February 4, 2019 • 39 mins
Colin talks about how the Rams took away almost every weapon the Patriots have and Tom Brady still found a way to win. He explains where he was right and wrong about the Super Bowl including totally whiffing on the final score. He says Tom Brady isn't chasing anyone but instead finds motivation from something that happened a long time ago. Plus, former Patriots coach Eric Mangini was surprised by the Rams game plan and explains to Colin what they did wrong. Presented by Perky Jerky.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to the Best of Herd podcast. Are
you sure to catch us live every weekday from twelve
to three eastern, nine to noon Pacific on Fox Sports
Radio and FS one. Find your local station for The
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live every day on the iHeartRadio app by searching Herd.
This is the Best of the Herd with Colin cowher
on Fox Sports Radio. Ah, here we go to Monday.
(00:24):
This is the Herd. Wherever you may be and however
you may be listening. We are live in Los Angeles
on iHeartRadio, Fox Sports Radio and FS one one hour
from now. Where Colin was right, Where Colin was wrong
on the Super Bowl Yesterday. Joey Taylor is joining me
on a Monday. Well, well, well, I feel like I've
(00:48):
been sitting in this chair before in a Monday after
the Super Bowl several several times. So the Patriots six
Super Bowl wins, Brady in all of them, in all
of us Super Bowl when has led the game winning
drive in the fourth or overtime, six for six. But
yesterday was in artistic, Yesterday wasn't pretty, Tom wasn't great.
(01:08):
I'm not that impressed. Wrong I'm blown away. I'm going
to talk about a word today that's always impressed me
about a lot of Americans, a lot of people in
the world, resourcefulness. The Los Angeles Rams had an incredible
defensive game plan. Tom Brady, you will not be able
to throw the ball deep, Chris Hogan, He'll never be open.
(01:32):
Tom Brady loves to throw to running backs. James White
won catch. They took that away. The Rams also led
the NFL this year in defending the bubble screen that's
not available. Tom Brady won a Super Bowl throwing to
one guy, a five nine slot receiver who was a
quarterback in college, who looks like Santa Claus. He won
(01:54):
a Super Bowl with that. What separates Bear Grills from
me isn't the fact that he can climb a mountain.
It's that he can do it with a spoon and
a gum wrapper. I I would need nine goats, four tens,
thirteen explorers, and two SUVs. He can do it with
a ball of yarn. Resourcefulness. I'm sorry, but I'm not
(02:18):
impressed with rich people's kids who go to Ivy League
schools and prep schools and then have a nice job
and make six figures I'm impressed with a kid who
lived through divorces, maybe drugs in the family, some abuse,
and twenty five years later they run their own company.
Overcoming life does not give you a linear path. It's
(02:39):
not sunny every day with no traffic and the kids
slept through the night and you slept perfectly and the
eggs were just right. That's not life. That's a television show.
That's a script. Life is having to overcome crap, bad bosses,
average help late to work a wreck. You got to
(03:00):
use an app to get there. That's what life's all about.
Tom Brady yesterday, I've said this about Lebron James. The
most impressed I've ever been with Lebron James in my life.
Wasn't winning with a great Kyrie Irving, wasn't winning with
Chris Bosh and the great defense d Wade. When Lebron
James lost Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving and took the
(03:21):
Golden Warriors Golden State Warriors six games in the finals,
and is the best most reliable teammate he had was
Matthew Delavadova, and he took the Warriors six games with
Matthew Delavadova. Are you kidding me. There's never been a
basketball player, including Michael Jordan, Kareem Magic, Kobe, Larry mj
that could take Matthew Delavadova and got six games into
(03:45):
the finals. Overcoming stuff blows me away. That's why Hollywood
makes movies about rags to riches, about people that don't
get perfectly what they want. Yesterday, the game winning drive
a story this morning that essentially, with nine minutes to
go in the game, Josh McDaniels went to the sideline,
(04:06):
the Patriot offensive coordinator, and said, I'm scrapping the game plan.
Nothing's working. We're gonna do something, and we haven't practiced
this in months. We're gonna huddle every play. We're gonna
use two tight ends in a fullback in Mike Devlin,
and have an empty backfield. And they huddled every play
because they hadn't practiced it. And they averaged on that
(04:28):
drive twelve yards of play. The rest of the game
they averaged four. By the way, I'm not saying last
year's Super Bowl wasn't impressive for Tom who threw for
five hundred yards and everything worked and Danny Amendola was
open and Edelman was open, and Chris Hogan was open,
and I'm not saying that wasn't impressive. But what was
impressive yesterday is the Rams took virtually everything away except
(04:53):
Julian Edelman. And I love Patrick Mahomes, and I love
Russell Wilson, and I love Andrew Luck, and I love
Aaron Rodgers. They're all amazing. Those guys aren't winning a
Super Bowl with Julian Edelman? Are you kidding me? They
didn't have a deep threat, they couldn't order running backs,
their running game was spotty. Chris Hogan was blanketed. Brady
faced interior pressure, the Rams had an unbelievable game plan,
(05:17):
and Brady with a seventy one quarterback passer rating. One.
By the way, let me tell you the quarterbacks who
have been able to win Super Bowls when they didn't
play great. Terry Bradshaw ninety six passing yards won a
Super Bowl. John Elway fifty one point nine passer rating
won a Super Bowl. Peyton Manning won a Super Bowl
(05:39):
with a passer rating of fifty six, Big Ben won
a Super Bowl with a passer rating of twenty two,
and Tom Brady yesterday one with a seventy one. What
are they all have in common their Hall of Fame
level players. Most quarterbacks in this league, Kirk Cousins, guys,
I like Alex Smith. They need a lot of stuff
(05:59):
to work for them to win big games. Nothing work
for New England except Edelman. We're spoiled. We've had so
many good Super Bowls in a row that if it's
not a fireworks show, if it doesn't go to overtime,
if it's not thirty five, thirty four, who cares? Yesterday
was all about great defensive game plans, great defensive pass rush,
(06:24):
great secondary play. Defenses were unbelievable yesterday. Wade Phillips, tip
of the cap, Belichick, Brian Flores, tip of the cap.
But one player on offense was able to overcome that.
Scrap the game plan, be resourceful, using just Julian Edelman,
(06:45):
and win the Super Bowl. Tom Brady, I'm sorry be
impressed with a rich family's kid who has a nice,
clean path to success. I like people who get crapped on.
I like people who overcome Brady Yesterday. It didn't feel
good in the moment. He's probably bummed out in the moment.
(07:07):
He'll look back twenty five years from now and go,
how the hell did we beat that Rams team? I'm
asking it this morning. I want to shift to this
great to have you in a Monday really is great
to have you in. I want to talk a bit
about Julian Edelman because there's five or six Patriots that
(07:28):
create the core of their team. Gronk and Brady and Edelman,
Devin mccordy, Dante high Tower, Shack Mason. And not all
of them are high paid. Most are paid below kind
of market value. They are the core of the team.
And I'm all for free agents, and I'm all for trades,
but realize when you get somebody via a trade or
(07:51):
free agency, they often come to your team wanting something.
Kevin Durant came to the Warriors wanting titles and wanting
to elevate his legacy. Okay, the Warrior's core is Steph
Clan Draymond. You don't hear a lot of talk about
them wanting to leave. Kevin Durant walks into a perfect situation.
(08:14):
And I'm every time I open a sports page, every
time I read a blog, it's not totally satisfied. Because
Kevin Durant came there with an agenda, came their wanting
things Steph Curry invited him and gave him things, gave
him the ball, let him take the big shots, gave
(08:37):
him more minutes, more fame, more headlines. I tell my
kids this all the time. There are very few people
that will jump in front of a car and give
their life for you. And there's a word for those
people called family. And you can go get free agents,
and you can get stars, but who who's there for you?
