The Ringer NFL Show - The Cowboys Aren't Dead Yet, Sound the Alarm On the Chargers, and More Big Takeaways from Week 3 | Extra Point Taken

Episode Date: September 27, 2022

Ben and Sheil start the pod by sharing their reactions to the Dallas Cowboys tough win over the New York Giants on 'Monday Night Football'. They then dive deep into the myriad of woes piling up on the Saints(6:09) and Chargers(10:41) before assuring us that the Chiefs, Bills, and Bucs will be absolutely fine.(23:16) They end the pod with Ben detailing a certain matchup next week which could decide the MVP(33:11) and Sheil giving the weekly extra point.(40:53) Hosts: Ben Solak and Sheil Kapadia Production Supervision: Conor Nevins and Arjuna Ramgopal Associate Producer: Christopher Sutton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Mac Jones is ripped. Matt Patricia's calling plays. The Celtics are title favorites. And The Ringer has a new Boston show. I'm Brian Barrett, host of Off the Pike, the show covering all things Boston Sports. I'll have shows multiple times a week covering your favorite teams and with your favorite ringer and local guests. Plus, maybe Bill will stop by to rant about the socks. Follow off the pike with me, Brian Barrett, now on Spotify.

Welcome to Extra Point Taken. That's right. We've got a name for the Monday Night Show after dark. on the Ringer NFL feed. I'm Shield Capadia, joined by Ben Solac. We're coming to you every Monday night after Monday night football. The format is

simple. We're each going to offer three takes. One of us will give the extra point. Ben, did I do a good job explaining that? But it's fairly simple. If you hadn't, I would have been very disappointed. It's like two lines worth of explanation. We are coming off a Cowboys 2316 win

over the New York Giants. I wouldn't say this is a game where they're going to be writing like oral history. about this game 10 years from now, but we got some entertaining football in the second half. And so, Ben, I'm just going to start us off right away. I mean, my takeaway from this game is that the Cowboys aren't dead yet. I thought the Cowboys were dead. When Dak Prescott suffered that injury in week one and they look terrible, I said right off, the Cowboys are no longer going to be in the picture. Since then, they win two games. They're two and one. They've got the commanders next week. I would

expect them to be favorites in that game. If they're, you know, three and two, three and three, when Dak Prescott comes back, well, all of a sudden now, they're still in the mix in the NFC, because the NFC isn't that impressive. I mean, since Prescott went down, the Saints haven't been impressive.

There haven't been these surprise teams that have emerged. And so the commanders look terrible. They beat the Giants tonight. So they're right there. They're one game behind the Eagles in the division. Am I nuts for thinking that the Cowboys are still alive after these two wins with Cooper Rush? Oh, according to, like, the general cowboy reaction after this game, you would be nuts for thinking that the injury of Dak Prescott would in any way affect the Dallas Cowboys.

Because this, we're doing the, the Cooper Rush thing, man. We're doing like, oh, they won the games. They were good. Beat the Bengals. Beat the Giants. Score 20 points. The offense. I've seen a lot of, like, the offense just looks better.

Like, it just looks cleaner. It just works. Yeah, they don't, because they don't try to do anything, right? When they try to be. I need to see, when you do takes like this, you're going to have to start naming names or something, because I feel like, I'm not going to go straw man on you. But I mean, are there people who you respect, whose opinions you respect who are actually saying things like this? You don't have to name names. I'm just kidding.

But these are not just randos, you know, trying to get a couple retweets here and there. You're saying there are people whose opinions you should respect or one could potentially respect for actually saying that. John Meadowcalf, ex-NFL Scout, with our Eagles, by the way. She don't know I do an Eagles spot. Just go listen to it. To me, DEC has obviously accomplished way more. But if you argue there is a gap in the talent between the two players, you might want to put down the sauce.

It's very clear there's a gap in talent between the two players. I've watched Dack Prescott play. I watched Cooper Rush play. Dak Prescott's better at pretty much all aspects of the quarterback position. Coup's not a bad backup. Functional backup. I don't know how many backup quarterbacks we need to see, go out into an offense, play accurately, be willing to take a hit,

be willing to, you know, rush for a third and four and, like, you know, dive out for the football, play tough ball, play discipline ball, play assignment-driven football, throws them accurate passes and score 20 points. And then when they get, you know, the chips are down, they get faced with an actual defense. They don't have the talent to elevate their team. Like, we get five of these a year, right? Like, this is the entire theory behind your Trevor Simians and your Mike Lennon's

and your Nick Foles and your Mitchell Trebiskees and anybody else you want. This is the diamond dozen. This is Andy Dolton, just, you know, retrograde. It's all the same. And so my, like, Cowboys takeaway is, like, defense is still winning. The past rush is awesome. Trayon Diggs is playing well. Dan Quinn deserves to be a head coach again.

Like, this defense is powering this team. Anybody who's deluding themselves into Cooper crush nonsense, just keep going, if you like. That's fun for you. But there's no doubt who the starting quarterback of this team is, no matter what Jerry Jones likes to joke about on Tuesdays. Well, that's what I was going to say. I mean, Jerry Jones feeds into it. I'm with you.

Yeah, I don't think that. I think most rational people would agree that a healthy Dack Prescott is going to be significantly better than Cooper Rush. And listen, when Prescott comes back, the team's going to look a little different. Michael Gallup could potentially be back next week. Now, all of a sudden, you could have Gallup and C.D. Lam there. Maybe some of those offensive linemen settle in a little bit. I thought their offensive line was, you know, pretty good today. They popped a couple big runs there with Pollard and Ezekiel Elliott.

