The Ringer NFL Show - NFL Awards Races With Ben Solak!

Episode Date: December 4, 2025

Sheil is joined by Ben Solak from ESPN to analyze and debate which players and coaches should be the front-runners for some of the major NFL awards at this point in the season. (00:00) NFL awards races!(1:21) The MVP race(11:05) The Coach of the Year race(19:05) The Offensive Player of the Year race(26:58) The Hurry Up: Lions vs. Cowboys on ‘TNF’ The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit ⁠www.rg-help.com⁠ to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Host: Sheil KapadiaGuest: Ben SolakProducer: Chris SuttonSocial: Kiera Givens and Brian WatersProduction Supervision: Conor Nevins and Arjuna Ramgopowell Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Ringer NFL show. I'm Shield Capadia. Today we are talking awards races. I'm focused on the close ones. MVP, coach of the year, an offensive player of the year. Where do we stand with those three with five weeks left? Guess who we're talking to about it?

Our old friend, Ben Solac, now with ESPN. He returns. We agree a little bit. We disagree a little bit. We keep it civil. We didn't go too crazy shouting at each other, but always fun talking football with Solek. Let's take a break.

We'll come back and we talk awards races. This episode of The Ringer NFL show is presented by State Farm. Having insurance isn't the same as having State Farm. It's like expecting the leadership of a team captain on the football field, but getting a C captain? Sure, they're both captains, but who is going to run your offense? You wouldn't settle for just anything for your team, so don't settle for just any insurance.

it comes to getting the help you need state farm is the real deal like a good neighbor state farm is there all right we are back here with ben solex so like before we get started on the awards do you need a second to comment on ben jonson's uh lack of chest hair or was that off the record you're texting that was off the record when i texted you about the fact that some people just don't have chest hair and we don't need to have full conversations about some people not have enough chest hair it's just a thing that some people do and have some people don't have that's all and it doesn't make any less of a man I believe, not to quote you. There are many things that I claim

doesn't make you less than a man. They accumulate over time. And so it's a worrying volume. All right, had to get started with that. Let's talk MVP first, So lax. So it's mostly a two-man race. If you look at the fan dual odds, it doesn't mean it's going to stay that way.

But we want to talk about these in kind of two lanes here. Number one, who is your guy right now? Like the MVP through 13 weeks of the season. And again, the odds would say Drake May and Matthew Stafford are the favorite. So let's start there. and then we'll talk about, hey, maybe if this thing changes over the next five weeks who we're looking at.

So do you have May, Stafford, or someone else right now? I have May over Stafford. I've had May of Stafford pretty much the whole time. There was a moment there where Stafford became a small favorite. Eileen May because of the fundamental nature of most valuable player, right? It's kind of always the thing that I end up talking about in this time of year. There are some people who go about it with like stats and like we know it. It's often a team that wins the number one seat and so on and so forth.

To me, like I just want to watch and experience you as a player and think, to myself, man, if I replaced you with a league average player, like, no shot, right? If you took Drake May out of the Patriots offense with like the rotating cast of good enough wide receiver twos that they have with an offensive line that is, you know, much improved from last year, but I would still say was a below average line even before the injuries, which we obviously saw this past week with like the running back rotation, you know, Josh McAulence is doing a fine job as the OC, but this is no like, you know, Clinton Kubiak, Ben Johnson, let's hire him tomorrow, be a head coach sort of a guy. Like May is just, he's the straw that starts the drink,

he's the keystone of the arch. He's the reason the Patriots are as successful in offense as they are. Stafford, an unbelievable season without question. And to do it at his age with the back injury is a testament to his toughness and his talent. But I know that I could get a league average quarterback into the Rams offense

and who can't Kuwaita could carry games, that DeMonte Adams could carry games, that line carry games, and McBake could carry games in a way that wouldn't happen in New England. This is boring. We're on the same page. We like to argue with each other.

