The Ringer NFL Show - What the Playoffs Will Look Like in the AFC | The Ringer NFL Show (Ep. 327)

Episode Date: October 22, 2018

The Ringer’s Robert Mays and Kevin Clark link up to predict what the playoffs will look like in the muddled AFC (2:00) before listing their "Stock Up" and "Stock Down" teams of the week (17:30). Then the guys throw their challenge flags on clock-management mishaps and Mitchell Trubisky’s performance before analyzing why the Jaguars’ collapse will lead tomorrow’s headlines (52:30). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Show me the football. Are you ready for live football on your phone? With the Yahoo Sports mobile app, you got it. Watch local and primetime NFL games on your phone or tablet all season long. Never miss your local game, never miss another big national matchup. All you need is the Yahoo Sports app. Get the Yahoo Sports mobile app and you're golden. Unleashed the most powerful pixel ever on the network chosen by Google Verizon.

Pixel 3 has more than just any other camera. It takes group selfies, snaps in portrait mode, and it helps you always pick the perfect moment with TopShop, which automatically recommends the best picks, where no one is blinking and everything looks just right. And the Pixel 3 also has the power of Google lens, which means you can search what you see. And when you get the Pixel 3 on Verizon, it comes with America's Best Network. Visit your local Verizon store today or learn more at VZW.com. Welcome to a very after dark bring your NFL show. I'm Robert Baze, joined by Kevin. Kevin, how you doing, bud? Doing great. It is as late as you've ever podcasted.

I fell asleep. That's why I've been watching football for 16 hours. It's 1235 in the a.m. in central time. And yeah, we're doing this. I literally dozed off when we were supposed to record. So this is going to go great. We set a time, producer Craig and I, for when you'd be replaced by Danny Kelly

if you did not get back to us and you just beat the buzzer. I had to go to Walgreens to buy batteries, which was not a good move to start with, and then I dozed off on the couch at midnight. So here we are. But, you know. Well, we thought, just so the listener knows,

so we thought that the last thing we heard from you was you were going to buy batteries and then we just didn't hear from you again. So we were just coming up with all sorts of scenarios on where, what exactly happened to you during the battery buying. I bought the batteries, got home,

and then fell asleep on the couch. That's how it works. These are the dangers of recording a podcast 16 hours after the first NFL game starts. Yeah, that's how it goes.

What a day of football. We learned that Patrick Mahomes is good. Were you awake for that? I watched the entire Sunday night game. Okay. It wasn't that fun of a day of football. That was my problem. Oh, so you're blaming the football on that.

Okay. No. I mean, the chiefs were awesome. I'd be destroyed a team we thought was pretty decent. But everything else today was kind of ho-hum. And I want to get into that to start with. Because usually when we do, we kick off the Sunday show, there is a clear kind of storyline or through line from the day that we're like,

all right, this is what we're doing. And there wasn't one that necessarily presented itself today. And we had to kind of find one. And that's why I want to kick off today with somewhat chiefs talk, but not more chiefs talk because that seems to be every show. But I want to talk about the hierarchy in the AFC, which especially after today seems more muddled than ever. So there's a couple of things I want to talk about.

The first thing is about the expectations that we have for the chiefs now are so high that them absolutely destroying, a four and two team in prime time, a team that might make the playoffs, we just don't care about that. They literally put you to sleep. Like, that is how good and efficient

this Chief's team is, is that we weren't impressed by any of this stuff. And I think that's the most remarkable thing. You know, I think that... It's not that I wasn't impressed. I wasn't blown away, because that's just like,

okay, the Chiefs beat up on the bagels. Like, okay. Yeah, it's a weekly thing. We got some funny Marvin Lewis memes out of it and everybody moved on. We didn't have to, to watch C.J. Bethard or whatever in in prime time, and they flexed that out and they made the right decision. And it was great. Yeah. I mean, Patrick and Mahomes being a superhero is not

something that gets me out of my seat anymore. Well, in order, Andy Reid being a superhero gets me out of my suite. Did you see the stat for the second week in a row that's from the NFL, Patrick Mahomes has thrown only one pass attempt into a tight window, which is one yard or less of separation. That sounds nice. I feel like the guy that calls the plays for my team is also pretty good, but the quarterback tries to pass into tight windows for no reason. Or just random spots on the field.

You know the whole thing about how like quarterbacks throw to spots? He just throws to the spots. There's just nobody there. He just makes up his own spots. You're not seeing the brilliance in it. We're not going to talk about the bears today. Yes, we are. Except for talking about the bear.

Oh, we're talking about the bear. I got some bears notes for you. later. Jesus, okay. If we have to. All right. So,

let's do this. Let's do the AFC hierarchy, even with some chief's fatigue because of how good they are. So if we're trying to do the rankings right now, what is it for you? Let's do a top five. Let's do top six. Oh,

okay. Okay. So just because of playoffs. Are we doing what the playoffs look like? Why don't we just do that? Sure. So like your six AFC playoff teams.

Okay, okay. So chiefs and Patriots get the buy. Yes. Do you see them as one and two chiefs and then Patriots? 100%. You see Chiefs number one seat? I don't think it matters. I mean, it's...

Okay, I do think homefield matters. It matters, but like that's the tier. Okay. So if we're talking about the hierarchy, that's the tier. It's 1A, 1B. I would give the Steelers, the ASC norm. You still do a steel? was three.

Yeah, well, they're currently in first. I'm sorry, no, I'm doing them as a division champion. Sure. But you think they're the third best team in that division or in that conference, so? No, I'm doing it as playoffs. They're going to win the division. And then the only other division winner will be the AFC South. So the, the Los Angeles Chargers, who will get a wild card probably,

although we never know with them, are probably a better team. They tried to. lose to a football team from Tennessee today. Are probably a better team than the Pittsburgh Steelers, but they're just not going to win the division. So, and then so I guess the Texans will win now. I'm going to say the

Jaguars win the UFC Sal. I think they've got too much roster talent. I just, I think that the Texans might get Deshawn Watson killed. We'll talk about the Jags later. I think that that's... I mean, when you're right, Deshawn Watson, I'm sure no one who listened to the show missed this. Deshawn Watson

and had to go from Houston to Jacksonville in a bus. Just drive down I-10 in a bus because they couldn't build an offensive line around him that would keep him in an airplane. So let me tell you something. You've driven to Jacksonville. I've never have. What's that drive like?

