The Ringer NFL Show - COVID Chaos, Lineup Help, and Week 15 Bets

Episode Date: December 17, 2021

We attempt to parse through the wildest week of COVID-19 news in the 2021 NFL season and help you navigate what to do with your fantasy football roster this week. Then we offer up our favorites bets of the season before holding Fantasy Court and reading some listener emails. Join our FanDuel daily fantasy contest and sign up to play against us HERE! News (0:35) Bets (26:27) Fantasy Court (55:48) Listener Emails (59:53) Sign up and compete against us in the Bad QB League on FanDuel HERE.  Email us at [e-mail]. Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Producer: Craig Horlbeck Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, before we start the show today, we are doing the Ringer Listener League on Fandul, play with us, and whoever has the most points combined in the second half of the season, we're setting you a trophy, an actual trophy from Craig D.K. and I, you can compete against us, play against us in the Ringer Listener League on Fandualdial, and we're still doing the bad quarterback league. Check that out. Links for those are in this podcast description. All right, let's get to the show. Welcome to the Ringer Fantasy Football Show. My name is Danny Hyfitz. I am joined by Danny Kelly and Craig Horlebeck, and normally we'd be previewing week 15 for you. with some prop bets, Shark Tank style.

But this is not a normal week. It's not even kind of a normal week. There are no props to bet because the NFL has a bunch of COVID cases. So we don't know who's playing in the games. Why would you want to know who's playing in the games? There's no way we could know. Three dozen players were placed on the COVID list just on Monday of this week alone. That was the most players that were added to the COVID list on a single day in either of the last two years, which is disconcerting.

It's like it is literally the worst. situation ever so far with the NFL right now. In terms of positive tests. And that was just on Monday. So then this week has been crazy. All these cases have just, they've wreaked havoc on the NFL for week 15. So let's just do with one example.

The Browns are playing the Raiders in Saturday. And there are Saturday games this week. If this wasn't hard enough, make sure to sit your lines for Saturday. Maybe they should just push that back a day, you know? That'd be crazy. Why they just need four days a week even in a pandemic. Eight of the 22 starting Cleveland Brown's play,

have tested positive, including Baker, Mayfield, Jarvis Landry, their left tackle, Jeddrick Will's more than a third of Cleveland starters. Sheesh. Not to mention head coach Kevin Stefanski. There's the running back coaches also tested positive. And Cleveland's not the only one. You got Washington basically has the third of their active roster is on the list. The bears have all three coordinators on the list.

In all, seven teams entered into enhanced protocols this week because they've had positive tests. The Browns, the Rams, Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Minnesota, and Washington. are all in the enhanced protocols. That's almost a quarter of the league. Yes. And then the NFL was like, you know what? Well, how do everyone just goes to an enhanced protocol?

I think they're all in it. And look, this is not just the NFL. This is the United States. Cases in the United States have jumped 40% over the last two weeks. That's cornering the New York Times. Hospitalizations in the U.S. have increased 21% over the last two weeks. That's also cornered in the New York Times. I mean, you know, Omocrons here like this is messing up a lot of things.

And obviously football is like, you know, not the most important thing going on right now. Right. We want to kind of get that, you know, caveat out of the way. Obviously, we're going to be talking about the fantasy football, the implications for fantasy football. But of course, we just hope everyone is healthy, okay, gets through this thing, you know, healthy. Like, at least it's not too bad of symptoms and things like that. It's good that so many guys in the NFL right now are vaccinated. So hopefully it'll be, you know, something that kind of quickly passes.

But obviously, that is the caveat. We're going to talk about it from the football point of view. But, of course, we're thinking about these, you know, because. they're people. So obviously that's just in the front of our minds. Well said, D.K. Thanks. So with all this craziness with football, the NFL is just changing

their COVID protocols in response to this? Yeah, pretty much right as we started recording. Like fast. Yeah. This just happened. So like, honestly, forgive us, like, bear with us as we try to understand this ourselves. It's Thursday. We're going to do our best to just help you with your lineups off the top here and like what to do. This is nuts.

But so as of right now, the NFL's changed their COVID protocols. D.K., you want to walk us through this a little bit with like what the new rules are? So the basic gist of it is, and this is very important because right now it feels like chaos. Like, you know, we were scrambling before the show to basically be like, okay, who is out, who is going to be out this week? How do we figure out what to tell people? The basic gist is, we can't really give you any advice. Honestly, right now, this is coming on on Friday. We have to be vigilant. We have to see what's going on on Saturday. But the important thing is with these new protocols is

I believe it's vaccinated players if you test positive which many of these guys that have tested positive are vaccinated and they're asymptomatic if you're asymptomatic and you test negative the next day twice. Twice. So you have to take one of the official PCR tests plus one of those rapid tests

or whatever. If you can get both of those negative within one day, you can play that day. So instead of the old protocols it was like basically you had to test negative two days in a row and then sometimes it didn't really work because there was like some delay, some lag. Like I know a couple guys were upset

because they tested negative two days in a row, but like the league didn't rule on it in time kind of deal. And so they had to miss the game anyway. So basically what the NFL is doing is here. And they say they're going with the science. They're going with what the doctors have told them is basically if you're asymptomatic and you test negative, you can play immediately.

So that's huge. So a lot of the guys that we're talking about today, so this is Friday, we're recording this on Thursday. It will go up on Friday. You guys will be listening to it. hopefully, you know, Friday or Saturday, some of these guys may come off the list before these games. So just bear that in mind.

Make sure you're doing your due diligence for your team. But it is possible that a lot of these guys test out of the COVID protocols and play this week. But right now we're kind of just treating it like we don't know. So we're kind of just kind of walking through it. So what's interesting about all this is, yes, while fantasy football and real NFL has been kind of mired in these delays all season, it's actually going to get easier now, it seems because like you said,

these players might only have to be off, are on the COVID list for a day. So in terms of fantasy, like no longer will you see your player hop on the COVID list on Tuesday and then he's out for Sunday. That's kind of gone now if he's vaccinated and asymptomatic,

which is a good thing for fantasy. So guys like Tyler Lockett, like D.K said, if you test positive on Thursday, you can still play on Sunday. So keep that in mind. My number one is advice. Well, we don't know that.

It's possible now. It's possible. But we have no idea. But with that said, I think our collective number one piece of advice here is you just got to be on it. If you're in the playoffs and fantasy, this is the first week of playoffs. There's games on Saturday and Sunday. Before the games, an hour before the game, you make sure you check every single player because we have no

idea what's going to happen and things can change quickly as we've seen. So honestly, being vigilant is probably the best tactic you can have this week. Here's my real fantasy advice for you, because again, who knows who's gone on and come off the list between us recording this and you hearing us. So I'll give you the one piece of advice that is Evergreen for the playoffs. because it's fantasy playoffs, COVID's making anything crazy. It's the break glass in case of emergency. Turn your push notifications on for Twitter

and then go to Adam Schaefter and hit the little bell and have all, all tweets. Every Adam Schaefter tweet as a push notification, it's terrible for your brain. It's terrible for your friends, your spouse, your partner. It will overall decrease your happiness and the relationships in your life to have, Adam Schaefter's tweet, sent his push notifications.

This will make your life worse. However, you will be the first to know everything. And that is what winning's about, trading everything else in the pursuit of glory. Exactly. You know, you got to weigh your options here. Isn't winning more important than ruining all your relationships? I would face it. I think so.

It's like you have to go out of your way. If you have a partner, like do extra dishes and stuff because you're just not going to be listening as much to the people you love. You'll probably pay less attention to your children. But you will know that, hey, Lockett came off. You don't need Freddie Swain this week. Also, if you're using, like, let's say, the Yahoo Fantasy app, they also have a notification system where you can get it set up, where you can get a push notification every time there is a piece of news

that changes about one of your players. So do that as well. Oh, that's helpful. Yeah. Yeah. I use it every week. It's great. So with that broad advice that will overall decrease your really, I don't know,

utility as a human being, do we want to, what do we want to do? Do we want to get specific of like, there's literally too many people to name? It's not worth reading all the guys. guys. There's a lot. Just check your lineup. Many, many people. So many.

