The Pat McAfee Show - PMS 2.0 261 - Adam Schefter, Matt Hasselbeck, Mark Schlereth, & AJ Hawk

Episode Date: September 30, 2020

On today's show, Pat and the boys react to the news that the NFL has officially decided to move the Steelers/Titans to Monday night, and to chat about everything going on with that situation, Pat welcomes in ESPN NFL Insider, the king of the Adam Bomb, Adam Schefter (5:17-11:40). Next, 17 Year NFL Quarterback, 3x Pro Bowler, and current NFL analyst on ESPN NFL Countdown, Matt Hasselbeck joins the program. Pat and Matt discuss the situation going on with the Titans, and how having to potentially play on Tuesday would hurt the Steelers. Plus Matt explains what Joe Burrow needs to do better so he doesn't get killed, and his thoughts on the Bears QB carousel (22:31-50:15). Next, 3x Super Bowl Champion, 2x Pro Bowler, member of the Broncos 50th anniversary team, and current color commentator for NFL on Fox, Mark "Stink" Schlereth joins the show. Pat and Mark chat about how difficult it would be to play a game on Sunday without having any physical reps during the week, especially for an offensive lineman, who he thinks is going to get fired first, Vic Fangio or Adam Gase, what game he's calling this weekend, and much more (53:06-1:16:42). Lastly, on another edition of McAfee & Hawk Sports Talk, Pat and AJ discuss everything going on with the outbreak in the Tennessee Titans locker room, plus dive through the ESPN power rankings and give their thoughts (1:16:44-1:47:52). Subscribe to youtube.com/thepatmcafeeshow as we close in on 1 million subscribers and a $100,000 giveaway, and listen every day on Mad Dog Radio, Sirius XM Channel 82. We appreciate you all for listening, come and laugh with us, cheers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello! It is Wednesday, September 30th, and oh my god, an NFL game has been postponed because of a virus. Unprecedented territory has now creeped into the NFL. We talked to Shefty about that a little bit. We also talked to other incredible guests such as... Matt Hasselbeck and Mark Schlaireth, baby. What a day, Plus all the boys. Good conversation. We can't thank you enough for choosing to listen to this show.

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for a day now you can go eat like whatever you need and know that your body's taken care of all right let's get to the show massive day massive massive day in the history of the greatest league on planet earth, the NFL. It has been announced officially this morning that the Steelers-Titans game this weekend has been postponed due to a COVID outbreak within the Tennessee Titans organization. Yesterday, it was reported that three Titans players tested positive for the COVID-19 song bitch. Five personnel people tested positive as well on Monday morning. Now it is coming out this morning that one more player has tested positive. So four positive cases in the Tennessee Titans locker room.

Five cases in the Tennessee Titans player personnel area. Nine total cases. They were kicked out of their building yesterday. They were told you weren't going to be able to get into your building until at least Saturday. I early on said, if they're not allowed in the building until Saturday, that means they're probably going to postpone the game, which most likely means that the Steelers will now have a week four bye week instead of playing the Titans and having a week eight or week seven bye week like they're originally supposed to have I was attacked for saying that me saying that the game being postponed was inevitably going

to happen I was attacked for it because more reports came out throughout the day that they were going to have the game more reports came out through the day with Vrabel saying to his team like hey if we have to do zoom calls all week and then a walk through Saturday and play on Sunday we'll do that no excuses which is why Vrabel is awesome then we had reports uh in this particular office from numerous people in the NFL that told us in July the NFL basically said we do not care about competitive fairness whenever it comes to this COVID situation in how it's going to operate. That was probably in lieu of some stadiums having fans. That was probably in lieu of some teams having to potentially have players sit out for numerous days. The NFL told its coaches and members of the NFL that they do not care about competitive fairness

because we just want to have a season, basically. So now here we are, and there was a massive competitive advantage for the pittsburgh steelers playing against the tennessee titans because the tennessee titans weren't going to be allowed to be in their building all week before a game now we're hearing the games postponed so do they care about competitive fairness i would say yes they obviously care about competitive fairness i would say that they knew after yesterday's conversations and talking about it more and listening to former players talk about how this is going to be tough, I think, for them to play. They're like, okay, we'll postpone the game.

Now they're saying the game potentially postponed to Monday night or even Tuesday night, which is quite a nightmare on the backside there for the Steelers and Titans. But, hey, we're in unprecedented times. You got to do what you got to do to make things work. Joining us right now to talk about what he knows. This is a man who knows everything about everything it feels like in the NFL. Ladies and gentlemen, I don't know if he's in his Bentley Rolls Royce or his Maserati. Ladies and gentlemen, NFL insider, the insider from ESPN and the host of the Adam Schefter podcast, Adam Schefter. How you doing?

What a boring call. You're at your house right now, not in your car? Yeah, I'm not driving today. Trying to be safe here, Pat. By the way, the way you were driving was so calm, cool, collected. You used your turn signal and everything. We appreciated that last time. What do you know about this postponement?

Diana Rossini has been in the front line of this, co-worker of yours over there. The game's being postponed after inevitably or initially being talked about is happening on Sunday, whether they just have to do Zoom calls or not. Now they're saying potentially Monday or Tuesday. What are you hearing? What do you think is going to happen? And is there any way that the NFL could have prepared for this type of situation in the offseason? Well, I think that the league did prepare for this in the offseason. It's a situation where basically you've got a case here where the game now, I think they're going to have an answer by the end of the day tomorrow.

And I think they want to see another day of testing before they can determine that this game will happen Monday and Tuesday as they plan. Look, remember, they said yesterday they wanted and intended to have this game happen on Sunday as it was scheduled, and that's not happening. Now they've pushed it back to either Monday or Tuesday. That's what they want and intend to happen, and we think it'll happen. But if there are more positive tests, then it won't happen then either. So I think they're going to give the Titans and Steelers an answer by the end of the day tomorrow.

I think they need to do that. Look, you know, the way I figure it is that a lot of people work from home. What's the difference if they play it Monday afternoon, like 435? Does it matter? What? Oh, Shefty's cooking up ideas. I wonder if you're sending those text messages out with those ideas as opposed to those information coming to you.

I like that idea. I like that thought. Now, for the initial thought that they were just going to play the game on Sunday and power through it, was that because they realized if we test everybody and we find out that there's three positives and five, we can separate those people from the rest of everybody, which is, I think, the purpose of testing everybody on a daily basis and keeping socially distant parameters in the building?

Or why did they clean out the entire building if only, and I don't want to say only three because I would assume contact tracing and everything kind of linked them to other people, but if the negative tests continue to come back from the players only one more positive from the titans i guess if they continue to come back can the guys get back into the building tomorrow friday saturday sunday is that possible are they still the saturday ban until then uh no i mike vrabel said just a short time ago that he doesn't know whether it's going to be saturday or sooner or later look everything is contingent upon the testing because there's an incubation period to the virus.

It's not like you take the test on Wednesday or Tuesday and automatically have the test results back Wednesday. A positive test or a positive with a player or another employee there or a coach could turn out on Thursday or Fridayiday from the weekend they just don't know yet and so they're trying to be careful and i think they'll open their facility when they feel like it's comfortable and clear to do uh they're not going to do it before they recognize what's at stake they're trying to be careful here they're trying to be smart and cautious, which I think they're doing. And again, when they feel

like they have the answers, that's when that building will open. And I think they're giving another 24 hours on the testing part before making the decision. Again, if there's no positives tomorrow, I'll bet you they play the game Monday. If there's one more positive, they might push it back into Tuesday. And if there's more positives

to filter in, then they postpone the game altogether. Okay, so if they postpone the game, Tuesday would be insane, by the way, for both teams. That would be a wild thing to have to do to get ready for a Sunday game when a team didn't have to do that. But I guess they say, well, Thursday's the same way, but Thursday is a different animal. So Thursday has been hated by players for a long, long time.

But, hey, unprecedented times. We've got to get the season done. Let's go ahead and keep it moving here. If they didn't postpone to Monday or Tuesday because another positive comes back, when would they do it? Would they just give the Steelers this bye week, and then week eight is supposedly the Steelers' bye week, push it back, play on the seventh or whatever?

Yeah, I mean, that's where it gets tricky, and that's where you have to start juggling bye weeks. And honestly, I don't think they want to go there. I don't think they're preparing to go there. And until more positive texts come in, they don't want to go there. So, again, you have to figure the bye week will come into play in one way or another, Pat. Why didn't they put in, like, a buffer week? They could have done it.

You know, I still think there are invisible buffer weeks in there because the Super Bowl is scheduled to be, what is it, February, the first Sunday in February in Tampa. And what's to say that they couldn't push the Super Bowl back a week or two weeks or three weeks? I mean, at one point during the offseason, we were talking about moving the Super Bowl back potentially, if needed, not ideally, but if needed, into March or even April. So, again, there's cushion built in there it's it's disguised cushion it's not something that's readily obvious and it's not something that anybody wants to or plans to do but if they had to do it if there were a bunch of tests if there were outbreaks across the league if this happened on multiple weeks to multiple teams, yeah, they could always push back the Super Bowl if they needed to. Shefty, I appreciate you so much for coming in with your big knowledge.

What do you got there? Shefty, if the game is Monday, ESPN automatically gets a second Monday Night Gamer, and then we got Fowler and Herbie again calling Steelers. Here we go. I don't know how that works. I don't know how that would work right now. I think that

what was CBS supposed to broadcast it, so my guess is that it would be CBS's game still on Monday night. I mean, networks don't like giving up games just for the fun of it. So, I don't know how that would work yet. Well, Shefty, we appreciate you so much. Love your podcast.

I heard some Fitz magic on there. He said that Buffalo was his favorite football city, by the way. Bill's Mafia. We can't thank you enough for joining us, brother. I appreciate the hell out of you. Thank you, Pat. Appreciate you. Have a great day. We'll talk soon. Alright, man. Hey, you have a good one over there too, Shefty, will you? Thank you, buddy. Alright, see ya.

Ladies and gentlemen. All the boys here at Tone Diggs, Boston Connor, Ty Schmidt, the boys in the back, we appreciate the hell out of you. 1-888-MAD-DOG-SENSE. You can join the show as well. And Nat Viva Lazzito is here with his big old poll for the day. What is it, Zito? The big poll today is postponement to the NFL games because of COVID.

Do we like it or hate it? And right now, love it, it's at 38.4%. And hate it is at 60, oh, just changed, 60.9%. Okay, so that math doesn't add up but you did change midway so now 39.1 for love it this is very interesting because yesterday when i put out a tweet that hey i think there's pretty big news about to come out and just know that i knew there's a tweet that i put out you did and a lot of people were like oh jay glazer here jay glazer here because the news wasn't that big because i think some people and now listen i don't care

how you feel about a covet 19 whether you think it's the most dangerous thing of all time, which there are some people who truly believe that, or whether you think it's not dangerous at all, which, by the way, there are some people that truly believe that. I wasn't saying that, but I think the big, I don't care how you feel, by the way. Just be safe. Let's go ahead and get on with our life,

hopefully at some point very safely. And after watching last night, I don't know if anybody's going to be able to make that decision next. I mean, that was one of the most absurd things I've ever seen. That's what the political people watch, by the way. The people that don't like sports. Is that what they do every single day is watch stuff like that? Must be.

Right after they go to the news. That was Stephen A. and Skip yelling at each other about real life things. And by the way, just like those hot take sports shows that I just talked about. Not that Stephen A. or Skip's opinions don't matter. But like one day from now, none of that matters. Right? I don't know if that's how I'm supposed to watch that thing last night, but nothing matters. There'll be new information coming out, I'm sure, before the next debate.

I mean, just nothing matters. I would assume that if you hopped on the internet, nobody's changing their vote for any of these. We could have that election, I think, right now, and everybody is going to be dead set where they're at. Same as in November. And by the way, can't wait for that day to come so maybe everybody will start loving each other again

and realizing that we're all in this together. I love that. Hey, I love that too, Zito. And it doesn't matter what one stooge says about the other side or the other stooge says about the other side. It's like, hey, we're all in this thing together. Let's remember that. And hopefully in November that'll happen but it doesn't seem likely.

Fuck all that. Let's talk about the COVID thing where where i said if a game gets postponed because of this that's massive news like that is big news that the nfl in 2020 the nfl that said we're not changing when we're drafting anybody we're not changing anything we might go to zoom otas our season is going to kick off exactly at the time it's supposed to kick off we're not going to change anything and now here we are week four one game's already being postponed how are they going to react how are they going to do it this is an unprecedented thing for the nfl this is something i don't think anybody expected the nfl to have to do but here we are just less than a month into the season we're already moving games that feels like that's pretty big news and i'm excited to see how it all plays out to be completely candid yeah i think as long think if it's on Monday, it's fine.

