The Ringer NFL Show - The Seahawks Defense Pounds on Daniel Jones, Brock Purdy Can Win the Super Bowl, and More Big Takeaways From Week 4 | Extra Point Taken

Episode Date: October 3, 2023

Sheil and Ben get together to share their reactions to the Seahawks' dominating win over the Giants on 'MNF.' They then examine Bills quarterback Josh Allen’s MVP level of play the past couple of weeks and recalibrate their expectations for a suddenly resurgent Los Angeles Rams team (12:29). Sheil then shares his short list of coaches for his "More With Less" coaching club, while Ben predicts that an impressive Brock Purdy will go deep in the playoffs with the 49ers (27:02). Finally, they speculate on how long the Falcons can stick with Desmond Ridder and take an early look at the upcoming trade deadline (44:32). The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please check out theringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Hosts: Sheil Kapadia and Ben Solak Associate Producer: Chris Sutton Musical Elements: Devon Renaldo Social: Kiera Givens and Eduardo Ocampo Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Rigger Gambling Feed is back every Monday. Join myself, Joe House, Rahim Palmer, and John Derskepti for East Coast Bias. Sunday's action recap and our favorite bets for Monday night football. Then on Tuesday, we got the Rastodomis show where I'll break down everything you need to know in the betting world. Plus, the East Coast Bias boys will be back on Thursday to help you get your betting card sorted ahead of all the NFL action. And then on Friday's it's me back with Warren Sharp, deep diving into the analytics. So be sure to subscribe on Spotify. Spotify or wherever you get your podcast.

Welcome to Extra Point Taking Shield Capadia here, joined by Ben Solac after Monday night football, the Seattle Seahawks go to MetLife Stadium and pound Daniel Jones. Let's see, I lost track, I think 10, 10 sacks on 11. Wasn't it was 10? Troy got hit 11 times against Buddy Ryan's Eagles team. That's why that's in your head.

I think the box score is showing me 10. The Seahawks defense was dominant. 11 sacks, three takeaways. Three points allowed, three point four yards or play aloud. We were both right. Paris Campbell took one sack. So Daniel Jones was set 10 times. Very sneaky.

Paris Campbell for the 11th. You always forget about the wide receiver sack. That's how they get you. What a start. What a start to the show. Seahawks win 243, beat the Giants. We're going to talk about that game. We're going to talk about all the action in week four in the NFL.

Ben Solek. How are we doing? Now that you know how many times the, the Giants were sacked tonight. You feeling good? I'm feeling great. This is good because I wanted to check and see just how many games we have in history

of a quarterback throwing two interceptions and getting sacked 11 times. And then I had to go back and change it to make sure it was throwing two picks but getting sacked only 10 times. And it's a much bigger list, sadly. It's not as fun as it was. So yeah, games in stat heads database,

10 plus sacks and 2 plus interceptions, there's only 17 of them and there's only one that's happened in a year that starts with a two. John Beck, who I now believe is like a quarterback coach, like a private quarterback coach and that's right.

It's pretty good at it. I had a 10-sack two-pit game against Washington, or actually as Washington quarterback against Buffalo. Before that, the most recent was 1992 Bernie Kosar. So something we've only seen twice in my lifetime.

All right, this is like a comment or something. Daniel Jones, 10 plus sacks and two-plus interceptions. Not the best day in the office, Sheel. My first take of the show, which is supposed to be off of the game that we just watched, is one that I've had previously,

but remains every Daniel Jones game is a good reminder of it. This was the easiest franchise tag decision in history, and the Giants totally bungled it. And I want to do this in a way that is fair to Daniel Jones. Over the course of his career before Brian Dable, Jones at times looked like an interesting starting quarterback. He always was like a low-end starting quarterback because he has some accuracy, but he can throw it deep and he would hit Darius Slate on these bombs.

You'd go, oh, more of that. And then he would run, he would tuck and run. He was a good athlete outside of the pocket. He'll, oh, more of that. And then Brian Dable comes in, Daniel Jones contract year. And they start Daniel Jones, and Davel's got this guy moving outside of the pocket more and more designed runs and they have the option game. And they're throwing the ball shallower.

And it's a quick passing game, but like the wide receivers aren't that good. so maybe that's part of it. The Office of the line's not that good, so maybe that's part of it. And then you get this season where they end up, I believe it was 9, 7, and 1, their final record was.

But they go to the postseason, they beat the Vikings. He had a playoff win under their belt. And you enter the season feeling like, all right, like, we did something on offense with this guy that we weren't sure we could do anything with. But with that being his full body of work,

and with the franchise tag being available to him, this is a perfect spot. You have a first year head coach with a guy who's productive in just one season. It could not possibly have screamed louder. This could have been a one-off. This could be a spike year. We caught the league by surprise.

This is the exact environment in which you use the tag. And you say, all right, offensive lines can get a little better. Receivers are going to get a little better. And now we'll figure out Daniel Jones can really do this year over year. And then even in an eventuality, like the one of which we have arrived, where offensive line injuries have made the unit completely and totally untenable. Like no one's looking good. back there, right behind the Giants' offensive line.

Even in that moment, you could still say, all right, we're not learning anything about Daniel Jones, but good thing we didn't commit to him for more than a season. This was the, this is, like, the franchise tag is not a good thing for players, and I don't like that the franchise tag exists. But if there was a reason the franchise tag was made, it was for this exact Daniel Jones contract situation. And the fact that the Giants let things get to the 11th hour gave Daniel Jones the contract that they gave him, which they're not getting out of that after year one.

That's a two-year contract at minimum. And then did what, like, burned whatever bridge they did with Sequin Barclay by giving him the tag and then dealing with that whole contract negotiation is, I think, an egregious error for Joe Shane, who largely I think has done a nice job with the Giants. I think that that was as big a swing of a miss as I can remember. Such an easy franchise tag choice, such a big blunder. It's like if they taught a course in high school or college, you know, about like NFL economics and we're like, here's the franchise tag.

here's a situation where you would use it. Right. This would precisely be the exact situation where you would use it. And this isn't a revisionist history. I mean, we were talking about this all offseason. I think we were on the same page. I thought that's what they were going to do. Everyone I talked to thought that that's what they were going to do because it seemed

so simple. So listen, they're tied in for more money. They're tied in for an extra year here with Daniel Jones, not just this year, but next year it's not like they're tied in for, you know, four or five years or anything like that when you look at the guaranteed money. But I'm with you there. I mean, I look at this and just to keep talking about the Giants here for a minute, like, you know, Brian Dayball won coach of the year last year.

It's actually, this is like a good reminder as I was watching this. And, you know, we're going to have some takes on coaches we think are doing a good job and a bad job later in the show. Like, he was coached to the year last year. Is there a more unprepared team in the NFL this year? They've been outscored. Mistakes. Absolutely.

How about this? First half, Ben, 68 points they've been outscored by 68 points in the first. half. That's tied for the worst first half point differential through four weeks since at least 2000. That's as far back as true media. No team in the first half of the four four games have been outscored by more points since at least 2000. They are minus 76 on the season, Ben. Where do you think that ranks if you haven't seen my tweet yet? It's last, right? It's last. This is worse than, this is worse than a Broncos got outscore by 50 points. Yeah. And the Giants still have a... The first thing I did was I was like,

Broncos were close to the commanders, obviously beat the Bears. Bears were close to the Broncos. I think probably, yeah, it's the Giants. I mean, at home, they put up the score. They're down 64 to 3 in two home games. That's abysmal. If you take out the two games, the half against the Cardinals, this officer scored three points in 10 quarters of football.

