September 21, 2020 • 36 mins
Clay Travis reflects on an amazing NFL Sunday, says the Patriots will win the AFC East and feels that the Dallas on-side kick to live forever on Cowboys highlights. FOX's Joel Klatt is in the house to talk about a very unique situation he and his broadcast crew encountered this past weekend when they were waiting to call the Baylor/Houston game in Waco. Plus, Clay has "The NFL List of Sadness."
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Outkicked the Coverage with Clay Travis live every weekday morning
from six to nine a m Eastern three to six
am Pacific on Fox Sports Radio. Find your local station
for Outkicked the Coverage at Fox Sports Radio dot Com,
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(00:23):
Sports Radio. There was so much incredible action going on
in the NFL yesterday, from the one o'clock eastern kickoffs
all the way through to almost midnight when Cam Newton
got stopped going for the winning run there on what
(00:46):
would have been an incredible and improbable comeback, because I
really did think the Patriots were done, and instead Cam
Newton gets somersaulted. And by the way, Julian Edemand had
an incredible game. He had the game winning touchdown past
go through his hands. And I bet that's what Julian
Edelman is thinking about this morning when he gets out
(01:07):
of bed. Is as good as he was, as good
as he played, and he was played pretty extraordinarily. That
catch is the one that's gonna haunt him. Cam versus
Russell Wilson, it was a duel for the ages. It
was absolutely incredible, but it was just one of many
(01:28):
I almost want to say legendary moments. It felt like
a legendary day. And what I mean by that is,
I feel like we'll be seeing that little on side
kick in the Cowboy the Falcons Cowboys game for years
and years. I'm sorry, Falcons fans, I'll be watching your players, like,
watch that slow role as it moved towards ten yards
(01:50):
to see whether or not it was actually going to
stop or not. And that was pretty crazy to watch it, right,
watch that process play out. The Cowboys won a game
that they had absolutely no business winning. The Falcons lost
a game that they had absolutely no business losing, and
I feel like it was more of a Falcon loss
(02:11):
than it was a Cowboy win. And I said this
an hour one, but I just I can't get over
this stat. The Falcons had thirty nine points with zero
turnovers against the Cowboys entering today, meaning the weekend teams
were four hundred and forty and zero when scoring thirty
(02:34):
nine points with zero turnovers since ninety three, when team
turnovers were first tracked, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
I mean, I've never seen anything like that. And then
the Falcons twenty point blown lead, Sorry, Falcon fan, their
largest since Super Bowl fifty one against the Patriots when
(02:54):
they led to three in Houston before collapsing. That ball
slowly rolling felt iconic. I felt a little bit like
justin Herbert coming in played so phenomenally well, and I'm
still in disbelief that Anthony Lynn would be saying, oh,
(03:16):
Tyrod Taylor still our guy? Did Anthony Lynn watch the
same game that you and I did? Arguably, Herbert made
one bad decision the entire game. He should have pulled
the ball down and kept running and got a first down. Instead,
he tried to make a play through a downfield, got
picked off, and that left the door cracked just widely
(03:37):
enough for the Patriots to come roaring back. Sorry for
the Chiefs to come roaring back, the Patriots also came
roaring back. What an unbelievable day of NFL football. I mean,
it was just from basically one o'clock, like I said,
in the afternoon until midnight, thoroughly riveting hard to look away.
(04:02):
And I'm left, you know, I said, and we'll talk
about this probably all season long, but if you were
telling me right now, how would you assess Belichick without Brady.
Even though you lost that game, Patriot fans, don't you
all leave thinking to yourself, Hey, we're still really good.
(04:27):
We should still be the favorites in the a f
C East, even as good as Josh Allen has looked
with two plus yard passing games. If Cam plays like
that like he played against the Seahawks, the Patriots are
going to win the a f C East. Because we've
seen this story before. Belichick will find a way to
(04:50):
get his defense good by the end of the year.
Remember how slow the Patriots usually started the seasons with
Tom Brady set Timber was nothing to remember. October just okay.
By November, in December there round and again the perfect shape.
If anything, the Patriots are way ahead of schedule right now,
(05:10):
certainly on the offensive side of the ball. Josh McDaniels
has to be just in awe over how much he
can do right now with Cam Newton. Meanwhile, we haven't
even hardly talked about the Bucks. The Bucks were just okay.
I watched a lot of their game and they still
haven't hit their stride. I thought one of the most
(05:31):
interesting parts of the of the Bucks game was seeing
Brett Farve walk in with a bag of potato chips
and a Tom Brady T shirt that was actually really funny.
But Brady still does not look like Brady at the
highest level. Now he started to see a little bit
of rhythm with Mike Evans. He started to perform at
(05:53):
a higher level. But right now we said, we're gonna
kind of give you the divorce review, get the vorce
between Brady and Belichick. I gotta tell you, I think
Belichick is doing better without Brady than Brady is without Belichick.
And this will be one of the really interesting storylines
to follow, is to what extent was the Patriot dynasty
(06:18):
primarily being driven by Bill Belichick versus primarily being driven
by Tom Brady. Brady was mediocre. Bad interception, he missed
Gronk on a crossing route if you didn't see it,
overshot him. Very mediocre I thought in general. Now he
did have a couple of drops. Leonard Fournette ran the
ball well. I still like the Bucks to make the
(06:41):
playoffs in the NFC, which Brady has done virtually every
year he's been healthy enough to finish a season. But
I'm way more impressed early on with Cam and Belichick
and what they're able to do than I am with
Bruce arians and Tom Brady and what they're able to do.
(07:02):
So my early read here would be that Belichick is
winning the divorce and that the Patriots are going to
be the better team compared to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
And what's amazing is that's true on the Patriots, even
though they had seven guys decide not to play, and
that didn't even include Tom Brady. I mean, they are
(07:24):
remaking their roster on the fly and they're still being
incredibly productive. That last night was better than any offensive
performance I saw the Patriots have all of last season.
Cam last night with that Patriot offense was better than
(07:45):
any single game performance I saw from Tom Brady last year.
I'm not sure that it can be sustained. I'm not
sure that Cam can run the football as often as
he did. That somersault that he got hit at the
end of the game. Those are big hits that start
to wear and tear on you as you move into
November and December. Not to mention that Cam's already over
(08:06):
the age of thirty. But my goodness, what an unbelievable
and riveting game for all of us who stayed up
to watch it all. Right, when we come back, we're
gonna be joined by Joel Klatt, one of my buddies. Obviously,
he has an unbelievable story. He traveled to Texas to
call the Houston at Baylor game and then the game
(08:27):
got canceled because of the coronavirus after he was already
in Texas, already flew in from California. What in the
world was that like? We'll talk about that with Joel.
What does he think about the Big ten coming back?
What's he hearing on the Pack twelve? All of those
stories and more we will discuss Uh, and we'll continue
to break down everything going on in the world of
(08:48):
the NFL for the rest of this program. This is
outkicked the coverage with Clay Travis. We are rolling through
the program talking a ton NFL but also college football.
The SEC is back this week, which gives me a
new pep in my step. I can't wait for all
of college football to be back. It seems like we're
(09:09):
moving in that direction. But one guy who is a
little bit cursed at least when it comes to being
able to call a Baylor football game, Joel Klatt, Uh Joel,
So tell me what happened. Like Fox has got its
main game. It's supposed to be Baylor in Houston, which
was a game that was scheduled like in in in
record time, right, and you traveled to Waco and then
(09:31):
the game gets camped like what happened on Friday, the
day before the game, it gets canceled. How did you
find that out? I know it's been an unprecedented year
has but there can't have been I wouldn't imagine anything
like what your experience was. So walk us through how
you came to be aware that the game you had
traveled from California to the Texas to call wasn't gonna happen. Yeah,
(09:53):
I mean it was wild. Right. So so first off, um,
you're right about like the game is scheduled because they
ball they are getting canceled from somebody else. And then
we're frustrated about it because and they said, hey, are
testing is good? You know we're in good shape to play.
