Mark Willard and Ephraim Salaam are up to here with the Chargers

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
How was it, everybody? How was it?

Speaker 3 (00:07):
Did it get injected into your veins the way it
was supposed to be injected into your veins the day
that we have all been waiting for?

Speaker 4 (00:18):
All summer long.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Before we do that, I'm going to have to have
you pause that. Before you do that.

Speaker 3 (00:27):
Okay. I mean, can we welcome Ephraim in the way
we're supposed to welcome Ephraim in?

Speaker 4 (00:31):
Please, people, please.

Speaker 5 (00:32):
Come on. And right tackle.

Speaker 3 (00:35):
From San Diego State, number 74, Ephraim Salaam. Okay, my brother,
now you can say whatever you need to say.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
No, you go.

Speaker 5 (00:48):
You go now.

Speaker 2 (00:49):
Hey.

Speaker 3 (00:51):
That was some stuff, okay? I can't even sift through
everything that I wanna say to figure out what I
wanna say first, but I'm gonna give it a try.
I'm gonna give it a try. What about you? Do
you have something off the top here? Hey, you know what?

Speaker 4 (01:10):
Come on.

Speaker 5 (01:10):
This is what I have off the top.

Speaker 3 (01:12):
Okay.

Speaker 5 (01:13):
I woke up this morning early.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
I found myself getting up in anticipation of Seven thirty,
I rolled over.

Speaker 5 (01:21):
I said, no, no, no, no. This can't be it.
This can't be it.

Speaker 2 (01:23):
So I roll back over and I'm like, I just
just get another hour in at least. But I just
laid there and I said, you know what?

Speaker 5 (01:31):
Forget it. I'm getting up.

Speaker 2 (01:33):
I'm getting up and I'm setting the living room up
the way I set it up every Sunday so I
can partake in every game. And I rolled the other
TV out into the living room. And so now I'm
setting it up, making sure I signed into all the
things I need to sign into, which I'm glad I
did because it was like, oh, I haven't signed in

(01:54):
here in months, you know? And so I got that
all situated and I was sitting there.

Speaker 5 (01:59):
I was like, you know what?

Speaker 2 (02:00):
I could take the dog out for a walk so
I don't have to worry about it when I'm in
the middle of the game.

Speaker 5 (02:04):
I can get myself some coffee.

Speaker 2 (02:07):
So I set it all up and then I was
just sitting there with essentially two hours to go. It's
8 in the morning.

Speaker 5 (02:16):
I'm just like, all right.

Speaker 2 (02:19):
I played a little Halo on Xbox, just waiting, went
through my fantasy football lineups.

Speaker 3 (02:27):
Three times.

Speaker 2 (02:28):
Yes, on all four of the teams that I am GMing.
And I said, all right, I'm going to sit back
and let the chips fall as they may.

Speaker 3 (02:42):
Um, in fact, we are presented by underdog unleash your dog.
I'm so glad that you brought up your fantasy teams.
You said there are four of them. How did it go? Oh, well,
how did it go?

Speaker 5 (02:55):
Um, it went. Okay, I guess.

Speaker 4 (03:01):
Do you have any wins already in the bag?

Speaker 5 (03:04):
Oh, man.

Speaker 2 (03:05):
Oh. You know what? In my main one, I absolutely
do not.

Speaker 4 (03:11):
Okay.

Speaker 5 (03:12):
Lost that.

Speaker 4 (03:13):
That's going to be a no. All right.

Speaker 2 (03:15):
But I do have a win in the bank in
one of my other ones.

Speaker 3 (03:21):
All right.

Speaker 5 (03:22):
Okay. Nope, just one win on that one.

Speaker 4 (03:25):
Okay, just one.

Speaker 5 (03:26):
All right. Wait, wait, wait, one more, one more, one more.

Speaker 4 (03:28):
Checking, checking.

Speaker 2 (03:29):
Checking, checking.

Speaker 4 (03:30):
Checking, loading.

Speaker 3 (03:31):
How are we looking?

Speaker 5 (03:32):
So right now, I'm one and two.

Speaker 3 (03:35):
Okay.

Speaker 5 (03:35):
One and two.

Speaker 3 (03:36):
And a maybe.

Speaker 2 (03:37):
One and two and a maybe. Well, I'm about to
tell you right now.

Speaker 4 (03:40):
Okay, got to look at it.

Speaker 5 (03:41):
Oh, this changed.

Speaker 4 (03:43):
Oh, yeah, there's a lot of stuff happened there.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
It changed.

Speaker 3 (03:46):
Boy, the witching hours today were very bewitching.

Speaker 4 (03:51):
Weren't they?

Speaker 5 (03:52):
Who knew? Dallas Goddard would do what he did.

Speaker 4 (03:55):
I mean, there was a lot going on at the
end of these games.

Speaker 3 (03:58):
I'm old enough to remember that with eight minutes left
to go, the Vikings were losing. These are things that
happened now late in the afternoon.

Speaker 4 (04:08):
Okay.

Speaker 5 (04:08):
So as of right now, have one confirmed win.

Speaker 3 (04:11):
It looks like one. And it's early, my man. We
got a long season to go. And that's what you
tell yourself. If you won today, then you're like, my
team's amazing. I'm smarter than all of you. And I'm
the king. But if you lost, you just go, ah.

Speaker 2 (04:28):
I just need C.D. Lamb to go crazy tonight.

Speaker 5 (04:30):
Just week one.

Speaker 2 (04:31):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (04:32):
Well, then, and maybe he will.

Speaker 5 (04:33):
And the Broncos defense to shut someone down.

Speaker 4 (04:36):
And maybe they will.

Speaker 3 (04:37):
So we're broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios.
And that game you just referenced, obviously, will be starting
here in about 15 minutes. We always call it a
Sunday night watch party. The Cowboys are going to play
the Giants. Let's watch this one together. That'll be a
whole lot of fun. And then interspersed throughout that, we
will be going through every single game, every player, every reaction.

Speaker 4 (05:01):
That stands out today. Let me start with mine.

Speaker 3 (05:06):
You and I have talked for years about a phrase
that I believe in my heart that I coined years
ago here in San Francisco called draftism. And the space
of draftism for years in this league has been Brock Purdy.
Brock Purdy, who went out and had three touchdown passes

(05:28):
and a quarterback rating of over 105 and.

Speaker 4 (05:30):
Beat the.

Speaker 3 (05:33):
Unbeatable Los Angeles Rams by three touchdowns halfway across the
world a few nights ago.

Speaker 4 (05:38):
We'll talk about that.

Speaker 3 (05:40):
The opposite of Brock Purdy, and I'm going to be
careful here because I'm not trying to say that this
player is a bad player.

Speaker 4 (05:50):
But how many years, how many coordinators, how many running backs,
how many.

Speaker 3 (05:57):
Receivers have How many different ways do we need to
describe a.

Speaker 4 (06:05):
Player who's never won a playoff game.

Speaker 3 (06:07):
In his life, but we still refuse to remove him
from being one of the top five quarterbacks in the game?

Speaker 4 (06:19):
This is the opposite of draftism.

Speaker 3 (06:23):
This is when someone was picked in the top 10
and has that look. And GMs around the league will
always buzz, under the covers.

Speaker 4 (06:34):
You all don't understand, he's one of the best. Do
you know what?

Speaker 2 (06:38):
Maybe he is.

Speaker 3 (06:39):
But at what point do results start to overwhelm what
all of us think? Whether it's with our eyes, our hearts,
our minds, or anywhere in between. What exactly are we
supposed to do with the discussion surrounding Justin Herbert?

Speaker 2 (06:57):
Explain to me.

Speaker 5 (06:58):
I knew that was coming.

Speaker 3 (06:59):
What is it I'm supposed to do? Are we supposed
to spend decades?

Speaker 4 (07:06):
One decade?

Speaker 3 (07:07):
Is it two decades? How many years is Justin Elite?
He's closing in on his 30th birthday in less than
a year and a half. And he's never won a
playoff game. And now has someone who's known to be

(07:28):
a great coach. But this year, watch us work. We're
bringing in a fancy offensive coordinator who's got a resume
as well. 14 points against the Arizona Cardinals in what
at least the outside of the building says is your building.

(07:49):
I don't know if it is or not.

Speaker 4 (07:51):
Listen.

Speaker 2 (07:53):
I'll relent.

Speaker 3 (07:54):
I just want, what am I supposed to do with this?
As somebody who watches football, you tell me. I mean,
I guess the benefit of the doubt is gone. I mean,
I guess we're past that now. Look, I've been one
of the ones making excuses for Justin.

Speaker 5 (08:13):
Herbert because I like him. But now.

Speaker 2 (08:20):
I can't keep making excuses because now I look crazy.

Speaker 5 (08:24):
All right?

Speaker 2 (08:25):
And I don't want to look crazy for someone else.
Let it be of my own doing. But I just,
with the offensive mind of Mike McDaniels and the steadfastness of.

Speaker 5 (08:49):
Of hardball, I.

Speaker 2 (08:53):
Don't, I can't explain 209 yards, a touchdown and a pick.
Your offensive line is back, even though Arizona showed up
with a defense no one on the planet Earth knew
they had. No one knew Arizona was going to show

(09:15):
up and compete at that level. Matter of fact, some
pundits were saying they may go 0-16, 0-17. These are
real conversations I've heard all throughout the offseason. They're going
to be in the Arch Manning.

Speaker 5 (09:35):
Lottery. They're eyeing one of these young quarterbacks coming out.

Speaker 2 (09:41):
That's all we heard. Moore, Manning, the kid from Ole Miss.
They forgot to tell Jacoby Brissett, you're just a bandaid.
Don't do anything too special. And they showed up and
punched a team in the mouth on the road or road-ish.

(10:03):
And I have no excuse for Justin Herbert. I think
this year is the year people jump off. They jump off.

Speaker 5 (10:15):
Because this is what?

Speaker 3 (10:16):
Year....

Speaker 5 (10:18):
It's got to be year six.

Speaker 4 (10:20):
Oh, damn.

Speaker 3 (10:21):
Here, I'll pull it up for you. Justin Herbert. It's
got to be year six. 2020, 2021, 2022. This is
year seven.

Speaker 5 (10:28):
Year seven.

Speaker 3 (10:29):
This is the start of year seven.

Speaker 2 (10:31):
There we go.

Speaker 3 (10:33):
And he's barely missed a game during his entire career.
Give him credit for that. We've got to get off
the tracks.

Speaker 4 (10:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (10:39):
Now, you can't take away his overall passing numbers, having
more passing yards than anybody in the first six years.

Speaker 3 (10:46):
All of that.

Speaker 5 (10:46):
All of those things are great.

Speaker 2 (10:48):
But what we do need is for those things to matter.
We do need all those yards and the touchdowns to matter.
And they haven't been mattering outside of his first three
years of being in the league and having zero head
coach or identity.

Speaker 4 (11:08):
Sure.

Speaker 5 (11:09):
And succumbing that.

Speaker 2 (11:10):
Okay, good. You get kudos for that. But now, brother,
you got the show improved. And you're right. I have
no excuse. You know I was one of those truthers
when it came to him.

Speaker 3 (11:22):
The crazy thing is, my man, I like the guy.
I'm not someone who has been over here campaigning for
something against Justin Herbert. I'm flummoxed by it as well,
although I'm excited on the level that half my survivor
pool is already gone. Like damn near half of it
because of that football game. And I looked at it

(11:45):
and I right away went, I'm not touching that. They
have no home field advantage. Jacoby Brissett's a professional quarterback.
They have weapons. I need to see the Chargers look
like we all decided this offseason they were going to look.
And you know I was high on the Chargers this year,
and it's not all on Justin. Like, let's say that too,

(12:06):
but I just know the way we talk about quarterbacks
and look, this is not fair.

Speaker 4 (12:12):
It's just not fair.

Speaker 3 (12:13):
It's not fair to some of the other guys that
we make do it eight times in a row before
we go, oh, maybe they're good. And this guy eight
times in a row has not done it. And we
refuse to say anything about it. But Jim Harbaugh, Mike McDaniel,
Justin Herbert, your entire group, What's going on here? Why

(12:35):
does every Charger game feel like a rock fight to
see who can get to 20? Ben Johnson went to
Chicago and in one year he's like, let's score 80.
Why not? I mean, he literally swagged it all August
and they walked out and scored 59 in their first game.
59 points. I mean, it's going to take the Chargers

(13:00):
September to do that.

Speaker 2 (13:03):
What's going on?

Speaker 3 (13:06):
What is it? And I know the offensive line's always
got injuries.

Speaker 4 (13:09):
I know that.

Speaker 3 (13:10):
And I acknowledge that. And that makes it tough. But
what's going on, man? What do you see?

Speaker 5 (13:20):
First of all, there is no cohesiveness. There is no....

Speaker 2 (13:26):
I can't look at the Chargers and say, hmm, okay.
when they have one player that we know you can
depend on in the skill position, and that's Ladd McConkie.
But how far does Ladd get you? How far does

(13:53):
six foot, 185 pound Ladd McConkie get you in the
grand scope of being a formidable team in the league? Really,
you know, and so Omarion Hampton, a good young running back,
but is he a bell cow? Can we depend on him?

(14:15):
Can he carry the ball? Although this is rare, 30
times in a football game.

Speaker 4 (14:20):
Don't know yet. I mean, has he even– I mean,
he's barely played half of a season in his career.

