post June 1st. And then there's always somebody, though, right, in the NFL, that says it won't be like that in our building. I'll fix it. Right? There really is that, isn't there?

Totally. That'll be 15. Not just one. They'll be 15. They're not going to be paying them that. Joining us now, ladies and gentlemen, he's a man who probably has a little bit more insight on this. I used to have a podcast called Flying Coach. Now it's called Shrager Hour.

He also does the most interesting man in the NFL every single week. Didn't do Phil Rivers last week, it seems like quite a miss. Ladies and gentlemen, Peter Schrager. Yeah, Shragues, we appreciate you joining us. We'll dive into your selection of the interesting man piece that we obviously love as you one shot into a camera tell a beautiful story. But let's talk about the story of the Niners in Iyuk. Shanahan coming out and saying that was the first time I really caught ears on the situation.

What do you know and what are we kind of missing? Well, for the last couple weeks, it has been assumed that Brandon Ayuk was just not a part of this team and it was not going to be a part of this run, whatever they did. For Shanahan to come out publicly and explain that, yeah, we haven't seen him in a month. And, yeah, it would have been a nice bonus to have them, especially with our wide receivers room. But we're moving on. It was chilling, considering to what you guys said, all offseason last year was Brennan Ayuk watch, like Panda Watch, you know, on Anchorman. It was every day it was, where's Ayuk?

Is he coming? And then they did find a deal to bring him back, to think it came in an unraveled in such a way. Then he went on social media and was posting as well. So it's obviously one of those situations where you want. want to make sure everybody's okay. And then after that, say, okay, football-wise, what's that mean for his future? Because as much as it went awry here in San Francisco, and whether it's health-related or not, you would like to think that Brandon Ayuk's story is just going to get started somewhere else in the near future,

if that's the case. The dead money is the dead money. But it seems like the 49ers in Shanahan, they're over this, and they're moving on with Ricky Pearson and the boys that they got in-house. The NFC West is the NFL's best, and that Niners team can punch their ticket. to the playoffs of the win over the Colts on Monday night without IUC, without Fred Warner, without Bosa. It's incredible work. What they're doing out there, they're a fun

team. Let's stay in that NFC West. Devonte Adams, I think there's a report that came out. McVeigh said he felt it, but we're not ruling him out for Thursday. Did he save it maybe because he felt it and he's so in tune with his body? Or what are you kind of hearing about Devante, the 32-year-old's hamstring, who's become a touchdown machine

for Matthew Stafford in the Rams? Well, it's interesting because typically on a Thursday night, you would say, oh, no, no, no, rest that. the 10 days will be okay but this is the biggest game of the season for them this a win on Thursday gives them the division it gives them potentially a buy like this is this is everything so it's if you're going to push it for a Thursday night game if you were ever going to push it for a regular season game this is it and yet I would think it's unlikely he plays given the quick

turnaround of this game fortunately it looks like pukunuku was just fine and when he went down there was worries that that he would be seriously injured yeah that rams seahawks game um it is going to be so interesting because they're going back up to Seattle where the Seahawks early in the season dropped a couple games and it was head scratching and then since then have just been rolling but this game being played up there on a short week on the road I would be shocked if we see Devante Adams and yet I am not Reggie Scott their trainer I am not Sean McVe their head coach I'm not the one to make that decision it would just be a really quick turnaround on four days rest to go up there and play in those elements Jason Myers kicked the fairy tale right in the

balls on Sunday is he had six field goals, including a 56-yard game winner. He grew up watching Philip Rivers in the Chargers. He told us that. So afterwards, his family did say, like, hey, do you remember that? And, oh, I'm sorry, I just had the best game of my career. Maybe Phil River should have chose a different time to come back as a grandpa. This Seattle Seahawks team, you talk about it dropping a couple games early. McDonald was doing his Seattle Seahawks show, I think, and he was chatting about how one of the reps was trying to talk to him. And he's basically saying, I did not hear a word. You just said, I'm currently calling plays

for the defense right now. Can you give a better picture on what's going on in Seattle and how quickly this has turned around into a brand new chapter because they kicked Pete Carroll the hell out of town. They painted the walls. They said we're a brand new era. And they are certainly become a wagon and expected to be, it seems like, with McDonald

as the head coach. And if Donald continue to have success, played it great Indianapolis coach defense. So it's not judging. But can you tell me about the Seahawks? This is special out there, man. Really? truly it's really bold you know john schneider's been the gm going back to since 2010 so he's been with both the eras the the p carroll era the russle wilson era into like the gino era with p and then now this one with mike macdonald it's it's really cool because they were able to turn this thing

over without having that huge dip what's also really interesting is that last year you know they had an offensive coordinator ryan grub from the university of washington and it wasn't working and it's so rare that a first year coach would say you know what it's just it's not what we're for, rip the band-aid off, move on. Gino Smith, he had a fine career there in Seattle. They were like, you know what? No, we're going to rip the band-aid off after one year, and we're going to move on and pursue somebody else in Sam Darnold.

Clint Kubiak is the offensive coordinator, and he gets together with Sam Darnold. Now, what you have there is two guys who were together in San Francisco, but also with Darnold, you bring, you know, obviously the Shanahan stuff that he had, but also the Kevin O'Connell offense that he played last year, which is kind of McVeyish in a way. You combine that with Kubiak, and they have their own little offense going.

Now, their defensive coordinator, I think, is one of the coolest guys in the league guy named Aidan Dirty, who was, he's British, and he was the Dallas Cowboys defensive line coach. And one of the main things he was responsible for was bringing in to Marcus Lawrence and saying, hey, like, that's the guy who's still got something left in the tank.

Every off-season move they made, whether it be hiring Kubiak, whether it be going to get Darnold, whether it be drafting Nick Eman-Worry, who is, absolutely unbelievable in that defensive backfield in the second round to DeMarcus Lawrence on forward with Cooper Cup and the rest. Like, they've just hit home runs. And yet when we do this Coach of the Year talk,

which we do all the time, we immediately say, Vrable Ben Johnson. What Mike McDonald's doing right now in Seattle is pretty impressive too. And oh yeah, what Sean Payton's doing is pretty impressive. And what Liam Cohen's doing is pretty impressive. Like there are a few candidates in the thing. It's not just a two horse race. Yeah, certainly as we get closer to playoffs and everybody has to realize who's real and who's not? You know, the thing about Seattle

and it'll always be the case, and I guess it's the entire NFC West. L.A. obviously is its own media markets who hear about the Rams and A.F. Stafford and everything like that. But one of the Seattle Seahawks decided to completely move on, I think for most media conversations,

it's kind of just like, we started talking about the Seattle Seahawks on a regular basis this year because we thought they were unbelievable. We thought they were so good. They had this road win streak that was just outrageous that needed to be talked about

by people that understand how hard it is to go win on the road in that kind of that rapid of pace, Seahawks fans started sending us like, thank you for talking about our team. Like that actually started happening. Seattle Seahawks social media team started like ripping our clips

and being like, thank you for talking about us because like nobody talks about them, but you're going to be forced to now down the stretch because these, they're for real. Like the Seattle Seahawks can win a damn Super Bowl? Then the question all goes to, can Sam Donald play good in the biggest game? Do we think McDonald will be able to help him with that?

Do we think this setting with Jackson Smith and Jigba, Cooper Cup, and the boys will be able to help Sam Darnold? Like, what is your projection and thoughts on how he does down the stretch? Because that's literally the only thing that the Seahawks are going to get judged upon is how Sammy D. does at the end of the season. Yeah, look, they had 14 wins in Minnesota, but there was an eight-day stretch where he had two brutal losses and two brutal performances against both the Lions. And then the Rams down in Arizona in that Monday night game, and that stuff's real.

There's a lot of, all right, just find me in January with Sam Darno. And I think that's fair until he wins one. And that was the case with Kirk Cousins for a long time. Then he went and did it. And before that, it was the case with Peyton Manning, and he did it. Like, you got to go do it. So he can't get this thing out of there until he finally wins that big game. And I'll tell you, they had a road game against the Rams in which he threw, what, four picks in a big spot.

And those doubters and those critics came out again. So Thursday night, home game. They've given you all the money. That city loves you. You're the quarterback. go win this game, shut people up. Like, it would be great for Sam Darnold to have a big game. Because honestly, they are a passing first offense.

You know, Kenneth Walker and Charbonnet are fine running backs, but they're not Coram and Kieran Williams right now. They don't lead with the run, and their passing game is what leads to them. Okay. Quarterback Whisper, a quarterback guru here shaking his head. What is your take on this all? No touchdowns last week. At home.

Colts' defense was Spangy, brother. Without four starters and both their starting corners out. Something's wrong, brother. Lou and Remo's cooking, he's a sign. Lou and Betts are great. I love them. I know that, but it started last week. I started to see this December creeping into Sam.

Oh, no. See every single year, and I love Sam Donald. Don't get me wrong. But he's got to prove it to me. Yeah, like if they go to Tampa in the first round, they're going on the road. The Rams last year, the Rams this year. Look out.

Yeah, that's because you believe in Stafford. But before Stafford got to L.A., I think the same question was about him in Detroit because all the talent, all the skill, but not really ever winning the big one because was it him, was it the team? Now everybody thinks the Seattle Seahawks team can, just like the Vikings team can. So then it's 100% on Sam Dardo, which goes back to the conversation. Yeah, like if they're going to Tampa, and I also love the Seahawks in their defense.

To Stregor's point, Emin Wari, watching him play. I mean, he had one of the greatest field goal blocks I've ever seen last week against Atlanta. But like, are you going to take Sam Darnold and the Seahawks over Baker-Mayfield and the Buc? after Mike Evans and Godwin and Abuka and McMillan and then Kate Otten comes back. Like, I even find it hard to put myself there because I don't want to be there. I don't want to have to choose between Seattle and Tampa

because, like, I don't know, Baker had an unbelievable start to the season. You could see them closing out the season strong, beating Carolina, and then maybe going on a run. It's crazy. I believe in Sam. Just need the opportunity. I believe in. Hey, Sam, come on, Sam.

I thought you were doing it. No, that was tough Colts defense. Yeah. That was tough Colts defense. You know it. Dr. Lou was in there fucking doing his thing. Okay. Okay, let's move to the next conversation, shall we?

I got a text from Dr. David Chowell, okay? Okay. Former NFL team doc for a long time. He is currently in charge of the... The sports injury podcast or something like that? Zone. Sports performance. Zone.

I see the patch on his shirt. I can't think of what it's said. And I see what it is. So it's a slew of doctors and medical professionals that much like sports injury central. Okay, sorry, Dr. David Chow, we apologize for that. S-I-C. We see the thing. Yeah.

But it's just like the refs have their own setup with TVs everywhere for replays and everything like that. This is basically a bunch of medical professionals who I believe are... I saw that for the first time this week, the Chow War Room. Been doing it for like three years now. They've been doing for three years. It's like retired doctors basically or team docs or physical therapists and things like that. They basically all in there watching games in real time and then given their projections or prognosis through the screen.

Now, I will say this guy gets it right a lot of the time. Okay, they get it right a lot of the time because just like all of us and just like Schaefter said yesterday, we've all seen it a lot on TV. We can almost guess what it's going to be. He, I believe, predicted also the LCL for Patrick Mahomes, not just the ACL in real time with the sports injury central as they're watching it. And he texted me and said, with the LCL confirmed, there's no way that Mahomes will be 100% for the start of next season. Wentz in 2017 is the comp there just for your conversation piece. So on that note, with what the chiefs are going forward, that's his, Patrick Mahomes, Patrick Mahomes.

So obviously all these timelines and projections are certainly their own being and their own journey. And Patrick Mahomes will exhaust all options to get back as soon as possible. But what he's saying is with LCL also being damaged in this injury, the beginning of the season seemingly is going to be a tough task for Patrick Mahomes, which leads to go ahead, Conman. Yeah, Shreggs, what do you think the Chiefs look like going forward? A lot of, you know, fodder around Kelsey's future, Andy Reid. I think we all assume he will be back with Mahomes. And, you know, to Pat's point, even if Mahomes misses the first four games, you can see the Chiefs going 13 and 4 because of how good this guy is. but what do you think they will look like, you know, next year, the year after? Do you think this is kind of the beginning of a shift as far as their culture and maybe mindset and team build goes? Yeah, look, first off, Mahomes had surgery last night, so already has gotten under the knife with Dr. Cooper,

who's one of the best in the game down there in Texas. I texted with Mahomes this morning, nothing for like news just to chat back and forth. And he's in good spirits and is like, yep, we're going to attack this thing. So Mahomes, I think of it from his mental standpoint. And Pat, you could appreciate this. And B.A., of course, going on these long playoff runs that you've had. I was heartbroken for the injury, of course. But I'm also heartbroken for Mahomes for the fact that he has played in seven straight conference championship games,

meaning his seasons end in late January, early February for his entire career. When they were getting eliminated this season, I almost felt like a, all right, at least Mahomes gets an offseason. He's played four, five straight extra weeks every single year. And now you're talking about these injuries. He has to attack this. Like he's never attacked rehab or football in an offseason before. It's a huge mental weight on something that in his head, he was probably thinking, all right, if we're out on December 15th, we're out on December 15th, we finish out the string,

we'll go from there. But this is going to have to be an individual rehab so tenacious, so aggressive, given the timelines, that it's going to be the hardest offseason he's ever had. So I think of it right from that standpoint, the mental anguish, in addition to the physical anguish, and then as far as the teams goes, there will be changes. I don't know if anyone's losing their job, but I would imagine the chiefs look at themselves in the mirror and say, whatever version we were this year is not going to be enough. So whether they're minor tweaks, whether it's players, whether it's coaches, trust me, Clark, Mark Donovan,

and I would include Brett Veach and Andy reading these decisions. They're going to have to look in the mirror and really make some hard, hard choices. And as much as this season didn't go their way, you could also kind of rest on the fact that we're one in six in one score games or one and seven in one score games. And we still do have a really good young defense. And oh, by the way, the Bengals had an off year. The Ravens are having an off year. There's still a window where next year we get back and we're back in this thing. So I don't expect a complete overhaul to answer your question, but I would imagine there are some really tough decisions and hard changes that have to be made.

That's so cool. You just text with Patrick Mahomes. Tell him we said hello and Godspeed. We don't know what he sees or what he doesn't see. We assume his blinders are on. And yeah, you talk about his most intense offseason. It's miserable too and very painful going through all of this recovery and rehab. So we're pulling for him. But what it sounds like for you or what you're saying is Andy Reid back. Let's go ahead and run this thing again is what it sounds like you're saying. And then are you also saying the human exclamation point? Travis Kelsey expected. in your eyes to be back next year playing? Or that's the big conversation piece

because we're going to have this conversation later with B.A. He wanted to make the point. Like what Patch Mahomes and Travis Kelsey are is a historic duo in the history of our NFL. The Hall of Fame will showcase them on a very regular basis throughout the history of the league amongst the greats. And who else

are they next to? Well, there's been a couple other duos that they'll certainly talk about. Brady and Gronk and Rivers and Gates. I mean, that's what we're telling about. And you have to go way back Johnny Anitist and John Mackey, but that's a tight-in Hall of Fame. And I think you could even add in just like quarterback and pass catcher do it. Yeah, I believe

if I'm not mistaken, I think they have the most touchdown passes in the postseason to each other in the history of the sport already. So this is a huge thing for the future of ball in our eyes and also as massive fan of Travis Kelsey and as somebody that would never want to, not that I could just text with Travis Kelsey on a regular basis, but would never want to say, hey, I wouldn't want to put the pressure on him to make a decision, because that's a huge decision to make for your football life, for who you've been, and for being a goat at a sport.

But what is your lean towards that for the future? Because that's a huge part of NFL football that could potentially change next season. And that's the fears whenever we start thinking about this next chapter of this Chief's dynasty. I would never dare speculate or put my opinion on it because I don't have one. and if I know Kelsey, of course he likes the off-the-field stuff and would be a wonderful superstar in cinema and he could be the next John Sina. He could be whatever he wants to be.

But I also know that guy is a dogged, dogged competitor and is a football player. So everyone's speculating that just because they missed the playoffs and he's a certain age that he is done, like look, everyone for Brady's last season in Tampa was telling me Brady was done, Brady was done. Brady came back. You know, like everyone tells you that this guy's done.

These guys come back. So I would not, unless you're Travis Kelsey or Jason Kelsey or Taylor Swift or mama or dad, Kelsey. I wouldn't put your opinion out there as fact because he hasn't revealed anything to anybody. And my sources in Kansas City have no indication either way. So I'm not going to speculate on his future without him speculating on it first. Good luck, Trav. Don't be taking any bumps, though. We don't need you to start the John Cena.

Don't want you losing on your last game either. I kind of liked it. I know you don't want to hear my wrestling takes. I thought it was kind of cool how it ended. He quit. No, he didn't. You know how many people quit because of that? Maybe that's why McDaniels stopped playing in the fourth quarter.

John Cina's fault. I didn't even think about John Cohn's potentially influencing McDaniel. Two or two. And I saw those glasses. McDaniel certainly could have had one eye on Cina's retirement match, one eye on the game at the beginning whenever that thing was split. Don't let that happen if you're him. You do whatever you can to make sure that doesn't happen.

I grew up loving the Sopranos, and when that thing goes to black, and you're so shocked and you're so horrified, and you're like, wait, that can't be how this thing ends. I will never forget that ending. I can't tell you, rest in peace, macho man's last fight. I couldn't tell you this other guy. I will never forget John Sino's last fight because it was so shocking, and it was so different, and it was so unique. And yes, the torch has been passed. That's good call, Shraggs. I didn't even think about that.

And then Goonther comes out last night. The man that tapped out John Sina. And he says, John Sina tapped out like a bitch, dog. But I kind of loved it. Me too. Good healing. Yeah, right. Yeah, right. You know what Gunther is and what Gunther isn't. And that is not what Gunther is.

But I do appreciate that. It continued. And Gunther was getting an asshole chance as he's walking out the arena. I mean, that is. Good heat. Hey, it's good for the business, kid. That is really good for the business. Did you tap versus Gunther?

No. Did Sina tap first Gunther? Yeah. It might be my fault because my body couldn't stay awake whenever Gunther had me tapped out or choked out. Then my body just quit seeing. It was like, I don't want to be a limp body out here on my last night. Maybe it's my fault.

I didn't even look in the mirror at this potentially being my fault. But nonetheless, him smiling right beforehand. I was going to say. Yeah, it just was ready. It was ready. Screw it. It's over. This has been fun.

He wasn't uncomfortable at all. He took a shit. He was uncomfortable. He's gritted like the butcher's dog, man. He said he's leaving it in good hands, or shall I say, arms, is what he said. Austrian arms. So you're right, Shrek. It was good for the Bayesian.

