The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Insane Josh Allen, Lions Injury Crisis, Mahomes Concerns, Sneaky Bucs, and More with Albert Breer

Episode Date: December 16, 2024

Russillo starts the show with his awards for Week 15 of the NFL (0:53). Then, Albert Breer joins the show to discuss playing on short weeks, upcoming QB contracts, and which coaches are on the hot seat (22:35). Finally, Kyle and Ceruti join for Life Advice (70:28)! Should I have approached the person who ran a red light and t-boned my car? Check us out on YouTube for exclusive clips, live streams, and more at https://www.youtube.com/@RyenRussilloPodcast The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Host: Ryen Russillo Guest: Albert Breer Producers: Steve Ceruti, Kyle Crichton, and Mike Wargon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's episode, football, football and more football. Yeah, fire it up. We'll do some NBA for you on Wednesday, a lot of it. But today starts with the Dills and their win in Detroit. I have some thoughts on that. Dan Campbell, decision making, the injuries, also an award on I Touched It. See if you can figure that one out. I cover a lot of the different games,

including Philly's win at Pittsburgh and a few others in a stat for you that's depressing. Breer goes deeper on all this, the Allen MVP push, the turnaround from the homes with this injury and the schedule. So there's a lot there, coaching futures, quarterback contracts, and life advice. We get to the bottom of whether or not I gave blades to Kyle. We start in Detroit with the Bill's lions potentially Superbowl preview NFL week 15.

Let's do this. So this is a four game stretch here for Buffalo where they beat Kansas City. They trounced the Niners. They lost against the Rams where we could point to some defensive issues that are concerning Maybe some of those issues that we saw again yesterday Against Detroit although Detroit's playing catch-up because for three plus hours Buffalo was the better football team So now we take a look at the rest of the schedule after this last month and the Bills have the Pats Jets and then at The Pats so little easier sledding for the Bills. Buffalo has now gone eight straight games with 30 plus points.

That ties an NFL record. And I don't have a perfect way to describe what Josh Allen is doing. Other than when you're watching this every single week, it feels like he's doing basketball things in a football field. And what I mean by that is football is such a connected sport. Everybody has to do their job for something to work. football things in a football field. And what I mean by that is football is such a connected sport. Everybody has to do their job for something to work. All these other things had to work out for you.

If one piece of it's off, maybe you get away, a couple of pieces are off. The whole play screwed up. You call the wrong play against the wrong defense, all these different things. Alan just has a lot of moments. It feels like once every single Bill's possession where he is just above all the things happening, like he is just above all the things happening. Like he is just going to fix it and make something amazing happen. There's a play that points this out.

First and 10 at their own 30, he escapes a sack, he rolls to his right, he starts directing traffic, he's on the right sideline, he knows he's about to get hit by an oncoming pass rusher, he hits Keon Coleman in stride for 64 yards down the right sideline, plus the roughing the passer hit. This is the Mike Ditka balls of a mountain lion reference that I've brought up a few different times back in the early days of ESPN, hanging out on a Sunday, getting ready to do a Sunday shift to entertain a nation.

Mike Ditka would escape from the TV people. He'd come over to radio. He'd throw in a huge chaw. Sometimes he would fall asleep in the chair, but then he would wake up and he would see Brett Favre extend the play for his tight end to get a release, knowing that he was going to get murdered and Ditka would stand up or just sit upright and scream balls of a mountain lion. When he would talk about Brett Favre. Um, the other thing is when you hit Alan, even late, it's like, it doesn't even bother him. So it's plays like that where again, I feel like

it's every possession with bills, the bills run this year offensively where Alan just does something that's, you know, look, Lamar does it, and Holmes does these things. I'm not saying he's the only one who's ever done it, but he's just on an absolute roll. He hasn't thrown a pick since October 27th. He has 11 runs in the last year.

He's been on the big screen for a it, but he's just on an absolute role. He hasn't thrown a pick since October 27th. He has 11 rushing touchdowns, only six running backs in the NFL have more than him. We got an auto Graham graphic yesterday. Not since there's a lot of not since with Josh Allen or first Evers, but look kids, autogram was a problem.

Detroit giving up 48 points. No team has ever allowed 45 or more points in a game at home and won the Super Bowl. Does that really mean anything? Nope, not really. It's just a fact. But the defensive injuries mean something for Detroit. This is getting outrageous.

If you look at Detroit's T two deep from week one, 11 of the 22 guys now with the injuries we had yesterday, 11 of the 22 on the two deep on the defensive side of the football are out. I don't know if they're all out forever. I don't think so. But McNeil going down yesterday. So now if you look at their front four, three of those four from week one are out. They lost two more guys in the secondary. They're so far behind. So, but McNeil going down yesterday. So now if you look at their front four, three of those four from week one are out.

They lost two more guys in the secondary. They're so good on offense that the Lions. They're probably pieced together. And average defense and still win a Superbowl. So I'm not looking at yesterday's game and that factoid of, of Superbowl teams, never doing what they did yesterday. But I don't know how long they can sustain this with this level of injuries. On Sundays, I'll go through the inactives and you just try to see, oh, okay, this guy's out.

Because I think all of us could do a better job of that, but it just kind of gets lost in it where you're like, what's wrong with this secondary today? And you're like, oh, they're actually missing three of their top six defensive backs. Okay. When Jamal Adams was elevated from the practice squad and activated for that game yesterday, that's a sign that things are getting pretty thin on that side of the football. But I also think the important point of this is not just the results that we saw

yesterday, how much that bleeds into Dan Campbell's approach in a football game. So we have decisions to look at the last two weeks of the Lions and Dan Campbell. We know that 31-31, fourth and one, 43 seconds left last week against Green Bay at their 21 yard line, kick the field goal, then you're kicking off. What's really going to happen? Like, do you realize what you're risking a fourth and one? And Campbell, we already know is super aggressive. Now he wants to run out the clock and he wants to win.

Right. Well, yesterday down 28, 28, excuse me, 12 minutes left. He goes for the onsite kick onsite kicks conversion, where I would say recovery rate would be the better way to say it is it's 7? Like it's almost no chance of you getting it back. And I saw a lot of criticism for it. I don't love it, but I understand it. He thinks his defense has no chance right now with all of these injuries. Uh, there's something that happened and reminded just kind of whether it

was the field goal decision or the non field goal decision and then the game winning field goal decision from the Green Bay game or the onside kick yesterday. It reminded me a bit of this. Pat's Colts game from 15 years ago, week 10, 2009. Do you remember Pat's at the Colts? Pats are up 34 28. They're facing a fourth and two from their own 28 yard line.

2.08 left on the clock. And Belichick ran the offense back out there. That was 15 years ago when it wasn't cool. Brady passes to Fogg. They try to get the fourth and two. It's a one yard gain. They turn the ball over on downs. Colts take over the pass 29.

Four plays later, Manning to Reggie Wayne, 35-34 win. And I hated it when it happened. My thought being, cause I was on the radio the next day, Van Pelt and I were going back and forth on it. And I was like, you know what? They kicked the ball off. They have to, they have to field the punt. They have to, there's going to be more plays.

So perhaps more chances for something wrong to happen. If you're giving them a 29 yard field with Manning, like you're losing in game there. The point is, is that Belichick was so down on his defense at that point of the game that he didn't think it even mattered. So the only way of winning that game was converting that fourth and two. And you figure with Brady, like my chances are better than most teams. So it's like 15 years later, I feel like I understand that decision. Even if like at the time we talked it out, we let the show it because it was like

this really big deal the next day. Like, what's he doing? Why would he ever do that? It was because in that game, in that moment, he knew. This is probably still my best chance to convert this and reset the downs, even if it's going to give them an incredibly easy field, but he's feeling like they're probably going to score anyway, so it doesn't really matter. I think that's what Campbell is facing with some of these decisions

with all of the injuries. So the head coach in Campbell was probably the most aggressive coach in the NFL. He might even crank it up to another level. The I touched it award goes to Aaron Rodgers. You don't see this a lot. So yesterday in the Jets-Jags game, Rodgers is scrambling left. It looked like he may have been hit late, but he wasn't on the replay. He was out of bounds.

A defensive player from the Jags makes contact with him, but essentially like wiping dust off the back of his nameplate. And then Rogers goes down. And because the rule is when you're on the sideline of your player going down, you have to all lose your shit collectively. Like it's the worst thing that's ever happened. So you can just beg for the flag. I mean, look, everybody does it and noise the shit out of me. Um, I think the late hit stuff, I understand why it's been

implemented because of all these different things where they want player safety, but sometimes. I mean, it's just called in a way where you're like, it's completely unfair. Like we've talked about this before with quarterbacks, like trying to get that extra yard or two, and then the defensive player gives up. It's like, if you do that again, we've talked about this before with quarterbacks, like trying to get that extra yard or two, and then the defensive player gives up. It's like, if you do that again, I should just blast you and take the flag. This doesn't happen very often though.

Rogers goes down. Jeff Ulbrich, the head coach of the Jets, who by the way, wanted to make sure he left time on the clock, I guess, when they scored the game, when he touched down for the Jags because they wanted Mac Jones to throw another pick and he did. In fairness though, to Mac, if you look at the overall, if you look at the all 22 on this one, who's all 22 in it? Parker Washington, number 11, the receiver for the Jags actually stops running.

And that's why Mac gives you the despondent boy model look. Although we had another look when Spencer Rattler couldn't convert the two point conversion in that, hey, this is a game, game of the week with Washington, New Orleans for Rattler. He gave a little Netflix special look at the receiver that wasn't able to pull that one in. But all right, so back to this one. Rogers turns to Ulbrich as Ulbrich is screaming the officials for the late flag, the late hit flag. And Rogers turns to Albrecht is all brick is screaming the officials for the late flag related flag and Rogers turns it puts his hand up like I touched it

coach it was off me and then Rogers again drove for the game when he touched down where the Jets for whatever reason decided to not run bunch clock off there let's go to Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. Graphics guys on fire this week. I monitor graphics. I'm like a Brian Curtis, NFL graphic guy. So they throw up the steak and cheese, um, from Philly against the Pittsburgh sandwich that we

know as the Primanti brothers, where it's the bread with the beef thing and then coleslaw and french fries, second Van Pelt reference of the pod today. Apparently he went and asked them to not put the where it's the bread with the beef thing and then coleslaw and French fries. Second van Pelt reference to the pod today. Apparently he went and asked them to not put the coleslaw on and it blew their fucking minds. They were just like, but that's. That's how we make the sandwich.

We, these are the things we have a sandwich. This is how we make it. These are the things that are on it. It was a Gatel on that. He might be banned anyway, 10 straight wins for the Eagles franchise record. Hertz comes out dealing 12 or 13 in the first half. Everyone looked open. I don't know how to explain this other than just the simplicity of just everyone looked open and when they caught the ball, they were open. So they were open on the throw. So they dialed up some really, they were just really good

at just working Pittsburgh's defensive backs or just putting stuff in play. I don't know if they'd had it really charted out or everything, but every time first delivered ball, like that guy's wide open. And then where's the guy to, where are all the guys to tackle? So you don't see that very often with the Pittsburgh defense, but this is the week after AJ Brown, after a win was asked about what he thought the problem could be.