I thought Cooper Rush had time back there. Rush is a better backup than I thought. I'll give him that. I thought he was competent today. He's really accurate. It felt like specifically in this game, there are no physical tools where you look at it and say, wow, this guy has a high ceiling,

but you just want to survive with a backup. You don't want it to sink your season. And Prescott told ESPN's Lisa Salters before the game, he had the stitches removed from his thumb. And players always think they're coming back sooner than they're coming back. But he said a couple of weeks, he thinks he'll be back on the field. So the defense has been outstanding.

Michael Parsons was sick tonight, and so he wasn't as impactful to Marcus Lawrence was fantastic before he went down with an injury. But yeah, they've still got those pieces in place where this still looks like a competitive team. I don't think we need to spend too much more time, Ben, on that Cowboys Giants game.

I think that's where we are. Hit us with your first take from week three. All right. Week three down. once you lose to the Carolina Panthers, you get put in the crosshairs here. So first take of the episode is this. The New Orleans Saints only have themselves to blame.

This of the teams that thought they could kind of get aggressive and really build for a playoff push this year, like some of these precipice teams, you can put the Eagles in this category, right? They were like a just barely won the division, knocked down the wild card round team that went and loaded it with a ton of talent. You can put the Raiders in this kind of,

category, the Cardinals in this category, right? Early exit playoff teams who went and added some capital, added some quality players. And the Saints belong in this category as well, where they very clearly thought, even with the loss of head coach Sean Payne who retired, they could get James in, healthy James and they could load up on offensive weapons a little bit, get Michael Thomas back, Alvin Kamara back, draft Crystal LaVe. The defense would just kind of run it, plug and chug, and they could go make a playoff run. They've been stringing this along for a while under Mickey Loomis, right? They continue to rob Peter to pay Paul.

They're trading up in the first round of the draft and using next year's first round pick to get that extra capital with the Eagles, right? They are building aggressively for a 2022 playoff run. And there was like offseason hype. There was some excitement around maybe the Saints getting it done. I didn't really get it then. And I think that you're kind of seeing the fruits of that now.

They were able to eke out a week one win against a pretty bad Atlanta Falcons group, a game that the Falcons large. largely controlled. And then in week two and week three, they lost to a Bucks team that is good, but it's not very good. And then, like I said, they just lost to the Panthers. The Saints offense is 30th out of 32 teams right now in EPA per play. They can't get Alvin Kamara going on the ground. The offensive line departures, which they've been so good at filling those spots. They've run out of that luck there. Right now, it's Calvin Throckmore and Cesar Ruiz isn't the player that

they drafted. They lost the defensive talent. It's okay. Like, yeah, we got Marcus May. We got Tyron Matthew, we can replace Marcus Williams and Johnson Gardner Johnson and Malcolm Jenkins. No, man. You just eventually start losing on the margins. So this Saints team to me is listless. They're not just losing games. They're losing games without a purpose. They've already spent next year's money.

They've already traded next year's first round draft pick. They are just boat without a rudder right now. They're nowhere. Yeah, I've got a lot wrong so far about what's transpiring early in the season. But I was with you before the season. I didn't get the Saints hype. I didn't get their approach. I mean, to lose a coach, the caliber of Sean Payton, one of the best coaches in the NFL over the last 20 to 25 years and think you're not going to see any drop off.

And you're plugging in Dennis Allen there, who was not a successful head coach the first time around. Now you got James Winston playing with an injury and he's not going to look good doing that either. So yeah, they were just sort of to me, I never saw the high ceiling. I thought, all right, best case scenario, maybe they win nine games and sneak into a wild card game. But right now, that's even looking like a long shot with. what you mentioned. Yeah, that week one game, I mean, they got severely outplayed. Fourth quarter, James catches fire. Mario, you know, the Falcons don't go for it on that key fourth down. They could easily be 0 and three here, have not been impressive. Probably one of the more, I'm trying to think of the,

you know, well, we're going to get to some other disappointing teams, but probably one of the more disappointing teams, I would say, through the first three weeks. And they're extremely bad on turnover differential. They're the second most penalized team in the league behind the Broncos. So there's like stuff that could get cleaned up and get some breaks that go your way and you're like more so a 500 team but that's why I say like I don't think the saints are bad I think they're listless I think they're kind of you know floating around nowhere and this is always the cautionary tale it's in the NFL we like to convince ourselves that things become static that things become irrefutable truths right like I would just we have Kamara so kamara will always be Kamara no we

won't eventually kamar's not going to be the same guy right like we have michael thomas once michael thomas comes back he'll be michael thomas no he won't cam jordan right like cameron jordan's having career years at 34 35 that is a lie that is tricking you right like you you cannot you don't have sure things in the nflb so you draft chris elave and he's awesome like oh cool everything's going according to plan the rookie hit right that's the volatile thing yes and no rookies are volatile things but veterans fall off you can't just set your clock to the same guys coming back and being the same people year in and year out, not the way it goes. And obviously no long-term solution at quarterback after this season.

So I'm with you there. All right. Speaking of disappointing teams, my second take, Ben, it's time to sound the alarms on the Los Angeles Chargers after what transpired this last weekend. I also have a Chargers take. I'm very excited over this. Yeah. So you just piggyback off of what I say.

We'll see if we're on the same page or not. But 454 left, you're down 3810. You've lost your starting left tackle. You're playing without your starting center. Your quarterback had to decide whether he wanted an injection before the game for a rib cartilage injury, which was obviously hurting him. You keep Justin Herbert in the game. You have a, what, 15 play drive where Justin Herbert drops back to pass 14 times for no reason. Brandon Staley says after the game, well, you know, Herbert wanted to be out there.

