The Ringer NFL Show - Week 7 Recap: The Chiefs' Struggles Continue, the Bengals' Statement Win, and What’s Wrong With the Dolphins

Episode Date: October 25, 2021

Kevin and Nora are joined by Benjamin Solak to discuss the Titans' dominant victory over the Chiefs (2:30). Then they discuss the Bengals taking control of the AFC North, the Colts' Sunday-night road win, and more (21:45). Then Kevin and Nora are joined by Steven Ruiz to discuss the Dolphins losing again, this time to the Atlanta Falcons, and what Miami's next steps are (1:19:57). Then Kevin and Nora wrap up by answering a listener question. Hosts: Kevin Clark and Nora Princiotti Guests: Benjamin Solak and Steven Ruiz| Production Assistant: Isaiah Blakely Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Top MMA voices, Ariel Hawani, Chuck Mindenhall, and Pizzie Carroll are live on the Spotify Greenroom app for every major MMA card with the Ringer MMA show. Here the guys react to weigh-ins in real time and find out what they think of the fights the moment the final card ends. Plus, when breaking MMA news happens, they'll be live to talk to you about it. And if you miss the Green Room show, you can hear it as a podcast anytime on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. It is the Ringer NFL show, part of the Ringer Podcast Network. I'm Kevin Clark. It's been a very sloppy football game. now it's time for a not-stoppy podcast.

Hi, Nora, what's going on? Oh, wow. I love that transition. I love weather talk. I love learning about storm systems. It's going to be smooth. There's going to be no fumbles, no, no muffed punts. It's going to be great.

Benjamin Solock. Some of us looked at that game and still bet on it. So some of us are not enjoying the slop as much as other than that. Some implies multiple of us. I think it might just be one of us. Did you make any bets once the, the the torrential downpour started. No, though the live total for the second half as we report a half time is 21 points.

And to me, that's way too many. But I'm going to be a responsible boy and not do anything. You are a bomb cyclone of a human being, Benjamin's so long. And I love you for it. I take that as a compliment. I see this is an absolute win. All right. So there's a couple of segments.

I want to alert people about going into it. We're going to start with the chiefs. Obviously, they're going to get to the Bengals. And then Ruiz will come on with his Ruiz reports, razors, ruminations, and we're going to focus on Tua and the dolphins, and what the heck's going on there? And that will obviously touch on the Deshaun Watson trade rumors and all of that stuff. So a lot to unpack.

We will start with Titans 27, Chiefs 3. Wow. Wow. So the three points are the fewest for the Chiefs since Andy Reid arrived in 2013. Not a surprise. For the first time ever in the Mahomes era, they finished regular season game without a touchdown. Patrick Mahomes threw an interception. He lost a fumble.

he said after the game that he blamed himself, quite frankly, which he does all the time. He does take responsibility for this sort of stuff, even if it wasn't his fault. We're going to get to whose fault it was, or maybe it's nobody's fault. Maybe it's everybody's fault. We'll check it out.

But he said that he felt like he was pressing. He felt like he was going for 14-point play, kind of some of the stuff we even heard after the Super Bowl as well. Ben Solac, big picture question. You know, we've talked about the defense here and how the offense was still humming along. Now it's an offensive problem as well as a defensive problem. whose fault is this?

The Titans loss? Definitely more balanced than the rest of the games we've seen, right? I mean, every Chief's loss to this point, you would say emphatically, the defense is more at fault here.

We've got to remember coming into this game, not only was the Chief's offense leading the league in points per drive. They were doing it at a ludicrous rate. It was like, oh, they're the first. They would have been the first over the last few years in terms of their offensive output.

They were 32nd. i.e. worst in turnovers per drive, right? And that was the problem. Per drive, they're the best offensive football and the worst defensive football. Yeah, but particularly for offense, they were the best in points per drive and then the worst in turnovers per drive, which is absurd if you think about it. It's not like all the first in yards and then the worst in turnovers. So like the first in points and they were still turning the ball over more than anybody else. In this game, obviously we see, you know, Patrick Mahomes on an extended play where he's so good delivering the ball across the body where he's so good, but he gets a bad

bounce and it's intercepted. We see Patrick Mahomes on a second and 10 scamper where he's so good. But, and this is where kind of that idea of pushing comes in, talk the ball and slide. You know what I mean? Feel confident your offense can get third and two, third and one. No, he elects to push past the line of scrimmage or push past the first out marker, excuse me, really try to pick up some extra yardage and then ends up getting the ball knocked out on a good tackle, a good swipe from the Titans defender.

And so in this game, the balance, in terms of blame to dole out. I mean, this was the lowest scoring output, I believe, of Mahomes' starting career, three points. I guess the Titans' defense that, again, was 29th in DVOA coming into this game. The biggest culprit beyond the Mahomes pushing, which obviously was there, and he continued to have those turnovers. To me personally, was the performance of the offensive line. This Chief's offensive line has been actually pretty good,

coalescing coming into the season. Not amazing, like middle of the pack, but still impressive, have had some good games. They went up against a Titans team that in Pass Rush, win rate was, I believe, bottom quarter of the league and got absolutely big boyed for four quarters. Orlando Brown had a nightmare time against Bud Dupree, which is not a player that you should be having a nightmare time against Bud Dupree is one of the lowest ranking edges in pass rush productivity and PFF so far this year. Harold Landry is playing good ball. I understand that, but he was waxing Lucas Nying on the outside. Like they really, really struggled for pass

protection. And I know Mahomes, that's a little deep, but that's always been true of Mahomes. mature of him all season long and they haven't been having these problems. The offensive line really, really, really struggled against what is a poor defensive front, a talented, but generally this season, poor defensive front in Tennessee, passing game and running game, which the Chiefs were really trying to run. They really wanted to establish the run in this one, baby, and that was weird. So much more so a balanced assortment of blame in this game. I'm intrigued to see how Patrick Mahomes develops over the next couple of weeks.

And kind of learning, you know, I actually watched, of the post-game press conference, and he said, you know, it's been extremely good over the past three years. Yeah, it has been. It's been some of the best offensive offenses in the history of football, best quarterback playing in history of football, best coaching in the history of football, some of the best skill guys in history of football. And a lot of those ingredients are still there, but for some reason it's not working right now. And to see Mahomes kind of McGiver's way out of this is intriguing to me because we haven't had to see it. We saw the extreme version of it in the Super Bowl, and now we're back in sort of a more moderate version of it. And I'm intrigued to see it.

the chiefs are three and four. At what point do we stop saying, oh, it's the chiefs. Well, they'll get it. Now. I think we actually already passed that point. I think we passed that point in terms of the sort of inevitability

conversations that we had at the beginning of the year because of the defense. Now, I think, to Ben's point, it's something else, right? Because the problems are all of a sudden, and this is just one game, right, but the problems are all of a sudden coming from multiple sources. Another one that I want to bring up and I'm curious to hear what you guys think is,

how are we feeling about Andy Reed right now, someone who I still obviously consider a really, really good coach, but looking around, he's kicking field goals down for possessions. They seem really determined to, you know, run the ball on second and long. There's a lot of red flag stuff going on. and then you start listening to the quarterback

who's clearly going through it a little bit. And he's reminding himself seemingly when he's doing the post game, you can't have a 14 point play, right? And it's a little concerning to me that he seems to really need some steadying that's not coming from somewhere. And that's not to discount how hard it is, right?

Tom Brady used to talk all the time about when they won those first, Super Bowls in New England, he didn't realize how hard it was. It sounds crazy, but it just, it just happened and not, it's a different situation because not so much was on his shoulders, whereas, you know, Mahomes sort of took the league by storm and that offense was what was driving that. But it gets really, really hard for these guys once they've sort of had the, the, I mean, I think Mahom said like unicorns and rainbows or whatever. Yeah, I forgot that, yeah, flowers, I think was in there somewhere. Something like that. It's, it's been,

all flowers and rainbows or whatever. The period when it's no longer all flowers and rainbows for these potentially historically great teams, it's really, really hard. So I don't think that it's, you know, the sky is falling that they're going through it a little bit, but it does make me wonder how we're feeling about the coaching in this stretch. Sure. It's a great point because, you know, Andy Reid and Patrick Mahomes, once they got together, solved each other's problems because there were obviously, Andy Reid had made coaching

mistakes in his career. We'd seen it in Philadelphia. We saw it at the beginning of Kansas City. And then Mahomes solved those. Then in return, Reed gave Mahomes one of the best offense to have the best offense. Ben, when you watch this Chief's offense from a play calling standpoint from Andy Reid's standpoint, is there anything that you think has changed, anything that Reed needs to do better? No, that's the thing is, I don't think there's anything that has changed, which you can argue, like, is bad because maybe something should change, because we got some problems. But obviously, I think this was the first game where the Chief's offense really, really, really looks stuck in the mud.

Turnover luck aside, and obviously Mahomes getting them out of some bad spots aside, you could certainly look at like that Chargers game sticks out as one where it's like, we could be like doing some better, like, so I feel like this offense should be doing more. But in general, giving the, the, putting the onus on my home's shoulders and saying, hey, like, you make a play, get us in the right luck

and go make a play, generally works really well. You know what I mean? Like, that's been a generally fine approach of the last couple of years. I think that, I don't know, I think, I'm thinking, I envision Andy Reid right now as like, you know, a heavyweight fighter who like just took a punch in the jaw for the first time in a while, right? Like just took a shot after a couple of fights where he hadn't really taken a shot and he forgot what this was like. You know what I mean? He's reeling a little bit.

Stars, duck spinning around the head a little bit. Like they don't have a buy for another four weeks. I think they're by quarterback and coach are going through that right now. Yeah, right. Exactly. And I think that the arc of Steve Spagnolo is a pretty good like pre-curricular. for us here a little bit because for the first few weeks of the season

spags, you know, slack jaw a little bit. You know what I mean? Like that defense was horrible. They pitched back to back second half shutouts. That shouldn't be lost in this discussion. They shut out Washington after 13 first half points and then they shut out Tennessee after 27 first half points. Twenty-seven first half points is bad. They did not force a punt on five possessions. That is important.

But they are, this defense is starting to figure out some answers as they get down the stretch. They're starting to get a handle what the adjustments are. At one, and he'll had another great game Traverius Ward is back, Chris Jones,

over the three tech, whatever. So I think that you expect a good coach like Andy and a good quarterback like Mahomes to get their sea legs back under them. But you do have to find a breath where you have to find like a spot

like where you're able to calm down and get it. They get New York, the Giants this week of Monday night football. And if they can't get right there, it goes Green Bay, Las Vegas Raiders and Dallas before the buy. If they lose to the Giants, they can shut it down.

