The Ringer NFL Show - Power Ranking Our Week 1 UNDER Reactions, Fantasy Court, and the Pacific Time War Zone

Episode Date: September 10, 2025

The guys share their Week 1 under reactions in this week’s Power Hour, as they push back on some of the classic overreactions from the first games of the season. They then rule over some listener-submitted Fantasy Court questions before revisiting the time-zone discussion from the previous show. (02:09) Power Hour - Week 1 Under Reactions (04:36) Ja’Marr Chase and Joe Burrow Will Be Fine (06:55) The Jaguars Aren’t That Good (10:30) Underperforming Rookies Will Bounce Back (13:43) The Ravens Are Still Awesome (17:21) A.J. Brown Will Finish as a WR1 (22:51) Cam Ward Was Better Than His Stats (25:41) The Steelers Will Regress (28:30) The Seahawks Are Gonna Be Good (31:54) Davante Adams Is Poised for a Big Year (35:35) Ringer Fantasy Football League Update (38:40) Fantasy Court (53:27) Emails/The Time-zone Debate Revisited Check out the 2025 Ringer Fantasy Football Rankings: https://fantasyfootball.theringer.com/ Email us! [e-mail] The all-new Hyundai Palisade Hybrid. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to Ringer Fantasy Football Show. My name is Danny Hightfordson. I'm joined by Danny and Kelly, Craig Coralbeck, and today it is power hour. Every Wednesday, we powering something. And this week, we are underreacting to week one. Because everyone does overreactions and everybody needs to calm down, right? D.K.

Relax. Take a breath. Chill. That's the thesis of this show, is what I'm saying. It's week one. Exactly. Also, part of this is kind of like underreacting and not going overboard on takes based on one week of good stuff.

Weird stuff happens every week. And sometimes the first week is just the only week. And also it's the first week. So we're going to go through a bunch of underreactions. We're going to do fantasy court emails, time zone stuff. And yeah, it's going to be really fun. Again, we're coming to you Sundays, Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays. Power is the best.

We got a great show. We got a great show for you coming up. So stick around. We'll be right back. Craig commandeered the show. We should start doing that. That's what they do at SNL. That's after the opening monologue.

We got a great show for you tonight. Halsey is here. Oh, my God. We do the band in the front. Oh, my God. We have to get you to the band in the front. Not a bad idea. It's not bad.

Yeah. Okay. Should we keep this or is that getting cut? I don't know. I don't know. Who knows? All right. Now we'll take a break.

This episode of the Ringer Fantasy football show is presented by Hyundai. The all new Hyundai Palisade hybrid proves that an incredible SUV is so much more than the sum of its parts. It's more than a space. interior. It's more than being able to navigate difficult terrain, and it's way more than driving farther than you ever thought possible. It's the all-new Hyundai-Palestate hybrid, so much more than just another SUV. Visit HyundaiUSA.com or call 562-314-4603 for more details. All right, we're going to get into our underreactions from week one. Again, everyone overreacts like it's a bit, and we're going to tell you what to be calm.

Take culture. It's hard not to overreact. Take culture's gone too far. It's easy not to overreact, actually. No, it's hard not to overreact. When it comes down to it, when the chips are down, like when your team loses or when your player gets four points in fantasy, I feel pretty horrible.

I'm not going to lie. And I have to like talk myself into being, like, calming down. This topic is very therapeutic because there are many, many players on this list that we're about to get to that I'm worried about. like AJ Brown. I have so much vested interest in AJ Brown being good this year. So I'm very excited for D.K. To calm me down about AJ Brown. This is a very important episode.

Craig, can you take us on a tour of literally like week one last year? Yeah. So just as an example that you shouldn't freak out after week one, Joel Smyth at Yahoo put out a tweet yesterday about all of the overreactions that we made last year around week one, all of the fantasy performances, good and bad that we saw in week one that didn't hold true. So I'm going to read, these are some, fantasy point performances coming out of week one of

2021 last year. Chuba Hubbard, one point. Drake London, three points. Terry McLaurin, three points. Who went on to have a fantastic season? Amonra St. Brown had four points. Chase Brown had five points. Chase Brown ended the season as a top five running back. Derek Henry had 10. Jamar Chase had 12. And then you get into the other side. Alan Lazard had 26 points in week one. My God, I forgot about that. Cooper Cup. Cooper Cup had 32 points in week one. Ramondri Stevens had had 21 points in week one. Brian Robinson.

18 points in week one. Jalen Wattle, our beloved, 16 points in week one. We thought he was back. He was not. So this just goes to show, week one doesn't mean anything. It's a mirage.

Stay away. Oh, that's our, is that, that's an unofficial start to the timer. Wow. There we go. Look at that. Your ringtone should be Tom Tom.

Yeah, I'll change it. But yeah, so there you go. What a perfect segue. We're going to go through the underreactions we have after week one. And after every two minutes, you're going to hear Not that sound, but this sound.

It's such a great song. What a good song. Couldn't do it without that song. Okay. No further ado. DK. Just zen us out. Two minutes on the clock.

All right. If you are freaking out about Jamar Chase having, what was it, two points, something like that, four points in fantasy or T. Higgins not really doing much, Joe Burrow having eight points. He drafted him really early. He's going to be the backbone of your team. Can't wait for him to throw for 5,000 yards and 50 touchdowns. don't worry too much because there's a lot of reasons to believe this was just like a one-off blip for the early part of the year.

Number one, Joe Burrow is a notoriously slow starter in the season. And more importantly, I think he's been pretty bad against the Browns in particular. The Browns just seem to have his number defensively in the four games over the last two seasons against the Browns. He averages 12 points per game, 157 yards per game, 39% success rate, 6.8 yards per attempt. in every other game he's played over the last two years which is 24 other games 20 points per game 50% success rate 280 yards per game

7.6 yards per attempt so he is quite significantly a lot better quite significantly a lot he's a lot better against other teams quite significantly he just sucks against the Browns for some reason when he's not facing Jim Schwartz I almost said

Jim Thorntz because I was like Jim Schwartz Thorntz Joe Burrow but when he's not facing Jim Schwartz. He seems to be all right. And the Bengals are notoriously a slow starting team. We thought this year was not going to be the year because there was an excuse every other year. It was he was coming off an injury. He was injured in the preseason. He was sick. He had an appendectomy. That happened once, right? Yeah, COVID. Never had the normal loss season. We're like, yeah, the water bottle incident. Yeah. Right. The wrist, this was the year we thought

it would be all right. It was not. They still won. They won by one point. They scored 17 points against the Browns and they should have lost. The Brons. The Brons. The Brons Brown's kicker missed a field goal and an extra point, and they won by one. You couldn't buy a vowel or a kick. Bottom line, I think Burroughs can be just fine. I think we're still going to see fireworks. I still think Jamar Chase and T. Higgins are going to have great years. Chase Brown, who I think was dead last in the NFL in yards before contact per rush.

He was getting hit in the backfield more than any other running back this week. I think he's also going to have a good year. So don't overreact. DK, you know another reason the Bengals might be better next week? What's that? They play the Jaguars. There we go. Get right game.

The Jags came out in one. This is my second one, by the way. Yeah, just put two minutes on the clock. I think Jaguars are another team that it's worth. The Jaguars. Underreacting to after crushing the Panthers. The Jaguars, there's a lot of expectations around the Jags, and they did come out and dominate a really bad Carolina Panthers team made Bryce Young go back to the

Bryce young we saw at the early part of last year. There's 26 to 10 Jags, and it really should have been like 33 to 3. However, I can't, I just wasn't very impressed with the Jags still, despite the wind, despite everything, especially relative to expectations. Like, Justin, or sorry, Trevor Lawrence was still pretty underwhelming. 19 to 31 for 178 yards, a touchdown of a pick, 5.7 yards per attempt. Under four, under five yards in terms of intended, intended air yards per temp. So he was checking everything down. 12.7% off target rate, which was near the bottom of the league.

coach who was at the bottom William Cohen what's that who was at the bottom with the off target rate Caleb Williams I think probably yeah he had some pretty

horrific misses we don't have to get into that again Trevor Lawrence his coach put 30 minutes on the clock seriously half hour pause we've been

we've been texting with Caleb Williams for the 16 hours since we don't derail by train of thought here how dare you maybe Caleb is a little bit like Trevor Lawrence

he's gonna have a really long leash people are going to think he's really good good for about five years and guess what maybe he's not actually that good um so you don't think that you're not buying anything with the jacks this i am simply saying i don't think they turn a big corner in this game i love this the the weather delay certainly was a factor but the jacks look pretty terrible they didn't even kill the panthers if you look at like a lot of the underlying team it was like all right third down efficiency like the panthers were better the panthers just had three turnovers and the jags

had one. If you look at like rushing yards, passing yards, it wasn't that big of a difference. Brian Thomas, one catch. I love this take, D.K., in part because the Panthers, again, we've said it a lot, but it's worth repeating. Gave up the most points in the history of the NFL last year. We can give 30 second reprieve since I derailed it with Caleb Williams, but basically like they gave the most points in the history of the NFL 17 games, but still. And one of the reasons was the Panthers lost their best defender, Derek Brown at defensive tackle. Derek Brown got hurt in the middle of this game. And so the Jaguars were kind of playing this more or less the same defenses last year. I know they added some free agents, but I'm like still one of the worst defenses we've seen

recently. And the Jacks looked like fine. Oh yeah. And Austin reminds us to Sean Wharton, who they signed a free agency also got hurt. So like this was a pretty bare bones defense. And the Jacks looked okay. It's week one. I think it did under start 11 and 0 on Sunday? Like offenses are bad in week one. But if there's one defense, you should be able to crush. It's Carolina without Derek Brown. Like literally. So, Yeah, I'm a little concerned. I agree. I will say we probably wouldn't have had this discussion

if Trevor Lawrence laid the ball out just a little bit farther to Travis Hunter instead of getting picked. Because that was a pretty incredible pick by, I think it was J.C. Horn. Yeah, who dropped back and like, you know, full extension, basically one-handed interception. And if he hadn't have done that, Travis Hunter would have scored like an 80-yard touchdown. So we probably wouldn't be having this discussion. However, that ball did get picked.

