The Ringer NFL Show - NFL Week 4 Presented More Questions Than Answers (Ep. 152)

Episode Date: October 3, 2017

The Ringer’s Robert Mays and Kevin Clark recap a wild Week 4 in the NFL, examining why a prolific Deshaun Watson makes the Texans one of the scariest teams (02:45), why the Patriots have by far the biggest flaw of any contender (11:45), and how Seahawks-Rams has become the most exciting Week 5 matchup (19:30). Then, The Ringer’s Danny Kelly joins the show to explain why our days of enjoying Beast Mode in Oakland might be short-lived (32:30), and Rodger Sherman joins to debate whether the Cowboys can still be the best team in the NFC East (44:15). Finally, Robert and Kevin offer their lasting impressions from Week 4, including a reminder that good coaching is just as important as good playing (55:45). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's the Ringer NFL show. Robert May is here with Kevin Clark. Kevin, buying tickets to sports and concerts can be a pain. Not if you're going to see the Chargers. That's true. You can get those wherever you want, but you should still look elsewhere when you're looking for other things.

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I'm Robert Mays. Join, as always, by Kevin Clark. Kevin, another big week in the NFL. Exciting Monday Night Game. I don't know how much of it you watched. I was keeping an eye on it. It was a good one. Back and forth.

The Chiefs of the last undefeated team in the league. Why wouldn't I have watched the Monday night game? Oh, I don't know. I would just want to assume. You could have watched it this morning. I don't know. I watched the whole thing. It was great.

There you go. We're living in Andy Reid's world. Congratulations to the Chiefs for matching an accomplishment, last undefeated team that the 2016 Minnesota Vikings accomplished last year. And when the Chiefs are going through the same kind of thing, they lost like two more offensive linemen last night. I have more faith in the Chiefs. No, I have more faith.

I agree with you. I like the coaching staff. There's some general, there's a little more, I don't know. I mean, it's not going to be the worst offensive line in the history of football. Yeah, and also they played pretty well. Even when they guys dinged up last night, I was impressed. I mean, you got some guys in that Washington front that can play. And to come out midstream and have to replace some guys and then be able to still run your offense and not get too banged up.

I mean, that was a really nice showing from that entire group last night. And that's a good win. I would have loved to see the Redskins have a healthy secondary in crunch time because I thought that was part of the, I mean, obviously the last second drive was pretty much a full communication breakdown. But I mean, I'm really impressed with the chief. I mean, they're a legitimately good team. There's no arguing that at this point. So we're going to dig into some other teams that more or less looked like contenders or we thought it would be coming into this season at least where what they looked like this week. We'll get into some other questions from week four.

Danny Kelly and Roger Sherman are going to be here to join us a little bit. later to answer some of their questions. It's a deep dive a little bit on some of the stuff Danny saw. But before we get to any of that, Kevin, let's get to our four downs, our four biggest stories of the week. And let's start with first down. I'm not sure where else we'd go with this after the, I don't know, the church of Deshawn Watson was erected on Sunday.

I don't know what you say that hasn't been said. There were a couple of flaws. He threw off his back foot a little too much. But, I mean, it was an overwhelmingly positive performance. He threw off his back foot a couple of times, made some dumb throw his. but 95% of it was just awesome. This Texan team, if they get that, obviously they're not going to score 57 points

every single time they go out. But, I mean, they were just, this Texan team could be scary, man. I was really impressed. And I feel like this is kind of multifaceted and why he looks so good and why it's exciting for Houston. One, he came out and made some throws.

That won to Bruce Ownington up the seam. He ripped that thing. I mean, that's a ball that, not even your first reading. He's going to that. and then having to make a split second decision, you had the arm strength to do it. The touchdown throw to Will Fuller,

where he's coming across the field, that's a tight spot to put that ball. A lot of the work he did with Hopkins around the sticks was really nice, putting really good placement, giving Hopkins a chance to just physically dominate in shorter, smaller areas of the field. And then the way the offense was tailored to him

and the easy throws that they had that were built in. I mean, some of that screen back to Miller for the long gain, there was so much creativity, that you wouldn't normally see from Houston. And I feel like that's what a guy like this can do. He can energize everything about the team, the coaching staff, how they're building things, everything else. So I feel like if you're a Texans fan,

there are a lot of layers as to why you should be excited about this. The most important thing that came from that game that I saw online in the last 24 hours is his passerating under pressure was 102. I think that's so important. I think you look at the guys around the league who have consistent success, and it's the ability to at least be above average when they've got a bunch of guys in their base because it's going to happen.

Texans offensive line isn't abysmal by any means, but it just happens in the NFL. And the ability to take on that fire is extremely encouraging for his career. I mean, that's, you know, Russell Wilson is pretty much, you know, the best modern day guy at throwing with guys in his face.

And if you want to have that kind of career, you have to be able to do that. I was in Houston for training camp. West Virginia. They train in West Virginia. but I was at the Texans training camp. And, you know, one of the things they talked about a lot was we had a discussion about the pro transition as far as the spread offense goes.

And they were saying that Watson was a lot different than most of these guys. And he's actually a little more similar to Marcus Marietta in that he made NFL throws all the time at Clemson. And it wasn't one of these pure spread offense offenses where they're just counting helmets. He's not Bryce Petty. and so I thought there'd be a longer transition but I knew from talking to them that there would be the opening for him to be ready this year I don't think they expected it

being around the Texans in August I can tell you they did not expect this they did not expect you know Wentz like first month we know he's going to be a good quarterback I think they start they you know look Tom Savage started week one that's all you need to know I still don't know if Carson Wentz is good

so I'm still back and forth on that we know at least he's an NFL player. I mean, everything you saw was encouraging. It's pretty hard. It's pretty hard to figure out if a quarterback's going to be an NFL player in the first month. We have no idea if Kaiser will get better. We certainly had no idea last year if Jared Gough was an NFL player on October 3rd. I don't want to get out. I don't want to you to step on your point here.

