3 & Out - Justin Herbert & Chargers get HUGE WIN on MNF vs. Jalen Hurts & Eagles - The Herd with Colin Cowherd

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
The volume, What is going on everybody? John Middlecoff three
and our podcast, How are we doing? Probably better than

(00:23):
the Eagles who just lose on Monday Night Football to
the Chargers for the third straight week in a row.
They are now eight and five. The Chargers are nine
and four. Somehow win a game with no o line,
a quarterback with a broken hand who was throwing the
ball over the place, million turnovers, ugly game, but they
come out victorious in the Eagles five hour flight home

(00:46):
at eight and five. They got major, major problems and
are leaking serious oil. Schador Sanders named starting quarterback rest
of the year, Fernando Mendoza Heisman favorite, and Philip Rivers
turn four, twenty four years old December eighth. We'll have
a workout for the Indianapolis Colts on Tuesday morning. Pretty

(01:08):
sure I saw Schefter call him a grandpa. Uh literally,
I mean I think one of his maybe his oldest
daughter had a had a child. So grandfather playing football
this week, hopefully for the cold. I want to see
that happen. But we'll dive into that as well. We
have a mail bag at John Middlecoff at John Middlecoff
is the mail bag Fire in my dms on Instagram,

(01:30):
Subscribe to the YouTube, subscribe to the podcast if you
listen on Collins feed. Appreciate you guys, Thanks for supporting
the show, Thanks for always listening. And uh, before we
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last minute tickets low as price care team. I didn't

(02:38):
see this coming. Now. I took the Chargers money line
in this game, but it was more just like kind
of being counterculture. I don't even necessarily know if I
believed it. And you know, as Herbert's playing with the
broken hand their offensive line. I would say the majority
of this game, even as the Eagles were turning over

(03:00):
and turning it over and turning it over, I still
never really believed that the Eagles were going to lose
this game. Sitting on my couch, and when the game ended,
I went, you know what they deserve to lose, because
tonight's a great example of I mean, Jalen through four interceptions,
Two of them are one hundred percent in his fault.

(03:21):
One is clearly on AJ Brown, who's whenever his commercial
runs during Eagles games, it's hard not to laugh him
talking about like basically demanding the ball. It feels like
he wrote the script for that commercial that is basically
he wants broadcast in Jalen's locker. But if you are
going to keep saying this and I've defended him, I mean,
he had an awful drop that led to a touch

(03:44):
that led to a field goal that tied the game.
He had a play in the corner of the end
zone that probably ends the game essentially if he catches
it and he dropped the ball. Now, he did make
some plays, but he had two crucial negative plays. But
like you watched the Eagles, I was thinking about this,
would they fire their offensive coordinator tomorrow? And my answer

(04:07):
in my own head was probably not short week. You know,
Sirianni just claimed that he had a stronger hand in
everything they were doing, and they came out the game
and they were just atrocious, and Jalen was I mean,
that's as bad of a first half as you're gonna
see in probably football history, not just him, but the
overall operation of them in the Chargers playing offense, but

(04:29):
just intercepted multiple times. I mean, he literally had a
double turnoverplay. But in the second half, after they run
a great play the fake push push, you know, pitch
to Saquon for a long touchdown. He's running like twenty
five miles an hour. You went, okay, listen, Saquon shows
he still got it. Start giving them the ball. I know,

(04:50):
your offensive line is kind of in shambles. I know
the Chargers are pretty good on defense, and their defensive
line is stout, but how about this. Once he scores,
the Chargers get the ball, they go three and out,
and they punt. It is sixteen to three, there's like
ten minutes left in the game. How about this instead
of trying to throw the ball and spread this thing out,
like we got Joe Burrow playing quarterback, you got a

(05:12):
guy that's clearly a little off tonight. Your offensive general
is a little off. Start running the ball, settle things down.
What do they do? They throw the ball and the
worst thing that happened is they get a nineteen yard game.
The next play A J. Brown drops it, Chargers get
the ball, and then boom they score in sixteen to sixteen.
And I just think too often there's no identity, rhythm,

(05:33):
or any clear idea of what they want to do.
It's kind of just we're trying to prove that our
guy can be like some elite passer. I mean in
a game where I mean, how many how many touchdowns
the Charger to score tonight one they score one touchdown tonight
the Hampton pass Uh yeah, I mean they scored one

(05:54):
touchdown tonight just kicking field goals left and right for
Sakeuon Barkley only to have twenty carries is pretty insane,
and you essentially played five quarters of football like out
of Saquan at a game like this, you see you
look at Jim Harbaugh. Herbert had ten carries and a
lot of those are called carries. Hampton at thirteen, I

(06:14):
didn't think he looked that good. Vydell had fourteen. So
between the two of those guys, they had twenty seven carries.
They had seven more carries than Saquon Barkley. I get that.
Jalen and maybe the franchise no one's told me this,
but have gotten away from like he's not a running quarterback.
He's just a passing quarterback, even though a positive attribute

(06:38):
for him as a player is his ability to run.
Like justin Herbert's out there is a broken fucking hand.
They can't stop his elbow from bleeding. They're using like
all sorts of different ointments and contraptions on it to
stop it. The sideline reporters said that they tried like
four different things. They couldn't stop it from gushing blood.

(07:00):
And they are just calling quarterback keepers and it's working.
Why Herbert's an elite athlete? Do you know what Herbert
also is? Now he wasn't tonight, but he's a pocket passer,
like he's a great thrower of the ball. But it
was like, we gotta do what we got to do
to win. And you're looking at the Eagles, whose offensive
coordinator and clearly Sirianni's involved. It's like, we got to pass.

(07:21):
How does Jalen have forty pass attempts in a game
like this? Like to me, you would think like if
Ben Johnson or Kyle Shanahan or Jim Harbaugh had the
Eagles team tonight, I feel like they would have had
they had twenty five rush attempts. I feel like they
would have had forty five. And it's like, Okay, you're
gonna stop. But sometimes but eventually, this guy that we're

(07:42):
paying a ton of money that was arguably like the
MVP of the league last year, I know he's had
you know, a rough season, but it's gotten his mojo
back a little bit. We're gonna ride him, We're gonna
write him like secretariat. But that's just not how the
Eagles have really operated, especially with Kevin Patola. And remember
a couple of years ago, or was it last year

(08:02):
when they were kind of struggling, and then the offensive
line went in and they talked to him and was like,
let's run the ball. And what happens. Saquon went for
like two thousand yards. Now I understand the offensive line
is injuries. You know, Landing gets injured. Tonight, he comes out,
he goes back in lane, Johnson's out. Clearly their center
play has dropped off a cliff from where it was

(08:22):
last year. Their touch push, hell, they didn't even run
it tonight in a spot where Jason Kelsey at halftime
was like a little surprise there. It was like third
and two. Back in the day, we would have ran
two touch pushes, we would have a first down. But
I just think when you don't have an identity, when
you have a play caller who was under this much scrutiny,
when you're trying to prove to the world that you're something,

(08:45):
you're not, Like you have great wide receivers like aj
had a up and down night, but he is a
very very talented guy. DeVante Smith is clearly a big
time talent, and Dallas Goddard's a very good tight end.
So your passing weapons are top notch for NFL standards, right,
but if your quarterback, especially in a game like tonight,

(09:06):
has just he's been awful all season. I was thinking
this today. How many teams that lead the league in
three and outs in the middle of December often have
a winning record. It can't be very often. Typically the
teams with the worst offense in the league or one
of them are the worst teams. Now. I know they

(09:27):
technically don't have the worst offense, that's just a category
that but it's pretty bad. I mean that means your
punter is getting a lot of use, and it was
on full display tonight, and every time Jalen dropped back.
I don't know where you stood, but for me, I
thought it wasn't going to be a positive play. Now,
he made some really nice throws, the drive throw to

(09:48):
DeVante over the middle of the field, and overtime even
Troy said, like, I'd like to see him kind of
work the middle of the field a little bit more.
He throws a nice deep ball, but in terms of
when his rhythm and his timing's a little bit off,
it looks awful and tonight for the majority of the game,
it looked really bad. But part of coaching is strategy

(10:11):
is doing right by your players, and doing right by
your players is calling plays that are going to be
conducive to making them look good or making them productive.
And the continue to call passes tonight felt a little frustrating,
I thought, and then especially when for the first time
it felt like all year, say Quan how long was

(10:33):
that run? It was fifty two yards. It was like, oh,
this feels a little you know, against a high end
defense with a defensive coordinator that's going to interview for
head coaching jobs, it's like, listen, maybe you don't have
another fifty yard run this game, but maybe he's got
like a twenty yard run in the bag and they
just avoid it and the moment, here's their problem. A

(10:55):
good offensive coordinator who is confident in his ability to
call run plays and just overall in his running game
will stick with it. They will be unfazed. They will
not flinch on first down when you get stuffed fo
no yards or one yard. And that happened all the
time the night. They would call early down runs and

(11:18):
SAQ one would get swallowed up, and then the next
two plays would be passes. It's like, guys, why won't
you just have a drive where you call three straight
run plays? And I understand the Eagles are a very
analytically driven organization, and I just I can't get behind
when you have a player that great with a quarterback

(11:40):
struggling that much to continue to just try to ride
them until the wheels fall off and ultimately lost the
game doing what passing the ball? Now, it wasn't I
don't want to put it all on Jalen. It was
more of a great play by the defensive back. But
how can you be shocked when you lost the game?
When you when that was a fourth interception? I mean,

(12:03):
you had five turnovers. And the other thing that if
you're an Eagle fan, you're sitting here right now, you're
eight and five. And let's just state this fact. Neither
one of these teams are doing anything in the playoffs.
To me, both of these two teams are a one
and done operation. Come that second week of January, the
Eagles got you know, I would assume that they will

(12:25):
take care of business with Washington and the Raiders, so
they will end up with eleven wins and the Cowboys
can't catch them, even if they run the table. So
I'm gonna give them the benefit of doubt on that
that the Eagles end up winning the NFC East, which
to me, I mean still feels a little bold because
the Eagles are liable to drop a game. But when
you watch Washington play, I mean they're in complete shambles now.

