Week 2 Monday Night Football Doubleheader Recap: The Quintessential Baker Game!

00:00:01
Speaker 1: And then they run four. Herbert has all day in the pocket, takes a shut out, fiel Q wide open Pod, quint Justin.

00:00:08
Speaker 2: Touchdown, Chargers sixty yard touchdown.

00:00:17
Speaker 3: Herbert took you.

00:00:20
Speaker 4: What a throw from Justin Herbert?

00:00:23
Speaker 5: Oh, what a throw and what a call by bat Money Smith and Daniel Jeremiah, our friend on KFI. Yes, Justin Herbert with a dime down the field to Quinston Quinton Johnson, a sixty yard score in the middle of a game that wasn't the best game we're gonna watch this year.

00:00:42
Speaker 4: I'm Greg Rosenthal.

00:00:43
Speaker 5: Nick shook us with me all the way from Cleveland, Chargers win twenty to nine. Welcome if you're joining us live on YouTube, if you're listening in the morning, or wherever you find us. We're hitting both the Monday night football games in this show. We are going to start with the Chargers and the Raiders, and spoiler alert, the Texans Bucks game had a little more to talk about, but Nick, I'll just start here. This looked like a team in the Chargers that we're going to be talking about a lot throughout the course of this season in high leverage games, and.

00:01:17
Speaker 4: We're learning more about them now.

00:01:19
Speaker 5: In back to back primetime appearances, and a team in the Raiders that ultimately I don't think have enough players to get it done. One of the worst games in Geno Smith's career, unfortunately in primetime, and it was not nearly as close as the twenty to nine score would indicate.

00:01:36
Speaker 4: What is your biggest takeaway?

00:01:38
Speaker 6: Yeah, it was actually pretty casual in the second half by the Chargers. With that lead in especially the fourth quarter, they opened the door for the Raiders to make a couple of you know, comeback attempts, and obviously they didn't follow through on that, but that's how dominant the Chargers were in this game.

00:01:53
Speaker 1: We're not going to necessarily look at.

00:01:55
Speaker 6: This game in a few weeks and think, oh, this was when we realized the Chargers were for real. But to me, the defense alone makes me think, oh, the Charges might be for real because they own this game. They absolutely shut down the Raiders and anything that they brought to the table. They showed the difference in overall talent, and that's after they lost Khalil Mack to an injury as well. They were just dynamite in the secondary. Any ball that was tipped in the air, they almost all of them they intercepted. They started to playoff with the Diane Henley interception, a lopsided victory that, like you said, the score does not reflect how dominant the Chargers were tonight.

00:02:33
Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:02:33
Speaker 5: One of our viewers right now, Chris g is asking it is he turning into the dayon Henley Appreciation Hour?

00:02:40
Speaker 4: Yeah?

00:02:40
Speaker 5: Where were you for the dayon Henley flu game? On the injury report with an illness added, there was some real concern that he wasn't going to play in this game, and my new favorite player, Marlo wax I thought might be starting instead. He gets out there and you mentioned it gets the interception on the first play of the game. The comedy of a lowie Gilman and him, you know, Gilman breaking on a ball, which was typical of the entire night. Like Gino, Smith could just not find open receivers and when he did, he often missed them. Throwing forty three times for one hundred and eighty yards and three interceptions. And Henley, who had one of them, also had ten tackles, one sack, two tackles for loss, and a pass defense. And I said it going into the year, he is a future All Pro. It would not surprise me if he has that type of season this year. And you know how you have those type of seasons, you get everyone's attention in a game like this, you know, watching some of the young players, Eddrin Cooper and you have Johad Campbell next to Zach bond I. You know, Fred Werner and the Winters are playing well. I feel like linebackers are back and Dayon Henley.

00:03:52
Speaker 4: Is leading the way.

00:03:53
Speaker 5: This defense was absolutely ferocious and made a Raiders offense that was bombed away against the Patriots a week ago with nine to twenty yard plus plays looked totally toothless and they couldn't get anything done even as the offense tried to charger it away with some of the decision making and then the late fumble late in the game.

00:04:15
Speaker 6: Yeah, Raiders finished the game with a success rate of thirty five point four percent. Credit to the Chargers defense. The Chargers leaned heavily on zone coverage eighty seven point five percent of their defensive play calls against the past zone coverage. And you know when you look at that, sometimes you think, but you don't have the dogs to run, man. No, They're just so good in zone at taking away throwing windows for Ginosmith that it doesn't matter. There was a specific play, actually no, that was on the other side of the field. But they've been pretty dynamite against two offenses that look a lot different but also had the potential.

00:04:46
Speaker 1: To air it out.

00:04:47
Speaker 6: I think about the Chargers playing the Chiefs last week and limiting the Chiefs to twenty one points and also fighting back against the Chiefs comeback attempt, and that's a better team.

00:04:56
Speaker 1: I think about this week.

00:04:57
Speaker 6: They never really let the door open for the Raiders to get into it. Yes, they didn't put a ton of points on the board. Yes they had to settle for three when they were on the doorstep of the end zone in the second half.

00:05:05
Speaker 1: None of it mattered.

00:05:06
Speaker 6: None of it mattered because the defense, I mean, they couldn't run the ball very well for most of this game. People are begging Greg Roman to run the football. It doesn't matter.

00:05:13
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter because of the defensive place.

00:05:15
Speaker 6: So exactly, we've entered the alternative universe in which Quentin Johnson. You tweeted this, Quentin Johnson, everybody loves him and he's making plays and people are begging Greg Roman to run the ball.

