London Fletcher and Bram Weinstein recap the epic 45-31 victory over the Detroit Lions in the second round of the NFL Playoffs. Jayden Daniels continues to prove the haters wrong, Dan Quinn and his coaching mastery, and how the defense confused Jared Goff into becoming mid. Then, it's an NFC Championship preview as the red-hot Commanders get ready to roll into Philly.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
On this edition of the Booth Review, I Brand Weinstein,
London Fletcher. How about that defense five turnovers and a
win in Detroit, London?
Speaker 2 (00:08):
How about Jayden Daniels and the offense in the Lions, Dan?
Speaker 1 (00:12):
And how about the biggest game in the long held
rivalry between Washington and Philadelphia. Winner gets to go to
the super Bowl.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
That's on next on a Booth Review.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
Welcome into the latest edition of the Booth Review podcast,
brought to you by Microsoft Surface Powering a Better Game.
I Brand Whiteside with Big Fletch London Fletcher. First time
since I was in college, London, the Commanders are in
the NFC Championship Game. This is wild. You're oh too?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
So that was a long time ago, Man, you talk
about wild. Who could have imagined a year ago that
we'd be playing in the NFC champ Ship Game against
our heyday rivals, the Philadelphia Eagles, when Air advances to
the Super Bowl. All this happened in the first year
(01:10):
of the Adam Peters Dan Quinn regime.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Man, this is just don't wake me up dreaming type moment.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
Yeah, there's so many odd synergies that are going on
that I want to get to it's almost mystical in
some ways about what's happening here. But I want to
start with Detroit and what they did in Detroit, where
they had a short week. They're playing the one seed.
The one seed's got a historically great offense. But by
the time Friday came around, and I think this is
(01:41):
important to point out because you were up here, I
was up here, this team has never been satisfied with
anything they've done. I know everybody and including myself because
I ended up in the locker room asking Dan Quit
about this stuff, like where's the satisfaction of what you
have accomplished, because it's unusual to go this far this
quickly with an new group like this, especially with a
(02:01):
rooky quarterback, And he always brushes it off and says,
what's next. We're focused on the next thing. They were
very business like, and by the time we got around
a Friday, and I had a chance to speak with
coach Quinn and I know you did too, what I
heard from them in how they were going to try
to at least slow down the Lions. I had a
tremendous amount of confidence in what was going to happen
(02:23):
on Saturday night and I'm sure you did as well.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
No.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Absolutely, And it started like you see, a lot of
people will look at hey, we were underdog going into
that game. People outside of that building. But the sense
that I got is that they didn't view them Sales
as underdogs. They viewed them sales and or they went
in there with the mentality like we expect to win
this football game. We're not going in there just oh, hey,
(02:49):
we'll be happy with competing against the Lions, maybe making
a close gang. No, they went in there with the mentality,
we're going to win this football game. I told a
couple of people on Saturday at the game, like before
the game started, like, don't be surprised when it happens,
when we beat these guys. They'll be surprised because this
(03:11):
is what they expect to happen.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Yeah, I'm going to get to the offense in a minute.
I mean, I really think like there was an overestimation
by this has happened all over the league, and I
think partially it's because there weren't a lot of expectations
on Washington. They weren't in a lot of high profile games.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
A lot of.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
People saw the highlights, saw the close finishes, like saw
highlights of Jayden heard he's really good. But because he's
a rookie, because this is new, because Washington hasn't won
very much in recent years, everyone looked at this like
it's a cute story, but they hadn't really paid attention.
And we've been in the booth every week and we're
(03:48):
following this every week, and this is a team that
this is not an accident that they're where they are.
They execute at a high level, They control the clock
at an extraordinary highlight level. Their quarterback has been ahead
of the curve in amazing and we're gonna spend a
lot of time talking about him, obviously, but this team
is poised resilient as chemistry, ego lists, and the way
(04:13):
that they execute and handle all of these game situations
said to me all along, they're not going to get
blown out for sure. The only question I had was
would they score enough? That was the only question I had.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
And that was one thing you mentioned. You didn't mention
was confidence. They also had confidence. And the reason why
I say confidence being a part of that, and the
confidence came from preparation you mentioned in late game situations,
all those different scenarios, those you're confident in those moments
because of the preparation that you put in, when you've
(04:49):
got the ten thousand hours, so to speak, of preparation
and whatever craft or trade that you that you partake in.
These guys have the kind of the ten thousand hours
of preparation in late game scenarios, being going on a
row anybody, anytime, anywhere, mentality, all those types of things.
(05:10):
And when you add all those things together, and I
understood why you said, hey, will we be able to
score enough against these guys, because going into that game, Detroit,
the most explosive offense in the league, highest scoring offense
in the league, had some guys, especially in the running game,
that can harm us.
Speaker 3 (05:28):
Our run defense had not been up to park.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
But when I did it, when I personally did a
my study on the on the lines, I said, man
and Jered Golf in particular, I said, looking at this game,
we need to put it all on Jered Golf, and
by that like, you're not gonna stop Jamior Gibbs, but
if we can limit his explosive plays, and we didn't
(05:53):
do a great job of that, especially in the first
half of you know, but if we can force it
to where Jared Golf has to be the guy that
leads him and throwing the football around. He's gonna give
us some opportunities. That was my mentality, and that's how
it ended up playing out of that ball game. I'm
sure the coaching staff, because they have far more resources
(06:13):
than I do in terms of their studied all the
analytics and how they want to view a guy and
what things that they see can particularly bother a quarterback
and things of that nature. They saw those things as
well and said, you know what, let's put it on
Jared Goff and we can force him into some mistakes
and he did.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Like the note that I saw going in That really
gave me a lot of confidence. And I'm going to
tell you the line that Dan Quinn said to me
on Friday going into the game or Thursday, that gave
me a real lot of confidence about how things were
gonna go. Dan Quinn is head coach in Atlanta or
defensive coordinator in Dallas, played Jared Goff five times and
went four and one against him. One of those was
(06:55):
a playoff game. And granted this is a long time ago,
dan Quinn was the head coach at Atlanta and he
beat was one of the best offenses in the NFL.
Sean mcvayh Jared Goff Rams beat them in the playoffs.
The more recent ones that I think are closer comps
is he's the defensive coordinator in Dallas. Detroit played them
back to back years, lost both of those games, and
Jared Goff had one touchdown in six turnovers in those games. Wow,
(07:18):
he's got this guy's number in some way, I think
to your point, I think they had a very good
feel of what makes him really uncomfortable. And what he
said to me on Thursday going in, he wouldn't be
overly specific about what they were going to do, but
what he said was, we're not going to let them
play the way they want to. So I wonder how
that like sits with you now after watching them control
(07:41):
the Lions to the degree that they controlled them.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
No, it lines up exactly what I thought. I thought
one thing about Jared Goff. You know, he's not if
you can force him to hold on to the football
a lot longer or a little bit longer. And I
was looking at some like some status and it was
him versus man coverage as opposed to versus zone coverage.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
And I don't have my.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Notes there, but he was, you know, I mean, far
more effective against the man coverage than he was when
when you play zone coverage. It was like he was
like minus twenty three percent or minus you know, almost
maybe even thirty percent in a differentiation between the two
man versus zone coverage. So I figured, hey, maybe we'll
(08:29):
play a little bit more zone and also with zone
coverage and forces the quarterback to have to read it out.
Jerk Off is not a guy who's gonna you know,
buy time in the pocket, scramble do their things. He's
going to sit in the pocket for the most part.
So if you can get him off the spot, also
forced him to hold the football tab it longer, allow
our pass rush to maybe get some pressure on him.
(08:50):
I felt like that would be that was going to
be the better approach to him as opposed to playing
a lot of man coverage because he thried.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
I think he may have been. He wasn't the best
guy against man coverage.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
He was maybe two or three in terms of when
when teams played man coverage against him, and his effectiveness.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
You know, I think, like everybody sees the execution and
the players and the places Jaden made. We'll get to them,
but like the preparation in these first two playoff games,
you know, the coaching staff deserves a tremendous amount of credit.
They took on two top five offenses. They were able
to beat both of them. They were able to take
both of them out of the game that they wanted
(09:32):
to play. And with Goff, what I thought was very interesting,
like to your point about them playing more zone, like
actually Washington had been trending to play a lot more
man down the stretch of the season, So they are
showing that they are capable of playing very different versions
of the way they need to play week to week.
(09:52):
Like they talk about, they're able to access a game plan,
produce a game plan, and execute it on the field,
even if it's not what they're showing week after week.
They are prepared for whichever opponent they're about to take on.
And it showed up again against the one seed the
other night.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
Ah man, it really did.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
And I thought the the game plan, defensive game plan,
Joe Whitt I thought he called a great game.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
There was a I've had a chance.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
To maybe get through half of the of the game.
The rewatching the game and just especially it's it's hard
to see all of the stuff in real time as
we're calling the games. You don't you don't have enough
time to see everything. But there was some stuff like oh, dang,
I missed this coverage, I missed this this variation. They
had some very unique uh coverages that or ways variations
(10:43):
that they went to their their zone coverages, whether it's
a cover two rotation or Cover three rotation. You know,
some kind of some unique ways and and things in
ways that they hadn't done and before one time Frankie
Louvu ended up being the squawk the robot corner in
one of the scenarios, and maybe.
Speaker 3 (11:03):
They did had did this before in the season.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
I don't recall it where we had Louisu dropping out
of being a Cover two corner. And I mean, they
really had a great game plan and it caused Jared
Goff a lot of problems.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
They got five turnovers. I want to go through a
couple of them. So I think the game plan that
they talked about to try to unsettle golf showed itself
up in the Kwan Martin pick and then there he is.
I can only imagine what he was thinking. We got
to talk to him in the locker room. I mean,
you probably picture things like this when you're a kid.
A playoff pick six. He even like admitted to us,
(11:41):
he was like, I couldn't believe the balls in my hands,
and all of a sudden, I think, like you just
it's an out of body experience because it wasn't like
like it wasn't even like he jumped it out route
and had like an open laide. He like navigated through
traffic to get to the end zone. It was pretty wild.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
And by the way, we had a great call on
that that picked six. So on that particular play, this
is this is talking about doing some different things. So
they only rushed three and they played cover two. They
got John Allen dropping as kind of like a shallow
whole player hole defender, and they, uh, they play that
cover two and it forces Jared Golf to try to
(12:21):
fit a layer throw over over zone coverage, deep deep
zone coverage, droppers and inaccurate throws they call it talk
about tips and overthrows.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
That's where you got to get an interception.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
But then the ability of Kwalm once he uh, once
he made the interception and he broke some tackles man.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
He he became a great run game returner.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
We got to ask him if h if we got
a little background in his history about return to kicks
or being the offensive guy.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
But just a great game plan, great execution in that scenario.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
There's just there's so many like links back to the
past where you feel like this is destiny. Like the
last time Washington had a pick six in a playoff game?
Was Darryl Green?
Speaker 3 (13:03):
Did it?
Speaker 1 (13:04):
Darryl Green happened to have it was his famous game
in nineteen eighty eight, his punt return against Chicago that
helped Washington win that classic game and route to a
Super Bowl. Well, guess what, like in I just lost
my train of thought. Sorry, I'm a drag. Is I had?
Speaker 3 (13:21):
It was good?
Speaker 1 (13:23):
It was It was the first time they'd won on
the road in the divisional round since the Darryl Green game.
Like there's all these really strange destiny type synergies that
are like happening to this team right now.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
If I if I remember reading correctly, didn' d Green
also have an interception return he did against alions in
against the Lions?
Speaker 1 (13:45):
It was that was the last pick six? Was that
was the last pick six, right, And then of course
his famous punt return is the game they won in Chicago.
That was the last time they'd actually won on the
road in the divisional round in the playoffs. So there's
like all these really strange ghosts of the past that
have really been popping up throughout the year, Like how
many times early in the season were we mentioning, especially
(14:06):
when it came to like Jaden the things he was doing.
Not since nineteen ninety one, not since World War Two,
not since its not since that this started early where
they've been kind of rewriting the franchise's history. I'll get
the one that's really eerie in a little bit that's
about the quarterback.
Speaker 3 (14:21):
Not since you were at high school, right, or you
said at college.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
I was in college when they beat the Bills in
the Super Bowl. But I was in high school when
they played the Eagles the one and only time that
they played him in the playoffs, the nineteen ninety postseason
that they won. And it's funny, a friend of mine
that I went to high school with, we went to
that game. We bought tickets, we did. We bought tickets
(14:45):
because back then, I don't know if you could still
do this. But back then it was like a little
known fact that the road team had access to tickets.
You'd have to go to the box office though to
buy them, but I don't think most people knew that.
So me and my friend went to old RFK Stadium
and bought tikket to the game at the VET to
see Philadelphia play Washington in the wildcard playoff game. And
we went together, and so he like texted me, he
(15:08):
was like, we should he doesn't know him. The voice
of the team said we should go again because we
did that and to be I know, and I go
what I was like, do you not know what I do?
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Now?
Speaker 1 (15:19):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (15:20):
What is he?
Speaker 1 (15:20):
What?
Speaker 3 (15:21):
Has he been living out in a rock? I don't
have internet? Does he not? Well, he's not on social
he's not he's not following the team. I don't. I
don't know.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
Like that was the weird part of it. I'm like,
isn't it really cool? Because he's like, I'm gonna go.
Do you remember going? I'm like, of course I remember going,
and like I have all these memories of this first anything.
I was gonna get out of that stadium alive because
we ended their season and those people were not happy.
And then secondarily, that was back in the day before
there was instant replay, before they overturned calls. There was
(15:50):
this very famous non call on a fumble that Philip
didn't go Philadelphia's way, and I'll never forget this. In
the stadium, they showed a replay. It looked like it
was a fun I believe it was Err Spiner, and
it looked like it was a fumble, but on the
TV broadcast you could tell for sure it wasn't. But
they didn't show the TV broadcast one in the stadium.
(16:11):
They wanted the crowd to believe that the Eagles had
been robbed that day.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
Oh man, yeah, yeah, I'm surprised that you're still here today, Brah.
Speaker 3 (16:24):
Just those fans I got.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
I had a buddy of mine just to kind of
take you back a little bit and give fans a
true perspective of the Eagles fans and how they are.
