2023 Week 10 Recap

00:00:00
Speaker 1: The Around the NFL podcast likes to pop their color and rock advisor.

00:00:09
Speaker 2: Never from the Chris Westling podcast studio. It's Around the NFL. I am Dan Hansis. Got just one hero with me today. It's Greg Rosenthal, Mark Sessler under the weather hopefully back with.

00:00:23
Speaker 1: Us during the week.

00:00:25
Speaker 2: Greg never wore Advisor under any circumstances, even in the darkest of my bro days.

00:00:33
Speaker 1: Never Advisor.

00:00:34
Speaker 3: I think I had a little two lane Advisor that I would pop maybe when I'd go golfing in knowledge at the city courses.

00:00:41
Speaker 1: That's about it, though, this is the I want to photo that.

00:00:46
Speaker 2: This is the week ten double digits flagship program.

00:00:50
Speaker 1: And you know one theme that was starting to come together.

00:00:54
Speaker 2: I want to say narrative, but narrative has been turned into this pejorative, which I don't like because it's being abused.

00:01:03
Speaker 1: So why am I going away from it? Because then they win?

00:01:06
Speaker 2: But I'm going to stick with it and say a theme that had been coming together a little bit as the defenses have in their way more often than not in twenty twenty three. This week was an exception. Eight teams GREGI today scored at least twenty nine points ten scored at least twenty seven. We had a near fifty burger, We had multiple shootouts, good stuff.

00:01:31
Speaker 3: We had, for the first time ever, five game winning field goals on the same day. WHOA, that's pretty crazy. It's a pretty crazy Sunday. We weren't necessarily expecting there's some good matchups, but at a lot of good game winning field goals.

00:01:48
Speaker 1: I clocked that there were a lot.

00:01:50
Speaker 2: In fact, at one point, I think we changed one of our highlights because it just seemed to me there was too many game winning thirty one yarders.

00:01:58
Speaker 1: But still that tells you the quality of the games today.

00:02:02
Speaker 2: So we're gonna go through them all with up Nick Schuk joining us a little bit later. Let us start where we must start in Cincinnati, where the Cincinnati Bengals are looking to keep it roll with Joe Burrow, but CJ Stroud, he said.

00:02:16
Speaker 1: Huh huh, I'm the new guy around here. I'm the bad guy.

00:02:19
Speaker 4: John Weeks will snap, Cameron Johnston will hold thirty eight yard field goal of tip from the left hash mark for the victory for matt Amandola. Here's the snap, here's the spot, here's the kick. Plenty of leg there's one.

00:02:36
Speaker 5: It's god the Texans walk off with a winy Cincinnati oh man.

00:02:42
Speaker 4: They take it thirty to twenty shot Amandola at the buzzer.

00:02:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, it happens every year around this time of year too. I feel like where the stakes start building, there will be the color guy in the booth who just gets so caught up in the moment.

00:03:00
Speaker 1: No longer a paid employee, he's just a.

00:03:03
Speaker 2: Dude yelling yeah because he's happy the team he was rooting for was victorious. In this case, Yes, the Texans who get a thirty eight yarder from Matt Amadola at the gun to beat the Cincinnati Bengals thirty to twenty seven, a game in which Greg CJ. Stroud I thought outplayed Joe Burrow, which is very notable.

00:03:25
Speaker 1: And then you think about who Joe Burrow.

00:03:28
Speaker 2: Is one of the greatest quarterbacks in the league, and Stroud now has kind of put a stamp on it, Greg that he is the most exciting quarterback to enter the league since Burrow did a few years back.

00:03:41
Speaker 1: So this could be the first.

00:03:42
Speaker 2: Of many big time showdowns between these guys, and I hope they deliver as many classics as this.

00:03:48
Speaker 3: And it's the start of the Stroud MVP quote unquote conversation, it's we got eight weeks here, but he's in the mix, leading one of the best offenses in the league over the last couples and to win this game coming off Cincinnati's two week run where everyone left it saying, Wow, the Bengals they might beat five and three, but they also might be the best team in the NFL. And not just beating them, but beating them in a shootout and beating them in a game where they put up five hundred and forty four yards Dan and at one point, like midway through the third quarter, were tripling the Bengals in total yardage.

00:04:23
Speaker 2: Yeah, they could not stop Stroud and they could not stop the running game Devin Singletary. For the Texans, this has been a major issue for Houston all season long.

00:04:33
Speaker 1: They have not been able to move the ball on the ground. Not the case in this game.

00:04:37
Speaker 2: Singletary goes for one hundred and fifty yards, averaging five yards a pop.

00:04:40
Speaker 1: And it felt that way.

00:04:41
Speaker 2: It felt like every time he touched the ball it was five yards, seven yards, eleven yards.

00:04:46
Speaker 1: So he has the big day.

