The Ringer NFL Show - Bears Dominate Eagles on ‘MNF’ and More Surprises From Week 3

Episode Date: September 29, 2026

Tom, Sheil, and Billy get together to share their instant reactions to Bears-Eagles on ‘Monday Night Football’ before examining the ramifications of the big trade that sent QB J.J. McCarthy to the New York Giants. Sheil then brings the crew some topics from the Sunday slate that he feels need to be "Under Further Review." They end the pod with Tom’s injury update and a robust discussion on how the Tampa Bay Bucs should approach their next few games while Baker Mayfield is sidelined with an injured thumb.(00:00) Intro(1:53) Bears defeat the Eagles on ‘Monday Night Football’(19:31) J.J. McCarthy traded to the Giants(29:05) The Under Further Review segment(1:10:04) Injury report(1:11:56) Where do the Bucs go without Baker Mayfield? Check out Tom Pelissero's newsletter 'The Sweep' on Substack!: Upgrade Your Performance with Orgain Creatine. Available at Amazon, Costco, Walmart & Whole Foods. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit https://fanduel.com/playwithaplan to learn more about the resources and helplines. Host: Tom PelisseroGuests: Sheil Kapadia and Billy GilProducer: Chris SuttonVideo Editor: Curtis SchultzEngineer: Oscar De La CruzProduction Supervision: Conor Nevins and Arjuna Ramgopowell Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode is brought to by Uber Eats. You can get almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. Sorry, you can't get a beach deliver, but you can get a peach. A canoe, no. Shampoo, yes. A rocket? No way. Chocolate, yes way. It's everything you need, including $10 off your first grocery order with code,

anything 30-30. Get almost, almost anything with Uber Eats. Order now. Order a minimum of $30 required, valid on grocery, convenience, retail, specialty foods, or flower delivery orders only, Terms and conditions apply. What's up, everybody? It is the Ringer NFL show.

Late Monday night, Tom Pellisero here, Shio Capadia, Billy Gill along shortly as well. Monday night football. I know Sheel also has a Philly special to record tonight. We'll still get his thoughts on that Eagles performance. Case Keenum, AIDS 38. What do we make of all of it from both sides? We had a trade, first one of the NFL season,

and J.J. McCarthy is a giant. What is New York's thought process? What does it mean for Minnesota and that defense-driven 3-0 team? Also get into a lot of different items in review from Sheel from the week three Sunday and big injury updates around the NFL as well. Baker and the Bucks, O and 3 set to start an undrafted rookie quarterback. We'll bring it all down. Coming up right after this. The Ringer NFL show is presented by Fandul. The NFL is here, and it's your most rewarding season ever on Fandul. With the all-new Fandul Rewards Club, every eligible bet can earn you points win or lose. The more points, the bigger the rewards you can unlock. Head to fandul.com slash ringer NFL to start earning with Fandual Rewards Club. 21 plus select states, 18 plus D.C., Kentucky, or Wyoming. Gambling problem. Call

1-800 gambler. Call 1-88-7-89-77 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut. Sheel, I don't want to fully exhaust you mentally or physically. In terms of getting into the Eagles performance tonight, there's some strange stuff that happens in that game. A sequence, unlike anything I think I've seen before, of the quarterback going in the tent and then kind of being left in the tent and being confused why he's still in the tent. While Andy Dalton, in what I'm sure Eagles fans hope is the only time we see him this season, plays three snaps and throws a pick in the end zone. There were so many odd twists and turns in this game.

But from either perspective, also Chicago's on their third string quarterback in Case Keatim, get a big one at home. What did you make of all of it? Yeah, I think the bears were really the story, and we can talk about the Eagles. They look terrible, but I was thinking about Ben Johnson and the conversations we've had in the past, and it just feels like he continues to be elevated in my mind if you're just doing sort of a ranking of, huh, how many coaches would I actually have rather have over this guy? And I was thinking about like the last 20, 30 years. And it feels like all the great coaches have these moments where they're playing

with their backup. They're playing with their third string quarterback. They're underdogs. And they just come out and they figure out a way to make it work. I mean, they absolutely cooked the Eagles defense. They went up and down the field. You would have thought Case Keenum got every rep in the spring every you know coaches love to talk about reps this guy only get this many reps we only have this many reps well case keitham's the third string quarterback and he looked like they came up with the game plan that he was pretty comfortable with so great coaching job by ben johnson feel a good story i think we'll say maybe billy'll pour some cold water on that but we have a feel good story it felt like with case keitham that stage of his career you know he has a

moment in front of his kids now for the rest of his life so very very uh impressed win for the Chicago Bears Monday night. Why would you assume that I would pour water on the Kay's Keenum story? I was going to say, like, my biggest takeaway is how happy I was for Kay's Keatom. He had the game that you were talking about. His first started in like two and a half years. He had a rushing touchdown at the end of the game. Kind of like seemed like they had run out of time,

which happened twice where we got one of those Michigan situations from a couple weeks ago where it's like, well, there's two different play clocks and game clocks going on. And that one he got off just before. They reminded us, well, the back judge does give them an extra little tick there after it does hit zero. So I felt good for him. I thought it was great. I mean, he's obviously 38 years old now. It's been a while since he started.

It's been a while since, you know, he had a rushing touchdown. He was a third stringer. And he came in and he had a game of his life. Why would I feel bad for him, Sheel? Listen, sometimes, I think Tom could have had, you throw a little curveball in there. So I don't know. You might have, you might, you know, you could have taken the stance of like, end off with all this case kingdom stuff. It's so hokey.

Who cares? Oh, he came in through a couple passes, big deal. But he didn't, Tom. You know, Billy has a heart too. And he was feeling good for case. Sometimes. Yeah. I felt good for the belt there.

I felt good for Ben Johnson. Remember last week we were talking about, well, how is Ben Johnson going to do? He's never coached the game as an O.C. Or a head coach without a number one pick overall. And yeah, that now has been laid to rest. We don't have to talk about that anymore. Now we have to talk about, is Nick Siriani going to get fired again? Which, you know, I saw a tweet out there by a friend Alison Turner who said they should have fired him in the trophy presentation in New Orleans a couple of years ago.

So now people are already getting frustrated with Nick Siriani again, which is the circle of life, I guess. I want to get, I want to get Shields' eagles impressions momentarily. But first of all, the case keenam getting that start put me through the time machine. Because all of a sudden it occurred to me, I was at his first ever NFL start. It was in 2013. The Texan season was already completely unraveling. He started a game in Kansas City. They lost.

They lost every game that he started that year. Gary Kubiak got fired like it was a complete dumpster fire for Houston that season. And then, you know, I covered him a lot in 2017 when he was on that remarkable run with the Vikings. And a lot like, even though he's nine years older now than he was back in 17 when, you know, they went to the NFC championship game and Minneapolis Miracle and all that, but he always had this knack for almost making the big mistake, but not quite. Always throwing a few passes that would care him off somebody's hands

or get away with something like there were not only a bunch of passes that it seemed like he threw right to the Eagles and they couldn't take advantage of it tonight. He also has what he tries, like he's feeling himself in the second half there and he's on that scramble and he tries to do like the stop and jukem move

and then nearly gets stripped. I'm like, oh my God, case, just get down to two touchdown games still. That's why, and I know that, you know, Joe and Troy are debating it on the broadcast and Joe doing the TV professional thing where he clearly leads Troy down to state an opinion. And it's like, well, I wasn't even going to ask you that. Now, you know what you're doing, Joe. But Troy's like, I think you have to stick with Case Keenum. I disagree on that front. It's a great story for one night. I trust Ben Johnson, whatever he decides. but I don't know that what you did tonight with Case Keenham was replicable.

I don't know that you want Case Keenham throwing fadeaway shield across his body, dropping him in, credit to him. But playing that style, next week you got the Jets. And say what you will about the Jets. You're going to have to score some points to beat him. But also after that, you got the Packers. You've got really big games coming up. And based on what Caleb Williams told the sideline broadcasters about his injury and his timeline,

and like he doesn't ultimately know when he's back. Just to say that you won a game with Case Keenham Shield, to me, I think that that's overly simplified thinking, especially for someone like Ben Johnson, if he thinks that he can put a lot more points up with Tyson Bejant, you can bet Tyson Bayesian's going to be in the lineup. And honestly, I'd be surprised if Bejant doesn't start next week. That's interesting.

I think you did talk me into it. I don't think it's an easy decision because Keenom did play really well. You're right. He just, you know, I kept thinking like, man, he's pretty close to giving the Eagles one here. And Troy was getting anxious in the booth. He's like, Case, you got to leave, man. Just like settle down a little bit. You don't have to be trying all this stuff now.