A buddy of mine went to a game. This is
back when I was playing in Philly. We played the
Eagles there, and you know, on the road team, we
don't get the best seats as a visiting team players,
(16:46):
So I get him seats and we end up beating
the Eagles. Now during the game, they're talking crazy junk
to my buddy. I think they were winning most of
the majority of the game. We end up winnla turning
around to winning, and they're talking all kind of junk
to him. So once we it was a parent, we're
gonna win, he starts giving it back to him.
Speaker 3 (17:05):
He says, a lady takes like this big she had
a big.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
Thig of beer. It throws it on him, like I
mean throws it on him. So I mean he's he's
also been drinking, so he feels pretty good.
Speaker 3 (17:20):
He said he.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Had one and he threw his back on her.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
So he said they literally about twenty people chased him
out of the stadium.
Speaker 3 (17:32):
Course, and to.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
Know, to know my friend, and when he tells his story,
I'm about ready to beat my pants man, because this
dude is hilarious. That's the type of fans they have
in Philadelphia. So you know, I want our fans there
and droves. But man, it's gonna be tough for us
to get out of there after we beat them.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
Dudes.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
Yeah, like either way, it's gonna be an interesting environment.
You know, come ready, He's the best way to put
it all right, let me go back to the Lioness game.
I want to bring up someone else to and I
think his name is gonna come up later, but I
want to bring it up now. The interception that Mike
Sandras still made at the end of the first half.
He that's when he turned into a Michigan wide receiver. Again,
(18:15):
that was an unbelievable break on the ball that he made.
Speaker 3 (18:19):
Yeah, no, it was.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
And as I'm watching it, like it looked like he
Jamison had maybe just maybe a step on him. But
again you mentioned him under He undercut it, played it perfectly,
undercut that ball, and the skills, the hands like he
caught that, he caught it so naturally, and just just
his poise.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Man, that guy right there. Do we really understand what
we have in him?
Speaker 2 (18:47):
I think fans are starting to get a greater appreciation
for him. But the undercut of that ball and making
that pick and that interception. Then obviously had another one
later in that game. But he's going out there. He
was drafted to play the slot and fans, there's a
big difference between playing outside and playing inside, and here
(19:10):
he is, this is against we're playing.
Speaker 3 (19:13):
Quarters coverage cover for and on that coverage.
Speaker 2 (19:18):
The Lions ran what you call like a quarters beater
where the number two guy comes up and he runs
like a dig and that takes the post safety away,
and now they run a post with the number one
receiver Jamison Williams, and Mikey no longer has safety help.
His post help is gone, so he had but you
(19:40):
have to play it from outside ind So that's a
situation where you got to be tight to the receiver
and you got to be ready to defend that post ride.
A lot of court quarterbacks that try to throw that
receiver open running away from that the outside leverlge of
the corner. But so for him to be in phase
and not only be in fade in position, but then
(20:01):
to have the abilion to wherewithal to undercut that. You'll
see guys that make that play. We're talking about Hall
of Fame guys. Deon Sanders used to do a great
job over He would bake quarterbacks into that throw. They
think they have a step on him, a step or two.
He'd bake that quarterback to throw that post route and
he just undercut it. But man, that play that he
(20:23):
made sensational.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
Yeah, So that was the one in and I loved
what we talked to him in the locker room after
what I loved what he said about it was and
I think we were kind of on it in the
broadcast because at the end of the half, this is
an extremely aggressive team. They're not going to settle for
just kicking a field goal. They're right outside the red zone.
They're in that spot where this is the type of
team that will take a shot before they settle for
(20:45):
taking those three points. He was fully aware of that
and verbalize that to us. He goes, I knew that
at that spot on the field, this is exactly what
they were going to think about doing. It's understanding your opponent,
it's understanding their thinking. It'sading into their head. Again, this
goes back to the preparation. It goes back Mike made
an outstanding play, but the coaches prepared this defense for
(21:08):
what was a monumental task. That wasn't just a good offense.
That was an all time great offense. That was the
fourth highest scoring offense ever that they were playing this weekend.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, you hit that.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
You you said the key word, the preparation, the preparation.
In that moment, he talked about, Hey, that's the concept
we knew.
Speaker 3 (21:30):
They love to run that play. A lot of teams
they run that play against us.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
And and also here's another thing too, going into the
when you're on the in the midst of that game
is right before the half of a game high score,
I mean that that second quarter was it was crazy,
all all the points scored by both teams in that game,
you know, just a high score in the first half
in particular. But when everything chaos is going on around
(21:57):
you and it's at it reminds me a lot of
talk about Jayden and some of the throwsies the late
game throws a game winning touchdowns, whereas chaos all around you,
but you're able to slow your heart rate, settle in,
take a deep breath, and deliver in that moment. And
that's what that play that Mikey played was a version
of Jayden Daniel late game interception of game winner where
(22:22):
he's able to I mean late game touchdown game winner
that that Jaden would throw was the same version that
that Mikey had on that touchdown.
Speaker 3 (22:30):
And I mean that interception.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
Chaos going going all around him, slow your heart rate down,
make a play.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
You know, I'm sure you had this experience because you
played in the playoffs a lot, you find out who
your great players are in these moments. They step up
and I don't know if they ever surprise their teammates
in any way or not, but this is where you
make your name. I'm gonna get to Terry in a minute,
because he's been he's been nails the last couple of
If you were wondering what is he going to do
in the playoffs, you've seen it now the first couple
(23:00):
of weeks. But like with Sadristill, with Latimore, who I
want to get to in a moment, Who's who's kind
of they didn't throw the ball at him, so I
think there was there's an underrated portion of this where
Latimer I want to get to with him. But like
what you're seeing, all the stuff that they did, the poise,
the time management, the execution, none of this is too
big for them. This is totally carried over here into
(23:23):
the postseason. But in this game in particular, some of
their guys made the types of plays that you make
legacies about and are the reasons why you keep playing.
And that's what's like invigorated me even more that this
is a team of destiny that we're what we're watching,
what we're being a part of. This is so unusual
(23:44):
and so amazing to watch.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Yeah, no, you you you know, in those big games,
you always want your your best players to play well,
especially in the big games. But there's been some guys
about Diami Brown the playoffs, the first two games that
they had. They the catch that he that he made,
the d ball that he made against the Lions, and and.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
The throw was just ridiculous.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
That was a Yeah, i'msurd is exactly the right word,
the right adjective.
Speaker 3 (24:13):
But you know, he's he's emerged as a man. He's
a big game player.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
Some of the guys who made be rob having the game,
the type of game that he had, and there they're
gonna have. You know, your front line guys, you you
expected to play well and you wanted to play well.
But then there's some unsung heroes. I thought Trench Gott
came in having to and man, well we got to
talk about Sam Cosby and his his injury. Man, just
(24:40):
a tremendous blow. You know, I've been sick about that
over the last you know, a couple of days, just
with his loss.
Speaker 3 (24:46):
But for Trent to come in.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
He's he's a tackled by trade, forced to play the
guard position, and he went in there and he got
it done.
Speaker 3 (24:56):
Played this preyed extremely well.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
But yeah, a lot of guys have emerged and made
some plays during his postseason. But you know, the big,
the big, big time plays, the big, big time playmakers,
they show up in these games.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
And Jeremy Chin showed up. We saw the first week
Bobby Wagner, remember those first that first series he came
to play.
Speaker 3 (25:17):
It was obviously he came to play.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
There was that one series where Dante Fowler looked like
he had jumped out of a closet and like murdered
somebody like he came to play. That was a war movie. Yes,
out a lot of scurvy.
Speaker 2 (25:32):
That is just yes, like like, uh, you ever watched
those like the Animal Channel where they had the hunters
and the hunt. Yes, animals are going out to get
their prey. That's like National Geographic.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
The gazelle's running and here comes the lion, right, you
know who's gonna win in the end. That was that
was unbelievable. That was so like, these guys are invigorating.
Even Sandristill too, on special teams, had a huge hit.
There were two big stops inside the twenty on special teams.
It's across the board that's happening here. I want to
get to Cosmi in a minute two and I want
to get to the offense. But I didn't mention Marcus Slattimore,
(26:06):
and I want to bring him up one more time.
The Lions didn't throw the ball at him. He was
extremely physical out on the edge. This is a very
good sign moving forward, his physicality. I think he's getting
his sea legs under him. I think he's starting to
trust his legs again. Obviously he's been dealing with soft
tissue injury for a long time now. Remember we've asked
(26:28):
for a couple of years now, who's going to cover
aj Brown? Well, that answer might be coming this weekend.
And if he's going to start playing at the level
that he used to and the reason that they acquired him,
it's just another reason to be extremely confident that this
defense is going to get better over the next game
(26:50):
and hopefully two games of this season.
Speaker 3 (26:53):
Yeah, now, Mashawn, he looked, he looked good. He looked
I mean, he looked extremely good. You mentioned the physicality
with the tackles. I was watching him. I told you
I was able to rewatch you know about the first
half of that game.
Speaker 2 (27:05):
I was just watching his movement. He definitely looked more confidence,
more confident in his legs. He'll change the direction. There
was some his technique at the line of scrimmage. You
could see just the rust starting to come off. And
it's hard, man, you he's he's He's dealt with this.
He was dealing with that hamstream for over half of
the season. And it's for a cornerback to play that position,
(27:29):
you're going to being tasked with covering a lot of
times the fastest, if not fastest gallon on the football field.
You're back pedaling and changing, doing all those different things.
And against Mike Evans, Mike had made some plays with him,
and for a competitor like Mark Shawn, I knew he
was like he was chopping at the bed, like I
(27:49):
get a knot of opportunity, I'm about to lock in.
I can't wait to go back out here and show
you who I am. And he showed him man, Like
you said, the physicality on some of the tackles, but
just in being so uh spot on exactly where he
needed to be from a cover standpoint, and this this, uh,
this is gonna be an epic matchup between him and
(28:10):
Broad It was that first game. It was a it
was some questionable controversial p I against against him, But
I like to see this matchup again. And who knows, man,
this could be a situation these book both guys are
you know still uh, you know fairly in their primes.
This could be a battle within this division and for
(28:31):
championships to represent each team in the Super Bowl for years.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
If I I think I called him Marcus, I don't
know why. I'm punch drunk like we keep playing these
night short weeks. I'm punch drunk. Sorry, Marshaan, I correct myself, Marshaan.
Here's the other thing too. Just with that, I don't
remember a time in a while where we've had two
corners now as physical as this at this capacity between
(28:55):
sanders Still and Lattimore, like they are very physical, good tacklers.
Will they bring the heat both of them, like I've
seen this in a while on the edge like that,
with two corners like this at the same time year
and it.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
Makes a difference, especially if you want to play cover two,
which we started to play a little bit more. I
don't know if that'll still be the case against the
Philadelphia Eagles now, you know, going against Saquan and trying
to play cover two against that offense, maybe you'll have.
Speaker 3 (29:29):
To, you know, pick your pick your spots to do
it like that.
Speaker 2 (29:32):
But regardless, even if you're playing a man fronts, teams
are cracking. They want to force the cornerback to be
the tackler, and those guys are willing tacklers, and and
that makes a difference. You look at this the secondary,
I thought, just you got me thinking about our secondary.
I thought, Jeremy Chim he led the team in tackles.
(29:53):
He made a bunch of tackles out of space. Kawhi
Martin has been outstanding all year long, and his tackles
in the front of the post and overpel tackles.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
So when you got guys like that in that back camp.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
You know, it makes a difference in having willing guys
willing enable guys to make tackles.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
One of the other big stories I think we both
agreed was going to happen where both teams are aggressive,
both teams will go for fourth downs. They were top
two in attempts at fourth downs. Washington was the best
at conversions this year. Detroit was very good at it.
But we've had this happen all year too, where Dan
Quinn will say something at a press conference and you'll
hear foreshadowing of like what's going to come in the weekend.
(30:35):
And he mentioned this a couple times. He wasn't talking
about the Lions. He was talking about the Commanders, but
I think it applied to the Lions where he said
we're gonna be bold, but not reckless. And we could
argue over a couple of the fourth down decisions. I
think the one like going back to Tampa Bay, if
there was one I would have had over. I probably
would have taken the points in the fourth quarter one
where they had first and goal at the one and
(30:55):
they were going backwards it decided to go for it anyway,
didn't get it. Fortunately it worked out any way, they
got to turn over, won the game anyway. Like in
this game, I don't really have an issue with any
of the fourth downs they went with, but bold not
reckless is kind of the way that they looked at it.
The Lions for three years running now have been bold
and reckless numerous times they have made decisions that backfired
(31:17):
on them. I cannot believe when they were down in
the second half they called a play for a wide
receiver to throw a pass. I can't believe that they
called that, and I love that Sandra still was standing
there waiting for.
Speaker 2 (31:31):
It or the past. The play call was not the issue.
It was the decision to throw the football that was
the issue. They had the trick play had worked for
on the with the reverse to Jameson Williams, and they
had scored sixty one reverse that The play call wasn't
the issue. It was the decision to throw the football.
(31:53):
And I don't know if I'm sure they had to
tell Jamison, Hey, if it's covered, do not throw this football.
Speaker 3 (32:01):
Maybe they were expected.
Speaker 2 (32:02):
Maybe they didn't articulate that well enough to him, like
they maybe say, hey, they thought we were probably gonna
be in a man coverage and you'll get him against
a linebacker, and you may want to take take a
chance with Jamiir Gibbs in a linebacker one on one situation.
That wasn't the case. We were at his own coverage
and you got Mikey saber Steel with vision on the
(32:23):
quarterback just looking at and waiting on, waiting on him
to throw the football. So it was it was a
decision to throw the football. That that was that was poor.
He should just random like tuck it away, run.
Speaker 3 (32:35):
The ball so you get what you can get.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
I mean, it's just to me though, Like, and they
did a lot of these. I'm not surprised they had
a bye week. They do a lot of trick plays.
They run a lot of creative stuff, but it's just hubris,
like at some point, like you're just you can move
the ball effectively. We couldn't stop Jamir Gibbs. Nobody can
stop this guy. He might be We've gotten to see
the great running backs in the NFL that shop. We've
(32:58):
seen Saquon twice, so dare Henry once. This guy's as
good as either one of them this year. He is
a dynamic, fast, incredible vision, extremely tough, hard to get down.
