The Ringer NFL Show - Everyone’s a Contender in 2017 (Ep. 167)

Episode Date: October 24, 2017

The Ringer’s Robert Mays and Kevin Clark wrap up Week 7 in the NFL by looking at how this bizarre season has made for the most possible contenders at this point in the year (3:55), why the Seahawks and Vikings are the only teams we actually know right now (11:20), and whether the Patriots can win a title with the worst defense in the league (25:20). Then 'Talk the Thrones' cohost Mallory Rubin joins to explain how Joe Flacco admitted that the Ravens are completely broken (39:00) and why the Steelers don’t need Martavis Bryant (49:10). Finally Robert and Kevin offer their lasting impressions from Week 7, including why the NFL needs to dial back the amount of football on television (56:30). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Ringer NFL show. Part of the Ringer Podcast Network. I'm Robert Mays, joined as always by Kevin Clark. How you doing, bud? I've been run over by the Wenswagon. Man, you looked really good last night. A year after totally overreacting to Wence, calling him a top 10 quarterback, and then getting, I guess, the Wenswagon backed up over me after that.

Yeah, it did. It did, yes. And now it's pulling forward and is back over me again. Let's talk about Carson Wens for two minutes here. We're going to get into the Eagles and just there, overall kind of potency in the NFC. But I want to discuss the way we've treated Carson Wens, both on this podcast and in America. He was not one of the best quarterbacks in the league through four weeks last year.

That was a little overreaction there. It was a little too fast. And I think that he was bad over the second half. He had flashes of being a solid quarterback. He was a rookie. A lot of guys can come back from terrible seasons, and his season wasn't even that terrible. Look what Jared Goff is doing.

So pardon me if I wanted to see a couple games of Carson and Wens, looking really good before I was ready to anoint him. He looks very good right now. And I think considering kind of the quarterback void that exists, we've talked about it a little bit, Roger's getting hurt, you know, kind of that 2004 class falling off a little bit further and faster than they have previously. Rathesberger looked fine last week, but you know what I'm talking about. There is a spot to be filled.

There are a couple spots to be filled. And he seems to be doing that right now. And I feel comfortable saying that, considering we've seen it a couple times. after what happened last season, I'm sorry and, you know, pardon me if I'm going to take a little bit of time to say this guy's really good. Carson went without play action last night. So I have some PFF, 151 pass a rating without play action. I mean, I just think he's just a good quarterback. Yeah, and he's making stuff happen to.

I mean, just getting out of plays and extending stuff and. Yeah, scrambling. Yeah, everything. I mean, everything you want to see. You know, there's not just one single thing. I think he played a complete game last night against a banged-up secondary, but a defense that's been pretty good. Even without Josh Norman, they've played solid.

And I was very impressed. I mean, I think that I'm going to be very impressed. He looks like just a good quarterback. Yeah, no, we got spoiled by, and we've talked about this on every podcast for a year, we got spoiled by that sort of golden generation of quarterbacks. This is what happens to a normal rookie quarterback. They have ups and downs, and then they establish themselves. That's it.

That's the arc. And so not everyone. comes in as a finished product. And so Wence had trouble last year. He lost Lane Johnson. He had a receiving core as bad as ending in the league last year. Those things were solved. Credit to Hallie Roseman.

And, you know, Doug Peterson is an NFL coach. Yeah, they look good. I didn't say he's a good NFL coach. He's just, he's an NFL coach, which is just a totology. By definition, he is an NFL coach. Yeah, but some NFL coaches are not an NFL coach. That's a fair point. And also, by the way, I said the Eagles

were going to be like the 10th best team in the league, what everyone else said they were going to be bad. So I don't understand why everyone thinks I hate the Eagles. Like, I'm the one who picked the Eagles to make the playoffs. This goes back to a point we've been making. Everyone confuses every ringer NFL person for the other person. So I get sometimes, like, criticisms about Doug Peterson. People are like tweeting at me.

They're like, can't believe we said about Peterson? And I'm like, well, that was Michael Lombardi. I'm the guy who said the other stuff. All right. Well, we'll get into our Twitter trolls later. But we are seven weeks into the NFL season. and the league keeps getting weirder every single week. Lots to talk about today.

We're going to chat with Mallory Rubin, the host of Talk the Thrones, binge mode host, just all around great human being. Our boss. Our boss, yes. That's not why I'm saying that. Even when she wasn't my direct boss, I would have said that to her. This feels like a need, and we need to throw that in there. She is here to talk about the Ravens.

Everything else is happening in the AFC North. Before we get to all of that, let's get to our four downs, our four biggest stories from week six. Kevin, for first down, you know, we're going to zoom out. out a little bit here. We're going to have some broader discussions. I feel like over the course of this podcast, it's a good time for that as we're near the midpoint of this season. We've talked all

year about how there are no truly great teams this season. Everybody is in the middle. They're mired and kind of mediocrity. If the Eagles had lost, it'd be the first time in three decades or hadn't been one lost team at this point in the season. And even with the Eagles, I mean, I think everybody is closer to the middle

and further from the polls than they've been in a long time. We've talked about the downsides of that. Fewer stars right now, guys getting hurt. Fewer great teams. The league just doesn't have this inertia to it that drives interest. The flip side of that is that with all these teams around the middle, no one is really out of it. And I think that kind of makes for a fascinating reality. Which teams are you comfortable just saying, nope, they're done. There's no possible way they make the playoffs. Yeah, I mean, the Browns and the Giants. Yep. And the Colts. Oh, yeah, yeah. I think those are probably the three. And the same for the 49ers. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

There are four teams. It's bad for the Colts and the. not your side. I didn't even think of them among bad teams. Yeah, exactly. You've written them off. They're so irrelevant in your mind. So thoroughly and efficiently that I'm just like, nah, they're not even among the bad teams. But even that list of four is a small list. And I think you can start to pile on other teams there. The Cardinals are going to have a hard time without Palmer. You know, it's easy to kind of build these cases as to why more teams don't have a shot. But within the standings, they do. And I think that's kind of made for just a new world that we we're not used to this deep into the season.

I mean, how do you feel watching some of these teams knowing that we can't really write half the league off? It's as weird a season as I can remember. This is a couple things. Number one, football outsiders released that stat last week that there has never been a tighter bunch of teams from, I think, number two to number 30 in the history of DVOA. They are just bunched together in a way they never have been before. I've written why that is. A lot of that is the contract stuff that we talked about last week that teams are just built in a weird way to not be super. There's no way to have a super team in the NFL anymore.