Check your team. There's literally like 60 or 70 guys throughout the NFL last year. We're not going to just. Let's just, do you want to throw out a couple of guys that like if you are down one or I don't know seven starters

that you want to throw in some flexible guys? Yeah. Like flex. So based, so right now there, here's a couple of just, I'm going to throw out like highlights of in the,

I understand that's a bad. word in relation to what we're talking about here. But here are the guys that you need to keep in mind. Tile Lockett. I think a couple backups here would be D. Eskridge, the rookie for the Seahawks and maybe Freddie Swain. You could definitely, I would say, if Lockett is out, those guys are flex options. Which one you like more out of those two?

That's tough. I would say I lean Escortge just slightly, but I don't know. Like both of them are pretty equal. And then so like for the Browns, a lot of the Browns are going to be out this week. Donovan People's Jones. still out there. I think he's flexible. It sounds like David and Joku is off the COVID list. So he is going to be, I think, right now, as we know,

the one tight end on that team that is going to be in the roster. So he's a guy that out. That's a good note. If David and Jok is the only Browns tied in for that game and Jarvis Landreys out, David and Jok is actually an excellent streamer. Yeah. I think KJ. Osborne is still out there on waivers. So I think he's a guy to

grab Sterling Shepard to me is a high floor type guy that you can plug in if you're really getting desperate. And then running back situation in Miami, a lot of the guys are on the COVID list right now. So Malcolm Brown and Duke Johnson are both out there. And Ronald Jones is another option. It sounds like, and we'll get into, this is a good segue to the injury situation.

Because not only is COVID, we're just wrecking havoc on the league. Everybody's hurt. Everyone is hurt. Everyone is hurt. There's like four players who don't have COVID and are healthy. Oh my gosh. Every running back in the NFL, I think right now is hurt. Like, Sequin Barkley, David Montgomery, Leonard Fernette, like all these guys came up on the injury

report this week. So Ronald Jones is a guy to go look at Khalil Herbert is a guy to go look at Apparently David Montgomery is sick Not COVID this week So that's just another thing to like pile on here But we can run through I think it makes sense to run through the injuries

Really quick because these are not going to change as quickly As the COVID list ones And so I would just say maybe we'll run through these And then give you like The action item for each one to like be aware of As we go later into this week Does that make sense?

Yeah Okay, so I'll just go through him Lamar Jackson, he's nursing a low ankle injury. It sounds like he's going to try to go, but I would say right now, based on what we know, it seems less likely they's going to play. They signed Josh Johnson to the roster, which would indicate like they don't feel good about it,

or at least they're just not sure what's going to happen here. They don't know, I think is the real answer. I think they're leaning toward him playing, but I don't think they know. And obviously, Lamar having an ankle injury, he's not going to be quite the same kind of player if he can't, if they don't know right now. Yeah, so in Superflex leagues, if you need to get a backup, Tyler Huntley,

in one QB leagues, I think there's some really good streamers. Tua might be a good streamer this week. Justin Fields is a good streamer this week. Any other good streamers that come to mind for you guys? Who else do we like Jimmy G? Jimmy G in the Niners versus the Falcons. The Falcons these gotten shredded by much worse quarterbacks than Jimmy G. That's a good one.

And then the other major quarterback situation to watch here is Jalen Hurts. Because obviously if you've had Jalen Hertz on your team for most of the year, there's a solid chance that you're doing well this year. And so it sounds like I saw a report yesterday. I don't know if this has been corroborated or not, but like he has a high ankle sprain. So that is obviously very bad. That's something that kind of tends to linger.

It takes longer than like the low ankle variety. You can't really tape up a high ankle sprain. So Jalen Hertz, I think, is trending towards not playing right now, from what we know. So Gardner Minchu, get ready to fire him up too. So another week of Minchumania. I also want to note briefly that if Jalen Hertz is active,

I still think there's a world where he actually he could rotate with Gardner-Michu. Like, he could both play. So just because Jalen Hertz plays, I don't even know if that, like, you want a double confirmation from Shafter or Jake Glazer or someone on Sunday that he's starting and not just going to like rotate in.

Right. So those are the two major quarterback issues. Like it sounds like Aaron Rogers is going to play. It sounds like Josh Allen will be okay. Saquan Barkley, sounds like he had an ankle injury. I saw he was limited on Thursday, so that's a good sign.

But keep in mind, Devante Booker, if he's on free agent waivers right now. Oss Neckler, that's irrelevant because it's Thursday night game, so you guys already saw what happened there. We'll get to our Friday night. We'll get to our Friday morning Thursday Night Football Predictions. We're doing that. That's a new segment. I have that.

All right. Tony Pollard practiced limited on Thursday I saw, but keep in mind, he's dealing with a very, very painful planar fasciitis. Corey Clement, I think, is a good backup plan for that. Cream Hunt, ankle injury. Deeranis Johnson might be an option this week, but you just kind of have to see how that goes. Leonard Fernett came up on the injury report this week with an ankle. Ronald Jones is a good guy to have in your back of your mind. James Connor.

Giovanni Bernard for the Buccaneers went on injured reserve. So like it's the buck's only running back to really Leonard Fornett, who has the ankle injury, Ronald Jones, and then Kishon Vaughn, who has not really earned any trust from Tom Brady. I know the St. Randy is not a good matchup. But Ronald Jones, if Fournett doesn't play, is a really, really high-end streamer in a week where you're going to need that.

Yep. James Connor is nursing an ankle injury as well. I think Chase Edmonds is going to be coming back. He won't be on waivers most likely, but, you know, Benjamin could be like a very big desperation move. I probably wouldn't go that route if I were probably look at some of these other guys.

Elijah Mitchell coming off of concussion and knee injury, if Jeff Wilson's out there, he's a backup plan. D'Andre Swift, I don't think he's practiced this week. So this could be another big week for Craig Reynolds. I don't think DeAndre Swift plays. And if Jamal Williams doesn't come off the COVID list, Craig Reynolds is a really good streamer. And if Williams does come off, it's more complicated.

Exactly. Jadie McKissick, I think he's still going through a concussion protocol. I believe I saw that he was like on the side working out. It doesn't look positive for him going forward right now. Jonathan Williams came in and kind of spelled last week. And then, of course, Jared Patterson is still there. It's just mostly, I think, good for Antonio Gibson this week. The Washington team in general is missing.

There's like 20-something guys on the COVID list. So this may be a situation you just want to avoid. I don't know. I would avoid Washington because of the unknowns. As a general rule for this week, if you're on the fence, but for starts it, you should probably start the guy in the earlier game.

Yeah, that's a great point. Like, you know what I mean? In Washington, you just don't know what they're doing with. It's like two in hand or one in the bush or whatever. It's like,

you know, it's just, we don't know what's going on. Like, obviously there's guys propping up on this list every day. So if you have the opportunity to play someone, you know they're going to play, probably play them.

Rex Burkhead has, a hip slash knee injury. I think that's good for David Johnson. Royce Freeman could get some work. So those are a couple of guys that are flex-worthy. And then David Montgomery, just a situation to watch here. He was ill on Thursday.

If he can't get back to practice, Friday or Saturday. I don't remember, do they play Saturday or Sunday? I can't remember off the top of my head. But that's the Bears. Bears on Sunday. So the Bears' situation, I would say,

Khalil Herbert is definitely flex-worthy because he's been awesome when he's come in. relief of David Montgomery, but they don't have an offensive coordinator. Do we know who's going to be actually calling plays for the Bears this week? So I don't think it's actually as big of a deal

as it sounds. When you say, like, oh, there are top three coordinators are out. That's like a disaster. The Bears are probably more equipped for that than any team in the league because like Mike Petten, who was the Packers defensive coordinator

the last like few years is a defensive assistant for them. So he's been doing it. So he'd probably do that. And then the offense, they have Bill Laser, who I think could fill in. Or does laser doesn't have.

I think Laser went on the COVID list. Laser has it. Okay, well, I'll double check that as we're talking, but yeah. This is unbelievable, but like this is the state of the world. So it's crazy. Laser is in COVID protocol. That's unbelievable. Okay.