He had a game. But these guys, you know, they've
done this and it hurts them at times. A backfires
and that play, I mean, I couldn't believe at that
point of the game, when they were trailing to do that,
(33:21):
I couldn't believe it.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
I think part of it too you just mentioned a
trailer piece how much of the way our offense was
able to move the ball against their defense that they
may have felt pressure to call up, pull out all
the punches and go for that trick player at that moment,
because they're feeling like, hey, if Washington's going to force
us to dincon dunk, you know, be methodical and scoring touchdowns,
(33:47):
we may not have enough possessions to you know, win
this football game. Part of that may have played into
the equation for Nan Campbell and me and Johnson saying, hey,
we got to be we gotta be bowl. We got
to dial up a trick playing things like that because
of the way our offense would scorn and with such
(34:08):
great ease against Deions defense.
Speaker 1 (34:11):
You know, largely to one of the reasons why I
was very confident going in was and this was the
part I think everyone in Detroit who was overestimating this
team failed to see it put blinders on a bout,
which was this is just too bad that this happened
to them. They had too many injuries on defense, they
had too many guys on ir they were missing too
many people, and down the stretch of the season like
(34:34):
they had a really good win against Minnesota, but that
was an anomaly compared to the previous three four five weeks,
where they were giving up over a month stretch an
average a four D and twenty yards a game, thirty
two points a game over the course of a season.
That would be the worst defense in the NFL. So
them being favored the way they were favored, and the
(34:56):
over confidence, in my opinion, all read to me like,
you haven't watched star offense play. We could score on anybody,
and your defense is getting shredded. And so I knew,
Like this goes back to the beginning of the conversation
we're having here. I knew Washington was gonna score like
I had no no, like they weren't slowing them down.
Jaden Daniels was not going to have a Sam Darnold game.
(35:18):
That was not going to happen. The only question I
had was would we score enough? That's it?
Speaker 2 (35:25):
Yeah, Uh looking back at that uh, that Minnesota game,
and there were a lot of players that Sam just
didn't take advantage of, and and then uh pigging back
and when they lost that cornerback Robertson, So that made
(35:47):
a thin group even thinner, and it just just eventually
caught up to those guys. I also I also thought
our ability to get the run game going was was
key in that ball game. B Roy ran physical uh
great play calling too. There was the formations and Logan
touched on this a couple of times throughout the broadcast.
How the formations that Cliff was was given the lines
(36:09):
was really it was a great great identifiers for for
Jaye and Hayes. Own Man identifies the motions things like that.
There was one of the the Eckler runs. They had
two double wide stacks and that makes the box really light,
and then they pulled they pulled on a what we
call a C fold block and he gets up to
(36:32):
the linebacker and Eckler makes a makes a great run
out of that. I can't remember exactly how many yards
that was, but just stuff like that from a formation's
play calling and also them being thin and you know,
just uh just end up catching up to those guys.
Speaker 1 (36:46):
Yeah, it did. Let me get to je I'm going
to read some of the numbers that Jason, our producer
provided for us, and they're all just again they're just
mind blowing that He's like, you have to remind yourself
He's a rookie on throws of ten plus yards in
the playoffs fifteen of nineteen, two hundred and ninety two
passing yards, two touchdowns, ninety three point seven passing grade.
(37:09):
Remember they haven't turned the ball over once and they've
punted once in two games. Daniels is tied for the
most wins by a rookie quarterback in NFL history in
a single season, fourteen with Ben Roethlisberger. He can break
that this weekend if they win. Daniels registered three hundred
and fifty combined yards passing and rushing, number two all
time by a rookie in any postseason game.
Speaker 3 (37:29):
Ever.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
He is having the greatest rookie season of any quarterback
of all time period. It's not close with one exception,
which I'll get to in a minute, but I want
to stay in the current times. He has been beyond
expectation throughout the year every time, though we haven't seen
(37:52):
it at this spot or this place or that spot,
and you need to see it. It was his first
playoff run and he is acting like these are regular
season games and he's just got this. And you mentioned
the throw to Diamie Brown that was unbelievable, unbelievable play
that he made.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Eventually, Brad, as we continue to see him do it,
we're gonna have to start saying these are believable because
he just he just continues to do it. But the
the the the Lions tried everything they could, bringing pressure,
zero blitzys, you know, simulated pressures. They tried everything, and
(38:33):
he was in just total command of that offense. Think
about this, That dawn was the loudest that I can remember,
you know, the loudest environment that I can remember, and
I played in some loud, loud places, but that place
was rocket.
Speaker 3 (38:51):
He had such a great command of that offense.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
Not one single false start, think about that, not a
single false start.
Speaker 3 (39:04):
That's ridiculous.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
But just his ability to know on the on the
touchdown to Terry, he saw the Lion's zero bliss, the
safeties were down and they knew he had an opportunity,
gets that ball out, Hey throws out to Terry and
let Terry do the rest. And there was a number
of occasions that he did those types of things, even
(39:26):
escaping the rush and making things happen with his legs.
It's and I mean, he just he the work that
he puts in the poison. Then this is just unreal.
Like you said, that's nothing I've ever seen.
Speaker 1 (39:41):
On Terry too. This is second time this year. Now
I know he's fast. We all know he's fast. He
has a gear that he could hit, and it's the
second time we've seen it. He did it in the
Dallas game, remember the gamer. He caught the pass and
he broke all like weave through everybody and hit the
gas in the way I haven't seen him hit it,
and unfortunately missed the extra point and they lost that game.
This one too, he hit a gear that like almost
(40:04):
as if someone had like he was like on jet
skis and they pulled the rope and just pulled him
and all of a sudden it was like boom, he
like took off. He hit a gear I haven't seen
him hit before.
Speaker 2 (40:15):
Now he did, and he's he talked about I had
you have some issues getting down to the to the
locker room in detroitce I interviewed Terry before you got there,
and it was uh. He talked about running through the
smoke and being like hey like being fitscal getting wanted
to get better run after run. After catching the Dallas game,
(40:39):
I mean that was we say fifth gear, that was
the sixth gear, and then the same thing, like I
know in those moments, just like nobody's catching me in
and man, he's been on a tremendous run too. And
in these playoffs. I mean, well the whole entire season,
how many touchdowns is he up to?
Speaker 3 (40:56):
Now?
Speaker 1 (40:57):
It's fifteen now because he had won in each of
little off games, he had thirteen, which was was a
franchise record single season with the one that he caught
in Dallas. You know what I really am happy about
for him too, is I think he's going to get
the national respect now that he deserves. I mean, for
years he's gotten the you know, hey, we know he's
really good. But he's not justin Jefferson, or he's not
(41:18):
Tyreek Hill, or he's not this guy. He's a number
one receiver in every in every way, shape and form,
with the way that he conducts himself, his work ethic,
the way he represents the organization, his competitive drive, his
ability to get better. And if and when there comes
a time that he actually could be up for the
Hall of Fame, the first thing I'm going to show
(41:40):
the voters is here's all the quarterbacks he played with
before he got to Jayden Daniels and tell me how
he got to these numbers. It's because of who he
is and what he's about. And I'm very happy for
him that he's having legacy defining moments in these playoffs
as well.
Speaker 2 (41:55):
Yeah, Now, when when you when you've gone through the
things that he's gone through, and it's Santanna talks about
this a lot of when you play quarterback, when you
play receiver, you're at the mercy of obviously the offensive
line and the blocking, but the quarterback that you the
quarterback or quarterbacks that you play with, because you can
(42:17):
you can run a great route, you can be open
and something for one reason or another, the ball may
not come to you, or it may not come to
you accurately or on time, and all those different things.
So you're really at the mercy of some things outside
of your your control. And for Terry to put up
the numbers that he's put up and not not complained
(42:38):
when he could have complained, not be even early in
the season. I think the Tampa Bay game, you know,
the first Tampa Bay game just two receptions. There was
the first Philadelphia game in Philly, we had just one
reception for ten yards. And I have been on teams
where your number one receiver win, lose, or draw if
(42:59):
he didn't get the football.
Speaker 3 (43:01):
Often in the ball game.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
That offensive coordinator knew about it, the head coach knew
about it, the teammates knew about it.
Speaker 3 (43:09):
It was a time where I was attained where a
guy literally.
Speaker 2 (43:14):
He was the number one guy, So they're rolling coverage
to him, and the number two guys is having a
day because you know that's just how it was, Like
they're doubling you man, and the number two is having
a day. There was a critical I think third down
or fourth down situation. Well he refused to go on
the field because they weren't giving him the football. And
(43:37):
for Terry to carry himself in the matter that that
he carries himself in, you can't be nothing but three
or for the season that he's having.
Speaker 1 (43:46):
Yeah, I want to give you other one other weird number.
And I know this stuff like probably only appeals to
me and all the knucklehead lifer fans that like leap
read into these numbers, But like we're having a really
special season. We've linked all these things that have occurred
throughout the year to all these things that have happened
in the past, I believe that in the modern NFL,
(44:07):
Jaden Daniels is having the best season any rookie quarterback
has ever had. He's broken a ton of records, and
if they are to win on Sunday, he will be
the first ever rookie quarterback to start in a Super Bowl,
and if you were to win it, obviously the first
and only rookie quarterback to ever win the Super Bowl.
So I think all definitions of what the great rookie
(44:28):
season looks like will get changed and there will be
a new baseline for what it will look like. Good
luck catching it. But maybe the greatest rookie quarterback season
ever is actually in this franchise as well. It's Sammy Baugh.
This is from a different era, but he won a
championship as a rookie in nineteen thirty seven, and in
the championship he threw for three hundred and thirty five yards,
(44:51):
which is a lot now by these standards, but back
then was ridiculous. Redefined what quarterback play could be in
the NFL. Eating passers in the nineteen thirty seven season
averaged about one thousand yards a year. Like they didn't
throw the football very much. That three hundred and thirty
five passing yards that he had in an NFL championship game.
(45:12):
It took until twenty twelve until another rookie broke that
in any NFL playoff game. Sammy Baugh had the greatest
rookie season by any quarterback ever. Jayden Daniels in the
modern NFL can surpass it. And the weirdest synergy. To me,
and maybe this is only interesting to me, is this,
for the first time in thirty three years, Washington is
(45:33):
playing in the NFC Championship and potentially for the first
time in thirty three years, will be playing in a
Super Bowl. Sammy Baugh wore number thirty three. It's just
bizarre to me. It is, Man, who is your researcher, Moses, Moses,
My wife and family will tell you this. All I
(45:55):
do is think about this team.
Speaker 2 (45:58):
Right, Yeah, yeah, you tell about you going back to
nineteen thirty seven, man, Yes, yeah, that's uh, that's great stuff.
Speaker 3 (46:08):
Great nuggets too.
Speaker 2 (46:09):
As soon as you mentioned Sammy Bong, like the first
thing I thought of, like, we'ren't even throwing a forward
pass back there.
Speaker 1 (46:16):
No, here's the one thing Sammy's got on Jayden Daniels.
Sammy Ball was the punter of that team too. Let's
see you do that one. He is wearing number five.
Speaker 2 (46:27):
Maybe he should I bet, I bet he could put too.
I wouldn't put anything past him.
Speaker 1 (46:33):
Probably. All right, let me get back you mentioned sam Cosmy.
Let's spend a moment on that. That's a big loss
for this team moving forward. You know, every team has injuries.
You know, Detroit had a ton of them. We just
talked about it with them. Washington's had some this year.
You know, Noah Brown going out in the middle of
the year was a really big deal for them. They
had to try to figure out who was going to
become quote unquote the number two receiver. John Allen was
(46:54):
out for a long time. They finally got lucky they
got him back. They missed Eckler, They really missed Eckler
for that month that he was out. Every team has
injuries and prominent ones, but this one feels really big
to me, and especially this week where you know what
kind of problem that Washington's had with Jalen Carter and
Milton Williams, who's underrated had a very good year in
(47:14):
the interior defensive line for Philadelphia. This is a big loss.
So I wonder how you're thinking about Washington trying to
overcome not having cosme moving forward.
Speaker 3 (47:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:25):
First, first of all, you feel bad for Sam because
he's a warrior, leader on that offensive line, leader on
the team. Just just feel devastated for him. When you
saw the injury, the initial injury, you were hoping and
praying that it wasn't. Seriously did you get the news
and he posted that it was his ACM. So you know,
(47:47):
once you get past the hurt for him, then you
had to turn and say, oh, shoot, they got Jalen
Carter too, and Jalen was going to line up He
lines up a lot too our right, which is where
Sam Cosmey plays, So they would have been you know,
those guys would have saw each other a lot. But
you know it's a hey, we don't we don't have
to come up with a game plan for him to
(48:08):
deal with him. I saw I was watching the rams.
They had they had four heads. Jayalen Carter allowed to
try to live in his impact in that ball game,
So you know you have to you have to, you know, uh,
do things from a schematic standpoint game planning standpoint to
account for for him and Tris Scott, who I'm assuming
(48:31):
he'll probably be man that position again, you know, as
the starter of this week. He's a veteran guy. You
know he'll he'll study and have a have a game
plan and you know we'll be we'll be up for
the task. But yeah, definitely feel bad for Sam.
Speaker 1 (48:43):
Yeah, he's he's someone who's been through it here and
deserves to be part of this run. And it really
it's just terrible too that he's not going to be
part of it. Uh, he'll be there in spirit obviously,
but he deserves to be out there. And I think
it's just so it's so hard to the I want
to see how they go. You know, Chris Paul is
an option here. I know he's been inactive a lot,
(49:05):
but I think he's an option here obviously, probably will
be active now and up at bare minimum as a
backup at the position. And I agree with you. I
thought to ask Trent Scott to just run in there
and do that when he's when he has played has
been is either as a swing tackle, a tackle or
you know, the extra tackle when they go into a
jumbo situation. That's a big ask of somebody to go
(49:26):
in there and do that, and I thought he played
really admirably. So we'll see what they do by the
end of the week. All right, before we get into Philadelphia. Uh,
we got to do the Championship Belt. It's time for
Big Fletch's Heavyweight Commander Championship Belt. It's presented by Northwest
Federal Credit Union where trust matters. The champion was Jaden Daniels,
(49:46):
who is the contender this week?
Speaker 2 (49:49):
Ah Man So Jaden obviously he had a he had
a great game last week and then contented. It was
a It was a lot of a lot of guys
that I had to kind of sign for through and
you know, I had to go into the lab and say, okay,
who who who could be the guy that challenge Jaden?
And some of the guys I consider, I considered be
(50:09):
Rob b. Rob had you know, fifteen carries, seventy seven yards,
he had two Russian TVs. He was, he was an option,
he was he's a contender. I should say he's a contender.
I thought Austin Eckley did some nice things the Army
Brown six catching ninety eight yards.
