3 & Out - Tua’s Respect Problem, Coaching Hot Seats, and Rodgers’ Field Frustration

On this episode of 3 & Out with John Middlekauff, John dives into why Tua Tagovailoa still isn’t getting the respect he deserves despite his strong play, and whether some NFL coaches have officially worn out their welcome. Plus, John reacts to Aaron Rodgers’ latest comments on field conditions and what they reveal about the league’s ongoing turf problem.

Finally, John answers your questions in this episode's mailbag segment.

Follow John on Twitter, Instagram and YouTube for the latest. 

All lines provided by Hard Rock Bet

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
The volume, what is going on every buddy, Josh Middlecoff
three and our podcast. Hopefully everyone is doing well. As

(00:22):
we headed into Thursday night, Mike Tomlin taking on Flacco
and the Baltimore I mean the Cleveland, the Cincinnati Bengals,
his third AFC North team. Tomlin's not happy about it.
Do you like the Steelers a night? And we'll get
into something Rogers said earlier that just made me shake
my head, as well as a couple of things I
want to hit on. I want to defend two a
little bit. And uh, I think we always think the

(00:43):
grass is going to be greener on the other side.
And I read an article today that went, before you
fire your coach, I just want you to realize the
coaching candidates in this cycle. One is Mike McCarthy, who
might be the best. Like that's it's not exactly Bill Walsh,
you know, sitting out there on the open market. So
we'll dive into some football stuff and yeah, we'll also

(01:06):
be live after the Thursday night game, like we after
the Sunday night game, like we after the Monday night games.
I guess we got another doubleheader, So buckle up. A
lot of football going on and let's enjoy it. But
I do want to start with Tua because I'm at
the point now where I'm going to defend him in
this situation. Listen, we know who he is as a player, right,

(01:28):
No one's ever compared him to Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes,
Aaron Rodgers in his prime. Like he's a middle of
the road quarterback that can play well in decent weather,
struggles in bad weather, and it's going to turn the
ball over some times because he has not the greatest arm,
but he's better than you know, ten to fifteen quarterbacks
on a weekly basis if the weather's on his side.

(01:48):
But the other day when he said his comments about
the players only meeting, people freaked out and said he
was throwing people under the bus. One player's only meetings
in football are kind of stupid, given that you're at
the facility Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday for probably a
combined seventy hours. The amount of time, especially like a

(02:09):
player's only meeting typically is like offensive guys or defensive guys.
You're around your guys constantly in the meeting room, in
the team meeting room, in the cafeteria, on the practice field,
like your entire life is is a player only meeting
just the position coaches are there some of the time,
or strength and conditioning coach are there some of the time.
You're constantly talking to your teammates. It's kind of stupid

(02:32):
when you really think about it. And the other thing
is football parallels the military. Not in the sense that
you can die. I mean, technically you could die playing football,
but it's not life or death like it would be
for an Army ranger or a Navy seal or you know,
someone in the Air Force. But in terms of the hierarchy,
you know, the head coach is the boss and everyone

(02:53):
knows it, and a good organization once the season starts,
knows that he's the head of the snake. And I
think when you look at this dolphin situation, Mike told
you last year, he's like, I can't get people to
stop showing up late. Fines do not work. It's like,
this thing's done. It's over, so you can run it back.
But the moment the head coach acknowledges people will not

(03:16):
show up to his team meetings on time, it's never
gonna function. And the reason guys aren't showing up to
the team meeting on time is because my buddies that
are scouts right now on the road, they say they
spend way more of their time accumulating information on the
player off the field, his wiring, his character, all the

(03:38):
intangibles than they do sitting there breaking down tape of
the player. Obviously, you want to get the player right,
but when you're dealing with first second day picks, most
guys can play. The reason a lot of them fail
isn't because they're not strong enough. Isn't because they're not
fast enough. Not saying that doesn't happen a lot of

(03:58):
the time. It's the intangible stuff, and that's on the
general manager to draft and sign the right type players
in your building. Most guys are not Peyton Manning. Most
guys are not Troy Aikman. They can mf every single player, unfazed,
lead the group to the promised land. Whether a coach
is around or he's not around. Most guys need to

(04:19):
be led. There's a reason like Seal Team six doesn't
set the mission. Someone does above their head and they
are just tasked with executing it. It's no different than
a football team like Patrick Mahomes doesn't need to rally
the troops seven days a week. That's what they pay
Andy Reid to do. And like the Dolphins, in a

(04:41):
lot of these franchises, I think we have a point.
And it's almost a problem because these owners are so
flush with cash they can fire and hire people without
hesitation anymore. Paying a guy five ten, twenty million dollars
to go away is pocket change to mirror you. And
it's created a culture because these people have no they

(05:03):
don't speak football, they don't understand football. It's why business
men for organizations that are on their second or third generations,
like Kevin Warren with the Bears, like this president with
the Titans, can finagle their way in Rich McKay with
Arthur Blank and have incredible amount of power, right because

(05:26):
those people speak numbers. Those people speak business what the
owner speaks, and the owner has no clue about football.
And if they can fool that owner and thinking they
know a lot about football, they can take control of
the operation. And that's what's happening all over the league.
And Steven Ross and his franchise feels like a rudderless
ship out there in the Atlantic Ocean, which is kind
of warm and nice, and you know, you got some

(05:48):
you know, string bikinis walking around the beaches. But this
football team. Think God Mario resurrected the college team, because
this team is just a joke and it's all falling
onto a who I'm not trying to act. And maybe
there's been some people online saying he's been late to
meetings in his past. I don't know. I'm not there,
but this doesn't all fall on him. He's just attempting
to do whatever he can because no one else will.

(06:12):
I do think we got to be really careful this
offseason about just like John Harbaugh is a good example.
Let's say the Ravens end up with five six wins
and just have a season from hell. There is going
to be a large contingent of people saying fire him.
I did this last year with Mike Tomlin. I said, listen,
no one with a brain would say Mike Tomlin is

(06:33):
a bad coach. But has his time run out in Pittsburgh?
Does his message run flat? And we can debate whether
that actually happened or not. Obviously this season's going pretty well,
But like there are candidate, there's a specific candidate you
can resurrect and get your offense into the modern world.
Ben Johnson one of the best OC candidates in recent memory.