So I don't know. I just want to just want to. I just want to point out, like, even though the jacks came out and won the game and blew them out or whatever, it's like still kind of mediocre offensively, it's just kind of frustrating. That's a good segue into mine, my first underreaction, which is all the rookies, all the first round rookies that played like shit, it's going to be just fine. Don't worry about any of them. O'Mary in Hampton, Ashton, Jentee, Travis Hunter, Ted McMillan, Trayvion, Henderson. None of those guys scored more than 11 points in fantasy this week.

It's going to be fine. Malik Neighbors had nine points in week one last year. I actually think all of these guys passed the eye test straight up. I think the hardest one to kind of wrap your head around was Ashton Gentie. He had, I saw a ridiculous stat. He had 33 rushing yards in week one, but he had 44 rushing yards after contact. Yeah, yeah. So he literally ran for more yards after contact than he ended up with.

He was second worst in the NFL, Craig, in yards before contact per touch. He got impacted behind the line of scrimmage on average, like 0.3 yards. So basically, like, a foot behind the line of scrimmage on every play on average. And then he just, like, had to basically create out of nothing on every player. The offense was so terrible. A variable defense. So, Craig, that doesn't concern you, though, Craig, about the Raiders' offensive line going forward. Do you think week one, like, they'll gel after this?

I mean, the O' line's been a, it's a huge issue for the Raiders. Yeah, I agree with that. However, he played 86% of snaps, which was third among more running backs last year. here. I do think, this is why I think he still might have a Leonard Four Nett type season where he gets like a lot of volume, not a lot of efficiency, but ends up being okay. But like he scored 10 points this week. And he also ran a ton of routes. He ran around on over half the team's dropbacks, which again is also super important. I trust the coaching staff to figure things out as they move forward. I'm just not freaking out at week one. Another guy, Omerian Hampton, who was pretty disappointing

despite the volume. He got, I think he looks great. I think he passes the eye test. He also runs a lot of routes. I think he's going to run for like 200 yards against the Raiders. I think he's totally fine. People were, sorry to interrupt you, Craig. People were kind of freaking out a little bit about Hampton. I thought that was curious. He's a rookie gave you in Brazil and he caught two passes as a rookie and played all the time. He looks like he had a lot of juice. Yeah, I agree. Every time we touch the football, he was like shot out of a cannon. He also was like very involved in the passing game. I think he is a, if you can somehow buy low on Elmerian Hampton, I would do it. I agree with this, Craig, people somehow forget that the rookies are human beings and this is their first NFL game

and it's like completely nerve-wracking. And then even Justin Jefferson again had two catches his first week and then he had 1,400 yards as rookie. Yeah, I'll quickly wrap up. Travis Hunter had had six catches. He almost had a 70-yard touchdown. They threw him three screen passes. They're clearly trying to get him the ball. Ted McMillan, 26% target share. He had a sick catch. They ruled a drop. I think he passed the eye test. He could create separation. That was a big question for him. did. And then Trayvion and Henderson on New England. He was 15th and expected fantasy points at week one, despite only having 11 touches. I think he, and Romandre had it averaged two yards of carry. Trayvon Henderson averaged almost triple that. I think in a month he's going to fully

have control of this backfield. He's going to be great. And he's also a bylaw. That's what I was going to say, just to add on to that. Like Romandre just, he just doesn't have it anymore. I at one point thought he was pretty good. I don't know, man. Not anymore. He's just like very league average. I like this take, Craig. My first underreaction, he, here two minutes on the clock. I, the Ravens are going to be fine. The Ravens should be Super Bowl favorites. The Ravens I still think are clearly the best team in the NFL.

And I, it's clear before I go into this, I, you guys agree. The Choker label seems to have stuck with the Ravens after this week. I think that there are memes. There are all these compilations of all the leads the ravens have blown. All these games, you know, and just, I feel like it feels all the 277 and zero until this game. Yeah. A lot of like, a lot of like. A lot of like Lamar in the fourth quarter when I have American currency on.

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. It just feels like this one's stuck. And so I think the Ravens have this like label now that they'll have to shed, which I understand it is fair. Having said that, let's say the bills and Ravens had a rematch this Sunday night. Last week, the line was Ravens favored by two and a half. What would the line be if the Ravens played the bills this week? I think it'd be larger or not smaller.

or it'd be the same or the same i think the ravens ran for 250 yards yeah they look great i think that was just larger that was a wild game i think it also went under the raider that didn't keon colman's touchdown was just a deflected pass into the back of the end the ravens have this you can't run on their defensive line the secondary is unbelievable kyle hamilton's probably the best safety since pique earl thomas the ravens just are they have the best running also we don't say this enough i think the ravens we officially have to start talking about if this is one of the best running games in the history of the NFL. The backfield of Lamar Jackson, Derek Henry, is the ultimate thunder and lightning

backfield we'll probably ever see. Derek Henry is a firmly, like, unique player in history of the league. Lamar Jackson is maybe the most unique player that's ever been a quarterback in the NFL. He probably is the most singular talent we've ever seen a quarterback. Derek Henry is the most singular talent of our generation at the running back position. They're together. They're the perfect skill set compliment. And Lamar can pass.

He threw 41 touchdowns to four picks last year. They have the running, the offense, the defense, the secondary, the run D. I'm like, Tyler Loop, the kicker that replaced Justin Tucker is nails already. So they'll be fine. They should be favor to win. Hi, Fitz. Stat for you. Derek Henry, how many times he carried the ball?

He carried the ball like 19, 18 that time. He averaged 10 yards of carry almost. He averaged three and a half yards per attempt before he was touched. This is what we were saying when he went from Tennessee to Baltimore. He literally went from like last in terms of how. early you're touched to first. Have I ever told you guys, wait, have I told you guys to take out of a football that would explain it better?

Is instead of yards, instead of 100 yards, we should just talk about us 300 feet? Because how many feet before contact is Derek Henry getting contacted over? Like almost 10 or probably over 10. He's like 12 feet before. And suddenly you're like, oh my God, that's a lot. 3.5?

That's crazy. Derek Henry's getting 12 feet further downfield that Ash and Jentzy on average before anyone touches him. No wonder Derek Henry's doing great. So Derek Henry is going to, we're going to look back on him and have, I'm not sure what I'm going to tell my children about Derek Henry because, like, he's not Sequin.

Like, when you watch him, you're not like, he's kind of just like big man run fast, hard to tackle. He kind of just runs straight and he's huge. Runaway beer truck. Yeah. Like there are sometimes where he runs into someone's ass and falls down. And I'm like, this guy's the best running back in the league. Like, this guy's ran for 2,000 yards twice.

And then other times I'm like, he is the hardest person to tackle I've ever seen in the history of the NFL. I just like all the way down the field. I had a take. I was going to say, but I think if I said, I'll jinx him. I'm not going to say it.

But yeah, it's unbelievable. But I really, this Ravens backfield is underrated. It's actually like an anomaly in the history of the NFL. I think Raven should be favorite to win the Super Bowl. Okay, Deky, what's your next underreaction in week one? I think AJ Brown's going to be a,

he's still going to be a wide receiver one. Top 12 in the standings in points per game. So exactly where you drafted him, basically. Yeah. And this is, look, I think it kind of flew under the, the radar. Maybe that's on us a little bit for not talking about it more, but he had a hamstring injury throughout most of camp. Yes. Just got cleared like a week or two ago. So obviously there's a little

bit of a ramp up there. He's probably not in peak physical shape right now. Um, and this is just one of those games where game script, the defense and, you know, coaches talk about this all the time. It's like, just like the flow of the game, it just whatever they didn't get him the ball very much, even though I'm sure they wanted to. They go into every game thinking, let's feed Devante Smith and AJ Brown and then go from there instead it was a dollar scotter game and that's just sometimes how it goes most of the games are not going to be dallas goddard games do you think he looked fine do you think he looked healthy um i think so i mean he didn't look really slow to me if that's what you're asking i don't know if he looked like peak explosiveness necessarily um what did you think it honestly it was kind of hard

to tell because he was he was so absent the entire game he just like on the other side of feel he didn't have he did not have a target until a fourth quarter one catch for eight yards which one the game. And also just squeaky wheel theory. This is a story. Siriani was answering questions about it and pressers. He's getting talked to about it. Like this is going to be a thing. Also, to your point, TK, he has, it was a Thursday game. So he has, he has eight days to get ready for the next game, which is the chiefs. And the Eagles are underdogs versus the chief. The chiefs are favored to win. Is that right? Dude, I thought I was having a stroke. I actually thought I was looking at the wrong thing. I know. No way. Can we? Can we take.