Speaker 3 (50:25):
Terry.
Speaker 2 (50:25):
Terry had a great game four receptions eighty seven yards,
had had the fifty eight yard touchdown. Then you flip
to the defensive side. You have Mikey samer Steel. He
had the two interceptions. Jerry Chen twelve tackles, led the
team in tackles, also had an interception.
Speaker 1 (50:44):
Pick somebody, pick somebody.
Speaker 2 (50:46):
Hey, hey, this is called drama, man, I'm building up.
This is the build up, man, the build up. So
the guy that I've got the challenge Jaden is Mikey
savag Steel. You go back and you have two interceptions,
you got you gotta make him a challenger. But so
Jayden had to Mikey had two interceptions. Wasn't enough to
(51:10):
dethrow Jayden. Jayden's game two ninety nine yards, two tds
QB rating up QBR of ninety one point eight, flawless
offensive performance and still big Fletch's heavyweight combat. This championship
belt stays with Jayden.
Speaker 3 (51:33):
Daniels.
Speaker 1 (51:34):
Listen, I know I have no vote in this, but
this one is a split decision. I thought you were
gonna give it to Sanderstill because the defense had to
stop the best offense in the league at Sanderstill. The
Michigan man goes back to Michigan and pulls off two interceptions.
I thought he was gonna get it.
Speaker 3 (51:54):
Yeah, but it wasn't.
Speaker 2 (51:55):
You wasn't enough to dethrow Jayden nearly threw for three
hundred yards man to TNS, and he was flawless.
Speaker 3 (52:02):
He was famed that.
Speaker 2 (52:03):
They couldn't do anything really against They didn't fluster him
in that environment. Not one single false star penalty on
offense all those days taken had to be taken into consideration.
Speaker 3 (52:16):
That's why he remains the chap.
Speaker 1 (52:17):
I'm gonna give Mike Big Brams Welterweight Commander's Championship bell
to Mike Sandras. Still yeah, all right, h yeah, you're
my champion this week. All right, here we go. World
War three Philadelphia Washington. Biggest game in the rivalry's history.
(52:38):
I'd mentioned this earlier. They've only played once in all
the years that you know they've been in the same
division and rivals, they've only played once in the playoffs.
It happened back in the nineteen ninety season. Memorable. We'll
talk to B. Mitch, I'm sure this week because that's
the year of the famous body bag game that Washington
that B. Mitch was forced to play quarterback after a
(52:58):
couple of quarterbacks got injured. In that game. They lost
to Buddy Ryan's Eagles, but got payback in the playoffs
and defeated them before their season would end a week later.
So this is only the second time they've ever played
in the playoffs, obviously the first time ever with a
chance to go to the Super Bowl. This is gonna
be something else London.
Speaker 3 (53:17):
It really is.
Speaker 2 (53:18):
Man. You thought we thought Detroit's environment was was electric.
Speaker 3 (53:24):
Can you imagine what is going to be like.
Speaker 2 (53:28):
Sunday at three o'clock walking into that stadium.
Speaker 3 (53:32):
You know, the bus is pulling into the stadium.
Speaker 2 (53:35):
I'm sure a lot of one finger salutes and other
things to welcome us into the into that environment.
Speaker 1 (53:41):
It's gonna sound like your dog does right now.
Speaker 3 (53:43):
I know they're normally they they're ready, they're ready to
bring some recavoc.
Speaker 2 (53:50):
But the man, I can't wait for that game because
everything is on the line, Like the physic catally is
going to be.
Speaker 3 (54:00):
We had an all time high. Yeah, the emotions are
gonna run high.
Speaker 2 (54:03):
You're gonna have to make sure you control your emotion
emotions in this ball game.
Speaker 3 (54:07):
The build up, all of the build up to this game.
Speaker 2 (54:11):
The media coverage is going to be unlike any we've
seen in a long long time. It'll be probably any
that we've seen because back in the nineties there wasn't
the social media aspect. The Internet wasn't like it is now.
So the media build up is going to be bananas.
I mean it's going to be I can't wait. I
(54:32):
cannot wait.
Speaker 1 (54:33):
So I think one of the big keys, and we're
taping this on Monday, so I don't know. Obviously, we
don't know, and they're not going to say anything about
it at least until Wednesday, when Nick Sirianni and Jalen
Hurts have to speak to the media. And I don't
know that we're going to really know his relative health
until the game gets there. But Jalen Hurts got injured yesterday.
He hurt his knee got bent over backwards. He had
(54:56):
missed the last couple of weeks of the season because
of head injury concussion that I actually occurred in the
Washington rematch earlier this year, but the knee injury obviously
is oft is of greater concern currently right now. They
didn't do a tush push at the end of that
Rams Eagles game, which they almost always would on the
(55:16):
goal line, and they're speculating on the broadcast, and I
don't think they're wrong to speculate it that they didn't
because they didn't feel like he was healthy enough to
do it at that moment. Then he started rolling out
a little bit, but he wasn't really running the ball.
He was trying to get rid of it. His relative
health is going to be huge in this game.
Speaker 2 (55:35):
No, And when I saw when I saw the hit
man you it looked it looked like a nasty hit.
I was wanting to like, was it potentially growing issues
he's going to I'm sure he feels bad right now
because Nord of course the game and that adrenaline is going,
so you're still feeling okay. But it's that that day
after and the days after where the information starts to
(55:56):
set him, the swelling starts to set him. I'm sure
he'll be getting around the cloud treatment to try to
get himself ready to go. I feel like, you know,
I think he'll be able to play in that game,
but well, is he going to be one hundred percent?
Is he going to be able to operate in the
matter that he wants to fully operate. I'm not sure
what the temperature is going to be that day, but
(56:17):
cold weather or colder weather will, uh, we'll play a factor,
and how you feel and those types of things. So
it's a it bears watch him at you know, Fulfilly,
I know their life.
Speaker 3 (56:30):
Man.
Speaker 2 (56:30):
We hope he can go, but there's something that's gonna,
you know, play a major part of this ball game.
Speaker 1 (56:35):
Yeah, and I would assume now it goes back to
what we're talking about earlier, where it's a very different
cornerback tandem. It's suddenly Washington's bringing in. I think you're
gonna trust Lattimore at Sandrastill maybe a little bit differently
than you had previously. I think you have to find
out Ken Jalen hurts run. I think you definitively have
to try to force them to throw. So Object one
(56:56):
obviously is to slow down Saquon Barkley in night game
for the entire game. Were they able to really do that?
He had a huge first half in the rematch. Once
Kenny Pickett came in, they suddenly had a lot more
effectiveness than slowing down the run game in the first
matchup actually limited him in the first half. It was
in the second half where he ripped off a couple
(57:17):
of big runs and ended up with some really big
numbers and kind of salted the game away in the
fourth quarter. So obviously stopping Barkley's a big deal. What
do you remember about the first couple of matchups that
shows you maybe the direction they're going to go to
try to slow him down a little bit.
Speaker 3 (57:31):
Yeah, I was as you were thinking, I was like,
how can we mess?
Speaker 2 (57:34):
Kind of mess those two performances, the first half performance
from Philly in the first game and then the second
half performance against Philly in the second half.
Speaker 3 (57:43):
From a run defensive standpoint, I.
Speaker 2 (57:45):
Think one thing we did we were a lot more
physical at the point of attach said playing a stay
in our gaps, and when we stay in our gaps,
we're putting good run defense. There are times where even
against the Lions, there's situations where we get out of
our gaps. Were and these backs, especially the patient backs
like a Sa Kwan, the Jamior Gibbs, they'll they're patients,
(58:08):
so they'll act like they're about to, you know, dip
into one hole. Get you to get out of out
of your your gap you're supposed to do and next thing,
you know, they're cutting back and getting big games through
those of those gaps that you've vacated. So you have
to stay patient and in your gap and don't leave
it until you know for certain he's acrossed a lot
(58:28):
of scrimmage, get off blocks the uh. There's also times
where we might spin out of a spin out of
a gap. You can't do that with these with these
great backs, like like Sakwan it is, you have to
maintain great gap integrity, big be uh.
Speaker 3 (58:46):
You know with the.
Speaker 2 (58:47):
Corners you mentioned the corners, we'll probably look at more
eight man fronts as opposed to like you'll show your disguises.
But there will be times where hey, we're going to
be obviously gearing up to stop the run corners. Hey,
you're gonna have to be a little bit more on
an island, a little bit expose a little bit more.
So maybe that's that's kind of within the game plan too.
So it's going to be a situation where you have
(59:09):
to understand it's an all day affair.
Speaker 3 (59:12):
We all have to be in our gaps all day,
all play long.
Speaker 2 (59:17):
And if we do that, I feel like we'll run,
we'll be able to play a lot better run defense.
Speaker 1 (59:22):
You know, I think they have this motto. It's worked
all year, anyone, anytime, anywhere. I think there's one more
they could add this week, which is any type of game.
Last week we thought maybe they would be in a
track meet. They hadn't really been in one of those,
and they kind of were. Second quarter was crazy. It
was the most combined points in any NFL playoff game ever.
Forty two points were scored in that second quarter, So
(59:44):
they showed they can play in that. We saw how
they played against Tampa where they had to limit a
team run the clock, control the clock. They were able
to do that. They've won some lower scoring games against Philly.
They want a higher scoring game where they had to
come back with a bunch of turn This one reads
to me, London early like a low scoring If you
(01:00:07):
make a big mistake, it's gonna really hurt you in
the end. Type of game either side. With Hurts seemingly
somewhat marginalized here, we'll see this weekend and Washington, with
an offensive line that already struggled against that defensive line
is now missing one of their best players. Points I
think are going to be very hard to come by.
And then we'll have to see what the weather is.
Obviously this weekend up in Philadelphia's outdoors, you know, in
(01:00:30):
the winter, want to see what the weather is. This
screams a low scoring old school NFC East back from yesteryear.
Let's who's gonna hang in there till the end type
of game.
Speaker 3 (01:00:43):
To me, what's your definition of low'scorn.
Speaker 1 (01:00:48):
Twenty to seventeen, seventeen to thirteen, something like that. I
think it's good. I think both teams are going to
have a hard time scoring this weekend.
Speaker 3 (01:00:57):
Yeah, yeah, it is. This is I can see. I
can see it.
Speaker 2 (01:01:02):
Maybe twenty four to twenty one good, maybe Burgady and go.
Speaker 3 (01:01:07):
I'm confident.
Speaker 1 (01:01:08):
Don't get me wrong, I'm confident. But I think this
game is close, and just the way it's kind of
going into it with their quarterback and the condition that
he's in our offensive line, and the condition that's in
the fact that their defensive line has kind of had
their way in the first two games. Anyway, it just
feels like this is going to be hard point both sides.
Hard to come by. Points are gonna be hard to
(01:01:29):
come by here.
Speaker 3 (01:01:29):
Points are going to be at a premium.
Speaker 2 (01:01:31):
One thing ball security is going to be at a
premium too. When I mean, yeah, every game you always
talk about this turnover battle.
Speaker 3 (01:01:39):
Can you win a turnover battle?
Speaker 2 (01:01:41):
And you know your odds increased greatly if you win
that turnover battle in turns of winning a game.
Speaker 3 (01:01:48):
So especially going on a row, hey.
Speaker 2 (01:01:51):
Can we get can we manufacture short fields, go for
it on fourth down like we've done, be able to
execute in fourth down situation.
Speaker 3 (01:02:00):
So but I think, uh, I know they will go.
Speaker 2 (01:02:05):
They're going to have a great game plan going against
the egos again. This is that vig fan Joe defense.
This is the third opportunity that that.
Speaker 3 (01:02:14):
We've had against them.
Speaker 2 (01:02:15):
Now, the first time we were so banged up and
just man short week and all those types of things.
But now a little bit more opportunity to get healthy,
you well healthy or than we did the first time,
but with the exception of Cosmy. But it's also the
third opportunity. We've seen all their stuff, they've seen a
(01:02:36):
lot of our stuff. So you know, who, how can
you figure out a way to make some plays and
get chunk plays at that?
Speaker 3 (01:02:43):
All?
Speaker 2 (01:02:43):
Right?
Speaker 1 (01:02:43):
Last thing, you played a lot of playoff games. Did
you ever play a division team where you had the
third meeting in the playoffs. Did you ever get one
of those?
Speaker 3 (01:02:51):
I don't think. Yes I did. Yeah, played the Saints
in the.
Speaker 2 (01:02:58):
Wildcard round back in the two thousand season, and we
were the road team. We played them, actually we played
a week back then week sixteen or the final game
of the regular season, beat them at their place, then
had to turn back around and come back and play
them at home again.
Speaker 1 (01:03:15):
Do you recall that being any different because of the
familiarity between the two teams?
Speaker 3 (01:03:22):
Ah, No, not really.
Speaker 2 (01:03:24):
It was just it wasn't any It was the intensity
was greater and it was already intests anyway, just because
you know, I written our normal battles and we were
kind of having a good run during that during that
time in that division. But the uh, the same stay.
They went out, they pulled out all stops.
Speaker 3 (01:03:43):
At one point, they had some some.
Speaker 2 (01:03:45):
Voodoo people walking around on the fields pretty siously pre
uh pre game. They had out what you call it,
and they're call themselves cursing the end zone and all
this types of things.
Speaker 3 (01:03:58):
Man, it was.
Speaker 2 (01:03:59):
It was weird, weird stuff going on and that building.
So a bunch of my teammates, the Christians on the team,
they come out and they start praying over the area.
That that the uh yeah, that the praying over the field.
Speaker 3 (01:04:13):
Yeah, it was.
Speaker 2 (01:04:13):
It was some spiritual battle goal spiritual battle taking place
in that in that doll.
Speaker 1 (01:04:18):
I think the Eagles fans might be cursing the end zone,
but it's going to be a more conventional voodoo that
we're used to this weekend.
Speaker 3 (01:04:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:04:25):
No, this this, it definitely is a difference in the
ball game because what's at stake this is this is
for the opportunity to represent yourself.
Speaker 3 (01:04:36):
You're you're represent and the super Bowl for the NFC.
Speaker 1 (01:04:42):
In this in the summer, I didn't foresee this. By
the middle of the season, I thought it was very possible,
and I know you did too. I can't wait for Sunday.
This is an amazing ride and I don't think they're
done yet. So let's see what happens when they get
the Eagles this weekend up in Philadelphia.
Speaker 3 (01:04:57):
Oh yeah, I can't wait. Man, I know these guys
gonna be ready.