Houston got canceled on by I believe it was Memphis.
Baylor got canceled on by law Tech the week before
(10:15):
in a game that we were supposed to go do.
And so like they're like, hey, you're good, we're good,
let's play. And then all of a sudden, you know,
Baylor has a couple of positive tests, and because of
contact tracing, the offensive line group um basically is unavailable.
And and that's, by the way, we could get into
a whole another the contact tracing. By the way, in
(10:37):
the contact tracing, how's this, clay, You're gonna love this.
It doesn't matter if those individuals even test negative, even
times they absolutely essentially isolate, like, by the way, this
is happening. But anyways, no, no, this is happening. By
the way, Joel, you know, my three kids are all
back in school, and so if a kid test positive,
(11:00):
even if you continue to test negative, they make those
kids leave the school and they have to quarantine themselves
for fourteen days like elementary school kids. Right, so even
if you're consistently testing negative, and so this contact tracing
business in general, I just the fourteen days is what
gets me. I mean, if you wanted to say, hey,
(11:21):
we're gonna do it for five days, or we're gonna
do it for four like whatever. The average this gets
into the specific, but the average person is going to
manifest an infection within four or five days. To me,
we should treat the average as opposed to the outlier,
because then you could have four or five days. It
would be a lot easier to rectify. But all this
is crazy. So you find out literally the day before
(11:43):
as you're at the facility to meet with the team,
that is not happening. I didn't even get to the
best part. So we travel there, you know, I travel
late on Thursday, or I've pretty late in Baylor, or
excuse me at Waco and wake up. We've got a
nude meeting set uh for to meet with coach or
and we're going to do it in person but socially distance,
you know, maps on all the whole business. Right, We're
(12:05):
sitting there and and twelve or five comes, and then
twelve ten comes, and I immediately I'm like, nope, this
is bad because which is are prompts? Right? Like, so
it's you, it's you, like Gus and Jenny. You're sitting
there waiting to meet Yes, our producer and um and
director as well, and so the whole team. You guys
are sitting there and you're like, this is not good
(12:26):
because coaches are usually always on time because they have
such a heavily scheduled day right, especially date game day
before game. Thirty minutes later, the A D walks in
hanging his head Macro Rhodes and I immediately I'm like, okay,
I just closed my book because I'm like, okay, we're
not gonna play. And I mean, he was devastated, you know.
(12:46):
To his credit, he's like, listen, I'm he's he's apologizing profusely,
and and he says, you know, listen, we're not going
to be able to play. And and you know, this
is the other interesting part. I don't know if this
has been report it a lot or not. And I
don't think I'm breaking any any news here, but David
Ended did something that I think is gonna pay dividends
(13:07):
for him long run. He could have they felt under
the big twelve threshold by one in the offsite, fine group, okay,
by one you need seven. They didn't apparently have that,
you know, based on their numbers, And he could have
gotten to the threshold if he were to unsuspend one
of their players. Unwilling to do that, and he said,
(13:30):
I'm not gonna do that. I'm not gonna unsuspended player
on my first game as I'm trying to build something here,
and I thought, you know what, that's pretty commendable, you know,
for Dave Randon. And so he walked in after the
a d mac Roads did get a chance to talk
with him for a second. He was very dejected and disappointed.
The best part about it was we walk outside. So
(13:52):
now it's like twelve forty we walk outside. My phone rings,
it's Dana Holgerson absolutely like waterway, what's happening? What are
we doing? Uh? Well, this is the fourth time my
kids are gonna be crushed. And to his point, think
about this, he and he told us earlier in the
(14:13):
week he was like, one of the reasons I accepted
this game wasn't just so that we could play. It
was because he thinks he was teetering on potentially losing
his team. Right, because they're asking these kids to be
I mean, what's the words. They have to be disciplined
on a level that no college kid has ever been
(14:35):
disciplined before, right, Like you're asking them to buy in,
to buy in in a way that literally maybe maybe
you can say an Army and Navy and in one
of the academies. You know what, you just have to
be incredibly But but there's no precedent for a regular
college kid to be in this situation and to be
this discipline right, and so to be hermits. You know,
(14:57):
so Dana is basically like, listen, I had to have
a game or else I was going to lose them,
and you know, so who knows? And and that brings
up a bigger question and we'll see how it manifests
itself in some of these conferences that are gonna do
daily testing. But you know what happens when the team's
one and four, Well, yeah, quite like I'm telling you,
(15:21):
this is gonna get This is gonna get really dicey.
In particular, was because of some of these standards, these
playing standards that these conferences are putting on these teams.
The big tent standards are incredibly difficult. Twenty one days
for a positive test, automatically five of your team test positive,
you gotta stop for seven days. Like it's there. There
(15:42):
are things now. I think the daily testing might help
a little bit, in particular with the contact tracing. But
I'm I'm I'm nervous for some of these other conferences
just because of the fact that, yeah, we're we're asking
these kids to do something that these young men that
is unnatural to people their age. Let's just say right, yea. Look,
(16:03):
there are two things that that build out of what
you were just saying that I think you're fascinating. One
is this the Big Ten's coming back. That's a very
good positive. They're coming back with almost no safety net,
right they're coming back on of October. They're trying to
play eight games and then a conference title game. And
by the way, one of the funny things is you
talk about a team quitting when they're like one and four,
(16:26):
are oh and eight Rutgers and oh and eight Illinois
or whatever it is really going to meet in a
game at the end of the season to see, you know,
like you talk about trying like that for the toilet
Bowl or whatever you want to call it, the opposite
of what the Big Ten title game is. But Joel,
what happens if you know, Ohio State is is obviously
the best team, and I think they'll decide who wins
(16:48):
the Big Ten. Uh. You know, in that game between
Penn State and Ohio State, we will find out one
of the team is gonna play right like on and
that's our corent wing. But what happens if the Penn
State or the Ohio States of the world one of
the really good teams. What happens if two of the
teams on their schedule they can't play because they have
to cancel and they're still really good, but they only
(17:11):
get to play six regular season games? Like, how in
the world is the College Football Playoff Committee gonna look
at that? If an SEC school plays ten, if hack
a Big ten, Big twelve school plays eleven, you know,
I mean there's like, I mean, that's a huge difference
in trying to overall evaluate the quality of a team. Yeah,
and you know, I think that this is when it's
(17:31):
going to get back down to those words that some people,
you know, love and then other people hate. And now
it's going to be on the other foot. But it's
it's really gonna come down to that I test the
four best teams, and you know, listen, I think it's
pretty obvious that Ohio States really talented. If they're undefeated
(17:51):
and only get five games, they're gonna be in right, Like,
I just that's just kind of the way that that
the cookie crumbles, Unfortunately, I don't think. And and the
hard part is is that I don't think that you
can you can punish them for something that would be
clearly out of their control. That's what I'm saying, Like,
(18:11):
if somebody is not able to play against them. The
problem with the Big ten decision. I'm glad that they
got it back right Well, you and I we talked
about it. We've been fighting for them to get back
to play all that stuff or in agreement. But the
problem with them starting on or heck, whenever the Pac
twelve decides that they're going to play, there's no bubble,
you know, there's no ability to adjust like they have.
