The Ringer NFL Show - Week 10 Recap: Stroud Outduels Burrow, the Ravens Blow Another Fourth-Quarter Lead, and the Vikings Win Their Fifth Game in a Row | Dual Threat

Episode Date: November 13, 2023

Nora and Steven start their recap of Week 10 with C.J. Stroud leading the Texans past the Bengals. Then, they run through their winners and losers of the week, including the Niners, Ravens, Commanders, and more (22:04). The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming, please checkout theringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Hosts: Nora Princiotti and Steven Ruiz Producer: Isaiah Blakely Social: Eduardo Ocampo Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal and Conor Nevins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey everyone, it's Peter Rosenberg from Cheap Heat. Join me and the fearless, physically large stat guy, Greg, and of course Super Agent 35 under 35 Dipperstein as we tackle the biggest stories in pro wrestling each and every week. To hear us, follow the ringer wrestling show on Spotify or wherever you get your podcast. Stay major and enjoy yourself. I'm Steven Ruiz.

It is week 10. Week 10 Sunday is in the books. We are going to break it all down here. Confession, I think we owe our wonderful listeners. before we get to our headline where we're going to have a really fun conversation about a really exciting Texans Bengals game. Stephen and I are recording. It's currently 1038 Eastern. We've pressed play on our recorders.

The New York Jets and the Las Vegas Raiders are currently locked in a 9-9 battle with 46 seconds left in the third quarter. So we're going to be counting on producer Isaiah on the fabulous Eduardo Ocampo, who's one of our illustrious socials managers who's on the Zoom right now. I don't know. If someone scores a touchdown or something, you guys are just going to have to let us know. Look, look, I'm an advocate for watching the games, but you don't need to watch Jets Raiders. not even to analyze the game. Like, we'll be perfectly fine later in the game. I'm sure, like, I could just, oh,

Zach Wilson had a mistake in the fourth quarter and the Jets lost. Like, I'm sure that will apply to this game as well. I don't know. We don't even need to watch it. The result of this game actually does have some implications just because if Aaron Rogers is going to come back and blah, blah, blah, blah. We'll talk about that at some point. But something had to give.

Do you have the game on right now? Do you have the game on right now? No, I don't. Okay, keep it off. And at the end of the game, let's both guess who won the game, what the score was. And Isaiah can tell us how close we were. Okay. I don't know.

I want someone to tell us that there's a touchdown. But okay, no, I'm in. I'm in. I like it. There's not going to be a touchdown. So don't worry about that. There hasn't been for three quarters. Oh, my goodness gracious.

The day started with Patriots Coles in Germany. It's ending with Jets Raiders. This is bleak. But thank goodness, we had some. exciting games today, including the Texans beating the Bengals 30 to 27 on Matt Amidola's last minute field goal. This was the second game in a row in which C.J. Stroud was both just incredible overall and led a game-winning drive in the final moments. What did you learn from this, Stephen? I thought this game for C.J. Stroud, it wasn't the record-setting game that last week was,

but I thought this game was even better than last week's game. From a processing standpoint, from a mistake avoidance standpoint, obviously he had that one interception at the end of the game, but he comes back after that and leads a nice drive, the game-winning drive, set up the field goal. But before then, he was like, he was doing the Joe Burrow things, the things we celebrate Joe Burrow for,

he was doing it on the road, hostile environment, against a better team, frankly, a more talented team. It sounds like he's throwing to these elite receivers that we see some other guys, like in that 10 to 15 top 20 quarterback range. When we see those guys succeed, they're throwing to superstars. He's not doing that. It's really impressive to watch. He's starting Noah Brown.

He turned Noah Brown into a start. What do you have like 175 receiving yards? In this game, he's making clutch catches on third down. Like, he's getting help from the system. Sloak system is the Shanahan system. We've seen other quarterbacks get just boosted by it. But this looks like the Matt Ryan version of the Shanahan offense, where you can do a little bit of everything.

And there's no limitations. And this looks like what these types of offenses, this is how they look when you have a talented quarterback behind them. It's really fun to watch. And I'm really excited that Stroud found himself in this type of offense. Yeah. I think the type of offense is is certainly a factor in how he's taken the league by storm. But as you said, it is.

It's that Matt Ryan version of it where he averaged 9.1 yards per attempt today. They had 17 explosive plays as an offense. Now, some of that was on the ground. They have not had a good running game in Houston overall this year. They entered the game 28th and EAPA for Rush. But Devin Singletary had a really, really strong effort, which I think helped them be more balanced. but Stroud, I saw Hayden Winks put this out on Twitter. And, you know, I don't mean to like be dunking on Bryce Young with the comparison here,

but it's just, I think it's instructive. Bryce Young has 14 completions this season on throws of 15 or more air yards. CJ Stroud had nine today. So the deep ball is there. He's doing the hard stuff. He's doing it against, I mean, look, look, there's been a little debate on this podcast feed about Big Lou versus Kemp. Captain Lou.

I pause that the person who might get to decide this. Yes, it is a debate. Just live with it. The person who might get to decide this once for all, I would put it up to CJ Stroud because it's not as though the Bengals defense wasn't playing the game they normally play. I mean, you know,

it's always hard to look at that stuff just on broadcast copy and really get a sense for what they were trying to do. But I didn't see anything where it was like, oh, they really mess. this up or this went wrong. He just was making really hard throws. And he was playing a really, really advanced game and making really good decisions. And it's really hard to beat a team like that. I mean, I don't think that this is any huge indictment on the Bengals to lose this game. It's obviously not what they want is they're trying to claw back from that slow start. It hurts them in just

the math of the playoff race. But this to me, the interesting thing about this was that this was too really good teams just go and blow for blow in a shootout. And the Texans ended up being the one to get the last word. And so they win the game. And the question for me that comes out of that has more to do with, okay, is Stroud elevating himself from offensive rookie of the year and just a really, really exciting quarterback prospect to maybe sniffing the MVP conversation? he's second among quarterbacks in total passing yards to Sam Howell, which is sort of funny.

But he's passed Tua. As a team, they're now a game behind the Jaguars who lost today for the AFC. Yeah, for the AFC South lead. And the Jaguars, their remaining schedule is the Titans, the Texans. The Bengals, the Browns, the Ravens, the Bucks, the Panthers, and the Titans. The Texans have the Cardinals, the Jaguars, the Broncos, the Jets, the Titans, the Browns, again, and the Colts. I kind of think the Texans are winning the AFC South. They're not winning the AFC South.

Don't do this. I kind of think they're going to win the AFC South. Don't do that. They lost to the Panthers two weeks ago. They're winning the AFC South. I'm sorry. If there's a thing that's going to stop them, look, you know, I don't know if that secondary can hold up because it didn't today, right? Like they just, they entered the game 20 second in passing defense by EPA per dropback.

The way they won this game is they basically out burrowed burrow, but the Bengals made plenty of offensive plays here. And to me, if there's something that that is still a concern in terms of Texans being able to actually overtake the Jags, being actually able to stand up against teams like the Bengals, but maybe in more meaningful spots or just in additional ones, it is that secondary. But that's an easier schedule than the Jaguars have left. The Jaguars look lost offensively, I think. And I don't, do you really think that's so far-fetched? I think they're winning the division.

I think they're just too young. I think it's too soon as evidenced by that egg they laid against Carolina. I think that type of performance is still very much on the table every week with the team that young that's still learning how to win. That would be like my one way of pumping the brakes. But they are a good team. And like that's all that matters. And they have a quarterback who I think like you said is beyond the like the offensive

rookie of the year discussion is over. Forget about that. We don't even need that's a boring discussion. we're two weeks past that. This is a, where does he rank amongst the league? And how far can he drag this Texan team? I don't think he needs to drag him. That's the wrong verb.