Yeah. So it maybe it's, you know, like right now they're 46% on, on 538's playoff projection. I think that that's probably reasonable, assuming they're able to pick things back up. But yeah, this is rubber meets road for sure. They have to find something they get right with, something to settle down with against the Giants. Otherwise, this upcoming stretch is going to kill him. We obviously got to mention here. Mahomes got knocked out of the game. I don't think that's come up.

And he passed, he went through the concussion protocol, supposedly all. good there. Reed said that he kept him out for the remainder just as a coach's call. But that was scary. Just to clear up your Spag's take, so you think they should promote him to head coach. No, thank you. Don't want him outside the building. It's like Kellan Moore. Listen, I almost forgot Spagg's name on Bill's podcast like a week ago. So right now I'm on a big Spaggs apology for. Boom. Boom. There we go. So I want to quickly put it to you guys before we get to the Titans here. So they have the Giants next week, as you said, then the Packers, the Raiders, the Cowboys. Do the Chiefs make the playoffs nor Prince Yachti?

I kind of agree with the 46%. More likely no than yes, but just by a sliver. Yeah, I think the AFC is good enough this year that I don't think they make the playoffs. I think they can get coaching stuff right on both sides of the ball. But at this point, and I mean, as we trinched in to talk about the Titans, this is to me the hallmark point. The linebackers, man, like you just can't. There's no coaching the league who's going to look at this defense and be confused as to how to attack it. They're horrendous. And that's not going away. It's not going away for at least an offseason. So to me, even if coaching settles stuff down, this team still has such clear exploitable weaknesses.

My only thought here is they do play the Raiders twice more so they can make that up. If they, if they're an actual good team, they have the tiebreaker over the Browns. I see a path. I'm going to say yes. Let's talk about the Titans here for a second. So Ryan Daniel was via PFF. 7 of 7, seven behind the line of scrimmage, eight of 11 on short passes, three of three on medium length passes, and three of five on deep shots. He got to do whatever he wanted to do. He got to do whatever he wanted to do today. Meanwhile, on the other side of the ball, Mahomes, according to PFF, only 25% of his throws were past the first down marker, which is extremely un-Mohmsian. Ryan Tanahill was allowed to do whatever he would like to do. Norah what impressed you about

the Titans, aside from Derek Henry having more touchdown passes than Patrick Mahomes. Well, what impressed me about the Titans in this game was, lo and behold, the Titans had an impressive pass rush, right? Like, they got 30 pressures on Mahomes. And as Ben pointed out, that's not something that we can point to as a consistent thing throughout the season. So I'm curious if you guys see anything that's replicable there. Obviously, you think back, I mean, this team was in the AFC championship game against Kansas City two years ago. And Mahomes had all the time he wanted, right? Like Mahomes could, I mean, Bud Dupree said something after this game where he said the whole game plan was to not let Mahomes be Mahomes.

Well, Mahomes usually gets to be Mahomes, right? And it's pretty unusual, given recent history that the Titans defense is capable of doing that where he just has to get the ball out so quick and short that he can't throw past the first down marker more than a quarter of the time. I don't know if they can do it again. but when they're getting pressure from Autry, from Dupree, from Simmons, from Landry, that has at least the potential to show up as a spicy foursome. I don't trust it to keep happening, but they're running away with the AFC South, which, I mean, it gets you to the playoffs.

It counts just as much as any other division. That would be the biggest thing for them, just because it's what they have gone out in free agency and spent a ton of money the last couple of, of years trying to do and haven't been able to find. I don't know that I trust that it's real. But if it is, even to a certain degree, that would be significant for them as having a more potent front for and past rush.

Yeah. Ben, is this real? Okay. Is any of this real? Listen, you can't do this to me because Harold Landry came out of Boston College and that young man he could run underneath a table. Kid was nuts. And then he's just ankle injury after ankle injury.

and you cannot be an edge who wins with bend around the outside corner and sustain ankle injuries because you need those puppies be flexible. And Harold Landry looks so doggone good. And I just don't want him to get hurt. I can't get hype and they get hurt again. So for Harold Landry, it's real because we love Harold Landry.

For everybody else, I'm not sure I believe it. Jeffrey Simmons is a monster, though, and he's been that way for a while. When you and Danny Kelly start doing draft podcast together, and he's talking about, like, what kind of car a player runs like and you're talking about guys who can run under tables.

I think we're going to need to kind of hose you guys down a little bit. Listen. It's just going to be strange analogy. Just going back and forth. Fly in through the air. Actually, I think, Kevin, I think you're on to some movie because, Ben,

you love the, like, can do X in a phone booth. Right. Right? Like, you love what someone can do, what structure someone can do something underneath or within. Yeah.

Danny loves the gate analysis. And how they move, yeah. Yeah. Gate analysis is fun. Listen, the world of draft coverage is a world of, colorful language and idioms, which I, I fit into and I love. I will say, though, just to continue our theme here,

the Titans blitz Mahomes on one dropback for next-end stats is from Kagan, Abdu at NGS. The Chiefs right now do not have an answer to literally rush four drop seven. You don't, you do not need to blitz him. And that is a, that like, again, every team that faces the Chiefs on offense is going to continue hammering play action, hammering linebackers. everything that faces the chiefs on defense is going to continue hammering rush for

run stunts, run games, try to take advantage of a young offensive line and just put a blanket on top you, put a roof on top of you, make Mahomes, throw short of the sticks. And until they get answers, the teams are just going to keep pressing those buttons because it's the only way you beat the Chiefs. Doesn't seem ideal. Yeah.

Can we, before we move on, can we just officially welcome AJ Brown to the 2021 NFL season? We got knocked out by Chipotle. He had some food poisoning recently. He got over it. I'm, I'm happy he's here. I, I, I'm intrigued to see, and I'll put it to you,

Norris, since, you know, you seem excited about the Titans, where this Titans team, if they're in it at all. I mean, obviously they both beat the bills last week. We can get to talk about that on the Sunday night show because it was a Monday game. But now they've done this, is this, should these guys be in the kind of top chargers, bills, because you could say Bengals, Ravens tier? Don't you dare put excited about the Titans on me, Kevin Clark? I heard, I heard what you said.

I've never heard more excitement about the Tennessee Titans in my entire life. Which is, for whatever that is worth, which is approximately the value of the table, Harold Landry ran there. Nobody get, nobody get mad at me. Are we all on board with the name Titans or could we do a rebrand? You just, what? I just looked into it. I think it's got good balance to do it.

And Nashville is known as the Athens of the South. I looked into this. I just briefly went to the surface. This is a real thing. I know, because I almost tweeted it and I was like, I don't want to get, you know, if it's like deeply meaningful to the people of Nashville, I don't want to upset them. And then it turns out, I mean, there was like a tenuous link. Kevin, you just took the sharpest left turn in this conversation and are doing it as though

it is the most normal thing in the world. This is incredible. Kevin has told me now about two tweets today he didn't send. I want to find Kevin Clark's burner. You didn't know if there is as good as. Or you want to answer that question. So I just pivoted a little bit. Okay.

I'll answer the question for you. I don't think that they are as good as the cream of the crop in the AFC. I do think the cool thing they have going for them is they can just, they have big, strong football players. Like that's the Titans whole shtick. And it can be pretty cool, right? Because sometimes they play teams like the Bills, who have spent all of this brainpower and done all of this great work figuring out how to beat the chiefs who are suddenly.

bad at football. And then the Titans just show up and they're like, hey, we're huge. And it's a pretty good change. So I like that for them. I don't think that they're like overall is good. And I know this is like a heresy. So like for the nerds don't listen. But

to me that matters in January. Like to me being very big and very physical is irritating now and the colder it gets the worse it gets. Like we've seen this Titans team following this formula. Be big. Run Derek Henry. Throw play action shots, be physical up front,

be violent up front. We've seen that be a really tough playoff out. We went up two scores on this very Chiefs team when they were unstoppable. Yeah, they've been a real tough playoff out and it's because, man, it's not fun to play that team when it's cold. It just hurts your bones. And so I don't

consider the Titans as like a top tier contender, but like this is a formula we've seen work and they're sitting here five and two in a really weak division. There you go. Ben Solak endorsing the body blows theory of the run game. I love this. Listen, I can watch football players and prove to you they don't want to tackle Derek Henry. Not hard.

No, I completely agree. I completely agree. I mean, we had, we had Bucky Brooks on this podcast last year, and I asked him about that. And he was just like, I would do everything I could to not take it. If there was a way for me to not tackle him, I would. And so I think that's just how that's processed. And I really do, I really do believe this. There is a path in which if the Titans are actually this team and they roll.

off a bunch of wins. I don't even, I understand that quarterback is always more valuable than running back, always in every situation. But I really do think there's a pathway for Derek Henry legitimately with MbP. Nashville is called the Athens of the South because of its historical dedication to higher education and the many colleges and universities found in the city. Okay. How many are there? Vanderbilt. I know Vanderbilt. Is Belmont there? City College? of Nashville?

Yes, my old Soul Cycle instructor in Boston went to Belmont and it was in Nashville. Well, that's two. So there we go. All right. Takeaway here is we're hugely impressed with this Titans team. We don't know if it's going to be real, but it looks good and they should get their flowers after absolutely destroying a chief's team, which strangely, I think like, I really think that they are on, this is a strange thing to say, they're on the chief's tier in the

a FC after absolutely destroying them. And there's a way to square that circle, and I'm not going to do it right now. All right. Let's get to our first super hold of. It's the Bengals. Wow. Another wow game. So it's Bengals 41 Ravens 17.

A lot to get to here. Jamar Chase is one of the best receivers in the NFL. Joe Burrow looks like one of the best young quarterbacks in football. We knew that. But now there's going to be some renewed arguments about where exactly he is. Then they put it to a Raven. team that we thought was one of the two best teams in the F.C. Nora?

Are we, is it time to talk about the Bengals? I was going to say when you, when you introduced this podcast that our, our later segments were contingent on Ben and I being able to make it through all of the Bengals gloating that is just about to be, be unleashed. No, no. I don't have to do this. The audience knows.

Yeah. The wind speak for themselves, Nora. Yeah. I'm just handing the ball off to the ref in the end zone. What tier are you asking me if the Bengals belong in? I'm not. We've lost control of the tiers. Are they a top tier? No, I think they're second tier.

