The Ringer NFL Show - What Are the Most Important Things About the Conference Championship Games?

Episode Date: January 26, 2022

Kevin opens by speaking with The Athletic’s Sheil Kapadia about the conference championship weekend matchups, Shanahan vs. McVay, and Sean Payton’s future. He is joined by The Athletic's Chiefs writer Nate Taylor and ESPN's Bengals writer Ben Baby to discuss the Week 17 matchups, “nuggets” for the AFC championship, and their predictions for the game.  Host: Kevin Clark  Guests: Sheil Kapadia, Nate Taylor and Ben Baby  Associate Producer: Stefan Anderson Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I'm Derek Thompson, long-time writer with the Atlantic Magazine on tech, culture, and politics. There is a lot of noise out there, and my goal is to cut through the headlines, loud tweets, and hot takes in my new podcast, plain English. I'll talk to some of the smartest people I know to give you clear viewpoints and memorable takeaways. Plain English starts November 16th. Listen for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. It is the Ring Runn-Fell Show, part of the Ringar Podcast Network. I'm Kevin Clark. Great show today.

What you need to know about the AFC and NFC and NFC chance with games ahead of some of the most compelling games we've seen in a long time. Chiefs versus Bengals, Holmes versus Burrow, and Rams versus 49ers. Grappolo versus Stafford, McVeigh versus Shanahan.

Really intriguing stuff. So we have Shil Kapati from the Athletic, joining us talk about all the games, big picture stuff, plus Sean Payton and the shadow that he's going to cast over the next few years of coaching cycles. Really interesting discussion. And then Ben Baby from ESPN covers the Bengals.

Nate Taylor covers the chiefs for the athletic. They join us together. And we go through kind of the things you need to understand about that particular matchup. Really in-depth stuff, really smart stuff. I learned a ton. Let's get to Shield. All right, Shield Capaddea from the Athletic. We were just talking before we came on.

The highlight of Shield's year is the offseason when teams start doing stupid stuff. Are you excited about that? Only a couple months away, a couple weeks away, probably. Absolutely trades, free agency moves, weird justifications for things that they absolutely should not do. Fan bases talking themselves into these things working out. That's my time. February, March, April, May, you know, conference championship weekend Super Bowl, that's fine. But that's really my time to shine, I feel.

I mean, really, it's disappointing for you to see teams that are well run, teams with good quarterbacks, teams calling the right plays. That's not really what you're after. You're after like absolutely awful decisions, right? It's a good balance. You need like a handful of those teams so you can say like, look, they're doing it the right way. But yes, do not like go all NBA on me where, you know, all every organization is run well and you have nothing to criticize. I do not want that. Wait one second.

Not every organization, but it's much, it is much different. You're talking to an Orlando magic fan. He just dropped every NBA decision is a good one. Wow. Okay. So we are going to preview the two games week, the four teams. week. We're doing something similar in the other segment as well. We just want to

teach the listener as much as seemingly possible about these teams, about these games so that they are the smartest person in the world at their... Do people have NFC and AFC champion game parties? I don't think they do. I guess you would if you're in a town. Nobody gets together. That's why the rate... Like 60 million people watch these games

because everyone just watches them alone. All right. So we'll start here. I want to start with the NFC. Shanahan v. McVeigh is as interesting a coaching matchup because there is a moderate football. You start where with this game, too? Where do we start with this game?

You know, I think if you look at it, I look at it from the 49ers defense against Matthew Stafford. I mean, what D'Amico Ryan's has done with that group. Like, I think there's this perception that that's like a loaded defense. It's not a loaded defense. They have like three great players. And then they have a bunch of guys that really probably anyone in the league could have had over the past few years. And they've had, what, a top five, top six defense for the entire.

season. They go on the road twice here and they win those games. And so to me, that is the most interesting aspect of this game because my thought on Matthew Stafford going into the postseason was I don't think he can string together three games that are good enough to get the Rams to the Super Bowl. When you watch the Rams in the second half of the season, I thought he's making too many mistakes. This offense is too uneven. Well, he's had two awesome games so far in the playoffs and now he's won away. So that probably is the most interesting thing to me. Josh Norman is playing for this team. I had Norman.

I wanted Norman, I asked nicely on this podcast like six weeks ago for Josh Norman to retire. Because I felt that every time he was on the field, he was doing something embarrassing. I forget what it was. He did some memeable thing. He got stiff-armed, obviously, a couple years ago. But, like, that's where we're at. And D'Amico Ryan's is such a good coordinator that he's won with scheme. It's really unbelievable.

You said they do have three great players. I mean, there's just some elite blue-chip talent on that defense, but not a lot of it. Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, Joey Bosa, Eric Armstead, Fred Warner, those guys are fantastic. That's the list. That's the list. But, I mean, when you have a defense where you can't play man, I mean, they cannot play man coverage. If you look at it statistically, whatever, they're among the two or three worst teams in the NFL. They've stopped playing it to a high degree. I mean, that takes out like a chunk of an, of a defensive coordinator's playbook. Not that they don't play any snaps of it, but, you know, they really have to rely on playing a lot of zone coverage. They don't blitz a great deal. And you can just see they're so well coached. They know how to, you remember those Seahawks defenses used to talk about when you're playing zone. Everyone's got to be on a string where one guy's moving here.

And that's what you really see with the 49ers defense. They don't have these huge voids where they're giving up easy completions. And so can they do that one more game against McVeigh and Stafford for a third time? That's going to be fascinating to see. Hey, you wrote a piece a couple weeks ago about how teams should hire head coaches. And obviously, we've both done a lot of reporting on that. It's a grim system. No one has figured this out.

