The Ringer NFL Show - A Closer Look at the Conference Championships | The Ringer NFL Show (Ep. 386)

Episode Date: January 17, 2019

The Rams look to avoid a repeat of their last matchup against New Orleans (0:30), and Bill Belichick and Andy Reid square off in a battle of this generation’s best coaches (22:30). Hosts: Robert Mays and Kevin Clark Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Liz Kelly and welcome to the Ringer Podcast Network. The NFL conference championships are here, and on the site, Robert Maze is writing about why this year's chiefs are the team that Andy Reid has been waiting for, and Kevin Clark breaks down the era of the old dominant quarterback. Also, don't forget to check out all of our sports video coverage. We've got Master Sports with Roger Sherman, slow newsday with Kevin Clark, and NBA desktop with Jason Concepcion. You can check it all out on YouTube and the ringer.com. Welcome to the Ringer NFL show. I'm Robert Maze. by Kevin Clark.

Kevin, how are you doing, buddy? We are in New Orleans, Louisiana. We are sitting in the same hotel room. We are crossing pads. You are leaving. I am coming. Yes. This is like this evening.

Remember I've seen in Bill and Ted's excellent adventure. We're on the opposite sides of the parking lot. You know what I'm talking about? You don't forget to set your watch. It's kind of like that except for recording a podcast. It's been wonderful. We are very excited to talk about the championship games because as we've talked about last Sunday, as we've talked about several times during the week,

these are the best four teams. Well, we've been talking about it since about late. September. And then we got distracted. That was the problem. Because other teams were like a shiny object. We got distracted because the Chicago Bears briefly made us think they were one of the top four teams because you spread their propaganda. That's not fair

there at all. I never thought they were one of the best four teams. I thought they had a chance to beat one of the best four teams. That's very different. Well, they lost to the six seat. Yeah, trust me. They lost to Nick Foles. All right. But that's not what we're here to discuss. We're here to discuss the NFC championship game, which you will be at at the Superdome. You will be in an Arctic

blast. I am not looking forward to it. I bet it ends up being like 35 degrees. So I have to go get my coat tomorrow. People don't remember the Des Bryant Descottic game. That was supposed to be an Arctic blast. And then I got out of my car that day and I didn't need a jacket. Were you there? Yeah, you were in Denver that day?

I was. I was. That was the day. They lost the Colts. Yeah. I get all my Denver playoff games mixed up because I've been to several of them and they all kind of run together at this point. What a flex. Well, it was because that's where I've usually ended up weirdly every year.

So I was at the Broncos Steelers game where they beat the Steelers. I was at the Patriots game where they beat the Patriots. And then I was at the Colts game where they lost. So sometimes I forget what year, what thing happened in Denver. But what a run. Last Sunday was my first game in the Superdome, which is where you will be. And it is a rematch of. I went to the Super Bowl where the lights went out.

Oh, wow. I watched that at Sean Fennessey's house. My colleagues was in the bathroom. A year before I started going. My colleague was in the bathroom for that. And he had a bit of an adventure. So obviously this game has been played already this year. The Saints were victorious.

They won in pretty convincing fashion. I think that's one of the first weeks where the Rams' defensive woes were starting to come to light. I keep sleep been playing that game. Marcus P. just got absolutely torched in that game. Said something weird about gumbo afterward. And now we're here. Still, by the way, Marcus Piers is still going with Sean Pate. I love it.

It's really good. And Sean Payton is the type of dude that is not going to just take that. and I think he will specifically scheme things in order to take advantage of Marcus Peters because Sean Payton, kind of that guy. Okay, so this was also my theory. This was awesome.

The NBA seems to have convinced himself they've cornered the market on pettiness. Then you see what we have with Antonio Brown and Emmanuel Sanders as well. Or Sean McVeigh's entire career, excuse me, Sean McVeyer's entire career. Yes. So there's a couple things here.

Number one, this was my theory on Des Bryant when he was a saint for like two days because they were playing the Cowboys like three weeks after that. Like Sean Payton was just going to sit in a lab and figure out a way to get Des Bryant three touchdowns in that game. Yeah. Because he, he,

he, he, he, he, he, he doesn't wish he was the Cowboys coach. He could have gone at some point, but it's kind of got a Gatsby's Greenlight thing about getting that Dallas job.

And Des Bryant is Des Bryant. So I always thought that. So I think the revenge factor, not even a revenge factor because they won, but I think that the level of pettiness going against Marcus Peters will be really fascinating to me. I don't, I think it's going to be a little bit less of a track meet than it was last time. But I, really?

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. We'll discuss that in a second. But I think that, that the Peyton Peters thing is really, really fun. So, okay. So here's why I think that Peyton Peters thing goes beyond kind of curiosity into actual matter. Okay.