I think they're second tier. But who's on that tier? The Titans. Are the Ravens on that tier? The Titans are on that tier. The Ravens, the Ravens are either the bottom of the tier above or I want to put the Ravens in the bottom of the tier. above. I think the Bengals defense. Spicy, man. And they can make big plays.

And I like that formula. I like explosive plays on offense. Defense that's come together. Zach Taylor said that Jesse Bates and Von Bale are the best safety tandem in the NFL. Did I hear that on the broadcast? He, Bates is really good. I mean, I don't know. That's quite right, but they're good.

Gets to come along on that particular ride, but that's good. I thought that that cracked me up. But, yeah. I'd put him like second tier, like solidly second tier. I think there's, but here's the problem, dude. I think at some point where there's no first tier. Like I think that the first tier is Bill's Chargers, Ravens, Bengals. Yeah, that's the second tier. Yeah, that's the first tier.

Can it be Bill's Chargers? I think the first tier is Bill's. Okay. You think that they just lost the Titans who are on the second tier? There can be a one team tier. So they lost the Titans. I mean, they had a fourth and goal sneak and Allen's cleats in and catch the turf.

You know what I mean? To me, like, that's a game that like... I feel like we're unfairly tiering the Titans. Right. I think this. I think the AFC is a mess. I think it's, firstly it's a transit of mess.

But that's why I'm putting everybody in these tiers now. I'm grouping the tiers. I, for me personally, I think I've talked about this before on this show, the bills feel like something that can last longer for me because of the depth, because of the versatility.

Like, I like that a lot as we go into the playoff time. I think they have a good inside track on being able to get that first round by as well, just with the way they've been playing. The Bengals, and this is my thing with, with, like, 41 points against the Ravens,

like a really good game, and a team that I've largely doubted up until this point, I keep on saying to myself, like, yeah, like they beat the Packer, or they were right there with the Packers, the Packers are a playoff team, but there was no Jay Alexander in that game, and oh, they beat the Steelers and the past perception looked good,

but there was no T. T.J. Watt in that game, and, oh, they rushed really well against Lamar, and they were getting pressure with four, but Ronnie Stanley and, and Alejandro Villanueva so bad, like they keep taking advantage of opposing teams, you know, big absences. And it's like, well, yeah, it's because they're really balanced and they've got a lot of different ways to win.

You know what I mean? Like they, when they decided they wanted to salt the game away, they're pushing a pretty good Ravens defense line off the ball. They were not afraid of Marlon Humphrey, who had a really rough game, not just covering Jamar Chase, but covering like CJ Uzoma. They have a lot of answers.

And this idea of the Bengals as just a team that's got, really good leadership, really good continuity and really good chemistry is attractive. They're a young group with a lot of talented players who feel like they're on a rising tide that's lifting all boats. Burrow is making Chase better. Chase is making Burrow better, which is making things easier for Boyd, which is making things altogether easier for the running game with Joe Mixing, which means that Jonah Williams job is easier. Like that idea, that interconnectedness is a lot of fun. It's hard for me to believe in on like an AFC playoff run. But if we're talking about it, you know, in late January, early February, that's a really,

really, really awesome story. I'll be glad to be wrong at that time. So they don't feel like a top team for me because so much of it is about like they've come together as this no name group and really all elevated each other. It's easier to trust a team with star players, look at like even the Cardinals who are a little bit highly questionable, but they have to star guys more so than it feels like the Bengals do. But with all that said, proof's in the pudding. This was a statement game. Dominate the Ravens and you'll have dominated a legit playoff contender. You'll take your control your division. They did exactly that they deserve their, uh, the feathers in their cap for it. The thing that kind of holds me back is just, I still don't think they're getting great

offensive line play. They're not getting great past protection. They're not getting great run blocking. They, this is the part where it's like, there's two sides. You can, you can see it either way, depending on how you want to see it, right? Is I love their explosive playability because it just gives them such a greater margin for error, right? Like, they're getting a lot of yards after the catch, but Burroughs also thrown it down the field. I mean, obviously the connection with Chase is phenomenal. And then you only need so many of those plays to go right before you're going to have a lot of scoring opportunities. That to me opens up, okay, you can have some weak link spots and you'll cover it up pretty easily because you'll be in, you know, a positive game script

situation because you can get chunk plays here and there. And that's great. It is the type of thing that feels a little fragile. And I just, top to bottom, it still just doesn't feel like the overall talent level is established and consistent enough to put them with, say, the bills. But I think

I'm right there with where Ben is, where it's like, step below, but still, it's not like they're a one-trick pony. Okay. So the Bengals generated, obviously playing the Ravens is a different deal. It's a different deal than playing anybody else. the league. But the Bengals generated a 49% pressure rate as a team. They're the ninth team in the

NGS era, according to the NFL, to have three players with seven more pressures. And it was Hendrickson, Hubbard, and Hobart and that's correct. Yeah, yeah. And I think that this was, as you said, a statement win. I think that this was the weirdest thing I saw today, and I saw a lot of it was, oh, man, Jamar Chase really took that criticism personally in training camp. He's showing you guys. I don't think, I think we're kind of rewriting history on what happened to you. The Bengals were brutally honest.

Joe Burrow, Zach Taylor, Brian Callahan, everybody was like, ooh, boy, this is ugly. And then they just kept getting better and better and better and better. And I viewed that. And it's something we talked about in the podcast. I viewed it as a good thing that they thought they suck. You know what I mean? Like I was just reading a couple days ago, Winston Churchill out of this room during the

World War, all he wanted was facts. He didn't want anything else except like the raw data. What's happening? Good or bad, good or bad, good or bad. And then he knew there would be nothing clouded in that, right? And I feel like the Bengals had a very realistic view of the facts of their situation, which was Joe Burrow couldn't really read defenses because, and this something he talked about, he couldn't really read the defenses in practice.

I mean, there was just so much that he had to. to get coming after from injury, get back to normally. And he got there. And this was, and I know you guys are make a joke, but like this was a true process. And they're there and we're getting to see,

Nora's so happy right now. Nora's, we're getting to see kind of what this was always supposed to be. And I knew, I forgot who made the point. But remember, Justin Jefferson rewrote record books last year. And Jamar Chase was better than Justin Jefferson at LSU.

And I think we probably should have learned some lessons from there. I just, I think that this is, I know the offense line isn't as good as it could be. I know they didn't. And they did upgrade it obviously from last year. But this is what this team can be. And it's a statement win.

And they show, I don't think they're going to win the AFC by any means, but they're going to make the playoffs. They're going to win the nine to 11 games that I said they were kind of when I was just kind of spitballing and Rich Eisen. But I just, this is this is what I thought. I mean, this is, this is what I expected. I want to hit you with this, this trivia question from the NFL, Ben. There are. So Burrow now has two games of 400 yards and three judges. Jones. Okay with there are three other players who have done that within the first 20 game to

their career. Like there's no timeline here that I get at all it's just like an antipal they're all they're all pretty pretty much modern era one of them is further back than the others and the one of them you're never going to get and this is why I'm asking you I guess herber is one is he no it's not dang it sucks he's watched bad bad player uh I got to put a time limit on this because it's bad radio first 20 games? Yes. So it's not any of like the...

Okay, tell me him. All right. Nick Foles. No how to get that one? Patrick Mahomes. Probably should have gotten that one. Yeah. This is what I'm bringing out.

Ever heard of him? There's a fourth name here. There's a fourth name here that I would just want to break up. This is the entire reason I'm bringing this up. The fourth one is Billy Volick. It's a lot of different ways you could go here. I was going to make Nick Foles is on so many weird record lists. No.

And then Billy Volick is not going to back door. to the good side than old BV here. All right. So a couple things. So Joe Bro now has more deep completions than he did all of last year. He played until November last year. Ben, seeing what Chase did to Humphrey,

seeing the, as you said, it wasn't just a chase thing. It was just the secondary getting abused all day. Yards after catch. I think there were 76 yards on the 82 yard touchdown. They were after the catch. Are you worried about the Ravens defense in a big way?

So the Ravens defense has been very peculiar. I was trying to figure it out as the game was happening once it was decided. The last three weeks have been this performance, 41 points allowed to the Cincinnati Bengals. Before that, it was seven points allowed to Los Angeles Chargers. And then before that, it was 25 points to the Colts. Before that, it was seven to the Broncos. It's just like, yeah, on and off.

Like, just every other week will be great or terrible. That's how we're going to alternate. The biggest concerns in this game were the tackling performance. They took horrible angles in the secondary for the entirety of the day and then could not secure tackles when they brought up down. I mean, that Jamar Chase catching run was an embarrassment. Chase, by the way, this is the most incredible season I think I've ever. It's unbelievable.

He's right now in next-gen stats the fourth worst in terms of separation generated at the catch point. Average of two yards of separation. It's horrible. Alan Robinson is the worst. It's with, like, Auden Tate and, like, A.J. Green and Arizona and stuff. Like, the reason they got rid of AJ Green is because he couldn't separate. Chase is fourth worst. He's got 750 yards.

It feels unsustainable, but it's also like what he did in college so well. It's really quite incredible. So with the Raven Stevens, you're concerned about the tackling. I think that that pass rush was on early. You saw Justin Houston living in that backfield. And then it fell away. And I don't know if that's a, they lack depth problem. So their legs are a little bit tired.

there's generally an older group, Galeas Campbell, Justin Houston. I don't know if that's just a Bengals, offensive line improvement, coaching staff adjustment. But I think that this Ravens defense with the amount of injuries they've sustained is extremely mercurial.

If they're able to dial up the Blitz and hassle bad quarterbacks, that's where they want to live. They'll be fine. Burrow was really quite good against the Blitz, has been in his career and was good in this game, was constantly willing to just test one-on-one coverage. Every third and long,

they're expecting a blitz. found Anthony Abert and they said, we're going to target that guy. And honestly, it didn't even work for a while. And then eventually they started moving on and finding different matches. They were willing to test Humphrey in the second half. And eventually they found that answer and then just kept hammering it and kept hammering it. So shout out the Bengals process because Joe Burroughs control with the line of scrimmage was instrumental to this game being as much of a blowout as it was. Shout out Kevin Clark.

Oh, really? So just literally everything I wrote two months ago. Yes, yes. It's like it's like when they make a movie out of it. the book. I wrote this whole story and now it's just happening in front of us. It's like Dune. Oh, I hate the smile on this way. You're watching it on your TV. It's like Dune in the sense that there had to be like six different absolutely terrible iterations of it before they got one that worked. Oh, very well done, Nora. Get him back. Let's go. That's that's what. Kevin, you invoked

Winston Churchill. Yeah, with the Bengals. As part of the Bengals process, I have no joys but to congratulate you. That's fantastic. I did Dune too. Okay, Nora, please don't avoid the question so then I have to ask about a Bengals rebrand. Take us through the ASC North the rest of the way.