I've driven from, I've driven from Orlando many times. I've driven from Atlanta, and then that's it. So what does that drive like? A lot of outlet malls. You can have Tallahassee there about four hours west. So I don't know where he stopped, but here's, I have very few rules in life. And one of them is, if your offensive line has gotten your quarterback so injured,

he can no longer take a flight, you're a disaster. They're winning the division. they're in first place in the division. Let me tell you something. The Jaguars and the Titans, they've got some quarterback problems, but those guys can get on airplanes. Everything about this is amazing.

Because I've never taken a direct flight to Jacksonville. So I understand the perils of getting there. I never have. Every time I've flown to Jacksonville twice in my life, I think. Okay. Because I've done two Jags stories. I flew there from New York a handful of times. and one time the plane squeaked the whole time,

like one of those uncomfortable squeakings, you know what I'm talking about? Maybe you don't, because you've never flown from New York to Jacksonville. Oh, I'm taking some puddle jumpers in my life. Yeah, this one, it wasn't even that small. It was just squeaking, though. They just gave this the worst big plane.

I don't know anything. The AFC South is hilarious to me. Like, the Texans couldn't put their quarterback on a plane and their winning division, and they won this game convincingly. Yeah, so, like, I don't know what else to say. Are we doing Bordles talk? Are we doing that right now?

Yeah, let's do it. So, Blake Bortles on the season, nine touchdowns, eight interceptions, an 80 rating. He had 61 passing yards on Sunday, 64 rating, 50% completion percentage. Here's the problem with this whole situation, Robert. It's that if you saw those stats at the beginning of the year and said, on October, 21st, this is what Bortle's stat line will look like. He'll have had one incredible game against a contender. He'll

have a bunch of inconsistent games against teams that he shouldn't have inconsistent games against. You would say, that sounds like Blake Bortles. This is not a surprise. None of this is a surprise. The only surprise is that they didn't get somebody better than Cody Kessler to come in

when the inevitable happened. Or maybe going back further, they shouldn't have given them a two-year deal basically tying up all their Cap Space and Blake Bordals. I mean, it's, it's madness. And if you're surprised by that, I guess your name's Tom Coughlin. We had this conversation when the Bortles thing was happening this offseason. They probably were going to have to pay him anyway because of the injury situation. The elbow, it's about, it was his fifth year option was guaranteed for injury. They had to pay him

most likely. And they were trying to free up some room. But, Here's my problem with that entire kind of line of thinking. If you're freeing up that room for $16 million of Andrew Norwell and $10 million worth of Dante Moncrief, why the hell do you need the room? And can't you use some of it to bring in some competition to quarterback? I just want to back up here for a second

because I wrote a story in January about how Bortles and everybody around him sort of deals with the Blake Bortles joke industry. And I fired it up, Google it, you know, got it on my last. my laptop. And I just started to scan it real quick. So I forgot a lot of stuff that was in it. How do you feel about that one now, by the way?

I love that story. It's a really good story. It's funny. Now that we sit here, it's the fact that there's a Blake Bortle's joke story is funny. Yeah, no, I'm extremely happy that I wrote it now and then and in hindsight. But I got to like the fifth paragraph and it said the Jaguar is play Buffalo in the playoffs on Sunday. And I actually, I was alone in my house and I actually just yelped out loud because I just forgot that that was a moment in time.

I remember watching that game so vividly. It was awesome. I do too now. But I mean, that's how much things have changed to where not only is Buffalo and we knew they were going to be disaster, but now Jacksonville has played so poorly these last two weeks. I now consider them in the sort of zone where I cannot believe they played a playoff game 10 months ago. All right. So let's kind of cap this with the AFC playoff situation.

So if it's New England and Kansas City at the top, and then we're talking about Houston as a division winner, Pittsburgh probably winning in division. Is there anyone in the Jacksonville of 2017 range that you feel is a potential buzzsaw in one game? Or do you think this is the year where it's just chalk, chalk, chalk, chalk in a way that it hasn't been recently? So you mean not, not in the same. San Diego or the Los Angeles. I'm, you know what? I'm sorry. No. You know what?

No what? I got news for you. I keep saying San Diego so much because I don't want to say Los Angeles because of the Rams, okay? Because they're an actual team when it's in Los Angeles. It's the Rams fans here. So from now on, when I say the San Diego Chargers, not correcting myself. You know why?

I haven't corrected myself for two years. Do you know, you know why? Because that's on them. Yes. I didn't move to Los Angeles. I didn't want you to move to Los Angeles. I didn't want you to move. You're done, buddy.

So you're San Diego. And that's, that's on me, actually. Let's, let's put the chargers in there as a possibility. Like, if you want to consider the chargers in that realm, then go ahead.

Okay. Did you think the chargers are the team that can be a buzzsaw to one of those like stalwarts to one of those like sterling contenders in the conference? So Philip Rivers is passing as well as anybody in the NFL right now.

Weird game. Yeah, extremely weird game. But what specifically stood out to you, aside from the fact that, I mean, I guess it was all weird. They almost lost to a team that can't score. The Titans almost won that game, but I didn't come away not impressed with the Chargers, I guess, is what I'm saying?

Right. It's they didn't have the ball. It's one of those games where they had such a little time of possession, the Titans controlled the clock so much that it seemed like the Titans had a shot. but the Chargers didn't score on like one of their five possessions, they just never had the ball. So that was the funny part.

It's like, oh, man, the Chargers offense looks amazing, but they scored 20 points. And then, you know, you look at the box score, it's like, did the Chargers really look good? And the answer is, yes, the Chargers did look good. Yeah, I mean, it was very strange, but I do want to say that the biggest sort of, the biggest issue with the Chargers is what Joe,

Joey Bosa looks like when he returns and when he returns. They need him. Because if he's elite, if he's Joey Bosa, then everybody, chiefs included, should be terrified of playing the San Diego Chargers. The Los Angeles Chargers. Yeah. I mean, that team, we talk about it so often. It's like, oh, the Chargers talent, the Chargers talent, the Chargers talent. And I know that your eyes can glaze over as we continue to do it, but that team is five and two now.

