October 17, 2023 • 30 mins
Jason Smith and Mike Harmon react to the Chargers losing to the Cowboys on Monday night and react to Justin Herbert's poor performance. The guys explain why all hope may be lost for the Houston Astros after the first 2 games. Plus, Anthony Richardson is forced to end his rookie season way too soon.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to The Jason Smith Show with Mike
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Speaker 2 (00:22):
Give this you're listening to Fox Sports Radio.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Meetings and welcome inside Final hourt Tonight at the Jason
Smith Show with my baz friend Mike Harmon, live from
the tiraq dot com studios tirack dot com. You know
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(00:50):
The way tire buying should be. So the Cowboys beat
the Chargers tonight, and a real bit of a shocker
in that Justin Herbert played really terribly and I can't
tell you, Mike, just how surprised I was that he
(01:13):
played as bad as he did, because this is not
a This is not a guy that's been on a
heater or someone who, hey, you know, is up and down.
This is someone who is one of the best young
quarterbacks in the game, and for him to play this
not just clutch time, because the thing about the charge,
(01:34):
it's more about the Chargers not being a clutch team
than Herbert being clutch, because forget about the final couple
of minutes for a second, he was off all night right,
he was sailing passes. He was missing wide open wide receivers.
It's not like the Cowboys played great tonight, not like
the Cowboys defensively was fantastic. They had one play. It
(01:55):
was Micah parsonsack on the next to last play of
the game that set up the pick, right, like that
was it as bad as he played. I don't know
that I've seen him play a worse game than he
played tonight. I really don't, because if he just has
an average night, then the Chargers win this game, probably
by ten points. But he missed so many receivers, and
(02:15):
this game in my mind, like if you said to me, hey,
give me one visual that sums up the Chargers game
against the Cowboys, it'll be Chargers wide receivers leaping for
balls that are three feet over their head. And the
biggest one is the likely touchdown play that Herbert missed
a wide open kid. Keenan Allen's never that wide open
(02:35):
because you know they cover Keenan Allen or they try
to anyway. But the guy's great. I mean he this
is a blown coverage and Keenan Allen is open at
Midfield's it's a thirty yard play that's going to turn
into a seventy yard play and Justin Herbert overthrows him.
Not even close, not even close there. You know there's
plays where he could say, well, was that an overthrow?
Did the receiver not get to the ball in time?
(02:55):
This was? This was This was Keenan Allen at mid
field with his hand up going hey, dude, just hit
me with it, and Justin Herbert still missed it. It
was stunning to me how bad he played, and because
a guy that doesn't play that bad, but that that's
the that was this game in a nutshell. Why did
the Cowboys win? Yeah, Dak was fine. Dak was good.
(03:16):
This is about as good a Dak as you're gonna get,
which is not the best use for the Cowboys, but
it was good. He played tonight. But Justin Herbert was awful,
and the Cowboys won tonight because he was as bad
as he was. That's why the Cowboys walked away with
the win and the Chargers are doing four.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
Yeah, I mean, we look at what he did over
the course of the game, and you're trying not to
get too much into the Hey, the recency of this
game and making this the the folk point. I mean,
obviously it's the game we're talking about, but trying to
extrapolate to the season at large for the performances and
(03:52):
even to his career, and right there's staunch defenders of
his saying, look, he's such a small part of what
Staley is. The lack of run game at times, and
the defense which has been non existent. Yes, the sack
total the last two weeks have been fine, but they're
still giving up points overall. But for for Herbert tonight,
(04:16):
they misses to Keenan. Allen would just love to go
back into that, right because coming into the game, a
lot of concern about the left hand. You know that
even with the bye week, and you saw it on
a couple of exchanges where it looked like he was
struggling to grip the football and you know how much
was that going to affect anything. Well, he's still throwing
(04:38):
with his right hands, so it didn't matter, you know,
once once he's back in the pocket, and they did
a good job of keeping him clean for the most
part tonight and time to create separation. I mean, you
saw that first drive after the punt return, just a
very efficient drive and a lot of separation for Allen
and and it started off brilliantly and then it went
(05:01):
off the rails from there. You don't know if he's
if it's a younger quarterback and a guy that's really
just starting to come into his own You're wondering if
he's hearing footsteps, feeling the pressure, or someone who's really
been struggling that perhaps they're forcing the issue and against
the Cowboys. Might there be some of that given their
reputation and what they've been in terms of their aptitude
(05:24):
and pressuring quarterbacks week to week. Maybe, But in this
particular case, you got a supercut of four or five
throws that are just inexplicable, you know.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
And another part of it is because we're gonna hear
from coming up in a couple of seconds, is the
two big plays are and one of the things that
they need to really fire on. And and maybe I
don't know if this is part of it. But watching
the Chargers offense, they've always had no matter who they
roll out there at wide receiver, they've been great right
(06:00):
for the for twenty years now, whether it's Malcolm Floyd
or you know or anybody. Whoever they roll out there
is terrific. And the guys are why Philip Rivers had
just went through guys all the time. And I keep
going back to Quenton Johnston who came into this year. Hey,
he was gonna be great and coming out of TCU
(06:21):
and and and everything his skill set. Look at what
the Chargers plan on doing, right, you can tell their
plan coming into this year was we have Keenan Allen. Now,
who knows after this year, but after the rookie season,
Quenton Johnson will probably be our number one receiver. Mike
Williams will be number two. We'll move on that way.
And Quenton Johnston has been invisible. Okay, he did try
(06:41):
to throw to him on the final play tonight that
got picked off, But the guy had two targets tonight.
The one time he was open, when Justin Herbert could
have had him on a third and eight inside the
ten yard line, he would have had his first big
play of his NFL career. Herbert didn't even see him.
Like he was on the back side, you know, coming
in off a post and Herbert just looked to the
(07:01):
just look back a little bit. He's got the guy
wide open for a touchdown. But the Chargers wide receivers,
this is not the same. Hey, you got a lot
of guys, and who do you play in fantasy type group?
This is Keenan Allen and nobody else. And I know
you want to say it's too or it's early to
call Quentin Johnston a bust, but this is a guy
(07:22):
who came in in the first round and had a
chance to elevate because Mike Williams has been knocked out
for the season, he's been out a while, and he
can't do better than two targets tonight. The guy's got
thirteen targets all season, all season long, and he's playing
with one of the best quarterbacks and one of the
biggest pass happy offenses you could possibly have. Austin Eckler's
been out the last couple weeks. They throwing the football
(07:44):
all the time, and he can't even get looks. He
can't even get targets. So while you say, hey, it's
probably too early to call him a bus But is
it too early? I mean, is it really too early?
When you see guys and Zay Flowers has had an
impact on that Ravens team and we didn't know if
he would have one because look at all the guy,
Oh who's he gonna catch passes for? You got Andrews
there and Odell and all this, Zay Flowers has been
pretty good. Guys have come in and done it. Guys
(08:06):
have come in and done it. And Johnson was supposed
to be that big part of that offense and I
look at that's a huge thing they're missing because if
it's not Keenan Allen, it's just a bunch of guys
and that holds the Chargers back to that's a big
part of this offense that's not firing along. Whether it's
Herbert not looking at him, not seeing him, he's not
but that that's something that needs to be addressed now
because he's the guy that needs a step up if
(08:28):
this offense is gonna go anywhere.