He was essentially like passing. So that made a ton of headlines in Philadelphia. As an aside, let's talk about the workplace in general. Like we lose our minds when athletes will say something that's even remotely revealing because they're all coached up because you're not really supposed to do it. And AJ Brown probably shouldn't have done it because then it leads to all this bullshit and they have to work through it. And I guess it

doesn't really matter. And I think Philly kind of thrives in this chaos stuff. To be honest, we even had the sideline thing with Sirianni, the defensive line coach, where we were like, this is happening in the middle of like you beating Pittsburgh. What a weird team. Anyway, they're really good. Um, but with the AJ Brown quote, cause you were like, yeah, I think there's some times that it can feel like hurts is limited in games.

With where he'll get the ball out or where he'll want to go. But this team is so good on offense. They can do anything. And we'll get to that as they close this one out against Pittsburgh. But maybe we should be more fair when athletes do reveal a little bit of how they feel about what's going on at work. Because can you imagine, can you imagine if you worked

at a company of like 50 people and then all 50 people were interviewed all the time? Like, hey, how'd today go? Eh, you know what? interviewed all the time. Like, Hey, how'd today go? Yeah, what? Yeah. You know, this guy reporting to his just he's, he doesn't see it, man. I don't even know why this guy has this job. The time has passed him by his ideas are old. His jokes are terrible. Um, he has awful coffee breath. Like it just, it's, it sets a bad tone to start the day.

Our first, our 9 a.m., it can ruin the day. It can derail us. We just need to be better. We need more efficient and the guy needs a breath man. So, I mean, I always joke about baseball. Like how could you possibly interview baseball players 162 times? Hey, you know, one for 12 and runners are scoring position.

You know, what does that say about this lineup? Have you watched a baseball game before? Like it happens. It happens sometimes, but we have to answer all those questions. So maybe with the AJ Brown thing, if you feel like a person has enough equity within that locker room, they should be allowed to do it and not turn into this nightmare for a week, but it doesn't even matter with this team. So what?

Look, Pittsburgh, of course, because it's the NFL, they get back into this one. They're down 2013. Najee Harris fumbles, I think this is the first time I'll season. Philadelphia drives to the touchdown, Pittsburgh's down the two scores, they're facing a fourth and seven into Philly territory and they punt it. It's 1040 left.

So that one, I can understand Tomlin and want to do it, but then Philadelphia just absolutely empties the toolbox. They started their own three. They won't run 21 plays and the final 1029 off the clock. They did everything. It was a Ted talk of a football drive. Like they just covered it all. Concerns about Pittsburgh.

Yeah, I'm unchanged on this. I don't think Pittsburgh can win the AFC. I realized no Pickens again for the second straight week. That changes who they are. The deep ball threat doesn't feel like it's even a possibility, because at least with Russell Wilson, he'll look that way a couple of times.

Like if he thinks he can beat the safety on the throw and it's one on one with Pickens, I love that he takes those chances. So look, they have Baltimore, they're at Baltimore at KC and Cincinnati to close. Uh, I still like Baltimore more. I know that I'll get some mentions of Steelers fans like at Steve's at your mom's. Steve's at your mom's is like, dude, we beat Baltimore already. We're solo. You don't think they can win a shootout.

They want to shoot out with Cincinnati. 27 last week against the Browns without pickings. Look, I know Steve's at your mom's, uh, it's just how I feel. Stats. Let's go war gone. Stats to impress people. Mike McDaniel after Miami's lost to Houston yesterday, his record against teams over 500 is three in 15.

I went to Houston, Miami going, is there something from this game? Can I learn anything from this game? Will I, will I change my mind about what's possible with either of these teams? Uh, because on the Houston side, it feels like they've been off the radar quite a bit, maybe since the Bills win in week five, or when they blew the game to Detroit. But at least in that game, I kind of liked them.

Like, hey, they're hanging with Detroit, then Detroit comes back. So they just feel like they're off the radar in comparison to where they were last year. A lot of the CJ Stroud numbers are the same, except for the 23-5 touchdown interception split that Stroud had. He's got the nine picks this year.

I don't know that that's the end of the world. The opposing yards for play, they're actually third defensively in the NFL. They were 13th last year. The scoring D is about the same. So overall yardage is down. There was a turnover alert with them last year where they were plus 10 in the turnover margin, which is pretty good in the NFL.

That was like fourth, tied for fourth. Well, this year they're tied for third. So it's not, they just, it could be as simple as it was new and it's a rookie quarterback and look how clean he's been all year long and D'Amico's there and maybe it's not the name brands defensively, but they can, hey, but nobody's really like picking them to win the AFC.

But what an incredible story when you get the QB and you get the coach right. Like I remember those segments happening all the time. They might be the same team and none of it really matters. The problem is, is for Miami, they're kind of the same team. But we talk about it in a different way and I'll get to that because like, look, this is just a bad two again. He was terrible. He'd gone over a month without a pick, 184 pass attempts, all three picks. The Rossello interception point chart.

One, not your fault. Matt Damon, three, it's entirely on you. Those are all three pointers it's entirely on you. Those are all three pointers. They're just brutal. So remember last year with Miami, even when it was good and they're putting up all these points, we're still wondering, we're questioning it. Some pressure stuff felt like if you got to a off schedule, it was a completely different set of results now we're I think collectively over it.

We're not even, we're not even talking about it anymore because they don't be good teams. And you know, even though he'd come back and I'm thrilled that he came back. He was healthy. It put up some good numbers. The Packers game was ugly, but this game was ugly yesterday. Final award, the Deshaun Jackson award. He continues to be perhaps the most influential player of his generation. We had two Deshaun Jackson's yesterday. Jonathan Taylor for the Colts big game against the Broncos just

drops it at the goal line. First one I did, I thought he was going to maybe break the plane on that one. He said, quote, it'll never happen again. Maybe with you, it'll never happen again, but it's going to happen again in the league and then an incredible one from Jordan battle of Cincinnati fumble recovery, and then the first one, the with you, it'll never happen again, but it's going to happen again in the league. And then an incredible one from Jordan battle with Cincinnati fumble recovery runs it in for the touchdown, except he dropped the ball. And the funny thing with him is he knew Taylor celebrated it.

Did a dance battle like new. Oh, I think I screwed this up. And he like went to chase after the football after it was Ernie 10 yards past the end It was like by the wall, picking it back up. Being like, hope no one saw that. We saw it. So we got two of those yesterday. Closing thought, a historic run may be over. We only have three weeks left.

I have not seen anyone, and I don't mean like anyone. I mean, anyone in the media, whether it's the NBA, left. I have not seen anyone. And I don't mean like anyone. I mean, anyone in the media, whether I like them or think they're an absolute hack. I have not seen anyone suggest. I'm building here. Like usually you see a little Nathan Peterman. You see Tim Boyle getting some reps yesterday. Usually there's somebody still doing and Kaepernick can't get a job. He said in August, he was still open to playing for a team.

It's been seven years, but I'm afraid it may be over. Cause I love, I love to update that every year. It was like, we got somebody week, week eight, like, are you serious? You're serious with are you serious? Do you serious with the Tommy DeVito thing? And Kaepernick's at home three weeks to keep the streak alive. And now it's time for today's winning bundle segment presented by State Farm. There's something to be said about a strong coach-player relationship.

When that bond is solid, you can see the magic unfold. Players have the confidence to take risks and show off their skills, knowing their coach is in their corner. A few standout winning bundles definitely come to mind. I guess Belichick Brady can't use that one anymore, although we do need to update the legacy rankings. Andy Reid, Patrick Mahomes, kind of the gold standard.

But may I offer up one from this year? Sam Darnold and Kevin O'Connell with the Minnesota Vikings. Think about this, Sam Darnold, young Sam Darnold, the third overall draft pick in 2018 by the New York Jets, week one, 48 points against the Detroit Lions. And you're thinking the Jets have their quarterback answer for the next 10. And if I'm being greedy, 15 years, we've got to die. Except you didn't. He was gone three years later.

Stops in Carolina, San Francisco, now with Minnesota. And at the beginning of the year, it looked really good, but there were still doubts, right? Like, is he really this good? Is it just the defense? It doesn't really throw many passes when they're trailing football games. Well, he's answered all of those questions and he and his head coach have put together a resume saving season that can change his career. That's a winning bundle.

You know what else is better together? Bundling your home and auto insurance with a personal price plan from State Farm. The personal price plan lets you call the play so you can choose the right coverage at a price that's right for you. Talk to a State Farm agent today to learn how you can bundle and save

with the personal price plan. 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. Let's talk some more football with Burt Brear from si.com. You read his piece every Monday morning and we're going to cover a bunch of different stuff here. I do want to start with Josh Allen, which is where I started this podcast. I know you don't have an MVP vote, but I was pretty hunkered down into the Lamar camp for a long time because of what the rest of the team hasn't done around him.

Um, but as each week continues here with Allen, it's going to be pretty tough to hold this guy off from winning his first MVP. If you had a vote, which way would you go? It'd be Alan. I mean, I think Lamar would be in the mix. Saquon would be in the mix. Cause I do think Saquon kind of pulled the Eagles out of the fire.

When things didn't look great at the beginning of the year. So Saquon would probably be number three for me. I think Josh and Lamar have similar cases in that a lot of those rosters turned over this off season and it wasn't just an offense. The Ravens lost 60% of their offensive line, which is a big freaking deal. You lose that much of your offensive line and you're breaking in young guys all over the place up there. And then the transition with Derek Henry coming aboard. And then the defense loses Mike McDonald,

who's one of the best defensive coordinators in the league. And they lose Patrick Queen. And the same goes for Josh Allen in Buffalo. He loses center, which is a big deal for a quarterback, and Mitch Boris. Stefan Diggs is gone. And then the defense is almost completely turned over. And you look at the guys who are gone,

the leadership that's gone, with Micah Hyde, Jordan Poyer, and Trinnebius White, you know, all out the door. It's, I think both of them have sort of had to step forward and it's like, this is what you need when your quarterback's making 50 or 60 million dollars a year. It's like a guy who can make up for it when you have to let people go.

And both those guys have proved it. I just, the eye test for me with Josh is not even numbers. It's just, I don't know, Ryan, like I can't remember a quarterback looking this way. You know, I know that sounds like a little like abstract and stupid, but just the way he's playing the position now, the way he's toggling between taking what the defense gives him and then the Superman plays,

he's playing at a ridiculously high level right now. There were a couple of those, the throw early in the game to Ty Johnson yesterday, the scramble play downfield to Kion Coleman. It's like he's got a few of those every week where it's just like, I don't know if there are five guys on the planet that could make that play, and he's doing it multiple times every game. He's my MVP and I think he will wind up winning it based on everything that Buffalo's had

to weather with the attrition from the roster and everything else and how he's had to step up and be an even bigger part of the team. Nothing to add to that. Completely agree. Every game you feel like he's doing something that it just seems really hard to do in football where everyone has to be kind of connected. And then he can just have this moment where it's like that entire thing happened only because of him. Not to say that there aren't other quarterbacks that do it.