But how far can he carry this team? Don't get me wrong. Like, I don't think he's winning MVP. I just think that it's a, it's starting to be the more appropriate conversation, which in and of itself is meaningful. If we're putting Brock and Tua into that discussion, I think C.J. Stroud should be in that discussion.

he's doing the same things they're doing in that offense. We just don't give him credit for it because he does other things well and we don't have to patronize. I don't know. We don't have to embellish the things that he, but he should be in the conversation. I'm with you. I'm pumping the brakes on the Texan hype. And I do think there is a danger this week of us going a little bit too far with the Stroud hype.

I think that's going to be a thing that happens this week. but he deserves in that conversation. Am I really even doing that, though? I don't think you're doing that. I don't think you're doing that. But just in terms of them being able to win the division, they are one game behind the Jaguars, and they have a markedly easier schedule the rest of the way out.

And the Jaguars are a little eh, you know? No, yeah. But they were against the 49ers. I'd rather be against 49ers than against the Panthers two weeks ago. It's ancient history. What's happened since then? C.J. Stroud's been like the best quarterback in the league. Yeah, it's true.

I mean, since that first half last week, he's just been lights out. Because I do think last week, even with the big numbers, the first half was like he'd look like a rookie. And then after that, he just turned it on and hasn't stopped since then. But I think we should talk about the other side of the ball. Because I kind of disagree with like the Bengals making a lot of, They made plays, but I thought it was that old formula where it's like, oh, we hit on three explosives, but everything else in between is kind of hit or miss. Like, Burrow took a lot of sacks, and their offense line did not hold up.

Alex Kappa gave up like eight pressures himself. I think it was Sheldon Rankins had three sacks, had all those pressures against him. Will Anderson had a couple of pressures, a couple of quarterback hits. Grinard also had a sack. So the defensive line dominated in this matchup. The Texas defensive line is really good. How good is it?

Is it really like it's good? It's good. I think it's good, but I don't think it's like elite where if the Bengals get dominated by it, I think it's a red flag for the Bengals. I'm not trying to take anything away from Houston, but I think like anytime you give up that much pressure and give up and let your quarterback get hit as many times

as Joe Burrow took a beating. in this game. It was a rough game for him. Yeah, physically. And then he obviously had the mistakes at the end. I still, like, I was kind of trying to pump the brakes on the Bengals hype, like Bengals being back last week. I just think there are some of those mistakes that are still there, like are some of

those weaknesses, like the offensive line and a reliance on Jamar Chase, especially this year, to make big plays. They kind of got relief with T. Higgins last week, but obviously he was out this week. But I don't know. I still think they're putting too much on Burroughs plate, too much. much on Jamar Chase's play. They really have to carry the offense with these big plays. And that's just hard. And we saw the dam eventually crack in the fourth quarter where Burrow trying to create, he hit on a couple of those throws out of structure, but then he throws the pick in the end zone.

And I know they tied it after that, but that was essentially the game right there. At the same time, if Tyler Boyd doesn't drop what is a completely wide open touchdown, the Bengals win this game. And we're talking about... The 64-yard touchdown to Chase, we're talking about the big play that Boyd did make. We're talking about Joe Burrow, deep passing, finding a way to win. I hear you that these are the weaknesses with the Bengals offense. I don't think that's going to change. I just think that they have, and probably for the worse, they've gotten too far.

are doing it like this. And I think they, I think this is just who they are. And they're always going to have some of those types of vulnerabilities. I do think that Houston gave him a heck of a game. Yeah. Obviously on the offensive side of the ball, but then also in terms of,

of that defensive line really beating up on their front, which I mean, the Bengals offensive line is not exactly like a team of world. beaters. It's something that they've worked on, but it's also something that they continue to have to work around a little bit. But that's kind of the issue, right? They've poured so many resources into this line and the fact that in these losses, at least, it's still an issue. Like, that's disappointing because this is a team that are a front office whose margin for error is going to shrink when these contracts kick in. And the way they've used that surplus hasn't worked.

But they've, I mean, they've poured resources into it because they have in part done it in free agency. But the name of the game for them, or at least what they've tried to do in part just because it's hard to do it any other way is get rid of the absolute weakest links, right? It's never been like, oh my gosh, this is the Eagles offensive line all of a sudden in Cincinnati. And I think it's fair to quibble with that team building strategy. But just, I mean, it's been worse. It has been worse. It's been worse. I do think one thing we saw one thing we saw today was and I don't think this is how we viewed it the last couple of weeks.

But maybe this is how we should view it in hindsight is that how reliant this offense is on Joe Burrow being able to move. Because I thought today. Yeah. he couldn't get outside of, I thought it was like the, the tech has made it a point to keep him in the pocket with how they rushed the passer. And that's when the offense kind of stalled out.

And we saw when they did make plays, it was with Burrow getting outside of the pocket, like on the deep ball to chase the deep touchdown. And then eventually, like when you put that playmaking pressure on him, he's going to make mistakes eventually like he's human. Everyone, he's not going to be perfect. And then he throws into coverage. And then that's when you get the turnovers.

I don't know. I don't put those turnovers on him. I put it on the situation just demanding that he's perfect in situations where it's impossible to be perfect. Yeah. There's a version of this conversation with Trevor Lawrence, too, where it's just like the line is not great. And yet the quarterback is asked to do a fair bit of let the play develop enough so that you can

hit a tough throw to the sideline. hit a deep shot and often that ends up being reliant on either Burrow or I think in Lawrence's case too it's like they have to create out of structure because otherwise you're just not going to get enough time. The way in which I do think this is this is tough for Cincinnati, they're now five and four. The Ravens lost today, which helps them. but every loss at this point in the season does become a bigger and bigger deal because if they are going to make up some pace with any chance of catching Baltimore,

I think that is looking pretty tough at this point. The wild card thing is a different and sort of less dire conversation, although the Steelers somehow keep winning games. So their own division is looking a little bit like a math problem. I think they're probably fine from that perspective. But just as we get later in the season, right? Like they got to be careful with that stuff because they put themselves in a hole in September and still have to climb out of it. Anything more from Texans Bengals?

No, I agree with your one takeaway where this was just a game of. like two good football teams playing. Like I don't think this is a game where I'm like freaking out because the Bengals lost it. I know it's the Texans at home, which sounds like a game you should win. But when you play a quarterback that's playing at that level, you lose games sometimes. And that's what this was. It was just a quarterback playing at like a top five, top three level for one Sunday. And you lose those games.

And again, like Houston does not get. And look, this does not reflect incredibly well on. on the Bengals either, but Houston doesn't get 150 yards out of Singletary very often, slash ever. So there was just a lot that was working for the Texans. And I do think that we should take a second and consider where the Houston Texans were a couple of years ago, having entrusted their entire franchise to a team chaplain, with a sketchy past and everyone hated each other. And the Deshawn Watson situation was such a horrible thing that they were involved in.

And it was all just like so hopeless seeming. And a lot of that was not like bad luck. Those were things that they did and should be held responsible for or like they deserve whatever was coming to them for those things. But it is instructive in terms of if you get the right quarterback, like, things can change so fast. And maybe there's some sort of lesson to be learned of like, and, you know, C.J. Strads don't grow on trees.

But this is what it looks like. And I'm making a mental note of that for the next time. There's like a Mac Jones or whoever where it's like, oh, yeah, it's, you know, maybe there's a little something there. Like, that's not what it looks like. it looks like this. If you're lucky enough to have a player like this, this is what happens.

Yeah. I think that's the takeaways, like the Texans found their guy. And with guys like this, it's obvious, like you said. You don't even have to second guess it with him. It's obvious.

Like, if I was a Texas fan, I would be excited. I'm not, though. So I'm not. My team drafted someone else. You could be.

