The Ringer NFL Show - Jim Harbaugh to the Chargers, Raheem Morris to the Falcons, and Conference Championship Weekend Picks, Props, and Predictions! | Extra Point Taken
Episode Date: January 26, 2024Conference championship weekend is here! Ben and Sheil will have all the picks, props, and predictions you’ll need to know to determine which teams will be playing for the Lombardi Trophy. Plus, mor...e coaching vacancies have been filled. How will Jim Harbaugh take Justin Herbert to new heights, and will Raheem Morris give Falcons fans hope in Atlanta? The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please check out theringer.com/RG to find out more, or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Hosts: Ben Solak and Sheil Kapadia Producer: Cliff Augustin Social: Eduardo Ocampo and Kiera Givens Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal and Conor Nevins Musical Elements: Devon Renaldo Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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Welcome to Extra Point Taking Shield for a lot here.
Join by Ben Solac.
It is championship weekend.
Four teams left.
Two headed to Vegas.
Two going home.
We will talk about those games.
Plus a pair of head coaching hires.
Since we last spoke earlier in the week,
we will lead the show with that Jim Harbaugh of the Chargers,
Dave Canales, to the Carolina.
Panthers, picks, props, long shots.
I mean, we got a lot to get to,
So like, how we do it?
Oh, it is, it is conference championship.
This is the last, like, week of the NFL season, right?
Super Bowl week is, like, special this, different than everything.
This is the last, like, regular tempo.
Do your come, do your, piece comes out Wednesday,
and pot is everything.
This is the signara to, like, regular NFL 2023 season.
Could not have come sooner.
Gosh, I'm exhausted, but I'm excited.
Then we get the fun off season.
All right, let's get to it.
No, no need to.
waste time here. Let's talk about these coaching hires. Let's start with the big Los Angeles
Chargers hired Jim Harbaugh. We talked about it earlier in the week. One of my takes on the Monday
show was that I'm in. Precient. I'm in on Jim Harbaugh going to the Los Angeles Chargers and now
Jim Harbaugh is actually going to the Los Angeles Chargers. So why am I in on it? One,
Jim Harbaugh is a fun character to have more in my life. Not that I don't watch college football,
but I mean, think about it. Like a Monday in week six, So lack of
next year, I can just be firing off Jim Harbaugh takes.
Like, that's good for content.
I'm team content.
He's won everywhere he's gone.
44, 19 and 1 in four seasons with the 49ers.
Did not have a losing record.
Even when it went bad, bad was 8 and 8.
Bad wasn't like 2 and 14, and that's very rare.
Goes to Michigan, gets over the hump, beat Ohio State, win the national championship this year.
Knows how to coach a winning football team.
Players seem to like him and, you know, embrace his quirkiness.
Should we call it?
I like that.
I like his eye for talent, you know,
that he's had some good coaches on that Michigan staff in terms of coaching talent.
So that's been good.
So I think if you're a Chargers fan, like, this is as good as you could have hoped for, right?
You got Jim Harbaugh.
You got Justin Herbert.
On paper, it's nice.
I'm not telling you that it's definitely going to work because if you're a Chargers fan listening to this,
you're going, how are they going to screw this up?
How is this not going to work?
But I think it's a fun combination.
I think it gives you a chance for big time upside, and I'm in on it.
Where do you stand?
Yeah.
Director of social video on the podcast, Eduardo Ocampo is a Chargers fan.
We were chatting in the pre-show.
And he did exactly what you said, where I was like, hey, how are you feeling about Harbon?
He was like, I'm not getting too excited.
All right, number one.
And Cliff called him out.
Cliff was like, it's Harbon, Herbert.
You've got to get excited.
And he goes, okay, yeah, fine, fine, I'm excited.
But Ben, what do you think of the hired Greg Roman as OC?
It's like, Edwardo, you got to love it, baby.
You got to live.
Come on.
You got to enjoy it.
You got to enjoy it.
yes, if Greg Roman has handed the keys to the offense, I will have some concerns.
However, you made the good point.
Harbaugh generally does a really good job telling out his staff.
And while Greg Roman in 2024 is kind of the butt of the Lamar Jackson joke,
Greg Roman in 2013 was like, I'm going to run the pistol.
And the NFL was like, what?
Like that, at the time, like this was a big deal, right?
And so it's less about-
How about 2019?
Five years ago, I mean, they had one of the Ravens had an amazing offense.
Like, you look at all the numbers.
I'm referring to when Harbott brought Roman in.
Right? To the NFL, right? It was they were doing Colin Kaepernick-Davada pistol stuff,
and they were doing options of heavy personnel. And so to me, it's more so Harbaugh's got an eye
for good schemers and good coaches, less Harbaugh takes Greg Roman at where he goes.
And so I think overall, you feel good, like you said, about his ability to fill out a staff.
I'm really interested to see the hires, though. That he has not been in the NFL for a long time, right?
Michigan, 2015, when he took that job. And so is he going to pull exclusively from Baltimore?
That's what they've been making kind of their general manager interview.
years right now, has been from his brother. Is it going to be Jesse Minter, the DC at Michigan,
comes and joins me in the NFL? What's his current network? That does really interest me,
because I don't know what it is just yet. We haven't seen him take a new job in a long time,
and he's making the college to the NFL jump. I wrote last year about how I personally, I don't
think I would ever hire a coach college out of the NFL. Harba is the exception that proves that
rule because he tends to be good at kind of code switching the schemes and to figure out who's got
the mind for what. We'll see how he does with LA. Yeah, I think actually more important than the
staff, like, I think he'll do a fine job with the staff.
We'll see, I'm very interested in who the personnel person is coming in, because, you know,
you're at Michigan.
All right, you're picking, you're literally picking all the players.
You're recruiting players that you want to come in, uh, and they join your team.
In San Francisco, that thing got real ugly with him and Trent bulky, you know, even when
they were winning games, but certainly, uh, when they were losing games there at the end.
So it's got to be someone.
I don't want to say it's got to be someone he knows, you know, that's why I floated the Ravens thing
out last week.
Like if it's someone who his brother is vouching for, that, no, no, no, no, like this is a good person.
You will work well with this person, something like that.
Would make sense.
If it's someone who's got no background with and doesn't know, then it's like, well, we'll see.
And I don't think we know the details of the contract.
Like, does Jim Harbaugh have final say on the 53 man roster?
Does he have, you know, final say on personnel decisions?
Is that totally out of his control?
And that's going to all go to the GM.
So we kind of have to get details on what the setup's going to be.
But listen, there's always, like, there's going to be potential for it to, you know, blow up at some point.
But, you know, look at, I like to look at everything in life in, like, you know, two to three years, you know?
You don't have to, like, when you're making big decisions, you don't have to commit to.
Like, look at it like a car lease.
You know what I mean?
You don't have to commit to it for a decade here.
So I think for the next two to three years, if you're a Chargers fan, there is some hope.
This is better than I think what the alternatives might have been.
So there you go.
We'll see how.
They do have work with that.
roster. That's why I'm pouring to the personnel stuff.
Like, it's not like, come in and win a Super Bowl right away. I do think they could be
competitive right away. Like, they could make the playoffs next year, no doubt about it, but
they're going to need some tweaks to that roster after the last several years.
The number one bar for my 2024 Chargers evaluation is, are you, Harbaugh, and whomever you fill
out for that personnel staff, are you, do you understand what you need to put around Herbert?
Because the previous staff can never get there, right? The previous staff was like,
look at all these big bodies.
And it was like, dude, the guy can throw it a football field.
Like, you need to be able to create vertical space.
You need to be able to stretch.
And take advantage of what you've got here.
The other thing is that they did not handle protection the way they needed to, the old
staff.
And a guy with Herbert who like loves to stand in there, take a shot and throw the ball.
Like, you want to kind of protect him from his worst self and say, all right,
if our guy's going to hang back there in the pocket and grip and rip it, like we have
to have a legit pass protection plan because otherwise he's going to hurt himself.
And we've seen that with Herbert.
He takes shot after shot and he's playing on bad ribs and whatever.
understand your guy and build around them.
That's the number one thing.
If they're six and 11, 11 and 6 or anywhere in between,
I want to feel like they know what they've got and Justin
and that they have an idea for what he's supposed to look like.
I want to feel good about Herbert improving,
saying, all right, we saw so much potential first couple of years.
And, you know, we don't need to get into a big Herbert conversation here.
We'll have plenty of offseason to do that.
But I wanted to be like, ooh, they are getting the best version out of this guy.
Or, ooh, he's doing things that we did not see him do the last two years.
that kind of thing. So there you go. All right. Other big hire Carolina Panthers.
Higher Dave Canales, I know, I know I'm getting old because now like all these, you know,
coaches are getting hired. I'm like, oh, I covered a team where this guy was, you know,
the wide receivers coach, which is literally the case with me and Dave Canales when I was in Seattle.
He was the wide receivers coach for Pete Carroll. So first time offensive coordinator this past year
with the Tampa Bay Bucks. Previously was Pete Carroll's guy, got his foot in the door,
with Pete Carroll at USC, then coached with the Seahawks for many years there in a variety of different
roles, wide receivers coach, quarterback's coach, passing game coordinator with the Seattle Seahawks,
then went to Tampa last year. And listen, I will use my catchphrase more with less.
Did he get more with less with that Bucks offense? I would say yes. I mean, I thought that Bucks
offense was going to suck. Anyone could have had Baker Mayfield last off season. That was their
quarterback. It was kind of a bridge year. And I thought they did some nice things.
things. They had some really nice flashes to the point where kind of resurrected Baker's,
Baker Mayfield's career, uh, in a way. So, uh, I think that's a good sign. If you were,
you know, hanging in there with Bryce Young like I am, the head coach is going to be the one
voice and is here. The guy, the guy designing the offense. I don't know if he'll be the guy,
uh, calling the offense, but, uh, I do wonder like, you know, we talked about that Panthers
job before how, what was the pool of candidates like that were like, yes, I want to go coach
or be the GM for David Tepra.