You know, like I, there's probably my homes fans listening and going, are you guys unaware of the dude in Kansas City? It's like, I think we all understand what kind of level Mahomes is at, who I have some thoughts on here with that injury here yesterday. But before we pivot off of that game with Buffalo and Detroit,

the Detroit injury thing is, it's becoming like, there was no version of that game where I was like, hey, you know what? I can't take Detroit seriously. So I'm not saying that. But there's almost like for myself, a recalibration of like what is actually possible for a team

that is that decimated on that side of the football. Yeah, and like losing Lee McNeil is a huge deal. He's such a big part of replacing Aiden Hutchinson's production. I know they don't play the same position, but just as disruptive as he's been and what he does inside for them. I think it's like what? 13 guys on IR on the defensive side of the ball alone, and now they'll have a couple more with Lee McNeil and Carlton Davis going there. the ball alone and now they'll have a couple more with Lee McNeil and Carlton Davis going there. They lose David Montgomery on offense.

What does that mean for the way they use Jameer Gibbs? It's interesting because Jared Goff has had to be the bus driver and I think he's done a great job. I think he deserves all-pro consideration for how well he's played and the level he's been at. And now it feels like it's almost going to swing back around where the Lions are going to need him to carry the team at certain points over the next six or seven weeks if they're to get to the two-role.

Now they're going to get healthier in some spots. All their linebackers, with the exception of Malcolm Rodriguez, is going to come back. Aiden Hutchinson, there's hope that he gets back in the playoffs. And then they need some of the young guys to really, really break through. Terry and Arnold, James and Williams, some of the guys who are high-drapics, who've been really good, but maybe not superstars yet, they need some of those guys to break through. It feels like the margins now are razor thin for the Lions, or if they lose a couple more guys, like, it could look a lot different than it has. I'm not surprised Mahomes got hurt because I feel like it's been multiple

weeks now with him where you're like, and then he gets up and you're like, okay, and he's been taking way more hits this year, going into this week. I think he was third in hits behind Borough and I think Stafford when Stafford's O-line was a mess earlier in the year. So look, we know what kind of game he plays. And then obviously the scrambles late are going to open himself up to, even though it seems like nobody gets a clean shot at him when he's running for the first down towards the sideline.

He just knew it was starting to kind of take its toll or he was just opening himself up to a spot where it's like, is he going to get through this game again? I even thought there was a couple of throws where I felt like, man, he really, there was a throw to Hopkins. It wasn't the incompletion that was challenged. There was a throw on the right side where I felt like he's really loading up on that throw for somebody with all that arm talent, like is there some lingering stuff with him?

So look, he leaves the game. We see him in the card app with the fact, we'll see where we're at by the time this is posted, maybe we'll have an update, but it also leads to something else that you and others who cover this league were telling us in August. And now here we are where the Chiefs are going to have 10 days to play three games with this extra Christmas deal here. Um, so give us your Mahomes thoughts and just kind of the overriding thing of like, all right, cool, there's more football, but that's a big ask for these teams that are trying

to close those with seeding on the line. Well, so like, first of all, like, if you don't mind, Ryan, like I'd hit the long term concern here with Mahomes, because I know there are people that are organization that are worried about the accumulation of lower leg injuries. It seems like you see him so often where he's got guys wrapped around his ankles basically and he's twisting and contorting himself to make throws. He's tough as nails.

No one would ever doubt what he brings to the table from that standpoint, how badly he wants to play, the things he does in order to get himself in a position to play. But those things can be cumulative. And so I sort of, I wonder if long-term there are some things they got to coach him, coach into him. And it reminds me of Todd Haley getting with Ben Roethlisberger in 2012, I believe it was, and or maybe it was 13, right? And they're somewhere in that period. And Roethlisberger was almost a decade into the league and he'd done a lot of the same

stuff. Now I'm not saying he's Mahomes, but he had done a lot of the same stuff Mahomes had stylistically in not being a runner, but running to throw and being this big body who could withstand the hits. And Todd Haley coached into him, we want you to get rid of the ball faster. You're not gonna hold up if you keep playing this way. And we're gonna put these great receivers around you, and you're gonna have Antonio Brown

and Emmanuel Sanders and Mike Wallace unload the ball, let them make the plays. And I do wonder if that sort of, you know, like reckoning is coming with Mahomes and it won't be this year, but in the next couple of years where it's like, look, dude, like you're, I think he's 29 now. Is he 29 or he's going to be 29 next year? I don't have it. I'll look it up for you.

Just keep going. Yeah. So he's approaching 30, bottom line, right? And I believe he's 29 now that I'm doing have it. I'll look it up for you. Just keep going. Yeah. So he's approaching 30, bottom line, right? And I believe he's 29 now that I'm doing my head. I think he was born in 95. So he's approaching 30. Great job. We've seen this with guys who've gotten beaten up at that position.

And so I do think that that's part of the equation now with Mahomes is that he's dealt with a lot of this stuff and fought through it, and that's to his credit. But there, I think, will be a time where he's going to have to learn to dial it back and play a little bit more judiciously. So that, I think, long term will be a part of the equation for him. I think right now, like they, if I'm the chiefs, I'm looking at this and I say, you know what, we got a two game lead

and regardless, we're almost certainly gonna be one of the top two seeds. If we win one of our last three, we're gonna be one of the top two seeds. So, you know, at worst, we're the top seed playing on wild card weekend and the only road game we would have to play would be in Buffalo in the AFC Championship, where we won last year.

It's more important to us right now that we have our quarterback at full speed, as close to full speed as we possibly can have him. And so I look at the schedule and I'm gaming it out, and see you've got, obviously a game with the Texans on Saturday, and then the Steelers on Christmas. I'm thinking about sitting him for the Texans game, so I give him 10 days of runway into that, which then gives him 11 days of runway if I have to use him in week 18.

And look, the NFL made its bet on this. You know what I mean? Like the NFL put the teams in these positions where they have to make decisions like this. And I do think, you know, if it's up to Mahomes and it's close and look, we may get to like four o'clock today and maybe it's a much more serious high ankle sprain. He just can't go for the next month because these things can be that serious. But if there's like a question or it's borderline, then I'm saying sit them.

I know the way that the players talk about this particular injury, how playing on it can make it worse, how it can linger. It's one of those like a hamstring, it doesn't go away unless you give it a lot of rest. And so, you know, if I'm the Chiefs right now, I'm maximizing the amount of rest I'm getting Patrick Mahomes before the playoffs. And I know he's gonna hate it, but like I think this is a decision

maybe you have to make for him to give yourself the best chance in January and you hope February. And the fact that they're still, despite the head to head, two losses up on the bills in the AFC. I mean, they can rest him, cost themselves a game, and still be in a really good spot here. Then the Pittsburgh game becomes something entirely different because they're going to still have something to play for. But I don't know that you would want to go what's...

Look, it all depends on what we learn the rest of the week and all this kind of stuff but. Yeah, the other thing I would throw on top of this is just kind of like, I wish they would take what the players say into account a little bit more with this stuff. It does matter that it's this late in the season, you know? Like doing this now is not the same as doing it in October. And making them go through this now is not the same as doing it in October. And making them go through this now is not the same as making them go through it in October. And I think there's another element to it too,

which is like, so I was on the field before the Packers-Lyons game. We had that game, it was a Thursday night game. And both those teams had played on Thanksgiving and then they played the Sunday before. So it was three and 11 days. So I was talking to a few of the coaches and a couple of the players,

and I was mentioning how it's good, even though it's a Thursday game, you get a full week's rest. And a few of the guys said to me, it's like, yeah, but you come off of the first Thursday game and now you're playing another one, it's like your body still hasn't had a chance to catch up.

So really, they don't feel like they're going to be whole until they get that mini by and they go to the following Sunday. So I just think it's like, to me at least, Ryan, the league should want to have its best players in the best spot going into the playoffs in position to play their very best and like I just I look at this stretch of three games in ten days for four teams that are almost certainly going to be in the playoffs and It's just like is the juice worth the squeeze here like where you could be jeopardizing some guys that are their market players Performance going into going into the most important month of the year. Right, but the owners would like to add another game.

Oh no, they would. I mean, based on what they got for the Christmas games for Netflix, from Netflix, I know for a fact this is all gonna fall on deaf ears. Yeah, right. all going to fall on deaf ears. Yeah. Right.

Uh, but I look, all you need is a, is a slate, like the one o'clock slate yesterday to, cause we saw a bunch of guys in there, whether it was quarterbacks being benched or guys getting hurt. Like there was a, there was a lot of backups getting some reps yesterday. And that's whenever anybody, you know, cause I think like there's a bigger thing that I would talk about. And there's probably like a bigger segment that I have here in my head, but I'll just share it with you now

as it pertains to the NFL part of it. But think of all the changes the NFL has made in a very short amount of time and how often that was met with just like immediate criticism. And the biggest thing was like, oh, well, these guys aren't even allowed to tackle anymore. Might as well put flags on them. Like this isn't the football I grew up with. It's like, well, it, these guys aren't even allowed to tackle anymore. I might as well put flags on them. Like this isn't the football I grew up with.

It's like, well, it also shows that none of you are turning it off. None of you are turning it off. Yeah. So whatever you were pissed about and like the late hits on quarterbacks, engaged enough to complain are the last people who are turning it off. Right. Right. Like there's nothing that would back up that any of the changes.

And I don't blame the NFL for being towards the absurd on how some of the flags are thrown. Like I hate the sideline stuff that happens, but I understand it. The quarterback stuff, like there's usually one or two a week where everybody loses their mind, like, I can't believe that's a flag. Like that's ridiculous. It's a, yeah, they just don't want defensive players. They won't actually, excuse me.

They want defensive players scared to death to even hit the guy. And guess what? The game keeps on rolling. And as long as they score points, which is happening, I know there was a dip down at the beginning of this year, but I would say like about five year snapshot of it. Like people based on the ratings seem to love the points. They don't care about the evolution of the lack of physicality or removal of certain elements of physicality or the, you know, defenseless receiver

stuff that everybody was mad about. It's like, Hey, what's the safety supposed to do? I don't know. Well, there's a game on tonight at eight 30 and you're going to watch that one too. So like all of the consternation around it, it hasn't, it hasn't mattered. Yeah. And I mean, the other thing is these guys are bigger and faster and stronger than they were 20 or 30 years ago and the hits are more violent, you know, like naturally

because of the force that they're happening with. And it's just, you have to, to some degree, you have to protect your stars. And like, I understand the whole, you know, like idea of what football was. And there's some of those things that I actually subscribe to. You know, like I do think they should probably hit more

in training camp. I think there's evidence out there. I talked to Sean Payton about this over the summer, like how there's a lot of evidence out there that callousing your team makes you healthier in November and December. And that's something they really have to look at. I completely agree with that.

And when John Harbaugh said that years ago, there were so many people in NFL media that just looked at him as this caveman. And you're thinking, how could you not understand that your body actually needs to be abused a bit to be able to handle abuse? I mean, that's, that's pretty standard for anybody that's ever done anything.

And yet it was just a ton of people being like, oh, this idiot. And he was just like, no. So that part of it, I completely agree with, but again, the players association, when they go to the table with this stuff, they give up money. They give in to some of these. Right. And it's like, can we hit less? And they're like, yeah, we don't give a shit.

