The Ringer NFL Show - Week 2 Recap: Chiefs Survive the Bengals, Saints Upset the Cowboys, and More

Episode Date: September 16, 2024

Sheil, Steven, and Diante return to discuss, debate, and share their expert takes on the biggest games and storylines of Sunday’s NFL action. Bengals-Chiefs (1:05) Saints-Cowboys (13:35) Bucs-Lions (20:42) Niners-Vikings (23:44) Raiders-Ravens (31:61) Rams-Cardinals (38:58) Bears-Texans (45:57) Jets-Titans (52:49) They end the pod with some quick-hit analysis of the rest of the Week 2 slate. Browns-Jags (58:31) Seahawks-Patriots (1:01:25) Colts-Packers (1:05:21) Commanders-Giants (1:09:28) Steelers-Broncos (1:14:44) Chargers-Panthers (1:19:27) The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Hosts: Sheil Kapadia, Steven Ruiz, and Diante Lee Producers: Chris Sutton and Tucker Tashjian Production Assistance: Daniel Comer Production Supervision: Conor Nevins and Arjuna Ramgopal Social: Kiera Givens Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, guys, your boy Johnny Bananas here. The Challenge Season 40 Battle of the Eras is finally upon us. I'll be covering every episode with all your favorite challengers on my podcast, death taxes and bananas on the Ringer Reality TV podcast feed, and on the brand new Ringer Reality TV YouTube channel where you can find full video episodes all season long. So buckle up. Come along with me as we see who will be crowned winner of the Challenge

Season 40 Battle of the Eras. Follow Ringer reality TV on Spotify and subscribe to us on YouTube. Welcome to the Ringer NFL show. Shield Capadia here with Deontay Lee and Stephen Ruiz. Week 2 in the books. Welcome if you're watching on Fandul TV or listening on Spotify. Upsets all over the place in week two. And I thought, I don't know if it's a classic,

but a very good game in the late window. We're going to get to all of it. If you're not familiar with the show, we start out with our big takeaway. And then we go from there. And Deante, you're leading us off and what we thought was going to be the biggest game of the weekend. But sometimes, you know, they don't live up to the hype.

But Chief Bengals was a fun one. What did you see? Kick off the show for us. You know, it's funny. The first thing I thought about as we were getting later into that game was a conversation that we had Thursday for the preview show, right? Because you spent a lot of time really talking about concern for Cincinnati and talking about like what kind of game would they have to have,

where even in a loss, you might feel comfortable with, how they played. And I think that that's exactly what played out today. You know, the run game wasn't very good, but I thought that they were pretty effective at trying to protect Burr on early downs. I thought I got the ball out of his hands pretty quickly, even though he didn't see as much production from Jamar Chase as I would have hoped. And I think a lot of that is, you know, by the effect and design of Kansas City's defense. But they got good turnover luck. I thought they rushed to Pasher pretty well. I thought they did a pretty good job of keeping Kansas City's offense rained in. And then you get to, you know, you get to the end of the game. And

The city drives right down and they win just basically exactly as they did last week against Baltimore. And I really kind of had to test, you know, our prior conversation and say, like, am I pleased with where Cincinnati is at? And I think I am. I actually think I feel much better right now than I did when Stephen was recapping the Bengals Patriots game last week. And a lot of that is because of the fact that they were able to force some turnovers. I think you got to see the best version of the secondary and why they drafted for so much speed at the corner position. because they matched up pretty well, running stride for stride with guys down the field.

Ultimately, if there was an issue with them, it was that so early in the game, it was clear that that defensive interior is just going to be a problem against basically anybody, right? And I thought that Kansas City was able to keep them at arms length when they needed to, control the ball when they needed to,

and it allowed them to kind of fight their way back in the game, and then once Kansas City retook the lead, you knew that that game was basically done. So it was an impressive game. It was a really good game, and I think I'll walk away from this, feeling pretty good about both teams. Yeah, as the resident Bengals defender,

I thought I was going to have to be the one coming on here and you guys saying, oh, my God, they're 0-and-2 and giving me the stats about 0-and-2 teams missing the playoffs. I feel the way you feel. You know, you come away from this game, you're going up against the defending Super Bowl champs. You went toe-to-to-to-to-against them. You just know, it's so funny how you just know facing Mahomes,

like the Bengals have the ball with 6-57 left in that game, and they're up 25, 23. And you can ask any Bengals fan in your life, any objective observer in your life, it's like either you need to score a touchdown or you need to basically run out the clock so that there's, you know, 25 seconds left or even that you wouldn't feel safe. They're not able to do that. Spags gets them on a third down blitz. The Chiefs get the ball back. But this, it came down to a couple high leverage plays, you know, Burrow fumbles. If you give up a defensive touchdown to the Chiefs, I don't know what the stats are. I could

make one up. Like the Chiefs are 71 and O when their defense scores. It just feels that way. How do you beat them when their defense scores a touchdown? That's number one. And then fourth and 16, to your point, Deonti, I thought the Bengals defense showed up in this game. I mean, they get him in fourth and 16. And I'm going, wait, is Mahomes actually not going to do it in this spot? And then the young kid, the rookie, you know, has the defensive pass interference. Just being aggressive, not a dumb play or anything like that.

He's trying to make a play. It was a good. It was the right flag. And then they kick a field goal from 50 plus. So you don't want to dig yourself into a O and two hole. And it's one of those two things can be true things, Ruiz, where one, the Bengals missed a lot of opportunities in this game, and you probably feel like, oh, my God, you had a chance to pull off the upset. But I feel like by the time Wednesday rolls around,

if you're a Bengals fan, you're going to be like, all right, we're O and two, but Burrow looked better. We're going to be fine this season. Where do you stand on this? I don't think any of us had concerns about the offense, kind of figuring it out eventually. I think it happened way sooner than any of us believed. I thought T. Higgins would have to come back to see this type of performance. But at the end of the day, it wasn't like a great vintage Bengals' offensive performance. And on the other side, I thought the past defense played well.

I thought Louana Ramos' plan was really good. And it reminded me a lot of these matchups that we saw between these teams in the playoffs the last couple of years before the Joe Burrow injury last year kind of ruined this rivalry last year for us. But the rushing defense, it just sticks out to me like a sore thumb, and I just don't know

how you coach around there. That's the main difference between what the Bengals were when they were challenging the cheese for the mountain top in the AFC and what they are now, 57% success rate on the ground for Kansas City on early downs. I mean, that's a 97th percentile result. Going back to all the way to 2000, that's how effective they were on the ground on a down-to-down basis. It's hard to play defense when you give up that type of production on first down.

But I do think the Bengals Secondary stepped up in a way that they had to, in a way we had never seen from them. I do wonder how much the turnover luck played here. we get that amazing interception by Cam Taylor Britt. We get an uncharacteristically dumb interception from Patrick Mahomes over the middle of the field. But the number that sticks out to me is a 37% success rate for this passing offense. This was a vintage Big Lou performance and a vintage performance for this past team. I just need to see it on both sides of the ball because it's going to be hard to replicate that

if you can't stop the run on first and second down. And right now there are no signs that this Bengals team can stop the run on first and second down. Yeah, Mahomes threw for 151 yards in this game. I think it's his lowest total in a game that he both started and finished. And I think we talked about it going into the game, Deante, kind of the game script here for the Bengals. You're an underdog. Can you shorten the number of possessions? Then when you get those two turnovers, it's meaningful.

So not saying that they were letting the Chiefs run the ball. I mean, the Bengals run defense has now been an issue for a year and two weeks. And like you said, Ruiz, unless they can just sign some, sometimes you can find a nose tackle who's just like 33 years old, chilling at home, hasn't signed. with anyone. He comes in and joins your team and helps your run defense. Unless they can do something like that, it's not going away. At the same time, I think if you would have told Anarumo going into this game that, hey, they're going to have that high success rushing the football. Mahomes is going to throw for 151. You're going to get two takeaways. You take that

bet every day. Signs up for that every single time, right, Deontes. So the game script actually worked in their favor. And still, it just shows, as the 49ers know, as the bills know, that is just even when you feel like you did everything in your game plan all week, Deontay, it's still hard to put the Chiefs away. 100%. And it's not just the defense. This is something that came up when we were talking last week about the Bengals' offense fighting against the Patriots. They're 8 of 24 on 3rd down over the last two weeks.

And it's something that stuck out to me specifically in this game. Looking at Steve Spagnolo, sending blitzes that were getting home, or just using pocket pushes. It's not like they were just killing this offensive line up front. It was just pocket pushes, making Joe Burrow a little uncomfortable. And I think that there's this weird thing happening where there are certain snaps with Burrow where he escapes the pocket and he looks really good and he gets the ball out and you feel good about it. And then there are other third downs where you just see him pat the ball.

And it looks like he's searching for something that's not there. And he takes these sacks that were uncharacteristic of them when they were at their best in 2021 and throughout the regular season in 22 when he was healthy, you know. And I think that that to me is really where my hangup is at. because the explosive offense isn't there, and we still have not seen any establishing of a run game for this offense. And if they're constantly going to be in third down, Jarborough's got to be in hero mode,

and defenses are going to be successful in the way that they've been over the last two weeks and putting a lid over Jamar Chase, I just have some real concerns about just how the variance is going to play out for this offense if they're not able to succeed on early downs, finding things in a run game to keep them ahead of the sticks, and then pushing the ball down the field when they can. So I'm not really sure what to make of this team. I just know that coming out of this performance,

I'm not ready to dismiss them as an 0-and-2 team that you can just say the season is over with quite yet. I think that's where they miss T. Higgins the most, like the part where Joe Burrow is patting the ball and third down, because having Higgins out there and having Jamar Chase out there on either side of the field, that simplifies the defense. The demons can only do so much with those two guys on the outside. And I think it makes Burroughs job diagnosing the defense.

before the snap so much easier, and he's doing more guesswork after the snap these first two weeks without Higgins out there. And going up against a Spag's defense, that's a losing strategy. But it was almost a winning strategy for this game. I think this shows that Burrow, even though there's so much play-making stress on him,

and the entire burden of the offense is on him at this point to just drop back and drop back and drop back and drop back. You're going to make mistakes eventually when you're taxed like that mentally. But I think this showed that Burrow could still pull out one of these performances that gives you a chance to beat the Chiefs on the road in this tough environment. So that's a bright spot.

