Best of The Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon

Jason Smith and Mike Harmon react to Chris Ballard's vote of non-confidence in Carson Wentz and explore what realistic options the Colts have to actually improve at quarterback. The guys preview the Rams and Cardinals facing off in the Wild Card round. NFL Insider Jay Glazer joins the guys to discuss his new book and give new insight on what happened between Brian Flores and the Dolphins. Plus, Jason tells you what the NFL has taken from MLB.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to the best of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmen podcast. Be sure to catch us
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Eastern seven to eleven pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio.
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by searching fs R. This is the best of The

(00:22):
Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon on Fox Sports Radio.
But today it was another day and another day of
quarterback drama. Mike Harmen. It feels like every day since
the regular season and we've had days with quarterback dramaware
teams have said we're happy, we're not happy with our quarterback,
we have thrown ourselves behind our quarterback for next year,

(00:45):
or we're not throwing ourselves behind our quarterback for next year.
It's like that's been every day this week since the
regular season ended. Well, that's good because now we're doing
the assessing of blame and while kind of taking owners
hip of it. In the case of you know, we
talked to a bunch of about Indianapolis, you know, and

(01:05):
Carson Wentz as part of all of this. You know,
there's also the you know, he didn't hold up his
head to the bargain either, Like we bet on this
guy and we gave him everything we possibly could. I mean,
that's that's what they're saying without saying it when they
get in front of the podium or in front of
the dictaphone. Uh. And you know you mentioned Indianapolis and

(01:26):
Indianapolis big jumping off point for the conversation right now,
because GM Chris Ballard was asked today about Carson Wentz
coming back to quarterback for the Colts next season, and
Ballard gave you the old you know who can't make
any kind of projections at this point in the off season.
Take a listen. At the time of the decision, we

(01:47):
felt good about it, and I still don't regret the
decision at the time. I won't make a comment on
hold on, hold on stuffing right there at I don't
regret it at the time. Any time, how bad do
they want away from Carson? What's they're saying. Listen, I
didn't regret it, then you're gonna go back then at
the time, it was, you know, it's really what we had.

(02:10):
It's turned out to steak but bad at the time.
What do you want? Man? At the time, I like
the decision. Okay, at the time, I liked eating that
fourth slice of pizza. But as time has gone on,
I shouldn't have had that fourth slice of pizza. Is
that I don't regret it. Back then, we had to
do We had to do something we never quarterback. Our

(02:31):
quarterback couldn't throw the ball more than eight yards. He's
going to coach high school football. We had to go
get somebody else. All right, So let's let's hear more
from Chris Pallard. I won't make a comment on who's
gonna be here, going to be here next year? That's
that's not fair to any player. How is it not
fair to any player? Is Carson gonna be there? It's
not fair if I say he's gonna be here? Wait

(02:52):
wait wait wait wait wait? What How is that not fair?
You can say? I mean, if I say it today,
I might not have better options one way or the other.
I might have to cut him, you know, or trade
him later. And I feel bad because I would have
said he was gonna stay. But if he stays and
I said, yeah, we're evaluating all options, does he feel loved.
Does he feel the support that he needs? Right, going

(03:14):
back to the time in Philadelphia, as soon as he
didn't think they had his back, what happened and it
all kind of went to hell. So I trying to
avoid that happening again. Yeah, and uh, you know, just
the more that goes on, the more I think Ballet realized. Okay,
there's microphones on and if I go back on my word,
they're gonna play this back forever. So I want to
make sure I don't say anything that could come back

(03:34):
to allow me. In other words, you know, we want
out from under Carson Wentz. I don't know we're gonna
do it because we traded the first to third round
pick for him and we gotta pay him again next year.
And um, they they want out. They went out, And
you know this goes back to what we talked about
last night. Yeah, it's great to say, Hey, I'm signaling
to the fans were open to making a move right

(03:55):
for any any team, any fan base. It's great to
signal that what went on with us at quarterback this
year was not good enough and we need to make
a move. Right. There's nine or ten teams that can
say that and have done that. But again, the other
part of it is, who are you going to go
get right, because we told you, unless you're gonna make
a trade for Wilson or Rogers or if Deshaun Watson

(04:18):
situation gets cleared up and you can play in the
NFL again, who are you going to bring in that
you can say, Oh, I feel so much better than
Carson Wentz with this guy. I mean, look, Wentz was bad, right,
Wentz was good at the beginning of the season, and
then he was terrible down the stretch. At the end,
he was awfu in the last two games when they
needed to win to make the playoffs and they couldn't
do it right. So I get it, I understand. But

(04:38):
at the same time, where's that guy? Where's that guy
that you're gonna say, Okay, yeah, we're moving on from
Carson Wentz and we're going who is it? Who is it?
The only player, the only quarterback that is. And this,
this shows you that they actually wound up lucking out
in the end, is that after this year, you know,
the forty Niners half to go to tray Lance. Right.

(05:01):
It was great to do this year with Jimmy Garoppolo,
but now suddenly if uh, if Trey Lance is not
ready that whoa, what a horrible then you pick that
guy third in the draft and all these different things. Right,
So this year the Niners wanted a lot for him.
They weren't gonna give him. We love Jimmy, We're not
gonna give him away. He you know, we look at
him as a big time asset, all this stuff holding

(05:21):
on to him. Now, he's gonna be the guy available
that you can say, all right, maybe this guy is
a bit of an upgrade over Carson Wentz, but he's
really the only one, right And is he that big
of an upgrade or is he just better than anybody
else that's out there. It's okay, you know, he's better
than anybody else you can go get because all the
other guys are not people that are gonna blow you

(05:41):
away or people that you can say, hey, this is
our franchise quarterback. I'll tell you who. It's gonna be
big four in the off season. It's gonna be big
for the backups with upside because that's what teams are
gonna do. Teams are gonna follow more like what Washington
did last year, saying okay, we like Ryan Fitzpatrick and
Taylor Heineke. Heineck he maybe has a little bit of
something to him, but if it doesn't work, we got

(06:03):
Ryan Fitzpatrick who has done it. So I feel pretty
good overall about our quarterback room because we have two
guys we can maybe go to and use if we
need to. That's how teams are gonna have to approach
the off season. This is where backups with upside suddenly
become hot commodities. I mean, like Mike White. The Jets
could get like three first round picks from Mike White.