And it's because the Saints and what's, I think what's impressive about their offense right now is they can kind of achieve any situation, achieve in any situation. It doesn't matter if it's third and 15. It doesn't matter if you're playing man. It doesn't matter if you're playing zone. The Eagles played a lot of zone last week because I think that they were afraid of what those young corners

would have to do against the Saints receivers. And it seemed like every single time the Saints needed to dial up the right route combination, they had it. And I was talking to Tason Hill about this yesterday. Every time you had third and 14 or third and 10, they got a 14-yard route or a 10-yard route. They just have so many answers

for any spot that you put them in. And I think where it was zone last week, it's going to be a lot of man this week because the Rams played a lot more man coverage. And I think you'll be able to take advantage of Marcus Peters in that because last time it was trick plays. It was flea flickers. They really tried to just manipulate him and use the fact that he can be a little bit overaggressive.

And I think that's just who he is at his core. And I think that's why he's the type of guy you can kind of go after. Yeah. I mean, I think the Saints offense is a matchup nightmare because they're a matchup nightmare for everybody. That's right. I mean, we can sit here and see. say, oh, they don't match up favorably or whatever, but I mean, they're in the dome.

They win at home and Drew Brees is one of the most efficient past in history of football. So, go ahead. So I'm with you on that. So, and I think on the flip side, I feel like the Rams strengths match up with the Saints strengths in a way that's conducive to the Saints because New Orleans has had one of the best run defenses in the NFL the entire year. We saw what the Rams could do to a very good defense last week with the running. have not seen C.J. Anderson and his pregnancy weight. I don't know if you saw those comments.

That's why I will not be, I will not be expanding on them. But that's, that's his story. I, uh, I did not make fun of C.J. Anderson because I live in a very glass house right now after spending seven days in New Orleans. I feel like I've gained like 80 pounds since I've been here. It's really bad. This, I've been to the city twice in my entire life. If you're, if you're keeping score at home, it is New Orleans to Robert Zero. I lose to this place every time. I came down here for a Sunday night game in 2015. It was one of the last things I did for Grantland. We were just kind of, I was going to a game every weekend because I think we all knew the ship was going down.

So it was very fun, but I had won too many hurricanes. I did not drink one this time because I don't do that anymore. But last time, it was not good. It was a very bad situation. The aforementioned Super Bowl week got me so hard that I no longer, it's been five years. I don't really go out on the road anymore because of that. I'm not joking. Like, I don't, like, I really truly sort of just sit around and work when I'm on the road.

And a lot of that is because of how thoroughly New Orleans defeated me during that Super Bowl. I just have a cultural phoma when I'm on the road. So it's not even just about going out and drinking. It's more about going out and doing something. I felt like I had to go to Frenchmen and just, like, see some jazz this week because I was two blocks away from it. If I didn't, I would feel guilty about my choices. so it's tough, but I'm with you. I also understand the benefits of not going out.

So, okay, so let's talk about, this is a long way to talk about C.J. Anderson being a little chubby and the Rams running the ball well. So I feel like when I talk about the Saints and how they can, they have this breaking case of emergency version of their offense where they can just get it when they need to. I don't feel the same way about the Rams. And I think because they're going to struggle to run the ball as efficiently as they normally do, you're going to be in those scenarios where we don't have a lot of faith them shotgun third and seven putting the ball in golf's hands and making him use the dropback

game and i think that you're going to see the same deficiencies that you've seen when the rams have struggled over the last two months it's that offensive line is awesome when they're the ones dictating the game when they're not the ones dictating the game they can struggle and this ram at the saints pass rush even without shelton rancans still has cam jordan still has a couple underrated edge guys as well so i think that we're going to see those shortcomings of the rams that we have seen over the second half of the season every once in a while on Sunday. I just feel like the Saints have more answers than the Rams are going to. I saw a really interesting staff this week that the NFL put out, but essentially

Breeze and Goff are opposites in this regard. Breeze think is the quickest or among the quickest releases in the entire NFL. That's just his thing. That's why he's able to play at age 40. It was his 40th birthday this week. He's able to limit the carnage and he's able to get on with it and he doesn't take a lot of time behind the line. Goff is in the top five longest to get rid of.

of the ball. He sits back there. And listen, this is only a matter of half a second, but in the NFL, half a second is basically everything. Golf sits back there longer than almost anybody before he throws. I think that's a really interesting matchup here is I've been sort of obsessed with the sort of two and a half seconds or less game that's developed in the trenches. You know, the Eagles last year, one of the things they were really good at was generating pressure within 2.5 seconds. I think that is so important because the quick game can really alleviate all of the past. rush rush unless you can really get either exterior or interior pressure really, really quickly. And so golf in this game against some talented pass rushers against, I mean, I don't, I don't,

are we in on Dennis Allen? I don't know. That's a really good question. I feel like this is beard now. This is kind of in the, it's to convince us that he's a different person from the guy who was three years ago when they were the worst defense in the league. Okay. But anyway, the point is Jared Goff standing back there, if he needs all day to throw,

if that's sort of the way he wants to play, that might be a problem with the way the line's playing, with the way the defensive line is playing in Dolance. So I'm with you, and that's kind of how I see that going, especially when they're using, not using play action and they don't, because the play action game,

everyone thinks it's just about moving the linebackers, and it is. It's the biggest part is kind of giving yourself windows. But they do such a good job of slowing down pass rushes with the play action. They're using kind of wham concepts across the formation to make it look better, but that also helps you seal the backside.