Take a timeout to talk about this. I actually have never felt less confident in my football analysis than going through the lines. And it's on the road in Kansas City. But the Eagles are underdogs against the Chiefs. It's by one and a half. I'm checking right now to make sure that's still correct. We're recording on Tuesday after noon. Plus one and a half.

And I was like, I know what there's all these memes. I know what Doory Jack? No, no. The Eagles are favored by a point in a half. Did that change though this morning? It changed because Hy-Fitt sent a picture of it earlier. I put a lot of money on that. Well, that's good because it did swat.

It's now Eagles, but that's the public, though. Like, that's like, well, I don't know exactly why lines move all the time, but that, that's funny how it swapped. But I, but bottom line is, I think, I think AJ Brown's going to have a chance to have a big game here. I saw this stat from Sunny Weaver on Twitter. And I went back and looked and I didn't check all his stats, but this is, this basically followed. AJ Brown in the, in the four times that he's had less than five targets in the game. So there's been like four times he's either gotten one. I think he got hurt in one game.

And then there was a couple times he had four targets in those. games, the game after, he'd never had fewer than seven, basically because it's exactly what's happening here. It's like everyone's asking, why are you getting A.J. Brown more involved, they go in and make it a big part of the game plan the next week. In the games after these dud games that he says, these averages eight and a half targets per game, 16 and a half pvr points. So, DK, what you're saying is in kicking and screaming when Will Ferrell sees his team doesn't give it to the Italians, the next game, what does he tell the team? Pass it to the Italians. Just to give you some context of what AJ Brown has done over the last few years because it's easy to get like myopia and just look at

this one game and think about this offense myopia um he has in three seasons with the eagles he has a 28% target rate he scored 25 touchdowns which is seventh most among all receivers he has averaged almost 15 points per game and he averages 2.7 yards per outrun which is only behind puka and tyreek so he's an elite receiver i just want people to kind of remember that and be And I take that these games happen sometimes. I'll take that one step further. I think it's very hard to make a trade after week one and fantasy just because people kind of don't want to over it to week one. But if anyone has AJ Brown and some people are just bad.

He was the wide receiver 100 this week. So if anyone, if you actually can get AJ Brown. Yeah. I saw someone emailed us and said they were able to flip something for like buck you. If you could, I mean, ask. Kick the tires because worst case, he's bad again and then you can get him later. So I would kick the tires on AJ Brown. Okay.

We're going to keep rolling here through the power hour. First, the ringer fans of your football show is brought to you by Fandall. Football fans, every NFL Thursday is your chance to hit the jackpot on Fandall. Because with Fandle's Thursday touchdown jackpot, you can win a share of two million dollars in bonus bets each week to get in on this Thursday's action. All you have to do is place in any time touchdown score or bet before the game between the commanders and Packers kicks off. And if your player scores the first or last touchdown of the game, you'll win your bet

plus a share of bonus bets. I think the touchdown scores I'd choose. I think you always get a good value on quarterbacks. So Jane Daniels, even though he runs a lot, I think it's value. I do think overall, though, the Packers, Josh Jacobs, the easy one. But Jaden Reed, just all he does is score touchdowns, he had the, he has a Jones fraction his foot he's going to play through. But man, all Jane Reed does his score.

I think of him as not mini-debo, but I just love the way Jane Reed plays. But he doesn't play all the time. I think he defies a lot of the traditional modeling about how playtime routes run, everything. But like, he just doesn't nose for the end zone. I don't think people want to admit it. but I will always think Jaden Reed is a disproportionately good bet to score a touchdown, especially in this format on a short week.

That's Fandul.com slash ringer fantasy for your chance to win a share of $2 million in bonus bets. Play your game with Fandle, an official sports betting partner of the NFL. Next underreaction to week one here. Craig, underreact my socks off. I am underreacting to what appears on the outside as a terrible Cam Ward debut. you in week one. I'm underreacting to that.

What he finished? Dead last? Yeah, he had a good day though. It was literally dead last them on quarterbacks, right, DK? He was dead last. Two points. It was a pretty, it was a terrible box score,

but I think there is no larger discrepancy between box score stats versus what actually happened on the field if you watch the game. Him playing against Denver on the road as a rookie in his first game is literally like dropping a toddler into the deep end of the pool.

And I actually thought he treadwatered quite impressively. And I thought he was calm and poised. and he was changing protections and he looked like he belonged and his receivers dropped a ton of passes his poor father watching the game on the sidelines

was in agony felt his knees in the Walmart literally had to like get up out of his seat and go into the aisle and like he's like oh my god Walmart people own the Broncos that's even better

that works well yeah he literally like what Craig was talking about he gets up out of his seat walks into the aisle and like he grabs the railing of like the stairs

working attorneys. He's like, dear God. Yeah, I thought he made a ton of great throws and I thought he looked like he belonged. And I think Calvin Ridley and Tony Pollard and Chig of Conquo, the tight end, Euluk, Io Manor, the rookie row receiver.

I think all of them are bilos. They're playing the Rams in a week two at home, which is not the easiest matchup. But I just think Cam Ward is going to be good and the Titans are going to be a viable fantasy offense this year. To quote my cousin Vinnie, I think this is dead on balls accurate. What do you think, D.K.

I agree with this. I think the context that is important to remember here is first start in the NFL on the road against one of the best defenses in the NFL. With the reigning defensive player of the year Patrick's retain. And then honestly, they have the, they have the best quarterback room in the NFL, I would say, Denver. And the Titans offense is Calvin Ridley. And then a bunch of rookies, like, rookies basically, Chicoke was really young. Like they just weren't ready for that. But overall, I thought, you know, this is kind of subjective stuff.

It looked like he belonged. It didn't look like it was too big for him. He obviously made a lot of mistakes and he wasn't super sharp, but it didn't feel like he was out of his depth, if that makes any sense. So I think I'm still encouraged. He made some, he ripped some throws down the field and they didn't get completed in most cases. But I don't know. I still think stylistically he's going to be good. And I was encouraged overall.

I'm willing to eat my words if Cam Ward sucks, but I think he's going to be good. The moment consistently looked too big for Will Levis. And Cam Ward in a very tough situation made a lot of mistakes, but not in a way that he did not look rattled at all. And he was very, I thought it was right. Even though with the bad stats and everything, I thought it's an impressive overall performance. Like just given the circumstances. Dead last though. Okay.

My next underreaction, two minutes on the clock high is, I think Aaron Rogers and the Steelers are going to like come back to Earth in a pretty major way. Do tell. I think I think you're right. Unfortunately, the worst person you know just made a great point. I think I think that is correct. their defense got shredded by Justin Fields in game one. They can't run the ball. They're playing Seattle.

Seattle's defense looked pretty good last week. I just minus that last drive. Yeah. Like I don't, I don't think after that game, my takeaway was not the Steelers are going to win 14 games. My takeaway was like, what an awesome game.

Rogers is not washed. But I, I don't have like a completely new perspective on how far the Steelers' offense is going to go. I think the Jets, obviously Aaron Glenn, the head coach of the Jets came from the line. And the Lions under England and the Jets last week played a lot of man coverage,

cover like one deep safety, a lot of man coverage where it's like we're going to line up and we're going to just out execute you man to man. And I'm like, that's kind of like kind of asking for Aaron Rogers to kick your ass to a certain degree. And I just think when you have the Seattle where you're not going to know what Mike McDonald's defense is doing. Like the whole point is you don't really know who's coming to the line of scrimmage on a given play.

You don't really know what the coverage is going to be. The defensive line in Seattle, they're so hard to run on. The Seahawks defense of line is so underrated. There are so much. So the Steelers are not going to be able to run the ball. They only ran for like 55 or 60 yards against the Jets. They're not going to be able to run. I don't think that Roger is going to be able to carve him up.

I think. And also, we didn't really acknowledge Justin Fields shredded Mike Thomas defense. Maybe Justin Fields is better. If Justin Fields sucks this week, we're going to be like, holy shit. What if the Steelers' offense defense, which Cody Alexander at match quarters, great substack. I highly recommend Cody Alexander and unbelievable work points out the Steelers defense is the most expensive in the NFL. Highest percentage any team has spent on their cap this season.

the Steelers on their defense. And yet, Justin Fields shredded them. So it's one of those things that if Sam Donald walks in next week and shreds the Steelers and then Justin Fields doesn't play so hot, suddenly we're like, wow, what if this Steelers team isn't quite what we think? I think this is on the table.