I think the practice time is massive. There are five or six things that are coming together and they're conspiring against good play in the league. Do you think they're conspiring against good play in the league or do you think they're conspiring against like dissolving parity in the league? I think that the play has been fine. I think the play has generally been shittier than it has. been. I don't know if that's necessarily true. I think that there were seven teams and the failed to score offensive touchdown on Sunday. No, that's fair. Sunday was a weird one for that. But I'm thinking more like that Kansas City Oakland game. I get that. But we can't just

keep saying, well, Sunday was a weird one for that. And then all of a sudden that we say that every Sunday. Yeah, but there, I mean, there were not three shutouts every single week. I mean, that was an aberration. I understand that. But the Kansas City, Oakland's of the world are the exception, not the rule. That's fair. I mean, a 31.30 game where there are literally three plays run with no time on the clock, that's special. I think the better example of the NFL in 2017 is the Bears and the Panthers in which no one knows how to do anything. Yeah, that's fair.

Except score defensive touchdowns. Yeah, which is fun in its own right. Did you see that the Panthers are scoring less than the Ravens? Which is so bizarre because the Panthers had those two weeks where it look like they're like, all right, they found themselves a little bit. They're moving the ball and then now it's just dissolved the other way. Yeah, all right. Back to the issue at hand. Not to get off track and start talking about the Panthers' offense and the Bears' defense.

But I just think that there's a million things that's coming together. And I don't know. I think the NFL would rather have a few established teams at this point. I agree with that. The reason Sunday Night Football is the top rated show on television, not sports, not football. The top rated show on television is because there's always an established group of teams at this point. Last year, there were, what, five teams that started 6'0? And a similar number the year before of either undefeated teams or five and one teams or six and one teams.

I mean, we have that every year and we have the Eagles this year. And I don't even know if a lot of America is buying them. I think they're good, certainly. But at this point, I don't know what the league does because the Steelers, the Lions, the Sunday night game this week. Does anybody want to see that? I guess, yeah. That's fine. That's better than the alternative.

It's better than some of the games you got in prime time. Raiders and Dolphins is the next week. That's garbage. And also like Ravens Dolphins this week is, holy shit, is that bad. Thursday night! Oh. When it's on, it's on. When it's on, it's on.

Jeez. I just think the NFL is getting into a problem where the parody is good in the same way the parody was good for baseball and it made revenue go up because teams stayed in it and fans stayed involved. But I think the NFL makes its money on big matchups. I agree with that. And I think that it's worse for the NFL. Well, for me, November 13th, Monday night, Dolphins Panthers.

Good luck with that, buddy. Man, I will not be watching that. So here's my thing. I think that for the league, that's correct. And I wrote about this a couple weeks ago when Rogers got hurt. And the lack of great teams, the problem with that has been compounded with the players going away. I mean, the fact that you can't even sell Green Bay, not as a great team, but with one player. And those teams have become fewer and fewer as those guys have gotten hurt.

So I think that there's a host of problems affecting the league as far as just, again, that inertia that drives the interest. Football is football. We know what it is. We're going to keep watching it because of A, B, and C, reasons. A and B are now gone. So what is C reason? The one thing the NFL is not done efficiently is build up a fun sort of side show like the NBA has. Eric Bledsoe tweeted I don't want to be here and everyone thought it was sort of funny everyone talked about it

it would like dominated the headlines Martavis Bryant who I would say is significantly better than Eric Bledso would we say that sure probably yes

I mean he's obviously has he's been suspended for an entire year and all that but like the off field stuff isn't viewed as fun and interesting as much as it is in the NBA I think it's fun and interesting

we do we do because we know who these players are and all that but I'm saying the general consciousness does not view it the same way. I think the NFL needs to do a better job of selling its, I guess you would say, reality show type drama like other sports have. This is my overarching theory of football. In a way, it plays into exactly what we're talking about.

The league is so homogenous that there isn't this individual aspect of these teams. These teams don't have individual personalities the way that they're run. Some do because it's so poor, but they're so grouped together that there isn't this like flaming train wreck of an owner in Robert Sarver in the NFL. There are a couple versions that are close, but we don't get quite that bad. I think that's part of the problem is that the league is so similar and so uniform that you're not going to have these situations where it's a sideshow, where you can just point to it and start laughing. It doesn't happen as often. Right, exactly. The NFL needs to have more fun.

Yeah, I agree. That's the note for everything. And also looking at the stats, Eric Bloodsoe and Martavis Bryant are the same person. It's like 15 points a game versus, you know, 800 receiving yards when you're healthy. That's like the same thing. comparison. Let's spend 10 minutes breaking that down. I'm going to get all these nerds in the Twitter mentions, just yelling about this comparison.

Oh, they're going to crush you about basketball analytics. I don't care. All right, second down. Second and goal from the 22, McKissick out of the backfield, and Wilson's going to lay it up on the top. Doug Baldwin is in. Touchdown! Just as you start to lose a little bit of faith, Russell Wilson with a beautiful

rainbow and Doug Baldwin just runs away from the coverage into the end zone, and the Seahawks take the lead. Just as you start to lose a little faith is interesting because I think that's kind of what we want to talk about here on second down. With all the uncertainty in the league right now, there are a couple teams I think we can rely on. There's so much up in the air, we do know who they are. And for you, Kevin, that's the Seahawks.

And why don't you lay that out for me? Is there any clearer sign that the Seahawks are back than them fighting on the sidelines? No, probably not. Let us know they're in mid-season form. I'm worried when I look at the Seahawkside line and they're not fighting. That's where I'm out right now. So a brief history, 2014, they start 3 and 3. And then in 2015, they started 2 and 4 and then 4 and 5 that season.

And both years, they recovered. This is a team that is designed to peak at two times. In the second half of games, you get better as the game goes on because of their physicality and because of their conditioning and all that, and their defense, obviously, and their ability to make plays, explosive plays, and the second half of the season. They're primed for both those things.

They've obviously, against the Colts and the Giants, just taken off in the second half, just destroyed those teams after a little bit of trepidation. The big issue for them, and this coaching staff laid it out, was how many explosive plays they were giving up. I think that they can solve that. I think they have the defensive talent to do that.

I think you make a Sheldon Richardson trade so close the season's going to take a little while to jail. I think the Seahawks know. They're one of the teams we talk about who understand that the first two months of the season are extended preseason now. And the November and December is what really matters. So if you're telling me right now

that essentially the Seahawks are four and two and they've looked kind of this disjointed, they're going to go on a run, buddy. I'm thinking like 12 and 4 maybe. We talked about this last week, just what team you felt best about in the NFC and I don't understand why they wouldn't be right there after the Eagles.