(12:48):
I mean JJ McCarthy just lit them up like Christmas Tree.
I mean the Raiders quit two months ago. The Buffalo game.
That's an l I mean, if your offense doesn't play
well in that game and there's no way you can
beat a team that can score like the Buffalo Bills.
But I just think I get back to if I'm
a defensive player for the Philadelphia Eagles and that was

(13:10):
the good tonight. I mean they were awesome. The linebacker
played tonight. I mean, na Kobe Dean hit Omarion Hampton
so hard in the hole and went right through him
and caused that fumble on on on Justin Herbert. I
only imagine Kirby Smart in his office, just just going
six to midnight with a massive smile. He might play

(13:32):
that in the in the Georgia practice facility. Just on Loop.
That was Nolan Smith flying around Jalen Phillips flying around,
Jordan Davis making plays, Cooper Dejean, you know, locked up
Lad McConkey like he was Dion Sanders. He was. He
was awesome. They had seven sacks, they were all It

(13:53):
felt like they had twenty sacks. They hit Herbert over
and over and over again. Herbert's like he Jalen Carter
didn't play in this game or he literally might have
died a night on the field. I mean, he was
getting crushed. There would be times when he went down
you liked, he is he gonna break his hand again.
So the Eagles defense was awesome, but when your quarterback

(14:14):
and your offense is turning it over, I mean they
literally turned it over twice. On a play he threw
the pick, which was a terrible pick. Then the obviously
the defensive lineman is thinking, I don't know if he's
thinking pick six or what he's thinking. Definitely doesn't think
he's ever gonna end up with an interception, gets the
ball knocked out. Jalen gets it, and he immediately gets
the ball knocked out, And that kind of summed up

(14:36):
and was symbolic on Philadelphia. And here's the thing I've
lived in this town. It is an intense place. It
can thrive on negativity and that that fan base has
to hate this team right now because they know there's
a lot of talent. Like that's the thing with the
passing game. Like I watched these two wide receivers in
a tight end dominate and be a huge reason our

(14:58):
team won the Super Bowl. I watched this running back
who is a local guy, ball out since high school
to Penn State. Then we finally get him from the
New York Giants and he runs for two K and
he looks like Walter Payton doing it. And now we
just consistently go away from it, even the night when
a play worked, like, we won't go back. It doesn't

(15:21):
make any sense. So I'd be a little surprised if
we wake up in the morning and the offensive coordinator
has been fired, because who else are you gonna put
in that position? But we have seen teams late in
the season. Remember a long time ago, John Harbaugh fired
I think it was Cam Cameron late with like three

(15:42):
games to go. You know, a couple of years ago,
the Eagles made a move with their defensive coordinator that
that might have been middle of November with Patricia so
that they are not afraid to do bold things. And
I would imagine Howie and Jeffrey. You saw the smile
on Jeffrey face after that tush push goes fifty plus,

(16:04):
you know, because he's like, God, we got so many
explosive players, why don't we have more explosive plays? And
the answer is the offense is just broken. There's no
raw Rod new Rockney speeches from Nick Sirianni in his
Eagles gear with the Italian flag on the side of it,
that's gonna do a goddamn thing. Your passing game is broken.

(16:25):
It doesn't work. Your offense does not work. And I
think the frustrating thing is for them. Aj makes a ton,
Davante makes a ton. God, it makes a ton. Saquon
makes a ton a ton. Obviously, the quarterback is very
highly paid, so it's not like we got a bunch
of random guys out there. We're paying premiums for this

(16:47):
operation and it's simply not working. And to lose a
game to night to a team that basically has no
offensive line, I mean they literally lose one of their
backup offensive lineman early in the game. They cannot block
anybody that they barely have a run game. How many
yards as a Charger? The Chargers ran for one hundred

(17:08):
and seventy yards, but sixty six of those were the quarterback.
You know, Hampton has fifty six yards. I guess they
ran for a little bit better than I thought, But
I mean I just thought, how do we lose that team?
It's essentially a home game five hours away. That's a
devastating loss for Philly. And like I said, I don't

(17:31):
see them winning a playoff game. There are some shades
of two years ago when that team just unraveled and
then they got blown out in the first round by
Tampa Bay. Kind of feels like that's gonna happen again
this year. And like when I confidently said that they're
gonna win the division, I do have a hard time
seeing the Raiders or the Washington team that I just

(17:53):
watched last weekend beat them. But when you're playing this
poorly on offense, and you know your inability to get
first downs, your you know, the turnovers to night obviously
it's one of the worst games he'll ever play in
his entire career. But like their offense has been operating
like this, just without the turnovers, right. I looked they

(18:16):
averaged twenty two points a game. They scored nineteen tonight,
So I mean, this is this is kind of the
Eagles operation, and you know, typically they win because they're
not just giving you field position like they did to
night with some of these turnovers. But I thought the
play calling was atrocious and I just don't really know
where you go from here, Like there's not a fix
in the middle of the season. It kind of is

(18:38):
what it is, and buckle up because I think some
stories are gonna come out. This thing's gonna get weird.
AAJ I don't know if he really has a leg
to stand on in terms of talking shit after this game.
I'm recording this one as they're probably you know, talking
to the to the media in the locker room. But
when you have a bad drop and another drop that

(19:00):
leads to an interception, he kind of just gotta know,
bite the bullet and be quiet. But man, just an
embarrassing performance. Sound the stretch by Philly and they are
there's no really way around it. They're in shambles right now.
I mean you look the Cowboys game, they're up twenty
one to nothing, they lose twenty.

Speaker 2 (19:19):
Four to twenty one.

Speaker 1 (19:22):
Bear's game, they get their ass kicked twenty four to fifteen. Honestly,
that doesn't even do a justice. And then the Chargers
game to night that they are very very lucky that
they get Pete Carroll and the Bad Raider team. Today's
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(21:17):
New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia. And the Chargers, I mean,
I have no clue how they're nine and four. I mean,
I really don't. They can't protect the quarterback. Their quarterback
has a broken hand. His passing, you know, I would

(21:39):
say his prowess is a little off. I mean he
missed a couple throws at night. That he should be
able to make in his sleep. He didn't look very
good tonight. Passing was very hit or miss. It looked
like they're passing game in terms of routes. Like once
upon a time when I lived in the Bay Area,
Greg Roman was Harbaugh's often coordinator and Vic Fangio was

(22:01):
a defensive coordinator and the team kind of fell apart.
In twenty fourteen, Trent Balkey's daughter famously threw out a
tweet that said fire Greg Roman kind of went viral.
And you watch Greg Roman to night, you know, Ravens
fans will say, this passing game isn't really his thing.
It's like neither of these teams schemed easy ones. You know,

(22:23):
when you watch Kyle, when you watch McVeigh, when you
watch Ben Johnson. There should just be some easy place
throughout a game like this, maybe a quick screen, maybe
a running back screen. But they're just calling these long
dropbacks for both these guys. Jalen is struggling to pass Herbert.
They can't protect him, Like what are you guys doing.

