Patriots Playbook 10/4: Quick Takeaways from Loss to Cowboys, Previewing the Saints, Resetting Expectations for Pats

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
This is Patriots Playbook, the legend. He wants to make
the big blood. That's the kind of guy he is.
He wants a TfL tackle for loss. For anybody that's
wondering what the hell TfL is, I thank you, anybody, anybody,
Eldred if you don't blow the horn, anybody flip you off. Yeah, Gary,
I know who the hell you are. Okay, I've only

(00:26):
known you for thirty five years. Dude, you gotta lighten
up and enjoy life. It's the Friar's baby, the Prius
Buell Muffins. Now here's your host of Patriots Playbook, John Rook.
I think we're all trying to lighten up just a
little bit and enjoy life over the course of the
last few days, because what I think what we all
witnessed on the field at AT and T Stadium last

(00:47):
Sunday was unprecedented. I'm trying to remember a game in
which I felt as miserable as I felt about the
New England Patriots in my thirty two year association with
the team, the almost forty years that I've been covering
the Patriots, I just I can't remember a time when
I felt more let's just say, I don't want to

(01:10):
say down, let's just say disappointed. Yeah, I think there's
a little bit of a difference. Down indicates that I
have skin in the game. It's always better when the
team plays well. I think we know that as you know, reporters,
as media people who actually work for the team. It's
kind of that way. It is the way this day
and age. But man Alive, that was just like it
was almost hopeless.

Speaker 2 (01:30):
Yeah, I think it's like a culmination of three years
of mediocrity. Like if it was one bad game, I
mean it was one very very bad game, then you
can chock it up like and even with Brady, like
I mean you remember like thirty one to nothing against
Buffalo in Week one, right, Like you know, like there

(01:50):
were definitely games, you know, onto Cincinnati against the you know,
the week before against the Chiefs, like you know, they
get blown out. There definitely games where they they got
blown out or didn't well or whatever. But those teams,
you always knew that that was just a one off,
like that was just an anomaly. And I don't think
this Patriots team is like that bad as they were

(02:11):
on Sunday, but they're a mediocre team, like that's it's
not like they just had like one bad night at
bet and that was it.

Speaker 3 (02:18):
Like this is just kind of who they are.

Speaker 1 (02:19):
The thing that kills me is that it's a mediocre
team at best, and they and when they're now lost
a couple of key players. We're going to get into
all of that over the course the next couple of
hours here. Then this could make it a it could
be a really tougher stretch than we bargained for around here.
Patriots fans, this reminder. If you want to see Toyota's
best offers, including those not seen on TV, go to

(02:40):
buy at toyota dot com. It's Toyota's official website for
deals from the official vehicle of the New England Patriots,
Toyota Let's go places, John Rook and Evan Lazarre here.
A little bit of a change in format here because
he's kind enough to give us the time before their
locker room gets involved. Mike Triplett has covered the New
Orleans Saints for well quite a long time, actually doing

(03:01):
it now for New Orleans Football dot Com, and Mike's
gonna join us from Nolan's uh here inside the playbook, Mike,
thanks for a little bit of time today. Sure, appreciate it.

Speaker 4 (03:11):
Yeah, thanks for having me this. I'm listening to your
last two minutes, and I thought I accidentally entered Saints talk. Well, funny,
the exact team. These these two teams are in a
very similar place.

Speaker 1 (03:25):
These teams have parallels right now. Uh, you know, although
the Saints are two and two, the Patriots are one
and three going in this Sunday. But I'm just gonna
ask you. I'm sure as you've gone through your you
know notes thus far, and you sort of get prepared
for your own you know, coverage this weekend, uh, you
probably see some parallels here. The Patriots may have an

(03:46):
advantage of the injury department, you tried to say, or
maybe they don't. I'm just kind of curious as to
your perspective looking at New England from New Orleans point
of view.

Speaker 4 (03:56):
Well, it's funny. I heard another show where they were
talking about the Patriots and talking about how it's going
to be tough to play in a home atmosphere this
week because if they get off to a bad start offensively,
there might be boozed. They might be, yeah, you know,
calling for the backup quarterback and and we just got
done watching the Saints offense at home in the Superdome,

(04:17):
getting getting boot off the field at halftime, and getting
booed throughout the game. So parallel, yeah, yeah, very much so.
And and with the Saints, obviously, they got off to
a great start this year and they were two and
zero and and so two and two is not a disaster.
But it's a three year cycle now, including Sean Payton
last year, where this offense has lost its way. And

(04:40):
and there was a lot of excitement that that's spending
the money on Derek Carr and getting Michael Thomas back healthy,
and getting some offensive lineman back healthy, and Chris o'lovey's
breakout year last year, that that we were finally going
to see a more potent offense. And it's been more
of the same. And and and fins are just both
besides themselves right now. And I'm I'm less to my

(05:00):
head as an analyst. I thought, but we're going to
see an improved offense as well. And it's really surprising.

Speaker 1 (05:05):
That can you narrow it down as to an item
or two that why this offense is not performed to
the expectations that you thought it might have.

Speaker 4 (05:16):
Well, the first three weeks, it was very much pinned
on the offensive line. The offensive line, it was a surprise.
They have veterans, they have first round picks, they have
guys who've played well in the past. But the offensive
line was just playing so poorly in the first three
weeks that the offense couldn't even get out of the gates.
And it was third and twelve all the time. And

(05:37):
you know, they're among the leaders in the league in
allowing sax this year, but that was not the case
this last week. Derek Carr had time to throw in
this last game, and they still didn't have answers. And
it's you know, the play calling has really been under
attack from fans, and rightfully so. The play calling was
really head scratching in this game. It didn't seem to

(05:59):
match what what Tampa's defense was was presenting. And you know,
it's just it's just really grown stale around here. It's
been a long time. They've gone ten straight games now
without scoring more than twenty one points.

Speaker 1 (06:13):
Wow, I'm hearing almost like it's a you know, it's
looking at your reflection in the mirror, especially when he
comes to offensive line play. So let's go oh, go ahead,
go ahead.

Speaker 4 (06:27):
But I was gonna say, now the sat the Saints
have playmakers, that is one, and we're waiting to see.
You know, maybe it takes a little time. With Derek Carr,
I know, the jury was out on him nationally. People
were excited around here because it felt like exactly what
they need, you know, I was looking at the parallel,
was like, you know what Kirk Cousins brought to the U,
to the Vikings, or what Ryan Tannehill originally brought to

(06:50):
the Tights. Not that he was gonna be a world changer,
but that he was going to be the kind of professional,
you know, reliable quarterback who get the ball to guys
like Chris Olave and Michael Pops, Rashid Shaheed, Alvin Kamara.
And there's still hope for that. The playmakers have still
shown a lot of explosion. The receivers are still making
big plays, so there is hope in that regard.

Speaker 2 (07:11):
Okay, Mike, I wanted to ask you about Derek Carr
actually because obviously you know, playing through that that shoulder injury,
and just a two part question. One, you know, how
much of the game plan and the play calling last
week was was due to his injury, and do you
expect him to be healthier on Sunday or even play
on Sunday.

Speaker 4 (07:29):
Yeah, I think he'll play Sunday. I think he'll probably
be healthier. I don't think the shoulder actually limited him
that much. I think the biggest problem in this game,
if you're looking at it individually, is you know, they
played Tampa Bay, who very clearly and I'm sure you know,
for for whatever false is going on in New England,
Bill Belichick still knows how to take away what a

(07:50):
team is good at doing, and I'm so I'm sure
we'll see the same thing. Tampa Bay basically said, you're
not going to get the ball deep to Chris Olove, Anders,
Teacher Heat and Michael Thomas in this game. You're going
to have to settle for everything underneath. And they threw
thirteen passes to Alvin Kamara for a total of thirty
three yards, which is just a stunning number, but a

(08:13):
lot of that was in response to nothing's open deep.
We're going to settle for this and hope he can
make a play, and they were all over it. So
I think I don't think they had answers. I think
they should have been working in the middle of the
field more. But car Date unleasha sixty hard pass and
when sixty yards in the air barely got batted away
by Antelin Winfield. He missed a couple throws that was

(08:33):
probably due to the shoulder, but it wasn't necessarily a
we can only throw short because of his shoulder thing.
I think it was a lot more what the Tampa
Bay defense was giving him.

Speaker 1 (08:44):
Is it possible? And maybe again Mike Trippler from New
Orleans Football joining us here and said, the playbook, so
is it possible just because he had success against the
Patriots a couple of years ago, that the Saints might
find a way to, Hey, what the hell do we
need to kickstart things a bit on offense. Let's play
Taysom Hill.

Speaker 4 (09:01):
Well, they don't have to make that decision in the
sense of let's switch to Taysom Hill being the quarterback.
There are a lot of Taysom Hill plays in the playbook.
You will see a lot of Taysom Hill in this game.
And yeah, they could always do more of it. And actually,
whenever Taysom Hill has worked, which is a lot in

(09:21):
the recent past, we've always said, why do you only
do that five times a game, why not fifteen times
a game? So that is always a possibility. And mostly
he's part of the run game. But he's a guy
who's average. You know, he averaged six hours to carry
last year. He's always averaged over five yards of carry.
So I think we'll see a heavy dose of them.
I don't think they would they would make the full
time switch to.

Speaker 1 (09:42):
Yeah, well flip it over. On the other side, these
two teams look like they can play representative amount of defense.
The Patriots obviously lost their two best defenders. Maybe they're
two best athletes on this team period. This past week
and that debacle lost to Dallas. Where do the Saints stand?
What do you in your estimation? Do they do the
best against an opposing offense?

Speaker 4 (10:05):
Yeah? At times, the Saints defense is among the best
in the league.

Speaker 1 (10:08):
I think they.

Speaker 4 (10:09):
I think it's probably fair to say they're a top
five defense, or at least they've been a top five
defense over this stretch of the past three or four years.
Some of their star players like Cameron Jordan and to
Mario Davis, Tyron Matthew are getting a little older, so
it remains to be seen. The defensive line played great
the first two weeks. They've tailed off a little the
last two weeks. We still don't know exactly what their

(10:33):
defensive line is, but it's definitely a strength. The secondary
is definitely a strength. Marshawn Lattimore is as good as
any cornerback in the NFL, to Mario Davis and Pete
Werner a great linebacker duo. Kim Jordan still looks like
he's twenty five, not thirty five. So you know, it's
a strength, and it's probably why the Vegas over runner

(10:54):
for this game should be about fifteen points.

Speaker 1 (10:57):
I think I saw forty, did I was I right
on that that's hot.

Speaker 2 (11:00):
I mean the Patriots Jets game a few weeks ago,
I think was thirty six and a half or thirty seven,
So I that's where I would put this game.

Speaker 1 (11:10):
Matt Marine says it's forty and a half.

Speaker 2 (11:12):
Holy crap, I'm more respect for Derek Carr than Zach Wilson.

Speaker 1 (11:17):
That does I'm guessing, I don't know. I wanted to
ask Micah a quick question about Cam Jordan because here's
a guy that you know quietly, and someone unassumingly has
managed to maintain a level of play you kind of
alluded to a couple of moans ago. For a very
long time, what's been the secret to his success?

Speaker 4 (11:35):
Well, I wish I could tell you how you maintain
at his age, but then we'd all do it. Yeah,
what has always been a big part of his makeup
is he is a very well run I mean, there
are a lot of comparisons to like JJ Watt and
probably Cala Campbell. I mean, he's an end and those

(11:57):
guys are primarily tackles. But inside outside ability, that power,
speed combo that like, he is not just winning around
the corner, he is bull rushing you. He is working
you the whole game when he doesn't get to the quarterback.
He's among the league leaders over the past decade batting
down passes. He's a really good run defender at his size.

(12:18):
So you know, he finally he wasn't always getting the
high sack totals. He those finally came a few years
ago and he started getting recognized on all the top
one hundred lists and All Pro first team, All Pro
second team, So that came a little later than his
career than it probably deserved too. But he is always
he has always been more than just an edge rusher
getting fifteen sacks. He's doing something that's helping the team

(12:41):
on every down.

Speaker 1 (12:42):
All right, So here's something I did not know. Since
twenty eighteen, the Saints have the best road record in
the NFC, second best road record in the entire NFL
over the course of the last five years. And right now,
this is what the first of a couple on the road.
And I think I think I looked at the schedule
order today. Five of the first eight for the Saints
this year are on the road. Hey, there was our

(13:06):
there was our alert. Anybody else getting it on their
phone right now?

Speaker 3 (13:08):
Yes, we got it.

Speaker 1 (13:10):
There's our our emergency broadcast system they might. Okay, thank
you very much. There we go. Presidential alert. We were
all warned that was going to happen at twenty past
the hour. So everybody's phone is going off the hook.
Cut around the country. To appreciate your your patients with
that one. It didn't knock us off the air, did it?

Speaker 5 (13:28):
No?

Speaker 1 (13:28):
Okay? All right, We're not a licensed broadcast facility here,
so that's why. All right, So back to what I
was sinking before. My phone just down near scared me
to death. This team is one on the road. How
does this team win on the road this week in
a game where you know clearly they're going to be
a little bit matched against a Patriot team that's struggling

(13:51):
on offense. Is this where they have to rely on
their defense to do it again? And is that good
enough to play Kate Saints fans?

Speaker 4 (13:58):
Joh yeah. Look, I mean the States won their first
game against Tennessee at home sixteen to fifteen, and they
won their second one, you know against the Panthers was
a twenty to seventeen or whatever. I mean, line them up,
they'll take ten of those all all year long ago
to the playoffs. Like, of course they'd like to see
more offense. But that's the thing. That's the defense has

(14:20):
been so good around here that fans, analysts, all of
us have just been like, just give them the fifteenth
ranked offense in the league. Just you know. Perhaps the
Saints defense had their own streak. It was a franchise
record streak of eleven straight games holding opponents to twenty
or less until last week. That should be enough. You know,

(14:41):
if the defense is going to hold every opponent to
twenty points, then you should be winning eleven twelve games
that's all that anyone's asking around here, not to be
winning shootouts or anything, but just to be able to
get to twenty four points. And that's you know, that's
all that anyone. You know, that's what yer Carr was
supposed to bring. That that would have been worth thirty

(15:02):
three million a year. And you know, the jury's still out.
He's only played four games with the Saints. But they've
got enough talent, they've got enough playmakers, and they've got
a good they should have a good enough quarterback to
be able to go out there and win games exactly
like this, you know, twenty four to seventeen. And as
they can go out and finally do that in a
clean fashion, Fins would happily accept that.