Um, like, I'm still going Ravens. Ravens, Bengals, Browns, Steelers. I think that's right. Ben? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I'm down with that.

I'm going to be very interested to see Ravens, Bengals, Part 2. It's obviously 4117 is very big. but, you know, there were a couple of garbage time, big rushing touchdowns for the Bengals. Lamar played a really, really good game. He was tremendous. They got no help from their running backs as per usual. And also, like, this whole, like, he's leading the league in Adopt thing.

Like, it's pretty sick. And his deep passing is amazing. But at some point, 13 targets from Marquis Brown and then, like, 17 for everybody else just is not tenable, given how up and down a player Marquis Brown is. So continue to get this high quality of Lamar play, continue to hunt explosives, but they do need to find a little bit of a better balance in their short passing game, especially given the issues they have running the football. There was a point in the third quarter, they'd yet to have a third down at less than like five yards.

Gotta be like you want to be a running team. That's who you want to be. And you're losing that and you don't have a short pass game to replace it. Makes you very hot and cold on offense. So round two, I think if they distribute passes a little better, Ravens probably hanging this for a little bit longer. Also, the Ravens, if they could learn how to tackle, I'm positive they would win the Super Bowl. Yeah. Just putting a lot of very physical defensive backs, very fast defensive backs on the field is fun for a lot of reasons. And then you just need a tackle on third and eight. And you're like, dang it. Deshaun Elliott's a nutcase. I just want him to slow down and make a tackle. All right, Nora, take us through Rams 28 Lions 19. Oh, oh goodness. So heart of hearts,

I am gutted for the lions. Because it's, They're 0 and 7 and they're so frisky and they just want it so badly, but they haven't won a game. And they lose 28 to 19 to the Rams and there's all the revenge game stuff. But they played genuinely three really, really, really solid quarters. When given the choice between, is this a good or bad superlative, what we gave them? I just said sad, which there's going to be a silver lining here, though, I promise. I end with hope.

I end on a hopeful note here. but I have to be honest, I don't tend to have a lot of, like, I have no rooting interest in either one of these teams, right? But when they are down 25 to 19 in the fourth quarter, they go on a 15 play drive,

they're in the red zone, they're converting third downs, they get a holding penalty, knocks them back 10 yards, they figure it out, they get there, and then all of a sudden, like,

Jared Goff, just Jared Goofs, Aaron Donald's in his face, throws up a just fluttering duck. Ramsey intercepts it and it all falls apart from there. I was sad. I was sad for them. I was sad that they were denied. Dan Campbell euphoria.

I was sad that we were denied Dan Campbell euphoria. I really, really, really wanted to see Dan Campbell just going absolutely berserk. Yes. Onside kicking. I wanted the press are so bad. I wanted it so badly. I just wanted this to be rewarded because they score on the first possession, then they on side kick, then they fake punt, and this is all in the first quarter, and then they fake punted again,

successfully again, in the third quarter. It was just beautiful. It was a sight to behold. I really, really, really wanted that kind of just like, fuck it. We are the less talented team here. We're just going to go for it. I really wanted to see that rewarded. I just like Dan Campbell.

Clearly those guys want to play for him. And it would have been really, really interesting to see what would have happened if they'd gotten a big upset win like this, if that kind of morale boost would have meant something. That said, here's the silver lining stuff. It's obvious how jazzed up there to play for Dan Campbell. They're going to get the first overall pick.

What he's doing is really smart. They're on track to get the first overall pick. Although, I think they're going to beat the Eagles. but I was going to say, I was going to ask so like if you even knew that game was happening. I'd be honored. No, I know.

And I'd be honored to have Dan Campbell's first way to be against my Philadelphia Eagles. I'd love it. I love that. I'm trying to figure out how to handicap that game and I honestly just don't. It's like the Eagles are a three point favorite. I'm like, sure.

I know what that means. This is not to say that you get the first overall pick and, and suddenly your franchise is completely on a different trajectory. And I don't know what they're going to do. I mean, I think they've got to bench golf. Like, let's see what David Blow's got. I think this was like his going away present. I think this was like, oh, you get to try to get your bench on your old team.

Here's a necktie kind of thing. Who's the backup there? David Blow. Ah, of Purdue greatness. Remember, remember he? Do you want to see David Blow beat the Eagles next week? He started building the culture by everybody who's watching his wife in the Olympics. It's a very touching moment.

Oh, yeah, that was sweet. Okay, so a couple things. Number one, I agree, Nora. that the lions are playing this exactly right. They're playing their ass off, going forward on fourth down. Dan Campbell's establishing himself as a guy who players want to play for. And Dan Campbell's not going to be for everybody. That's something we've already talked about.

Like, if you, I think people brought up the, there was a Jamie Collins cameo in the video where Dan Campbell was doing updowns. Jamie didn't seem all that jazzed about it, right? It's not going to be for everybody, but it's going to be for people in a rebuilding situation. Jamie Collins is going to be a part of that. That's fine. Also, I say this with love. I've covered Jamie Collins.

He's a nice guy. There's not a lot of moments where Jamie Collins seems particularly jazzed about things. Not a jazzy guy, Jamie Collins. Not a jazzy guy. He's back with the Patriots. He's going to be no jazz there. No jazz whatsoever. Okay.

So I completely agree. This is a sad, but I feel like they're on the right track. I want to give a 10-second golf take, which is that, so Jay Glazer reported that Jared Goff hung up on Sean McVeigh when Sean McVeigh called him Tom But the Trade And then they sat two tables over from each other at dinner A couple of weeks later And it was awkward again and Sean came over

And they were as cordial as you could be In that situation but they still didn't really interact And that Goff was still kind of mad at him Then Goff said this week that he wishes McVeigh says he wishes handled better Gough kind of hinted that he was still a little frustrated My only take is this He has every right to be frustrated.

traded. I understand this. What I also understand is that if Sean McVeigh had not entered Jared Gough's life, Jared Gough would probably have about $115 million less than he currently has. I'm just going to leave that there. I think that's fair. I think that's fair. I mean, look, there was a lot of there was a lot of reporting there that

particularly from, I think, Lindsay Theory at ESPN, that McVeigh was not very, not very, even by his own admission, not very nice and not a great communicator towards the unfair with Goff. I think to your point, the flip side to that is Jared Goff has never won a game when Sean McVeigh has not been his coach. So there's a little bit of a debate between feelings versus results. But it does seem like, I mean, look, I don't know.

If Jared Goff feels like he wasn't. He has every right way. He has every right to hang up the most of the ones. I just think that there's two separate things you can compartmentalize and go, man, this guy did reinvigorate my career after my rookie year where the stats were similar to like Andrew Walter if you remember he could have had a rookie contract full of Jeff Fisher just a thought Ben any thoughts on lines ramps yes DeAndre swift yes coming together yeah uh 13 carries for 48 not super great eight catches for 96 and a touchdown that'll play uh every time i watch him he just

looks healthier right like he was just battling it all last year. He's even battling it early this year. He was dealing with an ankle during this week of practice, but he looks spry. And this is what they wanted out of him. The lions are 0-N-7, but man, you could be in a worse spot than clearly having a team that's bought behind your head coach. Some coordinators are doing some good stuff. Like, I like what Anthony Lynn's throwing out there. I like what Glenn's doing with the defense. Some young guys who are rounding out. DeAndre Swift coming together, T.J. Hawkinson coming together. Jalen Reeves Maven has really woken up since they got rid of Jamie Collins,

they like Julian O'Cquora. Like, they are 0 and 7. They are in the driver's seat for the first overall pick. And this year, that's probably not going to be a quarterback and that kind of stinks.

But other than that, for O and 7, there's a lot to like about the tribe. Okay. So Ruiz is going to come on and talk about the dolphins and where they go from here. But Ben,

so, like, you have a take on the team. We're going to have two dolphins falcons segments. The people are demanding it. They're banging on pots and pans in the street, saying we've got to have more

Falcons Dolphins and we are delivering for you. The first segment is about the Falcons. It's Falcons 30 Dolphins 28. What'd you like about the Falcons today? Was this the only game in the day slate that had like actual game winning drive? Like close at the end? Kind of.

So yeah, this is the high demand game. Yeah, on the Falcons side, my superlipes. My good superlative is titled the Matt Ryan Tannahill Award. Oh, wow. Oh, who-hoo. There is nothing better than the EPA boost that you get when you quarterback at Arthur Smith offense, baby.

Like, I know it's not real, but it's also because it's just a good offense and it looks good on a spreadsheet. This from Charles McDonald, since week two, so excluding the Eagles game where they just looked abysmal and totally out of sorts. Matt Ryan right now is sixth in the league in EPA per play. It's behind Stafford, Rogers, Josh Allen, Patrick Holmes, and Tom Brady. That's pretty good, doggone company. And in this game particularly, like you alluded to, Kevin, this was the Kyle Pitts game. This was the breakout for him. Pitts ended this game with seven catches on eight targets, 163 yards, including two critical

catches on the go-ahead two-minute drive when the Falcons were down by one. They had a rep where they put him in a three-by-one, isolate him on the backside. Eric Rowe, one-on-one coverage. Ryan just puts up a prayer ball, says, go make a play, young man. And you remember that Kyle Pitts is six-five with Vine. the great ball tracking ability. He's just big boys, Eric Rowe, and Eric Rowe is a doggone good tight-end cover man.

That's a clear example of what you drafted at number four overall. You drafted a player to be an elite tight end, a player to intentionally isolate and then attack in man coverage. It's exactly what you were able to do on that play. And the growth of Kyle Pitts has been really important to this team. He started the season eight out of 6.4, 8 out of 7.8.

This is when the Falcons offense was really struggling to get off of the field, or excuse me, to get the, to get the, plane off the field to get moving to generate some points. Since then, eight outs of 11.7, 10.3, 10.7. And then in this game, intended area yards of 16.8, which is the fifth highest of anybody on Sunday and the highest on the team. They are using him as a downfield weapon.

We are starting to really see, even without the presence of a running game, which was an important lesson for Arthur Smith to learn. By action pass out of Lunders Center, we're pulling that guard. We're pulling the guard and the tight end. We're three-step, drop, five-step drop. Matt Ryan is hitting his back foot. and firing. You have to trust what you see. You've got to be willing to chuck it between two zone defenders. Like that takes gumption. And he's delivering that ball to Kyle Pitts, trusting him over the middle of the field.