00:05:26
Speaker 1: That's exactly what we saw tonight, I.

00:05:28
Speaker 5: Guess in Greg Roman's defense, you know, Amari and Hampton ends up with twenty four yards on eight carries. A couple of those who were on the goal line, like you mentioned, Naje Harris eight carries for twenty eight yards. A lot of this is in, you know, trying to run the clock out and struggling to late in the game, and Harbaugh made some curious decisions. It made me wonder if the rivalry between Pete Carroll and Jim Harbaugh was almost you know, making him make emotional decisions like trying to stick it to Pete Carroll. You know, he didn't go for a four and goal on the two yard line when they couldn't punch it in, almost emotional because he was so mad that they couldn't run it in. But then he does go for it on his side of the fifty and calls like an end around to Trey Harris where they were rushing to play. They refused to take a time out and they end up fumbling the exchange snap. And yeah, ultimately it doesn't matter because this defense just is full of bad men. You know, Tarheeb still is a guy not many people know he was all over the place tonight. Tony Jefferson definitely one of the candidates for our Wednesday Unka the.

00:06:35
Speaker 4: Week this week. I mean he he was out of football.

00:06:40
Speaker 5: He was in football, but he was working in a scouting department a couple of years ago. He's like in his mid thirties and he skies for the one I would say understandable interception of Gino Smith where he just decided to throw it deep on the third and six and it turned into a pretty good armpunt. This group and their second year in Jesse enter his system and the way that they play their match quarters. You know, we had Cody Alexander on the show in the preseason and the defense that they have and all the disguised you know, pass rush looks that they give where you just don't know where the pass rush is coming from. It totally scrambled one of the smartest quarterbacks in the league in Gino Smith, and he didn't know what to do. And that's despite not having that Gould have a four man pass rush and that is a concern.

00:07:26
Speaker 4: Nick.

00:07:26
Speaker 5: You mentioned Khalil Mack. He left with an elbow injury. He had, you know, a cast not a cast, but it was in a sling on the sideline. It did not look good. They showed some pretty gruesome replays and it would be surprising if we see Khalil Mack anytime soon. I'll just leave it there and that that's really disappointing and I think could be really costly for this team, Nick, because it is not a deep pass rush group. I actually said, you know this week on our show, that to me is their number one concern. And so it's really got to be on Jesse Minter and the coaches, the ski team, something up or maybe the front office to look at the team that they have and try to find someone as we get closer to the trade.

00:08:07
Speaker 1: That.

00:08:08
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's funny because as you watch this game progress and the Raiders, you know, fail to find the end zone. I'm listening to the broadcast and they're just emphasizing how important is that Ashton Genty gets the ball more that they lean on him because you think, all right, well, you should be able to run against this front, especially without Mac out there. He finishes with the eleven carries for forty three yards. Some of that's dictated by score difference by the Chargers coming out and scoring a touchdown just before the end of the half by you know, moving down and tacking on three more in the third quarter. But I think it also just kind of pointed to the fact that no matter what the Raiders tried to do, they weren't really able to do much of anything. And while we worry about the depth upfront, which I think you're right, could be an issue, you know, in weeks ahead and against better teams with better run blocking, better you know, run schemes, because I think Genty's a great player, so I wouldn't say better running backs. At the same time, I feel so good about their linebacking core and their secondary, and the beauty of it is the versatility. It's Gino's last interception that illustrates at the best, in which Derwin James is playing a middle zone and he's running back and Gino makes the right decision on that throw.

00:09:10
Speaker 1: That's where you're supposed to throw that football.

00:09:11
Speaker 6: But because Derwin James is an uber athletic safety playing in that role that's usually occupied by a linebacker, he's able to match.

00:09:18
Speaker 1: The foot speed.

00:09:19
Speaker 6: I think that's how it was described by Lewis Riddick of the intended target who was Jacoby Myers, get his head around, deflect the ball, and then another defensive back is there to pick that off.

00:09:27
Speaker 1: That is where the strength of their defense is. It could be a week point up front.

00:09:30
Speaker 6: It's something that will continue to monitor from week to week, especially against the better teams. But I feel so much better about the second and third level that they could potentially cover up for it, especially if you're able to disguise some blitz and get some pressure that way.

00:09:42
Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:09:43
Speaker 5: I think those are all really good points, and I'm glad you pointed out that play. Let's actually roll that highlight. Derwin James, who also had a fantastic night, really ending the game for the chart.

00:09:58
Speaker 1: They rush for pressure, comment takes a shot to the.

00:10:01
Speaker 4: End zone, popped up in the air, intercepted for the third time a touchback. I think Derwin tipped it.

00:10:11
Speaker 3: Derwin definitely tipped it, and Dante Jackson comes down with it exactly what they needed his twentieth career interception.

00:10:22
Speaker 5: Oh good, good play there by Dante Jackson. And yeah, the Chargers defense, you know, they looked better with Kleio Mack. But I'm not worried long term. I see a comment in the chat that says Brady. Tom Brady, the part owner of the Raiders, who was there at the stadium with a headset end said he's got to know how bad Gino is.

00:10:46
Speaker 4: Why is he allowing this? And this does hurt?

00:10:48
Speaker 5: And I know people are watching and I'm getting comments on Twitter, and yeah, everything's happening, and I would just like to make a statement as the president of the Geno a Preciation Society and just admit this was one of the worst games of his career.

00:11:05
Speaker 4: I think it was a good defense.