You could just jump ship. That's true. All right. Let's take a quick break. Come back, get to winners and losers. Score early this NFL season with Fandul, America's number one sports book. Right now, new customers get $150 in bonus bets when your first $5 money line bet wins. So that would apply to Monday night's game between the bills and the Broncos in that game. If I was betting on it, I would bet on the bills giving seven points. I also like Josh Allen as an anytime touchdown score in that one.

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All right. We are back on dual threat, and it's time for winners and losers. Brought to you by Uber Eats. You can get almost, almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. Fake puns? No. Fresh produce? Yes.

Offensive offsides? No. Olive oil? Yes. Uber Eats is an easy win. So let's talk about the other winners and losers this week. Stephen, who would you like to start with? I'm going to start with the Lions who beat the Chargers 41 to 38 on a last.

second field goal by Riley Patterson, but I'm picking them because they've won the game. Like Dan Campbell didn't sit back and let the Chargers lose this game. He went out and won it. They went for it. They had a fourth and two. They were in field goal range already with around, he was around two minutes left. Most teams would just kick the field goal there and place some defense, trust in your defense. But Dan Campbell, like, he read the room, so to speak. Like, he knew where this game was going. They couldn't stop Justin Herbert. They couldn't stop Keaton Allen. and they couldn't stop this Chargers offense. Their offense was going to win this game,

and Dan Campbell sent Jared Goff out to do it, and he did it. And he made two clutch plays in short-yard situations, the fourth and two to set up the game winning field goal. But the touchdown to take the lead, that was a Jared Goff check at the line. I believe the lines were in a run play, and he kills the play. The Chargers come out, load up the front,

have like seven guys on the line of scrimmage, and he throws to the tight end over the top after a play action fake wide open. A good throw by Jared Gough. Like Jared Gough made enough plays, but it's the same story with the Chargers. It's the same story every time. I mean, our guy, Shiel Capadio, tweeted out that the Lions' offensive performance today was third best by any team all season and EPA per drive. The Chargers' offensive performance was the fourth best by any team all season.

They scored touchdowns on their final five possessions and still managed to lose the game. It is so like, it's like tragedy. I mean, this is like something out of a Greek tragedy or whatever. Yeah, that's what it is. They were so good. This isn't even like, usually it feels like they do this to themselves. This one actually doesn't feel like that to me. The Lions just went and won this game.

I can't, I just can't believe this. I can so believe this happened to the Chargers. And I also just can't believe this happened to the Chargers. It's like, this shouldn't happen to anyone. I want to know like how Justin Herbert feels about this situation. Because like, I'm convinced. Bad. Definitely bad. But here's the thing.

I don't know if he knows how bad it is. Because I honestly don't think he's online at all and has no idea about like the Chargers lore and how we talk about them and how we discuss these games. And he's just probably like, oh, man, that's another bad break, you know? They're really stacking up and just getting a lot of bad breaks. And the rest of us are like, they're cursed. Justin Herbert is, Justin Herbert is very smart. Justin Herbert probably has some sense of like math and probability and has watched and played a lot of football and must have a clear understanding of the fact that this is not what is

supposed to happen. Right. Like beyond just this isn't supposed to happen to a really good quarterback who like on a day when you score almost 40 points, this isn't supposed to happen to anyone. This is, I mean, this should be impossible. That's why I want to know because I don't even think he like fathoms the discourse being what it is because it's not logical. Like we're sitting here going, they're cursed. They're never going to win. They're destined to lose these games when it's really just like he's probably like, oh,

this is a lot of bad luck in a row. Oh, man. Like, he doesn't know Emmanuel Acho exists in, like, tomorrow. He's going to be like, oh, my God, he's not clutch. And this says something about him as a person. I don't think he knows that. If I went up to Justin Herbert and said something like, what happened, man?

Like, did you just walk under a ladder as a child? Like, do you and Brandon Staley adopt black cats after practices to? together, like, he would go home that afternoon and say to someone, the weirdest thing happened to me today. Like, this girl was going on about, like, bad luck or something. She must have been crazy. I have no idea what the, I don't think there's, that can't be possible. It is such a bit.

I don't know. I believe it. Like, you would, you would posit that chargering doesn't mean anything to Justin Herbert. No, he has no idea what it means. He would just be like, you're, you're grammatically challenged. Yes. And he'd be like, no, it's just bad luck. It'll even out over time. Justin Herbert's not particularly online.

I don't think he would have to live under a rock. I don't think anyone in Justin Herbert's life talks about football in the ways that like we do as media. I envy him. Me too. But I think the story of this game is that the lion's roster is just so much better than the charge of roster. And that's like, that's what I thought dictates. at the matchup on the other side of the ball where the lines could do whatever they want. In the first half, they just ran the ball over the Chargers defense.

You saw in the second half, and Tony Romo talked about this. They adjusted by putting more guys on a line of scrimmage and leaving their secondary on an island. So what happens in the second half? That's when Jared Goff starts to find space and starts to connect on passes downfield. And like, we can rip Brandon Staley for that, like his defense. He's the defensive coach. He built this defense.

But like when you don't have the dudes when they're playing these. these guys that I've never heard of in the secondary and on the second level of the defense, Kenneth Murray still can't diagnose a play. Right. What do you do? Like, you try to stop the run game or you try to stop the past game in the first half, you get ran on. You try to stop the run game in the second half.

You get passed on. And I just don't know what they're supposed to do when they're just getting dominated in the trenches on both sides of the ball. Right. It's a poorly built team going up against a well-built team. I think, like, that's the difference. between these two teams who I think that we view in the same, like, are in the same tier to fringe playoff teams trying to break through and become contenders.

But like, really, they're miles apart. Well, yeah. I mean, or they're just different, right? Because one of them is about the total team construction and all the parts working together. And the other one is about a top heavy roster with a quarterback who just passed Peyton Manning and Dan Marino. for the most passing yards in his first four seasons and just has to, like, sit there and have this happen to him every week.

And it's so sad. I can't get over it. Not to mention their powder blue jerseys, which was the reason they lost. They couldn't stop to run because the powder blue. Absolutely. Gave up 533 yards of offense. Come on. I'm just asking questions here.

Try something else. I want to hear a little bit more about Jared Gough. What a sentence? Where is Jared this season to your eye? We talked a little bit about like this game specifically, but just how does that fit into the bigger picture of the development or overall performance of one Jared Goff? I think he's a good quarterback.

I think he's still a funny quarterback. Like it's easy to make fun of him at times. Like when he throws it away on fourth and goal as he did in this game. I want, I would like you to have. add that sticker to QB rankings because actually that's incredibly useful no funny quarterbacks

because some quarterbacks are funny and some quarterbacks are not funny. Can I give you my top three? Like my top three, Jared golf is on the list. But my top quarterback, Kirk Cousins is the funniest quarterback of all the time. Kurt Cousins is the funniest quarterback

who's ever played football. Absolutely. I think you can put like James Winston just like leaning into the bid at all times. Like he came into. to this game today. We're going to talk about it later, but just throwing wild interceptions.

Yeah. I think that, like, he's on the list just because of that. Carson Wentz, though, is my funniest sport back of all time. So I was going to ask you about Carson. I mean, Carson Wentz,

throwing an interception on a lateral is pretty funny. Like, that's a good bit. Sometimes with Carson, like Carson Wentz had always seemed like he was, he seemed so actively turning people, against him. Yeah.

I don't know if it gets in the way of the human, but okay, I'm glad to hear that, or I'm at least noting to hear that he's, he's part of the funny, funny. The practice photo with like the Frankenstein practice gear get up. One of the funniest photos of all time. You're right. Only topped by the commander's letterman jacket photo from a couple years ago. Oh my gosh. Okay, no, you're so right.

