Nerd Sesh - NFL Week 1 Reaction - The Volume

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
The volume.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
No, Oh my god, how could he do that?

Speaker 1 (00:14):
No?

Speaker 3 (00:16):
Watch what Charles Darwin? The nerves is where it's at.
Welcome everybody back into Nerds Sesh. As always, I'm Carson Breveren.
Alongside me is Logan Cams and today is what many
would call, I would argue the best holiday of the year,
the first full slate of NFL games, and it lived

(00:39):
up to it, especially with the closing game. We got
an awesome Sunday night showdown between the Rams and the Lions,
a revenge game of course for both Stafford and Goff
goes to ot. The Lions end up marching down the
field coming out with a win. We're gonna talk about
every game today to be clear, so every fan get excited.
We'll talk about your team or maybe get ready to
be pressed because the reality is half your team's lost.

(01:02):
But we're starting with the grand finale. What was your
biggest takeaway from the Sunday night game, Logan.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
I mean, I think that the Rams and Lions are
on pretty equal footing. I think you saw that, you know,
I mean, this game goes to ot. I do think
the Lions are a better team and they finally got
back to their identity the running game. I couldn't, for
the life of me understand why they threw the ball
so much in the second half, Like Jared Goff was
clearly off a little bit, and the running game was working,

(01:32):
like they dominated up front when they gave the rock
to Montgomery and the last two drives, the Rams.

Speaker 2 (01:37):
Defense just was gassed.

Speaker 3 (01:39):
Man.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
They were tired at the end that final drive where
they get marched on, and then in overtime too, when
they end up just getting in the end zone. Like,
I don't know if they threw the ball once on
that drive. Yeah, I think they're on equal footing though.
And the great equalizer to me is how explosive is
this Rams offense can be.

Speaker 2 (01:58):
Like, it's a really great offense.

Speaker 1 (02:01):
I worry about this offensive line a little bit because
Detroit did a good job getting pressure. They just didn't
get a whole lot of sacks because they did such
a good job of getting rid of the ball early.
And credit to Detroit too. They did a great job
of bending and not breaking in this game too. Multiple
drives they forced a turnover on downs in the red zone.
They hold La to a field goal in the red
zone twice actually, but I don't think these teams are

(02:24):
that far apart. The Rams are down a couple of
offensive linemen. Poka Nakula goes out very early in this game,
and Stafford and Cup kind of have a classic Stafford
and Cup game. Cup looked amazing tonight, fantastic.

Speaker 3 (02:37):
Man.

Speaker 1 (02:37):
I'm hoping he's back to his offensive player of the
year kind of days and we could maybe see a,
I don't know, maybe another career year for Cooper Cup.

Speaker 3 (02:45):
Man.

Speaker 1 (02:45):
I think when you have a quarterback like this, an
offensive genius like McVeigh, the Rams have such a brilliant offense,
and I thought they came equipped with a really good
offensive game plan that played directly against Detroit's hands.

Speaker 2 (02:58):
It's just not enough. Defense doesn't hold up.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
Ultimately, they don't run the ball too well in this one,
and they do have a pretty costly turnover, even though
Jared Goff gives them one back.

Speaker 3 (03:08):
But I don't think the.

Speaker 2 (03:09):
Margins are that far.

Speaker 1 (03:10):
But I think the difference maker is the fact that
the Lions just have a reliable offensive formula. They can
run the ball down basically anybody's throat, and the strongest
trench team in football.

Speaker 2 (03:18):
Man.

Speaker 1 (03:19):
I thought their advantage of the lion of scrimmage was
pronounced throughout this game.

Speaker 3 (03:23):
It's interesting to me that your takeaways that these teams
are on very even footing, because we disagreed on the
Rams preseason more than just about any other team out there.
You had them in your NFC title game. I had
them winning just eight games, third in their own division
out of the playoffs, and I think a big cause
for that difference was our outlook on the defense. I thought,
losing Raheem Morris, who was a very good defensive play caller,

(03:46):
losing Aaron Donald, of course, the greatest defensive tackle the
game has ever seen, and losing Artist Jones, who was
a really valuable, important, versatile piece of that defense that
wasn't even good last year that was nineteenth in yards
per drive allowed, nineteenth and points per drive aloud. I
thought this could be one of the weaker defenses in football.
I will say they impressed me today. I thought that

(04:06):
they were flying around. I thought that they played really hard,
and they really were not exposed for much of this game.
But I do think that you see the difference in overtime.
It is a concerning stretch from the Rams defense, which
just gets absolutely gashed physically. The Lions are dominant in
the trenches. They are an incredible rushing attack. That is

(04:28):
where they excel as a football team, and they can
do that to a lot of teams. But that could
never happen to a defense with Aaron Donald's right, you
could not run up the middle over and over and
over again like that. I mean you mentioned the final drive.
The Lions mark seventy yards. They throw the football once,
every other play is a run, and they're getting great
push up front. Montgomery is carrying dudes multiple yards. That's

(04:51):
a meaningful difference to me, because although I think these
are both very good offenses, I do think the Lions
have more defensive talent. I think the Lions are especially
better up front defensively, where they can dictate games at
the point of attack and they can get meaningful pressure
in a way that the Rams don't. But even offensive
formulas acknowledging that the Rams are really really good there.

(05:12):
It required so much Matt Stafford heroics, right, He's having
to escape the pocket, He's having to flip the ball
out to dudes and find guys with that improvisational style.
Cooper Cup carrying an insane load with Puka and Nakua
out and hopefully he's able to return from injury. And
it was impressive. But when it comes down to it,

(05:32):
what do the Lions have to do in overtime? I mean,
they don't have to sweat, they don't have to take
a single risk. They just run the football down your throat.
You see some nice play calling for Ben Johnson early
with the reverse. I thought that was a testament to
another strength of their team, that they have one of
the best offensive coordinators in football. But there are stretches
late in this game where I'm like, I trust Matt

(05:53):
Stafford more than Jared Goff and so it feels like
the Rams have the advantage, but overall, the more significant
advantage is just hoving the better offensive personnel and having
a way, way better offensive line. And of course the
Rams are down Rob Havenstein, he's injured, They're down Jackson
he's suspended, But even at full strength, like there's still
a big gap. So I do like the Rams. I

(06:14):
was impressed in this game. I do think that maybe
I undersold them a bit, but I still think there's
probably nobody in football who has a more sustainable formula
than the Lions. Everybody else needs heroics from the quarterback position.
Everybody else needs exceptional playmaking. The Lions just run the
ball down your throat and they open up the play
action and they have great play calling and that is

(06:35):
really hard to stop. When they lock in and just
play to their strengths like they did in overtime.

Speaker 1 (06:40):
I mean, it's old school classic football, man. That's what's
gonna win you games in the playoffs. And like you
mentioned too, you don't need a great game from Jared Golf.

Speaker 2 (06:47):
Frankly, I thought this was.

Speaker 1 (06:48):
A pretty bad game from Jared Golf, Like you do
have the one interception, that one not that I right
away he puts that ball in arms way. Yes, but
it's like a bang bang collision and right as it
you know his receivers meeting the guy there. You're expecting
your guy to win one on one. For me, the
bigger issue was him just being off target, off time

(07:09):
on some throws and just wasn't effective enough. And again,
once you see the Lions get back to that bread
and butter, it is a formula that you can rely on.
That's why I think that the Lions are my favorite
out of the NFC. When you were this strong in
the trenches, when you can run the ball like this
basically on anybody. The only concern I have with the
Lions is that secondary and you see it a little

(07:30):
bit in this one. It's a good contrast, and that's
why I really was interested in this matchup coming into
this week. Not only because it's a rematch between the
NFC Wildcard game from last year that was decided by
a point, not only because it's golf versus Stafford, right,
two guys facing against their own old teams, two guys
who were traded for each other facing off two number
one picks, a ton of great storylines. But it's also

(07:52):
the drastic contrast and how these offenses put in work,
and I think that they clash pretty well. I think
that you see the defensive line is going to need
to come a far away if they want to be
taken seriously.

Speaker 2 (08:04):
It's a lot of young guys up front.

Speaker 1 (08:06):
Byron Young Fiskey, the rookie from this year's draft class,
verse his teammate at Florida State. Right, you get to
see them get tested against probably the best front and
all of the NFL. And on the inverse, you get
to see this Lions secondary and if they have improved
against one of the top notch aerial attacks in the NFL,
and I think there's room for improvement on both sides,

(08:28):
a little bit more on the Rams defensive front, but
I did like what I saw from the young guys.
I am a little bit concerned about the Detroit secondary
just in terms of again how great they can be
and how that impacts them in certain matchups. But they
look better than last year. In my opinion, I'm a
little more confident. I like how Arnold looked. Carlton Davis
drops an interception, but I think he's a definitive upgrade.

(08:50):
And you you could see Rake Strow out there a
little bit. I think Brian Branch is really really solid.
So I think they're going to be better than last year.
And when that's your only weakness and you show this
to me against a really high octane offense week one,
I'm even more encouraged. Again just the way they win
this game. When your defense can hold up in the
red zone multiple times like that again, two red zone

(09:12):
stands where they hold him to three points, a red
zone stand where you get a turnover on downs, and
then along with that you get a lot of pressure.
I was really impressed, and you win again when your
quarterback doesn't play his best game or throw his best punch.
It's an impressive Week one victory for the Lions.

Speaker 3 (09:29):
And I do like this Detroit defense. I agree with you.
Of course, the secondary is always going to be the
question mark. That's the reason I didn't pick them to
go to the Super Bowl. I am worried about that.
And although we talk about the offensive formula being so replicable, like,
there's probably going to be some game, some moment where
they need Golf to be better than he was in
this game, in the clutch, and they do need him

(09:49):
to make some more high level throws and we'll see
if he can do it. But the defensive front, which
was already their strength, right, they were a phenomenal run
defense last year, really good pass rush. It's just even
better now. Marcus Davin was really impactful in this game.
He hits the quarterback three times. Alee McNeil is another
stutup front Aiden Hutchinson. Of course, he is living in
the backfield in this game. And I love the linebacking corps.
Azelone was great again and I do think that Brian

(10:12):
branch is going to be a better fit at safety.
I thought that he was pretty impactful in this game.
There is one other wrinkle to this Lion's offense, though,
that makes me maybe even more optimistic about them on
that side of the ball than last year, and that
is the emergence of Jamison Williams, who I've been high on,
who I've been really excited to see out there healthy
with another offseason of development. That's been kind of like

(10:35):
the biggest concern for a lot of people offensively with
the Lions, at least, the lack of depth in the
receiving corps, the lack of high impact guys outside of Amarra,
even though we know that Laporta is one of the
best receiving tight ends in football, and I've been confident
that Jamison Williams is the sort of explosive threat who
can take the top off of defenses in a way
that Amonra and Laporta working the middle of the field

(10:57):
as possession consistent guys just don't thought the saw that.
I mean, he absolutely burnt my beloved Trey White, which
was tough. I felt for my boy coming off the Achilles.
I'm happy to see him out there starting, but that's
a young man's game covering Jamison Williams and he was
not up for it. On that play they get him
going on a reverse, like he just adds a dimension
to this offense with that sort of explosive speed. That

(11:19):
just makes life even easier on Jared Goff. So like,
this wasn't a great offensive second half from the Lions.
They stalled a little bit. But also you think Golf
didn't play very well, didn't really get Laporta involved until late,
didn't really get Amanra involved at all. It's just the
run game and it's the emergence of Jamison and they
still put up twenty six points and when it comes

(11:39):
down to it, they march down the field. So I
think this is an elite football team the Rams. I
was impressed, but I do still have more questions.

Speaker 1 (11:47):
Yeah, just a few more things I want to add
on top of that. The interception the Golf throws in
the second half too, That takes three more points off
the board. You have three three and outs in the
second half of the Lions. Again, that's when they were
leaning on Golf a little bit more. And Jamison Williams
is that home run hitter. I mean, you see it
even back in the NFC title game, in the early
stages of that game, first quarter hits a home run.

(12:09):
Every NFL team needs a guy like this, and that
is the thing that unlocks this offense to its full completion,
Right you.

Speaker 2 (12:16):
Have a Monra and Laporta your steady hands.

Speaker 1 (12:19):
When you can have that kind of home run hitter,
it just opens up everything else. And I like, for
the record, I like Khalif Raymond a bit too. I
think he's a good slot guy. I think he's a,
you know, a good third depth receiver. I don't think
they're like I liked Josh Reynolds when he was here,
and I thought he had a decent game in Denver
for how bad bo Nicks was. But I fully trust

(12:40):
Jamison williams Is to step up and fill that role.
And last thing I want to mention about the defensive front.
Davenport had a great debut with this team. He looked phenomenal.
This is a defensive line that's still down DJ Reeder,
who is one of the best run stuffers in all
of the NFL. He's out of this game with a
torn quad.

Speaker 2 (12:56):
I mean, when he.

Speaker 1 (12:57):
Gets back, this is a probably the best defensive line
in football, one of, if not the it's gonna take
another step up even more.

Speaker 3 (13:04):
So.

Speaker 1 (13:05):
Yeah, I'm still I'm still hoarding all the Lions stock Man,
I am still You're all in.

Speaker 2 (13:11):
I'm still rocking with them.

Speaker 3 (13:12):
I mean, you're saying the Rams are on the same
level as them, And for people who don't know, you
have the Lions winning the Super Bowl, So that's the
top level. You can't get any better than that. I
do think that there's a gap, and I mean you
mentioned the defensive front. I think Stafford throws that pick
in the end zone. I think the pressure was a
large part of that. Also, he misdiagnosed the coverage, but
they're just accelerating that timeline. And I did think the

(13:34):
Lions were able to do that and Stafford dealt with
it because Stafford's just him, Bro. Stafford's been underrated. It
feels like there's sort of a collective awakening, like, Wow,
this dude can make throws that very very few people can.
And even though he's not the most athletic, he's still
a great improviser, and he can create out a structure
a really high level, and he can carry an offense
and he did all that, He just missed a couple throws,

(13:56):
misses that third down throw to Cup that could have
basically end of the game, and then almost threw the
pick to Carlton Davis as you mentioned. So he wasn't perfect,
and he probably had to be if the Rams were
gonna win this game. So it's a good showing from
the Lions. Not perfect, but they end up getting it
done when it matters most. Let's move on logan to

(14:20):
Bill's Cardinals. Why don't we talk about that game? Of course,
we're always going to talk about Josh Allen and his
greatness here, and he delivered today. What did you take
away from that one?

Speaker 1 (14:29):
Well, I really thought the Bills let this game be
way closer than it should have been to start off
this game. On the first drive for the Cardinals, third
and thirteen, there's a horrible unnecessary roughness penalty on Dorian Williams.

Speaker 2 (14:43):
Kyler.

Speaker 1 (14:44):
W Kyler, Murray, excuse me, gets out and scrambles is
going to duck and like Dorian still goes for it,
but you can clearly see that he lifts up right
at the end of his tackle, none of his weight
hits Kyler. I'm pretty sure Kyler gets under him unscathed,
like that should have been a field goal. At worst,
they give the Cardinals a free TD. The refs do

(15:05):
excuse me. I mean they should have gotten off the
field there. And then DJ Dallas has an eighty eight
yard return TD for Arizona. So outside of that, I
mean the defense actually would have given up, you know,
eighteen points at most. Josh also has a sack and
fumbles in the red zone. Kyler also gives that back
to He has a sack fumble that turns into points

(15:26):
for Buffalo. But I always felt that everything was gonna
be okay because they had Josh Allen. He goes for
two hundred and thirty two yards today four total tds,
two passing and two rushing. Two power rushing tds versus
Arizona two. I mean, you just can't bottle up Josh
in the red zone. It's what he does. Man Shakiirn Coleman,

(15:47):
I thought looked good. I think they need to get
Dalton Kincaid going a little more. They ran the ball
effectively enough in this game, and I didn't think the
defense played great, but they held up. Like I said,
I think they were played better than the stats suggest
you got to eight points on the board, but you've
got a phantom TV that should have been a field
goal return TD. The defense holds the Cardinals to field
goals on two of four of their red zone trips.

(16:09):
They hold Kyler Murray under one hundred and seventy yards
passing and they get back there four times. I don't
think the Cardinals are a good football team. I think
the Bills defense is a little underrated at this point.
But I was impressed with how they bottled up Kyler
Murray for the most part, and.

Speaker 2 (16:23):
Josh Allen did his thing. If you can just clean
up on.

Speaker 1 (16:25):
These weird, freak fluke plays that always seem to happen
to the Bills, Man, there's never a normal Bills game.
But I thought they played. I thought they played pretty well.
And again many they got Josh Allen the end of
the day. Man, I just believe in Josh Right. People
always were asking I had so many people Carson after
our previews, why do you think the Bills are gonna

(16:47):
be good this year? All why do you do you
think the Bills have a chance at beating the Chiefs
in the playoffs, Because that is a prediction of mine.
To me, there is no quarterback in the NFL more
well equipped to go head to head to go toe
to toe mahomes than Josh Allen. And so when you
asked me a question like that, why are you picking
the Bills?

