Colin Cowherd Podcast - Steelers QB Controversy? Jets Hit Turbulence, Are The Giants…Good? Broncos A Playoff Team? USC’s Loss “Unacceptable” - The Herd with Colin Cowherd

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
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Speaker 1 (01:25):
Well, if you like nostalgia, like the seventies and the eighties,
you would love watching the Pittsburgh Steeters outdated offense. I
mean they're trying to get into a wrestling match and
have it decided in the last couple of drives. And
that's what happened tonight. And Dak Prescott, who didn't have
a great night Ceedee Lamb was vanished in the second half.

(01:47):
He had a couple of picks. But you know, Dak's
a professional quarterback. There's always been like to me, he's
always been sort of Kirk Cousins, but more popular, moves
a little better, It doesn't throw quite as accurately, but
these are professor quarterback and you give him a final
drive and fifteen plays later without really much CD lamb
and Dallas wins the game. So it's really an embarrassing

(02:11):
loss for Pittsburgh. And now, I mean, listen this, they
make one more stop and they win the game. So
but I went and look, Terry Bradshaw retired the former
Steeter great in nineteen eighty three, and it's twenty twenty four.
So in that time, the Steeters have had twenty five quarterbacks.
From Bradshaw's retirement until Justin Fields and Russell Wilson, one

(02:36):
big ben has been exceptional. Now Cordell Stewart had his moments,
or a Tommy Maddox or a Bubby Brister, Mike tom Zach,
but they've had one really high end quarterback. They've had
multiple great tight ends, receivers, linebackers, defensive alignment running backs,
they draft wide receivers very well, safeties, corners. They've had

(02:59):
one exceptional quarterback and that's kind of it. So you're
watching them tonight pass for ninety seven yards, and again,
George Pickens should have ninety seven yards. I'll argue all
day long, it's not the personnel. I mean, Arthur Smith,
the coordinator made Ryan Tannehill a pro bowler. Five years ago.

(03:25):
Ryan Tannehill left Miami, went to Tennessee and nobody had
him in high regard, and he ended up having a
really nice career second half of his career, and Arthur
Smith made him a pro bowler in the AFC. You know,
that was before you know, Lamar and Mahomes had become
Josh Allen had become stars. But nonetheless, you know, Brady

(03:45):
took one of those spots every year, so it's not
him and Dallas didn't play well. I didn't think offensively,
I think they looked functional, which the Steelers didn't. But
they just they're just outdated. Offensively, they don't.

Speaker 3 (04:00):
You know.

Speaker 1 (04:01):
Mike Tomlin's a motivator. I think he inspires teams. That's
his strength. His teams are tough physically. But and the personnel,
the front office does a good job. There's plenty of
personnel here. They remind me a lot of Seattle. Now,
Geno's better than justin fields as a competent sit in
the pocket, throwing down the field quarterback. But it's it's

(04:22):
like Seattle. You can't tell me Seattle's roster isn't solid
They've hit on multiple draft picks the last three years, receivers,
running backs, corners, mid round, late round guys. But they're
not good enough a quarterback and couldn't beat the Giants
at home. And I mean, look at Dallas was without
Micah Parsons, DeMarcus Lawrence Dak didn't play particularly well and

(04:45):
Pittsburgh at home passed for ninety seven yards you know,
end of the you know, the big scoring drive for
the Steelers tonight. I mean, just to show you how
pitiful it is, they benefited from hit on Justin Fields
where the cowboy defender his helmet did not hit Justin
Field's helmet, nor was it particularly a late hit. It

(05:09):
was just a hit that officials were I guess, uncomfortable
with because it was violent. I don't get the penalty.
It was a bang bang play. There was no helmet
to helmet collision and it was a penalty. Without that
fifteen yards, they likely don't score the touchdown. So twenty seventeen,

(05:31):
you know, Dallas wins this game on you know, last
play of the game, and that's betting. I'm two and
two going into the Saints in five and a half
points tomorrow, and what I think will be a really
interesting game without Rashid Rice, it'll be fairly low scoring
mostly now the Chiefs win that way. But you know,

(05:51):
it's what I've found with the Steelers, Mike Tomlin and
Justin Fields. They're actually a perfect match because you'll never
make Tomlin fans or Justin Field fans. You'll never talk
them out of their devotion, regardless of what they see.
And uh, you know, Tomlin, they're still clinging till we've
never had a losing record, all right, if that's your standard. Uh.

(06:15):
And Justin Fields, I mean, he's a big, tall, runs
around well, has a pretty good arm, but I just
don't think he sees the field particularly well. I don't
think he's terribly accurate, although more so now than ever.
And you know, the good news is when you look
around to the Cowboys and Steeters, because I think we
watched two. You know, when Mike and DeMarcus Lawrence come back,
Dallas feels like a low end playoff team to me.

(06:36):
Pittsburgh doesn't. And again you know Dak with Ceedee Lamb,
competent receiving crew, not great, but competent. Brandon Cooks comes back,
you know, Dallas may sneak into the playoffs, although Washington's
really good and the New York Giants are no pushover.
I'll talk about that game the Seahawks lost to the
New York Giants and the Pacific Northwest with John middlecoff

(06:57):
here in a couple of minutes. But you know, I
guess the good news for both the Steelers and the
Cowboys is who's really good?

Speaker 3 (07:03):
Now?

Speaker 1 (07:03):
There are you know, Baltimore's offense, Cincinnati's offense, Kansas City's defense,
But I mean teams like San Francisco, they're just not
the same team. You know, Baltimore can get gash. Buffalo
is on a two game losing streak, so they're they're
you know, I think Detroit's good, but something feels like
it's missing a little bit. I think green Bay is

(07:25):
getting better every week. I picked them to beat Detroit
in the NFC North and I think they're they're picking
up steam. But there really isn't a dominant team so far.
There are dominant units, but not dominant teams. So we
have a long way to go. And you know, I
just but ninety seven yards passing with those weapons on
a cowboy versus a cowboy defense, that is all beat

(07:48):
up is a bad look. But again, the Tomlin fans
one quarterback since Terry bradsch are retired has been exceptional
and they've either drafted, traded for acquired twenty five Sperkstein
our quarterbacks. And I will say this about Russell Wilson.
You know, they they these these broadcast crews have production

(08:11):
meetings before games and they you know, so they get
some information and over the course of a game, that
information comes out through the broadcasters or sideline reporters, and
you know, they made it sound throughout the course of
the game a couple of different times than you know,
Russell Wilson, they showed him a lot earlier. You know,
Russell Wilson will get his shot. But I mean he
had a calf injury. You know, it's it's he didn't

(08:33):
break a collar bone, it was it was a calf injury.
So you know, I think the coaching staff and Arthur
Smith right now like the more athletic, taller, younger justin
fields and I think if he would have won tonight,
they would have stayed with him. But these losses give
Russell Wilson an opportunity to get the job. But it's

(08:55):
I mean, how long does a calf injury take for
a professional athlete. I don't know. This is a long
time to be out that drama with a Pittsburgh Steelers
quarterback situation is I just think starting. It's just starting.
So congrats to the Cowboys again. Back through for almost
three hundred and fifty yards. And the one thing I

(09:15):
always liked about Dak and I really do appreciate this
about Dak, and it's kind of the opposite of Aaron Rodgers.
You can't tell in the middle of a game if
he's playing well or not. He's unbothered by interceptions. Dak
doesn't care. Dak's made a fortune, He's won a lot
of games. He's not deterred if he has a couple
of bad picks. He doesn't have crappy body language. I mean,

(09:37):
ceedee lamb and him jawed in the game. It doesn't
affect how he plays. Dak is very much Kirk Cousins.
Smart reads the entire field, nice distributor of the football,
a real leader, excellent intangibles, and doesn't get overly emotional
in games. You know he's not. He'll pump a fist

(09:57):
once in a while, but you know he and CD
are struggling in the second half, and he's got picks.
He almost fumbled the game away down to the goal line,
but he's just unbothered by it. Good plays, bad plays,
and that's He's really one of the models of the personality,
the EQ, the emotional quottionent that you really need as

(10:19):
a quarterback. You can't tell. I mean, you can tell
when Aaron Rodgers throws a pick. You could zone me
into a game in the third quarter. I could watch
Aaron's body language and tell you how to not watch
the game, how he's playing. You can never tell. With
Dak Prescott. He's a total grown up. And the Cowboys
needed that tonight because they were before that fifteen play drive.

(10:43):
It was choppy, it was turbulent. They're on the road.
They seedee Lamb vanishes in the second half, so you
know Dallas doesn't have a great run game. I mean,
a full back now has become a crucial element to
their offense. So credit to Dak being a pros pro.
Will we watch Kirk Cousins do it on Thursday, You
watch Dak do it on Sunday night. Professional quarterback play, unemotional, smart,

(11:09):
make the play the throw in the biggest moment of
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(11:31):
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(12:17):
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Eats get almost almost anything for game day. So I'm
I want to just start with the first game of
the day, the Jets. So the Minnesota Vikings beat the Jets.

(12:39):
I was it twenty three to seventeen. And Jets got
off to a really bad start, as they've been prone
to do this year. Even though those are supposed to
be the scripted plays and where you get off to
pretty decent starts offensively, they didn't. And I've got reams
and reams of notes here. Sam Darnold had a bad pick.
There were opper tunities. But so already New York media

(13:04):
wants to fire Sala, Robert Sala, So let me just
defend him. And I don't think he's a great coach.
He hasn't proven to be one. Because the general manager
whiffed on Zach Wilson and a left tackle, they had
to basically desperately give the franchise to the best free
agent quarterback they could find, which was Aaron Rodgers. So

(13:25):
Aaron had the power to bring in Nat Hackett. I
don't think Robert Sala wanted to. So his GM put
him in a situation where he's dealing with a relationship
with an oc he wouldn't have hired. I mean Nat
Hackett's you know, reputation is what it is. We know
he's got an impulsive owner. Now Alan Lizard's had multiple

(13:46):
drops today. That's on Aaron. But Hassan Reddick, this defense
is good. They somebody finally shut down Minnesota. How good
would they be with Hassan Reddick? So I look at
Saul and I think you can blame him. But John,
I do this all the time. Are you as a coach,
Matt Eberflus, are you good with your side of the ball.
We finally found a defense that slowed down Minnesota today.

