The Ringer NFL Show - ‘GM Street’ — Saturday Sit-down Week 15 (Ep. 203)

Episode Date: December 16, 2017

The Ringer’s Michael Lombardi and Tate Frazier are joined by Joel Solomon to review Thursday night’s Broncos-Colts matchup (0:52) and give their picks for the weekend: Los Angeles Chargers at Kansas City Chiefs (8:05), Green Bay Packers at Carolina Panthers (11:13), Los Angeles Rams at Seattle Seahawks (14:27), Dallas Cowboys at Oakland Raiders (17:15), and New England Patriots at Pittsburgh Steelers (22:35). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to GM Street part of the Ringer Podcast Network. This is the Saturday Sitdown. I am Tate Fraser. I am joined by Mr. Michael Lombardi. Tate Frazier, how are you today? I'm doing all right, and I'm also joined by the great Joel Solomon. Joel, how you doing? I'm good.

I'm trying to keep up. Michael Lombardi's had four cups of coffee already. I've had one, actually. No, I haven't four. I've had one. I was late today. I had to walk the dogs, right? So I'm all by myself.

I had to walk the dogs. I'm like Superman. I need a cape. I'm like, you know, when Kramer was making all the stops on the bus? Yeah. And they were ringing the bell, even though he was fighting people off. That was my morning. That was my morning.

I'm walking dogs, feeding dogs, writing for the book. You know, get over here. I had to do no bull with you. And now I get this. So. Barty shot like eight videos this morning. And you would think he'd be worn out by that. No.

Instead he's rejuvenated it. I'm back. And I know why. You know why? The heist. I mean, it was unbelievable. It was so good. And now you know how he did it.

The color rush jersey. He just needed that. You think that's where it was? Yes. He got rejuvenated by the color. You don't think it. it was the fact that the Colts tried to play cover one

with a bunch of guys they just signed off the street. I thought you were going to say the Colts were colorblind. That's all I can say. There's a lot of things the Colts were. I mean, it was so predictable. You don't realize the Colts

are minus 85 in the fourth quarter? Minus 85. God only knows what they are in the other quarters. Can I make an announcement to you? Absolutely, please. Chuck Pugano's going to lose his job. Like, I'm not going to get credit for this on Twitter, nor do I want credit for this on Twitter.

But you know, when Black Monday comes around, people are like, oh, you know, the first one to report, that, like, I'm just telling you, okay, like, there's certain things you know in life. Like, you know, you probably'll get a nice gift for Christmas. He'll get pecan pie from his mom for Christmas, right? There's things you know. You know.

She'll say it's pecan. Pecan. I'm from Jersey. I don't know. Anyway, you know you're going to get a Chuck Pagano firing either the Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday after the press release has already been written. It's written. It's done.

I mean, like, it's over. How many times have they written that press release? I feel like we've heard about Chuck Picano getting fired for at least three years now. I feel like every single year he somehow slides by. They're like, we've got to get rid of PEP. We've got to get rid of all these other people. This is the first time he's, well, he was wanted to fire when he was with Grigsin, which the owner made a colossal mistake.

He kept them both, you know, and then he should have probably got rid of them then. And then they got rid of PEP, but they've made the playoffs every year, you know, and obviously the team really has fallen apart. This is more, Chuck Luzon's job is really more a reflection of the inability that Grigson. I mean, that's really a poorly built team. And now Andrew Luck is, you know, somewhere in Europe. Do you know where he is? No, let's talk about this.

So Andrew Luck, we keep seeing him. Well, he keeps talking about like he's reverential as if he is like some personal proverb that's going to come back in. You hear that word he just used to that? He could tell him. He's going to save the day. He's going to come back in. He's this great quarterback. But meanwhile, we don't see him play.

He doesn't get treated like he's done anything. You know what I mean? He gets treated like he's still like Tom Brady or something like that. We haven't seen him in a long time. He had to go find himself. He went to Europe. He probably has a huge beard again. You're right.

He got offered $50 million and then he just ran away. That was smart. Actually, good idea. Did he ever do the comedies? Did he ever get paid for that? No, but he, you got two big Netflix specials. Maybe Andrew Lux's working on his Netflix special in Europe. You know what I think happens is there's things going on in Europe medically that you can't do here in this country because of the FDA laws and restrictions.

