The Ringer NFL Show - The Pats’ Descent, the Shaky Steelers, and Week 14 Bets

Episode Date: December 11, 2020

Sharp and House react to the Patriots getting blown out by the Rams (0:30) before recapping the results of Week 13 (7:30), analyzing the marquee Steelers-Bills matchup (27:30), and offering some betting advice for the rest of the Week 14 games (51:30). Hosts: Warren Sharp and Joe House Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, everybody on today's episode of the Ringer NFL show, Warren Sharp and I recap the Patriots Rams Thursday night game, discuss when you might want to bet the spread or the money line with underdogs and break down all of the biggest matchups for week 14 and how to wager on them, including a couple of teams from the NFC East. What? Stick around. Hello, everyone.

Welcome to the Ringer NFL show. show, I'm Warren Sharp. It is Friday, and that means I'm joined by the one and only Joe House. House, a lopsided affair on Thursday night. What did you make? Let's talk some Pat's Rams here. Sharpie, it's week 14. The football gods are good. The football gods took note of this wonderful slate. The biweeks are in our rearview mirror. We are looking at the pretenders and sending them to the back of the bus. We're looking at the content. and we're ready to get going with the playoff seating, the playoff implications. It's an exciting time.

And the football gods, in recognition of this, set us up with a slate where you and I honestly could talk for about an hour and a half. And I think we probably will on this podcast. But you know what? We only need about five minutes to talk about this Rams Patriots game because it was just a difference in class. and all credit to Tom Brady. The most interesting thing about this game is what does it mean in the big picture

about the divorce between Tom Brady and the New England Patriots? At least that's the only interesting thing to me. Ultimately, who is going to win that battle? The Patriots now, it's pretty clear, are not making the playoffs this year. And Tom Brady and Tampa Bay Buccaneers are in decent position to make the playoffs in the NFC. so Tommy's got the advantage. But the thing that I was interested by and what struck me in watching this game,

the Patriots are outclassed. They don't have the talent at the skill positions to compete with a defense as good as the Rams. And their defense this year, the Patriots isn't as good as years passed. And that's a combination of a lot of guys opting out in connection with COVID and injure. But these are just two teams headed in different directions.

The Patriots made their season mildly interesting the last couple of weeks, got themselves back to 500. We're sort of nosing around a possible playoff berth. I think that's off the table now. And, you know, the Rams look like they are ready for some playoff business. What do you think, Sharpie? Well, a number of things. Number one, I thought this game plan for the Patriots is kind of trash.

I'll be honest with you. I know that they are lacking and you're exactly right. They do not have the talent, but they should know by now what Cam Newton is. I saw it when he was playing with the Carolina Panthers the last several years there. It became very obvious what this version of Cam is at this stage. He is a front runner and he's been that way for a number of years. If you get him started in the game and you get him feeling good about himself and you get him running into the end zone a little bit, he is going to be out there celebrating and having a good game and playing with his head in the game.

If you just hand the ball off to running backs nonstop and have him throw the ball on third and long, he's going to look terrible. He's not going to feel part of the game. And he just loses confidence. It shows on his face when the camera cuts to him standing out on the field, standing next to his coach and Josh McDaniels. So every single game I look at how many rushing attempts did Cam Newton have in the first quarter, and tonight he had zero. Last game against the Chargers, he had four. And I just don't understand why they don't get him involved and try to pound the ball a little bit more with Cam early on in the game to get him in the game. That's one thing.

Number two, I'm going to go to Sean McVeigh. And Sean McVeigh was very intelligent with his game plan here. a lot of people were tweeting at me during this game about a lot of 12 personnel. They saw a lot of 12 personnel out on the field. And then they tweeted, or sorry, they posted after the game and I took a shot of it. 43 snaps from 12 personnel in this game. That means one running back two tight ends and two wide receivers. Only 18 snaps from 11 personnel.

This is how you beat the Patriots. This is how the Rams offense is going to protect Jared Gough. and I have no idea why they refused to do it in the Super Bowl, but sure, whatever, Sean McVeigh make up for it in a meaningless week. Week 14 game for the Rams. I'm glad they did it, though. It definitely was the catalyst to earn him to win. The run-blocking game cammakers completely blew up and ran through these guys.

And one of the things I was debating with myself was, what was the strategy that Sean McVeigh going to take here, not just from a personnel deployment perspective, but from a run-pass perspective. perspective. Weeks one to six, this was the third highest run team in the NFL on early down to the first three quarters. They went 53% run. Week seven onward, they switched massively. They became the fifth highest pass team in the NFL. They went 61% pass. Were they going to pass the ball, even though they're going to play the number 27 ranked run defense of the Patriots? No, they did not.

They reverted back. They went back to what they were doing at the beginning of the season with a different running back this time with Cam Acres and they were just running the ball down the throat of this number 27 ranked Patriots run defense. I thought it was the quickest path to victory. That's what you as a coach always want to find. What is the quickest path to victory? The quickest path here is run the ball, use a lot of 12 personnel, build a halftime lead. These are all things that they did. Defense a coordinator, great game plan. They did not choose to go a lot of base. They stuck with their nickel, and that's what the Patriots really struggle against. Most teams go to base and try to use base against them. The Rams did not. They stuck with their nickel. They play about a 10%

more nickel than the NFL average, and they used a lot of their secondary to help collapse on this run game. And I think they did a brilliant job. I think kudos to McVeigh and his staff, his defensive coordinator. And yeah, pretty boring game because KAM couldn't get anything going. they weren't trying to get him going and we saw what happened. And kudos really to the Rams defense. I mean, this was their moment out on the national stage to remind everybody that, you know, defense is the way to win games. If you can impose your will defensively, they had a defensive touchdown and six sacks.

And that was really it. You know, the six sacks felt like 16 sacks. The Patriots could never. get comfortable. You know, Cam was, was uncomfortable all of the time that we saw him in there. And then Stidham came in and had, you know, two or three successful completions and then was immediately nullified. And you could see that Rams defense out there enjoying themselves. But that's kind of enough for that game. Let's go ahead and talk about the rest of the week 14 slate because I promise it's going to be a lot more exciting than what we just watched.

Sounds good, House. Let's do it. What was the betting recap from last weekend? Well, first things, first, Sharpie, we haven't been doing this very much on this podcast, but I get a little do a little pat on the back for us. Good job by us. We hit on probably half the slate last week, and a lot of the things that we talked about came to pass. We need to be doing better than half the slate, though. We need at least 52.4%. No, no, but I'm just saying we covered like half the games on the entire slate, right? There were 15 games on the slate. We talked about seven or eight games.

And of those games, we had like a strong view on the over in the play action bowl, aka the Browns and the Titans. And by golly, I think we had that over locked up by halftime or damn near. Very close to it. Yes. Yes. We liked Indy laying three and a half down in Houston. We liked the Patriots in.

a pick-em position against the Chargers, and that wasn't even really that square of a play. And then we talked about why the Washington absolutely 100% professional football team had a good position going up against Pittsburgh this week on Monday. Those were all very nice plays that we put out there for all of our gambling gurus, all of our wagering wizards out there, right? Hey, we're not just sitting here flipping coins and talking shit on a pod here. We're putting in the hours while we're off the air here to make this happen. I mean, the only one that I have a tiny bit of regret was the San Francisco one,

and that was us going against Brian Dayball, which was clearly a mistake. But we will make up for it this week. Yeah, we won't be doing that anymore in the near future. For obvious reasons. For obvious reasons. Here's the real quick recap on the week in review. Favorites. Well, let's just talk about it in terms of positives.

The underdogs once again, nine and six. Over unders, the under trend continues, six, eight, and one over. So unders were eight. Overs were six and there was one push out there. On the season, underdogs now 110, 80, and two. So speaking of the cherished 52.4% mark, we're well above that. If you blindly played underdogs all season long, congratulations. Your bankroll is looking very healthy.

Obviously, we don't recommend that to anybody. I do want to hit on one thing before we get to the games. And we've been talking about underdogs in a variety of different sort of classifications and categories this season. This is a nugget that I saw in a write-up from your colleague, TA Cleveland, and it caught me a little by surprise. So Road Underdogs this season are now 61 and 48 against the spread. That's a 56% clip, and 39 of those 61 have been straight up winners.