(14:08):
I might take is sla is having to overcome GM mistakes,
an impulsive owner, and Aaron's age, which he's just not
what he used to be. You're kind of smirking. Would
you run him out of town?

Speaker 3 (14:20):
Solo? Well? I laughed, because only Colin Coward and Aaron
Rodgers could get me out of bed. Six thirty am
to watch one of these London games and I did it,
and I did it for you, and I did it
for Aaron, And ten minutes into the game, you're just
thinking they're gonna get boat raced. Yeah, I mean it
was just three and out, three and out. You know,
that game against the Patriots, it was hard to deny

(14:41):
he had a youthful feel. It turns out the Patriots
are awful. Yes, And these last two weeks you saw
him against Denver, who turns out Denver playoff team defense.
They're pretty impressive. And then obviously Minnesota really really good
on defense. He looked really old. Yeah, you know, he
looked really old and he could move around. He's definitely

(15:05):
you know whatever's going on with his lower leg, it
was he talked about it coming into the game. He
got rolled up. But the magic is gone. I mean
those back shoulder throws, I mean the throw that ended
the game. There were the pick six, little fluky that
happens sometimes when you just kind of throw it in
the guy. But the other two picks the way the
game ends. When has he ever been so off with

(15:28):
the wide receiver on that throw that that was really bad.
But his other pick, which is a layered throw, which
I would say Aaron Rodgers is as good as anyone
in the history of the sport. Down the scene between
two defenders, and it was it looked like a remedial quarterback.
What they do air mail? I mean, the receiver has
no shot and you're just going I just don't see it.

(15:50):
And the other thing is how did they get his
swag back? And this was when he was younger pre
Achilles in Green Bay. They started running the ballway and
you're watching the last two games. I mean, I don't
think they've accounted for like seventy total yards and they
don't even try. I mean, you're just at this point
in time, forty years old, the way he was playing today.
To ask him to throw at forty five ish times

(16:12):
is not a winning formula. And let's face it, Colin,
these quarterbacks and his resume was way better than Russell
Wilson and obviously Deshaun Watson. But great quarterbacks never become available.
That never happens. The reason Peyton Manning became available they
thought his neck was broken. Yeah, right. Bill Belichick said, listen,

(16:33):
you guys don't think I'm crazy. I'm shorting a forty
two year old player. It's very rare that like oh
Josh Allen and his primer Lamar changes teams, that's not
what happens. So we now have a long list of
Russell disaster. Obviously Deshawns has a chance to be historic disaster.
And this Aaron Rodgers thing. Last year, old guy got hurt,
freaky okay, and this year you're just seeing him play

(16:55):
decent competition and they just feel overwhelmed. I mean they
really do, but it's he's not good enough. He's not
good enough to mask their issues, like you said, with
their offensive coordinator and their personnel.

Speaker 1 (17:06):
Yeah, they asked him to throw fifty four times and
he's not that player. And the other thing is, you
know I had said this, I always thought Cam Newton
wasn't very disciplined mechanically, but I thought he got away
with it in his prime. You know, Cam was just
an arm thrower. He wouldn't set Aaron has been able
to get away with sometimes floating, flipping, kind of a.

Speaker 3 (17:31):
Captimes I would say, the majority of the time.

Speaker 1 (17:34):
Right, And in his prime he could get away with it,
and he just can't anymore. His mechanics, Cam Newton's mechanics
they're just and that's why. That is literally why Brady
was good to the end. He was mechanically.

Speaker 3 (17:49):
Perfect too before his arm fell off.

Speaker 1 (17:52):
Yep, and Aaron and Cam Newton jump out to me
as players that were just sort of so gifted they
got away with it. I mean, go back to Aaron's
last year in Green Bay. They were eight to nine
Aaron again in a organization that was young but stable.
They lost at home to Detroit, which was one year
away from being good. And now you look at them,

(18:14):
think about this. Denver, with a worse roster and a
rookie quarterback, has a better record and has beaten the
Jets head to head with boon Knicks, who, by the way,
I watched the day again. They're not asking him to
do a ton, but athletically bo Nicks is moving. Boone
Nicks is picking up, He's moving the chains. That's an
average roster that Vegas had at five five and a

(18:35):
half wins. So Denver's beaten them in New York, has
a better record one again today and is actually starting
to figure it out offensively. So I think I think
your point is true, is that when you talk about
I mean, I think Matt Stafford has kind of like Aaron.
He's still he doesn't move as well, but I think

(18:56):
he's mechanics are better and he's got a better head coach.
But you most of these guys not named Brady John
may age really fast and Aaron gull hit today. He
was in pain the last quarter and a half of
that football game.

Speaker 3 (19:09):
Yeah, it feels this could end pretty ugly the rest
of this year. Obviously, they'll still win some games. They
got players. I don't view them as like a four
or five win team, but it could be a bumpy
seven to eight win ride. And the way he looks
relative to what he's been You talked about this a
lot leading into the season. You know where he would

(19:31):
rank in the AFC, the overall landscape of the quarterbacks,
and you know, a lot of people freak out when
you say, hey, seventh, eighth, ninth guy, give or take
somewhere in that region. The last two weeks, he hasn't
sniffed being a top twenty quarterback. Obviously, last week he
even admitted he was atrocious. And today you just see
his physical limitations. He's not able to move like he

(19:54):
once did. You know, beside Garrett Wilson. They're solizarre dependent
and when they're not running the ball, he can't just go.
It was really glaring today because again, we had a
football game start for us at six thirty in the morning,
so right when the ten am game starts, and you
just go from that because that basically ran right up
till ten and then all of a sudden, it's Lamar

(20:15):
and Joe Burrow and you go. You know, for a
long period of time. Even these guys have been good
for a while now too, but a couple years ago,
Aaron was ahead of them, winning MVPs or right there
with them, the superstars of the league. And then you're
watching those two guys and you just witnessed Aaron. You're like,
he feels like, I didn't watch this, but Willie May's
on the Mets or something now his version of it,

(20:37):
and it's just I don't think that you can circumvent
his age if you can't run the ball, because his
game was very predicated on him moving around. And there's
a couple of times I think he knows, like I
can't get away like I used to, and he kind
of just plops and it was a he just looks old.
He looks weathered, Colin. He looks weathered.

Speaker 1 (20:59):
What I think really helps Robert Sala and saves his
job for the time being is they don't have a
strong offensive coordinator. If they did, I think Woody Johnson
if they lost to Buffalo would make a move.

Speaker 3 (21:11):
I really do.

Speaker 1 (21:11):
He's that impulsive. But they don't have a great coordinator.

Speaker 3 (21:15):
Is that who they played this upcoming week? Buffalo?

Speaker 1 (21:16):
I think it's Buffalo's on the schedule, so their schedule
gets really tough.

Speaker 3 (21:20):
You know.

Speaker 1 (21:20):
The other thing is that, and I mean they targeted
Garrett Wilson twenty two times today. They're like the Cowboys.
If Ceedee Lamb or Garrett Wilson twist at an ankle,
they don't have an offense. They're totally dependent. That's why
the Devonte Adams rumors make sense. But you know, when
you start looking at the Jets, and I said this

(21:45):
this week, Yankees Mets in the playoffs next season starting
this is the first viable championship team. So much of
this franchise historically has been about relevance. And it's like
I always call him the low self esteem sports franchises.
You know, Cleveland gets desperate. Deshaun Watson's contract. You know,
we've seen NBA franchises like this, the Jets, Mets, historically,

(22:09):
the Yankees had a big signing. We have to have
one this organization. Now you start looking at it, I
think they have to draft a quarterback in the AFC Mahomes,
Allen Lamar Burrow, C J. Stroud, Justin Herbert. You know,
it was okay, let's get Aaron some help next year.
They have to draft a quarterback. There's no question they

(22:31):
have to draft a quarterback.

Speaker 3 (22:32):
Well, I understand the GM and the coach have to
be realizing the light at the end of the tunnel.
If they win seven eight games, they're all going to
get fired. But you cannot trade a high pick for
Devonte Adams. I think that's malpractice in the long term
landscape of this operation because even if you add DeVante Adams, okay,

(22:54):
what you're still probably a one and done playoff team
at best, maybe winning a game. If this is the
version of the quarterback right, he's not a top ten quarterback.
So you know, I don't know if you saw the
report today, did Mark Davis? You know, most of these
teams it's like, listen, I hire my GM. You do
what's best for the organization. Mark Davis like, we will

(23:15):
not take anything less than a second round pick, which
I understand where he's coming from, but that kind of
shows you the dysfunction of the Raiders. He's the one
making the call on the compensation, but maybe the justice
kind of give in. Well, they're not gonna be a
top five drafting team, right, They're still gonna win games,
So you're not drafting high enough to probably get the
premium guy, which is already a pretty questionable quarterback draft,

(23:36):
so you're more likely to be where they just were
twelve to fifteen. So giving up that second round pick
or your two third round picks or whatever that's valuable,
you know, capital to move up. So I now that's
the problem though, So internally, these guys are fighting for
their lives, yeah, because they can just see getting fired
coming right down, you know, the railroad tracks at him.

(23:56):
So maybe they're like, screw it, take the pick, Mark,
And if I'm the Raiders and I could get the
Jets pick, that's that seems pretty crazy to me. And
I also think if you're DeVante Adams, you know you
go with Aaron, It's like, is he gonna retire after
this year. It just it feels this is the problem
about how much limited equity the franchise had together that

(24:18):
once you go through a little adversity, like the Niners
right now are in shambles. Yeah, but at the end
of the day, Fred George Kittle, Trent Willings, all you
guys have played together for so long, and the Patriots
or the Chiefs when they go through bumpy roads, like
sometimes it's like, hey, guys, we've been doing this for
a while. Everyone with the Jessic I just got here,
you just got here. We've played four games with Aaron total.
It's just it's it feels like a ticking time bomb

(24:41):
because of this situation hanging over the head with the
with the executive and the coach, and then Aaron's ah,
and he's just kinda I don't want to say he's poudy,
but he's just his body language is not grey right now.