But yeah, for this one, we're on the same page with Drake May. Yeah, I'm with you, just because I think the situation is worse than Matthew Stafford's situation. Like you mentioned, you know, he's in a good situation. He's playing awesome. He's played awesome. But he does have Pukunakua, Devante Adams, Sean McVeigh. Drake May does not have any of those things. And statistically, he's better. I don't need to go through all the nerd stats, but he is better statistically in all those areas. He's better in the traditional stats as well. So yeah, I've got May over Stafford right now. And I was actually

thinking, So lack. How many quarterbacks would the Patriots trade Drake May 4 right now, this second? Two. It's the Mahomes, Alan Lamar triumvirate, right? Are we sure? It's all three of those? No, but I'm saying like it's that group. Yeah.

Right? And then you introduce May and you say, okay, rookie contract, can he be one of those guys? And it's like, yeah, he absolutely can. Right. Meena said this on ESPN, the suit, which is very accurate. He's already in that rarefied era of guys. You just can't do X against him, right? like, okay, you can't blitz him.

You also can't drop in the zone against him. Okay, you can't mosh rush him. I'm going to get outside of the pocket. Okay, you can't man and press, right? He's going to kill you down. Like, there's just no, like, one thing that's an answer to the guy. So, no, like, I think it would be a conversation for, like, every single quarterback in the league.

Now that that top echelon of guys all off the rookie contracts. Yeah. May is, like, May is without question. The most valuable player in football from, like, the contract perspective. Like, what is he being paid relative to the, the, what he's giving you on the field? Without question, number one, in that, like, cap-oriented look at most Iowa player. I think Mahomes and Allen, you would, you know, just, this is all obviously not, this is not

real life, but I think Mahomes and Allen you would do just because you're saying, all right, it is a small sample. We know we're getting a top five offense with those two guys making that deal. I think everybody else is a conversation. Like, I mean, if I were the Patriots and like you said, with the salaries and maybe some of the injury stuff with Lamar in the past and the fact that he's going to be, what, 29 years old versus the age Drake May is, I mean, I mean, me, Joe Burrow, all these guys, I would be like, no, I think I'm just going to stick

with Drake May on the rookie contract and take my chances. A word on Stafford, and on May as well. It is, I think, the case this year that both May and Stafford's campaigns for MVP are not as strong as the difficult campaigns, right? Like, they aren't as strong as, like, Lamar's MVP seasons have recently been. Allen's last year, Mahomes is, right? We've been used to a certain caliber of quarterback season being MVP. I think Stafford may have both are cut below that.

But it's a hand we've been. Like, these are the guys that we've got to talk about. So I see some people being like, May could never be MVP. Look at how his, you know, performance compares to Josh Allen's last year. That was last year. It didn't happen this year. Alan Mahomes and Lamar,

not one of the three is having like a, you know, thermonuclear change the game season. So these are the guys we've got. You can't not give a guy an MVP because it happens to be a down year on the award, whether it is Stafford or May. And still, I mean, 70% completions. He's going to average almost nine yards per attempt. He's first in total EPA.

He's second in EPA per pass play. So it's not, yeah, It's not a weak resume, but I am with you. The others, it felt like, oh, my gosh, we're seeing something like crazy right now. We've just been on a run like that. So let's say we revisit this conversation in five weeks. Is there a guy that you would look at and say, this guy could sneak his way into that conversation, depending on how the rest of the season goes?

Yeah, I bet Dax to win MVP before the Chiefs game. And I think that Prescott winning the MVP is a serious thing to consider. The Cowboys are plus 240 to make the playoffs. DAC is right now 14 to 1 to win MVP, there are very few worlds in which the Cowboys actually make a run and get to the postseason in which I think Prescott doesn't win the MVP award, right? If you look at like... Really? But it's always like the one or the two seats.

So you're saying this would really be an exception to type of year because they're not going to be the one or the two seats. That's why I brought up the week class, right? Because I do think like the Patriots just finished a 10 game winning streak. They are 11 and 2. They are the unquestioned top seat in the AFC. And May right now is like minus 1. 120 to win the MVP, right? If his name were Josh Allen, minus 500, right? Like, the market does

not want to run to Drake May as MVP. It's leaving the door open. And if we use the market as an adequate reflection of where voters' minds will be, which I think is fair in cases like these awards, they're leaving the back door open for voters are for Dak Brouscott to finish the season on a 6-0 run. We know that like the Cowboys defense is certainly improving, but it's very unlikely the Cowboys win the bulk of these games on the back of, like, defense and ball control. No, it's going to come with Goddy stats for Dak Prescott. It's going to come with touchdown passes.

