The Fellas with Anthony Gargano & Jason Fitz discuss the Dodgers World Series Victory, MLB vs. NBA in popularity, & MORE!

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Don't listening to Fox Sports Radio Radio.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
Well, good morning, good morning, good morning, good morning, good morning,
good morning, buddy, Well happy, happy, happy Fox Football Saturday.
This is the fellas Jason fitz I'm Anthony Garganta. We
come you live from the ty raq dot com studios.

(00:24):
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we got a big neon kickoff.

Speaker 3 (00:40):
That's going to be a great game.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
Three v four Happy Valley Dateline State College, Pennsylvania, Ohio State,
penn State. About the kickoff and a little little about
seven hours from now. Cannot wait for that one. Lots
to get to. Good morning, my man, Fitzie.

Speaker 4 (01:05):
Good morning, Good sir. How are we feeling? You know
what I'm gonna tell you? I know we got a
lot of football to get into. Can I tell you something?
As a lifelong diehard one week Dodgers fan, I'm just
I'm out here now, like shopping for some World Series merch.
I'm ready for this moment. I feel like, you know,
life has prepared me. I waited a long time to
commit to a baseball team. You know, it feels good

(01:27):
that I waited for that commitment because now I get
a World Series championship I feel great about. But I
will tell you you'd be proud of me. And I
wanted to tell you this in person, as we say
in radio, like even though we're not actually in person.
I want to tell you this this morning, after that
Friday night that we talked about last week, that connective moment,
that oh my god, that Freddie Freeman I told you
I'd never forget. I ended up watching that entire damn series.

(01:50):
I was just and people listening like, of course you
do this for a living. I'm telling you, I don't
know the last time in my life I watched the
nine inning baseball game and I sat there and I
got sucked into every single pitch of this thing. It
was amazing. It was riveting. The Dodgers incredible. I've done you.
You gotta have a connective moment, right There's got to
be something if you don't have a team from the

(02:11):
city you're from, if you don't have a team that
your your parents grew up with, your friends grew up with,
Like none of that was part of my life. My
dad hated baseball. We grew up in Vegas. Vegas was
a Dodgers town, ironically, but it just wasn't like connective
that way in the eighties, like people weren't just you know,
clamoring for Dodgers the content in Vegas. As a kid,
I've never really had a connection That Freddie Freeman moment

(02:32):
connected me. I felt invested in the rest of the series.
I wake up today a champion because I'm now a
Dodgers fan.

Speaker 3 (02:37):
There we go, look at that, look at that look.
I honestly, I love the fact you watch a series.

Speaker 2 (02:44):
I tell you what happened. I had football and Freddy
was a was awesome. I mean, honestly, you can't what
a story come up?

Speaker 3 (02:55):
Clutch.

Speaker 2 (02:56):
I mean, I mean he deserved all the act Like
listen on a team is Stars right show, Hey and Mookie.
You know he was the man man. I think that
was It was just a beautiful moment, great for the sport.
I love the fact that you were all in man.

Speaker 4 (03:14):
Now every look. I also, as we've talked about, you know,
for the what a year and change that we've been
doing this show, I'm a big ratings guy. You know that.
I'm like, hey, ratings mean something. Oh my god. I
mean if you everybody keep saying, when is baseball going
to capture? Well, baseball captured. I mean you talk about
the ratings through the roof for the younger kids, the

(03:35):
ratings through the roof overall. You look at it. There's
a reason because you know, I hear the noise already
as a lifelong that hard one week fan of people
talking about, you know, great that you can buy a championship. Well,
at some point I will always look at this and say,
you know what, whatever the system allows, if you want
to work that system to get your team and your
your fan base a championship that is well within the rules, right,

(03:57):
And what do you want from your favorite team? You
want your favorite team to do everything they can to win.
As a lifelong Raiders fan, I want my team to
do whatever it takes to win. I'm looking at the
Dodgers team that went out recklessly, spent, fearlessly spent, wasn't
worried about any of the ramifications of that bought themselves
a championship. Okay, if that's the way it goes, If

(04:18):
if money is the one delineator, then everybody should be
able to just go out and buy one.

Speaker 3 (04:22):
Right.

Speaker 4 (04:23):
So, I there's not a single thing about this that
I thought was anything less than perfection for Major League Baseball.

Speaker 3 (04:29):
Yeah, I mean, listen, this is what it is. Right.

Speaker 2 (04:34):
So I agree with you that you can't cry money.
I mean, you know, I mean, honestly, I don't think
you can do that. I do think it hurts the
sport that there's no cap, that you have franchises that
are dead franchises, right, you know, I mean, how good
would they How good would the Tigers be if there

(04:57):
was a cap and you were a li you had
to spend there was a threshold in what you had
to spend.

Speaker 3 (05:03):
Two.

Speaker 4 (05:04):
Yeah, I don't disagree that. I think in general, these
are the moments that we have a great reminder that
the NFL, for all that we critique, has done some
things really brilliantly. They have figured out how to all
get just wildly rich together, and at the same time
they've created a product where parody is king. In fact,
the NFL has created a product this is still jarring

(05:25):
to me. Right now. There are ten teams out of
thirty two teams in the NFL, there are ten teams
today that have two wins or less on the season,
think about that, like or coming into this week, I
guess the Jets got their third one. So coming into
the week ten teams, almost a third of the league sucks.
And we don't sit here for a second and say, ah,

(05:46):
product is broken. Nope, We're like, this is what makes
it exciting. People aren't training at the trade deadline because
there are so many teams that only have two wins
Like that becomes a good thing. So you know, you're right.
There's equity that comes in in being able to let
everybody have a level playing field, that for sure, and
it allows your product to stink and still have people

(06:06):
clamor over it. So you know you're right about all
of that.

Speaker 2 (06:09):
Yeah, I mean I don't think it's you know, like
I was going to talk to you about. One of
the things on my list this morning is MLB v
n B A, and I kind of wanted to discuss
kind of where the LEAs are because.

Speaker 3 (06:26):
I think the NBA has got major.

Speaker 2 (06:28):
Issues, and I do I do think the MLB is
in a good place.

Speaker 3 (06:35):
You know, I think there's some things to tweak.

Speaker 2 (06:37):
I don't think it's for today to talk about the
you know, like a cap and you know there are dead,
dead franchises and it's not right, you know, I mean,
it's not right for those fan bases and it hurts it.
But I mean, you know, if you look, if you
turn around today, we look at MLB and we look

(06:57):
at what the Dodgers did.

Speaker 3 (06:59):
It was a ride, man, it was a great ride.

Speaker 5 (07:01):
I was I mean, it was Yankees, it was two
classic teams. Those data matters too, right, And you had
stars everywhere.

Speaker 2 (07:12):
My god, I had stars who failed. Like part of
the storyline is Arad Judge who had a disappointing October,
had a couple of moments of course, the blunder, right, Like,
you know, you had these moments of stars, stars who
delivered and stars who failed.

Speaker 4 (07:32):
Well and not ironically but amazingly, one of those stars
who failed could make the argument injury was part of it.
But like show, hey didn't really show up in this series.
We all know that too, right. It's amazing to me
that we got to the spot by you know, game
two or three of the series where you really felt like, man,
I can't wait till we get to that Mookie Freddie
Freeman like it wasn't about show Hey. The fact that

(07:54):
the Dodgers won this series will mask the fact that
show he was pretty irrelevant in this series, which is
a stunning thing to say when you ask about the
two spots.

Speaker 2 (08:02):
I mean even in the postseason he had a couple
of moments, but he wasn't great in the entire postseason.

Speaker 4 (08:08):
Which is a little reminiscent of you know, there were
there was a time we forget where Mahomes didn't have
the best numbers in Super Bowls either, and you know
it's like you just sort of have to go through that.
It's funny that show Hay gets a ring. Not I mean,
they got there in large part because of show Hay's contribution.
So I'm not taking anything away from the regular season,
but in the postseason he gets the great glorious bonus

(08:31):
of I get a ring. I can sit here's a
World Series champion. But I also, you know, maybe didn't
play my best and next time I get into it,
it's a different experience, your second World Series, presuming you
know he hopefully gets back there. For me is a
lifelong die hard fan. I will say this, yeah, when you.

Speaker 3 (08:48):
Ask about the sports dieheart fan, Yeah.

Speaker 4 (08:51):
A week long diehard fan. I love the two sports.
Makes me think of something they used to say in
country music. He used to say, there's two times that
you play the county on the way up and on
the way down, and on the way up it feels
a lot better than it does on the weight down.
And that's real for so many artists, Like you might
play the local county fair when you have one single out,
nobody's ever heard of you, and you're rising and it

(09:13):
feels great because hey, there's a crowd here. And then
you spend years, spend you know, playing all these massive
festivals for tens of thousands of people, and then all
of a sudden you're older and you're back playing those
county fairs in the middle of the afternoon for smaller audiences.
I do believe that what we're seeing for the NBA,
like there's been a lot of grace and forgiveness for
anything the league may have not nailed over the process

(09:36):
of this, because it has felt like a rise, rise, rise, rise, rise.
I'm not sure that there isn't a long term slow
decline happening right now for the NBA that they need
to figure out. And what I will say is that
sometimes when you're on that you know, climb down. I'll
use a band like Diamond Reo for anybody that remembers Dimondria.
They were a big country band in the nineties. I

(09:57):
remember those guys were playing on festivals when we were
when we were first touring, and they were so happy.
They were genuinely happy because it was five o'clock in
the afternoon. They were playing their songs and they're like, man,
people still want to watch our music. And once you
learn to be content with where you are in the spectrum, man,
you can have such a great and glorious ride. The
problem is there are a ton of people are like,
why am I playing? You know what I mean? Like,

(10:19):
I think the.

Speaker 3 (10:19):
Hard party that's great.

Speaker 4 (10:22):
Yeah, it's like yeah. For years for baseball fans it's
been like, give us more credit, give us more credit.
I don't think like at some point you just accept, Hey,
the NFL is what it is, and if that's what
you want, man, go to it. Flock to it and
enjoy it. And if you love what we do, we're
gonna do what we do really well, and we're gonna
appreciate the audience we have. And it's gonna be just fine.
And that's where I think Major League Baseball needs to

(10:42):
learn to be. It's going to be jarring for NBA
heads that have been you know, talking to talk for
a long time when they realize that that's also kind
of where they are, Like all of these sports are wild. Second,
I never thought.

Speaker 3 (10:54):
Of it like that.

Speaker 2 (10:54):
That's a really interesting way to look at it.

Speaker 3 (10:58):
The great analogy, you know, the band.

Speaker 2 (11:02):
I could picture the band in Twilight and I don't know,
you look at like cause you look at baseball and
baseball even more so than the NBA had to deal
with something like that because Baseball was king There was
no doubt about it. Mean, for an entire you know,
you know, forever leading up until what you want to say,

(11:26):
the nineteen nineties, Baseball was king Man. Baseball was you know,
Bob Costas retired. I'm not the biggest constance fan, but
he retired and he was pretty synonymous with baseball, and
you know, it's it's kind of it's kind of interesting

(11:47):
how it all's kind of come about. I think back
to when I was a kid and the World Series
was like musty TV, like there was nothing bigger. The
football game paled to the World Series game, like there
is always the confluence of football, basketball, and baseball in
October and hockey and football was you know, you didn't

(12:12):
even think about the Sunday Night game on ESPN, right,
Like if the World Series was up against it and
that was on the NBC, the World Series was king,
not the ESPN Sunday Night Football, And I got to
think about that. You're you're one hundred percent right. So
we saw the the klin the fall where it not

(12:34):
only fell behind the NFL, but then it probably fell
behind the NBA as well. And now it's kind of
back up right, and it's back up in that spot
where to your point, it's the band that's content, going,
hey man, we're having great moments. We got good ratings,
people are talking about us.

Speaker 3 (12:54):
It's really cool.

Speaker 4 (12:56):
And those are the moments where everybody wants to be
the Rolling Stones, and everybody wants to think that they're
going to play huge arenas there in like huge stadiums,
I should say, their entire life. They're not most of
them aren't, right, But if you can find joy and
being exactly who you are, like, I think we can
all argue, all agree that you know, the new Kids
on the Block and the Backstreet Boys, like their time
of being you know, culturally relevant at the highest possible

(13:19):
level is over. But those are two acts that still
sell out arenas to this day, and they still tour
and they still have a blast, and no, they're not
making what they were, and know they're not. You know,
they can walk up and down the street. I ran
in a couple of years ago when I was traveling
for ESPN. Jordan Knight, he was one of the new kids,
was sitting in a Starbucks and I saw him there
and I just sat down. I was like, hey man,
and we just started I'd never met it before, and

(13:41):
we just started this long conversation. We sat there for
like half an hour. And when I walked away from it,
you know, thinking, by the way, it was a super
nice guy. But when we when I walked away from it,
I was thinking, my god, how cool does it have
to be for him now that he can sit in
a Starbucks across the street from the arena he's playing
the next night and nobody but mobs and nobody bothers him,
And how cool was it for him at their peak

(14:02):
when he couldn't even leave the hotel room without.

Speaker 3 (14:04):
Security you have to experience.

Speaker 4 (14:06):
Yeah, like and I do think that there's some level
of like for for baseball fans revel in this moment,
you know, like just revel in the glory of what
this is because the biggest stars went out and represented
the hell out of the sport, right like, and that's
I just think that's a beautiful thing. You look around
and say, hey, it doesn't really matter right now. If
the NFL is is the big you know, NFL is

(14:27):
Taylor Swift, that's fine. Let the NFL be Taylor Swift.
They do well at that level. People will still flock
to it.

Speaker 2 (14:33):
So that's so interesting, man, you know. So it's funny.
It's a great lesson that like just your take is
I find really really interesting, man, to be honest with you,
which it starts deep today, like the philosophical will amp

(14:54):
up to you know, Penn State, Ohio State, which I like,
I'm really geeked out over, and we'll get into all
the games.

Speaker 3 (15:00):
But I love this discussion.

Speaker 2 (15:02):
Because the NBA fits right into it because the NBA
and you know, like I think about baseball and those moments,
I mean, the Kirk Gibson Freddy Freeman thing, I mean
that was that was freaking outrageous. I mean the fact
that it happened at the same time of the night, Yeah.

Speaker 4 (15:24):
That was I honestly thought that wasn't real, Like that's uh,
you know, up your Twitter x for you know, never
letting me believe anything anymore. When I saw that, I
was like, that can't be accurate. There's just no way.
And then it's like, oh my god, you know you
have to you have to look up everything four hundred
times now because we don't know what we can trust
in information. The fact that that was actually real just

(15:45):
blew my mind. You know what a weird like, what
a weird parallel. And for a new generation, it's almost
like when they you was a movie guy, like when
they suddenly decide that they're going to remake a movie
I didn't think need to be remade, But then all
of a sudden you realize that it just opens up
a whole new generations of vans to something. And that's
what it felt like that moment. Did there are a
bunch of people that hadn't thought of that Kirk Gibson

(16:06):
play forever, and all of a sudden it just brought
it back to the forefront to be at the same time.

Speaker 2 (16:11):
As wild Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I guess you know what,
And it's a good way to look at it, where
you know, the sport has a resurgence or you know
whatever however you want to describe it. But yeah, I
think this postseason, you know, had that I don't you know,

(16:32):
I don't know what it was like for you know,
people that are from the Midwest or you know, from teams,
but they had the great moments like if you're in
Detroit and Cleveland. There were some great playoff moments from
the from the Tigers and the Guardians, right like there
was there were some cool stories. I just thought, like

(16:55):
school Bull was a great story. The Guardians they interesting, uh,
you know, the Mets had a really kind of cool run.
You know, there was there was some good stuff that
came out of the of the whole October and I
don't know, And I guess we can discuss this too,
which is I don't know, I don't know if you

(17:18):
kill the sport this way or worse than the sport.

Speaker 3 (17:22):
I just love October.

Speaker 2 (17:24):
It's so much better than the regular season that I
don't know how you elongate it without killing the regular season,
which is what the NBA did. The NBA and we'll
discuss this next is in a really bad spot now.

(17:44):
They print money, so it's not like it's going to
be an economic disaster, but they're they're close to, like
you said, long term decay, and the sport itself is decaying.

Speaker 4 (18:00):
I don't The NBA is getting a lot closer to
being the NHL right now than it is being the NFL.
And that's that's fine. You know, you mentioned long playoffs
that that immediately makes me think of the Stanley Cup
playoff run, which is its own, just like we even
forget that the regular season existed.

Speaker 3 (18:16):
Right in the NBA.

Speaker 4 (18:17):
Now I am closer to being in that realm than
than they are to being where the NFL is. It's
just that's what happens when you realize how much money
is made by all the playoffs, and you know, we
we sit there and say, well, the playing game has
become the so interested to playing tournament has become so interesting,
and it's it has Like I do believe that the
playing tournament is interesting, but it really does scream just

(18:39):
another reason to not pay attention to the NBA until
you know, until.

Speaker 3 (18:44):
Dude, I hate the playing tournament. I just hate it.

Speaker 2 (18:48):
We'll get into We've got to take a quick time
out and then then I guess we'll talk about it
because it's on my list to gripe about. And there's
a reason why I'm in the center of the decay
with the Sixers, so I kind of wanted to talk
and Chuck supposed that with baseball, I love it.

Speaker 3 (19:06):
We get a little deep with the sports.

Speaker 2 (19:07):
And as we just commence on a early November Saturday,
this is football time, and so we'll get into a
lot of Football's the diegoes on? Where the Fellas, Jason Fitz,
Anthony garganolfiggies off today.

Speaker 3 (19:24):
He's been dealing in Dodgertown.

Speaker 2 (19:28):
That's right, A's we're hanging out here on a Fox
Football Saturday. The Fellas on Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 6 (19:35):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app. Search FSR to
listen live.

Speaker 2 (19:47):
Fellas Jason Fitz, Anthony gargandl Ty iraq dot com Studios.
How was your Big Halloween Bash?

Speaker 4 (20:00):
Good Man? Halloween is just it's weird this year though,
can we acknowledge that, like by it being Thursday, I
had like a ton of people were partying the weekend before,
a ton of people were partying the night of. Now
I've got people that are partying tonight. Like we us
a society need to come to some sort of a
conclusion on how we're going to handle Halloween when it's

(20:20):
not on a weekend, which is again why I support
my my you know, longestad week theory of making every
single holiday in America just like Thanksgiving in the sense
that we always know that Thanksgiving is whatever, the third
fourth Thursday of November, whichever one that is, like that,
it's it's standard. I just want to make every Halloween should.