Speaker 1 (15:24):
The parallels here are just they're incredible, because that's the
kind that's really the way that Bill Belichick has built
the Patriots, hopefully utilizing the defense to win games until
the offense can somehow come around. And unfortunately, not only
has the offense not come around, but now you've lost
your two best players on defense. You might have made
a bit of a of a stopgap measure today by
trading for J. C. Jackson to get him back into

(15:45):
the fold. But nevertheless, I got to tell you, if
I'm an opponent of New England right now, I'm definitely
carpe dim right now with whatever, I got to win
a game because I think there's an opportunity there.

Speaker 4 (15:59):
No makes perfect sentence. And obviously the Saints are getting
a break and not having to face Christian Gonzales, which
is really unfortunate on your side of the ball. You know,
Unfortunately I won't be able to watch him, yeah play,
So that's tough. I mean, the Saints they can't use.
Injuries is a huge excuse this season, but the last
two years they've been among you know, the most make

(16:23):
bitten teams that you'll ever see in a two year stretch.
I mean, if it's anyone who's ever made a Pro
Bowl or an All Pro team for the Saints, they
missed half of season sometime in the last two years,
and it's really been devastating for them. Right now, they
have decent health. They're missing a couple of guys, a
couple of guys in the secondary, but that should not
be an excuse for the Saints to this.

Speaker 1 (16:42):
If you're game playing against New Orleans, how would you
beat them?

Speaker 4 (16:48):
Well, score twenty points.

Speaker 1 (16:52):
Right, I mean, I just score twenty points against that defense.

Speaker 6 (16:56):
But the thing that I keep waiting to see is
this last game was the first game where Derek Carr
had time in the pocket and Tampa stopped him.

Speaker 4 (17:06):
Tampa. Tampa said, you know, we're not letting you get
the ball to Chrys Olavey and Rashichihi, the guys he
was kind of really depending on early in the game.
So I would be pretty stunned if we don't see
that same approach from New England, where you know, they
try to take you know what I know. I don't
know if it's I don't know if you've heard it
so many times that has become a cliche, or if

(17:26):
it's really true that Bill Belichick is so good at
taking away every team's bread and butter. I imagine he
is not gonna let Crystal lave beat him in this game.
So I would like to see the Saints find creative
ways to, you know, get Chris olave the ball on
quick outs. They're coming across the field on short routes,
maybe making plays after the catch, getting the ball in
Michael Thomas's hands in the middle of the field, getting

(17:48):
Alvin Kamara, you know where he can actually operate in
space and isn't you know a couple of them were
so predictable last week he was losing six and seven
yards they in tackle behind the line of scrimmage. So
they need to figure out how to work the middle
of the field and move the chains and and and
put together. You know, three or four scoring drives in
this game should not be that difficult. But you know,

(18:09):
I'm sure they're going to make sure they don't get prebs.
But just throwing to their speed RECEIVERSAM very good.

Speaker 1 (18:15):
Mike, Thanks for a little time to They sure appreciate it.
And uh, safe travels on the way up if you're coming.

Speaker 4 (18:20):
Up this way, all right, thank you, you got it.

Speaker 1 (18:23):
Mike Triplett, he's at Mike Triplett t R I P
L E T T on X see almost said Twitter,
I do that. He covers it for the n O
WES Football Network, Uh in Newortlands football him and Nick
nick Underhill. Right, pretty good one two punt the really
cool website you know if you you know, want to
follow Saints football in particular. But uh, they got a

(18:45):
lot of good a lot of good info there and
I mean you know, and it was great with him
to come on and talk to him give us a
little bit of insight. But frankly, it sounds like a
broken record of what we've been hearing and talking about
around here. Saints are very much in a similar situation.
The only fact is that they haven't started out with
quite as tough a schedule as New England did, which
is probably part of the reason why they're two and two.
Going in number one and number two. They have some

(19:08):
injury issues, but they haven't lost their two best players
to injury maybe the rest of the season yet.

Speaker 3 (19:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (19:12):
I would also say I think the Saints have more
talent on offense than the Patriots do.

Speaker 1 (19:17):
Yeah, that's fair, I think.

Speaker 2 (19:18):
You know, I don't know what Michael Thomas is at
this stage of his career. He's not the same player
anymore that he was pre injuries and all this nonsense
that's happened with him injury wise last couple of years.
But the Patriots don't have anybody on their roster offensively
as good as Chris Olave like. He's the best player
and best skilled player in this game by far. And

(19:39):
then Alvin Kamara is coming back. Another guy like I
don't think he's in the same category as Michael Thomas
quite but another running back who's you know, had a
lot of carries, a lot of wear and tear over
the year. I don't know if he's necessarily as explosive
as he was three or four years ago, but still
a really good running back. And then this new guy,

(20:00):
Shaheed I think I'm saying his name correct. It's kind
of a tongue twister. Uh you know, watching him on film,
a really explosive player, like you can tell how fast
he is and how kind of big plays that he
can create.

Speaker 1 (20:12):
Ra Shi, Yeah.

Speaker 2 (20:13):
Similar, I think he's a little bit thicker, but similar
an idea as like what Patriots fans want Pop Douglas
to be, right, you know, that that sort of big
play type of guy. Uh So they I think they
have more talent, and like Mike you know, said, they
have offensive linemen that are good players on their line.
They just haven't really played very well together and and

(20:35):
I think that's a big part of what's been plaguing
them too. That's why they're Carmichael, their offensive coordinators under
a lot of fire because this isn't a talent depleted offense.
This isn't quite like the Patriots, or like the Carolina Panthers,
or like one of these teams that has no receivers,
and they have a decent amount of fire power if
they can.

Speaker 1 (20:55):
Just can't seem to piece. Yeah, yeah, yeah, all right,
So let's bring it back then, full circle of what
we have a few more minutes here and again coming
up later on the show. Kyle high Tower, who covers
the Patriots for the Associated Press, will join us, and
Russell Baxter will be along as well in the second
hour of the program to hit through week five around
the NFL. But I mean, after that kind of a debacle,

(21:16):
there is only one way to go up, and then
you find out, I mean, you know, all right, I'll
ask you the obviouson run off the bat, is this
rock bottom?

Speaker 3 (21:27):
I think it's pretty close. It's silly.

Speaker 2 (21:28):
I mean, it's the rock bottom in my Patriot time.
You know, I'm not old enough to remember much Prey Brady.

Speaker 1 (21:35):
But considering that I did Rod Rust's Coaches Show back
in nineteen ninety, this is not rock bottom in my time.

Speaker 2 (21:40):
No, but this is rock bottom of the Belichick here, certainly,
I think because you had two thousands his first year,
like they had to transition to the team, he had
to build up his program like that whole thing right
his first year as the head coach. You're not expecting
him to go out there and win the Super Bowl
in year one. But other than that, know how smooth
sailing has been. And I think what's what's depressing about

(22:04):
the team in its current state is it's the same
thing over and over and over again with the offense
that they just can't score any points.

Speaker 1 (22:15):
And but it's it's mostly the thing that it's griping me.
And I know this has to be at the forefront
of our fans minds. Is it's self inflicted wounds that
are keeping them from moving the ball in a lot
of ways.

Speaker 2 (22:27):
Yeah, you know, we've talked about this a little bit
on PU. I don't necessarily think it's self inflicted. I
think that these their players are playing above their weight.
Like I think that these guys are trying to do
things that they're not keep. Yeah, and so in some
respects you can say to Mac Jones, hey, Mac.

Speaker 3 (22:47):
You can't throw it across the.

Speaker 2 (22:49):
Field like that, like you need to hone it in
and focus on what you can do and you'd be right,
you know, to give him that criticism and give him
that coaching. But when he plays even a buttoned up
version of football for Mac Jones, what's the ceiling of
the offense? If Mac Jones is playing like he did

(23:10):
against the Jets, when he didn't turn the ball over,
but they only scored thirteen points on offense, and I
think that that's the part that is frustrating or is almost,
I don't know, confusing, is like, okay, well, when he
lets it go a little bit like he did against
the Cowboys, he's turned the ball over like crazy. But
when you play within yourself and you play within the

(23:31):
confines of your skill set, you're only putting up fifteen
points a game. So what's the answer. And I think
there are ways, like you know, like you said, you
can only go up from here, right, So I think
there are ways that the offense can get better, even
with their collection of players.

Speaker 3 (23:49):
That they have right now. But a lot of it
doesn't involve Mac Jones.

Speaker 1 (23:53):
It starts with the offensive line. Yeah, it just does Mac.
Part of the reason that he has the case of
happy feet, you know, And that's what I've kind of
called it. Even though sometimes he has sometimes be nice
if he had happier feet to get out of there
and run with the ball. But I don't think he's
capable of doing that. Be that as it may, he's
had some of the issues that he's had because he

(24:16):
just doesn't have trust. He doesn't. I don't think you
can see it. He rushes throws, he'll look around, he'll
make a secondary read, and all of a sudden he's
got extra time, you know, which has been few and
far between. He takes too much time because he's trying
to make just the right throw in order to do
exactly what you just talked about, try to make a
play that he really probably shouldn't be attempting because he's

(24:39):
trying to do something to kickstart his team. I don't
blame Mac for that. I blame Mac for it not
playing within himself and being Mac Jones. That's part of
the problem. But he gets an assist on that one
because the coaches, the scouts, everybody, they failed him in
that regard.

Speaker 2 (24:57):
Yeah, it's tough to watch a I implode like that
in a game because when you watch it, when you
watch it live, it just you know, it's just like
a tidal wave.

Speaker 1 (25:08):
Right of mistakes and that you just feel for.

Speaker 2 (25:11):
But then when you watch it back on film, I
think what was the most frustrating part watching it was
that there were opportunities to get the ball out, and
there were opportunities. I'm not saying guys were wide open
down the field and he was missing it. So I
don't want people to take it, you know, take it
that way, But there were ways to get the ball out.

(25:33):
You know, there was guys open, mostly underneath and towards
the sideline. But there were guys open and he just
wasn't seeing it.

Speaker 7 (25:40):
You know.

Speaker 2 (25:40):
I don't think that that That's the part that I'm
holding out hope on is like, Okay, we know that
Mac Jones is limited, Like we know that his skill
set is limited, and his physical tools aren't great and
all that kind of stuff. But Bill Brian said it
on Tuesday, that was an uncharacteristically bad decision making game

(26:00):
by Mac.

Speaker 3 (26:01):
Like take out.

Speaker 2 (26:02):
The throws and arm strength and the mobility and like
take all that out of it for a second and
just look at the mental side of it. Right, that
was a poor game from him from a decision making standpoint,
which I don't really feel like We have had very
many examples other than this one of him just kind

(26:22):
of losing his mind out there a little bit. I
mean that second quarter was turnover worthy play after turnover
worthy play after turnover worthy players, And that is not.

Speaker 3 (26:34):
Really who he is.

Speaker 2 (26:36):
Like you like, you can critique them all you want
for all the things that he's not, but he's usually
a pretty smart, uh you know, mistake free type of
decision maker. Maybe the ball doesn't get there with as
much zip as it needs to, or maybe he you know,
can't make throws out into the sidelines as well as
he needs to, or he can't run with the football

(26:57):
like he needs to, but play to play decision making.
And I thought really in the first three weeks of
the season he was really buttoned up in that regard.
Even if they weren't moving the ball or scoring many points,
he was still going to the right receivers in the progression,
you know, like he was still making the right decisions
in the right reads with the football. This game, I've
never seen anything like it from him before. This was

(27:21):
up there for me with like some of the Seeing
Ghosts games for Darnald or Zach Wilson.

Speaker 1 (27:28):
Yeah, I mean even the pick six like, he's got
the route.

Speaker 2 (27:32):
The ball he threw was open if he hit it
at the top of the drop, right, like if he
comes to the top of the drop. Yeah, and he
hits the top of the drop and throws it on
time to Kendrick board Bourne's open along the sideline on
a deep comeback round. He just threw it two seconds
after he should have. And that that's how you, you know,

(27:52):
come into those things. And that's not that's not really
who he is.

Speaker 3 (27:56):
It's not.

Speaker 2 (27:57):
And so the one thing that I hold out hope
with is I think that this was an uncharacteristic game
for him in that recept.

Speaker 1 (28:03):
Is the offensive line fixable as it now stands, I mean,
you know it should Antonio Maffi still be in there
at guard. I mean, what do you do about when
one u in terms of his performance? Do you rotate
a couple of guys in? Because Lowe had some troubles
at right tackle, big troubles at right tackle this week.
That's why we saw Parsons with what ten pressures or
whatever it was this week. I mean, it looks like

(28:24):
it's a mess.

Speaker 2 (28:26):
It does, and that that when people say, like, what
can we do to salvage this this season, Like what
can the.

Speaker 3 (28:31):
Patriots do to salvage that?

Speaker 1 (28:32):
This has to be the goal.

Speaker 2 (28:34):
Run the ball, like running the ball. You have to
be able to run the ball. It's it's the number
one thing that they have to fix. Is you got
to be able to run the ball shortened games because
it makes everything else easier.

Speaker 1 (28:46):
Like shortened games.

Speaker 2 (28:47):
If you run the ball and you stay ahead of
the chains, you can incorporate play action which Mac needs.
You can incorporate, you know, things that help the quarterback
stay protected and get the ball out quickly and don't
ask him to do the heavy lifting of moving the football.
If they can't figure out a way to run the ball,
they're porked. It's that simple. And they they are built

(29:08):
to run the football, and they have two good running backs.
And then maybe not great, maybe not you know, Zeke
doesn't have the burst that he once had and things
like that. But I I think Remandre and Zeke could
run the ball effectively if the holes were there for
them to do it. And they gotta they have to
figure out a way to run the football.

Speaker 1 (29:25):
That's a period, that's a term, and I don't think
i've heard since College porked.

Speaker 3 (29:29):
Oh they are, they are. They are flat out cooked.
If they can't figure.

Speaker 1 (29:33):
Out, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna disagree. In fact,
when I heard this morning that Christian Gonzalez's outlook on
the rest of the season was probably gone. Yeah, he's out,
That's what I said. Oh, well, porked. I mean, I'm
just kind of like, wow.

Speaker 2 (29:47):
See, like I I, they're missing pieces on defense. Is
obviously terrible, and I I feel honestly like, and I'd
mean this sincerely, I feel for Patriots fans that Christian
can Zales is out for the season because I know
this fan base. You know, we get all the emails
and all the callers, and I know all you guys

(30:07):
wanted a first round pick that you could really love
by the jersey, see him here for the next ten years,
maybe see him in a red jacket, like let's get
crazy with it, right like you thought.