Speaker 2 (17:04):
It's not a Bills thing.

Speaker 1 (17:05):
Like I think the Bills are a good football team.
It's because that's how much I believe in Josh Allen.

Speaker 3 (17:11):
It's not a conversation when you talk about who's number two,
and I think that we seem to be trending towards
that recognition. I don't know, maybe I'm being overly optimistic,
but I talked about how the fact that it was
ridiculous that we ever had this whole Burrow Allen conversation,
that that was frankly a fake ad debate. I tweeted
that out and seen the most people agreed with me

(17:31):
on that matter. So we'll see. I'm sure things will
eb and flow. Josh will have a game with two
turnovers and then everybody will decide that he's awful again. Literally,
the strip sack like the first thing the announcer says, Oh,
that's the Josh Allen experience. How do you like? Four touchdowns?
Two hundred and seventy yards and an incredibly efficient performance.
He had four touchdowns five incompletions in this game. Logan,

(17:52):
it was really surgical, and he did that in spite
of some sloppiness around him. Offensively, James Cook was mostly
good in this game. But really what I'm talking about
is the offensive line and particularly penalties. Dude. The Bills
had nine penalties in this game. I would guess that
six or seven of them were on the old line,

(18:13):
and there's a bunch that came at pretty pivotal moments,
like down seventeen to three, trying to lead a crucial drive.
At the end of that first half. They had three
false starts in like a minute and a half stretch,
and Josh still led them down the field for a
touchdown to start the second half, again, trying to get
on even footing in the game. They hold immediately set

(18:33):
up first and twenty. Josh still leads a touchdown drive.
They have a false start to set up third and
fourteen in the fourth quarter, another pivotal drive. Josh gets
it to fourth and short, then he converts with his legs.
He leads another touchdown drive. So they kept on having
these sort of potential drive killers, and Josh was able
to overcome that, I thought, particularly extending plays, rolling out

(18:55):
that's where he was at his best in this game.
Not necessarily any like one jaw dropping moment, just again
extending plays, buying himself time and improvising. But I thought
that he did that really, really effectively, and they were
never in a hurry. It never felt like this was
panic mode for the Bills. Josh never got careless with

(19:16):
the football, and I thought that that was really positive.
You mentioned the weirdness of this game. I do want
to be clear because it was a bogus, bogus roughing
the passer call that went against Dorian Williams. Kyler is
a rusher at that time, or I guess they called
it unnecessary roughness. His sliding Dorian pulls up literally makes

(19:37):
minimal minimal contact, is very clearly actively trying to avoid
making contact. And that was on third down. They were
going to get off the field. Instead they get a touchdown.
What I will say, and what's important to mention, is
that the Bills got a call later in the game
that went in their own favor that was also pretty egregious.
They called roughing the passer against the Cardinals, it looked
like maybe it was a face mask in the moment,

(19:59):
which is not what they called, but it really wasn't.
I mean, there was a little contact to the head,
but I don't know. I thought that that was a
clean sack and that allowed the Bills to maintain a drive.
So I thought that things even out on that front.
But when we talk about the rest of this offense,
I liked what we saw from the receiving corps as well,
and I have been very, very vocal about the fact

(20:19):
that I basically thought that this Bill's offense would not
skip a beat and that they would not miss Stefan Diggs.
He regressed last season. He was the third most productive
receiver over the last twelve weeks of the year. Some
addition by subtraction, just with being rid of Ken Dorsey
for a full season, knowing what they have in the
running game with James Cook, like, there's just a lot

(20:40):
of pieces in place that I really like, and there
are receivers who I like. Here, Khalil Shakira, I've been
saying one of the most underrated players in football. He
has a touchdown in this game. His balance is just incredible,
he's got a knack for getting open. And Keon Coleman
played a really good game. The rookie who they picked
thirty third overall. He was getting open, made a beautiful
catch on the side line, and we talked about this

(21:01):
after Thursday night. The instant that Xavier Worthy did anything
good for the Chiefs, everybody rushed to say, Oh my god,
how could the Bills do business with the Chiefs and
let them get their guy. I think Keon's more of
a true number one. I think he has that build.
I think he has that upside. And the Bills got
their guy. They got the guy they wanted, and I
was happy with his performance in the debut, but also

(21:22):
the depth pieces. It's a well rounded group, I think,
not an elite group, not a flashy group. But Mac
Collins looked good. He caught a touchdown off of a
smart audible from Josh mvs. He's a frustrating football player,
but he is at least a deep threat that you
can introduce to this offense. Curtis Samuel was sort of
like the gadget guy. He catches a screen in this game.

(21:44):
And of course Dalon Kinkaid is like the best route
runner arguably the best pass catcher in this room, and
he didn't even really do much in this game. So
Josh was really spreading the wealth. And I think that
that is reflective of a the fact that this room
is deep in the fact this room has been underrated,
but maybe more importantly that he's Josh Allen and he's

(22:05):
gonna turn out a top five offense no matter what,
because he's just the sort of special dual threat who
is capable of doing that, a talent that we've very
rarely seen in the history of this sport. And if
he can buy you four to five seconds rolling out
to get open and then he can throw back across
his body, like yeah, any receivers are going to be
able to produce in that environment. That's what he does.
He's an elevator. So I thought that the offense produced.

(22:28):
I mean, they put up thirty four points in this game.
I think they're going to be one of the lead
offenses in football. The defense was more of a mixed bag,
and I thought that Kyler was really surgical in the
first half. He was escaping the pocket when he had
space to do so, but when the Bills were really
trying to contain him. He was just dotting up from
inside the pocket and the pass rush wasn't getting home.

(22:50):
I didn't love the play calling from the new defensive coordinator,
Bobby Babbage. I thought there were a couple of breakdowns.
There was a third down where he dropped Greg Russo
into coverage. Your best pass rush. He was dominant in
this game as a pass rusher. Have him do what
he does best. They were struggling to tackle Connor early.
Like first half, Cardinals had three possessions, they got three scores.
So the Bills defense was struggling and you're missing some

(23:13):
key pieces there at Matt Mulano. Tarren Johnson gets hurt
in this game. But of course they also let both
of their veterans safeties go this offseason, Jordan Poyer and
Micah Hyde. Second half, though, I thought that they really
snapped into gear. Rousseau just took over. Ends the first
series with a sack on third down, has a strip
sack on the next series. He's a star. I think

(23:33):
that he probably remains underrated on a national scale and
logan of all people. Von Miller makes a play to
give the Bills an opportunity to go up six in
the final couple minutes of this game, just a straight
bull rush just drives the left tackle into Kyler for
a sack. I am not suddenly going to become a
von Miller optimist, but last year he was just about

(23:56):
the worst football player that I'd ever seen. I mean,
he quite literally made zero impactful plays in an entire
season of football. I think he had two or three
tackles in a season of football while being paid like
a star. Of course, so he already taught that in
game one of this season, and the run defense was
much better in the second half. So we've been harping

(24:16):
on this. We don't need to beat a dead horse.
But all the losses that people were concerned about with
the Bills were, in my opinion, largely overstated. They're going
to be in a lead offense. McDermott's a good defensive coach.
They still have good personnel in place. If they can
stay healthy and survive Milano's absence in the regular season,
it'll be a really, really good team and they should
be the favorite to win this division.

Speaker 2 (24:36):
Still, Yeah, I agree.

Speaker 1 (24:38):
I thought Bernard played a good game too in the middle,
holding it down. You watched this one a little closer
than I did. How come the Cardinals couldn't get Marvin
Harrison Junior going in this one? He is one catch
for four yards on three targets. Yeah, what did you
attribute that to?

Speaker 3 (24:54):
I thought he was well covered. I thought the Bills
made him a point of emphasis. He also got a
target early in this one, and Kyler threw him a
nice ball and he just dropped it. And that was
another thing. Kyler played really well. Man. The stat sheet
is good, but he also threw a couple of nice
balls that were dropped, including on that final drive Michael
Wilson drops a ball. He basically put that last ball

(25:16):
exactly where it needed to be and it was just
a good play by the dB for the Bills. So
I'm not worried about Marvin. I just think he's gonna
demand a lot of defensive attention and he's never got
going in this one.

Speaker 1 (25:29):
Yeah, I mean some other guys had good games. I
thought Trey McBride played a pretty good game too. Kyler
seemed to find him.

Speaker 3 (25:35):
And Kyler loves Dorsch as well. Like I think it's
just an underratedly deep receiving room for the Cardinals too.
And the Cardinals I think are very solid.

Speaker 1 (25:44):
Dude.

Speaker 3 (25:45):
I consider this a good win for the Bills, especially
rallying from being down early. That offense is legit. The
defense is not so good. But I think Kyler and
the Cardinals they're gonna give a lot of teams trouble
in a good game this year. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (25:58):
I was gonna say, I don't think it gonna be great,
but they're gonna be feisty, they're gonna be competitive, and
they're not gonna go down. I like the Cardinals too,
and it hinges on Kyler Man. Kyler's I said this
in offseason. I mean, when guys go out.

Speaker 2 (26:11):
For a long time, it's weird.

Speaker 3 (26:12):
Man.

Speaker 1 (26:12):
Normally they get a little overrated, right. I think the
inverse happened with Kyler Man. I think that people have
kind of forgotten about how good he is, and I
honestly don't think the stat sheet does him justice. But
the pressure did get home in the second half. I
thought for the most part, he dealt with it really well,
especially extending play. He's one of the best weapons I've
seen rushing like he's so good at getting out of

(26:32):
the pockets, so good at manipulating it. Yeah, I think
the Cardinals are going to be competitive. Man, I don't
look at them as a real playoff contender or anything
like that. Again, they're playing in a pretty tough division.
But I don't think the Cardinals are just gonna be
a pushover team in the ways that sometimes they were
last year.

Speaker 3 (26:48):
No, And I'm with you on Kyler. He really is
a very unique, very special talent at the position. Everybody
hates him because he plays cod and because he can't
single handedly save the Cardinals, and he was a number
one overall pick, so I expectations are high. But like
the combination of arm, talent and speed, it's incredibly rare.
And again, he was making really good decisions in this game,

(27:08):
so you're right, Actually this actually doesn't look crazy for him.
But I thought he played a really good football game,
and I thought that this was an encouraging Week one
for the Cardinals overall. All Right, you know who did
not have an encouraging Week one? Logan the Jacksonville Jaguars,
who were in full control against the Dolphins early, potential
for a little bit of an upset and they end

(27:28):
up just melting down late. Really, what was your biggest
takeaway from this game?

Speaker 1 (27:35):
I mean, they completely crumbled. The Jets less let this one.
The Jaguars, excuse me, they let this one slip through
their fingers, basically a fourteen point swing. They're marching in
the second half. They have a lead and etti En
fumbles the ball out of the end zone. Immediately after that,
Tyreek kill in this offense. I answered with a eighty
yard TD.

Speaker 2 (27:54):
To the house.

Speaker 1 (27:54):
And I want to give a big shout out to
the Dolphins defense. They absolutely clamped the Jags up in
the second half.

Speaker 2 (28:00):
Half.

Speaker 1 (28:00):
The jag score seventeen points in the first half. They
score zero in the second half. They go two of
ten overall on third down. They have five three and
outs in the second half, and they amassed just one
hundred and three total yards in the second half. Ninety
four of those came on one drive when at TNAS
the turnover, they come up with back to back clutch

(28:21):
sacks on Trevor Lawrence. Jason Sanders missed a forty two
yarder earlier in the game. He makes the game winner
fifty two yarder. He is now eight of eight on
game winning or tying field goals in the fourth quarter
in overtime, and Trevor Lawrence has to be better, man.
I was really disappointed with him. Twelve of twenty two,
one hundred and sixty two yards, one TD to zero picks.

(28:43):
I did pick the Jaguars to win this game, and
I was pretty confident that they were gonna wrap this
thing up.

Speaker 2 (28:49):
It's just it's inexcusable.

Speaker 1 (28:50):
Man. Lawrence is responsible for just thirty seven yards in
the second half, and you know, the Dolphins did a
much better job of getting pressure home. You got to
carry to the offense, man. You gotta put something together
like Bigsby and Attend did their thing on a drive.
Lawrence really didn't do anything in the second half. And
the big thing to me is that the Dolphins offense,

(29:12):
in my eyes, can only be better. It's impressive that
they won this game without the rushing attack. This was
the number one rushing attack in twenty twenty three that
averaged five point one yards per attempt. In this game,
they averaged just three point two rushing yards per attempt.
And I gonna give a lot of credit to it.
He played a good game. I still don't think he's
as good as everyone says he is. I don't think
he's a top ten QB in football.

Speaker 3 (29:34):
Yeah, let's hear all the mandatory disc claimers.

Speaker 1 (29:36):
I have to he struggles when he's pressured, he struggles
to make plays out of structure. But he has three
hundred and thirty eight yards a TD eight yards per pass.
The Dolphins offense goes eight of sixteen on third down,
and I only think the offense is gonna be more explosive.
Tyreek Hill one hundred and thirty yards, eighty yard TV. Yeah,
Waddle goes for one hundred and nine yards a chain

(29:56):
has seventy six receiving yards. Like credit to this Jags
front and holding the running game in check. But the
Dolphins have multiple ways they can kill you, man, like
when you can't get immense pressure on two and get
him off target.

Speaker 2 (30:08):
I thought the Jags did a better job of that
in the first half.

Speaker 1 (30:11):
They can get going, and it's really impressive to me
that the Dolphins did this without the running game. I mean,
every game they dominated on the ground, this one they didn't,
and they show that they can win it in a
different way. And this defense played much much better in
the second half, completely bottled up Jacksonville.

Speaker 3 (30:27):
There's just something about the Jags that I really don't.

Speaker 2 (30:31):
It's a sunk Man. It's like a curse or something. Dude.

Speaker 3 (30:34):
Yeah, well, now they're riding at like an all time
low considering how last year ended, dropping five of the
last six. I think, for me, the biggest thing is
just that I do not like this coaching staff. I
don't like Doug Peterson, I don't like Press Taylor as
a play caller. And listen, there's a couple of really
unfortunate moments that don't go their way. Eatn fumbles on
the goal line, great punched by Javon holland huge play

(30:57):
basically kept the Dolphins in that game. But some of
the decision making from the coaching staff going for it
in their own territory, they give the ball to Etn
play is just completely blown up, like they aren't close
to converting it. And I just think consistently the play
calling here is not creative. It doesn't make the most

(31:18):
of Trevor's talent, and Trevor had to be better. The
Jags were just really bad situationally, especially later in this game.
They go two of ten on third down and Christian
Kirk drops a very catchable ball on third and five
when they're up a field goal and they're potentially driving
downfield like they just didn't execute in any of the
big moments. Brian Thomas Junior looked really good in the

(31:39):
first half of this game and then basically just got
phased out. So they're just a team that I fundamentally
don't trust. They have pieces in place. I like. I
am a Lawrence defender. I don't think that he is
one of the elite quarterbacks in football at this stage,
but I think he's knocking on the door of top ten.
I think that he is still an immensely talented quarterback

(32:00):
who largely is not at fault for the Jags issues.
But he never closed the door in this game, and
so he didn't have that catastrophic moment. But at the
same time, he didn't do what is expected of him
as a high end quarterback in the home stretch of
this game. I thought the Dolphins played fine. I thought
that Hill and Waddle did their thing. They're phenomenal. It's
the fastest offense that we've ever seen, and you felt

(32:21):
that in this one. I mean, you get Hill and
Waddle going on these deep crossers. It's unguardable. They're going
to go for fifty plus yards once a game a
Chan is just explosive, not necessarily on the ground in
this one, but got really involved in the receiving game.
And Tua did his job. I thought he played a
solid game. He got the ball to his playmakers, especially
in that second half. I do want to give some

(32:42):
credit to the Jags run defense. I thought that with
Eric Armstead up front there now there was some improvement.
But as you say, Dolphins didn't run the ball well,
they still did enough offensively, and I do think they
were gifted some opportunities by the Jags. So I'm not
really moved on my outlook for either of these teams
by this game. I think the Jags are probably gonna
be just outside the playoffs, and I think the Dolphins

(33:05):
are probably just gonna sneak in.

Speaker 2 (33:08):
I feel the same way.

Speaker 1 (33:09):
I don't have the Dolphins making the playoffs, but I
think they're gonna be knocking on the door, and I
think the Jags are gonna be better, although I don't know, man,
I don't like Press Taylor either at this point. I
don't like Doug Peterson. I think you gotta fire him
if you don't make the playoffs this year. Like there's
enough talent here where you know, they shouldn't be this

(33:33):
bad and Trevor Lawrence shouldn't look this bad. Like in
a lot of ways too, they don't. I don't think
they set them up for success with this play calling.
What I will say, I like Brian Thomas Junior a lot,
and I think he's probably the best receiver that Trevor
Lawrence has had up to this point, and I'm really
excited about him long term in this offense. I think
they're gonna be a really potent duo. That TD was nice,
he had another nice sideline grab. He's really solid, and

(33:54):
I think this offense could go up a notch if
they get it done, and the chants aren't that far
off if they score that TD if et gets in
the end zone, which again I think that was way
more had to do with the rushing attack with bigs
B with etten going on that drive. We're looking at
this game in a little bit different way. That one
play really swung the momentum in this game. I mean

(34:15):
just and the Jags crumbled, and sadly that's kind of
a part of the Jags identity and experience right now
is when you give them a little bit of resistance.
When you push back a little bit, you know, they
fold like a house of cards. That's got to change,
and the way that changes by winning games against good
football teams. They don't get it done here, but they
were really, really close. You got to play a complete

(34:37):
game and the Jags put up a goose egg in
the second half. Man, you can't just call it after
one half, dude. You got to put the whole thing together,
and they just didn't tonight. But yeah, I think they're
going to be better. But there's there's definitely a stink man,
a black cloud, or a something over Jacksonville for sure.