(20:41):
Halloween should instead of being October thirty first should always
be like the third Saturday in October. Just give us
that so that we know when it is and we
can all come to one conclusion on when we're partying
and how we're trick or treating. Because it's it's wild too,
like because in the South, some people, you know, obviously
down down in Nashville, all those years, like you got
the trunck or treats and everything, and people are doing
like events the weekend before and then you know people

(21:04):
out there, and then what do you do when it rains?
In Nashville, it rained on on Halloween, so I know
a bunch of people down there had multiple nights of
trick or treaters. We've got to come to a consensus
on trick or treating people. We got to figure this out.

Speaker 2 (21:16):
Ah, I'd like the odd day. I know, I'm sorry.
I liked the different day. I like like Christmas is
on Wednesday this year.

Speaker 3 (21:27):
I love that. I like the different days.

Speaker 4 (21:31):
I still support. You know, this is a very very
controversial if I've ever elected, you know, president has to
be very controversial opinion. But you know, if you moved
Christmas permanently to the fourth Saturday of December, everybody Friday.

Speaker 3 (21:45):
Don't bleep with Christmas? Man, then we give everybody Friday,
We've got a problem, dude.

Speaker 4 (21:49):
Everybody gets Christmas Eve off like and then you get
to like that way.

Speaker 2 (21:53):
It's like Christmas is awesome, but it like the days
every weirds little bit different.

Speaker 4 (22:01):
Oh got it. It was a period of my.

Speaker 3 (22:04):
Life, same way.

Speaker 4 (22:05):
It's cool. Oh no, there was a period in my
life a long time ago before I was able to
have any success in music where I had a day job, right,
and Christmas when you have a nine to five, like
it's just a normal nine to five, Christmas on a
Wednesday is like suffocatingly bad because you work usually a
full day or how like I was lucky enough we

(22:26):
got a half day on Tuesday. From that example, and
then you work, you have Christmas on Wednesday, and then
you got to be back at work on Thursday, like
you don't like you're back. So like when I first
still my family was like in you know, in the
Maryland Ary. At that point, I couldn't go home, like,
so I want everybody to have a chance to go home.

Speaker 3 (22:44):
Listen, I get that.

Speaker 2 (22:46):
And during his work issues, I mean forever I used
to cover Chicago, it was the Bulls played every Christmas day.
I did it, you know forever. Then I did and
I fallast off. So you know, sports work, you know,
holidays right then retail those poor people who are really
working hard work holidays. I mean that's what sucks. Like

(23:08):
I wish everybody could have off no matter what the
day of the week is.

Speaker 4 (23:12):
See, and that's why I'm.

Speaker 3 (23:14):
I don't think it matters because.

Speaker 4 (23:16):
I can't see. I can't force because I was. I
was working for a stock brokeers firm. Like it's you know,
like a little underling on it. Not like I was
a big successful stockbroker, but I was working for a
brokerage firm. The markets are open Tuesday, they're open every
day but Christmas. So like you know, here I am,
I'm I wasn't. I was barely making enough when I
first started, barely making enough money to pay my bills,

(23:36):
and I still had to work the day before and
the day after.

Speaker 2 (23:38):
So well, but most places you don't. I mean, retail
is the real problem.

Speaker 4 (23:47):
Really, Like if you work at a like just a
regular normal widget company, you know, nine to five the
day before the day after, aren't.

Speaker 2 (23:54):
You No, you're not working day after Christmas and you're
not working Christmas Eve from now normal companies that had
nothing to do with that, you know, you bring up
you know, finance or sports or and number one's retail,
right or you know, God blessed, you know, first respond

(24:16):
there's police fire, right like you know, I mean, you're
always working. There's certain you know, there's certain places that
you're always working, but most people don't. I mean, we
work at media, and that's different yeah, yeah, yeah, No,
I know we're in a different like.

Speaker 4 (24:32):
Look, I don't mind the fact that like football, football
now makes Thanksgiving and Christmas for you know, for me,
it's a work day. I don't mind that at all.
Like I don't talk about sports for a living. So
I'm not going to complain about.

Speaker 3 (24:42):
Working on a hobab exactly.

Speaker 4 (24:43):
That's not I'm a man of the people. I'm worried
about the little people that, you know, the little people
like I'm with you, do be.

Speaker 2 (24:49):
Fair because I want to get into this discussion and
I I gotta do trending or else.

Speaker 3 (24:53):
You know, I get I get it, let's hear it. Yeah.

Speaker 7 (24:58):
We had a Friday Night lights act in a college
football as a Boise State, showing that they very well
could be the favorite to make the College Football Playoff
as the group of five entrant. They had a dominating
performance on the blue turf Friday Night, fifty six to
twenty four. The Broncos win it to move to seven
and one and four and zero in Mountain West play.

(25:21):
Yukon is now Bowl eligible after beating Georgia State thirty
four to twenty seven, so the Huskies now six and
three in South Florida a blot win at Florida Atlantic
forty four to twenty one. In the NBA Timberwolves and
Nuggets huge matchup in Minneapolis, Anthony Edwards taking over down
the stretches. He'd finish with twenty nine points uplift Minnesota

(25:42):
to a one nineteen one at sixteen victory. Nikolai jokicch
a rebound shy of a triple double twenty six points,
nine rebounds, thirteen assists, but some tough news for Denver
as Jamal Murray had to leave the game in the
third quarter and has since been placed into concussion protocol.
On the score from around the Association, Thunder over the

(26:03):
Trailblazers one thirty seven to one, fourteen. Pelicans meet the
Pacers one twenty five one eighteen. The Lakers get thirty
eight points and eleven rebounds from Anthony Davis, and they
bounce back from the loss of the Caves. They beat
the Raptors on the road one thirty one to one
twenty five. Nets of the Bulls one twenty one twelve.
Kings beat the Hawks won twenty three one fifteen. Nicks
will the blowout win against the Pistons one twenty eight

(26:25):
ninety eight Cavaliers take down the Magic one twenty one
oh nine, and the Celtics will They won twenty four
one oh nine victory against the Charlotte Hornets.

Speaker 3 (26:33):
Beet you guys, all right, buddy, thank you, We appreciate it.

Speaker 2 (26:37):
Where the fellas Jason Fitz Anthony Gargano from Lee Tirerack
dot Com Studios.

Speaker 3 (26:44):
So, DBA, we have to get into.

Speaker 2 (26:50):
This for a couple of moments because I don't want
to run this by Dick. I freaking hate this leak,
all right. I love basketball. Okay, you know I could
sit here and you know we're sports heads, right, so
we could do I could do chapter and verse on
all four of the major sports I like. In soccerpe

(27:12):
for that matter, the NBA. I love basketball. The NBA
is a wretched, wretched product. And it's just a meaningless
eighty two games and I'm in the middle of the
de value of the NBA regular season. The seventy six

(27:33):
ers have started this season without their two best players,
Joel Beand and Paul George. Paul George is legitimately hurt.
Now are they taking their time bringing him back? Yeah,
but it's kind of understandable. Jella Dean, who has been
a you know, he's a tremendous talent who's been all injured.

(27:56):
He's a big and I guess it comes. It certainly
comes with the territory for some bigs, and he's the
poster child for it. He played in the Olympics, he
has in need. It's been been ambiguous as to whether
or not, like what the actual issue is.

Speaker 3 (28:16):
With the knee. He plays.

Speaker 2 (28:19):
He's been practicing five on five, but he's yet.

Speaker 3 (28:23):
To play in the game, and.

Speaker 2 (28:25):
People are like, what are you guys doing Like they're
not you know, you're they're not. They haven't been forthright
to the fan base is to you know what the
situation is, and you know, there's he looks great. He's
just this is like management of the knee.

Speaker 3 (28:44):
It's all this craziness.

Speaker 2 (28:45):
So people are because they have fed up, they have
enough and they're getting ripped. So in Bed, who never speaks,
calls a press conference yesterday, and at the press conference
and Beat's talking about how you it does deserve to
be treated this way, and he hits you with the
all I've done for this city.

Speaker 3 (29:07):
And this is this is where this.

Speaker 2 (29:11):
Whole league has no perspective, right, This is where the
athlete is completely on another planet. The fact that he
would utter the words what I've done for this city,
it just shows you you got you live in another

(29:31):
world man, that you have no concept of reality. When
he listen, if you're building schools and you know you're
you're an athlete that has been you know, winning championships
and bring in all kinds of does all kinds of
charity works and everything else. I'm sure you know when

(29:52):
you generate five hundred million dollars, there's a charitable part
of your company right of who you are. But the
concept of what I've done for this city is the
most outlandish.

Speaker 3 (30:10):
And I like him being right.

Speaker 2 (30:11):
I was always big and Bee fan, but it's the
most outlandish thing to say. It's talk about no perspective.
You mean, what you've done to earn five hundred million
dollars your job? Like these dudes are completely entitled, and
God forbid they get the least bit of criticism, they

(30:33):
just go crazy and nobody could take it. And the
fact that matter is the product of six is put
out there. On Wednesday night, in a loss to the Pistons,
was an absolute disgrace and they completely Any fan that
was at the game that paid money deserves a freaking refund.

Speaker 4 (30:54):
The hard part is, because you're right about so much
of that. As people start to say what I've done
for this city, it reminds you of the hardest thing
about critiquing people that have given, and like, at some
point you have to be able to say when you
give a grace without expectation of acknowledgment, in my opinion,

(31:18):
just in life. So you know, the fact is, as
I say this, like every year at Christmas, I the
last several years I've gone to a shelter or Thanksgiving
the same thing, gone to a shelter and tried to
feed people. Right Like, I don't do that because I
want to put it on social media and have everybody
be like, oh my god, you're the best. I do
it because I'm trying to get back to the community.
I think that at some point you look at again,

(31:40):
I'll go to other industries, whether we're talking about actors
or musicians or just rich tech people. Of philanthropy is
a huge part of that. In large part if you
want to be cynical because you get a huge tax
write off for doing it so like there's a fine
line on all of this and the fact is somebody
that's given a lot of money to the community, I
want to say thank you for that, and then you

(32:01):
say thank you, period. End of statement. Now let's talk
about what you're doing with your job. There are two
very different conversations, like this is really hard for everybody,
but yeah, buttonism doesn't work very well for me. And
I don't know when I've said this to you before,
but I'll apply it here. I don't know when we
decided that it was okay as adults to argue like

(32:22):
we are children. And I know when I was a kid,
if my mom came in and said, why'd you do that,
and I'm like, yeah, well they did it, okay, I'd
still got my ass beat. If my mom came in
and said why'd you do that and I was like, well,
you know what you do this, I give my ass beat.
Like there's a level of why we get to deflect
it every every turn. I don't understand. That's just a

(32:44):
difference in the way my process is things. So like,
I think it's fair to turn around and say, Joel Embiid,
you have given tremendous money time and resources to community.
Thank you. Stop now now that we finished that statement,
what about because as I say this, without any bullet
leaning one way or the other, you want to talk
about people that can absolutely die on the hill of

(33:05):
look at what I've done for the community. That would
be the answer of basically every single politician. Yet we
still have to hold them accountable for the work that
they do, the good and the bad. So it doesn't
like there it's two separate categories that are being co
mingled by Joe Ellenbid and I don't agree with that
at all.

Speaker 3 (33:21):
Now, I mean, I gotta tell you too, I'll be
honest with you.

Speaker 2 (33:25):
It was in the front took it asn't been fan.

Speaker 4 (33:30):
He's a classic deflecting too.

Speaker 3 (33:32):
I'd be worried. Are you?

Speaker 2 (33:33):
Are you out of your mind? What you've done for
the city? Stop like you've accrued five hundred million dollars.

Speaker 3 (33:43):
That's part of the equation. I'm sorry, you don't get credit.

Speaker 4 (33:46):
It's fair. You don't get credit.

Speaker 3 (33:48):
You will recruit five hundred million dollars. That's what you've done.

Speaker 2 (33:51):
All right, You've done your job to go away and
give me you you play, you play both like what
it's what he meant to say, I think was well,
why he criticized me. I've played hurt, right like, and
that's a fair statement to say you've played hurt. You know,
you're all injured, but you know you give it a shot,

(34:14):
right whatever. You broke your orbital ball twice, so that's fair.

Speaker 4 (34:18):
Yeah, But is that being done for the city, of
course not.

Speaker 2 (34:22):
That's where it's That's where it's in the front. I
mean quite frankly, Hey, we got to take quick to you.
We'll come back. And this is all big part of
a pool of the entitlement of the league that is
completely unlikable. Where the fella is right here Fox Sports
Radio Fell is from the tairaq dot com studios. You know,

(34:49):
it's funny that what have you done for me lately?

Speaker 3 (34:52):
Right?

Speaker 2 (34:52):
Like people don't they love the throat of your face,
right like, oh, you know you treat Look how we're treated.

Speaker 3 (35:00):
It's just a packed man.

Speaker 2 (35:03):
Like you know, the agulation can't come twenty four to seven,
three sixty five every year, right unless you're you know,
Michael Jordan Lebron James, like you know, you think about
that league and the league is has a real issue
because you know, it's three wise men, the three great stars, right,
lebron kd and Staph are in the twilight, and there's

(35:27):
nobody else to really take this place that have that
kind of mag of that magnitude. Right, there's some great ballplayers.
There's some girly good young players. Uh, there's some you know,
Luca and Jokic, and there's some you know, Wemby's promising. Right,
there's some really good talent. But like those three guys
had had it all, the league is going through that

(35:51):
transition period that it goes that it went through post Jordan.
But the issue is the amount of you know, entitlement
from the players. It's outrageous really when you think about it.

Speaker 4 (36:06):
It's hard for a current player to understand that they're
in that moment because players are wired to think that
they are the greatest. Like that's part of what it
takes to be part of the one percent. I do
believe that, And so what's hard is it's hard to
explain to any of these guys. Hey, by the way, Yeah,
I mean it's not like you're Michael, you know, like

(36:27):
there's a sense to me of how do you because
everything you're saying is true. I agree with all of it.
This is a transition period. The guys in the league
don't see it as such because what they see is
the global money coming in is absolutely wild, and that
you know, they're part of the league that is talked
about on ESPN every day, so that it must be

(36:48):
things must be great. And it's like, I don't know.
I think we all get in our bubble, and once
you're in your bubble, you have an inflated self. Forth
and again, I'll just I'll go back to the number
of times I've sat there. I've sat on tour us
Is with acts that are huge in country music that
are complaining about the fact that, like all they're doing
is selling out twenty three, twenty four thousand. Why is this?

(37:08):
You know, these people over here are selling out stadiums
every night. They're not any better. Like and people lose
once you're in that, especially you toddled to that point,
you just lose so much perspective on exactly where you are.
I just and you're right by the way. I mean,
we're looking at like WEMBN Yama think about that, like
one of the most talented and hyped prospects we've ever

(37:31):
seen come into the league and the conversation on when
min Yama is a whisper now compared why, because man,
to even get to the point of Lebron and Michael,
you got to win so much. That stuff takes time,
Like you got to win enough for people to love
and hate you all at once. And that's just man,
that just takes a lot more time than I think
people realize. So it is a transition.

Speaker 3 (37:50):
Pirity, it really is.

Speaker 2 (37:52):
And you know, I mean, now, the big picture is
it's not Embeed an entitlement and players, and that's a thing.
The real big picture in this whole thing is the
Sixers are treating Embiid and I get it like a
you know, like this delicate object, which he is. And

(38:13):
they're basically gonna devalue the regular season because it's all
about this tournament, right, It's all about the spring. And
so they're not gonna risk Embeid. They're Knaki's they're gonna
come back slower from the knees and big and there's
medical reason for it, an whole thing. And Paul George
is an older player, so you're gonna do the same

(38:34):
thing with him, and they're they're gonna kind of coast,
daring the regular season and hope they can amp it
up and make a run in this.

Speaker 4 (38:43):
Tournament because because what they're telling us, Anthony, is that
the regular season doesn't matter. That would be their answer
is the regular season doesn't matter. If they know it
doesn't matter, if we know in front of a microphone,
it doesn't matter. Why, Like, what's the message to fans?
How am I supposed to make any weak night game
in the NBA a big deal when the fact is
the NBA doesn't make it a big deal, like let's

(39:03):
just all just sit here until we get to the playoffs.

Speaker 2 (39:05):
It is it's completely wild, Like so you flush your
flushing a whole season, a whole regular season, all those
games nobody should truthfully, nobody should go because if it
don't matter, it's all an exhibition of a night. What
is the messaging.

Speaker 3 (39:27):
It's a huge problem for that sport. Huge problem. Fellas
on Fox.

Speaker 1 (39:33):
Don't listening to Fox Sports Radio Radio.

Speaker 3 (39:36):
Well, good morning, good morning, good morning.

Speaker 2 (39:37):
I'm on that happy happy Fox Football Saturday. Fellas, Jason
Fitz Anthony gar End up coming alive from the ti
rack dot Com Studios. Tire rack dot Com will help
you get there and I'm Matt selection fans, free shipping,
free road atser protection, over ten thousand recommended installers, tire
rack dot com, the way tire buying should be. And

(40:00):
we move closer six hours from kickoff.

Speaker 3 (40:03):
I cannot wait for this game, FITZI.

Speaker 2 (40:06):
It is number three Penn State, number four Ohio State.

Speaker 3 (40:11):
That is the jewel of today. It is going to
be a.

Speaker 2 (40:18):
Sunny November day, probably about you know, high fifties, low sixties,
perfect autumnal November day for number three, number v four
on a Fox big noon kickoff.

Speaker 4 (40:37):
Yeah, and couldn't be better timing for this, I mean
not the time of the day of the game. I
know Penn State fans upset that this game isn't at night,
but they couldn't be better timing. We get our first
College Football Playoff Committee rankings on Tuesday, so this is
a great opportunity to make a statement to write before
the committee releases those first rankings. And this is a
big game. I think one of the things that really,

(40:59):
you know, everybody keeps talking about Drew Aller, who was
the starting quarterback a Penn State who was injured in
the first half of their game last week, but I
would say this, There wasn't a drop off in the
second half, and that to me just speaks to how
good the offense has become. A Penn State under a
new offensive coordinator that's just driving the ball deeper down
the field. You can see it. Penn State obviously physical

(41:21):
on the defensive side of the ball too, But man,
I think there's a lot of faith that comes in. Hey,
even if Drew Aller can't go, we know that we're
gonna be just fine. We're gonna be okay. This Penn
State offense is different. This is gonna be a real challenge.
And if you're Ohio State, you're looking at it saying
the good news is, Man, we faced the best offense
we're gonna face all year in theory when we took

(41:43):
on Oregon at Oregon and we took that offense like
so we handle that offense as but well as you can.
So you know, I think Ohio State has a little
bit of been there, done that when it comes to
facing explosive teams. But man, this feels like it's just
gonna be just a absolute hit him in the mouth.
Players are gonna you're gonna have to break lucky, not
good like. It's just this feels like points are gonna

(42:04):
be a little bit at a premium to me.