And they're two losses or the Rams and the Chiefs. Philip Rivers is leading the NFL and adjusted net yards per attempt with 11.8. Mahomes is number two. And I just, I don't know, I just have a, it's such a strange phenomenon because I live in the city where they play and there are no fans. So it doesn't seem like a, you know, one of the things about a good team, Robert, is like you and I can go to the, like, I was in Kansas City. weeks ago, probably go there again in the near future. We both went to Jacksonville in the last year. And you can be around a team in a city and get a vibe and, you know, see the fans and see the excitement. I live like 10 miles from the stadium. And I have no idea what the vibe is around

the city because they don't have any fans. Well, you may live 10 miles from a stadium, but it takes you two hours to get there. So I could right now, at 11 p.m., I could get there in 45 minutes. It's great. Los Angeles seems like a wonderful place. lived here. It has probably got the soccer, the soccer stuff out right now. So you couldn't even see any football stuff out there. But so that, that is sort of strange. Just the fact that I just don't know where they are as a franchise.

But yeah, I mean, they've got roster talent. Do they have the coaching? We'll get to that. I think today was an indictment of just decision making everything else. And again, as we're talking about the hierarchy, maybe the coaching is enough of an indictment. Maybe it's enough of a shortcoming where it's a two-horse race this year and that's just how it goes. I mean, Baltimore loses to the Saints today.

And I feel like Baltimore was an interesting team. They were kind of an anomaly. It was like, all right, are the Ravens real? Like, how far can they go? But in reality, they're probably not very good. And I don't know. I want to believe in the Chargers, but I don't know how real they are in a meaningful game. I guess that's what I'd say.

Yeah, I mean, but we haven't seen the Chiefs in a meaningful game. Yeah. I'm just saying, I'm just saying, theoretical. It's all theoretical. The Chiefs have one loss. The Charters have two. It's not like, I mean, obviously what the Chiefs have done is incredibly impressive.

I am blown away about what they've been able to do, especially on offense. But, you know, they still have that defense that certainly can struggle at times, not not tonight, but certainly at times. They gave up 43 points last week to a to a team. that's been very inconsistent on the offensive side of the ball. And, you know, I think this is such a weird AFC because it's not the usual cast of characters with the exception of the Patriots,

such a weird league, quite frankly, that all of this stuff is just projection and guessing. You know, Craig and I, Craig and I, before we came on, we were just talking about just the teams we trusted. And Craig said that he trusted Drew Brees. And I just don't know, you know, it's such a strange time right now.

defense is so weird right now. I just, I'm having a tough time trusting anybody, if that makes sense. So let's get to that. Let's do stock up, stock down for the day. And let's start with stock up. And I want to start with the Saints because I think that's a fascinating point. And I think where the NFC is particularly is so interesting because it's the Rams who are still undefeated.

And we just, again, the Rams of the Chiefs, it's like, oh, the Rams won again. You know, cool. do we really need to talk about that? The answer is probably no. But if we're talking about the hierarchy in that conference, if you had to bet on an NFC championship game right now, wouldn't it be Saints Rams? Yeah, I think the Vikings are just below that tier.

So I totally agree that there are a different team than I thought. I was texting with Courtney Cronin today from ESPN and I was just like, are the Vikings good? And we're just kind of talking about it. And I think they're definitely in the conversation. And they're not the team we expect to coming into the season. It's just in terms of like, are they the best defense in football? But they're so dangerous because of the talent.

And I think Minnesota is in that conversation. But right now, if I had to pencil in two teams that I feel like you're going to play in the Coliseum on January 15th or whatever it is, it's Saints and the Rams. The Rams have to be one of them if it's in the Coliseum. but the Saints are the other one. Great if just the Saints and the Vikings played in the Coliseum. I probably should have given a different venue or not specify the venue, but yes. I kind of narrowed it down.

Yeah, I think it's those three right now. I'm in the NFC East. I just don't care right now. I just do not care about the NFC East. We'll get to the Eagles. I mean, today is a very disappointing game for them. Yeah. And again, like the usual.

that you would trust to win a playoff game just aren't there. The Seahawks are not the Seahawks anymore. The Packers, I mean, who the hell knows what's going on right now? I thought the damn bears were good. Now they have the same record as the Lions. Even if they lost New England today,

they have this ridiculous stretch of their schedule coming up where they can rattle off some wins. And I've kind of resigned myself after today to the idea that it's going to be an encouraging bearer season that is ultimately disappointing. That's where I'm at.

Dude, have you seen the Saints schedule? They have Vikings next week and then the Rams. Then they skip a week and have the Eagles. They have the Bengals who are pretty good actually in that week to skip. Oh, so the Bears are going in the FC Championship game. That's what you're saying. I'm just throwing out. We're talking about schedules.

The New Orleans Saints have a very, very hard schedule. Vikings, Rams, Bengals, Eagles, Falcons. The Falcons are a really good one in 14. I'm going to find out about that defense pretty quickly. All right, so stock up Saints. they just win. They went on the road and beat the Ravens. This is the second time this year,

two completely different teams. The second time this year, the number one offense has played the number one defense in points, which I find fascinating. That's how quickly everything changed. It just happened three weeks ago with the Jaguars and the Chiefs, and now the Jaguars are where the Jaguars are.

Those teams, the offense is now 7 and 1 in the last 15 years when number one offense, number one defense, play each other. that's very interesting to consider, especially in this era of football. Is that one game that's Super Bowl in 2013? I don't know. We already did this on the show.

I threw a series. I had the list in front of me, and I forgot. So we all, none of us have working brains, is the point. So, yeah, they win. And I was really impressed. I really wanted to see them against this Baltimore defense, who have seemed to have figured out. And I still believe they have figured out defense in 2018.

I still think the Ravens can be fairly good. And also, by the way, the Saints could have easily lost this game. Had Justin Tucker not missed the first extra point in what, 200 attempts or something? That was very strange. You're the number one Justin Tucker stand. So I assume that was a... No, we have some incredible Justin Tucker stands at the ringer. Roger Sherman is one of them.