They're one of the highest pass rate over expectation teams when they get inside the 30-yard line. So he's going to accumulate the stats. Like, to me, like, Dak is a very clear third Dark Horse where it's, it's not that I think he's going to actually get it done. I think the Patriots are going to end up, like, you know, 15 and 2. So I think May is going to have a great finish of the season. But in the worlds in which the Cowboys make the playoffs again plus 240, that plus 1400 odds is very, very short. You should be betting on that. All right.

There is a narrative. There will be a statistical case. I think he absolutely, you know, if we're just saying individual performance this year, I think he belongs in the conversation. It just usually that would be against the norm with just the total number of wins they're going to have. The only other names I'll throw in there.

If the bills were to win out, so lack. You know, they're plus 500 to win the AFC East. They have a 24% chance to win the one seed per the athletics playoff simulator. I think there could be a case for Josh Allen. Now, it's a tricky one because I don't think this has been. his best year. But if they go on a tear and he looks, you know, we're like, whoa, this is the best version of Josh Allen over the next five weeks. He's going to have all the counting stats. He's going to have all the nerd stats. He's going to have the whole like, hey, if we look back in 10 years and are like,

are we going to like regret not having Josh Allen as the MVP? I think there's that type of case. I'm with you. I don't think it's going to happen. I think the Patriots are going to hold on there. But he was one other name I wrote down at least. It's really hard to repeat, right? And we saw that literally with having Lamar and Josh Allen last. year where it's like, okay, do we give the guy a second MVP for having a second really, really good season? Or do we give it to the new guy for having this newly great season, right? Like, it's very hard to compare Allen to May, because of Allen's in the conversation, they almost certainly beat the Patriots. I want to say it's week 17 when they're playing. It might be 16.

And so, like, that, I think is a little bit of a hard comparison. But like, let's say it's Allen and Stafford because they do beat the Patriots. I think the voters are going to want to give it to Stafford as the guy to recognize the career chief. Let's give him his first MVP, much the way they did to Allen over Lamar last season. Like this guy deserves to have at least one up there on his, on his shelf. And so it's hard for me to get there on Josh just because he's a repeat guy. But yeah, like, it's that one. And then like, yeah, talking about unseeding your divisional rivals to win the conference.

Like Jordan Love deserves probably, I'm actually. He's the last one. Yeah. The thing with both the bills and the Packers that also gives me a pause is both of them just like growing the football a little too much, right? Like there's some worlds, like I said, with the Cowboys, Prescott's put up numbers because the way they play. There's roles like the bills win their last four games,

you know, running the football 62% of the time the way they did against the Steelers. I think the Packers are in a similar boat where they're obviously passing a little bit more, but still, like, they're just so run heavy. There's going to be games so those guys don't accumulate the stats they need. Yeah, I agree with that. They would have to accumulate those numbers.

They would have to win the division, maybe be the one or two seats. I don't think it's going to happen, but I do think Love deserves a mention. You really don't like Bo Nix at 100 to 1? It's right there. No, I don't have that. Speaking of which, let's move on to coach of the year.

So like, maybe you give the Broncos a little bit of love in this spot. I don't know. Who is your coach of the year through 13 weeks? I actually have six names written down as my finalist. So you want them now or you want to give me your pick? And then I'll tell you. If you gave me a ballot, the topic for me would be Mike McDonald, who's the coach of the Seahawks. Right now, I would still be willing to give it to him over Ben Johnson, who's the coach of the Bears.

I'm not there on Brable as coach of the year. I understand why it feels that way. The Patriots were a mess. Last year, situationally, execution-wise, Brable walks in, they are now no longer a mess. They have unbelievable execution. That Giants game, man, what a testament to coaching. I was positive that was a trap game for the Patriots.