It gives you angles. You don't have those when you're just dropping back to pass. It gives your offensive linemen just, it puts them into disadvantage. It doesn't give them these little tiny edges that you do when you're using the play action game. And I think that that's going to be the problem is that they can't use play action. You're going to see those pass rushers pop up. On the other side, though, when we're talking about interior pressure in two and a half seconds, there's a guy named Marendonald who plays for the Rams, and he's probably going against a guy

who had surgery on his hand last week and did not play well against Fletcher Cox. So that's another thing. watch. So here's the matchup. It's not Donald versus the interior line of the of the Saints. I hear you on that, but it's not that. It's Aaron Donald against Drew Bree's

and Sean Payton. Because the way they can scheme out of it, if Drew Breas can throw incredibly quickly, you know, I keep going back to the way Matt Nagy handled him a couple of weeks ago, which is when Aaron Donald was single teamed, which was not that often, Mitch

Trubisky got rid of the ball in one point five seconds. And they also gave Donald a lot of help in that game. So it's just coming out from two different angles. Right. And so what I'm saying is that there's a way to bring, there's a way to sort of scheme Aaron Donald out of a game a little bit in certain plays. You can't remove him. He's a game wrecker. What I'm saying is there are things you can do to neutralize his presence of teams have done this year.

Absolutely. But it only takes one or two. Yes. And when you're playing against the guy who can't use one of his hands, the kind of likelihood of those one or two plays starts to rise. No, of course. I obviously think the world of Arondana, I do think he's the best player in football. I'm just saying that the saints are going to be well aware of the limitations of our one-handed friend. I agree.

And I, so, well, I think it'll be interesting to watch what the defensive backs do and what the approach is from Wade Phillips to kind of complement that pass rush. Is he going to play a little bit more press coverage against? Because Michael Thomas is fantastic. thick, but he's not a burner. He's not somebody that's really going to hurt you down the field if you get to let him get one step behind you. It's more about just route recognition and late separation and all of that stuff.

And all the things the defense has to do to respect Alvin Kamara, by the way. Because we're not talking enough about that. So that is the side of it that I feel like if you play man coverage against the Saints, they're going to get destroyed because those linebackers are not built and are not good enough to stick with Kamara. If you're going to send him, remember the touchdown that Taysam Hill through that came back, if you're going to use him vertically, like so many good. coaches have done over the last two years.

Think about Gurley. Think about what the chiefs have done, all of that. And then I think that it's going to be a problem. I think he is going to be the most important offensive weapon they have, despite what Michael Thomas, one, has done all season and two did against the Rams the first time around. Do you remember when there was that weird thing that went around 10 years ago about how Reggie Bush was most important saint because of like what he did to defense or something? And it wasn't true at all. That's such a 2008 opinion.

Yeah, it was like an NFL live meme where it was like, well, you got to of Reggie Bush in the field. And it showed that Reggie Bush, when he was off the field, was significantly that the Saints were better. So, but I actually think that that is actually true of Alvin Kumar. He is what people thought maybe someone like Reggie Bush would be, which is that the entire defense has to account for him.

And they change looks. And without someone dynamic like that in the backfield, Michael Thomas is getting very different looks. This was not a matter. The Eagles were not just letting Michael, they know who Michael Thomas is. They were not letting him get those sort of matchups just because they wanted to. that was not by choice.

The Saints defense gives you a lot of looks that give Michael Thomas favorable matchups. That's how you have a 90% catch rate because you're getting favorable looks all the time because Sean Payton is good, Drew Breeze is good, Alvin Kamara's good, and offense is good. They have such a, I mean, I wrote about,

I talked about this play a little bit, but I talked about Zach Lyme yesterday. We were just discussing the one concept where it was like third and 13, and Breeze moved the, like the cover two corner with his eyes to the sideline, and Michael Thomas kind of drifted. into that spot. That's a type of stuff that you just can't count for. There's nothing to do. You can

run the perfect defense and they're going to beat you. And I think that's why they're so dangerous to me is because you can dial up the right call. It can be the right thing against that route combination and it doesn't matter if you don't get to him because he's going to find a way. I would like to talk briefly. It's kind of funny to me. I wrote a story on the ringer.com today about sort of this generation of older quarterbacks and what they mean for team building, how they got here, what they mean for offense, all that, all that jazz. And one of the funniest points that was made was by Matt Hasselbeck. And he said basically it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy when you start talking about quarterbacks who've seen everything, Drew Brees, Tom Brady. And what ends up happening is

defensive coordinators say, well, he's seen everything so we can't blitz. He's going to torch this blitz. And then what happens is you end up getting blitzed a lot less than you should. You end up getting more maybe vanilla looks and you stay healthier than you should. And you're you just keep going. I mean, that's, that's part of it. Is defensive coordinator is not exactly sending the house? That's so true. Just think about all the, kind of the numbers and the rates for like Brady getting blitzed because people like, well, the way to beat Brady is you could only bring four. And that's rooted in truth because at one point it was the way to do it. But those things just kind of endure in kind of a way that's really funny. Well, you just hear like, it's all very anecdotal.