But it's a very different taste. You know, Case Keenum has kind of seen it all and has the experience and has the reps. And I think they look at Tyson Beijan. And every word out of that building, it feels like for what? The last three years has been like, no, you don't understand. They really love Tyson Beijan. And, you know, you've mentioned before when you pay a backup quarterback a certain amount of money, you're putting your money where your mouth is.

And they did that with Tyson Bayesian. So I would think Ben Johnson would look at it and think, you know what? We can do more with Baygent. More of my playbook is available to us with the guy like Bejan. He's got more of kind of just the traits and the skill set than Keenham. So I think I'm with you. I think they would probably go to Bejit, but then it gets tricky. You know, if Bejan doesn't play well in his first start back, do you have a quick hook?

and you're like, we're going back to Keenham. It could play out that way over the next few weeks here, or they could just make a commitment to Beijing and be like, he's going to be our guy until Caleb Williams comes back. Billy, what do you think? Do you think that we'll get to this in a minute after you talk about this topic? Do you think that maybe the Giants are saying, man, we could have had Case Keenum on our team,

said to JJ McCarthy, and they wish they wouldn't have pulled the trigger on that trade so soon? No. No. A little different. Listen, they could have gone and gotten the older guy, just the fill-in guy. And yeah, we'll get to JJ McCarthy trade in the second here.

But again, I don't know that you watch that. Like, again, it's a fun story. Take nothing away. Case Keenom's 24 or 34 for 247 yards, two touchdowns, no interceptions, and a 110.8 pass rating. Okay? Statistically, you can't argue with it.

They moved the ball. They scored points. Some of those, like his first touchdown pass, for basically a handoff to Luther Burden. But he did his part. I just think it's too important for the Bears. Let's put it this way. Let's say Caleb were to get hurt again in week 17.

Who do you want starting that game in week 18? Do you want Tyson Bajor or do you want Case Keenum? I want the guy who's going to give me the best chance to score a ton of points. And to me, as much as Keenum is, you know, the wily veteran, cold weather, I want the bigger guy with the bigger arm who's younger. That's what I want. And to say, you know, you're not going to give Tyson Bajon a start. In my mind, you're setting your start.

yourself up for potential failure down the line. In other words, I don't want Sheel the first time I see Tyson Bejant play in this season to be, oh crap, Caleb just got hurt in a playoff game and now we're throwing the guy out there cold. Like get him into the flow, get him some reps. It's important. He's still a young player. The truth is I just give Ben Johnson the benefit of the doubt here. Like whatever he doesn't be like that's the, you know, that he knows those guys better than I do. He knows what he can do with a guy like Bejan. And I, you know, I sort of feel like you're probably right that he's going to go with Bayesian. They made a commitment to him, and he's going to end up being the backup here,

starting some games for the next few weeks. But if he went the other way, I'd be like, okay, he saw something in Keenum, and he still has some questions about Bejan, and I trust him there. But yes, he is the orchestrator of this thing, and he's incredible. I mean, just the things that he does, that first drive to come out like that, and he was just in his bag, and they just went right down the field. And they're always, it's not like a finesse thing with him. That's always what's so impressive is.

They are such a physical team. I loved when Aikman was talking about during the broadcast that Ben Johnson is literally the only coach I've ever heard talk about. The run game is to create explosives. It's not to get on schedule. It's not to get in third and manageable. No, we are trying to put pressure on the defense every single time we snap the ball.

And for some coaches, I would listen to that guy. You're talking a big game. But you watch them play, and it's like he's backed it up over and over again. So again, whoever he chooses to go in, I feel like he will come up with a game plan that works for them. And I don't think they're going to embarrass themselves with having a backup in or having a third string quarterback. And he showed that tonight that he's going to be able to do enough for them to remain competitive until Caleb Williams gets back. Flip side of its shield, 27 points for the third string quarterback on Vic Fangio's defense.

It seemed like it was a penalty fest on the back end. I don't know how many illegal contact calls they had. There was just a whole bunch of mistakes on that side of the ball. And then offensively, like I found myself, maybe this is just where the bar is because of where we are in the season. But I felt like Jalen Hertz was playing pretty well in the first half, but they had no points until he has a quarterback sneak to score a touchdown before the half. Second half looked like the entire thing was out of sorts. Jalen was a little out of sorts. What did you see on their side?

And that's been a theme for them. I mean, he had the game winning drive in week two, but really they come out of halftime. And there are these different versions of the offenses, of the offense that you see. And you're right. You know, when he was healthy and on the field in the first half, they didn't get a ton of opportunities, but they were running the football. It looked pretty good. And then they come out in the second half and they can't do anything.

I mean, this was a horrendous offensive performance. They had the ball nine times, three turnovers, four punts, one failed fourth down, and one touchdown. If you look at the nerd stats that I like to always tell you guys about, it's their worst offensive game in the last four years. and anyone who's watched the Eagles knows they've had some bad offensive games. So, yeah, that was concerning. And then defensively is maybe the more disappointing side of the ball.

You know, offensively you thought maybe you're going to have some growing pains, new offensive coordinator and Sean Mannion, some injuries on the offensive line. I'm pretty sure they had all 11 starters healthy. Well, I don't know if I should say healthy, but on the field defensively in this game. And they couldn't do anything. I mean, the pass rush wasn't there. I think Cooper DeGine's playing with a little bit of an injury. Rie Kulin, who has played well, had some penalties here.

But there's just too many guys open. I mean, their calling card over the last couple of years with the great defense has been, our coverage is going to be so good and so tight and we're going to communicate it so well. We're going to give the pass rush a chance to get home. And it just hasn't been that way so far this season. So, yeah, the Eagles defense, it's hard to really point to what's going wrong. But that's been one of the more underwhelming units in the entire NFL, I would say, to the first three weeks.

They were almost shut out. I mean, if they would have called that, you know, that they would have said the time was out, they wouldn't have scored that touchdown. They would have no points to the game. That was a weird kind of turn of events because Jalen was driving down the field. Then he gets hit out of bounds. So they say, you know what, injury time out?

We need to get him evaluated. Red rifle comes in. He starts kind of, it seems like he's going to leave them down the field, get a touchdown, throws that interception, then they give him a field goal. Then Jalen comes back in and then they have that drive where they score. But Jalen was just sitting in that tent because the person who was supposed to be checking on him

was taking a break? Where was the red hat guy? Apparently walked away. There was a lot of, there's a lot of ample lip reading opportunities between what Jalen was saying in and once he got out of the tent. I'm pretty sure I knew what Nick

Siriani was saying. My question is who he was saying to I think the Bears linebacker who hit Jalen, but really could have been anybody on the sideline could have been any player. Nick was a little bit fired up. Let's take a quick look, Billy, at the NFC standings right now. The Eagles, who just again give them 27 points to a third string quarterback,

lost in pretty bad fashion on national TV, tied with the Giants. The Giants who seem to lose a star player literally every week. They're both two and one. Dallas is one and two coming off of a game. We'll get into a little bit later in the show that they have headed to overtime with seven seconds left and somehow losing regulation. And the commanders who won a game with a backup quarterback over the Super Bowl champs who hadn't lost since last November, how do you stack up that division right now, Bill?

If you're telling me who you believe in in that division, is there somebody? I thought it was the Eagles, but they looked so bad today. So, I mean, She'll had me believing in the Eagles. By the way, we didn't mention this, but Sheel, we had a little extra interest in this game because that was your final Ringer 107 pick of the week. I don't want to talk about that. And Tom, are you familiar with what this show's record was, Ringer 107 this week? I believe this show is in first place.

Were in first place. Was. Yeah. Until an 0 and 5 performance this weekend. I think we're in last place now or second to last. First or worst, baby. Let's go. It was very bad week for the Ringer 107, the Ringer NFL show.

Good time to point out I have nothing to do with the picks. I don't weigh in on the picks. I was very proud. wave of positivity when they're good. I take no responsibility. Billy, are you separating yourself too? Listen, this week, you tell on the Friday show, I want to know because we have the website, Ringer 107 on the ringer.com.

Right now, it's a shield kababadi and Billy Gill after the 0.5 week that I just had, I need you to make a decision by Friday's show whether you still want your name on there or not. Here's the thing is on the website, I am shown alongside you in terms of the picks. were in first place and I was like, this looks great. A little bit stolen valor, if I'm going to be honest with you, because Shio was making the picks and I was like, I'm not going to get in his way. He really wants to make these picks. I'm not going to give too much input here.

