The Ringer NFL Show - Which Loss Was the Most Devastating on ‘MNF’? Plus, the Patrick Mahomes Outburst and More Big Takeaways from Week 14 | Extra Point Taken

Episode Date: December 12, 2023

Sheil and Ben get together to share their takes on both the Giants and the Titans' big upset wins on the ‘Monday Night Football’ doubleheader. Sheil then analyzes Patrick Mahomes's reaction to the infamous Kadarius Toney penalty against the Bills, while Ben makes an MVP case for Lamar Jackson (31:25). Finally, they debate the Broncos' playoff viability, and Justin Fields's future prospects before speculating on the playoff scenarios in both conferences for the episode’s Extra Point (54:46). The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please check out theringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Hosts: Sheil Kapadia and Ben Solak Associate Producer: Chris Sutton Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal and Conor Nevins Musical Elements: Devon Renaldo Social: Kiera Givens and Eduardo Ocampo Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The ringer gambling feat is your one-stop shop for all things betting throughout the NFL season, from week one all the way through Super Bowl 58 in Las Vegas. We have you covered every which way. We've got our favorite futures. We've got props. We'll discuss the lines. And, of course, we'll throw in a few parlets. That's a given.

So whether you're a sharp or square better, we'll be breaking it down in terms. Hopefully, everybody can understand. And we'll try to win some money along the way. and be sure to subscribe to the ring of gambling feed on Spotify or wherever you get your podcast. Welcome to Extra Point Take It. Shield Capati here, joined by Ben Solek following two wild Monday night football games, two upsets.

Giants take down the Packers 24-22. Titans come storming back 28, 27 over the Miami Dolphins. We're going to talk about those games. And of course, everything else that happened in weeks. for team. Benjamin, let's start with this. Okay, so two teams here, Packers fighting for a playoff spot in the NFC, Dolphins fighting for the number one seed in the AFC. Both those teams go down. Answer the question right here. Which loss is more devastating for the fan base, the team, whatever, the Dolphins loss or the Packers loss, and then we'll just start with that

game and then we'll hit on the other game. I'm curious to hear your answer here. I think Packers is worse. The Dolphins loss sucks. Edward of ESPN tweeted out that teams that were down by 14 points with five minutes or less time remaining in regulation were up until this game. They were 0 in 767 over the last 767. Which that only takes us back to 2016.

Like that sounds a lot longer than it is. A lot of teams are down by 14 points with fewer than five minutes left in regulation. But still, been 760. of those games since we've had a loss. So I think the nature of the dolphins' loss is a little bit more crippling. It's more like shocking and it kind of came out of nowhere. But that was a 13-13 game until turnover started to get weird. The Packers just didn't look good against a pretty bad Giants team.

And the dolphins still have solid positioning in the AFC East, solid positioning in the AFC playoff race. They were at a point in this game, had four offensive lines starters that were not playing their starting positions, right? from left attack all the way to right guard. They had musical chairs and they had guys injured, obviously, and so you kind of say, listen, we know we're really good.

Vrable and the Titans, they kind of tend to do this. If you're the Packers, you need every win. You don't want to be sit in six and seven tied with the Rams, tied with the Seahawks, tied with the Falcons, tied with the Saints, tied with the bucks. You wanted to sit at seven and six up there with the Vikings, retain positioning in what's going to be a really crowded NFC wildcard race.

Because the Eagles and the Cowboys, one of those teams can be in a wildcard team. There's only two spots in the NFC wildcard race. you did not want to be dropping a game to the Tommy DeVita New York Giants. And so, well, I think the nature, the character of the dolphins lost a little bit more embarrassing because of how it came to be, it's more meaningful that the Packers lost to the Giants in the perspective of their playoff race now over the month of December. I think that's probably true. After we talk about both games, I may change my mind.

But let's start with that. So Packers lose this game. They fall to 6 and 7. Now, if the playoffs started today, they would still be in. They'd be a wild card seat, according to these ESPN. NFL standings because they'd win the tie break, but oh my goodness, is it bunched up down there? So you mentioned it. Whoever does not win the NFC East, that team is going to be the five seed.

After that, it gets very interesting. The Vikings are seven and six right now. They would be the six seed. And then, Ben, we got the Packers, the Rams, the Seahawks, your Falcons, the Saints, the Saints, all six and seven. And if you want to get a little friskier, Giants are five and eight, and bears. are five and eight. So the Packers had a chance to be in that seven and six territory. They were favorites in this game.

This was precisely the type of game you outlined in our Friday show last week when I picked the Packers minus six and a half as one of my picks. I mean, see, I don't come out of this game and say, oh my gosh, I'm really concerned about the Packers. Like this to me was very explainable in that this was a game where their youth showed. It was a reminder that, you know what? Progress, improvement for young players, for a young team. It's not linear.

It had kind of been linear for the Packers, especially like the last four or five weeks. Every game they play, they play on Thanksgiving. It's better than the previous week. They play the cheese. It's better than the previous week. And I was just thinking, this is a dangerous team. Could they actually make some noise in the playoffs? Now all of a sudden, they come back down to Earth a little bit.

I mean, Jordan Love was not sharp in the first half of this game. He had the fumble. He had the interception. He was missing throws. They had the special teams. Error. They're the big one in the second half. And so those were all issues.

And then this defense, Ben, I mean, I have never trusted this Packers defense. But to have a game like this where Tommy DeVito, I think, had been sacked 20 times in his previous three games. I think he had a sack rate over 19 percent, they said, coming into this game. They did not have a sack on Tommy DeVito. They did not have a takeaway on defense. I don't, except for the same. They had the Sequin Barclay, all right, self-inflicted fumble, and then they had a special team's one.

They were not making plays. And then you had the game in hand. Like I was, the take here could have been, hey, Jordan Love didn't have a great game. But man, when they needed him at the end, he makes that throw. They get the catch there to Malik Heath for the touchdown. They persevered. They get the win.

You need wins like this as a young player. That could have been the take. But the defense comes out on the field. They're just letting Tommy DeVito complete pass after pass after pass. And then Wondell Robinson has the 32-yarder. That defense is still going to be a concern for me. I still like this Packers team. I still think they're going to make the playoffs.

I think if you're a Packers fan, you're frustrated about this one, but you can also kind of explain it away and say, all right, we kind of know what we were getting into. Maybe we got a little carried away because we listened to She'll say he would give Jordan Love a $700 million contract on last week's episode. Let's take a step back, regroup, and get ready for the last four games. That's how I view it for the Packers. What did you think?

Yeah, I think defensively, when you, force only four Tommy DeVito incompletions and then also give up 71 Tommy DeVito rushing yards. You kind of got to look around and be like, all right, where, Joe Barry's had a better year this year than I thought he would. Joe Barry's, the Packers' defense has had better

performances recently, especially like no Jerry Alexander. They traded away Rasul Douglas and they've made it work with like Corey Valentin. It's been a better overall performance in Packers' defense, I think, on the season than I expected. But there are these nights, man, where Joe Barry's getting beat by something, this time it's just like QB run. And you're like, dude, do something.

Like, let's, we got to. Don't let them do the one thing they want to do. The only thing they can do, I mean, until the end there. They're trying to dial up pressure on Tommy DeVito in the first half. He's escaping up the middle. It's him against Devondre Campbell, one-on-one in space. And then they just lost to it. Snap after, snap after snap.

They live in the same defensive front. They live in barefront. Nobody runs more five-man front in the backers do. Snap after snap after snap. And they just keep losing the C-Gap runs. I know that's how you beat barefront. Whenever the Packers have a defensive performance like this, it's always just so like, what do you guys do here?

Like, you line up the same way, and then you run into a good offensive designer like Daible, who knows how to get your weak points, and then you just sit there and take it. And it's embarrassing enough when it's Kyle Shanahan doing it to you, as he's often done during the NSE playoffs. It's another thing when it's Tommy DeVito, man. Seriously.

But when Wondale Robinson and Isaiah Hodgins are beating you. Like, that's just not, the world you want to live in. Who would you rather have right now? Tommy DeVito or Bryce Young. Bryce Young. I just want to ask for fun. I didn't know who you were going to ask.

You could have said anybody there. I was going to think, what do you? I'll tell you, Tommy made a couple throws tonight. This is the first game of Tommy DeVito's career where I'm now willing to entertain people asking me things about Tommy DeVito. Up to this point, somebody DM me on Twitter, Giants fan, Avi, at Big Blue, 69, 420, like, oh, like, Tommy DeVito, you watch the film?

No chance. I'm not, absolutely not. I'm not engaging with that. Tonight I made some throws, dude. Tonight, I was like, okay, I will engage with the Tommy DeVito discourse. Keep them on the team. That's my thought to this point. Like, keep them as QB2, whatever.

But it's certainly been a fun experience to watch. It's been a fun set of memes for the Giants. They're not taking it too seriously. They're just having a good time within. They're using them as a runner. It's a blast. Absolutely. You know what?

And the Giants do deserve credit. You know, the Giants are not going anywhere. the Giants have had. One three in a row, the Giants have. That's right. Just said they're one game back of the Packers. So maybe I shouldn't say that. All right, I'll settle down here a little bit. I don't think they're going anywhere. But at the same time, this was the type of season. I think a month ago, I said the Giants are getting the first or seven pick second pick in the NFL draft. And that has not happened. So I do think Dayball, he comes off that season last year. He's coach of the year. They get off to this terrible start this year. And you're going,

all right, which way is this going to go? There's that Wink Martindale report that comes out. they're still playing hard. They're still trying to win games. If you can come out as six and a half point underdogs and win a football game like that. And DeVito's definitely, listen, he's definitely improved. The New York, you know, the tabloids, the media,

they're going to get carried away. That's okay. That's part of the fun of sports. I like it. It's fun. He seems like a likable guy. His teammates seem to like him. I'll tell you what did stand out to.