No, we call that the Kobe Bryant treatment. I think that's what's going on over that. Peyton went over there to get his neck, you know, did that surgeries over there. I thought he said Ashley to go over there. Maybe he did. I don't know. You guys are too good. Anyway, and so, you know, I think that's why people are going over there.

The rehab's different. Everything is kind of state of the, I don't want to say state of the art. It's just different because the FDA takes so long in our country to approve the thing so they can cut the red tape and go over there. And besides, who wouldn't want to go to Vienna? I'm sure that. I don't know where he is. He might be in Vienna. I want to go to Vienna.

Me too. You know, I want to go hanging in Vienna. Beach watching the Broncos run all over your squad in those orange jersey. Trust me, he wasn't the only one. There was a lot of empty seats in that place on last. night too. Absolutely. But you like this coach job. You're saying this is a desirable job. Oh, I think it's the number one job out there because of luck. Most jobs open because the quarterback isn't there, right? So typically the Giants have an opening because Eli Manning is on his declining hour, right? Chicago's

opening because they went with a young quarterback by Glennon. I mean, there's the reason why, like they don't give you houses in Beverly Hills. Like there's no vacant property in Beverly Hills that you can take over and just say, come on in, Joel, take over. You're going to have this $3 million mansion. No problem. You know, we'll pay the taxes. You know, unless you're friends with George Clooney. But the reality of it is is that when you get one of these, like this is one of those where you have a great quarterback, you still have all your draft picks. So you can rebuild the team. You can reshape the team.

And plus, I think you can recreate the culture within the building. I think it's by far the best job. And Tyoy Hilton just seems like a cool guy, right? To hang out with? I think you just like when he does the TY dance when he scores a touchdown. He might be one of my favorites. He's like keeping Colts fans somewhat interested, I think. It's hard to do.

I mean, they've all switched to basketball in that state. But I do think it's a really good job. I think of the jobs that open up, you look at the quarterback, and they've always been in a good place to play. Crap division. Crap division. You get your boy Blake Bortles twice, you know. Now, you got Deshawn Watson coming out, but I think the AFC landscape makes it all different.

I think it's a really good job. You mentioned Deshawn Watson, to me, that's the best job. And I know Billy O'Brien, people don't want to say that he's going to get canned. And I don't think that's been even reported anywhere. I know you mentioned it last week on GM Street that keep your eye on that job. But if that job opens up, I think, you know, with Clowny, the Texans, and obviously Deshaun, that's a pretty good job. Yeah. The reason is, is there's always conflict between Billy O'Brien and the front office, Rick Smith, the general manager.

That's always going to have some kind of conflict because, you know, Billy works from an environment that he's never really, it's always been coach DM attached at the hip. And that's not simply the case. Billy has one year left. Rick Smith has four more years left on his contract. So, you know, I think Houston has to make a decision. Do they want to extend Billy or they don't? You know, and no coach wants to be a lame duck. Yeah.

And no coach wants to enter the year as a lame duck and want to have security. So I think that will come to a head. Either Billy will be there and they extend them or Billy will be gone. And, you know, he'll be in Chicago. He'll get another job somewhere in the league because there's going to be enough openings that's going to be hard to fill them all with assistance. He should have been a Penn State. He just, he had it made there.

He could have been a king. I don't know. Could have had Seekuan Barclay this year. Yeah. Could have been fun. Coaching against Harbaugh. That would have been fun. I think college jobs are better, Joel.

Yeah. I think they are. You have more control. You are the GM. You are everybody. You are the personnel director. You are everything. Now you have to come in.

You listen to all this. You know, now you're finding who's this, who's got to say. I mean, look at Cleveland. Okay, John Dorsey comes in and says they really weren't picking real players. Now, I can promise you this. In Cleveland, everybody's got their racer out. There will be five. All the executives in Cleveland will have loved Deshawn Watson.