What he did. It was good for the business. What he did. But, yeah, I didn't expect us to just dive into this entirely. There's certainly other things to talk about. But we got to get a hard out, brother. Big story in sports. Yeah, truly.

Last night, McDaniel, is he on a hot seat? Yeah, look, you missed the play. playoffs and on a nationally televised game put out that effort it's there's everyone's going to be under the spotlight in miami i'll say that everyone who's that quickly i would think they did i think they have to explore the quarterback position are you going to get any further in with this guy i don't know no i don't know that's comfy he is certainly in his emotions right now but certainly has a feeling and there's a chance though there's a chance global warming makes every game warm so he's better and good everywhere but i don't know when that's coming brother hopefully not that soon who knows

We appreciate you. That's Peter Schreger. We appreciate that. Listen to the Shreger Howard podcast, incredible. He gets incredible guests because he knows everybody and a jolly fella. He's the best. Jolly fella.

It's very nice to talk to him. It feels like he knows more than most, but he's also scared to give out some stuff. So kind of got a pry at him. Hi there. Surprise. 30 for 30 presents Booya.

Can I get a witness from the congregation? You can't stop authenticity. Boo ya. Stewart was exactly like you saw him on camera, off camera. He dialed it up 10%. Can you imagine the impact of young black boys and girls looking at that going, I feel seen. He changed the culture. He changed sports.

Stream Boo-ya, presented by Modelo, right now on the ESPN app. The NBA is happening Christmas Day. Five games, one unforgettable lineup. That's what Christmas is all about. Breakaways for dessert. It's the holiday tradition. Christmas is all day. With star power from across the globe.

The stars, they are going to be out. The best gift, you don't even have to unwrap it. We want to say Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! NBA Christmas Day begins at noon Eastern on ABC and ESPN. That's right. That's a good cadence right there by a man who coached football for 47 years, multiple times Super Bowl champion Coach Bruce Sanchez.

Shout to you, B.A. I said it was November 16th, and I think that's because my mind wants time to slow down. Sure. You know, not only because my baby girl is growing. She's going through growth spurts right now.

It's a cool moment. She's obviously incredibly uncomfortable, but seeing her grow in continue to be the person. Amazing. I would like time to slow down at each one of these stages. But also football, I would like time to slow down. We're a meaningful football time.

We got division championships about to be one. We're about to see playoff tickets get punched. We're about to find out who's who. And last night, I think we learned that dolphins are still shite in the Pittsburgh Steelers might be for real this year. They invested a lot this offseason to take this miraculous run. It felt like everybody in the Pittsburgh Steelers building understood that maybe their window

is kind of closing up. Cam Hayward's been around a long time. T.J. Watts's been around a long time. Obviously, Coach Tomlin and the coaching staff have been there forever. Are we going to make a run at this thing? Sure. Let's bring in a Hall of Fame quarterback in Aaron Rogers. Now, they didn't have a deal with him throughout all of the spring ball.

They didn't really have a quarterback. A lot of people were saying, we're just going to wait for this guy. We're going to wait for this guy. Mike Tomlin, from my understanding behind the scenes, was like, yep, we will wait for this guy because he's such a big fan. They inevitably get Aaron Rogers into the building in the summer. He becomes their quarterback. They sign and pay, D.K. Metcalfe, a wide receiver, a wide receiver, $30 million.

A wide receiver that's never been a Pittsburgh Steeler for $30 million a year, completely out of the norm for the Pittsburgh Steelers. They make trades for Jalen Ramsey, John Hussmith, they bring in Darius Slay. They start spending money and doing things that the Steelers had not done ever in the history of the Pittsburgh Steelers all to kind of signal to the world,

we're going for a Super Bowl. Their fans bought it, the NFL bought it, and now we're living it. The Pittsburgh Steelers are still very much in it. They can still very much win the AFC North. Next two games against Detroit and Cleveland, really matter. Play the Baltimore Ravens final week of the year. If they beat the Ravens, they will have a home playoff game. If they get in the dance, Aaron Rogers is in the dance,

T.J. Watts in the dance. Chris Boswell, who might be the best kicker in a league is in the dance. And Mike Tomlin, a man who's had a successful run as an NFL quarterback for the better part of the last two decades would be in the dance. I think all they care about is getting in, and when they get in, can they win? Well, that's what they're trying to prove to themselves and to all of us every single time they step on the field. Pitches to John O'Smith. him running downhill. Outrageous. Darnell Mount Washington, their tight end that weighs 320 pounds who just sealed that particular block right there, who can get down the field in crazy ways, is obviously a monster.

Are the Pittsburgh Steelers going to do everything that they hope to do whenever they change their ways this past off season? Last night would tell you, yes. And on a flip side, are the dolphins everything we thought they were going into the year? Last night would tell you, yes, they got to figure it out as well. The toxic tables here at Boss of Connor, at Ty Schmidt. Ty, anything I missed there on the breakdown of both those teams last night? No, I think that was pretty accurate. And for, you know, a lot of people were saying last week

when the dolphins went into the Meadowlands and beat the Jets and it was 40 degrees, like, hey, they did it. Two is a cold weather guy now. This is the end of this. The difference between playing in like 40 at kickoff and like 15 when it actually feels like it's closer to zero, just as people who live in cold weather states, It's like, that's a pretty big difference. It's very cold when it's like zero degrees.

It's not that cold when it's 40. And to your point about the Steelers in the playoffs, like if it stays like it is right now, like I can see the Steelers beat the Chargers. And then you win one game in the playoffs and get a little of momentum. Like, who knows what could happen next? Who knows injuries are going to happen to any team? Who knows what the future looks like for anybody?

Honestly, you experience this this past weekend. You lose your best player on the field. What does the future look like? Who knows? You know, the Green Bay Packers are going to deal with a Michaelist team going forward. Who's Green Bay play next? The Bears in Chicago on Saturday. You don't think the Bears are pretty pumped that they're facing

a Green Bay Packers in Week 16 without Micah Parsons? I would say so. I mean, that could happen any week. We saw Devonte go down. We saw Micah go down. We saw Patrick Mahomes go down. You're talking about pillar, pillar, pillar players, game wreckers across the board can change. That's the end of the season. That is what can potentially happen.

So if you get in the dance, who knows what a team looks like in the divisional round versus the wild card round, it's almost a game of attrition at this point. Who can survive because the season's so long, and obviously it's very, very brutal. Who can stay healthy and who can go on a run? Are the Pittsburgh Steelers one of those teams, nine-year NFL vet, Darius J. Butler? Like you said, playoffs, definitely.

Can win a game in the playoffs? Yeah, Super Bowl, that'll be a stretch. But, you know, down the stretch, I know we're saying these games, you know, don't matter when it gets to the math, but they do matter on the field when it comes to it. Because when you hit the playoffs, when you're hitting the home stretch, you want to be playing your best ball. And so these games will mean a lot. And obviously, our last game against the Ravens would be huge.

But Super Bowl run, that would be stretched. I have to see that to believe it. Let's go to Hammer. Dot, Tad. AP Tone, everything that you guys were dreaming of in the off season, still very much alive right now. Was it wet dreams last night, or did you stay awake and beat the hell out of yourself? Both, actually.

Nice. I didn't get all out the first time when I was awake. So that situation happened. But no, like this team in general. A little half. Yeah, they show flashes in all areas of being a good enough team to go on a deep run in the playoffs. It's just like certain ports stored in the season. It just has never all come together in one game.

The last two weeks have probably been the closest situation. And we talk about like the next two games not mattering because you don't have to win those games. You can lose those and then play the Ravens in week 18. But if the Ravens lose this week to the Patriots or next week to the Green Bay Packers, all the Steelers have to do is then beat the Cleveland Browns in week 17 and then guess what there's two left tackles out right now the D line is banged up obviously we know about T.J. Watt, Herbie got a little bit hurt last week. We have corners out. Then you can rest week 18 to get prepared for that home playoff game in the wildcard round of the playoffs. So while yes,

you don't have to win the next two games to get into the playoffs, it would be super awesome to potentially win and then not have to worry about Ravens, Steve, Steelers, Week 18, Winners gets the AFC North. Like, that's not something that I don't think anyone really wants. Yeah, that are Steelers fans. Correct. I definitely would like to see. Yeah, the Baltimore Marine against Pittsburgh Steelers

for who is going to make the playoffs and who wins the daunted, tough AFC North. Coach Bea, you've gone on multiple Super Bowl runs with multiple different teams. There's always the conversation about the end of the season whenever you can choose to rest. Does that create rust or does that create recovery for your team? What are your thoughts on playing your best ball at the end of the regular season and how that can carry into the playoffs? That Tampa Bay team that you were coaching with Tom, I think it was like week 11. You guys had a buy week or something like that. And then on the other side of that, I think you beat the Falcons.

And then you guys just go and demolish seemingly and go on a war path, basically, right to the Super Bowl. Your thoughts on ending the season with Mo momentum. Yeah, I think that was huge for us. We had to win the last four. And we're down 17, nothing to half of the Falcons and score 31 in the second half. and that propelled us the rest of the way. And so there was never any rest. I've been on it, hey, let's sit them this week.

And we went one year, we set everybody. And a team had to win to get in. And we went and beat them with our guys. It's like, hey, these cats were, these wanted, they wanted to play. And I'm not going to name the team. But it was, it's hot. Get hot at the right time. So let's talk about the rest.

So my rookie year, we're undefeated. And by we, I played eight. tiny rule. I mean, I held for Venetarian, I kicked off. I also didn't know what I was doing punting the ball, but I punted for the team, and we did not punt that much. So I say we, I mean, I was a part of the operation that did this.

We were undefeated until we chose to lose. Okay, then we lose to the jets. We choose to lose to the jets. We kind of let them into playoffs, and then we lose to the bills the final week in the middle of a snowstorm blizzard. OGs on the team are not happy, because obviously 72 dolphins are the only team that's ever gone

undefeated, and they wanted to chase that. I believe Bill Pulling made the decision, though, like, we're not losing anybody these last two weeks if we're in the playoffs. It wasn't for rest. It was strictly like, we are top heavy as a motherfucker on this roster. We cannot lose anybody here. So we are going to remove the risk of anybody getting hurt was kind of what the decision was made there. Your thoughts on those types of things towards the end of the year. Because momentum, I think the boys would have said, like, we also can get better through these games, which is what everybody else kind of gets to do. Where do you kind of sit on that? Yeah, we kept playing our guys, even in Arizona.

when we had a lockdown we you know i had a lot of confidence in drew stanton if i wanted to sit cars and palmer but uh no at most of you can only sit like four or five guys anyway because you don't have any guys on the roster somebody's got to play so i'm gonna let you three sit you three got to play i'm pissed about this shit all right now so let's all play let's go win what are your thoughts on it d bud oh it depends on your team you got to know your team where you are injury wise how much it will help you and to your point it's only so many guys that dress up so let's say you decide to you know sit tie and come man and then the guys playing ahead him get hurt now you got nobody play teams they

maybe have to go in now and play in the second half so it can be a shit show um and all these reps matter you know and on the flip side i know we're talking about teams you know resting and being at the top of the league but at the bottom of league we know we had that graphic yesterday when it done you know and people say oh these are meaningless games you know we see jane daniel shut down you know which is probably a good decision with how he's been this year but most of these teams for players and coaches like these are critical games going to for it because a lot of those teams we talk about what six to eight jobs being open so those are coaches and front offices changing so those rosters most of those guys after probably the

top four or five guys are kind of head on the swivel when it comes to changes so these are critical games for you know a lot of those teams as well also when it comes to evaluation like your competitive spirit all that type of shit comes into deciding if somebody's going to be a part of your program be a part of your team if you get a chance to get some film let's make sure it's good film yeah that's why whenever people are like uh this team's tanking for this person it's like The players on the field aren't tanking because they don't want to put shit film out there. Well, if their superstars are good, well, they're trying to make the Hall of Fame then. So they don't want to put, there's no reason for any player to put shit film out there to anybody.

Now, are there other decisions being made on who's getting a chance to do film by some people, potentially? But the players never want to put bad ball on tape. That's just a matter of fact. This is a profession where money is made by putting good ball out there and money is lost by putting bad ball out there. Yeah, if you've made it to the NFL, you're a hell of a competitor, and competitors don't fucking quit. They play, and they play to win. And that's the way every

team should be. Hell yeah. Unless you know it's time. Yeah. Joining us from an attic in Ohio, ladies and gentlemen, a college football national champion, a Super Bowl champion, a rider cup winner, ladies and gentlemen, AJ Hawk. Yeah. Unless you know, it's time,

obviously, to go and move on and allow the business to prosper in a different way. But let's talk about last Last night, and the Miami Dolphins, I guess, will fall into the category we were just talking about, about down the stretch here, what does their team look like? Who's going to be on their team? What does the next year look like? And then for the Pittsburgh Steelers, hey, this is everything they talked about in the offseason. And I think there was a lot of times where Aaron had to do is R-E-L-A-X quote to a lot of different people about when they want to play their best ball.

They're seemingly doing that. What did you learn last night, AJ, about this Pittsburgh Steelers team? Well, I mean, this throw at DK was awesome. early on. You knew Aaron felt pretty good when you saw him complete this ball early. And D.K., first off, getting the end zone later was unbelievable. Like, the dude obviously cannot be tackled and gain well. I think their offense was great.

I think Aaron, you guys, it's funny mentioned, like, his, yeah, you notice it's got a cast on his left hand. Like, yeah, that is something for sure. It definitely affects his play, I would say, but to Miami's credit, like, they came out early. I legit stopped it a few times and ran some of their defensive

plays back for my kids. But I came in, watch these dudes make an open field tackle. them set the edge. Like Miami was very physical early and then for some reason after half it just kind of fizzled out. If you want to know what it's like to watch an NFL game with the all-time leading tackler for the Green Bay Packers as his kids, just know Monday night football does become five to ten minutes behind the rest of the world because dad wants to make sure we see proper form tackle, pursuit angles, look at the tenacity and the alphaness here. This is what we need if we want to play good football. Is that happening every game you're

watching with the kids? No, it's not. But the older I get, the more I do want to run plays back. Hey man, remember I tell you, keep your outside arm free. Here we go. And then you keep it and you knock it back inside of your 10 buddies run inside out. Like, it's very simple. And when I see teams like showing that on national TV, I have a hard time not stopping it and run it back. Who are you showing this to? I use you my three boys and my daughter, too, if she's there. What are your three boys' name, just so we can kind of get a little more intel? Hendricks Veteran Axel. Okay, Hendricks, Vetter, Axel, please.

Come here. See, this guy's sacrificing his body for the betterment of his team, but he has good angle. See, he's on the outside shoulder. He's forcing him back. He would not make the tackle, but he sacrificed his body for the good of his team. Do you see that?

That is Hawk football. That is what you will do. Do you understand? And Vetter's like, I don't know, he could have just made the... We'll go back to the fucking beginning of it. Every single time. That's awesome.

Hawk football, baby. Hey, that's a good thing for the future of ball. I appreciate you doing that. But to your point, they didn't look like it was the cold it didn't look like it was going to be an issue for them and then the Pittsburgh Steelers pull away tell you more about the Miami Dolphins or the Pittsburgh Steelers AJ I think it tells you more I think the dolphins maybe they're a little little bit of what we thought they were but I think the Steelers might be a little better than we thought they were coming into this one

can they go on a run brother they get into the dance Aaron Rogers T.J. Watt Chris Boswell okay those are the those are the three leaders of the three prospective groups Boswell, potential best in game. T.J. Watt, potential best in game. Aaron Rogers, first ballot hall of famer. Now, I know there's 10 other people on the field with them whenever they're out there. But defense, most expensive in the league still, Tone?

I believe so, yes. Okay, so they got talent, stars all over the field there, especially if they're able to get healthy. Offense, are they going to be able with Aaron to be able to make any plays against playoff caliber defenses? I guess that would be the question. What is that, Lord? What is that?

Well, you just picked up your two top receivers. You just got in the last three weeks who have been cast off. Yeah, but Thelan's a blocker right now. I don't know if you see him. Delan's getting down there. Demon mode. Yeah, the demon Thelan's getting panics. Him and Darnell Washington.

He was blocking guys that didn't want to make a damn tackle. Yeah, well, that's the Dolphins. You're right. We're going to have to find out if it's going to be in the world. Fald as Gantley catches a touchdown. I mean, he was on the street. But they got met. Yeah, Rodgers loves him.

He knows him very well, and Thelan, Aaron knows his role. But that still scares me when he thinks. thinking about going against a high-powered offense. Coach you did it with Scottie Miller. Scotty Miller is on Steelers. He can't even get on the field. Okay, so.

They don't know how to use it. They don't know how to use them. It's going to be a... Aaron can't throw it that far. This is Aaron, not Phil. Yeah, I'm joining us right now, ladies. Watch your fucking mouth. Hey!

You got that one, yeah, it did. I was about to introduce somebody that was maybe going to give us a little bit more information. I didn't know old man Rivers was about to take a shot. you sack of shit don't you do that to fill there's no reason to now on that note Aaron rogers does spin that thing and that ball that ball is still hovering above earth defying gravity somehow at the age of 40 what what is he uh 42 42 years old i mean it's outrageous the arm strength and i don't want to reiterate the story but it is worth noting

fresh out of bed bud light from fridge at cabin We are 80 yards away in Lake, two-step from the deck into somebody's tube, looking for a beer, whatever time it was in the morning. That's fresh out of bed for Aaron as a 30-plus-year-old, like 35-plus-year-old as an old man. Shoulder, you think potentially, elbow, potentially, wrist, maybe even in that thing. Yeah, right, goes back to fridge, grabs a couple more, spinning them out there. And then I ask him about it. I'm like, hey, that beer toss might have been the most impressive throw that I've seen just because as somebody who was throwing a couple beer cans before, I know the size of it and also the weight distribution, not the best for this, especially with how old you are. I could see quarterbacks wanting to warm up entirely before doing any type of those things. He just literally woke up out of bed and huck something 80 yards as like a 37, 38 year old. And it's like, what's that all about? He's like, I could probably do that for. or whatever, whatever. There's not even a thought

that that thing's going to slow down, AJ. No, no chance. Yeah, you know, it's quick release, everything. It was on, you know, it was on display last night, I feel like, even in the cold. Joining us now, a man who has a lot of the same traits that Aaron Rogers has. Danor Wobsky. Hey, Dano!

What's up? How you doing, Dano? Hey, what network are you on? What network do you work for? ESPN. Dork. Oh, wow. That's so cool. I like that. I'm not following. It's like he's on baseball team.

Yeah, sweet hat. How come we don't get one of these hats? How come we don't get on this? That's not ESPN. Well, whoever it is, they're getting sued. Yeah, they need to watch it. We weren't even allowed to put a line through the PMS Live. Remember that?