Speaker 3 (42:06):
Yeah, me too. Uh So we'll see that Aler.

Speaker 2 (42:11):
You know, I I think he's gonna play. I'm not,
you know again, just from which I've heard from people,
and uh so I think there's a good chance of it.
But I will say this, that bo Purple you talked about,
it came in last week and they did uh and
they didn't miss a beaten. Part of it was it
was interesting, it was great coaching. The uh they completely

(42:34):
scrapped so so Aler has a big arm and uh
and bo Is is more of a your runner, more
of a read option you know type of thing. So
they they completely scrapped their offense and morphed it into
more of a read option offense. So I give the
coaches a ton of credit. So this is interesting and that.

Speaker 4 (42:57):
Was a great by the way, to that point, bo
using his legs was such a dynamic that obviously Wisconsin
couldn't have been ready for. There was nothing they could
do about that, right, There was not much plan for
that moment. It was definitely a bit of a gut punch.
I think it'll be interesting to see how Ohio State
this week is prepared because they are, you know, different

(43:17):
enough stylistically. And I'll remind everybody that the offensive coordinator
came from Kansas, where mobility at the quarterback position was
a key. That's something they really wanted Kansas, so wanted
at Kansas. So you know, you look at these moments
and you're like, hey, from a coordinator standpoint, and both
he's got both tricks in his bag, and that's there's
power to that at Ohio State. You know, we talk
about injuries. Ohio State's offensive line is banged up, so

(43:40):
it just, man, it just feels like both of these
defenses are going to have a chance to get after it.

Speaker 2 (43:46):
Yeah, I think you nailed it right there. I think
the whole key to the game comes down to one thing.
Can Penn State exploit Ohio State's offensive line, because if
it can't get to Howard then then they're not gonna win.
Then Ohio State will survive. It's all about the pressure

(44:08):
they have. They got Carter to get a kick. This
kick Carter can get to the quarterback they got, they
got some players, they got a decent front, and can
they collapse Ohio State The Ohio State's offense.

Speaker 3 (44:21):
That to me is the whole game.

Speaker 2 (44:23):
It to me, it's Ohio State, Ohio State's offense versus
the Penn State front And can they you know, can
they exploit that.

Speaker 3 (44:33):
Tackle spot that's their line.

Speaker 2 (44:35):
They have a couple of week spots at tackle and
at and some and along the interior you.

Speaker 3 (44:42):
Can collapse them. That's gonna be to me, that where
the game's won.

Speaker 4 (44:48):
Yeah, and let's I know, we just mentioned Penn State's
quarterback got some some rushing yards last week, but neither
team ran the ball with their running backs very effectively
last week. So, uh, can you be made one dimensional?
Because you don't want to be made when your offensive
line is having an issue and you have an issue
at left tackle and by the way, you're taking on
a defensive front that has Abdul Carter on it. It's

(45:11):
absolutely He's absolutely beast this season. I do think there
is a concern of are we made one dimensional? If
we can't run the football either side I'm talking about
if you can't run the football with some level of effectiveness,
then you're gonna have an issue in this because they
are going to tee off on those quarterbacks and man,
I think both teams looking back at the tape last week,
would say, Man, we should have been more physical at

(45:31):
the line of scrimmage. We should have run the football
better with our backs, and that's you know, that's going
to be part of this. That's why I wouldn't be
surprised at all to see both teams just trying to
hammer through the run game, even if it's not successful. Early.

Speaker 2 (45:43):
Yeah, yeah, it's good. I am upset that it's not
at night, to be.

Speaker 4 (45:48):
Honest with Yeah, should have been a night game. Should
have been a wide up.

Speaker 2 (45:51):
I love I love the Big New kickoff, but you know,
the prime time game is always special, and I get it.
I think tonight would have been games set in a
or old series. So you know, you're not you're not
putting you you're not going to put that game on
at night. You can't and you want to make sure
you protect that game. That's a that's a huge game.

Speaker 4 (46:12):
I couldn't too because they're both Fox, so like it right,
be right, like there was.

Speaker 3 (46:17):
No choice because of the World Series that it has
to be.

Speaker 2 (46:21):
They're they're calling for a white out, so an afternoon
white out next week? Is there white out that's when
the whole state it's cool.

Speaker 3 (46:30):
Happy values are great. Have you been there?

Speaker 4 (46:33):
Yeah? I went with Game Day to a white out
game a couple of years ago and it was it
was surreal, like.

Speaker 3 (46:40):
You know, and pretty cool, right.

Speaker 4 (46:42):
Yeah, when you think back to the wild environments like
that was definitely white out game at night. Man. You
you could you can feel the rumble in your teeth,
which is like the best stadiums. Yeah, standing on the sideline,
you could just you can feel the crowd through your
bones and that that definitely hit like that was how
is a wild different environment?

Speaker 3 (47:01):
Yeah, yeah, no, you're yeah, it's it really is.

Speaker 2 (47:05):
It's it's something man, And today that's to me the
jewel of the whole day. You got Oregon in Michigan, Man,
an't amazing freaking Oregon is a fourteen and a half
point favorite at the Big House. I mean, you know,
you're just a year a well off of the National
Championship and now Oregon's a fourteen and a half point

(47:28):
favorite or a Michigan.

Speaker 4 (47:31):
Yeah, just thinking about the fact that Michigan has fallen
so far that now it's like, well, just want to
make sure we don't fall asleep on this Michigan game,
but they just they're so I always talked about one dimensional.
I don't know how you get into modern college football
at the highest level and you don't have a guy
that can complete a pass. It just doesn't have any
shot at a passing game at this point. And you

(47:53):
know that's we're not talking about the service academies ten
years ago. Like you can't win at the Big ten
if you can't spread them out do something, and they
just they can't. And you know how about not.

Speaker 2 (48:04):
Get a quarterback. It's unbelievable. It's unbelievable to me that
they can't get a quarterback.

Speaker 4 (48:12):
Yeah, and that's the most inexcusable thing that can happen
to it. That's what when this happens, when you have
no quarterback and it's not because of injury, you just
don't have a guy that can throw the football. I
think you got to look at your recruiting staff and say,
what did we do here? Because this makes no sense.
Like in today's world, quarterbacks can be bought. Let's just
be very clear about that.

Speaker 2 (48:32):
You want to the era of the portal, that's the
whole point, Like it's the era of the portal.

Speaker 3 (48:38):
What do you think, like.

Speaker 2 (48:40):
Huh, Like, here's the thing, Like, let me throw this
at you. So, Kyle McCord, now I think he was
a scapegoat by Ryan Day, all right. I know I
know the family, and I think Ryan Date escapegoat to
that kid. Whatever you want to call it, it is
what it is. It is right, So goes to Syracuse.

(49:01):
You're gonna tell me that if you're Michigan, you don't
make and you know what, you got a quarterback, you
don't make a run.

Speaker 4 (49:08):
From a Cord doesn't make any sense to me.

Speaker 3 (49:11):
I mean, he's the perfect guy, chip on your shoulder.

Speaker 2 (49:14):
You come in and he's good, he's competent, right like
you know he he may not be you know, uh
Carson back. But if kid's good, kid can play like
he's you could see, and if you can, you protect
him with that.

Speaker 3 (49:31):
Line like like what what's like? Why would you do that?

Speaker 2 (49:35):
I just, for the life of me don't understand why
they come into this season without a quarterback.

Speaker 4 (49:42):
Yeah, and that is you look around the landscape. I
mean look no further than Oregon. Oregon knew they had
to make an aggressive offer for Dylan Gabriel. They did.
Dylan Gabriel is their quarterback. By the way, Dylan Gabriel
left Oklahoma, Oklahoma was comfortable letting him walk out of
the room because they thought they had guys there that
could just handle the position. Those guys have not handled

(50:03):
the position. You can't tell me we don't look at
prep venables differently, the head coach of Oklahoma right now,
because you had a guy in your building that now
has a shot at the Heisman, playing for the number
one team in the country, and you don't have a quarterback,
you can trust them, So like this is the just
like not having a quarterback will get you fired in
the NFL, modern college football, this gets you fired. Like

(50:25):
just look at the number of transfer quarterbacks that are
out there and then ask yourself, why do we not
have one? Why is Dylan Gabriel somewhere Wise Camboard somewhere,
you know, go up in that Wise Will Howard somewhere,
Like they're all all of these quarterbacks can be bought,
and so it's really a question.

Speaker 3 (50:41):
You can't you.

Speaker 2 (50:42):
Can't bemoane the state of Kyle. Oh, we don't want
to do that. We don't want to get involved with
the portal. We don't want to do that. Oh yeah,
well if you don't do that, you're done. So this
is it, like you got to embrace it or else
you're not going to compete at that level.

Speaker 4 (51:01):
And like I always say, if it's as simple as
raising the money at the most important position in sports,
raise the damn money. Like, I mean, I can't say.

Speaker 3 (51:11):
That loud enough.

Speaker 4 (51:12):
If all you need is cash to get a quarterback,
and you don't have a salary cap in your system,
how you go get you a quarterback? Like and so
from Michigan, they're they're so frustratingly inept on offense. I mean, Oregon,
I wouldn't be surprised for Oregon be to by thirty.
And then that's I know, that's that's wild at the

(51:34):
Big House a year after winning a Natty.

Speaker 3 (51:36):
I know, it's it really is crazy, it really is.

Speaker 2 (51:42):
This is uh, you know, it's it's weird because this
is that week that you have, you know, like you're
where you look at and you go, all right, well
there's some good stuff, but again, you know you're kind
of waiting for the prime time nine stud games, you know.

Speaker 4 (52:03):
Yeah, I mean I think this is where college football
can bank on one big game and basically say, hey,
this is the game. Everybody's gonna pay attention to it.
This is the one we all want to see. It's
according to I don't know how the stat Winnie's come
up with this, but according to the stat wenis that
are amazing. In stats in info group at ESPN, I
heard that this was this was predicted to be the

(52:24):
best remaining game of the calendar year for Ohio State
Penn State for the rest of the season.

Speaker 3 (52:29):
This is get that.

Speaker 4 (52:31):
But yeah, I don't know how to figure that stuff out,
but that I speaks brother. Like, imagine remember when Florida
Georgia mattered, Like because I just want to remind everybody
that cocktail party is today and nobody cares.

Speaker 2 (52:44):
Yeah, well, I mean that's I mean, look, you get
Florida back. I mean, that's just what it is. I mean,
next week, here's a couple of previews. Right, So next
week you got Georgian Ole miss that's a good game.
And then you got Alibi MLSU, which is a great game.
I mean, that's gonna be a great football game.

Speaker 4 (53:04):
Yeah, that's going to be stunning. That's a huge implication.
That's winner loser leaves town matches. What that is like,
that's the old ladies wrestling loser leaves town match for
that one, because they're going to be leaving the end
of the college football playoff match from that.

Speaker 2 (53:19):
And then you got the November sixteenth is Tennessee Georgia, right,
Like that's going to be outrageous Tennessee Georgia. And then
and then you know, I'll tell you what the game
that's gonna be awesome and it's at Yankee Stadium in

(53:41):
a couple of weeks November twenty whatever it is, fourth
is or November twenty third is Army Notre Dame and
that'll be a prime time game.

Speaker 4 (53:52):
Yeah, that's the other statement win opportunity. Where Notre Dame
is placed by the College Football Playoff Committee is going
to be one of the more interest things that we'll
see from their first rankings. It's going to be a
pretty historic rankings. It's more complicated than people may realize
that haven't been paying attention to it. Remember, the committee
is not going to sit here and just tell you

(54:13):
they're going to give you two things. They're going to
give you rankings, and then seating will come from those rankings.
And I just have to keep stressing that that if
you're watching on Tuesday, not that there's anything else going
on here'll just be watching the first college Football Playoff
Committee Tuesday. If you're watching Tuesday and they give you
one through twelve, understand that that is not at all
what the actual seating would be for the playoffs. There's

(54:33):
a real scenario where, for example, right now, Oregon's the
number one team in the country. You know, Penn State's three,
Ohio States four. If it were to be a college
football playoff ranking, they might have the same thing. But
by the time you do the seating, that means that,
you know, the fourth ranked team in the playoffs might
end up with the seven seeds. So just understand that,
because the top four seeds go to the top four

(54:55):
power for the top four conference champions, and then there's
a guaranteed a group of five team involved in this,
the playoff seating will look far different than the rankings
that you see from the committee.

Speaker 2 (55:06):
Wow, that's gonna be interesting. Yeah, that's gonna be a
lot of fun. I mean, thank god, right, I mean, otherwise,
if this was normal, the normal year, you're just looking at, well,
here it is, you know, October Zone, the minute October ends.
I feel I get depressed because there's one there's only

(55:29):
one more month really left in the season, right, and
and then now with the playoff, it adds so much.
There's a whole other layer because it's not just nonsense
Bowl games and you know, and then three games, right
like the two playoff games in the championship games. It

(55:49):
now feels like there's something. I say it every year,
but man, it's November, and I get depressed. It moves
too quick. October, the greatest month the season, is just
so fast.

Speaker 3 (56:04):
Man.

Speaker 4 (56:06):
Just imagine for everybody that again hasn't paid attention before Christmas.
This year, the weekend of the twentieth Friday, December twentieth
will be first round playoff games Friday and Saturday. The Friday,
December twentieth Saturday, December twenty first will be the first
round of the playoffs. For the first time ever, we're
going to see a playoff game that could involve in

(56:27):
a weird let's just you know, imaginary say saying here,
you could be looking at Alabama having to go up
to Penn State and play a first round playoff game
of the weekend before Christmas and then New Year's Eve
instead of giving us, you know, bowl games that may
or may not matter. I still hate that they're on
New Year's Eve. But on New Year's Eve there will
be a playoff quarter final. On New Year's Day there

(56:47):
will be three quarter final games like this is. This
is great, Like we're gonna have college football all the
way the national championship this year is and until December
isn't until January twentieth, like this is I love it.
Such a different such a different mind around it, especially
in the month of December, where we're not, to your point,
just gonna be twiddling our thumbs. We'll still twiddle our
thumbs with bowl games because they're still gonna matter to

(57:10):
the fans that go to them and to the teams
to get to go to them. They're still gonna find
joy in playing in whatever the Music City Bowl. But like,
let's be real, those couple of weeks leading up, man,
it's going to be epic playoff football for college football
for the first time ever. Like the Fellas on Saturday,
December twenty first, are going to be previewing three college
football playoff games. Like god, that just feels epic.

Speaker 3 (57:33):
Yeah it does. I love you as you say it
gets popped up.

Speaker 2 (57:37):
Fellas will take quick t come right back right here.
I gotta get back to that. We have to put
a bow on that NBA conversation where the fellas hanging
right here?

Speaker 3 (57:47):
Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 6 (57:49):
the nation. Catch all of our shows at foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app. Search FS to
listen live.

Speaker 2 (58:01):
Welcome back Fellas, Jason Fitz, Anthony Gargano, Hey, don't forget
football fans, be sure to tune into Fox Sports Radio
every Saturday morning right after rouslin a m Eastern six
am Pacific Countdown to kick Off, presented by Bett MGM,
Brian no rich Ororenberger. Betting analyst Jared Smith got you
covered three hours before college kickoffs. Every Saturday morning, listen

(58:26):
to Countdown and Kickoff, presented by Bet MGM right here
on Fox Sports Radio in the iHeartRadio app. Don't forget too.
Shortly after our show's over, the podcast goes up, so
be sure to check it out. You miss any portion
of the program, you got it right on the podcast.
Just search Fox Sports Radio wherever you get your podcasts.
You'll see this show pop up right after we get

(58:49):
off the air, all right, I just want to put
a bow because I'm a d D like that if
I see something that's hanging out there, I have to
close it. Even though do we have a whole completely
different audience, I'm sure if we started to show we're.

Speaker 3 (59:04):
Talking about baseball.

Speaker 2 (59:05):
And I love the fact that that fitzi uh is
that it really enjoyed this baseball postseason and he cleaved
to the Dodgers and it was h it was just fun,
right and and listen as a baseball fan, I thought
it was a great postseason and there was some great moments,
and I love the fact that you were in on it.

(59:26):
So we get on this whole discussion about baseball knowing
where it's at right now, understanding and feeling good about
its positioning in the sports landscape. And the NBA is
another animal, and it's the value of the regular season

(59:48):
has really just it's killing it.

Speaker 3 (59:52):
It's killing it in a big way.

Speaker 4 (59:55):
So how do we bring the value? And you like,
as someone that lives in an NBA city, and this
is always my great question, how do we bring value
to an NBA product that doesn't have value until June?
And then you know, realistically the NBA product. I think
the other part of it has become so divisive for
so many people. Like you've got players and former players

(01:00:16):
that will stand up and say every conversation about the
NBA is ill informed and it's not nuanced enough to
the way the sport is played without acknowledging that. When
you watch NFL coverage, if we're being fair, ninety percent
of it is not sitting down like it's rare. I
know Ryan Clark and Dan Orlovski is sort of the
exception on NFL lot, but you most of the coverage
we see on the NFL is you know, basic, top

(01:00:40):
top level, very shallow, like good bar conversation. We rarely
see somebody say, well, the problem is he took a
false step here and this guy wasn't in this gap,
and like we we rarely see x's in those conversations.
But I feel like part of the hard part for
the NBA is that the players and former players come
out loudly and say that everybody talking about the game
doesn't really know and they're all stupid. So then it

(01:01:03):
forces less conversation about it because it feels like you've
got to be suddenly some level of expert but b
if you put that level of expertise out there, guess what,
Like like people don't consume it, like if you sat there,
if you want to do Like I love watching some
of that high pick and roll conversation that we've seen
with JJ Reddick and Lebron. I think it's really smart,

(01:01:24):
it's fun, but compared to what most media outlets are
putting out every day, Like, that's not what most people
are flocking to on a Tuesday afternoon, you know what
I mean?

Speaker 2 (01:01:32):
So, like, unless you're a geek like I like stuff
like that, I'll be honest with you.

