The Ringer NFL Show - Reassessing the Super Bowl Race | The Ringer NFL Show (Ep. 359)

Episode Date: December 6, 2018

The Cowboys, Eagles, and Texans are making a late-season push, but can they actually contend for a Super Bowl? (0:30) On this week's Take Shop, Aaron Donald and Russell Wilson need to be considered for MVP (23:30), plus the three biggest games of the week, and deciding whether you would rather have Sam Darnold or Josh Allen (33:00). Hosts: Robert Mays and Kevin Clark Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Unless, of course, your team is playing the Bears. Welcome to the Ringer NFL show on the Ringer Podcast Network. I'm Robert Mays. joined as always by Kevin. Kevin, how you doing, buddy? I am excited about football. Last week, really, it was such a strange week, and it recalibrated a lot of my thoughts about the 2018 NFL season,

the Saints losing to a Cowboys team that looks a little frisky now. You know, the Rams looking. mortal, I guess you could say. I mean, even the Chiefs didn't have, I mean, they put up 40 points, but they still give up 33 to the Raiders. I just feel like a month ago, we were talking about this runaway group of four teams, and now I feel like the pack is a little wider. I hope so. As someone who roost for a team in that pack, but I do tend to agree. I mean, the way the Rams look, which we'll get into, definitely mortal, or flawed in ways maybe we didn't understand before.

It started off, the week started off very strangely with the Chief, or with the Saints exactly. So we'll see. I mean, maybe it's an aberration and maybe we're going to get back to our regularly scheduled programming this week. But I don't know. Maybe we won't. Maybe that pool is going to get a little wider. And we're going to talk about that a little bit to kick off the show today. You know, we've talked so much about the dominant teams in the league, whether it's the Saints or the Rams, the Chiefs this season.

We want to kind of do a reset of the potential contenders that are in play. So we're going to talk about some teams that maybe we've glossed over a little bit in the last month that we feel like we should really. hone in on as the playoffs are about to begin. So why don't we start off with that? And who is the first team among that group that you want to throw out there? Well, I think we need to take a look at the teams that have sort of

quietly risen in stature. Because again, a month ago, when we were in Las Vegas at our live show, Philadelphia and Dallas played a Sunday night game that I didn't think was all that important. I thought both of these teams were kind of just running

out the rest of the season. It wasn't going to be a big deal. and now you look at it and Dallas is coming off one of the most impressive wins of this season from a non top four team. And generally they look like they are almost locks to win the division except the Eagles who now have a 28% chance to make the playoffs, which is a lot higher than we obviously thought through weeks ago. According to 538, Dallas has an 81% chance to make the playoffs and a 73% chance to win the division. this is essentially a eliminator game for the NFC East. And I'm excited. Yeah, I mean, the NFC East fortunes changed so much with the Alex Smith injury, which we'll get into a little bit.

But, I mean, the fact that the Eagles now have a window to make this happen. In fact, Dallas is the favorite. It's drastically different than it was three or four weeks ago. There's a couple of things I want to address here. Number one is it looks to me, and this is a very small sample size, but it looks to me like all of the Amari Cooper trade haters, and I was one of them. Trade haters is a great term.

I'm really into that. There's a trade haters. You know, the Action Network put up a stat box about just what he looks like, what Dak Prescott looks like with Cooper. And it's unbelievable. It's above in many ways what he was in 2016 when he had the perfect situation.

I mean, 2016 Cowboys, a team that was not built for him, Best offensive line in football, best running back in football, skill position guys who could really put him in a position to succeed. A lot of contested catch guys. That's when Desmond is bullied people. A lot of contested catch guys. He is way above completion percentage.

He's 73% right now. He was 67 in 2016. Around the same yards per attempt, way more yards per game, and a better touchdown interception ratio. So essentially, Amari Cooper. And his ability to get open and stretch the defense and all the things we talk about, what we never really think can happen. Essentially,

Amarie Cooper has made this Cowboys offense as good as everything else that happened in 2016. Because he was, Dak Prescott was not good, pre-Cupert. He was not good. We were sitting here on this podcast wondering whether or not the Cowboys should even resign him. People were rolling their eyes. The entire sort of pundit class of football were rolling their eyes when Jerry Jones, about six weeks ago, said, of course we're going to extend Dak,

Prescott. I said, well, how can you possibly do that without looking into this, this and this? Amari Cooper has, is an inflection point. Maybe if he stays healthy and continues on this path, he might be an inflection point in the Cowboys in the Cowboys trajectory. He's going to save Jason Garrett's job. He's going to make Dak Prescott a whole lot of money on its next extension. If you think about where they would be without Cooper, I, I shudder to think how different

things would be. So those two things you just said, though. Oh, no, those are bad things. I'm saying those are bad things. Are we sure those are good? So I feel like that's the weirdest part about this is that this run, and if they do win the division, it has shades of the run-the-table packers year to me,

where the staff probably should have lost their jobs, but by some sort of miracle, in this case, it's the NFCEs falling apart. In that case, it was Aaron Rogers turning into a superhero. They're going to keep their jobs for two more years than they probably should. And maybe they're going to invest more money in DAC Press

than they should. At this point, I think what Cooper has provided on the Prescott front is that it gives you a template through which to evaluate Dak Prescott properly. I don't know if you could have

with the receiving core that was in place before Cooper got there. So now that you have Cooper, I'm not sure this is the reason to give Dak Prescott $100 million. Oh, I agree. But I do think it's enough to say, all right, with a viable receiver,

DAC can be okay. I still think if they're going to give him an extension this off season, the only type of extension I would try to secure as a franchise, is that trapdoor type extension we've seen for the likes of Andy Dalton, Ryan Tanhill, and others.

If we're doing four or five years with some guaranteed money and all of them, that worries me. I totally agree. When I'm talking about a flexion point, I'm not saying that saving Jason Garrett's job or putting Dak Prescott in line for a mega extension is necessarily healthy.

But I think that the opposite, which is a total overhaul, giving Dak Prescott, maybe, you know, obviously they're not going to do that because of the Cowboys, but sort of driving a hard bargain with Dak Prescott, signing him for two years instead of five years, that kind of thing. I mean, I think that it's just very, very different.