But I felt like, okay, we're in first place. This is great, but I didn't deserve any of this. Now that it's a no one file, I'm like, eh, she was going to be making these picks. Maybe we take my name off of this situation so that I'll get tied to these picks. But we'll figure it out by then. But to answer your question, I mean, the Giants made a move, but they made a move for a quarterback who was not very successful and made it to third string on his past team. And now he's going to have to, the good thing about this situation is the Giants have an

easing next like four or five games. So he can kind of ease his way in and kind of get things, get acclimated to the team, get acclimated to the Giants and figure things out with not the hardest schedule. So we'll see how JJ does there. The Cowboys are not the greatest offense there is. We know that situation. That's what they were coming into. They're okay, but not the greatest there is.

And the commanders were surprising. I still want to believe in the Eagles shield. I know that this is like you're laying, you're the Philly guy. Why shouldn't I believe in the Eagles? Why shouldn't you? Well, they haven't had a good three weeks. I mean, their first two wins literally came down to the last possession of the game against the commanders and the Titans.

And then they got blown out against a third string quarterback. So I, you know, I think there's reason for concern with the Eagles. I think they're probably, I think definitely they're the most talented team in the division still. and they do have a track record of winning a lot of games. But there's a lot of uncertainty with all these teams. I think the best unit of any of them is probably the Cowboys offense is the one that you kind of mostly know what you're going to get week to week. You know, the commanders and the Giants.

I know we're going to talk about J.J. McCarthy here in a second. So I would still say Eagles and Cowboys I feel the best about. I had them both as playoff teams coming into the season. And I don't think I want to redo on that three weeks in. Although, you know, am I 100% confident? No, I wouldn't say that either. So with regard to the trade that the Giants made, first trade of the season, there have been a lot of speculation. I wrote in the sweep on Saturday.

League sources believe they're going to land a quarterback as soon as Monday. They were calling everybody. They were assessing their options. Here's why J.J.J. McCarthy makes sense. It's not that he's going to ride in and rescue the season. Six and four is a starter. Let's be clear on that. He's played 10 out of a total 36 games in his NFL career.

But they have had success around him. What he brings you is another young developmental quarterback. He's the same age as Jackson Dart. And it allows you to take a flyer. It's a fifth round pick on a guy that you were scouting as your potential first round pick a couple of years ago. John Harbaugh surely had plenty of information from Jim Harbaugh about what makes JJ tick. And he's a cost-controlled young quarterback who can be on your roster going into.

to a year where, frankly, you can't just go, well, Jackson will be healthy. He'll be good. He will be healthy by next camp, but his track record so far is not that he can stay healthy. So maybe Matt Nagy, Brian Callahan, and that crew can unlock something in JJ McCarthy. There's something to be said for just a fresh start. There was a lot that happened, man, in Minnesota with JJ. It was, and this is not making excuses for him, but if we are just chronologically laying it out, tears his meniscus in the first preseason game, he plays misses his entire rookie season. Comes back in 2025 is the unquestioned starter. They made that decision. Everybody's watching Sam Darnold, who went with 14 games the year before going

win a Super Bowl in Seattle. Everyone's watching Daniel Jones going lighted up in Indianapolis. What's happening to JJ is the player of the week, week one with the comeback win over Chicago, week two, plays bad, gets hurt. Misses like five weeks. He is a mess of injuries all season long. He's got a new baby. He's learning how to be a dad. Everything was happening at once. And then in the offseason, he has them bring in his obvious replacement in Kyler Murray. Like, all those things kind of stick to you. And it's not that the Vikings don't believe this guy could still be a good quarterback. It was not going to work in Minnesota. So they get a fifth round pick. They save like four plus million dollars cash in cap space, gain some flexibility, avoid whatever headache there

would be this season or next off season if JJ were still on the roster as a backup. And for JJ, you know, he gets a new shot. So I like it all around, but in terms of the immediate future shield of the Giants, this is not like a needle mover. Yes, it brings one more into the room,

but Giants can still add another quarterback if they're concerned about James, you know, faltering here as we move forward. He hasn't done a lot yet. It was weird weather last week. Let's see what they put together in a game plan this week. But James Winston is still going to be a part of whether or not the Giants win or lose shield. However you want to take that if you're a Giants fan.

So your understanding is that James is going to start for now. If he falters, maybe they make a move, right? Or that's what they're saying publicly. Could potentially have another quarterback? You know, could JJ play at some point? Sure. But he's never played in the scheme. He doesn't, you know, he's walking in there, never been with his teammates.

Like the worst thing for JJ is sometime in the next month, he's got to just get shoveled out there, which is always the concern. trade a cut down as a quarterback, you trade it in season. Like, your odds of having success is not a lot of Baker Mayfields rolling in on a Tuesday starting Thursday and reviving your career. Like, JJ needs to sit a little bit and kind of get revived. But he does bring some things, Sheila, as you know, that look kind of like Jackson

Dart. Like, he can move around. Those quarterback movement concepts that you basically can't call with James. JJ can do some of those things. So there's a lot for them to kind of experiment with and see if they unlock something. But this is the move to save the same. season. This is the move to kind of set themselves up even into 2027 of let's get another young, talented guy in the room and see what works out. I like, I like it from the Giants perspective. And I'm

not like the biggest J.J. McCarthy fan. Like, if you ask me, what's the likelihood that he's going to be an average starter in the NFL? I wouldn't put that number very high. It's just based on what we've seen. And that might be unfair. He's only 23 years old. But that's like a pretty high bar to clear, you know, consistent average starter in the NFL. But the reason I like it is what you said, this is low cost. This is rookie contract, fifth round pick. And I do subscribe to the idea that if you don't have a quarterback, take a bunch of bites at the apple. Like you don't have to just put everything on Jackson,

dart, this is our guy. We can't do anything else. You have no idea if he's going to be your guy or not. It's like some of the coaches or GMs who say just draft a quarterback every single year. I think that's overall, you know, doesn't have to be every single year. But overall, that's a good philosophy when you don't have one. Because even if he ends up being a solid backup, like that's

good value for a fifth round pick. Even if he ends up being like the 24th best starter in the NFL, it's actually sometimes can be hard to find a guy who's the 24th best starter in the NFL. So I know I'm setting the bar really low, but given the age, given what you gave up, I do like it from a giant's

perspective. I think it's kind of, it's not even a gamble to take because if it doesn't work out, he's gone and all you spent really was a fifth round pick. I'm just kind of relieved to hear that we're going to lose James after seeing his like inspirational interviews and stuff this past weekend where they ask him how confident are you in carrying this team forward? He said one thing I do is forgetting those that is behind and reaching forward to what's ahead while staring off into the distance.

And then after, you know, it was bad weather. We will admit it was bad weather. There were, you know, different sports leagues around the country that were moving their games out of the state or different times or whatever. And they still won the game and they said, you know, hey, You didn't score any touchdowns, but thoughts on the game. He said winning this game for Jackson, 12 points, six times two. It's for you. That's 12. So I'm glad that we're not going to entirely lose James there.

But I have a question for you. So you said that you reported this past weekend that there was an expectation that they would have a quarterback by as soon as Monday. And it is Monday and they have a quarterback. And you said they were calling around. So are you at liberty to tell us like who else might have been in play? like what was Tom hearing who might have also ended up in New York? I believe pretty strongly at that point that it was going to be JJ McCarthy.

They did check on other quarterbacks. I thought, I mean, there were some other names that would make sense. I thought Justin Fields potentially could make sense just because, again, the quarterback movement stuff that you do, but that's a different style of quarterback still from Jackson Dart. Mack Jones, there was never really anything there. You know, the price would be high for, for a Mac Jones, although the next team to lose a quarterback, all eyes will be on Mac Jones

because that's the logical next guy up. You know, Spencer Rattler's had interest. I don't know that the Giants ever called on him, but the Saints would, they wanted a lot of the cutdown to trade him because there were teams that tried to trade for him and nobody was able to get it done. Teams don't want to give up quarterbacks, like all the Flacco stuff on what planet are the Bengals knowing Joe Burroughs history and knowing the importance of this season going to trade a guy. and Flacco played a really high level last year. Like, that's part of it. JJ was third string in Minnesota.

He wasn't going to see the field unless something happened to both Kyler and Carson Went. So, yes, they had called around. I was fairly confident it was going to end up being JJ McCarthy. And then obviously everybody had to see how they got through the games on Sunday. Vikings didn't have any injuries. Deal got done Monday morning. JJ got called in and he's got a fresh start in New York as a wild,

wild turn of events for a guy who, you know, a year ago at this time, well, a year ago at this time he was hurt, but two weeks before that, it was, hey, he's one and oh as the starter, he's the player of the week. This is going to be the guy. Again, environment means a lot. Kevin O'Connell tried to create the right environment for him in Minnesota, but there were a lot of environmental factors that came up. The success of Donald and Daniel Jones not being an insignificant part of it in terms of how people felt about everything. everything that transpired in Minnesota. A lot more stuff happened over the weekend.