Speaker 3 (08:29):
Yeah, if you listen to well, I'll do the self
touting on the iWatch of Flex podcast. Zay Flowers was
a guy we talked about a lot. So I'm gonna
I'm gonna take the victory lap for the Baltimore Ravens
in what you.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
Actually said, Brandon Flowers And it was a ten team
rock singer league. You said, take Brandon Flowers in the
first round.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Okay, yeah, since I don't know who that is that works.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
You don't know who? Really seriously, you have Brandon Flowers
at the lead singer of the Killers. Yeah, Brandon Flowers. Now,
oh now, Tys just got to play the Killers. You
really don't Brandon Flowers leads it, not Brandon Flowers, former
dB in the NFL.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
I know who the brand is, but no, I did
not know the lead singer. I had no idea.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Okay, right, well, I don't good for them.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
They're going open for guns and roses at Hollywood Bowl.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
All right, mister rock and roll. Hey, Mike Harbon's gonna
give you a rock and roll history here. We got
no all right, go.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
Yeah, no, I really don't care. Coming into tonight, Keenan
now in forty four targets Mike Williams with twenty six.
Your third leading target getter is Josh Palmer, who, again
given his familiarity with Herbert given past success when healthy,
that made perfect sense. But with Williams going down, sure
you got another huge target. The fact that they're not
(09:41):
integrating him more fully into this offense. I haven't done
the all twenty two. I'd love to hear someone who's
doing it for the Chargers, whether Daniel Jeremiah or whoever.
He's on the radio broadcast right with our guy Frostburg
and Matt money Smith as when he looks at it,
is is it that he's not getting separation? What is
(10:02):
it on the practice field? What is it that has
made him such a non factor to this point, because
you figure, if nothing else, red zone, you got a
big body. I mean, that's almost like having another tight
end out there, right, given the size and length that
he has. Gerald Everett, who you saw come across and
that was a nice design by Callen Moore for the
(10:25):
touchdown right fake one way to Eckler and then Everett
scrapes across the line and he's wide open. We've seen
that with motion used a lot across the NFL, and
they did it expertly. There, so brilliance there. And ever
it's a guy that you can trust. You saw him.
He was involved in the first possession as well. But
(10:47):
beyond that, yeah, there's not a lot of depth. There's
not a lot to roll to hang your hat on.
So the question is can you go and we're talking
about the trade season, why not make them and find
them another piece from a team that's divesting at the position.
Obviously it's a learning curve and an acclamation process. But
(11:10):
if Johnson's not getting there to where he's on the
field and giving you another option, man, how many years
do you have before you know you're lost? Right in
terms of these offenses because you talk about Keenan Allen
and how many more years he Mike Williams, you're not
banking on him being on the field. So yeah, there's
a lot of questions there. Eckler's missed a lot of time, right,
(11:32):
he came back for one more year. Presume that unless
suddenly he's Superman in the second half of the year,
he's not going to be a Charger and you're looking
to move on there as well.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
Let's hear from Justin Herbert finishing meeting the media a
couple of minutes ago, as he talks about the Charge's
loss too the Cowboys tonight.
Speaker 4 (12:01):
How challenging was dealing with the pressure tonight.
Speaker 5 (12:05):
Yeah, They've got a really good front seven. You know,
I thought our offensive line battle and they did a
great job up front. You know, unfortunately we fell short
and I got to make more places as a quarterback.
Speaker 4 (12:14):
You guys obviously wanted to try and establish the run
early to sort of keep those rushers off balance all that.
How much do you feel like that impacted sort of
how they were able to play the game defensively.
Speaker 5 (12:24):
Yeah, Like I said, they've they've got a really good
front seven, so we had to do our best, and
you know, it didn't go our way on the ground today,
And you know, I think it's just the.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Testaments how good they played.
Speaker 5 (12:34):
And you know, I think we can do a.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
Lot better on offense, and especially at quarterback.
Speaker 5 (12:39):
I can play a lot better. So you know, I
thought the defense came up with some big stops today,
held them when we needed them to.
Speaker 6 (12:44):
So it's on us as an offense, so you could
play a lot better. Did you feel like tonight wasn't
a good.
Speaker 1 (12:50):
Game for you.
Speaker 5 (12:52):
I missed a couple of receivers through some bad passes.
There's a lot left out there. So there's a lot
to work on and a lot to improve on.
Speaker 6 (12:59):
Did feels happened on that last play with Quintin at
the end on the interception? You just flow through like
what happened on that play? Was it just the pressure
that got to or was there dimmunication?
Speaker 3 (13:10):
Yep?
Speaker 1 (13:10):
I threw it and it got picked it off.
Speaker 6 (13:11):
You made a good play on it.
Speaker 7 (13:13):
Does those missed opportunities for you encourage you about what
this offense could be? Or was it more of an
empty and as we should have did better? How do
you reconcile those two that?
Speaker 5 (13:23):
It's a little bit of both, you know, you know,
Keenan ran two great routes and I missed them, And
so that's on me as a quarterback, and we have
those explosive opportunities and we have to capitalize on those.
You know, that's a really good defense that we're going
up against, and you know, I can't miss those like
that and expect to, you know, to continue to get
back on third down and get back on track on
second down. So you know the top opportunities, but we'll
(13:44):
watch the film and be too critical on ourselves.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
So and we'll learn from it.
Speaker 4 (13:48):
When you do assess those two misses that you're talking about.
To Keenan, did you feel like you were rushed at
all in those moments because of how the pressure was
getting home earlier in the game.
Speaker 5 (13:57):
Yeah, even if I was, you know, that's on me
to be able to call my feet down, stay good
in the pocket and deliver. That's right, ken ran two
great routes, and you know he gave us those opportunities
to get those explosive plays, and so that's on me
to stand in there and deliver and do my job
to get him the ball.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
All right. So that was a little bit of Justin
Herbert they are talking for about the loss to count
I will say that I like him taking accountability. And
I'm ready I said, I'm ready for a bit. I'm
ready for for a bold prediction.
Speaker 3 (14:22):
Let's go.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
If they make a movie about Justin Herbert's life. He's
played by Jared Padlechi. Okay, Padalchi plays Justin Herbert in
the movie Fifteen Yearly. Padatelecy's like, I think he's in
his early forties. But yeah, I'm seeing Justin Herbert, Jared Padallechi,
I'm seeing that now. The other hot take is this,
we talk a lot about Justin Herbert in the clutch
(14:43):
Gene right. This is the third game that they've played
that they've had a chance to win this year where
Herbert's not been able to do it. And I get it.
You want a quarterback to be able to lead the
team down and say, yeah, he's got that it factor
about him. But I don't know that it's a it's
a a Padialachy thing.