(06:56):
And you could argue Vrabel is just a version of Tomlin,
So that would be replacing one guy kind of with
the same guy, but maybe gave a fresh message. I
was just open to the possibility. Clearly the Steelers were
not well. Kind of a similar situation here in Baltimore.
It's like, hey, has his message, Ran Flatten? Did he
miss his window? If this season continues to go really bad,

(07:17):
let's get rid of John Harbaugh and hire Mike McCarthy.
Arthur Smith. I love him, but Matt Naggie like the
crop of coaches unlike college football, like Penn State is
going to go all in, probably for Kurt Signetti or
Matt Rule, a guy that played linebacker for them and

(07:39):
has one at countless schools. When Florida fires Billy Napier,
they're probably gonna go after Lane Kiffen, a guy who
is setting records for the amount of wins in a
short period of time at a program that's never good.
Ole Miss Like, there are real good candidates in college football.
Dude to South Florida, the dude to Tulane obviously Matt Campbell,

(07:59):
there are legitimate candidates. If you're a big school to
go land a guy. Whether you dominate and win the
press conference or not, the resume speaks for itself on
a lot of these guys. Not necessarily true when it
comes to the NFL. And when I looked at this
list that the Athletic put out, Mike McCarthy was by
far the best candidate. And let me see this, I

(08:20):
don't think he's a terrible candidate. He can coach quarterbacks,
he can be the offensive coordinator while being the head coach,
and he's proved he can win a lot of games
in the regular season. Now over the long period of
time now since the early twenty tens, his resume in
the playoffs hasn't been that great. Lost some big time
games that he was favored to win, even in Dallas twice,
lost at home in the first round. The agreement Packers

(08:42):
and Sanfrans go forty nine ers pre devastating losses. Right,
so he leaves a little something to be desired. You
could argue, what the hell's the difference between McCarthy and
Harrball and Tomlin and some of these like, if you're
gonna you might as well just keep the guy that
you feel comfortable with. But that's what we're dealing with here,
and I think it's universal. Get rid of this guy
and some of these guys like Mike McDaniel. Obviously you're

(09:02):
gonna fire him, Zach Taylor, if you keep losing, it's
gonna get fired. But you fire Brian Callahan, who's taking
that job? You were just paying them. And listen, most
people in society would give their left, you know what,
to make three million dollars a year if you're a
head coach in the National Football League. I mean, what's
the average what's the average rate? Nine million dollars. If

(09:24):
you average it out, there are ten probably plus guys
making over thirteen million dollars. How many people in college
football make seven to eight, let alone nine or ten.
So when you pay someone like that, you're showing we
don't think he's any good. You'd be like, well, it's
just negotiation, it's just leverage. Well, it's just showing you
you're getting a guy that has no options and that
you won't hesitate to fire in a couple of years

(09:46):
because it won't be you know, very cost prohibitive in
terms of you losing money. He's like, whatever, give them
a couple of million to see you later. Well, it's like,
if you're the Titans, you have this young quarterback, like,
why don't you just call Steve sar Keys or Lane
Kiffin or something. But those guys wouldn't even accept your
phone call. They make three or four x what you

(10:07):
were just paying the head coach that you just fired.
And guess who they answer to Nobody, they're the boss.
So you can't even go down that road. When I
was with Philly and they fired Andy Reid, they have
their sight set on two guys. First, they went after
Bill O'Brien at Penn State. He turned them down, he'd
only been there a year. And then they got Chip Kelly,
a guy that looking back, not a great hire, but

(10:29):
at the time everyone wanted. So I just think you
look around this class, it's not great. There does not
seem to be a Ben Johnson, some offensive coordinator that's
just a shooting star. There are guys like Joe Brady that,
depending on the week you watch him pretty good, pretty bad.
Clint Kobiak a couple of years ago fired. You know,
it's like, this league's weird, and I think all these

(10:52):
teams now, they they just are. There's never been more
pressure right to try to win because the amount of
money you're guaranteed to make money win or lose. But
if you are a competitive team, it is it's so
lucrative to your bottom line. The aggression from these owners,
it's like, well, we just got to upgrade. Well, and
when you upgrade, it's awesome. You know. The Patriots hiring

(11:14):
Mike Vrabel shocked that worked. No shit, that was gonna work.
But that's not most of these situations. I think Arthur
Smith's a pretty impressive guy. His story's pretty cool. Worked
his way up the Titans. By the end, he was
the best offensive coordinator in the league. But he became
a head coach. Probably not all of his fault left
a lot to be desired, you know. And at the

(11:35):
end of the day, when you're the head coach, last
offensive coordinator and you're cool with running Desmond Ritter out there,
I just don't take you as seriously anymore. You could
argue that Matt Naggi winning some games with Mitch Trubisky
that can't complete of like the nine routes on the
route tree, like seven of them. Not that bad, but
if I tell you that you you know, the Ravens
fired John Harbaugh and hired Matt Naggie, you would be like,

(11:57):
what seriously? So I I just think we got to
be very very careful when it comes to these situations.
And listen, some of these guys are gonna get a
second opportunity. And the other thing is when you give
a guy a second opportunity, you know he knows that
he can handle stuff right because he has sat at
the chair where when a guy gets DUI when a

(12:18):
guy just disappears from your franchise, like the situation with
Josh Simmons right now, I have no inside information that
you don't have. I've just seen that he disappeared, and
they know where he is, they don't know when he's
coming back. Guess what. Andy Reid has experience dealing with
situations like that. Maybe not apples to apples this situation,
but he's seen this before a time or two. So

(12:39):
while some coaches would just freak the you know what out,
I might as well like what the fuck am I
gonna do now? Instead, Andy can take a deep breath,
we can handle it. We'll figure out. Here are options,
and no one prepares you to do that as an
assistant coach or as a coordinator, because that's not your job.
And this gets back to the Tua thing, like Tua