I mean, separate from the Eagles who definitely look like the best team in the conference right now. Who is next? I think that Seattle was a reasonable answer to that question. I think New Orleans is interesting right now, and we'll talk about them a little bit later, but I feel like they have the right combination of stuff at this point that they can be pretty potent on the stretch. But Seattle is just that rare team this year, and that's what we want to talk about here, is that we know the Seahawks. The Seahawks, the same players are involved, the same style is involved.

Russell Wilson is healthy, so you know he's going to find it. those plays are going to be there and they were on Sunday. The defense is going to get there. I think the Jeremy Lane being hurt and them kind of having some moving pieces there is a factor. Cliff Averill is not playing. They're trying to figure out that element of things. So there are a couple of things missing. I think that's why they haven't necessarily clicked right away.

The Richardson trade is another good example. But they always do something to the point. They never click right away. They're designed to never click right away. We know the Seahawks are going to be there. The defense is going to coalesce by the end of the season. They're going to be formidable. That's just how Seattle is.

As long as those guys are there, it's going to be the case. And I think that my team that's similar to that and the one that I feel good about just kind of week in, week out, this is the team we're getting. It's based on the defense as well, and it's Minnesota. And I feel like we saw that again on Sunday. Like the Seahawks, we know the guys involved in this Minnesota defense. Same group we've seen for a couple years now. They're good. Defensive line is excellent.

Everson Griffin had two more sacks. I'm going to talk about him a little bit later. But Hunter's playing great. Anthony Barr's back. Harrison Smith playing well. I mean, the guys that we've seen and kind of put our faith in that we know a little bit about football, how it's supposed to be played, they're doing it again. And I think that those are the teams that are rare right now, but I think those are the two best examples. On Sunday, they're going to come out.

We're going to know what that team is. And with Minnesota, it's a little bit more problematic on offense because we don't know who the quarterback is. And then Diggs has been hurt a little bit, but they've been solid on that side of the ball. So I feel like in a league where there's very little to latch onto both of those teams have given that to us. And I think it's just because of continuity of personnel on one side of the ball. Case Keenham, if he's starting a playoff game against anybody, do you think they're going to win? If there's no other quarterback who comes back, do you trust Case Kim to win a playoff game in a vacuum?

I think Case Keenum can win a playoff game with that team. I love this. I love the NFL in 2017, because I agree with you. This is great stuff. Because I'm just thinking about their offense. And this is another one of those teams that kind of tracing what they were going to be coming into the season. You had a plan.

And then you hoped you were. were right because I like the way this team is built and they were that team. Dalvin Cook was excellent and of course it sucks as he got hurt, but those two tackles being a real NFL players has made such a huge difference. I mean, it's really shown up. Their offense has functioned. And when Diggs and Thielen are in there, it's like, okay, they're cooking with gas. This is fun.

And even with Keenham in there, I kind of have faith in that collection of players, which is weird. I can't believe I'm saying that, but I think we're on the same page here. I love this league. it's pretty ridiculous you can have your eric blood so we've got case keenum yeah exactly right all right let's get to third down which is kind of on the opposite end of things here this is the batch that has shown their true colors but in a bad way yeah so we got into the you know which teams don't are out of the playoffs but i think that this is a different conversation slightly this isn't which teams are out of it this is which teams are just a complete and utter

disaster so far so the two teams we're going to discuss are the browns and the colts yes The Browns lost the Titans. They looked... Did they look worse than they have? They had a chance to win this game. They stopped people on defense. They had a chance to win this game. On offense, they're changing quarterbacks now every half.

They've gone full spurious. That is my problem with this entire thing. My problem is they have a bit of an identity crisis where like, are they trying to develop these young guys or not? You mean the quarterback? Yes. Or anybody. I don't know. You know, Drew Bill Peppers was out over the weekend.

But, like, I mean, I just, at some point, you just need to either play Kaiser, play Kessler, whatever. I mean, where was Cody Kessler the first six weeks of the season? This is my concern with the Browns. And I may write about this later in the week, but just kind of why it's been as bad as it has this season and why it shouldn't have been. What the hell are they doing a quarterback? What is the reason to yank a guy every half? You're going to be bad. We know this.

Why wouldn't you choose one guy, let him go down. or somehow managed to fight on and try to develop as a young quarterback. Do you think, I mean, the conversation we just freaking had about Jared Gough and Carson Wentz, Jared Gough was as bad as you can be as a rookie quarterback last year. Historically bad. And I understand that the coaching change is what helps kind of pull him out of that. But if you think you were going to try to develop a quarterback of the future, why wouldn't you just let him get as many reps as possible?

You're literally going to lose anyway. Exactly. And so I just don't understand why in my. Maybe Kevin Hogan's the guy. I think we clearly know he's not. I mean, just watching him, he's not an NFL quarterback. Maybe Cody Kessler's the guy. Just put one in and let him play because you're going to lose anyway.

And I just don't understand all the mind games and all the, well, I guess Sean Kaiser is out on Friday night. Cool. You drafted a guy in the second round, high in the second round, and he has a lot of talent. Why wouldn't you try to let him work through some of this stuff? I mean, you drafted Kessler in the third round the year before, before Dak Prescott. The entire approach with the quarterbacks is driven. me crazy. A third round pick is a high pick for a quarterback. Sure. That's fair. Both those guys should have gotten a fair shake. But isn't the Deshaun Kaiser pick kind of an indictment of what you thought

of Kessler was a rookie? Sure. But first of all, passing on Wens' is an indictment of the entire regime because we know what he is. The Wence thing is a perfect example and I think that it's a really good way to think about this. So just hypothetically, let's drop Carson Wence onto last year's Browns. The offensive line was horrible. Okay. They went out and they spent some money on it this year to try to shore that up. The offense line was horrible. They had no one to throw the ball to. So you have one half of the factors that Carson Wentz faced as a rookie. He didn't know to throw the ball to. Now the offensive line is also bad. I think that in part, why Carson Wentz has been able to succeed after a season and a half of starts is that he was never beat up as a

rookie. The line was fine. He missed Johnson, but for the most part, they're NFL players in that offensive line. There weren't in Cleveland. Now you have a complete team around. Carson Wentz in Philly with the receivers that they've added. Ertz looks great. He's healthy now. The line has been very good. They lose Peters, but that's beside the point. The group they started with is excellent.

And I think that helps facilitate development. In a way, I think that's what Cleveland was trying to do. If we're going to probably be bad again, I think they're going to win five games, that they're still going to be terrible. Let's try to find the quarterback after we've developed some sort of support system for him. It's a good plan. They've just done a terrible job in following through on that plan in a few different ways. I mean, the Browns did go out and build an offensive line.