It's just, this is crazy, right? So there's a lot. There's a lot. We'll move on to quickly. We'll go through the receivers. Big news here, DeAndre Hopkins has an MCL injury. He is out for the year. There's a chance he could return for the actual NFL playoffs, but obviously he's done for

the fantasy year. Yeah, you can cut him. that is a boost, I would say, for Christian Kirk. AJ Green becomes sort of an interesting pickup on the waiver wire. What about your way, Rondale? If you're still out there? I don't think Ronnell. Really, I think Zach Ertz becomes more streamable than anything.

I think Zach Ertz has been out, has gotten a lot more targets. I think Zachertz is the biggest beneficiary of this. AJ Green and Kyle don't look like they're on the same page. I think that they've actually been better than... Greeners had a huge game. He had like 100 yards against the ramps. I would say it's the biggest boost for Green because now you're going to have

like Antoine Wesley on the outside and so now all the outside stuff is probably just going to go to AJ Green. I don't think it really changes stuff in the slot which is why Rondo Moore probably doesn't get a big of a boost which is disappointing for me personally but that's just the way the cookie

crumbles as Ian Hart is to put it. Terry McLaurin has a concussion he's going through the protocol. I believe again I saw that he was on the side working out but it's unclear if he's going to be able to play this week. I would just avoid Washington's offense other than Antonio of Gibson maybe.

Yeah. You wouldn't start Terry McLaren if he played? No, Terry McLaren, if he plays, I would play him. I don't know that I even would because we don't know what the deal with quarterback is. Do we know if Taylor Hineke is going to play? Like, for sure, and this is a team that isn't able to practice this week. And Terry McClough, like, you have permission to bench Terry McLaurin. He's already been super boom busts.

Like, generally we're like, start your stars, but it's like, I mean, you probably have someone on your bench who's been outscoring Terry McLaren recently. Like, I'm not saying you should, but if you're leaning that way, I would go with your gut. Because, I mean, this is a disaster situation for Washington this. week. Yeah. Emmanuel Sanders, this is actually a big one. This is an important one.

Emmanuel Sanders has a knee injury, which means big opportunity here for Gabe Davis, Gabe Dave, our guy, who has, number one, he's produced in the past big plays. He's shown the potential to score touchdowns. He scored a bunch of them as a rookie. And I think he's just like a big play creator. And so this is, you know, again, like you're in the NFL's most past heavy team. You got Josh Allen playing quarterback. In terms of streamer or in terms of like flex option.

type streamer type guys like gave david is one of my favorites this week i would say what do you guys think yeah i like gave dave a lot i would also throw amon ross st brown for the lions because t j hawkinson is on injured reserve now yep he got hand injury it sounds like he had surgery already so he's done for the year so amon ross so many things this week sorry for the lions amon ross 24 targets over the last two weeks which is like fifth in the NFL so that's a really high end option at receiver especially if you're in ppr and then darren waller's probably not going to play this week on Saturday. So Foster Moreau's like a backup there. You can get him. It's tough. I think he's been on the

injury list as well. I would just not bother with either because Moreau hasn't really done anything in like, you know, in his relief of Waller anyway. So both of those guys, I would say just probably look for other options. Wait, one other guy is Devante Parker who had a buy last week who's not super owned and they're playing the Jets this week and he's actually been not bad with two at when he's healthy. So Devonjean Parker's barely played this year, but he's been pretty good when he does. And Jill and Waddles on the COVID list. So

we'll see if he comes off or now. So with all this said, like, I just want to circle back to the beginning of what D.K said for a guy that's super under the radar, which is Malcolm Brown for the Dolphins. The Dolphins have three running backs in COVID list. One of those guys could come off and in which case this piece is meaningless. But if none of the dolphins running back to come off the list, I want to throw out Malcolm Brown is on injured reserve. He's probably, he might be activated this week. Everyone is assuming Duke Johnson will play. But Malcolm Brown is actually the guy for Miami. He might be the only running back. Duke Johnson's not really between the tackles runner. The Jets have like the worst run defense in the NFL. And if, if, Malcolm Brown comes off. He could be like a strangely weak winning guy. And if you have an IR spot and don't have players on IR, you can actually pick up Malcolm Brown, throw him in the injured reserve, pick up someone else. And if he gets activated, he gets activated,

you maybe play him. And if not, you'd not. Anyway, it's just a sneaky guy. And then we've mentioned a lot. And also just to do the Adam Schaefter Twitter notifications. If you want to rot your brain, it'll help. Pay attention to all the news because things are crazy. And just be flexible.

a big notification about something that happened late Wednesday night if you would have done that if you would have the Adler Shepter's stuff transition

ding ding ding ding kind of buried the lead a little here obviously there's a lot happening I wouldn't say we buried the lead I would say

we ordered this properly correct the other thing I'm not going to say this is good news but I'm going to say this is of a different this is rather lighthearted

Urban Meyer fired by the Jaguars wow okay can I just say huge mistake for Jacksonville Urban was just getting started the burn book remains undefeated.

Oh my God. We burned Odell Beckham two days before it was like Free Odell and now we've burned Urban Meyer two days before he got fired. Who's next? And then Russell Wilson's not going to be on the Seahawks next year. Oh, God. Yeah. Look at that. Oh, boy.

There is so many things that happen with Urban Meyer, but I guess the thing that pushed it over the edge was the story for the Tampa Bay Times where Josh Lambo, the kicker was stretching in like a split squat. And he comes over and kicks him in the legs like, hey, dip shit, make your fucking kicks. Urban Meyer kicked him, to be clear. Urban Meyer kicked the kicker. Sorry if people are listening with their children. I apologize. I'm going to, don't you ever effing kick me again is what Josh Lambo said. And then he said, I'm the headball coach.

I'll kick you whenever I want. He's just such an asshole. Like, this is, I'm just honestly, like, obviously, you know, you never want to be the person that's like, oh, yeah, you should get fired. But like, this was the clearest and most easiest decision ever. Like, this is fine. Like, usually we're like, oh, you know, you don't want to refrain for fraud. When you kick your employees and then they're like, no, I'll bow.

allowed to do that. Yeah, get fired. I'm the head ball coach. I'm the head ball coach. I can kick anyone I want. You got to admit, hey, dip shit, make your fucking kicks is objectively funny. I mean, I've said that a lot, but just not to their face. And I'm also not their coach. We need a segment on this Friday show where it's like, hey, dip shit, make your fucking picks. Yeah, seriously. Hey, dip shit, make your fucking bets. That's actually how Craig was before he was full-time host when we just had him as a producer. We just like kick him right in the ribs, be like, hey, make these guys.

damn edits, Craig. Damn straight. And then what is, yeah, I don't know who's Josh Lambo, who's Shod Khan, I don't know who's who in this situation. We'll just move on. Oh my God. All I know is that Craig started producing well. That's how we build culture.

This is incredible. Do you think he was fired with cause or does he get a buyout now? I think this is the correct question. So coaching, it's not like NFL players where like the contracts are more well-known. The really guessed a bit for him. his deal, I believe, was $9 million a year for five years, so basically $45 million for five years. We don't know how much of that, but coach contracts are guaranteed. I'm sure there's like incentive escalators and stuff, but let's just say it's $9 million.

So he's been paid a large portion of that, but that still means there's like more than $30 million left in his deal. I really feel that he was not fired after the bar incident with the woman who was not his wife while his wife was watching their grandchildren and he was, you know, doing whatever he was doing with that. Because they'd have to give him a buyout then? Because it was not for cause and so they'd have to pay them the full 40 extra million dollars. Can you explain what that means for people? If you're fired for cause, they don't owe you money. Right. And if you're fired you fired somebody because they're bad at performance, then you owe them the money that's guaranteed. But there's a clause in your contract that voids your guaranteed money often because of moral or ethical behavior. And so some, I guess they decided that like him dancing in a bar was not going to

because and so they couldn't do it. I have a feeling that kicking a player and then being like, I'm allowed to kick you because I'm the head coach, like specifically citing your job as the reason you can kick someone, I wonder if that, I have no idea, I'm not a lawyer. But I'm wondering if that actually will void or not the remaining 35-ish million dollars that they owe in. And that was allowed them to fire. This happened at Washington.

The Washington Huskies football coach, like, pushed a guy. And that was the impetus to kind of, like, get him out of there. And I think that they did some sort of deal or whatever to, like, buy him out. But I'm guessing, like, again, this is just speculation, but maybe they come to some sort of agreement. Like, we'll give you X if you don't sue or whatever for the rest of it, you know, blah, blah, I don't know how it's going to work. But bottom line is he's gone. Yeah.