00:04:47
Speaker 2: Noah Brown is I don't know He's unlocked something here with CJ. Stroud that was not going on with Dak Prescott Dallas seven for one seventy two. He had one hundred and fifty plus last week as well. You have Dell putting the roller skates on a cornerback and scoring a touchdown in this game, and the fact that they and we're gonna we'll get into like all the different like how this game came down to the wire. But Houston also gave up the ball multiple times on the Cincinnati side of the field on turnovers, so that they really, very rarely, rarely were stopped by Cincinnati's defense, and most notably the exception being.

00:05:28
Speaker 1: A pick six that Stroud throws.

00:05:31
Speaker 2: That was a stunner because the at the time Cincinnati was down double digit points, there was I believe, less than four minutes to play in the game. Burrow had just thrown his second interception of the second half, and the pick six by Stroud woke up the building. In fact, a lot of Cincinnati fans are streaming toward the exits, Greg and they all pour back in.

00:05:52
Speaker 3: And they went down at the one. So Mixon got the touchdown with nick one yard.

00:05:55
Speaker 1: Oh that's right, my fault. Yes, they get him.

00:05:57
Speaker 2: They take it all the way down, get the touchdown, force the punt, and the Cincinnati Bengals will have to They'll rue the day and Soul likes I locked them up, Gregie.

00:06:09
Speaker 1: Just one of those years. You know, sometimes you got to take take the.

00:06:12
Speaker 2: Bad beats, because I will never feel bad about getting behind the Bengals at home with Joe Pearl playing at this level. He hits a go ahead touchdown pass that's just dropped a bad drop.

00:06:24
Speaker 1: They have to settle for field goal and then shut out.

00:06:26
Speaker 2: Tyler Boyd drops a killer one and then Stroud takes over and marches him right down the field for the winner.

00:06:31
Speaker 3: I mean, this is the stuff legendary careers ever made of. To have that touchdown drive, with those throws with under thirty seconds left last week, to tanked Oll and then to be in a position where it's a third and six at his own twenty nine, he finds Schaltzefter buying some time, and then a second and six at the Bengals forty two with fifteen seconds left.

00:06:52
Speaker 1: That's it, and he gets it to Brown who makes it.

00:06:54
Speaker 3: Was a terrific throw, and Brown makes an even better individual play to pick up a lot of yards after the catch, making tackles. That was a big play in the Bengals season. Because Trey Hendrickson was hurt on this play. We hope it's not a serious injury. And then you get the game winning field goal after that. Seventeen explosive plays in this game for the Texans offense. It's a game that we shouldn't need it, but it's like it lets us think even differently about the Texan season, even then a week ago, even though last week kind of got us halfway there is this is another level because they lost about seven starters to injuries last week. Dan, you know, Damian Pierce isn't in this game. Nico Collins isn't in this game. A bunch of players in the secondary aren't in this game. And then to win it with seventeen explosives. That's the fourth most of any team in any game since two thousand. Whoa the Texans versus the and that's against a good Bengals defense.

00:07:43
Speaker 2: I mean, you want to talk about a team that is arriving ahead of schedule. That is Houston right now, and they are showing themselves to be a team that cannot be taken lightly not you do not lock against them because they are a team they could absolutely make you look bad. And it should also noted that this game started out to script with Burrow going right down the field and he throws one of the prettiest balls you'll see all season. He throws it right on the money. The touchdown goes to Irwin right down the sideline thirty two yards and he pulls out Burrow. One of my favorite celebrations I've seen, and sometimes he pulls out the archerymove like, oh, Burrow the Archer.

00:08:27
Speaker 1: That's a great nickname potentially.

00:08:29
Speaker 2: But then Houston's defense with Dimiko Rans leading the way there of course, forces five consecutive punts and gets the game under control. So you saw the Stroud interception late that allowed Cincinnati back in the game. But not only was the offense something to really be excited about, Houston putting up ten points in each of the last three quarters, the fact that their defense is making strides as well.

00:08:53
Speaker 3: I mean, look out, they've won different types of games. I think of that Saints win where the offense actually didn't do much they wanted defensively. It's something special is Brewing here. We'll get to the Jaguars later, but like that division seems much more open than we expected.

00:09:08
Speaker 2: And then all of a sudden, Greggy Cincinnati they got the Ravens in Baltimore, and we're gonna get to what happened with the Ravens today on Thursday night on a short week, and the Houston Texans get the cards at home.

00:09:19
Speaker 3: So like interesting, I did not I would not have said I would have happily locked this if I wasn't bullied over the last few weeks from our friend Nick Wesley to not taking like six point spreads.

00:09:31
Speaker 1: So that help, you know what.

