The Ringer NFL Show - Week 7 NFL Power Rankings: Giants and Jets Continue to Climb, Plus Can the Vikings Be Trusted? | Power Rankers

Episode Date: October 18, 2022

Austin is joined by former NFL receiver James Jones to discuss the how the NFL power rankings have shifted following Week 6. They start by discussing the Giants and if they are as good as their record indicates (1:41). Then, they break down why the Ravens should still be optimistic about their season (8:11). Later, Steven Ruiz joins the show to talk about why he still doesn’t trust the Vikings (19:05), before discussing his QB rankings, and how the Patriots and Cowboys can learn from what has happened with Bailey Zappe and Cooper Rush (38:03). Host: Austin Gayle Guests: James Jones and Steven Ruiz Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal and Conor Nevins Associate Producer: Carlos Chiriboga Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, my name is Kevin Clark. I'm the host of a new football podcast called Slow Newsday. I want to tell you about it. On Mondays, Lindsay Jones and I will recap the weekend in football that was, as well as look ahead to what's next. On Wednesday, the normal Slow Newsday, the thing you've been watching for years, current players, current coaches, current analysts talking about the football world. And on Friday, it's a wild card.

Could be some college football. Could be more pro stuff. It's a video podcast so you can watch it on Spotify or listen to it wherever you get your podcasts. Follow on Spotify. It's Slow Newsday. Welcome into the ringer NFL show. I know that you're expecting me and Jason Gough to rip it up, him to make fun of me constantly throughout the show.

But that's not the case. Jason Gough, out of commission, on PTO. I don't know where he is. Celebrating Chicago's losses, maybe, looking at 2023 quarterbacks, but he's not here. And who's replacing him? A little combination of James Jones,

former NFL Whiteout, also doing some media with the Raiders and the Green Bay Packers. He's got some takes on the Giants, the Jets, the Ravens, and the Packers. And we also bring in Stephen Ruiz. He's usually at the end, 10, 15 minutes on the quarterbacks, but he stays for about 20, 30 minutes. We talked through some of my power rankings this week.

Let's get it. Jones, thanks for joining the show. Not a problem, man. Thanks for having me. Jason Goff don't know what he's talking about anyway. I have to start with this. I'm born and raised in Oakland. I'm now, I just recently moved back to California.

I've been living in L.A. I am a massive Raiders fan. I remember the lone year you were with the Raiders in 2014, thinking that you'd help us write the ship. But here we are. Here we are talking shop here, talking NFL, talking power rankings. Where I want to start, man, I think is where every single show is starting this week. And it's New York, right? These two teams, the Giants at 5 and 1, the New York Jets at 4 and 2,

have far exceeded expectations. I saw ESPN drop their own version of power rankings. I think they had the Giants as the fifth best team in the NFL, Jets cracking in at the top 10. I think it's insane to see the support East Rutherford is getting right now. Where I want to start is with the Giants. And just to recap last week, the New York Giants upset the Baltimore Ravens at home. 2420 in classic comeback fashion that is showing out to be like fourth quarter giants, man. They are showing up Daniel Jones specifically. The Ravens led 20 to 10 with 1254 remaining in the fourth quarter. Daniel Jones marched down, scored a touchdown.

They get out to 2017. Then Lamar Jackson, in a panic after a muff snap essentially throws a bad interception to Julian Love, sets the Giants up for the go-ahead score. But still, Jackson gets the ball back with 154 left in the game. And rookie Kavon-Tibado gets the strip sack. And the Giants win that game. They're five and one off and upset over the Baltimore Ravens. How legit is this Giants team?

What are your accents from this big win over the Baltimore Ravens? And how far does this team go? You know what, man? I'm still trying to figure that out, man. Kudos to the Giants. Kudos to that coach staff. Brian Dayball and that coach staff is coaching. They tail off, man.

You know, the Giants is beating really good football teams, man. You beat the Green Bay Packers. You beat the Tennessee Titans. Now you just beat the Baltimore Ravens. and they're beating them with three plays. You got a bootleg, you got a wildcat formation with Seekwon, and obviously you hand the ball off to Seekwan Barber.

But they are beating teams with three plays. They are starting to believe in each other, believing that coach and staff. And I think that's their formula. Their formula is we are not going to beat nobody by 40. All right, let's look up there in the fourth quarter, and let's see ourselves in this ballgame, and let's go try to make one more play.

than the opponent, right? And that is how they are playing and it is working. They are not making the mistakes at the end of the game like their opponents are making. I'm still scratching my head over here because I don't think the Giants are a good football team. I believe they are kind of, you know, a Cinderella kind of lucky team right now, sitting at five and one with some things going their way, bouncing their way. They don't have a straight outright W, you know what I mean, over anybody, you know, over a good team, over a bad team.

But at the end of the day, they are finding ways to win. Like I said, Brian Dayball and his coaching staff is coaching. They tail off, man. But I'm still, I'm not like ESPN and their power ranking having them as a fifth best team. I still don't believe that they're ready to compete with those top teams in the NFL. Consistently, you might find a way to win one or two. But consistently, I do not think they are good football team. I'm still, I'm still struggling to find 10 wins for them.

I'm still struggling to find 10 wins. But I have picked against them every week, and they had told me, James, shut up, because we are a good football team and we're going to continue to win. You do not know what you're talking about. I don't care if you play the game. You are stupid. We are good. That's incredible, man. I've picked against the Giants, too, and they just continue to win.

And I think it's evident in how the betting market sees them, too. I think Bandal has their win total set nine and a half with, I think, juice towards the under. And then you look at this week, they're going against ESPN's 24th ranked team, the Denver Broncos, and their three-point dogs. and their three-point dogs on the road. Like, betting markets still aren't backing the New York Giants against bad football teams because this roster is still, specifically at wide receiver berefts town.