Speaker 1 (01:05:01):
All right, that'll do it for the Booth Review. We'll
talk to you next week post the NFC Championship Game.
On this edition of the Booth Review, I Brand Weinstein,
London Fletcher. How about that defense five turnovers and a
win in Detroit, London?
Speaker 2 (00:08):
How about Jayden Daniels and the offense in the Lions, Dan?
Speaker 1 (00:12):
And how about the biggest game in the long held
rivalry between Washington and Philadelphia. Winner gets to go to
the super Bowl.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
That's on next on a Booth Review.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
Welcome into the latest edition of the Booth Review podcast,
brought to you by Microsoft Surface Powering a Better Game.
I Brand Whiteside with Big Fletch London Fletcher. First time
since I was in college, London, the Commanders are in
the NFC Championship Game. This is wild. You're oh too?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
So that was a long time ago, Man, you talk
about wild. Who could have imagined a year ago that
we'd be playing in the NFC champ Ship Game against
our heyday rivals, the Philadelphia Eagles, when Air advances to
the Super Bowl. All this happened in the first year
(01:10):
of the Adam Peters Dan Quinn regime.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Man, this is just don't wake me up dreaming type moment.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
Yeah, there's so many odd synergies that are going on
that I want to get to it's almost mystical in
some ways about what's happening here. But I want to
start with Detroit and what they did in Detroit, where
they had a short week. They're playing the one seed.
The one seed's got a historically great offense. But by
the time Friday came around, and I think this is
(01:41):
important to point out because you were up here, I
was up here, this team has never been satisfied with
anything they've done. I know everybody and including myself because
I ended up in the locker room asking Dan Quit
about this stuff, like where's the satisfaction of what you
have accomplished, because it's unusual to go this far this
quickly with an new group like this, especially with a
(02:01):
rooky quarterback, And he always brushes it off and says,
what's next. We're focused on the next thing. They were
very business like, and by the time we got around
a Friday, and I had a chance to speak with
coach Quinn and I know you did too, what I
heard from them in how they were going to try
to at least slow down the Lions. I had a
tremendous amount of confidence in what was going to happen
(02:23):
on Saturday night and I'm sure you did as well.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
No.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Absolutely, And it started like you see, a lot of
people will look at hey, we were underdog going into
that game. People outside of that building. But the sense
that I got is that they didn't view them Sales
as underdogs. They viewed them sales and or they went
in there with the mentality like we expect to win
this football game. We're not going in there just oh, hey,
(02:49):
we'll be happy with competing against the Lions, maybe making
a close gang. No, they went in there with the mentality,
we're going to win this football game. I told a
couple of people on Saturday at the game, like before
the game started, like, don't be surprised when it happens,
when we beat these guys. They'll be surprised because this
(03:11):
is what they expect to happen.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Yeah, I'm going to get to the offense in a minute.
I mean, I really think like there was an overestimation
by this has happened all over the league, and I
think partially it's because there weren't a lot of expectations
on Washington. They weren't in a lot of high profile games.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
A lot of.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
People saw the highlights, saw the close finishes, like saw
highlights of Jayden heard he's really good. But because he's
a rookie, because this is new, because Washington hasn't won
very much in recent years, everyone looked at this like
it's a cute story, but they hadn't really paid attention.
And we've been in the booth every week and we're
(03:48):
following this every week, and this is a team that
this is not an accident that they're where they are.
They execute at a high level, They control the clock
at an extraordinary highlight level. Their quarterback has been ahead
of the curve in amazing and we're gonna spend a
lot of time talking about him, obviously, but this team
is poised resilient as chemistry, ego lists, and the way
(04:13):
that they execute and handle all of these game situations
said to me all along, they're not going to get
blown out for sure. The only question I had was
would they score enough? That was the only question I had.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
And that was one thing you mentioned. You didn't mention
was confidence. They also had confidence. And the reason why
I say confidence being a part of that, and the
confidence came from preparation you mentioned in late game situations,
all those different scenarios, those you're confident in those moments
because of the preparation that you put in, when you've
(04:49):
got the ten thousand hours, so to speak, of preparation
and whatever craft or trade that you that you partake in.
These guys have the kind of the ten thousand hours
of preparation in late game scenarios, being going on a
row anybody, anytime, anywhere, mentality, all those types of things.
(05:10):
And when you add all those things together, and I
understood why you said, hey, will we be able to
score enough against these guys, because going into that game, Detroit,
the most explosive offense in the league, highest scoring offense
in the league, had some guys, especially in the running game,
that can harm us.
Speaker 3 (05:28):
Our run defense had not been up to park.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
But when I did it, when I personally did a
my study on the on the lines, I said, man
and Jered Golf in particular, I said, looking at this game,
we need to put it all on Jered Golf, and
by that like, you're not gonna stop Jamior Gibbs, but
if we can limit his explosive plays, and we didn't
(05:53):
do a great job of that, especially in the first
half of you know, but if we can force it
to where Jared Golf has to be the guy that
leads him and throwing the football around. He's gonna give
us some opportunities. That was my mentality, and that's how
it ended up playing out of that ball game. I'm
sure the coaching staff, because they have far more resources
(06:13):
than I do in terms of their studied all the
analytics and how they want to view a guy and
what things that they see can particularly bother a quarterback
and things of that nature. They saw those things as
well and said, you know what, let's put it on
Jared Goff and we can force him into some mistakes
and he did.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Like the note that I saw going in That really
gave me a lot of confidence. And I'm going to
tell you the line that Dan Quinn said to me
on Friday going into the game or Thursday, that gave
me a real lot of confidence about how things were
gonna go. Dan Quinn is head coach in Atlanta or
defensive coordinator in Dallas, played Jared Goff five times and
went four and one against him. One of those was
(06:55):
a playoff game. And granted this is a long time ago,
dan Quinn was the head coach at Atlanta and he
beat was one of the best offenses in the NFL.
Sean mcvayh Jared Goff Rams beat them in the playoffs.
The more recent ones that I think are closer comps
is he's the defensive coordinator in Dallas. Detroit played them
back to back years, lost both of those games, and
Jared Goff had one touchdown in six turnovers in those games. Wow,
(07:18):
he's got this guy's number in some way, I think
to your point, I think they had a very good
feel of what makes him really uncomfortable. And what he
said to me on Thursday going in, he wouldn't be
overly specific about what they were going to do, but
what he said was, we're not going to let them
play the way they want to. So I wonder how
that like sits with you now after watching them control
(07:41):
the Lions to the degree that they controlled them.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
No, it lines up exactly what I thought. I thought
one thing about Jared Goff. You know, he's not if
you can force him to hold on to the football
a lot longer or a little bit longer. And I
was looking at some like some status and it was
him versus man coverage as opposed to versus zone coverage.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
And I don't have my.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Notes there, but he was, you know, I mean, far
more effective against the man coverage than he was when
when you play zone coverage. It was like he was
like minus twenty three percent or minus you know, almost
maybe even thirty percent in a differentiation between the two
man versus zone coverage. So I figured, hey, maybe we'll
(08:29):
play a little bit more zone and also with zone
coverage and forces the quarterback to have to read it out.
Jerk Off is not a guy who's gonna you know,
buy time in the pocket, scramble do their things. He's
going to sit in the pocket for the most part.
So if you can get him off the spot, also
forced him to hold the football tab it longer, allow
our pass rush to maybe get some pressure on him.
(08:50):
I felt like that would be that was going to
be the better approach to him as opposed to playing
a lot of man coverage because he thried.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
I think he may have been. He wasn't the best
guy against man coverage.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
He was maybe two or three in terms of when
when teams played man coverage against him, and his effectiveness.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
You know, I think, like everybody sees the execution and
the players and the places Jaden made. We'll get to them,
but like the preparation in these first two playoff games,
you know, the coaching staff deserves a tremendous amount of credit.
They took on two top five offenses. They were able
to beat both of them. They were able to take
both of them out of the game that they wanted
(09:32):
to play. And with Goff, what I thought was very interesting,
like to your point about them playing more zone, like
actually Washington had been trending to play a lot more
man down the stretch of the season, So they are
showing that they are capable of playing very different versions
of the way they need to play week to week.
(09:52):
Like they talk about, they're able to access a game plan,
produce a game plan, and execute it on the field,
even if it's not what they're showing week after week.
They are prepared for whichever opponent they're about to take on.
And it showed up again against the one seed the
other night.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
Ah man, it really did.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
And I thought the the game plan, defensive game plan,
Joe Whitt I thought he called a great game.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
There was a I've had a chance.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
To maybe get through half of the of the game.
The rewatching the game and just especially it's it's hard
to see all of the stuff in real time as
we're calling the games. You don't you don't have enough
time to see everything. But there was some stuff like oh, dang,
I missed this coverage, I missed this this variation. They
had some very unique uh coverages that or ways variations
(10:43):
that they went to their their zone coverages, whether it's
a cover two rotation or Cover three rotation. You know,
some kind of some unique ways and and things in
ways that they hadn't done and before one time Frankie
Louvu ended up being the squawk the robot corner in
one of the scenarios, and maybe.
Speaker 3 (11:03):
They did had did this before in the season.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
I don't recall it where we had Louisu dropping out
of being a Cover two corner. And I mean, they
really had a great game plan and it caused Jared
Goff a lot of problems.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
They got five turnovers. I want to go through a
couple of them. So I think the game plan that
they talked about to try to unsettle golf showed itself
up in the Kwan Martin pick and then there he is.
I can only imagine what he was thinking. We got
to talk to him in the locker room. I mean,
you probably picture things like this when you're a kid.
A playoff pick six. He even like admitted to us,
(11:41):
he was like, I couldn't believe the balls in my hands,
and all of a sudden, I think, like you just
it's an out of body experience because it wasn't like
like it wasn't even like he jumped it out route
and had like an open laide. He like navigated through
traffic to get to the end zone. It was pretty wild.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
And by the way, we had a great call on
that that picked six. So on that particular play, this
is this is talking about doing some different things. So
they only rushed three and they played cover two. They
got John Allen dropping as kind of like a shallow
whole player hole defender, and they, uh, they play that
cover two and it forces Jared Golf to try to
(12:21):
fit a layer throw over over zone coverage, deep deep
zone coverage, droppers and inaccurate throws they call it talk
about tips and overthrows.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
That's where you got to get an interception.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
But then the ability of Kwalm once he uh, once
he made the interception and he broke some tackles man.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
He he became a great run game returner.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
We got to ask him if h if we got
a little background in his history about return to kicks
or being the offensive guy.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
But just a great game plan, great execution in that scenario.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
There's just there's so many like links back to the
past where you feel like this is destiny. Like the
last time Washington had a pick six in a playoff game?
Was Darryl Green?
Speaker 3 (13:03):
Did it?
Speaker 1 (13:04):
Darryl Green happened to have it was his famous game
in nineteen eighty eight, his punt return against Chicago that
helped Washington win that classic game and route to a
Super Bowl. Well, guess what, like in I just lost
my train of thought. Sorry, I'm a drag. Is I had?
Speaker 3 (13:21):
It was good?
Speaker 1 (13:23):
It was It was the first time they'd won on
the road in the divisional round since the Darryl Green game.
Like there's all these really strange destiny type synergies that
are like happening to this team right now.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
If I if I remember reading correctly, didn' d Green
also have an interception return he did against alions in
against the Lions?
Speaker 1 (13:45):
It was that was the last pick six? Was that
was the last pick six, right, And then of course
his famous punt return is the game they won in Chicago.
That was the last time they'd actually won on the
road in the divisional round in the playoffs. So there's
like all these really strange ghosts of the past that
have really been popping up throughout the year, Like how
many times early in the season were we mentioning, especially
(14:06):
when it came to like Jaden the things he was doing.
Not since nineteen ninety one, not since World War Two,
not since its not since that this started early where
they've been kind of rewriting the franchise's history. I'll get
the one that's really eerie in a little bit that's
about the quarterback.
Speaker 3 (14:21):
Not since you were at high school, right, or you
said at college.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
I was in college when they beat the Bills in
the Super Bowl. But I was in high school when
they played the Eagles the one and only time that
they played him in the playoffs, the nineteen ninety postseason
that they won. And it's funny, a friend of mine
that I went to high school with, we went to
that game. We bought tickets, we did. We bought tickets
(14:45):
because back then, I don't know if you could still
do this. But back then it was like a little
known fact that the road team had access to tickets.
You'd have to go to the box office though to
buy them, but I don't think most people knew that.
So me and my friend went to old RFK Stadium
and bought tikket to the game at the VET to
see Philadelphia play Washington in the wildcard playoff game. And
we went together, and so he like texted me, he
(15:08):
was like, we should he doesn't know him. The voice
of the team said we should go again because we
did that and to be I know, and I go
what I was like, do you not know what I do?
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Now?
Speaker 1 (15:19):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (15:20):
What is he?
Speaker 1 (15:20):
What?
Speaker 3 (15:21):
Has he been living out in a rock? I don't
have internet? Does he not? Well, he's not on social
he's not he's not following the team. I don't. I
don't know.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
Like that was the weird part of it. I'm like,
isn't it really cool? Because he's like, I'm gonna go.
Do you remember going? I'm like, of course I remember going,
and like I have all these memories of this first anything.
I was gonna get out of that stadium alive because
we ended their season and those people were not happy.
And then secondarily, that was back in the day before
there was instant replay, before they overturned calls. There was
(15:50):
this very famous non call on a fumble that Philip
didn't go Philadelphia's way, and I'll never forget this. In
the stadium, they showed a replay. It looked like it
was a fun I believe it was Err Spiner, and
it looked like it was a fumble, but on the
TV broadcast you could tell for sure it wasn't. But
they didn't show the TV broadcast one in the stadium.
(16:11):
They wanted the crowd to believe that the Eagles had
been robbed that day.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
Oh man, yeah, yeah, I'm surprised that you're still here today, Brah.
Speaker 3 (16:24):
Just those fans I got.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
I had a buddy of mine just to kind of
take you back a little bit and give fans a
true perspective of the Eagles fans and how they are.
A buddy of mine went to a game. This is
back when I was playing in Philly. We played the
Eagles there, and you know, on the road team, we
don't get the best seats as a visiting team players,
(16:46):
So I get him seats and we end up beating
the Eagles. Now during the game, they're talking crazy junk
to my buddy. I think they were winning most of
the majority of the game. We end up winnla turning
around to winning, and they're talking all kind of junk
to him. So once we it was a parent, we're
gonna win, he starts giving it back to him.