They also could have just decided, like, you know what, this is a sunk cost because this is embarrassing. and we have to get rid of this guy now. I mean, they're going to ruin Trevor Lawrence. Like, we got to save Trevor Lawrence. Like, this is ridiculous. Urban is, like, the evil coach in a sports movie at this point. I'm the head ball coach. I'll kick you whenever I want.

Did you guys, I comp to, I came up with this comp, and I actually think it works insanely good. He's Diatloff from Chernobyl. Did you guys watch Chernobyl? I did watch Chernobyl. Like, the main guy in, like, the power plant that basically was, like, one of the big reasons it all went to shit. Oh, it was all on him.

His arrogance is the reason that happened because he couldn't believe that somebody below him was correcting him and knew more than he did. Yeah. And he like doubled down on it, tripled down on it.

And he's like, there's one scene where the guy's like, I need to read the thing and he like throws the clipboard at him. He's like, well, then review it. I'm like, this guy is... Is that why Chernobyl happened? The head guy at Chernobyl goes around the league

and it's like, you guys tell me when you were winners. Go give me your resume. Exactly. He's like, I'm the head nuclear ball coach. there literally is a scene in the movie, Craig. I know that this is like probably maybe didn't actually happen in real life,

but there's a scene in the movie where he's like, I've been doing this for 30 years. How long you've been fucking doing it? And then he's like, you're all losers. All you assistants are losers. I'm a winner.

Yeah. I had a better nuclear staff at Bowling Green. Yeah. Anyways, so Urban Meyer, Diatloff. It works really well. That's all I'm going to say.

I just, you know, I, this is, Should we reveal that this is how our staff meetings are sometimes like for this podcast? I'm just like, look at Craig and I'm like, what's your resume, Craig, huh? And then he's like, I've been doing this for 30 years.

I've been doing it. Oh shit, that's pretty good. Okay, well, let's move this into, we're deep into the show now. So what we're going to do with propets this week is obviously it's very difficult. There's like six props out there. So we're going to pivot quite heavily.

It's Thursday football, which we'll want to help you because you'll hear this on Friday. And there's Patriots Cults. Yeah, so maybe I think D.K. might have a Patriots Colts prop. But other than that, We're going to stick to game lines, totals, stuff like that this week. With that said, I want to lead off Shark Tank Week 15 with this Houston Jacksonville game, right? I don't know what I'm going to do, to be honest.

So we're only going to do, I think, two bets each this week because, again, very limited resources in terms of betting. One of mine is the Houston Jacksonville game, but I actually haven't decided what I want to wager yet. All I know is that I need to put money on this football game. Yes. And I wanted your guys' advice. So what's really surprising to me is, so the Jags are three and a half point favorites. against the Texans. So these are arguably

the two worst teams in the league, maybe Detroit's in there. Didn't the line move? No, the line moved to five and a half after he got fired. Urban Meyer being fired

the head coach gave the Jaguars two extra points. Like, he's worth negative two points in this game. I think it's back down to three and a half. I just checked.

Oh, damn. That's really, you missed your opportunity. It was a hysterical narrative that that could have happened. But anyway. It was much funnier when that was true.

I mean, regardless of they're getting more than a field goal. The Jaguars, they're minus 200 to win this game. And so I'm kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place here. I desperately want to bet the Jags because this is hilarious, right? Darrell Bevel's calling plays, which we actually learned.

Urban Meyer's been calling a lot of the plays, and it's been a disaster. He's been putting his stamp on the offense, I think. Yeah, and Bevel, who's like a relatively respected O.C. is now going to be calling play. So that's a positive. The flip side is they've had two days to prepare this now that Urban's been fired. But minus 200 is a lot of pulp to lay on the Jags just winning a game. I'm like, damn.

I feel like, Texans, the value. Texans are plus 170? I kind of like that, maybe. I don't know. I think the value's been sapped out of the Jaguars for a couple of reasons. One, it would be really cool that the Jaguars just blew the Texans out, right? Yes. For, look, James Robinson will probably play more this week.

But like, it's very easy and neat to be like, they're all happier. Everyone's like, ding dong, the witch is dead. And now we're all going to be happy and, like, we're going to crush the Texans. In reality, more than a field goal for the Jaguars is unearned. It's a lot. Like, if they went on a game-winning field goal, they'll still run and be happy, and it'll be like,

La, La, La, La, Urban Meyer, that was really funny. But, like, giving the, I don't know if the Jaguar should be favored by more than three. I know. So, Bartymey's like, do we want to take,

even if you take the Texans plus three and a half, you still get plus odds. It's plus one-tenth. To take the Texans spread. With Davis Mills is starting. Your favorite guy, Craig. My favorite guy. Well, here's the thing,

but this is also, like, the funniest game of the year. This is Texans, Jaguars. These are, two of the only three teams of the AFC that are even eliminated from the playoffs. And are, I would say, unquestionably,

the two biggest disasters in the league facing one another. Yeah. Well, do you want to bet on this game? I do. I absolutely do. I desperately want to bet. Okay, so what's your bet?

Because we need to decide whether we're going on. There's big stakes here. They're both two and 11, and the lions are 1-11 and 1. Is it tank bowl? Mm. So the loser is like almost definitely going to get the second pick in the draft,

probably. Right. and could probably get, and the Jags won't take a quarterback, but if the Texans lose this game, they could lock themselves into drafting a quarterback if they wanted one. Interesting.

I don't know. I want to do this all together. We got to bet this together. I'm kind of thinking we just grabbed Texans plus three and a half, right? I think that's where I was, that's where my instincts were. No, but no, no, no, no, no.

This is where I'm going to, like, stop your logic. We can't, you can't, do you really want to be rooting against the Jaguars in this game? We're going to get all these, like, camera angles of Trevor Lawrence smiling, and Daryl Bell was the head, coach and they're all excited. You're going to see the pregame huddle.

They're all going to be amped. And it's like, you're going to run against them. They're all going to be thrilled. Do you want to lay three and a half? I don't want to do it. But sometimes you throw this is one of those like, like a couple bucks on it. You throw five bucks on it, whatever. And just be like, yeah, I'm with the Jaguars today.

All right. Put an amount of money that you don't care about. Today we're all from Duval. We're all. Duval. Like, come on. They've been through enough. This is solidarity.

And the words of dad. Denzel Washington. Today we remember the day they fired Urban Meyer. No, no, no, no, it's not. It's, um, Braveheart. It's like, run, you will live, stay. You may die. All right.

So are we all, we're all in, we're going to lay three and a half for Jacksonville? Or just take the money line. You're from to win. I don't care about the points. Minus 200 is ridiculous. Okay, so we're, so they're, they have, they have to cover three and a half. Yeah, I'm taking that. I just hate the idea that like if they go

to line up for a winning field goal we've already lost I hate that Who cares? It's fun They're gonna win by 20 I'm gonna go with the money line I just want them to win I can't have points This is not a juke

This is not a bet you're making for like the profit This is obviously stupid All right but we're all in on Jacksonville Speaking of obviously stupid You guys want to hear my bet Yes So this is again I think I'm just gonna start doing this one time

A week this is my George Costanza bet, which is you can just go against your initial instinct or your gut. I'll take chicken salad on sourdough, untoasted, and a cup of tea. And everything just starts working.

Jags versus Texans over 39 and a half. Number one, 39 and a half, that's like pretty low. That's low. I realize both of these offenses are dog shit, but guess what's worse? Guess what's more dog shit than these offenses? The defenses.

No, well, about Jacksonville. Jacksonville is actually not the worst defense. No, they're pretty bad. So, hold on. Let me pull up where their defenses are.

Jacksonville's actually weirdly been pretty good against quarterbacks. They've allowed the league's seventh few as fantasy quarterback points. I feel like that's because because everybody's running

in the second half. They just run. Here, Jacksonville is 26th, sorry, 29th in DVOA. defensive DVOA. Houston actually is pretty good.

Houston's 13th. However, however, they are 30th and points allowed per game. How does that work? Well, their offense can't score. It basically accounts for, you know, opponent, all this other stuff. Plus, they've been getting a lot better lately.