Speaker 1 (24:55):
Yeah, So Viking fans, I know you're upset with us
because we're talking about the New York Jets, but they're
in crisis. The Vikings now are undefeated. They had a
pretty bumpy second half. Sam Darnold did have one of
his kind of classic reckless interceptions. But I will say this,
he mostly managed the game even good. I mean, Kansas
City's had multiple bad halfs and Mahomes has had multiple

(25:18):
horrible picks. Today, Stafford had another one, Aaron had several,
so Donald is allowed to have some. You know, he
throws the ball down the field. Sam has receivers that
can make plays. I thought overall, Minnesota really really controlled
the game in the first half, got into Aaron's head,
and then it was just holding on. I kind of
feel like that way with the New York Giants, even

(25:38):
though we thought the game was in doubt, I feel
like it was the Giants' day. Their own line was
just controlling Seattle's injury plague d line. So Minnesota's undefeated.
I don't take anything negative. You're not going to run
through this league. I mean, good God, Bama got beat
by Vandy. You're not going to run through this league
and not have really bad halfs. So I don't have
any take on Minnesota. They won.

Speaker 3 (26:00):
That's an impressive wins to me. You're not going to
beat everyone going up twenty eight nothing in the first quarter, right,
That wasn't a sustainable model, So to me, to win
a game like this where you did have the lead
the whole time, but they were kind of coming back
and your defense hold serve and like you said, Sam,
like he didn't crumble today would have been a moment
yep in previous years where maybe he fumbles and throws

(26:21):
two other picks and it's just you know, the Jets
win because they get handed to victory by Sam Darland,
and that did not happen today.

Speaker 1 (26:27):
All right, Let's go to San Francisco Arizona. That was
one of my blazing five picks. I like this seven
and a half. Arizona I think should have won by more,
but they had that field goal blocked and San Francisco
took it. In Arizona beats the Niners twenty four to
twenty three. San Francisco once again without Christian McCaffrey. Kyle
shannan has losing record. Now, Mason Jordan's a good running back,

(26:47):
but McCaffrey gives you so much more than that. So
I had said one of the things, I believe, I
think Washington's for real. And when they housed Arizona, people sold,
but Jesus Arizona, Murray Harrison and Wilson McBride the tight end.
Connor's a freaking beast at running back. He is, He's

(27:08):
a good player. This offense. I don't know if they're
a playoff team. I don't know if they're brilliantly coached,
but they're gonna beat teams. They just have too many players.
Kyler Murray after the interception of Bosa standing still in
freezing would drive me insane if I was a head coach.
But let's let's it's a huge win for them. Let's

(27:29):
talk San Francisco. I thought their offense. I mean, if
you looked at the box gol I did right before
I came on, I mean, it was even if you
didn't watch the game, you'd say, oh, it's a great game,
twenty four to twenty three, but it did feel like
it was a game in which San Francisco had in
the bag and let's slip away.

Speaker 3 (27:45):
Yeah, they were one and six in the red zone.
I mean, they're just not scoring enough points. And I
don't know if that's you can put it all on
Christian McCaffrey. Obviously he's a loss.

Speaker 1 (27:55):
It's a part of it.

Speaker 3 (27:56):
You got, you got Brandon Aiyuki, got George Kittle, you
got Deebo, Samuel Juwan Jennings, you got Mason. Like to me,
there are no excuses to not You're up twenty three
to ten and a half. And I understand you lose
your kicker early in the game, but I don't give
a shit You're you're not playing. This is not the
seven Patriots here, Like you said, they've always Kyler's always

(28:16):
given the Niners fits. You know, he basically opened the
game up with a fifty yard run. They do a
lot of that zone read stuff. It throws the Niners
d lineman off because they are so quick to get
upfield and all of a sudden, the crease. The Niners
defense has not been the same.

Speaker 1 (28:30):
It's not.

Speaker 3 (28:30):
Today was a total team loss offense and defense. Purdies
I thought was pretty hit or miss, even the final pick,
which is not all his fault. He's hit, but Tom
Brady's like George Kittle's wide open. We don't have time
to be patting the ball. You gotta get rid of it.
I don't care what your You have to make these
quick decisions. And that's what they lean on him to do,

(28:51):
to be really smart. And I thought, it's like you're
holding the ball for a guy that's covered down the
field when you got eighty five wide open. But defensively,
Greenlaw got hurt in that Super Bowl and they are
just not the same as a run defense. You can
run on them the physicality. They still hit hard, but
usually it's guy six seven yards down the field right,

(29:11):
and if Boston the d line doesn't sack the quarterback
basically wants to drive, which is hard for them when
they're playing a guy like Kyler Murray who can scramble around.
They just look like, I don't want to say, a
shell of themselves, but they are a watered down version
of the defense we've seen for the last three years.
And that's with Fred Warner playing at a really high level.
But I think you feel green Laws miss and let's

(29:32):
face it, just over time, like this dynasty not a dynasty,
excuse me, that's that's Chiefs. This run of the Shanahan
era is like there's a lot of film on these guys, now, yeah,
you know, so it's it gets more difficult. People know
what party likes to do, what Kyle likes to do.
And defensively, they've had a lot of It's not like
they have a spags right or a Flores. I mean,

(29:53):
they just elevated this guy who's been a lifetime position
coach that I'm safe to say no one else was
ringing down the doorbell to hire. Well.

Speaker 1 (30:00):
I mean, look at Seattle's legion of boom defense. You
get about a three year run on new stuff and
then and then you know, the legion of boom. All
of a sudden, somebody's a free agent.

Speaker 3 (30:10):
They leave.

Speaker 1 (30:10):
You can't afford them. All of a sudden. The league's
got two and three years of tape. You know Miami's offense,
Remember for about seven games, eight games, nobody can follw
that motion. Then people it's dot college football, where you know,
sometimes a coach can't literally can't over the course of
a game, the coordinators can't solve the riddle. NFL team
solve the riddle at half. It's just better coaching. So

(30:33):
I look at I think that's a great point by you,
and I also I also think, you know, there are
certain guys I can't quit. I'll get to Lamar later.
I think he's just a remarkable player. Kyler Murray, you
have to make decisions in this league. You would hope
you'd never have to make it with a quarterback maturity commitment.

(30:54):
But John, you look around this league, there are not
a lot of Kyler Murray's. Let's say he's Let's say
he is, and I think he throws a better ball
than Lamar, but I think he's about eighty percent of
Lamar Jackson in terms of elusiveness, movement, playmaking. He brings
the same headache to a decordinator. You're never quite sure.
I mean, you can't cheat. That's why Connor, you can't

(31:15):
cheat on him. And that's I've said this about it
is people hung around with Jay Cutler, who didn't have
Kyler Murray's ability for a long time because of the
arm strength. Where are you on Kyler Murray? I mean
they're stuck with a contract. I mean him not moving
on the Bosa pick, just staring at it is like bad,

(31:36):
Like that's really bad. In the film room, I.

Speaker 3 (31:39):
Think one fatal flaw And I would say the biggest
difference between Lamar and Kyler is Kyler cannot see sitting
in the pocket and Lamar can he and he did
it today. He can pick you apart in the pocket
when he's on and Kyler one of his biggest throws
the day on a fourth down to Marvin Harrison. He
can do the Lamar Michael Jackson backpedal right and get

(31:59):
away from pressure. Because he's such an elite athlete, he's
got such a great arm. But you have to get
him on the movie. To me, he's a little bit
of a tease like he is fair. He's an excellent talent.
Do I think you can build a sustainable winning team
with him? I'm not sure you can't.

Speaker 1 (32:14):
I think you're right.

Speaker 3 (32:15):
I think he's I think he's a tough guy to
win with over the course of a season, But on
an individual game basis, like you said, no defensive coordinator
feels great getting on the bus headed to the stadium.

Speaker 1 (32:25):
Nope, I think that's the best way when I watch him.
First of all, he's gonna get dinged up over the
course of a season. He runs a lot, and he's small.
And the second thing is he he's he's sort of
a moody player. There's times when he's really engaged, and
there's times when he feels a little like Aaron Rodgers.
After Aaron had that second pick, he started he was

(32:46):
kind of too casual with some of his deliveries, like
he was pissed off, and he was telling Hackett to go,
go go, and he's Iroll and Lazard and Alan. It's
not that Aaron's not playing hard, but you can see
his emotions. You know, Brady would pump his fist after
a touchdown or he'd yell briefly on the sidelines, but
he was fairly robotic emotionally.

Speaker 3 (33:06):
In a game.

Speaker 1 (33:08):
Aaron and Kyler Murray, I can I can tell I
could just tune the game in and go. They're leading,
their trailing, they just threw a pick. And I think
Kyler's hard to coach, even though I think he's brilliant.
I think he keeps everybody on eggshells. I've been told
this by a former teammate, an executive, and a coach
that Cliff Kingsbury there were times he wanted to go

(33:29):
to Colt McCoy like it.

Speaker 3 (33:31):
Drove him nuts. I think it's weird, right. I respect
his god given abilities, which he's got to be on
the short list of some of the greatest athletes that
have ever played the sport. I mean, you're talking like
Bo Jackson Deon Sanders, especially when you factor in the
guy was a top ten draft pick in baseball, but
also his main downfall as a player, beside the intangible stuff,

(33:55):
that height is something pretty hard to overcome. Yeah, and
in a game when I can core value or you're
just not running it at well, which he was today,
I don't trust him to be able to do what
Lamar consistently does because I think there's a big difference
in whatever Lamar is sixty three. I mean that's you know,
almost a five inch gap between the If you told
me Kyler Murray was Lamar's height, I don't. I still

(34:18):
think that what Lamar's intangibles are pretty special.

Speaker 1 (34:21):
And Lamar is also there is no question he is
completely committed to his sport.

Speaker 3 (34:27):
No one's ever exactly. So the intangible stuff, which is
a make or break thing, would still drive people nuts
with Cayler, but I do think he would. Then you
could make the argument you could build a sustainable winner
with him because he can't throw like it's not because
of lack of armstrang. I just legitimately think he can't see.
How could you? Yeah, it's just it's just basic math, right.