We'll get to that. But I think that there are other things in play here that we can't discount. One, I think there were some easy throws that were given to him by the coaching staff. Sure. But, you know, that he deserves a little bit of credit for that solely because. he's the type of player you can build around. And it's the reasons that I'm excited about Trubisky is rooted in a lot of this is because you can have two quarterbacks dropped into the exact same circumstances and it can look like

a different offense based on how you tailor it to that quarterback. And it's not to Sean Watson's fault that he has a skill set that juices up a coaching staff to give him easy throws and to make an offense that actually looks functional. That's not his fault. There was... The other part of this, though, is the Titans were abysmal. Their defense was entirely lost. There was a ton of play action that Houston used, which, again, is smart with a guy that

you want to give some easy choices. But the fact that the Titans didn't even understand how to function when they were using those play action elements, it was kind of embarrassing. I was like, good God, I wanted the Titans defense to be better than this because I was excited. They are not better than anything. They are certainly not better than anything. I couldn't believe it.

Watson's passing chart was really impressive. He sprayed the ball all over the field. I think that there was this meme going around, oh, look how many quarterbacks the Browns have passed on. It was dumb. I hate that. I hate it, too. Watson and Cleveland would not look like this.

Watson and Cleveland would not look like this. He'd have a different coaching staff and certainly he had different skill players. And so... Can we stop talking about the Browns draft in Cody Kessler instead of Dak Prescott? Everyone skipped Dak Prescott three times. I don't understand this. I don't know if you know this, but if he had played for the Browns last year,

he wouldn't have been in one of the best situations in the history of rookie quarterbacks. The Cowboys were a packed in which. Everybody calmed down. And that's the same thing this year, too, with the Browns. I mean, I don't know if Kaiser's going to be any good, but I certainly know he doesn't have DeAndre Hopkins and Will 4. I mean, the receivers are awful,

but also Kaiser's holding the ball a little long. No, I know. Kaiser's probably bad. But we'll get to that. I don't know that. I don't know that. I'm just saying that, you know, there are elements of these quarterbacks. Like Watson, I think the one knockout have on Watson on Sunday is that he tried to do too much sometimes.

And if that's your problem, that's something that is, that's a good problem to have. Yeah, it's fine. That's not the worst thing. If that's your, that's your downfall. But, you know, they all have these kind of ticks that are hard to go, that are, don't go away right away. Even golf has them still. I mean, you see it sometimes. He's not good under pressure.

He, when he has to kind of go from read to read, he struggles a little bit sometimes. times. But again, he's 11 starts into his career. It's okay. That stuff is fine. Yeah. The one thing I want, but before we move on here, oh, go ahead. No, no, no. I was just going to say that generally, I think that this Houston team that Watson has taken over, you're putting that in sort of the pantheon of good situations for rookie quarterbacks. It's not quite Dak Prescott. It's not even probably Ben Rothesberger, but it's not anything close to that. I think it's on par with having Hopkins is nice. No, certainly. And Will Fuller is nice.

It's not those two things, which are the two best situations in rookie history probably. But, you know, I mean, I think Mark Sanchez had a hell of a situation in New York in 2009 when he went to the AFC championship game. I mean, I think you're looking at that second tier of that. The one thing I want to say before we get off this game, I wrote about this in my Monday recap just kind of briefly. Mario dao going out in the second half, I think you saw the reality that you'd have to live if you're the Titans. if he doesn't play. And that's a Matt Castle or Alex Taney sort of situation that you never want to be in.

And I feel like this Titans offense is a chance to be really exciting all year. They hit a buzz saw on Sunday. I mean, I think that's just the, sometimes that happens in the NFL. Mario does run the ball 20 times in three and a half games. He only ran the ball 60 times all of last season. I think that they might have to start pulling back

some of those elements because he can't get hurt. Nope. And I know it makes them. more dangerous, but I feel like you have to just admit that you're not, it's worth not hitting that ceiling if you don't have to just crater 20 feet into the ground without him. And I think that that's something they'll have to play with. But just, he's a guy that's had trouble staying healthy. He's running the ball even more now. He's that 34 yard touchdown. It's thrilling. They look so good sometimes when he does it, but I don't know if it's worth it. I mean, Ken Wisenhunt lost his

job because he wasn't able to protect Marcus Mariotta. And it's a little. little different because that was just protection schemes, just very, very basic. Yeah, but I mean, I think the same thing extends. If ownership sees the Marcus Marriota's getting the crap knocked out of him all the time, he's a really good quarterback. Mike Mularky's going to see that and say, we got to stop something. I mean, you look at Cam Newton last year, this year, it's way, way different, but he changed

his game. And we'll get to whether or not the Panthers' offense is sustainable in a second. But, I mean, I just, I think that you have to use Marcus Mariotas' athleticism some of the time, but he has to, you have to find a way to keep him healthy because he obviously is, he hasn't finished a season healthy. That's exactly right. I mean, that's the problem. If he was a guy without that sort of track record and that sort of injury history,

I think that you'd be a little bit more willing to open that side of your offense up. But because we know what we know about him, I think that you have to be a little cautious. All right, let's get to that Panthers offense and that Patriots defense, man. I feel like that is one of the biggest stories of the weekend. that's going to be our second down. I think that the conversation here is which one is to blame for this? Do you give credit to the Panthers offense? Do you just kind of throw this on the Patriots defense that has been horrendous for the first four weeks of the season?

I know where I land on this. I don't know about you. I wrote on Friday at the ringer that this was a clarity weekend for some of the quote-unquote contenders around the NFL. And I spotlighted this game because I thought it was Panthers offense against Patriots defense. one of these units has to show that they are something. I still don't know what I saw on Sunday because it's exactly what you said, which is, is the Patriots defense just historically bad,

or did the Panthers find something? I was impressed, you know, we've talked about Brian Baldinger's breakdowns on Twitter, and he had a couple of them about the Patriots, and he just said that they're embarrassing. I mean, it was just like, like, just basically.

assignment football was just thrown out the window. They had no idea what they were doing. They would lose guys second after the snap. I mean, I don't know what the hell is going on was Stefan Gilmore, but they've got to figure something out there. I just, I couldn't believe it. There was one screenshot that was floating around football Twitter of the Whitaker touchdown. Did you see this, Robert? Of the, the, yeah, we're basically

they dummied to McCaffrey. And 10 players, 10 Patriots? bit and Whitaker, you know, was basically free on the other side of the field. I mean, just basic football discipline out the window. And that's why I lean more towards the Patriots being having a problem than the Panthers having solved something. Robert, your thoughts? I'm not leaving anywhere.