We have some real Justin Tucker heads. I mean, Mal has to be. Yeah. It is a Tucker high. I just wrote a pretty, I wrote a pretty meaty story about him last year. I have not really kept up with rooting for him since. Kickers are tough because they just make the kick.

It's going to happen every once in a while. But I mean, the Saints had to score 17 points to win this game in the fourth quarter, but they did. It's one of those things where you go on the road against a really good team. And if you win, you win. And it's the same thing with the Chargers today.

They weren't impressive beating a team from the 8th. aFC in London, but they won. And as you continue to rattle off wins at a certain point, as every team in the NFL was three and three, it becomes impressive. Yeah. No, I totally agree with you. And, you know, Drew Bree's just

another one of those things we didn't care about. Got his 500th touchdown pass today. He's just going to keep breaking records. And, you know, you see this stuff where, you know, even these guys we think are putting up unprecedented passing numbers. It's going to take them like 18 years. to catch Drew Brees.

I mean, it's just really kind of incredible. And so, yeah, I mean, I have a question for you, though, because Craig and I were talking with this off air, and I want your perspective. Are the weapons he has now better than the weapons, and I would assume we would throw Jimmy Graham in there, so let's say the 2011 team. He had the number one offense in the NFL in 2011.

Are the weapons now, as a whole, better than they were in 2011, the last time he had the number one defense or number one offense. Yes. Great. Well, that's it for the show. Appreciate you. I'm looking right now.

I'm looking at it right now. It's basically Jimmy Graham was the elite of the elite. So I'm looking at it right now. And this year, you have Michael Thomas and you have Alvin Kamara. So it's basically two elite guys versus one. So let's distribute this. So Darren Sproles had 111 targets in that season. I think Alvin Kamara is a more dangerous.

dangerous backfield weapon as a receiver and a runner than Darren Sproul's. I agree. I agree as much as we all love Darren Sprouls here. We're all Darren Sproles heads. What do you think was the number one rushing attempt number on the 2011 Saints? 16 games. I'm going to guess 104. 122.

Perfect. Drew Brees through 657 passes. I mean, just that makes sense now, but six years, like seven years ago, that's hilarious and ridiculous. Pierre Thomas ran the ball 110 times, 657 passes for Drew Breeze. He completed 71.2% of them, which again, it's fucking ridiculous. But yeah, I think that if you're looking at it just from a pure talent perspective, so Jimmy Graham is your de facto number one receiver. Marcus Colston is your number two guy. He got 107 targets.

They're better now. I mean, they're better with Kamara, this version of Ingram, this offensive line, and Michael Thomas. I have to think that. Is that weird? No, no, no, no. Is that really, he biased or no? No. I don't think it is only because I think Jimmy Graham was, as I said, the elite of the elite that year.

He had 1,300 yards, 99 receptions. 11 touchdowns. 11 touchdowns. He was really free. freaking good. Lance Moore caught a touchdown passes on 52 receptions. I don't think they had anybody else who was top five at their position. Yeah, Colston's weird.

I think Colston may have been top 10, top 15, but he wasn't. I think Alvin Kumar and Michael Thomas are both top five at their position. That's really important. I just don't know how we're going to talk about Marcus Colston at like 15 years from now. I think Marcus Colson is just going to be one of those guys where it's like, oh, we played with Drew Brie's. How do we even so like start thinking about his place? in the NFL when he played. I think he's just going to be lost.

And I don't know if whether, if that's fair or not, I'm not sure. Yeah, I mean, he had a very short prime. Yeah, but how good was Marcus Colston? We don't have to do this. Like, because I think it's a layered conversation that probably deserves more time that we can give it. In his first seven years,

he had 6,000 yard receiving yards. But is that a Drew Brees thing? Yeah, I mean, not everybody who is always, targeted by Drew Brie's gets those numbers. I do think there's a level of consistency needed and, you know, ability to know what you're doing on the field. But certainly if he was playing with Derek Anderson, he would not have gotten those numbers. You had to be the Derek Anderson line was coming. I knew it was coming eventually. I was just thinking of someone who was around then that, you know, was maybe more league average than Drew Brie's. I'm very curious. I don't think he

would have pulled a Josh Gordon and gotten 1,300, 400, 400 yards with, you know, the worst quarterbacks in football. I'm very curious about this now. In 2007, Derek Anderson made the Pro Bowl. Drew Brees did not. Yeah, because Derek Anderson is elite. Derek Anderson.

I was really hoping that was true. And it is. Derek Anderson led a little Brown's revival there for a while. Yeah. He went to the Pro Bowl in 2007. Who was his top receiver in 2007? I believe it was Oh my God, I can't remember his name.

The Michigan guy. Brelon Edwards? Yes. It definitely was Brail and I was in 2007. I'm not looking this up. I'm just remembering this. Braylon Edwards, it was his only 1,000 yard season.

How dare we besmirch? Derek Anderson. He created stars like Braywin Edwards. Before we move on, let's take a quick break. This episode is brought to you by an all-new season of the Showtime original series, Ray Donovan, starring Leav Schreiber, John Boyd and Susan Sarandon.

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Now back to the show. All right, let's get to a couple more stockup, stock down. The Houston Texans are now winning in the AFC South. I believe they deserve some stock up after their quarterback could not get on an airplane this week. Can we do realignment, like in college? does get new divisions. All right.

I'm listening. Lay it out for me. That's it. We're just going to get rid of the division that gives the playoff spot to the guys who can't put their quarterback on an airline flight. But we just did this.

Who deserves to get it? Which AFC team probably deserve that spot? Why does it have to be NFC? Why does it have to be AFC, rather? Okay. Which NFC team? I would rather have the Eagles in. Okay.

If the Eagles play the Texans right now, they'd win by 14 points. I think I'm not so sure about that. Well, I mean, yeah. I mean, they just, that, that panthers game was so strange. That game killed analytics.