(34:48):
The guy standing in front of him six five, he's
five nine. That's why he runs around and he god
he's a fun player to watch.

Speaker 1 (34:54):
Though, it's time for this week's player I thought might
give almost almost anything to redo his game, brought to
you by Uber Eats. This week it was Aaron Rodgers
three picks, including two in the first quarter, first time
Rogers ever had two picks in the opening quarter of
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(35:17):
with Uber eats, the official on demand delivery partner.

Speaker 3 (35:19):
Of the NFL. Order.

Speaker 1 (35:20):
Now, all right, let's segue to Houston beats Buffalo twenty
three to twenty and I want to talk specifically the
bill second straight loss about some game management. So, for
those who didn't watch, the game was tied twenty twenty.
There was forty seconds left. The Bills were deep in

(35:42):
their own territory at the three yard line. Houston had
all their timeouts. So what you'd want to do is
run the ball in the line, run it into the line,
run in the line, force the Texans to use all
their timeouts, punt it away, and they'd have, you know,
sixteen seconds. Instead, the Bills through the ball three times,
givvy Houston just enough time to get it and kick

(36:03):
a field goal and win. So this stuff was and
I don't like to crush coaches. John on game management,
Andy Reid took heat for years. I don't know your injuries,
I don't know your game plan. But there are things
I think that it's fair to criticize coaching. I think
there's I mean, like, listen the Cowboys. Seventeen seconds they're
running a quarterback draw. It's like, that's not the play,

(36:26):
especially when you watch Kirk Cousins in Atlanta meticulously line
up this past Thursday to win, like that's how a
veteran team does it, and a veteran quarterback. But I
watched that game management by the Bills as they lose
to the Texans, and there's no I mean, it's Buffalo's fine.
I mean, this is a good organization. They're going to
win this division. I mean New England's awful, the Jets
aren't very good, and Miami's quarterback play is you know, suboptimal.

(36:53):
But I was sitting there thinking, and I like McDermott,
but I'm sitting there thinking that one's on MCDNERHM and
Josh Allen won't say it, but do you believe against
the John Harbaugh A Jim Harbaugh a Demiico Ryans and
Andy Reid in maybe a year of Sean Payton. Do

(37:14):
you trust Sean McDermott.

Speaker 3 (37:16):
Well, I picked this team to, you know, compete for
the Super Bowl. I liked him more than most people
that thought they were going to take a step back.
And that was pretty embarrassing because C. J. Stroud had
a pick and a fumble in the fourth quarter. Yeah,
they were trying to give you the game. And in
that situation, at this point in time, how can you like,
I can't trust the Bills. And I've been one of

(37:38):
Josh Allen's biggest fans, but it's hard to say he's
you know, based on today, you couldn't say he's better
than Lamar. That's what I mean. It was one of
the worst games I've ever seen him play. He was
atrocious today. So part of it to me, and this
is always the pushback from the anti analytical number people
of like are we sure in this situation? Like I
get the overall picture, but it's like you're pinned your

(38:01):
quarterback I think at the time was like nine for
twenty seven, yeah, which again I don't remember him playing
such a bad game, and to throw it three times
when your quarterback's playing poorly. To me, if he's rolling
and that's the pushback, I think the Zach Taylor's gonna
get It's like your guy is humming. So you had
your decisions have to be dictated off what's going on

(38:23):
in the game.

Speaker 1 (38:24):
Peyton Manning has talked about this with analytics before. He said,
there are times to go for two, but if you're
squeezing out two yards run and they have a pass rush,
it can't just be well, the numbers say, it's like,
what's happening in the game. Josh wasn't playing well in
the game on the road.

Speaker 3 (38:44):
I just I can't believe they didn't just run the
ball three times. It basically burned off what like twelve seconds.
And even for the Houston Texas, like it was still
pretty tight, they only got a fifty nine yard field
goal off. It's not like, well, they ended up kicking
a twenty yard chip shot. So it's that loss. Given
that CJ threw the pick and had the fumble down

(39:04):
the stretch. After you had again back to back weeks
started really slow, looked terrible. I mean it looked at
one point in time if if Houston was gonna play, well,
they're gonna lose forty to ten in this.

Speaker 1 (39:15):
Game, Okay, so they try to trick play. Was it
last week or Joe? Okay, it was the Ravens and
McDermott clearly didn't call it. He said, you know, I'm
gonna have to talk to our guys about daddy Joe Brady.
So my question is is this Brady or McDermott. I
would guess it's I would guess it's Brady.

Speaker 3 (39:37):
Well to me, though, Colin, he's the head coach, so
at any moment he can tell him, yeah, he's not
calling the place. And I would guess, like a lot
of defensive coaches, he doesn't know the details of every
single play in the offensive playbook, but he easily can
get on the headset and go, Joe run the ball here. Yeah,
And unless Joe wants to be a malcontent and get

(39:57):
fired the next day, he said, yes, coach, it works.
And I think that is a mistake that clearly he
didn't say it, and he let his offensive coordinator, who
I think's done a pretty good job. Yes, he's taken over.
Not really debatable. That is one that's an embarrassing moment
when your quarterback's playing like he was playing, and your
offense was playing like it was playing. They were running

(40:19):
the ball. Well, maybe who knows, Maybe you bust like
a fifteen to twenty yard run and then maybe you
take a shot. But you got to take a deep breath.
You've got to force him to take timeouts. And again
they kicked me fifty nine yard field goal, so the
time would not have been on their side. You would
have been overtime. Now there's no guarantee you go to overtime. Shit,
anything could happen, but that is a it's hard for

(40:41):
me to take the bills. I was high on him
after three weeks, but these last two weeks, especially today,
it's like, well.

Speaker 1 (40:47):
I don't know, man, it's the drip, drip, drip. There's
the Texas had.

Speaker 3 (40:51):
A bunch of injuries today too. It's like it's not
like they were fully strength.

Speaker 1 (40:55):
No, it's just one of those things where when you
see things that build up over time. It's the bad
call against the Ravens, though I don't think their defense
was stopping him anyway. But you do these standalone games,
you're gonna be judged more harshly so that today it
was not a standalone game. So you have to be
egregiously outrageously wrong for us to talk about it and
people to talk about it. But I I can't remember

(41:18):
the last time I watched a head coach in the
NFL not just make an It wasn't a mistake, it
was a belief. It was a now we're gonna do it, first,
on second, on third, It's like, Sean, what are we
doing here?

Speaker 3 (41:34):
What are we doing here?

Speaker 1 (41:36):
You know?

Speaker 3 (41:36):
I think the thing if you're a Bills fan, which
would be hard to sleep, is like our organization is
so well run. We do a really really good job
of like character guys, talented guys. We got rid of digs.
We looked like we drafted well. Key On Coleman had
a big time, like we know what we're doing, like
we But what has been their downfall over the last

(41:58):
couple of years? Specific coaching things, specific coaching things like
that's really been the difference of them who knows, you know,
super bowls of coin flip game usually, but like being
in a Super Bowl and getting run in the second
round up whatever with thirteen seconds left, like that's kind
of been there. You watch today. It's not like we
just didn't have enough talent, or we're not we don't

(42:18):
have enough good players. No, it's like specific coaching things
now has been the Bill's downfall. And in this sport,
this isn't baseball where you can blame the GMS because
they were setting the lineup. This isn't basketball where the
star player can do whatever he wants, like in football,
the head coach. There's a reason they get so much
money and so much praise because they do control so much.

Speaker 1 (42:36):
Yeah, and adding to that, the Bill's inability to win trophies,
even though they've been to several Super Bowls. It just mounts,
It just adds. It adds an enormous amount of weight
on the franchise that you get, you're gonna get. For
as much as Josh Allen takes a beating, you probably
have four more premier years and then four more good years.

(43:00):
He won't age like Cam because I think he I
think mechanically, I think he's more coachable. I mean, he
does mechanically get off the reservation, but he gets pulled
back in. He's clearly a coachable kid. He's he's into
the right stuff. But you probably only have four great
years left of just like and then all of a sudden,
it's like Travis Kelsey says, then you're on your fourth surgery.
You know, your second ankle surgery, your third shoulder surgery.

Speaker 3 (43:23):
So but even today, there was a moment late in
that game, Oh yeah, he got hurt where he had
to go to the tent in Trubisky and they basically
wasted to play on a run ye know where I'm
sure that they would have passed it with him because
they were in the red zone. And he takes a
lot of shots. Now, he is physically like he's like
a Lebron Giannis type of the NFL. Right, there are
many back to Cam, back to Roethlisberger, but look at

(43:45):
those guys, and I do think Josh is a pretty
special player. Today was pretty bad. Yes, they're not going
to win with their quarterback going nine to thirty. They
got no chance against the Texans or just a random
NFL team.

Speaker 1 (44:00):
All right, let's talk Chicago Bears thirty six, Carolina Panthers ten.
It's an early window game. So Caleb Williams again every week,
looks a little more secure. Twenty to twenty nine, three
hundred yards a couple of tds. They jumped out to
a twenty seven to seven lead. Swift had a couple
of really nice runs. The run game was okay, but

(44:20):
Swift does give you he gives you pop. He'll hit
on a couple of big runs, and so you have
to be honest. DJ Moore again Clivenge game, revenge game.
And my take watching Caleb is and I said this
before the season. I said, I don't know if they'll
win more than seven games, which is what Justin Fields won,

(44:41):
because I do believe Minnesota, Detroit and Green Bay the
division's better young team's all good. But I said, you'll
feel better about the seven wins. And I think today
because Carolina was playing pretty damn good football. Two things today.
Once again, we have to give Matt Eberfluse credit.

Speaker 3 (45:01):
He does. He knows what he's doing on his.

Speaker 1 (45:04):
Side of the ball. Secondly, this team was playing well Carolina,
and I thought, I think they I think I was
thinking about this. When you have somebody that's limited. Bonnix
has some limitations, it makes it easier on Sean Payton.
When you have Caleb and you have fewer limitations, it
may take you several weeks to figure out. Okay, what

(45:25):
am I comfortable with? What am I not comfortable with?