(06:24):
Oh my god, are you kidding? No, we gotta hold
onto Mike White. Uh No. But guys like Marcus then
what's he gonna do? Run the ball? But like a
guy like Marcus Mariotta, who in Spurts the last couple
of years with the Raiders has played pretty well, is
he someone that you can bring in to say, listen,
this guy's our starter, but we want you to fight

(06:44):
for it, and we're gonna open the job and training
camp and if you win, you'll play, and if he falters,
you'll play. And Marcus Mariotte is gonna say, al right, well,
it's I'm not taking over for Derek Carr obviously, So
I have to go here and look, everybody's contract situation
is different. Some guys gonna be free agents. Some guys
are gonna wind up, you know, making raking trades for
But you're gonna see teams with quarterback i's you say,

(07:06):
we gotta go get a backup with upside and and
those are the guys are gonna wind up having big
years next year in the or big opportunities in the
off season because there's nobody else out there. Right, it's
a bad year in free agency, it's a bad year
in the draft for quarterbacks. You can't just say there's
no guys like Sam Donald. You're gonna get to hell.
Maybe he turns into our franchise guy. Now, unless you
are pooning up for one of the top two guys

(07:27):
and you call the Packers, and you call the Seahawks,
and you call the Texans, and this is how it works.
This is where you're going. So this is who what's
gonna be big for. Jimmy Garoppolo will be the Jimmy
Garoppolo feeding frenzy. This offseason is gonna be insane to oh,
we gotta get Jimmy gotta get Jimmy gott The Steelers
are gonna go crazy for Jimmy Garoppolo. Oh, we gotta
get Jimmy, gotta get him. So many times we gotta
have Jimmy. And it's like, dude, it's Jimmy Garoppolo. Yeah,

(07:48):
but he's better than anything else that's out there. And
then it's gonna be about the backups with upside. So
it's crazy, but Garoppolo is gonna be the king of
the off season, barring a trade of one of the
top those three quarterbacks that I mentioned, Why do you
say that like a drunk. He's a playoff quarterback. Jimmy
wins this weekend, it's an even bigger deal. Jimmy Garoppolo
is okay, winner, He's okay, he's okay. He's been fan,

(08:15):
you know, he's see That's why if he was a
Cubs fan, you wouldn't say a word about You would say, yeah,
Jimmy steaks. You know what I would say is a
larger Chicago area kid is what I would say. Then
he's look, he threw twenty touchdowns this year. Okay, threw

(08:36):
twenty touchdowns. Right, didn't throw for four thousand yards? His
quarterback rating is absolutely smack dab in the middle of
the pack. He's been the middle of the pack quarterback.
That's kind of who he is, right. It's not like
you say, well, he's no the guy's thirty. Now, Okay,
we've seen him. We've seen enough of Jimmy Garoppol over
the past couple of years to know that, Okay, this
is the quarterback that he is in this year, coming

(08:57):
in with a guy looking over his shoulder, knowing I
need to be at my best the entire year. He
just had an okay season, never threw more than two
touchdowns in the game. He's just all right, He's just okay.
But but he doesn't. But it's like he doesn't have
to throw for three fifty. Well, teams that need quarterbacks,

(09:18):
you need guys to throw for three. A lot of
these teams need guys throw. I don't know some of
these teams. I mean, because look, if Cleveland can get
rid of Baker Mayfield, would they trade him out for
Jimmy g You're damn right they would they kiss No,
it's gonna do us. I'll take that Baker Mayfield eighteen
million dollars in pay him dogs. Oh that you can't
darnald him. I'm just saying if you can darn him
somewhere else, you can't because everybody knows it's it's unlike

(09:41):
a year ago. Just like speaking Donald didn't do existence
and made a verb. I've turned Donald into a verb.
Like like a year ago, where it was, well, we
can blame Adam Gates for a lot of the problems
at Sam. I'll get him away from Adam Gate. He'll
be great. Oh wait, that didn't work. So you had that,
but now he's with that rule and do we trust
Matt Rules? And he saw the no centsical line he
had about rashons later he should be fired just in

(10:04):
that moment. Hey, I'm sorry, weren't you a line guy?
Wasn't that your deal? How many guys is Sam Dornald're
gonna play for? They're gonna wipe up getting fired. We
talk about coach killers. Oh my goodness, Sam's already two
guys got fired. Now Matt Rule, you know he's got
one foot dipped over uh and into the ocean of
your fired nous. So yeah, this is this is not

(10:27):
gonna be a great offseason to try to go get
those guys. Look at Baker Mayfield. If the rest of
the NFL didn't see him and they didn't like Kevin Stefanski,
they can say, all right, let's get Baker Mayfield out
of Cleveland. Might work. But they've seen him play. They
know he's not very good and they know it's not
Kevin Stefanski's fault. So yeah, you can't. You can't donald
Baker Mayfield this year. Yeah, as I um, you know

(10:47):
said with with rule as a line coach. Yeah, he
was a defensive line coach, which means he should know
what kind of guys can destroy your divine evaluation. You
just showed yourself, man, come on now. But that outside
of that, outside of that, that's what it's going to be.
That that's how, that's how the offseason is gonna go.
A quarterback and it's gonna be we're not going to

(11:08):
commit to Carson Wentz because we're gonna make it. We're
gonna bring in Mike White if I could be, Mike White,
wanna be, you wanna be, and we'll throw that job
open for Carson Wentz. And that's gonna be what it is.
Because it's great for teams to see here in a
vacuum and say, now, yeah, we're scouring the landscape. We're
not going in with Carson Wentz next year. Well then
when you when you scour that landscape, you go, uh yeah,

(11:31):
it looks like we gotta come back with Carson. So
everybody was like on Monday night, right, Andrew Lucks back
in the building and we talked about it. You know,
it look like Captain Andrew Luck with the mustache. But
that guy looks like he ain't seen the inside of
a weight room or a workout in a while, which
is fine for him, good for him. But you know
anybody's saying, oh, there he was, He's back around football.