What would have happened if it had not traded for Cooper? Yeah, it's definitely altered the trajectory of their entire season in ways both good and possibly bad. We can talk about these NFC East teams, but do you think either of them is viable in the NFC as a contender? Do you think they can come out of that conference even after Dallas beat the Saints? Great question.

So I would say that anybody who can get in a shootout can win a playoff game, okay? Because I just think these, the defenses are so weird right now that if you can put up 30 points in a game, 35 points, you can, you can steal a game from a team like the ramps. The Saints were more interesting to me. Do you think, and this is a more hypothetical question for you, do you think if they play again, Robert Mayes, that the Cowboys will be able to do to the Saints what they did last week? No.

Okay, why not? I think the blip in that game is how bad the Saints played offensively. Okay. I just don't, I think they were completely... Just missing throws and that kind of thing? Yeah, it's just the sloppiness from a Saints to we don't normally see. The refs had a huge involvement in that game. It's just so many flags. It was just an ugly football game. I don't

think if they played again that the Cowboys would be able to muck that game up quite to the same degree. I like a lot of the talent they have on defense. I think their front gave the Saints more problems than most teams do. I know Toronto Armstead was hurt, but that's still just more press pressure than Breezes used to dealing with.

Combined with the speed they have at linebacker, a couple of the playmakers they have on the back end. I like their defense. I just don't like their defense enough to say, indoors, they can stop the Saints twice. I agree. I tend to agree that was such a strange referee game.

It was, it was disjointed, it was terrible. The Saints never really got in a rhythm. The Cowboys have incredible defensive talent. We know this. There are athletes all over the place. They're as sparky as it gets from athletic testing standpoint, and

that's starting to show. But I just feel like if they play again, it's going to be a little more saints-esque in their performance. Did you see, by the way, and by the way, just to talk about the Eagles real quick, the Eagles, I do not necessarily believe in, only because they're so

banged up in the defense right now. The defense has been okay. What I'm interested to see is, And I know that the run game is so overblown and the run defense doesn't actually matter. But, you know, Zach Berman had a great piece today, I think, about how much of a litmus test it is on Sunday to see if the Eagles can stop Ezekiel. He had 151 yards in their first meeting. I'm intrigued to see that that matchup. And by the way, Dak Prescott, I think, is fifth in the NFL in passerating on screens.

So the linebackers versus Zeke Elliott is going to be a fairly big matchup on Sunday. I'm intrigued to watch. It's incredible how far the Eagles run defense has fallen over the course of this season. And that happens, though. When a past defense starts to fall apart, you just allocate resources in different ways and in ways that will often hurt you elsewhere. So it's not surprising to see one area to start to collapse when the other area had already been on its way down.

But again, I think both of those teams, as intriguing as they are in that division, I'm not sure how dangerous they are in the grand scheme. Let's talk about two teams who might be, though. And let's start with the Houston Texans who we have not talked a lot about on this podcast, strangely, even though they have won nine games in a row and have one of the more exciting players in the entire league at quarterback. I wrote about the Sean Watson today. It was a story I reported a while ago, and it kind of kept an eye on just because their season has been so strange. But the way he's playing right now and the way the defense is playing right now, this team is beyond just the winners of a middling division.

I mean, this is a team that absolutely could secure a first round by if all things go their way over the next three weeks. Yes. I totally agree. Four weeks. Yeah, I forgot how many games are left. The Patriots have the tiebreaker on. Yes.

But they're the same record. So it's not as if they're two games up. I mean, the Patriots lose. I'm just saying if they finish with the same record, the Patriots will get it. I am extremely intrigued by this because there's talent all over the place. We've talked about it a million times. the defense is just all the way back at this point. My only concern, again,

is the offensive line good enough for the playoffs? I don't know the answer to that. My tendency is to say no, because that's just my natural leaning in the world is to over-emphasize the importance of offensive line play. Think about, just think about, I saw a staff the other day. I think, I think D. Ford and Justin Houston

lead the NFL in combined pressures, as far as the top two guys. That's going to be concerned. Yeah. I mean, that's the, that's not the matchup you want, dude.

That's the defensive line. And I guess that's not the only one, because if you play the Chargers, yeah, you have to do with both in Ingram. If you play against Pittsburgh, you have to do what their interior guys and the guys they have on the edge who aren't quite as scary,

but can do the right damage against bad offensive lines. So that's fine. And we can talk about how bad their offensive line is. I believe he's the second most pressured quarterback in the league, uh, among qualified players. Josh Allen is number one. Oh, wait, is Josh Allen qualified now?

It depends on how you change the qualification. So if you go to PFF and you do the 20% of snaps, I do 50. I do 50. So I do 20 just because I think that. I'm a big time sample size guy. Big time sample size guy. That's fine. So if it's 50, then Watson's one.

If it's 20, then he's number two behind Josh Allen. But they've still been able to win nine games in a row and their offenses look pretty damn good for stretches. So if Watson can mitigate this in the regular season, why can't he mitigate it in the playoffs? And that's what we have to answer. He had a play against Tennessee, and I watched it live, and it was incredible. And then I watched it again this morning where he ducked past Dural Casey's case he was coming to the pocket and then jump cut up the middle of the pocket and ran 40 yards for a first down.

And this is weird because I viewed Deshawn Watson so much as a passer coming into the NFL that sometimes I forget how fast he is. And that may be strange. I'm maybe the only person who does that. But every time he rips one of those off, I'm like, God, I forgot that Deshaude Watson's really, really athletic. Because in college, it was just all about how his passing numbers were off the charts. So when he can do that stuff combined with his ability to extend plays, that's what I feel makes him really dangerous.