This is, this is Aikman's Beer Company 8. Bye-bye, Troy. He's going to get a... Are you sure? Better change that quick. I don't think so. I think you're lying to us. I'm always lying.

Exactly, which is a part of the problem. I'm always lying. Yeah, is it a worker or shoot? We never know with you. So that's the eight beer? Because he was getting a lawsuit from somebody else for that. Yeah, Lamar, I don't think so. I'm going to walk.

Troy and the beer, that is not the last, ESPN logo. I mean, what are you doing? Why are you lying to us? This is the eight logo right here. It's right, dude. What's the purpose, man? This is, I believe, Can he put Dan where my seat is?

This is his new logo. He just gave me these hats like two, three weeks. Yeah, him and Joe Buck just got signed from Fox like two years ago, three years ago. Yeah, he's got signed to ESPN. They're the number one crew on Monday Night Football. We get it. Mark as Mark, dude.

Yeah, so. He gave him to Laura. Laura gave him to me. So these are Troy's new hats. Troy's line of Laura? I don't like that with what happened with Herbert. I don't like. Troy definitely told Laura like, hey, let's tell Orlovsky

that these are the new beer hats and he'll just think that That could be true That could be true I mean how many years have you worked for ESPN All right let's take this off Seven years I'm happy you're just now learning What the logo is you're the greatest

We appreciate you Okay so you've been doing television I hope I don't get in trouble for that Let's see For not knowing what ESPN's logo is Either one Either one either one Yeah Troy Aikman's gonna be pissed

Troy was going to say we spent so many hours with focus groups trying to get the perfect logo and here you are wearing ESPN's logo thinking it's our logo. Troy's Doc. Yeah, Troy's going to be doing some crazy core workout from however old he is, 90 years old or whatever the hell it is. He's just doing it. Him and Joe, very good, by the way.

Very, very good. They're great, man. They're great. Always will be, and we appreciate them for that. Let's talk about the game last night. Pittsburgh Steelers stomp dolphins inevitably in the end. Now, Darren has a couple touchdowns. Dolphins seemingly make it to play's fourth quarter. They're just running it as a casual offense.

This game's over this to get some preseason reps here. We'll kind of go about our business as if there is no sense of urgency. And, you know, who knows how or why we got to that point? Is it because Tua doesn't understand what's going on? Is that because McDaniel don't trust them? Can they even operate a two minute? Who knows? Whatever, nonetheless, let's go to the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Aaron Rogers, I just told the story about him throwing a beer can 80 yards from literally waking up out of bed from like as a 38-year-old. he had that throw to DK where they had the great replay from the end zone on it where it looked like the ball is still just levitating perfect spiral we're in week 15 right now he's been playing a lot of ball he's still spinning it at his best level the offense seemingly find it mvS gets in the end zone he might become a new deep threat for the pittsburg steelers t j watt's going to come back inevitably that defense gets a win for the first time without t j watt on prime time just what are your expectations for this pittsler's team and what

changed last night or maybe stayed the same in your mindset Yeah, nothing really changed for me off of last night's performance. Last night I was way more disappointed in the Dolphins and myself for actually believing in them. But for Pittsburgh, the reality for Pittsburgh is this for whether they can win the division and get in and if they get in. Can they be efficient on offense and can they keep Rogers clean? If they do those two things, yes, they'll have a shot versus someone in the playoffs. but those are a very big ask and or question mark if like last night in miami i have defensively i really don't know what they were doing i mean they weren't very um they didn't make things hard they were

very soft zone they were just giving completion on a consistent basis to guys and they never really got to rogers and so do i think that if the baltimore raven's defense is going to do that no do i think that the houston texans or the jaggs defense in a playoffs the baltimore rave excuse me the broncos defense in the playoffs would do that no so there's a very small margin of how pittsburgh has to play it's efficient because they're not explosive and they got to keep people away from rogers if they do that they can play good enough on offense to be in a game but i just don't think it's likely okay and for the miami dolphins you're bummed out man i thought they were different man they're the same cold dolphins so yeah dude they were playing so much better their run game was

awesome. Just the different stuff that they were doing. I thought going against the defense that was struggling against the run, I really thought they could go in there, make it a good game in the fourth quarter, Tua would make a throw or two. And they were in the first half, but that was because of their defense, not their offense. I was just so disappointed with the way they played. I'm disappointed with how Tua's played all year. I've been a huge fan of Tua, as I still am. But goodness gracious, man, the turnovers are just debilitating. And, you know, a person. performance last night only kind of reiterates a lot of the question marks about, you know, the longstanding spot in the organization moving forward, which stinks because I'm a huge fan.

For McDaniel Antiole, you're just saying maybe the future looks different for the Miami Dolphins and you're saying that Gumpy is just going to have to kind of strap in for just another turnover. And here's the contract details for Tua. If he's traded before June 1st, It's only a $45.2 million dead cap hit in 2026. If he's traded post-June 1st, it's 13.4 in 2026 and then 31.8 in 2027. With where the cap is headed and how much money is already a dead in most places, this feels like something to dolphins would be willing to take on. But I guess another team would have to pick something up.

B.A., what are your thoughts on any of the movement for potential to a post-dolphin? I don't see anybody picking up any of that much. money you know what yeah just that it the guy hasn't gotten any better in my opinion the last three years of any of these got worse he took two sacks you just throw the damn ball away terrible you're running to your left you're left handed you're 10 yards behind a line of scrimmage and you take two sacks what year is this for him oh too many six maybe same same as burrow yeah so and her yep yeah because the way we judge those quarterbacks is how uh situational football they are what do they like with their football i

yada, yada, yada, all those things. And you talk about if Patrick Mahomes was to take a sack and not throw the ball away or something like that, we would bury him, obviously. Whenever we talk about guys who are in their sixth year, whenever we're talking about being in their second contract, show me the money.

To a bunch of fans that are showing up at a free event, probably because they do not have the ability to get tickets, so screaming that. We're talking about at least becoming an elite quarterback. Like, that is kind of the goal of the entire thing, and you're saying there's too many things that are just like very much on display. Like Dan said, the first interception. He's got a two-man

route. They're playing cover two. You're trying to throw a corner route with nobody in a flat to hold the corner and you throw it right to the corner. I mean, Assante Samuel's just standing there. Throw me the ball. And he did. I mean, that's inexcusable for a six-year vet.

And they did do a little statue on there to B.A.'s point about how I think 15 of his interceptions are against zone. So, like, a lot of the times, and man, it's awesome. because he's got, you know, high flyers all around, flying around. But when it's in zone, he's not really reading anything. He's just throw into a spot.

And then a guy like, you know, Asante Samuel, Jr., just standing there. When there's eyes on you, when they're just waiting, literally, for you to throw it to you, it's a little different than whenever everything was kind of operating full speed and you're throwing to a spot. And everybody was kind of trying to figure out your game. I think now defenses get a book, right? That's kind of the conversation is. You get the book and you get the motions and you know the spots. I guarantee you look at like a hand.

heat map of Tua, like it'll be between the numbers and the hash. Those would be like dark, dark red and everything else would be, you know, blue or light blue. And I always go back to like my ISO cam test. If I'm just watching the quarterback and I'm just watching Tua, as soon as he goes from his first read and he gets to his second read, his everything just gets off whack. His feet, his eyes and it's almost like you know nothing good is going to happen. B.A. talked about it. The sack, like taking those sacks, like you can't take the, at least make it a situation where you got to think about going for it in this situation. When you take this sack, this is like something we talk about

rookie quarterbacks where it's like, okay, you got to get used to the time. Understanding that throwaway is a good play. Like, where are you? It's 14-3. Yeah, we can't have these conversations. You're looking at his class. I'm like, Burrow, Herbert, Hertz. Like, those look like veteran quarterbacks. They'll have a bad day here and there, but nine times out of

10, they're going to make the right plays. All right, let's move past the Miami Dolphins, which look like a sad franchise. Absolute shite. Looks like it's the Finkel. almost, but they can only dream to have a moment in which a miss kick would matter. Right?

They're in the middle of the purgatory, too, where they've won enough games where they won't have a big... How's the 14th pick? Oh. No thanks. Me thinks, that stinks. Tamarino was on the sideline

last night, too, so the fans actually got a chance to see what glory almost times were like for the Miami Dolphins. And he's talking to seven, who's obviously filled with wonderment of what he's seeing

Santa Claus actually came to the game last night what you don't see on this camera is Dan Marino and Ben Rothersberger seeing Santa Claus

from the first up Yeah Bob humpug Dan But Dan said I fucking saw him yesterday you know you told me you weren't coming here

and Ben's like Santa you know this is obviously two magical moms I know what happened okay Ben saw Aaron

Spinitt was like Oh, we're awesome. And Dan Sott was like, oh, we're fucked tonight. So it's not, so it wasn't Santa Claus. I think it was a little bit of both. That's a little bit of both. Oh, geez. Okay, that is potentially that moment.

Actually, we would like you to tell us what this moment was. What do you think this reaction was to? Go ahead and comment below or post on X below or put in the Instagram comments below. Best responses will make the program tomorrow. Now, let's move past the Dolphins and the Steve. dealers. A.J. Hawk has a question for you, Dano, who has a husky poking up over it. Hey, Dan, I'm sure, obviously, you've been asked about Phil Rivers and his performance going out of Seattle. And, you know, probably should have won the game, obviously, unbelievable

kick there to win it as well as what four other kicks, I believe, in that night. What you make of Phil's performance? And how tough is that, really, if you think about it, coming off the couch after five years almost and having three days practice leading into this? Yeah, I got tons of credit or tons of, like, Like, kudos to Philip for doing that. Credit to him for doing it, unbelievable and very cool and courageous. And the post-game comments that he makes about his son's or son and the kids that he gets the coach are awesome. Hopefully that they can learn from that and see like, hey, don't be scared.

Don't be fair to failure. He was good. You know, got the ball out. I thought he moved in the pocket. He didn't look uncomfortable in the pocket that often. The ball went to the right place. You can tell he still got smart, still can throw it under 10 yards, right place, right? time type of thing. That game is what it is because of the defense and really because

of Seattle's offense right now and where they are more so than anything that Indy did offensively. So really impressed by the fact that he was able to go out there and do it, but there's nothing really in that offense that makes me think this team's going to get in or if they get in, they're going to be a threat to someone. Can you get one or two wins here? Can he get one or two wins for him down the stretch, you think? I don't think so, man. I think San Francisco, maybe. San Francisco's pass rush is relatively non-existent and they'll be able to run it on san francisco but san francisco's offense is just firing right now and um the way that they're playing and healthy and brock has been sensational and then they play jacksaville jacksville and trevor lawrence is on an absolute heater and

their offense can throw it around i think that match up well versus that run game that indy has from a defensive perspective and then playing the end of the season i believe they play houston uh which is a good luck so i just i think it's hard to envision if they can get maybe one I don't think they get two. Okay, so all these conversations that are being had by people on television about Phil Rivers' performance, and you can't throw the ball far. He was playing a Seattle Seahawks defense. They're very, very good.

Now, you talk about the down the stretch, got the Niners defense, and you got the Texans defense. So he's not playing, like, the easiest defenses to get dropped back into an NFL game, and maybe they're not allowing deep balls to be thrown. And Phil Rivers is too smart knowing that it's not my job to be out here to do any turnovers. We are trying to keep the ball So I assume there's shots that he could have taken That he didn't

That I think with another week In an NFL building for the first time And half a decade He's gonna be letting that thing fly Look for Phil Rivers To have a 20 plus yard completion On Monday night In the Lodhaus in my eyes

But also he put us in the right spots Okay and who knows what that team looks like without him A lot of people saying Riley Leonard could have done that A.R is back to his return window Cam Newton who we all, I am, we are massive fans of and have a lot of

respect for. He had a lot of people and including himself, they were upset that he wasn't asked. It's like, all they're looking for right now is somebody to operate this offense, right? Isn't that kind of what they're trying to do? Phil's our best option. Yeah. I think so. Yeah. I think Phil was our best option. Maybe Riley Leonard. I don't know how much Riley

knows, though, and I don't know how many defenses he has looked at and seen. I don't know any of that type of stuff. In the building, they might know that. I'm not 100% sure if they would. If they haven't seen them actually in the games. But it was clear what they were looking for. We want somebody that's able to operate Shane Steichen's offense. And Jonathan Taylor is the one that's going to be winning us games or not.

Literally everybody else has been saying that all season. Yeah, I mean, they couldn't afford to win that game. They couldn't afford Riley Leonard to go out and throw four interceptions, which is possible a rookie quarterback would do. We just saw Max Brosmer do it not too many weeks ago. They knew, hey, Phil might not be having a bunch of explosive plays, but he's not going to go out here and throw five picks. And we cannot turn the ball over if we want to win this game.

They got the entire AFC South down the stretch, obviously a lot on the line. Let's stay in the AFC South on a completely different side note, it feels like. You talk about two young quarterbacks. Trevor Lawrence, you mentioned it earlier, him been on a heater. Obviously, he had a historical day on Sunday. But this last five weeks, they've won five in a row. He's been playing great. And then C.J. Stroud, too.

I know he had to knock some rust off with Nick Haley, his O.C. He's been playing well. What are you seeing from these two quarterbacks and these two offenses? Yeah, I'll start with CJ. I think Houston, from an offensive perspective, is, the most improved unit in football. If you go to what they were to the start of the season, offensive line was still a huge concern.

The adjustments they've made on their offensive line is totally revamped to this offense. The interior of their offensive line playing so much better. And now CJ, I think CJ's one of his superpowers, the butt is like throwing the ball in the middle of the field. He's got great understanding of windows, the touch in between windows or over the top of windows. so that and then Nick Cayley as an offensive coordinator

I think he's the most improved offensive coordinator in football this year we called their Monday night game on the road in Seattle two months ago maybe 10 weeks ago and it's like it feels like the same stuff of last year and the way that they've brought six offensive linemen into the game the way that they've gone back to underneath the center the way that their young players have stepped up in Higgins Kirk is healthy Nico Collins is dominant Woody Marks running the football they're not trying to get overly creative with their run game. He comes from the Rams. And I think you're starting to see a lot of the

stuff that Houston's doing has a lot of the elements that the Rams have done in the past. The Keeper game. I continue to go to that. Matthew Stafford is running the keeper bootleg game more than anybody in the NFL. CJ Stroud is in top five when it comes to the usage of booting your quarterback out five or six times a game. And so we rave about Houston's defense, rightfully so. I've only seen this offense just get better and better and better. And Houston is much more a complete team today than they were, you know, certainly in the middle of October. And it's not just about their defense. It's a great unit.

But their offense is very, very good right now. When you talk about throwing the ball over the middle of the field, though, because I see a lot of people take shots at other quarterbacks avoiding the middle of the field. What's so difficult about that and what kind of separates quarterbacks that can attack the middle of the field? And that can't. Yeah, I think the middle of the field, number one, there's more bodies there. so there's more danger. You know, quarterbacks that throw the ball to the perimeter,

more often than not, there's less people that you have to throw the ball through or over, and so it's a little bit more of a safe and confident throw. You know, throwing the ball over the middle of the field, you're usually having to throw one of two ways, in between people from a horizontal perspective. So you've got to throw it with windows that are open

before you want to and close faster than you kind of see them. So you've got to be able to anticipate, but also throw the right pace of a football to like this ball he's holding nico up so like you got to throw that ball in between that underneath defender of his right helmet number 20 but also 27 excuse me but also not pulling nico into that back side defender so like that's a zone ball that that's a dangerous throw that if you throw that ball on a line 27 will back that one off down here in the red zone like this is a you got to throw over people but you can't throw it too. high because there's usually a safety behind or out of bounds.

And so, like, I just, you know, that's the skill of throwing the ball over the middle of the field is anticipation. And it's, for me, it's pace, a pace of a football of how fast or harder throwing it is a huge deal. So real ball throwers can throw in the middle of the field. Hell yeah. Yeah. That's kind of the difference maker.

That is, you know, in baseball, it's can you see the curveball, right? That is the thing. Can you hit? That's how you get into the next. that's how you get into the majors if the hitter can see the curveball and hit the curve ball. So for quarterback, it's like,

can you make the throws over the middle? Because you have to have good timing. You got to have good anticipation. You've got to know where the ball is supposed to go. You've got to know what the defense is doing. And you've got to have elite arm talent is what you're saying, middle of the field kind of equals?

Yeah. Yeah, like that throw right there. If we took that throw, that one that Nico, he just connects. If we just took that and did routes on air, you would sit there. If you just had CJ and Nico running the route, you would go, oh, the ball's behind Nico.

And then you would sit there and say, that's an accurate throw. But when we're playing real football, and you're throwing with defenders and windows, that's the right throw at the right time. That's why I always sat, I've always sat there and said, like, don't find me a quarterback who can make all the throws, make the right throw at the right time. That's the right throw at the right time. And so, yeah, I think that's a superpower of his, man. And I think also I would say this, there's some quarterbacks that,

because scheme, the middle of the field gets schemed, open, so it's a little bit easier. But we'll know when those are happening, right? We'll know when that's happening, though, right? For our, our, on quarterback. Make it open. Okay, we'll be able to see whenever. That feels like that's not really the quarterback having to courage and the confidence,

because the amount of things that go into every one of those throws, confident in your arm, courage that your decision is the right one, and then also an understanding that this could go terribly while getting blasted in the face as you're doing that. I was saying it last night on that touchdown pass to D.K., where I think it was David. His 21, his hand was like, he was like he never saw that same fight because he just trusted. He still has the juice to kind of get it through it.

It looked very similar at touchdown and throw against the Steelers. When I think it was RC, Ryan Clark talks about that play. I think he was the backside of quarters and he had his own and went right. But like the quarterbacks, they just got to trust it. Got to be able to let that thing rip too, unbelievable throw, man. Yeah, Aaron said there's nobody that's currently out of my frame that's going to get this ball before DK gets. His decision that he's making in his head. He had no idea if a guy was coming, but if somebody was coming,

There's no way they're going to get there. And that's the one you think, Aaron, whenever he came back after the injury or whenever he feels like he's in it, a strike over the middle to beat zone is a ball that quarterbacks can kind of, I don't want to say flex their shit on, but flex their shit on, Dio? Yeah, I certainly think so. How are you over the middle, Dan? How are you over the middle? Elite.