Holy cow. I mean, that is. Oh, no, brother. That ain't it. Yeah, that ain't it? You know, this is more than 14 by 14. 14 more points than the Chicago Bears, who, you know, everyone just makes fun of all the time and mostly for good reason. The Giants have been outscored by 14 more points than the bears. So somebody has to take the, I mean, you mentioned you think Joe Shane has done a good job. I mean, like I was going back and forth during this game. And they've had some injuries. Don't get me wrong. They had at least a, you know, a couple offensive linemen out, including Andrew Thomas, but the offensive line stinks. You look at the past, I remember thinking going into the season, this is what they did with this past catching group. Like, these are all the upgrades.

that they've made to this group? Like, that's not enough from last year. Defensively, tonight they were pretty good, but during the whole season, they haven't been very good there. So you just look at it, it's like talent deficit, not well coached, not well prepared, from a front office perspective,

not managed well. And there aren't many teams that I would say their fan base feels like as different as maybe a Giants fan does from the end of last season to where you are through four weeks into the season. I mean, is there another fan base that kind of probably feels as differently

about their team and their organization? I don't know. It would be a short list for sure, I think. Bears, some Bears fans for sure, I think, are there. Bengals fans, but like, is it true stuff? I mean, yeah. Bengals fans, you're saying, all right, this might be our year from hell, but we, like, long term, it's different.

I have another fan base that I will, a page as one such fan base, but that's for a later take. That's called foreshadowing their shield, a whole podcasting tool. keep the listeners engaged. All right. Catch that.

There you go. All right. So that's the Giants. I'm glad you. I do think the Giants were the story tonight in this game. Real quick, let's just give the Seahawks some credit. I mean, Devon Witherspoon. What a night.

Shield, I'm going to tell us to you, you're probably going to make fun to me. I don't care. I started going back and just watching Illinois highlights of Devon Winterspoon in the middle of this game. I just clicked him up, found him on YouTube. Nice seven-minute compilation. Stepping down, hitting on screens, making sacks, the hawk in the ball and cover two. As fun of a player to watch as there is in the league already.

Just what a joy. He's got such, such vibes. He's such a fun corner. Love Witherspoon. Three QB hits, two sacks, had the pick six, seven tackles. I mean, he was everywhere in this game. I mean, this Seahawks defense has not been a great defense. That's another thing.

If you're a Giants fan, you're like, should, we gave up 10 sacks to them? Like, what's going to happen when we face some really good pass rushes here? So their defense came up, came up. came up big tonight. Seattle offensively, it was an uneven performance. Gino Smith gets injured, goes out, comes back in the game. They really didn't need to do a whole lot

offensively here, but they were very good offensively through the first three weeks of the season. So hopefully Gino is fine, and they keep rolling. I was panicking about this team after week one, and since they've won three in a row, they're three and one. They just want to kind of be in the mix here. They've won the last

two games here by a total of 31 points, not good teams. The Panthers and the Giants, but still they beat the lions before that. So, yeah, you're feeling good as long as Gino is healthy there if you're a Seahawks fan. And I tell you, I understand the front seven is not a particularly terrifying group. Bobby Wainer, I had like 20 tackles today, I think. Bobby just eaten in the middle of the defense. Love it for the old fella.

So I gather the front seven is not that great. Offensive line injuries, right? They had more injuries in this game. There's rotating starters in there. So, like, right now this isn't true, but really, I still believe this. I believe this in summer. I believe it still now.

This is not going to be the sort of team that you're going to want to play in January. Like they're, they're an offense that can just dump 35 on you when they're hitting, right? And that's running and throwing the football, right?

They have explosive running game. They have multiple tight end sets. And then they have enough wide receiver talent and Gino's good enough to spread and shred you. And then defensively, they're not perfect, but they make plays, man. I mean,

that secondary really has. Yeah. Yeah. That secondary has the talent to like flip a game by, by getting a, by getting a turnover, by making some stops, by being real sticky. Like, I get, like, Seahawks are far from a perfect team.

There's ways to beat them. They're well documented. You run the football in this team, no problem. But, this is the sort of team that when we get to January, it's just like, their peak games are really, really, really tough to stop. They have some impressive playmakers. They're going to be hard out, but when we get to playoff football, I believe that. Yeah, they can win in different ways.

Jamal Adams came back tonight and then left. We don't know what his status is going to be. Yeah, they're down, I mean, in this game, They're down three offensive line starters. So if you're a Giants fan saying, hey, you didn't get, you didn't talk enough about how we were injured on the offensive line. The Seahawks were literally down three offensive line starters in this game. And they still win that game by three touchdown. So credit to them.

All right. My first take here, Benjamin, I was joking with you before. I formulated this take. I got it already. And then I looked. I said, I went on the ringer.com. We'll check out Ben's column, the hot read. Everyone check it out every Monday morning.

They said, oh, Ben, Ben agrees with me on this take. Ben pretty much had the exact same take. But listen, I got to talk about it anyway. And that's that this is the best version of Josh, Josh Allen we've ever seen. I know Nora and Stephen talked about this game on dual threat, but I was like, I got to talk about this game. Because the bills come into the season, we do that show after Bill's Jets Monday Night Football Week 1, it leaves kind of a bad taste in your mouth when you think about Buffalo in their 20, 23 season. And after that, no one's really paying much attention. They got to deliver beat downs to the commanders and the Raiders,

but, you know, no one's really paying too much attention to those games. And then they had this marquey matchup against Miami on Sunday afternoon in Buffalo. And really, if you look at since that Jets game, to me, I think Josh Allen has been the best player in football. You look at what this team has done since that first game. And on Sunday, it was a blend of the conversation. How many times have we had it at this point? 17, like the version of Josh Allen, the style, what we want to see, what's the most effective

Josh Allen. This is definitely a topic that comes up a lot because the bills have been a really good team. And it's, well, should he, you know, be taking more of the layups and taking what the defense gives him or no, should he just be doing Josh Allen things? Because that's where he thrives. This was like the beautiful blend. Like if you're Sean McDermott, if you're Ken Dorsey and you're drawing up, how exactly

do we want it to look? At least that's how I felt. I'm curious to hear how you feel. not how you feel about it. I felt it was a nice blend of take the layups, make the easy throws, and then also do the Josh Allen stuff. Like at first I thought the theme was going to be, he's doing all the easy stuff, Ben, and then they had the drive where he's handing the, he hands the ball off to James Cook. They nearly fumble it. And then he decides, you know what, I'm just going to do an impromptu tush push on James Cook. And I'm just going to get

low here and try to charge him into the end zone. Not many quarterbacks you see in the NFL. doing that. He's got that. He's got the improv touchdown to Stefan Diggs. He's got the 48-yard completion to James Cook down the right sideline where Tony Rome was literally yelling, throw it away. And Josh Allen's like, no, thank you. I'm just going to keep this baby alive and come up with a 48-yard completion. So right now, Josh Allen is completing 74.8% of his passes. I mean, do you remember the accuracy issues this man had coming into the league? It's unbelievable. It's unbelievable. This is, we've never seen anything like this. This would break Drew Breez's. I'm not saying he's going to maintain it. If he did, it would literally break Drew Breezes record for completion

percentage from 2018. This is 11 percentage points higher than last year and higher than his career average. And then you kind of zoom out and you look at this Bill's team based on all the advanced stats. This is easily the best Bill's offense we've seen. Now it's a four game sample. EPA per drive, they're scoring 33 points per game. They've scored 37. or more in three straight games. This is a team to be reckoned with. I think Josh Allen is obviously at the heart of it. He does more, I think, for his offense than maybe any other player in the NFL.

And I thought that was kind of just to steal a word from Pete Carroll since the Seahawks one tonight. Just a beautiful illustration of what Josh Allen can be. I know you agree because you wrote about it. Yeah. So I couldn't agree more talking about that blend, right? That idea of you got to let the Bronco buck. That's what makes Josh Allen special. I like that.

See, you got a way with words for a young fellow. You paid attention. Where does this vocabulary come from? I'm sorry to get sidetracked. But I need to know. Like, were you like 12 and just throwing this stuff out? I mean, did you study it in school? Did you read?

Like, where does this tremendous vocabulary come from? I appreciate that. I was literally about to give credit because my old podcast and co-host of many, many years ago, also bald. Michael Kist was a big fan of saying letting the Bronco buck. And the thing for me is, like, I just love the way things sound. And so when someone says something cool, I collect that, I keep that, and I integrate it. Like, I just, I have so many, like, down-southy, folksy idioms, and I'm just not from there at all.

But they just sound so cool that I just steal them. I just straight graft them, which is not good. It's appropriation. But it's fun how it sounds. So, yeah, you got to let the Bronco block. When I wrote about Josh Allen for the hot reading of the column, I wrote about bottled light. I wrote about bottled lightnings. That's what it is, right?

