The Ringer NFL Show - Week 17 Recap: Playoff-Bound Browns, NFC East Drama, and the Dolphins' Flailing Finish

Episode Date: January 4, 2021

Kevin and Nora break down the Browns reaching the postseason (2:35), discuss the "competitive integrity" of the NFC East (1:00:00), select their Week 17 winners and losers (16:40), deliver the Hurry Up (1:08:55), and answer a couple of listener questions (1:11:04). Hosts: Kevin Clark and Nora Princiotti Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It is the Ringer NFL show, part of the Ringer podcast Network. I'm Kevin Clark today. Nora Prenciotti joins me to discuss the Cleveland Browns making the playoffs for the first time in 18 years. The Miami Dolphins flopping in their opportunity to make the playoffs. And for the first time, people are worried about the competitive integrity of the NFC East. Nora, the playoffs to hear the schedule's out. The schedule's out.

I am ready for some playoff football team football in prime time. This is a wild time in football. Chris Collinsworth is. openly revolting against the Eagles. Doug Peterson decided to say, I don't think there will be any issue with our culture moving forward because he played Nate Sudfeld.

How bad do you feel for Nate Sudfeld that he was so bad and is such a bad player that Doug Peterson had to say he won't, playing him won't affect our culture? People should be nice to Nate Suddfeld. He's a wonderful man. He did nothing wrong. I covered him very briefly in Washington

and he was so lovely that I remember talking to him on a cut day and he just said something so earnest. Like, I just wish everybody could stay. And I was a Nate Sudfeld fan for life at that point. This game, this outcome, the end of this week 17 that was crazy and we'll get to all of it. It felt like they let the 2020 writers come back and write like a reunion special. And we all watched it on our televisions.

It's interesting to me that Nate Sudfeld said to you, I wish everyone could stay because no one said that watching the football. team play the Eagles tonight. No one looked at this and said, let's keep this together. So everybody hated that game. We're going to get to it. A lot of talk about tanking, a lot of talk about culture, all that stuff. That's coming later. Let's get you the playoff schedule just so everybody knows going into it. Colts at Bills on Saturday, 105 Eastern Time on CBS. Rams at Seahawks 440 Eastern Time on Fox. Bucks at Football Team 815 Eastern Time on NBC. On Sunday, Ravens of Titans 105 on ESPN and ABC,

bears at Saints 440 Eastern Time on CBS and Nickelodeon, obviously. Browns at Steelers 815 on NBC. And the overall seating in the AFC, Chiefs 1, Bills 2, Steelers 3, Titans 4, Ravens 5, Brown 6, cold 7. You can figure that out from some of the matchups, but that's the order. And then NFC, Packers, Saints, Seahawks, football team, bucks, rams, bears. We're finally here.

Browns 24. Pittsburgh Steelers 22. It's our first winner. The Browns are in the playoffs of the first time since 2002. What were you doing in 2002? I was absolutely crushing second grade is what was going on then. I think you just depressed a lot of our listeners. Yeah. I was on, yeah.

We'll leave it at that. I don't leave it that. We'll let that hang. We'll let that hang there for a while. So the Browns. Well, or no, we can just lean into it. So the year of my birth was the year of the last Browns playoff victory. Coached by Bill Belichick. Bill Belichick, who you've been covering as a journalist. Good year.

Fantastic. And it all comes full circle with the Brown. It all comes full circle. And now we have to talk about the Patriots for 30 months. Okay. All right. No, we will talk about the Browns who beat. Let's let's be clear.

We're going to give a lot. of credit to the Browns here, would they beat the Steelers JV team here today? Mason Rudolph 22 of 39, 3 and 15 yards. Nick Chubb started the game, 14 carries 108 yards. Baker Mayfield gets the game ceiling scramble, I guess you could say, Cream Hunt threw a great block. A lot to like about this Browns performance. It didn't make it easy.

There was essentially a 15-minute heart attack that every Browns fan had at the end of the game. Whether that was the Steelers coming down to score, a failed two-point conversion that could have been a penalty, maybe if a ref saw something. And then the strange onside kick that was trapped between the legs compared on the broadcast to a shortstop, not really getting the hop there. That looked like it could have been caught by the Steelers or recovered by the Steelers. But in the end, the Browns do it.

And for the first time in 18 years, they're headed to the playoffs. There's a lot to get to as far as what this means for the franchise. Kevin Stefansky comes in. I was looking at the Browns coaching registry, I guess you could say. And his 11 wins were more than seven full-time coaches in Cleveland had in their entire tenure. Okay. And that was just this year. Obviously, Stavancy got arrived a year ago this week, I think.

And only Romeo, Cornell, and Butch Davis won more games in their entire tenure than Stefansky has this year. This is unbelievable. Okay. And I think that there were people, I tweeted that out earlier today and there are people who were saying, oh, why is the bar so low for Cleveland? Let's let Cleveland have this, okay? Like, this is not the Niners. This is not the Giants.

This is not the Patriots. There's no history of greatness with the New Browns. There is in the past life with their old franchise. But let's let the new Browns have this for a second. Before we get into the big picture implications of all of this, what do we learn, Nor? Well, we learned that when they win, it's because they understand who they are. I think that's what Stefansky's done such a good job of is just figuring. figuring out what they're good at and working with that.

They, so when the, the Browns play the Steelers in the wildcard round, it'll be their third, it'll be the third rematch of this, or the second rematch, I guess, but the third time these teams meet. And the first one was week six where the Steelers just absolutely blew out the Browns. And that was a game where they didn't have Nick Chubb. A lot of different things going wrong. And that game was a while ago. We don't have to read too, too much into that. But it's really, really, really clear what works.

works for this Browns team, which is when they use the running backs a ton, when they have that going, when they get Baker moving, I don't think it's an accident that he kind of sealed this game, getting on the move using his legs a little bit. That's what works. And they've kept it simple and succeeded by doing that. That's the kind of way that you win 11 games in your first year when they have that kind of history. So I think it's the same thing. The Steelers team certainly that they'll play next weekend not looking like the team that blew the Browns out and that that goes beyond resting some of the starters here. So that to me is a really interesting matchup. But with the Browns, it's pretty simple. It's just if they can keep Baker protected, which they've been able to do

and rely on the running game a lot. And I think that's tough against the Steelers defense. But I certainly think it'll be more of a game than we saw earlier in this season. in between these two teams. The Browns have an identity, and that's important, because the Browns have had an identity in the past, but you don't want to know what that was. Okay, it was really bad. Right now, Kevin Sfansky is doing two things.

Well, number one, he's doing the outside zone stuff really well. We know that that's his bread and butter. That was, if you'd said last January, what is he going to do well in Cleveland? It would be that, okay? Building around the running game, bootlegs, getting Baker on the run when he does pass it. And then this PFF had a great number.

which is essentially that Sifansky is getting Mayfield in position to throw to his first read all the time. At this point, his first read passes are 70%. That's among the highest in the league. That's really good. And it's speeding up Baker's decision making. This is about this is, and there are four, five, six, seven teams like this. So let's not act like other teams aren't doing it. But when teams see what Kevin Svansky has done to make Baker, Mayfield's life,

easier. They should be wondering why their team isn't doing it. And I just think when I look at this Browns team, I just see a lot of good things. And the way that they've changed this culture has actually been been pretty interesting. Mayfield has done a good job of getting better the season goes along. I was playing around with the pressure numbers earlier today. And the big book on Mayfield was that under pressure he can't play. And if he's kept up right, whatever. And that was true. That unbelievably true for the first half of this year and particularly in the first month this season. And it was a take that I had in my back pocket and I kind of felt like it was, it was, it was going to be, it was just the book on Baker from now on, right? Like I thought I was like,