I wanted to bring this up with you, obviously a former receiver in the NFL. The Giants are the only NFL team without a 200-yard receiver. Richie James leads the team with 189 yards through six weeks. Kenny Galdi has been this rare combination of benched and injured. Former first rounder Cadarious Tony can't get healthy enough to see the field. Their best receiver, Sterling,

Shepard hasn't played a game in the last three weeks because he's out for the season with the torn Achilles, and he still ranks second on the team in receiving production with 154 yards. It's been James, it's been David Sills, the rookie tight end out of San Diego State. Go Aztex, Daniel Belanger, Marcus Johnson, Darius, Dyson, Dary Slaten. This receiving core is bad. And the offensive line has allowed pressure at the second highest rate in the NFL, yet Daniel Jones and Brian Dable are still finding a way to get it done offensively. This offense has one completion over 20 yards downfield. That's the lowest in the NFL. Every other team has at least four.

Like they can't create explosive plays. They can't get things going downfield because the receiving core is banged up and the offensive line is struggling, but they're still getting it done. What is Dave all telling Jones to get this out of him, right? Like what is the coach saying to get this out of, you know, specifically Daniel Jones, the quarterback? Yeah, and it's crazy, man, because with all that said, how in the hell are they finding ways to win games?

All those side leads to bad team, right? But they're still finding ways to win. is bouncing that way. Yes, yes. But what I took out of that right there, number one, they better pay they running back whatever he wants.

Bring the bricks truck out and pay safe Bob Barkley whatever he wants, right? Because that is who the ball goes through. In the run game, in the past game, whatever, in the Wildcat game, I mean, the boy is doing everything.

He's a quarterback, running back receiver. He is doing everything, right? So that he is their offense. You know, that is who the ball goes through. I don't care. if you have any bona fide number one wide receiver. I'm still not a believer in Daniel Jones.

I don't think Daniel Jones is that guy that makes his receivers better. That is why I'm saying. I don't know what Brian Dayball is doing, but if I was a GM, I'm coming to get Brian Dayball to be my head coach. Because he has a roster to where people can probably name three guys, if you're not a Giants fan, probably name three guys on that roster

that could really probably be a solid contributor on another roster. You know, but with all that, said, they are still winning and beating good football teams, which is crazy in my mind. And that is why I am not high on them because I think the true giants are going to show up. And when I say true giants, I'm not saying last year, Giants. I just think the Giants that don't have the roster calendar right now to compete with these teams will show up. I'm not saying they going to go out there, Daniel Jones going to throw 20 interceptions and Saquan going fumble and all that.

No, I'm not saying that they will play well. but I just think their roster will finally start showing up as these games get going. And I don't think this will continue. Really quickly, before we move to the New York Jets, I wanted to focus a little bit on the Baltimore Ravens. Obviously, lost this game against the New York Giants. So far this year, the Baltimore Ravens have three losses. In those losses, they've trailed for a combined one minute and 58 seconds.

They are collapsing late in games. They are struggling specifically in the second halves of games. Looking at Lamar Jackson's EPA per dropback, He ranked sixth in the first half, 28th in the second half. The offense overall in success rate, 12th in the first half, 30th in the second half. How much of this is Greg Roman, who I know gets his fair share of scrutiny? How much of this is Harbaugh? How much of this is Lamar Jackson?

What is going on in Baltimore, right? Because they just lost to, like you said, a giant team that should not be winning as much as they are. Man, to be honest with you, I really don't know what to think from the Ravens, man. The Ravens can easily be six and O right now, and we can be looking at them as the best team in the NFL. and Lamar Jackson could be looking at $300 million. And I think as a Baltimore Raven coach, as a Baltimore Raven player, like at the end of the day, you should be excited about this. You know, the only thing that should make you sad is that you're going to have to go through Buffalo, right,

because you're giving up games like this. But when they turn the tape on, they have dominated people. Like, they have purely dominated people and just not finish the games in the fourth quarter. right you're dominating the buffalo bills right i don't know what happens you just get relaxed you give up a game in the fourth quarter you're dominating the dolphins team that was playing at a high level with tool at the time you find a way to blow that lead for 21 points you're dominating the new york giants who so called a good football team and you find a way to win that game so for me number one as we turn the tape on we know that this is self-inflicted this is everything that we can

control and these teams that they are saying are good that we're blowing leads on they can't mess with us and that's just the bottom line you know what i'm saying they had the buffalo bills looking like the buffalo bills was the jacksville jaguars until the fourth quarter you know they had the miami dolphins looking like they was the jacksville jaguars until the fourth quarter this raven's team is really good they starting to play better on the defensive side of the ball i'm telling you right now with all this said and and everything that they've been through they sit there's sitting at first in the vision, right? And they have, like I said, their schedule has been really tough. And they have handled everybody on their schedule just not finishing the ball game, right? And that's something

that can be fixed. This Ravens team is going to be five. And I'm telling you right now, more and more as I watch the Ravens, man, they, they're going to be one of them teams that when they get in the playoffs, this going to be trouble. I think you're echoing a lot of what Lamar Jackson said, too, after this game. He said, like, multiple times in a post-game presser that we're beating ourselves, we're beating ourselves, we're beating ourselves. And I think that is a better problem to have than being a talent deficient team that can't come out hot, right? And the Baltimore Ravens have proven that against really good football teams. Let's get to the Jets here.