Now, they wouldn't have said a word during the draft, right? Nobody said anything. But today, everybody loves the Sean Watson. Well, you know, we love Trembudsman. Whiskey, we love Watson. They just wouldn't pick them. Well, the good news is they'll have their choice again. If there is. Yeah. I think that's going to be cyclical. That's every year. They're always going to have a pick at the top of the story. It's like the Medea movies. Like you get one every year. You know Cleveland will be at the top of the draft.

And you know, there's going to be that sad portion of the movie. You know, it's going to be real funny. He's going to hit you for five minutes. And you're going to go 40 minutes of sad. It's going to come back. It hits you with three minutes of funny. 30 minutes of sad. Yeah. What's your favorite movie tape, Fraser? Of all time. Yeah. That's tough. probably layer cake. I don't even know if people know

that movie is. Daniel Craig, great movie. Go check it out, layer cake. It's not expecting that. That caught me completely off guard. I'm gonna have to see

if I can build out of Zoolander. Since Bell and I are alone, we'll have to watch that. I mean, I'll do the general audience answer. You know, wedding crash was a great movie. Really love that movie too. You know, everyone loves winning.

Who dreams I thought you would have gone? He got game is one of my time. I mean, I don't know. I'm spread across. Layer cake. All the genres. You know, it changes by the day, guys. I don't know.

I'm just saying things. That's the whole point. It's Saturday, sit down, and we talk about all the games. Lombardi picks five games, and we run through them all. I was good last week, Treyfraiser. I had a good week last week. You're doing great this whole year. I had some bad weeks.

No, but you're moving lines in Vegas, and that's what really matters. The Chargers are going to take on the Chiefs. We're going to see who's going to end up running the AFC West this weekend. This is going to be a real showdown. It's going to be on Saturday. It's in Kansas City. The Charters are on a four-game win streak. They look like they got the offense role on.

Keenan Allen's been incredible. The Chiefs have been. subpar to say the least. Kareem Hunt, though, did show some signs last week, finally got it rolling again. They started giving him the ball. Andy Reid has given over his play sheet. Do we think the Chiefs are going to get this thing back in order?

You know, seven times they've played the Charger team and the Chiefs have once all seven. Look, it's a hard place to play. Kansas City, you know, I know they lost there before. It's a hard place to play. The Chargers are the better team. That being said, it always worries me when the Chargers are the better team. Like, do I think Philip Rivers is having a great year? Yes.

If you watch the Browns game closely, there was moments in that Browns game, where you felt like the Browns were going to win the game. And if Kaiser Soso didn't hold the ball for 42 minutes and get stripped sacked from behind by Bosa, I just think these are one of the games where the stakes get risen a little bit, and I think the home team has a favorite. I think the rush will help.

And if the turnovers create the situation, for some reason, I know the charges of the better team. I just think the chiefs are going to win. You say they're going to be the chargers that we know of old. That's what worries me. Yeah, they've been on a roll lately. A missed field goal, something. And, you know, like they're going to stub their, they're the better team.

If you said to me, play on a neutral field, who wins? No doubt. But you go in that, like, nobody really understands going into Kansas City. It's truly like going into downtown Moscow. It's all red, right? You're in complete red, right? And the people, they're very friendly. They're very nice.

When they throw things at you, they're very polite. But it's a hard place to play. And the field's kind of sloppy. And, you know, that'll hurt the pass rush a little bit because you can't get great traction there. So Bosa and Ingram, it's not going to be a fast, track, like if you're playing in the Meadowlands. I just worry about the Chargers handling the responsibility of being a great

team. I really worry about that. I've always been worried about that secondary, too, and I know one guy specifically I'm always worried about, and that's Trey Boston. I don't want to point him out, but we had two or three plays last week that if Kaiser Soso had made the throw, Josh Gordon would have scored a couple touchdowns. I mean, he beat them deep plenty of times. How about Blake Bortles?

I mean, you know, they win the game, but if Blake just makes a couple throws, they worry me. I mean, they're close, and there's a margin, and I just think when you're at this point of the season, it's very difficult. What would wild card AFC Saturday be without the Chiefs losing in that game? So that's why I just, I still am holding out hope the Chiefs will win that division. The home field thing is interesting because I feel like the Rams and Chargers play 16 road games.