Speaker 2 (14:24):
And so that is exactly what I'm talking about. Justin Herbert, yes,
he can throw the ball. He can make all of
the throws. But who exactly is he going to throw to?
Is it Quentin Johnston? I mean– When we first were
introduced to him, he couldn't catch me.

Speaker 3 (14:43):
All right. I don't even know who. What did he
do today? And McConkie left the game. McConkie left the game.
Quentin Johnson had two catches for 17 yards.

Speaker 2 (14:53):
So now David Njoko from the Browns, is he coming in?
There is no one you can be like, oh, as
bad as Minnesota is and whatever they're doing at quarterback,
you can say Justin Jefferson. Get him the ball. No
matter what, just get him the ball. Even Oakland, Jante,

(15:18):
hand them the ball. Yep. Right, so their teams, another
team that doesn't have something like that, without even the
quarterback position, are the Cleveland Browns, right?

Speaker 5 (15:30):
So when you start saying, well, we'll get to all
of that.

Speaker 2 (15:32):
But what I'm saying is when I'm looking at their roster,
the coach, yes, he's going to come and be the
adult in the room.

Speaker 5 (15:38):
That's great.

Speaker 2 (15:40):
The quarterback, yes, they have the right quarterback and all that.
But what are we doing around him in a league
that is, you know, explosive? And I think that's where
we're like, huh. Well, their expectations are in that division.
Let me tell you this. In that division scoring 14 points,
that's not going to get it done. Nope.

Speaker 4 (16:02):
Nope.

Speaker 5 (16:03):
That's not going to get it done.

Speaker 3 (16:03):
I mean, in the NFL, did you see how some
of these offenses came out and they looked ready to play?

Speaker 2 (16:10):
Good Lord.

Speaker 3 (16:10):
I'm like the Texans and Bills. What are y'all doing
out here? I thought the Texans was the best defense
in football. The ball is flying all over the place today. So, yeah,
there's a bigger question there, too, I think, about the
philosophy of Jim Harbaugh. We can get to that, to
the Browns. The game is about to kick off. We're
broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios. Football is back, baby. And, underdogs,

(16:35):
keep your million. Starts you with a million-dollar stack. You
make your picks. You survive 20 rounds. And whatever's left
is yours. Underdog, unleash your dog. Terms apply. Ephraim's looking
for a little seedy lamb action tonight. What are you
looking for? Let's keep rolling. The season is underway. There
is so much to talk about, and we will.

Speaker 4 (16:56):
That's Ephraim. I'm Mark, and this is Fox Sports Sunday.

Speaker 3 (17:00):
Football!

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Speaker 3 (17:45):
As we speak, the season is underway for the Dallas
Cowboys and the New York Giants. The Cowboys are going
to have the ball first, just short. of their own
30-yard line. We're going to talk about that game and
much more coming up live in the Fox Sports Radio
studios with Ephraim Salama, Mark Willard. Quick reminder, with the
iHeart app, you can stream us wherever you are. Catch

(18:07):
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(18:29):
live okay are you a buyer in this dallas cowboy
preseason hype i am yeah me too.

Speaker 5 (18:36):
Yeah i think they got better I think they got better.

Speaker 2 (18:39):
We knew offensively they would come back and they would
still have, you know, the weapons that they had. But
I think they definitely got better. You know, I think
they did things in the draft defensively. You know, they
grabbed a couple guys, one, you know, arguably the best
player in the draft. But It was very quiet. That's

(19:06):
what really has me leaning into them. It was very
quiet this offseason for the Dallas Cowboys, except towards the
end when, you know, Stephen Jones had to, you know,
just out there just talking. But, you know, picket, sign
the franchise tag, just come to work, and I think

(19:28):
they really have a shot.

Speaker 4 (19:30):
Um, and obviously I think, you know, you're referring to
Caleb Downs.

Speaker 3 (19:33):
We're not going to see him yet, but, but people are,
I mean, that to me is what we're really looking
at with Dallas. Every time we talk about the Cowboys,
people are like, you know, okay, Dak and CD and
George Pickens, your offense is fine. Are you planning on
being a complete football team this year? I mean, this
is the question I would have for the Bears. It's

(19:54):
great that Ben Johnson is like, watch this. We're going
to score on every play. And I'm like, watch this.
They're going to score on you on every play, too.
And so I don't think that's really a great strategy
for success. I think it's going to be wonderful. Boy,
I hope you drafted Bears in your fantasy league. Good Lord,
I hope you drafted Bears. Because that looks like it's

(20:18):
going to pay some dividends this year. But this Cowboy team,
that's what I'm looking for this year is can you
play football the whole night on both sides of the ball?

Speaker 2 (20:28):
Well, they're going for it early right here on fourth
and inches in their own territory. Well, talk to me.

Speaker 4 (20:32):
I know how much you love that.

Speaker 5 (20:34):
No, I don't.

Speaker 3 (20:35):
Let's hear it.

Speaker 5 (20:36):
I don't like that.

Speaker 2 (20:36):
I think at the beginning of the game, which, you know,
they're probably just going to take the penalty and punt.
But you don't ever want to give a team at
home the ability to have a short field and them
not have to work for points.

Speaker 5 (20:54):
You don't ever want to do that. That could change
the whole game.

Speaker 2 (20:58):
And they did. They were up there, you know, fool's goal,
trying to get an extra one, trying to get an
easy one.

Speaker 4 (21:06):
Nothing against that.

Speaker 2 (21:07):
Nope.

Speaker 4 (21:07):
No problem there.

Speaker 3 (21:09):
So, yeah, it looks like the Cowboys will be punting
to the New York Giants.

Speaker 4 (21:13):
That's something else that we should get.

Speaker 3 (21:15):
Into today, though, because you and I have made it's
kind of a tradition around these parts to where we
can talk about where'd you go for it on fourth
down when you shouldn't.

Speaker 4 (21:24):
I was joked earlier today.

Speaker 3 (21:26):
I'd like to start a podcast with you called Take
the Points, the Take the Points podcast.

Speaker 5 (21:31):
Oh, we got some of that.

Speaker 4 (21:33):
By the way, you want to know who the number
one offender is in my mind?

Speaker 5 (21:36):
Oh, I already know.

Speaker 2 (21:37):
It's the team that we already talked about.

Speaker 3 (21:41):
The Los Angeles Chargers were down 10-7, and it was
fourth and goal from the two in the first half,
and they went for it. Because that's what we're going
to do. We're going for it. I disagree with that. Yes.

Speaker 5 (21:58):
In terms of who's the number one culprit.

Speaker 4 (22:02):
Oh, the number one offender?

Speaker 5 (22:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (22:04):
No.

Speaker 4 (22:05):
Okay. Hold it.

Speaker 5 (22:06):
I'm going to hold it. I'm going to hold it.

Speaker 3 (22:08):
I can't wait to hear it. The same way I
can't wait to hear what Dan Byer has to say.
I heard you make what I found to be a
very fascinating point on the show you were doing just
before we started talking about how division games should be
somewhat uniform in their importance. I mean, maybe you can

(22:29):
kind of even recap it for people with the fact
that the Niners and Rams were playing halfway across the
world earlier this week.

Speaker 7 (22:35):
Yeah, I just I think it's hypocritical of the NFL
because I don't like the playoff format where the division
winner gets the automatic home game because they won their division.
But the league is telling us winning your division is important.
But apparently division games are not. If you're going to
ship them to Australia or you're going to ship them
to Brazil. or you're going to backload them into the

(22:55):
end of the year, which, by the way, guys, half
of week 18 is irrelevant.

Speaker 2 (23:00):
But that's all division games anyway.

Speaker 7 (23:02):
So I just feel the NFL talks out of both
sides of their mouth when they're talking about scheduling and
how important it is to win your division. When these
division games aren't treated equally, I feel there should be
certain sections of the season that are allowed for divisional football.
Like the Niners have already played the Rams. Now the
Rams and Seahawks don't play until week 16. You're completely
different teams at that point. Just a lot of hypocrisy.

(23:25):
I feel with the NFL when it comes to the divisions, it's.

Speaker 3 (23:28):
A super interesting point. The one thing is I was
driving around listening to it and I wanted to add
into the conversation and wonder if it, If it enters
your thought process at all with the point you were
making in that the Rams very much campaigned for that
to be the opponent for this game.

Speaker 4 (23:45):
The Rams were the home team in Australia.

Speaker 3 (23:47):
That is their marketing rights area along with the Seahawks.
I think there were a number of games that were
probably on the table as far as who the Rams
could have in Australia.

Speaker 4 (23:58):
And the Rams very much pushed for it to be
the Niners.

Speaker 3 (24:01):
And I think we know they will never say this
out loud, but we know obvious reason why they don't
like the Niners at SoFi. They don't like the Niners
at SoFi because the whole place is red and it
turns into a sort of truncated de facto home game
for the road team.

Speaker 7 (24:15):
Yeah, I can understand the optics of that on why
the Rams would not. I feel the 49ers were put
in a bad spot, and while it may work for
the Rams, it may not work for everyone else. Chargers
were put in the same spot last year by having
to play the Chiefs in Brazil. I mean, I just
don't think it's fair when you're telling us that they're

(24:36):
so important, and then you make them fly 17 hours
to go play a football game.

Speaker 3 (24:42):
It's an interesting point. Super interesting point.

Speaker 4 (24:44):
Dan, thanks, man.

Speaker 3 (24:45):
We'll talk to you again next hour.

Speaker 4 (24:48):
What do you think about that, E?

Speaker 5 (24:49):
I think it's right.

Speaker 2 (24:51):
And what Dan is saying, it sounds to me like
it's similar to how the college season.

Speaker 5 (24:56):
Goes, right?

Speaker 2 (24:57):
You play all your non-divisional games early, and then when
it really comes down to it, when it matters, you
start playing them in a row because they all matter, right?
You playing one at the beginning of the season and
the next one at the end It's kind of like
you are separate teams.

Speaker 5 (25:15):
You are a different team. So, you know, play the
other divisions.

Speaker 2 (25:21):
And then once you start getting into your division, you know,
you may have a game or two in between them. But,
you know, you should never not play those at home.
You should never not play those at home.

Speaker 4 (25:37):
Super interesting.

Speaker 3 (25:38):
And I, I'm able to say this while we're, while
we're on the topic, by the way, we've already got our,
we've got the emotions running high already on the sideline
and a 15 yard penalty because Jackson Dart did a
design rollout and he ran and it was a nice run.
And then he got hit out of bounds. And my
mind is going in multiple places because I'm like, here
we go again with sort of two sides to the coin.

(26:01):
Like there's the you hit the quarterback out of bounds angle.
But there's also the is Jackson Dart going to live
in this league if they keep playing football like this
with the Giants?

Speaker 4 (26:14):
Tough.

Speaker 5 (26:15):
So tough to survive, man.

Speaker 2 (26:18):
I mean, Kyler Murray– We saw him preseason.

Speaker 4 (26:20):
Look what happened to Kyler Murray today.

Speaker 5 (26:22):
Good Lord.

Speaker 3 (26:23):
And I'm not putting that on Kyler, but it just–
it's rough out there, man.

Speaker 4 (26:29):
It's rough out there.

Speaker 5 (26:30):
And I hope Kyler's okay.

Speaker 2 (26:31):
For those who don't know, early in that game, two defenders,
you know, tackled him, and he was laid out concussion
from what I understand, and they had to take him
off the field.

Speaker 5 (26:47):
Like, it just– It looked awful.

Speaker 3 (26:50):
Yes, it looked a lot like the 201s did where
his arms locked up. His arms locked up. Pretty bad.
You immediately knew that it was a concussion. And when
you looked at the replay, you're like, oh my. Like
he got kind of sandwiched in the head twice. And so, yeah,
pretty bad. It was good to see him get up
and walk off the field under his own power. But,

(27:11):
you know, this is part of being a quarterback who
puts himself in the middle of the field a whole lot,
running the football. But anyway, back to that Australia experience.
I mean... You came on my show up in the
Bay about a week ago, whatever that was. And you

(27:33):
very much... You said you'd take the Rams against the field.
You liked them that much. And I'm certainly not going
to do what we love to do and eliminate the
Rams from competition because they lost a football game.

Speaker 4 (27:45):
That'd be silly. But.

Speaker 3 (27:48):
Aaron Donald doesn't even go the Rams score the least
amount of points in the Matt Stafford and beyond era
for the entire franchise and they land back in LA
and put Miles Garrett on IR I don't think that
that could have all gone worse.

Speaker 2 (28:06):
Man that's a bad week that is an awful like.

Speaker 3 (28:09):
So i know people love to do the whole like
oh don't you know overreactions i'm not overreacting to the
season that was a crappy week that went about as
poorly as it could.

Speaker 2 (28:18):
Have gone i don't know if it could have gotten
any worse that was pretty bad that was really bad
and and look the aaron donald thing i was like
okay yeah and then watching you know Miles Garrett play,
I was like, wow, he really doesn't have the explosiveness

(28:42):
that we've been accustomed to seeing.

Speaker 4 (28:44):
Totally.