00:11:07
Speaker 5: More than anything, but there were a number of times in this game where he left a relatively clean pocket because he looked a little panicked and not sure of what he was seeing. That that is not a good sign. And then, more than anything, he just missed four or five throws. And when I look at what I think Gino does best is when a throw is there, he makes it. His on target rate, even from a year ago when he was, you know, had worse traditional numbers, was right there at the very top of the league, especially even when he was pressured, but especially when he wasn't pressured, and tonight he missed a few throws, including a potential touchdown late which would have made it a one score game to brock Bauers, where he just sailed it. So it was a really rough night for Gina. We can just admit that that doesn't change how fantastic he looked in Week one, how underrated and fantastic I think he's looked over the last couple of years. But it is a concerning game for both him and Chip Kelly. And I'll spin it to you Nick this way. I thought it pointed out just how vital everything brock Bauers does is this offense, because that was not the brock Bowers were used to seeing. He was on the injury report with a knee injury, he had a brace on. He's still got eight targets, five catches for thirty eight yards, but I was watching him very often and he was just not moving the same. And they need brock Bowers. He is, to quote Dave damashek their Jenga piece, and if he is not right, I just don't think they're dynamic enough on offense.

00:12:43
Speaker 6: Yes, I think that explains a lot of their struggles tonight, and I wanted to contextualize it and kind of, you know, have your back a little bit against the Geno haters because this offense looks so different without him at full strength.

00:12:56
Speaker 1: Yes, he was out there, but I think that one.

00:12:58
Speaker 6: Play where uh Or when James pulls down his arm and gets away with the pass interference kind of just illustrated what he's going through right now. He does not have the athleticism and leaping ability that makes him so special with that knee.

00:13:12
Speaker 1: I mean, he's going through it right now.

00:13:13
Speaker 6: When he landed after jumping up, it's like he tried to avoid landing on that leg that is not anywhere close to one hundred percent brock Bowers, And like Damnschek said, I completely agree that you pulled that one Jenga piece the whole tower falls. That's what we saw tonight because we went into the season looking at their pass catching options and I call it pass catching options because we are very much leaning on tight end here as a key part of this group. We knew that Jack Besh hadn't been the second round pick that they thought he was going to be, that Dante Thornton had outplayed him and was going to have a higher spot on the depth chart. We knew it was Jacobe Meyer and Dante Thornton and just figure the rest out. Because Brock Bauers is better than all of those guys. There's going to be your top target. When you eliminate your top target from that operation, when you cannout run the football, when you can't protect effectively against some of these disguise looks and pressures that are coming from unexpected angles, your all offense just gets cut at the knees. And that's exactly what we saw tonight. So that's why I say we're not gonna necessarily look back at this game and think this is the moment we thought the Chargers were for real, because I think context is super important in this matchup alone. But I give them a little bit of grace for the struggles that they endured tonight because they were ugly. It was a pretty ugly game for them, But they're not at full strength. I'm not excusing it, but I am saying that to help everybody kind of understand why it was so ugly and why Gino had one of the worst games of his career.

00:14:33
Speaker 4: Yeah, look, they're one and one.

00:14:35
Speaker 5: If you went into the season, you would expect them to be happy with that. They got a road when they lost this one in the division. Hearing from a lot of you watching who are all over the place, Netherlands, like over twenty percent of the people watching right now are from Europe, and yeah, some Canadians on the West Coast watching as well. So we appreciate you on and we'll be doing this each and every Monday night.

00:15:01
Speaker 4: Can we talk about Brady a little bit?

00:15:02
Speaker 6: I mean, do you want to talk about his prem announcement because that was fun.

00:15:07
Speaker 5: No, I don't care about the flag football, the flag football sportswashing. You know, there shouldn't be enough money to have Tom Brady do that. I mean, he has enough money, but he's doing it. Don't care about that. It's just so bizarre that he is going to a production meeting to announce a Chicago Bears game this week. Nick Shook and his Raiders are playing the Bears in week four, and that this just continues on. And I get there are conflicts of interest all over the media, but it's a little extreme. He's talking with Chip Kelly, according to the broadcast, two or three times a week about offensive game planning, and meanwhile he's gathering intel from all these other teams and obviously I'm aware that Ben Johnson is aware of this, and they're not giving up state secrets to Tom Brady. But he is allowed to like make connections with players, with coaches that he might one day want to hire for the Raiders, and he is learning something and the whole thing is just strange. I always thought he should have had to pick between being announcer and being an owner and him being up there, you know, with the with the headset on and the whole suit, and then when the camera was on him, he started like slinking down in his chair.

00:16:28
Speaker 4: Did you know that.

00:16:28
Speaker 5: It was almost like he was trying to get off camera or something. I'm doing that for the YouTube bodience too.

00:16:35
Speaker 4: I don't know. I'm just blame.

00:16:37
Speaker 6: Well, let's add in the fact that the league kind of loosen the rules on him this year. Like last year was you can't be in production meetings at all. Now you can do it over zoom. Still can't be in the facility. What you think that, like the flow of information is just gonna stop because he's not in the facility, Like he's still in these meetings.

00:16:53
Speaker 1: You're right, it's not state secrets now.

00:16:54
Speaker 5: Right now he's going into the meeting. Now he's going into the facilities.

00:16:57
Speaker 6: You're right, yeah, yeah, it's just the conflict of interest is it's not ideal. And also I came to the conclusion today actually about the flag football thing, but this too. His sphere of influence is like as large as the NFL. Like as you're in the you're on the a team for the Fox broadcast America's Game of the Week. You're right there with Kevin Burkhardt. You're on a national game every week. You're also a minority owner of a team. You're also a legend. When you meet some of those players in these meetings, you think they're not going to look at you and be like, oh my god, that's Tom Brady. You think that's not going to influence how they interact with you.