I have two feet in the Patriots side of this. They were really bad. I mean, that play was awful. And that's just a simple throwback screen. There was nothing that creative about it. I mean, that's just the type of play you see all the time on NFL Sunday, and they were helpless to stop it. The Devin Funch's touchdown in the third quarter that he was just sitting there wide open in the end zone. That was so confusing to me.

There are so many parts of this. And I think that missed assignments are one of them. And those two plays clearly are a result of that. But it goes beyond that. And I think you saw that on Sunday. Missed assignments, them getting absolutely no pressure on Cam Newton whatsoever. And I know that the Patriots aren't a team that just lets their. guys pin the rears back and go. But if you're not going to be that team and you're not going to

get after the quarterback, you also have to contain him. And the fact that Cam was just able to easily scamper for two third down conversions on one drive, pretty much back to back. If you're not going to bother him and not going to stop him, what are you doing? You got to do one of those two things. They don't have a pass rush. Their best pass rush is Dante High Tower. They clearly have no assignment discipline when it comes to that lane discipline. understanding where they're supposed to be in zone coverage, any of that stuff. And the third thing, I mean, Devin Funches was like roasting Malcolm Butler in man coverage. I don't like these, this is so bad that it's not just guys not knowing where they're supposed to be or being able to just complete what their assignments are.

It's being physically beaten as well. So there isn't one problem. It's multifaceted. And I think that's the issue here is that you can't just say, well, they'll figure out the assignment part. They're getting beaten every which way. And I do think we should give the Patriots the benefit of the doubt. We always have and it's always worked out. But this is really bad.

They've given it 33 points three times. They haven't done that in a season since 2009. Yeah, it was fascinating. Some of the Patriots beat writers were talking on Twitter the other day about just how many of those amazing Belichick Brady stats about how they don't lose when X, Y, and C happens, have just been thrown out the window through the first four games of the 2017 season. It's amazing.

I mean, this is not the Patriots. I mean, the one thing I worry about, again, just like you, I want to give them the benefit of the doubt, because there's a lot of people who buried the Patriots and paid the price for it. We're four weeks in. That's the same exact time frame from the Chiefs game a couple years ago. My only concern is it just seems,

I don't know what, it doesn't look like it's schematic. It looks like it's just player. And it's like what you're saying, Devin Funch is roasting Malcolm Beller. Devin Funch is roasting anybody on your defense is a horrendous. to sign and certainly the quote of quote Devin Funchess ain't exactly shifting

the lockdown corner that won you a Super Bowl at one point I mean I have to get roasted by Devin Funches and with that is not a good sign to say the least do they get better so

I mean Michael and Barty's been talking about Bellichick Michael and Barty's been talking about Belichick being more let's say more involved in the defense and I think that could help but I just I don't know man

I don't know if this is a scheme thing. I'm not sure if it's a scheme thing either. So we have these, every like heavyweight coming in the season lost on Sunday. New England did, Atlanta did, Oakland did, and there's one more. Dallas. So the four teams that probably would have been the buys last year, if Carr had and broke his leg, lost on Sunday. And they lost in the ways that we would assume they would over the course of the season so far. And I wrote about this in my recap, just which of these apparent flaws is most real, and which is not. And I said the Patriots defense was the most real. But all of these teams, were worrisome on Sunday.

I think that Atlanta, I think they'll be fine. They played a Bill's team that has a very good defense. We're going to talk to Danny about that. But between Oakland and Dallas, which of those teams are you most worried about? I mean,

I'm concerned about the possibility of Derek Carr missing six weeks. That's a problem. Even if he misses two weeks. But even before Carr came out, they looked awful on offense on Sunday. Watch that game again today. I am worried about the Raiders.

Okay. I really am. Just because that defense is so bad that the offense has to reach this height that if you don't get close to that, if you're not one of the best offenses, it's a problem. It's not like these other teams where you need to get to league average on one side of the ball. Their defense is so bad that I'm concerned about it. The Patriots are going to be okay because their offense is that, but I don't know if the Raiders is. Right. Yeah, it's a huge concern.

I mean, E.J. Manuel's starting games is not ideal to put a much. mildly. I thought it was interesting, and Jack DeRio said this many times, but the broadcast mentioned it, that he had said it last week, which was, what did you learn about the 20, what did Jack DeOreal learn during the 2016 season? And his answer was, don't lose your quarterback. And not two days later, he loses his quarterback. And so, you know, it goes back to the old Tom Moore thing. You know, in Ron Joroski's book, John Gruden asked Tom Moore why he doesn't let anybody but Peyton Manning take practice reps. And Tom Moore said, because if Peyton Manning goes down, we're fucked, and we don't practice fucked. That is backup quarterbacks. That is backup quarterbacks in the NFL. I mean, you can count on one hand the amount of backup quarterbacks you can come in and not be a huge tire fire.

But the difference between Derek Carr and E.J. E.M. Manuel is substantial. I think if he really does miss five or six weeks, I hesitate to say this because I love that Raiders team. I love Colomac. and I still love their skill guys, despite what I've seen the first month of the season. But, I mean, it's, we have the chiefs in that division. You have the Broncos in that division. You have a Chargers team that can still steal games from you, even though their season is done.

I don't know what happens to the Raiders. Let's get to third down here. And speaking of Danny, we're not going to talk to him about the Seahawks, but we are going to talk about the Seahawks. Kevin, are the Seahawks back in your mind? Was that enough for you to see them beat down the Colts and say, okay, this is what we need to see? I can't believe I'm going to say this.

I want to see them play the Rams this Sunday. I'm excited about that. Can they contain the mighty golf? Their thing about Seattle is they've always played the Rams stuff, even when the Rams were bad. I know. So now that the Rams are good, what's going to happen? This is going to be great.

This is going to be great. Jeff Fisher, Jeff Fisher from Beyond the Grave. Were they back? I think I saw a lot of the things. So first of all, the Colts are terrible. Jacobi Brissette is a better quarterback than we think, but he's still not a good quarterback, if that makes sense. I think generally, I saw a lot of the things I wanted to see,

but they still have a long way to go. I mean, the Colts were not going to test your offensive line in a way that any sort of league average defense would. Malik Hooker bawled out for the Colts, and I was super impressed by that. I thought he was great. But I think the hallmark of the state, Seahawks is a team that gets better as the season goes along and gets better as the game goes

along. And the fact that they were able to have that second half run, the fact that they were scoring with guys I never heard of, it was vintage Seahawks in my mind and I'm a lot less worried about them than I was four days ago. I tweeted this and it got embarrassing in a hurry, tweeting about the fact that Seahawks team shouldn't be favored by two touchdowns over people. And in the moment, I believe that I still kind of do. I mean, they scored two to defensive touchdowns and that's swung in the game, they can drain your will very quickly. When you score two defensive touchdowns in the game, it can get away from the other team very fast. And I think that's what happened.