I was like, well, I'm going to reheat this take in January, Baker can't play under pressure. Well, here's what's happening. Okay. First part of this season, first half of this season, according to PFF, according to their database, I was doing a little searching. His passer rating under pressure was 29. Not good. good. Well, in the second half, it's 65, which obviously, if you're just hearing it, it sounds bad, but that's actually middle of the pack, better than golf, who is also bad under pressure, better than Tom Brady, better than Ben Robertsberger, the other Robertsburger thing, you know, that's separate category. By the way, Drew Locke, second half of the season,

17 pass the rating under pressure, not what you want. Anyway, the fact that these teams played earlier in the season, and the Steelers won 38 to 7. To me, I'm intrigued to see next week because I think the Steelers win this game, but I think that this Browns team has gotten significantly better since then. I feel like Kevin Stefansky, who, by the way, was able to do all of this stuff with no training camp, or shortened training camp, no OTAs, no offseason,

didn't even meet as players until August. The fact that he's able to get this team to improve this much in a short period of time is a testament to everybody, Cleveland. I love what they've done. I don't think they have what it takes to win next week. But I don't think that we should just sit here for the first time. No, it's been 18 years since we've sat here on a week 17 Sunday and said the Browns are going in the playoffs. I don't want this season to feel like a failure for anybody. This is success for Kevin Sfansky, Baker Mayfield, Andrew Barry, who I spoke to in August and he said, our job is to make the quarterback's life

easier. Mission accomplished. Okay. So I'm, this is a victory. for the Browns, they should be extremely happy with how far they've come. That's not to say, I don't think that this is what you're saying, but they could win that game. Oh, absolutely. It is completely, I mean, yes. Like, Rob, it's not like Rothersburg is right in the world on fire. And not enough fluky wit. Yeah.

No, no, no, no, no, no. They have talent. This is not, no, this isn't the eight and eight bear sneaking in here. Okay, they can win this game. I'm just saying when I look at this game next week, I just see the Steelers winning. but they had the talent to to win this game. Yeah, no, that's, that's, that's, that's, I think, mostly how I feel. Although, I don't know, maybe I feel like it's a little bit more even than that,

potentially a little bit of recency buy-ins with what we've seen from the Steelers offense, but I can, that this seems oddly evenly matched to me. And again, that's going off of where the Steelers have been in December. certainly less than early in the season, but that's where we are, right? And I'm sure the rest helps. I'm sure all of that factors in. You mean when you say how they've been in December,

you mean completely unable to function as an offense and a quarterback. Yeah, that would be one way to put it. Large stretches of football games. Yeah. That. That thing. That whole thing they've been doing. And I know that people are going to say,

okay, well, this was a close game. And obviously the Steelers rested a bunch of starters. Cleveland was up against it as well. They had another. stable of COVID outbreaks, Densel award was out of the game. B.J. Goodson, Harrison Bryant, Malcolm Smith, and Justin Dejo. Two coaches, Chatt O'Shea and Bill Callahan, were out due to COVID protocols as well. So they were short-handed as well.

And I think this game was a little closer than Browns fans would have liked, especially because, you know, old memories start to creep in at some point. But I think that this was, I think that this was fine. And I think that, you know, it's interesting to me, the NFL had a number tonight. that the three longest playoff trouts in history that have come to an end, the Saints in 87, the Bills in 2017, and now Cleveland in 2020, that all three of those ended when the new coach was in his first two seasons. And I think there's something there where once you sort of know the coach, like McDermott, I think you knew right away.

The fact that they started Nathan Peterman that year and all sorts of weirdness, whatever, fine. But when I was in Buffalo or I was in Rochester at training camp, whatever it was, I knew that something good was happening there. I said it on this podcast. We wrote it. We talked about it. And I get those same vibes with Stavansky right now. For some reason, there was a very heated as Stamancy Coach of the Year, as McDermott

of the Year conversation on Twitter. I don't, that's a midweek thing for me. But what I can say right now is that Kevin Stefansky took a very, talented roster and became the first person to do something with it. And that is so commendable for me. Every time he does, the more boring his press conferences are, the more confident I am that the Browns are going to win their next game. Kevin Stavansky just getting on Zoom and being like,

yep, we're going to take it one day at a time. I'm just like, you can do this. Okay, let's go. Yeah, I mean, I totally agree. I mean, there's something to stability in Cleveland. You know, I mean, there were people talking about, you know, Jarvis Landry being great acquisition. I remember how controversial that was, especially in the kind of tape fantasy analytics

community. Oh, is Jarvis Landry valuable, whatever? He's making these guys valuable. He's making Nick Chub valuable, who's obviously a great player to begin with. You know, there are so many ways. The fact that we're sitting here and saying that a run first, I think they run the ball something like 48% of the time or the design runs to 48% of the time. The fact that they're.

able to do that in an era and they're not doing the passing on first down. They're running on third down. I think at the third highest rate in football behind, I think behind only the Ravens and the Patriots. I think I read that on PFF. So I, the fact that they're for as much sort of analytics focus as they do, the fact that they have Paul D. Paul D. Podesta in the front office, former baseball analyst guru, Andrew Barry has done it all. He's been a pro scout, a college scout analyst guy. This is an old school football team. And obviously a lot of the wide zone is of them. They're innovating, but they're playing in a way that I think is teaching us a lesson about how many different ways there are to win a football game in 2020, because I think that there's a

lot of people who sort of view the game as homogenous now. And I think you can make your quarterback better by not passing sometimes and building around him. And I think that there's, again, there's some lessons here. The Browns a couple years ago were the thesis statement of the team was, this is a massive collection of talent and talent is just going to win out. And, We hyped them up to no end and got totally transfixed by that. And that's fun. And no regrets. You live by the Browns.

You die by the Browns, whatever. But then this team, think about what a pivotal moment it was when they lost Odell. And that had been an up and down relationship in six different ways. But that marks a transition from the way that we're going to win is to overwhelm teams by just having better players and be more stacked than whoever else. And clearly that hadn't worked.

They hadn't gotten where they wanted to go by doing it that way. This way they had to do it. They're pretty good. They're also a little boring. And in the greater Browns context, both of those things are actually compliments. It's fine. Last thing, before we get out of this particular discussion, how many games in a row do you think the Browns have lost in Pittsburgh?

Six. 17. That is physically jarring. the third longest road losing streak against a single opponent in NFL history. I'd love to see the first two. I'm not sure. I'm going to look that up later. All right, let's move on to listen, as excited as we are for Cleveland fans,

we feel that, I don't know, frustration, I guess you could say, for Miami fans. Because, you know, we had a reader question last week, Noro, that asked which team had the least to lose. from a narrative perspective and the most lose from narrative perspective they missed the playoffs. There are obviously a lot of double-digit win aFC teams were in the hunt and one of them wasn't going to make it. And we find out that was the Dolphin's Day. But they lost in such a way that I don't think that this is a oh hey great we feel good about the season. No stakes. I'll see you next year. A way that makes me question everything. They still built an incredible foundation. Brian Flores is still a really good coach. I still believe that they're going to have a

lot of talent going forward and that they have the draft capital to make their team better. But this was really, really bad. You cannot lose 56 to 26 to the Buffalo Bills. And allowing for the fact that the Buffalo Bills are an absolute buzzsaw right now, you just can't play like this. Okay. Well, and the bills, I mean, they played Josh Allen for, part of the game, but they were hosting some of their guys and Trey White, Jerry Hughes, those guys weren't playing. This was not a Bill's team that,

to quote Ray Lewis, was pissed off for greatness, okay? They were going to play a half. They were going to see how it's going to go and they were going to just see how it went. This was not super duper motivated bills team. And that to show you, by the way, how good the bills are. The Dolphins according to ESPN allowed 56 points

after entering the week as the number one scoring defense in the NFL. They're the only number one scoring. defense to allow 50 points in a game. Never happened before. So again, that should show you two things. Number one, how poorly the dolphins played and how well the bills played. They're also now,

this is a bill stat, also from ESPN, that this is, their 56 points was the second most in a single game franchise history. Okay, fine, probably be expected. Through the first team to enter the playoffs winning six straight games by double digits since the 2014 Seahawks. Don't look up what happened in the 2014 Seahawks.

but this is, if you're Buffalo right now, you should feel amazing. And if you're Miami, we're going to get to the quarterback conversation here in a minute. Boy, does this suck? It's brutal. And they had been so well-coached and stable and confident, even in moments when they were winning close games

and switching back and forth with the quarterbacks. But we had so many conversations about how the locker room had been managed there through going to two out of fits, to two out of fits, to two out of fits, which should have been really, really, really hard. And maybe it was hard, but we didn't see a lot of evidence of that on the field. And then you're in a win-in-in situation.