It's saying, like, we know this guy's always going to have this explosive potential. He's always going to have, at any time, he could rip off a play that nobody else in the league except for 15 could rip off. And that play is going to keep us alive for life forever. That's going to give us an advantage that nobody else has. But we can't ask him to do it on every play because the cost is too great, right? It's too dangerous. It's too explosive. There's risk.

There's consequence. You brought up the play where Allen's running to his right, James Cook on the wheel down the sideline. Tony's saying throw it away, throw it away, throw it away. and he throws it to cook and it's an explosive gain. There's a play, a few plays after that one where Alan's scrambling out of his pocket, out of the pocket to his left. He has a potential throw into the end zone. They're at about like the 25, 30.

And he's moving to his left. You'd have to flip his hips. There's a sinking defender. And you can watch him think about it. Think about it. Think about it. And then just tuck the football and get the second and eight. And that play for me was like, yes.

Because I came on this podcast after that week one Jets game. so inflamed, so impassioned about being like, Josh, just don't do this. There's just no need for you to play this way. And I came down hard on him and I was frustrated because I knew that he could do this. Right? That's what it was. It's like there's a lot of, I've seen a lot of stuff after this Dolphins game of people in the media and people in the NFL being like, Arbery wrote off Josh Allen after the Jets game week one.

We didn't write him off. We came down on him because he's not supposed to behave this way. and we know when he behaves better, it's the coolest thing in the world. It's the best offense in the league. It's record-setting stuff. It's high standard because you can achieve really really incredible things.

This game was an example of that. On throws of less than 20 air yards, Josh Allen was successful in this game on over 80% of his dropbacks. The highest mark of a single game in his career by 10 percentage points. The offense has never been better in structure in the short-to-intermediate area of the field.

than it was against the Dolphins, which is an enormous credit to Ken Dorsey, who I think is doing an excellent job getting quick, easy stuff open right away, and also an enormous credit to Josh Allen, who is taking it. He is not denying it. He's not going to big game hunting. He's saying, if Dalton Kincaid is going to turn around in the softstop between zones

for six yards, I'm going to take it. We're going to get the second or four. If he does that the rest of the way, he's the leader in MVP odds right now and right, so I can't stand the whole L. Everybody wrote out. Like, we talk about what happened every week in the NFL. Like, sometimes you're,

going to say something and they kind of everybody settled down with the everyone wrote off somebody. But no, that's, that's well said. Bills are plus 84 through four games. That's tops in the NFL. And listen, I'm not saying we've never seen Allen have games that good before we have. I mean, we all remember that playoff game against the Patriots, the playoff game against the Chiefs. Like, man, he is building quite a resume of just individual, like some of the greatest performances you will see from a quarterback. This one was a little bit different. And also, I think, think it wasn't just one game. Like, this has been a stretch now of three games.

So I think there's still going to be games this season where we'll say, oh, okay, well, they probably didn't need to do that. But overall, if you're a Bill's fan, especially after that first game, you have to just feel like, sorry everyone's bored with us, but guess what? We might win the Super Bowl this year. We're contenders once again. We're one of the best teams in the NFL once again, and our quarterback is playing great. All right.

Take a break. We'll come back and we'll get to your second take. All right. We are back on extra point taken. Benny Souls, what do you got? What's your second take of the night? As I said in our giant section, I think there's a fan base that expectations before the season, into the season are recalibrated. That fan base is the Rams.

And I think that I'm willing to say four weeks into the season, successful season for the Rams, win. Great stuff. We won. Good season. Everything else is coasted. It's all cake on top. Here's why, Sheel, because you and I were doing bold predictions. for the NFL season like two months ago.

No, no, no, let's not bring these up. That never happened. Move on. And all we all wanted to talk about, because it's the most fun thing to talk about, is where Sean McVeigh was going to be employed in 2024. Sean McVeigh very openly flirted with the idea of retirement off of the Rams' Super Bowl season following 2021 and into the 2022 season, where the Rams really sucked. They were really bad. It was that good.

And Matthew Stafford, who was 35 years old, had back issues. and he had elbow issues and all the talent was leaving. And as McVeigh, he's talked about this, but again, like he said these things. It's not reading between the lines. He has been explicit about this. McVeigh was losing and hated it and didn't know what to do with himself. Just didn't make feel good.

Like his general life experience was a negative one. Entering this season, he was, you know, viewing the job with renewal. It was reinvigorated and was ready to change his paradigm of NFL coaching to like not just if I win a Super Bowl, all be happy. It's like, I need to be happy doing this without like a Super Bowl potential. But as beautiful of an idea as that is, I was really worried entering the year. I think many Rams fans were very worried entering the year that the Rams are just going to lose a lot of games. I gave out on this pod, Rams under six and a half wins for the season. And that Sean McFey was going

to hate that, and that Aaron Donald was going to retire, and that Matthew Stafford's body was going to continue to deteriorate. And McVeyer was going to be gone. And the Rams are going to be left holding the bag. The Rams are all right. This is pretty cool. I've been We're like, are the Rams the best team in league? No, they're going to make the playoffs? Probably not. The Rams' offense is working. Matthew Stafford right now is 8th in league and expect the points out of or drop back. 11th is success rate.

Sixth, an explosive play rate. And critically, like, a lot of the McVeigh stuff is what's going on great here, right? They stole some of the Dolphins motion and they're using that in creative ways. Tutu Atwell, who like, they could not get Tutu Atwell started the first couple years of his career. He's finally hit for them, right? And that was a big, like, Sean McVeigh pick, like speed threat. we're going to start to kind of change the way that this offense works. He's had 1197, 57, 50, and 24 yards in four games, which 24 yards is not a big deal.

Those other three marks are like all career bests for to do Able. He's had as good of a start of the season you could ask for. Everybody knows everything there is to know about Pukunakua. Don't need to go into him that much. Kiron Williams, right? Again, there's like a late round draft pick for them. He's been a bell cow back. Steve Avila, the second round picket guard.

Plug him in there. He's starting. Like the Rams young talent has picked up the bags that were dropped by the departing talent. And this offense works. Matthew Stafford, dude. Stafford looks like the guy we saw two seasons ago. Stafford looks like he can play a few more years.

He's playing as well as he has previously. Defensively, they're kind of still making everything up. That's how you give up a 23-point lead to the Indianapolis Colts. And it goes in overtime 23, 23, and Stafford has to have heroics late to win it in overtime. But guess what? You still win that game, and it feels amazing. The locker is going crazy and there's chanting Bukin'aku and you're giving a game ball to the rookie. The vibes around the Rams.

It's like after that Cooper Cup injury and the preseason man, the vibes down the Rams are terrifying. This team's going to walk out. They're going to be 0 and 4. The opposite line's going to break Matthew Stafford and they're going to be left with no direction, no compass. It's a total waste. It could not possibly be further from the truth.

I love the vibes around the Rams right now. It seems like Sean McVeigh has reinvigorated this offense. The young talent has stepped up to the plate. And hey, guess what? They've got a first round pick in the 2024 NFL draft. Can you believe it? Yeah, how about it? We are out here making picks, baby.

We're going to get some more talent in the building. I'm thrilled for the Rams. This has been an awesome thing to see. As a fan of Stafford, as a fan of McBays, this team's arrow is pointed up in a big way. Stafford's throw... I did not think Stafford would be able to throw the ball like this at 35 years old.

If you would have told me, Cooper Cup's going to be out for the first four weeks of the season, and this team would be fourth and six offensive success rate. Fifth, in EPA, a top five offense. By any metric you look at, I mean, they hung 460. 67 yards and 27 first downs on the Colts on Sunday. So yet their offense really, you know, like they played against the Niners in week two.

They were in that game late. They had the weird game against the Bengals where their offensive line gets banged up in the middle of the game and they can't really protect Matthew Stafford. They were great in week one against the Seahawks. They were great here in week four against the Colts. Now, it is a long season. And Matthew Stafford did suffer what it looks like I'm reading Jordan Roderig. on the athletic right now. And it looks like he's expected to participate in some capacity in practice this week,

per Jordan, and play in Sunday's game. Now we know Matthew Stafford plays through, like, everything. I mean, I'm trying to think of quarterbacks who have played through more in their, you know,

in their careers than Matthew Stafford. Having said that, we'll see what it looks like. I mean, he literally, like, couldn't move on that leg for part of that second half. It really should not have gone to overtime.