Speaker 3 (30:18):
And we all can see that with.

Speaker 1 (30:20):
Christ great Patriots.

Speaker 2 (30:22):
Yeah, and we all saw it with Christian goan Zalez,
and he was on that track of having a defensive
Rookie of the Year type of season. And to see
him go down like that and after four games is
really it's a gut punch and I but I will
say the one thing that I still think that Bill
can do is max out his talent on the defensive

(30:43):
side of the football.

Speaker 3 (30:44):
And now that they got j C. Jackson's in here,
went and.

Speaker 1 (30:47):
Traded back for him today In case you missed out
on that, it happened earlier this after.

Speaker 3 (30:51):
Yeah, Jonathan Jones hopefully comes back from it, and jury.

Speaker 1 (30:54):
Used to come back. Jones needs to come back pretty
quick too.

Speaker 2 (30:57):
Yeah, I think Jason see Jonathan Jones. I know people
don't like him, but Miles Bryant, I think that top
three as your cornerback room, you could do worse, And
especially with Bill Belichick and being the one that's putting
it all together, I think they'll be okay on defense.

Speaker 1 (31:13):
Now's the time for a guy like Keon White though,
to step up and show some of the promise that
we saw in the preseason, and I would agree. I
think it's hands down he's got to be the guy
in there getting a lot of that time in the
absence of Matt Judon.

Speaker 2 (31:28):
Yeah, and I'm not saying that it's gonna be perfect
right away or it's gonna be as good as it was,
it's certain they're gonna be take a step back on defense,
but let's.

Speaker 1 (31:35):
Let's let the young man, you know, start to you know,
find his way.

Speaker 2 (31:39):
Yeah, I just I think that Bill will get the
most out of the talent he has on that side
of the ball. Could say what you want about the
offense and his philosophy on offense, but you know, guys
like you know, Jelani Tavai and Dietrich Wise, and you
know some of these guys even at Juwan Bentley to
an extent, like these players are not blue chip elite

(32:00):
talents like a Christian Gonzales is or Matthew Judon is,
but Bill makes them serviceable. You know, Bill gets the
most out of those guys. And I still think he's
got that feather in his cap. So I think that
they'll be okay on defense. Are they gonna be as
good as they need to be? Probably not, But I
still think that they're gonna be a respectable defensive.

Speaker 1 (32:19):
They need playmakers. JC Jackson was that when he was here,
So you know, yeah, will he get burnt, sure, probably
once or twice. Will he get you a couple of picks?
You're banking on it? Literally, the success of your season
may depend on it.

Speaker 2 (32:32):
Yeah, Look, I love the j. C. Jackson trade. I
think it's a great trade for the Patriots. They're basically
not paying him anything to play for them this year, right.

Speaker 1 (32:39):
The Chargers are picking up the bigger part of the
nut here.

Speaker 2 (32:42):
Yeah, yeah, I mean they're paying him like a one
point five million in active game roster bonuses for the
rest of the year, so they're basically not paying him
to play here.

Speaker 3 (32:51):
He fits the system, you know, he fits the system.
He knows the system.

Speaker 2 (32:55):
And like you just said, the one gripe that I
had with the defense of the first four win of
the season is they had two takeaways in four games.
And if you're gonna win in that side of the ball,
you need to be a ball hawking defense. You need
to turn the ball over, you need to get the
ball back for the offense. You need to score some touchdowns,
to pick sixes, fumble sixes on your own. And I

(33:18):
think a guy like j. C. Jackson has that that
ball hawking trait. He I mean, he had an interception
in the Miami game. You know, like he still can
do that, and you're to your point of him getting burned. Yeah,
Like he's not. He's not Gilmore, he's not Reevis. He's
not one of these corners that's just gonna take his
guy and take them out of the game.

Speaker 3 (33:37):
It's never been who he is. The Chargers thought that's
who he was, and they were dead wrong about it.
He's not that type of.

Speaker 1 (33:43):
Bit from what I understand.

Speaker 2 (33:45):
Yeah, you know they are watching the film against Miami,
which is the game that he played the most in
so far this season. Hey, they just putting him on
Tyree Kill and Jalen Waddle without safety help and just
expecting him to just take those guys out of the game.

Speaker 1 (33:59):
You do that within, buddy, against those guys, you're gonna
get burnt.

Speaker 2 (34:01):
But it's just not him, Like he's a boomer Bus corner.
He's gonna make some plays and he's gonna give some
plays up. That's just the bottom line. The Patriots know that, though,
and the Patriots will use him to the best of
his abilities like they did in the time that he
was here, and they'll get some stuff out of him.
I think that the film shows a guy that's not washed.
Like I don't think J. C. Jackson can't run anymore

(34:23):
or is incapable of playing football anymore. But I think he,
like so many other guys before him, he's got to
be used in the Belichick way, right like just yea,
put in the right spots and put in the positions
to succeed.

Speaker 3 (34:36):
And I think the Patriots will do.

Speaker 1 (34:38):
That, all right. I gotta ask you one more before
you get out of here. The other topic conversation has
been sort of and i'll paraphrase here, that the game
has passed Bill by yeah, And I know a lot
of fans are talking about. Social media has been all
over it for the last seventy two hours since the
end of that game really on Sunday against Dallas. How
much longer does this season need to continue in the

(35:00):
current direction that it's continuing before decisions need to be
made or should be made.

Speaker 2 (35:08):
So I think the biggest thing with Bill and his
job security to me is I have been on his
case about the way that he builds the roster for
a couple of years now.

Speaker 3 (35:19):
His roster construction, we've all been very crazy.

Speaker 2 (35:22):
I think we can all understand is not has not
been good enough in terms of how he builds the team.
The beginning of the end for me was in that respect,
was drafting Cold Strange, and it's no offense to Cold Strange.
I keep on reiterating that because it's not about Cold Strange.
Taking a guard in the first round on a rebuilding

(35:43):
roster is and this isn't you know, this isn't nineteen
sixty five, right, Like what you can't do that with
a team that's rebuilding. When you're rebuilding, you need playmakers,
you need stars, like unless you're telling me that you're
drafting Zach Martin, like getting that with the guard. So
that was, you know, a big one for me. But

(36:04):
in general, I think what's been disappointing about the first
month of the season outside of the Philly game, which
I thought they they coached well on both sides of
the ball, but he had all off season to prepare
for the Eagles, like literally all off season to get
ready for that game. In the other two games that
they've lost, they've gotten thoroughly out coached. They got completely

(36:25):
out coached by Miami. I mean that one was not
even close.

Speaker 1 (36:28):
And it just pains me to say that Mike McCarthy panched.

Speaker 2 (36:32):
Him, out coached him. Yeah like him, I absolutely right there.

Speaker 1 (36:37):
I absolutely love.

Speaker 2 (36:38):
I love Dan Quinn I think dan Quinn's a great
defensive coordinator. So I look at dan Quinn a lot
like I look at Bill O'Brien in the respect that
dan Quinn's got the defense, like Mike McCarthy doesn't do
anything with the Cowboys defense, that that dan Quinn is
the head coach of the Cowboys efens. Yeah, and so
I give all the credit in the world to dan Quinn.
I thought the Patriots are gonna keep this game competitive

(37:00):
because I thought that Belichick would have the upper hand
over McCarthy, and McCarthy came out in this game and
said they're a week at corner. They don't have you know,
they're shorthanded already at corner. The Joneses are not playing
in this game. We like our matchups against Miles Bryan
and shod Wade. We're not gonna run the ball right
at the Patriots defense because they got big run stuffers.
They got Godshaw and Bentley and Tavai and Dietrich Wise

(37:24):
and like these Lawrence guy like, we're not running at
a brick wall.

Speaker 3 (37:28):
So we're gonna put Dak in the gun.

Speaker 2 (37:30):
We're gonna find twenty six and twenty seven in the
secondary and we're gonna let it rip. And I didn't
think that Mike McCarthy had that in him. I didn't
think that's how he would play.

Speaker 1 (37:40):
He coached it almost like Bill coaches defense. Yeah, he
identified the weak spots and attacked him. And that's exactly
what the Cowboys did. Yeah, And I give him a
lot of credit. They had a good plan.

Speaker 2 (37:50):
They had a good plan, and they had a quarterback
that's obviously capable with Dak and throwing the football like that,
and they went after the weak links and the Patriots
secondary and they made him pay for it. And I
think the biggest thing that was so good about the
game plan for McCarthy was he knew that if we
cut we get a couple of touchdowns, they're not going
to score, you know, if we get this to you know,

(38:11):
fourteen to three, and was it eighteen to three? I
think was the Yeah, they're not going to score nineteen points,
So all we got to do is throw out the
gate and get the score up.

Speaker 1 (38:23):
Right. Coasted in the second half. Yeah, they coasted, Yeah,
twenty eight to three at a half time, largest devosit
of Bilde's career at the half, down twenty five points,
and they coasted in the second half.

Speaker 2 (38:33):
Yeah, so I give McCarthy a lot of credit for
not you know, the Cowboys have been running the ball
like crazy the first three games of the season. They've
been running it like crazy, and I thought that's what
they were going to do again. I thought they were
going to put the quarterback under center. They were going
to run the ball, and the Patriots would play that
game all day long. You want to shorten the game,
run it at our box that's got seven eight guys
in it, like, go ahead.

Speaker 3 (38:55):
They didn't do that. They spread the field, they threw
the ball.

Speaker 2 (38:58):
And so now, you know to the bigger point is, yeah,
he does he even coach it well anymore? You know,
like is he even the like with this mastermind, game
planner and all this stuff, Like.

Speaker 1 (39:09):
Is that worth a question?

Speaker 2 (39:10):
Is that is is the chess man, you know, man
chessing anymore at this point because McDaniel completely took him
apart and now McCarthy out coached him. And if Bill's
not bringing that to the table anymore, if he wants
to build a roster the way he wants to build
a roster, but he's still coaching his butt off in

(39:32):
game and game planning like we know he can, like
he has in the past. Then you're still gonna win
a lot of games with Bill Belichick as your head
coach because of the coaching advantage that you're gonna have
every week. If they're not gonna out coach teams anymore,
and the roster is gonna be what the roster is,
then what is he What's he bringing to the table?

Speaker 1 (39:51):
Not a lot?

Speaker 2 (39:52):
And that's what I think that you have to look
at if you're the crafts and have to look at
if you're the decision makers in this organization, is if
this this is how it goes for the rest of
the season, what is Bill bringing to the table at
this point? And the answer might not be and it
might not be enough, It might not be enough for
him to keep his job.

Speaker 3 (40:12):
Like that, that's the bottom line.

Speaker 1 (40:14):
For the first time in twenty three years of being
around here with Bill Belichick in the same hallway, right,
it's the first time I think it's reasonable to assume
that if things continue the way that they're going now,
you could say a mutual parting of the ways at
the end of the year.

Speaker 3 (40:29):
Yeah. Yeah, it's it's so tough to me.

Speaker 1 (40:32):
If it goes the continued direction. There's I mean, I
think there's still enough talent. There's not it's not a
ton of talent. There's still enough talent on this team
where I think they can be reasonably competitive with the
schedule that they still have in front of them. It's
gonna be tougher because of the injuries that they've had
and because it's just the inert pressure that's on them
right now from everywhere up Mac I'm Bill O'Brien on

(40:54):
the offensive line, on the defense now without two of
their best players. I mean, there's a ton of pressure
that's on everybody. But the schedule still plays out. For instance,
I was going to open up if they had lost
this game, you know which I was thinking that they
probably would. I was going to open up this week
by saying, well, you know what, one in three, they're
right on schedule. I even wrote about that this week.
One three. Who thought that they wouldn't be one in

(41:16):
three after the first four weeks only really the most
eternal optimist the way that the season started. So in
my way of thinking, they're not any worse off than
a lot of us thought they were two months ago. Looked, yes,
it's because it looks awful. The optics are terrible, and
the optics don't suggest that there is any immediate improvement,
especially with the injuries exacerbating the problem. So where do

(41:39):
you go from here? I mean, if there was ever
a time to put on blinders and concentrate about one
step at a time, one week at a time, one
game at a time on the New Orleans whatever you
want to call it, that that's what they need to do. Now.
They got to figure out a way to win a
game sixteen fifteen, whatever it can be, make a play
on defense, some points from those special teams, whatever it

(42:02):
may be. But it's got to start with just one game,
one score, one touchdown, even what you know may and
then hopefully a win in order for confidence to begin grown.
It's kind of like trying to grow grass without seed,
which I tried to do on my own lawan this
fall and failed miserably. You gotta play it the seed first.

Speaker 2 (42:21):
Yeah, I just what's tough for me is like when
people talk about Bill's job security and moving on from
Bill Belichick. I just laid out the reasons why it
might be time, right. You know, the in game coaching
has taken a slip. The roster building is obviously not
what any of us think the game.

Speaker 3 (42:41):
Is played these days.

Speaker 2 (42:42):
It's a philosophy thing, right, and we all agree on
all of this. My fear about moving on from Bill
is that I still think from like a program building
infrastructure sort of thing, that we might not give that
And it's not like the old like the cliches of
like the Patriot Way, and That's not where.

Speaker 3 (43:03):
I'm going with it.

Speaker 2 (43:04):
I just think that, you know, at the end of
the day, like he has built a foundation to a program,
a football program here in New England, and tearing that
entire thing down and building it back up, I think
is a big It's a big ask of an owner, right,
Like that's that's the bottom line, is that it's a
big ask of an owner to look at it and say, well,

(43:28):
you know, we're just gonna start from scratch on our
football team. When Bill Belichick has put all of these
different things in place already, you know, from front office
to strength and conditioning to nutrition to like all the
things that go into the football team, and we're just
gonna strip it down to the studs. And that that's

(43:48):
that's a tough thing to do, uh.

Speaker 1 (43:50):
Really cool item here that came by way of Aaron
Salkin of the Patriots Media relation department. Mike Reese tweeted
it out just a little while ago. Jac Jackson coming
back to the Patriots when you Pier's in a game,
he'll become just the twenty ninth player to have at
least two separate stints with the Patriots as an active
game day player since two thousands. So there's not a
lot of coming back home, so to speak. But my

(44:11):
question to you before you go here is what does
he do about his legal entanglements.

Speaker 3 (44:16):
They still got Roast Capaccio on retainer.