Right. So I wonder if they're at the point now where the crowd, they're just ambivalent. They work on a silent count all the time. Yeah, look, and Wissent Hunt has always done a good job in these kind of games. I went into Denver, you know, went. went on the road when he was a coordinator at San Diego before he went to Tennessee as a head coach again, won some road. I mean, they know how to play on the road. I grant you that. I just feel like the pressure sometimes on San Diego. Can they do it? Can they cover well enough? Don't kick the ball. It's a tree kill.

Please don't. You have a better chance. I think they probably will, knowing the Chargers. I had to guess. Next up, we got the Packers and Aaron Rogers. The return of Aaron Rogers, he's going to go into Carolina to take on the Panthers. The Panthers are having some problems on the offensive line, Trey Turner is out. Their backup for Trey Turner is also out. And I don't know, Lamarck-Lombardi, I might be playing right guard for this team. Yeah, they're not good in the line to begin with. I mean, forget when they start, and now they start having injuries, they're not really good in the line, which sometimes helps them because Cam starts to run around and starts to make plays. But, I mean, this is a, last week was a tough game for him. You get beat up on that

game. But what worries you the most when a great player comes back, there's a sense that the team thinks, okay, he's back. I don't have to do as much. And really, when a guy's missed as much time as Rogers had, you've got to do more. You're going to have to do more. And to me, I think that this whole thing Rogers coming back has given the Panthers the motivation to kind of step up. And I don't know.

For whatever is, I don't trust the Panthers to play a consistent game on offense. So I think Green Bay will be the favorite here. I think Green Bay could win the game. I just sometimes I worry about Carolina just playing consistently offensively. Absolutely. I think it is weird, though.

The Carolina does have this great game. They beat the Vikings, the team that everyone has sort of coordinated as the best team, and then people kind of went silent on the whole week. I watched a lot of shows that cover the NFL. A lot of people did not talk about the Carolina win and kind of just, what you're saying, everyone's still hesitant to say this team as an actual contender. They're hard to, they're really hard to kind of fall into because, you know,

they do miss Charles Johnson, who's been suspended for the last two games. You know, they're hard to really, like, say they don't consistently move the football enough, and, you know, they have enough playmakers. I mean, Funches has been great the last couple weeks. Stewart's been running the ball really more effectively. But for whatever reason, they just have those lulls and games. And when you have a law and game, you're playing a great quarterback in 12 possessions, you have six lulls in a game.

He's going to make enough plays. But, you know, that being said, I think he's going to be a little rusty. I like that Jonathan Stewart is like the safety valve. Like they kind of rested him this season, let McCaffrey do his thing. And now he's basically been there since I think the franchise started. And now it's like, let's go back to Jonathan Stewart. It was Carrie Collins, Jonathan Stewart. Yeah, that's how it all rolled out.

Yeah, he's been there since. Who was the original coach? It was... 1995, original coach was... Polian was there. Yeah, Dom Capeers. Polian capers, yeah. Paulian capers.

And Gary Collins and Jonathan Stewart. And he'll still be there. And I don't know. Maybe that's just like the way it should have been. Like they'll figure out McCaffrey, just let Jonathan Stewart in goal line situations. And I don't know, I think Carolina is still too much. Maybe it'll be a shootout.

Aaron Rogers will throw some Hail Marys. Maybe it'll come down to a Hail Mary. But I don't know. I like your Panthers. Here's what Aaron Rogers had to say. He said, I'm not coming back to save this team. I'm coming back to play quarterback the way I know how to play it, which is him saving the team. Which is what he does.

They run de-slant 752 times. He'll throw the ball in it and he'll just make a play. He'll run around. But, you know, he's going to have to take a hit. Look, they have proven that they can run the football effectively before with him out. And, you know, Williams has run better. They still have Aaron Jones and he's healthy. They're more complete team now that he's gone because they've had to be.

Because they really couldn't rely on just him just. just making a play. I will say if I'm Aaron Rogers, this is not the defense I want to play in my first week. They're physical, especially up the middle with short and those guys. I mean, he may take some big hits. This is where they have to be smart with the football. Absolutely.