It's funny because the Steelers really only won that game only because Rogers was great. I feel like I was almost like, can we win despite Rogers and we won because of Rogers? The defense was terrible. The offensive line sucks. to the running game sucked. It was all Rogers.

He also, frankly, is a madman, and he's like Baker Mayfield, where I don't think he plays well unless he's doubted. And like, that was a grudge match. I think that Jet, like, he really, like he, he prepared so hard for that game.

You know what I mean? Like, that meant more. We'll say, again, I think Rogers will be better than he was with the Jets, but I think that it's not going to be as easy as going forward. Speaking of the Steelers playing the Seahawks next week,

part of the reason I'm down on the Steelers is my next underreaction is I think the Seahawks defense, in general are going to be so much better than the taste left at our mouth after the last game. The Seahawks, I don't want to say blew it, but they kind of really should have beaten the 49ers. They blew it.

Yeah, they do it. And the 49ers ended up winning that game. They definitely blew it. What are we talking about? They blew it, fine. The Niners won 1713. I think the Seahawks are going to have, like, if you had to tell me,

we're going to stop talking about Denver's the best defense this season. I think if I had to pick a team, it'd be Seattle. I think the Seattle defense is going to be incredible. Also, honestly, all, Seattle beat the Niners. on that last drive. Just, freaking Tarek Wollin just screwed up two plays.

He was in position and just stopped running. And Ricky Pirslaw had that huge thing. And then Tariq Wollin is perfectly in position to knock down the pass in the end zone that went to the tight end. He's never caught a pass before that game. And he just tried to toe tap it in reception like he was Santonial Holmes in the end zone. I'm like, if he just plays through his hands,

the game's over. So you look around and you're like, okay, Seahawks, Niners. Like, Niners are so well suited to stop Seattle on both sides of the ball. We talked about the Niners are more familiar with what Seattle wants to do on offense than like any team. And so overall, I just kind of think this week where Tomlin has the more old school defense.

I just, you look at what the Ravens have been able to do. Obviously, it's different, but like the Ravens run all over Pittsburgh. Jets just ran all over Pittsburgh. I think Seattle wants to run more. I kind of think what we were thinking about the Seattle offense reestablishing the run. I kind of think we see it this week versus Pittsburgh. And I also think the Seattle offensive Donald is going to look more like what we want to do overall, but also the defense is going to look way better against the Steelers.

So I think the Seahawks are going to look better and the Steelers will look worse overall this week. I think I agree with the take that the Seahawks are better than they kind of felt and looked in week one. I think offensively they can be a lot better. Defensively, I thought they played actually pretty well. Like you said, there was a couple of busted coverages late in the game that really just fucked them over. For the most part, otherwise, they played really well. I think they gave up a scoring drive on their first defensive possession and then basically put the clamps down until the very end of the game. I can't remember the exact timeline.

But yeah, and then offensively, I'm a little worried. I don't love that they're going to Pittsburgh this week to play an early game. Oh, I did forget that. A morning game. That's just like historically not. What time is that game? Seahawks is at 10 o'clock where I live. He's a morning game.

Yeah. Just you wait at that. Just you wait for the time. It's at one o'clock. It's at one o'clock where the game is being played. He said morning game and yet you knew what he meant. I'm a little worried about that. So, and if the CX start 0 and 2, it's not going to be great.

However, I do think just as a quality of a team, yeah, they're better than they looked in that week one. Should we take a break and just do the time zone emails now? No, we have one more. No, we have two more power hours. One more. Here, TK. Give us final. Did Hyfitz curate all the good emails that supported him?

And then cut out the other ones? You guys go through the email. Tell me, uh, I, well, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll, We'll talk. We'll talk. We'll talk. We'll talk. This is really cocky right now. I don't like where this is going. All of our listeners live in New York and Boston. That's the problem. Seems so based on the emails. Or maybe the West Coasters weren't awake for the pod.

The emails get in. West Coaches were outside and joined the weather. Yeah, West Coasters were too busy getting a matcha and touching grass. Yeah, going on a walk. Think one last under reaction. Big Devonte Adams days are coming. This was a tough. This was a very underwhelming game for Devante. Adam start to start the season. Four catches, 51 yards.

He was a wide receiver 46 on the week. But he had a 27% target rate in this game, a 29% first read target rate, which is really strong. And quietly, Matthew, how big was the first retarget rate? 29% of the first read targets went to Devante Adams. So basically, and if you look at it, it was like 40% went to Puka. 30% went to, and 30% went to Devante Adams. This is why we call Matt Stafford, the king maker.

It's fucking sick. He's going to throw two guys and two guys only. And Matthew Stefford was quietly really good in this game. Obviously, there was a lot of worry about him coming off of his back injury. He made some of the most incredible throws in this game. There was one we mentioned before where he basically got pressured and he just threw it to a spot on the field in the middle of the field. And he sort of whipped it sidearm. This is where we were talking about he can't turn one way because his back is so hurt.

But he had some incredible throws. He had, let's see here, according to fantasy points, hero ball percentage, which is, Hero balls are, they chart these as extraordinary throws that maximizers all the plays. Basically, like, it's similar to big time throws that PFF does. And he had the highest rate of hero throws in the NFL in week one. And I think that's just kind of like what to expect of Stafford. The other thing to keep in mind here, Pooka Nakua went to the, he went to the blue tent at least twice. I didn't, I couldn't keep track of how many times he kept going to the blue tent. It's just going to be a miracle, I feel like, if he stays healthy this year.

That's correct. This is a great call, DK, and I would like to give Craig his flowers for, I can't believe how many of our tattoos really bared out immediately, including Craig's observation last year that he doesn't want to put a new Puka in the first round, even if the numbers suggest it. Because Puka's lack of, like, self-restraint on a football field is inevitably going to get injured. It's just too tough. And it was amazing to see him bleeding, like, out of the States, the first game. He already, like, hit bingo on the season-long Puka bingo card in one game. He really just has no restraint. He, I mean, he had a great game.

game. He had he had 10 catches, I think, 130 yards. And I like, I don't want anything to do with it. I think this is a great call in that if you could pro-rate a triple crown, if you, if I actually think yeah, if there's three or four games that Devante Adams will play without, without Pooka, those four games he will lead the NFL and catches yards and touchdowns. The one thing I will say that I'm a little worried about is I think two of the Rams starting offensive linemen got hurt. It's fine. It's just both guards. What do you need those? That. That's concerning. There's four ankles and two of them, two of the ankles are fine.

So, you know, two of the four, you know, we just stitch them together. I think basically, though, it was just good to see Stafford slinging it. I think the box score didn't really quite show it, but he was, he was nails in this game. I will say, uh, the Rams are like this incredible team where they're so fun to watch in any given game where everyone's healthy. You're like, they could beat anybody. Oh, yeah, Super Bowl teams just don't look like, yeah, your quarterback had to get an epidural because he's 37 and his back's been fucked since 2017.

And also like three of your five linemen have like major issues immediately. Like that's a pretty tough combo. Anyway, I think you're right, Dekin. Devante, yeah, I still believe. All right, we're going to get to the afternoon games on Sunday in a second. But first, this episode is brought to you by Hyundai. What makes the all new Hyundai Palisade hybrid an incredible SUV? Is it the spacious interior that's comfy for the whole crew or the capability to go off road?

Maybe it's the up to 600 miles plus of range. What if it's all of that? that and more. The all new Hyundai Palisade hybrid, so much more than just another SUV. Visit HyundaiUSA.com or call 562-3-3-3-4-4603 for more details. Put the time's other thing at the end for the people who don't give a shit. But I will say,

do we want to give a quick update in the Ringer Fantasy Football League as well? So we launched the Ringer Fantasy Football League. We brought it back. We have Bill Simmons. We've Sean Fennyson. We have the three of us. We have Van Lathen. We have Cousin-Sall.

We have everyone here at the Ringer, Chris Ryan. We have all these people involved. And Craig, how do we give an update on this in a way that people who don't give a shit about other people's fantasy links will be interested? I don't really know. I guess I can tell you this. Bill Simmons is in last place, which I think people will enjoy hearing. Who did he lose to? He lost to Hyphids handedly.

That's me for the people on the podcast who never know whose voice belongs to who on a podcast. That's, that is. Bill is in last, Sal's in first. South team is kind of a wagon, I got to say. Like the man put together a quality roster. He kept sniping me in that one. Bill was the only guy who didn't get to 100 points last week. And the funny thing is, so Bill famously drafted five quarterbacks.