(12:59):
asked to act like he's Peyton Manning. What are you doing?
He has enough trouble just completing the bang eight over
the middle of the field. Can we just have someone
else be a leader. I don't know the head coach,
but he's wearing these weird ass capri pants that are
up to his knees. I mean, how could you wear those?
And I am pro the jogger pant obviously they look

(13:22):
better on a taller, skinnier guy. I have a pair
from Viori that I kind of wear to travel around,
but they go down to my ankles. You can't really
tell if they are just like kind of you know,
sweat tight pants or joggers the way he's wearing them.
And Big Cat put this out, you can't be one
and five and wearing these pants. I completely agree, Like

(13:44):
that look is you can't suck that bad. You can't
be How is a twenty eight year old guy who's
a multi millionaire who is married with the kid going
to take you seriously? But they just can't and it's
clear by the team that they don't right, And that's
what all these teams are tasked with doing. How can
I hire a coach that everyone can follow because leadership

(14:08):
that characteristic, which is hard to quantify. It's impossible. No
one knows, but you know it when you see it,
you feel a presence. I've been lucky enough to work
for Pat Hill and Andy Reid, and when they walked
in a room, they had a presence to him. I
can't imagine sitting in a room when some of these
guys walk in. You're like, I'm supposed to take this guy,
Mike mc daniel seriously, and people think I'm shitting on
the guy. He's a smart, offensive mind. He has no

(14:29):
business being a head coach. Hell, Robert Sala has a
presence to him, obviously. He's, you know, a good leader
of men when he's dealing with the defense, not a
good head coach. You know, it's it's like a quarterback.
It's extremely hard to do. We can nitpick lane, right.
He used to have this happen. I watched a documentary.
He's cleaning sober, his team's kicking ass. I know he

(14:51):
knows how to be a head coach. He's been a
head coach of big programs, he's been a head coach
of little programs. He's dealt with Nick Saban like, I
know the guy can handle some stuff. I'd say the
same thing for Sark is a perfect no. But can
you handle a lot of stuff? Hell yeah, Ryan Day,
Ohio State hater. But I respect what they're doing up there.
It's a pressure pack gig. We saw the pressure with
James Franklin crack the whole program. It's split in half

(15:14):
like the Titanic and sunk to the bottom of the ocean.
They hit serious adversity because they had built up all season.
And I've seen a lot of different people. Should he
have been fired? Should not have been fired? Once your
team legitimately quits on you, when you've put all your
chips into the table, like you've lost all your money,
it's over. You don't have any more hands to play,
you don't have any more chips. And that's what happened
to Penn State, right And that's why last week against

(15:37):
the Rams, I was like, you know what, we have
a long resume of John Harbaugh. I don't care if
he's gotten me and you out there playing defense. They're
gonna play hard this game, and what do they do
for a long period of time. It was three to three,
and the Ravens were playing their ass off. They just
don't have enough bullets in the gun and they eventually,
you know, lose by double digit points. But it's like
that was It's like, okay, I respect that. It's like, listen,

(16:01):
I had a couple of people forward me the social
clip that I sent out about the Browns and Mike
Tomlin talking about Andrew Berry treating these players like widgets,
like you traded Joe Flacco. You traded Joe Flacco to
an Indivision rival, who, if their quarterback's healthy, is a
preseason I don't know if they're quite a super Bowl contender,

(16:23):
but they're definitely just like, you know, a contender in
the division, a contender in the conference to win double
digit games, and you just give them a capable quarterback,
a guy that you deemed starting quality week one, and
even if he's not going to start, because you want
to start the younger guys, his value as a leader
to teach these guys like how to be a pro
in the league. But you don't give a shit about
that because you actually don't care. You're like a stock manager.

(16:45):
You're just treating all these guys. They're all widgets to
you in everything's value and you can say, well, John
Howie kind of operates like that. Clearly, not have you
seen the type guys that they have built that team around,
and they balance it with the character with the crazy guys,
with some of the flyers, like they cognitively think about that.
I know a lot of people in that organization. So

(17:06):
the reason they bring in Jalen Carter because they knew
they had Brandon Graham, Fletcher Cox, and Jordan Davis right
around him, that they would not have done that if
they didn't have any of that infrastructure there yet. Andrew
Berry just like in the Cleveland Browns. And I'm not
going to beat a dead horse on this one, but
they are operating a little bit like the Sam Hinkey
seventy six ers, and no one in the NFL takes

(17:27):
them seriously and clearly. I think Kevin Stefansi's kind of
caught in the middle because even he when they traded him,
was like, yeah, didn't quite see that one coming. And
you look back, you're like, oh, Tomlin worked with Stefanski
once upon a time in Minnesota, because you never hear
a coach just shit on someone else in the NFL
like that. And I think he's kind of standing up
for his guy because Andrew Berry, this, you know, Harvard

(17:49):
former player, not NFL player, but college player, is really
much more like a theo Epstein or you know, the
guy who's running the Dodgers. Here's the deference. Those guys win.
You can't lose and keep acting like you're smarter than
everyone else. It ain't working. It is not working at all.
And team building as a front office is really really important,

(18:12):
and you see some of these people have no fucking
clue what they're doing, and then these fans I feel bad.
You watch the games like the same thing every week,
and it starts with the head coach and the GM
that these people are placed in jobs that just have
no clue. So I guess I come around to maybe
Mike McCarthy's not that bad of an option. You could
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(20:05):
quick things. The Steelers, their field Rogers called it a
borderline unplayable. The big Fella, Ben Roethlisberger came out and
said that the University of Pittsburgh needs to build their
own stadium, a little small one like twenty five k
and just get out of there. I don't know, obviously,
the economic situation. I'm sure the university pays the Steelers.