And this happens for the first time in history. So it is really disappointing. I would not say that I am equally frustrated for Dolphins fans, as I am ecstatic for Browns fans, just because I do think that once you get past the sting of it, that greater picture of, okay, it's okay, it's not what you want in that situation. And again, this is a team that for the last couple of years has had, has just hated losing, has just, even when it was good for them, even when it had something to offer them, they just seem to

have absolutely no interest in doing it. So I'm sure everybody there is really, really, really pissed about this. But again, they do, they lock in the number three overall pick today. The future there, I do not. I am not part of the move on from Tua or consider that a really serious question crowd. We will get to that. But I do think that for them, their situation in the playoffs, I never felt like they were going to make a deep run this year. So in some ways, once you get over the initial sting of it, which is severe, then you move into, okay, still a really, really, really strong foundation here. So I think that that it still holds what we were talking about

last week where this is the team where the narrative doesn't change as much although it does mean that they have to withstand this another quarterback thing. I disagree with you. I actually disagree with you. I think the narrative shifted

from wow this. So first of all, it's true that this team is going to be really good and have a lot of roster talent and have a lot of good coaching for a number of years. That part is true. I've already said that. But the narrative switched in so much this went from, hey, good team won double digits when last September they're losing by 50 all the time to is to one and done. And I don't, I don't think he is, but I'm just saying I can see this narrative already. A lot of smart people where that's Bucky Brooks came out and said, listen, Tua now has to be compared to Justin Fields and Zach Wilson.

Mike Tannenbaum said it last week that there's a chance that that Miami sees sees someone like Zach Wilson as option. At the number three pick, I think it's a little hard. I mean, the Cardinal situation with Josh Rosen was totally different because that was number one pick. And you didn't have to get into is this a two-quarterback draft, is a three-quarterback draft, whatever. You didn't have to say, okay, is Zach Wilson going to move up on our board?

It was just, we can take Kyle Emery and we're going to do it. And I think that for me, first of all, I want to say that the Josh Allen thing, I want to, this is a big picture thing, but the Josh Allen thing is going to be an aberration in NFL history. And I think I've seen a lot of people defend any raw quarterback when they're young now is saying, well, Josh Allen is bad. What the bills do with Josh Allen and what Josh Allen did with Josh Allen is not going to happen very often.

Okay. And so I don't necessarily like the argument that, oh, well, Josh Allen is bad so Tua can get good. But what I will say is the Tua will get better. And I don't think you cut bait now. I think with the third pick, you take another guy probably along the lines who's, or excuse me, a skill position player or along the lines, whatever you want to do with Tua. But I think you have to give him a chance one more year. I don't think the third quarterback in this draft is going to be so significantly.

good that he's going to blow two his doors off and you have to go with him. It's not going to be a Kyle or Josh Rosen situation. But what I do think is that people are going to talk about that for the next four months. I think the dolphins are a stable enough franchise where that's not going to affect it. But what I am saying is the question was about narrative. And I do think the narrative is flip. You know, Dave Hyde, the great columnist in the Sun Sentinel wrote it today right after the game. He said, you know, that's, they give him a couple days to decompress and then figure out if two is your guy. I don't think, realistically, anyone was going to think that if they lost or everyone was going to write that or talk about that if they lost by six points today.

That's true. But in a month, somebody's going to lose the Super Bowl and there's going to be a whole different thing. I'm not sure that this will be moving and have legs to the extent that it's really going to change internally how they look at it, internally how they feel. The other thing I feel like is, okay, I could almost understand if they wanted to do something crazy and say, you know what, let's get another quarterback in here. Let's take another swing. Sure. Because it's the most important position and we have this draft capital and it's more important to us to have a second opportunity to get it right. But the idea of just cutting bait and deciding right now that Tua is not the guy, to me, if that were to happen, it would be so.

unfortunate because it would be a reaction, I think, to the ridiculous weight of expectations that got put on a player who was coming off of a brutal injury. Yes. And that's the number one reason that you give them more patient. In the weirdest, weirdest, weirdest freaking season ever. And that was why I thought it was so ridiculous in the start where it was like, well, he looks like the greatest college quarterback that a lot of people have ever seen. So obviously from day one in the NFL, it's going to look the same. And that's, that is terrible logic. And so if that's the standard that we're holding two or two, then of course it's not going to work out. Give the kid an opportunity to take a leap

in the second year, which we see so many quarterbacks do. And I don't understand what they possibly could have seen this year, which by the way, I mean, this was an abysmal game for him. They run an offense with Tua that is just totally horizontal. And then, And later in the game, when they started going downfield a little bit more, he just wasn't completing anything there and was overthrowing everything. So it was a brutal, brutal, brutal day. Up to this point in the season, Tua has not been that bad. He was completing like 65% of his passes.

It was not nothing explosive, not putting up big numbers. There were some moments. Like if you think back to that game where they beat the Rams, I think he had under 100 yards, but he still, there were moments of poise there. And I just think it would be a real shame. if somehow that got in the water stream internally there,

which I don't think it will. I think they have way too much sense for that, that that was somehow disqualifying for him because this just doesn't count as enough of a chance. I think the two biggest things, and number one, we talked about sort of the chances they took,

he threw 58 passes, second most by a quarterback this year, and he was 5 of 17 on deep passes. That was this Sunday. And I think that there's two reasons. I don't think that he's going to have any competition next year. Number one is, as I said, there's a huge difference between the first and third pick. And when it becomes the quarterback, when you need a quarterback, they go really, really early.

You have to trade up and draft capital, whatever. You're not going to get Fields. You're not going to get Lawrence. So you might as well try to build around two and figure that out. Okay. If they had the first and second pick, that's a different conversation. If they get Fields, it's a different conversation. or if the Jets just talk themselves into Zach Wilson,

that's a different conversation. And then the other part is what you said, where I think they have a little too much sense for this to know that unless you can get a sure thing, there's no reason to do this and that there's resources better spent elsewhere. I want to ask you this very quickly. If Ryan Fitzpatrick were available today,

would he have come in the game? Yeah. And I think their offense would have been better. That to me gets to the heart of it. And for as much as we, we were talking about Brian Flores as a coach of the year candidate a couple weeks ago, for as much as we love the future of this team.

I mean, this is, I don't think there's any team who we're in more of an agreement on than the Miami Dolphins. This was a step back today. And I don't know. And by the way, by the way,

maybe this is just the bills being awesome. And maybe the narrative flips in three weeks when the bills run through the playoffs in January. And we go, oh, wow, turns out the dolphin just got the wrong schedule at the wrong time. Well, if Josh Allen, I think aberration is strong, but I agree with you that Josh Allen is a bit of an anomaly in terms of how his growth happened. But if he continues to play the way that he's played this season and if Tua doesn't work out, then the conversation that needs to be had is about the transition from college to the NFL vis-a-vis, what the receiver talent that a player was working with in college was.