But there's a subset of this that TA points out that this really was surprising. says road underdogs who are getting six points or less in games where the totals are low are through these first 13 weeks 14 and oh against the spread

and now that's certainly you know an anomaly right it there's there's it's just a curious interesting thing that pertains to this season we're not saying that we can use it as a predictive measure

an undefeated 14-0 against the spread is not capable of being sustained. Last week, the Lions fit that narrative. The Lions were getting three against the Bears, and the total in that game was 44.5 points. This week, interestingly, we have two games that fit that. We have the just-concluded Patriots Rams game, and we have the Washington's getting three against San Francisco, and that total is 43 points.

I know that we've been pointing out the lack of home field advantage, but is there anything else that you think is driving this particularly curious factoid? Well, the fewer the points from a total's perspective, which he's slicing out lowers totaled games, the more valuable those points are to get when you're the underdog. So, you know, naturally points are worth less and high total games, and that's why we prefer, but don't have to tease games that have the lower total because those points are just worth more as you're moving through various key numbers

and non-key numbers. So that is the reason why this trend makes sense. It makes sense from lower total games. It also makes sense from lack of home field advantage this season. I would certainly be surprised to see it continue undefeated the rest of the season. But I am, and I'm a little surprised to see that it's undefeated at this point in time, but it absolutely makes a lot of sense. When you're looking at trends, you have to try to understand, does this trend make sense?

What are the stipulations that this trend is asking you to look at and do those make sense? And I think in this case, they do. well I'm going to go ahead and use that observation as a segue into this week's sharp points so podcast pals as you know if you have a question for brother sharp you can hit us up at our email address sharp points NFL at gmail dot com s h a r p o i and t s nfl at gmail dot com because we are at the point in the season where we were separating the contenders and the pre-tendez and fantasy football playoffs are getting started and there's no more bye weeks.

It's time to get serious. I thought maybe we would do two questions for all of our wagering wizards out there. First from podcast listener, Mike from Chicago. Mike says he's a square better. And, you know, hello, Mike. Welcome. I'm a square better as well.

He says, if you like an underdog that's getting less than a field goal, should you take the points or just play the money line? He wants to know, like, how often does an underdog cover when they're getting two and a half points or less, but not win outright? Well, I could tell you,

just looking this up really quickly, that underdogs catching less than three points, and I know that we've discussed this before since 2017, have covered the spread 56.6% of the time and have won the games outright, write 50.8% of the time. So if you're taking them on the money line,

you're obviously going to be up. If you're taking them against the spread, you're obviously going to be up as well. It sort of depends on the situation as to whether or not you feel like the points are valuable enough. I know that there are some people who, if it's at two and a half, will do one of two things or both will buy to the three,

which we want to buy up to the three in certain cases. or tease through that number. Now, we're obviously not talking about that. But if it's one or two points, then this is definitely an interesting situation where you could choose to just take the money line. Yeah. And some of it's driven by the pricing. Or let me put it in the form of a question. Is the price difference between the points and the money line over a consideration for you? Absolutely. I mean, if you're talking about the payback, Sometimes there are lines, and I'm looking at, let's say, one right now on the board. Buffalo currently is laying 1 minus 17. Now, they should be adjusting the money line such that it reflects the fact that the one has higher juice associated with it. So you shouldn't be finding too many inconsistencies between the juice on the spread and the money line, but you may. And the one time that you're going to strongly find, issues with money line being mispriced on a favorite. We could talk about this later, but just remember,

it's going to be at the Super Bowl because a lot of people end up betting the underdog to win the game outright, and therefore you get a little bit more favorable odds on the money line. So if there is ever a time when there is a very public underdog, you may find, and this is for the regular season as well, though it's not quite as mispriced as it will be. at the Super Bowl, you may find that it is more favorable to bet the money line if you're laying the points. If you're taking the points and the underdog is a very public underdog, then you may want to just take the point as opposed to the money line because there might be a little bit misprice going on there with the amount of people in your shoes who are tailing you as a public square better,

taking the dog on the money line, those odds may be reduced compared to what you could get if you just took the points. Just took the points. Sure. Okay. So let's talk to Joe D from Madison, Wisconsin. By the way, Joe D. has a restaurant, and he invited us to, if we're in Madison, to come through and enjoy some cheese curds and maybe an adult beverage or two.

I've never had a cheese curd, Joe D. In your whole life? In my whole life, Joe D, you'll be popping the cheese curd cherry here. You've never had Poutine? Have not. Wow. Okay. Well, how about that?

We'll have to figure out an occasion in 2021 to get you to Wisconsin so you can experience it properly, Sharpie. Joe D. wants to know, this is a strategy question relating to teasers. And he says, do you ever construct teasers strategically where you're looking at the late Sunday or Monday game as the last leg of a tease so that you have the opportunity to hedge that bet with a straight up play or give yourself a middle against a tease. Like if you're looking Thursday, you're saying, oh, how am I going to construct my betting card?

Well, here's a couple options. And then I want to have a tease where I'm going to make sure that one leg of the tease occurs late Sunday or Monday so that I have a middle opportunity. Do you ever think that that way for the Sharpie? I don't approach the teaser card like that. I try to not look at the time of the game at all. I don't like intentionally not look at it. I do know that more people are likely to chase on a Sunday night game.

And thus, if I want to play a side that I think will be a little bit more public, I will try to bet that earlier in the week just because I know the way that the public is going to tend to react and come on that side. but I don't really pick my teaser like just so that I can get the final one of a three-team teaser, let's say, or a two-team teaser to fall on a primetime game so that then I can money line the other side or whatnot and try to get a middle. But I will take the opportunity if it presents itself to add the money line if I've already got a teaser and it's sitting out there. And I think that I've got a good reason to do so. If thoughts have changed.

changed. If there's injury information that comes down two hours, an hour and a half before kickoff, that makes me feel a little bit less confident in my original position. If I'm seeing some line movement that I wasn't anticipating, or I'm seeing, you know, in some of the spots that I have access to access, and I'm seeing some other big betting groups that had a slightly differing opinion than I did late in the game, then I may come back on the money line to try to middle of teaser, yes, but I don't insert the teaser bet with the belief that I'm going to come back and do that. Yeah.

But so you're not dismissing it out of hand, though. You're saying you don't personally play it that way, but there are opportunities where that might make sense. And it's not necessarily a strategy that in and of itself has any inherent flaws. It's just as you formulate your own strategy for how for teasers that you're going to play, you're not looking at the time of game as an element. That's not a data point. Right. I'm not. Now, let's take in mind this week's game, which we're going to get into in a second, Buffalo against Pittsburgh. And with Buffalo laying two points, let's say it gets to two

and a half points, and then you can take a teaser and move it through the three and the seven, take Pittsburgh. And you don't love it, but it's an optimal teaser strategy. And maybe, let's say there's another game on the board. I'm just giving you House and Joe D. the most like square way that I could like align myself to this theory, right? Let's say there's one teaser like earlier in the day that I absolutely love. And I absolutely love this teaser. Like I really feel confident about this one. You mean like the giants? If the giants tickle your fancy, then yes, the giants. And then you look at the pit, you look at this Pittsburgh game. You say, look, I can't really find something else. But this is a great way to move through the

three and the seven. And then I can money line the bills later. on, and I do actually think that the bills are going to win this game, but I think it's going to be close and you can present some other arguments. Then on optimal teaser strategy, that does make a little bit of sense to try to approach something like that just to take advantage of moving through those key numbers on a primetime game like this. But that's, so this is one where it would present his theory this very week. We might have to put that into play because we will get to this, but the Giants getting to, at least at the moment on the card as I look at it right now. It came off of my book earlier today, but it was sitting at Giants getting to.

I think that's because DeAndre Hopkins wasn't practicing. I mean, you know, the books with taking games off the board because one guy, you know, might, whatever. Is that a new? Let me take you down that rabbit hole for just 10 seconds. And apologies to all the podcast pals if you don't like it. But this is helping my bagel. I don't know.