The New York Jets. I want to start with a quote from Soss Gardner, who is the Jets first round quarterback out of Cincinnati. Shout out Queen City. One, has been absolutely lights out this year. Should be in the front of the conversation for defensive rookie the year. Two, taunted Green Bay with a cheesehead after the game. I'm sure you love that, James Jones. And then three, said in an interview after the game,

game. I didn't even know this. I did not know this. As long as I've been covering football, I did not know this. That teams after playing in London, which obviously the Packers did in the losing efforts to get the Giants a week ago, get to pick to either take the buy, their buy in the season, or play any team on their schedule. And they picked the Jets and lost 2710 at home at Lambeau Field. That is absolutely incredible on multiple levels. One, because Robert Sala or someone on that Jets coaching staff or a veteran player that knew that rule or knew that scheduling situation, said that during the week and created that extra motivator. And two, it just shows that this Jets team has just like a fire and a swagger that we haven't

seen from the Jets in a long time. They're four and two, Zach Wilson, Joe Flacko, haven't played great. And a lot of the offense is going through Brees Hall, the rookie running back in this rushing attack. But the defense is top 10 in any metric you look at. This Jets defense led by Soss Garner, led by Quinn and Williams, who's having a career year, is legit. They're coming off a big win over the Green Bay Packers.

Same question, right? Are you buying this Jets team as maybe a postseason contender? The same reaction with the Giants. Hell no. No, no, no. I mean, you got to give credit, you know, to where credit is due, right? Because they did come in the Lambo and they beat up on the Green Bay Packers. The Packers could not move to football on the off the side of the ball.

Quinn Williams was strictly a game record. He looked like Aaron Donald out there. They could not block him where there was a double team. whether it was one-on-one, he was wrecking the game. It matches up with the back end. Sauce Gardner is just playing out of his mind. I mean, really what we expected. I mean, he's a phenom at the position.

He plays with a lot of confidence, man, and an extremely talented player, right? You go to the offensive side of the ball. Their receivers are just like the Jets, I mean, the Giants receivers. Obviously, their receivers are more talented than the Giants receivers. But when you talk from a stat standpoint, since Zach Wilson has entered back into this ball game,

The stats for the receivers have went down, not saying that Zach Wilson is not their franchise quarterback because I believe he is, but they have to find their way, right? As for the Green Bay Packers, I don't know what to think. I don't know if it's the Jets really coming up and being a good football team

or I don't know if it's the Packers just playing bad football right now and really not find a way and knowing what type of team that they are going to be or can be. So kudos to the Jets, man. You came in there and you beat up on the, Packers on what a lot of people believe as a solid football team. And they manhandled them, man. They really manhandle the Packers, man.

And got after the Packers. I don't know if it was one of those. Man, we coming out to London. We're playing the Jets. The Jets ain't that good. We picked to play these guys. And they got hitting them out, you know. But like I say, man, confidence is contagious.

And you hear Breast Hall and those boys talk and they believe that they have a special ball club and they believe that they're going to win any game that they step into. And that's the way they playing football right now. And the Jets and the Giants are finding ways to get W's. And as I'm out here in New York right now, all you see is Jets and Giants stuff on the street like that's going to be the Super Bowl. Really quickly, before we bring in C. Ruiz, I want to hit on the Packers real quickly because I know you brought them up.

For you, what is Aaron Rogers saying to these guys right now? Because I saw on some bigger ESPN shows and stuff like that, like, oh, Aaron Rogers doesn't care. he's not fired up like Tom Brady is, yelling at his offensive line. He has to be frustrated with this start for Green Bay. Has to be frustrated with the receiving core of the offensive line, maybe it's play calling. What is Aaron Rogers kind of saying to his team right now,

you think from your perspective to kind of get things going right? And maybe even what do you think is going on with his offensive? Fired up like Tom Brady is. Tom Brady calling everybody out but himself. That's what Tom Brady doing. Everybody else. Everybody else playing bad but Tom. That's what Tom do.

But, no, at the end of the day, man, I've been in the locker room with Aaron Rogers. I've been on the football field. I've been in the huddle with Aaron Rogers. I know the type of guy that Aaron Rogers is. I know the competitor that he is. I know how bad he wants to win. If he didn't want to win, he would not have come back.

I know how much this game means to him. I know how much another Super Bowl means to Aaron Rogers. So, you know, for anybody to sit there and say he don't care or whatever, they are absolutely wrong. Do you know what I'm saying? I think the problem with the Green Bay Packers' offense is the problem that we all thought was going to happen. Now, we didn't think it will be to this extent, right?

We thought Aaron Rogers will be Superman and he will make some plays and they definitely wouldn't lose to the Giants of Jets, right? But I think this is what we kind of expected without Devante Adam, right? Finding their way. Once they got in a rhythm and they beat the bears up, Sammy Watkins goes down, who a guy who I thought was going to be their number one receiver and a guy that could stretch the field and run the whole route tree, right?

So now you're forced to play with a bunch of young guys. Lazar, Christian Watson, Romeo Dobbs, who I love all those young fellas, right? But it is going to take time to get those young fellas going and being on the same page and chemistry with Aaron Rogers. And that is showing up. That is showing up on the football field. Aaron Rogers used to know if it is a curl route, JJ is going to run it like this, Greg Jennings is going to run it like this, Jordy Nelson is going to run it like this, Randall Cobb is going to run it like this, Donald Driver is going to run it like this. they're all going to run it a little bit different, right?

But at the same time, we had so much chemistry with each other and played together for so long. He knew all that. He knew where to put the ball. He knew where we were going. He knew the timing out of our brakes and all that. He doesn't know that right now, and that is going to take some time, right?

And you're going to see this offense stall at moments. But at the end of the day, I'm looking at this defense. We have first rounders all on this defense. We have big money all on this defense, right? And we ain't stopped the run since the season starts. And that is a problem, right? Because if our offense is struggling and our defense cannot stop the run

and we are struggling stopping the run, you know what that equals, right? Else, that's what that equals. And that is exactly what is happening. So they got to get that stuff fixed on the defensive side of the ball and then they just got to find ways to get these boys the ball

on the offensive side of the ball and make some explosive plays and move to rock, man. I'm so glad you brought up the defense, too, because I know, like, everyone had that narrative going into this year that the Green Bay Packers receivers are going to be young, and this offense wouldn't be, you know, hitting on all strides without Devante Adams. But we just talked about two teams that also have bad receivers.