(22:44):
I don't pretend to know more football than Greg Roman
or Kevin Batula when it comes to the board, but
I could confidently tell you that I've watched enough football
to know are you just are you just too stubborn
to go Let's just try an easy one here, or
let's just let's just try a quick screen. Let's just

(23:07):
try a quick wide receiver screen. Everything is down the field,
especially with the Chargers. It's like, guys, you cannot protect
against this Georgia at Alabama front. It is not gonna work.
Their linebackers look like ray Lewis right now, you're gonna
get this guy killed. He's literally playing with a broken hand.
And they just kept calling those plays and he kept

(23:29):
getting crushed. I'm telling you sacks seven times that that
doesn't feel like what I just witnessed. But they're nine
to four, they feel like I mean, if they split
these last two games, they're definitely in the playoffs. I
feel like this is why coaching matters. You know, Jim
Harbaugh his teams. There's a toughness, there's an identity. I

(23:54):
think they're definitely passing the ball a little bit more
this year than they have in years pass But their schedule,
it's pretty hard to end the season. They go to
the Chiefs this week, which is not going to be
an easy game. Just because the Chiefs are going to
keep trying. Then they go to Dallas, then they get
the Texans, who literally might kill Herbert, and then they
go to the Broncos. Another incredible pass rush. So I'm

(24:18):
fascinated to watch the way this shakes out. But props
to the Chargers for pulling this game out of their
ass because I thought they were in major, major trouble.
Speaking of the Chargers, their former quarterback Philip Rivers. He

(24:38):
turned forty four years old today. As Adam Schefter tweeted out,
he is a grandfather. Let me repeat, he is a
grand father. So Philip Rivers will conduct a workout tomorrow
with the Indianapolis Colts. And on a lighter note, that's
just pretty cool that that just makes me smile, Like

(25:01):
that story is one that's just kind of fun. There
is no way on God's green Earth that Tom Brady,
that Peyton Manning and Drew Brees. I'll just use those
three guys for examples. Aren't a little jealous if you
don't think like Drew Brees. Definitely, Tom would just like
their phone to ring, even if they would say no,

(25:21):
to be like, hey man, anyway you could make it
to Indie on Tuesday morning. We got some quarterback issues.
Our backups are both injured. Our starter has a broken
leg and a torn achilles. We got problems. We're eight
and five, so it's not like we're, uh, you know,
two and ten. Here would you work out? Would Tom

(25:42):
say no? Would Tom say no? I think he might
say yes. He might turn them down if they offered
him the gig, but I think he would fly there
just to get the sweat in. I think it's a
pretty cool moment. Obviously, Philip has played there, so he knows.
Chris Ballard. I think it was two years ago. John
Lynch said that when Perdy messed up his arm, if

(26:03):
they had made the Super Bowl, they were already planning
on calling Philip rivers. So that's fun. I also think
it's a little bit of an indictment to the situation
in which they found themselves in. We were talking about
this offline earlier or last night after we did the
show that you know, Chris Ballard, I've said this forever.

(26:27):
I respect people that are aggressive in life. You know,
Charlie Munger has this thing when you have an advantage,
bet big. So anyone who puts all their chips in
the table when they have an advantage or they think
they have an advantage, whether it's in business, in poker,
you know, running a football team. I'll tip my hat
to you. There are no guarantees in life. There's only

(26:50):
a couple, right, death and taxes. So even when you
do have an advantage and you bet big, doesn't mean
it can't blow up in your face. And I think
Chris Ballard, looking back, I think he has operated recently
a little bit more out of desperation than thinking he
had an advantage. A couple of years ago, he takes
Anthony Richson, a guy that had thirteen career starts in

(27:13):
college and for the most part wasn't that good and
was an enormous risk. A couple years later, clearly blows
up in his face and he essentially has to bench him.
But then the guy that saves his what looked like
career at the time, Chris Ballard's is a player that
for years most people agreed, like NFL analysts, NFL players,

(27:33):
NFL coaches, fans is not a very good player in
Daniel Jones. And then he has a stretch of like
five or six games where he just looks pretty capable
and the team's winning, the running back is going nuts,
and Chris Poward goes, we got something here, and right
before you know, the trade deadline ends, he makes I mean,

(27:57):
I don't want to say the biggest, but I mean,
there aren't that many in season trades for a player
that cost you two first rounds, two first round picks,
and the guy's making ninety million dollars. That is a
massive bet. But the moment he made that bet, I remember.
My take was he bet that, like Daniel Jones is

(28:17):
going to be his quarterback for the next several years.
He made that bet on Sas Gardner, and Daniel Jones
wasn't even under contract for twenty twenty six. He hadn't
even given him a seventeen game sample size on his
own team. You could argue it was borderline reckless more
than it was super aggressive, like you don't really know

(28:39):
what you have in Daniel Jones. Let's see this thing
play out. Let's see as you play better teams. Let's
see as you come down the stretch, Let's see as
you go outside. Let's see how he looks in the playoffs.
And obviously, the worst case scenario happens. He breaks his leg,
and clearly, I don't even know how anyone would argue
this the you know, the mechanisms in which your legs work,

(29:03):
the pressure it puts on the other leg. That a
couple weeks later he tears achilles. So now you have
a guy that's not even under contract next year with
a broken leg and a torn achilles in late December,
which I'd say that's not Chris Ballard's fault, but you
were also betting on that player essentially like he was

(29:24):
a Josh Allen, Joe Burrow, like an elite player. Because
if you're gonna make one of those trades, you think
you have a team led by a quarterback. You know,
Sean McVay has done that, and he did it with
Jared Goff, and even by the end he was out
on Jared Goff. But Jared Goff has proven like he's
a high end quarterback. If Jared Goff was your quarterback,
you would feel comfortable doing something like that. It's a

(29:48):
lot of Lions fans have said why don't we get
more aggressive? And you could have made the argument for
whoever the guy is, you should be more aggressive when
you have a Jared Goff He's not Joe Mon Hannah,
Aaron Rodgers, but he's a really good player that you
know is gonna be your starting quarterback for years. Chris
Ballard and the Colts could not have known that about

(30:08):
Daniel Jones. He literally wasn't under contract next year and
we hadn't seen him play in real meaningful games. What
was he What if you're one and done in the playoffs,
would you still do that same deal in the offseason.
Probably not. So he made a big bet, like it's
not his fault that Sas Gardner or Daniel Jones are injured.

(30:30):
But I think if you look at the way that
his mind worked to go about that deal, it was
a little flawed. And they're in complete chambles right now.
They're depending on a forty four year old Philip Rivers,
which I hope, I mean the forty nine ers play
them in a couple weeks. Sign me up to watch
Philip Rivers play the forty nine ers. Sign me up

(30:51):
to watch Philip Rivers play some of these games. I'm in.
I'm in. I wish if you told me whatever time
it was Tuesday morning that the Philip Rivers workout was live,
I would one hundred percent tune in, it would get
NFL network ESPN, it would do good ratings. We'd watch.

(31:11):
I used to be the guy my first year in
the NFL, guys like Philip Rivers. I would go pick
him up at the hotel and then I'd bring him
over to you know, usually get some sort of physical
meet with the trainers, give him whatever he needed, water,
some breakfast or whatever, and kind of take him out
to the workout before the coaches and Howie Roseman came

(31:33):
out to the indoor bubble to then watch the guy
work out. That's what's gonna happen tomorrow. Now, it's gonna
be a much more serious workout than just your typical
Tuesday workout throughout the league of some dbs or wide
receivers or offensive linemen. And this guy might be a
starting quarterback, which would be insane. He's been coaching high
school football even if he has been working out. And

(31:56):
clearly I respect Philip his love of football. I've always
said I wished he would have gone into broadcasting, because
no one like this guy likes football like John Gruden
likes football. It's like all he thinks about and talks about.
It's like his life. It's like his blood. But when
you're in this position, it shows you they're in major,
major trouble, man major trouble. And if you had to

(32:20):
bet on a horse right now, Houston or Indy, I
don't think you can find a soul in America that
would bet on this indie situation. So you make some bets.
Like I said, you can make big bets when you
have good information and it fail. But when you make
bets a little out of desperation, and let's be real,

(32:41):
I know their record was good, but Daniel Jones was
still your quarterback. Everyone was like, oh, I love this
deal for the Colts. I remember my reaction was like,
this seems crazy. This seems a little reckless. Chris Ballard
feels like the guy who was just always saying saving money,
always saving money, always saving money. He's like, I'm gonna

(33:03):
buy like one day, I'm gonna buy a big home.
And then you're like, Chris, where'd all your money go?
He's like, bought a Lamborghini, Like what you did? What?
And it's just like out of left field. And that's
what his personnel decisions kind of feel like. And whether
it's the daughter influencing him, because she even was quoted
like go.

Speaker 2 (33:23):
For it, Like are you were.