It does seem like this is happening with the frequency. That is games appearing and disappearing on the card with their frequency. Now, obviously, the COVID impacts are material, and they are affecting lines and what the books are willing to have out there. But it just feels like this is happening with an unbelievable frequency now. It is. It's happening a little bit more often. It's also happening with guys that aren't quarterbacks, you know, and that's when it kind of frustrates you a little bit. It also bothers me in particular because I know that some offshore books kind of set the market for some of the

off-screen books as well. And so when you have a couple of offshore books that don't have their numbers up. Meanwhile, the numbers are up in Vegas. They're up at the local legal sports books inside of the United States. Those lines are moving, but some of the bigger spots then that control a lot of the off-screen outs that maybe some people might be shopping at. You can't really do anything with those games because they're not up. Meanwhile, they're taking action, they're taking money, and the lines are moving at some of the other spots. So that's when it's the most frustrating to me late the last half of this season is when some books are off, some books are on. but yeah, it does get a little bit frustrating.

I mean, this is the life we chose, though, so we have to still try to deal with it. We have an unbelievable full slate, 16 games, and I know how happy this particular slate makes you, the number of late games this week. We have six late afternoon Sunday games this week, Sharpie. I mean, how are you sizing up this Sunday for yourself? Oh, I mean, man, when I first saw that they flipped out the Packers Lions game from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.

And so we have, sorry, to 4.25 p.m. I just, it just made me feel awesome inside because now we only have seven games at 1 o'clock. And, you know, this projector screen over my left shoulder here, that can hold the 8 box pretty well. And so one of the games are not going to be on the lower right-hand corner when DirecTV throws up the 8 box. And the beautiful thing about projecting the 8-box onto your projection screen is that you can maximize the picture size to cut out the little borders and margins that DirecTV sticks on the edges of their screen. So you can control what you have up there. So now you can make it even larger. And then I got a couple of other screens for the other games. So I absolutely love that.

And having two games that kick at 405 means that maybe we'll get one, if not two of the 1 p.m. games to kind of trickle past that kickoff due to various different reasons. And then you got a handful of games that are now on at four. And then you got four more games that fall into your lap at 425 p.m. Eastern time. And, you know, one of them's going to be your Washington football team. I won't say, I won't sit here and tell you, House, that these 425 games are the most compelling of the day. It will absolutely be must watch TV to see Jalen Hertz versus Taysam Hill.

That's going to be an interesting game, but it's not going to be a pretty game, if you want to call it that. I want to see what Anthony Lynn does after he takes over special teams coordinator responsibilities. I'm expecting big, big things out of that special teams unit now that he's running the show there. And other than that, I mean, it's going to be some interesting games. Of course, Washington football team taking on Kyle Shanahan and sort of like a revenge game for Kyle. And everything just gets the juices flowing and appetite wedded for the Sunday night game, in my opinion. And the Sunday night game is an absolute delight.

It is the game that we have teed up as our marquee game of the week. There were some other contenders out there. Baltimore and Cleveland is pretty juicy this week as the Monday night game. And the Podfather apparently, selected Miami, Kansas City as his marquee game of the week. And he's entitled to his opinion. You also have the Colts Raiders. I mean, there are some, there are some many options for a marquee game, but this is ours. Yeah, this is, this is our. So let's, let's do that one first, because we're going to get to the Washington 100%, 100%, 1,000%, definitely professional football team

this week. But I'll go ahead and keep it. We'll, I'll, I'll give everybody 10,000, or 15 minutes before, you know, the zipper zone really gets going here. The Buffalo bills are laying two and a half against Pittsburgh. So this was really interesting. This one had a giant line move. The look ahead, I think was Pittsburgh by two or two and a half. Yep. It varied.

Right. It varied. But after the Washington's took care of their business, handled their business against Pittsburgh on the early Monday night game. The line bounced all the way to Buffalo laying two and a half. And that's natural and exactly what you would expect. We saw Buffalo absolutely, speaking of handling its business, just out maneuver, out play, outperform, out execute,

out everything relating to the San Francisco 49ers defense. And it was not a barrier. It was the second worst defensive effort of the week behind only the Dallas Cowboys who remain the unabashed kings of bad defense. But the Steelers, Bill's thing is interesting. The Steelers over the last handful of weeks have had this recurring problem. They've had a hard time converting third down opportunities, and it caught up to them against Washington in a couple different ways. Now, the Bill's defensive line, I'm so happy to say this, is not as good as Washington's defensive line, but if the bills can generate some pressure on Big Ben and get him making quick decisions and make him slightly uncomfortable, you know, your colleague Dan Bazuta's written about Big Ben's disinclination to get vertical, especially on the outside. and, you know, the bills have, you know, been very good this season in terms of offensive snaps and having the lead and playing with the lead.

Now, the Steelers are second in that category. But the bills also are scoring at the second most efficient rate in the NFL on their possessions. They're scoring on over 52% of their possessions. Interestingly, Pittsburgh has held their opponents to scoring on only 26% of their possessions, which is the lowest rate in the league. So it's a nice matchup. But the Steelers, it's their third game in 12 days. So it's just another tough spot for the Steelers and the bills have been making their own luck,

10 takeaways in the last five games. in Pittsburgh against Washington, they definitely miss both Devin Bush and Bud Dupree. How are you sizing up this game? Well, there is a ton of talk about here, House, on both sides of the football, because the Steelers' offense is a great offense to discuss because you got a really good offense,

but at the same time, they're really struggling and they're sort of one-dimensional, and so there's a lot of different ways we could take that discussion. But what I want to talk about first is the Steelers' defense, right? And this is the defense that everybody's talking about, like one of the best in the NFL. But we are now seeing the factor of injuries catching up to them. But before we even get into injuries, I just want to talk about the simple fact that the Pittsburgh Steelers defense has played the NFL's number one easiest schedule of opposing offenses, is number one easiest schedule of opposing passing offenses. And so at this point in the season, this type of stuff matters.

It matters a lot. They have played six straight passing offenses that rank bottom 11 in the NFL. And now you're taking on Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills number four ranked passing offense. This is what I call a shock to the system. This offense that Buffalo is going to trot out onto the field will be a shock to Pittsburgh system after they have taken on the likes of Alex Smith, RG3, Jake Luton, Garrett Gilbert, Joe Burrow, and Lamar Jackson in their last six games. The Steelers, let's talk about the injuries now.

They were already playing without Bud Dupree. They were already playing without Devin Bush. They just lost in their last game, linebacker Robert Spillane, who was filling in for Devin Bush and doing one hell of a job. We talked about it on the Wednesday show. Now you saw maybe, but it is news that number 98, Vince Williams, their linebacker, who is one of the best of pressureing the quarterback and one of the worst in coverage, which we'll talk a little bit about their defense coordinator and his desire to drop linebackers

into coverage momentarily. However, he just got put on the COVID list. So Vince Williams, I believe, is going to be out for this game as well. Also, they don't have Joe Hayden practicing. He's in, he had a concussion. He left last week's game. I'm expecting him to be back. But we are now talking about cluster injuries at the linebacker position for the Pittsburgh Steelers. A defense, that was really good at stopping the run, but hadn't played any strong passing offenses. And the two passing offenses that they face, I'm not going to dive into all the detail on these two games house.

But what I will do is talk about big picture the offense coordinators of both of those games so that we can start talking about Brian Dayball. The offensive coordinator or the play caller at the time, Bill O'Brien, for the Houston Texans, saw that the Texans had a 21-point first half. were leading in Pittsburgh against the Steelers. Deshawn Watson average 11.2 yards per attempt, completed 14 of 18 first half passes, 200 passing yards in the first half,

two touchdowns at 151 pass a rating, crushing them. They're not having any success running the football. They tried to run the ball on early downs at a pretty high rate. They only gain 2.1 yards per carry, but they have a lead at halftime. And so a dude like Bill O'Brien

is just going to look at the second half and be like, guys, we got this. Let's just grind this out, keep that high-powered Pittsburgh offense off the field. So what does this moron decide to do? He decides to go massively run heavy. He went 71% run on early downs in the second half, didn't bother realizing that they were terrible running the ball on early downs in the first half. Those runs gained just 1.6 yards per carry, 20% success.