Like you guys have said, I would be more optimistic about the Bengals after this 0-and-2 start than I was after the 0-1-1 start. But at the same time, an 0-and-2 start is a tough hole to dig out of. But they do have one thing working in their favor. The Ravens also dropped a very winnable game today. So the division isn't out of hand. The AFC North Leader is quarterbacked by Justin Fields.

It might be quarterback by Russell in a few weeks. So it's going to be fine. Yeah, I think just to finish on this game, I think Burrough deserves a ton. He wasn't perfect in this game, but you look at the box score. Mike Gisicki had nine targets in this game. I mean, that was your leading, like, key third downs.

All due respect, and Gassiki had a nice game, seven catches for 91. Eric All Jr., he did not make our preview episode last week. He had four targets in this game. Trenton Irwin had six targets in this game. You just, like, some of those high leverage downs, you mentioned at Deonti on third down, you're just like, oh, man, it would really just adding T. Higgins,

even if his numbers aren't huge, just as somebody who the defense is like, what's our plan for him and Chase, I do think that would make a major, major difference. It's funny, you look at their numbers through two weeks. They're fourth and offensive success rate behind the Saints, Lions, and Bills. But the explosives, it's just such a turnaround from that team we saw go to the Super Bowl as such a different offense than that one, but they're still moving the ball pretty efficiently there.

So Bengals, O and two, but encouraging performance. Chiefs, listen, if you're a chief, fan life is good. Just go. Have fun. Listen to this podcast. Skip around your neighborhood. Put your Mahomes jersey on. Just a very hard team to beat. Did you even feel anything with this win? Exactly. Did these regular season results mean anything to you at this point? I mean, oh, fourth and 16 flag to turn it around. Who cares? They're in that Lakers space now where because everybody is so resigned to who they are, they can start to play the whole nobody believes in us because they don't talk often enough about how good we are a card if you're a fan. And that's probably like the best place you can be

is that, you know, performative of grieved type of stance that you can take because nobody is showing enough love to you when the truth is, we don't have to talk about you guys until January. Everybody knows what they are and we'll get to you guys when the games are real for Kansas City. I saw one of those like memes that became popular of the last couple years. I think it became popular with the Eagles when they were off to that start last year where it's like, oh, the first like 50 minutes of the game, oh, I want to die and then, oh, we won. Cheese fans, do not post that. I'm sorry. Do not ever post that meme ever again. You guys have won how many championships over the last five years? Enough. As a Panthers fan, please stop. Life is good if you're a chiefs fan. All right, we'll take a break. We'll come back, get to main takeaways from myself and Stephen Ruiz. What a great NFL weekend that was. And fan duels giving you another chance to start the season with a big return on America's number one sports book.

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as E-terms at sportsbook. Fanduel.com called 1-800 gambler or visit RG-dashelp. All right, we're back on the ringer NFL show. I've got kind of a twofer here. I want to talk about the two NFC South teams who pulled off the upsets, but I'm starting, you know, the Saints in the Bucks, bucks win in Detroit, but I'm

starting with the Saints who are the biggest surprise in the entire NFL through the first two weeks of this season. I have ripped this team. I have said, I don't want to talk about this team. They're irrelevant. They're boring. I don't want to watch them. I want nothing to do from a content standpoint with the New Orleans Saints.

I thought the score for this game was going to be a blowout. 4419. If you would have told me on Friday, I would have said, yeah, that sounds about right, because one team I think is good. The other team I think is a fraud. Whoops! Got that one wrong. on the wrong end of that one, I did not think that the New Orleans Saints would go to Dallas

against Mike Zimmer and scored touchdowns on their first six possessions. You can watch a lot of football games at any level, high school, college, pee, whatever, and Nazi and offense score six touchdowns on their first six possessions. And this was a combination of two things. One, Derek Carr was playing very well. I mean, his 70-yard touchdown to Rashid, he had pressure in his face and he launched it. And he was making some plays. And then the other thing is Clint Kubiak, who, listen, if you were to get a hold of my phone,

would you see me when people were complimenting him before the season and high on the Saints, would you see me saying he might be a Nepo baby, you know, Kubiak, let's see him do something before we, maybe. I'm not giving you my phone to check, but it's possible you would have seen that. But he was cooking his former boss or coworker, Mike Zimmer. I mean, they had a screen that went for 57 yards. they were just going up and down the field with ease. And so you look at this Saints team through two weeks.

They've scored 11 touchdowns. Four more than any other team in the NFL. They blow out the Panthers. They blow out the Cowboys. They come out. They look prepared. Again, you read my columns and don't do a command F for Dennis Allen and see what I said about him as a head coach either.

But they've been very prepared these two weeks here. So I don't know, Ruiz. I'm looking at this. I owe the Saints fans an apology, at least for this week. for the first two weeks of the season. I don't know if it's going to last all year, but they have been a surprise story to me through the first two weeks.

What do you think? I think we all owe Derek Carr an apology, especially the shit we were talking about him on this podcast. I mean, they don't hand out MVP's after two weeks, but if they did, Derek Carr would be the unanimous league MVP. He's averaging 11.5 yards per dropback this year. The next closest guy is at 9.6. It's Baker Mayfield.

That's like a two-yard difference between the second-place guy. And like you said, he's doing it under pressure. He hasn't been under pressure too much, but when he has been under pressure, he has performed, and that's always been the knock on Derek Carr throughout his career.

I remember Joey Bosa had no qualms about saying that in public after a game against the charges in 2021. He's like, yeah, that's the book on Derek. You know, if you hit him, he's going to curl into a ball. Like, he used that phrase curl into a ball when he was talking about him.

And I don't think any player in the league is comfortable talking about most quarterbacks like that, especially like a top 10 quarterback. But to his credit, Carr has been a different player under pressure. As you said, the long touchdown pass to Shehit, he stood in there and took a shot and delivered a perfect pass all the way downfield. Right now, under pressure, guess how many yards per attempt he's averaging? He's averaging over 20 yards per attempt under pressure.

It's only been six attempts now. And there's always been a direct link between Derek Carr's performance and the protection he's getting. Right now, the Saints are doing a very good job of protecting him, which makes me want to give the credit to Clint Kubiak, because this is not an offensive line. we were excited about going into the season. I think you saw it on Sunday, how Kubiak's able to scheme around those limitations and take the teeth out of a pass brush, even one as good as Dallas's is.

And like you said, Zimmer had no answers for it. It seems like every time I looked up at the screen, they were showing a bewildered Mike Zimmer on the sideline, just scratching his head, looking for answers, and he wasn't going to find any, and he didn't find any. And that just makes it easy to wash away any optimism we had about this Dallas team after that week one performance, because this felt like every other.

disappointing doubts loss we've watched since Mike McCarthy became head coach. Yeah, Derek Carr was hit one time in this game on 17 dropbacks. They were using motion really well. They were using a ton of under center play action to make Micah Parsons. And that pass rush at least have to respect, you know, the possibility that they're going to run the football. And yeah, I made the joke that, you know, I know Mike Zimmer liked to hunt. He had the whatever the animal head was, I think it was during the pandemic. We're in his office when they went to him.

So I said, I don't know, whatever animals you hunt. the DFW, just watch out. It might be a long week with Mike Zimmer doing that. Deonté real quick, just do you look at this more tough one for the Cowboys or give the Saints credit here? Worst loss or better win? I would say worse loss because I think that I came away from this

feeling like, okay, the narrative that Dallas fixed this interior of the defense is not as sticky as I thought it might be. And that was something I was really hoping. I thought that what we saw last week, in terms of them dominating Cleveland up front was probably more a product of the injuries that Cleveland is dealing with with this pair of tackles

and maybe just not having Nick Chubb to be able to create for them after contact in between the tackles. This week, to see New Orleans put up nearly a 60% success rate on early down runs, it was insane. I mean, every time you look up, you see Alvin Camara falling forward.

You see them resetting the line of scrimmage. And to Stephen's point, I think anybody could have laid out the most optimistic outcome for this passing offense in New Orleans, which is like, oh, Derek Carr, all the arm telling in the world, if you protect them long enough, he's going to push the ball down the field. I just think that nobody bought that. And then you watch the game, and you see how they're using their personnel. And it's just such a good use of the guys they have. This week, knowing you're dealing with Michael Parsons, you saw a lot of two tight-in sets,

putting them on Michael Parsons' side to really kind of stretch out, you know, the edge and make him run wider and I thought that bought Derek Carr the time he needed to push the ball down the field. And you see the confidence with what he's throwing the ball because even when he is pressured, like Stephen said, he's still pushing it down the field. So for all the credit that I'm giving New Orleans here, I do think that this says a little bit more about Dallas's defense and that they probably have a little bit more to work on. And we have not quite flushed all the Dan Quinn out of this program quite yet. No, no.

There's still a lot of Dan Quinn left over from his time there. And can we officially like, can we be done with the Sean Pinn? Payton offense and the Sean Payton Coaching Tree, like the stark difference between what this offense looked like under Pete Carmichael, a Sean Payton long-time assistant under Sean Payton, and what it looks like now, and the talent is largely the same.