I mean, he is athletic. You know, he was able to, that was basically their entire game plan. It wasn't only the scrambles. They were using him in designed run game. He had a run of 26 yards. He ran 10 times. for 71 yards in this game.

Oh my God, Packers. How do you look yourselves in the mirror? DeVito just raided for 71 yards on you. And then he made plays at the end. I think there was what, four straight completions he had on that final possession. You don't leave Tommy Cutlets one minute and 31 seconds. I've been saying it for years.

You can't give Tommy Cutlets. Are we calling him that? I don't know they were calling him that. Here's a problem with giving Tommy DeVito a nickname. Tommy DeVito. Tommy DeVito. It's too good. It's already perfect.

I agree. I agree. Tommy Davido. Tommy Davido. Yes, we're not going to get into any on walking here or anything like that. We're going to keep it on the up and up. But nice job by the Johns. They played hard.

Sequin Barkley has the big fumble at the end just after he reels off. Two monster runs. And you're thinking, oh, my gosh, they blew it. They're not going to win this game. But they come back. They score Wondell Robinson big time game, 79 receiving yards, 36 rushing yards. Like you said, Tommy DeVita goes 17 for 21. They had very little interest in passing the football in this game,

but they were able to do it when they had to. They just leaned on the run game. They broke out every trick. I mean, Zone Reed, flea flicker, jet sweep, like, you name it. They're just throwing the kitchen sink at the Packers, and it was enough for a victory. So if you're a Giants fan, it hasn't been the most fun year to watch the team. So you'll always have Tommy DeVito on Monday night and the game-winning drive against the Green Bay Packers. So again, Giants 5 and 8, Packers 6 and 7 here,

would still be in as the 7 seat if the season ended today. But a little bit of breathing room they could have created for themselves. They did not do that here. I still like them. I still think they're going to be good. I still believe in Jordan Love. This was just a little bit of a step back for them. Can I ask you this real quick?

Yeah, what do you got? Do you think when we're in the summer of 2024, we're going to be doing like, you know, Giants beat riders are keeping track of Daniel Jones first team reps who he's completing passes to, Tommy DeVito, who he's competing first year. I just like, I'm curious how far this goes. Is this Bailey Zappy last year or is this a little more? That's all I'm wondering.

Well, I will say the Giants media market would tend to take this, I would say they would tend to take this kind of thing and really run with it. So yes, that is something I could potentially see. I could see Brian Daibald being asked about it quite a bit. I could see, you know, back pages with both these guys there, you know, the locker room divided, all that stuff. I think will be played out quite a bit here. So, yes, I mean, we'll see how the next month goes.

I guess he has improved. I'm with you. I wasn't really, you know, trying to pay too much attention to Tommy DeVito so far this season. But here, you know, you win a game. You're five and eight. They've got two games against the Eagles in the final four. We'll see if you can show a little bit more. All right.

Dolphins. This was a wild one. So like I was telling you before we started on my ringer picks against the spread column, I had Titans plus 12 and a half, 13 and a half, whatever I got it at. I'm feeling great. It's on my second screen. I'm watching Packers Giants mainly. You're watching Titans Dolphins a little bit more.

All of a sudden, the Titans are just blowing it in the fourth quarter. I'm going, no, no, no, I cannot lose this game. I had the right side. They come back win this game. What are your big takeaways from the Titans win over the Dolphins? Yeah, show my big. takeaway is that it's extra point taken brought to by State Farm. That's right, baby. Some things are better together like tailgating and cornhole, buffalo wings and blue cheese and bundling your home

and auto insurance with the State Farm personal price plan. Now, that's a play you want to make. The personal price plan lets you choose the coverage you need at a price you can afford like a good neighbor State Farm is there. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by State. Coverage options are selected by the customer availability. Amount of discounts and savings and eligibility vary by State. The number one thing for me watching this game, and The narrative arc that we saw the Tyreek Hill to a tungle by low-up pairing, that dynamic duo, that arc kind of was the first arc of the game. The second arc of the game was the Titans comeback.

There are a little bit of separate ideas. But Tyreek Hill goes down in the first quarter with injury. Now, we saw, you know, he gets his ankle rolled over. It's another example of the hip-drop tackle, and this is going to be something that continues to get talked about throughout the season. But he's on the sideline, and he's not getting treatment, but he's standing there without his helmet on, and you're wondering, can he get back into the game? he was into the locker room early,

but there's an evident shift in this dolphin's offense when Tyreek's not on the field, right? You can just tell it, you can just feel it. A little bit like if you lose some of the juice, right? You enter a place where it's a lot easier to blanket and get condensed on that middle of the field, take away some of the wattle routes. You can be a little bit faster downhill

into the throws behind the line of scrimmage, right? The checkdowns to the backs and the checkdown to Alec Engold. You're just your entire, there's an umbrella, lifted off your defense. There's a weight lifted off the defense of shoulders when 10 isn't on the field, right? And so you see they have methodical drives by success rate. Tua was better in this game with Tariq off the field than it was on the field,

but they're kind of inching it. They're kind of walking it, right? And they're not putting up big points. They're not having the offensive day you expect them to. And then Tariq comes back late in that third quarter, and you see that big catch on the sideline that he gets put him in a first and goal position. And it immediately feels like, oh, right, that's how this Dolphins' offense works. there's a lot of like,

O'Tua without Tyreek Hill discourse and who's the MVP here in Miami discourse? We talked about it last week. If we had to give the MVP to one of these guys, who would we give it to? I think you and I are both lean on the Tyreek side of things. It's going to be weird for the dolphins. You know, if boats come down,

would he get split, what have you? But you can tell that when Tyreeks on the field, the defense gets elongated. The spaces between players are bigger. And because Tua has such a quick release and because he's so accurate, when he gets that open space, he really makes this offense.

work. It works from this. This is the way it's supposed to go. And so there's no like value judgments now. It's not like, oh, MVP this, MVP that. That brief moment, that quarter and a half where we saw this offense without Tyreek Hill, it's ugly. It just doesn't look right. You get Tyree kill back on there, and now all of a sudden it looks the way we expected to look. Both of these guys' integral pieces of it and removing Tyreek for that moment kind of shows how important they both are to the offense working the way it's supposed to. I think that quarter and a half is going to, I don't think anyone's voting for as MVP. It's dumb. It's a quarter and a half.

I understand that's going to be hard to shake. Tua's had a fantastic year. I'm not taking it. They're nine and four. They've had a great year. They've had one of the best offenses in the NFL. But that on national TV on Monday night, we all watched that. And you can say, I didn't know that with success rate.

That's interesting. You could feel it. You could watch it. They were not scoring points. It was not the same scary. The second Tyreekill steps on the field, it becomes the scariest, maybe second scariest offense in the NFL. And when he's off there, yeah, maybe they can have success.

Mike McDaniel is still a good coach, too, is still a good quarterback. You have Jalen Waddle, you have the running backs, but it's completely different. I don't think anyone's going to be able to shake that image, that quarter and a half from their memory. I think it strengthens Tyree Kills MVP campaign. If you're someone who's thinking, all right, do I want to vote for him or not vote for him? I mean, just seeing that, I think it does shape it a little bit. and it would just be hard for me to imagine after watching that and seeing some of the other quarterback play in the NFL

that Tua is going to garner many votes. But it was weird, Ben. I mean, I had that on my second screen, so I didn't have the announcers on, and I see Tariq go down, but then he, like, runs off the field and it's like waving to the crowd. I don't know if you saw that moment. I'm like, what is going on?

Is he interested? And then he's not coming back on the field, but then he comes back in the second half. So, yeah, as it is recording, we'll see if we get anything here as we record that's more definitive. but that was a very strange injury situation, I thought. When Tyree got traded from the Dolphins,

from the Chiefs of the Dolphins, and he was at his height of, you know, he'd played incredibly, but he's also entering his late 20s. He's hitting 30. I thought that we were going to see a steep decline his athletic ability. Like, I thought the cliff was going to come for him

and it was going to come from fast. I still think when the cliff comes for him, it's going to come for him fast. However, he's staving it off. I think the price of staving it off is he gets nicked up quite a bit. Like, I would say like, 50% of Dolphins games that I watch live

when I watch it on film, there's a play where he gets tackled into the sideline, and then he's like, all right, I need my hamstring. Definitely true. And massage for next four plays, then I'm back in. But he's just, he is perhaps more so than any player in the league, a quick Twitch player, right? I mean, he is all the Twitch muscles,

all the weird angles and stick your foot in the ground and just, you know, you need mobility in your joints. And when you get older, I can attest to it on top. I'm getting there. I can't. I don't know what you're talking about. You lose the mobility. your joints. So I think that he gets inked up a lot and maybe this was a bit more austere of a

neck. But that's kind of like living life with with Tyreek. What was really, you know, worrisome was that Jalen Waddle hit on the first two attempt, right? When he throws between three players and Waddle gets his bell rung, that's a sort of throw that always scares me about this particular offense, right? Where I talked about this with the Bengals when Joe Burrow was in his super like dink and dunk mode. You can throw like all these anticipation throws over the middle and find windows. You can just you're asking your receivers to take lick after lick after a lick and eventually it adds up. And so that's one where, especially when we get late in the season,

I'm just like, Jaylin, get up, get up, get up. Because you lose him, you lose, again, like another important aspect of this offense. But yeah, I agree with you. I think anybody who has an MVP vote who is watching this game will learn a lot about Tyreeks' MVP case versus two as MVP case. I can't guarantee you all the MVP voters are watching the game. But anybody who was, I agree, I think they'll come to that conclusion as well. Dolphins now nine and four.