Because with Josh Allen, that I think it's fair to say was detrimental to his growth, that he just wasn't playing with guys around him who were going to force him to make anticipatory throws. And credit to him that he's figured out a way to do it, that's the part that doesn't happen that often. But we might be needing to readjust a little bit how we look at that as part of the context. And this is not me saying that that's definitely. what's happening. And I don't think that, I just don't think we know with Tua is my point. So if they wanted, if the dolphins wanted to add someone else into the mix, I don't, I don't, I wouldn't necessarily fault them for it. But if it were because they looked at this year and said,

this clearly isn't the guy and we've got to go full Rosen, I, I don't think that they would do that for a second. And if they did, it would be ridiculous to me. Josh Allen and his improvement, which I think is pretty much here to stay is, I just don't think you can rely on that. If you ran his career a thousand times in a thousand different situations, there's no guarantees. Okay, the fact that he went from 2,000 yards or 3,000 yards to 4,300 yards in a two-year period is unbelievable since 2018. We did the whole stats thing, the whole improvement thing last week. I don't want to do it again. I'm just saying that, you know, I think for a long time everyone held up Peyton Manning's

said in the interceptions record as like, oh, bad quarterbacks can become good. And I generally do agree with that. I'm just saying that you should be asking the question as soon as they get in the building because there's nothing, there's nothing that matters more than whether or not you've solved the quarterback problem. And I remember Thomas Dimitrov told me this a couple of years ago. We're talking about Matt Ryan, about the contract stuff. And he was like, when you don't have a quarterback, you feel it in every room in the building. And my question right now, and I don't know the answer is if you're in the Dolphins facility right now, do you feel like you have a quarterback or not? Yeah.

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Our next winner is the AFC South, which gets both the Titans and the Colts in on the last day of the season. The Colts certainly needed some help. The Titans, we kind of assumed they were in. Derek Henry became the fourth player in the last 20 years to rush for 2,000 yards. He also became the eighth player overall to rush for 2,000 yards. had 250 yards. He's untackable.

We're doing this again. It's January and Derek Henry is just going to do the thing where he can't be tackled. Interesting game. They went on a doink. Doinks in a lot of that going around in January, a lot of doinks. What did you learn about the Titans and Colts? And what did we learn? And we're going to get to a Colts, Bill's prediction here in a second.

But what did we learn about the AFC South today, Nora? First of all, I want to know how you responded to, the doink because I can't imagine being I thought it was out. I thought it was out too. I went fetal position essentially as soon as I saw the ball hit the upright and then somebody yelled no it went through and it was just a real roller coaster. But one of the crazy situations of the day, the Colts

were so interesting to me this week because they came in with the possibility of being out of the playoffs. in his wild card or to win the AFC South. And they're funky to me. I think they're in a tough, tough game against the Bills. And I just don't think that they've been consistent enough this season for me to feel like they really have all that much of a shot against a Bills team that just feels like a buzzsaw right now. But it's funny to look back because there was that chance that they could win 11 games and be the third 11 win team to miss the playoffs even in a year. where there's an extra seed,

which I'm glad that they are not, because you look back and you look at their off season and go, okay, well, rivers, not perfect, but that worked out pretty well. And it's a pretty big swing to take a chance on an aging quarterback, and he's coming off a bad year, and at a certain point,

that tends to go in one direction, and they figure he can make it better. And Buckner and their draft picks, a lot of things went right for them. And this is a team that, you expand the frame a little bit and go, okay, they had the guy that they thought was their franchise quarterback suddenly retire. They got left at the altar by a guy that they wanted to be the coach.

And it's a little bit miraculous when you start to put it all together and go, so they've still been pretty stable this whole time. And actually none of these things have jumped up and bitten them in the face. So my feeling is kind of the Colts did everything right. And I also don't think that they have all that much of a chance against the bill. although I'm very, very, very curious to see Roads on Diggs, which I assume will be a really cool matchup that we'll get. But I think you get into how the bills receivers are going to be able to find the spaces. The cold tend to play a lot of too high zone. And I just think it's going to be a

tough one to go blow for blow with them. But an interesting situation with the Titans who are going to play a really hot Ravens team. It is kind of, if they're playmakers can be untackable enough to make up for the fact that they have a really, really, really terrible defense that's playing an offense that's been on fire for the last month. And I'm, I got to be real. I'm not optimistic. I asked Mark Engerman who on his day last month, whether he'd want to, it's a 10 yard, 10 yard kind of fight here.

Would you rather try to tackle Derek Henry or Lamar Jackson? And he said the answer, obviously. He would actually have a go at both. he would lose to both. But we talked a little bit about just the different, the different problems each, each present. Obviously, they're extremely different, but they both force mistackles.

And they're both just nightmares to game plan against because they, even if you are standing in front of them, things don't go your way sometimes. But I think that nothing surprised me more in the last couple of years of football than the Titans Ravens game. And I think that we've all forgotten, and we've all decided to forget collectively

what the feeling was in this Ravens team coming into last year. And this was, I told the story to Rich Oromberg when he was on this podcast over the summer. He was on, I was in the green room at Fox and he was on Fox saying that the Titans are going to give the Ravens a run for their money. And everybody,

sort of all of the different shows were there like the sports shows and everybody was just chuckling. Like we were just like, oh, this guy. Like, I'm talking about like former players, the whole deal. We're all just chucking. We're all just like, yeah, okay, okay, buddy. Like, who let this guy on TV? And then Saturday night, everything he said about the gaps and all that stuff turned out to be correct.

And I think that this is a tough team in Tennessee. I think that they win games they shouldn't, which I think is probably the best compliment you can give of any team. And I don't know. I think that the Ravens are primed for a run. And that's kind of what I'm going back to when I talk about. this time last year. We had forgotten about the chiefs this time last year. Remember, they only got the buy because of late season, Fitzmagic, all that stuff. And I think that there's, you know, when, when we go into the playoffs, we tend to have these narratives slipped on their head very quickly.

And so I guess what I'm saying is I like Titans as an organization. I like them as, you know, in theory, I think the Ravens are really coming together at the right time. And I think they're getting better and I think Lamar Jackson kind of understands what this is. I think that there's, from Lamar's standpoint and something he and I've talked about, you know, I think that there's something real where every time he posted anything and he said this, you know, every time he would say, hey, I'm at my house. You know, 5,000 people would win one second and say, hey, man, you sucked in the playoffs. And I don't want to do the last dance meme, but I do think he took that personally. And I think there's, I, I'm just intrigued to see what happens in this game because, again, I can't, I, I think Brable is really good coach.

I think it's going to be a very close game, but I do think that the Ravens have the actual capability to make the Super Bowl if things break right. I think there are three teams right now. Obviously, the Chiefs are number one in the AFC, and the bills are right behind and that gap gets closer every time I see the bills play. But I would not be surprised if the Ravens made the Super Bowl. The Super Bowl. If the Ravens made the Super Bowl, I would not be surprised. They would be third on my list. I'm just repeating it for emphasis so that people remember.

I would be surprised. I'd be surprised of any other team made the Super Bowl. I'm acting surprised, but I'm just making you put your take clearly on record. I like it. No, I think, I think the ASTs team is going to be chalk. I think it's going to be Chief Spills, but I'm just saying that if we're sitting here and on the Saturday before the Super Bowl

and we're talking about Lamar Jackson and going, why do we forget about Lamar Jackson? I wouldn't be surprised by that, okay? You wouldn't be shocked. Yes. I want to get back very quickly because this is not the Raven segment to the Colts. Because Philip Rivers had a weird game today, 164 passing guards, has now been picked off by this wind guard guy twice in the season for the Jaguars.