The quarterback is definitely the same, and only a year older. 1,000 percent. And then we see what's going on in Denver where it does not look like Sean Payton is making things easy on Bo Nex, but we'll get to that later. Yeah, I mean, I think Bo Nex, you know, we'll get to Bo Nex. If we were doing Bo Nex in the opening

segment, man, I would be curious. about what happened in that game. So Saints and Press, and then real quick here, the other NFC South team, the Bucks go to Detroit, and I would describe this less as an impressive win and more as a gutty win. You know, if you look at this box score, you go, how did they win that game? The Lions out gained them 463 to 216, but the Lions go one for seven in the red zone in this game. And the lions had this situation at the end of the first half where they didn't know whether they wanted to spike the football or bring the field goal unit on. They spike the football, but the special teams units coming on, they get flagged.

They don't get to kick the field goal. And it comes back to really bite them because they had two drives in the fourth quarter of this game where they're in field goal range, but they need to go for the touchdown and they don't get it either time. So I've complimented Dan Campbell before. I think his game management generally is actually really good, but that really hurt them in this spot. But Tampa, you come in, no Antoine Winfield, no Colise Cancy. their right tackle. Luke Geddikey was out and Aidan Hutchinson wrecked this. He had four and a half sacks in this game. He was just destroying drives the poor backup right tackle for Tampa. But still

with all that, they battled and they come out of this with a victory, seven and a half point underdogs in this game. Servassier Dennis, this player who I not heard of, this linebacker for the box was flying all over. They just had young guys like him flying all over the pace. So I'm given Todd Bulls credit for this win, Ruiz, that, you know, it might not have been pretty, but sometimes you get some ugly wins, and a win is a win, and you improve to 2 and O. Yeah, that's where my first thought, win is this was like a Todd Bulls masterclass, and this is the type of offense that he has struggled with over the last couple of years, the type of offense that can run the ball against any front you want, because that's always

been his thing, is I could stop the run, get you in obvious passing situations, and that's when I release the hounds on you. And, I mean, it worked. Like, we saw Jerich golf very uncomfortable in this game. This was one of those games where you worry about Kevin. Jared Gough all that money and it offered up a reminder why the Rams didn't want to give Jared Gough all that money or continue to pay him all that money. But you saw that on the other side of the ball. You saw Baker Mayfield struggle with decision making. He put the ball into dangerous

areas over the middle of the field countless times in this game. And I think this game just goes to show that these teams are very talented. But that question mark at quarterback is going to be hanging over both of their heads all season long. And in January, the problem is only going to get worse. Yeah, I thought Mayfield also, though, to be fair to him, he did have some moments where it's one of those plays where you're like, oh my gosh, he's not escaping this. And he actually did a few times and made some nice throws. He had some nice plays to Chris God. When he had a run and then he had this scramble that he got all pumped up for. And then they called a QB draw on the very next play in the red zone.

And he somehow got in and scored a touchdown. But that's one of those things where you don't want it to happen. It's like you said last week on the pie where like a bad three-point shooter makes the three. And you're like, oh, man, now he's going to be jacking up three. You don't want Baker-Bayfield scrambling. You want the Baker-Mayfield we saw in week one against Washington. He gets the snap. He takes his drop and the balls out when he hits his back foot.

You don't want this Baker-Ba-field who's trying to play like the number one pick overall. I think he didn't have a lot of choice in this game with Aidan Hutchinson. He was under a lot of pressure. Ruiz, I think you got something bike. Another upset. The Vikings. Another thing. I was, man, I've been wrong many times throughout my career and doing.

But in terms of like one week, just having horrible takes, this might be my master piece here because the Vikings beat the 49ers at home. What stood out to you in that game? First of all, no, Shia. I'm going to defend you here. You are on the right side of state. Oh, I thought you were going to point to another week where you're like, you really suck that. Remember, like week eight last year? You got everything. Right, yeah, week eight, 2022 was way worse for you. I remember. And everyone else does too. But no, you're on the right side with Sam Darnel. Like, the only reason this game was close in the 49ers had a chance to win, because Sam Darnel can't help himself in certain situations. He's like, he's like a person that needs to be

in a toxic relationship. And if the relationship is going too well, he figures out the way to screw it up, whether it's running into a sack by Nick Bosa, throwing to a linebacker over the middle of the field, or maybe his worst play of the game, he didn't even get punished for. There was like a blown-up screen.

I don't know what happened. I think the Vikings had two tight ends kind of pooling. And Sam Darner was like, screw it. I know this play is dead, but I'm going to throw a backwards pass over top of my tight end and try to get it to my running back. It did not get to his running back.

and ended up being like an eight-yard loss on a fumble. But somehow he turned the ball over a couple more times after that and kept the 49ers in this game. I will say Fred Warner played a fantastic game and had a lot of large hand in keeping the 49ers in the game and turning those plays into turnovers. But I want to talk about the 49ers offense and how much it missed Christian McCaffrey.

Like you go back to our Friday show, I don't even know if we mentioned Christian McCaffrey's absence as like a problem for the 49ers. And rightfully so, after what we saw Jordan Mason do on Monday night against the general. That's what he ran for 147 yards. He had another big game in this one. 20 carries, 100 yards, 5 yards per pop, and a touchdown.

Broke, a lot of tackles again. Very Isaiah Pacheco-coded performance from him over the first two weeks. But if you compare, he's at the top. I think he's second in rushing yards right now after two weeks. But if you look at the stats and you stack those running backs at the top of the leaderboard up against one another, he stands out in one way. He has a 6% explosive run ring. Everyone else is up over 10.

Christian McCaffrey last year was 13%. That's what this team is missing right now without Christian McCaffrey is that explosiveness. So you're seeing Brock Purdy have to go on these long, painstaking drives where if they make one mistake on first down, all of a sudden you're in third and Long and Brian Flores gets to send a blitz at you, and you're Brock Purdy just trying to figure out what you're seeing.

And it's so hard against a defensive coordinator like Flores. And then it's also happening in the past game. Last year on passes behind the line of scrimmage, Brock Party average 0.26 EPA per play. This year, he's at minus 0.26 EPA per play. It's flipped. He went from being the most productive quarterback on those short throws to the least productive quarterback

on those short throws. And I think Christian McCaffrey's absence is the big reason why. Coming into this game, when they announced that McCaffrey was going on short-term IR, you look at the schedule, they're playing the Vikings, they're playing the paths,

they're playing the Cardinals. That seemed like a manageable stretch. Not so much after they dropped this game and with how good the Cardinals looked on Sunday. This could get dangerous. I still have all the faith in the world in Kyle Shanahan, but I wouldn't be surprised if they fall behind a game or two, which is vital in the home field advantage race.

What do you think, Deontay, what's your sort of, if you're a Niners fan, your level of concern, you still have 399 yards of offense. Purdy sacked six times, had an interception and a fumble. So it goes back to when you play the Niners, it's not about kind of the total yards. They're going to get theirs. You know that, but can you force enough negative?

negative plays, it sounds like the Vikings did a pretty good job of that. But yeah, Christian McCaffrey's got this, Achilles tendonitis. Mike Kyle Shanahan said after the game, nobody knows how long he'll be out. He told reporters asked about surgery. He said, quote, not that I've been told, according to Nick Wagner of ESPN. So a lot of uncertainty about when McCaffrey's going to return, what version of McCaffrey you're going to get. What do you think, Deontay, what this looks like without him for the short term, at least? Well, I think, and this is not specific to San Francisco. This is something that I've been watching all the way across the league, which is that when you don't have a dynamic playmaker and your employ,

the way that Christian McCaffrey can be for the 49ers, you just see offenses bogged down in the red zone. And as offenses are getting less and less explosive year over year, week to week, where you're seeing more and more high leverage plays in the red zone and offenses really kind of grinding to a halt. And I think that that's really what undid San Francisco here. I think that, you know, there was a little bit of turnover, look, right? Like you get the sack strip that kind of just flung out of the pocket out of nowhere

from Brock Purdy. And a couple of interceptions, I think I would say at least one of those is just like Brock just being bad, you know? And the other one, you can kind of tell that he didn't really know what he was looking at and just made a poor decision laying it down. But I think in the red zone specifically, outside of the Jordan Mason touchdown run, there really wasn't anything there for San Francisco inside the 20, right? And you were really able to see Brian Flores play a lot more man, play tighter coverage, send more pressure, and in those situations, having Christian McCaffrey running a choice route out the backfield is your instant money, right? That's a free money thing for them. And not having it makes it more and more evident where the limitations are in this

offense, right? And especially when you're going to be losing the turnover battle or losing, you know, losing the ball in key situations the way the San Francisco did. So when he's back, assuming his health, I think that they'll be okay and they'll be able to get a little bit more explosiveness. And like I said, this is around the league, but I was looking at them in the red zone, a couple of possessions they had where they got there. And it just felt so clear, first down, no matter what the situation was, that Brock Pretty was not good enough to beat good defense in those situations. And it is going to be, I think, an ongoing storyline when they play the better teams in the NFL. And I don't even think Brock Purdy, like, threw the ball poorly in

this game. Like, he had a lot of impressive downfield throws when he wasn't being pressured. And there is a distinct split between the pressure rate on early downs and pass downs. And I think that was designed by Brian Flores. Like, they were dropping back deep on first and second down, dropping into soft zones, first and second down, which the 49ers never see. The 49ers can guarantee count on two things. A loaded box and single high coverages all day long. When Christian McCaffrey's out there, when he's not out there, we saw the defense get to play the game on its terms. And we saw how effective that can be against a dropback passing game that is kind of limited from a scheme standpoint. We talk about Kyle Shanahan as this genius play caller, but most of that is

focused on the early downs when he's, you know, he's motioning guys, he's dialing up runs, he's throwing screen passes. On third down, this dropback passing game leaves a little bit to be desired. You can only major in so many things as a football coach, and they've decided to major in first down offense, which has obviously worked for them, but this is when you see it kind of become a problem, when they don't have those easy buttons on first down. And I think we saw Brock Purdy kind of collapse under the weight of that playmaking burden without Christian McCaffrey there. Three for 13 on third and fourth down. So it is interesting. You look at the total numbers and they're not, they're like, oh, they've, you know, had most offensive coordinators. We'll be like,

oh, yeah, 399 yards of offense. The quarterback throws for over 300. We're good. We just didn't get a couple balances. The high leverage spots, maybe they didn't come through. I'll say, I think they're probably going to light it up the next two or three weeks, even without him. But it's up. It's something to monitor, we'll get a bigger sample. We'll have some more data, some more answers to what does this look like with McCaffrey versus without McCaffrey because now he's going to miss at least here. It'll be a total of five games at least. And who knows, it could be more than that.