I think that's a fair question.
You know, Canales, I think some people maybe thought maybe he's a year away.
He does the interviews this year.
And then it's a head coach next year.
Yeah, I thought it was on the Ben Johnson time.
Right.
No question was my idea.
Yeah.
But now he's a head coach right away.
So I think if you're a Panthers fan, I would be like cautiously like, okay.
I sort of feel good about this with Canales, but I still have questions because of my
owner.
I think that's where I'd be at if I were a Panthers fan.
I think you are a big,
big Canales fan, right?
Yeah,
over the course of the season,
it just became clear and clear,
like this guy gets it,
uh,
in terms of like,
making Mike Evans work,
right?
And,
and finding ways to maximize Mike Evans.
Like,
it's dumb to say making Mike Evans works.
It's Mike Evans,
right?
But you go and you watch that last staff for the Byron
left foot staff and it's just like,
all and runs down the field,
like nine ball,
nine ball post,
vertical ball.
And they're like,
no,
like we can use Mike as a regular receiver.
Like,
we can run him on real routes and like actual route running and
and breaking stuff and get him yak
opportunities. Like, Mike is complete for us. There's, there's an acknowledgement of just
smart ways to use players. You don't kind of pigeonhole guys. A lot has been said and rightfully so
about how Baker played fast under Canales. And I think that that's a pretty good sign that
he understands how to make the quarterback's eyes right, how to make the quarterback comfortable,
feel empowered in the offense because Baker notoriously, not playing fast, likes to hold on to
the football, likes to take his sacks and run around back there. That was not the Baker that we saw
in Tampa. And then, like, obviously, Chris Godwin, like a little bit of acquired our end of
the season, okay, but in general, like the ancillary pieces with Rashad White and Kda and
and then Trey Palmer, like, they found creative ways to get those guys involved. It wasn't the
most stacked unit there. And so Canales, like, is an iteration on an iteration on an iteration, right?
He's on the, under Shane Waldron and everybody had other experience, and then that from McBay
and everything, it's incorrect to say that he's running like the McVeigh system. He's got a nice
motley crew to him. He's got a nice, I've pulled some things from different places. And that
leaves you to believe that, all right, like, he's got a sharp offensive mind on him. Now,
in Carolina, I'm not sure he can run what he ran for Baker. Because I don't know if you can,
like, I don't know if you can do that with Bryce in terms of like the amount of under center stuff.
Bryce has always been like a shotgun RPO quarterback that he wants to be able to see it,
kind of develop in front of him. He doesn't want to turn his back. The quick game stuff like
from the gun is, the bucks didn't really rely on that too much. It's interesting. I don't think
his system translates over one to one.
But I also don't think Canalis is a sharp attack, as a smart cookie.
And when he talks, man, like, I'll buy it.
That's what I was going to say.
He's got that.
Now, maybe we're suckers, right?
Because we're like, you know, me, damn.
Oh, this is cool.
I was about to say.
I'm 100% of sucker for this.
Yeah, me too.
It's like, you know, a clip circulates on social media.
It's like, wow, this guy's actually willing to explain sort of what he's thinking here.
That's how I love this guy.
I do think though he has that like, I do think he will be sort of an easy to get along with leader, likable.
He's got that Pete Carroll positive energy, you know, not Pete Carroll's energy.
Nobody has that.
But, you know, that's sort of his like the way about Dave Canal.
So I always like that.
You know, I think that's good.
I think players will take to that.
But yeah, when he explains it, he speaks very much to what you're talking about.
He's not like, my system, my scheme.
He's sort of like, well, what's the defense?
doing, what do I have to work with? And as I write in my guidelines for hiring an NFL head coach,
everybody says that, that they don't have a scheme and they'll adjust to what the players do,
but how many coaches are actually able to do that? Well, that separates the good coaches
from the bad coaches. And so we'll see if he's able to work that out there.
The other thing from what people have said about canalesis, secondhand stuff, but they say,
like, the energy and the vibes are high. They, you know, like, obviously he spent a lot of time
under Pete and he knows the value of bringing a smile to the table and whatever.
But from what I've seen from him and what a lot of people have said, like, he just seems like
the sort of guy to be like, all right, players want to be around.
Like this is a, this is a fun dude.
I don't think we're in danger of an Arthur Smithing over his time in Carolina.
Who knows?
Frank Reich, man, Frank Reich walked in a pretty pleasant man in Carolina and 11 weeks,
turned him into a dark soul.
He was not having a good time.
If Dave Conallis looks like Frank Reich at the end of his first season, that would be a bad
bald beard and a shattered eyes, not good.
but I think we'll be all right in that regard.
Breaking news here.
No way.
From Kiera.
Wait, don't look.
Don't look in the chat.
Okay.
Did you look in the chat?
Don't look in social chat.
No, I haven't looked.
Okay.
Thank you to Kiera for dropping this in.
Second pod in a row.
Last time we had a coaching hire.
Gosh, we just pod constantly.
And you asked me, and I got it wrong.
I did not think Brian Callahan was the Titans coach.
Now we have a hiring in Atlanta.
Oh, finally.
Atlanta is going to be hard.
They interviewed 400 different people.
All right.
Well, we got to do the same thing.
Now it's a bit.
All right, Ben Stolak, you have three guesses about who the new Falcons head coach is.
What do you got?
All right.
I don't think if it was Bill Belichick, you would have contained yourself like this.
But obviously the first guest, the first guess I have to give.
Shepter no.
Shefter said earlier today, he was like, Belichick's running out of steam there.
So I'm not guessing Belichick.
I'm passing over Belichick.
Maybe I don't look dumb.
Okay.
Okay.
I try to remember,
they've interviewed basically every day.
I'm trying to remember who they found for second interviews.
You want me to try to find a list here?
Can't be saying anybody who's active.
I'm going to start with Bobby Sloick.
Bobby Sloick is incorrect.
Oh, all right.
No Bobby.
This is fun.
It's much more fun to be the guy asking the question than the guy guesses.
If I were Arthur Blank, I wouldn't do Dan Quinn.
I can't hire anybody.
Dan Quinn.
Dan Quinn, was already the question.
their coach, Ben.
Come on.
Get it together here.
Stop cracking under the pressure.
I'm just running through the names in my head of dudes who are actually available.
How is the Times of India, the first Google search?
Is this just because it's me?
I call it Falcons Head Coaching Search interviews and Times of India, which I don't,
no, I would read.
I don't read is the first link.
I mean, that's weird to me.
Sorry, I'm trying to buy time for you.
Go ahead.
No, I appreciate it.
Dude, this is, I got at least a.
list. I don't have a list right now, so I can't remember anybody who's up for these jobs.
Okay, Bill Belichick. I'll guess Bill Belichick. No, not Bill Belichick. Oh, for two.
O for two. Um, they interviewed Brable yesterday. I'm tempted to say Brable, but the Brable
Arthur Smith thing feels weird to me. I don't know if they would do it. All right, Brable, final
answer. Incorrect. It is Rahim Morris. Oh, that's awesome. Is your new
Atlanta Falcons
head coach, the guy
who was getting endorsements from
Sean McVeigh, Kyle
Shanahan. I've heard Mike Tomlin say
Rahim Morris is the best football
coach I've ever been around.
Players, right? Jalen
Ramsey going to bat
for the guy. So Rahim Morris
who obviously when he was
very young
coached the Tampa Bay
Buccaneers for let's see how many
seasons was that. That was for
one, two, three seasons. Three seasons coached the Tampa Bay Buccaneers during that time. Tampa
went 17 and 31. That was when he was 33, 34, and 35 years old. Then I guess he had an interim,
interim stint with the Falcons in 2020. Okay. I think I forgot about that. Had an interim
stint with the Falcons in 2020. So it's funny because I was thinking about the Dan, I was thinking
about the Dan Quinn staff. I was like, okay, like it wasn't Dan Quinn. And my head was like,
Rahim Morris was also on that staff, but then I didn't say it.
Yeah, he was there from 2015 to 2020.
So they're obviously familiar with him there.
He's now 47 years old.
I like this.
He seemed like a guy to me that deserved another shot here over the past couple seasons.
I'm not telling you it's a home run and it's definitely going to work out,
but he's been a good defensive coordinator.
He's coached under very good coaches.
He's been, you know, like we just said, I mean, Tomlin,
McVegett, like these guys all vouch for him, players vouch for him.
And I think you need a nice, like, fresh voice in Atlanta where they've got some talent.
We'll see how they use it.
We'll see what they do at quarterback.
But this is a move that makes sense to me.
This isn't like a rush into a, hey, we got to win a Super Bowl next year type of move.
This is like a, hey, let's hire someone and let's try to get some sustained success in here,
which has been eluding us.
So that is my initial reaction to Rahim Morris in Atlanta.
Yeah, I'm happy Rahim got a job.
That makes sense.
Rahim has coached a good defense in Los Angeles, excuse me, for a while with like weird pieces changing over time.
Talk about more with less, right?
This year, I mean, we couldn't name anybody on that defense when the season started.
I was literally about to do the like, do we want to talk about the Kobe Durant snaps, right?
Do we want to talk about, they got the safety with the funny last name.
Russ Yeast, there it is, Russ Yeast.
They got dudes, right?
They're throwing cats out there.
Rose Booms out there.
They're trying to figure stuff out.
And he's, I think,
a really nice coaching job overall where,
remember,
he inherited that unit from Staley.
And they were kind of,
they were like,
Rahim come in for the culture and for the,
the player aspect of this,
right the way they connect with the guys.
But also,
can you just run the Staley stuff?
And he was like,
yeah.
And then after a few weeks,
he was like,
no.
And then they,
they incorporated some of it and they kept some of it,
but they largely moved to like more traditional
kind of defensive approaches.
And he integrated that pretty well.
And,
and,
and,
and you saw the,
the fruit of that in the 2021 season and then going on from there.