D'Amico Ryan's seems like a home run. Yeah, as much of a home run as there is. I mean, he checks all the boxes. You know, you have leadership qualities. I know I covered him as a player and it wasn't, you know, it's not just one of those things that you say. Like, I remember once asking him because Chip Kelly would always talk about, like, you know, Damico Ryans is like the greatest.

And I went up to like Damico Ryans. And I was like, your connection with Chip Kelly. Like, you know what's so special? about it. And he didn't want to say it, but he was basically like, the gist was every coach loves me. Like, I'm the most easy to coach guy there is. Teammates love him. Like I said, what you want from a coach is who can do more with less because you're not always going to have the best players.

You're not always going to have the edge personnel-wise. And he's shown that this year that he can do more with less. So yeah, I think there are certainly a lot of things that are attractive about D'Amico Ryan's as a candidate, especially compared to some of the other guys you're seeing being considered. First conversation I ever had with Holly Roseman was about to make a run. He had just made the trade. I just got on the NFL beat.

Great trade. Makes me heel old now. Okay. So let's flip this for the Rams per sec. Where do we start? Well, I think flipping the other side of the ball, Rams against Jimmy G. Obviously, you look at it on paper and you go, he's going to have trouble. But I do think a lot of times, and I know you asked about the Rams and it'll get to that.

But I think. No, no, no, no, please. Let's, let's, let's, let me tell you a minute. When you're talking about Jimmy G. You're also talking about the other team, okay? There is, those two things are extremely connected. Well, I do think we asked the wrong question with Jimmy G. And so this was one of like the stats when you asked me to do a little prep here.

If you look at the 49ers offense over the last three years, just the snaps that Jimmy G has been on the field, they've had the sixth best offense in the NFL. So oftentimes we ask the question, is Jimmy Garoppolo a top. level top six, top eight, top 10 quarterback, whatever. The answer is no. I mean, I don't think anyone's taken. If someone wants to have a hot take and take the other side on that, I would love to hear it.

I would not be that person. But that's not really the question that matters in this setup. It's can the 49ers have a top six, top eight offense with Jimmy G? And the answer has been like over a big sample three seasons that the answer is yes. When you have Kyle Shanahan and Debo Samuel and George Kittle and Trent Williams and the other players in putting him in that position, the answer. has been yes. Now, if you're a 49er spin, are you terrified that there's going to be two, three, four plays in this game that just he botches and he turns the football over?

Yes, absolutely. I mean, it's not, it's like the lowest level of football analysis. You'll find this on any pregame show on Sunday turn. You know, who's going to win the turnover battle. They got to win the turnover battle. That's right. So, but it's like really true in this case. I mean, if he doesn't turn it over, they generally move the football well. Debo and George Kittle are amazing players who just get the ball in their hands. they're going to do things. But he's probably going to have a couple plays where either the Rams are going to, you know, produce those turnovers or they're not.

And that's going to determine who wins the game. When analytics was first starting in the NFL, like actual analytic staffs, one of the young analytic staff who told me a story that kind of cuts to the heart of everything that goes on this league, or used to go on this league, at least, is that he was sitting in his office and nobody on the coaching staff ever gave him the time of day, ever. and then one day one of the assistants walks in

and the analytics staffer gets so excited and the coach goes I have a question and analytic staffer parks out and he says can you crunch the numbers on our record

when we win the turnover battle I don't know how much it's evolved from that honestly he was crestfall and he was like I think that's like

on ESPN like like that's just in the game splits so you can just I'll just send you a profile reference link. So that's where we are with Turnover Battle. It's important. Hey, it's important.

You got to win the Turnover Battle. Yeah, it's fascinating. Stafford in particular had that run of pick sixes and, you know, Doug Far had a great piece a couple weeks ago about how basically they were sitting on his first read. What I guess the question is, you expect Jimmy to make far more mistakes than Stafford. Is Stafford out of that cycle? like compare these two quarterbacks as far as volatility goes? I don't.

I actually, you know, I think Stafford makes a lot of mistakes and even just going back and watching those first two games against the 49ers. He certainly did multiple interceptions. I think in both those games, although one was not his fault. So like I think, you know, Stafford's high level game is definitely higher than Jimmy Garoppolo's high level game. But if you, if you told me, hey, Stafford's going to throw two interceptions in this game and Garoplo is not going to throw any and the 49ers are going to win, that would not

shocked me. And so Stafford's such a high variance player to me. I mean, he's on a heater right now. When he's going well and McVeigh's run into the end zone and the ref has to push him back to the sideline, they're sort of like this team where you're like, wow, they can beat anybody right now, but they go into these lulls. And I do think part of it, I think

McVeigh, like, he gets conservative in some of these games. I mean, even that game against the Niners in week 18 if you look at it, the Rams had the ball there on a late possession. And I think they had a third and seven, where if you convert there on third and seven, you're moving on.

The 49ers are not even in the playoffs. And he handed the ball up, which I understand. You want the 49ers to use a timeout. But to me, it's like, this is the great judge of how much a coach trusts this quarterback. Third and six, there's like a minute 40 on the clock. You can actually literally end the game with a six or seven yard completion. Are you going to trust your quarterback to do that?

Or are you not going to trust them to do that? And he didn't trust him to do it. It's like you trade all these picks for a guy. You know, you've talked him up. and he's playing great and you don't trust him here. And so the game management aspect of this is really interesting to me. Because both McVeigh and Shanahan, if they have warts, I mean, that's what it is. We can point it out whether it's clock management, not aggressive on fourth downs,

taking the field goal when you're inside the tent. All those things apply to both these guys, which you wouldn't really think would be the case, you know, these two young and up young head coaches. But I think that's another big thing to kind of keep an eye on here. Why does Shanahan own McVeigh? I don't know. I don't have a great answer. But I mean, to me, like, I'm going to give you the most boring answer, which is there's just some randomness involved in a small sample of six games.

