The Ringer NFL Show - Week 9 Recap: Kansas City’s Defense Continues to Impress, Bills Fall to 5-4, and Stroud’s Historic Performance | Dual Threat

Episode Date: November 6, 2023

Nora and Steven recap Week 9, beginning with another impressive showing from the Chiefs defense, this time over the Dolphins. Then, they talk about the Bengals' continued ascension in the AFC with their fourth straight victory, this time over the Bills (22:11). They then move on to winners and losers, where they discuss the Ravens dominating the Seahawks and the Eagles continuing to roll and taking control in the division with their win over the Cowboys (36:02). They wrap up by talking about Joshua Dobbs's improbable performance, which led the Vikings to a win over the Falcons, and C.J. Stroud’s historic performance in a win over the Buccaneers (1:09:28). The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming, please checkout theringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Hosts: Nora Princiotti and Steven Ruiz Producer: Isaiah Blakely Social: Eduardo Ocampo and Kiera Givens Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal and Conor Nevins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, everyone, it's Ariel Hawani, and I wanted to let you know that each and every week, I'm part of a great program called The Ringer MMA Show. I hosted alongside two absolutely brilliant minds. Their names, Chuck Mindenhall and Pizzie Carroll, and every Thursday, a new episode drops where we preview the weekend in mixed martial arts and react to all the biggest news. Plus, after every UFC pay-per-view, we give you a post-fight show. So this is what you have to do. Just follow the Ringer M-M-M-A show on your Spotify app.

So you don't miss an episode. We'll talk to you then. I'm Norm Pciotti. And I'm Stephen Ruiz. And Week 9 is in the books. We are officially more than halfway through the 2023 NFL season. Stephen, does that excite you? Does it feel finite?

Does it feel meaningful? Did midway through the afternoon slate of games? Did something click in your mind of just like, we've made it? We're at a milestone. I'm just like so. just in this that I almost forgot my name at the beginning when we did like the little intro. Like that's how deep I'm into this season. Like I'm happy we're halfway.

We're halfway there. It feels like we're already like 75% of the way there. But today was like a good midway point. Like the schedule just set up perfectly for us to hone in on these four games that mattered and the rest of the games you can just safely ignore. Yeah. So we're going to do the show slightly differently this week because it just felt like the slate of games warranted it. there were really four games that absolutely mattered, and we're going to go through all four of them,

Chiefs Dolphins, Bills Bengals, Ravens, Seahawks, and Cowboys Eagles. And then we'll talk about a little bit of news and notes from some of the other games that happened, but it just felt like there were four heavyweight matchups. And then, like, Brett Rippin was playing, and there were a lot of backup quarterbacks and just a lot of things that we didn't really need to structure an entire. podcast around. So excited to dive into these juicy matchups. And we're going to start with the headline. And that's the two AFC games, Chiefs Dolphins and Bill's Bengals. I think we should start with the early game, which was the Chiefs hanging on to beat the Dolphins 2114 over in Germany

this early morning. What was your takeaway? Getting up early. We're both on the East Coast. So it wasn't really that early. But getting up and watching this. fight in Frankfurt. I thought it was the Chief's defense. This was its first real test, I would say. It was its first real test, especially with like Chris Jones in the lineup. Obviously, they played Detroit, which has, I think the results haven't been as good, but Detroit has obviously been a good team in week one.

But this was the first time we saw them get to go up against this high power Dolphins offense with this fully formed version of the Chief's defense. And they dominated. There were a couple of drives where the Dolphins got a little bit going. with the outside run game. There was the one touchdown to Cedric Wilson where he kind of just moths. Right.

McDuffie. But outside of that, like it was just a dominating effort. Like in every level of the defense, the defensive line did their job. They got pressure on Tua. The linebackers missing Nick Bolton with Drew Tranquil in there. They played fast and physical in the run game.

The secondary did its job. The cornerbacks stayed tight to those receivers. The safeties, they made plays in both the run and the past game. Just a dominating. performance on all three levels. And that's my main takeaway. After the game, Peter King asked Patrick Mahomes, is this the best defense he's played with in the NFL? He said, I think it's the best defense in the NFL right now. I don't necessarily agree with it, but I could hear the argument.

I think it's either top two, top three type of defense. And the first part of that question, right? Like Mahomes took it in a different direction maybe because he didn't want to insult anybody that he played with in the past. The first part of that question, I think the answer is pretty unequivocally yes. There hasn't in the Mahomes era been a defense that has been so consistent at all three levels like you just described. They have had, you know, a feisty pass rush at times, but it's just so balanced. And the thing, I mean, McDuffie, part of one of the plays of the game, right?

The strip, fumble, return touchdown, crazy lateral scoop and score, which we'll talk about. because I do think that for Miami, this game is going to be defined by two plays. But broadly, this becoming a defensive battle and what that says about where Kansas City is, the thing that that strikes me is that McDuffie is kind of an emblem of what's amazing about what's working for them right now because I still, and we'll get to it, I have, they're not concerns. We need different words because it's the chiefs. But I think that there are real things going on that make. this offense more vulnerable than past iterations.

But they have a homegrown defense full of guys who have been there like Trent McDuffie that have sprung up around Patrick Mahomes, this guy who they're now paying $50 million a year and whose contract they have to, you know, operate their team in different ways and let go of certain offensive playmakers in order to make it work. But they have drafted and developed this really, really, really, good young defense where last year during the postseason, such a storyline was, can they get by with this young of a secondary? And they managed to do it. And, you know, that's, that was not without its growing pains. And it's still probably those things can come up again because a lot of these guys

are young. But we are seeing homegrown talent really carry them defensively, which is not just excellent because of the results that they have on the field and because they're able to hold an offense like Miami and check this way. But just from a team building perspective, it's so critical as they continue to try to, you know, build a dynasty around Mahomes that these are guys that the front office identified, brought in, and are going to be part of the team. So it's going to be part of the team. So it's going to be interesting to see if the Patrick Mahomes chiefs can win a Super Bowl as a defensive kind of minded team. It's a crazy idea.

And I still don't fully believe that they would do that without there being one or two or more results where it's just like, oh, yeah, Mahomes did some Mahomes stuff and they put up 40. but this offense, and that's a distinct thing from, you know, Mahomes is playing great. Mahomes is fine. This offense is not really built to win like that. And so it's just interesting to see them win in this different way. Yeah. For Miami, they were really impressive defensively too. And, you know, they have Jalen Ramsey back in the fold.

They also had Zavian Howard, who was out last week when Ramsey returned. What did you think about Miami's defense? Yeah, that was my other takeaway was like, you can use this game to bury the, the dolphins and like come up with these narratives about them not beating good teams ever. One, I don't know how true that is because they had some really big early season wins last year where they beat Baltimore in Baltimore. They beat the bills early on in the season. So I think that's kind of overblown.

But my takeaway was the defense. This is the second week we've seen them with Jalen Ramsey since he's come back. And it's a second straight week where they've been super impressive. And this time it was against Patrick Mahomes. And like we could talk about the receivers and the lack of separation. That was like a big talking point during the game. But for me, it was the offensive line that really cost the chief's offense in this game. Like when you watch the All-22, guys aren't getting open, but guys aren't given the time to get open.

Like the routes aren't developing downfield. And really, the Dolphins weren't playing like man coverage. It wasn't like the chiefs receivers couldn't shake. the Dolphins man coverage. They were playing a lot of zone. Guys were finding open spaces in the zone. It was just every time Mahomes hit the back of his drop, there was pressure in his face.