(09:01):
The core of the Patriots is defined by Edelman. Precise,
tough as a cheap steak, plays hurt, imperfect seventh rounder,
never seeks attention, never demands the ball. I'm not saying
stars don't have a place, and I'm not saying free
(09:24):
agents don't have a place. NFL free agency. I mean
they're trying to get more like NBA free agency, which
is awesome. But when Lebron went to Miami, Duane Wade's family,
Lebron James was just really talented and rented. Chris Bosh
was really talented. Udonis Haslama's family, stephis family, Edelman's family,
(09:49):
High Towers family, Gronkis family, Brady's family, Josh McDaniels. Now
he left for a while, he came back he missed
his family. Is that when I watch that game yesterday,
what really really sticks with me is that, And it's
not Edelman's story is not just about that. He's, you know,
(10:10):
a seventh rounder. And but I go back to something
I've always believed in sports that sports are similar to
like a house. You have a foundation and then you
build the house. But when you drive down the street
and you see a house being built, it all starts
with the foundation. They don't build the roof first, they
don't build the kitchen first. That they build the foundation,
(10:33):
and then people come in from the county or the state.
And if the foundation's not right, you can't build the house.
Your foundation is who you draft. There's an old saying
in sports, nobody loves you more than the team that
drafts you. The Orlando Magic love Dwight Howard. Everybody else
(10:54):
just saw him as a means to an end. Edelman,
Steph Curry, they def fine their current dynasties. Drafted by him,
mentored by him, coached by him, loved by him, willing
to give because when you're in the family, you'll step
(11:15):
in front of that car for another family member. As
much as you say you like your neighbors. As much
as you say you like your friends, as much as
you say you like your college professor, your buddy, you
wouldn't step in front of a car for him. Edelman,
Steph Curry. That's what you build around. Be sure to
catch live editions of The Herd weekdays and noon Easter
nine am Pacific on Fox Sports Radio FS one and
(11:39):
the iHeartRadio app. Last year, one punt yesterday most of
you wanted to punt the Super Bowl. But I will
say this, Lebron James middle of the third quarter had
a tweet and it was man, where's Sham's woes? Haynes McManaman.
Those are NBA reporters. He was looking for something interesting,
like an NBA story because you know the NFL, the
(11:59):
Super Bowl was born, and I wanted to tweet back,
weren't you in the finals? That was a sweep? Wasn't
the World Series a total mismatch? Red Sox one in five?
Wasn't the College Football National Championship Game decided by thirty points?
The Rams and the Paints Rits were tied at three
with a minute sixteen to go or something. I mean,
(12:21):
I mean, how much time would it go? It was
three to three in the fourth quarter. Yeah, it was
early fourth, it was three. It was a one possession game. Late.
There was no fumbles, at least none recovered. There were
not a lot of drop passes, only twelve penalties. New
England only had three. Defense was blowing stuff up. Listen,
the Super Bowl is where my wife watches. It's where
(12:43):
fringe fans watch, and they come in and they think
they're gonna get this wild showcase. Most Super Bowls. In fact,
there was a period in the eighties we went through
about a ten year period where eight of them were atrocious.
Like Dallas would beat Buffalo by forty yesterday we had
a tie football game in the fourth quarter. I'm okay
(13:03):
with that now. It wasn't the most artistic, but I mean,
you know, it's just like it wasn't a headline super Bowl.
Last year was full of headlines. This was not a
headline super Bowl. But it was close and it was competitive.
The World Series was unwatchable and it was a blowout.
It was a mismatch. I mean, it was the NBA Finals.
After Game one, the remaining three games were unwatchable. College
(13:27):
Football National Championship was a blowout. Yukon women's basketball. That
dynasty's mostly been blowouts. We had a tie game in
the fourth quarter. And you know, it's just like like,
like most millionaires in America are not tech millionaires. Most
of them have paid off their house. It's a husband
and wife that both work and they have both healthy
four oh one ks. But that doesn't make headlines. But
(13:49):
that's seventy five percent of American millionaires. They've paid off
their house, they've paid off their cars, and they both
have a four oh one K and they're millionaires. They
have about a million and a half net worth. They're
not working at you know, Facebook, They're not like twenty
seven year old Elon Musk genius level dudes. That's not
really that gets the headline. So I looked at yesterday
and I think defense wins a lot more than we
(14:11):
think in sports. Pitching in baseball wins championships. Home run
hitters do not win World Series. Who wins World Series
of the Red Sox And they're pitching the year before
the Astros and they're pitching pitching his defense. Michael Jordan's
Bulls were not the most gifted offensive team. Michael Jordan's
Bulls were the greatest defensive team I've ever seen. Both
(14:33):
of our college football dynasties are based on defense. So
do you know every single Super Bowl New England is one,
all six of them. Their defense has been ranked no
lower than eighth. New England wins these super Bowls when
they come into a Super Bowl and they're efficient offensively,
(14:55):
they always are, but they're very good defensively when they win,
they always are. So I think the defense. You know,
I've said a couple of things about Brady's legacy. He's
almost always had good offensive lines. Dan Marino didn't, John
Elway didn't. Brady's always had good offensive lines. But those
don't make headlines. And the second thing, their defense is
(15:18):
always better than we give them credit for. It is
generally a bend not break defense. Yesterday, New England's defense
hyper aggressive. They blitz statistically fifty percent of the time.
Jared Goff could not get his feet under him. This
is not a headline super Bowl. This is not one
of those eight or nine you know, Pittsburgh, Arizona Big
(15:40):
bandess Antonio Holmes. This was all about defense. So was
the World Series. So is our college football dynasties. And
that's okay. Too. I'm not a fringe fan. I'm not
somebody that just walks into the Super Bowl. Joy is
not a fringe fan. We watch these games all weekend.
So when you watch them all weekend, I like other
wise we'd have the Canadian Football League down here. I'm okay.
(16:03):
I'm okay. When Pittsburgh beat New England earlier this year,
it was like, what was it score? Like? Thirteen ten?
Did Pittsburgh celebrate me last? It's okay. Not everything has
to be rams Kansas City at the Coliseum. I'm okay
with that. Be sure to catch live editions of The
Herd weekdays and noon Easter not a Empacific. Yeah. I
always tell you when I'm right because I know that
(16:24):
most of my listeners listen once or twice a week,
So I remind you when we're right. But it's also
important on Mondays to say listen. We whiffed on a
bunch of stuff too. So here we go on a
Monday after the Patriots Super Bowl win. Colin right, Colin wrong?
Where Colin was right. We had a great playoff run.
There were eleven playoff games. We picked ten right. That'll
(16:46):
never happen again. I mean, I pay attention to this stuff.
I care. The only game I missed was the Chiefs
losing to the Patriots, and even that was an overtime
you know, the Super Bowl to me, and I bet
just a little on it. It really turned out the
way I thought. I said, if Todd Gurley is not
a factor, and that means like ten Carri's not eighteen,
(17:08):
then I just don't think the Rams can win. And
very early in this game, late in the first quarter,
I felt like Gurley is not a factor. And even
though there wasn't any scoring, I did feel like the
game was turning out to be a New England game.
So eleven playoff games, we picked ten of them straight up,
and we feel good about that. Where Colin was row,
(17:29):
I did think yesterday we were going to have a
lot of offense. I was shocked at the Patriots pass rush.
Four sacks, twelve quarterback hits. They devoured the Rams offensive front.
I was blown away by the Patriots pass rush. And
I'll tell you this, the Rams defense was money. I've
(17:52):
never seen. Tom Brady can't even find open running backs
to throw too. They reduced Tom Brady to find Julian Edelman,
hurry up and get rid of the ball. The game
was a complete defensive classic. I did not I thought
the teams would be like last year by the end
of the year, the refs would let stuff go. You'd
(18:14):
have a lot of big plays, and it was just
it was just not the case at all. Where Colin
was right. I did predict that Julian Edelman would have
a day. I said, a non quarterback is going to
win MVP here and I'll say it again whenever I
read these lists of top ten players in the Super Bowl,
(18:35):
and I saw one this week, I had Edelman at eight,
and I thought, how do you not put him top ten?
Some people don't have him top fifteen. He is so productive.
He is the quickest player on the field yesterday. Now
I'm not saying the fastest. I'm not saying the tallest
or the strongest. But in the NFL these days, the
bubble screen and the short slot pass is every bit
(18:56):
as big as the home run ball. So what I'm
saying is quick is now as important as fast it
used to be. It was a fast league. Now it's
a quick league. And if you're not, if you don't
consider Edelman to be a great NFL player, I can't
help you because he was turning Marcus Peters a key
to lead like real players in circles. He wouldn't just open.
(19:18):
He was wide open all day. Where Colin was raw,
Jared Goff was not sharp. Now a lot of this
is he just didn't have time to step into anything.