This is the wind guard's highlight day. Jonathan Taylor, 253 yards, franchise record. And this is simplistic. And we'll get more analysis later in the week and all this stuff. But listen, the bills were 27th in rushing yards against by attempt this year. And Jonathan Taylor clearly had the capability to take over the game. And if you're just doing very simplistic, and we'll get more analysis later in a week on this feed. But if you're just doing the napkin math, the bills are 27th in yards per attempt rushing against this year.

And Jonathan Taylor has the capability to take over the game. The Jaguar stink. The Jaguars absolutely stink. We saw this all year. but I'm just saying if you're looking for something to recommend the Colts, I think you'd start there. Philip Rivers is going to do just enough to keep you in the game. He's going to make some mistakes.

It's going to be, is it going to be Phil Rivers. I think that this is going to have to be a roster win, I guess you could say for the Colts where everything breaks right, where their talent shows out. And I think that there's a path, but I just think that, man, the bills are a freaking buzzsaw right now. And as for the Texans,

who obviously play the Titans in that game, Deshaun Watson deserves me. better. We saw that today. He almost won that game, uh, single-handedly. And I think that there's, he said after the game, there's no foundation there. So I don't know. I just, I just hope for the best. Every time I watch Deshaun Watson, all I can think of is I hope for the best for Deshaun Watson. And today was a real driving that home game because he was unbelievable and nothing. I was a bummer. There's no, I just don't know the path. I just don't know the path. I just don't know the path forward. Whatever. It upsets me. It upsets me. The one thing, though, is that they will be

able to, every time I start talking myself into that being just a bad coaching job, I have to come around to every coaching job is a good coaching job and people want them and they can offer a lot of money and figure it out. So I do think that there's hope in that particular context. Every coaching job is a good coaching job in so much that you can. buy a home in like your hometown that costs three million dollars sure yeah that's it not every every job is there's 32 of them so yeah they pay a bunch of money but sometimes there are situations you go into you're hired to be fired sure but do you think even i don't think the texan job is like that i don't think that i don't think the i don't think the texan job is like this i'm just saying that

i am i'm pushing back and we've talked about this in this podcast before i'm pushing back on the idea that all 32 coaching jobs are generally good coaching jobs. They're not created equal, but they're good jobs. They're jobs that people want. You think Joe Douglas was psyched about being the general manager of the Jeds? They doubled the offer in years and I think money. So he was psyched at the end of contract negotiations. Yeah.

So that he was psyched. But the factor of the dumpster fire organization, there was a way of alleviating that. Yes. So I think that the thing with Watson is that the text have solved the problem that every other team's trying to solve, which is elite quarterback play, and then how much is that then weigh against teams that don't have it figured out, right?

And for all we can say about Jacksonville in the blank slate and getting Trevor Lawrence and stuff, we've never seen Trevor Lawrence play at the NFL level. So if you're a top candidate, what do you want more? It's fascinating thing we've had discussion before. We'll have it again, but that's, I don't know, they got doink today. free to Sean.

All right, yeah, I think both these teams lose next week, but good seasons. Our next loser, the Arizona Cardinals. They lose to the LA Rams 18 to 7. Kaila Murray leaves the game for large chunks of an ankle injury. He finishes the game 8 of 11 for 87 yards. John Wolford coming in for an injured Jared Gough, 22 of 38, 231 yards, one interception. did we have higher hopes for Arizona or once Kyle left the game

we knew how it was going to go? Well, I think once Kyle left the game, we pretty much knew how this was going to go. I hate to shade CFL legend Chris Strebler, who by the way, somebody tweeted at me calling him CFLJR Smith and it was the best thing that I saw all day.

It made me so happy. Yeah, a lot of shirtless photos. A lot of shirtless photos. A lot of shirtless photos. A lot of shirtless photos of the stream. And I think he did his best. And we support him. And CFLJR was,

was really working for me today. But the cards, the thing is, is that they were just, they were so inconsistent all year. And they had, they had really good moments. But it seemed like whenever they got in a game where Kyler wasn't being able to

threaten defenses with his mobility or DeAndre Hopkins wasn't totally going off, they just got one dimensional and everything started getting screwed up. And the coaching was, weird and and there were so few moments when everything was working right for them. So then you play that out to Kyler goes down and even though on the other side is John Wolford who has an active LinkedIn page, which feels like, right?

This is a quarterback for the Los Angeles Rams. But I don't know what the stats are on starting quarterbacks who have active LinkedIn pages, but I just got to assume they don't win a whole ton of games. But the Rams just overall, particularly with how good their defense is, that's the team that can withstand starting one of these guys. And the Cardinals, they just seem so easy to knock up their access. And it's been a disappointing year because I think we both had fairly high hopes for them in different ways, both with Murray's development.

But they start five and two. And then they were the hail Murray away from a five. game losing streak. And I don't know how much of that gets fixed in one off season. I don't know how they're really feeling about Cliff right now, not that, you know, certainly not saying that he's going to get fired or anything, but that seat might be getting a little warm. But in a weird way, this is an encapsulation of their season. And, you know, the bears say thank you. So first of all, if you're a huge college football fan, I don't think you are, but I am. You can get in some real LinkedIn rabbit holes with former college football stars because if you go on one, then everybody

on the panel where it says like people also viewed, it's other college football stars. I don't know people who never played in the pros, right? Or it played for like two years in like 2008 and you're just like going through it and all of a sudden you're just, you know, you're in 10 random Wake Forest quarterbacks with LinkedIn pages. That's all. Okay. So a couple of things here. Number one is again, because Kyler was out for most of the game, even though they came back in,

I think it was a little too late. It was two possession game at that point. I think you kind of have to throw the stats away a little tiny bit. But Jailen Ramsey had a great game today. Shadow DeAndre Hopkins scored in Next Gen stats on 75% of his routes. Hopkins ended up with two receptions for 28 yards on seven targets when Ramsey was nearby. And I think that there's, I think that the Rams are a sneaky, interesting team. And I think they're the last couple of weeks where things started to go south.

I think that they're, you know, listen, they had that 84-yard pick six today on Strievler, Troy Hill, just playing really well. They're deep and they're well-coached on both sides of the ball. And I think the golf thing probably removes them from any sort of meaningful playoff run, the injury, obviously. But I think they could scare a team. I think the Seahawks kind of own them. I think it's a bad matchup. And I think that if they were playing other teams, I'd pick them to maybe cover or something like that. But I just think that the Seahawks thing is just a little too.

It's a little too much for them to overcome. The Seahawks are really good. Just for listeners, it seems like going into this game, the expectation with Goff was that if they were indeed in, it was likely that he was going to be able to play in the wild card round. And then it seems like after this game, McVeigh was kind of like, eh, we'll see unclear. So who knows if that's just postgame press conference.

I don't want my quarterback. I don't want my quarterback without thumb injury. It seems like a bad thing to have. You know what? You and me both, Kevin. I'm glad we have that in common. McVeigh said he's not sure about gospel ability. We'll talk about that. So that's what he said. So I don't know. It doesn't sound all that interesting. Yeah, with Cliff there, I guess this is, this is maybe a question for another pod. But is there any path you think with, obviously, they need to make huge.

changes within their coaching staff and and Cliff needs to do a little more self scouting and all that stuff but if if you're a bid well do you roll with Cliff for another year yeah I do we've we've said it a bunch of times what Cliff has done that is more impressive than anything else even the schematic stuff is show an ability to evolve pretty quickly and I would offer another opportunity for that to happen okay I think I agree. I think I agree. I think that the general vibe of this conversation, whether it's to a cliff or whoever else, is I'm looking at this,

but I'm going to let you stay. That's it. That's my general vibe for every team. And so I'm fixing every team is I'm asking the question, but then everybody's coming back. All right. On notice. Let's get everybody's on notice. Our next winner is not on notice because they're in the playoffs. It's Chicago Bears. They lost by 19, 35 to 16 to the Green Bay Packers. Aaron Rogers looked like he was not going to have an incompletion. Finishes the day 19 to 24, 240 yards, four touchdowns.