He drafted Trevor Lawrence, Caleb Williams, Tua, Michael Panics, and Matt Stafford. So every week, the poor guy's got to decide to got to pick two out of the five. I still think the funniest thing is Bill was like, it's a two quarterback league. So if I have five quarterbacks, when other quarterbacks get hurt, they'll come to me for a trade or I'll screw them over. And it's funny to me that he chose the three most injury prone quarterbacks, which is Tua Matt Stafford and Michael Penix, where I'm like, if you would just let other people have those guys and take an healthy players, you probably would have been better off. It's tough. It becomes a hat on a hat because it's just becomes a conundrum every week deciding

who's going to play ball. So he chose the two of the five quarterbacks. The two he chose were Tua and Trevor Lawrence, who were the two lowest scoring of his five. And he hates watching them, which is funny. Bet on the Falcons then put Pennix in. Yeah, kind of kind of just 0 for six there from Bill. Sal's team, I will say, he has Dak Prescott and Cidieland, which in a two-quarterback league, the stack is pretty fun. Justin Jefferson. And he had Herbert and then he reached a lot for Ibuka and Tyler Warren, who immediately

vindicated it. His team's a wagon. He's got Bucky Irving. I'm playing him this week. I'm 1-0. High offense is 1-0. Danny Kelly's own one. Tough look. I had a tough week. I wasn't going to throw him under the bus, but. Who did I have? I had a bunch, like, Nico Collins was my number one receiver. He had a huge dud of a week.

Let me see. I had Kenneth Walker. We all know how that went. Not great. So I got some problems. I got some problems I need to fix. Yeah. So I'm looking to do that. Anyway,

we'll check in every power hour. We're going to check in on the league. We're going to put some stuff on Instagram so people can follow. Yeah, that's the update right now. By the time you're listening to the show, we're going to put on Instagram. We'll put a little carousel of all the matchups and the standings and everything.

So go to the Ring or Fantasy Football Instagram if you want to look at that. Okay. Any other football thoughts you're going to talk about or email before we get to fantasy court? No. All right. The only other under reaction I want on record, we don't have to talk about this. Daniel Jones sucks and the Broncos are going to rock him. But like that's kind of obvious.

Well, yeah. I don't know if that was worthy. There's some real like Saints, 20, 24 week one vibes with the Colts. Yeah. It's like that was like, oh wow, I guess they're great. No chance. First team in 50 years to score out all their possessions.

I'm sure that'll care. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. So fantasy court. And a reminder is email us ringer fantasy football at g-gumel. com for fantasy court. I do actually love fantasy court because I'm a big leader that fantasy football leagues at their core are actually the smallest possible version of a democracy.

It's just you and nine friends. And you know what? We need a legal branch sometimes, you know? Do we have the, we don't have the sound drop, do we, the fantasy court sounds? Oh, no, we forgot. We'll have to bring that back. Yeah, we'll get it. We'll get it.

We'll get it. We don't tell anyone about this thing that you're doing. I don't really want to be handcuffed. The definition of an object is a material thing that can be seen and touched. The fantasy Supreme Court where we define an object. Carlos, we're looking at the definition of. fucking object. I don't remember what that case was, but

the definition of an object. That was amazing. Also, the irony is we were probably trying to talk about an objection and then we just looked up object. All right. What's our first case here? This is, I love this one. This is from Harry.

Harry. Harry. Each bone. I have strong thoughts on this one, but I want to hear what you guys think first. Okay. You have a take? Weird. Harry says,

our high school friend group of 10 people has a longstanding fantasy football league. This past year we decided to make things more official by adding a vase as a trophy engraved with the winner's name. A vase. I thought it was weird too. I know. Just get a trophy with the trophies. You know, why it's a vase. I agree.

It distracted me as well. Just get a fucking trophy, guys. Maybe they're like 19. I don't know. It's kind of Nick. Yeah, whatever. I feel like they're, I don't know. During the championship, the two competitors decided that they were going to troll the group by sitting their entire team to

intentionally force a tie. And they agreed before and just split the pot down the middle. This was last year? This is last year. Why? Okay. That's super lame. So some of the, this is Harry's email continued.

Some of the guys in the league think that this is the most chicken shit thing in the world. Others think it's a funny piece of lore to add to what will hopefully be a lifelong league. The money has already been sent out, but the two, in quotes, winners want their names, both engraved on the vase. Our commissioner is holding out on engraving the vase and on sending the vase to either of the winners because by his book, there has been no official winner yet in this league in the vase era.

Others want... The vase. The vase era. The vase, yeah. Others want the commissioner to engrave the vases with both names. Are there two vases or one vase? No, sorry.

There's one. Sorry, you're right, Vase. I'm fucking in him now. Others want the commissioner to engrave the vase with both names, but put a literal asterisk on it as well. A rule has already been added to prevent this happening in the future, but we are in a tense standoff between camps right now. And we have agreed as a group that we will leave it up to us, the people, you guys,

us, the people on the show, whatever we decide, they will abide by. So I want to start, D.K., the eldest of the judges, what do you make of, again, money's been paid out. how do you think we should handle what goes on the vase? Did the guys get their names on the vase or what do you think? There wasn't a winner, right?

Well, they tied in the championship. They chose to tie. Wait, and so they split all their players. Everyone sat all their players. They split the winning pot these two guys. They split the money. You know what?

I say neither of them on the vase because the simple answer would have been you decide before the game to split the pot and then you still see who wins. That's all. One trillion percent. You just, you know what? If you're worried about the money, split the pot, you can agree to that.

Sometimes people do that. I think it's probably dumb, but whatever. If it's a huge pot, sometimes people are just like, look, let's just split it. But then you still play to see who wins the league. Craig, what do you think? Agreeing to split is lame. Sitting all your players is lame. This is lame across the board.

I think they, I think Avaz is a punishment. Honestly, they should have to get a vase. And they have a vase in their high. I don't know. I don't do you have a, what is your lean? Because like I'm, I don't like that these guys did this and I would like to punish them in some way. I agree. I feel really strongly about this.

You'll be shot. But I feel really strongly. They got the money. They got what they wanted. They got the money. Yeah. Now they want the glory of being on the first one. No way.

I, like object. Get them like a championship participation trophy. Literally. Get them nothing. Except they didn't participate. They bench. all their players. They literally didn't participate. It's not even that. They literally, objectively, declined to compete for the championship. Scared to compete. So they don't get to be

on the trophy. I think the tie, and so I think you don't delete history, the tie should be commemorated. Their names can be left to the dustbin of history. I think that it should say the 2024-25 season, and I think it should either say shame or just tie or frankly, Rileyan, a giant asterisk, but none of their names go on the thing. Just a giant fucking asterisk or tie in that spot. But their names don't get to be on the trophy. Yeah, I agree. Yeah.

No way. So what do we want? Come on. Play the game. Do we want? You make it all the way to the championship and then you bail? So what do we want? Do we want tie parentheses shame?

Or just a big asterisk. We're just a small. who you are. If you know, you know. Wait, what do they want? Do they want both their names on one day? They want the world to burn. Put third place on there is the winner.

At least he's trying. I actually think that's really funny. You know, these guys are trolls. And I think that's funny. Third place gets the name. I actually love that. I think, I think everyone else's name on there except for theirs. Everyone else's name.

I think you, um, I think you just. start the vase tradition next year, this year. There's no vase. Sorry. You're not going to be on it. Do you not commemorate that this happened? 2024, you don't want to leave it blank. You just start it next year and just, oh, don't even don't even don't feed the trolls you're saying. Just nothing. Yeah, there's no vase. We're starting the vase tradition this coming year. We'll remember the tie. We can all talk about it, but it's not on the vase. What do you think, D.K. I like the idea of putting everyone's name except for the two people. I agree. I think it should be that's fun. Craig, that's sure. Logistically, it's hard to do that. Should we just, you know what?

I think third place getting their name there is so funny to me. Remember in Oceans 11 with the two, the two like Utah brother, it's like Scott Kahn and Casey Affleck. And they're at the wedding reception or whatever it is. He thinks everyone in the room except for his brother. I just love that part. So that's what I see. Yeah. I think, yeah, if they're able to pull it off, option A, I think is very small font, everyone else's name.

And if they can't pull that off. No vase. No vase? or third place? I don't like third place. All right. No vase. No vase. All right. No mas. But if you can, really small font, everyone else. Everyone in his name except them. Harry, tell your friends to fucking sack up.

They suck. Honestly, you know what I don't like? They said they're like, huh, huh, it's a bit. No, they were afraid. They were afraid. And they also, you know what else? I can, I want to, I don't want to guarantee it, but I think I have a strong hunch. They didn't think about splitting the pot no matter what and competing. They didn't, it didn't occur to them. Because they have a coward's mind. Yeah, they just were like, well, we just tie it.

And then we both split it. It never occurred to them that they could just split the money and then play it out. I bet that never occurred to them. They probably thought they could get a fast one past us. Well, you can't. All right. I'm glad we are on the same page. I'm glad.

I felt strong. They don't get to be on the truth. That was a unanimous decision. Okay. Yeah. This one is, this one's kind of egregious. This one's kind of easy. I almost didn't.

Fuck, I don't read it. This one's from Jacob. Jakey. Jeannie bone. I'm reading because I like his breakfast. My breakfast today was a chorizo hash with eggs and beans and a black cold brew. Ooh. I don't like cold brew.