But Goff look rattled. He looked nervous during the anthem,
and I thought I thought he would be better here,
simply because I didn't think he had a lot of
awareness either. He got pop going out of bounds. It's like, Jared,
(19:40):
get down, get out of bounds. Listen. It's just one
of those things, is that these young quarterbacks, I think
we're just unfair. We expect them to walk into these
massive games when they don't have a Todd Gurley and
they don't have Cooper Cup, and we expect them to
just be money. And let's say he looked a little
overwhelmed and he didn't have Todd Gurley and he didn't
(20:00):
have time to throw, and he didn't have Cooper Cup.
After week nine and he's never quite been the same.
I thought he would be a little sharper. I thought
a couple of his balls fluttered. I thought he missed
a couple of wide open receivers didn't see him. I
thought he'd played better. But again, a lot of this
is their own line where Colin was right said all years,
stop hyper vent lady. Come December, Come January. Defense is
(20:24):
gonna matter. September and October fooliss every year. The weather's great,
the stars are healthy. But here's what happens. Over the
course of the season. Your running backs get hit more.
Todd Gurley gets hurt more, your wide receivers get hurt.
Who's getting tackled in football? Offensive players, you start getting
tackled for three and four months, you're not healthy. Offenses
(20:44):
slow down. Players don't have the zip, the running backs
don't have the burst. They're not a dynamic and frankly,
defensive coaches have seen your entire playbook by November, and
you're not fooling them like you are in September and October.
Andy reid stuff historically has been great early and strong
a bit more late because all the new stuff he introduces,
people catch up to it a little bit. And if
(21:06):
you look at these NFL playoff games, almost to a
playoff game, defense was the key. Almost to a game.
Defense won the game. Where Colin was wrong, I said,
going in, Wade Phillips worried me. Is that the young
(21:26):
sharp Sean McVay, seventy one year old Wade Phillips. I
know he's wearing his dad cowboy hat in the jacket
and that's cool and everything, but I thought, is he
just going to look like an old timer? I thought
he was the coach of the game. I thought Wade
Phillips was unbelievable. I mean, he I've never seen Brady
that handcuffed. They had nothing, first ball was intercepted Brady.
They literally had to shelf their entire offense. At the
(21:49):
nine minute mark in the fourth quarter, New England went
to the sidelines and said, nothing is working, so we're
going to create an offense in a set of two
tight ends in rex burghead and huddle and empty backfield.
I mean, Wade Phillips to me, was the star for
the Rams, not a player. He was the star of
the Super Bowl for the La Rams, and I thought
(22:11):
potentially he could be a liability. Where Colin was right,
I said, listen, everybody's fallen in love with young coaches.
Everybody thinks Sean mcbay's this and that, I'll go back.
I said next year, I think Philadelphia is the best
team in the NFC. Philadelphia. Doug Peterson's not a kid.
GM Howie Roseman's not a kid. Philadelphia out coached New England. Okay,
(22:36):
the Rams got outcoached. I said before the Super Bowl,
my pick for next year in the NFC is not
the Rams, It's the Eagles. Philadelphia, by the way, should
have beaten New Orleans, but they you know, we're missing
nine starters that everybody. Everybody has annointed the Rams stars.
And I said, no, Philadelphia is the team to watch
(23:00):
out for next year. And what Philadelphia did last year
out coached New England. The opposite happened. The young offensive
coach for the Rams got out coached. By the way,
how would you like to be Cincinnati today? You got
the Rams quarterback coach? How'd that work out? Yesterday? Where
Colin was wrong? It's not that I don't like Gronk,
(23:21):
but I've been saying all year he's done. And you
know what, he was great against the Chiefs, and he
came up with the biggest play yesterday. And he's also
become a very good blocker. He had the last two
games he had eighteen targets. It's almost like the Patriots
knew they were saving him until they really needed him.
(23:43):
And it's not. I mean, Gronk's a great player, but
he's always been a little goofy for me. He's always
been a little silly for me. But you know what,
he's matured nicely. After the game, he's like, I don't
want to talk about my retirement. This is about the team.
And for a guy that walked into this game and
was a goof ball, he became a great blocker, a
tremendous big game player and this year was really special.
(24:08):
He didn't do anything all year. It's as if the
Patriots knew he had about three two three big games
left in him. I suspect my guess is he will
retire in about ten days to two weeks. It's a
good tight end draft. The Patriots have twelve pick six
in the first three rounds. They will definitely draft no question,
(24:32):
a tight end. One more heard. The Herd streams twenty
four hours a day, seven days a week within the
iHeartRadio app, Search Herd to listen live or on demand
whenever you like. I think a lot of times we
think that you know Kobe Bryant was good because he
was chasing Michael Jordan, or Lebron's good because he's chasing
(24:53):
Michael Jordan, or Michael Jordan's good because he's chasing Magic Johnson.
I think a lot of that stuff is just whoy.
I think it all comes down to powerful childhood experiences.
And when you're young pre twenty five years old, there's
not a lot of data. You're young, not a lot
has happened to you. By this point in my life,
(25:14):
I've been hired, I've moved, I've had kids, I've been divorced.
Has a lot of stuff packed into my life. But
when you're twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen years old and the
prettiest girl in school says I'm not interested, and you
ask her out to the problem and she says no.
You don't have a lot of data. That puppy sticks.
And when your high school coach doesn't pick you to
(25:35):
make the varsity, that never goes away. It's sticks because
you don't have a lot to clutter up your mind.
And I'll give you two examples. I don't think Brady's
chasing anything, and I don't think Jordan ever chased anything.
They had unique childhood experiences where they worked really hard
and somebody told them, no, you're not good enough. And
(25:55):
I think it lasts forever. Here's Tom Brady after winning
three Super Bowl Mary Knew a supermodel five hundred million
that worth beautiful kids. After winning, talks about Draft day
and look how deep and powerful it is. It was hard.
(26:16):
I remember taking a walk with my dad and mom
around the block. It was just a tough tay, you know.
I just remember being there with my mom and dad.
You know, they just were so supportive of me, and
they take it as emotional as I do. Finally, when
the Patriots called, that was so excited. You know, I
don't have to be an insurance salesman. But again, he's
not chasing money. He's not chasing Peyton Manning, He's not
(26:39):
chasing Joe Montana. He's proving people wrong. That get you
up every morning. Michael Jordan similarly, it wasn't about the Pistons,
it wasn't about magic, it wasn't about the money. For Michael,
he tells a story during his Hall of Fame speech.
(27:00):
And then there's Lewa Smith. Now you gotta think that's
a myth. Lea Smith was a guy. When I got cut,
he made the team on the varsity team, and he's
here tonight. He's still the same six seven guy. He's
not any bigger, He's probably his game is about the same.
But he started the whole process with me, because when
he made the team and I didn't, I wanted to
prove not just to Lewa Smith, not just to myself,
(27:23):
but to the coach who actually picked Lero over me.
I wanted to make sure you understood you made a mistake. Dude.
That stuff is deep, and you're not overly cluttered in
high school and you don't have a lot of life experiences.
So when you have a negative one at sixteen or
a negative one at twenty, man, it's it's up the
whole world. It's your whole world, and that stuff stays
(27:47):
with you forever. I mean, it sounds a bit comical
when you listen to it's dude, get over it, But
the reality is none of us do. We all have
something that happened to us, that that moment where everything
just shifted. And that's where you make a decision if
you're gonna let that drive you or consume you, and
or a mixture of both of it towards something positive
(28:08):
or negative right that you know what it is. It's
the fear of that feeling that they had when didn't
make a team, or that feeling that he had when
he wasn't getting drafted coming back again. So it drives
you every day to not experience that again. About ten
years ago, there was a sixty minute story with Larry Ellison,
who runs Oracle Oracles, a massive Silicon Valley company. He's
a billionaire, and he was talking about his childhood and
(28:29):
nobody believed in him, and his stepdad, you know, didn't
believe in him. And he stopped and he said to
the reporter, he goes, I had all the things necessary
to be a billionaire. Nobody believed in me. And you
can go up in Wall Street and Silicon Valley and
our presidents and no, you can't do this. You'll never
be able to do this. Michael Jordan and Brady the
(28:51):
two greatest team sport athletes of all time. It's a
high school experience. It's a college drafting experience that dry them,
not chasing money, fame, or all time greats. Be sure
to catch live editions of The Herd weekdays at noon
Eastern a Empacific on Fox Sports Radio FS one and
(29:11):
the iHeart Radio app. Well, I don't think there's anybody
that knows more about the Patriots and how they're run
that's not currently on their staff than my friend Eric Manginie.
