The Ringer NFL Show - A Thriller in Buffalo and the Vikings Complete Largest Comeback in NFL History | The Ringer NFL Recap Show

Episode Date: December 18, 2022

Nora and Ben hop on to give their instant reactions to the Bills' 32-29 victory over the Dolphins (04:13). They discuss Buffalo's defensive game plan to limit Mike McDaniel's offense, the Dolphins' silver lining despite the loss, and the snowy atmosphere in Orchard Park. After, they discuss the Vikings' historic comeback against the Colts (27:06). Hosts: Nora Princiotti and Ben Solak Producer: Eduardo Ocampo Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Peace! We're out of here. Welcome to a special Saturday edition of the Ringer NFL Recap show. I'm Nora Prince-Iotti. I'm here with Benjamin Solac. We just watched the Bills beat the Dolphins, 32 to 29, absolutely instant classic snow game. So we decided that we would hop on the mic to break it all down

because this was one of the best games of the year. Bill, Bill, Ben, geez, before we start, pelting me with a snowball during this podcast is a 15-yard penalty. Do you accept the ground rules? No, I don't. I thought that was soft. We used to be a country, all right?

We used to be a people. where you can throw snowballs during football games and the only thing that would happen is you would hit Santa and have it held against your city for like 65 years. That was it. Now we're both had to throw flags? Unbelievable. I'm with this.

I'm with this, actually. I made the joke to start the pod, but I'm with you on this one. The idea, first of all, seeing all of these people like tweeting during the game about, people got to stop throwing snowballs. First of all, no, they don't. It's fun.

Second of all, refs throw a flag and they'll stop throwing snowball. real quickly. I'm sorry. How many drunk football fans have you been around in your lives? I love that. Why are they throwing snowballs?

Because they're drunk Buffaloans welcoming back a team that beat up in a 20-degree weather and they've been anticipating this snowstorm in this matchup for like two and a half months. I'll throw a snowball on my wife for no reason. You don't need a single reason to throw a snowball. The whole guy's like 19 reasons.

Also, I'm soft. Like, I'm a soft whiny person and generally very amenable to arguments based on like, someone could get hurt. They're wearing helmets. Okay? I get that there's ice and snowballs. I'm a baby if someone throws a snowball at me.

If I'm wearing a big helmet, it's fine. Everybody calm down. We live in a society. Which, right. If they are like, hey, like we have to protect the camera people. to protect the staff on the sidelines, like stray snowballs are hitting, like, you know, sound employees. Like, great, that's awesome.

I just love the fact that it's a 15-yard penalty against the bills. Like, hey, the fans here, the majority would promise to yours, but maybe some guys who aren't are endangering NFL employees, 15-yard penalty on you guys for living here and not building a dome. If I were a Dolphins fan, I would have made immediately 10 snowballs. Start packing up. Yeah. You're like reaching underneath other people's seats to grab whatever's left.

Every single Dolphins offensive third down, I'm beaning Trent Sherfield. I'm just hammering Mike Kiske. Just straight out of the whole play. On the sideline, I'm finding Matt Hawke. I'm finding a punter. Alex Engel, this one's for you. And we're getting a 15-yard penalty because they're assuming there's some Buffalo fan that doesn't understand down a distance and just throwing snowball.

at the least opportune time. And you got to like fake the accent, get really into character. This one's from lack of water. It's beating somebody in the face. It was just so funny because the entire saga of Snowball Gate was like, all right, Twitter is massively overreacting to a thing that they're just perceiving as a third party from the comfort of their homes far away. And then the game stopped.

And I was like, there's no way. I put the volume like further up on my TV as it. if I misheard what they said. There's no way. I started clicking it up. Couldn't believe it. Anyway, great football game. Great football game.

This game was absolutely awesome. Bill's win. Josh Allen, absolutely spectacular game, goes 25 for 40, 304 yards, four touchdowns. Also had 77 yards on 10 carries on the ground.

I ended up, my biggest takeaway from this game is that I feel better about both of these teams after watching it that I did from the beginning. beginning with the bills that has a lot to do with Josh Allen. I just thought he played a spectacular game. He's running it so well, obviously. He's so dynamic. But we've seen him for the past

several weeks be a little bit shakier with some of the passing than when he was really lighting the world on fire earlier in the season. I really felt like this was a game that I was hoping and waiting to see from Josh Allen just to feel like, oh, oh, he's still got it. What did you think? Yeah, no, like he's still a velociraptor, right? It's still just like a big guy who can run. They, the dolphins went to a spot where they started playing more man coverage in the second half, which Balzy, I respected. This young man, they found Josh Kahua, Kahua, I don't know, I apologize to pronounce the last name, but like they, they, they, yeah, I think they, like, I thought the injuries at corner were going to sink the Dolphysville, they played defense.