All right, take a break. We come back. We get to some other storylines that stood out in week two. All right, we're back on the Ringer NFL show. We hit the big stuff. Now we hit the still big, but not quite as big stuff here. And the game we're starting with here, Deante, is with you because I didn't have eyes totally on this game. I'm looking at the score going, okay, Ravens are in full control against the Raiders.

They're up by 10. You know, they'll blow them out and they'll take care of business here in the fourth quarter. And then the score kept changing. And then all of a sudden, the Raiders come back from a 10-point second half deficit and pull the upset on the road at Baltimore for a victory. What in the world happened in this football? game. It was funny. The flow of the game, I think, was just so disjointed for the reason I'm going to bring up. And it's just the interior of this offensive line, and specifically right guard,

Daniel Fahillet, makes this offense so hard to operate at times. And it was like, there were points early in the game in the first quarter. You get a couple TFLs for Max Crosby or just some disruption for Max Crosby. And I think my first thought was like, oh, no, it's going to happen again, right? And I think that Baltimore was able to kind of mitigate it a bit. They played with some heavier personnel. You got a lot of Derek Henry today. So there were still some positives to take away from this. I thought that Derek Henry looked pretty good when they were able to get him moving downhill. The issue was that so often their drives are derailed by a blown protection from Follale

or just a brown protection up front because it wasn't just him. But they were really going after him with twists, with stunts, with slants to really try to put Max Crosby and Christian Wilkins in his face. And it just made it, it made the offense really kind of grind to a halt in a way. that made it clear to me that this is just not viable. And we talked about this on, you know, last Thursday after the Chiefs game, right? Which is that what is going to happen to this offense when Lamar Jackson can't go in a superhero mode? And I think that we saw that in the second half. They had plenty of opportunities to put this game away, but the Raiders were able to generate enough pressure to kind of keep him rained in, you know,

and keep themselves within contact. And then late in the game, they just got the plays they needed a couple of timely pass interference calls to keep drives alive. was really, I think, what broke the game. You know, an early misfield goal from Justin Tucker really kind of came back to bite them. And I don't think that things are bleak for Baltimore. Like you said, the AFC North is still within reach. I don't think anybody should look at the standings in that division

and see Pittsburgh at the top of 2 and O and think that. With one touchdown, Dei, with one touchdown, they're 2 and 0. They scored one offensive touchdown all season long and they're 2 and O. Sorry, I don't mean to interrupt, but for something like that, I had to get it in there. No, but that's real, though, because that's exactly how I feel. That's exactly how I feel. It's like, in the grand scheme of things, Baltimore's fine in the AFC. Nothing in the AFC has been determined yet, aside from the fact that everybody still got to go through Kansas City if you want to play in the Super Bowl.

But still, it's just looking at such a clear hole on a team that I want to consider a contender, makes me really reconsider whether or not they're as high in the pecking order as I originally had them entering the year. Lamar Jackson, 21 for 34, 247 yards, a touchdown, one interception, two sex. Man, the Raiders are doing a nice job with Max Crosby and Christian Wilkins in terms of getting the matchups they want so far through the first two weeks of the season. Crosby, even last week is lining up on the right side. They're running stunts and games with those guys and they don't come off the field. Crosby does not come off the field to Sacks in this game, four tackles for loss and two quarterback hits. Ruiz, do you have a level of concern with this Ravens team? Are you kind of with Deonté that they got to get stuff fixed, but they're going to be okay? I think they have stuff that

they could fix, and I think they will fix some of these issues. But that offensive line issue is, even if they find a temporary fix that helps them throughout the regular season, that's going to be a problem that good opponents prey on in the playoffs. Can you imagine Steve Spagnolo attacking that? We don't have to imagine it because we saw it last week at week one, and they had no way of blocking them. They had no way of blocking Max Crosby.

So that's an issue. And I think Justin Tucker is starting to become an issue. That's a second short week where he's missed. And we've seen his accuracy on 50-plus-yard field goals. kind of tail off of the last couple years. I don't know if the goat is generous. It's falling off a cliff right now. Especially, and it really stands out on a day like today where you're watching these games and Kai Me Fairburn is just like 50. They're like, aren't going to let him try it from 61 and he's just banging these field goals through. It clearly affected the end of game strategy

because they weren't. They needed to get 20 yards to feel comfortable and you could see them playing for 20 yards. And ultimately, when you get down to that last play situation, Lamar had no choice, but to take off and try to win the game, right? It wasn't just take a dump off, get the ball across the midfield point, and then maybe you're within range to where Justin Tucker can at least put something by the crossbars. It's clear that they understand that his leg is not the same as what it used to be. And obviously, this has been one of the best kickers that we've seen in our lifetime. So, you know, we have enough reference material to say when something is wrong here. And I think that we can probably pretty definitively say that this team is lacking something in the

special teams department if he can't knock down 50 plus yard field goals. Yeah, I think the other concerning part about this is Baker Mayfield, sorry, not Baker Mayfield, Freudian slip, Gardner Minshew going nine for 13 and averaging nearly 10 yards per 10. I don't know who should be more insulted by that, by the way, and a touchdown. Like, he went up and down on this defense, which is obviously concerned. And I would say, I wouldn't imagine that happening on Mike McDonald's watch. And I would say, oh, you lost the Gardner Minshew in an early season game. Like, this is a season-ender.

If I hadn't seen the Ravens do the same exact thing last year when they lost a Gardner-Minchu and the Colts in an inexplicable game early in the season, they figured it out then. I think they're going to figure things out now. I'm worried more so about this team's ceiling, not really about its long-term prospects. They do have these dumb law. I mean, there were some stat during the game that they've blown more of these leads. I forget what the actual thing was, but like more than any team in the league, it might have been 10 points or more when you're up by 10 points or more in the second half of the season.

And you're right. I remember that Minchew game last year. You're like, this is the stupidest loss by any team all season long. But it's fair. Like, I think you also point out that this feels a little different than other Ravens. Like, when are we talking about the Raven special teams potentially not being an edge for them in a game? I mean, that hasn't, that's like never happens for them in the last decade or so. So you've got that.

You've got the defensive stuff. And then you've got the offensive line stuff as well. And the penalties. This was another big penalty games. I think the Raiders had like a 100-yard advantage in the pennsylvania. The Ravens are going to complain about a couple of those calls, especially the defensive pass interference that kind of decided the game on Brandon Stevens, which I thought should have been a no call.

But if you're in that position at home against a West Coast team, that's very bad. That's playing at 10 a.m. on their time, the game should not be that close, especially if you fancy yourself a Super Bowl contender. Yes, that last point is really what drives at home. Yeah, they had 383 yards of offense. The Raiders only had 260, but to Ruiz's point, 109 yards of penalties for the Ravens, 15 yards of penalties for the Raiders. Hey, Antonio Pierce, if I'm going to rip him for the coaching stuff,

it's a nice, you go on the road, only 15 yards of penalties, your team finds a way to come back from 10 points back. Everyone was making fun of Antonio Pierce after week one. I was taking shots at the punting thing, but you deserve credit for that because there's more to coaching than the in-game decision-making. So nice job by the Raiders getting that victory. All right, Cardinals, Rams, Ruiz, another game that I had the absolute wrong read on.

if you are like a fan and you went out to go get a drink or get something to eat and come back like six minutes into the first quarter, the game was pretty much over. What did you see in this one? Well, first of all, shout out to Marvin Harrison Jr. for making me look like a moron, almost immediately for showing some concern about him, especially on the vertical routes, and he catches a couple of vertical balls in the first quarter. I think he went for 131 yards in the first quarter. Didn't he catch a ball after that? So maybe I could wave the red flag again after that. He's not a crunch time. He's not a second half player.

Yeah, not even a second quarter player, apparently. But, no, the story of this game is Kyler Murray, who finished with a perfect passer rating. I think he averaged over 12 yards per attempt. And the highlights are even better than the numbers implied. Like, he was making plays out of structure. He was making plays in structure, in the pocket, out of the pocket, with his legs. He did hit the over on 50 yards. So I did get one prop right this week.