The Giants might have the worst receiving core in the NFL and they're five and one. The Jets have young receivers and Elijah Moore and Garrett Wilson and Braxton Barrios. I don't even know who the Jets' tight end is and they're still winning games. The excuses have to be beyond the receiving corps young and Aaron Rogers doesn't have chemistry. The defense is where I think people need to look. They're 32nd an EPA per rush allowed when playing two high coverages. So while the NFL is leaning towards these two high coverages and wanting to limit explosive plays to the air,

Green Bay's doing that too and can't stop a nosebleed on the ground. Overall, they're 29th in defensive success rate, 25th in yards before first contact per attempt allowed. They are a bad run defense. One of the worst run defenses in the NFL, and they spent all three of their last first round picks on the defense side of the ball. James, this has been fantastic.

I think we might have to have you on every single week. Jason Goff, like you said, might not know what he's talking about. Yeah, man. You can bring me on with J or you can kick J off, man. Just let me know when you need me, brother. Fantastic. Really appreciate the time. Thanks again.

Out goes James Jones. Here comes, Steve Mouise. I don't know who would be James Jones or you who'd be a better receiver for the Packers right now. But I think they need one of you guys. I don't know where you're at with the shoulder. I know you had an injury, but how you feeling? I'm running like a smooth 5.440 right now. So it's probably not me.

I could probably beat out like Randall Cobb. Okay. Randall Cobb looks like he has some juice this year. That's true. Don't just slander at Randall Cobb. He actually looks kind of good this year. Did he just get hurt too? What's your problem?

That's just relative to the other Packers. I guess that's fair. I guess that's fair. I'll say this. I'm more vaccinated than Alan Lazard. I got that going for me. That's always good. You love to see that.

I recently ran in a full sprint in a long hallway in my new apartment here in L.A. just for the buck of it. And trying to stop before my door, I thought I was going to blow out both. my ACLs. I don't think, I think as you get older, stopping from full speed just gets harder and harder. I almost died. So I'm happy I'm not running receiver for the Packers. But how I wanted to do this, because James only had 20, 30 minutes with us, I wanted to bring you in and talk some of the stuff that Jason Goff normally does. He's out of commission this single week. But this new segment,

I was going to debut to Goff, but I'm a debut to instead. It's the I don't know what I'm doing segment. And it's looking at my power rankings and throwing teams at you where I just really don't know what to do with them. Starting with the Minnesota Vikings, Sue, I have as the second best team in the NFC and the fourth ranked team overall in my latest power rankings, as does ESPN. So there's multiple people on this bandwagon of Vikings potentially being a top five team in the NFL. I think there's a significant gap, obviously, between the Eagles and the Vikings and a significant gap, obviously, between the Chiefs, bills, and then the Vikings there as well. Man, I didn't know what to do. They're five and one on the year.

Kurt Cousins, I think you called in your quarterback rankings, one of the best system quarterbacks ever in a Kevin O'Connell offense that's scheming targets to, Justin Jefferson, Adam Dehlin, Dalvin Cook is playing well. Like, I don't know. Like in a team of, in a league where I think it's 66% of the league has two or three wins, it's a very parodist year. And quarterback play hasn't been as important to wins as it has in previous years. Why not give the Vikings number four? Am I crazy?

What am I doing here? Ah, I, like in a vacuum, it sounds crazy. Like, this team does not look like a team that typically ranks number four in power rankings. But like, this is a comment on the NFC more than a common. on the Vikings themselves. I think the NFC is just so weak that you kind of have to put them in that spot by default, but nobody trusts this team come playoff time. I don't think you do.

They have some questionable wins. Lutz misses the field goal that hits the upright or the crossbar and misses by a foot, basically, and then they have to struggle to hold on against the bears who we saw on Thursday night are just an awful team. I mean, we know how this is going to end, but for right now, I don't think you're too high, them. And I think you know, you know, then that's why you're bringing them up that this is not going to last. Exactly. And I think this is a perfect kind of segue to a tangent. We've talked about either on the mic or off, I'm losing track. But like, just how overrated doing these power rankings

every single week and getting death threats in the DMs for ranking the Jets or the Giants too low or whatever it may be, doing these power rankings every week, fans expect wholeheartedly that power rankings are essentially just an extension of standings. Right. It's like if you have this many ways, If you have this many wins, you're a top team in the NFL. Like, it reminds me of the Pittsburgh Steelers when they're on that undefeated run. It's like, if you don't have the Pittsburgh Steelers, number one, in your power rankings, you are blind? There was a comment today on where he says, you put the giants behind the Packers or whoever

it was or the Jets behind the Packers. Are you blind? The Colts beat the Chiefs. If you put the Colts ahead of the Chiefs in your Power Rankings, you're insane. Like the most overrated stat when putting together actual strength of power rankings is regular season wins. The second most overrated staff is head-to-head wins. Because that is not as important.

That is not as important as strength of your team and all that stuff. And that's reflected in the betting markets. I brought this up with James Jones. But the Jets, who are four and two and everyone wants to call a top five team in the NFL are underdogs this week on the road against, I think, the Jags. Or are they playing the Broncos? The Jax. The Giants who are five in one, a top five team, according to ESPN, are underdogs

against the Broncos on the road. Like, this is reflected in all that stuff. I think that if you want an extension of standings, just go look at the standings. Just go look at the Giants are 5'1. Let's go. If you want to look at power rankings, that's when you're trying to sift through

the most confusing stat. That's wins and actually tell people who the best teams are. Like, who the most talented teams are? Because if it was just standings, you know, we'd just write standings every single week and we'd see if the SEO picks up for those. But I don't know. I get frustrated at because I just don't think people understand.