Let's just start creeping into Tuesday. And then if anything gets canceled, then it's a much bigger deal. Like if the buys didn't work out the way that it seemed like they would work out if they did have to postpone this to another week, then it would become a big deal. But as long as it's Monday, we're good. Tuesday, I guess I saw a 2010 day to postpone a game until Tuesday because of a blizzard season.

Obviously, different, but it's fine. As long as it's not canceled, I'm all right. Yeah, the interesting thing here is, hearing Shefty talk about if they need to push back the Super Bowl or whatever, we were first to report. I should have said this to Shefty's face. Oh, yeah. This is the last time I got into the insider game, by the way.

We're the first to report that the NFL has the Super Bowl hotels for an extended month or first right of refusal for the hotels for an extended month after the Super Bowl because we have ears on the ground in the hotel community down there, hospitality community down there in Tampa Bay sent a message to us, let us know. We then had to get that fact checked because that's what the insiders have to do. It got concurred.

So we always knew that there was a chance that the NFL would extend the season a little bit. But if it's only one team or two teams, there was a chance that the nfl would extend the season a little bit but if it's only one team or two teams how do you do that and still balance everything do you extend the season because of one game or one team who knows i assume that they're expecting maybe this is going to happen again but if it's monday all good midday game by the way awesome awesome maybe do it during this that'd be if you could do it at noon we would appreciate it and by the way monday would be a watch-along for the game, and we would have guests come in.

Oh, my God, it would be awesome if they do that. And that's a good concept there by Schefter. And Schefter's not just saying that, by the way. He's probably heard that from somebody at some point. But if that gets to Tuesday, it's early in the season, which is good. Guys aren't as run down and beat down as they are. But you've got to remember, like, guys in week four, I don't know if this is the case.

I assume there are some people that are like that. Guys aren't feeling like humans again until, like, Thursday sometimes. After a game on Sunday because of all the collision, the car crashes they're in, what their body's been through. They've got a lot of things going on. So that's why the Thursday night game has always been hated by players. It's like you care about player safety, but you've got to play it on Thursday night. You care about player safety, but you've got blah, blah, blah.

That's always the conversation. The Thursday night game is always in there because there isn't enough recovery time for guys. I think we're early enough in the season where that's not going to affect as many people, which is good news. But if they go to Tuesday for this game, is that going to make them do it later in the season when this happens as well? And I would assume the NFLPA is going to have something that's like, hey, we've got guys barely able to get to a game now.

We've got people missing games and everything like that. But hey, unprecedented times. People got to come together and make these fucking games happen because you know why? The world needs the NFL. Steelers-Titans is going to be a very, very, very, very big game long term in the AFC standings. They got to make it happen somehow. And it sucks for the Steelers either way because

the Steelers did not get infected at all here. They're still going through their work. If this game gets postponed, they will not have a bye week throughout this entire season, which is a wild thing. But hey, it's 2020. Everybody's got to deal with different shit, I guess. That was going to be my question. If you were the Steelers, would you rather have it postponed until Tuesday

and then play a short week for week five, or have this be practiced all week, have it be postponed until week eight so this was technically your bye week? Would much rather have a bye week, a full bye week, have it be postponed until week eight so this was technically your bye week. Would much rather have a bye week, a full bye week, because the bye week is a great time for your team to reflect on yourself, for your body and mental headspace. I mean, not for me, it doesn't

matter, right, for my position. It did not matter. It's like, okay, bye week actually hurt me sometimes because I lost a rhythm a little bit. I had to get back into a rhythm because I was on a beach probably somewhere by Wednesday or Thursday, which I'm not 100% sure they're going to be able to do here. But a bye week for a lot of guys, mental, physical, it's like a refresher. And for a team, you do a lot of self-scout there and you can change your entire team. So if you don't have a bye week, it is a competitive

disadvantage, I believe, for a lot of teams. But the NFL said in July, we do not care about competitive fairness whenever it comes to the season. We are going to get the season off because America needs the NFL. Hell yeah! Going forward too, obviously this wasn't, or we don't think it was related to the fans in the stands, but all these teams were planning on bringing in fans slowly, like

week five, week six. They're probably not going to be able to do that anymore now, right? Just on the worry of a possible another breakout. I don't think the fans or anything, right? Because Vikings completely empty. Yeah, yeah. That's what I'm saying. They didn't have a deal, but would they stop that just in case? I don't know because there's a lot of things. By the way, let's bring

up that sidebar for a list of shit for us to talk about. Yeah! The charity event thing with Al Davis. We talked about this yesterday. I talked about this yesterday. And I assume some people called me a bad guy for talking about this. But I saw the Colts players out handing out things to the community, which, by the way, awesome.

Giving back to the community is a big part of being in the NFL. You're lucky to be in the NFL to represent a city. Giving back to the community is something I took very seriously. I was a Walter Payton Man of the Year candidate. Salute to Service Award. I mean, there is, I believe in giving back to the community. But the conversation around this entire season has been, guys are going to have to lock down.

Guys are going to have to contain themselves. Guys are not going to have to be out there doing anything. And then I see a video of Colts players just out there handing out groceries to the community and going into people's cars and dropping things off. And it's like, what the fuck are we doing? Like, I thought, now I understand it's in the shield of philanthropy, which is great. Like, let's do that. But I thought the mindset was, hey, we need these guys to lock it down. Like, don't even see your family sometimes.

So then being out there in the community, I was like, well, that's kind of an interesting thing. Because I remember back in the day when I started doing my show every Tuesday, I started doing a show here in Indianapolis. It wasn't until I was good at my job that I decided to start really, you know, delving into things outside of the field. And I had a show. I did my Twitter a lot. And I got a lot of people that didn't like me, obviously, because that's just kind of the human I am. People are not going to like me.

And they're like, well, if you didn't spend so much time doing blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, your show, your Twitter, your stand-up, maybe you wouldn't have mishit that ball on Sunday or whatever. And that's real things that were said to me, which is why I've always said like Juju and all these guys that are loud, like you're giving people a lot of ammo if you ever have a bad game, because I experienced it.

I had like two bad balls in time and I got attacked for it. And it was very interesting to me that they never attacked me for going and doing an hour and a half breast cancer awareness speech or whatever. They never attacked me whenever I was going out

and doing a military thing for two hours on a Tuesday. It was always any time that I was potentially doing something that could help me long term. If I was doing something community-wise, it literally took a lot more effort. I had to give a speech a couple times that I was not prepared to do, and I had to really think in. That was always, oh, okay, yeah, you do that.

But if you're trying to help yourself at all, that's a big problem. Now we've got the Raiders players going out and doing the community events, and it's like, oh, that that's completely okay they're doing that but if there was to be an outbreak for the raiders because al davis or mark davis i guess is pissed off that raiders players were doing uh didn't have mass home when they were doing charity events would they address the issue for what it is like hey these guys were doing charity things and they got like the titans players go and do something on monday a charity event that is good for the community great for the community not saying you shouldn't do it but i just think if it takes all of us

and we're all buying in, how come there's some other things that are being sprinkled in there as well that potentially jeopardize the game whenever we're putting players at risk playing on Tuesday because of said things potentially happening? I think it's all very interesting. They're obviously trying to wade the water at the moment that we're in. They have no idea. But I assume everything's going to get kind of settled here in the next couple weeks.

And this Titans-Steelers situation is something that they're in. They have no idea. But I assume everything's going to get kind of settled here in the next couple weeks. And this Titan Steelers situation is something that they're going to look back on and say, this is the big decision that we had to make. I'm very, very intrigued by all this. It's a tough spot because, yeah, it was Darren Waller's charity. It was a charity event that he was hosting, and Derek Carr was there, and I guess they didn't have masks on and stuff.

But those two players go down for the Raiders there. Fuck. They're done for. Buddy, they're doing something good in the community, so it's like you can't bash them too much. But it's also like, well, I thought we weren't doing that. Like, I thought we were potentially. Waiting. Locking people down. Yeah.

Like, AQ. I FaceTimed with AQ Shipley from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers last night. He was in his house with a mask on. Wow. AQ. Yeah. Because his daughter had a friend. His daughter did something with a friend

or something like that, and she came back with a runny nose, and AQ was like, I'm not risking it. And AQ hasn't left his house down there in Tampa. It's like, that, I thought, is what everybody was going to have to do. That's why it's such a big deal. That's why you've got to thank the players for not being humans here for like five months. But then when you've got them going out and doing things, it's like, I feel like we're raising

the risk level. And if only three players testing positive is means for a shutdown of a game yeah exactly hey you better tighten the fuck up donner a man that they paid 350 million dollars gary cole you said a man who should be paid 350 million dollars for his incredible brain in the nfl world you can see him on sunday nfl countdown ladies bald head, incredible quarterback, formerly of the Green Bay Packers, Seattle Seahawks, Tennessee Titans, and the Indianapolis Colts. Now, you can find him all over

the interwebs with his big brain and on ESPN. Ladies and gentlemen, the handsome Matt Hasselbeck. Smart. Very smart. I'm in Nashville, Tennessee, Pat. You can't be too safe here in Nashville. Hey, no glove, no love for your face down there in Nashville, to be honest.

Yeah. Have you talked to anybody in the facility? I forgot how close your relationship is with the Titans because you were the starter down there for a good bit, and then before you came to the Colts. What is the messaging around the facility? Because Vrabel came out and said, hey, we did everything we were supposed to do. This thing is just going to happen with this COVID-19 thing.

Is that what you're hearing from the facility and from the people in Tennessee? Well, I think you're hearing from Mike Vrabel exactly what you expect to hear from Mike Vrabel. Like, hey, so what? We'll show up anywhere, anytime, pick a parking lot, a stadium, ready to play. Practice, no practice. I think what I've actually heard from some players on that team is like, hey, listen, this is a huge opportunity. If we can go out there and get a win against the Pittsburgh Steelers with no practice, then think about what practices going forward might look like.

Maybe it's not going to be such a grind. Oh, you got to hit against each other every day on Wednesday and Thursday and Friday in order to prove how tough you are so you can go get a win on Sunday. Like this is an opportunity. I think NFL players around the league are sort of like secretly rooting for the Tennessee Titans this week. Like, man, if they could get a win, you know, we have some leverage here going forward with our coaching staffs. Well, especially week 13, week 14, week 15, week 16, week 17. And they put a number, a limit on how many padded practices are allowed to be had.

I think it's 14 now, 14 padded practices. And I don't think I've ever seen a coach not hit the limit, by the way. I think it's almost like this is the standard now you have to go there. If they can get a dub after Zoom calls and not even seeing each other, I think you're 100% right. There's a lot of people that are like, you see what the Titans did?

And the Steelers team's no joke. They didn't even practice. They didn't even see each other. Hell, they were at home sleeping in until 9 a.m. every morning, and they got a dub. Let's go forward with that. Let's talk about that game.

They're saying it's potentially being postponed to Monday or Tuesday. Diana Rossini, co-worker of yours, is reporting that. Schefter reiterated the fact that maybe the game goes to 4.30 on a Monday. Out of nowhere, if it gets there. As a quarterback, who has to prepare. And I think that's a position that has to be the most prepared. And I don't know if something just died off the camera there or not.

We've got animals, man. It's like living at Zoom. You've got dogs. You've got kids. You've got all that stuff. Anyway, keep going. You're an adult. I apologize. But okay. We've got animals, man. It's like living at Zoom. You've got dogs, you've got kids, you've got all that stuff. Anyway, keep going. You're an adult. I apologize. But as quarterback for Ryan Tannehill here, they're a running team. They're very

much a running team. So you'd be able to keep it very simple and all that stuff. But what does Ryan Tannehill lose out on without the walkthroughs, without the practice if the game is postponed to Monday or Tuesday? Listen, I always loved playing on Thursday night football. I always loved playing on Thursday night football. I always loved playing on Thursday night football because I knew we were going to keep it simple offensively.

We were going to try to invent new plays. We were going to go to our bread and butter plays. And basically, we were just going to do what we always do, do it a little better. And the wrinkles would be pretty simple. That's one thing that I always liked. Another thing that just, I think, an advantage for Tennessee in this situation, going up against the Pittsburgh Steelsburgh steelers that pittsburgh steelers defense that scheme you know it's keith butler

running it right now but like it it um it really has not changed since the days of dick laboe like it's it's the same kind of like you could go into the encyclopedia and sort of know what you need to prepare for that's not why they're the best defense in football they're the best defense in football because they're so versatile and they've got all these different guys that can rush the passer and they can they got guys that can drop out in pass coverage when you're double teaming them in pass protection like that's i i think the advantage for the tennessee titans is that the pitt the Pittsburgh Steelers are very mathematical. And so you got the combination of like, hey, we're going to simplify. Maybe we have fresh legs.