We had controversial clock management laid in some games. We had some teams with not a lot of offense, still winning games. And we've had some teams now at 3 and 0 that we didn't expect to be 3 and 0. Some teams 0 and 3, we definitely didn't expect to be 0 and 3. What's our biggest surprises? Shield's got some ideas right after this. The Ringer NFL show is brought to you by Fandul. Welcome to your most rewarding season ever only on Fandul.

How rewarding are we talking? More rewarding than an 18-point comeback, maybe even more rewarding than an O-Linman catching a touchdown. In this NFL season, that feeling doesn't stop on the field. Look out for the all-new Fandul Rewards Club exclusive offers, surprises, and more. So every week, check the Fandul app to see what's waiting for you. Make this your most rewarding season ever with Fandul. Download the app to get started.

FanDul, play your game. 21 plus select states or 18 plus D.C. or Wyoming. Gambling problem, call 1-800-Gampler. Call 1-88-7-8-8-9-77-7-7 or visit ccpG.org slash chat in Connecticut. So every Monday in the second segment of this show, and granted, I haven't been here that long. But we usually come to Shield's takeaways from the same. Sunday that was across the NFL, which brought me to an important point that I don't think we've discussed, at least since I got here. And Billy, I want your answer too. Sheal, how do you watch

football? Just describe to me what your setup is on a Sunday, all the games going on. What are you seeing? I got three TVs on the wall, of course, had to do that. It was work-related. I had no other choice when we were, you know, doing some work on the house. So three TVs on the wall in the office. I have Red Zone on one, and then I have the two most important games that I feel are the most important games on the other. And so that's how I start watching. Now, once we get to the second half, the games can change. You know how it goes? You thought this was going to be an important game? For example, I had Patriots Jaguars on one. That's a blowout. I switched to something else. So that's kind of how I do it. And then Sunday night, Monday morning, I'm just condensed games and

reading and stats and everything I can do to chew up the stuff that I missed on Sunday. So there you go. Billy, what does it look like for you? Well, I'm still an up and comer in this industry. I don't have the three TVs money that Shield does, you know, the extra rooms where we set up the TV. So we have like the living room TV, which we just upgraded. And it's not because of like, you know, vanity. It was because the other one just the light stopped working on it. So we had to upgrade it. It was a forced upgrade. But we went slightly larger than the last one. So that threw off my former, we would have it mounted on the wall. And then it was a white wall. So there was some room. So I got a cheap projector from Amazon. I would plug a

Roku into that. And then I'd project next to the TV on the wall a game that was going on. It stops doing that because we don't have the space on the wall anymore. So now I have the main TV, usually on the red zone. The iPad will then have usually like the local game, like the Dolphins game, the 1 o'clock window, and then the big game in the 4 o'clock window. And then if I need anything else, I'll have the phone next to me. And then that'll have like a third game. Now, This week was tricky, not football-related, but it was game 162 in all of baseball. So we had MLB network on one of them. So at one point in time, we had nine games in the one o'clock window, three o'clock.

Every single baseball game was going on except for the games that were in the Northeast because of the weather. I had my football notebook on one side, had a baseball notebook on the other side, to which my wife said, you cannot possibly be paying attention to all of these games at once. And I said, I most certainly am. And I was just taking notes. And at around like 4.35, my head was just hurting. I was like, I need a break from this. So we went down to just Red Zone on the one TV because it became too much.

So I'm a, I've got the projector that's like the main game. Very simple. It's like whatever is on local TV. Because I've got a streamer. You're a little bit limited. Then I'll have, I got the two TVs going on the sides, either a second game plus a highlight show. And then I've got always Red So. Zone, right? With Scott Hansen in one year, so I've got that on the laptop, kind of coming and going,

some taking notes on injuries and everything else. But I've gotten used to that seven hours of just Scott Hanson throwing out 8,000 names. And there's always one witching hour on Red Zone every year where it seems like Scott might spontaneously combust. And I think that was yesterday. I think with, there were like three games at one point that all had like a goal to go situation. and it was bang, bang, bang. So it was a fun afternoon watch, Sheel. I'm curious, as you step back and you review, give me something that's on your mind.

Yeah, unfortunately, I think that witching hour was all bad for our Ringer 1 of 7 picks, but we'll get to that. You sucks this week, Sheel. They were all happening. Bad things were happening at the same time. I'm like, no, no, Scott Hanson, stop. Don't tell me that. But that's okay.

It's a long season. We will bounce back. Okay, so here's the idea. It's kind of like upon further review, where everyone has their takes right after the game, they're firing off takes. We got a little extra time. So here are some things I've been chewing on since Sunday.

My first thing here, and this is a passion of mine, and you'll probably tell me I'm unfair, so I look forward to you guys giving me a balanced take here. But I think two coaches really cost their teams at the end of their respective games yesterday. Like these could be things. We look back week 17.

week 18 and we go remember in week three when this happened. So here's the first one. Brian Schottenheimer. And I kind of like Brian Schottenheimer. He's grown on me. I think he's done a good job overall in Dallas. But I think a lot of eyes were on that Ravens Cowboys game. And the way like the last 20 seconds of that game went were a disaster.

But the biggest thing to make, because some stuff's out of your control, the tight end false starts, you know, you can say that's poorly coached, whatever guys make mistakes. Game tied at 31. seven seconds left. The Cowboys are kicking off. You have two options there. Kick it through the back of the end zone for a touchback or force them to return the kick.

And they chose the first option. And I can't understand why they chose the first option because they kick it through the back of the end zone. And now you give two-time MVP Lamar Jackson a chance to complete a pass and set up for the game-winning field goal, which is exactly what happened. Whereas if you would have forced a return there,

even if it's a decent return, turn, they're taking off two, three, four, five seconds off the clock where they literally would not have been able to complete a pass and then kick a field goal. So that really was on my radar as I was watching that game because coaches talk all the time about situational football and they've got guys in their ear telling them, hey, here's what you should do in this situation. I think the Cowboys botched that one at the end of the Ravens game. Billy? What do you think? I, you know, I'm kind of with you. I think that you think you kick it out of the end zone so that way you don't have someone get lucky and return it for a touchdown, right? So far this season, there have been zero

kickoffs return for touchdowns. The longest kickoffs return this year 40 yards. There's been a couple guys that return it 40 yards. If you kick it, if you ever turn it for 40 yards, let's say they kick it to, it's a short kick to like the, I don't know, 10. You get to midfield. 40 yards is going to take you, you know, fastest guys will be like a 4 or 3, but with contact, That'll probably take you a good six seconds maybe. So you'd have one second to kick a field goal if you're even close enough to kick a field goal. And that's like worst case scenario right there. That's worst case scenario.

But I think I saw a stat and I think that this was the first time that there have been two field goals kicked within 10 seconds left in the game. So you never expect that to happen. You think, you know what, let's just kick it away. They'll get it at the 35 when it goes through the end zone. and then they're not really going to have enough time to make a player. If they do, it'll be a miracle. And sure enough, that miracle happened in Rio. So, like, in retrospect, you can say it was definitely the wrong call,

but it's something that has absolutely never happened before. So I don't know how much you can actually blame him for that. If you're being fair, if you want to be the hot take guy, you know, which you're known to do, come in here, throw the hot takes, get the reactions out of people. I can see why you're saying they should fire Brian Schoenheimer today. I thought in real time. I'm like, you got to force them to return the kick now.

And maybe those takes, I should text on our group chat so that it doesn't look like I'm just saying it after the fact. But I swear, Tom, I thought in real time that they should force a return there. My question in that closing sequence was what happens on the third and goal, where it looks like DAC has a back shoulder to George Pickens. There's a clear miscommunication. Dak throws it like George is right to the back of the end zone. George stops and looks wide open. and the ball sales higher that I think George even could have gotten it. That was a weird play.

I'd be curious to be in the film room and find out like what got lost in translation there. When it comes to the kickoff, I probably would have more of a problem with it if they literally hadn't just tried the kick-it-in-play thing with Brandon Aubrey, the previous kick. I mean, he kicked it out of bounds. So it's an extra five yards. I guarantee you there's a math component. They've got the game management people there.

and it's like, all right, the 35 to the 40, like that five yards matters. And also, it has to be exactly perfect for the six seconds to like get it and get it to the field goal line and get down. You know, obviously he got there and they put the second back on the clock because Lamar called time out quickly. It had to have been something in the math that we can't run the risk of giving them the extra five yards. Because you're right, Sheila. If you put the ball in play, you're at least burning. They fair catch it deep in their own territory, which doesn't help you. or you burn a few seconds off

and all you have left is a Hail Mary or a lateral play. It was a strange ending to that game overall. Obviously, exciting for all the fans in Brazil, but definitely just kind of an odd sequence of events that really dates back to. If you score a touchdown there, again, on third down where it looks like Pickens is open, field goal doesn't matter.