Speaker 4 (01:01:36):
I love but you you love NFL like you, and
I pull.

Speaker 2 (01:01:39):
Like I watched film, I watch, Yeah, I got the
NFL films and watch film and then I enjoy that stuff.

Speaker 4 (01:01:45):
I enjoy rewatching, like I watch the All twenty twos
and I enjoy enjoy rewatching college football games like I'm
trying to find the nuance. I love that, but most
fans aren't sitting there, so like the hard part is
to do that right and so like, you don't want
me to have an unair quotes, uninformed conversation. Don't want
me just to talk about the soap opera, but what

(01:02:05):
you market is the soap operas, because the soap opera
of the offseason is more interesting than the actual regular
season and none of it has any meeting until we
get to the playoffs, and by the time.

Speaker 3 (01:02:13):
We get all the out we're.

Speaker 4 (01:02:15):
Lost on all of it. So like, I just don't
know what the sport even wants out of the way
it's supposed to be covered that will help it grow,
Because amazingly, I cannot say this loud enough, if the
Jacksonville Jaguars were undefeated right now, they would be the
talk of the town and they would be on every
single outlet everywhere, because that's what the NFL has figured
out how to do. In college football, We've heard more

(01:02:36):
can talk about Boise State this year than we have
in the last ten years combined, because they have a
shot at the college football playoff. Like this is what
happens in the NBA, the NHL, Major League Baseball. None
of those sports are built in a way to make
meaningful conversations of unexpected teams being great because the regular
season doesn't matter exactly.

Speaker 3 (01:02:55):
Do be fair, sit right there, because it's a great point.
Let's get some trending and it.

Speaker 7 (01:02:59):
Will just NBA action on Friday. It was a great
matchup we had up in Minneapolis, Timberwolves and Nuggets, and
down the stretch it was Anthony Edwards taken over this one.

Speaker 2 (01:03:11):
Top of the key to call me back over to
Edwards thirty seconds to go. Edwards hasn't working against Porter
Coase to the left hand.

Speaker 3 (01:03:18):
He's of the page.

Speaker 4 (01:03:19):
Bob Guys, Time out.

Speaker 7 (01:03:22):
Denver call from the Minnesota Timberwolves radio networkdout was part
of twenty nine points from Anthony Edwards as he gets
Minnesota to way one nineteen one at sixteen victory. Nikola
Jokic a rebound shy of a triple double twenty six points,
nine rebounds, thirteen assists, but some not great news for

(01:03:42):
the Denver Nuggets, as Jamal Murray had to leave the
game in the third quarter and has since been placed
into a concussion of protocol. Thunderbeat The Trailblazers won thirty
seven one fourteen thirty points by shake Gilles Alexander Pelicans
over the Pacers won twenty five one eighteen, and the
Lakers bounced back to beat the Raptors one thirty one

(01:04:04):
to won twenty five Anthony Davis with thirty eight points
and eleven rebounds. Kings beat the Hawks won twenty three
one eighteen. Nets over the Bowls won twenty one twelve.
Nicks bought the Pistons on the road one twenty eight,
ninety eight, Cavaliers beat the Magic won twenty one oh nine,
and Celtics over the Hornets won twenty four to.

Speaker 3 (01:04:19):
Two one oh nine.

Speaker 7 (01:04:21):
In at college football, we had three games on Friday Night.
Number fifteen boys he State, the one ranked team in action,
and they showed that they very well could be a
playoff contender for that group of five. Spy was a
blowout win against the San Diego State Astacks fifty six
to twenty four. So the Broncos now seven and one
on the season. Yukon, don't look now, but the Huskies

(01:04:42):
bowl eligible. They beat Georgia State on their home field,
thirty four to twenty seven. South Florida we win at
Florida Atlantic forty four to twenty one.

Speaker 6 (01:04:52):
Back over the Bellas.

Speaker 2 (01:04:54):
Fellas hagging Jason Fitz Anthony Gargane. Let's put a the
boat of this conversation, because we're talking about this regular
season thing, and you know we're so excited. The reason
why football is king is because the regular season matters. Man,

(01:05:16):
you can't invest in a two month tournament.

Speaker 3 (01:05:21):
It just can't do it.

Speaker 2 (01:05:22):
It's antithetical to how we consume sports, right like we
consume sports where.

Speaker 3 (01:05:30):
It's a journey. And I talk about the sixers.

Speaker 2 (01:05:35):
If your players are gonna play, you know, thirty forty,
you know, maybe fifty games your best players, what journey
is that? First of all, I don't know how you
get any kind of continuity, but forget that. The fan
journey of this season, there is none because every other game,

(01:05:55):
or every third game is like players that are just
dumple long in the league, playing big roles like it
makes no sense in fancy.

Speaker 4 (01:06:08):
So I was. I was on the treadmill yesterday doing
my sprints, and as I was doing my sprints on
the treadmill, I looked up and one of the TV
shows was talking about the NBA. And I literally laughed
at myself. And I'll point out my hypocrisy because as
I was running, I thought to myself, why the hell

(01:06:29):
are they talking about an NBA game right now? Like,
who cares? It's just a regular season game. And I
laughed at myself when I finished my Sprints game, and
I was like, I would never say that about a
regular season college football game, a regular season NFL game.
Like if I looked up on the TV and they
were talking about Jags Titans, I keep using, you know,
terrible teams, but there's a reason for that. If they

(01:06:49):
were talking about you know, the Browns Raiders right there,
two terrible teams this year. I turned around and be like, oh, yeah,
that makes sense. But they were talking about like a
meaningful game from the night before. I just don't think
anything has meaning right now. And again, full transparracy before
anybody thinks that I'm just suddenly anti MBA. I worked
for the flagship station for the Nashville Predators when I

(01:07:11):
was in Nashville my first year doing radio, and I
said the same thing about talking about hockey in the
middle of October, when they'd be like, well, we need
to spend more time talking about you know, last night's
spreads matchup, and I'm like, do you think in October
November anybody listening really cares about the third line defensive
pairings for a team that none of this will matter

(01:07:32):
in three months versus talking about the Titans. I died
on that hill when I worked for an NHL station,
Like I just like, part of this is just what
do people care about? And people just right now, the
NBA is no different than Law and Order. In my house,
it goes on in the background when I'm doing dishes,
and I don't want to think like it is law
and order. It's bar rescue. It's bar rescue. You know,

(01:07:53):
bust open the books, like give me John Taffery yelling.
That is essentially what the NBA is at night. And
there's nothing that they can do about that because they've
already built the system so much towards pay attention to
us in May, June, July or thank you very much.
I've watched it original on order too, miss Me with
SVU or Criminal Intent, those are both just bad knockoffs

(01:08:15):
of the original. But you can't sell everybody the entire time.
And the other deep part of this conversation is the
way we cover the sport. Players will tell us that
the only thing that matters is a championship. And if
you spend every single year telling me that chips are
the only thing that matter, and no matter what you
do in the regular season doesn't matter. If you win

(01:08:36):
the most games in history. If you don't win a chip,
nobody will remember you. If that's the case, why am
I watching the regular season? If none of this matters
until we get to the playoffs, Because none of it
matters without a championship, And the only way players are
now judged is by how many rings they have. Then,
my god, who cares how many triple doubles do you
have in the regular season? And if nobody cares how
many triple doubles you have in the regular season, why

(01:08:58):
am I watching?

Speaker 2 (01:09:00):
And I played Popovich? I mean Popovich is the root
cause of the whole thing. Yes, it was because he
was the first one who said, well, I'm just gonna
do load management and rest my guys.

Speaker 4 (01:09:13):
That's fair.

Speaker 2 (01:09:14):
And that signified and signaled that the regular season didn't matter.
And it was never like that, and there was great
enjoyment in the regular season, like the quest to win
fifty eight games or sixty games like the Bulls was
very real. Like we go back and look at box scores,
I've done it. Michael Jordan playing thirty eight minutes in

(01:09:35):
a game in you know, April second, right, Like playing
forty four minutes in a game in March, like, go
back and look at the minutes play. Look at Alan
Iverson playing forty seven minutes in a game in February,
right like that that was a nightly thing. And a

(01:09:56):
minute you take that away, and a minute you you
have your stars and you're talking about load management and
guys aren't playing.

Speaker 3 (01:10:05):
That's it. It's done.

Speaker 2 (01:10:07):
And you could give me all the non sense like
this stupid playing tournament or this uh mid season tournament
is it's just it's meaning, let's stop, it's ridiculous, Like
you you've already devalued.

Speaker 3 (01:10:20):
Bring back the value of the regular season.

Speaker 2 (01:10:24):
You know, all of a sudden, if you lop a
couple of playoff teams off, well not all of a sudden,
the regular season may matter. But instead you made it
worse by doing a playing tournament. I cannot can you imagine.

Speaker 4 (01:10:36):
If we just decided, all of a sudden, you know what,
there are going to be four games during the NFL
season that we're gonna give a trophy out for, Like
everybody would roll their eyes. You don't have to do that.
If your sport's clicking on all cylinders, you don't have
to find some way to make everybody believe in your
you know, your your weird sort of tournament that doesn't matter, Like,

(01:10:59):
I mean, who remembers anything about the mid season tournament anyway,
you're in your that's all sort of a joke.

Speaker 2 (01:11:05):
First, it's dumb, right, and you know what it is.
It's like, well, let's do soccer, right. Well, here's the
thing about major soccer. It's completely different because it's out
of the league. Like if you get a mid season
tournament with European teams all right, you know, like the

(01:11:26):
NBA teams played the European All Stars. Well now I'm
kind of interested, right, like you know, kind of I
don't know how you do it with the season, but whatever.

Speaker 4 (01:11:38):
That's different. That's like a crossover episode of Family Guy
and the Simpsons coming together. I want to watch.

Speaker 2 (01:11:44):
That's what the soccer tournaments are. The mid season soccer
tournaments are that, like they're not Those tournaments matter because
they're interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:11:55):
So you could play, you know, you could.

Speaker 2 (01:11:57):
Watch I don't know, man, you play uh Saint Germain,
You're right, Paris or you know whatever, Like you could
see that, right, Like you can watch Barcelona like it's
an interm.

Speaker 3 (01:12:12):
It's the comingling of the leagues are interesting.

Speaker 4 (01:12:16):
Yeah, I'm all in for something that's different, you know,
and like.

Speaker 3 (01:12:21):
You're in the same teams, I mean even if you.

Speaker 4 (01:12:23):
Yeah, And that's the problem is all of it feels
like Wringling Brothers. It all feels like some P. T. Barnum,
like pay no attention over here, We're going to distract
you with this over here. And none of that works
long term, Like you, at some point you have to
actually have a valuable product every single night with games

(01:12:44):
that mean something. And that's that's the problem.

Speaker 2 (01:12:48):
And you know what it is. All it is is
to sell out two and I don't listen. That's what
the league's for, right your ear. But the streamers and
everybody fell in love with sports because it was the
was people would watch because the commercials mattered.

Speaker 3 (01:13:06):
The problem is is that who's watching them?

Speaker 2 (01:13:09):
If the regular season nobody cares about, then what Then
you're an idiot for paying all that money. You're something
exec all right, You're a fool for paying all that
money for the rights to a product that nobody cares about.

Speaker 4 (01:13:23):
Yeah, and we found so many ways to monetize everything
at this point that you got to ask yourself, what's
sustainable like you can make money for a minute. It's
like the age old argument I've said, when it comes
to what we should want for a favorite team, do
you want your favorite team to be good? Or do
you want your favorite team to make the playoffs? Because
you can make the playoffs any one year things got lucky,

(01:13:45):
You're like, oh my god, we made the playoffs. I
can't believe it. Good is a sustainable thing. That's far different.
And unfortunately, I think you know there's this product, like
do you want your product to be monetizable or do
you want your product to be good? And if there's
anything that I did learn in my time that that
was for me working for the Four Letters, like we
did a lot of digital shows that had a lot

(01:14:05):
of viewers that made a lot of money. I'm not
sure anybody really cared how many of those shows were good.
They just cared about the fact that they were sold
and they made money. And like, for a while, you
can do that, you can make money, and it's like, hey,
this is perfect, it's working. But at some point you
say you have to trust that in order for people
to come back time and time again, the product has
to be good. People have to give a damn about it.

(01:14:25):
You have to invest in the product. You have to
make sure that you're paying attention to every last detail,
and if you're not, your products are going to collapse.
And that's sort of what's happening right now. Rich does
not mean good. The NBA is rich, It doesn't mean
that it's good.

Speaker 2 (01:14:39):
Spot on, man, all right, we have to a quick
t o. We'll come right back. Fellas Fox Sports Radio
Fellas Jason Fitz Anthony Gargano hanging out from the tiraq
dot Com studios. So I didn even realize, thanks to
Breathe and Mighty Mark, I didn't realize that this is

(01:15:01):
the weekend to turn back the clocks.

Speaker 4 (01:15:04):
Oh my gosh, we fall back tonight.

Speaker 3 (01:15:07):
Yeah, I didn't. Did you know? We didn't know either.
I didn't know.

Speaker 4 (01:15:10):
I didn't know.

Speaker 3 (01:15:11):
I didn't know.

Speaker 4 (01:15:13):
Short than an hour of sleep tonight. Yeah, I know.

Speaker 3 (01:15:15):
We get gaining How.

Speaker 4 (01:15:16):
We gain it?

Speaker 2 (01:15:17):
Oh?

Speaker 4 (01:15:17):
Yeah, come on, now, let's go.

Speaker 3 (01:15:19):
Yeah, we gained the hour? Do you care? Do you
like the uh?

Speaker 2 (01:15:23):
Because you're on the East Coast like me, and you know,
wake it up in the morning. I hate waking up
the darkness. I don't lie darkness at four thirty as
much as I prefer it, for you've always prefer light,
but I would I would rather have the light in
the morning.

Speaker 4 (01:15:42):
I uh so, I don't really like I hate how
early it gets. I mean, in Connecticut, once we hit
deep dark winter about three thirty in the afternoon, it
is literally, you know, starting to get dark outside. So
I don't love that. But I will say this, for
everybody that screams, we have to get rid of this,
google it. You'll find it. In the seventies, I think

(01:16:02):
it was, they did get rid of it. They tried it.
Congress went in and said, we're not going to do
this anymore. And it created such an awful cluster essentially
where the kids were at the bus stop in complete
and total darkness. It did not work, And it was
it was our general population that came in six months

(01:16:23):
after and said, oh my god, please please make it stop.
Don't do this. We don't want this anymore. Really, I
know that. Yeah, year was that. You know, I'll google it.
You stall, well, I'll go.

Speaker 3 (01:16:34):
Yeah, wow, that's fascinating. No, I could see that.

Speaker 2 (01:16:38):
First of all, you can't get up in darkness, now,
you know. I mean, it's not to create your day.
It's too dreary, the darkness, the cold to start your date.
You wouldt least need some sort of I wake up
five point thirty every morning, right, so it's always dark,
although I always like the in the spring the summer,

(01:16:59):
like we had the dusk and then light, like when
the light comes, it's it's the whole meaning of the
light of the new day.

Speaker 4 (01:17:08):
Yeah, so it looks like it was nineteen seventy four
they signed legislation reversing permanent day in daylight saving time
because it had been done year round. So it was
nineteen seventy four. I'm looking at this as you know
live accidents. It was signed into law by Nixon and
seventy four to maximize evening sunlight and mitigate the gas crisis.

(01:17:32):
And so initially when it was signed into law, seventy
nine percent of Americans expressed support for it, and that
was in December of nineteen seventy three. In February of
nineteen seventy four, that percentage had decreased to forty two
percent that actually liked it, and the main drawback was
prolonged early morning darkness in the winter, which left kids

(01:17:54):
heading to school when it was jet black outside. They
felt like it was unsafe for kids to wait at
the bus stop, and some wasn't rising until part of
the way through their school day. It was changing their
sleep habbits. It was all of those things. So uh.
It lasted a year before Gerald Ford in seventy four
signed a legislation reversing it. So we tried it once
and it lasted one year. So this is the time

(01:18:16):
of year I remind everybody, you know, hey, we've done
this before. We got rid of it before and it
did not work. Wow.

Speaker 3 (01:18:23):
I never that's good. That's a good item.

Speaker 4 (01:18:25):
Man.

Speaker 3 (01:18:25):
I never knew I was such a nerd.

Speaker 4 (01:18:27):
I'm such a nerd.

Speaker 3 (01:18:27):
I love that.

Speaker 2 (01:18:28):
And no, no, because I you know, you figure, you
know when the older you get, the more you kind
of get a crew, right, I didn't.

Speaker 3 (01:18:34):
I didn't know that. That's awesome.

Speaker 2 (01:18:36):
Yeah, I hate it, don't you hate getting up with
the I like I like when it's I love the
light of the morning.

Speaker 4 (01:18:41):
Yeah, I want to get up and have that like
sun night, sunlight hit me in the face and just
start my dad want to carpet the hat. I don't mind.

Speaker 3 (01:18:47):
Conversely, I don't mind like a being in a bar
at four thirty. It's dark, all right, that's fair.

Speaker 4 (01:18:54):
It's already dark at the bar anyway, let's go.

Speaker 2 (01:18:57):
Yeah, it's happy hour, man, you know, it's all right.
So what like I'd rather I definitely rather have the
light in the morning. That's funny.

Speaker 3 (01:19:06):
All right.

Speaker 2 (01:19:06):
We'll come back and take a look at the NFL
coming up next, where the fellas hanging out? Fox Sports Radio,
Sports Radio Radio. All right, good, good, good morning everybody.
At seven am in the east, four am in the west.

(01:19:27):
Big day November the second Penn State, Ohio State, Big
new kickoff on Fox five hours away. That's gonna be
the jewel of the college football slate this afternoon.

Speaker 3 (01:19:41):
We'll get into that a little bit.

Speaker 2 (01:19:43):
We covered that we haven't covered the NFL though, FITZI
fellas coming a lot from the tire rack dot Com studios.
Tyrack dot Com will help you get their fast, free shipping,
free road hats protection over ten thousand recommended its dollars
Tiger tire rack dot Com the way tire buying should
be U FITSI. Let's discuss a little NFL first. We

(01:20:05):
always talk about the Thursday night game and the Jets
on Halloween. Uh, you know, it's interesting. I don't know
how they won, Uh, Garrett Wilson. I mean that catch
was absurd, and you know, I know that they damn
finally broke for the Texans. Uh defensively, but they had

(01:20:26):
they had. They were giving the Jets fits right like
they were giving them. You could see how once they
labored and if they're so bagged up offensively, Uh, and
a couple of bad breaks. I still don't know how
the Texas lost the game, because, uh, you just got

(01:20:46):
to keep running. You just can't keep running, Joe Mixing right,
Like every time they did Stroud went back to pass,
he got sacked like for like behind the sticks, big sacks.