They're not going to necessarily surprise us with anything. Like I can sit home on my on my computer and watch the film that watch the tapes, watch the blitz pickups that they're going to bring. I think the Tennessee Titans actually, if there is a team or a matchup that could pull off a victory in this COVID situation, it's Tennessee. Coach Herman Boone had the philosophy, we're only going to run four plays. It's like Novocaine, man. Eventually it'll work. And that feels like kind of the Tennessee Titans plan right now. You saw the mask on Vrabel that said, please give the ball to Derrick Henry. And this past week, they held true to their account.

Even if we're down, we're going to continue to run the ball. First half, we'll beat them down. Third quarter, fourth quarter, some of these will pop open. We'll be able to make up whatever we got to do. And that's very different than what the Baltimore Ravens tend to do. It feels like the Baltimore Ravens, anytime they get down, they just go completely away from the run. They're like, okay, now we got to pass. We got to pass. We got to pass. We saw that on Monday night. The Tennessee Titans don't do that. They hold true to what they are they know their identity so maybe it isn't that big of a deal that they don't have a couple days to walk through a practice well i would i would just i would just say this you make a great point pat you know mike vrabel you know run the damn ball all

that stuff the offensive coordinator for tennessee is this guy named arthur smith arthur smith was an offensive lineman um at the University of North Carolina. He thinks, I think he understands what an offensive line really wants out of a play caller. He spent much of his career, when I was with the Tennessee Titans, he was actually a defensive coach charting and working on the defensive side of the ball. He understands where run gap discipline is weak. A lot of these creative, you know, sort of guys with like maybe a quarterback background, they let defenses off the hook where they may be susceptible in the run game. I think Arthur Smith has kind of mastered all of it. He's mastered the passing game. He also sees it through the lens of an offensive lineman. And therefore, you know, that marriage of Arthur Smith plus Mike

Vrabel, they're going to run the football. They're not going to let you off the hook. And that's part of the reasons that they are undefeated and one of the best teams in football. COVID might be getting a hold of your service there like every 50th word. You kind of got a Jason Witten thing going on. Can we talk about Joe Burrow for a second? Because you are a guy who as soon as you came into the locker room, you were this wealth of knowledge at the quarterback position, kind of a calm, cooling presence, but you're also backing up a guy who took a lot of shots.

And a lot of people said it was his style of play. That's why he held onto the ball too long. He never gave up on a play, so he'd get killed. And ultimately, that shortened his career. And Andrew Luck was a once-in-a-generation type talent. It was awesome to be a teammate and to watch him play. But it feels like whenever you watch Joe Burrow, he has been slaughtered.

And that shot he took last week, his neck and head dislocated from his body, and then it came back. And he came back in and led his team to a tie. Now, Zach Taylor has come out, and there's a couple quotes where he's like, you know, I don't want to say he's blaming

Joe Burrow for the hits, but he's not letting Joe Burrow off the hook, saying he's playing, he's holding on to the ball too long, he's setting himself up. If you're the he's blaming Joe Burrow for the hits, but he's not letting Joe Burrow off the hook saying he's playing, he's holding on to the ball too long, he's setting himself up. If you're the backup quarterback for Joe Burrow and you walk into that locker room, what are you saying to Joe Burrow? What is the mindset that Joe Burrow should have? And is he just a guy who just likes getting slaughtered? Because I forget who told us this the other day.

Mark Sanchez told us that he doesn't mind taking a shot to kind of like get him into a game. But at some point, if you're the franchise, those shots where you're potentially getting whiplash from a car accident that's going to affect the entire team what would you say to Joe Burrow and how do you move forward in this entire thing to keep him safe and hopefully playing for as long as possible yeah well I'm really impressed with Joe Burrow but he's been sacked 14 times in three games that's the most in the NFL last week against Philly and this amazing tie that they had he was sacked i think eight times and hit 18 times so it's it's way too much you're not going to last the season and their pass protection is not great so like the offensive line sure they can take some blame there were a couple plays there was a there

was a play in overtime it looked like tech mobile when you pick past two and your opponent picks past two and it's like an automatic sack that's what it looked like with fletcher cox you know a couple of times and then a couple of times it was i would put it on coaching a little bit you've got your tight end in a three-point sorry you're tight in in a two-point stance acting like a wide receiver trying to block barnett or a defensive end like it's not gonna happen it looks good on paper it's never gonna work so those are those happen okay but then talking about the quarterback there were a defensive end. Like it's not going to happen. It looks good on paper. It's never going to work. So those are, those happen. Okay. But then talking about the quarterback, there were sacks that were definitely on the quarterback. Like you're not in college anymore. You're not going to make guys miss on the regular. So Mike Holmgren would always say this to me when, uh, when I was playing for

him, he was my head coach. He would say, you can never, ever take a sack on a three-step drop. That would be your fault. The other thing is, if I ever call a movement play, like a naked bootleg or a sprint out, that's a change the launch point. We're going to help out the offensive line. We're going to help out you. If it's there, it's there. If it's not, throw it away. If you ever take a sack on a naked or a naked bootleg or a movement play, that is your fault. That is the quarterback's fault. And so you talk about that hit that Joe Burrow took,

and I've got a tremendous amount of respect for Joe Burrow. Takes the hit, misses a play. He's back in the game, not only playing, but playing really well. But that was a fake run to the right, naked bootleg to the left. Couldn't break contain, defense stayed at home, no sweat, throw it away. But what did he do? He said, no, I'm going to naked left.

They got outside contain. I'm going to cut back right and then throw the ball downfield to Tyler Boyd, and boom, his year was almost ended with that hit. So luckily he's a very tough guy. It's been my experience as a quarterback, though. You make those mistakes sort of like once, and then you're like, okay, I got it. Kind of like when a young baby puts their hand in a candle and sees the fire. And then, ooh, they see themselves.

Now I know I'm never reversing field like that on a naked bootleg. Dad of the year, by the way, letting your kid just play with fire as a baby. Unbelievable there. Let's talk about luck, though, seemed to never learn. And I think luck, Andrew Luck, who I'm referring to here, if I get this right, he and I didn't have a lot of conversations because he was so much smarter than me and, you know, whatever. But when you hear other people talk about his style of play and like I overheard him say some things as far as it almost felt like he thought he was disrespecting football if he was to give up on a play or that's not how you're supposed to play

for like i don't think people know that enough about andrew luck like andrew respected football so much and he thought like if he slid or threw a ball away he wasn't respecting the game enough like so those big hits whenever you hear him mic'd up saying, like, hey, good hit, man. He genuinely thought that was a good hit. He liked the game of football. If you're Joe Burrow and you have that same mindset, how do you as a vet tell him?

Because I always wanted to say this to Andrew, but I was nowhere near in the position to say it. Like, hey, if you stay alive, that helps everybody else in this building. Like, if you tell your offensive line, like, Hey, I need you to protect me a little bit. You're not being an asshole. What you're doing is you're actually looking out for everybody else in this facility, because if you're healthy and playing well, that helps out everybody else.

I think that's sometimes hard for quarterbacks who have this mindset, like, Oh, I got to take these hits. I got to do this for the good of the game. It's like, you need to see a bigger picture here. Like actually you taking those hits isn't good for the game of football especially in this particular building how do you relay that message to a young quarterback that has that mindset yeah listen quarterbacks are just trying to earn the respect of their teammates and i think that joe burrow not only earned the respect of his teammates but also the rest of the league taking that hit against philly being out for one play because that's the rule and then coming back in like the hits are going to find you you don't have to go prove how tough you are i would say this the him taking unnecessary

hit hits and you mentioned andrew luck any young quarterback it goes back to taking sacks there's some really good quarterbacks right now that just take sacks when they don't need to and that's what's stopping them from taking it to the next level. If you talk about quarterback sack rate, okay, who's number one? Patrick Mahomes is number one. Who's number two? Aaron Rodgers is number two. I would think that most young quarterbacks, Joe Burrow included, they want to be more like Mahomes and Aaron Rodgers.

So throwing the ball on time, knowing when to give up on a play, understanding that it's okay to punt, on time, knowing when to give up on a play, understanding that it's okay to punt. Those are three great coaching points that young quarterbacks sometimes don't learn right away. Matt, do you see what the quarterback situation that's going on in Chicago, is that ultimately going to be a problem when you're kind of like going back and forth between two guys? It's really tricky because I don't think Trubisky played that poorly that he warranted getting, you know, pulled so quickly. Hey, Sanchez, Sanchez said the same exact thing, by the way, he was like, it felt like a quick pull. Well, it definitely was like, it definitely was like,

man, like you have no, no wiggle room. Like if you do one bad thing, you're gone. Like you're out, you know, somebody else's turn. And then, but what complicates it is like Nick Foles comes in and throws three touchdowns. He actually had two other plays that were called touchdowns in the game that were reversed through instant replay. One was called incomplete and one was ended up called an interception. But anyway, he comes back. It was 28 to whatever. Like, you know, it's a huge lead. And he comes back, he was 28th or whatever, it's a huge lead,

and he comes back and he wins the game. So I guess for me, you can't turn back away from Nick Foles now. Now it's like, hey, Mitchell Trubisky, we were 2-0 with you, but we're turning the page. The mechanics of it are really dicey for a head coach the thing that i would say just kind of knowing both of these guys a little bit you do have two very very unselfish guys in trubisky and foals and so it might work like collectively as a unit like it might work it might be a two two quarterback operation this year that would not happen on most teams just because because of the ego factor at the quarterback position, usually

it could potentially work in Chicago. Well, that's what I was going to ask you. Easy, easy, though. He's very mad at the ref for that interception. That seemed like a bad call. But quarterback naturally has an insane amount of

ego. Like, just have to. Ever since you're in high school, you're propped up as like, okay, here's the hero of our team. You're probably getting, like, all the benefits that people say athletes get that I've never received ever in my entire life. But it's the quarterback that's doing it. In college, quarterback is propped up. Like, hey, here we go.

In the NFL, quarterback is propped up. So whenever you bring here we go. In the NFL, quarterback is propped up. So whenever you bring in two guys, okay, I've never seen this situation before, two vets who have had success, and they're put in the same room. The dynamic of that, even if you're saying they're unselfish, the rest of the locker room, too, is trying to figure out who to rally behind. And when Nick Foles gets in there and plays that good, especially at the time they pulled it, I would assume that players who can sense out bullshit pretty quick are like oh they've been looking to put nick foes in for this and then

once he has success it's like okay this is our guy now what if nick foes struggles and they go back to mitch i mean that's just a you're just talking about a a tsunami of of emotions in that locker room that doesn't make anything any easier even though they're still undefeated it feels like that is inevitably going to be a boiling point that's just going to blow up everywhere yeah i agree but it happens in other positions right you see it happen at wide receiver running back like a guy that should be starting isn't starting or a guy that plays well or gets hurt uh please playing well but gets hurt loses his job or maybe there's a guy drafted uh high so he has to play. So I think the rest of the locker room is going to watch how these two quarterbacks handle this situation. Like, are they going to put the Bears first?

Are they going to put the team first? Or are they going to put the fact that, like, hey, the team's got an option year on my contract? Or, hey, I took less money to come here to play in Chicago than I would have made in Jacksonville because I wanted to be here on this team with this defense and this coaching staff. Like, you know, like, is the money going to come into it? Is the position, is the depth chart going to come into it? Or is it going to be what every coach talks about? Like, hey, when you strap up that chin strap, it's all about team.

So I think the other people in the locker room are watching this. And, like i don't know they talk people talk about quarterbacks lead in the locker room this is an example of how quarterbacks lead in the locker room how you handle a demotion is how you can lead in the locker room i remember i got benched in seattle for uh you know they traded me they like gave given up a lot to get me. And I get benched for Trent Dilfer, who was the veteran quarterback. He had just won the Superbowl of Baltimore. And that was a tough thing for me at the time. But one of the things that I did, it was like, you know what? All right, I'm going to take this as an opportunity to work on myself, get better at my game. Listen to Mike Holmgren now coach Trent Dilfer, see if I can learn anything from it. I'll be ready the next time I get my chance. And what I heard from my

teammates, what I heard from many of my teammates during that time was, hey, I respect the way that you handled the demotion. I respect the way that you were, even though you were voted captain of this team, now Trent's the starting quarterback and he's really the captain of our team. You know, you're wearing the C on your patch, but he's leading this team. He's the guy, the pregame talk. He's the guy, you know, with the speech after the game. I respect how you've humbled yourself and learning from that. And I respect that you'll be ready the next time you get your chance. And there are other position groups that deal with that exact same thing.

Offensive line, defensive line, DBs, whatever. So I think in a way it can kind of galvanize the team and bring the team closer together. So I think in a way it can kind of galvanize the team and bring the team closer together. But just as easily, if the guys don't handle it that way, it can rip the team apart and this whole thing will be a disaster. Well, quarterback's a much different thing than every other position. I think you would even agree with that because it is like the face of the team. And I'm happy to hear that you didn't think about stabbing Trent Dilfer in like the hamstring. No, I thought about it.