You're up four and then the game's different. Yeah, Schenheimer really took responsibility for that. He's like, I probably overcoached back there. And I'm like, all right, I appreciate a coach, kind of taking the bullet for the player. But I'm like, that Prescott's, what year is this? He's in like year 11? I mean, they made it sound like it was like, if it's not there, throw it away because you don't want to take a sack or do something dumb where now all of a sudden the clock runs out.

But there was like a lot of time there. And it was a quick out. It's like as basic of a route as you could run. Like, look, and you're right, he was wide open. I thought that play was there. And I put that one on Dak. It felt like he panicked there. And we don't know for sure because he didn't want to.

to talk about it after the game, which maybe that's telling maybe it's not. But yeah, they had that. They had the fall start. Even on first down, they could have run the ball to at least force the Ravens to use a timeout on first down. Then they're not going to be able to do what they did at the end of that game. So you're right. There's a lot of factors.

They had kicked the ball out of bounds twice, I think, in that game. But we've seen the last couple of weeks, special teams has been a huge factor in these games. You look at that Bengals Steelers game, huge factor. You had a muffed pun in that game. You had a roughing the punter in that game that kept the drive alive for the Steelers. That was a close game. In week two, the Titans did something similar to the Cowboys and that comeback against the Eagles where they're kicking the ball out of bounce.

These teams can't figure out, Billy, the kickoff rule. Don't you think by now it's like kicker? This is what you need to do at practice. It's all he has to do. It's all you have to do. And I don't mean to simplify it, but it feels like you should be able to figure it out. Kick it between the zero and the 20. Do it until you get it 10 times in a row.

And then your practice is over. That seems like a solution. Can I ask you guys a question that we're three weeks in, somewhat related to your question, but definitely related to this game. We're three weeks in. How do we feel about the JJ Watt, Jim Nance pairing so far? And how do we think it's going? Because I got to be honest with you, yesterday I was kind of missing Tony a little bit.

Like it was the first time that I was like, you know what? I think maybe Tony did his time. I think maybe we bring him back here because like there's something about JJ. And this is not, you know, meant to be a shot. will come off as a shot at him. There's something about when he gets enthused that just feels somewhat insincere to me. Like, it feels like it's almost too enthusiastic, too much of a put on like, we're supposed to be having fun. I'm going to have extra fun here. And it just feels a little bit forced to me. Am I alone on this? So the energy. I hear what you're saying with the enthusiasm.

Now, I think of that often when people are talking about football. I'm like, I settle down. My default is like everybody settled down, which people don't appreciate it because people like to get excited. So I hear what you're saying there. I hadn't thought about Romo not being there. I haven't felt a strong feeling one way or the other to them. I'll tell you who I do enjoy more in Tomkin, if he wants to chime in on water, not Nancy can.

But I feel like Brady's really improving. I mean, that call on that Herbert interception, just coming out, calling it a meatball sub. Now none of the hipsters can defend Justin Herbert. Tom Brady just told you that was a bad throw. You can't tell me on Tuesday when you're watching the film that, no, no, no, that wasn't Justin Herbert's fault. That was quitting Johnson's fault.

So I feel like Brady now has really moved up my power rankings, Tom. The number one thing that former players have to be able to do is cut it loose. The thing that you would say if you're on your couch with your buddies watching the game without any curse words, although Tom violated that last week, like that's the thing you've got to say in the moment. You've got to say your actual emotions and your feelings. You know, John Gruden got a reputation for a long time on ESPN is like, oh, it's just always this guy's awesome and all that. But like John in the second half of games, if a team was bad, you could actually hear him getting mad and talking about how bad it wasn't. I don't understand

that, man. You would get those pieces. Like that's the thing. That's where Tom, who spent 20 plus years in the NFL, learning from Belichick, don't say anything, be just very much in the middle on every single issue and stay out of trouble in your building, stay out of trouble politically, all that stuff. He had to wash that stuff out of him. It had to be completely flushed. I think Tom's done a great job.

I know that when he made his debut, which is a while ago at this point, it was like, oh, it was a little bumpy, but I thought that last year the arrow was pointing up, and I think Tom keeps getting better and better. Did you get a little shot? He took this week, guys, at the bills, where they're kind of like in the overhead like blimp shot or whatever,

they showed the old Highmark Stadium. He's like, oh, the old Highmark Stadium, like, man, I lost two games. It goes, would bother me if I didn't beat them 33 other times. And then they just go back to like the bills. He's just letting it loose now. He's letting her. The thing about JJ, the enthusiasm is one thing.

I just kind of felt on some of those calls, like JJ's read about having fun in a book. So he's trying to put that into action, you know? Yeah. I think here's your thing. you have to be yourself. Like, yeah, no matter what. And I think that's just, I think JJ, that's like his actual personality.

I mean, he's a pretty straight line type of the dude. I think Tom's got a little bit more of that, you know, that rascal in him. But that's, you know, let's see. They're like, let's, JJ goes directly, like he was on the desk, right? At one point at CBS. And then he starts doing games. That was on the number one team out of nowhere where he didn't have like off-season reps with Nancy.

It was just like, hey, Tony got in some trouble. you're up buddy that's a I'm not like making any excuses for him I haven't like sat there and broken it down I'll let other people do that but it's it's a reps thing man you find out right before you're about to go do this I hell I got I found that out I wasn't supposed to you on the sideline and Netflix in week one it's kind of like hey here you go like there's that was natural Billy I would say that would be an example yeah you know what I got it you're the best right I wasn't fishing for a compliment my point is when you don't

don't have like the time to prep. It's like, all right, I guess we're doing this thing. Jay-G kind of is doing the same thing. So let's give them the season. We'll evaluate JJ at the end of the season. I'm going to keep an eye on it, Billy, for you. Come back with a stronger take. I didn't feel like I had a strong enough take there on the Watanance combo. Okay, I gave you the Cowboys. The other team, the Houston, Texans. And I think Demico Ryan's is a very good coach. But man, he has had a rough start to the season. And I, generally in the past, I'm always hard on the coaches who don't go for it on fourth down. I'm like, come on. Be aggressive.

Listen to your analytics team. He's very conservative on fourth down. I'm not even going to kill him for that because I understand you're a defensive coach. The defense is the strength of your team. But the basic timeout usage and game management, I don't think enough people were watching this Texans Colts game because this I thought was pretty egregious. So if you didn't see the game, they're up 17, 16.

They drive, they take the lead. They're feeling good. They got their defense on the field. Then the Colts complete a couple passes. and then they run the ball with Jonathan Taylor, they're in field goal range with a minute six left, just needing a field goal to take the lead. At this point in the game, time's not a factor for the Colts.

They have two timeouts. They're in field goal range. Like, they can do whatever they want. They can run it. They can pass it. They can do whatever they want. If you're the Texans, you've got to start thinking about getting the ball back. And they don't.

And they sit there. And they don't call time out. And they don't call time out. And the clock ticks from 106 to 29 seconds. And then he calls a timeout at that point. And then the Colts end up kicking a field goal. And then how does this whole thing play out? Texans offense gets the ball back.

11 seconds left. They complete a pass. But guess what? It's not like the Ravens game. They can't kick a field goal. And they have to throw up a hail marry. Whereas if they would have called time out earlier, they would have had more time on the clock.

Maybe they complete one more pass and they attempt a field goal. And this one I'm okay with, you know, especially being critical. Because D'Amico Rines was asked about it. And he was basically, like, that's on me and I have to do a better job of that. So I'm still not out on the Texans. They're 0 and 3. I don't think they're cooked. I still think they have a chance to salvage this season, but the little stuff kind of around the edges, around the margins are not going their way. And some of that self-inflicted, I think, early in the season. So you mentioned the 106,

which is when they got into field go range, but they got into it with a five-yard run. Right before that, they had completed a 20-yard pass to get them to like the 45 with 148 less. So they could have stopped the clock there already. They still had their three timeouts. I guess at that point they were waiting to see what are the Colts going to do? Are they going to get close enough? We don't want to kind of help them out here by stopping the clock and get them more time. But the 106 to 29 was egregious because you're seeing it play out.

And the Colts are just very casually and leisurely walking to the line. They got the play clock down to, I think, two seconds where it's like, well, I mean, if the Colts don't call a time out here, they're going to get a delay of game. So someone's got a call the time out. So then they bail them out. they do it, 29 seconds, 24 seconds, 21 seconds, as you mentioned. And then they get it back with no time. And even that last throw that they had was kind of a miracle that C.J.