Speaker 4 (01:20:59):
Yeah, I mean that offensive line is just the Texans
fell apart. The offensive line can't protect him.

Speaker 8 (01:21:05):
C J.

Speaker 4 (01:21:06):
Stroud did not have a particularly efficient game, but who could.
But also the Jets passing defense better than some might think.
In fact, Look, I know fantasy football is not real football,
but there are some metrics from fantasy football that I
think are important. And it kind of blew my mind
when I was looking into it for some of my
Yahoo fantasy worked the other day that the Jets passing

(01:21:26):
defense gives up an average of passing points nine point
nine points to quarterbacks. They don't give up a lot
of passing touchdowns to quarterbacks. The way that they've been
beaten as a passing defense is by quarterbacks that can
also run for touchdowns, which is not really CJ. Stroud's game.
So it just felt like coming into it, this was
a weird matchup. Vegas was right, Vegas is always right

(01:21:47):
when they favored the Jets, but also the first half
of that thing, I mean, this thing looked like a disaster.
And I know Aaron Rodgers feels like maybe they save
their season. I don't. I just I don't think the
Jets are a good football team. So I know you
have to overacize.

Speaker 3 (01:22:01):
Agree, dude, I think the same thing. I think you're
you're spot on.

Speaker 2 (01:22:06):
Like you look at their you know, I love Garrett Wilson,
Devonte Hopps, right, I mean, I like both their backs.
It's amazing, Like I love their offense weapons and their
defense is good. But they're not what is it that
they don't fit? They're just not a good team.

Speaker 4 (01:22:26):
Yeah, them that hasn't gelled together, you know, And like, look,
they're gonna take on the Cardinals next to Cardinals are
a better team than you know, I think they're getting
credit for. The Cults are a bad team. But then
they have the Seahawks, the Dolphins, who if they're healthy
or much stuffer, Like just for everyone that's in there saying, well,
you know what, they're gonna write the ship. They're gonna
make the playoffs. To make the playoffs, they can only

(01:22:47):
lose two games the rest of the year, you know,
and they still have I mean, and that's that's at
most two games, maybe only one. They still have the
Dolphins twice, they still have the Bills. They still have,
like I said, the Cardinals, the Seahawks, like they're gonna
be They're gonna be the underdog in several of these games.
I just I think people are taking one half of
football and making too much of it. I need to
see actual four quarters of really good football from the

(01:23:09):
Jets before I'm bien.

Speaker 3 (01:23:10):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I hear you. It's my man.

Speaker 2 (01:23:15):
Kyle's chill brings up a good point about Rogers, saying,
you know, he's just too old, and he's right, like,
if you look at him every time he gets hit,
you wins for him.

Speaker 4 (01:23:28):
I mean, he looks are we allowed to say this.
He looks kind of washed, like it's just not I mean,
he looks Aaron Rodgers washed, right, Like he doesn't look
washed like you know, brock Osweiler, but he just doesn't
look like himself. And no, I think that's probably okay
to admit.

Speaker 2 (01:23:43):
You know, yeah, I think you got I think that's
that's spot on one. Like I look at it and
I go, Joe Flacco looks good, right, Why does Joe
Flacco look good and Aaron Rodgers doesn't.

Speaker 4 (01:23:58):
I mean part of this is that the Jets offense
line still just isn't good enough, you know.

Speaker 3 (01:24:01):
Yeah, I just think you're right. I think that's it.

Speaker 4 (01:24:04):
And we've known that now. I mean, yeah, it's just
now we're a couple of couple of years of this
where it's like, man, they're trying, but it's just not.
We undervalue you. And I talk about this all the time,
but it is just hard to find a good quality
offensive line that one true hold on to it, like
for dear life, it just isn't much out there that's

(01:24:26):
worth Like, there are very few lines you look at
right now and you say, oh man, that offensive line
gets it. And the Jets don't have one.

Speaker 2 (01:24:34):
You're spot on I and again, and it makes him
look worse, right, like, it just does because he's and look,
he's still like there was a play where he moved
and he looked pretty decent moving. But overall, I think
you're right. I think it's the it's that old line.
That old line is is just you know, it can't

(01:24:56):
protect them, It just can't. U. But I'll tell you this.
I love what the Ravens did getting Deontay Johnson. Are
you kidding me, dude? That's nothing great. I love Deontay Johnson.
I was shocked he went for that cheap and you
look at him on the Ravens. Oh my god, the

(01:25:20):
way Lamar is playing, he's got You know what's insane
is that all of a sudden, look at the weapons
he has. He's gone an all time epic running back.
He's got great receivers now, like you want to tell
him about great receiving play like I love Zay Flowers.

(01:25:44):
He's got three tight ends. Two of them are are
are like automatic you know, playmakers, and a great old line.

Speaker 4 (01:25:53):
Well, and I feel like this is a rare year
in the NFL. I think somebody said the other day.
There's already been nine. So the trade deadline is Tuesday also,
and you know they pushed it back later into the season,
but there's already been so many of them. But what
the Ravens are showing you is that they understand their
weakness on the defensive side of the ball. They understand
that they're gonna have to be able to score a
lot of points, and they also understand they're in a

(01:26:15):
super Bowl window. So they went out and aggressively addressed it.
I love just going in and saying, hey, like, we're
gonna make sure that our two time MVP, Like that's
just this, this is Derrick Henry's team. The Ravens lose
when they forget to give the ball to Derrick Henry
a punch. But that being said, their two time NFL
MVP quarterback just got another weapon to play with. And now,

(01:26:36):
all of a sudden, every single team in the league
is then have to figure out how to stop yet
another person. While you also can't necessarily put that much
effort into stopping Deontay Johnson because you still got to
figure out how to slow down Derrick Henry. Like they
they are built like a monster truck they're just gonna
roll over people. I'm stunned their record isn't better because
I still believe that on paper they they should be

(01:26:57):
the best team in the NFL, the best team in
the AFC at least.

Speaker 2 (01:27:00):
Well, But here's the thing now, and this is where
I don't know about the best team, but I'd love
the way the ANFC is shaken out because you have
three superpowers, and they are they're all super to three superpowers.
That's why we're talking about the Jets making the playoffs.
It's like, who cares you're gonna get beat by one

(01:27:21):
of the superpowers. And the superpowers are Baltimore Buffalo, and
you look at what Buffalo has done and how getting
a receiver that's amazing, right, Getting a receiver like Amari
Cooper for Josh Allen because as great as Lamar's playing

(01:27:43):
is as good as Alan's playing, right, and then getting
a received, getting a receiver like DeAndre Hopkins for Mahomes.
All of a sudden, that coaching staff and that defense,
all of a sudden, the Chiefs are right there, like

(01:28:06):
those three superpowers, and the AFC are awesome.

Speaker 3 (01:28:10):
They're there there. That's fun.

Speaker 4 (01:28:13):
Well, as you and I have talked about so many times.
The conversation around the Chiefs is how broken they are,
but they're undefeated, you know, like that's just we're sitting
here saying constantly, Well, the Chiefs gotta do this, The
Chiefs gotta do this. No, they don't have to do
a damn thing because all they do is win. Like
all this team does is win ugly football games and
it's just every week and just what we're gonna do

(01:28:35):
when we get to the playoffs, Well, the bubble's gonna
burst this week. No, nope. I mean that Kansas City
team is as ugly as it could possibly be and
they're doing it and they're winning every single football game
that way.

Speaker 2 (01:28:46):
So you crazy the deadline. If I were them, there's
one position I would go after. I still think they
need one more player, and what position I thought you're
gonna guess.

Speaker 4 (01:28:58):
I mean, they did addressed the wide receiver enough that
you're happy at the wide receiver.

Speaker 3 (01:29:02):
Yes, I think they need another board.

Speaker 4 (01:29:04):
Then they're gonna take it aback.

Speaker 3 (01:29:06):
I think they need another running back.

Speaker 4 (01:29:09):
Okay, how buy that?

Speaker 2 (01:29:10):
I mean you could say you're one about Hunt and
you know, I kind of like half heartily like hunt,
they and it got forbid.

Speaker 3 (01:29:18):
Something happens there.

Speaker 2 (01:29:19):
They got nothing right, Like I would go out there
are now we're in the We're back to having a lot,
a plethora of really good.

Speaker 3 (01:29:28):
Running backs, you know when and we're and.

Speaker 2 (01:29:31):
I love how these teams are rating the bad teams
like it's great. I would look and I would look
around the league and I would find me at a
secondary back.

Speaker 4 (01:29:41):
I mean, I've heard a couple of insiders, including Charles
Robinson at Yahoo, say that Alvin Kamara is a name
to watch.

Speaker 3 (01:29:48):
I mean, that's a perfect city.

Speaker 4 (01:29:51):
Why not, Like if I'm Kansas City, go out and
get get Alvin Kamara. You know that that's Saints fans.
You just got to accept the fact that this season's
right and so get what you can out of it.

Speaker 2 (01:30:02):
Because I don't know what's contract. Can they fit him
with his cap? I will look out because I mean
that that would be like now, he's a perfect Kamar
is a perfect for Andy because Ay could do a lot.
I have some fun with some backs with a back
like Kamar because he's still he could still play.

Speaker 3 (01:30:23):
Kamar could still play.

Speaker 4 (01:30:24):
Alvin's got a big cap number sixteen million this year. Yeah,
big number.

Speaker 2 (01:30:29):
Yeah, I don't know if he could be moved, but
I would be looking for a back that's I'd be
looking to poach. I look some bad teams and look
at and look to poach some backs. I think that's
the best way for them, because I love where Buffalo's at,
I mean Cooper, they have a great running game and

(01:30:49):
the way Alan's playing, and their defense has come together.
Baltimore is, like you said, has the super offense and
Kansas City's got the really really good defense, and you know,
I think could you and Hopkins helps obviously in a
big way.

Speaker 3 (01:31:07):
Yeah, I don't see.

Speaker 4 (01:31:10):
Well, I was gonna say, Hopkins is a really interesting
addition for them because he's just a guy that knows
how to get open right. And if you were Kansas City,
what you needed to bring in was a veteran wide
receiver that can learn quickly, that can communicate quickly, and
that you know, can can gel with Mahomes quickly and
what that offense needs to do. It's just and I
don't think it's an accident that we're seeing Travis Kelson

(01:31:32):
get so much out of this too. So yeah, I
think that was a great addition for them.

Speaker 2 (01:31:37):
So all is because I don't think anybody could touch those.
I look at those three and then I think it's
clear now that we are in the middle part of
the season, that those are the superpowers of the the AFC.

Speaker 3 (01:31:52):
The NFC is a little bit more wide open.

Speaker 4 (01:31:54):
Well there's one. Let me let me just ask you.
I don't think that's a superpower. Yeah, but that's my
only question is that this is the most under talked
about six and two I can remember for Pittsburgh, right like, yeah,
I mean, and there is this moment and I keep
going back to what Tomlin said, you know, never confused
good for great when he made the decision to put
Russell Wilson in at the quarterback. And I thought it

(01:32:16):
was a weird decision at the time. Most of us
thought it was a weird decision at the time. And
boys been glorious and Russ looks far better than I
ever would have expected that he would look. And if
I'm the Steelers, I'm sitting at six and two, and man,
I'm pretty I know they beat up on three straight
bad teams right like, so I would love to see

(01:32:37):
it against like they got Washington this week than the
Ravens next week. Let's see where they look after those
two games, because you know, I just man, I think
maybe we're sleeping on Pittsburgh a little bit. They're not
in that same level, but they're not that far off.

Speaker 3 (01:32:50):
To me, it's interesting. I don't know. I don't know.

Speaker 4 (01:32:55):
I come on, you want to say a defense wins championships?
You want to be that guy? Come on, buddy, come
with me.

Speaker 2 (01:33:02):
Yeah, I would love to say. I just don't think it.
I I love defense, uh and defense still matters, but
it doesn't win championships. You gotta go out down the
field and score. I don't trust RUSS. I love the Steelers.
I love the way I love Tomlin. I'm a huge

(01:33:23):
Mike Tomlin fan. I love when when nag he's going
downhill right like that's fun, that's stealer football, and he's
rumbling and you know, you look at their attacking defense
and I love that. But I don't think that they're
on the level of those three teams. And I don't
think they're close to them either.

Speaker 4 (01:33:45):
The harder part for me isn't just believing in Russ.
It's that I gotta believe in George Pickens to be
in it every single week and when he's in it,
it's good. But I just don't know right now that
I can tell you that. But I I could not
trust if I had a bit my house on George Pickens.
I'm not betting.

Speaker 2 (01:34:02):
Yeah, I know, I listen, I'm with you, but even like,
but let's let's be real here for a second. When
we talk about Russ, Like, can can you close your
eyes and imagine Russ, you know, going down the field
in Buffalo, in Kansas City or Baltimore and winning games

(01:34:25):
and and keeping up with those teams.

Speaker 3 (01:34:27):
I just can't say it.

Speaker 4 (01:34:30):
No, I totally agree with you, Honestly, I totally agree
with you.

Speaker 2 (01:34:33):
And again Shane, because I like the Steelers, and I
love Tomlin, and I love their attitude and you know,
it's a great atmosphere. To me, it's football in so
many ways. I just just keeping.

Speaker 3 (01:34:44):
It one haunted.

Speaker 2 (01:34:45):
I don't, I don't, I don't, just don't say it.

Speaker 4 (01:34:50):
You've actually talked me out of it. Never mind, Steelers
going from the conversation.

Speaker 3 (01:34:55):
Uh, and stay in the NFC. But we'll go to
the NFC coming up next.

Speaker 2 (01:34:59):
But standing I see, obviously, the big news this week
was the whole Anthony Richardson fiasco. So I'm curious about
where you stand on that. Where where do you because
it's completely outrageous.

Speaker 4 (01:35:14):
It's my byes. It is so wildly stupid that it's
actually irresponsible. And to me, all of it is about
what you knew you were drafting. And you know, Chris Ballad,
the GM of the Colts, actually told one of our
insiders when he was drafted, you know, you got to
understand the ups and downs, basically paraphrasing that we know

(01:35:34):
that there's going to be peaks and valleys, and we
just got to see the kid through it. Because the
one thing that we all knew Anthony Richardson needed when
he was drafted was time on task. He needs to
be on the field. I don't care how bad it looks.
He is one of the rare. Like if you want
to sit somebody and give him time to develop, I
get that. But somebody that only played thirteen games in
his college career and I was only played ten games

(01:35:56):
in the pros. And I had a scout tell me
last week that the number of every but he's looking for
is twenty four. If you could have twenty four games
of college film on a kid, then you really feel
like you have a sense of who they are as
a quarterback. Anthony Richardson doesn't have twenty four games combined
in the NFL and in college, so one thing he
has to have is time on the field and putting
him on the sidelines knowing he needs that time on

(01:36:18):
the field more than any other quarterback because of his
lack of experience. You're just basically throwing the position away.
You're throwing the kid away, You're throwing the draft pick away.
It's none of it makes sense. I so what the
cults are gonna play Joe Flacco and try and make
the playoffs this year so that they can get their
butts kicked. That's fine, but they just basically told the
world that they've got a ten year question again at

(01:36:40):
the quarterback position.

Speaker 2 (01:36:41):
Yeah, except he's he's here's the thing. He needs time
on the field, but he also needs to learn, like
he should not have. I wouldn't have played him right away.
I think the biggest mistake that they made because you
see the dynamic ability, right, so kids got ability. He's
so raw, he's so immature. You gotta there's a reason

(01:37:06):
why Jordan Love looks way more polished in just his
second year. And I'm a big believer in letting him
and letting him see and sit and watch and wait
and learn, like not just on the field, but off
it and learn how to be a quarterback and learn
about the Yeah, dude, you don't tap out like like

(01:37:31):
I mean, I.

Speaker 3 (01:37:32):
I mean, I can't listen.

Speaker 2 (01:37:34):
You know, he's a kid, right, I can look at
my son, right, who's eleven, plays quarterback, and and like
I had to give him a whole conversation last night
about uh, you know, walkthroughs.

Speaker 3 (01:37:47):
Walk throughs.

Speaker 2 (01:37:48):
You're boring, daddy? Why do I have to go? I go, dude, Well,
first of all, you're the freaking quarterback, all right, you
need to show some leadership. And we don't miss practice, right, don't.
We don't miss practice, And we definitely don't miss a
walk through because walk through. You got a game on

(01:38:08):
Sunday today. He was to walk through. This is kind
of what we're looking at. What are plays? What are
we going to do? Not everything because they're you know,
he's eleven, and they think it's boring and it's not right.
They get explained to him, so he he's close. Put
it this way, Anthony Richardson is closer to Masmo than

(01:38:30):
he is to us, right, So he doesn't know tapping out?

Speaker 3 (01:38:34):
What does he know about tapping out? Right? Like, he's
got to be He's got to be taught all that stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:38:40):
Now, dude, you gotta get on the field, you like
if you really that gas lay down on the ground
at fake a injury, right like you know, you just
you can't.

Speaker 3 (01:38:50):
You can't. It's just a horrible look.

Speaker 2 (01:38:51):
You can't do that, dude, And that's why he should
never have been playing in the first place. It was
a dramatic error by Styching to play that.

Speaker 4 (01:38:59):
Kid, there had to be like game. There had to
be a business plan, like from the day you drafted him.
You had to have a business plan and no matter
whatever happened, you had to stay true to that business plan.
The Colts didn't do that, and that's why I think
short term, long term both ways, they're screwed at this one.

Speaker 2 (01:39:17):
Yeah, no, I feel you all right with a quick
time out, will come back. We'll dive into the NSC
fellas hanging out right here.

Speaker 3 (01:39:25):
Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 6 (01:39:27):
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app search FSR to
listen live fellas.

Speaker 3 (01:39:41):
Jason Fitz, Anthony Gargana. Hey.

Speaker 2 (01:39:42):
By the way, Rapid Radios or the official communication device
of Fox Sports Radio. In an emergency, you want Rapid
Radio's instant push the talk walkie talkies for clear national
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connecting with family in an emergency. You can go to

(01:40:05):
go to Rapid Radios dot com now for up to
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Speaker 3 (01:40:13):
Rapid Radios.