Speaker 1 (44:18):
They should go find him. And for those that don't know,
I mean, there was a warrant issued for his arrest
what a week ten days ago for not appearing in
court in an Attleborough area courtroom because of a violation
the previously, I think when he was here over the
summer whenever it was before that, and he just never
bothered to come from Los Angeles to answer the note.
But now that there's a warrant out for his arrest,

(44:40):
does this keep him off the field.

Speaker 3 (44:42):
I think Rose has got this.

Speaker 1 (44:44):
You think she's going to get a sign the case.

Speaker 2 (44:46):
I mean, when didn't you assign her to the case
after what happened with Jack Jones?

Speaker 3 (44:51):
I know I would rose.

Speaker 2 (44:53):
Yeah, yeah, I mean she's I mean, they still got.

Speaker 1 (44:55):
To I don't really want to. Yeah, I don't really
want to make light of the situation. But the the
fact is is that this is something that nobody has
talked yet about today. No.

Speaker 2 (45:04):
I but it was like a like reckless driving or
like speeding ticket.

Speaker 1 (45:09):
It was a reckless driving ticket to my understanding. That's
just what I know.

Speaker 2 (45:12):
But I just want to like put it out there,
is that it's he didn't.

Speaker 3 (45:15):
It wasn't a violent crime, right, right, that's my point.

Speaker 1 (45:18):
Yeah. So, I mean, you know, reckless driving. Whatever he
was supposed to report or appear in court, he didn't
because he's playing football in Los Angeles, right, and so
the Edinburgh you know, court issued a warrant for his rest.

Speaker 3 (45:31):
She's got this.

Speaker 1 (45:32):
Well, it's just hope that something pans out because they
kind of need him on the field on Sunday.

Speaker 2 (45:38):
Yeah, that that's for sure. That's for sure. It'll be
interesting to see what happens with that, I guess. But
I they if you're a Patriots fan, like I I J. C.
Jackson's not the Lord and Savior. He's not coming in
to make them a playoff team or a super Bowl team.

Speaker 1 (45:54):
But I think we'd like to see somebody try to
make a play.

Speaker 2 (45:57):
Yeah, I think what you can hang your hair when
I'm haking my had on is all right? This gives
you a chance to remain competitive because if you did
nothing with the injuries that they suffer with Judean out
and Christian Gonzales out now on defense and the Jones
is still banged up and you did nothing to help
the football team out at that point, then you were

(46:17):
we were really looking at it, you know, a situation
where you know Caleb Williams was in play, right like,
you're looking at like a four or five win football team.
Does this make them.

Speaker 1 (46:26):
A would you drive Caleb Williams if you could? Oh?

Speaker 3 (46:28):
Yeah? But is this Does this go from like five wins?

Speaker 1 (46:31):
Another conversation right now.

Speaker 2 (46:33):
It doesn't go from five wins to nine wins or
ten wins. I'm not saying that that it does that,
but I think it gives you a shot, and you
got to take that shot right now. All right, Thanks
for the time, No problem, and definitely as to Caleb.

Speaker 1 (46:44):
Williams, Okay, I'll go with your experience. I've seen that
she played once already this year. I already liked what
I've saying. But I mean, my goodness, they don't like
to play defense in trojan Land right now. Uh. It
is a big, big, big college football weekend for games
other than you know what he's gonna do as well, Strippers,

(47:09):
this is for you, buddy. I believe the score was
forty nine to nothing last year. Yeah, that's my alma

(47:31):
mater's fight song. It's Texas oh U week at the
Cotton Bowl in Dallas. Yeah, Strippers is a longtime listener
fan of the show. We love to you know, snipe
at each other because he's a big you know, oh
you fan, which is fine. I mean, can you know
everybody has you know, bad habits. Yeah right, Uh but

(47:52):
you know, you know, I we've had a sort of
a long standing, you know, sort of agreement that you know,
whoever wins that game, uh, you know, the other one's got,
you know, do something about the alma mater. So I
have to get my shots in first in play Texas
fight because that means next week if I got to
play Boomers sooner. It's you know, one of the most

(48:12):
ridiculous fight songs you've ever heard, just because it's so repetitive.
You know, then I figure out, might as well, you know,
cover myself. I don't know, I don't know. You know.
Now it's about the time on Wednesday before the big game,
I started to develop a case of sweaty palms. I've
been out of school for forty two years and I

(48:34):
still get sweaty palms on Wednesday, the week of Texas
ou I don't even know what to say to that.
That's like, okay, dude, I thought I had problems, but
you you got problems. H flash movie suck John, Yeah, exactly.

(48:56):
Oh my goodness. What I do miss most about the
State Fair tex where you know Texas don't going to play.
I miss the corny dogs, Oh my god. I miss
all the fried foods. Just makes your cholesterol level go up,
you know, six or eight points just by smelling it.
You know. One of the best things, you know, I've
ever had there was the chicken fried while actually I

(49:17):
should take chicken because wouldn't chicken oil, but it was
fried Snickers bar, and I don't even really like Snickers
I mean, I'm okay with this snooze bar. I actually
prefer a milky way, but the fried Snickers where they
will take the snickers and freeze it and then they'll
drop it, you know, they'll batter it and then they'll
drop it into the you know, the fat the French friar,

(49:38):
and it is one of the most unbelievable things you've
ever had in your life. Favorite guy and a little
that would be me. That would be me, fat guy
in a little car. Yeah, absolutely, that would be me,
especially if I lived, you know, in Texas any longer.
And you know, I managed to go to the state
Fair every year for that hod enough that those people

(49:59):
sweat all the way. No, yeah, well that's just it. Lately,
at least has been the heat has been at a
level where, you know, you shouldn't have any problem taking
off those extra pounds. I know, a couple of years
they've done things like, believe it or not, fried butter.
Can you imagine a stick of butter frozen and battered
and then dropped in the deep fryer really just eating

(50:19):
yeah and eat it. Yeah, it's like eating a buttersickle
gagged a little Yeah, right, I don't get it. There's
things like that all over the place, you know, fried bananas,
fried Snickers bars. You know, obviously you know there's the
state Fair. If you've never been to the state fair, well,
any state fair, pick a state, any state fair is

(50:41):
going to have fried food at the wazoo. Okay anybody right?
State Fair in Texas has been notorious for that for
over years, and you know that's been one of the
great things about you know, the carnival atmosphere surrounding a
really good football game. So anyway, Stripper is thinking about
you this week and beat the hell at ou is
all I can tell you, right, all right, eight five
five pats five hundred total free telephone number. Thank you

(51:04):
for allowing me to the digression as my palms, you know,
continue to drip with nervousness just because of the Red
River rivalry, which I'm pleased to hear will continue as
both teams move into the SEC next year. And Greg Sankie,
the Commission of the SEC, is basically said, hey, you
guys still want to play at a neutral site of
the Cotton Bowl. We're all for it. I mean, uh,

(51:26):
who else plays somebody else play in the SEC plays
on a neutral site. Georgia Auburn, somebody plays a neutral
side game. I mean the Iron Bowl where you know,
uh in h Alabama. I'm not I mean somebody does
I know somebody at Georgia Florida. Is that a neutral
side game? I don't know one of them is? One
of them is. But the Texas Oklahoma game is the

(51:47):
one neutral side game I know where you look at
the fifty yard line, one half of the fifty yard
line on the TV cameras. Watch it this weekend because
it's going to be it'll be a new and eastern
time kickoff on Saturday. Right half of the stateum will
be orange, half of the state will be crimson red.
And you can see that line of demarcation right down
the fifty. It's the only time you'll really ever see

(52:09):
that pretty incredible pomping circumstance and everything else that's there.
It's really cool. Eight five five Pats five hundred Web
Radio at Patriots dot com the email address. Hit me
up on Twitter or you're ex posting for your ex
posting whatever they're gonna call it at JR Broadcaster on
x John dot Rook on Facebook. You can alsoe me

(52:31):
at JR broadcaster on Instagram. If you like, it's all there,
take your pick. All right, let's get to Eldred. Eldred,
you're in the playbook. How are you, buddy? Hey today
it's all good. It's all good, brother, How are you?

Speaker 4 (52:54):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (52:55):
I actually thought of you on Sunday because you know
what we talked about last week, and I know that
you'd probably taken a lot of heat from some of
your familial Okay, Aldred, and I hung up on you.

Speaker 3 (53:09):
Sorry, call back.

Speaker 1 (53:12):
I wondered where the hell did he go? Eldred? Sorry,
I will pick you up as soon as I can
get you. Oh yeah, oh you got him? Okay, hold on.
You can blame marine for that. Oh my fault. Sorry, okay,
but I but as I was telling you, you were
the one person I thought of because of the familiar
problems that you would have, you know, with that game

(53:32):
last week, and so I'm wondering how you got through it. Okay,
I got through.

Speaker 7 (53:37):
It, I crow And you know, yeah, they all celebrated
and like to say one thing out of everybody's mouth,
and I mean, no disrespect. We're glad Tom Brady wasn't playing.
We take Matt Jones any day.

Speaker 4 (53:52):
Of the Week.

Speaker 1 (53:52):
Yeah, well, I think I think that's probably I think
that's probably a universal thing with most people, most fans,
most teams who play the Patriots. Now it's like, oh,
at least it wasn't Tom Brady, because Tom Brad would
kill us in the past, you know. And yeah, and
and okay, that's fine, that's a credit to Tom. I
don't even necessarily think it's a slam on the guys

(54:13):
who are currently on the team. What I would tell
you is that the current team has to realize that,
you know, And this is where I think we've had
problems with the coaches, and I know you've had the
same problem with the coaches that they don't realize Tom
is here. They're still building the team like Tom was here,
and that can't happen anymore because they clearly are getting
it handed to them.

Speaker 7 (54:32):
Yes, sir, h that's that's been my biggest right that
I've been hearing from you today. And well I've been saying,
f ye, just the jam part one of these days,
gonna catch you way college. But I keep hearing everybody
just the guy see you.

Speaker 8 (54:49):
Facebook?

Speaker 7 (54:50):
You know they got a Facebook page that I made
a comment. Yeah, well, have been, but it won't be
no time, no Bill or Dot the craft. So I
as the back, well you still got to here, doesn't
go what's your record down? H Yeah, it's just my
time back. What's what's your record down?

Speaker 1 (55:07):
Yeah? You know, but.

Speaker 7 (55:09):
If people don't give no web it's like right now,
I know it hurt on defense, you would have to
J C. Jackson, But you gonna need somebody else on
office on the outside.

Speaker 4 (55:17):
I'm sorry.

Speaker 7 (55:18):
Even though Matt Matt looked crazy, uh sunded like he
wasn't just him Transton or whatever. You know, you still
gonna need somebody. You're still gonna get good defenses. You
ain't got no no web door, no no playmakers. I'm sorry.
I don't see one besides maybe just Sticky or Henry.
But that's the middle of the field. You ain't got

(55:38):
no bad on the outside. And it ain't Parker and
it show ain't juju. I wish we would have kept Myers,
but it wasn't.

Speaker 1 (55:45):
I think a lot of people would agree with you that,
but you know they clearly Uh Bill had I you know,
it seems like Bill had a little bit of a
buck up. As we were in about about Jacoby. Uh
and I don't know why. I'm not sure why you would.
Jacoby was as reliable as they come, but I guess
they thought they would, they potentially had. They had potential

(56:06):
for what I would call yak yards after the catch,
more of that with Juju than with Jacoby. And as
it turns out, because he's banged up or something, it
ain't that way, is it. I don't see the catch,
I know, I mean that was my reason, that was

(56:27):
my reasoning. Look, I love Jacoby. Jacoby was a great
safety valve, you know, he was. He that There was
a reason why he had a rapport with Mac Johnson,
why he was Max Binkie whatever you want to call it,
because he would be at the right spot. The problem was,
once he caught the ball boomed down. You know, there
was no extra there was no yards after the catch,
no yak as we call it. Juju hasn't been that way,

(56:49):
you know, at either of his two stops prior to
New England. But the problem is that you know they've
got damage goods here, even though nobody will formally admit that,
but it has to be, has to be. There's no
other excuse for it. Then why can't you get the ball?
I mean it's up to Mac as the quarterback to
get the ball to his receivers. And so if he

(57:09):
can't get the ball to the receivers, then the receiver
can't get to the spot. And if the receiver's not
getting to the spot where he needs to be, not
only can Mac not get the ball to the receiver,
but then the receiver is no good and he's not
gonna play. So so I'm like, what else are we
led to believe? He can't be he can't be healthy

(57:30):
enough to get to the spot.

Speaker 7 (57:32):
Mm hmm that too. And then, like I said, Matt
missed a lot of he waiting till late hit the crosses,
he waited till late get the hitches. I don't anybody
want to chalk up to a bad day.

Speaker 9 (57:44):
But like I said, I didn't want.

Speaker 7 (57:45):
I didn't like to pick when we picked him. We
could have went up and got somebody else. But no,
that's that's they called. But I don't know, Uh, mister
legend right now, I ain't got no face.

Speaker 1 (57:55):
They win any game, be honestly, well, I don't think
it'll be that bad. I mean, I guess anything's possible. Look,
at it this way, if they don't win any more
games than at one in sixteen, they'll definitely have Caleb
Williams in the hand, and you don't have to worry
about going forward here. The decision will kind of been
made for them. I would also argue that if they
go one in sixteen, you probably don't have Bill Belichick

(58:16):
as head coach again, yes, or GM but or GM.

Speaker 7 (58:21):
Yep or GM yep. It might be a little bit better,
you know, but like I told everybody, it's a better
GM that we're going to need anyhow, offensively minded like
like they were saying earlier, you know, I think Able
said they don't bring down the structure. Well, another coach
ain't gonna coach under Bill Pellerchick's structure anyway.

Speaker 1 (58:42):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what do you think this week then?
Against New Orleans?

Speaker 7 (58:49):
Uh, let's see, you got Latimore, you got the other guy.

Speaker 8 (58:52):
You got a Lave.

Speaker 1 (58:53):
Yep, A Lave is the one, Yeah, A Lave is
the one you gotta worry.

Speaker 7 (58:57):
About, right, And I wanted but we got strange because
he was sitting right there.

Speaker 1 (59:04):
Yeah I know, I know he was sitting right there.

Speaker 7 (59:07):
But we got a durned card like I said, you
could have gotten third and fourth round like a draft dake.