Sleepy 2-win giant team. They have a week 14 by, then playing for 13 games straight. This is like a classic come out a little bit dead in a primetime game. All of a sudden we're down 13 to 3. We have to like inch our way back into the stupid Giants game. They came out of there,

is hating people. They loved playing football that night, right? That is all brable. So he deserves flowers for that. He absolutely does. But I think the ineptitude of the 2024 Patriots has been greatly exaggerated

to create the myth of the 2025 brable effect. Like, without question, they were losing ball games. Coaching was a big part of that, you know, bad end of game, end of half decisions, so on and so forth. But like,

may look great last year for like the last 13 weeks of the season, right? We can't like pretend that that didn't happen. I struggle with how much credit Brable is getting for May. I think that a lot of that is backwards. So to me, it's McDonald and Ben Johnson in the conversation. I lean McDonald.

He's a second year coach versus a first year coach. It often goes to first year coaches. But when McDonald did in terms of the office coordinator change, right, moving on from Grub quickly, admitting the mistake, getting a guy in Clint Kubiak who matches very nicely with Sam Darnold, managing new offensive coordinator into new quarterback is the thing that is very, very difficult to do and be very successful that fast. They did that.

The thing about the personnel moves. that were clearly McDonald's influenced, right? The addition of DeMarcos Lawrence on the defensive line has just simply been one of the best defensive line in football, a preposterous amount. The Nicomar and Wari trade up and the role that he's played in that defense

now that he's gotten healthy. Like there was such a clear vision on that side of the ball that he's executed. And then they are stone cold nails perfect in terms of like game management, fourth down management, red zone management, right? They are, McDonald's is a wonderful job in game. And if you listen to the way he like talks

he's had these press comments and whatever about how they think about things week over a week. And like, you know, he was getting all the questions. Oh, matching personnel, like 13 personnel. Like McDonald is as sharp as they come in terms of like week to week game planning, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, work preparing his guys. You see that out there in the play. I think that McDonald deserves the biggest slice the pie credit for Seattle's like, you know, really, really quite surprising success.

I think the game management stuff he understands really well. There are times where you can just tell he's like, I'm not letting Sam Darnold lose this game for me. I love my defense, which maybe you don't hold that against him. Yeah, maybe he knows his team. All right, you could. I mean, now, if it gets to a better team and some bigger, like I do think we could be having a conversation in a big spot in December or January,

we're going, all right, I know he loves this defense, but man, you know, that was very conservative right there. But maybe not. Maybe we'll say, all right, this is kind of a different way to look at it. He knows his team. So I get that one. I wrote down Ben Johnson initially. but then I thought I feel like

I'm having some recency bias here and just if we're going through 13 weeks the entire body of work I think I still go Shane Steichen Yeah he was like he was the clear coach the year in September right Yeah well October 2 probably Yeah I would say because if we're zooming out

And like if I would have said at the beginning of the season Hey these two scenarios One Ben John you know the bears are going to be Atop the AFC North And Ben Johnson's going to have coached a top 10 offense or Shane Steichen with Daniel Jones will have a top three offense by every metric in the NFL. We all would have said the Ben Johnson thing is way more likely.

Like I can't just say, I know they've struggled lately, and I think I'll change my mind probably in five weeks with the way this Colts thing is going and could potentially go. But if I'm saying right now at this moment in time and I had to vote, I think I would still give it to Stuyken. Right. I treated this after the Bears be the Eagles. But I was like, listen, I was positive to start the year that Shane Stuyken was the coach of the year.

until I became positive that Mike McDaniel was, Mike McDonald was the coach of the year, and I'm now currently becoming positive that Ben Johnson is the coach of the year, right? For as much as MVP candidates are below average, the coach of the year candidates this year are like, it is a very, very tight race, right? Brable is like the market leader right now.

You and I haven't really talked about him. Like every 49ers fan in the world is trying to convince me Kyle Shanahan's coach of the year. And I'm like, guys, I get it. I'm with you. He deserves to have won one by now. The coach he's done this year is incredible. It's just this award doesn't tend to go

to like nine year head coaches or whatever. is at this point. So it's brutally close. Stichen, and it's hard because I don't know the extent to which Daniel Jones has hurt and how some of that is going. Stuyken, he had this issue with Richardson and I was having this issue with Jones. When the helicopter starts spinning, he is not good at pulling that ship back to right. Like that is my one thing with Shane that drives me nuts.

This Texans game was another example. They walked out, they were down one touchdown of the third quarter, and they walked out, drop back, drop back, drop back, drop back, drop back, drop back, buddy, like it's not that. urgent yet. You can get back to running the football. You can stay in your base, right? They would go for like these crazy fourth ounce, right? They have the drive against the chargers.