And it's because the Dolphins' defensive line is really good. The secondary is playing a lot better than it did early on in the year. I think Jailen Ramsey helps, even though they're not really utilizing him like you would think. Like when you think of a team with a top cornerback, you think of them like shadowing the top guy on the opposing team, playing man coverage. But they're really just playing a bunch of zone coverage.

It's a typical fan geo defense, but just working really well. But he helped. I mean, Ramsey helped on Kelsey, right? And they had, you know, they were doubling him a lot. But like, it's just like, this is how a Fangio defense is supposed to look. And we've seen it the last two weeks. And that's like a good sign going forward. The bad sign is this offense.

Whenever it goes up against a good defense, it looks ordinary. And it's a trend so far. And like it continued on Sunday in all the ways that it's looked before. Like this looked kind of like that Buffalo game. It kind of looked like the game against the Chargers on Sunday night football last year. The problems come down to a quarterback that can't create under pressure and an offensive ecosystem that is really delicate. I think Ben Solac tweeted this out that when this offense is humming, it looks unstoppable. But when you throw just a grain of sand into the mix, it just gets totally disrupted.

And then you have games like this. And it just so happens. It happens against defenses that are good that can match their game. talent. And I would put the chiefs in that category this year. Well, so let's talk about the two turnovers because this really, I think, made the difference for the dolphins. There's a world in which they win this game or where, you know, it really did come down to a minute left in the fourth quarter. But without the Tyreeks strip, fumble, scoop, and score. and without the sequence towards the end of the fourth quarter,

this is a different conversation. But those types of mistakes, I think, have become a little bit emblematic of this offense when things are starting to go south. I don't want to, look, Tyree Kill probably should have been, should have had better ball security. I think that was a really good play by Trent McDuffie

to strip the ball. And then the sequence that happens after that, all credit to the Chiefs to Edwards and Brian Cook, to Edwards in particular for having the presence of mind to think, I'm not going to get any further with this ball, so I need to flip it to my teammate and then Cook to just absolutely motor all the way to the end zone. That was an incredible play.

I'm not sure how much it says about the dolphins' vulnerabilities. No, I agree. Like, the thing you have to also throw into this is that they did have a trip across the Atlantic Ocean. And for an offense that is so predicated on timing, that could be thrown off. And we've seen in the past, past games, when this offense just gets thrown off a little bit, like, it gets really thrown off. So, I mean, it's so easy to write the narrative that, like, the dolphins can't win the big game. They're not ready for prime time or whatever. But I just don't think that's true.

I just think they went up against a better team on Sunday and they lost a close game that they had a chance to win multiple times. They had a chance to win in the second half and the offense didn't come through. But if these teams played again, I would expect another competitive game. Yeah, no, I mean, look, Miami ended up finishing the game averaging slightly more in yards per play than Kansas City. They had five Kansas City's number was 4.8. both quarterbacks finished with season lows and passing yards. So there was a lot about this where absolutely what the dolphins were able to do defensively held Kansas City and checked to the point where, I mean, this team, Miami can score fast, right?

So they can come back and win a game like this with relative ease. The two scores that they did have, they came back to back and it was just like, oh, all of a sudden the dolphins have 14 points. Obviously, when you take that over a 60 minute sample size, that's not a lot of points. that's not a good day at the office for an offense. But first of all, it is as many offensive points as the Kansas City Chiefs scored today. And second of all, it happened so quickly that it just reminds you they do have that in their bag. But I do, I feel at least like it's worth paying attention to the fact that there hasn't been a win against a good team this season.

just because of how it relates to that idea of when something starts to go wrong, when the timing gets screwed up, they don't have the counters and just everything seems to snowball from there. We'll, you know, give them time. It's a long season. This is still, to me, like the dolphins are still, the dolphins are a good team. The dolphins are a team that for as disappointing and frustrating as them giving this game away in some ways because they had a chance at the end and just absolutely blew it.

As frustrating as that is, the like 30,000 foot takeaway from this is, yeah, like the dolphins played the chiefs and they hung in there in the game, which is not really what you could say after the Bill's game after the Eagles game. But the stuff from the beginning of last season feels like a long time ago. And it does to me feel real in some way that they've had some of these great performances, but the six wins have come against teams with a combined record of 11 and 27. And I'm not saying that there's like an actual relationship between the strength of competition and the specifics of their offensive design that mean that when certain things just aren't humming. it gets worse from there. But both of those things, I guess what I'm saying is that both of those things give me questions

about their ability to win multiple playoff games against the cream of the crop in the AFC. Even though there is something you can take away from this game, that is, the Dolphins just played arguably the best team in the AFC, the team that, you know, you still probably have to go through the Chiefs to make the Super Bowl out of the AFC. And they played them pretty close. And they absolutely blew it when they had the opportunity. But with a minute left, if Tua hadn't missed Wilson on that third and 10, if the snap on fourth and

10 had been cleaner, if Tua had managed to do a little bit more with corraling that ball and trying to make something out of that play, if one of those things had gone differently, we could be talking about the dolphins beating the chiefs. And I just think we have to live with both of those things sort of being true at the same time. Yeah, we do. Because we do have to see them win one of these big games eventually.

It's sort of similar to the charges. Yeah, just win a game. It's not that hard. Just win a football game. Just win an NFL game against the Super Bowl champs. It makes it easier for us to say that you're still a decent team. Right. And that's what's really important here.

That last snap, man. It missed by about a foot. It was like a foot outside of Tua's frame. If he catches that, it's a bad snap, but if he catches that, the Chiefs were in cover zero. It was a SPAC special. It was cover zero, all out blitz, and Jalen Waddle was wide open. Like Jalen Waddle had the entire middle of the field wide open.

That's the difference in the game, was a foot, a snap that was a foot off, and Tua doesn't catch the ball. I think the dolphins are fine. They showed me enough in this performance. It's, if anything, like, I think more highly of them now that I've seen this defense in practice for the last two weeks than I did three weeks ago. When I did when they were riding high in five and one and just had scored whatever it was against, they scored 42 against the Panthers a couple weeks ago. Yeah, I don't feel any different. I agree with that.

I agree with that. I do want to say this two years ago after, I think the Chiefs played the bills on a Sunday night game and just got blown out by the bills in Kansas City. I wrote an article the following Monday, just ripping GM Brett Veach for this roster he had built. And the take was that he had made too many mistakes for Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reid to kind of make up for it. I was wrong. I'm an idiot in hindsight. I'm totally wrong. No, Brett Veach is a good GM.

I'm bad at my job. I just want it. I just want me a colpah. Sorry, Brett Beech. Thanks for letting us know, Stephen. holding myself accountable. Yeah. No, that's that, you know what?

More power do you? Look, you know, there's so much randomness and drafting, but I do think that I think that things have gone well personnel wise. The thing that is still irking me a little bit and what you said about the offensive line is really interesting. But I do still think that this receiver group is not what you would want it to be. And the thing is, I think the kind of talking point that has been easy to hone in on up to this point has been, well, they have Kelsey. But what can the rest of these guys do to compliment Travis Kelsey?

It might be time to talk about the fact that Travis Kelsey may not be entirely healthy. also got a whole host of double teams, but is also 34 years old, is not quite the athlete that he once was, and is a great player with great chemistry for Mahomes, who I absolutely believe is going to be there for them in the playoffs and will make plays and has that in him. And we've seen it this season.

He's had some great games. But I don't know that we are getting, a like vintage Travis Kelsey seats it. And when that's supposed to be the thing that we fall back on as like, okay, this guy who plays an offensive position that can be really important

and has a lot going for in terms of being able to do all sorts of different things on the field. But statistically usually isn't able to produce at quite the rate of like an outside receiver. There are just still some things that, that are more productive if you are a wide receiver who always lines up out wide. Plus he's a little bit older.