Speaker 2 (14:58):
I don't know that it's a.
Speaker 1 (14:59):
Justin Herbert thing.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
Is the Gilmore Girls? All that guy did was wine.
I mean, that's a complete opposite just In there.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
But he was Sam and supernatural and he saved at
playing someone whose brother's name was Dean. How about that?
He comes full circle? No Dean Sam. But I don't
know that it's a Justin Herbert thing as much as
it's a Charger thing, because look at a couple of
things tonight from that final possession right that that ended
with the interception. First down play was a pass to
(15:31):
Keenan Allen where he gained seven yards when out of
bounds he could have cut it up and gotten the
first down. You have plenty of time left, right, there's
two and a half minutes left to go in this game,
and Keenan Allen was just happy going out of bounds
for seven yards, got out of first down, right, could
have started things over. You're up over the forty yard
line and you're feeling really good, but no, I go
out of bounds. Where is your sense of urgency there?
Where is your clutch gene there to do that? After
(15:53):
that play, it's first and five because they let the
play get wiped out, they take the penalty off sides
on the Cowboys. Justin Herbert could have gotten the first down,
but he slides after three yards and he could have
gotten that first down a little bit and not have
to worry about getting drilled. This is where it's the
end of the game. Guys. You got to get in
there and and make sure that you're there for that
(16:14):
first down you got. You can't just sit here and
say I'm okay going out of bounds. I'm okay with this.
Just overall, I got a lack of sense of urgency
from the Chargers and in other big moments, you know,
the fourth and one play they call earlier in the
half and they and they wind up biffing it. I
just don't get a sense that the Chargers overall have
that clutch gene yes, and Herbert's a big part of
(16:36):
it because he's the quarterback. He's gonna get all the blame.
But overall, I just don't see this team as, Hey,
when they need to make a play, they're gonna make it.
I see the Chargers as when a play needs to
be made, they're absolutely not going to make it. And
whatever you think is gonna happen, it's gonna be one
hundred and eighty degrees the other way. So when you
talk about a quarterback thing, it's more of a Charger
(16:56):
thing than it is than justin Herbert thing.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Well, yeah, you extrap laid it out, but you know,
quarterbacks always gonna get the scrutiny. Is he clutch? Is
he not? I think we'd already decided that Brandon Staley wasn't,
So you need to stipulate to that. And you say,
all right, we gotta still we got still got time
that we need to have a conversation about this. So
what else can we say about it? We know that
(17:20):
given the options on a fourth down play. They're gonna
call the wrong one or they're not going.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
To execute it to be wrong.
Speaker 3 (17:30):
We've seen it time and again, right, I mean, even
they caught a break when they botched the fourth down
play and the incomplete getting batted away from Palmer. Defense
made it hold up and they were able to get
the subsequent possession to come down and kick a field
goal to get right back to where they should have been.
(17:50):
Defense did their job. Offense left us scratching our head.
And that is Charger football.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Charger's gonna Charger tell it goes.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Fox Sports Radio. The Jason Smith Show with my best
friend Mike Harmon. You know who this is, Harmon.
Speaker 3 (18:13):
I know who the band is, Oh okay, I just
didn't know who. I didn't know their names.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
It was TJ.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
I listened to a lot of bands. I don't necessarily
know the COMPONENTDJ.
Speaker 8 (18:24):
Somebody told me you didn't know who the lead singer
of the Killers was TJ.
Speaker 3 (18:29):
No nically done. I mean, for the longest time, did
anybody to know who Larry Mullen Junior was no until
it became a thing to know who Larry Mullen Junior was.
Speaker 8 (18:40):
And TJ clearly Mike Harmon looking at the mister Bright's
side for the Chargers coming out of this loss.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Oh no, burn it all down, let's go.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
Yeah. But the name of the song is mister Brighton. Yeah,
I know, I mean it wasn't mister burn it all downside.
That's a that's a different song.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
That's a song I'm writing now and on my keyboard.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
All right, what about now, mister Purple's another guy in
that job. He's right out of the job. Hey, before
we get into another big story out of the NFL,
because we'll talk about the tush push in tonight's game
that the Cowboys were not able to execute against the Chargers. Uh,
the Astros are down to zip now in the ALCS,
he watched the Phillies jump out to a one nothing lead,
(19:24):
they had a bunch of home runs and held on
to beat the Diamondbacks in Game one, and now the
Rangers are going home with a two zip lead after
they hold on to beat the Astros today five to four.
Nathan Evaldi gets out of a bases loaded, nobody out
jam and he goes six innings and pitches and strikes
out nine, and I just I go, really, Nathan Evaldi
(19:47):
is like the most clutch pitcher that I never believe in,
and that every year he's in the playoffs, he's pitching
well like Nathan Evaldi, Come on, man. But the general
consenting I've seen a lot of this today is that, well,
the Astros are good enough. They can go win the
next three and they'll score thirty five or forty runs
the next three games. What they said about the Dodgers
in the last round, exactly how many runs did they score?
(20:08):
And I get that. I get that sense because the
Astros level of excellence they have had, whether they're getting
the signs or not. Look, this is they're the defending champs.
We've seen them get hot, We've seen them score a
lot of runs. We have that in our mind. The boy,
if any team can do it, it's the Astros. Let's
just look at reality, Okay, in the last twenty seven
years of Major League baseball, because I'll tell you why
(20:29):
the Astros aren't winning. In the last twenty seven years
of Major League baseball, two teams have come back from
down two zip to win the series. Two teams. That's it. One.
Everybody knows the Red Sox in two thousand and four,
right down from three zip against the Yankees. The biggest
comeback in the history of sports. The other time was
the Dodgers coming back from two zip and that was
the Bubble Year against the Braves. That's it, you know,
(20:51):
I know you can say, well, we're down to zip.
You're down two zip. You get down to zip. That's it, right,
you're down to zip and you're not going home. You're
down to zip in You're you're going on the road.
All the old adages of well you get down two
zip to get this the series is still there. No,
you're down to zip. That's it. Once in a great
while you can come back and win. But you gotta
be a great team. And the Astros aren't a great team.
(21:13):
This version of the Astros isn't great. This is a
version that barely got to ninety wins, that needed the
Rangers to lose on the final day of the regular
season to be able to win the Western Division. This
is not a great, great, great Astros team. Yes, they
are the champs, it's not the team they were a
year ago. They're down two zip to the Rangers who
are hitting the baseball and rolling this series. The Rangers
(21:36):
are gonna be in the World Series. I'm gonna get
to watch Max Scherz are in the World Series and
pretend it's ce Mets.
Speaker 3 (21:41):
Well, he's gonna pitch in Game three for you, buddy.
It is all sure as as prescribed as you go through.
And look, you had Valdez with another terrible starts. This
was CJ. Ntkowski put this out earlier today. Last six
starts at home, he was one in five with a
(22:01):
six point a two e ra A and the one
win was his no hitter against Cleveland. Uh so take
that from that what you will. Uh, you just go
through the process of these playoffs and and getting in
and we've seen team's big beginnings early right and getting down.