I wasn't good enough, bro. I wasn't good enough, nor courageous enough. You know, I think, like, if you watch Stafford right now, I mean, that's where, like, some of the no-levels. lookers come in again zone people you with zone you got to move people with your eyes you know and so stafford right now is lighten it up Trevor Lawrence right now with the middle of the field to answer de butt's previous question you know I think that um you know with Trevor what you're seeing with Trevor is there's finally and BA knows this at a high level too like when the quarterback truly believes in the play call and the people around them it's almost to a point like I I could place this ball

wherever I need to. I just have so much confidence in myself and the play call and the people. There's very much a Kyle Shanahan, Sean McVey element to this where as a play caller, as the quarterback, you're like, I have so much confidence in these play calls right now. I'm just going to cut this sucker loose because I believe the dudes will be open. And with Trevor, it feels like they've finally gotten him to this point where it's like, dude, just trust us. We're going to get guys open. See it, trust it, and rip it. And I think that's allowed him. be way more aggressive, way more confident, and also allowing him to not think as much and just react. And you're seeing some of the athleticism on display. I mean, that throws off the charts

good, dude, because he's going from that crosser to that in-round on the backside. And he's hot right now, but I think a lot of it is to do with just the structure of the play call. Liam Cohen is dialing right now. Jacoby Myers has been a godsend for them. um high level of confidence see it trust it rip it that sounds like a quarterback meeting t-shape yeah that sounds like something that is said on it's just like alignment assignment technique is in there you know like there are so many of those little quick reminders for people uh whenever they're doing their job see it trust it rip it what a cool thing bro yeah i heard a bra at the end of it too i think that's probably how most quarterbacks that's the old ron turner

thing okay turner we used to with frank rike and when i was in indy with payton and Collins and whatnot. That's a Frank Reich, Ron Turner thing. Was he out West Coast, right? Ron Turner, I think, was a part of a lot of different offenses. I think. Yeah.

I think, do I know? Norve. Yeah, you're thinking a Norse. Norve is his brother. Norves with Akeman. PA probably knows him. Yeah, they're all from the Ernie Zambezi and Don Correale. What's that?

From that tree. Corleone? They're from the Corleone family? Is that right? Ernie Zambezi. Oh, Zambizi. Yeah, I know. He used to gobble that thing, better than anybody.

John Correale was the best to put it up the field, baby. Yeah, and they called Ronnie Turner, Ronnie play calls. Where is, is he? Norve, Ronnell came out of that Coriel tree. Okay. Which is. Joe Gibbs and everybody. When you got Joe Gibbs, you got a good chain.

Yeah, exactly. Put your hands up. Who are we? The commanders. That was a bar that guy dropped. Okay, let's get to some quarterbacks who can spin it, and we've seen spin it. But how long are they going to be spinning it for? Go ahead, con man.

Yeah, Dan. I know everybody's kind of worried about the Cincinnati situation with Joe Burrow and the stuff going on, you know, off the field that's been alluded to. That's one thing. Hopefully everything for Joe is okay there. But just talking about on the field and in the building, like what do you think since he can do to get this fix? You know, he gave this press conference basically about how he's not really having too much fun. Pat talked about it kind of earlier in the week this offseason when they made their team and built their team around two number one ride receivers and gave them. him all that money. Not many people thought it would work. How do you think

since he can kind of make this happen for Joe Burroughs, so he's not in this miserable situation? And what do you think about the people calling him Boohoo Burrow on the internet? I can't believe I can't get it out, but it is sad. They're calling him Boohoo Borough. I don't like that at all. Yeah, I don't really have

any thought on that. I think the problem in Cincinnati for Joe and really Jamar is like, where's the hope of the future? there's there's this is a years of this kind of being the same story not drafting well enough not developing well enough the defense continues to fall apart this was a historic performance last year from an offensive perspective and didn't get in they can't protect and so there's not a lot of evidence in the last five years in Cincinnati with joe that they'll figure this out so like

what can get done i don't really have that answer i mean the easy answer is well draft better and develop better and get good players. Could you sit there and say like a different philosophy scheme-wise? Maybe, but they score a ton of points. Zach Taylor can call an offense, you know, so that's, do you want to get rid of that? And so I think that's part of this is like, Joe, I got to imagine sitting there going, where, what can I point to for a hope for the future? And for everybody sitting there say, well, they gave him everything that he wants.

They paid his two number one wide receivers. we've seen that at times in the NFL we have we're watching it in Philly they've got two highly paid wide receivers and be successful and they've drafted well with some of their younger players and so I'm not saying it's the best way but they've been very bad for the Eagles who's this one right here Sam the quarterback hiring who's this one right here what's that at Sequin Barber Sequin yeah I mean so I think so I I just don't know what to point to for them and say, like, if you fix this, it'll be better. His defense has been bad for years now.

This offensive line can't keep them clean. It's not going to get fixed overnight. It's not going to just be one offseason and all of a sudden it's flipped. So we think he had the realization that that's the truth. Joey B had somebody in his family go, hey, we've been trying to shield you from this. Okay, so you didn't start thinking like how everybody else was thinking, but this looks this is probably what the team looks like next year too

and turns out probably the team after that and then guess what I hate to break it unless we get lucky on some draft picks probably that next year and then it starts spiraling and then Joey B who has always kept the blinders on

and thought as if he could be the one that changes the Cincinnati Bengals franchise forever and brings a Super Bowl a Lombardi there and becomes the Ohio boy who delivered for the Bengals if that's doubt starts creeping in, that's not good. I don't like that at all, right,

no matter how it gets in there. Yeah. And I think the two quarterbacks that are getting correlated to situation-wise a little bit are Andrew Luck and Stafford because I, and you were around luck, but like I remember

Matthew got drafted, I believe in 2009. Yes. And the Lions, he would get beat up and they would lose. But like he had the 2000, I think 11 season. They went to the playoffs

and they were really good. and he was like, so there was improvement. I think they went to the playoffs in 13 and 14 as well. So there wasn't this significant stretch three years at a row right now for Burrough not getting in while also getting beat up. And last year, the historic offense and bad defense. So there wasn't maybe as much with Matthew. And then with Andrew, I think Andrew went to the playoffs a decent amount in his first four or five years, right,

even though he was getting beat up. Yeah, it went to the AFC championship. Second year, I believe. First year made through a playoff. off saying Coach B.A. Wild card rookie divisional championship. Remember, rookie here, we would have went to the Super Bowl. Coach B.A. got sick in Baltimore.

Happy, you're okay, by the way, but we certainly missed your ass. I mean, it was certainly a game changer morning of the game. But, yeah, there was success, and there was those types of things that keep you going, I think, and keep you believing that there's a chance that you can win here no matter what. Well, and then when they finally figured out the offensive line, it was too late. Like, they finally dropped to Quentin Nelson. They got all these pieces to, you know, block. for him, but then he called it

the year before, and that's when Jacoby Percette stepped in. Bia, your thoughts on the Joey Burrow situation that's currently brewing, because can he find it again? Can he find the law? I mean, Carson Palmer, I guess, and you had him in Arizona. He has the best, what was the stats? The only winning quarterback in the history of the

Arizona Cardinals. With a minimum of 50 starts. Yeah, boom. The only, how many? 50? I think. 10. 10. What? 10 games. That's a crazy stat. If that remains to be true, there's no quarterback that has a winning record for the Arizona

Cardinals with a minimum of 10 starts says the Marv Spaces. Kurt Warner 30 and 31. Really? Yeah, he was one under, yeah, because everybody responded and there was their response. But nonetheless, Carson Palmer was that guy. You coach him out there, obviously, you know Carson well. Carson was like, I'm quitting football. I'm not doing it anymore. And then finally

force his way out of Cincinnati, and I'm not saying Cincinnati Bengals organization is the same now as it was then. Obviously, there's been a lot of upgrades and things have a change and there's an indoor facility and maybe that's a universe saying they also forgot to shovel their seats this weekend so maybe that's why the universe they're saying not so fast but let's just assume there are two different organizations and then and now but for joey b if he's lost like the drive at this stage is this just middle of the season frustrations you think does it change in the off season or what are your kind of thoughts on where he's at right now yeah it's

very scary for me because i would have never guessed android to retire you know having coached him and how much he loved the game and how tough he was. I mean, for Joe to have the ball 40 minutes last week and no points, that hasn't heard of. That's usually 35, 40 points every time. So there's something missing, obviously. Hopefully it's not a mental health issue, but he's got to find his love for it for sure. That's for sure. And it's going to be a tough, tough off season for them.

We love you, Joe. Good luck, Joe. I love you, Joe. Even this cat in the middle. Will you meow at him a little bit when you sit back up, when you sit back up just a little bit? Dano? What a cat? What are you talking about?

Well, you sit back a little bit. Go to your left a little bit. And, yep, stop. That's where you were... You did that, though, for a lot of your answer, I want to let you know you're going to watch it back. You had... Boom.

You had ears the whole time. You had ears the whole time. It was awesome. I was hoping he would purr or something. I didn't know what I was going to take. Better than the hat. It's a dog. It's a husky.

It's not a cat. Yeah, but with the size of your head versus the size of that particular painting, the ears looked like cat ears. It did not look like dog. at all so you were kind of a cat you know kind of meow there was no her cat's cats cats are good animals hey they they are why watching what's going they suck damn they don't that was cats pretty good animals they take care of themselves they poop in their own places they kind

to just live amongst themselves you can even have some cats and want a little bit of attention so they'll act like dogs and then they'll kind of leave you alone you like dogs then love dogs give me all the dogs and big dogs too i don't i'm not i'm not a little dog guy either there's a new big dog in my house and i'll tell you what this thing is what you get wrecking ball it is uh we saved it from the hamilton county humane society which we're awesome very grateful for that blue healer you know uh what blueie is you know the the the car chair blueie it's uh the the type of dog is called a blue healer dog it's like a cattle dog or something like that and when i was in Australia where blue he's actually from, I saw a couple of them on the street walking with a veteran

man who had been in the military for 16 years. And he was walking without any leash with them downtown Brisbane, just walking with these two dogs. And I could see that they were a special breed of dog that had like gray hair, a very cool look. So I went to ask them about it. I'm like, I kind of want a dog that just kind of trails me. Like I'd be sick to just have one of those dogs that's just always on the lookout, you know? So I started talking to Aladdin also. I'm in Australia. Everybody that I know is asleep right now because it's the opposite time of the world. So I'm talking to anybody I can over there. So I start chatting this guy, learning his story. And he talks about these dogs are the best bloke, you know, he tells the entire thing about how loyal they are,

how fast they are, how athletic they are, and everything like that. He said, but they are stubborn that, you know, gets into the entire thing. So then we look at the list of dogs at the Hamilton County Humane Society. I believe it was on Thanksgiving. We look into it. And this dog that is like Bluey, which is obviously McKenzie's favorite cartoon is Bluey. And I saw the Bluey in Australia, told the story about it. There's a Bluey at the Humane Society. It's very, abnormal. I don't think blue healers are just kind of sitting at a humane society. So we go, look at this dog.

Dog runs like the wind. I mean, it's a gazelle. It's like such an awesome dog. Such a good personality, you know, very loyal. But what I forgot is how smart these things. This thing was just kind of selling to us because he wanted to get the hell out of there. This dog is a psychic. I mean, you're talking about the most amount of energy out of any

dog in history. You know those puppy zooms that puppies get? And puppies are small. This thing is this big, this large. Zoom. around the house. I mean, jumps over full bed from one side of bed, doesn't touch bed to other side, just casually galloping around the house.

It's like, holy shit. What's just doing to the floors? So, piss it. I didn't even think, yeah, bingo. He has pissed. You got him on the treadmill, man. Get him on the treadmill, tire them out. We're getting the geot tag here for the Thunderdome.

We're getting the geot tag for the Thunderdum because we got a field over here. This thing needs to run. This thing needs to be out there. moving. I don't even know how it survived this long in our house. I'm running it upstairs from one side of the house to the other, like just trying to get some

energy out of this thing. And I looked into it. I don't think that energy is ever leaving. Like for the next 10 years, this thing is jacked up. It's like a sheep dog or something. It is, yes. Incredibly cool. Nice, kind. Sees McKenzie jumps over or around McKenzie.

Like, doesn't hit me? Like, this dog is awesome. It is so kind, so cool. But geez, Louise. It is way too big to have the amount of energy that it has. And I'm being told that this is the rest of its life. So we are promptly trying to find a way to get this energy out. And we're putting the electric thing here. And I think every morning I'm bringing this thing up. And I just got to as far as I can for as many as I can with this dog. So yeah, it's, I love this dog. I love dogs. But it's a life changer. It's a life changer completely that what's about to happen. But it is awesome. This dog. Awesome. I want a Burmese mountain dog. That's the next one I want. Big. Those are big.

Those are very big dogs. Hey, you look like a cat again. So on that note, let's get you the hell out of here. Ladies and gentlemen, that's Danilovsky. Meow! Yeah, meow. Hello. All right, we got three minutes before the end of the show.

That dog, blue, he's awesome. Oh, yeah. He's a cool dog. Blue's a cool dog. Jump up in bed whenever I'm going to bed and, like, those are full on. How old is he? They said one, but who knows, dude? Who knows?

The feet are so big. And it's like, is this thing only going to keep growing? Like, is this thing only going to, here he is laying at her feet. Literally, this is what he looks like. So he is cool looking, man. Cool dog, nice dog, fun dog, just the most amount of energy for a horse that I've ever seen. Like, I've never seen a horse with this much energy. He's, uh, he's sweet.

They're very new to the family. And McKenzie loves him. Like, you wake up McKenzie and she go, Blueho? And it's like, yep, yep, blue him. And I think she just likes the spectacle of this. big motherfucker just wrecking our house, you know what I mean, just all the way through the entire thing. It's been sweet. You should adopt, though, by the way. There is a lot of dogs, especially the Hamilton one, they have such a nice facility. A lot of people donating to them, obviously,

which is what they run upon and they're very thankful for. But so many dogs just looking for a home. And dogs are such a good companion, obviously for a family. If you have the ability, I would certainly promote it. And I'm very thankful for Blue coming into our life. It's going to make me more of a runner, I think. I think I'm going to be half to. I mean, I'm running sprints at my house trying to wear this thing. Because there's snow and everything that's going on. You can put him on the treadmill, man.

I had a dog that ran out of treadmill and loved it. Kevin? No, not Kevin. I will put his... He's smart enough, too, to learn. Oh, yeah, you put that leash up on there. You're standing on the side with a little leash. The thing will go.

You run forever, man. His strides might be too long for the treadmill. That's on something he's going to have to figure out. He's going to adjust. Quiet, too? like a ninja. I'm like, what the hell is this thing? First morning, it's in the house.

I'm sleeping. I hear like a little, like some noise. I think it's maybe a cat or something. And then all of a sudden, this whatever pound, 70, 80 pound thing jumps over me, lands on bed next to me and then puts its head down on my pillow. And I'm like, what's up, dude? Welcome to the house.

And he's like, yeah, great to be here. You should have seen the shit all that was right. You know, I couldn't even raise. So, go ahead and adopt this holiday season is my big message. And you never know what you're going to find. Maybe a whole new life. And it's a beautiful thing. Be a friend, tell a friend something nice.

It might change your life. We continue digitally. Goodbye. All right. Let's take a break. On the other side, we got BS or no BS with BA. We got BA's game balls. And we'll also have a conversation with Seth England.

Really? Yeah. One of the founders of Big Loud, which is obviously a music label, Donner in Nashville. has many artists that you obviously know and guys that we love. Hardy, Ernest, oh yeah, and the third largest artist of all time, Morgan Wall.

So we are so incredibly thankful for his friendship and I'm excited for the combo with him. We're kind of forcing him to do this because he's here. So I'm sure he's pumped about that. But we got questions. He's got answers. And we hope you will watch

as we continue on this glorious BA Day December 16th, 2025. Talk about stepping up. It's time to level up your game. Introducing the all new ESPN app. All of ESPN, all in one place. You're home for the most live sports and the best championship moments.

The electricity is palpable. Step up your game with no annual contract required. It's the ultimate fan experience. Level up for more on the ESPN app or at stream. ESPN.com. Sign up now. Football. He's the greatest. That's A.J. Hawk. Coach Bea is here.

The Toxic table is here with it. That was your best game. That was it on. Yeah. What was that on right there? That's three, baby. It was a hard. Let me hear the three again. Okay, so let's say I'm an offense alum. All right. I'm in my stance. It's fourth quarter. 65 plays in.

Cold. cold but I'm dead I am dog tired I'm over there Miles Garrett right over there okay just waiting on me it's uh it's late in the game and my quarterback comes out and goes we're going on three to try to save you right that's what we're trying to do so I'm out there on an island and I hear this other quarterback head oh no yeah they back on five and it's like just fucking go on one please jeez louise and they got the dns who are up there on the edge

of their fingertips just like rudy back in the day I'm sorry, Vince Pappali back in the day Whenever he applies Rudy also If it's wet his age I'm coming You're on the edge Miles Garrett's trying to get

the old time sack record In the history of the NFL And the quarterback decides Go on 3 And it sounds like what I mean how do you No Now it's going to the other way

That's good cadence Need that It's from here It's not from here It's from Seoul It's from knowing ball Is Zach Wilson going to be doing that

for the Miami Dolphins. Coach McDaniel has come out and said after being asked about two tongue of the lowest struggles. Is there a quarterback change possibility? Everything's on the table, says McDaniel. Talk to the table at Boston Connor, at Ty Schmidt, nine-year NFL vet,

Darius Jay Butler. What does that mean whenever that answer is given? Everything's open. Exactly what he said. Usually coaches lie, but I believe that. We've seen the worst, some bad football. I won't say worse.

It's been some bad quarterback play this year, but it's been some terrible quarterback play. about all the reasons earlier with all the quarterbacks in his class. When you're at this point in your career, you can't do some of the things that Tua has been doing. When a coach says this publicly, that means conversations have already happened behind closed doors, that he's allowed to

say that about the franchise quarterback you've already paid? Yeah, I think it's already been set in stone. We're switching. And talk to you yesterday, I'm going to put it out today. Okay, and now who has to be a part of that decision? Everybody, right? Chris Greer gets fired, so obviously there's no GM or president, but you would think top down would have to be a part of the head coach

coming out and saying, hey, the quarterback that we paid a of money is potentially not the quarterback anymore. Like that is a massive statement to make, I think, by the head coach. Yeah, you're going to the ownership. You're going straight up top. Hey, we're making this move. And you have to have their blessing. And there's been science too. Like against, I think it

was the Browns or whenever it was when you know, they had that interaction. We're two or through a pick and McDaniel basically, you know, very, very animatedly, if that's a word, basically it was like, all right, sit this guy the hell down. And then you know, other stuff happened as well. But like there has been things like, it feels as though this isn't out of nowhere, even though, you know, the losses and stuff have piled up.

Let's go to Hammer that time. AP, Tone. Tone, we thought there was a chance that this game was going to be a clear house situation for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Instead, your team is on the side that is actually causing changes on the other side. Good for you, Tone. I know you didn't think that was necessarily going to be the outcome last night. Yeah, I mean, it feels really good to be on this side. It feels nice to be happy the day after a game. It feels nice to respect your team and be proud of the team that you watch play on Monday night football instead of you know, the Miami Dolphins

who haven't won a playoff game in 25 years and their quarterback stinks. Okay, let's go to the other half of the hammer God Cowboys Bobba Gumpino. What do you hear from McDaniel here whenever he's saying everything's on the table? Even on the wind streak, too, it wasn't playing that great. You can look at his numbers.