They're not running. The line's fine. The line is not my problem. The John Thomas thing is a whole different issue. It's that they've made the wrong decisions in a lot of other ways. The players they picked at receiver, Corey Coleman's heard just on the do about that. The Kenny Britt signing has been a disaster, like an unmitigated disaster to give him that money. Terrible.

Every choice they've made about who should run their defense has been a disaster. Coaching-wise. Yes. So the coaching decisions that have been made plus some of the individual player decisions that have been made have been poor. and I think that you can have the best plan in the world, but if you don't pick the right guys, both in the booth and on the field, then the plan doesn't matter.

Right. And that's sort of what I'm getting at is when you're doing a long, exhausting rebuild, you have to make a lot of good decisions or you can just make one good decision and that good decision is drafting a good quarterback. But I don't know if that one good decision matters if you've made so many other poor decisions.

That's what I'm trying to say about dropping Wentz into that. I think we have a fundamental disagreement on this Because I think that a great quarterback masks a franchise's flaws. But I don't know if you can make a great quarterback with an inherently flawed franchise, except for a couple very rare cases. It's a chicken or egg thing that's very hard for me. But great quarterbacks are a rare case. So if Carson Wentz is that, I know he's at least a good quarterback.

If Carson Wentz is a great quarterback, he will solve everything. That's what great quarterbacks do. Full stop. Okay. Is Carson Wentz that I do not know? We don't know yet. It's a second season. That's why it's tough for me.

Carson Wentz, the Browns would be so much better if they drafted him. The Browns would be a reasonable franchise if they drafted Carson Wentz. That may be true. I think there would be a reasonable franchise. Obviously, certainly not at the elite level where he masks having Greg Williams as an defensive coordinator, but a good quarterback, a great quarterback does that. And I think in two or three years, he would do that. In the same way, luck did that.

So let's get to that team for just a quick second here because we talked about the Browns for a long time. The Colts are also kind of a disaster. there. And I feel like they're a disaster in a different way just because Andrew Luck is there. And my question is now, I mean, Peter King, I believe, reported this weekend that it was the Patriots who called about Prissette to Indianapolis and that they probably wouldn't even made that call if it weren't for the pets wanting Philip Dorset. Do we think the Colts knew how bad this Andrew Luck situation was? Do we think they knew he would just be out for maybe this season?

Or do you think that this has kind of happened in waves and there was no way for them to combat this in a source? smart way. I think they knew it was a serious injury. They at least had to play out in their mind if they had any functional intelligence that if he misses half the season, then he might as well not play in the second half because they're going to be like one and seven, two and six. So at that point, just sit in the entire year and plan for that. So I think that there was a, you know, the weird thing, this sort of elephant in the room was that this was a make or break year for Pagano. So it's sort of unfair for Pagano because you're giving him just the shittiest team imaginable

to try to coach for his job. But on the other hand, What did Pagano do when he had Andrew Locke? Yeah, that's not what I'm concerned about this. I think the decision that I would be critical of is not giving Chuck McGano a terrible team his last year is probably their head coach. It's, did you really think that Scott Tolzeen was a viable candidate to play for half for all of the season if Andrew Luck was not your quarter? Crazy. Absolutely crazy. And they didn't, I was there in training camp.

I do not consider myself a great NFL scout. I could tell, even if I had like, you know, get. and got hit by a football and he only had one eye and was standing 300 yards away, I could have told you Scott Tolzeen was not ready to play in the NFL. I mean, we've seen him obviously in Green Bay and all that, but I was looking at him in training camp

weeks before he was about to make his NFL start and I said this guy is going to be a massive disaster. And I know there are a shortage of quarterbacks. It's very hard to say our quarterback is bad. How do we fix that? I mean, there are a lot of teams that would like to do that, but it just feels like there was probably a better

solution than just saying this is what we're going to do. And it would have gone horribly bad. Can you imagine how bad that team would be if Jacoby Perciat was not the quarterback? If Tolzine was still in there? Yeah. It'd be unwatchable. The league would have to step in and remove them from the league. Oh, man. Tyoy Hilton is the only person who knows

what's going on. He blamed the offensive line. That's true. That's again, but Sunday was a great day for like outbursts on social media and that were kind of distributed via social media. I mean, TY. Hilton or Tavis Bryant, the league is doing that now. Guys are just the same to do you anymore.

No one thinks it's funny. I think it's hilarious. I think it's great. I think it's hilarious. Why would you give you if you were T.Y. Hilton anymore? Like T.Y. Hilton is like, man, this offensive line sucks. And meanwhile, like NBA Twitter is like, whoa, Janus is tweeting about smoothies. But to be fair, to the offensive line in Indianapolis, there were some decent, the coverage sacks were readily available.

When you get sacked 11 times, it's not about the offensive line. It's not about the offensive line. It's about the franchise. Exactly. All right. Let's get the fourth down here. second down and five at the 11 white stands to the left of brady and the gun two receivers to the right now cooks in motion they flip it to cooks on a sweep cooks to the 10 cooks to the five

with a blocker and cooks into the end zone for the touchdown brandon cooks patient waiting for the block to come from gronkowski when it did the door opened and he scoots in for six to give new england a six nothing league this week was interesting because the primetime games gave us a look at what are presumably the contenders in each conference. I mean, they're supposed to do that, but that hasn't always been the case this year. So the Chiefs lost to Oakland on Thursday, obviously. Patriots knocked off an Atlanta team that, who knows what the hell is happening there. And then the Eagles looked excellent against Washington last night.

If you're betting on it right now, do you feel like the teams that come out of these conferences are the teams we saw in prime time this weekend? Oof. No. Because Seattle. Yeah. I mean, I think Seattle, this is a great question. Kansas City, I still really like them,

but I don't think there's so much better than I'm ready to stop the fight. Yeah, I agree with that. I also feel like Kansas City has kind of stepped into that flawed group of teams that the rest of the league inhabits, but we didn't think they did. I mean, their defense does,

it looks like it has issues right now. And we just kind of rode off because they look so good early in the season. Like, oh, they'll be fine without Eric Barry. You know, like, oh, Terrence Mitchell's great. You know, he's breaking up passes. They're throwing 30 passes out of him a game.

He's fine. We're starting to see the seams now with the chiefs. Their offense is still going to be fun. I mean, they're putting up points left and right. I think that group is really good. But again, they are not a spotless team. And there are very few of them. But we thought Casey might have been an exception.

