The Ringer NFL Show - The NFL Is Changing on and off the Field (Ep. 147)

Episode Date: September 26, 2017

The Ringer’s Robert Mays and Kevin Clark recap Week 3 in the NFL, including how this weekend’s player protests created a real opportunity for meaningful change (03:00) and how the game on the field has become impossible to predict. Then the guys discuss why the Titans are who we thought they were (10:00), how the Patriots are the kings of making a play every time they need to (19:15), and how one Cowboys defender affects the game on every single down he plays (26:30). Plus, Danny Kelly joins the show to explain why the tanking Bills have the best defense in the league (32:45). Finally, Robert and Kevin explore the rift between President Donald Trump and the players, and how it isn’t going away any time soon (45:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's the ringer NFL show, Robert Mays here with Kevin Clark, and we're sponsored by Delicious Miller Light. I picture you just slugging Miller Lights on Sunday as your Bears beat the Steelers. So many Miller Lights. Actually, I won't confirm or deny. I was drinking a lot while I was supposed to be working. But if I were, it would be okay because Miller Light only has 96 calories, so I could have been enjoying it all day from one game to the next,

but mostly during the Bears game. It's been the original light beer since 1975. Miller Light tastes great and less filling. We're also brought to you by MyBooky.ag. Kevin, I assume a lot of people lost a lot of money if they bet the wrong games on Sunday. If you had the Ravens plus 36, you lost. The favorites got slaughtered. Yeah, it was a weird day.

I feel like this was a day where we really learned we didn't know anything about the league. Yeah, we learn that all the time. I also won a lot of money with my bet that Marcus Cooper would drop a blocked kick at the one-yard line. But with MyBooky, it's as important where you bet as what you bet. MyBooky.ag has an awesome mobile site that makes betting so easy. easy, provided you know what to bet on. If you did get that bid on on MyBooky Sunday, you'll be getting paid it today. It's pretty good.

It's not very long. And if you didn't, you should join now in MyBooky will match your deposit with up to a 100% bonus. So get with it. That's MyBooky.orgie.org, with the promo code Ringer NFL to activate. You play, you win, you get paid. To the Ringer NFL show, part of the Ringer podcast network. I'm Robert Mazed. joined as always by my friend Kevin Kavanaugh.

Kevin, how are you? I'm great. What a weekend in the NFL? Truly, like that's, it was as impact. weekend as I can remember in covering this week. We'll get into the biggest story for the weekend, but just the games and how nuts they were in succession. That early slate, Barnwell wrote about this this week.

I wrote about it in my Monday recap, just those five games that were so close at the end, that Buffalo, Denver game was a two-score game, but not really. It was decided in part by Von Miller being an asshole, which I thought was incredible. That's not the word for it. I think he was being a real dude. I mean, it was funny. didn't, to me it was not a problem. The fact that he got flag for is insane.

It kind of wins Zuprooter film on this, but did you see that he's done this many times in the past to. No, I didn't know that. Not only to quarterbacks, but to fans, to people on the street. He is a, I'm not shaking your hand, aficionado. The only thing I have a problem with with this is that it's like six-year-old comedy. It's a kid that just discovered jokes. That's what he would do.

Having sat down with Bon Miller for a long time in my life, I can confirm that that is his style of humor. he watches a lot of YouTube videos. That's great. I'm not surprised whatsoever. We'll dig into all of week three. We have a lot to talk about. As always,

we're here on Tuesday and Friday all season. Danny Kelly will be here to dig into some of the nitty or grittier stuff you may not have seen this weekend. But first, let's get into the biggest four stories of the week. And I'm not sure where else we'd start, Kevin. I think that the most important things that happened on Sunday in the NFL took place before the games even kicked off. What's fascinating to me is that. there's no doubt we've entered a new era.

And I saw some reporting from Josh Dossi, a politico, my old colleague. And Josh had said that essentially people have told him that Donald Trump is extremely excited about going to sort of a war of words with NFL players and will continue, even though people may be telling him that it's not going to work. He thinks he's winning. So there's no end in sight for this. And I think he was tweeting this morning about the Monday night game and about the booze. Yeah. So the era that we're entering now, it's not going to be a short one. I mean, this may last at the end of the season and may go into next season.

We have no idea what's going to happen. What's interesting to me, and this is something I wrote about the other day. But in April, Malcolm Jenkins was here. And Malcolm was talking about, and Malcolm obviously extremely socially active. I mean, one of the players in the league that does the most outside of whatever protests, anything else in his community. I mean, it's very specific and pointed in. He's met with lawmakers about mandatory minimums.

I mean, he's done a lot. And we were talking about the idea of being blackballed and why coaches hate sort of political activism. He said, you know, what we need to do is we need to come up with a sort of union or maybe a literal union of socially social justice aware players who then we can come together. And if one team is saying you can't do this, then we, you know, make our voices heard or we, you know, we have a network of 30, 40 guys, right? That is what Jenkins said players needed so that they didn't get singled out. If they happened to be the only player on the team who wanted to kneel for the anthem, there needed to be a support group across the league. We're on the other side.

Then there'd be five guys and they would be able to talk before the game or talk after the game, whatever it is. That's what Jenkins was proposing. And what happened is that in about 24 hours, Donald Trump said something so outrageous that he did the work for them. That group exists now, and it's every player in the league for the most part. It is incredible what the players are going to do, what they have done, and it's going to be as fascinating a subject

as we've seen in the NFL. Do you think that, I think it does, just no questions asked, but to what degree do you feel like this would help Colin Kaepernick to get a job if he wants one? Just because now every argument about

the non-football elements of this are gone. Yeah, there's nothing left. This idea that distractions, the politics is a distraction, that's over. Because Donald Trump has forced politics into the mainstream of football. That every single,

locker room is talking about that. Alejandro Villan Wave had to give a press conference about it yesterday. Every single coach in all 32 locker rooms either had to give a statement or give a press conference yesterday about politics. So that's over. That excuse is over. And so do I think he gets another, maybe he gets another call, you know, he had the Ravens, he had the Seahawks the last couple months. Do I think that if a quarterback needy team needs to get a guy, I think they look at him a little, you know, if they have 15 players kneeling, it makes it. less impactful if Colin Kaepernick is there. So I do think this will help his chances a little bit.