It was like 14 to 21. Like, we can go back. Give me Quinn yours as well. I don't need to see Zach Wilson. Let's trot out the rookie. Yeah. Quinn Ewers goes from first overall pick to seventh rounder somehow. I don't know how that took place for his college career, but maybe him and McDaniel's system, maybe he is the one that needs to do it. And Zach Wilson, would have been so negative about?

A lot of quarterbacks that have left New York have gone on to have prosperous careers in her second chapter, third chapter. Ewer's already jumped him for backup in one game. He came in that Browns game, so it has happened before. So I imagine it is on the table. I think I saw Ewers in a shiasty last night, and I said, I forgot Ewers was on the Dolphins. Is that what you did as well, AJ? Yeah, a little bit, but can any of these guys save his job, the head coach's job?

Well, that's the thing, especially with his offense, right? Because there's a lot of shit to it. It's kind of what we learned through the heartbook. What if Hewers comes in and lights it up then? Could McDaniel say, hey, man, I told you, like, two is just not seeing it how I see it, but other guys will. And they have kind of turned it around. Like, this was of all the teams in the NFL, the team in Miami,

after firing their GM, you would think, be like, all right, let's quit and let's just have some fun in Miami. But they didn't quit, per se. Are they one to six? We start one and six? Yeah, they were awful. And when people quit, they say that's on the coach. Yeah.

Yep. They kind of quit last night, though. They were cold. Well, the coach kind of. No, they kept fighting. No, they kept, yeah, take your time on this. Make sure we're under four-minute offense here. Let's do this thing.

Right. Four minute offense here. Let's go ahead and operate here. This is exactly why you got to root for multiple teams. That's exactly why. It's example when Exhibit A, this, because like, imagine just being, what did you say in 25 years, wait for a playoff win? week. 15 just

wrapped up. This season's already done. Probably a new coach, probably a new quarterback. Guess what? I got Jalen Hurts and Eagles. I got the charges in Hertz. I mean, I'm charges in freaking Herbert. Oh, no, you're not. You know what I'm not in a thing.

It's like, you're a fraud. Debutt's not getting sent to any coach. Don't call yourself a fan. You're not a fan. You're a football fan. And to your point, is exactly what you stay. No, no. No. I'm a fan of one to you. Hold on. No. Because when you suck for this long, once you finally get good again, it means more.

That's Foxy. Foxy's team has sucked his whole life. They're finally good. It means more. I mean, look at me. 25 years. It took me 30 years to see my team win one playoff game, and that was the greatest day of my life. Now, on that, was it worth 30 years of suffer?

It's a long time. It built character. It built grit. Boom. It turned me into the man. I got character. I got grit. Guess what?

Detroit's on the borderline of being out of it again. Oh, whoa, whoa, eight and six football team, eight six football team. Borderline right now. Hey, roof multiple teams. Look, I'm a fan of blood in, blood out with the dolphins. I'll forever be a dolphin fan. It sucks, yeah. Same thing with the coach.

That's my football family, football home. So that's one side of buckets. Another bucket where as a player, I'm a fan of players. I'm a huge fan of Herbert, huge fan of Hertz. So they made me a fan of their team. So it's two different buckets, but I'm going to enjoy every football season. X players. Everyone.

X players can also do that. Agreed. You can do that. Because I see organizations different. Right. And also, all these teams could have drafted you. For instance, I grew up in Pittsburgh. Steelers could have drafted me.

Uh-huh. I won't pick 222. Okay, that's a long time waiting around where they could have picked me. The Colts said, hey, we would like to financially invest in your family's future. So my family picked up the Indianapolis Colts as a thank you. And I am an Indianapolis Colts fan because of that. So I do think ex-players are a little bit different. Yes.

But you've been a little bit greedy with your just picking everybody that's good to become a fan of. Good place to be. Like you could just do your teams though Like you also talk about New England Like you still have love for New England too You know like you could do You could do that right you know what you're right I do like New England

That's what he just did right there Number two team in the AMC They gave me an opportunity Give me the first opportunity Being an NFL player Callback hey Robert Kraft I will always have a huge respect I said courtside of the finals Robert Kraft

I got to watch Kobe B Bryant playing the finals God rest his soul They always have Be near and dear to my heart How'd you set that up Yeah that's amazing How's that come about? Hey, he set up, you know.

When you play football in New England, Tom DeVotton. Tom, what it means when you play football in New England, all the teams, the Brewers, the Celtics, and socks, all got great relationships. And it wasn't like some other teams where you got to pay money. Like, these are free court side seats. The final, Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett. I can't believe they're doing it up there. As title time, baby, it means more, okay? Is that why I'm seeing Anthony Anthony around there?

Exactly. Well, Tony, Tony and Drake May happen to be. freaking best friends. So the young core in New England, from that standpoint, yeah, they are all buddy-buddy, very close. And Missoula and Vrable, right? Missoula and Vrable, both sickos

in their own right, yes. They don't really have friends. They just talk ball, 24-7, that's all they think about. And then, you know, the Bruins, the Bruins are the Bruins. A lot of Eastern Europeans on that team. I don't know how much they have in common with the other

kind of athletes in the area. But that's the thing. There's so many good guys that just buy... Who's on your team? I forget, you guys trade away all your good players, right? No, no. Funny enough, Bruins are already back, baby. David Posternike, yes.

We currently don't have a captain, but David Posternach has kind of taken his leadership role. Chuck, Charlie McAvoy. He broke his jaw three weeks later. He's backed. I mean, he looks like the Goonies guy because of how messed up his face is, but he's already playing hockey again. He's a sick fucker. Are the Penn still in the lead?

The best team in the hospital? hockey? No. Pends have lost a couple games in overtime recently. We're worse than a flyers? Blown a lot of leagues. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. That can't be true. We stink?

It's probably one point out of a playoff spot. We're worse than Detroit. It's a tight race right now. And two games in hand. Five and O. A week from now, the whole thing will be different. The NHL is hot. Oh, really? Everybody's back good. Actually, yeah, the NHL is incredible, and there's

already been a massive trade. the captain from the Vancouver Canucks, Quinn Hughes, just got traded to the Minnesota Wild for like a first round pick and three players. And the Penns traded a goalie, I think, to Stu Skin. Funny enough, they traded Tristan Jory to Edmonton

or Stuart Skinner, the goaltender, goalie swap. Those teams play each other tonight. Oh, goalie revenge game. We needed it. You guys should make a new, we needed a new person back here. Change of scenery for both guys. We'll do them both wonders. And both cities, I assume. Would be good.

and better off. We've done this before in the past in between the pipes, AJ. Okay. I love hockey around here. The NFL seasons rolling. Florida Panthers way down. I was hoping we just glowed right over there. They have one five straight. Tampa Bay Lightning, baby. What are you Tampa Bay Lightning, fan? Oh, yeah. Go ahead.

Cats beat the shite out of the bolts last night. Who did? Cats beat the shite out of the bolts. Panthers are fine in it right now. Five straight. Okay, that's Florida Panthers and the bolts is Tampa Bay Lightning. What you heard was a Canadian speaking about hockey right there. people that don't follow hockey might not have known who either of those teams were.

Florida Panthers, been to three straight Stanley Cups, one back to back. They could win three straight. They got dogs all over the ice, but a lot of them are injured, right? Is that why they're so low in the standings on the... Yeah, they got a lot of injuries, a lot of long-term injuries.

They played a lot of hockey. What was that, Nick? You know, Debutz. They got, you know, Barkoff the captain. He's been out of a long time. Chuck, he's hurt. Great pot Wasn't called Bob was struggling for a little bit

He's turned it around It's called Ice Heights What you said Be a sick name I was just reinforcing all Dibut's points About all the injuries And the goaltender struggles

They're turning it around It feels like you don't know What's going on the Florida Panthers December baby December hockey Toronto fucking stinks again Kind of sweet That is sweet All right well good luck hockey

We appreciate you NHL Love you Go coach Coop that seems like they both had quite a run there will they be able to continue to do as such we shall see okay let's do BS or no BS with BA where we will read statements of seemingly fact that have been said around the sports media world and BA will tell us if it's BS or no BS are you ready BA I'm ready baby okay let's get to the first one having a top tier defense is the way to win a Super Bowl again Rams Seahawks Broncos and Texans all have dudes on defense to win it all. Is that BS or no BSBA that the top-tier defense is the way to win a Super Bowl? That's BS.

What? No. It helps. It helps. If you got a quarterback can't score no points, you're going to get your ass kicked anyway. What do you mean? What are you talking about? There's only one defense that won the National Football League.

That was the Baltimore Colts. I mean, the Baltimore Ravens, where the Ray Lewis, when they outscored their offense the whole month of October. That defense went off. Trent Delf from you. Now, when you look at those teams you just mentioned, the Rams number two in offense, Seahawks number five, Broncos number 12, and Texas number set. They all got great quarterbacks.

They can score points. Now, with a defense and points, we had a great defense in Super Bowl 43, but it took Ben 92 yards to go win the Super Bowl at the end. You got to have a quarterback, baby. You got to be able to score points. So we're putting a lot of, and I don't know if you're seeing our clips or just the conversation in general, about how great defenses are this year. We've been talking about, hey, it feels like this year,

do you have an offense that can keep up with your defense as opposed to a defense that can maybe get a stop at some point? We started chatting about how defense is about to be the leader here down the stretch. And what you're saying is that's cool to have one. Yeah, but a fucking quarterback is the most important thing whenever we're talking about Super Bowl. Yeah, I thought the Broncos Green Bay game was a highlight of what's going to happen in the playoffs. The hottest quarterback's going to win.

Jordan Love came out on fire. smoking the Denver defense who's great all of a sudden Bo Nix comes back Micah does get hurt but Bo Nix had a hell of a, which they every week a hell of a fourth quarter and they beat them and you ain't doing that without a quarterback. Okay and we've already

heard your thoughts on the Seahawks then I guess yeah because he said well it's starting uh... that one's got to be seen. What's that? That offense that's got to be seen. Is it the offense or is it Sam Darno? It's the whole offense I think but it starts with Sam. Well we hope he's able to

figure it out. Me too. And I think defense is going to be the story of the playoffs, but I appreciate the fact that you're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Is it going to be zero-zero in the Super Bowl, or is somebody going to have to make a play on third and long, or make a drive in a two-minute situation? Or, hell, is there going to have to be a wide receiver that's going to catch some Hail Mary or deflection that's going to get to win?

Inevitably, offense is going to be the thing that's going to win it, but your team being great defensively certainly gives you a head start and quite an advantage. Yeah, and I guess part of it could be that, like, in the AFC, there's no Mahon. homes. There's potentially no Lamar Jackson. There's no borough. So like the elite of the elite quarterbacks, if they're not in the playoffs, you kind of just tend to lean towards like, hey, this team with the better defense might, you know, might win this game. NBA, I want to believe you outright, but Hembo sent me a stat actually that kind of contradicts what you're saying. This season, offense and defense are virtually identical and explanatory power for winning.

They each account for roughly the same share of win percentage variance. Thank you, Hembo. what I've been fucking saying this whole time. Let's go to the next one. Show me. Hembo or BA? Huh? Who you, are you listening to?

Hembo or BA? Are you saying the Hembo stat is BS or no BS? I think that's that. What's that? That's ANWRIC. Oh, okay. So he's saying BS. You're saying BS?

BS, babe. No, that's no BS. I'm not even finished reading that, Ben, percentage variance. You don't even know. That's a big thing. That's not, that's no BS. Yeah, exact.

WBV. I'm talking about that for months. Okay. Let's get to the next one. Conman has it here. Yeah, B.A. Mahomes and Kelsey can only be compared to Brady and Gronk or Rivers and Gates. There are Rushmore,

QB, tight-end tandem. Is that BS or no BS? That's no BS, man. This tandem has been great for 10 years. And, you know, just pass Grom and Brady for, I think, the most touchdowns in the playoffs. And, Antonio Gates just went to Hall of Fame.

Man, these combinations, I go way back to John McEy. and John Unitas was, I thought, one of the greatest two. But these guys, they're just tight ends. They're receivers. They're game changers. They're game records. And, you know, the quarterbacks love those tight ends.

Is the tight end position more prominent now than it's ever been? And will we see more of quarterback tight end duos that might be able to catch up to these four that you just referenced? Yeah, I think you're seeing more and more athletic tight ends, you know, but the guys like Gromk who are, they can block, you know, and catch and be a wide receiver. They're very rare birds. but college football is starting to put the tight-end position back out there a little bit. Travis Kelsey, the reason why he's so good is because he just had a feel for the game that was just better than anybody, much like Gronk, I guess, and probably the basketball player, River.

Antoinette's, yeah. I mean, Antenio Gates had a great feel. Philip knew where he was all the time, and they'd always go trips, Antenio Gates on the backside, let's get a safety back here and give him a two-way go, and that's not a fair fight. And how about Gronk? They talk about his football IQ as if it's just outrageous. I mean, if you go look back to the Super Bowl, his second touchdown.

Oh, yeah. He's got a corner route, all right? He sees Tom, and he sees the DB turn. He turns and goes back inside. Tommy hits him for a touchdown. That's just playing great football. That's Kelsey all the play, all the way. Him and Mahomes, there's no design play.

He's just go out there and get your ass open, I'll get it to you. And he, even by his own self-admittance, had to get better at blocking as he got older, I think as he became more of a prominent tight end in the goat conversation. I think he felt obligated for the position, but also for. for the good of the offense, started putting his body in the way later in his career, as opposed to earlier in his career, which is completely ass backwards whenever it comes to everything. But I think that's because of how much he appreciates the position and how much he appreciated

the opportunity to be part of the good chiefs, because I think he was there when they were asked, too. I think at the beginning of his career, I think they were not good. And then they get great, and he's a huge piece of it. I think he feels like he had to hold up his end of the bargain. Yeah, without a doubt. And he came on and basically talked with us about how, like, they went through that period where the offense kind of had to change.

They went from, you know, where he was having 14 catches a game and 130 plus yards. And he was like, no, you know, I basically had to learn how to block a lot more and then just make more out of the opportunities that I was given. And then obviously in the playoffs, it seemed like he was good for a touchdown every single playoffs. All right. Let's go to the next BS or no BS with BA. Ty Schmidt has this one.

It's about the kicking position, which is amazing this year. Go ahead, Ty. Coach, the new kickoff and new K-balls are winning and losing games for NFL teams this season. Is that BS or no BS, B.A? Yeah, that's no BS. I think this has changed defensive play callers totally. At the end of the half and at the end of the game, I look at the Colts Seahawks. The Colts had a game-winning drive.

That's a game winner for the last 10 years. Now, getting the ball in the 35, even the 40, if you hit that short kick and it doesn't make it, two first downs and all the kickers are making 60, 60. year field goals was unheard of five years ago since they changed the balls. Now the balls have at least 15 yards. Look at that kick last night by the kid from Miami

at Hinesfield in 54 yards at 10 degrees. Just in Heinzfield in general, let alone in freezing temperatures hitting a 54-yarder and having room. He's not known as like, no offense to him. I don't think anybody's thinking him as like one of the best kickers in ball. He makes a huge kick last.

and one of the best I've seen, to your point. Yeah, and you look at Seattle makes two completions, and all of a sudden they kick a field goal and beat the Colts with 45 seconds left because of the ball and the kickoff rules. So the kickoff, the new kickoff, having to hit the land zone and having to cover a kick is we've talked about this since the beginning. It's just like baseball. Like you're going to have to throw a strike in baseball to get out of a game.

No matter how much you're winning by, if it's a close game, you just took the league lead. You have to throw a strike. You have to give the other team an opportunity. With this kickoff, it's very similar. You have to give the other team an opportunity to return it. Or you're going to have to just give the ball to them at the 35 if you want to hit a touchback. It's like 35-yard drive start.

To your point, about 56-yard or was what Jason Myers hit, routinely. That was a 56-yard field goal. Just kind of a walk in the park. It was a sixth field goal of the day. That's only a couple first downs. That's only two plays, which takes what, nine seconds? Maybe 10 seconds is what that takes? It changes your whole philosophy on defense at the end of the games.

It's like, the board prevent is out of the game, I think, anymore. You can't play prevent defense anymore, and you never should have. But you've got to come out and you've got to have a blitz. You've got to have a special one-minute package. I think now it's a defensive coordinator. And I'm saving it. I've got two special blitzers. I'm not going to give up anything big, but I'm getting after their asses.

Sack changes, obviously, the math for all of it. Yeah, you're talking about having to throw a strike on special teams. You kind of got to throw a strike on defense, too. It's not like you can sit back in too high because traditionally it was, hey, cover two or cover six. You keep too high safety. You kind of play it safe. Make them walk down the field. Now you kind of have to be aggressive.

You got to play more press coverage. You got to have more one-on-ones. Maybe like you said, send the pressure, which typically you're not doing in like late two-minute situation. So, yeah, everybody, it's kind of like everybody has, it makes the game more exciting in all phases. AJ, what are your thoughts on how we thought this could end up being a thing? Because I think early in the season, we started seeing some kickoffs. You either go out of bounds, ball at the 40. or a big return happened, and so all of a sudden it's a completely different outcome than we

could have expected just 20 seconds beforehand. Now it's starting to get to meaningful football in primetime. People are starting to see it. It's going to be on display. This is what the NFL kind of wanted, didn't they, AJ? I mean, this is making it much more exciting. I mean, you're never really out of it. Like, you're always in the game, I feel like, and like Debutt said, that you can't sit back. You can't give any free access. They only need two or three completions to get into field goal range. You've got to press them. You've got to blitz them. You've got to do something to disrupt them because before, yeah, hey, nothing behind you guys, nothing behind you. Let's, you know, sit at the sticks, protect them. Let's rally and make the tackle and keep

them on the ground, try to sit on for a couple extra seconds and not get that penalty so they get up slow and it takes more time. But now it's like, okay, we got to get up in their face and you're all, I mean, you're also, you're obviously giving up, you're taking a little more risk defensively to get and be deep. A little ripple effect here for the new dynamic kickoff is like defenses also have to play a little bit more aggressive. There might be more plays there, also causes some explosive plays against it. You know, no risket on either side, no biscuit, but also you risk it every once in a while. You're going to get cooked for said biscuit going the opposite direction.

That's going to change the season. That's going to change the playoffs. Oh, yeah. It's going to be massive. The playoffs for sure. And there's going to be people that are very pissed off about that. There's going to be people that are very pissed off about the fact that a new kickoff, the way it is in some people's eyes, a gimmick kickoff is deciding games. That's what we're going to have a new kickoff to decide what games are.