They put up zero points in the second half and lose the game. Pittsburgh comes back and wins the game for him. The other game was against the Tennessee Titans House, and we talked about this game at length. Once again, in this case, you had the offense coordinator for Tennessee decide to go, who I like. I like Arthur Smith, but he's got to stop running the ball on first downs and first and second downs in the first quarter games in particular,

but he ran the ball far too much. They had four quick drives. They punted a couple times, a turnover on down. They fell into a big hole because their runs, were not successful. But when he was passing the ball, he had a lot of success. And so on this side of the football, and we haven't even gotten yet, House, but I want to get your take on some of the stuff I'm spitting here. We haven't gotten to discuss what Pittsburgh's going to do when they have the football. But I think it's really interesting to see the fact that you had only two top 15

passing offenses that the Steelers have faced. And both these guys decide to run the ball a lot with mediocre to poor rushing attacks. In the case for the Titans, they have a good rush attack, but they're not very good in the first quarter when they use it. And they kind of shot themselves in the foot in both cases. Brian Dayball does not shoot himself in the foot. Brian Dayball makes adjustments as he need to, but he is one of the most pass-heavy coordinators in the NFL. He has been calling plays brilliantly so far this season.

And I do not believe that he is going to take the ball out of Josh Allen's hand, the number four passing offense in the NFL right now, to hand the ball off to his running backs an extraordinary amount of play calls in this game. I think they're going to attack the Steelers where the Steelers are weak and in addition, pay close attention to when the Steelers are dumbasses

and line up linebackers on slot receivers or linebackers on receiving tight ends because I am telling you how it's going to happen. I would have been able to tell you it would have been number 98, Vince Williams, and we would have seen Cole Beasley torch this guy in coverage multiple times but 98 is probably going to be out due to COVID.

Somebody else is going to fill his shoes and it's going to be another linebacker. And just watch as Brian Dayball use a little bit of pre-stamp motion to identify who is going to be covering either Cole Beasley or Dawson Knox in a receiving route or something like that. They're going to eat when those guys are lined up in coverage on the Buffalo Bills. And last point on this side of the football, the Pittsburgh Steelers have not even faced a single pass attempt from 10 personnel. That's four wide receivers on the field with a running back. Not a single one so far this season. Most of the offenses that Pittsburgh have been facing use a lot more heavy personnel

sets, some 11, but there's nothing like a Buffalo Bill's offense that they've even come close to playing this year. So it's going to be really exciting to watch Brian Dayball and Josh Allen create havoc for the Steelers defense. Sharpie, I love it when you get cooking like this. It's just the way that Dayball has let Josh Allen cook. this season. We talked to the beginning of the season about letting Russell Wilson cook. And you know what? We all saw over the course of the season. You got to remember the NFL season is long.

And these teams, you know, some teams are more adept at showing flexibility. They're able to revamp on the fly. And, you know, you have to be a little bit lucky with injuries as well. But this Buffalo team has stuck to its principles, Josh Allen with his sixth 300-yard passing game last week against San Francisco. And one of the things I saw in the research, I think it was one of your guys who wrote it up, talked about how Buffalo has been deliberate in crafting their receiving core with guys who fit a lot of different categories, a lot of different kind of skill sets in the way that basketball teams might sort of, you know, come up with their optimal lineup, their optimal five. Can you talk a little bit about that? I loved that analogy.

Well, Brandon Bean, you know, for the Buffalo Bills, he's their GM. He actually just got an extension to well-deserved extension today. This afternoon it was announced to continue on as the GM for many more years to come. Buffalo used to have these tall, slower, wide receivers. And when they first drafted Josh Allen, they expected his accuracy was off because it was in college. And so maybe the solution is to get. give huge targets with big wingspans and allow him to hit these guys. But they found that these guys just weren't able to get open. So then Josh Allen is always looking in the direction of

guys and everybody's covered. And he's like, well, what the fuck am I throwing the ball to this guy, even though he's covered and hoping that I throw it high enough so that the smaller guy can't out jump him. And it just wasn't the most effective game plan or strategy to have these slower guys. So one of the things that they went out and did was they drafted some guys that were good at separation and creating space, just getting all these guys out on the field to quickly get into spots and zones that Josh Allen could read them and they could get uncovered quickly to present targets early in his dropback. So he had a good idea of where to throw the football to. And then when pressure does come, these guys are really adept at moving and making

things happen and create spacing and getting open. And so they went with like quicker, shorter, faster receivers, and it's really meshed well with what Josh Allen likes to do. But that was Dan who wrote up and went into a lot more depth as to what Brandon Bean is really done from a wide receiver construction perspective. Yeah, one of the observations he made was about what a perfect marriage, Stefan Diggs, has been for Josh Allen in particular because of the quality of route running by Diggs. And then the same sort of idea with, with Beasley in terms of, you know, his particular strengths and what he represents as a safety blanket to Josh Allen. I mean, one of the best props of last week was Cole Beasley at three and a half

receptions. He had seven catches and over 100 yards in the first half. And, you know, that prop was, was a stone cold green cash winner within the first 10 minutes of the football game. It felt like. Well, let's talk real quickly about the other side of the ball. what the Steelers are going to be able to do offensively against the Bill's defense. Yeah, and a lot of people are thinking that the Buffalo Bill's defense, I know they got their linebacker back, but they think that this is going under a resurgence here, that the Buffalo Bill's defense is getting stronger. And I'm not going to doubt that they are a little bit better.

But let's put into context who they've been going up against here. You're talking about Nick Mullins without your number one receiving option there, which is your tight end. Strangely enough, for the 49ers, it is their tight end. So, you know, they were trotting out like Samuel and Iyuk, which are great options, right? And Kendra Bourne ends up getting six targets. But this offense really loves to go through George Kittle. And he's still not there.

And Nick Mullins is throwing up putting up over 300 passing yards and three touchdowns on these guys. Now, I did throw a couple of interceptions. And Trudevius White for the Bill's defense. I mean, he's just such a sick cornerback. He picked one off right there at the goal line. Otherwise, the 49ers are scoring more points here. Then you have like an implosion by the L.A. Chargers, which we saw them put up a goose egg the very next week. This is a team that puts up 17 points.

This is the most horrendous game plan. I think I've seen all season. I don't want to get my blood pressure too high talking in depth about that game. But that was an Anthony Lynn special. Prior to that, you have Kyler Murray. and Kyla Murray wins the game in the last second Hail Mary, but they obviously put up into the mid-20s from a point production perspective.

And we've seen, like, look at what the Cardinals' offense is doing lately. Look at what the Charter's offense is doing lately. So should we be patting the bills on the back defensively for allowing these teams to, you know, do what they did against them? No, I don't think so. The prior week, they take on the Seattle Seyoxu puts up 34 points. And Russell Wilson is literally playing with DJ Dallas as his number one running back. I mean, they had no backs up multiple first.

second string guys were down. It was a one-dimensional offense. And Russell Wilson had to try to create and he threw a couple of interceptions, still put up 34 points. And prior to that, you got Cam Newton and the Jets offenses that they played. And we just saw Cam Newton. He's the first quarterback since Brady Quinn in 2009. Well, we don't know what he's going to do tonight.

But prior to the game on Thursday night football, Brady Quinn was the last quarterback in the NFL to win consecutive games throwing for less than 100 yards until Cam Newton came along the last couple of weeks. So we can't really say that Buffalo has played some very good offenses. Their defense, I think, could be vulnerable to Pittsburgh. The issues with Pittsburgh are that they're constructing this offense that's very pass-heavy, and that is fine. It's good to be pass-heavy.

It's optimal to be pass-heavy, especially if your run game is not going to be very productive. Now, you can't throw the ball 100% of your plays, but so you need a little bit of balance, which I think that they are getting. It would be nice to have a little bit of an upside with the balance and have a running back that's not like buried in your depth chart who now has to play because your starter is down. That being said, the style of the offense that they're choosing to utilize does have some downsides. I think they need to get a little bit more aggressive with the passing attack. They were way too many times against Washington last week where they were throwing the

football behind the line of scrimmage only to let Washington rally up and tackle these guys short of the sticks. There's got to be, and there is a middle ground between the super short, and then these deep balls that really have no chance. I mean, the first play of the game, they're chucking a deep ball. It goes out of bounds. Ben hadn't been practicing all week, and that's the first play. I would just say this. Mike Tomlin is a very good coach and was borderline coach of the year if he had taken this

team for an undefeated season. But Mike Tomlin makes mistakes in critical games when he doesn't get his team rallied up. Like, I think they're going to be fine. They're going to be juiced up to play the Buffalo Bills in this sport. spot. But oftentimes Tomlin plays down to his level of competition and they have these close games against teams that they shouldn't otherwise have to deal with. They're superior teams, but they're dealing with these instances. And secondly, there are all too many instances where the Pittsburgh Steelers have gotten leads and then rested on their laurels. And I'm looking at their

last three games. They've led by pretty hefty margins entering halftime. They led 17 to 3 against the Jaguars, 14 to 3 against Washington, and 12 to 7 against the Ravens. The Ravens scored a touchdown late in that game. Pittsburgh was kind of like in control of that first half for the most part. You know what Washington does in the third quarter? They put up goose eggs every single time. They're allowing their opponent to get back into the game. They're not staying aggressive in the third quarter offensively.