Speaker 2 (28:46):
Even being double and triple team, he still was relentless.
And you kind of, you know, shout out to Trent Williams, okay?
A lot of that was Trent Williams having him one-on-one.
and really imposing his will on Miles Garris. So you
want to know how valuable Trent Williams is? That shows
you right there where you can handle arguably the best

(29:10):
defensive player in the league at the time one-on-one. Now,
whatever's going on with his knee is weird that you
decide now to have the surgery and you could have
done this the day after the trade. and use those
four weeks or two months to get yourselves ready to

(29:31):
ready to go i mean look i know about scopes
and what it feels like and when to have them
I've been there. I've had six, seven on both of
my knees. Eight total on both of my knees.

Speaker 6 (29:48):
Wow.

Speaker 5 (29:48):
And so I understand with that.

Speaker 2 (29:50):
I mean, I even came back and started about nine,
11 days after I had one procedure.

Speaker 5 (29:55):
Don't do that. I wouldn't recommend that. Right leg doesn't
work now.

Speaker 2 (29:59):
But I say all that to say, as New York
scores the first, oh, and there is the backflip from Skadaboo.
Cam Skadaboo scores the first touchdown of the evening. New
York's up six, pending the extra point.

Speaker 3 (30:18):
Look, you know, again, we don't overreact to things too early,
but that new look Cowboys defense was not very impressive.

Speaker 5 (30:24):
Nope, didn't look good at all.

Speaker 4 (30:26):
No, this went right through them.

Speaker 3 (30:28):
Probably should have scored a touchdown on the previous play,
but Isaiah likely slipped and fell with the two.

Speaker 4 (30:34):
So, Kemp's cataboos in. Six nothing Giants extra point on
the way.

Speaker 3 (30:39):
There you have it.

Speaker 5 (30:41):
There you have it.

Speaker 3 (30:43):
Okay, so much more to get to. I do want
to get to the two games that happened earlier this week.
It sounds like we want to talk about the Browns,
but coming up next, let's hear that play that you
thought was the most egregious. We're going for it on
fourth down and shouldn't have played. That's coming up next.
We're live in these Fox Sports Radio studios with Ephraim Salam.

(31:04):
I'm Mark Willard, and this is Fox Sports Sunday on
Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 1 (31:09):
Listening to fox sports radio we.

Speaker 3 (31:12):
Back we back that's it from salam i'm mark willard
live fox sports radio studios presented by underdog unleash your
dog football is back baby and underdogs keep your million
starts you with a million dollar stack make your picks
survive 20 rounds And whatever's left is yours.

Speaker 4 (31:32):
Underdog, unleash your dog. Terms apply.

Speaker 3 (31:35):
They're probably throwing a little bit too much to George
Pickens for your liking so far, Ephraim.

Speaker 5 (31:43):
Yeah, I think we need to spread that thing, C.D.

Speaker 4 (31:45):
Lamb, a little bit. Well, C.D. Lamb, early going in
this one. Giants are up 7-0.

Speaker 3 (31:52):
Jackson Dart not only 22 yards passing, but 23 yards rushing.

Speaker 4 (31:58):
Scataboo's got the touchdown.

Speaker 3 (32:00):
George Pickens, two catches, 17 yards.

Speaker 2 (32:02):
C.D.

Speaker 3 (32:02):
Lamb, one target.

Speaker 4 (32:05):
But no catches.

Speaker 3 (32:06):
And Javante Williams has 10 yards on the ground. Early numbers,
first quarter, Giants lead the Cowboys 7-0. So who was
the one that you really, really, really hated today when
they went for it on fourth down?

Speaker 5 (32:17):
Green Bay.

Speaker 2 (32:18):
Green Bay in a 22-17 game late in the second half.
Green Bay kicked a field goal. It was fourth and six.
Green Bay kicked a field goal, which made it 25-17.
You're up by eight in the fourth quarter. And Minnesota

(32:47):
was off sides. So now it's fourth and one.

Speaker 4 (32:50):
So we're going to take those points off the board.

Speaker 2 (32:53):
Take the points off the board and went for it
on fourth and one. Did not get it. So now
it's 22-17 again. The final score was 22 to 39. Yes,

(33:13):
it was.

Speaker 3 (33:14):
Yes, it was.

Speaker 2 (33:16):
And a few things happened there. Number one, you never
take points off the board, especially when you're ahead.

Speaker 4 (33:26):
You take points off the board if it's a first down.

Speaker 5 (33:28):
There is.

Speaker 4 (33:29):
Of course.

Speaker 2 (33:29):
I mean, the points come off the board if it's
a first down. You don't even have to take that.

Speaker 3 (33:33):
Well, no.

Speaker 2 (33:34):
You could decline it.

Speaker 5 (33:36):
Yeah, but you don't. You know what I mean? That makes– okay, now.

Speaker 3 (33:40):
I'm just saying.

Speaker 2 (33:41):
If we have to explain it like that, then this
is not the show– And you're not the target audience, okay?
Just trying to be clear. Just trying to, there are some-
Keep that to yourself. Okay. That is ridiculous. It makes
zero sense, okay? You have no idea what you're talking
about with that statement. Strike that from the record. Where
is the dump button?

Speaker 3 (34:01):
Onward. Okay. Go ahead.

Speaker 5 (34:03):
So, if you're ahead, you never take points off the board, okay? Never.

Speaker 2 (34:10):
Now, what happens is, now- You get to kick the
ball off, defense is set, ready to go. Long field,
make them earn it. Now, what Green Bay decided to
do is take the points off the board, not have
the first down already, to your point, and we're going to.

Speaker 5 (34:33):
Go for it on fourth. They didn't get it. They
didn't get a yard.

Speaker 2 (34:39):
Matter of fact, it was probably the worst quarterback sneak
I've ever seen where Love took the ball, went to
his right, flopped the back down on his back, and
didn't gain a yard.

Speaker 5 (34:52):
It's awful.

Speaker 2 (34:52):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (34:53):
Jordan Love, awful quarterback sneak. Well, they don't have a
run game. No, they don't.

Speaker 4 (34:59):
Green Bay doesn't have a run game.

Speaker 5 (35:01):
No, they rushed for 66 yards.

Speaker 3 (35:03):
We can get to the Josh Jacobs conversation when you'd
like to get to it. But that was very evident
that they don't have a run game. And they actually,
I'm sorry, he's a nice story. They told us today
that they don't like Marshawn Lloyd.

Speaker 2 (35:19):
Yes. Don't get mad at me.

Speaker 3 (35:22):
They told us that, and I don't want to hear, well,
they're injury concerns, so we're going to go slow with this.
What the hell does that mean? Like, he's not even.

Speaker 5 (35:34):
2.8 yards to carry. That's not going to get it done.

Speaker 3 (35:37):
You're not paying him to be your starting running back.
Why would we be slow playing this? Why are you
acquiring other running backs? Like, you don't like him. So
that's fine. That's fine. You don't like him, but Marshawn
Lloyd is not even really the starting running back in
Green Bay when Josh Jacobs is not there.

Speaker 5 (35:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (35:59):
That was news to me today.

Speaker 2 (36:02):
This is– that to me was the beginning of the
end for them. They had the game under control, right?
Allow your defense to keep you in it and to play.
They go down and score. And now it's 25 to

(36:23):
22 because they went for it.

Speaker 5 (36:26):
They scored. And two-point conversion.

Speaker 2 (36:32):
Right?

Speaker 5 (36:32):
So now you're behind.

Speaker 4 (36:33):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (36:34):
So now everything you're doing and calling, you're trying to
catch up. And it didn't work. And so for me,
that's the dummy of the day. That was a terrible play.
make any sense to.

Speaker 3 (36:50):
You that the commanders in the fourth quarter were down
eight and scored a touchdown and kicked an extra point?

Speaker 4 (36:56):
That make any sense to you?

Speaker 5 (36:57):
There's a lot of dumb things going on out there
right now, man.

Speaker 3 (36:59):
I mean, I know they ended up getting their chance
to go for it later. No, let's get into it. Okay,
let's get into that. The Browns, what happened Wednesday, what
happened Thursday, all still ahead.

Speaker 1 (37:09):

Speaker 3 (37:12):
Still getting started. Week one, National Football League action. Sunday
night football watch party is on Giants right now in
front of the Cowboys. Early going for sure. Seven to nothing.
Second quarter. is just getting started. As we speak, we're

(37:33):
broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios. And oh,
by the way, with football back, Underdogs Keep Your Million
starts you with a million-dollar stack. Make your picks, survive
20 rounds, and whatever's left is yours. Underdog, unleash your dog.
Terms apply.

Speaker 4 (37:51):
And speaking of the.

Speaker 3 (37:52):
Fantasy, I just had a conversation with my son And
he is already lamenting.

Speaker 4 (37:59):
He took his.

Speaker 3 (38:00):
Entire 60 second clock of a draft pick. I don't know.
It was a fourth round or whatever it was trying
to decide between cam scatting boo and Quinn, Sean Judkins.
And he took Quinn, Sean Judkins. Lord, And he believes
that he has made a terrible, terrible error.

Speaker 5 (38:20):
He's not wrong.

Speaker 2 (38:21):
At this hour. He is not wrong. Well, what I
told him- You didn't want to give him guidance there?

Speaker 3 (38:27):
I wasn't there. He was doing it on his own.
It's the day.

Speaker 4 (38:32):
Right? I'm out there.

Speaker 3 (38:35):
I was honest with him when he's like, what do
you think?

Speaker 4 (38:37):
And I'm like, so I don't want any Browns.

Speaker 3 (38:43):
None.

Speaker 4 (38:44):
Period.

Speaker 5 (38:46):
I don't want any.

Speaker 3 (38:47):
I don't want any rounds of any kind for any reason.

Speaker 4 (38:54):
Like, it just, to me.

Speaker 5 (38:55):
Sounds racist, but.

Speaker 3 (38:58):
Damn it, if you clip that and use it against me.

Speaker 2 (39:03):
You have to be careful on how you speak.

Speaker 4 (39:07):
Yeah, you sure do.

Speaker 3 (39:09):
All right?

Speaker 2 (39:10):
I don't want any Browns players. I don't want any
Cleveland Browns, okay?

Speaker 4 (39:15):
Yes.

Speaker 3 (39:16):
But, yeah, I just don't, and... Also take it from,
I had to convince my wife. She's like, Hey, cause
we're all in this big survivor pool. And she's like,
my dad's already taken the Jags. And I'm like, I
want the Jags. And she's like, no, we should. diversify.
And I'm like, no, we shouldn't. I want the Jags.
And I had to convince her to take the Jags.

(39:39):
Because I'm like, for as long as we may go here,
we may just take whoever's facing the Browns.

Speaker 2 (39:45):
Whoever it is. This is a relegation.

Speaker 3 (39:48):
Situation, brother. He should not be in the league. And
they should not be in the league with what they're
putting out there right now.

Speaker 5 (39:57):
It was pretty bad.

Speaker 3 (39:58):
That was, I mean, the Jags didn't even, they sort
of just went through motions in the second half. This
thing was over a quarter and a half into the
football game.

Speaker 2 (40:10):
Yeah, it, oof, you want to talk about bad ball.
Quenshawn Judkins, 12 carries, 33 yards. 2.8 yards to carry.
His longest run was five yards. Deshaun Watson. 16 for 22.

Speaker 5 (40:37):
205 yards.

Speaker 2 (40:39):
Sacked five times for 20 yards. Leading receiver. Denzel Boston.
Two receptions, 59 yards. There's nothing....

Speaker 5 (40:57):
I mean... 46.

Speaker 3 (40:58):
Of those yards came on an over-the-top play when this
game was long decided in the fourth quarter. And I
don't even know if the Jags had their second or
third team in.

Speaker 2 (41:10):
You only muster up 272 yards on 50 plays. I can't...
One for eight on third down.

Speaker 5 (41:24):
These numbers....

Speaker 2 (41:26):
Are indicative of the level of despair they're about to
be in all year. No matter what they want to
do at the quarterback position with Shadur and all of that,
they can't. They can't survive this, right? They can't survive

(41:47):
the Deshaun Watson experiment. If this happens one more year,
I mean one more week, Something's.

Speaker 5 (41:55):
Got to give, right? I mean, you can't.

Speaker 2 (41:58):
Look like you don't want to win.

Speaker 3 (42:00):
I'm trying like hell to figure out what it is
they're doing. And sure, there's always the standby of like
tanking for draft capital. If I'm Cleveland, I don't really
think you need to work that hard at it. You're
going to be in the top five. This is done.
And we knew that before today started.

Speaker 4 (42:22):
We did.

Speaker 3 (42:23):
And I don't know that it even matters who you
play at quarterback. I don't know if Cleveland is trying
to justify his contract or not. We already know that
that's already in the past.

Speaker 4 (42:35):
That's a completed story.

Speaker 3 (42:38):
If in some way this is a, and this would
really be next level thinking, is Cleveland sticking him out
there in an effort to sort of even soften the
fan base to Shadur Sanders?

Speaker 4 (42:52):
Make Shadur look like the savior?

Speaker 3 (42:54):
Build him up as something fans are chanting for or
wanting whenever they get home?

Speaker 4 (42:59):
Because that's going to happen.

Speaker 3 (43:01):
And at some point you'll put him in and you
create a runway for him.

Speaker 4 (43:06):
I don't know if that's going on.

Speaker 3 (43:08):
The truth of the matter is I can come up
with five or six different sort of odd angles that
make this make sense, but none of them actually make sense.