So it's like, oh, you could never blitz patent man. There was that story that John Gruden told years ago about the time that he sent the house against Peyton Manning and Peyton Manning threw a touchdown, like a 50-year-a-touchdown. He walked past John Gruden, so are you kidding me? And like, I heard that story. I'm sure everybody else did. And they're just like, we're never blitzing. It's just never going to happen again. And then you get 10 years of just not being blitzed. And then you learn to play against it. I mean, everybody seems, again, it is a self-fulfilling prophecy at some point. These older quarterbacks can get comfortable because defensive coordinators don't really want to make them uncomfortable.

Yeah. And the thing with me, it's not about that kind of overarching. They've seen everything way to approach it. I was listening to Bree's talk yesterday and a couple other guys in the offense. And it's really just the backlog of communication between him and Sean Peyton. So they can, when they're tweaking route concepts and route depths and alignments and kind of how a team guys are spaced, they can talk about how, well, we need to do it two steps to the left here because this safety moves his eyes like so and so did in 2010 when we played

the Packers. And that, it is so valuable to have that. I just want to touch on that. Talk to Rich Gannon this week. He made a very similar point about the continuity with specifically Brady and Breeze and until this year with Aaron Rogers. He said basically from Charlie Weiss to Josh McDaniels to Bill O'Brien to the weird year Bill Belichick was the coordinator back to Josh.

Tom Brady has essentially run the same library of place. The same general theme. Breeze is the same way for his New Orleans. stuff. And he said, the thing no one talks about, even though it's so hard to learn, he called it, you know, Spanish, then German, then Russian, right? Even though it's so... And with the Saints, it's a Russian novel. I mean, that thing is thick. But he said, people talk about how hard it is to learn a new offense. And that's true. But he said, what you really lose when he keeps stopping and starting on off, on offenses and different sort of schemes and different coaches is you lose the

library of plays. He was saying, one of the things that Brady and Breeze can do is, if they need to make an adjustment, they can say, hey, remember that play we ran in 2011? That would really work right now. And everybody knows what they're talking about. It's so valuable. It's so important. And everybody from Pete Carmichael to Sean Payton to Drew Brees, not the players. That's the weirdest part is the Pete Carmichael thing, by the way. The fact that they had the same offense coordinator for a decade, it was a really good offense. You never see that. It's so strange. I don't know what to tell you. So it's just, there's little hidden advantages that both veteran quarterbacks have here that I think is

really fascinating. Totally. I want to talk about Kamara very briefly one more time before we talk about the AFC championship game. Because remember last year, he was running into some of the latest boxes in the league, and that's a huge part of why his rushing efficiency was so good. This year, it feels like even though Drew Breese is on the Saints, a lot of teams have done all

they can to slow down the running game. You know, Gurley ran into eight or more man boxes 6% of the time this season. That's the third lowest rate in the league, or 8% of time, excuse me, 8.2. The only guys less are Wendell Smallwood and Tarek Cohen. Wendell Baldwin are not built like Todd Gurley. So that's what makes the Rams so good, is that they're so just smart about how the

offense has to work in order to keep teams in nickel. And they do that a lot with their 11 personnel. And they say, all right, fine, you want to play base against us? We're going to throw the ball all over the place. Fine. You want to play nickel? We're going to run it right down your throat. The Saints haven't been able to do that this season.

Ingram is near the top of the league. And where Kamara was right in that 6 to 8% range last year, he's more than 22% this year. teams are loading up to stop the run because of how good the Saints weren't running the ball last year. And what does that do? It gives Michael Thomas favorable matchups, like exactly what you were saying.

It's just there's no smart way to go about this. Yeah, they're really good on offense. And my advice, my advice about playing the Saints in the Dome is to not play the Saints in the Dome. It's to pray. It is to go to a church somewhere like right before you're about to take the field and just take your best shot. I mean, it's looking at this now, it's so interesting.

So the only guys that faced eight or more more often this season than Ingram. This is a list that makes total sense. Ligarrett Blount, Rice Freeman, Royce Freeman, Leonard Fournette, Nick Chub, Carlos Hyde, Alfred Morris, Alec Collins, Derek Henry. That's like those quarterbacks on those teams for the most part aren't very good. Dude, what's your prediction? I think the Saints win. I just think they have too many ways to do it.

But what does the game look like? So 34 to 31, 34 to 21, 34 to 20. 27, 21. 27-21. I think that's probably correct. That's what I'm looking at. I think the Rams will try to take the air out of the ball a little bit more than they did last time. I think they will try to run, even though the Saints are a very good run-off defense.