Stroud threw it out of bounce. And they even got the one second left because they almost didn't even get a shot at that last play because he took so long to get rid of it and get it out of bounce. So it was a bad one. I mean, if you're the Texans, it's bad because this is a division rival of sorts. So you lose another division game. You're 0.3. The silver lining, I guess, is you could say, well, they were 0.N3 last year.

and they made the playoffs, so it's not time to panic yet. But they're having those redstone struggles still. They turn it around a little bit. But the play clock, I mean, you give him an extra 40 seconds there by using a timeout. You'd think that they would have had plenty of time to get three, four, five more plays in there and get within field goal range and get at least an attempt up to win the game. So I'm with you. That was probably the worst of the two coaching decisions this week.

I rewatched that sequence right before we're recording this. What stood out to me was, didn't mind the letting it run down to 29. When it's 105, Lequan Treadwell pops up just past midfield and is like rushing, hey, hustle up to the ball. The coach, like, no, no, no, let's slow it down. The score is 17-16. Neither offense was very good in the game. And the Texans probably aren't going like, hey, if we give C.J. Stroud 45 seconds instead of 15 seconds, we're going to have a great shot. Your best chance is you got one of the best defenses in the NFL. Keep the Colts from getting into field goal range, which, by the way,

Spencer Schrader had a groin injury earlier in the game. If you watch it, like, they're looking at a 60-yard field goal until the last play where they actually get it closer than that. There's a steering contest that takes place because the Colts aren't using their timeouts? Demico's probably going, aren't they going to call

a timeout at some point? What I thought was weird was then the timeout of 29, there was something they obviously didn't like, but then you call timeouts on second and third down. So why you're conserving it there as opposed to let it run again? let it run again and make the Colts call it or run it down to two seconds and then kick a 60-yard field goal. That was the part that I just thought was a little bit off.

But again, I'd love, D'Amico didn't give a whole lot. He rarely does on those game management situations. But that's where I was left confused. It's either one or the other. Either, hey, make it run two plays and kick a really long field goal or conserve all the time you can. They kind of split the baby on it. And, you know, obviously you saw the results, which was straighter head. I think it was a 53-yarder after they had the cut.

completion to get themselves into range. And your red shield didn't leave a whole lot of time left of the Texans feelback. Yeah, to your point, the defense, I mean, you would think because they had a drive, they had the go-ahead drive, kick the field goal offensively, and you just need one stop from your defense that's supposed to be this top five unit. And I'm not saying they're playing poorly. They're overall playing well, but it's like you look at the strength and weaknesses of that team and you kind of need them to be an elite unit, you know, kind of like what we're

seeing with the Vikings so far this season, we're just like, no, that you They are going to win the games for you. And you would have liked to see them shut down that Colts offense with, you know, you give up a big explosive to Laquan Treadwell on the biggest drive of the game there. I think that was disappointing for them as well. Well, we'll see. Maybe they get Nico Collins back and that offense can get going a little bit. All right.

So those are my coaching things. Now, here's my next thing here upon further review. Two teams had what I'm going to call, and I'm just trying this out. I don't know if this is going to stick with the ring or NFL show or not. I'm going to call them deodorant wins. Okay? They got a little B-O, you know, like a mask it for a little bit, but you might need to do something else.

It might be something in the diet. It might be something's going on with the laundry detergent. It's on your shirt. Some of those dry fits nowadays, you know? The stink kind of stinks. Okay, you don't know what I'm talking about. But anyway, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, and you won a game so you're feeling good,

but I think there are still issues underneath the surface. That's what I'm trying to say here. The first team here, the Denver Broncos. Wild Sunday night game, very fun game. They come back. It felt like last year once again where you're looking at it going, wait, how are they in this game? Wait, how are they leading this game?

And then you look up at the end and it's like, oh, they won again. That's what the Broncos did all of last year. Maybe they'll do it again this year. But I feel like there are some issues there. underneath the surface. They get outgained against the Rams by 225 yards. A little trivia question for you guys. Okay. In the last 35 times a team has outgained its opponent by 225 yards. How many times do you think they lost? 35 times since the start of last season. Zero. Billy? Two. One. One and 34. All over it. Split the difference. Fantastic. Good job.

you know, you talk about Damico Ryan splitting the baby. We're splitting the baby and coming up with the right answers here. One in 34, and they end up being the second team to win a game despite being outgained by that margin. So I think offensively, you know, I remember us talking after that first Broncos game and we're like, man, the broadcast is really being like Davis Webb. He's got a short lease. Chris Collinsworth saw that and was like, that's nothing. Wait until you hear me. He's like, Sean Payton could be taken over play calling to it.

He's in the third quarter of today's game. Trust me, I know Sean. He's not going to let this slide. They had 67 yards in the first half. I was like, this is kind of crazy that all of the analysts on these games are basically like Davis Webb. You have a short leash. Now, they got some things going. I don't think it was perfect.

I don't think it was a great offensive performance overall. And so now you look at it. I think they've had one good offensive game out of three. I think they're in an okay spot. You want to just pile up wins early in the season. but I still have quite a few questions about the Broncos' early season performance here. I don't like this.

You've got to pick aside here. You're getting right up to the line just called this team a fraud and then you're backing up. I think that they're going to turn this around. No, I didn't say that. Yeah, you said like the B-O game. I'm sticking with my pre-season

10 and 7 wild card team for the Broncos. Here's the thing. Okay, we have 18 weeks here. You got to paste yourself. Like there might be a week seven I want to call them a fraud or something. So I'm not doing that yet. People have a short memory, okay?

Like this week they're mad at us about the whole Brock Purdy situation. Tom, are they mad at you about that? I had to take myself off as a collaborator on the Instagram post with Billy's quarterback tears because my entire mentions was just people calling him a moron. I couldn't take it anymore. I decided to bail out. You get used to it. I'll say this on the Brockman's like the second half does count.

Yeah, the first. staff was not good. It's 16 to nothing and they're in a whole. But it seems like there's a little bit of they're kind of figuring out what their offensive identity is as a whole. It's not all Davis Webb. It's how are we using Jalen Wattle? How are we using Pat Bryant, who's one of the breakout stars in the NFL in the early portion of the season in terms of being a playmaker? They've had this rotation in the backfield because guys keep getting hurt. So you're trying to figure out those things. Bo Necks plays well in the big moments. And by the way, The Rams, who looked like they were coming out of the gate on both sides, the ball and were unstoppable, just kind of crumbled in that second half.

Now, they get an extremely unfavorable call, the Rams do. On the interception, which I saw that again. That game was replaying this morning when I was on the bike. I was just watching it going like, I don't know that that's, and there's any way you can convince me that's pass interference. But I believe it's Pat Brian on that play, right? Throw the arms up, soccer style. go down and draw the call. The Rams, no puka, no Miles Garrett,

Aaron Donald played 35 snaps, one quarterback hit, one tackle. This is probably what we should have expected from Aaron Donald out of the gate. He's been out of the game for a couple of years here. They look mortal right now. They're without some really, really good players, but they weren't able to finish it out.

Jalen Watson dislocated his shoulder. There were a lot of things going on with the Rams, but the team that everybody had anointed going in, once they got a little bit beat up, they're struggling to close out these games. Now I'll blame Sean McVeigh for being as frustrated as he was last night. I think that they, okay, first game, they were not good offensively, right? They had the second drive of the game,

68 yards. They score a touchdown against the Chiefs. The rest of the game, they didn't have a drive that went over 20 yards. That was a bad offensive performance. You said they had one good offensive performance. I'm assuming you're talking about last week when they played the Jaguars. It's the good offensive performance, right? So they had a 72-yard drive, a 76-yard drive, 45, 64, 56-50s, they had good drives put together.

This game, I think part of the problem was they didn't have many drives, right? So in the first quarter, they had one four-yard drive, and then they had a second drive that was 40-yard, they missed the field goal. The Rams just kind of controlled the ball. Second quarter, they had a short seven-yard drive to start, and then they had a 21-yard drive. They did nothing with that. So they had a bad first half. They weren't able to kind of hold on the ball, and they weren't able to milk clock at all. They had two drives and they both sucked and that was all they had.

Third quarter, they have the six-yard drive. They start off bad again. Then they have a nice 42-yard drive, 52-yard drive. Both of those are touchdowns. You made my head hurt, Billy. What's that? It's a lot of numbers. You're making my head hurt.

Keep going. Yeah, I'm just saying then they had like a nice 65-yard drive to end the game. They got bailed out by a pick six also, which got them back in the game. So like, the problem is they're not having long drives if they're not scoring. And then they don't get the ball back, so they're not able to score. But I think it was fine. I mean, they did okay. They had decent drives half of their drives.

It's just the Rams are a good team. I didn't think that, you know, that Rams would be one and two right now, did you? And they did get bailed out on the fact that they overturned an interception. But I'm not all down on the Broncos right now. Yeah, they don't have to apologize. They're a good team. They're a talented team.