That's a working man's breakfast right there. Yeah. Van Lathen drank the cold where I think he thought it was weaker than regular coffee. And then he was like, he did some episode and it was buzzing. Jacob says, we have a pretty big issue in her league that could affect the year in the coming years due to keep her rules. One team in her league was auto draft because the owner lives in Denmark and they couldn't like figure out of time. So he sent the commissioner instructions on what players he. wanted in each round that were brief, but pretty deep, pretty easy to work off of. And he attached them to the email.

So that Jacob writes, round five comes along and the commissioner says, the team that's auto-drafting wanted the best available receiver. So the league debates a bit and settles on Craig's favorite player, Jalen Waddle. The commissioner failed to mention the team specifically asked for Emeka Abuka in round five. Uh-oh. In his subsequent round, the commissioner took Emekaabuka for himself, meaning he can then keep him echo Buka next year. Long story short, we're all, and he did it again later

with Rishi Rice and Matthew Gold, just ignore the guy's written instructions. And so the commissioner who sniped Buka despite instructions is saying he thinks he did nothing wrong. And I think this is actually black and white. People who cheat usually. They should just trade them. They just swap everyone in the league's like you should swap them. The commissioner is like, no, I think this is no brain. Right. Like they have to swap Waddle for Bucca. Like no question. This, this is a abuse of power by And because the commissioner did it, I kind of think of Bukas points last week should go to the guy too. The very rare situation where I would change the matchup. If it would have given this guy a win, I'd consider that.

Like this, frankly, you're an idiot, the commissioner because this guy, you're trying to, like, big picture is like, this guy's in Denmark and trying to be in your fantasy league. Like, you're basically like, what the fuck? You might as well quit. You're an idiot. I wonder how. I wonder how. He spent sending that draft plan. I, it's so.

Only to be betrayed. I wonder how this came. out because it's it it's a clever crime by the commissioner because you know I'm sure the dead proof I probably didn't think anything of it he's like oh I sent in my list these are the players I ended up with I wonder how this came out so the commissioner got a book that's weird route six two and two together yeah he's like why did you pick a buca after I picked waddle so yeah I think that's one's one more one more fanning score here from Dakota Dakota Dibone this one I think is important because it's representative of a lot of cases we get so if you have ever had a

collusion or trade veto story. I want to you to listen to this one. So Dakota writes, cold brew and maybe a bagel for breakfast. Maybe a bag. Maybe. I know. Dakota writes early last week before game started, a league mate reaches out asking what Emeka Buka would cost. We settled on Trey McBride for a Meccabuka straight up. She like she's or I don't know, Dakota is giving up a Macabuca. They're getting back trade right. McBride. Um, league goes in an uproar. League vetoes in a matter of minutes. League mates say they don't want Dakota to win because the team's already good enough, blah, blah, blah. Wait. So Dakota acquired Abuca and got Tray McBride.

Got it. And then everyone vetoes it in like five minutes. I blah, blah, blah, blah. I actually nothing bothers me more than people being the fantasy football HOA where they're just like, you can't, your fence is the wrong color. And I'm like, shut the fuck up. It's not your team. Like I just literally when the Eagles traded AJ, they got A.J. Brown, no, Jerry Jones and the Giants didn't get together and be like,

this is bullshit. We should literally in real life where there's billion. of dollars at stake, there's been one trade veto in the four major sports out of thousands in our entire life. The idea that fantasy football managers think that you get to fucking predict the future is one, pathetic, two, ridiculous. So I just, also every year we get stories of vetoes of trades that actually ended up being amazing in the wrong direction. But like, vetoing is so cowardly, it's stupid. Vitoes are for when someone did a trade drunk, someone doesn't care about the league anymore, someone checked their team zero time. Or there's clear collusion. Yeah, it can prove. Collusion or

apathy. It's like whatever bad faith, but it's like some people don't check the league for 10 weeks, don't know the people in the league. Trade away their best player. Don't check the league again. You can veto that because like this person isn't going to check the league once and they just made a trade. They've one friend in the league. They're going to quit next year. That's a veto. Like someone owes someone money or like, you know, a lot of big one we get now is my wife's in the league and she asked me to do this deal and I said yes. Like you can veto those. Like those are a little weird. And so this is like people like literally it's your team. Like get the fuck out of other people's teams. This is my stop fucking managing other people's teams. I agree with

all that. Yeah. I think that, I don't think there should be votes for vetoing anything. I just think commissioners should act and roll with an iron fist. I agree. Quite literally, not a thing to vote on other people getting, like, like, even in real life with more mergers, it's like there is a decision on whether it gets to go through or not. The other companies don't get to vote. No. It's crazy. Because they have a fucking, agenda. Yeah. That's the thing. People pretend they're like, oh my God, they're just jealous. Literally, in this email it says, they didn't want to see me win as my team was already good enough. Your team's good enough. Sorry, I'm winning. Your team's already good enough.

Yeah, it's like literally it's like the Giants are like, actually we should have gotten Micah Parsons. We used to have a rule in my long high school league where it was like, if there was there, because there was one trade that was super imbalanced, everybody got mad. So then it became like this vote. thing where when there was a trade, it would basically go out to everybody in the league and they would vote on if they thought this was a fair trade. And now I'm like, fuck that. I'm the commissioner. I look at the trade. I text both sides and I say, are you good with this trade? And are you good with this trade for the two people involved? They both say yes, I send it through. Consenting a dog. Also, frankly, no offense to people listening who veto trades. But if you think you are just smart enough to decide like what will happen in the future, like the

entire popularity of football is in part because it's so fucking unpredictable. But also, it's America. You have the right to be stupid. People get to make bad decisions. It's part of freedom. It bothers me so much. If I notice as the commissioner that this trade is incredibly in balance, I will maybe spend a minute with the person I think is getting swindled to say, hey, are you sure you

want to do this? If someone's never played fantasy before and it's their like third day on the job, then like, yeah, maybe there's a conversation. Or I'm like, hey, you know, George Kittle is on IR now, right? You see that. Like once you, but once you confirm that and they say, yes, I know. you send it to read yeah anyway let people manage their own teams i hate literally we're almost never supportive youtube trend okay um having said that if you have a fun one email it in ringer fantasy

four at email dot com okay send in the fantasy courts uh also we'll take more trivia for the trivia waivers next week but yeah let's get a couple emails okay the the time zone thing Craig will you just briefly try to summarize the very long argument we had at the end of the show on uh monday or monday to Tuesday. Well, it's kind of a long-standing issue, but D.K. and I refer to the first slate of games sometimes as the morning games, which you don't like because the majority of people in America live on the East Coast. And there are no games that take place in the morning on the East Coast. They take place technically in the afternoon at 1 p.m. But you also in general just don't like when we plan things at the Pacific time because you're on the East Coast and it confuses you.

and you in general have an issue with the PT versus ET situation across the board. I don't have an issue with it. That's like for our company. That's just something I have to deal with. And the way I described that part. Well, first of all, that was a good song. You call the Pacific Times on a fake time zone every time we bring it up.

That's because it bothers you. It's funny. I'm just saying, you call it a fake time zone. I would say, you don't acknowledge it. I would describe it as diminish our time zone over here. We like our time.

It's a micro frustration that I have to convert all the time zones, but then it comes out when you say the early. It's a micro frustration that is a. macroaggression. Yes. That's exactly it. It builds up like cholesterol into aneurism I have. But anyway, so the emails came in and I want to focus on one point, Craig said during the argument.

Because I was really, we're going to cherry pick one line. Zoom in on that. You said, when I say morning games, everyone knows what I mean, which I think is the crux of what we're actually arguing about. I guess, sure. I think DK and I are in general. I'm just like, why are you so fucking upset about it? I'm just going to read a bunch of emails. It's just being pedantic.

about like this thing we say well i'm just saying this was i didn't this was the like i checked the emails this i look let's be honest i've been humbled by the email account far more than i've been decided being honest here the seattle fish toss incident like the amount of times i thought things were going to go one way and they went the other like it's like in calvin and hobbs there's like the spaghetti incident there's the he just talks about the the great maestro incident from 22 yeah Helsinki 1919 we all know what happened there the salamander incident i just yeah and so Anyway, have I not been humbled a lot? So I opened the email and I kind of was like,

how am I going to get rocked today? And I will say an unexpected through line emerged. That's his daily. Yeah, what the fuck am I going to get rushed on? Today. I will say an unexpected thing emerged. And I'm just going to read a bunch of emails. Nick.

Endbone. Nicky. After the discussion regarding time zones, I wanted to write in from Chicago. I'm central time zone. I'm generally with Danny Hyfitz on this one. Morning games are the Steelers Vikings game coming up in week four from Dublin with a kickoff of 8.30 a.m. Refer to normal early games as morning games makes me think

there's an international game coming up that I can wake up to, only to then realize there are none, which I get confused. Owen writes in, morning games are played in London, Ireland, Germany. Don't let them bully you, Haifitz. Case writes in, Craig is so incredibly wrong about morning games on today's episode. He said morning games. And in my mind, I was like, oh my God, is there a London game already. Bobby writes in. Every time Craig says morning game, I think there's a game in London or Germany. It drives me nuts. Early windows totally fine. Morning confuses me. Zach, Haifich, you should have said the morning games are when the European games start.