Next up, we got the Los Angeles Rams. Taking on the Seattle Seahawks, going up to Seattle. Seattle is kind of in control of this division a little bit, getting a home game against the Rams. They could take control of this division at the NFC West. What do you see in this one, Lombardi? I thought it was interesting. Sean McVeigh made a great point this week.

He said, I got to get back to the running game. I've got to run the football. I think what Sean has done a tremendous job of his masquer the illusion that Jared Goff is the offense when reality it's girly. And golf has done a nice job. I don't think the Rams have five dropback passes in their offense. I think it's all playoffers pass. It screens.

They've done a great job of mirroring those things. And I think that their defense took a hit last week. Webster getting hurt. That Eagle game took a lot out of it. That was a playoff game for me. That was a true playoff game. And Seattle going home, licking their wounds. Bobby Wagner not playing worries me.

I like the Rams here. I really do. I think the Rams are the better team. I think Gurley will run the football effectively on them. I think the Rams are the better team. Yeah, Tramaine Johnson, on the Rams, has been talking a lot about this matchup with Seattle. And, you know, he got in trouble with that earlier in the year. So if you're a Rams fan, I may maybe just tell Tramaine to hold back a little bit.

I don't know if Russell Wilson can just pull it out of his. And like, it's like, this is their offense. Like just Russell Wilson run around and throw. Russell and bustle. Russell and bust. You can feel it here in Los Angeles. I mean, everywhere you go, Rams fever. Like people wearing Rams jerseys.

I haven't seen anybody, have you? What? Today when I was doing my Kramer impersonation, you know, doing 10,000 things, right? I saw two people walk in the beach this morning with Eagle's shirts. I mean, like the Eagle fans haven't left yet. But here's where I think it sets up for the Rams. No one was expecting this. And it came out of nowhere.

Usually a team takes that one year and you can see it coming. I think this is the weekend we find out if they're for real and headed for the playoffs or if it's like that year, this is that year, it's a stepping stone year. Yeah, this is a huge game for them. They lose in Minnesota. The most signature win was obviously beaten Dallas in Dallas, a game they trailed at halftime. This is going to be fascinating to see them handle the snap. I mean, it's going to be hard up there, right?

The crowd noise is going to be. This is a playoff game. So the Rams are playing another playoff game. And it's going to be a challenge for them to handle the snap count, to handle everything. And if they're catching Seattle at the right time with Wagner being hurt, that's the only reason. If Wagner was playing and I knew that, I would go with Seattle.

But I'm worried about Wagner not playing. They're going to try to get this matchup with Gurley on KJ, right, and it may not do good things. The matchup they got to worry about is the same matchup that the Eagles got them on is that inside. Fletcher Cox over the right guard, Brown, and they got to worry about blocking Richardson. Their defensive front of Seattle, whenever the Rams have played a good front, Seattle, they lose, Minnesota they lose, Philadelphia, they lose, Washington early in this season, they lose. When they play a good front that can control the quarterback and stop the run, that's when they lose. This is a good front. Now, whether they can do it or not without Wagner, that's the only hesitation I have.

Next up, we got the Dallas Cowboys taking on the Oakland Raiders. The Raiders. Lombardi, how you feeling about this one? Tate Frey's, I don't like this one at all for the Raiders. Who's going to light the torch? You know, they should have you light the torch, Joe. This would be, yeah, I have to light eight of them, though. Yeah. This is what I think, I can't believe that Jason Garrett lasted the eight nights of Hanukkah.

I think the real miracle is he lasted eight games this season. The Clapper is still there. And here's why I actually like the Cowboys. It's kind of like me here. Jason Garrett throughout his career as Cowboys coach has done just enough to save his job. He said just enough to three. Just enough claps, just enough moisturizing cream on his hands, just enough. And he's going to do just enough this season.

And you're never going to get any better. He will stay there. Jerry Jones can't fire him. It was another tough year. They didn't have Ezekiel. But they'll still go maybe 10 and 6. just miss out and repeat next year. Yeah, look, the Raiders are terrible.