Calvin Ridley has now replaced him as that underneath guy, much better usage for him, got the big shot play to Russell Gage. This is what it was supposed to look like this passing game. So even if the running game doesn't catch up, Ryan, Pitts, and Ridley, that's enough to build the ship out of in terms of the passing game. And we've seen them score now. They're averaging over 30 points per game over their last three. Atlanta's offense. in the passing game is rounding here into form a little bit. Very incomplete team. Offensive lines of problem, defense is all over the place. But that core part of the passing game, which people who believed in the Falcons were really hanging their hat on coming into the season took a few weeks to get off the ground. Now we're cooking.

This is Corderole Patterson's slander. I will not stand for it. I don't buy it. 60 yards today. I don't acknowledge. Cannot. R.B1, baby. 6.6.0, Ben. Deal with it. Okay. Yeah, I like the Falcons. They're kind of coming into form to be the team that I thought that they could be at the beginning of the season. I kind of got the bandwagon there a little bit, but I still picked them at the playoffs.

Yeah, I like it. Nor any Falcon's thoughts. So Arthur Smith after this game said that Matt Ryan is quote criminally underrated. Yeah, we should make that a crime. To overrate Matt Ryan. Yeah. Just underrate. Excuse me, underrate Matt Ryan.

Kick down the door to Falcons Media Shack. You're under arrest. I don't know. I don't think the Falcons. I think it's us. The Falcons media is not underwriting. It's us. Look in the mirror.

We're the ones underwriting Matt Ryan. You probably have to install the place to book people like they have in Philly and Atlanta. It's going to be like minority report where they're going to come into our brains and just figure out how we, whether or not we properly rate Matt Ryan. Hey, speaking of things that should be crimes. Can we punt national tight end day into the sun? Can that never be a thing? Yeah. I love it.

I don't know what that was. So someone the other day was like, do you want this hugely famous tight end on Solnayneu's Day? And I was like, yes. And they were like, well, okay, well, he's going to talk about national tight end day. And I was like, there's some things, I'm sure you guys have had this for where someone says something to you. And you're just like, you don't want to make them feel insane. But then you're like, well, am I insane? Am I supposed to know what that is?

Something's very wrong here. And then I was just like, absolutely. Absolutely. And then it's not happening, obviously. But that just was dropped into a sentence. And I just kind of reckoned with it a little bit and just kept it moving. Here's the worst part, though, is that they did that last season. They did? That was one of, yeah.

No, they did it last season. And that was one of the most stark time stood still for over a year. Things that I've experienced in a good bit was, holy crap. It's been a year since the first. national tight end day. So Fandle had a prop for total number of tightens score touchdown. I believe Draft Kings did as well. If you go to the NFL social right now, their header photo is George Kittle.

Their description is, quote, everyone has a little tight end in them, end quote, at George Kittle 46. That seems to highly inappropriate. And their pinned tweet is this class party, and it's a drawn graphic of a bunch of a bunch of tight ends in a classroom. Tony Gonzalez is at the blockboard, the blackboard, and it says block, release, catch, spike, and gronk and Kittle and Kelsey and Woller,

all they're wearing party hats. What? Kevin, I'm 100% sure that we started a show last season where you, you know, you said, Nora, how's it going? And I said, Kevin, hi, happy national tight ends day. I'm sure it happened. Last year was just an absolute blur. It didn't happen.

And one of the things I am in agreement with you, this is like a time stand still. I don't remember this happening. I'm sure it happened. Holidays were weird during quarantine. Oh, wow. Happy National Tightend Day, Kyle Pitts. Better late than never.

Kyle Pitts on National Tight End Day, very meaningful for him. His first ever, you know, it's great. All right. Sunday night recap, Nora,

take it away. All right. I think we have to have a, we have to have an intervention with Carson Wentz here. Well, that's where you're starting. Okay, well,

there's a lot of interventions on the table here. Yeah. The one I'm choosing to have, and I hope you will all join me, is with our guy, Carson Wentz. Okay. Who won? Who won tonight? Yes. The Colts just beat the Niners, 30 to 18. I want to be careful to not take too many concrete things away from this game because of the bomb cyclone that enveloped the stadium. Weather was very bad. Also, the Colts had, I think, approximately 600 yards. on defensive pass interference. But, you know, you get some credit for that. Here's the thing.

Here's the thing. Our guy Carson here is playing some okay football. I think he and Frank Rake have a little, little nice thing going. My guy has to stop throwing the shovel pass. I blame the Holmes. He starts doing it. Everybody thinks it's the hot new trend.

All the kids are doing. in it starts throwing the shovel pass. Carson Wentz has two interceptions, both on shovel passes. Fact check, he has one interception because that was called a fumble and does not show up as an interception on his stat sheet, which to me, that's a farce. But it's how they counted it. Benjamin Solek, do you know what this is? This is the state of denial.

You are not helping to cause of this intervention. Five, turnovers. Turnovers. There we go. Like a huge percentage of Carson Went. as turnovers on the season are on shovel passes. My guy's got to stop doing it because there are other very, very, very positive sides. I mean, again, I don't want to take too much in terms of exactly how this game played out

as stuff that we're going to see repeating itself for the remainder of the season just because the conditions were so extreme. Colts were pretty good. Niners seemed like they started to get something going when they were doing a little bit more motion misdirection later in the game. but it was sort of too little too late. Too little too late, I think, is also kind of an appropriate way to describe where they are at two and four at this point.

Just a really steep uphill battle. It's not the number one most meaningful thing for them, obviously. At a certain point, they're going to turn the page to Tray Lance, but I don't know that we're sort of not crossing off the Niners, but it's becoming a mathematic situation here. The Colts obviously still in it. And I think... What tier in the AFC are they on? They're below the Bengals.

They're the tier below the Bengals. But what... Okay. You know, part of the problem is we all have different numbers of tiers, different tiers, so we have no frame of reference here. I think the number one problem is that you make Nora every single week re-ranked the 16 teams in the AFC. Yeah, I know. And we're bad at it.

They're just kind of good. This is what we're working on midweek. I'm like a coach. We're working on ranking AFC tiers. The bears are out there Wednesday practice trying to get the protection calls right. We're just out here on a Wednesday on a Zoom call. We got to have a two teams off the jump. We're like 50 minutes into a podcast.

Kevin is like in a complete vacuum. No specific opponent. Rank these people. Rank these teams and tell us what shape they remind you of. What animal. No, that's your Thursday pod. No, no, no, you're thinking of your Thursday. That's true.

That's true. The shape and animal is your Thursday. and I ended doing my schtick. Yeah, you ended up doing the Thursday show. Accidental Thursday show. The Colts are not as good as the Bengals. The Colts are not as good as the Titans. But the Colts are okay.

And they'd be more okay if Carson Wins would stop attempting shovel passes. All right, Ben. Yeah. The Niners have. Cancel the shovel pass, Ben. Do it. Do it. They've got the Bears next week.

They've got the Niners. Is it the Niners of the Cardinals after that? And then they have the Rams and Prime Times. I want to get to the Carson Went's point that Nora just made. But I just want to let you know that I'm begging Trey Lance to practice better. Yeah, and I think that...

I can't do this anymore, buddy. I think, I definitely think if he were healthy enough to go, he would have gone, especially once you saw the weather report. This is obviously, as we saw by the opening script and by the approach from both teams, a game in which you wanted to be able to run the football, especially during the deluge of the second quarter

and into the third quarter, things were kind of a little bit easier in the first and the fourth. So I think if you're healthy enough, he would have gone. And I imagine if he's healthy enough to go against the Bears, he'll go, because especially once we started to see just how deleterious the rain was to the passing game, he would have changed that game tonight. Yeah, and Shanahan usually doesn't trust Garoppolo.

Once it started like raining and there's no kittle, it was as kitty of an offense as he calls, right? And I think that this game is emblematic of the frustrations he has with Garoppolo in certain conditions against certain opponents. where he feels like it fetters his overall offense. Now, as we know of Lance, as we've seen of him for the game and a half he's played, he also, in different ways, limits the offense

just because of his erraticism at this time. But you're two and four in a really good division. It might be time to start thinking about development of Lance and getting reps under his very inexperienced belt as the priority over competing. You know what I mean? You know, two and four, it's not over. You've got plenty of division games left,

but I think that, right, at this point, once Lance is healthy, I would imagine he's given the reins and they'll ride him through some bad games with the idea that, listen, this guy only had one year of reps in an FCF school. He simply must get game experience to grow. There is no way we can replicate that in practice.

And if that means we lose some games in the short term for successes in the long term, we're fine with that. Are you canceling the shovel pass? No, I'm canceling. on. Wentz's continued. So the shovel pass Rams was like, that was the script and he threw it and the Rams taped it off.

This was classic Wentz tomfoolery where it's like, dude, it is a downpour. And you're out here trying to backhand a pass past the linebacker. Like, the number one thing for Wentz to improve is the mental acceptance of the idea that he doesn't need to make every play a spectacular game winning play, which for as good as he performed against the 49ers, tonight, he tried to throw like five picks. When Darnold got benched, he gave Carson Wentz his freak the fuck out button. Right.

And none of us saw it wasn't caught on camera. So we didn't know. But unfortunately, this is a familiar button for Carson Wentz. He's used it before. He's willing to use it again. He loves the button. Right. Over the last three weeks, Carson Wentz and the Colts offense in general,

fourth in EPA per dropback, second EPA per rush. There's second and total EPA per play behind just the Tampa. of a Buccaneers. This is the best stretch we've seen of Jonathan Taylor in terms of volume, both in the running game and in the passing game and then efficiency at volume. And then it's the best stress we've seen from Carson Wentz since certainly the early, happy sunshine and Rainbow's Eagle Days. This offense is working.

And it got Quentin Nelson back. It's getting healthier than it was. T.Y. Hilton is returning. Michael Pittman had himself a really nice game in the rain. Yes, they're still very much oriented on the explosive play. And that's cool, but also at times. you wish this offense could look a little bit more methodical. DPI is carrying them a little bit.

They're still very weird in terms of efficiency in the red zone. Obviously wrinkles to iron out, but it took them a few weeks, went to miss a lot of training camp that came into the season with a lot of injuries. This was the goal. This is what it was supposed to look like on offense. And the Colts are three and four. I know we've talked about the Titans as a team that's in control of the AFC South, and the Titans already have their win over the Colts, but they play next weekend.

it's a repeat game on the 31st of October. Really, really big game. If the Colts offense is as legit as it seems, win that game against the Titans make this division a thing again. I think if it's an absolute downpour outside, there are way worse offensive strategies than just like Jonathan Taylor, Jonathan Taylor,

DPI. I don't disagree. Yeah, they adjusted to the surroundings. Nora, San Francisco here, last thing before we move on. So last week, Jimmy Grapola was ruled out this week, Trey Lance has ruled out.