They both have changed to play more zone, and it also got a great play to him. No way Vinogany's played better, so they started to play more man coverage. Stefan Diggs fell quiet, right? The bills were having that difficult third quarter. Diggs on the sideline telling everybody who listened, give me the ball, give you the ball, give me the ball. It felt like the bill's offense fell into that rut that was becoming familiar, like you said. I've been a little bearish on the bills as an AFC contender over last few weeks because I'm like,

I don't know, this offense is hot and cold. It requires Allen heroics. Well, then in the fourth quarter, you're down eight points. You know, you get a strip sack and you give up a huge lead, a massive slug. playing and Alan just comes right back and just wills him to win. That man coverage, suddenly becomes scramble looks, right? It becomes screw around behind the line of scrimmage flying guy. Gabe Davis had a structure and then get down to field and break a tackle, right?

He's got that when he scrambles, he's more dangerous than Mahomes, right? And when you look at it in terms of efficiency numbers, first down is generated for scramble, especially on third or fourth down, EPA numbers. He's the most effective scramble in the lead. He doesn't do it as much as general. It doesn't do as much to Justin Fields. In terms of converting to a new sets of downs and generating positive EPA, when Josh Tom, there's nobody better.

He did that several times of the course of this game. And then obviously his complete lack of concern for his own life, as exhibited by the two-point conversion, which is like, brother. His own life,

common decency, possession of the football. I'm with you on I feel better about Josh Allen. The bills for me are still like, it's always something with this team. They struggle to play a comprehensive game of football

against good opponents. There's always, like, stretches where the defense is in control, but the offense can't get the pants on straight, and then the offense finally figures it out, but the defense starts giving a step up. And then there's some special teams issue that occurs in the middle of it. Right, like this entire game, they end up winning 3229, but they faced an offense.

They got quite well handled over the course of the last two weeks, and they walked out and were not able to stop them. And the absence of Vaughn Miller has not even remotely been as strongly felt as it was in this game, where every third down, they're sending a linebacker and they're stunting a line and they're sending a nickel and they're dropping a guy off the line and they're trying to find a way to generate a pass rush.

And for most of the game, Tua's just fall out in two and a half seconds, 25 yards down the field. Same way he had for most of the season. And that's the bill's defense is disappointing. Obviously, Vaughn's a star. But you lost him and Trudevius White is not all the way back. They went hunt for Tradavius White.

I don't want Kyrieuem. Sir Ron Johnson, they're pressing. physical. They went hunting for Trudevius White the Dolman's offense did in this game. And Trinavius White struggled to answer the call. This is a Bill's defense without stars right now. Jordan Player, great player. But this is Bill's defense without stars right now. And they were exposed

a little bit in this game. So it's always something with this team where I can always find a way to talk myself out of them. They were pressing a certain amount and it's always hard to tell off the TV copy. So with that caveat, were you surprised it didn't feel like they were taking more from the, I'm not going to

use the B word, but the 49ers, what the 49ers and Chargers games had given us in terms of instruction about how to shut down this Miami offense or at least slow it down. So this is one of the reasons about the blueprint conversation always falls short, not just like the Dolphins offense, but in general, like just in any capacity. And I'm like, you know, perpetrator number one of this because you just got to say blueprint and then go as fast as you can to get your point across on the podcast. I didn't say it. I alluded to it because that's a, loophole. Yeah, yeah, very clever. But one of the reasons why the blueprint doesn't work is because

we as football analysts, consumers, watchers, discussers, and debaters talk about big dials. Play more man. Take the man coverage dial. It's the opposite of his own coverage dial. There's only two of them. And spin it really high up. You did it. The blueprint, right? And that's how we talk about things in big pictures and broad strokes. When a coach is installing a game plan, he doesn't do it in big strokes. He does it in extremely much. new details. So you said the bill's pressed quite a bit, and they did. But the way Traddevious White was playing press coverage is not the way you have to play press coverage against this team. Trinavius White was playing, I'm going to play responsible press coverage. I'm going to mirror

off the line. I'm going to adjust him off of his route just a little bit. The press coverage you play against the Dolphins is a lot of roulette press coverage. Exactly. It's Yolo. I'm going to shove this man as hard as I can. And if I miss, I'm going to give him a touchdown. but if I get him, it's a sack. Tradius White thought, well, if I just, you know, mirror and, you know, just a little kickstep and, like, you know, make sure I've got my read, correct everything, then I'll stick with Tradius White and Jay and Waddle, and he never did for the entire game, right? So there's, we talk about the big dials.