(11:52):
It's like, are you can't come on, man, you can't
just try to speak that into existence. You got a
better shot out of Troy Aikman, who's all yoked and
launching beer and and hanging out in the fox booth decide, Hey,
I want more, one more run on a team that
will let me throw the ball more. No, it's it
ain't happening. Be fighting over Jacoby Brissette and Tyler Huntley. Hey,

(12:15):
let's call let's call the Raven, see if they'll trade
Tyler hunt But that's the other thing. Everybody I mean,
Tyler Huntley was intriguing, but you know what, they still
lost every one of those games. Yeah they did. Hey,
you think the Texas will trade Davis Mills, No way, man,
he's their starter now. Oh boy, he was good the
last six weeks. All Right, that's gonna be the off
season of quarterbacks. I'm tough, and I'm hopeful that we

(12:36):
have one of the big guys getting dealt. Whether Aaron
Rodgers decides right after the season's over. Blank you, I'm
out Russell Wilson, who knows how things will go with Watson,
But that's gonna wind up being the overwhelming storyline what
happens with these guys. But in reality, for the nine
or ten teams and eat quarterbacks, we'll just we'll just
just bring some other guys in and just uh, you know,
I don't know, shuffle up and deal. Maybe just can

(13:00):
some other headline happen when no one north asked me
about my quarterback shop can come into her. 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 I Heart Radio app
Elsewhere in the NFL as we get set for a
big weekend here. You know, first time we got a
Monday night playoff game, we only have one. By we

(13:21):
get six games. Uh. Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford has put
everybody at ease, well most people at ease by saying
his toe is okay. It should not impact him much
in Monday night's wildcard playoff game against the Arizona Cardinals.
But he's not gonna let you see it, unlike Aaron Rodgers.
Let me show you my COVID toe. Here it is.

(13:43):
It's this, and I wouldn't show anybody. But he said
he is okay. I should be feeling really good on Monday.
I'd show it to you, but I don't want to
do that. That's for other guys to do. I'll keep
my toes to myself and this one. But it's doing good.
I should be all right. Stop with your Rex Ryan jokes.
Stop me there. His toes are okay. Everything is fine.
Matthew Stafford says he'll be all right. Were you worried

(14:06):
about his toe, well, he wor up on if he
suits up on Monday. I don't give a damn about toe.
You made it onto the field there are no excuses
for toes. Come on, man, what everybody else is worried about?
I can make you feel better because everybody's worried about
Matthew Stafford. And now is he turning back into Matthew

(14:28):
Stafford right after a big run this season? He started
out great, He had a couple of bad weeks the
middle of the season, then he had three great weeks.
Then he struggled a bit the last three game, especially
the loss of San Francisco. Uh, they're losing overtime and
he throws the bad pick trying to force the ball
to Odell Beckham Jr. And overtime that seals the game.
And now, for all the good will Matthew Stafford has

(14:50):
put out there, everybody is on pins and needles, going,
oh my god, is Matthew Stafford. He's gonna stink again.
Oh my god, he's back. He's gonna throw three picks.
We're gonna lose. The Cardinals are gonna when I can
solve all of Matthew Stafford's issues with one within one
fell swoop Because I'm gonna say this, You're gonna go,
oh yeah, those are the Rams issues. I can solve

(15:12):
them all and it's something that was the the question
I had when the Rams got Odell Beckham Jr. Was
hopefully they don't try to force the ball to him
like the Browns did, because Odell's coming in and he's
at least the number three weapon on the team, maybe
number four, but he's not Odell Beckham. Where you gotta

(15:33):
get him the ball because look that hurt the Browns
and Baker Mayfield and other Browns have said it. You know,
we had to try to get him the ball early
in games that didn't give us a great offense. And
when Odell Beckham got hurt last year and wasn't playing,
the offense kind of flowed more. So, yeah, you want it, well,
we got to get the ball to Odell Becka. We
gotta keep him happy, gotta keep him happy. He's living
his last NFL life right now, so he should be

(15:56):
happy just being on the Rams as long as the
Rams don't try to force the ball into him. And
what does Matthew Stafford do trying to force the ball
to Odell, But he's trying to force it to him deep.
If you would stop trying to force those deep passes
to Odell, everything would be fine because that's when Matthew
Stafford makes bad decisions when he throws those down. How

(16:17):
many times? How many times? I three of his bad
interceptions off the top of my head in the last
five weeks where because he tried to throw the ball
deep to Odell Beckham. And you know what, Odell's not
that great a deep receiver. That's not where he does
his damage. That's not the player he is now. He's
someone in the middle of the field that can find space,
long outs, long passes over the middle. But to try

(16:37):
to throw it deep, you see, they're just not on
the same page. Whether Stafford under throws him like he
did last week for the game aning interception, whether he
throws into double coverage where Odell can't go up and
get the ball. Uh, that's the thing. Just stop trying
to force it deep to Odell. That's not the guy
to do it too. You need him in the middle
of the field and move the chains. That's how you

(16:58):
go with Odell Beckham. He's a guy that can find
those sweet spots and give you some twenty yard games
and it looks like he's not even trying. That's how
you do it. When you try to throw deep That's
what puts him in trouble, because it's not just Matthew
Stafford right that that interception the end of the game
against the Niners. Odell made absolutely zero play on that ball.
And he saw it coming down, and he could have
stepped and and and fought for the ball and maybe

(17:19):
broke up the interception, but he just kept going. He
looked back, he sees the ball coming down, he knows
it's underthrown, but he's gonna keep running. And I'm like,
how do you not stop and at least try to
make a play on the ball. How do you not
even try? He made a horrendous play on the ball.
He's done that a deep balls in the past. It's
like he expects the ball to bounce off somebody's shoulder
pads into him. So I'm still gonna be trying to
be three yards past everybody when the ball is coming

(17:41):
down because if it's not here, it's gonna bounce over
to me. Uh. They're just on on the same page
and that that part of it just isn't working, and
that's when the Rams get into trouble. If you stop
doing that, the Rams probably win have two more wins
on this season than they do. They probably you know,
they probably find a way to pull it out last week.
They probably went earlier in the season as well, and
that now the Rams have much less difficulties. But if

(18:03):
you stop doing that, you solve all the solvable Matthew
Stafford problems and everything is great going forward. Yeah, for me,
I think a lot of it comes down to you
got a little bit of game action, a few carries
for cam Akers. Can he become a bigger part of
the offense alongside Sony Michelle Uh to give you that
play action back And like you said with Odell Beckham Jr.