00:09:32
Speaker 2: I'm gonna try to get Nick on the show for the Thursday night football matchup there too, so maybe you guys could work some things out, all right. So Houston was listeners know a finalist for the Team of Around the NFL. The other finalists and the actual choice is the Minnesota Vikings, And here was their first game as the team of atn hosting the Saints.

00:09:54
Speaker 6: Dobbs got the shotgun on third down, Cam Jordan got around the right tackle. Dobbs, we'll cheese nothing now. He runs out to the left's magic.

00:10:02
Speaker 1: To somebody he turns off five to the side.

00:10:06
Speaker 2: Oh incredible, Shosh Stops put a.

00:10:11
Speaker 6: Rushing touchdown past run Minnesota to a sixteen three fleet.

00:10:19
Speaker 2: Oh gosh, Stops true for a career high two hundred and sixty eight yards. He had two total touchdowns, including that beautiful scramble.

00:10:30
Speaker 1: The Vikings built a big halftime.

00:10:32
Speaker 2: Lead and then held on to beat the Saints twenty seven to nineteen. That is five straight wins for the team of ATM.

00:10:40
Speaker 1: Whoa that right up? Straight right? I don't know. They were owing three yes. They get thumbs up from Roberts behind their glass. They were owing three yes. And now they are comfortably It's important. This is a very special fie.

00:10:56
Speaker 2: They're comfortably in the NFL NFC playoff picture right now. So Greg, the team of ATM keeps finding away and with its Dobs right in the.

00:11:05
Speaker 1: Middle of it.

00:11:06
Speaker 7: All.

00:11:06
Speaker 3: That run in for the touchdown was part of a first half that was magical. It was like they listened to our podcast during the week and they said, Dan Mark.

00:11:17
Speaker 1: And Greg believe in us. Hell, we believe in us. Josh Dobbs.

00:11:20
Speaker 3: I'm not just gonna be like one of the best stories of the NFL I'm watching that first half and I'm just thinking, this is just one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL right now. The very first play from scrimmage a dot I think it was to Addison, a throw they would tell you not to make because it was so impossible. I'm sure the expected completion on that from next gen was like ten percent, but he fits it in the smallest of windows, and I thought, oh, this could be a pretty special game. A third and one where they run an RPO something you wouldn't be able to do with Kirk Cousins. And then a fourth and seven, or rather a third down breaking tackles before he threw the ball. That to me was even more press of. Then that rushing touchdown where he's just like guys are falling off of him and he's making these don't I don't even know who to compare him to exactly, Just like, just imagine any great rushing quarterback where he just is impossible to get down, but he's still making terrific throws down the field. Like he added that all up and they held on in the second half.

00:12:22
Speaker 1: But I don't care. You can't talk about the second half.

00:12:25
Speaker 3: They had three hundred and eighty eight yards, twenty seven points, no turnovers. The offense did their job and they showed they can win a different type of game with the way the defense closed it out.

00:12:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was you know, I was tracking other games at the time, but you know when you saw the halftime stats and you saw the highlights, you're thinking yourself, like, what are we? Is this the Is this the story of the twenty twenty three season? And perhaps it might? And it's almost like the football gods were like, let's tone it down in the second half here, Actually, we want to overplay our hand at this point.

00:12:56
Speaker 1: And that allowed the Saints to get back into the game.

00:13:00
Speaker 2: And the Saints are a team that seems to be always dealing with some level of drama.

00:13:05
Speaker 1: They lost their quarterback again.

00:13:07
Speaker 3: Yeah, Derek Carr hurt his shoulders and they listed him as having the plural concussion.

00:13:13
Speaker 1: Your bull shoulders, No, his shoulders.

00:13:16
Speaker 3: I meant to like, it was multiple injuries. It his shoulder and they tested him for concussion. I need to follow up on that. They believe because Car spoke after the game, which is usually a sign actually you passed the concussion part of that. But he took a brutal hit on his best play of the game. Actually, he showed toughness on a great throw to Olave and then just got absolutely hammered and he struggled before he left, he had a fumble, he held the ball, and then Jamis comes in and immediately goes like three for three and through two of the most improbable touchdowns of the season according to Next Gen Stats. Actually, I think that was why I was in my mind. His throat to Olave was the least probable touchdown of the entire season, and I swear the other one where he threw it across his body to at Perry and it was just a babe, a better play by Jamis even than the Olave one, which was just an outstanding play by a Lave and a good throw like those are two of the best touchdowns of the season.

00:14:15
Speaker 1: But then reality always abut yeah, the reality.

00:14:17
Speaker 3: Said, And he threw a couple interceptions, and he had three different chances to potentially have a game tying driving the fourth quarter.

00:14:23
Speaker 1: In all three times the Vikings defense stood up.