I mean, that is an amateur hour answer. I mean, any athlete I've interviewed has always said, they always think they're going to play. They always want to play. I mean, this is what plays in the locker room. This is what gains the respect of your teammates. These are the alphas. These are the most competitive people you could ever mean. They've played through all kinds of pain.

We've all seen it in the NFL. That cannot be Justin Herbert's decision. Your job as the head coach is to demonstrate some leadership and protect him. from himself. This guy is the franchise. This guy is either going to make you all have nice, long, great careers with the Los Angeles Chargers, or guess what? If he suffers a big, big injury, your reputation is going to be ruined, and you're going to ruin his career as well. So that really annoyed me, that answer right there. I mean, you have to exhibit some leadership, so you have to take the decision out of the player's hands, especially we just saw a week ago,

Justin Herbert playing in that Thursday night game, and he wasn't coming out. Guess what? I mean, he was injured in that game, could barely walk, unleashes that great throw. But at some point, you have to be smart about it. So that's number one. I'm questioning just sort of the leadership, the direction, the decision-making with the Chargers. Number two, I mean, the injuries have just piled up. Losing Rayshon Slater, the left tackle for what looks like a season-ending injury here. You're already playing without center Corey Lindley.

Keenan Allen didn't play Sunday. Jacey Jackson didn't play Sunday. Joey Bosa left the game. We already mentioned Herbert with the, rib injury. That's number two. And then number three, the defense that was supposed to be a lot better with all these upgrades, I mean, Doug Peterson just handed it to him on Sunday. I mean, that defense did not do anything. That defense is marginally better than it was last year. It's still a below average defense. And so I'm adding it all up. And I'll tell you what, the week two game against

the chiefs really annoyed me how conservative they got with their fourth down calls after a year of explaining, on our team to play with an aggressive mindset and that's why we're going for it. That all made sense to me. And then to go in the exact opposite direction in week two to have a tight end in Gerald Everett tapping out because he's tired and then he's getting targeted on the next play. No one notices he wants to tap out. He's getting targeted. You throw a pick six and that loses you the game.

Like these are a lot of things, Ben, that have happened. We're only three weeks in here. This was a team I thought was go. I picked them to go to the AFC championship before the season. and I thought they had a Super Bowl ceiling on paper. And right now, I am in like full panic mode if I am a charger span. Am I, am I nuts? What is your take on the chargers?

Exact same take. Far rosier disposition because I would like to believe that Justin Herbert has a long and incredible careers. I love watching them play, right? I just like, I. Me too. Me too. That's what's making me so mad about it.

For my own personal interests, I would like for Justin Herbert to play and play well. Mike McDaniel's head coach of the Miami Dolphins never played NFL ball. And he got asked about that when he was with the Niners under Shan Ann. He gave a really, really good answer about how when you didn't play in the NFL and like, this just simply matters. So it's called Spade of Spade. You don't look like you play in the NFL. It's pretty clear to players looking at you.

That guy never played in the NFL because Mike and Daniels like $5.9, a buck 90. You know what I mean? We're a buck 60. You have a constant daily effort in which you are trying to prove to. of the guys that you bring value. You add value. Like, I deserve to be in this room with you. I can help you become a better player, even though I didn't play.

Not in a hostile way, like the players walk in and they're like, you don't know, Jack, but just in a sense that, like, you know you're up against that. That is a reality that is present in the room. Brandon Staley also has to deal with that a little bit. Brandon Staley was not a NFL veteran. You're not playing the NFL. He's not coaching the NFL for a long time, right? Like, Staley also has that McDaniel background to him where the guys in the locker room are going to be able to identify.

Players will identify. This guy isn't Mike Rable. Is he not like us? And this is a spectrum here, right? You have guys who like, you know, you're Kyle Shanahan, for example, like definitely didn't like play in the NFL and was a big time player, but like is more of NFL establishment. And then you're Matliflor. You've been matril floors and so on and so forth, right? So there's a spectrum here.

But with Staley and with a lot of like the way he talks about. the way he talks about fourth downs, the way he talks about player toughness, the way he's talking about this injury thing now, you get the sense that the big thing that there is for Brandon Staley to learn. I think Brandon Staley is a good football coach, a really, really good teacher. I think he's a great defensive mind.

It's going to be in the NFL for a long time. I think he's going to matter in the NFL for a long time, and I believe he could be a really, really good head coach. The thing that is missing in his puzzle, the obstacle that he's currently attempted to overcome, is how from a messaging and personnel management, from an HR perspective, he gets his philosophies in line on Sunday.

He gets, this is how I want to run a team, and this is how I think football should go, and this is how my guys need to respond to football? How am I going to get this message from here to there? How am I going to get from the coaches to the players? We're all going to be on the same page. And like,

I have commanded the locker room, but it's still like a player-oriented locker room. That's a difficult alchemy for every coach, right? Not just like guys don't play too much in the league, but it's a larger issue for, as Mike McDaniel points out, guys who just don't have that background. They weren't in NFL locker rooms as players for a long time, and NFL players know that when they're their coaches.

