The Pat McAfee Show - PMS 2.0 1474 - TNF Preview, NFL Week 16 Preview/Picks, College Football Playoff Opening Round Preview, Mike McCarthy, Nick Saban, & AJ Hawk

Episode Date: December 18, 2025

On today’s show, Pat, AJ Hawk, and the boys preview tonight’s Thursday Night Football game between the Rams and Seahawks in what is perhaps Prime’s best Thursday Night Football game ever, before previewing the entire week 16 slate, as well as the college playoff games this weekend. Next, Super Bowl Champion, former Head Coach of the Green Bay Packers and Dallas Cowboys, Mike McCarthy joins the show to chat about tonight’s Thursday Night Football game, the importance of managing wind at this time of the year, his thoughts on the Tua situation, and much more. Next, 7x National Champion, the GOAT, College GameDay panelist, and new part owner of the Nashville Predators, Nick Saban joins the show to preview the college football playoff games this weekend, what changes he would make to the current format, and 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’re off tomorrow, but we’ll be live on the field for Miami vs. Texas A&M on Saturday at 12 PM EST on ESPN2, and then we’ll be back for Overreaction Monday. Cheers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

beautiful people and welcome to our humble abode the thunderdown on this college football playoff eve thursday december 18 2025 this program begins now football is magical and tonight on amazon prime the NFL is delivering a fastball a hundred and eight on the tape rams seahawks in seattle the stadium that is known as the greatest environment in the NFL with the loud as fans, maybe in the entire world, hosting Matthew Stafford on an MVP-like run, the Seahawks favored by one and a half at home. But if you do the math on home field advantage versus a team traveling in, it's basically a pickum.

As the number one seed, Los Angeles Rams will try to lock down the NFC West or the Seahawks team with Sam Donald in his first year. Is he a guy? Can he lead a team on a playoff run? When meaningful football comes around, and that fat mind is about to travel down chimneys all across the world. Can Sam Donald deliver in the biggest way? Or will he crumble like we have seen a couple times in the past? Nobody will believe it until they see it. Sam believes it. MacDonald, the coach of the Seahawks believes it. And on the other side, Sean McVeigh has had this

Los Angeles Rams team go from, oh, that little whiz kids pretty good coaching offense to, oh my God, they won a Super Bowl in their home stadium, to oh my God, they have no picks, they have no money, and one of the goats, one of the greatest players of all time. Aaron Donald is going to retire. What are they going to do going forward? Well, Stade, McVeigh, Stafford and the boys have been pillars throughout multiple different iterations of this Los Angeles Rams greatness run. They got a wide receiver in Puka Nakua, who is seemingly untackleable.

Now, a lot of stuff off the field is getting loud. He's going to have to continue to perform and be an absolute monster. We love Us. We would like the best for Us, and we know that whenever Us is on primetime TV, He makes every play every time. He's going to have to. Devante Adams pulled his hamstring this past weekend just four days ago. Now, Sean McVeigh was kind of tight-lipped about him being ruled out.

Let's assume 32-year-old Devante Adams will not be playing tonight because of a hamstring, even though the game is massive for both of these teams. The injury wire, pretty clean for both sides. Wow. Late in the season here. The teams that are playing, very good on both sides. it's week 16 and it's special so we can't wait to tune in tonight as

Kirk Al Kaylee Hartung, Carissa Thompson, Fitz, Witt, Sherman Gonzalez propel us into the greatest weekend of ball maybe ever. Oh yeah, there's a chance. Because it's not just tonight that is special. Tomorrow we kick off the college football playoff.

CFP kickoff Friday, Alabama. Ty Simpson and the boys travel to take on Mateer Venables in Oklahoma to kick off the 12 team counting down to one so we can crown a CFP national champion it's a special time for football fans this is going to be electrifying college game day live six to eight eastern time beforehand then we'll kick off this college football playoff that has been obviously highly scrutinized highly talked about but the eyes that'll be watching this will be huge because it's a

special time with great teams and incredible environments Oklahoma's going to deliver tomorrow night and then on Saturday at noon in college station Texas. We'll be on the call on ESPN2 for our field pass. Miami and Carson Beck travel to take on a Texas A&M Aggie team that were undefeated all the way until the last game of the season where they lost to Texas. That's a bad taste in the mouth of Marcel Reed, Mike Elko, his big ass brain and a fan base that is ready to be showcased to the entire football world as one of the greatest environments in the history of sports down there at Kyle Field. Two other college football

playoff games on Saturday, NFL games on Saturday, NFL games on Sunday. Then Monday night here in Indianapolis, the Niners travel to take on the Colts to punch their ticket to the playoffs. This is it, folks. We did it. We are in the most important time of ball that

there has ever been, and we should celebrate that every moment we get. Fox tables here at Boston Conner and that Ty Schmidt, Ty. It's a special time. It's a special day. You had a cake from Tom Cruise earlier today. Unbelievable. I mean, you know, and there were a lot of guys in here who were looking the gift horse in the mouth right when it came in.

Well, wait, T.C. didn't send, you know, Mav's helmet from Top Gun, or he didn't send this and that. Listen, a lot of these new school dudes don't understand that sending some sort of cake around the holiday season, around the Christmas season, is not only one of the classiest gestures you can do. And then you take it up a notch. And it's T.C.'s, you know, I don't know. even know how it. What was it? Coconut, white chocolate, bun cake that he makes all these himself. He's in the kitchen, you know, from 6 a.m., basically until 4 a.m. cooking these. And he said, he only sends him to his closest of friends. And he sent one here to the office for all of us. So, I mean, you know, I could go on and on. I don't want to waste any more

time. No, no, no, no. Football's great right now. Football is great right now. Football is great right now. But coconut bun cake from Tom Cruise. Yeah. Are you kidding me? With names on it. Yeah, exactly. is this the best day ever? Tom Cruise's coconut cake is almost as famous as he is, and we got the recipe. The only thing missing from the recipe that you're about to read here is the Tom Cruise Secret Touch that we could certainly taste with every

single bite. It was moist. It was delightful, and boy, it was gorgeous. Yeah, it was the best piece of cake I've ever had. Now, listen, I'm a coconut guy. I love coconut. I love white chocolate. I love everything that this... It's almost like TC took a quick profile

of me and said, you know what? I know exactly what this guy once and a piece of cake. And then he made it. He sent it here. And then, yeah, just a classy touch of putting everyone's name on there. Hey, I remember all you guys. I had a time of my life when I came on here and I was, you know, doing the Mission Impossible docket. I love you guys. So I just wanted to send you a couple cakes just to remind you that I'm thinking about you this holiday season. I mean, how many people over the years of this program have, you know, been on the show maybe once or twice? And T.C. is the one of all people to send us something over Christmas. So many people could have done it.

Plenty. And I don't want to throw out specific names, but I got a few up here right now. We had a Pete Thamel family Christmas card. Wow. Yeah, where's that? The last couple of years. Where's that? That was the only thing we ever put on our fridge. Yeah. Pete Thammel's Christmas card, his family that has been on our fridge.

The last two, we've got them for the last two years. The only thing on our fridge, the only thing has been the Thamel family. I feel like I'm watching this family grow. I agree. I feel like I'm seeing the authority and his beautiful family. kind of continue to develop into this awesome powerhouse of a team.

And then all of a sudden, guess what? No Thammo this year. He might have been the one to call me a diva in that article. I was going to say that. It might have been him doing the anonymous quoting from College Game Day. But just know this, Tom Cruise. We appreciate the hell out of you. I'm so thankful. Also, got a gift from

Coach Saban, who will be joining us in about an hour or so. Cannot wait to catch up with him. His hockey team that he owns, the National Predators, are currently completely defeated with him as an owner. They lost 4-1 last night. We'll ask him how he's going to turn that around. He makes some different line changes.

Will you maybe change it up in between the pipes? Coach Saban, what are you really thinking about turning this Predators team back into who they were when they were in Smashville? That guy Joe right there, a huge brain. That guy's moving a lot of cars. That guy's moving a lot of business for Coach Saban. I got nothing about respect for him and them. And Coach Saban's business acumen, outrageous. Guy obviously greatest college football coach of all time.

going to go down as one of the greatest leaders of all time. I think it's hard to put like war generals and football leaders and different sports leaders kind of all in one category and judge them. I think we could just say that he's one of the greatest leaders of all time. He's one of the greatest speech givers of all time. I think he's one of the greatest teammates of all time, one of the greatest friends

of all time. I assume he'll get into a sports complex even if he doesn't know how to skate or knows what the hell a stick is. I assume he'll be able to figure out what needs to happen or what can happen or how he can kind of implement what he is. And congrats to the Prads. I don't love that. Penguins just sold. I wish Saban would have got in on that. I don't know how. We let him go to

Nashville instead of the Pittsburgh Penguins. But congrats to him, we're pumped for him. But on that note, football. Thank you, Tom Cruise. Thank you, too. Love you. Stephen. Football is wonderful. Tone, 62% of the bets tonight are on the Rams getting a point in a half in Seattle. 60% of the bets are more of the public bets for us as betters has been terrible throughout this season thus far. Your thoughts on tonight and what is the over-under? What are some of the props that look like they're getting a lot of action. Yeah, so only one week this year has the public won on 60% and more of the bets being on teams for that week. This last week, we're five and six in that

situation. The total night is 42 and a half. I'm not surprised that the majority of the public is on the Rams. They just played a few weeks ago, and the Rams turned Sam Darnow over four times. The Seattle Seahawks offense didn't look great. Even though it was still a really close game, there was a chance for the Seahawks at the end, even with all those turnovers. But I'm still not surprised that everyone's on the Rams. Tonight, something to watch for. There's been a lot, a lot of weather in the Pacific Northwest, T's and peas to everybody. There's flooding, wind, everything like that. Tonight, there's going to be wind gusts up to 40, I believe, was sustained around 20. So there's going to be a lot of win tonight for these offenses against

really, really good defenses. With that total of 42 and a half, it might be something to look at. And last night, I mean, 40-degree, or 40-mile-an-hour, 50-bile-an-hour is insane wins. They were reporting 142-mile-hour wins last night in Washington. A best of 142 mile an hour was reported in Coldwater Ridge, Washington, as a storm brought powerful winds to the Pacific Northwest, causing power outages across the region. Once again, positive thoughts and vibes and prayers to everybody up there battling any inclement weather at this time. I had no idea that happened up there in Seattle. I knew it was rain, 142-mile-hour winds, and it's probably at altitude and stuff like that, whatever the case. That can certainly affect a football game.

Oh, yeah. Now, the way that stadium is built is like this. So you would think potentially the boxiness of it might. be able to keep the wind out of there, but it will certainly get down there and maybe do a little bit of damage. I don't think the Rams run to rock. I don't think Seahawks care. They run the rock as well. So this might set up just be a little bit different, more of a physicality type game if the wind is bad, but I don't think either of these teams are scared to play that type of ball, which is a beautiful thing. That's why like Jason Myers, who we had on the program earlier

in the week is such a massive advantage. He's used to it. Last week against the Colts, it wasn't great weather. Thicker kicker, I think this would be what, his third, fourth, fifth game he's been kicking good though yeah his have all been congrats to harrison i believe bevis harrison bevis the thicker kicker he every single one is seemingly pure i'm proud it's not easy to do especially in your first real action yeah and this would be a massive kind of test for just because pure ball matters here okay so yeah that's what i was going to ask like how do you jason meyers hits a pure ball uh that's why he's so good for so long there's a lot of guys who have really strong legs that can get away with not hitting a pure ball okay so we always do this uh

I do this once a year, so if you've heard it already, I do apologize. Okay, here's football. This is Baby Duke. Actually, you've ever stored up. Backback shit, I'll call him. Great tail get through them. I mean, it's perfect size. And toughness, and you can kick it and everything.

I mean, it is. I don't want to get into a full QVC, but this one, this is good, bro. Where's the QR code? This is a good ball. Okay, so when you kick a ball, obviously, there's a sweet spot, okay? There's a sweet spot, right below half and then about an inch there. That's about the sweet spot is what you're looking for. Hit it too low.

You're going to spin it two things. You're going to go to the right. hit it a little bit higher than that. It's going to hit it fat, just like in a golf shot, you're going to pull that thing. Now, there is an ability, though, to hit it a little bit fat, but still because your leg swing coming up and through it, have it go straight. What you're looking for whenever you hit it pure, straight through the ball, you're going to have an end-over-end rotation, kind of slower, not too fast, but just perfect end-over-end. That'd be the perfectly pure struck ball, okay? You see some Boswell hits like this. Bucker used to hit like this. Aubrey says he doesn't hit like this, but it does. It is a very pure, Pure ball. Then there's some that can't hit that spot as clean, but their leg strength and their

leg swing make up for it. So it's a little bit of an X, okay? It's, it's not as tight of an end over end. You see, it makes an X kind of as it's flipping, but if you have a strong enough leg, even if it's a little bit off tiltered, you can kind of control it. If there's wind, though, that's more surface area, you see, that's more surface area. So the wind is more likely to eat that shit up. So that's why whenever you see balls, probably because it was a little bit of an X ball, and then the wind ate it. And then you see some guys that are able to cut through wind a little bit more and they'll hit a little bit lower maybe get a little bit faster spin so you can kind of chop through it everybody thinks that whenever you're hitting a longer ball or something like that you need to drive it lower like drive it through but actually your best ball is you don't really hit you don't see uh baseball players hit 500 foot line drive home runs the best ball the biggest ball is your most pure ball which is an absolute bomb you might not want to do that in high high winds you might want to have to cut it a little bit but the cut just because you you're hitting the lower you have to lower the trajectory so it gets as far because you're losing

distance whenever you're hitting the ball thinner so there's a lot of little gamesmanship happening holders okay now here we go so uh everybody kind of gets mad at herb street for the way he holds for right footy kickers they're always like he's leaning it he's leaning it's like yes that's what you do you lean it because with a soccer style kick it's coming through like this and there's a natural chance that it could pull so the lean actually straightens it up naturally as it comes off the foot every kicker has a different lean that they like matt stover who i held for my rookie year. He liked that thing basically straight up and down, almost teetering on leaning towards him, and then he liked it a little bit forward because he wanted the sweet spot to be

very viewable, very, and he wanted a little bit more open. Adam Venetary liked that thing leaning towards my right knee, damn near away from him, because his leg swing was coming in through this way, so that had to straighten it up. Now, if I'm holding for him and the wind is coming hard this way, okay, from my ass going this way, right to left, I might lean that thing a little bit more kind of keep that thing pure if it's coming hard left the right then to tarry i might sand that thing up a little bit just a little bit more to kind of combat it if the wind if he needs to um fully get through it right because the wind is going this way okay if the wind is going left the right i'll close my knee down on him okay so he has to kind of get through it uh that way so instead

of holding with my knee open like this okay like i'm down on one knee i'm holding like this i'll shut that thing down like this so that he feels as if he has to fucking hit the ball to the left so then we can play it there. Obviously, the conversation with the holder, Michael Dixon, who's the punter for the Seattle Seahawks with Jason Myers, they are looking for a target. Very rarely, do you give up the upright? So a lot of times you'll see a ball like move

half an upright or something like. Vers the Colts, the game winner for Myers. Yes, so you'll see a ball move like that. Very rarely are you giving up the upright. And by that, I mean, very rarely are you aiming outside of the upright because then if the wind stops or something like that, you're having a miss. But there is very regular basis where we're aiming up.

foot inside upright or were you even aiming at upright and letting it eat there was two games i think were me and vincentary uh and he he's the one making the decision at the end i am just caddy a part of the conversation where we gave up the upright where it was like hey we are aiming fat guy three outside left upright is where we're aiming and then we're going to let the wind kind of do its thing so that's a huge part of the entire game playing the wind there's some guys who are great at it nick folk one of the best wind kickers in the history he's still doing it He's still doing it. So I think he hit a 57-yard game winner versus Jeff.

I have no idea how he's still doing it. One of the best win-kickers of all time. Goscowski obviously was great. Vinutari was a great win-kicker. There's few in the history that are very good at reading it, very, very good at playing it. And that's quite a weapon. I think Myers is one of these guys.

I think he's very good at it. And we'll see if Beavis is as well. But he hits a pure ball. I think the issue is being confident enough in trusting the wind enough. like hey I'm going to aim at this upright and I am trusting that this wind that I can't feel because I'm not up there nobody can feel up there what it is I'm just going to trust that it's going to take it and I'm going to trust that in warm-ups what the wind was doing is the same exact

thing that it's doing right now because the wind changes literally minute to minute so the high dusting winds if it's left the right on these uprights you really find out a lot about the kicker on whether or not they trust it or if they can battle it or if they're just hitting and hoping and you can kind of see those as well well and how long Is that, or I guess, how close to the kick is that conversation happening between kicker and holders? Because it changes so much. Jogging on field. So we're jogging on.

Everybody talks about the top of the uprights, the flags. That's just the wind there. That's just the wind there. There's so many different, I mean, depending upon the stadium, if it's perpendicular, is that what it's called? No. If it's apparent, what's it when shadows, when one shadows the other? Symmetrical. If it's a symmetrical stadium, okay, wind comes in this way, and then it's going to come.

back out this way. Okay, so this side is getting this side. If there's holes, now obviously that changes everything. So what that flag is doing in some stadiums, like in Pittsburgh, is actually the opposite of what it will be doing for the rest of the field until there. So flags definitely matter, okay, but it doesn't tell you the whole story of everything that's kind of happening. It's more so like a visual feel, I think, for the TV people to be there. But it is nice to know what the hell is going on at that exact spot whenever it gets there. We were The Colts facility. We have an outdoor field. Then we have an indoor facility here. Our field runs this way. And then there's like an alley that comes in between the practice facility and then the actual full facility. There's like a wind gap right here. And there was a day where we would be kicking. And then as soon as it got to five yards in front of the upright, it was like a fun game. But Venetary weren't this shit. Like he wanted to go out there. He wanted to see it. That's why you see a lot of kickers good at golf. Because we're just like a jet. It was like a fun game. But Venet Terry weren't this shit. Like he wanted to go out there. He wanted to see it. That's why you see a lot of kickers good at golf. Because whenever you're in golf, you have to be able to play the wind and do everything.

But it takes a lot of trust that you're, A, going to hit where you're aiming, because it's like in a putt. If you're not going to put the ball where you're aiming it anyways, does it matter if you aim to the right and it breaks three cups? Like if it breaks two cups, but you hit that thing, four cups, does it matter what it was going to do anyways? Not at all. Exactly.

So, like, you have to have enough trust that you're going to be able to hit to where you're aiming, first of all. And then, oh, yeah, we are aiming outside of the uprights and see what we can do. A little game inside of a game. But if it's going to be 50-mile-an-hour wins, then it's going to get in there. I mean, there's a chance that we get one of those. The Niners had lefty.

I think it was John Casey maybe. John Casey has a legendary kick. John Casey with a K, by the way, great spelling. He has a kick where the ball, like, I think it's like a 20-yard. Like a 20-yard bend. I think it goes in. I think if I'm not mistaken, I think the Bears have a couple in their history.

Elliot 61-yarder, I think it was Kelsey's last season. and had a crazy to tie the game where it went left and then came back and snuck in on the right. Anytime you're aiming outside of the uprights, it's like you've got to have massive. Yeah. Because if you pull that, so let's say you aim left and the wind is left to right. But if you pull that at all and don't hit a pure ball, that thing might go out the side. Yeah, we've seen it by like the hundred and fifty. So it's like, it's an embarrassing situation.

You might lose your job forever. Good luck out there. Take a luck, boy. Go get them. Good luck out there, brother. Mivas. Mevis? Mevis. I just looked it up. Harrison Mevis. But I think it's pronounced B.

I think the reason why I thought Beavis. I think it is Meavis. Meevis. From Missouri, talented kicker, getting an opportunity to be with maybe a Super Bowl team. UXFL product. I'll tell you what, you make kicks, brother. You go win a Super Bowl, then you just do it again next year. That's right, bud. And then now all of a sudden you have a 10-year career in Los Angeles. That is what it's like. You just need an opportunity, need a chance, need to make your kicks,

especially in big divisional games and then add in potential 40-50-mile-an-hour wins it's like you make a couple kicks tonight, brother, you might have a career, you might. Yeah, you might literally. Tonight you might make yourself a career. Congratulations. Get paid.

Yeah. We lived good for a long time here. You hit a couple of big balls. We talked a little bit with Myers about it. Like, obviously they go on the road so they'll play some game, but like being in L.A., there's really no way you can prepare for this that much either.