Mitch Trubisky, funny. Who's it not funny? No, not funny? Derek Carr is not funny to me. I don't want to watch that. It's just sad. Mitch isn't funny. Who else is not funny?

We'll get off this in one second, but give me one more like, okay, here's a quarterback that I like that I don't think is funny. And like Justin Herbert, he's too serious. And like that's kind of his issue at times. He doesn't go off script. He doesn't live a little. He doesn't laugh. He doesn't go online and,

and look at the takes. Justin Herbert is missing a little joie de vivre. I love it. All right. I have absolutely no idea what we were talking about. I asked you about Jared Goff, who's funny. Jared Goff's fine.

I think we're done with this conversation, right? He's good. Yeah, he's good enough to do what the lines need him to do. Love it. Congratulations to Alliance. Give me a winner. Do you have a winner? Yeah, I do.

Okay. The San Francisco 49. Winning. They snapped their three-game losing streak. They beat the Jaguars 34 to 3. My takeaway here is that Chase Young looks great in this defense exactly how they wanted him to look. We talked a couple weeks ago, maybe, about how there was a little bit of a need.

You know, I don't think anyone was going to say that the 49ers defense was out there really struggling, but there had been some if he results and it seemed. like Nick Bosa was carrying a little bit too much of the load at edge defender. And coming into the game, he led that whole group with 44 total pressures and didn't have a ton of support. Drake Jackson and Cleland Farrell were tied at second with 14 apiece. And Young in Washington had 38. So you're hoping that you add that guy into the mix and it's just going to make everybody

look better. And I think that's exactly what happened in this game. Jacksonville, the offensive line definitely has some problems. But the 49ers defensive front was super dominant. They sacked Trevor Lawrence five times, hit him 10 more, forced to fumble. That happened when Bosa and Young, just like old times in college, met at the quarterback for the sack and the force fumble in the second quarter. I think they have to be super happy about the result defensively there and just what

putting those two guys together and just adding Chase Young to the defense in general looks like and how that bodes for the rest of the season. In general, this was a really good bounceback win for them, a dominant win against a team that has some problems, but it's still a good team. I thought Brock Purdy played a pretty good game, although a lot of that had to do with how well he played when he was pressured. He was pressured on half of his dropbacks, which was a career high and also threw for a career high, 143 yards when he was pressured, including two touchdowns.

And I'll tell you why I'm bringing this up. There was one where he hung in the pocket and hit Kittle on the deep ball early in the third quarter. That I thought was a really impressive play and good throw and good patience and poise. There was also an early touchdown throw to Ayyuk that he threw across his body. and I asked producer Isaiah to cue up what Kyle Shanhan said about this throw because I thought I would make you laugh. Yeah, that was honestly one of, I can say this because he played his ass played well, but that was like one of his worst decisions. I think he's made since he's been here.

And it took me a while to get over it, but I thanked him for the touchdown. I'm so happy. My favorite part of that is it took me a while to get over it. I don't know if he is. He's still going to watch the film. He's going to watch the film and be mad all over again. It was a nonsense. The over under is Thursday for when Kyle Shanhan will be over that.

But that it just made me chuckle because that is a pretty good example of some of the Brock being rewarded for some iffy decision making that we've maybe talked about it at times on this show. But in general, he played a good game. he made some really good throws. All three of the passing touchdowns were on throws of at least 10 air yards. So he had to do some creating and I thought played a good game. Overall, just a really good bounce back performance for San Francisco. Yeah. I mean, we saw the team, the offense at full strength again for the first time.

And like, I don't think either of us was worried about this team, even after the three losses. I think we were worried about maybe the high end ceiling of them. but like over the long term, we thought they would be fine and we saw that. I think the Chase Young thing is the big takeaway from, they dominated in the trenches on both sides of the ball. Sometimes like analyzing these games is easy. I think in this game that was the case.

On both sides of the ball, they won in the trenches and getting Trent Williams back, getting Chase Young to this front seven. I think it not only affected, obviously, the pass rush and made Nick Post his job, easier. I thought it made like the run defense better. I thought it made Fred Warner's job a little bit easier.

Adding dude to the front seven was always going to be the way to fix whatever problems, whatever perceived problems this defense had. I thought they were a little overblown last week and I think we're starting to see that. I will say this. I want to see them go up against a different style of team because I think

we've seen the Jaguars have problems against this style of defense where you could just make them go on these painstaking drives that just feel like they last forever. And if one, one thing goes wrong, it's over. And that's what happened today. It felt like the Jaguars had the ball for like most of the game. Every time they were around midfield, they had the ball. And then like the drive would fall apart somehow. And it just feels like every time they lose this year, that's been the case. Right. Yeah. Offensively, I think Jacksonville just,

just, it's hard to totally diagnose exactly what's wrong because it's a lot of different things. It's It's the lack of a running game. It's the struggles with the offensive line. It's the fact that Calvin Ridley just continues to not really be an exciting part of the passing attack. I don't think it's primarily Trevor Lawrence, although I don't, you know, it's not to say that he's not to some degree part of it. And then they were just playing a really, really good defense. But it would be nice to see them find another gear. but I don't know that they have a year besides Trevor playing out of his mind.

That really works for them when they're trying to put up a lot of points or put up points against a good defense. I still, I think they're a good team. As discussed, I think they've got some real competition in the division and they should be careful to not have a number of these types of performances. but even though I think their schedule is a little bit tougher than what the Texans have to face coming up, they certainly don't have another 49ers defense on the schedule. Well, they do play the Browns, actually.

No, they play the Browns and the Ravens. Okay, I mean, they're going to have some tough moments, but I still think they're okay. I just, I think there's a ceiling on this offense. And that was always the worry with their offseason two years ago. Like when they signed Christian Kirk, it's like, yeah, like Trevor needs these players. and if they have to overspend, so be it to get a competent team around him, but there was going to be a ceiling.

Like paying Christian Kirk $20 million a year, even though he's been a good player, he's been a productive player, and he was again in this game. I think he had a fumble in the red zone. It's just like, that's not a team that's going to win the Super Bowl, though. Right.

You're not going to win a Super Bowl with that team. Right. Right. All right. How about a loser? Speaking of not winning a Super Bowl. My first loser is the Raven. No, I'm too harsh on that.

I honestly, no, I'm still on the bandwagon. This is just another tough loss. Like I feel like we just explain away these losses with Baltimore. But like every time they give away these games, they lose to the Browns 33 to 31. After leading by two possessions late in the second half, Justin Hopkins hits a 40-yard field goal as time expires. But like, I'm so frustrated by this team because this is not a game they should be losing. on defense, I thought they did a really good job.

I know the Browns had some success running the ball. But for the most part, they kept Deshaun Watson in the pocket. They made his day hard all day long outside of a couple of plays where he got outside of structure in the fourth quarter. He wasn't good under pressure and he wasn't good outside of the pocket. And their defense played really well. But then a couple of mistakes on offense, that's the story of this team for the last three years, is they can't close out these games. I interviewed Kyle Hamilton at training camp,

and I asked him, like, what's going to be the difference in this year if you guys win? And the difference in this year and last year. And he said closing games. And this is a team that still can't close games consistently. The Colts game, they should win that game. This game, they should win that game. What's the other game they lost?

Another game that... Well, going back to last year, right? I mean, every, I think Ben Solac likes to tweet out the win probability graphs where every single one is just like 98%. 98.9%, 99.3% 0% games over. Yeah. It's just the most dramatic thing. They are only the third team in NFL history. This is according to NFL research to lose a game despite holding four separate leads of four. 14 or more points in a game and the first team to do so in nearly 20 years. It's not great. They're the East Coast Chargers. Yeah,

I was going to bring up that you said that I really don't like that because I don't like what it means and I don't, it feels like a hex. And I'm not really a superstitious person, but I just, I don't, I don't like the vibe of us putting that out into the universe. but I also think that a lot of things were made clear to me when you said that. It's unfortunate. Yeah.