They're none. Yeah. I mean, honestly, I think the Eagles are the best team right now. I think they're playing the best. I feel the best about them. I think so, too. I think so too, but only in the way, and this is what I discussed last week.

some point when you're the six and one team and everybody else looks like crap you're the good team that's it we can't we can't keep searching for the team that's for real because it's right in front of us so let's piece together philly a little bit here i feel like we talked about wence a lot that's a known quantity right now the defense has been fine for most of the season believe they're 15th in db oa coming into the week they didn't have fletcher cox for half their games he's back he was excellent again last night that front can just take games over and they're going to do that They're going to get Darby back probably next week. And with Robinson and Darby, that works.

Mills has been fine. We'll see how that entire rotation fits. That defense is going to be good. And the offense has been better than I even anticipated. The one thing now is you lose Peters and is that going to be a domino effect sort of deal. You put Vitae at left tackle probably. They didn't, I think that's what they're going to do just because continuity matters. And if you're going to screw up your offensive line, why screwed up in two places?

you know, put Vitae next to Brooks when he doesn't play next to him. Let, let Johnson stay there and figure it out. We'll see what they end up doing. But these are the sorts of things that, okay, now the Eagles have an issue. Just feel like every single team weekly something happens where it's like, God damn it. Just be good. Just continue to be good. Why can't this happen?

You really want this? I just want, I mean, they looked great. I don't want injuries to be the reason that like, oh, this is going to be sabotaged now. Jason Peters was playing excellent. And now he's out for the year. and the Eagles' offensive line starts to slowly fall apart. I just think that's a shitty way to go. That'd be terrible.

I'm rooting for it. I would love a good Philadelphia team. That'd be great. I like them. I think that they're a version of the team I thought they could be coming in the season with Wentz being even better than I figured. And the defense being not quite as dominant, but still a good group.

How do you feel about New England right now? New England is going to be New England. They're going to win a playoff game. Do I think they're going to make the super? I mean, it just comes down to how flawed can, New England team B and still be the favorites because that's what we're dealing with right now. That conversation changes this season also

which I think is worth considering. Is that because they're super flawed or because there's no other teams that are really emerging in the AFC? I think there are no, everyone is super flawed. I think that's the reason that it's a different this year than it would have been two years ago. And so it gets into, and this is something I've talked to people in the league and they don't have an

answer. I've talked to you and you and I certainly don't have answers. In a league where we know for the past 36 months that every team has a massive flaw, what flaws matter the least? And can you get away with the 32nd rank defense? I don't know. We're about to find out. This is kind of a weird take, but stay with me here. The most analogous sport to football, I think, is Formula One racing. And what the formula is, is they literally change basically how the engines work. And so every couple of years, the entire sport literally changes. And, you know, cars are built differently and the teams work

around the clock, figuring out the different advantages you can have or whatever. And that's sort of how we need to view football. And it's how teams view football. It's how Belichick views football. But that's not how we view football. What's changed is that the Patriots used to be two years ahead of everybody. They used to get the plans for that new engine. Two years.

Like if it was that Belichick planning for the 2017 season, he got those engine blueprints two years ago. They will, to be fair, they got the plan because they had bugged headquarters. Yeah. Did you see Belichick affected the weather on some? I did. But no, what I'm saying is that the sport changes every five years and you just need to view it and don't care about conventional wisdom from five years ago. The only thing I care about is maybe the past three seasons, maybe the past three seasons, okay? Because the sport just changes and gets flipped on its head all the time. And so with regards to a defense, I don't, I can't say if that defense is too bad to make the Super Bowl, because we haven't had that many years of this current iteration of the sport.

it's totally fair and I think I think in a way we have in the sense that I've always felt the safest way to build a contender was to have a very good offense and hope your defense is good just because offense is more consistent from year to year statistically it always has been you can have a random year defensively I'm thinking about the 2006 Indianapolis Colts so I think that when you look at teams like that one of the reasons I feel really good about New Orleans right now is the offense is what we thought it was going to be in a slightly different version they're running the ball really well and Kamara is a fact and that kind of stuff. But if the defense is solid, which it is now, why can't they be in the mix? So I think that is why I would say that I feel better about a team like New England rather than a team with a shitty offense. Just because I think you can find competence on defense

for short stretches of time. I think that's harder to do offensive. Yeah. Bad offensive teams are bad all the time. That's the point of a bad offense team. They have to find ceiling. Their ceiling is very low. Right.

Whereas all it takes is, you know, a freaking, turnover and all of a sudden the worst defense in league looks exactly right in turnover dependent defenses if with a very good offense and that was the 2009 sense and i think that we've seen those types of groups succeed in the past so all right buddy uh let's move on it is time for your craziest headline of the week laid on us okay this is going to be real quick because we just spent like 20 minutes talking about them i think that it's crazy that people are trying to say it's time to give up on the browns regime i think it's insane and i'm not saying that the browns have

done a great job at all. What I'm saying is, you know, I go back to something Paul DiPodestis at a conference right before he took the job. And he said he met with the Haslam's and they said, what do you want an owner? And he said, well, I don't know what I want an owner, but I know what I don't want. And what I don't want, and this was a long, tortured analytics analogy, which I'm all about. And he said, you know, it's analytics is a roller coaster and it gets scary. And the one thing an owner can't do is when it gets scary, say, I want to get off. and it's been two years for Deepadesta, they are enacting a long-term strategy,

whether or not that strategy works is irrelevant to me at this point. But to change midstream, and what are you going to go and hire Mike Holmgren again? What are you going to do? Stick with the plan. The NFL is a league of two types of teams. Teams stick with the plan and teams that get scared and hire Mike Holmgren.

I agree. I think that in the front office level, this is something you have to stick with. level, it's a different conversation. I feel like it's one we'll be having at the end of the season, but I think we've reached our Brown's cap for the day. So I'm going to move on to my ringer of the week, somebody just that watching this week's games kind of stood out in an interesting way.

And the guy I'm going to go with is Akeem Hicks, and not just because he plays for my team. I feel like, especially on the defensive line, part of the reason that offensive lines have struggled recently is that there are so many good rushers and there are so many rushers built in a similar way. I think about Jacksonville. Jacksonville has so many speed guys just on their defense and their front four. And watching Akeem Hicks, and Everson Griffin is kind of similar to this,

these defensive linemen that play with so much physicality and they don't really care about going around you, they're just going to run you over. I feel like those guys are fewer and further between now, but also can be more effective with the way that offenses are trying to stop past rushers. Just because guards are getting paid so much more money, they're having to worry about these guys like Aaron Donald and players that are, just so quick and, you know, defensive ends sliding inside on passing downs. So watching guys that just wreck people and run them over as defensive linemen,

we don't see it as often, but I think those guys are going to have a place in the league solely because they're the exceptions at this point. And watching Hicks this weekend, that's what he does every week. And he's just extremely fun. And I feel like those guys have a place in the league. Pro or against John Fox's beard. I don't care at this point. Whoa.