00:17:32
Speaker 1: I don't like it either.

00:17:33
Speaker 6: I agree with you, and I think this would be more of a concern if the Raiders were like a wagon and they're not.

00:17:38
Speaker 5: Well, look, there are one of the teams in the NFL.

00:17:42
Speaker 1: And they are they are one of thirty two.

00:17:44
Speaker 5: If Tom Brady has any thing to say about it. And I think they'll be competitive this year. Although it wasn't great all right, last couple things on this game, and we'll get the Texans bucks very shortly. I do think it's notable justin Herbert keeps running so much, get an awkward slide at the end of the game, which I didn't like to see where his cleek got caught in the turf, But early in the game when they were struggling to get things going offensively, him scrambling really made a difference, and I think you can see the difference. He played a good, confident game tonight and getting all the sport that he's getting from the defense kind of points out what the Herbert hive has been saying all along, like he's doing his job. If he can get help around him, he will look a lot better. And ultimately he's played two very clean games. I think he looks very composed, and he had enough great plays tonight, including that long touchdown to Quinton Johnson. And the other one that stands out to me is when they went for it on fourth and two in the first half, Nick and his first read was taken away on that play and he calmly just gets to his second read and it was Keenan Allen over the middle. The Keenan Allen improvement from a year ago I think is real. He is really helping this team on third and fourth down. Maybe now it's fourth and keenan and he just calmly and quickly gets to that second read. So right now, I'm really happy as a guy who's always loved watching Justin Herbert with what they're doing around him. For the most part, the running game is not great, but the pass protection has been pretty good.

00:19:14
Speaker 6: Yeah, you should feel vindicated too, because I feel like Herbert has taken too much negativity from critics over the last couple of years for the charger struggles, as if it was his fault just because he plays quarterback. The narrative, and it's true over the last I would say the last two years, more specifically two years ago, was that they didn't protect him well enough, and they've worked on that since then with the investments they've made in the offensive line. Well, now he's getting protection, and now the offense is running through him again, and it's not this run first offense that we thought we were going to see. It's we're going to empower him to do whatever he wants. Those two touchdown passes looked way too easy to be in an NFL game against a team that's like not a bottom barrel team. And that's what people should worry about if they're playing against the Chargers, is oh God, Herbo might come in here and dice us up, because he's looking real good right now.

00:19:59
Speaker 5: So they've beaten both the division, you know, games that they've had in front of them, the Chiefs the Raiders, and they can try to complete the trifecta. In one of the biggest games of Week three, they played the Broncos. Weird schedule, it really made this September be extremely important for the Chargers. If you can sweep your division in the first three weeks of the year, they could potentially have like a two game lead and a tiebreaker over all three teams in week four, almost unheard of. And it makes me think about how hard they practiced in training camp hurt you know, Harbaugh runs a tough training camp, and the fact that they had an extra week because they were in the Hall of Fame game, it all might have helped them out a little bit to get a head start.

00:20:43
Speaker 4: But they'll have to beat the Broncos next.

00:20:45
Speaker 6: But but I'm also a little worried how that's going to look when.

00:20:49
Speaker 1: We get to November and December. Okay, let's just say it.

00:20:52
Speaker 5: Let's not worry about the charger reason the marathon, it did really kind of look like they tried the charger it away. But so they're different this year. They're they're complete, they can win games different. Okay, let's talk Bucks and Texans. If you're listening on audio, let's take a quick break.

00:21:15
Speaker 4: Let's go to the Bucks and the Texans.

00:21:18
Speaker 5: And yes, it came down to the very end.

00:21:22
Speaker 7: Mayfield such back in motion, hands the ball on shot White into the end zone.

00:21:26
Speaker 4: Is the in? Is he in?

00:21:28
Speaker 3: Touchdown? Tampa Bay touchdown? Tampa Bay Buccaneers take the lead at twenty to nineteen. We're shot White right up the cut.

00:21:38
Speaker 4: Oh that's Jeem decker Hoffa alongside Dave Bore for w f US.

00:21:43
Speaker 5: On a night where the Bucks running game had a success rate that you know, I would have accepted like on a math test back in high school. They run the ball in at the very end after Todd Bowles, of all people, manages the clock apps beautifully. Baker Mayfield did it again. They didn't score Nick for seven straight drives before Baker Mayfield got the ball back with a couple minutes to go, and when he got the ball back. I don't know about you, but I thought, oh, he's gonna go score a touchdown.

00:22:20
Speaker 4: And you know what, he did it, Yeah, he did.

00:22:24
Speaker 6: The instant cries of you score two quickly Texans were proven to be correct. Baker Mayfield is a magician. He is a ball of fire disguised by a Buccaneers uniform. He's somebody that you can rally an entire team around. You know, back in the day when the Browns dratsed him first overall, John Dorsey drafted first overall because he walked into the facility at Oklahoma and made a little like call to his teammates and they all responded. Because he's a leader. He's a guy that players will rally around, and he's a guy that players will trust. In a moment of a high leverage moment, a moment of adversity, you're on the you're playing primetime, the stadium's lot. I don't know if the roof has closed or open, but I'm sure it was loud regardless, and he goes right down the field. He converts a fourth down by slipping what would have been a game ending sack or at least a sack that would have put them in a bad spot because they still have their timeouts, and then he continues to just dot the sideline with passes. They managed to clock not perfectly, at least from the coaching side, but because Baker's out there, they manage it well and then they.