Mitchell Trubisky, 33 completions, 252 yards, one interception. Listen, completions are completions. Mr. Chibisky showing us the value of it. All right, so there's probably some really easy jokes about the bears. I'm not going to make them. They will lose next week to the Saints on Nickelodeon at 440. that game is also on CBS. But, you know, listen, they finished the year 8 and 8.

And, Nor, you've spent time in the NFL locker rooms. You've spent them in the Washington football team, which I'm sure was a different vibe than the Patriots. But you've been in those, and you've been in other teams after games or whatever. Really easy for a team to get off the rails when things start going south. Really easy.

And I don't think that this is the greatest coaching job in the world. I don't think that Matt Nagy is Sean McVeigh. I don't think Mitchell Chubisky is Deshaun, Watson. But what I will say is that I, I think that I, a month ago or whenever it was, when things started to go south, I saw a very different ending for this Bears team. I saw a very different ending from Mitchell Tribusky. The fact, these talk is way into extension talks, the fact, this team, even, listen, it's a seventh seat. I get that. Um, I think that there's, there's something to, I don't know necessarily if you can extrapolate on it or if it's repeatable or whatever, but I do

think it's commendable that they got to this position. And, and, listen, I'll probably make some Bears jokes later this week, but I don't, I don't think that there's, I don't think this is all bad. They made the playoffs. I will likewise hold off on the jokes, even though I have extensions for everyone written in my notes. You can all pretend I didn't say that. But I do think we have to acknowledge that they lost and they backed toward into the playoffs. They got destroyed. They got destroyed. and they back toward it. But that's not anything we didn't. The Packers are much better than that, as are the Saints.

The Bears are significantly worse than every other NFC playoff team, except anyone from the NFC East. And by the way, I'd love to see a Bears first the NFC East tournament. But I don't, I think that we learned that the Packers can kick the Bears' ass, just like we'll learn next week that the Saints kick the Bears ass. That's not new to me. It's just congratulations that the Bears on getting the place for the seventh best team. in the NFC.

Sure. But you get creamed back door into the playoffs because another team loses in a year where there is arbitrarily an extra seed and the entire vibe narrative feeling about what the outcome of this year was changes. And that's inevitable because one of the major goals of NFL teams is to make the playoffs. And they did that. And they don't control how many seeds make the playoffs. and none of that is up to them.

So they have no choice and they did everything that they needed to do in terms of going for that. None of that is wrong. None of that is bad. In fact, most of it is very good.

But these are the types of things that cause people to make bad decisions. Absolutely. Based on a change in feeling that is not actually the product of a real change in circumstance. And I will just say

that at the beginning of this, you said we're going to switch to someone who is not on no notice. The bears are a winner, but they are also on notice. All right. We're putting the bears on notice. I'm sorry to have pulled the old switcher on Bears fans. The bears are on notice. So there's a couple of things you said there that found an issue. So I don't think that the bears, I think at eight and eight and getting their ass kicked by the by the Packers, I don't think that the Hallis Hall and the

decision makers there are going to say, oh, we're bringing back Ryan Pace for giving him extension. Matt Nagy gets an extension. Mitch Chubisky or get him $50 million. I don't think that's going to happen. I think that they're probably pretty realistic on this. And by the way, the Chubisky bringing Trubisky back that was talked about before, you know, two games ago with Adam Schafter. And so I think it was always trending in that direction. And I think that they're not going to, I don't think they're going to make any decisions they wouldn't have after this game they wouldn't have had made on Sunday morning. And so I think that there's, I'm not saying that this is sustainable or anything like that. You know what this is like.

do you have any friends who got into like college but they got in like the weird program of a good school do you know what I'm talking about like they got into like a summer school type thing and it was like well I got into this school but I had to go like after enroll in June and then get like a GPA of something and then I get it conditional conditional acceptance I don't know what you'd call it a couple friends who went to good schools on that that's what the bears did okay but you don't you don't say like oh man that's sucks. You got into the fake version of school, you go, oh, man, I love that for you. That's what I'm doing with the Bears right now. Right. But then three years out of college or whatever, those people are not rolling around going, yeah, well, I did this and I enrolled in June and I filled out all the

extra paperwork and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. They just say I went to school where I went to school. And it becomes baked into the assumptions and the narrative about what their education was like. And I'm not sure if we're having conversation about how much the dolphins loss and missing the playoffs changes the narrative for them. I'm just not sure that it doesn't do the opposite or the same or whatever. I don't think anyone, I don't think anyone is like this bear season is a massive success. I think it's an amusement. I think it's a side show. But I don't think it needs to be that much.

I think the Bears playoff game is a side show. I think the Bears playoff game is a side show for everybody. I don't think anyone, I don't think that they're going to pull out. the George W. Bush Mission Accomplished banners and sit on an aircraft carrier and go, we did it, guys. Ladies and gentlemen, we got them. That's a different George W. Bush thing. But yes. Well, then that's good, but you

have more confidence in that. You have more confidence in that than I do. I don't, I, I, I would be surprised if they make emotional decisions based on making the buzz first, not. I don't think, I think the same decisions that were made. But if they're already on the fence. And I'm not saying they're on the

to give everybody a 50 year extension for life. Congratulations. You actually own the Bears now. Give Matt Nagy the Gurdon contract, 10 years, 100, money. Yes. Yes. Give to Biscuit and Mold's contract. It's not enough. It's not enough. They are the seventh seed. I don't think, I don't, I don't think any decisions will be made off this. I think this is, this is, this is, this is, like, not a thing. This is like the equivalent of making like the citrus bowl, the capital one bowl, whatever they call it. All right. Well, we'll find out, I suppose. Miami made the cheese that's bowl in Orlando.

All right. One thing. Let's hold on. Before we do that, let's just mention one thing about this, which is that, so they're playing the Saints probably will be unsuccessful in that endeavor either way. But that is one of the Sunday games, which means that there is at least a chance that Alvin Kamara can. play because he will hit the 10-day mark on the COVID list on that Saturday. So if he continues to test negative and whatever, he wouldn't have practiced, but he could play in that game because it is Sunday instead of Saturday. That's a great note. All right. Our last loser here is

Adam Gase, who has been fired officially as a Sunday night by the New York Jets. It was reported on Sunday morning. This is going to happen. End of an error, Nora. We hardly knew he. Adam Gage. So the Jets only have one option, which is do everything they can not to ruin Justin Fields' career. If they want to talk themselves into Zach Wilson, I'm willing to hear that. But I don't think so. I think this is Justin Fields' pick. And I think that you have to figure out your plan because I don't think they had a plan with Sam Darnold. And that was one of the things that I said for three years, what are we doing here?

because the best thing in football to have is an elite young quarterback who's making not a lot of money on those cheap contracts. And they had that with Darnold and they wasted it and they didn't have an identity and they're firing Mike and Hagen after the draft and they're hiring Adam Gase in 2018. There was just write something down on paper and then do it. Okay? Because I don't, I think if any time you would raided the Jets office and said, hey, guys, show me your plan. Show me your blueprint. They would have gone, uh, I don't think we really have one. Okay. And now is the time for Joe Douglas to sit down and remake this franchise. I think that