No, you're on the right side of history. You're doing this the right way. When I used to do power rankings back at my old job, I would have that same dilemma. It was like the Jets had a winning record and then maybe like a team like the chiefs had a losing record. And like common sense, the other team is better just because the record is worse.

I don't care. I don't care. Like the Steelers were the perfect example, that 11 and 0 team that if you watched every week, you saw that this was not an 11 and 0 team. This was not one of the better teams in the AFC if you watched. So I'm with you there. I think one of the best teams in the NFL,

NFL is the Baltimore Ravens and they're three and three. I mean, they've trailed for a combined minute and 58 seconds. There's a, there's a way, there's an easy path to them being six and no on the season and no one talking about it. But because they're three and three, people want the jets ranked ahead of them, the giants ranked ahead of them, these other teams that have obviously won more games. I think the other painful thing is, and something that I'm probably extending this tangent too far, but looking at, you know, people will say on a neutral field, whose favor, right? And that's like the real kind of process for power rankings. I do think it's important to separate that and make sure that you're always factoring in within the game

you're playing. Right? Like with the Minnesota Vikings at 5 and 1, they have an edge to being the number two seed in the NFC, which will grant them, you know, multiple home playoff games, which would have them maybe favored over a Green Bay Packers team or a Bucks team or other teams that maybe have better quarterbacks and all that stuff. You're not playing in a neutral field situation. And then some other times, it's like if they played this team 10 times, they'd win out of eight. That's not what you're playing. The game that you're playing is secure home field advantage so you can win deep in the postseason and all that kind of stuff. And I think some of these teams that have wins

are setting themselves up for that. Another team I wanted to bring up, and we just brought them up. They're three-point favorites over the Jets this week, or the Giants this week at home. It's the Denver Broncos. I know we're hitting the panic button with the Denver Broncos. I know that Russell Wilson can't hit over the middle of the field. I know that this offense is drastically, drastically falling below expectations. The run game, I think is 31st in EPA per rush.

Like nothing's going well. Nathaniel Hackett's not doing well. Nothing's going well. The defense looks good, but the offense is struggling. I still have them 15th. Because I still have them 15th, largely because of this defense. I still have them 15th because it's still a very talented team. In a league where we're making excuses for Rogers and Brady and Zach Wilson

and Daniel Jones for not having receivers, the Broncos do. Like, I like Cortland Sutton. I like Jerry Judy. I think KJ. Hamler's good. I think they're using their tight ends well. I think that I'm not saying they figure it out and they vault into the top 10, but I'm not ready to cast them into the depths of the league

just because they're two and four. Yeah, I agree. And I kind of had that thought on Monday night watching them against the charges. They're going to play to their competition. I think that's the best way to describe this team. There's plenty of talent. Like if they play the Chiefs, I think they're going to be in that game. And I agree with you that you should pick, you should leave them around like the middle class of the NFL right now.

Because I do think they could play up to competition down to competition. And like, Russ still has that that part of his game where he can make those explosive plays. It's not happening consistently enough. But we saw it even like on that early touchdown drive. Like he made two amazing throws, two amazing plays outside of the pocket. And if he still has that going, like I think eventually it's going to get better.

It's not going to get to a spot where Broncos fans are going to be happy about paying $250 million for Russ. But I think it's going to get to a spot where the offense is just okay. And then we've seen what this defense can do. I think it's a very, very good defense. Well coached, a lot of talent. you have a star corner like Sartan who could just lock down any receiver you put across from him. This is a good team.

And like the Russ jokes aside, they're going to compete every single week. And I think if that's the case, you can't say that about a lot of teams in NFL right now. There are a lot of bad football teams. The Broncos are in that group, but I think they're a bad football team that has the potential to play like a good football team in spur. Barroning, massively exceeding expectations. I think Bradley Chub is having a career year on the edge of the Broncos. Patrick Sartan, every single week. Patrick Sertan plays football, and a lot of that has been in prime time,

and I think that's part of this. NFL players, other cornerbacks specifically are like, oh, my God, Patrick Sertan. I don't know if you saw Marlon Humphrey tweet last night. He's like PS2 teach tape every single day. It's like, you know, you got people really appreciating Patrick Sturtan for all the right reasons. And offensively, Russell, as funny as the memes are, as funny as the jokes are, is still a talented quarterback, at least average, at least average starter in the NFL. And then his receiving core, I think, is still generally very good as well.

I'm happy I'm at 15 and I'm happy you're agreeing with me. You agreed on the Vikings, you greet on the Broncos. Next team. I think I might be too low on this team. It's New England Patriots at 23. They, in my opinion, have played a lot better than I thought they were after the first two weeks. I think the Patriots offense was getting mocked repeatedly. Matt Patricia and Joe Judge repeatedly mocked for how they started the season.

28th in offensive EPA per play. They weren't running motion. They weren't running play action. It looked like a disaster. Over the last four weeks, they're 11. And they've done that with a hodgepodge of, you know, backup quarterback Bailey Saffy and an injured Mac Jones. Like, they've been okay. And some of that strength of schedule, you know, some of that's just like they were so bad it could only get better.

But am I wrong? You know, I think the Patriots sitting at three and three right now. Am I wrong to have them that low at two and three or at 23 in my power rankings even with how they've had success with Bailey Zappy? Yeah, I do think you do. I would put them in the same category as the Broncos. And we have Denver there because of the talent. like we're not quitting on that talent. I'm not quitting on the coaching staff.

And I know like Matt Patricia and Joe Judge are in charge of the offense and maybe that's something that I should be skeptical about. But man, Belichick just figures it out on defense. He just figures it out. And like, I think losing Mack Jones to injury was the best thing that happened to this season because to their season because it forced them to coddle the quarterback position. And now we're seeing all that stuff you're talking about. We're seeing more play action.