And I know this is terrible podcast. I think you're one of the smartest people in football. Your last two takes have been got to win the turnover battle. And there's some randomness. I mean, listen, they won an overtime last in week 18. Like, that's a coin flip game. There have been some one score games in there in the sample of six. It probably could just as easily be three and three.

and we're not having this conversation. So whatever. That's my take. I'm texting my producer to see if we get Warren Sharp on for the rest of this interview. Go ahead. Love you, buddy.

All right. So let's go big picture. Who do you expect to win? I think I like the 49ers to cover. It's three and a half. I think of everything in terms of who's going to cover. Right now, I think I'm leaning 49ers.

I don't know. I don't have a strong take about it. The Rams are the favorites. But I think it's going to be a coin flip game. Like I said, I went into the postseason not thinking the Stafford could string together these three games to lead them to the Super Bowl. And so I'm just going to kind of stand by that and see if you can or not. Not that I, you know, imminently trust Jimmy Garoppolo, but they're not going to ask Garoppolo to do as much as the Rams are going to ask Stafford to do. Any other stats in this game before we move to the next one?

Cooper Cup against the Blitz, 636 receiving yards. most by a wide receiver in a single season over the last 15 years. Now, the 49ers don't blitz a lot. And so it's not like this is going to be 12, 15 plays, but there's going to be a handful of plays. We saw it with Damiko Ryan's on that last third down against the Packers. He sends the two safeties on a blitz. There are going to be some high leverage plays in this game

where he's going to say, listen, I'm willing to gamble and take a risk here. And we'll see what happens. And the Rams, they go to Cooper Cup every time against the ball. blitz and double him. We saw the 49ers do that with Devante Adams, but those like handful of plays to me are going to be really key. All right. Let's flip to the other side. Chief Spangles. It almost feels weird doing any analysis this game after what we saw on Sunday. Like that transcended the sport, Mahomes and Allen, and now they have to play a normal game against a team that's not made up of offensive gods, although I love, love Joe Burrough. I love Demar Chasen, and we're

going to get to that more in depth in the second segment. But the thing that stands out to you first about the Chiefs is what after Sunday? It's actually a big picture thought here with the Chiefs. Patrick Mahomes, if they win the Super Bowl this year, Patrick Mahomes will have his second ring at the exact same age as Tom Brady, 26 years old. And so I remember thinking last year before that Super Bowl, do Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reed, do they have a chance to catch Belichick and Brady? I mean, he's so young.

Reed has shown no signs of wanting to stop coaching anytime soon. And it kind of goes back to what you were saying about Sunday. Now I'm not so sure because they're well positioned this year. There's no doubt about it. They're favorites to win the Super Bowl. But now the AFC has Josh Allen, Joe Burrow, Justin Herbert. I mean, every young, great quarterback is in the AFC, but like maybe. And so if you get number two here at the age of 26, I mean, we have a long way to go with these two guys.

and we're just kind of penciling them in to the AFC championship every season. I mean, think about how this season went. You know, the conversations in October about, oh, my gosh, what is going on with the Chiefs? They don't look the same. Here we are again and their Super Bowl favorite. So it's kind of an interesting big picture thing, I think, in the legacies of both those guys, Mahomes and Reed, if they do win here and if they do win the Super Bowl. It's fascinating.

Bengals? Bengals. Joe Burrow has 12 completions of 50 plus yards this season. that's more than Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, and Justin Herbert combined. That's the most by a quarterback in the last 20 years. And so do not count out the Cincinnati Bengals. This is a, I mean, Joe Burrow, we saw like he can get sacked eight, nine times. Guess what?

They're always one play away from scoring a touchdown and getting right back in. And I feel like they're not getting any type of a chance in this game. There's seven and a half point underdogs. If you look at that historically, the team that's seven and a half point underdogs, they win 22% of the time. Like I think if you just took a random poll and asked people what type of chance the Bengals have, they'll be like, oh, you know, 10%, 8%. It's not what like the betting markets suggest.

And so I love Burrow. I love this Bengals team. I love Chase. And I'm just like, listen, Zach Taylor, do not take the ball out of this man's hands. Like, I don't care if you have to throw it 55 times in this game. I don't care if he needs like four weeks to recover, easy for me to say, after this game because his body is so beat up. Like, I want the high level right end of the high variance of Joe Burrow in this game.

And if it's good enough, you know, maybe you have a chance to surprise it and get to the Super Bowl. Anything else in this game before we get to Sean Payton? No, I think those are the big things. Yeah. Love it. Okay. Sean Payton retires on Tuesday. This, to me, affects every single coaching cycle for the next until he returns. because every team, with the exception of, I'd say,

the chiefs, the Patriots, and I guess the Rams, is one bad month away from a Sean Payton room. Right? Like, any market is going to be talking about Sean Payton, especially if he's on TV, especially he's ever present. He's retiring at 58 or quitting at 58, which is the same age that Bill Parcell is always when he quit the Jets. Parcellus had two and a half more acts in him,

including one sit in the media. By the way, I didn't know. He's a consultant for the Browns and has been since 2014. What's going on here with Bill Parcells? Bill Parcells. It says it's a, honest Wikipedia, it says he's a courtesy consultant and has been since 2014 with the Browns. Absolutely.

We might want to get a second source on that. I don't know. Absolute insanity. All right. Anyway, this plays out how in your book, she'll. We know how this is going to play out. We can talk about all. We know exactly how this is going to play out.