And I also think that what's different about this year's Deshaun Watson versus last years is just the proficiency has as a pocket passer. It's not just run it around and chuck it. He's really making more advanced decisions. his thought processing, his decision making everything else now takes way more into account what defense is trying to do to him, what individual defenders are trying to do to him. Tyrone Matthew was talking to me during training camp about how Watson will just pick his brain about why he broke on certain balls, what sort of coverage he was playing, just the elevation

Watson has to put on certain throws. And that's been so cool to watch the season. A couple of the throws he's had recently, those little touch throws to the back corner of the end zone to a tight end type, he just wasn't making those types. touchdown throws as much last year. And it's really cool to see. So I just feel like his general development and his progress, if I had to guess, may be enough to overcome what's going on with their

offensive line, especially when you consider how good they are on defense. Because for all of the shortcomings of their offseason on the offensive side of the ball, just because they couldn't improve the line, they hit a home run on defense. Getting Matthew on a one-year deal and bringing Justin Reed in, who's been very, very good as a rookie, it's really helped the entire secondary come together. That team does not have many weaknesses on that side of the ball, especially compared to the last couple of season when Kareem Jackson was just playing not well.

So I totally agree with you. Matthew was one of the deals, I mean, we talked about in the summer. That's how you win a Super Bowl. I'm not saying the Texans are going to a Super Bowl. I'm just saying getting guys like that on deals. You can sort of always reverse engineer. In the same way, the two things you can reverse engineer are,

who the best player in a draft, is and who won the Super Bowl. And what I mean by that is that you can look back and everything always makes sense in hindsight. This guy was playing on this deal. We talk about the Broncos all the time. All these cheap guys like Malik Jackson. You know, you have him on a rookie contract.

You got eight of those guys. Yeah, you're going to win. The draft, I feel, is the same way. But Tyron Matthew is a championship level contract. You get a guy like that for cheap. You can win a Super Bowl. So they have depth everywhere. I mean, I just think that generating

pass rush is something that pretty much all of the good teams do. I saw a quote from Kyle Shanahan yesterday. He said, quarterbacks and past rushers can solve all your problems. And I agree with it. They don't have any pass rushers, so he knows.

Well, no, he knows. We're a quarterback right now. We're a quarterback now. Yeah. He is, it's like a John Gruden bit, except he didn't trade anybody away. We don't have any

quarterbacks or pass rushers. So, yeah. So just for me, the only thing I worry about is I think that if you're not going to get the buy, I don't think you are in Houston, then you're going to have to play four games. And at some point, the past rush is going to catch up to you. The averages say that that's true. I mean, we'll see about the buy. New England isn't exactly destroying people.

Maybe they drop one here over the next four. Houston stays hot. Who knows? I tend to agree with you just compared to the really, really good teams. but I also feel like the good players in that team are playing so well. All right, let's talk about the other kind of looming potential contender in the AFC that we haven't discussed all that often. And that response is kind of how looming.

I don't know how looming they are. Somebody on Twitter the other day, I think, was describing your disappointed dad tone when you're scolding teams about their performance. It feels like that's where you're at with the Steelers. You're just so sad about where they're doing and how they're playing. What was that game on Sunday night? So let me play devil's advocate about the game about the game.

the Steelers. It's the holiday season. I'm giving Mike Tomlin an internet connection and, and the lesson on how to Google who Keenan Allen is. That happens, though. Every once in a while, Kenan Allen's going to have those games. I love the Keenan Allen so much. Especially when you put a linebacker on my coverage.

That's true. I don't know. He roasted Joe Hayden a couple times. Figure it out. I mean, they had a defensive coach. Figure it out. They had a double digit lead in that game. they had 500-something yards

of total offense against the Broncos. So they lose both of those games and it looks really bad. But do we really have that much of a different understanding of who the Steelers are now that we did two weeks ago? Well, okay, here's my point

about the Steelers. So much of their value is wrapped up in getting home field. Yeah, that's gone. That's over. No, that's what I'm saying. If they get, if they had gotten home field advantage,

if they had not blown it, then a potential game against the Patriots looks so different. potential game against the Texans looks different. I mean, keeping in mind, of course, they did blow a home game against the Jacksonville Jaguars last year, which inexplicably allowed 45 points. But I think generally, in my opinion, a home field Steelers team is a scary Steelers team.

And I just don't necessarily think that in with this sort of with this sort of AFC playoff matchup where everybody's dangerous, I tend to think home field is going to be a massive, massive thing. And for them it is so important. Have you seen the records? I mean, like, we've talked about that. It's been 2012 since someone won a championship game on the road. And it's fairly close

in the divisional round as well. And it's even more pronounced for the Steelers. I mean, the difference in how they play offensively is remarkable. So, yeah, I'm with you. I also just feel like that team, looming is the word to me.

They just have that monster game in them every once in a while. And if that happens to come, let's say, like it did against Jacksonville last year, then, and then obviously Jacksonville, but the offensive output in that game is just ridiculous. I just think that's always there for them.

And when we're talking about teams needing to win shootouts and what you'd have to do against the chiefs, I don't know. I still believe that they're going to have a part to play in all this, even if I should. I mean, they're going to make the playoffs. Yeah, I just mean. It's beyond that to me, though.

I feel like they're going to scare either the chiefs or the Patriots when it all comes down to it. I would pick the chiefs more so just because we've seen them do it so often. But maybe that's just me having, way more lingering respect for that team than I should. I mean, I have respect for him. I mean, first of all, James Conner's out. Is that concern you?

For how long, though? I don't know. You're not playing Sunday. Yeah, I mean, they're going to win the division anyway. Yeah, of course they are. So, I mean, at this point, does really matter. If they're not going to get to home field and they're going to win the division, if James Conner, if James Conner's back to the playoffs, that's whatever.

It's kind of how to feel about the Chargers and, uh, Moven Gordon. Well, they're not going to win the division and they're going to get the five C anyway. I think it's possible. Well, I want to, I want to backtrack on yes, of course, because I was looking at the wrong thing here. So they have a,

they have a 71% chance to win the division. That's lower than the Cowboys. Who's going to beat them in the division? Lower than the Bears? The Ravens. I don't know. I didn't still think the Ravens have a shot. A good shot.

A better shot than you think. We'll get to the Ravens here in a little bit. We're going to talk about their game against the Chiefs. We will discuss. They're going to make the playoffs. The Steelers will make the playoffs that we know that. Yeah, that Colts loss is huge.