Like you said, they beat a good team. September, I think that, you know, there is a theme around the NFL that September is about like piling up some wins and figuring out who you are. I'm just saying they do need to still, that's still on the to do list for. for them offensively is figure out who they are. But maybe in three, four weeks, it's going to look a lot different there.

But yeah, where are you struck by Collinsworth? I mean, Tom, what's with the, what's with the announcers here just being like, Sean Payton's going to grab that play sheet any moment now? This is twice in three weeks, both times they've been on national TV here. One, they all know Sean. And Sean, most people in the league would have said, you'll take that play sheet from his cold dead hands. It didn't work out that way.

there were organizational decisions made to hand it over to Davis Webb. Two, they spend like an hour with Sean in a production meeting talking about the offense, and I'm sure they can hear the way that he speaks about it, and he's going to sound like a guy who would call it a certain way and has certain things he'd like to see fixed. And then when they watch the game and those things are not fixed, they just assume that Sean is going to insert himself. I'm not saying you're saying that we get to January, and Davis Webb hasn't replaced as a play caller, I don't believe that's the plan.

I'm confident it's not. And I think that if you see more stretches like they had in the second half of that game last night, it's going to buoy the fact that, all right, this is a young, really bright coach who needs reps. He hasn't had that many. They did a preseason game last year. That's fine. But like, that's not this. He's doing it for the first time.

He's a really young guy. If you're going to invest in it, it's like a young player. You don't start a rookie middle lineback for two games, then go, no, that guy sucks. let's take it away from, let's play the veteran. And with a player, at least he can get back in the lineup. Once you take away the play calling from Davis Webb, it's over. You can't give it back to him. Maybe Sean finds ways here and there to, like, inject a play call.

He's clearly not doing it now because we all see him with his hands on his knees for that L4, L5 spine deal that he's got going on right now. But he's got the play sheet. I'm sure he's got designs on it. He's trying to let Davis Webb have some space. It's a really, really difficult job to have that microscope on you, both externally and internally every single week. They're also still only a game out of first in their division.

The world's not ending for them. They'll be fine. Yeah. Okay. All right, Billy. Pro boncos. I have a question. You like the horse?

What kind of bike were you riding there, Tom? It's like an exercise. I caught that too. I was wondering about that too. I mean, I'm not outside. Yeah. Watching a game, just to be clear, that would be against a variety of traffic laws. It's a branded bike, but I don't know who sponsors the show.

Who's your instructor? Yeah, can you give us the instructor name? So maybe we could take similar classes. That would be a tell. I like that. No free ads. I like that. But he is on a bike.

He is watching football while it's on. Okay, the other deodorant team here, the Minnesota Vikings. You know, nine first downs in that game. It made me a little bit nervous. Now, maybe it shouldn't. Maybe there's just going to be a team that they're going to win a lot of games and their defense is going to dominate every single week. But, man, that was kind of hard to watch that offense.

The Vikings have had so many different quarterbacks over the years, and I understand all the things. Kyler Murray's first game back. Justin Jefferson leaves the game. I'm not saying it has to look perfect. It doesn't even have to look average. But it's just something that, you know, we're keeping an eye on here at Kapadia headquarters

of what the Vikings are doing offensively because their defense is incredible through three weeks. I mean, Brian Flores just comes out with a bunch of guys who've never heard of and they're just dominating. But I think that's the point. I know you don't want to see Kyler miss the type of throws. You don't want to see the short drives. But this is strategic.

They have adopted the stance. We've got the best defense in the NFL. All we have to do is not mess it up. If we got a score, if at any point they fall down by 14 points, I think you'll see them open it up more. They did a little bit yesterday. Jordan Addison had a couple of big catches. They have the one big play.

They had the punt return touchdown. And other than that, they're kind of playing possum. That's their plan going in. They feel like we can win with defense as long as we don't mess this up. Don't have turnovers. Don't have Kyler throwing the ball into double coverage. He threw the pick on the first possession of his first game with the Vikings. Don't have that happen.

Right now, they had no Jefferson, as you mentioned, Sheel, for most of that games, he got hurt early. Aaron Jones is like dragging his leg. He's gutting it out because that need does not feel good. So he's trying to find his way. you know, Juan Jennings has been sort of a non-factor so far. Jordan Edison's kind of your main threat, but you don't need to do that much.

I guarantee you, if they fall behind, if it gets into a track meet type of game, they'll open it up and you'll see them throwing the ball down field more. But right now it's just like, hey, if the reed's not there, throw the ball away, we'll punt. We'll just punt over and over. We want a game of match for 152 yards last year. We'll play this way.

It might be ugly, but we're winning. We're 3 and 0. I don't see them backing off that even though they'd like to be more efficient, obviously, if they move forward. I guess, Billy, their job is not to entertain me, I guess, is what I'm learning here. Unfortunately, it's the hometown team for Tom

and he's fine with what's going on, so who are we to argue? 372-yard punting yards. If you like punting yesterday was for you, oh, Tampa, we had 426. Lots of punting in yesterday's game. I was going to give an incomplete, honestly, to the Viking because you're here saying, like, oh, B-O-Team, maybe something.

It's like, come on, Kyler's been out. the first two weeks, essentially. He's back this week. We're still kind of figuring this thing out if you're the Vikings. Here's the problem. It's week three. So it's early for everybody. But you know why, you still got to have some takes. You got to talk about what you observe. This was their success rate as a metric that just measures how often are you producing a positive play on offense. This was their worst offensive success rate in 20 years as a franchise. So all those those quarterbacks who played last year, they were actually producing a positive play at a lower rate in this game than any of those. So that's the only reason. My,

monitoring the situation. I probably now looking back, I think I could have rephrased the segment. You know, like we're monitoring the situation, something like that. That way you can't yell at me and say, Sheila, it's week three. They had this, this and this. I said, I'm monitoring the situation. Maybe we do that next week. Can I give you some good news? Yeah, please. Dolphins are coming to town next week. So they will get right next week if they're ever going to get right. With no Devon A chain. Yeah. With no Devon H& and you're going to go up against the best defense in the NFL. Maybe this is the week. Maybe this is the week you go in and you go, you know what? We can probably forward to turn it over a couple of times.

Like the dolphins of the team, they're well coached. I mean, they were in that game against the Chiefs, but they just, they don't have the horses right now. This is year one of a very long, a multi-year build. Maybe next week you are, Kyle, like, let's kind of have the training camp mentality. Let's, let's see what you can do. Let's try to get something going here. Although then he throws a couple of picks and the fans start to panic even more than they

already have about the offense. It's 3 and O. It might be ugly. Maybe this is the 2000 Ravens Trent Dilford style of play. It honestly, like, it's not a terrible comp other than you don't have Jamal Lewis in the backfield to run for 2,000 yards for you. Yeah. Listen, I picked him and bake the playoffs. I'm happy.

Keep piling up those wins. Yeah. KOC. Do you want another one, Tom, or are we taking a break here? Oh, bring it. What are you got? Okay. One last one.

I was thinking about Billy, what's the biggest surprise in the NFL this season? Yeah, we're through three weeks here. Nothing's concluded, but Chargers being 0 and 3, that surprises me. I thought they were going to be a playoff team. Texans being 0 and 3, that surprises me. I thought they were going to win that division. But you know what I landed on? What?

A team we probably haven't talked about enough, and I feel like we should talk about them now because they haven't had a lot of success in recent years. The Las Vegas Raiders being 3 and out. I mean, is this the story of the first three weeks of the season and you watch them? and it's not fluky. It's like, Kirk Cousins is just marching them down the field and Clint Kubiaks in his bag and Brock Bowers returned.

And it's like, is he just open on every single play? This is incredible. And here's the thing I like about him. You can tell a well-coached team when you're watching maybe one of those screens that you have on on Sunday. And they're mentioning guys who you've almost never heard of, like Cody White,

Hezekiah Masses, Mike Washington, Mike, Mike Washington, Jr. I mean, these guys are making monstrous plays. Like, that doesn't happen by accident. That, to me, if you're a Raiders fan,

you're like, that's the sign of our coach kind of knows what he's doing because no one expected anything from these guys and they're having major contributions and we're three and no. So, yeah, I think the Raiders deserve a little love here with their three and O star. I don't know anybody that was predicting them

to get off to such a hot start. And they've kind of flipped places with the Chargers. where the Chargers, it's like they look like they're going to be the last place team, and maybe the Raiders can be a little frisky here. Listen, they're playing for first in their division this week against the Chiefs. So, like, this is a sneaky big game for the Raiders, is it not? Biggest game in how long?