And I still have my concerns about this offense in a game that is tighter, that another, the other team isn't playing from behind everything else. I think that they have elements that have always excited me. I think those receivers can be fun. And Chabal Sheard being in coverage on Jimmy Graham and not trying to bother Russell Wilson is interesting. but I agree that most of the time you're going to have fronts like you will with the Rams this week that can give them more problems. I want to see more of it. I mean, they're always going to be really good on defense. I'm kind of fired up about this Ram C. Hawks game.

It's a really fun. It's a really fun game. Losing Cliff Averill sucks. Losing Chris Carson sucks. They don't have enough depth in the backfield. I mean, they have guys. I don't know if those guys are good. The fact that now it's just Thomas Rawls again. There's a reason that Chris Carson was playing over Thomas Rawls. So we'll see how that works. Again, it's a really nice match with the Rams offense. It's going to be fun. I hesitate to say they're back. I want to see it for one more week. And in that same vein, as we're talking about the Rams, so we got a bunch of these three-in-one teams that we didn't expect to be three-in-one.

I'd say the bills are in there. You probably say the Lions. I mean, you like them, but they've looked a lot better than I think some people, including myself, thought. The Rams are in that group, maybe Philadelphia. So very quickly on Fort Down, before we get to our next segment here, which of those teams has surprised you the most and do you believe in the most? This is a very, very tricky question.

And even though we've been thinking about it for 24 hours, I still don't know the answer. I think the answer is the Broncos only because of this. I think so too. Only because of this. We know that they have an elite, they have elite talent on one side of the ball, which I mean,

honestly, maybe the Rams do. I have no idea. but I just, I've seen it from the Broncos. The bills, I love that culture there. I love Bean and McDermott, but I'm not, I'm not ready to believe in the bills necessarily. The Lions.

We'll take into the bills with Danny, I mean, a little bit just some of those specifics, but I tend to lean that way. I believe in a lot of what they're doing in some ways, but I still don't know if the talent is there to sustain it for the year. Yeah, I like the Lions a lot, and I, I buzzed about them in the preseason.

And I think they're right a notch below the Broncos. but they just don't do one thing so extraordinarily well that I'm going to put them on the same plane as the Broncos. And the Eagles, I just don't know. I mean, they just played some weird games, weird opponents. Still don't necessarily believe in Doug Peterson. I know that's the ringer ethos, is not believe in Doug Peterson.

It's a cliche at this point, but I'm a little hesitant to buy in. Philly is interesting. They have played in a way that I did not expect them to on offense. Their run game has been so good. And I really like the way that line is playing. just as a cohesive unit. Wendell Smallwood's, you know, getting stuff done.

I mean, they don't have a ton. You know, Blount and Wendell Smallwood aren't exactly superstars there. But they're running the ball really well. And I feel like when their defense gets healthy, they're still going to be very good. Without Fletcher Cox, Ronald Darby, hopefully be back in a couple weeks. But that unit comes together. I'm still believe in them and with the running game. I think they have a chance to be really interesting.

But I still would go with Denver. I just feel like that defense is so good right now. And their past defense is always going to be good. They have been for years. But the fact that they're stuffing the run this way, after finishing 21st in run defense TVA way last season, for their last three games, they played against LaShawn McCoy,

Ezekiel Elliott and Marshawn Lynch, and they average less than two yards of carry combined. It's really impressive. And when you can combine that sort of just assignment, sound, funneling guys to the right spots run defense with their secondary, they're going to be one of the best defense in the league, if not the best for the entire year. And the way their offense has been able to function and how creative they've been and getting the ball to the running backs, getting Semi on the move, everything else. I still am going to put them number one. But man, there's so much bunched up

underneath that. I really like what the Rams have done. The bills have been fun. It's a good group. I think that all of those teams are going to hang around all season. I have the most faith in Denver, though. 100%. I totally agree with you. I like fans. Joseph a lot. If you have a good secondary, you can compete in the NFL. That's it. I mean, combined with a really good pass rush, I mean, it's not just, they have so much going for them in the past defense category. The fact that guys like Adam Gatsis and Shelby Harris and dudes like that are contributing in the run game, that is impressive. Hey, I just want to talk about one thing real quick. Justin Simmons, 40 inch vertical. I mean, it was on display.

I was buzzing about Justin Simmons around the draft time because of the athletic testing thing. I know I get roasted for talking about athletic testing too much, but that was on display on Sunday. I think Josh Norris tweeted out, you know, he had a seven inch, he had a seven inch vertical advantage on his receiver. I think Cooper, obviously, and that stuff matters. That's all you need to know. All right, buddy, let's move on. Let's get to your little Tuesday segment here. It is Kevin's craziest headline from the weekend.

curious about what this week is going to be. There's a lot of options. This is the craziest narrative and it's just something we need to slow down on. Quarterback overreaction in October 3rd, October 4th, October 5th. If you were to just take, I mean, there have been so many overreactions to quarterbacks in early October over the past five, six years that I think we should learn our lesson about crowning a guy or conversely burying a guy. I mean, Jared Goff looked as historically bad last December. I mean, people were talking about some of his metrics as being possibly the worst rookie quarterback ever in some regards. And now he looks like not only a competent quarterback, but an above average quarterback.

So this idea that Deshaun Kaiser is done, way premature. This idea that Deshaun Watson is a star, way premature. I think that we need to, you know, this time last year, Carson Wentz was being, you know, I had, I remember relentlessly roasting, there were two teams, the Rams and the Browns who passed on Wentz last year. And I was relentlessly roasting those two teams for passing on Wentz this time last year.

And I'll say, you know, one of the employees of one of those teams, which narrows it down to about 600 people, was texting me and was like you gotta give a time you gotta give a time you gotta give a time and I didn't want to give a time because I'd rather just tweet a funny joke which is my ethos

of course and and that person was right and and I I think that Wentz regressed a little bit and you know obviously the tweet was worth it because it was funny

which is all I care about but it's just yeah you still do the tweet there I mean if I had to do the tweet over again I would do the tweet over again I don't know what's going on. Of course. You don't regret tweets.