Can you? I think it's windy in L.A. done it? But like, not like, I mean, I guess 50-mile-an-hour wins are a little bit different, but like, you know, Myers was saying how, like, the elements out there kind of, like, you know, it's always rainy. Like, they're probably much more used to. I mean, I guess, I don't know, like, would you be able to prepare for that at all? Is it kind of just he went to Missouri? How's Missouri's weather? I would imagine Midwest, so probably, it probably gets windy. Tornado alley, so. Yeah, very true. Uh-oh. I mean, I'm, yeah, exactly. I, uh, he might

have been growing up, legit. Like, I grew up in Pittsburgh, obviously. So, kicking in snow, punting in snow and shit like that was never really like a worry for me. Then I go to West Virginia. It's wildly windy, wildly cold. Every day was tough. Not really a worry for me. Then I get to Indianapolis and I realize like, oh, every day it's windy out. Like every day it's very windy out here. So I felt like I was prepared for everything. And then we played in Cleveland and it was cold and mentally I was like, no, I can't I can't do anything today. So it can get you. It's just like when you're from the cold doesn't mean you're going to be good in the cold. It's like, yeah, you have a better shot at it because mentally you've been able to just battle it

your whole life. But that day in Cleveland, I never forget, just going out there and being like, I don't know if I can even make contact with a footballer. This is a little bit too breezy for me. The cold thing, the girl, but like in playing in the cold thing is, I think we felt it today, like, because it's been zero degrees all week. And then this morning, it was 35. It felt like it was 80. T-shirts. Yeah. That's the difference. It's like when it's zero, yeah, everyone's cold. But when it's back up to 30, like, people who live here, it feels like it's 80. That's what we were trying to tell the Tennessee kids

when they had their shirts off. It's like, hey, hey, hey. It's cold in Tennessee. Yeah, no, yeah, I know, but you don't have to act like you're not cold. We are all cold. It's cold. Everybody here is cold right now. It is actually cold. No human's supposed to really be doing this. Even the Inuits

would say, this is cold right now. So let's make sure we, yeah, we're trying to tell them. Yeah, exactly. They're Vaseline to. We're tough. We're tough. And you're talking jacked speaking of okay that right yeah okay absolutely it had some good glisten in there all right let's talk about some other news around the football world uh chicago bears are now going to be the midwest bears yeah yeah there's uh stories uh brewing about chicago leaving soldier field and building somewhere else

and now it feels like this is three different times where we thought it was for sure going to happen we for sure had a place they were for sure moving forward and congratulations the bears have a new stadium and a new super duper park around it where they're going to own everything. The Bears now no longer downtown, the Bears are now out a little bit in Arlington or something like that. That feels like we've had this conversation

throughout the course of our live shows existence since Kevin Warren has become CEO and president of the Chicago Bears three different times. Every single time some political tax stuff pops up and goes, nope, actually it's not happening anymore. Who knows what they're going to do? State of Indiana came in and we're like,

hey, Gary, Indiana is very close. They consider themselves a part of Illinois, and there was almost a re-zoning of the states that was being talked about where southern Illinois would come over into Indiana and I think some of northern Indiana would go over to Illinois to be in Chicago. That was being talked about in like 2025. That we're redoing a state was being talked about for how close we are. And now to Tone's point, it is two different time zones,

which would certainly be quite an issue. But Gary, Indiana is in the Chicago time zone as opposed to the Indianapolis time zone. So, like, that area is kind of already operating as if it's Illinois, but it has Indiana taxes, Indiana, a lot of, which is, could be quite a benefit for a business if they were to operate. And the governor of Indiana has come out and said, hey, whatever you guys need up there. We'll give you tax-free build. We'll give you land. We obviously got the space for it. You can build your entire thing. And they're trying to bait. They're trying to bait the bears, I think, to potentially move into a promised land here that's close to Chicago. but certainly not in Illinois. That would be a fascinating thing. Are you still the Chicago Bears?

Because a lot of people up there consider themselves to be Chicago people. But if it's in Indiana, are you still going to be able to get away with that? Or is this the Midwest Bears? Are we the Midwest Bears up there coming out of Gary, Indiana, potentially because of tax breaks? Yeah, and Illinois screwing this up and Chicago screwing this up is awesome for the people of Indiana just because they should. I mean, you want to build a Jerry World, a Patriot Place. Teams want that now. You make so much more money.

I didn't even think about the tax thing between Illinois and Indiana. Like if you are, you know, Kevin Warren, President and CEO, and he's done a lot of things and a lot of business moves that I think everyone said, huh, okay. But if he were to bring them to Indiana with that entire layout, with a tax-free build, like you're not just saving hundreds of millions of dollars on the build itself. You're also profiting billions of dollars by having. In the long run.

In the long run, yeah, by having all those things. let alone if they were to pitch, like, hey, could we do a casino? Like, there are casinos in Indiana already. Could we possibly do one? What's wrong, Ty? No, I agree. Fans are not busy. If you're, if you're, if you're pissed.

And I'll tell you what, there's not enough people in that area of Indiana to make up for the fans. No, Chicago Bears are one of the most, like, synonymous brands in sports. And this isn't like commanders are in Washington, D.C., but they play in Virginia. You know, Washington, D.C. small. It's like, you take a team that's been in the NFL, one of the oldest franchises, yeah, and you move them to Gary, Indiana. Like, listen, they're good right now, so that certainly helps. They don't stink.

But you think Bears fans are just going to be like, oh, yeah. You know, I'll drive from my place in downtown Chicago to Gary Indiana. How far you think it is? All right, so I just looked it up, okay? Where was the, it was, it was, they said it was going to be in Arlington Heights, potentially? 40 summer. So, so from, from Soldier Field to. Arlington Heights, it is 35 minutes.

Okay. So from Soldier Field to Gary, Indiana, 31 minutes. Closer to Chicago. Are we trying to keep this thing like the Chicago Bears or not? We all know what Chicago traffic's like. Yeah, if you leave and it's like high end legend. Everybody's helicopter. You're right.

And all these Bears fans can afford that. Gary's closer. Maybe it is a good move. But that's the thing with having all that land. Like instead of, hey, we're going to the Bears game Sunday, it's no, we're going to Gary Friday. We're hanging out. on Friday night at the casino there.

We got a hotel room Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Gary was the highlight of that show. Oh, where's Michael Jackson from? His house will be in between a casino and a stadium. Boom. And walk by and see what a Jackson 5. This is the right move. I mean, you're going to lose a piss of people off.

You're going to piss the people off. But hey, it sounds like it's already happening. So welcome the Midwest American Bears. Crazy. And if they're good, too. Oh, you're a Bears fan? Oh, you're going to leave them when they're finally good. Go ahead.

Go ahead and leave them when they're finally good and you finally have a quarterback that's going to throw for 4,000 yards at some point. I would like to let Mike Braun know, Governor Mike Braun, I appreciate him just being like, hey, we're all years over here. Let's go. Whatever you would like.

Governor Holcomb, the previous governor, who did the max amount of terms and ended his time. He was very much like, hey, Indiana, we're open for business. We got a lot of space and opportunity here. We got good taxes and brought in a lot of business. Like Indiana, as you see and you hear about, we host everything we got a lot going on here northwest indiana not talked about a lot as like developing no if governor mike brawn was able to throw a hill mary to get the

chicago bears to move to india dude they build up an entire place what a move i mean the chirps bears fans are going to get from this like just any like we just lost to the gary bears this week i mean it's not going to be chicago anymore and it's going to piss people off that are bears It's 31 minutes away. It's 301 minutes away. It's nothing. And that's on Chicago. Look, it's not on the franchise.

It's not on, you know, Caleb Williams. You can call them the boohoo bears if you want. If you are a bear's friend, you get upset. But, hey, it's a business. And it is a winning team that's looking to expand a little bit. Okay, blame your state. Blame your city for basically kick him out. Blame your politicians.

Yeah, which we can do for everything it feels like. But let's move along. Joining us now, ladies and gentlemen. I hope it happens. I hope it is so bad. Packers fans. Oh, God, they'll be relentless. I mean, the names we were throwing out,

Chicago Bears is historic in the sea and everything. But, I mean, they got a chance to rebrand here to, not just Chicago. Like, hey, what about the, what was it, the American Bears? The American Bears are the Midwest. Hey, goodbye, Cowboys. You're not America's team. The American Bears. Up there and Gary are American's team.

Sorry, Jerry. All the Midwest. All right. Hey, welcome to Indiana. Hey, welcome to Indiana, Ben Jones, or Ben Johnson. We appreciate you. Caleb. The new Indiana Jones.

Caleb's going to love Gary. Caleb's a big Michael Jackson fan. He might buy Michael Jackson's house. It's not for sale, brother. You can actually certainly have to be a part of the entire thing, but let's not get crazy here. Gary's not completely for sale, unless it is. That's the right price.

Joining us now, ladies and gentlemen, he's a man who's an absolute legend. I think what I've been so impressed by is the depth of this Yenzer's thoughts I did not know was possible for said any Yenzer really. He's a good football coach. Coach of all great football teams. He's a Super Bowl champion. He's obviously incredibly handsome.

And he has a dog that has a multiple-time Ribbon Award winner for getting birds out in the woods. That's right. Ladies and gentlemen, Coach Mike McCarthy. Hey, coach! How you do, cook? I'll tell you what, your introductions never get old. That was, that was, that was fine.

I want to make sure you're gone. Thanks for the love for Gus. Oh, yeah, Gus. I want to make sure Gus got a little bit of love there. Speaking of love, looks like there's a lot of love over your shoulder. Who do we have joining us here today? Well, I'll just, you know, being with the Christmas spirit and trying to line up with your shirt, I was just, it's amazing to all the parents that, you know, you have young, young kids and how fast they grow up. So this is, these are my two youngest here. Izzy and Gabby, they're 14 and 17 now.

And just as we're getting ready for Christmas and, going through the old pictures and so forth. It's just amazing how fast these kids grow up. So just a friendly reminder to you and all the other gentlemen on the set there that have kids. Everybody tells you that they grow up fast and they certainly do. So it's been really cool just as you prepare for Christmas

and as my wife Jessica gets the house ready that some of these pictures are floating around. So I just thought I'd share that today. Hell yeah. Thank you for the message. And I will, actually. You know, we're in the middle of football season. There's a lot of activity,

a lot of things to figure out, a lot of things to sort, and you're right, maybe, yeah, I did need to hear that. Thank you so much. Obviously, I'm enjoying time with my daughter, especially now that she's coherent enough to kind of understand what's going on, and Ho-ho and Santa is bringing good stuff, and then being able to hold that over her head's nice, too. Hey, you think Santa's going to like that you did that? That's been a lot of fun. Now, did you dress up as Santa Claus every year or just whenever they were young? Looks good. Oh, come on. I don't deserve that. You didn't always have his fine beard, but I'm about ready to get rid of this thing anyways.

But, no, but, you know, it's funny to just, because the enjoyment I get from that picture, all my daughters were scared of mascots, you know, Santa Claus and so forth. And this is probably one of the first times that we were ever able to get the girls to sit on Santa's lap. So that's where, you know, you remember those times, the little things that happened. You know, my oldest daughter, Alex, actually when we were. in Kansas City, we used to have Casey Wolf come to the house, you know, had paid for Casey Wolf to come to the house for three birthday parties and never was able to get a picture with her and him because they were scared to death of Casey Wolf. So, I mean, so, you know,

those are the little things you remember. So this was really cool that for them actually to sit on Santa's lap and take that picture because, you know, some kids are just, you know, not comfortable in that space. Casey Wolf is the Kansas City mascot. Casey Wolf is not the guy that robbed the banks and ends up in jail. Okay, which is good. Because if Coach McCarthy would have been bringing that particular wolf to the house, obviously, we'd all have questions. Instead, it's just the Kansas City Chief's mascot, which we are grateful for. We love you, coach. We appreciate the fact that you are great father, great dad, and also a guy who shows up every single week for us, genuinely, you try to crush it for us and you give us great answers every single week. You've made us better. And I think

in this holiday season, we need to tell you, we appreciate that. the hell out of you. Now, Tom Cruise sent us a coconut bun cake. Yeah, that's right. Three of them. Okay, just won't let you know that. Really? Yeah, just something to think about it. As you're doing, check in your list. I think it might have said it to him, too. There was a mic on the card. Yeah, actually, he, yeah, he might have been talking about you. He might have been just assuming you're a part of the crew. Tom Cruise sent you a coconut vanilla bun cake to this Thunderdum. We ate it. You won't get to see it or enjoy it, but just know that it was spectacular. Well, that's cool. Yeah, Mike, Gump, Mike.

I will say this, though. You are on Jessica's Christmas list, so I don't have no idea what you're getting, but I don't know when, you know, when the, that's, she's awesome at it. So I think you guys are being great shape. All right, well, please tell Jessica, we said, thank you.

We appreciate the hell out of you and your family for everything. And I'll tell you what, it is nice to find out what we got somebody sometimes, you know, whenever, me. being Sam will walk into a thing I'll make sure I ask Yes that's that seems like a veteran tip Well I got next week right you know

I'll be ready Okay all right sounds good We'll see but Sam having something perfectly wrapped Obviously she wrapped it she wrapped it she does or takes her time with it And everything like that she's an artist And then she hands it to somebody and then I immediately go I have no idea You're gonna love it

I have immediately big sell hey that thing is awesome We're gonna love that yes yes they are going to love that okay perfect perfect perfect today we move forward Merry Christmas to all into all a good night speaking of good night we got a great one in store here NFC West battling this is real football now week 16 is kicking off in a huge way 62% of the bets are on the Rams getting a point in a half up there in Seattle Matthew Stafford leader in the MVP odds this year at the age of 38 or 39 whatever it is Devante Adams we assume going to miss with a hamstring still have a plethora of weapons

and then for the Seattle Seahawks, it's all about whether or not Sam Darnold can perform in a big moment, basically. Jackson Smith and Jigba's outrageous, but will that even matter with the 50-mile-in-hour wins, potentially? Will this come down to run game? Will this come down to defense? What are your thoughts on this game, and how special it is that we have a matchup like this happening on a Thursday night

just a week before Christmas, Coach? I'm laughing because I'm looking at my notes. I think you read half my damn notes. Okay, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. You've been teaching me this year. It's all good. This is going to be another great division game. I know they played a few weeks back, and, you know,

Turner was obviously very high for Seattle with the interceptions. But, well, I think this is going to be just a barn burner. This is going to be in lockdown, drag out. Both teams are obviously excellent football teams, but they're playing very well right now. So I think they're playing. This is going to be a clash. Division, you know, Seattle, you know, has to have it.

Obviously, the Rams are already in. But, you know, I think that the key, I mean, I believe, I believe, you know, weather. I mean, something I've always studied in Green Bay was the wind, you know, just, you know, every day at practice, watching the flags and, you know, be able to tell the mile an hour and then obviously the rain and things are coming out and, you know, in the numbers up there. I mean, I mean, don't think, do they not call 140 mile an hour wind in Seattle a hurricane? I mean, it was a registered hurricane. I forget what, four, three, four. Yeah, category four. Four, yeah.

142 mile an hour documented in Coldwater Ridge, which obviously positive thoughts and prayers to everybody. We don't know where Coldwater is. Two and a half hours south of Seattle. Okay, so the whole area is getting hit, obviously that area the most. But yes, they did categorize it as a hurricane, which is obviously very detrimental to a football game

that is potentially happening in the middle of it, Coach. Yeah, definitely. No, definitely. When, to me, is the biggest factor in preparing for a football game. I mean, rain, snow, you know, heat, but I've always felt when, you know, factors more than anything, you know, you always changed my mindset and changed the way I looked at the game. So I think, A, being a home team, you know, being an outdoor team, you know, I think those

do, those things factor. You got two outstanding defenses. I really love what the Rams have done, you know, practicing against the Rams when I was with the Cowboys, you know, out there in California two years ago when all these guys were very young, you could see this thing was building. Can't say enough about the job Chris Schuller's done there. And so, and obviously what Mike McDonald's done with the defense in Seattle. So you've got two knockdown, drag-out defense playing in a bad weather win game.

So it's always about the football, but, you know, taking care of the football is going to be at a premium. And when you're playing these games, you know, the way you call it and the way you play the decisions you make in situational football, field position will be huge in this game, the field position battle, you know, what you do on third and fourth down. you know, how do you approach that? So I think it's going to be a knockdown, drag-out type game. I have such great respect for Matthew Stafford because these games usually come down to the quarterback that can move the football in those types of situations.

And, you know, I've seen him play, you know, outdoors so many times in Green Bay. So, you know, I think he'll definitely be ready for this. But, you know, to me, I'm o' and three when I bet, you know, when I bet with my heart, this is when the tide's going to turn. I'm going to John Snyder. Seattle Seahawks, and I think they're definitely going to pull this one out. I like that the – I'm going to take the Seahawks tonight. I like that, you know, because A.J., very similar with Schneider and his relationship up there in Green Bay.

Almost three whenever I just clearly pick my friends, but I'm going with the guy. None of us have talked about Schneider and Seahawks. I love everything about it's the holiday season, good for the friend. And they can certainly get a huge win here, just like the Rams could. It's only one and a half point spread. I want to talk to you a little bit more about the wind with the quarterback. I talked about with the kickers, you know, about aiming and where you're doing and cutting and driving and pure ball as opposed to like a fat ball. You hit a fat ball. That thing's going to get eaten up. You have to hit a pure in the wind.

Punting sucks in the wind, worse than kicking, I think, because there's a moment of free fall where you're not touching the ball. And if it's gusty there, that thing moves. You're going to see some shanks tonight, I would assume, even though, these guys are very, very good punters. It's like punting sucks. The decision to punt, though, is something that a coach has to make, certainly, because, If we're gonna only get 25, 30 yards here in net field position or 20 yards net field position, should we go for it or not? And then let's talk about throwing a little bit. Do you know any tricks that guys do for throwing in the wind or why some guys are better in dealing with the elements?

Big hand, is there like a spin rate maybe that cuts through the wind better? Is there anything that you've kind of seen or acknowledged? Yeah, definitely. I remember as a young quarterback coach, you know, I had a coach tell me that they would change the way to hold the ball. But I never believe. I was very fortunate to have, you know, we had Aaron and Brett in Green Bay. You know, these guys, you know, long arms, you know, 10-inch hands can really torque the football. And, you know, most important thing is not to overgrip the football, you know, in the bad weather.

So, you know, I thought you made a really good point about the punning, you know, something that I'd always look at, you know, particularly on your call sheet, you know, the shot plays when you take them and so forth. Because, you know, third long now becomes a better, you know, a better opportunity to take the shot because, you know, an interception on a shot. shot play would probably serve better than a punt. So all those little things that go into, you know, into playing the game, in the win, you know, really come into this, you know, the strategy for the coaches, you know. And you talk about the wind for kicking. And I thought Mason Crosby was an outstanding kicker for us all my years in Green Bay. And not only the wind, you know, anytime there was a, the weather, the pattern would be

different, you know, Mason, whether it's, you know, during practice or after practice before practice, you know, him to snapper and holders. Rob Davis was a big part of that would go up because they're always one to work to different, you know, different win because, you know, the big flag, we had the big flags in the north end zone out there in Lambo and, you know, full pitch flags, 25

mile an hour. So you learn, you learn how to read the wind with, you know, with the density of how the flags pitched. Had an old military guy take me through that. So that's something you watched during the game, but, you know, during my time in Green Bay, they had a north end zone expansion. So now that changed

the way the wind come in, you know, because now it kind of can, you know, you may have a northwest wind, but it would start to come in and turn the bend a little bit to the southeast. And, you know, and then when they put the south end zone in, which was even higher, you know, now that kind of created a swirl effect, you know, because when you have those elements of building, like in Dallas, you know, you've got those corporate buildings around that practice field, you're pretty much in a wind tunnel, you know, so you, so you, you learn through your years of experience that, you know, that's something I used to do as a head coach. You know, you've got a guy, you know, behind us.

We had T-Bone, Tom Bock in there in Green Bay. Said his name right, Tom Bocken. So in Green Bay, you know, just he would stand behind me doing the, he would be doing the timing and things. But we'd always, any time as a win today, we'd say, hey, what's the win? We'd guess, you know, 14 mile an hour 50. It was all based on the flag. So, you know, those years in Green Bay were very beneficial for me, you know,

as a head coach learning that. But I thought Mason and Rob Davis in our battery of snappers and kicker did an outstanding job at getting in the stadium on the odd days any time you see a little different weather pattern just to make sure they had to feel

how that wind was coming into the stadium and with those expansions over the years the way it turned changed too so it's definitely part of the game I mean that could be the difference of taking the ball

and going to the north or deferring and getting the ball make sure you want to go south at the end of the game so to me that's all part of your pregame strategy I appreciate that you think about all those things. As I was listening to you just on the other things, I'm like, man,

would have been nice to know a lot of these things here. You're doing a third down arm punt. Boy, I would have been so pumped. There's a day in Cleveland where I wish we did about three or four third down arm punts. And Andrew Luck gave me one. He gave me one. He actually came over to me afterwards. It was like, I figured you wouldn't care.