Never wear any pads. Like. I say, can we have three weeks off in the spring? You mean I get to turn the lights off for three weeks? Where do I sign? Cool, we want an extra game. All right, can we not have weed testing? Sure, we want another game.

All right, even. That's its own conversation of what happens when they sit down at the table and try to redo the CBA over time. I have a money question for you because it's starting to be talked about a little bit with the Niners finishing out what's a disappointing season here.

Purdy's under contract for 25 at like a nothing number, right? And the Niners have all sorts of kind of cap issues they're looking at with committed contracts before we talk drive class and all these different things that you point out this morning on si.com. What do you think happens here with Purdy? So like I could tell you without reservation, Brock is their guy and they think he's better

than he gets credit for, Kyle loves him. Now there's not, I mean, you wouldn't be a Kyle Shanahan quarterback if you didn't do some things that infuriated Kyle Shanahan. So I think that does exist with him to some degree. But, you know, Kyle will tell you, like if you sit down and watch the tape, like this guy plays like a top of the league quarterback. So like he is like, like they view him as their guy. So, I think it's when not if they do a deal with him. But I think the when is massively complicated by this just bottleneck of contracts that they have, that they're going to have to clean up this offseason. And so, you know, I think what history

tells me is that they will try to get out front of it right after the season. That's what they did with Jimmy Garoppolo. If you go back and you look, they signed Jimmy Garoppolo to an extension, I think it was like the end of January, you know, in 2018, right after he had just gotten done playing that first half season after the trade. So like I think having that sort of certainty would appeal to them and, okay, like, now we know with the rest of our players what we're working around. So that's one piece of history that can inform you. I think they will make an

effort to try to get out in front of it quickly. I also think at that point they'd probably be looking for a discount to do it. And if they're looking for a discount to do it, then how much pushback do they get from Purdy's side? Are they trying to play on the insecurity of a guy who was the last pick in the draft? Is Purdy sensitive to that? There's all kinds of dynamics that can play into that. You know, and then there's the history they have

the last three years, they've had pretty contentious contract negotiations. Last year it was IUC, the year before that it was BOSA, the year before that it was Debo., the year before that it was DBO. So they've had to ride these things out in the past. So I think they have every intention of getting it done. The question to me is like, at what price and when?

I don't think that they would be bothered by the idea of going into 2025 with Brock playing out the final year of his contract and then having to franchise him in 2026. I don't think that's their preference, but I don't think it would bother them that much to have to do that because of all the other business that they have to do with all the guys that are left on the roster now. And then, I think the other thing that's sort of a twist to all of this is that there could be two guys that have a connection to that program as veterans that could be available this off season in Sam

Darnold and maybe Kirk Cousins, you know. So if those two guys wound up being available, do you use those guys' leverage to try to get your price of party? That's sort of like, I think a fascinating element that could play out in the first couple of months of the negotiation. Yeah. Okay. All right. I love this stuff. And it's a good transition cause I was going to ask you about Darnold's future here in a second, but I think I would just like to add that the Garoppolo contract was terrible. They made him the highest paid player in NFL history.

He had seven starts under his belt. And then I remember, I think it was the Niners did a thing with Kevin Clark when he was still at the Ringer where they talked about the Garoppolo contract and it was so front load and it was almost like, yeah, but look, we paid him so much money now. Then we don't have to pay him as much later. And you've went is that's the defense of this contract, but it was also another lesson in like the way the quarterback contracts work is it's not so much who you are.

It's when you're signing them in comparison to whatever the previous quarterback class got when they redid their deal. So that leads us to the Purdy thing where it seems like they'll probably take care of their guys. Purdy has far more of a track record than Garoppolo did when they did the deal. Um, you know, you could say, maybe we just get away with this for another year, but that's not really how teams do deals with quarterbacks. They feel as their guy, usually they'll wipe out that cheap year.

Cause the agent's like, look, we can't have our guy playing on minimum wage when he's the face of the franchise here. It also helps you manage it because you're folding that year in, which brings the average per year down, right? Like like because you're folding in that year at whatever a couple million bucks and now so like you you add the new money average to the end of it but that really cheap year on the front end you're folding that in so it brings the total average down a little bit you know and I think sometimes but but that that sometimes that number has been wiped out

though like they've they didn't they do that with Russell Wilson it doesn't get But sometimes that number's been wiped out though. Didn't they do that with Russell Wilson? It doesn't get wiped out, no, it always gets folded in. So the total number you hear is the new money. So the new money is just basically the big number. And then it's not like they have to play out that final year of their contract or the final two years of their contract, but that's accounted for and folded into the bigger number.

So the earlier you do it, the cheaper, if you add like two cheap years, now they can't do that with Purdy because of the rules, but that brings the total number down. I also think like what's interesting about this one too, is like it's not just Patrick Mahomes making that much money. Dak Prescott's at 60, Tua's in the 50s, Jared Goff's in the 50s, Trevor Lawrence is in the 50s.

So I think the room for the Niners to say, we got to take you under 50, like, I don't know if they have as much room to say that anymore based on how you would stack party up. Against a trevor lawrence or to a tongue of a law or a jared goth. So the hard part for this is like the niners i don't know how they would negotiate they can go like hey look no one else is gonna want pretty as much as we want pretty so. want Purdy as much as we want Purdy. So, but again, you're not really even going off of other comps as we've just covered here a million times. It's just new guy is up, new guy makes this much more than everybody else. So that leads us to the darn old thing.

I mean, that would, that would be, I guess you could negotiate it that way. It just doesn't seem like anybody ever does that with their quarterbacks, but what are the Vikings going to do? Because I think on one hand, clearly, like whenever I read something, it's like the Vikings still really like JJ McCarty. They were like, well, no kidding. They took him 12th. So obviously if all the same people are there, they really, really like him. But Darnold has answered questions about, hey, can he, what are they like when he has to come back in a game? I mean, the numbers, this guy's had an incredible year. And I think that'd be part of me, even if I was the person that was in the war

room, just campaigning for JJ after all the work, it's one thing to be excited about what somebody could be versus having a year like this with Darnal. We'll see what happens to the playoffs or whatever, but like somebody that's really doing it. So there's a historical comparison here, um, that I think makes some sense. It's the Chargers in 2005. If you remember, they drafted Philip Rivers fourth overall, and the idea was they're out on Breeze. Then Breeze goes and kicks ass. I think they went 12 and four in 2004. And they brought Breeze back on the franchise tag in 2005. Breeze gets hurt, they transition to Rivers in 2006.

Maybe that's the answer. The franchise tag is going to be more than $40 million this year at quarterbacks, so it's not like that lump sum is cheap or easy to work around. It is what it is. But look, having talked to people there, they laugh at people on the outside who think the bottom is going to suddenly fall out or the other shoe is going to drop on Sam Darnold. I mean, they'll tell you he's a really good player. His quarterback rating has been over 111 times this year.

He has navigated through some rough patches. He's performed in the clutch. He's done everything you wanted him to do. It's because he's gone to a place where the coach is tailoring the system to him. I think Adam Gase and Dow Loggins and those guys with the Jets wanted him to be Peyton Manning. He was never that. He was very raw coming out of USC.

And like the Vikings have let him go out and be a playmaker. And they've obviously put a good crew around him. They've navigated and dealt with a lot of injuries at left tackle. I think they've had four different left tackles. Darisal was one of the best in the league. He went down. He's checked every box. And if you didn't have JJ McCarthy, this would be a no-brainer. was one of the best in the league, he went down. He's checked every box.

And if you didn't have JJ McCarthy, this would be a no-brainer. You reassigned him. If they were in the situation Tampa was in last year with Baker, it would be like, yeah, OK, like you can go to the market and see your value, but come back to us and we'll sign you at whatever the price is.

I think in this case, because they really like JJ, but because JJ lost all of that development time, he lost the time from August to January, and he's been great, they love him, but he lost all of that time to develop, and they may not get a chance to see him physically, like where he's gonna be before Darnold becomes a free agent, and you've got this team that's ready to compete

for a championship right now. Do you owe it to the other players? I don't know, Ryan, what do you think? Do you owe it to the other players on your team to give them the best shot at quarterback, which might be having both guys on the roster going into training camp? Well, I mean, that's a different question than maybe the answer that I'm giving you because with the way it's flexible, and by the way, I've already looked at it with the number of the six or seven teams that probably desperately want to make a change at that position, adding to this draft class, looking at who's available out there. There's not going to be enough chairs out there for the teams that want to come in.

I'm like, they'll come in with somebody new, but I don't think seven teams are going to feel excited, whether it's through free agency or this strap class or who their week one starter is in 25. So I'm totally cool with the idea of it. I think that's why I could see Atlanta going, this cousin's thing hasn't been great right now, let's see how it looks at the end of the year, but with the money they paid him, it's kind of a two year contract. Maybe there's a trade for them where they feel like they're getting the assets back and the money that's out and then they're ready to go with PENX immediately.

But JJ and Darnold make sense to me. I think my overriding point to the veteran thing that you're talking about, I'm always, I don't care if I think I'm the smartest NFL guy going, I'm always going to be scared to death of a guy that actually hasn't done it on a Sunday as opposed to what Darnold's put together this year. Yeah. And I agree with that. The flip side, so like the difference in the PENX comparison, of course, is

they've got Missy Pennex develop all year. So they have probably a clearer picture of where Pennex is than the Vikings have right now, McCarthy. And to me, the flip side of that argument would be if you're Kevin O'Connell, Wes Phillips, Josh McCown, all the guys that are involved with and touch the quarterback there, I think you'd be pretty confident in your ability to make do at that position. Even if JJ is a little flawed in year one, doesn't the last three years of evidence show us what that group is as a quarterback development machine?

They're going to make it work with whoever goes in there. I mean, even after cousins got hurt last year, some of the things they were able to do, at least over short term with Josh Dobbs and Nick Mullins and guys like that. Like I, if I were them, I would feel pretty confident that if I get a talented kid in there, I'm going to be able to make it work.

I think the question is, are you going to be able to make it work. The question is, are you going to be able to make it work at the same level it's working right now with Sam Darnold? If you aren't confident that it'll get quite to that level, again, service to the rest of the team, service to the veterans on your team. Do you owe it to everyone to give them two bites of the apple at quarterback and franchise Darnold and either make him the starter going into training camp or open it up to a competition. I think it's a really interesting question to ask.

Although of course it would be expensive to do that because I mean, $40 million, I can't do the math in my head but I think that the salary cap will be around 275. It's a healthy percentage of your salary cap to be devoting to a second quarterback. Yeah, and there's also, as we're talking to Sal, I mean, if they just really love JJ and there's a market for Darnold,

then you're talking about getting a two, three year window here with a quarterback on a rookie salary scale and you feel like, okay. So, you know, but it is very different in the fact that they haven't, even if they loved him that much to go ahead and draft them to not be able to see them get him work out. I guess.