I mean, they average over six yards per play in this game, too. It's not like they played poorly. It's not like they played badly. Yeah. No. The bad plays just happened at the wrong times in these games. The other game that I was thinking about was the Steelers game, which they had no business losing.

So it's just, yeah, enough with the silly losses. I just want to see them start to close these games out. And I don't even think this is one of those like, oh, it's an issue with how the teams build. Like they don't have it in them. They can't close out a game. I don't even think it's that. I just think they make just the silliest mistakes. Like even the pick six today, Lamar throws it, bounces off a pass rusher's helmet,

bounces up in the air like 30 feet and lands perfectly and drops into a Newsom's hands, pick six. I don't know. Yeah. Maybe I'm trying. I'm overlooking them because I do think this team is good. Like I'm overlooking issues. But this win doesn't do anything for me. It doesn't move the needle for me.

It's just like another instance of them not closing out of game. But like in terms of overall team strength, I thought they looked good on both sides of the ball when they weren't just making these game losing plays. I'm choosing to have confidence in that. Because I think we've just seen two weeks in a row of really, really dominant and clean sheets, right, from the Baltimore Ravens.

And this is unfortunate. It's unfortunate that it happened in a division game. It's not as though we've only seen this type of stuff happen to them within the division. But I do think that there's just some extra element of those games can get weird. You know, Brown's Ravens is, that's going to be a dog fight. It's going to be a weird game. I'm choosing to cling to that as my excuse for.

why we don't have to worry about the end of game stuff because I just I still think they're too good. I think that if you removed the result and if you didn't know what happened, you would watch this game and pretty clearly think that Baltimore was the better team. I'm like meditating right now. I'm just I'm just choosing. I'm just choosing to live with that. The cope is on. The other part of it is like there's no point because they play the bangles in three days. Like there's no point to have a take right now. Yeah. My take is I'm excited for Thursday of a football. Yeah, good stuff. Love it. Uh, okay, here's a real loser. Is it the Patriots? Is it Mack Jones? Is it both? Matt got benched in New England's 10 to 6 loss to the Colts in Germany.

Maybe Germany is the loser. I mean, geez, we should send something better than this across over there. Uh, but we have been spending a bit of time on this show talking about the potential end of the Bill Belichick era in New England. And I do think that we witnessed the end of the Mack Jones era this afternoon, which came with around four and a half minutes left in the game. Mac was 15 of 20 passing for 170 yards. He'd taken five sacks already at a point where you could tell based on the game plan, they had absolutely no interest in him throwing the ball.

it was like the first drive, maybe eight of the first 12 plays were runs. It was obvious that the offensive staff just does not have confidence in him throwing the ball at this point. You could see it the entire game, but he's still in there. He's going, whatever. They have a chance to win the game. They're in the red zone. And he throws an interception to Cold Safety Julian Blackman. which I don't

when I saw this, I knew immediately that we were going to talk about this throw on the show. And I thought to myself, how are we going to do this in an audio medium? Because I don't know how to describe this throw. It didn't make it to the end zone. It was at least like seven yards short of where it was supposed to be. But there was also like he was targeting Hunter Henry. Like, it wasn't like something went wrong. It just, it was like, I think that is not in live action, but I actually seriously think that's what it would look like if I stood on an NFL field and like tried to throw to the back of the end zone.

I'm actually kind of not kidding. If you remove the past pressures and stuff, which is obviously saying, like, it was, am I making too much? No, it was like an optical illusion. Deject. Like, I don't know that I've seen a professional quarterback make a throw like that very many times. And I think I tend to err on the side of this guy was an okay quarterback, maybe somewhere in between a dream backup and a passable starter. but this team completely ruined any chance of development and confidence and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, which I think means that I err on the side of defending this guy. That was, like, it, it just didn't seem, like, I don't want to put things in terms of trying.

Of course, he's trying. But so many things had to go wrong for that to happen the way that it did. And then he got benched. And I'm not necessarily saying that I don't think that we will ever see Mack Jones at quarterback for the New England Patriots over the course of the remainder of the year. I do think that they're going to, they have their buy. I think they're going to look at what their options are. I bet we're going to see Will Greer in this offense, which like, no one needs it. but I do think it's happening.

Because it's, every game they find a new visual of just everything is bad. Like Bill O'Brien had already lit into Jones on the sideline earlier in the game. They kept showing shots of Bobcraft and his like big puffy coat looking sad. The big picture is that Mac Jones

has been one of the worst quarterbacks in football going on basically two seasons. And I just, like that was a moment that to me felt like the last straw. So I think that we witnessed the end of the Mac Jones era in New England. I think it was arguably like the first proper benching for him too. A proper benching. We've seen these benching at the end of blowouts.

And I don't know. I feel like that's different. I feel like we saw him kind of do a similar thing with Cam Newton just like to protect them. And there's no point in like subjecting your quarterbacks to hits at a game you're not going to win. And then we had the- But this was still. competitive.

We had the Bears game last year, which on Monday night, which, I mean, it was a benching, but it just came out of nowhere. And then Bill was like, oh, we plan on playing both guys anyway. That was a weird one. But this one, like, there's no denying. And you can't talk your way out of this one. It was a benching. And I agree with you.

Like, I think you just saw all the limitations. And I'm on the other side of that argument where I'm like, I don't think the Patriots ruined Mack Jones. I think he was destined to be a. mediocre quarterback no matter where he went. And I think like throws like that throw you're talking about are why, like when he's forced to make. He's not, he's not, he's not within sniffing distance of mediocre.

Right. Yeah. And I just don't think he has the high level talent to be a high level starting quarterback. And I think that was clear before the draft. But we're not, we're not talking about the high level talent. We're talking about he can make that throw. Like, in a normal. Yes.

It was like a 10-yard throw. I'm going to be honest with you. I did not watch one second of this game. I did see that throw. Okay. You did see the throw, though? Yes, I saw the throw. He missed by like seven yards.

It was like a paper airplane. Yeah. I thought that was really bad. I thought that was much worse than usual. I thought that was a cry for help. Yeah, I just, I think when you put these guys in these situations and you asked them to, not that they're asking Mack to be like a superhero quarterback, but like the offense just naturally puts them into these situations

where he doesn't really get help. And I think that's why we're seeing all these weaknesses just get highlighted. We just never, we didn't see it during his rookie year. I think this player was always in him. They just hit it better. He's in the back of the end zone. The ball landed on the turf like two yards short of the goal line.

I don't like, do we remember rookie Mac? Like, I feel like in the first month he would do that, like, thing where he would turtle and, like, just throw the ball into the ground to a, like, it was happening every week where you would have a fumble like that. Like, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, but like, fumbles, at least are protected by just the weakness of the human eye. Like, fumbles happen amid chaos. So then, yes, you go back and you see the replays and you can see if someone was really reckless with ball security and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Or if he just freaked out or, yeah. there was just something about watching that ball just like plop onto the term.

This scarred me sad. I know. Let the mark on you. You'll never forget it. Not good. But I don't know. I feel like we would like see replays of Mack Jones like fumbling during his rookie year and he'd be like it would look like he was screaming.

It was like a cartoon character almost. He does have, he does have like an earlier iteration of Jared Gough used to have this too, where he would just free. the fuck out. And Mack has a little bit of that in him too, but like this wasn't that. This was just sad. Yeah. I don't know. It's over though. At least it's over. I mean, they're going to get a really, they're going to get one of the best draft picks that they've had in a long time. New England hasn't picked in the top five since 1994. I think the question is, you know, the number one question is the Belichick thing, but the number two question is

how are they going to use that? How's the quarterback class going to shape up in terms of who they might be interested in in terms of do the sort of second tier of guys? Because unless they come up with a package to try to trade up, where they are right now would seem to be outside of the Caleb Williams, Drag May conversation. do any of the other guys end up being kind of temptations that make you look silly in hindsight? Or is there anyone else that?