They were kind of just throwing away. way possessions there. He had a play where he's dropping back and he literally like it looked like the leg gave out on him and he just trips and kind of takes a sack there in the second half. Now, you're right. He comes back. He makes plays an overtime. Throws the Pukua for the game winning touchdown. But yeah, that's going to be certainly something to keep an eye on. Is this an injury that all of a sudden we're having a conversation here in week eight, week nine, oh man, it's a shame that that, you know, Matthew Stath, kind of like what we're having with Burrow right now, that it's a shame that Matthew Stafford's injury has been lingering.

They had such a great first four weeks. He hasn't looked the same since. So we'll see. I'm hoping like you are that he's healthy, that he continues to play well. Cooper Cup coming back, going to practice this week. So I think you're right to kind of shout out the Rams.

I mean, it has been a very impressive start to their season, specifically offensively, and to me, a very unexpected start to their season. All right. My second take, Benjamin. I want to welcome two coordinators to the More With Less Club.

You're probably tired of hearing me talk about it. If people listen to the show often, they're tired of hearing me talk about it when it comes to coach. Now, I might need you for like a good name for this. Is this like club MWL? Is this the MWL? I don't know. There's got to be young minds at work figuring yourself. I am positive.

I know who the two coordinators are. Okay. Well, let me just explain the notion here. And you know what? I'm going to say, like, if I could bet on Fanduel that you're going to get them right, I think I would bet a lot of money because I do think you're going to get them right. Now, for listeners who don't know what I'm talking about, my basic premise when it comes to evaluating coaching is simple. Are you maximizing the talent at your disposal? I like to look at the players. I like to look at who's healthy. I like to look at how the pieces fit. Then in my mind, I go, well, how would this group look with, say, an Andy Reid or a Kyle Shanahan? What would they be getting out of them?

What are you getting out of them? And then, you know, I might go, I'm not going to throw any, you know, bad coaches under the bus. But then I think to some bad coaches, what would this terrible coach be doing with this group? And where does the actual coach land? So I've got two coordinators who I think are unquestionably doing more with less through the first four weeks of the season. And I'm not going to give any more hints since Solek was so confident. And I'm confident in him. You know, he podcasts with me 17 hours a week.

I think he should be able to get this. What do you got? Drew Patsing for the Cardinals Correct Bobby Slovak for the Texans Come on now That might that predicts All right next week

I'm calm coming to the table With some more unpredictable things Just come with a great milk toast Like Patriots Patriots take just average whatever Yeah Matt can no it's Matt Canada

And Bill O'Brien You're incorrect I just wanted to make you feel good Just watching the games On Sunday I was like I couldn't believe My, I mean, Drew, let's start with Drew Petsig.

Okay, Cardinals offensive coordinators was with the Browns and Kevin Stepanski before that was with the Vikings. You say, Sheal, are you really like gassing up this guy whose team scored 16 points, which they did. The Cardinals lost the 49ers, 35 to 16. However, if you watch that game, the Cardinals offense was keeping them in that game. That was the worst defensive performance by any team this season, according to EPA per drive. The Cardinals defense gave up five touchdowns on six possessions. The Cardinals' offense only had the ball seven times. 23 first downs, 362 yards.

This is with Josh Dobbs, James Connor, Hollywood Brown, Michael Wilson, Zacherts. This was a 21-16 game in the third quarter here. Through four games, Ben. The Cardinals are eighth in EPA per drive. They're better than the Eagles, the Chiefs, the Ravens, the Lions. Now, stats don't tell you everything, but still, if you were to tell me that with this group, that's going to be performing like a top 10 offense through the first four weeks of the season. I would have said it no way. I thought this was going to be the worst offense in the entire NFL. And you kind of just watch how they do it. Like you can tell it. I mean, they're scheming stuff up. They're using Dobbs as a runner. They're getting creative here. And so I think Petzig, who is somebody I knew nothing about, I still, you know, kind of know very little about is doing a phenomenal job. when Kevin Sofansky was hot in Cleveland, petting was hot.

And then as is typically the case, when Sifansky grew cool, Petsing grew cool. But he's another one of that long lineage of guys who got thrown to a tight end coach so that way they could just learn off like run blocking and passing game, which is one of my favorite things in the world.

I want to do a story on it so badly. Anytime a guy is like really smart, like making the tight ends coach, that way he can help us out in both phases of the offense. Yeah, yeah. So that's where Petson came from. But yeah, I didn't have this in my range of outcomes for Drew,

even though I kind of, I knew the name. I didn't think we were getting this. So you got that. Then you got Bobby Sloick, who, again, somebody I really don't know a lot about either. He came over with D'Amico Ryans from the 49ers, takes over Houston.

The Texans, 451 yards and 24 first downs in that win against the Steelers. And this one is one of those where you just watch the game, and you're like, oh, baby, he's scheming stuff up. I mean, their screen game is nice. Their package play game is nice, where you're seeing C.J. Stroud is under, and then he just, bam, takes it and throws the screen when the corner's off. You got that going.

There was a stretch in this game, Ben, where Steelers had a fourth and one. Disasterous play. Kenny Pickett gets sacked. I think it was the play where Kenny Pickett actually gets injured. Texans get the ball back, and they go half-back pass for the touchdown. And it was just like right there, I'm just thinking, what would Bobby Sloick be doing with the Steelers offense? What would Matt Kennedy be doing with this Texans offense?

I mean, that's how my mind thinks whenever I'm, yeah, you, what do you, like, if Bobby Slovak had this dealer's offense, they're at least a mediocre offense, right? Yeah, George, you're putting George Pickens in the Nigo Collins role. You're putting Calvin Austin into the tank dial role. Deonti Johnson, when he's healthy, is in the Robert is in the Robert Woods role. None of those are perfectly one-to-one. It's great for George Pickens, right? The blocking ability and then the catcher run over the middle of the field, that 70-yard post that he housed a couple of a couple weeks ago. I think it was against the Raiders.

That's the sort of route that Nico Collins is dominating on Collins' 5th in league right now in overall receiving yards. Calvin Austin's not exactly tankedell, but it's an 80% sort of a thing. I'm fine with that. And then Pickett, I don't know if Pickett would be as good at the offensive Stroudwood. That would be the change for me.

Straub's been a better player. There's no doubt without it. But it maps pretty nicely. That's why my first thought was like, ooh, I kind of like that. And then, yeah, Matt Canada, we're in charge of the Texans. He just be running Nico Collins down the field on vertical routes and deep comebacks and have no idea how to maximize the guy. Yeah, I mean, the Texans right now are 13th in EPA per drive,

and you might say 13th, why are you bragging about this guy? With a rookie quarterback, with the offensive line injuries they've had, like, that is not easy to do. Yeah, it's not easy to do. And you mentioned Nico Collins, leads the NFL in yards after the catch, 195 yards, and like you mentioned, fifth in receiving yards here. So I'm just very impressed with both these guys. Again, these are not household names.

These are not guys that I, really knew a lot about coming into the season, but I've been impressed with both of them. I'm trying to come up with what the rules are for this club, Ben. Like, should this, there should, there should, this is a probationary period. Like, you don't get welcomed in and have like a lifetime, um, membership to the more with less club. I think basically I can kick you out at any time. But for now, we welcome these two into the club.

I think it's just like, you know, like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, these are the guys that she'll has identified. Like, they know this is a X-Point taking listeners will come with something better than Shil Shack. It sounds a little ominous, we'll be honest. But these are the guys that we've identified as, hey, like, these cats are it. Like, the guys Shills have his eyes on, and accordingly in a year, they'll be household names. Or in a year, there'll be disasters, by the way, which that also happens.

You dropped a Nico Collins, Tankdale. I didn't know anything about these guys. I tried to tell you, Sheel. I tried. I tried. My Nico Collins preseason stock just selling three. the roof right now. I love it. I need to go back and listen to the specifics of that conversation.