The Raiders are horrible on offense. I'm in defense and offensively. They can't throw the ball down the field. You know, last week, the Cowboys won without their best defense alignment, David Irving. I know DeLarence Grant's still a good player, but I don't see how the Raiders beat anybody. I've never seen a team like the Raiders, right? They talk about Crabtree is in a play. He runs a row.

He comes off the field. Third down the most important. Like, to me, you watch the Raiders. Everybody says, well, you've got to get Marshawn Lynch the ball more. He couldn't carry it three. times in a row. He's not in shape. Give him the ball more. Yeah, that's great, but he's going to puke on the sideline. There's no

conditioning on this Raider team. The Raider team looks really out of shape and not fundamentally sound. And even though I'm not a Clapper fan, I'm going to clap for him. I think they win. Good for you, Clapper. He did it. He finally did it. Did you hear Collinsworth last night, given he's basically saying Des, once Zee comes

back, it's going to help Dese so much. Desk can't get open. Well, his whole thing was like, the reason Desk can't get open is because Ezekieliot's not there. But I don't know if he watched all the games. Yeah, Desk was there. Des can't run. Des can't separate. I just don't think he's ever been Dax number one. Des was, Romo loved him. I don't, I don't think, do you believe in that? Connections with

receivers and quarterbacks? Well, here's why. Everything about, like Tom Brady, everything about great quarterbacks that I've been around is about trust. Trust that you're going to be in the right place at the right time. Des has, takes a long time for you to trust them to be in the right place. You can't move Des around. You can blame Lennahan for the generic offense, but it's hard when your best receiver can't line up at multiple positions and move him. him around to create the matchups you want. Plus, Des needs the ball in his hand to be used his size and power. He can't separate.

He's a jump ball receiver. You're paying $17 million. I mean, his numbers are going down. Beasley's numbers are going down. Jason Winton's a great career, but they're not explosive at all on office. They will struggle to move the ball. And even as bad as the Raiders are on defense, they'll struggle to move the ball. They're just going to have to hope they turn it over.

That's why Mortavius Brian will get a big deal from the Cowboys. You're predicting that? Yeah. Just run straight down. It sounds like a cowboys. They're going to need a lot. I mean, they're going to have to revamp this office. offense. Like, I don't think people realize, you talked about this, I don't think people realize

how much the Cowboys have to change. I mean, Des isn't worth 17 million. Beasley's way down in his numbers. They don't have another reason. They're going to have to change their skill players to improve their offense. They're not coming back with Zeke is going to solve everything. That's not going to happen. I think it's going to be Ryan Switzer that solves everything, right? If he get them on the field. All right. Finally, the showdown. The moment we've waited for. You're not going to talk about Jimmy G? Yeah, let's do a quick Jimmy G aside, right? I'll give you some Jimmy G talk. Go ahead.

Okay, the Titans are going to take on the 49ers. He's undefeated. He's undefeated as a starter. We keep talking about Garapolo. He's a handsome fellow. He's beloved. Bill Simmons keeps calling him handsome. He's compared me to him.

I have tried to push that to the side as much as I can. Jimmy Garapolo against the Titans, is he going to expose the Titans for what we know they are? A bad team. This is perfect for him. This is play at home. The home crowd will see my man Jimmy G. Look, Jimmy G's, I mean, he's good.

I mean, I don't care how anybody. I was talking to somebody in the league this week, and they said they went to watch Jimmy G. play, and they said, I just wanted to see if I could get a couple of plays that I really thought were different. It was 15 play. I mean, Jimmy G. Everybody watches tape in the NFL, knows Jimmy G. G. is a real deal. The Patriots don't regret this trade now.

They don't, we should have asked for more? I think at the end, I will make this pretty. I think in three years, they're going to regret this trade. I think when they do a football life with Bill Belichick, and he's, like, mumbling under his breath when he's frustrated. At the end of the doc is going to be about Jimmy Garano. Yeah. I don't think anybody wanted to trade. I think to me it's still, that's going to require Abraham's the brooder.

It's going to require the Warren Commission. There's going to have to be a thorough investigation to see exactly what happened here. We know Bill didn't make that trade. That's what you're saying. The best part is when the 49ers were like, we're going to let them learn the system. It lasted like one week. Like what system did he have to learn? And everybody said, well, you know, you can't put them out there with CG.