We're seeing more early down runs. They're not asking. Bailey Zappy to be Drew Breeze, like a prime Drew Breeze, like they were asking of Mac Jones. And I'm hoping that when Mac Jones comes back, that we see the same offense.

I hope they don't go back to asking Mac Jones to be Drew Breeze because one, he's not that type of quarterback yet. He's just not there in his development. And two, they don't have the talent surrounding him. And they don't have Sean Payton calling the plays and, like, devising the mismatches every week. Coming up with the game plan, like, that's the difference.

and like I I always harp on the low ceiling quarterbacks but this is why you want to avoid having a low ceiling quarterback is you have to have like the perfect offensive setup around him and we saw the Pats did not have that over the first month or before he got injured and the results were bad we saw a lot of a lot more mistakes from Mac Jones I think I think that was the big difference

there were more like high level throws on his film over the first month but there were a lot more mistakes and that's the tradeoff when you have a limited quarterback. I think they were kind of like seeing him as that first round pick, the guy that they're going to build a franchise around, and they're like, we have to put him in a real offense. But I think to get the most out of them, you have to put him in this offense.

You put Bailey Zapi in where I think Bailey Zapi's throwing a screen pass on 18% of his plays, which is just a ridiculous number. I think the NFL averages around 5%. Like the Ravens called three screen passes last year total. And Bailey Zapi's throwing them on 18% of his dropbacks. That's the kind of offense you need with Mack Jones, though, and it's not entirely a reflection of him. It's the talent around him.

But you've got to make up for it somehow, and it's through scheme, and they're doing it right now. My take on that, too, and when you talk about coddling the quarterback, which I think has an obvious negative connotation. You coddle people that need it. You coddle, you give support to quarterbacks that are limited in those things.

The take I have is coddle every quarterback. Run pre-snap motion all the time. Run play action all the time. Call a high percentage of screens. because this leak is very hard. As we've seen with Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady and all this stuff, it's easy to fall off the wagon.

There's only two elite quarterbacks in the league right now. And it's Josh Allen, Patchman. You don't got to coddle in. And I still think you should. I still think you should call screens. I still think you should run preset motion. I think that what they're doing with Bailey Zapping and what the Mac Jones injury had forced them to do,

they should have been doing from the start. Like, before any quarterback reaches that elite tier, that elevator tier, you need to be, you know, coddling him. And now I think Justin Herbert's an interesting conversation. I don't want to get into that. I didn't have that plan in the show. But like, Herbert's being coddled in the worst way. He's being like, it's too much swaddling.

It's almost ridiculous. But one more comment on the Patriots, only because I was listening to the Bill Simmons podcast. And he and Sal were talking about doing the Patriots. And Bill was like, man, I really like the Zappy kid. He's got poised. He's, you know, he's got confidence. And Bill was saying his dad is all in on Zappy,

calling him the next time Brady. Pump the break for me, you know, on Zappy. And give me the skinny. on the tape that you've seen. He's got two starts, two wins. Where are you at on Zapp? I think he's like, if you took Mac Jones

and you made him a little worse at everything, that's Bailey Zappy. And I get that people want to compare them because they do look alike. They do play like a similar style. They make the same type of throws. The difference is like the high level accuracy that you see with Mac Jones,

you just don't see with Bailey Zappy. And the arm strength, I think he has a slightly worse arm than Mac. I don't think he's as athletic because Mac Jones, which is kind of funny to say, Mac is he's kind of slept on as an athlete just because of how he looks, but he can move a little bit. He can escape pressure.

We've seen him do that a couple times. Zappi's not giving you any of that. So I feel like Bailey Zappi's the trial version of Mac Jones. And Mac Jones is like the $5 a month subscription app version. Oh, nice. Yes, that's the difference. He's the Patriots Plus, because everyone's going to Plus. You got NFL Plus, PFF Plus.

He's Patriots Plus under center, and whereas the free version still gets you a lot of goods, a lot of stuff. You've got to watch ads with Zappi. You don't have to watch the ads. It's ads free with Mac Jones. I freaking love that. All right, two more seconds with you.

I want to get to the quarterback rankings at the back end as we normally do. But game of the week this week, normally Jason Goff is hitting us with the game of the week. I decided to show out. And I think the game of the week next week in week seven is the Kansas City Chiefs

going to San Francisco to take on the 49ers. They are only favored by three. Only favored by three on the road against a good San Francisco 49ers team that can't stay healthy. Multiple starters. I mean, if you include Trey Lance, George Kittle, Bosa, Trent Williams,

Eric Armstead, Jimmy Ward, have been out and missed multiple games due to injury and will miss more games due to injury. Traverius Ward and Mike McGlinchie both left the second half of last, you know, their loss against Atlanta last week. They are one of the most, if not the most injured team in the NFL.

And with the Kansas City Chiefs, they're on the road, they're favored by three. they just lost the Buffalo Bills. I think this number is probably four, maybe four and a half if they beat the Buffalo Bills. But still, their favorite by three against San Francisco. Quickly preview this matchup for me. Are you leaning either side?

And can San Francisco really overcome these injuries to maybe pull off the upset? Yeah, it's so tough with that. I have faith in Domeco Ryan's crafting a smart game plan, a game plan that limits big plays by Patrick Mooms. I think they're going to be able to keep them in the pocket more so than other teams have been able to do. Chavarious Ward injury, I think, is the big one for this one.

Because we've seen defense's play man coverage against the Chiefs this year, which is kind of a change from the last two years where teams were just deathly afraid of doing that. They just don't have the receivers that they once had. They don't have Tyree Kill intimidating you. They have no deterrent from preventing teams from playing man coverage. And Chavarice Ward, like, his presence allowed the 49ers to play a little more man. I think that's why the defense got off to such a better start than it did last year when Damiqa Ryan's. kind of had to figure things out.