00:23:24
Speaker 4: Pounded in there just about perfect.

00:23:25
Speaker 6: What did you have a problem with, Well, I felt like they kept the time out in their pocket when I don't know if I necessarily would have had them do it, but it paid off because then they were able to run the ball in the goal line because they had that timeout.

00:23:35
Speaker 5: They kept their timeout s, which to me kept the flexibility.

00:23:39
Speaker 4: You're right there.

00:23:40
Speaker 5: There was a chance that they would have only had time to run one more play after this, but probably not with six seconds left. I honestly think it was one of the best managed two minute drills that I've seen, in the fact that they kept those timeouts in their pocket and then we're able to run it. There is a feather in Todd Bowles's cap and Josh Grizzard the Lizard King. What I always forget what Jordan's lizard lick from Lizard Lick man.

00:24:08
Speaker 4: He got it done.

00:24:09
Speaker 5: You mentioned the fourth down play to Baker Mayfield, so yeah, let's set it up here. I like I mentioned two minutes and ten seconds left. They have the ball on the twenty, so not great field position. Had gone seven straight drives without a single point after two touchdowns to start the game. They're playing without their two starting tackles. Tristan Wurf's not yet ready to play. They're all pro left tackle. They did have Luke Geticky start this game at right tackle. He actually looked great, I thought on the first drive, which was a touchdown drive. Then he comes out. They still score a touchdown on their second drive. After that, you kind of saw the hard hitting Texans defense do what they do and really shut down Tampa. So that's the sequence that sets it all up. First three plays of the drive, Nick no yards, incomplete pass, a completion that doesn't go for anything. Baker, like he was most of the night, is under a lot of pressure. And then we get to fourth and ten and the Bucks, rather the Texans send another blitz, maybe one blitz two many.

00:25:19
Speaker 7: Nineteen fourteen Houston Bucks have one more down, fourth down in chan can Baker Mayfield pull something out? Of the hat and convert on fourth down and long. Here's the snap. Here comes Heat picked up nicely. Mayfield in the pressure.

00:25:34
Speaker 3: He's gonna run Mayfield with the forty Mayfield with the forty five yard line. He's tripped up with the forty seven. So Baker Mayfield. That's a better Baker does his thing.

00:25:43
Speaker 5: Yes, it is time for delivering results by Uber Eats, and let's have our Baker conversation, because he absolutely delivered that.

00:25:53
Speaker 4: That was a play where he saw the.

00:25:56
Speaker 5: Pack pocket collapsing around him. And I think in that moment, like every Texans fan and I live with one, he's ten years old and he's asleep by now, thought the Texans were gonna win that game. And then Baker just does what he does and escapes and flips over in true Baker style, and then calms down afterwards. And it's crazy because it's like, if you're a Baker hater, he gives you like those bad moments for you to say, oh, well, he got lucky, Like early on he threw a ball in the triple coverage that should have been picked. He fumbled the ball twice in this game, including a fumble where he punched the ball out of his own hand. It was it was bizarre, like he had bad moments and yet when when it really mattered, he comes up with that big play and that's becoming like the defining thing in what is you know, just a fascinating career.

00:26:52
Speaker 6: Yeah, you know, in the biggest spots, when it seems like the chips are stacked against him, he pulls off not quite racles with something close Like Henry Toto had a great game tonight and he was the guy blitzing kind of a late arriving blitzer that was there to sack Baker on that play as we just played. If you're watching on YouTube, and I don't know how he slipped that sack. I mean, Toad's almost over pursues a little bit, but like there's not a lot of space there. He slips it like it's nothing and takes off and runs. And as soon as that he takes off, you realize the middle of the field is open. But in classic Baker fashion, he doesn't slide. He's like, bring on the contact. He battles multiple like knee issues suffered in the first half. I was shocked he was out there after one of them. The slow mo replay, his knee gets bent in awkwardly. He grabs at it immediately and you're thinking, oh no, not another quarterback to go down in week two, gets right back up, gets back on the field, he runs, He scrambles on that play, or it might have been an earlier play where he bangs his knee on the turf and grabs his knee again, and then CJGJ ced Deuce is in his face talking trash and instead of being like, oh my knee, Baker understands the moment, stands up, gets in his face and immediately starts talking trash back, because Baker's never gonna be talked down when it comes to trash talk. Like he is the He defines the energy of this team, and it's just like they did in Atlanta last week. They're in a tough spot. Most teams lose in those situations. He has no fear, goes right down the field, hits Abuka for the touchdown last week. This week, he makes all the plays to set them up for the rushing score. That was the top story from this game was the way that he finished the game. It's something that we just have to come to expect from him in these key moments. Now you can never count him out. Just there's like four quarterbacks you can't count in these situations. Pat Mahomes, Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, and Baker Mayfield.

00:28:37
Speaker 1: That's it.

00:28:37
Speaker 6: Like those first three year are like, oh well, those guys all one MVPs. And then there's Baker Mayfield.

00:28:44
Speaker 4: Actually you just look at last minute I.

00:28:45
Speaker 1: Would throw I would throw Herbert in there.

00:28:49
Speaker 6: I know that people would push back against that. I would throw him in there in my own private conversations, maybe not publicly. Yet those four though, I would put my life on the line thinking they're gonna go win this game because of who he is. And like we haven't even talked really a lot about how well they were running the ball and how they did defensively, And yet it's because Baker dominates the conversation because he's that special level player he is.