Plus it just hasn't quite been there. There's definitely some health stuff. And then the other compliments on the offensive side of the ball are not taking as much defensive attention away from him. The framework of, well, it'll be okay because as long as they have Kelsey, they can get by with these guys. it's not just that these guys are not totally inspiring. The framework of that, I am like a little about. Yeah, I think that's fair, but I just don't think it's a problem for 95% of their games. I think that's going to be a problem when they go up against the Ravens defense

and when they go up against Big Lou, a guy they've had problems against. Captain Lou? No, absolutely not. Absolutely not. Big Lou. It's sticking. But I think they're going to be fine. And I say that because, well, here's one thing.

Here's how I know it's the offensive line. And the coaching staff thinks it's the offensive line. That's the problem and not the receiving core. When it was third down, they kept guys into chip help the tackles. And if you weren't worried about your offensive line, you wouldn't do that. And if you were worried about making sure you got people open downfield, you wouldn't keep them in a block. You wouldn't just have three receivers run downfield. My other thing is like, I trust Andy to get it to get guys open against zone coverage.

I would get, I would be more concerned if they were seeing a lot of man coverage. But we saw Patrick Mahomes' response to that early in the season. He was just scrambling. Like if you play man, you turn your back to the pocket, he's going to scramble for, for a first down. If you have like an extra set of eyes on him to prevent him from getting outside of the pocket, then you can't double Kelsey anymore. And if you're, if Kelsey has a one-on-one versus man, he's probably going to get a first down. So I think they have like these.

deterrence in place that kind of protect them from having personnel deficiencies at the receiver position. I still think it shows up situationally, like when it's third down late in the fourth quarter and they take away Kelsey and now Mahomes is throwing a sky more and he's dropping the pass or not running the right route, then it becomes a problem. But I don't think it's like a macro level problem. I think it becomes a problem in specific situations and specific matchups. Yeah.

I think that's right. The bar for them is just so high. Yeah. All right. How about Bill's Bengals? Cincinnati, proving the Bengals are back crowd. Right, I think. In a 2418 win against Buffalo, Joe Burrow is 31 to 44 for 348 and two touchdowns. Great, great T. Higgins game, 110 yards for T.

What did you learn from this? I was ready to come on here and just like rip Sean McDermott and this defense and just read their eulogy and just be like, it's over. This defense, enough, I've seen enough. But they kind of rebounded in the second half. And we saw them stop the run game. And we saw them put so much on Joe Burrough's plate. The problem was Joe Burrow was basically perfect today. He had a couple of misses.

He had a couple of passes batted down at the line. He got caught with a couple, or he got fooled by a couple of blitzes. But outside of that, he was basically perfect. I still have the issue with this defense that it kind of allows quarterback. to be perfect. It challenges them to be perfect. And there are a handful of guys in the NFL, the guys you have to beat to get to a Super Bowl that are capable of doing that.

But they figured some stuff out. And I think the problem was more so on the offense in this game. That's the reason they lost it. I think we can definitely say the Bengals are back. Like this looked just like the playoff game, at least for the first half. My question is, are the Bengals better? And I don't think this game gave us any answer. We knew this passing game could tear up this.

Bill's defense. The question is the run game still, and they average like two yards per carry. So Mixon put the game away in crunch time with that last run, but they average two yards per carry. He had 37 yards total. My only concern if I'm a Bengals fan is like, are we going to be the same thing we were last year where it's just like Joe, everything's on your plate? It's just tough to get through January like that. You need a run game. I think we should reserve judgment on that a little bit because we've seen some signs of them trying to figure out a more diversified run game. But if you take, just to isolate this game, if the question is, are the Bengals better than they were a year ago, the result that you would take from this is like, the Bengals are the exact

same. Yeah. Because the way that especially the first half of this game went down, it was identical. Joe Burrow came out. he led a perfect touchdown drive, didn't miss a pass on the opening possession. It was the exact same thing that happened in that playoff game. I do think I agree with you that the bill's offense is the reason that they lost this game. But I also think that that happening and they did make defensive adjustments eventually.

But there was so much of this off season where the concept that they were trying to enact was Sean McDermott taking more responsibility and a heavier hand in the defense. And at least the implication was that that was intended to make them a little bit less of a lineup and play style of defense. And they were going to make it harder on these elite quarterbacks and find ways to throw wrinkles at these guys so that they don't know exactly what the bills are doing on every snap. And I don't know that like I am just not really willing to assign the partial credit of a half time adjustment when everything that they did in the off season in terms of how they approached defensive football was supposed to make that different was supposed to make that opening drive where a borough comes out and is just surgical not happen. And they are so injured. right but I do think for posterity they failed that test that's that's what makes it so tough is like everyone's hurt Matt Milano gets hurt Terrell Bernard gets hurt who's like calling the plays for the defense

now he gets hurt in this game tray white is heard obviously they trade for Russell Douglas but he's not in there yet they were just overmatched today like the Bengals just had the better team and it was a wide gap and like we're starting to see some of these guys in the secondary like like the safeties are who I'm talking about. They've aged. Like they're just not the players they used to be. They're not the players they were when this Buffalo defense was something to be feared. And it's just tough.

And now you, on the other side of the ball, you have an offensive line that's kind of hard to scheme around. It's kind of hard to play around. You have a quarterback who is the second best quarterback in the NFL. Let me preface this with saying that. He's one of the very best players in the NFL. But he's not a normal quarterback. And like it's always hard, it's always hard to judge this offense without having seen like the all 22 because like you never know with Josh Allen. There could be guys wide open.

He's just scrambling just because that's what he likes to do. Or maybe there aren't any guys open and he's doing it out of necessity. But like it's hard to say it from the broadcast angle. And I don't know. Like every week it's a different thing with this offense. And I think it's partially because the quarterback is just so damn chaotic. But it's like the best thing you got going for. This is obviously not something that has only happened in and.

games, but I think the officiating crew also might not know what's going on some of the time because that the intentional grounding call on what was like pretty clearly a miscommunication between Alan and the receiver was tough. Is it just me or have we just seen so many more of those? I feel like that's just become a thing. Like we see it once a week. We see a miscommunication get called as an intentional grounding. It's like the same play every time.

I feel like because it's, it's also. also because they're calling intentional grounding, which like intentional grounding, I feel like for years was like a unicorn. It was just like the most blatant throwaways would be like, ah, whatever, you know. This guy was like sort of near there. And all of a sudden it feels like it has, and I don't know of any point of emphasis or anything that the league is trying to do. but it feels anecdotally like it is being called more. And maybe it's it's just the prevalence of option routes and those styles of plays being all over the league where it's more likely to happen and the officials aren't used to dealing with it. But it does feel like it's come up a lot.

Yeah. And like outside of that call, it was just a rough day for officials in general. And I don't know about you, but I feel like I don't recognize these officials anymore as much as I used to. Like they got, like, see. Who are these randos? They snuck in a new batch of them and like they're not any good. I don't know any of these guys. I can't even complain about them specifically because I don't know any of them.

I haven't seen Jerome Boger call a game all. What happened to Jerome Boger? He's probably, I think he's somewhere. I love the idea of doing like a let's remember some guys, but with like Bill Vinovich. Yeah. That's what I would say. I don't know any of the refs. I don't know any of the punters anymore.

They're not like, who are the punters now? Is Shane Lekler still the best punter in the NFL? I have no idea. So I just, I just, I, I googled Jerome Boger. I guess he's not here. Yeah, no, he's, he's out. He's not. Do you remember this happening?