They're calling place too conservatively. This team also has zero understanding or zero concept. And if you can't tell, like I respect. the hell out of Mike Tomlin, but Randy Fitchner, their offense coordinator, is kind of a bum at times. And I find major play calling issues with this guy on fourth downs. The last two years, he's been one of the worst in the NFL. In fact, the worst of 11 teams that have tried fourth down attempts at least 20 times. This guy's conversion rate is down at 42 percent. And I'm talking about fourth and one to two yards. Very low on that level. We saw often, and you alluded to it earlier,

them trying to convert these short yardage plays and not once this Big Ben sneak the ball when this dude is like almost 300 pounds. I mean, you know, I'm obviously exaggerating a little bit, but he certainly could bowl over somebody. You get the bush push from behind with a running back. If you got linebackers that are jamming him up, then I understand it. But if you don't have linebackers crowding the line to stop that, even if they're playing a tight front,

you give me that offensive line with Ben and a running back helping push him in. I think Ben's going to be able to get that one yard. In some cases, it was like two inches, and they wouldn't try it at all. They have a very high pass rate. Those passes are not very successful. Their running backs kind of stink running the football. And so then turning around and handing the ball off to a running back, which, by the way, turning around and running three yards backwards to hand the ball off to a running back,

who's standing six yards behind the line of scrimmage to begin with on a fourth and one is definitely the dumbest play call that you could. have as an offensive coordinator, and far too often teams are doing that. The most efficient play call in that situation, by far, is a QB sneak. And the defense, if the defense is taking that away, there are other things that you can do besides running backwards and handing it to a running back. So in either case, this guy stinks. I'm intervening.

I need to just intervene and convey my appreciation for that strategy on the goal line against my Washington professional football team because it led to the go-perfect. goal line stand, which enabled and facilitated my team ending their, they're clearly fraudulent undefeated season. Anyway, there you go. It was fraudulent. It was a fraudulent undefeated season. So bottom line here is there are things on this Pittsburgh offense.

There's too much talent across the board that this team can't raise the ceiling of what they're doing offensively. And they're going to be pushed in this game for one of the first times. Look at the schedule of opposing offenses that they've played. There is nobody since maybe you could say the Cleveland Browns and Baker Mayfield just like melts under the pressure that Pittsburgh was able to put him under. Nobody since then that they even have played that you would really say, oh my God, this is a dangerous offense. I guess Tennessee prior to that, but they chose to run the football. I think the Steelers offense is going to be pushed.

I think they need to come to play. I think their defense is going to struggle against Buffalo more than what the number one really. rated defense should struggle. Like people are thinking, oh, the Steelers have the number one defense. I think they're going to struggle a little bit here. So definitely the game I'm looking forward to most because I really want to see, is my hypothesis correct in that Brian Dayball and this Bill's offense should make the number

one defense in the NFL look a little bit silly at times? I also want to see, can this Pittsburgh Steelers D-Line get pressure just like the Chargers with Joey Bosa was able to get? Because if T.J. Watt is able to affect this game like Joey Boso, was that's going to create problems for the Buffalo Bill's offense. But Brian Dable came out after two series against Joey Bosa, seeing what that offensive, that defensive pass rush was doing to his five-man protections. And four down linemen were getting pressure on his five-o linemen because he spreads out the receivers. And they were still getting to Josh Allen. So he made some adjustments

on the fly in the middle of the first quarter. I know it's shocking, right? Like an offensive quarter would actually overhaul their game plan in the first quarter to do something different and get ahead of the thing. But that's exactly what he did. He built a big lead heading into halftime. So I'm interested to see how he makes adjustments here. And I want to see what does Ben look like. He finally practiced today.

He didn't practice on Wednesday. He practices on Thursday. So he's getting a little bit more chemistry. I mean, I saw the O.C. Blame the lack of practice time from Ben on these receivers dropping the football. It's like, dude, how does it matter if Ben's the guy throwing the football of these guys or not? You're in practice. you're catching the ball in practice,

catch the damn ball in the game too. I don't understand how these guys kept dropping the football in the game, but we shall see, my friend. It's going to be a great game. I'm looking forward to it all day long on Sunday. Yeah, I mean, it's week 14. By now, I think, you know, we don't need any more practice time

or chemistry building time, I would hope. Just one other little nugget, Josh Allen, as an underdog, for whatever reason, his professional career 13, 6, and 2 against the spread, I will be laying the 2-5 points with the Buffalo Bills this week because I resolved after last week to never again bet against Brian Dayball, at least this season under- Good news. You don't have to lay two and a half right now. The line is down to one and a half or two at most spots. So you alluded to the fact it took,

it was on the look ahead, Pittsburgh minus two and a half swung big time to Buffalo minus two and a half. Now it's dropping back down with some Pittsburgh money. I would assume the guys that like Pittsburgh bought to the three. They bought the half point, took the three, and took some Pittsburgh plus three. We'll see where the line goes from here. But the Vince William News is going to get factored in a little bit, only because it's a cluster injury situation. Vince Williams alone is not worth anything on the spread. But if you're already down Roberts Blaine and you were already down Bush ahead of him, then it is going to be a little bit of a factor. What a bunch of analysis on that marquee game. Wagering Wizards. Take note. Take note.

note. All right. Well, here's the rest of the dance card. I'm going to throw a bunch of games at you. I'm looking at some combination plays, some teasers, as is my way. I have a question for you where the first game we're going to look at is this Washington 100%, 1,000%,

1,000, 1 million percent, definitely professional football team getting points at San Francisco. Now, this is another one where the line opened up. I think the look ahead was like five and a half on Sunday before Washington went out and took care of its business against Pittsburgh and now it's

down to three and a half. I don't know if it's gotten all the way down to three. Some spots, yes. Some spots, yes. So before we talk about this game, I have a question for you. Are you a fantasy? Do you play fantasy football anymore? I mean, I know how full your schedule is. Are you able to play in a league? In a league? Yeah, in a league. So I did two leagues like two years ago. I cut out one of leagues that I had been in for a few years. I only did one league with my buddies that I knew from college and some high school. And then I cut that out this year. I just working for a couple more OCs and talking to these guys a little bit more on a regular basis. I couldn't spend any more time dabbling in the fantasy stuff because it takes a lot of work. Like I wanted a couple of years

ago. I won the league a couple of years ago. And then last year, my record was not very good because I wasn't devoting as much time to the waiver wire and all the other shit that needs to happen in season. And so I had to stay married to what I'm best at, which is not playing fantasy football. But I am going to be playing a bunch of DFS, I think, on putting some lineups in on Saturday night. I will tell you that much.

Well, we are at this point of the season where there should be some opportunities because the fantasy football season playoffs are getting underway officially in week 14, I am in two leagues and I will not be in the playoffs in one of those leagues. And the reason that I'm not in the playoffs in one of those leagues is because I lost another than Bill Simmons in week 13 because my two running backs, Derek Henry and Antonio Gibson, combined for seven points.

I still had a chance in that game on Tuesday with Lamar Jackson out there slinging the rock and running all over the joint. Unfortunately, he threw a dirt ball. I don't know if you recall. It was at the end of the third quarter, maybe in the fourth quarter. Yeah, I remember he had the guy in the back of the end zone. He threw it like five yards short of him and hit the paint.

Yes, yes. And that was the difference between me making the playoffs or not making the playoffs. I got to tell you, it's probably better for your career at the ringer that he did throw that dirt ball because I don't think you want to beat your boss. Well, you know what? He was already in the playoffs. This was me, you know, trying to scratch my way in, scratch and call my way in. This wasn't an elimination game.