So they had a chance to go 10 and three, they had a chance to tie the Ravens with the best record in the AFC instead. They're 9 and 4 right now would be the two seat, but they've got, you know, those two teams still play this season, Dolphins still have some big time games on their schedule, so we'll see where they end up. I do want to talk about

Dolphins' playoff picture real quick, but I do have to say that this part of today's episode was brought you by State Farm Shield. It's important to say, if you want to score an affordable price on your home and auto insurance, talk to a State Farm agent today to learn how you can bundle and save with the personal price plan, like a good neighbor's state farm is there. Prices are based on rating

plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer, availability, amount of discount and savings, and eligibility vary by state. Shield! Dolphins bills to end the season. Okay, I'm not saying, I'm just saying, Week 18, Dolphins bills to end the season.

Bills have already been the Dolphins once. Ergo, were they tied when the season ended, and the bills won that game against the dolphins of Week 18, the bills would lead the division, which means that the bills went out, and if the dolphins lose one of their next three, which the Dolphins next three are the Jets. Jets at home. Cowboys and Ravens?

Ooh! Maybe we might have a week 18 AFC East contest, which I have a lot of dolphins to win the division exposure. I have a lot of Josh Allen to win MVP exposure. I'm playing both sides. That way I always come out on top. I'm ready for that game. Give it to me. Yeah, that's really what it comes down to.

next three weeks if the bills can pick up one game on the dolphins. So bills go three and no, dolphins go two and one, or bills go two and one. Dolphins could go one and two. I mean, look at that schedule. Two and one, one and two. Then all of a sudden, that game in week 18, the Buffalo Bills potentially still, still, you cannot kill this team, have a chance to win the AFC East. I'll be honest, I wasn't even thinking about that until you just said it.

I looked at their sketch. I thought I had that rack. AFC East is wrapped. They lose the one seat, but they're still going to be good. No, no, no, no. This thing is still very much alive.

It's good news if you are maybe the Jaguars or the chiefs. You could bump up to that number two seat in the AFC as well. So this is a big time loss in the AFC playoff picture. Bills have Dallas at home in Buffalo, Chargers and Patriots. And so obviously, Cowboys is a very serious game. Chargers and Patriots, dude. Yeah, and their favorite.

Bills are favorite even against the Cowboys this weekend, too. And then they'll be big time favorites. If the Bills yank this season out of the gutter, I will lose my mind, dude. Oh, man. Bill's Dallas 4 o'clock game this Sunday. Circle it. I can't wait. What's the weather?

Let's get some snow. Sorry, they're not bored now. How about the Titans end of this? I mean, Titans, like you said, one of the most improbable wins. I'm scrolling through Twitter here. I think next-gen stats is telling us. me. This is the second most improbable comeback since 2016. Jets over Browns last year, which I don't remember at all because I'm an old man, is the first one. This is the second one. They had a 0.4%

win probability. What did we learn about the Titans tonight? What do you let? I mean, first of all, just never. Mike Vrabble is like a big dog, man. Just stay as far away as possible. If you don't like the Titans, just don't touch the game. Because my gosh, how many, he has at least one of these in him every year, sometimes a couple of them in him each year. And for them to come back here, I mean, what stood out to you from that comeback? I think as is appropriate for us to do, we are going to highlight when the analytics helped a team win the game.

Yes, sir. So that way, it doesn't only get talked about when they lose. The Tennessee Titans are down, 13 to 27. less than five minutes left. They got to drive the ball down the field. Score and score it. It's a two-score game. When they score their first touchdown,

Brable holds up the two fingers on the sideline. He elects to go for two when down 14, down eight, right? This decision, if you're not familiar, is a decision that is supported by all publicly available win probability models. We generally use to understand what decisions teams should make. Obviously, teams have their intrinsic models that can change these outlooks slightly. Like, oh, if you're a big dog,

oh, if you have an injury, you do that work internally up for your own team. But in general, we can say that agnostic of context, when you're down 14, you score that touchdown, it is best to go for two. The reason is because if you take the extra point, score another touchdown, score the extra point, you tie the game.

You've just done something really challenging. You've scored two touchdowns in a short period of time. And your reward, the result is overtime. And for simplicity state, we can just call overtime like a coin flip, right? say it's like 50-50 against probably not exactly because of context. We can just say it's generally 50-50. You did a very challenging thing, those two touchdowns in a row, just to get to a coin flip.

By going for two after you score that first touchdown, you are generating some worlds, some outcomes where after that second touchdown on regulation, you don't have to flip the coin overtime. You can just win a regulation. You go for two and you get that. Then that second touchdown, your score doesn't send you to a coin flip. It sends you to a win. And that's where the additional win probability comes from.

That's the value. Of course, if you fail to get the two-point conversion, you've now made some universes in which you lose in regulation. But it's okay to invite some chance of losing if you're getting additional and greater chances of winning. And that's what's absolutely happening when you create those winning chances in regulation, those ones that don't even bring us into overtime.

Of course, if you fail to get the first two-point conversion, you can still get to overtime by getting the second two-point conversion. And that's why it's beneficial. because you still get all of those worlds where you get to the coin flip, you get to the overtime 50-50, but you've created some worlds where you win a regulation. This was one of those worlds where you're able to get that two-point conversion. You did this before the two-minute drill.

It was a nice drive. Levis early in that first drive, he was looking for downfield throws. He calmed it down. He checked down to the back. He just let the defense give him the inches down the field. You end up holding all of your timeouts, huge, being done before the two-minute warnings. That way, on the punt, you still have the two-minute warning.

enormous, and then you're able to work down the field. And after you score the touchdown, it's just an extra point to take the lead, which if the Titans had an extra point to take the lead against the Colts, okay, like a week ago, but they couldn't do it things. They could have a hold or whatever. So even then, like the extra point's not guaranteed, but they get it done and they win a regulation. So a huge moment to highlight and to emphasize and to say, when you're mad at analytics

because it doesn't work, understand there are a lot of times where it does. And this is one of those instances in which it does. Absolutely. Well said. I have very little to add. You take on some risk. The downside is you miss both two, you know, you miss the two point try twice and you lose the game in regulation. But the upside is exactly what you saw today here, which is that you get the two point conversion, then you kick the extra point.

I mean, then you don't even have to go to overtime where again, your big time, especially for them, they're what, 13 and a half point underdogs in this game. Do you really want to go to overtime? The bigger sample, the less likely there is a chance that you're going to win the game. So you just go ahead, get it. and then you kick the extra point and you win it in regulation. So that's a fantastic job by Rabel and the Titans. Nice job by you highlighting it. Nice job by the Titans, 403 yards of offense here.

I mean, Tai J. Spears, every time I looked up, either DeAndre Hopkins was making a sick catch or Tyjee Spears was running free. I mean, every time I looked up from that Giants Packers game. Tai J. Spears got the juice. He's all about it. I love that little guy. He's good.

And Willevis finishes with 327 yards. I wasn't even thinking about last week. You're right. If they didn't screw that up with special teams last week, we're talking about a six and seven frisky Titans team potentially. Some of us had a parlay on the 7-1 a.m. games that lost on the Titans plus one and a half against the Colts because they couldn't an extra point regulation, which is why some of us remember that particular extra point in this.

I will say this Dolphins defense now, a unit that I thought was really improving. You know, I liked quite a bit. Since then, down Jalen Phillips, down Jerome Baker. and down Javon Holland. Now, Baker and Holland, the expectations they're able to get these players back over the course of the season here. Phillips, obviously out for the season. That plus the offensive line injuries,

the Dolphins are just to me a great example right now of one of those teams that, yeah, in September, they look like they could do it. October, they could go to the distance. They are starting to accumulate an untenable amount of injury where they're just not the same team. They were offensively or defensively at this point. So I still like the way that that unit improved,

but I do think the injuries are really starting to pile up for this team. and they need to get hauling back, something fierce. He's an important player for them. Even Baker, they have good linebacker debt, but that's a solid player. I think defensively you're starting to see the issues with those injuries there. And then offensively for the Titans,

I'm not sold on Will Levis at all, but I want to see him play. I love watching this young man play. He's a tank, dude. He's a tank, dude, take on some contact. I don't know how long he can play like this, but, man, it's some Carson Went stuff. We were just like, dude, you are a linebacker.

Holy smokes. And he brings you something from an arm-challel perspective, that throw-to-the-Andre Hopkins at the end of the half, right? Those are meaningful three points when we get to the end of the game. And then the underneath stuff, I thought he matured throughout this game, and he became more willing to take the stuff the defense was giving him. Obviously, some of that was structural, but still, it was important that he didn't push and didn't make a crippling mistake,

and he didn't. So you're seeing him grow up. I'm not, I'm knowing you're sold on Levis. I like what I'm seeing. I like his demeanor, and I like the toolkit he brings. Entertaining, absolutely. Jacked Carson Wentz, who seems to be, well liked by his teammates is how

I would describe Carlson Wentz would have had a nice long career I'll tell you that right now. Tijes, I mean, Levis was given his post game interview and Tai J. Spears comes over and he gives him a monster bear hug there. That was a cool moment. So, you know, similar to if you're a Giants fan,

if you're a Titans fan, season doesn't go exactly how you expect it. But this is a fun game, a big upset in a big spot. You're glad you spent your time with this team for three hours tonight. And like you said, the Will Levin experience is not always going to be great, but it's going to be pretty fun for you. All right. Let's take a break. We'll take a break.