And I'm like, nope. Thank you so much, dude. Like he threw like, I think it was like a 52-yard pick and it was very windy. Clearly just threw that thing up into nothing. guy caught it, tackled down at like the 15. And I, thank you. Thank you. As you was coming off.

Because for punning, you have to drop that. That thing is free falling. So it's like if any gust happens, it would be like when you're driving and a ball just falls off the tee, but then you still have to hit it. It's like the punting part of it, nobody really thinks about because most people kind to go to the bathroom when the punting happens or they just, it's a turnover, we'll just get it whenever it comes back. It's like, if you're usually getting 45, 50 yards,

and then you actually only get like 20 yards. You're putting your defense in a bind, especially with the way they could potentially go the other way. It's like wind is a huge part. And you understanding the jet streams of each stadium, I like that the head coach is involved in that because obviously kickers, punters, that's what we're trying to figure out.

We're trying to figure out what the jet streams are as soon as we get in there. Because there's some places where it can be in your face, field level, but if you get that thing up to about the third story, that thing is shooting that way, actually. So the only goal is just to get this thing up in the air, even though usually with wind in your face, you would not want to hit it up because that thing's going to go backwards.

It's like, well, actually, if you get this thing up there, that thing will take off for you going that way. It's a wild part of the game that 50-mile-an-hour wins. It can really be a huge factor tonight. In the snow. I mean, Drake May did this. They had the ball in the 40, and they were in the snow. It was a bad weather game.

And on third in, I think it was third in 28 or third and 30, he did just do like, all right, arm punt. And it ended up being an intersection. on the eight-yard line. And I think Jage called it that in a real time. He said that was a 49-yard arm punt, basically, there, which we will take. It's like, I appreciate you as call player or play caller and head coach being like, let's help out McVier a little bit.

Just if nothing's out there, just I think safety needs another pick for like a career record. Just throw that thing up to him down. You know, like that is, go ahead. What are you going to say? Well, I'll say this. You know, I wasn't really doing it to throw the interceptions. I always felt that the, you know, your 50-50 balls fake, you know, obviously favor of the offensive player, you know, when the ball is moving and it went, too.

So, you know, not to disrespect the DBs, but there's a reason why they're on defense and you're throwing to, you know, an offensive receiver. So I also thought that that factored into taking advantage of those one-on-ones. And, you know, something I got into as a head coach is I start going on the early, early bus with the trainers and the equipment guys over to the stadium, you know, which is like four hours before the game. And, you know, me and the equipment system equipment manager, we would go. out, you know, Bucky used to do with me in down there in Dallas, and we go out there and we'd look at the wind, you know, so we would get the

wind pattern and, you know, look at the surface always on the outdoor games, obviously it didn't factor. But that was something that was part of the, you know, the pregame exercise and then when a special teams coach, you know, particularly John Fossel would come, then he'd obviously have the conversation with the, you know, with the specialist. So, I

think that's part of your job as a head coach to understand the conditions of what you're playing in each and every week. We've wasted a lot of time on this, and I appreciate, it's not wasting. It's a lot of information, but I did not expect us to get this deep into wind reading, but there's a chance that it's a massive factor night. Let's talk about some other things happening around the league, and let's talk about one of the people that you literally just mentioned.

Go ahead, Tone. Yeah, coach, you mentioned Aaron Rogers, and obviously he's one of the best cold and wind throwers of all time. And basically the last two weeks have been his best two weeks of the season as the temperature drops. But not all, like the play on the field, yes, but then he's coming out. this week and he said finally the Steelers are practicing like a team that is ready for the playoffs, their habits and stuff like that.

He's getting 12 men caught on the field. You know, he was yelling at the sideline because they substituted when there was a play that could have been overturned. Like all these things, I think we're starting to see what Aaron brings to a team. Are you seeing that? And what does Aaron bring to a team

this part of the season, this late in the season in a playoff push? Well, this is why I was excited you know, for him to end up in Pittsburgh. I think he just was a tremendous fit all the way around. You know, you've got a team that's, in my view, has one of the top defenses each and every year. And, you know, the ability this time of year to have your defense, it's always going to keep you in the game. And, you know, there's no one, you know, no one else you'd want to have the ball in a two-minute drill.

So, you know, just from a basic general outlook, I thought this was a tremendous fit. But, yeah, you're seeing a big part of this guy's, you know, his greatness. I mean, his game management and, you know, just the reps. you know, in the detail that he puts into us. I mean, that's, you know, that's the way he's played for, you know, well over a decade. So, and it's, and it's just, you know, reps. And you do, you know, they do really look good.

I've really liked the way they played the last, you know, the last two weeks. And, you know, I'm actually, he was real excited. I thought he was outstanding on the, on the Pittsburgh push. I mean, his stance was something. I'm sure he had to work on dramatically. Well, just in case there's a fumble.

He's got to get the tackle. Yeah. He's got to make the tackle, you know. Yeah, I was. I was hoping AJ would be honored because he had to be laughing at that too because I couldn't imagine not giving him the ball on third and one or fourth one down there in a key situation when he's 25 years old. I think being 41, he definitely handles that a little better because you know, them guys, you know, great players, great players want the ball in those situations.

And then, you know, when I think back, I actually, I thought Brett Farve and Marcus Allen had two of the best explanations of goal line, you know, Ryan and goal line pass at it that I've ever, you know, I've ever heard nothing, but they also backed it up, you know, Brett's whole thing was, you know, give me the ball inside the five, you know, would go on personnel because you've got all 22 guys right here. So, and, you know, get me out of the pocket and I'll get it in the end zone. And Marcus Allen gave one of the all-time greatest, you know, explanations of, you know, Marcus has looked at as one of the greatest school line runners in a history. And his whole thing was the same thing. All 22 guys are right here, you know, in the phone booth. You just see that

calm in color, accelerate the crease. And if you remember Marcus's running style, I mean, it was, you know, just his forward lane and, you know, he couldn't be stopped. So, you know, there's a lot of, I don't know why I'm talking about going on the defense, but I just thought, I thought Troy, Troy was having a good time with it on TV. I was dying laughing because I could imagine what was going through his head,

you know. That's funny. You actually going in, uh, whenever he was young days with the Packers as we're building the goat resume that he's currently exists. All right, Aaron. So in this touchdowns, situation for you where it's an easy

pass potentially you're just going to stand back here and we're going to bring in somebody else is going to take the snap and they're going to score instead. Is that okay? You're just going to stand here here. What am I just am I holding my ass? Mike? What am I doing

back? Yeah, just kind of don't pick your nose. That's a penalty but just stand just stand right back there and do nothing. And I'm sure that would have won swimmingly is what you're saying. That's what it sounds. Blowingly. Go on. You can high fiving. You can go push Tom Crap for you if you want.

You're going to go. Yeah, somebody, Coon's going to be there. You'll see him. He'll take the snap. So you need to teach him how to do that, by the way. You can take some snaps from you. And then also we need you to assist him to score the duck down. Don't be surprised, though, if, you know, that snap goes between Connor Hayward's legs one time.

And Aaron's sitting there with the ball on his hand ready to throw it. And he might even have his hands in the thing like he does. And then all of a sudden, darnel, Mount Washington. Sneaks out. Just right out the entire thing. There you go. That might be the deceptive. That might be the next call.

Okay. dump it, dump it, we don't want to bury it. Okay, that game, obviously, Steelers, Miami Dolphins, primetime game, and it was a good game for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Huge win for them, huge win for Coach Tom, and obviously it's getting very loud for this team with all the expectations going in. They're still very much in it.

Are you on number one in the north is what he said last week? They still are, and obviously have to beat Baltimore last game of the year to host a playoff game, which is crazy to think about. But on the other side, some changes were made after that game. Go ahead, Ty. Yeah, Coach, what do you think of the whole to-a situation? Obviously, we saw post-com.

game. He was the last guy on the field yucking it up with Jalen Ramsey as they were essentially eliminated from the playoffs. And then yesterday he gets benched. Quinn Ewers is starting and a lot of people are just assuming, okay, his time in Miami is done. They're going to eat whatever massive cap hit it takes and he'll be gone. If you are the head coach or the quarterback's coach or the play caller, like how do you digest that whole situation? And also when Tua does get another opportunity because he was the fifth pick, do you think teams are going to view him as a starter, or is he going to have to be kind of a reclamation project and be a backup for a few years here? Well, that's a great question, Ty. I think there's a number of things

there. Number one, I'm not totally, you know, engaged with everything that's going on in Miami, but, you know, you do have a young guy in Quinn, and, you know, I've actually had a chance to spend some time with Quinn before their draft, so I'm excited for him personally. But, yeah, I don't know if this is a, you know, you're out of the playoffs. I think, you know, when you get to this point in the season, you know, you haven't been there a lot of times, but there's a lot of things you've got to talk about, you know, particularly, you know, what are you thinking in the future? You know, they don't have a GM. So I don't, you know, I think there's some, there's some answers to your question that probably can only come from

inside, so why exactly they're doing this. We all understand this contract situation. So, you know, that, that factors, you know, more than people would probably want to admit. So I think, you know, Hopefully it's just they want to give a young guy an opportunity to see what they got in Quinn to get more information as far as the whole overall quarterback position. Because I'm a huge believer. When you're developing the quarterbacks, you're developing the whole room, all three of those guys in the room. And personally, I wish they'd make you have four in the building and mandatory because, you know, it's the most important position in football and the development of that position is critical. So, you know, I'm thinking they want to find out of by Quinn and see. and give him the opportunity, you know, I think it's definitely part of this, too.

So not known exactly, you know, with the post game, and, you know, I wasn't aware of any of that. So I don't know what all that plays into this if it's part of a decision. But, you know, I think there's a lot, you know, there's a number of quarterback decisions around the league that are being made. You know, obviously, you know, in Washington, you know, resting, you know, my homes, you know, went down. You know, when you see that, you know, which your off season is going to look like, too. So when you're out of the playoffs, you know, you definitely want to go win the game. The fans are, you know, they're paying. That's important from the business perspective of it and so forth.

But there is a future outlook for some of these teams. And, you know, whether the coach and, you know, standing in the coach and GM, I know is probably part of that. But, you know, when you're building a championship program, you do have to forecast some of those decisions. And how you go into the offseason, I think, is critical. So I think some of that plays into it too But yeah, I'm not exactly I think there's more to it In Miami there usually is

And those are really, you know, things that are going on internally Yeah, and you talk about looking at Quinn Ewers for the future It's like GM already fired Is the head coach going to be there next year? I have no idea Is he going to be down there with sunscreen? Maybe he gets a chance to see Yeah, maybe

Well, Quinn Ewers, we're not putting your name up for any jobs or forcing anybody out of any jobs But it would be hilarious to see you back head coaching now that we know you much, much better you know, much, much better. You in Miami would be incredible. Not, hey, Coach McDaniel is still down there. We, and obviously the team continue to fight for him,

so we're not making any of those decisions. But I have, I don't know if you have done this, I have placed you in a couple different spots. Just the thought of you going out there in that teal, bright red, I mean, in Miami, you would be, you'd be that guy right behind you with your daughter's there. Sun hat out there, yes, sun hat.

Oh, man, we need it. We need it. No, McDaniel, we like them, whatever happens to the future, but we appreciate the hell out of you, coach. Enjoy the hell out of the weekend. Great ball tonight, college football playoffs tomorrow night, Alabama, Oklahoma. Any thoughts on these? Ooh, just looking forward to watching it.

I don't want to upset any of these calls. I think this call is just national championship brackets. I just love what they've done. So these games are so exciting. And no, I'm just looking forward to sitting down and being a fan. All right, we'll be on ESPN 2, noon on Saturday, calling Texas A&M Miami from the sideline. Hopefully you enjoy us, and we would like text messages if you see anything for anybody so we can sound smarter. We won't give you credit, but we will steal your shit.

You're the man. Ladies and gentlemen, Coach Mike McCarthy! Thank you, Coach. Thank you, coach. He's the man. Dude, it is fun placing them now. I feel like I haven't done that enough. Oh, you should.

Have them in Miami. First training camp, it's 115 degrees. 400% humidity and he's just drench it. We got a fast team. We've got to work hard today. It's a bad idea. There's Irish Inzer in Miami. That'd be Italian Inzer went down there and did pretty good.

Okay, Damarino. Yeah, you're right. Maybe you need the Irish to go down there. A lot of Italian injures going down in Miami. There's a lot of Italians in general that head down that way. Okay, and a lot of Irish head down that way too. They all seemingly have similar jobs, but. Trash.

Amongst other things. Sanitation. Sanitation, please. That's also concrete. Funny Frank's still living in plum. Football! It is magical. We're so incredibly lucky that we get a chance to chat about it tonight.

Week 16 of the NFL season kicks off in a huge way. And tomorrow, the college football playoff. The second ever 12-team college football playoff kicks off on a Friday night in Oklahoma, as Alabama will travel to take on mature inventables in an entire sooner nation ready to deliver an epic environment as Alabama is underdogs, as Oklahoma favored by a point and a half at home. Let's go to one half of the hammer.

Bow, Cowboys AP Town. What are the numbers saying for this particular game here, Tone? And what's the percentage of bets on who? I naturally assume that more people will just say, give me Alabama, just because it's Alabama. Alabama, I think there's some sort of stat line that's out there about something, about since 1860 or something, they haven't done something and lose in some sort. But obviously, this is DeBore's Alabama.

This is not Sabin's Alabama. This is a massive one for DeBore, Ty Simpson, and Alabama. And for Venables, he's been waiting for this in Oklahoma. I mean, Venables was brought in from Clemson as the defensive guru that led to Clemson team in a fantastic fashion. He gets to Oklahoma. They have a little bit of a run and a little bit of a law. Texas goes on their big run, and then all of a sudden, Oklahoma is kicking off the college football playoff

with the Venables defense that's going to hunt. I mean, they are going to hunt. They are going to look awesome. Is Mateer in Arbuckle, in the offense that we saw earlier in the year, then a little bit at the end of the year, going to show up in the biggest moment and continue this magical run, or Alabama and Ty Simpson, who had a tough road throughout the middle of this season and got to this point. Well, they continue their journey to a national championship in the post-Sabin era. It's a huge one to kick off this college football play.

off tomorrow night. Yeah, it's a ginormous one. I think the line kind of reflects how I feel about this one as a coin flip, but you're going to get the favorite because of the home and the home field advantage. These two teams played, what was that, three, four weeks ago. In Alabama. Yeah, in Alabama, Oklahoma won 23,

21, but Bama outgamed them by 200 yards. It was kind of the story of turnovers. That Oklahoma defense was getting sacks, turnovers. They had an interception return for a touchdown. But like so Ty Simpson has five interceptions, I believe, on the season. Four of have come in the last four weeks, so it's, and there's, you know, there's internet rumors about

his health and stuff like that. Alabama can't run the ball. And then the other side, the Oklahoma offense, the second half of the year has been shit too. But like these three weeks off for both of these teams, like, what are they going to, are these teams going to turn back to what they were at the beginning of the year where Alabama won five straight against ranked teams or four straight against ranked teams and Oklahoma's offense beginning the season with Mateer was unbelievable before we heard his thumb. It's, yeah, it's an incredible. It's a coin flip for me. You talked about. about Venables. He was kind of on the hot seat before

this season. He is not anymore. He's a dog, by the way. He's got... Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. He's got... The vascularity. Yeah, he's still in there. I think he's still in there moving. Always has a raspy voice, no matter what. I think their SID, the guy that controls, like, his press appearance is, like, the hardest in the country to work

with. Like, in my hardest, I mean, like, keeps them... Yeah, biggest nightmare. Just like, no. That's what I heard through the Reddit pages that I was reading. They would spin it into a positive way, though, like... He wants coach focus on ball, Yeah, just kind of keep it out there. I don't think a lot of access to Venables has ever been a thing. I don't think that is something.

Every time he comes on Game Day, though, the way he's on the show, and then how he interacts with everybody in between, feels like he's a dude. You know, like Venables is a guy, is a dude that you would want to hang around, even though we don't know much about him because he's not really out there as much. But him getting his team to be able to play this way. And then bringing in Arbuckle and Matur together to kind of flip the offensive side and catch up. That was a magical story at the beginning of this year.

Matier was going to win to Heisman, and then obviously he hurts his thumb. Then he comes back early, maybe, against Texas. Everybody was saying in the offense, kind of slow start. Three weeks to reset that, get healthy, and also go back and maybe do some self-scout. Maybe they're back to be in that special offense and dynamic offense. And then for Alabama, Ty Simpson talked about injuries late down the season. Three weeks is a long time to get healthy.

That's a long time, especially for these young lads to get feeling better. I think we're going to see the best out of both of these teams. And this is what it's all about. Starting with 12, kind down to one. It's about who's going to become a CFP National. If this one comes down to a kick, as you know, Oklahoma's kicker, Tate Sandel, I believe was 23 of 24 in the season with the long of 55. I believe he was either a finalist or won Best Kicker in the country. Those awards mean nothing because they do it via Zoom. We hate that.

What are we doing? College football is the second largest sport in America behind the NFL. I don't know why we wouldn't treat it as such. The NFL shuts down an entire city for their awards shows. College football does Zoom calls. So I don't know how. that's a thing. We should know that. That should be a celebrated thing. That's on me. And that's a huge moment for him if he did win that. It was either him or the kid from Hawaii. I can't remember what I thought. That man from Hawaii. The Japanese guy who learned through YouTube on how to kick and then turns a dream and a career. Not a career, but yeah, maybe a career in this entire thing. It's a beautiful American dream story happening out there at Hawaii for the kicker.

Yeah, the Tokyo To Kansai Matsuzawa. And the most prestigious trophy for the best college kicker in the country is in the Luke Rose Award given annually was to Tate. Yeah. So it comes down to a huge moment, by the way, for this kid's life that he won that. And have we seen a, have you seen a clip of it or anything? No, no, no, no, absolutely not. And our outlet would see that, right, because we're in college football and kicking? Yeah, yeah.

I would assume so. Are we sure that's real? But Tate's good. True. Tate is good. Yeah. Tate is good. And now will he be good?

He's got short pants. Yeah, but he said also, hey, that. It was a little shorter than I thought. He'd have a little bit of a rip. Joining us now, ladies and gentlemen, he's a college football national champion, Super Bowl champion, Ryder Cup winner, ladies of gentlemen, A.J. Hawker.

Walker, the CFP kicks off tomorrow night. Obviously, gigantic stuff. Friday night kickoff. I like that heading into a great weekend. I think it's great. I think we missed an opportunity there. You could have played the nice jingle for coach Mike McCarthy. I think he would really enjoy that.

I doubt that he has seen that yet. Well, we'll make sure he knows what that's all about next week. You're right. That'll be our Christmas gift to him. and we'll put him full screen as we play it and just kind of see his... What are we doing? What is it?

We're still live? Is this your song? Am I on the screen right now? What's going on here? Cartoon characters singing this. This don't look like football fans. Average prices of the tickets here from our friends at Sea Geek.

Miami, A&M, down there at Kyle Field, biggest game in history, 745 bucks. Tulane Ole Miss, $4333 bucks. Alabama, Oklahoma, to kickoff CFP, $450 bucks. JMU, Oregon

out there in Outson, $304. So obviously, there is a demand to get into these buildings, and this is what we love about the college football experience, is the environment. We wish that there would be second round home field advantages as well, because obviously a game down here in Bloomington

or a game in Athens or a game in Columbus or a game in Lubbock would be gigantic in the second round and be very special. But at some point I guess they decided that no only the teams that weren't the best in the country get home field advantage and then we have

to move it on to keep corporate sponsors happy. Hopefully we'll be able to change that going forward and we'll still be able to hit all the New Year 6 rotating basis for the next round. But it's a special weekend. We're lucky to be a part of it. What's the Montana Montana State ticket that's happening out there for the FCS? So semifinals

FCS, Montana Montana State. They played earlier the season. They were one versus two. It was a three point game. They're back in the semifinals. Zee was looking it up. He said the cheapest ticket he could find to get to that game was over $400. That's a, it's going to be an awesome environment. Wow. Montana, Montana State. A bunch of people, obviously, that thought we should go out there for game day. Just know, we agreed with you. JMU had a weekend earlier in the season where that same weekend where they should have potentially had it. We agreed with you. We thought it. I think there was a conversation like because of JMU schedule, not by us, because of JMU's

schedule. There's no chance, I believe, is what the words were. That's correct. Is exactly what. Just because I ask questions, so all of the college football fans that get mad about where Game Day ends up, once again, would like to reiterate, lucky to be a part of the institution and have been part here for the last few years of an institution that people are excited that your show and that your thing is coming to their game. That's a cool thing. Always will be a cool thing for College Game Day.