Price is the playoff season? That Chargers won on like a week 18, right? When was that one? Where was the weird? Are they going to try to tie or are they going to try to win that entire sequence? Like, that's got to be the last, like, truly big game. And it's in Vegas, right? So this is like on their home field, the black hole is going to be going absolutely bananas.

Yeah, the Raiders are a great call. These are all, you know, these are winnable types of games. You didn't look at the schedule and go, gosh, this is so tough. Other than I don't think we had them beating the Chargers. To me, though, the Chargers are still the biggest surprise. And, you know, yesterday was the most competent. It looked like the Chargers at least. But the offense and Justin Herbert just continues to scuffle so much.

much. You can honestly throw the Patriots in there too, Sheel, if you want to talk about biggest surprises. Them getting boat raced by the Jaguars is not a good omen. And Drake May, along with Herbert, the only person with a lower pass rating through three weeks that Herbert and Drake May right now is James Winston. That's where we are in the early stages of this season. I just think it's the Chargers. We talked about it a lot last week. Nobody thought they would lose two out of the gate to the Cardinals and the Raiders. Again, a couple of competent, looked more like the Chargers type of effort in Buffalo. The Bills, though, woke up and finished the game off, even on a week where it didn't look

like they were playing their best football. And it doesn't get any easier for L.A., because they're going to Seattle this week. We talked about that previously, though, with the Chargers who were like, they might improve, and it might just be too late when you look at their schedule. You know, if they're playing a different team, then maybe they win that game. But to have five takeaways, I know people have seen the stats already, but I'm sorry, I have to repeat it. Last 10 years, when the Chargers have created five takeaways, they're two and two.

The rest of the NFL when they create five takeaways, 66, 4, and 1. I mean, this is, I don't understand. It was like, you kept looking at the score going, how are the bills still in this game there? Every time I look up, they have another turnover. And the Chargers just couldn't take advantage of it. And it's like, Jim Harbaugh, I didn't even get to it with the game management stuff, because it's kind of the least of their concerns. but man, he's had a lot of fourth and ones, fourth and threes.

It's like, you're going up against Josh Allen. You might need to do more than just kick a field goal in this situation. And they just can't get out of their own way. Herbert with the interception and just all the other stuff going wrong with them. I almost feel like, Billy, we're chargers out. It's like, is there anything else left to say at this point other than what are they going to do at the end of the season? I mean, they've also had really big drops on wide open passes that would have changed. try. So like, even sometimes

Herbert, it's like, okay, if Herbert's going to hit Quinn Johnson in the chest and he's going to drop it, like what else can he do here? But, man, that felt like the game that they needed to steal. Like five turnovers. That one was there and it was ready for them to kind of write the ship. Yesterday, the Seahawks showed us that they are beatable.

So maybe, you know, you go in, you're like, okay, like you get a little roll on here. We beat the bills on the road. The worst thing that could have happened to the Chargers, by the way. You want Seattle flying high at 3 and 0 and things to be a cable. You don't want them having all week and having Mike McDonnell and the staff

being like, cannot happen again. That's the worst thing. I'm listening to the commanders. Worst thing that could happen to the Chargers with now the Seahawks headed back home. There is another O and 3 team that just lost its quarterback.

We'll talk about the latest on Baker and the Bucks after this. This episode is brought to by Orgain. Go harder and push farther with Orgain creatine. It helps improve muscle size, strength and power when combined with a regular exercise and weight training routine. Orgain creatine is certified with informed choice, which means it's tested for prohibited substances

in sports. Upgrade your performance with organ creatine, available at Amazon, Costco, Walmart, and Whole Foods. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Some pretty key injuries coming out of the week three Sunday in the NFL. We mentioned Devon A-chan, torn ACL, out for the season in Miami. Wasn't going to be the difference when them winning the Super Bowl or not, but that much harder for the dolphins, even just to try to function now on offense.

They thought their best player. Giants lose their best defensive player in Brian Burns to a torn ACL. We talked earlier in the show about the quarterback moves that they've made. This is honestly part of why they didn't trade Kvon-Tibodil is at least they have depth at that position, but Burns is the tone setter that everything comes from on that defense. He got it out if you're not practicing, and now he's out big there. J.C. Horn, Panthers Corner, this one cannot be overstated. It's a quad injury. It's got a really wide time frame. He's getting additional opinions, but it's minimum six weeks

from what I'm told. So he'll go on injured reserve, be out for a long time. And now the Panthers, Adrian Ovaro, are going to have to try to, you know, stick this thing together. You hope Bryce Young is okay. He got a little bit banged up in that game. You hope the offense bounces back after a tough day in Cleveland, but it's not going to be easy defensively. And then there's Baker Mayfield, who was in a ton of pain,

you know, not making light of it, but like if we start, we may have to start a list, shield, of people who appeared to be in the most pain on the field. Like Caleb Williams was up there, Baker might have topped it in terms of like how much like audio-visional.

you had of the level of pain dislocates his thumb and you could see it on the replays. The thumb basically disappears. He's following through four fingers, no thumb. They went underwent test. There's no ligament or tendon damage. There was no fracture.

So he's going to get back. The problem is like this is not 1990s Brett Farr where you break your thumb and like they tape it up and you go throw. Like he's got to get the grip strength back. He's as tough as anybody. This is not a lot. a toughness issue is a functionality issue, which means barring something wild happening,

Jalen Daniels, who played like 19 years at Kansas, is going to be stepping in for an 0 and three bucks team shield that needs a win. This is tough because I could make the case, if Baker Mayfield were healthy, I could see myself making the case, the bucks are going to be okay. It's not a great division because if you look at their first three games and how they lost those games, week one, they have, what, four turnovers against the Bengals week two, they have the weird weather delay, they have a chance to win that game on the final possession. And then week three, their defense plays terrific.

I mean, Brian Flores deserves credit, but Todd Bowles had the Vikings offense in a blender for that game as well as we just discussed on the previous segment. So I could be like, you know what, there's still a lot of talent on this team. Baker Mayfield's going to be okay. But now you're 0 and 3 and you're going to be without him. And to your point, you're starting a rookie quarterback. I don't know if things could possibly get ugly here. if they're a team that Billy all of a sudden

we're checking out. Tom's got a tweet out that they actually made a move for a veteran quarterback you know, do they try to salvage their season and do something like that. It really feels like it could go either way for that. Well, I believe unless the internet fooled me, which it did not fool us on the Martin Luther King quote last week. Amazing. Confirmed, yeah.

I believe that Todd Bowles said the good thing about being Owen Thruz were only a game out of first place, which is absolutely true and just incredible that they're in that division. It's funny how you said this is not nice. 1990 you can't just tape up the thumb like he's Brett Farf? Because I was thinking like, if you tape it strong enough, you can pretty much tape that thumb into place, right?

And then just do almost like the cast or like the tips of his fingers are loose and he has like the motorcycle type thing. Just that one thumb is in place to hold the ball. But I guess we're not going to be going that route, Tom says, with Baker. Which is funny because like Baker is notoriously tough to his own detriment, right? And he will go out there and he will play through things he shouldn't play through because he's just like that guy. And for him to sit out because of a thumb

has to kill him with all the other things he's played through, I would think. Jalen Daniels, by the way, I was only slightly exaggerating. Six years of Kansas, the rare guy who played six college football seasons without transferring. How far back does he go?

I just pulled up. I didn't realize this. Jalen Daniels first college game it's in 2020 in the COVID season against Coastal Carolina. Isaiah likely had a touchdown. That's a long, Gailin Daniels was playing college football.

A guy who's now on his second contract in the NFL went up against him in that very first game. I haven't gotten the sense, even back in camp, I didn't get the sense the Bucks were trying to trade for a veteran quarterback, even though he looked at their roster. It was like they got Jake Browning behind Baker and then this undrafted rookie. They felt that strongly about Jalen Daniels and the juice and everything that he brought to the table. And he's essentially a veteran at this age. They thought he could step in. but same point they made on James Winston, which is, yeah, they re-signed James,

they gave them an extension. No team sets up their roster going, yeah, we put the backup quarterback in for 14 or 15 games. Let's see how this week goes. Let's see what the Bucks may or may not try to do, try to bring in a veteran here. One more question. Feels like we've got another one every single week

about the quarterback position. We are back on Wednesday here on the Ringer NFL show. Thanks to everybody for tuning in today, wherever it is that you tuned in for Arjuna, Chris, the whole team behind the scenes. Billy and Shield, I'm Tom C. 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in D.C. or Wyoming? Gambling problem. Call 1-800 gambler or 1-800-Myreset.

Call 1-888-7-8-9-77 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or visit MD Gamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit Gamblinghelpline, MA.org, or call 800-32750 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts or call 18778-8-Hope-N-Y or text Hope N.Y in New York. For Louisiana, call 1-877-7-7-7-8-67.