I'll be curious to see the Rams did such a good job last week, just a phenomenal coaching job. But you're using more 12 personnel now. They're kind of going against some of their own. Your story, brother. But it's really smart, right? Because in the playoffs, you kind of need to fight left-handed every once in a while. So I guess in Rocky was right-handed

And they're using more 12 personnel They're running it out of 12 personnel a lot They ran out of shotgun twice Yeah They never do that And they gain like 11 yards per carry So we think we know how this game is gonna go But in reality at this point in the year

A lot of times teams look different Than they have for much of the regular season Because they know they need to do something a little bit different I kind of liked the end Dominican suit comeback game last week Yeah I mean he's good He's very talented We've always known this He's not as talented as the other guy though

I think the other guy makes one or two big plays this week against the address Pete broken hand. All right, before we move on, let's get a quick break. Today's episode is sponsored by ADT. ADT can design and install a smart home just for you. Back by 24-7 protection for a new smart home at your service customized for your lifestyle. With a secure ADT smart home,

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ADT will set up your home with multiple smart home devices and secure. features like indoor and outdoor cameras, locks lights, and garage door control, even video doorbells. Visit ADT.com slash smart to learn more about how ADT can design and install a secure smart home just for you. ADT.com slash smart. All right, let's get to the other game, a game I will be at Chiefs Patriots. I mean, this is as good as it gets, man. So I liked the, the Peyton Manning thing. I have my own fun little anecdote from from yesterday year that that bird is distracting me now. Wow.

Just so, all right, all right, all right, all right. Just so, we've got to tell the list of what's going on here. All right. There's so many problems happening. I'm not going to be able to listen to that bird. I don't think they want to listen to that bird, that bird either.

So, so in order to record this podcast, if it turn off the air condition. Yes, so it's very hot. So you don't hear, it's not that hot. It's hot. You're wearing basketball shorts.

I'm wearing a Orlando Magic Shooting shirt. And so Robert said, opened the window and then we did and then within 30 seconds he'd become distracted by a bird. The bird kept chirping. It's not my fault. I was going to listen to that bird the whole time. I'm trying to make a point here. Okay. So, so

this. Tell your nostalgia. So it's, I wrote a story today about how this Andy Reid offense has really been coming for 20 years. And he's kind of he built the foundation with the West Coast and then kind of putting on additions to the house over the years. And they were in the form of spread concepts. They were

in the form of, you know, certain types of route combinations and route alignments. And then really the last kind of piece was Patrick Mahomes. So Brad Schilders told me a great story about how Andy has innovated more than other West Coast coaches have. And the story was about Mike Holmgren. And they never used shotgun in Green Bay when Brett Farb was there. And this was all under center. And apparently, this is when the running shoe was kind of coming to prominence in like the late 80s, early 90s. So they were looking at that stuff. And they're like, man, I kind of think that would work with Farr. We should try it.

And I guess in the walk through the day before they were going to use their first shotgun formation, the snap went over Brett Farr's head. And HomeGerman was like, fuck it. It's out. We're not using it. And like that's the beauty of Andy Reed is that he's never said that. It's never been, oh, that doesn't work for me. It's how can I make that work for me?

Right. And that's why the chiefs have become the chiefs. It's, what's amazing to me is beyond just the talent and the quarterbacks is we have four of the best coaches. McVeigh isn't there yet because it's only been a year and a half for him. No, but the stuff like what he did last week, like, that's how you get on your way. What I'm saying is like, these are

like Pantheon level coaches. Oh, that I'll check and read are the two best coaches of my lifetime hands down. I mean, I thought this creativity, do you know that, so obviously the Rams score from less personnel packages than any team in the league. Yes. Only three. Do you know who leads the league in most personnel packages? That's probably the chiefs.

It is the Saints. Oh, that's interesting. That makes sense, though, because they use a lot of 21 and a lot of 12 where the chiefs don't as much. I mean, they use Tasing Hill everywhere. But the Chiefs also use a lot of different personnel packages. They have 13. That's, that's so crazy. Guess what? Off scheme lord Frank Reich is second. Well, they love them some 12 and 13. So, so I just think that that's, that's a really interesting wrinkle is how good these freaking coaches are. Yeah. And, you know, it's funny. When I was from my Wildcat story in August, that this,

the story was that Tony Sparano said if you ever fumble in the wildcat in practice, we're not running it. Coaches are wired to just avoid fumble. All they care about is

that they're risk averse. That is what football coaches are at our court. If an offensive quarter to came to you and was like, I came to a head coach and was like, I'm going to score 70 points a game and I've got this quarterback

who's going to have 158.3 rating at all times. And if he fumbled once on July 29th, they'd be like, screw it. We're going back to the ground and pound. And it's the beauty of what Reid has created. And when you watch them, and everyone I talked to, I talked to Matt Nagy for the story,

and we were just discussing really kind of what the basis of this offense is. And it really is the same West Coast principles that Reid has been using since he was in Green Bay. And they've done a good job of shortening play calls to make it easier on guys that come from these spread concept or these spread offenses where it's one word. Well, I started that start with Belichick, by the way. Belichick started a lot of that because he got it from Chip, And they've done, they do a ton of that stuff. So the chiefs have done that.