(18:25):
Were working in the middle. We're trying to find a
scrape over over the middle for him and some running
room and not balls where he's got to go up
and play defense because he's not doing it right. I mean, look,
some of those throws by Stafford were atrocious, you know,
forcing it into double triple coverage. But your your wide
receiver still has to go and try to play the

(18:47):
ball instead of kind of watching a lot of let
us stand by kind of thing. It's like we talked
about in basketball, the time's all right, superstars got the ball.
I don't really need to work because he's it's not
coming back out to me. The same thing here, O'Dell.
You know at times disappears. And what they need to
recall is you had an offense that was huming before

(19:08):
you got him in. And I know, the big play
potential is there, the reputation is there, and he's made
some big plays, right the touchdown reception, you know, reaching
in past the pylon, uh in a big game at
the end of the regular season. I mean, those those
are all wonderful things, but it's all about staying on point,
non balance the tow I you know, between that and

(19:30):
Kelly Stafford saying please don't sell your tickets because Matthew
couldn't get wet. But like right now, tickets you can get.
You can get in there if he came out to
l A and you wanted to go to sofar Monday
nights under seventy five bucks. Was the last time I
saw forget in. And I'm still getting text from you know,

(19:52):
ticket reps saying you want in like I work, leave
me alone. We've had this conversation. I'll be on commenting
about how many fans are taking over your stadium. But look,
Odell Beckham is at at best the number three guy
for the Rams, right, he's that that's he's at best
the number three guy and maybe the number four guy

(20:14):
depending on the game Van Jefferson is having. Uh, it's that.
That's the That's always my was my big fear that
the outsize persona him coming in. Well, now we we
have to get we have to throw him the football, right,
we have to keep him happy. We have to make
it make it obvious that there's a reason why we
brought him in, how he makes us better, and he's
just got to be part of the offense. I get

(20:36):
it's a hard thing. I get it's difficult, but that's
that's the one thing that if you want to win,
they have to do. And I got news for you.
There's gonna be a lot of points on the board
on Monday because the Rams are struggling defensively. Look, they
signed Eric Wettele, uh you know, but we we know
the Rams can put points on the board. This is
gonna be one of those last possession kind of games
where the one turnover can wind up just absolutely crushing.

(20:59):
You know. They gotta they gotta get on this, like
right now. If they can just stop that Matthew Stafford
look like a much better quarterback and everything will be
okay because he'll still throw a pick now and again.
But he's still throwing three yards and three touchdowns a week. Uh,
that's okay, that's just gotta cut back just instead of
throwing two. If you have a game with three touchdowns
and one pick, alright, great, they'll live with the one pick.

(21:21):
But that second one when you try to throw it deep,
and that's a deflating pass because all it does is
deflate the team. Why is that pass being thrown? Odell
is not gonna get it, and now we're going back
out there to play defense. That those are those are
the unforceable or or the the errors you can stop
that are unforced errors. Right, there's some interceptions where well,
I gotta try to make this throw. It's third down,

(21:43):
I try to get in the window and it gets
picked off as a bad decision, or I'm getting taken down.
I want to get the ball out and I make
a bad decision trying to make a play. All right,
that's something happens in the heat. About these are the
unforced errors that happened, and if the RAMS can cut
down on those I'm feeling I'm feeling great about my
Rams Super Bowl prediction right now. I gotta be honest,
I'm feeling really nervous because Monday Night can go either way.

(22:04):
Even though the Cardinals are on vapors going into this game,
and and and clearly their season could end just as
easily as it goes on. It's almost like the Raiders
and Chargers last week moving ahead this week in the NFL. Yeah,
I think the big thing, uh coming into this game
is taking the totality of it. We'll get into a
deeper tomorrow night. Is you know, James Conner and Chase

(22:26):
Edmonds are both game time decisions. Edmond says he's gonna
go Connor maybe a little less certainty, which to me
is a big is a huge deal for that offense.
We talked earlier about why couldn't you get Larry Fitzgerald
to come back? If nothing else, he could have just
been a sit down guy towards red zone opportunities for you.
I know he only had one touchdown catch a year ago,

(22:47):
but the point is things change, things evolved for Odell
Beckham Jr. Right now, having been with the team for
half a year, he is fifth on the season in
the target count Cooper Cup hundred ninety one, gets on
the year Van Jefferson, Tyler Higbee eighty nine and eighty
five respectively. And then you've got um Robert Woods who

(23:09):
was at sixty nine when he got hurt, so uh,
certainly working to get him into into game situation, averaging
six targets per game. Uh. It's just gotta be smart usage.
And for Matthew Stafford to play within himself something I
know is one of the great euphemisms in sports, but
don't try to force it. You've got plenty of possessions

(23:30):
and you've got a creative play caller who may or
may not fire his people nine times again. Be sure
to catch live editions of The Jason Smith Show with
Mike harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern seven pm Pacific. Hey,
this is Jason McIntyre. Joined me every weekday morning on
my podcast Straight Fired with Jason McIntyre. This isn't your

(23:52):
typical sports pod pushing the same tired narratives down your
throat every day. Straight Fire gives you honest opinions on
all the biggest sports headlines, accurate stats to help you
win big at the Sports Book and all the best guests.
Do yourself a favorite and listen to Straight Fire with
Jason McIntyre on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast

(24:12):
or wherever you get your podcasts on the hot Line
with us right now NFL on Fox Insider Extraordinary. You
can follow him on Twitter at Jay Glazer. And today
is a big day for Jay. Actually yesterday a big
day as he opened up a big package in his

(24:33):
house and there was free food in and his book arrived,
The Unbreakable Book is there, Jay, welcome. I know you
had a rough day earlier this week. You talked about
waking up for no reason. You were in the gray
on Tuesday. Wednesday, a better day for you with the
book arrival. How you doing, man? Oh, I'm good now
because as you saw, like you know, look when I

(24:55):
have those days and I never know when they're coming,
Like I don't make the rules here. Um, you know,
I reached out to my teammate, you know, and and
that's what you gotta do. You gotta reach out to
you and that thing I told you guys last week,
I'm the show when you actually, like a lot of
dudes just feel shame um by telling somebody they look
at it like it's weakness, but I think it's stronger,

(25:16):
like our vulnerability is true strength. And I reached out
to one of my teammates, Mark Kerr, who is the
you don't know he had. He had a documentary and
HBO that was made him called the Smashing Machine a
long time ago and Mark was one of the he
was the first ever UFC Heavyweight Champ of the world.
I said, Mark, Man, I'm really struggling today. I need
you to come over and basically I need to punish

(25:38):
me in the face like we gotta spar And I
was like, hey, I need you to come over and
give me more CTE so I can feel better about myself.
And uh, I was talking about being messed up. That's
messed up, but I'm good with my messed up this
and um but it's that teammate man. Like again, I
think too many dude keep it in. They don't talk

(25:58):
about it. And I can tell you this. I told
to you guys last week. I'm sure too, Like man,
I went out of ten, but just to stay with
Ronde Barber and our crew over there to open up
and tell them because I was just man, I've just
been a bad place for this whole year. And then
I realized to why the year. I just realized that
this week, why the whole year has been rough for me.

(26:19):
And when you have the level of depressing anxiety to happen,
you don't ever feel like anything is ever worthy of
good happening to And look, I know people home are
gonna know what Like, yes, a lot of good has
happened to me. And my life is great, like God
has blessed me. My life is incredible, except between my
years and you, anytime something good is gonna happen, my

(26:44):
initial the roommates in my head tell me that I'm
so not worthy of it. So the sky is gonna
fall and come crashing down around me, and it's not
gonna happen. So when I finished the book in February,
I was convinced that from February to like here, January
twenty two, that it's just I was gonna mess my

(27:05):
life up. The sky was gonna fall, come crashing down,
and it wasn't gonna happen. And and I realized, like man,
when the book came to me, yeah I don't. I
was happy. I was excited, but over these last these
next twelve days, like I'm gonna live in the hell,
like I'm gonna be convinced that my whole world is

(27:25):
gonna crash before this thing gets starts getting told January
twenty two. And it's just that's that's that's my mental illness,
that's not you know. But but at the same time,
and this is a kind of the moral of this
whole book is like my mental struggles and my depressing
anxiety and in those roommates in my head that talked

(27:46):
so badly to me, it's actually what made me so successful.
Like it forced me to because I have so little
love for myself on the inside out, It's forced me
to go through such great ridiculous this these great things
to feel love from the outside there. And without my
depression anxiety, I wouldn't be where I am, so like

(28:09):
I am. You know when M d P. I always
talking about being proud of our stars, and this is
a way for me to kind of practice when I
preached everybody else. It's hard for me, but it's it's
I gotta practice when I preached the vlogs you've been doing.
And obviously I'm up moving around because well I don't

(28:30):
sleep so I heard saw you on the Dan Patrick
Show this morning, part of the Network, and I mean
the outpouring of love and support there. Hopefully you feel it, man,
because I mean, you've been part of our team for
going on a long time and I volunteered to do
anything but get hit in the face, buddy, but I
got you. That's about that pounds. And how about if

(28:50):
you go watch the video. I'm like, that is my
friend Mark kert I asked, I was feeling bad today,
so I have to become my faith Marcos. So I
said yes, and like again like that's like I'm I'm crazy,
like I'm off, like there's there's something wrong with me
to get me to be like, oh, that makes me
feel good about myself. But it does make me feel

(29:11):
special and different. Like mixed martial arts for me because
I got involved in the early days when it was
so ostracized. It made me feel special because to send
the world unwilling or unable to do it. And even
though I only had two pro fights, I've coached, you know,
over a thousand guys and it's like it just makes

(29:34):
me feel special and different to this. And I think
also I growing up because I have such little self worth.
I felt like such a dumb, dumb kid. I felt
fighting was the only thing that gave me any sort
of value. So to this day I kind of fall
back on that as a default. And and I'll tell
you another funny thing, like it's you know, I said

(29:56):
in my little post there. When I got it, I'm like, hey, um,
it's pretty amazing for me to write a book for
a kid who's in immedial English growing up. And then
when I wrote in the caption the title of the book,
I misspelled one, boards did really well. It is a
long title. I will say that Unbreakable. I turned my

(30:19):
depression and anxiety into motivation and you can too. As
long as it was you know, the word too, I
spoke it was one. I once said it too, you know.
And I even said, I said, I think I sold
all the words, right, Well, no I didn't. Yes, I
since edited it. I got somebody my friend caught it

(30:42):
for me and he's like, hey, moron, you said this
and you actually didn't sell all your words, right I'm
I am excited guys, because like for me, like you know,
and I explained it the book like it's a prescripted
book of what gets me through the grade? What gets

(31:02):
you through depression? Anxiety? And I think nowadays, I would
say by a huge majority have some version of it,
and a lot of it is depressions of social media.
Like we compare ourselves. Everybody else has filtered tracks and
every second in our lives and it's not it's not true,

(31:23):
like nothing's true. But how do you not think your
life doesn't suck? Or you feel left out? And you
see what everybody else at great day looking back should
have a second of one day, and you're comparing yourself like, wow,
how came I'm not on that boat? How come I'm
not looking like that? How come mine up at this party?