I'm not so sure about that. Did you see the, did you see the Panthers Eagles game? Yes. That was the strangest game. I have no idea how the Eagles are where they are right now. I that was that none of that

none of that made sense but all right we're giving the Eagles credit because they're the Eagles is there anyone else in this conversation? Okay oh wait who should make okay let's go through it here if the Texans played the Bears who would win I hope the Bears would win but I

can't tell you at this point if the Texans played the Packers who would win that's a Rogers respecting though I don't think the Packers are good but who would win probably the Packers in ridiculous fashion the same way they did it Monday night. Yeah, they would go down 21 points

and then they would just let it rip. So the Texans wins this year are to a Jaguars team that have stopped functioning, the Bills, a Cowboys team that, I mean, we all saw that game. That was not a good game. They've lost to,

and they beat the Colts. They beat the Colts. They've lost to the New York Giants, the Patriots, and the Titans. Let's start. off here. If you lose to the Giants, you should not make the playoffs. It's just, it's an eliminator.

Yeah. No, it's just kind of like, again, it's a loophole in the league rules. Again, to go back to the college thing, it's, I'm looking at strength of loss here. And, you know, this is one of those like old Dominion type losses. That's fair. It just disqualifies you from the playoff. It's over. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, losing to the Patriots, no shame in that. beat the Colts by three points, beat the Cowboys by three points, beat the bills by a touchdown, and then your first double-digit win of the years to a dead-on-arrival Jaguars team.

They have the Dolphins, Broncos, and Redskins next three weeks. Get this team off my television. Oh, they're going to be there because they're going to be playing in the playoffs. Now, part of the rate, and I want everyone to be, I want everyone to be on the same page of me here.

Part of my rage is how much I love Deshaun Watson and what they've done to him and how he's become the most under pressure quarterback in the NFL instead of figuring any other plan out and some of the offensive play calling, especially earlier in the year. I mean, I don't know. The whole thing to me, I want to see Deshaun in the playoffs. I want to see that guy thrive, but I also want the Texans to be punished for what they've done to that guy. I totally agree. I mean, it's, it was, I also kind of wanted just a new head coach there. It's a conversation I was having, you know, sort of online last week when I was talking about earlier this week, actually, when we're talking about the Giants. And like, oh, if they don't

get the top two pick, they'll just trade up for a quarterback. That's what teams do now. It's like, okay. Yes. Like, some teams have done that. Do you realize that the Titans, or the, excuse me, the Texans getting Deshawn Watson is the reason they don't have an offensive line right now, right? Because they had to trade a future first round pick to go get Deshawn Watson. Like, this stuff just doesn't happen. You have to give up stuff in order to go get that quarterback. Like the Carson Wentz thing worked out for Philly because they got to trade a first round pick to Minnesota because their quarterback is knee exploded in August. And they got Derek born out as a result.

Like, this shit happens at a cost. It doesn't happen for free. And the Texans don't have an offensive line because they had to go get a quarterback. Like, you can't just do it all. You can't have everything. So I want to talk about, that's a good point. I want to talk about the decision that just rules the entire AFC right now. Because if it was made, if it played out a little differently, everything changed.

This is sort of the beginning of the butterfly effect in the AFC. Fourth pick, Leonard Fournett, 10th pick Patrick Mahomes, 12th pick Deshaun Watson. I cannot even, I don't even want to start talking about the close. The entire AFC is explained by those three lines. Because if the Jacksonville Jaguars select either of those two quarterbacks, they are absolutely unbeatable. I couldn't even imagine

what the damn Jaguars look like with Patrick Mahomes. I'm actually glad it didn't happen. We both like Tom Palisero. He does a great job at the NFL network. He was reporting on the Carlos Hydra today. And his explanation of it, maybe he was yesterday. I was in a car listening to the audio

slash watching the video. He was talking about how in the Jags' mind, Carlos Hyde fits their profile. And they fit, he fits their style of running back and he could replace Leonard Fournet because Leonard Fournette's not playing. They drafted Leonard Fernett fourth overall. And Carlos Hyde was averaging like 3.5 yards per carry for the Browns. Is their style of player not good players?

Well, they're not. It's players who get under four yards to carry. but it's a tough under four yards of care. Yes. They gave him. I think that... I love his career 3.9 yards per time. Their rationale was he replaces what Chris Ivory gave them.

So it's maddening. It's maddening what they've done. It's... Everything about it is amazing. They could have been helped so many other ways. Even if it's not a quarterback, just not a running back. Yeah. Anything. Anything. Anything.

It's going to go down as one of the worst decisions. I mean, let's assume, let's assume the Jaguars do not get a Super Bowl out of this. That's the reason. And by this, I don't mean this year. I mean, just this whole era of having a lot of talent on defense. Do you know which team Teddy Bridgewater is? right now? I do. Which team? He's on the New Orleans Saints.

Yeah. Do you know who the New Orleans Saints quarterback is? I do. Yeah. So I don't, the Saints traded for Teddy Bridgewater. The Saints. Drew Breeze is their quarterback. Why? Yeah. Why? Why not do it?

Some teams understand the value of a good quarterback and you know that if you don't have a second one, as we learned last year. Jeffrey Lurie told me this when I was reporting the Eagles story and I keep thinking about it. They don't even call the Eagles don't even call

the backup quarterback, the backup quarterback. They just call them the second quarterback and they think it's like a semantics thing because he's going to play at some point. So I don't know why they do that necessarily, but it's just a way for them to show that they value

the second quarterback who's not a battle. By the way, Cody Kessler is the backup. quarterback. Yeah, Cody, Blake Portles is a backup quarterback. They just happens to start the games. Yeah, that's fair. So that's the way

a lot of teams view it, for instance, team that's won the Super Bowl or a team that's going to compete in the NFC, but the old Jaguars are saying, well, hold on now. What if we had two bad quarterbacks? It's quarterback one and quarterback two. Just neither of them is a guy

you want to be quarterback one. You know the old Jimmy Johnson thing, right? If you have two quarterbacks, you have none, right? So maybe the hack here is to start with no quarterbacks and then have two. Yeah. I mean, they're a forward-thinking franchise. We've always considered them that way.

They're just hacking, dude. They're just hacking everything. All right. One more stock up very briefly. And again, we mentioned this off the top. There's not much more to say. But we need to talk about Patrick Mahalmers for like two seconds. Yeah.

He has 22 touchdown pass. is through seven games. He's on pace for 50 touchdowns. Like, I know it's not fun or interesting to say that Patrick Mahomes and the chiefs are really good. What if he throws 50 touchdowns? So he might, and now he's got Cream Hunt rolling.