However, they're still almost dead last in points allowed per game. Here's the deal. I think my initial instinct was like, look, Lawrence has thrown one touchdown in six games. Like, that's not good. That's something that makes me want to bet the under. The Texans. meanwhile are bad. They're very bad. Like Davis Mills, we kind of joke about how he's good.

Craig, you might actually believe genuinely that he's really good. However, for the most part, he's been terrible this year. And, frankly, High-Fitz-I think he's better than Zach Wilson. Okay, well, that's fair. High-fits peer pressures me a lot to bet unders. So, like, part of that is, like, I just want to, like, placate High-Fits so he won't get upset with me. With all that said, I'm going over on this one because

post-Urben bump, which we talked about, I think that the Jags are going to be playing free. They're going to be loose. They're going to have fun. It's like take the weight off everything. It sounds like what I saw a report. I think it was from Pelisaro that said like everyone in the Jags organization is just like elated that Daryl Bevel is the head coach right now. He's the interim head coach.

Like they love him. He's like a hard worker, you know, all this stuff, which is of course like reading through the line between lines is like obviously damning for what, you know, Urban Meyer was doing before. So and then the other thing that I think is. interesting here is last time Lawrence played Houston which was in week one he threw three touchdowns that game was 37 to 20 the over under here is 39

and a half so and again I actually kind of do think Mills has been like impressive all things considered like it's a it's the situation is terrible the skill players are all pretty bad other than than Brennan Cooks you know and he's a third round pick he never really panned out

he was like one of the top if not the top high school quarterback recruit in the country at one point. He had a bunch of injuries. His knee injury really held him back in college and they came out probably a year too early, all this other stuff. I mean, Davis Mills has over 300 yards and three of his last five starts. There you go.

There you go. So anyways, all that said, I just, again, it's like a vibes pick. I'm rooting for like a shootout, like of two terrible teams. It's going to be fun. Let's do this. D.K., your Costanza pitch of everything points under, therefore over? Yeah. I think is excellent.

Salie. Thank you. I, however, as this is shark tank still, and really you're both pitching things here, I feel like more Cuban. Everyone,

all the other sharks are out. I'm what's left. So gentlemen, you've both made exciting pitches. However, I have to pick a bone with Craig who said that the lines had changed.

I will tell you right now, I'm on Fandul of Sportsbook right now. Let me tell you something. The Jaguars are giving five points. So, which leads me to this. Let's do the money on. Gentlemen,

I want to tweak your offer. I'm going to tweak your off. And again, I want to be clear. Urban Meyer being fired has given the Jaguars two points, like extra as favorites. Gentlemen, I'm going to tweak your offer. I want to combine both of what you're saying. Ooh. I want a two-team teaser with what you're saying.

I want Craig's plea to take the Jaguars and the points minus five, teased with DKs under. So we're going to take both those, tease them together. It will be Jaguars getting one point. Jaguress has to win the game or tie, lull, with over 33 and a half. Oh, yeah. I'm all in. I'm all in. I love it.

This is fun. Boom! Now Peeky Blinders spitting a hand, handshake on it. Bang, right there. Incredible. Also, I will say this Jags line is all over the place. William Hill is 4.5. Other sports books that will not be mentioned are 3 and a half.

And you said Fandle's 5.5? I think that's because everyone's doing what we just did, which is a terrible sign, but everyone's like, oh, they get fired him. They'll totally win now out of spite. And like all the books are, because it's not like a numerical decision they've made. Like it's completely based on the action they're seeing and like... Bounce around because you can find some, some better odds. Yeah, so we'll do, okay, so there we go.

That's a teaser. That's a group chat. That's incredible. That's great. I love it too. Sharks, let me turn around and pitch you guys something. All right. I love this bet. Packers giving, I think now the number is five to the Baltimore Ravens. this is one of those numbers

it's just too low like the Packers are going to wipe the Ravens I feel confident in this Interesting The Ravens are the walking wounded Their season is a zombie movie A quarter of their salary cap is on injured reserve A quarter of Baltimore salary cap

Hurt I really genuinely think Rogers and the Packers cut through them like zombie survivors Like with chainsaws Or like they're like rolling through the golf cart Woody Harrelson in Zambi Land. That's going to be Aaron Rogers this week.

Lamar is hurt. I genuinely think the Packers crush them. By the way, it's five and a half now. They're laying. Four and a half, five. It's like the Urban Meyer thing. Here's the thing. The Baltimore secondary is destroyed.

Marlon Humphrey is out for the season. He is a peck injury. Marcus Peters out for the season, ACL. Deshawn Elliott has a peck injury. And their other safety, Chuck Clark, who has the green dot and calls signals is on COVID-List. That's all four of their starting secondary.

from week one. Like, I can go through, like, what they got left, but Aaron Rogers destroys bad cornerback groups. Yeah, it's going to be tough. Any, if you go through Packers fans know this. When the other team is like, has a weak link or two, it's a problem. And those are the games where Aaron Rogers has four touchdowns and no picks. The Ravens have like three weak links in the secondary.

They've got Jimmy Smith, who's 33. He's just too old. He's too old. He's just guarding tight ends up. He's too old. He's literally, he can't even guard receivers in the outside. anymore. You got Anthony Averett is their number one cornerback. He's like 70th out of like 80 cornerbacks in pro football focus. He's number one for the team. Their other safety is 70th out of 80

in safety. So it's the third round rookie is starting at safety in this game. And they've got another quarterback, Tavon Young, he's pretty good, but he's dealing with injuries. Like they say he's not injured this week. Not many 27 year olds get rest days as veterans, like a veteran rest day for 27 year olds. That's not normal. This team is battered. Aaron Rogers is going to shred them five points. I don't think it'll be close. Did you mention that Lamar Jackson is hobbled and might not even play. That's what I'm saying. That's not even what I'm talking about. But yes, that's also very important to note. Yeah. And also, Green Bay's defense is playing great. Their secondary is good. They rush the passer.

Well, I want nothing. Five and a half is not enough. It should be over a touchdown, in my opinion. They're going to roll them. If you want to put them in a teaser, just take Packers money. Like the Packers work in every two-team teaser for me. Like the Packers win the game. This to me is the pivot point of the, week. I feel if last week, like, the Chargers beating the Giants was like a 10 out of 10 confidence for me, this is like an eight and a half approaching a nine. Also, a little sprinkle on top, it looks like the Packers start left tackle, David Buktiari will be back as well. Really? Interesting. He practiced this week. The only thing that could go wrong with your guys's

spiel, because Hyphids, I think you're absolutely right. Like on paper. What's that? Oh, the toe. Well, that's something else I actually wasn't thinking about. But yeah, Rogers is playing through. toe injury, but however, I still think they could just run the ball, like, all day long. What I was going to say is the one place this could all go awry for you guys is the Packers special teams units have been just straight up Keystone cops. Like, it's been hilarious how bad they are. Against the Bears last week, they gave up, I believe, two 40-yard punt returns, a kick return or a punt return touchdown.

I can't remember which one it was. Do you remember it was Joachim Grant, I think? Yeah, Gene Grant just was running up the left side. for what seemed like 45 piece out of the team. Yeah. They had, they, they botched an onside kick. They almost, they had a muff punt that would have like totally changed the game, except for the Bears had like a penalty.

They ran out of bounds on it. Like, their special teams group is a cluster fuck right now. That been said, I still, I don't think it's going to be that crazy this week with their special teams. This is like a perfect storm last week with everything that they did. I still think the Packers win. And for all those reasons, I'm in with you guys on this one. I do think it's just like, the Ravens are just too injured at this point.

I just don't know how the Ravens are going to score 21 points. Especially with Lamar out. Like I'm just, I'm actually kind of treating this game like Lamar's out. And also, even if Lamar plays, it's not a normal Ravens offense if Lamar can't run. Like the fact that it's even a question of how healthy he is with the ankle means if he plays,

it's not a normal offense. And again, I cannot stress this enough. Aaron Rogers is going against the team where every single starter is down in the secondary. And honestly, two of the remaining ones are hurt. Like,

it's ridiculous. There's a, like, said, basically, he went for two against the Steelers because he didn't want to play overtime, but like the subtext was, we can't guard anyone. Anyway, I

love the Packers this week. Is that a group chat right there? That's a group chat. All right. Let's move on here. Guys, sharks. Yo. Sometimes making money's easy, folks. Okay. How would you like to just hand somebody $10 and they just hand you back

17? I would like that. Well, you're in luck. Daniel. Because that is an opportunity I am presenting to you today. This is an easy money line parlay. This is Favorites Week. Again, last week was Favorites Week. I love it.