You know, they're going to get killed. It's like, I was talking to somebody in the league and they're like, you know, well, Deshawn Watson doesn't, you know, he got to play with Hopkins, he got to play with Lamar Miller, he got to play with Braxton Miller, yeah, Will Fuller, yeah. And I said to the guy, well, you know, so did Savage. He couldn't move the ball with all those guys too. So, I mean, quarterbacks make teams better. I think there's no doubt.

Jimmy's made them better. But that being said, I love the Niners in this game. I love them, Joel. I love them in this game. We're going to watch Jimmy G at Tony P's. That's right. If you come to Tony P's, there's a whole section for Jimmy G in there. Tony P's, Mike Lombardi will be there.

All right, finally, the game we've all been waiting for, the AFC showdown to see who's the best. Mike Tomlin's been talking about this game. It seems like since last year, he's basically claiming it to be a Super Bowl, despite him being 2 and 10 against the Patriots in the Tom Brady dynasty in his career. He says that they know how to beat the Patriots.

We will see this Sunday night. Joel Solomon, a Steelers fan, Mike Lombardi, aligned himself with the New England Patriots. This will be fun. You know, I think it's going to be a hard game for the Patriots. I really do, because I think the weaponry that they have in Pittsburgh. Now, Judeo Schuster's at the hamstring. Can he play? I think that's a critical component of this game. But the Patriots for them to win, they must win this game with their

offense. They're going to have to control the pace of the game, a little bit like a basketball game. They're going to have to keep this game in the 20s, low 30. If this game starts to become a little bit more explosive, it's not good for the Patriots. And they're going to have to limit big plays. All playoff games come down to third and short, third and ones in the field, and they all come out to Red Zone offense and defense, right? So the four-point plays matter more in these. games. And I think Pittsburgh playing at home has a favorite. And here's what I wouldn't want to have happen for your Steelers, Joel, and then I'll give you the floor. When the battle, lose the war. Right. Because this is coming again. And so whatever you do, you don't want to unload everything

you want to do in this game just to win this one because something down the road could happen and it could jinxia. But I like Pittsburgh here only because they're playing at home. And I think it'll be hard for them to keep up. The Patriots defense hasn't impressed me all year. See, this is why NFL narratives, week to week, get me so nervous. The Patriots have one off night. They didn't have gronk. I'm still convinced they had an extra night in Miami. They might have had like their team Christmas party.

And something happened in Miami. Or an OBJ night in Miami. Right. We don't know what happened in Miami. Is he okay? He's all right. Did we send him flowers? He's actually at the Nike campus today.

I keep up where he is. He's in Nike campus. He's talking about LeBron James. He's been doing all right. Steelers have looked good. But they've also had to come back. They've led up a ton of. points, come back, Antonio Brown's bailed them out.

The Patriots are still the Patriots. They're the Achilles heel. I think when fans in Pittsburgh nationally say, what does Ben have to do to be in this conversation? What does Ben have to do? He puts up the numbers. He's won titles. He has to beat Tom.

And here it is right in front of him. And I told Lombardi earlier, I love that this is like a Heisman race where everyone's talking about Antonio Brown for MVP. Antonio Brown's been doing this for years. It just happened on national television the last couple weeks, and he's won games for them. And now here's Antonio Brown also going against Tom Brady in this like MVP showdown. That said, I think the Patriots is just too much. So they call reverse jinx.

Yeah. Bill Simmons have added that. Absolutely. They could put the whole team on Gronk. You will see at one point eight Steelers just trying to bring up. I think this. I don't think the Steelers have done a good job of setting up their team to beat the number one team they have to beat to get to the Super Bowl. So it's a big Al Davis thing. Like, you know, the one thing you have to do is figure out who your opponent is, and you're going to have to build your team to beat them. And so when I was in Cleveland, we would lose to Denver and John Elway. And it used to drive me crazy because we would lose to them. And then Denver would play Washington or Denver would play the Giants or they would play the Eagles.