No, only me getting, only me getting eliminated. But the reason that I shared is because, personally, the tradeoff of the Washington professional football team beating Pittsburgh without Antonio Gibson, it was worth it. I just what, I mean, you know, my fandom always comes first. it is always a conflicting existence. The last 20 years of being a Washington football team fan has been a tough row to hoe, let me tell you. And I'm not going to mention the owner, but that is the only aspect of what this team is doing

under Ron Rivera that gives me any pause whatsoever. I wish it didn't redound to the benefit of the asshole owner. But the team itself is so refreshing, so enjoyable. God bless Alex. Smith. I'm knocking on wood. I want him to stay upright and stay healthy. We had the gruesome scene of him suffering another leg injury. Now, fortunately, it was- God. Did you see that thing? It was grotesque. I thought my grandfather took a bullet in World War II and showed me his scar. And that thing looks exactly like I felt like it was he took a

bullet right in the middle of his shin there. That was dripping blood all over the place. And they just bandaged him up and just like put some athletic tape on it. And you're like, you're good. just keep going. Yeah, because he's a football player. That's why, because he's a football player. Now, you mentioned, as we were talking about the card, Kyle Shanahan having this sort of revenge angle in his return, you know, battles against Washington.

Well, how about Alex Smith, former quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers, getting his moment to show the franchise they gave up on him too early? I am obviously riding the Washington professionals. there is an interesting angle. So first of all, we mentioned this fits your boy, the Cleveland Corollary for close matchups. This game fits that category, right? With Washington getting points on the road

and the total in this game under 45 points, it's like a 43 and a half or 44 from what I saw. There's also this weird, and I don't have a good explanation for it. The 49ers under Kyle Shanahan, the last three and a half years, they're not good as home favorites. I have no idea why. Road underdogs going either into San Francisco or in this instance into Arizona are 113 and one against the spread. And on the money line, road dogs are seven and eight.

So that's straight up in these circumstances that road dogs are going into San Francisco and beating Kyle Shanahan's 49ers. I don't have a good explanation for it, but it's just something to point out. Well, I don't know. Something else to point out is I don't know what I did to deserve. I've got on the two ringer pods I do. One is with the biggest Dallas Cowboys fan I think in the world in Chris Vernon and the biggest Washington football team fan in the world in Joe House. I'm in the midst of this like Thanksgiving annual Thanksgiving rivalry that you guys have probably had with each other for years. But I am absolutely the number one fan of Alex Smith being a comeback player of the year. I think it's incredibly. remarkable of what he was able to do and the production. And I think that Scott Turner's doing a really good job with crafting and offense that gets the ball out of his hands quickly to the receivers, try to make some plays down the field. I like some of the concepts and the play designs. He definitely confused Pittsburgh a couple of times. One of the touchdowns, you will remember this one house that he threw against Pittsburgh was when he had a, I think a mesh concept that really

faked. It was almost like a pick play, but it wasn't quite a pick play. that got number 98 matched up against one of your tight ends, and the tight end caught a touchdown pass on the left-hand side of the end. Loga Thomas, of course I remember. You know I know that. And Vince Williams was like probably 17 to 20 yards away, kind of lumbering towards him, and that was the guy who was supposed to be covering him.

And then there was a lot of plays down the right side line where you were getting a running back and a tight end, and there were different levels that Alex Smith could throw the ball to on some outbreaking routes and both of the guys were open. It was just some really good play calling that Scott Turner was implementing there in the second half in their comeback win. I think this game obviously has a lot is very important for both of these teams. I think that we cannot underestimate and I probably wasn't factoring this in enough.

The confusion that the 49ers had in their move to Arizona for the one game and, you know, Like now they're there. Now they're there. And I think they're going to be a little bit more focused for this game. But moving midweek and getting your apartment and all these new things, like, you know how it is. Like, God, it takes me like two weeks to get settled in someplace that I'm trying to go. And like, hear these guys play a game. Then they have to move to a new city, get a new apartment, move their shit, whatever they're bringing with them.

Go practice a few times. Like, it looked like it messed up a lot of different things for that team. Interesting, you got Alex Smith, who wasn't the week on starter. versus Nick Mullins, who's not the week one starter. You mentioned so many different rivalry elements here with the quarterback going back and the coach playing his former team. I think it's going to be a fun game to watch. It's not often that Washington is in that late time slot for you.

So that's going to be like a real nice opportunity for you to get to enjoy the one o'clock without often to worry about sweating out something with the Washington team. And you get to save that for four o'clock. Yeah, that's right. And I'm just hoping for that same kind of ferocious. past rush, really in the fourth quarter. It felt like Washington's defense against Pittsburgh got stronger as the game went on. And that's like a kind of a newfound thing.

That's something that I really attribute 100% to Ron Rivera and the defensive play calling with Del Rio. I mean, I think they're just, it's a, it's such a refreshing experience to have a good defense. When you have a good defense, you really feel like you can always be in a game rooting for a team and I just haven't had that experience in a long time. So I'm on the Washington's on this one. I'm not going to put a ton on it, but it's just fun to be at this moment. It's December and Washington could be still yet in the playoffs. And that's enough for me. That's a W for me, Sharpe.

Yeah, that's well, especially the way this season started, right? And especially everything that unfolded early on. I mean, you got the win over Washington, but you saw Dwayne Haskins wasn't going to be your guy and so you pull him and then your backup gets a concussion and you didn't know who was going to be your quarterback and you thought the season was lost and then obviously Alex Smith comes in and saves the day. So I can get that. I can buy that totally. I'm knocking on wood that the continued good fortune in the face of all that bad fortune and all of that chaos to begin. Speaking of chaos and your own fate in having to deal with the NFC East, I'm looking at another NFC East team and we had to talk about this game. The New York Giants

are getting points at home against the Arizona Cardinals. And two things about the Giants in particular, as I was doing the research for the slate this week. The Giants have the best record of any team in the NFL as an underdog. They're 8 and 2 against the spread. They're also the number one in the NFL when the closing spread, if you take the closing spread and you tease it by six points, the Giants are 11 and 1. I think that this Cardinals team is a very different Cardinals team than they were five weeks ago. And I think that Kyler Murray is hurt.

I think his shoulder is hurt. And I think that they've been trying to protect him. He's been running far less for far less yardage. And in the absence of him running, him running in Kingsbury's offense, it was really the way for them to set up the past. seriously enough. He's thrown for under 175 yards in each of the past two games against the Patriots and the Rams. And the yards per pass attempt suck. Five yards against the Patriots, 4.4 yards per pass attempt against the Rams. And now he's going on the road against the Giants defense that is very good in points allowed per game from the pass. And they haven't allowed more than two touchdown passes in a game since week one. And I'm honestly, slightly curious.

why it is that the Cardinals are favored at all. If they had not successfully completed that Hail Mary pass against the bills, they would be on a five-game losing streak right now, Sharpie. So help me understand what's going on with this one. Well, I think you've got just the reputation proceeding itself. I think that there's some element that who has, who have the Giants really beat. I know that they've got five wins on the season. Just like Washington, I didn't want to tell you this.

at the time, but I'll go ahead now that you mentioned, you have a team that of the five wins, which Washington also has five, the Giants do as well, three of those five wins have come against the NFC East, which is terrible this year, obviously, as you know, one of those five wins have come against the Cincinnati Bengals, same for Washington, same for the Giants. And then last week, both of those teams had like their marquee victory, right? Washington beats Pittsburgh, formerly undefeated. The Giants beat the Seahawks. And so I think that the two, you know, you have this hook, well, what really are the Giants? Are we going to change our thought process of this team just with that game against Seattle? Or is that a little bit of a fluke? Where are we going to

go here? I will tell you that what makes the Giants such an interesting team is the schedule of teams that they have played. Do you know that the Giants offense has played the number one most difficult schedule of opposing defenses so far this year? But their defense has played the number one easiest schedule of offenses. So you've got like a defense that probably is worse than what it looks, although it's trending better because of the bad offenses they've played in general. And you got an offense that probably is a little bit better than what it's looked. Now, they've dealt with injuries. They've dealt with all these different situations. We know Sequin Barclay has been lost for weeks and weeks and weeks. But I think what's interesting

to me when I look at this game is the number one thing that we think about when we think about Arizona is Cliff Kingsbury and Kyler Murray, right? This is an offensive football team. That's what comes to our mind with our thought about the Arizona Cardinals. The Giants have played, like I said, the easiest schedule of opposing offenses. But the three offenses that have been the best that they have faced this season were the Seattle Seahawks last week, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers back in week eight, and the L.A. Rams back in week four. And they lost two of those three games. by a combined nine points. They lost by two to the bucks.