I do. It just seems like I wrote this yesterday, just the fact that what we saw on Sunday wasn't necessarily surprising, considering what had happened in the past 48 hours. I feel like as soon as what happened in Huntsville and as soon as what Trump said, went down. And then when he doubled down it on a Saturday afternoon, I guess morning, it's hard to keep track of the timeline. The man is, you know, all over the place.

We knew there's something that this was going to happen. And then even, but watching it was still staggering. I feel like in waves, it was interesting. Villanueva just sitting there outside the tunnel alone, I just thought that was really powerful. And then looking at that empty field with Seattle and Tennessee was just like, this is bizarre. Sure. I mean, it's been, people talked about this all weekend. The anthem has not been a part of pregame ceremonies forever.

It's a relatively new thing. The financial relationship between the league and military organizations complicates this in a way and has complicated it since the Concapernic. stuff began, but it still was strange considering how much focus there's been on what players look like on the sideline to see an entire game where none of them were there. Yeah, and I think that this has been co-opted by the league and it's interesting to me the league is going to win, finally win a public relations battle because Donald Trump has botched this so badly. But I think the NFL needs to be careful because I think the ownership, locking arms with these guys, I think the end, I think Goodell taking some of this credit, I think that's

going to start to look bad. This is a player-driven protest. 100%. The players who started this initiative last year, Kaepernick, Eric Reed, Kenny Stills, Malcolm Jenkins with the raised fist, those players really went on a limb to do so. And they faced enormous consequences for their career. And some of them obviously paid for it with their career if you look at Kaepernick right now. And so I think that it's, I think the NFL needs to take a step back and say, we cannot take credit for this. We cannot have, you know, we cannot have victory marches from owners talking about unity and stuff like that because this is a very different protest. What the owners are doing, what the players are doing are very different things and they need

to be cognizant of the protest that's actually happening. That's what I wrote on Monday a little bit, just that those are the two things that worry me about this. One, that guys like Daniel Snyder who gave money to Donald Trump are somehow going to try to trot themselves out in front of the nation and say that they're somehow against this. The hypocrisy with all of that is strange to me. I also don't know what locking arms is supposed to mean. I have no idea what it means.

And so that part of it all is something that I feel like we have to be vigilant about just the way we talk about it, the way we think about it. And the other part is that this is completely different. But Colin Kaepernick was protesting something specific. And this is not that. This is in large part a protest against Donald Trump. And it's a protest against intimidation and free speech is what Von Miller said. It's splintered off in a bunch of different directions. And I think that it's important through all of that to still.

maintain why some of these players had done it before anything the president said, before ownership started just saying that it was okay. I mean, there's a lot to sift through here. And I feel like it's important to try to have a nuanced conversation when we can. It started as a police brutality conversation last August. And for most players, it still centers on racial injustice. Yes. And that's what I like that message of it.

And I think that's where it goes off from whatever the owner. sure i mean the owners the owners are locking arms to be pro NFL essentially exactly because now it's trump versus the NFL and i think that's a very um shallow protest i mean i just i think what the owners are doing is a very shallow thing and i think that what the players are doing is very meaningful thing that is that is my opinion i totally agree all right let's stick into the games a little bit here kevin what is your second down for this week right so getting back on the field i was fascinated with what happened in the Titan Seahawks game. It's fun game. Yeah,

fun game for the Titans, certainly. So the Titans rattled off the longest run against the Seahawks in the Pete Carroll era. I was fascinated by a couple of numbers here. We found out what a good offensive line can do. PFF released a statement, Steve Palazzoa released

this. Last two weeks. Seahawks have allowed 44 pressures last two weeks. Titans have allowed six. Okay? Marcus Mario 44 is almost impossible. Marcus Mariotta.

It's not like, I mean, I like the Titans. I like the Titans front seven, but it's not like they're the best in the league or anything. Those edge rushers, I tweeted this on Sunday. You could just tell how excited they were to play against the Seahawks from the start of the game. Brian and Arakpo looked like a shot of cannons.

Acknowledge. It was from the start. Like they were just like, they were licking their lips from the start. It was incredible. It's awesome. It's like, remember the old thing about like, the old joke about,

playing for the Phoenix Suns, how they rejuvenated your career. That's playing the Seahawks. So true. As a defensive end. Marcus Marriota has had one dropped pass all season. So we spent the last six months talking about supporting casts and how important they are in the context of the Tennessee Titans. And everything we thought was going to happen is bearing out. This team is awesome.

The line was able to bully people. I think we were a little bit worried after the Raiders game because they started a little bit slow. But man, the Titans, to chance. Denny Green, the Titans are who we thought they were. And it was great to see. Now, from the Seattle perspective, when Danny Kelly joins us later, we'll talk about this. But I'm getting increasingly worried about Seattle because I don't know, I don't know where to look at them. I mean, because, you know, the defense gave up a lot and the offensive line looks at this point beyond repair.

You know, there was, I think Britt gave up one pressure. I saw that. And the other guys gave up the other 22. And so it's bad, man. entire offensive lines under the bus because there are some decent players on these bad lines. Like, Brits been fine. The tackles have been awful. And there was one play where Joko got a holding, a personal foul.

And I think that the right tackle got a hold. It was incredible. It was in the first half. It was like four flags on the same play. It's like this is impressive. It's impressive how much of a train wreck they can look like on one given snap. And I got to tell you, I know the people think this is overrated or whatever, but I love the Titans locker room. Like, I've been there.