Speaker 3 (34:54):
Let's talk about the other AFC South matchup Logan Colts Texans.
This was a fun one. Texans end up holding on
It's a close game. What did you take away from
this one?

Speaker 1 (35:04):
It was a very fun game, and I just was
really surprised that Joe Mixon's debut. I was convinced Mixon
was washed. He goes for one hundred and fifty nine
rushing yards the TD. The Texans in turn dominate the
time of possession game forty minutes to twenty minutes. In
this game, the Colts defense was just on the field

(35:25):
a lot and CJ. Shroud played well enough. This was
an underwhelming Week one for me. Statistically. You may look
at it and you go all CJ played a good game.
Twenty four thirty two two hundred and thirty four yards
two tds. He has a really bad interception in this
game in the red zone. He's rolling out of the
pocket trying to make a play. Ultimately, a holding penalty

(35:46):
on the defense brings that back. There's also another play
where he's under duress trying to throw a ball out
of bounds that one gets almost caught. He gets lucky
on that one. So I didn't think Straul played his
cleanest or best game. It wasn't a horrible game, but
there were a little There were a few rookie moments
that we didn't see in Stroud's rookie year. And honestly,

(36:08):
if you go back and look at the tape there,
he only has five picks his rookie year. There's a
lot of passes on tape two that he gets away with.

Speaker 2 (36:16):
But it was a good game.

Speaker 1 (36:16):
I thought the Texans did a good job with their
pass rush getting home. They did a phenomenal job on
Jonathan Taylor in that push up front, and I think
Anthony Richardson is gonna have a bit of a roller
coaster season this year. Carson nine of nineteen forty seven
point three completion percentage, two hundred and twelve passing yards,
two tds, and a pick. He also has fifty six

(36:37):
rushing yards and one TD.

Speaker 2 (36:39):
What I will give him props.

Speaker 1 (36:40):
For that was an insane throw to Alec Pierce. I
have not seen many highlights like that man. The fact
that he snaps the ball, he slips, and in the
moment of like a second, recollects himself fires a pinpoint
accurate ball past two Texans defenders. I mean, it's in strive,
it's on time. Pierce doesn't have to slow down or anything,

(37:01):
catches it, waltz into the end zone.

Speaker 2 (37:03):
It's a freaking bomb like that.

Speaker 3 (37:06):
Tell me if I'm overreacting, I think that might be
the best throw I've ever seen.

Speaker 2 (37:09):
It's up there, it's it's it's step.

Speaker 3 (37:11):
Seven yards a split second after slipping, damn near off
his back foot.

Speaker 1 (37:15):
Steal take and he took a lick. He took a
lick right afterwards.

Speaker 3 (37:21):
Legitimately one of the most incredible things I've ever seen
on a football field.

Speaker 1 (37:24):
The reason I say it's going to be a roller coaster,
and this is why I picked against the Colts. It's
also a combination of why I picked against the Titans
having great seasons. I think you're just gonna have a
battle of both right now. He's a young quarterback inexperience.
He also has an awesome play fourth down. The Colts
are down nine points, they need it in the red zone.
Just a grown man clutch, big body rushing TD. Almost

(37:47):
gets held up at the one, but he's not going
to be denied. Uses all of his weight to push
into the end zone. But he does throw a really
bad interception overthrow in the middle of the field. There's
another ball to Alec Pierce that he just misses. Again,
it's about the consistency, you know. Again, he's below fifty
percent completion percentage. I think Richardson is gonna put together
one hell of a highlight tape if he can stay

(38:09):
healthy this year. I'm talking pinpoint accurate bombs like we
saw it to Pierce, huge plays like that. I think
we're gonna see him make some monstrous plays with his legs.
I think he's gonna be really efficient in the red
zone as a rushing threat. He's just got those physical tools.
But again, I think there's gonna be some technical issues
him reading the field, going through progressions, decision making, and

(38:30):
a little bit of that inaccuracy that's gonna lead to
some turnovers.

Speaker 2 (38:33):
I'm high on Richardson long term.

Speaker 1 (38:34):
I think it's just gonna take him a little bit
of time to get more experienced.

Speaker 2 (38:38):
But I think it's gonna be a bit of a
roller coaster.

Speaker 1 (38:40):
You're gonna have some really high highs with Richardson, but
I also think there's gonna be some lows, some learning moments,
and his what is basically his rookie year.

Speaker 2 (38:48):
I mean, he plays in four games last year.

Speaker 3 (38:50):
I'm higher on ar than you are.

Speaker 2 (38:53):
And I mean this season or long term.

Speaker 3 (38:56):
I know that. I mean think this year is gonna
be roller coaster. I don't disagree with that. However, when
you compare him to Levis, I would put them in
a different.

Speaker 1 (39:05):
Cabg no, no, no, no, no, I'm okay. I'm definitely hot.
I don't mean to lump them in the same I
think Levis is going to have more.

Speaker 3 (39:12):
Lewis just has way more of a tendency to make
like those absolutely boneheaded plays. We saw perhaps the goat
of them all today and he's just not as talented.
Anthony Richardson is legitimately one of the most physically gifted
quarterbacks we have ever seen. He's six ' five, he's
built like a tank, he runs a four four forty,

(39:33):
and he has one of the handful of strongest arms
in football. Like he is physically Cam Newton reincarnated. He
is Josh Allen like that is the sort of freak,
but faster, faster than both of them. And I think
that this guy's probably going to be a superstar in
this league. I think that he is on that trajectory.
I just cannot think of a guy this physically talented

(39:57):
who didn't reach those heights. Like but he's probably gonna,
say JaMarcus Russell, because he could throw the football seventy
five yards on his knees. But like, no, First of all,
the mobility alone is such a meaningful difference. And also
Anthony Richardson is in a situation where he's with a
good oc He's with a good offensive mind in Shane Steichen.
I think that's important. And when I think about Josh,

(40:19):
how Josh looked in year two how Josh looked as
a rookie. I thought that Richardson, Yes he had his
moments of inaccuracy last year, Yes he had his moments
of questionable decision making, but I thought in the four
games we saw he was more polished than a rookie
Josh Allen. I thought this game, yeah, again, we only
see him throw the ball nineteen times, but he was

(40:39):
pretty good overall. And there are just like so many
special moments out there where it goes beyond, just like
a highlight reel, like he is just shredding the Texans
with the Reid option on the ground. He doesn't just
make one of the craziest throws I've ever seen that
we talked about. He throws another ball sixty yards that
Alex Pierce makes a great play on, but like again,
an accurate ball sixty yards downfield, fourth and goal, he

(41:03):
just carries a defender into the end zone on a run.
And he still has so much potential to continue to
tap into like he is such a young man.

Speaker 2 (41:14):
In he's the youngest starting quarterback in the NFL.

Speaker 3 (41:17):
Youngest starting quarterback in the NFL barely twenty two keep
in minutes after his rookie season. He's still the youngest starter,
famously only started one season in college, got hurt last year.
He's only started eighteen games since high school, and he
already looks pretty damn good when you consider that standard,
when you consider that trajectory for development for these guys

(41:38):
who are crazy talented but are raw, I think he's
ahead of schedule, and I think there's gonna be one
year where just all comes together. I don't think it's
this year. I think this year might look something like
twenty nineteen Josh Allen, where there are moments where you're
frustrated and doesn't take good enough care of the football.
But I think the year that he like takes that
leap and all of a sudden is one of the

(41:59):
different makers in football. I think it's coming. I don't
know if it's next year. I don't know if it's
the year after that, but I think it's more likely
or not that we see him reach those heights.

Speaker 1 (42:08):
One another couple bonus points for Anthony Richardson. I mean,
he keeps him in this game when Jonathan Taylor really
can't get going. Sixteen carries, forty eight yards three yards
per carry, he gets a TD. But I mean, this
is Richardson, you know, pulling this offense to being in
this game. And also you talk about the JaMarcus Russell
Compton people might go to when they're trying to downplay

(42:29):
his physical tools or why Richardson might fail in this league.
The difference between them two to me is Richardson cares.

Speaker 3 (42:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (42:36):
I mean Richardson just cares on a different level in
a way. You know, he wants to get better, He
wants to be great, Like I see it every week
that he's played, like. He just has that kind of
iron will that I believe in. And you talk about
his you know, his union with Shane Steikn Stichen, in
my opinion, makes the most out of these guys and

(42:57):
comes up with great game plans. Look what he did
his with Jalen Hurts. Again, Anthony Richardson is not Jalen
Hurts right now. It's honestly, I don't mean to downplay
Jalen Hurts. It's probably not that far of a gap,
Like I could see Richardson closing it pretty soon. But
that's what I'm saying. Stikeen is a guy that's gonna
get the most out of him. I thought the offensive
line had a pretty poor game out the gates. I

(43:17):
think they're gonna play better and they don't get Jonathan
Taylor going whatsoever. And again, Carson, like you said, when
you can connect on these big kind of shot plays,
there are just some quarterbacks that can't do that. Yeah,
there's some quarterbacks that are incapable of making the big
throws that he can. There are quarterbacks that are incapable
of having this kind of impact on the ground. So

(43:39):
it's like, Okay, you're giving me just a diamond in
the rough. If this guy can clean up the easiest
part of the game, which is processing, which is being
accurate on shortened medium routes, which is going through his progressions. Again,
playing quarterbacks probably the hardest job in football.

Speaker 2 (43:55):
Maybe you go corner, it's.

Speaker 1 (43:57):
A damn hard job. But Anthony Richardson does the hardest
things at the position pretty easily right now. And if
he can just clean up on the simplicity, I do
think he's gonna be a damn good QB. And I
think there is a gap between him and Levis. I
think Levis played a better game than the turnovers and
the numbers will suggest, But you know, I'm not confident
in him being like a consistent starter. I could see

(44:18):
him having a bad year this year and getting benched.
I don't see that with Richardson. I think Richardson is
a multi year starter here and has a lot more
room to grow. I think he's going to be pretty good.
I don't know if it's top ten good. I don't
know if it's top five good. I don't know where
it is, but it's upper half of the league, and
I think he's going to reach it next year or two.

Speaker 3 (44:39):
Yeah. Again, I think about the crazy talented but raw
dudes Lamar Josh, he's further along, and I really do
think that if you put dudes with that sort of
talent in the modern NFL, with a good offensive mind,
like you can really tap into a ton of that potential.
It's not to downplay the importance of reading the field,

(45:00):
taking the easy stuff, being accurate, but like we have
seen dudes get to the point where they're good at
that stuff and then they're also just absurdly physically talented,
and that's what makes for an elite quarterback. And it's
a skill set that you just can't replicate, and he's
got it.

Speaker 2 (45:13):
It's the most valuable one in the NFL.

Speaker 1 (45:15):
Today, and absolutely like you're talking about with average quarterbacks,
there are quarterbacks that can go through the progressions and
make all the right reads, but they're limited in the
elite stuff, the stuff that makes quarterbacks elite, the scrambling,
the out of pocket playmaking, the limitations of having a big,
strong arm. A r's got all of.

Speaker 3 (45:33):
That, Like Joe Burrow would be an example of one
of the dudes who's got all the intellectual stuff, but
he just doesn't have that top tier athleticism creation. I
think Joe's great. I think he's a top five quarterback,
but rough showing for his Bengals today. Rough showing for
him today. They lose to the Pats, who a lot

(45:54):
of us have anticipated would be one of the worst
teams in football. And they don't just lose. It never
really feels like they're in the game. I mean, just
a kneemic end to end. How worried are you about Cincinnati, Logan.

Speaker 2 (46:08):
I mean, I won.

Speaker 1 (46:09):
I don't know if I said it on last show,
but I said it on the THEO Show. I did
take the Patriots to win this game, and my predictions.
I just had a weird feeling and I mean, I'm
not worried because I didn't expect the Bengals to be that.

Speaker 2 (46:22):
Good this year. But Burrow looks really limited in this one.

Speaker 1 (46:25):
I thought New England did a phenomenal job of taking
away passes over the top, but they looked really limited.
And that's what I said in the preseason with this
team is they're so reliant on their top two players,
Joe Burrow and Jamar Chase. It's like, if you can
x out Jamar, if you can make him, you know,
into an average receiver, which he had six catches for

(46:47):
sixty two yards, if you can take him out of
the game, there's not really much else that they can do.
Joe is not a particularly mobile quarterback that can punish
you on the ground. They couldn't get the running.

Speaker 2 (46:56):
Game going in this one. T Higgins is out.

Speaker 1 (46:59):
The offense just looked really, really limited. Down Higgins and
the Bengals lose to fumbles. That's not on Burrow. Tanner
Hudson has a fumble, Charlie Jones has a fumble. But
they're bad on third down. They go four of eleven there.
They only produced two hundred and twenty four yards of
total offense and the defense got shredded on the ground.

(47:20):
The big problem with the Bengals last year is they
couldn't stop anybody through the air.

Speaker 2 (47:23):
Is this year?

Speaker 1 (47:24):
Is this going to be the problem that haunts them
this year? Like Jacoby throws for one hundred and twenty
one yards in this game, yeah, you never want that's
Kenny Pickett numbers.

Speaker 2 (47:33):
You don't want to lose to a guy like that.
I mean comedy.

Speaker 3 (47:35):
You don't want to be in Kenny Pickett conversations.

Speaker 1 (47:38):
And Ramandre Stevenson carves him up for one hundred and
twenty yards in a rushing TD.

Speaker 2 (47:42):
It's just like.

Speaker 3 (47:43):
Jakobe was moving though Jacoby made some blaze with his legs.

Speaker 2 (47:47):
True thought.

Speaker 1 (47:49):
I'm mad at myself because me and Angelo cooked up
with QB rushing yards parlay. We thought about putting Jacoby
in there, but then we waved it off. But the
Bengals look really one dimensional offensive, and that one dimension
is Joe to Jamar. It seems like Joe Mixon might
have actually been really helpful in this attack. I don't
think the offensive line is that good.

Speaker 2 (48:10):
Again.

Speaker 1 (48:10):
You can win a lot of games with Burrow and
Chase and them going off and them doing their thing,
but out than the Patriots did a really good job
axxing those guys out of taking away big shot plays
over the top, which is Bengals team is dependent on.
And I think this defense is going to be solid. Man,
I am worried about the Bengals, and I wonder if

(48:30):
I overshot the win totals for them and the Browns
this year.

Speaker 3 (48:33):
Man, well, neither of us have been high on the Bengals.
You had them last in the division. I had them
winning nine games, But a big part of that was
just the cupcake schedule that they have outside the division.
They play the Titans, they played the Giants, they play
the Panthers. There's a couple other gimmes in there, or

(48:53):
at least what should be gimmes on paper. One of them, though,
I thought, was the Pats, and listen to the Pats because
of their defense. It seems that MAO is maintaining a
Belichickian culture. Like, I mean, they still brought it with
the game plan. They played their asses off defensively. That
makes them like an uncomfortable team to play. But also
they're absolutely gonna be a bottom three offense in football.

(49:16):
So like, I'm not really moved on the Pats here.
I think that, yeah, they can give you some trouble
with their defense, but they put up sixteen points in
this game still and against most teams, that's just not
gonna cut it.

Speaker 1 (49:28):
When you have an All Pro first team wide out
in an All Pro first team quarterback, apparently, yeah, you
gotta get you gotta score more than sixteen. It's completely
on the offense.