He was their defensive coordinator back two thousand and five,
Jets Brown's head coach, joining us via the Coward Global satellite.
First of all, just from your worldview the actual game,
(29:35):
what wrap a bowl around what really impressed you? What
really impressed me? Look when I heard Andrew Whitworth talk
about the game afterwards where he said that the Patriots
played more zone than the man that they had been
playing all season, to me, that told me a lot
about the Rams approach and where they went wrong. It's
(29:58):
not about how the Patriot it's played anybody else. It's
not about their tendencies over a sixteen or eighteen game breakdown.
It's about how they're gonna play you. And to me,
you've got to look at your weaknesses. You've got to
look at your strengths to be able to anticipate what
you're gonna get. And that summarized where the Rams went wrong.
(30:22):
That one quote, to me, summarized where the Rams made
a mistake. Yeah, I mean I really felt I'll just
throw this out there. I felt New England believed if
they mixed up coverages and created a little pressure, they
saw Goff as a weakness due to his lack of experience.
When I watched the whole game, I thought it was
built around we're going to confuse Jared Goff. We're gonna
(30:46):
blitz more than usual. That's what my interpretation was. They
take away your strengths in New England, and they also
feast on your weaknesses, and they probably felt, in my opinion,
that golf was kind of a weakness going in. Does
that sound right? That was to me, that's absolutely right.
They had a loaded box, they played borderline goal line
(31:07):
defense and said Todd Gurley and C. J. Henderson are
not going to beat us, and golf is gonna have to.
And then why when he did get step back to throw,
they were gonna mix it enough pressure so that he
was uncomfortable. And even if it was just a function
of someone putting their hand on his shoulder so that
he knew that they were close, that's what they were
gonna do that, and they were going to force him
(31:28):
make post nap breeds. Now, the other thing that I
was surprised by is offensively, you control the tempo, you
control personnel, you control shifts, motions, formations. I thought they'd
do more to try to take back control of the
game to England instead of letting New England dictate what
they wanted to do. You've got that control, offensively, use it,
(31:51):
attack their weaknesses, go some no huddle, see whether or
not to change a tempo can affect things. And I
just I didn't see that at any point. No, I
think Gurley, excuse me. I think McVeigh has created an
interesting culture and the players buy into it. But there
have been instances. Now I've seen it against New England
and Philadelphia, two staffs I think are very good. When
(32:13):
they've thrown wrinkles at mcvay's offense, they have not been
great at in game adapting. Now I want to go
to Julian Edelman. Why was he so It's not just
Eric that he was good, he was so darn open?
Why why? I mean it's I mean, they did a
really good job. They put some pressure on Tom, they
(32:34):
took away the deep ball, they took away the running back,
the pastor running backs very effectively. Whatever they did with
Edelman didn't work. Why was he so open Because New
England does a great job of gathering information pre snap
and then collectively they understand what coverage you're in, and
then based off the coverage that you're in, there's certain
(32:57):
weaknesses that are inheriting that those coverages, and there's certain
leverages that go with each coverage. So Edelman can run
read routes or even if he has a designated outside
breaking route, he's going to threaten hard to the inside
and attack leverage, threatened leverage and be able to break away.
And he's got such good short area quickness, and he
(33:17):
does such a great job of stemming the route and
selling something different right up until the breakpoint. And then
when he does break there's an incredible amount of separation.
We saw four or five, six seven yards between him
and the defensive back because of the pre stnap read
and then the way that he attacks leverage and then
his ability to come out of the breaks at the
(33:39):
top of the roads. Some have suggested we could rename
the Lombardi Trophy the Belichick I'll just say this, is
it harder? Could you make an argument what Bill's doing
is harder today than what Lombardi did. I absolutely think
you can make an argument for that. There's free agency,
everything is designed for parody. The draft. You've moved to
(34:03):
the back of the draft. You're constantly in a state
of flux. Your schedule is harder when you win. It's
all built to make sure that there's a strong middle
class and that everybody at the end of the year
has a chance to make the playoffs. It's not like
he's been able to hang on to his great players.
The Bill's done a tremendous job of being ruthlessly efficient
(34:25):
the way he moved on from whether it was Seymour
or Vaybel or Lawyer malloy or take your pick of
any of those guys, and making those tough decisions that
you have to make. Yeah, plus the salary cap that
you know, I mean, let's be honest, you just can't
keep players. I mean, yeah, yeah, it's it's every years
you've got to start over. You know, the Todd Gurley situation.
(34:47):
Joy and I have talked about this. It's like the
Bermuda Triangle of sports topics. I can't figure it out,
you know, It's like, where is he hurt? He doesn't
look like he cuts as much as he did earlier
in the year, but he played. He's got some ability
to pop. What do you make of the girly situation?
Did they overuse him eric in October? In September? Because
(35:09):
you know this, the Rams are very top heavy. They
don't have a ton of depth. They didn't until C. J.
Anderson have a second back they trusted. Is it possible
they overused him early and he's just banged up. Well,
there's a couple of different concerns here. Obviously, he was
very effective against Dallas. The Everard's seven point two yards
to carry in that game. So let's say he is hurt. Well, well,
(35:32):
that's a problem because there's a lot of people that
place bets on this game. And if and if he
was hurt and they told him he was healthy, you know,
that's that's one problem. Let's say he's not hurt. If
he's not hurt, then he's a guy that comes up
small in big games. So he's okay in the regular season,
but in the big moments you can't count on him.
(35:52):
And I think that's a really dangerous narrative that so
you're you're gonna have to get the truth out there,
because neither one of these looks very good for the
Rams or for Todd Gurley. Now all that being said,
his effectiveness at fifteen and twenty carries is impressive. Why
not give yourself a chance to see whether or not
(36:13):
that tendency holds. Why not make sure that he gets
at least fifteen carries or gets at least twenty carries
and see whether or not what has happened the majority
of the time continues to happen, or whether or not
it gets broken. But to go into the offseason not
knowing and giving the guy ten carries, I can't imagine
(36:34):
anybody's happy about that. You know, I said, this was
the most impressive New England Super Bowl to me. And
here's why you had an off field controversy. You had
the Jordan Josh Gordon situation. Edelman was suspended. You didn't
really have a deep threat the AFC with the Chiefs
and the Chargers is you know, you have a lot
of young quarterbacks who are very good. I kind of
(36:54):
felt like, with twelve draft picks coming up, your number
one pick, the lineman from Georgia got hurt. I kind
of felt like this was the year to get New England,
and they were incredibly resourceful this year. When when you
look at I think next year they're gonna be younger.
I think Gronk retires, they have twelve draft picks. I
think they're gonna be a little more dynamic offensively they
(37:18):
you know, Gronk will give him a little cap relief.
That's how I feel going into next year, that this
was a down year and it was the most impressive
super Bowl to me. What was your takeaway on the
season in full? Yeah, well, I disagree with being the
most impressive super Bowl. I think the first one where
we were fourteen point underdog against the greatest show on
Turf was a little bit more impressive. And I may
(37:40):
be biased, but yeah, the amount of things that they
had to deal with, But that's every year from New England.
And I don't know if you heard Bill's pregame interview,
but he talked about the fact that each year is
its own entity, and each year you go into the
season with who you would like to be, but then
the reality sets in of who you need to be.
(38:01):
And New England does the best job of understanding who
they need to be who they are, and then really
pouring resources into strengthening that and pouring resources into minimizing
whatever weakness is that shapes up into And it's hard.
It's hard. It takes a brutal honesty on the part
(38:25):
of the coaching staff and then a humbleness to say, yeah,
we were wrong, we were on the wrong track, and
we need to pivot. And you see it every year.