They went like three, fourth pounds on one drive. They got that Chiefs game, and they turtled real quick. Like, when things start to go a little bit wrong, Stiking in my experience, like, the pendulum could swing really far the other direction, and you can vacillet and, like, the tailspin gets worse. That's my hesitation with Shane. If he can pull the helicopter out of the tailspin here and, like, land the plane on, okay, we still win the AFC North.

We were kind of hoping for the one C, whatever. We're going to be the two seed. I'm 100% there. It's just, I know Stichen is not good at stopping the spiral. Yeah, I think that's a good point. I don't think I'm going to have it after week 18. That's why I'm doing the two exercises after week 13. And then projecting, I think the only other guys we didn't.

So, yeah, other guys on my list. I did have Peyton on there. I think if you dethrone the Chiefs and have a chance to be the one seat in the AFC and your quarterback is not like an elite, guy, then you absolutely deserve a mention, even if it's the defense, doing a lot of the lifting. And I think McVeigh deserves a mention as well. Like, it's sort of the Shanahan thing. You know, I had Shanahan on my list as well, where just because these guys have gotten credit maybe in the past

as great coaches doesn't mean they shouldn't be mentioned as the best coaching jobs this year. I'll tell you somebody who's not going to win it and is not going to get any votes at all. Well, I'm excited. But if I were putting a ballot out with like five names, Reg Choice, wherever does they do it, I would like want to make sure he was fifth on my ballot to make a point. And that's Dave Canales, the coach of the Panthers. The Packers and the Rams upsets are both remarkable examples of excellent in-game coaching. The way they manage those scripts, the way they shortened the clock and shortened the fields and kept it within one score and let the high leverage plays work from themselves. I also know he's not going to get it

because people are going to make, oh, the narrative, like, is Bryce Young getting better? Is Bryce Young improving? Is he ready? I see a guy who is like top shelf and coaching around his quarterback. He's maximizing his talent. I agree with that. There are games like the games against 49ers where it just like it feels like they're all wrong and like you know why when you run the football more and whatever because they walk out with some of these really polarized game plans to me it's because he's working around what he's got there the quarterback position canales in terms like the peak moments which i've been most impressed with coaching this year canales has like two or three of them right especially like i said those upsets so to me like he's not going to win it

they're not going to win enough games and like you know the narratives with the panthers are going to be about something else but he's he is really impressed me this season i like that it's hard to be like, oh, another coach would have that Panthers team with a better record right now. I mean, that's just another way. They are as sharp as they come there, man. I really believe that. All right, let's take a break. We come back.

We will finish with offensive player of the year. All right, we are back here on the Ringer NFL show. Offensive player of the year right now, Jackson Smith and Jigpa is the favorite. Jonathan Taylor also has minus odds, according to Fan Duel. There are other guys you could potentially make a case for. So, like, who do you got? I like this is a really really challenging like I if you made me vote today I don't know if I would take Taylor or JSN it's really quite hard you kind of want to see them get to the end of the year back all right which one of you gets 20 touchdowns which one of you gets 2,000 receiving yards right who hits the big milestone and then we'll go and give it to them between the two right now I think I lean JSN it's very very slight cold spins I can't stress enough like how impressing with what Taylor has done this season Smith and jigblut it feels a little bit more like against all odds to me right I I've seen Taylor have seasons like this before,

have stretches like this before. Obviously, this is his best one. I feel like Taylor's doing a huge part carrying that Colts offense. But JSN was more like, oh, my God, this is out of nowhere, right? And this, this Vikings game was really the first moment where it ever felt like there was a little bit of wind outside of the sales, right? He's still averaging like whatever it is, 4.28 yards per route run. Like, it's a number that is not only preposterous.

It's like beyond what we thought really like a player could do, right? And so I lean JSN between him and Taylor. I do think Christian McAfrey, who's on pace at the second 1,000-1,000-yard season is a much closer three than people are giving him credit for. But right now in this moment, I think it's still two-horse race, Taylor, and J-SN. I got JASN as well.