We'll come back and we'll talk about more of our week 14 takeaways. All right. We are back on extra point taking. Did you have something else you wanted to say? So like you gave me like a little lock. I didn't know if you had another point you needed to get to or you go. No, I tried to drink some tea. My throat started to go and it went down the wrong bite. And so I was just trying to get to commercial a cough. Yeah. And that was that all you were seeing on that facial expressions there. Gotcha. Is that, listen, it's that. Listen, it's that. time of year. I'm sipping on a little honey and lemon over here. I was doing so good. Dude, I was going to make it. I was so convinced I was going to 100% this winter and not get sick. And then I saw my brother come from college last weekend. And I dabbed him up, like, what's good? Big hug, everything. And like two hours later, he's like, yeah, I'm feeling real sick. Like, dude. Yes, it is. Normally the season ends and then like the day after it comes to get me once I catch my breath. But, you know, this year, maybe it's coming a little early. Maybe it's just one day. We'll see. All right.

Let's get to the rest of week 4. Yes, week 14. Oh, my goodness. All right. I am up with one of my takeaways from week 14. And I am going to that Chiefs Bill's game, Benjamin. And I'm telling you, my take is that Patrick Mahomes outburst was not about the refs. That outbursts, we all saw.

You see him on the sideline. He's going nuts. You're going, wait, is he yelling at Andy Reid? Is he yelling at a player? And then it's no, he's yelling at the refs. So everyone knows the Cadarius Tony thing. You know, he lined up off sides. The rest called it.

It was technically the right call. We could have a long conversation about the procedural stuff. That's not to me what this is about. This is about Patrick Mahomes' reaction because we have never seen Patrick Mahomes like that on the football field. And remember, after that call, it was second down from the Buffalo 49. The game was not over. Like that was not, you know, fourth down. That wasn't eight seconds left.

There was a minute 12 left. They had second down from the Buffalo 49. They don't do anything with it. They lose the game. And so that outburst to me is just something that has probably been building inside of Mahomes this entire season. And it's week 14. And he looks around and he says, I cannot trust the people around. This was supposed to be solved by now.

I was on board after week one, probably when Andy told me, all right, Cadarius, Tony had a rough night against the Lions. It's week one. We'll grow into it. don't worry, you know how this goes, everyone will be better. And then there was a Sky Moore drop against the Denver Broncos. And then there was a Marquez-Valdes-Gantling drop against the Philadelphia Eagles. And now you have this Cadarius Tony play against the Buffalo Bills. And you are an 8-5 football team.

Now, so like you and I have been discussing the Chiefs' wide receiver situation for much of the season, this was something that was supposed to have been resolved by now with young players emerging. And so for it to be week 14 against a guy Mahomes knows he might have to battle in the playoffs if the bills get there. And you're in your age 28 season and you're one of the best quarterbacks. You want to be one of the best quarterbacks of all time if you're not already. You're in your prime. You're healthy.

The league is wide open. You're trying to put together this career. And you're on a team where their wide receivers are making mistake after mistake, after mistake. And it's leading to this situation where the league is wide open. open and it's already cost you probably the number one seed. And you're thinking about the playoffs and you're saying, so we would have to win three games to get to the Super Bowl. We would have to win four games to win the Super Bowl. And these are the guys I'm going to have to trust and rely on in key spots against the Josh Allen's of the world. That had to have been building up

inside of Patrick Mahomes for quite a long time. This Chief's team has lost four of six. I'm not telling you they're done. I'm not telling you they're cooked. I'm not telling you that they can't do it with this group. I'm not that stupid. I know it's still Patrick Malmes. It's still Andy Reid. They could go on a run. We could be sitting here eight weeks from now and they could be Super Bowl champions. Having said that, like that's what it was about to me. It was the frustration of this entire season, him taking a step back and being like, man, the margin of error is so small. Even last year, they won seven one-score games on the regular season. Every playoff game was a one-score game. He knows how tight these things can get, and these are the guys he's going into battle with in the playoffs.

So he's got to be thinking this could cost me a ring. Now, I'm not saying like all those thoughts are going through his head, but those have had to have been lingering inside him throughout the season. Because you don't get that bad about one call when you've been on the other side of those calls that have decided games, and it wasn't even like the wrong call. It wasn't an egregious call. And so I think that's what it was about for Patrick Mones. and by the way, Andy Reid, too. I've never heard Andy Reid talk like that after a loss saying that's embarrassing for the league.

I mean, I have watched probably, you know, 90% of Andy Reid press conferences from the time I was in high school until now. And it's always we got to do a better job, like to an annoying degree. We've got to do a better job. You know, credit to them. We'll get it fixed. We got to do a better job. No, after this game, he might be seeing it too, that this plan we had when we traded Tyree Kill, when we drafted some of these guys, when we signed Marquez-Beldes Scantling, when we drafted

Skymore. It's not coming together the way I wanted it to, and it's getting a little late here. So I think that's where it is for the Chiefs. Now, I will say this. Overall, if you take a step back and maybe they do this this week, it was actually an encouraging offensive performance for the Kansas City Chiefs, I thought. I mean, they moved the

football pretty well, but still, these games that are going to come down to the end, who can you trust when you're dropping back to pass the football when you need to score? I think that's what that post-game reaction was about for Patrick Mahomes and for Andy Reid. I couldn't agree more. I, when we finished and we came off that,

it was Eagles Chiefs Monday night game. And I had the first take that night. You said, Ben, what's take on the game? And I was like, I think Patrick Mulham is going to be psychologically damaged by these guys. And it was like half tongue and cheek, right? It was a little bit like, you know, like, this is going to break him. And there were a lot of listeners who came and were like, you know, oh, like this Justin Herbert season, oh, like this, you know, like these season with this many drops.

Like, Bahams, like, how was he going to be psychologically damaged? This is what I was talking about. again, like it was tongue and cheek, obviously, you're kind of like, you know, thrown around a big, big phrase there. But you get to a point where you snap as a competitor with your body on the line, with the amount of effort you're putting in, with the amount of expectations you carry on your shoulders for the titles that you've already won. And this is what you're dealing with.

Like, it's one thing for the receivers to be poor. It is another thing for the receivers to be consistently losing games. the chiefs have a lead in the fourth quarter that is given away by a receiver making a mistake that is ranging from like the assonine to like the standard, right? Like the Cadarius Tony line up correctly to the MBS drop. Like MBS drop hurts, but you know MBS is going to drop it against Eagles.

NBS drops everything. The Tony thing is like maddening, right? That lived experience as a competitor where it's just like, you guys are my brothers, we go to war. And every time I just need you to finish the job for me, I tossed the ball by she needs you to dunk it into the hoop. You can't do it. It starts to like legitimately break a guy.

And that's why you saw Mahomes like act unbelievably out of character. It's because he's just up to his neck in it. Like I don't like how I behave when I'm angry. Like if you saw me when I was angry on national television, I would feel really bad about that in the way that I act. And Mahomes, he spoke to, I want to say, he spoke to Carrington Harrison today. And he gave a quote where he said,

I regret the way I acted towards Josh Allen after the game. So obviously when he hugged Josh, he was still just talking about the penalty. Yeah, that was odd. Yeah. He said, because he had nothing to do with it. I was still hot and emotional, but you can't do that. It's not a great example for the kids watching the game. I think in the sober light of day, Mahomes is watching these videos back to himself like,

not good. It's embarrassing and you feel dumb. You feel small. You feel like petty and mean. And like, no one wants to feel that way. The reason why he got there is less about the disappointment of a penalty being called. and like, oh, taking away Travis Kelsey's Hall of Fame, you know, resume or whatever.

And it's more of the accumulation. It's more everything coming up against the dam and the dam finally bursting in this home loss against the bills. Broncos are knocking on the door of the division. Like, you're just here being like, dude, there is no more I can do. I'm just done. I have run out of fuse. And he pops off.

I agree that there's ways you look at the offensive performance like brass tax. Let's put some stats on the board and be like, see, this is good. But I do think that that pales a little bit in comparison to the event of the way that that game ended. No doubt. This is a hard thing to recover from for Mahomes and Kidarius Tony, in my opinion. I don't know. Maybe they do, but it's a hard thing.

Yeah, and to be clear, like I like when, you know, we see like the raw emotion in him being his authentic self. Like, we all know what a competitive maniac this guy is and what he does and how smart he is and how, you know, when we finish our careers, you know, we'll probably be telling our, and yes, I'm older than you all say. so you don't have to tell our Granky, you know, if somebody who's the best player, like, we might both be saying Patrick Mahombo.

And so this is a very interesting time in Patrick Mahomes' career. Like when Seth Wickersham writes the book or whoever it is 20 years through now, this I think is going to be a very interesting segment. I mean, you look at the way they built that thing, and it wasn't that they didn't try to replace the production from Tyree Kill. They took a bunch of swings. None of those swings are connecting. And by the way, their offensive tackle play is not very good.

either. So it's not like they built the elite. I mean, their interior offensive line is elite. Their whole offensive line, when you look at some of the issues they've had in past protection at tackle this year, that hasn't worked out either. So now you've got that. In addition to Kelsey being a year older, in addition to none of these young wide receivers stepping up. And guess what? They still have a top five offense in the NFL because that guy's really freaking good. And like, there's only so low you can probably go with Patrick Mahomes as your quarterback. But at the same time, we're not talking about top five offense. We're not talking about winning the division. We're not talking about getting to the AFC championship game.

No, no, no, this is Patrick Mahomes. The bar is Super Bowl or bust every single year. He is in the NFL from now until he's probably in his early to mid-40s, and we're saying, is this the year? He declines. I mean, that's just what it is right now for him. So I thought that's what that was about, you know, not to psychoanalyze and tell you I can get inside of his head.