And I was trying to find the tweet talking about
(22:23):
the the type of pitch in Game one that you know,
Alvarez having his to home runs tonight, but you know,
had the hat trick of strikeouts in game one, and
they're talking about, you know, the unhittable pitch that everybody
was seeing and being flustered by in game one. Look,
it's as we've talked about a lot, the the ebb
(22:45):
and flow of the playoffs and the new world order
of pitching staffs and trying to get through. And for
the Astros, you thought they'd gotten right just in time, right,
that guys, including Alvarez, who'd missed a bunch of time
during the course of the year alto they that this
was going to be it. Well, you get down big
in the playoffs, you know, you need some help in
(23:07):
the relief relievers to bridge innings, of course, but that
long road of trying to get back from big deficits
early like they did today, and they almost made it
and made it back over the top. But assuming that
they're suddenly going to string together wins, there's no there's
no chance, there's no chance. You've just cited all the
(23:28):
historical data. But just assuming that what once was is
carrying over to the next year is foolhardy, Right, it's
a completely different roster, completely different lineup. And you know what,
the Rangers are actually pretty good. Now. Does that mean
that Scherzer might not might get out on the mound
and get absolutely blasted upon arriving. Sure, mighty exit early.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
Would you put the over over under? Does he survive
longer than any Dodger starter?
Speaker 1 (23:58):
Oh? All I keep thinking of, is you know what
would I rather watch Schures are in de Gram celebrating
winning the World Series saying Hey, life is great in Texas,
or having to watch Bryce Harper and the Phillies do
it like I don't know, and you know, those are
the teams that are gonna play and I gotta deal
with one of them, either another team in the NL
he's doing it, or de Grom and Sures are winning
(24:19):
to grind without throwing a pitch in months. They're gonna say,
I don't know, man, I don't know, I don't know. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:25):
On the other side, Bryce Harper Homer's on his birthday.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
Although, let's come on, Bryce Harper HiT's a lot of
home runs to say he's gonna Homer on his birthday.
That's not the biggest thing. It's not like saying, Hey,
Ozzie Smith is going to Homer on his birthday. All right?
Speaker 3 (24:37):
This is Bryce Harper hit his home run in the
playoffs on his birthday.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern seven
pm Pacific.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
Uh So, let's go back now because we saw this
story earlier today, it looks like Anthony Richardson is done
for the season. Colts quarterback wh he was one of
the most exciting players to come out of college this year.
His shoulder injury likely going to be surgery and that
will put him out for the rest of the year. Now,
Jim Irsay said, it's always up to the player. Usually
(25:12):
players follow the medical advice. This decision will probably made
some time in the next few days. And look, it's
a shame for him. It's a shame because he's such
a good player and clearly not having the reps in college,
not playing a lot of football didn't matter because he
got to the NFL and proved that he was a
huge weapon right away, and that's really something and not
(25:34):
many guys can do that. You know, him and CJ.
Stroud are guys who weren't talking about enough. Certainly Richardson
his flash ear and the guy can make unbelievable plays
at any moment. To have him out stinks. And the
offshoot of this is that his career is a question
mark for me because he needs to play a certain
(25:57):
way to be effective, and a lot of quarterback I
never want team to take away from a quarterback what
they do. Well, Oh, we got to take you and
put you in the pocket. No, but that takes away
from how good of a quarterback you are. If you
take me and put me in the pocket, I'm not
someone that can run well. And that doesn't work. You
can't just take a quarterback and run and say don't
run enough, and we're gonna put you in the pocket.
You're gonna be a great pocket passer. No, this is
(26:18):
kind of who you are at this point. You're twenty
two years old and playing quarterback one way. This is
kind of who it is. But for Richardson, now this
is this is a player. He finished one game okay
at quarterback for the Colts. One game. He got knocked
out of every other game with an injury. He missed
a game, and now he's out for the season after
another injury that really didn't look that bad. It was
(26:39):
a tackle off a design run and he went down
and now he's done, likely for the season. And when
I say it's a question markets you know, I don't know.
I don't know that his body can withstand the rigors
of what he's gonna have to do to win in
the NFL, right, because he's got to have the design run.
(27:00):
This is part of what makes him great and the
guy he is. He's got to have the design runs.
He's got to be able to have the football. You're
gonna get hit. You know, you can't slide on every play,
you know, not every play. Can you go down on stuff?
Stuff like that is going to happen. And when you
get knocked out of every game, and you get knocked
out twice, and here's an injury that didn't look that
bad when it went down. This wasn't someone's ankles, you know,
(27:21):
going one way, or this is just a tackle where
you went down and now your shoulders all all jacked up.
I don't know if he has the body that can
withstand the punishment of the NFL. And that's why I
feel like his career is a big question mark for me,
almost like Zion Williamson, Like his body can't withstand the
riggers of the NBA. So how long is he really
(27:41):
gonna play for? They like I think about that and go,
can I project he's gonna be a big star? I mean,
I think so, I'd like to think. But at the
same time, can I project he's gonna ever play a
whole season. I can't really do that. This is a
lot of injuries really early for a guy in his
NFL career.
Speaker 3 (27:56):
Well, Zion's now lean and mean, in the best shape
of his life. Okay, you look out.
Speaker 1 (28:01):
Yeah, we'll see.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
I'm trying to speak some positivity out here, nobody, but
I've seen it a lot, buddy, I know we've seen
this act before. It's like chargers and fourth down in
close game situations. I get it. It all ties together.
Yeah with Richardson, I mean, go back to Week one
where Trevor Lawrence sought them out to just say, hey, buddy,
good game, get down, preserve yourselves, live to see another day,
(28:26):
and look for some guys. And we've talked about it
a lot on the show as long as we've been
together here at Fox. Jason the you know, go back
to Cam Newton's career, what we've seen with Lamar Jackson.
You know, we've had all those discussions, and certainly Lamar
Jackson is a guy that we've seen, you know, what
makes him special, Josh Allen along those same lines, you know,
(28:47):
what they do on the run and physically makes them special, right,
makes accelerates and takes their game to another level. So
if you take part of that component out, you know
what's left still a pretty good quarterback, but not the
elite level for Anthony Richardson. After those first couple of weeks,
(29:07):
there were series and there were individual plays where you
just had your eyes pop and you're like, all right,
this could be something special. But again the fact that
we had to keep going back to Minshew mania and
now it's going to be him for the rest of
the season. Yeah, great concern. If you're Jim Ersay, you
thought you found the right guy, and physically yes, he did,
(29:30):
except when he took a hit and can't go. And
now this surgery. They were cagey about it and evasive
for it as long as they could, But now ers
confirms the worst of it, and you move forward and
they're interesting. Offensively, they're going to hang around and be
a nuisance to folks between Moss and Taylor in the
backfield and those wide receivers. But yeah, it's it's a
(29:55):
tough one. You like when you have some more ascending
stars in the game, and right now you've got a
giant asterisk next to this one.