00:29:13
Speaker 5: And I think this almost replaces his Rams game as the quintessential Baker game because of all the reason yes that I said, because he actually only averaged four point five yards per attend They were inefficient tonight, and he's a streaky player, but he had enough very good moments including the touchdown to Abuka early, the first couple of drives, and then the plays that mattered late. But they would not have won this game, as you mentioned, if it wasn't for the running game. Let's let's talk a little bit about Bucky Irving goes seventeen for seventy one on the ground, also catches six passes for fifty yards Rashad White who gets the game winner there, great job in terms of pass pro and then ten rushes for sixty five yards. They had a sixty three percent success rate, which is just outstanding. You get extra points that it came against this Houston Texans defense. Compare that to thirty three percent for the Texans. They almost double them up there. And you think about the play calling that the Texans had near the goal line where they decide to throw the ball after getting stuffed once near the goal line with Nick Chubb and he goes backwards, they decide to throw the ball twice. Meanwhile the Bucks. It was good running blocking for sure for a lot of the night, but I also felt like a lot of that success rate is Bucky Irving turning a negative play or a one yard run into a five yard run or a seven yard run or a four yard run and keeping them on schedule. He really is a special running back.

00:30:52
Speaker 4: Bucky Irving.

00:30:53
Speaker 5: Mashad White's great too, but man, Bucky Irving makes something out of nothing.

00:30:58
Speaker 6: Yeah, Bucky Irving has the explosiveness and the swiftness to kind of like slice and dice knife through a defense to turn what looks like when he first receives the handoff maybe a two yard gain into a nine to twelve yard gain. And he didn't have a ton of plus ten yard runs tonight, like his average was I think around four yards per carry.

00:31:18
Speaker 1: It was four point two.

00:31:19
Speaker 6: But make no mistake, he paced this ground game and we knew what he was capable of because of what he did last season. The beauty of tonight is that he's not the only guy in that backfield. Rashad White lost his job to Bucky Irving last year because Bucky was clearly the better option. They're both pretty damn good. They're both also good as three down backs. It's rare that a team has two guys that they can lean on. His three down backs that you could deploy at the same time and keep a defense, you know, guessing even more because they're both out there and they combined for what was it, one hundred and thirty six yards on the ground. I mean, that's that's great production right there, success strate sixty three percent. You said you'd take that on a mathess You're like, okay, all right, Like, I guess we're taking low grades here, but you know who grades the running backs to have low grades?

00:32:08
Speaker 4: Yeah?

00:32:08
Speaker 5: That they got the only D I think in my life in freshman like it was I think it was Honors math, and it was a good lesson for me. I then dropped down a level the next few years in math.

00:32:21
Speaker 4: It was a first.

00:32:21
Speaker 5: It was really the first time in my life I was like, oh, you can't just get away with everything by like by talking and by like not trying that particularly hard. At some point you're going to come up against something that you just can't overcome with that. It was a good lesson. Shout out to miss du Gray, who taught me a tough lesson in life. So yeah, I took I took a D and I'm not gonna apologize for it. Look that that was delivering results, by the way, presented by Uber Eats, where you can get the best deals on game day food all season long. It's the official on demand delivery partner of the NFL. It's not too late, you could now. I mean we're hearing from people overseas. It's morning in Dublin, it's afternoon in Australia. I'm actually gonna be heading over to Dublin next week. Don't know if I've officially mentioned that on the podcast. Going to be part of a live show too, by the way, where there's some tickets with the Irish NFL show. Michael McQuaid very excited about that, So go check out his socials, my social to get tickets to that.

00:33:26
Speaker 4: That's on Friday night.

00:33:26
Speaker 5: I'm just decided, let's throw some plugs in there, shook before we get to the Texan side of things, and then go to bed because it's one in the morning.

00:33:35
Speaker 4: One thirty in the morning where you are here in Cleveland.

00:33:39
Speaker 5: Okay, Well, we gave Bulls the props for managing the game. I think they're much better. They actually hired one of these game management assistant which more and more coaches and organizations are starting to do. And maybe he gets some they get some credit to, but I think this improvement started a year ago. I think is a real well run organization. They have a lot of injuries, like they're missing their two starting tackles. That could have been an excuse. And Baker Mayfield was under a lot of pressure. Why Will Anderson had nine pressures in this game. Daniel Hunter had two sacks. But when you look at the pressure rate and you look at the blitz rate and everything, the Texans actually in the bucks in terms of their pass rushers were about a draw. Like, the pressure rate was about a draw, and the Texans actually had to send like a lot of blitzes to get their pressure rate. And so if you can make that a draw while you're missing your two tackles and you're going up against this great Texans pass rush, that's a win.

00:34:40
Speaker 4: That's good coaching.

00:34:41
Speaker 5: I just think they're really well coached despite having a brand new offensive coordinator. And then on the other side, I think Todd Bowles has his mojo back. He was sending the heat tonight and he finally has a secondary he can trust again. And the group that's kind of the safety Nickel group, Antoine Windenfield, Tike Smith, and the rookie Jacob Parrish. He can be very multiple and these guys can tackle and they're versatile and they're really good.

00:35:05
Speaker 4: And Todd Bowles was in his bag.

00:35:06
Speaker 5: I know they've only won by four points over two weeks, but they were playing pretty good opponents. I am really impressed with what the Buccaneers are doing from a coaching and just organizational perspective so far.