Speaker 3 (17:05):
He says, a lady takes like this big she had
a big.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
Thig of beer. It throws it on him, like I
mean throws it on him. So I mean he's he's
also been drinking, so he feels pretty good.
Speaker 3 (17:20):
He said he.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Had one and he threw his back on her.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
So he said they literally about twenty people chased him
out of the stadium.
Speaker 3 (17:32):
Course, and to.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
Know, to know my friend, and when he tells his story,
I'm about ready to beat my pants man, because this
dude is hilarious. That's the type of fans they have
in Philadelphia. So you know, I want our fans there
and droves. But man, it's gonna be tough for us
to get out of there after we beat them.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
Dudes.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
Yeah, like either way, it's gonna be an interesting environment.
You know, come ready, He's the best way to put
it all right, let me go back to the Lioness game.
I want to bring up someone else to and I
think his name is gonna come up later, but I
want to bring it up now. The interception that Mike
Sandras still made at the end of the first half.
He that's when he turned into a Michigan wide receiver. Again,
(18:15):
that was an unbelievable break on the ball that he made.
Speaker 3 (18:19):
Yeah, no, it was.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
And as I'm watching it, like it looked like he
Jamison had maybe just maybe a step on him. But
again you mentioned him under He undercut it, played it perfectly,
undercut that ball, and the skills, the hands like he
caught that, he caught it so naturally, and just just
his poise.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Man, that guy right there. Do we really understand what
we have in him?
Speaker 2 (18:47):
I think fans are starting to get a greater appreciation
for him. But the undercut of that ball and making
that pick and that interception. Then obviously had another one
later in that game. But he's going out there. He
was drafted to play the slot and fans, there's a
big difference between playing outside and playing inside, and here
(19:10):
he is, this is against we're playing.
Speaker 3 (19:13):
Quarters coverage cover for and on that coverage.
Speaker 2 (19:18):
The Lions ran what you call like a quarters beater
where the number two guy comes up and he runs
like a dig and that takes the post safety away,
and now they run a post with the number one
receiver Jamison Williams, and Mikey no longer has safety help.
His post help is gone, so he had but you
(19:40):
have to play it from outside ind So that's a
situation where you got to be tight to the receiver
and you got to be ready to defend that post ride.
A lot of court quarterbacks that try to throw that
receiver open running away from that the outside leverlge of
the corner. But so for him to be in phase
and not only be in fade in position, but then
(20:01):
to have the abilion to wherewithal to undercut that. You'll
see guys that make that play. We're talking about Hall
of Fame guys. Deon Sanders used to do a great
job over He would bake quarterbacks into that throw. They
think they have a step on him, a step or two.
He'd bake that quarterback to throw that post route and
he just undercut it. But man, that play that he
(20:23):
made sensational.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
Yeah, So that was the one in and I loved
what we talked to him in the locker room after
what I loved what he said about it was and
I think we were kind of on it in the
broadcast because at the end of the half, this is
an extremely aggressive team. They're not going to settle for
just kicking a field goal. They're right outside the red zone.
They're in that spot where this is the type of
team that will take a shot before they settle for
(20:45):
taking those three points. He was fully aware of that
and verbalize that to us. He goes, I knew that
at that spot on the field, this is exactly what
they were going to think about doing. It's understanding your opponent,
it's understanding their thinking. It'sading into their head. Again, this
goes back to the preparation. It goes back Mike made
an outstanding play, but the coaches prepared this defense for
(21:08):
what was a monumental task. That wasn't just a good offense.
That was an all time great offense. That was the
fourth highest scoring offense ever that they were playing this weekend.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, you hit that.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
You you said the key word, the preparation, the preparation.
In that moment, he talked about, Hey, that's the concept
we knew.
Speaker 3 (21:30):
They love to run that play. A lot of teams
they run that play against us.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
And and also here's another thing too, going into the
when you're on the in the midst of that game
is right before the half of a game high score,
I mean that that second quarter was it was crazy,
all all the points scored by both teams in that game,
you know, just a high score in the first half
in particular. But when everything chaos is going on around
(21:57):
you and it's at it reminds me a lot of
talk about Jayden and some of the throwsies the late
game throws a game winning touchdowns, whereas chaos all around you,
but you're able to slow your heart rate, settle in,
take a deep breath, and deliver in that moment. And
that's what that play that Mikey played was a version
of Jayden Daniel late game interception of game winner where
(22:22):
he's able to I mean late game touchdown game winner
that that Jaden would throw was the same version that
that Mikey had on that touchdown.
Speaker 3 (22:30):
And I mean that interception.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
Chaos going going all around him, slow your heart rate down,
make a play.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
You know, I'm sure you had this experience because you
played in the playoffs a lot, you find out who
your great players are in these moments. They step up
and I don't know if they ever surprise their teammates
in any way or not, but this is where you
make your name. I'm gonna get to Terry in a minute,
because he's been he's been nails the last couple of
If you were wondering what is he going to do
in the playoffs, you've seen it now the first couple
(23:00):
of weeks. But like with Sadristill, with Latimore, who I
want to get to in a moment, Who's who's kind
of they didn't throw the ball at him, so I
think there was there's an underrated portion of this where
Latimer I want to get to with him. But like
what you're seeing, all the stuff that they did, the poise,
the time management, the execution, none of this is too
big for them. This is totally carried over here into
(23:23):
the postseason. But in this game in particular, some of
their guys made the types of plays that you make
legacies about and are the reasons why you keep playing.
And that's what's like invigorated me even more that this
is a team of destiny that we're what we're watching,
what we're being a part of. This is so unusual
(23:44):
and so amazing to watch.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Yeah, no, you you you know, in those big games,
you always want your your best players to play well,
especially in the big games. But there's been some guys
about Diami Brown the playoffs, the first two games that
they had. They the catch that he that he made,
the d ball that he made against the Lions, and and.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
The throw was just ridiculous.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
That was a Yeah, i'msurd is exactly the right word,
the right adjective.
Speaker 3 (24:13):
But you know, he's he's emerged as a man. He's
a big game player.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
Some of the guys who made be rob having the game,
the type of game that he had, and there they're
gonna have. You know, your front line guys, you you
expected to play well and you wanted to play well.
But then there's some unsung heroes. I thought Trench Gott
came in having to and man, well we got to
talk about Sam Cosby and his his injury. Man, just
(24:40):
a tremendous blow. You know, I've been sick about that
over the last you know, a couple of days, just
with his loss.
Speaker 3 (24:46):
But for Trent to come in.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
He's he's a tackled by trade, forced to play the
guard position, and he went in there and he got
it done.
Speaker 3 (24:56):
Played this preyed extremely well.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
But yeah, a lot of guys have emerged and made
some plays during his postseason. But you know, the big,
the big, big time plays, the big, big time playmakers,
they show up in these games.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
And Jeremy Chin showed up. We saw the first week
Bobby Wagner, remember those first that first series he came
to play.
Speaker 3 (25:17):
It was obviously he came to play.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
There was that one series where Dante Fowler looked like
he had jumped out of a closet and like murdered
somebody like he came to play. That was a war movie. Yes,
out a lot of scurvy.
Speaker 2 (25:32):
That is just yes, like like, uh, you ever watched
those like the Animal Channel where they had the hunters
and the hunt. Yes, animals are going out to get
their prey. That's like National Geographic.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
The gazelle's running and here comes the lion, right, you
know who's gonna win in the end. That was that
was unbelievable. That was so like, these guys are invigorating.
Even Sandristill too, on special teams, had a huge hit.
There were two big stops inside the twenty on special teams.
It's across the board that's happening here. I want to
get to Cosmi in a minute two and I want
to get to the offense. But I didn't mention Marcus Slattimore,
(26:06):
and I want to bring him up one more time.
The Lions didn't throw the ball at him. He was
extremely physical out on the edge. This is a very
good sign moving forward, his physicality. I think he's getting
his sea legs under him. I think he's starting to
trust his legs again. Obviously he's been dealing with soft
tissue injury for a long time now. Remember we've asked
(26:28):
for a couple of years now, who's going to cover
aj Brown? Well, that answer might be coming this weekend.
And if he's going to start playing at the level
that he used to and the reason that they acquired him,
it's just another reason to be extremely confident that this
defense is going to get better over the next game
(26:50):
and hopefully two games of this season.
Speaker 3 (26:53):
Yeah, now, Mashawn, he looked, he looked good. He looked
I mean, he looked extremely good. You mentioned the physicality
with the tackles. I was watching him. I told you
I was able to rewatch you know about the first
half of that game.
Speaker 2 (27:05):
I was just watching his movement. He definitely looked more confidence,
more confident in his legs. He'll change the direction. There
was some his technique at the line of scrimmage. You
could see just the rust starting to come off. And
it's hard, man, you he's he's He's dealt with this.
He was dealing with that hamstream for over half of
the season. And it's for a cornerback to play that position,
(27:29):
you're going to being tasked with covering a lot of
times the fastest, if not fastest gallon on the football field.
You're back pedaling and changing, doing all those different things.
And against Mike Evans, Mike had made some plays with him,
and for a competitor like Mark Shawn, I knew he
was like he was chopping at the bed, like I
(27:49):
get a knot of opportunity, I'm about to lock in.
I can't wait to go back out here and show
you who I am. And he showed him man, Like
you said, the physicality on some of the tackles, but
just in being so uh spot on exactly where he
needed to be from a cover standpoint, and this this, uh,
this is gonna be an epic matchup between him and
(28:10):
Broad It was that first game. It was a it
was some questionable controversial p I against against him, But
I like to see this matchup again. And who knows, man,
this could be a situation these book both guys are
you know still uh, you know fairly in their primes.
This could be a battle within this division and for
(28:31):
championships to represent each team in the Super Bowl for years.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
If I I think I called him Marcus, I don't
know why. I'm punch drunk like we keep playing these
night short weeks. I'm punch drunk. Sorry, Marshaan, I correct myself, Marshaan.
Here's the other thing too. Just with that, I don't
remember a time in a while where we've had two
corners now as physical as this at this capacity between
(28:55):
sanders Still and Lattimore, like they are very physical, good tacklers.
Will they bring the heat both of them, like I've
seen this in a while on the edge like that,
with two corners like this at the same time year
and it.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
Makes a difference, especially if you want to play cover two,
which we started to play a little bit more. I
don't know if that'll still be the case against the
Philadelphia Eagles now, you know, going against Saquan and trying
to play cover two against that offense, maybe you'll have.
Speaker 3 (29:29):
To, you know, pick your pick your spots to do
it like that.
Speaker 2 (29:32):
But regardless, even if you're playing a man fronts, teams
are cracking. They want to force the cornerback to be
the tackler, and those guys are willing tacklers, and and
that makes a difference. You look at this the secondary,
I thought, just you got me thinking about our secondary.
I thought, Jeremy Chim he led the team in tackles.
(29:53):
He made a bunch of tackles out of space. Kawhi
Martin has been outstanding all year long, and his tackles
in the front of the post and overpel tackles.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
So when you got guys like that in that back camp.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
You know, it makes a difference in having willing guys
willing enable guys to make tackles.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
One of the other big stories I think we both
agreed was going to happen where both teams are aggressive,
both teams will go for fourth downs. They were top
two in attempts at fourth downs. Washington was the best
at conversions this year. Detroit was very good at it.
But we've had this happen all year too, where Dan
Quinn will say something at a press conference and you'll
hear foreshadowing of like what's going to come in the weekend.
(30:35):
And he mentioned this a couple times. He wasn't talking
about the Lions. He was talking about the Commanders, but
I think it applied to the Lions where he said
we're gonna be bold, but not reckless. And we could
argue over a couple of the fourth down decisions. I
think the one like going back to Tampa Bay, if
there was one I would have had over. I probably
would have taken the points in the fourth quarter one
where they had first and goal at the one and
(30:55):
they were going backwards it decided to go for it anyway,
didn't get it. Fortunately it worked out any way, they
got to turn over, won the game anyway. Like in
this game, I don't really have an issue with any
of the fourth downs they went with, but bold not
reckless is kind of the way that they looked at it.
The Lions for three years running now have been bold
and reckless numerous times they have made decisions that backfired
(31:17):
on them. I cannot believe when they were down in
the second half they called a play for a wide
receiver to throw a pass. I can't believe that they
called that, and I love that Sandra still was standing
there waiting for.
Speaker 2 (31:31):
It or the past. The play call was not the issue.
It was the decision to throw the football that was
the issue. They had the trick play had worked for
on the with the reverse to Jameson Williams, and they
had scored sixty one reverse that The play call wasn't
the issue. It was the decision to throw the football.
(31:53):
And I don't know if I'm sure they had to
tell Jamison, Hey, if it's covered, do not throw this football.
Speaker 3 (32:01):
Maybe they were expected.
Speaker 2 (32:02):
Maybe they didn't articulate that well enough to him, like
they maybe say, hey, they thought we were probably gonna
be in a man coverage and you'll get him against
a linebacker, and you may want to take take a
chance with Jamiir Gibbs in a linebacker one on one situation.
That wasn't the case. We were at his own coverage
and you got Mikey saber Steel with vision on the
(32:23):
quarterback just looking at and waiting on, waiting on him
to throw the football. So it was it was a
decision to throw the football. That that was that was poor.
He should just random like tuck it away, run.
Speaker 3 (32:35):
The ball so you get what you can get.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
I mean, it's just to me though, Like, and they
did a lot of these. I'm not surprised they had
a bye week. They do a lot of trick plays.
They run a lot of creative stuff, but it's just hubris,
like at some point, like you're just you can move
the ball effectively. We couldn't stop Jamir Gibbs. Nobody can
stop this guy. He might be We've gotten to see
the great running backs in the NFL that shop. We've
(32:58):
seen Saquon twice, so dare Henry once. This guy's as
good as either one of them this year. He is
a dynamic, fast, incredible vision, extremely tough, hard to get down.
He had a game. But these guys, you know, they've
done this and it hurts them at times. A backfires
and that play, I mean, I couldn't believe at that
point of the game, when they were trailing to do that,
(33:21):
I couldn't believe it.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
I think part of it too you just mentioned a
trailer piece how much of the way our offense was
able to move the ball against their defense that they
may have felt pressure to call up, pull out all
the punches and go for that trick player at that moment,
because they're feeling like, hey, if Washington's going to force
us to dincon dunk, you know, be methodical and scoring touchdowns,
(33:47):
we may not have enough possessions to you know, win
this football game. Part of that may have played into
the equation for Nan Campbell and me and Johnson saying, hey,
we got to be we gotta be bowl. We got
to dial up a trick playing things like that because
of the way our offense would scorn and with such
(34:08):
great ease against Deions defense.