If they're healthy going forward, how do you handle the situation? Well, how do I handle the situation? How do you? Coach Nora. Coach Nora goes to Trey Lance. Coach Nora at this point is taken on long, hard look in the mirror and feeling like it's one time to prioritize the future over the present, but also at full health is recognizing that Tray Lance at least gives you some

wrinkles that Jimmy clearly is not necessarily giving you. And if the argument against playing an inexperienced rookie is that the veteran is not going to make the same amount of mistakes, well, I don't know that that's exactly your Jimmy Garoppolo situation. That said, every single thing Kyle Shanahan has done and said this season tells us that if he can start Jimmy Garoppolo, he would like to. It seems like that is still the case. He's just waiting for, I don't know. I don't know.

He's waiting for A, Lance to practice better and B, I don't know. I mean, the decisions being made for him every time the 90s lose a game like this and the future becomes more important than the present, obviously. It's all fascinating. It'll be interesting to see. And as we know, the Shanahan press conferences are, we learn a lot for them. Even if it doesn't say anything, we kind of learn a lot from what he's talking about and how he's saying and all that stuff.

So it'll be interesting to watch. I feel like he might have had some things to say about Ayuk during the pre-production meeting. Sometimes like a guy, they just talk about a guy a ton and I just feel like. Collinsworth said, hey, Garabolo, my play is way into the job for the next year or two. Did you hear that?

Listen, they compared Carson once to Lamar Jackson. What's going on his production? What's going on his production meeting? They said Carson Wenz and Lamar Jackson's name in the same sentence after a Carson Wens run. And then the RONCast was allowed to continue. The FCC was like, yeah, that's fine. Dude, I don't know if you value wins and losses, but Wents, Wentz won today and Jackson

lost, so they shouldn't be in the same sentence. QB wins. What tier is Carson Wenson? I just start on rating Kevin from tiers of everything he says. I'm, I'm up for it. He's clearly on the Lamar Jackson tier. worth said it. Why would he say it? It's not true. Move us on.

Let's move on. So I'm going to touch briefly on the 25 to three Giants Panthers game today. I have the Giants beat the Panthers today. And apparently, apparently that game tilted the Panthers into the Deshawn Watson

sweepsticks. It's interesting to me. What's about to happen? So the trade deadline is November 2nd. John McLean of the Houston Chronicle gets, has some great info, usually not wrong on big picture things like this. And where they, where the Houston Texan stand right now, he says that they want to get this deal done in the next week. And the reports emerging are that the dolphins are the leading contender, but that the, it's been some other teams in the hunt and that the Panthers are now one of them. Watson has a full no trade clause.

According to McLean, Watson already rejected the Eagles. He's approved Miami. That's the only destination he's approved so far. This to me is one of the most fascinating stories I've ever seen at the football level because it shows you how reckless teams can be if they think there can be a competitive advantage. So there's a lot of conflicting reports here. And I don't want to make any judgments because a lot of smart people have said many different things. So the NFL Network reported that he'd be able, Watson would be able to play immediately and probably would not be suspended this year.

Obviously, there's a grand jury still out if he was charged with something that would change any second. But from an NFL discipline standpoint, the NFL network said that likely he'd be able to play this year. Mike Florea went on TV on NBC and said they haven't made a decision on the commissioner's exemplary because they haven't had to because he's not playing. He's just sitting out in Houston right now. He was playing safety or whatever in training camp. And then Josina Anderson said that she didn't think that he would play right away because there's still the personal contact policy. There's a lot of hoops to go through.

So I've heard five different things here, right? And there's 22 civil complaints. As I said, the grand jury is still out. Ten criminal complaints. Again, he has not been charged with anything. But the idea that a team right now would allow their circumstances this year. And the dolphins who have been in the hunt for a long time for Deshaun Watson, at least modern situation.

But if they're getting pressured into making this trade because they've won one game, or if the Panthers are so upset with Sam Darnold that they would make this move, the idea that that would mortgage your future not only for a short term, because we know he's going to play this season. But we have no idea what's going to happen to Deshaun Watson in the future. We have no idea what the NFL punishment will be next year. Typically the timeline is he probably normally when these things happen, these sort of investigations happen,

it takes a year for the NFL punishment to kick in. We've seen that time and time again. So there could be a significant punishment next year. The idea and the negotiation, according to John McLean, starts at three first round picks. You were not allowed to get to Sean Watson without three first round picks. If a team does this right now, I don't see how it's not anything other than the most reckless trade in history.

And I saw a couple reports where they're like, well, obviously owners can ask Roger Goodell what the punishment's going to be. Well, that sounds like a huge scandal to me because if Roger Goodell is telling NFL teams or would tell NFL teams, hey, we're actually going to punish this guy, XYZ for this amount of weeks. And he doesn't tell other teams. That seems like a competitive advantage that certain teams would have in this negotiation. So I actually don't think that's going to happen that explicitly. So no, I don't think there's intel to be gleaned. And if there is, that's a whole different story. Okay.

And that's a whole different scandal. It would be a massive scandal. And even if that were the case, you know, who's not calling up NFL owners and telling them what's going on? The FBI. Yeah, there's two separate things here. The grand jury, the investigation of criminal stuff, would you come down at any second, including after the trade deadline?

I don't know if you guys know this. but grand juries don't operate on the NFL's trade deadline calendar. Okay. And then the second part of it is that we don't know the NFL's punishment. And if someone does, that's a whole different can of worms. Okay. So the flippant nature of the reporting around this has been very strange to me. The flippant nature of, well, if everybody's comfortable with this, it's going to be fine.

I think there's a whole lot of unresolved issues here that everyone talks about risk management all the time. They're obsessed with it. That's all the fucking obsessed with. Oh, mismanagement. We're studying risk management. Well,

we felt comfortable with this. This is, this is the riskiest trade. If you trade three first round picks with no protections for Deshawn Watson, it is the riskiest thing in NFL franchise is done in modern football. Does anyone want to talk about this? Not particularly. But I think the most,

the thing that, The thing that I, like, circle in the last 2448 hours, right, is we like, you know, we, we like to think that NFL owners care about these issues. We like to think the NFL owners think about things the way that we do. And then we notice that the Panthers go from not being in the Deshaun Watson conversation to watching Sam Donald be horrible against the Giants and putting PJ Walker in and that are suddenly in the Deshaun Watson conversation. And that tells you all you need to know about what NFL ownership in general cares about. Right. And like, you know, winning isn't everything. It's the only thing.

Like you're going to win. At what cost at what expense? Because as you nicely summarized it, this is the most like ludicrous, outlandish, riskiest idea possible. And yet it's a moment's decision. Donald's playing poorly. We have a window. Let's take a look. I'm seriously asking.

If anybody can find me a more reckless move with the stakes involved, three first round picks, I'm not saying obviously there's been very few trades with that many picks going in any direction. I'm saying a team that has mortgaged their future for more, a more reckless move. I'd love to hear about it. I would love to hear about it because I don't think it exists. Ben, Justin Fields, Zach Wilson, take us through it. Yeah, this is my bad superlative. It's the, hey, you drafted him to perolative.

It goes to Joe Douglas and Ryan Pace. We should start. The Jets, obviously, Zach Wilson gets about two and a half drives before he's lost for the game. And what was the sequence of tough hits and tough calls and the league's gray area of litigating protected quarterbacks when they're outside of the pocket is something that probably really needs to be cleaned up. Especially, you know, a lot of times it's like quarterbacks with bigger bodies who complain that they don't get the calls. but then, like, Lamar doesn't get calls. And Zach Wilson's not the biggest dude in the world.

And he's scamping around out there and he gets hit around the legs. And so figuring that out is tough. But this was an important game for him because it was going to be a repeat against that Belichick defense against which he threw four interceptions earlier this season. It's going to be a nice benchmark test to kind of see if we've grown at all. It was shaky performance early. They're obviously missing Mackaybacton and having missing McKaybockton. He took a third and seven sack, which was largely the right tackle, Morgan Moses's fault. but also, you know, it is his front side.

It wasn't like a blind side. He got to see that. He had a nice throw in third and four. Whatever. But the issue for the Jets continues to be that every single offensive linemen there, save for, yeah, I'm pretty sure it's all of them. It might be four or five. Is a Joe Douglas acquisition.

Morgan Moses certainly is. George Fant certainly is. These are the players that you wanted to be successful on this offensive line to protect the rookie quarterback. You wanted to prepare to make the investment. They have not done so. Wilson's been under constant pressure. He's the poorest rated quarterback against the Blitz.

And it was evident from his college film that this was going to be something that was important for him to figure out over time at the NFL because of how much time he had to BYU, which brings us to Justin Fields. The Bears lose to the bucks three to 38. Justin Fields has his worst day as a pro. This from Seth Walter of ESPN, his QBR was 1.9, which is the second lowest QBR of a game this season. Only Davis Mills 0.7 and week four was lowest. Fields QBR the season is 16.7 least among qualifiers. He had three picks and two fumbles.

I've been talking a lot about how Fields' picks have not been his fault. Not so much in this game anymore, unfortunately. Though it is worth noting in the first pick, he thought he had a free play because over the headset he was told he had a free play

because the bucks would have 12 on defense. Not ideal. So he just yeated that thing and thought he had a flag and he didn't. Another pick was tipped, but then the third was pretty bad. In this case, Elijah Wilkinson, was projected to be the starting right tackle,

was placed on the reserve COVID list as a surprise. It happened to this morning. Justin Field said he learned about it on Sunday morning. A man named Lachavius Simmons played right tackle for the Bears. I won't go so far as to say

offensive tackle Lachavius Simmons stepped in for the Bears. He was there. He surrendered. I want to say four pressures on 12 past dropbacks, I believe it was, before he was benched,

including two sacks. he was not given tight end help, Chip help on either one of them against Shaq Barrett and Jason Pierre Paul. You may have heard of them. From the Super Bowl? Yeah, they've got their third, fourth string, running back in there,

Khalil Herbert and Darrell Williams because they got injuries, or Damien Williams, excuse me, because they've got injuries. Those aren't guys you want in pass protections. You want to put your large number of tight ends out there and kind of help out your fourth string right tackle, your third string left tackle.