They hit the ground running this year. The injuries have derailed them a little bit. But I think if Domech O'Reins is the guy, if he's the next big hot coaching candidate, which I think he will be next offseason, this is a game where he can prove it. Like you're short-handed. You're going up against a good chief's offense,

but an offense that is somewhat flawed and their flaws are exploitable by the defense. They allow you to do certain things because they don't have the receivers that are going to threaten you downfield. So for me, that's what this is about. This is D'Amico Ryan's on him watch. Is he him?

He's going to be able to prove it this year this week. And I think you also get another, it's another referendum on this Chief's offense, which I feel like we've just been discussing ad nauseum for like the last year and a half, like the problems with too high, the run game, mixing the run game in the past game, getting Patrick Mahomes back to like 2019 level

where you're throwing it all over the field. Going up against defenses like this, against smart defensive coordinators, this is when you see the, the flaws in these top offenses. These are the types of teams that can expose those. You're not going to see it when the Chiefs are playing the Raiders. That's why those games, like, when you're a team like the Chiefs

and you've accomplished what you've accomplished and the expectations are where they're at, those games don't matter. It's games like against Buffalo. It's games against top defenses like the 49ers. These are the ones that are going to tell us what this team is going to be in January, and that's the only thing that matters with them. It's all Super Bowl or bust. Yeah.

And rightfully so. I think, and I'm not necessarily saving up for the postseason, but it's working through the kinks until the postseason, right? It's trying different things and all that stuff. I think with the San Francisco 49ers and Him Watch, I'm going to rank my least favorite bits right now, my least favorite bits. Kneecaps is one. I told you guys that last time we talked.

I hate the kneecaps jokes. I think all those are terrible. Number two might be Him Watch. It's close. It's close. I think the hymn stuff has gotten, here's the take. Once social media coordinators get a hold of it, it dies. Like immediately dies.

Like as soon as it's not funny in the DMs and as soon as it's not funny from like personal branded accounts on social media and it becomes the NFL tweeting out who's more him with a voter poll. That's when it dies. It just falls off the vine. It's unfortunate to see how quickly things can die like that. And maybe I've been responsible for some of that in my previous roles. Let's get to quarterback rankings here. We talked to little zappy versus Mac Jones. I don't think anyone's saying anyone should be.

saying Zappian should be the starter ahead of Mac Jones. I think Patriots are just running the right things with a ad version of their offense. And hopefully when they get to no ads, Mac Jones can have some success. But the other two situations I wanted to go after was the Cowboys and Arizona Cardinals. Starting with Kyler Murray and playing off the same vibe I did last week where I did like a little bit of a versus thing, Kyla Murray versus Cliff Kingsbury. What's going on here? Because I think every single week from the most advanced analyst that covers the NFL to the least advanced

analysts that covers the NFL. Everyone's saying the same thing. Cliff Kingsbury is limiting Kyler Murray and this offense isn't, you know, setting him up for success and he's overcoming a lot of things with Cliff Kingsbury. Cliff Kingfair is a bad coach. Why did they give him this extension? Everyone's saying that. Is that true? And what does Cliff have to do to unlock Kyler Murray? Because this is a Cardinals team that didn't score an offensive touchdown against the Seahawks last week. The worst defense in the NFL and they did score an offensive touchdown. Something's going wrong. How much of it is Murray? How much of it is Kingsbury?

I think it's right down the middle, and that's a bad answer, but I don't think it's an answer that you hear a lot, because people just by default, like you said, blame it on Cliff. If you watch the film, this is like the greatest rivalry playing out over the last couple years on all 22. There are plays where there are receivers wide

open and Kyler just doesn't throw it. It happens multiple times a game, like five times a game. In this last Seahawks game, on the first drive alone, he had a couple cornerouts that he could have thrown, and he just took the checkdown option. or he panic in the pocket or he misses the throw or he just makes a bad read. Like Tyler is inconsistent.

The high level play is so impressive, but just the other 90% is just so inconsistent. And it bleeds over into the play calling. Like it affects the play calling because if you're dialing up coverage beaters and the guy gets open and you don't make the throw, it's going to look bad on the coordinator. Now, at the same time, here's Cliff's problem. I feel like Cliff

goes into each game with like three concepts like general concepts like not the same play but general concepts on how to attack defense and he's just going to spam those concepts. And if the defense adjust then usually the offense just gets shut down.

We saw that against the Seahawks. They had those corner routes that were open. Kyler doesn't make the throws. The Seahawks adjust. They're not there for the rest of the game and Kyler struggles. The play calling doesn't get any better. But then there's sometimes,

when the defense doesn't adjust, or they're just way better than the other team, like if DeAndre Hopkins is out there, for instance, and they could just out talent the other teams, and then it looks good,

like it did early last year. But when you have this coach that is inconsistent based on matchup, and you have this quarterback who's really volatile, sometimes he plays great, sometimes he doesn't. It's hard to get those aligned.

And I feel like last year, when they started 9-0, it was just like the perfect alignment, and like they were having their best games at the same time. Then it fell apart. And around that little streak, I think they started 6 and 0, 7 and 0 or something. It's just been inconsistency.

Like they'll win a game that, and they'll beat the bills on a Hail Mary, a game that they competed with one of the best teams in the NFL. And then next week, they, like, lose to a bad Dolphins team. That's the problem with both of them. They're just both inconsistent. The high-level stuff is good. Like, Cliff's run game is fun. It's well-designed at times.

It's innovative. It changes every week. but you have to have more than just like two cool run concepts every game. You have to have more than two cool past concepts every game. You have to have like a fully fleshed out offense that's like connected and they don't have that. And then at the same time, you have a quarterback who is not going to follow the script of a play every time. And that makes it hard to call offense. I think it's a chicken of the egg situation or question with Murray being as inconsistent as he is.