Speaker 1 (33:25):
You really going for it with Daniel Jones and Sauce Gardner,
Like that's not exactly like Steve Young and Deon Sanders.
I just think that's it looks awful now in hindsight,
there's no really arguing that a couple other things. Dia
almost a Diana Shador has been named the starter for

(33:50):
the rest of the year, obviously. I mean you just
he's made like two or three passes this year in
his couple of games that Dylan Gabriel couldn't even I
actually think this is really bad for the Browns front
office and coaching staff. Like I actually think this announcement,
which of course they were gonna announce this, what are

(34:11):
they gonna do? Go back to Dylan Gabriel. They're gonna
be in position because they're awful and they might lose
out to take Fernando Mendoza or take Dante More take
a quarterback really high in what world if I was
Jimmy Haslam, could I trust your guy's evaluations because I
just saw you guys take a guy in the third round,

(34:32):
which isn't nothing for a quarterback, and I think we'd
all agree. Again, nice kid, not an NFL player. I mean,
I bet if you just asked most gms, especially on
the good teams, if they were talking about him like
an undrafted free agent. You took him in the third
round and immediately your fifth round quarterback like two games

(34:53):
in looks like Tom Brady compared to him. That's like
abal pract that just can't happen. And listen, you make
mistakes in the draft, everyone does, Ron Wolf, Bill Pollian
like Hall of Fame gms with okay, but the Dylan
Gabriel thing at the time was like universally agreed upon.

(35:17):
This is insane, even if they at Chador didn't even exist.
Let's say he didn't even exist as a human being.
You just took Dylan Gabriel in the third round. That's
like a fireable offense in itself. Like what, I do
you know the amount of Oregon fans that I know,
I remember texting last year because you watched him, Like God,
Dylan's kind of slinging around all of them. Be like,

(35:37):
he's an awesome college player, good in this offense, not
an NFL guy. Everyone random fans knew that, so I
have these two IVY League guys running my operation. Clearly
the head coach doesn't like Shador. I mean, we don't
even need to debate that at the moment, But how
can I trust you because I've seen you with the quarterbacks?

(35:58):
I don't totally like Deshaun's just terrible. I think Bill
Walsh could have coached him and it wouldn't have gone well,
but it couldn't have gotten much worse when you were
coaching him. The one thing I think we have to
admit is Kevin Stefanski's not very adaptable when it comes
to quarterbacks, right. He kind of is looking for one thing,
and clearly what he's looking for. If you give him
like Matt Ryan in his prime, yeah, probably work, but

(36:20):
that doesn't really exist. Like sometimes you got to adapt
your offense and your talents to what you're dealing with.
And the Dalan Gabriel thing is a clear indictment of
your evaluation skills, which are clearly atrocious. Okay, last, but
not least, the Heisman finalists have been announced. I have
no clue how the Ohio State quarterbacks going. I know

(36:42):
the Heisman like the MVP has kind of turned into
a quarterback Award, But I think we'd all agree that
Julian Saying is probably not a top five player on
his own team. I mean, from an NFL prospect standpoint,
he's not even a top ten player. But I get it,
quarterback one of the best teams. But that seems crazy
to me. The other three guys are very deserving. You know,

(37:04):
Jeremiah Love has a chance to be a star in
the NFL. He's been a star in college. He's a badass,
and he's a legit Heisman candidate. And to me, if
they had won a couple of those early games, I
think you could easily give it to him. What Diego
Diego Pavia did for Vanderbilt is one of the most

(37:26):
incredible resurrections you'll ever see. It's kind of reminds me
of Andrew Luck at Stanford. Took over a dog shit
academic football program. I mean, they were dead in the water,
and by the time he's leaving their ten and two
and I mean on the precipice and right there to
make the playoffs. It truly is these last couple of years.

(37:48):
If you gave him the Heisman, no one would argue.
And if Fernando Mendoza and the Indiana Hoosiers didn't exist.
I think he would win it. But when you watch
that game on Saturday night with Fernando Mendoz, I actually
think you learn more about a guy in a spot
where that first place. I was thinking about this because
I saw him getting an interviewed today on Pat McAfee.

(38:11):
The first play of the game, he said I had
never been hit that hard, and he got his wind
knocked out of him. He said he couldn't breathe, and
I think most people he's lying on the ground. You
kind of thought, you know, Colt McCoy, brock Purdy, you
lose the quarterback, that the game is just irrelevant. You know,
Indiana would have no chance to beat Ohio State comes

(38:33):
back in a couple of plays later after his brother
comes in. I even thought in the first half, I
know his stats weren't that great. I'm like, he's showing
some pretty good boxy and toughness here and he's just
kind of feeling his way out. He lost his you know,
some might say his best receiver, second best wide receiver.
He's just kind of feeling his way and he didn't
make any huge mistakes, right, He didn't knock their team

(38:56):
out of the game, but there were a couple of
throws where he changed arms angles with a blitzer in
his face. Obviously a couple of those deep balls. I thought,
from an NFL scouting perspective, like that was pretty impressive.
And I know he's a little goof here, you know,
like Kirk Cousins, But if you watch the way his
teammates on the dais and where Klatt is given the

(39:19):
U the Championship trophy and the you know, game MVP
trophy to him, the way they embraced him and got
so excited, and the smiles up there with his guys,
Like this is not one of those Kevin Costner movies
when no one shows up at his birthday. Clearly they
like him a lot, and you know a lot of
times in sports you're gonna like your best player. But

(39:42):
it felt pretty genuine to me. And you know what
he did for them this year to beat Oregon, to
beat Ohio State, I would say those two games alone
from an NFL perspective, like that's if the season ended
to day and he didn't play again, he would kind
of have seen enough, like he would have done enough

(40:03):
to me to be a top five ISH player, and
you know, let's face it, if you're a top five
ISH player quarterback, you're gonna.

Speaker 2 (40:10):
Go number one overall.

Speaker 1 (40:11):
And his athleticism, his arm strength. Clearly he's a bright guy.
He's an optimistic guy. Anyone that saw the story about
his mom, that's pretty powerful. I mean, I can't imagine
going through that at that age. I've just I was
blown away. I was really impressed. Not that I wasn't

(40:32):
a fan, but watching him against that team, against that defense,
and he was telling Pat McAfee today, he's like, it
should it's not even fair going up against Matt Patricia
calling with those defensive players and with him and his
offensive coordinator just found a way. And it also shows
you the power of good play calling. Wide receivers coming

(40:53):
down with the ball. You know, a lot of stuff's
out of the hands of a quarterback. You know, Jalen
threw some bad picks tonight, but he also threw a
ball that hit AJ Brown in the hands. But AJ
knew that he was about to get hit and he
kind of he just let it go. Well, Aj, this
isn't he's not allowed to hit you. Like Ronnie Lott.
This isn't nineteen ninety six. But as I'm not getting

(41:13):
hit in the ribs, not for this guy. And that's
a whole other conversation we can get in kind of later.
But I think Fernando Mendoza, he's gonna win the Heisman.
He's gonna be the most important football player in the
history of Indiana football. Obviously, I mean led them to
the number one overall seed winning the Heisman. What happened

(41:36):
or not herb Street, but Aikman mentioned tonight, like what
Signettian happened at that program over the last two years
is nothing short of incredible. It really is. And let's
face it, they got Mendoza in the transfer portal because
obviously his brother's on the team. So they had an
in which I'm sure happens a lot in transfer portals. Right,

(41:56):
you have it in with the guy's high school teammate,
you have a guy's you have an end with the
guys you know high school coach, you have an in
because you know the guy's dad. Like there's obviously sometimes
transfer portals, if you're just offering a lot of money,
you can get guys blind. But the relationships and connections
still matter. But looking back if people no way his

(42:20):
value on the open market. I mean, Carson Beck got
like four million dollars. People were beating down the drums
for some of these guys the last couple of years,
and that was just not the case with this guy.
And you got to give Signetti a lot of credit
for isolating him. You got to give this, you know,
Fernando a lot of credit for getting up to speed
with these wide receivers. And he went from a guy that,

(42:42):
you know, interesting prospect, guy to watch to more than
likely gonna win the Heisman Trophy, gonna potentially be the
number one overall pick. And if I was him in
Cleveland wanted to draft me, I would refuse to go.
If I was him and some of these teams that
are awful wanted to draft me, I would refuse to go.
I just wouldn't go. Like if listen, I like John

(43:04):
Spytek a lot, but if like Pete Carroll's still there,
like I'm not going there. I'm I'm not doing that,
you know. And this that's the whole conversation we can
get into a little later. But I mean, you look
at some of these teams that are gonna need a quarterback, high.
I'm out, Doug, I'm out. You know, even Caleb give
I think some of the things that happened leading up

(43:26):
to the draft process were a little egregious. But the
one thing they were right on is like Ebraflus the Bears,
and they were right now once they got Ben Johnson
gonna change his life potentially, so it does matter a lot.
But you know, Fernando Mendoza, Kurtz Signetti, what an incredible story. Today,

(43:57):
we're gonna do a little mailback at John Middlecoy at
John Middlecoff. It's just my instagram DMS wide open thought
we would, you know, bang out ten questions and just
see what you guys got cooking out there in your
football mind. So again it's just my Instagram DMS wide open,
and we do a mail bag like three or four