And it's like, yeah, I think we got a couple thousand more plays. The defense has to play harder. The kickoff has to match. It's like, this I think is what the NFL wanted. Now we're going to experience it and see, I guess, the reaction. It is electrifying to know that at any given moment, some guy that was signed on Wednesday to a team is going to have to keep his lane integrity on a kickoff. And if he doesn't, all of a sudden, another team is going to continue in the playoffs for the Lombardi.

I mean, it is an interesting dilemma, but it certainly adds electricity to it. Yeah, I don't know if you really can be pissed because at this point, like, we've had an entire season of it. You know, everyone was working from the same set of rules, and it kind of has been from the start. Like, there are certain teams that are pretty solid with this, and there are certain teams that aren't very good with this. And, you know, the Packers are actually kind of, you know, tighten things up a little bit. But even like when they're doing it successfully, they're kicking it to the eight-yard line. and the opposing team's getting, you know, a 25-yard return. And it's like you're at the 32 or the 35.

So it's like it's a massive deal. And every team has had the opportunity to kind of figure out how to game this or how to get good at it. Yeah. And it'll be on display. Those who have sucked at this will get exposed in the big moment. It doesn't show up until. It shows up.

And that'll be when everybody's watching. Now, on that note, I think that adds to this BS or no BS debuts. Everybody better show up. This will be the most exciting last three weeks of a season for playoff spots ever. Is that BS or no BS? That's no BS, man. Oh, ever, long time this league's been around. But you look at these last New England and Buffalo, Jacksonville, Houston, Indy, all in it.

Chicago, Green Bay and Detroit all playing each other at the end. Tampa and Carolina play each other twice in the next three weeks. They're tied for it. And the Rams Frisco and Seattle. Throw it up. Who's coming down? It starts Thursday night. God, Thursday night's going to be special.

And three out of the four teams who are trying to punch their ticket in the playoffs, I'll play on primetime this weekend, which is one of the first thing that you said to me was like, Thursday night matters, Sunday night matters, Monday night matters. The team can punch their ticket in the playoffs. This is exactly what the schedule makers were dreaming of. And for the purpose of this graphic, too, the Bears and Packers play on Saturday night in primetime. So like, you know. Hey, congratulations, schedule makers.

It felt like this year, AJ, and I might be mistaken. it didn't feel as if there was as many dud weekends. There's a couple shitty slates, but I don't think there was a lot of them this year. No, there was always some good games, I think, to balance it out when we did have like a slate that didn't live up, I guess, of the week prior. But yeah, you're right. We're having

just like blockbuster games. I guess that's what the NFL right. That's what they want to do. Like, every single weekend, they want all these games to be a huge deal. And now, especially leading into the playoffs, too, we have these monster games going into their most viewed games of the year. So yeah, it's a great time. And network executives, not

being cowards and actually flexing games. We appreciate them doing that, having the right to do that for the good of ball. You are in a position to be a steward of the league for all of us sports fans. So having enough courage to say yes, we are going to flex this for the betterment of ball. We appreciate you

activating a right that you have been given and only you in that seat can make. So thank you for doing that for the rest of us so we don't have to watch some shite whenever something else gets buried into a one o'clock slate behind a bunch of other games. It's like we're in meaningful football season right now. The fact

that all these games matter and there was a flex to make a game matter, it's like let's go. Hell yeah. Let's go. This is we're doing it right. I mean, the NFL is throwing heat and college football is about to do the same exact thing this weekend. Now, there's some college football

news, obviously, not just the college football playoffs and then transfer portal news. There was a big announcement seemingly on the internet, even though it didn't come directly from family. Arch Manning set to return to the University of Texas next year. We obviously have not heard this directly from Arch Manning or the family.

This is via Schaefter's report from Adelson's report here about what is the plan for Arch Manning going forward. It felt like, and this is just my perspective on it, and I think you could go back to September of last season on College Game Day, where there was a lot of talk about Arch Manning becoming the starter because Quinn Ewer's got hurt. Arch played a couple games. He played really good. They blew some teams out.

They obviously had an incredible team that would end up making it to the semifinals and losing to Ohio State and everything like that, the Texas team. But Arts was playing for a couple games and Quinn Ewers maybe wasn't playing his best ball going into it. So there was an easy natural conversation

that Arch should be the starter, Arch should be the starter. And he got really loud. I mean, he got really loud. And there was a lot of people that were just trying to live in a fairy tale land saying, this shouldn't be that big of a deal. You know, nobody should make this that big of a deal.

This is just standing up breaking procedure. It's like, the world has watched this guy play football since he's, like, in 10th grade. His entire family name is football. So, like, if he's going to be playing football games, it's going to be a story. Like, that is just kind of how it is. So the Manning family came out and was like, hey, you don't lose a job from injury. This is Quinn Ewer's job. We are very here.

And then I was also told that, like, hey, Arch is not rushing this college football process either. Like, he is okay. He understands what he's signed up for. He doesn't mind the process. getting better and, you know, the entire college football thing. So the narrative that he's rushing through this or wants to get on the field so that he can potentially speed up the clock to get to the NFL and maybe you're ready. It's like, that was never from the Manning.

So like, I don't think this is abnormal to hear this as announced. And maybe with how the season went, it wasn't exactly what he was thinking. But obviously, B.A., you know the Manning family very well. You know quarterbacks very well. There are still chatter about him maybe being the number one overall pick because he is Arch Manning. and he has shown some spots of being very good at football this season, even though the entire season hasn't been it. What are your thoughts on this decision?

And how do you kind of feel whenever you hear it about Arch? Yeah, I think that was the plan all along. I mean, the Manning family, they're going four years. They're going to develop all the way and be totally ready when they get to the NFL. And I don't think it's any different for Arch than it was Peyton and Eli. And so it's like, yeah, he got better and better this year, but he's still not a finished product. Go back, enjoy yourself.

play college football, learn, keep learning. And I think next year he will be the number one pick. You can never go and do college again. You know, like that is a message, especially if you're making millions of dollars. We don't know what his contract is and don't want to pocket watch. He has a Red Bull deal as well amongst other deals. So if you're already making millions of dollars and your family is okay,

you know, money-wise, financial-wise, your situation is what it is. If you can go back another year in a system that you know with a team that you know and potentially accomplish something that you had dreams of, feels like probably easy decision for Arch even though maybe there's talks of him still being top five pick because he is Arch Banning? Oh, I wouldn't yeah, I wouldn't call it easy

you know, being in his shoes, maybe for the people around him, but as a kid or a young man who has the opportunity to, you look around the landscape, he can definitely be the quarterback that flies up the charts and be the number one pick. So that's always, I think, a tough decision in any sport when you have that opportunity. But like the B.A. said, been in the family

with two former number one overall picks who went the whole ride through college and they didn't have to either. So having that guidance around them, having a family around him, definitely I think part of the decision was kind of made for him, and then he obviously has to make the final call. So I like this, though. He needs to go back and develop, hopefully have a fully healthy season

and be that guy coming out. AJ, enjoy the little run that Ohio State's been having. Because what I read from that tweet is, we're back. And that's the Texas Longhorns, AJ, Hawk. Maybe. Hey, it's good. I want the Texas Longhorns. horns to be a solid team, obviously, but did

Bart, did Arch put in his draft rate? You know, you can go, you can try to apply, whatever they'll tell you where you might get drafted. Do they do that? I have no idea. I would assume that his family does know from people that they know what people are thinking or saying.

I assume he has access to all information while they're making these types of decisions. And people are going to say, well, that's nepotism. He has, yeah. Yeah. It is. It is. Yeah. It is. It's not his fault either. Like, that is not Arch's fault.

It's like his grandpappy is maybe the grandpappy of football, just as a whole, you know, college football and the NFL. His uncles are obviously Hall of Famers Super Bowl champions and also promoted by the league and by football as the faces of football. So Arch might get access to things and viewed and talked about differently than everybody else. That's just life. I think that's just kind of how it is. And to that point, maybe the beginning of it. the season was a lot for Arch and maybe he was nowhere near his best ball and he had to experience that and maybe that's a part of development of being a good quarterback is like when

everybody is expecting you to be the greatest player of all time like your uncles were and talking about that with a team that's supposed to win a national championship mentally mindset forcing things maybe not being the quarterback that you are that's a part of college development to make it into the NFL so maybe that's behind them and now he wants to work on everything else going forward yeah and I think there could be you know maybe a little bit of human nature involved too looking at next year's potential, you know, top three, like, okay, well, the Raiders fucking suck, and they might for a really long time. I don't want the fucking, the jets are really bad.

You know, the Giants, they obviously have a quarterback, but like all these teams, all these teams, why wouldn't you, if you have the opportunity to go back and maybe win a national championship and continue to get better, why wouldn't you just, you know, put the dice back in the Yatzi cup and just shake that up again and, you know, maybe try to get a Yatze next year. Let's go to Hammer. Dot. Top. AP, Tone, your thoughts on Texas getting their quarterback back, not only for next season, but

Transfer Portal. You got Arch Manning as the quarterback. During the recruiting period, you're able to say it. What are your thoughts on it all, Tone? Yeah, I think after the way the season started, that this is kind of how everyone thought it was probably going to be. He did get a lot better as the season went on, and that's expected as your first season as a starting quarterback in college football. And we look at all these quarterbacks that come out. Guess what? If you play more games, you're going to play better in the NFL. kind of how it works. And also a lot of these guys who are now staying extra years, a lot of them are making more in their last year of college football than they would as a

rookie in the NFL. So I think that probably might, I'm not saying it has anything to do with Arch because like we said with, you know, his NIL and the family and everything like that, he's going to be fine. But a lot of these quarterbacks, they're making a lot, they're making more, I wouldn't say a lot more, they're making more in their final year of college than they would as a rookie quarterback. Salary wise, not signing bonus wise, but still point remains. we understand it's a new world in college ball where you are making a lot of money and he stays in a system, he gets a chance

that, you know, there's a lot of expectation that are going to come with it, as they should. Maybe we'll see Ars at that top. Ooh. D.J. Lagway, he's hitting the road, Jack. Bryce Underwood soon. Where's he going? Definitely away from Michigan.

Dylan Riola, he's on the way out. Yeah, there's some QBs out there. Soorsby, yeah, Cincinnati's Quarterly. Sam Levitt, yeah. Sam Levick. Leaving. Oh, shit. Transfer Portal was about to be.

Oh. Beal, pew, pew, pew, pew, pew, pew, boom, boo, exclusive shots. Shout to Gannon. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, final thing with BA here is, it's time to give out BA's balls, ladies and gentlemen. BA will give out his game balls,

one for the AFC, one for the NFC, and as a custom in team meetings on Mondays after NFL games or whatever day your game has played, coach normally comes in and has a couple game balls made throws him out it's normally a big celebration we're doing that each week we'll continue today your nfc game ball winner BA is who Jason Myers six field goals and it's hard not to give it to you know pits from Atlanta but

Jason Myers just put on a show the other day 1816 six field goals from Jason Myers Philip Rivers and the Colts get 16 he hits a game winner with 56 yarder with less than a minute left to put Phil Rivers' fairy tale story into quite a bind up there in Seattle. We talked to him, and he's been good for a long, long time. We're happy that he was able to have this type of game. And also, AJ, inside kicker gets game ball. Good news, brother. We like that.

Great news. He also, I assume he played some other positions when he played football as a kid or he played other sports. He seems like an absolute athlete, too. Like, he seems like a stud. Mindset, yeah, he has a lot of humility, too, about him. He's special talent, but once again, he's up there in Seattle, so it's so far away. Nobody really talks about it.

Every time he's on my TV, though, and I'm not just talking about this week against the Colts, which also would remain true, he makes the kick. Like, any time this guy's on, the kick is good. And that's such a weapon to have, and he beat the Colts. Congrats to him winning. A game ball from BA. Now, your AFC game ball goes to who, coach? Oh, what is a game?

Trevor Lawrence. Six touchdowns, five throwing, one running. What a game. I mean, he's coming to fruition. He's the guy that well thought he was going to be. And Liam Cohen's doing a great, great job with him. Learn it, trust it, rip it, know it, trust it, rip it. I forget the exact Ron Turner line that Dan Rolovsky dropped.

But what do you think the difference is? Do you think he's comfortable and confident in the offense and has trust in it? What are you seeing from Trevor? Yeah, I mean, it's first year in this offense. And he and Liam, and Liam did such a great job with Baker last year. and I see a lot of the same things with Trevor started out a bit slower and all of a sudden boom now he's let he's got great anticipation

he's always had the great arm but he's seeing it and he's letting it rip and letting it go first NFL player in history and anytime you're the first one in history obviously that's a special thing you see him running there had 50 rush yards a rushing touchdown and through for five touchdowns that's called taking over and dominating a game he certainly did that against the New York Jets who have a defensive head coach

yeah they fired the defensive coordinator though so that you know that was yeah he was good move yeah it is a good move Trevor Lawrence though this might not be there might not have been anything anybody could do on defense side without Trevor was rolling down there in Duval does this continue oh I definitely think so yeah they're on a roll right now and he's got a lot of trust in the guys around him and ATN is running his ass off and we had a little wasp play here from Trevor Lawrence from the Super Bowl where he's 30 yards behind a lot of scrimmage throws it as far as he can and gets a completion for a first down. E.T.N. makes an absurd catch. It's like their weapons are starting to show up, too, Dibbutt.

Yeah, E.TN had three tuss. Tutton, he had a touchdown. He will be out for the remainder of the season. I believe Parker Washington was out. But if you go to that touchdown from Tune, obviously, it's about Trevor Lawrence, but the play design, like, there are unbelievable play designs. Dan O talked about having the confidence in the plays, having the confidence in the players around him. We were talking about Brian Thomas Jr. earlier in the season, how he was struggling with drops and his confidence he's come on he's making big time plays but the play design along with Trevor Lawrence believing in it and making throws they're uh hitting their

stride right at the right time yeah this if you run it back to the beginning like this is an unbelievable play more defense to try to guard this corner he has a flat and then toton is going to come from the back field the other running back you'll see uh etienne flare out unbelievable uh play design great throw great play like i mean yeah obviously deep he got fired for a good reason They weren't producing for him, but Lawrence had an unbelievable day. Ref, get the hell out of the way. Trevor Lawrence says a little bit of space that he needs. Congrats to the Jags.

10 and 4. They're in the lead in the AFC South. Wow. 10 and 4 to rookie head coach. Unbelievable. And rookie G.N. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

He's 27 years older. Yeah, exactly. Without his number two overall pick. Without his number two overall pick. Yeah. Crazy. BA, we appreciate the hell out of you. You're the man.

47 year football coach, our coach. Ladies and gentlemen, Coach Bruce Herring. We love you, BA. We love you, B.A. We appreciate the hell out of you. AJ, you know, through this world that I've been living and we've been living through it all, college football has become a special thing for meeting legends, okay? Because in the South down there, there's a lot of people that love college ball. In the South, there's a lot of people connected to country music. In the South, country music is king, and in the South, country musicians and their friends all watch ball.

so I have had the opportunity to meet a lot of different legends of country music and it's actually been a pretty insane like an insane thing actually like hey who'd you boom just no problem and then hey these people want to talk to you actually because you're a part of college football it's like an absurd little connection from the south and with its you know ball and uh in doing so I met this 39 year old dude not even from South. It's actually from Southern Illinois. Grew up a Colts fan.

Now, he is being regarded as one of the greatest young executives in all of everything. One of the founders of the big, loud music label. A man who's been in music for 20 years. A friend of the program, Seth England. Yay! Yeah, Seth.

Way to go, Seth. Side entrance. Way to go, Seth. Coming through the think tank. I like that. Normally people come through. the hallway. Seth, he's an innovator. Seth's doing differently.

Seth's going to do his own thing. Yeah, Seth's going to do his own thing. Hey, appreciate you, man. No, not your bad. Good. This is what you do, Seth. You think outside the bar. Trailblazing entrance. Yes, I would say. For sure.

I would say, yeah. Anytime anybody comes from the think tank, we'll say, hey, that was that big brain, big loud guy, Seth England's entrance whenever he was here. First of all, thank you for traveling up to the Thunderdove. Thank you for having me. It's always an honor. It's a very cool place. Thank you for being kind to me and the boys. Oh, the boys are great. be nervous up here, but this is very comfortable.

It feels very similar to over there. You just got to remember, people will see this. Over there, nobody really sees. Here, people will see. People get caught up in that sometimes. Even some of us get caught up in that sometimes. You remember one tone at the beginning of the season was like, is Aaron really? And we're like, yo. Yeah. We are alive right now. I didn't say that. I didn't say that. So there is a little bit of like a kind of lost in where we are. Know that people can hear you and they can see you. And they should, by the way. You're a legend. And you've been very cool to us, so we are very, very thankful for that. I don't know about all that, but thank you.

My phone was blowing up, was it last week where I got some nice compliments from the show. Some unfair words were thrown out about my style. I appreciate that. Was that me? Yes, I had teammates from my college days that I probably forgot about. They're watching this show religiously, so y'all's impact on football culture. Yeah, what you play? You played football?

I did. I played in college. I was more on a music business track. But yeah, I played football all the way through college near St. Louis, at Greenville University. Are you a ball fan still? Big ball fan. Actually, when I was in college, I was trying to decide about going to the music business or coaching. And I was very serious about it. I think I love recruiting more, so I probably would have tried to stay in college if I had done that. Okay, so I don't want to ask like the

cliche question, but how do you think your football experience has helped you with your record label executive world that you're in currently? Well, yeah, it kind of does sound cliche, but there's actually a ton of parallels. Recruiting, number one. You know, when you're recruiting an athlete, you need to make them feel comfortable, make sure it's a mutual fit. You don't want to just force them to come somewhere where you know it's not going to work. The same is very true in music. And also, as you know, a lot of athletes and musicians become natural friends. It's very competitive.

You kind of always have to have this always on edge, you know? And so, like, when we're hanging with Morgan and Indianapolis, I saw a ton of similarities between you and him and Tyrese. It was just different professions. Okay, so let's talk a little bit about Morgan and Miranda Lambert and Hart. Party, Big Loud, obviously, has become this name and music that is obviously synonymous with success and awesome in my eyes. Everybody that I've met from your company and your business, cool. You're a suit, but I think you're like super cool suit, an innovative suit. I assume the

music industry is very old school, though. There's a lot of tradition and pageantry. How do you think you guys kind of have separated yourself, and why do you think you're having the success that you're having with Big Loud? And who's with you at Big Loud? Yeah, it's called Big Loud. Well, first off, there's three owners, myself, a man named Craig White. Wiseman and a rock and roll legend named Joey Moy, who we borrowed in country music for about a decade and a half. We're now, unfortunately, sending him outside of maybe Morgan and Hardy's music, sending him back to rock as he's making his own rock label in Los Angeles.