(18:32):
They have themselves into a corner where everything has to
go perfect to get the full season. I do think
that the daily testing is gonna pay dividends though, right
Like I think, like trust me, like when I go
into these big twelves places, they're like, listen that the
testing three days a week is killing us because we
have to go back two days and sometimes two and
(18:54):
a half days in contact tracing. Whereas when you're doing
it every single day, the con tracing is a minimum
because you can you can virtually guarantee that if a
player is on the field of competition, whether it's in
a game or a practice. He has tested negative that day,
So that's a that's a big part. So then you
(19:15):
can start to build your schedule to where your limit
the amount of time that you're exposing everybody together, you
limit the exposure to your position group outside of the practice.
So basically from the time you know, I just think
that that's going to help them. But you're right, there
is there's no leeway in this. There there is. And
(19:36):
to be honest, like I said, I think that we're
going to have a really bumpy road as this goes on.
But part of this bumpy road is also our own doing.
And this is the frustration from my end of this. Again,
there has not been a hospitalization, not one, right, and
that's a good thing. That is a good thing. This
Baylor postponement with Houston, the only cases that tested positive
(19:59):
were a symptom out of cases. That's a good thing.
And I want to at least give that as as
not as evident that we should be doing anything different.
But it's just like that's a positive thing. Right. We're
taking overwhelming precautions on this and maybe even too steep,
but the fact of the matter is is that there
(20:19):
is some good news in this and that is that
this this virus is not hitting these college football players
very very hard, at least to this point. And that
is that is a a very good thing right now.
In particular, when you start looking forward to to whether
we can conclude a season or play a playoff or
or any of those things. You know, it's interesting. And
I bet you've had some of these conversations behind the
(20:41):
scenes too. But I've talked to a bunch of people
in college athletics and they've talked about high school football
and wherever you are across the country, I understand some
places you can play high school football, some places you can't.
But for instance, where I am in Tennessee, we've had
a month of games going on and almost none of
them had to be canceled. And people say, well, how
does that happen. They're not testing regularly in high school
(21:04):
football unless somebody actually gets sick, right, unless somebody has
a fever, unless they are noticeably ill, And as a result,
they're able to play all these games because they're not
having to do the contact tracing and everything else. Because
there may be some kids who have it, but they're
all asymptomatic. They're not progressing and showing that they have
(21:24):
a fever. They're not you know, showing in any way
that they are ill. And that's the vast majority of
the people in college. But when I talk to some
of these people in college, they're saying, Man, one of
the big issues we've had is what you just said,
nobody's actually very sick. Some of these guys can't believe
they've actually got it. But because we're testing so frequently,
we are catching those cases, which is leading to games
(21:45):
getting prostponed. And it's just not happening in high school.
So it's it's it's kind of a fascinating window to
look at the at the difference. I mean, again, we're
a month in in many different states for playing high
school football and almost no games are getting canceled and
they're playing with fans. Yeah, so I mean listen that
who who knows, right? I mean, this is this is
(22:08):
it's uncharted territory, beyond the beyond the shadow, and and
and the bros would say, as I like to, you know,
the bros would say like, well, it's so dangerous for
those high school kids because of myo kardiitis. But you know,
I mean, that's so I just wanted to bring that
up as as the Corona Bros. The Corona Bros Are
(22:28):
like getting a standing eight count right now, Joel, Like,
I mean, you know, if you got the Mountain West,
you got the Pack twelve, you got the mac coming back.
You know, you see some of these guys and we
all know who they are on Twitter and and some
of these these journals that like immediately start with the
long haul articles and and all sorts of different articles
about the doom and gloom of you know, well the
(22:50):
CDC now says this and so on and so forth.
So they're certainly getting the standing eight count in the corner.
And I think that they know it, and I think
that they're throwing some of their kind of like last bitch,
you know, Mary, you know, Haymakers to try to get
back into the fight, because the fact of the matter
is is like the reason is winning out because of
the data, right and and so I think that that's
(23:12):
that's a good thing. And I'm hoping that the Big
twelve can get to a partnership with some sort of
of daily testing because I do think that the daily
testing in the Big pen and what's going to happen
in the pactwelve is going to pay huge dividends as
it relates to the roster and it being decimated because
of contact tracing, and that's something that would be worried
for in the SEC. Although if we're gonna talk about
(23:35):
the SEC, I think that the SEC probably has it
right because they at least waited for these waves to
hit cancer then subside. And I don't know if we're
going to have the stop and starts in the SEC
because it's kind of like been through the campus, whereas
the Big twelve tried to play through campus opening to
the general population population and I think that's that's what's
(23:57):
made it so difficult for them. Look, I gotta give
credit to UH and I think we're gonna have Greg Sanky,
SEC Commissioner on this week. But he told me, yeah,
I don't know if it was I know he I
know you've talked to him as well. I don't know
if he said it on air with me or off air,
and I don't think I certainly know he said it
to other people since then. But in one of our
early conversations in the summer, he said, look, my experts
(24:20):
are telling me that when all the kids come back
on campus and a lot of the campus kids come
back in SEC schools in late August. He said, we
are going to have an immediate spike in the number
of cases that are gonna occur on campus. And he
said when that happens, there's gonna be a lot of
doom and gloom. A lot of people are gonna get
nervous about this. But he said, what my experts are
(24:41):
telling me is we'll see an initial spike when all
these kids get back on campus, may take a couple
of weeks, and then it's gonna start to come back down.
It's gonna recede. And he said, that's what we have
to get through, and that is why we are pushing
back the start of the SEC to September. And he said,
I I've made this argument to the Big ten, to
the twelve, to the to the you know, it's like,
(25:02):
this is what my experts are telling me. He ended
up being a hundred percent right, and knock on wood,
it's hard to predict anything in right, but knock on wood,
it appears those cases are now declining, and in theory,
that would be helpful to the college football teams as well,
because that would mean they're just less cass cases on
campus in general, which would theoretically mean less exposures for
(25:24):
your average athlete. Yeah, I think that that's exactly right.
And I think that that you know, it's so interesting
because commissioners in this sport that they have to kind
of pay their dues to earn the the political capital
within their conference to be powerful. Does that make like, Jim,
(25:44):
do you like Jeff Delaney and Mike's live or longtime
guys that had built up in the SEC in the
Big ten and they had enormous political capital within the conferences,
which is why there was never splits or or you know,
people raising their hands saying like I disagree. It's like
once the decision was made, it was like, if we're
(26:05):
all on board, and this is what we're gonna do.
And and unfortunately for Kevin Warren, he didn't have the
opportunity to do that since it the first year, which
is part of the reason you've seen that divide us.
Scott has bungled, has bungled so many things that now
you're starting to see some of that fracture happened within
the Pack twelve because now there's coaches in a d
S getting real upset that they're like, listen, we're trying
(26:26):
to make the Halloween weekend work for week one and
now you know, like U. C. L A Said like, well,
we can't be ready, and some of the other coaches
are like pound Sam, we're playing like we're tired of this.
Ye know what I mean. So you're starting to see
that fracture happened there because Larry doesn't have the political capital.
Bob seems to have it in the Big twelve. But
I I say all of this to say, like Greg
(26:47):
Sanky is going to come out of this as like
the front runner to be the commissioner of the sport
if we ever move in that direction. He's nailed it,
he really has, and and he's been reasoned, he's been cautious,
he's been polytical, he's he's look at the data, and
I think that that might be or could be, or
probably will be the conference with the with the fewest
(27:09):
number of postponements or stops and starts. And if that,
if that actually plays out like I think it will,
he's gonna come out of this being the most powerful
man in college football if he wasn't already, And for
everybody out there, he's a college football fan. Most importantly,
we're just gonna be able to really start to marinate
in the sport and enjoy it because there's just gonna
be a lot of games, you know, starting up this
Saturday and then rolling all the way into October. I
(27:32):
know you can't wait. I can't wait either, Joe Clatt,
we will talk to you maybe on Friday this week.