You just go for you. You tweet again. So I think generally we just have to stop this culture of drawing conclusions this early. I know people say it and it sounds cliche, but once you get this stuff on tape, it really does make a difference. Once you play a divisional opponent for the second time, it really does make a different. There are so many guys we've crowned in October that have not turned out to be as good or conversant the other way. So I just think that my advice to everyone is just to relax and enjoy Deshaun Watson for what he is,

which is a talented fun quarterback. We don't have to crown him. We're all, we're going to be okay. And that's, again, I don't want to bring this whole thing back to Trubisky all the time, but it's the same kind of deal. I mean, Peyton Manning, I know it's a different era. Peyton Manning broke the record for interceptions when he was a rookie. So.

Trubisky is going to do some terrible things. but it's a matter of understanding this whole thing as a process. You're dropping him behind an offensive line that is not bad. He's not going to get beat up. You're going to put him on the move the way you want to in this offense. And it's going to be a learning curve. There is going to be some ups and downs this entire thing. It's going to happen with Watson.

It happened with Wensk. It didn't happen as much with Prescott, but there were moments. Those Giants games weren't very good. And he doesn't exactly look great right now. So there are a lot of different stops along the way here. And I feel like that needs to be appreciated more than it does. I fall into it sometimes and so do you.

Absolutely. We all do. It's hard not to. We have to. We have to talk about the league. And everybody wants to talk about the league. So you end up with premature evaluations. And so, I mean, it's really something we need to avoid, but we can't avoid if that makes sense.

And for Carson Wentz, you heard all of those things that came out in November or December about his delivery. And the flaws in his delivery and his mechanics and all that stuff that weren't coming out. September and that only got revealed because he got more stuff on tape and defenses started to figure out what to do with him. I'm going to go in a different direction here and also talk about something that everyone needs to talk about, which is my ringer of the week. And that is DeForest Buckner from the San Francisco 49ers. This will move the needle. DeForest Buckner is one of the lone spots on a pretty epistemal San Francisco 49ers team. I wrote about him this week.

Again, this is the point of this segment is to find the needle in the haystack, even if it doesn't move the needle, Kevin. So I have loved watching this haystack is in the back of the barn. It is buried underneath. It may be behind the barn. The 49ers are, this is exactly what this year was going to be for them. Their entire roster is a void of talent. going to be bad, but you needed some development from the guys you drafted very highly the last

couple years. And what Buckner has been able to do in that defense has been remarkable. I mean, he just takes over games. Watching that Arizona game, it seemed like he was in the backfield constantly. I know he only only has one sack, but we've talked about this all the time, just how misleading that stack can be. He's second in the league and quarterback hits behind only DeMarcus Lawrence. That's pretty damn impressive for a three technique tackle. And it was always going to be a question moving from that defense they had last year to a four three more in the Seattle mold. How were those guys that they drafted going to fit into that scheme? Buckner was a three, four defensive lineman.

They didn't mean moving him to defensive tackle is a new position for him in a lot of ways. And his ability to just come in seamlessly and really affect games in a constant way, I've been super impressed. His hands are really good. He's really quick. He's not really built like a defensive tackle. He's taller. I feel like that gives him an advantage.

in some ways. I feel like what he's done so far this season is the bright spot for a team that does not have any others. I'm on Brian Balding his page watching some breakdowns. It's really good. It is now time. It's welcome in our good friend Danny Kelly. Danny's here to help us put some things in perspective from the weekend.

Danny, let's start with the Raiders. Kevin and I kicked them around a little bit in our first segment, but I really want to dive deeper here. We know that Derek Carr is going to be out a couple weeks, maybe more, you know, those back injuries you never know, which it was fascinating to see Romo call that game because he knew in the moment. And the trepidation in his voice was very strange. But even with Carr in the game, that offense has looked bad over the last couple weeks.

What do you see going on with the Raiders? And do you think it's something they can fix if and when Carr comes back? Well, I mean, obviously the biggest thing so far is drops have been killing them. I mean, Amari Cooper has basically disappeared from that offense. He's dropped to passing in every game this year. and he's just really struggling to watch the ball in and all that. And I think that's been a big part of it. Even last week, I think we saw Jared Cook dropped a touchdown pass.

I mean, it would have been a tough play, but he still probably should have caught that. I just think that drops are obviously hurting them quite a bit. I'm worried, too, about the run game. I mean, it just hasn't really caught on. Marshaun Lynch has unfortunately not looked as good as I thought he was going to be. I kind of was on the record thinking he was going to be pretty good. good in that offense, but he's looking more and more like a 31-year-old running back that took a year off and just hasn't really found his traction in that offense yet. And so my question is,

is Lynch kind of done and should we expect this? Or is this sort of an indication of, and we saw this in Seattle a little bit when he first got to Seattle, it took him a while to kind of figure out the offense and get himself, you know, some run plays that really work and and figure out how to work off the blockers and things like that. So my question is, is the run game doomed or, or is it just kind of like stalled right now? I feel like against Denver,

it's hard to judge because that run defense has been so good for the first few weeks of the season. I mean, even against Dallas, they just physically dominated them. But against Washington, you'd assume they could move the ball a little bit better. I'd like to see more examples of the run game. I'd like to see them play more teams that don't have that good of a run defense

and just see if that offensive line can impose is will, like it should be able to. That's the thing. I mean, that group just as a collective unit should be able to push people around. The run game I'm going to withhold judgment on for at least a couple more weeks. The passing game is really frustrating to watch right now. And I feel like even against Von Miller and Shaq Barrett and that Denver pass rush, and even against Ryan Carrigan the week before,

Derek Carr should not be as quick to let go of the ball as he is. We talked about it coming into the year. we wanted him to be a little more aggressive. He was getting the ball quicker than any quarterback NFL history in the first three games. Exactly. And it just frustrates me. I just, he has such a freaking canon. And when he sits in there and moves around the pocket a little bit and gets to his second

read and is able to pump throws in there that other guys can't, that's when he looks the best to me. When he's just staring down first option wheel routes and doing his little wrist flip thing to a guy that's covered, that's frustrating. I don't understand why he just can't trust his ability to sit in the pocket and make choices more. It just that was one of the first thing that jumped out of me in the passing game against Denver. It's like, why are you throwing the ball, man? There's no one there.