That's what it felt like to me, I should say, watching that. was that, you know, watching athletes and you try to put what's going on here. Why is he so out of character? That's what it looked like to me. Not just one call. It manifested itself in one call. But man, this has been kind of building up from that first Thursday night game we watched against the Detroit Lions there. I am legitimately furious that that Travis Kelsey play won't live in like actual recorded, you know, NFL history.

That's just like, it's such a cool play. And I wish it was like, they've been trying to do it. And they poke around it. but that was the best lateral thing they've had down the field, the context, everything. Oh, it was so fun to watch. Well, listen, he'll get other opportunities. There's a Suey's still got, what, four weeks of the regular season and the playoffs.

Do it again. Kelsey, it was awesome. It was one of those that gets you off the couch when you're watching live. Like, oh my gosh, I can't believe he did that. And then all of a sudden you see there's a flag there. All right. What do you got? What's your next day?

I still just want to give Lamar MVP. It is a twisted and tough and tight MVP race. There are a lot of guys who can legitimately have an argument for it. I want to start this by saying, I don't think there's a guy who could get it where I'd be legitimately mad that they got it. Every time I talk about Lamar for MVP or Dak for MVP or Josh Allen for MVP, I got 19-9ers fans being like, oh, Brock Purdy sure would make you furious.

Not really. He's playing great ball. I don't think he's as good at the other guys. I wouldn't vote for him to be on my ballot. But if he gets it, like, I'll get it. Whatever. It's MVP. Who cares?

But it's a really chaotic year. right? There's no this one quarterback who we've always presumed to be like an elite top five guy is producing an elite offense largely on the back of his talent. I'm sure there's some Niners fans who would say, no, that's Brock Bertie. I don't hold him in that air. I think a lot of people

don't hold them in that air. And so you're Patrick Mahomes, you're Josh Allen, you're Justin Herbert, your Joe Burroughs, your Jalen Hertzes, you're guys who you thought were going to be in that top tier of crowd of quarterbacks every single season. They're not necessarily having those years offensively overall. And then you're kind of second tier, of

where you start talking about your DAC Prescott and your Lamar Jackson's, these are the guys who have really big performances. And so there's a lot of room for debate. No pick's going to bother me. What I will say is that Lamar Jackson is on pace for 3,800 passing yards and 800 rushing yards. Shield, do you know how many seasons we've seen of 3,800 passing yards and 800 rushing yards in NFL history? I think it's probably zero, I would say. It is one.

Kylo Murray, as a rookie, had 3,900 passing yards. crossing yards and he had 800 rushing yards. That was his, he was his 2020 season. It was a great time, right? He was an offensive rookie of the years of prorious stuff. But we've only seen this done once, right? When you go and you look at even Lamar up against like his own previous seasons, right?

I mean, he at this point, like, from an EPA per drop back perspective, he's not having like an unbelievable mind-blowing year. He drops back a ton, though, a lot more than he used to, right? They used to just run, run, run, run, run, drop back. And then they would get big explosive gains and big touchdowns. They now use him as a standard passer. It's still, they're the 12th offense in the league by EPA per dropback. The seventh offense in the league by EPA per drive.

They're the fifth offense by the league in success rate. Mar's got one of the best success rates of any single season of his career right now, 46%. He has the lowest interception rate of his career on a season at 1.3%. Completion percentage-wise, he's at 69%. He's putting up equivalent numbers to his 2019 season when he won MVP. Now, that's the numbers talk. Let's do the anecdotal talk, because to me, that's where it's more interesting for Lamar. 23-22, late in the fourth quarter,

your defense is banged up. They gave up a touchdown less than five minutes left to Los Angeles Rams and the bad weather. Lamar walks out, drives the Ravens down the field. They had two third downs

on the game-winning drive because Lamar's just walking them down the field, no problem. They had a third and four where Lamar found Nelson Aguilar for a quick five-yard gain, and then they had third and 17 from the Rams 21.

So this is a five-point game. Tasha, if you're going to do, doing it for you this late. We're past a two minute warning. Third and 17 in the 21. You have two plays to go 21 yards. Lamar Jackson needs one, and it's a ridiculous freaking throw. It's just leaning to the left in his pocket, just step, step, step, step, step, flip that body and whip it with speed directly into Zayflower's chest. Zayflowers likes to drop passes. We're not letting him drop this one. What are you showing me?

Can you see this? No, I can't. These are my old school notes. These are my old school notes that I keep while you're on group chats. Yeah. Lamar, I wrote Lamar methodical drive and then... So I guess I should talk in a mic into the mic. It's okay,

we had a good producer and Chris. So how'd be out? You're good. I wrote Lamar methodical drive and then what a throat of flowers. These are the dumb notes I take as I'm... Do you have any notes on the two-point conversion? No,

is that what put them up 3128? That's right. They're up 29, 28. And now the two-point conversion here is important because as we know, the Rams get a field goal and just goes to overtime. You need this two-point conversion, right? Ask the Packers would have one.

we don't get it. Lamar in a sprint out to his right, there's immediate pressure by Ernest Jones, and Lamar does the thing, and again, we're talking MVP here, that no other quarterback in the league does. Other quarterbacks are, like, they have responses to unblocked pressure.

Like, Alan will just, like, drop kick a guy in the face and then, like, run away from it, you know? Bahams will, like, pirouette and dip and duck and dive. Lamar will just, with players, like, within five inches from him, with defenders, like, in arms reach of him. He had a throw in this game. where Aaron Donald was holding him by the jersey. He just circled around a couple of times

than chucked it. He will just sit in arms reach of a defender and just like kind of lean and squirm and just because he's so agile. He's got such great balance and body control that he's just buying a half second because he knows the secondary when they see him in the grasp

is going to stop their feet. And then he just with an unblocked defender already at him and then a second defender now at his feet, like doing the splits getting folded and a half by Michael Hoat just hits Zayflowers up against the sideline for the two-point conversion. Obviously, game goes to overtime, and then the Ravens went on their punt return,

and so, okay, if it had been a Lamar legacy drive and they win 37-31, maybe that's a little bit stronger. But plays like that on the drive that gave the Ravens the lead and very well could have won them the game, defensive stops notwithstanding, Lamar showed that he just does things

that other quarterbacks in the league don't do. Like, the Ravens running game is so good. And it's just Gus Edwards in a solid offensive line. And it's because fundamentally, the world that defense is played against the Ravens is different than all the other worlds. The presence of eight on the field, we talked about Tyreek and him, his presence on the field. The presence of eight on the field warps gravity. It changes the fabric of space.

The argument for me for Lamar MVP is a narrative one. When I watch him play and how the other 21 players on the field move, it is dictated by him in a way that you really don't see for like even your Dax. and your Jalen Hertz is, and like your Joe Burroughs. Like, it's really just the Bahms and Allens of the world where the field folds around the guy. He controls everything. And the way he can manipulate defenders is unparalleled with how he's playing right now. And so we're seeing a great statistical Lamar season. We're seeing emphatic clutch wins from Lamar.

I think they're going to be the AFC one seed. They're going to win the buy in what's a like unprecedentedly crowded conference. And then when I watch him, it passes the sniff test for me in a way that it doesn't for Purdy. And like, Dax certainly passes the sniff test for me, but I feel differently with Lamar. We're like, this is truly a unique player, a valuable player in a multitude of ways, in cascading ways the way that he changes the field. I don't mind who gets it. I don't have a vote, who cares. So I, you have to listen to me to talk about it on a podcast. I would give my vote to Lamar. I love the season he's having. I think it's totally justifiable. Yeah, I don't disagree

with a lot of what you said. I mean, a lot of times for these things, I look at it. Like if you, you know, If I have it narrowed down to three guys, I like to think in my head, if you replaced, you know, player X with player Y, what would it look like? And right now, I mean,

the Ravens are fifth in offensive DVOA. He lost Mark Andrews. Their first in rushing DVOA. That is because of Lamar, like there's no other quarterback you could put in that spot and they would be like top 10. I mean,

that's monstrous. Yeah. In the Greg Roman offense, the narrative was, always it's because of Lamar plus Roman because Roman invested so much in that offense. Now they're just an 11 personnel spread team. They're just the same. They're just offense, but they're still the best rushing team because of what Lamar brings you.

Yeah. And they're, you know, 10th in passing DVOA with, you know, a bunch of injuries they've had throughout the season. And it's just tough because, yeah, you look at that supporting cast. And then you look at Brock Purdy has played fantastic coming into the season. I said he's only done it for eight games. I want to see more. and they've had one of the best offenses we've seen in what the last 10 years by everything statistically. So this is not a knock on him.

It's just a harder. I would have a harder time saying, you put Brock Purdy in that Ravens offense. You put Lamar in that 49ers offense, which one is more likely to be able to operate at the level. It's operating right now. And I would say Lamar's, I would, I don't know, I'm kind of leaning towards Zach Prescott right now.

But yeah, I'm with you. I think it's hard. And I agree. Like, I don't think any of these guys would really make me that. Dak Prescott right now is plus 150. I'd say that's fine. Brock Purdy is plus 175. I will not be the person online ripping Brock, like Brock Purdy.

Like, you can have those arguments and say, all right, but he's got Shannon. He's got the supporting cast. Well, he's still, you know, Shanahan has had good teams before and the offense has never been as good as this. And statistically, there's just like an overwhelming argument for Brock Purdy. Like the numbers, I could write a piece for the ringer, you know, just a 25 absurd stats. I'm doing the play sheet on Brock Purdy is very good and is a good quarterback, plus also, like, I don't think he's the MVP. So those two worlds can coexist. But if you do think he's the MVP, that's what there's a lot of data that would support that for you.