Speaker 3 (45:28):
Now?

Speaker 1 (45:28):
Cliff Kingsbury, who's Washington z OCI has had several players
like Jaden Daniels, so they got symmetry in camp. But
you're looking at Waldron, you know, you're looking at his career.
He never had anything like Caleb. So it feels like
it's just taken the Bears coordinator and staff. Okay, we're

(45:49):
not going to do this. We're going to do this.
But I thought I thought Caleb. I looked around to
day and I'm like, okay, I mean one time he
was running around. It was almost comical. It looked like
a high school thing. They didn't get anything out of it.
But if I was a Bears fan today and they
only went seven, I feel like I have a franchise quarterback.

Speaker 3 (46:07):
Yeah. To me, you see moments like today. If they
can get him more consistent throwing the ball down the field,
they're gonna be a lot more competitive because when you
have a really good defense, you're gonna be in games.

Speaker 1 (46:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (46:17):
I just pulled out their schedule because I was thinking,
like they haven't played any three teams in their division.
They play them all late in the season. Yeah, the Vikings,
the Packers.

Speaker 1 (46:24):
They don't play the Packers till week eleven.

Speaker 3 (46:27):
Yeah, And so you could argue an alliance. You could say, well,
it's gonna be a really tough stretch. But they also
could benefit because think how much experience he gets to have,
you know, kind of under his belt, you know, up
to like Thanksgiving or whenever they start playing. They also
play the Niners in there, Like if their offense can
hit and he can be explosive down the field and

(46:49):
they can run the ball like that, they could be
a competitive, frisky team that competes in the wild card. Absolutely,
they had no chance early on with him overthrowing and
not having much confidence in their passing game. But if
they can run the ball and he can add the
explosive play element. Because their defense is when the dust settles,
if they stay healthy, they're gonna be a top five
ish defense in the NFL. And when you have a

(47:10):
great defense. You see this with the Broncos. You see
this obviously with the Bears. Like your quarterback doesn't have
to have a great game like that's they could carry
you and all of a sudden, it's you know ten
ten in the fourth quarter. You just have to make
a player or two. That's always The Niners got away
with a lot of that over the year, especially with
Jimmy Garoppolo. Well they were just being a thirteen to
ten game, then one big run you win twenty ten.

(47:32):
But when your defense like today with the Bengals and
the Ravens, both those teams, I would imagine on Monday,
we should never go to overtime when we score thirty
eight points, Yeah, we should win the game by seventeen
points when the clock keets doubles. That was a game.
But there's no that was That was insane. But the
Bears don't play like that. They can rush the pass

(47:52):
or they're stout up front and they get their dbs
are really good. I was texted with a coach who
played them early in the season, an assistant coach. He's like,
their defensive backs a good cause. So if you have
good defensive backs in twenty twenty four, that's just that's
the Broncos. They have really good defensive backs. Well, half
the teams are obsessed with passing, and watch the Packers.
What do they want to throw the ball? Obviously the
Vikings want to throw the ball we know the Lions

(48:14):
like throwing the ball. So if you can you know,
defend the pass with DBS and you have a good
pass rush, you're going to be a serious, serious problem.
And to me, Caleb, you know, parties kind of was
doing this today. That hero ball. Sometimes it's just a
couple of steps, get rid of the ball and if
nothing's there, just thrown out of bounce. Yeah, you know,
not everything has to be Lamar can get away with it.

(48:34):
But some of these guys that start doing the three sixties.
I mean that used to be a Russell Wilson thing.
And I think players, you know, on the offensive line
have been like, just get rid of the ball, right,
you know what what are we doing? Because every sweet
play you hit, three or four of them screw up
and you get sacked or you maybe throw a pick
or so. I yeah, I think the Bears the Panthers
kind of came back to earth today. Yeah, but part

(48:56):
of that was the Bears defense. So I yeah, nice
little win.

Speaker 1 (48:59):
No I. And what I really think is, I think
they probably need another edge rusher in Chicago and they
got to do a better. They have to get another
running back beyond DeAndre Swift and shore up the old
line a little bit. But I you know, thirty six
to ten in this league, we have not had a
ton of blowouts. Today was interesting because now you're starting
to see some blowouts. Now you're starting to see some

(49:20):
interesting stuff where teams are separating. But I thought, Chicago,
this is five straight weeks. I thought his first game, Uh,
he looked a little nervous. I thought, the second game
he looked frenetic. I thought the third game he looked
more under control. I thought last week, Okay, there it is.
And I thought today I was like, if that's what

(49:40):
he was just today with the parts he has Keenan
Allen comes back, I'm like, oh, they'll win eight games,
they'll be a there'll be it, they'll be out. They'll
spoil somebody's season in December, no question.

Speaker 3 (49:50):
Well, I think I think all of these divisional matchups
between the four teams in that in the NFC North
are fantastic. If I tell you any mixture of those
teams playing each other is on it that seems getting
its own television right Bears, Packers, Packers, Lions, Lions, Minnesota.
I mean that division's really really good. Obviously, all four

(50:10):
of them are gonna make the playoffs, and if you're
a betting man, you'd probably bet against the Bears. Uh,
you know, of being maybe the odd man out, but
who knows. I mean, they kind of control their own destiny.
If all of a sudden they go three and three
in those games, maybe get an upset on the road
and win a couple at home. I don't think it's
inconceivable they get around that nine number.

Speaker 1 (50:29):
Okay, So I want to talk. Packers beat the Rams
twenty four to nineteen. It was pretty interesting because you
kind of felt like the Rams, mcvah and Stafford were
kind of just keeping them in the game. I do
think the Rams these are the two youngest teams in
the NFL. But if you start going up and down
and you start looking at numbers, I worry. Sometimes there

(50:53):
is some leakage with the Packers defense, although they are
taking it away, and Jordan Love had a it wasn't
a Will Levis moment because I don't think it was nerves.
I think he thought, I don't want a safety here.

Speaker 3 (51:05):
He was desperate.

Speaker 1 (51:06):
He was desperate, So it's not he didn't see that guy.
And by the way, I don't that doesn't happen. That
kind of play doesn't happen, so take that out. But
as I watched that game today and again, Stafford was
fifty percent on third down, they had a time of
possession advantage, they had three hundred and seventy yards two
hundred and thirty six. And they're doing it without Pooka

(51:26):
and they're doing it without Cooper Cup. And I am
watching these older guys and Kirk Cousin's old, but he's winning.
Aaron's old and he's not. And I looked at Stafford
today and I'm watching all these guys run around and
Lamar and Brock Purty and Kyler Murray, and it does
limit what the Rams can do now no Cooper Cup
and Pooka. But Cooper Cup now is injured regularly. That's

(51:46):
like part of him, and so they need tackles, they
need they need a number one corner. But as I
watched that game, I think Green Bay feels like last
week in the second half. In this week, between Reed
and Craft and Jordan Love, they got some really nice
offensive pieces. They have some and you know, not everybody's healthy.

(52:08):
But it makes me think about this game today. Would
you waste a top draft pick for the Rams to
get the quarterback, or do you just give Stafford one
more draft because they have a first of two thirds
of four to three six's, they could get him more weapons.
What would you do if you ran the Rams? Would
you draft a quarterback? I mean, he's one of the

(52:29):
last pocket dudes in this league.

Speaker 3 (52:31):
Yeah, to me, he's right at that number at thirty six,
thirty seven years old. Yeah, he's a weathered individual, like
he's taken a lot of hits. And you know the
thing with the Cousins the pocket, even the Goths, it
doesn't feel like they've taken the punishment, even of Rogers,
because those guys scramble around more in a safe place
and that's some of the most legendary plays. Or outside

(52:53):
the pocket throwing the ball right, and Stafford feels much
closer to Aaron's age than he does Kirk Cousins age.
I would like this might just be the year. What
they're doing, honestly, even just being competitive these last couple
weeks against the Bears and the Packers was pretty impressive.
But there's a four point swing, right if he takes
a safety instead of the pick six as twenty four

(53:15):
to fifteen at the end of the game. It's actually
not as close as it feels. Yes, so it's kind
of a freakish play there. I would again, I don't
really love these quarterbacks, so it's like I'm watching Carson back. Yeah,
I don't really see it. Quinn Ewers, I can't even watch.
He's injured. Now. We'll see if he comes back this
weekend's Oklahoma. That's back to back years of being an

(53:35):
injured guy. This is in college. He hasn't been in
the SEC that long. And hell, I don't even think
he's played an SEC game yet because he got hurt
before it even started. And I don't think got hurt.

Speaker 1 (53:46):
I don't think Schnor Sanders in LA with McVeigh. I
think they could drive each other crazy. So I'm with you,
cam Ward.

Speaker 3 (53:52):
I got to see McVeigh kind of liking that though,
because he is. We'll find out over this next five
weeks about Colorado, but so far, you got to tap
your hat to Dion. I mean, they beat the crap
out of UCF last week as a fourteen point hunderdog.
He's looked pretty good. There's no disputing his You know,
he's not super tall, but he's six two six. He
was fine, big arm, can move really pretty accurate. I

(54:14):
holds on the ball a little bit long, but I
mean that's he's college quarterback.

Speaker 1 (54:17):
No, I think I think Shadure. Like when I watch
Carson Beck, he looks thin. I think he reminds me
of Arch Manning as a freshman. I'm like, dude, eat,
you need fifteen pounds of muscle. Arch has put it on.
You can see Arch. He's thicker. Those Texas quarterbacks that
all they have weight room competitions. They're all big thit kids.
Carson Becks does not drive the ball. Beck doesn't drive

(54:38):
the ball. And they have an average OL line at
Georgia this year, and he's limited. He doesn't have rock
bowers and you can see it. He doesn't have his
safety valve. So I think Shaudur is the greatest talent.
Cam Ward's right behind him. He's fascinating. But let's be honest.
The Rams they don't have the draft capital to move
up and teams aren't moving back. You have to have
a quarter who's gonna ge what do you have to

(54:59):
give up to move to like the number one or
two pick?