I've met the, I've talked to those guys the last three or four years, it's different there. Marcus Mariotta is a leader unlike anything I've ever seen. I just, there's a vibe. That stuff matters to me. There's a vibe coming from that team. It's like when I was in Atlanta last year, I felt that way.

Sure, sure. There's just a vibe that I like. I mean, there's a vibe you can tell from good teams. They're not all the same teams. The vibe in Oakland last year was really positive and really good, but it was different from what's going on in Tennessee. I mean, every team has a different vibe,

but there is a vibe, but there is a if that makes sense. And I really, I think you saw that a little bit when Mario to got decked by Sherman. Yeah. And Luan just lost his mind, which I think that Taylor Luan is prone to losing his mind about stuff that maybe doesn't warrant it. But that does. And the entire team just seemed to get riled up all at once.

They went into a frenzy. That's the stuff I like. I mean, I don't mind that. They love him. And there were a couple, when I was doing that story by his leadership and, you know, the insane things like New Marcus Mariotta driving an untimely. drafted free agent 30 minutes to his home every day or the hotel every day because he was a nice guy. Like when you do those stories, those were sort of stacked upon each other and their

offensive linemen who are saying, when we realize how nice of a guy Marcus Marriota is, and I know that motivation is a weird thing, but they were saying we want to protect him more. I mean, it's not like they're not, it's not like they wouldn't try if Matt Castle were the starting quarterback, but you just have a supernatural motivation when you just love a quarterback. And that's happening in Tennessee. I totally agree. That game also swung a little bit weird. If Adory Jackson, if that kick return or that punt returns and call back for that god awful

block in the back, that game is different. I mean, it's 13 nothing. It starts rolling downhill a little bit. It's weird with the Seahawks. They looked horrendous for most of the first half. The last drive before the half, they speed it up, they open it up, they start slinging it downfield. Wilson makes three ridiculous throws and suddenly at 7.6.

Yep. They just have that element to them. It's just buried somewhere. We just don't see it all the time because of them having to protect a little more, everything else. It's just, it's weird. They're a very strange team right now, and we'll see what bears out by the end. My third down is something similar to Seattle, just the team we thought would be very good that is really middling right now. And that's Pittsburgh.

I mean, I know they're two and one. I know they could have won on Sunday. This isn't about record as much as it, as much as it's about how their offense has looked through the first three games. They're just not impressive right now. I don't know what the hell that was. I don't have any next level analysis for you. I don't know what the hell that was. I mean, I knew, I took a lot of heat for saying Levyon Bell was going to start extremely slow

and that maybe it was on the fantasy show. I don't want to, you know, I don't want to bang my chest about all the fantasy advice that we gave. But I will say that, you know, Levion Bell skipping an entire training camp is a big deal. Okay. And I think that, you know, they're just a little disjointed right now. I think that they do have a chance. I think they do have a chance to be the one team

that has a few problems stemming from this anthem thing because I don't know what the hell is going on in that locker room right now. I was going to say the same thing. Everything that's happened in the last few days is just bizarre. I mean, Ben Rathesburg, releasing a statement saying essentially he disagrees with the head coach. Alejandro Villanueva clarifying what's going on. I mean, I don't, I really don't understand what's happening there.

I mean, I think I do, but I am sort of baffled by it. the idea that the players even in the locker room after would say, well, I thought we all to do this together. Yeah. Just read the room. Just read the room for like two seconds and understand that he probably is allowed to do something different than you. I mean, it just doesn't that follow?

Isn't that common sense? I understand teams or teams. I get why in the moment it might be jarring to have your head coach say we're all doing this together and see one person do something different. But can't you just kind of sift through the common sense elements of that? No, apparently not. So, I mean, and then Rathesberger releasing that was odd and, you know, just all that stuff. But beyond that, I think just the on the field stuff, they look disjointed and they look out of rhythm.

It doesn't seem like that offense is kind of existing in any sort of flow. I mean, they had some bad breaks on Sunday. Martavis Bryant drops a touchdown first drive of the game. I mean, that changes things a little bit. You're already without Marcus Gilbert for the game. Then Ramon Foster gets hurt. So you have two linemen out, no stuff on to it. But is it two backup offensive linemen and a lack of Stefan to it and T.J. Watt enough to not be able to run the ball for the most part on your side of the ball.

And then not be able to stop a Bears team that didn't do much on the ground for the first two games. I mean, Jordan Howard had nine carries for seven yards against Tampa Bay. I have a question. Who do you think feels worse about this Super Bowl pick? Mario. What was yours? Seattle. Seattle?

I think you do. Yeah. Well, I had the time. Titans in the AFC championship game. I'm feeling good about that. I think you feel worse about it. I feel, I mean,

the Steelers are still going to be okay, I think. Their defense at full strength, I think is a really good unit. And that's the, what's what encourage me is that the Steelers defense looks good when they're healthy. And that offense is going to get to a certain level of competency.

Sure. So I feel like when it all comes together, they'll be fine. But my problem is I thought they'd be better than fine. I thought they'd be much better than fine. Yeah. I mean, we'll get to this a little bit later.

But I mean, everything is so flawed that figuring out who has the most manageable flaws is sort of a fool's errand at this point. And it's also worth three weeks into the season. I think that the one thing I've learned after doing this for a little while, you know, if you've covered the league longer than I have, it's very important to not overreact. And just to kind of understand what we're seeing through the first three weeks. It's why like when I see what Denver does this week and they lose to Buffalo, which we're going to chat with Danny about, it's not the end of the world. I'm not sitting there thinking, oh, my God, I can't believe this happened.

Is Denver really that good? These things happen. They're on the road. Sean McDermint's a decent coach. I mean, there's a lot of things that can pop up from week to week. Oakland losing in the way they did was weird to me. I mean, that's a game I want to go back and watch. I haven't been able to sift through that again because I know we weren't going to really dig into it.