And so it's such a huge thing for Staley to be dealing with. So I love the perspective you brought there. The rosier disposition that I'll bring is simply this. If necessity is the mother of invention and getting uncomfortable invites change, not for this season, but for the upcoming seasons, there's a chance that some of these injuries are really, really, really helpful to the Chargers. Because a lot of the, like we talked a lot about human resources there in communication, a lot of the X's and O's, a lot of the football personnel aspect of the Chargers,

feel like such easy solutions. They chose to walk into the offseason with Trey Pipkins and Storm Norton fighting for the right tackle job. Two tackles that if they went to any of the other 31 teams would not be remotely in the conversation for fighting for a starting job. The fact that Storm Norton is Roshan Slater's left tackle is appalling, and it will hopefully indicate to the Chargers, you have to take offense of line depth more seriously. Also, when Roshan Slater's out for the rest of the season with the torn bicep, you've got to find a way to protect Storm Norton.

You have to go find a way to help Storm Norton, which means you can't be the same passing offense you've been this season. Justin Herbert, three step drop back in the pocket, five step drop back in the pocket, quick game, balls out, we don't move the pocket, we don't do play action, we don't have him, you know, They move his launch spot a decent amount. They do roll them out. But you're going to have to find, you can't be a 15-player drive short drop-back team

if Stormor has a tackle. He's just going to get waxed every single plane. And Herbert's going to keep taking hits. Jalen Guyton, who's their speed receiver. He's their only speed guy. Tor his ACL. He's out for the season. We already know what Chargers' offense looks like

when they can't stretch the field. We're about to really find out just how bad, just how onerous, just how taxing, just how tight. This offense feels when there's no speed to stretch, there's no vertical element. These are things we've been complaining about. You and I for a long time with the Chargers offense. So there's a way that some of these injuries push on the pressure points of this Chargers

offense and make it very clear like, hey, you are building a very fragile offense. You're building this in a very weird way that you don't have to be building it. If Jalen Guyton removes your ability to get big plays, you did not build the receiving core the correct way, period. Keenan Allen's a good player, Michael Williams is a good player. You did not build it the correct way. So the hope is that like,

it sucks that it feels like the Chargers season is tank. It sucks that it feels like it's just scuppered. It's at the bottom of the ocean. However, a good coaching staff is going to learn from this. Hopefully on the offensive side of the ball

where I feel like a lot of their easy solutions just sit on the nose on their face just like in plain sight. Hopefully some of these injuries open their eyes a little bit. Yeah, it's hard to say a team with a quarterback as good as Justin Herbert after week three that you're going to absolutely bury him. And so there's a scenario where he just goes supernova and listen, the great, he showed this when he was a rookie, what he could overcome. He's shown it in many instances what he can

overcome the surroundings he has to deal with, whatever it is, the circumstances he has to deal with, like the true grades are able to do that. It's dealing with a rib injury. That part makes me nervous. If he were 100% healthy, I would say, you know what? He'll figure it out some way. Their ceiling might not be as high, but they're going to play a lot of good football. But all those things adding up here through three weeks make me nervous. And maybe you're right. You know, if Brandon Staley were to come out later this week and say, you know what, that was the wrong decision.

I shouldn't have done it hurt. Justin's always going to say he wants to play. He's the ultimate competitor. I made a mistake and I should take him out of the game in that situation and remove him from harm's way. Then great. Then we're evolving. then we're learning from our mistakes, and we'll see if he actually says that. But I mean, my thing is, like, the players see this kind of thing.

You know what I mean? Like Justin Herbert's teammates see that. Justin Herbert's teammates aren't questioning, is this guy tough or not? They saw what he did on Thursday night. Like, he has nothing to prove to them. I mean, players are smart, especially players when they have a quarterback that good. They pretty much always know, oh, my, this is the guy. I actually, you know, they're thinking, well, I have a chance to win a Super Bowl

because this guy's my quarterback. I guarantee if you did a silent poll or a, you know, a secret poll among the other 52 players in that locker room, they would be like, no, he should have been out of the game. We were down 38, 10. Maybe I'm wrong about that. Maybe other people feel differently. For my interactions with athletes, coaches, locker rooms, that's kind of how I feel about it. That that's what you would get from other Chargers players.

So, hey, they're an interesting team because I didn't think they had a lot of juice in that game. Like, again, I don't want to read too much into the body language, but just seeing the Jaguars. compared to the Chargers and what was going on there. I mean, the Chargers really felt like a bore and the Jaguars felt like the team with energy. And so we'll see if they can turn it around a little bit. In terms of what they're going to look like, fight-wise and play-wise,

I think they're going to be okay. Herbert very clearly was not healthy and should have been playing. I think if Herbert gets over the rim injury, which is an if, but if he does, the offense will just look better, period. Like, he was missing throws that he's, we've never seen Herbert miss the NFL level. And then defensively,

I don't fault them too much in that they had no J.C. Jackson and no Joy Bosa. They had no, like, this defense is built around a top five edge and a top five corner and neither one were playing. And so that's like, okay, you get a little bit of a pass for that one. Joey Bosa's week to week with a groin, not day to day, week to week per Brandon Staley. And J.C. Jackson has inflammation in the ankle that was surgically repaired like two seconds before the season started. So we might have to get used to a non-J.C. Jackson. and Joey Bosa World, and that's a really important thing for Brandon Stey's a really good defensive coach to do. They got to find a way to get Kenneth Murray off the field. This is an aside.