Speaker 3 (49:38):
Absolutely. And there's a few reasons that I have not
been high on the Bengals, one of them being that
they just weren't very good last year, that that defense
took a huge step back, and they bring in Gino
Stone this offseason. Their safeties were just really rough last year.
There was a big drop off there, So okay, that's
one improvement, but overall, I didn't see enough in this

(50:00):
to think they're gonna suddenly leap to being an above
average defense. And then I look at the offense and
it's Joe Burrow and it's Jamar and that's it. They
don't run the ball well. They haven't run the ball
well for years. Their line is mediocre, their line's been mediocre,
but crucially, they're losing receiver depth. Like you can dismiss
the Tyler Boyd loss. He's been a very consistent number three,

(50:23):
and when t Higgins does go down like he's out
for this game, then you feel that lack of depth.
And I just think in a situation like this, Joe
Burrow is not an elevator in the way that a
Patrick Mahomes, a Josh Allen, or a Lamar Jackson is.
Were those guys, it doesn't matter nearly as much who

(50:43):
is blocking for them, who is catching passes. They have
such an incredible ability to create to overcome the situation.
Like I was saying, if you can run around for
four or five seconds by yourself time and then make
a ridiculous throw across your body, it doesn't really matter
who's blocking, it doesn't really matter who's passing catches. That
is going to produce good offense. Joe Burrow just can't

(51:06):
do that. So yes, when you put him in a
better situation with one of the most talented receiving corps
like he's had for a good portion of his career,
he can execute. He will produce as an elite quarterback.
But still he still hasn't produced the regular season offenses
that Josh and Pat and lamar have. I do think
that he got overrated off the Super Bowl run when

(51:27):
that defense balled out and Evan McPherson went insane, And
I do believe that the Bengals have been overrated as
a whole since then, and people have ignored a lot
of the issues on this team. They've ignored the defensive regression.
They've ignored the fact that with Burrow, this team was
five and five last year. And I see people saying
stuff like, oh, Bengals start slow, just wait until the winter.

(51:48):
I'm just not sure i'd buy that. Like twenty twenty two,
they started slow, then they were awesome. Last year they
were just five and five when Burroll played. They only
averaged twenty points per game, everged six point three yards
per attempt, which is awful, and he was banged up
early and that was especially brutal. And then they got
a little better, but like, they were never playing like
an elite football team in my opinion, So I'm not

(52:11):
just giving them the benefit of the doubt when I
see a bunch of problems with this team. They let
the Pats run for one hundred and seventy yards on them,
and this is a team that has no passing attack whatsoever.
I just do not think that they belong in conversations
with forget the elite playoff teams in the AFC. I
don't think they're a playoff team.

Speaker 1 (52:33):
I agree with you, and I mean you mentioned the
Tyler Boyd loss. I think the bigger loss is the
guy that's been with Joe Burrow this entire time, Brian Callahan,
new coach of the Titans. I mean a lot of
people wanted to point to the fact last year that
this team ended up winning games with Jake Browning. Why
you have a lot of receiving depth. And I'm not
putting Jake Browning or Joe Burrow on like the same

(52:54):
level or anything close to that. But Browning field in
was on time, was efficient, was accurate, got the ball
to Jamar Chase when they needed to, got the ball
to Tyler Boyd. You know, spread the ball around. And
now you're down Brian Callahan, who was a huge part
of you know, this offensive success. So I just heear
regressing across the board man and I got a feeling

(53:17):
since he is gonna bounce back, they'll probably win. They'll
win soon and you'll have your detractors Carson. They'll always say,
you know, all the Bengals start slow, they're gonna kick
in the year.

Speaker 2 (53:27):
I don't think this is the year, man.

Speaker 1 (53:28):
I think we're looking at a potential bottoming out of
this team.

Speaker 3 (53:33):
Who do you think Burrow is closer to Is he
closer to Josh Allen or is he closer to Dak Prescott.

Speaker 2 (53:39):
That's a great question, Thank you.

Speaker 3 (53:42):
I try.

Speaker 1 (53:43):
You said closer to Lamar, closer to Dak.

Speaker 3 (53:45):
I said Josh. You can say Lamar if you want.
But I think Josh is probably a tougher question because
I think that gap is pretty freaking big.

Speaker 2 (53:56):
Probably Dak.

Speaker 1 (53:57):
I mean when you just like, look at the skill sets,
pretty similar, skills sets, very very similar. I do like
I like Burrow more at the line of scrimmage. I
trust Burrow a little bit more as a decision maker.
I like Burrow's arm a little bit more. But I
think it probably is closer. And if you're looking at
guys that are in this year, I mean, you know,

(54:17):
I mean, after tonight you can have a real conversation
about should.

Speaker 2 (54:21):
Stafford be over Burrow right now?

Speaker 1 (54:22):
You know, I mean, it's it's not just this game,
right And I don't want to act like it's last
season too, and we have to take it all into account.
And yeah, I think he probably is closer to Dak.

Speaker 3 (54:34):
I agree. I think that he is pretty clearly closer
to Dak, and I think Dak is really good. I'm
high on Deck. I think he gets too disrespected. But like,
what are they They're excellent pocket passers, they are high
IQ operators within the pocket, and they can move a
little bit, and they can extend plays just a little bit.
But like for the most part, it's gonna be processing

(54:55):
the game in accuracy from within the pocket. Neither of
them are great arm towns. They're both average arm talents
and there are just dudes who can do more to
elevate offenses single handedly. So at the end of the day,
Joe Burrow is not the reason that I'm like this
low on the Bengals. I think he is absolutely one
of the bright spots, one of the greatest strengths, one

(55:18):
of the best players on this team. But what I
will say is I have a different level of confidence
in a Joshua Lamar to cover up all the blemishes
around them and still win eleven games, because there's a
difference a difference in their transformative impact, dual threats, extending plays,
everything that we've talked about for the Pats. Like I said,
this doesn't really move me. This is a pretty quintessential

(55:40):
twenty twenties Patriots win excel defensively, run the ball, win
the turnover battle, make timely plays. Defensively, you can win
a few games that way. Their offense is still going
to make it hard. But what I will say is
encouraging is that they have maintained that with Mayo, because
that wasn't a guarantee. You lost the best defensive mind
and football history and one of the best culture setters.

(56:02):
And even if he fell off as a GM, and
even if he wasn't able to put forth a decent
offense in the last several years, like that always made
the Pats a pretty competitive football team, and I think
they'll be able to maintain that. They just have a
really tough schedule as part of the reason I think
they're gonna win so few games this year. All Right,
we're gonna take a quick break, and then on the
other side, we are going to keep on mowing through

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Speaker 3 (58:20):
So logan the Bengals result is significant because there's a
lot of people who expect them to be a very
good team and they lost to a team that a
lot of people expect to be very bad. One of
the other major storylines, though, was not necessarily so much
about the team, as it was a player who a
lot of us were very excited to see debut, that
being Caleb Williams, and the Bears got to win. However,

(58:44):
maybe not in the way that we would have expected,
and definitely not on the back of Caleb. So before
we get into this game as a whole, what did
you make of his performance in his debut?

Speaker 2 (59:00):
I thought that.

Speaker 1 (59:02):
Chicago buttoned up the playbook a little bit for him.
Caleb does become the first overall or the first number
one overall quarterback to win their debut game since David
Carr in two thousand and two. As you meant, well
had very little to do with Caleb and the Bears offense.
He goes fourteen of twenty nine with ninety three passing yards.

(59:23):
There's some bad moments. Caleb misses a deep pass to
a wide open Keenan Allen that's basically a for sure touchdown.
There's a lot of deflections and batted balls at the
line of scrimmage. Chicago goes just two of thirteen on
third downs. They muster one hundred and forty eight total
yards of offense and two point eight yards per play. Delicious,

(59:44):
But I think Caleb's going to be a lot better.
There's so much zip on his ball, and I don't
just say that to like, you know, I don't say
that about every quarterback. There's pop when Caleb throws the ball.
He had a dot to Dj Moore on a rollout.
I just think it's gonna get time for him. And
I'm not making excuses here because I feel like Caleb haters,

(01:00:06):
you know, right now they are. They're very excited. And
of course he painted his nails before the game, so
they they're.

Speaker 3 (01:00:12):
Staring at their barschool, their barstool flag, and they are
just cranking off to it.

Speaker 2 (01:00:16):
Yeah, man, they got a little extra ammo.

Speaker 1 (01:00:21):
He can't play the same way he did in college, though,
and I think you see a little bit of that.

Speaker 3 (01:00:24):
Man.

Speaker 1 (01:00:24):
It's a transition to the NFL, Like you can't just
go Fran Tarkenton mode and scramble around in the backfield
and you know, find your guy.

Speaker 3 (01:00:32):
Another culturally relevant reference from Logan.

Speaker 1 (01:00:35):
Again, the I think the Bears limited their playbook a lot.
It wasn't a ton of going through his progressions. It's
a lot of screen passes, a lot of short passes
out into the flats. I just think it's a matter
of him getting comfortable. I'm so confident in Caleb being
a franchise quarterback. This is not the game to say
that after because he doesn't play a great game. He
plays a pretty poor game.

Speaker 3 (01:00:54):
But stand on it.

Speaker 1 (01:00:56):
He didn't have a huge screw up. There wasn't a big,
you know, a bad, super bad pick. There's not a
super bad fumble here again. I think it's just gonna
take time for him to get acclimated, and I think
maybe this will be a rougher year. But also I
wonder at some point in this year if there's gonna
be a breakthrough game or just where he figures it
out right. I look at him very similarly to Caitlin Clark,

(01:01:20):
and I don't think he's going to take the sport
by storm as much as Caitlin has. I think Caitlin
took to it like a duck to water. She is
that much more talented and that much more brilliant than
everybody else in the WNBA.

Speaker 2 (01:01:33):
I don't feel that way about Caleb.

Speaker 3 (01:01:35):
That is, she's nice.

Speaker 2 (01:01:37):
I don't feel, you know, it's like that with Caleb.

Speaker 1 (01:01:41):
But it's like Jordan Love in his first year, the
first eight weeks of Jordan Love, you know, we were
relatively underwhelmed. I think it may take a minute for Caleb,
but once he hits his stride, I think he's gonna
hit the ground running.

Speaker 2 (01:01:52):
And this may be one of the best.

Speaker 1 (01:01:53):
Situations a rookie quarterback has ever stepped into the talent
that he has around him. Offensively, from Keenan Allen to
Dj Moore to Roma Dunze, who I like, adunesay a lot,
to Cole Comet, there's weapons here. I don't think this
offensive line is, you know, super bad or anything like that.

Speaker 2 (01:02:09):
And this was one hell of a defensive performance.

Speaker 1 (01:02:12):
Two defensive, two defensive slash special teams. Touchdowns, you have
a block punt recovered for a touchdown, you have a
pick six. They force three total turnovers. They hold Tennessee
to three or fourteen on third downs. That's a major
appeal for a rookie quarterback. Man. You see the disaster
that it is in Carolina where you don't have anything
going for you. A bad defense, bad weapons, a bad

(01:02:34):
offensive line, no running game. It's a disaster trying to
watch Bryce Young do that. There's a lot less pressure
here on Caleb in Chicago, and again, I just think
it's gonna take time, man, because there's gonna be a
game where he breaks out, and I think that's gonna
be his like coming of age moment. Is I'm here,
recognize me, put some respect on my name, and I

(01:02:55):
think he's just gonna build on that.

Speaker 2 (01:02:56):
It's just gonna take a couple of weeks.

Speaker 3 (01:02:58):
Man.

Speaker 1 (01:02:58):
I'm not expecting a breakthrough, but he didn't have anything disasterful,
which is all I can ask for for Caleb Man.

Speaker 3 (01:03:05):
He didn't f it up, he did not, but he
didn't really do anything good. So I'm not going to
make excuses for Caleb because I have been extremely high
on him. I have put my nuts on the table.
I've said I think this dude's going to be MVP caliber.
I think he'll be a top three quarterback in football.
He played a bad game. You mentioned he's got zip

(01:03:26):
on his ball, absolutely a little too much zip in
this one. I think there were a lot of balls
that were thrown a little hot, a little low as well,
missed on some intermediate throws, missed on a deep ball.
I had four balls deflected at the line, as you mentioned,
and maybe most significantly, I just thought held onto the
football too long. And that has been the biggest criticism

(01:03:47):
of Caleb, that he is accustomed to sort of backyard
football that can work in college when you're way more
talented than everybody else, but it's not going to work
in the NFL. I feel like that criticism has been
over stated. I also feel like Caleb is the sort
of crazy talent where backyard football the willingness to improvise,
to do that special stuff outside of Structure's part of

(01:04:10):
what makes him so great, as it does for Ma Homes,
as it does for Josh Allen, and so I have
not been nearly as concerned about that as a lot
of other people. But this is a game where you
do see that it's going to be an adjustment on
that front, and he does need to get a little
bit quicker as a processor and take the easy stuff
and whatnot. He made some nice plays with his legs,

(01:04:31):
I mean, particularly a third and ten didn't have the
killer turnover. As you mentioned at the end of the day,
that was enough for them to win this game. But
it was not a good performance at all. And I
do have high expectations for him, not just long term,
but this year we talked about him contending for breaking
the Bears various passing records, which obviously suck, but him
doing that as a rookie, I don't think that's out

(01:04:52):
of the question whatsoever. I love the weapons, I love
the talent. I love the ability to make plays with
his legs and the arm talent, and I think he's
then his detractors give him credit for it's tough Week one.
It's tough. We see it. Three rookie quarterbacks debut today.
He was in the middle of the pack out of
those three. He was not disastrous like a bow Knicks,

(01:05:14):
but he definitely was bad in this game. I do
want to give props to the Bears defense, though, because
they were just sensational and I expected them to be
pretty average on that end. But obviously they flipped a
switch once they added Montese Sweat into the fold last year.
I mean, the entire pass rush just transformed and they
made a lot of timely plays. Jalen Johnson was really

(01:05:37):
good in this game. TJ. Edwards was good, So props
to them for really caring on that side of the ball.
On the flip side of this, we have the Titans
who are probably going to be one of the worst
teams in football, which does put the defensive performance into context.
And we were talking about Will Levis a little bit earlier.

(01:05:57):
What did you make of his performance today?

Speaker 2 (01:06:00):
It was shaky.

Speaker 1 (01:06:02):
Nineteen of thirty two, one hundred and twenty seven yards,
one touchdown, three turnovers, two interceptions, and a fumble lost
ends this game basically a blind side fumble. He had
two good drives in this game. Made some plays on
the ground with his legs, but it's mostly powered by

(01:06:22):
the running game. Just legitary man, and that's kind of
Levis sow Al. Levis has looked like not settled in.
He's got a live arm, but it's not the most accurate.
And he's the biggest reason I was skeptical about the
Titans this season. Like I like the offensive line, I
like the running game, and I think the defense is
much improved with their additions, especially the secondary. I don't know, Man,

(01:06:46):
Levis looks far from an NFL you know, a star
franchise quarterback. He's much closer to the bottom five starting
in the NFL today. He's just got to get more comfortable, man.
He looked uncomfortable the whole game right, didn't look like
really poised, legittery. And the thing with Levis Man is
he's just a little too comfortable with putting the ball
in harm's way. And that's my biggest n flag with

(01:07:08):
him is like I like a cowboy, I like a
gunslinger who doesn't The reality with those guys is you're
gonna live by them and you're gonna die by him.
The games that they're making all the throws, you're gonna
crush the other team, and the games that he's not,
he is gonna sink your boat really fast. I think
Will Levis, considering his inexperience at the NFL level, considering

(01:07:28):
how you know, inaccurate he can be at times, I
think he's got to reel in that buck wild side
of himself a little bit. Man, He's got to be
just more conservative. I think that this team can win
some defensive football games with how much this defense is
going to be better, with how good the O line is,
with how.

Speaker 2 (01:07:44):
Good the running game is.

Speaker 1 (01:07:44):
And I don't think they're elite on any of these things,
but their average to above average.

Speaker 2 (01:07:49):
I think Will has to do a.

Speaker 1 (01:07:50):
Better job of just not shooting themselves in the foot
and protecting the football better. I think they're gonna be
towards the bottom of the league, but I think they
can win some defensive run oriented bat But he's got
a reel in the gunslinger stuff.

Speaker 3 (01:08:02):
Man.

Speaker 1 (01:08:02):
I think Levis is a little bit too much, a
little bit too much of a cowboy right now for
me to buy into the Titans this year.

Speaker 3 (01:08:10):
I agree. I've been concerned on him, and I think
a bit lower on him than some people. After last
year it felt like he was a real offseason riser
where a bunch of I mean, he's the breakout candidate.

Speaker 1 (01:08:21):
Now he had the debut game of four tds and
it's hard, you know, not to buy into that.

Speaker 3 (01:08:25):
It was awesome, But I do think with him more
so than a Richardson, right, you see like those real
red flag moments. I remember rewatching his game against the
Dolphins last year, which was a good comeback for the Titans,
and thinking he threw like nine balls that should have
been intercepted. This one he literally does one of the
dumbest things I've ever seen on the football field when

(01:08:46):
he attempts to just flip that ball to the sideline
as he's getting wrapped up, and it's like five yards
short and just a complete lame duck and it's just
the easiest pick six in the world. Like you cannot
gift wrap touchdowns for the opposing team like that. And
like you say, Logan, I like creators. I like betting
on physical talents. I like dudes who are going to

(01:09:08):
take some chances. But there's a delineation between taking chances
and being stupid. And I'm just not sure that he
does enough in the positive direction to where I'm like, yeah,
that guy's going to be a franchise quarterback. Three turnovers
in this game, and in this one it was more
bad than good, Like he used his legs well, he
threw a nice touchdown, but he basically melted down and
lost in this football game. And I think you're going

(01:09:30):
to see that several more times this year. And I
just don't think the Titans have enough around him for
me to be like, yeah, they're going to be competitive scrappy,
like they're okay, they're okay in other categories. But Pollard
looked good in this game. The defense should be slightly improved,
but it was not good last year. I do think
that they're going to be towards the bottom of the league,
and Levis is probably like the most important storyline for

(01:09:53):
them this year, just figuring out if he's the guy
or not. Let's talk about your Steelers logan. We shouldn't
put it off any longer. I see you there, you
got the jersey, you got the hat. A win for
the Boys, perhaps the most vintage win there has ever
been six field goals from the Bos, ten points allowed,
and of course, a Steeler's victory to start the season.