It feels like the Steelers are kind of locked into that six spot now, even mathematically they might not be, but just in terms of how teams are looking. All right, anybody else you want to discuss before we move on? Now, I do want to talk real quick about the, one more thing about the Eagles and the Cowboys.

Did you see Gruger Hill, the linebacker? I did. Say that the Cowboys always choke. Yes. I have a question about that. Everyone's always like, oh, this is bulletin board material.

Oh, here come. And I looked him up on Wikipedia, someone to see his draft status. Someone had said, that someone had edited it that said, this is the guy who's going to be the reason the Cowboys win on Sunday night. I just psychologically,

the NFL is such a high strong. They practice and they watch video and they work about a hundred hours a week, I would say, about 100 hours a week. Why would a linebacker who's not particularly famous make you so motivated

that you would now, the outcome would be different? Either way. I just think that the outcry over this sort of stuff, the bulletin board material, it's a little stupid. But if he does, isn't that a problem?

If the Cowboys come out, my God, we were so much more motivated. I also think that, I also think this about, like, being clutch, right? Like,

if you're better in the last two minutes of a basketball game than the first 46, then maybe you aren't trying in the first 46. Like, that's that kind of thing. If the Cowboys who are 7 and 5, we're going to be awoken, because a linebacker,

who was a sixth round pick two years ago, said that the Cowboys always choked and maybe the Cowboys have a problem. Yeah, the clutch thing is always interesting to me because I feel like it's not about being better. It's about being just as good. It's about kind of being the player you've always been in those two minutes,

but we talk about that's a conversation for a different show. Have you read Finding the Winning Edge? Or no, it's the Scortescare of itself. It's the other Bill Walsh book. Basically, he's like, being clutch is just doing the same stuff without panicking. Yeah, that's what I mean. That's what I'm saying.

Yeah, he's like, his whole thing is don't get amped for a big game, just be the exact same. Because if you're just normal, everything will work out. And the score will take care of itself. That's kind of, I mean, after writing about Sean Watson this week and having 10 different people tell me that watching him go into a drive in the last two minutes is the most soothing, calming thing ever, that's kind of my thought is that if you have a dude that just completely uninfluenced, unfazed by every single thing that's. happening, that does affect people around him. So that's what it's all about. The funny thing is if you lose in that spot, like the famous Joe Montana pointing out John Candy before the Super Bowl drive thing, like, if they had lost that game, if they

lost that game, people would be like, oh, he's not taking it seriously. Like, I feel people have overreact and try to show emotion because being either normal or blasé is seen as weak, I think. But that's a whole other podcast. It's a whole different conversation. All right. Let's get to this week's take shop. I'll start it off.

I have one, it's not one point I want to make here. It's a few different ones. So it's been become very popular now. Just every time someone throws out a non-quarterback for MVP, for everyone to just shit all over that idea and just say, well, no, he's like the hundredth most viable player in the league. You can't be the MVP if you're a running back or whatever. I agree.

Running back, it's completely impossible based on the current structure of the MVP. And with any other position, it's completely impossible based on the current structure of the MVP. To give the most valuable player award to any position in the NFL aside from a quarterback is impossible if we're giving it to the most valuable player. And I just feel like it's absolutely time to reframe these conversations and to rename the awards because it's dumb. It's not fun.

Aaron Donald is the best player in the NFL and he cannot win the MVP award based on the fact that it's called the MVP award because of the structure of the sport. could you imagine if every single guy in the NBA except for one position was just not allowed to win the MVP consider who the best players in the NBA are right now I mean you could do them in any order but may I may I humbly suggest that the a nickel of Usovich I was going to say aside from Nicola

Vosovish no no no no may I humbly suggest the best defensive player in the NBA can also not win the MVP award and we also have a defensive player of the year award in the NBA that's fine but I think that it's more interesting conversation when more players are on the table, when guys that are as different as Anthony Davis and Steph Curry can win the MVP in the same year and be a part of the same conversation. And I don't think that a player like Aaron Donald can win the MVP if it's called the MVP.

But I also think that giving him the defensive player of the year award doesn't properly express how good he's been compared to the other players in the NFL period. We can call whatever you want. I think that most outstanding player makes sense, but I'm not a branding expert. Something else. I understand it's been this way forever and you're changing how we view things through the prism of history because we've had the MVP under this structure. But think about how different the game is.

We have to change our opinions of records and numbers based on how the sport changes. When we constructed this narrative and this way to name the MVP, quarterbacks didn't have this type of importance. now they do. I don't understand why we can't reframe how we give awards in this sport, how we talk about end of season considerations because Aaron Donald is more than just

the best defensive player in the league. He is the best football player compared to the other player at his positions. And I just feel like there should be a way for us to hand that out and for us to award that person at the end of the year. That's it. Are you done?

Yes. Can I give my take shop? Sure. Russell Wilson for MVP. I'm curious about this because I did see the argument and I did just a little bit of research out this morning. So I'm curious as to why you're thinking this. Lay it on. Okay.

First of all, Seahawks are just objectively good. They're an objectively good team. They've won three in a row. He has not thrown an interception in four games. In that time, he has 11 touchdowns. Okay. His passer rating is 115, which is the same as Philip Rivers, right behind Breeze and Mahomes. The difference being, it's, by the way, six points higher than Mr. Jared Gough.