Hey, Kareem Hunt now, half of his touchdowns from Scrimerj are in primetime games. I mean, that was always going to come back around. When you have an offense that's scoring like this, the running back is going to get the ends up. So I'm kind of obsessed with the next-gen stats. They give you sort of the read on how long a guy actually ran on a play instead of just saying he gained 20 yards.

They tell you how long he actually ran. And there's a couple of stats I pulled here. I'll get to all of them later. But on Hunt's 21-yard run in the first quarter, how many yards of distance did he run? 55. 75. 70.5. Yeah, that was like Mitchell Tribes. his touchdown run today.

Yeah, no, I got that. As impressive. Well, no, that's even funnier. He had 71 yards on I don't want to talk about it. I'm just going to say it so the listener can know. He had 71 yards, 71.9,

so basically 72 yards of distance on an eight yard touchdown run. It was a great play. Is he better than Leonard Fournett? He was the second overall pick, obviously. Yeah, was that the pick? Was that the right pick, but only from a running perspective. It's what the Jag should have done.

Is taking Trubisky and made it on a runner? Trubesky and put him in the back field. Dude, that would have been actually an innovative offense. Much more innovative than what they're doing now. Why don't, I, so did they try that with Dinar Robinson and I just blacked it out? Why doesn't a team do something like that?

No, he was just a running back. No, no, but why don't they just pass like 25% of the time? That would change everything. I mean, Alabama did that this week? Or last week. What'd they do? They just handed it off to a guy in the backfield and had him run like a little tiny bootleg.

It's the next wrinkle. Princeton does it all the time. Yeah. No, having two guys who can throw the football in the backfield is the future. I've heard that a lot. Maybe that's what the Ravens have to do. It was also the past. It was also like they did that in the 1920s too.

Football is a flat circle. All right. It really is. Let's get to stock down. the Browns should have scored 50 points on the bucks today and they lost. Are we just done with Hugh Jackson? What's the point of this patience that we're showing? John Dorsey literally had to trade Carlos Hyde this week in order for Hugh Jackson to play his best players.

So now Hugh Jackson says that he's thinking about taking over play calling. Is that supposed to help? How, what? Todd Haley is the offensive coordinator. Well, I mean, it's not like, Hey, Hayley hasn't been lighting the world on fire, but he's certainly better than Hugh Jackson. Todd Haley is their offensive coordinator.

It's not like some quarterbacks coach that you're like, oh, I'm going to try to, you know, empower this guy this year. It's not the bullshit that Mike McCarthy does every year. Like, you hired a real offensive coordinator. Hey, do you know what, uh, Hugh Jackson's record in, uh, three points or less games? I assume it's 0 and something. It's 2.10 and 1.

Two. Yeah. Where are the two? He's got two. Well, that means he, when he, I mean, when he does win, it's not by a lot of points. This theme is, I mean, we said this coming in the year. I think that I said it a few times even since. Call me when they have a different coach.

I mean, their talent is, I, there was a play today where Denzo Ward just had incredible coverage on Deshaun Jackson and the fate in the endzo. And I'm just sitting there like, Goddy, that guy is good. And watching that team, all I can think is, I cannot wait until someone else is in charge of this team. Yeah.

Am I delusional? Are they not that good? They need to go out and they need to hire a guy who just has incredible understanding of modern schemes and get Baker Mayfield in a position. You know what I want to see next year? This time next year. I want to be doing this podcast.

And I want to see a stat that Baker Mayfield has only thrown one tight window throw in the last two weeks. Exactly. That's what I need to say. I'm with you. I mean, it's just one of those things where you just watch that team. And every time you want to get excited about them, it's like, oh, wait, never mind, Hugh Jackson's their coach. Like, there's nothing exciting about this.

Could you imagine being a Browns player and you lose and all this stuff? And then you get even worse news and that Hugh Jackson wants to take on more responsibility? Like when Tyrod like tapped him during training camp was like, why don't we do this? Yeah. You want somebody to tap him. It's like, you know what? You sit back. Just control the game.

It's what you're best at. Except he's not the best at it. It's just what you have to tell him. Yeah. It's not a good situation. And I'm excited to see. Who would you hire next year? Lincoln Riley.

Yeah. Why not? I think so. No, I think so. I worry that someone like the Cowboys, that means he's just going to give him a blank check. I think it's about how much he likes Baker Mayfield. Yeah.

And I don't know the answer to that. But if he really thinks Baker Mayfield is special, then he probably takes that job. If not, then he doesn't. Tell you something, Robert. I love working with you. Just like I'm sure he loves working with Baker Mayfield. someone offers me a blank check to go host a podcast with Danny Kelly.

I will never talk to you again. That's fair. I don't fault you for that. Now, who's going to offer me a blank check to host a podcast, Danny Kelly? I don't know. Jerry Jones. That remains to be seen. Yeah, Jerry Jones.

Who else could? David Tepper over in Carolina. He could pair me and Danny Kelly. All right, very quickly. Two more stock downs. one, two of three here. Are we worried about the Eagles? Yeah, we should be.

Yeah. The only reason I said they could be the Texans is because they have a lot of talent on the roster and I believe in their coaching staff. But, I mean, they lost a very strange game today. They should not have lost that game. They look really good in stretches. And then there are others where it's just like,

what is this team? And I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. And, you know, it was just, just, it's frustrating. I'm in awe of Michael Bennett's shoulder pads.

He's wearing the same amount of shoulder pads that I am right now in this moment. What kind of shoulder pads do you want to know? Non-existent. Oh, okay. I thought maybe you just put them on. We can't see each other. So I thought maybe you just threw on some pads that should get a vibe going. Yeah, I like to get jacked up for the show.

So I put on a helmet. Yeah. Yeah. They should not have given up 21 fourth quarter points. I don't think the Panthers are that good. So I don't know. I mean, it's just, it's, it's not, I, I, they were, the, the defense gave up 226 yards in the fourth quarter.

They'd given up 145 yards in the first three quarters. It was a bizarre game. I mean, but at the same time, like, now it's week seven. And at a certain point, you need to start winning. Like, I mean, that's just how it goes. I understand that they looked. Better, but they're three and four. Not even just from our perception.