I did a rip you for saying the Texan supporting cast was good. I'm still not sure how good they are. Nico Collins has looked fantastic. If you were on the record with that, then I will give you credit for that. But other than that, I'm still looking at it going, wow, they are doing more with less. That's why it's the more with less club. So nice job out of both those guys. All right.

What do you have for your third take? Brock Purdy is playing well enough that the 49ers come in the Super Bowl. the question with Jimmy Garapolo at the helm of this offense every single year was okay like the Niners defense is great and the Niners weapons are great and the Niners running game is great

and the Niner's running game is amazing but can Jimmy do it? Can Jimmy get through three playoff games and not be a problem for this team? Can they win it with Jimmy? And I was always like yeah maybe like Jimmy was like right on the border for me

of like that he's enough But I don't like how I feel watching him play in the Super Bowl, you know. Brock, I, I'm there where with how Brock's played to start this season. And now we've seen it over the course of almost 10, or was it, 11 starts now, I think it is. This is becoming really, really viable for me. Niners fans got pissed off at me because I said in my column this week that Brock Bertie's playing the best football of his career. he's still a Kyle Shanahan puppet, but he's turning down some of the mistakes.

And they were like, wow, no credit for Brock. And I was like, I said he's playing the best football of his career, man. It's not my fault that is how Kyle treats his quarterbacks. The major thing to highlight for Brock ending last season and moving into this season is this. He's continued to stay aggressive. In 2023, he's had an average time to throw of 2.44 seconds through four games. That's below his average in 2022, which is 2.77.

The thing that made Brock really noticeable and different, in the 2022 season was that he immediately walked in and was willing to be more of a gamer than Garoppola was. He broke the pocket more. He scrambled more. He was more aggressive pushing down the field. After his first start against the Buccaneers last season, he had as many touchdowns throwing outside of the numbers,

20 yards down the field than Jimmy had in like three years with the 49ers. Niners fans always like to do this whole like, oh, people accuse Brock of being a checkdown merchant. I'm sure some people have. At first, I definitely thought he was just going to be like a Jimmy Garoppolo iteration, but he really has never been that. He's always been willing to push the ball down on the field and be aggressive. And so you have to start this season now, 20-23, you have, they had, he had four pass

stamps of at least 20-plus yards against the Rams. He had three pass-dems of at least 20-plus yards against the Giants against the Cardinals. He had only one, but it was a pretty easy game for him. He's remained pushing the ball down the field, but the time to throw has gone down. So now we have a player who's retained the gamer aspect. He's retained the aggressive aspect. while also speeding up his process within the offense, while also still like looking even a little bit more Shanahany

and that he lanes on the back foot and just drives this thing. So he was making a lot of these gamer plays in 2022, but you were worried about how that would process, given the fact that he's not a huge player and he's not a great tackle breaker and he's quick, but he's not really fast. Well, lo and behold, he's done that important thing,

kind of that Tuatunga-esque thing, where he's pushing the ball down the field while also dropping the time to throw. It's the unstoppable thing. Like when you can have a quarterback with a low time to throw on a high A dot, that's when you're pitching with just ultimate gas. And then, like I said, in the article, he's pushing down, in my opinion, on the mistakes, right? He still throws an interceptable pass or to a game, but the inaccuracy

rate is down a little bit. And the interceptable pass rate is also down so far to start this season. He seems like he's understanding a little bit better what he can and can't get away with, which totally makes sense for a guy who, like I said, hasn't been about a full season yet of starting games. Brock is emphatically better in this version of this office. than Jimmy was in his version. It's a little bit apples oranges because with Debo plus Iuke plus McCaffrey, it's even friendlier now than it was back in the day.

So it is Apple's orange, just a little bit unfair to Jimmy. But I feel stronger that Brock has the ability to create plays, win with aggressiveness, do a little bit more outside of structure in this system than Jimmy did. And that has me really believe in, like, yeah,

this guy can be enough that if the Niners end up in a Super Bowl run, I'll have the faith in him to make the plays that Jimmy wouldn't have made. I mean, their offense is just humming. Like, for a 20 for 21 performance, I don't know that any could get like less pub than Brock. I mean, he went 20 for 21 in that game.

Yeah. Like, wait, what? No, no, that's not something that happens. He had a completion percentage of over 95%. And in games in which a quarterback has at least 20 attempts and a completion percentage of at least to 90%, Brock Purdy has the record for Addot at 8.6 yards. So among games in which you had insanely high completion rate,

no quarterback through the ball downfield more in those games. You're just seen like six yards, five yards, four yards, rock through it eight and a half yards down the field. That's like an average to above average day for an NFL quarterback on any given Sunday. So the fact that they're pulling off that level of completion while not sacrificing anything for aggressiveness is just, again, it's the holy grail. If you can pull that off, you're unstoppable. Yeah, that was the best offensive performance by any team this season.

Like I mentioned earlier, if you just look at the drives they had and what they did with those drives. I mean, they have looked like an unstoppable offense. There's no doubt about it. The mistake thing that you mentioned there, that's the one where if I'm like, all right, what's the thing I'm keeping an eye on that we could be having a different conversation for five weeks from now? Like, there have been games here and there. I'm not saying it's every game.

I'm not saying other quarterbacks don't have, you know, interceptable passes that aren't intercepted. I'm not saying that he's doing it 10 times a game or anything like that. But I think that's something at least worth keeping an eye on when he's, you know, facing great defenses, by the way. a huge matchup this week, week five, 49ers Cowboys. So we will learn something about both those teams in that game. But yeah, I mean, the thing has always been,

and I know you're saying you kind of believe the ceiling is higher with Purdy than Garapolo. I don't know that I view it as significantly different. I mean, I thought they could win a Super Bowl with Garoppolo. They were there. They were right there in the fourth quarter and didn't do it. I mean, the question, and I think 49ers fans feel one way and everybody else usually feels a different type of way, is just that, like, is Brock Purdy a top five quarterback in the NFL? I think you and I would probably both say no.

Statistically, it's actually like very easy to make, but you could have done that with Garapolo. And so my thing was always, well, can the offense perform at a top five level with this player at quarterback? And the answer was yes with Garapolo. The answer is yes with Purdy. I agree with you that the offense in this stretch right now probably looks better that it did at any point with Garoppolo.

like you said, is that because, well, they've got all these guys healthy. They've got McCaffrey. I don't know. But, you know, we probably like, there's probably just a Kyle Shanahan fatigue. And, you know, I'm generally part of the person saying I have Kyle Shanahan fatigue. But my goodness, like talk about him. I don't even know if he fits in them more with less coach because they're very talented, obviously. But still, you're not operating with Patrick Moehm's or Josh Allen.

And you have, you know, what the first or second best offense here in the NFL. So it's been impressive. Kyle Posey, who's a writer for Niners Nation, and is a good 49ers follow. After the Steelers game, he had a great tweet where he was like, Brock Pretty being a doubles hitter instead of a singles hitter is what's elevating the Steelers offense. And I really like the way that's framed. I like that.

Jimmy would just drop back and just take the singles, take the easy stuff, throw it to where Kyle told me to do. Brock's still doing that, but there's a little more zing on it, right? There's a little more, hey, like, yeah, like Debo's open on the drag. but you know who's also open on the post 20 yards down the field? Ayuk, and we're going chucked this thing. Now, I mean, there's a play that, like, Niners' Twitter's going nuts over that brought, like, this huge throw that he threw to Iuk and double coverage down the middle of the field.

That's just objectively an inaccurate throw in a bad decision. That, like, Niners fans like, this is incredible. Brock's still getting away with stuff that he would not be able to get away with everywhere else. Ayuk, by the way, talking about contract year. Ayuk's on pace for, like, 1900 yards right now. He is living. Iuke's playing better ball than he's ever had.

So the glut of weapons, the Cali-Shan end of everything, the fact that they can just hand the ball off and pick up five yards, like Brock gets away with a lot of stuff, but still, he's a doubles hitter instead of a singles hitter. And that elevation right there has me buying this more than I bought those Jimmy Garoppel offenses. How do you keep track of what all these, like, Niners' Twitters going nuts about this? Bears' Twitter is saying this.