I hope the people that run college game day understand that that's a thing. And it feels like some of them maybe, but not. you know, not at the game day world, but in the ESPN world as a whole, like, hey, it's, this is, we're very lucky that this is viewed this way and treated this way. Obviously, it's been earned over a long, long time of putting on great shows and everything and celebrating the second largest sport in America behind the NFL. But like, I also ask questions, have no say, I think it's well documented that I'm pretty low in the totem pole over there, have no say in the entire thing.

So whenever some of these decisions are made and I just go, what? Why? Why? We were just there. They had 40,000 people for us. The entire, why would we not want to do that? Well, there's no chance they make the college football playoff with their schedule. So we'd basically be kind of just showcasing something that is only going to make more people upset because there's no chance they're going to make a playoff. Well, look at, JMU is currently in a college football playoff, right? They're currently in it.

So whoever said that should probably look in a mirror and think to themselves, maybe I should just have a brain every once in a while. And then, you know, Tulane, I don't think there was ever a thought to go down there. But Montana, Montana State, definitely in conversation to go out there, wanted to know wow why the brawl of the wild i believe is what it's called it's special environment we got a chance to go out there a negative 14 degree the entire state came out for us and uh it was a special thing so just know that we we asked the same questions everybody else does oh yeah and stanford steve is the one that's making all the decisions yeah stanford steves the while making the decisions

but we do know college game day tomorrow night college game day Saturday morning uh field pass on ESPN 2 Texas A&M on miami we cannot wait to call that I don't want give anything away Don't like to go behind the curtain too much. Break the fourth wall. Sure. We got a chance to speak with both Coach Elko and Coach Crystal Ball about things that they won't tell just the media because we are calling the game. And we got a little bit of a production access to these guys. Really kicked back and relaxed, got to get to know the real then yesterday.

That was an awesome experience yesterday, AJ. Truly, that's the first time we've gotten to do this. We reach out directly to the coaches and to the people at the schools. They were both like, absolutely. they would much rather do that than any of the other stuff that they have to do. It's like we only need four or five minutes, six minutes. Yeah, eight, nine, ten, fifteen, seven, we have twenty minutes. Once we get them in there, we think they'll have a good time.

If they're not having a good time, we'll send them the hell out of there. But they were very good with us, I think, AJ. And that was very productive for us, I think, as we try to call this game on Saturday and do it justice. Yeah, it was very productive. I mean, thanks to you. Obviously, you have a way of making these guys feel, I guess, at ease and comfortable, and they trust you. And you have a relationship with them beforehand.

I mean, I've been in plenty of production meetings where you don't get anything, where they are tight-lipped giving you, like, the coach speaks. So the fact that they were so open and cool about it, and they both seem like they just seemed super excited. They just couldn't wait for the game to get here, I feel like. They're just, they're ready to go. Thankful gratitude for being in the game. Like, it genuinely felt like, and I think they view us as just football dudes.

So like whenever we're talking about them, it's just like, hey, explain the situation to them about us calling these games. We have no idea if it's a three-yard gain or a four-yard loss from where we're standing. but it would be cool to at least get a heads up on how you're viewing so we can kind of call and talk about it as it's happening. I think other people that call games get to do that. We were wondering if we could do the same thing

and they were like, absolutely, here you go. And then there was even a couple, when you see this, we're doing this, whenever you see this, we're trying this, it's like we would have never had that in the past. What a weapon that is for us going into this game. But what I got from both these coaches, they both obviously love their teams, but also they feel very good about how their teams feel going into this game.

It's very much like, hey, let's go do. this thing as opposed to like hey let's feel it out it feels like they are both very much going for it here and it's going to be fire i think we should expect the best of all parties in this particular game with the way the messaging has come yeah by all means this should be a night game this is the best game of the first round you can make that argument i think the price kind of reflects that it's so awesome that this is the noon game and yeah the NFL being on saturday probably doesn't help it as much but both the school's first time in the college football playoff right i mean this is historic for both sides and it does feel like that is at least came through when talking to

him like how much this means not just to the teams but to the universities to the cities to the towns that they are in like this is a monumental moment for both of these places and it also did feel as if the coaches and players knew they were representing their people like it was cool it was like a very genuine cool conversation about how confident they are in their team how much they like their team here's some stuff that we're going to do obviously we can't talk about until it starts happening on why it's happening and we had to obviously we're in the football world so we don't want to give away any strategy from anybody or anything like that but just like the genuine excitement it felt like from both sides about the opportunity was cool like even listening to

coach christabal talk about traveling and playing a cowfield yeah he's like hey i've been there with alabama uh we went up to oh high state obviously got a chance to experience of that uh f i u we played went to a and m played there he was like so i i was at oregon he had a bunch of big games like that. And he said, he talked about how pumped he is for his team to experience it because it is a different animal. Yeah. Like he is like, it's like a respect. Yeah, it was like a very like respectful.

It was, uh, it was cool to kind of hear it all. Joining us now as a man who's obviously no stranger to huge games and also no stranger to huge games at Cal Field. Joining us now, the greatest college football coach of all time. New owner of the Nashville prayers. Wow. Ladies and gentlemen, Nick Saban. Yeah. How you doing, Coach?

I'm doing great. How are you guys doing? What, are you selling Toyotas now? I see that shit sitting right over your head. I thought you're a Ferrari and Lambo guy. I didn't know you're a Toyot-a-thon guy. You're moving Toyotas, too? Yeah, I had to do this in the store today because I had some meetings this afternoon,

so they set it up for me, and we're here, and not trying to advertise anything. No, of course not. No, no, of course not. Yeah, it doesn't. look like it at all. There you go. Doesn't look like. Got Lexus here if you need it? Shit. We got you the best thing you could possibly need

for a stalking stuff. We've got a Toyotathon little elf here. You can buy, where is this Toyota located out here, Coach Saban? This one's in Montgomery, Alabama. Well, if I ever need anything, I know I'm coming to Toyota right down there in Montgomery, Alabama. Coach Saban, Coach Gristie, and all the boys there will take care you and get you everything you need.

Let's talk about you being an owner of the Smashville Predators. Listen, you're a completely defeated an HL owner, got their asses beat, four to one, L, L, L, with your ownership. But tell me how you got into this, and how much do you know about hockey and what is your planned presence

for the Nashville Predators going forward because I got a lot of friends in Nashville that basically as soon as they saw this announcement were like, Sabin's coaching the Predators, we're winning this thing. What is it? What is the expectation? And how did you get to this? Congratulations, we love hockey here.

Yeah, well, it was an opportunity for me really with Mr. Haslam, Bill Haslam, who we talked about some sports franchise opportunities in the future, and this was the first one that came up. I love hockey. I think hockey is a great investment. You know, they have a salary cap, and, you know, it's a growing sport. I think there's a lot of interest in the sport,

and Nashville is a great city. We have businesses there, so, you know, I'm kind of a fan, and, you know, look forward to being a part of a team, which I think they have the structure there to, you know, rebuild this team. I'm excited about being a part of it. And, you know, I don't know enough about hockey to really coach anybody how to play it, but I know enough about successful organizations that, you know, hopefully can contribute something to the organization in a positive way.

I don't like to hear that. So you're actually going to do stuff here? You're not just going to stay away from the building? Because the Pittsburgh Penguins just sold, too. I don't know if you've already signed. We'd love to have you in Pittsburgh. We'll certainly give you a better deal than whatever the Predators did. So you just kind of give me a heads up on that.

If you want me to stop mentioning that right now or now, as the Inc. tried? Well, you know, I went to a Predators game in the playoffs several years ago, and the Penguins were actually playing the Predators in the playoffs. And I had a Predator's jersey on trying to promote our Nashville businesses, and I got about a thousand negative emails from my people. back in West Virginia, who were Penguins fans. So I got my ass kicked on that one.

Good. I hope you get more this time, because we were just for sale. You could have bought the whole damn thing potentially. No, we love to see you continuing to get in the sports world and give back to the sports world. The Predators are very lucky. The City of Nashville knows and appreciate you becoming more of a part of it is a great thing. I love you. You're a part of hockey coach. We love hockey around here.

And to your point, up and to the right. And go Preds going forward. Go Preds going forward. but also the penguins are about to beat that ass, saving whenever they have to. And that's a good thing about hockey. Let's talk about football now. Let's talk a little bit about college ball.

This weekend is obviously huge. CFP is kicking off tomorrow night, Friday night. Alabama, Oklahoma. Very close to home to you. And obviously, Oklahoma came into Alabama just about a month ago and got a win. Tone has a question for you about what we think is obviously the X factor of the entire game. Yeah, coach. You've obviously had to go up against Coach Venables in your time in the playoffs.

Now that Alabama has seen him once this season, and they're going to have to see that defense again for a second time. Is that a good thing for Ty Simpson and the Alabama offense and what makes going up against Brent Venables so hard? Well, I think, you know, the pressure package that they have, and I think that was the big difference in the first game. You know, when you watch the game, when they got their pressures blocked up, they made a lot of explosive plays.

I'm talking about Alabama. But when they didn't, it was devastating. in terms of sack fumbles, pick sixes, sacks that led to stop and drives. So it was like feast or famine, you know, in the game. So how they can execute against the pressures to me is the most important thing because if you can get to the back end of Oklahoma's defense, I think you got a chance to make plays, which was evident in the first game. I mean, Alabama had over 400 yards versus Oklahoma's 200,

but three turnovers, all in negative field position that led to 17 points, you know, helped Oklahoma tremendously in the game. And you can't have those kind of plays. If you have those kind of plays, Oklahoma will be successful. That's how they win. They've not scored a lot of points. Their defense is outstanding. And they thrive on making plays in the game that are going to impact the game,

and they did it to Alabama a month ago. Yeah, they did, Coach. Yeah, and Alabama, Ty Simpson, has five turnovers or five interceptions on the season, four of them come into final four weeks. That three-week layoff, is there a way to fix that? Or is that just something that's going to come with games down the stretch whenever you're trying to take a shot?

Well, I really do think that some of the issues that have been created on Alabama's offense come from, you know, the fact that there's more pressure, more sacks. They've been able to affect the quarterback, which led to the four interceptions that you're talking about. But Ty's very capable, but I've always said this. Quarterback's a hard place, a hard position to play, maybe the hardest position in sports if the people around you don't play well. So their ability to run the ball, their ability to protect, pick up pressures, the offensive line needs to play a little more consistently.

That'll help the quarterback. And if they can do that, I think Ty's very capable of, you know, getting back to where he was somewhere in the middle of the season when he was playing outstanding. We're obviously hoping for the best out of everybody. included in Oklahoma whenever he started this season. It was, wow, I can't believe this guy is as good a football player as he is. He gets hurt. They weren't able to find their rhythm yet again afterwards, but starting to find it towards the end of the season. Will the three-week layoff help them? Now, let's move to Saturday as we travel from Oklahoma on Friday to

to college station late Friday night. Go ahead, AJ. Yeah, coach, we will be on the field for the, you know, Miami taking on Texas A&M. I guess what should people be watching, say the first Taft, what should we be paying attention to to to kind of see, or what are you going to be paying attention to early in that game to see how it's playing out? Well, I think two things are very interesting in this game and it's the style that both

teams play defense. And Miami has got really talented front guys. I mean, they dominate the line of scrimmage. They rush four guys most of the time. These guys make a lot of negative plays by how aggressive and physical they are. I think Jason Taylor's done a fantastic job of coaching

these guys up front. So, and then you go on the A&M side of it. They're not as big. They're very athletic. They can run. And they rely on different kinds of pressures and slants to give you negative plays. And if A&M gets you in third down, they are lethal, man. They've got a great third down package where they create a lot of pressures, a lot of overload-type simulated pressures that give people problems.

So this is going to be the tale of, you know, like, how does this game go? If Miami can control the line of scrimmage and eliminate the negative plays and stay out of third down long situations, I think they'll have success against A&M. If on the other hand, you know, A&M can't block this front and they affect the quarterback, although I think Marcel Reed is an outstanding player. Not only do they have to affect them, they have to keep them for running, which you see him doing right here. And this guy can throw it. They've got good skill guys. So this is going to be a real challenge. I think this is going to be one of the best games of this early playoff season, man.

I'm looking forward to this game because both of these teams, to me, are very, very good football teams and play different styles. And it'll be interesting to see which style, physical Miami team versus a very skilled, fast, aggressive A&M team. I know you have relationships with every coach around the country. yesterday we had the chance to catch up with Coach Cristobal and Coach Elko. And you talked about this being one of the best games here of obviously this early. But the entire year, it sounds like the way they're talking about it, the excitement that their entire team feels, as opposed to nerves and anxiety,

what we heard through the coaches and through the locker room is like excitement and honor for the opportunity almost from both sides. And anytime you have that, I think you've got teams that are going to show up in a big way. How much does the Kyle Field, you think, play an effect in this entire game, especially with that Texas A&M defense that can get after the quarterback, especially with how loud that place could be. You played in some monster games there. You've talked about it before,

both whenever we were down there for game day and on this show. But them hosting a college football playoff game, I think is good for college football, for people that maybe haven't watched college ball all year. You tune into this game, and it's like, holy hell. This place is one of the greatest fan places in the world, maybe, Coach Saban. Is that the way to describe that? I don't think there's any question about it.

You know, I did more complaining to the SEC office. It was more than complaining that I don't really want to say on this show about this is the noisiest place. Plus, they pipe in noise. Whoa. They pipe in noise. I mean, you can't hear yourself thinking when you're playing out there. And it is a huge advantage when they play at home, especially for their defense, especially getting off the spot. It makes it really difficult for the offensive line.

but the one thing that I think Miami can get under center and they can run the ball that might be helpful to be able to settle them down from a noise standpoint but if you have to go on silent count in this game which you probably will especially if you're into gun

it's going to be a huge advantage for A&M's defense. Sanky I mean come on have you been there? There's no way that's just human voices. They've got to be they got to be piping in and I think they take a lot of pride in that obviously down there as being a fan base that knows way. to yell, knows how to yell, and they have yell leaders. It's not cheerleaders. We got

yell leaders. Like, they are promoting it from the day they get on campus. We're heading to that midnight yell the night before, Coach. If you want to come with us, it's going to be late after, obviously, the Oklahoma game day whenever we travel down there. They have a pep rally basically at midnight before every single home game that 50,000 people show up to. It's like, you're talking about commitment and being on display for the world here, opening college football playoff weekend. I think we got it right here, Coach. Legit, I think we got it right. But I have a tremendous amount of respect, even when I was coaching and happened to go play there, the traditions that they have at Texas A&M and the spirit that they have at Texas A&M,

it's unique and special. And I have a tremendous amount of respect for it. It's almost reminds me of, you know, like coaching at the Naval Academy, where they have this tremendous prod and you know you see that in the army Navy game but they have that at A&M too it's something different and something special they're loud man I can't wait to be on that sideline I didn't even think about us not even being able to hear the whole podcast yeah

I'd like to know I'd like to get your guys opinion are you taking the crew there yeah you're just going to crew so you tell me after this game if they're piping in noise or not I'll pay attention yeah we will certainly be snooping it out okay let's talk about the other two games

happening on TNT and True TV. Go ahead, Ty. Yeah, coach, you've talked about rat poison, you know, so many times with us. For these two particular games where we've had 21 days where basically everyone has said, hey, Ole Miss is going to beat the shit out of Tulane and Oregon's going to beat the shit out of JMU. There is no way that these guys can win. If you're the coach of either one of those teams, how do you address that? Because obviously it's not just another game. It's the playoffs now.

And are you assuming that these guys will be able to handle it? Pete Golding and Dan Lannin pretty fine because they both come from your coaching tree. Well, you know, I just this morning watched the first Tulane Ole Miss game. And, you know, the game really was like 23 to 3 maybe, late in the third quarter. And Tulane got stopped three times on fourth down and short, fourth one, fourth and two, fourth and three, fourth and five at the five-yard line. So the game could have been a little closer than it was. I think the issue for Tulane is offensively, they moved the ball against Old Miss. But, man, they just could not stop Ole Miss's offense.

And I think that's going to be a huge problem for them in this game. My approach to games like this was, I used to tell players all the time, is, look, you're supposed to be playing to your standard, to your ability. When I was in the NFL, they gave me a cut up. I didn't know who you were playing what the score was. So your challenge is to play your best all the time because that's what you're going to get evaluated on. You want to play in the league someday? They're going to look at this film.

You're going to play relative to the guy you're playing against or you're going to play the way you're capable of. And that's the way we try to get guys to think about it. So they control what they do and they control the standard that they play to. And that's what I challenge them to do. And when you're into playoffs like this, you want to gain momentum. And to gain momentum, you've got to earn momentum. So you've got to play well, make good plays, play to play to. together as a group. And that's what I used to try to, you know, emphasize to our guys so that,

you know, we would gain some momentum. So you're going to have a tough game. The next game, you know that. Dan Lanning is definitely selling everything about Indiana having JMU kids and coming in there and winning. And then this show, even Coach Saban, there was a couple of times last week where some people on this show were like, you know what, Jamie, wins games. I like them. Maybe they go in there, especially with what happened last year with Oregon and the Rose Bowl in Ohio State. Some people on this show were kind of feeding. rat poison towards JMU's side

almost as opposed to Oregon side in its entirety. We know Laning will have the boys ready to go, but JMU could obviously do something special. In the history of the college football playoffs or college football, you know, postseason, large spreads have not voted well for the teams that

are receiving the points. They haven't won, but they have covered, seemingly. Okay. So highest point spread in college football playoff history, obviously 21 is the biggest against James Madison. In 2020, the semifinal, Alabama, you remember this Coach, 19-and-a-half-point favorites against Notre Dame. They won pretty good, too.

Didn't cover 1 by 17. Yikes. Had people pissed off at your ass, Coach Sabin. Then obviously, old Miss Tulane's in there. And then 2018, Alabama, they were favored by 15 against Oklahoma. You remember this one, Coach. They won by two scores. Jeez.

Didn't cover, though, only one by 11. So had a lot of people pissed off. So I think what the stats are saying, massive spreads into playoffs. Certainly the winners are going to win, but that's a little bit too much of a projection Is that because maybe things are a little bit tighter regardless because it's playoffs? Maybe, or what do you think it is, why sports books maybe overshoot it? And how did you feel as a coach who probably had to hear from some people, even though you win by 17, couldn't win by 24 bump, like that in this entire thing?

What are your kind of thoughts on the projections of a game versus maybe the outcome, especially whenever it's playoffs and who knows what it could be like? Well, there's one thing. I've learned a lot from you, Pat. I've got to admit that over the last, you know, year and a half, two football. seasons. And I learned something today. I never paid attention to the spread. But I would have enhanced my legacy a lot better if I would have tried to cover some of these spreads. Yes. Yep. Because you pissed us off. We got Sabin playing? Yeah. All right. They're definitely

going to cover. And then wins by 17, said 19 and a half. This fucking asshole. This guy ain't got it. This guy ain't got it anymore. Can't get the boys to rally. Can't even cover out there. But yes, it is something that is interesting. And obviously the expectation. One thing I hated, though, was when we were heavy favorites in a game, because I think sometimes players think that game is going to be easy, and these games are never easy. I mean, I don't care who you're playing, when you're playing. Anybody's capable of eating anybody.

But I do think the bigger spreads come because the big people can dominate the game. When the big people can dominate the game, which is going to be the issue for Tulane, especially their defense, it's going to be the issue. for JMU who relies on running the ball. And if they can't run the ball and use the quarterback run game, I don't think they can throw it well enough to generate enough offense. So when you have the big people dominating the game, I think that's when you get the big spread.

That's just my opinion. And I think that in most of these games, other than these two games, you're going to have big people that are pretty well matched, and that's going to make for some great games. Well, I think it goes back to the point of like there's weight classes in every physical sport. Like there is any physical sport, there's always weight classes because there's advantages to having more meat and everything like that. Whenever you think about a JMU roster versus an Oregon roster, I mean, any big name, but Oregon more specifically with everything that we know about Oregon, it's like you would assume in the trenches there is going to be quite a weight differential that could potentially cause a problem in a sport that involves physicality between the two people.

but JMU, low man, good leverage technique, you know, spoiled all right there. They got a chance of nose to the ball, you know, being able to sacrifice for a teammate. There's all those things that can come together on any given Saturday, Thursday, Friday. But here's my thing about this. I mean, look, would we allow the winner of the AAA Baseball League, the International League, whatever they call it, I don't even know the name of it? Would you let them in the World Series playoffs? I don't think they do. No, they don't.