What game do you have this week? Yeah, let's do
it because I got a ou Kansas State. Let's hope
I've talked to them. They both say that they're they're
looking good as far as numbers as of right now.
So let's hope that they didn't party too hard this
last weekend. And then um, yeah, let's do it Friday morning.
(27:52):
I'll come on Friday morning and we'll run down the weekend. Uh.
That looks head to the SEC. Awesome. I appreciate a
man's Joel go follow him on Twitter at Joel Clapp.
This is outkicked the coverage with Plate Traven. We talked
in the open of the first hour of the program,
(28:16):
but all the two and oh teams and who kind
of stood out to us. I thought, and this may
be a sadness, the list of sadness with all of
the O and two teams, And to me, there is
one element of the O and two teams that stand
out and you think to yourself, Wow, I can't believe
they're O and two. Alright, So here are the teams
I'm gonna run through right now, all the teams that
(28:38):
are O in two and as we said earlier in
the program, if you're two and oh, you have roughly
a sixty one point three percent chance to make the
playoffs historically. But remember you now have seven a f
C and seven NFC. Uh, if you're O in two,
you have a twelve point six percent chance. Again, a
little bit better chances to make the playoff than these
numbers would reflect, because there are out more teams that
(29:01):
are gonna be able to make the playoffs. But to me,
what stands out here as you run through the list
is a lot of the teams that aren't very good
are the teams that we thought would not be very
good coming into the season. In other words, it's not
a surprise that they're owing to the Bengals, the Jets,
the Dolphins, Uh, the Giants, the I would say, uh,
(29:24):
the Lions, not that those teams didn't have a reason
to be excited about their expectations, because there's always teams
that go from worse than the division to best. But
those are teams that I don't think we anticipated necessarily
being very good. And even like the Bengals who are
O in two coming off that Thursday night game, I
think there are a lot of Bengals fans who think, hey,
(29:46):
even though we're O in two, there's a lot of
reasons for optimism. Joe Burrow has looked phenomenal, and hey,
we're not that far away from being a pretty decent team.
And even some of these O and two teams, like
I'll give you an example, the Broncos. I know they
got the injury to Drew Lock, but they could easily
be two and oh right, there's not that much difference
(30:08):
between the way that they performed. But to me, the
teams that are right now OH and two and you're like, oh,
there's no way we should be OH in two. The
three biggest disappointments are the Texans, even though the schedule
was tough, the Eagles, and the Vikings. Okay, and I
(30:30):
would say, in particular, what is fascinating to me about
these teams is the Eagles, there's no way they should
have lost to the Redskins, right a ka. The Washington
football team. There's no tellent how many times I'm gonna
call them the Redskins, the Vikings. I think the way
that they performed yesterday against the Colts, it makes you
(30:50):
feel a little bit ominous, right, not that they not
that they necessarily lost, but the way they got whipped
and the Texans in particular, their schedule is brutal, but
when you actually look at it, you say, Okay, maybe
we didn't expect to beat the Chiefs, and maybe we
didn't expect to beat the Ravens, but they got dominated.
(31:14):
And that is why I would circle the Texans and
the Vikings in particular and say, this is an interesting
storyline that I don't think is getting enough attention as
you break down these two teams. And let me explain
what that is. Uh. It is that the Vikings traded
away Stefon Diggs and they traded him to the Bills,
(31:36):
and Stefon Diggs went off yesterday and the Bills are
now two and oh and oh. By the way, there
was a lot of questions about what was going to
happen with the ability of Josh Allen with the Bills,
and he's suddenly thrown for over three yards both of
the first two games. And if anything, if you're a
Bills fan, which you look at and say is man
(31:57):
our defense hasn't really been as good as our defense
was last year, but our offense has been white years better.
We look a lot more explosive. Josh Allen went for
over four hundred yards and Stefon Diggs went for over
one fifty, and suddenly the Bills are two and oh. Meanwhile,
the team that he left, the Vikings oh and two
Adam Feeling can't get open, Josh Jefferson a little bit
(32:20):
too young to be able to get open, and that
offense has kind of fallen apart. Even with Dalvin Cook.
They had the offseason hold out everything else. But again,
Stephen Diggs is there and they're pretty good team. Win
a playoff game, go down to Saint Storry, New Orleans,
go out of New Orleans, get a win there. He
(32:40):
leaves the team, He joins his two and oh and
looks a lot better offensively. The team that he was
with nowhere near as good as they were before. Kirk
Cousins three interceptions in Week two. Offense is awful, all right,
but the Texans Texas gave a hundred million dollars to
Deshaun Watson. Deshaun Watson has had Andre Hopkins his entire career.
(33:03):
Look At how good DeAndre Hopkins is right now for
Kyler Murray. The Arizona Cardinals are a surprising two and
oh that Houston Texans are an awful low in two.
And I've been saying this about the Texans for a while.
As soon as the schedule came out, I said, oh,
for the Texans gets a lot easier on the back half,
but that first half, they're gonna play themselves right out
(33:24):
of the playoffs. I think there's a good chance that
the Texans are gonna start either one in six or
two and five, and they are not going to be
able to blow up in any kind of way and
replace DeAndre Hopkins. And much like Adam Feeling is not
as good without Stefon Diggs, the Texans right now are
not able to exploit and push the ball down the
(33:47):
field without all of the attention being paid to DeAndre Hopkins.
And Will Fuller's always got hurt hamstrings and everything else,
but he was a major down filled threat. Kenny Stills.
Those guys were able to make plays last year when
they were healthy with with DeAndre Hopkins on the field,
because DeAndre Hopkins created so much of an issue. Have
(34:10):
you seen what DeAndre Hopkins is doing right now with
the Arizona Cardinals. He's absolutely dominating. I was watching the game,
they put up a stat on the screen, no first
year wide receiver with a new team, you know, traded it,
signed as a free agent, whatever you however you want
to classify it. Nobody has been as good as DeAndre
Hopkins has been so far for the Cardinals. And he
(34:34):
looks like an incredible security blanket now for Kyler Murray,
which is exactly what I expected to happen. His performance
on the field has already been extraordinary, not even necessarily
in the total number of catches he's had, because he
had eight for sixty eight yesterday, but in just his
consistency so far. Eight receptions sixty eight yards in a touchdown,
(34:59):
four teen receptions in Week one against the the forty
for a hundred and fifty yards. And here is what
DeAndre Hopkins does man. He gets open eight receptions on
nine targets for DeAndre Hopkins. Basically, every time Kyler Murray
looked to him, he's open against the forty nine fourteen
(35:24):
catches on sixteen targets, you put the ball in the
vicinity of that man and he makes a play, and
the Cardinals now are two and oh and the Texans
are oh and two, making me believe that we have
as a group, including certainly the Texans and the Vikings,
drastically undervalued the impact of DeAndre Hopkins and Stefon Diggs
(35:49):
on their teams and what impact they can have. Worth
keeping in mind, we talk a lot about quarterbacks, but
how much of Deshaun Watson's success was predicated on having
the security blanket of DeAndre Hopkins and how much of
Kirk Cousin's success was predicated on having the security blanket
of Stefon Diggs. I think you're starting to see the
(36:09):
answer was a tremendous amount, particularly early on, and the
growing pains that are gonna be involved there. When we
come back top of hour three, we'll talk about Sunday
night football. We'll talk a little bit about what happened
in the Laker game. As the West Coast is waking up. Also,
we're gonna be joined early in Las Vegas. But my
guy Todd Ferman, he's on Fox Bet Live a k A.