The difference with all of these people in the top five, Breeze, Mahomes, Rivers, and Gough is that Russell Wilson has Brian Schottenheimer as an offensive coordinator. You know, I don't think Mike McCarthy should have come back in 2019, okay? But what I do think is that he's getting a little bit of a bad rap in the sense it wasn't like he was a sleeper cell working against Aaron Rogers. He didn't have all that innovative schemes or whatever. No, no. And and and and and Russell Wilson his offensive situation is not particularly good. Okay. He threw two touchdowns to Geron Brown last week. Geron Brown has played on all the teams. Right. And so when you start to look around and say who did the most with the least, the answer is also Wilson. He's no longer. I think this will be the first time since he entered the league. He's not a top three. Pressured quarterback. But I think that he will be end the season.

top five pressured. So it's not like he's sitting an empty pocket back, or something a totally clean pocket back there. So if you start, I'm not saying that he's, he's, he's, number one on my ballot, you know, in a month, my ballot that does not exist. But what I am saying is that right now we need to be talking a lot more about it. I'm with you. I feel like he's been fantastic. And he's done it in so many different ways. He's, his pass rating on D passes is 128.1. The only buddy, the only person better this season is Drew Brees. And there's hidden elements to what Wilson does too. It used to be that he would kind of mitigate the impact of the offensive line

to be able to run around, do some stuff. This year, in my mind, it's been how he affects the run game. Seattle, when they line up in shotgun, they run the ball 47% of the time, which is absurd. It's so far and away the number one team in the league, it's crazy. The Bears are number two at 33%. And why that's important is the way. way that Wilson is allowed to hold defensive ends because he's a running threat on those readplays gives you a number's advantage all the time. Go back and watch the touchdown that I believe it was

Rashad Penny scored against the Rams. They're in the red zone. They go off the right side. And the Rams defensive end comes all the way up the field to try to hit Wilson because he still has the ball. Wilson just hands it to Penny who runs right into that vacated spot for an easy touchdown. He changes the game in so many different ways for the Seahawks. what he's been able to do down the field outside the numbers to guys like Geron Brown, to guys like David Moore. I mean, Tyler Locke is scoring a touchdown every week. This has been one of his best seasons.

It's the best he's played since that end of season run where a lot of people thought he might be the best quarterback in the NFL. Including myself. This seems like one of those years we're going to give Mahomes the MVP and give Pete Carroll coach of the year. Wow. I don't think that's true. Who's going to win coach of the year?

If the Bears go like 10 and 6 and win the division? Oh, it's classic. That's a classic Coach of the Year pick. But I'm saying, if we're going by how teams normally do it, I don't even agree with that necessarily. But those are the guys that typically win Coach of the Year. I would maybe go Pete Carroll. I can understand that.

I'm talking about just like the Coach of the Year sort of template. I think it's Andy Reid. No, I think that it just, we're going to want to give the Seahawks an award and we're going to give them something. I don't know if Pete Carroll should deserve a lot of credit for how Russell

Wilson's playing. No, I'm not. No, no, no, no, no, no. I'm, I'm, I'm, you're making my point for me. I'm saying that Russell Wilson is the reason this is happening, but we're not actually going to give them MVP. We're going to give it to damn Drew Breeze or Patrick Mahomes, even though they have really good setups. They don't Brian Schottenheimer. I'd love to see Drew Breeze with Brian Schottenheimer. How long with that relationship last? Coach of the year, if we weren't going to give it to the guy that is, again, ticks all the boxes that normally go with coach the year. It's a fascinating conversation because I think Andy Reid's in that conversation.

Frank Reich is in that conversation. Matt Nagy's in that conversation. It's a good crop. And we've had a lot of coaches have a huge impact, especially on our offenses this year. Who's your anti-coach of the year? Ooh, that's a good one. I mean, it's John Cruden, right? It has to be.

Maybe. He's my anti-executive of the year. I mean, he's the coach, too, though. I mean, Hugh Jackson. Maybe so that up. I wasn't even counting him anymore. Todd Bowles is... Does Q Jackson qualified?

Did he coach enough games? You only have to coach one game. Also, he's coaching for the Bengals. He continues his legacy. Yeah, Hugh Jackson's got that sewn up. I think it's John Gruden is number two for me, though. Yeah. All right, before we move on,

let's take a quick break. Meet Sonos Beep, the smart, compact soundbar for your TV and the newest addition to the easy-to-use home sound system. All Sonos speakers connect wirelessly. I use my Sonos beam. every day. In the mornings, I fire up a podcast when I'm making breakfast. In the evening, it's a perfect way to stream music on Spotify while I'm cooking dinner. During our Friends Giving last month, I just threw a playlist on my Sonos speaker, filled the entire

apartment for four hours. You just touch it, let it go. Controlling Sonos is so easy, even for technology rooms like me. You can download the Sonos app on your phone and control everything at the touch of a button. Sonos is also sleekly designed to fit with even the most modern living room. My beam sits right under my TV. It fits in perfectly with every bit of my home entertainment set up. Looks fantastic. All Sonos speakers and components work together. So you can expand your system anytime. And I may be gifting myself a few more Sonos items to deck out the rest of my place this holiday season. So go to sonos.com to learn more and order your Sonos beam to start your home smart sound system. That's Sonos. S-O-N-O-S dot com. Let's move on. Let's get to this week's Bex Games. Let's start

with the Rams at the Bears. I am very nervous and very excited for this one. As you said, coming into the top of the show, discussing the Rams, they looked mortal last week. And I went back and watched that game again this morning just to kind of see if I could pick up on whatever the Lions did that other teams weren't doing.

And the Rams offense is so predicated on taking advantage of just lack of discipline by the opposing defense. So so much of that play action stuff and the misdirection and the motion is supposed to play with the assignments of individual defensive players. And the Lions did a fantastic job of more or less saying, fuck the play action.

I don't care about any of those fakes. We are not going to give them any credence. We're going to come after the quarterback when you're faking a handoff and we're going to run with the receivers and not treat them like blockers when you're faking a handoff. And it worked. And that's why I have some faith in this game because the Bears are a very disciplined team. They play incredibly sound assignment football

And that's what you need to do against the Rams And after seeing what a team could do Against this offense, that's not a very good defense, I don't know, maybe I feel a little bit better about this that I should. I think you feel a little better. Yeah, I agree.

You feel a little better than you should. I don't know if it's going to happen. It was just encouraging to see a team do it last week. Yeah, oh, no, I'm with you. As I said at the top of the show, I enjoy the fact that this is a little more of a fair fight. I'm actually watching because I don't know where my remote is and I can't make a sound.