(44:17):
times a week. We will start with Trent. My question
is this. I know you said mac Jones is worth
a lot to the Niners, but with the unfortunate injury
to Daniel Jones, I think I'd be willing to send
him there for two. The Colts decided to go all
in for the sauce trade, so they don't have much capital,
but it's hard to go all in and then run
Anthony Richinson out there. It's also better for the Niners

(44:40):
than sending him to Minnesota or Arizona. Thank you for
the content. I do think after this year, I mean
I'm recording this going into the Titan game. I think
if they win that game, it's very hard to see
them not be a playoff team and mac Jones will
have the essentially, I mean it's crazy that they could

(45:03):
still technically be the one seed seems a little unlikely.
I will be a little stunned at this point if
they win the division, but that they have a home
game remaining with with Seattle their four and one in
the division, they would not be where they are without
mac Jones. I mean we saw last year they had
Kyle Allen as their backup when Perdy got banged up
and it was a nightmare. Was that two years ago

(45:24):
they went to Green Bay. I mean, he like couldn't
even function. And when you have the right backup, you
see it with the Texans. The Texans I think went
two and one when CJ. Stroud was injured. Well, Davis
mill is like a legitimate NFL player. Is he a
future starter? I mean I think someone's gonna eventually give
him a shot, but he's gonna be in the league
for a long long time. And when you have a

(45:46):
guy like that, they can keep your head above water.
And mac Jones did more than that. I mean, he
played really really well. So you know, perty now like
he had a major, major shoulder or elbow injury. Now,
he didn't really miss any time beside that NFC Championship
game because it was the last game of the season,
you know, for the Niners, and a couple of years

(46:08):
ago he missed that. Trying to think what injuries he's had,
he obviously had the turf tow this year. He definitely
missed another game somewhere along the line with Kyle Allen,
but which would have been last year. I don't even
remember the injury. My point is like, I just think
you have to be a little uneasy with his durability

(46:32):
where you are pretty aggressive with the backup quarterback. It's
not like you're gonna pay fifteen million dollars, but you
really want to feel good about that guy. Partly too,
that if he misses a month, you know, over the
next couple of years, obviously he's gonna be the starting
quarterback on the big contract. You have a coach that
you can win, you know, games with a random quarterback,
but it has to be the right random quarterback. And

(46:53):
I'll give Kyle credit, you know, back to back. I
guess they skipped a year, but Sam Darnold and Mac
Jones two of the last three years quarterback pretty freaking good,
So I trust him. I would just be hesitant. Second
round pick, that's pretty valuable. And I think if you're
the Colts and you trade a second round pick for
Mac Jones, one he's pretty cheap, but two then you're

(47:16):
just all in on the roster that you have, and
I don't know, I think it's pretty risky. They're they're
in a weird spot right now. I feel I've always
thought Chris Bowder did a pretty good job, and this
year he got a little out of character. I mean,
let's face it, he's made a couple out of character moves,
and it turned out like the owner forced Anthony Richardson

(47:37):
like you need to draft a quarterback doesn't really feel
like their type guy. And clearly that's been a disaster.
And obviously the sauce move, I thought that was insane.
Clearly sauce. Maybe I undervalue him. Is a really good player,
but like if I'm trading two ones for a corner,
like he'd be better be like Darell Reeves, you know.

(47:58):
And I just I don't know. I wasn't on board
with that move, and that has nothing to do with
him being injured. I just thought, like big fan, so
to me, I would think about it, but again, you're
gonna have to blow me away, like party's gonna have
to play the rest of the season, not get injured.

(48:20):
I still, like, you know, I think about Perty's injury history.

Speaker 2 (48:25):
Let me bring up how many games he's played over
the course of the last four years. There definitely was
a stretch I'm trying to remember.

Speaker 1 (48:36):
So I guess he just missed the one game or
he missed two games in twenty four and obviously he's
missed a bunch this year. So and I think he
gets a little bit of a pass in the sense
of and you can say it's a freaky injury, but
it was a major injury. The elbow injury. Just things
that make me nervous. But I get maybe more nervous

(48:58):
about injuries than most big fan of the show. I'm
a Washington State Cougar fan. As you know, Blank has
hit the fan in the darkest way imaginable. Washington State
isn't even relevant anymore. And with the way college football
has changed, do you think in order for a dynamic
change and more publicity, we need to acquire a big

(49:20):
name head coach. If so, who are the possible candidates?
Let me say a couple of things. One, I'm not
being a dick at all, but no big name head
coach who is you know has options as coming to
Washington State. And I want to preface everything I'm about
to say by this, you guys got screwed. You guys
really tried. I would say the same for Oregon State

(49:41):
football mattered in the community. You took football seriously. There
were a lot of programs with the PAC twelve disbanding,
like you guys were a way better program most of
my adult life than Colorado, than the University of Arizona,
than UCLA, than what Cal had become probably till right
now with hiring Tosh. But you guys got screwed and

(50:06):
you got left behind. The problem is is there is
no catching up. You're done. I think the best case
scenario for you because at the end of the day.
And I put this out this weekend on the old
X app. When your coach went to you know, your

(50:26):
coach came from South Dakota State, obviously you know this
was there a year and then just went to Iowa
State to replace Matt Campbell and one and done guy,
And how do you blame them? I would rather be
at Iowa State than Washington State. You guys don't have
a conference, but when the Pact, it doesn't exist anymore.
It is essentially the Mountain West. So what you guys
are now is a non power forward team, and I

(50:47):
think for the health of the sport, they need to
build a non power for playoff, whether that's eighteen twelve
teams or whatever, and just separate the two conferences. And
I think best case scenario for you, you try to
dominate that like South Dakota State, like North Dakota State,
like Montana do a D one double A and like
Ohio State, Bama, Georgia, right, Texas, Oregon do at the

(51:10):
highest level. And you kind of find that sweet spot
because you're never you're never getting invited back to the dance,
which sucks because you did it the right way. You
gave a shit when you hired Mike Leach. It was
a game changer, but you had been relevant when I
was in like Junior high. I mean, Ryan Leaf was
a number one overall pick in the draft. I guess
number two Peyton went one. But you guys were in
the Rose Bawl. You'd had some excellent NFL players over

(51:31):
the years when I was at Fresno State in eight
o nine, like we recruited against you guys are recruiting
good players. It sucks, but things change, and I think
you just have to adapt the best you can. It
happens to us, all right. I'm very fortunate in a business.
Once I kind of went all in on the radio

(51:53):
audio space, you know, I kind of just fell into podcasting,
and obviously I fitted dramatically from getting into it in
like twenty sixteen, twenty seventeen. I know so many people
who've been fired in radio the last couple of years,
and they're so far behind they got no shot. And
I feel lucky that way. And the game change really

(52:15):
really quick overnight. And when it changes, you know, sometimes
things are out of your control and you're not going
to be in the same position that you once were.
If you want to stay doing what you were doing,
and you guys want to you know, it's not like
you guys want to go play D one double A football,
but you're never playing power for football again. It's just
it's just the shitty reality. So I think you're better

(52:37):
off trying to hire like an alumni, someone like that,
who will be pretty passionate about the program, than trying
to hire like sweet up and coming coaches. Speaking of
the power Forward, Virginia Tech went from a lower than
one hundred and twentieth in national recruiting rating rankings to
twenty third on signing day. No one's ever argued the

(53:00):
man can recruit. I mean, listen, A huge part of
college football is talent acquisition, like the coaching element of it.
If you have way more talent than the teams you're playing, Like,
how many games does Kirby truly have to out coach
someone of his fifteen games a year less than five?

(53:21):
Right now, he has an advantage. He's in the league.

Speaker 2 (53:23):
Coach.

Speaker 1 (53:23):
The same thing with Sabing, same thing. You know you
saw Signetti right Google Indiana's scores this year. They were
destroying people. Even Ryan Day in Ohio State. They were
killing people you couldn't score on. Now Indiana didn't really
score either, but like that was a game that they're
like losing in the second half, and they were talking

(53:45):
about in the broadcast like they're not used to being
in this position. It's why all underdogs go, Hey, when
you're playing the big bad wolf, get them in a
position where they're backs against the wall and see how
they respond. And what did Ryan Day do? And listen,
you know it's funny. I I stand by like my
overall take clearly. Listen, I got nothing personal against the guy.