But there are some of these play calls. And when Nagy would read it off to me, it's like 13 words long, but it sounds like he's saying it all in one word because that's how Reed says it. Because he said it so many times. And it's just you can understand how the DNA of the West Coast has been imprinted in Andy Reed, but he just dresses it up like it's a spread offense. And sometimes it's a little bit more now. They started using more three by one bunch sets to combat the rise of man coverage.

all of this stuff. But it's just so fascinating that we have this thing that looks like it's never been done before. But in actuality, it has been done before just not with this level of open mind. You know, the thing I always come back to

is the conversation out with Andy Reid in 2013 where he said, college is usually about five years behind the pros. And when in five years you're going to see college concerts. Basically, I'm paraphrasing, obviously,

but that's basically what he said. And I'll be damned if the 2018 season, wasn't, excuse me, the 2018 Super Bowl wasn't just a big 12th game. And this is five years since Reed got there. He got there in 2013. So this is the reason we talked is because he was doing,

he was sort of talking back then. He doesn't really. Yeah, he doesn't talk as much anymore. He doesn't talk anymore. But it's so funny because there are limits to it, right? So it's two different things. One, you have to build on it. So when they started all these RPO concepts in 2013,

it was all bubble screens because that's what RPO's were back of the day. It was that inside run paired with the bubble screen out to the outside. But then they started putting slants in instead of bubbles to make it, to give it a twist. Jeff Schwartz told me a funny story about how they tried to install the pistol, like the Chris Alt.

Chris Alt was a consultant. He was a consultant. So he was there. And apparently the run calls and the strategy and the scheme in the pistol is backwards for offensive linemen. Like the call is counterintuitive to what you normally think it would be with other play calls. So they just fucked it up over and over and over again when they started.

So there are limits to this, but there are so many coaches who, who just wouldn't even try. And I think that's what, that's like at the core of the brilliance of what Andy Reid has done. Yeah. So I think that's fascinating. Did you get,

this is an aside. Chris Alt came in, remember everybody was trying to hire him as a defensive consultant because of Kaepernick? Yeah. Do you remember this? No, I don't remember that.

He was, he was Capernick's college coach. Yes. Yeah. And then everybody was like, we got to stop this, this damn read option. So they all tried to get it.

And I believe his deal was, I will not help. stop my former player. I will not like stifle my creation. But what I will do is go down to the pro, go up to the pro level and teach them the pistol. So I am again Andy Reid on freaking top of it. I mean, think about the

diversity of the backgrounds. Matt Nagy was a high school coach. Yep. I mean, Eric B. Enemy has college, you know, he was a Colorado. He has college background. I mean, this is not, they're not just going out and getting their friends here. They're getting a lot of, Andy Reid's Andy Reid's looking at so many different offensive philosophies and blending them under the West Coast umbrella. It's really incredible. Yeah.

And again, it's all rooted in a willingness. I mean, Bradshaw just told me another story about Mike Holmgren where they would try to bring this stuff in. He'd be like, I don't know that play. We're not running that play. And Reed is the exact opposite. I wrote about this in August. But they had a board in the, in Reed's office in Kansas City, I believe it probably still do, where they would just, it was the beautiful mind board. and you just go in and write down play concepts all the time.

So this is a very long-winded way of saying the chief's office is very good and it's very hard to stop. So what do you think is, I mean, this is anybody's guess, but what do you think the Patriots defense is going to try to do to slow down the chief's office? Okay. Tyree Kill. Yes. Okay. So next gen stats put this out.

By the way, if you're not just studying next-gen stats all the time, you're a bad football fan. There is so much amazing. But I knew that. There's so much amazing information out there. I knew that like three years ago when I wrote a story about it that they were sitting on this gold mine and I and I wrote it and so there's a lot coaches don't want this stuff out there. Okay. They don't want the all 22. Let's give a big picture. They don't want all coaches really do not want all 22 out there. They really don't want. They really don't. And this has been written about the Wall Street. My, my, the guy replaced the Wall Street. The NFL writer wrote an amazing piece about this about how basically coaches and the Accompanion Committee truly wanted to block all 22. And it really took a lot of push. back for them to even approve it five years ago. So there's a couple of things. Number one is that they didn't want X-Gen stats out there essentially because they just think that in a lot of cases, there are coaches who just believe that this sort of data should not be public. And there's,

I think there's the nature of they don't want to be second-guessed. I mean, again, it's all out there. Coaches have talked about this. There's also been resistance to, you know, coaches. There's been resistance to even any technology in the sideline, including tablets with sort of of up-to-date pictures. The whole thing is just bizarre. The NFL coaches relationship with technology is still quite hilarious. However, that's a long way of saying next-gen stats rules. Patriots defense.

And lay this one on me because it's a really good one. Okay. Patriots defense, their defensive backs have allowed the second lowest yards per attempt in press coverage and the lowest pass rating. Okay. Stefan Gilmore has allowed one reception on 15 deep targets in press coverage. Okay. And by the way, four receptions. on eight targets and off coverage.