See, they just snuck in a new batch of refs without telling us. Wow. There's someone named, there's a guy named Adrian Hill. New refs. we need a yearbook. We need a, we need a, like, a directory with fun facts. Somebody's got to get on this. We got to get to know the new refs.

This is what's going on. We have to know who we're getting mad at every week. Like, who was the ref that called the intentional grounding? Who was the ref in the Cowboys Eagles game? We don't know. We should know. Show yourselves. I hold myself accountable.

The refs need to hold themselves accountable. Do you realize that we are a little bit making the argument for the refs should be on TV more. That's a good point. It's probably a good thing. It's an unfortunate thing that happened. Let's see. Bill's Bengals.

Oh, I know what I needed to talk to you about. Joe Burrow doesn't need to go to bed at 8 p.m. Right. I was having the same thought. Was he sleepy during the game? Right. But also, here's the thing. Here's the thing that I want to understand.

Is that like, there needed to be some follow-up questions on this, because the broadcasts spend a, fair amount of time talking about Joe Burroughs bedtime. There is going to bed at 8 p.m. where you turn the lights out and close your eyes and immediately try to go to sleep and you're hoping that you like drift off at 8 p.m. There is also a version of that where like Joe Burrow gets in bed and watches TV on his iPad for like three hours and then he goes to bed. That to me like sounds like absolute heaven. And if that's how he wants to live his life, like absolutely more power to him.

But then I go to bed at 8 every day. Yeah, exactly. Like we all go to bed at 8 p.m. Joe. I need like some follow-ups on the bedtime routine. Because if he's really, right. He works very hard physically. He has a lot for his body to recover from. I love sleep.

I love going to bed. It's the best. 8 p.m. is really early. Like Tom Brady didn't go to bed at 8 p.m. So let's say he's getting the eight hours, the typical eight hours. Is he waking up at 4 a.m? And my question is why? Like, what is the benefit?

Chris Collins was like gushing over and he'd be like, oh, yeah, he's so dedicated to his craft. Like, what is the benefit? Right. I mean, he could be, he's grinding tape at 4 a.m. Right. I don't think he's getting up at 4 a.m. I think the implication is that he's sleeping more than 8 hours a night. Okay, good.

Which he probably needs to. He print, like, I'm sure somebody in Joe Burroughs position needs like 9, 10. But even then, if he slept from 8 to 6, I guess that's not crazy. But I'm just, if that were me, I would just sleep from 9 to 7. It's just somehow more normal. Like 8 p.m. is just so early. Yeah. I mean, he's basically doing Zach Taylor's job for him.

So he's got to get extra sleep. Wow. Wow. Meanwhile, Zach Taylor's just, Zach Taylor's getting four hours of sleep and he's fine. He's like, ah, whatever. Maybe that's the problem. He's going to sleep at 3 a.m. I mean, also, yeah,

coach is famously, like, keep horrible hours. You know what I think is happening? I think Joe Burrow is just telling everyone that he goes to bed at 8 p.m. so that people won't bother him. Or it's just like, hey, Joe, like, I wanted to go over some stuff from the game plan with you. Like, oh, sorry, missed you. Getting some shut eye.

Turns off notifications and slack. All that. Definitely got the do not disturb. Chobro has notifications muted. Would you like to notify anyway? Classic. Classic. Anything else in this game?

No, not really. Like, I think my main takeaway outside of like the bills defense and all that stuff is that even though I said, I don't know if the Bengals are better. I just don't think it really matters in this AFC so far. I think they're good enough to beat the Chiefs, even if they're not better than they were a year ago. the only team that I'm the only matchup I'm worried about if this offense doesn't like evolve a little bit like find a run game. Yeah. You know, whatever is the Baltimore.

Yes. Say it. Yeah. It's the Baltimore matchup. Because we've seen this team take advantage of them being one dimensional. We saw that last year. And the Ravens defense is even better. It's more healthy.

Mike McDonald in the second year has taken it to another level. Like that's the one team that I would be worried about with this Bengals offense. But anybody else in the AFC. like they're fine. They have enough to win. They've proven that over the last couple of years. The Thursday night football gods have not exactly been giving lately. Thursday, November 16th.

I am excited. It is circled on the calendar. We will be there. We will be. I mean, it will be exciting. I want to talk about the Ravens. So let's take a break and then we'll come back. We're going to do winners and losers on Ravens Seahawks.

and Cowboys Eagles. But why don't we start with Baltimore after this break? Score early this NFL season with Fandul, America's number one sportsbook. Right now, new customers get $150 in bonus bets when your first $5 money line bet wins. So you can sign up in time for Monday nights game between the Chargers and the Jets in that game. I like the Chargers money line. It's always risky betting on a Charter's game. But going up against Zach Wilson, I feel comfortable.

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Brought to you by Uber Eats. Get almost, almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. Cornerback? No. Babyback ribs? Yes. Fake punts? No. Fresh produce? Yes. Uber Eats is an an easy win. So let's talk about the other winners and losers this week. As promised, starting with the Baltimore Ravens, who a week after a dominant win against the Detroit Lions, a contending team, they turn around and they beat the Seattle Seahawks, 37 to 3. Where do you want to start with this? Mike McDonald in the defense, like where we left off the last conversation, for a second straight week, an NFC team gets Baltimore's dose of reality. I, like, this is not the best defense in NFL history. I'm not saying that. It's not the best

defense I've ever seen personally. But I've been covering this league for like the better part of a decade now and it's the best coordinated defense I've ever seen. And it's not even close. I'm in all of this defense every time I watch it on film. It's like they are in on the, like Mike McDonald

I think I made the stroke midweek and I'm going to make it again. I don't care. Mike McDonald was on that Michigan staff. I'm not surprised that all this stuff is happening at Michigan with them stealing signs. It's like he's still stealing signs. The film from the Seattle game, I don't even think Gino or the offense played poorly in this game. I just think they didn't have a chance because the Baltimore's defense,

their defense was just so suffocating. They're on every throw. There's no room in the run game. If it's third and longer dead. They're just going to dial up some pressure where they get a free rusher and you got two seconds to find an open receiver. It's the best defense in the league. It's the best coach defense in the league.

It's the best coach unit in the league, offense or defense. Mike McDonald's should be a head coach right now. Who is Mike McDonald's Connor Stallions? I don't know. It's him. Like, maybe it's Connor Stallions himself. This is all a decoy. He's really spying on the Bengals right now and getting ready for that matchup we talked about.

But like, I have no words for this defense. Roquan Smith is one of the best linebackers in the NFL. That trade for him last year was one of the best moves of the last two years. So impactful. I do not care about how much they paid him. I don't care if he's an off-the-ball linebacker. I don't care about positional value. He's changed that defense.

He made Patrick Queen a better player just by being there. Kyle Hamilton, he doesn't have the numbers. He dropped in what would have been a wild interception in this game, but he should be an all-pro safety. The cornerbacks are playing out of their mind. Gino Stone leads the NFL in sacks. Jadavion Clownie is playing the best football of his career. Kyle Van Nuoy is a useful player.

Justin Matibuque is playing the best. He's going to get $100 million. in the offseason maybe. This is actually how, this is how we have proof that there's, that Meg McDonald is up to some Conner Stallions,

B.S. Kyle Van Nuoy, picked up in the middle of the season, just drop him in. He's getting back to back strips, strip sacks on, on Gino Smith. It's like,

he's been really productive for them for the last couple of weeks. The chargers are standing there being like, what the fuck? What is this? What's going on? They know something we don't. Like that's just what it feels like in Baltimore.