Speaker 2 (43:17):
Yeah, I don't know what they're doing. I can't put
a smart thought to what's happening there. I can't put
an intelligent thought behind what they're doing. And for me,
it's like, I mean, poor fans. Poor fans.

Speaker 3 (43:46):
And they've been poor fans for like, you know, three
or four decades.

Speaker 2 (43:50):
There's a reason the team got up in the middle
of the night and left the first time.

Speaker 3 (43:55):
Oh, my God.

Speaker 5 (43:58):
And went to Baltimore.

Speaker 3 (44:01):
And became good.

Speaker 2 (44:02):
I mean, did you want to segue into– Let's do it.
You want to segue into what that looked like?

Speaker 3 (44:09):
I mean, yeah, we can have some fun at Cleveland's expense,
but be honest, like this is not– it's not.

Speaker 4 (44:14):
A cool story.

Speaker 3 (44:15):
No, it's terrible. There's nothing to say here. It's way
too easy. I don't know that I can remember in,
quite frankly, my whole life, of starting a season where
something like, sure, there's always teams where you go, well,
they're not a contender. Every league's got bad teams. But

(44:38):
for the Cleveland franchise to be what they've been for
as long as they've been, to be offering this up
at this stage, I've never seen something more hopeless and
almost to a degree, like, offensive.

Speaker 4 (44:56):
Like....

Speaker 3 (44:58):
You can't tell me that putting him out there as
your quarterback in any way, shape or form is trying.

Speaker 2 (45:05):
No, you can't like, you have to try.

Speaker 3 (45:07):
I don't. People make bad decisions. People evaluate wrong. Things happen.
I feel bad for all the guys on the roster
who have to go through the blood, the sweat, the tears,
the pain of an NFL season. You know, wide receivers.
Two of them they drafted there. They're dust. You're not

(45:29):
going to put up numbers. Sorry, Denzel Boston and Casey Concepcion.
You might be good players. You're done. You're never, you're
not like your second contract. You're going to be looking
to get somewhere else. And like, you've got no chance,
no chance for them to do anything.

Speaker 4 (45:47):
It's brutal. It's absolutely brutal to watch.

Speaker 5 (45:50):
Yeah. I really, I couldn't even watch a lot of
the game.

Speaker 2 (46:00):
You know, I pride myself on watching all of the games,
two games.

Speaker 5 (46:03):
I couldn't watch. Would you like to guess the other one?

Speaker 4 (46:06):
I got to think that, well, it's one of two.

Speaker 2 (46:09):
No, no.

Speaker 5 (46:11):
Go ahead.

Speaker 4 (46:11):
No, no, no.

Speaker 3 (46:12):
I know. You're either talking about the Jets and Titans
or you're talking about the Raiders and Dolphins. I'll guess.

Speaker 5 (46:17):
Go ahead.

Speaker 4 (46:18):
I'll guess that it was the Jets and Titans.

Speaker 2 (46:19):
Of course.

Speaker 3 (46:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (46:21):
No desire. Now I click over and I'm looking. I'm like, yeah,
I'm good.

Speaker 3 (46:27):
I'm good.

Speaker 5 (46:28):
I'm going to leave that alone.

Speaker 4 (46:30):
Actually, can I say something about that real quick? Okay.

Speaker 2 (46:34):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (46:36):
Robert sala took the wrong job.

Speaker 3 (46:39):
And i hate this for him because he's an awesome
coach and i don't know that there were any other
offers out there and i bet it's really hard to
turn down a head gig when you're still a coordinator
and he took the 49ers coordinator job at a time
when a lot of people didn't think he would take
that step backwards and go back home again and and
all of these things but I don't know if you

(47:01):
get a third chance.

Speaker 5 (47:03):
It's going to be hard.

Speaker 3 (47:04):
So you get one gig, and I think the world
looked at him and went, okay, the Aaron Rodgers of
that whole thing.

Speaker 2 (47:10):
I get it. I think Robert got dealt a bad hand.

Speaker 3 (47:15):
But then you take another gig, and I just, you
don't have anything on that roster. And Kim Ward is not,
That's going to be, at minimum, a really long time
and probably never before he's like truly it.

Speaker 4 (47:31):
Just my opinion.

Speaker 3 (47:33):
But I don't.

Speaker 4 (47:37):
Think he's got the right gig. I don't think that's
going to go well.

Speaker 2 (47:40):
No, they don't have a quarterback. They don't have a
running back, a defense. I mean, when the Jets make
you look like you don't belong, then.
When Geno Smith is slicing and dicing you. Not to

(48:04):
take anything for the rebirth of Geno Smith, but I mean,
that's tough, man.

Speaker 4 (48:15):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (48:16):
There's just nothing there.

Speaker 3 (48:17):
There's just nothing there. And there's another team. It always
amazes me. When teams, I get it, they're bad, and
so they're in the top 10, and they get wooed
by the fancy wide receiver. Like, I'm sorry, I laughed
every time I saw someone get excited and draft Carnell
Tate in fantasy. I'm like, what is it that you

(48:40):
think's going to happen? You think he's going to get
a bunch of 100-yard games? The whole team can barely
get to 100 yards. And it sucks. I bet Carnell
Tate's a wonderful receiver, but you're not putting up numbers there. No.
You're just not. So wide receiver is that position. It

(49:00):
matters so much where you end up. Who's your coach?
Who's your play caller? Who's your quarterback? And they've got
a defensive coach and a young quarterback who I don't
think is it. And they don't have much to offer
on an offensive line or beyond.

Speaker 4 (49:14):
And it's like, I don't know how it is you–
What is it you think is going to happen?

Speaker 5 (49:19):
It's crazy.

Speaker 2 (49:20):
Because, you know, this is week one, of course. And
no one is condemned after week one.

Speaker 3 (49:26):
Right.

Speaker 5 (49:27):
Win or lose.

Speaker 2 (49:28):
But you can watch and say, huh. Well, that's not
going to work. And we two, three, four, five, six, seven,
so on and so forth. Like you can see that totally.
I never like to condemn after week one, but as
some things that are fundamentally disturbing to me when it

(49:52):
comes to a few teams and we've been talking about them,
the Cleveland Browns, the Tennessee Titans, like I just, it
pains me. Now, on the flip side of that, there
are some teams that did some things that I'm like, okay.

Speaker 3 (50:12):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (50:13):
I see what's going on.

Speaker 4 (50:14):
Sure.

Speaker 2 (50:16):
And, you know, I think we should get into them. Okay,
let's do that. After a little break.

Speaker 4 (50:21):
Let's do that.

Speaker 3 (50:22):
I can't wait to hear some of the teams where
you felt, okay, I see where you're going with this.
Let's talk about that. That's coming up next. Giants and
Cowboy Watch Party is on. We call this Fox Football Sunday.
That's Ephraim Salam. I'm Mark Willard, and this is Fox
Sports Radio.

Speaker 6 (50:42):
Hit that thumbs up icon and comment away. Fox Sports

(51:13):
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Speaker 2 (51:25):
Split between Cousins.

Speaker 1 (51:26):
Gets the snap. Behind the end zone.

Speaker 2 (51:27):
Fires over the middle.

Speaker 8 (51:29):
Jethi at the five.

Speaker 2 (51:31):
Touchdown, Raiders.

Speaker 4 (51:32):
He got away from Johnson.

Speaker 1 (51:34):
Deuce in the end zone.

Speaker 3 (51:36):
Touchdown, Las Vegas.

Speaker 7 (51:39):
And for Kirk Cousins, that is career touchdown number 300.

Speaker 3 (51:44):
Well, hey, now, that is Learfield Sports and the Raiders
Radio Network. We're live in the Fox Sports Radio studios
with Ephraim Salaam.

Speaker 4 (51:53):
I'm Mark Willard on Fox Sports Sunday.

Speaker 2 (51:56):
So, yeah, go ahead. Fire away with your list.

Speaker 4 (52:00):
Who do you now sort of see? You see through
the weeds what's going on.

Speaker 2 (52:04):
I think we start with the Raiders.

Speaker 4 (52:08):
The Raiders.

Speaker 2 (52:09):
Now, I was on record in the summer being adamant
about Mendoza not starting. Yep. I think Kirk Cousins, you know,
I said I think Kirk Cousins gives them the best
opportunity to move forward in terms of putting a product

(52:34):
on the field that, you know, that could compete. And now, granted,
it was against Miami. But if you watch that game
and you watch... He got a little loosey-goosey with the ball,
had two picks. But you can see why there's value

(52:57):
in Kirk Cousins.

Speaker 4 (52:58):
Sure.

Speaker 5 (53:00):
You can see, I know Ashton Gentry loves him.

Speaker 3 (53:05):
Was it two weeks ago or three weeks ago we
sat here on this show And got the breaking news
that we thought Jenty was going to be out for
the year.

Speaker 2 (53:16):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (53:16):
The way they were talking about the way he went
down in practice and people all took a knee and
they prayed.

Speaker 4 (53:23):
They prayed.

Speaker 3 (53:24):
And in week one, he had 102 yards on the ground,
45 yards through the air, two touchdowns and 29 touches.

Speaker 2 (53:37):
I guess he's okay.

Speaker 5 (53:37):
I think he's okay.

Speaker 4 (53:38):
He looks okay to me.

Speaker 2 (53:40):
I think he's good.

Speaker 4 (53:40):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (53:43):
I think just looking at the Raiders. Now, like I said,
that division. Sure.

Speaker 4 (53:51):
They played Miami.

Speaker 5 (53:52):
Right.

Speaker 2 (53:52):
They played Miami. But I think this is the number one,
the best thing for them. But number two, the best
thing for Mendoza. For Fernando, I think. being able to
really learn from a pro. Things go bad in the game.
You throw a pick. What happens? All of those things

(54:14):
that you can suck up and learn and watch, it's
just going to be beneficial for them. So I was
highly impressed. And it pains me as a former Bronco.
It pains me to even say that.

Speaker 3 (54:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (54:31):
It does. It pains me to even say that about them. Well,
it's very mature of you. The other team is the Cardinals.

Speaker 3 (54:38):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2 (54:39):
Somebody forgot to tell them that they're in the quarterback
sweep states.

Speaker 4 (54:44):
Right.

Speaker 3 (54:45):
Right.

Speaker 2 (54:45):
They forgot to tell them, hey, man, you guys are
vying for the number one pick. So you can you're
in the Arch Manning sweepstakes.

Speaker 3 (54:52):
You know, it's interesting you say that because I don't
know if I ever felt that way. In other words,
not that they were. Listen, I didn't think in the
division they're in. It's easy to forget about them.

Speaker 5 (55:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (55:04):
Right.

Speaker 4 (55:04):
With the other three teams that are there.

Speaker 3 (55:06):
But I never thought the Cardinals were on par with
the Titans or the Browns, the Dolphins.

Speaker 2 (55:17):
Really?

Speaker 4 (55:17):
I did not.

Speaker 2 (55:18):
No, there's too many.

Speaker 3 (55:20):
Listen, what did we just say about those teams we
were talking about in the last segment where we're like,
there's just nothing there. There's nothing on the roster. Now,
I watch a Cardinal game, and I'm like, hold on
a second.

Speaker 2 (55:32):
Okay, well, to that point, and I didn't mean to
cut you off. No, go ahead. Just before this game,
Looking at that roster, who would you say fits that bill?

Speaker 5 (55:44):
Like, oh, they have this, this, and this.

Speaker 4 (55:46):
They have Trey McBride. That's definitely the first answer.

Speaker 3 (55:49):
I'm a big believer in Michael Wilson.

Speaker 4 (55:51):
I think he is a solid receiver.

Speaker 3 (55:53):
I don't think much of Marvin Harrison, but you saw
on the box score today that they're starting to move
him down the pecking order. Um, I'd never seen him
play football at the NFL level yet, but they grabbed
Jeremiah love and, and, and they're flanking him with Tyler Algier.
And I'm like, got to think that that's, and then
Jacoby Brissett is nothing to write home about, but.

Speaker 2 (56:13):
He's also like a serviceable.

Speaker 3 (56:16):
Yeah. Like he can play football. Like, he can run
an offense and score some points. So that's how I
felt about the Cardinals. I don't feel that way about
the Dolphins, Titans, and Browns.

Speaker 2 (56:27):
Did you see anything defensively that....

Speaker 5 (56:36):
Because I didn't.

Speaker 4 (56:38):
You're talking about today or coming in? No, no, coming in.
I mean, I've always liked Buda Baker.

Speaker 5 (56:42):
Buda Baker, of course.

Speaker 4 (56:43):
Buda Baker's a good player.

Speaker 3 (56:44):
Other than that, no.

Speaker 2 (56:46):
So for me... I knew Trey McBride was good on offense.

Speaker 3 (56:51):
Sure.

Speaker 5 (56:52):
That's it.

Speaker 3 (56:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (56:54):
And then Buda Baker. That's two players.

Speaker 2 (56:58):
And so they fit in the category with the Titans,
with the Browns, with, you know, the Saints. I'll even
say the Saints.

Speaker 6 (57:12):
Wow.

Speaker 5 (57:13):
Which is another team.

Speaker 3 (57:14):
There's an interesting team after today.

Speaker 5 (57:16):
Which is on my list as well.