But no, it was a reminder of how talented. this guy is, which I think we all forgot over the last couple of years because we just haven't seen him play a lot of football. But this was reminiscent of the Kyler Murray we saw in 2021 when they got off to that 7-0 start. And he was leading the MVP discussion. Now, it's the same question with him. Is he going to be able to sustain this? He's going to be able to stay healthy. I can't answer those questions. Nobody's going to be able to answer those questions except for Kyler. But his ceiling is that of a top eight, top five maybe quarterback when he's on his game like this, he could do it all. He's just not very tall, and that's always going to be

an issue. But in terms of playbaking, out of structure, in structure in the pocket, I think he's leveled up as a quarterback, and we've seen him take more initiative before the snap over the last couple of years, which is continuing to evolve. Yeah, it might have been the best quarterback performance. I'm trying to think of week one, but of any quarterback this season. I mean, it's really hard for me. You mention it, and I totally agree that the numbers don't do it justice. Like, if you didn't watch the game, go watch the highlights because it was a, combination of, yeah, there's some good, like, this wasn't like a schematic masterpiece. This was kind of just his talent on full display, whether it was high degree of difficulty

throws, whether it was evading pressure. I mean, he had a play where he avoided like multiple sacks, held the ball for, I think it was eight and a half seconds, and then just threw this ridiculous ball into the end zone for a touchdown. And he did like the Steph Curry where he turned around before the guy even caught it. Like, he was feeling himself in this game and rightfully so, 17 for 21, 266 yards, three touchdowns, no interceptions, only took one sack, and you mentioned it, ran five times for 59 yards. I was looking at some of the advanced stats on this. I was like, there can't be many offensive performances better than this, because he was on the field for eight possessions. They scored five touchdowns, two field goals, and one punt. It was the best

performance statistically by any offense this season and was better than all but eight performances all of last season through the playoffs last year. So yeah, that Rams defense, this probably looked a little bit more like what I thought it was going to look like coming into the year, but also Deonté, I got to give Kyler Murray credit because that was a special performance.

I mean, to me, this was a perfect proof of concept game for the Cardinals offense. This is exactly what they've been trying to sell this offense being, is that if they just added a vertical piece, which they believe they have in Marvin Harrison, Jr., A, it opens up so much for Michael Wilson. It opens up so much for Trey McBride. You really saw that after the explosiveness of the first quarter.

Once they kind of had the Rams attention on the back end, you saw a lot more from Wilson. You got to see some third down conversions from Trey McBride, and I think that that will only be added to it. But I think all of those things are really just window dressing for what I love most about this offense. And it's the fact that they can do so much in the run game. Right now, at least through the first two weeks of the season,

they're seeing an eight-man box at the sixth lowest rate, and they've got the six highest rate of 10 plus yard runs. And so much of that is just because you have to respect the fact that Kyler can really punish you in the passing game. So you want to put a roof over the defense. But if you do that, that allows him A, to scramble, which is an issue for defenses. If you don't have more guys near the line of scrimmage to account for them. And B, when they do have the design run game, you got to see that, especially in the second and third quarter, they're able to do so many things creatively out of spread formations, you know,

whether it's arc blocks with the tight end where he's cutting across the line, line of scrimmage and leaving a defensive end unblocked. Even if that guy is giving Kyler a give the ball read, he can pull it and just win the race to the edge. Right. And that's something that we've seen from guys like Lamar Jackson. When General Hertz was at his healthiest, he was able to get away with that a few, a little bit two years ago. And when you have that effect in your two defenses with your run game, it really puts them in a bind. And that's why they were able to run away with this game so easily. I don't know if it's going to be like this every week because to your point shield, this as far as proof of concept, this is proof of concept on

our take that the Rams defense is going to be an issue for them all year long. But I do think that we saw some really encouraging signs from Arizona. And I have a little bit more reason to believe on what they can be in the NFC West than I might have had two weeks ago. Do you know what this kind of reminds me of like on a smaller scale is like when the Eagles went from Chip Kelly to Doug Peterson? It was like the bones of the offense are similar, but it's a little more professional. Like there's more integrity to the structure of passing. You didn't strip everything down. You kept some of the good stuff, but added, it needed stuff.

Especially in the past game. This is an adult passing game that the Eagles had after Chip Kelly. And I think that's what we're seeing in Arizona, where the bones of Cliff Kingsbury run game, which was always the best part of the Cardinals' offense, from the moment Kyler Murray got there, are still there. And last year, when he came back, they were the number one rushing efficiency team in the league after his return. And this year they've picked up right where they left off. But now we have this passing game that you also have to worry about.

It's just going to be a force multiplier for this entire offense. And the Rams, man, it's almost feels like the point of no return with these injuries. Cooper Cup, according to Jordan Rodriguez, the athletic left the locker room in a walking boot. He was struggling in this game. Puka Nakua is on IR. We know about the offensive line injuries. I thought their offense actually had opportunities in this game. The game just got so out of hand six minutes in.

Marvin Harrison had two touchdowns and it was 14-0. I mean, so there was nothing really you could do. But yeah, we'll see what happens with those Rams. The 2022 vibes on this team are unreal to me. Like, it's beat for beat the same season, which means we're getting a Jimmy G resurgence at the end of the year like we saw it with Baker Bayfield in L.A. that year. Yeah, I know.

And then last year they were so healthy. That was part of the story of their success. And now it goes back to the injuries again. So we'll see what the Rams look like. I don't think they're going to be an easy matchup. most weeks as long as Stafford's on the field and McVeigh's calling the plays, but at some point, you just don't have the guys. All right. Last game in this segment, I got Bears Texans. I don't know if this is an overreaction or not, so I want to hear what you guys do. I just think it's time to reset

our expectations for Caleb Williams this rookie season. And I'm someone who picked the Bears to make the playoffs. But what I've seen here, the first two weeks is just, this is ugly. They scored one offensive touchdown in two games. And this isn't a shot at Williams. This is a, like, like a commentary on how hard it is for rookie quarterbacks to come in and play well. You saw it with C.J. Stroud on the other side of the field there. And it's just like, that is the exception. That is the exception. That's not what normally happens. And this offense between the scheme, the lack of a run game, the offensive line issues. I think I personally probably overrated the situation coming into the season.

Now, Keenan Allen's injured today, but you still had DJ Moore. You still had Roma Dunce. but it feels like nothing is in structure. I mean, some of the teams we've talked about so far where you're like, oh, you know, the same, all they schemed it out. It's like, nothing seems schemed up. Like, I wonder if they weren't on hard knocks,

I would wonder if this team practiced in August. Like the number of times Chris Collinsworth said they're not on the same page. They should do like some type of meter or a ding or something. I mean, that was the entire game tonight. DJ Moore's frustrated. Caleb Williams doesn't look like he has answers. D'iko Rines changes his usual game plan. and they're blitzing them like 40% of the time.

So I'm reminding myself more than anything of what I said going into the season that the average rookie season, you're like the 26th best starter in the NFL. That's the average. So that's not, you know, like, so it's understandable from Caleb Wobis's perspective. But I, if you're a Bears fan, you have to be like, shooter. We have in those environment infrastructure type questions already with our new QB here. And Deonti, I know you had Shane Waldron on Fraudwatch. in our Friday show,

this game does nothing to alleviate anyone's concerns, I think. I was going to say, you don't have shots to take, but I certainly do. I'm the king of preference of things. I want to preface this by saying, I went to school with DeAndre Carter.

That's my guy. We play football together. He's one of the hardest working people I've come across, and I'm so glad that he's had a long sustained NFL career. But if you end a half where DeAndre Carter is tied with DJ Moore

in targets, there is something funding. the mentally wrong with their offense. And at the end of the first half, DJ Moore and DeAndre Carter each had three targets. And it looked like there was something fundamentally wrong with the offense. And I think that this comes back to what I was saying with Shane Waldron. And one of the points that I made on Thursday was that the predictability of this offense on

early downs was going to be a problem against a defensive coordinator as well prepared as D'Amico Ryan's can be. And you saw that in spades today. They were so often behind the sticks because they're throwing bubble screens on first downs. And Houston was just teeinging off on guys, swing screens. You know, the zone running game wasn't there for them. And now you're putting a rookie quarterback in a position where he is most likely to fail and almost guaranteed to fail against a talented defense like Houston's.

And that's obvious passing situations. And you just saw, to your point shield, this is something that I've noticed because I've been spending a lot of time studying D'Amico Ryan's defense. The Blitz meter really only gets turned up against offensive schemes that he doesn't respect and quarterback said he doesn't respect. And you could kind of see that. You know, the longer the game went on, that he was like, okay, I can get at you this way.

I can turn this up this way. I can send guys off of this angle and you're not going to be able to pick it up. And then that's when you really got to see this offense unravel. You know, that was something I noted with some of my colleagues while the game was going on was all the issues they were having pre-snap. We're trying to check protections.

We're trying to reset formations. We're trying to get in and out of plays. You could tell that they were having issues getting on the same page in general, and then specifically to try to combat what looks Houston was giving them. So yeah, I leave the first two weeks of this season, looking at Shane Waldron, like, it does not feel like he has the right kind of grasp on where the ball needs to be

to get the most out of this offense. And if I'm taking what it looked like in the second half, outside of Chicago's defense keeping them in this game, it looked like they had no answers at all to make the situation better on Sunday night. Brian Flores is to system quarterbacks, what D'Amico Ryans is to fraud offensive coordinators. That's my takeaway from this game. And I don't think Shane Waldron on fraud watch was on my radar coming into this week until Deontes said it. But looking back on it, I think we have to rethink his tenure in Seattle and give a lot of that credit to the fact that Gino Smith is way better than any of us thought he would be.

Like you go back to that first year under Russell Wilson, that might have been Russ's worst year as a Seahawk. It was his worst year as a starter. Gino Smith last year was great in isolation, but when you add in the fact that they couldn't scheme around that offensive line, his numbers took a big hit. They still finished with the top 10 offense, but I think that largely had to do with the talent of the quarterback. And now this year, like, we came into the season thinking the Bears

had this great system around Caleb Williams. Well, Keenan Allen's hurt. The offensive line hasn't been nearly as good as people thought it would be. And the play calling, like Deonti has laid out here, has been disjointed at best. like Caleb Williams is not playing good football. He's missing throws that we didn't see him miss at USC. He's doing some of the things in the pocket that we feared he would do in the NFL.

But I think the bigger issue is the fact that he hasn't been reined in a little bit more and put into structure where he doesn't feel like he has to be a superhero on every play. Like we saw in Green Bay today with Malik Willis, who was like maybe one of the worst quarterbacks we've seen start a game over the last couple of years and he looked viable under a good coaching staff. Caleb Williams doesn't look viable. We know he's better than Malik Willis. And he has a comparable team around him.