Like, do you have a spreadsheet? Are you updating the daily? Or are you just scrolling? Like, what is happening? Here's what happens, Sheel, when your policy isn't, Let me go into my little hidey hole, not talk to anybody else who works at the ringer and then pop out with my tapes, which is how you do it. Yes, how dare you? I'm a wonderful colleague and teammate.

Every single Sunday, every single Sunday, we have to 1259 p.m. Eastern and she goes, excellent, the football games. And like powers off his phone, puts in a drawer and shuts it. So you're like, pay attention to the games. What happens, She'll? Me and Stephen, that's a compliment. Me and Steven are just constantly sending clips and tweets back and forth to another like, did you see this? Did you see that? Look at this. Look at that. And that you get the cross-pollination of it all. Okay. Well, I do do what you said. I actually put the phone

face down there on my table and I watch the games and I take my notes and I formulate my takes. Chill, you got to get in the group chats, buddy. No, no, no, the extra point taken listener. You're getting my stuff fresh. No one's seeing it on a text, on a slack thread, anything like that. You're getting it before anybody else. I started tweeting about my extra point. today and then I was like, oh, shoot, I better stop because she'll make fun of me if he sees this. That's right. See? Good job out of you. All right. Take a break. I'll come back with my third take. All right. We are back on extra point taking now. I don't want you to take this as a shot. I've gotten 700 things wrong about the season. This is not a shot. I actually think this is something that we need to discuss. And it's a falcons take. I know. I know this is, well, I just don't know how much long Arthur Smith can stick with this.

Desmond Ritter here. I mean, you look at it. Some of the stuff was very troublesome in that Sunday morning London game. Not only Ritter's play, which has not been good at all. He's been by any metric, really one of the worst quarterbacks in the NFL 33rd out of 34 in EPA per pass play. He was a disaster in that game against the Jaguars. He was a disaster the week before against the Lions. The offense, this is the most important thing. It kind of goes to that 49ers discussion. Like, we can deal with a quarterback who might not be playing at an elite level if the offense still works. And I think that's what a lot of people thought with this Falcons offense coming into the season, that Ritter, no one was saying really Ritter is going to be a great quarterback.

It was that Ritter can be competent enough for this falcons offense to work. And that was a reasonable take, given what we saw last year with Marcus Mariotto, but it hasn't worked this year. They're worst by any metric you want to look at. They've scored six and seven points in back-to-back games. Like if this was a thing on Fandul before the season, that this offense coordinated by Arthur Smith with Bejohn Robinson being amazing

and still have Kyle Pitts and Drake London, we're going to score six and seven points and back-to-back games. I mean, no one's making that bet. And so I look at not only the way he played, but there was the little clip that got captured of him going up to Mack Hollins on the sideline, you know, after he overthrows,

or I think underthrew him on the play there, goes up, tries to give him a high-five, and Matt Hollins is just like not having it. So I'm looking at all this stuff together. And normally my take would be, it's only four weeks, chill out. They're two and two. He's a young quarterback. Give him time.

But I also don't know exactly what the motives are for this Falcons team. Like, is it make the playoffs this year? Because we've been seven and ten in back-to-back seasons. Because if that's like the number one objective, I can easily make a case that you give Taylor Heineke a shot here. Is the goal, develop Desmond Ritter? You want to know what he's got so that you have a better. understanding of your quarterback situation at the end of the season,

then obviously that's different than we have your, one of my favorite takes of yours, which is that priority number one for coach. I think you say it for GMs, but it's coaches too, right? Yeah, keep your job. Priority number one is also keep your job. Now, I think Arthur Smith is probably fine there.

It seems like they like him. I think he's a good coach, but this would be three straight seasons without making the playoffs, and they have no quarterback plan for the future. So I'm adding all those things up. We're only four games in. I don't know what the plan is, but I do feel like it's kind of reached a level of, I don't know if panic is the right word.

It's reached a heightened level of concern maybe that I wasn't expecting this early in the season. So where are you with this Falcons team with Desmond Ritter and what Atlanta should do a quarterback? Yeah, Ritter's not playing well enough to keep the job. Like that's along and the short of it. A lot of Ritter's issues on film for me are just he's struggling so much with the pace of the game. and it's weird because it's not always that the game is too fast for him. Sometimes he's too fast for the game where he's like,

you know, play action fake and then there's a dig breaking over the middle of the field. If you just wait for the second window, just clear the linebacker, he's wide open, but Ritter's like, I got to get rid of this ball. Like,

this is when the ball's supposed to be out. So he just tries to throw it right through the linebackers. Like, dude, just, you can actually slow down and be okay. So he's very erratic. And that's where you get like these under-th these overthrows. So often, he's just not playing within like a comfortable rhythm.

He's not playing with a good base underneath him. He's not playing with good eyes because his timing and his tempo is all off, which this offense stresses you out as a quarterback a lot in that regard, just because there's like a high variety of dropbacks, right? You're going from under center and it's five step, and then they have the rollout stuff and they have the naked. It's like a lot in terms of timing and landmarks. It's not like, you know, the offense, the Bengals are running right now,

where she's like, everybody's have a shotgun, three-step drop, like, you're not ever really thinking back there. So it's a lot to put on a young guy. But it's just, it's overwhelming him right now. The water's up to his neck. Now, this is why, like this exact stretch is why I was such a big proponent of starting him last year. It was that instead of London against the Jags being his eighth game, it could have been

his 12th game. And I don't think his 12th game is going to be that much better than his eighth game, but it's more likely to be better than his eighth game, right? You're more likely to start to settle into a place. Because I was banging the drum for him last season because you wanted to get more experience under his belt for this season. You also wanted to have more to see at the end of last season. Again, if you had eight starts out of him instead of four starts,

so you had up to this Jaguar's game of data, you probably would have thought a little bit more about your alternative quarterback options. And that's the thing with Arthur Smith's quarterback management that really interests me. Mariotta got 12 games last season before he got the hook. Remember, the Falcons were bouncing around 500 the entire season. They were bouncing around the division the entire season.

We're four games in a Desmond Ritter. They're bouncing around 500. The Bucks are 3 in 1, but they're still like right there for the division. From a game to game basis, Ritter's been about as bad as Mariotta was, right? Like, you know, you look at expected points out of for drop. Worse statistically, yeah. Yeah. If you look at like explosive play rate, expected points out of dropback, Marioada's higher.

If you look at like success rate, Ritter's a little bit better, whatever. What's the hook? What is the, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what's the approach here? Because is it, are they going to go 12 games with Ritter, get stuck at five and seven? And then throw Taylor Hineke in for the last four games trying to make a playoff push. Like, are they going to just make the same mistake? Because I think like, even as a guy who really endorses Ritter, you probably need to figure out what you got Hinekeye faster so that if he's actually good enough to execute the offense here, you have a chance to push for the playoffs.

All this is probably water under the bridge. They could bench Ritter tomorrow or bench him two months from now. They're still probably getting a different quarterback next year. if not like a Ryan Tannenhill trade deadline acquisition this season, which I'm kind of interested in. So you're probably still going for a different quarterback, and that's where you bring up the keep the job axiom, right? GM Terry Fontenow and head coach Arthur Smith have not yet done the big investment in one quarterback. When you look at the history of coaches and general managers, typically they get one swing to really invest in a quarterback, like a pick in the first 16 picks of the draft. You don't do that in your first couple of years.

You go for the Drake London selection. You go for the Bejohn Robinson selection. That's fine. It's all well and good. But you paint yourself into a corner where it's like, all right, we now have to go make this selection. We now have to trade picks to go make this selection. We have to move resources to go make the selection.

When previously you might have been in a position to do so naturally. And that's where like you only get one crack at this. If you're going to delay it, okay, but you better get it right when you get it right. Otherwise, you know, your clock's going to expire pretty quick. From a personnel management perspective, they've painted themselves into a little bit of a corner. First, with how they brought ridder along and gave him the starting job. And then secondly, with the fact that they're probably going to hang around 500 and not really necessarily be able to go get that premium pick without spending resources.