Speaker 1 (59:11):
Yeah. And you heard Evans say the biggest problem, the
issue that he's had with Bill the GM is that,
you know, when you're trying to rebuild a team back
to a certain level, you've got to go get playmakers.
You got to go get talent. You can't necessarily build
with a defensive mindset unless you have the ability to
move the ball on the other side. And they just

(59:32):
they haven't done that. You know, they've you know thought
that you know the running game and in whatever or
you know, defensively, hey, you got to be able to
stop teams. Well, yeah, I agree, but in the in
the twenty first century era of National Football League play,
you know, when you have five wide and empty backfield
and you're always playing out of the shotgun and you
rarely have this, you know, the quarterback under center, you
got to be ready to sling the ball. And if

(59:53):
you can't sling the ball again some of the best
defenses out there, then you are behind the times, way
behind ten.

Speaker 7 (01:00:01):
But like I said, I've been houted for that number
one for fifteen years. You know that, miss I know,
even with and like I told one of the guys
on those things if he wouldn't get why a good
wide receiver for the greatest quarterback in the game. Yeah,
he's sure you're donna get one for Matt. The only
time that gonna happen, well, he ain't no longer here,
Like I told, that's the only time this's gonna happen
when he ain't here.

Speaker 1 (01:00:21):
Yep.

Speaker 7 (01:00:21):
But like I said, I give you, I give it
a score prediction. Okay, twenty eight ten New.

Speaker 1 (01:00:27):
Orleans twenty eight to ten. Y you think they're gonna
score that many points? New Orleans' offenses down around the
Patriot level, down at the bottom of the league.

Speaker 7 (01:00:37):
But they got playmakers and and car was hurt, so
he came back, you know, a little bit off the
end of the injury. You give him a week, get
it a better report. The goo thing to ball, we
ain't got We got corners, but we.

Speaker 1 (01:00:49):
Don't have on Well, I gotta admit, you know, if
I'm yeah, yeah, I mean I.

Speaker 8 (01:00:54):
Have to your best pass rush. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:00:57):
If I'm the Saints, I have to kind of take
a page out of out of the Cowboys playbook last
week and attacked those corners.

Speaker 7 (01:01:03):
Yeah, yeah, that's what I would do, all.

Speaker 1 (01:01:05):
Right, Eldred, hang in there, brother. I hope we don't
take any more abuse this week.

Speaker 7 (01:01:09):
Oh oh, I'm wonna take it every year because, like
I told him, I got my brother stuff out. I
got my little crying towel too.

Speaker 1 (01:01:15):
So well, I tell you what you need to do
is take that eighteen wheel years and just back up
over those bastards.

Speaker 7 (01:01:23):
Well, I thought about it a couple of times. Here
I come, no, I ain't gonna, ain't gonna put your
warning them. I'm just gonna back up.

Speaker 8 (01:01:34):
But they famine.

Speaker 7 (01:01:34):
I can't do them like that.

Speaker 1 (01:01:37):
Well, it's nice to hear Eldred. Thank you you' the
man buddy. Good to talk to you, all right, friend.
Eldred in North Carolina, sac a couple of moments here
to visit with Kyle Hike Tower. Kyle covers the Patriots
for the Associated Press. Largely he joined us here in
the playbook. Hey Kyle, how goes the battle today?

Speaker 8 (01:01:53):
Hey?

Speaker 5 (01:01:54):
John, how are you? We're hanging in there. We're a
tight media course, so we're all here and to reach out.

Speaker 1 (01:02:00):
Yeah, well, I mean you kind of have to because
everybody has to sort of live and coexist with all this,
and I'm just kind of curious from you know, uh,
seeing it from both sides of the coin here, Does
it look as bleak as it might to a lot
of the fans who are reading what you guys are writing.

Speaker 5 (01:02:18):
I mean yes, and though I would say not as
bleak maybe as the as the fan base think. It
is one thing I think that the at its core,
we all kind of realize that this is just you know,
four games into a season. Obviously, it's kind of hard
to not overreact. And you see some of the things
we've seen in the last few weeks or or the

(01:02:39):
last of the last few weeks from this team, especially
now with the injuries and the challenges they have ahead
of them. But I think it's as bad as they
as it seems. They do have time to turn it around.
The question is do they have the personnel and you know,
and the coaching metal right now to change is necessary
to make it to turn the page.

Speaker 1 (01:03:00):
Sorry, I had to, like, you know, drag you out
of Celtic practice or something to talk Patriots today, since
you know, the Celties clearly have a different mindset right now.

Speaker 5 (01:03:10):
They do. I'm actually agile atte today though, Oh good
for the day. So I'm here for the for all
the pleasantries and the hopeful, hopeful kind of uh gates
coming down the Patriots.

Speaker 1 (01:03:26):
Has anybody talked yet about uh J C. Jackson's legal
difficulties uh in Attleborough and whether or not that'll be
solved in time for him to suit up and play
on Sunday.

Speaker 5 (01:03:38):
It has not come up. I mean, everybody is as
you know, everybody's very tight left until things gonna happen.
The players did kind of, you know, allude to, you know,
him being back in the building, how great it would
beat to see him and the football attributes he brings
to the table. But again that's that's uh, you know,
that's something that when is it does go final and
this is actually official and he is coming back, and
he's gonna have to be addressed because yeah, I mean

(01:04:00):
great on paper to say the guy could come in
and be back in a place where he's been productive.
But if the stuff of the outstyle will allow it
to be then that's a different story.

Speaker 1 (01:04:09):
Yeah, that's kind of what I'm thinking right now. I mean,
it'd be great to get a familiar face back because
you need somebody desperately. We talked about it a little
bit earlier in the show. You need somebody desperately to
be a playmaker, and he has kind of been a
feast or famine guy in the backfield when he was
with the Patriots. You know, in the last few years,
you still kind of need that, and you probably would
be willing to live with that, because frankly, you got

(01:04:31):
to have some help, especial if we're going to try
to slow down some of the receivers that are still
on the schedule and be that as it may. You know,
the offense has still got to be a work in
progress with the offensive line, and I'm just I'm beginning
to wonder if there is anything else that this team
can do to continue to try to make that offensive
line representable to where they can run the ball, because

(01:04:54):
right now they can't even run block, much less pass block.
This is why part of the reason, and I think
everybody will agree certainly a huge part of the reason
why mac Jones has had the difficulties.

Speaker 5 (01:05:02):
He said, oh absolutely. I mean, because they've become very
predictable and often they can't run the ball. Then teams
you kind of, you know, stack the box and sit
back and make on these receivers make a play to
beat you. And the problem is mac Jones, you know,
as it is it consistently throwing the ball well down
the field. He's barely throwing the ball deep deep down
the field at all. I think it's like you know,

(01:05:24):
under probably hunderd ten times he's gone over twenty yards
in the air. Here's forty yards down the field rather
you know, for a deep for a deep ball. And
then the receivers have had minimal success in catching those passes.
And you're right, they can't run the ball. Teams know
that w on mac Jones. They don't trust him to
be able to beat them, and it's gonna be a
long season if they don't figure that out in a hurry.

Speaker 1 (01:05:45):
So if you could kind of diagnose what this team
should do from this point forward after that debacle and
I love to call it the debacle in Dallas, probably
because of the alliteration here, But if you could sort
of diagram what this team should do from this point
what would you what would you put out there for them?
What what would be the what would be the best
route to travel right now when there's really no other

(01:06:07):
place to go? But up.

Speaker 5 (01:06:11):
You know, I feel like the quote that that that
great Seinfeld episode where you know everything is opposite to day,
I think that's what you do here. I mean I
think that you know this team clear what they're doing.
Is it working with the person that they have, with
the approach they have. Obviously, you know you're not gonna
change your spots overnight. You're gonna have a core about
who you are. You can keep that. But you know, look,

(01:06:31):
if you're not having trouble or not having success throwing
the ball deep, you know, find some intermediate routes. You
know this this underneath this, you know there's this deconduct
kind of ran a football isn't working offensively, you know,
craft a game plan which puts the ball in Romandre
Stevenson's hands in different way, not just the same way
with them getting in the ball. Bring in some different guys,

(01:06:53):
some guys some different opportunities to come in there and
make plays because you know, and you you roll the
kind of roll those dice you might fat some that works. Uh,
you know, they need to be open minded and really
stake outside the box to kind of figure this thing out,
especially offensively defensively. Look, they've been they've been pretty admirable.
They held the Cowboys and what two offensive touchdowns last
week they did?

Speaker 1 (01:07:13):
They kept one for four in the red zone.

Speaker 5 (01:07:16):
Yeah, Rose they can possibly play and obviously that's injuries
to the deal was now is going to be a
test for them, But it's on the offense. The offense
has to found some way and be creative and learn
to push the ball down in the field, to hang
at the ball.

Speaker 9 (01:07:29):
In the end zone.

Speaker 1 (01:07:30):
Yeah's something you know, has it probably got to they
I guess baseball pitching analogy, you'd say you got to
throw a change up because clearly what you're doing is
being sat back on and defended well by the other teams.

Speaker 7 (01:07:45):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (01:07:45):
And then defensively, your weaknesses have been identified and they've
been attacked. Mike McCarthy did that extraordinarily well last week,
and the Patriots really had no answer for that, and
the result was a tidal wave.

Speaker 7 (01:07:59):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (01:08:00):
You know, basically that overwhelmed the team and their performance
last week. When you add to that the fact that
this team still seems to have an uncanny pension for
beating itself, you know, for you know that illegal motion
that hold that you know, roughing the passer or whatever
it may be that seems to wipe out big plays
or good plays. It's extraordinarily frustrating. And I mentioned earlier,

(01:08:24):
a little earlier. I gotta admit it's the first time
in a long time that I look at this team
and I think, Wow, where is success potentially going to
come from? I still see it from the defensive side
of the ball. But now when you lose your two
best arguably your two best players on that side of
the ball to injury this week in the same game,
no less, Wow, this is I don't think we should

(01:08:46):
get our hopes up for the rest of the season,
even though the schedule still might be favorable.

Speaker 5 (01:08:52):
Yeah, things do snowball quickly in the NFL. I mean
it's you know, it's not predictable from week to week
as we find out, you know, we fout out from
time to time best off, so you can't predict what
an injury could do to a football team. As you say,
having you know, two huge ones in the same week
is devastating to a team that you know was really
struggling earlier in the season. Yeah. Again, I think that

(01:09:14):
you know, it's it's time to to really think about
the box from the team, Uh, you know, the the
being set in your ways, the the old school mentality
the Belichick has had, you know, have backfired him in
the biggest way this season. And I heard you talking
about earlier. I mean, he's really got to you know,
put his trust in in people that are that aren't

(01:09:34):
named Bill Belichick if you gonna figure this stake out,
because uh, the the guy at the top of the
pyramid is clearly you know, in in everybody spotlight and
it's gonna be a test of him and his you know,
his bas experience as the coach to kind of fight
his way out of it.

Speaker 1 (01:09:49):
What do you see right now, Kyle, as being something
good that this team is doing. We were beating him
up pretty good here, and I know that's a lot
of frustration that's coming out from you know, fans, from
from media, from you know, hell, from everybody. I think,
because they just haven't put a lot of good out.
But is this team doing something good? In your you know,
in your eyeballs.

Speaker 5 (01:10:10):
It's very slim pickings. I mean I think that, uh,
what they're doing, I think, you know, overall, just I'll
focus on the defense. I think that Yeah, obviously, before
these injuries and stuff, and you know it's gonna be
really a test for them going forward. I think that
they were you know, they were doing well. They're being
constittent on the defensive side the ball. Uh, the secondary

(01:10:31):
had been you know, had been you know, one of
the stress despite you know, not playing without the spie,
playing without a Johnathon Jones, without playing with out of
Jack Jones, you know, guys like Marcus Jones and stepped Doug.
Yeah he's hurt obviously. So I think the secondary so young,
have performed well. I think that the you know, the
new play caller on you know, on defense on the field,
you know, he's been well. And you know, in a

(01:10:53):
guy like Jawan Bentley has done a good job of
keeping that group together. I think it's gonna be more
incumbent upon him and other people that other veterans on
that group to keep it going. But I think overall,
I would put the defense defensive corps as being the
strongest component of this team. That you know, they they
feld together and we kind of had some continuity to
last season, which whether we worked sure that would be

(01:11:15):
there coming.

Speaker 8 (01:11:15):
Into this season.

Speaker 1 (01:11:16):
Sure, I think that's fair. All right, A final one
then for you, Kyle, and and hopefully this will get
your thinking a little bit. But uh, if you had
a piece of advice for Mac Jones today, what would
it be.

Speaker 5 (01:11:29):
I would think it would be to relax. And I
know it's hard to do that. I think that kind
of comes through. And when he speaks to us, is
that he as much as he tries to stay the
right thing, as much as he tries to be the
the noble soldier in front of us. Uh, you know
he's rattled by how this you know this the other
part of the season is gone. I think, yeah, it's
throughout training camp. Throughout training camp, you know, he had

(01:11:52):
he had the projection and had the confidence of a
guy who felt like that, you know, Bill O'Brien being there,
felt like that. A few new pieces, you know on
that offense, you know, having a guy like Tykwon Thornton
back fully healthy at the time, you know, we know
would help him out and those things have a materialize.
I think the guy who's been very nervous of the
early part of the season, I would tell him just

(01:12:13):
to relax. He's playing kind of with house money here right.
The right on the wall says that if he's playing
like this, he won't be here next year. Well yeah,
he had a starry quarterback role, and I think that
that kind of gives you that should have give him
some freedom to go out and just play football, spling, spling,
the ball in the air, let it go, and what
will happen? What will happen. It can't get much worse
than this. So just relax, guy, and go out there

(01:12:34):
and play football and trust your ability, and you know,
you live and die base on what happened.

Speaker 1 (01:12:40):
Should the Crafts be somewhat concerned with the Bill Belichick's
direction for this team right now? And should they perhaps
have to make a decision one way or another if
this road continues to go downward? Should they have to
make a decision. Should they be making a decision on
his you know, uh immediate future in New England. Uh
at the end of the year.

Speaker 5 (01:13:03):
It's the it's the undercurrent of every conversation that you
know that people to have with me about about the seave.
You know, it's Bill Belichick in trouble. It is I
can not to subscribe to the the tenor that you
know that he is on the quote unquote hot seat.
I just don't think that Robert Kraft, at the end
of the day coach is that close to immortality. Uh

(01:13:24):
and coach he wins a guy who's been here and
you know, has been the shepherd of so many Super
Bowl wins that he would absolutely fire and get rid
of a guy like that. I do think, however, that
everyone is is right on part or right on it's corrected.
I think that Belichick's time as the GM and as

(01:13:45):
the person who picks the you know who picks the players,
a person who you know who gets the agreements to
make the meal, I think those days are probably numbered.
I think it was gonna make a change to be
made that will be one made by Craft. But as
far as him being head coach, I think that he
he's here as long as he wants to be. That
may wrinkle some fans and they make some fans uneasy
about the future of this team. But from a coding perspective,

(01:14:07):
I just can't see Robert Craft, party of Whites of Belichick.
But as far as the GM part of it, I
think those days are number. I think you have based critical,
incorrect decisions over the last handful of years, last handful
of drafts that have really come back to buy this team,
especially the opposite side of the football.