Lock it in with me every single day. We'll talk
(36:32):
about the gambling universe and the NFL week to action
in general, all that still to come. Fox Sports Radio
has the best sports talk lineup in the nation. Catch
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Outkicked the Coverage with Clay Travis live every weekday morning
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(00:23):
Sports Radio. There was so much incredible action going on
in the NFL yesterday, from the one o'clock eastern kickoffs
all the way through to almost midnight when Cam Newton
got stopped going for the winning run there on what
(00:46):
would have been an incredible and improbable comeback, because I
really did think the Patriots were done, and instead Cam
Newton gets somersaulted. And by the way, Julian Edemand had
an incredible game. He had the game winning touchdown past
go through his hands. And I bet that's what Julian
Edelman is thinking about this morning when he gets out
(01:07):
of bed. Is as good as he was, as good
as he played, and he was played pretty extraordinarily. That
catch is the one that's gonna haunt him. Cam versus
Russell Wilson, it was a duel for the ages. It
was absolutely incredible, but it was just one of many
(01:28):
I almost want to say legendary moments. It felt like
a legendary day. And what I mean by that is,
I feel like we'll be seeing that little on side
kick in the Cowboy the Falcons Cowboys game for years
and years. I'm sorry, Falcons fans, I'll be watching your players, like,
watch that slow role as it moved towards ten yards
(01:50):
to see whether or not it was actually going to
stop or not. And that was pretty crazy to watch it, right,
watch that process play out. The Cowboys won a game
that they had absolutely no business winning. The Falcons lost
a game that they had absolutely no business losing, and
I feel like it was more of a Falcon loss
(02:11):
than it was a Cowboy win. And I said this
an hour one, but I just I can't get over
this stat. The Falcons had thirty nine points with zero
turnovers against the Cowboys entering today, meaning the weekend teams
were four hundred and forty and zero when scoring thirty
(02:34):
nine points with zero turnovers since ninety three, when team
turnovers were first tracked, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
I mean, I've never seen anything like that. And then
the Falcons twenty point blown lead, Sorry, Falcon fan, their
largest since Super Bowl fifty one against the Patriots when
(02:54):
they led to three in Houston before collapsing. That ball
slowly rolling felt iconic. I felt a little bit like
justin Herbert coming in played so phenomenally well, and I'm
still in disbelief that Anthony Lynn would be saying, oh,
(03:16):
Tyrod Taylor still our guy? Did Anthony Lynn watch the
same game that you and I did? Arguably, Herbert made
one bad decision the entire game. He should have pulled
the ball down and kept running and got a first down. Instead,
he tried to make a play through a downfield, got
picked off, and that left the door cracked just widely
(03:37):
enough for the Patriots to come roaring back. Sorry for
the Chiefs to come roaring back, the Patriots also came
roaring back. What an unbelievable day of NFL football. I mean,
it was just from basically one o'clock, like I said,
in the afternoon until midnight, thoroughly riveting hard to look away.
(04:02):
And I'm left, you know, I said, and we'll talk
about this probably all season long, but if you were
telling me right now, how would you assess Belichick without Brady.
Even though you lost that game, Patriot fans, don't you
all leave thinking to yourself, Hey, we're still really good.
(04:27):
We should still be the favorites in the a f
C East, even as good as Josh Allen has looked
with two plus yard passing games. If Cam plays like
that like he played against the Seahawks, the Patriots are
going to win the a f C East. Because we've
seen this story before. Belichick will find a way to
(04:50):
get his defense good by the end of the year.
Remember how slow the Patriots usually started the seasons with
Tom Brady set Timber was nothing to remember. October just okay.
By November, in December there round and again the perfect shape.
If anything, the Patriots are way ahead of schedule right now,
(05:10):
certainly on the offensive side of the ball. Josh McDaniels
has to be just in awe over how much he
can do right now with Cam Newton. Meanwhile, we haven't
even hardly talked about the Bucks. The Bucks were just okay.
I watched a lot of their game and they still
haven't hit their stride. I thought one of the most
(05:31):
interesting parts of the of the Bucks game was seeing
Brett Farve walk in with a bag of potato chips
and a Tom Brady T shirt that was actually really funny.
But Brady still does not look like Brady at the
highest level. Now he started to see a little bit
of rhythm with Mike Evans. He started to perform at
(05:53):
a higher level. But right now we said, we're gonna
kind of give you the divorce review, get the vorce
between Brady and Belichick. I gotta tell you, I think
Belichick is doing better without Brady than Brady is without Belichick.
And this will be one of the really interesting storylines
to follow, is to what extent was the Patriot dynasty
(06:18):
primarily being driven by Bill Belichick versus primarily being driven
by Tom Brady. Brady was mediocre. Bad interception, he missed
Gronk on a crossing route if you didn't see it,
overshot him. Very mediocre I thought in general. Now he
did have a couple of drops. Leonard Fournette ran the
ball well. I still like the Bucks to make the
(06:41):
playoffs in the NFC, which Brady has done virtually every
year he's been healthy enough to finish a season. But
I'm way more impressed early on with Cam and Belichick
and what they're able to do than I am with
Bruce arians and Tom Brady and what they're able to do.
(07:02):
So my early read here would be that Belichick is
winning the divorce and that the Patriots are going to
be the better team compared to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
And what's amazing is that's true on the Patriots, even
though they had seven guys decide not to play, and
that didn't even include Tom Brady. I mean, they are
(07:24):
remaking their roster on the fly and they're still being
incredibly productive. That last night was better than any offensive
performance I saw the Patriots have all of last season.
Cam last night with that Patriot offense was better than
(07:45):
any single game performance I saw from Tom Brady last year.
I'm not sure that it can be sustained. I'm not
sure that Cam can run the football as often as
he did. That somersault that he got hit at the
end of the game. Those are big hits that start
to wear and tear on you as you move into
November and December. Not to mention that Cam's already over
(08:06):
the age of thirty. But my goodness, what an unbelievable
and riveting game for all of us who stayed up
to watch it all. Right, when we come back, we're
gonna be joined by Joel Klatt, one of my buddies. Obviously,
he has an unbelievable story. He traveled to Texas to
call the Houston at Baylor game and then the game
(08:27):
got canceled because of the coronavirus after he was already
in Texas, already flew in from California. What in the
world was that like? We'll talk about that with Joel.
What does he think about the Big ten coming back?
What's he hearing on the Pack twelve? All of those
stories and more we will discuss Uh, and we'll continue
to break down everything going on in the world of
(08:48):
the NFL for the rest of this program. This is
outkicked the coverage with Clay Travis. We are rolling through
the program talking a ton NFL but also college football.
The SEC is back this week, which gives me a
new pep in my step. I can't wait for all
of college football to be back. It seems like we're
(09:09):
moving in that direction. But one guy who is a
little bit cursed at least when it comes to being
able to call a Baylor football game, Joel Klatt, Uh Joel,
So tell me what happened. Like Fox has got its
main game. It's supposed to be Baylor in Houston, which
was a game that was scheduled like in in in
record time, right, and you traveled to Waco and then
(09:31):
the game gets camped like what happened on Friday, the
day before the game, it gets canceled. How did you
find that out? I know it's been an unprecedented year
has but there can't have been I wouldn't imagine anything
like what your experience was. So walk us through how
you came to be aware that the game you had
traveled from California to the Texas to call wasn't gonna happen. Yeah,
(09:53):
I mean it was wild. Right. So so first off, um,
you're right about like the game is scheduled because they
ball they are getting canceled from somebody else. And then
we're frustrated about it because and they said, hey, are
testing is good? You know we're in good shape to play.