This was not the case. So to Ryan Pace, whose receiver room is abysmal. Cole Komet is a very fine, like Kyle Rudolph clone, but they're targeting Jesper Horstead on third and goal. Like that's where this passing game is right now. That's where this offensive line is right now. So for Joe Douglas and for Ryan Pace, which Pace is a little bit different because he's had two cracks of the quarterback thing.

It is nice to draft early drafted, early first round quarterbacks. It usually gives you some job security. It gives you a year or two cushion to see what that guy becomes. got a little bit make the bed for him before he arrives, though. Got a little bit lay the foundation here. The Jets and the Bears' offensive supporting casts outside of the quarterback with injuries considered are two of the worst in the league. And it feels like we might say Justin Fields is doing some really nice stuff on film.

Next year when the Bears' offense is better, this will look better. It'll be reflected in the numbers. But then you look back at who's in charge and you wonder if that'll happen. The same thing is true of Wilson, to a lesser degree, because like I said, this is Joe Douglas' first crack at it. And he's probably got a little bit more time, new head coach and what have you. But my faith in these general managers to build around their talented but imperfect rookie quarterbacks is waning. Whereas like, Josh McDaniels, they're kind of doing it out there a little bit. Best game of Mac Jones career.

So situation matters. And right now, Chicago and New York, not good situations to be in. Bears not respecting national tight end day. What? Truly, truly. Ben, we got a really funny reader listener question from got MJ Rigden who said, should the Bears consider replacing Matt Nagy with an offensive-minded head coach?

Honestly, it really revitalized that side of the ball considering the defense where they're building their house. I feel so bad that Bears' defense. They legitimately played so well against the bucks. 38 points. They were up every touchdown, every third down throw. They were right in the pocket.

And Brady was just odd one. I mean, this was a nuts Brady game. Yeah. an offensive-minded head coach in there. Somebody not named Matthew. Ooh. Okay. Any Matthew?

We can't have any Matthews. No, no Matthews. No, no Matthews. Norah, any takeaways from the rookie quarterbacks on Sunday? Well, I mean, again, the disrespect to National Tide End Day. You just hate to see it.

Yeah. Well, so Wilson got hurt is, I think, the piece that we got to clarify here. They're hoping it's a mild PCL sprain. which would be like a couple weeks. Again, unclear. They're going to do more testing.

Obviously, that just stinks because you miss time, you miss development. Clearly, as Ben just said, not developing under ideal circumstances, but that's obviously something for them to monitor going forward. I do. I think there's a little bit of a distinction between where the jets are and where the bears are here just because Joe Douglas is sort of in his first crack. at it, which is not the case in Chicago. How many cracks is Ryan Pace had?

This is number two. Ryan Pace is one of very, very, very few in select group of general managers to draft a top half of the first round quarterback. Twice. Tims fail and then get to do it again. We call this the Rick Spielman air. It is a beautiful place to be with unimaginable job security

for basically no reason. He also hired two coaches? Is that correct? Or was John Fox there before he was? I think Fox was there before he was. That seems right. Yeah, it's, it's, it's, the cracks, there have been cracks. There have been cracks, folks.

There have been cracks, but I think Joe Douglas has had fewer cracks. I agree. I just think that as impressed as I was, and Ben, you know this because you were at the same training camp I was and I was just extremely busy and couldn't really talk to you. But Joe Douglas was so well thought of in Philadelphia. And he was the guy when you talked to. about, and you know this better than anybody, if you ask 10 people in Philadelphia, why the Philadelphia Eagles won the Super Bowl in 2017, you will get 10 different answers. You will get 10 different answers

depending on that person's worldview. But one of those 10 answers might be the toughness that Joe Douglas was brought to the roster and sort of the way he helped Howie, how he had more to do with it, obviously, but I think that there was, there were some people who said, man, he really, Joe Douglas really brought something to that team building experience. So I expected better of him. And I just, I just haven't seen it. Yeah, offensive line is a tough thing to get right. There's a reason why we talk about offensive line coaches being the top positional coach. It's because bringing in and just drafting talent is far less of the story. You've got to get them in. You got to get them on the same page. You got to get that chemistry going. You got to get the body types working and what have you.

So a little bit like, you know, when you draft a guy for his trench toughness, a lot of times that'll show up on the defensive side and then on the offensive side, it's trickier. So again, like, like we're saying, like the leash is certainly longer for Douglas just because of the amount of time he's put in and certainly the hand he was dealt in that Adam Gase McCagnan era of Jets roster management They needed to do it on offense and on defense.

Yeah. Like Chicago had a solid baseline defensively. Yeah. They gave McCagin an extra draft. Yeah. Come on. And he took Chikai Polite in the third round, which is still again the funniest thing in the entire world.

I was horrible. He did exactly what you thought you'd get if you gave Mike McCagney. an extra draft. But it's, we, it's worth remembering that Douglas is a guy

who has done a lot of moving and shaking in the draft. And oftentimes when a general manager makes a lot of good trades, we, we can conflate that with saying, like,

he's, he's drafting well, right? This might be, we might call us the Howie Roseman phenomenon if we're going to hit a little bit close to home here.

The Jets drafts over the last couple years, even post McCagnan. I haven't been great. Yeah. And it's early. Right. But,

It certainly is, there is an emphasis now that the rookie quarterback is in place that some of our young talent starts to develop along with him and shore up the bedrocks that he can grow. I know that sounds a little bit contradictory, but I actually do think that they need to give this more time to settle, like way more time to settle. I think that the institutional rot that was happening after McCagnan and Gase is such that you actually, anybody, whoever it is, I don't, I literally don't care who it is. If you hired anybody who's not Mike McAgnon, just give him five.

years to do something. Also, it took Seala a couple years in San Francisco as well, and he did a lot of tweaking in that scheme to figure out where they wanted to be. So it's certainly an effort that is deserving of patience, but the Zach Wilson absence, I think is going to highlight really like who matters in the scheme and who doesn't, who's talented and who isn't, what concepts are key and what concepts aren't. So that hopefully when Wilson gets sort of back in, the Jets have a better sense of their identity, their go-toes, and then it'll be easier to kind of put this, put this,

framework around him instead of just asking Wilson to make big plays out of structure. Shout out, Mike White. Shout up Mike White. Hilltopper, great. Ben, thanks, buddy. We'll see you. See you this week.

See you on the ringer gambling show on Wednesday. That's it. We've been going for an hour and 20 minutes. I know, but I always have such a good time flies, Kevin. Kevin, tear the time. Yeah, I was going to say,

no, I was going to say, time flies when you're tearing as many things as you possibly can. You're tearing random out of them. I just hear the word tier. You're going to go to sleep tearing things. Echoing in my mind. Yeah.

Echoing through history. Tears. All right. Gladiator tears. What tier is Churchill in? Depends to you ask. Modern, modern tearing is not as kind to him.

It's not as kind to them as the tiering used to be. Bye, Ben. Now it's time for Ruiz's, Ruizans, report ruminations, rips. We were just discussing, Stephen, before you logged on the Zoom, what kind of sound. effect we can play either when you log on or when you give us just a scorching take and

the floor is yours if you have any ideas i want the uh like the funk master flex bomb uh sound effect you know what i'm talking about yeah yeah yeah we'll work on that we'll work on that i was ready for that question all right um so let's uh let's get to it the game at hand we already talked to a business in the falcon standpoint and now we're going to talk about it from the dolphin so we i just got mad about the Deshaun Watson situation. But we wanted to dive into Tua, the Dolphins, and what was wrong here. So this has been an awful season for the Dolphins.

And it was something we, I think after last year we expected them to at least tread water, be okay, win some games they shouldn't, be in the playoff hunt. They're now one and six. I'll start here, Stephen. Is Tua good?

Tough question. I would say he's not terrible. I'm not going to go as far to say as he's good. He's like, the best way to describe him is that he is a one contract quarterback. If you're giving him a big second contract, I think you're making a huge mistake, but I think you can win with a good team around him

while he's on a rookie deal. So he's like Andy Dalton ceiling type quarterback to me. Okay. What mistakes is he making right now? What does he need? We'll start here. What is preventing him from being? better than Andy Dalton, I guess.

Well, I think his problem is the same where if there is pressure in the pocket, he just immediately collapses and starts to panic and his feet get all messed up and he throw, like the interception he threw today. The second one was one of the worst interceptions I've seen. It was Brandon Whedithead-esque. And they basically have to run like a college offense for him. Like they're just running like 50% RPO's. Like if you watch this, if you watch this team, it looks like an ACC team, like a bad

ACC team. I'm watching it. Because the games are over, there was no lie of football on. I am literally watching a Pitt Virginia game right now. And it looks, I guess you're saying it looks like that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

What's funny is if they kept their pick, which I think is the second, it's slated to be the second pick right now. Yeah. Georgia Tech, by the way, not Pitt. Yeah, go ahead. They probably draft Sam Howell, who's like the same quarterback is to, like, where you just run RPO's for him. So they probably save themselves by trading that.

Take us through the interception that you call Brandon Whedoness. What actually happened there? So this is something that he's done for the last two years. And he did it in preseason even when he looked good. When the pocket gets tight and his first read isn't open, you could see like alarms going off in his head. Like you could see it. And his feet just start to, you know, pitter-patter.

Kind of like Paid Manny, but Peyton Manning was under control. And he did it and two is not. And then he just panics and just throws it. And it was like, it looked like, a guy who wasn't throwing with his natural hand, his dominant hand, which he is it. I do like, I want to get to that in a second. I do like the take, kind of like Peyton Manning, but bad. The bad version of Peyton Manning. The non-dominant hand thing, is this, are we going to, are we going to go full KOC here? Is Tua throwing with the wrong hand? Yeah. I mean,

his dad made him a left-hander because he was left-handed, which is a weird reason to make someone left-handed, but like, I do wonder what does his arm look like? We see this sometimes. We see this in baseball. We see this in golf where guys for competitive reasons become lefty or righty. Could Kellan Moore fix Tua? I think him and

Kellan Moore has the same amount of arm strength as Tua. He'd probably be a better quarterback if he just went in there. So, wait. So are we just going full Ben Simmons here and we're just saying to it, he needs to become a righty? Yeah, he needs to go back to be a right-hander. This is all I'm saying.