This week is Favorites Week part two. Real simple. Real simple, son. There's a kilo of Colombian Bam Bam Bam. That kilo of Colombian Bam Bam is the Cowboys over the Giants, the Bills over the Panthers, and the Cardinals over the Lions. Oh, yeah. Just the money lines.

You shove those all together, minus 175. that is literal free money folks I feel like I feel compelled to note that we are not giving legal advice this is uh you know maybe don't actually empty your bank account on this bet however do it however do it

I the giants listen I've been talking about this for weeks they can't score touchdowns you guys it's a big part of football they're very bad at scoring touchdowns uh the Panthers they are going to be, sorry, the Cowboys will be the Giants. The Panthers are a disaster. The Panthers are a cluster fuck right now. They are going to rotate at quarterback. I repeat, they're going to have like a quarterback rotation. And worse yet, they would be better off if Sam Darnold were coming back right now. So right now it's going to be PJ Walker and Cam Newton. We're unsure exactly how they're going to do that. Maybe it's Cam Newton like in the red zone. Who knows? Do you think it's rock, paper, scissors? They're desperate. Like the quarterback situation sucks for them.

The defense has actually been playing well, but I think that the bills are just a better, way more balanced team, and they will win this game. The Cardinals or the Lions, that one I don't really need to pitch you on. Also, Cardinals and Bills are coming off losses. They are not losing two games in a row to the Cardinals and then in the Panthers. It's not happening. I like this. So you're money lines. So you're basically combining Cowboys, Bill's Cardinals all have to win.

My other bet's basically the same thing without the Cardinals. It's Cowboys giving four and a half and the bills giving four and a half in a Panthers teaser, which I think is the same payout. it basically is going to be like 75, 80%, depending where you are. I did the same thing, basically. I just didn't want to add a third team in, but I'm just so confident that Cowboys beat the Giants by more than five points

because the Giants suck, as has been stated, Mike Lennon's playing. Daniel Jones, dude, I don't know what's with Daniel Jones's neck, but I don't think he's playing again this season. Oh, yeah. He's going to get the specialist in his neck.

This is bad. I mean, there's a off chance that he never plays again. I don't know what the situation is, but, you know, obviously, when you're going to a neck specialist, that's definitely very concerning. So yeah.

I haven't seen anything like that if he never plays again. I'm just saying that going to different specialists. I'm dubious we see him again this season, put it that way. So Mike Lennon, Mike Lennon against the Cowboys,

first of all, if you have fantasy, the Cowboys defense this week, unbelievable. And then just again, it's what Craig said about the bills. So my question is, are you guys more interested

because it's the same payout to give points for two of these three teams or to tie all three at the money line together? Cowboys against the Giants, bills against the Panthers, Cardinals against the Lions Would you rather all three to win or take two and give like four points or so?

The Cardinals would have to give six. I think I like the money line one more just because division games with the Cowboys and the Giants like it wouldn't be that surprising if there was like a backdoor cover of some sort here. Yeah, you know, I just don't have to worry about some 2420 win that the bills pull out over the Panthers

and they end up losing. Just give me the money lines. Right. Because we're basically adding the Cardinals in? Like, they're not going to lose to the Lions for the second game in a row. I would agree. Thoughts. Thoughts. Highfitts is just pissed.

No, I'm just thinking, you're probably right. I'm trying to envision a world with the Lions beat the Cardinals. I think generally speaking, though, like, you probably want fewer variables than taking two games versus three games would get you that. Yeah, but the variable of the spread. Yeah, the lines are just, yeah. We could take them both. I mean, hey. I think, honestly, I want to split the money in half and just do

both. So I think we do a moneyland parley, Cowboys, Bill's, Bulls, Cardinals, and we just do a teaser of Cowboys giving four and a half, and Bill's giving four and a half. Okay, beautiful. I love that. All right. TK., what if you got? I've got one more. As we said at the beginning of the show, there's not very many props. Like, when we were looking through the props, Thursday afternoon, there was like two games up. So,

I actually happened to like one of the props that was up. Carson Wentz under 225 passing yards. Under 225 and a half, sorry. I'm looking for a $5 investment on that. Here's the thing. The Patriots defense is tough to, it's tough to figure out exactly what the Patriots are due,

because obviously we talk about this all the time. It's a cliche at this point. They're going to try and take away what you do best. So does that mean they're going to try and take away the Colts run game? I don't know. I don't actually know if they're equipped to do it because they've been kind of bad lately at defending the run or at less, or I'd say maybe like a below average at defending the run.

also maybe they actually want the Colts to run because like it's less efficient less explosive less dangerous they can keep everything in front of them all that stuff so I think that the Patriots are going to get gash a little bit on the ground here by Jonathan Taylor I think Jonathan Taylor's going to have a good game and I was listening to Sharvin Solek on the NFL gambling show on the ringer gambling show I should say and they pointed out

that Indianapolis runs a lot from the 11 personnel and New England has actually struggled in the like relatively few times they face those types of run looks. And so, I don't know, basically, I think it's a matchup that's good for Jonathan Taylor, less good for Carson Wentz. In fact, the Patriots have given up the third fewest passing yards quarterbacks this year. Their last six matchups, it's like insane to look at. Josh Allen, 145 passing yards. Ryan 10, Tannan Hill 93. Matt Ryan, 153. The combination of Mayfield and Keenham, 154, Darnold 172, Herbert 223. Only three quarterbacks have thrown for more than 225 yards on New England this year.

Dak Prescott, Tom Brady, and Craig, your favorite, Davis Mills, Davis Mills of all people. I don't know. To me, it's just like, it feels like this is a game that Belichick's going to be like, look, we can beat them. We're not really that afraid of them. We'll shorten the game. You know, we'll run a lot. We'll let them run. Well, that's my one question.

Why would the, like, if I feel like, first of all, I like that you took an under. I like that you took an under against the Patriots and I like that you took an under and Carson Wentz. My only thing that you said that stripped me up. was if you're the cults, forget to who they're playing. Or is it your preferred style of football dominate with Jonathan Taylor? Wence can do some stuff, but we basically don't want Wence to lose these games for us. We don't want to put Carson in a position.

We have to lose, and we're perfectly happy for Jonathan Taylor to get 180 yards and three touchdowns, and Wence doesn't do much, we win by 14. Why would Belichick let them go with their preferred game? Doesn't Belichick want Wenz to have to win the game? Well, that's where I was a little, this is where it got a little. little tough for me. However, it's just like, I think that's the way that they're built. Like, there's, there's so much stronger against the pass. And rushing is just less efficient. The Patriots are stronger against the past. Yes. rushing is just less efficient. Like,

you're less likely to score points this way. Um, I don't know. I just, that's, like, if I was Belichick, that's probably what I would do. Like, I would not want to get beat, uh, through the air because that's just making it easy on them. But I don't know. You, you guys have to decide. I don't. If you put a gun to my head, I actually think Wents would go over this amount because I think that they don't want Taylor just run all over them. However, I'm so happy to take an under. I'm so happy you took an under. I'm just going to do the under. Just pandering. I want to reward this behavior. I love it. Yeah, that's funny. It's like a Pavlovian response. High Feteer's under. Yeah, that's exactly. Gives his money up.

I got to be honest, when I also saw this Wensline, I was like, I think maybe the over this week, right? They're going to make it throw. That's going to be the whole thing. Oh, God. This to me, be honest. This one should have been Costanza bet. This one should have been constance.

Everything points down under, so we go over. Yeah. But I'm going to go the under with you because you said over. This is chicken salad, untosted on salad. Yeah. I don't know. So I understand. Here's, I guess here's like my big picture thinking.

Like, I understand the idea that you stop their best player. However, I think for like almost every team, you would way rather have them run the ball. Like, that's like... I don't think that's how Belichick thinks. I think that's how NFL Twitter thinks. I don't think Belichick's, yeah. Let's let Jonathan Taylor run for 160 yards in a very inefficient fashion.