Speaker 3 (55:02):
Yeah, I mean, I would you entertain if you were
drafting high enough. Just trading Stafford, Yeah, just trade him
the Raiders or something, you know, just move, you know,
if you had the opportunity to get a young quarterback,
I think that's what you'd have to entertain doing. Obviously,
in a perfect world, they would just be fully healthy
and roll with Stafford. But we've have a couple of
years now. It's like they had injuries last year. They're

(55:22):
adding up again.

Speaker 1 (55:23):
Also, John he had really ugly moments today. He had
a couple. He had a terrible pick. Last weekend he
had a terrible You get you get at least one
a weekend. You know. It's funny we look at Sam, but.

Speaker 3 (55:35):
I see if I was defending him, and I bet
if he was sitting here, it's like, I don't have
a choice. I can't what am I supposed to do?
I mean, I have to force the issue to give us,
you know, a snowballs chance, just to you know, to
move the ball down the field. Yeah, if I don't
let it rip and push. Now, I think people that
are anti Stafford will say, well, he does that no
matter what, right, right, So I think he's kind of

(55:58):
in a tough spot. To me, it's more about the age.
And I think historically you go back to Walsh, you
go with Belichick's mindset to Brady of when he shored them.
Now it blew up in his face. I think you
can't go wrong shorting older, weathered guys that have been
hit a lot. And he's how often, even when he's
playing his best at the end of games, he kind

(56:19):
of limping off the side of the field. I mean,
that's that's like a go to move for his career,
just because the punishment he's taken.

Speaker 1 (56:25):
Yeah, so Jordan Love and again, I think he's really talented.
And I again that picked six. He he just didn't
want to say if he would have been at the
twelve yard line or something, it wouldn't it would just
be a mistake. It's the end zone. It's great. It's
one of those classic highlights. It's it's very far of
like I think his brain just turned off, you know,
he just kind of yeah. So, but I thought today

(56:47):
they didn't ask him to do much. And I thought,
and I think this is why Matt Lafleur, I mean,
fifteen to twenty six, two hundred and twenty four yards
he ran three times. I think because of the injury
in Willis playing. I thought last week's first half he
was overwhelmed. Second half he was better. And I thought
in this game Green Bay came in and felt, listen,
we're gonna win this game. We're just gonna slow play it.

(57:09):
I'm not worried. But he's not off to a great start,
are you at all? To me?

Speaker 3 (57:14):
He feels somewhere in the middle of not as terrible
as he was when he started last season. But obviously
he's not the guy that we saw at the end
of the season that got the one hundred and seventy
million dollars contract. He's kind of in no man's land
right now. Still can make remarkable plays that I guess
it wasn't a touchdown, but like the eighty yard ball God, yes, yes,
as good as it gets, right. But also when it's

(57:36):
in the air, because it's that player, you think that
he just throw a pick in a triple coverage and
he can get really loosey goosey with the ball just
kind of flying all over the map. So it's like
when I watch him by the end of the year,
because he had sacked so many good games, you had
a lot of trust him in him as a player,
and by the time the playoffs came, he's like, this
is one of the best players in the league. When
I watched him. Right now, I don't trust him, Like

(57:56):
when he drops back, I think anything could happen. And
whether that's obviously he got injured, but remember even before
he got injured in that Eagle game, he just I
don't know if it's Russ. I don't know if it's
trying to prove the money because whatever the way he
was playing last year, there was a freeness to it,
but there's also a control. He wasn't turning the ball over.
You know, he puts a lot of balls into Harm's way,
Colin's that's my thing. But he could make up for

(58:19):
it because with that power arm and obviously they got
I mean, they got some pieces that they're a team
that if if their defense just played solid. I mean,
Jacobs was running really well today. Obviously the wide receivers
Tucker with the sweet long touchdown that they could be
a problem. But they need him because the NFC, let's
face is pretty wide open right now.

Speaker 1 (58:38):
Oh, Jason McIntyre, Tech five teams could probably win it.
We were talking Friday. He goes, I can't believe you
took Arizona, and I'm like they got humiliated. San Francisco
Warner may not play. So you know, my take is
who is good? Thursday Night Football is on. It's only
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(59:01):
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(59:22):
Amazon Prime for details. So the New York Giants controlled
the Seahawks all day, even when it was ten to ten,
and they go on to beat Seattle twenty nine to
twenty blocking a kick up in the Pacific Northwest. So
this was this is the one game I've lost so far.
But as we do this, I thought Seattle No Moleague

(59:45):
Neighbors Singletary was banged up. But I will tell you
when you watch the Giants, they're old lines and d lines.
They've committed to those in the draft and in acquisitions.
I mean, Daniel Jones twenty three to thirty four, two touchdowns,
two fifty seven. He rushed eleven times or carried eleven times.

(01:00:08):
I thought that is as good as Dan And that's
without malite neighbors John, Like, I watched that today and
I'm not surprised by much. Bandy beating Bama. You know,
USC losing, Yeah, yeah, USC losing the way they did
the Giants that was twenty nine to twenty. It it
felt like they were the better team. And you've got

(01:00:28):
to give this team credit. They have an offensive coach
on like the Jets. Their defensive line is excellent. When
I watched the Giants, I think they're well coached. I
think they're limited. But Daniel Jones, he moves, he's big,
he's healthy. Now, what did you make of that win?
It's something.

Speaker 3 (01:00:48):
Yeah, well, let's just acknowledge this. You remove week one
when they played Minnesota and got embarrassed. Yes, Dan Jones
been pretty good this season. He really has. He's made
a lot of plays. I mean, he made a bunch
of plays against Washington in the game when they didn't
have a kicker. Yeah, and Malik Nabors. That's kind of
got his start going. I didn't think he was that
bad against the Cowboys. He underthrows some deep balls, but

(01:01:09):
no one ever like he's not Josh Allen Mahomes. He's
not a deep ball thrower, but he's not turning the
ball over. There was one time I looked up and
he would lowered his shoulder. Yes, So, I mean, I
think he's playing just pretty solid. Now, you know, are
they good enough? Like what does that mean? I don't know.
I mean Seattle, think about played Monday night in Detroit.

(01:01:32):
I don't know, what's that flight? Four and a half hours,
you lose, you get back, kind of your classic come
out the gates not playing that hard. New York off
a long week because they had just played Thursday, looked
like the fresher team.

Speaker 1 (01:01:44):
Yes, but New York is not.

Speaker 3 (01:01:46):
I don't know. They're more likely in my mind to
win six or seven than nine or ten. But they
are a tough, you know, operation to play right now.
They are not some joke franchise. This is not, you know,
I don't know of the worst team in Miami. Patriot games.

Speaker 1 (01:02:02):
They remind me of Denver. They're squeezing every ounce out
of their team, and that to me is coaching. I mean,
I watched them today and I'm like, I thought, I'm
like neighbors Singletary, how the hell do they move the
ball now? Again? Seattle is dinged up on the d line.
But when I'm watching Daniel Jones, it's one of those things,

(01:02:23):
it's just the Hostetler. It's Phil Simms, it's Eli. Even
when they have the right quarterback in New York, it's
never dynamic and pretty. And I love Phil Simms and Eli,
but there's a Hostetler quality to Daniel Jones. And years
ago when I worked at the other place, I used
to call them the accounting firm of the NFL. Even
when they have a great earnings report, it's boring. They're

(01:02:44):
a boring team. But I don't think you can deny.
We have to be totally honest about this, Brian Dabole,
and in New York it's just harder to coach. I mean,
if he was going through what Doug Peterson's going through
the last two months, he'd be done. He'd be out
with a Trevor Lauren, he'd be fired. When I watch
that offense again, I'm watching Sean Payton score thirty fourth

(01:03:06):
day with bow Nicks, They're just squeezing every ounce. Then
I watched Josh Allen have a terrible day. So I
look at the Giants and I'm like, they have what
kind of the Jets don't, which is a really good
offensive coach. They get the most out of their talent.
There's really no drama. The HBO series didn't help, but

(01:03:26):
there's not a lot of drama around them. They're boring.
I don't love Daniel Jones, but I will say this,
he'd have a market because of what Brian Daboles done.

Speaker 3 (01:03:37):
He'd have a market. He's changed, I would say the narrative,
which was not good at all coming into this season,
and I think if you just throw on his tape,
I mean, he's playing pretty solid, like he's an NFL starter.
The version that we've seen after Week one, which I
got news for you everyone that plays Minnesota looks pretty crappy. Yeah, right,
So you could argue that actually aged pretty well on

(01:03:59):
his side. But I just the NFC East, you know,
I was looking at Washington schedule. Obviously they get a
resounding win today. They get the Ravens coming up, which
is going to be difficult. Then they play the Panthers,
the Bears at the Giants, so that division could get
weird because they could just have a record, you know,
be like six and three. Then all of a sudden,

(01:04:20):
if you just split a Cowboys or the Eagles and
one of those teams, like they're already kind of fighting
their way, you know, behind Washington right now, just because boom,
what you know, they just start three and one, four
and one, All of a sudden, you look up, they're
five and two and the numbers are just kind of
on your side. And then when I play you, if
I already got a two game lead, you have no
margin for air if I'm the Cowboys or the Eagles.

(01:04:42):
And let's face it, like the Giants are not just
some locke l to both those two teams, that's right.
I mean, hell, they almost beat the Cowboys the other night.
There's no telling. If they just play the Eagles on
a random you know, Sunday or Monday night, they won't
lose that game. That being Philly, like, they are not
just some pushover joke four win team. Now, I don't

(01:05:04):
think they're a playoff team by any means, but could
they win seven eight, I mean, he did it a
couple of years ago. To me, it's this, can Washington
maintain this when they start playing better teams and New
York like that. That's an impressive win to go on
the road to Seattle. And like you said, the score
was close. If you were watching the game, it wasn't
feel that close. Seattle did not look good. That's by
far when you say Seattle they looked off today.

Speaker 1 (01:05:27):
Well, here's the good news with Seattle. They really have
all the pieces. All they need is a quarterback. I mean,
they've got multiple receivers, two backs, capable tight ends, a
left tackle, they've got their coach, their d Linzo was hurt, secondaries,
nice linebackers, that move. That's a team that could give
up four picks move because they're too talented. Not they're
not gonna get a top twelve pick, but that's a team.