I mean, at this point, the Washington Redskins are four and two. Yes. And the Washington Redskins might go ahead and just accidentally win nine games. So you got to win nine games. I mean, if the Eagles make the tournament, I'd be worried about playing them. Just because they have a lot of Ross talent. Carson Wentz is going to become Carson Wentz again at some point, even though I think it didn't completely like 80% of his past today. But it wasn't, you know, it wasn't.

you know, the Eagles of 2017 by any means before December of 2017. Yet I just, I'm, they're just running out of clock is what it is. Because again, the Redskins are just going to accidentally stumble into eight, nine, 10 wins. Yeah. At a certain point, you have to start winning. I mean, we talked about this last week on the last week's show. It was like, by this time of the, of the season, these teams are starting to become what we

think they are. And at a certain point, the Eagles have to be. a dangerous team, a scary team, a team that we think can win these games, and that's not what they are right now. Are you aware of who they're playing next week? No. They're going to London, England.

Oh, yeah, I did see that because I know I have to get up at fucking 8 o'clock again to watch the game. To play the Jacksonville Jaguars. That is an amazing, like whoever wins that game gets the momentary, like our season is saved. It's very momentary. No, but it's going to happen.

Whoever wins that game gets to do that our season is saved. We're back. We always knew it was possible. And it's entirely possible. Both those teams are bad. All right. One more stock down. Would you like to take back your Sean McDermott, good coach take?

No. Take shop on Thursday. No, because guess what? First of all, it's a take shop. There's just a no judgment zone. And it's like, I'm not, all right, let me rephrase this. I'm not asking you to take it back.

I will not be, I will not be taking, I will not be taking, I will not be taking back my take shop. Do you know, you do the workout classes. Remember when they're like, beginning, like, this is a judgment free zone? Yes. That's take shop. Take shop is the workout class in this podcast. I'm not judging you.

I'm not asking you to take it back. I feel a little bit, judge. Would you like to re-workshop it? I'm not going to re-work shop it because what was the caveat that we both decided on that one, with the exception of quarterback to, decision making, which remains his Achilles seal. So now what do you do? They got pasted by the Colts.

No, what do you do? What do you do now? I don't know. You're not thinking about this logically. He's got one Achilles seal. It's quarterback decision making. So in 2019, you just hire a guy to make the quarterback decisions. You hire who's available right now, Dick for Meal? You bring in Dick for Meals quarterback guy. I don't know why Dick for Meal is the funniest thing you could have said.

but I just, I can't stop laughing now. Because Dick Vermil, Dick Vermil made a number of good quarterback decisions. And also he was the first person who's retired, who ran a good offense that popped into my head. So, McDermott goes to training camp. To be clear, Vermeal has nothing to do with the team. He's not,

he doesn't live in Buffalo. He doesn't go to Rochester for training camp. McDermott coaches the team through OTAs to training camp into the season on Sundays, we bring them to Buffalo and he just looks at a couple of things. He talks to the guys maybe for like 20 minutes and then he tells Sean McDermott

which person to start. And that's every single Sunday. I'm sorry, I'm trying to lock back in here. So Sean McVeigh has John Fossel in his ear for four-down decisions. And Doug Peterson has an analyst guy in his ear on certain things. Yeah.

And Sean McDermott. has Dick from Neil at his ear on Saturday morning. Yeah, pregame. Pregame. So Chris Ivory had 16 carries for 81 yards today. What do you think the Jags are going to trade for him? I mean, I didn't know Chris Ivory did that today. Well, Shaw, LaShaul McCoy left the game in like the first quarter or so.

Yeah. You're not going to believe this. I didn't check in too much for that game. I assume that the Jacksonville is going to trade a six-round pick for I, every day or this week because he fits their style. Listen, I don't, I don't even care what's going on with them right now. I'm just so happy that I just came up on the spot with just the way to solve the Bills franchise.

It's incredible. I feel like maybe, I feel like maybe we should, we should just not include that. And I should just send the, I just send an email to the Pagula's offering my services. Then you definitely won't be doing a podcast with Jenny Kelly next year. No, Danny's coming. Danny and I are going to go solve the bills franchise together with Dick Vermeal. All right, challenge fags very quickly. I want to talk about the Anthony Lynn experience today.

They won that game, but I'm sitting there watching that Final Titans drive. And Tennessee has the ball inside the five with like a minute and 54 seconds left. And the chargers are doing nothing. It's like, okay, sounds good, you know, good luck scoring. and they let it tick down to 25 seconds eventually. And then Anthony Lynn calls timeout in order to get 10 seconds back on the clock to prevent the runoff that had just happened.

It was one of the more maddening things I've ever seen in my entire life. And then the discourse about the Titans decision to go for two after that was amazing. I had CBS on because I was waiting for the Bears game to start. and the logic being employed by the people on that broadcast about why you shouldn't go for two to win the game and you should play for overtime was amazing. It's like, do you guys know how far one yard is after you get a penalty?

I literally measured it out and took a picture of it. I'm doing it with my hands right now. It's a very short distance. And I feel like that is your best chance to put, a football somewhere is from that distance. Everything about the final five minutes of that game just drove me absolutely crazy. Could you run a quarterback sneak from one yard out? I think so.

It would more be about taking the exchange. I don't think you could do that. I think you would get nervous and drop the ball. That is the, yeah, I may fumble. Yeah, you'd fumble. You'd also fumble as soon as you got hit. yeah that's fair i may fumble you know who wouldn't fumble an NFL player marcus mariotta yeah he would probably score a touchdown instead yeah but they went they went five wide and uh had to

take the staff in the shotgun though so that wasn't an option man it's pretty the the state of goal line play calling is not good no so i kind of think everyone just run a read option on the goal line and that's just the every play or do something with jet motion and run the run like a shovel pass or run that little flip play to the receiver coming in motion, like do something to give yourself a numbers advantage when you don't have the space advantage. Yeah, the thing I wouldn't do is just run a pretty simple pass. It's very discouraging because I was really in the mouth floor. Yeah, I mean, he had some good moments today and the Titans probably could have won that game in

five different moments and they absolutely did not. All right, what's yours? What's your challenge for the vet? The Mitch Trubisky. What about it? Didn't have a great accuracy showing today. Yeah, it was his worst game I've seen him play this year, by far. It was just, that whole game was, I don't want to sound like a broken record, but that was a, a game I just failed to understand what the hell was going on for, for large parts of it.