Houston got canceled on by I believe it was Memphis.
Baylor got canceled on by law Tech the week before
(10:15):
in a game that we were supposed to go do.
And so like they're like, hey, you're good, we're good,
let's play. And then all of a sudden, you know,
Baylor has a couple of positive tests, and because of
contact tracing, the offensive line group um basically is unavailable.
And and that's, by the way, we could get into
a whole another the contact tracing. By the way, in
(10:37):
the contact tracing, how's this, clay, You're gonna love this.
It doesn't matter if those individuals even test negative, even
times they absolutely essentially isolate, like, by the way, this
is happening. But anyways, no, no, this is happening. By
the way, Joel, you know, my three kids are all
back in school, and so if a kid test positive,
(11:00):
even if you continue to test negative, they make those
kids leave the school and they have to quarantine themselves
for fourteen days like elementary school kids. Right, so even
if you're consistently testing negative, and so this contact tracing
business in general, I just the fourteen days is what
gets me. I mean, if you wanted to say, hey,
(11:21):
we're gonna do it for five days, or we're gonna
do it for four like whatever. The average this gets
into the specific, but the average person is going to
manifest an infection within four or five days. To me,
we should treat the average as opposed to the outlier,
because then you could have four or five days. It
would be a lot easier to rectify. But all this
is crazy. So you find out literally the day before
(11:43):
as you're at the facility to meet with the team,
that is not happening. I didn't even get to the
best part. So we travel there, you know, I travel
late on Thursday, or I've pretty late in Baylor, or
excuse me at Waco and wake up. We've got a
nude meeting set uh for to meet with coach or
and we're going to do it in person but socially distance,
you know, maps on all the whole business. Right, We're
(12:05):
sitting there and and twelve or five comes, and then
twelve ten comes, and I immediately I'm like, nope, this
is bad because which is are prompts? Right? Like, so
it's you, it's you, like Gus and Jenny. You're sitting
there waiting to meet Yes, our producer and um and
director as well, and so the whole team. You guys
are sitting there and you're like, this is not good
(12:26):
because coaches are usually always on time because they have
such a heavily scheduled day right, especially date game day
before game. Thirty minutes later, the A D walks in
hanging his head Macro Rhodes and I immediately I'm like, okay,
I just closed my book because I'm like, okay, we're
not gonna play. And I mean, he was devastated, you know.
(12:46):
To his credit, he's like, listen, I'm he's he's apologizing profusely,
and and he says, you know, listen, we're not going
to be able to play. And and you know, this
is the other interesting part. I don't know if this
has been report it a lot or not. And I
don't think I'm breaking any any news here, but David
Ended did something that I think is gonna pay dividends
(13:07):
for him long run. He could have they felt under
the big twelve threshold by one in the offsite, fine group, okay,
by one you need seven. They didn't apparently have that,
you know, based on their numbers, And he could have
gotten to the threshold if he were to unsuspend one
of their players. Unwilling to do that, and he said,
(13:30):
I'm not gonna do that. I'm not gonna unsuspended player
on my first game as I'm trying to build something here,
and I thought, you know what, that's pretty commendable, you know,
for Dave Randon. And so he walked in after the
a d mac Roads did get a chance to talk
with him for a second. He was very dejected and disappointed.
The best part about it was we walk outside. So
(13:52):
now it's like twelve forty we walk outside. My phone rings,
it's Dana Holgerson absolutely like waterway, what's happening? What are
we doing? Uh? Well, this is the fourth time my
kids are gonna be crushed. And to his point, think
about this, he and he told us earlier in the
(14:13):
week he was like, one of the reasons I accepted
this game wasn't just so that we could play. It
was because he thinks he was teetering on potentially losing
his team. Right, because they're asking these kids to be
I mean, what's the words. They have to be disciplined
on a level that no college kid has ever been
(14:35):
disciplined before, right, Like you're asking them to buy in,
to buy in in a way that literally maybe maybe
you can say an Army and Navy and in one
of the academies. You know what, you just have to
be incredibly But but there's no precedent for a regular
college kid to be in this situation and to be
this discipline right, and so to be hermits. You know,
(14:57):
so Dana is basically like, listen, I had to have
a game or else I was going to lose them,
and you know, so who knows? And and that brings
up a bigger question and we'll see how it manifests
itself in some of these conferences that are gonna do
daily testing. But you know what happens when the team's
one and four, Well, yeah, quite like I'm telling you,
(15:21):
this is gonna get This is gonna get really dicey.
In particular, was because of some of these standards, these
playing standards that these conferences are putting on these teams.
The big tent standards are incredibly difficult. Twenty one days
for a positive test, automatically five of your team test positive,
you gotta stop for seven days. Like it's there. There
(15:42):
are things now. I think the daily testing might help
a little bit, in particular with the contact tracing. But
I'm I'm I'm nervous for some of these other conferences
just because of the fact that, yeah, we're we're asking
these kids to do something that these young men that
is unnatural to people their age. Let's just say right, yea. Look,
(16:03):
there are two things that that build out of what
you were just saying that I think you're fascinating. One
is this the Big Ten's coming back. That's a very
good positive. They're coming back with almost no safety net,
right they're coming back on of October. They're trying to
play eight games and then a conference title game. And
by the way, one of the funny things is you
talk about a team quitting when they're like one and four,
(16:26):
are oh and eight Rutgers and oh and eight Illinois
or whatever it is really going to meet in a
game at the end of the season to see, you know,
like you talk about trying like that for the toilet
Bowl or whatever you want to call it, the opposite
of what the Big Ten title game is. But Joel,
what happens if you know, Ohio State is is obviously
the best team, and I think they'll decide who wins
(16:48):
the Big Ten. Uh. You know, in that game between
Penn State and Ohio State, we will find out one
of the team is gonna play right like on and
that's our corent wing. But what happens if the Penn
State or the Ohio States of the world one of
the really good teams. What happens if two of the
teams on their schedule they can't play because they have
to cancel and they're still really good, but they only
(17:11):
get to play six regular season games? Like, how in
the world is the College Football Playoff Committee gonna look
at that? If an SEC school plays ten, if hack
a Big ten, Big twelve school plays eleven, you know,
I mean there's like, I mean, that's a huge difference
in trying to overall evaluate the quality of a team. Yeah,
and you know, I think that this is when it's
(17:31):
going to get back down to those words that some people,
you know, love and then other people hate. And now
it's going to be on the other foot. But it's
it's really gonna come down to that I test the
four best teams, and you know, listen, I think it's
pretty obvious that Ohio States really talented. If they're undefeated
(17:51):
and only get five games, they're gonna be in right, Like,
I just that's just kind of the way that that
the cookie crumbles, Unfortunately, I don't think. And and the
hard part is is that I don't think that you
can you can punish them for something that would be
clearly out of their control. That's what I'm saying, Like,
(18:11):
if somebody is not able to play against them. The
problem with the Big ten decision. I'm glad that they
got it back right Well, you and I we talked
about it. We've been fighting for them to get back
to play all that stuff or in agreement. But the
problem with them starting on or heck, whenever the Pac
twelve decides that they're going to play, there's no bubble,
you know, there's no ability to adjust like they have.
(18:32):
They have themselves into a corner where everything has to
go perfect to get the full season. I do think
that the daily testing is gonna pay dividends though, right
Like I think, like trust me, like when I go
into these big twelves places, they're like, listen that the
testing three days a week is killing us because we
have to go back two days and sometimes two and
(18:54):
a half days in contact tracing. Whereas when you're doing
it every single day, the con tracing is a minimum
because you can you can virtually guarantee that if a
player is on the field of competition, whether it's in
a game or a practice. He has tested negative that day,
So that's a that's a big part. So then you
(19:15):
can start to build your schedule to where your limit
the amount of time that you're exposing everybody together, you
limit the exposure to your position group outside of the practice.