But again, week three is just one of those things where you think you know stuff and then it all goes out the window because somehow you've convinced yourself that seeing two weeks of a team was enough to understand what they are. When an actuality, it's not even close to that. Right. And as we continue to harp on September is as meaningless as it's ever been. I mean, it's it's the extended preseason. I talked about this with Mike Lombardi last week. I mean, he knows. They just, teams are working in, working in schemes.

I mean, some teams don't have their playbooks installed all the way because it's just a limited practice in August. So I don't read too much into it until mid-October. All right, let's get to four-town. Yep. All right, this one short and sweet. Tom Brady still rules. First of all, he's rediscovered his deep passing. I think people were worried about his arm strength.

Let's kill that narrative. Tom Brady on third down this season. 20 of 28, 301 yards, three touchdowns, 142 rating. Best in the NFL. That's from Ryan Hannibal. Through three weeks, this is from Mark Daniels of the Projo. He has a pass rating of 120.

21. That's the second best mark of his career behind 2007. Yeah, they've looked good. I feel like that offense, the numbers are not as good as they were. the numbers are better than they were on Sunday. They had a lot of big plays that guys took it after the catch, that Hogan touchdown, you know, a couple of past interference calls. They were more stop and go than the numbers actually indicate.

I think they got beat up up front, which isn't necessarily surprising. No cannon. Solders hurt. That front is good. So that element of it, I think that they, yeah, they didn't like blow away the Texans. And that last drive, we're talking like two tiny little plays. But, but we're on. year 16 of two tiny little plays and the Patriots lose that game.

I mean, I thought the most fascinating. I thought the most... They pull out bad teams. I thought the most fascinating thing. I mean, I think that they are the king of making a play when they need to. I mean, that's it. Brady threw like four desperation needs on that last trash. They're not going to be the 2007 Patriots.

We've already discovered that. We know that to be true. They've already lost a game. And so I just, they're not going to be the same. But what they can be is a really, really, really, good team behind Tom Brady who at age 40 is doing something that that we haven't seen out of a 40 year old quarterback. That's fine.

Payton Manning was dead at age 40. That's fine. I agree with you. I still think they're going to be the best team in the league when it's all said and done. They were one Corey Moore not bump by Brandon Cooks and picking off that pass from being one and two and from allowing, I don't know how many yards to a team that couldn't move the ball for the first two weeks. That's all I'm saying.

I know. I mean, it's not as if. they like came in and beat up the Texans. They were inches away from losing. Again, the Patriots have been getting those inches. I don't want to snick Al Pacino in any given Sunday, but you know, it's, it's inches, man. And I think that the defense will work itself out. I think Belichick will take a little more control away from Matt Patricia.

I think that, I mean, I just, I think, I sort of think that like we were saying in the last topic, Belichick doesn't care about what his team looks like until mid-October. and the only thing that matters at this point is that Tom Brady looks awesome because everything else will work itself out in a very, very flawed league at this point where, I mean, essentially the only teams I'm super impressed with are the Kansas City Chiefs and the Atlanta Falcons. Yeah, that's really it. I mean, again, coming away from this, Brady looks good, the Patriots look fine.

Sean Johnson, Sean Johnson. Deshaun Watson is the guy I was most impressed with the guy after that game. I'll say that. I mean, he looks good. He made some really nice plays. it's amazing how inefficient and unstable that offense would be with a normal quarterback. Like if he wasn't back there, they would give up eight sacks a game. It's ridiculous.

Even against the Patriots, they couldn't pass protect. And the only reason they could do stuff is because he was running around back there. He's going to be fun. I've been impressed with him since he's got the starting job and really taken over. It's uneven. He looks like a rookie a lot of the time. But he made some plays on Sunday. They were just like, wow, that is really impressive.

I totally agree. All right, buddy. It's Tuesday, which means it's time for Kevin's craziest headline from the weekend. Let's do it. I was surprised at the amount of Raiders negativity coming from the Sunday night game. I understand we have to overreact in September every year, and we certainly have to overreact to primetime games. That's just sort of how it goes. But this idea that the Raiders are not a contender after they lost to a fairly decent Redskins team on the road in a very, very weird week, I think that we're really, we're really really,

reaching here. You know, this is an insanely flawed league. It's exactly what I've said all year. And what we have to figure out, and we don't know, the game has changed a lot over the past six years. The post-CBA NFL is almost a different sport than the pre-CBA NFL because of the lack of practice time, because of just the different schemes, because of the influence of the spread offense, the new quarterbacks, et cetera. Okay. And so what we haven't figured out is what flaws matter more than anything else because we don't have a large enough sample size. Maybe in football, we're just never going to have a large enough sample size. But what I'm saying is we haven't figured out what flaws matter.

Is an offensive line like Seattle's easy to overcome in the long run? I don't know. Is it terrible defense like the Raiders have a fatal flaw? I don't know in 2017. I used to know. I knew in 2008, but I don't know in 2017. And so I think that burying anyone who's looked as good as the Raiders have the first two weeks is very strange to me. And I just, I think that the Raiders are still a top four team in the AFC and I don't care what they did against Kirk Cousins.

I was very impressed with Washington. I mean, again, I haven't watched that game again, but as I was watching it on Sunday, it seems to the first, the second straight week, Washington was really good at taking away plays early in the down. Just being really prepared at route combinations, where guys are going to be, just anticipating. And Card is looked out of sorts. He did not look good on Sunday. and he has his up and down games. I feel like he's not this just completely efficiency monster quarterback

where he's going to run you over all the time. He isn't that yet. He's very solid. He plays in a really comfortable setting in Oakland. So I feel like Washington's defense was better than I thought they were going to be, but I still did not expect Oakland is coming in and lay an egg against that team. I really didn't. 100%.

It's obviously a short-term disappointment, but I think everything's going to be fine. I think they're going to make the AFC, at least the AFC divisional playoffs, and they'll be fine. I still, I know this is probably dumb at this point, but I'm betting on September being as meaningless as ever. I still think they win the AFC West. Wow. I don't know about that. I still think they do.