I don't like, I guess it's working. And who hasn't had a strong opinion about that either way. It shows a level of apathy that makes sense to me. Yeah. So it doesn't matter to me. The John Fox regime overall to me is just something I've lost the will to care about. I remember I've said this, but I think it was Patrick Daughtry who pointed out that the John Fox thing is just like the Jeff Fisher thing. In a year, we're not going to think it was real.

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See site for complete details. Kevin, a lot of people say fall is their favorite season. What about you? We don't have fall. It's 95 degrees in Los Angeles, say, Robert. Well, it's 50 in raining here, so I guess take your pick. Whatever the weather is, though, it's a busy time of year. With everything going on and all this rain, it's been hard for me to get to the grocery store,

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Now we're welcome by the ringer's own, Mallory Rubin, host of Talk to Thrones, binge mode, huge Ravens fan. I got to say, watching all of your favorite characters get killed off for seven years on Game of Thrones, Mallory has probably gotten you prepared

for this Ravens season. Quite the opposite, in fact. I'm just like, why is Joe Flacco still out there? Who can organize a red wedding on the football field for me? Help me out here, people. All the secondary characters

have been killed off, though. So I think that's the most important part. That part's really tough. We've already talked about the Vikings a little bit today, Mal. They took apart Baltimore this weekend. Thanks for the reminders. Yeah, of course.

I mean, that's what we're going to do. Now the Ravens are turning around to play Miami on a just a ridiculously bad Thursday night game. Is there any reason I should care about this Ravens team at all? Oh, no. Certainly not. I mean, I guess the fact that we've known each other for a while and you potentially are invested in my like mental and emotional well-being. Your well-being is important to me. I think you gave up on my physical well-being a long time ago.

That's so true. Honestly, this team is, you know, and I say this with, genuine, sincere, lifelong, or almost lifelong, affection, a complete abomination. And really painful to watch. Really, really painful to watch. I am, you know, at home, I'm a fan of the two TV living room experience. You got the big primary screen. Do you have two TVs?

Well, we have four TVs, but we have two next to each other in the living room. Really? Oh, yeah. You're welcome to come over at any time. Halo would love to meet you. Just to be clear for the listener, I've never been invited to Mallory. It's not true. He has what I think is an implied standing invitation.

Never been invited. It's a great setup. The reason I mentioned in the multiple TVs is because throughout the two TV living room setup history, always no matter what else was going on, the Ravens had to be on the primary screen for me. It just had to be. It was too important of a thing in my life

to compromise and relegate to a second screen experience. But now, you know what's on the main screen, boys? Red Zone. That's what? And you know what's on the second screen? Maybe. Joe Flassett and the Ravens. Those two never overlap. That's true.

So you're not wasting time. You can only see Joe Flacco. Would that that were true? You know, the Ravens game is often on Red Zone just because the other team is scoring or Flacko is getting sacked. No, I meant Flacko. Flacco is never in the Red Zone. However, you have to keep in mind, Red Zone channel shows turnovers and so he is often featured. The Red So the Red So in, the Red So now this season, I've noticed just a critical mass of roughing the kicker penalties.

Just a lot of just Scott Hanson saying, you know what the Flack? Man's that early in the punt. That's how you know it's a compelling NFL season. In terms of the quality on the field. That's what I want to see on Red Zone for sure. People running into players kicking balls. I just Googled Marty Morningwig because you could have easily convinced me he was fired three weeks ago. And I just see the headline on ESPN from two days ago.

Marty Morningwig likes when the heat is on the Ravens offense. Yeah, sure. I mean, it's not the worst quote from this week. I think that definitely goes to Flacco for the not completely broken quote, which I'd like to actually talk about in full. In full, if we can. Because the headline that came out of that game in this quote, this press conference, was not completely broken. People were really hanging on completely as the operative word. However, he said something after that.

That is very important context. Here's the whole thing. You go back to work. You get better. You look at where you made mistakes. But I wouldn't say overall that we're trying to fix something that's completely broken. We can't look at it that way. That's the rest of the quote.

We can't look at it that way. Guys, that is fundamentally not the same as saying the offense is not completely broken. It actually is. It's a sly acknowledgement. Acknowledging that the offense is completely broken and that he is one of the faces of the franchise and the quarterback of that offense, cannot in good consciousness and faith, say that out loud. That's pretty concerning, though this is the same guy who came out of the Steelers game and

said, I sucked. Right. So that's a low bar. I'm sort of rooting against the Ravens just to hear Flacco getting more and more detached. Well, attachment was never really his strong suit. I mean, even, like, that's one of the things about him that's always been frustrating as a fan, is even during the perennial playoff runs, even during the Super Bowl year. Like, he's never been what we would call a lively, energetic presence. And, you know, it's one thing to make jokes about how it looks like he'd rather be taking a nap than playing football when they're winning.

It's sort of painful to have to acknowledge that now when they're losing and capable of scoring. He has really just no grasp of the offense whatsoever and also no one around him to throw the ball to. That's the problem is that it's everything else is just such a mess. I mean, he's not good, but when you put a not good quarterback into an absolute, I don't even know how to describe it. I mean, it's just a flaming wreck.

You can describe it as a Marty Morning Wing lead offense. With no players. They were out of wide receivers by the time the game ended on Sunday. You know, we all made fun of Jay Cutler for his no selling of the Wildcat a couple weeks ago. Joe Flacco was the original I hate the Wildcat quarterback. When they ran it with Tyrod, he called it a high school offense and just blasted the entire team for it. Joe Flacco is the original J. Cutler is what I'm

saying. What a flattering comparison. Now it's okay because he only makes $24.75 million next year. I'm on his cap right now. You know what? I'm looking at the contract. It's staring me right in the face. You know what? I'm changing my tune on this, on the contract thing specifically. Just because contextually, I've spent so much time with my Michael Bowman with dear sweet Michael Bauman, head of the Marxist movement on the ringer.com.

The Marxist Vertical. It's obviously in terms of the confines of the cap and what a contract like that means for managing a roster, it is flat out indefensible. Kevin would call it malpractice. I'm a big malpractice guy. These guys are so criminally underpaid across the board. I watch a lot of baseball. As you guys know, it's the World Series this week. I can't wait to talk about baseball with you.

I assume that's why I'm here. Exactly right. But it's hard to spend a decent amount of my year talking about whether Bryce Harper or Manny Machado will be the first to get a $400 or $500 million contract and then get pissed about a $24 million a year hit for a quarterback. That's just not that much money in the grand scheme of what athletes earn today. Yes, it is an anchor on the franchise and they have to figure out a way to get out from under it. The other thing is, and this is something that people have, I don't think this has quite caught on yet. The flacco bizarre, like somewhere between hype and acceptance lasted a couple years longer than it should. That is really fading now in spectacular fashion this year.