(31:43):
I'm right? And man, at the same time, Twitter, all
you see is hate. And think about this when you
were growing up and you got bully out of playground
and fringed out bully in the playground, Man, I sucked
for a few days. But we're not. That's one instance.
We're seeing it every second, thousand instances per second, every day,
and I don't think the human condition has been for that.

(32:06):
Did you have you ever thought? Because I know people
have done this, and I've did too many different variations.
I know Brady Quinn actually did this not too long ago,
and he said, boy, my outlook changed a little bit.
Did you ever think of taking a social media break
and wondering and see if that affects you? An that, Yeah,
I hired someone to do mine, or I don't have

(32:29):
to look at comments, um, but I still do and
I try not to and that's yeah, that's it's bad.
And I actually hired him gun named Scott Schmirtz, so
I won't look anymore. He will pull so we'll plan
it on. He'll send me hey hey, and I'll send
him hey post this is this, so I won't look
at the comments anymore because I am like, I'm an impact.

(32:51):
I can't stand to see whether it's at me or
somebody else. And by the way, the crap people says
to me like yeah, it hurts like people make fun
of me for this or that could be everything on
air about me looking fat or be being stored my
coat here this or that, Like, man, that's not cool.
But also like if you saw me a bar and

(33:12):
you say that, I'll beat your ass right because you
hurt me. And man, you get all these people like dude,
here I am this past speech and breaking storage for
you and you're you're criticizing the way my body looks.

(33:32):
Man like. You know, I've done a lot more with
my body than you have. And it's it's just because
you're you're you know, you made at your certain level.
A lot of us make it your shirtain level because
our hearts are really big. And yeah, no, it hurts.
It hurts all of us, it definitely, Like I just
you don't like it. I don't like to be I
don't like to to be bullied or hear that crap.

(33:54):
But even forget for me, when I see it happens
other people can hurts me. It really hurts me to
see other people get such bad things said about them.
And it's just, man like I said, the human conditions
not met for that. Well, and that's the story of
the week with the firings in the National Football League.
You mentioned Brian Flores on on Sunday Beyond that, any

(34:18):
surprises and and anything you know that that you're hearing
out of left field in terms of these processes, Yeah,
it'll probably be another one or show um um. So
the floor is one is funny because you know, again
I was the only one who said that hey, keep
an eye on Brian Floores here. Uh. You know, at
the end of the week, I'm hearing that it could

(34:40):
be moving on him, and I said, if they get
rid of him, they had a lot more problems there
than just that, right, So I did only want to chat,
but I put them in the category in the grasphic
of state, because my god, could I need three sources
for every day? And this one was He's like, I'm
telling you go strong with it. He's out and I'm like, dude,

(35:00):
what if they beat Patriots. He's like, well, maybe though,
that will help shift something. So that's why I put
him in safe. But he was so positive and I
was like, man, and so at least I talked about
it and I didn't know, but but I was always
I was almost like that cooler hasn't kind of prevailed here,

(35:22):
like it's got it, And it was. It was. It
was really bad friction with Tim and Chris career that
last months, really bad. And but you know what they said, Well,
they're trying to say, now, well, Brian or stuff to
work with, So is every you think Bill Belichix and
walk in the park painting the fun dude to work
with kive me like, Sean Payton fires his coaches like

(35:42):
nine times per games. Asked Dennis Allen, how many times
Sean Payton fired up during the game over the point
of his career. It's probably a hundred and fourteen. I
love that he's brutal. He is brutal. Right, So you've

(36:02):
got a good coach over there, man, really good coach.
And I'll say this too, The NFL has a problem.
There's one blackhead coach. That's a problem. That's a huge problem.
And you know, I was part of helping Mike Tomlin
get his head coaching start. And it's just a what

(36:22):
people would say about him. Oh man, he's gonna be
a star, but you know he's he's greener, he's not ready.
But listen, ins be a star. Oh get him? Like
if you think they're doing that. I have one team said,
that's the best interview we ever had in our lives.
I said, really, Jay, most impressive interview where ever had.
So might you hire now we're hiring an offensive coach.

(36:43):
So you just told me that's the most impressive interview
you ever had in your life. But you're not gonna
hire him because you you're gonna hire an offensive coach
and makes that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. And
but right now, yeah, the league needs to kind of
they got this issue. They have one black a coach,
and black that is a problem. He's on Twitter at

(37:07):
Jake Lazer. That is at Jake Lazer and the book
is here, Unbreakable, How I Turned my depression and anxiety
and motivation. And you can to Jay's on Twitter for
more information on the book. You can see it check
it out again, Unbreakable. How to go to HarperCollins for
Amazon of Barnes and Noble or wherever you want to
buy it, please uh take it and and be of

(37:29):
service to other people. Man, we gotta I'm trying to
form a big team of crazies together. We walked this
walk together. Because we got a team, its a lot easier.
And just to just to confirm how he Long is
still your uber driver, right very much? All right, good,
very good. I want to make sure why she keeps
that job. Howie is in the book because I have
because I'm the book has a lot of laughter in it,

(37:53):
and there's a whole practical joke chapter in there, because
I use laughter to get through the Gray and I
put a lot of jokes on Howie's and they're in
there and he's gonna kill me. He lived through it
already hed it. Oh my god, best I can't wait
to read it. Jake how he's my mus He's my muse. Jay,

(38:18):
thanks a bunch man, Keep fighting the good fight. We
will talk to you soon. Have a great money. Oh
my god, that was outstanding stuff from Jay. How he
had to live it. Now he's gonna kill me. 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 I Heart Radio app.