Maybe. I don't know. Casey just looks so good. Again, who knows what we know. Who knows? Yeah. I mean, I just, we don't even know what to say. Last year.

I'm frustrated. Last year, I guarantee you, if we've dug up the archives, we'd be talking about two things from September 2016 at this point. The Vikings. Vikings and Carson Wentz. Yeah, pretty much. That's all we talked about. I can dig up some stuff about you talking about Carson Wentz.

Who cares. It was good radio. Yeah, that's what we're going for here. Someone's got to give good radio around here. Someone's got to hype up Carson Wentz in week three. Yeah. So that's my feeling. is that it is a flawed, flawed league.

And if we're going to start picking apart teams, we need to further understand exactly what flaws matter or what don't, because I don't think anybody knows at this point. Robert, let's hear your Roberts ringer the week and week three. After last night, it's hard not to go with to Marcus Lawrence. I was going to talk about Carl Lawson a bit, but I feel like what Lawson did against the Packers is stimulated by the Packers' playing with backup left tackle, everything else.

He looked very good. I like him as a pass rusher. The Bengals got him in the third round, and I think that's going to be a steal. But Lawrence has been incredible independent of circumstance. I mean, that guy, I liked him a lot over his first couple years. In 15, when he was healthy, I thought he was really promising. I was excited about him last season.

He played half the year. He's had a hard time staying on the field. And through the first three weeks, he leads the league in sacks. He's got six and a half. And Sacks can occasionally be misleading. And Vic Beasley led the league in sacks last year. Vic Beasley was not a guy down in and down out that was affecting the game. those numbers were pumped up a little bit.

And you're really out on Vic Beasley. He's a really talented guy. He impacts the game, but he is not a guy that affects the game on every down. He's not somebody play in and play out that is bothering quarterbacks. And DeMarcos Lawrence leads the league in Sacks. He is that guy right now. He has been the best past rusher in the league through three weeks. And I was excited about him two years ago when he was playing well when he was healthy.

I thought he could be really good. I did not think he could be like this. I mean, he is a monster. right now. Whether he's lining up over the guard, whether he's lining up over the tackle, it just seems like he's making plays against the run. Every single way you can affect the game defensively as an edge player, he's doing it right now. And that's what Dallas needs. Their defense is not good enough to have a guy, their defense is not good enough to lose him at this level. They need him to play like this, really to have a chance against good offenses. And the good news is

he is playing like this. He looks like an absolute monster right now. I just, Real quick, before getting into the Cowboys defensive line, I just want to revisit the craziest headline I saw, which is I just saw it. And it's Indianapolis star saying that Jacoby Brissette is so good that they should trade him because he should be able to be a backup. Anyway, Demarcus Lawrence, it's a game changer because there were obviously a lot of reasons that we, even though we both pick the Cowboys make the playoffs, there were a lot of reasons we thought they would have regress. and one of them was just how bad the Cowboys defensive line could be in the start of the season with the suspensions. And quite frankly, we didn't know what they look like when they're healthy. It's not that they set the world on fire. And they needed that because of an uncertain secondary, which I think now that that secondary is fairly good.

And so I think that Lawrence... Fairly good seems strong. They're fine. Yeah, whatever. But the, the, Demarcus Lawrence is a, I know it's a cliche. It's an absolute game changer. to have him as good as he is. Because, again, we talk about this all the time.

A one player position unit is completely acceptable at this level now. But we've also seen the limits of how impactful that can be. Think about Oakland. They have Khalil Mack. Kulomak is as good as Kulio Mack has been right now. He's still Kaleel Mack. And they can't stop anybody because they don't have anything coming from the other side. You need a varied pass rush.

As good as DeMarcus Lawrence is, there's still a limit to how good your defense can be because you need a pass rush from every level. You can slide protection. There's nothing coming from inside. You can easily step up. This is something where having him is necessary, but it still won't be enough unless they get somebody else. I want to be clear when I say one person position units.

I mean that if you have a lot of other talent elsewhere on the field. I mean, the reason that the Raiders can get away with it is because typically they have an offense that is just doing, is performing miracles all the time. Adelaide should have the same thing. Yeah, exactly. That's exactly what I'm saying.

That's exactly what I'm saying. what I'm saying. And so if they follow the Raiders blueprint, they're in a very, very good position. All right, buddy, coming up, the ringer's own Danny Kelly is going to join us to talk about the very feisty Buffalo Bill's defense. Also, some things from week three leaving a lasting impression on Robert and I. We're going to get back to that after a quick break. Kevin, people always ask us what to bet on. I say you can always bet on Kevin and me giving a hard time to the bears on this podcast, but not this week, which I really appreciate. It's true, huge win. But if you're going to bet on anything, you should bet it on mybooky.ag. They have a rock solid reputation and 100%

cash bonuses. I'm still not sure what that is, but I'm pretty sure it's awesome. And you get paid quickly two business days, no waiting around for weeks hoping to get your cash. It's the only service we recommend. They have live in-game betting and a sweet mobile site. So wherever you are, you can lay down some cash. If you join MyBooky now, they'll match your deposit up to a 100% bonus. So you're literally playing with house money. Just visit mybookie.ag and use the promo code Ringer NFL to activate your offer. You play, you win, you get paid. I just had another flashback to you, sipping Miller Life in celebration that Bears win. I'm still not admitting to that. I had to write later on. I will not admit to doing that very drunk and very happy. But if I were, I would have been

enjoying some great taste that is less filling. 96 calories is nothing. You could drink it all day, Sunday game after game. Responsibly, of course, you know, be smart. It's been the original light beer since I first hit the stands back in 1975. Sea Geek is still my favorite. Seek is still my favorite way to buy tickets, Kevin? Let me guess, is it there's seamless mobile experience, Robert. I need seamless at this point. When stuff is not going well, when I have to work too hard on the internet or on my phone, I'm not happy anymore. And Seekek is two taps. I'm buying tickets, I'm selling tickets, two taps. Doesn't matter. And you get to see your favorite musicians in sports teams. Robert, what do you got coming out? I mean, the Cubs are about to be in the playoffs,

so I assume I'll be wanting to go to some of those games. Also, Night of Schnelle is just announced the show in Las Vegas, and I think that I might have to go to that, which, is just irresponsible, but I'll be in LA anyway. So two taps, man. That's the big stuff. And it's seamless. So it's totally fine. You can't afford not to go to 9-inch channels in Vegas.