(20:28):
I can't imagine it's a lot of money. Like, it's
not like the roonies are dependent on that income to
pay TJ. Watt. If I just had to take an
educated guests a couple hundred thousand dollars a game, maybe,
I don't know. So if you play six home games,
you do the math. I mean we're not talking two million, max.
Maybe a million for the year. I don't know. Whatever
the rent is, how does it make sense that I

(20:51):
can go on my phone and basically have anything delivered
to my front door, from food to TVs to a
car within twenty four hours? Get these teams worth billions?
Of dollars. Let me repeat billions of dollars. If the
Pittsburgh Steelers just went on the open market, what would
they go for? Whatever the number is, add fifty percent

(21:12):
to it, because one, they never come on the open market,
and if they did, they would be overpaid for right
based on whatever the quote unquote valuation was. This isn't
the twenty twenty five housing market. I see it with
my wife right now. Everyone's you know, it's like, hey, buddy,
your house isn't worth a million dollars anymore. You know,
you bought this thing twenty years ago. You paid three

(21:33):
hundred thousand dollars for it. You're desperate to get You've
already paid off the majority of your mortgage. You're thinking
you're getting nine hundred thousand dollars profit. No, lower that,
bad boyd eight seventy five interest rates your high, Take
your profit and move on. But if you think you're
gonna be waiting a long long time unless interest rates
precipitously drop the next six twelve months, which doesn't really

(21:53):
feel like that's gonna happen. All I hear is everyone
talking about it. It never happens. So if you want to
get your household and you want to still make a profit,
like you can drop the price a little bit. This
is in twenty twenty one. Times have changed. Adapt that's
not football. Their prices only go up. And I think
the Pittsburgh Steelers are no different than a lot of
these franchise I've said this forever. These families that bought

(22:16):
these teams decades ago, fifties, the sixties, they do struggle
with the current valuations of everything because they don't operate
like that. Look at the Jets and the Giants when
it comes to their turf. Can you imagine paying players
hundreds of millions of dollars and go, yeah, we're not
on the best turf, or we don't take care of

(22:36):
our grass. We let someone else play on it the
day before. It's like, you know what happens when a
major comes to your golf course, They shut down play
a couple weeks before I play. Where waste management is
guess what? They kick us off the course ten days
before the tournament starts. Why to get the course ready
for the pros? So to have a college team play
on your field the day before, it's pretty insane and

(22:59):
it's simple, just a money grab. That can't be that
much money. So I just don't understand where we're still
at the point where we're talking about fields, grass or
turf when it comes to these NFL teams, but we
constantly are every single week. It's nuts. I mean, it
really is. I just don't comprehend it. But it clearly

(23:22):
is not going away because at their soul that that
that frugal nature does not change regardless of the money
flowing in. And last, but not least, I I took
a gummy last night for the first time, probably like
I don't know a year, maybe not quite a year,
maybe like eight nine months, and it was like this
saying this new sponsor, we got to send me some

(23:43):
of the stuff, and it hit me. I didn't quite look.
I thought it was CBD. It was actually THHC. And
I was floating watching the Dodger game, and I was
just thinking that it's pretty unfair what they've done, how
good they are, And you know the thing, I got
a lot of techs when it came to you know,
I know a lot of Giants fans and they don't

(24:05):
want to see the Dodgers, who I think we all
have come to grips with if they're gonna pitch like this,
they are gonna walk to a World Series championship. And
they're rolling out last night Otani's buddy from Japan that
goes a complete game that they paid three hundred and
fifty million dollars too. They got Blake Stelle, who they
paid a ton of money. They got Glass. Now they
have all these guys they paid a bunch of money,

(24:26):
and their business model is broken. And I don't blame
the Dodgers. I commend them right from making a lot
of money spending a lot of money. That's the whole point.
If you're a fan, like I want you to be
all in. But a lot of these franchises, and I
saw it forever, like with the Oakland A's, it's like,
why don't we spend more because the franchise doesn't make
any money? So just because the owner is rich from

(24:46):
other business endeavors, if he invested in this franchise, there's
no guarantees going to make the money back, and more
than likely he will not. So I think the one
thing football has and we should be and this is
you know, my mind is just racing. I' getting all
these thoughts, trying to balance you know, not be too
negative in my head and positive thoughts and writing down
things that are firing into my head about what I

(25:07):
want to talk about for the next couple of weeks
on the podcast and these football theories. Football really figured
it out is their ability to spread the wealth in
the partnership of the television revenue and the universal umbrella
that everyone financially benefits from the Steelers playing the Bengals,

(25:29):
the Airs on a Cardinals benefit, the Jacksonville Jaguars benefit,
the New York Giants benefit. We're in baseball. They're kind
of like independent operators that are combined as a league
in basketball somewhere in the middle right, because the Lakers
don't have much in common with the Memphis Grizzlies. Where
at the end of the day, the Cincinnati Bengals wanted
to give Joe Burrow three hundred million dollars, the gavehim

(25:50):
three hundred million dops. They wanted to give Jamar Chase
one hundred and fifty million dollars, the gave one hundred
and fifty million dops. That's just not the case in baseball.
And you're watching, like thee if they win a World
Series this year, They're gonna be the betting favorite again
next year. They're not going away, and they're just gonna
keep doubling down. Where in football, like what the Chiefs did.
Why it's so incredible them making five of the six

(26:11):
Super Bowls is that shouldn't be the case. Everyone's operating
with the same amount of draft picks, everyone's operating with
the same amount of cap space. You just choose how
you get to, you know, use those resources. The Dodgers
have the ability to have like five three hundred to
four hundred plus million dollar players. There's like a handful
of teams that don't have a payroll above like seventy

(26:34):
five million dollars, let alone the capability to sign one
of those players. So props to them for just putting
all their chips in the middle of the table and
utilizing all their assets. And I think football and this
is this is gonna be the question with college football
is how do we get everyone operating and rowing in

(26:55):
the same direction where the television deal for the SEC
and the Big Ten and the Big twelve, we're all
together and we're all sharing in these revenues. And the
hard part is that they're at the point where they've
been even though they've been in conferences, they've been independent
in the sense that Ohio Steco's were way more valuable
than Minnesota, let alone Rutgers. Well, yeah, the Cowboys are