(54:06):
I'm sure he's a nice guy. I think he's a
tad bit overrated. I mean, I really do. And as
true colors came out in that moment at the end
of the game when he kicked the field goal. Like
he works at the Ohio State now with Saban Gone
is by far the number one program in the country
in terms of resources, in terms of backing, in terms
of recruiting. It has it all like it is a

(54:28):
efficient monster. I listen as someone that I respect the
shit out of their operation. But he has unlimited funds
to buy any coach. He has unlimited funds to buy
any player. He is a good recruiter, Like he tries hard,
so I respect it. You know, no different than Sark
or Lane or Landing. Like these guys try. They're not
like Chip going like I'll work for you, but I

(54:49):
never want to recruit well. Part of the businesses recruiting.
But like tell me this, Ohio State fans, I think
if you if you ask an Oregon fan, you go, ye,
Dan Land got like Chip Kelly vibes, this is badass.
We love this guy. If you ask Georgia fans, you go,
this is the greatest coach we've ever had. Right Obviously
Bama fans, you know with was Saban, you know anyone

(55:12):
that's had Urban I mean you guys had urban Meyer.
Like deep down you kind of know Ryan Day ain't
that he's good. But like I could take fifteen or
twenty coaches and give them Ohio State's operation, and I
think they would kick ass and take names. Like I
think they would be really really good. But if you
had an all time coach, which you did in urban Meyer,

(55:33):
or like George does with Kirby, I think you'd be unbeatable.
And the simple factor is you're not unbeatable right now.
Indiana just beat you, and I thought they out coached you,
and they kind of out toughed you. They kind of did,
and there's no disputing I heard Danny Knell say this.
He's like I was on the field and I picked Indiana,
and I wanted to change my pick halfway through warm
ups because you just look at their roster and you go,

(55:55):
it's an NFL team. I do believe this, Like Fox
trade countless NFL teams. Definitely the NFC South to keep
Ohio State's rights to play all their games on Fox
round the season. They are a bohemoth. I say that
they're an NFL team, and I think the answer is like, yeah,
Ryan Day won the National Championship. Okay, that's great, got

(56:17):
out coached against Michigan in a game that, let's face
it just means. I don't I can't quite quantify this.
I'm not part of an Ohio State or Michigan man
clearly means a lot to me. It's when I was
a kid, I thought Yankees Red Sox was like the
cream of the crop. Rivalry Duke North Carolina had its moments.
I think Ohio State and Michigan right now is clearly

(56:38):
the number one rivalry in sports. It's in collegiate sports
for sure. You could argue, you know, pro sports as well.
So I just think that's a stain on his resume
and that that game kicking that field goal. It's like, bro,
you're the defending champ. And my point is like it
just kind of felt like who he was, Like he's
there's the little insecurity and scaredness to the guy where

(57:00):
there's just not With Signetti, tell me this Ohio State fans,
if you could choose right now for the next five years,
who would you rather have running your program? Kurt Signetti
or Ryan Day? Just asking my question is this with
Tom Brady on the up and up and JJ Watt's
great hair, who would you say are the top three
NFL analysts personally? Joe Buck's face makes my screen, makes

(57:26):
my screen, makes my Monday evening worse. Little script there
on your grammar no big deal, Maria that we were
talking about the other day about like what school is
going to look like for a son in ten twenty years,
and I was like, you know what's crazy? When I
went and then I'm kidding. I can't not My grammar's terrible.
I can't spell or write, but It's like when I

(57:49):
went to when I went to high school, internet was
really kind of taken off, but it was dial up.
You know. Google definitely didn't really exist till I was
in college any and then it's nowhere near what it
was now it was. You know, I guess it could
help you do some homework type stuff, but not really

(58:11):
Like why would I listen in class? Now? Once I
learned how to you know, read basic writing, just the basics,
it's like, hey, we're gonna teach you calculus, Well give
me the equation I'll just throw it into jad GPT
or here you need to learn this? Why just type
it into Google? I think there are elements and you
can say listen. Obviously there's a creativity element of the brain.

(58:32):
But we were talking like, well, you got to learn
to write, do you. I mean, how many people that
are listening to this right now that for their job
or you know whatever needed descriptions like you can use
this thing called the Internet in Google and jaed GPT
and all this stuff. I just think the world's changed
so dramatically, so fast. I just can't even imagine, Like

(58:56):
I thought, honestly, Like I remember sitting in last and
it always bored me my entire life. How could you
even justify paying attention now in a lot of these
class Now, I get it if you're gonna be a
doctor or an engineer, but the majority of us are
gonna be like general business type people, right, Sales, I
just don't know if you're learning that much in high

(59:17):
school and college anymore. I mean, if you ever were
sorry for my ted talk. I've always liked Joe Buck.
I mean I kind of think he gets a bad rap. Listen.
I mainly watch have the sound on in the big games,
which I was I was telling my crew the other day.
When you watch like ten games at once, the one

(59:39):
thing that sucks is whatever game. You know, you can't
have four audios on, right, so you're just listening to
one audio and you get a lot of nuggets, right, Like,
you know, Tony Romo says like the offensive coordinator was
mentioned this to us. You know this guy is not
as good, and you just kind of can pick up
on a three four five thing throughout the game of like,
oh that's kind of what the coaching staff's feeling. They're
telling Tony and Jim that, But you kind of miss

(01:00:00):
out on all the like I don't know what they
said on the Bucks Saints game, and I think there's
an element to some of the bad the worst games
just I think have a little less I don't know,
they feel lesser than. So I'm a sucker for it. Now, Listen,
al Michaels is an absolute legend. He is marv Albert

(01:00:21):
his last year at TNT. It's rough. Him and Herbstreet
have had just a weird rapport their whole time. But
I think Buck and Akman are the cream of the crop.
I just enjoy, Like, I know people say he's goofy
or whatever, but sometimes, like on a Sunday night, I've
been watching football for forty eight hours straight, Like I

(01:00:41):
kind of like just an upbeat, optimistic individual. I mean,
technically I can, I guess not technically in reality, I
can lean kind of negative and pessimistic. So sometimes getting
a little positivity in my life, I'm all for. I'm
with you. JJ doesn't just have good. JJ Wat's been
pretty good, Like JJ Watt's pretty just easy. Listen, I
think he's got a chance to just be pretty good,

(01:01:03):
pretty comfortable in his own skin for a guy that's
really rich and big name he's pretty good. You know.
Brady's definitely gotten way better, partly because he was so
shitty at the beginning. But there is just an element
to Tom. You know, like the two biggest entertainers of
my life were Madden and Gruden, and there was kind
of this everyman quality to both. Right, there was this

(01:01:25):
everyman quality to both guys that you could like run
into him at a Burger joint and have a conversation
and they would talk to you about football. John no
one was like John Madden, even though John Madden was
making eight million dollars a year to call NFL games
in nineteen ninety three. Like John Madden owns half of
the East Bay. John Madden's family trust is probably worth

(01:01:49):
hundreds of millions of dollars. John Gruden, like ten seven
years ago, signed a ten year hundred million. These guys
are just multi millionaires, but they carried themselves. He's kind
of like you know, Tom. You see him in the
last yesterday with Burkhart at Green Bay. Now, granted I
would have lasted five minutes in that weather. I could
not have lasted. It looked absolutely miserable. But he's wearing

(01:02:13):
I mean clearly thousands upon thousands of dollars of like
some leather trench coat thing that like John Gotti would
have wore. And it's like Tom, you know that there's
it's weird because he loves football, so anyone that loves
football he could have a conversation with. But it does
feel like this, I don't know, almost like a Jordan

(01:02:35):
type quality. Michael's a little smoother at it and like, yeah,
I don't want to talk to you. Where Tom kind
of can like straddle the fence about it, I don't know.
I think he's still got a little ways to go.
You know, Romo, They're fine. I think every football fan

(01:03:04):
has the experience of being on a couch and watching
clock management that feels objectively misguided or downright horrendous. I've
certainly heard you express bewilderment over many teams execution on
this front. Curious your thoughts on this seems will always
at occur, Curious your thoughts on how it always seems

(01:03:25):
to occur that it should. But I'm most interested in
your thoughts about the use of timeouts. To me, any
use of a second timeout in a close game has
to be game defining importance all the time. You'll see
a coach or quarterback call a timeout in the third
quarter or early fourth because they're about to get a
delay a game. The notion that a timeout is equal

(01:03:46):
in value to five yards there's a ton of game
left to play is one hundred percent incorrect. Even if
I'm down three at the opponent's twenty five and it's
say third and three, I'm one hundred percent taking the
five yards, I can still kick a converting it. Totally agree.
I'm not bothered by first half timeouts. If you got

(01:04:06):
to use a timeout in the first quarter in a
big spot, do you feel like whatever I do think
the second half, it is extremely important to not waste
any of them in the third quarter. I have a
hard time. I'm sure there is one seeing a scenario
where on offense you use a timeout because of the
delay game. And it happens constantly, and this is not

(01:04:29):
college football. So you find yourself whether you're the Saints
or the Titans, or you're the Rams or the Bills,
a lot of these games are pretty close in the
second half, and when these teams have wasted it because
like you said, you know on the forty yard line,
it was you know, second and four and the play

(01:04:49):
clock was about to hit zero, and they it's like,
what are we doing? So I don't know why I
think these guys know that, but I've always defended the
clock management aspect. When you're on your couch eating M
and m's, having a coffee in your ug slippers, you know,
with a sweatshirt on and a blanket over you, with

(01:05:12):
your doggling on you, it's easy to go like that
fucking idiot, what a dumb clock? What is he doing?
We've all done. I'm as guilty as anybody. There is
no way that is the feeling on the sideline when
you have a headset on, and if you're the play
caller and you got guys talking to you, you got your coach,
you got trainer telling you this guy can't come back in.