We talk about blueprints, press coverage. What failed the bills in this game were the little dials, where the little switches, the tiny adjustments, the way Tradavis White is playing press coverage. On the Jayland Waddle catch and run, I wish they'd give him more replays. It looks like a very interesting play. But Tremaine Edmonds and Matt Moulon, the second level of the linebackers, are both standing over Jalen Waddles to his side of the field,

and they're pointing at Jordan Poyer, and they're like, he's coming that way. He's going to go through us to you. We are giving him to you. Him passed me to you. And then Jordan Poyer comes screaming downhill, nobody picks him Jalen Waddle. And that's the little dials.

That's okay. Like the charges played a ton of cover two, cover six, like stuff that's been good for them. and the bills played that too. But if you miscommunicate on one route concept, if you misunderstand, I'm passing this off, I'm not passing this off. The dolphins don't just get a 20-yard game.

They don't just get, oh, 25 yards, pick up, first down. When you miscommunicate in the second level against the dolphins, the ball gets to one of Jalen Waldo or a Tyree kill, or even as we saw against the Niners, Trent Sherfield, in stride. Once it does, good night, go home. It's not, oh, we get a new set of downs. It's 67-yard touchdown.

And that's why mistakes against this Dolphins team, errors in the little dials matter so much more than mistakes against other teams because they punish you the worst one. Some of those are defensive errors by Buffalo. I also think some of that is a credit to Miami. The reason I feel better about the dolphins right now than I did at the start of this game after having seen how they looked against San Francisco and against the Chargers is because I think we saw Mike McDaniel. kind of throw his first counterpunch. And obviously they don't win the game, right? But a lot of the stuff they did in the run game,

we should talk about because I thought that was really interesting. But we also saw them dial up some beers for those coverages, right? Like the first time they take a lead in this game, obviously they don't keep it, but they go up 26, 21 on that touchdown to Tyree Kill. And that play is a play designed to beat Press Man. And now that's a play where they're going after Trinavius White, right? And he's doing exactly what you just described, where he's playing kind of, he's pressing Tyreek a little bit.

He's touching him. He's getting some hands on him, but he's not going for it. He's not committing all the way. So you have a little bit of just how Tyreek is choosing to act on that play. But that's Mike McDaniel. And I think they were looking for that specific situation and that's specific coverage. That's Mike McDaniel looking for a situation saying, okay, I went back to the Whiteboard.

and came up with some ideas and put together a list, put together a play sheet of stuff that I think can beat this. And to see him do that, it's not surprising that he's able to do that to me because we think he's a really good coach. From everything we've seen, he's a really good coach. But that was what they needed to do. That was what we were looking for.

And I think even though they didn't win the game, I came away from this feeling like, okay, yeah, they know what they're going to see. for the last month of this season. They know what they're going to see in the playoffs. They know what their opponents can look at on film and go, that had a pretty decent shot at slowing down Miami. And they're coming up with stuff that has a decent shot of fixing it.

So I thought that was super encouraging. Yeah, again, big dials. But the willingness of the team to run the football early was such a big deal for the way that this offense worked. And currently how they ran it, right? They handed the football off. all emotion RPO, JET that's sort of run. Run. They just called a run.

They called a first down run where the entire offensive line knew there run blocking. They could go downfield. From under center. Yep. Under center with what their under center rates got massively up of course last week and a half. You know,

they got Durham Smyth on the field. Durham, go block for us, right? I was like, Mike is sick. He's killing it tonight. And then like a quarter and a half in, I realized that's not Mike is Sikki. Not Mike a sick.

It has Durham. They got a block and tight end in there now. And Mark Sanchez, who did a really next job, I think, calling the offenses of both teams during the game was calling that out in terms of this first. And this is first and ten, they're just going to hand the ball to Reheme Moster. And Rehamed, to his credit, like, was the starting back for this team, won the job over Chase Edmonds, a little bit banged up. Then they traded for Jeff Wilson. Wilson's incredible. Like, his job's kind of been up and down, whatever.