Typically they don't start as well, but they finish strong
and they keep getting better and better because of that
self awareness that so many other teams either don't have
(38:46):
or are too arrogant to accept. Good scene Yet, my man,
Eric Manginie, you have a nice offseason. We'll bring it
around here. Why don't you stop buy in La. We'll
take out for a nice steak and you do some
draft stuff for us. I'd love to see you soon,
all right, I'd love to be out there,
Thanks for listening to the Best of Herd podcast. Are
you sure to catch us live every weekday from twelve
to three eastern, nine to noon Pacific on Fox Sports
Radio and FS one. Find your local station for The
Herd at Fox Sports Radio dot com, or stream us
live every day on the iHeartRadio app by searching Herd.
This is the Best of the Herd with Colin cowher
on Fox Sports Radio. Ah, here we go to Monday.
(00:24):
This is the Herd. Wherever you may be and however
you may be listening. We are live in Los Angeles
on iHeartRadio, Fox Sports Radio and FS one one hour
from now. Where Colin was right, Where Colin was wrong
on the Super Bowl Yesterday. Joey Taylor is joining me
on a Monday. Well, well, well, I feel like I've
(00:48):
been sitting in this chair before in a Monday after
the Super Bowl several several times. So the Patriots six
Super Bowl wins, Brady in all of them, in all
of us Super Bowl when has led the game winning
drive in the fourth or overtime, six for six. But
yesterday was in artistic, Yesterday wasn't pretty, Tom wasn't great.
(01:08):
I'm not that impressed. Wrong I'm blown away. I'm going
to talk about a word today that's always impressed me
about a lot of Americans, a lot of people in
the world, resourcefulness. The Los Angeles Rams had an incredible
defensive game plan. Tom Brady, you will not be able
to throw the ball deep, Chris Hogan, He'll never be open.
(01:32):
Tom Brady loves to throw to running backs. James White
won catch. They took that away. The Rams also led
the NFL this year in defending the bubble screen that's
not available. Tom Brady won a Super Bowl throwing to
one guy, a five nine slot receiver who was a
quarterback in college, who looks like Santa Claus. He won
(01:54):
a Super Bowl with that. What separates Bear Grills from
me isn't the fact that he can climb a mountain.
It's that he can do it with a spoon and
a gum wrapper. I I would need nine goats, four tens,
thirteen explorers, and two SUVs. He can do it with
a ball of yarn. Resourcefulness. I'm sorry, but I'm not
(02:18):
impressed with rich people's kids who go to Ivy League
schools and prep schools and then have a nice job
and make six figures I'm impressed with a kid who
lived through divorces, maybe drugs in the family, some abuse,
and twenty five years later they run their own company.
Overcoming life does not give you a linear path. It's
(02:39):
not sunny every day with no traffic and the kids
slept through the night and you slept perfectly and the
eggs were just right. That's not life. That's a television show.
That's a script. Life is having to overcome crap, bad bosses,
average help late to work a wreck. You got to
(03:00):
use an app to get there. That's what life's all about.
Tom Brady yesterday, I've said this about Lebron James. The
most impressed I've ever been with Lebron James in my life.
Wasn't winning with a great Kyrie Irving, wasn't winning with
Chris Bosh and the great defense d Wade. When Lebron
James lost Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving and took the
(03:21):
Golden Warriors Golden State Warriors six games in the finals,
and is the best most reliable teammate he had was
Matthew Delavadova, and he took the Warriors six games with
Matthew Delavadova. Are you kidding me. There's never been a
basketball player, including Michael Jordan, Kareem Magic, Kobe, Larry mj
that could take Matthew Delavadova and got six games into
(03:45):
the finals. Overcoming stuff blows me away. That's why Hollywood
makes movies about rags to riches, about people that don't
get perfectly what they want. Yesterday, the game winning drive
a story this morning that essentially, with nine minutes to
go in the game, Josh McDaniels went to the sideline,
(04:06):
the Patriot offensive coordinator, and said, I'm scrapping the game plan.
Nothing's working. We're gonna do something, and we haven't practiced
this in months. We're gonna huddle every play. We're gonna
use two tight ends in a fullback in Mike Devlin,
and have an empty backfield. And they huddled every play
because they hadn't practiced it. And they averaged on that
(04:28):
drive twelve yards of play. The rest of the game
they averaged four. By the way, I'm not saying last
year's Super Bowl wasn't impressive for Tom who threw for
five hundred yards and everything worked and Danny Amendola was
open and Edelman was open, and Chris Hogan was open,
and I'm not saying that wasn't impressive. But what was
impressive yesterday is the Rams took virtually everything away except
(04:53):
Julian Edelman. And I love Patrick Mahomes, and I love
Russell Wilson, and I love Andrew Luck, and I love
Aaron Rodgers. They're all amazing. Those guys aren't winning a
Super Bowl with Julian Edelman? Are you kidding me? They
didn't have a deep threat, they couldn't order running backs,
their running game was spotty. Chris Hogan was blanketed. Brady
faced interior pressure, the Rams had an unbelievable game plan,
(05:17):
and Brady with a seventy one quarterback passer rating. One.
By the way, let me tell you the quarterbacks who
have been able to win Super Bowls when they didn't
play great. Terry Bradshaw ninety six passing yards won a
Super Bowl. John Elway fifty one point nine passer rating
won a Super Bowl. Peyton Manning won a Super Bowl
(05:39):
with a passer rating of fifty six, Big Ben won
a Super Bowl with a passer rating of twenty two,
and Tom Brady yesterday one with a seventy one. What
are they all have in common their Hall of Fame
level players. Most quarterbacks in this league, Kirk Cousins, guys,
I like Alex Smith. They need a lot of stuff
(05:59):
to work for them to win big games. Nothing work
for New England except Edelman. We're spoiled. We've had so
many good Super Bowls in a row that if it's
not a fireworks show, if it doesn't go to overtime,
if it's not thirty five, thirty four, who cares? Yesterday
was all about great defensive game plans, great defensive pass rush,
(06:24):
great secondary play. Defenses were unbelievable yesterday. Wade Phillips, tip
of the cap, Belichick, Brian Flores, tip of the cap.
But one player on offense was able to overcome that.
Scrap the game plan, be resourceful, using just Julian Edelman,
(06:45):
and win the Super Bowl. Tom Brady, I'm sorry be
impressed with a rich family's kid who has a nice,
clean path to success. I like people who get crapped on.
I like people who overcome Brady Yesterday. It didn't feel
good in the moment. He's probably bummed out in the moment.
(07:07):
He'll look back twenty five years from now and go,
how the hell did we beat that Rams team? I'm
asking it this morning. I want to shift to this
great to have you in a Monday really is great
to have you in. I want to talk a bit
about Julian Edelman because there's five or six Patriots that
(07:28):
create the core of their team. Gronk and Brady and Edelman,
Devin mccordy, Dante high Tower, Shack Mason. And not all
of them are high paid. Most are paid below kind
of market value. They are the core of the team.
And I'm all for free agents, and I'm all for trades,
but realize when you get somebody via a trade or
(07:51):
free agency, they often come to your team wanting something.
Kevin Durant came to the Warriors wanting titles and wanting
to elevate his legacy. Okay, the Warrior's core is Steph
Clan Draymond. You don't hear a lot of talk about
them wanting to leave. Kevin Durant walks into a perfect situation.
(08:14):
And I'm every time I open a sports page, every
time I read a blog, it's not totally satisfied. Because
Kevin Durant came there with an agenda, came their wanting
things Steph Curry invited him and gave him things, gave
him the ball, let him take the big shots, gave
(08:37):
him more minutes, more fame, more headlines. I tell my
kids this all the time. There are very few people
that will jump in front of a car and give
their life for you. And there's a word for those
people called family. And you can go get free agents,
and you can get stars, but who who's there for you?
(09:01):
The core of the Patriots is defined by Edelman. Precise,
tough as a cheap steak, plays hurt, imperfect seventh rounder,
never seeks attention, never demands the ball. I'm not saying
stars don't have a place, and I'm not saying free
(09:24):
agents don't have a place. NFL free agency. I mean
they're trying to get more like NBA free agency, which
is awesome. But when Lebron went to Miami, Duane Wade's family,
Lebron James was just really talented and rented. Chris Bosh
was really talented. Udonis Haslama's family, stephis family, Edelman's family,
(09:49):
High Towers family, Gronkis family, Brady's family, Josh McDaniels. Now
he left for a while, he came back he missed
his family. Is that when I watch that game yesterday,
what really really sticks with me is that, And it's
not Edelman's story is not just about that. He's, you know,
(10:10):
a seventh rounder. And but I go back to something
I've always believed in sports that sports are similar to
like a house. You have a foundation and then you
build the house. But when you drive down the street
and you see a house being built, it all starts
with the foundation. They don't build the roof first, they
don't build the kitchen first. That they build the foundation,
(10:33):
and then people come in from the county or the state.
