Aaron Torres and Jason Martin talks Colts vs Cardinals and NFL Week 16!

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Fox Sports Radio. Welcome in Everyboday, Fox
Sports Saturday, Fox Sports Radio. I'm Eric Torres. Jason Martin
will be joining me momentarily. Before we get into anything,
I want to wish everybody listening a very merry Christmas.
We hope that obviously you got to spend some quality

(00:21):
time with some friends, some family, whether you're traveling in
the car now, whether you're at home after a long
Christmas day, or whether you're working. We hope everybody had
a great Christmas as well. Uh. And as I said
last night, I was working with Arnie Spanier, I said,
go ahead tweet at us. Let us know where you're listening,
how you're listening on a Christmas evening, and we hope

(00:43):
that we can help get you through the night and
uh into December twenty December. But with that said, my
partner every Saturday night is here, Jason Martin. Happy Saturday,
Merry Christmas. I don't know why I almost said happy
christ Us. I mean, I guess that's not wrong technically,
but Mary Christmas, I hope you and your family had

(01:04):
a great holiday. How was the holiday, my man? It
was interesting and eventful. Um, what do you have a
little kid. Isn't every day interesting and eventful? That no questions.
Now she's now eight months and eleven days. So this
was the first Christmas, which means she got nothing except
what people got her back in April that she didn't
know about, plus boxes and wrapping paper. So that was fine.

(01:27):
My parents came down, everything was good. We were at
my wife's parents house with everybody, and then we go out.
I'm saying goodbye to my parents and their car won't
turn on. Oh boy, and you know you call a
toe on Christmas Day. Eventually they called three hours later,
after giving him an e t a of forty five minutes.

(01:49):
They called three ours later and like, hey, we don't
actually have anybody to come out, and so my parents
are now in the process of getting into a hotel room.
And that's how that's how the last four hours of
Christmas have gone. So it got real eventful, real fast.
After everything was smooth sailing for a while. Uh. Just

(02:09):
a reminder, just a quick reminder that even on holiday,
life doesn't stop. Well, life doesn't stop. And the till
men in some capacity somewhere are working, we're working. And
as I said, I feel free to tweet at us
at Aaron Unders Score Tours at Jason Martin. Let us
know at j mart Radio where you're listening to this show,
how you're listening all that good stuff to Sager. Just
got you caught up on the current NFL game. Colts

(02:31):
up twelve to six in a game where the the
Arizona Cardinals look very much basically like they've looked the
last two weeks without DeAndre Hopkins, struggling to move the ball,
had one big run from Kyler Murray, and then other
than that, the offenses was stagnant. And we will get
momentarily to the first game of the day as the
Packers took care of the Cleveland Browns twenty four to

(02:52):
twenty two at lambeau Field. Discover real credit card questions
require real people, someone who understands your issues and works
to resolve them with you. That's why I discover offers
helpful US based representatives available twenty four seven. Discover exceptionally
common sense. Jason, let's start with this game. I do
want to talk pack in Browns in a minute, but
let's start really quick with this game. Colts up twelve six.

(03:14):
Here about ten minutes eleven minutes left in the third
quarter as Kyler Murray and he does hit. Uh, it
looks like for a touchdown pass, and it looks like
it will stand. There's no kind of confusion, nothing like that,
Antoine Wesley. So all of a sudden, it is twelve
twelve extra point pending. The Cardinals have missed an extra
point earlier in this game. Jason, I was ready to

(03:35):
start the show with are the Cardinals in trouble? Are
they screwed? Is it over? They lost to Detroit last week?
Maybe we're the good luck charm that the Cards needed
to turn the season around, because I was worried about them.
But uh, they are one extra point away from taking
a lead here against Indiana. Game that uh, you know,
you don't want to call it must win, but a
team that is fighting for a division title of course,

(03:57):
also just trying to get back on track. Pretty close
to a must win, even though it's not technically a
must win. Wait, you're not telling me that one touchdown
pass just had you change your narrative, But not a
thing that just happened. I mean, all I'm saying is,
if if you win this game, it feels a lot
different than if it's twelve six and uh, you know,

(04:19):
you turn the ball over on down. So of course
it didn't change the narrative of my opinion. I'm just
saying is that, um, you know, it did change the
flow of this game because the Cardinals could not do
anything for the first you know, two quarters and change
of this game other than a big Kyler Murray run
that's set up. That's set up at the only score
of the game for the Arizona Cardinals. So no, I
wouldn't say it changes anything. I still think they're in trouble.

(04:40):
I still think they're limited without DeAndre Hopkins. I don't
think at this point we should probably expect them to
win the division. I don't think at this point, I
don't think they're a real super Bowl contender. But you
needed a sign of life, and you got one. It's
the first sign of life we've had in about two
games from them. So I was just trying to you know,
it's Christmas Day, Jason Markin, I'm just clown. I'm just
having just trying to. I I was trying to be

(05:00):
glasses half full here, Okay, Jay's we got a lot
of Arizona Cardinals fans listening with the game on in
the background. I'm just trying to be glasses half full
here on Christmas, That's all I'm trying. Uh Yeah. So
I talked to Jeff Schwartz, who just tweeted out by
the way Cardinals bringing out all the tricks to be
the Colts team missing their entire offensive line and best
defensive player. So he's on the troll tonight. But I

(05:21):
had him on the show yesterday on my show here
in Nashville, and I asked him about the Cardinals and said, hey,
doesn't this team look like one and done in the playoffs?
And he said yeah, and he goes, this is what
Cliff Kingsbury does. Cliff Kingsbury did this at Texas Tech,
and all his teams have always done this in both
the spots where he's been a head coach. They'll start
out in one way and they'll finish in another. They

(05:42):
end up limping to the finish line year after year.
Now this time they got out to a much bigger lead, though,
like they look like they were closer to Usain Bold
than somebody that was middle of the pack. They look
kind of the part, but and I don't know how
fair it is look I was gonna say that huge
difference just everything that's going on. Jeff's really talented and

(06:03):
Jeff's really smart. But I don't think you can compare
apples to apples in this one, just because I mean,
DeAndre Hopkins is such a game changer and yeah, but
go ahead and continue, but I I don't think that's
totally fair. But with that said, you know you're gonna
have to play without him going forward, and you'll lose
to Detroit. Last week, Uh, you get smoked by the

(06:24):
Rams on Monday night football at home, even though technically
the final score didn't reflect the fact that they were
in fact smoke, but they were, and it was trending
in the wrong direction against the Colts here for about
two quarters and change. We'll see if this is the
tide that turns it. But yeah, they're they're not playing
very good football right now. Well and pass that again.
Your point there is the right one. You have to
go with who you got like, whoever is playing, whoever

(06:45):
is healthy. In the playoffs, they're gonna be out there.
So look at a couple of teams. Look at Tampa
Bay's Tampa Bay in trouble. I think they might be
I mean, you lose Chris God. When you listen, you
miss a lot. Mike Evans is a little bit banged up.
You're relying on Antonio Brown, who went on Twitter when
he realized he's gonna be the number one guy and
not cut basically by saying, hey, put some respect on

(07:07):
my name. It's like, what are you doing? Man? Like
a B is gonna be a B. But Bruce arians
didn't want to bring him back, and he's like, you
know what, last year he really impressed us. We gotta
do what's best for the football team. What that means
is we got nobody else and ab is good. So
we can't let him go right now, even though I
can't stand him, Like that's that's basically what that was
code for. But if you want to see problems, you

(07:28):
can find him. You can find him in Arizona. You
can find him in Tampa Bay. Teams that are banged
up right now, teams that are getting unhealthy at the
wrong time. Unfortunately, that could be ah, that could be
a death knel for those teams. So when you look
at Arizona right now, I don't think they're gonna be
much of a threat in the playoffs. Either, and it's
because of something that might not be their fault. They

(07:50):
were rolling. But you take Hopkins out of the equation,
you're putting a lot on Murray. And and here's the
thing about Kyler Murray. When you put a lot on him,
he does some spectacular stuff. You what else he does?
He turns the ball over quite a bit, at least
so far in his career eron and that's what I
anticipate is he's gonna go try to play hero ball
because he knows he has to because his weapons are diminished,

(08:11):
and that right there could be the death now. No touchdowns,
two interceptions against the Rams uh last two weeks ago
on that Monday night game. As I said, one touchdown,
one interception against the Detroit Lions last week in Detroit.
Bad loss, by the way, what we got four hours
here to talk Pack and Brown's it's kind of funny
with the Colts, right because we were on air last

(08:33):
week when it when Indie went ahead and beat New
England in Indianapolis. It was a great win, all that stuff,
but I think we were both like, Okay, this team's fun,
they're interesting. Jonathan Taylor. But I vividly remember you saying, yeah,
this is a nice win, but let's not get too
crazy about Carson Wentz and uh, you know all that

(08:55):
good stuff, And so I do find it funny here're
you're playing now on the road. Obviously big you know,
Marquee game here on a Saturday night for all the
world to watch. But it was funny last week against
the Patriots. You know, we kind of talked about they're
kind of the team that's built to beat the Patriots
because you can control the clock with Jonathan Taylor, you
can run the ball effectively. Uh, then the Patriots fall behind,

(09:15):
then mac Jones has to throw the ball and they're
not equipped to play games like that. Well, we're now
seeing what the Colts look like here for a second
straight week. One week they look really good, one week
they don't. Carson Wentz is a little bit of erratic.
And as we sit here, uh, the Colts have a
hundred seventy seven yards of total offense midway through the
midway through the third quarter here, So uh, this to

(09:36):
me is is the gift in the Curse of the
Colts is that if you can get ahead with Jonathan Taylor,
you could probably have some success. But but there are
gonna be nights like tonight where you know, if you
can't get the run game going right away, if you
can't get out to that early lead, it allows teams
to kind of stand yeah, and look again, you have
to play with your you got, But their offensive line
is not what their offensive line is supposed to be tonight,

(09:57):
So that's gonna harm your ability to run the football
pretty much right out of the gates if you're Indianapolis.
But something I want to discuss, and we've got, luckily
a long time to do it tonight, is how similar
the Colts and the forty niners are in terms of
how you feel about them going into a football game.
I think the coach you believe in a little bit more,
but I think they both have the same sort of

(10:19):
X factor in the wrong direction, and that is a
quarterback that can do some good things but also often
does some very bad things and needs a lot to
be right around him in order not to do a
lot of the bad things. I think both those teams
are dangerous and have a lot that you like, and
then they don't have quarterbacks that you believe in, And
to me, that's the thing that keeps you from really

(10:40):
being able to put stock in them in the postseason.
Is do you really want to lay money on Carson
Wentz in the playoffs? Do you really want to lay
money on Jimmy g in the playoffs? I would argue
the answer to that is a very easy no for
anybody that doesn't want to lose money. It's funny. You
sound like a man that spent three or four hours
yesterday breaking down to San Francisco Forty Nighters Tennessee Titans

(11:02):
game where the forty Nighters had a double digit lead early.
Am I crazy? Yeah? Now? And uh, for people don't know,
Jason of course hosts Weekdays in Nashville, and of course
you I'm sure I don't. I'm not sure. I'm positive
you spent all day yesterday breaking down that Thursday night game.
And of course, the Indianapolist culture a team that you
watch closely in Division. I hadn't really necessarily thought of

(11:22):
that parallel, but I think it's totally fair. And what's
interesting too, is that Wentz and and Garoppolo are kind
of at a similar point in their careers. Right. Uh,
you know, I guess by technicality, second team, although that's
not as important. I mean it doesn't really count by
the way, as as we uh, you know, kind of
talked about the old line struggling Jonathan Taylor rips off
a nice fifteen eighteen yard run there. Um, But they're
at a similar point in their careers. Uh, you know,

(11:44):
we kind of know who they are. In Carson Wentz's
cases as his second team, Jimmy Garoppolo by technicality is
the second team too, although we never really saw him
in New England. But but they do kind of strike
me as similar is um, you know, we know what
they you know, we know what they're capable of at
their best, we know what their limitations are, and I
think at this point we kind of know they are
not the type of quarterback there. They're They're they're very

(12:07):
Now that I'm talking it out here live on air,
it is kind of interesting. Essentially, the quarterback that can
get you a lot of wins in the regular season,
beat the teams are supposed to maybe beat a team
or two that they're not. But again, they're not the
Rogers Mahomes Brady type that can put a team on
their back, lead him to three or four consecutive wins
and you know, kind of win the Ultimate Prize here.

(12:27):
And I know Garoppolo just made a Super Bowl a
few years ago, but we know it was the run game,
it was the defense, etcetera. So I hadn't really taken
much time to consider that, Jason, but I like it
a lot. Yeah, we'll think about it during the commercial break.
Because both those teams also have dudes. And by dudes,
I mean they just got some guys, like they got
some guys that are absolute problems, whether you're talking about
Kittle or whether you're talking about Trent Williams, whether or

(12:48):
not you're talking about Deebo Samuel or even Kyle u
Stretch or something like that. And then on the other
side for Indy, yeah, you got j T, but you've
also got Q. You got Quentin Nelson when he's you know,
able to play, and got Darius Leonard, and you've got
DeForest Buckner. You've got all these guys. You've got Michael
Pittman Jr. Who's got the ball in saands right now,
I do believe. But then you've got a quarterback where

(13:09):
you're like, you've only had a quarterback. Good lord, would
you be dangerous? And both those teams I think have
the same fatal fall. Well, and it's a perfect segue
because there is another team that has a bunch of dudes.
There's another team with a quarterback that may have just
essentially played his way. I don't know if out of

(13:30):
a job, certainly out of his fans favor. He played
earlier today, and no, I'm not talking about Aaron Rodgers.
Will discuss that next. Jason Martin eron Torres here on
Christmas Night. Hope everybody's having a great Christmas. Fox Sports Radio.
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
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(13:51):
Radio dot com and within the I Heart Radio app
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(14:13):
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Welcome back, everybody, Fox Sports Radio Christmas night. Hope everybody

(14:33):
is doing well. Hope everybody had a great Christmas, a
happy holiday. Uh. I said it to lead the show.
But if you are, you know, if you're listening to
the show, always tweet us in let us know where
you're listening, how you're listening, what you're doing. Uh here
on a busy, busy, busy Saturday night. Uh. And we're
hoping that it's not too busy, that you're relaxing all
that good stuff. Uh. And I'll say this, Jason fun

(14:54):
you know, like, like you know you think of Christmas,
you think of obviously the NBA. We're by the way,
Brooklyn is running away right now from the Lakers. They're
up eight with seven minutes to go. H Brooklyn, of
course without Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving has not yet
clear protocols. But I bring it up to say, like,
you know, you think of of Christmas as a couple
of NBA games whatever. It was a fun day of sports.
I know you were with the family and doing all

(15:15):
that stuff. I was as well, but but fun day
of sports overall. Obviously two NFL games, NBA. There's a
little college hoops. I think more on the sports calendar
than I realized, especially coming off a day yesterday where
there was literally nothing once the uh, once the Hawaii
Bowl got canceled. Yeah, Hawaii not being able to play
in the Hawaii Bowl and maybe reasons that we didn't

(15:37):
hear about, at least being speculated as to why. One
just being that they hate their coach. Uh, that's wild.
They've had a lot of games at the portal. I
can tell you that. I mean, we don't have to
break down Hawaii's depth chart here on busy Saturday night.
But but yeah, is that is that a rumber that
came out? I hadn't even heard them. Yeah, I had
heard it from a couple of different people. But at
the same time, think about this. Imagine hitting the transfer

(15:58):
portal to get out of Hawaii. Yeah, meaning the state
of Hawaii. Like you live in Hawaii, right, Like when
you go to the university, you also reside in Hawaii.
Almost everybody else in the rest of the country wants
to go where you get the privilege of living and
you can't wait to get out of there and off
their football team. That coach must not be fun to
play for it all like that, Like this is not

(16:20):
you know what, I'm leaving Siberia University. Like, no, it's
not quite the same. Let's just say if you offered
me a scholarship to why it would be like Zack
Morris when he said he wanted to go to Tahiti
Tech the Bell back in the day. Man, just send
me there right now, like Tahoe University, sign me up.
You know, it's really funny not to get off on
a tangent here, but you know there is one college

(16:41):
basketball terment going on in Hawaii is playing in it
and they're playing in the seventh place game later this
evening to say your mention of the championship game canceled
because of COVID issues in Stanford. But I was wondering.
I literally had that thought. I was like, why is
Hawaii not awesome at basketball? Like, like, I I know
that it's hard to get players out there, but you
need seven guys. You can't get seven guys from anywhere

(17:02):
in the country to go to Hawaii to play basketball.
It seems like it shouldn't be that hard. It seems
like they should be awesome every year. Well, I mean,
my argument about why it's so hard for Nebraska to
do anything in football now is because you're recruiting kids
to Nebraska who weren't alive when Nebraska was good. So
you're like, hey, no, I promise you were good at
one point in time. And then you look on the
flip side and it's like, uh, well, the problem is

(17:25):
I never saw it, and you want me to go
live in Nebraska. But USC just asked me to come
to southern California or Miami or Florida State or somebody
like that asked me to come to Florida. I think
I'm gonna go there. Texas A and m just asked
me to come there. They got a lot of money
and they play in the SEC. Like that becomes a deal.
But if Hawaii can't then field solid teams on a

(17:46):
regular basis, then that argument sort of blows out the
water because it's like, if you can't recruit to Hawaii,
where in the world can you recruit too well, And
it's you know, it's funny, because well, USC is stunk,
Miami is stunk. I've also, ironically, as we watched the
lay Kers and the Nets, I remember being in Tempi
during the time that James Harden was at Arizona State

(18:07):
and wondering why Arizona State was not literally the best
team in sports, the best team at every sport in
college athletics, because you ever spent any time on that campus,
it is a beautiful place to go to school, uh
with a lot of especially if you're a young athlete.
There's a lot of you know, pretty scenery around the campus,
if you know what I mean. But that said, let's
get back on track, so uh NFL. Obviously as we

(18:30):
speak here, I I we mentioned it to lead the show,
but Arizona Cardinals are playing the Indianapolis Colts Arizona Leeds
thirteen twelve, middle to the end of the third quarter.
There we'll keep you update on that one. But earlier
in the day, we did have another one of really
kind of interesting game, really fun one. Uh the Packers
beat the Cleveland Browns twenty four to twenty two. Aaron

(18:50):
Rodgers breaks Brett Farve's touchdown record, which will maybe talk
about a little bit later in the show. But as
Ben Maller likes to say on these air waves, the
more interesting story is often in the losing locker room,
and I think it was definitely the case today as
the Browns lose as I said, twenty four to twenty two,
in a game in which Baker Mayfield through four interceptions,

(19:10):
a couple of them, there was some questionable was there
a little bit of a defensive hold? Was there a
little bit of a pass inter fear? It's but the
bottom line is Jason Martin that Baker really the Browns
were in this game despite their quarterback, not because of them.
And so you know I was gonna lead this show
with with a quick moment of silence for Baker Mayfield's
time in Cleveland. I don't know if that's too dramatic.