It's going to play out with the Cowboys, season next year, flaming out in spectacular fashion. Maybe it's the wild card round. Week one, week one, there will be nothing but Sean Peyton rumors. Week one, there will be nothing but Sean Peyton rumors. Week 11 on a Sunday morning, you will wake up, scroll through Twitter. You will see Adam Schaefter's information dump, and it will say, you know, Sean Payton has enjoyed his time with NBC, but sources say, you know,

in the right situation, he would be interested in coming back in the NFL. That'll be week 11. And week 18, wild card round, maybe, maybe divisional round. We'll give McCarthy some credit. The Cowboys season will flame out in spectacular fashion. And Jerry Jones will be on the phone with the Saints. And they will negotiate a trade, which coaching trades, is there a better topic in modern sports? I say no, I can't wait for this.

They will work out a trade. I think looking at it, it might take, what, multiple first round picks, you think? To land, Sean Pink. Jerry Jones will say, I don't care. I've had Jason Garrett and Mike McCarthy as my coaches for the last whatever, 12, 15 years. Get me Sean Payton here. It's been an annual rumor for like the last decade. And Sean Payton will be the head coach of Dallas Cowboys in 2023.

That's how it's going to play out. I agree. What if he loves media and spends an extra year there? Well, this is. Yeah, go ahead. No, and I was going to say it. And the other part of it is like it's not going to be a one bid situation. Like, Jerry is not the only owner who,

need to solve their coaching problem. This is shield, like a league where teams hand over money and power to Urban Meyer. Okay? Like every team is going to be like, hey, Sean, solve this problem for us. Like, Sean is as close to a short thing in the coaching market. You're absolutely going to get. Yeah, I agree 100%. I would add two things to that.

One is the TV point is a good one. He might, you know, get in that Romo thing where it's like, you don't really have to do that much work. You don't have to do that much prep. You can kind of just show up. And you make $20 million. Like, this is a good life. Coaching was fun.

I won a Super Bowl. I'll just do this for a little bit longer. That's one. And two is, it is fun to think about the other teams, right? Who, you know, now we're looking ahead of year. So it's not going to happen. This year's going to happen next year. What team could be in position and that would be attractive to Sean Payton?

I'm going to give you two. And I hate that I'm sticking in the NFC here because I do think if you're the saints, you probably want to get them out. But actually, I'm going to give you three. One, Arizona Cardinals. It doesn't work out with Cliff. year you have Kyler Murray and Sean Payton's saying, if it doesn't work out with Chris.

Yeah, we're all waiting with bated breath. Yeah, Peyton saying, I can go to Arizona and coach Kyler Murray and no one's really paying attention and we can go win a lot of games. Yeah, that sounds pretty fun to me. How about this one? I think you're going to like this one. How about the Seattle Seahawks? They run it back one more year with Pete and Russ.

It doesn't work out. And now you get Twilight, Twilight Russ. You get D.K., you get Tyler Lockett. You're the sort of the savior. I don't know if Sean Payton and Pete Carroll get along. I could see them not getting along. I could see Sean Payton saying, I'll go there and I'll win a Super Bowl with Russ

at this stage in his career. And then the last one here. I mean, what would David Tepper give up for Sean? I mean, I'm talking money, turn over his hedge fund, private jets. Yeah, anything, his will. I mean, I'm afraid to even think of what he would be willing to give up to land Sean Peyton

when that thing fails spectacularly in 2022 with their rock star offensive. of coordinating. Your thoughts. As of December, David Tepper's total hedge fund assets are 4.2 billion. That's obviously, obviously that's other people's money in large part, but he could just turn that over.

He could just turn that over. Just tell the investors if we needed Sean Payton. Sorry, we invested in Sean Payton. Here he is. I could see it. Shio Capadia, thanks for joining us, buddy. Enjoy the games. All right, thanks for having me. All right, joined now by two of my favorite people. One of them has been on three times

this year because his team has gone through a lot. We started with how to beat the Chiefs. And then the second episode he was on is, why is everyone beating the Chiefs? And now the third episode he's on is the Chiefs for the Aosu champion game. It's Nate Taylor. Nate, what's going on, bud?

Kevin, good to see you, my friend. Good to join you yet again on quite this saga. Yeah, it's a journey. It's been a journey. We're also joined by a newcomer, Bengals writer, boxing an F1 fan, but we're not going to get to that at this point. Well, who knows?

It's a long episode. Ben Baby, what's going on, bud? Hey, nothing much, Kevin. Yeah, you know, I came prepared with some boxing metaphors. I did not watch the previous Gary Russell Jr. fight, as I'm sure you have. But, you know, we won't get into all that. We've got a busy week in NFL action here. You don't need to watch Gary Russell fight ever. Ben covers the Bengals for ESPN.

He does a great job. I did not expect, I love the Bengals. I might have been the number one national media Bengals guy over the summer. I did not expect them to be here and not expect Ben to be on this week. So I'm pleasantly surprised we could talk about the Bengals this week. Really easy episode this week. Tell me something I don't know about what's going on. So I had Ben and Nate come up with three nuggets.

It's a culture of competition. So whoever has the worst nuggets will never appear on the show again. But competitive cauldron. But just, you know, we want to teach as much as possible. Ben, let's start with you. What's the number one thing we need about the Bengals? It's a lot of pressure. coming off the rip here.