Exactly. Seekeek searches multiple ticket sites to get you the best deal. And our listeners get a $20 rebate off their first purchase. That's actually pretty sweet. We give away a lot of cool stuff on this podcast. It's true. To get your $20 rebate on tickets, down the C-KeeK app, go to the settings tab, and click add a promo code. At a promo code, Ringer, NFL.

Seek will send you $20 if you made your first ticket. purchase. Dial on the Ciki cap and enter promo code Ringer NFL today. All right, it is now time to welcome in our good friend Danny Kelly, who has some things to say about the bills, a couple other things. I mean, Danny, this is your deal.

This is when you dig into stuff we may not have seen this weekend. Guys, the, the bill's defense is not fucking around. I don't know if you've noticed this so far. I noticed that this weekend. I mean, it didn't seem like it mattered in the first two weeks because they played the Jets and the Panthers who are legitimately bad offensively. but watching them do that to a Broncos team that look pretty solid for their first two games is impressive.

Yeah, exactly. And don't you dare say that about the Jets? The Jets offense is actually humming along pretty well right now. I kid. Okay. Oh, Josh McCown. Okay, well, I mean, he has done a little bit better than I expect it. That's true.

But the bar was extremely low. Yeah. All right, so here's a few stats about the Bills defense so far. They have yet to give up passing touchdown. They've given up the league best 37 points so far. They're fourth in the league in yards per play, four and a half. They're fifth in sacks with 10. Fourth, an opponent pass rating, 64.9.

I mean, I didn't have a ton of high hopes for this team coming in because they were undergoing a total regime change, making a lot of changes, making a scheme change with, you know, the new coach coming in, switching over to a 4-3. I mean, we've talked about in the past, like switching from 3-4-4-4-3 doesn't mean me. maybe what a lot of people think it is in terms of it's not like a complete overall because teams are playing nickel and all that stuff.

But it's still change and you're still getting guys doing different things like, you know, you don't have outside linebackers dropping to pat or dropping to defend the pass and things like that. And so far, I mean, it's looked really, really good. I think that obviously Sean McDermott knows what he's doing on defense. And I think he's deploying his skills or his players in positions for them to succeed. What's surprising to me is that in Carolina McDermott, it's not vanilla, but it's a simpler defense and it's a less aggressive defense than a lot of them around the league, right?

Right. You have a four or three. There's a lot of zone. They didn't blitz a lot. I think they're right there in the top five and rushing four percentage-wise pretty much every single year. And then you come to Buffalo, you bring that four-three. Leslie Frazier is their defensive coordinator. Leslie Frazier isn't exactly a modicum of aggressiveness like in any way.

And then the first couple games, and especially on Sunday, they're blitzing a lot. Their defense backs are flying up and run support. They're run blitzing. And the one thing they were doing a lot of that we just didn't see much in Carolina putting a lot of man and just like manhandling people outside. It's a style that I didn't necessarily anticipate. And right now I was working for them.

It definitely worked for them on Sunday. They were the aggressor. They were the one that defined the game. Yeah. I mean, I think I was looking at some quotes from after the game. And, you know, Vance Joseph, the Broncos coach, was talking about how they basically dared the Broncos to throw the ball, right? They were stacking the box.

It's a pretty good strategy. Well, as we see now, I thought that Trevor Suman was the next coming of, you know, the next great... You're thinking of all the Northwestern people who work at the ringer who were saying that. There's no one on this podcast who's like that. How dare we throw shade at Roger Sherman? He's the best. We love Roger.

Yeah. So, yeah, I mean, they basically loaded the box, asked Trevor Simeon to throw, and in the corners on the outside, including E.J. Gaines, who they got in a trade, and Tradavius Wright, sorry, the first round pick. I mean, their players are, yeah, he's played really well. He keeps making plays. And, you know, essentially what, what Vince Joseph said was, like,

the cornerbacks won against Marius Thomas and Emmanuel Sanders. So, I mean, that's pretty high praise. I mean, he's obviously trying to lie to fire under his team, but so far, I mean, this Bill's defense, is giving them a chance to win every week. It's a weird thing because a couple different parts of that. One, if you're winning against the Broncos receivers, that's a good sign. Yeah, right.

Those guys are pretty solid. Two, we just heard for like five years how corners were a marginalized position in Sean McDermott's defense. And now, like, their corners are the ones that are winning games for them. It's just weird. It's not a style. It's not a type of team I thought they would be on that side of the ball. It's been impressive. I watched the game again this morning.

They look good. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think if you look at Shaq Lawson, He's playing really, really strong. Obviously, they've got some good players on the inside with Kyle Williams and Marcel Darius. Jerry Hughes looks really good. I mean, even like 34-year-old Lorenzo Alexander still, you know, got some juice. I don't know.