Thanks for listening to The Jason Smith Show with Mike
Harmon podcast. Be sure to catch us live every weeknight
ten pm to two am Eastern seven to eleven pm
Pacific on Fox Sports Radio. Find your local station for
The Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon at Foxsports Radio
dot com, or stream us live every night on the
iHeartRadio app by searching FSR eleas.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Give this you're listening to Fox Sports Radio.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Meetings and welcome inside Final hourt Tonight at the Jason
Smith Show with my baz friend Mike Harmon, live from
the tiraq dot com studios tirack dot com. You know
at will help you get there fast, free shipping, free
roadhazard protection, over ten thousand recommended installers, tirack dot com.
(00:50):
The way tire buying should be. So the Cowboys beat
the Chargers tonight, and a real bit of a shocker
in that Justin Herbert played really terribly and I can't
tell you, Mike, just how surprised I was that he
(01:13):
played as bad as he did, because this is not
a This is not a guy that's been on a
heater or someone who, hey, you know, is up and down.
This is someone who is one of the best young
quarterbacks in the game, and for him to play this
not just clutch time, because the thing about the charge,
(01:34):
it's more about the Chargers not being a clutch team
than Herbert being clutch, because forget about the final couple
of minutes for a second, he was off all night right,
he was sailing passes. He was missing wide open wide receivers.
It's not like the Cowboys played great tonight, not like
the Cowboys defensively was fantastic. They had one play. It
(01:55):
was Micah parsonsack on the next to last play of
the game that set up the pick, right, like that
was it as bad as he played. I don't know
that I've seen him play a worse game than he
played tonight. I really don't, because if he just has
an average night, then the Chargers win this game, probably
by ten points. But he missed so many receivers, and
(02:15):
this game in my mind, like if you said to me, hey,
give me one visual that sums up the Chargers game
against the Cowboys, it'll be Chargers wide receivers leaping for
balls that are three feet over their head. And the
biggest one is the likely touchdown play that Herbert missed
a wide open kid. Keenan Allen's never that wide open
(02:35):
because you know they cover Keenan Allen or they try
to anyway. But the guy's great. I mean he this
is a blown coverage and Keenan Allen is open at
Midfield's it's a thirty yard play that's going to turn
into a seventy yard play and Justin Herbert overthrows him.
Not even close, not even close there. You know there's
plays where he could say, well, was that an overthrow?
Did the receiver not get to the ball in time?
(02:55):
This was? This was This was Keenan Allen at mid
field with his hand up going hey, dude, just hit
me with it, and Justin Herbert still missed it. It
was stunning to me how bad he played, and because
a guy that doesn't play that bad, but that that's
the that was this game in a nutshell. Why did
the Cowboys win? Yeah, Dak was fine. Dak was good.
(03:16):
This is about as good a Dak as you're gonna get,
which is not the best use for the Cowboys, but
it was good. He played tonight. But Justin Herbert was awful,
and the Cowboys won tonight because he was as bad
as he was. That's why the Cowboys walked away with
the win and the Chargers are doing four.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
Yeah, I mean, we look at what he did over
the course of the game, and you're trying not to
get too much into the Hey, the recency of this
game and making this the the folk point. I mean,
obviously it's the game we're talking about, but trying to
extrapolate to the season at large for the performances and
(03:52):
even to his career, and right there's staunch defenders of
his saying, look, he's such a small part of what
Staley is. The lack of run game at times, and
the defense which has been non existent. Yes, the sack
total the last two weeks have been fine, but they're
still giving up points overall. But for for Herbert tonight,
(04:16):
they misses to Keenan. Allen would just love to go
back into that, right because coming into the game, a
lot of concern about the left hand. You know that
even with the bye week, and you saw it on
a couple of exchanges where it looked like he was
struggling to grip the football and you know how much
was that going to affect anything. Well, he's still throwing
(04:38):
with his right hands, so it didn't matter, you know,
once once he's back in the pocket, and they did
a good job of keeping him clean for the most
part tonight and time to create separation. I mean, you
saw that first drive after the punt return, just a
very efficient drive and a lot of separation for Allen
and and it started off brilliantly and then it went
(05:01):
off the rails from there. You don't know if he's
if it's a younger quarterback and a guy that's really
just starting to come into his own You're wondering if
he's hearing footsteps, feeling the pressure, or someone who's really
been struggling that perhaps they're forcing the issue and against
the Cowboys. Might there be some of that given their
reputation and what they've been in terms of their aptitude
(05:24):
and pressuring quarterbacks week to week. Maybe, But in this
particular case, you got a supercut of four or five
throws that are just inexplicable, you know.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
And another part of it is because we're gonna hear
from coming up in a couple of seconds, is the
two big plays are and one of the things that
they need to really fire on. And and maybe I
don't know if this is part of it. But watching
the Chargers offense, they've always had no matter who they
roll out there at wide receiver, they've been great right
(06:00):
for the for twenty years now, whether it's Malcolm Floyd
or you know or anybody. Whoever they roll out there
is terrific. And the guys are why Philip Rivers had
just went through guys all the time. And I keep
going back to Quenton Johnston who came into this year. Hey,
he was gonna be great and coming out of TCU
(06:21):
and and and everything his skill set. Look at what
the Chargers plan on doing, right, you can tell their
plan coming into this year was we have Keenan Allen. Now,
who knows after this year, but after the rookie season,
Quenton Johnson will probably be our number one receiver. Mike
Williams will be number two. We'll move on that way.
And Quenton Johnston has been invisible. Okay, he did try
(06:41):
to throw to him on the final play tonight that
got picked off, But the guy had two targets tonight.
The one time he was open, when Justin Herbert could
have had him on a third and eight inside the
ten yard line, he would have had his first big
play of his NFL career. Herbert didn't even see him.
Like he was on the back side, you know, coming
in off a post and Herbert just looked to the
(07:01):
just look back a little bit. He's got the guy
wide open for a touchdown. But the Chargers wide receivers,
this is not the same. Hey, you got a lot
of guys, and who do you play in fantasy type group?
This is Keenan Allen and nobody else. And I know
you want to say it's too or it's early to
call Quentin Johnston a bust, but this is a guy
(07:22):
who came in in the first round and had a
chance to elevate because Mike Williams has been knocked out
for the season, he's been out a while, and he
can't do better than two targets tonight. The guy's got
thirteen targets all season, all season long, and he's playing
with one of the best quarterbacks and one of the
biggest pass happy offenses you could possibly have. Austin Eckler's
been out the last couple weeks. They throwing the football
(07:44):
all the time, and he can't even get looks. He
can't even get targets. So while you say, hey, it's
probably too early to call him a bus But is
it too early? I mean, is it really too early?
When you see guys and Zay Flowers has had an
impact on that Ravens team and we didn't know if
he would have one because look at all the guy,
Oh who's he gonna catch passes for? You got Andrews
there and Odell and all this, Zay Flowers has been
pretty good. Guys have come in and done it. Guys
(08:06):
have come in and done it. And Johnson was supposed
to be that big part of that offense and I
look at that's a huge thing they're missing because if
it's not Keenan Allen, it's just a bunch of guys
and that holds the Chargers back to that's a big
part of this offense that's not firing along. Whether it's
Herbert not looking at him, not seeing him, he's not
but that that's something that needs to be addressed now
because he's the guy that needs a step up if
(08:28):
this offense is gonna go anywhere.