Speaker 2 (57:18):
Yep, as it should be. And, you know, just I
think that's the most intriguing thing for me starting the
week one is who's coming out of training camp and
preseason and based on what they ask all of us

(57:39):
to do prior to the season. is give your picks
or who's going to win the division or some form
of that. No one had on their bingo cards, Arizona,
the saints, even having a chance. I thought that game
was wildly entertaining. Um, them and the lions, right. For

(58:04):
a lot of people have the lines winning that division.

Speaker 4 (58:06):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (58:07):
And not playing that type of defense.

Speaker 3 (58:09):
Not that way.

Speaker 2 (58:11):
Um, But it's also about what will the Bengals look like?
And Baker got the money, so what does he look
like now? There were some questions that were out there
that charged all of these things that I think I
love week one for because you get to kind of see, okay,
who's closer or farther away from your prognosticating? Yeah.

Speaker 3 (58:38):
I mean... Now, I'm not expecting you to remember this,
but when we did the division thing a couple of
weeks ago, I think the.

Speaker 4 (58:45):
Saints are going to win that division. Yeah, you did
say that.

Speaker 3 (58:48):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (58:49):
And by the way.

Speaker 5 (58:49):
And I said, really? Yep.

Speaker 4 (58:51):
And guess what?

Speaker 3 (58:52):
They are in first place right now. Yes, they are.

Speaker 4 (58:55):
Yes, they are.

Speaker 2 (58:56):
But look, they look really good, though. They came out
and they, I mean.

Speaker 3 (59:03):
They were kind of messy early in, I guess, a
sort of understandable way.

Speaker 4 (59:08):
But, um.

Speaker 3 (59:10):
Shuck is interesting at times, and then at other times
you're like, ooh, this is a mess. I don't know
about their offensive line, so the thing's got a little sideways,
but he's got something.

Speaker 2 (59:21):
He does, but what you can't have him do is
throw the ball 56 times.

Speaker 4 (59:24):
No, that's too much.

Speaker 3 (59:25):
But, I mean, when you fall down by 17 or
whatever the hell they were down, then Obviously, that calls
for some desperate matches.

Speaker 2 (59:32):
And he had 410 yards now. I'm not taking anything
away from him. But if you throw the ball 56
times or that amount of times in the NFL, you're
going to give.

Speaker 5 (59:41):
It to the other team.

Speaker 4 (59:41):
Yes, this is correct.

Speaker 3 (59:43):
And he did. A couple of interceptions. His receiving core
is interesting. Olave is excellent.

Speaker 5 (59:50):
Oh, my goodness.

Speaker 3 (59:51):
Olave is excellent. Just excellent.

Speaker 5 (59:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (59:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (59:55):
Absolutely.

Speaker 4 (59:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (59:58):
But, you know, so is Jameer Gibbs. And so I
don't know. The Saints are not ready, but they might
be ready to win that division. Speaking of being ready,
I hear Steve DeSegar's ready.

Speaker 5 (01:00:10):
Oh, the myth.

Speaker 2 (01:00:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:00:10):
The legend. He cascaded and down.

Speaker 3 (01:00:16):
By parachute.

Speaker 2 (01:00:16):
Yes.

Speaker 5 (01:00:17):
The helicopter dropped him off on the roof.

Speaker 3 (01:00:20):
Steve, were you out at this Los Angeles Chargers-Arizona game?

Speaker 8 (01:00:24):
I was working today. Yes, I was there, and I'll
be back, if theory is, when the Raiders visit next Saturday.

Speaker 2 (01:00:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:00:30):
Next Sunday, I should say.

Speaker 4 (01:00:31):
We led the show with that game.

Speaker 8 (01:00:33):
Oh, well, it was the most notable result, was it not?

Speaker 4 (01:00:36):
For sure. For sure.

Speaker 3 (01:00:38):
And so, curious your thoughts on the Los Angeles Chargers
from the Jim Harbaugh, Mike McDaniel, and Justin Herbert angles.

Speaker 8 (01:00:49):
That first drive they had was everything you thought that
the season would be.

Speaker 3 (01:00:53):
Right.

Speaker 8 (01:00:54):
And it reminded me a bit in retrospect of there
was a preseason game when the Browns did something in
the offseason exciting. And the play by play call of
the first drive Browns touchdown was not just touchdown.

Speaker 5 (01:01:08):
So and so.

Speaker 8 (01:01:09):
And then an extra sentence, and that's how it's going
to be. And then, of course, later we realized, no,
it's the Cleveland Browns. It's not going to be like that.
So the first drive was incredibly impressive. And then for
the bulk of the rest of the game, the offense
only had about 180 yards. But more disappointing was the
defense wasn't stopping anybody. And this was one of the
better defenses in football last year. There were times when

(01:01:33):
Justin Herbert was running, and it reminded me a bit
of last year. Nobody was good. And that's really damning
evidence against a franchise that on the opening game of
a season— No one was good. The coach wasn't good.
The quarterback, the special team, certainly block punt, the offense

(01:01:55):
or the defense. When it was close, it didn't deserve
to be close. And early in the fourth quarter, it
was only 16-14 Arizona. The Chargers had no business being
in that game in the fourth quarter.

Speaker 3 (01:02:09):
It is a head scratcher. I mean, guys, do we think...
that um i.

Speaker 4 (01:02:16):
Hate the phrase the game has passed him by but.

Speaker 3 (01:02:19):
There's always these like you know there's there's there's evolution
and there's updates to the game and i'm thinking about
what wins in football and it's it's fun to sort
of touch base with the old us and we love
like hard-nosed and clouded up.

Speaker 8 (01:02:35):
You're talking about horrible we're gonna run it.

Speaker 3 (01:02:37):
Down your throat is this working in the nfl Well, that's.

Speaker 8 (01:02:40):
Why I think this was a good offensive coordinator hire.
Because say what you will about what he was as
a head coach. I think he's a great OC and
will be a good hire for the Chargers.

Speaker 5 (01:02:50):
McDaniel's first game was today.

Speaker 3 (01:02:52):
Agreed.

Speaker 8 (01:02:53):
However.

Speaker 3 (01:02:53):
But not today.

Speaker 8 (01:02:54):
When you have, let's talk about the head coach. He
said going into the season, I'm not sure I have
a starter at left guard, so I'm just going to
rotate the guys. So the guy he started today was
very good for the first two drives. And then he just,
because he decided in advance, had someone else play left guard.
And he happened to be in there when they went

(01:03:16):
for it on fourth and goal. And Herbert immediately got
sacked because someone came through the guard slot. And it's like,
Can you not maybe think that so-and-so had a good
first couple of drives and maybe deserves to be back
in there?

Speaker 5 (01:03:30):
It's just nobody was any good today.

Speaker 3 (01:03:33):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (01:03:34):
Which is too bad, because as I brought up on
this show before, when the Chargers first moved to L.A.,
obviously they did not have fans at L.A. That has—
I mean, it's so obvious how that has changed in
the last five years, and today was a good example
of it. It was so loud at the beginning with
a home crowd and revved up, I had to put

(01:03:55):
on headphones to hear the guy speaking on the air
literally next to me, the chair next to me. And
by the late third quarter, it was as silent as
a library.

Speaker 4 (01:04:06):
Yeah. Wow. That's interesting.

Speaker 8 (01:04:09):
So next week, it's the Raiders, and that's going to
be at least half the fans.

Speaker 5 (01:04:13):
So we talked about this before.

Speaker 8 (01:04:15):
When the Cowboys visit or the Steelers or, you know,
somebody with a history.

Speaker 3 (01:04:19):
Sure.

Speaker 8 (01:04:20):
Keep in mind, we had a whole generation of Los
Angeles that had no home team. I don't fault fans
in Los Angeles at all for being fans of other teams.
But we're going to see that again next Sunday.

Speaker 4 (01:04:31):
Yeah, no doubt.

Speaker 3 (01:04:31):
I mean, nothing's ever the fans' fault. The fans get
to do whatever the hell the fans want. So, all right, Steve,
great stuff. Thank you.

Speaker 2 (01:04:38):
Thanks, Steve.

Speaker 3 (01:04:40):
Ephraim, what do you think of that?

Speaker 2 (01:04:41):
Like, is Jim Harbaugh doing this right? You know, I mean,
I'm asking a real question.

Speaker 3 (01:04:47):
Like....

Speaker 5 (01:04:50):
I don't know, man.

Speaker 2 (01:04:52):
The jury's out. It's perplexing to me a little bit,
you know? You have these expectations and, you know, great
talent combined with, you know, supposedly great coaching, great results.

Speaker 5 (01:05:10):
And it's, man.

Speaker 2 (01:05:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:05:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:05:15):
You know, speaking of hardball, the other hardball, if he
doesn't get these kids together in New York, they're not
going to last.

Speaker 3 (01:05:23):
What do you mean?

Speaker 2 (01:05:25):
Jackson Darden took some hits in this game.

Speaker 5 (01:05:27):
I'm like, oh, he. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:05:30):
Week three, we're talking about whoever the backup is. Jameis Winston?

Speaker 3 (01:05:34):
You get a reputation for a reason.

Speaker 2 (01:05:36):
Good Lord. Scadaboo, his nose is already bleeding, and I'm like,
what is happening right now?

Speaker 3 (01:05:41):
Blood all over his face four minutes into the game.
It's like we just spent a whole summer. of people
talking about you as a battering ram. Apparently you considered retirement.
You're taking jumps off of your roof. You do back flips.
You're getting into it with teammates in practice. We're like,
this guy's a crazy person. And four minutes into the game,
his face is filled with blood. It's just like, okay,

(01:06:02):
this isn't a movie.

Speaker 2 (01:06:03):
Jackson Dart with the eye black and the head.

Speaker 5 (01:06:07):
That's not what you want, man.

Speaker 3 (01:06:09):
Nope.

Speaker 5 (01:06:09):
This is not a movie. It's not an after-school special.

Speaker 2 (01:06:14):
Grow up. What quarterback? What quarterback has face paint on?

Speaker 4 (01:06:25):
Jackson.

Speaker 2 (01:06:25):
This is not the program.

Speaker 4 (01:06:28):
Right.

Speaker 5 (01:06:29):
This is not any given Sunday.

Speaker 3 (01:06:33):
No, and it's not WWE.

Speaker 2 (01:06:35):
Like he's taking some shots. I'm talking about oof. Yep.

Speaker 3 (01:06:44):
Yeah, it won't work.

Speaker 5 (01:06:45):
I don't know if they can protect him.

Speaker 3 (01:06:46):
It won't work. I mean, we sat here for all
summer and go like, so that's going to look different.
And it doesn't look any different. It actually kind of
looks worse.

Speaker 2 (01:06:56):
Dak Prescott just threw a pick. And that is an interception.

Speaker 3 (01:07:01):
Yeah, it sure looked like one. And the call on
the field is that it is. Yeah, these two offenses
look sloppy right now. Man, they look like this is
the first preseason game. George Pickens is dropping balls. Tyrone
Tracy fumbled. We're getting an interception now from Dak when
he was trying to throw the ball away.

Speaker 4 (01:07:18):
All right.

Speaker 3 (01:07:21):
We're live in the Fox Sports Radio studios. If you
miss any of today's show, which is not your assignment.

Speaker 4 (01:07:26):
But if you do.

Speaker 3 (01:07:27):
You're going to want to catch the podcast afterwards. So
search Fox Sports Radio wherever you get your podcast right
after the show. Our pod is posted. You follow the pod.
You rate it a five. You provide a review. Search
Fox Sports Radio wherever you get your podcast. Follow the feed.
And you're going to find our full show posted right
after we get off the air. Hey, would love to
talk a little bit about the week that was. How

(01:07:50):
about that Wednesday game? How about that Thursday game? Let's
get into that a little bit. Coming up next with
Ephraim Salam, I'm Mark Willard. Fox Football Sunday on Fox
Sports Radio.

Speaker 1 (01:08:01):

Speaker 5 (01:08:05):
College football is back.

Speaker 6 (01:08:06):
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Speaker 2 (01:08:07):
New customers use promo code WILDCAT.

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To start trading.

Speaker 3 (01:08:29):
May shotgun snap looks to the end zone now.

Speaker 4 (01:08:33):
He wants to throw it up for grabs he does
it's intercepted.

Speaker 3 (01:08:35):
Did he keep his toes in did he keep his
toes in he did it's intercepted in.

Speaker 2 (01:08:40):
The end zone holy catfish the third pick of the
night by the.

Speaker 3 (01:08:46):
Seahawks We're sitting here in the Fox Sports Radio studios. And, oh,
by the way, I think you noticed football is back. And, underdogs,
keep your millions. You, with a million-dollar stack, make your picks,
survive 20 rounds, and whatever's left is yours.

Speaker 4 (01:09:07):
Underdog, unleash your dog. Terms apply.

Speaker 3 (01:09:10):
Touchdown, Isaiah Likely, who early on, I would say, if
you look at this offense, he was kind of a
sexy later round tight end for people in the fantasy world.
It's not just this touchdown. He is easily the target leader,
the catch leader. Isaiah Likely is a huge part of

(01:09:33):
this Giants offense. And first half, five catches, 59 yards,
and a score already. Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:09:40):
That's a big target, man.

Speaker 3 (01:09:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:09:43):
That's looking good for them. It is looking good for them.
And a savior for Jackson Dart.

Speaker 4 (01:09:48):
No doubt. No doubt.