And if the foundation's not right, you can't build the house.
Your foundation is who you draft. There's an old saying
in sports, nobody loves you more than the team that
drafts you. The Orlando Magic love Dwight Howard. Everybody else
(10:54):
just saw him as a means to an end. Edelman,
Steph Curry, they def fine their current dynasties. Drafted by him,
mentored by him, coached by him, loved by him, willing
to give because when you're in the family, you'll step
(11:15):
in front of that car for another family member. As
much as you say you like your neighbors. As much
as you say you like your friends, as much as
you say you like your college professor, your buddy, you
wouldn't step in front of a car for him. Edelman,
Steph Curry. That's what you build around. Be sure to
catch live editions of The Herd weekdays and noon Easter
nine am Pacific on Fox Sports Radio FS one and
(11:39):
the iHeartRadio app. Last year, one punt yesterday most of
you wanted to punt the Super Bowl. But I will
say this, Lebron James middle of the third quarter had
a tweet and it was man, where's Sham's woes? Haynes McManaman.
Those are NBA reporters. He was looking for something interesting,
like an NBA story because you know the NFL, the
(11:59):
Super Bowl was born, and I wanted to tweet back,
weren't you in the finals? That was a sweep? Wasn't
the World Series a total mismatch? Red Sox one in five?
Wasn't the College Football National Championship Game decided by thirty points?
The Rams and the Paints Rits were tied at three
with a minute sixteen to go or something. I mean,
(12:21):
I mean, how much time would it go? It was
three to three in the fourth quarter. Yeah, it was
early fourth, it was three. It was a one possession game. Late.
There was no fumbles, at least none recovered. There were
not a lot of drop passes, only twelve penalties. New
England only had three. Defense was blowing stuff up. Listen,
the Super Bowl is where my wife watches. It's where
(12:43):
fringe fans watch, and they come in and they think
they're gonna get this wild showcase. Most Super Bowls. In fact,
there was a period in the eighties we went through
about a ten year period where eight of them were atrocious.
Like Dallas would beat Buffalo by forty yesterday we had
a tie football game in the fourth quarter. I'm okay
(13:03):
with that now. It wasn't the most artistic, but I mean,
you know, it's just like it wasn't a headline super Bowl.
Last year was full of headlines. This was not a
headline super Bowl. But it was close and it was competitive.
The World Series was unwatchable and it was a blowout.
It was a mismatch. I mean, it was the NBA Finals.
After Game one, the remaining three games were unwatchable. College
(13:27):
Football National Championship was a blowout. Yukon women's basketball. That
dynasty's mostly been blowouts. We had a tie game in
the fourth quarter. And you know, it's just like like,
like most millionaires in America are not tech millionaires. Most
of them have paid off their house. It's a husband
and wife that both work and they have both healthy
four oh one ks. But that doesn't make headlines. But
(13:49):
that's seventy five percent of American millionaires. They've paid off
their house, they've paid off their cars, and they both
have a four oh one K and they're millionaires. They
have about a million and a half net worth. They're
not working at you know, Facebook, They're not like twenty
seven year old Elon Musk genius level dudes. That's not
really that gets the headline. So I looked at yesterday
and I think defense wins a lot more than we
(14:11):
think in sports. Pitching in baseball wins championships. Home run
hitters do not win World Series. Who wins World Series
of the Red Sox And they're pitching the year before
the Astros and they're pitching pitching his defense. Michael Jordan's
Bulls were not the most gifted offensive team. Michael Jordan's
Bulls were the greatest defensive team I've ever seen. Both
(14:33):
of our college football dynasties are based on defense. So
do you know every single Super Bowl New England is one,
all six of them. Their defense has been ranked no
lower than eighth. New England wins these super Bowls when
they come into a Super Bowl and they're efficient offensively,
(14:55):
they always are, but they're very good defensively when they win,
they always are. So I think the defense. You know,
I've said a couple of things about Brady's legacy. He's
almost always had good offensive lines. Dan Marino didn't, John
Elway didn't. Brady's always had good offensive lines. But those
don't make headlines. And the second thing, their defense is
(15:18):
always better than we give them credit for. It is
generally a bend not break defense. Yesterday, New England's defense
hyper aggressive. They blitz statistically fifty percent of the time.
Jared Goff could not get his feet under him. This
is not a headline super Bowl. This is not one
of those eight or nine you know, Pittsburgh, Arizona Big
(15:40):
bandess Antonio Holmes. This was all about defense. So was
the World Series. So is our college football dynasties. And
that's okay. Too. I'm not a fringe fan. I'm not
somebody that just walks into the Super Bowl. Joy is
not a fringe fan. We watch these games all weekend.
So when you watch them all weekend, I like other
wise we'd have the Canadian Football League down here. I'm okay.
(16:03):
I'm okay. When Pittsburgh beat New England earlier this year,
it was like, what was it score? Like? Thirteen ten?
Did Pittsburgh celebrate me last? It's okay. Not everything has
to be rams Kansas City at the Coliseum. I'm okay
with that. Be sure to catch live editions of The
Herd weekdays and noon Easter not a Empacific. Yeah. I
always tell you when I'm right because I know that
(16:24):
most of my listeners listen once or twice a week,
So I remind you when we're right. But it's also
important on Mondays to say listen. We whiffed on a
bunch of stuff too. So here we go on a
Monday after the Patriots Super Bowl win. Colin right, Colin wrong?
Where Colin was right. We had a great playoff run.
There were eleven playoff games. We picked ten right. That'll
(16:46):
never happen again. I mean, I pay attention to this stuff.
I care. The only game I missed was the Chiefs
losing to the Patriots, and even that was an overtime
you know, the Super Bowl to me, and I bet
just a little on it. It really turned out the
way I thought. I said, if Todd Gurley is not
a factor, and that means like ten Carri's not eighteen,
(17:08):
then I just don't think the Rams can win. And
very early in this game, late in the first quarter,
I felt like Gurley is not a factor. And even
though there wasn't any scoring, I did feel like the
game was turning out to be a New England game.
So eleven playoff games, we picked ten of them straight up,
and we feel good about that. Where Colin was row,
(17:29):
I did think yesterday we were going to have a
lot of offense. I was shocked at the Patriots pass rush.
Four sacks, twelve quarterback hits. They devoured the Rams offensive front.
I was blown away by the Patriots pass rush. And
I'll tell you this, the Rams defense was money. I've
(17:52):
never seen. Tom Brady can't even find open running backs
to throw too. They reduced Tom Brady to find Julian Edelman,
hurry up and get rid of the ball. The game
was a complete defensive classic. I did not I thought
the teams would be like last year by the end
of the year, the refs would let stuff go. You'd
(18:14):
have a lot of big plays, and it was just
it was just not the case at all. Where Colin
was right. I did predict that Julian Edelman would have
a day. I said, a non quarterback is going to
win MVP here and I'll say it again whenever I
read these lists of top ten players in the Super Bowl,
(18:35):
and I saw one this week, I had Edelman at eight,
and I thought, how do you not put him top ten?
Some people don't have him top fifteen. He is so productive.
He is the quickest player on the field yesterday. Now
I'm not saying the fastest. I'm not saying the tallest
or the strongest. But in the NFL these days, the
bubble screen and the short slot pass is every bit
(18:56):
as big as the home run ball. So what I'm
saying is quick is now as important as fast it
used to be. It was a fast league. Now it's
a quick league. And if you're not, if you don't
consider Edelman to be a great NFL player, I can't
help you because he was turning Marcus Peters a key
to lead like real players in circles. He wouldn't just open.
(19:18):
He was wide open all day. Where Colin was raw,
Jared Goff was not sharp. Now a lot of this
is he just didn't have time to step into anything.