Obviously, now the offense has to kind of pick up some of the slack. And, you know, obviously I think Tyra Taylor is going to get a little more comfortable in, you know, I don't know if it's a completely overhauled system again, but it's a new system under Rick Denison. I think it's going to take some time. The run game really hasn't done much so far. And we could see that pick up. but so far the defense has given them a chance to win every week. And I think it's, you know,

top three defense in the NFL right now. It's interesting. One more point before we move on. I just thought about this. Sean McDermott was raised in the shadow of Jim Johnson in Philadelphia. It's almost as if he's like going back to his roots with the way that they're playing. I didn't really think about that because he's been in Carolina for so long now. But you can just kind of,

it's interesting with a coordinator and a head coach and when they're kind of collaborative on that side of the ball, which Rivera and McDermott were, whose style influences who? Like that part of it is just hard to separate sometimes. And when a guy moves on, you can just tell where he wants to be versus where that conversation took them in his previous stop. So I think that's kind of what we're seeing right now. This is the defense McDermott just at his core really wants to use, which is kind of fascinating.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think he's, I mean, like I said earlier, he's really using the pieces that he has on that defense, like smartly and really well. So, I mean, kudos to them for sort of picking up some guys. guys that really work in that system. I think it's so far, it's shown that he knows what he's doing back there. All right.

So let's go to the other side of the ball with a different team right now. You have a story coming out this week about the Vikings offense and just the skill position players. I wrote about it a little bit in my Monday recap. The bucks were the team coming into the season, Deshaun Jackson, Mike Evans, they draft O.J. Howard. They were the group that was supposed to have this monster supporting cast for their quarterback. And then on Sunday,

the supporting cast on the other side actually took over the game. Yeah, it was incredible. That was, I think, one of the biggest surprises of the week was, you know, obviously, you come in and not very high hopes with Case Keenum starting the game. And I think Stefan Diggs looks like, you know, a legit number one. Like, he should be a bigger superstar than I think he is so far. I think he's still one of the more underrated players in the NFL. I mean, he just kind of took over the game. And then, I mean, obviously, again, Adam Thielen, he's another very, very underrated guy.

I think both, and you wrote about it on Sunday, both these guys are just insane. underrated. It's going to be very, very interesting to see what happens with the Vikings offense going forward because we actually don't really know what the quarterback situation is going to be. I mean, Sam Bradford's still got that knee and that's worrisome. I don't think Case Keaton was going to be a starter. And then you get Teddy Bridgewater potentially coming back into the mix pretty soon. So the nice part is, though, no matter who it is, they're getting dropped into a very nice situation.

The line is whatever. But those receivers plus cook, it's like, okay, they're cooking with gas with those guys. It's really impressive. and Keenham's numbers were insane on Sunday, but let's take like two steps back. The only thing he did correctly was throw the ball to the right person. Where he threw it didn't matter because of what Diggs and Theon did. I just want to say how funny it is that Jeff Fisher had Jared Goff and Case Keenum and still fucked it up.

I still don't think Case Keatom is good. He looked a lot better than he did last year. That's fair, but Case Keenom was literally just throwing the ball in the direction of his receivers on Sunday. He was not capable of that last year. That's fine. That is fine. That's totally acceptable. But he was throwing.

The touchdown that Stefan Dix had, the one he caught in the end zone, he literally just took it away. Actually, both of them. He just took the ball away from the cornerback. He looks as good as any receiver in the league right now outside of, like, Julio Jones, who is an actual alien. Like, in the non-alien category, he's pretty much number one right now. I mean, he was going back to college. You correct me if I'm wrong way. He was one of the top high school recruits in the country, right?

Like he ended up staying close to home and all that. The reason he fell is multi, is like several pronged. There's a lot of stuff that was going on there. But he's always been super talented. And last year, he just got hurt. I mean,

he looks really good at the beginning of season. He gets dinged up. He looks phenomenal. But Thielen is right there, man. I mean, he's not as good. But what he's been able to do is somebody that was on the practice squad at one point. He looks amazing.

And then Delvin Cook, Danny. I mean, this guy might be the truth. Dude, he looks, he looks legit. And, I mean, let's not even forget about, like, they got a first round pick in the quad and treadwall. Like, he hasn't really done much so far. I'm okay with that. I'm going to be okay with moving on from Laquan here. I'm just saying the upside is still there for them to even get any better and get even better.

And, you know, so, yeah, I think that this skill position group in Minnesota, very, very underrated. They're, you know, highly talented. I think they're going to, like you said, put. Whoever is quarterback is getting dropped into a good situation there. So I think right now, Minnesota is one of my teams that kind of could surprise a lot of people. Kevin, you got anything? I'm just still thinking about Jeff Fisher. Yeah, Kevin, I'm here for the, I'm here for the Jeff Fisher talk, by the way.

It's amazing. It is amazing. He's my hero. He got multiple extensions for doing this. They have so many first round picks on that team for so long. It's incredible. Also, if you think the upside is that what, Lequant, I agree with Robert. If you think the upside as Laquan Trite will can get better, then there is no upset.

I'm pretty much okay with Laquantra will not do much in this team, Danny. They've gotten a couple receivers. Danny, before we get out of here, one to ten, how worried are you about the Seahawks? Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, we talked about it. You know, I think it's probably in the five-ish range. I'm starting to get a little bit worried. But to be honest with you, there were some good things that happened last week.

I mean, obviously, Russell Wilson ending up kind of, Passing all over the yard in the fourth quarter is encouraging because he just looked like garbage the first couple of weeks. It was garbage time, though, Danny. I think we should, his stats were not indicative of the way that offense played all game. Well, that's true. And it's always funny to me because I don't know how you define garbage time because with the Seahawks, it's, they've done so many crazy comebacks in the past. It's hard for me to define that as garbage time. And they got within one score and all that.

Garbage time is when the defense is playing to let you get yardage. Yeah, and that's what I was going to say is you're right, that they were, They were dropping back and playing a little bit differently at that point in time. So, you know, that's why I am worried. And I think, you know, the defense giving up so many crazy rushing yards. So, like, this year they've given up tons and tons of rushing yards, which is completely out of character for them. So there's definitely some things to worry about.

I'll put that way. I think that first half, they frustrated Tennessee. I think what's really impressive about Tennessee is that they have such a deep stable of guys and they can come at you in so many ways that they're just going to keep coming. They can just keep hammering and hammering away at you, not just with the run, like literally hammering away at you, but just there's so many different ways in avenues they can attack you. Eventually one of them is going to break through.