You said that this is, this is one of the best defenses that you've ever seen. There is like historical context is the way that we have to be talking about them right now. Because they are giving up, I believe our, our pal, Benny Souls tweeted this out. They're giving up a touchdown on 8.7% of their opponent's drives. and you can go back to 2000 in true media data, and there's only one defense that has been better than that

at limiting opponent touchdowns on a percentage of drives basis, and that's the 2000 Ravens. The year 2000, first of all, taking place in a wildly different world of how offensive football looked and worked and what the challenges that were presented to a defense were,

and what you could do in terms of hitting people was very different. So there is certainly historical, there's a historical case to be made that this is one of the best units we've ever seen. Now, obviously, like, we're nine weeks into the year and we shall see. But I think they're the best defense in football. They're certainly playing that way right now. I don't really think there's much of a case to be made for anyone else. I mean, the Ravens entered this game already the top team in DVOA and then they win 37 to 3.

So there is, we were talking about this a little bit before we started recording. There is this Ravens thing where it's always been something with them and it has always been something with them at times this season too, right? Like weird drops and losing games that they should have won. Some of that I still tune into their games and go, I wonder what could possibly go wrong. On a statistical basis encompassing the breadth of their output this season and certainly from what it's looked like the last couple of weeks. and let's bear in mind that this is a team that underwent a lot of change over the offseason, and it would be fair to expect that that would take a little bit of time to gel. In both of those ways, the picture that you get is this team should be a favorite to win the Super Bowl,

maybe the favorite. I'm, I think they're the best team in the AFC. I think they're the best team in the NFL. The Chiefs are still my Super Bowl pick because they have Patrick Mowens and they have Andy read and that's my default Super Bowl pick for the next decade. But all of the evidence suggests that this is the best team in the NFL, 115 point differential. No other team is over 80.

The bills are in second place at 80. That's a 35 point gap between them and the second place team. They should be undefeated right now. This is very funny for the five and three bills who are like in danger of losing their hold on the AFCs to the Jets of a few more things right the wrong way. I just wrote their eulogy. Right, yeah. Such a weird team.

That's what happens when you have Josh Allen as your quarterback. I'm going to keep repeating that. But I think there's a very good argument for this team being the best team. It's the defense I trust the most going up against any team, like from the coaches game planning,

from the players showing up and executing the game plan, from the star talent they have to match the star talent they're going to see in the postseason on the other side of the ball. It's the team I trust the most. The problem is still, like you said, that feeling, that unshakable feeling in the back of your mind that something's going to

go wrong. I don't feel that for the defense now. I think I've seen them overcome enough over the last two years since Mike McDonald's taken over as DC. I still have that feeling for the offense because it's still so Lamar centric. And this was another game. Well, this was a game where he got a lot more help in the ground game. They did do some option stuff, which helped those running backs run for nearly 300 yards. Keaton Mitchell. It doesn't matter. Never. had a carry for the Ravens in his life, ripping off 9 for 138, a 40-yard touchdown and a 60-yard run.

Yeah. The only reason they didn't get to 300 yards is because they kneeled the ball at the end of the game. It put them at 298. But even that's not my takeaway, which is crazy to say about a team that just ran for 300 yards. It was just the control that Lamar Jackson had

throughout the game. The numbers don't jump off the page, but it was just a professional quarterback in this. play. To me, it was like the game we saw him play against Cincinnati in September, where he wasn't throwing down field. There weren't like highlight real plays, but he was just always in control. And he kept that offense ahead of the chains and kept them in good down and distances against the Blitz. This had been a problem for Lamar in the past, the Blitz. Yep. And I don't know if it was his problem. I think it was more so on the offense and how it was set up and the skill players they

had especially at receiver, but against the Blitz today, seven for seven, nine point seven yards per play. 0.43 EPA per attempt on 2.1 seconds per throw. Like this is the quarterback that supposedly he couldn't be. This is why they couldn't put him in a real offense because he couldn't operate a passing game like this. He's just shattering all of these narratives. And the running game is still what it was under Roman.

Like Lamar's amazing. If not better, if not more. Like the, that has happened. because of the space that exists within this offense. I feel compelled to say it. I feel like we feel compelled to say it every week. This quarterback was just like randomly available this off season. Actually one of the wildest sliding doors moments,

I think of like either of our NFL consuming lifetimes. is this dude just being like you could go out and and try to make him an offer and who knows what would have happened who knows the Ravens could have matched whatever

blah blah blah blah blah if teams were so sure that they would have just matched any offer by the way then you should have made one and force them to pay more and more and more and no one did it and or 13. Smith didn't do it. And Bill Belichick didn't do it. And all of these teams, the commanders

didn't do it. Like, it is just unbelievable that 20 plus teams, like, have sort of no excuse for just at least taking a peek. And no one did it. And now this is happening. And he might just win MVP and win the Super Bowl. Like, that is so within the realm of possibility. And that would be pretty cool. It would be pretty satisfying, I think. So, you know, we'll see what happens. And I think we've gotten to the point where, like, Lamar's superpower is no longer just the fact that he's such a brilliant runner and player in space.

Like, the way he throws the football, we have to start putting him in the same conversation as Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen and Matthew Stafford and these guys with these arms that just seem capable of doing anything. There was a throw in this game. I think it was in the second half. It was like a play action play. Lamar's first read isn't there.

He has guys around him in the pocket. He has a receiver, not open, but on the backside with like three zone defenders all within like five yards of him, but he's still like kind of open. And Lamar just kind of like sidearms it without adjusting his feet at all, side arms it around a Seahawks pass rusher, like around his head because he's right in his face and just puts it in a perfect spot in between these three zone defenders, 25 yards downfield, just with a flick of a wrist. and like he never gets credit for having this this arm talent and this throwing ability that I think is exceptional. Like there are only like five other quarterbacks that I think can match him. And it's cool that we're starting to be able to recognize stuff just because he's in an offense that allows him to play like this now.

And he never was before this year. So even if this doesn't end with them going to the Super Bowl, I think this is a very important step for this franchise and Lamar Jackson's career. What about Seattle? Gino now has eight turnovers in the last four games. It seems like that's a little bit of a yellow flag, let's call it. And they went up against this defense that might be genuinely historically good. We already know full well that a team like the Lions in a similar position is,

as maybe not a cream of the crop NFC team, but someone who's threatening and has real playoff aspirations, just can't get it done against these guys. So there's that context, I think, should stop people from panicking. But what do you think is going on in Seattle? I mean, my takeaway from this game is they are clearly a cut below the top teams in the league. Like, there is a wide gap between them and the championship contenders.

They are not close to that. I don't know if they thought they were that team when they traded for Leonard Williams, but I just don't think they're close to being that team. I think this game is going to warp a lot of perceptions of what this team is and lead a lot of people to think they're worse than they are. Because like I said, I don't think the offense played that poorly this game. I think the defense happened at them. Like, there was just nothing open.

And I don't know what they could have done better. I honestly don't. They just went up against a better. team, a better coach team. And that happens in the NFL. And that happens when you go up against a team that leads the NFL and point differential. I think this is still a playoff team. I think the offense is still good. I think this can this team can still play with most teams in the NFL. And nothing from this game really dissuaded me from thinking that. The offensive line is an issue. Like they can't protect well enough to kind of get the most out of Gino Smith,

who needs to be like a drop back passer. The running game has been inconsistent. And we saw, that again today. They ran for under two yards per attempt. I think this is this was just one of those games. I think there are like larger problems if you're like viewing this team through the lens of like a team that could be contend for a Super Bowl. They're not that. But they're a good football team still. I don't like what happened today doesn't change that. It was just a bad matchup and the Ravens played as well as they possibly could have. And I think it exposed some of the stuff that that Gino has been kind of keeping a float for them where the Ravens generated pressure on over 54% of Gino's dropbacks.