Speaker 2 (01:40:14):
All right, let's get a trending and then we'll come
back and start to tackle the NFC.

Speaker 7 (01:40:20):
Yep, we've already reached week ten of the college football season.
We had three games under the Friday night lights and
number fifteen Boise State looking like they might be the
favorite to make the playoff.

Speaker 6 (01:40:32):
As the group of five representative.

Speaker 1 (01:40:35):
O'Neil dakes it to Cooper.

Speaker 2 (01:40:38):
It throws at the right side, intercepted at the thirty
three by McCoy.

Speaker 1 (01:40:41):
It's a pick six.

Speaker 3 (01:40:43):
It's twenty to nothing.

Speaker 2 (01:40:45):
McCoy right the play all the way.

Speaker 7 (01:40:47):
He didn't buy the fake to Cooper at Boise State,
leading twenty to nothing call from KBOI Radio in a
Boise as the Broncos roll over the San Diego State
as Techs fifty six to twenty four to improve this
seven and one on the season, Yukon is Bowl eligible.
The Husky's a thirty four to twenty seven win against
Georgia State to move to six and three. South Florida

(01:41:09):
blows out Florida Atlantic forty four to twenty one. Huge
matchup in the NBA on Friday night, Timberwolves and Nuggets
in Minneapolis, and Minnesota with a big hell from Anthony
Edwards down the stretch wins it one, nineteen one sixteen.
Edwards with twenty nine points, jok rebound shy of a
triple double twenty six points, nine rebounds, thirteen assists. But

(01:41:29):
the Nuggets some tough news as Jamal Murray had to
leave the game in the third quarter and has since
entered a concussion protocol.

Speaker 2 (01:41:38):
Back over to the fellas, All right, thanks buddy, we
are the fellas. Jason Fitz, Anthony Gargana, coming you live
from the IRAQ dot Com studios. All right, let's go
deep dive in the NFC, of course, lines a huge
game tomorrow Lions and Packers. My man, it's gonna be

(01:41:58):
uh it's quote one and I'm curious again. We talked
about the loss of Aidan Hutchinson and how that thing
will affect the Lions. I'm curious this week because you'll
learn a lot about, you know, kind of where the
lines are. Defensively, Offensively, they're ridiculous, right like you saw
it last week. They just can score and attack you

(01:42:21):
from all different angles. Two great running backs, a great
receiving core. Now you gotta deal without Jameson Williams. And
don't get me started on the guns. I don't understand
it why you need to be carrying guns with you,
but whatever, Jameson Williams out for a couple of games.

(01:42:44):
That offense, though one complete, is obviously the biggest force
in the NFC.

Speaker 4 (01:42:51):
Yeah, but also, you know, as some of the guy
on the show that's simply never doubted Jordan Love, I'm excited.
I'm kidding, I am kidding loudly. We all know that
I am. I am the first to admit that I
have had my questions, let's say politely, on the the
overall trajectory of Jordan Love and how it has been well, no, no, no,

(01:43:14):
but I think I.

Speaker 3 (01:43:16):
Bring that up.

Speaker 4 (01:43:17):
No, but like you know me, like I'll admit when
I'm right, and I'll admit when I'm wrong, And I think,
you know, you look at the way that this is
worked out. The funny thing to me is if you
look at just at the numbers, If you look just
at the numbers. As much as we love Jared Goff,
Jordan Love's numbers are comparable and everybody he's got a
few more picks, but you talk about overall completion percentage, yardage, like,

(01:43:38):
I think, actually we've gone from over hyping Jordan Love
to maybe under hyping him a little bit, if that's
if that's even at all possible. And the fact is
the Packers have absolutely surprised me. I thought the Packers
would take a little step back. You look, they have
two losses this year. One was obviously Week one against Eagles.
I really don't care what happened in Week one. The

(01:43:58):
other was a two point law to the Vikings. And
other than that, they have just they've been able to
win a lot of close football games. I give them
a lot of credit for that. It's interesting to me.
I think this is like the real test right when
you take on the Lions. Now, the Lions have become
the tester, so I'm interested to see this offense is
gonna have to be able to put up what high twenties,

(01:44:20):
low thirties against the Lions to win. That's the way
you try and beat Detroit. So I think this is
a huge prove it moment for Green Bay and for
the Packers. But if you ask me today right now,
take the records, throw them in the trash. You asked
me today, right now, what team is the best team
in the NFL. I do not care that the Kansas
City Chiefs are undefeated. I think the Lions are playing
the best football in the NFL on both sides of

(01:44:42):
the ball. Complimentary, as I like to say too much.
Even without Aiden Hutchinson last week, they still got pressure.
I think the Lions right now they look as solid
as any team in the league. If I had to
make a Super Bowl champion pick today and beat Detroit.

Speaker 2 (01:44:56):
Yeah, I know, and you know me. I like Detroit
coming of the season. I felt that they were the best,
the best team, and I do like the Packers. I
think the Packers, I think that I think what you're
talking about with Love?

Speaker 3 (01:45:10):
Is he listen? He he you The Packers.

Speaker 2 (01:45:15):
Rely on Jordan Love more than the Lions rely on golf.
Not a slight of golf. But when you have those
two running get those two running backs and that running game,
I mean, it just makes the offense that much easier
to navigate. And then you throw the weapons in and
and that's the beauty of how GoF what Gof's done,

(01:45:37):
And he's found a perfect home man. He runs that
thing really really well. So but the Packers need Love
a little bit more. They have a good running game,
but it's about their you know, array of receivers, right,
they got lots of wide outs.

Speaker 3 (01:45:52):
You go five deep wide outs.

Speaker 2 (01:45:54):
You got tight adds two of them, right, So you
got you got a lot of weapons, and you're gonna
rely more on on on Love's arm. The Lions played
Downhill on you and they just beat you up. There
was I remember talking to somebody actually we talked about
this years ago when you played the Ravens, teams were

(01:46:20):
banged up after the week after, and the same Ravens
effect from years ago is in play now with the Lions.
Like after you play the Lions, I got to look
at it. I was talking to somebody who gave me
the stat and I forget it was a great stat
teams off of Lions games and how bad they are,

(01:46:43):
and it's because of how physical they play.

Speaker 4 (01:46:46):
Now, which speaks to their identity. Obviously, it speaks to
Dan Campbell in the way that he runs his football team.
I think those are all fair things of sort of.
The big difference is for them, they have a sense
of exactly who they are and exactly how they want
to do it and exactly what they're trying to do
in everything that they do from a transaction point, you know.

(01:47:10):
And I think that's a big part of what we
have to remember in the off seasons. We need to
stop questioning the Lions. And I say that because it
wasn't that long ago that well Jared Goff that that's
never going to work, and then it worked. I was
covering the draft obviously for ESPN that year when they
took Jamier Gibbs in the first round and Sam la

(01:47:31):
Porter in the third round, and people are in the
second round, I should say, and people were blowing that
Jack Campbell was the other first round pick, if I
remember correctly, They were blowing that draft up as, oh
my god, this is so stupid, why would you do
business that way? And what do you know? It turned
out to be the they knew exactly what they're doing,
exactly how they were doing. The teams that win in

(01:47:51):
the NFL the highest possible level are the teams that
shut out the noise and just do what they know
is right. Like Kansas City did it when they decided
they were gonna go with Mahomes instead of Alex Smith,
which was not universally praised as a decision at the time.
I remember Buffalo did it when they realized they had
Josh Allen and everybody else said he was never gonna
get accurate. They're like, shut up, we know what we're doing.

(01:48:12):
We're doing it our way. We're gonna take our time.
They shut out the outside noise. The Lions had become
that right, Like they got the quarterback nobody thought was
gonna work. They had a draft that everybody thought was stupid,
and all of a sudden, you sit around now it's like, oh,
what do you know? They absolutely destroy teams defensively, playing
physical football, and then on top of that, oh yeah,
they've got an explosive offense that can work from everywhere

(01:48:34):
because they absolutely knew exactly what they were building from
the day they built it.

Speaker 3 (01:48:38):
Right. They have great that online school.

Speaker 2 (01:48:41):
Don't think they're just nasty, and you know they beat
you up not only defensively but offensively because they pound
you with that line and that running game.

Speaker 3 (01:48:52):
Man.

Speaker 2 (01:48:53):
You know Montgomery, Montgomery, Montgomery bang right, there's Jamar Jamir
Gibbs like that is that. It's a great team, man,
it really is. You know, it's a shame. And I
really feel bad about Lusion Hutchinson because he was such
a great player and what he meant to that front
is a big deal. But that game that's gonna be

(01:49:16):
a fun game. That NFC North is is really it's
just a lot of fun. I mean, then you got
Minnesota Sunday Night against Indie and Flacco, which I think
is a good game. It's good test. I think the
Vikings are five point favorites.

Speaker 4 (01:49:33):
Yeah, that feels about right though. I mean that Minnesota defense,
I know, has been challenged more the last couple of weeks,
so some of the shine has come off of them.
But this is the Colts. The Colts have some weapons,
a wide receiver, the Colts have the ability to Obviously,
they're playing Flacco because they think he can take better
advantage of those weapons. I get it, but I think
this is a bit of a get right opportunity for

(01:49:54):
the Vikings. And you know, I still look at this
division up and down and say, I don't I know,
going to beat up on each other. And that's the
reason people think they won't all make the playoffs. But
I don't know, man, every one of the teams in
that division feel like they are good enough to be
a playoff team, including Chicago.

Speaker 2 (01:50:10):
Yeah, I don't know, Chicago is still I still look
at it side eyed. I mean, Caleb is going to
be a player, it's just a matter of times.

Speaker 8 (01:50:18):
And.

Speaker 3 (01:50:20):
He's going to give you. You know, it's gonna be
rookie mistakes.

Speaker 4 (01:50:23):
I know, and that's fair. Yeah, Like that's the one
thing that makes me nervous. Does he go through that
two or three game spelled the rookies go through where
all of a sudden he forgets which team he's playing.
And Caleb's natural instinct that gets in his way sometimes
is I'm going to make a play out of this,
and that that makes me nervous sometimes, man, makes me nervous.

Speaker 2 (01:50:40):
Yeah, sometimes you just got to learn it to throw
it away and lived for the next play.

Speaker 3 (01:50:46):
That's a cliche, but it's it's legit.

Speaker 2 (01:50:48):
Now for a reason, you know, right, his father ripped
Eberflus by praising the the commander's coaching staff, and which
is not fair, you know.

Speaker 3 (01:51:02):
I mean, you can say what you want.

Speaker 2 (01:51:03):
I know DJ Moore came out and ripped the play
and the whole thing. Am I going to fall back
dive and whatever? I mean, truthfully, you can't lose the
game because you know you're you're dawn with fans and
then you run back into field of play and then
you tip the ball when that was your Amanda box out.

(01:51:26):
I mean they lose the game like that. That's a
game losing horrific play more than anything that happened on
offense that was that should never have happened.

Speaker 4 (01:51:37):
Yeah, that's suffocatingly bad. To lose that way is just Look,
I think the world was too tough on Malachi who
for fumbling and the Jets one play, more often than not,
one stupid mental error is no different. Dropping the ball
at the goal line is a dumb thing to do.
So's lining up off side. So's a false start, like

(01:51:57):
all of these things, they're all dumb plays. There's a
difference between that and I am just out here chirp
and chirp and chirping, and all of a sudden, I'm
not even paying attention to the snap of the ball
like that. Just that's a different level of discipline, Like
that's one of those moments that.

Speaker 3 (01:52:12):
Stuff with kids. Let my kids do stuff like that.

Speaker 4 (01:52:17):
And that's that's crazy. That's that's crazy. That should have
been coached out of him a long time ago.

Speaker 3 (01:52:23):
Yep, let's take a quick deal.

Speaker 2 (01:52:25):
We'll come right back as we continue our deep dive
into the NFC where the fellas hanging out right here
on Fox Sports Radio fellas Jason Fitz, Anthony Gargan hanging
out here from the tire Rack dot Com studios. So, uh,
we went through, We're going through the NFC, and let's

(01:52:48):
stay set. So the North we know, are you know,
just ridiculous, right, there's nobody in this south right Tampa.
You can cross off now losing you know, and you
lose those receivers, You're done. Uh, Atlanta, I don't buy Atlanta.

Speaker 3 (01:53:09):
You buy Atlanta.

Speaker 4 (01:53:11):
I think I buy Atlanta to be pretty good. But
I don't buy Atlanta as like a great super Bowl
caliber team. I buy it Atlanta as you know. It's
interesting because people keep saying, well, Kirk Cousins is getting
his rhythm and everything's looking better. They are doing a
better job of using their weapons, which I respect. Their
final I finally feel like Drake London is becoming who
we Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:53:29):
I like their offense. I do.

Speaker 2 (01:53:31):
Pitts has showing you that he could play right, He's
got a real quarterback. Now. I love Beijon and in Algier.
I like those guys. I don't know how good your
defense is.

Speaker 4 (01:53:42):
Yeah, I think Okay is probably the best case, right,
not chance. Not. The thing of it is when we
say are we buying them? I think that they they're
a pretty good team that's going to make the playoffs.

Speaker 3 (01:53:54):
I think they win that division.

Speaker 4 (01:53:55):
Yeah, yeah, they win that division. But do I buy
them in the same category as the best of the
best from the rest of the conference? God?

Speaker 2 (01:54:01):
No, Well, and I don't buy them, Like, let's look
at the other the other teams that are contenders. Right,
so we'll save the East because you got Washington.

Speaker 3 (01:54:10):
We'll talk more about them coming up.

Speaker 2 (01:54:12):
And the Eagles that have that have played better, but
out West, I still think, you know, you got the
Niners and you're you're they'll get They're gonna get McCaffrey back.
They're really good, they're well coached, So I, you know,
I think that they're they're going to make a run.

(01:54:33):
And I like the Rams, man, I think DRAMs are dangerous.

Speaker 4 (01:54:38):
Both of those teams are sitting here saying, man, we've
been waiting to get healthy, you know. And it's funny
because one game does make such a huge difference. It
was a week and a half ago everybody's sitting here saying, well,
the Rams might blow this thing up. You know, the
Rams might have to trade everybody, blah blah blah blah blah,
And now all of a sudden, it's like, Nope, the
Rams just kind of get healthy. And when they are healthy,
we see exactly how good they can look. So yeah,

(01:54:59):
I think I think the Rams have every shot at
making a dangerous run here too. And you know, I
don't think Arizona's a particularly good team, but Arizona's still
at least playing meaningful football, right like, so I can't
count Arizona out. I just don't think Arizona's in the
same level as the other two. The other two has
just been so hurt.

Speaker 2 (01:55:18):
Like, yeah, I think Arizona wins this week, but like,
I think they beat Chicago. But I agree with you,
I don't buy. I wish the Rams defense was a
little better. But I think their offense is could be
really good and they could just protect and stay healthy online.
I think they could be dangerous.

Speaker 4 (01:55:38):
Yeah, And the forty nine ers, by the way, are
where they are basically with their backups, like their second
string is keeping them where they are, which to.

Speaker 3 (01:55:45):
Me, yeah, I don't know. I do.

Speaker 2 (01:55:48):
I like san fran I think san Franz legit, and
then you go I like.

Speaker 3 (01:55:57):
Seattle. I don't.

Speaker 2 (01:55:59):
I'm not a I'm not a believer. Now, obviously you
need DK for anything to do in Seattle. I think
you need DK.

Speaker 4 (01:56:07):
Well, don't you. I think Kenneth Walker the third two
makes me a believer in anything, because I just I
believe he saves offenses. What do you not? I'm sort
of torn on Seattle too. I just there have been
good and bad moments. I feel like Seattle is the
perfect example of what the NFL is this year, Like
there are times that I look at it in my keep.
I totally get it. And there are times I look

(01:56:28):
at it and I have no idea what they're doing.

Speaker 3 (01:56:30):
Yeah, I'm not a big fan. I don't know. I
look at the Seahawks. I'm not impressed.

Speaker 2 (01:56:36):
I don't I'm not I've never been a big Geno guy,
So I mean, I think he's all right, like you know,
I mean, and then I look at their defense and
it's young in the secondary, and I think secondary wise,
like down the line, it.

Speaker 3 (01:56:51):
Could be good. I don't think they're really good up front.
I don't think they're contender.

Speaker 2 (01:56:57):
I you know, they do nothing that I fear, Like
I look at these teams right and I go, all right,
what's is there?

Speaker 3 (01:57:06):
Do they have something that I fear? Is there is
there a piece of.

Speaker 2 (01:57:11):
Them that's so good that could change the dynamic?

Speaker 3 (01:57:17):
I don't know. I mean, you see anything on that squad.

Speaker 4 (01:57:20):
I think that speaks to the lack of belief in
Geno at some level. Because when you have, presuming DK
gets healthy, if you have DK and you have JSN
and you have you have Kenneth Walker the third, you
should have enough weapons on the offensive side of the
ball that you're scared of them. I think the defensive side,
we all knew was going to take a second to
jail together. They're a little ahead of schedule in my mind,
but they were going to take a second to jail

(01:57:42):
together because that defense is complicated that they're learning the
new system.

Speaker 3 (01:57:45):
But they all, you know, think about it.

Speaker 2 (01:57:47):
They got They got beat by the Niners at home,
banged up Niners earlier in October. They get beat, they
get destroyed by the Bills last week at home. The
Giants beat them at home. I mean they lost three
times in October at home, and that was always a
place where you didn't want to They could never lose.

Speaker 4 (01:58:06):
And they struggled to beat bad teams.

Speaker 3 (01:58:08):
But the fellas hanging out Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 1 (01:58:14):
You're listening to Fox Sports Radio Radio.

Speaker 2 (01:58:17):
Well, good morning, good morning, good morning, Buddy, Well happy
happy happy uh Fox Football Saturday.

Speaker 3 (01:58:27):
The fellas Jason Fitz, I'm Anthony Gargana. We're with you
every week.

Speaker 4 (01:58:34):
Right here.

Speaker 2 (01:58:36):
We comeing a lot from the tire rack dot Com studios.
Ti rack dot com will help you get there fast,
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Tirerack dot Com the way tire buying should be. And
by the way, if you missed any of the program earlier,
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(01:58:58):
That's right, your podcast this show will come up and
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Fox Sports Ready, wherever you get your podcasts, you'll see
this one posted right after we get off the air.
Been all over the place, from baseball in the World
Series and the Dodgers to the NBA's obviously all the

(01:59:19):
football and you heard we were talking about earlier four
hours from now Happy Valley. It's Ohio State Penn State.
It's a great rivalry.