No, they don't, but I'm saying, but that's the equivalent of what we do when JMU gets in to the college football playoff and Notre Dame doesn't. I mean, I don't want to start any shit here, but it is. Coach, you're adding your name onto a long list of people now because the one,

the one Power 5 team getting in and taking one of the 12 spots, everybody was like, good for ball. Love it. That's good for ball. We like that. Yeah, give anybody a chance, you know? Now, granted, if the one Power 5 team makes it into the college football playoff as one of the final 12 teams, that entire team is probably getting poached to somewhere else immediately after the season anyways. But we still thought it was good for ball.

The fact that two of them made it in this year, I think, has made everybody go, this is not what we signed up for. This is not what it was at all. assume change will come? Don't you think it feels like it's getting loud? Yeah, I hope so. I hope we learned each year from this how we can make it better. The ACC, not having a champ that could be in the top 50 ranked. It's just really through an entire wrenching to it. But we needed it to happen, right? And we need these games to happen this weekend. Because if Tulane goes ahead and smacks Coach golden in the mouth down there in Oxford. And then JMU travels to

Otson and smacks landing in the mouth. This entire conversation is null and void. But boy, if Ole Miss wins by 30 and Oregon wins by 30, it is going to get real loud and maybe change will happen afterwards. Just so everyone knows moving forward, you know how we've talked a lot about the Notre Dame. If they're in the top 12, they're automatically

in the playoffs moving forward because of the deal they sign. Also, if you're a Power 4 conference and you win your conference, you're in moving. Like Duke would have been, if This was next year, Duke would have been in. Is that with a 16 team, Bragg, or 12? 12, I believe. Okay, interesting. So I'm fascinated to see how it all goes.

We're going to make it better. What's that? If they do what, you know, to me, if you're not in the top 15, I don't care what league you play in, you shouldn't be in the playoffs. JMU, whoever it is. If you're not in the top 15, power group of line, it doesn't matter. Because you're taking somebody out of the playoffs that deserve to be in the playoffs. So you can think about it one way where we're letting somebody from the group of five in, but you're also taking somebody that should be in, out.

And that's not fair. That was my whole point about would we let the AAA baseball team who wins their league play for the World Series? Doesn't happen. It's a different league. These guys ought to have their own playoff. It's all about money. Just give them the money. Each group gets $4 million for playing in the first round.

Is that right? so, yes. $4 million and put Notre Dame in. I want to see Notre Dame and Oregon play? Texas Ole Miss. Oh, hell, yeah, hell, yeah, hell, yeah, right. Hell yeah, we do. Hell yeah, we do.

Hey, let's move some more Toyota's and maybe we pay them ourselves, Coach Sam, you know, let's maybe get the Predators back into the Stanley Cup finals and maybe we do that. But I think, Coach, I think there's going to be a lot of change this offseason, just like there was last. Remember, it was the four highest ranked champions. We're definitely the ones. now it's just the top four ranked teams are in there.

I think they are trying to massage it and fix it. The ACC champion not being in certainly was not expected whenever they made these rules, so who knows how it goes. But once again, we'll find out on the field. We'll find out on the field what happens. But when it goes down, how it's probably going to go down, everybody's going to say, we're done with this. We told you.

This is not what it is. Now, let's talk about teams that aren't playing this week, but have to wait another week. Go ahead, con man. Yeah, coach, the winner of tomorrow. tomorrow night will play against Indiana in the Rose Bowl and Kurt Signetti just won his second straight AP coach of the year. I assume that's because they got sick of giving you the award and that's why he's the first one ever to win it back-to-back years. What do you think about Coach

Signetti and the Hoosiers this kind of playoff run? Last year they played in the first round at Notre Dame and they were booted, but this year feels different. Mendoza wins the Heisman. Signetti has the boys going. Do you think they have the best year? shot, I think statistically, or sorry, the odds would say that they do, or them are Ohio State. So can you speak a little bit on Ryan Day and Coach Signetti and what their week looks like this week as they just kind of watch from afar and get ready for their New Year 6th day? Yeah, well, first of all, you know, Indiana, I said this before they played in the Big Ten championship game. They have a better team this year. Mendoza is, in my opinion, the best quarterback in

the country, probably the first guy going to get picked in a draft at that position, and they're more physical on defense. I mean, it surprised me in the Ohio State game that they were as physical as they were on defense and able to stop Ohio State the way they did. So this is a really good football team. Now, you know, I think the world of Kurt Zignetti, he's done an outstanding job there, not only in how he coaches the team, but how he's brought players to the team, how he's gotten guys to come to Indiana.

I mean, that's pretty impressive in and of itself. I think Ryan Day is, you know, I think Ohio State is one of the best jobs in a country in terms of your ability to have success and the quality of the institution, the tradition, and I think Ryan Day has done a fantastic job, you know, and what he's done with that team. And I think these two teams may be, you know,

right up there as two of the best, with the best chance to win the championship. But, you know, you're going to have to play the games to see because I think there's probably seven teams, in my opinion, in this playoff that have good enough players to be able to win the championship. I think there's seven teams that can do that. So there's seven teams that could beat any of the other teams, in my opinion. So that's how I see it.

I know that the odds don't really reflect that. But I think A&M could beat anybody. They're the seventh team right there, right? plus 2,000, they could beat anybody. Yeah, I mean, we kind of mixed up the numbers there, but one, two, three, four, five, seven, nine, six, ten, eight, just a matchup-wise championship odds as we go. But A&M, we think can beat anybody, right? We all, we all believe that. Just what the team did they get.

I think Texas Tech could beat anybody. Definitely. Sure. I think Texas could. Oregon could. I think Ole Miss, the way they play offense, could outscore you. So, I mean, but I think that's what makes a good tournament, you know, when you have lots of teams that you feel like have an opportunity to have a chance to win.

And I think that's not disrespecting the other teams in there, Alabama or Oklahoma or Miami, but because they could probably beat anybody too on a given day. So that's why we're going to play the games and that's why it's going to be very exciting. more teams get a shot to shine you know that's a lot more fun a lot more prize a lot more fun yeah starting with 12 count down to 1 is how we crown a CFP national yeah champion and you're going to earn it you know with these teams in there whoever wins it they're going to earn it and damn right you know I was never for going to 12 because I didn't want to minimize the importance of ball games, which has come to fruition. But the excitement that it's created is worth it. And I think it gives a lot more players an opportunity to have a chance to win a championship. So I really like this.

Now, I think it's more difficult, just like it was more difficult when there was four than when there was two. And two was more difficult when the AP poll decided who was the national champion. Now it's going to be more difficult with 12 people in there, 12 good people. Well, we'll start tomorrow. I can't wait to see you out there. Oklahoma. Go ahead and move some Toyotas today, okay, for the holiday season. Yeah, I got to change hats here. That's no doubt about that. What's the, what's the quarters of going to go from hockey to selling cars to being on your show,

going back to selling cars, and I'm not much of a salesman. I'll tell you what, retirement life is pretty good. Sounds like you can sell the shit out of a lot of things. Hey, what's the quarters up there? Is that a Toyota Thong quartersip there? Is that your national Predators? Oh, that's Nick's Kids, man. Nick's Kids. Oh, shout out. I think we're doing a donation to Nick's Kids because of the Alabama lady.

That was fantastic. Fantastic, the way that, Ms. Terry is so happy. I didn't have to. Today's our anniversary, 54-year anniversary. Oh! I didn't even have to buy or anything because you took care of the whole thing for me. Hey, well, I'm happy I could do that for you. You know, that's a lot of fun.

We don't know how much longer that's going to last, you know, future years. It's getting very expensive, obviously, week in, week out. You know, whenever you're paying to be a part of a show, you know, that's certainly something. That is certainly an interesting dynamic. But, hey, what you give will come back in spades. I get a chance to be friends and sit alongside you. We appreciate the hell out of you, Coach.

Tell Ms. Terry, we say congratulations. Well, hey, we appreciate you guys. I enjoy being on the show. Happy holidays to everybody if I don't see you guys. Love you, man. Hey, they'll see you. They're going to make sure you see. We love you, too, Coach.

Ladies and gentlemen, Xavier Joe. That's the national rankings, I guess, in the top left corner with the odds next to it. I think we could have left the rankings off there. But I appreciate that it's added piece of information on the graphic. It should be down at the lower left corner there, put the graph. But that's on me. I should know what was going up for, one up there. I thought it was just an odds graphic, and then I start seeing random numbers on themes.

And I'm like, who's fucking drunk doing this? And to be clear, the graphic design, boys, this is something that could come out of their department. this is without any other you know real reasoning or behind it there it is that's boom that would be look at that okay it makes sense now now we're now we're doing a graphic i don't know what the teams are ranked in the playoffs well it doesn't matter this is what their odds are this is what we're looking at here on this particular graphic but i will say to the graphic design boys great work out of you boys they become a really good factory over there of of graphics every once while there'll be something that comes out of there and you just go you're an artist i know you're an

artist how just from the conversation we had how is that the way that went well i was trying to okay yep you're an artist you're an artist now you just wasted 35 minutes of your life and there's no way we could show that in there we don't have a lot of time but i want to let you know i appreciate you taking a shot and i appreciate your artistry but i still don't fully understand how humans speaking the same language could be that further away from what we're looking for. And then they hop right back in the saddle, fix it, which is why we respect and appreciate them. There are some artists with some mental toughness

and an ability to a dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge their way through every morning. We appreciate you, graphic design, boys. Word, boys. You are dealing with artists, though. You know, anytime you're dealing with artists, they want to protect their art, and it's like, nobody's going to see that.

Are you going to tweet it? Who's going to, who's going to see it? And we can't use that, though, because it doesn't make any sense, you see. But if you lay out how we got to the, you know, if you read right to left, though, it's actually, oh, okay, we'll put it up in China then, yeah, where they read from that side of the page to the other. That makes sense. All right, I'll fix it. I'll change your round. They're good, though.

They're very good. We also have breaking news here at the Thunderdome. There are some new champions. Oh, hell, yeah. I did see something about that. Did you? Congratulations to partners. It's like, James, you being Oregon, basically.

Oh, easy. It is. More like Tulane and Ole Miss, but JMU, Oregon as well. Bruce Brown and Boston Connor are U-ball champions of the world. Wow. I mean, I can't begin to tell you how good this thing feels. I do now know, AJ, I think you can speak to this.

Jim Tressel holding that diamond football. That's exactly how this thing feels. and Bruce, let me just say 9 to 5 game, Bruce puts one in the cup, 11, 5, that's how we get to 11. It was all Bruce, that's how we got there. Bone and D, but I think we can all agree.

Just not deserving U-ball champions. They just did not represent the game well and me and Bruce will do that. Unfortunately, I did go to the doctors. I have a lower body injury. I will not be able to play for quite some time. So you guys are

We will not vacate the title. vacating the title. We will not do that. We will not do that. The doctor actually gave me a note saying this injury is so serious to the point where vacating the title would be disrespectful to you ball. So you guys just need to respect my injury and respect the fact that me and Bruce, we earned it. We earned a back-to-back games. We use strategy. We use teamwork. We used throwing the ball freaking down. What? After Pat kind of let Bruce know like, hey, stop laying the ball and start dunking it. And that changed our entire team. Bruce, I don't know, Bruce, you got anything to say?

I don't even know why this thing's up here. Who cares? You know, you got this one. Oh, man. It was a Christmas miracle, truly, that you guys won yesterday. And we're incredibly proud that you immediately did a photo shoot and you are celebrating. Bruce, I don't think anybody would have thought an insider for a sport could ever become champion of the sport. But that is certainly what you've done.

Congratulations, Bruce. Yeah, thank you all so much. And Connor was selling himself short. came alive on the defensive end was the MVP on that end of the floor. And then you know you just got to stay focused while you're shooting and make those shots and we got the job done. It was a proud

night. It was a proud night. I can't believe it. Honestly, I never thought I'd see the day. I saw your wording of your tweet, certainly drew some reaction. Thank God my family, my partner, Connor at Pat McAfee Show and everybody behind the scenes who helped make this possible. A lot of people saying the way you described your relationship with Connor

was something, but I do think it is closer than just friends at this point. You guys are champions. together. That's you ball. Yeah, that's what friendship's all about. You know, some people haven't been in the locker room. Don't understand that. They don't understand the dynamic between, say, a Josh Hard and a Jalen Brunson. You know. You guys did celebrate differently whenever you guys. Conner is my partner. I'm proud of that. We did celebrate differently. Immediately, we said, hey, look, pumped, really happy. Let's go nuts. Keep your thumb out of my asshole. Okay. I know you're a fan

of the Knicks. I ain't doing it. Okay. I'm not doing that stuff. That's how Josh and Jalen have fun. That is their thing. That is their thing. Was Bruce arguing, though? Was he arguing against it and said you needed it or what? Now, Bruce, to be clear, even though he is a diehard Knicks fan and loves Mr. Brunson and Josh Hart and their antics, if that's going to keep the Knicks winning more NBA Super Duper Cups. I think he does have respect for it.

But he clearly said, no, we don't need that. That's not our team dynamic. No. That is not our team dynamic. That might be the Knicks team dynamic. It is not. Do you guys have an official team name? Honestly, no.

We're just the champs. You know, I think you guys could just call us that. going forward maybe we do kind of create some sort of you know brown boston maybe i think that's kind and now you're not able to play uh not forever uh but yeah look lower lower look i got to listen to the doctors what do you want me to do you want me to play hurt and then you guys want to win an injured ubal championship i mean talking about winning something that doesn't mean anything and to be honest you could say that this title run by me and bruce was even more impressive since i was playing with a lower body injury, not to mention

when Bruce was going through, you know. He was coming off a hell of a night after the next one, the NBA Cup. The guy was as hung over as you could possibly be. And Bruce doesn't know if he's a right of your lefty still. Bingo. And he's the champion. So that's crazy. Well, every once in a while he'll do this one, which he made big.

He made big shots like the... I've watched him make cut shots with me. He wouldn't be playing. Put up an air ball, okay, in the first shot of the last inning. And it was like, oh, no, the boys are about to crumble, you know? And then all of a sudden, Bruce steps up, does his dribble, splash, and then I think he hit another one.

That's downtown Bruce Brown. Downtown Bruce Brown. And then on the defensive end, they started putting an effort. And in U-ball, because the hoop is at eight feet, you see. In the little ball, it takes weird bounces because it's not around. So, like, doing a layup tip off the backboard is very dangerous. I mean, it is very dangerous that thing can go there. Bruce Brown for a long time, I don't know if because he's a humble guy

or didn't want to cause too much of a fuss but he was always like trying to lay it up and it was just like brick city brick city and I said Bruce can you dunk like can you dunk or no and then all of a sudden the Boston Brown team

just starts like Bruce starts hanging on the rim it's like whoa whoa I didn't know we had a little monster unlocked down there but it really did you guys started kicking ass on the boards you made shots whenever you need them it was a Vali and championship run congratulations yeah hey

just just happy to be here And the bone and butts, that was a good championship round. I think they defended three full days. They had three four days of defenses, which I think is very impressive and certainly the second longest run in the history of U-Bull. Yeah, a lot of people are actually comparing it to the Sina era, and that's not a good thing because they were the worst champions in this office that we've ever had and how it ended, reminded us a lot about how Sina ended the other day.

Geez, he was, yeah, it did seem like they were content and they did tap out. Yeah, you guys were kind of like Rome. Tired. He, I mean, obviously, theirs was like Sina, and maybe ours will just be like, like Gunther. You know, you stop crying. Sorry, I can't play. You know, it is what it is. Hopefully I can get back on that course soon. Hopefully. Yeah, and you know what? Team Boston, Brown, Brian Boston. Maybe we're just Team B, B, and just like you ball, the team name's up to you. Big ballers, you know, big balls. Whatever you want to call our team is what it could be.

All right. Well, congrats, champs. Hey, thanks, man. It's great to hear before you even had a chance, you've decided you're not fighting. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. This is not on me, brother. This is how my body's responded. Look, do you want me to blow my a kiss? You want me to blow a knee? You want me to blow a hip?

It's a risk we're willing to take. Yeah, look. That's not a risk. That's your, that's up to you. It's up to me with my injuries. Call it me ball, bitch. See, it's already a part of the problem. Me and Foxy need to get that title ball back as soon as possible.

As soon as I am physically able, as soon as the doctor, as the three years. months from. Soon as trainers clear me, I'm going to be back on that field with a... Well, you also need some rehab days, I guess, to get back into the swing of things. Well, it's going to be, exactly, one-on-one-one, two on two, three-on-three, four-on-four, five-on-five. This is a Zion-William-type return, huh? Back to two-on-two, let's play a ball.

Yeah, I think he's not play, I don't know. Speaking of being out, Joe Burrow talked about being out of Cincinnati. Interesting call response here from a press conference for Joey Burrow, who said he wasn't having fun, then he looked disinterested, and now he's being asked about the future. here is his response is there ever is there any world in your mind where you're not the quarterback of the Bengals next year I could I couldn't I can't see that no did you ever thought about the possibility of not being the quarterback here during your career or type you think about a lot of things who has the fucking typewriter in there we need to get that over just burrow on the table it's

unbelievable that this some soft touch keys or something do they have them yeah I don't maybe just is it do you You actually don't have to type like that. Well, I like the fact that some of these people's fingers say, this is about me, and they kind of go for it. But also, there's really nothing else they could do as they're trying to be stenographers and get the right answer there. What did you hear from Joe Burrow?

He said, I couldn't imagine that whenever they first asked them about not being on the Bengals. He could imagine. And then they said, hey, have you thought about it? He's like, yeah, you think about a lot of things. What did you take from that? I thought that was the most convincing I'm going to be a Bengal answer. I've heard in some time.

But there's certainly people that are like, he said he thought about it, though, not being there. I think your natural human instinct is to maybe visit other places at sometimes. Yeah, of course. I would imagine at some point you've envisioned what it would look like if you were somewhere else. But normally it would probably think, hey, what if the Bengals want me out of here? And I got to go play somewhere else. What does that look like?

What does it feel like? But no, I, for what I took from that is Joe will be back in Cincinnati next year. Did you hear that you cannot wipe your or shoot your boogers in celebration? Amon Ross, St. Brown. I guess he is the booger trailblazer for the Detroit line. even though he's not the only one that's doing it. I guess the NFL officials told the Detroit Lions wide receiver coach to tell Amal Ross St. Brown on the sideline,

enough with the mine in for gold. What happened to your burger first down celebration? You guys stop doing it. What is that? Did you see me do it? I saw you do it. I saw like two other guys do it. Like what happened?

What happened, bro? We do it the first drive. Our receiver coach comes, dude after the first drive hey man ref said you guys can't do that no more I'm like what the really you can't digging your nose and flick it that's crazy why is that bad I want to know

NFL why can I dig in my nose and flick it like no way what is bad about that is that why do you want it no but you know is that derogatory they're anti-fune I don't know man it's not like you flicking an actual burger on somebody yeah that was like hey it's flicking but like yeah

not like bro I want to do that all games so bad Yeah, no, that was a good thing. That's all he wanted to do. It was a fun game. It was a good time, but I wasn't allowed to throw boogers, yo. So I'm not happy about it. You're, hey, here we got it.

Is it a weapon? Is he shooting a weapon? Is that what they're saying? So I looked into this a little bit. You know, the CD Lamb, this thing got banned and outlawed. I thought, and I was misunderstanding, I guess, I thought it was because of cocaine references, you know, where it's like, hey, you can't be signifying drugs or stuff like that.

I guess actually, yeah, it's gang related. you know, with Rico charges with young thug and gunna down there in Atlanta. So you can't be throwing up gang-sized slime. Yeah, you can't be doing the entire thing, I guess is what, the NFL came out and said, he references gang, seemingly, and they wrote that in the loss.

So I thought the booger thing was like, well, they're talking about booger-sugar, brother. You can't be doing that. The reps are saying he can't be doing it. Turns out that's not your rule. The rule is the gang thing is why C.D. can't do it. So I guess it's just unsportsman-like is what they're going with,

and they can call that on anything. And I don't know, maybe the guy can't breathe. and he's just trying and get in there and clear the entire thing out or maybe he's just trying to be a booger king and it might be the booger gang

we're not 100% sure so we'll have to get more information on why the rest are looking for it this past week though he had a big time catch sideline official was looking at his face don't pick your fucking nose all right

we're off tomorrow we'll be live game day tomorrow night for college football playoff see you then take we nailed it yeah he should pick his ass yeah you got to throw your turds they got to throw turd

pick his ass Spell it? Yes. Maybe both of them. Maybe both of them and then. I like that. You know, I don't know. But then that would be a poop gun and a booger gun. You're right. But you can't do the guns. So I'm not certain sure how he gets around it, but I think maybe this is what the Section 3, unsportsmanlike conduct Article 1 prohibited acts reads. Okay. Nice.