I actually thought about it many times. But like what I was able to work through was like, no, that's not the hamstring. No, I thought about it. I actually thought about it many times. But like, what I was able to work through was like, no, that's not the right idea. The right idea is to just put your nose down and just get down to work. Get to work and work on your weaknesses. We have some more breaking baseball news. What? Trevor Barpar lost his no-hit fourth inning.

Infield single. Good God. That may have been on me Little dribbler Oh my god Ty interrupted earlier for some baseball news It's all good It's all good

He just ruined Trevor Bauer's fucking Yeah, no, I saw it It's kind of like when the announcer Like Pat, when you and I were calling Thursday Night Football, you would talk up the kick, goal kicker right before a kick. And then I could sense it in your voice. You were like, oh, shouldn't have done that. Miss.

I mean, that's not a real thing. That's not a real thing. I agree. I agree completely, by the way. Things are going to happen. Things are going to happen that are completely out of control. I'm a big control of the controllables guy. You know what I mean? Binders on. One of my favorite things,

I don't know if you watch the Red Zone channel, but I love watching on the Red Zone channel and he'll always like purposely try to jinx the field goal kicker, but like proving that it's not a thing. Like the field goal operation is because of the snap, the kick, and the hold.

Really, that's the thing. Yeah, I mean, the Red Zone channel stinks. Both of them. I'm usually on a train with a laptop. Do you own a train? Oh, my God. Do you know that we looked into buying a train during the quarantine?

Yeah, yeah, we're going to do a Hello America tour on the trains. Turns out, that is a dangerous game to get into, those trains. And you're not getting anywhere fast. Do you mind if we take a call question for you? Sure. Let's do it. Let's go to Chuck in Chicago.

If this is Pagano, I will lose my mind. What's going on, Chuck? How's it going, guys? How you guys feeling on this glorious Wednesday? That's not him. There's two words in there that we would have been able to tell. It's guy-ish and glory-ish. What do you want to talk about, Chuck?

I want to talk about this potential Super Bowl matchup between the Colts and the Bears this weekend, and how do you think the Colts fare against the best D in the NFL led by Khalil Mack and the biggest D in the NFL held by Nick Foles? Great question, Chuck, and I like the way

you worded both of those things. Incredibly well delivered. That's a good phone call right there. Interesting you say that the Bears' defense is the best because the Colts' defense is actually the best in the NFL right now when it comes to certain ratings and things like that. This should be a pretty good game, especially with Nick Foles and Frank Wright's knowledge of Nick Foles starting there.

The Colts' team seems to be coming together. They haven't really played anybody, right? They beat the dog shit out of the Jets, and I think everybody's going to do that, except for maybe the Broncos, who are getting boat raced by everybody as well. So Thursday night's going to be interesting. How do you feel about this Colts team? Phillip Rivers seems to really have bought in. He's loved by everybody in the building, from what I've been told.

As opposed to that shaky start against the Jaguars, they're figuring it out. And the Bears, on the flip side, have a lot of drama going on. Yeah, the biggest thing for the Colts is they've got to protect the football. Last year, Phillip Rivers had kind of a turnover problem, and that's why he's no longer the quarterback there. So he comes in to Indy in week one, has a turnover problem, and they lose to Jacksonville. Since that time, though, they have got it fixed,

and Phillip Rivers is playing very, very good football. And I think that's probably the thing that I would say, like just being a veteran quarterback going to another team there is a learning curve um you saw with tom brady he looked terrible against the new orleans saints and then he's figured it out now he looks like tom brady there'll be four and one here in no time so i think that i think the the philip rivers and and basically in indy they have figured it out the wild card for me though is nick fo Nick Foles going up against Frank Reich. There probably isn't a coach in football that Nick Foles has a better relationship with than Frank Reich.

And just remembering back to when Nick Foles was in Jacksonville, trying to get out of Jacksonville, trying to get traded into an offense or to a coaching staff that he really felt like was a great fit for him. I believe that his first choice, if I remember correctly, his first choice was the Indianapolis Colts. That was his first choice. They chose to sign Phillip Rivers instead. And maybe the timing was off for him because he was under contract. Phillip Rivers was going to be a free agent. But his first choice would have been, I believe, the Indianapolis Colts, and his second choice would have been the Chicago Bears.

So just a personal relationship of going up against somebody that you really love and respect the way that he feels about Frank Reich. You know, they won the Super Bowl when he was with Philly, and Frank Reich and Doug Peterson had a lot to do with that. That's, to me, the most intriguing thing about this, this matchup, but there's all kinds of stuff. Chuck Pagano,

uh, going back to all that kind of stuff. But to me, Foles is the wild card. And, um, so I guess what I want to say about that. And that's all I got to say about that.

I'll walk and hit this drop. Different quote, but still just as good as you go. Do you think that Nick Foles is going to play better or worse because of those emotions of playing against a guy that you respect on the other sideline? Does that bring out the best in you? If it was kind of a hothead person,

kind of like I was a little bit of a hothead person, then maybe those emotions would make you play worse. I remember Brett Favre the first time that we played against Mike Holmgren when he was the Seattle coach, which all of a sudden it was Monday Night Football. Brett Favre didn't play like Brett Favre. He didn't have control of his emotions that night, I think he would tell you.

Nick Foles is not that kind of quarterback. He's more reserved. He's a little bit more calm. What? I think his style of play would lead him to have a good game. Hey, whenever you're just going to drop locks out in the middle of a conversation, let us know.

So you think the Bucs are going to win this weekend? Sounds like it. Listen, I looked at the Bucs when everyone was trying to jump off the bandwagon week one. They're trying to say Bruce Arians can't coach. Tom Brady can't play. Gronk should go back to wrestling. they're trying to say bruce arians can't coach tom brady can't play gronk should go back to wrestling that they're going to be fine that first game against

new orleans for them was their preseason game they had no off season they over you know how hard it is to go in and learn a new system the tampa bay buccaneers are gonna they're gonna be winning football for a lot i forget their first tough matchup But I know I wrote it down that they're going to be 4-1 By going into week 6 Got it Go ahead Connor Oh thank you Matt, Adam Gase is an absolute cancer to really good players

I mean Kenyon Drake, Devontae Parker Tannehill, Lev Bell, Jamal Adams You can keep going Sam Darnold Is Sam Darnold Joe Montana and he just happens to have Adam Gase as his coach or what's going on there? Yeah, it's a tough situation. I think, you know, one thing

I do, I'm in this fantasy football league like a lot of people. One thing that I notice is that the defense that plays the Jets is always picked in fantasy, like on the waiver wire. It could be like a terrible defense and they pick whoever's going up against the Jets. The Jets is always picked in fantasy, like on the waiver wire. It could be like a terrible defense and they pick whoever's going up against the Jets. The Jets are struggling and I would say

it is going to be an uphill battle for Adam Gase to get it turned around, unfortunately. Are you ever coached? Like for instance, this Jets job allegedly is going to be open potentially on Friday morning or maybe on Monday. Would you ever throw your name into that and be like, you know what? I do good on the TV. My suits look good. We got that cool New York studio where we all kind of sit at a round table. And we got Bruno Mars, Teddy Bruschi here to the left. And legend Randy Moss here across the table.

And Ponder's guiding the show. And Rex Ryan, legendary. I love my Sundays, you're probably saying. And I get to travel down to Nashville, get COVID, go back to New York. I get to live this life. Have you ever thought about potentially getting into the coaching world? Listen, coaching is a lot harder than, for sure, people on TV realize. And it's a lot harder than players realize.

So there's a lot that goes into that. So, no, I don't think that that would be foolish of me to just say, oh, I could be the guy that does that. However, Pat, however, there are some great assistant coaches out there that have never gotten an opportunity to be a head coach. And there are some people that actually, in my opinion, would be a better head coach than they are doing what they're currently doing as an offensive coordinator or a defensive coordinator.

But specifically, I think, and I'm not just saying this because I'm on your show, and I've said this, check my resume, I've said this a hundred times, a hundred different ways. Check it. Special teams coaches are the most qualified position to then become a head coach. Bingo. They are the position that deals with game management. They deal with the entire roster, roster management. They know the situational football far better than usually a defensive coordinator would know it.

And certainly a guy that maybe is good at just calling plays. So would it be me? No, I don't think it should be me. But just recycling the same old play caller on offense or defense is part of the reason why I think NFL owners get it wrong when they do the hiring of their coaching staff sometimes. Hey, amen. Couldn't say it better myself. Ladies and gentlemen, you can see him on ESPN on Sunday.

I really do enjoy your show. And every day that passes, Bruschi does look more and more like Bruno Mars, which is not a bad thing. He looks unbelievable. I love the give and take you guys have on there and the information. i set a lot of bets off of the things that you guys say and every once in a while i will text you and say what you just said was very stupid but normally it's very very smart ladies and gentlemen matt haskell uh so sorry to interrupt i just want to let you know that although we're having a great

conversation we should maybe focus a little bit on how you're sleeping, how you're hanging out. You know, about a quarter of your life, maybe even up to a third, depending on how you live is spent in your bed. Yeah. Are you watching TV? Probably. Are you sleeping? Obviously. Are you making love? Hopefully. But the bed is a place where a lot of things happen. And a lot of people are sleeping on beds that just aren't comfortable they're sleeping on mattresses that they've settled for because whenever they bought their mattress they had to go into a creepy mattress store with a creepy mattress salesperson or anything that is along a car salesman like type of figure like hey this bed's more comfortable than this one isn't it and you just yeah, yeah, because you just want to get the hell out of the awkward situation. What are you doing rolling around in somebody else's sweat? You know how many people

have laid in that bed before you got there? Especially now with the world we're living in, a little bit more wokeness to how disgusting germs are. You have no idea what's happening in those mattresses before you go into those mattress stores. What if some little scumbag kid's running around with his shoes all over the place? And said shoes are stepping all over dog poop right outside. So what are you doing now? You're laying in dog poop, other people's sweat and lice, and now you're supposed to

make a decision on whether or not a third of your life is going to be spent in something that's comfortable or not? No! Get out of town. That's an archaic model. What you need to do is just trust our friends over at Leesa. L-E-E-S-A. Leesa mattresses are studied, researched, and developed for maximum comfort. Whenever you lay on a Leesa mattress, you say, damn, this is a comfortable mattress because they've spent years diving into comfort

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But you get it. In the next couple days, have the best sleep of your life with our friends at Lisa. Back to the show. We'll be joined here momentarily by a man who once, we found a photo, once might have weighed 395 pounds. At least. I'm not 100% sure if this photo has ever been seen by the public. He has a suit on. It looks like he was on television.

He might have been 395 pounds. And I would assume he was bench pressing 500 pounds. Ladies and gentlemen, a man who won the Super Bowl three times. A man who has spent 12 seasons in the NFL. And a man who is now maybe my top three color commentator in all of sports. But favorite meathead brain, ladies and gentlemen, Mark Schlaer. Hey, Pat Schlaer. Yeah, boy! Hey, Pat, thank you.

I really appreciate that. You know, by the way, I wasn't going to do this, but now I got to do it. No! Yeah! Oh, my God! Oh, wow! Let's go! Look, look, look. Don't skip leg day.

Oh, okay. I thought that was... Don't skip leg day. Oh, okay. I thought that was... Don't skip leg day, baby. You know what? You're sleeveless. I'm sleeveless. I think this is the best way to do this, brother. So let's get it on.

I ain't never skipped a leg day, Mark. Okay? I ain't never skipped a leg day. Let me tell you what. Now, I have the legs of a 180-pound man, Pat. But, you know, like my father says, you ever see a quarter horse with fat legs? No says you ever see a quarter horse with fat legs no you never saw a quarter horse with fat legs i'm a quarter horse baby i can run i can go i'm like a horse too mark from what i've heard hell yeah real quick um

uh real quick can i ask you about this particular photo right here we found on the internet what was this guy that was you know that was i was doing conan o'brien look at that that was i was on a strict diet of uh taco meat and cheese was at the time and um i was actually it was right after super bowl 32 and i went on with the rest of the offensive line, went on the Conan O'Brien show. And, you know, we were ahead. You know who else was on that show? We came on before Angelina Jolie. At that time, we were more famous than Angelina Jolie. The only reason he had us on is because I know Elway and Terrell Davis and everybody else, like, turned him down.

So it was myself, Tony Jones, Dave Diaz Infante. I think it was the three of us that went on the show, and it was tremendous. So we had a great time. But, yeah, I was about to pop right there. What are you at right there, 350? No, no, I was 290. No!