It ran extremely tough tonight. We obviously had the big long run, the broke tackles. You know, the bills are at penetration front. They want to get to you right when you get the ball, get you behind the line of scrimmage. he turned negative games into positive games, which it helps keep you ahead of the sticks. Number one, the orphans actually weren't really great at like doing the

first and 10, second and six, third, and two offense because so many of those third and two quick passing game instances were pass breakups, the bills were driving down on those out routes. But when they were successful, like the first touchdown drive they had at the second quarter, they converted a third and four, third or five, and a third and ten.

And it was just run, run, run, pass, run, run. And at the very least, it establishes play action for you. It establishes the threat of it. And EPA-wise, it was more valuable to them. They were a better team in this game in terms of EPA for play on rush stamps than they were on passing attempts. And that's to the point of your running attack, taking advantage of a defense that is selling out, that is dedicating so many numbers to take away your passing game. So you've used the threat of the pass over the course of the last three months to now establish the opportunity to run the football.

Worked very well. Awesome stuff. Michael Daniel designs his things. It's just you end up losing a three-point game. But that is a huge note for the dolphins, which is that right? If you're going to try to play all out, everybody's in the middle of the field, we're worried about RPO's, you're not rushing the edges because you want them to stop the tight ends on play action.

If you're going to dedicate all these guys to stop in the past, we are willing to call a first-and-10 handoff. And we can pick up five or six yards, and that's going to be good for us. It's a very, very big deal for the team. 7.5 yards per carry for the dolphins in this game, particularly a lot of success running behind the right side of the line running to the right. It's funny, they looked a little bit more like the Dolphins offense that I think if I'd drawn in my mind's eye in August, what's it's going to look like. It's a great way to say.

This is so much more like it than it was for the largest chunks of this season that formed sort of what we think of this offense and what we think of what it is. but if that's what they need to do now, very good to see them do it. Yeah. I just wish we had gotten another quarter of snow football. I just really, like, we just didn't get enough to the dolphins in the running game

and Josh and everything. We just got tasted. It's nine minutes. I needed more. It was beautiful. It was. Were you feeling a little romantic? I was feeling a little romantic.

I was so in my feels, Ben. Just so in my fields. the Buffalo gets a good good defensive series dolphins go three and out but then Jalen Phillips has that strip sack of Josh Allen defense comes back does its job bills get the ball back again Josh Allen breaks off that 44 yard run gets him to the red zone bills have been they've punted on their last what four drives at that point but Josh Allen takes it takes it with his legs get them and gets them into the red zone runs it again gets the call for the late hit going out of back which looks like he sold it a little bit. And as the snow begins to fall, there's some scrappiness on the sideline. Like we've just seen the quarterback. He's running it all the way down the field.

It's just like, how can you not be romantic about snow football? And then they hit the touchdown to Dawson Knox. And Josh down does his spear diving two-point conversion. And they chase them all 35 yards down the field. I want, like, we call this a snow glow game, right? I want that in a snow globe. I want just a little ball of glass with white glitter on the inside

that I can shake up. We know what a snow globe is. I appreciate the breakdown, but yeah, I was already with you on like most of that information. I'm a shiny cinematic bed. It's romantic and snowing. It's beautiful. There's ambiance.

I want the scape, the landscape inside the snow globe. I just wanted to be Josh Allen like extending the ball across the plane just barely across the plane and then losing it

and having it like bounce all over the place just the silliest one of the silliest trajectories I've ever seen a football take the football a very silly object

an object prone to extreme silliness just putting on an absolute show of ridiculousness in that moment with the flakes coming down in Orchard Park

really really special stuff it really truly did feel like the western New York Lake effect snow right all just heard they like saw the scoreboard they saw the Jalen Phillips fumble recovery they saw the 8 point lead and said like all right the bills need us like we yes one must arise and then like the snow and the wind and just everybody's singing let it let us know yeah let us know yes we're just like yes it was one of those the dolphins are losing this game, aren't they? This is very sad for them.

They play very well. It's tough. However, once, like, the fourth quarter snow starts and all the psycho buffaloans begin chanting their war song, their battle cry. Yeah. Sorry, the game's over. Did you see Tyler Baz, the bill's kicker

who hit the game-winning field goal afterwards? He just, like, chest slides. The penguin slide, yeah. The penguin slide, yeah. Of course. How did you feel about playing for the field goal over the touchdown? It was a weird, it was... Okay, because I, you know, disclosure, I was on Bills minus seven in this game.