So I would say that the Bengals actually outweighed Kansas City in the second half of that game. And the big question everyone's asking, you know, especially, you know, we just watched Kansas City and Buffalo put on a, just an offensive master class. And like, I don't know if we're going to be more beautiful, like, few minutes of football than what we saw in that game in the divisional round. But, you know, the question everyone seems to be asking is how is Cincinnati going to stop, you know, Mahomes and in that offense? But really, in my mind, it's actually the other way. around because in the first game, Kansas City was going to run Cincinnati out of their own building. And all of a sudden in the second half of that game, which was just a few weeks ago, the

offense just stalled out and the Bengals were able to come back and really outplayed them. And so my question is, can Mahomes really find a way to be productive in the second half and continue throughout a whole game against this Bengals defense? It's actually played pretty well at times. And we look at some of the raw numbers, you know, they may not be really, really impressive, but Cincinnati's done a really good job of carrying this team, the defense specifically of carrying this team throughout the entire season, as good as Joe Burroughs been,

you know, the defense has played to the point where as Burroughs has been trying to find his footing after that a knee injury last season, as the Bengals are trying to figure out what their offensive identity has looked like. The defense has been pretty consistent throughout the course of season. I think coordinator Louana Rumo deserves a ton of credit for that. And in that first game, in the second half,

they played a ton of quarters coverage, a lot of cover four against Kansas City and Mahomes. didn't really know what to do with it at times. And, you know, average is 4.9 yards per attempt in that second half, which shows that, you know, they really were like, we're going to basically limit all the explosive plays you're going to get, you're going to have to dig and dunk your way down the field. And, you know, Kansas City only got the ball three times in that second half.

And it was two points in a field goal. And the Bengals did not, you know, let them get anything else. So for me, that's a big question, Mark. And also, Kansas City's got an out-let Jamar Chase, I have 266 yards this time. That's a good, that's a good note. Thank you, Ben. on Jamar Chase. Nate, before we get to your first one,

how do the Chiefs view that regular season game? I think they view it as a game they probably should have won. As Ben mentioned, they had a 14-point lead a couple of times and potentially could have ended the game on a kickoff return for a touchdown with Byron Pringle. And unfortunately, for Chiefs fans, Zane Anderson and undrafted, from BYU,

basically tackled a guy on the kickoff coverage team and nullified a touchdown that would have been right before halftime. Perhaps the Bengals are just thinking about that and the idea of like, man, if we can't stop Mahomes and their scoring special teams touchdowns. So I feel like the Chiefs are like, hey, we had an eight-game winning streak. You know, crazy stuff is going to happen.

But I think for them, a lot of this week will be about, man, when we watched that game, we should have won that game. We should have been the better team. And now they realize the potential of Cincinnati. I think that was the true coming out party for the Bengals because I feel like what Joe Burrow had done against Baltimore, what he had done against the Packers. Like those were impressive games,

but to actually beat the reigning AFC champions at home to clinch your division. I just thought it was the true acknowledgement that way. They are way ahead of schedule. What's the first thing we need to know about this chiefs there, this Chiefs team. Yeah, so, Kevin, there's only one infamous play this season, despite the Chiefs being three and four at one point,

despite the whole idea of like the Chiefs are broken, bid knows this play. It's 3rd and 27. And I'm going to tell Steve Spagnolo right now, the Chiefs were one of the most blitz heavy teams in the league. They were top 10 in Blitzes. They don't need to blitz, Joe Burrow. I know it's enticing,

but on 3rd and 27, with the game kind of up there for grabs, they didn't send an all-out blitz, but they sent a six-man blitz, and I believe a seven-man blitz and a seven-man protection blocked it up beautifully. Everybody knows Jamar Chase was an alien in that game, and that's what led to the game-winning field goal. The Chiefs do not need to blitz the Bengals at all.

The Chiefs need to rely on their home field advantage, which is their loud crowd. And yes, ladies and gentlemen, the Bengals somehow gave up nine sacks and Joe Burroughs somehow walked out of that stadium. So the chiefs have Chris Jones, who's excellent, and who was kind of wrecking havoc in the first matchup. Melvin Ingram is obviously really competent in his role.

And then Frank Clark, within the right situations, can still bring a lot of heat on clear passing downs. So rely on your four-man. pass rush, don't blitz, make Joe Burrow earn everything, and hopefully that will mitigate some of the damage that Jamar Chase is clearly capable of doing. Interesting. Ben, do you have a burrow nugget because I want to get into the borough offensive line discussion? Do you have that?

I don't have a single burrow, no. I mean, I've got plenty of fun facts. No, no, no, so I'm going to ask the question. No, I'm going to ask the question then. I'm going to ask you the question. I don't want to step on a nugget. how do the bangles view the push and pull between protecting Burrow and running the offense Borough wants to run? And what I mean by that is he said the same thing to me that he's probably said to you,

which is he wants guys out in the route. He wants to use his vision. If he could have, if they could run the A11 offense and he could have 11, 10 guys out there running the route, he would love to do that. But there's a tax you pay on that, and sometimes it's nine sacks. And I'm curious, inside the building they view that how. Yeah, well, Kevin, not all of us are fortunate to get one-on-one interviews with Joe Burrow like you are. Okay.

You know, we just get him in colloquial settings in mass audiences here. But in the conversations that we've had with Burrow, and really Bengals offensive coordinator Brian Callahan, he actually said it probably best, you know, earlier this week in that there is a risk and reward, and there's something that makes Burrough great. And the fact that Burrough kind of plays quarterback like he's on defense. And the fact that he likes contact, he likes him. in people. He does not like sliding. Anybody who watched him attempt to learn

the slide knows that he's not good at it. And so there's a reason for that. And Burrow is willing to take some risks in the pocket. And the Bengals are willing to live with some of that. I think sacks, it's been interesting how they do sacks here. Not all sacks

are bad. Some of them are really bad. Burrow took one of them that took them out of field goal range in that game against Tennessee that was less than ideal. But all and all, I think if you're looking at it on third down and incompletion in the sack essentially are the same thing. It's a stop and the drive is over. So if you're not, if you're going to eat a sack, if you're going to have a few extra seconds to find a read, then, you know, they're willing to take some of that. And the biggest thing, I think the way that Burrow and Mahomes are both

special is that they're really creative, they're exceptional playmakers and they do a lot of things that you cannot teach quarterbacks. And the worst thing that you can do as a, a head coach or any coach is take that ability and skill away from them and then put them in a structure that takes away their creativeness. And that is exactly what the Bengals do not want to do. They want an explosive offense. And they want Burrow to have that capability to go out and extend plays, you know, make checks of the line of scrimmage is needed.