In your jaw? Are you kidding me? Come on. I told you I still had the legs legs of 180 pound man so i was built like a cartoon character what's the uh what's uh is it family guy dude you know yeah yeah that's how i'm joe that's how i'm actually built so yeah i was still only about 290 right there but if you were seeing i had these little spin i'm built like a turkey pat um got these little skinny legs on this gigantic frame.

I'll tell you what, as long as you win Super Bowls, who cares? But when that photo popped up in the group text this morning, I was mind-blown because you are still a physically fit monster, meathead, still throwing weight around, clanging and banging. So I'm going to let you know, didn't mean to show this on the actual video, but as soon as I saw your face and how good you look right now, I'm like, man, we have to show that guy that was massive all right let's get to this here mark uh you've been doing a great job calling games with adam amin you two are a great tag team i

hope to see you guys kind of escalate to the top of the entire broadcast booth i enjoy you a lot thanks for the shout out as well let's talk about this postponement of the game though because it is the topic at hand right now covid has infilt infiltrated the NFL. Titans now have nine positive cases, four players, five personnel people. They get kicked out of their building until at least Saturday. I didn't think there was going to be a chance to be a game on Sunday because that would just be insane to do so. Now they have officially postponed the game. They're thinking Monday or even Tuesday if it was to happen. And offensive line, much different than punter, obviously hand-to-hand combat. A Tuesday game feels like a real potential pain in the ass

for a lot of guys that have to, you know, kind of maul with each other for 70, 80 plays and then turn around to next Sunday. Does that matter? Am I thinking too much into that? Or is that a real thing potentially? No, I think it's a real thing. I mean, obviously it's a real thing. And, you know, in this day and age, and I always tell you this, you know, playing offensive line is one of the most skilled

positions you can play simply because every time you line up, the guy across from you is a much better athlete than you are. And so it's always one of those situations that I look at and say, man, you're already limited practice time wise. And now all of a sudden you're going to say, hey, we're not going to get a practice at all we're going to be basically um you know without any pads on ever we're going to do you know virtual walkthroughs or whatever and we're going to be asked to go out and play a game and that's that's going to be incredibly hard to do um but that's that's where we are right now and those are the things you knew eventually there would be you know a positive covid test and and there'll probably obviously more along the way and how the nfl is going to deal covid test and and there'll probably be obviously more along the way

and how the nfl is going to deal with it and and bottom line is you're going to be at a decided disadvantage because if you do play on monday or you do play on tuesday the other team that you're playing against is going to have those time in practice on the field all that stuff so that's a huge disadvantage and the other thing that's a disadvantage if you're the steelers who are it's the seals that are playing the Titans, I believe, you've got to push your game back from Sunday to Saturday. So that's going to ruin your preparation for the next week. So that's tough on them as well.

I mean, everybody has to kind of pay the price. Okay, so Mark, a lot of people say the practices, although they are incredibly detailed, at the end of the day, it's just football. It's just blocking, tackling. There's a lot of people that have never seen a football operation outside looking in. They're like, well, all these walkthroughs and all these meetings and all these things. Not that big of a deal if they have to miss them and do them virtually. I think every human I've talked to that's been in the NFL is like, ah, I digress completely from that.

Walkthroughs are almost maybe more important than the actual practices at this point and then film study how big of an advantage would it be for the Steelers to be able to do a walkthrough with what they are expecting from the Titans blitz pickups on the offensive line maybe how their defense is going to look and then how big of a disadvantage would that have been for the Titans not being able to do that yeah I think it's a huge advantage obviously for the team that can go through that. Because it's about the looks that you're going to see, that you know you're going to see. There's always going to be some unscouted looks,

and you're going to have to deal with the unscouted looks. But there are looks that you know you're going to see, and the feel of those looks, what they look like, what a defense gets into, what an offense gets into, and the way they run a route combination, the way they run a blitz scheme, the way, like, all those things matter when you go through those in a walkthrough or a practice environment situation at quote-unquote full speed. So it gives you a little preparation of what I should expect, what I should be ready to go for. So I think that part is important. I think it's a big advantage to the team that gets to do it, obviously. But again, it is what it is. You got to roll through it. You got to

be able to mentally absorb as much as you can. And I think one of the things that would be an advantage to the team that doesn't go through that stuff, Pat, is you got to keep it simple, stupid. And with the Tennessee Titans, man, they're going to run the ball even down last week to the Minnesota Vikings. I think they were down at times almost double-digit. They still came out in the second half, and I believe on first down, 65% of their plays on first down in the second half, even with a deficit, were still run plays. I mean, that's who they are.

So they're going to stick with what they are. They have an identity. And that part for them bodes well, that we know what we are, we know what we do, and we're going to go ahead and continue to do those things. We're not having a physicality during the week matter? Will it be like the first week when they didn't have preseason games where it kind of shocked some guys or kind of offset them? Or is this actually kind of good for the physicality part to kind of get some guys some rest up?

It depends on how set you are in your system and what you do like if if you feel really good about what you are you're a veteran team you know exactly how you're going to operate then i think it's a then i think it could be a good thing it can be a plus um to get off your legs and do those things there's just going to be like i said those unscouted looks those things that you're not quite prepared for um and sometimes it's the adjustment of of like the speed of the game where where it happens how it happens um tackling on defense some of those things um some of those things can bite you uh when you don't have that when you don't have that work or you're not real settled in your work

you know we always as a as a player even though when I was in Denver my last six years, we didn't practice in pads a lot. Man, we flew around without pads on. You know, we were scrimmaging once early in my career. We were scrimmaging the Carolina Panthers, and we went without pads. And we're flying around. We're just beating the tar out of these guys, right? And they're like, whoa, slow down. What are you doing? This is, you know, no pads. And as everybody was walking off the field, the Panthers were going, man, those guys don't know how to practice without pads on. And we were saying, man, those guys don't know how to practice without pads on. We flew around and played like it was a full scrimmage without pads.

And they weren't used to that. And I think you've got to have kind of that speed, that sense, so you really kind of have a good feeling of what it's going to feel like in a game. Jim Caldwell, my first couple years, we went to the Super Bowl, AFC Championship a couple times or whatever. He said, I want to be the fastest, freshest team on the field on Sundays. Because we had

an older team. Peyton, Dallas, Gary Brackett, Saturday, that whole crew. It was an older team. He was like, I just want to be the fastest, freshest team on Sunday when we get there. So it was a lot of walkthroughs. Practice was always upbeat, fast. I mean, Peyton ran it.

And there was a lot of time just in the film room. I guess if you have a veteran team in Zoom, you can do the film meeting. You can do the film. I think the walkthroughs are the biggest thing that is potentially the problem that we'll miss out on. But I guess we'll find out on Monday or Tuesday if the game is played. What's up, Diggs? Mark, sticking with that game, you were on a lot of teams that loved to run the ball and were very good at running the ball, like the Titans.

In a week when you knew that you were going up like a defense, the Steelers are number one in the league against the Rush, giving up 50 yards a game. As far as the offensive linemen on the Titans this week, what is the attitude going into a game when you know you're going up against a great rushing defense and you guys love to run the ball? Well, our attitude is we're going to a game when you know you're going up against a great rushing defense and you guys love to run the ball? Well, our attitude is we're going to have to execute you. And I don't care how good you are, we're better.

And so we always had, we were like Globo Jim, we're better than you, we know it. And so that was always the attitude. And the bottom line, I think, and this goes back to your play callers and your coordinators your guys have to understand the value of a two-yard run as long as that two-yard run is nasty as long as at the end of that two-yard run there are dudes on the ground and there are dudes that are paying for it on the defensive side of the ball and so our whole premise was you may shut us down for a while, but we're going to stay to it and we're going to continue to grind it.

And in doing that, we're going to have a couple of explosive plays in the play action game off of those runs. But eventually, we're going to wear you down to the point that third and fourth quarter, we're going to start getting gash type runs. the point that third and fourth quarter we're going to start getting gash type runs and so we always had this philosophy regardless of how good you think you are as a defense we're going to out execute you one because we're better than you and two we're just going to outlast you and eventually because let's face it playing defense takes a lot more effort than it does playing offense i mean if we're on a backside of a 18 handoff and I cut the linebacker,

you know, and he falls on the ground, you know what he has to do? He's got to get up and run and chase the ball. You know what I do? I lay on my big, fat stomach and just watch it. And then I slowly get up and walk back to the huddle. Like, there is zero effort on my part. That's why I always talked about, like, I always talked about the strength coaches in the NFL.

Strength coaches used to drive me crazy. We would run the up-backs or the 50s or 100s. I would tell my strength coach all the time, if I have to run 40, somebody's going to score. You understand that, right? If I've got to run 40 yards, somebody score. I always said when there was an interception and the guy was beyond me, I always used to run with an angle

Like this And I would run myself right off the film That way Then I could stop running So I'd take off And I'd shake my head And I'd really go to my arms And then I would just

And you don't see me anymore Because then I could stop running because I'm not catching anybody. And I didn't want to look like, hey, look, Stink's not running after the play. Well, of course I'm not running after the play. I'm not going to catch anybody. So I just run myself right off the film. And then I can stop running and stop expending energy that I didn't need to expect. You got to work smarter, not harder in all aspects of everything.

That's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. Especially whenever it comes to conditioning. I got very good at making it look like I was running as hard as I possibly could, so you didn't get a check for the lack of effort or anything like that. Right. And the fat guys, fat boys having a conversation with the conditioning is always entertainment. I mean, whether it's buying a little bit extra time in between reps,

asking questions about a sprint that we've done maybe 400 times so wait we're going all the way down and then touch and then all the way back yes we've done this every single day whoa whoa whoa whoa so we're going they was i was always a big fan of that i was always the offensive lineman were maybe the smartest workers in the history of uh work and i was respected i like that that's been a tradition for decades at this point. Let's pivot away from the Titans and the Steelers. Let's talk about this Chiefs team. This Chiefs team, against

the Chargers, who they've always struggled with, they get a game winner out of Harrison Bucker, who I think will bounce back. I hope he'll bounce back. Might have been a couple holds, by the way. Look at the placement of the hold. He was pulling balls to the left, which means the hold could have been about an inch towards him, which changes everything. New holder. Maybe that was it. Maybe Bucker had a bad night. But after watching the game on Monday night and you see what they did to the Baltimore Ravens,

and people are calling this the game of the year potentially, and they made the Ravens look amateur. Was that more on the Ravens playing bad, you think, or the Chiefs just got back into the groove that they had there the first couple of weeks and the entire end of last season? Well, I think it's a lot of what the latter there, what the Chiefs are able to do. And I think, you know, there's a couple of things about the Baltimore Ravens. They're 18-0 when they have a 10-point lead. Now they're 0-5 when they have a 10-point deficit. And the way they are built, they are so good at running the ball and so good at using their quarterback to run the ball. built, they are so good at running the ball and so good at using their quarterback to run the ball and all the play action stuff and the single read throws that come off of that stuff.

That is what they're built to do. And they're exceptional at it. And when they're doing it, when the Baltimore Ravens are up on you by a touchdown, you just feel like you're down by 21 points. Because, you know, offensive coordinators will start to look at it this way. Like if they go up on you 7-0, then you're sitting there as an offensive coordinator because they possess the ball, they've run it down your throat, they've done all those things. They look at you and they say to themselves, you know what? This is going to be not a 12-possession game, but this is going to be a

seven-possession game. So now all of a sudden we've got to score on every possession. So then they start throwing the ball. They get away from their game plan. And Wink Martindale, their defense coordinator, blitzes the snot out of you. He gets a hit on your quarterback. Ball flutters up. They get an interception.

Now they're up 14-0. And now it might as well be 35-0. And that's how you play the game, because you're like, it doesn't matter, we're going to lose this game, and we're going to lose the possessions. Whereas Kansas City is like, ah, so what, we've got five possessions, we'll score four touchdowns and a

field goal. We still win. Like, that's how they play the game, because they're so efficient, and they're so good with their quarterback and the players that they have. And's how they play the game because they're so efficient and they're so good with their quarterback and the players that they have. I think one of the things that goes unnoticed is how many times the Chiefs can design a play to get five guys out or four guys out in the pattern and they hold up up front because Schwartz is outstanding. Fisher is a really good athlete and a good player at the left tackle position. Colettio Semoli is a great player. Like, they have really good guys.

And they do things that just people don't, just unscouted looks, things you don't see every week that they create. As you see the formation that's on here right now. I mean, come on, what is that? I don't even know how, like, I speak, when it comes to formations, I speak Spanglish. You know, I just kind of make up the formations as I go. But what the hell do you call that? Like, really, what do you call that? Line up over there on, you know, whatever it is.