So it's not like his defensive numbers are going to look like, oh, like, you know,
if you hired Jim Schwartz, it'd be like, yeah, the best defense ever.
Like, it's not that, but the more with less theorem, I think really, really applies to him.
And then, like, I like the head coaching experience.
I don't, I don't mind retreads at all, especially when it's like he got it so young with
Tampa, where he probably was a little bit over his skis.
It's nice to have a guy who knows what the chair feels like, knows what the podium feels like.
And you can just expect, again, talking about Atlanta, what they're coming off.
of a level of professionalism, right?
A level of organization and team direction.
That's probably good from Rahim Morris.
And like, the vibes are great because Rahim was great when he was there, right?
Everybody loved him when he was there.
It was just they couldn't get over the hump with Dan Quinn and when once Shanahan left
that staff.
And so overall, I think it's a great hire.
I know that there was a very, very vocal support for Rahim to get a job.
And there was a lot of suspicion and doubt that he would actually get one in this cycle.
So good for him.
All right.
We have to go out of order here,
It's all that because I just said it would not make sense for me to not just do my Monday morning
storyline now. You don't have to do it, but I'm going to do it because it directly relates to
this. And my Monday morning storyline was going to be Bill Belchick's not getting a job.
Might not have a seat at the table. And look at this now. Ben, we got two open jobs in the NFL
as we record this, the Seattle Seahawks and the Washington commanders. Can I read you the list of
potential head coaching candidates
that are still out there
with two jobs left.
Bill Belichick,
who the Falcons were the only team
he interviewed with.
Mike freaking Vrabel
does not have a job
with the Seahawks and commanders left.
Mike McDonald,
who I thought might be like
the best head coaching candidate
on the market.
Ravens fans,
you might be getting
Mike McDonald back next season,
which, wow,
that would be huge for the Baltimore Ravens.
Detroit Lions fans.
Detroit.
You might be getting
Ben Johnson back as your offensive coordinator, which, I mean, that would be so huge for that
Detroit Lions team. He's still out there. And then you have other names like Dan Quinn, who I don't know,
is he going to get that Dehawks job and Bobby Sloat, Texans fans? Aaron Glenn also.
Aaron Glenn. You might get offensive coordinator back. Aaron Glenn in Detroit. So this has been
really interesting. There have been some surprises. I didn't necessarily think a guy like Callahan,
a guy like Canales. I didn't think, no, they were going to snatch.
these jobs with Mike Ravel,
Bill Belichick out there.
Like I thought those guys
were going to get two of the jobs there.
So that was my Monday morning storyline.
And what happens?
If Bill Belichick doesn't sound like he's going to get one of these jobs.
I mean, that's the most interesting story in the NFL.
Bill freaking Belichick, what's he going to do?
TV?
Is he going to go coach Navy?
Is he going to go coach high school?
Is he going to be an advisor for a team?
What is this man going to do next year?
He's 72 years old.
Unbelievable.
Three man game.
Get on the show.
Extra point taken.
Oh, come on.
He can't keep up with these takes.
Exclusively special teams DVOA talk with Shield for Bill Belichick there.
Yeah, I mean, I would say it's more likely than not Bill doesn't get a job in this cycle.
Like, I don't see him taking Seattle.
Commanders feel extremely to me like they're sitting on Ben Johnson, right?
Like, that's been the T leaves.
And they already hired a GM.
Yeah.
So that's not like totally open.
They have a GM.
So you're not, is that guy going to want to hire him?
Yeah.
In the worlds where Ben Johnson takes Seattle,
I think Washington tilt into Bill Belichick is not impossible,
but you need to get to that world first.
We don't know if we're going to get there.
Detroit, man, win this ball game.
Keep those coaches for another two weeks.
Make Washington, Seattle, sweat this thing out.
Win this ball game this weekend.
And if at least one of the two jobs closes,
you can be positive you're returning at least one of the two coordinators,
that is a good feeling.
As a Philadelphia Eagles fan,
that is a nice comforting feeling.
So important game to win for a lot of reasons.
But the coordinators here,
adding on top being one of them.
Yeah,
I would say I'd be shocked if Bill gets a job.
And at this point,
I don't think Bravel's getting a job either.
Now,
a year off,
like,
I think more coaches should take the year off
and then try to get the job again,
the Doug Peterson instead of the Frank Reich,
because you're just,
you're just tired.
You're exhausted.
Like,
give yourself a minute to breathe
and, like,
acknowledge that,
that other jobs will open up next year and they'll open up the year following.
That, I think, applies more to Vrabel.
That's what I was going to say.
I don't think that does not apply to Belichick.
I mean, he's 72.
There were seven jobs open.
Like, I mean, that's a lot of,
or seven or eight, seven or eight jobs open this cycle.
I mean, that's a lot of jobs to like sort of look around and try to find one.
So, yeah, I can agree with you on Vrabel.
If you sit out a year, it's not the end of the world.
There's going to be openings next year for Belich.
at, not to keep bringing up his age, but man, that is very, very, very surprising.
I don't think the Seahawks have even interviewed Ben Johnson, by the way.
So, they haven't, but I don't understand what their whole deal is.
They haven't interviewed John, the Seahawks, somebody hit me up.
Somebody hit me up and they were like, who do you think the Seahawks are going to get?
And I was like, well, they haven't interviewed Mike McDonald's.
So are they aware of what's going on in the year 2020?
That was weird.
I'm reading off of s.i.com, Richie Witt's piece here.
And he has Dan Quinn, Frank Smith.
Oh, excuse me, this is just a list of guys.
I don't think this is a list of interviews.
So I was looking for a list to see who they've talked to.
But if you haven't talked to Ben Johnson and Mike McDonald,
you can play in ball.
What are we?
These are the guys.
You at least want to get the ideas.
You want to hear what they're up to because they're going to be head coaches somewhere soon.
I don't, Seattle's search makes zero sense to Ben right now.
I've got no idea who they're going to hire.
Dan Quinn, Mike Kafka, like those are, I mean, those are a couple of the names.
Yeah, it is weird.
How do you not, how do you not tell?
I think, I think they talked to him more.
Okay.
After Graham.
Right.
They're barking up their own tree, the Seahawks are.
Out there in the Pacific Northwest, just doing business.
There you go.
All right.
So we're up to speed.
Thank you to Kiera for that.
And if there's anything else, please drop it in the chat and we'll react to it.
Let's take a break.
We'll come back.
We'll talk about these championship games.
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All right.
We are back on extra point pick.
Hell,
your Belichick prediction is going to be wrong.
He can't win a playoff game
if he's not coaching.
He's not coaching.
That's right.
I forgot about that out
where he just doesn't get a job.
All right.
We got two games here.
We're going to talk about
both of them.
I don't even know.
Let's start with,
let's just go in order.
We got Chiefs at Ravens is the first one.
What's got your attention
for this game?
We could obviously name 400 different things.
What's like on the top of the list where you're like,
ooh, I can't wait to see how this plays out.
It's, I want to see from the defensive perspective
how we address these quarterbacks, right?
Like, that's the most interesting thing to me.
I wrote this week about Mike McDonald, the DC of the Ravens
and Steve Spagnolo, the DC of the Chiefs,
and how, like, they're similar philosophically.
They both want to change the picture on you
and move guys post-snap,
and they have highly versatile players.
They can line up in a bunch of different personalities and formations and looks.
But it doesn't necessarily all end up playing out the same.
The chiefs are a lot more cover two.
They're a lot more man coverage.
They press more often.
The Ravens are more like cover four and quarters.
And the chiefs blitzes a lot more.
And the Ravens will send blitzers,
but they drop defense alignments.
It plays out a lot differently.
But one of the fundamental things that's paired with these guys
is that when they can anticipate your snap count
and when they can anticipate your checks on offense,
like your protection rules,
they can really make life just a living hell for you.
I mean, these guys are headaches to deal with.
And so this is a big, like, prep week.
This is a big, okay, if we get them into third and seven,
if we get them into third and six,
how are they got a pass protect?
Who do they want to get the ball to?
And how we're going to be able to win in our rush?
Critically for the Chiefs, Joe Tuny,
potentially out for this game,
Star Right Guard, Nick Allegretti,
would be stepping into play for him.
Also, not for nothing.
Mike Edwards, the safety for the chiefs potentially out as well.
Edwards was already the backup to Brian Cook,
who's already out for the season.
They could be on Justin Reed and Dionne Bush,
safety four,
starting in this game. And they played Charmardi Corner as well, who is a rookie for them.
But safeties and versatility and chess pieces really important to this defense,
Chiefs with a couple of key injuries coming into this. But that off as a line issue with Joe Tooney,
with the amount of the Ravens throw at your interior, and with the way they twist and they stunt
and they play games and the communication that that takes, just a really tough time to be
dealing with a shuffle deck at the office line, especially losing a guy like Toonie,
who's so experienced and so established. So for me, it's game planning stuff. This is a huge
Mahomes scramble game.
Like he's,
you're not going to have clean pockets
when you're on pass downs
in this game.
You're going to,
your lines from playing better
than they have in the past,
but they're not going to win,
I think it's just something
against those Ravens front.
So this is going to be a lot of
Mahomes outside of the pocket,
a lot of Mahomes tuck and run
and does a little waddling duck scramble
and you got to be able to tackle him in space
and punish him for that.
And then on the Lamar side of things,
the chiefs, man,
when they play Lamar,
when they play Russian quarterbacks,
they bring those safeties way, way,
way up.
They bring them right.
They bring them real load
to the line of scrimmage. And they said, we were going to press and we were going to have a lot
of presents in the box, and we are not going to let you screw around with this quarterback run game.
You got to win over the top, right? This is the game for why we went out and got Zayflowers,
right? Why we went out and got Odell Beckham Jr. So when we get that deep post one-on-on-one,
we connect and we hit it. So for the Chiefs, it's all handoff to Pacheco and Mahomes.
It's all five-yard gain, staying ahead of the sticks. Don't get sacked. For the Ravens,
it's all, they're going to take that away from us. We got to kill them with 50-yard shots, right?