I just love seeing guys that have done it before. I'll never forget. Like even man, Jeannie, when we were talking through all these available guys years and years ago and man, Jane, he was like making the case for Matt Castle and he's like, look, I'm not telling you he's this all world guy, but at least there's a couple seasons in there where you thought to yourself, okay, this guy did it at a decent enough level, you know, games one through whatever.

He was good with the chiefs too. But he had the, he had the, he had the year they won 10 games with the chiefs. Yeah. Yeah. I, I wasn't, I didn't expect to be doing like a castle because it wasn't pretty there at the end. Big shout out to Matt. I've never heard anybody have a bad word to say about Matt Castle.

If he gets a little love today, then good for him. The point of the story or the point of the anecdote is more about these coaches, they will default to any kind of experience in the face of like no experience. So, um, not to say that that's exactly what the Vikings will do. Speaking of coaches. So we've got the three openings now. How many more openings do you think we're going to have past Jets, Bears and Saints? Jacksonville, Dallas.

Although see, like I'm almost to the point now where like if Mike McCarthy had two years left on his contract, I think they might keep him. But like the fact that his contract is up makes this like complicated and that they got to do an entirely new contract with them. And I mean, that team is playing its ass off. They're six and eight now. They're still not eliminated, believe it or not. They've really responded after that ugly loss on the Monday night to Houston. Their best players

are playing well, like Lambs playing well, Parsons is playing well. But I think there's probably a change there. So that gets you up to five. But then after that, like Vegas, I think is, I think Vegas is definitely up in the air, whether or not they bring back Antonio Pierce. New England, I would have said no, absolutely not a week or two ago. Like now I'm a little, after, it really was last night and that press conference last night that makes me think like, I don't know. Cleveland I think is safe.

Can we just stay on the New England one for a second? What is going on in these Gerard Mayo press conferences? And I think you're, you're pointing in particular where it sounded like as a reporter was asking him about a Drake may keep her on third and one and fourth and one that Mayo essentially was like, you said it. Like as if he was that disconnected from his, from Van Pelt. From his offense.

Yeah, like it was like, it was like, I don't know how you take that any other way, but then you're throwing the offensive coordinator under the bus. And you know, I don't think it was ever, it's ever been the craft's intention to even think about walking away from Gerard Mayo, you know, in part because of how much they've invested in the guy and put faith in the guy.

I don't think it was ever their intention to even consider walking away from him after a year, but I said it a couple weeks ago, I'm barring something cataclysmic. My point of reference here is the Joe Judge, three years ago when the Maras had no intention of walking away from Joe Judge after 2021. Then that press conference happens and everything comes unraveled. This puts Gerard Mayo in an interesting spot where they've got a quarterback that I think could attract a top coach.

There is probably only one shot they'd get at bringing Mike Vrabel back. And I think Vrabel is going to be the most sought after candidate out there. So like, do all these things converge now to make Robert Kraft, who's in his mid eighties, say, you know what, love you, Gerard, but this didn't work out. I still don't think he does it, but I also like, there's the potential they get blown out the next three weeks. They play Buffalo twice in the Chargers in the middle of those two. If it looks really ugly down the stretch, you know, I, I, I wouldn't be, I wouldn't be totally floored if they wound up,

if they wound up making a change. And maybe part of it is they back channeled a variable, and try to see if he'd be interested before they do anything. KS I would be shocked if the crass fired man. I would be too. I would be too barring again, this thing completely collapsing. KS I would be against almost any coach losing their job after one year. I mean, it would have to be weird stuff going on for me to be like, okay, I have to, but from just a football standpoint, I don't.

It's becoming so common though, that's the thing. I mean, Ryke and Hackett, it used to be really rare, like, whoa, they fired them after a year. You know, it's actually to the point now where, you know, they've actually, the owners has been this internal push to stop doing this because of the amount of dead money that is out there for coaches and how many teams are paying multiple coaches, you know, that was part of like that. That was part of like what I heard on, on Dallas with, with McCarthy is like.

That Dallas is unwillingness to extend McCarthy and, and, and, and, and the decision to send him into a contract here, which is really, really rare. Was colored by like Jerry being the guy who's like, we're not going to do this anymore. We're not going to just extend guys to extend. I have one other coaching thing, but I want to give two teams a little love here that I haven't really talked about here. I mean, I could just do this for hours today. Um, let's, let's let maybe I'll try to sneak in like an either

or, and then one other team. So let's do a little Houston, the four seed AFC nine and five. You run through some of the numbers. There's not a ton that's necessarily different. They feel completely i said my open just off the radar because it isn't the new thing with the quarterback and the me go. Do you look at them is anything that's really threatening in the air seat. No i'm a little surprised that i don't i thought i would i thought they would be. that I don't, I thought I would. I thought that they would be, you know, maybe the three seed that could make it

to the AFC Championship game, and I don't know that I see them that way anymore. Their offensive line has been pretty disappointing. I don't think CJ's taken the step they expected him to. Obviously, Diggs getting hurt affects things, and they were without Nico for a while. The Nico stretch is explainable, where, you know, cause I mean, Nico was becoming what looked like

maybe a top five receiver. Right, yeah. Yeah, so like I think Nico, like Nico's obviously like a huge piece of it. Like they lose digs, but they didn't have digs last year. You know what I mean? Like, and they were without Takedel for a while. So it's just, it's like still like,

why doesn't it look right? And you know, it does make me wonder like okay is this a critical month for Bobby Sloak as their offensive coordinator? Because they are in such an important time you know with their quarterback on a rookie contract and the effort to build around him you know. So I like the some of the feedback I've gotten is that it's gotten a little stale offensively there from a scheme standpoint from other coaches and you've gotten is that it's gotten a little stale offensively there from a scheme standpoint from other coaches. Now I think it's on Sloak and the offensive staff to try to move that forward going into

the playoffs. I think the defense has mostly been fine. I think that's a really good defense. They've got stars all over the place. Hit a little bump there where Will Anderson got hurt, but the combo of Anderson and Hunter I think is what they would have expected it to to be Stingley is one of the best corners in football. So I think like really if you're looking at the difference between this year and that

last year, it's like they had this offense last year that looked like it was going to become like an intergalactic offense in 2024 and that just hasn't happened. Okay. All right. So last thing before I finish up on a coaching point here, look at the seed in the NSC Detroit, Philly, Detroit, still the one seed because Detroit has the uh, best winning percentage in conference games, eight and one versus seven to two. This is where the seeding part of the divisions is funny because Minnesota and

Green Bay are five and six because Tampa and the Rams are three and four. Uh, I think I've probably spent enough time just talking about how impressed I am on the Rams. So if you have anything, let's get there. But I just felt like Tampa Bay deserved a couple minutes today, putting up 40 points on this Chargers defense. And you could argue the Chargers statistically with the scoring defense was a little schedule-y based on opponents, but you watch the Ravens game, they're in it. You watch the Chiefs game, clearly they're in that one. It comes down to the last second field goal.

So we still collectively felt really good about the charges and maybe it's just a one-off for this week. But for Tampa to put a 500 yards of offense on that charge's defense, like just deserve some kind of mention. So I didn't think I would, I would be sitting around Monday going, is Tampa actually a little scarier than maybe even the Rams are this resurgence Rams team that we're just so excited about the job that Bay's done. I mean, we could be happy about both, which would be a concept here, but

just give me a little on like Tampa that was, was flukey. They get the playoff win last year. I don't know that any of us, they feel a little Pittsburgh II for me in a way like hey, awesome story. Good for you, but I'm not going to pick you against anybody. And I just thought yesterday was was really impressive and under the radar with the other headline games. Well, think about I thought about this last week, like we've all we've looked at like New England as a gold standard, right? Like

franchise. Tampa has come out of its Tom Brady era much cleaner than the Patriots came out of theirs, right? Well, yeah, they had a plan. Yeah. So, like I think it's impressive the way they've come out of it. I think getting what they've gotten out of Baker is really good. They've had to replace offensive coordinators in consecutive years, going to Canalus last year, and obviously Liam Cohen this year. I think weathering the storm of the injuries too. Now, Godwin's not coming back, but they were without Godwin and Evans for about a month there.

We see the difference Evans makes now who Evans I think is one of the most underappreciated players of this era. To be a threat now to go over a thousand yards in 11 straight seasons in a year where you're 31 years old and dealing with all kinds of injuries is just incredibly impressive. They've turned the roster over where it's like one of the youngest rosters in the league now, believe it or not. And they've got like this core of players that was part of the championship. Evans and Tristan Wirfs and Vita Vea and

Levante David and Antoine Winfield. They've got a bunch of guys who have rings. Absolutely. I think that this is a team that, again, weathered the storm of injuries in mid-season, has come out of it and they're not completely whole. Again, Godwin's out for the year, but on top of like the established pieces they have, they've got a coaching staff that's experienced

and battle tested and they've got like this crew of second and third year players, like more than half of their roster is made up of homegrown guys in their first three years. And that like gives me hope that, all right, you got your core pieces and now the ancillary pieces are going to keep getting better as you go into the playoffs. Your guys like Jalen McMillan and Bucky Irving and some of the offensive linemen, Graham Barton, they look like they're set up in a way where it's like, this is a team that's

ascending going into the playoffs. Because again, they've done such an impressive job turning over the roster while holding on to some of those veteran pieces. And you think about the disaster against Atlanta, prime time, they're like, oh, how did that happen? And then granted they lost to them twice. You know, the Baltimore game, you know, it's Baltimore, Kansas City.

They come back into that one, headed over time. San Francisco felt like Niners were better for three, and it was just like, hey, Tampa's classic NFL. They're just lingering, they're hanging around. And those stretches where they didn't feel like they had any receivers. I think that was the Niners game where I'm like, how the hell are they even doing this today? But they've won four straight.

One thing I'd add on the Bucs really too, and this is an old school thing, but I think we're in an era where blocking and tackling are in a premium, because of the way these guys come up now. I talked to Todd Bowles about this last night. He was like, when we went into our buy, they'd lost four straight coming into their buy. He's like, I felt like our fundamentals were slipping. So those two weeks were about blocking and tackling for us and they've won four in a row since and I just I think if you look at the best teams in the league there are teams that are really good in those areas. It's it's boring to talk about no one wants to jump into like a conversation about like drills and all that stuff but I think it is notable that you've got

like an old school Parcells, you know, a Parcells descendant in Todd Bowles doing things that way and building a program that's sustainable and winning late in the year. Last thought, Belichick to North Carolina. Um, I read this quote, it's Mike Sando's piece, the athletic Monday morning, which I enjoy, uh, I reference it quite often. Uh, he talked to front office people about this and one executive said, quote, they will meaning Belichick and his staff, they will be better evaluators.