Great, great leg performance from Mitch Chubisky. and one of the worst armed performances I've seen from Mitch Chubisky. In the modern NFL against that defense, to go 26 of 50 is just unacceptable. I mean, he threw two picks, but he tried to throw three more. No, yeah.

A lot of the analytics guy's talking about the interception luck he's had this year, and at some point, that's going to come home to Roos. So, yeah, it was all very strange. As I said, 71 yards of distance on that eight-yard touchdown run, and then he had less yards covered on his 39-yard run. He only had 65.

I mean, the guy has, he's mobile. He makes stuff happen. But at a certain point, pulling the ball down to do that stuff and just the penalty luck they've gotten on like third down this year. So many defensive holdings, legal contacts, like, it's, it's not sustainable. And I've, I've come to terms with it. Like, the defense is fun. to a certain degree

and the offense has made strides. I think that Nage's done a really good job with the talent that he has, especially the quarterback that he has. But they're not a contender. They're not a real team. No. It's going to be a fun season in some ways.

You know what I was encouraged by. This was the first time this season that Tariq Cohen has played more than half the snaps in a game. Yeah, the Jordan Howard thing is like over. That's extremely good, dude. I don't know what they're going to do with the running back situation.

next year. I mean, Howard's a free agent. So it's going to be interesting to see how they're probably not going to bring him back. No, they're definitely not bringing them back. Right. So like, what do they do? They go draft somebody in the third round. I mean, I don't know the answer. Because Tariqone is not a full time running back.

And I have no interest in the Benny Cunningham experience. Yeah, they'll probably I mean, or they take a flyer. I mean, running backs can be had in this league at pretty, pretty cheap prices unless you draft the one fourth overall. And then trade a fifth round pick for another one. all right very quickly let's stay on the top the tom cough on jaguars tomorrow's headline yeah we both agree it's that we're just going to start wondering why the hell the jaguars did this when they had such a

deep roster one of the best defenses in the modern game and they went with like boardles for the two years and now they're basically stuck with them and they're stuck with cody kessler we're going to start to wonder why Tom Cofflin did this and I bet pointed questions will be asked over the next couple of weeks. Yeah. I mean, one sort of reprieve is they are

going to London. So it's now like the media will be normal in that regard. To me, it's about how fast title windows close in the modern NFL. Yeah. Well, they close I'll tell you what, dude, they close a lot quicker when he got Blake Bortles than when he got Patrick

Mahomes. And we talked, we talked about this a lot over the last like six months. Even off the show, even like in idea meetings at the ringer.com, just about quarterbacks and infrastructure and how important they are and everything. It's like, oh, can you win without one? And it's like, nope, you just can't. What you need to do to be a real team without a quarterback, that needle was nearly impossible to thread. And they did it for a season and they did it for a couple games in the playoffs and they almost beat the Patriots and now it's over. Yeah, I mean, maybe a miracle happens.

So let me ask the question. You've studied their defense and their cap. When does that sort of stuff have to be broken up? Like, when does Clayas Campbell have to go? When is the real salary cap trouble next year or the year after? They're $10 million over the cap now for next year. So what do they have to do next year as far as cash lies? I mean, Darius is gone.

They get $10 million off their cap by cutting Darius. there are a couple other ones where they can get some money like Abrey Jones is I think four or five million they can get under but they need to play they need to pay Blake Bortles next year. There's no easy solution to this outside of from cutting a couple guys. But can that what I'm asking is can they cut guys to where they still have the best talent defense in the league? Yes.

Next year they can do that. Darius is the only guy they have to lose next year. No, but I guess what I'm saying is that so they have next year and Bortals will still be on the roster. And there doesn't seem to be a clear path unless they hit on a rookie quarterback who can win a damn Super Bowl right away. And that's not going to be the case

that at any pick they have because they're not going to get a top top one pick. How could they draft a quarterback that high? That's what I'm saying. When you're paying a quarterback $21 million next year. I'm just trying to map this out. Okay. So that's next year.

So really the first year, you're going to be able to start fresh with a new quarterback who can, you can get in free agency or trade or whatever would be 2020. And at that point, you know, you're going to start paying Jalen Ramsey. You're going to have, you know, guys, guys get expensive all over the board. It just starts to get a little hairy. The windows are not so long that you can just stick with Blake Bordles for two more years. But that's what they've done.

They actually have some reasonable cuts next year. So it's, they get 10, almost 11 million by cutting Marcel Darius. That has to happen. There we know. There's, so that's seven. Remember, they were still really damn good before they got Marcel Darius last year. Correct. Correct.

And then Tashon Gibson is 7.5. Barry Church has no dead money left on his deal at 6.2. But again, then you're cutting guys that made you the best defense in the NFL. Something has to give. There are no free lunches in the league. That's how this goes. If you're cutting these guys, they'll cut Carlos High. There's no dead money.

It's 4.75, obviously, but they're still paying them this year. It's just they're going to be able to get under, but it's not going to be easy. Like, there's a lot of gymnastics that they have to do. Hey, Robert, that's the price you pay in the National Football League. But for getting running backs to fit your physical profile. I feel like we need music, like NFL lifestyle music when I say, National Football League. Just have a kick in.

Don't do that, Craig, by the way. Don't do that, please. Do that. All right. That's all we got. Does NFL, does ESPN still use NFL primetime music in any capacity? I have no idea.

I've not watched NFL Prime Time in a long time. Well, no, it's not on any. I mean, it's like they don't have the Sunday package anymore. Oh, yeah, that's true. The music is great. We can see if we can get the rights. I doubt we can.

They've got a number of really good podcasts that if they were going to use the song on a podcast. I'll make some calls. I'll see what we can do. We're going to get sued. That's how this ends. All right. As always, guys, thank you so much for listening to the Ringer NFL show on the Ringer Podcast Network. We'll be back on Thursday. Thanks, guys.