Otherwise, it would come through on the speakers. I'm actually watching Bears Giants right now. Oh, excellent. I watched that again yesterday. It was not fun. It's on a phone network right now. It's a bizarre game. And it's one of those games on the road with your backup quarterback who throws two picks,

including a pick six. Those games are, they're going to happen. Every once in a while, you're going to run into those bizarre outings and especially with your backup quarterback, it does not change the way I feel about the bears. I agree with you. I mean, I think you have to, assuming Mitch Trubis, going to come back and be the Mitch Trubisky

he was a month ago, which is not exactly saying he's going to be Patrick Mahomes, but he's going to be certainly above Chase Daniel. I'm sort of throwing these results out in large part. Is Trubisky good to go? Sounds like he will play this week, but I thought he was going to play last week. So

at this point, I'll wait to see until he's on the field. He feels really close to 100%, according to the Bears. Ms. Trubisky expects to play Sunday night versus Rams. Great stuff. I'm right where I need to be. It's amazing that it matters. Just the degree to which he is important is something I never thought would ever happen.

I missed him so much last Sunday. Hey, is this the end of Chase Daniels gravy train? I don't know. I think he has more than a one-year deal with the Bears or maybe not. Yeah. He has money on his deal next season. No, I just mean he's not going to get the sort of. of the problem is he was never a starter for sort of the early part of his career.

And so he can't do that. I'm going to be 42 and a backup for some reason. Then Matt Hasselbeck route, Rex Grossman did it in D.C., where you just sort of kind of ride a golf cart for four years. He's not going to get that because he didn't have any credibility on the front end as a starter. I mean, I don't know, man. Jay Stanley is going to be 32 next year. He's made something like $40 million in his NFL career.

I think he's done just fine. I think the gravy train, even if it comes to a stop, had a pretty good run. What a gravy train. Yeah, I mean, he's making $6 million next year with $3 million in dead cap. Barring some weird circumstances, he will be the Bears backup quarterback next season. That's some Nick Foll shit right there. Like, Nick Foll is one in the Super Bowl who's making more than the average backup.

And now every team is like, well, we got to have a good backup. Good for Nick Foles and good for Chase Daniel. I am worried that, I mean, I'm not worried about it anymore. But I think the Bears offense, this week will be a little bit more than continual wheel routes down the right side line to Tariq Cohen, because that's what it was last week. And one huge shot to Alan Robinson. That was the bear's passing game.

So hopefully it's a little bit more spread around when Chase Daniel and Aaron Rogers have the same exact accuracy on their deep ball, according to football ball focus. Wonderful. Stats are great. I will be curious to see what the bears do offensively and how they go after the Rams. You know, to lead back as much as you figure you can take advantage of the Rams linebackers in coverage. They're actually fifth in passing DVOA against running backs. So I think the number one thing I want to see the Bears do is either with Robinson or if you're

going to put Miller there, take advantage of whoever they got in the slot because that's been their issue all season, whether it's been Hill or whoever they have to try it out there, their third corner more or less, I mean, no matter who it is, they still don't have the cornerback depth that you feel good about. So I would like to see interior receivers for the Bears try to do some work. outside of that, I'm very worried about what Aaron Donald is going to do to my team. Is this an MVP case game for you? No, because he can't win the MVP.

We already had that discussion. Just campaign for it hard. I'm not going to do that because it's just not possible. It makes me look like a moron. It's not possible with that attitude. All right. Let's get to our second game. Ravens at Chiefs.

What a just bizarre combination of playing style this is going to be. If you were the Ravens, would you ever throw the ball in this game where you would just run it 50 times? That's a great question. I don't think it suits them to throw the ball very much. Although, you know, I think that I feel like this this whole Lamar Jackson running all the time thing, especially in certainness in his first start, it sets you up for like one fourth quarter deep ball in a very impressive way.

Sure. I think you have to, you know, sprinkle in some shots every once in a while to keep a team honest. and I also think there's some big plays to be had. But for the most part, I don't ever want to see them throw. Kansas City's dead last and run defense TV away. That's a little bit skewed because when teams are running against something, they shouldn't be. You can't, you can't do, you can't look at really good teams and their run defense. Well, it's not a matter how many yards you give up.

I mean, they're usually teams that have a very good offense have very good run defenses by yardage because teams are never running against them. And they can have bad past or run defenses by advanced numbers because teams are going run a draw on second and 13 and gain nine yards. It doesn't do you any good when you're down 21 points in the third quarter. I still think that Kansas City's run defense is objectively bad, even if we kind of take the context into account. Yeah.

Okay. Let's talk about the other side of the ball. 24-7 sports have this, this stat. The Ravens have not allowed a pass catcher to have a hundred yard receiving game this year. The chiefs have had 12 of those in 14, 13 weeks. That's a nice little matchup. I saw somewhere that Marlon Humphrey is basically in the second half of the season, just allowing a really, really low league leading catch rate.

He's very good. Marlon Humphrey is very good. It's a solid defense, man, I think. I mean, I think, again, we're talking about sound defenses, teams that are good all around that are hard to take advantage of an individual spots. This is another team you have to talk about. Humphrey's been excellent.

And their linebackers are solid, weddell on the back end. It's a hard defense to create big plays against the same way that the bears are. And that's really what the chiefs and Rams have subsisted on. You know, they're getting these chunk shots down the field. And we're having the two best chunk offenses in the NFL play against the two best chunk defenses in the NFL. And I'm really curious to see how it's going to go. My wife just shared a bunch of emails from Zillow.

That can't be good. No, that never leads anywhere good. Best of luck with that, buddy. This isn't good. All right. So, yeah, I know I love this. It's actually kind of a, it's really interesting. We get the bears against the Rams and the Ravens against the Chiefs in the same week because what we're starting to see and you need these highly isolated matchups to see it is what a great offense against a, you know, relatively good for 2018 defense looks like.