They lost by eight, by a combined 10 points. They lost by eight to the Rams. You're talking about a team that then goes out and beats the Seattle Seahawks. I can't explain how they were able to run the ball on Seattle so well. They had a great game plan

of how they were going to attack that Seahawks defense. And Seattle did a terrible job of trying to fit that up. And they had a lot of success. I have really been impressed by Patrick Graham, formerly down in the, he was with Green Bay for a while, but he was the defense corner for the dolphins, actually. Now he's got a shot up here with the Giants of how he changed up their defensive strategy to deal with D.K. Metcalfe and trying to take him out of the game a little bit, playing a little bit of too high and some other things that they don't typically do. I was really impressed with Patrick Graham and his ability to change things up. You're 100% correct. If Kyler is hurt and we know that. that he's not been running, you had the nugget of how many designed runs that he has had compared to what he's been averaging season to date, he's not running with the football. And if he's

not running with the football nearly as much, you take away that element. What you got is a short quarterback who is not really going to test you on the ground enough. And I think the Giants' defense can take advantage of that. So I think this game is a, we know that these two teams played last year. I know Chase Edmonds had a couple big touchdowns. We're able to pull away. I think it'll be really interesting to see how this one goes. And I do sort of envision like a closer, lower scoring game, which makes a teaser really appropriate here. But I also know that a lot of the public is going to be coming on on the Giants after what they saw last week as well. Yeah. Well, all I'm intending to do with this one is tease it. And I have some other teaser

legs that I'm looking at. I'm not going to grab the points for the Giants. For the Giants. although I'm very skeptical of the Cardinals. I have one more game I want to go through before we get to the square play, and then I have the most obvious tease in the world to bounce off of you. But let's talk about the Vikings' Bucks game, because I know that you have a couple of thoughts on that one. The Buccaneers are coming off of a buy. The defense is kind of a tale of two halves of the season,

so far for their defense. They allowed through weeks one through six a league best 4.6 yards per play. And since then, they've been in 26th place. They've allowed almost six yards per play. And they're allowing seven yards per pass play over that stretch after they were allowing only five and a half yards per pass play through the first six weeks. I'm not sure what's going on with that Tampa defense to attribute. that to one other interesting matchup in the Tampa, Minnesota thing that jumped out at me.

Obviously, Dalvin Cook is a monster. He leads the league in runs of 10 or more yards. He has 35 runs of 10 or more yards. And he's second in yardage on those carries. He has 500 and all 580 of his yards this season have come from those kinds of runs. Tampa's really good against runs of five yards or more. They're first in the NFL in the rate of runs to five or more yards. They allow that less than a third of the time. And they're second in the league, in the rate allowed of gains 10 or more yards. And they're very first in the league in holding off and staving off what are described as explosive rushing yards, explosive run. So, you know, they're particularly well suited to go up against Dalman Cook. Now, one interesting

thing from Minnesota, we've been skeptical about them, and I think it's well-founded. Kirk Cousins have been playing pretty good over the last five games or so, but they've also Minnesota, and they're on a decent streak. They've won four out of five games. They put themselves in the mix for this playoff berth, the last playoff berth. And in fact, they are going up against Tampa. There is a six spot in the playoff seating right now that this game. will definitely affect, but Minnesota has looked lackluster against Jacksonville, lackluster against Carolina, and lost to Dallas. So I'm not sure about the identity of this Minnesota team. I think this is a spot where Tampa, who's laying six and a half points,

come off the by and just come out and kick butt. What do you think about this one? So you're absolutely correct that this is going to be a tough spot for Dalvin Cook, and it's going to be interesting to see how quickly, if that does not work, does Mike Zimmer walk over to Gary Kuback and say, fucking chuck this ball because we got some good wide receivers out here, Justin Jefferson, bowed out to the offensive rookie of the year, potentially.

Like, I love watching this guy play, although Justin Herbert, a huge fan of him as well as a quarterback, but Justin Jefferson, just great. Maybe it's a good year to be Justin as a rookie in the NFL. But the most interesting thing to me, House, in this game is the Bucs, They have the last bye week of the whole season. And it's Tom Brady, a QB, who has been indoctrinated into a system in New England for decades, going to Tampa to play with a totally different style of offensive coach and play color and philosophy that Bruce Ariens has with the no-risket, no-biscuit type mentality. What I hope and literally almost pray for, it's not important enough to be actually asking for prayers on this.

But I want to see them have changed some things in the by week to improve this offense. And some people are going to look at me on the pond and be like, what are you talking about? They're a top 10 offense. Yes, I understand that. But they have some major issues. And you may not have realized what some of these are. So I want to walk through a couple of these issues. Tampa Bay is one of the most predictable teams from a play-calling perspective in the first quarter.

This is why they have only led at halftime in four games all season. season long. I know they've got a winning record. They've played 12 games. They've only led a half time in four of them. On first down in the first quarter, they are 60% run. That's the ninth most run heavy team in the NFL. Those runs gain just 2.9 yards per carry and a 41% success rate, that's the third worst efficiency in the league. So their top 10 most run heavy, but third worst efficiency. You know what they do on second down in that same first quarter? They flip up and go 67% pass. That's the number one most pass heavy team in the league. Now, as a defense coordinator, if you're telling me that I know this team's going to go 60% run on first downs and 67% pass on

second downs, I got a good idea what to expect here with how I'm going to call my defense. Those pass plays produce just 7.7 yards per attempt and a 51% success rate. That might sound good. It's not. It's barely above average. And this actually continues into the second and the third quarter as well with them passing the ball on second down. Listen to this. The top 10 teams in the NFL pass rate on second down in the first three quarters, Tampa Bay's at 74% pass. Is the number two, that's number one, pass heavy team in the NFL. Is number two 73? No, are they 72? No. Are they 71? No. 70? No. 69. No. It's down at 67%. And then we got three teams at 62% and a couple teams of 65%. Everybody's bunched.

around two-thirds pass of the top most passive teams. And the bucks are all the way up by themselves at three-quarters past. Nobody is close to that. The reason why they end up going so pass-heavy on the second-down playshouse is because they have an average of 8.3 yards to go on second down in the first three-quarters of the game. That is the second most in the NFL. Why do they have the second-most average yards to go in the NFL that's forcing them to go so pass-heavy? It's because of the no risket, no biscuit philosophy on first down. Bruce Aaron's either calls run plays that suck and don't generate anything on first down, but he continues to do that so that can set up deep shots, or he's passing the ball

deep down the field. Do you know that their average air yards when they throw the football on first down is 9.5 yards downfield? That's the third highest rate in the NFL behind only Denver and Jacksonville. Since week eight, it's 10.4 yards downfield. that's the number one most in the NFL. Tom Brady, when he's in New England, he was down at like number 20 in terms of depth of target on first down at like 7.3.

Here in Tampa, they're at 10.4. This is not meshing well with Tom Brady. This is why they end up passing the ball a shitload on second down is because their first downs are so inefficient. And this is why they end up not bypassing early downs. I say all that to say this. I was very refreshed. And maybe this is turning the page here.

by a comment that I saw out of Bruce Ariens yesterday. And he said, quote, I think the big thing is that third downs have been a problem. So one of the ways to fix that is to make first downs on first and second down and stay out of third down. Yeah. And the heavens parted. And the man fell from the sky. And this, he has seen the light. If this is what he's going to start doing and get rid of the no risk, no biscuit, no biscuit.