Speaker 3 (01:09:50):
The receiving core with the Giants is going to be
an interesting one. I'm not sure really yet what to
think of the health of Malik neighbors and the story
before the game where he was supposed to be working
out three hours before kickoff to decide if he was
going to play, and then he wasn't even at the
game three hours before. Odell Beckham is back, but he

(01:10:10):
doesn't actually play. I'm not sure what to do yet
with this receiving core.

Speaker 5 (01:10:16):
There's a lot going on.

Speaker 4 (01:10:17):
There's a lot going on.

Speaker 5 (01:10:19):
Or not going on.

Speaker 3 (01:10:21):
Seahawks Radio Network on that call. Let's not forget because
it was so many days ago. We've seen a lot today.
We've talked about a lot of quarterbacks. There is no
interception that was thrown today that was worse than the
interception that Drake May threw to end that football game

(01:10:42):
on Wednesday night. That wins my award.

Speaker 2 (01:10:47):
How do you throw that?

Speaker 4 (01:10:49):
That's the worst throw of the week. You got one thing.

Speaker 5 (01:10:54):
That you can't do. And that being your third.

Speaker 2 (01:10:57):
Correct.

Speaker 3 (01:10:59):
Listen, I've never played quarterback in the NFL, Ephraim, so
things are coming at you fast, and I understand that
sometimes you think you can throw it away, and then
all of a sudden your legs are taken out from
underneath you. You can't get enough juice on it.

Speaker 4 (01:11:12):
Take a sack.

Speaker 3 (01:11:14):
Taking intentional grounding, anything in that case would have been better.
You cannot throw an interceptable ball in that situation.

Speaker 2 (01:11:24):
Throw it to the lady who just came back with
the nacho.

Speaker 3 (01:11:28):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (01:11:30):
Plus her nachos up into her face when the ball
smacks her lap. Or the guy who just got the
beer and he's coming back holding the popcorn and the
beer as he's coming down the stairs. Bust that out
of his hands.

Speaker 3 (01:11:49):
What did you think of that football game? The champs
come out, we're five plays in, and Sam Donald's in
the locker room.

Speaker 4 (01:11:58):
And I thought the.

Speaker 3 (01:11:58):
Patriots were the better team for two and a half
to three quarters.

Speaker 4 (01:12:03):
But then the.

Speaker 3 (01:12:03):
Seahawks defense does its thing. And I don't want to
take any credit from them, but I stand by the
statement I just made.

Speaker 4 (01:12:10):
That last pick is way more on.

Speaker 3 (01:12:12):
Drake May than it is a great play by the
Seahawks defense. Really interesting opening football game with those two
teams that played in the Super Bowl back in February.

Speaker 2 (01:12:27):
Yeah, it was, you know, it wasn't anything to write
home about. I think the Patriots....

Speaker 5 (01:12:37):
Um allowing drew lock to come in.

Speaker 2 (01:12:40):
And be as proficient as he was and beat them
that doesn't bode well for them right uh moving forward
i think you know when sam went down i said
oh oh wow okay this is New England's game.

Speaker 5 (01:13:04):
I think we all felt that.

Speaker 4 (01:13:05):
For sure.

Speaker 2 (01:13:06):
Especially because they had the lead. And so I just,
you can't allow that to happen. You know, when a
backup quarterback comes in, you can't give that away. I
think that was the biggest problem I had with the
Green Bay game.

Speaker 5 (01:13:27):
When Kyler goes out.

Speaker 2 (01:13:30):
And You know, you got to, although you've prepared for
the starting quarterback, you have to be able to make
an adjustment and take advantage of them, of the offense
not being at full strength. And the two quarterbacks that
left the game, their teams end up, you know, winning. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah,

(01:13:56):
happened to two teams this week. Carson Wentz came in. Like,
I'm like, how? Right.

Speaker 3 (01:14:03):
And both of them, it happened against teams that are,
you know, expected to be playoff teams this year.

Speaker 4 (01:14:11):
So, all right.

Speaker 3 (01:14:13):
That's the Wednesday game. Let's talk about the Thursday game.
We haven't talked about those Ravens yet. There's a lot
still on the table, and it's coming up.

Speaker 1 (01:14:22):
The Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 3 (01:14:42):
And he is beyond motivated. No contract in hand. Same
for C.J.

Speaker 4 (01:14:46):
Stroud.

Speaker 3 (01:14:47):
We'll talk about both of those situations, both of those
teams coming up. The Bengals' defense, were they lucky or
were they good? We will get to that. All of
it as we sit here tonight live in these Fox
Sports Radio studios. But before we do circle back to today,
let's put a bow on Thursday. Down under. And we

(01:15:10):
talked earlier, this week could not have gone worse for
the Los Angeles Rams.

Speaker 5 (01:15:14):
Can we play a game?

Speaker 4 (01:15:15):
Play a game.

Speaker 2 (01:15:16):
What do you got? Who did it right? Who did
it wrong?

Speaker 4 (01:15:22):
Can I answer that two ways? Yes.

Speaker 3 (01:15:24):
First of all, the quick answer is, duh, the Niners
did it right. The other answer is, there's a piece
of me as a Niner fan that's a little bit
bugged that the whole travel plan thing kind of takes
away from the football they played The game plan they

(01:15:45):
had makes it sound like, well, we already know the
Rams are great, but they just traveled wrong.

Speaker 5 (01:15:51):
Yeah, right. I get that.

Speaker 2 (01:15:53):
Right.

Speaker 3 (01:15:53):
They also just got their arses kicked in every facet
of that football game. And so I don't know how
much of it had to do with travel.

Speaker 4 (01:16:03):
But here's what I do know.

Speaker 3 (01:16:05):
From the moment the Rams explained their point and we
talked about it, we're like, look, they got scientists, too.

Speaker 4 (01:16:14):
They're not dumb.

Speaker 3 (01:16:15):
I'm sure there's a reason they came up with this plan.
But as a human being, when I listened to it,
I was like, that sounds like hell. Maybe you're right.
Maybe it will optimize your performance for those three hours.
But we're going to get there, go to bed, wake
up and play, and then come back? Bro, I've been

(01:16:40):
on some whirlwind trips. That sounded like human hell. And
they looked like it. No doubt about it. I don't
know what your perspective is on it.

Speaker 2 (01:16:55):
This is what I can tell you. Having made that
trip to Australia before. And while I was playing, I
took that trip in the offseason. And so I was about,
you know, 6'8, I guess anywhere between 3'10 and 3'20,

(01:17:21):
somewhere in there. And yes, I had the live flatbed
and all of the room they say you're supposed to have.
I was upstairs in the Qantas, you know, it's my
first time being on Qantas. I'm like, oh, it's upstairs
up here. It's a bar, all kinds of stuff. It

(01:17:42):
was uncomfortable for me.

Speaker 5 (01:17:45):
As plush.

Speaker 2 (01:17:47):
And as big as the live flat seats are supposed
to be, they're not made for me or anyone like me.
So now you want to take a whole bunch, a
whole team of me's.

Speaker 5 (01:18:04):
And make them.

Speaker 2 (01:18:08):
Pile into these seats a mere, what, 20 hours before
you have to play?

Speaker 4 (01:18:13):
My goodness.

Speaker 2 (01:18:17):
It didn't make sense to me. I think it was
poor in judgment. there is no way. And they said, look,
we sent people out over the summer to do research, right?
To how their bodies fit. Did you send athletes or

(01:18:38):
did you send staff? Because that's a different ask, right?
Anyone you sent, I can promise you wasn't on that 50%.
So that nullifies whatever experiment you did. You sent people...
part of the staff or the travel whatever that is

(01:19:01):
to do research on how your body is affected none
of them were highly skilled and trained athletes so therefore
your the information you got.

Speaker 5 (01:19:11):
Is inconclusive.

Speaker 2 (01:19:14):
That's the types of conversations that weren't being had in
the rams organization Like, hey, yeah, we sent a bunch
of interns or a bunch of this and that, but
we didn't send anybody who would have to play 65
plays in a game on really no sleep for three

(01:19:37):
hours against a division foe that we've had fits with.

Speaker 4 (01:19:41):
Right.

Speaker 2 (01:19:42):
Who've been here and acclimated to the environment and the
time zone.

Speaker 5 (01:19:46):
For eight days.

Speaker 3 (01:19:47):
Right.

Speaker 2 (01:19:50):
No, we didn't do that. And so expecting you to
put a bowl on a pile of waste is just
a pretty pile of waste. And that's what we got,
and that's what it looked like. Now, I don't want

(01:20:11):
to take anything away from what the 49ers did because
they looked good and they played extremely well. So much so,
Myles Garrett is now on IR.

Speaker 4 (01:20:24):
Right?

Speaker 2 (01:20:24):
Like, however you want to say it and whatever you
want to say about it, he's now on IR. And so,
I think the Rams got it completely wrong. And shame
on them for trying to outsmart.

Speaker 3 (01:20:48):
Physics.

Speaker 2 (01:20:49):
Life.

Speaker 4 (01:20:49):
Life.

Speaker 3 (01:20:50):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:20:51):
Yep. Like you've reduced your team to a shell. Your
body doesn't work like that. I mean, I was really like, man,
this is great. I've been on that trip. And I
didn't have to play 20 hours after I got there.

Speaker 3 (01:21:08):
So the way I now look at what the Rams
did is actually something that we see a lot of
in sports now.

Speaker 4 (01:21:15):
We see this all the time.

Speaker 3 (01:21:19):
And for example you're not allowed to bunt anymore in
baseball because you're stupid if you do that and you're
not allowed to kick a field goal inside the five anymore.

Speaker 4 (01:21:30):
Because you're stupid if you do that And.

Speaker 3 (01:21:32):
What happens is the math and science of it all
starts to whirl at such a pace that the common
sense emotion of sometimes sports, and in this case, just
who we are as human beings, gets erased by math

(01:21:54):
and science. And to me, that's what happened here. I
was never going to criticize it. I've never been to Australia.
I've never been an NFL player. My opinion was not relevant.
You've been both. But my opinion ahead of time was
not relevant. All I could think of was, boy, if

(01:22:18):
I were going to Australia for any reason.

Speaker 4 (01:22:22):
That sounds awful, right?

Speaker 3 (01:22:25):
And my favorite one, and these are mostly Rams fans
because this is what we do, is you circle back
after the game and you go, I know the Niners
won week one, but what this is actually about is
week three and four. Let's see who recovers better on

(01:22:45):
the back. What the hell are you talking about?

Speaker 5 (01:22:48):
This whole thing.

Speaker 3 (01:22:51):
First of all, both teams now have a week and
a half to be in bed. I'm not saying they're
going to be perfect for it, but the idea that
the Niners, you know, they acclimated.

Speaker 4 (01:23:01):
So now this is going to be wild.

Speaker 3 (01:23:04):
Well, the Rams spent half of a week basically on
a plane.

Speaker 5 (01:23:09):
On a plane, literally.

Speaker 3 (01:23:10):
You took a four-day period and spent half of it
on a plane with a loss. Don't tell me that's
not emotional for football players. That's the most arrogant thing
I've ever heard. Oh, well, the Rams didn't really care
about this one.

Speaker 5 (01:23:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:23:27):
All right.

Speaker 2 (01:23:28):
Rams were.

Speaker 5 (01:23:29):
That was the worst flight home ever.

Speaker 3 (01:23:32):
Ever.

Speaker 5 (01:23:33):
You got crushed. And it kept going, though. The flight was.

Speaker 2 (01:23:36):
You could have went to sleep for 10 hours and
woke up and still had seven to go.

Speaker 4 (01:23:42):
That's right.

Speaker 5 (01:23:43):
In misery.

Speaker 3 (01:23:44):
And I bet someone woke up on that plane and went, oh.

Speaker 4 (01:23:47):
That wasn't a dream.

Speaker 5 (01:23:48):
We're still.

Speaker 3 (01:23:50):
Flying wait we scored seven points and we're still on
the plane and.

Speaker 2 (01:23:54):
We just got off of the plane just got off
of the.

Speaker 3 (01:23:57):
Plane a day and a half ago like I don't
know man still on the plane.

Speaker 4 (01:24:03):
I don't know I don't know who came up with that.

Speaker 2 (01:24:05):
I've been on that flight it's the longest flight ever man.

Speaker 3 (01:24:09):
It is not good special hello to all of the
media members who decided that the 49ers were stupid out
thought themselves that the Rams were fancy and smart and
all of that.

Speaker 4 (01:24:24):
There's not one thing on.

Speaker 3 (01:24:26):
This trip from the body clock to the ambassadorship.

Speaker 2 (01:24:32):
Right.

Speaker 5 (01:24:33):
You're supposed to be ambassadors.

Speaker 3 (01:24:35):
To the standings, to the injured reserve list. There's not
one thing that went the Rams way this week.

Speaker 5 (01:24:43):
You know what it made me think about?

Speaker 4 (01:24:45):
What's that?

Speaker 5 (01:24:46):
I was like, huh.

Speaker 2 (01:24:48):
I was having this conversation with my brother, and he
brought up a good point. He said, oh, I see
what happened. The league is trying to figure out if
we can put a team over there and what that
would look like. If the Rams would have flown out
there like they did and were successful, they would have

(01:25:11):
had data that says, oh, no, you can treat this
like a regular– game huh like they're trying to see
what what it listen right i'm listening right like i
know it's wild to even think this.

Speaker 4 (01:25:30):
If that's the case then back to the drawing board.