And 90% of these major colleges will be. And the first part of me from the Belichick GM years, thanks, Luca, why is he just going to be way better at something that he was so bad at for so long? I still can't believe it ever happened. I've covered it far too often. But then I started thinking about it a little bit more and I was like, you know what, I get the point. When I first read the quote, it was just resistance. I just went, all right. And then I thought about it a little bit more and it's like, yeah, but if they're going to have a system and they're going to have to build a roster, they're going

to be thinking about this, like it would be one of the dumbest things ever for anyone to look at the GM draft track record and then just assume like it's the same thing, it's not the same building. It's not the same business really at all. Um, so 90% may be aggressive, but I just have a hard time believing he's just going to pick a bunch of wrong players when he's building his college program. Right. Uh, like, so I can, I mean, I can tell you like, uh, they, I think they're

gonna, they'll go in there and they're going to try to set up an NFL type of operation, which he said, um, and like they view NIL as salary cap, they view Transfer Portal as free agency. And I think their model is going to be sort of like what Michigan was with Harbaugh at the end, where you've got like a bunch of players who are older, who maybe aren't first round picks, but you get the guy in year three, year four, year five in the transfer portal, who may have talked to his agent and his agent asked around and the feedback was, you're a fifth or sixth round pick. All right, I can do better than that.

That's the guy I think Belichick's going to get. With the promise that maybe I can turn you into a second or third round pick. I think that there's something really attractive for Belichick to sell there. And I had this in my column this morning, Ryan, like I asked Sean McVeigh over the weekend, like, you know, would somebody who's been through Belichick's program be more attractive to you? And he like jumped out of his shoes. Absolutely, absolutely. That kid would, you know, like 100% that kid would because Because I know he's been well-coached, I know he is going to have gone through a program that's

going to give you an idea of how he would react when he gets the pros. So yes. So these guys are going to get developed, I think at a pretty high level, and they're going to have that on their resume going into the pros that I played for Bill Belichick in college. I think that that's probably the pathway. And then you have to do, as you and I both know,

you have to do enough in getting high school players in and developing those guys in the ground floor and everything else. But I think that there's a real path there, and I think that's sort of what he saw, is that, like, I don't know that there's a real path there. And I think that's sort of what he saw, is that, like, I don't know that there wasn't an NFL job out there for him this year. I think what was sketchier was the idea

that there'd be an NFL job out there with the control that he would want to do it his way. And I think for him, when he looked at it, it was like, first of all, the hiring cycles don't match up. One is in December, the other is in January. He had this bird in the hand with North Carolina, giving him the chance to build it his way and set it up his way,

and hire his people, and just go out and coach. That's his primary focus was, I need to coach in 2025. So it was either taking the certainty of that, or it was waiting a month. And you know, maybe you get an offer, maybe you don't. And if you do get an offer to are those offers going to be working for some team president you don't respect having some front office force

upon you, inheriting somebody's scouting department? Like I think that's what he was looking at. You know, so now he gets to go coach and build it his way and we'll see what happens. And I think we all saw the buyout. So I wouldn't rule out year or two, in a year or two, if the right situation comes along, you wouldn't think about it.

You can read the rest of our Brewers column on si.com up every Monday morning. And as always, man, love catching up. Thanks, man. Awesome, thanks, Ryan. You want details? Buy. I drive a Ferrari, 355 Cabriolet.

What's up? I have a ridiculous house in the South Fork. I have every toy you could possibly imagine. And best of all kids, I am liquid. So, now you know what's possible. Let me tell you what's required our email address is life advice rr at gmail dot-com We get Kyle we get Steve How is everyone doing well doing well

Sam's Soft tones here on a Monday. Yeah, no get little snow. A little snow here in the Northeast. It's nice, just a little dusting. I'm a big snow guy. I've been real itchy lately. I don't know, that's something that I've been Googling. It might be called something called winter itch, but we're not really a big winter thing.

Yeah, I'm just scratching like crazy, I don't know. It's not bed bugs. I've had bed bugs before. I know what that is, so I don't know. I'm trying to get to the bottom of this. Maybe just a little more moisturizer in my life. Eczema? I don't think so. I mean, it's red. I scratch it and then it goes away. That's not like

anything that's sticking around, but it's driving me nuts. New? That's new for you? That's what's new. Could be a body chemistry thing, right? Getting older. God, I hope not. Did you switch your deodorant? No, I'm a degree guy you switch your deodorant? No, I'm a degree guy.

I've been a degree guy forever. By the way, the aluminum free deodorant thing that we never really did, we had a lot of smart people chime in that was like, this is almost all bullshit. So does the girl who has the smelly boyfriend. And he just decided to read some stuff one day and be convinced.

Yeah, oh, shocker. Right, but he likes normal toilet paper, right? He's not all about it, right? It's probably not using recycled rough stuff. So you pick and choose your spots there. When you're younger, you're impressionable. But I guess I find people that like want to be impressionable, but it's always,

they want to be impressionable in the same lane. It's like, oh, you're really fighting the man, but you literally believe everything else. Like cool. Yeah, they want to be early on the next thing. To say that they were early on the next thing. You know, like, oh yeah, I've been telling you guys. But the guy that's like, I'm not going to wear deodorant and I'm going to smell around the house because I read this thing. Like he, he thinks he's like a freedom fighter, but reality, he's just-

Take a shower. Yeah, or that. Yeah. Speaking of little feedback, we just have to do it. Probably 50 plus emails on the tailor-made Rocket Blades clubs that I gave to Kyle, because I've still been super confused by this, because although Saruti is 100% right, that I would be the guy to be like, let me just buy blades now and I'll figure it out and work my way into them.

And I did buy some irons, couple sets over here that were a little bit more aggressive based on my handicap. But I do like them, so whatever. But I've also learned too, like golf, you don't just, it's not like playing hoops. You're like, I'm going to wear these sneakers today. Like you kind of have to learn your irons. So just being like, I'm going to play these today. No, no, I'll play these tomorrow and this will be fun. And I'm going to, maybe I'm just going to do a lot of just tight little fades

with these guys. A lot, a lot more shot shaping. When you stink, you can't do any of those things and it makes it even harder when you start changing up your irons. So, but that is the backdrop to all of this. We had a lot of people that remember these specific irons because they came out like 10 plus years ago. And I guess there's, cause I even researched it cause I was so confused that Kyle's like, no, you gave me blades and I'm pretty sure they're cavity backs. So there were three different styles and I'm almost positive Kyle that they, even if they say rocket blades, they're not blades. And I've been backed up by this quite a bit, um, on some of the emails.

So could you go grab one and look at the back of it and then show Saruti is actually the golf expert. Yeah. And that's not true. That's not true. But well, compared to Kyle and I, you're fucking Ben Hogan. So is there, is there a possibility of grabbing there?

Is that a huge ask? They're in the car in the basement. So that's not gonna happen today. Yeah. Okay. But if you're saying when you're correct in that there is like a cavity in the car in the basement. So that's not gonna happen today. Okay. But if you're saying when I have your backs, you're correct in that there is like a cavity in the back of them.

That's how they would look. Yeah. So that would mean a non blade and that I didn't give you blades. It says the word blade on it. So yeah, what to say? That's, that's weird. I don't like that if they're not blades and they say blades. Where'd you get them? On the street? Where did I get them? No, I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding.

The look on his face and I was like, maybe he could grab one. It was great reading that it was already not happening. And now that I realized we're talking about in a car in the garage. Yeah, I don't want you to do that. Wednesday show and tell. How's that?

All right, bring one for Wednesday. You got it. Yeah. Cause, um, I think I can answer the question to 10 minutes of confusion of whether Ryan gave a set of blades to Kyle. I'm almost certain that Ryan or Kyle are the one of them in a prior episode mentioned the clubs were tailor-made rocket blades I own and still play these iron, so I know personally that they say our blades right on the clubhead. And they most certainly are not actual blades.

Merely a marketing ploy, they're a game improvement iron Taylor made released around 2012, 2014. Super forgiving iron, horrible sound, but a nice feeling iron overall. Thank you. Well, I was scared of them. I'm definitely a burner guy, but maybe I'll take them for a spin.

I probably shouldn't after everything we just said. But two iron Kyle, but he has it. No, he has two sets. Okay. All right. Yeah. Let's let's get to an evening. All right. Hey guys, 31, five, 10, 230 pounds.

Basketball comp is Michael Scott. Like almost literally the same skill level. Honestly, Michael Scott, much better basketball player for a hockey player than you would think. Right? Sure. Not really though. That was really tough to watch.

Tough to watch. They were like, hey, he's been really good and everybody likes Steve Carell. He's an awesome skater. Can we do an episode where he skates and hockey skates? Like, yeah, birthday party, finally. My family and I have a four bed, three bath in the rural Midwest. When we bought it a couple of years ago,

the previous owners had already finished the basement, but we knew the carpet would have to be addressed at some point. That time wound up being this weekend. We called the local contractor, the previous owner had recommended, let's call him Benny. Benny's a one man crew. Sometimes though, he has the help of his son. We used him last year for a similar project in our main level.

During the first job we hired him for, the only issue he had was he arrived a couple hours late. Otherwise the work was great and he was easy to work with. With the second job, we'd agreed that he come to our place on Friday morning around 9 a.m. to start ripping out the carpet. My father-in-law was going to be at the house so my wife and I could go to work. Friday comes, I'm at lunch, Benny gives me a call.

He says, hey, sorry, I haven't gotten to the house yet. This is news to me. So I ask what's up. He says his previous job is running long, but it shouldn't be too much longer. He'll be there soon. I call my father-in-law to update him as well as my wife. We know, we now know being late must be a bit of a theme since that also happened on job number one, but no issue.

I finished my workday head home. My wife calls in the way home. Benny never showed up. I'm kind of ticked now, not because the job is urgent or needs to be rushed, but because he isn't communicating, isn't following through on the agreed upon timeline. I call Benny. It goes to voicemail, but because he isn't communicating, isn't following through on the agreed upon timeline. I call Benny, it goes to voicemail, but the box is full. Probably full of cries of previous customers

in the same boat as us. At 8 p.m. Friday, he calls me and apologizes for not showing up. He says, he'll be there first thing Saturday morning. In the meantime, my father and I rip, my father in law and I rip up the carpet and haul it out of the basement. Uh-oh, we take the carpet to the dump Saturday morning,

expecting to see Benny when we come back. No Benny. The hours tick by and finally Benny pulls in around 1 p.m. The lack of urgency or remorse for his lack of timeliness has me fired up, but he does get to work for a couple hours. He then seeks out each of myself, my wife, and father-in-law to tell us he has to get a couple things from his shop in a drink from the gas station. The emphasis on this being a drink from the gas station, I just say, okay, dumbfounded

by this exchange, like how fucking important must this gas station fountain drink be to make sure each of us hear it directly from him? He returns up to drink. He's kicking Sobe everywhere, man. Only gas stations if that's what you're into. I'm just kidding. I don't even think they make that anymore. Dude, I love the great sobi recall from you though.

Thanks. What was your favorite sobi? I don't know. I think it was like some like, it was like a pink one. I don't know. I kind of got scared off. I remember. I got scared off by like the white cloudy ones or whatever that was. Like I wasn't a big like purple ketchup guy either.

Something just didn't, didn't, when it looks weird, I just, I don't know, I don't think it, it works for me. But definitely feel like I should be saving up my money for Sobeys when all the other cool kids were having them too. Like I tried to get going a lot. Yeah. It's cool. The green tea one was good.

Do they still make Sobeys? I haven't seen them anywhere, man. Maybe like Midwest or something, but I don't know. I'm seeing right now, uh, discontinued. Yeah, it makes sense. Oh wait, can be found in stores occasionally. Wow.