We have to be able to kill them with the moonball.
the interplay here, the chess match.
This is one of the most exciting games this season.
Yeah, I had Mahomes versus the Ravens defense as the thing I want to see here.
I mean, I've been yelling about it all season.
Chief supporting cast isn't good enough.
Tackles aren't good enough.
There's no way.
And here we are one freaking game away from this guy getting his team back to the Super Bowl.
I mean, is he going to make me look and others who agreed with me look totally stupid?
or is this the game where that kind of lack of talent around Patrick Mahomes actually shows up?
That Chiefs offense we saw last week was different than we've seen all season long.
I mean, they had eight plays of 20 plus yards in that game.
That was a season high for them.
They scored on five of seven possession.
So you have to ask yourself, did they figure something out?
Are guys getting more confidence?
Just the randomness of, hey, MVS makes a play here where he wasn't making that play
early in the season, or was it an outlier performance? Well, we're going to get like a pretty good
answer to that because this Ravens off defense is the best in the NFL. They're legit. They don't
just do one thing, you know, as you alluded to, they can game plan for the opponent. They've been
impressive doing that all season long. They've got, they've just got guys. I mean,
Clowny and Matabuque and Roquan Smith and Kyle Hamilton. Like, just looking at the talent on one side
versus the talent on the other side, specifically with that tuny injury, where now it's like,
like, oh, chiefs in three spots are not great on that offensive line.
Like the Ravens have a talent advantage on defense.
But you know what?
It doesn't matter sometimes.
Like I just turned in my picks, Ben, for the ringer.com.
And, you know, I'm doing all the, right.
Here's numbers and scheme.
And then I ended it.
I'm just like, is this going to just be a Mahomes game we're talking about like 10 years ago?
As Mahomes as an underdog again, right?
So he's going to win outright 80% of the time.
Mahomes as an underdog on the road against the best defense in the NFL,
where Mahomes does not have all the guys he's had in years past.
Is he just going to be able to figure it out and not take sacks
and put the team on his back and scramble, like you said,
and make second reaction plays and make every good decision.
Like, you know, we always look at the highlights and I love watching him too,
but my gosh, this guy as a decision maker,
just knowing what's going on around him, the spatial awareness,
what the defense is trying to do to him.
Like all these things, we could name 400 things that Mahomes does at an elite level.
is he going to be able to make, because the Ravens, it's not going to be easy.
The Ravens, this will not be easy for Patrick Mahomes.
He will have to make those 1% plays.
Is he capable of making the 1% plays?
Of course, we've seen it over and over again.
Like, I was thinking about that Rams game in week 14, where Matthew Stafford was awesome,
and they took the Ravens to overtime and they scored, what, 31 points in that game?
Like, I think it's going to, and Matthew Stafford had a lot more help than Patrick Mahomes has with this Chiefs team.
But it's going to take that type of effort, that type of precision.
that type of
sort of near perfect play
from Patrick Mahomes,
in my opinion,
for this Chief's offense
to turn in
a good performance
against this Ravens defense.
Yeah,
they connected on a couple
bigger plays,
bigger connections
against the bills
than they had
from much of the season.
That's not the game plan
on this one.
The Raven is one of the best
defenses in the league
in like pretty much every metric.
But in passes
of over 20 air yards,
they are suffocating.
They are really,
really good on the deep shot.
And so this is your
run run yak game,
right it's the it's the it's the ugly sort of game that the chiefs have been playing but you know
generally winning for much of the season 21 17 and 24 to 20 where it's not you know the usual
playoff performances and they're not going to have a walk down the field the way they did against
the bills and that banged up defense that game is not the ravens are going to make them play
that short and shallow game this is an enormous isaiah pacheco game right this offense
works when pacheco's in there because they don't have an alternate back to really bang it
between the tackles that's not clad edwardsillair that's not jerrick macken uh uh uh excuse me
Pacheco back practice on Thursday
he was walking through.
The expectations that they're just keeping his workload light
so that he can play.
They need Pacheco and they need him to be an important player,
a big player.
The other thing is Mahomes scramble success.
Like in the playoffs,
like in the regular season, it's good.
And in the playoffs,
it jumps to a new heights.
Like,
yeah,
this is,
like,
we're obviously going to get to bets and props later.
This is the Mahomes rushing game.
This is the,
he carries 11 freaking times game.
Like,
it has to be because coverage-wise,
they're going to lose.
Like,
like they're,
they're not going to reliably get guys
against the Ravens.
He has to create with his legs.
Sounds like we may have
one of the same wagers in this game
once we get to the contest.
But,
yeah, Chiefs,
second in the NFL
in average yards after the catch
this season,
Ravens defense fifth,
uh,
at limiting yards after the catch.
And to your point,
Ravens first in DVOA against deep passes.
So,
uh,
this doesn't look like a game.
It would be surprising if the,
if the,
The Chiefs won this game by gashing the Ravens downfield.
They're going to have to be methodical.
Yeah.
And that run-run methodical approach has been accompanied by such a good defense for the
Chiefs, right?
It's been excellent all year.
It's been a matchup defense that's been great.
Lamar.
Like, you are running into the quarterback who's played the best ball this season.
Like, in almost every other game you've played,
you've had the quarterback on your side who's playing better ball.
Not this game.
Like, in this game, it's a draw, right?
Or it's Lamar, Ed.
Lamar's the MVP.
And the Chiefs are bad success rate
against Scramble, right?
Because of how much they move guys
in the back seven.
That's not where they're successful.
They've been successful this year
pressuring, right, heating guys up.
Next-gen stats have this unbelievable stat.
Lamar, in games in which Lamar is pressured
on at least 40% of his dropbacks,
he has 1,62% of those games.
The average NFL quarterback wins 36% of those games, right?
When Lamar gets pressured,
it doesn't really seem to fluster
the Ravens' offense as much as it should.
So the way the Chiefs have won is just not the model that you're usually going to win against.
We'll beat Lamar out with.
So even if they get that run-run methodical and they're scoring seven on the Ravens and they're
inching those drives down the field, you just worry Lamar on the other side is going to match
you seven for seven.
And he's going to do it a lot easier.
You really have to be like picture perfect on offense.
Last time we saw Lamar Jackson go up against Baggs was week two of 2021.
Chiefs were very blitz heavy in that game.
and Jackson had a very good game 18 for 26 for 239 yards.
He threw a couple interceptions, but Ben, in terms of dropback success rate,
that was the sixth best game of Lamar Jackson's entire career in that game.
And that was, again, different scheme, different supporting cast.
It's upgraded since then also is the best Chiefs.
The Chiefs past defense has been since then.
So that is going to be fun as well.
All right, we'll continue to talk about that game as we get into our picks for the weekend.
Let's move on to the second matchup, the Detroit Lion.
Lions fans, you just got to love that we're saying.
The Detroit Lions are in the NFC championship.
They are one game away from playing in the Super Bowl.
They're going to San Francisco to take on the Niners.
Niners are seven-point favorites.
I didn't mention it earlier,
but the Chiefs are three and a half point underdog in that game at Baltimore.
All right, Lions at Niners, Solek, what do you got your eye on?
The Lions are the worst explosive pass rate defense in the league by a mile.
The 49ers are the second best explosive pass rate offense in the league.
And it's unfair to say that's your ball game, but that's that right there is your ballgame
on that side of the ball.
For perspective, since week 13th, this is since the beginning of December.
The Lions are allowing an explosive pass on 15.2% of their drive.
On almost one out of every six passes, lines are given up an explosive, 20 plus yards.
Second place is at 11.6.
Like this is an enormous difference, right?
And this is including the postseason as well.
Why is this happening?
Because Detroit has no issues leaving their corners on islands.
And their corners are Kindleville or Cam Sotton.
And Cam Sond, I feel bad for Cam Sond.
Cam Sond's like a fine corner too.
It's just that he's playing corner one right now.
And that's not not, yeah.
And, like, he hasn't even been as bad as, I think he's, he's, uh, made out to be.
It's just that he's often in the highlight reel, right?
And like this, that's, that's the nature of playing corner.
But Kindleville are on the opposite side, right?
They have all these safeties and they rotate these guys.
And Brian Branch is good in the slot.
But they just lose to the deep outside shot.
And then Aiden Hutchinson has really stepped up his game down the home stretch.
He was a high pressure, low sack player for much of the season.
He has become a high pressure high sack player as of late.
And that's just regression, right?
That's just like some unblocked sacks and some noisy stuff.
but altogether, like he's having the sort of disruptive, I can win for my defense one v1
and save the other 10 guys.
Like he's having that level of impact.
That's star impact in the postseason needs to have an enormous game against Colton
McKivitts to get this done against the Niners.
Obviously, there's a Debo Samuel question.
And the Niners, oh, they cover with Debo, they don't cover without him.
They're about one in three without Debo playing on the season.
Yeah, but if you go and you look, like take out the Cleveland rain game, like the
offense was still explosive.
Like they were losing to some, you know, Kirk Cousins had.
a hero performance in primetime for the first time in his life.
Like it was, it wasn't like, you know,
Brandon I, you can George Kittle forget how to play.
Yeah, I've got,
forgets how to play when Debo's not there.
Yeah, sorry, not, not to interrupt you.
I agree with you because I've got a little nugget that does the same thing.
I mean, I think there's this thought that like the 49ers off when they had that losing streak,
their offense completely sucked.
Like, it did not completely suck.
Their defense was not good.
And they turned the football over.
When they haven't had Debo Samuel this, when,
So when they've had Samuel with Brock Party this year, they've had a 50.9% success rate,
which is best in the NFL.
When they've had Brock Purdy and not had Debo Samuel, they've had a 47.3% success rate in the NFL.
Guess how many teams have had a 47.3% success rate in the NFL this year, other than the
Niners?
The answer is zero.
Yeah, zero.
Yeah, it would still be their offense without Debo Samuel on a down-to-down efficiency basis
would still be the best offense in the NFL.