Tyreek Hill averages the absolute best yards per route. It's fun when the stats line up. In press coverage. You don't want to press Tyreek Hill. He's faster than you. His press coverage yards per route

is better than any player since 2016. 4.1 yards per route. This is awesome. Yeah. This is awesome. It's strength on strength. And that's why I'm so curious to see how he's going to do it

because the Rams, or excuse me, The Patriots play in man coverage, I believe, on 58% of their snaps, which is the highest rate in the league. It's the opposite of what you saw last week. So last week, you saw what the chiefs can do against a zone heavy team. They did an amazing job of just kind of picking it apart. And we know how good Mahomes is against zone. He's also very good against man, though.

And they're very hard to stop when you're playing that kind of press coverage because of their team speed. So something has to give. I just don't know what it's going to be. Yeah, I mean, it's a great, great, great stylistic match. The thing in fighting, the thing in boxing is styles make fights. This is it. This is the fight. So do you think that we're going to see what the Patriots have done all season?

Or do you think it's going to be one of those Belichick things where they just come out and say, we're going to rush, we're going to drop eight. Yeah. I mean, it's just something completely. I don't know. I mean, there's a couple of things. Do they, maybe they just play a particularly violent brand of press coverage, almost do what they did to Peyton Manning 15 years ago?

It just feels like that's, that was what I was going to say. That, I wrote that on Tuesday. and the more I think about it, the more makes sense is for them to just... So I talked to my prayer about this, and he talked and don't get mad at me, Seahawks Twitter,

but he's talked a little bit about the Seahawks in the past, about how basically their gambit... Depending on every play. Their gambit was to commit what is essentially rampant past interference on the first... I love how afraid you are of Seahawks Twitter.

I wrote it. They got mad at me. This is five years, six years ago. So Pereira said they, they, what they do is they commit very flagrant pass interference. Yes. Very quickly. Yes.

And so that establishes a baseline. Yeah. Okay. And then it's, well, you can't throw it now. I do. You should see what I did on the other play. You should see the other guy. Pereira's theory is that that, that was, this was 2013.

Yeah. It's much different now. Yeah. But what I'm saying is that I would not be surprised if Belichick was like, you know what, this guy can pick us apart. He's, he's, you know, we've played them already. Now, here's a deal. they baited him into one of the worst interceptions he's thrown all year.

Mahomes. That passed, which linebacker was that? I can't remember. But it was a weird one. Yeah. And so maybe they think they could confuse him a little bit. He is a young starter. Tom Brady is 10 and O against playoff starters in their first year.

I mean, there's something to that. I don't think that's a Brady stat. It's a Belichick. It's a Patriot stat. So I think there's ways to confuse him or the ways Belichick might think there's ways to confuse him. And he would game plan for that. I think the other option is just try to. beat the crap out of the receivers and hope that their refs give you some favorable. I mean,

it's going to be cold. It's going to be on the road. But I can see a bunch of different scenarios. One is the Belichick tries to go with a very finesse, very smart game plan. One is he just tries to knock the crap out of those guys. I think that the way you couple your front with that finesse game plan is you try to contain rush him. You have a game where Trey Flowers doesn't pin his ears back and get after the quarterback. It's funny because that's the Patriots, they can be either. People say their pass rush isn't very good, but that's not true. I mean, their pass rush just is more passive at certain times based on the game plan. So I think in that finesse game plan, you're going to see them do that controlled rush, keep him in the pocket, don't let him create.

On the other side of it, I think you're going to see, let's go get him because if we're manhandling the receivers, he has to make a quick decision. And you make him, and the pass rush is good. He can't make that quick decision. So it's going to be, I'm very curious to see what's going to happen. There's so many different ways that I think that both these teams can attack each other, and I have no idea which one's going to happen. Well, you never know with Belichair. Exactly. There's just predicting it.

The only one is that James White will set and broke another of Jerry Rice's records. Just catch 20 passes in that game. All right, so let's get to the other side then. So what was so cool to me about what the Patriots did last week, right? We knew the charges were likely going to come out in a similar defense in the sense that it was going to be like. They were going to have safeties of lineback or all that stuff. Put a clown suit on Gus Bradley. You really did.

You really did. So I thought, okay, they're just going to crush them. Remember when the Patriots have played? the Colts a couple years ago and they would just throw the ball six times and it was like 50 runs because they knew the Colts couldn't stop them. The Jones Gray game? Yeah. The Patriots are not a free. And then they just cut the guy who did that. It might be the most Belichickian thing that's ever happened. So that's what we, so last week, I think so many Michelle got 26 carries or whatever, but a lot of that came late. What they did is kind of a wrinkle on their wrinkle was to use the play action game

just so efficiently. Brady was nine of 12 on play action. I think it was for 133,000. two of his yards. And I could see the same thing happen because the Chiefs run defense is very bad. And you don't want to play with those. You want to avoid those past rushers because they can really wreck a game, even though the Pats, offensive line is very good. Again, there's just so many strengths. But I think that because we believe they're going to run the ball so much, that's when

the play action game starts to open up. Yeah. I mean, it's Brady. It is not MVP-level Brady, but it's still Brady in the playoffs. Now, there is a couple of things. He was pretty damn good last week. I've seen some people on Patriot Twitter. who are getting a little defensive about the fact that they have lost our last two

F. F.C. Champions on the road. One of them was to Peyton Manning. One of them was to the ghost of Peyton Manning. And... Peyton Manning's bones is how I like to refer to it. Bones. A Peyton Manning jersey over bones. Take off his helmet. It's just the cryptkeeper. Yeah. And, uh, hey, the Super Bowl. But people were saying the offensive line is much better. And that's much better. That's the X factor. And that's much better. That's true. That's true. Dante Scranack.

is back in the biggest way. Biggest move for the Patriots of the offseason, the one that, I mean, we'll talk about it when they make the Super Bowl, because you hit every storyline when a team goes to the Super Bowl. Trent Brown, they got him for nothing. He'd make it $1.7.9.