We're so happy for him. But, yeah, my path was very interesting. You know, again, musicians are a lot like ballplayers. Ball players can sniff out a coach if they're full of shit, you know, on different topics. And not that I know every single thing or can make music in the studio, some as good as Holman who's here helping you out. you know, Joey Moy. But I understood it and I went to college for music. So to have a little bit of appreciation for what they do, I think that's the first thing an athlete would want to know,

a little bit of validation, appreciation from the coach. So that's your role you view as like a coach of Big Loud? Very much. I've probably had worse nicknames or very synonymous nicknames as you might find with a coach sometimes just because I think, you know, not to sound cliche back, but I think you've got to always compete against your best self. And that's very true in music, whether you're writing songs, you know, your live performance, no different in football. Okay, so let's talk about Morgan. Today, it's a huge day. He was just deemed the most successful country musician of all time,

R-I-A-A-certified musician. You know what that means. I'm not 100% sure. All I know is I saw that he is the most certified country musician of all time in a streaming world, I think, and then he's the third largest artist of all time behind Taylor Swift, Drake, and then Morgan Wall, and he's obviously Big Loud.

He has his own business, I believe, as well in the music world. But your ride with him has been through, I think, from the beginning, right? And when you talk about coaching, it hasn't always been where he is now. There's a lot of the other stuff. What has the ride with him been like? And what has it taught you maybe for the rest of the record label and how everything else goes? Well, on a human level, he's one of the best dudes.

Like, if he was here right now, I think he would just become everyone's best friend on the human side, you know? And I really enjoy getting to know him that way. We met him before he became popular, and we helped him with that ride. And so it's a very cherished experience for us to sort of always get to look in his eyes and know who's there. than had we met him during this ride. But I'll say, you know, if I was to speak about his music skill like you might an athlete, he's all pro-elite first ballot Hall of Fame or not just because of the stats you mentioned,

but his drive and his ability behind the scene is second to none and his natural skill, especially in singing his taste in music, is it's still sharp. Song selection's a big deal, right? Huge, huge deal. And that separates the great from the good? Is that a part of being a talent,

is figuring out what song is right for you or writing the right song as opposed to just performing it? Because I hear a lot of people outside the music world that go like, everybody can sing and everybody can play. It's just the people that got lucky are the ones that made it. When that's not necessarily true from your perspective, I assume. There's certainly some serendipity in our business just like others, but no, I don't think that's an accident.

I think, and Morgan, one of his superpowers, I think he has a few, but one of them is his song selection. He has this ability, certainly like anybody else, they're going to love something they wrote, but he has this weird ability to not have that much more attachment to that than a piece of music he didn't write. And that, if you stop and think about it, if you were to paint a painting or something,

you're going to be emotionally invested. If you spent hours trying to, you know, when you write songs, you feel investment to it. But to have that equal feeling when you hear something else as if you're in the room writing it is not normal. It's a talent to be able to do that.

And also equally, he knows when it's not him, you know, but in the same way, he knows 1,000% when he hears it, it's him, you know. Well, congrats to you guys. Congrats to Morgan. Congrats on the success. Congrats to everything you guys have going on. Let's talk a little bit about Ernest now.

Another member of Big Loud, but also DeVille Records, Cadillac Records. Hitmaker, extraordinaire, guru genius, hilarious individual. I mean... One of the funniest. Of all time, if he was a talk show host, I think he would do a phenomenal job. I think... Now, granted, he's got ADHD worse than any human I've ever encountered, ever in my entire... Which is a part of his gift, not his curse.

guy can freestyle for about 25, 30 minutes straight. Just no questions asked, no problem. And during that freestyle, he'll drop five different songs that'll go diamond in them. And then people will just be ripping him basically and being like, there's a song, there's a song, there's a song. Special talent, he's the reason why

I get to know you. And he's been helping me out with my shit. You've been helping me out with my shit. But how many earnest are out there? And what is earnest? If you could describe it to people that maybe say, well, it doesn't have the most amount of listens. It's like, well, this guy is influencing music. basically all over the board.

Yeah, he's another one in my life that, you know, at times, for better or worse, I kind of call him my little brother in the business because that's where when we met, he was just this young kid who he got his first publishing deal. He hadn't quite found his success and some people had introduced us because he was so unique, you know, and they thought maybe Seth might have an idea for him, and our friendship just grew and grew. I've signed him to three different record deals with the partners, meaning different stages in his life.

Over 10 or 15 years, I've just believed in him so much. but I would describe him as a savant. Sometimes I jokingly tell people, if you haven't met him, he's an alien. You know, there's many styles of songwriting. I'm not sure if there's just these two, but I would say there's like a freestyler style, freestyle style, and like a surgeon.

And neither right or wrong. I think for me, I've met way fewer freestylers. So when you meet one and there's accurate as him, he doesn't just rhyme and ramble. He rhymes and storyline. He can turn King of the Hill on and put on mute and go in the Hank Hill voice and just start rapping whatever the show,

what it looks like it's doing, and it just shows his brilliance. You know, it's effortless for him to do stuff like that. Can you tell me a little bit about the songwriters? Because that is Nashville, Music Row. I got a chance to experience it. I am huge fan of music. The show Songland was one of my favorite shows.

I couldn't believe they got rid of it. It was a glimpse inside of like the super music minds and how a song kind of comes together. I actually sent an email to every one of the coaches from there saying, hey, I would like you guys to make my songs into good songs. never heard back from any of them talk to jelly roll jelly roll was like bub i got you let me introduce you to ernest ernest that brings me this that's how this is all literally come to be but my fandom of music and not having a clue about the behind the scenes because i don't come from a musical

family i never took a music class never took a choir class never was able to do any of those things so learning about it all has been awesome and spectacular music row in Nashville is one of the most powerful places uh in the business obviously yeah but all of entertainment and the songwriters are seemingly held up as the gods almost of the entirety, right? Is that inaccurate? I would say so, and also because of that, well, I tell people a lot that Nashville, in Nashville, the songwriters, it feels like they run the town. Nashville is so unique because it's all together densely. I have people in the music friends and the music business in New York, L.A. or any other London, where when they leave the office, they may not necessarily hang out with music friends

and in Nashville, we're all right there together in a super unique way. So sometimes I say on the best days, it feels like going to a college campus. I can walk across campus and see my friends, and so this dormitory is connected with this one and a publishing company, and we got a riff with this frat house over here, you know, because they've been punks or vice, whatever it is. I say on the negative days, it's kind of like a theme park. You know what I mean? You can't always get out. That's why you see artists spend their work hours there maybe and take a break. But, no, the songwriting community, Ernest, you mentioned, Hardy, he's a surgeon. You know, he can do a lot of different things and he's great off the top, but he's an absolute surgeon and

maybe nobody better when he knows where the song is supposed to go. But yeah, the songwriters kind of run the town. Some of Morgan's best friends, for example, again, are some songwriters. People he's being creative with a few times a week for a few hours at a time. He'll add on a workout class with him, you know, maybe a Bible study. And I think you just kind of see how the creative partnership is very intimate. And, you know, you need to talk about more than the song sometimes just to get good at it together. You know, us songwriters.

Big music star. Yeah, right. Yeah, right. It's been a fun process that learning about your guys' world. Don't let you guys know on the show, but for people watching, don't let this guy play you. When we met, which, by the way,

it's not like we have a ton of free time to make music with people just interested in making music. I'm not trying to suck up or anything, but kind of caught me off guard that day when you were going through your phone and you were showing me, you know, voice note on voice note of lyrics on lyrics,

on lyrics, some of it structured, some of which not, some of which had a hook and a concept. I think that's what Ernest saw as well. And then not to mention your platform and willingness to try things that most wouldn't, you know, you take some courage to do that. It's not easy. It can, it's a very vulnerable sport, to be honest. Well, I appreciate you giving me effort in time and

honestly investing your energy in it and travel. I mean, you've traveled up here multiple times. Boys love you. I mean, Bone, obviously. He's Big Laude's biggest fan. I mean, he knows your entire. He already pulled the album that you gave us. He goes, I got a vinyl. You see, it's fine. 10 year anniversary, Big Lawn. I had to be at the Christmas party to get this. Obviously, I wasn't invited to the Christmas party. I honestly said this is the big loud of sports media. For those in here that haven't been to Big Loud come down because they're the songwriters, the creators,

the people help make the show, and it's the same for us. Yeah, well, we're very thankful that you've invested, and I'm excited for the people to hear my story through songs. When are we leaking the next one? What's the plan? I don't know, I don't know. We're up there recording this morning, though. Hey, I think you would know much better than me.

I think we have a couple. People are thinking that, like, I'm not going to get into it. dukey was a canary into the cave that is what dukey was it was a bold place to start it certainly was it certainly was but it was i'm proud of it yeah because we went to organ a couple times i mean it just so happened to be i mean in there but it's like with your guys's brains and the music that has been around it and uh i practice you know a little bit for so i don't ruin these words and these stories but it's been like a pretty emotional journey through my shit through the last couple years of my life,

last 20 years of my life, revisiting moments and like, you know, when you journal, I guess, I've never journaled, but I've always, like, wrote poems or bars or verses or choruses. It's like me talking to myself in there. So it's like the songs are very much like

me going through different moments of my life and what I was telling myself or what I was trying to get out. So whenever I'm reliving them or, like, recording them, it's all just so crazy to me that it's going to live on. You know, like, that is like kind of the weird thing.

And if my daughter hears it, you know, or my baby boy, like, I think they will be able to know exactly who I am through different stages of my life. So if I was to die, which is certainly possible, which you're going to hear me talk about a lot, you're going to hear me talking about a lot of death stuff in there because I never thought I was going to live long. Like, I thought I was dead at 30. Like, the fact that I'm 38 and I was crazy. I never thought about life as a 40-year-old. And then now in the world that I'm in, I have people telling me they wish I was dead. And then there's other stuff that happens around the world. and it's like, I'm going to die.

I think I'm going to die at some point. Okay, I think I'm going to die at some point. There's a chance I freeze myself. I was going to say, yeah, shout out of Ted Williams. I have looked into that. I have tried to look into it. The catalog is going to live on. I wanted this to out.

I wanted all my shit out. I wanted like my daughter and my family and people that maybe didn't get to know me or people that didn't know me or only read like headlines from people that didn't know who I was and wanted me. Like this is who I actually am. This is my fucking note section. And there's different parts that are mixed with different. parts so not everything's there but like you were like hey man I'll get your messages out

dude like you said that to me like very much like hey I will do this for you so I'm very grateful for you thank you thank you for letting us do it and nothing's going to happen to you but if it ever does your kids are going to know you made bangers and you were fearless to try something uncomfortable and I think that's dope bangers we got a couple right don't we do I believe it I believe it you don't want to overhype the music let the fans aside but I think they'll be pleasantly surprised how good it's going to get let's talk about music a little bit more now and then. Go ahead, Dibbutt. Oh, yeah. Speaking of bangers, you know, I'm more

throwback traditional country, Charlie Pride, Linda Martel, even Hootie, Darius Rucker, obviously we got the same name. So you've been in a... G.S. Thorstrait. Oh, mm-hmm. These are my favorite.

My Rush for it. But you talked about parallels with sports and music, and I feel like you guys are kind of a big part of, like, evolution, and you obviously got to, you know, take a chance, and you'll hear a lot of noise. How has it been kind of been? a big part of kind of the change of country music as a whole it's been great i mean you know

both my parents are still alive and watching what we're doing and you know my mom is always great about hitting me and just sort of saying something very grounding make me whoever's important in your life when you're excelling in sports reminding you like you know because in and out of a football season you might you're excelling just by doing it a lot of people don't realize that you know so i think just being up at bat to play is like it is a special thing but then taking a step further i idolize Motown Records, Fuel by Rahman Records, Craig Wiseman, one of my partners

came up in A&M records and all of these, plus more, you know, Sun Records, Stacks. They were very specific cultural brands. They weren't just a major music company which we have good friends there, but I think just by doing that in general, we are setting out to be different.

And so the first band we had before the record label that we met was a country band named Florida, Georgia Line. And, yeah, like, let's start to petition. Never heard of them. Let's start to petition and bring that shit back. Maybe, you know,

make me want to roll my windows down and bruise when they're ready what's that is he fucking hop up in his truck what is the brand new Chevy with a lift kit would look a hell of a lot better

with you up in it come on yeah there it when they're ready we're turning lights on back in Noblesville I saw them take pictures together I know I saw them take pictures together at the last event hey we like that boys

we like that would not have happened I don't think like six months ago to a year baby steps all the right steps. Let's get them back in there. But Florida Georgia Line, I think, to Debutt's point, contemporary country versus old school country versus what's pop, what's rock, what's, you know, what's what's what is kind of like the conversation around. And they were so polarizing when it started. You know what I mean? With that band, you either loved it or hated it and we learned over time that was one of their superpowers, you know, kind of talking to the guys individually

recently, kind of explained to each of them, you know, as you're both making music, I think that's awesome. But remember, it's kind of hard to chase your own tail here. Because what you would make for either one of you individually is so different than the songs you should make for Florida Georgia line. That's a buddy with my band. That's like Thursday night basketball. You know what I mean? That's what I do for guy time. And the songs should sound like that. They should sound like for the boys in a way. And so yeah, we all kind of miss that in our A&R pursuit. What do you think of because I think Hardy addressed bro country? I think there's been a lot of conversation about it. Has that kind of settled down now that there's two different genres for awards? Because that's

really what everybody was pissed off about, right? Definitely. I mean, you know. go on the fact that they're talking about you again admit like in your profession can be a good thing if they want to label it something that probably just means you really stood out in that decade and you know both hardy and earned before they were artists they were young aspiring songwriters on buses that would travel with the florida georgeline tours because all of our paths crossed and so we put those two guys in front of brian and tyler often they were spark plugs in the room i remember walking back up on the bus and hearing a demo that neither the fGL guys had had sang that night and i'm like who's saying this demo like the voice was just jumping off the

speaker and they kind of point to you know at the time i would i would describe him as dude on the couch you know always sitting there really quiet smoking and it was a very young quiet michael hardy i'm like bro i know you but like let's go for a walk and um just got to know each other and eventually his aspiration grew and you know i feel like the songs are the most important thing anyway so he had that on lot and he goes from there to having a place wall-to-wall and he still ain't sold out yeah i love that and he ain't scared to put a dead buck upon his instagram you know he ain't worried about it at all obviously incredibly talented and all these people have been so nice to me

through my entire process of trying to make my words become music and you've got a special group of people, man. The culture is good. Is that where Bowen was driving, the Hershey Poole? Yeah, 17 hours. Me and great. And Bowen also put together

the earnest songwriter playlist on Spotify. Hey, Aaron, here you go, brother. You're welcome. Here's all your songs in chronological order in which you have wrote them. Bone did that on his free time. And then Hardy, I'll be able to predict what your song order will be for your album because I know you better and you know yourself

and he does and he did turns out he did and uh that's bone football I mean that is bone football but he's a fan of talent and uh you guys certainly have that in abundance go ahead con man yeah so you you just kind of mentioned it a little bit there kind of the stars that are stars now how they start out like in today's day and age Pat's situation a little different but how how how does that kind of go as far as seeing a guy who might or a girl who's a songwriter and then realizing like okay you're different like you can be a star is it going to bars in Nashville and just seeing who's performing is it people who are already within labels and kind of realizing like okay sure like you have something different and is there like a specific look like is

there anything like that that also goes into it I mean yes and no to all the above there's no one or most common way that it happens. I think if I was to pick one of the most common ways, there's people that develop in the publishing companies, which that's sort of, if you're not familiar with the music business, that might be the sister company, if you will, to record labels. Record labels are for artists as publishing companies are for songwriters, many of which don't have artist's aspirations. So their skill would be to pair them up with successful artists who may want to find new collaborators to write music together, maybe hear some of their songs, even if they did or didn't write them. So Big Loud has that. We have a very dense publishing

company as we were talking about and all the songwriters are there available to the artist if they want to work. So that's how Hardy and Ernest came up, right? They developed in the publishing companies. Morgan, we met him through a booking agent. He was with a group of guys in Knoxville were starting to play shows and through a network of people was trying to get his now manager's dad at the time to be his agent. And he kind of put Morgan through this test. Like would you play cover gigs at these bars for three hours straight, which is a very, it's not what an artist wants to do. You want to play your music, you know, get on hard ticket shows and all that. But he was more than willing to do it, put the time in, learn a bunch of songs in order to prove it to just

get this one guy's attention. I had Florida, Georgia Line with him. And so he sent me an email just saying, I met this new kid, you know, he was just trying to give him a co-write. And I heard the demo. The songs were Morgan would even say mediocre at best, but his voice just jumped out of the speakers. And, you know, we met him, if you've never met him, he's just very down-to-earth guy, but when he gets rolling, he's funny and he's unique, and, you know, he's just that, the way I talk, that first song that came out was just very much his personality. So it happens a bunch of different ways, but I would say, at least for Big Loud, we definitely want to find the best creators we can. You know, that's kind of something if we're

trying to be, if an NFL team has a certain way of guys they're picking up on their squad, there would be a few quirks that we might emphasize more in a weighted decision than others. Oh, yeah, as far as. Patriots like super smart guys with Belichick, So they can run four different defenses in one particular game. What you're saying is we're looking for good, obviously, but a trait that we would like is creativity. Yeah, creative 100%. And then the look, you know, there's no one right or wrong thing,

but I would say the fans are the best A&Rs. And we've seen this happen over and over again where like the unlikely physical appearance person has an insane skill set. You know, Luke Combs, where, and I mean this lovingly, he would probably dogging himself worse if he was here. Like the guy that looks like he should change your oil. has an incredible skill set. And I think that's almost what makes him even more believable.

Sometimes we get the perfect-looking artist, the amazing voice, but they may not believe the singer. For some reason, we may be really high on someone and we just can't get him to connect with the fans. So that's also a subjective thing that happens from time of time. We have these all-star-looking folks that...

How do you know when artists can't connect with the fans, like in that aspect, like Luke Combs, for instance, like if he sings a song, that maybe if Morgan sings might do really well, but if it's coming out of Luke Combs's mouth, it might not do well. Like, how do you even, like, gauge something like that? Well, two answers.

One, now with social media, if we're putting stuff out and putting videos, we can react with our eyes. We say that to our artists a lot because I never want to be a trite company. Like, go make music with your gut, your ears, your inspiration. Once we put it out,

we will need to react with our eyes and see what the fans are gravitating to because they're not wrong. Don't say they're wrong because their habits or their habits of their choice, you know, but for me, behind the scenes, especially before we had social media to get a quick read like that.