But Goff look rattled. He looked nervous during the anthem,
and I thought I thought he would be better here,
simply because I didn't think he had a lot of
awareness either. He got pop going out of bounds. It's like, Jared,
(19:40):
get down, get out of bounds. Listen. It's just one
of those things, is that these young quarterbacks, I think
we're just unfair. We expect them to walk into these
massive games when they don't have a Todd Gurley and
they don't have Cooper Cup, and we expect them to
just be money. And let's say he looked a little
overwhelmed and he didn't have Todd Gurley and he didn't
(20:00):
have time to throw, and he didn't have Cooper Cup.
After week nine and he's never quite been the same.
I thought he would be a little sharper. I thought
a couple of his balls fluttered. I thought he missed
a couple of wide open receivers didn't see him. I
thought he'd played better. But again, a lot of this
is their own line where Colin was right said all years,
stop hyper vent lady. Come December, Come January. Defense is
(20:24):
gonna matter. September and October fooliss every year. The weather's great,
the stars are healthy. But here's what happens. Over the
course of the season. Your running backs get hit more.
Todd Gurley gets hurt more, your wide receivers get hurt.
Who's getting tackled in football? Offensive players, you start getting
tackled for three and four months, you're not healthy. Offenses
(20:44):
slow down. Players don't have the zip, the running backs
don't have the burst. They're not a dynamic and frankly,
defensive coaches have seen your entire playbook by November, and
you're not fooling them like you are in September and October.
Andy reid stuff historically has been great early and strong
a bit more late because all the new stuff he introduces,
people catch up to it a little bit. And if
(21:06):
you look at these NFL playoff games, almost to a
playoff game, defense was the key. Almost to a game.
Defense won the game. Where Colin was wrong, I said,
going in, Wade Phillips worried me. Is that the young
(21:26):
sharp Sean McVay, seventy one year old Wade Phillips. I
know he's wearing his dad cowboy hat in the jacket
and that's cool and everything, but I thought, is he
just going to look like an old timer? I thought
he was the coach of the game. I thought Wade
Phillips was unbelievable. I mean, he I've never seen Brady
that handcuffed. They had nothing, first ball was intercepted Brady.
They literally had to shelf their entire offense. At the
(21:49):
nine minute mark in the fourth quarter, New England went
to the sidelines and said, nothing is working, so we're
going to create an offense in a set of two
tight ends in rex burghead and huddle and empty backfield.
I mean, Wade Phillips to me, was the star for
the Rams, not a player. He was the star of
the Super Bowl for the La Rams, and I thought
(22:11):
potentially he could be a liability. Where Colin was right,
I said, listen, everybody's fallen in love with young coaches.
Everybody thinks Sean mcbay's this and that, I'll go back.
I said next year, I think Philadelphia is the best
team in the NFC. Philadelphia. Doug Peterson's not a kid.
GM Howie Roseman's not a kid. Philadelphia out coached New England. Okay,
(22:36):
the Rams got outcoached. I said before the Super Bowl,
my pick for next year in the NFC is not
the Rams, It's the Eagles. Philadelphia, by the way, should
have beaten New Orleans, but they you know, we're missing
nine starters that everybody. Everybody has annointed the Rams stars.
And I said, no, Philadelphia is the team to watch
(23:00):
out for next year. And what Philadelphia did last year
out coached New England. The opposite happened. The young offensive
coach for the Rams got out coached. By the way,
how would you like to be Cincinnati today? You got
the Rams quarterback coach? How'd that work out? Yesterday? Where
Colin was wrong? It's not that I don't like Gronk,
(23:21):
but I've been saying all year he's done. And you
know what, he was great against the Chiefs, and he
came up with the biggest play yesterday. And he's also
become a very good blocker. He had the last two
games he had eighteen targets. It's almost like the Patriots
knew they were saving him until they really needed him.
(23:43):
And it's not. I mean, Gronk's a great player, but
he's always been a little goofy for me. He's always
been a little silly for me. But you know what,
he's matured nicely. After the game, he's like, I don't
want to talk about my retirement. This is about the team.
And for a guy that walked into this game and
was a goof ball, he became a great blocker, a
tremendous big game player and this year was really special.
(24:08):
He didn't do anything all year. It's as if the
Patriots knew he had about three two three big games
left in him. I suspect my guess is he will
retire in about ten days to two weeks. It's a
good tight end draft. The Patriots have twelve pick six
in the first three rounds. They will definitely draft no question,
(24:32):
a tight end. One more heard. The Herd streams twenty
four hours a day, seven days a week within the
iHeartRadio app, Search Herd to listen live or on demand
whenever you like. I think a lot of times we
think that you know Kobe Bryant was good because he
was chasing Michael Jordan, or Lebron's good because he's chasing
(24:53):
Michael Jordan, or Michael Jordan's good because he's chasing Magic Johnson.
I think a lot of that stuff is just whoy.
I think it all comes down to powerful childhood experiences.
And when you're young pre twenty five years old, there's
not a lot of data. You're young, not a lot
has happened to you. By this point in my life,
(25:14):
I've been hired, I've moved, I've had kids, I've been divorced.
Has a lot of stuff packed into my life. But
when you're twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen years old and the
prettiest girl in school says I'm not interested, and you
ask her out to the problem and she says no.
You don't have a lot of data. That puppy sticks.
And when your high school coach doesn't pick you to
(25:35):
make the varsity, that never goes away. It's sticks because
you don't have a lot to clutter up your mind.
And I'll give you two examples. I don't think Brady's
chasing anything, and I don't think Jordan ever chased anything.
They had unique childhood experiences where they worked really hard
and somebody told them, no, you're not good enough. And
(25:55):
I think it lasts forever. Here's Tom Brady after winning
three Super Bowl Mary Knew a supermodel five hundred million
that worth beautiful kids. After winning, talks about Draft day
and look how deep and powerful it is. It was hard.
(26:16):
I remember taking a walk with my dad and mom
around the block. It was just a tough tay, you know.
I just remember being there with my mom and dad.
You know, they just were so supportive of me, and
they take it as emotional as I do. Finally, when
the Patriots called, that was so excited. You know, I
don't have to be an insurance salesman. But again, he's
not chasing money. He's not chasing Peyton Manning, He's not
(26:39):
chasing Joe Montana. He's proving people wrong. That get you
up every morning. Michael Jordan similarly, it wasn't about the Pistons,
it wasn't about magic, it wasn't about the money. For Michael,
he tells a story during his Hall of Fame speech.
(27:00):
And then there's Lewa Smith. Now you gotta think that's
a myth. Lea Smith was a guy. When I got cut,
he made the team on the varsity team, and he's
here tonight. He's still the same six seven guy. He's
not any bigger, He's probably his game is about the same.
But he started the whole process with me, because when
he made the team and I didn't, I wanted to
prove not just to Lewa Smith, not just to myself,
(27:23):
but to the coach who actually picked Lero over me.
I wanted to make sure you understood you made a mistake. Dude.
That stuff is deep, and you're not overly cluttered in
high school and you don't have a lot of life experiences.
So when you have a negative one at sixteen or
a negative one at twenty, man, it's it's up the
whole world. It's your whole world, and that stuff stays
(27:47):
with you forever. I mean, it sounds a bit comical
when you listen to it's dude, get over it, But
the reality is none of us do. We all have
something that happened to us, that that moment where everything
just shifted. And that's where you make a decision if
you're gonna let that drive you or consume you, and
or a mixture of both of it towards something positive
(28:08):
or negative right that you know what it is. It's
the fear of that feeling that they had when didn't
make a team, or that feeling that he had when
he wasn't getting drafted coming back again. So it drives
you every day to not experience that again. About ten
years ago, there was a sixty minute story with Larry Ellison,
who runs Oracle Oracles, a massive Silicon Valley company. He's
a billionaire, and he was talking about his childhood and
(28:29):
nobody believed in him, and his stepdad, you know, didn't
believe in him. And he stopped and he said to
the reporter, he goes, I had all the things necessary
to be a billionaire. Nobody believed in me. And you
can go up in Wall Street and Silicon Valley and
our presidents and no, you can't do this. You'll never
be able to do this. Michael Jordan and Brady the
(28:51):
two greatest team sport athletes of all time. It's a
high school experience. It's a college drafting experience that dry them,
not chasing money, fame, or all time greats. Be sure
to catch live editions of The Herd weekdays at noon
Eastern a Empacific on Fox Sports Radio FS one and
(29:11):
the iHeart Radio app. Well, I don't think there's anybody
that knows more about the Patriots and how they're run
that's not currently on their staff than my friend Eric Manginie.