(27:17):
more valuable than the Jacks and are more valuable than
the Cardinals, just like the Packers generate more revenue than
you know, the Miami Dolphins for the league in primetime games.
But guess what when the television money gets distributed, they
all get the same check in the mail. And that
is the strength of the NFL. And that's why I think,

(27:38):
you know, sports like baseball, which obviously the pace of
the sport unless you're stoned out of your mind on
the couch like myself, like this is incredible. It's slow.
And as someone that grew up loving baseball, I don't
think I watched nine innings all regular season. I've watched.
I watched a decent amount of the Dodger playoff games
just because listen, I'm supposed to hate them, but I

(28:00):
mean Otani, who looks like crap right now, It's just
I mean, these incredible. I freaking love Mookie Bets and
I'm old school. I like watching a picture. Just go
seven eight nine innings in a playoff game and just
shove it right down your throat like that was badass
to watch last night. And yeah, just I just pays
me to say this, but I think the Dodgers are
gonna win a world series. Okay, let's go mail bag

(28:37):
at John Middlecoff at John Middlecoff is the Instagram fire
in those DMS questions answered here on this little old podcast.
We will start with I actually a bunch of people
forward me this and I saw it online. Is Kyle
Shanahan did the injury report today and it took thirty
two seconds and he took six breasts. So it just

(28:59):
shows you the forty nine ers they've never had, never
been anything quite like that. Here's the question from Eric,
how terrible with the forty nine Ers offensive line? Oh,
with how terrible the forty nine Ers offensive line has been.
Do you think Kyle Shanahan will change his philosophy on
being able to scheme around a bad line? I really don't.

(29:23):
I think his organizational philosophy is skill guys over guys
up front. Obviously, if he get a start left tackle,
he'll do that, but he doesn't value those guys over
skill guys. He's admitted it. His offensive line coach has
admitted it. They value wide receivers, tight ends, running backs,

(29:44):
guys that could impact with the ball in their hand
more than offensive lineman, which to me is insane. It's
harder to find good offensive line, especially now more than ever.
But is Kyle Shanahan going to change his philosophy? At
the end of the day, he's the boss, right, so
John Lynch they answered him like he's in control and
what he wants to do. You know, as my dad said,

(30:07):
when you start paying the mortgage, I'll listen to you.
So I'm gonna use that on my chriw too, And
he's right. So it's like, I don't think Kyle's gonna change,
not at this point in time. Even though the Ravens
are one and five and the defense has been abysmal,
I still hope they can make the playoffs. The Bengals
and the Browns are terrible, and the Steelers haven't played anyone,

(30:29):
and I would bet a lot of money they start
losing when they play tougher teams. They will get Lamar
back after the bye and should be able to win
their next five games against the Bears, Dolphins, Vikings, Jets, Browns,
which would put them at six and five. The defense
is obviously a concern, but they get turned around last
year and only gave up seventeen points to the Rams
despite the offense being awful with Cooper Rush. I don't

(30:53):
think you guys, even if get healthier, obviously you get
Lamar back, you're not gonna lose every game. But I
can't just you're gonna look as abysmal as you've looked
with a bunch of injuries to just get Lamar back
and rattle off five victories. Like remember you lost a
lot of games with Lamar Jackson. Meta Bouquet is not
coming back. There's no replacing that individual. You've had other

(31:16):
injuries in your secondary. Now, like you said after the bibe,
maybe some guys get healthy, but you guys early on
were a little healthier and also losing. So you definitely
can just get back into the mix with a couple
of wins. But I cannot with a straight face go
five straight wins. I don't care who you're playing. You
have not shown now. Should you beat the Browns and

(31:39):
the Jets, Sure, but I don't know if here's a
lock to beat the Vikings or the Bears. You know
the Dolphins can score. The Dolphins just scored what twenty six? Well,
they lose twenty nine to twenty six against Chargers twenty
six twenty three. I forget the punel. Yeah, I forget
the final score, but mayke a score. But again, I

(32:04):
wouldn't say your season there's some one in five teams
or seasons over. Your season is not over, but you're
in major trouble in your margin for error. You can't
blow one of those games that you're gonna be favored in.
In my opinion, the Chargers are in stage two of
a process rather than stage ten. The building blocks of
the team is still young. There's a reason they didn't

(32:26):
go nuts and free agency in the last two years.
And are you still confident that Jim Harbaugh will win
a Super Bowl before he retires. Yes, I think Jim
Harbaugh and Justin Herbert will win a Super Bowl in
the next five years. I do believe that this year,
with some of the injuries, it's gonna be tough. But
I think they're farther along than two. But they're definitely

(32:48):
probably in the middle, not at ten. As a Packer
fan who lives in the metro Detroit area. I'm surrounded
by Lions fans who always seem to use the transitive
property of equality. We're getting deep now when telling you
how bad your team is. Example, Green Bay lost to Cleveland,

(33:09):
and then the following week Detroit wins against Cleveland. Therefore
Detroit is better than the Packers. The NFL is one
league where there is where this theory is not applicable.
There are too many variables that can change on a
week to week basis. Do you use the transitive property
to compare teams? And I'm totally in agreement. One thing

(33:30):
I've learned being around the NFL on any given Sunday,
That's what makes the sports so appealing is like, even
when you're having a bad season, how often do does
like a four win team get a cool upset in December?
It happens all the time. You're dealing with human beings.
It's very physical. Game plans can just be bad. Obviously, teams,

(33:55):
especially on like Monday night or Sunday night, if you
get primetime games, you're a bad team. Injuries play a
huge part. It's very, very difficult to play that game
in the sport. I would say the same thing for
college football. You know. The other thing is when you're
a good team, right Detroit, Green Bay obviously, the Chiefs,

(34:16):
the Ravens, any team that has sustained success, overwhelm. You're
getting everybody's best shot. Every single team is throwing the
kitchen sink at you. This year, the Eagles, every time
they play, what do you think they're saying all week
long talking about the defending champs. We're gonna take down
the defending champs. So there's a motivational you know factor