(19:32):
What did you make of this game? Because I'll just
tell you and I'll throw it over to you and
you can tell me if you agree or disagree. I
know that they can franchise tag them, and I know
they gotta figure out, you know, extension, non extension whatever.
I bring it up because what I saw on the
field at lambeau Field today, outside of the Packers, who
are awesome, who are on track to get the number
one seed in the NFC, I saw a team that

(19:54):
has a roster built to win a Super Bowl except
that the quarterback position. And I and I don't know
if you can come back with Baker Mayfield next year,
and before the record, I understand he's heard he's banging
up injuries. This that the other thing. I don't know
if you can come back with Baker Mayfield next year,
because we know running backs go quick. Nick Chubb is
not gonna be this way forever. Jarvis Landry is getting

(20:15):
to the other side of thirty. Uh. You know you
Everything is there to win a Super Bowl right now,
except at the quarterback position. Tell me I'm wrong. Oh no,
I mean, you're absolutely right. I mean I talked about
WinCE and Jimmy g Well, you can throw Baker in
there too. You can talk about all three of those things.
They all have great rosters and quarterbacks that you would
not trust in crucial games in the playoffs. But you

(20:37):
look at the roster and you look at Myles Garrett
Defensive Player of the Year candidate. You look at what
they have on the back end. You like Denzel Ward,
You you like a lot of what they're doing. Clowning
has even giving them some good things this year. They've
got a solid offensive line. Chubb is one of the
most talented backs in the league. You don't love their
wide receivers, but I still really like Juice quite a bit,
and I think with the right quarterback, somebody like in

(20:58):
Joco could have been a lot better. But then Baker
Mayfield squanders a lot of it. And look, we forget,
or maybe we don't forget. He could add surgery and
into his season like six weeks ago with his shoulder,
and he wanted to play that thing out. Maybe he
should have elected to do that, because think about this here,
and if he did do it, that would have created
a little bit of well, who knows what would have

(21:21):
happened had he been healthy, because the team had been
banged up early in the season. But he goes ahead
and plays on it to show how tough he is,
but in the process he wasn't gonna play well. And
it hasn't gone well for Cleveland. And yet again, as
my partner in crime here in Nashville, Ramon Foster has
said over and over again one time, the Browns are
gonna win this summertime super Bowl and it's actually gonna matter,

(21:42):
meaning they get hyped up and then they actually play
football and then it turns out to be this all
the time. And unfortunately, if you're at the quarterback of
that team, and you throw four interceptions, you're the only
one that's gonna get talked about. Even if it wasn't
all on you. Nobody cares about the official, the officiating
mistakes that were made and all this. Baker Mayfield has
put himself in the unenviable spot of having a lot

(22:04):
of talent around him and everybody knowing it and then
them just looking at you and saying, well, why aren't
you better, because if you were, this team could win
the Super Bowl. Well, and that's been my thought on
him for two or three weeks. And I think some
of this does fall on Kevin Stefanski as well. Is
that And I know they had COVID issues and all
that kind of stuff, But um, you know, if the
players always gonna want to play, right, but if if

(22:27):
the injuries really are the problem, which is what we've
been sold coming out of Cleveland for the last two,
three or four weeks, then you owe it to your
team to not play the guy that's injured. Sometimes the
guy that is injured is not the best option, even
if he is by technicality to the starter. It's not
as though your backup case. Keenum, and again I understand
he was dealing with COVID all that stuff. It's not
as though case Keenum is incompetent. You know, this is

(22:49):
a guy that's one playoff games. This is a guy
that got the Minnesota Vikings the NFC Championship game, and
so you know, I get the idea of wanting to
be a hero and wanting to stick it out and
wanted to but at some point either either it's it's
the old cliche, but it's true. Is if you do
step on the field, then there is a level. And
this is the part that bothers me with Brown's fans

(23:10):
that and I don't I don't think there's very many
that are still defending Baker, but the ones that always
banged up, Well, if you're not healthy enough to be
a difference maker or to play at a level capable
of winning games where you're not turning the ball over
four times by yourself, and some of it wasn't on
bad refereeing holding this that the other thing, then if
you if you step on the field, you have an
accountability to your team, to your roster. And I don't

(23:33):
think there's any doubt that coming out of a game
like today, you could go back to that Baltimore game
on Sunday Night a few weeks ago. He is letting
down this roster because I'm telling you, man, all the
other pieces are there. I can't stop thinking about that
when I watch this Cleveland Browns team. Look talk to
anybody who's played in the NFL, and they will all
tell you the same thing. If you're out there, nobody

(23:54):
cares at that point in time. If you're on the field,
you're expected to play and you're expected to ball, and
your point is dead right. Like I want Nuck Hopkins,
but I don't want him on one leg. If you
told me that one leg doesn't work, okay, well that
guy's gonna be on the sidelines. The problem for Baker
Mayfield is like why are you doing this? Like there's
no reason to play the hero. If you're harming your

(24:16):
football team, that's not being a hero. That's actually being
selfish or being look at me, look at what I'm
willing to do to help this team win. But you're
not helping the team win. There's no way you're helping
the team win, and you're not helping yourself because, as
I said, I even think I bet you when I
mentioned the injury a little while ago, a lot of
people listening to us right now, Aaron be like, you

(24:37):
know what I forgot about that exactly because nobody cares
because you're out there. Everybody assumes that you should have
some level of football play that you flat out don't have.
So if that's the case, why didn't you just go
ahead and go under the knife and get yourself right
as opposed to staying out there being six when everybody
expects to see a hundred and putting yourself in a
spot where your team's gonna miss the playoffs. Well, there's

(24:59):
gonna be plenty more conversation on this one because I
have some more thoughts on Baker Mayfield, have some more
thoughts on this game. We gotta talk about Aaron Rodgers too,
who breaks Brett Farve's record. That will be one of
many things that are good friend Steve Disagreb talks about
as we find out what's trending, and Merry Christmas to
both of you, and uh, we had a few seconds
left in the third quarter at Arizona, but the Colts
have kicked to field goal to take a fifteen thirteen lead.

(25:22):
You mentioned the College Hoops Stanford's tournament final in Hawaii,
against Vandy was canceled due to COVID, and Hawaii seventh
place consolation game was canceled against Northern Ill. Are we
gonna watch health issues? They're a limited number of players available,
so they're done attendants about four thousand, they've all gone home.
B Y, you took the third place game and earlier
Wyoming won the fifth place game at the Diamond. Had

(25:44):
Jason Martin's Vanderbilt Commodore's won by default, Jerry Stackhouse, Baby,
probably contest love vany. You live right down the street.
You can see the string. You said also lived down
the street from gas stations that I would not walk into.
So I don't know that that works. Wow. Does Vandy
get the trophy for this? With Stanford not being able

(26:05):
to take the card? I was we're gonna talk about
the college football playoff guys, remember what they said. They're
not gonna They're not gonna push those games back. There
could be a Cincinnati situation where they win. Well, if
Alabama can't play, there are rules. They're not gonna push
it back a week. You're right, Well, I was told
Memphis took home the Hawaii Bolt trophy, So if they
took Bolt Trophy. Then Vanny should take the Diamond Head

(26:27):
Airlines Classic or whatever trophy. So we still have one
more NBA game coming up on this Christmas night in
about fifteen minutes, Dallas at Utah. The game in l
A had Brooklyn up big in the second half and
then the Nets went about five minutes without scoring. Lakers
sev run to get close. It's now three minutes to go.
Nets one ten, one oh six. James Harden back in

(26:47):
the lineup tonight, has thirty two points, eight rebounds, nine assists.
Kevin Duran and Kyrie Irving are out due to health protocols.
Earlier NBA wins for Golden State, Milwaukee and New York.
Paul George of the Clippers will us at least a
month or so with a torn right elbow ligament. He's
already missed the last couple of weeks. Until tonight's news.
He's averaging twenty five points a game. You mentioned the

(27:09):
Green Bay contest earlier today at home, they beat Cleveland
Aaron Rodgers three touchdown passes, but a key to the
game A for the Packers they got a touchdown right
before halftime. B for the Browns, they're missing their kicker
Chase mcloughlus we mentioned on last night's show, was placed
on the COVID list, So Cleveland's new kicker missed the
first extra point attempt today. Later, the team went for

(27:31):
two after a touchdown and missed that and lost by two.
Baker Mayfield two touchdowns, four interceptions, sacked five times. Aaron
Rodgers sacked no times. The Ravens placed quarterback Tyler Huntley
on the COVID list. We've mentioned last night that he
missed practiced yesterday due to illness. Come to find out
he's not playing at all this weekend at Cincinnati, and

(27:52):
quarterback Lamar Jackson's out hasn't practiced the last two weeks
due to a bad ankle, So tomorrow's quarterback for Baltimore
is Josh Johnson. Ravens trying to and a three game
losing streak. Ravens and Bengals each eight and six. Chargers
wide receiver Mike Williams on the COVID list. Running back
Austin Ekeler out for tomorrow at Houston. He is test
positive this week. Jets head coach Robert salis still on

(28:13):
the COVID list, will not be able to work tomorrow
against Jacksonville. But Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni cleared COVID protocols,
and Chief's wide receiver Tyreek Hill cleared protocols, as did
tight end Travis Kelsey. Updating the NFL game at Arizona tonight,
They're about to start the fourth quarter. Colts fifteen, Cardinals thirteen.

(28:33):
Remember the Cardinals gave up a safety earlier in the game.
It was late second quarter, and now they're down too.
M There was a college football game today, the Camelea
Bowl in Alabama. Went to Georgia State, a team that
started one and four as of early October, but they
won fifty one twenty against ball State, which finishes six

(28:54):
and seven. Updating the NBA two minutes to go and
that's one twee oh eight over the Lakers. Back to you,
Thank you, Steven Seager. This is Fox Sports Saturday. I
am Aritoris he is Jason Martin. You want to tweet
into the show on this Christmas night? Tweet us at
Aaron Underscore torres at j mart Radio. Always want to
know where you're listening, how you're listening here on a
Christmas night. Hope we can entertain you here for a

(29:16):
few hours as these games go final. So yeah, Jason,
I just kind of want to keep this this Baker
Mayfield conversation going. And it's not to pile on, but
it's because one, it was the biggest game of the
day obviously, and then to the other thing that that,
you know, I think it leads to kind of the
fascinating conversation that comes this offseason. And one thing that
really kind of stuck out to me watching this game

(29:37):
and really watching the last three, four, five weeks, and again,
I do understand he's hurt. I do understand that last
year when he was healthier, when O'Dell was out, Um,
you know that that they made the playoffs, they want
a playoff game, they took the Chiefs down to the wire.
I get all that, But I also, you know what
struck me was this, Jason, is that I think the
excuse or the the logic with Baker for all this

(29:58):
time in Cleveland has been this is that you know,
the idea is, yeah, he's not a superstar, Yeah he's
not this. Yeah he's not that. But we all remember
the famed uh you know, uh Cleveland Brown's quarterback jersey
with Spurgeon Win and Ken Dorsey and all those guys
that were on there, and I can't remember all the
names now, um, but I bring it up because, like
the argument always for Baker was, or at least my

(30:20):
understanding of it, was, well, you know, he's not Patrick
Mahomes or Aaron Rodgers, but at least he's not Spurge
and Win. At least he's not Can And and I'm
watching the game today and I'm like, he kind of
is Ken Dorsey, he kind of is all those guys there,
And I think that's the That's where I landed at
the end of the game today. And maybe by the
way he gets healthy in the offseason, he looks good.
All that stuff. I don't know, but I I just

(30:42):
I sit there and say, for a long time, the
argument was he's he's good enough and the roster around
him can kind of carry him. And now I just
don't think he's good enough. And and I just I
just go back to and it's funny. Producer Bow and
I were talking a little bit about the Lakers as
we were watching this game here, and you know, windows
of teams, championship windows, all that kind of stuff, and

(31:02):
to bring it back to the football field again. The
Browns window is now. I mean, Nick Chubb is awesome.
We saw it today. Jarvis Landry, as I said, is
right around thirty years old. He doesn't have a lot
of time left, you know, you just you just never know.
And I just look, I just look at this team
and I say, it's right now. The window is now.
You don't have very much longer. And can you afford

(31:23):
to bring back not not literally afford, but metaphorically afford
to bring back Baker Mayfield and try to run it
back next year even if the assumption is he's better
if he's healthy. So here's the thing. You say, the
window is open. I think you're looking at a painting
because I thinking, two, you have a quarterback. There's a
painting of a window, but there's not a window. There's

(31:44):
a wall. You have to have a quarterback or you know,
have a window to begin with. Let me say, I'm
basically making your point forward. No, no no, no, And it's
just so funny because this has been the argument in
other places. You know, I just saw a promo for
the Vikings Rams game tomorrow. I mean that was the argument, right,
is that you know, we looked at at the Rams
as being a a a you know, the Rams being

(32:05):
a win away from being Super Bowl champions, And Sean
McVeigh looked at it as if I didn't have Jared Goff,
we would be super Bowl champions, right yeah, and right now,
I think I think the Colts would take Jared Goff.
I think the Niners would take Jared Goff. I think
the Browns would take Jared Goff over what they have.
I'm not kidding you, Like I actually went and looked
this up because we actually did this on the air

(32:26):
a few days ago. I got nothing but times. I'm
gonna try to do it as fast as i can.
But after Bonnie Bernie Cozar in Vinny tests have already played.
And then you had Todd phil Cox, Mark Rippon, Eric's
that first one was made up? That sound really No,
that's a real name. That is a real name, Mark Rippon,

(32:46):
Eric Sire Tim Couch. If we all recall from Kentucky,
Ty Dettmer, Doug Peterson, Yes, that Doug Peterson, Tim Couch again,
Spurgeon Win, Kelly Holcomb, Jeff Garcia, Luke McK down, Trent Dilford,
Charlie fry Derrick Anderson, our partner, Brady Quinn here At Fox,
Ken Dorsey, Bruce Gradkowski, Colt McCoy, Jake Delone, Seneca Wallace,

(33:12):
Brandon Whedon, That Lewis, Jason Campbell, Brian Hoyer, Johnny Manziel,
Connor Shaw, Austin Davis, Robert Griffin the Third, Josh McCown,
Deshaun Kaiser, Kevin Hogan, Baker Mayfield, Tyrod Taylor, Case, Keenum,
Nick Mullins, and again Baker Mayfield. Now so okay, I'm

(33:33):
not okay, I think I might have to take back.
I'm not ready to put Baker Mayfield on the I
mean what you're talking about that Lewis and Austin da
I mean, okay, Baker is at least he he is
went healthy, a little bit better than those guys. I
do think that the point about the paintings still stands true,
but I should probably take back that mean thing I
said about he's not better than or he's that he's

(33:55):
he's no better than the guys are that are that
around that Jersey? So yeah, well, I mean on the
way that that's accurate is to say that none of
them are gonna win you a Super Bowl. Sure, then
I think that part of it is what you really
were saying. And I think at this point you can
look at Baker Mayfield and say, yeah, I don't think
that dude's winning you a super Bowl. Like you could
do worse than him, but he's always gonna infuriate you

(34:16):
because for every good thing he does, he's probably got
a bad thing in his pocket waiting to do as well,
and really quick. The difference is that the rest of
the roster around him is probably super Bowl good, and
those other guys you could criticize them, and you can say, Okay,
Thad Lewis, isn't the guy that's gonna get you there,
Bernie Costars and it's gonna get you there, whoever, whoever, whoever.
They didn't have Nick Chubb, they didn't have this offensive line,

(34:37):
they didn't have the defensive front that this Brown's team has.
So to me, that's kind of the fundamental difference there. Yeah,
I agree, I think that that's all accurate. I think
the bigger conversation to have, and maybe we can carry
it over and do it on and do it on
the other side, is eventually there's gonna be the quarterback
that doesn't just set the market, but resets it where
all of a sudden, it's like, you know, the next

(34:58):
guy doesn't have to make more than the and that
just came before. We know what Josh Allen got paid
before the season. We anticipate Lamar Jackson is gonna make
similar money, if not a little bit more. But if
it becomes well, the next quarterback in line gets paid more.
I don't think that happens with Baker. Well, I'm not
sure he ends up outside of Cleveland because I don't
know what the market is. If he's gonna try to

(35:19):
go be that guy. There's not a soul in the NFL,
there's not a team in the NFL it's gonna be
willing to pay that for his services? Does so? Does
he reset the market back to the midline for quarterbacks
where it's well, it's not just the next guy, it's okay.
If you're Tom Brady, will pay you this. If you're
Aaron Rodgers will pay you this. If you're Baker Mayfield,
there's a different scale. That is a very interesting idea,

(35:39):
and that is a very interesting idea that I want
to discuss next. He's Jason Martin, I'm ariatoris here on
a Merry Christmas to all of you out there across
the country. This is Fox Sports Radio. Welcome back everybody,
Fox Sports Radio. I'm Aaron Torres. He is Jason Martin
here on a Christmas night. The Lakers game has just

(36:01):
gone final. The Lakers. For all of you Lakers fans
out there, not a great time to be a Lakers fan.
They lose fifteen of Brooklyn. Of course, Brooklyn no Kevin Durant,
uh No Kyrie Irving, who should be back soon. The
Lakers in their defense, of course, we know that you know,
Anthony Davis is hurt, but they still had three Hall
of Famers on the floor. They lose by seven to
the Brooklyn Nets. Any any NBA hot takes Jason before

(36:24):
we get back to uh, before we get back to
the Cleveland Brown situation. There no not yet, I mean,
and I know that I know you had this on
the list of things that we're going to talk about
tonight on the show. And it is really strange because
I'm a huge NBA fan, But I've never cared less
well about the league than I do right now. And
I think we will get back to where we care
about it in the new year at some point in time.

(36:47):
But man, right now, you want to talk about, like
I know, Christmas Day is where it often begins for
a lot of people for the NBA, well, I just
couldn't possibly have cared less today. I will tell you this.
We will continue that conversation at the top of next
hour if the NFL has officially just killed NBA Christmas
Day basketball. But we'll get back to that momentarily. In
the meantime, let's gotta wrap on hour one with with

(37:08):
some Baker stuff. And I thought it was an interesting
point that you were bringing up there to lead uh
to to end the last segment. Excuse me the idea
that you know, there's kind of always been this understanding that, um,
you know, quarterback money is going to continue to go up.
We know the value of a quarterback. Bernie Frider could
tell you from a Vegas perspective that they they're really
the only players that can can really alter games from
you know, from you know, statistical standpoint whatever. Um. But

(37:31):
I bring it up because you know, there's been this
notion that that quarterbacks forever, that the money is just
gonna keep going up. And as you brought up, you know,
Baker's kind of the next guy coming up, as I
should mention, by the way, the Colts have just scored.
They were up fifteen thirteen. They have scored a touchdown
to make it pending. So they kicked this p a

(37:51):
t all of a sudden, the Cardinals are down nine,
although there is a penalty flag on the play. We'll
get back to that momentarily, Jason, But go ahead, go
back to Baker. I thought it was a really interesting
point that you were making there. I was just saying that,
I mean, look, Baker is looking for for his next deal,
as he should be. The three guys coming into the
season that we're talked about the most were Josh Allen,
Lamar Jackson, and Baker Mayfield. And Josh got his money

(38:15):
as he should and we assume Lamar is gonna get
his money, and because without him, I don't know what
Baltimore is, I don't know that they're my My hot
take that they were gonna make the playoffs may actually
turn out to be right before we're all said and done.
But Baker Mayfield is a guy that's not going to
get more money than Josh Allen. And that's what we
had seen forever. Is wasn't it wasn't who was the

(38:37):
best quarterback making the most money, it was who's the
next quarterback in line that needs to get paid? Because
that's the way the market was working. If you made
forty one, I'm gonna make forty one and a half.
Next guys don't make forty two, Next guys don't make
forty three, then Aaron Rodgers gonna renegotiate his contract for
forty five. Then Mahomes is gonna sign some crazy backloaded
deal where he's gonna make this, And that's how it
was done. Well, eventually the NFL is gonna have enough

(38:59):
of that, and eventually NFL is gonna be like, wait
a second, just because your next in line doesn't mean
you're good enough to deserve this level of money. So
the question for the Browns is do you want him
back at all? Because I think you can get that
guy for about twenty seven million dollars a year, or
maybe even a little bit less, because who exactly, you
tell me, Aaron Aaron, who exactly is paying over thirty

(39:23):
million dollars for what we know Baker Mayfield to be
at this stage in his career, he's not getting more
than Josh Allen not even close. The question is do
the Browns want to move on or do they? I mean,
how do you do how do you throw an offer
low enough that somebody beats it without embarrassing the guy
in the process. It's gonna be really fascinating to watch

(39:43):
because I think we have the potential here to finally
see a shift where it's not just next man up
gets more money. It's no, You're gonna get what you
deserve because the rest of the league has a market
for you as well. And all right, you're a used
car at this point. You don't have a ton of
mileage on you. Let's go to the Kelly Blue Blue
Book value. You're not necessarily a Cadillac Escalade. We're right

(40:05):
now looking at the key to tell you, Rod, and
that's how we're going to market you. So first of all,
I should mention, by the way, the Colts that touchdown
was good. It was a late hit on Carson Wentz.
They kicked the extra point. They are now up nine
points with under seven minutes to go. Obviously, if Arizona
cannot hold onto this game, uh, it would be a
third straight loss. They would fall out of first place.