Now, there's noise.
It's a small sample on office.
I get all that, but I'm with you. Listen, we can all agree. Debo Samuel is awesome and their
offense is a lot better when they have Debo Samuel, but their defense, I mean, their offense
doesn't like fall apart, like you said, and it doesn't suck all of a sudden because they don't
have Debo Samuel. So I'm glad you made that point. Yeah. So, but altogether, right, Debo or no
Debo, Purdy is the middle of the field. That's where, you know, I said deep outside, they'll lose,
but the lines also have linebacker issues and coverage. You can win over the middle field to
them. Lines not great against tight ends. You have George Kittle. He's walking explosive play at
tight end. There's just there's a lot that the Niners can find success within the passing game.
It's worth noting running game wise. Lions defense are really strong. That's obviously the
Niners are tend to still be a high rush over expectation team. They still want to hand the
football off. This feels like the sort of game where Kyle's going to have to skew towards letting
Brock run the offense a little bit more, which in big games, he tends to do that with Brock,
where he'll come out and be a little bit past happier than usual. Uh, and so,
So altogether, you expect them to just be able to have a big day moving the football.
Now, the other half of this is that the Niners are a bottom five defense against a run, right?
And I have consistently struggled against this late.
I put this up on Twitter because I think, like, folks don't realize in general, since week 13 again, since December started,
the Lions are better than the 49ers on defense by EPA per drive and by success rate.
They're 23rd and EPA and 15th at success rate.
The Niners are 26th and 22nd.
Now, those numbers aren't perfect, right?
There was a week 18 game where the Niners were playing the Rams and meaningless game.
Eric Armstead was out for it.
But in general, if you look at like broad numbers, right?
We get down to specifics, it's terrifying for the Lions because the explosive fast stuff.
Broad numbers.
This Lions defense is not as much of a liability.
It's a huge difference liability than the Niners are.
The nature of the liability is the difference.
The 49ers against the run have been a bottom five EPA team for most of the back half of the season.
They've been a bottom five success rate team.
We saw the success of Aaron Jones.
Jones had against them in the Packers, Niners game.
Structurally, they allow themselves to lose to the run.
And Detroit has shown us over the course of this season and seasons pass.
They will have no problem handling the football off in a shootout.
They feel like it's going to be a high scoring game.
Like, oh, we have a throw with Jared Gop.
We've got to go down the field.
No, they'll just junk it on you, right?
I mean, this is a Dan Campbell team.
Now, if you're on a Jackson injury, a left guard, he leaves the game.
Frank Ragnow, super banged up.
What percent of him are you getting?
And you might have offensive line issues that mitigate this for Detroit.
But if they get good line play, if they get healthy,
players back or if they just commit to it, even if they're losing, you know, five play 75
yard drives to the Niners, they can come right back with a 17 play 75 yard drive of their own
and we see points get up on the board here. And so it's a bad look for Detroit defensively.
They really don't match up well into the Niners. But there's worlds in which the offense
keeps pace and we're in for a lot of fireworks. Yeah. And with Detroit's run defense, you're right.
I think they're first in rush, DVOA against the rush. Last week, though, is a little concerning. I mean,
that's a bad buck's running team and you know they got him a little bit they didn't run the
football often but man they were averaging i think over five yards per carry their run defense did not look
as someone who is on the rashad white under and then he went over and then immediately left the game
with injury i'm aware of what rashad white did on i against the lions overall i think that was a
we're super indexed the past and we're if we lose to rashad white in this running game we do but
we don't think we will and they were right like rashad ripped off those big guys
gains because like on chunk gains, right?
If it's rid of yards on chunks.
But then they'd give it to them and they would just get a penetration and it's second
and 11.
But that's losing by structure to me.
Next gen stats, the lion's second best team defense in the league in terms of allowing
rush yards over expectation to backs, right?
They allow very few over expectation.
Third best teams in terms of getting penetration.
And Christian McAfrey is all about yards over expectation, yards over expectation,
block yards behind the line of scrimmage, you know, getting that positive stuff
from the scheme.
That matchup is a big deal.
spoiler. I'm under for Christian McCaffrey
rushing roads when we get there.
The point you made about the Lions being able to sustain drives,
not to repeat myself from last week,
but I do think it's a similar formula.
I mean, the Packers were doing that.
Packers come out, have that long drive.
They're shrinking the game.
Lions theoretically have the ability to do the same thing.
I do think this is a game where you need your offense
to help your defense.
Can you limit the Niners to eight possessions instead of 11 possessions?
I think that's a big deal here where you're able
to invite some more variance as seven-point underdogs
if you can do stuff like that.
So we'll see.
Jared Goff, this lion's offense, that run game,
and they string together long drives in this game.
You're right.
I mean, listen, that Niners defense overall has been good this season,
but man, Packers were going up and down the field
on that Niners defense last week.
And so if you look at it overall,
this Lions offense has been pretty much as good as that Packers' offense
all season long, so I think they've got a shot there.
with that formula.
All right.
Talk more about that game as well as we get to some of our picks.
I gave my Monday morning storyline.
So, like, what do you have?
What's your Monday morning storyline before we get to our picks?
Yeah.
My Monday morning storyline is Detroit Lions attend Super Bowl,
54 in Las Vegas.
Whoa.
Whoa, baby, before we get to the picks,
seven point dogs, you think they're going to win the game?
Outright.
I think they have pretty good shot.
I think seven is,
too big of a number. I'm going to be on Detroit plus seven. I've been on to Detroit this entire
postseason. And I said at the beginning, they're my wildcard team. I like the run that
they got. I like the draw that they got. Like I said, defensively, I'm terrified with how they
match up to San Francisco. I know we talked about how that offense is good without Debo. Still missing
Debo is meaningful. It is one of your primary weapons. It's one of your versatile. You know,
we mess around with formation guys. But the main thing for me is just looking at the lines
offensively. They're a lot better than the Niners defense. And they have the ability to control
clock and control tempo and control game scripts. I don't think that the Niners can be able to
steamroll Detroit the way that it's projected. I think this is a much closer game than seven is indicating.
Now, Detroit had the two games at home, right, and they had the four field aspect of it. Going on the
road against a really playoff experience team as a young team, like it is a tough road to hoe. It absolutely
is. I think if you, you know, water gun to my belly, I had to pick one of these teams to, you know,
see tomorrow. I'm probably picking the Niners because I just feel better about it.
But I think this is, I'm surprised that this line has stayed this big.
I took Detroit plus seven at open, feeling like, all right, we're going to see some sixes.
And we haven't seen some sixes.
We've seen mostly money towards the Niners, but see Seven get a lot of juice.
I understand the doubt over Detroit.
I understand the visibility of how this defense is struggling.
I just think that the Niners' defensive issues are pretty dramatically understated.
I think there's a much better chance.
This is a shootout.
This is a possession game.
This is a who gets the ball last game.
This is a who makes the turnover game.
Then people realize.
And I like Detroit's ability to continue to hang in those.
So give me the Lions.
Why not?
All right.
Let me make the case for a Niners blowout.
I'm not telling you what my pick is,
but I have thought about the case for a Niners blowout.
It's pretty straightforward.
You mention it.
Lions are down.
Jonah Jackson.
Frank Ragnow is going to, I think,
their center trying to play through like four different injuries in this game.
Frank's held together with Duck Day, man.
Yeah, there is a possibility where the Lions pass rush just tease off on Jerry.
The 49ers.
pass rush. Oh, yeah, sorry, the 49ers pass rush tees off on Jared Gough and forces him into
mistake after mistake after mistake for as well as golf has played. Those are still in there.
We saw it in that Rams game. He had a few of those in there. And there's a chance that the 49ers
literally score on every possession. I mean, they could have a play of 25 plus yards on every
single possession in this game. That is a big, big mismatch as well. Golf's going on the road.
They're not in the friendly confines of Detroit anymore. He's going on the road. I think there's a chance
that maybe people overrate, you know, that,
or have recency bias with that Brock Birdie Niners' offensive performance last week.
When it was in the rain, it was a weird game.
For most of the season, they have been by far the best offense in the NFL.
So there you go, Niners fans.
You were probably listening going, come on,
that we'll make the case for our team here.
So there you go.
That's the case for your team blowing out the Detroit Lions.
All right, we take a break.
Then we come back and we make our picks for Championship Round Weekend.
All right, we are back on extra point taking.
The contest continues.
We've got two weeks left, seven points at stake in each of the next two weeks.
Dolak, what does the scoreboard set?
Head-to-head two-point difference, Shiel.
I'm at 63.
You are at 61.
It was a tight week.
I was going to wildcard round for a second.
me. I was about to be like, the Texans covered.
And then I was like, no, wait a minute. They didn't even come
remotely close. Yeah,
you and I were both on Texans plus nine and a half against the
Ravens. That one was no good.
You had the lines against the spread and the Packers against the spread.
I had the lines against the spread and the chiefs against the spread.
Both of those won.
My prop hit, Sam LaPorte, over 41.5
receiving guards. Thank you, Sam LaPorteur. Thank you
to Payne killers for getting Sam LaPoida on the field.
We appreciate it. Under 53 and a half
rushing guards for Rashad White, Sheel, you were on.
I was with you on that one.
You jinks me. You made that one of your keys
to the game on Twitter, which I don't appreciate, putting the bad juju on me.
And then all of a sudden, Rashad White comes out and he's breaking off runs for 17 yards.
Don't even think about doing that again.
To the prop king.
It was a great bet.
And as I said, I'm going to be on running back facing the Detroit Lions under again today.
You've been warned.
Rashad White, by the way, came extremely close, right?
The line that you had him at was 53 and a half.
He ended that day with 55 yards.
He was at 1.58 yards and then lost.
three yards on his final carry.
One more of those.
You also 80 plus receiving yards for Travis Kelsey was your long shot.
He was at 75.
I still don't know how we didn't get it.
He had like 68 receiving yards.
Like it felt like 10 minutes into the game.
I'm like beautiful.