It's just crazy. We got an empty backfield here. We got quad stack to the left, one out to the right. I mean, that is legit. They just go in there. I think any one. Quad stack, that would be, you know what that is quad stack open right you know and then they're going to motion the back back into the backfield but then motion of trace stack motion trace stack open right i mean it's it's

ridiculous hey do you mind if we take a phone call real quick broncos fans on the line yeah absolutely let's go to david in Iowa. What's going on, David? Hey, how's it going, Pat? Not too shabby. What's up, Stink? He just said, too. I heard him. Yeah, that's all good. Hey, so big Broncos fan,

been a Broncos fan since the Jake Plummer, Jake the Snake days. At what point in the season do we start to pack it in? At what point is it just we're not going to make the playoffs, do we start getting draft capital, and you start going on for the next season? All right, great questions, David david yeah thank you david uh from what from what i've watched in three the first three games you've already packed it in i mean i you know it's always

funny to hear people say hey the games were close no the scores were close the games weren't close the scores were close the games not so much i mean The scores were close. The games not so much. For crying out loud, Tennessee missed three or four field goals in that game. They won 16-14. That should have been a double-digit

loss. Pittsburgh just messed around and let you back into that game. That should have been a double-digit loss. Tampa should have probably beat you 45-3 as opposed to 28-10. So, you know, the scores have been close. The games haven't been close. This team is not good enough. You know, and you've fallen victim.

Obviously, you got your quarterback hurt, and I get that. And you fall victim into, you know, we are so fast. I mean, they went on a victory tour after the draft about all the speed they drafted and the wide receiver position and how they built this team around Drew Locke. Hey, listen, if you can't block people in this league, you can't win. That will never change. That's been since day one, since the inception of this league. If you can't block anybody, you can't win.

They have given up 13 sacks and 29 quarterback hits in the last two weeks 13 sacks and 29 quarterback hits and some of those are on the quarterback i understand that but the bottom line is you guys you know number one you can't block them number two your coaching staff doesn't ever change we're a three-wides team and we're gonna drop back and we're gonna spread you out and we're gonna throw the ball, and we're going to spread you out, and we're going to throw the ball. Well, you know what happens when you spread teams out? You spread out an offensive line, and this offensive line isn't good enough to block people when they're spread out.

So if you're not going to condense formations and get into heavier packages and stuff, you're just going to go, this is what we do, and dang it, we're going to adhere to it. Well, I mean, how many more quarterbacks are you going to lose during the course of the season? You're down now. Right now you're starting somebody off the practice squad on Thursday night. Brett Rippon. I played with his uncle Mark. We won

a Super Bowl together. Brett Rippon out of Boise State. He got cut last year and then brought back to the practice squad and got cut this year. Brought back to the practice squad. That's who you're starting on Thursday night against the New York Jets. And I understand the New York Jets are abysmal.

But, you know, I mean, both these teams are in the Trevor Lawrence bowl, for crying out loud. They're fighting for Trevor Lawrence. Tell us how you really feel. I don't want to even dive into the timeout fiasco that opening night against the Titans. Potentially that poor game management. What do you got, Connor?

Yeah, Mark, first of all, I love your passion about how much the Broncos suck. But if you were to guess between the Jets and the Broncos tomorrow night, which coach is going to be fired first? Because it's a barn burner, personally. Right. I don't think there's any question it will be Adam Gase. Nice. Because I think Adam Gase is already, like, I think they've already talked about it.

They lose this game, which, you know, is a serious possibility. They lose this game that Adam Gase is gone. They haven't started talking about, they still talk about Vic Fangio after the season here in Denver. So he'll last probably at least until the bye week. But, you know, they win this game against the Jets, and he's saved. If the Jets lose this game Monday morning, Adam Gase may be gone. You know, he'll be gone Friday morning, but he may be gone Thursday night.

They may fire him in the third quarter. If they're, like, behind by a lot in the third quarter, they may just say, hey, it'd be like office space. We're going to move your desk underneath the stairs. They're just going to be like, they're going to take his swing line stapler and they're going to just send him out. If they Lane Kiffin him,

that would be good for our show to talk about the next day. Lane Kiffin, but terrible for Adam Gase, obviously. And Lane Kiffin talked about the bottom of his life being fired on tarmac. Thought he was potentially done forever. Mark, I can't thank you enough. Every time you come on, I enjoy the hell out of your brain, buddy.

I appreciate it, man. Always love coming on and, you know, give a shout out to the brand. Although the brand took a hit on the block punt. But it wasn't the punter's fault. Snapper just got one. Yeah, although he did drop one. He did drop one in week two. Yeah, fault. Snapper just got one. Yeah, although he did drop one. He did drop one in week two. Yeah, yeah.

I mean, dropped one. They got one blocked. They'll get it figured out. I mean, they will get it figured out. That's your boy McMahon, too, right? Yeah, yeah. That's my guy. Yeah, that's my guy.

Yeah, watch your eyes there, all right? I saw what you did there. Ladies and gentlemen, you hear him on Fox. What game do you got this weekend? I am Giants at Los Angeles at the Rams. Ladies and gentlemen, you hear them on Fox. What game do you got this weekend? Giants at Los Angeles, at the Rams. Oh, so Rams probably win by 60 there, potentially. The Rams are actually, it's so funny, too, because everybody says,

oh, like last year, Sean McVay, the league is cutting up to Sean McVay. And I can't wait to tell Sean McVay, man, I'm so glad you remembered how to coach again because, you know, last year, it's funny what happens when you change a few players and you get your offensive line back in shape and you start ramming it down people's throats again, how much smarter you get all of a sudden. So I'm looking forward to that. They're a really good team. The Rams are a really good team watching them on tape, they're a fun team to watch. You and Adam are a really good team, too. We can't wait to listen to you again. Ladies and gentlemen, from Fox, Meathead, Super Bowl champion, Mark Flair.

Yeah! I never show up on your show with a tank top on, but you know what? This is for you, man. This is for the brand right here. Go ahead and give one. Go ahead and give one. Go ahead and give one. Wait a minute.

Oh! How old are you? Hey, Mark, I don't want you to out yourself here, but how old are you right now? I am 54. I'll be 55 in... 55, sorry. I'll be 55 in January and I'm

246 pounds of twisted steel sex appeal. Yeah! Joining us now is a man who played a long time in the NFL, college national championship, Super Bowl champion, ladies and gentlemen, the Crimson Chin, A.J. Hawk. A.J.! Holy shit! What's happening, fellas?

Hey, what was that guy's name I caught a little bit of the show earlier? Pepe? Yeah, Pepe in New Mexico. Guy's a good guy. Yeah, good guy, good guy. Yeah, great caller. Good caller. Had a lot of good stuff to say.

Oh, so you like Pepe? I do like Pepe, yeah. I thought he was a valuable caller. I thought you guys got excited. He seemed pretty excited. All right, so let's talk about every other caller that you hate then. If you pick only one to like, that means you hate everybody else. We'll dive into that a little bit later there.

I want your take, though, on this postponement of a game. I don't think anybody expected the NFL to do this. I think we expected COVID to reach the NFL, but the NFL actually having to move a game, whether it's due to competitive fairness or an advantage or they think they can't get it under control or not be able to postpone it to another date. What are your thoughts on this entire Titan-Steelers situation with COVID?

Well, first off, are you really that surprised that they had to postpone the game? I think postponing, because how they were testing everybody, okay, every single day, I thought the purpose of doing that was so that whenever it happens and you catch somebody, you can separate them from the rest of the pack, a la, you know, outlier, a lone wolf type thing, and everybody else could continue to do their thing. So whenever that doesn't happen, whenever just three people get it,

why are you testing everybody then? Why aren't you just testing one person in each position group? Because if three people are going to take down the entire team, why are you doing what you're doing? That is kind of how I felt about it. So I didn't think they were going to have to postpone a game, to be honest with you. I thought people were going to get it.

They were just going to separate them from the rest of the team so that they can move forward business as usual. Yeah, it's weird. I mean, the whole contact tracing thing is what you hear people talk about. Like, I guess they're going to go through all the people that they were near for more than 15 minutes to test all those people first. I don't know. Because the tests, too, like every test that is positive now,

they're saying, oh, we're doing our due diligence to verify the test. So you give them, what, three more tests and hope that those are the same? Or you hope that they're negative and you had a false positive? Like right now, it's just there's so much up in the air, I feel like. Well, and then remember there was a conversation about them keeping a lot more people in the roster pool because if guys get it, they're going to have to be out for a week or two. Now it's like if guys get it, the whole team is out. So what is the, I don't know. I think there's a lot more questions I have now that this is happening

as opposed to answers that we potentially thought would come whenever this situation – I'm just asking you more questions about how things were handled before, why was a protocol put into place. If that protocol, if there's any type of positive, it's like, no, we're shutting everybody down. I'm just not 100 100 sure if any of it makes sense at this point of course why would it make sense does anything make sense right now does anyone have any answers bingo people watch this show i have no fucking idea why

no idea why aj uh aaron rogers yesterday was awesome yeah he was uh he seemed to relax he seemed excited i'm just wondering if he's ever going to call from a different location. He's always in front of that nondescript stone wall behind him. He doesn't want to give us any info. He doesn't want anyone to see anything about where he lives. It's great masonry behind him. Incredible. Probably some Italians out there doing it.

Is there Italians in Green Bay? I would doubt it, but I'm sure they taught someone to do it in Green Bay. There's Italians in Green Bay? Yep. I'm sure there's Italians pretty much much no no when he said not in indiana we're talking about like over 25 we're talking like a community a community you don't have little italy days out there i'm pretty sure no no little italy little italy days in pittsburgh though you gotta keep your head on a swivel down there if you are of a pale-skinned breed. Don't. What's that?

Don't start. Come on. Is he lying? He's not. Am I lying? Yes. Oh, my red face walks through Italian days, and you're saying there isn't just a mad,

immediate judgment casted over me? It might not be your face. Maybe it's your mouth. Oh. Okay. So now it's my lips, you say. I ain't that interested. I'll tell you what, these lips have funded a lot of Italians

with the amount of pizza that I ate growing up, and I get no respect from the entire culture. A little respect around here. Anyways, now that we got off of that, we have to talk about a phone call, because I have no idea. Do you have something you, prevalent, would like to talk about right now?

Oh, no. You can go to the caller. I thought you were trying to get to a caller before you took a detour on something about Italians that I'm still confused about. Well, you're talking about masonry. See, this is how I know there isn't a lot of Italians in Columbus. You have no idea. You know what that is because I know that you don't even know what we're talking about.

There's actually a lot of Italians around Columbus. Why don't you try to talk to them? Why don't you talk to them? Say hello. Yeah, I do all the time. Oh, I bet. Now you do. AJ Hawk's like, you look

Italian. Why don't you go ahead and get your little ass, I'm not saying what he probably said, out of here. What were you going to say, Connor? Yeah, AJ, yesterday there was moments during that Aaron Rodgers interview. Hold on, Connor. What was that, Nick? Your head shaking back there? Is everything okay? Mr. Nick Moroto, is everything alright back there? Just move on. Get to the caller, Connor. What was that, Nick? Your head shaking back there? Is everything okay? Mr. Nick Moroto, is everything all right back there?

Just move on. Get to the caller, please. Oh, Tony D'Gilio, you got a problem with this? No. It's expected from you, too. It's just really... Me? I didn't do anything.

What the hell is going on? It's AJ. What just happened? The Italians do not deserve this. The Italians brought a lot of great things into this world. Great people. AJ, do you know what the Italians brought to America? No. Can you tell me?

Everything good. Yeah. Basically. They named America America. They brought a booger to Bepo. Those cigars that you smoked? Probably from Cuba. What do you got, Connor?

AJ, yeah, yesterday there was a moment during that Aaron Rodgers interview where you kind of interrupted Pat. You put your hands up on the screen. You and Rodgers were communicating somehow. What was that all about? A what? Well, it was because Pat made a reference to robin williams and i've called aaron robin for 10 or 11 years now because of how hairy his knuckles are message hey here's your time jump in you can we always

like to give some good good pub to robin williams and his estate and let us let everybody know how amazing he was and i always tell aaron it's so nice of you to carry on the tradition of Robin with growing your knuckle and hand hair out. So is Aaron just incredibly hairy? I did not know that. I guess I should have guessed with his facial hair being as dominant as it is that the rest of his body probably looked like a bear. I had no idea.

I mean, yeah, it's just a joke. I used to joke with him like, man, you're already like one of the best quarterbacks ever to live. Can you imagine how good you'd be if you just shaved that right hand? It's so much friction when you're trying to zing that thing out there with all that hair catching the wind. one of the best quarterbacks ever to live. Can you imagine how good you'd be if you just shaved that right hand? That's like so much friction when you're trying to zing that thing out there with all that hair catching the wind. Let's go to Cody in Ohio. What's going on, Cody? No Italians out there.