And his results when pressured were tough. He was 5 of 13 for 29 yards in an interception. The Ravens sacked him four times. Generally this season, when the Seahawks offensive line hasn't been a strength and they've dealt with injuries and he has faced a lot of pressure, but he's been pretty good when pressured. He has avoided sacks really well, and it hasn't turned him into a total, you know, into a checkdown merchant. He will still test the deep ball. You just, that just wasn't possible in this game. There wasn't, the pressure was too strong. It was there too quickly.

there wasn't really an option for Gino to just sort of like move around a little bit, be smart in the pocket, step out a sack here or there and make some, you know, try to pick up chunk yardage on some shot plays and test some deep balls here and there. The time did not exist for those types of routes to develop. if he'd stepped out of one sack, there's another guy on the other set. Like, it just, it, that's been something that I think has masked some of the stuff that's going on the, on the offensive line for them. And there was just facing this defense and something about this game, especially as they were trailing by multiple and more multiple scores and needed to be passing. and it was clear what they were going to be doing.

It just, I think it got out of hand and he didn't have those options to kind of make it look a little bit more okay than it is, which I think he has been doing a lot of. So I think I'm most, I agree that they are not a team that's going to get blown out like this very often, but it does reveal some weaknesses that put a ceiling on what they're able to accomplish despite still being, I think, a good team, a team that's hovering around the top 10 of the NFL. Yeah.

I mean, I think that's the takeaway for this team. I think another point that just kind of illustrates how much was put on Gino's plate today was the fact that they, I think they ran the ball like 13 times and they had about six play action passes and everything else was just dropback, like pure dropback passing. And when you're going up against a defense that puts so much on your plate mentally as a quarterback like Baltimore's does, you're going to make mistakes eventually.

Like, that's just what they do. That's just kind of what Baltimore's defense does to quarterbacks. It happened to Joe Burrow when they played them earlier in the year. He throws that one interception to Gino Stone that just like, you're like, what is Burrow thinking? And it's just like they put so much mental stress on you that eventually you're going to make a mistake. And I think that's what we saw in today's game. And I agree.

I think like that's a perfect way to put it, is that Gino has been covering up a lot of things. But he's also the type of quarterback. And I think like Dak Prescott is another quarterback like this. I think Philip Rivers used to be a quarterback like this where they're going to go down swinging. Like if it's third and 20 and they're down by 20 points late in the fourth quarter, they're going to throw it downfield. They're not going to throw the check down to preserve their season long stats. And I think it just kind of like stacks up with Gino over the past couple of weeks because he's kind of been playing from behind playing with a team that is overmatched against better opponents and mistakes happen.

All right. Speaking of mistakes happening, our loser for the day is the Dallas Cowboys, who I think played another game a little bit like Chiefs Dolphins, just in the sense that they hung in there against the Eagles. This is not a game that I come away with going, oh, these are super mismatched teams. But Dallas, to me, just goes.

got crushed by their own mistakes. You have the Schoonmaker play where their fourth and goal attempt fails to convert by, I mean, two inches, something like that. And then DAC trying to run the two-point conversion and going out of bounds. This ends up being a five-point game. And they turned it over on a fourth down at the goal line and cost themselves. two points on the conversion attempt. So if you're Dallas,

I don't think you come out of this game going, oh, we can never beat the Eagles. We're a step below. We're never going to have a chance to compete with this team. And we are definitionally worse than them, which I think was the feeling after the 49ers game. But if you're in that locker room, you're still going, oh, my God.

We could have had him, but just couldn't get it done and messed up those little moments that end up costing the game. Where do you want to start with Eagles Cowboys? I think we have to start with Mike McCarthy. We talk about the mistakes in this game being decided by thin margins. But as Mike McCarthy has shown throughout his career, like when you put him in a situation like that, he's typically going to find a way to lose the football game. And it happened again today. Mike McCarthy coaching a tight game as it goes into the fourth quarter and gets towards the end of the game situation.

What could possibly go wrong? What, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, is getting the most ire from in terms of the coaching. I think it's just game time decisions, like game day decisions. I think the offense has been fine the last couple of weeks. I thought it was fine today. I thought the plan was pretty good today. Uh, the play calling was, is fine. even though I think it was salvaged by Dak kind of moving around.

We talked about that last week how Dak started to scramble a bit more and moved around. And we saw it a lot in this game, especially on third down. I still don't think he's getting a lot of help from the play calling, but it wasn't like it wasn't bad. It wasn't like Matt Canada bad. It's just these little one one percentage point decisions that he makes. And he always seems to make the wrong decision. And like that's my takeaway is like this game, these teams are really close.

And if you look at the stats, like every stat was basically identical. The difference was those little mistakes the Cowboys made, like you said. The problem is you can't change two things. You can't change the fact that the Eagles are now two and a half games up in the division. Like those games are in the bank already. It doesn't matter how much the Eagles struggled and how fluky some of your losses may have been. And you can't change the fact that Mike McCarthy is going to be your head coach going forward. So even if these teams are competitive.

I mean, you can, but you're not going to find like a viable replacement. I think, like, Dallas would be the favorite when these teams play in the rematch later in the year. But in the playoffs, like, I'm not going to try. I'm not going to pick the Cowboys over the Eagles in a game. You think Dallas would be the favorite when they play later in the year. Talk to me about that. Yeah, because I don't think the line was that big for this game. So, like, I'm just assuming they're going to Dallas.

Dallas seems to match up with them relatively well. It's in Dallas. I think that's enough. I don't know. I think it'll be favorite. Okay. I couldn't be wrong. By the way, just because I want to tell you this, it's not related to this game, but because

you mentioned Matt Canada, the New York City Marathon was today. And I had some friends running and popped out after the early game to like walk down the course and wave and do all that stuff. And I saw someone with a Fire Matt Canada sign just like holding it up. as all of these runners go by and and that was fun for me. I enjoyed that. Could you imagine if, can you imagine being Matt Canada?

That was my thing. Just people at random events that have nothing to do with football, just holding up signs that say you should be fired. Well, Brooke Priority has been wrote a really good story this week about like, the fire Matt Canada phenomenon and also how it fits into the legacy of like, she talks like Todd Haley of just like, what was it? What was that like when everyone wanted you to lease your job?

And one of the things that was in the piece was that like Snoop Dog is a huge Steelers fan. And so Snoop Dog is always like a really vocal opponent of whoever the embattled coordinator is. I do think the Matt Canada stuff has like reached a different sort of fever pitch. But I just thought that was very funny. And it was very funny to have read that and then be like walking down the path along the reservoir and see. a guy just being like, fire Matt Canada. Are we getting to the territory where Matt Canada might be underrated? No.

He's being discussed as like the worst offensive coordinator of all time. And there's got to be worse offensive coordinators than him. I don't think he's that bad. But anyway, back to the Cowboys. Speaking to someone who is that bad or was that bad today, Terrence Steele, he gave up nine pressures and gave him three sacks all by himself. Like, that's why the Cowboys lost. There's going to be.

talk about this game. There's going to be debates over Jack Prescott about how he didn't play it as well as he had in the first three quarters in crunch time. But they just couldn't block the Eagles when the game mattered. And that's sometimes football is simple.