(40:25):
They would be you know, the Rams would be ahead
of them in the lost column as the Rams get
set to play the Vikings tomorrow. Back to Baker, you know,
it was funny when you were talking about that. Uh,
I used to I used to date a teacher and
she used to tell her students, you get what you
get and you don't get upset. And that's kind of
what I feel like with Baker is is I'm with
you a percent? Is the idea that if he goes
to the negotiating table, uh, kind of under the impression

(40:48):
that he is going to get the money that these
other guys have gotten. So now it just kind of
becomes an interesting kind of dynamic of of what is
he willing to accept? Does he understand his value? That's
gonna be an interesting more than eight and that's gonna
be one of the most interesting things going into this offseason. Jason, Oh, yeah, no,
I agree. And then then then the Derek Carr question
is gonna be the other one and we could talk
about it afterwards. It's just what's gonna happen with Derek Carr?

(41:10):
Because right now, who would you rather have? Derek Carr
Baker Mayfield. I don't even think it's close even though
the Raiders are trending in a bad direction too, I
still think Derek Carr is a far better player than
Baker Mayfield. The Raiders have a lot of problems. I
don't know how much all of them are related to
Derek Carr, but plenty more NFL coming up. We react
again to this Cardinals Colts game. More on the Packers,
Brown's errantors, Jason Martin, Fox Sports d Welcome and everybody

(41:33):
hour to Fox Sports Radio. You heard the man, Jason
Martin aeratoris here on Christmas night. Hope everybody had a
great holiday, very merry Christmas. Hope you got all sorts
of good gifts. Hope you got to spend time with
friends and family. And as I said, if you're at work,
if you're whatever you're doing, feel free to tweet in
at Aaron Underscore torres at j mart Radio. Let us

(41:54):
know how you're listening, where you're at, what you're doing,
and why you are making us a part of your
Christmas night. Uh, disager just told you Colts with the
ball up nine four minutes to go, they could really
put this game on ice here if they can get
a couple of first downs and essentially run this clock out,
so we will keep you updated on that one. Discover,

(42:15):
if you're a value customer, you deserve a simple gesture
of appreciation from your credit card company. And that's why
Discover matches all the cash back you've earned at the
end of your first year. Discover exceptionally common sense. Learn
more at discovered dot com. Slash match limitations may apply,
So Jason, as I said, we'll keep everybody updated on
this Cardinals Colts game. As Disager told you, Cardinals trying
to avoid a third straight loss, first time out, third

(42:38):
and thirteen for the for the Cults, So if the
Colts can I get a first down here, the game
would essentially be done. But that said, Jason, I want
to kind of talk about something that you brought up
last hour, and I don't even think it was necessarily intentional,
but it was a thought that I had today and
that was this, um. This is the second straight year
that we have had NFL football on Christmas Day, And

(43:01):
obviously for people who know sports, anybody listening no sports,
the NBA, of course has generally owned Christmas Day. NFL
owns Thanksgiving, NBA owns Christmas. College football usually on the
New Year's, New Year's even New Year's Day kind of window.
But I bring it up because last year we had
a Christmas Day game, and part of it it really
wasn't the NBA's fault. If you remember, they were coming

(43:22):
out of the bubble from the previous year. They weren't
sure when the season was going to start, and the
NFL kind of said, you know what, if you guys
aren't sure, if you guys are gonna play, We're gonna
just throw one game on on Christmas Day just in case. Yeah,
I'll just give the sports fans something that's something to
watch in case you guys don't play well. That Viking
Saints game Alvin Kamar, I remember because I talked about

(43:43):
it on air that night. Alvi Kamara had like six touchdowns.
It was incredible. Twenty million people watch that game. I
looked it up last night when I was on air
with any Spanier. And now we have two games today.
Great game between the Packers and the Browns. Really entertaining
game coming down to the wire here between the Cardinals
and the colt And I'm with you, Jason, I know
you said at an hour one, I don't want to
speak for you I have never paid less attention to

(44:06):
the NBA than I did on this Christmas Day. It
was really interesting, kind of the marquee game of the
day was supposed to be Lakers nets, but there were
some COVID issues. The marquet of the game of the
day ended up being Warriors Sons. That game ended right
around the same time as Brown's versus Brown's versus Packers,
And I don't I didn't see anybody tweeting about the
about the Warriors game. I saw everybody tweeting about football game.

(44:28):
So I don't know exactly what the plan is for
the NFL going forward, but I had that thought today.
If the NFL just decides, you know what we're playing
on Christmas Day and there's nothing the NBA could do
about it, I kind of wonder if we're ever gonna
look at sports on Christmas Day the same where people
are always gonna watch the NBA. But if you have
the choice between the NBA and some good NFL football

(44:48):
like we got today, I think NBA basketball and Christmas
Day might be dead. Jason Martin, what do you think?
So here's here's my long time theory about the NBA
regular season, and I think our opinion today and how
little that we cared about it. And we say this
knowing that we talked about this league quite a bit.

(45:08):
But at the same time, I also think a lot
of listeners feel the same way. At this point, I
think it's this, when you play a schedule of E
D two games, it's really hard for you to make
me care about one of them because it's such a
small piece of a piece of the pie. But let
me jump in there real quick, though, let me j
up in there really quick. And first of all, I

(45:29):
I want to respond to that, but bo I want
to bring a producer. But I think bohead something to say. Yeah,
I was gonna say, just we were talking in the
break about next year in Christmas Day. Next year is
on a Sunday, so I think it will be interesting
to watch next year. Who blinks, because I don't think
the NBA is gonna put their slate of games up
against the full NFL Sunday. Well, and I would say too,
I think the more interesting thing would be I guess
it would be December of three, if you can look

(45:53):
that far ahead. I'm not great at math, but that
would mean that thanks, uh, thank Christmas Day would be
on a Monday, and does the NFL just go with
one Monday night game or does it go with several
kind of like what they do on Thanksgiving. They had
to today. Um, you know, and obviously I should mention, like,
you know, I don't know what the NFL's plan is,
because of course they always have games on Saturdays in December.

(46:13):
So what I wanted to jump in on there, Jason,
is you were kind of going down the lane of
only one game in a D two matter. You know,
it's one of a D two games, Do they really matter?
All that good stuff? I would normally agree with you,
but these are supposed to be the marketing. I mean,
these are the games that the NBA hand picks for
Christmas Day to get the biggest audiences that they possibly can.

(46:35):
I mean, we had Nets versus Lakers, which was supposed
to be Katie versus lebron We had Warriors versus the
Phoenix Suns, who are coming off a trip to the
to the NBA Finals. We had Celtics versus Bucks. So
I understand the the idea that it's hard for the
NBA to make any noise when you're playing a D
two games, And by the way I should mention. Adrianodronowski
reported today that there's talk of inserting a mid season

(46:57):
tournament in to try and get some kind of eyeballs
on the sport earlier in the year. He just reported
that today. But it's I understand the idea that, you know,
it's hard to make a dent when you play a
D two regular season games, but they hand pick these
games to try to kind of capture the audience as
best as they can on this Christmas Day, and I think,
you know, it just completely fell flat because the NFL

(47:20):
is this this monster that can't be stopped. Well, my
point again is the same. I know that if it's
a really good matchup, I'm probably gonna see it again
in the playoffs, when they care a lot more. When
it's Christmas Day and it's one out of a D two,
it's still counts as one out of a D two.
Even if it's a marquee matchup, you still only get
one w for it. They don't give you five. It's

(47:42):
not anywhere near as important as one out of twelve
in college football or one out of seventeen now in
the NFL. All of those seem to have bigger steaks
because there's fewer of them, it's a larger piece of
the pie. Any good NBA game in February you really
don't need to watch because you're gonna see it again
in a or you're gonna see it again in June.
And I think that's one thing that's part of it.

(48:04):
The same way I feel about baseball. It's really hard
to make me care about the regular season in baseball,
even though I love my Braves, because there's a hundred
sixty two freaking games. There's so much And what's weird
about it is it gets the end and somebody misses
out because they end up having one loss at the
very end. So you could then try to go back
in time and say, well, that game that you didn't
care about in December might have actually mattered. But that's

(48:26):
one problem. The second problem is this, I know the
NBA has a lot of recognizable names for big time
sports fans, but I don't know that they have a
whole lot of box office attractions. They've got Steph Curry,
there's no doubt they've still got Lebron James, but a
lot of these dudes Aaron outside of the hardcore NBA
community how many of these dudes are like slebs that

(48:47):
you're really gonna tune in to watch on a regular basis. Well,
I don't think like Damian Lillard and Mitchell in Utah.
I love all these guys and I love this league,
but at the same time, like those dudes are not
pulling a bunch of giant television audiences. Maybe I'm wrong,
but it just doesn't seem to me like the NBA

(49:08):
star power, as as deep as that league feels like
it is, doesn't feel like it makes that big of
an impact on the population writ large. Well, and it's
so funny because Arnie and I have had this conversation
for years about, um, you know how many guys actually
do draw you to a TV And I think it's
a few as Lebron Steph maybe Kevin durant Um, and

(49:30):
I think there are guys that can get there, like
Janice going to the finals last year was awesome, But
this was something that I actually remember talking with Arnie
about through the years. Is like I think those four
years in a row where we got Calves versus Warriors.
I thought it was great in the moment. I also
do think that it hurt the sport as a whole
in the bigger picture, because uh, you know, you didn't
get to know who that next wave of guys was,

(49:52):
and you don't have those like like it just felt
like every year, And let's be honest, you know, the
the audience continues to grow as the playoffs go deeper.
So if you're not paying attention to the regular season,
most people don't watch the first round because most of
the series are over pretty quick. Maybe you start to
kind of sort of pay attention in the in the
conference conference semifinals. Then you really start to pay attention
to the conference finals. Then then you bring in the

(50:14):
casual viewer that doesn't really care about the NBA at all,
but they just kind of want to know what's going
on in the finals. And it sounded great to have
the same NBA finals four straight years. But you don't
have a chance to get to know a Janice. You
don't have a chance to get to know um whoever.
You don't. I'm trying to think off the top of
my head, but I think you're right right, Like I
think that if you went on you know, Twitter, on

(50:36):
a random Tuesday night, uh, and John Moran does something cool,
you think that John Moran is the biggest athlete in
the world, whereas the reality is like people probably really
have no idea who John Moran is. And to bring
it back to the NFL equation, I would argue that
even a casual sports fan kind of knows who Kyler

(50:56):
Murray is, kind of know who's knows who it isn't
just Aaron Rod Jersey. There's probably seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen,
whatever number of guys that you know beyond just those
two or three supermarketable guys. I don't think the average
fan knows Donovan Mitchell, as you said, I don't think
the average fan knows Jayson Tatum. I'll be honest. I
don't think the average fan knew Devin Booker until he

(51:16):
started dating Kendall Jenner. And so I just bring it
up to say, you know that well of guys that
you feel like draws you to the TV. I really
do think it's probably smaller than the average fan wants
to admit. Oh it is, it is. And look, television
ratings aren't made by the hardcore sports fans. They're made
by everybody else. That's why it matters. That's why Magic

(51:37):
and Bird and m J and Hakimla Jahwan and Dominique
Wilkins and so many of these names that you could
rattle off. Isaiah Thomas and all of this. Those guys
felt larger than life. And I think that they benefited
from the fact that there were there was less competition.
There were the eyeballs and entertainment well, and you have
all the streaming, you have everything else. I don't need

(51:58):
to watch your NBA games on Chris to Day, I'm
gonna watch the five minute Ted Lasso Special and then
I'm gonna flip over to Apple TV again and watch
Charlie Brown Christmas and don't gonna go over to HBO
Max and I'm gonna watch National Influence Christmas Vacation. Like
I don't even need to watch sports if I don't
want to NFL, I'm gonna care because we're near the
end of the year and so all these games have steaks.

(52:19):
And I think I've said this too. I think the
competition within sports is that much bigger because and I
use this example all the time. Think about the idea
that we now watch the NFL combine. Okay, we're not
I'm not talking about games. I'm not even talking about
the draft. I'm not talking about college games that you
watch if you're an NFL fan to kind of see

(52:40):
the guys that are going to be in the draft.
I'm talking about dudes running around in shorts and T
shirts and doing bench presses and so like you know,
And that is where I do think the point that
you brought up earlier about such a being such a
fragmented society, But then also the NBA and Major League Baseball,
and obviously there's other sports to the end. HL college basketball,

(53:01):
where their seasons are so long, where the games don't
mean as much. Is where I think that hurts them.
Is Now that guy or girl that in April and
May had nothing to watch twenty years ago other than
the first round the NBA playoffs. Well, now you got
a week or two leading up to the NFL Draft,
you got the combine, you got the NFL Draft itself,

(53:21):
where all of a sudden, like I said, I and
then on top of that you have the non sports
stuff like you said that that you know, all the
different streaming services, So you know, I don't know if
there's an answer for the NBA, but it's just something
that kind of keeps creeping into my mind. It just
feels like every single year, these games, these regular season
games become less and less relevant. And I think this year,

(53:41):
on Christmas Day, with two NFL games, I think it's
completely dwarfed. The NBA. Well, like, think about it, like,
if the Lakers are playing the Warriors in January, do
I really need to watch that or just assume I'm
going to see that in the Western Conference Finals or
the Western Conference semis at least, like that becomes the problem.
And again, there's just so much and there's so many games,

(54:03):
and as a as a function of that, it makes
it harder for me to sit there on a day
to day basis and keep nearly as close to tabs
on this league. I mean, I can tell you the
record of almost every NFL team without even looking it up.
And we talked so much about college football this year, Aaron,
I did that thing when my laptop close most of
the time because it didn't matter, like, because I was

(54:23):
so dialed in to what was going on and the NBA.
I have felt that way for a while. And it's
not like there's not dudes that I want to see.
It's just like, man, the playoffs are different NBA playoffs
are an absolute blast. But until we get to that point,
I'm just kind of like, yeah, I mean, I'll watch
it if it's on, and i still will watch Inside
the NBA, and I've d v RD every single week,

(54:44):
and I've even found myself not getting to that and
I love that show because the NBA seems like the
season started too soon, and when my attentions on football,
it's really hard to put me away from it, and
I feel like I'm more representative of America than anybody else. Yeah,
and it's something too, And you know, maybe we could
get to say as the looks like the Cardinals very
interesting play as they were just out of bounds on

(55:05):
what would have been a touchdown pass Cardinals driving. They
are down nine points with just about a minute to
go in this game. But you know, disager share some
really interesting stats on some some bowl games versus uh
NBA regular season games, and and it just again it
proves the point that there is so much more out
there drawing you away from the NBA. Where even this
year in college football, uh, you know, on on a

(55:26):
Saturday night or you know on a on a yeah,
on a Saturday night, you can watch college football. Then
you have the post game stuff, then you have the
coach again. There's just a lot going on in the
bandwidth of a sports fan. This what I wanna do? Uh,
we want to come back. We'll talk as the Cardinals
are lining up for a field goal to cut it
to a one possession game, Colts up twenty two to thirteen.

(55:48):
We'll continue this conversation. Will obviously keep you updated on
this Arizona Indianapolis game as it is now twenty two
to sixteen, forty two seconds to go. Plenty more on that,
Plenty more on the games than selves from the NBA
and of course the NFL as well. Erators. Jason Martin
here on a busy Saturday night, busy, busy, busy Christmas
Saturday night, Fox Sports Radio. Welcome back, everybody, Fox Sports

(56:11):
Radio aeratoris Jason Martin here on a busy Saturday night.
Of course, we have the NBA fans tweeting in about
how great the NBA is blah blah blah. We we
deal with these all the time. Listen, I ideal with
facts and data. NBA ratings are going down to say,
you can get us updated in a minute. Um, The
Independence Bowl with b y u and uh and uh u.

(56:34):
A B last week had three point one four million viewers,
okay um or three point four two million viewers. Excuse me.
No NBA regular season game outside of maybe Christmas Day
will do even close. So I'm sorry that we upset
the NBA fans and they're so heard and blah blah
blah blah blah this and that, but we have to
talk facts. Speaking of facts, let's get to back to
the NFL, which is what do you got. I gotta

(56:58):
add to that, if you listen to me in the
middle of night on Sunday mornings ever before, I talked
a lot about the NBA, you can talk to my
entire staff back there. All those all those talented people
out there probably got tired, sick and tired of me
talking about the NBA, because I love the league. All
the people that are tweeting right now and the ones
it's like, this is why we love Rob Parker and

(57:19):
Chris bruss are and also nothing against those are those
are great dudes, and they're like they defend our interests
and all this other kind of stuff, and and trying
to push back against the point you're making. My point
for me, you're a hardcore NBA fan. My point is
the numbers are going down not because you don't think
there's marketable players. I'm not saying Donovan Mitchell is not

(57:41):
fun to watch. I'm not saying that I don't want
to watch Chris Paul do his thing in Phoenix and
all of this. I love the game. But the vast
majority of the general public, the ones that are responsible
for the ratings, I poppers. Those people are not coming
out of the woodwork. But for guys that you could
count on, I would say maybe one. And do you
think that's fair? Aaron? Think about one hand? One hand

(58:03):
was so that gives you five guys, right, Steph Absolutely,
that's being very generous. There's three who else you want
to put? Honest? Maybe maybe there? Yeah, man, and I
love you honest too, real quick. And I think the
important part about this too is you know NBA fans well,
you know it's if it's a fragmented audience, ratings you're
going down. Um yeah. The Cowboys and Raiders did a

(58:28):
thirty one year The Cowboys Raiders on Thanksgiving Day was
the highest rated Thanksgiving Day game at thirty one years. Okay, uh,
Fox and ESPN every week during college football season, we're
setting record ratings. You know, so like like you know,
NBA fans get so hurt, gets so offended. But like,
here's the bottom line. There are a lot of sports

(58:49):
that are trending in the right direction. College football, the NFL,
n c A tournament numbers are way up last year.
And then there's the NBA. And you can fight it.
You can argue, you could this. Let's we're just dealing
with facts here. That's about my go ahead. I don't
know if you have anything else to say. Well, the
only other thing I would say is this, there's there's
one of two facts, right, the stuff that we're saying
is right, or the messaging coming from some of the

(59:10):
players in the league off putting half the country. That
might be the other part. And we like, you can
take it wherever you want to take it. I'm not
going to speculate as to whether or not that's accurate,
but there's some reason people aren't watching the league the
way they used to write. Like you can love the
n b A and you can want to talk about
the NBA, oh you want, but you also have to
look as as you said, Aaron at the facts and data,
and it's one of two things. Either league is not

(59:31):
exciting or they've ticked people off. Which one of those
is the better one for you? I'll accept either argument.
I'll tell you what. We will get back to that
later in the show, because that is that is a
very interesting conversation that I do want to have. But
we we need to talk a little bit about this
Cardinals Colts game which just went final. The Colts do
win twenty three to sixteen, or yea three six sixteen.

(59:53):
Excuse me, Cardinals kicked a field goal to cut it
to six. Of course, Uh, they were down nine. They
missed a p A T early in the game, it
would have been eight. All that good stuff. Colts now
have one for a second straight Saturday Night there at
nine and six overall, Cardinals at ten and five. Jayson,
let's start really quickly with the Cardinals because you know,
again I mentioned earlier Ben Mallery not the only one

(01:00:15):
that says it, but the more interesting story is often
in the losing locker room, and the Cardinals have now
lost three straight games. Uh, it's not a coincidence that
it coincides with DeAndre Hopkins new Copkins going down with
a season ending injury. He is not expected to be
back at anytime soon. Um. I don't even know where
to begin. I mean, I think it's beyond like like

(01:00:36):
I I think we're past the point of arguing is
the Arizona like like, are the Arizona Cardinals a Super
Bowl contender without DeAndre? Because I think right now, we
have the sample size, we have the data. They've lost
three straight games. Um, they have. They have a game
in Dallas next week. It's not gonna get any easier.
I don't even know what the conversation is other than
that this team is totally trending in the wrong direction.