Speaker 3 (01:59:33):
Man, Penn State can't beat it.

Speaker 2 (01:59:35):
We were talking about this during the week the fitsy.

Speaker 3 (01:59:40):
This is a huge game for James Franklin.

Speaker 2 (01:59:43):
Now the Penn State's pretty locked into the playoffs, so
if they lose, they should.

Speaker 3 (01:59:50):
Still be in the playoff.

Speaker 2 (01:59:52):
However, James Franklin has not beaten Ohio State. He's like
one to nine and he needs is record against ranked
opponents is not good. This is a big game for him,
So I you know it's at home. You know, I
know Aler's hurt, but I think he's gonna play we'll

(02:00:14):
see for sure, and then you know, there's really no excuse,
like you got to win.

Speaker 4 (02:00:22):
I think that's what's really interesting about this game is
it's the apoplectic boll To me, whichever fan base loses
is gonna be losing them. They're gonna go apoplectic. They're
gonna lose their minds.

Speaker 3 (02:00:30):
Right.

Speaker 4 (02:00:31):
It's either gonna be Ryan Day can't lose these types
of games, or it's gonna be James Franklin can't win.
You know what I mean. Like it's it's one hundred percent.
Either fan base is going to absolutely freak out. And
I want to believe that. You know, one loss, obviously,
Penn State's safe no matter what. I think, you're right.
But I also think, man, this year, it's the first

(02:00:52):
time ever we've seen the College Football Playoff Committee have
to rank twelve. I don't know what they're gonna value.
It just gets a little hairrier, right, So this is
your chance to have such a big win. And right now,
if you look at most of the metrics, if you
look at most of the most of the advanced analytics
that the committee looks at, Penn State is a absolute juggernaut.

(02:01:13):
There is no doubt about it. But after this game,
Washington stinks, Produced stinks, Minnesota, Maryland, man, like you just
go up and now they don't have another big opportunity
for a landmark win on the calendar. So I don't know.
I want to leave it to chance. Like the belief
right now is, hey, okay, so what we lose this game,
We're still gonna have the chance to play for the
Big Ten championship game. I don't know that we can

(02:01:33):
say that either we just right now, it could go
one of a bunch of different ways. So the only
sure way to make sure that you're in the college
football playoff if your Penn State is to win this
football game.

Speaker 2 (02:01:45):
So Franklin's record against ranked opponents in his eleven seasons
is thirteen and twenty six. That includes beating Illinois that
would in Illinois twenty five this year. Of the thirty
nine games that Penn State has faced the top twenty
five oppondent on the Franklin seven have comedic ball game

(02:02:10):
and those games, Franklin was three and four. I mean,
it's pretty damning when you think about it. You know
what they've done. You know, he needs, he really needs
to win this game. And they have not performed well
against Ohio State and Michigan in big games.

Speaker 4 (02:02:28):
I wonder will the hasn't performed well against Ohio State Michigan,
which is such a true and real narrative. Does that
change now as an important thing when we add the
college football playoff in, like, will fan bases be more
forgiving of like, well, who cares we still went to
the playoffs? I don't know the answer to that, because
you're right. For years, the test has been can you

(02:02:51):
beat like? For hardball? For years, there's ay campt Ohio State, right,
So that was just all anybody wanted to talk about.
And that one game. You look at Ryan Day's winning
percentage again in Day's winning percentage is absolutely incredible. But
Ohio State fans will freak out if he loses this game,
where if he loses to Michigan like those games. I
wonder if that that changes in a college football playoff
system that you know, hey, I lost to Ohio State

(02:03:13):
but still made the playoff and won a playoff game.
Nobody will care. Like That's the interesting thing about what
all of this means.

Speaker 2 (02:03:19):
For Yeah, I read you're right. Games moving forward, I
think you're right. I think it will happen. I think that.
I think you're a spot on there, I think, but
it can't happen until you know, in time, due time, right, yeah,
you know.

Speaker 4 (02:03:34):
But look at the and also look at the Ohio
State side of this. If Ohio State loses this game,
they now have two losses and they'll be the two
best losses you could possibly have, right they lose at
Oregon and at Penn State. You know, Oregon was number
three at the time, number one, now Penn State number three.
Right now, you know they have Indiana left ahead of them,
but they will basically Ohio States plea will be you know, hey,

(02:03:58):
we have the two best losses. Who is their signature
win going to be against at that point? So like,
if I'm Ohio State, I definitely feel like my back's
up against the wall. Like I'm looking at it saying,
I think there's a very real chance that Ohio State loses.
If they lose this game, they missed the College Football
playoffs and they won't even get the benefit of a
Big Ten championship game likely to be able to prove

(02:04:19):
that they can get that landmark win at that point,
they need something else to happen. They need extra breaks
to happen their way to get into that game. So
this really becomes interesting, And I don't know what's better.
Would you rather have two losses not be in the
conference title game at all in that situation and say, hell, okay,
I got two losses, I'm not in the conference title game.
I don't get the chance. Or would you rather go

(02:04:41):
into the conference title game with one loss each your
second loss there, and then hope the committee believes you
were competitive? This is this is why I guess really
hairy going into these conference championship games about whether or
not you'd rather be there or not.

Speaker 2 (02:04:55):
Yeah, it's a great point. It really is a great point.
I think State has to be just has to be
the more desperate team. I mean, and you know, I
just think it's that's.

Speaker 3 (02:05:06):
Got to be.

Speaker 2 (02:05:07):
That's got to be obvious, right, Like, they got to
be the more desperate team.

Speaker 4 (02:05:11):
Yeah, there's no there is no doubt that they're I mean,
they should be the more desperate team. And because of that,
very like, because you have things like Notre Dame constantly
lording over your shoulder, Like what happens, Like what is
the committee going to do with Notre Dame like, these
are things that didn't matter, and you make them not
matter if you win this football game. Like if you
win this game, you're Ohio State. You win this game,

(02:05:33):
you say, Okay, you know what, we have one loss
and it's a it's a great loss, right, but we
we got a huge landmark win. Now we feel really
good about where we are going forward. This is going
to absolutely be a you know, never leave the committee
a reason to say.

Speaker 3 (02:05:47):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:05:47):
But and fans are gonna lose their mind about that.

Speaker 2 (02:05:51):
Yeah, man, I mean they're gonna lose their mind in
a big way. I know, I think you're I think
you're a spot on. And then the other game today
that will that you know, we'll talk about, which is
Oregon at the Big House.

Speaker 3 (02:06:06):
And they're a huge favorite.

Speaker 2 (02:06:08):
I mean, fourteen and a half points, pretty wild, man.

Speaker 4 (02:06:12):
Yeah, And I think that's a big statement to how
good Oregon is and Oregon wasn't early in the season. Like,
if we're being fair, Oregon early in the season never
really showed the explosiveness we thought they'd have. I thought
Dylan Gabriel was risky with the ball, even though his
completion percentage was great. They had some close wins. It
shouldn't be close wins, you know, And frankly, you know,

(02:06:34):
looking back at that first half against Michigan State, that
was closer than they wanted it to be. They survived
Boise State. Now it turns out that Ashton Genty has
made Boise State a really tough out obviously for everybody.
But if your Oregon, you've really hit your stride.

Speaker 3 (02:06:48):
Now.

Speaker 4 (02:06:48):
I think that win over Ohio State sort of woke
everything up. Now you have the chance to just put
style points on for the next several weeks. It's just
they're going into the Big House ready to make a statement,
and I think they will make that statement. The problem
for Michigan is that punts turned into points for the
other team. Right when you're giving the ball to Oregon's offense,
punts turned into points. And man, if you're letting them

(02:07:09):
get points, you're gonna have to be able to keep
up with them, And how do you do that when
you can't run the football. Not only that, but Michigan's
top corner is going to be out for this game,
so you know they're gonna be attackable. So if I'm Oregan,
what I'm trying to do early I'm just trying to
bombit through them early and make sure that I'm putting
Michigan on their heels from the outset, because if this

(02:07:30):
game turns fourteen nothing, if this game turns seventeen nothing,
then it's going to turn forty nothing like. That's just
there's no viable way the way Michigan is built to
compete in this football game.

Speaker 3 (02:07:40):
Yeah, man, I feel you. I feel you.

Speaker 2 (02:07:45):
Hey, I got one other thing I want to ask
you about what back to Penn State for a second.
So my main Nikki hits me up and you listen
to the conversation.

Speaker 3 (02:07:56):
He goes, listen. Franklin blows as a coach.

Speaker 2 (02:08:01):
He goes, I don't care that he's a great recruiter
when he can't coach these recruits to big time wins,
it's useless. It's a great point that he brings up, man,
which is you know you shooner or later you gotta
win or else having accruing talent, what does it mean?

Speaker 4 (02:08:23):
That's why I used to always say that Jimbo Fisher
wasn't hired to be the head football recruiter. He was
hired to be the head football coach A and M
for years with Jimbo putting up huge recruiting glasses and
it didn't result in wins. And so I think it's
a really fair criticism because when you constantly stack the roster,

(02:08:43):
when you are constantly built to win, man, you better win,
you know. And it also makes a huge difference in
these games now for later because you know, we talked
earlier about the college football playoffs schedule, remembering that there's
going to be a huge debate when they get into
these the twelve team playoffs, because seeds one through four

(02:09:03):
have a buy and then you know five twelve, five
takes on twelve, six takes on eleven, you know, so
on and so forth. Well, that means that eight to
nine matchup, it's going to be huge. Having that eighth
seed versus the ninth seed is about a home field.
Imagine how different the playoffs will look in December if,
for example, Penn State has to go to Alabama versus

(02:09:23):
Alabama going to Penn State. Right Like, So, I do
think that if you are Penn State, you will not
only have to win this because there's pressure to win
these types of games, but also, man, I'm not sure
there are many schools better equipped to handle, like what
the home field advantage could look like. Then a school
that's like Penn State that's in a cold weather environment

(02:09:46):
that's impossibly difficult to get to where there's no hotel
rooms available. And I say that because you know, the
year we went with Game Day, for example, the closest
hotel I could get was our half two hours away
from the stadium, and it's it's impossible on these big games.
And so think about what a home field advantage will
mean for Penn State.

Speaker 3 (02:10:07):
Did you find out the hotels?

Speaker 4 (02:10:11):
They did big booking blocks, but we were new the
digital side of game Day, our our digital show that's
countdown to Game Day was new to the family. We
weren't included in those blocks. So yeah, well, and even
the blocks were hard to get for Penn State because
there are so limited hotel rooms. And I don't even

(02:10:31):
remember who Penn State was playing, that's how bad my
memory is. But it was such a big game that
rooms were books.

Speaker 3 (02:10:37):
And now it's hard. It's one way.

Speaker 2 (02:10:39):
In one way, it's a great atmosphere, it's awesome, but yeah,
it's really difficult, Like you do have to stay like
if you're it's not worth you know, it's tough.

Speaker 4 (02:10:51):
They actually recommend people at ESPN just make the drive
instead of flying and trying to like just drive the
four and a half hours, like it's it's easier than
anything else. But they think about that, like, think about again.
We'll use that imaginary scenario where you're an Alabama fan
and you want to go to the game of Penn
State to support your team. How how you getting there?
You're not right, So, like, I just think for some

(02:11:14):
of these schools, home field advantage in the playoffs will
be so epic. If you're Penn State, you're looking at
it and saying, man, this is our our opportunity to
stamp our playoff spot. I think, barring a massive, unforseeable meltdown,
it would stamp our playoff spot. It would also put
us in the front runner position to get a home
field playoff game. Like these are the things that are

(02:11:34):
gonna matter so much. That's that's why there's more on
the line than just beating Ohio State today.

Speaker 2 (02:11:39):
Yeah, man, I hear you, buddy. It's it's gonna be interesting.
It's gonna be a lot of fun. So we talk
a lot about the college game. We got over into
the NFL and the NFL obviously, and our big conversation
we've kind of broken up by conference and with the
Rave getting Deontae Johnson, I just I love what they're

(02:12:03):
how they look, and the Bills. I think the Bills
will destroy Miami coming up and then Kansas City right
undefeated the whole thing and getting DeAndre Hopkins. So we're
kind of going through it and we know the powers
of the AFC. We were in the middle of the
NFC and we never really finished it. And we went
through the West and obviously got San Francisco, your jewels

(02:12:26):
in the North, so you got Detroit, Green Bay, Minnesota.
To some extent, I still don't I don't think they're
as good as those other two teams.

Speaker 3 (02:12:36):
You got San fran I think the Rams are dangerous.
And in the.

Speaker 2 (02:12:40):
East is interesting because you had Washington, which keeps on winning.
But we all kind of feel certain that there is
a that there were a year or two ahead of
kind of what they are, you know, kind of winning
off the last place schedule. They really shouldn't have won
against the Bears. They've had a couple of games. They're
a great story. So I don't want to kind of

(02:13:01):
poop go it. But if you're talking about any real threat,
I mean, do you think they're a real threat.

Speaker 4 (02:13:09):
No, I don't think. I think they're a better story
than they are a threat. To your point, they have
beaten up bad teams for people that haven't seen it.
Their wins are over the Giants, the Bengals who've turned
out to be terrible, the Cardinals that was a big
win for him, but also then the Browns, who are terrible,
the Panther is terrible, and then they miraculous win over
the Bears. The thing that will help them is that

(02:13:31):
they have the Giants again. Then they go through a
tough stretch, but then they have the Titans and the Saints,
so they have three. Even if they lose all of
the rest of the games to good teams, they're going
to get to nine wins. So the weird part about
the Commanders is all they have to do is sneak
one out against the Steelers, the Eagles, the Cowboys basically,

(02:13:51):
and the Falcons. They sneak one win out of all
of that, and they're going to get to ten wins.
So do I believe they're great football? Do I believe
they're in the same category. Where is the other teams
we've talked about. No, I do believe that they're pretty
deserving of a wildcard spot. I just have a hard
time not getting them to ten wins at this point,
which ten wins is going to be a wildly respectable number.

Speaker 2 (02:14:12):
Yeah, and I'm with you. So I guess the question
is are they as good as the Eagles? And are
the Eagles a threat? A legitimate threat? They've won three
in a row, They've looked much better. They beat the
Giants twenty eight to three to the Giants, but still
they roll them and then it makes it look that
much better by going into Cincinnati and they probably Hurts

(02:14:36):
probably had one of his best games of this season
in Cincinnati. So the Eagles with Barkley, AJ Brown, Devonte Smith,
they get Jacksonville. I don't see them losing that game.
So now all of a sudden, you're six and two
and you're looking pretty formidable.

Speaker 4 (02:14:56):
Yeah. And the funny thing is, I'll be fair their
last three wins, Brown, Giants, Bengals. I just listed those
as bad teams that the Commanders have beaten. That's so
now we have to go back to, well, what have
we seen and what do we expect, right, So you're
right when this offense is healthy, we knew that this
offense needed to get healthy. When they get healthy, this
is exactly what we thought we'd see, right, And so

(02:15:17):
you're a thousand percent right that. Then you look at
upcoming games against teams like the Jags. That's certainly when
they also have the Panthers ahead of them and the
Giants again, so they've.

Speaker 3 (02:15:27):
Got you know, the Cowboys are wretchet.

Speaker 4 (02:15:31):
Right, So it's easy. I honestly think it's pretty easy
to get Philly to ten wins too. So now it
really comes down to the Phillies. Commanders have two games
left against each other. They haven't played each other yet,
so I believe Philadelphia is a better football team on
paper than the Commanders are. I also believe this year
that Jayden Daniels seems to be kissed by the football gods.

(02:15:53):
There are some throes hees gotten away with that are beautiful.
And also he's just he's just electric. He's taken over
the league. So if I got to trust one of
these two quarterbacks to get a win, I'll take the
one that's kissed by the football gods. But if I
trust one of these offenses to be better. I trust
the Eagles, you know, so I genuinely think it's it's
pretty interesting. I believe the Eagles are a better football team.

(02:16:15):
I'm not one hundred percent sure Washington doesn't get to
another to an extra win on them, though.

Speaker 2 (02:16:20):
Well it'll be the next two weeks. We'll tell you
a lot about the Eagles because you got and it's
interesting because you have Jacksonville this week, so that should
be a win.

Speaker 3 (02:16:33):
But then you got to go to Dallas.

Speaker 2 (02:16:35):
Now Dallas will be wounded, and you get them in
an afternoon, like this is it kind of do or
die season against a rival. And then you come home
on a short week and play Washington on a Thursday night.
So you got two division games back to back, and
then and then you have a couple.

Speaker 4 (02:16:56):
By the way, that should never be allowed back to
back division games on a Thursday night, Like division games
mean too much. I just it bothers me that you
put the Cowboys and then three days later you're taking
on the Commanders. That just feels like such a flux,
such a change in the way the entire East can

(02:17:17):
be decided. You know, that's just for me. I just
don't understand. You know, at least the Commanders have the
Steelers and then you know, three days later get the Eagles,
So if they lose that one of those two games,
it doesn't have to have that same consequence. You put
division games in the same week on a Monday or
on a Sunday and a Thursday. That just feels gross
to me.

Speaker 3 (02:17:38):
Yeah, I agree, I have think gets tough tough spot.

Speaker 4 (02:17:41):
I mean the Eagles, like the Commanders get the Eagles
and then they get ten days off before they have
to take take on the Cowboys. That's just a much different,
much different. You know, when you've got two teams that
could be vying for first place in the division, and
you've got a common opponent in the division, one of
them is going to be a normal week and then
a short week, and the other one's a you know,

(02:18:02):
we get that extra mini bid to prep for it.
That's just a huge advantage.

Speaker 3 (02:18:05):
Yeah, now you're right.

Speaker 2 (02:18:08):
Uh, let's say quick too will come back, the brain
will join us, We'll take a look at the weekend
from a betting standpoint. That's coming up next with the
Fellas Jason Fitz Anthony Garganta right here on Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 6 (02:18:24):
the nation. Catch all of our shows at foxsports Radio
dot Com and within the iHeartRadio app. Search FSR to
listen live.

Speaker 2 (02:18:36):
Cool Welcome back, fellas hanging out from Thetirack dot com studios.
I was just giving Brie a little pasta. How to
make your own pasta, right, Bri, oh me, really easy.

(02:18:57):
It takes you twenty minutes. Takes you twenty minutes.

Speaker 4 (02:19:01):
Simple is the recipe for sharing with the family.

Speaker 2 (02:19:03):
Was like, I'll tell you what. After we get done
with the brain, I'll give it to you. It's literally,
it's it'll take him twenty minutes. I do what every
I do it twice a week before my kids.