Speaker 2 (01:25:33):
Right like one of you one one team is gonna
go out there seven days early or eight days early
the other team is gonna we're gonna try to treat
this like you know And I'm just speculating. But when
he said it, I was like, dang, that makes a
lot of sense. Because if you're trying to expand the league,

(01:25:56):
like who would the team in Australia play? Oh, my God.

Speaker 5 (01:26:01):
Who would they play?

Speaker 2 (01:26:03):
So if you can fly out there the day before
the game, get there, like have a day, then wake
up that next morning at 7, essentially, because everybody's up
at 6 o'clock. getting ready for a 10 30 kickoff
you're up at six because you're at the stadium right
three and a half hours before the game right so

(01:26:25):
you're up at 6 a.m and you're coming to the
stadium to play a 10 30 a.m game which sounds
ridiculous but if they would have shown up and and
and shown out I can see them saying, oh, okay,
this is doable. Now they got to figure out, okay,

(01:26:47):
this doesn't look right.

Speaker 3 (01:26:49):
Why would the Rams, like, let's go with your theory.
Why would the Rams allow themselves in a home game
against a division foe be a sacrificial lamb like that
in an experiment?

Speaker 2 (01:27:02):
Well, maybe they believed in it.

Speaker 4 (01:27:04):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:27:06):
I mean. Maybe the experiment came from. talking to both
teams and figuring out where they were leaning. You understand
what I'm saying?

Speaker 5 (01:27:17):
Like, oh, okay, no, no, do that.

Speaker 2 (01:27:19):
Instead of mandating them go out at least eight days prior,
everybody travels together, let's get, you know. No, no, no,
let's see what this turns into. It's not good. That's
no way to travel and no way to come into
a football game.

Speaker 3 (01:27:35):
It was not good at all. It was not good
at all.

Speaker 5 (01:27:40):
It was hard to watch. I'm like, this is terrible.

Speaker 3 (01:27:43):
Yeah, they got they got. They got handled in every way,
shape or form. And it went from this is me
just watching. I'm like, we were told they were the Avengers.
And then the game started and they looked like Puka.

Speaker 4 (01:28:03):
Period.

Speaker 3 (01:28:04):
Period.

Speaker 5 (01:28:06):
They look like the Thunderbolts.

Speaker 2 (01:28:08):
Yeah. We were told they were the Avengers and they
showed up to play like the Thunderbolts.

Speaker 3 (01:28:13):
The constant joke everybody kept doing was, well, actually, I
see what the Rams did travel-wise. Miles Garrett's not even here.
Devontae Adams is not even here.

Speaker 4 (01:28:24):
Like, I don't know.

Speaker 5 (01:28:25):
They're still on the plane.

Speaker 4 (01:28:26):
I don't know what.

Speaker 3 (01:28:28):
It was like Matt Stafford would drop back and I'm like, oh,
Puka is the only one on this field with any juice.

Speaker 4 (01:28:37):
Seven points, dude.

Speaker 5 (01:28:38):
That was bad.

Speaker 3 (01:28:40):
Oh you know and your one chance for momentum Brock
Purdy makes the early mistake and then you give it
right back I'll tell you.

Speaker 5 (01:28:48):
This shout out to the 49ers they're gonna be dangerous
They're always dangerous.

Speaker 2 (01:28:59):
Right.

Speaker 4 (01:29:00):
Say it.

Speaker 5 (01:29:02):
Even when they're not healthy, they're dangerous.

Speaker 2 (01:29:04):
But if they can stay healthy, boy, this division is
going to be interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:29:08):
People forgot, and I don't know if they're going to
be healthy, but people forgot the.

Speaker 4 (01:29:15):
Amount of talent that's on that roster.

Speaker 2 (01:29:16):
Man.

Speaker 4 (01:29:18):
They're old in spots. They could get hurt.

Speaker 2 (01:29:20):
Let's just talk about Brock Purdy. Brock Purdy was, I mean,
we already know we're fans. I'm a fan of Brock.

Speaker 4 (01:29:27):
He's fantastic. He's fantastic player.

Speaker 5 (01:29:29):
He is an adult.

Speaker 4 (01:29:31):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:29:32):
Very mature, very calculated. He is perfect for Shanahan.

Speaker 4 (01:29:45):
If they play defense like that.

Speaker 5 (01:29:46):
Oh my goodness.

Speaker 4 (01:29:48):
And Fred Warner and Nick Bosa are back on the field.

Speaker 3 (01:29:51):
It was as if you watched the Niners play and
you knew what they needed from last year. You're like,
you know what?

Speaker 4 (01:29:57):
We need a pass rush.

Speaker 2 (01:29:58):
We need Nick Bosa back.

Speaker 5 (01:29:59):
Greenlaw and, man, they were like, we back, baby.

Speaker 4 (01:30:02):
Greenlaw and Fred Warner.

Speaker 5 (01:30:03):
Good Lord.

Speaker 3 (01:30:04):
And then they're like, you know what we don't have, though,
on offense is we don't have like a man-to-man beating
wide receiver. Oh, okay.

Speaker 4 (01:30:11):
Grab Mike Evans.

Speaker 2 (01:30:12):
Man.

Speaker 3 (01:30:13):
Grab Fred Warner.

Speaker 4 (01:30:14):
Grab Dre Greenlaw. Grab Nick Bosa.

Speaker 5 (01:30:17):
How good does Mike look?

Speaker 3 (01:30:19):
Oh, get Debo back because now we can really make
the defender's eyes go all over the place. Oh, one
other thing. Could we grab a running back to pair
with Christian McCaffrey? Dude, they got a lot of answers
right now to a lot of questions.

Speaker 2 (01:30:39):
For sure.

Speaker 3 (01:30:40):
So anyway, all right, let's get to Baltimore. Let's get
to a bunch of these teams. We will do that
coming up in just a bit. Football is back under dogs.
Keep your million starts you with a million dollar stack.
Make your picks survive 20 rounds and whatever's left is yours.

Speaker 4 (01:30:57):
Underdog unleash your dog terms apply.

Speaker 3 (01:31:00):
Hello to all of those of you who grabbed Isaiah
likely in the 10th round. You're looking real, real smart today.
That's it from Salam. I'm Mark Willard. This is Fox
Sports Radio.

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Speaker 2 (01:32:18):
Well, hello, Lamar Jackson.

Speaker 5 (01:32:19):
Good to have you back.

Speaker 2 (01:32:21):
Welcome, buddy.

Speaker 3 (01:32:23):
Oh, boy. That was great for the NFL to see
Lamar look like Lamar.

Speaker 5 (01:32:32):
No, I think it was fantastic.

Speaker 2 (01:32:33):
I just, you know, the wild part was watching Lamar
Jackson under center and then, you know, bootleg out.

Speaker 5 (01:32:42):
And, man, it's wild. Watching that game reminded me of,
remember last year?

Speaker 4 (01:32:54):
Sure.

Speaker 2 (01:32:55):
Remember the game they were having with Buffalo? And when
we got off the air.

Speaker 5 (01:33:03):
We were like, oh.

Speaker 4 (01:33:05):
Baltimore's winning the Super Bowl.

Speaker 2 (01:33:06):
This is ridiculous. By the time we got home. the
bills had won they had lost the football game yes
and so watching that i was like oh okay well
i've seen this before.

Speaker 5 (01:33:23):
But oh my goodness 324 yards passing.

Speaker 2 (01:33:31):
He's special.

Speaker 5 (01:33:32):
Another 40 on the ground.

Speaker 3 (01:33:33):
Look, he's flat out one of the best players in
the NFL.

Speaker 4 (01:33:38):
He's box office.

Speaker 5 (01:33:39):
The unaged Derrick Henry with 144. Come on, man.

Speaker 2 (01:33:43):
Six yards to carry.

Speaker 3 (01:33:44):
Apparently, at age 30, running backs die. The guy's 33.
He's incredible. Lamar Jackson was not healthy at all all
last year. There's going to be now. There's some injury
issues now with the receiving core.

Speaker 5 (01:33:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:33:59):
Zay Flowers left. And the kid they love, Jacoby Lane,
broke his wrist. So they're going to be challenged at
that position right out of the gate. But that was
a statement.

Speaker 2 (01:34:12):
They're back.

Speaker 3 (01:34:14):
And whatever was going on with the Colts in the
first half of the year last year, Remember when they
were great?

Speaker 5 (01:34:20):
Yeah, that died.

Speaker 2 (01:34:20):
And Daniel Jones was. That's gone.

Speaker 4 (01:34:22):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:34:22):
I don't know what that lightning in a bottle was,
but I didn't see any of it today.

Speaker 2 (01:34:27):
No, it's gone. Jonathan Taylor looked good. And look, just
to be fair, they ran up against a buzzsaw.

Speaker 4 (01:34:36):
Sure.

Speaker 3 (01:34:38):
Sure.

Speaker 2 (01:34:38):
Lamar Jackson is in a contract year. You don't ever
want someone with that level of talent trying to prove
their worth.

Speaker 3 (01:34:47):
Can we talk about that for a second? What in
the hell are the Ravens doing?

Speaker 5 (01:34:51):
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (01:34:52):
This is the second time.

Speaker 5 (01:34:53):
Makes zero sense to me. I don't know. I really don't.

Speaker 3 (01:34:58):
Who?

Speaker 1 (01:35:00):
Who else?

Speaker 5 (01:35:02):
If not him, then who? Honestly.

Speaker 2 (01:35:05):
If not Lamar Jackson, the two-time MVP, then who? Who
could we be like, you know what?

Speaker 5 (01:35:13):
Nah, you gone, man. We are going to replace you
with who?

Speaker 3 (01:35:19):
Can I say something that might– I don't know if
the perception is this or the opposite or whatever, but
what does it do to everybody listening when I say this?

Speaker 2 (01:35:31):
Lamar Jackson's not 30 yet.

Speaker 3 (01:35:32):
No. He's not 30 years old yet.

Speaker 5 (01:35:35):
Which means he could play 11 more years.

Speaker 3 (01:35:37):
There are quarterbacks in his division who are 40.

Speaker 2 (01:35:41):
He's not even 30.

Speaker 3 (01:35:43):
I've never seen a team be so cavalier with the
most important position in sports.

Speaker 2 (01:35:49):
When you get one, you cradle one.

Speaker 4 (01:35:52):
Period.

Speaker 5 (01:35:52):
You just give them what they want.

Speaker 2 (01:35:54):
A quarterback is like a great spouse.

Speaker 4 (01:35:56):
When you get one, you do not mess with this.

Speaker 3 (01:35:59):
No, man.

Speaker 5 (01:36:00):
Don't run it off.

Speaker 3 (01:36:02):
Like, to me, I don't know. If I'm Lamar and
we're going to do this again, I might.

Speaker 4 (01:36:07):
Just leave on purpose.

Speaker 5 (01:36:08):
It's like, you know what? I'm good, guys.

Speaker 3 (01:36:10):
Yep. I'm going to go somewhere where they want to
give me four years. And I don't know.

Speaker 4 (01:36:16):
Be nice to me. Be good to me.

Speaker 3 (01:36:17):
Like all the other teams are to their quarterbacks. Boy,
Lamar Jackson. MVP, Lamar Jackson. And we're sitting there going, ah.
Why don't we play it out?

Speaker 5 (01:36:34):
Pay that man his money.

Speaker 3 (01:36:37):
Meanwhile, in our Sunday night football watch party, it's a
pretty good football game right now.

Speaker 5 (01:36:42):
Not bad.

Speaker 4 (01:36:42):
Pretty good football game.

Speaker 3 (01:36:45):
I'm not sure what to make of either team yet,
but it's a pretty good football game.

Speaker 5 (01:36:49):
That's kind of what I would say. But it's good, though.
It's entertaining. That's what we want.

Speaker 3 (01:36:53):
And Malik Nabors looks fine. Not quite dynamic yet. There
was a catch over the middle where then he also
went over to the sideline, and they were kind of
looking at.

Speaker 4 (01:37:04):
The knee and everything.

Speaker 3 (01:37:05):
I'm like, oh, boy. But he's got five balls for
61 yards, and he's out there doing his thing. I
don't know who's on the field that's supposed to take
eyes off of him. So we talked about that a
little bit earlier. I'm not sure about the Giants receiving
core this year.

Speaker 5 (01:37:24):
Yeah, I.
I don't, is OBJ just there?

Speaker 3 (01:37:28):
I mean, I don't think, I could be wrong because
we're sitting here chatting. I don't know that he's taken
a snap yet. He certainly does not have a target.
I don't know that he's even taken a snap. They've
got Darnell Mooney out there. They've got Malachi Fields out there. Obviously,
Isaiah Likely, the tight end, is having a big night.

(01:37:52):
I have not seen Odell Beckham out on the field.

Speaker 5 (01:37:56):
Yeah, we'll see.

Speaker 3 (01:38:00):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:38:01):
We'll see.

Speaker 2 (01:38:01):
Now, if he's the adult in the locker room and
the team guy, I think that's what's happening and some
teams don't have those guys.

Speaker 5 (01:38:10):
But is he the guy for that?

Speaker 4 (01:38:12):
I don't know.

Speaker 5 (01:38:14):
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (01:38:17):
Let's go back while we're on the AFC North and
building up the Ravens like we are. Two other comments
that I wanted to make. The Cincinnati Bengals won today.
and they did some interesting things with their defense which
is I know what everyone's waiting on which was the
defense sometimes turnovers are a sign of a team playing

(01:38:42):
good defense sometimes they're just good breaks the Bengals got
a bunch of fumbles today and they still had to
hang on to a six-point lead.