Don't do it. Okay. So then they have to talk about, I mean, you know, it's either free agency or it's packaging picks and trying to make a case to get up there or or Will Greer it is. Yeah. I mean, I think that's the best way to go. I think you just have to bottom out. I think you need a proper tank.

None of these mid-round options. That's kind of how you've gotten to this spot by settling from Mack Jones. I don't know. You're going to talk yourself into J.J. McCarthy? I don't see another guy out there. Should we talk about the five and five Colts? Yeah. Or should we not?

Because I kind of don't understand it and don't want to understand why the Colts, how the Colts are five and five right now. They're actually, the thing about the, I mean, I guess I'm still talking about New England, but the Colts offense is pretty good. I think Scyken's done just a really, really good job with them. The thing that was doubly depressing, I think, and is why you're right to point out that this is the first, like, proper benching is that the New England defense did its job in this game.

I think holding those guys to 10 points is a pretty good day's work, and they were still in it and just couldn't do it offensively. Um, what's your take on, on the Colts? Uh, I mean, they're fine. I don't think they're going to compete like the Texans might, even though what are they only like a game back with the Texans. Yeah. I just don't trust Minchu enough. I think we just see it every time we walk.

Like when you watch him play, like he puts the ball in dangerous spots. The difference between wins and losses for them, just based on whether the defense catches it or not. Gardner Minchu, funny quarterback. It's a little cringe. He's trying a little too hard to be a funny quarterback. It's like he's aware of it. With the mustache and stuff. Yeah, yeah.

The jean shorts. It's too much. All right. Anything else here? Should we move on? Let's move on. All right. We've done losers.

Time for another winner. Who's your next one? My next winner comes from the Vikings. Saints games Vikings win 27 to 19. But my winner is rocket science. Josh Dobbs. Because if you were like an NFL fan And your only exposure to rocket science

Was Matt Patricia. Yeah. And pre-2023 Josh Dobbs who never played. You'd be like, all right, what's the big deal with these guys? It's not a good look for them. But I feel like Josh Dobbs single-handedly is bringing him back over the last few weeks. The pasturnaut. The pastur-not doesn't know the offense.

Doesn't matter. He'll learn it. He'll pick it up fast. He needs to know the offense. He knows how to make a rocket goal. to space. That's right. I mean, we're joking about Josh Dodds,

but he was like legitimately good in this game. Like pocket movement, throws downfield, throws to like the intermediate areas. It was, they're like I think the Vikings are legitimately a playoff team. I picked them to make the playoffs in our midseason predictions. And right now they have a top 10 offense by EPA.

And that's with them missing Jefferson for what has it been like a month now, three weeks now. Yep. they've missed Kirk Cousins the last two weeks. They started, well, they didn't start Dobbs last week,

but he had to play in a pinch. They started Jared Hall. Now they start a guy they just picked up eight days ago and they're top 10 in offense. And now they're top 11 in defense by EPA. Yeah. That's what I was going to say is,

I mean, it's not like, they're just smart defensively and they're so aggressive. They had 12 different players generate at least one one pressure today. They just send everybody.

It's chaos. It's not going to, it's not going to beat great teams. But they do so much with the roster that they have, which is funny to compare this team to last year when like, we spent the entire season being like, the Vikings are frauds. The Vikings are frauds.

The Vikings are frauds. And like, that was true. But it was just this very tortured conversation. And now like this team is so fun. It's just. like just watching them make smart decisions and and do the best they can and have that be something that's actually pretty exciting and gets this quarterback who who is a week removed from having to teach the offensive line his cadence and now all of a sudden he is a great nickname

and I love it. Yeah. And he's making plays with his legs. And I think like that's the element they've added to the offense that they didn't have with Kirk Cousin. So whatever they lost as a because obviously Josh Dobbs isn't as good as Kirk Cousins as a passer. They gained something with this offense. Like the run game, they haven't leaned into the bit like really heavily yet, but they are starting to dabble with some zone read stuff. Like Dobbs had a keeper today and picked up 11 yards. They did a couple RPO's.

So we're starting to see them layer on these elements to the offense that we didn't see before. And I think there's a chance like the offense, them falling off without Kirk Cousins isn't as steep as we imagine it would be. a couple weeks ago when we thought it would be Jared Hall starting for the rest of the year. And then defensively, like, it's not going to work against the great teams. But so far this year, it's given them a chance against the great quarterbacks they played. Like, that Eagles game, I think it was on a Thursday night.

The Eagles ran the ball well in the second half. But the game was close because the defense kept them in it. And I think the same thing with the Charters game where Justin Herbert just blacks out and has one of these games where you're not going to win no matter what. But they did like, they made the game hard on them. And I think that's what you could say about this defense. Even when it's like giving up points like it was at the beginning of the year, you could see the thinking behind it.

I think that's the difference between this team. They have an aggressive smart defense. And they have this now. They have this offense where if the play call doesn't work out, they can create outside of structure, which I think is interesting. And when they get Jefferson back, I think it's going to make things a lot easier in the passing game and the run game.

the final wildcard spot in the NFC, probably, I mean, it's early, it's hard to say this for sure, but it probably comes down to the Vikings and then the Falcons or the Saints, whoever doesn't win that division. And winning this game is pretty significant as far as that goes. So I really, I like that take that this is still a playoff team. And it would be really funny if this year's Vikings team had a little bit more fight in the playoffs than they did last year against the Giants. But they're a better team. The past or not, he's arrived.

There are four teams in the NFC with a better point differential. The Eagles, the Cowboys, the Lions, and the 49ers. Those are like the elite teams. And then it's the Vikings. I mean, the Saints defense is really. no joke. I think what they did offensively against them is, is, it's moved beyond L.O.L. He got here on Wednesday. Like, that was, it was a genuinely impressive performance. I'm curious to see what happens as they do integrate a little bit more and more and more of

his, of Dobbs' ability to use his legs, which they, I mean, they did somewhat. He had 44 rushing yards, and he ran the ball eight times. But this is fun. They're just a, really fun team. I don't want to put such lofty expectations on them that it makes it not fun because this is still this was not the plan. But the Vikings are a vibe. Congratulations to them. Who needs a Super Bowl? I feel like a wild card loss this year is going to feel so much better than it did last year. Yeah. And also like, I don't know. We'll see. Especially because it's it's Don't, are you talking yourself into them winning a playoff game? Is that what I'm hearing? No, no. I I'm just talking myself into them, like, not, not getting blown out.

Not getting embarrassed by Daniel Jones on national television. Yeah. Yeah. That's the bar. I'll say one thing about Brian Flores. He will not let that happen. There's a number of reasons that that will not be taking place. All right.

I got another winner for you. And it is the Arizona Cardinals and Kyler Murray in his return, I think, 355 days after his ACL tear. I thought he was really pretty good in his first game back. He had 249 passing yards, 35 rushing yards. On the game winning drive, I thought you saw the classic Kyler, escapability, athleticism, a minute and 50 seconds to go. They're in a third and 10.

he runs for 13 yards, gets the first down, and then he hits the 33-yarder to Trey McBride, who had a big game that sets up the field goal by Matt Prater that wins them the game 2523 against the Falcons. It's everything you want. You know, I think the Falcons defense is pretty good. and Arizona might have had actually a much better performance offensively if they hadn't gone 3 of 11 on third downs. I think they will get better with some of that situational stuff when they got a little bit more time to work with Kyler. But if you're just looking to see him pass the test of not looking super rusty and looking like he's still got it coming back in the first game, I think that absolutely happened.

they move to third in the draft order now. I have a feeling we will see them continue to creep backwards there. They've got some winnable games against the tech. Well, the Texans is maybe not so winnable anymore, but the Rams and the Bears coming up. But even that Texans game, right? Like, if Kyler's going to be himself, then this is just pretty automatically a more interesting team than and all credit to Josh Jobs, right? Because it's very fun to see what he can do.