(01:05:32):
There's a lot going on. You know. The Bears, for example,
clearly they were a little loose yesterday with their clock
management at the end of the game. Now, Ben's the
first year head coach, Caleb's in his first year playing
real NFL football. After I don't even count last year,
you're on the road, it's freezing cold, like that was

(01:05:53):
a teachable moment, right that you get up, and it
felt like they had a minute thirty Then all of
a sudd and you look and it's thirty seconds on
the clock. You're like, listen, I'm no, you know, clock
manager here, But I'm not sure that this is right.
I'm looking for the scenario because if you go to

(01:06:14):
the play by play of the Bears game, the last
drive by the Bears, he was so they ran a
play on second and four to get them to third
and one. They ran the play on second and four
at one seventeen, and they didn't run another play till

(01:06:35):
thirty five seconds. I just think that there's a level
of urgency, you know, Ben super folks on the play call,
because it's a big play call. Yeah, I think it's
just kind of complicated, which I defend him a little
bit that way. My question is, how do you think

(01:06:57):
Aaron and Mike tomlins legacy will be affected if this
year the Steelers go under five hundred and top with
Tomlin as the coach. Well, I think yesterday's win was
pretty big. I still think that they I remember I
looked at their schedule yesterday. They got the Dolphins coming

(01:07:17):
up on my on Monday night. That game's in Pittsburgh,
then they go to Detroit, then they go to Cleveland,
and then they get the Ravens again. They're seven and six,
so they gotta win through two more games to get
to nine. I think they're winning two more games. I
think they're gonna go about five hundred. But let's just

(01:07:37):
say they go one and three and they go eight
to nine. I think it impacts Aaron Rodgers legacy zero,
I mean literally zero. And the only Tomlin ding it
has is like that's kind of his defining attribute right now. So, yeah,
he won a Super Bowl a long long time ago,
hasn't won a playoff game in a decade. Like, think
how much changes in your life in a decade. If

(01:07:58):
you're listening to this right now in your third years old,
think about ten years ago when you were twenty. How
much shit has happened in those ten years? Right? For me, Like,
I'm forty forty one technically, how much stuff happened in
my thirties? And I just think that, you know Tomlin
what he really hangs his hat on. His teams never
go under five hundred. They're always competitive, they're always in

(01:08:19):
the wildcard mix. They're usually at minimum going ten and seven.
I mean in the last couple of years they're ten
and seventeen. One year they went like nine to seven
and one, but like several games above five hundred. So
I think this year that there's definitely been some cracks,
which you know, part of its roster building, which I
mean only people inside those buildings know truly how much juice.
He has a lot of people on the internet telling

(01:08:40):
me he has a lot, which I'm sure he has
a lot, but I don't know. Their team is just
kind of poorly built. Why are your thoughts on Cal
hiring Tosh Lupoi and retaining jks? Are we back? This
is a good example that Cal was in this spot
of being a powerful version of like what I talked

(01:09:03):
about with Washington State, where it felt like they were
kind of getting left behind even though they kind of
got a seat at the table. Who knows how long
the ACC is gonna survive when it comes to football.
Notre Dame just attacked it. We've known that Miami clems
in Florida State like they've wanted out, So if that
ever crumbles, does Cow get kind of left and Stanford

(01:09:25):
kind of looking that they would definitely try to jump
to the Big Ten, and I would imagine the Big
ten would have some interest. But the unique part about
this hire is Tosh played for Jeff Tedford. Tosh played
at cal so his passion for the program because I
don't know if a normal guy in his spot, someone
that had worked at Alabama and now's at Oregon, Like

(01:09:46):
every guy's just taking the cow job. So you know,
Ron Rivera is their GM. My buddy's on the scouting trails.
He's very involved. There was a second once they fired
Wilcox and I watched some col games. I mean I
grew up going to Memorial Stadium with my dad and
walking up that hill. Is there are some videos going

(01:10:07):
viral of Ron with the headset, And honestly, I'll give
Ron credit because it crossed my mind, like I just think,
why wouldn't Ron just sign himself to like a four year,
twenty million dollar deal and just become the head coach.
Hire some recruiters and think that he could just out
tough and out physical. He's playing the acc thing. He
win eight nine games. I thought he was gonna do that.
So I give him a lot of credit for maybe

(01:10:29):
he kind of likes this life of being able to
kind of have a little more time with his wife,
but also still be very involved in football. And you
know the most important, most impressive thing is they hire
the guy their quarterback. For those of you that don't
fall Cal football, which I do not blame, you would
have potentially been if he would have said I'm going
to the transfer portal, the number one quarterback in the

(01:10:52):
transfer portal, I mean, he would have been definitely a
top two or three guy. He would have had, you know,
all the team in the SEC, any sweet big ten team,
all these teams that need a quarterback would have been
all over him, I mean big time. And he was
such a bigger he went to Oregon. He was gonna

(01:11:12):
go to Cal. Then he decided to go to Oregon.
He got there early, went there for spring ball, realized like, wow,
I'm not gonna be the starter. I'm gonna be the
back of the Dante more and he's not necessarily going
to go anywhere for a couple of years. So he
like wanted to play because he knows he's good enough.
And he's transferred to count He immediately became their starter
as an eighteen year old, and he was by far there,

(01:11:33):
you know, highlight of the season, which they're a bowl team.
But I'm excited because the one thing Tosh, and this
goes back to when he worked for Jeff Tedford. You know, Cal,
if you remove sports, kind of carries itself like an
Ivy League school. They're a public university and they will
tell you they're the number one public university in the world,

(01:11:54):
but they think of themselves like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Penn
something like that. And Jeff Tedford went there and by
a couple of years into his tenure had Aaron Rodgers,
had Marshawn Lynch and DeShawn Jackson. I'm not sure how
many classes those two attended, but they were kicking the
shit out of people and the only team they really
couldn't beat was the Trojans. But he had them competing

(01:12:16):
to be number one. And Tosh was a part of
that as a young assistant coach. And by the end,
like he's brown bagging Keenan Allen getting him to come there,
like Keenan Allen was supposed to go to Alabama out
of high school from North Carolina. Now part of it
was Cal did a package deal with Keenan and his brother.
His brother was his left handed quarterback and Saban say,

(01:12:38):
you know, the currency in college football used to be
a scholarship, right, I got eighty five scholarships. If I'm
at Alabama or I'm at cal if I give you one.
You typically went where you just went to the better
program who gave you the better scholarship, and then obviously
in the SEC they'd give you a little brown bag
of twenty grand cash or whatever. But now you have
this enormous tons of money changing parts. The scholarship is

(01:13:00):
completely irrelevant. I wonder if some of these recruiting visits
scholarship even comes up. But if you do go to
cal you know academically, like, not everyone's gonna be Deshaun
Jackson or Marshaun Lynch or Aaron Rodgers. I mean a
lot of you guys that are just gonna be a
couple of play for a couple of years and go
into the workforce. Well, if you work in business, the
hot school of business, go fucking work at Goldman Sachs,

(01:13:24):
go make three hundred and fifty thousand dollars as a
twenty three year old immediately in the workforce. So I
think he's got a lot of things going for him.
He knows that area. I'm really really excited. I think
they could be in the next couple of years. And
I watched some of his press conference. He kind of
talks like he's been around Saban and Landing, like we're

(01:13:45):
in the talent acquisition business, like he gets it. He's
seen the cream of the crop. We're recruiting the best
of the best. I mean he was he worked for
Saban in his heyday. And you know, Tosh was on
a staff with like Kirby Small, Lane, Kiffen, Dan Lanning,
Mario Crystobaal. Tosh basically worked for Nick Saban from twenty

(01:14:08):
fourteen to twenty eighteen, two time national champ Lane, Mario.

Speaker 3 (01:14:15):
Sark, Brett Good Group, Kirby.