Joe Douglas can be a GM, a good GM. I think that Joe Douglas made some good draft decks, and we saw that. I was high on that, on that, that higher two years ago, and I remained high on that higher. I just think that the case wasn't it, and I don't think that the talent base was very good. And so I think that there's, there's a path there. It starts this week, starts this month, whatever it is, I'd love to see a guy like a Brian Dable or an Arthur Smith, something like that, who's just going to be able to figure out what to do or potentially, potentially a college guy who would maybe someone has familiarity with the cutting edge of college games and would be able to marry that with the pros, something like, remember, Brian Dable was at Alabama a couple years ago,

he sort of understands it. Justin Fields, obviously, from Ohio State, but has played in the SEC. see. So I just think if you can marry pro in college schemes, there's something there. And I'm intrigued to see where this goes. I'm thinking about college analogies now. And the Jets have been, you know, how there's the kid who comes into class. And like most people have, they have a laptop, they have a notebook, they have pens and pencils, whatever. They have some way of organizing their assignments and taking some record of what takes place in the lecture. But there's always that one guy who comes in clearly doesn't have anything and then has to ask someone to like rip a page out of their spiral notebook. Absolutely. And then he takes in. He's like, thanks. And then five seconds later,

he's like, actually, do you have a pen to? Like, that's where the Jets have been. Would it surprise you to learn I was that person? Actually, yes. Yeah. It was much different back then. Not academics, not my thing. Academics, not my thing. Academics, not my. thing. Just different, you know, everybody has different strengths. I get bored easily and then just she's not going to pay attention to her in this class. You strike me as a notebook guy. No. Wow. Kevin Clark. I have very specific passions and I'm extremely prepared and focused on those things. For instance, sports, sports media, those sort of things. The things I actually do. But if I'm actually bored by something as I wasn't like math totally out so I was off on high school I think

was last in my class I'm not mistaken had to work my way up how to go first in our hearts some some some fake programs myself to get into some schools here all right Nora I guess there's a winner here and I guess it's the Washington football team Washington 17 Philadelphia 14 jalen Hertz gets removed for Nate Sudfeld. Nate Sudfeld does Nate Sudfeld things. There is an open revolt against the Eagles and their lack of competitive integrity, both of the broadcast and on social media. Dan Orlovsky has a Twitter note here that I'm reading right now that said what happened to respecting the game and respecting the other teams in the league. Giants players, and they show this in the broadcast, Giants players were all over social media

complaining about what was going on, the fact that the Eagles were clearly just not trying to win. Lindsay Jones, our buddy, said it best. She said the proof that tanking doesn't really exist in the NFL is just how stunning it is to see it actually happen in real time. What we saw tonight haven't really seen anything like it. The football team makes the playoffs. The six and ten giants are not going to make it, much to their dismay.

What did you learn? What did I learn? I don't know that this was a real academic, learning experience for me. I think I learned how to watch a football game through through the slit in two fingers that I was mostly holding a hand over my eyes would be the main takeaway. I'm not crying for the Giants here. The Giants would have had to win the Super Bowl to get to 500 if they had been the winner of the NFC. Let's not the competitive integrity argument. I understand all that stuff, but let's not worry about what happened to the six and 10 giants.

Okay. They had their, they had their opportunities. And now, Dan Rolovsky is our buddy and anyone who wants to go full notes app, I support you. But oddly enough, I guess the right, I don't know, do you feel like the right team won the NFC East because I suppose that's my feeling after watching this game? I guess. I mean, what is the point of the right team? What is there a right team? One of our reader questions is whether, one of our reader questions is whether or not the NFL has switched to a college style poll voting, like a, coaches poll for playoffs just to keep teams like the NFC East teams out, which I think is a novel

concept. We'll just rig it so that these teams can't make the playoffs anymore. Well, can't wait to see him against Tom Brady in prime time. Yeah. So we're trying to preview every single game when we talk about the winner or loser. And I don't feel like we need to spend all that much time on the football team against Tom Brady. So the one thing is you could say that that pass rush, that defensive long, could make Brady uncomfortable. That in and of itself is a matchup that is worth watching

and that's why I kind of look at this and go, okay, I guess if I have to choose, congratulations to the football team. We'll see you in the football playoffs against the football quarterback Tom Brady. Cool. The thing about the bucks, there's one part of this buck season

where it would be totally peak bucks to be like, oh yeah, they're going to lose to the NFC East winner in the playoffs. then when you really think about it, think about the bucks is that they've struggled against good teams and they've beaten a lot of bad teams pretty handily. And I guess I'll leave it there.

So I agree with you. I'm actually just from a football dork standpoint, really interested to see how Brady handles that because a ferocious pass rush is how you get to Tom Brady. That's also, by the way, how you get to every quarterback's ever played football. And so I just, I'd like to, that's a nice little early,

test to to simulate what that playoff run is going to look like. But I don't, I just don't think the football team has, has the horses for this. They're building a foundation. I really like Ron Nberra. The Alex Smith thing is unbelievable. He's going to win comeback player of the year. I will say Josh Norman had to pick six today. Josh Norman's ability to bounce back from the Derek Henry Stiffarm gets him in my top five or to come back player of the year. I'm sticking with Alex Smith, but that's a good joke. Let's, uh, is it a joke? Um, Chris Collinsworth, let's get back to this very briefly. He said, quote about the Nate Seinfeld thing, quote, I couldn't have done it.

I simply couldn't have done what Philadelphia did. I don't know. I mean, we just saw it, and so it's hard for me to form a real-time opinion here. I'm just, this is not, they didn't throw the game. They just put in a bad quarterback in crunch time in a game that they obviously could have won. and they did lead. And our Roger Sherman pointed out, basically, you don't need to evaluate Sudfeld.

You need to evaluate Jalen Hartz who came out of the game. And so I think that they don't need to evaluate Carson Wentz. By the way, if they were really tanking, they would have put Carson Wentz in. Oh, and so sad. But I don't know. I just, again. Wasn't he inactive?

No, he was inactive. But I'm just saying if the whole plan was to tank, Carson Wences day was being ruled and active. Yeah, but I get the joke. I'm just, I just want to point out

how far we've come. His day was, his day was being ruled and active and then leaking that he wants to be traded to the Colts. Maybe he should ask the Colts about that

before that happens. And it was the best Sunday of his season. It was the best Sunday of a season, leaking that he wants to leave. Okay. All right.

Anything else on this, on this game in this division? We'll talk more about this matchup later, but, and there'll probably be more to come as far as who says what about this.

Jason Kelsey, by the way, a couple weeks ago went on that rant about how winning the game should always be the most pressing concern. He'll probably have some comments about the fact that his coach decided to just start getting weird with it in the second half of a game with massive playoff implications. Well, right, they didn't, I guess we're saying that they didn't actively try to throw the game, but then they put in a quarterback who wasn't going to win it.

So that arose is a rose as a rose. Although, no, I'm sorry. I don't think that they were, I don't think that they told anybody. It's like what NBA teams do, okay, when they're trying to tank. I'm not going to imagine a lot of this, okay? It's not about telling Nate Sudfeld to throw the game. It's about playing Nate Sudfeld.

Right? And so that's what, there's a difference between not trying to win and throwing the game. I don't think, I don't think Nate Sudfeld was trying not to win. Right. Nate Sudfeld was trying his ass off. He was, he was just Nate Suddbush. Nate Sudfeld, by the way, is really, really, really lovely. I don't know him that well.

I don't know him at all. He was the third string quarterback in the brief span of a few months when I covered the Washington football team. Truly a revenge game or revenge game for him. Yeah. This reminds, like the magic would tank by like running plays for Shabazz Napier in crunch time. And you go, well, that's, yeah, Shabaz Napier is trying, but he's just Shabazz Napier. right and that's that's sort of what sudfield one so it's not like for me it's not necessarily like

there shouldn't be congressional investigation of this okay it's just like this is something crappy that Doug Peterson probably shouldn't have done but I also think that maybe the giant should try not being six and ten like if there were integrity let's talk about a six and ten didn't make of the playoffs if there was a congressional investigation into what happened do you think that it would air in prime time because of the NFC East television markets. It absolutely would. That's a great point. That is an amazing point.