There shall be no unsportsmanlike conduct. This applies to any act, which is contrary to the general understood principles of sportsmanship. Such acts specifically include, among others, okay, throwing a punch or a forearm or kicking at an opponent, even though no contact is made. So even if you say, I'm going to do this. If you get in a way, I'm going to kick you, they consider them already in a way. Anybody kicking them, okay?

You can't do that. B, use an abusive, threatening, or insulting language or gestures to opponents, teammates, officials or representatives of the league. I don't know, picking your own booger pointing into space. Pretty disrespect. Flicking all the other team? I don't think he's flicked it on the other team yet, though. Has he done that and rubbed it

like we've seen others? Hypothetically. That would be a problem, yes. If he want boom, boom, boom, bang, pow. Or he shot it at a guy, or he went and tried to rub it on something. I get that. I get that. Okay. So, but I don't think we've found it yet. I don't think we found it in here in Article A or

B here. How about C of section 3 article 1 of the unsports my conduct using baiting or taunting acts or words that may E-N-G-E-N-D-E-R ill-will between teams engender

ill-will? Okay, whoever's right in this needs to stop being an asshole. Just use words that we all understand because maybe that's engendering ill will, I guess. You can see that. I can see that. Don't fucking pick your boogers at me. Don't do that. Engender is to cause

or give rise to a feeling, situation, or condition. So any using baiting or taunting acts or words that may engender ill will between teams. I don't know, I see a guy picking his bugs over there. I don't think I'm getting any ill will. I'm like, bud, everybody can see you. Yeah, I think he's the way everybody's saying. Yeah, well, what if you're, you know,

you're with your kid watching the game, you're trying to get your kid to stop picking your nose and all of a sudden, dad, see, everybody's picking their nose. See, I'm not reading where that is hurting, Parenting? I haven't seen this anywhere. D. Violent gesture, which shall include but not be limited to, okay? Because they might come up

with other ideas. A throat slash simulating firing or brandishing a weapon. Remember the kid? Yeah, God, Garret. Can't do that. Using a nose wipe gesture. Okay. Using a nose wipe gesture. There it is.

Or an act that is sexually suggestive. So any amount of pumps, if it looks like you're pounding something, it's certainly going to be a problem. Picking your butt, potentially. depending upon what you're into yeah yeah because what if somebody starts whipping themselves yeah we don't know because maybe the ref's like i know what you that was that was turned on that's that's that's section three article one d you know that guy over there got a bowler yeah yeah doma matrix boom did you imagine somebody gets a first down wraps one of those chokers

around the ball gag and the refs like oh why you know that teammates starts walking them like a collar Someone's got to do that. Golden shower. Shouldn't be illegal. All right. That would be part of it. Cleveland's team, right? There's a lot of...

So many. I think if you were to do that by yourself as a celebration, it would just look like you were dumping. I don't think anybody would really know you're potentially dumping on somebody else, which I guess it would be engendering ill will, but I don't know if it would be a sexually aggressive thing

just by the site. Unless you laid somebody down. You would have to. What if they fall in care of? You would have to. But if you're a rep... What if they say? I'm good with it

I'm reporting to the referee he gets up on me and then here we go if you're the rep do you have to go to all 53 on the other team and ask them if they were turned

on by the move time out time out let me check is your dick card is your dick card is your dick card cop check

you know how they used we used to line up before soccer games and they would check our chin pads exactly just just shut up the side of you

yeah. All right. So we don't know. Submit this. Clip this and submit this, by the way. The only thing we've really got is the nose wipe gesture. Yeah. Which is how it's written in the rules is nose wipe gesture.

Unnecessary physical contact with a game official under no circumstances. A player allowed to shove, push, or strike an official in an offensive disrespect for it on sportsman-like manner. Okay. So those are, that is the entire rule right there. Because I was asked, what's the deal with the bugger, man? Who cares? If somebody wants to do that. let them do it.

You know, it's not gang affiliated. Unless, like you said, there is, like, a big upstart booger gang in Detroit. He's going around wiping boogers on the back of seats at the Lions Stadium. 8 miles. Hey, Miles, do it. Exactly. I mean, you could see Tim Robinson in Detroit doing that exact. Wipe of boogers everywhere.

Everybody in the 3-13. Get your boogers on your fingers. You're going to wipe on me. Yeah, I mean, there's a chance. All right. Let's get to a break on the other side. We'll make our picks. And we'll wrap up all the very, very serious sports.

Like that one. Yeah. Yeah. If we don't talk about it, who will? We just read the entire... Yeah, all the bylaws. Nose wipe, I think, is where they got you, Amonra. Nose wipe.

We read them all. Nothing there says you can't throw turds, so they should try it. I guess you could catch them. Yep. Just launch it. Not at somebody, though. You can't throw it at another player. No, but remember, that would be dropping a bomb.

And right here, it clearly says, any violent gesture which shall include but not be limited to. So if the ref on site picks up the fact that you're catching a turd and throwing a bomb, poop is a weapon. Flag potentially coming. Plus you might put a grenade.

Don't throw it like a grenade then. Throw it like your baseball pitch. So it doesn't look like you're throwing a grenade. That's even worse. There it is. Bam. But you got it. You got to cut. You got to hold it like that.

This is unstable in my hand. It's sliding through my fingers. You got to show that. It's stinky. You got to bring it up to your helmet. Like gorillas. You ever seen a gorilla throw poop? Yeah, smell it.

I saw a gorilla. Yeah. Shart? Yeah. Dude, just on the window. I'm thinking, was that AI? I think that was AI because that was crazy. What are they feed that thing?

It's explosive. What are they feeding that thing? Are we the only three to see that? Not bananas. Did you see it? I saw it. I mean, yeah, I saw it. It might be real.

I know for a fact is AI, but I might be real. I thought so. I don't know. This video is not real. is AI generated. Son of a bitch. Community notes will get you. I haven't seen it.

Oh, you have. You got to see it. You do it every night in your bathroom, pal. I'll tell you what. I have had a couple explosive situations in a bathroom. And as soon as I see his video, I go, Silverback, definitely. Possible. It's certainly possible.

This is silverback gorilla. I think. I don't know all the different types of gorillas, but I believe it's silverback. The biggest, bad is loudest. The one you don't want to kind of meet. you guys were questioning if that's real how would you know how would you know

I'm sending it to you age hey John I'm sending it to you when I heard you guys described but I knew it had to be fair no in the moment I said I could see it I thought it was real I could see it

run it run it run it run it run it run it yeah look this could definitely have but you never know

she's getting sassy with him boom boom you never know You can't watch that once. Look at that spray pattern. And look at the science. The science, it feels like that would be how it would go.

And also, he's about sick of it. I've had a couple moments of the orangutans. You never know. So that's not real. Okay, good. Go see the silverbacks at the zoo. That's not going to happen to you. Football.

It's happening in a huge way tonight and throughout the entire weekend. That's A.J. Huck. The toxic tables here at Boston Connor and at Ty Schmidt. One half of the Hammer, Cowboys AP Tone is here. And Tone, I think we've got to make our picks, don't you think? It feels right to me. Because we're off tomorrow. We will not only be selecting this evening's game, but also this weekend's NFL matchups.

And then for college, obviously, we're going to be on the call, so don't have to make a pick, right? Yeah, no, can. No, not allowed to. That's kind of the thing. We can. We can. Beagle Boys, definitely can. No, but even you guys. Technically, we can't either.

That would not be, we've got to be right down the center with this one. So, Des, Coach Saban, the guest picker, who, Boz is going to be tomorrow. Hell yeah, boss. Can't wait to see him. I assume he's still incredibly jacked in a lot. And then Johnny Mansell will be the guest picker for Saturday down there at College Station. Now, I've seen him throwing up to you recently with an actress.

And I also saw him with Vandy a lot this show. year. I thought he's a Vanity fan. I think he's a Diego Pavia fan. I think he's obviously Texas A&M legend. So like I think obviously anytime you get Johnny Manzell at college station, you're going to go ahead and do that. Johnny Manzell needs to be a part of the biggest moment in the history of Kyle Field because he has a couple of them.

He has a couple of them already. So be excited to see him. Be excited to see boss. But I certainly won't be able to pick that Texas A&M Miami game now that I'm thinking about it. No, you won't. Well, Herbie should be able to pick it though, right? Because he's not.

Yeah, you guys flip. You should. Yeah. So I'll make to pick tomorrow and I guess. Correct. And he can't. And then you will. Yeah.

Perfect. Wow. That would be cool for you to say. I don't think you should let anyone know until it happens. Yeah, because there's no way anybody at Game Day knows that I'm calling the game. Bingo. Actually. Actually, they will not know that.

It will also be awesome if you close the show by just doing like a big promo and be like, with that said. I'm going to go call this thing. I can't pick this thing because I got to go call it. But it's in the stadium. Oh, yeah, true. I think we're in the stadium somewhere, so, you know, both games, actually, in the stadium. So you kind of get out of having to really do any of the fish people off. The song and dance, D.

All right, yeah, you don't have to do all the... Unless it's over the stadium, Pierre. Which? I don't want to give it away because I don't know if it's been set in stone yet. Saturday morning, college game day, we could potentially have the biggest field goal kick in the history. That's all I'm going to say. kicking as easy as the contest obviously each week this year has been spectacular you know it has been fun to kind of do very expensive obviously a lot of money going out of this particular business into other people's pockets including charity which has been a very fun part of all this finding different charities and different locations around campuses and all that stuff nick's kids was the one selected by the lady from the SEC championship remember she was Alabama fan husband was Georgia fan husband Georgia fan gets two kicks he misses but we still donate 250,000 to wife's charity of choice as a opposed to his charity of choice.

She picked Nick's kids and got a photo with Miss Terry and Coach Saban. I mean, it was a... Merry Christmas. You know, yeah, kicking his easy contest has created some magical moments, obviously, in Alabama this past. I couldn't even tell you the Penn State one was insane. How awesome. Vandy was insane.

It'd be hard to just pick Georgia whenever Hot Rock comes out. I mean, there's a lot of really cool moments that have happened. I think this one at Texas A&M on Saturday will be... If everything gets... Everything has to get. Because we're going to the stadium, so that would mean... I mean, the kick is in the stadium? Yeah, I think there's a lot of people that would have to approve it,

but I think there's a chance that we have 100,000. Oh, my God. Jeez. Yeah. Not a chance. I think there's 100,000 plus, yeah. I think there's a chance that that's going to happen. Now, Coach Elko and Texas A&M folks have been very, yep, let's, we are in,

but I don't know the actual logistics of what is happening, so I don't want to guarantee that it's taking place. But without saying anything, there's a chance Saturday morning the kick is. happening in front of a hundred thousand plus and there's no chance that kid is going to make that and it might be worth it might be worth boo koo bucks a big one yeah just depending on how the vibe is and there's a chance that this will be going to and the thing will be yeah pressure cooker oh my god 100 some thousand people chanting some kid's name imagine that just yeah maybe you'll be so tired or she will be so tired or maybe they'll be so adrenaline fueled that it'll help

them instead of hurt them or maybe that thing really gets to them and they have a moment of oh no this is not that fun to be a kicker how did I sign up and win this lottery to do this one of 300 people but there's a chance Saturday morning's going to be awesome no kick tomorrow night before the game because of logistics and everything the same place but Saturday morning allegedly there's a chance AJ that it is going to be the the biggest one possible and that be sick. And once again, I'm speaking for our experience. The Texas A&M hospitality has been outrageous for us. We just got invited in the gym. Okay. In an interesting phrase text message, we got invited to be able to use their facilities. Hey, we're not getting in until late or whatever

on Friday. It's all right. We'll have somebody come here and open if you guys need anything. Early in the morning, you need anything. We'll have somebody come open it for you. It's like they have been very, very, and I would say this, Miami earlier in the year, probably the most hospitable to us. So it's like, we are very lucky that this game is happening with how everybody's been treating us. Now it's our job to hopefully do it some justice on ESPN2, boys. That's right. That's right. We got to do that, boys. Do our best. Well, it's coach saving about, hey, you're all going to be there. I'll be interested to know after the game. You think that's real noise in there? Or do you think he, uh, saw his comments and made some noise. What's that since saying

it. Well, that one, but more of the G5 one. Yeah, and, you know, elitist culture, elitist mindset. Ty Schmidt's been heavily in the elitist conversation for a while with this entire group of five thing. There's a chance to prove it on the field. Yeah, we're not saying it's their fault. It's not Jamie's fault. It's not Tulane's fault.

They just played the games. The committee put them in. Fox put out what we were talking about yesterday with, you know, five stars and shit, four stars. A lot of it, obviously, production on the field got to be good. But body type, speed, That's all, like, projections on what players could be. So normally the five-star players are all the big, fast guys.

The unusually big, fast human beings. The bodies that are built differently than everybody else. Normally the five-star, built on projections of what they could be. Four-star, same thing, just whatever, three-star, same thing. And then Fox put out the comparison of the roster, and it's like, yeah, here's kind of how it lays out. There's six of them on Oregon, 52, four-star players. There's three at JMU. and then 51 others is like two star, I guess, or anything other than that.

Yeah, no star. No star for Oregon. So they still got the walk-ons and the lower recruited guys. But it's like this is what Sabin's talking about when he talks about a weight advantage. Because these stars, I'm not saying this is how good of a player is. I'm not saying this is guaranteed to make somebody be great because obviously I think I was a zero star before I went and hit a kick 65-yard field goal in Miami. And all of a sudden, I was the number one guy in the country and nobody had even seen me before that weekend. So I don't believe in all this shit, but the stars normally are body type projections is what they are.

So whenever you're talking about size and shit, they can be utilized, not skill, not heart, not the size of a dog, the fight of a dog, all that type of shit. I'm just telling you from pure body type reasons, this is why Coach Sabin and others are like, this game involves physicality. And whenever one side is clearly bigger, stronger, faster than the other, in football, they're probably going to win that game. especially if it's that big of a difference. That's why in the NFL you see a lot of the same. It's a lot of parody because whatever it is. But whenever you have different weight classes fighting, normally it bodes well for the bigger, stronger, faster team.

But, Jamie, you don't care about that, AJ. And they can change the entire conversation this weekend. So can Tulane. They can literally change everything that's being said right now can get settled on the field. But if it ends up going the way that all the people coach Shabin and basically everybody else has been a part of this conversation goes, it's going to be so fucking...

There's not even going to be a conversation about Alabama, Oklahoma. Nope. There won't even be a conversation about Miami, Texas, and I'm going to the next round. The entire conversation will be Notre Dame didn't get in, and these other teams didn't get in. And what happened on the field is exactly what everybody thought was going to happen. And once again, Tulane and JMU, not their fault. No, not fair for them either. They shouldn't be just getting murdered through this entire thing by everybody.

They should be celebrating a championship winning being one of the top five ranked conference champions. But in the reality of the entire thing, they took. Notre Dame spot. One of them did, if not both of them did. So it's going to be viewed as such after the games. And once again, they can go out there and win us. They can. They can be lizard-licking all over true TV and get a big-time dub.

They can change the future of the college football playoffs. Completely. Like, say both these teams win, like then, they're like, okay, I think we figure it out, guys. We don't need to make any tweaks. Even if it's close. Good game comes down towards the end, yeah. I think that's all anybody's going to be watching for. But as soon as it, if not as soon, sorry, then I am falling into the same category as everybody else that's just assuming it's going to, which I lean towards.

I do think that Oregon, and, you know, Ole Miss, we'll see how they handle it all. Yeah. A lot of drama. A lot of drama. Most drama before what happened in, obviously, Ann Harbor, but like that's not into the. I can also build them up too, though. That can also give you the old bunker mentality, I feel like, for Ole Miss. Yeah, but the entire offensive staff are LSU Tiger coaches. That is tough.

That does make it a little tougher. So what bunker are, you know? And a lot of the guys who are on Ole Miss currently, like a lot of those guys will probably transfer to LSU as well. So it is a fascinating thing. But on that note, could rally them and say like, hey, this is our one last chance to kind of do this as this team with this. So to your point, we never know how something could go,

but there are certainly outcomes that are very polar different. And fun fact between those two games, seven coordinators in those two games will be on different teams next year. The only coordinator staying is Golding, who got hired as the head coach at Ole Miss. Yeah, both teams still dealing with that whole coach and people leaving and stuff like that. But, I mean, also when you go to those four biggest spreads, we talked about how like, oh, well, the two other biggest spreads, you know, those two teams covered. Well, it's also when there's only four teams.

So, sure, the two other big spreads with, you know, sit where is it, Notre Dame Bama, the 2020 semifinal? Yes, you know, Notre Dame, they covered. They're the fourth-ranked team in the country, and same with Oklahoma. Like, this is a much different situation. Like, there's a huge chance these teams get fucked. And then we just have to not even watch, but it also, like you mentioned, it takes away from these other games that also might be blowouts. Like Oklahoma might vote.

Last year. Yeah. Like, that could easily happen. Like, oh, exactly. Ohio State murdered Oregon in the Rose Bowl. one seed in the second round yeah as the one seed like blowouts happen but in the first round that's when hopefully we could get rid of them instead the uh those those those those were the biggest spreads in college uh football playoff history the biggest upsets the biggest upsets the biggest wins in college football playoff history tCU was plus eight over michigan in 22 ohio state

plus seven and a half over bama in 14 and ohio state plus seven over clemson in 2020 oh yeah yeah and how tc u do in the national championship after that they got beef by close one to Georgia. Oh, yeah. Is it raining in Los Angeles that day? Yes, it was. The sofa. Yeah.

That was crazy. People were ripping on the Concord. Yes. Cracking their skull open. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. No, we move along. We move along.

We're thankful that we're on the side. I've got no updates, though. But we need to keep our head on a swivel down there. Big time. Especially if Spanx running around. Yeah. I hope. Me too.

We've decided we're going to fight you this year. That if you're listening. Does he know? That you, does he know that he is spanked that you're talking about him? I found friends of his to make sure they relay messages to him. Like, hey, let him know that, like, there's a significant investment on us being allowed to stand where we are. So if he needs to move two feet, like he needs to do that. And we're about sick of him prancing around us, giving us nasty looks and bumping into us and taking pictures of us and doing all this thing.

it's like just go do your job two feet to the left of us buddy we know you need this exact moment right here i'm sick of it i hate that guy oh yeah we'll see you oh we'll see you it's true the ref if we're too close the refs politely ask us to back up that has happened before and we have but the refs also kind of understand like hey this is a part of the media package of the college football playoff like the thing that is kind of doing this entire thing don't want to big dog you but i'm in the actual meetings wherever this is all being talked about you can move your fucking ass two feet to the left here buddy okay and i think there's other people that do your job i'm not sure this one there is any so yeah i'm excited for that i am excited me too me too i forget just now thinking about i'm like

yes spank get him around here this guy's bigger than the game this guy's bigger than the college football playoff this guy right here that's unbelievable i'd no idea that was even possible for somebody that dresses like that not to mention you know texas anem goes down early and maybe Spank runs his mouth to the wrong State Trooper. That state trooper. We got to see him. Yeah. Was he banned? Band. We don't know if he got. That day he was. That game he was,

but I don't know if he's bad. They ended up winning. So I I'm assuming he still hasn't paid for a beer in College Station. Let's make sure we find him. So we take a picture with him. I think that guy got reassigned, if I'm not mistaken. To the person side? To the old office. No.

What do you mean? Like, you ain't fucking working these games anymore, pal. Yeah, I've been pretty sure he got reassigned that was unbelievable to see that it's like is this real life the texasanem said a state trooper made contact with south carolina players during saturday's game has been relieved of his game day duties but save the team oh yeah yeah hey you get going motherfucker and who won that game texasanan what was the score after that after that huge comeback mm 303 three i think and i'm relieved yeah but my duties okay okay I thought we wanted it every game earlier in the game y'all like to lose huh

okay I say my Aggies I don't want to work here more tech guy anyway Cody Campbell I'm gonna call him right now Cody Campbell like six of me around here boom what are you doing chase get back on the fucking field unreal you get both of them he did but you specifically get the fuck back on that field I love it he's like it's my tunnel protected why are you number eight sucks i would like to hear his explanation whenever he sits down and they go all right what's your side

of it as you can see i was protecting that tunnel that is where our is where our aggies come from so i just wanted i did want him know that he can't be going down there it feels like they were already coming back though they weren't really going yep if they wanted to do it again

i had to let him know that that ain't that ain't a right move but i don't think it was really just the situation with the... You don't care about that tunnel? See, that's why I was at the time. Well, it seems like you went out of your way to hit them, and then you kind of made us all look like assholes

whenever you turn and pointed it was them. I'm the asshole because I want the Aggies Tunnel to be protected. Fine, you want to hear me say it? We were down four touchdowns. I was fucking pissed. Okay? So I fucking gave them both the shoulder to chew on, and then that one son bitch had the gall to look back at me.