I don't know that people have started talking enough about the draft dip. I mean, this is a franchise that for years was renowned for basically making unimpeachable draft choices. And can someone explain to me why they haven't invested in offense basically at all in the last couple years? Paraman. Yeah, that worked out well. He doesn't have knees, Kevin. He also apparently doesn't have hands to catch footballs. Rashad Paraman might be like one of these guys, like the soccer players who just, it turns out they never played soccer.

He's on like 11 teams over over five years and he just never makes an appearance. That's a compelling theory to me. It's gone about as wrong as it possibly could have on that offense. I mean, the offensive line, I don't even know who they are anymore. And that's kind of what my deal is. So the fact that I don't, no one in the rest of America does, I guarantee you that. You guys over under 50 yards this season for Breschard Paramount, if you were to guess what his current stats were.

I guess he catches one 30-yard pass when he gets back healthy. No, no, no, he's played. He's played. Well, he was hurt this week. I know, but he's played. You're saying total on the year has he managed to top 50 yards pass? Oh, does he have 50 yards so far? He does not.

Four receptions for 26 yards. Yeah, that's incredible. I thought he meant, is he going to get there for the season. I was like, yes. I believe he gets there for the season. He might have 500 yards and drops. I don't know. I doubt he gets to 50 yards.

key yards in the season. I'm glad we got to move on. Very quickly, I want to ask you guys a question about this. I'm glad you mentioned the offensive line because obviously Urshel retiring and losing Yonda, that's a huge deal. The number of injuries, you know, losing Dixon early. West has been banged up.

Obviously, Macklin has been pretty good actually when he's healthy, but he's been banged up, lost Wallace this week. Injuries across the board, team-wide, but specifically with skill position players, it's impacting Flacco. Here's the thing. Is it like, if they were out there, would it be any better?

The tight end thing is the one where I look at that and say, he really needs a Dennis Pitta type of player out there to run the offense effectively at all. He doesn't have Pitta. He doesn't have Gilmore. Max Williams is never going to turn into a guy worthy of that draft pick at this point. We can officially write that off. But it's easy to look at the injuries and use it as an excuse for him, right? It's easy to say, okay, well, he doesn't have anyone to throw the ball too.

He doesn't really have a line to protect him adequately or for the running backs to run behind. You're still ultimately looking at Buck Allen and Alex Collins. saying that's a football team and it isn't. So is it about the injuries or is it about Flacco's regression? And is the injury mass going to basically allow Flacco to buy more time than he probably should based on what his ability level is at this point? I think one informs the other. And this team reminds me a little bit of the Vikings last year where at a certain point,

it doesn't matter the players you have on defense. You can't sustain an NFL team if you can't move the ball. And you can't move the ball if you literally can't block anyone because your entire offensive line is a mess. So I think that he's not a good quarterback, but it's exacerbated by everything that's happening right now. Wait, I'm sorry. I just need to bring this up. Rashad Paraman has four receptions.

Mays, guess how many targets he has? Seven. 18. Right. His catch rate is 20%. Joe Flacko. It's really bad, guys. All right, Mal.

Let's move on because we have to do something else. Elsewhere in that division, it seems like the Steelers are hitting their strata bit. I know this is like twisting the knife. after the conversation we've just had. So happy for the Steelers that they finally have a decent football team. That's great for those fans. Other than Martavis Bryant taking swipes at people on Instagram, it feels like this team is doing pretty well.

As someone who sees this team year in and year out and who hates them with all of her being, is this Pittsburgh team more or less of a threat to win the Super Bowl than they've been in years past? Well. I guess they're consistently a threat to win the Super Bowl, but it certainly feels like they are this year, even though they're not as good this year, just because of the landscape of the league. Like, there aren't good teams, right?

So I think what Kevin wrote in his piece last Friday is exactly right. We're going to get to the end of the season and we're going to say, how is it just the Patriots and the Steelers at the top of the AFC again? How did that happen when we spent so much of the year talking about how flawed both of those teams, were, but the thing is, those flaws are real. It's not like that's a mirage, but they are still so far ahead of where the rest of the league is. I mean, the North is a mess. You know, the

Ravens are, as we just outlined, like, feeble at best. Feeble is the most charitable assessment we can give the Ravens right now. The Bengals, that run is over. And the Browns. What a run. What a run. What a run. That run. That run a first round playoff exists. That storyed run. of first round playoff exits is over. Imagine being Andy Dalton and not being the notable ginger quarterback in the league anymore. That has to really hurt. I was thinking about that last night

when Wenz was giving his post-game interviews. He must have. And he's really leaning in to the hair this year with the pronounced fade. Is he trying to get his cornerback? Is he trying to say like... It's gone. Maybe.

I don't know. But here's the thing, Wence is not a notable redhead because he is not really embraced the right. redhead enough. True, and he's always wearing a hat. A hat. But the thing with Wendz is that you can see it in the beard. The beard is always there.

So you always have the reminder. That's not necessarily fair. Well, you're a redhead. Get out of here with that. What are you talking about? Wait, whoa, forget the rest of the outline. You don't think you're a redhead? Me?

What are you talking about? What color do you think your hair is? My hair is brown. Robert. No, it isn't. I've been alive for 30 years. You were the first person to ever say this. This is insane to me because I am now having this same conversation with the ringer staff for twice, but I'm on the other side of it.

Apparently, everybody thinks Riley is a redhead, but I think he has lovely strawberry blonde hair. He's a redneck man. I would call Riley a blonde. Do I just not know what hair color is? You think I have red hair? Yeah. I would say you're like a chestnut brown on the red spectrum, though. I would.

On the red spectrum is different than having a red hair or being a redhead. fiery red beard that you allow to grow to beautiful, luscious lengths. It's in a great place right now. I'm sure. I'd love to see you guys. Do you guys see what happens when the NFL is in a bad spot in 2017? No, this is Mallory's fault.

This is nothing to do with football. I'm shocked. I'm taking a poll on Slack when we finish this, and I think you'll be distressed by the results. I just think it's wonderful to be a redhead, though, so you shouldn't be distressed. I'm kicking you off the podcast. All right, goodbye.

Back to the Steelers. The Browns don't have a win. vision is a total mess and the rest of the AFC is as well, right? So, yeah, Ben Roslisberger is maybe not quite as washed as Flacco and Eli Manning and now Palmer. No one can be as washed. A lot of guys

getting the washed label this year. He looks good this weekend. And I think the other thing, I wrote this on Monday, I feel like having a couple superstars matters more now than it has in years past, again, just because of the landscape of the league. Like, the fact that Bell and Brown individually can just take over a game and they can win one for you because there are no good teams. That makes them scary.