I feel bad for you. Not. Hey, how's it going? Not too shabby, Cody. What do you want to talk about, bud? Yeah, I was wondering, what do you think about if the Browns were to bring in Kaepernick and run a triple threat run offense with Chubb and Hunt in the backfield?

Cody, great question. What have you been up to today, Cody? What have you been up to over there? Oh, you know, just doing a little fishing here and there. Filling some hay, feeding the chickens. Hey, we appreciate that. Take care of your chickens. We appreciate you, Cody. How about the weed? It, we appreciate that. Take care of your chickens. Appreciate you, Cody.

How about the weed? Sure feels like there's a lot of weed. But big shout-out to Cody for asking that question. And the Kaepernick thing, that conversation has kind of died off this year because I think he's now entering his fifth year of being out of the NFL, which is a very long time to not be in the NFL. We're in a very different world than whenever he first was in the NFL, obviously, with a lot more, I think, from the NFL side being much more open arms

to the message that Colin Kaepernick was trying to send in a protest four years ago. I don't know. I was very excited for that workout last year, and I was very open about that. I was very pumped about that, just strictly because if you're not in the NFL, you can't be working out as hard as you're not in the NFL, you can't be working out as hard as you would be in the NFL. So I was pumped for that workout that the NFL and Colin Kaepernick had originally set down in Atlanta.

Now that ultimately got canceled last minute and moved to a field an hour and a half away from there and a couple scouts traveled and he ultimately didn't get picked up. And they said it was because they didn't trust that the NFL teams were going to, they just didn't trust the NFL at that point because of the amount of friction between Colin Kaepernick and the NFL. And for me, I wish he would have done that workout. I wish he would have dominated that workout because by the way, that would have got leaked out that he did well, or if he did bad, that would have got leaked out immediately. And now Colin Kaepernick's team was like, well, that's going to get leaked out with a spin because the NFL is controlling it. It's not being filmed publicly or whatever. I just

think a lot more people would be fighting a lot harder for Colin Kaepernick. If he would have just for one day, just acted as if the NFL wasn't going to try to screw him over, which I can understand why he's felt that way. I don't under, I don't know that behind the doors conversation and did that work out. I think a lot more people would be like,

Hey, Colin Kaepernick is doing everything he possibly can to get back in the league and wants to be in the league. And who knows how he's playing. But right now I think Colin Kaepernick is doing everything he possibly can to get back in the league and wants to be in the league. And who knows how he's playing. But right now, I think Colin Kaepernick has done a lot more for the world than he would have if he was just an NFL quarterback. So who knows if Colin's even trying to get back in the league right now? I think one of the biggest issues he had when he originally had the workout schedule at Atlanta's facility, there was some waiver that they wanted him to sign and the wording, something

about the language wasn't right. He didn't feel comfortable, so yeah, he moved it. But my question for Cody, the caller, getting back to him, who's just been bailing hay and feeding the chickens all day long, I just wonder, if you want to bring Kaepernick in, yeah, it sounds like an explosive backfield with how well the Browns run the ball. How many plays a game do you want Kaepernick to be your starter?

Are you going to bench Baker? What kind of plans do you have for this new revamped offense you want to run i shouldn't have hung up on cody because i'm sure he had a well thought out answer for that that's on me wild cap oh well that'd be very marketable too yeah very quite an excitement on baker there well baker baker is a mobile quarterback he's athletic and stuff like that but he's not outrunning anybody and who knows if Kaepernick's outrunning anybody right now? I think five years out of the game is a long time, and this is coming from somebody that just had to kick the ball.

And I'm three years out or whatever, four years, however long I am now. If I went out there and tried to do, and I'm in probably the best shape, near the best shape I've ever been in. If I went out there and tried to kick balls at the rate that I would have to, I don't know if my body would be like, yeah, yeah, we're doing this. And I wonder if Kaepernick's body would be the same. He's a much better athlete than I am, but he would be asked to do a lot more than I would be asked to to get back out there.

I just think that's a hard thing to be away from the game that long and get back into it. But I wish we would have been able to. Why couldn't the NFL just be like, yeah, we'll broadcast the workout? They do that for everybody's combines. Like, why wouldn't they just do that? And I would assume that's what Colin wanted. I don't know.

Who knows? That's a situation where none of us have seen him play football at all other than a couple highlights of him throwing a deep ball. So, who knows if you're good. And those workouts, by the way, with the NFL, if you're a free agent, are not fun. Those, a lot of cardio in those workouts. You are running a lot.

And I wonder if that was one of the reasons why, he was like, I'm not going to do it. I'm going to puke all over the place. Even if he was in the best shape he could be in, those workouts, they just try to kill people. I've seen a couple of them. I'm like, holy, these dudes are dying out here. Some teams make you time a 40.

Did you have to do that? No, I didn't have to time a 40, but Matt Flynn was telling me he was on the Patriots for maybe part of the spring in all of training camp one year. And I think he said when they brought him in, they're like, okay, well, here, you're going to run your 40. And I think Flynn said, okay, I'll do anything, but I can't run a 40. That's not happening. I'm not doing it. And I need to send him a text because I don't know if he actually ended up running it.

I don't think he would actually tell me what they really timed him at but yeah i was like you can make a seven eight nine year vets run a timed 40 when they haven't ran a timed 40 since the combine isn't that very interesting though because everybody mocks the importance of a 40 yard dash for a lot of people including a quarterback would be an interesting position to have that but the greatest coach and scout of all time bill belichick is making people run it even in year nine. Maybe I changed my take on the 40. It's very important. No stone left unturned, right? There's their attention to detail.

They're going to go above and beyond, I guess. They want as much information as possible on every guy that's on their team. In my head, Bill Belichick would be the last one to make him run a 40. Before this story right here, Bill Belichick would be like, let's make him do some position running. Make

it a good 7, 10 miles before. You've got to check his running form. How else are you going to fix his running form if you don't know what it is? They have those dudes running in those workouts so much. It would normally happen either before practice or after practice. I always stuck around and got extra work. As a

punter or kicker, you have to be out before practice anyways. So I would always see these workouts that were happening, and I would just stand there and just be like, that guy, he just ran his, I don't know, 10th gasser maybe at this point. They just want to see if he's in shape, if we need you this week. And then he put him through a drill after that, and it's like this guy's footwork is the worst. He's trying not to puke here.

And it's like, hey, we'll call you back. So those guys that get on those workout circuits, they should be in the Titan Games. Those guys should go do the Titan Games because they're just going through hell and all those things. Or the Watt Brothers show. They'd do well on that one, wouldn't they? Yo, yo, Ultimate Tag.

Still a show? The agility and the conditioning they build up through those workouts, they would do very well on that show. This show is sick. Still a show? Still going on? The agility and the conditioning they build up through those workouts, they would do very well on that show. This show is sick. Still a show? I don't know if it survived. Did it win an Emmy? It's the Watt brothers.

I'm not sure. I love JJ. I don't know TJ at all, but I love the JJ. I love the Justin James. They're all savages. All of them. They're great. They were mic'd up.

By the way, really cool move by the Houston Texans and the Pittsburgh Steelers to have TJ and JJ as the captain. Now, Derek, go fuck yourself. Yeah, who cares? You know what I mean? These two come out and dap each other up and then kind of do the whole thing. That was really – I thought that was cool. Some coaches, you know, normally you vote on the year-long captains.

You have a team vote for the year-long captains. And then weekly you have like a game captain. And if you go back to a guy's hometown or a team that a guy was on, normally they put them up as the captain or whatever for that week. Pretty cool little move there. You know what I mean? Pretty cool little move there. If you're Derek Watt, you are not happy.

Well, you pulled your hamstring because of it. Yeah, true. Let's go to Justin in Chicago. What's going on, Justin? Hey, Jay. Yeah, AJ, the boys. Do you think Nick Foles is a long-term option for the Chicago Bears? If he has success and it saves Matt Nagy and Ryan Pace's job,

let's go ahead and assume that he will be for at least the next few years. I think that is a big play right here. Nagy and Pace, who knows what their job situation looks like after this year if they're not good. Now, granted, they're 3-0 right now. A lot can happen. They can keep going, keep climbing, get a lot better, or they can completely crash and burn.

That is not just because of the Bears. That's because that is real in the NFL. If Nick Foles goes on to have success for the Chicago Bears this year, I would assume Nagy and Pace are like, okay, we got our guy. This is our guy. Let's keep it moving. Oh, no question. I mean, he absolutely can save.

I wouldn't say save their job. I'm not saying naggy's like on the hot seat he's gonna get fired but yeah you're gonna win some games this year you need to give some hope and show that hey we have a plan moving forward and nick fools it when you say long term what does that mean like max long term three this season and two more he's under contract for that exact amount three more years this one and then two more yeah so i think three years is long term. And in the NFL by the way, that is pretty long term. Who knows what the world's going to look like two years from now. Will Kyler Murray

be the best quarterback on planet Earth? Patrick Mullins at that point will finally be getting paid some money and actually be a cap hit to the Chiefs. I mean, the world is a much different place in two years. So I think this year and next year is all anybody really thinks about. And if Nick Foles can win for him, I think he's definitely around next year for sure. Is Mitch Trubisky, though, as the backup?

See ya! Nope. Wow. Does Mitch want to be there next year as the backup? Would he take a backup job? I'm really intrigued to see how this whole thing plays out this year in Chicago between those two. The quarterback position is one that has— and I know Matt Hasselbeck joined us earlier and said these two are really unselfish guys.

That position is an ego position. you are the team there's a reason why quarterbacks are the way they are they've been fluffed up their entire life and now you got two that are competing i just i don't know dude i just don't also would it be a little bit easier to like swallow that if like the team wasn't worth the shit and they replace you it's like okay it's like they were undefeated and they benched his ass it's like hey yeah you haven't cost it us yet but this guy is still the guy moving forward hey you remember what you did last year we do okay so we're not going to live with that we just brought in a guy from the jaguars who broke his collarbone with the jaguars while throwing a touchdown he gets released for minshu mania we're going to put his ass in as soon as we

can it's very interesting situation i do not know how it plays out. Back to the phone lines here. 1-888-MADDOGS6. Let's go to Aaron in North Carolina. What's going on, Aaron? What's up, Pat? How y'all doing? Hey, not too shabby down there.

North Carolina, come on and raise it. Take your circle. Yes, sir. Twist it around. I got a question about my boys down at NC State. Well, right next door because I'm Raleigh. And Dave Doran because we're playing like dog crap out there. Yeah, yeah.

That's NC State, baby. Let's go to Casey in Florida. What's going on, Casey? Dude, what's with these eagles, man? Yeah, they stink. All right, let's go to Will in Connecticut. What's going on, Will? Sam, man. Man, they stink. All right, let's go to Will in Connecticut. What's going on, Will? Sam, Pat.

What's going on? By the way, I'm on a heater right now. Keep it going, Will. Good luck. I am in a groove right now. Live bullets here. Can you hear me? Yeah, yeah, you sound good.

What do you want to talk about, Will, up here in Connecticut? One person, Boston Cunningham, New England, does not want you to change your want to talk about, Will, up here in Connecticut? One person, Vosikani, we're a stooge. New England does not want you to change your name to Midwest Stooge. Saw that. Number two, Hammer Don is the best show. I wanted to say thanks to Tom for making me rich. Attaboy, Tom. And Zito, what's your favorite pizza in Chicago?

Giordano Don's or Lou Malnati's? Hey, give me Giordano Don's right now. Yeah, that's the worst pizza I've ever had in my entire life. What do you mean? You actually said you liked the pizza there. No, it was the lasagna pizza that y'all motherfuckers are pushing out as pizza. You like thin, though.

The thin crust from Giordano's may be the best pizza I've had in a long time. So technically you like Giordano's pizza. Yeah, but not what you guys are pushing, which is the Chicago-style bullshit pizza. No, you did. I'm not pizza biased. Yeah, you did. You did. He's a pizza person. You pushed the lasagna. I'm not pizza biased. Yeah, you are.

There you are. I love all kinds of pizza. If you're a human that doesn't live in Chicago and has been force-fed this lasagna shit pizza for your entire life, deep dish pizza, the thing crust at Giordano's is unbelievable pizza. It is very, very good pizza. So I would see how, if you like that pizza

that isn't actually pizza, it's like a soup of pizza with dough wrapped around it. I could see how you would like Giordano's the most because the dough is incredible, but the thin crust is very, very good. Let's go back to hammer down though. He said,

thanks to tone for getting rich. You just lost Chicago. Well, me and Gumby have the highest records. We've been making people rich. Not tough. Whoa. I see what you just did.

Yeah. That's good. The, um, by the way, Chicago, beautiful place. Love there. That's good. That's good. By the way, Chicago, beautiful place. Love that place. I love it. Love it. I love the pizza stands. The thin crust pizza is just the best pizza that Giordano's has.