And they understand that he's probably going to get hit a little bit more than they would like that he would like. But it is a growing process that they're willing to be okay with. I just want to clarify that it's a really good thing that I'm the only person who gets one-on-ones with Joe Burrow. Really? I mean, it's just, you know, leave it to the pros, Ben. All right. So, what's your second nugget?

My second nugget is that the Bengals are getting better and when they've been really good, they've been able to extend drives. Throughout the course of the season, one of the biggest criticisms I've had of Cincinnati's offense is that they were just not on the field enough and they were not able to extend drives throughout the courses

of the season when they were just not really effective. They were among the league leaders in three and out percentage. And games, where their offense has really been humming, they have been on the field a healthy amount. And I believe that Kansas City game was one of three games where they were averaging seven plays per drive, if not for the whole game, at least in the second half.

I'd have to go back and double check. But the most morale, like, the end of Bill's Kansas City was a prime example of what can go wrong when you leave Patrick Mahomes any kind of time on the clock. And in the first game against Kansas City the season, the Bengals made it very clear that they are not giving the ball back in any circumstances to Patrick Mahomes.

The Bengals got, we've got the ball with around like six minutes left in that game. And they did not get it back again. Yeah, I think it was eight, Ben. I think it was eight minutes. It was something absurd. Yeah. And it was like, it was, I know it was a 15-play drive that they ended up going down there. And if you will recall, Zach Taylor decided to go for it a couple times on fourth down.

And it extended the game. And a lot of people wondering, well, what's going on here? And Zach Taylor explained, we're not taking any chances with number 15 back there because it's just it's not worth it. And now we see why. So I think that if the Bengals are able to, if you look at it in that game in the second half, Kansas City only had three drives. And so if the Bengals are able to find a way

to kind of find that perfect mesh of finding explosive plays, but also being able to hold on the ball a little bit, that's going to be their best bet, and that's when they've been at their best throughout this season. Nate, next nugget. Next nugget up. Yeah, and just to sort of repeat what Ben said, yeah, there was 6.01 left on the clock.

And yeah, they never gave the ball back to Patrick Mahomes. So here's something that I think Bengals fans need to acknowledge. And it's kind of been the entire theme of this season for the Chiefs. The offensive line is excellent. And I'm not sure in a game that was as incredible and as back and forth and dramatic and hard attack, heart attack inducing, I should say. Sure.

Spill on that. The Chief's Offensive Line was excellent. In terms of giving Mahomes lanes to sort of escape against the bill's man-to-man defense, which I think there's some, I can see a reason for why Cincinnati would apply some of the things the bills did last week in terms of their coverage.

But you also realize you can't necessarily blitz Mahomes because he is lethal when you do that. And I get the sense that in the first matchup, and the reason why I wanted this nugget to be sort of in everybody's mind, is Orlando Brown suffered a cap injury in warm-ups. And it's just one of the wildest odd things that has occurred in, like, you know, a season that's way too long, in my opinion, going 18 weeks now.

So, you know, he's a Pro Bowl left tackle. He's proven in this, in this regular season, and definitely in this postseason, that he is capable of being in a past happy offense protecting the greatest asset in the Chiefs franchise history. He's done an amazing job. Joe Tooney had the slide to left tackle, and I thought he did a really admirable job, but he's like one of the best left guards in the league. And so there's sort of a cumulative effect. And I do think

Trey Hendrickson sort of got going in the second half. He started to apply a little bit of pressure on Patrick to make him sort of feel, hey, maybe I got to release this ball before I'm exactly ready before the route has developed to give me a window to throw the ball to. So if the Chiefs are to win Sunday, if the Chiefs are to be a more complete version of themselves,

it starts with that offensive line. And of course, you and I have talked about this, a ton, Kevin, Brett Beasts, the general manager, basically had a, you have to do this. Like, everybody in the league knows what your problem is in the offseason. You have to figure out a way to fix it. And so he gave Joe Tooney the most money a left guard has ever made.

He traded for Orlando Brown. They had an amazing draft with Creed Humphrey and Trey Smith, who have just been phenomenal as rookies. And give a lot of credit to Andrew Wiley, who entered the season as the third right tackle and has really held up. And so the chiefs did. not play the bingles with their projected offensive line. And I just wondered,

will that help the run game? Will that give Patrick Mahomes more time? And kid he, if he does have more time, I love Eli Apple. I love Mike Hilton. God bless him. If this man has more time than in the second half of the first matchup, I don't know if there's any corners, if there's any secondary on earth that can cover

Travis Kelsey and Tyree Kiel for longer than usual. It's interesting because we talked about Veech and there have been some criticisms out there of his drafts over the past since he took over. He nails two offensive line picks this year.