Even an empty. You have the best pass blocking line in the league. Sit there a little bit. Trust yourself. And it just feels like they don't right now. Yeah. I mean, it's like they're pressing a little bit too. With regards to Lynch, he now has performances of 12 yards, 18,

yards and 45 yards. I think that I know Denver is an incredibly adept team at stopping the run, but when a 31-year-old looks like that, typically the bet is that he's not going to get much better. Yeah, that's probably fair. I mean, I just, I want to withhold it maybe because of my own, my own pain that I would feel if Marshall Lynch is done. And that offensive line just can't do whatever it wants. I really wanted that.

So maybe that's my own personal biases. But I still want to see it a little bit more. Lynch was pretty banged up his last year. I mean, Lynch had 111 carries of 417 rush yards in 2015. It wasn't like he set the world on fire. He was banged up the entire season. And so I just don't, I don't think it was, I don't think the layoff made him magically healthy or, or magically better.

I mean, I just, he's 31 years old, running back's age. It's what happens. Here's what I'm looking at with the Raiders. that concerns me kind of just over the next month or whatever is. Number one, they're going to be without car, which is obviously a huge deal. And number two, if you look at their upcoming slate of defenses, it's brutal. Now, three of these games are at home, but they've got the Ravens, Chargers, chiefs, and bills up next.

And so three out of four of those teams are pretty damn good against the run. The Chargers defense is kind of all over the place, but I think there's still a lot of talent on that defense so they can rush the passer. I mean, we could be looking at the Raiders could be in serious trouble right now. I mean, it could kind of get away from them. So, yeah, I was looking at just kind of the Raiders offense in general. It's like Crabtree's hurt. He's got his issues.

Mari Cooper's not able to catch the ball. He's confidence seems shot right now. Marshall Lynch isn't running the ball. And then obviously you're going to be relying on E.J. Manuel to kind of carry the offense. Now, he looked pretty good. He had a couple good throws on Sunday, and they kind of just dropped the ball on him. But, I mean, that's asking a lot against four pretty damn good defenses in the next month. There is a chance that Ravens Raiders game is the most unwatchable thing I've ever seen in my entire life.

Good God, that has a chance to be bad. Yeah, that's going to be a low-scoring affair. I mean, the question is, is Flacco better than manual? That's quite a matchup right there. It is a question I don't want to ask. Did you guys see the pro football talk headline last night that was just flacco colon, I suck. It was 100% early headline. No, but that's fantastic.

All right, Danny, very quickly, before we move on, I don't want to just like throw out all these problems here and not offer any solutions. If you were Oakland, I mean, obviously, this is when car comes back. Whatever E.J. Manual is, that's going to be something they live with for a couple weeks. When car comes back, what do you want to see them do more of to kind of jumpstart what is very much a stagnant unit, right? know. Well, I mean, as far as is the Lynch problem, I think you do got to get Jalen Rashard and Andre Washington more involved, get them involved in the passing game a little bit, trying to utilize their explosiveness. I think obviously you got to hope that Cooper's not totally broken, and I don't think he is. I think he's still a really great route runner. So,

Mays, like you were saying earlier, like start attacking down the field a little bit more, more aggressively, let him, let Carr have those little bit deeper drops, longer developing plays. I mean, there's no easy answer, but they've got so much talent on that offense that I just, I got to believe that it'll kind of, they'll figure it out. I mean, again, they have that, they have that great past-producing offensive line. They did a better job of keeping him clean last year than any other offensive line in the NFL. So they've got plenty of options. I don't think it's dire straits necessarily, but I'm just looking at the next month and trying

to get them through it. It could be a big, I mean, it could be a struggle. All right. So let's get to the team now that actually, beat the Broncos last week before Denver came in and kind of knocked around the Raiders. The Buffalo bills are 3-1, Danny. We chat about them a little bit, again, in the first segment, going into Atlanta, an impressive win.

Do you think it is time to buy in on these bills? I think the defense is legit. I think that we can definitely buy in on the defense, and I think that gives them a chance in every game just based on, I mean, it's kind of like it is sort of the same as what the Broncos do. It's like if you have a shutdown defense, you're going to limit the, out of possessions. You're going to keep the score close and it gives your offensive chance. Now, their offense has struggled. Taira Taylor sort of came alive a little bit last week,

but overall the offense has been disjointed. And you kind of have to expect that based on what they've done over the offseason. But I think if they can get their run game going, we saw them run the ball so well last year. I have to think, you know, obviously losing Anthony Alain was a big deal, but I have to think they can sort of go back to it a little bit and sort to get that back on track eventually. I think that gives them a good chance. And if they can get that run game going, I think that makes them a very dangerous team.

You know, the builds have started so quickly in the past couple of years, and so it's tough to really buy in on them. But this is a defense that, you know, they create turnovers. They fly around. They play discipline ball. They tackle well. They're doing everything kind of you'd expect from a Sean McDermott defense.

And I think that the guys they had from last year fit in really well. the guys they've brought in, if they're in well, E.J. Gaines has played well. Tradavius White, the rookie, has played really well. And it kind of looks like they've got, like, all the pieces on defense. And if they can stay healthy, I think this is, I think it's a legit squad. And so, again, it gives them a chance. I'm still waiting to see some more from that offense before I'm really going to call them, you know, like a potential winner of the AFC East.

Obviously, you've seen them sort of start fast in the past and then give away to the Patriots a bunch of times before. But, yeah, I think, I think, I think they've got the pieces there. And it's actually really surprising because I think most people sort of thought they were tanking before the year. I mean, I certainly did. Danny, neither of us will bury the Patriots. You should do it. Yeah, do it, Danny.

Say it right now. It's all bills. Bill says it's a few viciously shorting the Patriots. Do it. I'm the sacrificial. Guys, I'm the one who wrote that the Patriots are going to go undefeated. So I'm not going to do that. Yeah, you should be angry.

You should be angry at them. And now on October 3rd, tell the, say the season's, over and everyone involves careers. I'm scorned. Danny, thanks, buddy. You'll be back on Friday as you always are with some great fantasy info and we'll be looking forward to it. Appreciate it, bud. All right, thanks, guys. Talk to you soon.