I think that's why they're scary. Yeah, I mean, I wrote about it on Sunday. It's like they really remind me of the Seahawks back like a couple of years ago where, you know, they're a very, very heavy run team. That's like they have an extremely clear identity, which, I mean, if you go around the teams in the NFL right now, there aren't a ton of teams that are like, oh, that's, that's their identity. You know what I mean?

I agree, especially on offense. I feel like a lot of the teams that are succeeding are the teams without a traditional number one receiver. I mean, these are teams that have to move the ball around out of necessity. They have to be creative. They have to use schematic advantages. I mean, you think about KC. You think about what the Titans are doing.

Even New England sort of fits into that category in a weird way. I mean, these are the teams that are playing well on offense. The Browns have an identity. And the Giants, the Giants have an identity. The Giants have an identity. All right, Danny. you so much. You'll be back on Friday with your fantasy advice. As always, really appreciate it, buddy.

Absolutely. Thanks for having me on, guys. All right, Kevin, before we get out of here, we're going to offer our lasting impressions from week three. I think this week, our lasting impression is pretty similar. I just saw a headline that came across my Twitter feed. I just opened up the story and saw it. And it's from the Charlotte Observer, Joe Persson. And it's that Jerry Richardson has frustrated many of the Carolina Panthers for his stance, for his stance on the social justice issues, that a growing anger is happening in the locker room

that very frustrated players are going to meet with Richardson to figure out what's going on. This is going to be, and Richardson is obviously an extreme example of an owner who was maybe less supportive of the social justices as other owners around the league. Not existing support. I mean, he did literally nothing.

The statement said like 17 words. Yeah, but he did. I mean, there was a statement. Obviously, obviously he was. as unsupportive as any owner was, but there was some it wasn't non-existent, but it was barely there, okay?

So what I'm fascinated by is where the anthem protests go from here, because we're going to see more of this. What happens in Pittsburgh this week? Does Mike Tom one have to address it with his team what happened last week when the starting quarterback is upset about it? What does Jerry Richardson say?

does Jerry Richardson, you know, this story basically hints that the players are worried about, the repercussions. Doesn't hint that. It says that. The players are worried about repercussions if they speak out on social issues. What happens if a team leader and team captain sits down with Jerry Richardson and Richardson says you can't speak out on social issues? We're about to enter an era we've never seen before. And I'm fascinated to see where it goes. I'm fascinated to see how ownership reacts. Because again, we talked about at the beginning of the show,

there are a lot of owners who gave a million dollars to Donald Trump. And now Donald Trump is at war with the entire NFL, including the owners. There is not an owner who was publicly taken Donald Trump's side in the last three days. And so this is a culture war in a lot of ways and is going to be something we've never seen before in this sport. I think what's really telling is that the one guy who stayed in the locker room in Carolina was Julius Peppers, who's a 37-year-old future Hall of Famer who has made, I don't know how much money playing football. There is nothing that Jerry Richardson can do to Julius Peppers. I mean, there's absolutely nothing.

But there are other guys in that locker room whose job statuses are much more tenuous. They can't just sit there and say, I'm going to do whatever I want because this is what I believe in. It's not as simple as that. And I totally agree with you. What happens from here is the most interesting thing about what Sunday is going to be again. I mean, it's going to be what we have to watch. And I feel like the other side of that is how many people start going the avenue of a Malcolm Jenkins or what Michael Bennett has tried to do. How many people take what they're doing on Sunday and extended outside of that?

And I know that so many players do things in their community. They do invest in the community financially with their time, everything. The idea that people on the internet are so pissed off because, well, what else are they doing? Is this really getting anything done? He's no idea what sort of time and effort these players put into helping the communities of which they're apart. The flag protest is not the centerpiece of the activism. The activism is Malcolm Jenkins going out and meeting with lawmakers of mandatory minimums, literally touring prisons. Marcus Peters got a family stranded in Singapore because one woman was an Iraqi citizen into the country using 100, getting him 100 lawyers.

Colin Kaepernick has given out suits outside of parole offices. That's the centerpiece of the activism, not kneeling. And how far does it go with the players who just become, not awakened is the right word, but just become invested in this more than they were a week ago? How much does it expand? How much does it just kind of get into the rest of a locker room? I think that watching CNN yesterday and seeing Michael Bennett talk to Anderson Cooper, this is working. This is a good thing. The fact that their voices are being projected in a way that they never have.

And now how far does it go? Into what degree do more of these players get involved in the sorts of things that Jenkins and Bennett and all of those guys are trying to do? I think that's one of the questions. What Sunday is going to look like is another one. And yeah, I mean, there is no bigger lasting impression from this weekend than where do we go from here with what we've seen. And we're going to see it this Sunday, man. Yeah, it's not going away. And I think that's a good thing.

I mean, the fact that it isn't, you know, we're going to see more change. People are going to be just alerted to this in a way they never have been before. I mean, what these players are doing is working. I mean, it is getting stuff done. And I think that's what's important. Trump's just going to keep going on this from everything that's been reported. And it's very bizarre because football is literally the only thing Americans do in mass anymore. It's the only thing we're 100 million people.

watch the Super Bowl. That doesn't happen for anything anymore. 50 million people watch the AFC-N-FC championship games. That doesn't happen anymore. And so he's taking on a very popular thing. And I think he's he's overestimating a lot of things. And number one is, I think that he's, he's underestimating the ability for the players to spark real change. Yeah. Guess what, buddy. Rating's up 3% from last year. Yeah. The pregame shows were at like five-year highs. Yeah. Nobody's paying attention to football, though. This is a good idea for him. Good stuff. All right.

That's it for today. We'll be back on Friday, get you all set for a week four and everything that comes with it. As always, thank you so much for listening to the Ringer NFL show on the Ringer podcast network.

We really appreciate it.