(38:41):
David Culley was fired today as head coach of the
Houston Texas There's no great segue. It's just the story.
It's big, it's out there. Um the It's not a
shocker because when he was hired. Look, Adam Schefter reported
that they they only were up to give his money
or only liable for his money for the first two years,
because they knew full well it was a could be

(39:03):
a one and done situation. David Culley says, no, they
only for the rest of that deal with paying me
the rest of my seventeen million, and I wanted in pennies,
so it looks like a mountain. Drop it off and
here you go. We gotta have somebody counting out the
pennies all right to put it in a roll. There
you go, because that's the thing that you have to
roll them otherwise they get all managed it like you're

(39:24):
just gonna shove them in that thing like the coin
star at the grocery store. Anyway, So when why do
I gotta roll them? Jerk? I remember having to do
that when I was younger, like in my early twenties,
and we had all kinds of this change, and we
and and and Pam would we'd be rolling money, just
rolling money, money, I said, rolling money, you know, roll
up to take it to the bank. We were rolling

(39:44):
up the money. After that came rolled up, you know,
were no no, no, no, no, no, no no, roll
no rolling money in the Jason Smith was once a
line coach, A no kidding, I was not. He went
at the table, what he said, you're doing that wrong.
Where we would we would say hey, we got like

(40:05):
like like there's like, oh my god, this is like
thirty dollars and change in the cart time you get change,
you throw it. It's like, let's go and take this
to the bank and we'll get you know, a twenty
and a ten for it. Okay, you know, you know
I had a buddy and when I washo who uh,
he only dealt in cash. He just hated the idea
of credit cards. I don't know if there was something
in the family whatever, but everything was cash. So whenever

(40:26):
he got changed, it went in. He had a water cooler,
so he had one of the empty huge, you know,
water water bottles sitting there and he would put the
change in there. And then every I forget when they
would do it, but he and his brother would cash
out and they'd go on a trip to Vegas and
would be all funded by the change that they went

(40:46):
and they dumped. When they're cashed out, would they just
like pull it right off and just put it in
the car with him and pull it. Come on, help
me carry this, this is my buddy. Then they take
it to the bank, and they had a bank that
recognized the absurdity of the whole rolling thing, and they
would put it into their processor and then they'd hand
them their money and off they drive to Vegas. So

(41:07):
they would just like weigh it and say like, oh
this is I mean, they would feel it through their
machine like you. They would just drop. But but you
know like you do at the coin star, right, you
do a little sweep and then it's and it gives
you your tally and then you decide either take the
cash minus a fee, or take the gift card or
credit at the store or whatever it is. And there's

(41:28):
no fees on that. Uh it was. The bank has
the same machine, right, They're gonna process it the same way.
So they found a bank that didn't make them do
the nonsense. It's like, all right, just bring in your jug.
So literally they had one of those little wheelie carts
like you would use as a mover, and they put
this giant however many pounds of change it was, strap

(41:51):
it in, bring it into the bank, and then they'd
wait while they dumped it. And you hear that machine
just going for you know, any minutes. Because some of
the volume they were pushing through it, it sounds like
you were already in Vegas, were that's gonna go through.
I hear the sounds that I'm gonna get money at
the end. I'm waiting for dinging dinging. But there you go. There,

(42:12):
you gotta take your change. Uh. So David Culley is
fired as as Texans head coach, and look, there's there's
many reasons for it. Look, the Texans weren't very good. Uh.
They thought Cully would come in and potentially be someone
to to put the franchise at East during a lot
of stressful times. He had a predisposition to running the

(42:33):
football a lot that didn't really work. Look, Cully got
the job because nobody else wanted it, right, it was
it was you're coming off Bill O'Brien trading everybody and
Deshaun Watson saying I want out. I'm not gonna play
here anymore. Remember David Culley got the job when Deshaun
Watson only said he wanted out. This was before all
these sexual allegations that that stopped him from playing in

(42:56):
the NFL this year came out. So this was just
when I so that that's the bad drop of him
getting this job, and I felt bad for the guy.
Guys a coach in the NFL for a long time,
here's your first chance at sixty five being a head coach.
But look, clearly the Texans they did they they hired
David Colley because I had to hire somebody. And like
I said, I feel bad for the guy because everybody

(43:16):
says he's a nice guy, and he's and and the
players like him. But it was just a bad season
and they need to start over. And there's the angle
of it of here's another black head coach who gets
let go, and two more black head coaches have gotten
let go, and now there's only one, and it's Mike Tomlin.
It's been Mike tom every time we do we do
this story, it's and it's still Mike Tomlin's Mike Tomlins.

(43:39):
And that has to change. I mean, that really does
have to change. And you know, and that's something that
that's been talked about a lot today and we talked
about it on the show, and that that's the number
one thing, um. But the other part of it is this,
and and this is where it gets bigger than just
who's gonna be the next head coach for the teams
that have openings, is that the NFL has kind of

(44:02):
taken a page from Major League Baseball, in which now
the front office and ownership are way more involved than
they used to be, all right, And and in Baseball,
We've seen that over the course of the past few years.
Managers coming in aren't given the keys to the kingdom
saying here you go, go go. Do you think the
team is yours? Put the lineup out. You know, I'm

(44:23):
trusting you, and if it's your fault, I'm firing you.
That's not the case anymore. More and more teams because
of the invention of and the advent of analytics, UH,
general managers have realized I can be involved in the
sport more. And now gms and front office members are
giving the the manager of the lineup. This is the lineup,
this is who we want to come out of the
bullpen tonight. This and owners are getting involved more. They

(44:47):
used to stay away, but now they've realized that with
this success of analytics and different kinds of strategies, why
aren't we doing more? Right? I want to be involved
in the game planning. So now managers that have come
in Major League Baseball don't get to come in and
write their own ticket. It's very rare. A guy like
Joe Madden will get a gig and hey, just come
and do your thing. Joe, We'll trust you, all right.