And I think that's what decided the game. They couldn't block this Eagles pass rush. Hassan Reddick is fully healthy now. Jalen Carter is still dominant. Josh Sweat, got a big sack. We talked about the Bengals being the same team they were last year. I think we could say the same thing about the Eagles.

Same formula. I think it's good enough to get them where they need to go. I think the question will be answered in these bigger games later in the year when they're facing the Chiefs, when they're facing the 49ers again. But like for the regular season, I think all of like these teams that were there last year at the end of the year are going to be there at the end of the year. And the discussion around them is almost like identical to what it was last year. The one changes in Kansas City. It's coming for Philly, right?

because they have the buy now, which is probably coming at a good time because it does seem like Jalen Hertz is dealing with a little bit of a banged-up knee or something like that. And then they get the chiefs, the Bills, the 49ers, the Cowboys, the Seahawks. And then the season finishes with Giants Cardinals Giants, which that's, I mean, the Cardinals, who knows what the Cardinals are going to be like in week 16.

But there's, there's a nice soft landing there at the end, but in the interim, it's, it's pretty intense. It does seem like unless there's a real stumble in there, which there could be. But unless it's something pretty significant and they lose three of those games,

Dallas kind of has to, the real loss of this game is they kind of have to, kiss the division goodbye. Because two and a half games back is, I think, a lot to a lot to overcome, given how this Eagles team looks. And the fact that they have,

they've, you know, begun this sort of brutal stretch and they're still, they're eight and one. They're not a perfect team. But Hertz has been playing pretty lights out. Every Eagle's drive seems to last like 11 minutes and go 50 plays. And it's just sort of like you're going to get four chances in this entire game and you better make the most of them and they've still got a pretty good defense.

And if not, then sorry. But I do think that that the ultimate loss here is just that like the whole in terms of the playoff seating and have. having a chance to make that really competitive feels big enough that it seems hard to dig out of. Yeah, I think the NFC East race is open. I agree. Like the Eagles are just too competitive. I don't think they're going to get blown out at any time during this tough stretch they have.

And if they hang around, the things they do well are just like, I don't know how to put this. They're like so easy for them. Like the Bengals, it's kind of like really, it's really hard to run the offense, how they run it because like it's so contingent on like Joe Burrow having this connection with T. Higgins and Jamar Chase that it's like hard to execute. But for the Eagles, it just seems like everything is so easy. It's like their signature play has a 92% success rate. Right. And like their second best play is just like throwing a pass underneath to A.J. Brown and he does the rest. Like these are plays that are easy to replicate.

It's kind of like how teams talk in basketball. about three point shooting teams, how they're inconsistent because you live by the three or die by the three. Like the Eagles don't have that. Their game just travels. They can apply it to any game. The Eagles are just playing on one of those like kitty hoops. Right. Like I think they're like the perfect regular season team. So I don't see them giving up this division at this point. Even with what do you think doesn't other other than just like how the Super Bowl went last year, what doesn't translate to the playoffs? Oh, I don't even know if it doesn't. and translate to the playoffs.

I just think when you get into a shootout with Patrick Mahomes and you don't have Patrick Mahomes, like that's the problem. But it's a tough thing to overcome. It's a tough situation. I mean, Jalen Hertz did a pretty good job of it in the Super Bowl. I mean, Jalen Hertz, look, I don't want to play this game, but Jalen Hurts uncorked of that touchdown pass to Devonte Smith on the sideline.

And that was a better throw than anything Mahomes did today. That's a good point. there's a line for the Cowboys and Giants game out for next week. I don't want to steal Bill's gimmick, but you want to try to guess how big the point spread is. Is it, is it? I'm like wondering if it is,

is it like 21? No, it's only 15. I'm actually kind of, 15 and a half. But the point total is only 39 points. So they're expecting a 40-point game, but the Cowboys to win by 15 points. Like, I got to do the math there, but that seems like a depressing output for the Giants offense. I called Tommy DeVito, Danny DeVito again today, but not as a joke.

I just was like, Danny DeVito. And then someone gave me a weird look. And I was like, ah, Tommy. Did he play again? Daniel Jones tours Azel. I was joking. I knew Tom. Davido played. But at a certain point, I looked up and there was like the bottom line had the

giant score and I saw Tommy DeVito had stats. And I was like, what is happening? How does he keep playing? Then I saw the Daniel Jones. It's a, it's a pretty dark timeline. All right. Anything else here before we wrap it up and cover some of the other nuggets? No. Should we should we? I did have a question. Should we rank the AFC teams? Of course. Why not? Why not? Love to rank.

Love to rank. Do you want to go? Do you want me to rank? I want you to rank first. Okay. The Baltimore Ravens are number one. The Kansas City Chiefs are number two. The Cincinnati Bengals are number three.

Do the dolphins and the bills. The dolphins are fourth and the bills are fifth. Okay. I'm with you. No need for me to do my list. That's my identical list. I was hoping that you would put the dolphins ahead of the bills. I've kind of done with the bills as legitimate Super Bowl contenders.

Is that too early? No. It's no. I don't think so either. I mean, they're going to win the division. Like, the jets are not doing this. The jets are not pulling this off. Aaron Rogers is not coming back.

There won't be a happy ending. That said, I, I, It just, yeah, I don't, they just don't have it. They don't have it offensively. The defense I don't think is, it's going to have it in the games that matter the most. I do, like, they are just weird enough where I don't want to totally count them out. But I'm, I'm with you. I kind of, I kind of think it's, they're just, they're so hurt.

I don't want to bring it up again, but like, the 13 seconds thing, man, that was the end, right? That was the end. We didn't know it at the time, but that was, that was it. It really has had a very long legacy. Someday we'll get the full. We'll understand the psychiatric toll and all of that. I know what the toll is. A guy scored a field goal in 13 seconds with the Super Bowl in the line.

I guess it was no, the AFC championship. Like that's enough. I don't think we need a deep dive into it. Like that messes you up. Yeah, but I want to see the darkness. Okay. Up close and bris and all. All right, let's take another break.

We'll come back. Do a little Josh Dobbs talk because that's what everybody needs an hour into their podcast. Thanks again to our sponsor, Uber Eats. With Uber Eats, you can get groceries, alcohol, and everyday essentials in addition to food from your favorite restaurants. In other words, get almost, almost anything with Uber Eats. Official on-demand delivery partner of the NFL. Order now. Alcohol in select markets and 21 plus to order, product availability may vary by region.

CAP for details. Okay, we're back. I'm going to call this the best of the rest segment. Starting with Josh Jobs, who I think put a pretty strong argument together this afternoon for practice, just being completely overrated as an exercise as a concept. This man arrived in Minnesota on Wednesday. Didn't know, like, anybody's name, didn't know most of the plays, was just like getting fed instructions and adjustments.

through his headset, like constantly throughout this game, but ends up executing a comeback win against the Falcons, Vikings win 31 to 28. I didn't see a ton of this game, to be perfectly honest, live just because we're watching the other ones. But I am genuinely very excited to go back and understand a little bit more what went on here. But all of the quotes coming out of Minnesota are just like,

absolute gold chef's kiss with Dobbs just being like, I don't know anything about this offense. I've never, I know nothing. It's like bordering on Josh Dobbs being like, I've never played football before in my life before today. Like that's where am I? Like who are you people? How did I get here? He was taking snaps on the sideline trying to learn the cadence. He was asking receivers what their routes were in the huddle, according to Jordan Addison.

It was amazing. I called bullshit on our very treasured sponsor Uber Eats. They say you can't order a cornerback on Uber Eats. The Vikings ordered a fucking quarterback and won a game. He is. I mean, Josh Dobbs is becoming the like dial a backup. It's insane. And they really, Kevin, Kevin O'Connell, he's stolen my heart.