Kelly says, the concept of a morning game being mentioned in the pod makes me double take and think there's a London game. I think we should call it early window, late afternoon window. That's the correct way to refer to it. That doesn't confuse me. I think we should call early window and late window. Let me say this. I disagree, but that's fine. I can see their point.

If that's the reality that they're living in, Craig, should we decide to say early slate? I say early slate. Yeah, here's the thing. like I don't feel strongly about this at all. It's the reaction to hyphens. Anger is what galvanized D.K. and IT entertain this ridiculous argument.

It's not like I have some staunch opinion that you need to say morning and not early. No, I don't know. I just say it casually without even thinking about it. Also, it's like, come on, morning games. There's usually not five international games in the morning. You know, I still think you should know what we're talking about when we say morning games, but. I agree with that. I think maybe that's what they think of and and that's a thing.

That is a thing. But we would call it like the London game or the Dublin game or the Germany game. So we're talking about morning games. It's like there's like one international game for like an eight week stretch during the middle. It's like, come on. You know what we're talking about. They're standalone. Yeah.

Anyway. Well, so, well, eight people said they didn't. However, I will say this is the general issue is east coasters fucking hate West coasters. and West Coasters don't mind East Coast as well. So I, so, no, well, here's the thing. I also wondered why did I care about this so much? You know what I mean? We're too busy fucking surfing.

You know why people in the West Coast didn't email in? Because they don't give a fuck. Well, I just like, we're too busy out in the woods. We always talk about how the West. We're going to porn in the woods or surfing. Fucking searching maniacally for porn in the woods. So I also was wondering, why did this bothers me so much? I spent a lot of time last time.

I was like, why did it? I didn't bother some message. I'm not going to lie. James emailed in and nailed it. Jimmy. Jim, boom. Jimmy Jimmy Jimmy James

Jimmy's gonna have it he's gonna know Jimmy Jimmy go ahead I love the this is a full paragraph from James I don't care at all about this I know but he nailed I figured it out this is therapy I figured it out why I bothered me I'm trying to be like an emotionally vulnerable person

it's like I this this is why I figured it out yeah all right I'm not sure if you're high fits I'm not sure if your anger is the same reason as mine but I've long held this anger anytime a friend he phrases weird, but basically just West Coast people talk about the morning games. Luckily, he goes up, blah, blah, blah. He says, he has this anecdote here about like when he first experienced it. But the point being, he visited a friend on the West Coast and he says, his friend called the morning games and it didn't really bother me. And then I visited him and he says, fuck, it's 10 a.m.

We just finished breakfast. And as soon as we're on, there's football on, so you don't have to wait two hours. Like you go to bed at a reasonable time. He's like, this is way better. He's like, the Pacific Time Zone is a way better way to watch sports. And Craig, you talk about this all the time. And so James writes, when you say morning games,

you're fucking rubbing it in our noses. That, you know what? The Pacific time zones are a better way to watch sports. It's a better experience. A lot of people may disagree with that. Like, a lot of people are like, I love the afternoon. I can never imagine the games waking up. I've done both.

I lived on the West Coast. It is a way better life experience for me. You tasted it. The games are at 10 a. You get a taste of it now. You can watch Sunday football ends at 8. You can watch Game of Thrones at 9 or whatever you want to watch, prestige TV on Sunday night at 9.

Frankly, basketball is completely different. I think one of the reasons the NBA has challenges is like LeBron's, Steph Curry and Nicole Yokic are like in mountain. Their games start at 10 p.m. I fell as the oldest I felt at that point in my life. I fell asleep. Absolutely insane. People have families.

They have to get up for work the next day. Yeah, like, people like, why is the NBA struggling with ratings? So maybe LeBron James is fucking on the Lakers. And he used to be at Eastern Time. That was way better. And like LeBron literally played a, there was a Lakers Warriors playoff game a couple years ago that started at like 10. And I fell asleep at halftime.

And I was like, well, I guess I'm a different phase of my life now. Anyway, it's way cooler when LeBron and Steph Curry played at dinner time. I preferred that. That was cool to sit down to dinner and watch LeBron and Steph. So all that's to say, James nailed it. It is better to watch sports in the West Coast. And you're not doing it on purpose, but I feel like I fucking get it, man. I know.

I got to sit around all day and fucking wait. The game ends that'll, I know you're not doing a purpose. It's just how we talk. I've spent my entire life here. I just, it's my nature. Can't we just do one thing for the 80% of people in the afternoon? And I'm like, morning. I'm like, I get it.

I'd rather the games be in the morning. I would. I'm like, yeah, bothers me. That's all. I figured it out. I'm not even saying it's your problem. It's my problem. There's a whole bit that our buddy J.J.

Goreson has where it's like every Monday night or Sunday night game. He's like he has a whole East Coast dad's T.M like trademark thing and like if they ever go to overtime or if there's ever a weather day delay he's like East Coast dads are cooked. Yeah. It's true. Yeah. Like when Mike Torrico comes up until fucking one in the morning to watch a football game. How annoyed were you when Mike Tariko was like yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The game was Zoom at 1130. Didn't you that bother you? Yeah. Well, and it was 830 for me and I understand that it's insane. I'm a lot. It's insane. I'm upset about it. Do you know,

Monday night football? We haven't talked about this. We do our money show now after Monday nights. Yeah. Do you know that next week there's a Cardinals Raiders game at 10 o'clock Eastern at night?

That shit's at 10 p.m. Eastern. It starts a football game at 10 o'clock at night. And the NFL. I get it. You're a saint. I lived on the East Coast for like 18 months. And I know some people might say,

no, no. It's nice. You can wake up and you can have a day. You can just go to go to lunch, exercise, do something with your partner. I get all that. It's still not bad.

I understand that. I think what I'm saying is my, the experience of the 80, and the number is correct, 80% of Americans, it is at the afternoon. And my experience of how late this goes feels erased when you're like,

yeah, games in the morning. I'm like, I waited all day for this to start. I waited all fucking morning. I, you feel so passionately about this. Yeah.

I didn't know. I feel like, I feel like time passes differently on the East Coast. It's like you really do feel like you're in the future. It is culturally different. faster.

Yeah, it is culturally different. It was like, when I go to, when I go to East Coast, I'm like, the day's already gone. Where the fuck did this day go? That's the thing. Carry Underwood out here. Waited all day for Sunday night. No, you two did not fucking wait all day for Sunday night. You have so much time left in your day on Sunday.

It's not even Sunday night yet for you. She starts the song like 445. That's right. That's all. Figured it out. Yeah, I feel better. I mean, that makes sense. To be clear, Craig and I weren't doing that intentionally.

It's just how we talk. They've just been the morning games in my entire life. It's just our reality. I've been saying morning games. I know. I don't say. I don't say.

I will try my best. You think I walk around with my friends and say early slate? I say fucking one o'clock games. I don't say it on this show. I will try my best to say the early slate and not morning games going forward. Thanks.

I appreciate you guys. Do you guys think that the Pacific time zone is the perfect time zone? It's better for sports. It's worse for other things. Also, like what? Generally. I mean, I don't, hypothetically, if your job is like news oriented, pretty fucking brutal.

I guess now it's probably nice to just wake up and have all the news done. I know, I was supposed to say it's like, by the time we wake up, there's no waiting around. Hypothetically, someone has to collect rundowns and newsworthy items. Yeah, it's a little harder on the West Coast. Working on like Wall Street and living on the East or on the West Coast would be tough. Yeah, it's why they don't. Yeah. So I guess that's worse.

Unless you're an early riser. Yeah. Although I actually on that note, someone actually sent a funny email. Actually, very on that note. I'm going to pull it up. Someone emailed in. Do it. You won't. And said, pull that fucking email up. Oh, I'm going to say that. I'm not going to say, Jaybone. J-bone. J-bone. Breakfast is add a roll and iced coffee. Christ. Stud. Fucking amazing. My life hack is I dream about living on the West Coast, but keeping East Coast business.

I'm not telling anyone when I moved to the West Coast. Oh, yeah, yeah, sure. And he's like, I run a small web development firm, a couple of buddies. For a few years, we were all single. We rented a condo in Pacific Beach, San Diego for the entire month of January. We didn't tell any of our clients we were traveling. And so we woke up every day at 6 a.m. Took meetings till noon or it took meetings to like 1 o'clock, didn't tell anyone we were

West Coast. And then we just spent all day surfing and golfing and getting drunk in part. And he says, parting with college kids at Shore Club. Craig knows what I'm talking about, baby. Fuck yeah, dude. And he said it was like a month vacation. P.B. Shore Club is like one of the most fratty bars in Pacific Beach

and it's it's there's a great time the Red Bulls slushies there people know people who have been will know so I thought that was funny I also while we're here on the Times and something I want to read you a Galaxy Brain take from Errol that was Errol

Errol Ebon this was a galaxy brain one and this is like this is funny and actually DK you just asked is anything better than Pacific time this was unhinged Errol says breakfast good apple peanut butter cinnamon cassidia for breakfast

Oh, my, what? Wow. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Apple, peanut, cinnamon, I like a good apple, peanut butter, cinnamon. Is there cheese in there? No, I hope not. He put all that in a cassidia?