Yeah, I think now when you look at the good offensive coordinators in the end of so many of them are able to scheme around the O line issues. I mean, not every team just has like five guys who are really good. Up front, most teams don't. And even when you do, those guys get injured. That's almost something now has become like, if I were hiring, I'd be like, I need to see evidence that you are able to do this. When have you done this in the past?

And to your point, Ruiz, you're right. I mean, the Seahawks offense, it's only been two weeks. It doesn't look to me like they've taken a drop off with a new offensive coordinator so far. So yeah, something to keep an eye on you. It is a good point that Williams has not played well, and I think it's okay to say that. You're not like crushing him or taking him a shot. We all realize it's two games. So he is not making the plays that are available to him.

At the same time, we can all watch this and then compare it to other offenses in the NFL and say, all right, you know, you could be helped out a little bit more by whoever scheming and calling. plays. All right. We take a break. We come back. We go a little rapid fire around the rest of the games that we haven't hit on yet. All right. We're back on the ringer NFL show. Shield Capati here with Stephen Ruiz and Deontel. Now's when we go a little rapid fire. We hit the big stuff and then the kind of big stuff and now we hit everything else. No offense to these teams. Some of them did some good things this week. But now is when we will get to all of them. And Ruiz, we're starting with you in Nashville. The Jets, it looks like, get a scare. What would that have been like if they were 0-and-2, but they come back? They beat the Titans. What did you see in this football game? I'm honestly relieved that they didn't lose this game. Not that I wanted the Jets to win or the Titans to lose,

just so we don't have to talk about this theme. Because this team is painfully boring to watch. That's my main takeaway. Aaron Rogers has two touchdown zero interceptions. You know he's going to be happy about that touchdown to interception ratio. It's the only thing he seems to care about these days. but a 46 QBR, 5.9. I wouldn't say the only thing he cares out.

That's a good point. He's got many. He's trending and tame dangerous grounds there. I stand corrected. He's very, very passionate about Alan Lazard in his continued employment. But no, 5.9 yards per attempt. And if you guys have had a chance

to look at his passing map on the next gen stats website, early contender for saddest passing map of the year. The guy could still throw a fade ball. He could still throw outside the numbers. We saw that against the 49ers. We saw it on the touchdown to Brees Hall in this game, but he is just not throwing over at the middle of the field at all.

He's not testing those windows. I don't know if it's because he doesn't have time or guys aren't open or he just doesn't trust his arm. Whatever the case is, there was just no attempts at all. I'm not exaggerating, no attempts in the middle of the field in this game, and we saw that against the 49ers too. And most of all, I just think he's a boring quarterback to watch. He doesn't try to push the envelope.

He only pushes the ball outside if it's a safe pass outside of the numbers. he knows that isn't going to get intercepted. The Jets' offense isn't viable like this. Aaron Rodgers has to be willing to throw interceptions and to test tight windows if this passing game is going to be what it needs to be to get to the playoffs because teams are just sitting on the run game. We saw them get off to a bad start,

especially Breece Hall in the run game, an inefficient start. They found things eventually that worked in the run game. Hall finishes with 62 yards. Braylon Allen chips in with 33 yards and a couple impressive runs. But there is a limit on this offense, and the quarterback is the one causing.

it. Yeah, I think it's a continuation of what we talked about during the week where it's just like, all right, it's Aaron Rogers and Nathaniel Hackett, what's it, you know, what's it going to look like? There's no melding of one person wanting to do it one way. It's like Nathaniel Hackett has to do it the way Aaron Rogers wants to do it. And it's just been ugly so far. I mean, in this football game, yeah, the numbers are not impressive. It seems like they're running into a brick wall most of the time. You mentioned it. They got it going a little bit, but they got out game. They had 265 total yards in this game. game. The Titans had 300 yards in this game. And it just seemed like, all right, they're throwing to the backs a little bit. But then when they throw the wide receivers, it seems very difficult.

I don't see a lot of easy stuff going to those guys. Garrett Wilson, Mike Williams had the nice catch. But again, those seem like, all right, let Aaron Rogers show off the arm a little bit. And, you know, you'll be like, oh, those are some wild plays, some highlights. And so they get the victory. That's good. But yes, I don't, you know, you watch the bills through the first two weeks and watch the jets to the first two weeks. And I'm like, what was I think? picking the Jets to win this division. I threw the link to the Aaron Rogers passing map in the chat on the thing.

I want to see your guys' live reaction to this. I'm looking at it now, and if you would have told me that this was Bo Nix's passing chart last week, I would have believed you. This is disgusting. This has been Rothesberger-esque. Stephen kind of pointed it out.

The issue here is that the running backs took up 41% of the targets and half the receptions in this passing game. And I look at Tennessee as a team that's just competitive and competent enough to kind of be a barometer for the teams that we want to consider real contenders. And this is a game to me where this Jets' offense should have said,

hey, for all the additions that they've made to the secondary, having a good defensive interior, if you're the team that you say you are, you should be able to win on early downs with the run game, and then you should really be able to just pick apart this secondary with end breakers, pushing a ball down the field, using a play-action game to push a ball down the field. And it's just like another week again

of Aaron Rogers running the Aaron Rogers offense. which is a bunch of just quick game, drop back stuff and checking the ball down, like Stephen said, to protect, you know, to protect themselves from taking any risks. And you can't win with this offense playing like Derek Carr did last year. And that's what the passing chart looks like. That's what the game looks like oftentimes. You know, and we need to see this offense maximize itself, given some of the attrition that New York's defense has gone through.

Even though I think they were pretty good today rushing a passer. I think it helps going up against Will Levis, who was going to give you plenty of opportunities. to get home. But I still just haven't seen enough from the Jets yet to say that they're the team that we know that they want to be. It's not quite close yet. I remember when Devante Adams first got to Las Vegas,

he compared Derrick Carr directly to Aaron Rogers. Little did we know. He was actually right. It's just a sad comparison, it turns out. They have my pet peeve, which I know Deonté are members from our Texans conversation, a team that runs the ball so much on early downs that is terrible at running the ball on early downs.

Right now, they're the fourth most run-heavy team on early downs, and they rank 25th in success rate. It's a great way to just put your team in tough third-down situations and really not be an efficient offense and only be facing defenses when you're passing the ball, when they know you're passing the ball, and they can do different things. That's what you don't want to do. Natty Hackett, that's what he's doing so far.

All right, that's Jets, Titans. Brown's Jags, Deontay. The Jags do not get a victory. they start out the season 0 and 2. I was watching the Chargers today going, Sheila, you were deciding between the Chargers and Jags as your last wildcars fight. I think you might have made

the wrong decision. Where are we with sort of the panic with this Jags team Deontes or is it more hey, Browns got some stuff together in this game? Oh, it's definitely not the latter. The Browns are bad in this game. But the Jags lost because in three of their four,

three or their four red zone opportunities, they came away with just six points. That can't happen. That's what Doug Peterson was here for, was to make this passing game more effective and got to have it situations. And this team still looks just as inept at times at getting the ball out of Trevor's hands and into open receivers' hands as it has been throughout his career. And there are going to be issues. I don't want to dismiss this all as just the team failing Trevor because the sack he took in the end zone that surrendered to safety was 100% Trevor, you know, perseverating on a throw, trying to find a deep downfield option,

not feeling pressure. And by the time he looks to escape, it's too late. And that has been something that's dogged him throughout his career. But ultimately, this team still does not have a run game. The offensive line was bad all throughout this game. And that combination of those two things put this guy in superhero mode. And I think that we have enough of a sample size now for as much as I like Trevor Lawrence and for as talented as he can be,

the superhero mode is just going to get you more bad than good with what he's working with right now and what some of his worst tendencies can be. So I think until we get not necessarily a training wheels offense, but an offense that is just more effective at getting the ball out of his hands quickly into space with guys that can create after the catch, I can't take this team as seriously as I want to because outside of that 66-yard bond we saw in the third quarter, there's nothing else happening for this offense. And that's an issue to me going up against a Brown's defense. That for as talented as it is, you know that their offense is, you know that their offense is

and that you're going to have plenty of opportunities to score. And they just, they gave this game away 100% in the red zone and in the second half. It's a great question about what is the best version of Trevor Lawrence. I honestly, I'm not sure I have an answer to that because as you were talking, I definitely was on this pod last year being like, oh man, it seems a little too like robotic and they're not throwing the ball downfield and like he's so talented. I want his natural talents to show. But you're right.

Then you have again, I mean, he's 14 for 30. In this game, his average pass went over 12 yards. They tried to push it. Yeah, that led all quarterbacks in this game. So, I mean, I feel like we should know at this point. What is the best version of Trevor Lawrence? But, yeah, their offense has just not been it so far this season once again. And they're in an 0-and-2 hole here as the Browns bounce back and improve to one and one.

All right. Now it's time for the win presented by Amazon business. we could all use more time, more time to try to figure out what's going on with Trevor Lawrence and that Jags offense. Amazon business offers smart business buying solutions so you can spend more time growing your business and less time doing the admin. I can see why they call it smart. And I'm highlighting a win for this segment by the Seattle Seahawks.

They take down the Patriots 2320 in what was like a, I mean, I don't want to like oversell it, But these were two competitive teams going back and forth here. There was a time where it looks like, all right, the Seahawks are going to run away with this. They get stuffed on a fourth and one. Then the Patriots are in control up 2017 in field goal range late in the fourth quarter, and they have a kick blocked. But Ruiz, you are going to enjoy, I think, the Gino.