This is not good for our podcast. It's just me for you football nerding. I have never, like Doug just, where's Kenneth Murray plays? There was an entire drive that just where's Kenneth Murray. They got to find a way to give this cat off the field. It's not good. We will see. We will see what happens to the Los Angeles Chargers. All right. I guess I'm on to my third one here. And I think you might have one on one of these teams. So these might be, this might be a longer discussion as well. My third take, the Chief's bills and bucks are all going to be fine. These are all going to be teams we're talking about in late December, in January as Super Bowl contenders. I don't take too much away

from their performances in week three. The Chiefs specifically, I mean, that game, just you're not going to have a game where you make that many errors and just hand a win over to the opposing team. I mean, they had a muffed punt that led to a touchdown. They had a mishandled punt that was downed at the one. They missed a 34-yard goal. They missed an extra point. They kicked a field goal from the Colts two-yard line. They had a botched fake field goal. Travis Kelsey dropped a touchdown. Chris Jones and unsportsmanlike conduct that gave the Colts a first down instead of a fourth and 14. I mean, that's the only one. If that one doesn't get called, they still probably, well, not probably, like they almost definitely win that game. So to me, that is just,

just one of those games in the course of an NFL season where you look at it and say, okay, you know, things didn't go our way there. We made a bunch of mistakes, but it's not going to define who we are. I have some other stuff on the chiefs. Do you have a chiefs take or no? No, of the three teams you listed, the chiefs are the one I am most, like, this past game, you're totally fine. I think the bills are better, but I think the bill is kind of like, the dolphins were,

the dolphins walked in and were like, hey, we think we can beat your line. And they did. And other teams are going to do that too. The Chiefs one was just like, okay, what the heck is this, guys? We just got to, men in black neuralizer wipe the memory of everybody in the building who played in this game, act like we're 2 and O and going to next week. Like the Chiefs, that was the most aberration in game. That was the most outlier. Yeah, the Chiefs offensively, I know it doesn't look the same statistically,

and I feel like this happens almost every season. They're second in the NFL in EPA per drive. All three of their offensive performances have been above. Now, I did think there were times in that game where the Colts definitely got the better of them up front and they got to Patrick Mahomes a little bit. But I think the offense is going to be fine. And to be frank, the defense is playing a lot better than I thought it would. I was down on this Chiefs defense coming into the season. So I think the Chiefs are fine.

The bills, you guys covered a lot of that well in the Sunday night show, just counting again. You know, the botched snap at the end of the first half. I didn't know what happened. I'll give credit the athletics, Joe Buscoglia wrote about. this. I thought that they just kind of did the Dan Marino where you fake the spike and throw the ball out wide. It was a botched snap. And so if he spikes the ball there, I think that would have been an intentional grounding was what Joe had written there. So it was actually, I guess, a bit of a heads-up play. But they miss a 38-yard field goal. Gabe Davis can't hold on to that touchdown. Matt Milano drops a

potential pick six. I mean, they failed on four shots from inside the Miami two, Josh Allen, and Mrs. McKenzie. So there were just a lot of, again, a lot of things that didn't go their way. I'll give the Dolphins credit. They've played hard and played well in all of their games so far this season, but I'm not panicking about that. If I'm the bills, the one thing that I'll look at it.

If I'm the bills, I mean, those secondary injuries are really, really piling up now. Yeah. You know, Christian Benford, the rookie corner now. He's going to be out for a while. You lost Micahide, the safety for the year. Jordan Poyer didn't play on Sunday. Trudevius White isn't back yet.

So that's the one area where I look at, hey, their offense might have to carry them in some of these games, but they're so well coached defensively that I'm not panicking there. You're on the same page with me about the bills, I think, right? Yeah, like I said, I think that the secondary injuries are a thing. The offensive line is also, they had rotations there. They had to get a third turn around the field, which, like, I think it was Spencer Brown was the one who, like, left during the game because of heat exhaustion. So you don't expect heat exhaustion to start being an issue in November. You feel like okay with that one?

but in general, I think line depth and their line shuffling is a little bit of a question mark coming into the season. I think that's still there. But yes, the dolphins, we talked about this like you said on the NFL Sunday show. The Bills outgained the dolphins by over 250 yards and held the ball for two-thirds of the game. It's very hard to do that and lose.

So you generally say, okay, we performed well, and then in the high leverage moments, we just lost the coin flips that we were hoping we were going to win. Bills also should be extremely okay. It's just you drop, to a game to an interdivision opponent who has not yet dropped the game. That's the sort of thing that like in week 15, where you could have like a half game lead, a one and a half game lead,

you could feel a little bit better about, okay, like if we drop a stinker, we're going to be all right. If we have injuries, it would be okay. That starts to accumulate. So losing to the divisional opponent always is tough on those coin flips. And then the last team I threw out there in this sort of try. I guess I did like three takes and one. Is that cheating?

100%. But I cheat on all the times with these. Like, I just am constantly just referencing how I want. So we're showing, we're showing. You don't mind. So the bucks were my last one. Now, the bucks might be the most interesting of these three because their issues are real.

If you look at it statistically, especially. Yes, this is the one I'm going to push back on you on a little bit. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Offensively, they are 30th in EPA per drive, 28th in success rate. So, like, it's not like, oh, they're fine. They're getting bad luck. No, their offense has played terribly.

They've had one of the worst offenses in the NFL. through three weeks. So here's the case for why I'm not panicking, why I think they're still going to be there at the end. The guys playing right now, for the most part, not all of them, are not the guys who are going to be playing when the games matter. They're going to get Mike Evans back. They're going to get Chris Godwin back.

What's gronk doing right now, Ben? Do you have like a gronk update? I know you're always on the Twitters and the social medias. Is he on a boat somewhere? I'm on first of all one social media. I'm not on any of the social media. I regret the accusation. That right?

I didn't know that. So you're on one. You're on it a lot, but you're on one. If you could promise me today that I could do my job at 75% capacity to what I do it now and I could delete Twitter, I would do it in a heartbeat. I would be gone. You would never see me there again. It's the greatest feeling.