Said, fuck you, get go! And we won. You should be thanking me. There's a home game this weekend. You all in here. They're talking about wiping boogers on the side of the law. All right, let's make some picks tonight. Rams, Seahawks,

Seahawks favored by a point and a half on Draft King. 62% of the bets are in Pooka Nakuwa. Hey, Pook, need a big one, buddy. Yep. Need a big one. You need to have a big game. This is part of becoming a superstar in the league and what it's all about,

especially if you're going to do stuff, it's going to be very lied if you don't perform on the field, which you always do. We can't wait to watch. Pocanaku and Matthew Stafford, Sean McVeigh and the boys travel up to Seattle for an NFC West heavyweight fight. Who's going to win the division? Who is a home playoff game?

Or maybe a buy in home playoffs throughout the entirety of the playoffs. AJ, who do you like? How do you like it? No injuries, basically, other than Devante. Okay, well, first of all, I like these Seahawk uniforms. Do we have a name for these? These are their version of the NFL rivalries. I believe they're the last team to wear them this year.

AFC East and NFC West. That's what those are. Mike McCarthy took the Seattle Seahawks strictly because of Schneider. I know. I'm only three whenever I'll pick with my heart, but damn, Schneider's got my heart pretty good. I'm taking the Seahawks up there. He would be nine and five if he was making selections. Last week he took another L, so he's nine and five, still very much a winner.

That is still a very good odds, still very good picking. He's on the Seahawks though because of Schneider. That is basically all it was. So it's kind of tough whenever he's that biased, knowing that whenever he watched film for this game, it was what the mindset of wanting to pick Schneider Seahawks. So, AJ, who do you like? How do you like it? Well, when I heard Coach Mike say that, you know, I'm going with John Snyder and the Seahawks,

I knew instantly what my pick was going to be. I was leaning heavily towards the Seahawks, and that just cemented my decisions to take John Snyder and the Seattle Seahawks. And, I mean, think about, though, the Seattle Seahawks defense, they bottled up Phil Rivers last week. That is not something that everybody can do. So I think they're going to continue with that momentum. Sam Darnold has a big game. I don't know why you're shaking your head. Give me the Seahawks.

No, I'm not yes. I'm saying yes. What you're saying. Because you're right. Everybody was just killing the Seattle Seahawks because it was a close game against Phil Rivers and Colts. Might we remind you that the Indianapolis Colts, whenever they had a quarterback that was operating, with the number one team in the NFL? This is the best offense in the entire league. Now, defense has a lot of injuries.

So Sam Darno and the Seattle Seahawks, not being able to move a lot on our defense. Lou Anirumo obviously gets a lot of credit for that. The defense flew around. So you can certainly judge that. But, like, Seahawks' defense still very good. I mean, Jonathan Taylor was an MVP candidate just three weeks ago. So whenever you talk about beating the Colts in the way that they did

and everybody holding that against the Seattle Seahawks, I think that was very disrespectful to the Indianapolis Colts. I think I was very disrespectful to the Seattle Seahawks. And on that note, give me the Los Angeles Rams plus one and a half going into Seattle. I like the Rams. And I think, I might not be mistaken, but I think Pooka's going to have a huge game. I think Puka knows he has to. Like, I think Puka is going to have a huge game.

Just anytime there's a lot of this, most dogs understand what they have to do. We all believe that Pooka's a dog, right? For sure. We all believe that is. So I think Puka is going to have an even bigger game, not that he doesn't, every single week. I think Matthew Stafford's going to do well. I think the wind is going to even only spotlight. Pooka's going to be able to do anymore. You're going to have a lot of jet

sweeps. You're going to have a lot of short throws to him, try to get him the ball early. He's going to run very angry. I think he has a good game strictly because he has to because if he doesn't, it's going to be very loud. And I think McVeigh gets the job, nope, give me the Seahawks. I like the Seahawks. What happened? I don't know. In my brain, I just saw, in my head, I just literally saw and heard the Seahawks faithful, like the fans. And it was like, that's a massive difference, actually.

In the 50-mile-on-hour wins, 40-mile-on-hour wins, I think that bodes well for the home team normally especially if they know the place and I think yeah I like the Seahawks I think too wow no Devante like we're talking Mike McDonald's being a defensive mastermind like having to cover two one sucks but now it's just puka it's like okay let's take him out of the game completely and then let's see if these three tight ends two two out well and karen williams can beat us like with devante I'm I'm with you it's just you wonder how like all those touchdowns how many goal goal to go touchdowns does Devante have like 10

this year? Like that changes their offense just a little bit. Who knows if it's enough, but a little bit. 12. 12 goal to go touchdown. Yeah, and we talked about it a bunch in the first hour. And I know Harrison Mivas has been good this year, but like Jason Myers is arguably the best kicker in the NFL

right now. And if you think it's going to be a close game, like you side with the guy who has been, you know, bulletproof. The last time we talked up Jason Myers though. True. True. He missed a kick. The next game. Tonight he might miss a kick because of how windy it is going to be.

Did you say 50-mile-hour gust up there? Yeah, they're saying 40 to 50. That's going to be wild. I mean, punting. I know I've played a game in Chicago where I'm on punt team, and the wind was so serious that snap got blown like 10 yards away from our punter. Yeah, the punting. The punting is the worst.

In McCarthy, I don't know if you heard us talk to him in the first hour, he said something that was so empathetic of his punters that I was like, fuck, man. I never even thought of a coach. thinking of that. Coach McCarthy was like, if it's super windy and it's third dime, you know, you're not worried to maybe take a shot here because the worst thing that could happen is just long interception and it's basically just an arm point. You kind of take it out of the punter's hands anyways. You don't have to worry about the wind. And I was like, yes. I would have loved

to hear that from like somebody going into a game like in Cleveland. We had a game in Cleveland. It was so cold, so windy. I mean, it was ass. And I did terribly. And I thought I was built for that. Like born in Pittsburgh, West Virginia, like I'm ready for this. and just mentally and physically just wasn't able to really do well. It would have been great if Andrew just throws four picks that game, you know, just four massive 55-yard picks. He did it for me. He didn't do it for me on purpose, I don't think,

but he said it did cross his mind. Like, ah, worst thing that happens here is 50-yard gain if an interception happens. Drake Bay just did it last week. It's like in these super windy games, punting is so hard. I didn't even mention the snap. That's 15 yards where that thing has to be. That's the scary thing.

When it's that windy, that snap is not easy. That's for sure. That's a 15-yard completion. like nobody really talks about it and somebody Can Sam punt? Can Sam Donald or Stafford punt and do the old Ben-Raltzberger take a couple steps back and then all of a sudden he quarterback boots it? Could. That would be even more

scary though because the free fall is what I talked about. So whenever somebody drops the ball and then from hand to foot there's a moment where that ball is just kind of lingering and it doesn't have a lot of power or force it's just kind of just hanging there and if the wind's bad and that thing moves it's like you got no shot to hit that thing

clean basically. So punning is a nightmare in this type of weather. In this is one of those games that I'll watch and I'll just be like so pumped that I don't even have to ever feel that feeling again of walking onto a field in warm-ups and just feeling and being like, well, let's hope I don't ruin my entire career today. Let's hope that this doesn't happen. And the worst thing that happens, you hit a shitty ball because it moves, hits off the inside of your foot, it's low, returner gets it, house call. Okay, so not only is it terrible average, it's a touchdown, Angie's fucked your team. So, all right.

It's been fun. That's possible tonight for the punters. So I believe in Dixon. Yeah. Yeah. I think he's very good. Who's a Rams punter? The Jack guy, right?

Ethan Evans. I like him. I think he's very good. On the flipside, though, for returners trying to catch those punts, if they actually do catch them, they can also muff them a lot easier. Yeah, a lot of this. A lot of this. Yeah, they're going to be getting away from it, for sure. A lot of Peter, poison.

What did you guys say? Peter. Always. I always heard Peter as well. Whole life. Every person, Peter. And then there's people that say, like, poison. too. You ever hear that? People say that?

I definitely heard other teams say poison. Yeah, we were, I was, we said Peter from first grade on probably. Yeah, and I think even backyard football, street football. What is that? What's the, what's the background of that? How did that start? It might be regional as well, because I've only ever heard poison. Back in, I think it was the early 20s,

1920s, Peter Van Dyke, he, he muffed the pun, he shouldn't have touched and so Peter, Peter, Peter. And then the band Poison, who obviously legendary band, yeah, their axe man was a punter. and, you know, growing up in the Northeast, he... He was just showing respect.

He started the whole poison thing. Poison, poison. Great bands. Get away from the ball. Yeah, listen to music. Don't touch the ball. Exactly. Yeah, there's a chance. Both those things are true. And there's a chance, both of them or not. I assume there is a guy named Peter, though, that did something on a pump play. And everybody was like, this fucking asshole, don't be him.

Just don't do it. All right, let's go to do the Saturday double-header for the NFL. Philadelphia and Washington, Washington with Marcus Marriota, over under 44 and a half. Philadelphia Eagles seem to be very very. jolly on hard knocks i'm actually really falling in love with their team yeah uh bradley cooper obviously was in attendance with a big smile on his face go watch his new movie uh is this thing on is available what tomorrow yeah december 19th up movie right yes uh it's with will will arnette arnette and uh laura durn fascinating he wrote directed shot and is in bradley cooper

so you're talking like super talent in this entire thing and we potentially heard from him while he was shooting and creating this. We're talking about actually holding the camera for a lot of these shots and then directing and then editing and the whole writing the whole thing. So we're incredibly pumped for Bradley Cooper. We think he did a great job. The tomato

score for this is very high. Certified fresh. Very, very. And it's like a 90 plus, I think. Very, very high. So congrats to him. And Will Arnett and Cooper, I believe, have been friends for a very long time. And Cooper was so excited and thankful that Will Arnette agreed to do it. Seems like he was

perfect for the character. We got a chance to watch like the first 45 minutes in here. Very thankful for the opportunity to do that. You're going to see the artistry in there, brother. I mean, there is shots, the whole thing. It's, uh, congrats to him. That's available tomorrow, I do think. Yeah, he 31 Zip. Eagles just beat the Raiders. Philly favored by six and a half. Who do you like? How do you like it, AJ? I mean, I, I got to go Philly here. I, I'm trying to talk myself into taking Washington because I like a lot of the guys that like Dan Quinn, but I like field here minus six and a half i'll ride with you as well 31 zip will shut up anybody who might have some doubts myself included for who that philodeffie eagles team is and who they can be and it's

meaningful football time all seriani's teams right except for that one year where they lose six straight have seemingly got better towards the end green bay versus chicago bears bears one and a half point dogs in chicago could be one of the last times they play in the city of chicagos go ahead bruce uh what's that oh i'm sorry the bears favored by point and a half they're dogs yeah yesterday. They were one and a half point dogs yesterday. Okay, so this is coin. What changed? This coin flip. I think the news

that this could be one of the final games in Chicago is maybe what changed things. AJ, we haven't got your opinion on that. Bears exploring all options as another seemingly deal to relocate is now no longer a hundred

percenter. Northwest Indiana, Gary area, only 31 minutes away from where Soldier Field currently is. said, hey, we're open for business. And Governor Mike Braun, who is a former businessman, now governor in Indiana, said, hey, we're open for business. And then allegedly there was either a law that was pitched or already on the books

that could involve, I think, sports complexes being built for professional teams with tax-free incentives if you're to build it. So it's like everything that we've heard that the Chicago Bears are looking for and any team is looking for whenever they're trying to build these new massive stadium, hotel, shops, restaurants, Patriot, place Jerry World type business. Indiana's like, yeah, we got it for you if you really want it. And if you can have it, we got it.

And we're close. We're close. You can still be that. So, AJ, I know Packers fans would make fun of the Chicago Bears fans forever. I think Chicago Bears fans would not be happy at all. But it feels like the Chicago Bears relocation thing is just as bad as like when the athletics are trying to leave Oakland here. It's not really going well for them, AJ.

No, it's not. I mean, come on. Now, you can't have the Chicago. Bears have a stadium in Indiana. I don't care how close. If I'm Indiana's governor, mayor, if I'm Indiana, absolutely bring them in. Build your stadium. Give me your millions and millions of dollars and tax dollars are coming in and we're going to bring all this revenue

for sure. But no, the bears need to be, they need to play in Chicago. The Jets and Giants play in New York City? No, they're the New York Jets, New York Giants, and they play in New Jersey. That's what I thought. Yeah. Chicago Bears. So maybe it happens. I mean, we're negotiating in the public. That's what we're doing here. That's all we're doing. Potentially, but they've done this multiple times. Kevin Warren has done this

multiple times and it has come back not good multiple times where it said like, yeah, we're doing it. Can't get the funding actually so we're not going to be able to do it. Well, why did you say you're going to do it? It felt like you thought you were going to get the funny. Well, there's always a chance. And then, we're doing it. Where the Cowboys play

it? And then all of a sudden they got it. Arlington. Hmm. What are the Niners play? It is the state of Texas. Santa Clara. Oh. We're talking to cities. We're talking states. We're just saying there's a lot of lies.

We're talking about the Midwest bears here. We're talking about the Gare Bears. Country Bears. Gary and Midwest Bears, the American Bears. Is that what you're talking about? Chicago Bears? I guess so. Yeah, I don't know.

I mean, either way, nothing's happening anytime soon. Oh, Governor Mike Braun said, actually, we can break ground tomorrow. Right now. Can't touch Michael Jackson's house. Okay, can't do that, but... Anything else. Where's that? Gary.

Gary? You mean? Yeah, I should drive through Gary all the time coming to and from Green Bay. See, so you know the land well. So Michael Jackson's house going to be right there. The Chicago, sorry, the Gare Bear Casino will be right here. You can not only stay at the Garber Casino, which we're getting all the revenue from all the hotel rooms and everything else that's happening right there. You can walk right outside.

I guess what we got, we got the American Bear shopping plaza right here. Oh, my God, not just a gift shop, but obviously any actual stores that you could potentially need on a trip. you want a new jacket maybe to go hang out maybe some gifts we got 14 different stores here a full plaza build a bear workshop oh my gosh and not only can you build a bear you can also build a nice meal we got 14 restaurants here that you're gonna kind of so basically you come watch the gear bears you're staying in our place you're eating our food you're shopping in our stores you're gambling in our casino and you're watching our team in our stadium that's all possible that's all possible not just michael tito also born there okay all the jacks and the rest of

There's a bunch of them. And. Latoya. And. Jermaine. Jermaine. And? That's about as far as I'm getting.

You're close, though. I mean, you're, I think you're. Yeah, you were very, very close. You almost had it. Joe? Is that Joe? That could be their pump-ups on. Their renegade turns into ABC.

Yeah, you know me. Oh, my gosh. Or man in the mirror. Don't ray me. ABC, one, two, three. And then they could, in the back of each end zone, beat it. For only Bears players.

maybe thriller i mean if we're just going to start listening off all the songs that we know by michael jackson i like that but in the back of the end zone the gear bears cleats they'll have secret things in there they can strap into two metal things and they can do that forward lean yeah yeah so that could be only in certain spots in the back of the end zone only the gear bears will know the location of and their cleats they'll be able to strap in like it's a bike you know like a peloton bike and then all of a sudden they're and then the refs are going to be like if he goes below what would that be 45 degrees? If he goes past 45 degrees, you've got to throw the flag. He just can't go to. Yeah, you can't be. Can't do that. Caleb in those things, he's going, he's going to 10 degrees.

Oh my God, I didn't even think about him all the way down. He's going to get a macha probably. Mm-hmm. A garret which they own the matcha shot. It might be Caleb's matcha, right outside. Maybe Calibs. Could be. Some say, Caleb. Some say Khalid. Roma Dunzee and Luther Berner are out for this one. They just got rolled out. All right. AJ, is that change anything for you? Packers, I was a shit low. No, but with all that being said, I will take the Green Bay Packers on the road. I know you want to do it.

I know you're going to pick the Bears, but you want to pick Green Bay because you feel and you know that they're going to win. But I understand what you're doing here. It's a program. You got, you know, you guys can pick against me. Here we go. Okay. This is a must win for the Packers. As I saw the GB there, all I thought to myself was good better, you know?

And then is there best on the other side there? I don't know. He's never got to say that against the Packers, so, you know. Ben Johnson said, I can't wait to beat LaFleur, two times. It would be 2026. Close to 2026, though. Maybe the year starts early, just like Chicago kind of stretches in a Gary, Indiana. They were going to realign the states, AJ. That was being pitched. Seriously, very real. Southern Illinois was about to, like, parts of Southern Illinois were about to become part of Indiana,

and then I think parts of that were about to go to Illinois. It was being pitched. Local news. knows if it's real who knows what's being pitched what's not being pitched but I think politicians are always spitting something mm-hmm I'll take the Packers golly I don't like it good to see you making nice rational decisions oh no I'm actually wanting to a box over there so boom I like to pick let's move along let's go to uh Sunday

games. We have the Buffalo Beals taking on the Cleveland Browns. Bill is favored by only 10.5. Once again, the Colts, 14-point underdogs in Seattle. Okay, I thought that was very disrespectful by the books. I will continue to think that is disrespectful. Buffalo Bill is favored by 10 and a half in Cleveland. Cleveland's defense in Cleveland crazy. Miles Garrett can obviously get a record for most sacks ever recorded in one NFL season. Shador Sanders fresh off a lot of picks what do you think goes how do you think goes AJ who do you like how do you like it

I mean I feel like this Buffalo Beals team is really rounding into form and they're really starting to hit their stride obviously Josh Allen doing well so I will take the Buffalo Beals on the road minus 10 and a half 15 mile an hour wins 28 degrees 30 degrees is what NFL weather dot com

colder windy or the better for Josh and the bills you know that agreed a slight chance of rain so it could be a little bit shitty give me Josh Allen in the bill is favored by 10 and a half as well. Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Carolina Panthers. Now, this one's interesting because Canal is the head coach of the Carolina Panthers, formerly of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, reference how this particular ref crew loves call pass interference. And for Mike Evans, this might be a little bit of a benefit. For the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, they might be

able to eat off this. Now, I know this because shit, we did whenever we were down there with Mike Evans in our weapons that we had. So that could be a storyline that could develop. I also appreciate the fact that we're starting to talk about these types of things with ref crews going into it because teams talk about this type of shit with ref crews. Hey, this crew is more likely to call hold. This crew is more likely to let it go. This crew calls the handsy shit. This crew does these types of things.

So these are the types of conversations that actually happen in buildings. Now that it's becoming public, I like it, especially with the NFC South on the line here. Who do you like? How do you like it in Carolina in Tampa Bay, A.J. Hawk? Yeah, the bucks have been a bit of a weird team for me to try. I've picked the bucks a lot of times. I've been, it's blown up in my face, but I feel confident.

I'm taking the bucks here minus three, even though they are favorites on the road. Why are they favorites? They should be, you should give the Panthers, you know, minus three. You need to talk to sports books for that. So 57% of the public bets are on the Carolina Panthers. Congrats to them.

There's no way that has ever happened. Nope. In a long time. It has not happened in a long time. I'll take the Carolina Panthers plus three at home. I was going to say if you believe in that the Panthers basically have been really shitty one week and then they look like world beaters

the next week and then they look really shitty the next week. They got beat by the Saints last week. A lot of people saying, hey, that may have been their really shitty game. They might come out like gangbusters and this one at home. To his point, Panthers are five and one straight up after a loss and 6-0 against the spread after a loss.

Kansas City Chiefs, favored by three in Nashville. Gardner Minshew at quarterback? Yeah. Okay, he gets a full week to work with the boys. Oh, yeah. He's going to want to win. Darden Minshu, perfect quarterback for the situation that the Tennessee Chiefs are currently in, I would say. He's older, he's respected. He only knows one speed, so hopefully that can rally everybody around him to buy in.