(01:05:47):
I thought they should have done it last year. I
argued last year was the year to go out and
get Pennix.

Speaker 3 (01:05:52):
There are six of them.

Speaker 1 (01:05:54):
Yeah, so like to me that that was my argument,
go get a quarterback. But they had signed Geno like
a Kirk Cousins deal. It's not prohibitive, it's not punitive
and let Gino for a year play, let the kids
sit behind him. But I think it's time for Seattle
to make a big pitch. I think when you watch
Geno today, you know, just he took a couple of
bad sacks. He's pretty darned mobile. But I just I

(01:06:16):
don't think anybody in Seattle. I thought Pete. When Pete
Carroll said yeah, I can win with Gino and Drew Locke,
It's like, that's a defensive coach. And I think when
defensive coaches tend to lack a little urgency at quarterback.
That's why I was so surprised that Tomlin moved off
Kenny Picket so fast. It was like, you know, mcveahta
had four starts and moved off him. So okay, let's

(01:06:38):
there's a couple of different things to talk about here.
I listen, we could talk about Ravens Bengals. I talk
about so much Ravens football that I'll do that more
on TV tomorrow. I do want to discuss this because
Denver hammered the Raiders thirty four eighteen. They now have
a better record than the Jets at three and two,

(01:06:58):
with a rookie quarterback and as This was one of
my takes this offseason. The best over bet was Denver
because I think their roster's okay, not great, but they
are generating a pass rush without a Pro Bowl guy
up front. And I watched Bonicks had a touchdown pass
drop today and this is the difference between defense.

Speaker 3 (01:07:18):
It was great. It was a great throat hit him
stride is I.

Speaker 1 (01:07:21):
Watch Bonick now? Jaden Daniels is different. I feel like
I'm watching Lamar Jackson light That's what I feel like
Jaden Daniels. I don't know what b Nicks's comp is.
And I was going to ask you about this as
a former scout. I do think there's a ceiling. He
is smaller, he doesn't have a big deep arm. It's
a little Derek Carr. I think Derek Carr right now

(01:07:42):
is a better deep arm than bo Nicks does. Do
you have a comp for because clearly, I mean Sean
is doing a Brian Dable. He's squeezing every ounce out
of this roster. What is Bonick's ceiling? Who is he
to you?

Speaker 3 (01:07:59):
I think before four quarterback inflation he fell under that
Derek Carr, Jimmy Garoppolo. Historically he would have been a
second round pick. Now he's a better athlete. And I'm
talking to Jimmy when he was decent for the forty
nine ers and Derek. You know, people love to bag
on him. He's had some pretty good years, yes, you know,
for a team that, let's face it, no one wins
with in the Raiders. So and I actually kind of

(01:08:23):
you know, the Saints. I think they're gonna have a
good season, and he's he's been playing well this season.
So I think he's under that mold. Now he's a
better athlete than both those two guys. Yes, Derek. You know,
when Derek was young, he had some pretty good pop
in his arm. I always say he's got more arm
strengthen Bo. But he'd never had a coach of Shawn's

(01:08:45):
you know level.

Speaker 1 (01:08:46):
He's had a lot of defense years.

Speaker 3 (01:08:48):
Yeah, so I think that I think he can be
a really good player if you build up the team.
And one thing Sean Payton has done really the last
couple of years of Drew Brees. When he brought in
Dennis out, they became good on defense. Today, we know certain.
I mean he's been a highly recruited guy since he
was like fifteen years old. But they have other dbs
flying all over the Yes, who are I didn't have

(01:09:10):
the volume on a couple guys made plays. I had
to look up their names, like who are these dbs?
Because they are I get it. They're playing the Raiders
and minschhew and O'Connell. But that was okay, you removed
that brock Bowers play early in the game. Once they
got to the second quarter, they took control and they
came out of halftime and that was they curb stopped him.
I mean they absolutely throttled them in the second half.

Speaker 1 (01:09:34):
And they're offensively. Mims looks like a good pick. Javonte
Williams are running back. He can catch it and he
can run it. I think I've always like Courtland Sutton.

Speaker 3 (01:09:45):
They like the Oregon wide receiver that dropped the ball Franklin.
It's kind of the knock on him right as the hands,
but he he's got speed and they played together in college.

Speaker 1 (01:09:53):
So I kind of look at Denver and.

Speaker 3 (01:09:56):
Are they a playoff team?

Speaker 1 (01:10:01):
I look at them like I look at Chicago. You
watch their defense and you're like, okay, so I have
a Super Bowl Trophy coach. Their defense is much better
than people think it's faster than people think, like Chicago,
and they have a rookie quarterback. The difference is the
NFC North may be the best division at football probably is.

(01:10:23):
Whereas the Raiders are a mess. The Chargers, you cross
their fingers they get healthy. The Chiefs are vulnerable. Though
they're on a heater, they're vulnerable. I in fact, I
like the points in the Saints tomorrow. They're just not
beating anybody. Denver is I mean, it's thirty four eighteen
and they dropped the touchdown. I think their personnel, you know,

(01:10:43):
I like this GM Patton. I didn't love the Russell
Wilson move, but I'm in fairness, I liked it when
they made it. I didn't know Russell was going to
drop off the cliff. I kind of like Denver's players.

Speaker 3 (01:10:55):
Well, to me, when you look at the landscape of
the AFC, right the Chiefs, the Texans, you know are
gonna be there. Obviously, the Bills are gonna be there.
Right now, the Chargers are the seventh seed, and just
based on injuries, you just know they're gonna have so
many it's gonna be hard to overcome. And if their
quarterback's banged up, they just be screwed. But turns out
Miami sucks. The Jets are I mean a complete wild

(01:11:19):
card at any moment. I mean there's been multiple times
this season when Rogers went down and you're like, is
he gonna get back up? I mean that happened today
when he got bent over. Yeah, is this season over?
And even if his season he plays in all seventeen
games that they are by no means no lock to
win nine games. The Browns, a playoff team from last year,
is an absolute train wreck right now. I mean has

(01:11:39):
the worst quarterback situation slack vibes going on right now
because of the negativity surrounding that situation. So I think
you just look at the landscape of the AFC Cincinnati,
who obviously is pretty good. I mean they got a
pretty special offense, but you start playing a numbers game
all of a sudden, you two and five. How do
you ever get back? You can't. You're not able to

(01:12:00):
win enough games in a row when you have that
big of a flaw as a defensive football team. That's
what's crazy about the Ravens is like where did their
defense go? But Cincinnati like that has like they're they're
not good on defense, and it's hard. I don't care
if you got Joe Burrow, Jamar Chason T. Higgins who
all looks fantastic. If your defense is that bad, well,
the Broncos are like, hey, we're gonna have some games
when the when the kid throws for seventy five yards

(01:12:21):
and you know what will when the fucking thing sixteen
to thirteen. We got no problem to it. Like Cincinnati
doesn't even have that capability. Harbaugh in theory would Yeah,
but Joey Bosset is already sitting in a suite. You know,
the injuries have kind of unraveled, and you know you
got Herbert limping around. It's hard this team. Just the
speed of Denver's defense. Oh no, they to do more
of a deep dive on their defensive roster. I don't

(01:12:42):
even know some of their players besides certain who is
I mean, what does he look like right now? Like
Charles Woodson meets Rod Woodson in this prime? Yeah? How
good does he look?

Speaker 1 (01:12:49):
No? It is and I last year the Rams were
my either better than you think. Team Denver this year
was my Their roster is I mean they have a
quarterback I like a super Bowl coach a more than
capable left tackle. I like their wide receivers and I
think Javonte Williams is the player. Their linebacking corps moves well.
You know, say what you want, they move well. College

(01:13:13):
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So I want to give this some time. USC we

(01:13:36):
usually do one big college football topic, and since I'm
viewed as a USC homer, I might as well just
embrace it.

Speaker 3 (01:13:43):
So they Loy Vanderbilt Alabama happened. It kind of overshadowed it.

Speaker 1 (01:13:47):
At Vanderbilt, by the way, is clever. A lot of
misdirection they You know, listen, you come off the Georgia
game and even though it's it's you can say, well,
Nick gave you a he gave you a Mercedes.

Speaker 3 (01:14:00):
Listen.

Speaker 1 (01:14:00):
Nick lost to Louisiana Monroe with good players. I mean,
Alabama didn't have to rebuild a roster. They had players.
They had no coaches. So it happens. They had just listen.
Vanderbilt fooled them. They weren't ready for it, and it
got ugly fast. And now you're trailing, playing from behind.
You have to call the game differently. It happens. But
I was looking at USC and I was texting somebody

(01:14:22):
this morning who covers them, And I said, the one
thing that jumped out to me, Minnesota played like it
was a Rose Bowl Minnesota. The stadium was full. PJ
Flex say what you want, brings a ton of intensity.
Those guys were jumping all over the place. Their running
back was powerful. Us he's bad. Tackling is re emerged,

(01:14:43):
which we thought it was done after the LSU game.
It re emerged against Michigan. I saw it again this weekend.
And now their offense is young. But when I watched
the game plan, John not a lot of motion, not
a lot of different sets from Lincoln Riley Miller. Moss
has been in that program now three years. Okay, this

(01:15:04):
is not a transfer. He knows the offense. Uh, They've
got some Really, their offensive line is young and at
right tackle is a problem. But I gotta tell you,
I have defended Lincoln to the end, and I defended, uh,
I've defended I defend most coaches, and I think we
all know that Lincoln's good offensively. But that loss is

(01:15:28):
not just a loss, John. It feels like one step
forward to back. I don't know if you overcome that.
I mean, you're essentially now with their schedule, they're not
making the playoff and La quits and.

Speaker 3 (01:15:39):
They're not a player. They're not a playoff team, right,
I mean, we asked this. They got that first half
last week. I would say against Wisconsin was a little alarming,
was it not.

Speaker 1 (01:15:49):
They were a mistake prone mess.

Speaker 3 (01:15:51):
So to me, their wins, the Michigan win, which I
thought was impressive because you're watching a live of the
physicality that game is not all. Turns out Michigan doesn't
know how to execute the forward pass right and just
lost by ten against Washington, who I'm not sure is
that good? Right? Right?