Speaker 4 (01:38:51):
I'm not– I guess what I'm saying is I'm not
sure that.

Speaker 3 (01:38:53):
These– I think these are just the exact same bangles,
but it worked today.

Speaker 2 (01:38:59):
Well, essentially what you're saying is without the fumbles, or
without two of the fumbles, this is a different conversation.

Speaker 3 (01:39:04):
I just think they're going to score a lot and
give up a lot, and I think that's still how it's.

Speaker 5 (01:39:08):
Going to look.

Speaker 2 (01:39:09):
Yeah. They have so many new pieces defensively. It may take,
you know, the first– quarter of the season for them
to figure out who they are and who they want
to be um you gotta take wins how you can
get them uh the fact that they were getting after
baker mayfield baker couldn't hold on to the ball i
think they had baker had three fumbles lost all three

(01:39:32):
and bucky irving had a fumble that's four fumbles lost
all four of them and you're still in a six-point game,
you got to take positives from something like that. If
we don't turn the ball over, we win these games
on the Tampa Bay side. On the Bengals side, look
what our defense did. We took the ball away. Right?

Speaker 5 (01:39:54):
So you got to live.

Speaker 3 (01:39:56):
Right.

Speaker 5 (01:39:57):
You got to live in both zones. They took the
ball away five times.

Speaker 3 (01:40:00):
Right?

Speaker 5 (01:40:00):
An interception, four fumbles. You got to hang your hat
on something.

Speaker 4 (01:40:05):
Sure.

Speaker 2 (01:40:07):
Right?

Speaker 5 (01:40:07):
It wasn't like they just.

Speaker 3 (01:40:08):
I mean, when you get four turnovers and you still
give up 27 points.

Speaker 4 (01:40:11):
Look, hey, we're not going to talk about that.

Speaker 5 (01:40:13):
We're talking about the fact that we took the ball away.

Speaker 2 (01:40:16):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:40:16):
Right?

Speaker 2 (01:40:17):
Now, they're leading the league in turnover. Yes, they are.

Speaker 3 (01:40:21):
Yes, they are. So, you know, I.

Speaker 2 (01:40:25):
Mean, you got to take what you can take when
you can take it and then build off of that.

Speaker 3 (01:40:30):
Right?

Speaker 2 (01:40:31):
So, hey, let's just keep getting after the ball. Let's
keep getting after the ball.

Speaker 3 (01:40:37):
Okay. Let me give you my next AFC North question.
So basically the theme is teams that won, but I
still don't like them.

Speaker 5 (01:40:48):
Say it.

Speaker 3 (01:40:50):
What the hell are the Steelers doing? We've been asking
this for two years.

Speaker 4 (01:40:54):
What is this? What are you attempting to do? This
isn't going to work.

Speaker 3 (01:41:01):
You can't beat Cooper Rush by seven at home and
be like, yeah, 1-0. There is so little that is
dynamic about the Steelers' offense. Even DK Metcalf and Michael
Pittman just sort of look like, eh.

Speaker 5 (01:41:23):
Well, first off.

Speaker 3 (01:41:24):
Go ahead.

Speaker 2 (01:41:24):
Look, I love DK. He's a personal friend of mine. Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:41:28):
But we can't do that. Ten targets?

Speaker 4 (01:41:33):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (01:41:33):
The drops?

Speaker 4 (01:41:34):
Yeah, a lot of drops.

Speaker 5 (01:41:35):
It's too good.

Speaker 4 (01:41:36):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (01:41:37):
It's too good for that. He knows that. DK knows that.

Speaker 2 (01:41:40):
But what happens is Aaron is finicky like that. We
saw it in the playoff, right? DK dropped a big
third down conversion. He didn't even go back to him.
You know what I mean? Right. This is Aaron.

Speaker 5 (01:41:55):
Rodgers we're talking about here.

Speaker 4 (01:41:56):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:41:58):
So you have to be mindful of that– And I think,
you know, that's something to keep an eye on because DK,
when he's on, he's one of the top receivers. But
he hasn't been on since he's been in Pittsburgh.

Speaker 4 (01:42:16):
Well.

Speaker 5 (01:42:16):
He had some big drops.

Speaker 2 (01:42:18):
He did.

Speaker 3 (01:42:19):
I just, when I watch the Steelers play, it appears
to me that the defense is aware that there's nothing
dynamic and Aaron is We're not going deep. We're not
going over the top. We're not going to use his
legs so we can condense everything up against the line
of scrimmage and everything. So everything that DK tries to catch,

(01:42:40):
there's somebody draped on his back.

Speaker 2 (01:42:42):
You can't throw the ball 40 times for 221 yards.

Speaker 4 (01:42:46):
I mean.

Speaker 5 (01:42:47):
Five and a half yards per reception. Come on. You
can't survive that.

Speaker 3 (01:42:53):
No.

Speaker 5 (01:42:56):
That's dying by a thousand cuts.

Speaker 6 (01:42:57):
Right.

Speaker 2 (01:42:59):
No.

Speaker 5 (01:43:00):
Yeah, I don't know. Look, that defense played well.

Speaker 2 (01:43:05):
Sure. But it was Cooper Rush. Atlanta, no one wants
to play quarterback in Atlanta. They can't get a guy
to come play quarterback.

Speaker 5 (01:43:15):
Cooper Rush was like, I'll take it.

Speaker 3 (01:43:17):
They had 12 completions in the game, and eight of
them went to B. John Robinson.

Speaker 2 (01:43:21):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (01:43:22):
Four balls to wide receivers. My son kept asking me.

Speaker 3 (01:43:28):
In fantasy drafts, why I wanted no part of Drake London.

Speaker 5 (01:43:33):
I was like, because they don't.

Speaker 3 (01:43:35):
Have anybody to throw the football on that team.

Speaker 5 (01:43:38):
Said no one's throwing them the ball.

Speaker 4 (01:43:40):
Right.

Speaker 3 (01:43:41):
So, yeah, that one gets me. The Steelers, like the defense,
the whatever, the reputation, they'll win some football games.

Speaker 4 (01:43:53):
But come on, man. That doesn't... That's not realistic.

Speaker 3 (01:43:57):
Like, what.

Speaker 4 (01:43:58):
I don't... They just keep riding the middle.

Speaker 3 (01:44:02):
When are they going to reboot some things and bring in.

Speaker 4 (01:44:07):
You know, like, some talent?

Speaker 3 (01:44:10):
You can't just keep grinding people to your 20 to
17 and we'll get nine of them and go nine
and eight and we'll be the seven seed and, like,
it just.

Speaker 4 (01:44:18):
I don't know. To me, that's kind of run its course.

Speaker 2 (01:44:22):
Yeah, it's... It's perplexing to watch because I'm pulling for
the old guys.

Speaker 4 (01:44:32):
Sure.

Speaker 2 (01:44:33):
So it's just, it's not going to, you have to
do more. You have to be able to attack down
the field and you got to run the ball. Two
things that they don't do very well. I had a question.
Are we going to break or should I wait?

Speaker 4 (01:44:54):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:44:54):
Oh, what?

Speaker 5 (01:44:55):
I'll wait. I'll wait.

Speaker 3 (01:44:57):
I'm on edge.

Speaker 5 (01:44:58):
No, because I want to spend a little time on it.

Speaker 2 (01:45:00):
Let's do it. Let's do it. Because I'm scratching my head.

Speaker 3 (01:45:05):
All right.

Speaker 5 (01:45:05):
I'll set that up as the teaser. I'm scratching my head.

Speaker 3 (01:45:08):
Ephraim's got a question. We're live from the Fox Sports
Radio studios.

Speaker 4 (01:45:12):
That's Ephraim.

Speaker 3 (01:45:13):
I'm Mark.

Speaker 4 (01:45:13):
That's next on Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 1 (01:45:16):

Speaker 2 (01:45:21):
There's a touchdown from Stefan Diggs.

Speaker 3 (01:45:25):
But then some things happened. Eagles win by two. The
other two teams in that division are playing right now.
Giants up by seven, 12 minutes to go, and driving
in Cowboy territory. Keep you up to date. We're live
in the Fox Sports Radio studios. Mark Willardy from Salam.
What's your question?

Speaker 2 (01:45:47):
Did you watch that Washington Cleveland game? I mean, I
watched it.

Speaker 3 (01:45:50):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:45:51):
Sure did.

Speaker 4 (01:45:53):
Sure did. Sure did.

Speaker 2 (01:45:55):
What were your thoughts on Jaden Daniels?

Speaker 3 (01:46:01):
Well, I thought that going into this year, this was
kind of going to be early in this season.

Speaker 4 (01:46:09):
This was going to be.

Speaker 3 (01:46:11):
A referendum on whether or not rookie year Jaden Daniels
was the real guy, or if what we got for
parts of last year was the real guy, and this
was a bad start. That offense appears to lack imagination.

(01:46:35):
It lacks a running game. It lacks... Really, it's funny
that one of their nicknames is scary. It sort of
lacks scary still position players.

Speaker 4 (01:46:50):
But I.

Speaker 3 (01:46:53):
Don't know.

Speaker 4 (01:46:53):
Jaden Daniels looks kind.

Speaker 3 (01:46:55):
Of ordinary to me.

Speaker 2 (01:46:58):
It was a tough watch because one of my questions
about this division was, what would Washington be? Coming into
the season, one of my questions was, who.
Is Jaden Daniels going to be? Because we have two
iterations of them, one good, one bad. And so I

(01:47:21):
was interested in watching this. And for the large majority
of that game, at one point in the fourth quarter,
he was, I think, nine for four. 20 or something
like that for like 64 yards.

Speaker 3 (01:47:37):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:47:38):
And I was like, oh, this is awful. There is
no flow to him. I think the biggest thing that
was enduring about him two years ago was he seemed unflappable.
He was very smooth. Even when things went wrong, he

(01:48:00):
seemed in complete control. And the last two years or
the last year, he was hurt a lot. But then
this game was the opposite for me. So it kind
of seemed like he was all over the place and
not very sure or accurate when he did make a decision.

Speaker 3 (01:48:20):
Um remember the conversation we were just having and you
were like aaron rogers averaged 5.5 yards per attempt.

Speaker 2 (01:48:29):
That's terrible can you beat that monty.

Speaker 4 (01:48:33):
Jaden Daniels, 4.8.

Speaker 5 (01:48:35):
Goodness gracious.

Speaker 3 (01:48:36):
34 pass attempts they threw for 164 games.

Speaker 5 (01:48:38):
It can't happen. Can't win.

Speaker 3 (01:48:41):
Can't win.

Speaker 5 (01:48:42):
Can't win games. So, look. I'm going to go ahead
and scratch them out of the running for this division.

Speaker 4 (01:48:53):
Already?

Speaker 5 (01:48:53):
Yeah, I'm going to do that early on.

Speaker 4 (01:48:55):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:48:55):
Because I'm not seeing anything. Offensive line, man. You know,
I'm not seeing anything. That would make me be like, oh,
they got a shot. He can get back to farm. Yeah.
That was a tough watch. And look, granted, the Eagles,
their defense is ferocious. I mean, they were coming, boy.

(01:49:15):
They were coming.

Speaker 3 (01:49:16):
I mean, look. That's a tough ask, first game. It
was a two-point game. They could have, you know, two-point
conversion there at the end. They could have sent this
thing to overtime. So, you know, they showed some fight.
I'm not, like, ending their season, but I wasn't terribly
high on them coming in, and today didn't help. Yeah,
I could see them as the fourth-place team in this division.

Speaker 2 (01:49:36):
Yeah, it just took them way too long to get started,
and their defense kept them in the game. Washington's defense
kept them in the game. They made it real difficult
for Philadelphia to get easy points. I think it was
a seven-point game or something like that for a large

(01:49:57):
portion of it. I just, you know, interesting.

Speaker 5 (01:50:01):
Interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:50:03):
We have a minute left, and we have undersold what
maybe was the game of the day. You want to
give 30 seconds on Bills and Texans?

Speaker 5 (01:50:09):
Oh, it's an unbelievable game.

Speaker 2 (01:50:11):
Right?

Speaker 5 (01:50:11):
Unbelievable game.

Speaker 3 (01:50:12):
Were you shocked that Josh Allen could move the ball
that well against the defense that we think is the
best defense in football?

Speaker 2 (01:50:17):
Yeah, I mean, but once again, this year's prices are
not last year's prices.

Speaker 3 (01:50:24):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (01:50:24):
A different team.

Speaker 3 (01:50:26):
Right?

Speaker 2 (01:50:27):
Different flow. And Josh Allen is a bad man. I
was pleasantly surprised by CJ Stroud.

Speaker 4 (01:50:34):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (01:50:35):
Yeah, they look good. I think they have a shot.

Speaker 2 (01:50:37):
If CJ can stay on form, I think that defense
will get better.

Speaker 5 (01:50:42):
But I think they got a shot. I really do.

Speaker 3 (01:50:45):
Sometimes there's little pieces that you can tell make a
big difference. DJ Moore was one of them today.

Speaker 5 (01:50:50):
Absolutely.

Speaker 3 (01:50:51):
Josh needed a weapon, and he got one. Hey, that's
week one, brother. Let's do it again next week.

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