It would air on Sunday night football. Cornacki would host. Oh, now I kind of want this. But no, Congress has better things to do. Anyway. Do that. All right. Let's get to hurry up.

Let's get hurry up out of this game. All right. Now it's time for the hurry up. Best of the rest. We're only going to do games with playoff teams. Bucks versus Falcons, Nora, Bucks when Antonio Brown reaches his. contractual bonus language gets a few hundred thousand bucks.

Learn anything? I am implementing a sort of swear jar for the football universe writ large. And there's two things. One is being just Antonio Brown hype. Let's leave it be. The other one is going to be congratulating the really any sports league on overcoming the adversity of the. coronavirus season.

Anytime someone catches themselves doing either of those things, it's going in the swear jar. I agree with you. Seahawks 49ers, David Moore reaches his contractual incentive. This is a big Sunday for receivers getting money. Big contractual incentive Sunday. Yeah, it comes, we should call this green Sunday. Because, you know, they call Monday Black Monday.

It's Green Sunday. Oh, good idea. Except the Eagles were green and they screwed. And everybody's mad about their Sunday. Um, this Niners are reported to potentially be moving on from Jimmy G. If there's anything worth upgrading for and what would you do with Jimmy G? I suppose I would move on. Again, it depends on the market.

It depends. It's a match of staff. It just depends. I don't know. You're not going to get anybody in the middle of the first round because the dolphins are going to take Zach Wilson as a joke for you guys. We'll call a call back in the biz. Uh, Chargers versus chiefs.

Justin Herbert puts on his show, the chiefs don't really care, learn anything. Anthony Lynn became Mr. Analytics today. Very exciting. I didn't, I, I heard, I missed what you said, and I thought you said Anthony Lynn became Mr. Marvelous or something. And you know what? Maybe both. Analytics, but yeah, marvelous as well.

He's back. Ever heard of it? As our buddy Bill Barnwell said, it's like eating the celery after eating all the wings. It's just too late for Anthony Lynn. Sorry, buddy. All right. listener question we've got to number one is from drum roll please is i first of all number one is actually a guy named cush who kept tweeting at us that the uh dolphins should draft jack wilson that's what

i'm talking about with narrative it's just fans are very angry right now all right yeah but maybe that's Zach Wilson's burner. It is. All right. Could you imagine if Zach Wilson? Why would Zach Wilson want to go compete? Maybe he loves Brian Flores. Maybe he listens to this podcast and knows what we think of their infrastructure.

You know, you don't know who listens to this podcast until you say something negative about them. And then you've learned very quickly who listens to this podcast. It's all I'll say about the lay of the land in football. All right. Kyle Hansen says, after some discouraging performances, is it realistic to think that Tampa Bay is the only not on one or two seed who can win the Super Bowl.

Great question. Kyle. Nora, start us off. Well, you think the Ravens can win the Super Bowl. Yeah, of course I can. Of course I do. Yeah. But let's go through it as an exercise.

Do you see anybody? Because I do. I think that there's, I think this is so jumbled together that I don't, I think there's a bunch of teams you can. So you start and I'll, I'll go from that. So I don't. So the chiefs and the bills in the AFC, one and two seats don't count.

The Steelers, in the spirit of this question, I think it's a no. Of course, anybody can, fluky stuff can happen, but it's a no. The Titans to me are also a no. The Ravens are yes.

I'm not as high on them as you are, but I do think that they, it's possible. The Browns are a no. The Colts. are a, the cults are a no. Colts are a no, although I just, I, I, I feel like, wow, Nora wants to pull the trigger.

You want to pull the trigger on the Colts. They have like, they have verb. Okay. Jonathan Taylor. I don't know. So the Packers and Saints in the NFC don't count. The Seahawks, I do think could win the Super Bowl. The Washington football team, I do not believe can win the Super Bowl.

The Buccaneers, sure, can win the Super Bowl. The Rams can't win the Super Bowl because of the and the Bears cannot win the Super Bowl. So the Seahawks and the Ravens are the other teams that I'm putting in that conversation. Okay. So Chiefs and the Bills and the Ravens. I don't think that the Steelers can do it.

I don't think the Titans can do it. Okay. NFC. Packer Saints. Seattle for me. Tampa Bay. So four teams in the NFC, three teams in the Airycy.

For me, seven teams can win the Super Bowl. Can Tampa Bay actually win it? If Tampa Bay played Kansas City, would you think about picking Tampa Bay? I would, Kansas City all the way for me. In some ways, I'm not sure that I, if I were formulating this question, I'll put it this way.

I certainly wouldn't have started it with, are the Buccaneers the only non one or two seed that can do this. Like I would- Kyle Hansen, just catching a stray here. We love you, Kyle. That's how you find out someone listens to the podcast is if you say something negative about their listener question that they submitted because they already listened to the podcast.

I love the question. I answer a good question too, but for me it would be, is there any team other than the Seahawks or the Ravens? Yeah. Before it would be, is there any team other than the Buccaneers? I think there's just a Tampa Bay.

There's a Tom Brady thing at everyone's mind. It's lodged in our brains that we cannot count out Tom Brady. He's eligible to win the Super Bowl in the amount of the situation. I think that's reasonable. All right. Very quickly, let's do this. Capiton's log, I think, is the name here. He said, are we counting Diggs to Buffalo as the biggest win-win deal in recent NFL history?

Now, what he refers to is the fact that the bill, sent a first round pick to Minnesota for Stefan Diggs. Stefan Diggs is one of the best players of football this year, and the Vikings got Justin Jefferson, one of the best rookie receivers in NFL history and the best rookie receiver in Minnesota since Randy Moss. Yes, it's on the short list. I would say that Rivers and Eli Manning,

that trade was a win-win. I would also say going back slightly further, obviously Rivers and Manning count because one of those guys is still in the NFL. I would also say that Michael Vick for Indian Tomlinson trade was a win-win during the draft. Also, San Diego got Drew Breeze and that and they kind of

nobody want a silver bowl from that. That's more of the Chargers' fault. And yeah, both those, by the way, all both of those trades are linked by the fact that there was the Chargers and then obviously Breeze got replaced by Rivers. So, yes, I think it is on the short list of win-win traits.

A, Nora? Yeah, definitely. the other it's hard to compete with quarterback quarterback quarterback win-win so I would go rivers banning but shortlist Stefan digs is so unbelievably good and I just I don't know if we talked enough about him on this podcast but we will at some point because he's he's going to make some plays in the playoffs all right we're going to close it out we're going to tell you the schedule this week

so it's a little bit different late Monday early Tuesday special roundtable with Cole Ryan Shazier and Kael Jones. I'm going to hop on that to give reaction, quick reaction to the Black Monday coach firings. So listen to me for me there, but it's going to be a great show with Cole Ryan and Kaelin. Wednesday, Chris Vernon and Warren Sharper here. Sharp is back on Thursday with Joe House. And then my schedule is a little different. I'm going to have a podcast on Saturday. It's going to be a live show with myself and Ryan Rusillo after the final wild card game. So I'm going to be on Saturday. and then on Sunday, Nora comes back.

We do this podcast again. That's also live after the wild card game. It's going to be awesome. Nora, you ready to go live? We're going to do it live. We're going to do it live. It's going to be awesome. I'm really looking forward to it.

I've actually never done a live show like this. And to do it with Ryan on Saturday and then Nora on Sunday's going to be really, really fun. Two great podcasts. And we'll see you then. He's been the Ringar NFL show on the Ringer Podcast Network.