(01:10:14):
How'd you feel about this one? What'd you take away
from it for your boys?

Speaker 2 (01:10:17):
Tried to tell you. I tried to tell you. So
many people were betting on the Falcons in this game.

Speaker 1 (01:10:22):
Just Chris Boswell was the MVP of this game. The
Steelers entire offense.

Speaker 3 (01:10:27):
Six made the MVP h over the teach.

Speaker 2 (01:10:31):
I mean it's.

Speaker 1 (01:10:31):
Probably TJ because I mean Boz, but I mean, dude,
we don't put.

Speaker 3 (01:10:34):
Up two MVPs. Call MVPs.

Speaker 2 (01:10:36):
Yeah, sure, let's do that, man, hutterwoke nonsense.

Speaker 3 (01:10:38):
Let's just give everybody a metal.

Speaker 1 (01:10:40):
I don't know about all that, man, but I mean,
he bangs a fifty seven yarder, a fifty six yarder,
a fifty one yarder, and then a forty four to
forty and a twenty five yarder. The guy on the
broadcast or no red zone. I remember Scott Hansen brought
it up and he was like, I can't remember when
this happened. This is the second instance I can remember
this happening both Steelers games, both with Boswell, this one

(01:11:03):
and then obviously when they defeated the Chiefs in the
playoffs with eighteen points. That's what the Killer Bees offense,
not the Justin Fields offense. They beat them completely on
all field goals. And I want Justin Fields to be
QB one on this team. He's eleven and twenty eight
as a starter, but he's one to zero as a
Steelers quarterback. And yes, Justin Field is flawed, but I

(01:11:25):
like his upside in his playmaking. He is a real
weapon with his legs. He has fifty seven yards rushing
in this game, and I almost wish he trust his
trusted his legs more. Fields wants to make these throws
on the run, and he does a couple in this game.
I want to give a big a lot of credit
to him. I thought he had a clean and efficient game,
passing no turnovers, seventeen of twenty three, one hundred and

(01:11:47):
fifty six yards. The Steelers go eight of seventeen on
third downs. I liked him out of the play action.
I thought he did a good job in rbos, out
of boots, out of rollouts. That's how you weaponize a
guy like this. You get the running game going with
not Warren. You get him mobile out of the pocket
and he can hit these quick out routes to Fryar
move through to Pickens.

Speaker 2 (01:12:06):
But again, there are some times where.

Speaker 1 (01:12:08):
I wish Fields would look to be more of a
threat as a runner, where he wants to make these
throws on the run, and it's like, justin, dude, my brother,
you have ten yards wide open in front of you.
You're one of the greatest rushing weapons this game has
ever seen. Just go And he's a little hesitant at times,
and so I think I wanted to be more comfortable
and believing himself a little more and look to weaponize

(01:12:28):
that more. But the biggest thing with him throwing the
football is he showed he can get the ball to
George Pickens. Six catches for eighty five yards. He has
the big plate towards the end of the first half
where the Steelers get points. He has another play where
he throws a beautiful post route inside of George the
corners on the outside. He only throws it where George
can go and get it. It's not the most accurate ball,

(01:12:50):
but George Pickens is a freak wide receiver talent. He
is a bona fide wide receiver one. He's one of
the most talented guys I've ever seen at the position.
And he has in insane coordination in hands. Yeah, like
it is tier one alien level freak stuff I'm talking about.
He's an athletic monster. He's a playmaker after the catch,
and he's a great route runner. And there's actually a

(01:13:12):
play in this game that gets called back. Fields dots
up a great throw towards the outside of Pickens, excuse me,
that gets called back for an offensive pass interference call.

Speaker 2 (01:13:24):
That's just bogus.

Speaker 1 (01:13:26):
I'm not gonna say there's not contact, but Pickens barely
taps the guy the corner doesn't move at all, Like
it just happens every single play.

Speaker 2 (01:13:36):
They never call that, and they bring back a big play.

Speaker 1 (01:13:38):
So Field was on time, he was efficient for the
most part, he was accurate, and he got the ball
to playmakers.

Speaker 2 (01:13:45):
I can't ask him to do anything else. I guess
I could.

Speaker 1 (01:13:48):
Let's get the ball in the end zone. But again,
there's a lot of flags that get called back as.

Speaker 3 (01:13:53):
The Steelers, Let's be honest, that's not happening.

Speaker 2 (01:13:55):
It is happening, I am.

Speaker 3 (01:13:56):
I mean, there's there's flags they're gonna get in the
end zone.

Speaker 2 (01:13:59):
Yes, there are two plays. The fantasm it's happening. Man
we don't have Josh Allen.

Speaker 3 (01:14:05):
But I believe when I see it, we're.

Speaker 2 (01:14:07):
Gonna be better. Fields is flawed, he's gonna hold onto
the ball too long, he's gonna take sacks. He's inaccurate
at times.

Speaker 1 (01:14:13):
He's just gonna miss throws, and he's gonna be laid
on some throws and reads. I thought there were blitzes
that Fields didn't pick up and he was late to
get rid of the ball and it led to some
pass breakups. And I'm gonna be frank with you, like,
the offense is not gonna be great. The Steelers have
no avenues to the offense being great. They didn't get
in the end zone. They had eighteen points. They were
all field goals. They have four point one yards per play.

(01:14:34):
I think the offense is gonna have to be run
heavy based. But Fields is a playmaker and he can
make some off script stuff happen that Russell Wilson just
simply cannot. And the biggest encouraging thing here is that
the Steelers are well equipped to be even better defensively
this year. They hold Bijon to three point seven yards
per carry. They hold Atlanta to two of nine on
third downs, and they.

Speaker 2 (01:14:55):
Forced two interceptions.

Speaker 1 (01:14:56):
A lot of that is because TJ is the biggest
in Ben's defense, defensive playmaker in football. You have the
fumble ball that is defected, deflected off of a motion
TJ recovers that. There are two other strip sacks that
are called back in this game. One is because TJ
was off sides, but the other is called back because
of a holding penalty on Dante Jackson. Like you have

(01:15:18):
to commit two guys to him, He's just gonna feast
on one man coverage.

Speaker 2 (01:15:22):
The pressure was hellish, the front was awesome.

Speaker 1 (01:15:25):
Hayward, Ogan, Jobie, Benton, Adams, high Smith all did their job.
Fitzpatrick hopefully is going to play the entire year back
from injury. The two secondary members that we brought in
this year, Dante Jackson and Deshaun Elliott, both had interceptions
in this game. Patrick Queen looked good in his debut.
And I think Peyton Wilson is a bona fide, really

(01:15:47):
good number two middle linebacker. The guy has wheels, he's
got great instincts, he's a great tackler. The one thing
that I was frustrated with in this game, and I'll
let you take over before we go over to the Falcons, Carson.
I thought it was a stupid ass gamble by Mike Tomlin.
At the end of this football game, fourth and one,
the Steelers have a five point lead.

Speaker 2 (01:16:07):
Go up by eight.

Speaker 1 (01:16:08):
Tomlin like it ultimately doesn't come back to bite him
because they force an interception on Kirk the next drive
out with that Steelers voodoo magic. But it was just
a dumb play call, Tomlin. We haven't gotten in the
end zone all game long.

Speaker 2 (01:16:19):
It's a fourth. That's not Steelers football. We play Steelers football.

Speaker 1 (01:16:23):
Steelers football says, take the points, play the safe game,
go up by eight.

Speaker 2 (01:16:28):
That ticked me off.

Speaker 1 (01:16:29):
Everybody and their brother knew we were gonna run a
QB sneak and you dial up a QB sneak field slips.

Speaker 2 (01:16:35):
We don't get it.

Speaker 1 (01:16:36):
That's the one area in the game where I was
really frustrated with, outside of not getting in the end zone.
Tom that's a dumb gamble, man. We play Steelers football.
Don't get off script, and he did right there and
it could have cost us. I'll talk about Kirk in
what my outlook is for him, but I'd love to
hear what you thought about this classic classic Steelers victory,

(01:16:56):
and it was.

Speaker 3 (01:16:57):
One of the greats logan. I would love for you
to just live a little. I mean, come on, who
doesn't love going for it on fourth and short inside
the opposing ten. I do disagree. I think the value
of going up two scores there the probability of converting
a fourth and one still the Steelers, but it's well
over fifty percent. I think it's a justified decision. I

(01:17:19):
actually think it's the right decision. And I think the
Steelers are like the single most conservative offense in football
when it comes to this stuff, and any little injection
of aggression, to me, is a good thing. I think
it's unfortunate you've been traumatized that it didn't work the
first time that they ever went forward on a fourth down.
I still think it's the correct process. I would prefer
to be aggressive in a spot like that, try to

(01:17:41):
effectively end the game instead of leaving it as a
one score ball game. But I don't have a ton
to add, dude. I mean, this is the same exact team.
I get it now, it's justin fields. It's not Trubisky
or pick It or Mason Rudolph back there. He's a
different kind of quarterback. He's a slightly better quarterback, but
he's far from a game changer. I thought, what was

(01:18:03):
nice about this game is he didn't mess it up.
I mean, he was reasonably efficient. He didn't have any
catastrophic mistakes. I'm always going to question his ability to
read the field go through his progressions, but again, there
were no moments where it's like he's running around like
a chicken with his head cut off for nine seconds
and something very very bad happens, and he used his

(01:18:23):
legs effectively. So yeah, this offense is going to be bad.
Like I don't want to cover that up. It's gonna
be a bad offense. Pickens was great, I thought, particularly
the adjustment on that deep ball was just a testament
to his talent. He's getting open downfield, he's making contested catches,
like more than half of the team's total passing output
went to him. But the weapons outside of him, especially

(01:18:44):
in the receiving game, very lackluster in fields. Although I
think he probably is a better option than russ just
because of his ability to move, you know, he's still
gonna be one of the bottom eight or so starting quarterbacks,
and this is gonna be one of the bottom eight offense. Like,
they get six field goals in this game, but that's
off three takeaways. I mean, they're starting with pretty good

(01:19:06):
field position in a lot of those spots, but hey,
they make the timely plays. They're a great defense. I'm
with you. I think this defense is even more talented
than last year, should be healthier than last year's and
they're gonna win eight to ten games. And we can
all agree on that they're not going to be a
bad football team because they're too well coached. They're too
good defensively. They're not going to be a threat to

(01:19:27):
beat the top end teams because their offense is still
just way too limited.

Speaker 1 (01:19:31):
Yeah, and I do think we would have gotten in
the end zone at some point in this game. I
thought there were two really bad penalties. They took the
Steelers out of scoring position. The OPI that I mentioned
on Pickens earlier, but the Broderick Jones penalty, to me
was inexcusable. Somebody, Grady Jarrett, you know, drives one of
our offensive linemen. I believe it's James Daniels into the

(01:19:53):
ground way past the whistle. Broderick Jones walks up to him,
behind him, just to say like, hey, you know, this
is my team, this is my guy. You're not gonna
do that to me. He doesn't initiate anything. Grady initiates,
hits Broderick. Broderick doesn't even retaliate, and yet they give
a unnecessary roughness penalty to both guys, unsportsmanlike conduct, which offsets,

(01:20:15):
which takes away a massive run we just had that
was gonna set us up for it, you know, in
the red zone, and.

Speaker 3 (01:20:21):
They get it. Logan, I get it. I understand valid complaints.
Here's what I'll say. Let's not lose the forest for
the trees. The average four yards per play.

Speaker 1 (01:20:29):
Like, I'm just saying, there's two big penalties that take
it away where we could have gotten into the end zone.
The other one I want to get on. They call
a hold on a fourth down punt to Camera Johnson.
I love Camera Johnson. It's weird to love a punter.
The Steelers punting situation has been bad for so long.
Camera Johnson's out for the year. The way his leg bent,

(01:20:51):
I can tell you right now. I'm not a doctor.
I have not gotten any actual update about him. The
way his leg bent, there's no way that Cam Johnson plays.
Not to be confused with Cam Johnson, the power forward
for the Nets.

Speaker 3 (01:21:03):
Oh of course, why would we be talking about him
right now?

Speaker 1 (01:21:06):
Australian punter Cam Johnson. His leg got bent up and
I was peeved. You don't hit the punter man. That's
a roughing the kicker ten times out of ten. But
because Cam Johnson has black and yellow on his jersey,
they called it a hold and they took it back.
His legs shot. He's an awesome punter. I hope he's
back for some point of this year because we're not
finding a guy that's solid. But in bigger news, more

(01:21:27):
important news, Kirk Cousins is back and one of my
big takeaways for Atlanta is that he just can't carry
this offense right now, returning off of an Achilles' injury.
It's a tough match up against Pittsburgh. In this pass rush,
he goes for one hundred and fifty five yards one
TD to two picks. He averages four point nine yards
per pass and Atlanta musters just one point two yards

(01:21:49):
per play in the second half. Both interceptions are bad.
He's going through his progressions, he gets panicked, doesn't want
to get hit, just trigger happy gets rid of the
ball right to Deshaun Elliott. Kind of the same thing
with Dante Jackson, and Jackson drops another wide open interception
from Kirk early in the first quarter. He probably should
have had three interceptions. But I think Kirk's going to

(01:22:12):
be better as this season goes along. The broadcast mentioned
he is just the second quarterback in NFL history to
return after an achilles injury from this season previous mid season.
The only other quarterback to return that quickly is Trent
Dilfer in two thousand and two.

Speaker 2 (01:22:29):
He's clearly not at full health.

Speaker 1 (01:22:31):
He's trigger happy, he doesn't want to take hits, and
so I think he's going to be affected extra by pressure.
Last season, Kirk took the highest percentage of snaps from
single back of any quarterback in the NFL, and I
think his injury severity is reflected by how many pistol
and shotgun snaps we saw from him in Week one.

(01:22:51):
I think you're going to see Zach Robinson in this
offense ease him back to more of that single back,
but I think it's going to have to be bijon
setting up play action, getting him rolling early and often
and letting Kirk eat out of play action. I don't
think he can shoulder the load of an entire offense
right now. I think it's going to be about mid
season before we really see him kicking the gear, getting

(01:23:14):
the ball to loundonto pits to these playmakers.

Speaker 2 (01:23:16):
There's a ton of playmakers here in Atlanta.

Speaker 1 (01:23:18):
It's just a matter of them getting them the ball,
and I think it's going to be probably about half
the season until we see Kirk really physically able to
do that.

Speaker 3 (01:23:27):
It is remarkable, though, that the conversation in Atlanta, in
a post Arthur Smith era. By the way, let's not
under sell the importance of the Arthur Smith revenge game here,
they were still just talking about them getting their playmakers
the ball. Man I mean, Drake Lundon Kyle Pitts of
course has the touchdown on an improvised play, but they're

(01:23:47):
still not getting involved at the level that their talent
would indicate that they should. And I thought it was
a very underwhelming performance from the Atlanta offense. Great performance
from the Steelers defense as well, but the ball better
going forward. I'm with you, that's the backbone of this offense, Kirk.
It's tough I mean his second pick, like that pocket
is just collapsing on him. He gets hit as he throws.

(01:24:10):
But as you say, he's not an elevator. He's never
been an elevator, but more so than ever before at
this stage in his career, he's just gonna have to
be the guy who executes for you, be a pretty
average starter, lean on the run game, lean on the
very shiny skill position talent around him that the Falcons
just continue to not fully tap into. I mean, Ray
Ray McCloud was their leading receiver in this game. I

(01:24:32):
was shocked. I was slandering Ray Ray McCloud in the preseason.
I've seen him. He's played for the Steelers, he's played
for the Bills. He's never been like a consistent actual receiver,
and he made plays in this game. So shout out
to him. But still weird stuff going on in Atlanta,
and I'm not very high on them. I picked them
to win the NFC South because it's the worst division

(01:24:53):
in football and they have the most talent, but it's
not a team that's gonna make any noise in my opinion.
All Right, let's move on Logan to talk about the
other rookie quarterback debut or I suppose that there were
actually three, but Bownicks went out there for the Broncos,
and after being praised as the savior of the team

(01:25:16):
for a lot of the aussees by a lot of people,
it was pretty rough. It was pretty rough stuff for
the boy. What did you make of his performance?