So basically from the time you know, I just think
that that's going to help them. But you're right, there
is there's no leeway in this. There there is. And
(19:36):
to be honest, like I said, I think that we're
going to have a really bumpy road as this goes on.
But part of this bumpy road is also our own doing.
And this is the frustration from my end of this. Again,
there has not been a hospitalization, not one, right, and
that's a good thing. That is a good thing. This
Baylor postponement with Houston, the only cases that tested positive
(19:59):
were a symptom out of cases. That's a good thing.
And I want to at least give that as as
not as evident that we should be doing anything different.
But it's just like that's a positive thing. Right. We're
taking overwhelming precautions on this and maybe even too steep,
but the fact of the matter is is that there
(20:19):
is some good news in this and that is that
this this virus is not hitting these college football players
very very hard, at least to this point. And that
is that is a a very good thing right now.
In particular, when you start looking forward to to whether
we can conclude a season or play a playoff or
or any of those things. You know, it's interesting. And
I bet you've had some of these conversations behind the
(20:41):
scenes too. But I've talked to a bunch of people
in college athletics and they've talked about high school football
and wherever you are across the country, I understand some
places you can play high school football, some places you can't.
But for instance, where I am in Tennessee, we've had
a month of games going on and almost none of
them had to be canceled. And people say, well, how
does that happen. They're not testing regularly in high school
(21:04):
football unless somebody actually gets sick, right, unless somebody has
a fever, unless they are noticeably ill, And as a result,
they're able to play all these games because they're not
having to do the contact tracing and everything else. Because
there may be some kids who have it, but they're
all asymptomatic. They're not progressing and showing that they have
(21:24):
a fever. They're not you know, showing in any way
that they are ill. And that's the vast majority of
the people in college. But when I talk to some
of these people in college, they're saying, Man, one of
the big issues we've had is what you just said,
nobody's actually very sick. Some of these guys can't believe
they've actually got it. But because we're testing so frequently,
we are catching those cases, which is leading to games
(21:45):
getting prostponed. And it's just not happening in high school.
So it's it's it's kind of a fascinating window to
look at the at the difference. I mean, again, we're
a month in in many different states for playing high
school football and almost no games are getting canceled and
they're playing with fans. Yeah, so I mean listen that
who who knows, right? I mean, this is this is
(22:08):
it's uncharted territory, beyond the beyond the shadow, and and
and the bros would say, as I like to, you know,
the bros would say like, well, it's so dangerous for
those high school kids because of myo kardiitis. But you know,
I mean, that's so I just wanted to bring that
up as as the Corona Bros. The Corona Bros Are
(22:28):
like getting a standing eight count right now, Joel, Like,
I mean, you know, if you got the Mountain West,
you got the Pack twelve, you got the mac coming back.
You know, you see some of these guys and we
all know who they are on Twitter and and some
of these these journals that like immediately start with the
long haul articles and and all sorts of different articles
about the doom and gloom of you know, well the
(22:50):
CDC now says this and so on and so forth.
So they're certainly getting the standing eight count in the corner.
And I think that they know it, and I think
that they're throwing some of their kind of like last bitch,
you know, Mary, you know, Haymakers to try to get
back into the fight, because the fact of the matter
is is like the reason is winning out because of
the data, right and and so I think that that's
(23:12):
that's a good thing. And I'm hoping that the Big
twelve can get to a partnership with some sort of
of daily testing because I do think that the daily
testing in the Big pen and what's going to happen
in the pactwelve is going to pay huge dividends as
it relates to the roster and it being decimated because
of contact tracing, and that's something that would be worried
for in the SEC. Although if we're gonna talk about
(23:35):
the SEC, I think that the SEC probably has it
right because they at least waited for these waves to
hit cancer then subside. And I don't know if we're
going to have the stop and starts in the SEC
because it's kind of like been through the campus, whereas
the Big twelve tried to play through campus opening to
the general population population and I think that's that's what's
(23:57):
made it so difficult for them. Look, I gotta give
credit to UH and I think we're gonna have Greg Sanky,
SEC Commissioner on this week. But he told me, yeah,
I don't know if it was I know he I
know you've talked to him as well. I don't know
if he said it on air with me or off air,
and I don't think I certainly know he said it
to other people since then. But in one of our
early conversations in the summer, he said, look, my experts
(24:20):
are telling me that when all the kids come back
on campus and a lot of the campus kids come
back in SEC schools in late August. He said, we
are going to have an immediate spike in the number
of cases that are gonna occur on campus. And he
said when that happens, there's gonna be a lot of
doom and gloom. A lot of people are gonna get
nervous about this. But he said, what my experts are
(24:41):
telling me is we'll see an initial spike when all
these kids get back on campus, may take a couple
of weeks, and then it's gonna start to come back down.
It's gonna recede. And he said, that's what we have
to get through, and that is why we are pushing
back the start of the SEC to September. And he said,
I I've made this argument to the Big ten, to
the twelve, to the to the you know, it's like,
(25:02):
this is what my experts are telling me. He ended
up being a hundred percent right, and knock on wood,
it's hard to predict anything in right, but knock on wood,
it appears those cases are now declining, and in theory,
that would be helpful to the college football teams as well,
because that would mean they're just less cass cases on
campus in general, which would theoretically mean less exposures for
(25:24):
your average athlete. Yeah, I think that that's exactly right.
And I think that that you know, it's so interesting
because commissioners in this sport that they have to kind
of pay their dues to earn the the political capital
within their conference to be powerful. Does that make like, Jim,
(25:44):
do you like Jeff Delaney and Mike's live or longtime
guys that had built up in the SEC in the
Big ten and they had enormous political capital within the conferences,
which is why there was never splits or or you know,
people raising their hands saying like I disagree. It's like
once the decision was made, it was like, if we're
(26:05):
all on board, and this is what we're gonna do.
And and unfortunately for Kevin Warren, he didn't have the
opportunity to do that since it the first year, which
is part of the reason you've seen that divide us.
Scott has bungled, has bungled so many things that now
you're starting to see some of that fracture happened within
the Pack twelve because now there's coaches in a d
S getting real upset that they're like, listen, we're trying
(26:26):
to make the Halloween weekend work for week one and
now you know, like U. C. L A Said like, well,
we can't be ready, and some of the other coaches
are like pound Sam, we're playing like we're tired of this.
Ye know what I mean. So you're starting to see
that fracture happened there because Larry doesn't have the political capital.
Bob seems to have it in the Big twelve. But
I I say all of this to say, like Greg
(26:47):
Sanky is going to come out of this as like
the front runner to be the commissioner of the sport
if we ever move in that direction. He's nailed it,
he really has, and and he's been reasoned, he's been cautious,
he's been polytical, he's he's look at the data, and
I think that that might be or could be, or
probably will be the conference with the with the fewest
(27:09):
number of postponements or stops and starts. And if that,
if that actually plays out like I think it will,
he's gonna come out of this being the most powerful
man in college football if he wasn't already, And for
everybody out there, he's a college football fan. Most importantly,
we're just gonna be able to really start to marinate
in the sport and enjoy it because there's just gonna
be a lot of games, you know, starting up this
Saturday and then rolling all the way into October. I
(27:32):
know you can't wait. I can't wait either, Joe Clatt,
we will talk to you maybe on Friday this week.
What game do you have this week? Yeah, let's do
it because I got a ou Kansas State. Let's hope
I've talked to them. They both say that they're they're
looking good as far as numbers as of right now.