(01:00:56):
I don't think they're gonna win the division at this
point with the Rams moving in the right direction. Uh.
And it just becomes a question now of are they
going to be a one and done after one point?
Many people thinking they were maybe the favorite to win
the Super Bowl coming out of the NFC. So they're
three and five in their last eight games from week
one to week seven combined, fifteen five and one since

(01:01:18):
Kingsbury took over in two thousand and nineteen. But they're
eight and eighteen from week eight on. This is what
I was talking about earlier. This happened at Texas Tech,
this happened here. Yes, Hopkins matters a lot, and I
think honestly he's the MVP of that team, not Kyler Murray,
and I think you see that without him being in there.
Kyler Murray resorts back to the hero ball stuff, holding

(01:01:40):
the ball too long, all of those things. But that
stat is pretty damning. Their three and five in their
last eight. They're fifteen five and one from week one
to week seven, but eight and eight teen from week
eight on since he took over inteen. That from one
of the local media guys here in Nashville, Mike Herndon, um,
that's a that's that's pretty damning. Like if you can't

(01:02:00):
win late in the season, Bomb Arizona and I think
I've got talent. Boy. I don't know that Kingsbury needs
to be there next year. I don't care what they're record.
Oh you're saying so so independent of whether they make
the playoffs next year, you think that there's an argument
or not not make the playoffs, But independent of whether
they get to the playoffs this year, whether they win
a game or not, which I don't think they're trending

(01:02:20):
they're turning towards being one and done in the playoffs. Um,
so you you don't believe that, you think that there's
an argument to be made to not even bring back
Cliff Kingsbury next year at all. I mean, look, if
they if they tank all the way down the schedule
right now, I mean eventually, you gotta make adjustments, right,
And that's what Kingsbury has been knocked for his entire
career at all levels is never making adjustments. When people

(01:02:43):
actually watch film on his teams and they start playing
them differently, you see what starts to happen later in
the year. So you have to adjust to that. And
the great coaches do that. The Belichicks of the world
do that. You see guys that are able to find
ways to win. The Indianapolis Coast tonight had a ridiculously
bad offensive line. Everybody was missing. Darius Leonard didn't play

(01:03:04):
in Arizona lost at home in a game that they
had to have when they were trending in the wrong direction.
They needed something. It's Christmas night and Cardinals fans got
a lump of coal in their stuff. By the way,
let me take it a step further, speaking of games
that they had have the game last week forgetting tonight.
They had have the game last week, and now they've
now lost three games in a row. Uh. And it's
a really interesting point, right because the team is improved

(01:03:25):
under Kingsburry went five ten and one his first year,
eight and eight to second year, already at ten wins
this year. Um. But you know, again, we we talked
about a lot with Cleveland, right is is championship windows,
championship opportunities, and clearly this team is built for right now,
this second. And I do think there's an argument to
be made. And by the way, we talked a lot
of college football on this show. You know, there was
a reason that that Cliff Kingsbury's name magically got leaked

(01:03:48):
as a candidate for the Oklahoma job. And I don't
think it was because Oklahoma was interested in hiring them.
It's because, if I'm not mistaken, he he doesn't what
is he on his last year of his contractor one
year left after this year or something like that. Yeah,
it's so thing close to that. I mean I had
said before the year I was sure he was gonna
be fired, and I didn't like when they hired him
because he was the worst coach in Texas tech history

(01:04:08):
over the last four decades if you look at who
they had, and that was literally the only job he
could get as a head coach. He's a nice guy,
You've heard that from everybody, but only his alma mater
would hire him to be the head coach. And he
was so bad that they ran him out of town.
He had nowhere else to go, and the Arizona Cardinals
signed him because they thought he could be like Sean
they meeting McVeigh, they thought he could be the next
one of those guys. Unfortunately, that was Green Bay that

(01:04:30):
got that guy. Well, the Packers got the guy that
was like Sean McVeigh and actually might be better than
Sean McVeigh in the end as a head coach with
Matt Lafleur. We gotta see how his career continues to
pan out and what he looks like. Maybe if he
doesn't have Aaron Rodgers as his quarterback, but Cliff Kingsbury,
you would think. I mean, they went ahead and Butcher's
the guy that they had gotten the year before in
the draft Josh Rosen, and pretty much ended any chance

(01:04:52):
of his career being good. Because you gotta give Cliff
Kingsbury's guys, so he brings in Kyler Murray. And what's
happened since that point in time, Well, the Cardinals have
I really done all that much outside of the regular
season early, So I think this next few games for
the Cardinals is gonna tell the tale. Why would you
bring Kingsbury back? If this happens again, like you've seen it,
and this isn't the first time that has happened. The

(01:05:13):
only way that you let this go is if you're
just like, yeah, well we lost Hopkins. If you hadn't
lost Hopkins, this would have been a different conversation, which
is true except for the fact that this happens every
year to this team. By the way, one year left
on Cliff Kingsbury's current contract, So I don't know that
he'll be let go this offseason, but I think there's
a very good chance he may be coaching for his

(01:05:34):
job next year. Plenty more on this Indianapolis Colts win
over the Arizona Cardinals coming up, but first let's get
back to our man, Steve Seger. What's trending. We'll get
to the n b A in a moment, but there
are two finals in the NFL and what you were
mentioning about the Thanksgiving ratings. By the way, and I
know for a fact that Aaron is a huge basketball fan.
He's not talking down the NBA out of spite. I

(01:05:58):
watched plenty of basketball, include being the Laker loss to
the Nets tonight, a game that was shockingly close in
the fourth quarter with the comeback. It has nothing to
do with this. The facts are the Thanksgiving game this
year with Raiders and Cowboys drew thirty eight million people,
so insane. That is averaging more viewers for that game
than any other basketball game that has ever been on

(01:06:19):
American television. The Magic Bird n c A Final seventy
nine that was about thirty five million viewers, Jordan's Finale
with the Bulls Finals that was about thirty five million.
It's incredible. This Thanksgiving game. Regular seasons, they're not even
goodt eight million viewers and keep them on. How much

(01:06:42):
how many channels you had to watch when you came
back to Magic Bird or the end of George. We're
compared to the number of streaming services and everything you
have access to with your fingertips right now, and you
did thirty eight million on a holiday that's insane. Yeah,
baseball has had some Game sevens, the World's Series getting
even higher than thirty eight million. Know, the Cubs Game

(01:07:03):
seven a few years ago, the Yankees Game seven twenty
years ago, that Marlin's Indians before that at Game seven
got huge numbers. So you know, it's not like we're
picking on the NBA. It's just when you put it
that way and those are the numbers, it's like, my goodness,
it's just the NFL is king over all sports. By
the way, to Segre, I definitely saw that thirty eight million,

(01:07:25):
and I thought it I must be reading the wrong outlet.
So I'm glad you because I knew it was a
multi year high, and obviously, as I said, thirty one
years highest rated, uh Thanksgiving game in thirty one years
dating back to I did not think it was possible
that it could be thirty eight million at its peak,
But here we are. It's something that usually only a
conference final would would get bigger than thirty eight million.

(01:07:49):
That's a lot of people, and it's also more money
than Baker Mayfield's gonna get paid well. Baker Bayfield had
two touchdown passes, four interceptions, sacked five times, just us
a COVID list and took the yell at Green Bay.
The Packers still hold the top seed in the NFC
at twelve and three record Aaron Rodgers three touchdown passes,

(01:08:10):
he broke Brett Farves team record for t V passes,
and the Colts go to nine and six with the
win at Arizona tonight. Sen What an awful sports Christmas
for the folks in Phoenix, Arizona. The Suns lost at
home to Golden State and blew the first place standing
that they'd had. The Warriors are now up a half
game for best overall record. And here, I don't know

(01:08:30):
what Arizona's offense is in recent weeks, and they've lost
three games in a row. How about this is how
they lost tonight Colts the final a Colts team missing
almost its entire starting offensive line and a tight end
went out injured, and its star linebacker went on the
COVID list. Today, the Cardinals missed two field goals and
an extra point attempt and lost by six. Cardinals also

(01:08:53):
gave up a safety first half. They also turned it
over on downs twice. They also committed eleven penalties. This
was a wretched game for Arizona tonight and really quick.
That speaks to the coaching philosophy, the coaching aspects of it,
which we can continue more after you keep us updated
to Seger. But it does kind of play into j
Mart's point about, um, you know, Cliff Kingsbury, you look

(01:09:13):
at the record ten wins. You know you can blame
injuries all you want, but those are the kinds of
mistakes that reflect on coaching. And if your offense is
sputtering this much without Hopkins, how is it that Kyler
Murray is only running four times a game? The Ravens
place quarterback Tyler Huntley on the COVID list. Lamar Jackson's out,

(01:09:34):
So Josh Johnson is sure Ravens quarterback at Cincinnati and
the Ravens have lost three in a row. They're going
up against the Bengals in a battle of eight and
six teams. For the Chargers, they're missing two players due
to COVID Mike Williams tested positive running back Austin Ekeler
as well. They're playing at Houston tomorrow. Out for the
Texans is wide receiver Brandon Cooks. Good news for the Chiefs, meanwhile,

(01:09:57):
who have the inside track. Of course, to win that
division after winning in l A recently, wide receiver Tyreek
Hill cleared protocols, as did tight end Travis Kelsey now
to the NBA, and there is one game still going on.
Utah's come back to take the lead mid second quarter
forty four over a Dallas team that's fifteen and sixteen.
Lakers are a couple of games under five hundred. They've

(01:10:19):
lost five in a row. Lost at home to Brooklyn fifteen.
James Harden returned for the lineup and had a triple
double with thirty six points. Now the Nets were up
twenty three with about ten minutes to go, blew that
lead and still at a seven oh run in the
final minute to win the game. Golden States win at
Phoenix was one sixteen one oh seven Steph Curry thirty

(01:10:40):
three points. Milwaukee came back to beat Boston. The Celtics
are a game under five hundred, New York over whatever's
left of Atlanta one oh one to eighty seven. Not
only Trey Young out nine players and health protocols for
the Hawks same as nine out now for the Celtics
and Big Clippers. Injury news tonight as Paul George is
going to miss at least a month or so with
a torn right elbow ligament. He'd already missed the past

(01:11:01):
couple of weeks. Until tonight's news, he averages twenty five
points a game. Back to you, Thank you, Steve Seager.
This is Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday, Aaron Torres,
Jason Martin In on a busy Christmas Saturday night. If
you have not yet, feel free to tweet us In
at Aaron Underscore, Torres at j mart Radio. Let us
know where you're listening, how you're listening, all that good

(01:11:22):
stuff here on a Christmas Saturday. By the way, Jason,
I will say Ernie Spanning and I filled in in
this time slot last night. This feels like day one
of March Madness. Compared to last last night was a
tough four hours to get through with not a single
sporting event going on. So it's great to have two
NFL games. And as much as we crushed the NBA,

(01:11:43):
as much as America thinks we hate the NBA, uh,
great to have five NBA games on today really quickly
with the Colts. I'm curious your perspective. Um. You know,
as I said earlier, you obviously host in host in
Tennessee hosting Nashville the culture of course, a division rival.
With this win tonight, the Colts are a loss uh
loss uh. One game back in the lost column, I

(01:12:04):
should say from Tennessee, who of course one on Thursday
night against San Francisco Indie By the way, very manageable
schedule down the stretch. They play Vegas at home next week,
followed by a trip to Jacksonville to close the season.
So I think at this point you got to imagine
they're going to finish eleven and six. Uh. Tennessee. On
the other hand, again they played on Thursday. They have
a a really you know, a streaking Miami team before

(01:12:26):
kind of closing with a nice what should be w
against Houston in Houston to end the season. Just big picture.
I remember you and I talking last week on the Colts.
We actually led the show with this tonight. The idea
that the Colts, I mean, they're an interesting team. Um,
you know, you do wonder Carson Wentz is he gonna
do those Carson Wentz things that always make you worry
if you're a team that supports him. Um, but you know,

(01:12:49):
Jonathan Taylor, the run game aer awesome obviously, is to say,
you're just reference. They were able to get the w
today without many starting offensive lineman because of Covid. And
I will say this for Carson Wentz, I mean you know,
I know that, Uh, he is not immune to criticism.
Obviously it goes without saying. But he does have four
touchdowns one interception in his last three so at the
very least, why I you know, I wouldn't see he's

(01:13:10):
playing elite football by any stretch. He's limiting the mistakes
and allowing kind of again the run game the defense
to keep his team in it. Does anything change for you? Jason?
With another win for Indianapolis, this one on the road again,
one game back Tennessee in the lost column in the
a f C South standings. Wait, does it change for me?
And what like? Like that they're ceiling what they can

(01:13:30):
do all that kind of stuff in terms of when
they get into the playoffs. Oh no, I mean again,
they're they're absolutely the definition of the kind of team
people want to see the playoffs, But you kind of
want to see the quarterback. I know what you're saying
about the stats, but I don't trust him if I
need to rely on him in the playoffs. That's that's
my main concern with the Their offensive line is healthy,

(01:13:52):
it's elite. Jonathan Taylor is a fantastic running back. I
think Michael Pittman Jr. Is a great wide receiver. Like
their defense, I love Darius Leonard, I love the Forest Buckner.
They've got a lot that you like generally. I like
Frank Reich in the way he coaches. It's Wins that
will stop them. Inevitably, if something does, it will be them.

(01:14:14):
But nothing changes my belief that that is a team
that can beat anybody as long as Wins doesn't turn
the ball over or do crazy stuff. So and really,
if you can get pressure on him, that's what forces
him to make mistakes. He just kind of gets Auntie
a little bits like he don't have confidence and he
makes serious errors. But if you can avoid those, they

(01:14:35):
can beat anybody. They can certainly play with anybody in
the a f C. Problem with them is because of
the way this has gone and the fact that the
Titans swept them in the season series. They're getting it
as a wild card. They're gonna have to go on
the road, and that, you know, that could be their undoing.
But if you look at the a f C. We've
talked about this for weeks. Who do you really trust,

(01:14:57):
who do you really really love and just say, well,
that team is definitely about to go on a run.
I don't know that there's anybody that just jumps off
the page. There are teams that have impressive wins and
putrid losses, but it's Kansas City right now, and then
it's everybody else. And even Kansas City is being taken
to the limit by by the Chargers, for example, a
couple of weeks ago, and but they've righted the ship.

(01:15:21):
But there that's the thing. Everybody that gets into the
playoffs in the a f C, unless Pittsburgh is one
of them, is going to have a shot for the
Super Bowl. I do not think Pittsburgh's offense is good
enough to get into the super Bowl, but anybody else
that qualifies could be dangerous. Five teams now uh AT
tied in the lost column for three playoff wild cards

(01:15:41):
in the a f C. We'll continue the conversation on
the a f C. I think there's a lot to
peel back there. As the Colts do take care of business,
get the win in Arizona on this Christmas Saturday night.
The Cardinals, of course, have dropped their third straight plenty
more on this game and the rest of a busy
weekend coming up in Sports editoris Jason Martin, Fox Sports Radio.
Welcome back, everybody, Fox Sports Radio air towards Jason Martin

(01:16:04):
here on Christmas Day. By the way, Jason, kind of interesting.
Bo and I were just looking up the schedule. Both
found it the next year, Christmas Day is on a Sunday,
and so you know, the natural assumption is that that
all the games are gonna be on Sunday, and it's
just gonna knock the NBA off the UH, off the radio,
or off the off the TV. And I only bring

(01:16:24):
it up because we found out both found out that
there was only two games on Christmas Day last time
that the NFL had Christmas Day, and all the other
games were actually played Christmas Eve Day, which would have,
of course been the twenty four on a Saturday. I
get the feel in the NBA the NFL ain't backing
down from the NBA next time. And I'm not saying
that's necessarily the reason that they did it last year
or last time, but my my guess is there's probably

(01:16:46):
no games on Saturday next year or maybe one or
two and then they go heavy on Sunday. Yeah. No,
I agree with that. I mean, by the way I
am watching Utah Dallas now, uh flipped right over to
that of me. Wait, because the NFL game is over.
I know that's gonna upset NBA guy. But again, it's
Christmas Day. We already know how long this regular season

(01:17:07):
is and how much how much more of the season
has left. I love your league. This isn't about me,
even though we said we were right now struggling to care.
But we'll get there. We always do. The problem is
for the league, they don't really have a league. They
just have a small collection of players. And again, I
don't think I can get to one full hand. I

(01:17:28):
don't think I can get the five names that are
box office in the way you need them to be
box office in order to make giant games. From a
ratings perspective, that's what we're talking about. We're talking about
revenue and television ratings. We're not talking about great players.
They are great players in the league that don't draw
flies when it comes down to ratings numbers. That's just

(01:17:49):
the way it works business. And we're just looking at
from a business perspective purely. Absolutely, absolutely, and I actually
want to kind of continue this conversation. Um, you know,
and maybe an hour three, maybe an hour four. We
got a lot to get to, by the way, Jay,
So we haven't even talked college football playoff yet. Uh,
we haven't talked. And I want to get to that
because we'll actually be on air for Doug Gottlieb on
Friday during the Alabama Cincinnati games. So I'm very excited

(01:18:11):
about that. Uh, And I want to get back to
some other stuff. By the way, Aaron Rodgers had some
really interesting things to say about Brett Farve today. We'll
talk about that, but just put a bow on this game.
You know. You mentioned kind of this playoff picture. Uh,
fascinating in the a f C. As I said, five
teams basically tied in the lost column for three spots.
It's technically six. Two of them are tied to top
the a f C North Baltimore and Cincinnati. So you know,

(01:18:33):
do you have any sense for and I'm not we
don't need to break down kind of how you know
everybody's scheduling all that stuff. But you know, right now
you have three teams in the a f C North
that are tied, uh, you know in that lost column.
One of them, the Steelers, has a tie, so it's
a little bit different. But any feel for who you
like to come down the home stretch here? If we

(01:18:55):
assume that casey Tennessee, New England and let's just say
Cincinnati for the sake of it, or Baltimore but they
play tomorrow, um, that would leave Los Angeles, Indie, Buffalo,
Baltimore on the kind of the the outside of the
you know, the wild card picture. Any feel for who
you think ultimately ends up out? Is it that last
team from the a f C North, whether it be Baltimore, Cincinnati,

(01:19:18):
is it Buffalo, Who's of course played New England this week,
because it's gonna be an interesting final few weeks to
get these wild card spots in the a f C. Yeah. Look,
the a f C North has made up of a
bunch of teams. I just don't really like seams. I
just don't really trust anytime I get behind the Bengals, Dude,
I said this with Arnie Spanning, or like Artie's like,
oh I gotta go Bengals tomorrow, I'm like or Sunday
I was like, really, I feel like every single time

(01:19:40):
I expect them to come out in a must win situation,
they always let me down. So yeah, I mean, look,
Josh Johnson is playing quarterback for the Ravens, and for
some reason, that makes me think they're gonna wine, meaning
the Ravens, not the That's just what the Bengals do.
The Steelers. Naji Harris, my gosh, what was it? Twelve
carries on Sunday the Titans for eighteen yards. That dude

(01:20:02):
has uh an insanely high usage rate, but he gets
no yards their offensive line. You can't buy into it.
We spent a good chunk of time already tonight talking
about Baker Mayfield. I don't like anybody in that division.
You've got seven playoff spots. Where are you getting multiple
teams out? I think the West. I'd be really sad
if the Chargers don't make the playoffs, just from an

(01:20:24):
entertainment standpoint. Obviously I'm a Broncos fan, but I'm just
looking at it from if I'm an NFL fan, where
I want to see the best seven teams make it.
I would hate to see multiple teams from the North
get in and the Chargers not for some reason. Just
that's just one example. Well, no, and it's it's so
funny because we've talked about kind of some of the marketability,
marketability of some of these NBA guys, and I think
the NBA in some ways was was hurt by the

(01:20:47):
fact that we got four straight years of Calves versus
Warriors in the NBA in the NBA Finals. I bring
it back to say, Justin Herbert is one of those
guys that if you if you don't watch the NFL
religiously and at this point, I mean between fantasy gambling,
I don't know how many casual viewers you're bringing in
for the playoffs, but I mean Justin Herbert's that guy
that that people could say that you and I know

(01:21:07):
and people that that would listen to a show like this.
No that I mean he could, he could win a
game or two himself, and all of a sudden he
becomes one of those supermarketable guys for the NFL just
because like he is that kind of guy, kind of
the opposite of Carson Wentz, opposite of Baker Mayfield that
we've kind of been crushing here over the last two hours.
In that um, you know, he wins a few games
and all of a sudden, everybody knows who he is. Yeah, No,

(01:21:29):
that's right. I mean that that's what you need. You
need one of those kind of guys to break through
and do something special. We already know who Patrick Mahomes is,
we know who Aaron Rodgers is, we know who some
of these guys are, and we know some of these
franchises as well, and so they carry marketability. But if
you look at the Chargers, they need this. I mean,
think about what the Rams were before McVeigh had that
little bit of a run and went to the Super Bowl.