This guy just ran... This guy had three past attempts for his own team like two weeks ago. That was awesome, by the way. We didn't really talk about that game much, do we? That was a fun game. All right, maybe I've talked myself into pretzels here. I don't know.

I don't know what's going on. I'm out. I'm out. I'm with you, I'm supporting you even though we're going to lose, but I'm not letting you. It made sense to me when I thought of it, but you guys almost are talking me out of this. I'm sticking with it because I put it on the dock and I'm, and I said it already. I'm going to let the listeners aside, but I'm not letting you go down on your own here.

Thank you for taking the under with me. I'm taking the under with you. All right. I actually like these bets this week, except for the one we just discussed where we're going to like be with DK. Otherwise, Craig, you want to summarize these? There was 12 potential bets and I decided this one looked good for some reason. All right. So our bets are we're taking the Jags money line and we're teaching.

teasing it with the Jags, or the total of 33 and a half. We're teasing it down. The Jags points. The Jags spread. Oh, sorry. Yeah. From minus five. Yeah.

So it's Jags plus one and then over 33, which I actually love that bet. We're teasing down the total and the Jags spread and taking that. We're also taking the Carson Wentz. We don't know. We're taking Packers minus four and a half first of the Ravens. We are taking both my parlay of Cowboys, Bill's Cardinals, money lines, as well as Highfitz's, Cowboys laying four and a half, Bill's laying four and a half.

And that's it, I think, right? If you're a real sicko, there's also a world where you kind of chop up these bets, whatever amount you were going to put, and you just tease, two team tease, the Packers in like a round robin with those other T teams. The Cowboys, Bill, Cardinals, Packers,

and you do a series of round Robbins with them and as many as you want of just like Packers, Cowboys, Packers, Bill, Packers, Cardinals, like, that to me actually could be very fruitful. All right. It's time. We have a new segment we're introducing. The new segment is called Friday morning, Thursday night football prediction.

What could go wrong? We're recording this on Thursday at 5 Eastern. You're hearing this after the game is over. Correct. Last week, or two weeks ago, last week I forget, we predicted that. I predicted that. I'm not going to rope you guys into it. Thank you.

Dalvin Cook would have a terrible game and he had maybe the best game of his career. I offhandedly. Watch him now have Dalvin have 130 yards and two touchdowns. He did that at halftime. He did. He looked incredible. So it's time to predict what will happen in the Chief Chargers game. There's no parameters to the segment.

I don't care if you predict a single player, the game total. I just need a prediction as one of you guys. I want to hear what you guys say and then I'm going to throw a stat at you that I have no idea what it means. All right. I think the Chargers is going to win by like 14. Ooh. Okay. Okay. Here's my bet. Here's my prediction. Bold prediction time. Big week for Josh Palmer.

What does that mean? I don't know. Touchdown. Josh Palmer touchdown. I think this is a, a, big Tyron Matthew game. The Chiefs don't of Chris Jones, which is like, he's like the best player,

honestly, on the team. A, and the Chargers don't have their right, Rayshon Slater, right? He's been left tackle. Yep. He's on the, well, he's in the COVID list.

I don't know now that could change. I think this game, I actually think this is close. I think Chargers win by a field goal. Although, can I three guys a stat? You know 80, 8.8% of the money on this game is on the Chiefs? Give me that Chargers line, baby.

80% of the money is on the Chiefs. Chiefs. You guys, this is Pat Mahomes going up against Mr. Too High put a roof on themself, Brandon Staley. I think we're all brainwashed from the Chiefs having another good game against Las Vegas. I kind of feel that way too. At the core of it, what this really means to me is like the Chief's offense has

looked bad, not bad, just not adapting to the, this, whatever this too high spell is. It's kind of like Lord of the Rings when he has that like cast on the King of Rohan. and, like, you know what I mean? That's how I think of it. I don't know what happened to the homes. That was a weird D.K. reference. Anyway, the Raiders, I think Craig's right that the two Raiders games where they scored a combined like 95 points has like really skewed this.

I kind of need to see the Chiefs offense do something. Yeah, I'll go Chargers by a field goal. I can't wait to hear how Chris Jones not being is. I can't wait to hear her how terrible this is. Should we Kostanza this? Like, Chief's win by 20, obviously. I should probably bet that. So we all kind of pick charges.

you took Josh Palmer touchdown. I said Chargers are going to win big, and High Fitz has taken them to win by three. I was agnostic on the winner. What headline are you going to see tomorrow? 80% of the money was on the Chiefs. Sportsbooks got killed, or 80% of the monies on the Chiefs. Oh, like, oh, cash, cash.

You know what, now they think about it, I want the Chargers. Now I think about it. That's why they keep building casinos. All right, we'll see how it goes. We didn't do so bad on prop bets last week. We all went two for three, so that's solid. Craig hit his favorite parlay.

There you go. I did. I did. Craig. Okay. We're going to do some emails right now because we're not doing Wednesday shows for the rest of the year. So we're going to hit some emails right quick. First we do fantasy court.

There we go. All right. From John. John. At last Sunday's family dinner, my brother dropped the bond that he, his wife, and my nephews are moving to Australia. Wow, this is a very specific for us email. Well, we're glad for them. also pissed because they're breaking up the band, so to speak.

So this Sunday evening, when he mentioned that he needed me to win for him to make the playoffs, I benched Aaron Jones out of pure Australian-inspired spot. Wow. Wow. Now it looks like that change. Now it looks like that will change who makes the playoffs in our league, but my brother somehow still made it, but two other teams flip-flopped in and out of the playoffs, but not my brother.

I'm nervous people will be pissed about the unintended consequences of me benching Aaron Jones. can I get a ruling on throwing a game purely out of spite? Do you think this guy listened to us talk about Australia so much that he was like, I got to go ahead. He's like, they make bluey there. We got to do this. To be honest, I got to say, I kind of don't know what to do with this. Well, so we've talked in the past about leaving an empty spot, right?

Like, do you know if he left the spot empty or if he just like started someone else? Hyphets. Did you check with this guy? He left a spot empty. I checked. Okay. I generally am against this. I don't know. Like, maybe I'm just like... But it already happened, I'm saying. He's not thinking about doing it. What are we supposed to do now?

Yes, what do we do now? The past Game of Thrones, like, the ink of history is dry. He's so bad. He's so bad his brother is moving. Do we treat this as, you know, apparently the playoffs were affected by this? Teams were flipped. Do we award the team who didn't? make the playoffs that would have if Aaron Jones started a playoff spot? Well, one, it's too late.

And we can't reverse it. I don't think in retrospect, you can switch it around. Let's say, though, if it were not too late, how would you guys feel? I still don't think you can change it. Unless there's a specific rule. If there is a specific rule in your league that says you can't do this, you can't leave a spot open, then that's like, makes it pretty easy to like go ahead and do this. This sucks for that guy. I'm not even at the technical point.

I think this is hilarious and that's fine. like I'm not getting lost in the legalese the letter of the law hides in the spirit of the rule the spirit of the law of fantasy football is you're having a good time with your friends including you fuck with them and if you bench like if you bench

your running back to screw over your brother that is your God given right you can be cane or able that's up to you that's what freedom is about and I'm fine with this but what I'm like yeah what upsets me the most about this is the stray bullet that this other guy

took because his brother still made the playoffs. It's some other poor sat who didn't make it because it sucks. He's got to live with that. Collateral damage. I was so annoying. This is how fantasy football lore happens. This is unbelievable. This is the kind of stuff that gets argued about group chats ad for millennia. This is why I'm against just sitting a guy in general. This is like this is a perfect example. Like this guy just took out two other like innocent bystanders. Here's what I think. It's so great. It's not collusion. Collusion to benefit is not allowed. Collusion to screw over the people.

is hilarious, not collusion, single-minded collusion. I have a compromise. Let me know what you think. So let's say six guys make the playoffs. That's standard in a 12th team league. I'm assuming, I don't know. That means you have a one in six shot of winning. That is what, 16%. I think if this guy, John, wins the title, he has to pay 16% of his winnings to the guy he screwed over. That's good. Well, you got to take up the Australia taxes.