He's their starting left tackle. It's unbelievable. I mean, obviously he was supposed to be the swing tackle because Isaiah and Wynn was supposed to start. But it doesn't matter. It's just the fact that guy is, you get tackled depth for $1.8 million. And it's a guy that talented.

It's just Belichick stays winning, man. So in college, I sort of have a theory that the strength coach is like the second most important guy. This is a tick shop, even though we're not doing those right now. At Miami, you've raised in Miami. They had this guy Tommy Moffitt, and he just took like a bunch of two stars like Ed Reed and just turned him into NFL superstars. And then he went to LSU and he just did the same thing. And then we stopped having. Yeah.

Yeah. And so. The secret sauce. Well, that's probably a bit of phrase that. No. no, it's all, that's, this is hard work. Yeah, exactly. It's really put in this.

And no, I, and, uh, so that's sort of my theory is that just like the conditioning and the strength aspect in college is so important where there's just such a huge difference between how guys, how guys bodies are. Offensive line coaches are kind of like that in the NFL where it's just 95% of the time, you're like, how is this, how, how is this team good? And it's like, oh, they have, they have Bill Callahan or something. Yeah. Like, it's just like, Bill, Bill,

Callahan is like should be the most coveted free agent right now because the parent in Washington's allowing him to leave. Zach Taylor might bring him in. Like the Bengals are going to win the Super Bowl in two years because Bill Callahan. And Frank Pollock is also now on the market because he was in Cincinnati. Dave Gigliamo. Bring him in. Just like Dante Scarnacia should be making $15 million a year.

What I and the Bears brought in Harry Highstand this year. He was fantastic. Everyone, all the smart people like Lewis Riddick has said. They also just solve problems. There's never like this off this offensive line coach. a bad offensive line. They just figure it out. Yeah.

Mike Munchak's going to crush it in Denny. Yeah. It's a huge hire. And again, it's a... Lewis Riddick said this and a lot of people have been saying this. The new coach is the most important hire they can make outside of the coordinator, which is most likely a defensive coordinator, is the offensive coordinator. I mean, just...

Wait, are they stealing my take that I just made up? No, you know, that's, yeah, that people keep saying that. That's the most important coach... I'm retroactively claiming this take. That's totally fun. If someone has made this take before, it's fake. That's my favorite conversation. I had last year, Super Bowl week, was with Jeff Steland.

And we were just talking... Former Miami Hurricanes. There you go. Not only offensive line coach, interim coach. So talking to Whammy. Jeff Stoughton is the offensive line coach for the Eagles. And we were just discussing how the Eagles, offensive line and more or less the Eagles offense was built on creative problem solving

and how they had so many different ways to block specific plays that other teams don't even think about. And again, it's just that. You just find ways to make it work. Guess who else has an amazing offensive lines? The Rams and the Saints. This is not an accident. This stuff matters.

Offensive lines are important. Yes, extremely important. Especially when you're playing Aaron Donald and Cam Jordan. All right. What's your prediction? Jesus. All right. I hate this.

I hate this underdog stuff. It's the worst. I hate it. It's the fucking worst. I'm going to say 27 to 25 Kansas City Chiefs. The problem... 27-25. 2724 is what I'm going.

It's a push. I'm going to same, the same thing. We were in agreement here. The thing about New England is when they do this shit, there's no one in that room that when Brady's the podium is going to be like, yo, Tom, this is fucking dumb. You are not an underdog. That's the problem.

I mean, they always, but I remember Teddy Bruske doing the nobody believed in this thing when they, when they beat, it's the worst. Like their third, when they won their third Super Bowl. I remember it was just like, everybody believed in you, dude. Every single person believed in you. Yeah. We're in an era where everybody believes in the, the teams that win.

Again, the top seeds just keep making the Super Bowl. The last time a Super Bowl participant played a road game was six seasons ago. Okay? We're in the era of everybody believes in anything in the NFL. There are no underdogs right now, including you, Tom Brady. They're going to win. I'm picking the Chiefs. The Patriots are going to win.

Oh, absolutely. No, no, no, I'm picking the Chiefs, but the Patriots are absolutely going to win. All right, guys, that is all we have for today. We will be back on Sunday night, me from Kansas City, Kevin from New Orleans. And as always, thank you for listening to the Ringer NFL show on the Ringer Podcast Network. It's time to turn here. I can make up. Thanks, guys.

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