(34:38):
here A big fan of the show. I love when
you talk sports, but I like even more when you
talk about life. I'm twenty nine, single, make six figs
as a project manager, Studes living aerospace company in the US,
and part of me feels like a failure. But I'm
not married and don't have any kids. I know you're
recently married with a kid on the way, congrats, But
did any part of you feel like you were behind

(34:58):
in life in your thirties without a family. I would
say I have a lot of qualities that I wish
I could change about myself, and I'm envious of other people,
either in my life or that I see from afar
that I could add. I would say one quality I
always had and I still have this even with a family,
is I've never really compared my personal life professionally. You're

(35:23):
constantly gauging yourself against others, but I never really My
brother got married in twenty eighteen. He's five years younger
than me. He has a six year old and a
three year old. You know that, It honestly did not
bother me at all. Now part of it too, And
you sound like I don't live around my family, like
I moved away when I went to college. I never

(35:44):
came back. Obviously I've gone back, but I just meant like,
I don't live in where I grew up. I don't know.
I just that's just one quality that never fazed me.
I just was so tunnel vision on myself. And I'll
say this for anyone that does not have children that

(36:04):
are thinking about it. You sound like you're doing pretty
well at twenty nine, but to have a child, you
better have some financial wherewithal I would not have been
able to have a child at your age. I couldn't
have done it. So that part of it was that,
you know, for all throughout my twenties, then even my
early thirties, I knew that. Honestly, I wasn't even set

(36:25):
up to get married, you know, financially. I didn't feel stable,
like you're stable. Then. I was a huge believer, like
some stuff's out of your control in life, you know, professionally, personally.
And I've always like when you try and you push
and you want something so bad, typically the universe gives
you the opposite, and it's hard. We're all human beings.

(36:48):
You're twenty nine years old, man, you got a great job,
You're making some coin. You'll be fine, You'll age well.
Typically men in your situation do so, you know, just
hit the gym, stay good looking, and you'll be all right.
Have you listened to a recent episode where a Broncos
fan seem frustrated with the NFL London game. I'm curious

(37:10):
to know whether you think there would be a point
at which fans from the US would actively protest the
expansion of international games, whether the league would even care.
As a Manchester United fan, I could not imagine the
league a League game being played in the US or
anywhere located abroad. I'm also interested in your thoughts on
how many gms, how many quarterbacks gms across the league?

(37:34):
Would you draft ahead of how many quarterbacks gms missing
period or Comma, I see what you're saying. Would take
Drake May? Do you think he has a special talent
or does this run remind you sort of like a
Jordan Love before he got paid. I don't think the
league gives one. You know what fans think about these

(37:55):
international games? All they care about television product and if
people are watching these more games, which I don't know,
I haven't even seen the ratings on them. I'm sure
they're not doing bad. They're not gonna stop, and I
think they plan on selling the package to make the
owners and players more money. And that's what I expect
to happen. So I hear you actively boycott, it's just

(38:17):
not gonna it won't have any factor. Uh what you
said about Drake May, I've been pretty impressed. I mean,
he looks pretty good. Schedule shitty, but the talent on
US team's not great. I think part of watching him,
part of watching Caleb the other night or Jayden Daniels,
is like it's it's pretty like the physical characteristics, it's

(38:38):
pretty evident, you know, Caleb, it was it was clear early,
like this guy can really move, He's got a huge arm.
Then it's about playing winning football, making winning plays, making
smart plays. One of the best plays of Caleb's career
is on that scramble late in that game when he
hit the ground like that was really impressive. How many
guys brain fart and run out of bounce happens all
the time? So what game was I was ole miss

(39:00):
earlier this season his quarterback did that, ran out of
bounce and Lane almost had a conniption. But you know,
part of playing winning football is more than just throwing
a deep bomb. It's about making smart plays. You know
what did Bobby and I say? Dumb loses more games
than smart wins. You know, obviously the spectacular plays, the

(39:23):
scrambling to your right, throwing the ball deep is impressive.
But he seems like he's got a chance to be
the total package. And uh Rabel won a lot of
games with Ryan Tannehill. Ryan Tannehill is not as good
as this guy, or at least this guy has the
opportunity to be way better than Ryan Tannehill. And it

(39:43):
does feel like Josh is kind of fine in his
stride with Drake. I'd be pretty fired up. If I
was a Patriot, I think he'd go pretty high. I
think he'd go you know, not factoring in if you
factored in age, you know, Mahomes would, Josh Allen, Lamar
would still all go one, two, three in some order.
I think Burrow's major curveball. Now with the injuries, he
might not go as high. Herbert would go really really high.

(40:07):
Then I think it would be up for debate. And
you know the Jade Daniels, Drake may c J. Stroud
a couple of years ago, you say would have been
a lock. You know, I'd have to text around, you know,
the vibe on him. It's not all his fault, but
he hasn't played as well as I think the hype,
so I mean, things change. Like I said this the
other day, like I don't litigate Patrick Mahomes on a
weekly basis, People like why aren't you? Why are we

(40:29):
going nuts on Josh Allen because he's an elite. You know,
I said this the other day, and I'm gonna hammer
this every day this year, like we don't, you know,
try to determine the guy's season based on one week.
When you're Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson. Now we nitpicked
them harder in the playoffs and stuff, but like on
a weekly basis, it's like, why doesn't he get the

(40:50):
same smoke that Tua gets? Did you hear what you
just came out of your mouth? Got a mail bag
question for you? As in the brat that's good guy.
What do you think about Rule to Penn State? Personally?
I think Rule is extremely overrated and hasn't won anything
and would be happy to see him move on outside
of his relationship with the Penn State AD. Don't see

(41:12):
how you could sell that to their fan base. You know,
I think part of like I played there, it means
a lot to me, I think that's overblown. In twenty
twenty five, I mean, these guys are making eight, nine,
ten million dollars. You know. Mario Christobal I'm pretty sure
grew up in the area, played there, and then they