(01:21:50):
They needed that, especially in l A. So yeah, the league,
the league needs marketability in its biggest markets, which is
why I bet you they want Russell Wilson to New
York next year. Is Fox Sports Radio. I'm Ritoris. He
is Jason Martin. Maybe maybe Russell Wilson in Cleveland. We'll
talk more about Baker Mayfield and that disastrous game against
the Green Bay Packers. Editors, Jason Martin, Fox Sports Radio.

(01:22:13):
Welcome in everybody, Fox Sports Radio. I'm Aria Torres. He
is Jason Martin here on a Christmas night. By technicality,
it is now officially December twenty six on the East coast.
So we hope everybody had a great Christmas, is having
a great Christmas. Jason and I taken you up to
two am Eastern Time when Bernie Frado, straight out of

(01:22:35):
Vegas will take you through get you ready for Week sixteen,
the full slate of the NFL. Discover Real credit card
questions require real people, someone who understands your issues and
works to resolve them with you. That's why I Discover
offers helpful US based representatives available twenty four hours a day,
seven days a week. Discover exceptionally common sense. As the

(01:22:55):
Sacre just told you two big NFL games today, really
you know, to kind of down to the wire interesting games.
The Colts took care of the Cardinals in the late
one sixteen. Just talked a ton about that one. If
you guys missed it, go back and download the podcast,
which will be available after the show. Jason, I do
want to go back to what we led the show with, though,
and I do want to talk about the game that

(01:23:15):
led the day. In the NFL four thirty Eastern time kickoff,
Packers take care of the Cleveland Browns twenty four to
twenty two is the final score. Um and and as
I said, uh Ben Maller says this all the time
on these air waves. Other guys have said it. It's
a It's a term that I've stolen. Is that while
you know, fans kind of look at the final score
and one who naturally go to the team that won. Oftentimes,

(01:23:38):
as Ben says, the more interesting stories in the losing
locker room. In my opinion, that is no doubt the
Cleveland Browns who lose this game twenty four to twenty two.
And the problem is they lose twenty four to twenty
two on a night in which Baker Mayfield turns the
ball over four times, four interceptions for the Cleveland Browns
quarterback worth knowing a couple of things. We know that
Baker Mayfields banged up. We also know by the way

(01:24:01):
that some of the interceptions really weren't on Baker. The
last one which kind of sealed the Packers win. It
was pretty blatant defensive holding by the defensive back. Troy
and and Joe Buck, who were calling the game. I
don't know if I just called Troy Troy as if
I know Troy Aikman the Hall of Famer, but Troy
and Joe Uh, you know, they kind of talked about,

(01:24:21):
uh that that it was a miscall, but it doesn't
change the fact that whether it was three on Baker,
two on Baker, he's not taking care of the football
enough and a team that is really, really, really talented
at a lot of other spots. I think they got
a lot of questions about the quarterback position right now,
Jason Martin. Yeah, And the problem again for Cleveland is

(01:24:43):
and which you said about Baker and how it's not
all on him with all the interceptions aren't on him,
but unfortunately the stat's gonna read interception and a lot
of people aren't gonna have seen it and are gonna
carry either way. Right. The issue is the same for
Cleveland year in a year out outside of the kitchen
gear well no, well, no, including the kitchen year, because
that year was the one where everybody had him hyped
and they were sure they were going to the super

(01:25:04):
Bowl and they didn't make the playoffs and a losing
season everything went south for him. They how many NBA
championships as James Harden won Aaron zero last time I checked, right,
But how many times do you hear about him continuously
before the season about is this gonna be a year?
I know the nets one, But I said years ago
and I stick to this, I will never pick a

(01:25:26):
James Harden team to win a championship until I've already
seen him do it. By the way, exactly right, But
go ahead continue. But my point is that Cleveland Browns
were in the same mix at this point. I need
to see Harden win a championship before I'll say okay,
he can do it. Once I see him do it,
then I'll say okay, you can win a second one.
Until then, I'm just gonna believe he wins zero because

(01:25:47):
I saw his act in Oklahoma City when they made
it to the finals against Miami, and I saw what
happened in Houston over and over and over again, and
then I saw what happened even last year. Now he
was hurt, and I thought he actually improved, is standing
by how he played just being out there and given
it all that he had in that loss to the Bucks.
Did everything that he could, and obviously he was kind

(01:26:08):
of a shell of himself from a health standpoint. But
the Browns, how many times you're gonna hype him up
and they're gonna let you down. How often do we
have to see this? The Browns will not win a
Super Bowl period, not maybe in my lifetime. That's what
I'm gonna think, and it's how I'm gonna predict forever
until I see them win a super Bowl, which point
I'll say, Okay, now they can win one. Because I

(01:26:30):
did fool me once for me twice, I didn't buy
into him the year of Kitchens, I said, I don't
understand hype here. I'm just not so sure. There's a
whole lot of volatile personalities here. How is this gonna click?
Is it gonna click? The answer was no. Stefanski came
in last year, did good things. You thought they were
on the right path, and guess what happened. A lot
of hyping the off season, they came out and they've
been relentlessly average all year. And you can talk about

(01:26:52):
Baker being banged up, and I think if that is
the case, that he should have gone under the knife.
There was no reason to play hero ball and be
fifty of yourself because you weren't going to lead your
team through the Super Bowl anyway. And now a lot
of people that forgot you were injured just think your
garbage that becomes the other thing. So I think that
you look at I think you look at everything that
is happening there, and it doesn't matter that you have injuries,

(01:27:15):
because everybody's got injuries. Look at the Ravens. They've got
no cornerbacks. They've got no quarterbacks right now either. That's
why they got Josh Johnson plan. Look at the Tennessee
Titans right here in my backyard in Nashville. They have
suited up an NFL record a eight players this season
because in the number of injuries they sustained. Historic Green
Bay has dealt with not having Aaron Rodgers on the field.

(01:27:37):
We've seen this across the league. Tonight, the Colts had
a backup offensive line, four out of the five missing
out of the game there on the road against the Cardinals,
and they win. Nobody cares about your injuries in this league.
Ramon Foster has told me that before he goes This
is the way Mike Tomlin used to tell us in
the Pittsburgh locker room. There are two things that happened
to a team that's injured. One, they don't care if

(01:27:59):
you've got the injuries. And to they're glad you have
the injuries, like they're happy to play you with the
injuries and they don't care. Nobody cares. The fans don't either.
Your fans might, but nobody else does. You don't win
trophies because you're injured. The excuse Olympics is not a thing.
So when you look at this with the Browns perspective,
it just looks like another mediocre finish and another disappointment

(01:28:24):
for that city with this team. And it's time to
finally just cut bait with this thing, if you're in
the media, and stop just expecting them to be good,
because it's not going to happen well. And I think
that the thing that stood out, like the thing that
really stood out to me today is one and it
goes back and we've talked about with the NFL, with
the NBA, is that sometimes when you are the standalone game,

(01:28:46):
it is just so obvious, okay, And I think what
really stood out to me today was the fact that,
you know, this is the first time that that Baker's
really kind of out of excuses, right, um. You know,
first it was you know, Hugh Jackson's fault and actually
Baker was probably the best he ever played. Was that
first year. Uh, you know once once Hugh Jackson got
fired when he replaced when when Baker replaced Tyrod Tabor.

(01:29:10):
But it was Hugh Jackson's fault. Then it was Freddie
Kitchen's fault. Then it was O'Dell's fault. Then it was
the injuries, then it was this, Then it was that, well,
guess what even even I'll even go back three or
four weeks. You know that that Sunday night Baltimore game
where he was terrible, and frankly, Mark Jackson was terrible too,
but the injuries just get him to the buy this
that well, guess what now you had to buy Then

(01:29:31):
you play Baltimore again, um, and then after that you
have a week off because of COVID, and nobody wants
to be out with COVID. But you know, you've had
two out of three weeks off now. And so as
you said, Jason, is if you are injured, you should
not be playing because you are hurting your team. But
if you are healthy enough to step on the field,

(01:29:52):
then you have to produce. And that that's really what
I think stood out to me today was I saw
a lot of people that have either been Baker defenders,
including myself, by the way, why I love Baker. I
wanted him to be awesome. I loved when he did
in Oklahoma. But you know, it just it's just it
felt like today was the day that kind of like
the line was drawn in the sand, like it's just
not gonna happen. And I think the thing that's frustrating,

(01:30:15):
the thing that's disappointing. We went through all fourteen fifteen
guys whoever it was on that Cleveland Browns quarterback Jersey.
They didn't have a Nick Chump, they didn't have a
Miles Garrett, they didn't have Jervis Landry, who I know,
you know whatever, he's not having a great year this year,
but whatever. They didn't have David and Joeku, who Baker
missed time and time and time again when they needed
to make plays down the stretch. And so I just
bring it up to just kind of say, like one,

(01:30:38):
it just felt like today was the day that everybody
was like this, this ain't it, This ain't gonna be it.
And again, maybe Baker really is that banged up, but
he hasn't played two out of the last three weeks
because he had to buy and he was out last
week because of COVID and couldn't be in the facility.
So if that's the case, if you're that banged up,
then you gotta go get surgery. But again, if you
step on the field, you gotta be better than you

(01:30:58):
were today when you tek and the ball over four times, Jason,
they've lost three or four. They lost to the Ravens
sixteen to ten, they lost to the Raiders sixteen to fourteen,
and they lost today two. They're losing close. And guess
what else doesn't matter. Losing close, It doesn't matter at all.
The problem is when you look at everything that they're doing,

(01:31:19):
it's just not quite good enough. From the quarterback spot,
Losing close matters if you're a rookie, if you're Baker
coming into a losing franchise, and those twenty two point
those twenty one point losses are becoming six point losses.
But in year four, you you know, you just made
the playoffs again, you have all the like. It's I

(01:31:41):
think there's a big difference between losing close if you're
say Trevor Lawrence going into the off season versus Baker Mayfield,
who has a roster that is built to win the
Super Bowl in the back here in the Fox Sports
radio studios, we have all the list of the all
the radio host that who they picked to win the
Super Bowl to go to the Super Bowl, m v P,
this and that. There are a couple people that picked
the Browns go to the Super Bowl. And I'll tell

(01:32:02):
you and and I'm not blaming any of them. I
don't think it was a bad pick in the preseason.
But again, it's one thing if you're a rookie. It's
one thing if you don't have any help around you.
But he's got the guys. It's year four. You gotta
make plays. And you can't use injuries as an excuse because,
as you said, Jason, everybody's banged up. Aaron Rodgers was
playing on one toe to day. By the way, Aaron

(01:32:23):
Rodgers wasn't even that good today, which is a credit
to him for doing enough to get wins or to
get the win and to score enough points. Most of
those points came directly off Baker Mayfield turnovers. But it's
not like Aaron Rodgers was coming in a hund percent
today either. You know, Baker Mayfield very often in press
conferences says stuff like you did after today's game. Where
he said, I hurt this team eventually, even if that's true.

(01:32:46):
First off, great for taking that and not throwing other
people under the bus and accepting responsibility. Eventually, you gotta
stop having the press conference because you're not hurting the team. Eventually,
you gotta stop having the press conference because you don't
need a maya culpa, because you don't need to go
out there and have an apology. Eventually, you just being
the stand up guy ain't enough. You actually have to

(01:33:08):
win games. I saw our guy, Fred Siegel, a freezing
cold takes who we both used to used to work with,
that basically was just throwing all these brown sticks up
because people were saying fourteen and three, thirteen and four
for the Browns before the season started again the summertime
super Bowl. It doesn't matter anymore. Like you go ahead
and predict that all you want until I see it.

(01:33:29):
I'm not I'm not gonna buy into it because I'm
looking at this right now. And you talked about the
championship window and the talent that they had. Remember the
Bears the first year of Matten Nagie, and everybody was like,
mold Matt Naggie's a genius where are we at now?
How's that? How's that looking right now? Stefanski last year
coach of the year, Right like everything's starting to trend
the right. Wait, boy, everybody likes Kevin Stefanski. Now look

(01:33:49):
at them, there's seven and eight. I think they're probably
limp into the finished line. They've got two division games
to finish off at Pittsburgh's not easy to play there,
and their defense is still solid. And then since Sinnati
to end the year and Cincinnati might be playing to
win the division that day, so they might have to
go full Bowl. So if you finished seven and ten
when people had you finished in thirteen and four and
being in the Super Bowl, like other than maybe Seattle,

(01:34:13):
there is by far no one else is disappointing as
you have been this year. That's what Cleveland gives his
fans on a pretty regular basis. And imagine last year
going to the playoffs and this year finishing three games
under five hundred. You want to talk about regression. That's frightening.
It is frightening, and it just goes back to again,

(01:34:34):
you're just out of excuses at this point. I mean,
we are now at the point where again it's year four,
we talked about it earlier in the show. You're coming
up on a contract extension, and I listen, I'll also
say this too. I think some of this falls on
Kevins Tevanski. I mean being a head coach. But there's
only thirty two of these jobs, right, We hear that
all the time. Well, part of that is making tough decisions,
and that might be sitting down Baker Mayfield and saying,

(01:34:57):
you know what, Baker, you just you know, you either
gotta shut this thing down or and I know this
was talked about a little bit a few weeks ago,
was the idea of, uh, you know, giving him a
week off coming out of the bye week against Baltimore,
where I know every game matters. I get all that stuff,
but but you know, can you get him out of
the bye week? Maybe give an extra week off, let
him get healthy going into what was obviously a pivotal stretch.

(01:35:20):
You lost to the Raiders, now you've lost to the Packers,
and for all intensive purposes, I mean the Cleveland Browns now, uh,
coming out of this game are sitting at seven and
eight overall. They still have uh, you know, two divisional games,
and it is not looking good for them going forward.
This is Fox Sports Radio. I'm Aaron Toaures. He is
Jason Martin. Coming up some interesting comments for from Aaron

(01:35:42):
Rodgers after the game. Very surprising. You're gonna want to
hear what he had to say. Aaron Torres, Jason Martin,
Fox Sports Radio. Welcome back, everybody, Fox Sports Radio. I'm
Aaron Torres. He is Jason Martin. Get a lot of
commentary on uh Baker Mayfield, some of which I can't verbatim.
Emmett says, I was a baker filling the blank washer

(01:36:04):
until that ball washer again. You know, I just watching
the yeah Football's, Yeah football washer. I think he has
run out of excuses. I honestly think he is at
his best when he has Chubb and Hunt balling out.
So I'm with I'm with Emmett. By the way, I
just think this was the day right. It was Freddie
Kitchen's fault, it was Hugh Jackson's fault. O'Dell was getting
in the way this that. You know, offensive linemen have

(01:36:26):
missed games at various times this year. It's like, dude,
everybody was there. Nick Chubb was bawling, Uh, you're you're
just you're out of excuses coming out of this game,
and I agree with him. At their Bake said, y'all
leave poor Baker Mayfield alone. He's great for sports talk radio.
I've heard yes, H E. R D and Lou Riley

(01:36:46):
just tweeted at me. He says, Hey, Aaron Baker has
a bright future in TV commercials. Uh And it was
funny because I was thinking, I said, you know, we're
just gonna is this gonna be? While I was watching
the game, I was like, is this gonna be torres
Martin in Mayfield next time, next next year at this hour.
So uh So a lot of people have a lot
to say about Baker. You know, Jason, I do kind
of want to switch to the other side. As in

(01:37:07):
this game, Green Bay Packers only twenty two, but Aaron
Rodgers passed Brett Farve in the first quarter touchdown past
to Alan Lazard for the all time UH leader in
Packer's history and touchdown passes, and you know, it was
talked about a lot during the game, but Aaron Rodgers
was asked about this after the game, and I actually

(01:37:29):
want to hear. I want you to hear what he
had to say, and I want the audience to hear
what he had to say, because I found it very interesting,
very fortunate I've played with the guys I've played with,
to be coached by the men I was coached by
over the years, and I did so much respect and
gratitude for this game. Appreciate Brett with the shout out.
I got to sit behind a legend for three years
and see what greatness looked like firsthand and as an
experience that changed my life forever. And I'm so fortunate

(01:37:50):
to be able to play here in the stadium with
these fans on this great organization for last seventeen years.
This is a longevity record, but it's one I'm really
proud of. So Jason, that first, that was courtesy obviously
a Fox. Thank you to Aaron Andrews who who got
that sound by for us on the field there with
Aaron Rodgers. Two things really stood out to me, and
that one Jason. First of all, maybe I missed the

(01:38:12):
part where Aaron Rodgers and Brett Farve are now best friends,
but that was like the nicest thing I've ever heard
him say about Brett Farve. Do you think that maybe
whether it's age, whether it's the fact that he is
now surpassing. I've never heard him speak about Brett Farve
like that, and I was kind of blown away when
I heard that. After the game, Jason, Well, look what

(01:38:35):
happens were You're talking about Aaron Rodgers and like giving
credit to Brett Farve here? I look, I said, I
sat behind a legend. These guys were supposedly not on
speaking terms for years. Dude, Man, Aaron, We've been around
for a minute, right, Like when you watched this, you
know what's really easy to do when you break some
dudes record, Look like you're taking the high road when

(01:38:58):
you're the pettiest athlete and professionals sports, because that's what
Aaron Rodgers is. That didn't feeling petty? That felt like
did did Aaron Rodgers hate Brett Farve? Or did he
hate the situation? Did Brett Farve hate Aaron Rodgers already
hate the situation? Did Tom Brady hate Jimmy Garoppolo? Where
did he hate the situation? I think situations change things,

(01:39:18):
and I also think time heals wounds. Brett Farve said
a lot of kind stuff about Aaron Rodgers over the
last few years, and Aaron Rodgers has become Aaron Rodgers
he won the m v P last year out of spite.
I still believe, and now this year, I think he's
about to win it again. So he's riding high. I
think he's riding out of green Bay potentially this year too,
maybe heading somewhere else. We'll see. That's gonna be another
story in the off season to try and follow. What

(01:39:41):
does Aaron Rodgers get out of being petty in that moment?
Nothing so but that moment you just give credit to
the guy. Well, I mean, that's just a smart that's
a smart political thing to do. But never do Aaron
Rodgers wore a T shirt that said cancel culture this week.
He never does the smart political thing to do. Yeah,
but when you're a Packer fan and you're in Green

(01:40:03):
Bay and you're in that situation, you're Aaron Rodgers and
now you've broken that guy's record. Now you can say
whatever you want about him because you already beat him, Like,
you can say nice stuff about him now because there's
nothing to look up at. You've both won a Super Bowl,
you're still playing. You're probably about to be the top
seed in the NFC again, probably gonna hope the NFC
Title game again. Have a chance to go to the

(01:40:24):
Super Bowl again and play like, at this point in time,
you give the dude all the credit in the world
because you know, in the back of your head, I'm
better than that guy, and everybody else knows it. The
stats says it. I don't have to say it out loud.
I can say, oh, it's so good sitting behind the legend,
while inside my own head, I'm like, yeah, screw that dude.

(01:40:45):
Look at the record, look at what I did, Look
at what I'm doing right now. I'm not trying to
speak for Aaron Rodgers. I'm just saying just because he
said the right thing in this moment, it doesn't mean
he's changed to stripes. It simply means that was just
an easy I'm that's just ease, that's just softball, that's
light work. Eron, just say nice stuff about Brett because
everybody saw you beat the guy's record. Yeah. I I

(01:41:08):
just if there's one athlete, maybe in all of sports
that is not going to say something just because it's
the politically correct thing, it's Aaron Rodgers. And so again,
I don't know whether it's it's the fact that you
know the records have been broken. There's no turning back.
There's no denying who the greatest quarterback in the history
of the organization is, or whether it's because time heals
all wounds, or whether it's some combination of all of it.

(01:41:30):
I was just blown away. I mean, I do think
there's a way to kind of, you know, answer the
question without acknowledging Brett far If. Yeah, you know, it's uh,
it means a lot. But you know, our focus is
on winning the next two games and getting the number
one seedon you know, you know, I mean like there's
it seemed overly whatever. I don't know what the right
word is, but that I would also why would he

(01:41:50):
beat phony? Though? But but he's never But that's you
can say criticize Aaron Rodgers. His biggest problem, the reason
people get mad at him is because he refuses to
be a second Aaron. What's the biggest story of the
year regarding Aaron Rodgers since the season started? That he
kind of lied about COVID. So don't tell me that
he's not capable of being disingenuous. And he lied about COVID.