I like Arthur Smith's offense. I like their scheme, like their X's and O's. A lot of the other stuff that's happened in Atlanta, not a huge fan of. Yeah. I mean, even the like little, you know, and I don't want to blow up the Matt Collins thing because I don't know, I haven't seen anyone write about it and tell me exactly what was happening there. But I did, like, there's a difference. So Hollins was asked about it.

And he did like a what? And they were like when you got like, you had like an emotional moment with Des. And he was like, I had an emotional moment on the sideline with somebody, but wasn't with Des. And he was like, it was a very, it was a very like, oh, what?

And I couldn't tell if he was like, it's pretty good acting. If it's not, I think it's acting. But it was a little ham on top was a little too much. Either way, Mac did a big like, I had an emotional moment,

but I don't think it was with Des. And it's like, yeah, it probably was with Des, man. At the same, you know, regardless of what that was, is like, that's something to keep an eye on. When the quarterback's not playing well and the rest of the team think they're playing well, by the way, if you're Kyle Pitts, you're probably tired of people being like,

you're not doing anything and you're a top pick. If you're Drake London, you're saying, I'm as good as some of these other wide receivers, but I don't have their quarterbacks. So all these things add up. The defense has played actually better than I thought the defense was going to play. They're just kind of a weird team stuck in a weird place. They sign veteran defensive linemen. You think they want to make the playoffs.

They signed Taylor Heinekeets. million dollars per year, which is a big number for a backup quarterback. They pass on all the, you know, they don't want to take a big swing on a quarterback in the draft. They immediately put their name out there when the Lamar stuff comes out that no, we're not interested yet. Do you remember the Deshawn Watson things? The only big quarterback they've really been in on, it seems like here, in the past couple of years was Deshaun Watson. So I don't know what they're going to do, but certainly a situation worth monitoring. Like you mentioned, it's the NFC South, like other than, you know, my Carolina Panthers. Every team's going to

going to be in it probably for a while here. So you're going to be able to convince yourself of stuff, even if your team's not playing great, that you still have a shot. So we'll see what happens there in Atlanta. All right. Benjamin, what do you got for the extra point taken? Yes, Shiel, welcome to spooky season, month of October. We love it. I know this as the month of the NFL trade deadline, October 31st this year. I've always been a big trade deadline fan. Love some rumors, love some theories, love to build some trades. And then, I don't know trade deadline largely has been a disappointing

event. It doesn't reach the NBA trade deadline, not even close. Last season, man, after that deadline, I was like, this is it. This was the one to push us over the edge. And lo and behold, we had Christian McCaffrey to the Niners. Best offense in the league since the trade. Roquan Smith

to the Ravens, top five defense in the league since the trade. Chase Claypool, 32 overall into, we're not inviting him to hang out with the team anymore. I won't comment on why or where he is or who told him what, but he's not allowed to be here any longer. Great trade. We had T.J. Hawkinson, that was a big deal. A lot, right? Last year's trade deadline was amazing. So I'm already preparing. I'm envisioning. I am getting prepped for this year's trade deadline. I want to toss some of my initial looks your way

and get a reaction, get a gauge, get a feel for some of them. See, this is why you're like a content king, October 3rd. and we're doing this. I mean, we got, I like it. Listen, I'll do trade talk anytime. So go ahead. Hit me with it. I like it.

We want to be ahead of the other podcasts on this. We've got some one in three teams. We've got some O and four teams. And we've got some clear contending teams that have some problems. Listen, I know for, like, I know for a fact, the phone's already ringing. Teams are already trying to figure these things out. You want to have the structure of a deal in place in case, you know, the Raiders stay bad. And you're like, hey, remember last time we talked about Devante Adams?

Like, this is how you got to do it. So. Okay, hit me. My favorite one of the thing. the world is Pat Sartan to the Ravens. I know the Broncos have said they're not moving Pat Sartan, I don't care. Pat Sotan goes to the Ravens,

I'm picking them for the Super Bowl. Devante Adams, I had dropped on Twitter today, I was like, Devante Adams, the Detroit Lion, and Packers fans hated it. So I feel great about that. Devante on Detroit, a little outside inside with Avonra Saint-Brown. I think that's delightful.

Another team that interests me for Devonte Adams is the Cowboys. Cowboys still have not really solved their wide receiver 2 problem just yet. Brandon Cook's not necessarily high volume, Michael Gallup, not 100% healthy. It's one to watch. Patriots, Patriots have got to be sellers, right?

I mean, this is bad. Who are they selling? Kendrick Bourne. Okay. Decent cap hit. Don't really use the way it needs to be used. I think Kendrick Bourne being a great chief. Chiefs need a nice little quarterback friendly wide receiver guy. Just move the sticks, kind of soothe the burn there while the young guys figure it out.

Love that. And then Michael and Wenow, I think Michael and Wenu, who's their big starting guard. they've had a bit of a weird relationship with him and his play style and they've made a ton of picks along the interior. I think he's a good candidate for the Ravens. I think that's one to watch out for. Great candidate for the Dolphins as well if the Patriots were willing to go intra-division,

which I'm not sure they are. A few more for you. Get a little spicier at the end. Let's put Kyle Pitts in a Dolphins uniform. Oh, oh, come on. You just want to see where Mike me Daniel lines the guy up. You just want to see where does you put him? I think of it'd be a thrill.

Ryan Daniel to the Falcons Kirk Cousins to the Jets we've already discussed these I think both of those make sense and then last but not least T. Higgins rib fracture this Bengals offense isn't working contract year they have to pay

Jamar Chase I don't I like they don't do contract extensions in season in Cincinnati I don't know if I were T. Higgins I would start making a stink I'll put it to you that way because I don't want to play out the rest of the season taking body shots running five yard slants and putting up no numbers in a contract year.

That's not for me. Whatever's happening for this offense right now, I'd like to leave it a year early than I'm already planning on leaving it. I think T. Higgins would be a good lion. I also think the Panthers, who are in the, who are in the news cycle today saying,

we're in the trade market for a top wide receiver. A very funny thing to say for the team that just traded DJ Moore. How curious, how interesting. I always think the Panthers are a team that makes sense for T. Higgins as well. Those are some of my early, machinations on the trade market.

Okay, I want to go over. So I didn't want to interrupt you. You were on a roll. I like what you're on a roll. I didn't want to interrupt you. So I want to go through some of these real quick because, you know, I wrote the trade value rankings for the ringer before the seasons. I want to get some more use out of this bad.

We are so well equipped for the deadline this year. If it's disappointing, I'm going to be so sad. Oh, I've got, I've got compensation for all of all these guys. Okay. So the most interesting, Pat, Pat, Pat, T, now, what is the Broncos's motivation? is just to let's just see, like, get a haul, our roster stinks, and we need to get as much as we can because I had Pat Sartan as 14 overall in my trade value column. It is rare for a defensive player to net multiple first round picks. Pat Sertan would absolutely, in my opinion, on the open market,

you're starting with a package that includes two first round. So what's the Broncos motivation? Allow me to take you to at P. Sertan 23 on Twitter. Patrick Sertan... Patrick Surtan, the senior, who tweets during the Broncos Dolphins game. God, I missed this. Toiling in the soil, exclamation part, exclamation part.

S&H2, Patrick Trotan wears two. You deserve better. So this is Patrick Chetan, who, by the way, was hired as a defensive assistant with the Dolphins last season. He was working for the team in 2022, 23, watching his son give up 70.

point said, Twilight in the soil, you deserve better. So Sir Tann family gonna get the young man out of Denver. I think that's the move. I mean,

Sur Tann is the type of player that rarely, like pretty much never gets traded. So that would be spicy if you were actually on the market. I mean,

I think best or second best corner in the NFL 23 years old. I would take on all of Russell Wilson's cap and already a Patrick Surtan on my field on my team.

I'll trade you a seventh for Patrick Sertan and Russell Wilson. deal? All right. So that's Patrick Sertan. They actually should trade Devante Adams. I mean, that one is one that like, no, no, this should actually happen.

Like, you're going nowhere. Your team stinks. He doesn't want to be there. Go ahead and trade Devante Adams. Now, Devante Adams is 30 years old. We know what he netted there in that Packers trade. I think you're starting with at least a first round pick for Devonte Adams. When you just look at what wide receivers typically go for.