My wife walked in today and said, are you excited about this NASA thing? And I said, what NASA thing? And she said, you haven't heard about this? They're going to shoot an asteroid? And I said, no, I haven't heard about this. And I was so thrilled. I hadn't. My ability, I have a tiny cocoon of worldly knowledge and it is exclusively football and football

adjacent. And I've worked very hard to preserve that. I don't know what Bronx doing is the answer to that question. I will agree with you that that is sort of an underrated thrill now. If you're somebody who's online a lot, when you find out about something through means that are not just online scrolling, that's a pretty nice feeling. I would say, I would agree with you. It's electric. when I see my cousins when I see my cousins and they have two times as many kids as they did the last time I saw them

and I have no idea what those children's name are I feel amazing God, oh, it's my mother is so mad at me Gabriel was born 11 months ago I had no clue, nobody told me oh perfect all right well I didn't know that

I learned something about you all right so you could this might be a late season wage I don't know if Bronx's gonna come back or not but the point is physically Tom Brady looks great to me I mean, he's throwing it well. He's moving how he's moved last year.

He looks like somebody who wants the surroundings improve a little bit. He could just kind of go off and go on a great streak. And the defense is playing as well as any defense in the NFL right now. So I just think they're in like survival mode, get some of these guys healthy. I think you can't lose all the wide receivers and all the offensive linemen. I think if you lose one or the other, Brady's going to be okay. I think they're in a division where they don't have to be great. They just have to be pretty good.

and I think they're going to be fine. Are you pushing back on that notion or you're on the same page? I am worried about, like, it's a little bit backwards. I'm worried about just how good of a defensive season the Bucks are having. The Bucks are playing outside of their minds on defense. Like, no Jason Pierre-Paul, Joe Tryon, Shianca, bang. Antoine Winfield is a slot now. He's one of the five best slot corners in the league.

We do not care. The Todd Bulls defense is firing on all cylinders. It's incredible. defense is volatile. You put the same 11 players out in the field one week later. You just don't get the same result. It is hard to play defense in the NFL. It would be a really, really good defense,

and all of a sudden, one week, we have up 30 to the Jets, which the bucks did last year. You know what I'm saying? Defense is volatile. So through three weeks, they have stating games. They very well could have lost that Saints game. They have stating games and hung around in games, gotten short field to the offense on the backs of really, really high caliber,

suffocating defensive performances. Even if everybody stays healthy, those are going to go away just by the virtue of variance, just because of how football works. Will they go away in a week where Chris Godwin's back? And Robert Hainesie feels a little bit better at center. And like some of the, they've got seven false starts, man. Like this is a sloppy team on offense right now. The running game works a little better, right?

They can't get Fournette going between the tackles right now. They're pulling dudes. They're trying to get them outside. They get a very weird box offense, nothing like what we're used to seeing. are how many of those issues are going to be solved and to what degree are they going to be solved when this defense inevitably drops a game? I don't know.

And that's the thing is, is they are comfortable in a bad NFC South and probably comfortable in a generally weak NFC. But this is a running hourglass. This is a ticking clock in terms of, you're not going to get carried for a whole season by defense in 2022 in the NFL. That outcome just doesn't exist anymore.

So they do have work to do to figure out this offense. And it's, they'll be okay because Brady's okay, but there is urgency there that isn't there, in my opinion, in Buffalo or in Kansas City. Okay. I think that's fair. All right. Hit us with your third take.

What do you got? All right. Time to call a shot. He says, having called the Raiders being okay last week, and then they lost the Titans and they're now O'N three, and the Raiders are terrible. Don't worry about it.

It's fine. We forget that one. Buffalo, Baltimore, week four, probably the best game on the slate. Eagles, is pretty good, but still, it should be a fun one. Winning quarterback of this game wins MVP

for the season. That's my take. Oh, I like it. Yeah, so if you look at MVP odds right now, the general consensus is that we're in a four horse race. Josh Allen is the favorite, and then Jalen Hertz, Lamar Jackson and Patrick Mahomes all have roughly the same prices depending on what book

you look at. Alan at the pole position and all of these guys very clearly, a couple good weeks, Alan is a bad week. They're going to be in the pole position. After that, you get into longer odds, Herbert, to Rogers, Dafford. Somebody can emerge, but sure. If Mahomes is amazing, the Mahomes is amazing, whatever. Like, Mahomes elite is always around.

Just kind of put that off to the side. Don't deal with that one. Obviously, the Jalen Hertz, like narrative would be really, really fun. I think an absurdly productive Hertz season. It would be exciting to give him the MVP. Eagles number one seat in the NFC. I can see it happening. But you and I talk about Jalen Hertz a lot on our Eagles show. I think that, you know, we're going to see some peaks and some valleys from hers.

I think we've seen the best version of Hertz over the last few weeks. I think that inevitably comes down a little. little bit. Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson are just they're just dragging two offenses, man. These running games are horrible. And in the case of Buffalo,

you have like a not amazing offensive line. You have a really short passing game. Josh Allen, 6.8 yards per attempt, 6.8 air yards per attempt. Lowest number of his career. Like, it's not perfect on offense. The Baltimore offense gave Rashad Bateman, but like it's still Greg Roman designing plays.

and they're multiple tight ends. Lamar's throwing to like Isaiah likely. Neither one of these team, these quarterbacks is playing with like unbelievable passing game, air raid, we have all the weapons, whatever. And they just can't be stopped. I mean, like, okay, like Allen 19 points against the dolphins, you know, not an insanely high game,

but that's because it's just our expectation for him has become these 30 point outings. Lamar just had the 37 point outing against the Patriots where they were on their third string left tackle. It just doesn't matter. Second receivers, David Nuberday just doesn't matter. Only two players so far this year have accounted for more than nine total touchdowns. That's Josh Allen with 10 and Lamar Jackson with 12.