But also, when you think about the window that the chiefs have, which is they've got Mahomes and Andy Reed and everything flows through that. Veach is a problem solver. He might be the best problem solver at the GM level in football right now, which is he had something to fix and he fixed it. And that's what you

need. It's kind of a game when you have Reed and Mahomes. It's kind of a game whack them will. Like, okay, we need to patch this up. Like, obviously, we know what they're going to attack this year. That's the biggest hole, which is defense. So it's just really fascinating to see that him evolve

as a GM and he just absolutely crushed up with a blind thing. Interesting point. Ben, for Hendrickson, he's going to be healthy. Yeah, yeah, he'll be fine. I think he got dinged up a little bit at the end of that Tennessee game, but Zach Taylor said, when I asked him about it on Monday or whatever day it was, he said, yeah, you know,

he should be good to go. And he's going to be big. I will say the Bengals being without Larry Ogun Joby, who's out for the year with a foot injury, that is a big loss. A lot of people ahead of the Tennessee game were saying, oh, that's going to be really bad for the run defense. And I was like, I don't know, the Bengals still got DJ Reader and DJ Readers. Really good. He's very good. He's got to be one of the best run stoppers in the NFL. He's just, he's phenomenal worth every penny they paid him.

But Ogan Joby, they got him in the offseason. They felt like he played out of position in Cleveland. and they moved him to a more traditional pre-tech defensive tackle spot and let him go up field and rush the passer. And he was very effective at that. And he was their second best pass rusher, in my opinion. And to lose him, that's going to be a problem because, like you said, you want to be able to get pressure with four against Mahomes

because you need guys back in coverage. And if you've got to bring more, he's going to make you pay. And if you can't get pressure, that's going to be a problem as well. So I think that's going to be a very underrated nugget. I don't think that was actually my nugget, but it can be. sure. No, we'll get to that. And also the highlight of the Kansas City game, I must say, since we did bring up

Brett Beach, I did track him down at halftime. And I was like, so I read in the ringer, this guy, Kevin Clark, the story that you're an F1 fan, is that correct? So for about like five minutes at half time. We talked F1 and his love of Max for Stappen and the lovely finish of the F1 season. So thank you for that, Kevin. Let me tell you something. He said this.

He said Max for Stappen is Mahomes and Lewis Hamilton is Brady. Brady. And listen, man. Max won this year. That's all I'm saying. Max won this year. Hamilton did not. All right.

So what's your third nugget? I was about to say Joe Burrow is George Russell, the young kid coming up, you know, about to be ascendant. But, you know, we don't have time to go into all these F-1-on-Gar. You really don't. But I really, you know, I wonder, can Jamar Chase, I think, Jamar Chase's been pretty good. And the Bengals, you know, Burrow and Chase at this point now have been really phenomenal.

And that connection, that synergy they've had, I was very, I was sleeping on it throughout most of the pre-draft process. So does it really matter? Yes, it does. It very much does. So that is something that I think is worth noting. Not my actual nugget. A lot of teases here.

The big matchup, in my opinion, Trey Flowers versus Travis Kelsey. Now, who is Trey Flowers? You might be asking. Well, it's a guy that Bengals picked up a corner in the middle of the season on the waiver wire playing high school football at Converse Judson, which is a San Antonio area powerhouse. I'm sure Trey and I have eaten at the same taco locations next to Judson, El Sabresito.

This is a... I'm gonna stop you, stop you up there. I'm gonna stop you right there. You've woven in all of your interest into this podcast, Formula One, boxing, and now Texas high school football. Anything else? Cricket? Any cricket? Not yet. No. Not yet.

That's when you bring me back the next time, Kevin. Right, right. But no. So, so they dropped it, they brought flowers in, and it's been really fascinating to see his usage. He's basically, just their tight end stopper. He's a really long guy. He's got he's got good sides. And for guys like Kelsey like Darren Waller, he's someone who when they put out there, it's basically a dime package. And then they'll have him in there to stop tight ends. And tight ends have terrorized Cincinnati for most of the last few seasons. And Travis Kelsey against Flowers, if that's

going to be somewhat successful, I think the Bengals have a pretty good chance based on the way that they have their defense set up. And Louana Ruma, what I talked about earlier, he's been a guy who was more than willing to tinker defenses week to week and adjust things and kind of be, you know, experimental to a certain degree. I think when they brought a zero blitz against Mahomes at the end of Kansas City's final offensive drive, I don't think they had showed one the entire game. Right. And really haven't played a ton of zero blitz the entire season. And he said, well, we're going to dial it up now.

And so, you know, I'm curious to see what Anirumo has under his sleeve. But it's going to be really fascinating to see that matchup. And if flowers can pay off, I think you've got to give the Bengals. is a ton of credit, Duke Tobin in the Bengals front office, a ton of credit, and find a guy who a lot of people probably had no value in and said, you know, we're going to come in and he's going to play a pretty key role.

So I think that Trey Flowers versus Travis Kelsey Batchel, could dictate a lot because if the Bengals are able to contain Kelsey to a certain degree, that could make the, bring a little bit more flexibility and figure out a way to stop the homes. Nate, last take? This was not playing, ladies and gentlemen. Oh, wow. And I appreciate being.

for just throwing me this lob on the L.U. Fast break. The nugget is, when in doubt, just trust Travis Kelsey. He is a playoff. Ladies and gentlemen, he is, and I know this sounds crazy. I know this sounds wild. Just stay with me. In the postseason, yes, the league is more pass happy down than it was then.

But in the postseason, Travis Kelsey is almost the equivalent to Jerry Rice. And that is stunning, okay? So Jerry Rice, in his illustrious, never going to be touched by any wire receiver ever in history, yes, I'm in that camp. He had nine postseason

games with a hundred receiving yards or more. Travis Kelsey is eight. Travis Kelsey has eight. He's second in the league all time in postseason games with at least 100 yards. So Bid is correct.

I felt in the second half of the first matchup, the Chiefs kind of went away from Travis Gilsie, who, by the way, had a very nice red zone touchdown in the first half. And what we saw in the Bills game is whenever the Chiefs need a quick play or a third down conversion, Travis Kelsey was just about always open.