Speaker 1 (01:14:24):
All right, Kyle, thank you for the opinions. Thank you
for the thoughts as well. Sure appreciate it. And hey,
you know, go cover you know a team that's you know, winning.
You know, you have my permission to attend Celtics camp.

Speaker 5 (01:14:36):
I'll go to Celtics and now, so check out that
team in provase they got to do coach up there too.

Speaker 1 (01:14:41):
Yeah, they do. It could be exciting time for basketball
fans around here, that's for sure. So we'll we'll find out,
I guess in the next month or so. Right, all right,
thanks Jean, appreciate you. Kyle, thank you. Kyle high Tower,
who covers the all of New England sports really but
covers the Patriots for the Associated Press, joining us here
in the playbook. K. Hight Tower the letter K last

(01:15:03):
name HI G H T O W E R, like
Dante Kyle Highttower for the Associated Press. All right, Russell
Baxter will joined us in about ten minutes. I got
to tell you that, you know, I don't see Bill
willing to give up the GM role if push comes

(01:15:23):
to shove, I don't. I don't. I just don't see it.
I don't know if there's a graceful way out of it.
I mean, if that's ultimately what the decision has to be.
That's why I said earlier to Evan and to anybody
who was listening, I said, look, I could see they
could just agree to, you know, mutually part ways, which
leaves the door open, and if he wants to retire,

(01:15:44):
he retires, leaves the door open for him to join
another organization to go get Don Shula's record, which you know,
I still am of the opinion he will get if
it's not here, he'll get it somewhere, and I think
it would be a shame if he doesn't get it here,
based on the history that we have. But I mean
I also understand that you know, hey, this is a

(01:16:07):
this is a this is a this is a win now.
Business people are used to winning. Here. It's the Patriot's
own fault. They don't go out and get Bill Parcells,
and then they don't go out and get Bill Belichick
to come here in the first place. We're not in
a position to talk about this. You don't have six
Lombardi trophies to your credit, which this franchise is fortunate

(01:16:30):
to have because of hard work, and yeah, through a
lot of Bill Belichick. Then we're not having this conversation.
I'm not sure it's you know, and Johnathancraft told me
this several years ago when the Patriots had a little
bit of an In fact, I think the last time
that I heard him mention this would have been during
the COVID year after Tom Brady left and things were

(01:16:52):
struggling and the team went seven and nine and what
have you. And there was a question that came up
about Bill again and you know, hey, Bill's built up
a lot of equity here, and that was his response.
Bill's built up a lot of equity here. And I understand,
I get it. But in a business that is as
you know, definitive as this one, you know is his

(01:17:15):
win now, as it is with fans that have been
spoiled by winning, and they're the ones that pay the freight,
you know, when it comes to buying tickets and buying
swag and TV ratings and everything else. You know, the
Patriots stand for and how they've made money and how
they've made the Crafts billionaires. Really, then I think, as
the boss, we all have to subscribe to a standard

(01:17:37):
of a if you're not doing the job the boss
needs you to do, you're replaceable. And that goes for
anybody and any you know, any place, anywhere. And I
know that Bill has a certain amount of immunity because
of what he's meant to this community, this region, you know,
this franchise to a lot of people around here. But

(01:18:00):
how long do you live on tradition? Ask the Dallas
Cowboys that question last week's opponent. How long do you
live on tradition? The Cowboys, you know, were a really
good team in the seventies, and you know when I
was growing up and had to live in the shadows
of the Pittsburgh Steelers dynastic era during that time, managed
to win a couple of Super Bowls, But were they

(01:18:22):
really better than the Steelers?

Speaker 3 (01:18:24):
Eh?

Speaker 1 (01:18:24):
Probably not. Then it came back around again. They fired
the legendary Tom Landry, Jerry Jones brings him in, and
for a while there it was god awful. But then
they started bringing in the kind of players that they
thought they would need in order to win the Troy Aightmans,
the m and Smiths of the world. And guess what,

(01:18:45):
they became a dynastic team again by winning three out
of four in the early to mid nineties, and this
is where the Patriots have kind of dropped off. The
Patriots have had two dynastic areas. They won you know,
three and four, you know, at the beginning of the
two thousands, and then had another stretch where you know,
they went three and five in the twenty tens, in

(01:19:07):
the twenty teens, so and they did it largely with
the same coach and the same GM rare. And now
you're asking to do it for a third time. And
my point is, I don't think you can do that
any longer because the game has changed so much in
the last twenty to twenty five years. It's a different game.

(01:19:29):
Bill wants to subscribe to doing things the way Bill
wants to do them. I get that he probably has
earned some of that right. But what makes people successful
over the long haul is their willingness, not just their ability,
but their willingness to change with the times and move along. Hell,

(01:19:50):
I started it as a writer. I was, you know,
you call an inkstained wretch. I was all about, you know,
the journalism and the facts and you know, but if
I didn't learn how to advance in the digital age,
I wouldn't still be in this profession. Bill needs to
learn how to advance in football. No matter if what
has been highly successful for him over a period of

(01:20:12):
thirty plus years has worked for him, it doesn't mean
it can't work still. What it means is is that
you've got to be willing to try something different. You've
got to be willing to throw them something they're not expecting.
You got to throw the change up, the slider, the slurve, something.

(01:20:33):
Let's mix sports metaphors here, right. You got to give
them something they're not expecting. And the Patriots are too predictable.
And when you have that much predictability on top of
inability and injury, you get what you got last Sunday.
Pretty simple. And how long are you, as fans of

(01:20:55):
the team, how long are you willing to put up
with that? I think Bill Belichick has deserved certainly the
benefit of the doubt. But when you keep getting thrashed
like you've been thrashed, how much are you willing to
put up with? How much more are you willing to

(01:21:16):
go with? Another week, another ten weeks, another season, another
two years, another ten years. And what you do if
you go five to ten years and let him hang
around long enough to get Don Shula's record. That becomes
then kind of tainted because he clearly would have stuck
around for a while and you kept him around so
he could get that record. What did you do to

(01:21:38):
the franchise in the process? And He's always said, I'm
only doing what I think, and I'm paraphrasing here, of course,
but I'm only doing what I think is in the
best interest of the football team. Have we reached the
end of that rope? I'm asking you the question, are
you ready to make a change. I know Eldred wants
to make a change from Bill the GM, should the

(01:22:01):
should this team? Should this organization think about making a change? Patty,
you still with us? Thanks for hanging in there, brother,
of course, John, what do you think?

Speaker 8 (01:22:15):
So?

Speaker 9 (01:22:16):
Uh, before I get to that, it's interesting that you
were bringing you know, you brought up the Cowboys and
how badly was Jerry Jones eviscerated for fire firing time?

Speaker 1 (01:22:25):
Horribly horribly viscerated. I know because I was the one
doing a lot of the skewering, because I was, you know,
and you know, because of my background, I grew up
a Cowboy fan, so and I covered the Cowboys. That
was my first NFL team to cover, uh, after I
got out of college. And I mean, shoot, Jerry Jones

(01:22:46):
was persona on grade. He was a devil incarnate. He
was everything for the way he treated Tom Landry on
his way out the door. And then people fans conveniently
forgot when the Cowboys won, you know, the first of
their three Super Bowls of the nineteen nineties. So I
mean all was forgiven. And yet now Jerry Jones can't
seem to get out of his you know, can't seem

(01:23:08):
to work his way out of a paper bag. It's
been you know, Cowboys haven't won anything in thirty years now,
but he still owns the team. He still owns the team.
And so I'm wondering, if you're a Patriots fan, do
you allow the Craft family to continue going thirty plus years.
Bill isn't going to last that long. But how many

(01:23:30):
coaches has Jerry Jones gone through in this last thirty
years to try to find, you know, the right combination
of coaching with talent and oh yeah, yes man, because
you had to be a yes man a Jerry otherwise
you weren't going to go very far in this business.
And I don't see mister Craft as a yes man.
Mister Craft, the one thing that I love about working
for him is that he allows people like us to

(01:23:50):
do our jobs. You know, there's some latitude there, and
I think that's one of the reasons why mister Craft
has had so much success in his business life as
well as his sports life. But at some point in time,
the owner, the boss is got to make a call.
When does that time happen? How far do we go?

Speaker 9 (01:24:11):
Yeah, And I mean I think that's a question that
a lot of fans are contemplating even after this game.
You know, I called him the postgame show and just
that I'm I'm ready, Like I'm I'm ready to strip
everything down to the studs and start over. And that
includes the quarterback too, you know, sure, and just see
what happens, because I don't know they just I'll say

(01:24:34):
this about Bill. He seems to have evolved on defense,
but as far as like his offensive structure, as far
as like building the roster, I'm with Eldride. I mean,
it's been years now since they've they've had that dynamic guy.
I mean, you got to go back to twenty twenty,
the first few games with Julian Edelman before he got hurt.

(01:24:58):
I mean, for and I don't want to say he's
never gotten talent, because I mean, come on, that's that's
kind of a slap in the face of guys like
Sean Branch to Rob Gronkowski, you know, wet Swelter and
Randy Julian Edelman. He's been able to identify talent and
get it on and at his price.

Speaker 6 (01:25:17):
You know.

Speaker 9 (01:25:18):
But I think what he's not understanding and how he's
not evolving is that you see, like you hear it
from guys like Evan and guys that really break down
film and that are like real analyticals, the two positions
in football that have evolved more than anything over the
past ten even like five years of being cornerback and
wide receiver because of all the seven on seven league,

(01:25:40):
you know.

Speaker 1 (01:25:40):
Yeah, and I don't.

Speaker 9 (01:25:42):
I don't know what's going on.

Speaker 1 (01:25:43):
I don't.

Speaker 9 (01:25:44):
I mean, he's got great friends in football, like Nick Davin,
who he himself said at a certain point, I got
to start getting offensive players because the game is changing,
and I'm wondering when that light is going to turn
on for Belichick and it may never, you know, and
for me, personally, I love what Bill's done and his

(01:26:06):
tenure here, but really over the past few years, it's
just it looked real ugly on offense and use the
architect of it.

Speaker 1 (01:26:12):
Yeah, uh, you know, you know listen, success or failure.
You know. Look, you know, a CEO of an organization
is you know, responsible for hiring people in the right
spots when you're a success, and you're responsible for hiring
the wrong people when you're not having success. So the
CEO is the one that's got to basically stand up
and make the call here for better for worse. Hey,

(01:26:34):
I'm running this organization. Is my money we're playing with here.
This is the call that needs to be made. It
may very well be they have a gentleman's agreement. Hey,
you know, I can leave in my own terms or Bill,
you know you've got you know, free reign here, and
you know what, I admire that and look for me
for me to say six super old trophies. You know
it hasn't gotten you that kind of latitude. But at

(01:26:55):
the same time, what kind of overall long term damage
are you doing to the friend, the value, the worth,
the fans who pay the freight, you know, the new
stuff that you're building of the stadium. What are you
doing to the long term uh you know, uh viability
of the franchise When you're not competitive and teams are
thumping you left and right, especially when you've always said

(01:27:16):
I'm only gonna do what's in the best interest to
the football team. Well, then no you're not. I think
you know again, I think we're we're rapidly approaching that
time now again, we're also jumping off the deep end
of the brag of bridge here in Fall River. We're
jumping off the deep end of the bridge here because
of the way these these four games have unfolded. But

(01:27:38):
as I suggested earlier in the show, Shoot Patty, very
few people thought this team wouldn't be one in three
right now. So I think in a lot of ways,
I got to get a grip. You got to get
a grip. We all got to get a grip. Okay,
and let's let this thing continue to play out. Is
it bleak right now? Yes? Is it an opportunity for

(01:27:59):
others to show what they got, yes. And if they
don't show what they have, what happens they move on
pretty simple. So that's that's the beauty. You can usually
change these things, right. The problem is is that the
decision making process in changing some of these names, these faces,
these coaches, whatever, that's what we call into question because

(01:28:23):
it may not be what this team actually needs. We
can see it, fans can see it. So what are
we missing that the hierarchy here in the papers organization
is seeing And what are we missing?

Speaker 4 (01:28:37):
What?

Speaker 1 (01:28:38):
What do they know that we don't? And this is
where we're having a little bit of a struggle in
that regard. I think right now, yeah, that means to.

Speaker 9 (01:28:47):
Me, it's all boiled down to offensive production. Like I said,
I think I think the defense well before I think
after the first or second week I called in it
said they're losing that the war of attrition. They are
on defense. But I mean, if he had a competent
offense or an offense that can someone keep case with

(01:29:09):
these other teams that you've played. Maybe not Miami, I
mean because they're super dynamic, you know, but like if
he had a team that could score twenty four points,
maybe you could win some of these games. But they haven't.
That you've proven this year that they can even score
over twenty. I know it's only four games, but I
mean we need to see something. Something has to happen,

(01:29:34):
you know, whether it's you know, Gonzales goes down, they
make a trade for j C. Jackson, what the what's
going on on the offensive line isn't working, what's going
on at the wide receiver position isn't working. Bill's not
a stupid guy. He's got to see that, you know,
and he's got to He's got to make something happen.

(01:29:57):
Or like like I said, like he's been saying all
all show, John, the Crabs need to make something.

Speaker 1 (01:30:02):
Yeah, which is why I'll let you go to the
Russell going to the game, John, So they're not losing.

Speaker 6 (01:30:09):
This week, unfortunately.

Speaker 9 (01:30:11):
Take the pat seventeen to fourteen.