So in my head, I was like, you obviously can't trust a field goal in this instance, but I was very financially motivated for a touchdown. But I, like, if, I think like because they're in Buffalo, they probably spend the week thinking about and reppping what, like, snow fuel goal attempt conditions we're going to look like. They seem like a very well-oiled snow clearing machine,

just all the opposite alignment and everything. But still, like, I don't know, that scares me. I just have visions of Tyler Bass slipping and falling on his butt, and we're going to overtime. I think that's right. And I think that's the right way for them to process it.

And if they worked on it and practiced it and we're ready for it, like whatever. As a viewer, the opposite, like the things that you're saying should have made them confident in the decision made me nervous. Like at first, um, Singletary goes down and it becomes clear that that's the decision that they're making.

And I'm kind of like, okay, this is a little weird. I don't know if I like this, but okay, like it's a really easy field goal. Fine. I'm sure the numbers probably work out where that's the right call.

I guess blah, blah, blah, blah. As soon as I see like six Buffalo Bills, just scraping snow off the turf with their, hands, that was when I started to be like, oh, I don't like this. This is bad. You're doing the hand shovels? They knew their rules.

Well, they knew their rules. You are not allowed to bring out an implement, right? It's a penalty if you try to use a towel. Yeah. So that's what I'm saying is they clearly had a meeting, right? Special teams meeting, whatever the frick you do special teams meeting in the week. I have no idea. They brought the line in and they were like, fellas, make sure you grab your towels to

clean off the snow and then like some yuppie. sixth rounder was like, you can't do that. It's not the rulebook. And the special team coordinator was like, great job. That was a trick question. Use your hands, son. But they knew what they were done. And it went off great. And they got very close. But like when they were you know, taking it down to the two minute warning, they had yet to get the pass an appearance call. If they don't get that pass an appearance call, there's a chance that are attempting like a 40 something yarder. And that to me feels, oh,

I would have liked to have taken a couple more aggressive shots downfield before I with them to think a 40-yard snowball in those conditions. Not ideal. Is a snowball, a successful snowball, if it doesn't survive the ground? I mean, if there's enough snow, no snowballs surviving the ground. It's just consumed into the existing snow.

Is the snowball a catch? Is essentially what I think I'm asking? The one that hit the back of the cameraman after the Quentin Morris touchdown and like firmly exploded, like it's in the center of the screen, not a catch. Very clearly did not survive contact. Got to go to New York for review on that one. All right. Anything else from this game?

We're going to each do one take from Vikings Colts before we call it an evening. But anything to extend our ability to luxuriate in this fabulous game for just a minute longer, Ben? The number one question that Mayor asked me watching it with me was why the Dolphins coaches were in hoodies. And I had to explain, like, well, you can't, you can't, you can't, off wearing the big coat because then you're not a man. So you have to wear six thermal layers and then the hoodie on top. The entire Dolphins coach is out with the putties. Wasn't a single big coat to be found.

And then the Ville's coaches have obviously also not in the big coat because you're expecting this from the dolphins and you have to count, you can't be charmed with a big coach here on the stadium. No fluffy coach. Sean McDermott wears a puffer, though. He wears a big puffer. I didn't catch what he was wearing in this. It didn't register.

That's why it in first caught my mind is I was like, is Sean wearing the big coat. And I feel like he wasn't. But he doesn't wear the big, big coat. He wears just like a big puffer. It's not long, but it's probably warm. I have a coat like that, and it's very warm. When I say big coat, yeah, I just mean the poppy thing.

I don't know the terminology here. I own like one coat. So McDermott wasn't wearing the puffer? I don't think so, no. I'm pretty sure he was just hooded up. Oh, wow. Yeah, that's mind games. Yeah, a long chess match in the media this week.

So anyway, because McDermott's in the puffer when it's, you know, 40. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. I think, right, I think it was just saying, well,

they're going to act like it's not that cold and we're going to act like it's not that cold, and we're going to act like it's not that cold, so on and so forth and so on. I hate to end this discussion, this game on a bummer note, but the bills lost center, Mitch Morse in the middle of this one with a concussion. He has a long and scary history of concussion.