And what I try to remind people, is beating the Chiefs, and this is for any team of the AFC. This is applicable to the Bengals, of course, and obviously moving forward, especially if the Chiefs go to another Super Bowl's with a victory Sunday. But beating the Chiefs in the regular season

is not the same as beating them in late January. It's just not. So for me, I think Andy Reid has probably some plays. He probably looked at the film and said, you know, did we use Kelsey enough? Because I think they were trying to get some plays Tyree Kill and I thought the Biggles did a hell of a job

of just saying, hey, we're not letting this dude get behind us again. Lord, hell no. Hell no. So if you know defenses are having that in their mind and you just saw this man run by the two-based safety combo in the lead in Jordan Porter and Micahe in the end of that regulation,

then that should give a lot of room, a lot of creative space for Travis Kelsey to work, whether that's in zone or in man. So I would target Travis Kelsey at least 10 times in this game. And I would really look for him in the red zone. If the Chiefs have four red zone trips, I would remind fans, yes, you could start the snap with Patrick Mahomes. You can kind of see what the Mingles are doing.

Keep your eye on Travis Kelsey. Because that out and up route on a back shoulder throw, Kevin, Ben, like, how do you stop that? I don't know. So, I mean, you could just run that anytime you're in the red zone, as long as Patrick Mahomes has time and as long as he's in rhythm. And so it's a perfect setup. I love what Ben said about, hey, the Bengals got away with it, guys.

In the first matchup, Travis Kelsey was only targeted seven times, five receptions for just 25 yards. If he gets 10 or more targets, he could tie Jerry Rice for the most 100%. receiving yards or more in a postseason in NFL history. Certainly the guy to go to if there's 13 seconds left from the clock. It's one thing I've noticed about the Chiefs. Guys, you've got you out here on this.

Predictions for Sunday. We'll start with you, Ben. I will say, I'm taking Kansas City here. I just, I picked the Bengals the first two games. But when you look at how that first game played out, you had to have a lot of things break in Cincinnati's favor for them to win that game. You had Kansas City had 10 penalties in that game, which you're definitely not going to be able to bank on second time.

A lot of pass interference. Like you said, a kickoff returner that was called back. I felt like they inexplicably did not pass the ball enough, which is crazy when you have Patrick Mahomes. Jamar Chase had more receiving yards than Patrick Mahomes at total passing yards. I just do not see that happening again. So when you look at all things considered, I just feel like it's going to be really tough for the Bengals to have another career day from Jamar Chase

to keep Patrick Mahomes on touchdown in the second half. and the limit Travis Kelsey and all these things that went Cincinnati's way the first time. And also, Clyde Edwards E-Lair did not play in that first game. He is back. Like Nate said, the offensive line is healthier. All things considered, I know the Bengals do not like the underdog concept and believe that they can play with anybody and beat anybody. And, you know, to be quite honest, it's true.

Like, it would not shock me if Cincinnati won. But if I have to be practical here, I think you have to take Kansas City, given what they've not just showed against Buffalo, but they played, I think, well-rounded games throughout the course of this season, more so than Cincinnati has. And I think that, you know, you can't bank on everything going your way like it did the first time. Nate? Last week I said on any platform, anywhere anyone could hear me,

that the bills at least needed to score 40 points. Because the only time Patrick Mahones has lost a home game in the playoffs was when Tom Brady got the ball in number. overtime and the New England Patriots, I believe, scored 37 points total. Okay? So it was 31-31 in overtime. As everybody knows, how ironic this thing is. Patrick Mahomes did not touch the ball in that overtime, he touched the ball on Sunday.

The bills did just about everything right on offense. Now, I would remind Zach Taylor, don't you punt that ball. Don't you ever punt it. I don't care if you're at your own 20. Just like you can't be afraid, just go for it. You need 40. You need turnovers. You need Jamar Chase to continue to be Jerry Rice,

a young Jerry Rice, basically, which is what he was in the first matchup. It's really, I'm so impressed by Cincinnati. I think the Chiefs will win. But here's a key fact that, fellas. This game for Kansas City, he can't be close in the fourth quarter. In my opinion, the experience has to matter,

and it has to manifest by getting an early lead and sort of reminding the Bengals that, like, yeah, it's a little early. Like the postseason, you're not supposed to, you know, in historical context, you're not supposed to just enter the postseason for the first time with your phenomenal quarterback and then just get to the Super Bowl. So the Chiefs obviously have the revenge factor to be

motivated by, I believe they'll win. But if Cincinnati's in this game in the fourth quarter, much to Ben's point, don't be surprised. Because as we saw in the first matchup, it could go either way, and it could really come down to who has the ball last. And if it's in Joe Burroughs' hands, I mean, why would you question him based on everything he's done so far? So if you're a Kansas City, you know, use your experience,

play better than you did in the first matchup, have a 10-point lead in the fourth quarter and just see if you can just squeeze it out. to go to your third straight Super Bowl, which would be just the fourth franchise in NFL history to be so. Nate Taylor from the Athletic, Ben Baby from the ESPN. Thank you guys so much. Enjoy the weekend.

Thanks, Kevin. We appreciate it, my friend. All right. Thanks to Sheal, Nate, and Ben for joining us. Next up on this feed, Nora and Mallory with a normal Thursday show. Ben, Kalan, and Stephen are here on Friday. We're obviously back this weekend on Sunday.

Me, Nora, Ben, Stephen. after the championship games. See you then. It's been the Ringar NFL show on the Ringer Podcast Network. Thank you, Chief Stefan Anderson, for production help additional production supervision

by Arjuna, or Iman Cole.