Speaker 1 (01:25:23):
Yeah, I mean the offense was a kneemick three point
three yards per play. The Broncos go five of eighteen
on third downs. They go two of nine on third
downs that were eight or more yards. That may have
gotten worse. I turned this game off after the last turnover.
Bo Nicks looked really, really rattled. He averages just three

(01:25:44):
yards per pass twenty six of forty two, and he
throws for a whopping one hundred and thirty eight yards
no tds, two picks. He's got a bad interception in
the red zone to Julian Love, He's got a bad
interception to Tariq Woolan, and his stat line should have
been worse. I mean, Seahawks gifted him extra opportunities. There's
multiple more dropped interceptions. He's off target in an accurate

(01:26:06):
on a lot of throws. He doesn't seem to have
any chemistry with his wide receivers like Courtland, Sutton looked
visibly frustrated on the field, and the biggest concern to
me is how average he looked athletically, playmaking and scrambling
and getting out of the pocket. I think that was
a huge component of the appeal of bo Nicks. Not
only is this guy going to be accurate and on

(01:26:28):
time and can get through progressions.

Speaker 2 (01:26:30):
He didn't do any of that.

Speaker 1 (01:26:32):
He also couldn't get out of the pocket and make
any plays whatsoever. And another thing I talk about this
with fields, there are sometimes when you were running on
the move and it's just smarter to take your momentum
that you have already established and scramble for a few yards.
Bo Nix's tendency is to scramble on the move and
still make those throws. He's just not that kind of
arm talent and not that accurate on the move like

(01:26:54):
that enough to make those plays. Sometimes it is just
smarter to take the three four yard game that you're
going to get on the move than trying to force
a football. The Broncos couldn't run the ball effectively either.
Williams and McLaughlin total fifty total yards. I'm worried, man,
I'm I'm really worried. And also two, in these third
down situations, Nix is consistently throwing way behind the line

(01:27:18):
of scrimmage, like not even trying to get to the sticks.

Speaker 3 (01:27:22):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:27:23):
And also I think the offensive numbers like make it
look like this off better than they were. Yes, I mean, dude,
Seattle has two safeties, they have a muffed punt that's
recovered in Seattle territory. That are three first half big
mistakes from Denver that lead to great outcomes. The Bonnicks

(01:27:44):
interception in the red zone leads to a safety, There's
a three and out that leads to a muff punt
that leads to points, and there's a three and out
that leads to the second safety. So you know, there's
three takeaways or three bad plays from Denver that actually
lead to eight points for them. And also the historical

(01:28:05):
anomaly that that is there's only been seven games with
two safeties since two thousand. It's the first time it's
happened since twenty seventeen. Miami actually forced two safeties on
Denver themselves in a thirty five to nine drubbing, but yeah,
like it they end up with twenty points. This offense
actually put up twelve points that they earned. Like it's

(01:28:26):
not even reflective in the score that this offense was
as bad as they were. I thought Denver was gonna
make big, big strides with bon Knicks. It's abundantly clear
that he's not as talented as I thought he was
coming into this game. It's also abundantly clear, Carson, I
don't think Sean Payton and the Broncos trust Bonnicks to
operate this offensive playbook. They're gonna be really bad again

(01:28:47):
this year. I didn't pick Denver to be to win
a lot of games, but I thought Bonnicks is gonna
look a lot better than this.

Speaker 3 (01:28:54):
Before I get on to bon Knicks, you mentioned the
two safeties, one of several anomalies today. Weird shit just
happened today. There were two separate instances in two different
games where there was massive confusion over whether or not
there had been a first down that went on into
the next play. Twice the defense thought that they had
just gotten off the field on fourth down. The second

(01:29:14):
was Cowboys Browns. I can't remember the first game, and
it was actually.

Speaker 2 (01:29:17):
First happened in Steelers Falcons Tea, You're right exactly.

Speaker 3 (01:29:22):
And then this one's not as weird, but Jade Daniel's
helmet came off twice in this game, and I thought
that's a little bit odd. Yeah, this was bad from Bonnicks,
There's no two ways about it. I have n't been
the highest on him, but I did think out of
this class he would be absolutely one of the more
pro ready guys. And I did think he looked good
in preseason, but also I did try to pump the

(01:29:43):
brakes on some of the he's the next great Broncos quarterback.
He's the savior because it's like, to me, his ceiling
has basically been solid starter. He's an okay athlete. As
you mentioned, he's a mediocre arm talent. His strength should
be just making decisions, taking the easy stuff. That's honestly
what I thought he did best in the preseason, and

(01:30:07):
it was just an extremely conservative performance from him and
from the Broncos offense. But you mentioned I mean throwing
the ball behind the sticks or inside of five yards
over and over and over again. That's how you get
one hundred and thirty eight passing yards on forty two attempts.
But the problem is with all of that conservative stuff
that isn't leading the offense anywhere. That's leading the offense

(01:30:30):
to just stall out. Every time that he did try
to air the ball out throw downfield, it was treacherous.
I mean, he has two bad picks in a double
coverage in this game, multiple balls that are hitting Seahawks
defenders in the hands like he just looked completely overwhelmed. So,
for the reasons I mentioned that, I don't think he
has the physical tools that give him a particularly high ceiling. Also,

(01:30:53):
he is twenty four years old, which does matter in
these conversations. I do think he's better than he showed.
I do think debuts are hard. I think we saw
that from all the rookie quarterbacks today. So I'm not
just completely bailing on bo Nicks. But I think the
ceiling isn't very high, and the floor in this game

(01:31:13):
was pretty darn low. I think it'll look better going forward,
but I'm not sure that he's going to be the
guy in Denver. We'll see though one game. Don't want
to overreact real quick, What did you make of this
for the Seahawks logan?

Speaker 1 (01:31:27):
I think I might be a little low on the Seahawks.
Now again, I think that record wise, I think they're
probably gonna end up about where I had somewhere between
seven and nine wins. I had him at seven wins,
but it kind of seems like the low end. The
only thing that I'm really concerned about Seattle is this
O line in pass protection. Gino was kind of running
for his life some of this game. Pressure got home

(01:31:49):
really early. That's not a good sign against Denver. They
don't have the best pass rush and so I don't
like that. But there's a lot of things I did
like from Seattle win this game. The defense look much improved.
I thought that McLaughlin and Williams were going to run
all over them.

Speaker 2 (01:32:04):
Does not happen.

Speaker 1 (01:32:05):
Seattle button that up really well in this game. I
thought the corners played a fantastic game, as did this
secondary overall, and the offense came alive in the second half.
One I want to mention, actually my final defensive stat.
They held Denver to nineteen total yards offense in the
third quarter, completely stifled them. But the offense really did
look good in the second half. Gino had a solid

(01:32:27):
game and some good drives. Their first TD drive in
the first half, Gino's got a beautiful play action throw
to Metcalf on time, he has another drop in the
bucket to Tyler Lockett, excuse.

Speaker 2 (01:32:37):
Me on the sideline. I mean it is a.

Speaker 1 (01:32:39):
Beautiful ball, a beautiful toe tap from Lockett, and then
Gino breaks a big scramble for thirty four yards. And
so I mean the Seahawks have playmakers. Kenneth Walker has
a great game one hundred and three yards and a
TD Charbone breaks a thirty five yard or for a
touchdown off a catch.

Speaker 2 (01:32:58):
So I think this.

Speaker 1 (01:32:58):
Defense is going to be a probably below average, but
closer to average.

Speaker 2 (01:33:03):
And Gino has playmakers.

Speaker 1 (01:33:04):
He's got charbon Ay, He's got Walker, he's got JSN,
he's got Locket, he's got Metcalf. My one concern is
the offensive line. I don't think Gino's gonna have a
ton of time back there, but he hasn't had a
ton of time back there in these past two seasons,
and he's been efficient and he's been good enough to
win them some games. So I think I was probably
a little lower on Seattle than I am after this game.

(01:33:26):
They came alive in the second half, and again I
don't think the score is reflective of how much they
dominated Denver today.

Speaker 3 (01:33:34):
Yeah, it was a really weird game. It was a
weird game for the Seahawks. I was higher on them
than you. I had them as a playoff team. In
some ways, maybe I feel a little bit better just because,
like I don't really worry about the offense now. I
do think that the line is bad. We've known that
the line is bad. But like Gino threw an awful

(01:33:54):
pick in this game, I trust his decision making more
than that. Again, I mean they're just being put in
these super compromised positions, right with the couple of safeties,
Like it was very hot and cold from the offense.
I expect them to be better. I did think the
defense looked improved, though, and that was the big thing.
This was a talented defense last year, but a really
underachieving one. You bring in Mike McDonald, great defensive mind,

(01:34:17):
and I did think that there was pretty immediate improvement.
We know that the secondary is stacked with talent, but Dodson,
an addition for my Buffalo Bills, I thought played quite well.
You have a full year of Leonard Williams.

Speaker 1 (01:34:29):
He he completely dropped an interception from bow Nick.

Speaker 3 (01:34:33):
Yeah. Yeah, I thought that Boye Mafe was good as
a pass rusher, Like I think that there is more
talent in the Seahawks defense, a good bit more than
was tapped into last year, and I think it's going
to be tapped into more this year. So you pair
that with an offense that I do think is pretty good,
and I feel pretty similarly about them as I did preseason.

(01:34:55):
Let's talk Cowboys browns logan, because this was kind of
billed as maybe the Marquie matchup of the daytime slate
before Sunday Night and it ended up just being a massacre.
What'd you take away from this one?

Speaker 1 (01:35:07):
I mean, we can get this out of the way.
Deshaun Watson completely sucks.

Speaker 3 (01:35:11):
Let's talk about it.

Speaker 1 (01:35:13):
Twenty four to forty five, one hundred and sixty nine yards,
one TD, two picks, two point seven yards per pass,
and a passer rating of fifty one point one.

Speaker 2 (01:35:22):
In the first half.

Speaker 1 (01:35:23):
The Cleveland offense did not have a play go for
more than eight yards. Deshaun Watson did not have a
completion past five yards in the first half. It's got
a bad interception to Eric Kendricks tipped by Parsons at
the line of scrimmage. He's got an interception to Trayvon Diggs.
He almost threw more an interception your three defenders. Dallas's

(01:35:45):
pressure was getting home. Parsons super disruptive in this one.
But I mean it's just remarkable me how off target
inaccurate he is. Yeah, nobody in NFL history can catch
some of these passes.

Speaker 2 (01:35:58):
Did Watson is throwing up? I wrote that.

Speaker 1 (01:36:01):
I said that to Mark because we were watching the
game together. He's a Browns fan, a struggling Browns fan.

Speaker 2 (01:36:06):
He had on his Nick Chubb shirt. I had on
my Baker Mayfield shirt.

Speaker 1 (01:36:09):
Man.

Speaker 2 (01:36:09):
We were trying to get all the good juju we
can get gone.

Speaker 1 (01:36:13):
But I mean I thought about it. I was like, dude,
Randy Moss couldn't catch some of these balls. Hell Man,
mister fantastic could come out of early. He couldn't catch
some of these passes.

Speaker 3 (01:36:22):
Stars couldn't catch him, dude.

Speaker 1 (01:36:24):
And with that, I mean he was throwing short of
the sticks consistently too, just being too conservative. And the
Cleveland offense was just abysmal as well. They were zero
of seven on third downs through the start of the
third quarter. They end this game two of fifteen on
third downs overall, and they just put together two good
drives all game long. They couldn't run the ball consistently

(01:36:45):
David and Joku leaves this game with an injury. So
I'm concerned that the Browns are gonna be worse than
I thought. And the reason I say this, eight wins
seems like a very tall task with QB play like this.
Watson can't even get the ball to his playmakers. If
you're gonna pick this Browns offense to be average, it's
because you think he can get the ball to Cooper,
he can get the ball doing Joku.

Speaker 2 (01:37:05):
They can run the ball with Ford.

Speaker 1 (01:37:06):
The bigger concern to me is, you know, it was
an anomaly that this defense was this good and that
they overachieved at that kind of level last season with
their QB play. It just seems like a really tall
task ask the defense to be that dominant again.

Speaker 2 (01:37:24):
With QB play like this.

Speaker 1 (01:37:25):
And it brings me to the question, Carson, why do
you get rid of Joe Flacco?

Speaker 2 (01:37:30):
I mean, I.

Speaker 1 (01:37:31):
Understand not wanting a quarterback controversy. It's much like the Steelers,
right because now you're left at an impass across roads
where you go. Do I go with Russ next week
or Fields? Fields gets us to win, So it puts
extra presser on Russ to win this. You know, I
understand not wanting the controversy, but Joe Flacco was objectively

(01:37:51):
better than Deshaun Watson has ever been in Cleveland last year,
and the reality of the situation is the Browns don't
have a stable quarterback on the roster. I emphasize stable
because you put Jameis Winston and he's the next guy up.
Jameis Winston is the most f at somebody's down there.
He's just gonna throw the ball.

Speaker 3 (01:38:10):
Just see if he's watched his morning Looney Tunes, then
you have no idea what then's.

Speaker 1 (01:38:14):
Then he's all riled up and he's feeling a little weird. Yeah,
Deshaun flat out stinks. I think he's lost all of it.
Like Dallas is a good defense objectively, but Deshaun stinks.
And dtr is nowhere near ready to lead an offense
out like god. I just I think and we knew

(01:38:35):
this coming into the season with a guaranteed contract. With
how bad Deshaun has looked, you're just handcuffed to being
a horrible offense unless Jerome Ford in this running.

Speaker 2 (01:38:45):
Game can get going. Deshaun stinks, dude.

Speaker 1 (01:38:47):
I think Deshaun is a bottom five starting quarterback in
the National Football League today. And we can go through
the names. Daniel Jones I wrote down the entire list.
I think I I must erased it. But Daniel Jones
Gardner minshew, I'm gonna see if I can pull the
rest of the guys off the top of my head.
Knicks was on my list, and there's two more guys

(01:39:09):
that I had penciled in.

Speaker 3 (01:39:12):
I'll let you take a bottom tier candidates. Yeah, think
about your bottom five, because I do think Levis.

Speaker 2 (01:39:18):
Levis was another one of them.

Speaker 3 (01:39:19):
Yeah, I mean I think that Shawn has to be.

Speaker 1 (01:39:23):
And Deshaun DeShawn is on there too. There's one more
quarterback that I had, but he's he's in that handful
of did you have? Brice was the last guy that
I wrote down.

Speaker 2 (01:39:32):
And it's just like.

Speaker 1 (01:39:35):
The quarterback position is the and this is a boring
This is the most lukewarm take you can ever get.
When I struggle with picking a football game, when I'm
struggling with figuring out what a team ceiling is going
to be for a year. My final question normally is well,
do I trust the quarterback to get them through when
the times are tough?

Speaker 3 (01:39:52):
No.

Speaker 1 (01:39:53):
And I think it was a drastic oversight on my
part taking the Browns to finish third in the division,
to win nine games when I have no faith in
their quarterback, Like this could very well be a five
to six win team with DeShawn. With Deshaun playing at
this level, It's just like, I don't care how damn
good your defense is. The Steelers are a football anomaly

(01:40:14):
that they do this every single year. The Jets, frankly,
with their quarterback play the past two seasons, are an
anomaly to eke out seven wins. The Browns defense can
be freaking awesome. Man, It can be one of the
top five units in the league. I have to see
more from DeShawn, if you know, to make me think
that this is going to be a playoff team.

Speaker 3 (01:40:35):
This is very surprising coming from a Steelers fan logan.
I think if there's anybody who can replicate the formula,
it's the Browns. They did last year.

Speaker 2 (01:40:44):
That's how That's how low I am on DeShawn.

Speaker 3 (01:40:47):
Oh, listen, I think DeShawn is awful. I think he
fucking sucks and that is beyond a shadow of a
doubt at this point. And you mentioned the whole Flacco
di Lamma. First of all, he would have been pretty
sketchy to start Joe Flaco for an entire season of
football at his age, Like he literally could not move,

(01:41:08):
And I worry that he could potentially crumple and die
and maybe just evaporate on the field if he gets
hit too hard. But you know what, he was mostly
accurate from inside the pocket. He was taking shots, He
was feeding Amari Cooper, he was getting the ball out quickly.
He was playing the quarterback position. Deshaun Watson is currently
doing something different, something that I'm not sure we've ever

(01:41:30):
seen before, and it's not working. It's not working at
all when it comes to Jamis. Listen, man, I get it.
It's a roller coaster. He's missedter thirty touchdowns, thirty picks.
Let me see Jamis at this point, Like you think
about the sample we got of him in New Orleans
as a starter. Guess what with a good offensive mind
he was able to execute. He can't be worse than DeShawn.