Sure. Like apply Kevin's. You don't need a quarterback principle, which fits a team like the Jaguar so beautifully. They have guys like a young, exciting running back like for net. Of course, injuries are just claiming everybody this year.

You got exciting receivers. You know, Robinson before he got hurt. Hearns, Lee. It doesn't matter what Bordles does. They're built to account for that. The Steelers, even with Rathosberger having a down year, he's still like so far ahead of somebody like

border, that they're going to be positioned to run an offense more effectively regardless. But Bell and Brown somehow being on pace for potentially career years in a season when one of the overriding narratives is that the Steelers' offense isn't as good as we thought it would be is pretty amazing. Obviously, the Bryant trade demands and Juju, Instagram, shaming is bizarre and I assume short-lived. I can't imagine they're going to allow that to fester for long. But Juju has emerged and been awesome. So they don't really need Bryant to be producing. That's the truth right now, right? Yeah. I mean, well, they

yes, they don't need it just because the style of their offense is different. They don't have that downfield element. And I wonder if that's going to severely limit their ceiling, but also does it matter? Again, are they good enough and is this version of them good enough to still be the best team in the conference? It absolutely might be.

And the defense, too. Like, this isn't a one-sided Steelers team. Like, it has been in some recent seasons. I mean, the players, and that front seven. Obviously, if you look at the secondary, I just can't believe it's real life that Joe Hayden is on this team

and that the Browns just gave him away. That will basically never stop being astonishing and bizarre. But the front seven, I mean, Ryan Chazir is one of my favorite players to watch in football. And I don't feel good about that because he's on the Steelers. But I have loved him since the Florida, Ohio State

signing day switch. I've been a fan favorite for quite some time. Guys like that, they have done an annoying thing in recent years, which is they've started drafting college defenders I love. And that is painful for me, but it's giving them that explosiveness. It's giving them that athletic spark on defense that they haven't had in a while. So they're more well-balanced across the board. So that's very true.

I mean, that's why they're dangerous. And it's those front seven guys. I love the guys they have, and it's made them a very real defense. And their schedule. I mean, okay, they've got the lions next. The Colts? Titans are a mess right now. They're going to have trouble beating the Packers without Aaron Rogers.

No. Bengals, Ravens. The Pats game, obviously, is huge. Texans could be interesting at that point, depending on how healthy Deshaun is. And then the Browns. Like, there are a lot of wins there. They're going to roll to the division title. And then it's just about how they set up in the playoffs.

Yeah, I totally agree. All right, Mal. Thank you. I appreciate it, buddy. I will really fight against this hair thing as we move on here through Slack and just for the rest of my life. This is confounding to me. Kevin didn't cast a vote. What color hair do you think Robert has?

be honest. Reddish brown. Wow, what a hedge. This is awful. All right. See you, Mal. Thank you, Mallory. Bye, guys. Keep making great content. You know we will. All right, Kevin, before we get out of here,

we want to give you our lasting impressions from week seven. What is going to stick with you from what happened this weekend? There's a story in Sports Business Journal on Tuesday. They detailed this sort of fight that's going on behind the scenes in the NFL League office right now. Networks are asking for two things. Number one, they want Thursday night package to be rolled back to maybe eight games, and they want the 930 games on the East Coast that are played in

London to go away, go back to the 1 p.m. Eastern time games, which would then be played, obviously, in London at 6 p.m., Greenwich meantime. So I think that this is a necessary step. I think the NFL is forced us into too much football. I think there is a, you know, there was a quote in there from Mark Lazarus, who runs NBC Sports, who is basically saying, by the time Sunday night comes around, there can be football fatigue. I agree with that. We love football. We love watching football. And, And growing up, I didn't think there was going to be because we only saw the game windows on 1 p.m, 4 p.m., 8 p.m. and then Monday night, I didn't think I could ever get enough football. I think America started to get a little too much football because of the thin slicing. I wrote about this last year. Now there's some actionable stuff happening on the network side.

I think the NFL has to be very careful about what it does with football distribution. I think they need to listen to the networks here. There is too much football and they need to roll it back. And I think that the story that was released today shows you that there's big changes of foot. And it's a story to watch. I feel that way every week, it seems. I mean, especially getting up early to watch those games. You do get there by the end.

It's 12 hours of football. You do it on Thursday night. It's supposed like there isn't a lot of break. And I don't mind it because I like being able to watch teams without anything else going on live. Just a rare kind of thing you don't get if you have to deal with the glut on Sunday. But I can understand why fans and networks have no interest. in it. This is what I do for a living. I'm not a casual observer of the game. Right. That's the interesting thing is that we are both football fans and professional

football watchers. And I think we are fatigued at both ends of it. It's hard to follow from a professional standpoint and it's hard to follow just as a fan. The enjoyment starts to get sucked out of it by hour 12 of football. Yeah, I totally agree. I'm going to go a little bit on the flip side here just about what I did enjoy about this weekend and what I have been able to enjoy about this season. I think that we got into it a little bit in our first down about how every team is still in the hunt and that the mediocrity per se about the league has really allowed no teams to be scratched off aside from a select view. And I think that while that has made the league a little bit less interesting from a super team's perspective, some of the stars have gotten hurt.

I really found myself this week latching on to some individual players and individual units throughout the league that have made the season fun in a way. Jacksonville is a blast. and that front four is a blast and you switch off whether that group of guys or the corners are dominating a game. They play with a certain energy they're very fun to watch.

Watching the Chargers pass rushers this week, just Ingem and Bosa going back and forth and Bosa taking over the game and just kind of the way they play off each other, that was just a blast this week. I think that just kind of latching on to specific guys and what they do well

and everything else has become more important this year because there isn't that easily, appreciatable team. There isn't that great team, that great offense, that great defense. Those have been harder to come by. So I feel like kind of sifting through that mired muck in the middle and digging into why these individual guys are great. Carson wants on Monday night.

If we're not going to have Aaron Rogers and some of these stars are going to go away, let's find new stars. And I think those guys are there and I think we can get there, but it's about a willingness to do so and not a complaint about. well, the league isn't what it was before. Well, that's fine. If it's not going to be what it was before, let's figure out what's compelling about it now

because there are elements that we can grab onto and that can make it compelling. We just got to look for them a little bit hard. Totally agree. All right, buddy, that's it for today. We're back on Friday to get everyone set for week eight. As always, thanks for listening to the Ringar-Fell show on the Ringer Podcast Network.