He was their defensive coordinator back two thousand and five,
Jets Brown's head coach, joining us via the Coward Global satellite.
First of all, just from your worldview the actual game,
(29:35):
what wrap a bowl around what really impressed you? What
really impressed me? Look when I heard Andrew Whitworth talk
about the game afterwards where he said that the Patriots
played more zone than the man that they had been
playing all season, to me, that told me a lot
about the Rams approach and where they went wrong. It's
(29:58):
not about how the Patriot it's played anybody else. It's
not about their tendencies over a sixteen or eighteen game breakdown.
It's about how they're gonna play you. And to me,
you've got to look at your weaknesses. You've got to
look at your strengths to be able to anticipate what
you're gonna get. And that summarized where the Rams went wrong.
(30:22):
That one quote, to me, summarized where the Rams made
a mistake. Yeah, I mean I really felt I'll just
throw this out there. I felt New England believed if
they mixed up coverages and created a little pressure, they
saw Goff as a weakness due to his lack of experience.
When I watched the whole game, I thought it was
built around we're going to confuse Jared Goff. We're gonna
(30:46):
blitz more than usual. That's what my interpretation was. They
take away your strengths in New England, and they also
feast on your weaknesses, and they probably felt, in my opinion,
that golf was kind of a weakness going in. Does
that sound right? That was to me, that's absolutely right.
They had a loaded box, they played borderline goal line
(31:07):
defense and said Todd Gurley and C. J. Henderson are
not going to beat us, and golf is gonna have to.
And then why when he did get step back to throw,
they were gonna mix it enough pressure so that he
was uncomfortable. And even if it was just a function
of someone putting their hand on his shoulder so that
he knew that they were close, that's what they were
gonna do that, and they were going to force him
(31:28):
make post nap breeds. Now, the other thing that I
was surprised by is offensively, you control the tempo, you
control personnel, you control shifts, motions, formations. I thought they'd
do more to try to take back control of the
game to England instead of letting New England dictate what
they wanted to do. You've got that control, offensively, use it,
(31:51):
attack their weaknesses, go some no huddle, see whether or
not to change a tempo can affect things. And I
just I didn't see that at any point. No, I
think Gurley, excuse me. I think McVeigh has created an
interesting culture and the players buy into it. But there
have been instances. Now I've seen it against New England
and Philadelphia, two staffs I think are very good. When
(32:13):
they've thrown wrinkles at mcvay's offense, they have not been
great at in game adapting. Now I want to go
to Julian Edelman. Why was he so It's not just
Eric that he was good, he was so darn open?
Why why? I mean it's I mean, they did a
really good job. They put some pressure on Tom, they
(32:34):
took away the deep ball, they took away the running back,
the pastor running backs very effectively. Whatever they did with
Edelman didn't work. Why was he so open Because New
England does a great job of gathering information pre snap
and then collectively they understand what coverage you're in, and
then based off the coverage that you're in, there's certain
(32:57):
weaknesses that are inheriting that those coverages, and there's certain
leverages that go with each coverage. So Edelman can run
read routes or even if he has a designated outside
breaking route, he's going to threaten hard to the inside
and attack leverage, threatened leverage and be able to break away.
And he's got such good short area quickness, and he
(33:17):
does such a great job of stemming the route and
selling something different right up until the breakpoint. And then
when he does break there's an incredible amount of separation.
We saw four or five, six seven yards between him
and the defensive back because of the pre stnap read
and then the way that he attacks leverage and then
his ability to come out of the breaks at the
(33:39):
top of the roads. Some have suggested we could rename
the Lombardi Trophy the Belichick I'll just say this, is
it harder? Could you make an argument what Bill's doing
is harder today than what Lombardi did. I absolutely think
you can make an argument for that. There's free agency,
everything is designed for parody. The draft. You've moved to
(34:03):
the back of the draft. You're constantly in a state
of flux. Your schedule is harder when you win. It's
all built to make sure that there's a strong middle
class and that everybody at the end of the year
has a chance to make the playoffs. It's not like
he's been able to hang on to his great players.
The Bill's done a tremendous job of being ruthlessly efficient
(34:25):
the way he moved on from whether it was Seymour
or Vaybel or Lawyer malloy or take your pick of
any of those guys, and making those tough decisions that
you have to make. Yeah, plus the salary cap that
you know, I mean, let's be honest, you just can't
keep players. I mean, yeah, yeah, it's it's every years
you've got to start over. You know, the Todd Gurley situation.
(34:47):
Joy and I have talked about this. It's like the
Bermuda Triangle of sports topics. I can't figure it out,
you know, It's like, where is he hurt? He doesn't
look like he cuts as much as he did earlier
in the year, but he played. He's got some ability
to pop. What do you make of the girly situation?
Did they overuse him eric in October? In September? Because
(35:09):
you know this, the Rams are very top heavy. They
don't have a ton of depth. They didn't until C. J.
Anderson have a second back they trusted. Is it possible
they overused him early and he's just banged up. Well,
there's a couple of different concerns here. Obviously, he was
very effective against Dallas. The Everard's seven point two yards
to carry in that game. So let's say he is hurt. Well, well,
(35:32):
that's a problem because there's a lot of people that
place bets on this game. And if and if he
was hurt and they told him he was healthy, you know,
that's that's one problem. Let's say he's not hurt. If
he's not hurt, then he's a guy that comes up
small in big games. So he's okay in the regular season,
but in the big moments you can't count on him.
(35:52):
And I think that's a really dangerous narrative that so
you're you're gonna have to get the truth out there,
because neither one of these looks very good for the
Rams or for Todd Gurley. Now all that being said,
his effectiveness at fifteen and twenty carries is impressive. Why
not give yourself a chance to see whether or not
(36:13):
that tendency holds. Why not make sure that he gets
at least fifteen carries or gets at least twenty carries
and see whether or not what has happened the majority
of the time continues to happen, or whether or not
it gets broken. But to go into the offseason not
knowing and giving the guy ten carries, I can't imagine
(36:34):
anybody's happy about that. You know, I said, this was
the most impressive New England Super Bowl to me. And
here's why you had an off field controversy. You had
the Jordan Josh Gordon situation. Edelman was suspended. You didn't
really have a deep threat the AFC with the Chiefs
and the Chargers is you know, you have a lot
of young quarterbacks who are very good. I kind of
(36:54):
felt like, with twelve draft picks coming up, your number
one pick, the lineman from Georgia got hurt. I kind
of felt like this was the year to get New England,
and they were incredibly resourceful this year. When when you
look at I think next year they're gonna be younger.
I think Gronk retires, they have twelve draft picks. I
think they're gonna be a little more dynamic offensively they
(37:18):
you know, Gronk will give him a little cap relief.
That's how I feel going into next year, that this
was a down year and it was the most impressive
super Bowl to me. What was your takeaway on the
season in full? Yeah, well, I disagree with being the
most impressive super Bowl. I think the first one where
we were fourteen point underdog against the greatest show on
Turf was a little bit more impressive. And I may
(37:40):
be biased, but yeah, the amount of things that they
had to deal with, But that's every year from New England.
And I don't know if you heard Bill's pregame interview,
but he talked about the fact that each year is
its own entity, and each year you go into the
season with who you would like to be, but then
the reality sets in of who you need to be.
(38:01):
And New England does the best job of understanding who
they need to be who they are, and then really
pouring resources into strengthening that and pouring resources into minimizing
whatever weakness is that shapes up into And it's hard.
It's hard. It takes a brutal honesty on the part
(38:25):
of the coaching staff and then a humbleness to say, yeah,
we were wrong, we were on the wrong track, and
we need to pivot. And you see it every year.
Typically they don't start as well, but they finish strong
and they keep getting better and better because of that
self awareness that so many other teams either don't have
(38:46):
or are too arrogant to accept. Good scene Yet, my man,
Eric Manginie, you have a nice offseason. We'll bring it
around here. Why don't you stop buy in La. We'll
take out for a nice steak and you do some
draft stuff for us. I'd love to see you soon,
all right, I'd love to be out there,
Hosts And Creators
Colin Cowherd
Jason McIntyre
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