The thing is, is that we have to remember is beginning with last season, MVP voting is now ranked choice. It is now meaningful who gets put second on an MVP valid. See, I don't know this. I don't vote. You don't know. How do you know the, do you have a vote now? Do I have a vote? No.

Do I gamble on the MVP market? Yes. Do I know how MVP voting works? Yep. So ranked choice now, this is meaningful, right? And so how many do you rank? I think you rank five? Five.

Five. I'm pretty sure you rank five. But what I'll be curious to see is how many people are like in terms of where they put Brock. Because I bet you a lot of people who don't put Brock first are just going to chuck him in at second to be like, because obviously very good. He's just not my MVP. and I'm very interested to see the results. But again, like,

Tyreek, Brock, Allen, Mahomes, Lamar, Dak, freaking Debo. Debo could win it, dude. You tell me you watch that Niners game and you'd be like, Debo is not the MVP of this team. Give it to Garrett.

The Browns are 8 and 5. How? Give it to Miles Garrett. I don't give a hoot, dude. This is a great year for MVP's. There you go. That was a good case for Lamar Jackson. That was a great drive.

I mean, they go 13 plays, 75 yards, with the game on the line in the rain. You know, that was not a game where now you could say, well, all right, the Ravens have the best defense. That certainly was not a game where their defense. I mean, McVeigh was in his bag and Stafford against that defense. They were doing a great job.

I tell you, Matthew Stafford. Dude, Stafford's 35. The next youngest quarterback in the NFC is Gino and Carr at 32 apiece. Stafford's 35 with a bad elbow. He's brain just throwing thumb this year. and it's just with three rushers in his grill dropping dimes. He's thriving right now. Stafford will be there having a great time.

They're fun to watch. They're on the team you don't want to play. The team you don't want a playlist, which I'm sure we'll get to in the next few weeks. They're definitely there in the NFC. Yeah. MVP is your top five ranks. All the other AP awards are top three ranks.

That's how the new voting system goes. Most important thing for this take. Okay, so the notes thing, You just, you just kind of have blocks for each game. You just got blocks. You're just taking, just stream of consciousness notes that the games go on. This is a very stupid method. It does nothing for me.

I barely reference some. I don't know why I do it. I need a better method. I don't have a good method. But I had the Ravens on the main screen, and then I had two other games on the other screens. And when something, I don't want to over note take. I just, you know, this is called a legal pad.

And so occasionally, it feels nice to have the old pen in the hand, you know? A little pilot G2. Yeah, I have, I have graph paper. I need it to be, like, like, like, It needs to be blocks for me. Oh. And then I scratch all my notes on that. And then when I prep for the pods,

I just have a tiny notebook with just data, like five EPA, seven success rate. And it's totally illegible. And I look at it as I can't read it and then I have to go off memory. Oh, no. My notes are much better for the pod. I take it much more seriously than you.

I got to type those bad boys out. I could never. All right. Let's take one more break. We'll come back with our final takes and the extra point taken. All right. We're back on extra point. Now I feel like someone's going to zoom in.

I hope I don't have anything weird written down here where someone's going to zoom in and say like, oh, you think that, you know, Baker-Mayfield's the top five. No, I didn't write that. That's not what it says. You can't read my handwriting. Anyway, don't even try it. All right, my third take.

Denver Broncos are making the playoffs. Dude, I was so close to doing Sean Payton. I didn't do it, but I was close. I had this as a preseason take. All right, so this day, let me read off this wild AFC playoff picture right now. So let's assume the division winners stay put, which is not guaranteed by any means. But after that, you've got the Cleveland Browns are 8 and 5. They would have the top wild card spot right now.

After that, the following teams are 7 and 6. Pittsburgh Steelers, Indianapolis Colts, Houston Texans, Denver Broncos, Cincinnati Bengals, and the Buffalo Bills. Six through 11 in the AFC, they are all 7 and 6. So earlier today, I'm going through this. I'm going, which of these teams do I actually think is going to make the playoffs? And I was going through and I don't like them. They had some injuries.

I'm not sure about it. Then I got to the Denver Broncos. A team in the preseason I had as a playoff team did not feel good about that after week six. They were one in five. They're even during their five game winning streak. I said, all right, there's some flukiness to this. But now I'm looking at it. And I kind of feel like they're one of the more reliable teams out of this group.

I don't think they're the highest ceiling out of this group. They're not the most exciting out of this group. But I think they're reliable. I think they're competitive. So they win that game against the Chargers on Sunday. Justin Herbert goes down, but they were winning that game before he even went down. Defense is playing much better. You know, they're getting guys like J-Quann-McMillan is like a household name for them.

UDFA. Greg Rosenthal tweeted during the game. He was like, it's crazy how Jay-Quah McMill is just the best player in football right now. There's always one guy. He's everywhere. It was De Ron Bland last year. Blan was doing this for the Cowboys last year where it was November. It was like, oh, it's probably one of the six best corners out of nowhere.

Jayquam McBillan, from nowhere, dude. You can't watch a possession where he's not doing something incredible. They've got him covering. They've got him blitzing. They've got him in like this playmaker role. And then offensively, listen, I'm not going to sell you that this is a great offense. What I do love about them is they know exactly who they are. Every single game the Broncos play is exactly the same.

And either they win it in the fourth quarter or they don't win it in the fourth quarter. Some numbers I was looking up here because here's how it looks at. When I'm watching it on TV, I go, okay, screen, screen, screen, check down, screen. Oh, Cortland Sutton, sick play. Russell Wilson, scramble. Like that, that's what a Broncos game looks like. So Russell Wilson so far this year, his passing chart, by the way, is hilarious if you look at it, especially from this last look, just the middle of the field.

You can just cut that whole thing. I mean, it's been like that for a long time, but it is so funny what it was. It looks like Hunter Sean Fayton. He has 116 passes at or behind the line of scrimmage. Okay? That's third in the NFL. He has 56 attempts, 20 yards or more downfield. That's sixth in the NFL.

They did that whole intermediate part. No, no, no, no, they don't need that at all. It's either going to go right here or it's going to go way downfield to Cortland Sutton, or he's going to scramble a little bit, which he has looked. I will give him credit. He absolutely looks more athletic this year than he did last year by like a long shot. thought those days were over. He's thinner and he's quicker. Yeah. He's got 250 yards on scrambles. That's sixth in the NFL. And so that's how they play offensively. It's mediocre. It's not great,

but it works for them when they're not turning the football over. And then defensively, you know, Vance Joseph, after that, they are doing more with less. They're not a great unit. They were still a little turnover or reliant for a while there. Now their success rate is inching up a little bit. And then you look at the remaining schedule then. They're at Detroit. Then they have the Patriots at home, the Chargers at home, and at the Raiders. That's potentially Bailey, Easton Stick, and Aidan O'Connell in your final three games. If you can win those three games, you're going to get to 10 wins.

You're going to get in. And Sean Payton is going to be in the conversation for Coach of the Year, I think. I mean, he's really figured out what kind of team he has and what gives them the best chance to win. every week. So I've got the Broncos in, as I look at all those teams bunched up there in the AFC. I think they're getting in the postseason. What do you think? Yeah, I think that we've now arrived at where we thought Sean Payton would be able to get this team. 100%. Yeah, we're around 500 and they're opportunistic on defense. They're also, which I think Peyton's done a really nice job with, and this was something that I had a little bit of a question about coming out of his Saints tenure,

where they just kind of like kept running it back with the same guys. And obviously the Saints cap management the way we expect them to do things. They've done a really nice job being like, hey, who wants a role? Chey Kuan McMahon, you want to play? You're playing. Here we go. You know, we're moving off of Randy Gregory. We're moving off of the other player that they cut on defense.

Frank Clark. Thank you, Frank Clark. You know, Baron Browning, get out there. Go, you know, earn yourself some snaps. We're going to play. You know, Jerry Judy, the same for you, the same for you. Right. Here we go.

That backfield. We got Samaja Piron, Giovante Williams, Julium McLaughlin. We're going to play all of you. And whoever's going to have the hot hands. or if it's going to be breaking tackles, making catches, that's what's going to play for us. So they're a nice job kind of knowing where you're at as a team. And listen, from a cat perspective,

we need to get some nice breaks on some young players. So we're going to open up some jobs and let them be won. I think that's been really big for this team. The Russ usage, right? They got the downfield stuff. They got the underneath stuff. They're still not good off play action, which that's what you're supposed to be able to do with Russ.

And I think that's a little bit weird. I don't know why they're struggling as much there. I haven't looked enough into the offense to have a good feeling. but they are doing cool, like one-off, goofy stuff off-play action. Like, they had that wonderful touchdown catch by the big tight end whose name. That was sweet. If I didn't remember Frank Clark, there's no chance that's Kroll. I can't remember who it was.

Yes, it's Kroll. It was Kroll. Not Nick Kroll. Yeah. And so you have a little nice one-offs that worked like that. I wish they were better off play action than they are. But generally, I think the champagne offense is kind of working with Russ the way that we thought it would. And then how lucky are we to get healthy court in the son back?

How I show. There's nothing. it's so underappreciated when we go from a player who has major injury and then he gets back to like 100% of where he was. Like so often they back to 90-95. Like yeah, they're still great, but like, you know, okay, it's not what it was.

Sutton is back to being that dominant force. Like that athletic, just freak. Carrying them. And just making plays, nobody has any business making. He has like 100% of the Cortland Sutton that he was, which has been a god-centered for this offense, especially with the fact that they can't really get Marvin Mims activated and Judy's not been not been huge for them.