(41:34):
offered him an unlimited amount of money and the conference.
It was a much easier path at Miami than it
ever was going to be an organ so there were
more variables than just like Miami's home, which obviously meant something.
But I think when you look at Matt Rule, yeah,
he played there in the early nineties, like the modern
day cell phone didn't exist, the Internet, nobody had it,

(41:57):
so to say, like, I just think I think that's
overblown sometimes And in twenty twenty six, for the next
five years, the only thing that matters are nil ability,
to recruit ability to pay coaches. If he gets a
huge advantage at Penn State, then he should be very interested.
If there's not a big advantage for him to go,

(42:19):
and he's comfortable at Nebraska and the ad likes him,
and he's I mean, he's got a chance to win
ten games this year at Nebraska, which would be incredible,
you just stay. But all my friends that in the
scouting business loved Mett. Role obviously did not go well
for him in Carolina, doesn't really go well for many

(42:39):
people there. But people have always thought really highly of Melural.
I've never met the guy kind of like him from Afar.
I think the other thing is who are he comparing
him to? Right, Saban's an outlier. You could have put
Saban in his prime at any major program, and especially
in the South, and he was gonna win. He would
have done that at LSU, he did it, but he
would have done at Obama. He would have done it

(42:59):
a Florida. He've done a Florida State. He would have
done a Clemson, he would have done it at all.
The at Tennessee who had done it all? If he
Texas would have hired him. He was an unstoppable force.
But most guys aren't like Ryan Day's really what he's
been doing is really impressive. But he's at the number
one program in the country. They have the most money,
they have the most prestige at this point in time,

(43:20):
they recruit by far the best players. He has unlimited resources.
You know, is Ryan Day if I just put him
at the University of Washington or at the University of Maryland,
is he not? I don't know. You know, I'm not
saying he's gonna be bad. But college Kirby has a
huge advantage. If you put Kirby at you know, let's

(43:41):
just pick at at Mississippi State, probably not gonna look
the same as gonna be a Georgia, Right, So Georgia
has all the resources. They have incredible high school football.
They will do anything for football. He's clearly a good coach,
But like you benefit, in college, it's easier to look
better when you're at the top programs. You know. It's
why it's really impressive what Signette's doing, even in an

(44:02):
NIL era, Like a lot of people could add Fernando Mendoza,
he was all over his ass. Why why aren't some
of these other programs, like where was Florida State? Why
didn't they offer the bag? They went after this dude
from Boston College who's been terrible. So I just think
that I think it's all about money, and not just
he makes a ton. I mean about what you can
pay the players and what you can pay your staff,

(44:24):
and the consistent NIL money moving forward. If there's a
huge advantage, he'd be crazy not to take it, especially
when you factor in that he played there and he
met his wife there. But if there's not like stay
in Nebraska, you could argue there's not that much difference,
because there is. To me, there's one program right now
that's just in the big ten that's head and shoulders
above everyone. That's Ohio State. Then right behind them is Oregan.

(44:48):
Then like listen, Michigan. They have a bunch of money,
they have the prestige. I got no clue if their
coach is any good. None. Seems like a nice guy.
Hardbough guy, tough guy, but like, is he a head
coach in this conference? Like is Sharon Moore getting into
the playoffs? I got no clue. I mean, I'm watching
their young quarterback and I get I'm not on rivals

(45:09):
dot com. Their receivers, the one freshman receiver for is
pretty talented. But you know, by all accounts it's they're
gonna get better over the next couple of years. But
is r coach always doing I don't know, I really don't.
You know, USC feels like they're probably a year away
from being a really factor. Maybe they're closer than we think.
This week we'll find out in Notre Dame. But like

(45:31):
it LINKL be the first tell you I got way
more advantages right now with all this money than I
would at some of these other schools. Texas Tech was
always like a second third tier program. Now they have
unlimited money, they're dominating. Like it is very possible that
you'll look up and Texas Tech will be in the
final four. Like how did they do that? Because they
have a billionaire paying defensive lineman in the transfer portal

(45:53):
to come to their school. I mean, so the priorities
now it's like whenever I hear people talk about facilities
at this point in time like facilities should are all
these facilities are fine. Let's focus in on what we
can pay the players, because that's how you land the players.
And at the end of the day, College more than

(46:14):
the NFL is about the Jimmies and the Joe's, not
the x's and those beside a couple of games a year.
Huge Steeler fan curious, how seriously you're taking the Steelers
right now. You seem a little barish on them earlier
in the season, but with some of the top AFC
teams dealing with injuries and the defense starting to look
like its usual self, do you see them making a

(46:35):
real push? Two questions I got for him, first and foremost.
The quarterback forty one years old. It gets cold right
your home games in November, in December, it's frigid now.
He's played in Green Bay's majority of his career. He's
a cold weather quarterback. But like once you get old,
playing in the the cold is easier on your body

(46:55):
when you're twenty seven, when you're thirty two, then when
you're forty one years old, especially when you've had some
injury issues. The last couple of years. So to me,
it's like, what does he look like in some of
these freezing cold games late in the season at home
on the road against the Browns or the Ravens. We
don't know. If he looks just solid, you're in good
shape defensively, if your defense plays well, that translates. We

(47:20):
know that does. But to me, what works in the
cold two things defense and running the ball. To me,
do trades for a running back in the next couple weeks,
because depending on gain, well, that seems a little risky clearly.
Caleb Johnson, I don't want to call it a lost season,
but feels like he's not gonna be what you'd hoped

(47:42):
when you drafted him. Well, you know, in the third round.
He's not like you're starting running back and Warren talented player,
but like, you can't ride that guy in a playoff game.
If you get a good running attack. I do think
you could win a playoff game. Could you compete for
the AFC? I guess you never say never, but I
would say winning a playoff game when you haven't won
one in however many years. And if you win a