Speaker 1 (34:11):
You know, largely to one of the reasons why I
was very confident going in was and this was the
part I think everyone in Detroit who was overestimating this
team failed to see it put blinders on a bout,
which was this is just too bad that this happened
to them. They had too many injuries on defense, they
had too many guys on ir they were missing too
many people, and down the stretch of the season like
(34:34):
they had a really good win against Minnesota, but that
was an anomaly compared to the previous three four five weeks,
where they were giving up over a month stretch an
average a four D and twenty yards a game, thirty
two points a game over the course of a season.
That would be the worst defense in the NFL. So
them being favored the way they were favored, and the
(34:56):
over confidence, in my opinion, all read to me like,
you haven't watched star offense play. We could score on anybody,
and your defense is getting shredded. And so I knew,
Like this goes back to the beginning of the conversation
we're having here. I knew Washington was gonna score like
I had no no, like they weren't slowing them down.
Jaden Daniels was not going to have a Sam Darnold game.
(35:18):
That was not going to happen. The only question I
had was would we score enough? That's it?
Speaker 2 (35:25):
Yeah, Uh looking back at that uh, that Minnesota game,
and there were a lot of players that Sam just
didn't take advantage of, and and then uh pigging back
and when they lost that cornerback Robertson, So that made
(35:47):
a thin group even thinner, and it just just eventually
caught up to those guys. I also I also thought
our ability to get the run game going was was
key in that ball game. B Roy ran physical uh
great play calling too. There was the formations and Logan
touched on this a couple of times throughout the broadcast.
How the formations that Cliff was was given the lines
(36:09):
was really it was a great great identifiers for for
Jaye and Hayes. Own Man identifies the motions things like that.
There was one of the the Eckler runs. They had
two double wide stacks and that makes the box really light,
and then they pulled they pulled on a what we
call a C fold block and he gets up to
(36:32):
the linebacker and Eckler makes a makes a great run
out of that. I can't remember exactly how many yards
that was, but just stuff like that from a formation's
play calling and also them being thin and you know,
just uh just end up catching up to those guys.
Speaker 1 (36:46):
Yeah, it did. Let me get to je I'm going
to read some of the numbers that Jason, our producer
provided for us, and they're all just again they're just
mind blowing that He's like, you have to remind yourself
He's a rookie on throws of ten plus yards in
the playoffs fifteen of nineteen, two hundred and ninety two
passing yards, two touchdowns, ninety three point seven passing grade.
(37:09):
Remember they haven't turned the ball over once and they've
punted once in two games. Daniels is tied for the
most wins by a rookie quarterback in NFL history in
a single season, fourteen with Ben Roethlisberger. He can break
that this weekend if they win. Daniels registered three hundred
and fifty combined yards passing and rushing, number two all
time by a rookie in any postseason game.
Speaker 3 (37:29):
Ever.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
He is having the greatest rookie season of any quarterback
of all time period. It's not close with one exception,
which I'll get to in a minute, but I want
to stay in the current times. He has been beyond
expectation throughout the year every time, though we haven't seen
(37:52):
it at this spot or this place or that spot,
and you need to see it. It was his first
playoff run and he is acting like these are regular
season games and he's just got this. And you mentioned
the throw to Diamie Brown that was unbelievable, unbelievable play
that he made.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Eventually, Brad, as we continue to see him do it,
we're gonna have to start saying these are believable because
he just he just continues to do it. But the
the the the Lions tried everything they could, bringing pressure,
zero blitzys, you know, simulated pressures. They tried everything, and
(38:33):
he was in just total command of that offense. Think
about this, That dawn was the loudest that I can remember,
you know, the loudest environment that I can remember, and
I played in some loud, loud places, but that place
was rocket.
Speaker 3 (38:51):
He had such a great command of that offense.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
Not one single false start, think about that, not a
single false start.
Speaker 3 (39:04):
That's ridiculous.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
But just his ability to know on the on the
touchdown to Terry, he saw the Lion's zero bliss, the
safeties were down and they knew he had an opportunity,
gets that ball out, Hey throws out to Terry and
let Terry do the rest. And there was a number
of occasions that he did those types of things, even
(39:26):
escaping the rush and making things happen with his legs.
It's and I mean, he just he the work that
he puts in the poison. Then this is just unreal.
Like you said, that's nothing I've ever seen.
Speaker 1 (39:41):
On Terry too. This is second time this year. Now
I know he's fast. We all know he's fast. He
has a gear that he could hit, and it's the
second time we've seen it. He did it in the
Dallas game, remember the gamer. He caught the pass and
he broke all like weave through everybody and hit the
gas in the way I haven't seen him hit it,
and unfortunately missed the extra point and they lost that game.
This one too, he hit a gear that like almost
(40:04):
as if someone had like he was like on jet
skis and they pulled the rope and just pulled him
and all of a sudden it was like boom, he
like took off. He hit a gear I haven't seen
him hit before.
Speaker 2 (40:15):
Now he did, and he's he talked about I had
you have some issues getting down to the to the
locker room in detroitce I interviewed Terry before you got there,
and it was uh. He talked about running through the
smoke and being like hey like being fitscal getting wanted
to get better run after run. After catching the Dallas game,
(40:39):
I mean that was we say fifth gear, that was
the sixth gear, and then the same thing, like I
know in those moments, just like nobody's catching me in
and man, he's been on a tremendous run too. And
in these playoffs. I mean, well the whole entire season,
how many touchdowns is he up to?
Speaker 3 (40:56):
Now?
Speaker 1 (40:57):
It's fifteen now because he had won in each of
little off games, he had thirteen, which was was a
franchise record single season with the one that he caught
in Dallas. You know what I really am happy about
for him too, is I think he's going to get
the national respect now that he deserves. I mean, for
years he's gotten the you know, hey, we know he's
really good. But he's not justin Jefferson, or he's not
(41:18):
Tyreek Hill, or he's not this guy. He's a number
one receiver in every in every way, shape and form,
with the way that he conducts himself, his work ethic,
the way he represents the organization, his competitive drive, his
ability to get better. And if and when there comes
a time that he actually could be up for the
Hall of Fame, the first thing I'm going to show
(41:40):
the voters is here's all the quarterbacks he played with
before he got to Jayden Daniels and tell me how
he got to these numbers. It's because of who he
is and what he's about. And I'm very happy for
him that he's having legacy defining moments in these playoffs
as well.
Speaker 2 (41:55):
Yeah, Now, when when you when you've gone through the
things that he's gone through, and it's Santanna talks about
this a lot of when you play quarterback, when you
play receiver, you're at the mercy of obviously the offensive
line and the blocking, but the quarterback that you the
quarterback or quarterbacks that you play with, because you can
(42:17):
you can run a great route, you can be open
and something for one reason or another, the ball may
not come to you, or it may not come to
you accurately or on time, and all those different things.
So you're really at the mercy of some things outside
of your your control. And for Terry to put up
the numbers that he's put up and not not complained
(42:38):
when he could have complained, not be even early in
the season. I think the Tampa Bay game, you know,
the first Tampa Bay game just two receptions. There was
the first Philadelphia game in Philly, we had just one
reception for ten yards. And I have been on teams
where your number one receiver win, lose, or draw if
(42:59):
he didn't get the football.
Speaker 3 (43:01):
Often in the ball game.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
That offensive coordinator knew about it, the head coach knew
about it, the teammates knew about it.
Speaker 3 (43:09):
It was a time where I was attained where a
guy literally.
Speaker 2 (43:14):
He was the number one guy, So they're rolling coverage
to him, and the number two guys is having a
day because you know that's just how it was, Like
they're doubling you man, and the number two is having
a day. There was a critical I think third down
or fourth down situation. Well he refused to go on
the field because they weren't giving him the football. And
(43:37):
for Terry to carry himself in the matter that that
he carries himself in, you can't be nothing but three
or for the season that he's having.
Speaker 1 (43:46):
Yeah, I want to give you other one other weird number.
And I know this stuff like probably only appeals to
me and all the knucklehead lifer fans that like leap
read into these numbers, But like we're having a really
special season. We've linked all these things that have occurred
throughout the year to all these things that have happened
in the past, I believe that in the modern NFL,
(44:07):
Jaden Daniels is having the best season any rookie quarterback
has ever had. He's broken a ton of records, and
if they are to win on Sunday, he will be
the first ever rookie quarterback to start in a Super Bowl,
and if you were to win it, obviously the first
and only rookie quarterback to ever win the Super Bowl.
So I think all definitions of what the great rookie
(44:28):
season looks like will get changed and there will be
a new baseline for what it will look like. Good
luck catching it. But maybe the greatest rookie quarterback season
ever is actually in this franchise as well. It's Sammy Baugh.
This is from a different era, but he won a
championship as a rookie in nineteen thirty seven, and in
the championship he threw for three hundred and thirty five yards,
(44:51):
which is a lot now by these standards, but back
then was ridiculous. Redefined what quarterback play could be in
the NFL. Eating passers in the nineteen thirty seven season
averaged about one thousand yards a year. Like they didn't
throw the football very much. That three hundred and thirty
five passing yards that he had in an NFL championship game.
(45:12):
It took until twenty twelve until another rookie broke that
in any NFL playoff game. Sammy Baugh had the greatest
rookie season by any quarterback ever. Jayden Daniels in the
modern NFL can surpass it. And the weirdest synergy. To me,
and maybe this is only interesting to me, is this,
for the first time in thirty three years, Washington is
(45:33):
playing in the NFC Championship and potentially for the first
time in thirty three years, will be playing in a
Super Bowl. Sammy Baugh wore number thirty three. It's just
bizarre to me. It is, Man, who is your researcher, Moses, Moses,
My wife and family will tell you this. All I
(45:55):
do is think about this team.
Speaker 2 (45:58):
Right, Yeah, yeah, you tell about you going back to
nineteen thirty seven, man, Yes, yeah, that's uh, that's great stuff.
Speaker 3 (46:08):
Great nuggets too.
Speaker 2 (46:09):
As soon as you mentioned Sammy Bong, like the first
thing I thought of, like, we'ren't even throwing a forward
pass back there.
Speaker 1 (46:16):
No, here's the one thing Sammy's got on Jayden Daniels.
Sammy Ball was the punter of that team too. Let's
see you do that one. He is wearing number five.
Speaker 2 (46:27):
Maybe he should I bet, I bet he could put too.
I wouldn't put anything past him.
Speaker 1 (46:33):
Probably. All right, let me get back you mentioned sam Cosmy.
Let's spend a moment on that. That's a big loss
for this team moving forward. You know, every team has injuries.
You know, Detroit had a ton of them. We just
talked about it with them. Washington's had some this year.
You know, Noah Brown going out in the middle of
the year was a really big deal for them. They
had to try to figure out who was going to
become quote unquote the number two receiver. John Allen was
(46:54):
out for a long time. They finally got lucky they
got him back. They missed Eckler, They really missed Eckler
for that month that he was out. Every team has
injuries and prominent ones, but this one feels really big
to me, and especially this week where you know what
kind of problem that Washington's had with Jalen Carter and
Milton Williams, who's underrated had a very good year in
(47:14):
the interior defensive line for Philadelphia. This is a big loss.
So I wonder how you're thinking about Washington trying to
overcome not having cosme moving forward.
Speaker 3 (47:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:25):
First, first of all, you feel bad for Sam because
he's a warrior, leader on that offensive line, leader on
the team. Just just feel devastated for him. When you
saw the injury, the initial injury, you were hoping and
praying that it wasn't. Seriously did you get the news
and he posted that it was his ACM. So you know,
(47:47):
once you get past the hurt for him, then you
had to turn and say, oh, shoot, they got Jalen
Carter too, and Jalen was going to line up He
lines up a lot too our right, which is where
Sam Cosmey plays, So they would have been you know,
those guys would have saw each other a lot. But
you know it's a hey, we don't we don't have
to come up with a game plan for him to
(48:08):
deal with him. I saw I was watching the rams.
They had they had four heads. Jayalen Carter allowed to
try to live in his impact in that ball game,
So you know you have to you have to, you know, uh,
do things from a schematic standpoint game planning standpoint to
account for for him and Tris Scott, who I'm assuming
(48:31):
he'll probably be man that position again, you know, as
the starter of this week. He's a veteran guy. You
know he'll he'll study and have a have a game
plan and you know we'll be we'll be up for
the task. But yeah, definitely feel bad for Sam.
Speaker 1 (48:43):
Yeah, he's he's someone who's been through it here and
deserves to be part of this run. And it really
it's just terrible too that he's not going to be
part of it. Uh, he'll be there in spirit obviously,
but he deserves to be out there. And I think
it's just so it's so hard to the I want
to see how they go. You know, Chris Paul is
an option here. I know he's been inactive a lot,
(49:05):
but I think he's an option here obviously, probably will
be active now and up at bare minimum as a
backup at the position. And I agree with you. I
thought to ask Trent Scott to just run in there
and do that when he's when he has played has
been is either as a swing tackle, a tackle or
you know, the extra tackle when they go into a
jumbo situation. That's a big ask of somebody to go
(49:26):
in there and do that, and I thought he played
really admirably. So we'll see what they do by the
end of the week. All right, before we get into Philadelphia. Uh,
we got to do the Championship Belt. It's time for
Big Fletch's Heavyweight Commander Championship Belt. It's presented by Northwest
Federal Credit Union where trust matters. The champion was Jaden Daniels,
(49:46):
who is the contender this week?
Speaker 2 (49:49):
Ah Man So Jaden obviously he had a he had
a great game last week and then contented. It was
a It was a lot of a lot of guys
that I had to kind of sign for through and
you know, I had to go into the lab and say, okay,
who who who could be the guy that challenge Jaden?
And some of the guys I consider, I considered be
(50:09):
Rob b. Rob had you know, fifteen carries, seventy seven yards,
he had two Russian TVs. He was, he was an option,
he was he's a contender. I should say he's a contender.
I thought Austin Eckley did some nice things the Army
Brown six catching ninety eight yards.
Speaker 3 (50:25):
Terry.