Speaker 3 (08:29):
Yeah, if you listen to well, I'll do the self
touting on the iWatch of Flex podcast. Zay Flowers was
a guy we talked about a lot. So I'm gonna
I'm gonna take the victory lap for the Baltimore Ravens
in what you.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
Actually said, Brandon Flowers And it was a ten team
rock singer league. You said, take Brandon Flowers in the
first round.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Okay, yeah, since I don't know who that is that works.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
You don't know who? Really seriously, you have Brandon Flowers
at the lead singer of the Killers. Yeah, Brandon Flowers. Now,
oh now, Tys just got to play the Killers. You
really don't Brandon Flowers leads it, not Brandon Flowers, former
dB in the NFL.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
I know who the brand is, but no, I did
not know the lead singer. I had no idea.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Okay, right, well, I don't good for them.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
They're going open for guns and roses at Hollywood Bowl.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
All right, mister rock and roll. Hey, Mike Harbon's gonna
give you a rock and roll history here. We got
no all right, go.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
Yeah, no, I really don't care. Coming into tonight, Keenan
now in forty four targets Mike Williams with twenty six.
Your third leading target getter is Josh Palmer, who, again
given his familiarity with Herbert given past success when healthy,
that made perfect sense. But with Williams going down, sure
you got another huge target. The fact that they're not
(09:41):
integrating him more fully into this offense. I haven't done
the all twenty two. I'd love to hear someone who's
doing it for the Chargers, whether Daniel Jeremiah or whoever.
He's on the radio broadcast right with our guy Frostburg
and Matt money Smith as when he looks at it,
is is it that he's not getting separation? What is
(10:02):
it on the practice field? What is it that has
made him such a non factor to this point, because
you figure, if nothing else, red zone, you got a
big body. I mean, that's almost like having another tight
end out there, right, given the size and length that
he has. Gerald Everett, who you saw come across and
that was a nice design by Callen Moore for the
(10:25):
touchdown right fake one way to Eckler and then Everett
scrapes across the line and he's wide open. We've seen
that with motion used a lot across the NFL, and
they did it expertly. There, so brilliance there. And ever
it's a guy that you can trust. You saw him.
He was involved in the first possession as well. But
(10:47):
beyond that, yeah, there's not a lot of depth. There's
not a lot to roll to hang your hat on.
So the question is can you go and we're talking
about the trade season, why not make them and find
them another piece from a team that's divesting at the position.
Obviously it's a learning curve and an acclamation process. But
(11:10):
if Johnson's not getting there to where he's on the
field and giving you another option, man, how many years
do you have before you know you're lost? Right in
terms of these offenses because you talk about Keenan Allen
and how many more years he Mike Williams, you're not
banking on him being on the field. So yeah, there's
a lot of questions there. Eckler's missed a lot of time, right,
(11:32):
he came back for one more year. Presume that unless
suddenly he's Superman in the second half of the year,
he's not going to be a Charger and you're looking
to move on there as well.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
Let's hear from Justin Herbert finishing meeting the media a
couple of minutes ago, as he talks about the Charge's
loss too the Cowboys tonight.
Speaker 4 (12:01):
How challenging was dealing with the pressure tonight.
Speaker 5 (12:05):
Yeah, They've got a really good front seven. You know,
I thought our offensive line battle and they did a
great job up front. You know, unfortunately we fell short
and I got to make more places as a quarterback.
Speaker 4 (12:14):
You guys obviously wanted to try and establish the run
early to sort of keep those rushers off balance all that.
How much do you feel like that impacted sort of
how they were able to play the game defensively.
Speaker 5 (12:24):
Yeah, Like I said, they've they've got a really good
front seven, so we had to do our best, and
you know, it didn't go our way on the ground today,
And you know, I think it's just the.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Testaments how good they played.
Speaker 5 (12:34):
And you know, I think we can do a.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
Lot better on offense, and especially at quarterback.
Speaker 5 (12:39):
I can play a lot better. So you know, I
thought the defense came up with some big stops today,
held them when we needed them to.
Speaker 6 (12:44):
So it's on us as an offense, so you could
play a lot better. Did you feel like tonight wasn't
a good.
Speaker 1 (12:50):
Game for you.
Speaker 5 (12:52):
I missed a couple of receivers through some bad passes.
There's a lot left out there. So there's a lot
to work on and a lot to improve on.
Speaker 6 (12:59):
Did feels happened on that last play with Quintin at
the end on the interception? You just flow through like
what happened on that play? Was it just the pressure
that got to or was there dimmunication?
Speaker 3 (13:10):
Yep?
Speaker 1 (13:10):
I threw it and it got picked it off.
Speaker 6 (13:11):
You made a good play on it.
Speaker 7 (13:13):
Does those missed opportunities for you encourage you about what
this offense could be? Or was it more of an
empty and as we should have did better? How do
you reconcile those two that?
Speaker 5 (13:23):
It's a little bit of both, you know, you know,
Keenan ran two great routes and I missed them, And
so that's on me as a quarterback, and we have
those explosive opportunities and we have to capitalize on those.
You know, that's a really good defense that we're going
up against, and you know, I can't miss those like
that and expect to, you know, to continue to get
back on third down and get back on track on
second down. So you know the top opportunities, but we'll
(13:44):
watch the film and be too critical on ourselves.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
So and we'll learn from it.
Speaker 4 (13:48):
When you do assess those two misses that you're talking about.
To Keenan, did you feel like you were rushed at
all in those moments because of how the pressure was
getting home earlier in the game.
Speaker 5 (13:57):
Yeah, even if I was, you know, that's on me
to be able to call my feet down, stay good
in the pocket and deliver. That's right, ken ran two
great routes, and you know he gave us those opportunities
to get those explosive plays, and so that's on me
to stand in there and deliver and do my job
to get him the ball.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
All right. So that was a little bit of Justin
Herbert they are talking for about the loss to count
I will say that I like him taking accountability. And
I'm ready I said, I'm ready for a bit. I'm
ready for for a bold prediction.
Speaker 3 (14:22):
Let's go.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
If they make a movie about Justin Herbert's life. He's
played by Jared Padlechi. Okay, Padalchi plays Justin Herbert in
the movie Fifteen Yearly. Padatelecy's like, I think he's in
his early forties. But yeah, I'm seeing Justin Herbert, Jared Padallechi,
I'm seeing that now. The other hot take is this,
we talk a lot about Justin Herbert in the clutch
(14:43):
Gene right. This is the third game that they've played
that they've had a chance to win this year where
Herbert's not been able to do it. And I get it.
You want a quarterback to be able to lead the
team down and say, yeah, he's got that it factor
about him. But I don't know that it's a it's
a a Padialachy thing.