And this may sound very like cheesy record label guy, but there's a word I use a lot around the office is called Frisson. It's a French word, which just means your body's emotional reaction to music, to something, a painting, a poem. You know, you ever heard someone said, that just gave me chills.

Supposedly, I don't know if this is true or not, supposedly everyone has a different amount that their body will let them do, right? So if I'm trying to give you an objective answer, like there's a lady in our company, our head of A and our Sarah, one verse on make her just waterworks, you know, but then there might be other people in other departments in the record label that may not have it. They may not, they can appreciate a good piece of music. They know why it might work, but they may not have that unexplainable body reaction. And so for me, that's kind of been my guiding light. I get it pretty good. You know, I don't go to waterworks, but if I'm listening to a piece of music, even if it's a party song, but I see images in my head of the music video or how big this might be live or the fans singing with it, it'll give me that chills feeling versus sometimes you can't explain why it just doesn't. You know, know, so I've missed songs that way, too.

Could have just been an off day. Yeah. You know, but for me, it just... Your free song was love. Yeah. I, I more or less did a nap before I got here, so if I go up there and miss one, my free song might be on E. No, no, we need you up there with good.

Yeah, so you need to fucking lock it in up there with your free son. Free song pronounced free son is a French word adopted into English meaning a sudden intense shiver, thrill, or shudder of excitement, fear, pleasure, or awe, often felt as tingling on the skin or chills down the spine, commonly triggered by music. Feels like you're in the right space. Art or elegant speech. It's a fleeting sensation, a mix of physical chill and emotional intensity translating directly

as shiver or thrill in French. And basically what they're saying is, yeah, bingo. Here, here, wherever it happens to you, you know. You can feel it. Yeah, that's what he's saying. All right, last quote, actually, we got two more. AJ has one from Ohio.

I apologize, AJ. Dude, what's up, Seth? Hey, I'm wondering with all these elite performers, all these singer-songwriters that you're around and that you recruit. Is there a common thread through all them? Like, is there one or two things that the great ones all have? Well, certainly songs, we covered that.

But I would say if I was to mention something next, sort of the opposites attract a thing that some people do. One of the best examples on our roster right now is an Indiana boy, Stephen Wilson, Jr. Legend. Fucking legend. This guy's story is incredible. Incredible. And he says this.

He describes his country music as death cab for country. When we met him, there was no one like him. So again, I don't know if there's a sports parallel there, a strategy someone has, but yeah, you know, I would personally rather sign the people that are going to be go big or bust, you know, because they're so unique. They're not, they don't just fit into a crowd, which you would think sometimes in sign of music, you want to make sure you get things that you think has a high percent chance of working. Perhaps we have a luxury of that because we've had a few that are on the board, keep providing business. But, you know, we really look for the unique. And opposites attract as Stephen does not exactly look how he ends up sounding. And that's what I mean.

That can also be in songs, Adele. Rolling in the deep, it feels like a big, positive melody, but heavy lyrics that just cut you like a knife. So that comes out in a few examples. But even in the human itself, I love opposites of track where you just did not see it coming. Someone very, you know, the human being is a unique. Do you smoke? What you did or no?

I don't know. Every now and then. Yeah, I think so. Yeah. Blime on Florida, Georgia, Georgia, Lion, Ernest, if I do. Yeah, well, certainly. And also. And now, Pat.

Well, hey, take it easy. Indiana. Obviously, whenever we're in states, which it is legal, we will certainly smoke all the time with the likes of Seth England. AJ, do you hear his brain, though, dude? Like, this is, I hate suits. Okay, sorry? I hate talentless suits. Okay, that is something that I don't like. I think it's a laziness. I think it's a neptitude. You talk about nepotism. I feel like these people got to the positions that they're in strictly because of the network that they have, probably whenever they were kids with their families, everything like that. I just have that natural reaction. Now, in my, I able to be won over. Yes, I think I am a pretty fair person whenever it comes to that.

But if you have like a drive and you say shit where it's like, wow, you've thought about it. Like you have spent time not just at work when you're clocked in. You have spent time in your life focusing and thinking about this and provide a different idea or concept or a different way of looking at something. I am, I don't want to say wooable, but I am certainly win-overable. And I think once you win me over, I am ready for war with you too. I think that is something that is very true. I don't know. I think it'll be judged.

Definitely true. Whatever I'm done with this entire thing. You know, there's a lot of people that make anonymous quotes that have certain power levels to very powerful publishers and broadcasting companies and things like that that have had jobs for a long time that I do not get along with because I think they suck at their job. At some point, they might have been good at their job. But in the modern world, I don't agree with them because I don't think they're good. And we're trying to, okay, we are trying to, okay?

So I don't really get along with those people. and I'm not quiet about it either. I'm just like, this person sucks at their job. I am not working with this person. I've afforded myself with the boys the opportunity to say that and do that. That's how this is going to go. Well, that's not how it's been forever.

It's like, well, I don't. That sounds like a you problem. You would never do that to somebody that has awareness and has drive and cares about their job. You wouldn't do that. Care about their job is all like, if you care about what you're doing

and you care about putting something good in respecting the position that you have, there's other people that wish they had your position. certainly there if you respect the position any position that you have there is somebody that wants that but if it's a especially in this business there is and you're in there if you

respect the position that you're in and try and want to be care like I will okay I respect it even if I don't agree with you I will I think that is what history will say whenever I am and we are kind of done with how this whole thing goes on that note as soon as I talk to you I tell boys immediately I'm like yo this fucker is a thinker

this guy is a this guy is a thinker. This guy is an executor. It is like, we're a big fans of the way you operate, man. And I think there's no suspicions on why Big Loud is successful. I want to let you, not just you, obviously your team, but like, you're you are a great suit, man. You are a good mind for our society. Thank you. The feeling is mutual. You guys do not phone it in in sports media. I'm not trying to just volley one back. Like, it's clear and evident. You try every day to be different, and that's why you'll continue to have success. Yeah, you just followed one back. This is our

shows, not yours. Okay, we'll compliment you. Tye has the last question for you. the success you've had. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. Speaking of the success... Are you a Packers fan? I'm a Matt LaFloor friend, a friend of the man. I support him. He's a Nashville guy for one year with Braves. Yep, that's right. Yep. I mean, what's the fucking music with him?

I'm sorry, did I just... You've got a fucking Patriotelman right here. You can't say, go brayball. I'm sorry, rapes for six years, even more so, six years. I wish we had. But you didn't say anything. I'm sorry. Fucking shit. Anyway, go ahead.

My bad. Malafloor guy, not a variable guy. We did just learn a lot. That's okay, though. That's not what we're talking. Go, Pat, go. Go. Go. Go. Go, pack. You're going to be tough down the road. You guys have lost a good player. Yeah, without a doubt. But, again, we can talk about that off the air. I am curious, though, with how successful you are now,

I would guess that most young, up-and-coming artists, like it would be a godsend if they could come work for you and be a part of Big Loud. Has it gotten more difficult now, with, I assume, just more people, you know, believing that they're right for you guys and very talented and all that kind of stuff. I assume you have to sift through a lot more stuff now. And going back to what you said about, like, your culture, is it difficult finding people who you know will fit? Because I assume you are kind of coming in contact with a lot of very, very talented people

that you believe you could make into massive stars. Yeah. And, you know, maybe just like a roster, you don't have enough bandwidth or time for everything that you see that you think could be successful. You kind of just have to pick, of course, pay attention to what you have on your roster, maybe not have too much of one style yet. Styles can be of seasons, so you may have a few in that vein. A few ways we've, you know, grown but still felt local is we started an office in Austin, Texas called Big Loud Texas.

That's a partnership with Miranda Lambert, John Randall and Brendan Anthony. John Randall? No, but he, man, how awesome would that. He turned the door. He's going to guitar in. Welcome to Big Live Texas. Lock in. And then one of the co-owners of Big Loud Joey Moy, as I mentioned, he has more or less started Big Loud Rock in Los Angeles, and the same things are happening there. I'm almost jealous of those two offices because they remind me a day one, a Big Loud where it was very cultural and kind of all-in.

I would say it's not a requirement that you get along with our roster because not everyone's going to like each other again in sports, no different. You're going to have little riffs even within the same team. But I think we definitely think to ourselves, how would that go? Because on the good side of things, if they do get along well, it's natural, and the roster is attracted to them. You know, artists break artists. That is very true, you know. In sports, you never do anything alone. So a good teammate you had put you in a position to win.

Artists break artists. Artists break artists, they do. Whether you take them on tour, whether you put them on a record, whether you just listen to their music. People want to know who they're listening to. You know, and that's happened with Morgan. He jumped on the FGL tour a lot as an example, and throughout the years he would then check in with me

or other friends of his in the business, who you're working on, always glad to be a good partner, you know, in many shows where he didn't have to do that, continues to do that. And I think he picks things that he likes. We don't ever ask him to pick something he doesn't like, so it starts there. But yeah, we always check on that, especially being Big Loud. I think we're an all-together kind of company, so we see if that can, the camaraderie can help,

because it really can. Well, I think it has country radio named you the record label of the year. Thank you. Congratulations. That's the OG building right there. I love that silhouette picture. Come see us in Nashville. Yeah, in that building, they added on to it, I believe, right?

Have you added on to that? We had to expand. We're across four different buildings, but by mid-next summer, we're moving for sports fans, a few blocks from the Titans practice facility in that part of town if you've been over there for any sports shows or coverage or anything. But I'm hoping to keep that building, Craig Wiseman, if you're watching. I want to keep that building for some history's sake. Even before Big Loud, Garth Brooks signed his very first record deal in that building

when it's Capitol Records in the 80s, so I think it needs to be preserved in a lot of history. Was I in the room where that happened? Yes. Yes. That's Holman's writing room. He was passed on. And then the media room, he came back and he signed it there. And then all the Morgan music's been made there, Florida, Georgia Line, and many, many others. So I think they should keep that. AJ, I don't know if you've been through music row. What he just said about that particular building right there and Big Loud and what that is, cross the street. Hey, this building, Waylon Jennings recorded here. This, like, every building is like a museum.

Music Row, you drive through it, and it's like, if you're with somebody that knows and they'll have billboards outside of the current music that they have in which their writers have created top ones and everything like that out front of it. But if you're with somebody that knows music, like Ernest is from Nashville and he's in a music, boom, in that building. Elvis Presley

in that building and it's like one street you just kind of drive down and it's like every single building and inside of that building all those buildings at any time of the day there's somebody in there

just trying to do one thing and that's make a hit that's all anybody is trying to do is just make a hit and it's a constant chase I think for every single building constant collab and it's like a really cool experience

that you guys let me in on for like four or five days and it was like wow this is all every day they're trying to get in there and hit the power ball every day you're walking in to all these buildings 2 a.m you drive by there's a light on in somewhere somebody that headphones in trying to figure it out 4 a.m. 5 a.m. middle of the afternoon there is somebody in all those buildings just trying to make a hit and trying to chase the dream very much it's very cool very cool scene very unique and anything can happen and it does we we uh when when the big loud

guys a lot of writers on that balcony you kind of if you can tell in that picture if they're congregated out there maybe they're not in the same session together and an artist drives by this has happened on more than one occasion uh the last one i remember luke brian stops in the middle of the street and gets out of his truck and he's like hey motherfucker write me a hit record today send it too much and gets back in the truck and drives on and i'm like now see that doesn't happen in london i don't think that's awesome Nashville is sweet we appreciate how kind you have been to us and uh hey let's try to make a hit let's go well you've already made a bunch we're going to make more today let me get the stats here your teeth in national right come see us in Nashville

Hell, yeah. There really isn't much to do, though. They come see you. They'll just be sitting outside. You guys got to figure out things for them to do. There's coffee across the street, I think. Oh, nice. You can get good coffee.

Too much to do. Yeah, but I'm just saying, definitely drive by, see the big loud building, take the photo, and then, yeah, you go do Nashville. Yeah, you're right. There is a lot to do in that. What a city, dude. What a city.

You have a good city, does it. It's a great city. I grew up coming to Indianapolis, though. There's a lot of memories here. Hell yeah. Hopefully we're making more. Yeah, boom. So the Coates fan, right?

Go ahead. I was, and still am, by the way. I didn't abandon it. I moved to Nashville. By the way, they were at Rose Holman in camp for many. How many years are you there at Rose Holman? Two. No, first year, one year, one year.

But many before that. The Colts weren't, yes. Yeah, yeah. So I grew up in Illinois, but Terrejo, Indiana was more or less my hometown. So I grew up seeing a lot of camp there. I became a big fan, RCA Dome a couple times. Okay. You know, very middle-class family, whenever we could.

And then when I moved. to Nashville, it was a year or two after that when the Peyton departure happened. So, you know, for a lot of Colts fan that time, if we moved out of town, you might have lost this for a little bit. And then I still definitely, I'm happy, as I've got to know, Pat, cheer for him. And I think it's cool what's happening this year. The Phillip River story is like, yeah. It's just getting started.

It's like the F1 movie. You know what I mean? Oh, yeah. Yeah, except Phil Rivers ain't winning like Sonny Hayden. It's relax a little bit. You know, have you have no idea what you just did. That F1 movie, dude. You don't know.

I'm a fan now. I'm all in on Cadillac. I want to ask you about music engineers because the engineers in F1 are so important. What was it, Toby Keith said? I ain't as good as I once was, but I'm as good once as I ever was. And that's forever for three more weeks.

Let's go. I'm locked in on this right now. Let's hope he survives. He will. He will. He knows what he's going. He's a dog. He's a dog.

He certainly is. But the F1 thing, I don't know if you know this, but our show pretty notoriously anti-F1. You know, just because Indy 500's right here, Indy car and everything like that. Now, I just want to let you know, hold on though, Seth. Big development here over the last couple of days.

I don't even know if our fans know this. Darius Butler watched the docu-series on Netflix. Yep. Became a G-1 fan, came into this particular program and was shoe-warning F-1 shit into our show. I was getting disgusted. Everybody was. Connor used to take his ears out and say,

I'm not fucking doing it. Connor watches this Brad Pitt shit. He comes in the other day. He's like, I'll tell you what, Cadillacs got a kid. They're in Indiana It's a movie Yeah

It is a movement Like I'm not talking a lot Like I am actually excited to watch it Now I'm only giving it one race I'm not doing the whole Like I'm here for a season But I will give it one chance I will give the Cadillac game

Don't be the Monaco one Yeah not the Monaco one The first one I'm doing the season opener Okay because Think about how excited we are For like That's where you're closed

By the way Indy car for life I grew up friends With Holman families I didn't mean to overlook Indy car like it come on let's go Indy car We're at a pinnacle

From New England like racing sucks Like we don't have to play this We have to do this shit Okay yeah I grew up in the Boston area Just the four major sports I mean sure New England Revolution

Who gives a fuck either way though But when it went moving out here Like you get ingratiated in racing Like you go to the Indy 500 once It's cool you get it But you meet some of the drivers Yeah good guys There's go car tracks out there

That have cars going 60 miles an hour You know, as opposed to just where you're from, where it's like electric, like out here. The governor's off. Yeah, it's actual racing. It's like you learn more about racing naturally. In the N, 800 is the world's largest sporting event every single year for good reason. So anytime F1. Legacy.

G1 was being mentioned on this show. Based out of Indianapolis, Indiana, I felt obligated to say, get that shit out of here. And I used to have a team of people on my side. And now what I'm learning is you fucking put Brad Pitt in a onesie, put him in a fucking G1 car. And he's a hero. He's all the way back. It's not just Brad Pitt, though. Javier Bardem is a true magnificent actor in this movie.

But you understand. You understand the entire term. I'm in. Listen how I'm talking. I sound like an asshole, but I'm telling you, all of a sudden I kind of get the whole entire thing, and I'm not going to try and woo anyone to F1. Use the words.

I will. It's the pinnacle. I'm not going that far yet. I haven't watched the reality show or the documentary piece on Netflix, but my wife and I went on a honeymoon in Italy this year, and we found out three days out that the race in Monsa was the same days we were in Milan. So we went to the race.

That was my first ever F-1 race, and I realized that I'm just like forever changed. You know what I mean? I went to the pinnacle race. I'm not going to start. I mean, I think Brad Pitt's going to awesome in the movie. I'm just saying I was there in person. I got to feel it.

I'm not calling it the pinnacle until I watch a race because I've watched any 500 race, and it is so sick. But the way they party during the race, before the race, during the race, and after, and they're walking out in the track. Like, it's nothing like I've ever seen. It's a real event. Well, congrats you and your wife on getting married. She's great. Family is awesome.

Thank you. I'm like you turning on this as well. It feels like I got nobody. AJ, are we still? You got me? I've seen the first 30 minutes of that movie. I will watch the rest of it. The movie could be great.

It does not entice me to actually tune into a single file line, you know, time trial. This reminds me, so this reminds me from the way. everybody has reacted to this Brad Pitt movie. Remember that Netflix had a documentary who was turning everybody vegan? Remember that was happening? Yes. Yes. And I was like, I'm not watching it.

I'm all watching it. And then everybody would be like, just be mentally tough. And then I watch another friend go down. Boom. I'm not eating burgers anymore. I'm like, why? Like, did you see the thing?

I'm like, no. So I'm like, I'm not watching it. I'm staying out of it. I've put the same exact rules on this Brad Pitt G1 movie. Okay, I love Brad. I really do. I will support the shit out of them.

But I'm not watching it. I don't want. want to know. I get it. I don't want to know. Who cares that the Cadillac team, the American team, is 10 minutes from this fucking office. It's located. It's based 10 minutes from here. It is literally right there. They got the guys, too. The engineers have did some research to him today. The team principal, nonetheless, he's a legend over there. So I'm excited. It's a great story. You don't think there's a script writer right now, writing down this Philip Rivers timeline? And going one day, it's the perfect Friday night light scene. Rivers is coaching. It's

cell phone rings and it's Shane Steichen. Can you get on the plane tonight? Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. It's tonight. Yeah, what you're talking about is turning people into Colts fans and football fans. I'm worried about seeing this fucking G1 movie and becoming a G1 fan. I don't want to do that. Mark, Jay. Australian Grand Prix season, though.

I'm pumped. I already got it in my calendar. You didn't even know it was 13 seconds ago. No, no, no. I knew it was in March. I just didn't know the exact date. In the month. He had no idea what continent it was on. I'm jacked. I'm a freaking watch. in the car to Super Bowl. But still,

Indy Car for Life. I'm with you. Thank you, Seth. And also, thank you for being with me during this musical journey. Thanks for having us. Thank you for working with Big Loud. Let's make some bangers. What are we doing? Fuck off. We need a motivate. Be a friend, tell a friend

something nice. It might change their life. Anything for the team here, Seth? Act like it's end of practice. You know, when everybody calls it up. Big hits, launch small names, small hit, slow down the big names. Team on me, team on three. One, two, three. team. Goodbye.