Yeah, I mean, the yards per route run numbers, the second since 2000 of like over 800 wide receivers. I mean, I just... It's disgusting. Yeah, that's what the defense focused on stopping him. No great run game, no complimentary. Second wide receiver. So I've got JSN.

I have another guy who I would put ahead of McCaffrey. I would have another guy third over McCaffrey. Now this is based on so like one of these years I want to do this exercise. No social media, no access to any statistical database. All I can do is watch the games, watch the film if I want, and check the injury reports. And I think if that's all I did this year. Jamir Gibbs. I would have Jemir Gibbs.

I mean, when I watch Jimmer, I'm going, he's better than every other player on the field. He's the best player in football. I know in a league where everybody is a world-class athlete, he's making people look stupid. So if I had just the eye test where it's like, who's a guy I'm going to remember from this season who's just been incredible?

And I think he's won them games. He's created explosive plays. I would have Jemir Gibbs on my ballot. Hard to argue with. Really is. And I think that he is hurt by the fact that Detroit tends to share their wealth a little bit more just in terms of general net touches than certainly Seattle does with JSA and then also Indianapolis does there with with Jonathan Taylor. If Gibbs had been getting the usage from

week one that he's gotten since like week six or seven on, then probably right. I think the numbers, I don't know how the exact stretch in front of me, but I would guess the numbers are a little bit more comparable to Taylor. He also doesn't score touchdowns in the same way that Taylor does because he's just not that style with back. He's not his face. This isn't fantasy. Come on. No, I'm saying, I'm saying that's why you're not hearing about this, right? The same way. talent-wise, pound for pound. Yeah. I mean, like, who the most talented back is in football? I was trying to

do this the other day where I was like, right, Jonathan Taylor, Jamir Gibbs, Bejohn Robinson, who like, Robinson is, and again, like, he doesn't have the stats because, like, the offense they run there kind of frustrates me like crazy and whatever. But just in terms of like, talent, pound for pounds, I'm not sure that Jamir Gibbs is the most talented running back in football.

But this always ends up being a statistical award, and it kind of should be in terms of the impact you have in their offense. Like, that's why the McAfre thing to me, like, people are like, how could, how could a back who's averaging 3.6 yards per carry. Yeah, I agree with that. I'm that person. It's not an efficiency stat. Offensive player there is not an efficiency

award. Who is outsizing their impact on the offense, right? Who is carrying the weight on their back, right? Who is owning the biggest piece of the pie? But the run game hasn't been good. He hasn't been good. Good thing. He's producing a thousand receiving yards shield. Okay, but he's not a receiver. He's not Jackson Smith and

and Jigby as a receiver. The fact that he can be the guy who's responsible for chunking out four yards on the ground to keep the defense certain luck to be establishing on first and 10 to keep the turnovers down and so on and so forth. And then when you are down in those games, which an office can keep pace with you, he could go and catch the ball nine times for 85 yards is singular. It is one of one. Jamir Gibbs does that occasionally. Christian McCaffrey does that weekly. And so to me, like, there is a degree to which raw fantasy production is reflective of like offensive

player of the year because you should just have like, you should have a large bulk of responsibility on you. The production should be siloed on you. It shouldn't be about, like overall efficiency. We're not giving this award Rico Dowdle, right, for his 5.3 yards per carry. No, you have to have a certain threshold of the counting stats,

but then we look beyond that. And I feel like Jemir Gibbs has the threshold. He's fourth in rushing yards in the NFL. He leads all backs in 20 plus yard plays. I mean, I just feel like what he's done is more impressive. Where McCaffrey, I mean, he is right now 43rd out of 48th back,

48 backs in rushing EPA. He's 48th out of 48 in rush yards over expected. I'm not saying, it's not impressive. It is impressive that he's able to take all. Exactly. Why are we giving him carries in like the fourth quarter of a blowout? The guy is good. Have you not

seen history here? But I absolutely agree that they've just been like, oh, you're also going to be, have to like carry our load in the passing game and we have like a top 10 efficient offense. I agree that that's impressive, but I can't give him like total credit for doing both things when the one thing actually hasn't

been that. It's just the Michael Thomas argument, right? 2018, 2019, whatever year it was. Michael Thomas had like 186 sketches, right, for like 7.6 yards of pop. And they gave it to him over Lamar Jackson. I remember this so distinctly. Because it's just sick to be that important to your team, right?