So first of all, I hope that is, as okay as it can be. His leaving the game was followed by a sequence where they have Quessonbury coming at Guard and Van Routen slid over to the center position. Offensive line gets penalized on three straight snaps. So first of all, Mitch Morris is probably

the strongest link on that offensive line as it is. And second of all, at least initially when he went out, things weren't looking so great on the offensive line there. I am very much with this Bill's team. Like I think I'd just been so preoccupied with has Allen, is Alan missing a little bit of what makes him him because the elbow might be hurting. I just felt like the short and intermediate accuracy had taken a bit of a dip following that injury.

I think I felt much better about them, maybe much as strong, but better about them after this game because I just felt like, oh, that's Josh Allen doing Josh Allen stuff again. And I do think that that's ultimately just the most. important thing for them. But to your point about how it's just always something, that is definitely something that bears watching. And then additionally, just, you know, hope Mitch is okay, because that's, that's scary anytime those things start to pile up. Yeah, that's a very good point.

The bills took their little set up the doagull snap, which they may have wanted a couple of extra yards away from the uprights just to give a little more visibility, but they took it out of the gun, right? And as we recall, against the Vikings, they were trying to take some snaps under the center and those tasks are not going well. And so they are... What about as badly as it possibly could have? Their backup center situation seems extremely untrustworthy under center,

which seems like a small thing, isn't a small thing. If I know you're 100% gun when Mitch Morris is around or at least like 99% gun, makes my defense easier. And so the operation center to quarterback, easy to look over. But yeah, Mitch Morris is one of the ones in leave. That really, really matters because of the bill's backup situation.

dire. All right. I said that we would go each give a take from Vikings Colts and then wanted to keep talking about Dolphins bills because it was just such a delight. But let's let's do it before we head out. Give me one take from this ridiculous Vikings Colts game where the Colts blew a 33-0 lead at halftime. The Vikings end up winning 3936 in overtime. I'm officially Zagging. Ready for the Zag? Zag's coming. Ready for the Zag. Lay it on. The Vikings are contenders. They're legit Super Bowl contenders now. I buy it.

Because if you're going to win this game, you can win any game. I mean, like, you can't, like, we can't, like, we, the whole time, man. We're like, the Vikings are bad. They're not real. They're not good. And they go down 33 to nothing to the Colts. And then they win. So now you can win, once you win a game you're trailing by 33,

you have to be considered a legitimate team to win every game that you play for the rest of time. I mean, I don't, like, they didn't even do with Justin. Like, K.J. Osborne. They got, this Vikings team has won games on a Josh Mattel's pick with 17 seconds left against the Lions, a Camdanceler forced fumble with a minute 12 left against the Bears. The Josh Allen sneak fumble, 41 seconds left, previously discussed. And then a Cambine interception against the Jets with 16 second left. And then in this game, obviously, like, the refs couldn't have possibly.

have bungled the whole operation more, I guess they could have. The one thing they got right was the bumble recovery of fumble recovery of Chandon Sullivan to give them the football back with like, whatever it was, three seconds left. I can't remember. This, the way, I'm done doubting the Vikings team.

They are now physically capable of winning every single game they play for the rest of time, and that by default makes them Super Bowl contenders. Congratulations. We need to stop analyzing the Vikings. Yes. Post-analysis. I'm done work.

I have no more thoughts. They can win it all. No more stats, just lulls. The Minnesota Vikings story. That's it. That's what I got. It's a funny group of people. Kurt Cousins, very funny football player.

That's what I got. They traded for T.J. Hawkinson. He can't stop making bad plays in low-level situations. Or high-level situations, excuse me. And it still was like, like, keep checking it to him. they, the amount of drives they had, a series they had, like the first, first and 10, they targeted Adam Thielen. And then second and 10, they targeted T.J. Hawkinson.

And then third and 10 was just Kirk staring at Justin Jefferson, pumping, pumping, and guys, you can do this on first half. They're exhausting to watch. I disagree with the last statement. They're pure comedy. Nothing is, like, I want the, I feel like they announced who was winning the Mark Twain Prize a couple days ago, but I want it redacted. I wanted to go to the Minnesota Vikings.

They're the funniest thing on television this year. I love them very much. I want them to win the Super Bowl. Once we got about five minutes left in the Bills game, I was thinking of myself, I was like, I'm so exhausted right now. Like, why am I so tired? Like, usually I love this.