Josh Allen dropped back 71 times against the dolphins. Single highest one game drop back total, any quarterback in charting history. Both of these offenses are completely and totally built around the quarterback's physical talent in a way that no other offenses are. Like Lamar is just like, okay, well, our quarterback can get us 100 yards on the ground, so we don't have to worry about that. Like, that's just, that's, that's unbelievable. Watching Lamar in that, that, that Patriots game, it's astounding how much more time he has to do things because he just always escapes the first pressure.

Like he just, he's just standing in the pocket, just feet, just pigeon footage, just holding the ball at his hip, just like not interested in like looking like he's ready to do anything at all. because if Dietrich Weiss comes down the pipe right now, Dietrich Weiss is never tackling Lamar Jackson. He can just stand there and evaluate. He dilates time in the Ravens offense. Two seconds in the pocket for the Ravens offense is worth twice as much as two seconds in the pocket

in any other offense because of what Lamar is. And then you have Josh Allen, who just two seconds in the bill's offense is worth more than two seconds than any other offense because Alan is three-step drop, laser beam anywhere on the field, and he can't miss this season. The Josh Allen inaccuracy is gone. These are the two most formative.

They are tent poles of their offenses. They get to play in a week form. We're very lucky for that. I think the team that wins this game, assuming they're able to withstand that level of offensive performance and production for the rest of the season, that quarterback is inevitably going to have the counting stats and the record that cannot be argued with

when it comes to MVP conversation. Your winner of MVP, it's decided on Sunday show. Yeah, I think that, I mean, the statistical case for both of them is going to be there. The Lamar Jackson touchdown thing. It was funny. I was just looking this up earlier today.

So he has 12 touchdowns this season. Do you know how many teams in the NFL have more than 12 offensive touchdowns this season? Okay, more than 12. More than 12 offensive touchdowns. Lamar has 12 by himself. The three weeks of the season, so averaging four touchdowns a game?

Yeah. Three. Zero. He has as many touchdowns as he has more touchdowns than 30 teams. So that is a Ravens. That means a Ravens back has not scored. The Ravens have 12. He has every touchdown that the Ravens have accounted for.

He's 100% scoring participation. 100%. He's thrown 10. He's run for 2. That's 12 touchdowns. The Ravens leave the NFL. They're tied with the Lions for 12 offensive touchdowns. What are the bills at?

The bills are 11? It must be, 10 or 11. Yeah. I was thinking Lions Ravens bills were my thought. Holy smokes. He has more touchdowns than 30 NFL teams through the first three weeks of the season. And, you know, the other point with these two guys, and they both pass the eye test, like you said, you watch them and you go, oh, my gosh, they're just

putting their offenses on their back. You talked about after week one out, Josh Allen, he's like, okay, you're going to play soft. I'll just, yeah, I'll get rid of the ball and go underneath. And I thought that Dolphins game was a great example of him doing the two things. I mean, at one point, he was 19 for 21. He was just getting rid of the ball quickly. And then there were plays there where he's just like, all right, let me get the cape out, and I'm going to have to do something here. I'll remember the second and 19 throw to Isaiah McKenzie in the second quarter

for as long as I let that. There's just, there's no window. He's not open. There's just no room for the football to arrive. And that's where you're just gaming. Like, it's just there's no like, what's the process? No, it's just I couldn't miss if I tried. I'm going to put the ball in his hands.

And so that's why, like, again, like, The word is tent pole. The word is gravity. There are right now incredible offenses in the league, Eagles, dolphins, lions that are working as a beautiful machine. Everybody is cogs and the wheels mesh together, like The Incredibles, baby. And then there's offense like Buffalo and Baltimore,

where it's just we have one guy who is so much better, so much better than all of your guys combined. And he holds the ball on every play. what are you going to do about it? I know. They never get a break. Lamar, the other thing I like is, before the season, it was all right.

You looked at the numbers against the Blitz last year and against man coverage. Those were the two things. Against the Blitz this year for True Media, 25 for 33 for 361 yards, six touchdowns and no interceptions. Like, to see a guy that young, and it's a small sample.

The Atlanta football show had that his EPA for play against the Blitz right now is like 0.94 per play. So like a point per play. You blitz Lamar Jackson, the Ravens score a point. That's like double the next closest, right? So Alan with the quick game and then Lamar with the Blitz, both of them just decided to get better off of what they've already done.

Disgusting. Absurd. I hate it. I love that. The great quarterbacks find ways to solve problems. They are. Here's how teams are attacking me. Here's what my weakness is. Can I solve it?

And to see the early signs be so encouraging this year are fantastic. So I love that call. That's a great call from you. All right? I guess I'm up for the extra point. You did the extra point last week. Yeah. My extra point, Ben, is that...

Don't miss it, Matt Amandola. Well, this is a team you talked about last week. I think the Las Vegas Raiders are going to be one of the most interesting organizations, franchises in the NFL over the next five months. And they're 0 and 3. I thought your take was not a bad take last week. I mean, they've lost three games, but they're a minus 13 point differential. So they're competitive.

They've had three. Six drives inside the 20 against the Titans, one touchdown. Yeah, yeah. Execute! Yeah. Execute, baby. Horrible. Three one score games, but O and three is hard to come back from.