00:35:17
Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:35:17
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think the four point victory margin over the two weeks is an example of coaching. Like I think that they've put themselves in advantageous positions and made up for the absences, especially a tackle by coaching. Like I was so impressed by the way Grizzard called his game tonight, Like I just thought that his flow was great, he sensed the situation and called the right plays really well consistently over this night. I mean, obviously, like we said, Bucky Irving kind of elevates that running game. But they were well balanced, they were paced well, they moved down the field when they scored, they did it effectively. It's just that when you face that defense, especially on the road, in an environment like that, you are going to run into some you know, three and outs of ugly scenarios. But overall, I was very impressed and I actually had the thought my head damn it, they're gonna do it again. They're gonna lose an offensive coordinator for the third straight year. They have the third straight you know, new offensive coordinator and there, and they're still gonna be successful. Wizard from like, yeah, yeah, Lizard, the Lizard Lick kid, the Lizard Lick guy is gonna end up looking at head coaching jobs after this year.

00:36:18
Speaker 1: Like, I don't know how they keep getting away with this, and yet they do because of you.

00:36:23
Speaker 6: Know, I think a large part because they have Baker Mayfield on the field. But yeah, great job of coaching on both sides. And I picked up on those blitzes too from Todd Bowles. It feels like he's back in his comfort zone, getting aggressive again, still being short in his halftime interviews.

00:36:35
Speaker 1: That's who Todd Bowles is.

00:36:36
Speaker 6: And I thought it was a stark contrast against the current state of the Houston Texans and maybe this is where we transition because I have issues with the way the Texans coach this game. Tonight.

00:36:45
Speaker 5: I was, you know, really proud of finding the text from Jordan that said King Gizzard the Lizard Wizard from Lizard Lick Do.

00:36:51
Speaker 4: You know that?

00:36:52
Speaker 6: But that's actually inspired by what there's there's actually a music artist named King Gizzard, I.

00:36:59
Speaker 1: Know, I know, I and other references big song, rattlesnake, you know.

00:37:02
Speaker 5: Yeah, No I don't, okay, So yeah, the offensive line for the Texans, they started well and they played fairly well, I thought tonight against the four man rush. The problem wasn't their individual abilities, although it wasn't amazing. I thought Ursery, who is back at left tackle now, actually played okay. I thought he played pretty well. But the communication of picking up the blitzes was so poor yea that the second Todd Bowles realized that it just was blitz on every key down And in the end CJ. Stroud under pressure goes three for eight for twenty five yards and took four sacks, and he did not have much of a chance. And by the end of the game, even when the pressure was picked up decently, he was panicking a little bit and had that one throw that should have been intercepted where he just like was just trying to get rid of the ball and not you know, drop back before they wound up kicking a field goal and got very lucky.

00:38:12
Speaker 4: And so this is a group that's ragtag.

00:38:16
Speaker 5: It's a new center, you know, replacing an injury, and it was otherwise mostly the group that they had in the preseason. But you know, they're guys that weren't very effective a year ago in the spots that they had in a rookie and a replacement, and it's a bummer for them to look so much like they did a year ago in this game.

00:38:35
Speaker 6: Yeah, because we were sold a bad bill of goods in the offseason. Oh, we just need to change the offensive coordinator. We need to make changes on the offensive line. Will be in a much better place. We were even sold that they were improved during training camp, and yet here we are again watching CJ.

00:38:49
Speaker 1: Stroud get baking a shot.

00:38:50
Speaker 4: I'm one of the people that tried to sell it a little bit.

00:38:53
Speaker 6: No, I was sold that by the people who were at Texans camp. I was writing those things up in the summer, like I was ready to buy into it too. Demiko said he had his starting five solidified. We talked about it on the show, and yet we're still watching CJ. Stroud get you know, be forced to be uncomfortable. He's just he doesn't trust his offensive line still. And the biggest issue with it is not the fact that they aren't holding up well, especially when you have these changes. That's understandable. It's not the fact that they couldn't run the ball effectively tonight. That's also understandable. It's the way that they called the game. I'm sorry, but if you're anticipating a blitz on third down called up by Todd Bowles, a guy who's notorious for sending pressure and knows that he can send pressure and find success, can you anticipate it in your play calling a little bit?

00:39:37
Speaker 1: Can you not lean on the pass? Like you look at the run pass ratio in this game.

00:39:40
Speaker 6: It seems very even because they did run the ball a little bit more in the later stages, which kind of evened it out. But there were stretches in this game in which they were just passing, passing, passing and not turning to the run at all and getting nowhere with it. And there were so many times where CJ. Stroud would drop back and have nowhere to go with the football. Now, if you have offensive line issues, you can call screens. You could, you know, potentially roll out your quarterback. They didn't roll him out by design until it was fourth and goal and gave him like one option to throw to and of course he sails it over the guy's head. Because like, this offense is just stuck. They're in a rut. And I think that it could be fixed with some better play calling in anticipation for the situation.

00:40:17
Speaker 1: And this is a first year offensive coordinator. He's gonna learn this.

00:40:20
Speaker 6: But it just frustrates me because you're you're putting your quarterback who is good in a bad situation to the point where now he's missing throws when he's not pressured.

00:40:28
Speaker 1: And that's really what concerns me the most. The effects from last year are bleeding over into this.

00:40:33
Speaker 6: Year and it's undercutting your entire offense and making you lose games like this tonight, a game that you very much had a chance to win.

00:40:39
Speaker 5: Yeah, I would give the grade for CJ. Stroud as a seat tonight. There were good moments. I will stand on the table and take all the stock people are giving away in CJ.

00:40:55
Speaker 4: Stroud.

00:40:55
Speaker 1: No, I'm taking it, and I'm.