I live for this. Edge of my seat. Why am I just burnt? And then I realized what Minnesota, Indianapolis did to me. And then I had not yet recovered. It wasn't ready for another one of these fourth quarters. But yeah, like, there's jokingness to it.

but also like Minnesota's got some like we've been down here before and we know the way out isn't to them, which like doesn't fully explain a 33 point comfort behind victory because it's never happened before. But in general, like Minnesota is not as good as Dallas, not as good as San Francisco and not as good as Philadelphia. But if it's the fourth quarter and they're down 10, they're going to be like, yeah, sure.

We've seen some things. Right. They're not going to not behave. Yeah, we're like, yeah, we're just good Justin Jefferson time. We've done this before, man. And so sure, like, once you get to the playoffs, wipe the slate clean. And Minnesota is getting to the playoffs. They have played some weird games and they're going to keep playing some.

So you said there'd never been a 33 point comeback before. My take for you has a little something to do with that. First of all, there had never been a 33 point comeback before. However, there had been a 32 point comeback. That was done by Buffalo Bill's backup quarterback Frank Reich. In the 1990. AFC wildcard round against the Houston Oilers. Legendary comeback,

largest comeback in NFL history. Jeff Saturday has taken everything from this man. He's taken everything from Frank Reich. What he had left was his record, and now it's gone because the Jeff Saturday Colts blew this game. Most notably, my real take here is that if Jeff Ursa... Jeff Urseille, I can't do names anymore. Jim Urseille wanted to screw around.

and make his interim head coach, his permanent head coach at some point. I think this is going to be the reason that he just can't get away with that. Yeah. It's a little tough once you have this game. It is a little tough. And that is probably, look,

from all I know, Jeff Saturday is a really good guy and a really nice guy, but this seems like a goofy thing that an owner decided to do. And sometimes NFL owners need raining in. And if it takes an absolutely absurd football game to make that happen,

that's probably for the betterment of the Indianapolis Colts in the long run, And I think that happened at the exact moment when he could have kicked, probably at about a 53, 50 yard field goal to go up 11, 231 to play. Ops to go for it. Now, that's okay. I'm not all, I'm not horrifically mad about the decision in the first place. At this time, we should note Chase McLaughlin is five for five along with 52 in a dome on the day. Correct.

Correct. The kicker's been good. The kicker's been kicking. barely kicking his 37-year-old Matt Ryan, with whom Jeff Saturday elects to run the saddest quarterback sneak I've basically ever seen. He said after the game,

we liked our matchup. What's the matchup one of you? What's the matchup, man? If you say, like, alignment, then I get it. It's like, we like the space we have, which the Vikings had it pretty nicely bottled up, but, like, alignment, I get there's space for it. Matchy been playing.

is like our center against their nose? Is that the match? What's the matchup? Matt Ryan versus a linebacker. Right, Matt Ryan versus a linebacker is your other option. So it better be the center versus the nose because otherwise, otherwise, unless we investigate,

the secondary option is an answer to that question. It is again, I will say for the third time in the last two minutes, 37-year-old Matt Ryan, just fighting to stay alive. They obviously didn't get it. Delvin Cook takes a little dump off from Kirk's 64 yards for a touchdown on the next play in the game is the game. The rest is history.

What are you going to say? At what point in the Colts Vikings game did the first memory of Falcons Patriots come from that Ryan's mind? If I would love to ask if I knew he wouldn't be upset, I would ask him this question. I would call him a right away. Matt, I'm just wondering. was it at 33 to 7 when the Vikings scored their first points of the game halfway through the third quarter to make it a 26 point game that you were like hmm 26 kind of close to 25

just when what was the first moment I think it's probably like you get a little bit closer like once it's 36 21 you're like oh we gave this up it'd be as bad as man what's another time someone's giving up oh no I just want to know when the thought first girl his life. That's hysterical. That's an incredible question. That is so emotionally devastating. However, Matt Ryan is a very lovely man. I would not ask that to him. But somebody who personally knows him, please ask him and then get back to me. Kindly. Ask him kindly, but get the answer so that we can make it. After an appropriate period of waiting in morning, obviously.

With time to heal. All right, Ben, thank you so much. What a delightful day of football and a delightful opportunity to break it all down with you. This has been been the Ringer NFL Saturday recap show. We will be back tomorrow with our usual Sunday NFL recap show. That's me. That's Ben. That's Stephen Ruiz. Thank you to Eduardo Ocampo for production on this episode with additional production supervision by Arjuna Rangipal.