Coming up, the ringers, Roger Sherman is going to join us to present a few more questions that arose in a wild week four. Also, some things that went down this week that will leave a lasting impression on Robert and I. We'll get to that after a quick break. Business owners have a tough enough time without having to wonder where they're going to get

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All right. It is now time to welcome in our first. our colleague from the Ringer You podcast and from just many other things. Roger Sherman. Roger wrote about the winners and losers of week four on the ringer.com. Yesterday, please go check it out. He's here today with some more takeaways from the weekend. And he wants to know if we're standing by him on those.

Roger, what are we getting started with? Hey, thanks for having me, y'all. First of all. Of course, buddy. So coming into the year, this was a pretty wild take at the beginning of the year. But I thought the Cowboys were probably. the best team in the NFC East. Four weeks into the year,

quarter of the way to the season. You're really getting out of a limb there. I'm impressed. Thank you, Roger. They gave up 42 points to the Broncos, the most points of the Broncos had scored since Peyton Manning was good, which wasn't the last year of Peyton Manning's career,

which wasn't last year either. And this past weekend, they give up 35 points to the Rams, who, you know, maybe the Rams are the greatest offense in football. no one knows yet. Points show that they might be. But I somewhat have my doubts.

I'm starting to think that maybe the Eagles or Washington could be the best team of the NFC East. The Eagles are 3 and 1. They've only lost to the undefeated chiefs. Washington looked good last night against the Chiefs. Who do you guys think is the best team of the conference in the division? And is it right to think it's not the Cowboys? First of all, I'd like to flip the they've only lost to the Chiefs thing as far as Philadelphia goes

and say that two of their wins have come against the Giants who are not a functioning NFL team at the moment and the Chargers who, that would mean, that was a weird home game for them in Carson, California. I can't draw many conclusions about the Eagles right now. We talked earlier. We still don't know how good Wentz is. The defense obviously has a lot of talent, but I mean, I think they've given up over 20 points three of their four games at this point. I think that my point from all summer, which was the NFC East, is going to be much more bunched up than we think still stands and that it's going to be a nine or ten win division

and that, you know, there's going to be not a lot of separation between the teams. I mean, Robert, what's your take at this point? Because I'm not ready to declare any team to be the best team in the NFC East except the fact the Giants are not it. I feel like Washington's looks at the best of any of the teams in the NFC East. I mean, they're games and just kind of the, I mean, they're the only team to slow down the Rams at this point, which, Jesus, this is the NFL is so fucking weird. They're the only team to slow down the Rams, which is in really impressive statement right now. Their defense looks very good.

They frustrated Kansas City last night in a way that other teams haven't so far this year. They destroyed the Raiders. I feel like Washington looks the best. I'm not ready to say they are the best. I still feel like Dallas is the best team in the division. they have the most talent in my mind just with that offense. And I know the defense has some concerning points on it, but I still would say Dallas is the best team.

I picked Philly to win the division before the season started. Washington's going to be without Josh Norman, by the way. Yeah, there you go. So there's just a lot. I feel like I would still say the Cowboys are the best team. I think Washington's look the best, even if they don't have the best record. But I do think that that Philly defense is going to be better for the season long

that has been so far because they've been so banged up. So I agree with Kevin. I think it's really bunched up, but right now I'd still say Dallas is the best team, even if Washington's looked like the best team. I agree. I like the, you mentioned the Eagles playing a rug game in L.A. And I just think it's so sad that the Chargers are just going to play 16 road games this year. It's the saddest thing. They play the Browns.

It's a disaster. They play the Browns in December, and I can't wait for that game. Yeah, wow. Who's going to have more fans there? The team with no fans are. Roger, can you go to that game? I would love to. I would love to be the one person.

Yeah, yeah. Philip Rivers, nine kids and then Roger Sherman. About the Browns. We had a matchup between the Bengals and the Browds, two teams with no wins on the season on Sunday. Expected it to be a horrible, you know, the toilet bowl of matchups. The Bengals really, really throttled the Browds.

Like, no points until Deshaun Kaiser came out of the game. That's always a good sign. Is there any competition for the worst team in the league right now with the Cleveland Browns? I mean, they played the Colts to a standstill last week, so I would say the Colts definitely have a claim, even if they don't get the crown necessarily. I think Cleveland is the worst team right now. And the problem with that is, last year, that was okay.

It wasn't supposed to be okay this year. This was not the plan. The Browns weren't supposed to be a. travesty again. And when you look at all the money they spent that they go out and get those offensive linemen. They signed Kenny Britt to the big deal. They retained Jamie Collins on a big contract. They shelled out cash for the first time. And this was supposed to be the, okay, we're a real NFL team now season. And it hasn't gone that way. Britt has been so bad. I mean, that contract looks miserable. They gave him $18 million guaranteed. That's awful. Can't catch a pass. And the fact that Kaiser can't

throw the ball to anybody. You're always going to have a certain ceiling with a rookie quarterback that people had tons of reservations about considering it was a second round pick. But I still thought that they would be competitive. And it just doesn't seem like they are right now. I'm surprised. The defense is really bad. Losing Miles Garrett sucks.

Jamie Collins didn't play on Sunday. Those kind of things start to snowball. But I saw a stat today. They have the highest blitz rate in the league, which good for you, Greg Williams. I'm glad you're still around. and the lowest pressure rate. That should be impossible. There's really no way that should be a thing.

Sorry. So they're blitzing more than any other team and they're getting to the quarterback police? Yes. Correct. I'm sorry. That's just really hilarious. I'm sorry to the Cleveland Bruns.

That's the opposite of football strategy. Yeah. No, that's it. You nailed it. I don't know why Greg is still around, but, you know, good for you, Greg. For our entertainment. He is for our entertainment, some sort of Don Quixote figure, descending 11 people at the quarterback and losing every game by 30 points.

You might as well. You got to try something. Kevin, is there any other answer to this? I mean, it's the Browns, right? They're not the most disappointing team. That would be the New York football Giants. But, I mean, if the Giants played the Browns right now, the Giants would win by two touchdowns.

If they scored, yeah. If the giant scored, just give it to Odell on a slant every single play and he would eventually score an 80-yard touchdown. Which is what they should do, by the way. If no one's blitzing, yeah. All right, Roger, what's your last one here? There have been two games in London so far this season.