Speaker 1 (01:30:13):
Seventeen fourteen sounds like a good score. There you go,
Thank you, Patty, Appreciate you. You know. I think one
of the things that you know, and I'll sort of
contradict myself, I guess in this particular is because I'm like,
we got to do something now. But at the same time,
I'm also thinking, well, I think we still need to
let this thing play out a little bit, because this
season isn't over yet. We played four weeks of a

(01:30:34):
seventeen week schedule, and very few people thought this team
would be anything other than one in three and that's
exactly where they are. So let's try to win. Let's
see if this team can't win some of these games
that we thought they'd have a chance to win. It
starts this week with New Orleans. It does you win

(01:30:55):
this one, you move on to the next one. And
this is little literally the time in the season when
you put one in front of the other and just
try to win a football game. I should tell you
that you get the practice update here from guys out
there today, and looks like the Patriots did get Riley Reef,
Cody Davis, and Trey Flowers all Riley Reef from the

(01:31:16):
ir and then Davis and Flowers from the pup back
at practice today. Now that doesn't mean they're going to
play Sunday. What it means is now the Patriots have
twenty one days to activate each player onto the active
roster or they'll miss the rest of the season. But
the clock at least is ticking on help on the
offensive line in the form of Riley Reef, and then

(01:31:38):
defensively with Cody Davis and Trey Flowers on the defensive line.
And yeah, I you know, listen, the other guy that
I immediately thought of when Matt Judon went down last
week was Josh Uche. He's gonna have to do more,
I think, than a third down pass rush specialist. He's
gonna have to get some extra time, so is Keon White.
We talked about that with Evan in the opening hour

(01:31:58):
of the program today. But you know, those guys are
gonna get some serious time. They're gonna get a chance. Look,
one man's misfortune is another man's opportunity, and that's what
this team has. And I think that's how these guys
have to sort of picture it right now. There's tremendous opportunity.
Why because nobody's expecting it. Nobody's expecting the success. Bridgestone

(01:32:20):
is the official tire of the New England Patriots, Proud
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(01:32:41):
England Patriots, Toyota. Let's go places. The real woman could
stop you from drinkings a real big woman.

Speaker 3 (01:32:50):
It's time to go around the NFL with football guru
Russell Baxters.

Speaker 1 (01:32:54):
Now what the name is Flounders on Patriots playbook? Floundering
is exactly what the Patriots seem to be kind of doing,
like a fish out of water over the last couple
of weeks. Russell, how are you today?

Speaker 8 (01:33:08):
Well, I'm doing I'm doing pretty well. You know. One
of the nice things I like doing with your show, John,
besides spending time with you, is getting to hear some
of the stuff while I'm off air, right, and the
solid calls that you get.

Speaker 1 (01:33:29):
I got smart fans. I'm very lucky to have smart, intelligent,
knowledgeable fans who will wave the pomp pom every now
and then, but you know what, they kind of know
what's what too, And I can appreciate that you can
wave the palm Tom pond and still be a smart person.

Speaker 4 (01:33:47):
You know.

Speaker 8 (01:33:47):
One of my newer Facebook pages I have is called
Football Nats and Present. Seriously, I've seen it. It's a
nice mix of this three and what's going on currently,
and I have the you know, former colleague from ESPN
the magazine who does a lot of stuff on there,

(01:34:09):
Kelly Morey, who I swear to god, she's posting every
twenty second everybody at the date with the news and
going on, and I'm able to share some of my
pieces on there as well. The same thing with my
Twitter timeline. Occasionally some stragglers wander in and you know,
try to upset the balance. But you know, again, I'm

(01:34:30):
very fortunate. I have people like you and a lot
of my former ESPN colleague and some of the best
writers in the country and reporters in the country who
I've worked with very fortunately who follow me and I
follow them back, and we have the dialogue. And that's important.
I mean everybody. You know, these people who rant and
rave and uh, you know, are ready to put a

(01:34:53):
team in the super Bowl after one win and ready
to find the head coach after one loss. That's not
how you run a business either, Nope. And that always
kind of blows me away when I hear stuff like that.
So it's very interesting and we're going to see what
happens here. How do the Patriots rebound from a thirty

(01:35:16):
five point more. It's something we haven't seen ever ever.

Speaker 1 (01:35:21):
In Bill Belichick's tenures.

Speaker 8 (01:35:23):
The last thing that even came close to something like
that was the like the thirty one nothing loss on
the opening weekend of two thousand and three quote unquote
lawyer Malloy.

Speaker 1 (01:35:34):
Games, Lawyer Malloy game.

Speaker 8 (01:35:35):
Yep right, And by the end of that year they
beat Buffalo thirty one to nothing and then went on
to win that second Super Bowl.

Speaker 1 (01:35:45):
Yeah. Can you believe that was twenty years ago?

Speaker 8 (01:35:47):
Russell God, I remember it very, very vividly.

Speaker 1 (01:35:51):
Twenty years ago. What the hell?

Speaker 8 (01:35:54):
Well, just to show you how time fly. It just
goes to show you now more than ever, this is
such an unpredictable league. You know, one thing I was
charting this week that's in one of my columns, is
these last two weeks we have, I mean, it's almost
looked like college football as far as the blowouts too.

(01:36:19):
You know, New England was the only team to get
blown out last week. There were six games decided by
twenty points or more last week alone. There were five
in Week three. In the first two weeks of the season,
there were five totals. So the last two weeks eleven
of the thirty two games played had a twenty plus

(01:36:40):
point spread. Not attractive, No, not at all what I mean,
but think about that. I mean again, so unpredictable, and
you really kind of spot on with it. It's a
one in three start that's kind of become slow. Starts

(01:37:00):
were even dig when when the team was winning Super Bowls.
So and I'm not comparing to the super Bowl team.
And last week, face it, last week was shocking. But
I got news for you. Dallas has done that three
times they year. Okay, think about this. They beat the Giants,
the Jets, and the Patriots. Are you ready for this one?

(01:37:23):
Eight to thirteen nuts? Okay? And yet the Arizona Cardinals
ran for two hundred and twenty two yards on that
defense and scored twenty eight points.

Speaker 1 (01:37:35):
Worst thing in the world that could happen the Patriots
was have the Cowboys getting beat up on like that
by the Cardinals?

Speaker 8 (01:37:41):
Right right, so physical wise and style wise, we know
how it works, you know. The swampy play is something
we've seen the last couple of years. Turnovers. Turnovers were
never a big thing. When time Brady.

Speaker 1 (01:37:59):
Oops, what the heck did I just hit the wrong button?
I must have. I didn't mean to hit that button,
but it just hung up on him. Oh god, okay, rook,
way to go. That was stupid. We'll get Russell back
here in just a second. Oh my god. I'm like,
where did he go? And I'm like, oh my god,
did earlier? Yeah? Well okay, so it's just I don't know.

(01:38:20):
It's just one of those things, all right, Well, you know,
penalies throw the flag on me fifteen yards for unnecessary
you know, canceling of whatever. He probably didn't even know
we got hung up on. I bet right, Bill, Chatt
and he's still going, it's like, why is my phone beeping?
Oh god? Oh man, okay, did you got him? You

(01:38:40):
got him? All right, Russell? That was that was all
my fault. I apologized profusely a thousand times. I apologize
to you because I'm sitting here trying to punch a
button and I hit the wrong one and you disappeared.
Oh I thought you didn't take the bill. No, that's
that's Marine's job.

Speaker 8 (01:39:00):
Get a PayPal account.

Speaker 1 (01:39:02):
Yeah, right, need a PayPal account exactly. Actually, I think
that's the one digital account I do have.

Speaker 8 (01:39:11):
It's what have we seen so far around the league? Yeah, okay, Yeah,
you have seen a very steady San Francisco team. Yeah, okay.
By the way, he's won fourteen regular season games in
a row, and going back to last year, they've scored
at least thirty points in seven straight.

Speaker 1 (01:39:27):
They're rolling, right, Yes, I mean.

Speaker 8 (01:39:30):
They kind of, and they're very balanced offensively. Defensively, they
can beat the run, they can be throwing the football.
I think they're clearly the best team in the league.
There are a lot of teams as four points, but
they have I think the offensive and defensive combination. Now,
I think the Chiefs are lurking. I don't think the

(01:39:50):
eaglesive coint quite hitch stride dead. I think Miami has
to go back to the drawing board a little when
it comes to their defense. And by the way, and
task rushing get very healthy this week the New York Giants.
But I think Daniel Jones might have just been sacked again.

Speaker 1 (01:40:06):
So yeah, yeah, see, I do subscribe very much to
the theory no matter how bad you have it, there's
somebody else out there that's always got it worse than
you do, and you might you might put Daniel Jones
in that category. Today.

Speaker 8 (01:40:20):
Yes, they're called the Chicago Bears.

Speaker 1 (01:40:22):
Yeah, well that too, that too.

Speaker 8 (01:40:24):
Who's last win, by the way, not to bring up
a source subject whose last win was against the Patriots
on Monday Night Football last year. The Bears have low
fourteen in a row, and which I believe is a
franchise record, and as the franchise has been running them
all three a long time, they Matt bieberflush comes in

(01:40:45):
to be called the defense. Their defense is horrendous. But
let me go back to Daniel Jones for a second,
because this is one of my favorite fun backs of
the week. Daniel Jones got sacked ten times the other day.
By the way, Harris Campbell, the wide receiver for the Giants,
got sacked. Okay, for I Dable got sacked in the

(01:41:09):
tunnel last week. Daniel Jones isn't the most sacked quarterback
in the league. It's actually Sam Dannell of the Washington
Commanders who's been sacked twenty four times already. Wow, Okay,
now I bring this up for two. The more fascinating
numbers the record that say longest they kept it, which

(01:41:29):
is before nineteen eighty two. As far as being sacked,
David Carr during the Texans inaugural season, was signed sacked
seventy six months.

Speaker 1 (01:41:40):
Gosh, that's now. I mean, it's amazing he can still walk.

Speaker 8 (01:41:45):
Well in some ways he doesn't. It basically beat him
into the career right out of him. Yeah, another bad year.
Here's my favorite, John. Could you even take a vile
guest at what the team records is for most sacks
allowed in the season.

Speaker 1 (01:42:03):
Team record for most sacks allowed in a year? Yeah,
we we haven't had anybody who reached triple digits, have we?

Speaker 8 (01:42:10):
Oh? Yes we have?

Speaker 1 (01:42:11):
Wow? Yeah, holy smokes. Then then no, I really I'm
not sure I can take a guess at that.

Speaker 8 (01:42:18):
With the expensive Ron Jaworski and Randall cunning Gamp, the
nineteen eighty six Philadelphia Eagles gave up one hundred and
four stacks.

Speaker 7 (01:42:27):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (01:42:28):
I would never have guessed Philly. I would have said
maybe Tampa Bay back in seventy six or something. You know.

Speaker 8 (01:42:34):
Yeah, a Huerta and four sacks in the sixteen game season,
which comes out to six and a half sacks a game.

Speaker 1 (01:42:39):
Yeah. Wow, that's that's wow. I mean one hundred and
four sacks. So, like I said, no matter how bad
you got it, somebody else has had it worse or
currently has it worse one way or the other. And
yet we're talking here about, you know, nowhere else to
go but up with the play of the offensive line,
because frankly, that to me has been the instigator for

(01:43:01):
almost everything rotten that's really gone on with the Patriots
thus far this year. Is not being able to run block,
not being able to pass block, not being able to
keep from committing penalties, not being able to protect your quarterback.
I mean, you know, and of course the guys that
you know, we originally thought would be the starters on
the offensive line for the Patriots this year haven't even

(01:43:21):
played one down of football together yet.

Speaker 8 (01:43:28):
Me, offensive line is a league problem if you're fortunate
enough to stay healthy early and get into a group.
But I know, if Johnathan, you and I have talked
about this bore the way they have changed the rules
during training camp as far as contact and so on
during training camp is one of those times that you

(01:43:48):
can try to build or reform your offensive line with
reps and get the same guck.

Speaker 4 (01:43:54):
You know, for.

Speaker 8 (01:43:54):
Years, I don't do it anymore. I used to track
teams starting to regular season. Now injuries happened, don't get
me along. Which teams would start the same five guys
at the same five spots on the offensive line and
do it for a season And it maybe happened once,

(01:44:17):
maybe twice. It wasn't. It wasn't. I don't even know
it's even possible now, okay, And there's some great examples
of guys who play. I think last year during the
Chief season, Orlando Brown and Andrew Wiley were starting tax
they started all twenty games. I can't remember what the

(01:44:42):
question was as far as the interior, but continuity on
the offensive line is huge, absolutely huge, and I think
that's why you see poor play along the offensive line.
I mean, think about what we just saw this past
week in terms of past walking. Khalil Mack had six
facts on Sunday against the Raiders. We just talked about

(01:45:08):
Daniel Jones the week before. Damn how it got backed
nine times by the bill. Now, I haven't done sack
numbers comparatively for four weeks and so on, but I
think that's the issues you run into. And as you
become more of a pass happy league and pass rushers
get more opportunities, just like quarterbacks are getting more opportunities.

(01:45:29):
These are the things that you're going to say, yeah,
all right.

Speaker 1 (01:45:33):
Let's take a quick look then if we can at
week five. And I know that I saw your piece
on full press coverage earlier today. But there's only fourteen
games this week because you've got four teams that are
getting the first bye weeks of the season. Brown's, Chargers, Seahawks,
and Bucks are the first teams to enjoy their bye
weeks off. But six of the fourteen are interconference game

(01:45:57):
Six of the fourteen, which is kind of interesting as well,
including of course the Patriots and the New Orleans Saints.
I mean by diagram, yes, but significance here at all.
Is this just the way that they want to try
to play the schedule out and who holds an advantage
in this particular regard at this time of year, getting
ready for someone that you're not going to see again.

Speaker 8 (01:46:20):
Yeah, which, and it's funny because this was one of
the four days of the Patriots. For twenty years, they
had standing. Now maybe that's because they were busy playing
in nine Super Bowls. You know that they did well
against the NFC, but during the regular season they were
absolutely upstanding. They've really struggled with interconference games the last

(01:46:41):
three or four years and so far. You know, the
NFC went the first two weeks and went six and up,
and then the AFC won all four games in Week
three and last week I think they split the four
games and so on something. But there are some interesting
teams because the games in that regard. I think the

(01:47:03):
one that stands out the most, knee John is Cincinnati
at Arizona. Who would have thought that both would be
one and three right now? I think some people thought
the Cardinals might be zero and four. Yeah, but you
could make a case that the Cardinals are playing better
football than Cincinnati.

Speaker 1 (01:47:17):
Oh, there's no question about that. That's one of the shocks.