I got this and then it was over.
I'll tell you.
Luke had Rashad White log as a win when I went and looked at this in the week.
And I was like, wait a minute.
I was on this bet.
And I checked out.
I was like, no, no, no, no, no.
Loss.
So yeah, so two points for you on the week, both on your locks of the week, huge for you.
Big week for locks of the week, shield.
Two wins from me, a prop and locks of the week.
So it is now 63 to 61 against the spread.
I'm hitting a 58%.
You are hitting at 38%.
We are still pretty much just like at 48%.
All right.
There we go.
So here's how we're doing it this week.
So we'll still have our prop of the week.
That's got to be minus 1.30 or better.
That's worth one point.
We still have our long shot of the week, which is plus 150 or better.
that's worth three points, and then we will each pick both games. Now, that only adds up to six.
So we each get a bonus pick. It can be anything that's minus 130 or better, and that will be our
option for a seventh point. And we'll do the same thing for the Super Bowl, except we'll have two
of those kind of wild card picks. All right. Let us start with the prop of the week. What do you
got? Yeah, Christian McAfre had under 86 and a half rushing yards against the Detroit Lions.
Shield, you know who the last back was to go over 80 rushing yards against Detroit this season?
I do not.
Hasn't happened.
Oh.
The most rushing yards for a single game for a back against the Detroit Lions, and the regular season, I should say, it's the query that I have.
Ty Chandler rushed for 69 yards against the Moss and Eckler, 67, Gus Edwards 64.
They haven't given up more than 70 to a back yet this season.
Now, Christian McCaffrey pretty frequently goes over 86, but this number indicates blowout script.
And one, I'm more suspicious
We don't get blowout script than the books are.
Two, I think on blowout script,
we see less Christian McCaffrey and more Elijah Mitchell
Because they already were starting to deal with Christian McCaffrey,
calf issues, a little bit gimpy, long season,
as we saw at the end of the regular season,
and then into the bow season,
where he's on the sideline with the Green Bay Packers,
getting the Theragun, getting the massage, right?
They know he's not at 100%.
And accordingly, I think if they're on a,
you know, we're up 17 points here in the third.
quarter, I think it's going to be, all right, let's get an Elijah Mitchell handoff in here.
Let's try to calibrate this a little bit. We got to make sure we win the game, but I wouldn't
be surprised if they try to take the edge off McCaffrey a little bit. So under 86 and a half rushing
yards for Christian McCaffrey, I trust that lion's run defense. The undersers are so like,
I was looking at some and then I'm like, wait, no, no, no, that player's awesome. Do you,
are you sure you want to do that, chill? Like, do you really want to take a Lamar?
Everybody who's playing has had an incredible game or two at this point. So what are you supposed to do
Yeah. Should I take my homes under a Lamar Hunter? No, no, no, what are you doing? Pick something else. So I am taking an over for my prop. And I'm taking a Brock Purdy over 274 and a half passing yards. Lions have given up over 300 passing yards in five straight games. I'm hoping so lax right about the rushing and at the Niners aren't going to be able to rush the ball as much in this game and they're going to say, all right, we can't rush it. We've got to throw it. And so I think he'll get opportunities. The weather, don't worry. I check the weather. The weather's going to be.
be nice in Santa Clara on Sunday. We don't have to worry about that. You had the numbers earlier.
Lions give up so many explosive plays that this could easily be a game where Brock Purdy's
averaging like 10 yards per attempt or higher in this football game. So Brock Purdy over 274.5
passing yards is my prop of the week. All right, long shot of the week. What do you got? Plus
150 or better? Yeah. Zay Flowers.
at least 60 receiving yards is plus 188.
And that's what I'm going to be taken for this week.
Interesting.
Against those Chiefs Corners, huh?
So the thing about Zay is that they put him in motion a ton.
He's one of the most motioned receivers in the entire league.
And he has a ton of receiving yards off of motion.
When they put him in motion, they do it to target him.
They do it to get him the football.
So he becomes a lot more challenging to press when you run him around like that.
That's number one.
Number two is I think.
And like I can't do, I can't get like a longest, you know,
over longest reception on the long shot of the week.
But I don't think we're getting 60 on seven targets.
I think we're getting 60 on four targets.
I think that we're going to see a big, big, big idea of getting Zayflowers the ball down
the field.
Next-Gen stats had this.
In the last three games that Lamar Jackson has played against Spags and the Chiefs,
passing down the field more than 20 yards, he's three for 20.
He hasn't completed his last 10 passes.
They made this Todd Monk in change for a lot of reasons.
One of the main reasons was because when they started to get defenses like Spags was
given them. Just insanely loaded boxes.
Low safeties, right? You'll see like, oh, the teachers
were playing split field coverage. It is
too high, but it's not too high because the two high
are too low. They are down near the line of scrimmage.
They're getting involved in the run fit.
One of the reasons why you had to make this OC change
was when Devens Cornyder street you like this,
you get over the top on them. You go connect
down the field. And that player for them has been
Zay Flowers, right? Odell Beckham Jr.,
not running more than 15 routes since Week 16.
I think that they wanted him to be fresh for the postseason.
I don't think they're getting that from him.
Rashad Bateman has not been reliable.
if I lose because Nelson Aguilar catches two downfield passes,
I lose because Nelson Aguilar catches two downfield passes.
I should have taken Nelson Aguilor over.
Why didn't I think of that?
Mark Andrews, potentially backed for this game.
Isaiah likely, okay, what if they're a heavy 12th personnel team?
Zay's still on the field.
That's the Ravens receiver I trust to get the most volume
and especially the downfield volume.
The big play to Zay, give me at least 60 receiving yards at plus 188.
It's interesting, those numbers with Lamar against Bags.
Downfield, the Chiefs have given up the fewest,
completions of 20 plus yards in the entire NFL this season.
But like you said, this is different.
You're playing against a different quarterback, a different scheme.
What are you going to prioritize?
Because their run defense has not been good all this season.
They know that.
So how do you attack this Ravens defense?
How do you give yourself a chance to win?
Yeah.
I think a lot of that has been because the quarterbacks can't hold run of the ball
long enough to consistently get down the field.
And Lamar is the solution to the problem.
Single solution in a man right there.
My long shot, I'm going back to that Niners Lions game and the same side of the ball.
I'm taking Brandon Ayuk 100 plus receiving yards.
Began, triple digits.
I forget one, it's plus 166.
I think, you know, if Debo Samuel doesn't play in this game,
that's going to be more targets for Brandon Ayuk.
But if he does play, I think you got a shot to hit this.
As Solek was saying earlier, that line's defense, they've given up the most completions of 20 plus yards
in the regular season.
and so I think you have a chance here for Brandon Ayuk to have a big game against those
Lions corners again we talked about it earlier they're going to be one on one at times and so
iuk had seven 100 yard receiving games during the regular season so seven out of 17 that's
pretty good I like my chances there of him having a monster game here so there you go all right
go ahead Connor Allen of yeah Connor Allen of four for four football uh he had our
excuse me, it wasn't Connor Allen. It was Hayden Winks of Underdog. I apologize.
Hayden Winks had a funny tweet where he highlighted that when the Lions have just four
defensive backs on the field, which they play base, right, four down defense linemen, three linebackers
at a pretty high rate. Brennan Ayuk averages like four and a half yards per route or something,
just like an absolutely astronomical absurd number because they're getting you into hard play
action and they're hitting Auk in the big spaces. I don't think the lions are going to give the
Niners those looks. Now they have these four safeties playing well. I would be stunned if they're
based that much. I think they're going to be if he Malophon was going to be a safety for them and
Johnson Garner Johnson and so on and so forth. But there's a world in which we're looking back
in this Brandon IU game. He's just like, yeah, 17.3 yards per reception, five yards per round run,
150 yards. Like if the lions are going to give them that sort of play action stuff, it's going to be
ballgame with the IU because they don't have a man cover who can stick with it.
Just do that up to 100 yards and then do whatever you want. That's all I ask. All right.
Nonsense prediction. This is not part of the contest, but Stolak, do you have something?
weird you think is going to happen this weekend. Yeah, I think there's going to be like a little
spicy Greg Olson, Tom Brady, Fox announcer vibe thing, right? Oh, I like this. All right. It's
much better than mine. Yeah. So for those of you who don't know, Tom Brady is going to be the
the 24 Fox number one play caller, be color guy. Congratulations. Like, he signed this deal while he was
still playing, and then he was going to do it in 2020,
and pushed it off for a year.
It's a very funny storyline for me, because, like,
why are we signing future contracts for color content?
It was ridiculous.
Anyway, in his interim, the Fox had a Super Bowl,
Greg Olson is our first team guy.
And then Greg, like, walked out, and he was, like,
doing cool, tight-end stuff.
I was like, all right, sick, whatever.
And then Greg got awesome.
Greg was so good.
Unbelievable color company.
Cool stuff, good ideas.
Big analytics, right?
Michael Wilbin's yelling about analytics.
Griggles is like, no, analytics are good, man.
Like, just the awesome.
well now right this is going to be fox's last game business is it right it's we got Greg
olson and then yeah yeah right because CBS has got the Super Bowl so it's going to be technically
Greg Olson's last game as their primary color commentator then it should go straight to tom brady
so I think we're going to get a little like sports media reporting like I don't know the New York
post guys who do this or whoever it is but there's going to be some sort of like you know
like Greg Olson looking at partnership with thursday night football Amazon prime you know whatever
Greg Olsen, like that Greg also might leave Fox
because Greg Olson should.
Greg should be calling primetime games the NFL.
He's excellent at doing it.
And I don't think Tom Brady's going to be that good.
So of all the things to watch for this championship game,
this is a deeply football nerdy thing.
But I will be enjoying Greg Olson calling his last...
I'll be enjoying the last game of Greg Olson
in the Fox A booth.
If he's the Fox B booth guy, whenever I hear him, I hear him, that's great.
But all together, I think he's done an awesome, awesome job.
And I wish you got to hold on to that job.