I mean, you enjoy the Gino Smith film every week. I know you do. But I think this is, you're going to be definitely tweeting out some clips this week because I thought he made some big time plays. And in the first half, it was more hang in the pocket, ripped some of those throws over the middle. But they had to put together two drives against what I think we now know is a pretty good Patriots defense,

one at the end of regulation, one in overtime. And he saw Gino the creator. I mean, in those modes, I mean, he's escaping the pocket. He had a nice throw to Tyler Lockett. He had another nice one to Charbonnet. He finished his game 33 for 44 for 327. yards and a touchdown. I think he had some drops in this game as well.

So that's the Seahawks end of it. The Patriots, it's like another competitive performance, but the thing about them, Ruiz, is that, like they have to play one way. Run the ball, defense, don't make a mistake. Hunter Henry, this might be my favorite stat of the week. Hunter Henry had 109 yards in this game. The rest of the team had 40 receiving yards in this game.

Like in the year, 2024, what a stat? So it's like when they have a kick block, or something, it's almost like they just can't recover from that, and now you have to pass the football, and you're not able to do that. But yeah, you're going to like the Gino film this week, and the Patriots, better than we thought. So give them some credit for that. Yeah, this Patriots team reminds me of that 2021 team, or 2021 team

that made the playoffs with Mack Jones. Like, that's the formula. If the quarterback has to win the game, we're probably not going to win the game, but if the defense of the run game can carry us home, we can get there, provided we don't run into the ultimate weapon, Gino Smith. He follows up his 36-yard touchdown run in week one with another, like Schill said, another creative performance.

But I wanted to continue to shit on Shane Waldron since, you know, picking up from where we left off in the B-block, Jackson Smith and Jigba. I think he's the big winner in this new offense. He has 12 catches for 117 yards after I think he had some questionable usage in Waldron's offense last year. We're seeing more of his game flourish under Ryan Grubb this year. and with Gino Smith, providing them with some nice passes. So I think, did we end up all picking Seattle to make the playoffs in this,

on this pod when we did the predictions? I think I was the only one who had them out, and I had them as like the eighth, well, would have been the eighth scene in the NFC. So beyond Deontes' cowardice, our optimism about Seattle was justified, obviously, with these first two games. Yeah, so far so good. Both games have come down to the wire, but they've come out on top for both of them. So there are 2 and O Patriots 1 and 1.

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All right, next game. I mean, this was the, you look at the line on Friday, and you say, stay away, be careful with your fandom, accounts on this one. Colts Packers, Malique Willis starting. Colts were what, two and a half, three point favorites? You said, this looks a little easy. And lo and behold, it was a little easy, Ruiz.

What happened in this football game? Matt LaFleur masterclass. I mean, this is a guy who, I mean, we have to put into discussion for one of the best coaches in the NFL. Like usually when we have that discussion, his name comes up later in that talk. I think it needs this piece. it needs to be brought up at the beginning of that talk after this one. We've seen him resurrect Aaron Rogers' career.

We saw him develop Jordan Love behind the scenes while all that was happening. And now we just saw him turn Malik Willis into a winning, starting quarterback in the NFL. I thought I'd never see the day after the first two years of the Malik Willis career. But he managed to make it happen by creating a run game based around, you know, constraints, I think. It was like a gimmicky run game, but it's what you had to do when you have a quarterback this limited it. They used Malik Willis's legs well enough, and then they avoid it at all cost, any obvious passing situations. And whenever they found themselves in those situations, they made it easy on Malik. This was the kind of support he never got in Tennessee under Mike Frable.

And this kind of performance never felt possible under Mike Frable in Tennessee. We saw it. Every time he got on the field, it looked horrible. It looked unviable. And like before the game, I don't know if you guys watched the ESPN pregame show, but they were doing their picks and they went to Rex Ryan and he was like, I'm picking the Colts in this game. And his explanation was, I've seen Belich Willis play football in the NFL. And that's enough for me to pick the Colts. And I was with them. Like I'm not trying to like submit that to old takes exposed. I'm not trying to dunk on Rex Ryan because I was with him right there. I bet on the Colts for that reason. And Matt LaFlead made me look dumb. And he did it by turning Malik Willis into one of the more efficient passers. in this week. It's 12 for 14, for 122 yards for Malik Willis.

They win this football game. 1610. Josh Jacobs runs it old school, 32 times. When do you get the running back who actually runs it 30 times in this game? Now, what about the Anthony Richardson experience in this one? Ruiz, was it just sort of up and down? He finishes 17 for 34, 240, 204 yards,

one touchdown, three interceptions. We know there's going to be some very instants. Was it just that kind of game? It was more of the same. The accuracy issue is always going to be the issue with him. The interceptions are because of accuracy. The misdrows at the end, obviously, or because of accuracy. They had a chance to kind of go down the field here,

and he missed a deep throw on the sideline that he should have hit. So it's a second straight week where we're questioning it. At this point, it's a pattern, and there's no way to talk around it. I know Colts coaches refuse to admit that he has an accuracy problem, but it's clear as day when we watch it. I also want to add, can he pick it not starting? Desmond Ritter? not on a roster right now.

Malik Willis QB1, it turns out, from that draft. That really is something that they, like, just days, weeks before the season starts, they acquire Malik Willis, make him their backup, and now he has to start in week two, and he goes 12 for 14, and you win the football game. I'm with you. That's when you're really, like, there are different ways to learn about how great a coach is, but, like, a performance like that.

I mean, Matt LaFleur right now has the 14th best winning percentage in NFL history. He is 56 and 28 as a head coach. And what did we learn after Aaron Rogers left? It probably wasn't that easy to coach Aaron Rogers. And then you do that with Jordan Love last year. And then this year, they could have got blown out in this game. And we wouldn't be sitting here going, oh, Matt LaFleur should have been better. We would have been like, what do you expect?

You know, you just got a backup quarterback. But I love that. No excuses. Your underdogs at home after losing in week one. And it's like, you know, you're just trying to keep your season alive until Jordan Love can get back on the football field. So I'm with you. Great job by him. And nice win there by the Packers. Speaking of nice wins, Deonti, the Washington commanders and Jade and Daniels, this is a nice looking box score for Jayden Daniels. 23 for 29, 226 yards, no interceptions, and runs 10 times for 44 yards.

Commanders take down the Giants 2118. What did we see in this game? I'm assuming that you mean nice in the way that like a girl will say that a guy is nice that she doesn't want a date. Because that's, I think that's a little bit. I mean, it's a second start. I don't know. That looks pretty good to me now. I would say that the box score kind of belies some of the yellow to orange flags that I've had with this offense after watching it the last two weeks.

It was four more scrambles for Jaden Daniel. So I actually think that he tried a little bit harder to be more of a pocket passer type. I think that they did spend a little bit of time trying to find different ways to get the ball out of his hand. try to slow him down, keep him from feeling like he just had to take off. But man, it was just, there was a possession in the red zone for them in this game where you could just tell he was so uncomfortable and it ended on him sailing a pass over the head of, I think, Zach Ertz in the back of the end zone. It was like, oh, if you were faster through your progression, you would have known where the

windows were, even if you had to move off of this throw and maybe you could have found something. And it made me want to go look at the numbers. And up to this point, his red zone pass-a rating is 39. And I know the people have probably heard this before, but the ones who haven't, a quarterback could take the snap and try to put a hole in the dirt on 10 straight possessions. And your passer rating would be 39.6. It is the equivalent to ending every play with an incomplete pass. And that's basically the value that he's getting out of the red zone. And his passer rating is 67.7 against man coverage in all situations.

And that's a bad quarterback. And what you're seeing, I think, and this is something I noted in the Tampa Bay game, is that there's a clear book. on how to make this guy uncomfortable. He's going to be dynamic. He did have a few nice scrambles to get away from Kvon, Tibado and Brian Burns and Dexter Lawrence, especially early in the game. But the less that that was available and the more that New York demanded that he had to play from the pocket, play with anticipation, beat tight coverage, the more you got to

see some of the holes in his passing attack. And it just makes me look at Cliff Kingsbury as a guy that's not a ceiling razor. And this is something that's not new. Stephen, you've been on this for a while now, especially in the passing. And we just had this conversation about Kyler Murray and what being away from Cliffs Kingsbury has done for him as a passer. And I think that we're seeing that kind of negative effect on Jaden Daniels as a passer now. I mean, Terry McLaurin has less than 40 receiving yards for the first two weeks.

I went back and looked, this is by far the least productive that he's been in his career to open a season through two weeks. So to me, the fact that you can't get the ball to your best receiver, you're having the scramble issues, you're not able to get the ball out. out of his hands effectively, unless it's on some manufactured touch like a screen or an RPO. I mean, when you play the better defenses in the NFL, what do you think you're going to see? And that's where I'm at with this team. And that doesn't even touch on some of the issues that they have defensively.

Boy, good. I mean, commanders fans are like, can we give us one week? Listen, we're here to tell the truth. That's up Diante's in this one football game. I wasn't being sarcastic with the box squad. I thought maybe Jay and Daniels played well in this, but my goodness. DeAndi just took a torch to that. It was a field goal fest.

You're never going to hear something nice about me in the field goal fest. Yeah, it was 21-18. And Daniel Jones had a higher EPA per play than Jaden Daniels in this one. So I wouldn't be too excited. I think you still have, like DeAnde said, you still have the questions about the Dan Quinn defense. It's mostly about the coaching. Like all this falls on Jaden and it falls on his stat line and we pick that apart.