(01:42:10):
I think they asked him, they said, have you been vaccinated?
He said, I'm I'm immunized. Come on, man, he knew
what he was doing. He didn't wear a mask at
the facility, giving off the impression that he had been vaccinated.
We talked, I think it's because he doesn't care. I
don't think it's because he's trying to be uh politically correct.
Well that's fine, But the point was he had a

(01:42:31):
very strong opinion on the vaccine. And my issue, as
I said, and you agreed with me at the time,
was look, I don't care what you believe about the vaccine.
Quite frankly, I'm vaxed. I made that decision personally. You
do whatever it is that you want to do. That's fine,
it doesn't affect my life. But the fact was, he
had a staunch opinion about it. He gave off the

(01:42:51):
impression that one thing was true when the other one did.
So we never stood up and actually took ownership for
a position. He never actually stood up and said, hey,
this is important to me. Let me just tell you this.
This is why I haven't done this, laid it out
as a lot of other guys did, because they took slugs,
because they made the decision that they made Aaron Rodgers
not a guy where everything he says, I believe it's

(01:43:13):
just genuine and straight from the heart, you know what
I'm saying. I mean, look at the way he handled
the offseason with the Packers, all the sort of everybody
else was talking for him. He's kind of going on
Pat McAfee's podcast here, he's doing the thing with Kenny
Maine and all this. This dude is very calculated in
what he does. And in this moment I could see
maybe he got caught up in the moment here. Maybe

(01:43:34):
he never again hated Brett Farve. That was just an
ugly scenario to be in. There's a lot of different
potential reasons. We don't know for sure. I'm just saying
that everything Aaron Rodgers says I don't necessarily just assume
as accurate. I usually just assume there's some kind of
motivation behind it. Sometimes it's a good thing, sometimes it's
not so good. I don't know real quick. Because I

(01:43:58):
also he seemed very complimentary of Green Bay, of the
fan base of the franchise. Do you think that the
success that he's had that he has basically one you know,
if you want to call it the argument from the
off season, you know, like he if there was any um,
you know, thought that Jordan's love was going to be

(01:44:19):
the guy or should be the guys maybe the more
appropriate term. If there was any justification for drafting a
quarterback in the first round, assuming that Aaron rodgers on
on on the back end. It's obviously been vanquished with
an MVP last year, an MVP almost certainly coming this year.
Uh did you sense and I'm guessing I know where
you're going what you're gonna say? Uh? Any possibility? Did

(01:44:39):
do you think, just the way that he spoke about
the Packers in the organization, do you feel like his
stance on a potential future in Green Bay has changed
at all? I mean, I guess you. I guess it's possible.
I would just say he wanted to to He wanted
to test the limits of his leverage. He wanted to
see whether or not he could become so toxic that
he could get what he on it because he was

(01:45:00):
Aaron freaking Rogers and how dare you? Basically, and the
Packers called his bluff and he ended up having to
come back to work, And I think he knew in
the back of his head, well, if this doesn't work,
worst case scenario is I go to one of the
best teams in the league with that roster, with Davante
Adams and everything else, one more time, we do this
last dance image that we put up there. We go

(01:45:21):
one more time, Maybe we win a super Bowl. Maybe
Devanta wants to go play with his guy Derek Carr,
and maybe I'm headed elsewhere. Like I think, in the
back of his head he wanted to get out, but
he also knew he couldn't control that. If the Packers
didn't want to move him, he was screwed. He either
goes and host Jeopardy, which I don't think they wanted him.
I think they wanted a couple of other guys in
place of him first, not that he was way down

(01:45:41):
the list, but he was fairly far Or he's gonna
go hang out with his girlfriend and fiance at that
point in time and then hang out with you know,
hang out in the mountains and do other stuff like
either he retires or he comes back to that team.
They controlled what it was that he could do, so
he's gonna come back. And now after this season, I
think a lot of people will still believe that he
might leave. So I think there's a lot I think

(01:46:03):
there's a lot here. There's definitely a lot here. I
don't know that if they win the Super Bowls and
make it more likely he comes back or less, probably less.
It just depends on what's happening around him. But he knows.
I think he loves the guys that he plays with.
It has nothing to do with that. And I think
he really likes Matt la Fleur a lot too. I
just don't know how fractured the relationship actually is with

(01:46:26):
the front office. I mean, they've been over backwards, nearly
apologized publicly. At one report was they were going to
apologize to him publicly and that was a condition upon
his return, and they grabbed Randall cob for him. Like
there was. They did everything that they possibly could do.
But Aaron Rodgers is the organization at this point. He's

(01:46:47):
the guy. He controls all the cards. He's the one
that has the keys. You don't get into the house
if he doesn't let you into the house. He has
all the power in the world. So the optics at
this point are I'm gonna go win the m v
P and try to win a Super Bowl. I I
think one of the more fascinating things is if that
dude signs an extension, how is that going to be
talked about? After what we witnessed during last all season?

(01:47:09):
What changed? Did winning cure all evil here? Or was
this just a star who thought he had more power
than he did, tested it to the limit and found
out Nope, nope, other people still control you. This is
Fox Sports Radio. I'm Aaron Torres. He is Jason Martin.
Coming up, Jason, I actually want to talk a little
college football player. We need to. This is because we're
not gonna be on again until well we are. Actually

(01:47:31):
we're gonna be on at a different times a lot.
We're not gonna be on this show again until those
games are over. Well, we gotta get to it before
we do. Though, Let's get to Steve the Sager with
what's trending. And you're right about power, which is a
dangerous thing to hold. But he's like when Arnie Spaniard
tries to give you the night off and he has
no power. So that's a running joke, Jason, every single

(01:47:52):
time that the saga works with Arnie, arready says I
was not. I was not. I was gonna give you
the night off, but I couldn't do it, and you
know the power in that house. Of course, this is
the one who helped put those Christmas boxes together. Great shovels, cooks, cleans,
basically does everything. Now, did your Christmas box arrived from
one Arnie Span your household? Vermont? You know, I just

(01:48:12):
did a quick browse through back there, Steve Sag I
found board op Don's. You know, Don works very hard,
he deserves it. I know you got yours. Yeah, it
was great. Well I didn't get one, so Arnie Span
here if you're listening, man, I don't know if if
you know if mine just got lost in the mail.
He doesn't have a mailman right now, as we learned
last night, but I will be uh. I'm working with

(01:48:33):
him for Jason and Mike on Monday, and that that
may be the lead topic of the show. Wow, how
does this happen? Yes? Yes, that that that's that's also
Arnie leading a show. A train wreck every time, a
car crash every time. But no, I do not have
any sweet beautiful maple syrup, at least I did not
see any in the back. Ye. But I hope you
and Don enjoyed that. It's some sort of mix up.

(01:48:56):
He's mixed up he is. I still can't believe that
actually happen. You know, the guy quits on Saturday. And
by the way, I love working with Jason, so that's
not an insult. But I love working with Jason. But
you know, the guy quits and now all of a sudden,
I'm off the list. I didn't do anything wrong. Maybe
maybe I forced him into retirement. I'm fun to work with,
right Jason just just just oh, well, Man with the

(01:49:19):
Power Aaron Rodgers right out of co host in this building.
Darn Green Bay is twelve and three with Aaron Rodgers. Meanwhile,
man with the Power Lebron James is on a team
that's the sixteen and eighteen. I believe he's general manager
of that lame as they lost their fifth straight game.
We'll get to that in the moment. The Packers win

(01:49:40):
was against Cleveland twenty to twenty two. Aaron Rodgers three
touchdown passes. He broke bread Fast team record for TV passes.
Tonight at Arizona, Andy beat the Cardinals six three straight
losses for the Cards. They lost by six points, missing
two field goals and an extra point attempt. Chargers running
back Austin Ekeler is out due to COVID for the

(01:50:00):
game at Houston tomorrow, so is wide receiver Mike Williams.
The Ravens place quarterback Tyler Huntley on the COVID list.
In the late NBA game, It's tied at Utah late
third quarter Dallas eight eight Jazz eight. Utah had trailed
thirty to fourteen late in the first quarter. Brooklyn's win
in l A was one two to one fifteen over
the Lakers, who've lost five straight. Brooklyn was up twenty

(01:50:23):
three with about ten minutes left, blew that lead and
still at a seven oh run during the final minute
to win the game anyway. Golden State Steph Curry with
thirty three points in a victory at Phoenix one six
one oh seven wins for Milwaukee and New York as well.
The Calves gave coach JB. Bickerstaff an extension through seven.
The Clippers Paul George, who's averaging twenty five points a

(01:50:46):
game and already missed a couple of weeks, and then
tonight's news he'll miss at least a month or so
more with a torn right elbow ligament. College basketball, Stanford's
tournament final in Hawaii against Vanderbilt was canceled due to COVID.
Hawaii seventh place cons elation game was canceled against Northern
Iowa due to health issues and a quote limited number
of players available. B y You took the third place

(01:51:07):
game seventy five against Liberty, even though the Cougars from
three point range were three of nineteen. B y U
eleven and three this season and Wyoming one it is
eleven and two. It lost to Stanford on Wednesday in Hawaii.
Wyoming took the fifth place game seventy seven fifty seven
over South Florida attendants about four thousand, slightly more tickets

(01:51:28):
than that had been sold to the University of Utah fans.
As we talked about last night, as we head toward
the Rose Bowl, which is one week from today, here
we are on Christmas now rain and Pasadena today. It's
going to rain on Monday and on Wednesday there and
probably on Thursday. But by the time we get to
the Saturday Rose Bowl Ohio State Utah, it will magically

(01:51:49):
be sunny, crystal clear, and the best setting for college
football in the nation. It's amazing how that happens. Back
to you, Thank you, Steve Sega, this is Fox Sports Radio,
File Sports Saturday eron Torres, Jason Martin here in on
a busy Saturday night, and Jason de Sager just, uh,
I'm sure because the saga is a total professional, totally

(01:52:09):
led us into what I want to talk about, and
that's some college football. You know, we spent twelve, thirteen,
fourteen weeks talking almost nothing but college football in this
time slot. And obviously it's it's been a quiet few
weeks as finals wrap up, a couple of kind of
minor bowl games get played. Um, but we're gonna have
a college football playoff. We're gonna have a national championship
games set up by the time that we get on

(01:52:31):
air next week is of course, the semifinals will be
on Thursday. Cincinnati plays Alabama early, Georgia plays Michigan late,
and then when we come on, we're gonna have a
couple of fun games the Rose Bowl. Of course, Utah,
I don't have State, Baylor and Old Miss at night
in the Sugar Bowls. So let's quickly kind of just
go through those two semifinals. As the first one, Alabama's
playing Cincinnati. Alabama little under a two touchdown favorite about

(01:52:55):
thirteen thirteen and a half points. I think the big
question for me coming into this one, Jason, is, you know, Alabama,
it's so funny, how and and justifiably one game can
change everything, But we spent weeks and weeks and weeks.
Alabama isn't the same, It's not the same kind of team.
They're gonna get destroyed by Georgia then they do the destroying.
Do you believe that that performance by Alabama was a uh,

(01:53:19):
you know, a sign that they figured out how to
put things together or was it just kind of a
one off deal, kind of where everything came right at
the perfect time against the perfect opponent. I don't know,
because one Machi is out and that's a big deal.
But James and Williams can play, and we know what
Bryce Young is capable of doing, and we know how

(01:53:39):
much talent is on that team. But I don't know
because I saw him the week before against Auburn, and
I saw their offensive line against Texas A and M.
And I saw the way they played against L. S U.
I've seen a version of Alabama that is as good
as anybody I've seen in the country. And then I've
seen a version of Alabama. That's the fourth best team
of the teams that are playing in the College Football Playoff.

(01:54:00):
It depends on who shows up. I don't know that
it's that jekal and high dish the way it is
with some other deals. But I don't know what the
SEC Title game version of Alabama was. That's the perfect version.
If that shows up, Cincinnati's got no chance, neither as
anybody else. But I don't I don't know on Friday
when that game kicks off and when we're on in

(01:54:22):
place of Doug Gottlieb, I don't know, Aaron, what Alabama
team we're exactly gonna see. I have a sense that
the one was on the SEC Title Game is closer
to the one that we're gonna see. But at the
same time, it's been a few weeks since that game,
and Cincinnati's definitely coming in knowing their situation, knowing how

(01:54:44):
many eyeballs are on them, and also knowing how many
people just kind of want them to fall on their
face so we can move on and not deal with
this kind of thing ever again. So is that pressure
gonna be too much for them or are they gonna
walk in and not laying kiffing this thing the way
Old miss it against Alabama in the first staff and
put them in bad spots. Is Luke fickle. We're gonna
be willing to be patient if he has to be

(01:55:06):
not take unnecessary risks which can which can get you
beat against Nick Saban very very quickly. I I don't
have a great answer. My sense is that Alabama in
the SEC title game may have kind of it's like
they it's like they took the training wheels off that
team because against Georgia and showed it out. It's gonna

(01:55:27):
be interesting because Cincinnati can play some defense man, so
it's gonna be a bit of a challenge and the
offensive line had better be up for it. If they
show up the way they did against Georgia, Cincinnati's got
no shot. Well. And that's the big thing with me,
is um you know, I tend to think, you know,
when we have a twelve game sample size of who
somebody is, you don't magically figure it out in one week.
And I actually thought Arnie, for for as much as

(01:55:49):
I joke, I thought he brought up a good point.
Is got something you and I talked about in the
last few weeks, is that you know, was there a
sense from Georgia were already in the playoff kind of
you know, kind of reading their own head lines, Uh,
you know, kind of believing that they were as great
as they were. Alabama is coming in desperate. Alabama needs
to win the game for their season, for there to
be meaningful games left in their season. It remains to

(01:56:11):
be seen. I think two things can be true. I
think Cincinnati plays him tough. I just don't think Sincati
has the horses for forty minutes or sixty minutes against
Alabama really quickly. With Georgia, Um, you know, the big
question may have already gotten answered. We we kind of
came out of that SEC Championship game saying, uh, what
what happens at the quarterback position? Well? J T. Daniels
is currently under COVID protocol. Uh, it does not appear

(01:56:32):
as though. I don't think he's going to be available
for this game, which means that George's rolling with Stetson Bennett,
the quarterback that they rolled with all regular season but
who also just didn't get the job done in the
in the SEC Championship game. Not to say that he's
not to blame, Uh, not say that he is to blame.
But you know, you're going up against some Michigan team,
probably best defensive front you've seen all year. Jason had

(01:56:53):
about a minute before the break. Um, you know, is
Georgia gonna bounce back? Because we just talked a ton
about Alabama. Georgia going up against a really good defense,
a really hungry defense. And it's interesting to note, Uh
the line is at seven and a half, which makes
it seem like Vegas wants you to bed on Michigan. Uh.
A lot to think about with this game. Georgia should win.

(01:57:15):
What you say about the defense is certainly right. Georgie's
defense let him down against Alabama. Also, that can't happen
here now McNamara, who maybe is playing his best football
of the year, and certainly they can run the ball.
I'm not convinced Michigan can score on Georgia. This could
be a very low scoring game as long as Bennett's

(01:57:36):
not turning the football over. Georgia still should win the game.
But Michigan is the perfect hot team and george is
the one that has everybody's second guessing now because of
what happened in the SEC title game. But is that
a function of Alabama playing a perfect game and saving
being better than Kirby Smart. Yeah, it could be. We're
gonna find out. This is gonna Bennetts opportunity. Either he's

(01:57:57):
gonna prove the way that we ran it about steps
and bed at night they lost to Alabama is still accurate,
or that Alabama was just really good and maybe we
need to pick them to be Georgia in the final.
It's gonna be one of the two. This is Fox
Sports Radio on air tourist. He's Jason Martin. Coming up,
we go back to the NFL. A lot of guys
out tomorrow because of COVID. Who is out? Who is in?

(01:58:18):
Steve Desager has the updates. Erin tourist, Jason Martin, Fox
Sports Radio, Welcome back everybody, Fox Sports Saturday Aaron Tourist,
Jason Martin. Hope everybody had a great Christmas. It is now,
of course, December twenty six on the East coast. Hope
everybody is enjoying the final few hours of Christmas. If
you are not on the East Coast, we're gonna wrap
the hour. Go over to Steve de Sager. De Sager,

(01:58:40):
you got a lot of information for people that are
gonna be watching NFL football. Plenty of NFL news, including
great news for the Chiefs as they're getting closer to
clinching another division crown. Wide receiver Tyree Hill cleared protocols
today and later they announced that also tight end Travis
Kelsey cleared protocols, so they're back is case he host
Pittsburgh tomorrow. Steelers punder Presley Harvin is out now Kansas

(01:59:04):
City whenever they clinch, this would be their sixth straight
a f C West crown. Right before this, Denver won
five straight and the Chargers when they had Ladanian Tomlinson
won at five out of six years. There's one team
missing on that list in the a f C West.
That would be the Raiders. They haven't won the a
f C West in almost twenty years. But Kansas City
has a chance to clinch a playoff berth with a

(01:59:27):
win tomorrow, and they could even clinch the division tomorrow
if they win and the Chargers lose. The Chargers update
is they will not have running back Austin Ekeler tomorrow
out for the game at Houston as he's tested positive
for the virus, and wide receiver Mike Williams also on
the COVID list for Houston. Wide receiver Brandon Cooks is out.
He's on the COVID list. We'll see about running back

(01:59:47):
David Johnson. He's misspractice all week with a quad injury,
listed as questionable for the game Sunday against the Chargers.
Good news for the Visitors defensive baca Sante Samuel Jr.
Finally cleared concussion protocol yesterday and the Charger have a
great safety in Derwin James. He was able to practice
yesterday on a limited basis coming back from the hamstring.
As for other clinching scenarios, well, who's going to take

(02:00:09):
that division that seemingly the Ravens had a good chance
at winning this year the a f C North. The
Ravens have lost three in a row. They're battling at
Cincinnati tomorrow. It's a battle of eight and six teams. Now,
Baltimore is going to be shorthanded, to say the least
at the quarterback spot. Now, if they lose this game tomorrow,

(02:00:30):
that means not only are they completely out of first
place that after that result, but that would put the
Ravens at one and four in the division this season.
Lamar Jackson is out for sure. Tomorrow hasn't practiced the
last two weeks with the bad ankle. Tyler Huntley was
going to start and then today was put on the
COVID list. He had miss practiced yesterday due to illness.
So it'll be quarterback Josh Johnson playing as the starter

(02:00:53):
at Cincinnati. I believe it's like six years since he's
last started a game. Something like that. Josh Johnson is
so old. His college coach was Jim Hart at the
University of San Diego. Oh, my gosh, that's what that
four jobs ago. Yeah, st yeah, exactly, My goodness. New England,

(02:01:14):
despite coming off a wretched performance last weekend, still can
clinch a playoff berth with a win and some help. Tomorrow.
Win would put the Patriots at ten and five. Tennessee
Titans well, they had to come back of course on Thursday,
and they would have clinched the a f C South
if Indy had lost tonight. But the Colts did get
the win. In case folks didn't hear, Colts one at Arizona.