You go into year five if you're the dolphins. Do you not just go to him and go, hey, I don't we try this one right-handed? It's kind of like, one of my dolphins' takes was that at the last days of Ted Ginn, they should have just put him back at cornerback because he was like one of the top high school

cornerback in the country. He's like, he's not going to, Bill Parcells hates him because he's soft. Just put him back there at cornerback and see what happens. All right. Wow. Nor are any questions about the dolphins

for Stephen Ruiz, who's already unleashed to two is throwing with the wrong hand and he's Andy Dalton Dick. should twoa just be their backup like a good backup quarterback right he'd be the best backup quarterback ever like that's he could be an elite backup quarterback okay there are worse futures for two

than being like chase Daniel oh no yeah okay that's that's a great that's a great NFL career chase Daniel okay I'm distancing myself from a couple of things here um okay you don't think I just I think that we have to just slow down a little bit. Yeah, we disavow.

No, I agree with some parts of this, but I want to ask, you know, I mean, we've seen a couple of quarterbacks pop later in the career, and I've been extremely upfront about the fact that I think that someone like a Josh Allen, that everyone's going to learn the wrong lessons of that. And we're all going to say, oh, you need to give a bad quarterback an extra year or whatever. Two is not Josh Allen. It doesn't have those sort of physical tools, not even in the same ball.

didn't go to Wyoming. Right. But he has had injuries. He hasn't had a ton of time on the field. You know, his senior is his last year in Alabama was cut short. The Brian Fitzpatrick thing was weird. He's got an infrastructure now where he should thrive.

But you're not, Stephen, you're not seeing any path towards Tua being a good quarterback. Can I say one thing? Like, when I comped him to Andy Dalton, I didn't think that was going to be like a grown worthy comp. Like,

a decent quarterback, even a good quarterback at times. He was in the MVP race one year. If you put enough a round two, I think he can be a good starter. I'm well aware. I love Andy Dalton. I'm in Dalton Stan. Apparently not because you groaned when I compared to a two- I don't. You don't, my thought process is

A, Andy Dalton wasn't a top 10 pick. B, he had everything going right for him, including offensive coaches, which the Dolphins do not have as good offensive coaches to Andy Dolton had that year. And I would say that, you know, part of this is you don't process for two years and you don't tear the whole thing down and lose to the Ravens by a trillion points and get embarrassed in the field and have

20,000 people in the stands. You don't go through all that pain for Andy Dalton as your ceiling. That, I think, is the frustrating part is the dolphins went through, we're in the wilderness. They thought they were out of the wilderness. And it's surprise, Ruiz report, Rip is that they got a guy was stealing as Andy Dolton. Well, you don't do it on purpose. No, no, no. But that's why I think the take is a little bit, is a little bit,

not shocking as the wrong word, but it's just like, once Dolphins fans realize this, they're going to be very upset. Well, yeah, but, and then, Stephen, you have to, this is your space to rip. But I just, we worked so much with Tua off of the,

I'm sorry, I've commandeered the rip. You know what? No, go, go. No, no, you. We work so much with Tua off of who he was in college. I totally agree. Everybody gets that wrong a lot. Like ourselves included.

It is a hard thing to do. And it just seems like there's such a disconnect. And I don't think he's in an ideal situation. I mean, they want to change where every single player on their offensive line plays. Like, it's not great. They are dead last in the past block. There's never been this acknowledgement in the conversation around. Tua that being one of the best college quarterbacks people have ever seen does not necessarily

translate to being an awesome NFL quarterback. I wonder what we would have thought of Tua if he doesn't come in during that national championship and throw that one game winning throw. Like it created this impossibly high bar for him that I don't think he was fair to him. And he's not like this quarterback that has these like amazing physical tools and he was never that guy. Like we should have seen this coming that he did have the ceiling. And I think a lot of people did before the draft.

Yeah, I agree. I mean, Mike Jenman was on the podcast saying Herbert was better. And, you know, I think that there were, there was a not small contingent that said that. But I just, I think conventional wisdom had, as you said, talked themselves into it as soon as they saw that throw against Georgia. Happens. I mean, like, you make it, you make a couple great throws on the biggest stage. I mean, for God's sakes, the Raiders had just been watching two college football games for the last four years. They just draft whatever guy on Clemson, Alabama looks good.

And so it's fine. That's, it's a version of recency bias. It's a big game bias. One of the biggest upsets is the fact that the Raiders never drafted one of the linebackers, like the slow linebackers that Clemson always has. They always have like a white linebacker who's really slow but really tough. How did it, how is one of those guys not ended up on the Raiders? The one guy is still there.

He came back, I think. You know the guy. Yeah. Yeah. The one guy. His name's like Scalcke. Yeah, yeah. No, I'm looking.

I'm looking. His name is, his name's Skalski. Yeah. Yes. He's got a GR next to his name. So you know, you know he's been around the block.

Oh, he's out. Nope. I don't know if he is. I don't know what his deal is. That's enough James Skalski breakdowns here. All right. Anything else in this game that stood out to you,

bud? No. Oh, I don't think, I think we focus on Tua being bad too much. meanwhile the defense is terrible and like that's supposed to be Brian Flores' thing like that would be my biggest concern because I think they can move on from Tua eventually or in the offseason. But if the defense stinks, then what is Brian Flores doing here? I agree. Are you going to is that, are you going to start the take?

Oh, I'm saying I think they need to move on from him. Okay, good. I just wanted you to start that take. Okay. I don't necessarily agree, but I needed that take out there. No, I think he has potential to be a good coach. I just don't think. it's going to happen in Miami. He needs to go somewhere else. Nora, you've spent a lot of time around Blurin for us. Takes. I don't think you should be fired. I think he's a good coach. I think

the Dolphin's season and trajectory is deeply off the rails and it's a real concern how bad things have gotten there. I still I mean, and I'm, look, talk about confirming your priors. Like,

I believe in him as a coach because of the things that I've seen him do. I don't think that they would not be justified in feeling like the results haven't matched what they expected to get and feeling like it's worth it to move on. I personally think the good outweighs the bad. There's also, you know, I still think the personnel issues are greater than the coaching issues, but there's a lot of issues. This is a pretty big blame pie to be divvy.

up here. Wow. Okay. So here's my take. I think this to bring everybody back for another year. And part of this whole process thing, right, is something Paul DiPodesta said five years ago at one of the conferences, Sloan or some. I wasn't even there, but I saw the write-up in baseball America. And I've thought about it ever since. And he said that analytics and real tear downs, real live, like, full tear downs are like going on a roller coaster. And you tell the owner, like, I want to go on this for, the roller coaster, excuse me. In this analogy, Paul Depodesta said that the children were the owners. And the owners say, I want to go on a roller coaster.

And they get on the roller coaster and they're like, can't wait for the roller coaster. And then it gets scary. And the owners say, I want to get off. Right. And Deepa Desi said to actually have a rebuild, you need an owner who when it gets scary, when the roller coaster gets scary, when the roller coaster gets scary, the owner does not say, let me off. And that's a rebuild.

And I kind of think like, okay, are they on the right track? No. but if you committed to having a full tear down, I don't think the answer is having somebody else try to in midstream build this backup. I think you can maybe try to get a quarterback. I don't wouldn't want it to be Deshaun Watson. Maybe you bring more competition.

Maybe you overhaul the offensive staff. But tearing it down, building it up for two years, and then saying, wait, let's let the end of somebody else who has completely different values have the next two years, completely different positional opinions, completely different scouting methods. Like, this is not going to work.

You're already rebuilding. You got to commit to it. That's my take on rebuilding. The back page of the New York Daily News says it has a picture of Zach Wilson. And it says 54 to 13 exclamation point. And it gets worse. And it gets worse. Stephen,

thanks, buddy. Thanks for having me. How many Funk Master Flex bombs did I earn? Solidly three. Yeah, I'd say. All right, nice. Isaiah's going to work on this for next week. All right.

If Isaiah comes through with this, I might send him a gift. A gift card. See you this week, bud. Thanks. All right, time for the reader question. What's your question? What's your question? What everyone to call it?

We got a lot of questions about games we already talked about and I didn't want to get. And it was all, most of it was stuff we addressed elsewhere. Although we did just get a question that just said, Eagles. A lot of those, a lot of those going around. We'll get to that midweek. Jake Diaz, however, asks, should the NFL adopt college overtime rules so that we can have two-point shootouts? So this comes on the heels of the Illinois Penn State game that went to eight overtimes,

nine overtimes, and neither team broke 20 points is from what I understand. So Nora, should the NFL change its overtime rule so we get eight, nine overtimes? I actually personally don't mind NFL overtime. because I like, I like that it prioritizes the coin flip. I think that's just a fun little chaos burger to throw into the situation. So you're a coin toss person. I love the coin toss. You're like Anton Chiguer.

What's the most of you ever lost in a coin toss? All right. So I think that part of this is the NFL coaches, aside from the, you know, the television part of it and all that stuff, they want it over quickly. They don't want the capability for it to go nine over time. By the way, it was 20 to 18 and 9 overtimes. Illinois 1. I think they like special teams being involved. I think they like defense being more involved

than being able to just not have the red zone defense, which basically is if you have one first down in college overtime. I think NFL coaches like the setup. But from a fun standpoint, I think the NFL, I think the college has it right. Like college overtime is electric. Yes. I think that's true.

I think what NFL overtime has is people complain about it, which I appreciate. There's a lot of complaints. There's a lot of like, well, they won the coin toss and both offenses were firing. So it's kind of like, we knew whoever won that coin toss was going to win the game. And there's just this sort of like undercurrent of backhanded complimenting that comes from the structure of overtime. One thing college does not have the NFL does is long walk-off touchdowns, like 60-yard walk-off touchdowns, which are so important to the overall cause. But on balance, I'm going college.

They're never going to change it ever, but it's just an interesting question off of last week. Next up with our NFL feed Tuesday's player podcast, Ryan Shazier, James Jones, and host of the full go, our newest ringer pod, Jason Gough. I'll be back on Wednesday talking about a big NFL topic. Nora will be back on Thursday with Nala Rubin, shapes and animals, as we already alluded to earlier. Pasta shapes and animals.

Pasta shapes. Friday show will be Ben, Stephen, and Kaelin Jones, our buddy, previewing week eight action. This show will be back next Sunday and every Sunday breaking down all the action the entire NFL season. Slow Newsday films on Monday with perhaps, perhaps the coolest guests we've ever had. Until I'm on it.

Until Nora's on it. on it. I mean, no, you can be on it whenever you want, bud. Well, thanks, Kev. I'm a little busy this month, but... We have a much cooler guest than you tomorrow. Thanks to Nora, Ben, and Stephen. Thank you to production assistant Isaiah Blakely

with additional production supervision by Arjuna Ramkevall. This has been the Ringer NFL show on the Ringer podcast network.