Because like some of it is him and some of it sound like him like being a little bit sporadic, but also I think some of it's him not trusting the offense sometimes and enforcing things because he feels like he has to. And then the other product of it too is just like the roster construction, right? Like this is one of the, if not the smallest receiving rooms in the NFL. And they run a lot of horizontal passing game. I think they, you know, their early down air yards are the lowest in the NFL. Like that's, you know, including runs, right?

So they're not, the aggressiveness or lack thereof on early downs, I think it's a reflection of some of this offense, but also like they just don't have big bodies and guys, that can really open up stride, right? Like a lot of these guys are quick and fast, like Rondell Moore, Markees Brown, but like open up stride and get open down the field, like stretch the field.

I think they're struggling with that too. And I think, I don't know. I worry about how Steve Kime has built this roster. I worry about the offensive play calling, maybe like struggling to win in the NFL because it's so predicated on like guys being faster than other guys when they're just not fat, right?

In college, like running a horizontal passing game and running screens and all that stuff and getting the ball in your best player's hands often leads to Ron Dillmore, Purdue, helping beat Ohio State, right? Like, you see, like, these guys, like, really, like, show up, whereas in the NFL, everyone's faster, everyone's an athlete, and running this horizontal passing game, like, just because you have Rondo Moore, Marquise Brown, and some of these other speedsters,

it's not working as effectively as it is in the league. All really quickly, and then I'll let you go. Dallas Cowboys. All signs point to Dak Prescott coming back this week, and also signs point to a nail gun with 500 horsepower has been taken to the coffin, that is, the conversation around Cooper Rush being the starter. head of Dak Prescott when he comes back. I said this in my power rankings file. Nothing blinds fandom and national media like wins. Nothing blinds it. You win some games and it changes everything.

And that kind of gets back into our tangent about how overrated sometimes head-to-head matchups are and regular season wins are. Dak Prescott is a top 10 quarterback in your rankings right now. He has been top 10 in EPA per play from a clean pocket in each of the last two seasons he's played. Cooper Rush is outside the top 25. He has struggled in the wins that he's had. And that is why the Dak Prescott conversation honestly should have never happened. But again, nothing more blinding than these wins. Yeah, I mean, honestly, we could just copy and paste the Patriots discussion.

Like when Dak went down, and obviously that was quicker into the season, we didn't have a real sample size of what the offense was going to look like. And playing the Bucks defense, that run defense makes things hard, makes running your early down offense hard. So I'm going to give Kellyn Moore a pass for that first game. But what we saw when Cooper Rush came in was the coddling of the quarterback again, early down runs, early down play action. We're not going to put you in bad situations.

We're not going to ask you to drop back and try to pass on third and seven. Only if we have to. And when we have to, it's not going to work because it didn't work for Cooper Rush. That's the difference between a quarterback like Dak Prescott and a quarterback like Cooper Rush. you can call all the plays you call for Cooper Rush for Dak Prescott, and it will be exactly the same, or maybe just a little bit better because Dak Prescott is more accurate and has better arm and has more athleticism.

But the big difference comes in those obvious passing situations, Cooper Rush doesn't have an NFL skill set, and that's when that shows up, because they're going to play tight man-to-man coverage, they're going to send an extra blitzer after you. You're going to have to create, and he's incapable of doing that. Dak Prescott can do that as well as anyone without having to get outside of the pocket.

He's one of the best in-pocket creators because he's so good at finding space, buying time, and anticipating things, anticipating what the defense is doing and throwing the ball early. There's no one better at it. And I think it's just going to unlock another part of the Cowboys playbook. Now the question is, will Kellyn Moore get enamored with that other part of the playbook and lean on it too heavily? I think that's what they did last year down the stretch. Early in the year, they were doing so much cool stuff. They were like putting the offensive linemen in the backfield, motioning, shifting, play action, jet sweeps,

all this stuff to take advantage of the defense, these sequences of play calling. And then at the end, it just devolved into like a series of hitch routes. Like, it just plays with five hitchh routes on it and just, Dak, just find an open guy. I think the lessons that they learned over the last month about how much, how easier you can make things on your quarterback by calling those concepts more often

could benefit them going forward. I just hope they learned that lesson, the same way that I hope the Patriots learned that lesson now that they're getting Mac back. I love that you essentially copied and paced the conversation between the Patriots and the Cowboys onto each other. Because I think that makes 100% sense.

And I think to use a different analogy than the ads analogy that you mentioned, it's like Mac Jones, as good as he was as his rookie season from a wins and box score perspective, still needed to go into this year with the training wheels on. The supporting cast wasn't that good.

The offensive line wasn't that good. Instead, they didn't have as much of the training wheels on and expected him to do elevated things. That didn't work to start the season. The offense was 28th in EPA for play to start the year. And then he gets her, and then they put the training wheels on because Bailey Zappy on paper is worse. For the Cowboys, they came in.

They're like, no training wheels. We got to beat the box, and we were just going to light it up and go down the field. And essentially, they lost multiple starting offensive linemen. They lost multiple starting receivers. This offense needed training wheels. more than ever with even as good as Dak Prescott was against a good Buccaneers team. It's time to put those back on. And it's okay. It's okay to coddle good quarterbacks.

I think I'm going to change the word. It's okay to support good quarterbacks. As good as Dak Prescott is, as good as some of these other guys are running, you know, running these, put the training rules on for a bit and running more pre-snap motion, some of these edges that you can create by just play calling, I think is super important. Steve, I think I get smarter every time I talk to you and I don't, I can't say the same thing about Jason Gough. No, I'm just kidding. I can't wait for Gop to come back. It was great to have you and James Jones join the show. Big shout out to our producers, Connor Evans, Arjuna Ram Kippal, and Carlos Churaboga.

Until next time, maybe Jason Gawford will turn. Who knows? But shout out to the listeners. Thanks again.