(02:01:36):
Arizona has lost three in a row, which is great
news for the l A Rams who are now looking
at clinching scenarios. First off, Rams are in as far
as a playoff berth with a win tomorrow at Minnesota.
As far as the Sunday night game, it's Dallas hosting Washington,
and the Cowboys can clinch the NFC East with a
win Sunday night. They could even clinch it if Philadelphia

(02:01:59):
loses earlier in the day. Tampa Bay, with a ten
and four record, can clinch the NFC South tomorrow with
a win as they play at Carolina. The bad news
is that wide receiver Mike Evans is out for that
game with a bad hamstring, and the Bucks today downgraded
pass rusher Jason Pierre Pauled out with a shoulder injury.
Carolina did officially activate quarterback Sam Donald off I R

(02:02:20):
expected him at one point. The Rams place veteran tackle
Andrew Whitworth on the COVID list. They activated running back
cam Acres, by the way, already not quite back from
the achilles injury. He's out tomorrow, but it's kind of
a procedural move. Interesting to even see it on the
transaction wire. Cam Akers, who was going to be out
for the season, not quite out for the season. It's

(02:02:42):
pretty crazy. Thank you, Steve the Sager this is Fox
Sports Radio. I am Are Torres. He is Jason Martin.
One hour left. Bernie fred will join us next hour.
Obviously talk about everything that happened today in preview Week
sixteen in the NFL. Of course, we'll have plenty more
on Week sixteen as well. We will also talk about
the the subject we discussed earlier. Has the NFL officially

(02:03:04):
taken Christmas from the NBA? Fox Sports ad You welcome
in everybody, Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday. I'm Ara Torres.
He is Jason Martin. It is, of course still Christmas
in the Mountain and Pacific time zones. Hope everybody had
a great Christmas holiday. I hope everybody got to spend

(02:03:24):
time with friends and family, and of course we appreciate
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(02:03:46):
if you miss any of the show. Jason, I'll say
this I feel like we've had a ton to talk about.
If you missed any of the show, go back and
download the podcast. Uh again, Jason, I don't know if
it's just because I worked Christmas even there was literally
not a single live sporting event on the entire day
or what it was. But if it feels like, like
I said, it's the first day of March madness combined

(02:04:08):
with the opening day of the baseball season, I don't know,
it's just it feels like we've had so much to
talk about. Man, It's been a fun Christmas night. Uh.
And again, I'm I'm glad that that you could make it,
that I could make it that we're on air, because
it feels like there's been a ton of talk about today. Man,
you know there has been. And I think that one
bonus is just having multiple NFL games, not just today,

(02:04:28):
but you had a Thursday night game with relevance for
both the teams that were playing in it. So you've
had three NFL games already, You've got the College football
Playoff now less than a week away, uh, coming up
on New Year's Eve. You do have the NBA playing
on Christmas Day. Like there is there is a lot
going on like it's a it's a solid day, like
it usually it's a decent sports state. Today it has

(02:04:50):
felt a little bit more so because when the NFL
has involved all of a sudden, matters a lot more. Well,
that is a great way to segue to what I
want to talk about, because it's something that we discussed
a little bit early here in the show. I thought
it turned into a really interesting conversation. But um, you know,
it's really interesting with how the schedule worked out this
year where Christmas, uh, you know, Christmas falls on a Saturday.

(02:05:11):
The NFL traditionally does have some Saturday games on you know,
games on Saturday's excuse me, once we hit December on
the calendar, but I can't ever remember a day and listen,
we don't know right now. We'll see the ratings when
they come out in the next two, three, four days
in terms of if this day was as dominated by
the NFL as we thought. But you know, between a

(02:05:33):
really compelling Packers game that ends with the Packers went
over Cleveland, with the Colts holding on to win by
six against Arizona Um and also with by the way,
you know, some bad luck for the NBA Kevin Durants
out with COVID, Kyrie's out with COVID Trade. There's a
lot of guys that were not able to play. But
I'll tell you this, Jason is next year, Christmas Day

(02:05:53):
is gonna fall on a Sunday. I would assume the
NFL will have a full schedule, um, But if the
NFL decides they want to play on Christmas Day, I
think they just straight up hijacked it from the NBA, which,
of course, the NBA is known for their Christmas Day games,
and it's worth noting last year the NFL played Christmas
Day game as well. I think they got a little
taste for it with the Vikings and Saints strong over

(02:06:14):
twenty million viewers last year. Now we have two marquee
games today, and I you said it earlier, I agree
with you. I don't ever remember a year where I
felt like the NBA felt less relevant than it did today. Yeah,
it really does. I mean I'm watching now, Luca is
not playing, but at least you have Donovan Mitchell and

(02:06:34):
You've got some other names here. But again, it's not
about me because I'm baked into the cake. Because we
want to do it for a living. But because I'm
a sports enthusiast, In fact, I do it for a
living because I care so much about all the games.
But when you're looking at television numbers and you're trying
to sell ad rates and all this other kind of
stuff and justify all this, it comes down to the

(02:06:55):
people that ordinarily wouldn't watch your product. There's a reason
that w w WE puts a bunch of Hollywood celebrities
on the WrestleMania card to do weird things. It's so
that they'll go on the morning talk shows and so
the view will have John Cena on. It's so they
can be on Good Morning America and all this other stuff,
because the wrestling fans already baked into the cake. It's

(02:07:18):
how many more people, how many more eyeballs, how much
more money can you draw from the people that ordinarily
aren't gonna be watching. That, to me is the NBA problem.
Because the NBA is defined by its stars as a league,
it's always been known as the regular season not to
take seriously, because for a long time, the running joke,
at least what I was growing up, was it's a

(02:07:38):
regular season. They're not taking it seriously, so why should
I once you get to the playoffs is gonna change. Well,
the NBA, because they're superstars, don't wear some kind of
protective headgear that masks them in some way. They have
a chance to be celebrities in a way almost nobody
else in sports does, especially in team sports. And the

(02:07:58):
problem for Adam Silver and the NBA, amid others is
they don't have a whole lot of guys that attract
the casual fan. They have Steph, they have Lebron I
would say they've got k D and then outside of that,
and you've got to start making real arguments for me
about the other guys that you would then put on

(02:08:20):
that list and say, yeah, that guy is box office.
And I don't mean box office to the sports fan
or the NBA enthusiasts. I mean box office to the
person that might be watching h G t V or
something like that. And instead we'll tune in because X
players on the court for this NBA squad. Well, and
it's really interesting because obviously we we know the history

(02:08:41):
of the league's like the very surface level history is
the NFL nothing is bigger than the shield um and
then the n n b A. It's been about the
superstar player. And you know, I think for years everybody
kind of assumed like the NBA hasn't figured out they
got their superstars, and uh, you mentioned it earlier in
the show, but you know, at one point it was

(02:09:01):
Magic and Bird and then it was Jordan's and then
it was um, you know, Kobe and Lebron and Shack
and this and that and this, and it just feels like,
you know, it feels like this could be backfiring because uh,
you know, we mentioned it earlier. But but the Cowboys
and Raiders played a game, and the Sacred brought up
this stat. Thirty eight million people watched the Cowboys and

(02:09:23):
Raiders and this was not uh, you know, I understand
the Cowboys are America's team. I understand the Raiders have
a lot of fans across the country. The Raiders are
abjectly terrible this year, playing for an interim head coach
Um and I don't mean to make light of the
fact that one of their most most star marquee players
unfortunately is no longer with the team. From the start
of the season, Henry Ruggs, has been discussed at length.

(02:09:44):
But you know that if it was Packers, Cowboys or
Brady versus Rogers. You could see, Okay, this is gonna
set record numbers. But we had an interesting but far
from elite Cowboys team and a Raiders team that is
again absolutely terrible, and it's set record ratings and the

(02:10:05):
Statusagre brought up which absolutely blew my mind. That NFL
game regular season week twelve thirteen, whatever it was, Yes,
it was on a holiday, that set that that more
people watch the Raiders Cowboys than any basketball game ever televised.
That was the Sager stad It was incredible. Uh, that
number was even more than Michael Jordan's final game against

(02:10:27):
Utah whatever. And so I just bring it up because
I think for years we've kind of been like, oh,
look at the NBA, so progressive or so forward thinking,
marketing their stars, all that good stuff. But you look
at it, and you look at the fact that the NFL, uh,
you know, just unbelievable numbers all season long. I expect
the fact that the Packers and Browns and the Colts

(02:10:49):
and Cardinals will crush any NBA game this today, And
I just think, man, like, you know, for years we've
been crediting the NBA, But now you start to look
around and say, does it need to be more about
the league? Because is if people are tuning in for
individual stars, there's just not as many of them that
people want to tune into. Seed the season feels really long.
What are the shortest seasons college football? In the NFL?

(02:11:11):
Like all of a sudden, you look up and we
remember us even saying in a few weeks ago, like
holy cow, the regular seasons over, meaning in college football,
like it's like it just started and it's over. The
rarity of it creates interest. There's so many less games,
every one of them has impact. College football oftentimes feels
like one and done from the very beginning. That's one

(02:11:33):
of the beautiful things about the regular season in college
football is all these games count. And I'm sitting here
in watching Utah and Dallas right now. It's a good
ball game. It's a two point game with three minutes
left in the fourth quarter. But I also know I
know another thing here, and I think this is this
is another piece that's fairly relevant. I also know needed

(02:11:53):
one of these teams is gonna make it to the
NBA Finals. I know it because Utah had a great
shot last year year and didn't make it. So let
me jump in there. Do you think we've talked so
much about the stars? Do you think that the lack
of parody hurts the NBA? Because I will say, you know,
that's something I've argued with Ernie for years. Is I
think that's hurt the NBA as well. Is is we

(02:12:14):
went four years with the reality that the NBA Finals
was kind of predetermined and it was just gonna be
who wins, you know, Cleveland versus whoever. But you know,
you look at the NFL and you're right. I mean,
we do have to watch a game today with the
Arizona Cardinals in the Indianapolis Colts because it is wide open,
and I understand there at a different point in the
year and the culture fighting for a playoff spot and

(02:12:36):
the Cardinals are fighting for the division all that stuff.
But you know, I I do wonder if that's hurt
the NBA as well. Is the idea that for years
you kind of knew who was gonna be in it.
Even this year, Brooklyn with with Kyrie out of the
line up, Brooklyn of course is in is in complete control.
In the Eastern Conference. You know, the West is probably
gonna be either Golden State, maybe the Lakers, maybe Phoenix.

(02:13:01):
Do you think that's part of it as well? Because
that is the one great thing that the NFL does
is on a week to week, uh year to year basis,
you just never know who's gonna emerge, you never know
who's gonna step back. You brought up the point earlier, Cleveland.
A lot of people, a lot of smart people, pick
them to make the Super Bowl, win the Super Bowl,
even um and they they're probably not even gonna make
the playoffs. Do you think that's part of it too?

(02:13:21):
Is that on any given Sunday or in this case, Saturday,
anybody can beat just about anybody, and and and and
yes there are a fewer games, and yes the games
mean more, but also it's just it's setting up four
and it sets up for an interesting regular season, but
an interesting postseason as well. Look, you don't even need parody,
but you need the illusion of parody because if you

(02:13:43):
can sell hope, then you can sell your league. And
when it comes to the NFL, it's one win and
out in the playoffs. When you have to beat a
team four out of seven times, usually the cream is
gonna rise to the top. Unless you've dealt with injuries
and things like that. Not a whole lot of eight
seas beating number one in the NBA playoffs. But you

(02:14:05):
can see a wild card team knock off the top
seed in the NFL because it's again, it's an any
given Sunday deal. But you don't have to beat them
for Sundays in a row. You just have to be
better than them that day. So I think that that
adds to the illusion of parody. Because do I think
that X NFL team is going to beat the Patriots
four times? No? Do I think they might be able
to get them this Sunday? Yes, And so as a result,

(02:14:27):
I might watch it. The problem for the NBA when
it comes to this is I watched this, and I
actually I was happy with what we got last year
in the finals, because I argued, you needed this just
so that other markets and other fans could actually see
some teams that they would always hear about all regularly,
all this team's really dangerous. Then they would never make

(02:14:47):
the finals. It would still end up being wherever Lebron
was against insert team here or whatever like that, it
all of a sudden it felt different. So you got
the Bucks and you got the Sons, and I think
that that was a good thing for the league because
it did create an illusion at the very least that
parody existed. The problem is, I'm still watching Utah and

(02:15:09):
Dallas right now and thinking, yeah, I'm watching two teams
for NBA players talented, even though no Luca tonight and
you're dealing with COVID and all this stuff. Neither one
of these teams do I think is going to reach
the NBA Finals. The league has created this weird hierarchy where,
even if there's actually more parody than we think there is,
if you go back and you look at the champions
and who's one and all this other kind of stuff,

(02:15:30):
I just don't think we buy the parody, even if
it's sitting in front of us. We're kind of like, yeah,
I don't know if this is legit or not, because
I'm just waiting for the Lakers to take off, or
I'm waiting for the Brooklyn to go ahead and cash
this thing in. And once you get to that point,
and then it's really hard to sell me on the
other twenty eight teams in your league. Real quick, Um,

(02:15:51):
do you think do you think the NFL going forward
again next year? Christmas Day will be on a Sunday.
I expect them to have the normal full slate. Maybe
they go light on that particular Saturday. Do you think
the NFL smells blood in the water? Because I think
they do. And I go back to last year. Uh,
the NBA was coming out of the bubble. There was
a delay. They didn't know if they were even gonna

(02:16:13):
start the season by Christmas Day. Lebron and those guys
wanted to push back past Christmas. I bring it up
because the NFL said, well, if you guys are on, sure,
you know what, we'll just throw one game on there,
you know, just dip Bartoe in the Christmas water. Twenty
million people watch the Vikings versus the Saints last year
on Christmas Day. I guarantee the numbers are gonna be
huge for for today's games. Do you think the NFL

(02:16:34):
smells blood in the water? And come when Christmas does
not fall on a Sunday, do you expect to see two, three,
four NFL games on that day? And you expect the
NFL to just kind of mark their territory and try
to take over Christmas Day like they've basically done everything else. Yes,
I do, because I think I think that Goodell, and
I think that the powers to be the NFL. No,
if they go ahead and put their finger in the water,

(02:16:55):
everything changes. They can put their finger on the scale
and everything changes. I don't think it's anything against the NBA.
I just think the NFL knows that they can dominate
whatever day they want to. I mean, they dominated, and
that wasn't even the prime time game. The Cowboys Raiders
game wasn't even the prime time game. That was the afternoon.
That was the mid afternoon game on Thanksgiving. That's a
lot of the time. That's when people are actually eating.

(02:17:17):
They're not even watching the second game. They often watch
the Lions, then they sit down and eat, and then
they pass out from a food calm and then wake
up in the second half of the prime time game.
And they still were able to do it. They know
the scales are unbalanced, because they know this is a
football craze society, a football craze country, and the NFL
is king. So if they want to, they can own

(02:17:37):
Christmas from here on out until they say otherwise, until
if they want to put five games on Christmas. The
NBA can cry itself to sleep. They will counter program
because they've always been the Christmas League, and they will
continue to do it. But what's gonna happen is people
are gonna consume the NBA games during the commercials and
during halftime in the NFL games, and that right there

(02:17:58):
is a disaster for the NBA because Christmas is such
a big day for their business. Because for many people,
and I've always believed this, the NBA season really should
start today. It shouldn't start before now, because nobody's paying
attention in the midst of the NFL season and what's
going on the season is already too long. If you
started in December, extended your season out deeper into the summer,

(02:18:22):
when nothing else is being played but regular season baseball,
you would be able to own a part of the
calendar absent football that you now can't. This is Fox
Sports Radio. I'm Aaron Torres, He's Jason Martin. By the way,
I agree with you. I think they absolutely they smell
blood in the water, and I think they're coming for
Christmas Day like they come for everything else. Uh. Speaking
of coming coming up, Bernie Fratto, he can hear him

(02:18:44):
top of the hour, straight out of Vegas. But he
will join us next Get you ready for Week sixteen
in the NFL. Tell you what was bet on today?
What will be bet on tomorrow? Aaron Tords, Jason Martin,
Fox Sports Radio, Welcome back everybody, Fox Sports Radio. My
favorite Christmas song Big Pimpin, So thank you don for that. Uh.
This is Fox Sports Radio Meritoris he is Jason Martin?

(02:19:05):
Do you want to get right out to the phones?
Bernie Fratto? Can hear him the top of the hour
straight out of Vegas? Uh? And of course he joins
us now to kind of preview his show and preview
of course. What is going on Week seventeen? Jason Jason Martin,
Area Torres. Welcoming in, Bernie Fritto. What's going on? Bernie?
How you doing? Man? Merry Christmas? Yeah, right back at you, guys.
And I sat there and watched both NFL games today.

(02:19:26):
Never have I been so happy I didn't fire on
either of these games. Arizona, they're facing a team missing
their offensive line, their best defensive player. My goodness, you
talk about not rising to the occasion. Looked incredibly sloppy.
Eleven penalties, give up a safety, and as two field
goals an extra point left seven points on the board,
and they lose by six. Meanwhile, Green Day there cruising

(02:19:48):
twelve and they usually step on people's next they stopped
playing and they almost lost the game on right. I'll
tell you the larger issue, that is, I do my
final handicapping before tomorrow. You guys already know at uh
you know, Ian Book starting, and it was announced earlier
today Josh Johnson will be starting for Baltimore. And yesterday
we found out that Jared Goff was out and so

(02:20:09):
Tim Boyle starting for Detroit. I am greatly concerned at
this point for the integrity the remainder of the NFL season,
and god forbid, the integrity the playoffs. If in the
current situation we find out that a star quarterback like
a Brady or a Aaron Rodgers or you know of
those ilk all of a sudden flunk of COVID test

(02:20:30):
tonight before the game during the playoffs, this would be
the NFL's worst nightmare. Now, there's zero doubt, Bernie, there's
zero doubt, and you know, we can only hope. And uh,
you know, certainly anybody that follows me on Twitter or
has read my tweets or listen to me with Arnie
last night knows where I stand. I hope we can
avoid that because it does feel a little bit crazy
really quick. Bertie, Um, you know, take us through Week sixteen.

(02:20:51):
I believe there were two games on tomorrow slate, maybe
even today's that the pros love coming into this week.
There aren't two games the Pros fired on pretty quickly tomorrow,
and one I really don't agree with. Uh they're on
the Bills plus two against the Patriots. The reason being defensively,
both teams are very comparable, but the markets have historically

(02:21:13):
undervalue Josh Allen in these types of spots. In the
regular season. He's seventeen and eight against the number on
the road as an underdog, and he's covered by an
average is six point three points, so they believe the
better team is getting points. In the other game, DAK
Prescott Land ten against Washington. I'm not sure if I

(02:21:35):
agree with this game, and I'm not on it. I
just know that in division Prescott twenty one and eight
against the spread, but for some reason, outside non divisional
games only twenty and twenty nine, and so it would
be an interesting game tomorrow giving ten points in the
divisional this late in the season. But you know, the
pros there are pros for a reason. So those are
the two they fired on. Bernie. I want to go

(02:21:57):
back to your COVID point about the integrity season and
just ask this, if you're if you're somebody the gambles,
what sense does it make uh taking some action before
the day of the game right now, Because even if
a number looks good to you three days before the game,
it can change so dramatically based on guys that might

(02:22:18):
not be available. It's absolutely correct. It's you're throwing dartboards
at the dartboard of the unknown because you're betting based
on numbers and power ratings and stats accumulated by players
that might not even be in the game. So you're
gonna find a lot of people hedging back. You might.
You know, you can always buy out your bet. Sometimes
the line moves in a way it's more favorable to you.