00:40:58
Speaker 4: Believing wholeheartedly in two things from tonight. CJ.

00:41:01
Speaker 5: Stroud is going to have a great NFL career and it is a very good quarterback right now.

00:41:07
Speaker 1: Yes.

00:41:08
Speaker 5: The other thing was this game was entertaining as hell. They put on a good show. It felt like a playoff game. Granted, it felt like, you know, a early playoff game, like what you know West? Why am I blanking on? You know that the early Texan slot.

00:41:27
Speaker 1: That that oh west of Us? West of its My brain is shutting off.

00:41:32
Speaker 5: After the last week, it felt like a West of His game because they were absolutely hitting.

00:41:38
Speaker 4: It was tight. You didn't know what was going to happen.

00:41:40
Speaker 5: There's a lot of great players on the field, by the way, like we're watching Derek Stingley Mike Evans matchup all night, which is going back and forth, and ultimately I think Stingley got the better of that nine targets while Stingley was in coverage only three catches thirty six years.

00:41:55
Speaker 4: There was a lot to like.

00:41:56
Speaker 5: There was an incredible couple drives to start the game before it settled down into the defensive struggles, so you saw different types of game. Hell, there was a great Kevin Harlan call on an absolute dime from CJ. Stroud where Nico Collins tapped his toes. Let's listen to that call.

00:42:14
Speaker 2: At the twenty nine of Tampa Bay under center.

00:42:17
Speaker 3: It'stroud first and ten shotgun snap left tackle, block, arching spiral passed down the near sideline en zone, over the shoulder catch once.

00:42:24
Speaker 2: Again, Collins touchdown. The Texans have scored on a twenty nine yard touchdown pass by cj'stroud Nico Collins in the end zone, both feet down, over the shoulder, grab six nothing Houston.

00:42:43
Speaker 4: Now.

00:42:43
Speaker 5: I love Kevin Harlan on Westwood One. So the bad memories late in the game, you know, when he got a little panicked, which felt like they were gonna get erased. After Jalen Noel has that long field goal return, and then Nick Chubb has a moment where I wondered for a second did the Bucks let Nick Chubb score there to get the ball back?

00:43:07
Speaker 4: I don't think so.

00:43:08
Speaker 5: I don't think Todd Bowls was asked about that, but I don't think so. But Nick Chubb gets the touchdown to cap that off that set up the Baker mayfield winning drive. There was a lot of drama, a lot of fun in this game, and I will defend this game to the Yeah.

00:43:24
Speaker 6: Yeah, even though I just completed about the Texans for five minutes, I was very thoroughly entertained. Also, it was nice to see Nick Chubb rip off his longest run since Week seventeen of.

00:43:34
Speaker 1: The twenty twenty two season.

00:43:36
Speaker 7: That was good.

00:43:36
Speaker 6: Twenty five yards for that touchdown. That was good to see him. He's a great guy. Glad to see him back in the end zone. Yeah, we were entertained. This is going to be in my top five games of the year so far. I think, oh, yeah, that's bold number five.

00:43:48
Speaker 5: We're making that list on NFL dot Com every week. I appreciate that. I appreciate you. I do think we've gotten to the end here of the show. I did want to update one injury situation from this game. Elijah Knty, who I thought looked outstanding for the first five quarters of this season, has a pectoral injury. Mike Garifolo of NFL Network says there is fear that it could be a season ending injury, but they are going to get an MRI, get further tests to make sure there are different pectoral tearors in terms of severity, and there's at least a chance, as we're recording, that it won't be the worst possible result. But Canty, to me, was a really important part of them finally figuring out their four man rush shook because I think even though the Texans offensive line was.

00:44:43
Speaker 4: Bad, I think it's a little underrated.

00:44:45
Speaker 5: How this group up front with Asan Redick, who had a lot of pressures tonight, and then Vita Vea and an underrated player in Yahyaddabi with Kanty, that was a really good group. And unfortunately it looks like they're going to miss a key part of that.

00:44:59
Speaker 6: Yeah. Yeah, and I'm worried about their depth in replacing him. You saw in the replay on that play, as soon as he suffered the injury, one of his arms just kind of drops, like suddenly, He's like, oh, I can't your whole from at least my experience anything in that area. When it happens and it's relatively severe, your whole arm kind of goes numb.

00:45:17
Speaker 1: And that's what it looked like.

00:45:18
Speaker 6: So I hope for the best with him, but you know, hopefully he gets good news, but if not, the Buccaneers are gonna have to figure out how to replace him.

00:45:27
Speaker 5: Thanks to everyone who joined, Thanks to everyone who is listening to each and every show.

00:45:32
Speaker 4: We know we do a lot.

00:45:33
Speaker 5: It's right there in the name. We love doing it for you. So that's it for our Monday night recap show. There will be three more doubleheaders Shook this year. I didn't check. I think they might all be these you know stat where they're staying up like very late. I will check that schedule and so a little bit of a change. I believe this is the last year though, of these double headers. Rodrigodell doesn't like it, so enjoy. We've only got a few more of these left. But we will be here every single Monday night with you live on YouTube and then of course in your podcast feed. We will also be back in the studio Colleen Wolf making her return to the Chris Westley The Podcast Studio. To see you next Tuesday. Crew, Me, Colleen and Jordan. We will go through all the injury situations. Oh yeah, JJ McCarthy's out and David Daniels might be out, and Joe Burrow's out for three months.

00:46:33
Speaker 4: We have a lot to talk about. It never ends on NFL Daily. We'll see you Tuesday,