And by the way, how freaking good Devonte Adams still is. It's like no signs of slowing down. Man, he's somebody who could almost like, you're talking about a guy who could like swing the leak if one of these teams gets Devante Adams. Who did you have him going to, Detroit? I brought up Detroit. Detroit, they're going to get James' back,

but still, like, I don't know how much you buy that. I like that. And then also Dallas, where that, like, after the Amardi Cooper trade was after that for the Raiders to Dallas. I'll just go back to the well, just Jerry Jones. And the Davis family, two old pals just shooting it up, shooting the breeze,

trade in star wide receivers to make the Cowboys better. Why not? Let's do it. I mean, really, the Chiefs should be trading for Devante Adams. Intradivision, so it's tough.

Yeah. Interdivision. But what are the rate, like, what do you care? I mean, I guess you do. I know the rivalry runs deep, but it's like, who's going to give me the most stuff

for this guy? All right. I like Adams a lot. Is it an interdivision trade or is it an intra-division trade? You're actually, you think I'm going to know the answer to that? If you don't know the answer to that? So like, international means between two

nations and intranational means within the nation. Within. I think it's within. I think it's intra. The NFC. West. Versus if it was Devante to the Lions, it would be interdivisional. But also, everybody says interdivisional, and I don't feel like being out on a limb with intra. So this is just, this is my internal conflict being voiced right now. These are the things I worry about. There you go. All right. Who else did we have other than Devante? Who was after Devante Adams? Was there one more who caught my attention there? Yeah, so I had Michael and one knew, Kendrick Bourne. Okay, those are kind of like more brass tacks.

Kyle Pitts to the Dolphins. Yeah. It doesn't do it for you. I feel like we could find a better home for Kyle Pitts where he's going to get a lot of tariff. Not that, not no, not okay, saw your face. Great offense, but you're what, the third most targeted guy there? Like there are some teams that could just feed Carl Pitts.

But your targets are going to be so cool. All touchdowns. I got a lot of Kyle Pitts to the Chiefs. And I get it. like Travis Kelsey plus Kyle Pitts is hilarious. But I think target distribution-wise, it's weird. I don't think Kyle Pitts should be

expected to be a high volume guy at any spot right now. Like he's just, he's the yush. No, but like, look at the model. No, but like look at the model of high value receiving tight ends, right? It's Travis Kelsey's and Mark Andrews. It's

guys who are like 6'4 and they're 240 and they're 245 but they're built like burly, right? Like, that's probably the wrong weight for those guys. They're probably thicker and denser. It's 255, 260. And they're being used more like these, again, it's high volume guys, more in the short intermediate area.

It's quick breaking routes, it's quick turnaround routes and sit within zone. Pitts, you want to legitimately like stretch the field. You want to send this guy down the field. He's at the best one he's running away from dudes. That usage is just, it's not, like, it's what the Giants tried to do with Evan Ingram before the Jaguars figured out Evan Ingram. And so it's, it's harder to achieve. from the tight end position.

So I don't think he's a high volume guy. And that's why I want him in Miami because you're just hitting teams with Tyreek and you're hitting teams with Waddle. And then all of a sudden you get Kyle Pitts on the wheel and they're not ready for it. And it's Kyle Pitts racing a four, six safety. I want to see it. All right. That's pretty fun.

T. Higgins, I think maybe your most interesting one, depending on how like the next two weeks here go for the Cincinnati Bengals. He said he might tough it out and play in week five with a broken rib, which unbelievable. How do you do that? Yeah, fractured rib. Yeah, I'm looking at this ESPN article right now, might try to play with broken rib. Now, if they lose these next two games and you're one in five, and maybe they're just like,

we're going to shut down Burrow for a little bit. We tried to have him battled through. It didn't work out. This is a lost season. And you think you're not going to be able to sign him. Then I think that's something. If you're Cincinnati, you say, all right, who wants to give something up for this guy if he's healthy in a couple weeks?

And, yeah, like Carolina was a good one. I mean, it's just, what is a team going to give up for T. Higgins knowing that he's a free agent at the end of the season? Like, you would almost have to either be able to sign him to an extension right away or be willing to live with that if you're a contending team who are like, we just want to win the Super Bowl and we don't care after that. The Vikings traded like a second and a third for T.J. Hawkinson on a contract year and then gave him a very large contract, which is not necessarily good business. So yeah, like the contract year makes it more challenging, but it's also why you move them if you're the Bengals, right? Because I know the Bengals want Teagan's back to 24, and they're trying to make it work,

and it's probably doable, but it costs a lot in terms of your cap. And I think that if a team comes in and says, hey, instead of waiting for a third round comp pick, maybe, do you want two seconds? And like, to me, like, that's not a bad deal for T. Higgins at all. Like, the Bears traded the first overall pick for DJ Moore. Obviously, they got more stuff back.

John Mac can do two-toos for a player who's better at wide receiver than DJ Moore. Yeah, I'm going to take that. Chase Claypool got the, I mean, we didn't know it was going to be the 30 second overall pick, but we knew it was going to be a number two. Yeah, so that's what you're starting. They knew they were trading their own pick, and they knew what they were doing on the football field, so they knew. Yeah, that's true.

All right, Higgins is a good one. All right, I think we hit on all the big ones there. The quarterbacks are tough. I mean, Tannenhill, they might be in the mix, so I don't know that they're going to be motivated to do something like that. Vikings win a game this last week. They might think, all right, we're still in the mix here. here and finish it with, I saw the text from Mama Solek. Where is Mama Solek on the, I'm excited to watch Zach Wilson's next game,

meter, 10 being I'm all in on him being back, one being probably where you are, that I'm not buying it at all. It was only one game. My mom's just really mad at me that I won't text her and be like, Zach Wilson looked great last night, which that was the best Zach Wilson's looked in ages, but I'm not going to give her the satisfaction. He played really well, yeah. I said it on the pot.

I said it somewhere, where did I say it? Oh, in the column. But I'm not going to text for that. That's what she wants for me. I'm going to make her keep on, you know, bothering me about it. Zach played well, but Zach played well in the way that, like, poor quarterbacks tend to play well, where they just, like, throw some back shoulder stuff, throw some tight window stuff, and the receivers make them right.

I need to see Zach play that game 15 more times before I'm like, oh, we got something here. You know, like, that's, it's going to take a lot to move the needle for me on Zach Wilson. Enjoy it, Jets fans. He gave you something that was a, it's, it's a, it's, it's, Hes the cheese, really hang the bear. Yeah. You know what?

He gave you a night of entertaining football, if nothing else. All right, I think that'll do it. Four extra point taking. Solac, taking us to that. Listen, we're going to be doing like 17 trade deadline things in the weeks ahead. So don't worry. That's just the start. We'll build off of what Solek had right there.

All right. Thank you to Christopher Sutton for producing. Thank you to Eduardo Ocampo for the video production. You can find all that on the Ringer NFL feeds on Solex TikTok. on my Instagram, whatever. Additional production supervision by Connor Nevins and Arjuna, Ramgopal. The next episode will be

dual threat with Nora and Stephen and then Solek and I will be back on Friday to preview week five. All right, everyone, thanks for listening and have a great week. We'll talk to you on Friday. Must be 21 plus and present in select states. Fan duel is offering

online sports wagering in Kansas under an agreement with Kansas Star Casino LLC, gambling problem. Call 1-800 gambler or visit fandul.com slash RG in Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Tennessee, and Virginia. Call 1-800-nextap or text next step to 533442 in Arizona, 1-888-787-9-777. Or visit CCPpG.org slash chat in Connecticut, 1-8009 with it in Indiana, 1-800-5224-7-00, or visit KS gamblinghelp.com in Kansas. 7777-7-7-7-7-0.org in Louisiana, visit MD gamblinghelp.org in Maryland, visit 1-800 gambler.net in West Virginia, or call 1-800-5-224-7-7 in Wyoming. In Wyoming, Hope is here. Visit GamblinghelplineMA.org or call 800-327-50 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts, or call 1-8-7-7-8-Hope-N-Y or text Hope NY in New York.