So let's hope that they didn't party too hard this
last weekend. And then um, yeah, let's do it Friday morning.
(27:52):
I'll come on Friday morning and we'll run down the weekend. Uh.
That looks head to the SEC. Awesome. I appreciate a
man's Joel go follow him on Twitter at Joel Clapp.
This is outkicked the coverage with Plate Traven. We talked
in the open of the first hour of the program,
(28:16):
but all the two and oh teams and who kind
of stood out to us. I thought, and this may
be a sadness, the list of sadness with all of
the O and two teams, And to me, there is
one element of the O and two teams that stand
out and you think to yourself, Wow, I can't believe
they're O and two. Alright, So here are the teams
I'm gonna run through right now, all the teams that
(28:38):
are O in two and as we said earlier in
the program, if you're two and oh, you have roughly
a sixty one point three percent chance to make the
playoffs historically. But remember you now have seven a f
C and seven NFC. Uh, if you're O in two,
you have a twelve point six percent chance. Again, a
little bit better chances to make the playoff than these
numbers would reflect, because there are out more teams that
(29:01):
are gonna be able to make the playoffs. But to me,
what stands out here as you run through the list
is a lot of the teams that aren't very good
are the teams that we thought would not be very
good coming into the season. In other words, it's not
a surprise that they're owing to the Bengals, the Jets,
the Dolphins, Uh, the Giants, the I would say, uh,
(29:24):
the Lions, not that those teams didn't have a reason
to be excited about their expectations, because there's always teams
that go from worse than the division to best. But
those are teams that I don't think we anticipated necessarily
being very good. And even like the Bengals who are
O in two coming off that Thursday night game, I
think there are a lot of Bengals fans who think, hey,
(29:46):
even though we're O in two, there's a lot of
reasons for optimism. Joe Burrow has looked phenomenal, and hey,
we're not that far away from being a pretty decent team.
And even some of these O and two teams, like
I'll give you an example, the Broncos. I know they
got the injury to Drew Lock, but they could easily
be two and oh right, there's not that much difference
(30:08):
between the way that they performed. But to me, the
teams that are right now OH and two and you're like, oh,
there's no way we should be OH in two. The
three biggest disappointments are the Texans, even though the schedule
was tough, the Eagles, and the Vikings. Okay, and I
(30:30):
would say, in particular, what is fascinating to me about
these teams is the Eagles, there's no way they should
have lost to the Redskins, right a ka. The Washington
football team. There's no tellent how many times I'm gonna
call them the Redskins, the Vikings. I think the way
that they performed yesterday against the Colts, it makes you
(30:50):
feel a little bit ominous, right, not that they not
that they necessarily lost, but the way they got whipped
and the Texans in particular, their schedule is brutal, but
when you actually look at it, you say, Okay, maybe
we didn't expect to beat the Chiefs, and maybe we
didn't expect to beat the Ravens, but they got dominated.
(31:14):
And that is why I would circle the Texans and
the Vikings in particular and say, this is an interesting
storyline that I don't think is getting enough attention as
you break down these two teams. And let me explain
what that is. Uh. It is that the Vikings traded
away Stefon Diggs and they traded him to the Bills,
(31:36):
and Stefon Diggs went off yesterday and the Bills are
now two and oh and oh. By the way, there
was a lot of questions about what was going to
happen with the ability of Josh Allen with the Bills,
and he's suddenly thrown for over three yards both of
the first two games. And if anything, if you're a
Bills fan, which you look at and say is man
(31:57):
our defense hasn't really been as good as our defense
was last year, but our offense has been white years better.
We look a lot more explosive. Josh Allen went for
over four hundred yards and Stefon Diggs went for over
one fifty, and suddenly the Bills are two and oh. Meanwhile,
the team that he left, the Vikings oh and two
Adam Feeling can't get open, Josh Jefferson a little bit
(32:20):
too young to be able to get open, and that
offense has kind of fallen apart. Even with Dalvin Cook.
They had the offseason hold out everything else. But again,
Stephen Diggs is there and they're pretty good team. Win
a playoff game, go down to Saint Storry, New Orleans,
go out of New Orleans, get a win there. He
(32:40):
leaves the team, He joins his two and oh and
looks a lot better offensively. The team that he was
with nowhere near as good as they were before. Kirk
Cousins three interceptions in Week two. Offense is awful, all right,
but the Texans Texas gave a hundred million dollars to
Deshaun Watson. Deshaun Watson has had Andre Hopkins his entire career.
(33:03):
Look At how good DeAndre Hopkins is right now for
Kyler Murray. The Arizona Cardinals are a surprising two and
oh that Houston Texans are an awful low in two.
And I've been saying this about the Texans for a while.
As soon as the schedule came out, I said, oh,
for the Texans gets a lot easier on the back half,
but that first half, they're gonna play themselves right out
(33:24):
of the playoffs. I think there's a good chance that
the Texans are gonna start either one in six or
two and five, and they are not going to be
able to blow up in any kind of way and
replace DeAndre Hopkins. And much like Adam Feeling is not
as good without Stefon Diggs, the Texans right now are
not able to exploit and push the ball down the
(33:47):
field without all of the attention being paid to DeAndre Hopkins.
And Will Fuller's always got hurt hamstrings and everything else,
but he was a major down filled threat. Kenny Stills.
Those guys were able to make plays last year when
they were healthy with with DeAndre Hopkins on the field,
because DeAndre Hopkins created so much of an issue. Have
(34:10):
you seen what DeAndre Hopkins is doing right now with
the Arizona Cardinals. He's absolutely dominating. I was watching the game,
they put up a stat on the screen, no first
year wide receiver with a new team, you know, traded it,
signed as a free agent, whatever you however you want
to classify it. Nobody has been as good as DeAndre
Hopkins has been so far for the Cardinals. And he
(34:34):
looks like an incredible security blanket now for Kyler Murray,
which is exactly what I expected to happen. His performance
on the field has already been extraordinary, not even necessarily
in the total number of catches he's had, because he
had eight for sixty eight yesterday, but in just his
consistency so far. Eight receptions sixty eight yards in a touchdown,
(34:59):
four teen receptions in Week one against the the forty
for a hundred and fifty yards. And here is what
DeAndre Hopkins does man. He gets open eight receptions on
nine targets for DeAndre Hopkins. Basically, every time Kyler Murray
looked to him, he's open against the forty nine fourteen
(35:24):
catches on sixteen targets, you put the ball in the
vicinity of that man and he makes a play, and
the Cardinals now are two and oh and the Texans
are oh and two, making me believe that we have
as a group, including certainly the Texans and the Vikings,
drastically undervalued the impact of DeAndre Hopkins and Stefon Diggs
(35:49):
on their teams and what impact they can have. Worth
keeping in mind, we talk a lot about quarterbacks, but
how much of Deshaun Watson's success was predicated on having
the security blanket of DeAndre Hopkins and how much of
Kirk Cousin's success was predicated on having the security blanket
of Stefon Diggs. I think you're starting to see the
(36:09):
answer was a tremendous amount, particularly early on, and the
growing pains that are gonna be involved there. When we
come back top of hour three, we'll talk about Sunday
night football. We'll talk a little bit about what happened
in the Laker game. As the West Coast is waking up. Also,
we're gonna be joined early in Las Vegas. But my
guy Todd Ferman, he's on Fox Bet Live a k A.
Lock it in with me every single day. We'll talk
(36:32):
about the gambling universe and the NFL week to action
in general, all that still to come. Fox Sports Radio
has the best sports talk lineup in the nation. Catch
all of our shows at Fox sports Radio dot com
and within the I Heart Radio app. Search f s
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