(45:08):
You want a World Series with the Cubs here and
and Anaheim will trust you. Most jobs are the manager
coming in knows that he's got to work with the
front office and they're gonna cut into his authority and
it's going to be something that's very palpable that the
players are going to know. So if you want to
manage in Major League Baseball now, you have to be
comfortable with the fact that what the job used to

(45:29):
be isn't there anymore. And there's still some jobs and
some managers that have the cash a that that are
allowed to do their thing. But the more jobs that
come open, the more jobs that are open are the
ones that have to involve managers having to work with
the front office and ownership. And now you're getting that
way in the National Football League, as you have seen
with the Houston Texans. You have an owner who wants

(45:51):
to get involved in kl McNair in a GM and Nickissario,
who was at odds with with with many people in
the organization, and whoever the next head coaches in Houston
has to know that they're going to be involved, and
they're going to be really involved. They're gonna cut into
your authority. Same thing in Jacksonville. You gotta be a
beholding to the owner, right, Shad con all the conversations
I had with urban Meyer, Wow, okay, you really have

(46:13):
to have those many conversations with him? Well, probably you did,
but uh know that if you go into Jacksonville, that's
going to be the job. That's gonna be the situation
for you. That's how it is in the NFL now.
All the time, Brian Flores in Miami, really good head coach.
Everybody liked him. What happened, couldn't get along with the
front office and ownership. Right, had issues with the players
as well, but front office ownership, that's who you have

(46:34):
to manage well if you're gonna stay on. So now
whoever comes into Miami has to understand that, hey, your owner,
your GM, your front office, they're gonna be hugely involved
in what they want you to do. In the quarterbacks,
they want you to play in the people they want
to put on the field. So that's a job where
you're not going to have the same kind of authority.
So while on the surface it's here's another job opening,

(46:55):
how it's gonna be filled is there's not many guys
that are gonna come in and say I'm the head coach,
you leave it to me. Jim Harbaugh is maybe the
only guy that can do that. But every other job
that gets filled is gonna be somebody. It's gonna be
a defensive coordinator or an offensive coordinator or a college
coach coming in. That's gonna understand. I don't quite have
the power, but I want to be a head coach.

(47:16):
I have to really be beholden more to the GM
and the Director of player Personnel and the owner that
I ever have before. And I gotta be okay with
that if I want to be a head coach in
the National Football League, Because this is now becoming the
norm all the job openings that come, you are now
working more hand in hand. You're not let alone you
are you are having personnel decisions dictated to you in
many instances, and that's what that's what the real issue

(47:40):
with the NFL is now is when you become a
head coach, that's gonna be the situation you walk into. Yeah,
I mean, it's just as we've talked about quite often,
right the rules of engagement and the line moves right
as to how you you're you're building a franchise, and
you know some trying to say, well, hire, hire the
coach before you get the GM's like, well, how does

(48:01):
that work? Right? Now, who's got the power play here?
And and it's usually top down and now you're you're
already building in a power struggle. No, that's not gonna
work right. There's still a structure that has to go through.
And then it becomes the for a guy like Hardball.
While he's shown success before, and we watched how that
blew up with Trent Balki, and while you know, as

(48:24):
Jay Glazer said, I'm sure he's not a walk on
the beach. Uh, Jim Harbaugh continues to do great things.
Trent Bulky. We're looking at him with our just shrugging, going,
how the hell did you mess up? What was going
on in Jacksonville that badly? And what what happened with you?
And urban is he writing a book? I would love
to read Balki's book about the year that they just had.

(48:44):
There's no question there. But you know, looking at Coli specifically,
he's not the guy that traded for David Johnson thinking
it was the fantasy hero of five years ago, six
years ago, right, Rex Burkehead became their valuable viable running
back UH for for you later on in the year.
Congratulations to you, UH, Fantasy owners that got some love

(49:06):
from him. Out of desperation place. Brandon Cooks was great,
but what else did you really have? So expecting something
else is absurd. But if you're you're coming up in
the ranks, you know these are now the rules of engagement, uh,
and that autonomy is not gonna be there. Even if
you're you're coming from one of these strong programs, right,
you want to go into the old coaching tree analogies

(49:29):
and and kind of do the diagrams across the board.
Even if you're coming out of Kansas City, you're coming
out of Tampa. You're coming out of these successful squads
and obviously we're looking straight at you know, for for
Eric b Enemy Byron Left, which knowing that you're you're
not going to get the first head coaching job and
be able to run them up right because you haven't

(49:49):
been a head coach and you know, with sustained success.
And I'm not saying it's fair because you know what
what happened with Jacksonville and all of the many, many
laundry lists of steps and missteps by Urban Meyer just unconscionable,
right in terms of everything that was able able to
be done and then finally shown the door is you're

(50:12):
not going to get that. Why was he given it?
Because he had one titles, and he had the reputation,
and the expectation was that he'd come in and with
the number one overall, picked the golden haired boy, everything
would be great. And then it was anything but uh.
And now he's the cautionary tale, you know, for first
time NFL head coach is going forward as well in

(50:34):
terms of getting that kind of control, no matter how
successful you've been moving up the ranks and pushing through.
But I hope those guys all get their shots and
not just cursory interviews, you know, and talking about Jim
Caldwell would be I think with hardball the one guy
would be looking at, you know, of the veteran Uh,
he'd been there, coached and showed showed he could want

(50:55):
to win in a different circumstance. But I don't I
don't know that that happens. Hell, I don't know that
he still wants to That's the whole other part of this.
But but it's certainly you know, when you go to
the analytics and and we watched it with the Chargers
like it or not, That's that's where the game is.
It may not be as visible, may not be as

(51:17):
in your face as some of the calls from Staley,
you know, seem to offend the sensibilities of people, ruined
the sanctity of the game for some, which which I say,
get over yourself. Life evolves, life is changed, uh, and
in the NFL there's still a lot of things to change,
which is why we bring up the names that we

(51:37):
do in this coaching carousel to make sure that guys
get a shot, uh and have a an office that
they can work into more success and not have another
one and done situation like we saw with Wilkes over
in Arizona or this year with Culli where he was
put in an untenable situation and arguing that he's going
to get to walk away with the giant novelty check. Uh.

(52:00):
Is the worst thing you could possibly do in this
process because it just showed the horrid nature of this
of all, right, that's supposed to be okay, lifetime of
football too well, he got a shot, like it's not
his fault that failed. I mean, you look at the
front office, ownership, whatever it takes some some onus go
give this guy some stuff to work with, you know,

(52:20):
an actual first string running back, and see what they're
able to do.