(01:41:52):
DeShawn has lost his mind. He's lost his ability to
throw the ball with any sort of accuracy. He has
lost his ability to maintain any sort of pull, and
we have a thirteen game sample now of him over
three years, just absolutely sucking. There is talent here. Amari
Cooper is a damn good wide receiver. One David and

(01:42:12):
Joku is a damn good receiving tight end. Jerry Judy
is solid if he's your third target. I'm good with that.
This team should be able to run the ball effectively,
and Kevin Stefanski is a great offensive mind. I think
you owe it to your team to at least see
what you have with Jamis out there, because what you
have with Deshaun is a disaster. What you have is

(01:42:34):
one of the absolute worst starting quarterbacks in football who
is very actively and blatantly holding you back. But I
don't think they're gonna do it, Logan, And it really
sucks for Browns fans not to say that Jamis would
be the savior. I just genuinely believe that he would
be better. And this team won eleven games last year
with some of the worst quarterback playing football, which is

(01:42:56):
why I did think that they could win ten games
again this year. Because I do believe that defense so much.
I believe in Stefanski, I believe in the offensive talent
everywhere but the quarterback position. But guess what, man, they
gave to Shawn the worst quarterback in history, and the
second that they bench him for Jameis Winston, then they
concede to everybody that they made one of the worst

(01:43:19):
decisions in football history, that they gave out the worst
contract in football history. And guess what, we all know that.
And they're only hurting themselves by leaving DeShawn out there.
They can't undo it, they can't unpay him. They're not
getting value from him just because he's out there on
the field. If he's worse than their backup Jamis, who
they're paying way less. Just because you spent the money, man,

(01:43:41):
it doesn't mean it's a positive asset. He is awful.
The money is gone no matter what. You can't bring
it back. But they won't view it that way. Teams
don't want to concede that sort of disastrous decision making,
and so he's gonna stay out there. But yeah, man,
I mean, it's just absolutely abysmal. One hundred and sixty
nine yards on forty five attempt two awful picks, spraying

(01:44:02):
the ball all over the field, holding onto the ball
for way too long as he did last year against
a great Cowboys pass rush. He takes six sacks in
this game. The Browns are gonna be able to beat
inferior teams with him because I do believe in the
defense that much and so much of the stuff around DeShawn.
But yeah, I don't know how I couldn't be lower.

(01:44:22):
And I've been low on Toshawn because again, he hasn't
put anything positive on tape in two years. Browns fans
or maybe some Deshaun defenders, if you're a DeShawn defender
and you're not a Browns fan, that's pretty weird. I'm
not gonna lie, but they'd say, oh, he went five
and one last year. Yeah, he played badly. They were

(01:44:43):
able to win games with everybody at quarterback last year.
He sucks, man, And I do think that I'm a
little lower on them, because like, this was as bad
as it's been from DeShawn, and it's already been bad.

Speaker 1 (01:44:55):
It's like Austin powers too man when he loses his mojo, Man,
Deshaun Watson completely lost all of it. On the other
side of this, I don't think we learned much about
the Cowboys. I think they beat an inferior football team.
That's what the Cowboys have been doing these past couple seasons.
I'll give them props on that. They not only beat them,

(01:45:16):
they beat them convincingly. And Michael Parsons is one of
the most disruptive players in all the football I know
he was your defensive Player of the Year pick, and
I don't want to give credit to Miles Garrett two.
Garrett is the only player in the last six seasons
to have ten sacks or more in every single year.
He was really disruptive in this one early and I
think we've seen it. The three guys that are the

(01:45:38):
most consensus guys for Deepoy I think are the most disruptive. Parsons, Watt,
and Garrett are just in a different tier of their own.
But Parsons was crazy in this game, immense, immense pressure
and just consistently winning one on one. Dallas has been
a huge beneficiary of that too. Last season, the Cowboys
were twelve and one when their team four to turnover.

(01:46:00):
They were zero to four when their defense didn't force
the turnover. They were extremely reliant on that, and this
is going to be a playmaking defense. As you mentioned,
they come up with six sacks. It's not just Micah
DeMarcus Lawrence. I thought had a really good game. I
thought they were better stopping the run this game. Eric
Kendricks looked really good in that respect. And on the
back end, you do force two interceptions, Diggs gets one.

(01:46:21):
Deron Bland is not out there. He's on injured reserve,
but he could be back by Week five against Pittsburgh.
I will say I was a little underwhelmed by the
Cowboys offense in this debut. Now, ultimately you don't need
anything extra. Turpin runs a punt return TD back. The
defense dominated. They only allow seventeen points, but the Cowboys

(01:46:42):
offense goes just four or fourteen on third down. They
have three three and outs in the second half. They
mustered just two first downs all second half. And you
don't really get anything special from Dak He's nineteen to
thirty two, one hundred and seventy nine yards one team.

Speaker 3 (01:46:56):
One beautiful throw, one beautiful not just one against the Blitz.

Speaker 2 (01:47:00):
There's a couple ones.

Speaker 1 (01:47:01):
There's a throw that he throws in the bucket to
CD over Denzel Ward. Beautiful throw and catch. It's a
one hander by CD. And the one that you're talking about,
that's a veteran QB throw first and ten pressure bearing down.
It's an empty set shotgun. So what this means is
Dak has no blocking help whatsoever. It's all wide outs.

(01:47:22):
They're all running routes, and the Browns bring the blitz.
Dak picks up that blitz brilliantly and just lobs that ball.
The only time you're gonna throw that pass is when
you know the blitz is coming. There's no safety help
over the top. It's just a veteran throw to Brandon Cooks.
And there was another one I liked. He's flushed out
left scrambles and he throws one across his body to Brooks.

(01:47:45):
So that gave you those moments. I just cooking, And
I understand too. You let your foot off the gas.
You know you're beating the brakes off of a team.
So I'm not gonna get too critical, but I thought
the offense could have a little better in the second half.
And other news, Brandon Aubrey is the best kicker in
the NFL. Man, I mean, he bangs a sixty six

(01:48:07):
yarder that gets called back because of a delay of
game that would have tied the longest field goal ever.
I've shout out Boz for having his great game. I
think he is also one of the handful of best
kickers in the league. But Brandon Aubrey, to me, is
a cut above everybody else.

Speaker 3 (01:48:22):
They only sent him out there for seventy one Yeah, dude,
before the Browns called time out. They had him out
there to kick a seventy one yarder. He's he's the goat.
He's the best in the game right now. I agree.

Speaker 1 (01:48:35):
Only other guy I've ever seen trotted out for that
long a field goal is Sebastian Janikowski. And I believe
Dennis Allen was coaching that team, So I'll tell you
everything you need to know.

Speaker 3 (01:48:44):
Very true, very true. I thought this was a good
performance from the Cowboys. I'm with you. The second half
was weird off installed but they had just so clearly
taken full control of the game. I honestly thought Zeke
looked better than I expected. He wasn't great, but I've
been very low on Zeke. He hurled a guy I
don't know. He looked pretty spry out there. He looked

(01:49:05):
pretty quick, pretty athletic for what I was expecting, and
Dak did make some great throws early. But this was
about the defense. And yes, Deshaun sucks, absolutely, that's an
important disclaimer. But the pass rush was just destructive and
this could be the best pass rush in football this year. Kendricks,
as you mentioned, vital in run defense, but also gets
you two sacks and a pass deflection. In this game,

(01:49:27):
Parsons and Lawrence were both eating Mike on top of
the sacks to flex a ball into an interception. And
I do think some of the work that the Cowboys
did in this draft was underrated. Like I picked them
to go to the Super Bowl, everybody hated it, and
what a lot of people said was, well, they didn't
get better anywhere. Why would this year be any different

(01:49:48):
than last year. I actually think that they're pretty concretely
better in a couple areas. First of all, they upgraded
Dan Quinn, who I thought was a bad defensive coordinator,
to Mike Zimmer, who I think is a very good one.
Kendricks is an important ad. They should be healthier. They should,
as you mentioned in a few weeks, have bland and
digs out there together. For I also think Dak is
just going to play better next time you see him

(01:50:10):
in the playoffs than he did last year. I thought
that was an uncharacteristically bad performance. I believe in Dak.
I expect him to step up. But also I thought
that they did a really nice job drafting in the
trenches and drafting defensively. I thought Overshown, who they took
in the third round, was great in this game. He
had a sack. Marshawn Neeland, who they took in this
year's draft, got a couple of quarterback hits, and then

(01:50:30):
you do have digs back there. He gets a couple
of pass breakups in this game. So the Browns offense
was bad because Deshaun was bad, but they also had
that man in hell, the Browns had fifty percent negative
plays deep into this game. Negative, crazy, unbelievable, So it

(01:50:51):
was just a shellacking. That's why I believe, man. I
believe in the defense. I believe in the improvement there,
especially when it comes to playoff time being more serious. And
I believe in Dak, and I know that nobody is
gonna be moved by anything the Cowboys do in the
regular season and that's why it's so funny. And every
single time I say they're checking these boxes that I like, Ooh,
that was a good win, everybody's gonna say, oh, we
say there's a million dimes before nobody cares.

Speaker 1 (01:51:13):
Well, No, I'm going to laugh at you when they
lose in the first round.

Speaker 2 (01:51:16):
I'm gonna laugh pretty hard.

Speaker 3 (01:51:18):
And what's hilarious, logan, is how hard I'm gonna laugh
at you and everybody else when they actually win multiple
playoff games. Listen, there's nothing fresh about saying the Cowboys
are gonna lose early in the playoffs. What's fresh? What's bold?
What's avant garde? Saying they're actually gonna win some games?
And I think they can do it. But again, I
know that everybody's just gonna laugh and point until it
actually happens. So we'll see if it does. Let's talk

(01:51:41):
Chargers Raiders logan. The Harbaugh debut is a win for
the Chargers. What do you take away from this one?

Speaker 1 (01:51:48):
Justin Herbert's finally gonna have some help this season. This
is the first time ever in Herbert's career that he's
thrown for less than one hundred and fifty yards in
a single game, and they win incredible seventeen to twenty six,
one hundred and forty four yards one TV. That's the
hardball Roman way. It's gonna be really running game dependent.

(01:52:09):
This is the seventh most rushing yards in a game
in the Herbert era. And I think Dobbins and Edwards
pack of potent punch. Dobbins is the man ten carries
one hundred and thirty five yards. He has two monster runs.
The second when he breaks, is the longest run by
a charger in two seasons. They're gonna be a run heavy,

(01:52:29):
defensive minded team, man, and that's really helpful. That's all
you can really give to everywhere in the Herbert era,
exactly under Stalley really impressed with the pass rush. Mack
and Bosa got a ton of pressure on Minshew. But
along with that, the reason that they're gonna have to
be a run heavy, defensive minded team is because they
don't have playmakers. I don't really trust any of the

(01:52:51):
receivers to win one on one. I think Mconkey is
the best of the bunch, really good route runner, shifty,
got good hands. But I mean they're looking at Hayden
Hurst probably your second best weapon. Palmer drops a TD
in this game. Quentin Johnston's statline looks all right, but
I think he still sucks.

Speaker 3 (01:53:08):
Yes, they're gonna.

Speaker 1 (01:53:11):
Have to win this way, and like Herbert's overcome this
situation a lot. I don't think he's gonna have to
overcome the situation because I think they're better in a
lot of areas.

Speaker 2 (01:53:19):
But I don't think this.

Speaker 1 (01:53:20):
Is gonna be a great season for Herbert. There's just
not a There's just not a ton of weapons here
for him to work with. And yeah, I think it's
gonna be reflected in his numbers. But that being said,
I think he's gonna have more help just overall again
coaching O line, defense, running the ball. I think the
charger is gonna be better in all those areas.

Speaker 3 (01:53:41):
They need to let him rip more. I mean that's
always been the most frustrating thing with Herbert, when you
have these hyper conservative game plans and it's a bunch
of short underneath routes like that was very much the
vibe in this one. As you mentioned, Palmer drops a TD,
Quentin Johnson drops a couple of balls. He's not good.
The receiving core is not good. Although I do like
Ladd and he had a nice touchdown. I think he's

(01:54:02):
a really good route runner and will be a very
productive player. But like, they didn't push the ball down
field at all. I mean, Herbert attempts twenty six passes,
only goes for one hundred and forty four yards. I
don't think that that's gonna tell the story of this
season necessarily. I mean Greg Roman, I will say he
loves establishing the run. There is frustration with him being

(01:54:24):
conservative in the passing game. I remember his days with
the Bills, and my god, that man loved calling a
screen on third and long more than anybody I've ever seen.
But he knows he has justin Herbert. He has to
know that. I think that they will unleash him more.
And even though his weapons aren't great, it's also not awful,
like I do believe in Ladd. I think Palmer's solid

(01:54:45):
and he's the sort of quarterback who I expect to
elevate those guys. So it is encouraging how well they
ran the ball. Dobbins looked really good. He's been amazing
every time he's been healthy in his NFL career, but
just after multiple major injuries, I was worried about him
looking the same. I thought, it probably just doesn't make
sense to bet on that, unfortunately, but he played a

(01:55:06):
really good game. I will say the breakaway run, the
long run that he had, it was a bit concerning
to me that he couldn't sustain his top speed because
he started slowing up pretty quickly and got chased down.
But he goes ten carries for one hundred and thirty
five yards, Like, you can't complain about that, And I
did like especially the pass rush defensively, as you mentioned
Mac and Bosa wreaking some havoc. The Raiders offense is weak,

(01:55:31):
but this is the least Herbert's ever had to do
in a win, so that's good. I also do just
think that the Raiders played a very bad football game, though,
I mean, I think that this offense is awful. Gardner
had a rough showing through a bad pick to seal
this game earlier through a ball backwards to nobody when
he clearly thought that there was going to be some
sort of bubble screen and there simply was not, And

(01:55:53):
it looked like he wanted that ball to stay in
his hand, but that thing was already going so like
that was a brutal turnover. Their line's not good, and
I thought Antonio Pierce flubbed this game, like just really
some nonsensical decision making early in this game, goes for
it on fourth down on Vegas's own forty one, which

(01:56:13):
was yeahnecessary, especially when you know you're a limited offense,
sets up a free field goal for the Chargers. They
gained five yards, and this is a game where points
were not easily come by. But then later he doesn't
go for it. On fourth and two in Charger territory,
down sixteen to seven, he takes the field goal. Then, okay,

(01:56:34):
games in the red zone. I would go for it.
I would try to make that a touchdown opportunity. He doesn't.
Then with seven minutes to go down six on the
Chargers forty two on fourth and one, seven minutes left
in the game, down six punts, which is truly one

(01:56:55):
of the most cowardly, one of the most unjustifiable coaching
decisions I can think of. It made zero sense, And
that was the football game right there, Like, man, maybe
you're gonna have one more chance to score, right You're
in position to do it right here, right now. You
have to take that. He didn't. And then just as
sort of a beautiful poetic ending to this all Jack

(01:57:19):
Jones gets in a fight as everything unravels, which, if
you've followed Antonio Pierce's career, you followed ASU football, you
know is really vintage stuff. So just one more takeaway
from this game for me, and I've been saying this logan,
I think the Antonio Pierce era is gonna end a
lot worse than most people think it's going to end.

(01:57:40):
I think there's a lot of optimism there because he
comes across as a hard nosed guy Raiders culture. They
definitely improved under him last year. That's all good. I
do not think he is a good leader of an
organization when it comes down to the tough moments, when
it comes down to him individually taking accountability. I don't

(01:58:00):
trust his decision making in meaningful spots like this. He
can get you fired up for a game. Sure he
appeals to players, but is the discipline there, is the
IQ there? I'm just not sold.

Speaker 2 (01:58:12):
Man.

Speaker 3 (01:58:12):
I've seen Antonio Pierce coach before and it didn't end well,
so I'm skeptical. Still.

Speaker 1 (01:58:19):
Yeah, I thought, no, I have a few more things
on this game real quick. I thought it was poor
game management by Pierce. But I do think the Raiders
are going to be better in the first half. They
hold the Chargers to six points, They allow only eighty
three total yards. They bottle up Herbert for the second
fewest first half passing yards in his career. They hold
LA to a field goal after the Minshew fumble. They

(01:58:40):
held LA scoreless after the White fumble. They almost get
a pick on Herbert, and I thought his pass rushes
are really creative. I think this is a good team
that's going to be able to have a really good
ability of rushing the quarterback. Now they got gashed against
the run six point five yards per carry, and it's
just abundantly clear that Minshew is capable of carrying this offense.

(01:59:02):
Like when they need him to make plays, he's not
gonna be able to. But I didn't think it was
an abysmal game for Minshew. Like he got the ball
to Adams, he got the ball to Bowers, he got
the ball to Jacoby. He just has to protect the
ball better. They lose the turnover battle three to nothing.
White fumbles on the breakaway run. I want to give
props to Madison to Madison had a big catch for

(01:59:22):
a TD in this game where he hurdles a defender
and breaks a couple of tackles. That was a good
TD by Minshew. But that's the formula that the Raiders
are gonna have to win games on. Man, it's gonna
have to be a strong defense. They're gonna have to
run the hell out of the ball. It's just a
lot to ask for Minshew, and so I think the
Raiders are gonna be better. I don't want to overblow this,

(01:59:43):
but I did think it was a poorly managed game
by Antonio Pierce. That's a Mike Tomlin with Duck Hodges
under the helm kind of call. You don't punt the
ball in that situation, right, you punt the ball.

Speaker 2 (01:59:54):
Especially.

Speaker 1 (01:59:55):
What I didn't understand about that too, is maybe in
the first half, I understand that call when you're defen
had locked the Chargers up, the Chargers had been marching
on you the past two drives. Like at that point,
I just think you have to have a You have
to have the awareness to know we have to score
right now. We might not get the ball back, so
we have to capitalize on this opportunity.