And so, yeah, they're winning the way we thought they would. I'm not sure they make it out of the AFC, just because I think it is so hotly contended. I also, like, I root for other teams more because I'd be more interested in seeing them, I think, in the playoffs. But absolutely. Like, this Broncos team is the team is the team that we expected to see. They were, you know, the runner-up for an extra point-taking team of the year. They were a playoff team for preseason.

This is what we thought they would look like. All right. What do you got? What's your third point before we get to the extra point taken? Justin Fields is playing himself into a star in job in 2024, right? He is, right? Not with the Bears. Make the case.

I don't know if he is or not. All right. Justin Fields' last three starts against the Detroit Lions on the road, a game that they lost. They were up by 12 in the fourth quarter. And then at Minnesota and then home against Detroit, both those games were wins. Three games, no interceptions. Do you know the last time Justin Fields had a three-game stretch with no picks? Has there ever been one?

Hasn't happen. No, sir. See, I know. your trick questions. Last three games, Justin Fields has had a sack rate of 8%, 7.5%, 8.3%. Three straight games with a sacrate of less than 10%. She'll know the last time Justin Fields had a three game stretch with no set a sacrate plus 10%. There's no chance that's ever happened. That's never happened. Matt Iberflus brought this up in the post game. He said, hey, listen, Justin's winning games for a big throw to DJ more down the field. He's scrambling. He's creating incredible. And Iberflus brought up

and highlighted, hey, well, he's not making mistakes for us. He is avoiding negative plays more consistently over the course of this season, over the course, last few games, I should say, then we saw from him previous. And that's been the big difference breaker for us. And it's absolutely true. The interception rates are down and the sack rates are down. And accordingly, EPA per dropback is up, right?

Like, Fields had a big, big, big peek in his performance in the middle of his career. If you were like rolling EPA per dropback, he had that 20-22 stretch. Like, this is going to be the guy. And then the sacks and the interceptions just came back kind of, kind of nuked it. He was like, you know, launching the ball 90 yards down the field on every single play. It was all downfield shots and it was crazy, crazy numbers, but he was throwing picks

and he was taking so many sacks that it wasn't sustainable and the rug got pulled out from under him. He's kind of recovered from that if you watch him visibly and you can see a player who's a lot more decisive than he used to be,

a lot more willing to eat a bad play than he used to be. And he just trusts his guys a lot more, right? Like, we had to remember what Fields was when he was growing in the league when he was kind of burgeoning was he was, you know, it was Darnel Mooney

that he was trying to like live on our office with that. Alan Robinson, who fully checked out, right? Then they go and they get Chase Claypool for him. These are the players that were trying to earn the trust of fields, make him believe that he can have a fully functional offense. It never, never, never clicked. But as they acquired DJ Moore,

and now as Cole Commets come really nicely along, Commets kind of, I didn't love that contract when they gave it to him. I think Commets kind of proven that he had more to improve and it kind of had more levels to level up. As those two players have emerged for him, and then backside of the backfield, Rochon Johnson, and you can just see that Fields is more willing to just give the ball to a guy and have that guy go solve a problem for him.

Offensive line improvement as well has been a big help for that. It wasn't their best game against Detroit here, but in general, the best offensive line he's played with. And so Fields has just settled a little bit. That's all it is. I don't want to get over my skis with, oh, he looks like this, and he does that, and these downfield throws. He's just settled a little bit.

He has, over the last few games, not hurt the team the way that we're used to seeing him do. Accordingly, if he finishes the season doing this, I think without question the bears are trading fields because they're going to have the first overall pick. I think they're going to pretend like they might keep him, but I think they're definitely training him. I think there's going to be teams that are interested in that acquisition. And it's a question of what are we willing to send for him? And when we send that for him, what does that communicate about our expectations for him when he joins the team? And I think if he finishes the season playing this risk-a-vers ball the way that he is,

he has a good shot of landing with a new team as an expected starter, as a player who's expected to fight for the starting job. Hey, we might draft the guy in round two. My draft guy in round three. But still, that's the expectation. Two teams to highlight. The Falcons would be sick. The Falcons, shield, would be sick, okay?

They do the pistol stuff. They do the QB run stuff. Get them activated on there. Push the ball down the field. Falcons need a quarterback. The field, the connection there would be great. Oh, boy. You tell me you want to like that? You tell me that's not good? Listen, I would I would like, I would enjoy that. I would enjoy that.

I would enjoy that experience, yes. The second team is Pittsburgh Steelers. This is, I think, a great opportunity for the Steelers. Oh, now you got my attention. Dude, the Steelers? I could picture him with that helmet on. Firstly, he would look clean. He would look great.

Secondly, we are talking about... That would be one of the best aesthetics in the NFL. We are talking about a Steelers team that, once again, is not going to be in a position to get a first round quarterback where you'd like to get them, right? They kind of already did this. Let's just stay at 20 and drafts Kenny Pickett. Quarterback's drafted in the back half of the first round

tend not to be great. There's a reason why they made it to the back half of the first round. You're already in kind of dice roll territory there. You're already in there, like, turn around blindfold dart at a dartboard territory. Why not? You can either trade a ton of future picks to move up in the first round and go get a guy, but you're not getting QB1 or QB2. They're off the board.

You can trade some picks and get yourself a dice roll on a Justin Fields. and CFS he gets older and you're able to continue that trend of lower interceptions with lower sack rates, he's still always going to be a volatile player, but you're able to have that trend and continue down while also retaining explosives, returning play creation ability. The pressures that he's been escaping over the last few weeks, man, get out of Dodge.

Justin Fields to the Steelers, I would love to see it. All right. As I've said before, I am the only reasonable Justin Fields analyst in the world. You're the only reasonable person on this podcast, if I mean honest. One is either all the way on this side, no, no, no, no, no, one good game and he's amazing.

Everyone's on this side. This guy sucks. Stop talking about him. I enjoy it, like we said with, who were we talking about earlier? Oh, Will Levisis. I enjoy the Justin Fields experience. I like watching Justin Fields play football. I think he's one of the best, like, scrambling scramblers I've ever seen in my life, legitimately.

One of the best scrambling scramblers. Yeah, well, I was going to say scrambling quarterback scramblers. I didn't know. Listen, it's after 1 a.m. You know, I'm an old man. I'm drinking honey lemon water, okay? I can't be expected to make sense here. You're giving me a three game sample where I have many more games from Justin Fields to look at.

On the season, he's still last in the NFL with a sack rate of over 11%. He's 26th in dropback success rate on the season. I need to see more before I feel like some team is, you know, and I do even watching that game, tell me if that when I watch him, Like, even in that game against the Lions, like, this guy is not going to last. He takes hits. Yeah. He takes some of the worst hits you will see a quarterback take all season in, like, the

course of a game where I'm just like, how is he even getting it? So I will credit for toughness, but you do not want your quarterback taking those hits. He's had injury issues before. So that his style of play makes me a little bit nervous. Like Lamar Jackson can pick up those scrambles, and I feel great because he's like, all right, I'm not taking huge hits when I'm doing this. Justin Field is getting like, he's getting like leveled into the ground. So that makes me nervous.

It's all about the negative place. I see the upside. I see the improvement as a passer. You're 100% right. He looks like he's more in a rhythm. He looks more comfortable in this offense. I think a lot of that is just the tools he has to work with, the offensive line playing better. And so I do see the upside with him.

He's obviously always going to hold on to the football a little bit longer. What happens when he does that? How many of those results in sacks? How many of those result in? Fumbles. His fumbles are down a little bit this year. Still a concern for me as well. So to me with Fields, it's all about the negative plays. Can he cut those out?

And can he stay healthy with this style of play? Now, look at the quarterbacks. We have starting this weekend. Last weekend, if I'm a team and it's a relatively low cost, maybe a second round pick or whatever, would I rather take a flyer on Justin Fields than those guys? Yes, absolutely. And he seems like he has the right makeup.

He seems like an authentic guy who's well-liked. by his teammates and all those things. And he's obviously going to be hungry if he gets traded from Chicago. So that's kind of where I stand on it. I am not as convinced as you are that he's going to get that opportunity. Should the Bears be the team that followed the nerds and do what the nerds always suggest here? I think you're anti this. Should they draft a quarterback and keep Justin Fields?

And say, you know what? It's what, 40% that we're going to hit on this guy. We still have Fields under contract. They're grown men. They played in college where he had, you know, two highly recruited guys on the same team. They've done this in high school. Why can't they do it in the NFL?

We'll sit them down. We'll explain it to them. Let's not get rid of a guy when we're not sure the new guy's going to be better than him if we don't have to. What do you think? I'm anti-draft two guys in the same draft. I'm lean pro mostly milk toast on keep a guy and then draft the guy. I think that's fine.

The world that you are creating is the world where every play on your locker room is hoping that you make a quarterback change in the event that things go awry, right? Like, Justice Fields are just boys with DJ Moore, they're just tight. And after the first four games of Caleb Williams, when Caleb can't find more and is playing terribly, more starts mentally checking

out because he wants to play with Fields. That's the worlds that I get worried about in the two QB construct, right? Which, like, Eric McCoy tried to fight Derek Carr on the sidelines this week. I mean, everybody has tried to fight Derek Carr on the Saints this season. I was reading the ESPN.com

Sorry to interrupt you, but this is too funny. I was reading the ESPN.com article about this, you know, because I missed it live about McCoy and Carr getting into that. And then like, towards the bottom, they recap all the like fights Derek Garz gotten in. Well, he did this with Chris Olavé this week.