Speaker 1 (01:16:09):
So?

Speaker 3 (01:16:09):
And even LSU, which at the time felt like an
impressive win because of the brand and because of the
name recognition of their players, how many guys are can
get drafted. LSU might turn out to be an eight
win team. So it's like Ohio State and we'll see
with Oregon obviously they play each other this week, but
in terms of the talent on their roster in kind
of a different level right now, and defensively, like they

(01:16:31):
were gonna have to hang their hat on that, which
looked like they could. It just turns out Michigan's offense
is future right and Wisconsin obviously is not very good
on offense either.

Speaker 1 (01:16:39):
Listen, USC, this is the one college roster I know
pretty much, front and back. USC has two playable tackles
on their team, and one's not good. So they have
a red shirt freshman, Elijah Page left tackle. He's not good,
but he is their future. His backup is a red

(01:17:01):
shirt freshman who is six feet two. He's a center.
They have no backup left tackle. You think it's bad now.
Mason Murphy the right tackle. They have a kid behind him,
Tobias Raymond. He's not ready to play. They've been telling
they they've leaned into Mason Murphy for years. It's just
too slow a foot, it's too many mistakes. He's a

(01:17:22):
college kid, you know whatever, But you cannot be USC.
I mean, you go to Oregon or Ohio State right now,
and there's six tackles that are six six and above.
There are six to seven four to five star tackles.
One's a senior, couple of juniors. USC has two playable
offensive tackles, a center backup left tackle, a kid that's

(01:17:46):
not ready to play at right tackle in the NIL
era with USC's brand, that's on Lincoln. That's the offense
that's not good enough.

Speaker 3 (01:17:54):
I've always thought, you know, Stark, who now obviously has
Texas rolling, and Ryan Day had this issue too. Once
Urban left, they became so offensive centric and loved passing.
That Ohio State most of my life has been a
defensive first NFL guys at every single position, and then
they kind of fell off a cliff because they were
just passing and all their wide receivers and quarterbacks were

(01:18:15):
so awesome. Well then they used nil to listen, maybe
they're never going to practice like Jim Harbaugh in terms
of running power for seventy minutes of a two hour practice.
But you can just buy those guys. So what ohiose
they do this offseason? They bought the kid from Bama
like they start buying defensive players. Sark clearly, like listen,
he's an offensive pass game guy, Like that's who he

(01:18:37):
is at his court, which is fine, he's really good
at it, but your defense in practice like that was
always a downfall of Mike Leach. Now he could never
recruit at the schools to their level. But you don't
create a physicality in practice when you're just passing the
ball all over the place. Jim Harbaugh's teams are not
physical by accident. That's because the way they practice is
a physical practice, you know, six months a year. So

(01:18:57):
what does Texas do? They have unlimited money, like ouse
they start opening the check book. Oregon, Now they've had
defensive coaches and Mario's an offensive guy, but he's an
oh line guy, and he thinks like that, They're just
start paying people. And it's like if USC is gonna
be on those guys levels Texas, Ohio State because they
are going to be consistent powerhouses because they are opening
enormous checks right now and paying a lot of money

(01:19:19):
for players. And obviously Lincoln he is going to be
able to figure out the offense over time. Yeah, like
that is his baby, he knows that. But defensively, they're
going to have to be cutting huge checks for defensive players. Listen,
that's kind of the name of the game.

Speaker 1 (01:19:32):
Now, I mean they one of their linebackers is six
to six Eric Gentry. He didn't play or if he did,
not much, and their tackling was just exposed. But their
linebackers aren't big, they're not intimidating.

Speaker 3 (01:19:44):
I mean, they have one.

Speaker 1 (01:19:47):
One guy, Anthony Lucas, that will get drafted defensively that
would you know, I'm talking first two three rounds, probably
gets drafted. They just don't have enough great players. They
have a kid named the Kobe Lane' his name. He's
a wide receiver. He's like six to five out of Arizona.
He's a very very tough to defend. Deuce Robinson very

(01:20:07):
tough to defend. They're like six five wide receivers. They're
very good players. They're not great. They're not like the
Ohio State kid or the Alabama receiver. But and they're nil.
They have thirteen million dollars. This is not a poverty program.
They've got real money here. Washington's got seven and a half.
They've got thirteen in the nil. So when I look
at their situation, they don't have an elite defensive tackle

(01:20:29):
or an elite They have one good center on offensive line.
If you counted all their d O linemen and you
had twenty guys. You have Anthony Lucas on the defensive side,
Monheim on the offensive line. They got two guys that
are draftable.

Speaker 3 (01:20:42):
But here, you know, if you think about it, last
year PAC twelve when you say had one of its
best seasons of the last twenty years, and they won
seven games, right, they won seven and five. And then
you go into the Big Ten, which like the PAC
twelve last year, just has on a given game, if
you're on the road at Minnesota at Iowa, like you
can lose, right Like last year with Lincoln, like you

(01:21:04):
went on the road to Arizona, or I guess Arizona
came to usc but you know what I mean, Like
the program was deep and on any given week Beside
in theory, you should never lose to a Vanderbilt, whoever's
the bottom feeder. But the teams in the middle, and
we can argue till we're blue in the face, what
conference is deeper, the SEC or the Big Ten? I
do know if any of those middle tiers six to
eight win programs play well at home on a given week,

(01:21:27):
they can beat most teams, especially now with the nil
and transfer Portal era. It's all kind of watered down
the day and age of like the two thousand and
one Miami hell just like three years ago, Kirby smart
team with twenty five NFL guys starting on his you
know two deep, like those days are done. Yeah, you
look at Georgia now, they look like a show of themselves.
Those early saban Bama teams. He kind of loaded up

(01:21:49):
the roster. It doesn't exist anymore. So it's much more
water down. Which if you don't get it right in
the nil, if you're not paying like the top guys
are going to garner a lot of money, your talent
is not going to be that much different. Because Minnesota
can get a couple of transfers here and there, and
all of a sudden it's like, ah, this teams not
that good. Well, actually they got this guy from there
and this other guy from there, and all of a sudden,

(01:22:09):
you're down ten in the fourth quarter.

Speaker 1 (01:22:11):
Yeah, I thought that was the two lane loss, but
that was an eleven win season. But the way they
lost that was ugly, and this one is it's just
not acceptable. You know, again, there was a little wind
that can't keep your offense down to seventeen points against Minnesota.
Bad bad loss.

Speaker 3 (01:22:30):
I'll tell you this, I didn't sleep much because I
stayed up late watching that Cow Miami game. Jesus and
that place. You know, someone I grew up with my
dad going to a Memorial Stadium and you know the
difference to call in Stanford. Cow does have a pretty
good fan base, and when they're good, that place will
fill out. And it was rocking and they were kicking
Miami's ass, and you go, this is Mario. He's not
coming back to back, you know, winning this thing. And

(01:22:51):
they pulled off one of the craziest comebacks you'll ever see.
I mean, what an incredible win. And they're a good example.
Like they got some money, they're buying some players well. Also,
I'm like USC most well coached, but their talent deep.

Speaker 1 (01:23:04):
Also, Mario's teams were physical. You didn't love them situationally,
but he was a big, strong guy. He's a UFC
fan like Oregon was physical with Mario. Miami's physical and
tough and cam Ward special and Miami's got the kind
of nil money they'll just go by cam Ward. I
was texting Ryan Risolo today, I said, I watched cam
Ward do that for two or three years in Pullman,

(01:23:26):
nobody watched him. So it's like when he went to Miami,
I'm like, you guys don't have any idea what you're getting.
You have no idea how good this cam Ward is.
He just had no pros around him. So they're for real. Listen,
it's hard to ask kids to go from Miami to
col three thousand miles. A lot of these kids, I mean,
when I was eighteen, had you been to had you
been to the South?

Speaker 3 (01:23:46):
Like I didn't you know?

Speaker 1 (01:23:47):
These kids don't know.

Speaker 3 (01:23:49):
I was having some beers with a buddy last night.
I'm like, do you understand what time these guys are
going to get home? Do the math? They'd lose hours
flying home if they get on the plane by one o'clock.
I mean it's nine o'clock in the morning when these
players are landing. It is pretty crazy some of these
patch ups now because of the conference realignment, which also
makes it fun, like that was a real, real fun

(01:24:10):
game and Miami got very, very lucky. But also you're
watching them, you see bamul loose. I think Georgia is
a shell of themselves what they've been so to me,
it's like, obviously text Ohio State are really good, but
we've seen college football. It's got a little NCAA tournament
feel to it. Like I think there are seven eight
teams once we get to the top twelve that if
Boise makes it, are you watching their running back? He

(01:24:32):
looks like, I mean, the best player in the the
guy used to having one of the most incredible seasons
in like the history of college football, something you would
have seen in like the eighties with like Barry Sanders.

Speaker 1 (01:24:41):
The way USC can't stop a powerful running back. Boise
State would give USC fits.

Speaker 3 (01:24:47):
Oh, he'd have two hundred plus yours. They gave Oregon
fits and who knows what if that's like the twelve
to five game, Yeah, would you want to play Boise
State as the five to twelve game?

Speaker 1 (01:24:56):
Nona.

Speaker 3 (01:24:57):
So it's like, I actually think that the playoff gonna
have an NFL feel a little bit. With a little
NCAA tournament, you're gonna have a couple Is Ohio State
down ten in the going into the fourth quarter. It's
football too, It's only one game. It's not a best
of five series.

Speaker 1 (01:25:11):
That's right, John middlecoff as Olas crushed it. Thanks Buddy A.

Speaker 3 (01:25:17):
Lot of football coling talk soon the volume.

Speaker 1 (01:25:23):
Thanks so much for listening. If you've enjoyed the podcast,
take a moment rate and review

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Colin Cowherd Podcast - Steelers QB Controversy? Jets Hit Turbulence, Are The Giants…Good? Broncos A Playoff Team? USC’s Loss “Unacceptable”

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Colin Cowherd Podcast - Steelers QB Controversy? Jets Hit Turbulence, Are The Giants…Good? Broncos A Playoff Team? USC’s Loss “Unacceptable”