And maybe he and Brady had some heart to hearts and thought about this. and maybe they're going to decide to play a little bit more efficiency and stop high-risk, high-reward type stuff on first downs, play a little bit more efficiently and avoid third downs. This offense can look even better than what they've been so far this season. Huh. So with that information in mind, the over-under, the total that I've seen was 51, 51-5 up to 52. It might have even gone above 52 at this stage. Do you think that there is a modest angle here as it relates to the total? Yeah, so I'll just lay the chips on the table here for myself. I waited until this thing got down to 51.5. It was being bet towards the under, and I took a little

piece on the over here. And the reason I did that was number one. My model thought that there was going to be more than 51.5 points scored in this game. But number two, look at the way that this game sort of might be playing out. You have a Vikings team that's a seven point underdog. Now, I think maybe Vikings will be the side here. The books may probably need the Vikings to cover this spread. They may end up performing better than what we think. I don't know if it'll come on the ground or not, but the bucks might have a lead here. It would be only the fifth time that they have a lead at halftime, but they might have a lead at some point, which would force the Vikings to try to come back in the game. Now, if there is a team that you need to score points late and

that you don't just want them to fold the tent and give up late because you have the over, it is the Minnesota Vikings. I have never been fucked harder than I was fucked by this team going up against the Atlanta Falcons. When Atlanta had him down, it was a super low scoring first half. I think the total was like 56 or something like that. We took the under it closed like three points lower than what we took it at. I mean, it looked like a hardcore great game and down a massive amount of points. Mike Zimmer is just chucking and ducking in the fourth quarter. He's on sides kicking the ball. They're down like three scores, he's onside. He does not even care. This team, if they are trailing at halftime, every single Vikings game but one has hit 51 points. They average 13 points in the fourth quarter.

The most fourth quarter points in the NFL over the course of the season is scored by Minnesota. If they're trailing in the third quarter, every single game, they've played seven games that they've been trailing after the third quarter, all but one has hit at least 53 points. The average score has been 58 and a half points scored. They score a ton of points in the fourth quarter. So I think they've got, and this is where Tampa Bay is a little bit weaker. They're stronger defending the run, a little bit weaker against the pass. As long as Kirk doesn't get totally pressured, he is going to have the ability to throw the football

down here and make some hay. And I'm hoping that Bruce Arons and Tom Brady had some heart to hearts, figured out a few things. Offensively, I will throw this little monkey wrench in there to all the listeners that Mike Evans did not practice today. He was listed as a limited participant on Wednesday's practice with a hamstring that he's been dealing with most of the season doesn't even practice on Thursday.

Typically, a guy goes from limited to nothing is a very bad indication of his availability for the game. Fortunately, with Antonio Brown in there now, they do have a lot of depth. Fortunately, we also have a history of Mike Evans gutting it out. We thought there were games he wasn't even going to play and he ends up playing and he ends up catching touchdown.

So who knows if he's actually going to play in this game or not. But the weather looks great. I think there's other receiving options. This Vikings defense isn't putting pressure on anybody. They faced just a ridiculous schedule of opposing quarterbacks themselves. If you talk about Chase Daniel finishes the game against them when Matthew Stafford started and got hurt, they've also faced their last six games. Nick Foles, Andy Dalton, Teddy Bridgewater, and Mike Glennon, are you kidding me?

So now you're going up against Tom Brady? Yeah, I think there's enough things here to like some points being put. put up in this one. Okay. Well, that's it. I knew we would get that out of you. I knew we would be able to get the, the, the strong angle. I didn't know that we were going to have a, the fact that you were hard-fucked to be part of that analysis, but I'm sorry for that, for that, but, you know, them's the breaks in this game that we're chasing along. Yes, sir. Speaking of the HF, let's dispense very quickly with the square play of the game. And it is not, I'm here to tell you, the New York.

Jets. I'm not betting against the Jets this week, and I might not be betting against them. It depends on the situation for the rest of the season. I was, I was, you know, we played every, more every, every Monday morning, wake up. Is Adam Gay still the coach of New York Jets? Yes, then we go against the Jets. But you know what? The Jets have been competitive the last four games. And, and snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. I mean, what they did against the Raiders was legendary. It got two, two G. Greg Williams finally fired. And hopefully that's, oh my gosh. His last job ever in the NFL. I doubt that that's the case, but I mean...

One can only hope. I mean, every podcast that precedes this podcast has already had all of the fun in, you know, decrying what Greg Williams did. I will say Joe Thomas went on the Rosillo podcast, and he made a really compelling argument about the Jets being motivated to not finish the season. 0 and 16 because that black mark, you know, it's a stain that follows all that coaching staff and follows the players. And it's detrimental ultimately to all of them. So I think the Jets are motivated. And I still have a glimmer of hope that they're going to win one of these games, one of these four remaining games. The one that I'm going against as a square play of the week is the Atlanta Falcons laying only two and a half points at San Diego.

the Chargers have been legendary on this losing streak in their failure to cover the point spread. The last six games, they last week had another terrible yards per play game. Each of the last four weeks, they've had bad yards per play game. Poor Justin Herbert is now under 55% completion rate. His touchdown rate is 1.6%. He's only doing 6.8 yards per attempt under pressure. His stats earlier were much better. The Chargers had not beaten the team this season with more than two wins.

They have three wins. They've beaten the Jets, the Jaguars, and the Bengals. And the game they beat against the Bengals, they won against the Bengals was Joe Burroughs' first start of his career. The Chargers are 918 and 1 against the spread at home at second to last in the league. I am going to go ahead and play on Atlanta. I don't have to say a lot of nice things about Atlanta, although they've been playing much better under Rahim Morris and their defense is greatly improved.

So square play of the week, Atlanta laying the two and a half at San Diego. Yeah, I don't know. I have not done anything on this game. The Chargers seem to be in position to make for a good teaser leg and obviously betting on a team that got completely embarrassed last week. Is it ironic at All House that Anthony Dillon, this team's competitive, almost every single game. And then Anthony Lee Ling goes out there and tells the guys, hey, we're probably not going to make the playoffs this year. And then boom, they score zero points

and lose 45 to nothing. Like, I don't think that's ironic. And I've been working for myself for many, many years now. But the one thing that I will say is, if I ever go full time and work for another employer, I hope he has as much patience with me as this Chargers Management has with Anthony Lynn because it's absolutely ridiculous what's going on out there. But the concern I would have for the chargers here is that Atlanta has a great run defense, a supremely good run defense. And what do the chargers like to do ever since they got Austin Eccler back? They like to run the football. So if the chargers decide, hey, we're going to game playing and skiing that this Atlanta Falcons team is worse against the past. We're going to pass the ball a lot more than we run it.

Then I feel more concerned for you. But I'm not so sure that they're going to enter the game with that game plan. And look at the Atlanta schedule down the stretch here house. Okay, week 11, Saints, week 13, Saints, week 15 bucks, week 17 bucks. I mean, the odd weeks are brutal, but in between there, they've got, they had the Raiders who they crushed, and now they get the LA Chargers. So we'll see if like against those ridiculous, and they have week 16 against the Chiefs. This is their last real opportunity to have a slam dunk against a weak opponent. after this they play the Bucks, the Chiefs, and the Bucks again. Good God.

So I think this is a Rahim Morris potential statement game here. But I don't know. I don't have any opinion on it. I will wish you good luck. It definitely is a square play to be. But anytime you're fading the chargers, I mean, it seems to work out for whoever's placing that bet, whether you're a sharp or square. Yeah, that's right. I mean, just to be clear, over the last five seasons, 25 instances of a team that gets shut out.

And then that following game, those teams are 17, 6, and 2 against the spread. So, you know, look, there's plenty of contraindication here supporting the charges. And what you mentioned, maybe you tease the chargers on up if you want to do something contrarian. But yeah, so that's a pretty good little topper for this week 14 slate. There's a lot of sexy games out there. We didn't even talk about the Baltimore, Cleveland Monday night or that has all kinds of juice and angles to it. But we've been going on here for a good hour and a half. I mean, I think the betting buddies out here have something to chew on,

have a game plan that they can make off this betting card. What do you think? I agree. And I'm absolutely thrilled that everybody's favorite team and that everybody's team that they hate the most and everything in between. All these teams are playing this weekend. We've got no buy weeks anymore. And the NFL has done a great job spreading out the games.

I think we've got a lot of things to dabble in. And I hope that everybody enjoys the week. and good luck to your pocketbooks. Good luck to your pocketbook, strong R-O-Y to everybody.