(48:03):
playoff game, meaning you beat the Chargers or the Chiefs
or someone in the first round. That's a pretty incredible win. Like,
there's a pretty good chance when the dust settles. The
wild cards are like the in some you know, former
fashion Denver, Chargers, Chiefs, Jags, Like those teams are all
gonna be hard to beat in the first round because

(48:24):
they have a lot of strengths, good defenses, good coaching.
So winning a game, assuming the Steelers win the division
at let's say eleven or twelve wins, you're gonna play
Jim Harbaugh, John Harbaugh or not John Harbaugh, Sean Payton.
The Jag situation, which that would be, probably be the
team you'd pick. It'd be one you would you would

(48:46):
one hundred percent pick the Jacks over Denver, the Chiefs,
or the Chargers. So yeah, I feel pretty good if
I were you cowboy fan. I've been following the team
for fifteen years now, since I moved to Dallas at
ten years old. What it must feel like to be
young again. Do you think an elite coach would come
to Dallas with Jerry as the owner. I just feel
like an elite coach would want more power and decision

(49:08):
making and think that's not Jerry. Also, it limits the
range of coaches we get, Yeah, I mean it's not
the coaches Jerry chooses, Like this isn't like recruiting. They
don't choose you. Jerry's choosing them. So if you just
look at the coaches they've been interested in the last
couple of cycles, like Mike McCarthy who didn't have any
other options. Schottenheimer definitely didn't have any other options. And

(49:30):
Shottenheimer's been fine. But you're not like interviewing the Mike
Vrabels of the world. If John Harbaugh or Mike Tomlin
were available, Like, you're not hiring those guys. Jim Harbaugh
was available a couple years ago, Like Jerry Jones was
never gonna hire Jim Harbaugh. Right, Pete Carroll types and
we can argue how good Pete is at this point
in time, but like that's Jerry's gonna hire Brian Schottenhimer,

(49:51):
He's gonna hire Jason Garrett. And you know, Jerry's in
his mid eighties. How much longer he will be going.
I think the question mark's gonna be when Steven Jones
takes control and at some point in time when Jerry
passes away. Well, he approached this differently and will he
not do weekly radio hits. My guess is he probably

(50:12):
won't and he won't want to, you know, copy his
dad in those situations, and it'll be a much more
desirable place for a quote unquote top coach to come
or a top GM to come. What if Jerry passed
and like Howie Roseaman became a free agent or you know,

(50:33):
a guy like that, and he was like, I'll pay
you twenty million dollars a year, Come run, my friend.
If I'm Steven, Like, I'm all over stuff like that.
There is a question mark about the Steelers. Was wondering
your thoughts. I had a take on the Steelers when
they signed Rogers. My take was this, and it still is.
Why aren't there more people talking about the Steeler team

(50:54):
like the fifteen sixteen Denver Broncos with Peyton Manning at
quarterback they won the Super Bowl, the dominant defense and
an aging quarterback. Because I was doing Raiders stuff, I
saw that team for three straight years live they are now.
I don't go to as many games over the last
seven eight years, but over my course of you know, basically,

(51:16):
I would say for seven eight straight years going to
games on a weekly basis and so seeing teams all
over the NFL, obviously, I was scouted for a couple
of those years, watching all the personnel. They're one of
the best defenses of the last twenty five years. There
was not a player on that defense who was not good.
They their defensive line was just better than your defensive line, right,

(51:41):
And that's that's not a shot at your defensive line.
That's their defensive line was unstoppable. They had Von Miller
in the peak of his powers, DeMarcus Ware was still excellent,
Malik Jackson was a monster, and Derek Wolfe, the Cincinnati
pass rusher, was a good player. And their linebackers were good,
and their dbs were other worlds. They had like three
cover corners they had you could hit back then they had,

(52:03):
say their defense just better in your defense. So now,
is Aaron better in that version of Peyton Manning. Yeah, So,
I don't know if that team would parallel. It's it's
not an apples to apples comparison. I guess what I
would say, I think that team was better than you,
but Peyton was way worse than Aaron. It's pretty remarkable
that they won a championship with Peyton Manning. That that version. Honestly,

(52:28):
they should have won earlier when he was like healthy,
because that defense was just it's Seattle's and the forty
nine ers early on with Harbaugh are two of the
more physical defenses I've seen in the last fifteen years.
The Denver defense was by far the fastest, and I knew,
you know, I remember talking to the coaches on the
Raiders for a couple of years or like, they just

(52:50):
don't have a weakness, you know. They had a keep
to leave Chris Harris, Junior, Bradley Roby. They had multiple safeties.
I think one of them was a Ward, the Oregon
guy who was just a hammer. Brandon Marshall was a
good linebacker. Danny Trevathan, the kid from Kentucky probably a

(53:10):
kid now he's probably in his mid thirties, but he
was young then. And DeMarcus where they were really really good.
They were exceptional. So I would say they're better than
you guys, but that's I guess somewhat of the mold
of what you guys need to do. They could just
depend They could go into a game and being like
the opponent's gonna not sniff twenty points. It's like, all right,

(53:32):
we're gonna find out. I mean, maybe you guys are
better than I think, and we'll find out as the
season goes. When it got when it gets cold, can
you just dominate, because if your defensive line is gonna
look now, it's Cleveland's offensive line right now, one of
the worst offensive lines in the league because every other
play it felt like there was a guy in the backfield.
So if your defensive line, on any defense, if the
d line dominates, everyone in the backfield looks good. Like

(53:56):
you could make average corners look awesome when you're knock
the crap out of the quarterback every snap. So that
that's gonna be clearly, clearly your route to being an
awesome team is to have the best defensive line in
the league and just having an unstoppable front. And you
draft the kid in the first round, you go with
t J. Watt. You got multiple guys on the other

(54:16):
side with high Smith and Herrig Cam still solid at
his age, so that if that that unit just dominates,
then yeah, you guys, that'd be tough. It'll be tough
to beat. And as long as Aaron just play smart,
doesn't turn it over like he normally does, you should
be pretty bullish, so I'm excited to watch this game
Thursday night. The volume