But I just think that has to be so encouraging for Arizona. Yeah. And Kyler had a couple of plays that it wasn't just like classic Kyler. It was like plays that you, he needs his elite athleticism to pull off. Like he had a couple of those plays where he like gives ground and kind of gets parallel to the line of scrimmage and then is able to like get around a defense. that he's able to do that in his first game back, I think is a really good sign. And they were getting him involved in the run game. They did a couple of like option runs. Right.

The vibes are just better. Like we talked about the Texans vives being improved over the last couple years. Like they were on the other side of that trade, that draft day trade with them. And I feel like this is one of those like blockbuster trades where legitimately after a year or it hasn't been a year. Like after eight, nine months, whatever it's been, both teams have to be ecstatic. They're both winners so far. The Texans got what they want. The Cardinals got extra draft capital.

And now all of a sudden, I don't think it's a no-brainer to move on from Kyla Murray. I think you saw it today again. When he is on the field, they have a chance to win every football game. That's been the case the last three years. And you don't move on from quarterbacks like that, especially with ones that are as talented as him.

If like, if Carolina is willing to give Bryce Young three more years, then like, why are we giving up on Kyler Murray? Yeah, I think you've made a really good argument for those reasons, plus the cost constraints that they would be dealing with if they did move on from him for why. And in my mind, like, I think they, I am working on the baseline assumption that he is their quarterback next year. Yeah. I think if he is playing this well and the money is what it is.

is the smart assumption is that he is going to stay in Arizona. Now, we'll see. There's been so much change there and cases of the relationship have been weird, though, obviously, new head coach, all that. But if you remove any of the personal stuff and just take a look at quarterback who can play like Kyler Murray can play, the cost that he would. cost versus the cost that they would have to pay for him to play somewhere else. That seems obvious to me.

But it's Kyler Marie and the Cardinals. So it's always been an Odyssey and I'm not going to say that there's no chance it won't be in the future. But this was certainly, certainly a good, a good first game, a good first step. So we'll see what comes next. The Falcons continue to be just. I don't understand them. It's the same as the Colts. Like, I don't understand them and I don't want to understand what's happening with them.

Desmond Ritter comes back into this game. And like, what? Well, Heineke got injured in the fourth quarter, but also had 55 passing yards through three quarters. If there's a silver lining for Falcons fans here, it's that Bison Robinson was at least a feature. He had 22 carries for 95 yards and a touchdown. So, you know, hang your hat on that. Maybe he's on your fantasy team. There's no rhyme or reason to anything that happens with this team in this offense.

You know what the problem is? It's Arthur Smith's shirts. Too tight. He wears, it's not even that. It's that it looks to me and I don't know. I think I've brought this up before, but maybe it's been like a year or so, so I'm due. I think he wears a vest over a short-sleeved t-shirt. Yeah.

Type of thing. That's weird to me. It's like the Belichick situation, but different. Well, but like, and when Belichick does that, it's also bad, but at least it's, it's, it's so grungy. It's a cutoff. It's, it's giving, I haven't done laundry in five weeks and this probably doesn't smell very good, which that's not what I aspire to, but it's certainly like purposeful in its own way. It's more noble. It's more humble.

You shouldn't like, because what Arthur Smith wears on the sidelines, it's like, you know, it's sort of like fancy Falcons ath leisure, but then it's just two items that don't go together. And if you need the warmth of a vest, I think you should want sleeves. And vests are already kind of silly, but it makes it all the more silly when the pairing is a t-shirt. And that's my diagnosis for what's wrong with the Falcons. I mean, I think there's something to it. Find a better one. This team makes no sense. All right, let's do our last losers. Who have you got? My last loser, I don't know. I kind of feel weird about calling them losers or calling Seattle winners, but the Seahawks commanders, I'm going to give the L to Washington. They lose

26 to 29 on a last second field goal, another last second field goal. There were like three of them this week. Yeah. I hesitate to call this a losing, like a losing effort for Washington because I do think they played well. And I think Sam Howell continues to improve. I don't think it's enough to

justify moving on with him beyond this year. But he is taking fewer sacks. Even though he leads the league in Fassie. That's the funniest thing. Does he? Yes. That doesn't matter. That's a fake stat. That doesn't count. No, Sam, but sure. But Sam Howell is leading the league in passing yards.

It is him and then C.J. Stroud and then Tua. It doesn't make sense. But it kind of does because he has the most dropbacks in the NFL. Like, that's what it is. Yeah. I can't. I'm like, now I'm like, am I somehow wrong about it? But I'm not.

I'm not. I don't think you are. No, I don't think you are. But he did take another three sacks and his sack rate went down for a third straight week. He's taking seven sacks over the last three weeks, which is actually like a massive improvement for him. Yeah.

So I think like things are generally going well. for Washington on the offensive side of the ball. But like whatever's left of their pass rush after the trade deadline, they couldn't get pressure on Seattle. And I think like that's the one way you've been able to beat Seattle is by getting pressure on the pocket. They couldn't do that. Gino Smith makes enough plays down the stretch.

It's D.K. MADCAF on two intermediate throws over the middle of the field on the game winning drive to set up the game winning field goal. I thought that this was just another good game for Dino Smith, like considering the context of this offense and how, how difficult they make things on him. Like it's a lot of like mid-range passes outside of the numbers, which are really hard, which I think is why you start to see some of these mistakes,

especially when he has to hold on to the ball against pressure. But like when you see it today, when the offensive line works like it's supposed to, like we saw it work at the beginning of last year, like we saw it work at certain times earlier this season, Gino can look like a top 10 quarterback. And he can lead you to the wins. When it's not like that, and he has to be perfect,

I think that's when you've seen the offense kind of fall off. I'm still at the same spot I am with Seattle. I would have liked to see them win this comfortably and not have it come down to a last second field goal. It's a good win. It keeps them in the race for the playoffs. It keeps them in the race for the NFC West. But for me, it's still, this is a team that's a cut below the other teams,

the top teams in this conference. Okay. Sam Howell leads the league and passes completed, pass attempts and pro football reference hasn't updated after today so what the list is right now is two is first and then

Sam is second and Mahomes is third but yeah Sam Howell leads to the league in passing that's one of those stats where sometimes it's bad to be to rank high in it like the year James Winston through like 40 interceptions he led the league in passing it's not a good thing

but it is kind of funny he also leads to in sacks. The time, the, the period when there was open speculation of whether or not Sam Howell was going to get sacked a hundred times this season made me feel bad for him. So I'm happy that he, he, at least he has his counting stats. And he's not getting sacked as much anymore. No. Gino, the last drive for Gino, the game winning drive just, just setting up the field goal I thought was really impressive.

I didn't see all of this game, but I saw the end of it. And it seemed like some of it had been up and down, but he, when he's surgical, he's surgical. There's another universe where they win this game by like 17 points. Like they had a couple of fourth and ones where they, it looked like they were going to go for it. And then they get a pre-snap penalty, get pushed back five yards and then kick a field goal.

They cost himself another field goal right before the half. It's those little mistakes that they can't afford to make and they're still making them. I don't know. I just don't think they have that margin for error. That's how you get into a game that's competitive with the commanders. I don't think the commanders played that well. Like, Seattle could have blown this game out, but I don't know. Those little things just elude them.