It should just be their pizza. Oh, no, you sold Don over there. When it comes to Hammer Don, though, which is our gambling podcast every Monday, Thursday, Friday, 3.30 at youtube.com forward slash the Pat McAfee show, Tone Diggs is the host, Michael Lombardi, former GM, is on there, and then it's me and Gumpy, okay? And me and Gumpy sit on the desk next to each other, and I think we're the only ones with a winning record at this point.

Well, that's not true. I mean, the only guys that have the balls to make a pick on Monday night. Oh! God, it's Gumpy Nuke! Whoa. I mean, the only guys that have the balls to make a pick on Monday night. I just want to say this. Me and Gumpy are a tag team in this gambling road right now, and we are hot, AJ. AJ, we are hot right now. I knew that was coming. That's why I was pissed he even brought it up.

Well, thanks a ton for making me rich. It's like, well, you're fucking welcome for answering your call, asshole. And for giving you every single wink. What did I say about Connecticut? It's got Anthony in New York. What's going on, Anthony? Hey, what's up, buddy? I'm a former West Virginia grad. Loved you there. Obviously loved your whole career.

And I'm hearing you on SiriusXM right now. My question is, how far do you think Cam Newton could bring the Patriots this year? I honestly believe they are a contender, strictly because they have Bill Belichick and Cam Newton. CBS crew is being told Steelers-Titans will be Monday night. We have breaking news here. Wow. Paul Kuharski, who is an NFL reporter down in Nashville, Tennessee, at Paul Kuharski, NFL.

I think I've done some stuff. Guy has a great personality. He just tweeted out 221 three minutes ago. The CBS crew is being told Steelers-Titans will be Monday night. So will CBS have a Monday night football game, or will this be a regionalized local game? I would assume, is CBS going to compete against ESPN for a Monday night football? Are we going to have dueling Monday night footballs?

And are they going to put Tony Romo and Jim Nance on Monday Night Football or CBS for the Titans-Steelers game? This is awesome for football fans. Congrats to the Titans getting their COVID outbreak under control enough to be able to have this game on Monday as opposed to on Tuesday or later on down the season. Let's have a game on Monday night. We have two

games. I'm pumped for it, A.J. Hawk. I just wonder if there's anything that ESPN has in place like in their contract that there can't be a competing nfl game i'm sure covid changes a lot of the rules where they they have to understand and give some leeway but you know espn doesn't want cbs putting a monday night game against them especially if it's on big cbs and not like the cbs sports channel or cbs sports app well and and also if you think about what espn is they're going through a new broadcasting crew they had the simulcast or megacast on alongside of what last week or two weeks ago if cbs was

just to drop jim nance and tony romo on a monday night steelers titan game by the way which is a big pittsburgh steelers is always a draw and the titans are a damn good football team that is a massive game i hope we can watch it somehow but in the past it has not been something that has been national it has always been regional and i think this year could it be different because force majeure with the covet 19 and they postponed the game maybe who knows 425 uh cbs game on sunday is new england at kc i assume nancy and romo are on that if they can make the flight from kc down in tennessee right after so they would have to get on a private plane. If they can make it.

They're absolutely flying private. If they can make it. Yeah, but the quarantine. I think the quarantine rules would have to be the thing. Pandemic, AJ. You think Tony's getting there four days before in quarantine in each city? No, at least a day, though, I'd assume. Don't you think?

No. No. He's flying in private, doing the game, and getting out of there. That doesn't seem safe. That's what Tony Romo's doing right now? What a fucking life. I have no idea. I would assume that's what he's doing.

Yeah, he's not going in and, like, quarantining in each city. By the way, every time they shoot up there, Jim Nance has a full. Jim Nance is doing this entire lean thing, and then Tony Romo's just sitting over there. I mean, they seem like they just are the most chill group out of anybody, and they do a hell of a job. Unfortunately, they are going up against the best quarterback in the NFL, Aaron Rodgers, on Monday Night Football.

So it's going to be hard not to, you know, Packers, Falcons then. A lot of points in that one. Yeah. Oh, also, the Falcons are probably dead at halftime, right? That bird probably crashes. Well, unless they're up, because then you've got to watch them blow the lead. Ty, why do you not have a good feeling? Because Green Bay Packers defense?

No, not a bad feeling in terms of them losing, but I think, yeah, their defense could be susceptible. But Matt Ryan will have a great first half, and then they'll hopefully end up beating them by three, four scores. We've got to get to a break. We'll answer more calls on the other side. That's big breaking news. Huge.

Steelers-Titans postponed from Sunday at 1 to Monday at 8.30. This is good for the players though because it doesn't change up the routine too much. Once you get into Tuesday or Wednesday, now you're talking about a different game now. Good for the NFL for figuring it out. I always wondered, why are you testing everybody and keeping them socially distant in the building if only three people

get it and your entire team gets wiped out? Why are we even doing all this? What is even the protocol for? I would assume that once these negative tests started coming back from everybody else and the building got cleaned out, they were like, okay, we can actually do this and get back in there. Good for the NFL for working through this thing. And ESPN put out their power rankings, AJ. I'd like to

see your reactions alongside me here. Chicago Bears are not giving a lot of respect for being a 3-0 team, by the way. They're ranked 14th overall, and I would assume that everybody that watches the NFL would would say yeah that's probably about where they should be even though they're three and oh nick foals came in and had a big comeback win they are currently ranked at 14 number one he got the kansas city

chiefs two baltimore ravens three the ospreys and four the green bay packers at five you have the buffalo bills how do you feel about the top five there aj i think it's all right i would uh i don't know would you put put Green Bay above Baltimore right now? Well, if you only judge Baltimore for how they played against the best team in football, the Kansas City Chiefs, I think that'd be a little bit difficult. I think the top five there, all right, I'll say it. The top five, I almost went with the top four, but I don't believe that is fair to the Bills' mafia. I believe those top five, first two to five, they're pretty interchangeable. Right behind the Kansas City Chiefs.

We don't know how that's going to play off. It all depends on whose defense shows up, what quarterback can play at the right time. Josh Allen obviously having an incredible year as compared to his years in the past. Aaron Rodgers, best quarterback in football right now. Russell Wilson's playing very good football. And obviously Lamar Jackson had an off night the other night. They kind of went away from the run. They need to stick with that, I think, because that's what makes them very, very special.

Then you have at six the Titans who are battling COVID. Then the Pittsburgh Steelers at seven. That's a Monday night football game. Los Angeles Rams at eight. Patriots nine. Saints at ten. That's the top ten right there. How do you feel about five through ten, A.J. Hawk?

So the Steelers are another team, and maybe I'm just not in that Pittsburgh bubble like you guys, that you guys travel with it. Does it feel like they're flying under the radar? Yes. From what they've done early this season? Yes, and Mike Greenberg has been banging the drum very hard. Everybody talks about the Chiefs and the Ravens. The Pittsburgh Steelers deserve to be talked about because last year,

the same defense that they have right now almost carried them to a playoff berth. And we are not in a league anymore where the defense can just carry a team to the playoffs. I guess people can say that the Patriots did that last year with their special teams in defense. They still had Tom Brady at quarterback. Last year, the Steelers, with no offense, basically, that defense almost got them. Same defense is there. Now you have a healthy Juju, healthy James Conner, and a healthy Ben Roethlisberger. I think it is a conversation piece where like, hey, the Steelers are aethlisberger, I think it is a conversation piece where, like, hey, the Steelers are a legit team this year.

I think them sitting at seven, Steelers fans are probably pissed off. I'd assume Tomlin doesn't even know that they're at seventh, but they probably deserve to be a little bit higher if I had to guess. They do, and if you're a Steelers fan or you're a fan of any of these teams and you're pissed off about where you're ranked, just know something, that none of this matters, and nobody knows anything. These are just to talk about. Yeah, take it. It's strictly for shows like this one to have something to react to

because on Wednesdays there's nothing to talk about. So do not get your emotions or panties in a bunch. This does not mean a damn thing. But if you're in New York, think about switching teams and trying to find a team to root for because 31-32 is pretty tough. Jets and Giants are 31-32. Obviously, Jets being the worst team. Then the Bengals there, who almost lost their quarterback's head

this past week whenever they tied the Philadelphia Eagles. Panthers are at 29. I'd assume Matt Rule did not expect that when he decided to kick Cam Newton out of town and sign Teddy Bridgewater. That's a wild look for them. Christian McCaffrey's hurt. Obviously, the power rankers saw that as quite a detriment to the squad.

Yeah, they did. I guess I know it's 28 and 29 we're arguing over. I would put them above the Broncos right now. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I think so, too. The Broncos playing Thursday night. They got a guy named Raipin playing. And then 27, you have the Jacksonville Jaguars. They got a big win over the Colts early, but it feels like they're potentially finding their water, which is at the bottom of the division.

The Atlanta Falcons at 26. That team could be undefeated right now, but instead they're the Atlanta Falcons. Yep. Yeah, Ty, are you scared for this Falcons-Packers matchup because if the Falcons could find a way to stumble into a win, it would turn their season around? No, I mean, I just think that— Oh, I thought you just said you were nervous about it.

Well, no, I am, but it's because historically the Falcons throw all over the Packers. Julio Jones, I don't know if he's going to play or not. The Falcons can score a lot of points. Their defense is obviously fucking trash, but I don't know. You just worry that the Packers have to play another perfect game because they're going to have to score a lot of points to win. Dan Quinn is definitely on a hot seat, too. So how will his players respond? And then let's go to the middle of the pack there.

The 49ers at 11. Their entire team was hurt, and the fourth stringers beat the Giants by 27 points. That has to feel good if you're a Niners fan for your depth going forward. Tompa, Bay Q, Gronk and Nears are at 12. Arizona Cardinals, who had a bad game, and it felt like Kyler Murray was not the same Kyler Murray we saw the first couple weeks. Will that Kyler Murray, who shows up, doesn't Kyler Murray who shows up doesn't show up shows up doesn't show up will that continue or is this just one little blimp and he's back to playing MVP style uh NFL football who knows

Chicago Bears right there at 14 at undefeated 14 seed 15 the Raiders 16 the Colts Cowboys at 17 Cleveland Brownies at 18 they They could potentially turn the corner. 19, the Chargers. 20, Texans. Vikings, Eagles, Lions, Dolphins, Washington. It rounds out the rest of the list. Very intriguing here. None of this means a damn thing because teams can get hot at different times,

but it sure does feel like there's about five to six teams that are already dead, and that's really all that matters here. It does. I would even drop the Vikings down a little bit. They're at 21. Wouldn't you drop them down to 24, 25? They have not looked great, but they could potentially open it up. They looked good in the first half of this game this past weekend. They've looked good in spurts.

Yeah, you're right. But for the most part, there's been times in every game that they've played where I'm like, man, this team team i always think the same thing too though oh they can turn around mike zimmer i have a ton of respect for him and i just the way they look at times just so out of like they don't i don't know none of them on the same page it just looks weird it looks bad well let's talk about the texans then who are at 20 they've had to face if you listen to the people that are talking about the steelers being top of the class of the afc they've had to to face the Chiefs, the Ravens, and the Steelers, their first three games. They're 0-3, obviously. That is a tough task to come out of the gates with while you're still

trying to figure out your team. And just like last year, the Texans towards the end got hot. So maybe they make a big jump towards the middle or the end of the year. But that's a team that looks like they've lost their way. But is that because they played incredible competition here to start the entire season? Yeah, we don't know. That's what makes it so intriguing i think we don't really know what what any team is i mean we kind of know who the chiefs are we know how the packers are playing and to see like the the top five or so we we kind of know who they are but everyone else you don't really know like you don't know how good you're you always go into the uh i always love when they release the schedule and people rank who has the toughest schedules and they do all that like oh people will ask me through the years man even when i was on the team is it have you uh when you

look at the schedule man you guys have the fourth hardest schedule in the league is that a tough thing to overcome i'm like i have no clue what that means i've never thought about how our schedule is i know our division who we play and oh who do we play this year oh the afc west okay then we'll go play them like you don't sit there and worry about your opponents uh by the way week is scheduled compared to what last year's team because the this team is very different than last year's team that happens everywhere that's why what the chiefs were able to do keeping everybody around is so damn impressive because the parody of the nfl is a real thing we're 2 and 14 then we made a run and went into the playoffs the next year with andrew luck you never know who's going to get hot or the big important thing, especially this

year, who's going to stay healthy. Who's going to be able to stay healthy? That is the ultimate X factor there. Can't thank you enough for choosing to listen to the show. If you liked it, please tell a friend. If you hate it, just act like it never happened. Big thanks to all our guests, all the boys, and to you. Have a great Wednesday.

We'll see you manana. Ty Schmidt, please play some independent music. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.