Then you should maybe audit those stores. The last one was made. Strawberry banana. Yeah, I wouldn't do that. I don't know if it was like a surge situation where you could only buy them like used on, or not used, but unopened, you know, online that. I don't know if it was like a surge situation where you could only buy them like used on, or not used, but unopened, you know, online, which, you know, if you're spending like hundreds of dollars for a soda that came out 20 years ago, like damn.

There's some snacks I'll look for and I'll be like, if I could find them, I would, I would pay a gross amount. I hate to say this. You guys remember cheese waffies? No idea. Yeah. I don't worry about it. You can't find them anyway. It's to say this. You guys remember cheese waffles? No idea. Yeah, I don't worry about it. You can't find them anyway. It's a wise snack. Cheese waffles. Sort of it was like a cheese sandwich, but the like waffle crackers. I don't

know. They would load it, you know, and if you ate one of those small bags, it was like, I'm sick. And even me and I've got kind of an iron stomach and I was just, they're just good, man. I don't know. They're good. That is from the wise family. She's waffies. I found them. Not great either.

No, no, waffies. Yeah. 99 cents. Big bunch. Yeah. Can't find them anywhere. I don't know. There's one here that says Instacart.

Yeah. When you try to do it, it'll say it's out of stock though. Oh, it's also saying it's $99. Yeah. For one bag. See, it's probably just a little over my budget, but you know, if it was like 40 bucks for, you know, I don't know. Was that if you hit a home run in T-ball or something? No, they were everywhere, man.

They were like Sobeys at that time. You could find them everywhere. Right. So they weren't, man. They were like Sobeys at that time. You could find them everywhere. Where I've never seen them shop. Right, so they weren't $100. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway.

So were you like ever a, oh, here comes, here comes like Ice Tea Kyle or Arizona. I could see you being, like having a trademark drink. I was in big Arizona. I loved the cranberry tea mucho mango, uh, in high school for sure. Um, they're just unwieldy Arizona's, you know, there's no cap on them.

You just kind of got to commit. And then you're like, you know, you put it in your hand for the rest of the time. So, uh, I, but yeah, Arizona for sure. Vitamin water formula 50, when that came out, can you imagine I was all over that? Um, but yeah, I would think of, I think imagine? I was all over that. But yeah, I think it went like Sobe, Vitamin Water, then Arizona. Now a big Celsius guy. Not cheap.

Ooh, look out. Starting the day with a little kick. You've seen the Arizona guy, like the owner, he just refuses to raise the price on those. Have you noticed that the 99 cents is not on the new cans anymore though? Oh, so there's like a, it's not being printed on the cans anymore.

Don't love that. You think you'll get like, um, an influencer, like a fitness influencer thing with Celsius. Dude, if I could drop some serious weight, I don't think it's off the table. I don't think it's off the table at all. I don't know if they're, I don't know if you're what they're looking for, but I think it should be what they're looking for, to round out the portfolio of influencers, you know?

Yeah, it's just like me. Not every person who's hawking a product has to be an Instagram model, you know? All right. Get the regular Joe. Enough, enough. Being supportive, all right. But at least I think it was a nice detour

to just understand what drinks can mean to dudes. Seriously, this carpet guy loves whatever's waiting for him. And he's gotta have what he's gotta have. So he returns after three hours, which is almost how long it took us to get back to the email. This is now 5 p.m. My wife and I leave for a Christmas party

that we don't think had any chance of interfering with this work project back when we scheduled them. Meanwhile, my mother-in-law is now tagged in to watch the kids stay at the house. Benny leaves about 8.30 Saturday, work still to be done. He tells my mother-in-law, he'll be back Sunday, which is today. So this is email from, this is how upset this guy is. He wrote this whole email out yesterday. That'll be back after church.

Can't really argue that our carpet install is more important than the big guy, so I'm okay with it. He also shares he can't go on a Monday as he has a large job starting then. So he takes solace knowing Sunday has to be yet. Well, the sermon at church must have been over the whole freaking Bible

as Benny didn't show up until after five o'clock today. Dude, he's at your house on a Saturday at 8.30 and a Sunday after five. He's doing extra work. Like you're not on his books on the things. He's like, I'll get to it when I get to it. I win. I have extra work on the weekend or whatever. This is not. Okay. All right. So sorry, because I just feel like it's so long. I didn't mean to interrupt you guys, but I'm writing this as we were again, dealing with the uncertainty of his antics and trying to keep the peace in the house while bedtimes and early morning for work

are on the horizon. I'm also not mentioning that our two dogs who get scared shitless, literally, by strangers in the house. We've been hiding them like hostages in our bathroom each time he's here. Benny just left at 9.30 tonight. 9.30 on a Sunday, carpet and stuff.

That's, those are crazy hours. Cher of me, he has about one to two hours of work left to do. I said I'd call him sometime tomorrow to help to figure it out when he can come back. I'm blown away by the nonchalant style he has. Like nothing is wrong with not being on time or the minimum communicating when he won't arrive as expected. What should I do? How should I communicate this frustration or just leave it alone at this point? We didn't have to put any events or shindigs on hold for this.

And the work he's doing is good. I haven't paid him yet. I honestly don't know if I have it in me to request it, request a discount. Do you have a discount? Do you have a discount? Do you have a discount? Do you have a discount? Do you have a discount? Do you have a discount? Do you have a discount? Do you have a discount? Do you have a discount? We didn't have to put any events or shindigs on hold for this. And the work he's doing is good. I haven't paid him yet.

I honestly don't know if I have it in me to request a discount due to the whole ordeal. But if you guys think there's a case for that, let me know. If he's doing good work, get it over with, never call him again. Pay him his full amount. Look, this sounds like Benny is self-employed. All right. And, you know, in the beginning I I was gonna be on Benny's side, I knew, and this is absurd, but Benny doesn't give a shit.

Benny drove, took three hours to go get a drink. Like, he's self-admitted. Probably wasn't gonna drink. Probably wasn't gonna drink, by the way. I think he lies about where he's been, and as a guy who smokes, if you need to get to the gas station and you don't want people to know

that you wanna get a pack of cigarettes, you say you're thirsty and you need a drink. That's just what happens. If you need cigarettes or chewing, if you need a tobacco product, there's really, you know, you go to a gas station and you make believe you're buying a Slim Jim and a Sobe

or whatever it is you're drinking nowadays. So I think that was probably part of it too. I don't think he needed a drink from the gas. Uh, go ahead. Sure. I think you're right. I think you just got to see it through. It's going to suck. If he's not like mangling your basement, paying him this fair share

and you don't call him again, it's probably what you got to do. Yeah. It's annoying, but you don't have to look at, you know, the shoddy work for the rest of, you know, and be like, is it okay that I paid him and like I feel like I'm less of a dude or whatever for this? Like, no. And like what I said before, I think he's probably not treating it like his big job that's on Monday. He's doing it on the weekends on off hours. He's just trying to squeeze it in so he beat the system and he, you know, he made some more money on his time, but he's not doing it at eight o'clock like he has to do this

big job on Monday. And I just, I think he's just, he's viewing it different. He's viewing your work differently and you're viewing it as if it was something else. So I think you're just like, you got burned with many, but, uh, if he finishes it, he finishes it and, you know, sniff out the next contractor better. Well, you, you may think you will. And this other guy, he did a job and apparently it was all right. But yeah, eventually it becomes kind of ridiculous. And then you don't really want a dude around your house on the weekends, on top of

everything else, especially when you have a family, you have the dogs and all that stuff, but I'm just telling you like, he doesn't think that's discounted math. He thinks he's doing the job and he's getting it done, even though there's been some ups and downs and clearly he has other jobs going on. He's, as Kyle said, he's trying to make all of this work. Um, I admire the fact that Benny is self-employed. I also wonder if he's self-employed because other people were like, I can't work with this guy anymore.

Jobs weren't happening on time. Too many Sobe breaks. Yeah. Yeah. He's just doing his own thing. I mean, there may be, and I'll be nice about this, um, a way that Benny sees the world where he's like, what's the problem? What's so that's, yeah.

So that's like the tile you asked for. I don't know. What's the problem? No, you sit there, you ask him for anything you want. Like, Hey, what's your discounted rate for fucking this up, you know, but you haven't actually established any of that yet. Cause you want the job done. You're kind of just stuck. You're just kind of stuck with this whole thing. You're like, look, if you think it's going to make you feel better,

you go, hey, I don't appreciate this. I don't appreciate all these different things. And you need some kind of like closure, like a relationship. Go ahead, let Benny have it as you hand the check over to him a little bit. But the discounted rate thing, it's probably, I mean, you can ask for it, but I don't remember ever seeing like a lot of sheet rockers But the discounted rate thing, it's, it's probably, I mean, you can ask for it, but I don't remember ever seeing like a lot of sheet rockers go, yes, sorry. Sorry.

You know, we didn't have, we weren't able to finish everything. Like I'm, it's just, it's kind of the way all the moving pieces kind of fit in with each other. So not to bring Chargers fan Judy into this, but that's a case that the customer would have lost. She would have been like, pay the man, get out of my courtroom. So even though you get why you're upset, it's just, you really don't have a leg to stand on there. Yeah. All right. Okay. We get a car accident here. 28, six foot, 175. Jim stats was in the 800 club currently not getting near those numbers. Although I consider myself an all-around athlete sub

345 marathon shot an 18 golf bold the 192 hitting dingers and slow pitch softball including inside the Parkers What you sir gave us the full palette? Congrats man, what's the 800 club? Is there a short way to explain that to me? Well a thousand pound club would be 200 that pounds more for bench squat and deadlift. He's in the 800. 800 what? Like you're lifting 800 or you're saying like

it's all together. No, you add it up. Right. So like if you could, if you could squat 400, bench 300, deadlift 300, then that's the thousand pound club. So those are the three numbers that go in deadlift squad bench. OK, just wanna know this is Max. Or is this reps? No, it's Max,

so it would be. Yeah, it would just be like whatever your your best number is in all those three. Then you add it up and our guys and 800. Understood, thank you. Trying to go up my number would be. To get like the 600 club? Hmm. I think I could, I don't know.

I haven't squatted in a long time. Well, I'm sure you pick it right back up. Make sure you have a Celsius before. Yeah, true. I did it. I hadn't done it in months and I went back and did it. And I was, I was like, you've got to be getting me. I mean, and it wasn't, it was barely any way it and I was like you've got to be kidding me.

I mean it wasn't it was barely any weight and I was like this is so bad like maybe you're just done because I was like I think I'm done. I was like it's starting then I was like I'm not done. We'll see. I'll keep you posted. Yeah so let's let's uh let's game it out quick. so I'll keep you posted. Yeah, so let's game it out quick. Saruti, best bench, any idea? I'd like to think I could bench 135, but I don't know. I don't know. I'd like to think you could too.

Thanks, man. I don't know. So how are we getting the rest of the numbers? You think I can squat 200 pounds? Today? I don't know. No, 175? Could you?

If this is a today thing without any warmup whatsoever. Well, I stretch, you know, I get it. I think I get it. Next is gonna be. I'd be psyched to get to the 400 club. Deadlift though, you could probably deadlift 225 right now. Okay. And that's where a lot of guys.