Speaker 3 (02:00:16):
And also logan in that situation, the very fact that
you don't trust your offense is why you have to
go for it. Because is it easier to get one
yard and then sustain a drive once you're already in
opponent territory territory as opposed to having to get the
ball back with less time on the clock and then
drive the full length of the field again, Like, this

(02:00:39):
is as good a position as you're going to be
in with your limited offense. Try to finish the drive.
It was just a catastrophic decision in my opinion. All right,
let's go rapid fire through these last few games, Logan,
because now we're really getting into the mud. Saints Panthers.
What you take away this was just a bludgeoning.

Speaker 1 (02:00:54):
Shout out Derek Carr man. I mean, Derek Carr had
an awesome, freaking game.

Speaker 4 (02:00:58):
Dude.

Speaker 1 (02:00:58):
I've been the biggest I've been the biggest Derek Carr
hater for a minute. Two hundred yards, three tds. Beautiful
home run ball to Rashid Shaheed, great play in the
red zone to scramble out right, got up Foster from
a row. He's got another beautiful throw to Taysom Hill
in the end zone. He'll drops that TD and the
other big takeaway two things. Bryce Young may be a

(02:01:20):
complete Nutter bust. Thirteen of thirty one hundred and sixty
one yards, two picks, sub thirty three passer rating. He
throws a pick on the first play of the game,
He's got an inexcusable overthrow on the run. And the
thing is man, he lacks NFL caliber physicals. He's not fast,
he doesn't have elite size. There's very little play extension

(02:01:40):
ability because of these limitations, and he's just been inaccurate
and off target. Like I flexed my guns for picking
the Pats Bengals upset, I also picked the Panthers to
win this freaking game. I couldn't have been more wrong.
The Panthers is gonna be one of the worst teams
in the league. Again, Carson, I think they might be
the worst. Yeah, couldn't move the.

Speaker 2 (02:02:01):
Ball at all.

Speaker 1 (02:02:02):
One in ten on third downs. Offensive line was abused.
They can't run the ball, they can't throw the ball.
Three point nine yards per pass, two point nine yards
per rush. The defense got marched on six point one
yards per play, eight yards per pass, and they got
scored on every trip to the red zone. I mean, dude,
David Tepper may have set this franchise back oh yeah,

(02:02:24):
but a decade. I don't know, man. I think the
Panthers are in this hellscape where I don't know, man,
they have the worst future of any team in the NFL.

Speaker 3 (02:02:35):
I think it's among the catastrophic front office decisions that
we've ever seen, I mean across all sports that I
pay attention to. It's an absolute disaster to trade up
such a bulky set of assets to then take a
quarterback at number one who is very very clearly the
wrong choice, very clearly inferior not just to CJ, I

(02:02:57):
think pretty clearly inferior to Anthony Richardson, and then the
next year have the worst record in football, so you
would have had the number one pick, and that is
a generational quarterback prospect. Like, there are certain moves that
I can think of, like, of course the Nets trade
in the NBA right where they just mortgage their future

(02:03:18):
for old ass KG and Paul Pierce, which made no sense.
But at least there it's like, Okay, the timeline they
chose just didn't make sense. I guess that's not better.
That arguably is just even more stupid. But what really
hurts here is like they were going to try to
rebuild either way, and they just completely completely flubbed it.

(02:03:39):
And now they have to watch these other extremely talented
quarterbacks with better assets, some of which they got from
the Panthers. Like when you're talking about the bear situation,
just rough rough stuff, man. But that's what this game
is about. Props to the Saints, they played well. This
is about Carolina being a disaster. I picked them to
win four games. God knows why. Perhaps I was possessed

(02:04:02):
by the spirit of Mother Teresa and a generosity within me.
Perhaps I wanted Matthew Spahanauer to smile for once in
his life. Yike's man, Yeah, this is the worst team
in football. And what I feel like we can say,
And maybe you think this is premature, I don't know.
I don't think it's gonna work out for Bryce in Carolina.
That's not to say that he can't find some success elsewhere,

(02:04:25):
because I do not think that he is a talentless quarterback.
In Throughout last year I defended him some because I
was like, this is a terrible, terrible situation. Not to
say that he would be CJ in Houston, but if
you dropped CJ in Carolina, he wouldn't look the same.
And while I still think that's true, I think Bryce
has many flaws of his own, and I think not

(02:04:46):
to be overly reactive, but like, we won't see a
player like him drafted number one overall in a long time,
if ever. Again, like what we talk about with Richardson,
what we talk about all the elite players dictate the
NFL at the quarterback position. They are physical freaks. They
are big, they are strong armed, they can move, and

(02:05:08):
Brice can move, but he doesn't really like to scramble
to extend plays. And he's small and he doesn't have
a strong arm, and I just worry for him, man.
I mean, he gets beat up physically again in this game,
and he throws bad picks. It's terrible. They can't run
the ball, they can't protect, they have a weak receiving corps.
I thought you'd see some improvement with Lagett and Deontay Johnson.

(02:05:29):
Maybe that's why I picked them to win four games,
but it's still a weak group and their defense is abysmal.
So sorry, Panthers fans, it's dark, man, It's really really dark.
It's also dark for the Giants slogan, who are also
on the short list of worst teams in the league.
They get shellacked by the Vikings twenty eight to six.
Would you take away from this one?

Speaker 1 (02:05:49):
Yeah, they're gonna be one of the worst teams in
the league too. Offense has three point five yards per
play in this one. Defense allows six point one yards
per play. One hundred and eleven total rushings. Daniel Jones
on my list as a bottom five starter in the league.
I recited it earlier. That includes Watson, Nick Young and Minshew.
Forty two pass attempts, twenty two completions, one hundred and

(02:06:12):
eighty six yards, two picks three point five yards per pass,
a pick six to Van Ginkle at the line of scrimmage,
an interception in the red zone. Daniel Jones sucks new slash,
who knew that guy's a bum Dable and Stefanski both
said after the game that they're not going to entertain

(02:06:33):
putting in the backup quarterback at all this or right now,
and like Davel basically said, that's not on my mind
at all. Brian Dabel, my friend Daniel Jones is going
to test your patience. I only think it's a matter
of time until Drew Locke is in this game, man, Yeah,
Danny time sucks. On the positive note, though, unquestionably, this

(02:06:55):
is going to be the best season of Sam Darnold's career.
Admittedly the bar is not that high. Last year in
Carolina was probably his most efficient. He had a highest
passer rating of his career. But twenty nineteen years ago.

Speaker 2 (02:07:08):
No last year.

Speaker 3 (02:07:09):
Last years with the Niners, he was their back.

Speaker 2 (02:07:11):
Oh that's true too.

Speaker 1 (02:07:11):
Yeah, two years ago, twenty nineteen, he posted career highs
in TD's yards and completion percentage. That's nineteen three thousand yards,
sixty two percent completion in this game, really efficient nineteen
to twenty four, one hundred and thirteen point two passer rating,
nearly eighty percent completion. He leads a ninety nine yard
TD drive and the Vikings go for it. On fourth down.

(02:07:33):
He throws a beautiful ball to Justin Jefferson on a slant, like,
you know, it's not like a mind blowing throw, but
he had to throw it with real accuracy, like he
fitted in a really tight window. And ultimately there's so
much skill position talent around him Jefferson, Jones, Addison. Darnold
is not going to have to elevate this offense. This

(02:07:54):
offense is going to elevate him, and I think he's
got a good defense behind him. So I think this
is gonna be the best situation of Donald's career. I
think they'll find their way to some wins this year.

Speaker 2 (02:08:04):
He'll be again. I think this is gonna be the
best season of his career.

Speaker 3 (02:08:07):
Yeah, I will.

Speaker 1 (02:08:07):
I'm really happy for Donald. This was a really solid
debut for him.

Speaker 3 (02:08:12):
This will be a career year for Donald. That's really
never been a question. However, I have still been on
the side of Sam Darnold is not good in him
being able to play a mediocre starting quarterback football in
a good offensive situation with really talented skill position players,
really good running back, good coach like that doesn't change that.
But I don't think he's at the level of awful

(02:08:34):
where like you're gonna constantly be shouting at the sky
and ruining the day that you ever signed him. His
problem's never been a lack of arm talent, though, I mean,
he's always thrown a pretty ball. You've always been able
to say that about Sammy DA's problem is seeing ghosts
and making some panic decisions with the football. And I

(02:08:54):
do think that that'll still happen at a couple points
this season, but I do think that he'll be okay
for that. Aaron Jones is still awesome, by the way,
I want to shout him out. I thought that that
was a really good pickup for the Vikings. He is
just a really complete, really efficient running back. Well Darnold again,
we got to see him tested more than this before
everybody buys all the stock back. This is the New

(02:09:17):
York Football Giants we're talking about, who were never going
to win in those jerseys, man, I mean, listen, I
love paying homage to the old folks as much, maybe
more than anybody, but the logo on the field works
for me. You can't have them playing in the nineteen
twenties uniforms. It looks out of place. They should have
leather helmets. It looks weird with a modern world around them. Hideous.

(02:09:41):
And they do have Daniel Jones as their quarterback, so
they're just awful. Maybe they'll win three games, Go Giants,
all right, last game logan we go from your nemesis,
Daniel Jones, who, by the way, we had some hilarious
conversations about with Drew Valz. If you want to go
check out our episode with him. He is a Danny
Dimes Stan and our thoughts and prayers are with him.

(02:10:03):
Right now, let's talk about Jayden Daniel's debut against the Bucks.
I was just hinting out how much you love Baker,
he's your darling baby boy, and he bawled out. But
let's start with the last rookie quarterback to debut today.
What do you think of his performance?

Speaker 1 (02:10:18):
Yeah, I thought it was a good game. Eighty eight
rushing yards, two tds. He's really elusive man, and just
good at escaping pressure. Like it's abundantly clear to me.
I mean, he does have that trait, you know what
I mean, And it's like it's why Field still has
a job in this league. He's like an A one
A plus rusher of the football, Like you're gonna need

(02:10:40):
to put a QB spy on Jayden often the Bucks didn't,
and he was able to have his way on a
lot of plays.

Speaker 2 (02:10:47):
He's just really fast.

Speaker 1 (02:10:49):
I thought it was an efficient passing day, two seventeen
to twenty four, one hundred and eighty four passing yards.
You know, he wasn't pushing the ball crazy downfield, but
he was making quick decisions, he was throwing underneath and ultimately,
I mean, the Commanders are getting blown out, you know,
towards the end of this game, so it's kind of
garbage time. But he didn't have any colossal screw ups.

(02:11:10):
He didn't have any balls that were like really bad,
and he was really efficient. And I liked how he
looked on the ground. I mean, when you have that
kind of trait, there's a reason that that you can
stick around or be a really good starter in this league.
And I was lower on Jaden Daniels, but I mean,
he looks a far sight better than bow Nick's. He
looks more comfortable than bo.

Speaker 3 (02:11:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:11:31):
Yeah, I thought it was a good debut against a
good defense for Jaden Daniels. You know, nothing spectacular, but
you know nothing that makes me scream and say, oh,
this guy's not an NFL QB.

Speaker 2 (02:11:43):
He looks like he belongs.

Speaker 1 (02:11:44):
And I had a question about that with Jayden, you know,
coming into the draft, coming into this season. I do
think Jayden belongs. I think he's a starter in this league.

Speaker 3 (02:11:53):
I definitely preferred Drake May to him, and I do
stand on that take, but I think that I may
have underestimated how much of not a weapon, but a
fail safe. Just being able to run like this is
for a young quarterback right when things do break down
around you. You don't have to stand in the pocket
and wait for your untimely demise or force a bad

(02:12:16):
decision with the football. You just take off and you're
gonna get seven yards. I mean, Jaden Daniels is that
sort of freak rushing talent as a scrambler, it's him,
it's Lamar, it's Anthony Richardson, now it's Kyler, it's fields
like that's the top tier. He is crazy, fast, crazy elusive.
Takes a lot of hits, of course, and we'll see
how that impacts his health throughout the season. Hopefully he

(02:12:39):
stays healthy as a thrower. I did think there was
some inaccuracy there. Missed on a deep ball. I think
he throws a nice deep ball, but missed on one today,
misplaced a couple screen passes. I think he had some
of those natural rookie debut jitters. I think the passing
attack is going to be limited, but my god, he
can run and he's obviously not incapable as a passer.

(02:13:00):
He's accurate, so I thought it was a strong debut
from him. I mean he played fine. He was great
running the football, and the other two quarterbacks were definitely
not fine. They were something below that. Well, I gonna
allow you to rain some love on your darling quirked
up white boy Baker. Now, I mean, what do you
even have to say at this point, MVP? Are we
starting the MVP push?

Speaker 2 (02:13:23):
He keeps up like this.

Speaker 1 (02:13:24):
I mean, the Commanders don't have really a good secondary
at all, but twenty four to thirty two and eighty
nine yards four tds.

Speaker 3 (02:13:31):
A quarterback has aura.

Speaker 1 (02:13:32):
That's all that matters, exactly, so composed, so confident. He's
got one hell of a playmaking group here. Man Mike
Evans and him have a special special connection. Chris Godwin,
I had a big game where Shad White is one
of the best receiving backs in football, and he had
a little bit of play extension then where the Commander's
got some pass rush home to disrupt him.

Speaker 2 (02:13:51):
And he extended some plays.

Speaker 1 (02:13:54):
I do think the Commander's defense, they've got a lot
of new fresh faces in here is I think it's
gonna take them maybe half the season to really gel together,
to get like acclimated. I think offenses that have been
together for a minute and have an identity in a
formula or probably going to eat on them. I don't
like the secondary. I don't like the I don't like
anything about the Commander's defense, to be honest.

Speaker 2 (02:14:15):
That's why a guy like Baker Mayfield.

Speaker 1 (02:14:17):
As much as I love him, can have a day
like this, right, And I mean he did something comparable
to this to the Packers last year.

Speaker 2 (02:14:23):
He had a perfect pass rating.

Speaker 3 (02:14:25):
Played a really good game against the Texans.

Speaker 1 (02:14:27):
Yeah, and so it's like Baker can have games like this,
but against the I mean, the Commander's secondary was just
getting fried by Baker in them. But yeah, I mean,
but this is the level that I'm not saying you
should expect this kind of play out of Baker Mayfield.

(02:14:47):
But he's a He's an average to above average QB.
Like he can have games like this, and I just
I trust him so much more than a lot of
other starters in the league.

Speaker 3 (02:14:55):
Man.

Speaker 1 (02:14:56):
I trust Baker so much to to make plays and
the gets a ball, the get the ball to his playmakers.

Speaker 2 (02:15:01):
Man, I really believe in Baker.

Speaker 3 (02:15:03):
I was just watching the Johnny Football Untold documentary very recently,
and as I watched Baker today do just such a
boisterous first down signal after scrambling. I thought Baker is
doing with Johnny Football.

Speaker 2 (02:15:19):
Never exactly exactly.

Speaker 3 (02:15:21):
And it's really beautiful. I mean, this is a quirked
up white boy with more confidence than you've ever seen
in any individual. But he's actually doing it. He's actually
doing it at the NFL level.

Speaker 2 (02:15:31):
He's about it.

Speaker 3 (02:15:32):
He is about it, dude, shout out to Baker. I mean,
he is absolutely stamped as a solid quarterback. I think
that the only question about the Bucks paying him is
just like where do the Bucks want to be in
a couple years, Like do they want to just be
in a hard launch rebuild. It's not about paying him
that dollar value. I think he's justified it. He's solid.

(02:15:52):
This team is going to be fine. I don't have
a ton to add. They beat up on one of
the worst teams in football. But I was glad to
see Baker ball out.

Speaker 2 (02:15:59):
Man.

Speaker 3 (02:15:59):
Last year, you and I we were on opposite sides
of the Baker thing, and I've moved past that. I've
grown as a person. I've learned so much and now
I can just appreciate what he's doing out there. And
it's much healthier and it's much better for everyone. Well, logan,
we're just getting started here. We have about four hours left.
No any final thoughts before we end the marathon. Week

(02:16:21):
one pod Nah's Reid Nas reid Man shout out to
anybody who stuck with us for this all. I hope
you enjoyed. If you just listen to our segment about
your team, that's okay too, but hope you guys had
a wonderful first NFL Sunday and hope that you enjoyed
our analysis of it. We have so much more football
still to come. Can't wait to talk about it all,

(02:16:42):
and it's all going to be right here. If you
want all of our season preview content, I don't know
why you'd want that at this point, but go ahead,
enjoy it. It's good stuff. If you want our reactions
to the Thursday and Friday night games, that's all on
our YouTube channel and you can listen to it across
audio platforms. We've got NBA content. We've got trivia stuff,
full shows and YouTube as well. If you want our
short form trivia content, graphics from the show, clips from

(02:17:05):
the show, follow us across social TikTok Instagram at nerd Sesh,
Twitter at nerd Underscore Sesh. You can join our discord.
The link to that is the link tree across our
social media bios, and if you want to check out
our merch you can do so at the volume dot com.
So appreciate all you guys. As always, I've been Carson
Braber

Speaker 2 (02:17:24):
I have been Logan Camden and this was nerd sez

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