All right. I will close things out. Our final loser of the day, the Green Bay Packers, who lost 23 to 19 to the Steelers. The Steelers. At some point we have to talk about the six and three Pittsburgh Steelers, who after every game that they win, their fan base just explodes into like abject misery about the state of their offense.

It's one of the funniest, like... Good. It's kind of like the Vikings last year, but it is a much more... It's not like that sort of Midwestern nice don't mean to us thing. It's like they're tearing themselves apart. It's really...

It's something. My takeaway here for Green Bay, though, is that something that was part of this loss has been, is something that's been part of their relative disappointments this year overall, which is that the Jordan Love Christian Watson connection just really hasn't been there. And today it was on the final play at a game where Love targets Watson gets picked off. the drive before he'd targeted Watson the end zone, ended up underthrowing him, was picked there too. And Love has 10 interceptions on the season so far. Five of them have come targeting Watson, which that's a relatively small sample size and interceptions can be fluky and there's just a lot that goes into them.

But love has not been having a great year. and that connection between two young players who could, in theory, be building blocks of this offense just is not where the Packers would hope it is. And it's just one microcosm of what's been happening in Green Bay and what's happening with that offense. But it was what cost them at the end of the game today. And I think it's, it's illustrative of some of the bigger issues there. Yeah, I mean, this is the youngest team in the NFL. It's the youngest offense in the NFL. And like the mistakes are young people mistakes, young player mistakes.

And I don't think that was necessarily the case, like for most of this game. But I didn't watch it. I didn't watch it closely. But throughout the season, it's just like little things. Like the receivers don't run the routes at the right depth. Or Jordan left's timing is just a little bit off. His feet are a little bit off. His eyes are a little bit off.

and I think if we saw him in a more experienced offense, I do think Matt LaFleur is doing a good job considering what he's working with and the salary cap situation and how it kind of ties into their personnel deficiencies. Like they went for it with Aaron Rogers and that's why they have this roster. So it's kind of hard to blame anybody.

It made sense for them to go for it and push their chips into the middle of the table when they did it. But like this is the result is that they have this very young team that doesn't cost a lot of money and they're playing like young player, and I think it's Jordan Love that's going to take the hit to his reputation. Because I think if you put a young quarterback, and he's not that young,

we've seen players in his draft class already get paid their second contracts. But when you put a guy into that situation, his weaknesses are just going to get highlighted more. Like you're going to notice the inaccuracy. You're going to notice the bad plays or the bad throws into coverage. But I think he's been fine for like 90% of the season. It's that other 10%, which is just like the product of him being a raw player that hasn't played a lot of football, that like I said, just gets highlighted because he's playing with these other players making mistakes similar to the mistakes he's making. And they compound. And when we highlight that, I think it's going to be a referendum on the player because he's the player.

And to some extent, that's totally fair. I think like there has to, part of the conversation has to have to do with this. philosophy of quarterback development, right? Because they have a really great history in Green Bay. And I think you're absolutely right to point out that they have certain salary cap constraints that have to do with having a Hall of Fame caliber quarterback who they won a Super Bowl with and we're going for it every year with having been there and also having moved on.

But I do think that one of the take. away is from what this offense looks like right now is that those those little mistakes and those the areas in which they're not polished. I mean, we have to take away that that you don't get that in practice then. Right. And if that's the case, then, you know, if I were them in the future or if I was another team thinking about that philosophy around quarterback development of having someone sit behind a starter, I guess I would think twice about it a little bit more after watching this because it seems like,

okay, you lose some of the cost-controlled years. They had the whole situation with Rogers being what it was. There's opportunity cost in that pick going to a player who's not helping you on Sundays for several years. And then when he does start playing, maybe he's promising in a lot of ways. Yeah. But he's not getting in there ready to go with with the nuanced in-game stuff down with your receivers, especially the ones who are also new and also young and also coming in. So there's probably like, it's a nuanced thing.

And I don't think the Jordan Love draft pick is necessarily a. in my mind a bad one or going badly. There's just, there's still a lot of work to happen there. And I do think that one of the takeaways is just, it didn't happen when he was taking backup reps behind a scowling Aaron Rogers. And maybe that's the lesson learned. Yeah.

I just don't think it's like over yet. I think it's very easy to kind of like write him off and just be like, oh yeah, they need a draft a guy next year. They need a tank. I don't think that's the case. I think you see a lot of flashes with him. I think there's enough. This isn't like a Zach Wilson situation

where it's like this guy's totally helpless and we don't even see the flashes that we thought we were going to see. Like you see the arm talent. Like there are third down plays where he's like throwing off his back foot and finding guys with tight window throws. So I do think there's something you can build upon. But I think the other part of it like the, whether this is going to be a referendum on quarterback development,

I don't think it ever was going to be. in a certain way because this wasn't the plan. Like Green Bay didn't draft Jordan Love expecting Aaron Rogers to turn back the clock and turn into an MVP candidate again. They drafted Jordan Love because everyone thought Aaron Rogers was falling off a cliff and it was over. Right. Right. Right.

So, yeah, this, like, sitting him on the bench for three years, like it was never part of the plan. So I don't think, like, teams are going to, like, take a lesson away from this. But I do think, I do agree, like, that is the takeaway. It's a hard model that really reduces your margin for error. We saw it with Tray Lance. Tray Lance misses his last year of college because of COVID. Has a redshirt year, his first year in the NFL, which made sense because Jimmy G

was still a decent player and was getting it done with that offense. And he gets his first season. He breaks his leg in his second start, third start, whatever it was. And that was it. We never see him again. And that's the margin of error you're dealing with when you don't start right away. Whereas like a guy like Joe Burrow can suffer torn ACL in his first year and doesn't really matter because he played right away.

So you already knew there was something there that you could build upon. And with love, like you don't have that. You said the phrase Zach Wilson's situation. So I think we should take another quick break. And then we'll come back and we will do our final segment and check in on Jets Raiders see what's happened with those crazy kids. Thanks again to our sponsor, Uber Eads. With Uber Eads, you can get groceries, alcohol and everyday essentials.

in addition to food from your favorite restaurants. In other words, get almost, almost anything with Uber Eats. Official on-demand delivery partner of the NFL. Order now. Alcohol in select markets and 21 plus to order. Product availability may vary by region C app for details. All right. So this is normally where we do the take purge.

But you've suggested, Stephen, that we guess the score of Jets Raiders? Mm-hmm. Do you want me to go? Okay, the last time I saw the score, it was like 50 seconds left, third quarter, it was 9 to 9, I think. Yes. Okay, so that's what I'm facing. It was 9 to 9. You can go.

Okay. Okay. I think, well, the game will be over by now. I think the Jets won 15 to 15 to 12. I'm going with not a touchdown in the game. That's a high score in fourth quarter. Three scores. Zach Wilson turnover, fourth quarter?

Yes or no? The vibe of the first three quarters was that, like, no one was moving the ball enough for a lot of turnovers, but I'll go yes. Okay. I'm going to go Raiders win. 16 to 9. Zach Wilson, sack fumble in the fourth quarter.

All right. Producer Isaiah, do you want to do the reveal for us or should I just Google it? I can do the reveal. You guys are sharp. It was 16 to 12 Raiders won. Zach does have a pick in the fourth quarter. Yes. Oh no, I didn't guess that.

Fuck. Too much faith in Zach Wilson. Wait, and Zach Wilson had a fumble in the fourth quarter? Interception. Incredible. All right. Stephen wins that one. This has been dual threat.

We'll be back on Thursday. Next up on this feed, Sheila and Ben will have extra point taken. Their deep dive into week 10. Thank you to Kiar Givens and Eduardo Ocampo for their work on socials. And Isaiah Blakely for producing this episode and for catching us up on all things, Jets Raiders, with additional production supervision by Arjuna Ramapal and Connor Nevins.

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