Because I love these high octane offenses going against defenses, which just know how to limit. these sort of place. And that's what I find fascinating about both of these matches we've talked about. Yeah. I mean, that's what the- Why isn't Wink Martindale getting any looks for head coach? I love this guy. He's had a really good season. The Ravens defense has been good for years. I think that they've done an excellent job putting that group together, but he's been good. I didn't know how he would fare in his first year call and plays, but he's done very well. Do you know that he was a truck driver? I did not know that. I just driving these Wing Martint-Wing-Martin-Dil Nuggets. I appreciate it. Don Martindale, very, very good defensive coordinator. And he has the

personality of like a 90 year old. And he's like a 75 year old. And he's 55. I'm very confused about this. Okay. So there's another guy named Wink Martindale. No. So Wink Martindale is a famous like entertainer. Yeah. I did not know that. Yeah. That's okay. So this guy is named Wink because that guy was called Wink? Well, his nickname. His name is Don Martindale. Yeah, they're both nickname Wink. Yes. Are they related?

No, it's an homage. Wink is a great nickname. I got to tell you, it's kind of a hockey type thing. Like, I feel like hockey is the sport that would just call a guy Wink, Martindale. Football, we don't give a lot of nicknames in football. Football doesn't lend itself to nicknames in the same way hockey does for some reason. Or any other sport. I really miss the nickname era.

Baseball. Christ. Yeah, I miss, I miss. Nicknames and sports, we just, we're in. the nadir of it. And I feel like I was before my time, or I was after my time. Basketball has much better nicknames than football. For sure. By far. Basketball has good nicknames, period.

Every sport, really, but football. All right. Let's get to our third game. Vikings at Seahawks. We discussed this a little bit yesterday. It feels like a loser goes home match in the wild card a little bit. This is a massive game for playoff implications. I'm starting to get a little Bill Parcell as you are what your record says you are with the Vikings.

Hey, I hear you, man. You're talking to talk about disappointed dad tone. Did you know, I thought this is interesting. Seahawks are 14 and 3 against the spread, 14, 3 and 3 in their last 20 games at home. Night games at home, excuse me, prime time games. I mean, they, they, they show up in primetime. They're also just good, you know, the other part of that is, miserable to play, too.

The other part of that is they're just really good against good. teams because they have good game plans and they're smart. And they've been and crucially they have good players. I'd like to think that Minnesota has the receiving talent to take advantage of Seattle. I mean, I think that again, they've just been so banged up on defense that as much as they've been able to put forth a pretty good fight, I still don't know if they have the talent on that side of the ball to hold up against explosive passing offense. It's not that the Vikings are.

Their line has been so bad this year that it's hard to really develop much down the field. And they've been so scattered and up and down. but I still believe that healthy Athelan, healthy digs can take advantage of the Seattle's corners. But maybe I'm just, maybe that's a misguided nomer at this point. Yeah, I totally agree. I have a question because I'm blinded by it because I was so in on the front end. Was Kirk Cousins a good sign it?

Yes. I agree. I would do it 100 times out of 100. I think you have to. I mean, you're trying to maximize your Super Bowl window. You have to sign a guy. I think he's been really good this year. the way they viewed him as just an entirely different class of quarterback than the guys they've had,

I think that you have to make that deal. I would do it again. I agree. Who wins this game? I think the Seahawks do too, but I still feel like the Vikings defense is playing much better. I'm not sure if the Seahawks be able to push the ball down the field the same way they have. Again, Seattle's done so much outside the numbers. Xavier Rhodes should be playing in this game, apparently.

I think that the way that he can take away stuff just to once out of the field, especially outside. I think that that hurts Seattle. The Vikings run defense is pretty good. I'm not sure if Seattle will be able to move the ball on the Vikings the same way they have some other teams recently, but I still feel like Seahawks at home. They're just playing better right now. Vikings still have a 20% chance to win the division.

That's as much as Philadelphia. Yeah, trust me. That lost to Minnesota last, or to the Giants last week. I'm not feeling that great. The Bears needed to win that game to put this thing away. So I'm a little bit worried. They have to play the Vikings again. There's a lot.

They have to play Rogers again who, who knows, you know, maybe it's rejuvening. Rogers after the McCarthy thing. There are a lot of elements in play here. I will say in playoff positioning, we're talking about loser leaves town. That tie is going to help them a lot. Minnesota's. Yeah.

538 has them as a 60% chance of making the playoffs. Carolina is less than 20%. Washington is 26%. Yeah, so it'd probably be both of these teams making the wild card, actually. Yeah, probably. Who's more likely to win an upset?

That's a really good question. I feel like on the road, it might be Minnesota. Yeah. Which is so weird based on the conversation we just had, but just as a gut feeling, I think that defense could throw the biggest wrench into a game against a better team. I just want you to know. I don't know. I want you to know that we made a case for Russell Wilson to win MVP.

We talked up to Seahawks, but the fact that we just flicked at the idea that they might not win a playoff game, mean Calks fans are going to be mad at us. That's true. I know. There's really no winning with them. All right. Let's get to Mays Geeks out and Kevin's Sneaky Truth. You touched on this a little bit earlier in the show, but I wanted to talk about the

Texans pass rush, especially against a very good Colts offensive line. And what Houston does, not only do they have excellent talent on the front four, you have Merciless, Clowny, Watt, Covington's an underrated player, DJ Reader's pretty solid. The stuff they do with twists and games, I feel like is worth watching because they'll put Clowny and Merciless on the same side. And they won't necessarily use them in a stunt, but they'll bring Mercilus all the way around the center and have Covington come across.

they're really liable to throw any guy in any gap, no matter where he lines up. And that stuff every once in a while will work. They'll get home on some of those plays against the Titans that Covington managed to come off a double team because they were so worried about merciless. But then the other thing that it does is it makes offensive linemen passive. Because they're waiting for those games so often,

on plays where these guys are just going to pin their ears back and rush the passer, they often get a bigger jump or a little bit more momentum. they can get into a bull rush and create a little bit more power than they would with a team that just rushes all four guys straight ahead every single time. So I would just watch for how often the Texans do that stuff where they're going to be twisting guys. And then just watch how passive, especially right tackles can be when Merciless and Clowny are on that side. And Watts playing excellent. I mean, he's dominating games the way he always had.