Speaker 8 (01:47:20):
Yeah, the Bengals have had two games this year where
they've been into a field goal, and you know last
year they were moving to and made the AFC typikin.
They don't bear any resemblance whatsoever to that team, And
I know Joe Burrow's hurting a little, but it's more
than that because they're getting gashed. You know, one of
the pieces I did this week was what a rough

(01:47:42):
week for the AFC. More, including myself, I thought be
a division would be among the best in the league.
And again it's only four games, but in one week,
three of your teams don't score a touchdown in the
same division and the only win was they both more
team that beat the Brands. I get it, the Browns

(01:48:05):
didn't have Deshaun Watson. I understand that. But Pittsburgh later
for Tata forget forget an egg in Houston, and we
just talked about Cincinneneity. So we again this blowout thing
that we saw this past week, but numerous teams not
being able to score touchdowns, and it's it's really much John,

(01:48:28):
because a quote quote for an offensive league, there are
a lot of teams struggling to score points. How is
this one? Are you ready? Miami scored seventy points in
Week three, I mean, one of the most talked about
games of the season against Denver. Correct.

Speaker 1 (01:48:47):
Okay, all right, okay.

Speaker 8 (01:48:49):
There are nine teams in the league currently after four
weeks that haven't scored seventy points.

Speaker 1 (01:48:55):
Jeez, that's crazy, isn't it. Patriots being one of those?

Speaker 8 (01:48:58):
Yeah, yeah, nineteenth. Okay. The Giants have forty six points
in four games, and thirty one came in one game
against Arizona.

Speaker 1 (01:49:09):
So you're telling me I need to take the under
this week in any game, I want to like, you know,
have fun.

Speaker 8 (01:49:14):
With right, I would take to say that you take
any betting under consideration.

Speaker 1 (01:49:20):
About I get it. Let's see, so within the division,
Jets are playing at the Broncos. We also have where
were the Dolphins are at home? They've got the New
York Giants and oh yeah, I think you're right. I
think he just got sacked again at quarterback. And then

(01:49:41):
the Jaguars are having to go on the road to
play at Buffalo, you know, and I was really surprised,
I guess pleasantly so to see Buffalo be as dominant
as they were against a really good Miami team at
the week after Miami scored the Big seven to zero,
and to really basically shut down Miami as well as

(01:50:01):
they did held them to what twenty points last week,
and Buffalo I thought, just kind of took it upon
themselves to say, hey, wait a second, you know, Miami
maybe better, but we still rule the ruse to the
AFC East. I thought that was an impressive performance.

Speaker 8 (01:50:15):
It was. And just so you know, the Buffalo Jacksonville
game has been one.

Speaker 1 (01:50:18):
Day, right, right, Oh that's right. Yeah, it's not at home.
It's in London. Correct, that's the that's the morning game.

Speaker 8 (01:50:24):
Yeah right, Okay, Jacksonville stayed over there. They beat Atlanta
there right last week. And what was fascinating about watching
Buffalo on the enemy last week. At one time it
looked like this was going to be Board versus Mecan
bro was you know fourteen?

Speaker 1 (01:50:38):
Yeah?

Speaker 8 (01:50:39):
Yeah, and then Buffalo just pulled away. And Buffalo in
the last three weeks to score thirty eight, thirty seven,
and forty eight points. It's almost hard to believe that
was the team that lost to the Jets, yeah right,
in week one. But it just goes to show you
how things can change so rapidly.

Speaker 1 (01:50:57):
How much of a difference does Jackville still being there
and having another game to play, how much of it?
How much of it does it give them an advantage
all with Buffalo coming in so called cold, even though
Buffalo clearly was impressive in their performance last week.

Speaker 8 (01:51:13):
I don't know if it necessarily gives them an advantage.
I mean, you know, I've watched Jacksonville play this year
and they've been very, very erratic. They couldn't score a
touchdown against the Chiefs at home in Week two, they
got blown out in this sense, mostly because of their
special teams in the stake against Houston. Houston beat them
in Jacksonville by twenty points seventeen. Yeah, and then last

(01:51:36):
week it was somewhat sluggish. But you know, I said
Atlanta was more sluggish. To me, Jacksonville is a supreme
mystery right now. And I know a lot of people
say that they were clearly above ten and above the
best team in the AFC South. By the way, all
four teams in the AFC South are two and two.

Speaker 1 (01:51:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (01:51:55):
I call it the Chuck Woolery Division.

Speaker 1 (01:51:59):
You'd have to watch the old dating game to understand
what that means. Yeah, well we'll be back in two
and two.

Speaker 8 (01:52:05):
Yeah. So again, it's so hard to form opinions in
terms of where this team has said it because you
just watch the team did its doors blowing, and then
all of a sudden they eat out a one or
a two point win the following week. You know, Arizona

(01:52:27):
is a great example. They blew that big lead against
the Giants and then a week later dominantly the Cowboy.
So unpredictable. This league is very unpredictable. And that's when
you go back and not to you know, wallow in
the cask. But you look at what New England did
for all those consecutive years in the playoffs, and you
look at what the Chiefs are doing right now. These

(01:52:50):
are rare opportunities. And it's more than just we had
a great quarterback. You know, the Patriots had great defenses,
and if you really watch the Chiefs, they share their
defense is got a lot of They have like four
or five young players on their defensive un John that
last year would draft choices, and they're kind of melding together.

(01:53:13):
And right now you can make a case the Chiefs
defense is a little ahead of Kansas City's offense. And
you know, maybe those things came. But I mean, Patrick Mahomes,
they get out to the seventeen up and start against
the Jets, and all of a sudden he throws two
horrific interceptions, and all of a sudden, the Jets are
back in there, and the Jets want of tying the
game eventually, I mean they He's found a way to

(01:53:36):
win and so on. But you know, again, Buffalo looks
pretty on a little bit of a role right now.
Be interesting see how they do here. But again, those
one losses in the division, so right, as good as
they can be. And to me, the biggest question with

(01:53:57):
the Bills jumping is what with their defense look like
in December and Janiusary, because that is the thing that
has really come back and fit them the last couple
of years. In the playoff wins to Kansas City. Yeah,
we last year's playoff lost at home to Cincinnati. Their
defense was a no show neither.

Speaker 1 (01:54:16):
Yeah, we know it's a war of attrition, so you've
got to be able to have something left at the
end of the year. And there's still a tremendously long
way to go with thirteen weeks left, right Russell, Before
we go, quick comment then about the Saints coming in
at two and two against the Patriots at one in three,
and I mentioned earlier in the show, I think the
overrunner in this game is like forty forty and a
half or something. And I mean, if I were, you know,

(01:54:37):
of a mind, I would think that, you know, a
twenty point game might be in order the way these
two teams have played offense this far.

Speaker 8 (01:54:44):
I heard somebody say seventeen to fourteen. I think that
stands about right.

Speaker 1 (01:54:48):
Okay, Yeah, I would tend to agree with that. By
the way either way, seventeen fourteen, one of these teams
is going to walk away with a win.

Speaker 8 (01:54:55):
About that range, well, I mean the Saints last week,
and Derek Carr was almost a surprise starter last week.
I think a lot of people it was going to
be Jameis Winston. You know, they struggled with school points
against Tennessee. They have struggled to score points. Their defensive
allowed them to hang in there and so on, but

(01:55:17):
offensively they have come close to gelling. What did Alvin
Kamara caught like thirteen passes for less than forty yards?

Speaker 1 (01:55:25):
Correct? Correct?

Speaker 8 (01:55:26):
That was very very strange. And they didn't get a
much damp last week. They just set up for three
field goals at home against Campa Bay. Right, they're not
exactly coming in here as the head of team. They've
actually lost their last two games after winning their first
two games.

Speaker 1 (01:55:41):
Right, got to play the game. It's the next one
less schedule. We got to play it.

Speaker 8 (01:55:49):
Yeah, and somebody's got to be a stadium to announce.

Speaker 1 (01:55:52):
The Really, who I mean, I hope actually that you
know it's gonna to be It's gonna be me. I
hope that that's the Uh, Well, you never know I
guess in these days and ages, I'm just I know
I'll show I'll show up and you know, and keep
going as long as they tell me to show up
and keep going.

Speaker 8 (01:56:13):
Well, you never know.

Speaker 1 (01:56:14):
To show up in your seat, miss Robin, she will.
She takes my seat all the time. Okay, Russell, thanks buddy,
good to talk to you, my friend. Talk to you
next week. You got it, You got it, Russell Baxter
at Backs football guru. Here's one that's kind of right
up his alley. I wanted to I wanted to touch
bases with him on it, but you know, I know

(01:56:37):
that he kind of knows this. I get this number
from Bette, Massachusetts this week, so I give them the
plug on it. But teams that start one in three
in the NFL okay teams they start one and three
making the playoffs. And this would be since gosh, since
twenty twelves. We're talking about the last ten eleven years. Okay,

(01:56:57):
Well obviously this is okay, so it'd be ten years, right,
No eleven years, okay, because you count twenty twelve, all right,
So eleven years eighty two teams have started one in
three in the last decade. In a little hand little plus.
Eleven of those eighty two teams have made the playoffs.
That's thirteen point four percent of those eleven teams that

(01:57:23):
made the playoffs starting the year one in three. Two
of those eleven won their wild card round. So that's
two out of eighty two teams since twenty twelve in
the NFL that have started one in three that have
won a playoff game, two out of eighty two. Yikes.

(01:57:47):
I would have to say that, well, you know, no
time like the president, make it three out of eighty
two or whatever. It's going to be right. But you
can see that this is the road that the Patriots
have to travel right now, Andy and Whale, and I'm
gonna give you the final word here in the show. Andy,
thanks for hanging in there. You're in the playbook, No worries.

Speaker 10 (01:58:06):
John, how are you doing today?

Speaker 1 (01:58:08):
Good sir? How are you?

Speaker 8 (01:58:10):
I'm good? Thanks.

Speaker 10 (01:58:11):
I just wanted to say I do completely agree with
that previous caller. I kind of like bringing in J. C.

Speaker 4 (01:58:19):
Jackson.

Speaker 10 (01:58:20):
I'm not gonna lie because the injury to Christian.

Speaker 8 (01:58:23):
Gonzalez is obviously you know huge.

Speaker 10 (01:58:25):
What I was going to ask you, what do you
think of bringing in JC.

Speaker 1 (01:58:28):
I think it's it's absolutely a must. I'm glad that
they went and made the movie. It tells me that
they haven't. The team, the organization, the coaches, nobody's given
up on this year. It's four weeks. How can you
possibly give up on four weeks? You haven't really even
reached the quarter markt your season barely, so you know,
they feel like they probably still have enough to be competitive,

(01:58:49):
and they need somehow desperately to get more depth in
that defensive backfield when you've been without the Joneses and
now you're gonna be without Christian Gonzales, and you need
somebody as well to make a play back there, which
is what he was known for doing when he was
here the previous time. And on top of all of that,
you give it up for a couple of draft picks,
a swap of a couple of draft picks, and you

(01:59:10):
only are responsible for a million and a half on
his salary. It's a no freaking brainer for the Patriots.

Speaker 10 (01:59:17):
Absolute no brainer. And he's only twenty sevent he's still
fairly young.

Speaker 1 (01:59:21):
So give him an opportunity to get back in the
good graces here, you know, I mean, whatever it takes
I mean, i'd like to be able to think, you know,
far ahead and say, hey, Christian Gonzalez comes back next year.
You got him on one side and J. C. Jackson
on the other. Wow. But I don't necessarily think that's
really gonna happen either. I'm just settled right now. I'd
settle right now for a win. And I think that's

(01:59:41):
the way most fans really feel. And I think this
was a good step toward trying to be competitive to.

Speaker 10 (01:59:47):
Do that, and I fully respect that. I mean, I
have a friend at work who thinks we're gonna go
one in sixteen. I mean, it's still early in the season.
I mean, and football is a week to week. I mean,
I don't agree at all with this whole Pop Douglas thing,
but I mean one in sixteen. Come on, I'm not

(02:00:09):
going there.

Speaker 1 (02:00:09):
Yet, right. No, I'm not really either, But I you know,
I think that's just what you know, people do when
when things are going poorly. But I think we've provided
plenty of perspective today that no matter how bad you
think your team has it right now, there's somebody else
out there that's feeling just as bad, if not worse
than you are. And I don't mean to drag, you know,

(02:00:30):
everybody down to that level. It just goes to show
you everybody's got their own I like to say, everybody's
got their own bos to carry your bag of bleep. Okay,
and the Patriots bag of bleep is a little bit
bigger than some it's not as big as others. Just
worry about moving on to the next day and getting better.
And I think that's where they really need to concentrate.

Speaker 10 (02:00:52):
Yeah, and I think I think, Yeah, I think Dollarshick
really did this.

Speaker 1 (02:00:58):
I agree with you.

Speaker 10 (02:00:58):
They couldn't hear you there and breaking up.

Speaker 1 (02:01:00):
No, that's all right, Thank you, Andy. I appreciate the call,
and thank you for hanging on in there during Russell's visit. Yeah,
you're one hundred percent right. I think they've tried to
do a good job of that. I think we all
probably tend to have to have a little more patience
where patience is concerned here. But like I asked a
little bit earlier on the show, how much more patience
are you willing to give this team? I fully expect

(02:01:23):
if they, you know, get behind the Saints, especially on Sunday,
they get behind the Saints early, the boot birds to
be out in force. Is that the right message to send?
I mean, it's probably not the right thing to cheer
them either. You know, Oh, it was good behind our guy.
You know, a message I think has to probably be sent.
But don't think that these guys don't know that. Okay,

(02:01:45):
don't think these guys don't know that. They're very much
aware of it. The crafts are very much aware of it.
I'm not so sure about the coaching staff because they're
so ensconced in their preparations that they don't listen to
the noise, nor should they. It'll be interesting to see
how it plays out. Score big with Bob's unbeatable savings

(02:02:06):
on power reclining furniture perfect for game dey viewing. With
features like hidden drop down tables for snacks and beverages
and convenient USB ports, you'll never have to get up
and miss a play, but only when you shop at Bob's,
the official furniture store of the New England Patriots. My
thanks to Kyle high Tower. My thanks of course, as
well to who the hell else did we have on

(02:02:28):
the show today, Matt Oh, thank you god, I'm losing
it now, my triplet of course, from New Orleans football
Russell Baxter as well Evan Lazarre as well. It's because
my palms are dripping with sweat here. Okay, it's Wednesday.
It's game week, Texas. OU I think I have to

(02:02:49):
leave strippers of message as we wrap up the week
this particular week and enjoy some college football this weekend,
enjoy the NFL this weekend. The Patriots can figure out
a way to stay competitive and win a football game
this weekend. But until same patch time, same patch channel
next Wednesday. For the next live edition of Patriots Playbook,

(02:03:11):
two pm Eastern time next Wednesday, I'll just simply say,
hook the Horns. Thank you for downloading this podcast, subscribe

(02:03:33):
on an Apple, Google Play, and everywhere else you listen.
Like the show, Please rate and review us. Listener comments
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