It's cool to be that integral, right? So, like, whenever it's tricky because, like, I always come at these markets from a betting perspective. So I'm always thinking about, like, all right, what are the, you know, plus TV bets here? And so in that world, right, where you're siloed off is just you in the film. sounds like a great world, by the way.

I'd love to be in a little film bunker. That sounds terrible. I think you're going to get, you're going to see things like, all right, Jimir gives over Christian McCaffrey. And that's very legitimate, right? Like, right now, like Officer Rookie of the Year Awards, Tedroa McMillan is finally leading the markets as he should be because his film isn't better than everybody for the entire freaking time.

But it's typically not how these markets go. They go other directions. That's why when I look at it, I think to myself, like, oh, if Christian McCaffrey has 1,100 rushing yards and 1,100 receiving yards, which is not impossible. people are going to want to acknowledge that as an absurdly successful and productive season,

even though, like, yes, he did touch the ball a lot and the efficiency is not that great. I like that. We agreed too much early. We rounded back into forum with the McCaffrey-Gyb's conversation there. Brother, that reminds me. How did you feel about the Jamir Gibbs pick at the time?

Were you like pro or were you like this? No, I probably ripped it. Yeah, I'll come clean. I have a tweet from Draft Night where I was like, man, this is not a good tweet. Yeah. And it's not a good pick. Lions fans are still

every single week, every week, Lions fans are like, holy this idiot. Meanwhile, I'm like, I'm so done. I'm so like,

man, this guy's incredible. I love him so much. He's unbelievable. It's crazy. We are three and a half season. No, 22, 23,

so far. We are three and a half seasons removed from the Jamir Gibbs moment and Lions fans are still trying to dunk on people for thinking of the bad pick. We've all moved on. He's amazing. It's so funny to me.

Never post is, of course, the lesson there. But that's not going to happen. All right. His name is Ben Solac. You can check out all of his work at ESPN. Check him out on with Mina Kimes every other week as well.

Solak, great to see you, my friend. Pasha. All right. I'll be right back with the hurry up. The hurry up is presented by State Farm. Don't settle for just any insurance when they're State Farm. And we have a huge Thursday night game between the Lions and the Cowboys. I just feel like this is a massive moment in the Dan Campbell era.

They had the rise in 2022. They were one of the best teams in the NFL, 27 and 7 over a two-year span in 2023 and 24. But they didn't get over the hump. They couldn't get to the Super Bowl. And now what? They're 7 and 5. And I don't know that people realize. Like the degree to which the lions are on the ropes here in danger of missing the playoffs is pretty significant,

according to the athletics playoff simulator. They have just a 30% chance to make the playoffs. and if they lose this game, that goes down all the way to 12%. So they wouldn't be out of it. If they win out, they still would have a good chance. But man, there is a lot riding on this football game. So I don't think Detroit's window is closed either way. Even if they missed the playoffs this year,

I'm not going to say they missed their window and it's over. They still have a lot of good young players. I still like Dan Campbell. But if this is a step back year, it is going to be hard not to think, well, maybe those Ben Johnson years 2023 and 24, maybe those were their best shots

at getting to the Super Bowl and meeting that level, that high level of an elite football team in the NFL. Again, it's not closed, but those thoughts are going to start to creep into everyone's head. So I just think this is a very interesting moment

for Dan Campbell, especially after his move to take over the play calling duties a few weeks ago. Are the lines an NFC contender or are they not even a playoff team. So really looking forward to this game. Obviously, you have all the implications with the Cowboys and the playoffs as well. All right, the hurry up was presented by State Farm.

You wouldn't settle for just anything for your team on the football field. Shouldn't it be the same for your insurance? So don't settle for just any insurance when they're State Farm. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Appreciate everyone listening. Thank you to Ben Solac. Thank you to Christopher Sutton for producing Kira Givens on Social and additional production supervision by Connor and Evans and Arjuna Ram Gopal. I'm Shield Capadio. We'll talk to you tomorrow on the ring around a fellowship. Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in D.C., Kentucky or Wyoming. Gambling problem, call 1-800-gambler or visit

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