And they'd get smoked, right? You know, they got killed in Super Bowls. And I said, you know, the problem we're having is we're trying to build this team to beat Denver when we should just build the team to beat the Giants. Because the one thing the Giants can do is beat Denver, right? So if we can beat the Giants, we'll beat Denver, right? If we build a team like that, and I think Pittsburgh doesn't really have that. If they play zone in this game without Shazir, they don't have enough team speed underneath to handle Brady, right? If they get into a man-to-man game and they probably will want to after watching the Miami tape figure and they can live with it, then Hogan's not going to be on the –

if Hogan was horrible last week, right? So Hogan was bad. So they're going to put – Dorset will have to play. Brady's going to have to throw the ball to somebody he doesn't trust completely, whether it's Dorset or Brits. or somebody if Hogan can't play. And that'll be the big challenge in the game. And then they're going to have to control the pace of the game. You can't have third and one throw a nine route to Hogan

and punt the ball back to Pittsburgh. Punts are the most dangerous aspect of this game because both offenses can score. So you've got to manage the game accordingly. To put this game in perspective, I will say this, the last time the Steelers did beat the Patriots, it was Antonio Brown's first touchdown of his career in 2011. Yeah.

And it was probably, I think Keith Miller made a few plays. I mean, it was a game where it became the Steelers, played a style to win the game. They got some pressure inside, and that's how you're going to have to play it. I mean, if this game gets too much exposed too far and it becomes a fast track, one thing the Patriots cannot do is give up a big play. They can't give up a 60-yard touchdown pass to Antonio Brown. They've got to make, Antonio can have 12 catches. He just can't have 200 yards. But that's why Dionne Lewis and Burkhead, the Steelers linebackers, that's scary. And then with Gronk inside, they can attack the middle field. We're against Miami, they couldn't

really attack. Miami challenged them. to try to win in the middle of the field, and the pass rush created a problem. Brady had, like, cabin fever in that game. He was trying to get rid of the ball too quickly because he understood the pressure, and they weren't winning on the outside. I think their lies to the difference.

Well, he knew Sue was trying to probably send a message and probably not him out, yeah. But this is where I think Tomlin maybe tries to outsmart himself even. I wonder if, and we spoke about this earlier, if they give Bell the Rock 25, 30 times, and try to, you know, really control the pace of the game, or how they've played better is letting, Big Ben in these final fourth quarters, just almost like a two-minute offense and just go.

I think if Ben throws it 66 times in this game, they lose. They got to control the pace of the game. I think the more Ben throws in this game, the more of the chances for interception. Look, Ravens had a chance for a few plays in that game. They didn't make them. But the Raven's secondary was horrendous. The Patriot secondary can cover. They can't cover Antonio Brown. They have to double him. But they can cover some players. I think if he throws it too much, they'll make a mistake. I think that's the recipe. Is more Bell. Brown, control third and short, take the bear out of the game. Juju, that's why Juju is the X factor.

Jesse James, get Jesse James involved, especially on third down. I can't take him seriously with that name. Because he's Miller. Who would name by Jesse? He should just call him Heath Mueller or something. Just give him like... Close enough. Heath James.

Just do that. That's easy. All right. Well, that's going to be a fun game this week. It'll be great. Everyone will tune to that one, Patriot Steelers. That's basically going to decide who's going to come out of the AFC, most people believe. I just want to throw one more thing out.

there to keep your eyes on. The Baltimore Ravens, a team that we do not believe in, right? They're going to go to the Cleveland Browns. I've been watching Cleveland Browns practice footage this whole week. They've been in the snow. Bug Howard, John Howard. They're having a great time. Josh Gordon looks happy. They just seem like they're all together. Hughes coming back. They're all galvanized. And I see the upset. I see it. I feel it. I feel it. He's like cousin Sal. He's like cousin Sal. First win of the season. The New Browns beat the old Browns. I love it. Yes. It's revenge on Baltimore. I love it.

That's the pick of the week. Nothing else matters. Yeah, that's all I got. That's all I got. Sorry, cousin South. I stole your Sunday there. All right, this has been GM Street. Part of our podcast network.

You got it. Mike Lombardi, Joel Solomon, Tate Frazier. We will be back Sunday night. Maybe Joel will come with us. Tony Peas. We'll see you there. It depends on Steelers win.