Speaker 3 (02:19:17):
It's easy.

Speaker 2 (02:19:19):
By the way, don't forget coming up right after us.
Countdown to Kickoff presented by Bett MGN Brian no Rich Hornberger,
betting analyst Jared Smith got you covered three hours before
kickoff every Saturday morning, right after US at nine Eastern
six Pacific. Listening to Countdown to Kickoff presented by Bet
MGM right here on Fox Sports Radio on the iHeartRadio app.

(02:19:41):
Let's get a trending and then we got my man
to brain.

Speaker 7 (02:19:44):
Yeah, we got college football on the slate today, first
games kicking off a little over six hours from now.
We did have three games a part of the Friday
Night Lights Action. Number fifteen Boise State a dominating performance
against San Diego State, winning at fifty six to twenty four.
The Broncos, now seventy one on the season, in very

(02:20:05):
well can make a claim as the top team to
claim the Group of five spot in the College Football Playoff.
Yukon now Bowl eligible as they beat Georgia State thirty
four to twenty seven. The Huskies now six and three
on the season, and South Florida blowout win against Florida
Atlantic forty four to twenty one. The bowls now back

(02:20:26):
up to five hundred and in the new kickoff win
Now we got games involving ranked teams. A big matchup
of the day in the big New Kickoff on Fox,
it's number three Penn State hosting number four Ohio State
out in Happy Valley. Number five Miami is gonna put
their re perfect record on the line at home against Duke.
We've also got number nineteen Ole Miss on the road

(02:20:47):
at Arkansas. Number twenty one Army will host Air Force
as the Black Knights look to stay undefeated in this
big Surface Academy rivalry game, and number twenty four Illinois
rounds out the ranked teams playing in that noon window,
as they will be at home to face Minnesota.

Speaker 6 (02:21:04):
Back on to the fallace.

Speaker 2 (02:21:06):
All right, buddy, we appreciated fellas hanging. Let's welcome in
the brain to take a look at the weekend's card
from a betting stands point.

Speaker 3 (02:21:15):
Good morning, Brain.

Speaker 8 (02:21:17):
Good morning with me. How are you today?

Speaker 2 (02:21:19):
Good to always hear your voice, my main man. Uh Brain,
let's go through the college We we've been talking about
the big new kickoff on Fox, and we cannot wait
for Penn State Ohio State.

Speaker 3 (02:21:32):
The line is down to three. Where you seeing value?

Speaker 8 (02:21:38):
Okay, Anthony, I get that Penn State on this game.
I think it's again. I know we briefly touched on
it earlier. Like Ohio State's offensive line to me is
weak obviously. The big question or a true hours health
like what you know is he going to play? How

(02:22:00):
if he will he be if he does, but even
if he doesn't play and he's not fully healthy, I
still again, I don't think this Ohio State team is
that good. I just really really don't. I think this
is a game where Penn State can match up everywhere,

(02:22:22):
and I think them getting points at home merricks of
that year, I really really do. I just I am
not a huge fan of this Ohio State team. They're not,
in my opinion, as good as I thought they would
be coming into the year. And again, I think this
line should be lower than three. Right now it's three.

(02:22:42):
You know, it was even three and a half. But
I like Penn State. I think tenn State finally with Franklin,
wins one of these big ones at home against the
higher ranked team.

Speaker 4 (02:22:53):
Bring you say, finally with Franklin, when they're setting lines
and they're getting everything set. From a gambling perspective, how
much do they factor in the things that we talk
about all the time, like James Franklin's lack of success
against ranked teams.

Speaker 8 (02:23:05):
I don't think at all the Stamps or fifty. I
don't think that they're looking at it, not even not
even a little bit. That's not going in a factor
and it's just power rating the point of view, what's
what not? How has James Franklin done in the past
against certain teams? Now, I mean I now from a
betting perspective, Do you want to factor those things in?

(02:23:27):
That's very ballent if you're handicapping it. But for people
who are setting the lines, no, I don't think that
factor is an even a quarter of a point.

Speaker 2 (02:23:35):
Again, the quarterback is the spot with Aler versus uh bouh.
You know I I again, we think Aler is going
to play. But you know, correct, you know, we'll we'll
find out where where does that come in to play
in your mind? And where does Ohio State Oregon play

(02:23:55):
on your mind when it comes to you know, pet
said hasn't played anybody like Oregon and Ohio State has.

Speaker 3 (02:24:01):
Where does that factor in?

Speaker 8 (02:24:03):
Well, yeah, well listen and that's me. You're right, they
have it, you know. But but again, I personally think
that's funny those lines were I think going back, I
think Ohio State with a leak two and a half
at Oregon and now they're you know, they're three to
three and a half at Penn State. But again again

(02:24:24):
I think Penn State can absolutely you know, hang with Oregon.
I think those teams are comparable quite frankly so to me, again,
I think I don't think Penn State is going to
come in and like route this team, don't. I think
it's going to be a close game. But again I
always talk about in closed games, and I can get
three points or more in a game that I expectfully

(02:24:45):
be a one score game. I think that's a big
advantage because I think if Ohio State wins, you know,
I think it's a very very good chance it's going
to be by one score. If that's one score game,
getting three points is obviously a huge advantage.

Speaker 4 (02:24:58):
The other game we've talked a lot about so far
this morning is Oregon at Michigan. Obviously at the big House.
I struggle to find a way the Michigan can keep
it competitive because they can't throw the football. What am
I missing here?

Speaker 8 (02:25:11):
Well, well, here's what you're missing in my opinion. You
say they can't throw the football. Now they they look
they have not thrown the football. Well, but since they
made the quarterback switch, they have been significantly better. And
again I don't want to overrate what they've been, but
Warren's at least been fairly competent. Like if you look

(02:25:34):
at his stats against sorry if you if you if
you look at this, he at least completed some passes,
which is like Orgy wasn't able to still anything, and
to me, I just think at least date they have
a snowball chance, so to speak, of doing something offensively,

(02:25:58):
which you know they weren't able to do before. I mean, look,
Partell had a couple moments, but well, I fully expect
this Oregon team to win the game. I really do.
I think at least Michigan has a chance to not
be completely impotent. Again, I did not bet this game.

(02:26:20):
I did not bet this game. I thought the flying
should come in around thirteen. It's you know, hovering between
fourteen fourteen and a half. Not a game I personally bet.
But I do think listen at the Big House. I
think Michigan's defense can at least play a respectable game here.
I do. And I don't think Oregon's like stamp me before.
I don't think Oregon's that great. I don't think there's

(02:26:41):
one team here in college football to see that's like
LSU Joe Burrow team, you know, one of the Alabama
Bryce Young Matt Jones teams and at Georgia teams the
last few years with Stepsan Bennett. I don't think any
of these teams in college football are that dominant, where
a team like Michigan, who obviously is not even a
top twenty team. But I don't think they're just going

(02:27:01):
to come in here and beat them like forty two
to ten. I really don't. I think Michigan can keep
this game respectable, and I think it'll probably be between
a ten and you know, fourteen point game. I mean,
Michigan is going to be.

Speaker 2 (02:27:15):
The key is going to be for them not to
fall beyond early, because yeah, they fall beyond early, then
that's when the game script works against them, and that's
when it works against your theory, right, Yeah, of.

Speaker 8 (02:27:28):
Course, yeah, of course you need you need to keep
this game somewhat close. And again again I would personally
probably again if you like the Michigan thought, I lean
Michigan more in the first half, you'll be able to
get seven and a half eight in the first half,
where that probably probably means after lose a game by
double digits in the first half, I'd rather probably take
the first half of maybe they can hang within one

(02:27:50):
score versus the longer the game goes with one team
that can obviously move the ball with Gabriel, the other
team that thoughtably going to struggle a lot more than
move the ball with Michigan, I would probably lean more
towards Michigan in the first half where I only have
to I don't have to. For example, the game doesn't
have to break for thirty minutes versus sixty.

Speaker 4 (02:28:10):
Yeah, I mean all of that makes total sense. What
other games do you actually like out there?

Speaker 8 (02:28:13):
Like?

Speaker 4 (02:28:13):
What are you looking at saying there's real movement opportunity?

Speaker 8 (02:28:17):
Yeah? Well, listen one game I like. I like the
textas A and M game against Arkansas. I'm sorry, text
A and M against South Carolina. Look, this is a
game we can get three three and a half points
with South Carolina. Guys, I think this line's up bad line.
I do multiple reasons. I like South Carolina here. First

(02:28:38):
of all, they're coming in off of by okay A
and M off that big, big, big win last week
against LSU. But that win, in my opinion, was I
don't want to call it fake, but certently was not.
What the final score was. I think they won by seventeen,
but that was a game they were losing most of
the game out gaming yardage wise, l Shuman to ton

(02:28:59):
of field goals. I actually thought that LSU is every
bit uh is good in that game. South Carolina is
the team to me is actually I think very underrated. Guys.
Two of their losses they fled out, should have won.
They beat LSU, they did everything except when the game
on the final scoreboard, and they had Alabama beat as well.
I think it's a good team. You want to give me,

(02:29:20):
you can get up to three and a half in
some spots track now at home, I think they're just
as good as A and M. I don't love A
and M. I think they're well coached, but I don't
I still don't trust A and M's quarterback play. Give
me South Carolina. I think they're gonna win the game
out right.

Speaker 3 (02:29:35):
What about NFL?

Speaker 2 (02:29:36):
We only got it like two minutes, So I'm just
curious kind of where you're.

Speaker 8 (02:29:39):
Looking at the Arizona Cardinals at home, guys, I like
against the Bears, who could lay one point. I really
thought this line would be a little bit higher than
it is. When you look at the strength of schedule.
Arizona's played I think the hardest strength of schedule the
NFL this year, but there is nowhere close. I think

(02:29:59):
our Zona. You know, I trust their offense a lot
more than Cale Williams for me is very erratic and
it's hard to me to trust Cale Williams in this
spot of this game. I like Arizona to win this game.
I think the line was too was too short. It's
interesting and the one game that did get away with

(02:30:20):
a little bit was I like to land at top
now hee at the three and a half. That would
now be a path for me. I suppose Buffalo against Miami. Guys,
Buffalo is a team I punion more and more than
any team in the NFL this year. Coming into the year,
I was big on their under you know, I changed
my mind. But the way the dad has switched, the

(02:30:40):
way they look, this is a really solid team. Do
not trust Miami at all. I don't like I just
I know that too is back, but laying lesson that's
home with the team I think is in premiere. I
do like the Buffalo Bills at home, and I think
the Chargers game against the Browns. I do like over
forty two points the Chargers, to me, I should have

(02:31:04):
a little bit more success offensively. I don't think Cleveland's
great defensively, and with Jameis Winston, this is a team
that you know now is not impotent offensively Cleveland, they
can Winston. What I like about taking overs in these games.
He can help both teams, if you know what I mean.
He could throw interceptions. He led the league interceptions basically
every year he's played. I think forty two is a

(02:31:25):
little bit too low.

Speaker 3 (02:31:27):
Yeah, real quick. I like I like.

Speaker 2 (02:31:33):
The Vikings just off the top of my head, just
kind of looking at things, because we talked about it earlier.
I like Minnesota. I like I you know, I don't
see how the Broncos. Yeah, I don't believe in their offense,
and I think the Baltimore offense will just shred them.
I think he's a day for favorites.

Speaker 8 (02:31:53):
You know, there's I agree with you in that, And
it's interesting, like that's a game where in some ways, right,
in some ways, it seems like a little bit like
the Michigan Oregons. Yeah, right, you know, And I mean
obviously today at the big ginning into Carolina last week.
But Anthony, as she said, I don't trust their offense
at all. And we talk about matchups. Anthony, you're a
big matchup guy. I think that's the wrong matchup for Denver.

(02:32:14):
I agree with you because I think it's gonna be
hard for that team to score. And I know as
good as Denver Steven has been Lamar at home, they're
going to score. In my opinion their twenty four plus points.
Is Denver gonna be able to hang in and put
up probably gonna need that. We's close to twenty, maybe
even more to cover that nine point spread. Only way
you can look eavyside Baltimore for me.

Speaker 3 (02:32:35):
All right, we gotta take a quick one, take a
quick break.

Speaker 2 (02:32:38):
But braid always great, brother, Best of luck to you
at Brad's Best Bets. You could check out the brain
each fantastic. Thanks brother, Look, I appreciate you.

Speaker 8 (02:32:48):
Brother.

Speaker 2 (02:32:49):
We'll come back fifty and I and wrap it up
right up next Fellas hanging out Fox Sports Radio. That
cracks me up every time. This is the Fitzy song. Baby.

Speaker 4 (02:33:03):
You know what after this, after this is over, that's
my day off of the gym. Not gonna lie. I'm
not gonna work out today, but I'm gonna do. I'm
gonna take the dogs out. Then I'm gonna go take
a shower, wash off the morning, and I'm gonna sing
this in the shower, and I'm gonna sing it at
the top of my lungs. I'm telling you that the
neighbors are about to get a performance because of this

(02:33:24):
feeling it. Let's go.

Speaker 3 (02:33:28):
By the way what to think?

Speaker 2 (02:33:31):
Mighty Mark are great sound engineer who tab the my way,
as well as our producer Brianna.

Speaker 3 (02:33:38):
We love them both.

Speaker 2 (02:33:40):
Uh Bree, did your your recipe work out?

Speaker 3 (02:33:46):
You're gonna You're gonna You're gonna try it. I'm gonna
attempt it tomorrow. Okay, let me know how well? Definitely
did you?

Speaker 4 (02:33:54):
Did you? What is this? Did you give the secret
to making a homie? I don't know.

Speaker 3 (02:33:57):
It's really easy.

Speaker 4 (02:33:59):
So like a bottle of rago in and then you like.

Speaker 2 (02:34:03):
No, please don't do that. No, you can actually do
something really good and tasty. And here you go two seconds.
Get really good olive oil. Okay, put it in the pan.
Put your slice of clover of gar like really thin.
All right, one tiny bit of onion, really thin. I

(02:34:23):
put it at a little salt boom, put it in,
and then get San Marzano tomatoes.

Speaker 3 (02:34:29):
Put that can in, break them up. Okay.

Speaker 2 (02:34:33):
Put your put a pasta pot right, put your put
your water fill your water salt it.

Speaker 3 (02:34:40):
Put your pasta in.

Speaker 2 (02:34:42):
Make sure it's outdente, which is a little more tough, right,
like a little more harder, right, because you want it
a little bit like that. Get two spoonfuls of the
pasta water after it's boiled, put it back with your sauce.
Then strain the pasta. Put the pasta in in the
big pan right with the sauce in it. Put it

(02:35:04):
around all right, you know, mix it all in with
the pasta, and then great locatelli cheese which is pecorino romano,
and then boom, takes you twenty minutes to I put
a little red pepper flakes if you like spice. I
do that with the garlic and the onion and fresh
basil in the sauce. I forgot the fresh basil.

Speaker 3 (02:35:26):
Fresh basil.

Speaker 4 (02:35:28):
Look. I pulled out an index card and I wrote
all of this down, and it's amazing. The only problem like,
what do I do since I'm not che What am
I doing? Like I can't I can't eat pasta? What
do I do if I can't get the pasta water in?
Because I usually just like to make the little sauce
and then put like the chicken straight in it so
that I feel like I'm getting pasta, but I don't
actually have the pasta. So like, is the pasta sauce

(02:35:50):
or without the.

Speaker 3 (02:35:53):
Protein?

Speaker 4 (02:35:54):
Well, yeah, I could, I just I just can't have
the I'm not eating pasta right now. So like without
THETA water, can I you know, can I still make
the saucer? Like do I do?

Speaker 3 (02:36:04):
Yes?

Speaker 4 (02:36:05):
I do?

Speaker 2 (02:36:05):
If you're going to so you're going to do it,
you want to do it with like chicken doesn't really go.
But if you want to do it with, uh, you
just make the sauce without the pasta.

Speaker 3 (02:36:13):
Worry, You're fine. I mean, it's not a big deal.

Speaker 4 (02:36:15):
Look, I learned this on tour because we like when
I was on the Brad Paisley tour Humble Break. When
we were out with Brad, he had this catering company
that was great and they used to do pasta night
once a week. I was like, man, I I didn't
want to eat a bunch of pasta while I was
out there. Didn't want to get fat on the road,
and so like I went to the guys the catering company,
I said, what can I do? And they taught me. Then,
like they took chicken and they thinly sliced chicken that

(02:36:37):
they you know, they cooked up and then they tossed
it in the pasta sauce at the end and it
was it was great. Like it makes me feel like
I'm eating you know, spaghetti with the you know, black
and chicken on it. I just don't have any. I
just don't have any pasta and it I still get
that pasta like fixed with the with the tomato.

Speaker 3 (02:36:51):
Like it serious saying you could you can easily do that.
You can.

Speaker 2 (02:36:55):
You don't do any breading on the chicken right on
the chicken. You don't make a cutlet right. I got
news for you. I will say this though, if you
eat pasta and you know, just don't eat a pound
of it.

Speaker 3 (02:37:08):
I mean you're you're fine. It's good for you. Go
to Italy. You'll see the people there. They're good.

Speaker 2 (02:37:12):
And the sauce that you're putting them in is not
a high caloric sauce.

Speaker 4 (02:37:17):
So well no. And there's a place down the road
that I just saw the other day has fresh made
pasta you can buy in small batches. And I was
like that sounds you see, not like give me give
me that something. Yeah, I want some you know some
grandma that that hand rolled, my my. You know, total
leaning for me.

Speaker 2 (02:37:32):
That's what I get. I could do it for you,
all right. I do it for the kids. The kids
love it.

Speaker 3 (02:37:39):
Right. By the way, it's cheap too.

Speaker 4 (02:37:43):
I'm gonna get. I'm gonna get a pasta making class
at Anthony's house on Thanksgiving. I'm coming. Let's go.

Speaker 3 (02:37:48):
We come. Christmas Eve. Man, you're invited. I told you.

Speaker 4 (02:37:51):
Christmas Eve is even better.

Speaker 3 (02:37:52):
Let's go.

Speaker 4 (02:37:52):
I'm in there, I'm in.

Speaker 2 (02:37:53):
You gotta come. I do the fishes. We did a
whole big seven fish celebration.

Speaker 3 (02:37:58):
All right. That's gonna do it. Man.

Speaker 2 (02:38:00):
Guys, have a great weekend. Can't wait for football. Go
for it.

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