But it comes back to the coaching. And it comes back to Cliff Kingsbury, just not putting him in a fully fleshed out passing. game. We're talking about what Jaden Daniels is now. As long as he's in this offense, it's hard to see him developing into something more than he is now, because that's all Cliff Kingsbury is asking of him. So all my pessimism around Jaden Daniels is based on the coaching staff and has nothing to do with him as an individual talent, at least not yet. Terry McClure's air yards per target was 3.88. That's unacceptable. That's unacceptable. Cliff Kingsbury should be thrown in football jail for

stats like that. Why did he come back from Thailand or wherever he went for that year? No. Yeah, it was, uh, it was Thailand. Listen, Cliff Kingsbury is going to come to his weekly press conference and say, 425 yards and we get the W. Put some respect on my name. I'm Cliff. I do no such thing. Oh, do no such thing. Your guy's face. I wish everybody watch you. The ring, this is a good plug for the Ringer NFL show, the Ringer NFL channel. These guys are just disgusted by the thought of Cliff Kingsbury doing such a thing after they go 0 for 6 in the red zone. But you get the victory. It's a commander's fans. You don't have a lot. You haven't had a lot to cheer about. So it's okay. I feel you. You got a victory. The guy's exciting. I think he's

exciting. And we'll see if he evolved or what it looks like against better teams. All right, speaking of Ruiz, offense, that might be hard to watch, maybe not great. Steelers Broncos, teams that have combined for two offensive touchdowns, again, combined through two games this season, but the Steelers get the victory. Mike Tomlin doing Mike Tomlin stuff, Bo Knicks doing Bo Nick stuff. Sean Payton doing Sean Payton stuff. Maybe we can start calling it that now. What happened in this ugly, ugly game where the Steelers come away with a 13-6 victory? It was a classic Tomlin performance. Going into a game where it seems like the Steelers are a little overmatched against a team,

against a team that's not coached so well, and they pull out the win by out-coaching the team. The takeaway for me is that Sean Payton is now a coach of a bad team, and he's been a coach of a bad team for the last two years, and that was never the case in New Orleans, even in their down years when Drew Breeze was carrying that team with a bad defense, or even in their down years later on when Drew Breeze ended up getting hurt, and they had to play Teddy Bridgewater and Taysam Hill. They always competed and they always got the most out of their team. You can't say this about this Broncos team.

Sean Payton isn't making things easy on Bo Nix as a rookie. He's already thrown four interceptions. He only threw three interceptions all of last season at Oregon. You see him struggling in the huddle. You see him struggling to get through progressions. You see him struggling to be comfortable in the pocket. These are the things that Sean Payton is supposed to be able to coach into a quarterback. That was his thing.

Give me a quarterback and I will develop him. He got a quarterback. quarterback who was very far along as a 24-year-old rookie, and he looks like a 21-year-old rookie who is way in over his head. And I can't blame Bo Nex for that. I think it falls on Sean Peyton. And then Sean Payton, at the end of the game, not going for the onside kick. When they're down by seven, they have one time out, and there's a minute 54 left on the clock. And Sean Payton tried to rationalize it after the game at the post-game press conference. It made no sense whatsoever. He was like, yeah, we were weighing the odds of getting an on-side kick versus the odds

of scoring with 26 seconds, because that's how much time would have been on the clock if they got the ball back after getting to stop. And we ultimately decided to kick the ball. So he thought Bo Nix was going to take this team down the field for a game-tying touchdown in 26 seconds with no timeouts. When all he's been doing all season is throwing these little short passes, it just makes no sense. And on top of that, the other layer of irony on this is that Sean Payne, won a Super Bowl by kicking an onside kick against the Colts when he was with the Saints.

I don't know if he has a ring if he didn't choose to kick an onside kick in that scenario, where it was not obvious to kick an outside kick. And now he's in this situation, what is it, 15 years later, where very clearly the right answer is to do the onside kick and he doesn't do it. He outsmarts himself. And I think that's pretty, that pretty much sums up to Sean Payton experience in Denver, a coach who continues to outsmart himself. It's a classic case of these coaches want to delay losing,

like definitively losing as long as possible, rather than giving themselves the best chance to win. Like, yes, if you don't get it, the game's over. But still, that's still your best chance to win. Like, you can't just delay the decision longer. That doesn't help you in the long run. So, yeah, it's ugly. I mean, they are 31st in offensive success rate ahead of only the Carolina Panthers right now

through two games. They had that stretch in the second half. They had the back-to-back plays in the second half, the one trick play where they had 75 yards. And it was like first half, 25 plays, 25 yards. Last two plays, two plays, 75 yards. And then Bo Nicks throws the interception in the red zone there. For split second, I was like, all right, if they score here, maybe this will be interesting. But it's a good point.

He handpicked the quarterback. He should have, he has, there's no excuses. Like other coaches, there should have be excuses, but there could be. You handpicked the quarterback. you should have had a plan for how you're going to help him be successful. And he doesn't look comfortable. And their offense is one of the worst in the NFL right now through the first two weeks of the season. So he's a rookie.

I get it, but he's an older rookie. And you overdrafted him more so than where the consensus boards. And most people thought he was going to be drafted. So you should have had an idea on how to make this work. And man, that is in terms of unwatchable teams. Who would think about that? Like Sean Payton having an unwatchable office. offense, but yeah, you're right. It's kind of two years in a row now with these quarterback.

So we'll see how that thing continues here as the season goes on. All right, we finish with the last game I watched. Should I just take the Panthers every week? You know, it's kind of a nice stress relief because like five minutes in, I'm like, all right, I don't have to pay that much attention to this game. The Chargers beat the Panthers 26 to 3. Harba was doing exactly what he said he was going to do. I mean, they run the ball 44 times for 219 yards in this game. They don't shoot themselves in the foot. If they're playing an inferior opponent, they're like, let them lose the game. We don't need to win the game.

They're running the ball well. I mean, Jake, it's not often. You just have a team that can reel off these like 40-yard runs every week. I mean, that is uncommon. So give him and Greg Roman credit for that. Justin Herbert, just 14 for 20 for 130 yards, two touchdowns and an interception. That's the Justin Herbert stat line here.

Chargers are 2-0. Quentin Johnson had two touchdowns in this game, beat J.C. Horn on a go ball. That was a nice throw from Justin Herbert. And then J.K. Dobbin, 17 for 131. That's a good story. That's a feel-good story in the NFL. The injuries that guy has gone through to now have a new home and be doing this. He's looked great through the first two weeks. He's averaging over nine yards per carry. It's crazy. It's insane. Yeah. They're getting these massive explosives through the run game, which isn't it's again. It's not even if you say that's what you want to do and focus on it, that's not easy to do. And the defense knows you're going to do it. And they're doing it. So it's easy against Carolina. A little easier against Carolina. Well, that's the other side of this. And honestly, I just feel bad for like, I just feel bad for Bryce Young, honestly, watching him now. I mean, this is sad. He was 18 for 26 for 84 yards.

Let me repeat that 18 for 26 for 84 yards. He doesn't have it. He's got no confidence through an interception in this game when he scrambles and tries to, he scrambled and try to buy time and then just took the sack anyway near the sideline and like got crushed. Seems like a great guy. Seems like a nice guy. I'm rooting for him. But they had seven first downs in this game. They've been outscored in the first half, the first two weeks, 50 to three. As I said on Twitter, if you are a restaurant owner in the Charlotte area, watch out. There's a man coming to flip your lid this week. He's not going to be happy with this performance. So I think they had two first downs in the first half. Canales is being interviewed. And there's like Andy Dalton Chance. I mean, that's when it's

sad. 2024 Andy Dalton Chance. So I don't know what they do. Adam Thielen was like very frustrated on the sidelines during this game. He spoke afterwards and said, um, he kind of caught in the situation and said, you know, he loves Bryce Young. It's not about that. It's about just frustrated with the entire offense. But this is just rock bottom in the NFL. Ruiz right now is the Carolina Panthers for as much as we talked about Bo Nix and whatever other teams we want to mention,

they're just on a different level than everyone else right now it feels like. Yeah, I don't even know what to cling on to. There's nothing to be excited about this team. Derek Brown got injured. He was probably the best player on the team after they've lost their best player three years in a row.

It's getting rough to watch. Bryce Young was asked after the game, like how he maintains confidence And he's like, my confidence is in the Lord. Anytime you're invoking faith, it's a bad place to be. Why are you dragging the poor Lord into this, into this misery? Don't do that. We don't have to drag him into David Tepper's mess.

David Tepper's hell, this hell that he's created in Carolina. Just get me off of this ride. I don't want to do it anymore. I want to stop pounding. Like, we got to stop pounding. Find a different way because it's not working. I can only imagine what Jim Harbaugh was thinking. looking across the field, looking at his quarterback,

it's like 6'5 football throwing God, and then looking across the field and they have a 5-11, 190-pound quarterback. He probably made him sick to his stomach. Yeah, at this point, it's like, again, because Bryce Young seems like a good guy, and he was, I love watching him in college. I just, like, what I'm rooting for now is the ceiling, it's like, can he have a long career as a backup?

Like, can he replace Carson Wentz in Kansas City next year or go to Buffalo or something in one of these teams and just be like the back. up for one of these star quarterbacks. And Buffalo would it be good. You can't let him stand next to Josh Allen. That would do horrible things to his confidence. All right.

So it's dire, dire situation there in Carolina. And the Chargers, meanwhile, 2 and O Harbaugh coming in right away and they're playing Harbaugh ball and it's looking pretty good. Even, you know,

he doesn't have to be Justin Herbert thrown for 300 yards for them to win. They're doing it in a totally different way. All right. I think we hit all the games. I'll say this every week. We might have forgotten something. These Sundays are a whirlwind, but they're also a lot of fun. Appreciate everyone listening on Spotify. Remember, you can check out the Ringer NFL YouTube channel for stuff from this show as well.

Thank you to Stephen Ruiz and Deonté Lee. Thank you to Christopher Sutton for producing additional production supervision by Connor Nevins and Arjuna Ram Gopal and our friend. Dan Comer as well. We'll be back later this week on the Ringwood NFL show. Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in D.C. Gambling problem. Call 1-800-Gamplinghelp.com or visit RGash-Help.com or visit RG-Gash-Help.com or visit www.mdGamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gambling helplinema.org or call 800-32750-50 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts

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