Did he grill it? No, I think it's just a cassidia if it doesn't have cheese? Remember that guy? Oh, the guy at the live show who said I eat eggs and peanut butter in the morning. Yeah. His friend emailed in him. He was high as fuck, and you called him out. He was like freaking out.

That was really funny. That's so funny. Interesting. So, wait, this guy does apples, peanut butter cinnamon between two, tortillas and we don't know if he grills it though. I don't know. He says slice up the apple, sprinkle them on a peanut butter cover tortilla with cinnamon sandwich, another on top and brown it both sides and skill of butter.

Interesting. Sounds pretty good. It does sound good. Not going to lie. Errol has a funny email and Errol says, I heard your tangent on time zone conversions. I wanted to bring up my own personal experience as someone who lives on the West Coast. I have abandoned changing my clocks for daylight savings time every year. I've stopped.

Oh, nice. I live on the West Coast. I change. I believe in that. He says, I change my phone's time zone to Arizona's, which doesn't honor daily life savings. So every day from spring to fall,

I'm on the same time as everyone else. But when everyone else flips their clock back, I keep mine the same. I cannot understate this. I can say it again. I cannot understate this. This was the best decision I've ever made in my entire life. I started doing this in 2021.

And once everyone else goes back, I feel like I've gained an extra hour in my morning. I still wake up at this. I still wake up at the same time for me. But now work. This guy's playing chess. DK, this is how you play chess. He's like, but now work just starts an hour later.

Happy hour goes later at bars. My bedtime stays reasonable. All I have to do is add one when people give a time to hang out. I've tried unsuccessfully convince my friends to do the same. They all complain how complicated it would be to do a conversion, but it's never been an issue for me. And I always say, worst case scenario is you're early. You're not late.

So there's not really a danger of getting in trouble or something important happening or you missing something. I implore you guys in the. West Coast. Give it a try for Deacon Craig. Change your time zone to Arizona's on your phone. It won't change the current time. But when daylight savings time happens, your time will just stay the same. Try it for one week. This is that I feel like this guy is the guy who's like, uh, from 6 a.m. to 11 a.m. to boom, that's day one. noon to 4 p.m. Boom. Day two. I'm going four days. I'm looking four days every day. How am I supposed to change? I don't understand like I have a child.

I have to get that child to school and do things. You do what we do. We do when we, do you know when we schedule a show, we're like, hey, can we record this at two o'clock instead of three? In my, that's five for me. So you just mentally, in my calendar, I don't put it at two. I put it at five. And I just, and so he's saying he just does that math all the time constantly, but then his life is better. Isn't this just mostly mental, though? It's just a state of mind.

Yeah. Yeah. I think he's saying why put all the effort into changing with daylight savings when you could just actually inertia change your life. without actually changing anything. I do agree very strongly that we should get rid of daylight savings. Me too. It's stupid.

It's made for farmers. It's like for an agrarian. It's made for farmers. You know, it's an agrarian company. You don't lie to the rest of the development. We're like, Buster can run the company. He got a degree in business. He's like, well, 18th century, agrarian business.

But I'm sure the principals are the same. You got a cartographer degree? Yes. He's like, so the land is obviously this blue part. Did you guys know that India and Pakistan, their time zones are 30 minutes off? Oh, interesting. I learned this in Australia. Brad Bolt, who has an Optima Fantasy football, told me that somewhere in Australia, it's like 45 minutes off.

How does that work? It's what I said. I think India and Pakistan, there was a dispute between them and they didn't want to be on. They couldn't agree on the time zone after the British relinquished their control. And so they basically couldn't agree. So they're like, fine, what does that different times? And it's, it's the same thing. If you think about it actually, it's crazy. It's actually

probably nothing we agree on more as a world than time. It's actually amazing how uniform it is. But same in Australia. Central Western time in Australia is 45 minutes ahead of Perth. That's crazy. 45 is the word. Why would you pick that? Forty-five minutes is like a lot of mental work.

Yeah. There's no reason to do that. Yeah. But Also, you imagine just driving half an hour and then like you're at a place that's 45 minutes ahead of you? What the fuck is that? Is it here? Yeah, dude. Right now, India 416 a.m. Pakistan, 346 a.m. What the hell?

That's wild. Wow. All right. Well, here you go. Times. There are the two states that don't acknowledge daylight savings. Is it Arizona and Hawaii? Right?

Are there two? I thought it was just Arizona. I don't think Hawaii. I think Hawaii might be right. Yeah. Well, that I guess. Because sometimes it's like three hours and sometimes. Sometimes it's two or four.

I can't remember what it is. No, I don't think they observe daylight saving. Along with Arizona. Yeah, it's Hawaii. No, because they're on the fucking equator. It's like, why they don't need to do this shit. Hawaii's on the equator? Well, they're closer to the equator.

This is because Hawaii's proximity to the equator means there's very little variation in amount of daylight throughout the year. There's no fucking point in doing daylight savings. Hawaii is much more south than people realize. Yeah. I think with the equator and just think about how people think the Earth is flat. I'm like, I don't know. It's like 10,000 flights all over every day. They're all in on it. We kind of figured it out. I don't know. Just me though. Okay. I think that's all we got.

Thank you guys for listening to me about the time zone. I appreciate it. I feel heard. No problem. I'm really excited for the early slate this week. Yeah. Those 10 a.m. games are going to rip. Thank you, D.K. Thank you, Craig. Thank you, Carlos. Thank you, Kai. Thank you, Ron. Thank you, Austin. Thank you everyone for listening. Emails at ring of fancy football Gmail.com. If you have put a number in it for the trivia, they're really good. Thank you for sending them. Email us your fantasy courts. Anything your argument

in group chat, just leave it at us. We'll litigate. We'll, you know, we'll give you, we're arbitrary. We'll give you some decisions. Our rankings, fantasyfewport.com. We'll have our retue rankings up later this week. If you need help us start sit decisions. And then, yeah, follow some Instagram for Ring or Fantasy Football. If you want to hear about the Ringar Fantasy Football League or anything.

We'll have posts there and also just a bunch of shenanigans. They're in TikTok. And yeah, thank you, everyone for listening. Thank you, Lord. Lord. Thank you, Pepper. Pepper? Do you remember Pepper?

Craig, I feel like you would know Pepper. Pepper. My parents' dog is named Pepper. Oh, that's a cute name. Is it a Black Lab? So they're from Hawaii. It is a doxened. Okay.

Pepper. I'm trying to remember, like, the big song. Are they like, are they like, uh... They're like reggae punk or reggae, yeah. rock reggae. I don't remember. There's one song that was like very famous. Stone love?

Yes. You would recognize it. Like a little pepper and a bra company came up first. Do I know pepper band? Oh yeah. I do know this song. Kind of for some reason it reminds me of San Diego. That's why I thought of it.

They're from San Diego. Oh, they are? No, they're from Hawaii. Sorry, from Hawaii based in San Diego. Oh, okay. So they are based in San Diego. They're based in San Diego. For some reason, I was from Hawaii.

just like I had that association. Influenced by Sublime. There we go. There you go. A lot of people emailed in saying they couldn't believe that I just kind of did the to Sublime and they were like, yeah, yeah, he knows it. I believe that you knew it.

D.K., are you familiar with the band Slightly Stupid? That was another big San Diego band. Oh, really? Oh, yeah. Nice. I have a huge blind spot on where bands are from. You can tell Slightly Stupid's is from San Diego. What slightly stupid's big song? Because I definitely remember that.

Closer to the sun? What else do they have? Cully Man? These are just off the dome. They're good, though. Slightly stupid. World on fire? Way of life.

I would say, I would say, do... Yeah. Is that closer to the sun? Yeah, I remember this. I remember it vaguely. They're great. They're like great driving music if it's a sunny day. That's a good playlist is like,

if you're like a good like sunny day top down convertible playlist yeah hi it's you on the PCH when you went to my wedding yeah yeah that was that you know what jacket i read at a red ford mustang we drove up the PCH to craig's wedding and that was uh they were like richard gear and american jiggle over yeah it was fucking if we're doing free association Craig you know what song reminds me of the PCH or not song band incubus for some oh sure drive yeah good song we got a great show for you tonight incubus is here stick around we'll be right back Goodbye, everyone. Hubba Stank is here.

Hubba Stake. Switchfoot is here. We'll be right back. Casabian. All right, now goodbye, everyone. Must be 21 plus and present in select states or 18 plus and present in D.C., Kentucky or Wyoming. Opt-in must-apply profit boost token on select market.

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