(02:22:40):
You can try to middle the bet. But as far
as traditionally trying to find that edge, uh, you know,
with the various trends that you know, for instance, Bill
Belichick forty one and seventeen coming off a loss against
the spread, that's I know, the Bills can't run the
ball or stop the run. The pros are on the bills,
what do you find out to someone's not playing. So

(02:23:01):
to your point, Jason, it's made it a real series
of land mines to try to handicap these games in
any traditional fashion. So Burn, I do want to switch gears.
We'll get back to Week sixteen in the NFL in
a minute, but we got to college football playoff games
coming up this week, baby, So again we you know,
everything is fluid, everything is fluctuating. And we did get

(02:23:21):
news from the college football front with Alabama offensive coordinator
Bill O'Brien hasn't been in the building because of COVID.
J D. Daniels, the backup quarterback at Georgia, who somethink
is the better quarterback, probably will not be available. But
what what has the betting been like for the to
college football semifinals so far? Well, the betting has been brisk.
But you're gonna see the majority, the lion's share of

(02:23:43):
the action. I'll start to come in twenty four hours
forty hours before the game, so I think Thursday you'll
see the vast majority of the action come in. I
know folks have a tendency to overreact to what they
saw the last of the tickets are on Michigan, so
they've become I'm a very popular public dog. Typically when
that happens, it's very favorable for the books when the

(02:24:05):
public he's on the dog. A couple of interesting trends there.
Michigan finds himself on the spot where they scored forty
plus points in their final three games as again of
their ball game. Historically, when that has happened and the
team has scored forty points three games in a row
heading into a bull game, and they find themselves an
underdog in the bull game, they're only one and six

(02:24:25):
against the spread. You fade that, you're add to that,
the Wolverine is only one in fourteen against the number
the last five neutral set games as an underdog on
four in their last bull games, the last four Bowl games. Georgia,
I think it's gonna be very physical and focused. Alabama
played desperate. Georgia was in the playoffs. No matter what
Alabama was, win or go home. I think you're gonna

(02:24:47):
see a totally different Georgia team taking nothing away from Michigan.
I think it's gonna be a game of attrition and
Georgia wins by about ten Bernie, when you look at
the numbers, where are they right now? Where do you
think they're going to be at game time? And to
of the spreads, I think you're gonna see the Georgia.
I think you're gonna see both favorites grow. I think
you're gonna see Alabama touch fourteen. It's it's held at

(02:25:07):
thirteen and a half. Georgia is all over the place.
I've seen nines, I've seen seven and a half, I've
seen eates. I think those seven and a half will
disappear by game day. So if you like the moral
of the story is, if you really like Georgia, you
get on them now before that line grows. And if
you like Michigan you might want to wait till game day.
You might get an actually half point point. So let
me ask a dumb question. Bernie has a follow up

(02:25:28):
to that, and I know we have NFL stuff to
talk about, but real quick, So Alabama sitting at thirteen
and a half, right, that feels like a very obvious
Alabama bet. They went by two touchdowns. You cast your ticket, whatever.
If the line has not moved, h is that a
reflection that the money isn't actually coming in Abama, or

(02:25:48):
is the money coming in Abama at minus thirteen and
a half and Vegas is sitting there saying we'll keep
taking your money because we actually think the other. Does
that make sense? You know what I'm saying? Sure? What
the the answer to your question is is, so far
the action has been fairy fairly evenly. Yeah, Obama's maybe
about sixty of the tickets they haven't really had now.

(02:26:10):
I don't know where the money is. I have to
look at that. I'll know more next Thursday. So all
bets are not created equal. You could have a ton
of tickets in there that are twenty bucks and a
handful of tickets that are you know, two thousand in each,
and that will change things. What it's telling me is
the books are comfortable where they're at right now with
what they believe their ultimate liability could be in that game.
Now that could change, you know, closer to game day,

(02:26:33):
I think you're still going to see Obama go to
four team. I have a lot of respect for the
Cincinnati team, but this is where Bama lives. Look what
they did to Oklahoma and Kyler Murray as thirteen point
underdogs two years ago. They destroyed them, and so I
just have a hard time feeling like Cincinnati can hang
four quarters. Taking nothing away from Cincinnati. We've seen Notre

(02:26:53):
Dame torchs, We've seen Michigan State torchs. We've seen Oklahoma
torchs more than once. Sore and excellent point. So the
longest short of it is um. I would just say this,
when it comes down to the math or the books
trying to create action where they maximize profits and minimize risk.
Right now, the action hasn't been you know, in one
direction anyway that will concern the books. Bernie tell me, uh,

(02:27:18):
I know that you had mentioned us and I had
seen it. The Saints nine oh win over the Bucks,
there was a crazy prop that cash was or not
there absolutely was. One of the more popular props that
originated back in the Pat's Rams Super Bowl was you
could bet there will be not a single touchdown scored
in the game, and with seven minutes to go. There

(02:27:38):
were no touchdowns in that Pat's Rams Super Bowl four
years ago, three years ago, but a touchdown was scored,
so the west Gate saved themselves a million dollars. Well,
just this last Sunday, that was a prop that was
on the board A two one Saints bucks. Will you
know you can bet you could get two one that
there would be no touchdown scored. There was no touchdown scored.

(02:28:01):
Interestingly enough, at the super book only three people cashing
on the bed. Two of them had a five dollar
bet and one of them had a two dollar bet,
So the book got away with only two grand but
the prop cash. Thank god that there wasn't more on
the game, Otherwise they could have been on the hook
for about a million dollars like the West Book would
have been three years ago. He's Bernie Fretto. You can
hear him at the top of the hour straight out

(02:28:21):
of Vegas. A lot of good information on of course,
what happened today and what will happen tomorrow Week sixteen
in the NFL. Also make sure you're following him on
Twitter at Bernie Freddo Bernie my man. We appreciate the
time and we will be listening at the top of
the hour. Okay, thanks guys, Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas to
you as well. Bernie. Thank you for joining us and
hope you had a great holiday. Uh. Speaking of holiday,

(02:28:44):
we'll start to wrap up here for the final time
this evening. Let's get to Steve to Sagre with what's trending?
You guys mentioned the college football semifinals are on New
Year's Eve. There was actually a bowl game today Camelliable
in Alabama and the winner was Georgia State, a team
that was one and four as of early October. They
won fifty one twenty over ball State, which finishes six
and seven. That's the game you missed. Ball State, by

(02:29:05):
the way, all time in bowl games one nine and one.
Coming up the Holiday Bowl Tuesday night on Fox TV
from San Diego u c l A against NC State.
Now to the two NFL games today. Colton A now
nine and six after winning at Arizona two to sixteen.
Jonathan Taylor over a hundred yards rushing Carson Wentz two
touchdown passes. Cardinals missed two field goals and an extra

(02:29:26):
pointed to empty. Mentioned the safety given up turned it
over on downs twice eleven penalties. Arizona has lost three
in a row. Cards running back James Conner was out
tonight with a heal injury, but Chase Edmonds not only
had a touchdown run but hundred twenty seven total yards.
Indie was missing most of its offensive line, had a
tight end go out injured as well. Linebacker Darius Leonard
on the COVID list. He'll miss reportedly two games. Still,

(02:29:49):
the Colts won this game a season that started oh
and three. They've won six of their last seven games.
Green Bay twelve and three, still holding top seed in
the NFC after beating Clee twenty two. Aaron Rodgers three
touchdown passes he broke Brett Farves team record for TV passes,
key touchdown right before halftime, no sacks against Green Bay. Meanwhile,

(02:30:10):
Baker Mayfield was sacked five times. Just coming off the
COVID list. Mayfield with two touchdowns, four interceptions, and key
to this game the Browns kicker. We mentioned this on
last night's show, Chase McLoughlin went on the COVID list,
so Cleveland's new kicker missed the first extra point try.
The team had to go for two later in the
first half and missed that and lost by two points.

(02:30:31):
Nick Chubb and the Browns, on only seventeen carries, had
a hundred twenty six yards in a score, plus three
receptions for fifty eight yards. But Davante Adams had ten
catches in the win hundred fourteen yards two scores, Devandre
Campbell of Green Bay twelve solo tackles, so all the
Browns offense had twenty eight first downs over four hundred
yards of offense four interceptions. Throne does him in and

(02:30:53):
the Browns our last place in the a f C
North record of seven and eight. Their last two games
of the season are at Pittsburgh on Monday and against Cincinnati.
By the way, all three of the Packers touchdowns came
on drives right after the first half interceptions from Mayfield
so green Bay seven and oh at home. They will
host Minnesota next. Chargers running back Austin Ekeler is out

(02:31:14):
for tomorrow's game at Houston. He tested positive and also
on the COVID list is wide receiver Mike Williams. Jets
head coach Robert salis still on the COVID list, will
not be able to work tomorrow's game against Jackson Bille.
He tested positive Wednesday. The Ravens place quarterback Tyler Huntley
on the COVID list. Chief's wide receiver Tyree Hill cleared protocols,
as did tight end Travis Kelsey and Eagles head coach

(02:31:35):
Nick Sirianni cleared COVID protocols. Patriots wide receiver Kendrick Bourne
is off the COVID list. Washington activated kicker Joey Slye
from injured reserve. Dallas tackle Toron Smith out with an
ankle injury for Sunday night against Washington. The NBA Late
game is over at Utah. The Jazz win it. They
had trailed by sixteen points late first quarter, but still

(02:31:56):
beat Dallas one sixteen. Brooklyn a winner over the Lakers
one two to one fifteen. The Nets blew a twenty
three point lead with about ten minutes left in the
fourth quarter. Lakers tied it with forty five seconds to
go and then didn't score another point. Nets where a
late seven oh run to win by seven. James Harden
returns to the lineup, has a triple double, including thirty

(02:32:16):
six points Patty Mills with thirty four. Lakers have lost
five straight. Great updates coming from a couple of veteran
NBA riders and one post game note from Dave mcmenimon
that Lebron James who was great again. He played forty minutes.
The Lakers were plus eleven points on the court when
he played. In the eight minutes Lebron sat they were
minus eighteen and they wound up losing the game. So

(02:32:39):
five straight losses, and during this five game streak, the
Lakers have been outscored by a total of seventy six points,
the most any Lebron team has ever been outscored in
any five game span that he has played. Lakers are
sixteen and eighteen and Lebron had thirty nine points. Russell
Westbrook four of twenty shooting and had a triple double

(02:33:04):
doubles exactly thirteen points, twelve rebounds, eleven assists. Great stat
from NBA dot Com in the restricted area basically under
the basket. Westbrook was four of fifteen shooting in this game,
including missing the dunk in the final. At least he's
not shooting, that's right, he's turning it over less class,
and he's getting triple doubles. So yeah, class, it's Christmas.

(02:33:26):
We gotta be We got glasses half full, miss missing
lower risk shots. That's much better. I Meanwhile, Golden State
leads Phoenix by a half game in the standings for
best overall mark winning at Phoenix one sixteen one oh
seven and then the Arizona Cardinals laws. So happy Christmas
to those in Arizona one a day. The Suns did
not score point in the last three minutes of this

(02:33:47):
game Milwaukee in New York each one. The Clippers injury
update that Paul George, who averages twenty five points a game,
is gonna miss at least a month or so with
a torn right elbow ligament. And in college hoops, Stanford's
tournament final in Hawaii against Your Bill was canceled due
to COVID. Thanks Steve Seger, the Sager. Thank you, by
the way, Merry Christmas to you, enjoy the last few
hours of the holiday. Thank you for joining us here

(02:34:09):
on a Saturday. Uh. This is Fox Sports Radio, by
the way, to Saga. We'll see you next week for
New Year's and we'll talk some football playoffs Bowl. Yes, absolutely,
we'll have a great evening. To Sega. We appreciate you.
Jason Martin eron Torres Fox Sports Radio. We're wrapping up
our show. As I said Bernie Friday, top of the Hour,
straight out of Vegas. Jason, let's just rip through some
of these Week six teen games really quick. Uh. One

(02:34:30):
that I find like very interesting Rams at Minnesota, and
the Rams are of course on a short week, they
played on Tuesday because of all the COVID stuff. Uh,
they are missing Andrew Whitworth, as Sager just told you,
they're starting left tackle. They also, uh now are in
first place in the lost column, and we'll be in
first place in sole possession of first place with Arizona's

(02:34:51):
lost tonight. Uh if they win the game. But they're
going up against the Minnesota team that obviously needs this
win for their own playoff hopes. What do you make
of this one? Uh? Well, I mean you're trying to
tell me to bet on Minnesota, and I would never
do it, thank you. I just like, there's nothing about
them that I like other than Dalvin Cook and Justin Jefferson.

(02:35:12):
Justin Jefferson might be within a couple of years, the
best receiver in football. I mean he's absolutely He's a
wonderful player, and you like feeling and what he's capable
of doing. And Dalvin can play. But when Kirk Cousins
is starting quarterback and Mike Zimmer is your head coach,
there's only so much that I can buy into. The
Rams are doing the right things. They have kind of

(02:35:32):
right of the ship. Stafford's played much much better as
of late, Cooper Cup. If he wasn't a wide receiver,
he could be in the m v P discussion. He's
in the discussion, but you don't think he's gonna win it.
Maybe he wins Offensive Player of the Year or maybe
it's Jonathan Taylor is probably one of those two guys.
But I know the NFL has a history of, Well,
the Rams are definitely gonna win this game, so now

(02:35:52):
you should pencil in the Vikings. I just think Minnesota
is just relentlessly average, and I don't think they've out
of shot. I'm so with you, you know, and I
get the argument that, like like you said, like I
just said, it's a short week, Minnesota's gotta win. It's
in Minnesota. I just don't trust Kirk Cousins. I mean,
how many times do we have to go through this again?

(02:36:13):
Go back to the Dallas Oh, no, Dak take Minnesota. Well,
what happened there? Oh they're playing the Lions, must win game,
gotta take to Minnesota, loose the Lions. And so I'm
with you on that one. Obviously. The other kind of
really big one tomorrow, there's a few really big ones.
Buffalo at New England. We all know what happened the
last time of these two teams played three pass attempts

(02:36:33):
for New England in a win. I expect him to
pass a little bit more. But if it ain't broke,
don't don't fix it. Uh. Do you think Buffalo can
get Bill Belichick out of his comfort zone? Make Mac
Jones beat you like Indie did last week? And obviously
Mac Jones was not able to beat Indie last week.
I think Buffalo has better success against New England this
week in Foxboro. Oh yeah, I mean, they're not going
to be dealing with the same kind of elements that

(02:36:54):
they were in that Monday night game that said, you
look at the rest of their schedule versus Falcons, versus Jets,
you assume even if they lose that game, they're gonna
go ten and seven. They're probably in the playoffs. But
the thoughts that they were about to run the division
are gone. And here's the bigger problem if you're a
Bills fan, they're gone permanently. They're not gone. They're not

(02:37:16):
It's not just that they're gone this year. It's not
like mac Jones is gonna get worse in year two.
Like this is him as a rookie and they're rolling out.
They've already beaten you once, they may well beat you again.
All of this talk about what the Bills were gonna
be and and I've said this for weeks now, Aaron,
for right now, I'm out on them even when they lose.

(02:37:37):
The media seems to be trying to back this narrative that,
like when they lost to Tampa Bay they made a comeback.
It's like, oh, I actually feel better about them now,
and I don't. They lost with you. They lost, they lost.
They lose to every good team they played, just about
it seems like they lost to the Colts, they lost
to the Pats already, they lost to Tampa Bay, they
lost to Tennessee, they lost to Pittsburgh in in Week one,

(02:37:58):
which is not particularly impressive. And they found a way
to lose to Urban Meyer like that. And that's the
thing that's history right there. There's only two teams have
been able to have been able to claim that they
lost to Urban Meyers, a head coach in the NFL,
and that's them. So they beat up on the Panthers
last week and who cares? And now it's at New England.

(02:38:19):
If they find a way to lose this that means
they've been swept by New England, which they're used to doing.
But this isn't supposed to happen anymore, right Like, they're
supposed to be a twelve and five kind of team
cruising their way into the playoffs where a division win,
and if they were to lose here, they're gonna be
eight and seven and they're gonna have to sweat out
the remainder of the season just to get one of
the wild card spots. Last game, we don't even have

(02:38:41):
to talk about. The last game that has major major implications.
It is in the a f C North Baltimore playing
UH Cincinnati. Unfortunately, if you missed it, Baltimore is only
down Lamar Jackson with the ankle injury, but now Tyler
Huntley is out for COVID protocols. As the sager told us,
Josh Johnson will start in that game. So don't mean
we don't need it to ffinitive breakdown there. But what
we will do is when we come back, we will

(02:39:04):
make our official picks. Four Week sixteen wrap up the show.
Aaron Torres, Jason Martin, Fox Sports Radio, Welcome back, right Ay,
Fox Sports Radio. Aaron Torres Jason Martin here taking to
the top of the hour. Of course, Bernie Fratto straight
out of Vegas, Will will tap in for us at
eleven Pacific, two a m. Eastern. Take you straight through

(02:39:24):
six eight m Eastern, getting you ready for a busy
week sixteen in the NFL. Speaking of which, don give
us a little music. Let's make some picks. I will
start with a game that we just talked about, Jason Martin.
The Rams go to play Minnesota. The Rams are three
and a half point favorite on the road, and I
know that every metric says you take Minnesota. They're at

(02:39:46):
home three and a half, they're getting the hook, all
that good stuff. And you know what, I don't care,
because there's no metric in Vegas. Jason Martinto account for
Kirk Cousins not being able to win games when he
absolutely needs to. I understand the short week for the Rams.
I get all that. I think the Rams role. I
think they go into Minnesota, get the win, and they
leave Sunday in sole possession of first place in the

(02:40:08):
NFC West. Yeah. I like that. It does look like
Theelan's gonna be able to go for Minnesota. At least
they're not playing any afternoon or in prime time, so
Kirk Cousin might not be quite as terrible. I look
at Lyons Falcons, Falcons six and a half point favorites
right now. Guess who's not playing for Detroit Jared Gas,

(02:40:28):
Tim Boyle, Yukon's in doesn't marry. He probably think the
Falcons are gonna be okay Aaron like six and a
half Arthur Smith's offense. I know they're not a good
football team, but I know, uh, Tim Boyle, I literally
was gonna have too. I had no ideas from Connecticut.
I wasn't trying to take a shot at you. I
would actually look, do you want to stat he got

(02:40:49):
benched at you got and actually transferred out. I don't
even remember where he ended up. Maybe that's a little Randyett.
So maybe that's more Randyett so than it is Tim Boyle.
But he did start his career at Yukon. But he's
an NFL starter now that I mean to cut you
off there, Jason, No, it's all good. I mean the
lines of two eleven and one. I think Matt Campbell's
created uh some space for himself. Dan Campbell should have said,
and it looks like his players love him is and

(02:41:11):
the city seems to be rallying around him. It's gonna
be a bad day for them. I think the Falcons
cover at home. How about this, you want to talk
about the impact of COVID. Cincinnati opened as a two
and a half point favorite. It is now up to seven,
and I still don't think it's enough. I get it.
I know we talked about Cincinnati. They are just like Minnesota.
Every time you expecting to win turn a corner, they
do something dumb and stuff their toe With that said,

(02:41:33):
if you missed it, Baltimore is down to Josh Johnson
as their starting quarterback. Lamar Jackson out with an ankle.
He didn't even travel. Uh Tyler Huntley out because of
COVID protocols. I know you probably shouldn't take the Bengals
because they're so inconsistent, but I'm gonna roll with since
he in a must win game for their playoff. Holks
biggest guarantee would be you wouldn't watch this game. But

(02:41:55):
Jags Jets Robert Sala COVID Zach Wilson. He's the quarterback
for the Jets. The Jags are a two point dog.
I like the Jags to win on the road. They're
both horrible. It's it's at least a small enough line
that I can see him. Dude. There's there's a lot
of double digit lines today in the NFL. I want

(02:42:16):
no parts of those. But I'll take the Jets favored
by two. When I see Jets favored by anybody, I'm
kind of like I might go to the opposite direction
there and at least feel like I've got a working
shot at winning that bet. Last one from me will
go all the way to Monday Night, and in honor
of Arnie Spaniard, the Miami Dolphins can't lose. Baby. They're
in New Orleans as a small underdog. Again, I hate

(02:42:36):
taking road underdogs, but I think this is our road favorites.
Excuse me, but I do think this is the right side.
Two is not playing great, but two is winning games.
They continue to win. They have played themselves back into
the playoff picture after starting whatever it was one in
five or whatever. I got Miami on Monday night beating
New Orleans in the Superdome. Let's trying to look at

(02:42:57):
Washington Cowboys a Sunday night game and say that Dallas
is gonna blow Washington now and they might, but tend's
just a high number, So I'm gonna pick ten and
a half. The Chargers are a ten and a half
point favored over the Texans. I think they're gonna absolutely
knock the you know, anybody part you want, all of
the Texans. I think Herbert's gonna have one of those

(02:43:17):
days on the road. I feel good about them, even
with Ekela and Williams being out. I just think the Texans,
I mean, come on, I like the Chargers to win
that game by three touchdowns. I think that's an absolute blowout.
All right, we gotta get out of here. I want
to thank the crew. I want to thank producer bo.
I want to thank Steve Seger. I want to thank
of course board optn't want to thank you, Jason Martin.
I hope everybody enjoyed their Christmas. Jason, I want to

(02:43:40):
thank you for coming in out of Christmas, keeping me company. Uh.
Coming up next, Bernie Friday, straight out of Vegas. You
can hear him the top of the hour getting ready
for weeks sixteen of the NFL slate. So yeah, we'll
be back Friday, by the way, and for Doug gottlieb
Er torist, Jason Martin, Fox Sports Radio,

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