Andy Reed and the Chiefs have to figure out what the future looks like, obviously, in the offseason. The present is the Tennessee Titans. Cam Ward has come out and said something about wanting to meet all the coach candidates. Cam Ward, I don't think you should want to do that, and I think you should not say that publicly. Just naturally, I appreciate what you mean by that and the sentiment of that, but everybody's natural reaction would be okay but okay that is basically what everybody immediately does okay let's try to do something erin rogers wasn't even talked to whenever the green bay packers hired their new coach matt lefleur currently some places do it some

places don't tennessee titans have a lot to figure out not saying cam ward's going to be a bad quarterback not saying cam ward shouldn't feel as if he should talk to the coaching candidates but cam ward should also know that it's much bigger than him whenever it comes to an NFL franchise and who knows what the Titans look like next year. With him, without him, move on from him. You know, he has no idea what this looks like anyways either. Can't see the Chiefs favored by three with Gardner Minshu. Who do you like?

How do you like it, AJ? I mean, I was thinking of taking the Titans here because I think the Chiefs have never been in this situation. A lot of these guys in the team have never been in a situation where you're not going to make the playoffs game doesn't really mean a whole lot. But I can't do it. I'm taking the Chiefs still.

Yeah, Chief's going to play free down there. Anyo, hey, a lot of history in Nashville for one particular one of those players. for one of those particular players. Who knows he's going to be singing the national anthem? Is it going to be Taylor Swift? Maybe. For a team under 500?

Chargers. She'll be wearing Chiefs gear. Oh, okay. Chargers. Bolte. Oh, yeah. Chargers. Cowboys. Cowboys favored by two and a half at home.

76% of the bets are on the Chargers. Yeah, Chargers need this one. They are at Dallas this week, but then verse Houston on the road and then at home, rather. And then at Denver. if they drop this one, then there is a chance that they finish in that seven seed or after the Colts beat the Niners, damn your fall out of the playoffs. Just came out today that Fluse will be spending the rest of the season up in the booth, calling the defense from up in the booth.

Okay, I thought their defense was kind of figuring it out. I like to work making some changes down the stretch here. A big fan of that. Dak Prescott and Brandon Aubrey had an incredible interaction on hard knocks after Brandon Aubrey knocked the guy down, didn't lose his balance. And then also admit it on the side of that, I don't know what I'm supposed to do in that situation. obviously grew up playing soccer, played soccer in the majority of his life, gets a tackle.

Then I guess he showed up a little bit late to practice, probably had some media obligation, maybe it was yeah, I have no idea what he was doing. And as he jogged out after Dak, the entire team was like, okay! And Dak even goes over to him, was like, hurt a little bit, though, right? Heard a little bit? And Aubrey's like, yes. It feels like their vibes are immaculate

at the Dallas Cowboys. I know that, you know, not everything has gone swimmingly for them this year. I know there's been ups, there's been downs, but if you watch the hard Knox. It's hard not to be a believer in Dak Prescott be in the face of anything you want to run. Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And I think that you know, I just think back to when they hired

Shottie and just how it was kind of like, not that he was going to be a lame duck, but everyone basically saying like, this is who you guys, you fired Mike McCarthy, you had no plan in place and you just said, all right, fuck it, we're going to hire Shottie. I think he's, I think all those guys really like him. They play

for him. I think he's done. I mean, the Cowboys were the laughing stock of the NFL after they traded Michael Parsons. And, you know, 10 weeks later, we were talking about them being maybe the hottest team in the NFL. So, yeah, they're probably not going to make the playoffs. But this season overall has been kind of a success for them. Yeah, they're damn near out. 99.9% eliminated from the playoffs.

A lot would have to happen. They would obviously have to win and many other things would have to fall into place. Do you like the Chargers or do you like the Cowboys, AJ? I was leaning Chargers, but honestly, you guys kind of talked me into taking the Cowboys. So give me Dak and the Boys here. I don't know how to take on this one. I mean, for one team it's a must win. for the other team.

It's, uh, let's go have some fun. Yeah, which you don't know. Exactly. Yeah, I know. That's why it's, uh, playing loose. That's why, like, for the Chiefs, I feel like the Chiefs are going to play very fucking good because it's just like,

first time in forever. Exactly. Yeah. Travis Kelsey hasn't played a who cares game. What in? And think when they come out to warm-ups for that Titans game, like, the stands probably aren't going to be jam-packed. It's going to be bring your own juice, one of those games.

And the, for the Chargers, I mean, there's a third one in the row. Like, they were overtime against the Eagles, and it was 16, 13, last drive against chiefs now it's at dallas i think i saw some uh resume uh for the chargers about the most wins against playoff teams or something like that i think the chargers have a lot of like if we're to score good wins i think or uh strength of schedule and shit like that i think the chargers fans were telling me if it might have been another team so maybe i missed there was i know there was something in the group about uh teams uh with records uh above 500 above 500 and the rams were 10 and whatever and everyone else was like three and whatever

I don't know if that was it I thought there was a charger stat somewhere because there was some Chargers fans tweeting me to have respect for what they're doing over there and it's like we do all right I'll take I'll take the Chargers

I'll take the Chargers plus two and a half going over there that's interesting though man that Chargers team I want to believe right don't we all yeah we do you don't want to believe not after not after what

that child had to hear last week. He's just trying to talk to his favorite player. Well, it's not his favorite player. We know that. To one of his favorite players. To a player, yeah. But on that note, still a child. Still just a small boy with an

even younger sister at his heels. Those are influential moments in the history of people's lives. I can't go home and rip posters down. Now, would Dak do that? Mm-mm. All right, so on that note,

give me the Chargers. Because Herbert's going to have to walk around a lot of kids. Exactly. He's going to be fucking pissed. So mad. So mad to see all these people and kids talking to him. Oh, fuck this. I fucking hate these people.

Why are these people here? This is football. They're not a fucking carnival. Hit me, Jim. Hit me. Right in the face. Actually, you know that kid, too. Smack my hand really fucking hard.

I forgot to get a broken limit. He does. Vikings, Giants. Vikings in nine, favored by three going to take on dart. AJ, who do you like? you like it? I like the Giants. Whoa.

Jeez, that's quick. I don't know why when I saw this game pop up, too. I like Jackson Dart and the Giants. I really do. All right. I think you finish the game. I'll follow the lead of betting against you. Give me the Vikings.

Windy, what's the weather here? I mean, it might help. There's a chance of snow, and nobody's going to fucking be there. Amen. It's going to be a, you're going to have just your buddies in the sidelines. Long Beach. Yeah. Just your buddies on the sideline for this one.

All right, I'll take the, I'll take the Vikings. Give me nine. Yes. Get me nine. Jets, saints, saints, favorites by four and a half. I like the saints, AJ. Saints. Bengals, dolphins.

I like the dolphins. What do we think the crowd for that one's going to be? Similar to the morning. Quinn, yours first start. Place will be cranked. Four and a half. Who do you like, AJ? I know Joey B is trying to throw us off the scent

and that's like he, things aren't really great, but I like Joey B here on the road. Give me the Bengals. That is. What? He said the same thing last week, and they went out and laid an egg. I did.

You're right. Miami, models, fashion, warm. Oh, good point. Give me the Bengals. Give me the Bengals. Give me the Bengals minus four and a half. Jack's a whole, but it felt like maybe a rally around moving on from Tua down there.

Oh, everyone's pumped. I saw the center get interviewed He was, he seemed pretty excited That's one of our games Fire Coach games, one of them And new quarterback is one of them I'll take Dolphins plus four and a half at him Let's go, Gump, let's go

Gotta have it Well, no No, you had to have had No, no, Quinn yours first start Gotta have it Well, who's gonna coach him next year If he is the quarterback? We'll figure that out down the road

We just got to win on Sunday Yeah, just cover Is all we're looking for plus four to have Yeah, Jags, Broncos Broncos favored by three in Denver. This Jacksonville Jaguars team special. Trevor Lawrence coming off his best game as an NFL quarterback by far. Five through the sky, one through the ground, six total touchdowns.

They got weapons, they got schemes, and they got a defense that's seemingly humming. How do you feel about this one, A.J. Hawk with the hot Denver Broncos. Yeah, I'm a big fan of what Treve and the boys are doing down in Jacksonville, but I feel like this is Bo Nix and the Broncos defense on this one. So give me Broncos. 58% of the bets on the Jacksonville Jaguars, good for them. I'll take the Broncos as well. Falcons Cardinals, just because I need the Broncos, by the way.

Falcons Cardinals, three points spread. 53% of the bets are on Arizona. Kirk Cousins breaking down every offense in the NFL at press conferences. Rahim Morris says everything's on the table for the quarterback position going forward. Ownership says everything's on the table for every position going forward potentially. And then the Cardinals routinely lose by 20 points. That is seemingly who they are now. What are your thoughts, AJ?

Who do you like? How do you like it? So, Kerkow's starting for the Falcons, right? This game? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, we just don't know. I like the Falcons. I feel like they've got to figure out. And like you said, you say that the Cardinals routinely lose by 20. I don't know if they lose by 20, but I think the Falcons win in cover here. They might lose by 20.

Drake London did practice yesterday. He's missed four straight games, and I think Marvin Harrison, Jr. also practiced for the start. I like that. I like the Cardinals team. I like Gannon, but every time you look at the score, it's just not good. stink. Yeah, I don't know what happened. I have no idea what happened to them. They got great local commentary team, though. Number two in the NFL, some people. Number two in the league. Also, Trey McBride

is 12 catches away from setting the all-time record for single-season catches for a tight-in. Good luck to McBride. I hope he gets it this weekend. He has been fun to watch, and his intensity would be great on a good team. So hopefully they're able to become that. I'll take the Falcons as well. Raiders, Texans. Texans

favored by 14 and a half, over under 37 and a half. So you start looking at the over-under and then you look at how big their favorite. They're like the Raiders are scoring, maybe three points in this game. Their team total is 10 and a half. Okay, exactly. Shut out by 30-plus, out-game by 300-plus. The Raiders, Ken City-Filly became the second team to have multiple such games in a season

since the 1947 Colts who are in Baltimore, obviously. Shut out-up by 30-plus and out-gained by 300-plus yards. It's only happened one other time in history multiple times in the season. This Raiders team is one of them. and this Texans team, it can certainly do it. And I will take the Houston Texans, minus whatever. You as well, AJ? Absolutely, Texans.

Lions favored by seven at home against the hot Pittsburgh Steelers. Aaron Rogers is going to want to go into Detroit and get a big time win. Obviously, he has a lot of history in Detroit. Foxy, favored by seven, love it or hate it? Seven's a lot of points, but if you guys remember, Dan Campbell, after a loss, holds the record currently. I think it's tied for the record for wins after. or a loss. So this would continue that record, break the record. And it's just been a weird season.

Our offense is like number one in every category, but the defense can't stop anyone. So I'm expecting a shootout. If it's a shootout, I think Lions win. Tom? Yeah, I tend to agree with what he said. Lines 5 and 0 this year off a loss, four and one against the spread off of loss this year. The one thing that they are horrendous at is their secondary in the passing game. So do the Steelers have the offense to exploit that? I don't know. I've been excited to see. this one doesn't matter. D.K. McCaff gave a great answer on Coons's podcast about Pittsburgh, basically being a, hey, his team just shows.

This city just shows up to work. They're genuine people. You know exactly how they feel. There's a ruggedness to the city that he appreciates. You're about to work or that I like. I like to hear that from D.K. McK. McHaf, I like Pittsburgh Steelers getting seven going into Detroit.

Detroit might win the game, but getting blown out at this stage. I don't think this team's going to have that happen to him. Go ahead, AJ. Yeah, I'm with you. I think the Steelers also, they get indoors. they feel pretty good. Your body feels good. You're all, you know, your joints, everything's great. So, yeah, I'll take the Steelers as well.

Watch out for the Demon. I was going to say, it's not just Rogers who has the NFC North, you know, memories in that building. The Demon. I think the Demon's going to score his first touchdown as a Pittsburgh Steeler this weekend. I like that. You got a cake from Tom Cruise today. Very true. New England Patriots taking on to Baltimore Ravens on Sunday night football.

Obviously, when you forecast this at the beginning of the season, you wonder if the New England Patriots are going to be good enough to make this game matter. Now, if we were to forecast this Sunday night football game at the beginning or at this stage of the season, it's like, what the hell happened to Baltimore? And also, what the hell happened to New England? This team all of a sudden is Super Bowl favorite, Super Bowl darling, whenever they got a first year head coach, second year quarterback, brand new offensive system, and an expectation level going in that maybe next year they'll be good. Maybe in the next couple years they'll be good. They're good now, and they want it all.

And they're underdogs going into Baltimore. Conman, how do you feel about that? Yeah, this is going to be a tough one to pick right now. Bob Spillane, Marcus Jones, Carlton Davis have missed practiced the last two days, including today. Yeah, Bobby Spillane. Yeah, boy, oh, boy, last week against the bills when that starting defense runs out. And Bob Spillane doesn't run with him. That's kind of when you started thinking, uh-oh, Josh Allen might have some fun today.

But the Ravens defense has kind of come alive. That's the real problem. Shutting out Burrow, you know, maybe in maybe not this year. means as much, but still blanking them means a lot, but three point dogs. I mean, kind of love it. Win and we're in the playoffs, baby. Let's go to the dance.

80% of the bets are on the New England Patriots. Fuck, man! That is not surprising. What the fuck? What do you mean? That's surprising. I thought they'd be favorites. Even on the road, I thought they'd be two.

AJ, you're taking a Patriots? Yes, I am. Yeah, me too. All right. Let's have the greatest weekend of all time. Hell yeah. Oh. Yeah.

You guys want to pick the J. Paul Anthony Joshua a fight yep AJ um I love Jake but I'm gonna take Anthony Joshua okay well I am a real American so give me Jake Paul Jake said he's gonna be coming everywhere yeah he did and he said fifth or six round I don't like the angle in which Jake Paul is choosing to create content here but certainly get a lot eyeballs on that situation that the fight's happening a lot of people seeing Anthony Josh will pick up Jake Paul and suck his face. Yeah. That was AI.

It was. I know that one I could tell. I still think the Silverback Gorilla might be real. Yeah, I don't love that that was immediately shot down as fake. If that silverback gorilla had the capability of doing that. Whoever shot it down immediately is an asshole.

Okay, that's something you've got to watch 10 times before you say, okay, fine. Poop doesn't just come out like a circle perfectly like that. Well, you would think if he does have consistent flow out of his cheeks, which clearly he could. Definitely. The window would then be doing

the science, and it would disperse at a perfect radius. And we don't know, do they just put some wind decks on that exact spot? So it kind of just catches it naturally. Makes that shape. And we assume that this man, sorry, this silverback gorilla has perfected the art of

bullet pooping. No doubt. And that was clearly birdshot. That's one of those things. Correct. So just the velocity, it which the turds flew out are what threw me out made me think it's probably not real so you've obviously never watched

them and he didn't see them and he clutches his butt right there yeah he aims it so like four he's probably four feet away from the window and somehow he got turds that's one yard dude we anybody get a yard that was believable to me you see the gorilla just sit down

right before to project our boom he did it's strategy see the muscles I can't rule it up Because in sixth grade, we went to Washington, D.C., and we went to the zoo, and there was a hippo with the zoo. They spin their tails. He pooped with similar velocity, but they spin their tails and chop it up. So it was impressive to see him in person.

You ever seen that? It's similar. It's awesome. No. I mean, if Bivo pushed the way that gorilla did, it would have pooped on your back. Yeah, but Bivo is a longhorn. This is a silverback fucking gorilla. Yeah.

It's a zoo. We don't know. Like, did this, did a couple burgers get dropped into the enclosure? Did this guy eat a couple slices of Zah that day? before he had to do something like this. We don't know. Case Doritos back. Well, maybe it was that.

But also what we would like to say, because he clearly has an upset tummy if you're able to do this. Yeah. He should be having some of Tom Cruise's coconut, blunt cake. I couldn't agree more. Yeah, maybe not the venison, because my stomach is killing me.

Really? Dude, multiple times. Is it the cheese, you think? Well, I eat the same thing every day. Did you have the cheese? I had both, yeah. Maybe it was the cheese. Not just the veils.

medicine, you never know. You guys get tummy eggs a lot from food? What's that, brother? You guys like get tummy aches because of food? No. Fast food, greasy stuff will get me now, I think, because I'm trying not to eat it as much. So I certainly feel like shit,

but I think I've just always felt like shit eating it and it's just been a part of it. Like, yeah, this is just what life is. My stomach feels like this, and then I dump it and I move along. Now, whenever you don't eat it every day, you do feel differently when you don't eat that type of food, and then when you have it out of nowhere,

it's like a hangover, like when you get drunk your body. You're tired. I just get tired Yeah And also Explosive I know I've never like Yeah I don't know

I've never thought of Like I've never correlated food To how I feel like that He put you don't eat anything He poops like a rabbit I do AJ hasn't had a normal bowel movement In 15 years

He's got rabbit pellets in there I remember he's a hundred wiper I don't know how That's a good point So now he's acting like that Silverback gorilla could Yeah okay He probably poops like that girl

Yeah he's the vanilla gorilla and he's out here just judge it. I instantly thought of which poor soul has to clean that glass is all I thought of, bringing out like brillo pads and scrapers trying to get those turds off the window. That silverback gorilla is not cleaning that.

That sober back gorilla is arms cross watching whoever. Clean it. I'm doing it again tomorrow too. Do it again. The second it gets clean dumps again. I would like the Tom Cruise coconut cake. Now.

Or we're doing this every day. Yeah. All right, have an incredible weekend of ball. We appreciate you so much for allowing us to do this for a living. Before we get out of here, there is an announcement that we have to make. Saturday we'll be doing the field pass. Please join us on ESPN2. If we suck, you should leave.

We'll tell you if it's not going well. And today, we celebrate one of the most talented human beings that sits in front of a microphone on a daily basis in the entire world, maybe the history of the damn world. He was smart enough to be an Ivy leaguer, got accepted to Harvard, said, nah, I want to be a big 10 angler at Iowa. Give me the booths, give me the football. I'll figure everything else out. We're so incredibly lucky that this guy blesses us every single day with his presence.

I would say that he is one of the most unique individuals in the history with his talent versus mindset, versus off the cuff versus script work. He's special. We're lucky, and it's his birthday. Happy birthday to Ty Schman. Happy birthday, Ty. Thank you guys, very much. We appreciate the hell out of you.

I guess the ice cream cake melted. Shout out to the entire group over there. Just certainly just put it outside and just left it there for at least an hour or two. It was cold. We appreciate it. It was ice cream. Now it's just cream. So that's actually...

Yeah, this is a TC cake. Okay, so... Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, dear Tye. Happy birthday to you. We love you. We appreciate you, buddy. Happy birthday.

Appreciate you guys. Thank you very much. Hell yeah. Shout out to admit. It's the first time that there hasn't been a bunch of wax all over the cake. Well, that's because they had to adjust here late. Good for them making an audible. And yes, to your point, it's crazy how. when there's a birthday in the back room, they all sing.

Yeah, just us. Now singing in the back. We were singing the whole time. No mics were on me in here. We didn't see anything. So, Ty, just know that there is a little bit of a... Now I do. Yeah, now we just learned that.

You run the footage back. Yeah, it's all the audience. You can't hear it. But we would see me screaming at the top of my lungs. Yeah, he didn't cut to us either. That doesn't help. Nope. Oh, true.

Boom. See, that's what we're talking about. That boy, Nick. Thank you, Nick, who didn't turn on the mic. Didn't sing. And thank you. Foxy for pointing that out back there but I would like to let you know Ty we love you man love you guys too thank you very much happy birthday we're thankful you were born and uh we can't wait to see what

you do this next year appreciate it and I'm very proud of you for saying you're going to be uh eating free and clean and living clean for the next year I'm certainly going to try I got another kid on the way so I definitely need to uh try but you guys heard JJ yesterday he said man you look slim you look good uh and no one has fucking said that to me in years so I don't know. I'm kind of thinking I'm just fine right now. You certainly are. You're more than fine. But I eat this whole fucking T.C. cake right after the show.

Well, I think that's smart. Yeah. Well, the elixir of eternal life, a lot of people would say. Be your friend, tell a friend something nice. I'll change your life. We're in this thing together. AJ, anything for the team here? Nope. I'm good. Thank you, though. Okay. Hell yeah. Okay. Thank you, too.

I'm not going to fake it. I'm not going to fake one, but yeah. Can't wait for Saturday. All right. We'll see you tomorrow. game day, 6 p.m. Eastern tomorrow before kicking off the college football playoff. Game day, Saturday morning, 9 a.m. And then we'll be live, field pass, ESPN2

for Texas A&M, Miami. The college football playoff is here. Week 16 in the NFL season is here. Football, all day, Saturday, all day, Sunday. We're back on Monday. We can't thank you enough for allowing us to do this for a living. And in this holiday season,

we hope we all enjoy it a little bit more. We're allowed to do this. We get to do this. We're lucky to do this, and we're not dead. Let's celebrate that. Team on me, team on three. One, two, three, team. Goodbye!