I'll be enjoying him calling the NFC championship game.
Let me ask you this, because I also really enjoy
Greg Olson, he is. I'm trying to think, yeah, he's, he's number one on my list. I mean, he explains
the X's and O's. He's, he's all on top of with the analytics. He's not boring. He's not too
dry. He doesn't, like, he's entertaining. He's got the good energy. He enjoys his job. He prepares
for his job. Like everything about it, Greg Olson. You mentioned the New York Post. I did see,
like, there was a New York Post column today, and it's Andrew Marchand, who's like their big
board. Andrew Marchand, I couldn't remember his name. I apologize, Andrews. He had something about how
Romo and Nance are, uh, you know, are a disaster.
like, you know, and I didn't get to look at the whole thing.
But so maybe you're on to something.
Maybe it's a little switch.
I don't know.
I know Romo's got a monster contract,
but maybe you're on to something,
a little switching of networks,
little politic, I don't know.
Here's the thing.
Here's the issue.
Here's my problem.
Greg Olson's got a nice suit game.
All right, he does.
Looking clean every single week, I appreciate it.
CBS, you got to wear the big Blazers with the CBS logo?
Why do they still do that?
Yeah.
Bad scheme fit.
Bad scheme fit.
It's not a good system.
It's not a good system for him.
Romo, man.
I can't do it.
I just can't. It is agonizing. I have no comment.
You could get in your contract, I think, that you don't have to wear this. I don't think,
if that cannot be a deal breaker, this wearing the blazer with the CBS. Here's the thing. It could
be cool. Just make it a cool blazer. Make it old school. That's what they should do. Make it real old
school, you know? Gobacks are in. Classy. Make it fun. A lot of Hall of Fames and Masters
and various other tournaments and or, you know, Legend Hall.
are doing a good blazer.
CBS should be able to do a good blazer.
It can't just be a Navy with the logo.
I agree with the there.
Good take.
All right, mine's boring.
I don't even want to say mine after yours.
Yours was great.
I just think the Lions need to play a high variance game.
And last week I said someone's going to do an onside kick.
Now I'm just saying the Lions are either going to have a fake punt,
a fake field goal, or an onside kick in this game.
That 49 are special teams.
An issue.
So lack loves when I bring up a little special team, DVOA.
25th, the 49ers.
last week. By the way, some amazing fumble recoveries last week. Underrated. Holy cow.
I mean, Eric Wilson. Eric Wilson. And then there was, was it, was it Dalton Kincaid had like the punch out after the Josh Allen fumble?
Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Incredible. Football IQ play. I don't even know what it's like to give that much effort to anything in my life.
Yeah, I'm trying here, but I mean, come on. Eric Wilson, unbelievable. So I think you're going to get, I don't think Dan Campbell's going to coach scared here.
I think he's going to realize what kind of game he's in.
I think he's going to realize his defense is up against it
against that Niners offense.
And I think he's going to have a trick up his sleeve
that we're going to be talking about for better or worse.
As you know, if it doesn't work, everyone's going to rip it and say,
why did he do that?
If it does work, people like me are going to say,
that's what I'm talking about.
You play to win the game.
So look for a fake field goal, fake punt,
or onside kick from Dan Campbell.
All right, let's get to it.
Locks of the week.
We will each pick each.
game and then we got one more pick at the end that is a wild card well why don't we just
start lion's niner's i already know your pick i mean you're picking the lions outright i'm also on
the lion's plus seven i was going i was struggling with this it's one of those where i start writing
the thing in the column and i go i'm taking the niners i think it's going to be a plow on and then i get
to the end and i go man this lion's team has been so competitive last 29 games so lack
22 and 7 this Lions team going back to last year.
Three losses by more than seven points in their last 29 games.
That is impressive.
They went to Dallas.
They were competitive.
They beat the Rams at home.
They win that game last week.
It's just a box.
I mean, they have been in all these games.
They had Buffalo last year on Thanksgiving.
They were not supposed to be in that game at all.
The Packers earlier this season.
Yeah.
This is not just beating up on Cupcake teams.
And that Cowboys game.
We're conveniently ignoring the Ravens game, but other than that.
You know what, though?
Yeah, I mean, the Ravens, well, we'll get to that game,
but the Ravens have done that to a lot of people.
But it's just like, that Cowboys game was the one I really looked at.
I go, okay, they went on the road against a good team, a very good offense in a big spot there at that point in the season.
And they're like, I mean, they're a two point conversion away from potentially stealing that game.
So I feel like the competitiveness, the talent, I'm a little worried about those whole line injuries.
Again, I can see a scenario where we're just like, oh, God.
off with Sacked for the, you know, fifth time here and the Lions are getting blown out at
halftime. I can see it, but I'm going to go with the Detroit Lions and take the points plus
seven at San Francisco. So there you go. Yeah. I'm on Lions Plus 7. Obviously, I did my
Lion Super Bowl 58 prediction, which I'm pretty sure I said it's 54. I can never remember. I always
call it the year. And then I'm like, no, it's not, it's, it doesn't have the four ends of an eight.
Okay. Is it 58? I don't even know. Is it Super Bowl 58 this year? It's LV I, I, I, which one is
that.
Yeah.
That sounds like,
that looks like 58.
Yeah.
Is it?
It's always,
it's,
it's time for that graph of,
of Google searches where every year,
Super Bowl spikes and then right under it,
Roman numerals,
how do you read them search spikes?
One of my favorite images.
People,
people be Googling about Roman numerals.
This is a game where if it was 16 games slate,
I would not be that in it for the contest.
I would not be taking it.
Like,
I think the Lions have a great shot to win.
I like the Lions plus seven.
I don't like to take games where the,
the offensive potential is this high.
because one team shows up and now it's a prorious blowout, right?
Like the Niners could, like, you come to the future,
tell me, Niners win this by 24.
I'm not too shocked.
You know, I'm surprised, but, so it's like,
this is not what I would typically be taking,
but why not?
Like, I believe in this Detroit team.
I've been around them, obviously,
and then I've watched it pretty closely now
and watching their past few games,
watching how they've gone up against top competition.
I like their ability to hang in them.
Niners fans don't get mad at me,
but let's keep an eye on the game management.
In this one, Dan Campbell versus Kyle Shanahan.
The little edge for the Niners got a lot of edges in this game.
That's not one of them.
That edge is going to the Detroit Lions and Dan Campbell.
You better beat him in three quarters.
You don't want to need four to beat them.
Hey, last week they showed.
They put that to bed.
They can come back in the fourth quarter and win games.
All right.
This next game, I don't think.
I will be shocked if this game is a blowout one way or another.
Legitimately shocked if this is more than a seven-point game.
I think we're going to get a classic,
a fun classic, and I have no idea what side Benjamin Solac is on Ravens. Let me check, double
check, still three and a half. Yes. By the way, Ravens three and a half minus 115.
First Chiefs plus three and a half minus 105. Solac, what do you got?
Well, on the Ravens minus three and a half. I think they're the better team. I think they're at home.
I think they're well coached. I think they are equipped for a Super Bowl run. I think we've been
seeing them delete postseason caliber competition all year. You tweeted out this stat. I tweeted
out this stat. I think we both arrived at it just over like a conversion evolution independently
against the Texans. Lamar is seven and two against playoff teams this year. He has a point
differential of like positive 130. It's just unbelievable how well they have played against
top competition. The reason for that, and you've heard me say this on this podcast before,
and it's a tricky thing to say, because I don't think Lamar is better than Josh Allen. I don't
think he's the second best quarterback in the league, but in terms of guys who just functionally
break the game. And guys who are like, all right, well, we're really good at stopping NFL
offenses, but now we have to stop the Ravens. Like, it is just a, it is a different problem. It's
written on the board with different variables. You have to use different calculus to solve it.
Like, he is just a different world of a guy. And so you kind of a little bit have to take what
you know about the Chief's defense and yuck it out the window. You can go back and look at
the 2021 games and this is how they played against him. Firstly, Lamar was sensational in that
game. I watched that game back and I was kind of like, man, I a little bit missed the Greg Roman offense.
Not really, but a little bit. Because it was just, Lamar was just running rough shot, right?
There was no self-preservation. There was no sliding. What if I threw a checkdown to Justice
Hill? No, it was just Lamar highlight reel running around back there. Regardless, you can look back
of that and say that's meaningful. It doesn't move the needle too much for me. This is such a different
offense than it was, the different Lamar than it was. The thing that I trust the most in this game is
is what Lamar bring is Lamar's ability to kind of be defense impervious to be defense immune and
just create a style of offense that you can't really stop it. You just kind of have to wait for it to make
a mistake, wait for it to air. And then defensively, like I've been the chief's advocate on this pod.
I've been the guys who are the chiefs are going to be okay. The chiefs can make a rod. Patrick Mahomes,
like, it's good. Baltimore's defense. And this is just, they've been stopping everybody, right?
And they are well equipped.
They're very good tackling unit.
They are great at rallying to the ball and stopping your yards after the catch.
They are well equipped to handling the way the chiefs need to precipitate the football,
need to matriculate it down the field.
I think the Ravens win it.
You said you'd be shocked if this was a blowout.
I also would be,
but I would not be shocked if this is a game the Ravens control protocol.
Right?
The Ravens get a lead and then maintain the lead.
And it's just Mahomes trying to will,
trying to hercuing an effort as way back into it and eventually falling up short.
All right.
So I pull up the spreadsheet.
What's our record when we,
both have the same sides because that's what we got here. I got the Ravens. Excuse me. I've got
the Ravens minus three and a half very uncomfortably. Okay, Patrick Mahomes. I don't like it,
but I haven't. Eleven times he's been an underdog. Nine, one and one against the spread,
eight and three outright in those games. So why in the world then, Sheal, are you taking
the Baltimore Ravens? I think this is just a special team. I think it's Lamar Jackson's
time. Aaron Schatz tweeted out, the Ravens have the highest weighted DVOA in his database. No team
has been playing this well through the divisional round in his database, which I forget goes back to
1990 or something like that. Ravens can win in so many different ways. They don't have to be
perfect on one side of the ball. Other side of the ball can pick them up. Special teams can pick
them up. They can win with Lamar instructor. They can win with Lamar being creative. We didn't even
talk about it as much because you were talking about how those Chiefs
safetys play, but man, that Chiefs run defense,
27th in DVOA against this rushing offense?