I'm convinced that he's a great coach. And it was very easy to do. And this is how he did it. They started spamming RPO's and Zoned Reed in the second half with Josh stops. That's all you got to do. See, that's my, that's my prescription for every team that needs a quarterback.

Get a quarterback who can run zone read and run RPO's and just make your offense out of that. The Vikings did it on the fly in the second half and won a football game against a defense that ranked in the top 10 in an EPA coming into the week. It wasn't like they beat some bum defense. I'm glad this happened to the Falcons. Because I do think that, like, Arthur Smith needs an attitude adjustment where whenever he's asked about anything, he's like so offended to have been, have his divine football expertise questioned and always goes on these like weird passive aggressive. They're not rants, but he's just like snippy about how nobody could possibly know anything about football other than him and that nobody understands how hard it is and how long it takes.

to install a system and to build it the way that you wanted to. Josh Dobbs got here on Wednesday, okay? Buddy, like, he doesn't know the cadence. Like, he's just like, who are you? Okay, let's play a football game. And they won. So I think that's, but that was probably a healthy lesson. No Justin Jefferson, no Osborne down to their third receiver.

down to their fourth quarterback with no practice reps and the Falcons lost to this team. That's a tough. And doesn't even crack like the top 10 of their worst losses in the last like five years either. Yeah, but it is like one of the funnier ones. It is. Which is saying a lot because they've had some. All right. And in less comedy of errors news.

CJ Stroud. Very good football player. Set the single game rookie passing record today with 470 yards in a 3937 win against Tampa Bay. Also seemed like a very exciting game. The highlight real for Stroud is just insane. And the Texans are not a competitive enough team. like they're just not ready. They have too many holes on the roster to truly compete.

But if they make, if they have like one good off season and just plug a few of those holes, all of a sudden this team is going to be downright scary. And I think we've been right to talk about some of the Jaguars moves within the context of like, what are the next few years in that division going to look? like Stroud is really good and is already doing things that just rookie quarterbacks just don't do. I mean, literally he set an entire record. Having a quarterback like this is how you get really good, really fast in the NFL.

And it just seems like the Texans are on their way. He's doing things as a rookie quarterback or he did in this game that I've only seen like Andrew Luck and Justin. and Herbert too as rookies. And he's doing things that we didn't see him do in college necessarily, whether it was the fact that he didn't really get the opportunity to do it, like with the creative stuff, because you just didn't have to do it in that offense at Ohio State or some of the processing just because it's not possible at that level.

Like you don't ask a college quarterback to process like an NFL quarterback. So it's not just that he's playing well. It's just that he's putting things on tape that we didn't see or that we question. before the draft. And like, that's how you get, that's how you change an opinion on yourself. That's how you move the needle. He's doing that. And like, I agree with you. I, like, with your take on the Texans, there's no perfect way to build a contender. But the formula of having a smart offensive coordinator, which they have in Bobby Sloick, who came over from Kyle Shanahan system, a good young quarterback, a talented young defense, and a smart defensive coach is usually

a formula that works and that leads to a lot of wins and the Texans have all of those boxes checked in year one of a rebuild. I like I don't care what happens for the rest of the year, barring like CJ Stroud totally falling off the cliff or getting hurt. This is a good year. This is a win for the Texans. This is a positive step in the right direction for a franchise that has needed one of these steps desperately over the last couple of years. All right. Last thing I think that we should hit. Uh, so the, The Raiders beat the Giants 30 to 6. Tommy DeVito, Daniel Jones injury. We don't need to talk about some of that stuff anymore.

But I think probably people have seen that there was a lot of cigar smoking in the locker room. And somehow I don't think what was being celebrated was shutting down Tommy DeVietz. I think the vibe in Las Vegas seems to be jubilant following the firing of Josh McDaniels in a way that feels notable. There's always something when a coach who's been going through it and doesn't seem to have a great relationship with players ends up moving on or getting the axe or whatever. I don't know that I've ever seen anything quite like this where they are just openly celebrating. I've never seen cigars in an NFL locker room in November. Yeah.

Yeah, this is different. This is different. And let me say something about the Raiders. They're four and five. They're one game back with the Buffalo Bills. Okay. All right. That's all I got.

That's the end. That's my. That's my next-gen stat. It feels worth mentioning that there was a report from Jake Laser before the game that included an anecdote about one of the finals. Let me stop you. Worth mentioning, we should have led the show with this anecdote. Yeah.

It's one of the most insane things I've ever heard. I actually like maybe we should just stop talking about this right now. And like tomorrow we come in and pitch like a five-part podcast series on the Jake Laser report about what. Josh McDaniels did in a meeting on Thursday. It can only be described as like one of those fake reporter tweets that is like so clearly made up like Joe Judge was like fighting Giants players on the side. Like you know those tweets that come out. That's what I thought this was.

This was a ball sack sports tweet. Yeah. It had to have been. Except except it was reputably reported. The story if anyone missed it. Um, was that in the like the final week of the McDaniel. tenure, there was a team-wide meeting to air grievances, which, by the way, already a sign that things are not awesome. And Josh McDaniels had asked Antonio Pierce to kind of serve as his defender proxy person to speak on

his behalf in the meeting because the players were just unloading on him. When there's a roast, you have a roast master. And that was Antonio. Right. They come up and they introduced the dais. That was Antonio Pierce. Martha Stewart is there for some reason. This turned into the Comedy Central roast of Josh McDaniels.

I don't know if that was the plan, but that's what happened. I mean, I feel like now we could have a roast of Josh McDaniels. So the report is just everyone's unloading on the guy. Antonio Pierce gets up and he makes an analogy about just controlling what you can control and that Josh is trying to install a culture. And I think the implication was like defending the idea of installing the quote unquote Patriot way somewhere that's not New England by saying that like teams come out of. nowhere and and you don't have to be the dynastic patriots to like be able to do the same things or hang with them and he makes an example out of the giants team that beat them in the

undefeated season in the Super Bowl and um just said like we believed we could beat anybody and then we played the Patriots and it was possible and we have to believe that here too So everyone thinks this is very normal, but then according to Jay Glazer, the only person who is not satisfied is Joshua Daniels who goes over to Antonio Pierce and says, don't ever talk about the Patriots like that. Are you disrespecting the Patriots, bro? That's what he said. Are you disrespecting the 2007 Patriots? Unbelievable. I don't have a take.

I'm at a lot. Like, just an unbelievable thing to say. an unbelievable reaction to have. The arrogance of like, I don't, I want this to be just like a funny insane thing that happened. But the arrogance to be in that situation with how bad of a job he had done and be like, don't you dare disrespect my 2007 Patriots is just, it's really my. it's really mind-boggling.

He was doing it for Benjamin Watson and Lawrence Moroni and all those heroes on the 2007 Patriots. Oh, man. Good stuff. Anything else from today before we get out of here? No, I'm not going to mention the Panthers quarterback throwing three interceptions and looking generally very small all afternoon. I won't bring that out. All right.

Well, maybe we'll get to that midweek. That'll be our other five-part series. The Josh McDaniels report the Panthers quarterbacking situation. This has been dual threat. We will be back on Thursday. Next up on the feed, Sheal and Ben will have extra point taken

their deep dive of week nine. Thank you to Kiar Givens and Eduardo Ocampo for their work on socials. And Isaiah Blakely for producing this episode with additional production supervision by Arjuna Ramquipal and Connor Nevins. Must be 21 plus and present in select states Fandual is offering online sports wagering in Kansas under an agreement with Kansas Star Casino LLC,

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