And the reports from the people who cover the Raiders, Mark Davis had a lengthy debrief with Josh McDaniels. Before McDaniels spoke to reporters, Derek Carr had some kind of comments about, well, practices haven't been that crisp. Devante Adam said he's frustrated. and angry with just the way where they are

after three weeks. And this is where I was harping on this all preseason, all off season. What's Josh McDaniels bring as a head coach when it's not about X's and O's. Can he keep everyone pulling in the same direction? What's the culture going to be like? What's the leadership going to be like?

Well, that's going to get tested here right away. Now, they could be a competitive team the rest of the way. I don't think they're just going to lay down and win like four games. I'm not saying that. I think they're going to be okay. I think they'll be a hard out pretty much on a weekly basis. They've got talented people. But I also want to see what happens if,

you know, what if they lose a couple more? What if they're 0 and 5? What if Devante Adams has three catches again next week? I mean, these are all things I'm kind of keeping my eye on. And they're just such an interesting team from ownership to McDaniels to Derek Carr, who by the way, has no guaranteed money on that contract beyond this season. I know they made a big PR thing. Oh, we're extending Derek Carr. He's our guy. Nope, that's not what the numbers say. That's not what the finances say. And so that could just have like this domino effect across the league. Is he the guy somebody trades for who to the Raiders target? I know I'm getting way ahead of myself.

But when you're 0 and 3, you start looking ahead a little bit. So I don't think the Raiders are a bad team. I think they're a mediocre team. But I think they're a very interesting team because based on how the next, whatever, 15 weeks play out, they could really be a team that is in the spotlight once the offseason rolls around. How many games do the 2022 Detroit Lions win if Derek Ruff? is the starting quarterback.

Good question. That's it. I would like an answer. You want an answer? 17 games season. 17 game season. I think I had, I'm trying to think of what I had them winning with Jared Gough. I think I had him at six.

I mean, but that was before the season and they've played better. I mean, they could win 10 games. What were you thinking? What was the number in your head? In terms of setting a line, I would have said I had 10 and a half. If you gave me the information I had about the lions through three weeks and then Derek Carr and the Lions, I would say, yeah, probably about a 10 and a half. over a 17 game season.

So the Derrick Carr trade thing is interesting. The other thing that's really interesting with the Raiders to remember is that they fired John Gruden on halfway through it an enormous contract. He was due, I want to say, $40 million guaranteed still or whatever when they fired him.

I don't know exactly how that coaching money works, but Mark Davis is also the least wealthy of the 32 owners in the league. So the Raiders who are like, a bunch of guaranteeing money to Devante Adams. They're like, you know, still paying off Gruden. They're having to pay McDaniels.

Like it's, it just made a Legion Stadium. The Raiders, it's difficult for the Raiders to be flexible and make quick changes relative to other teams because they're not as liquid. They don't have as much money in ownership. And so there's a chance that like things are abysmal

and then also things have to be abysmal next year so we can financially recover from the Gruden debacle and actually be ready to move forward as a team. So there are a lot of, moving pieces in Las Vegas. Absolutely. All right. Before we sign off, quick request,

I'm hosting the Thursday show, The Scramble on the Ringer NFL feed every week. We're going to do a little interactive segment on there. So get your questions in. You can email the Scramble Mailbag at gmail.mail.com. That's the Scramble Mailbag at gmail.com. Get some questions in. We'd love to hear from you.

And we will answer those on the Thursday show. Ben. Do I get to do an email? Email, be so like on Spotify. You can email me anytime. You what? Yeah. And just I said, no, I'm saying I want to ask for emails.

I want to get, why you get to just solicit listeners. Go ahead. All my hard work on this podcast. Okay. Email be so like at Spotify.com and I don't know, say something nice. Personal email. Wow. Okay.

Well, it's in my Twitter bio. You can find it. People email me all the time. Somebody from Canada emailed last week. They really enjoyed the show. I thought you were asking if you could email me and I was like, Ben, I talk to you at this point more than anybody else in my life. You don't need to be emailing me.

We have plenty of interaction throughout the week. We get to the end of the show and you're like, all right, thanks so much for listening. Anyway, help me with my next podcast. Just leaving Ben out hanging a dry. I'm on the Friday show. Nobody helps me out with that, John. I'm doing the hard work myself. I didn't know if you wanted a mailback segment.

I was going to give you a chance to plug, plug the video. Plug. What are you writing this week? Let the people know. We're writing Jeff Okuda this week, baby. Young man is back. Yes. He is back.

We knew he would be good. He survived Matt. Patricia, he survived in ACL, he's back. We're doing Lions. We're probably going to do Devante Adams as well a little bit because one week of two catches was like, okay, they'll never do that again. The next week of three catches,

now we've got to have a conversation. So yeah, ring our YouTube play sheet, ring our NFL show. The play sheet. Get the play sheet out there. We don't just mumble it. The play sheet is a friend's video. You can watch on YouTube.

He does a fantastic job. It's a lot of fun. 10 minutes, right? every week. There'll be no poison ivy this week, so that's a disappointment, but I'm sure you'll have other surprises. We do play breakdowns,

and bring on guests. Yeah, it's a lot of fun. I don't know. I was feeling myself with the whole let me shout on an email thing, and then I remember how much I hate talking about what I do, and how I'd rather just like never have to mention it ever. Listen, for the powers that be there, listen,

I tried to give us a quick sign of. Ben got me sidetracked there, play him. All right, Tuesday on this feed, you'll get the power rancers, Jason Galf, and Austin Gailon on, Wednesday, I'll be joining Nora Princeati on the island. How about that? You get a little too much of me this

week, but hopefully you'll enjoy that episode. Thank you to the great Chris Sutton for producing additional production supervision by Connor Nevins and Arjuna Ram Gopal. We will talk to you soon.