We've seen the unstoppable Jacksonville Jaguars offense just go to town on the Ravens. And we've seen the New Orleans Saints pitch a shutout. So is London of Bizarro worlds where, you know, up is down, cars drive on the other side of the road and the Jaguars and Saints managed to look competent? Or is there something to take away from those two, you know, complete outliers that Blake Bordle's looking good at football and the Saints defense looking like they can stop somebody? I love this take. I definitely believe there is a portal somewhere along the Atlantic Ocean that the plane just goes through midweek. I totally, I'm with you on this. It's lost. It's lost. Roger, have you, do you fly to Europe every once in a while? I wouldn't say every once in a while. I have been to Europe in my life. Jesus, Kevin, what's your travel schedule? I don't know. I don't know how to phrase it. I don't want to say like year by yearly. Every Wednesday I try to go to Slovakia.

A while is like every, I don't know, 20 months. I don't know. I haven't figured out being an adult yet. I went to Ireland last year. That's nice. Thank you. It was great. I have no broader point.

I just wanted to find out your travel schedule. No. I don't sleep on planes. I'm a mess for like my first five days in Europe. Yeah. And the dolphins flew in, I think, on Thursday night. I kind of think that's, I know there's been a ton of studies done. and it doesn't matter when you get in.

It doesn't matter where you stay. It doesn't matter where you practice. There's enough of a sample size to where there's no significant data saying that it matters when you get in. But on the other hand, I kind of think it matters. Just being a human being and being foggy for the first three days that I'm there, first five days, whatever it is. I kind of think it's a big deal. So, like, I think that the travel is a much more important thing than anybody thinks. not even just a sleep thing. It's just you feel off your bearings. And so it's very easy.

The NFL is such a marginal gains league that one or two guys who are key contributors being half a step slow is a big deal. And so if you don't have the proper rest techniques, you know, I remember the Jets a couple years ago had all these techniques where they were, you know, they were given them, I don't even remember. They were like shutting the, giving them super, super blind so that no light got in and like it in the toilet paper they brought toilet paper they brought the toilet paper but they also did some interesting sleep

stuff like that stuff matters over there and that's why you see some teams being a little bit lethargic over there my general thought guys I that all makes sense I don't think we should sleep on the fact that Jay Cutler is eternally lethargic and the dolphins might just be really

bad yeah the the Jay Cutler experiment is a well I wouldn't say it's going great, guys. It's great. I love it so much. He is, he's just living his best life. You know, he's the, the, so he didn't really need to block on that play where he was in the wild cat.

But he, just standing there with his heads and his non-existed pockets was my favorite play of the year thus far. It was great. I mean, you know, what's funny is that Flacco, Flacco has done something similar and it didn't get roasted because it was significantly less funny because it was Flacco. We have a long history of We have a long history of flacco failing At trying to do things he means to do So it could have just been an accident He didn't care about the wildcat

He didn't move Yeah Sometimes he forgot to move Shockingly if you get a 34 year old quarterback Out of retirement who has never given a fuck Period when he was an actual NFL player It's not going to go super well Not surprising

This is pretty much what we should have thought about When they signed Jay Cutler He could have been calling the game on Fox But he got more money to do this Instead he's making $10 million. Roger, thank you very much. Really appreciate it. We will definitely have you back on.

And yeah, thank you for this. Thanks for having me. I'll be in Europe the next time you try to podcast. Every once in a while, Roger. Every once in a while. All right, thanks, buddy. Thanks, man. All right, Kevin, before we get out of here,

we want to offer our lasting impressions from week four. What is going to stick with you from this kind of bizarre week of football? When we look at the NFL's quote unquote ratings crisis, a lot of the things we have to understand are that it wasn't the local window. that went down and have gone down since the beginning of the 2016 season. It's a lot of the national windows, Monday Night Football, situations where there's only one game to watch and people just turn away. That is the NFL's ratings crisis for the most part.

Sunday night's game was between a Seahawks team that aesthetically wasn't pretty to watch at this point and the Colts without Andrew Luck. I don't want to see Malik Hooker. I like Malik Hooker a lot, but I don't need to see him being the best player on the field for a team. The NFL has to find a way to be able to flex out all the time. It only takes eight days in advance, seven days in advance, something like that. And it's only a couple of hours.

I understand it incommanyance to some fans, but for the Rancid file fans, it will not. The NFL has to find a way to flex out those sort of games and say this is either going to be a blowout or it's going to be ugly to watch and find a way to get a good game in there because the NFL has to do something to keep those ugly games at a prime time. that. Yeah, that makes a ton of sense. I mean, I think that that's going to be a continuing story for the entire season. I mean, there's no doubt about that. The thing that stuck with me on Sunday, just watching a couple different teams. I mean, Watson, I feel like that's why we started the show. He's going to be in there. But one of the elements of Deshawn Watson playing this well is the way the offense was tailored to him and the choices he was able to make and how simple some of those options were. And I think what I've really realized over the first quarter of the season,

more than I have maybe in any other year I've covered the league is how important coaching is and how important certain schemes are and how important tailoring those schemes to your players is watching what Kansas City has done for the first month with an offense that is almost entirely new it is an entire it is entirely a product of innovation and creativity and everything else and then seeing what the Rams have done and how golf looks at a completely different player in large part because of the way the system has been tailored. And then seeing Watson come in and run these plays that are wholly Deshawn Watson and watching coaches that understand that you need to do what your players do well, not what you want to do.

And the teams that have done that have been successful and the teams that haven't aren't successful, seeing the Raiders be such a static offense. The idea that there is just this inertia of who you are as a play call or as a schemer and that is more important than whatever strengths your individual roster has has always been where coaches misstep in the NFL. And I think that we've seen through a month just how vital it is to step outside of that line of thinking and understand that there are ways to put your players in positions to succeed. That touchdown that Todd Gurley scored is just beautiful play design. It's creative. It's just ingenious stuff that we don't see from most coaches around

the week. And I think that you saw it with Atlanta last year and you're seeing with so many teams this year. The coaches that understand you have an entire roster of guys. Let's figure out what every single one of them does well. And that's how we're going to be successful. Those are the teams that are making it. And I think those are the teams that will be around to the end. Well said. All right, buddy. That's it for today. We're a quarter away through the season. We'll be back on Friday to get you set for week five. As always, thanks for listening to the Ringer NFL show on the Ringer podcast network. Thanks guys.