Speaker 2 (14:58):
I don't know that it's a.
Speaker 1 (14:59):
Justin Herbert thing.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
Is the Gilmore Girls? All that guy did was wine.
I mean, that's a complete opposite just In there.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
But he was Sam and supernatural and he saved at
playing someone whose brother's name was Dean. How about that?
He comes full circle? No Dean Sam. But I don't
know that it's a Justin Herbert thing as much as
it's a Charger thing, because look at a couple of
things tonight from that final possession right that that ended
with the interception. First down play was a pass to
(15:31):
Keenan Allen where he gained seven yards when out of
bounds he could have cut it up and gotten the
first down. You have plenty of time left, right, there's
two and a half minutes left to go in this game,
and Keenan Allen was just happy going out of bounds
for seven yards, got out of first down, right, could
have started things over. You're up over the forty yard
line and you're feeling really good, but no, I go
out of bounds. Where is your sense of urgency there?
Where is your clutch gene there to do that? After
(15:53):
that play, it's first and five because they let the
play get wiped out, they take the penalty off sides
on the Cowboys. Justin Herbert could have gotten the first down,
but he slides after three yards and he could have
gotten that first down a little bit and not have
to worry about getting drilled. This is where it's the
end of the game. Guys. You got to get in
there and and make sure that you're there for that
(16:14):
first down you got. You can't just sit here and
say I'm okay going out of bounds. I'm okay with this.
Just overall, I got a lack of sense of urgency
from the Chargers and in other big moments, you know,
the fourth and one play they call earlier in the
half and they and they wind up biffing it. I
just don't get a sense that the Chargers overall have
that clutch gene yes, and Herbert's a big part of
(16:36):
it because he's the quarterback. He's gonna get all the blame.
But overall, I just don't see this team as, Hey,
when they need to make a play, they're gonna make it.
I see the Chargers as when a play needs to
be made, they're absolutely not going to make it. And
whatever you think is gonna happen, it's gonna be one
hundred and eighty degrees the other way. So when you
talk about a quarterback thing, it's more of a Charger
(16:56):
thing than it is than justin Herbert thing.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Well, yeah, you extrap laid it out, but you know,
quarterbacks always gonna get the scrutiny. Is he clutch? Is
he not? I think we'd already decided that Brandon Staley wasn't,
So you need to stipulate to that. And you say,
all right, we gotta still we got still got time
that we need to have a conversation about this. So
what else can we say about it? We know that
(17:20):
given the options on a fourth down play. They're gonna
call the wrong one or they're not going.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
To execute it to be wrong.
Speaker 3 (17:30):
We've seen it time and again, right, I mean, even
they caught a break when they botched the fourth down
play and the incomplete getting batted away from Palmer. Defense
made it hold up and they were able to get
the subsequent possession to come down and kick a field
goal to get right back to where they should have been.
(17:50):
Defense did their job. Offense left us scratching our head.
And that is Charger football.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Charger's gonna Charger tell it goes.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Fox Sports Radio. The Jason Smith Show with my best
friend Mike Harmon. You know who this is, Harmon.
Speaker 3 (18:13):
I know who the band is, Oh okay, I just
didn't know who. I didn't know their names.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
It was TJ.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
I listened to a lot of bands. I don't necessarily
know the COMPONENTDJ.
Speaker 8 (18:24):
Somebody told me you didn't know who the lead singer
of the Killers was TJ.
Speaker 3 (18:29):
No nically done. I mean, for the longest time, did
anybody to know who Larry Mullen Junior was no until
it became a thing to know who Larry Mullen Junior was.
Speaker 8 (18:40):
And TJ clearly Mike Harmon looking at the mister Bright's
side for the Chargers coming out of this loss.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Oh no, burn it all down, let's go.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
Yeah. But the name of the song is mister Brighton. Yeah,
I know, I mean it wasn't mister burn it all downside.
That's a that's a different song.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
That's a song I'm writing now and on my keyboard.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
All right, what about now, mister Purple's another guy in
that job. He's right out of the job. Hey, before
we get into another big story out of the NFL,
because we'll talk about the tush push in tonight's game
that the Cowboys were not able to execute against the Chargers. Uh,
the Astros are down to zip now in the ALCS,
he watched the Phillies jump out to a one nothing lead,
(19:24):
they had a bunch of home runs and held on
to beat the Diamondbacks in Game one, and now the
Rangers are going home with a two zip lead after
they hold on to beat the Astros today five to four.
Nathan Evaldi gets out of a bases loaded, nobody out
jam and he goes six innings and pitches and strikes
out nine, and I just I go, really, Nathan Evaldi
(19:47):
is like the most clutch pitcher that I never believe in,
and that every year he's in the playoffs, he's pitching
well like Nathan Evaldi, Come on, man. But the general
consenting I've seen a lot of this today is that, well,
the Astros are good enough. They can go win the
next three and they'll score thirty five or forty runs
the next three games. What they said about the Dodgers
in the last round, exactly how many runs did they score?
(20:08):
And I get that. I get that sense because the
Astros level of excellence they have had, whether they're getting
the signs or not. Look, this is they're the defending champs.
We've seen them get hot, We've seen them score a
lot of runs. We have that in our mind. The boy,
if any team can do it, it's the Astros. Let's
just look at reality, Okay, in the last twenty seven
years of Major League baseball, because I'll tell you why
(20:29):
the Astros aren't winning. In the last twenty seven years
of Major League baseball, two teams have come back from
down two zip to win the series. Two teams. That's it. One.
Everybody knows the Red Sox in two thousand and four,
right down from three zip against the Yankees. The biggest
comeback in the history of sports. The other time was
the Dodgers coming back from two zip and that was
the Bubble Year against the Braves. That's it, you know,
(20:51):
I know you can say, well, we're down to zip.
You're down two zip. You get down to zip. That's it, right,
you're down to zip and you're not going home. You're
down to zip in You're you're going on the road.
All the old adages of well you get down two
zip to get this the series is still there. No,
you're down to zip. That's it. Once in a great
while you can come back and win. But you gotta
be a great team. And the Astros aren't a great team.
(21:13):
This version of the Astros isn't great. This is a
version that barely got to ninety wins, that needed the
Rangers to lose on the final day of the regular
season to be able to win the Western Division. This
is not a great, great, great Astros team. Yes, they
are the champs, it's not the team they were a
year ago. They're down two zip to the Rangers who
are hitting the baseball and rolling this series. The Rangers
(21:36):
are gonna be in the World Series. I'm gonna get
to watch Max Scherz are in the World Series and
pretend it's ce Mets.
Speaker 3 (21:41):
Well, he's gonna pitch in Game three for you, buddy.
It is all sure as as prescribed as you go through.
And look, you had Valdez with another terrible starts. This
was CJ. Ntkowski put this out earlier today. Last six
starts at home, he was one in five with a
(22:01):
six point a two e ra A and the one
win was his no hitter against Cleveland. Uh so take
that from that what you will. Uh, you just go
through the process of these playoffs and and getting in
and we've seen team's big beginnings early right and getting down.