He had this with Pete Car and Michael the other week. I'm like, this is not going well for the Saints. All right, sorry, continue. No, this is what we're talking about now. It is so unfair to me, personally, to me. It is attacking me that I which all I did this offseason was

Fade the Saints. Saints are not going to be good. Fade the Saints. All they have the easiest schedule. Fade the Saints. This is not going to be good. Cars are going to be terrible. And it's happening,

but because the rest of the NFC South and namely the Atlanta Falcons can't get there. You know what together. The Saints are still tied for the division lead. I want to talk about how badly this team handled this off season so bad and I can't until their season actually ends

and they might play a home playoff game. you? They might. Somebody's going to have to. Tampa Bay, Atlanta, or the same. So I will say this about Phil. Like the data, now, not that everything is database. It is rare for a quarterback to have the three seasons that Justin Field will have under

his belt and then emerge as a like top 10 to 12 starter in the NFL. Generally speaking, in written, I'm not saying it never happened. So you don't have to tell me it happened with this guy and this guy. But generally speaking, more often than not, a high percentage of the time, time after three seasons of a quarterback in the NFL, regardless of situation or whatever, you know that that's going to be your guy. I guess someone like Daniel Jones is sort of the exception. And is that the exception you want?

I mean, he led a top 10 offense last year. And that was very much not supposed to happen based on everything else we knew. What you're banking on if you are a team acquiring fields is not that you are acquiring a guy who you can develop into like a perennial top. quarterback. I think the point you made about play style and injuries is like the really big one. I don't think Fields like a long shelf life quarterback. I just don't see that. How he can be that given the way that he plays.

What you're betting on is that because of the unique skill set, he's 6,3, 2.40 and runs a 4-4, you can get an offensive designer in the league in a team, excuse me, who knows how to use that well. Think Brian Daible and what he was able to do for Daniel Jones. And you can

shot in an arm in offense. Right? And that's why the Steelers, it's like, okay, like let's, you know, Mike, Tomlin, I don't think Tomlin C is hot by any stretch of the imagination. I do think it's important that Tomlin gets the offense more correct, right? Like his last few OC hires and their quarterback carousel has not been good. You get Fields in there real quick and you should be like, boom, look at this. We can actually score 30 points every so often now.

That's what Fields can bring you. He can give you a shot in the arm and I think maybe bridge you into the next guy just because toolkit-wise, he can do stuff that not a lot of guys can do. And Tomlin has talked about quarterback mobility before. Like that, he should have a quarterback who can run based on kind of the way they want to play. You know, the best thing is always to have both or a guy who can really throw it.

But, you know, if you can't have that, the way they want to play, the way he wants to play, that would make a lot of sense. I want you to think about George Pickens getting deep bombs from Justin Fields. I don't you think about a backfield that has Najee Harris next to Justin Fields in it. I like it.

I would be excited about Justin Fields in a Steelers uniform. I don't know whether Steelers fans, how they would feel about it, him replacing Pickett. But yeah, that is a group that when you mentioned that, that got me a little excited. All right. Extra point taken. By the way, I think a few weeks ago, you were asking me the trade value for Fields and I

said a third and so like it's, it will go higher. I don't think it's going to get to a first. I agree. I agree. For Justin Fields if he continues to play. Second and change would be my prediction right now. Second and something if he continues to play relatively well. Maybe you get, you know, do the conditional thing.

Always do the conditional thing. A lot of a conditional thing. Yeah, if it turns into this. My entire participation in this podcast is conditional. I think we said that on like our second podcast together. We realized we both like conditions on on trades. And ever since then, it's been nothing but podcast magic. All right.

Here's what we're going to do. So I'm giving you playoff matchups. We're going to pick winners spur of the moment. And we're going to see who we think is winning the Super Bowl right now. Ready? Ooh. I love it. I haven't done this exercise.

All right. So the AFC, after today's first. results. The Baltimore Ravens, let me just hit a refresh, make sure I didn't miss anything here. Baltimore Ravens are the one seed. First round, AFC, dolphins host the Colts. Who do you got? Dolphins. Okay. Chiefs host the Steelers. Who do you got? Chiefs. Okay. Jaguars host the Browns. Who do you got? Jaguars, but I have some evidence that suggests that that might not be as easy of a win as once believed. A rematch. All right. So second round, we've got the Jaguars going to Baltimore. What do you got? Ravens.

Ravens, okay. And we've got, ooh, baby, who is? My chiefs go to Miami to take on the Miami Dolphins. Who do you got? Dolphins. Oh, baby. So you've got the Ravens hosting the Dolphins in the AFC Championship game. Art. I was with you until that one. What do I got? I'm not betting on Patrick Mohawk. Holmes not making the AFC championship game. I've got the king of like, these are the seven worst Mahomes games of his entire career. All true. And still just pick them to go anyway. All true. Yes, that's correct.

All right. So I've got the Ravens hosting the Chiefs. You've got the Ravens hosting the Dolphins. Who's going to the Super Bowl in the IFC? The Baltimore Ravens. Got to be. I think so, too. I think it might be there here.

I think it might be there here. All right. So I've got the Ravens. We both got the Ravens. Interesting. All right. You've got them taking down the dolphins. I've got them taking down the chiefs.

All right, NFC, San Francisco 49ers are the one seat. Right now, the Cowboys would host the Green Bay Packers in a very fun wildcard round matchup. Who do you got? That's Cowboys. Okay. The Lions would host Nick Mullins. Dude, the sixth seed in the NFC bench their quarterback this week. It's a chocked conference.

All right. So as much as many concerns as you might have about the Lions offense, you are picking the Lions to beat Nick Mullins or Josh Dobbs. Yes. Or who's the other guy? Who's the rookie, Jaron Hall? Jaron Hall, yeah. Okay.

All right. So Lions, Tampa Bay Bucks host the Philadelphia Eagles. We go back to the 2021 season. Who do you got? Eagles, yes. Please know. All right. So we've got that.

Eagles going to the bay to take on a 49ers team that just pants them a couple weeks ago. Yeah, they're losing that game. Okay, 49ers over Eagles. And then we've got the Detroit Lions going to Dallas to take on the Cowboys. The Cowboys get past the divisional round for the first time in 27 years. So 49ers host the cow, I hate to agree with you. I have, you know, I've not lived to see a Dallas Cowboys conference championship. I know.

Yeah, I definitely, I don't know if I brought it up to you before, but I've definitely thought about it before because those were like my, you know, fifth grade years. We're just like this up-and-coming Cowboys team that wins every year and is amazing. And John Madden loves them. Yeah. Yeah. And I personally love being able to say, well, I've never laid my eyes on a Dallas Cowboys Conference

Championship game, but I feel like I'm going to lose that opportunity this year. All right. So 49ers host the Cowboys, old school, in the NFC championship game. Who do you got? Cowboys. Oh, ho! I wrote it in the column this week.

They're going to go to San Francisco. Oh, very good. I wrote in the column this week. The Niners are really well equipped to beat the Cowboys. They absolutely are. They've beaten them the last three times they played. The Cowboys' entire offense is predicated on the idea that Dax's mind is a little bit faster than you, and then he's willing to hurt you in tight windows.

and the Niners, they're just so fast in the secondary, and then they hit those tight windows so hard. That's why the Cowboys not been able to move the ball against this team, but we have not seen Dak play the way he's playing right now in years. I mean, it is wood chipper stuff. It is very hard to beat a team that's as good as the Cowboys are just on paper that many times in a row, like the fourth time in a row. It's especially tough when they're coming in,

playing potentially their hottest ball, which I think the Cowboys will be if they keep this up. I think if the Cowboys face the Niners again in the playoffs, I think we see a performance of the ages from Dak, and I think he beats him. I will be taking the San Francisco 49ers in that matchup. I just said last week. I got to the point where I think the 49ers are the best team in the NFL.

So you've got Ravens Cowboys. That's a Super Bowl. That's a nice Super Bowl. I'm not mad at that Super Bowl. That's fun. I like it. Who is your winner? Ravens Cowboys.

At this point in time, you can always change this, but at this point in time. I'm picking Ravens. I'm willing to pick the Cowboys to make the Super Bowl. You will never hear, I will not pick the Cowboys to win the Super Bowl. I'm unwilling to do that. That would take a lot of emotional preparation and prayer from me. I'm not prepared to do it at this time.

All right. I think as long as the 49ers are healthy, this is Kyle Shanahan's year. This is their year. I've gotten to that point in recent weeks. They just blow every team out. Unless they have a game where they turn the ball over three times, I have a hard time seeing them be consistently stopped. Unless, you know, we might get one of these games where it's like,

Ooh, this defensive, and we're talking about it, you know, it's six years from now. Oh, remember that game plan that defensive coordinator X put together to shut down Kyle Shanahan? That would be fun. I don't know that it exists, but that would be fun. So I've got 49ers over Ravens, Solex Scott, Ravens over Cowboys as we go in to the final month of the NFL season with all the stars out.

Lamar Jackson, Jack Prescott, Nick Mullins. They're all out, baby, ready for the playoffs to begin. All right. there's a fun extra point taken. It's going to be a great AFC playoff and a really exciting NFC championship game

can't wait. And one divisional round game in the NFC. Maybe. I need the Eagles and Lions respective defenses

to start pulling their weight. Yeah, that's true. All right. That was fun. All right. Thank you to Solaq. Thank you to Christopher Sutton for producing.

Thank you to Eduardo Ocampo for the video production additional production supervision by Connor and Arjuna Ram Gopal. Next episode,

Nora and Stephen with dual threat, then Solek and I will be back on Friday to look ahead to week 15. Thanks for listening, everyone, and have a great week. Must be 21 plus and present in select states. FanDuel is offering online sports wagering in Kansas under an agreement with Kansas Star Casino, LLC, gambling problem, called 1-800 gambler, or visit fanduel.com slash RG in Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Tennessee, and Virginia. call 1-800 next step or text next step to 533442 in Arizona, 1-887-8-8-8-8-9-7-7-7.

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