Speaker 2 (50:25):
Terry had a great game four receptions eighty seven yards,
had had the fifty eight yard touchdown. Then you flip
to the defensive side. You have Mikey samer Steel. He
had the two interceptions. Jerry Chen twelve tackles, led the
team in tackles, also had an interception.
Speaker 1 (50:44):
Pick somebody, pick somebody.
Speaker 2 (50:46):
Hey, hey, this is called drama, man, I'm building up.
This is the build up, man, the build up. So
the guy that I've got the challenge Jaden is Mikey
savag Steel. You go back and you have two interceptions,
you got you gotta make him a challenger. But so
Jayden had to Mikey had two interceptions. Wasn't enough to
(51:10):
dethrow Jayden. Jayden's game two ninety nine yards, two tds
QB rating up QBR of ninety one point eight, flawless
offensive performance and still big Fletch's heavyweight combat. This championship
belt stays with Jayden.
Speaker 3 (51:33):
Daniels.
Speaker 1 (51:34):
Listen, I know I have no vote in this, but
this one is a split decision. I thought you were
gonna give it to Sanderstill because the defense had to
stop the best offense in the league at Sanderstill. The
Michigan man goes back to Michigan and pulls off two interceptions.
I thought he was gonna get it.
Speaker 3 (51:54):
Yeah, but it wasn't.
Speaker 2 (51:55):
You wasn't enough to dethrow Jayden nearly threw for three
hundred yards man to TNS, and he was flawless.
Speaker 3 (52:02):
He was famed that.
Speaker 2 (52:03):
They couldn't do anything really against They didn't fluster him
in that environment. Not one single false star penalty on
offense all those days taken had to be taken into consideration.
Speaker 3 (52:16):
That's why he remains the chap.
Speaker 1 (52:17):
I'm gonna give Mike Big Brams Welterweight Commander's Championship bell
to Mike Sandras. Still yeah, all right, h yeah, you're
my champion this week. All right, here we go. World
War three Philadelphia Washington. Biggest game in the rivalry's history.
(52:38):
I'd mentioned this earlier. They've only played once in all
the years that you know they've been in the same
division and rivals, they've only played once in the playoffs.
It happened back in the nineteen ninety season. Memorable. We'll
talk to B. Mitch, I'm sure this week because that's
the year of the famous body bag game that Washington
that B. Mitch was forced to play quarterback after a
(52:58):
couple of quarterbacks got injured. In that game. They lost
to Buddy Ryan's Eagles, but got payback in the playoffs
and defeated them before their season would end a week later.
So this is only the second time they've ever played
in the playoffs, obviously the first time ever with a
chance to go to the Super Bowl. This is gonna
be something else London.
Speaker 3 (53:17):
It really is.
Speaker 2 (53:18):
Man. You thought we thought Detroit's environment was was electric.
Speaker 3 (53:24):
Can you imagine what is going to be like.
Speaker 2 (53:28):
Sunday at three o'clock walking into that stadium.
Speaker 3 (53:32):
You know, the bus is pulling into the stadium.
Speaker 2 (53:35):
I'm sure a lot of one finger salutes and other
things to welcome us into the into that environment.
Speaker 1 (53:41):
It's gonna sound like your dog does right now.
Speaker 3 (53:43):
I know they're normally they they're ready, they're ready to
bring some recavoc.
Speaker 2 (53:50):
But the man, I can't wait for that game because
everything is on the line, Like the physic catally is
going to be.
Speaker 3 (54:00):
We had an all time high. Yeah, the emotions are
gonna run high.
Speaker 2 (54:03):
You're gonna have to make sure you control your emotion
emotions in this ball game.
Speaker 3 (54:07):
The build up, all of the build up to this game.
Speaker 2 (54:11):
The media coverage is going to be unlike any we've
seen in a long long time. It'll be probably any
that we've seen because back in the nineties there wasn't
the social media aspect. The Internet wasn't like it is now.
So the media build up is going to be bananas.
I mean it's going to be I can't wait. I
(54:32):
cannot wait.
Speaker 1 (54:33):
So I think one of the big keys, and we're
taping this on Monday, so I don't know. Obviously, we
don't know, and they're not going to say anything about
it at least until Wednesday, when Nick Sirianni and Jalen
Hurts have to speak to the media. And I don't
know that we're going to really know his relative health
until the game gets there. But Jalen Hurts got injured yesterday.
He hurt his knee got bent over backwards. He had
(54:56):
missed the last couple of weeks of the season because
of head injury concussion that I actually occurred in the
Washington rematch earlier this year, but the knee injury obviously
is oft is of greater concern currently right now. They
didn't do a tush push at the end of that
Rams Eagles game, which they almost always would on the
(55:16):
goal line, and they're speculating on the broadcast, and I
don't think they're wrong to speculate it that they didn't
because they didn't feel like he was healthy enough to
do it at that moment. Then he started rolling out
a little bit, but he wasn't really running the ball.
He was trying to get rid of it. His relative
health is going to be huge in this game.
Speaker 2 (55:35):
No, And when I saw when I saw the hit
man you it looked it looked like a nasty hit.
I was wanting to like, was it potentially growing issues
he's going to I'm sure he feels bad right now
because Nord of course the game and that adrenaline is going,
so you're still feeling okay. But it's that that day
after and the days after where the information starts to
(55:56):
set him, the swelling starts to set him. I'm sure
he'll be getting around the cloud treatment to try to
get himself ready to go. I feel like, you know,
I think he'll be able to play in that game,
but well, is he going to be one hundred percent?
Is he going to be able to operate in the
matter that he wants to fully operate. I'm not sure
what the temperature is going to be that day, but
(56:17):
cold weather or colder weather will, uh, we'll play a factor,
and how you feel and those types of things. So
it's a it bears watch him at you know, Fulfilly,
I know their life.
Speaker 3 (56:30):
Man.
Speaker 2 (56:30):
We hope he can go, but there's something that's gonna,
you know, play a major part of this ball game.
Speaker 1 (56:35):
Yeah, and I would assume now it goes back to
what we're talking about earlier, where it's a very different
cornerback tandem. It's suddenly Washington's bringing in. I think you're
gonna trust Lattimore at Sandrastill maybe a little bit differently
than you had previously. I think you have to find
out Ken Jalen hurts run. I think you definitively have
to try to force them to throw. So Object one
(56:56):
obviously is to slow down Saquon Barkley in night game
for the entire game. Were they able to really do that?
He had a huge first half in the rematch. Once
Kenny Pickett came in, they suddenly had a lot more
effectiveness than slowing down the run game in the first
matchup actually limited him in the first half. It was
in the second half where he ripped off a couple
(57:17):
of big runs and ended up with some really big
numbers and kind of salted the game away in the
fourth quarter. So obviously stopping Barkley's a big deal. What
do you remember about the first couple of matchups that
shows you maybe the direction they're going to go to
try to slow him down a little bit.
Speaker 3 (57:31):
Yeah, I was as you were thinking, I was like,
how can we mess?
Speaker 2 (57:34):
Kind of mess those two performances, the first half performance
from Philly in the first game and then the second
half performance against Philly in the second half.
Speaker 3 (57:43):
From a run defensive standpoint, I.
Speaker 2 (57:45):
Think one thing we did we were a lot more
physical at the point of attach said playing a stay
in our gaps, and when we stay in our gaps,
we're putting good run defense. There are times where even
against the Lions, there's situations where we get out of
our gaps. Were and these backs, especially the patient backs
like a Sa Kwan, the Jamior Gibbs, they'll they're patients,
(58:08):
so they'll act like they're about to, you know, dip
into one hole. Get you to get out of out
of your your gap you're supposed to do and next thing,
you know, they're cutting back and getting big games through
those of those gaps that you've vacated. So you have
to stay patient and in your gap and don't leave
it until you know for certain he's acrossed a lot
(58:28):
of scrimmage, get off blocks the uh. There's also times
where we might spin out of a spin out of
a gap. You can't do that with these with these
great backs, like like Sakwan it is, you have to
maintain great gap integrity, big be uh.
Speaker 3 (58:46):
You know with the.
Speaker 2 (58:47):
Corners you mentioned the corners, we'll probably look at more
eight man fronts as opposed to like you'll show your disguises.
But there will be times where hey, we're going to
be obviously gearing up to stop the run corners. Hey,
you're gonna have to be a little bit more on
an island, a little bit expose a little bit more.
So maybe that's that's kind of within the game plan too.
So it's going to be a situation where you have
(59:09):
to understand it's an all day affair.
Speaker 3 (59:12):
We all have to be in our gaps all day,
all play long.
Speaker 2 (59:17):
And if we do that, I feel like we'll run,
we'll be able to play a lot better run defense.
Speaker 1 (59:22):
You know, I think they have this motto. It's worked
all year, anyone, anytime, anywhere. I think there's one more
they could add this week, which is any type of game.
Last week we thought maybe they would be in a
track meet. They hadn't really been in one of those,
and they kind of were. Second quarter was crazy. It
was the most combined points in any NFL playoff game ever.
Forty two points were scored in that second quarter, So
(59:44):
they showed they can play in that. We saw how
they played against Tampa where they had to limit a
team run the clock, control the clock. They were able
to do that. They've won some lower scoring games against Philly.
They want a higher scoring game where they had to
come back with a bunch of turn This one reads
to me, London early like a low scoring If you
(01:00:07):
make a big mistake, it's gonna really hurt you in
the end. Type of game either side. With Hurts seemingly
somewhat marginalized here, we'll see this weekend and Washington, with
an offensive line that already struggled against that defensive line
is now missing one of their best players. Points I
think are going to be very hard to come by.
And then we'll have to see what the weather is.
Obviously this weekend up in Philadelphia's outdoors, you know, in
(01:00:30):
the winter, want to see what the weather is. This
screams a low scoring old school NFC East back from yesteryear.
Let's who's gonna hang in there till the end type
of game.
Speaker 3 (01:00:43):
To me, what's your definition of low'scorn.
Speaker 1 (01:00:48):
Twenty to seventeen, seventeen to thirteen, something like that. I
think it's good. I think both teams are going to
have a hard time scoring this weekend.
Speaker 3 (01:00:57):
Yeah, yeah, it is. This is I can see. I
can see it.
Speaker 2 (01:01:02):
Maybe twenty four to twenty one good, maybe Burgady and go.
Speaker 3 (01:01:07):
I'm confident.
Speaker 1 (01:01:08):
Don't get me wrong, I'm confident. But I think this
game is close, and just the way it's kind of
going into it with their quarterback and the condition that
he's in our offensive line, and the condition that's in
the fact that their defensive line has kind of had
their way in the first two games. Anyway, it just
feels like this is going to be hard point both sides.
Hard to come by. Points are gonna be hard to
(01:01:29):
come by here.
Speaker 3 (01:01:29):
Points are going to be at a premium.
Speaker 2 (01:01:31):
One thing ball security is going to be at a
premium too. When I mean, yeah, every game you always
talk about this turnover battle.
Speaker 3 (01:01:39):
Can you win a turnover battle?
Speaker 2 (01:01:41):
And you know your odds increased greatly if you win
that turnover battle in turns of winning a game.
Speaker 3 (01:01:48):
So especially going on a row, hey.
Speaker 2 (01:01:51):
Can we get can we manufacture short fields, go for
it on fourth down like we've done, be able to
execute in fourth down situation.
Speaker 3 (01:02:00):
So but I think, uh, I know they will go.
Speaker 2 (01:02:05):
They're going to have a great game plan going against
the egos again. This is that vig fan Joe defense.
This is the third opportunity that that.
Speaker 3 (01:02:14):
We've had against them.
Speaker 2 (01:02:15):
Now, the first time we were so banged up and
just man short week and all those types of things.
But now a little bit more opportunity to get healthy,
you well healthy or than we did the first time,
but with the exception of Cosmy. But it's also the
third opportunity. We've seen all their stuff, they've seen a
(01:02:36):
lot of our stuff. So you know, who, how can
you figure out a way to make some plays and
get chunk plays at that?
Speaker 3 (01:02:43):
All?
Speaker 2 (01:02:43):
Right?
Speaker 1 (01:02:43):
Last thing, you played a lot of playoff games. Did
you ever play a division team where you had the
third meeting in the playoffs. Did you ever get one
of those?
Speaker 3 (01:02:51):
I don't think. Yes I did. Yeah, played the Saints
in the.
Speaker 2 (01:02:58):
Wildcard round back in the two thousand season, and we
were the road team. We played them, actually we played
a week back then week sixteen or the final game
of the regular season, beat them at their place, then
had to turn back around and come back and play
them at home again.
Speaker 1 (01:03:15):
Do you recall that being any different because of the
familiarity between the two teams?
Speaker 3 (01:03:22):
Ah, No, not really.
Speaker 2 (01:03:24):
It was just it wasn't any It was the intensity
was greater and it was already intests anyway, just because
you know, I written our normal battles and we were
kind of having a good run during that during that
time in that division. But the uh, the same stay.
They went out, they pulled out all stops.
Speaker 3 (01:03:43):
At one point, they had some some.
Speaker 2 (01:03:45):
Voodoo people walking around on the fields pretty siously pre
uh pre game. They had out what you call it,
and they're call themselves cursing the end zone and all
this types of things.
Speaker 3 (01:03:58):
Man, it was.
Speaker 2 (01:03:59):
It was weird, weird stuff going on and that building.
So a bunch of my teammates, the Christians on the team,
they come out and they start praying over the area.
That that the uh yeah, that the praying over the field.
Speaker 3 (01:04:13):
Yeah, it was.
Speaker 2 (01:04:13):
It was some spiritual battle goal spiritual battle taking place
in that in that doll.
Speaker 1 (01:04:18):
I think the Eagles fans might be cursing the end zone,
but it's going to be a more conventional voodoo that
we're used to this weekend.
Speaker 3 (01:04:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:04:25):
No, this this, it definitely is a difference in the
ball game because what's at stake this is this is
for the opportunity to represent yourself.
Speaker 3 (01:04:36):
You're you're represent and the super Bowl for the NFC.
Speaker 1 (01:04:42):
In this in the summer, I didn't foresee this. By
the middle of the season, I thought it was very possible,
and I know you did too. I can't wait for Sunday.
This is an amazing ride and I don't think they're
done yet. So let's see what happens when they get
the Eagles this weekend up in Philadelphia.
Speaker 3 (01:04:57):
Oh yeah, I can't wait. Man, I know these guys
gonna be ready.
Speaker 1 (01:05:01):
All right, that'll do it for the Booth Review. We'll
talk to you next week post the NFC Championship Game.
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