What do you think about that over there in Australia? I think that's good. That's like going to civil court. like paying damages for you like hit some other people's car or something like in a road rage event yeah or just ear market for um vegemite or no no the other guy's not going to australia yeah this guy this is like this is a stray bullet guy this is a stray bullet guy gets 16% of the winnings i think that's good that's good i like that that's good okay good job justice whorlback okay we got a lot of emails with the canadian football league if you don't know on showdown time this week one of the questions. One of my favorite emails we've ever gotten was just name the nine Canadian football.

That was a great quiz. We then got very caught up and we briefly yelled at Craig because he thought there were two rough riders in the league and were like, you idiot, obviously there's not two different teams. There's only nine teams. There's only nine teams. Two of them are named. Two of them don't the same name. Well, why is there a space? Why is there a space between one of the rough riders, but not the other? It turns out there were two teams of the Canadian Football League named the Rough Riders. I'm going to let one of you two roll through this email. I'll go ahead.

So this is from Cameron, a big fan of the CFL. So yes, at one point in time in a league, with a total of nine teams, two of those nine teams had the exact same name. Saskatchewan held the first being one of the oldest teams in North America and being the riders since 1924. Then Ottawa also held the name Rough Riders. Yes, notice there's a space between Ruff and Riders. The Ottawa Squad refers to the Rufferf Ruff.

writers who went down to Cuba with Teddy Roosevelt, like the American, whatever, expeditionary force. Oh, yeah, we all remember the Canadians who went down with Teddy Roosevelt's Cuba. I learned that in school. Well, this is, like, actually just like a theory. Like, there's actually no real, and I'm breaking the email here now. This is just me talking. Like, there's actually no official line, I guess, from, like, the teams. This is just anybody's guess.

There's sort of like a legend or a lore that, like, a couple Canadians went down with Roosevelt's rough riders. and that's like they came back and started this league. I don't know. So anyways, that was the Ottawa squad was apparently related to the Teddy Roosevelt Rough Riders. Whereas Saskatchewan's Rough Riders most likely refers to the nickname for the RCMP,

so the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, whose headquarters are based in Regina, Regina, Regina, Regina. I think it's Regina. We're going to... We're going to... We're all thinking it. All I know is I'm 99% sure this is where John Ryan, the Seahawks punner, the old Seahawks punner, who is from Canada, is from Regina.

So, wait, these rough riders are named after the police? Yes. Apparently, and this is me breaking the email again. For my research, the RCMP, they would break the horses, like, they were wild horses, and they would break them and make them so that they could ride them. And so then they became the rough riders. Also, we also got a couple emails about this. Emailer Matt points out, the name origin he wants to believe is that they were named after

the log drivers who rode logs down the Ottawa River. He included a video old-timey guys would literally stand on the logs and do like the log thing where they like twirl in the water. Like there's this guy with like a giant stick. And every time it looked like he was about to fall, this guy was like

slap in the stick. It was like a tightrope walker. And they would ride these logs down the river and basically like shepherd these logs down the river. That's like real life splash mountain. This is why like when you see these logging competitions, the the guys are like trying to like stay up on the logs or whatever. That seems very dangerous by the way.

Can you imagine going back like 150 years to these guys logging? You'd be like, hey, later people will be able to make money doing fantasy football podcasts. Well, you know what's funny how it's? I was thinking the same thing. I was like, what would be more bizarre if you told us that long ago it was someone's job to ride a log down a river? Or if you went to them and said it's going to be someone's job to literally talk about fake football plays? This guy just jaw drops and he slips off his log and hits himself and goes under the water. Oh my God.

Okay. So here's my real question. The rough riders were both in the league. What was their overlap? How long do the rough riders overlap for? Oh, I don't have that in front of me. So here, I'm going to just read another email from Eric who kind of laid it out. So basically.

Eric. Eric. Eric. You guys indeed embarrassed yourself, although understandably. Some notes. Number one. Ottawa has been a historically troubled market for the CFL. they were the rough riders for the majority of their existence.

Unlike the Saskatchewan Rough Writers who play in Regina, Regina, capital of Saskatchewan. We got to know which one it is. Pretty sure it's Regina, but I'm not a hundred percent. We can't say Regina if it's not Regina. We're going to get so many emails about this. I think it's Regina. You are going on such a limb.

You were that guy in a log on the river right now. Okay, so the Ottawa rough riders folded, but the league expanded back to Ottawa for short-lived stint as the renegades. They folded again and came back as the red blacks, all caps, just like the Miami Heat, which I thought was funny. And what? I don't understand that. What's the all caps thing?

The name is all in caps. Like red blacks, like it's not lower case. The Miami Heat's name is all in caps? Is that right? I actually didn't know that either. Is that a thing? It's like one of those things that it's technically that, but we ignore it? I mean, upon Googling it, it does not appear so.

anyway so Eric went on to explain that he is from Toronto he is a let's see here so there's the the Grey Cup was last week the Hamilton Tiger Cats upseted Toronto the Argonauts and the most interesting part of this email was he said he like basically just threw this in at the end he was like anyway Hamilton blew a fourth career lead multiple one point rouges were involved

the Winnipeg Blue Bombers beat the Thai Cats in overtime. I felt like that was bearing the lead. There's something called rouges in the CFL. Did you guys know about this? Roger Sherman's explained a rouge to me like four different times and I've never once retained the information. The first time I read it, I thought he said rogues.

Like I just like, you know, in my head like, yeah, you mix up a word. There are one point plays Canadian football. I could not tell you what they are. So I reached out to Twitter about this earlier today about these ruges. They're also called singles. So from Twitter user Shane, a rouge or a single is a kick that goes through the end zone and it is worth one point.

A missed field goal that goes through the end zone is worth one point. Like outside the back of the end zone? This is from Cassidy. Any kick that ends in the end zone should be returned and the punishment for not returning it is giving up a single point. Oh, so it doesn't have to go through the end zone. It just has to land. Yeah, just through the goal line.

to be honest with you I got a lot of people explaining to me I don't think I could explain it to you 100% correctly maybe we do need to get Roger on here to explain it the bottom line is it's chaotic and awesome people were sending me videos of like these plays where basically like

you if you miss a field goal the people the defensive team has to be ready to like return the ball out of the end zone or else it's one point for the kicking team does that make sense I think that's how it goes there's a whole bunch of like rules about it Basically, in the Grey Cup the other day, someone on one of the teams, I can't remember who,

inexplicably downed a kick in the end zone, which resulted in one point for the other team. And then they were up by two points of the time. So basically, sorry, they were down by two points of the time. So basically then they went down three. They went back. And instead of kicking a field goal for the win, they kicked a field goal for the tie, and then they lost an overtime. Wow. So this guy inexplicably downing a ball in the end zone was a.

a rouge. And anyways, I've never heard of this before. I think that was pretty funny. I didn't know any of that. And I kind of was lost in the middle, but I did look up the pronunciation and it is in fact Regina. That is cool.

Thank you. I don't know how I feel about that. Here's the basic explanation. Andrew Walker from Twitter just said this. Imagine if touchbacks were worth one point. Okay. There you go. So basically, I think it like what it does is it incentivizes teams to return the ball.

That's kind of fun. Yeah. It's also like. So it's vagina is a pronunciation. It's kind of fun. All right. That's all we got. Okay.

Best of luck to everyone. Stay safe. Stay healthy. Everything's really weird right now. Just, you know, turn on those push notifications. Ruin your mental health. Yeah. Get that out of shift to write to your phone.

Up that screen time this weekend. Yeah. Up the screen time. Are you going to lose more? screen time. Your brain needs the dopamine feedback loops. Okay. Thank you, Craig. Thank you, D.K. Thank you, Lauren. Lauren. Thank you, Alanis Morset. Well, music box. Check out the music box. Yeah, music box series on HBO, folks. The newest one just came out last night on Juice World. Juice World, baby. Check it out. Also, we got to give a shout out to the ringer,

listener leak on Fanduel. Absolutely. Join us, beat us if you dare. I got an email from one of our listeners who won that league last week, by the way. So, congrats. Congrats on winning that week, that week. Yeah, so just go to the link in the description of the podcast. Click it. It'll take you right there. You can enter, beat us, take our money.

Bad quarterback's league. Beat us. Take our money. I'm doing well. Take DKs, buddy. Goodbye, everyone.