Speaker 1 (01:14:31):
Been watching the NFL my whole life, and I noticed
certain officials tend to be more trigger happy than others.
Does knowing which crew you have officiating the game affect
how a team will coach. There's not a team in
the NFL that doesn't go over the assignment the week
of the game with the players, with their coaching staff,
with their analytical department. Uh, It's it's definitely talked about

(01:14:54):
area for sure. College Ampro I was thinking anything stopping
owners from giving free money. Diehard Eagles fan, and I
was just thinking, hypothetically, what if the Eagles trade for
Max Crosby in the off season, but they want to
keep Jalen Phillips. Is there anything other than scouts honor
keeping Luriy from saying, hey, we'll sign you for three

(01:15:17):
years thirty million, but I'll dump another thirty million in
your account. On the side, if you're caught, you would
I mean something an infraction like that, there would be
hell to pay because obviously, listen, it's a very competitive industry.
People are cutting corners, like welcome to the private sector. Honestly,

(01:15:37):
to be successful in the private sector, I think you've
got to have a little little renegade to you. You know,
if you're following all the rules in everything in life,
you're probably gonna get passed by. And there's a difference
of like breaking laws and like if you're just always
gonna color in the lines, good luck to you, because
life's gonna be awfully tough. So it happens in all
of our industries, definitely in football. But something in the

(01:16:00):
example you gave, I think there would be a death
penalty type situation that if they found out you were
paying someone millions of dollars to stay on your team.
On the side, I don't know if they kick you
out of the league, but it would be it'd be
really bad. So I think it's more than Scout's honor.
I think it's part of it is in a weird way,

(01:16:20):
these guys are all business partners and win or lose,
Like they're all getting super rich together, arm in arm.
You know, they can the days of like Al Davis
and everyone at each other's throats. It's kind of few
and far between, you know, occasional Dan Snyder were it
took till the end for some of his I guess
people in his corner to turn on him. So yeah,

(01:16:44):
I just may call me naive. I think again, there's
a difference of one thing that definitely happens. You sign
with us, we will funnel you sponsorships, right And when
I was in with the forty nine or not with
the forty nine ers, but in the Bay Area around
the forty nine ers, you would see their main sponsors.
Who's their number one car, Like, who's the official car

(01:17:07):
of the forty nine ers, Toyota, who has a big
Toyota Brandial Rock Party. They have this eyeglass company Zenny Well,
who is their number one guy, George Kittle. So I
think that's a huge Element's big in the NBA. And
again there's difference of like where Kawhi Leonard got in trouble,
it was completely fake. It was a gigantic fugazi. I
mean literally they just pretended like, Hey, if you want

(01:17:29):
to fly around your private jet, we'll just pretend to
plant trees and then everything will be good and you
can tweet about climate change. It was all fucking fake.
Where that to me is like what is going on?
Most of these are at least like, Hey, I'm Joe Lacob,
I'm in Silicon Valley. You want to come play for
the Warriors. We will funnel you into businesses to invest in.

(01:17:50):
I'll hook you up with all these tycoons and you
can get in on the next Google potentially. And that
to me is a huge element that I think is
happening a lot. The forty nine ers definitely take advantage
of that. Is Mike McDaniel, the most hated coach in
the NFL. I hear nothing but criticism for the guy,
and none of it is ever even about football, Like

(01:18:10):
he's not a league coach or anything. But he's far
better than a lot of guys. He's made the playoffs
twice and this season he's now one four straight. If
you compare him just to Fansky, he's accomplished ten times more.
But the narrative around Mike is he's a failure because
he's scrawny, whereas the Fansky is some IVY league wiz kid.
McDaniel went to Yale, I think even though Mike literally
also went to an IVY league. Okay, you knew that too.

(01:18:32):
I just don't get it. Are people not cognizant of
how superficial they're being when viewing McDaniel. Listen, I think
we just judge him because hes a goofy looking dude.
He's a goofy, nerdy looking guy, and there's an elementus
to fan Ski that just I don't know, I guess
looks smart. I've been saying this forever. No team gets
a bigger pass in the Browns. Now that Shodor's playing,
people are really watching them and they're like, what the
fuck's going on? So one of you guys DM me

(01:18:54):
the other day. It's like in Coward said this got
they got a good roster. It's like, well, we all
hear this all the time, and they just every time
you got there three and twelve, It's like, what is
And maybe I've been saying this on the podcast. I
definitely told other people this. You hear this universally, and
I got nothing against the guy. He will get a
job immediately. If Stefanski's fired, he will like that's you

(01:19:15):
just hire this guy, Like he's just you know, like
James Franklin will just fired. It's like, yeah, that's James
Franklin had been winning. This guy has not been two
time coach of the year. How many coaches of the
years does like Belichick has? Who cares like no one's like,
no one actually cares about Coach of the Year. To me,
it's the fakest award of them all because we think

(01:19:36):
you're gonna be shitty and then you win like eleven games.
That's literally how Stefanski's wonted a couple times. You who
never wins Coach of the Year over the last like
seven years, like Andy Reid, right, I mean, Kyle Shanahan
ever win Coach of the year. No, who's gonna win it?
This year. Well, Ben Johnson, and granted Ben Johnson's been good,
but why is he gonna win it? Or Vrabel because
we thought they were gonna suck. Right, It's like no

(01:19:58):
one's giving it met Lafleura could win team games, like, well, hey,
he's coaching the Packers. Well, yeah, he's doing a good job.
So I'm with you, McDaniel. I don't know, people, I
don't know. His pants are bad. I mean the the
joggers that are way up tight or way up top,
like toward the knee. And I got a couple joggers

(01:20:20):
in the in the closet, so I'm not acting like
I would never put them on, but actually a couple
of rowback golf ones that aren't bad. Okay, what up? John,
big fan? I listen every day. I do have to
give you some credit for mentioning it a couple of
weeks back. But how is no one talking about Tyler Shuck.
I listened to you and Colin this morning, and y'all
are talking about Shador and JJ and it makes no

(01:20:42):
sense to me. Those are bad teams. There is an
argument Shuck is the best looking rookie quarterback outside of
Drake May from the past two classes. It's a little disrespectful,
and no other teams had him graded that high. You
always say you have to give credit where credits due. True,
We're also running a business here. And the most listened

(01:21:04):
to new podcast in my career happened on a Friday night,
and it was when Shador fell from the second and
third round to the third day of the draft. I
got a call from someone at iHeart. They're like, did
you find some magic sauce. I'm like, no, this guy
named shad Or Sanders, he's just falling in the draft
and it's like the biggest story in America right now.

(01:21:25):
And JJ McCarthy like, I don't know why. We have
a huge Midwest contingent. The Vikings have a lot of fans,
and that story really resonates with people, Like I'm not
like what we talk about things one. I talk about
things that excite me. But there's a reason that certain
franchises rarely get talked about that I would go out

(01:21:48):
of business if I did it consistently. Now, I'm not
afraid to talk about Tyler Shuck, just like I'm not
afraid to talk about the Saints. But at three and ten,
talking about a quarterback that most fans and again I'm
not playing, I'm trying to play plant or throw as
wide of a net as possible out here could point
Tyler Shuck out of the lineup he went to prom

(01:22:10):
not with but in the same limousine with their chicks
as brock Purty. Brock Purty's been in the league. This
is year four, so I think it's kind of a
unique story. He's really old, his path was crazy, and
your team is just out of side, out of mind,
and it's it's no disrespect like the Browns Titan game
would not matter to a soul beside fans of those

(01:22:31):
two teams. The moment you do or starts for that,
you know in that game people are paying attention. And
JJ McCarthy is a massive story. National championship at Michigan,
drafted extremely high, preceded or you know, Sam Darnold obviously leaves,
he comes in, and I just think that we know

(01:22:56):
what we're doing. So to think that, you know, Tyler
Shuck looking at his box score here, because every time
I look up he had some big runs. I will
give him that. I looked he had a couple of
really nice rounts. He did go thirteen to twenty FO
one hundred and forty four yards in an interception. No touchdowns.
And again I'm not I am box score scouting a
little bit I had. I had the game on, but

(01:23:17):
I'd be lying if I was super dialed in. The
Bucks have kind of lost me. I mean that they're
playing so bad they're a awful watch. The SEC is
really really big, and it drives enormous television ratings. Alabama
from a rating standpoint, goes to tote with everyone in
the country basically except like Ohio State, which is I

(01:23:39):
think the biggest rating you know, draw with Notre Dame
in Texas, but the you know, Georgia LSU. I mean,
these teams aren't cash cows. I've been saying this for
a while and this is no shade at the Saints.
I'm Doug nuss Meyer, Kellen's right hand guy. I love
that guy. I'm rooting for them to get it turned around.
But like I would say, the most irrelevant division right

(01:24:03):
now in terms of what what I do is the
NFC South. It really is. So unless it's something Tampa related,
I think with like Baker and this is a little
inside baseball, but listen, that's what we do here, and
so we're not not no one has anything against Tyler Shuck,
but the Saints are just very very low on the

(01:24:24):
list of making sure the lights are still on, you know,
so again props to him. A couple of rushing touchdowns
were nice. But twenty four to twenty, you guys beat
in Tampa, which a nice win. You guys scored seventeen
points in the second half. Somethings off with Baker on
hundred and twenty two yards passing only fourteen completions, averaging
four yards of pass How many yards did a mecha

(01:24:47):
only at two point fifteen. They ran the ball pretty
well too, They had one hundred and eight yards rushing.
But I'll be honest, I wasn't super locked in on
that bad boy.

Speaker 2 (01:24:59):
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