And this is, in my opinion, the number one reason this defense is a driving force between a team or behind a team that's won nine straight games. All right, what's your sneaky truth? All right, I want to talk a little bit about the Sam Darnold, Josh Allen matchup this week. Ooh, okay. Who would you rather have right now, Robert Mays? I don't know. We were discussing this on the Slack yesterday as part of a project,

and I had a really hard time kind of formulating my thoughts. I still haven't formulated them fully. When we say a project, we mean a series of social videos. You don't mean we're like diving. Why don't want to give it away? No, I don't. Part of a project sounds like we're building. building Jurassic Park full of Josh Allen and Sam Darnel.

I don't know how best to describe it. Okay. Anyway. So we did a video on it. Well, yes. I didn't know when it was going to come out, everything else. I'm not trying to give away proprietary information. Wow.

You went full Belichick on us. I am very worried about Sam Darnold, but I also think that Sam Darnold has very little help. What Josh Allen showed last week was pretty exciting, though. All right. This is a double-sided sneaky truth. Right now, both guys are under 70% pass. No, no, I'm sorry, not 70%. 70 quarterback rating.

That's much different. Josh Allen has had the two best rushing games over a two game span since 1951. Tobin wrote. So right now you'd rather have Josh Allen. And I can't believe I'm saying that. Josh Allen can make plays with his legs that we didn't maybe anticipate. So if you're looking at Darnold season and Alan's season, I think Alan is having the better season.

Here's the second part of that. Jared Goff also had under a 70 quarterback rating his rookie year. And I'm asking you, Robert Mays, because I'm sort of leaning. This is almost, this is in the zone of a take shop. Do you think that Sam Darnold can be goffed in the sense that the Jets can make completely wholesale changes, bring in guys who know what they're doing? doing and then Donald has a massive year next year. Or do you think, do you think maybe he's a little too far gone?

I have a lot of thoughts about this. I think that Sam Donald is a better quarterback down in and down out than Josh Allen is. Right now and going forward. If it's to make one pass, I would take Donald. If it's for one game right now, for some reason, I would take Josh Allen. Josh Allen has these scattered moments that are remarkable. I mean, the throw he made to the left sideline from his end zone to Zay Jones falling out of bounds last week. That's Rogers Mahomes shit. It was really impressive. But those that's scattered

plays. I don't necessarily trust Josh out to play quarterback for a whole game. My concern about Darnold's ability to be golfed is that I think Jared Gough was just completely overcome by his circumstances. And I think Sam Darnold's biggest issue right now is that he's become completely overcome by his tendency to make terrible decisions. And I don't know if you can coach that out of quarterbacks. We've talked about it with James Winston for years. We'll have these moments and they'll have these drives that are really impressive and then the mind-boggling interception comes.

And we've seen that. That just is going to be a part of who he is as a quarterback. We have to see whether that's going to be true for Donald. Is Donald going to have that same inclination over his entire career to look pretty good for stretches of four or five plays and then he just makes one throw where you just put up your hands and say what in God's name is going on? I don't know if you can coach that out of certain players. And that was the concern about Donald coming in.

And that's the concern I have about him moving forward. Hey. One thing about, like, guys who make really bad decisions to earn their career. You ever think that like Brett Farve had a very Benjamin Button type career? His decision making got more and more sort of rookieish as his career went on. His,

you know what? Fuck it. Attitude just kind of ascended where normally it goes down. Yeah, a lot of guys just have to get that sort of. coached out of them. And his, his grew.

He, like, peaked as a rookie quarterback when he was 38 years old. You know who also has gone up in that regard? Ryan Fitzpatrick. He's just, you know what? Whatever. I mean, over the last three or four years. I feel like with Ryan Fitzpatrick,

he realized that, like, there was enough money in having, playing five amazing games a year. Yeah. No, the cost benefit is there. Shouldn't, since Winston and Fitzpatrick are both really good and small sample sizes.

Shouldn't they just alternate and you just take them out when the sample size starts regressing? I think that's what the bucks have tried to do. I'm pretty sure that's been their strategy. It's hard. They're both sort of,

you know. It's hard to do it too early or too late. You never really know the timing on it. Steve Spurger did the one playing out thing with the Gators. Yeah, that's always worked. That'll just not.

If you have two quarterbacks, you have two. I did it again. Yeah. Exactly. If you're alternating them on every play. And then he would bring the play in with, he would tell the other one on the sideline what the play was and how to run it.

And then they would come in. It was actually, actually not bad. All right. I'm going to revisit that. I'm just some Googling later. Let's finish this off by break it down the Thursday night game a little bit. Jags at Titans.

Classic Thursday night. Color Rush. This is, when I think of the great matchups in NFL history, you know, it's Redskins, cowboys, bears, packers.

and it's Jags Titans on Thursday night. This is just what the NFL is all about. Thursday night football was designed for this. If the Jaguars and the Titans play on a day that's not Thursday night, it becomes Thursday night. I don't care if it's Sunday at 1 p.m. It's alter space in time. I don't care if it's Sunday at 1 p.m.

I don't care if it's Monday night. It's a twilight zone deal. You'll look at your calendar. It will say Thursday. The sun will go down. anything you thought you had to do on Sunday will not exist because it's Thursday night. It is a vortex. It's almost like at this time of year, especially when you're settling in with a familiar movie

and really makes you feel warm and fuzzy inside because it's a part of your childhood. It's a part of growing up, you know, whether it's a wonderful life or, you know, I watch the Santa Claus every year with my brothers, stuff like that. Just this is part of our traditions. Is that the Tim Allen one? Oh, it's a Tim Allen one. Yep. We watch it every year.

Just stuff like that. When you have traditions around this time of year, it's what the holidays are all about. And that's how I feel about December, Thursday night, Jaguars Titans games. I also, it's comforting to know that those teams are just back to being the Jaguars and Titans after a year of playoff contention. Uncertainty is not fun, Kevin.

I really love to know what's coming. And I'm glad we're back at that point. Fantastic. All right. All right. Wait, who's going to win? I guess the Titans. Who's a home?

I don't even know. No, I don't care. It's the Titans. The Titans are at home. It's right here in front of me. It's the Titans. All right, guys, that's all we got. We'll be back on Sunday.

And as always, thank you for listening The Ringer NFL show on the Bingham Podcast Network. Meet Sonos Beam, the smart, compact soundbar for your TV and the newest addition

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