Like there's a scenario where Ravens gash him that way,
just with their run game here.
So you've got that to deal with.
It's a different passing offense than we've seen in the past.
I will say this, that Chief's defense,
I will not be shocked if we're like four or five possessions in
and we're like Ravens are having some issues against this Chief's defense.
But last week,
What I loved what we saw from the Ravens
is that problem solving
during the game.
I mean, they were having...
Half time...
You said it wasn't close.
Like, and you're right at the end,
we both took the Texas.
Half time is a 10-10 game.
You're going, wait a minute now.
Are the Texans going to steal this one?
Ravens come out after halftime.
Lamar gives the speech it had him and Todd Monkin.
He talked about,
hey, we talked about how are we going to solve this?
They come out three state straight touchdown drives
and they look completely unstoppable
after halftime.
So I love seeing
that from a team in a big spot like this. So I think it's the Ravens, by the way. So I mean,
if the Ravens win this game, we've got a 27-year-old player with two MVPs under his belt in the
Super Bowl. I mean, we're talking about like, just think about the Lamar discourse before this
season and what it could potentially be here in two weeks. At 27 years old, if you have a Super Bowl,
and two MVP's under your belt.
Like, we're talking about, you know,
special, special territory.
H-O-F, baby.
By the way,
and on the other side of it,
man, if Mahomes is able to do this,
if he's able to go to Baltimore
and just say,
you ever doubt me again,
you are a complete moron.
If he's able to go there
as a dog with this group
against that defense
and just put him on his back,
I mean, I don't even know what to say
because I already consider him,
you know, an all-timer,
but, man,
just adding another,
chapter to what is already a Hall of Fame career. So I think the Ravens are the better team.
I think the Ravens are going to win, but no one's going to be shocked if Patrick Mahomes is
stealing this game in the fourth quarter. All right. What is our record when we both take the same
time? Oh, it's we're about 44% which is just what we are shared anyway. That's what that's what we
are. It's what we are collecting. Sorry. Sorry about that. You don't worry about it. You're good.
Um, what, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh,
, um, Detroit's 22 and seven over their last however many games.
Um, Lamar this season right now is 14 and three as a starter. All right. Last season, I'm, I'm doing the math
live one, two, three, four, either seven and four. So he would have been 21 and seven over his last
28 starts, Lamar would be in, in the last seven games over the last two years that the
Ravens have lost with Lamar as their starter. They've had a win probability in the fourth quarter of
at least 75%, right?
They've been fine. Remember all these, they lost that Dolphins game.
They found a way. They lost that Bill's game.
In all of them?
In all seven, they've had at least a 75% win probability in the fourth quarter.
In five of the seven, shield, they've had a 90% win probability in the fourth quarter.
And then gave the game away, right?
They found a way to lose to the Deshawn Watson Browns this year, right?
That was the 33 to 31 game.
They lost to the Colts, right, in the weather, in overtime, feel cold, Justin Tucker's missing
kicks.
Like Baltimore.
will have just won every game they've played with Lamar Jackson
the last two years or lost a game
one of the most spectacular unique fashions you've ever seen.
And the fruit of that could be we knock off Patrick Mahomes
and we're going to the Super Bowl.
Like this Lamar run, man, you brought up like two-time MVP special player.
We're going to look back back.
All right, 2019 took the lead by storm.
2020, 2020, 2021, there was a recalibration.
There was some injury.
22 and 23 was when Lamar Jackson,
the career defining, I'm going to dominate this league
for the next decade stretch came.
And he's two games away from starting that off of the bank.
I mean, you don't even have to just give me the last two.
58 and 9.
I know we can't talk about QB wins, but 58 and 19 when Lamar Jackson is their starter
in his entire career.
I mean, that's including his rookie season from start to now.
Good ball player, man.
They're just always, always in it.
Now, listen, the chiefs are always in it with malls too.
So don't think that we're dismissing that at all.
He's already been there, done.
that and could be doing it again. Lamar Jackson is trying to do it here for the first time.
All right, what is your final wild card pick here? Do we might have to say, I think we got the same
thing. What do you have? We're not doing that you referred to earlier. I won't take Mahomes rushing
to create the, to create the, some difference. We match, we matched on both on both locks.
Dave Montgomery to have over 44 and a half rushing yards is something that I'm already on personally.
Dave Montgomery rushes
has at least 10 carries in each of the last
nine games. His
carries line for this game is set at 10 and a half
with heavy juice to be over. I think that's
a fine pick if you want to take it. Again,
I'm not expecting as big of a shootout game script. I'm also not thinking
that if the lions get down 14, they're going to walk out
throwing the football. I think they're going to hand this off.
The Niners are a four down front, right? That's how
they want to align and they'll align in it pretty much all the time.
This is not a versatile team in terms of how they get
their defensive line on the field.
Lions, when rushing against a four down front,
their top three in success rate,
rushing between the tackles,
their top five in success rate,
that's where you hit this team.
And that's why I like Demo a little bit more
than I like Jamir Gibbs,
whose number is placed at 47 and a half.
Gibbs is obviously the juice, right?
He's the lightning, he's the explosiveness.
But they like him a little bit better
when they're getting those five down fronts.
They're going to nose tackle like Vita Bea,
and they need to get to the boundary.
That's more so where they live with Gibbs,
and they need to go between the tackles.
They'll go with Demo and just have him get vertical.
Jared Goff throws to the middle of the field.
Like, like, that they, that is even more than Brock Purdy, even more than two a tiger below.
He needs that to be successful.
And Fred Warner takes that away from you.
Niners best defense in the league defending middle of the field.
If you are going to open the important area of the field for Jared Goss passing
him to succeed, you need to run directly at Fred Warner.
You need to show him vertical runs right to his mouth.
And ideally, you need a punch a minute with Dave Montgomery a few times.
So I think you're going to see a big established Montgomery push from the Lions over 44.
and a half rushing yards. I'm also personally on like over 55, over 60, like over 70. I'm,
all the way up there on Dima. I think it's a big day for him. There you go, Aaron. Thank you.
I mean, he's, you're in the lead. So you're giving me the Patrick Mahomes one that we talked about.
I've got it. Patrick Mahomes. Safe Flowers number just dropped. It's now plus 172 60 plus.
Somebody just hits Zayflower is big. I will invest. Okay. I've got, I was like, what? I thought he
got injured or something. You started yelling to say flowers. No. It means it means other people are
betting on him to go over. I've got Patrick Mahomes over 26 and a half rushing yards. We talked
about it earlier. It's an old standby. Just take Patrick Mahomes over rushing yards in the playoffs.
You'll be in a good spot. I think there's going to be snaps in this game where he's back there
looking, uh-oh, nobody open. I got nothing. I got to go make a play and he's going to go make a play.
So he didn't have a big rushing week last week, didn't really need to. He had guys. He had over
40 in the wild card round. He had over 40 in the Super Bowl last year.
only thing that makes me nervous, Ravens got athletes.
So, you know, they chase down a Patrick Mahomes,
but Mahomes always finds a way he's so crafty.
So it's not a huge number.
He averaged 24.3 rushing yards per game in the regular season.
Just has to get to 27 for me to win this bet.
All right, there you go.
Man, there was a lot to cover there.
Coaching changes, championship games, picks.
What do you got?
I was just going to say, Patrick Mahomes to have at least 40 rushing guards plus
$220. A worthy investment. And I think you, and I believe so, like you will have a
fan duel. What do you got coming? You got a parley, a prop? What's coming up? Yeah. So,
no, I have my fan duel parlay coming up. For those who don't know, when you're in the app,
if you look at the top, there's a bunch of like little, you know, recommended bets you can
scroll through. There's one that's always from the ringer, parlay for the Sunday games.
That's built by your boy. And so if you like what Ben was talking about with some of these
props, you can find that on the top, on the top of the screen on Sunday. So if you want to,
you want to tail with Ben and sweat it out.
Ben complains about things on Twitter.
Like, why aren't they doing this more?
You experience what I experience on a day to day.
You can join me on that barlo.
There you go.
And you are fine.
Give us your picks one more time from the pod for the contest.
What do you got?
I think Christian McAfee's going to go under 86.5 Russian yards against the lions.
I also think David Montgomery is going to go over 44.
And a half for the lions against the Niners.
That's my bonus.
In Chiefs Ravens, I do like Zay Flowers, over 60 receiving yards.
That's my long should of lose.
week. It's right now plus 172. My locks of the week, I think Detroit's going to cover plus seven against
the Niners. Oh, baby, I think it's going to be a good one. And then the Ravens minus three and a half
at home against the Chiefs. I think you're seeing a Baltimore 49ers Super Bowl. Again, probably
put the water gun to my belly. That's what I would pick. But Ravens Lions rematch, man, Detroit
looking for some vengeance off of that midseason embarrassment. I would not be surprised.
I've got Brock Purdy over 274.5 passing yards. My long shot, I've got Brandon Ayuk,
100 plus receiving yards.
I also have Ravens minus 3.5 at home against the cheese and lions plus 7 at the
9ers and then my wild card, Patrick Mahomes, over 26 and a half rushing yards.
All right, there we go.
Only one more game to talk about this season.
Everyone enjoy the games on Sunday championship weekend.
Thank you to Cliff Augustine for producing.
Thank you to Eduardo Campo for his video production.
Additional production supervision by Conner.
and Evans and Arjuna. Ram Gopal, we will have Nora and Stephen
dual thread recapping these games Sunday night.
And then Solek and I will be back Monday with another episode of extra point.
Take and everyone enjoy the games.
We'll talk to you next week.
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