And I was trying to find the tweet talking about
(22:23):
the the type of pitch in Game one that you know,
Alvarez having his to home runs tonight, but you know,
had the hat trick of strikeouts in game one, and
they're talking about, you know, the unhittable pitch that everybody
was seeing and being flustered by in game one. Look,
it's as we've talked about a lot, the the ebb
(22:45):
and flow of the playoffs and the new world order
of pitching staffs and trying to get through. And for
the Astros, you thought they'd gotten right just in time, right,
that guys, including Alvarez, who'd missed a bunch of time
during the course of the year alto they that this
was going to be it. Well, you get down big
in the playoffs, you know, you need some help in
(23:07):
the relief relievers to bridge innings, of course, but that
long road of trying to get back from big deficits
early like they did today, and they almost made it
and made it back over the top. But assuming that
they're suddenly going to string together wins, there's no there's
no chance, there's no chance. You've just cited all the
(23:28):
historical data. But just assuming that what once was is
carrying over to the next year is foolhardy, Right, it's
a completely different roster, completely different lineup. And you know what,
the Rangers are actually pretty good. Now. Does that mean
that Scherzer might not might get out on the mound
and get absolutely blasted upon arriving. Sure, mighty exit early.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
Would you put the over over under? Does he survive
longer than any Dodger starter?
Speaker 1 (23:58):
Oh? All I keep thinking of, is you know what
would I rather watch Schures are in de Gram celebrating
winning the World Series saying Hey, life is great in Texas,
or having to watch Bryce Harper and the Phillies do
it like I don't know, and you know, those are
the teams that are gonna play and I gotta deal
with one of them, either another team in the NL
he's doing it, or de Grom and Sures are winning
(24:19):
to grind without throwing a pitch in months. They're gonna say,
I don't know, man, I don't know, I don't know. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:25):
On the other side, Bryce Harper Homer's on his birthday.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
Although, let's come on, Bryce Harper HiT's a lot of
home runs to say he's gonna Homer on his birthday.
That's not the biggest thing. It's not like saying, Hey,
Ozzie Smith is going to Homer on his birthday. All right?
Speaker 3 (24:37):
This is Bryce Harper hit his home run in the
playoffs on his birthday.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern seven
pm Pacific.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
Uh So, let's go back now because we saw this
story earlier today, it looks like Anthony Richardson is done
for the season. Colts quarterback wh he was one of
the most exciting players to come out of college this year.
His shoulder injury likely going to be surgery and that
will put him out for the rest of the year. Now,
Jim Irsay said, it's always up to the player. Usually
(25:12):
players follow the medical advice. This decision will probably made
some time in the next few days. And look, it's
a shame for him. It's a shame because he's such
a good player and clearly not having the reps in college,
not playing a lot of football didn't matter because he
got to the NFL and proved that he was a
huge weapon right away, and that's really something and not
(25:34):
many guys can do that. You know, him and CJ.
Stroud are guys who weren't talking about enough. Certainly Richardson
his flash ear and the guy can make unbelievable plays
at any moment. To have him out stinks. And the
offshoot of this is that his career is a question
mark for me because he needs to play a certain
(25:57):
way to be effective, and a lot of quarterback I
never want team to take away from a quarterback what
they do. Well, Oh, we got to take you and
put you in the pocket. No, but that takes away
from how good of a quarterback you are. If you
take me and put me in the pocket, I'm not
someone that can run well. And that doesn't work. You
can't just take a quarterback and run and say don't
run enough, and we're gonna put you in the pocket.
You're gonna be a great pocket passer. No, this is
(26:18):
kind of who you are at this point. You're twenty
two years old and playing quarterback one way. This is
kind of who it is. But for Richardson, now this
is this is a player. He finished one game okay
at quarterback for the Colts. One game. He got knocked
out of every other game with an injury. He missed
a game, and now he's out for the season after
another injury that really didn't look that bad. It was
(26:39):
a tackle off a design run and he went down
and now he's done, likely for the season. And when
I say it's a question markets you know, I don't know.
I don't know that his body can withstand the rigors
of what he's gonna have to do to win in
the NFL, right, because he's got to have the design run.
(27:00):
This is part of what makes him great and the
guy he is. He's got to have the design runs.
He's got to be able to have the football. You're
gonna get hit. You know, you can't slide on every play,
you know, not every play. Can you go down on stuff?
Stuff like that is going to happen. And when you
get knocked out of every game, and you get knocked
out twice, and here's an injury that didn't look that
bad when it went down. This wasn't someone's ankles, you know,
(27:21):
going one way, or this is just a tackle where
you went down and now your shoulders all all jacked up.
I don't know if he has the body that can
withstand the punishment of the NFL. And that's why I
feel like his career is a big question mark for me,
almost like Zion Williamson, Like his body can't withstand the
riggers of the NBA. So how long is he really
(27:41):
gonna play for? They like I think about that and go,
can I project he's gonna be a big star? I mean,
I think so, I'd like to think. But at the
same time, can I project he's gonna ever play a
whole season. I can't really do that. This is a
lot of injuries really early for a guy in his
NFL career.
Speaker 3 (27:56):
Well, Zion's now lean and mean, in the best shape
of his life. Okay, you look out.
Speaker 1 (28:01):
Yeah, we'll see.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
I'm trying to speak some positivity out here, nobody, but
I've seen it a lot, buddy, I know we've seen
this act before. It's like chargers and fourth down in
close game situations. I get it. It all ties together.
Yeah with Richardson, I mean, go back to Week one
where Trevor Lawrence sought them out to just say, hey, buddy,
good game, get down, preserve yourselves, live to see another day,
(28:26):
and look for some guys. And we've talked about it
a lot on the show as long as we've been
together here at Fox. Jason the you know, go back
to Cam Newton's career, what we've seen with Lamar Jackson.
You know, we've had all those discussions, and certainly Lamar
Jackson is a guy that we've seen, you know, what
makes him special, Josh Allen along those same lines, you know,
(28:47):
what they do on the run and physically makes them special, right,
makes accelerates and takes their game to another level. So
if you take part of that component out, you know
what's left still a pretty good quarterback, but not the
elite level for Anthony Richardson. After those first couple of weeks,
(29:07):
there were series and there were individual plays where you
just had your eyes pop and you're like, all right,
this could be something special. But again the fact that
we had to keep going back to Minshew mania and
now it's going to be him for the rest of
the season. Yeah, great concern. If you're Jim Ersay, you
thought you found the right guy, and physically yes, he did,
(29:30):
except when he took a hit and can't go. And
now this surgery. They were cagey about it and evasive
for it as long as they could, But now ers
confirms the worst of it, and you move forward and
they're interesting. Offensively, they're going to hang around and be
a nuisance to folks between Moss and Taylor in the
backfield and those wide receivers. But yeah, it's it's a
(29:55):
tough one. You like when you have some more ascending
stars in the game, and right now you've got a
giant asterisk next to this one.
Hosts And Creators
Jason Smith
Mike Harmon
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