So it's 500 a number I feel like I should be getting at here. No, because we're not even at 400 yet. I mean. That's true. Yeah, 500 might be doable, but you're also younger too. So maybe you could squat 185. Yeah, maybe, maybe we get you. Yeah, we probably.

It could be a funny YouTube play here where it's like. You should make a T-shirt 500 club bars just or the bar straight. It's just two templates on each side. It's not bending at all. It's actually like turned up a bit on both sides. Not a lifting guy, you know, what do you want me to do? Yeah, but that shirt would maybe you market it to people that are intimidated by those

numbers and then you could start an Instagram page. Like, Hey man, just about to hit the plunge. Absolutely killed it to the 500 club today. We got Doug over here. Deadlift 168. We brought the one and a halfs. Like everybody's fired up new personal best for him. Come on down and join us. Drop a new hoodies.

That would actually be pretty funny. Yeah, it would be good. I did a public event yesterday. I saw. Oh, was this the video that everybody was talking about? Was everyone talking about it? I just saw people asking if you were in your, like if it was a uh, you know,

slimming down season, I don't know. Kyle loved that one. Uh, slimming down. No, no. Although there was just a beast, a specimen of a guy yesterday. He took his shirt off before I got to take mine off. I was like, fuck. Figures.

The one other guy. Now, and they were like, well, he was like, I'll get in the plunge first. I was like, God damn it. They're following this act. I didn't run by the way, but yeah, it was for legends. It was local pop-up shop showed up jumped in the ice baths. People did a fun run. I said hello and then ran back to watch the rest of the football.

All right. So, uh, we have an email here. Loose Monday, huh? Loose on a Monday. Yep. So we started listening back when you were with Canale overrated, underrated, properly rated is still one of my favorite segments of all time. And Cerutis.

Let's do it again. Let's do an NBA one this week. Done. Nothing as if you guys wanted to do a YouTube this week, but yeah, could do it. Do you want to do it with that? Could do it. Yeah, do YouTube only. Okay. Done. Done and done. Don't know if I can do it, but heard that before. Yeah, we'll see. Put it on the list. You may or may not be there. Good chance I can't do it this week, but love the idea. There's a silo here, let's go. Yeah. Nice.

Can we tape it at 8.30 Saturday night? You guys are busy, right? And then don't show up. Like, oh, that was this Saturday. Haven't heard any emails about a car accident, so I figured this could be unique enough. This past summer, I ran the local four mile race on Father's Day weekend.

And on my way home at 8.30 AM, a guy blew a red light in T-Bone, the front driver's side of my car. After the accident, I'd see the other guy and recognize him from years of Park District League, slow pitch, softball. Never spoken to the guy, but I played against him for years.

Still see him at the local bars. After the accident scene was locked down by police, I was loaded into the ambulance on a gurney in shock. Whoa. On the way to the hospital, I'm facing the rear of the ambulance strapped to the gurney, and the EMT asks me some questions related to the incident. Then he starts repeating the questions, and I realize he's interrogating the dude that just totaled my car, and he's sitting three feet behind me.

In the moment, I couldn't fathom they put us in the same ambulance. To spare you some unimportant details, skip ahead and I find out the impact tore part of the AC joint in my left shoulder. Likely the outer AC ligament is forever torn. I did the physical therapy and currently have no pain and full range of motion again.

I recently started going to the gym. Everything is on the table except for benching. Chest workouts are still not possible with more than 25 pound dumbbells. We'll be trying barbell for another six months. A flash forward to the guy or flash forward to two weeks ago on Thanksgiving. I'm running another race, the local Turkey trot here in the Midwest race Tampa 28 degrees, okay. I find some friends before the race and, uh, the setting obviously wasn't the time for a conversation.

What were my options here? Should I have approached him and said, nice to see you. I figure you'd be in prison. End quote. Definitely not that. No, dude. Or should have I expected him to apologize? Or should I have said, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. to see you. I figure you'd be in prison. End quote.

Definitely not that. Or should have I expected him to apologize moving forward? I can only hope to return to hitting bombs and softball and beat this guy in the diamond. Whoa. All right. Well, look, first of all, it doesn't sound like you should be fighting anybody for at least six months. So put that one out there.

That's tough. Can we, can we take a, like the 10,000 foot view of this? Without having any information of why the guy ran the red light or T-boned you or whatever, could it have just been an accident or is the guy an asshole? Is he drive like an asshole? I think we just leave drinking off the table at 8.30 a.m. or whatever. But this email is obviously very upset. His car gets T-boned.

He's got some serious damage, like could be long-term damage. He obviously loves to compete. He mentioned softball three times. So I'm wondering, because there are people listening to this email, because I don't want to be getting it wrong. And it's not like I'm like, this sucks what this guy just sent us is completely sucks, but is anyone else like, at least my only guy, Kyle and Steve here, could it be as simple as you need to chill out?

It was an accident. Yeah, that was going to be my thing. It's they, they call it an accident, dude. He ran a red light, but you know. The only thing I would say is, if you kinda know the guy, it sounds like he wants some closure, like at least an apology, something. If the guy didn't say anything to him

and he's just kinda floating around town. Yes, yeah. That's like that. I can see that. That would bother me. I don't know that I would confront him and like be, you know, I don't know, go that route. But I get why you're probably upset. To be like, man, it's okay. Accidents happen, but like apologize to me, talk to me, say my bad, maybe buy me a beer or something. I don't know anything. And it

sounds like he hasn't done anything. So I gave those guys a, that I hit on Christmas Eve. I gave him all the money in my pocket that day. So I mean, do something. Yeah, no, that's good points, Rudy. Like legitimately just needs some acknowledgement of it. Like to be the guy that T-bones you and to never acknowledge it. Like I can't imagine if it was someone within the circle of like a small town where you're going to be running into each other. I mean, this guy's known, they haven't known each other, but they know of each other for a really long time. And then just feel like I'm going to ignore it after I. Yeah, you're right. You're right.

I can, I can see that. I guess maybe the level of like, I thought good to see you. I thought you'd be in prison. Like that, that cranks it up a notch. And also saying I'm not a fighter. So what should I do? It's like the fact that that's on the table. Like the nature of this is an accident.

You know what I mean? It's not like your, your family was in the car and he was drunk driving. Like, you know, that guy's paid something for what happened. It's not like your family was in the car and he was drunk driving. That guy's paid something for what happened. Not probably physically, but his insurance probably sucks now. Enough probably happened to that guy where he's just like, well, I paid my dues. I don't think that's a good view on it. I think you should still be like, sorry.

But I think he probably was like, yeah, my life sucks a little more now. So I guess that's how the world works. Yeah. That's probably, he's probably there. I mean, he's probably embarrassed you. I mean, it's just like, Hey, if I don't confront this, if I don't say anything about it, I'll just go away. Yeah.

And being a bad driver sucks as a dude. Like you get that like rap. Like when I was, when I was 17, 18, um, a lot of my friends, I think I'm a great driver. I think a lot of my, I don't even want to say, I won't say it, but I think, I think a lot of it. No, I'm not gonna, you can't make me, but I think a lot of my friends, I was kind of the guy who was driving like they just didn't have cars. And my dad let me use his car a lot.

And they were just like, they asked me to drive them everywhere. And I would because I just wanted to be out of the house. But then they'd be like, this guy's crazy. You know, I mean, I was just doing teenage stuff and you know, maybe not signaling before turning and stuff like that. But I definitely shook that. But for a while they were just like, man, bad driver Kyle. That's, that's kind of, that was like kind of the moniker for me. And I'm totally not true anymore. But as a dude, it's not, it's not good to be known as, as somebody who's like, yeah, you got to watch him. Good luck. You know? So he probably has a little bit of that too.

Small town, he's like, do you hear Jeff? Fuckin' blew through a stop sign. Watch out for Jeff. See, I had the opposite of that. For my whole life, I hadn't been in an accident. So it was always like, no matter how I drove, it's like, hey, I'm good. Like, I've never been in an accident,

so like, don't talk to me. And I feel like I was a good driver too, but then I got in a little fender bender dust up, you know you know a couple years back and it's a bummer to not have that They fall back on anymore. You know, it's like ah, man now I gotta I actually have to listen when people say do you know? And I'm not again. I'm not like a reckless driver, but that was always my go-to thing and it sucks not having that anymore So maybe that's that's what our guys going through. It's like shit now everybody thinks I suck, right? My church is more and I got this I got a bad rap now. Yeah, we had a crew in college I hated because they were just aggressive dickhead drivers.

They like to run red lights. They thought it was funny. I'd be in the car with them and I'd be like, I just, there'd be guys I'd be like, I'm just not getting in the car with you. It's not because I'm scared, it's just I think you're a dick. And then we had one guy that was such a bad driver.

Like he wouldn't pay attention. We did a road trip down to Boston with him. So it was Vermont to Boston and no one had any idea. And then we got in the car with him and guys were like, look, can he show the, like, is this serious? And he wouldn't, he wouldn't watch the road. You were so afraid. You were so afraid to not watch the road for him.

That it just, all you did was it's like a three and a half hour drive and you just sit there stressed out the entire time. Isn't it funny? Like that's just like what dude like dudes just do that. They just are dumb drivers when they're younger, they just do dumb stuff on the road. Like I remember when we were in college, ran a red light, save two minutes. That's a way I'm going to do it twice more.

And then I'm going to brag how I got this 30 minute trip in 18 minutes. It's like, dude, you can't do that all the time. We packed seven dudes into a Chevy S10 to go to Hooters in college one time. What a night. We had, it was, it was obviously driver passed two little seats in like the cab, whatever, and then three dudes just laying in the truck bed on the highway. Yeah, that's insane. Yeah, I've done that. I mean, especially when I had the truck and guys are like,

I'll just load in. What guys in their 20s could do with a minivan is absolutely insane. Do you think there's eight guys in there? There's 13. If this guy's local red light shithead, then we're all completely on your side with this. Because I see it in LA, sometimes I think the red light thing is just the absolute fear of being stuck in another cycle of traffic or whatever. But like at different intersections around my place, I see it constantly where you're not squeezing the yellow here. You're just like, I don't care because I know I can still make it because they're starting

point on a green and like you'll have a green and the car just shoots right across you. So I, I can understand the frustration with it, but I don't, I don't know that it needs to be like as confrontational as maybe you present potential scenarios in the email. Yeah, I think they're too mad. If your kids were in the car or something like that, you know, I could see, I can. If your kids were in the car or something like that, I can see it a little more.

I still would have been like, maybe you should chill out, it's an accident, but you know, charge to the game. Imagine how mad that guy's gonna be listening to this email. Don't get it. We're on your side to be clear. We are.

With the information that we have, I think we understand it, but I just, I don't know. Accidents do happen, unless this guy absolutely. We've covered it all. All right. That's enough. Um, that we're gone free. We're gone free Monday. All right.

Didn't get them in here. Feel like it could be a loss. I know sad. Thank you to Kyle. Thank you to Sarudy. Check out our YouTube page, which may or may not have content this week. That's bonus content. Ryan Roussela podcast, we're here to Spotify. Must be 21 and older, present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star

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