00:14:25
Speaker 2: It's a shame too for the New Orleans offense, because it seemed like they were starting to find a groove there with with Carr and Kamara and Taysom with a lave waking up a little bit. But now once again cars we don't know what his his situation is. Also Michael Thomas, it should be known he played in this game, left with an injury. It's not believed to be serious. It was an the issue, but he was also arrested on Friday for an alleged confrontation with a construction worker near his home.

00:14:55
Speaker 3: It was living in the police report, so I don't need to say reported, but according to the police report or Michael Thomas was upset someone he believed was recording him, like one on his phone. It was like an a contractor construction worker next door, and he walked over and slapped the phone out of the guy's hand. I don't know what else exactly happened, but he played in this game, had any injury. They believe he'll be okay. They actually said they didn't think it was serious. They have a buy now, so I think there's some optimism car In Thomas will return. And I do think it's important to note like Daniel Hunter had three quarterback hits in this game.

00:15:28
Speaker 1: He was leading the league in sex.

00:15:29
Speaker 3: I didn't mention him on my Defensive Player of the Year ranked you know, talk the other day and he's he's in that mix too, and he was making a big play on one of those interceptions by Winston.

00:15:39
Speaker 1: He got pressure.

00:15:40
Speaker 3: And I think it's cool that, like their defense really has played like a top ten defense. To me, it's telling like this was a coaching wink. You give koc all this Saints talent an offense, and if you give Brian Flores maybe what the Saints defense has, I think it's like they would the Saints would then win this game. I really believe that the coaching in this game particularly makes that big of a difference.

00:16:04
Speaker 1: Dennis Allen's defense is not making a big different.

00:16:06
Speaker 2: Nice start for the team of ATN And just a reminder that all this Dobbs excitement, the greatest wide receiver in the world is on the Vikings. He's been out for a month, but we could see him returning to the.

00:16:18
Speaker 1: Fray not too long from now.

00:16:20
Speaker 2: So that adds another layer to it, and that went into the thinking, at least for the old Zeusser of why this is the team of ATM because you get to root for a team that has justin Jefferson.

00:16:29
Speaker 1: So there's that, and I want to give a little love to TJ. Hockinson.

00:16:33
Speaker 2: This According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Gregy the second NFL tight ends is nineteen seventy eight to catch at least ten passes for one hundred yards and a touchdown in one half. And that's playing with a tear of cartilage in his rib area, playing through pain, kept on getting whacked. That's a guy that you like to go to war with.

00:16:55
Speaker 3: That's sort of what I'm talking about with koc It's like they started Brandon Powell. Addison, who was great, made another really good catching almost a near touchdown. He always just his hands are great. But they started Brandon Powell and Jalen Naylor at wide receiver and they're still getting and not really getting a running game other than Dobbs, but he ran for forty four, which makes a big difference. Adding to that, that's what I mean, and yet they still find a way. You get Hawkins in the ball. It's impressive. It's impressive. They're a game and a half up on that seventh spot right now. At this point they were actually I would say, considering their schedule and everything, it's weird to say this with Josh Dobbs, but at this point I sort of think they're the heavy favorite to get a playoff spot at this.

00:17:36
Speaker 2: Point, imagine imagine saying that or thinking that after week three when they were zero and three, we might, we might give you, give it to you.

00:17:45
Speaker 1: You deserve it, all right.

00:17:46
Speaker 2: Let's head to the big shootout that went down across the sidewalk here in Englewood.

00:17:53
Speaker 1: Here we go, final play of the game. Ryan's going for the win.

00:17:56
Speaker 8: Forty one yard field goal to tamp pashpark left side.

00:18:00
Speaker 1: Wait to snap there it is Fox the whole Patterson the kick, it is up and it is good. They got it. That's a big line on the final playing the game. Good won a game. It was back and forth they went, no separation between these two. Almic Patterson sends it.

00:18:21
Speaker 9: Through to secure up forty one thirty eight victory for the Lions.

00:18:26
Speaker 3: Great call, great f yeah by Dan Campbell. Run out to the middle of the.

00:18:31
Speaker 1: Deserving a Bungo.

00:18:35
Speaker 2: Him man fight pecas See girl brom tongue.

00:18:42
Speaker 1: Yes, the field goal was.

00:18:44
Speaker 2: Good at the gun, lifting the Lions to a forty one thirty eight win over the Chargers, who had a lot of pluck, a lot of fight, but they just could not find a way to stop the Detroit Lions.

00:18:59
Speaker 1: Uh, nobody could stop anybody in this game.

00:19:00
Speaker 2: Actually one of those pure shootouts where defense is really just an idea rather than something that truly exists. And I want to call attention to and I think we have sound for it. One of my favorite play calls of the entire year, and it was so on brand.

00:19:19
Speaker 1: It was so on brand for Dan Campbell and the Lions.

00:19:24
Speaker 2: And yet it was still so impressive to see a team be so fearless and just believing in who they are.

00:19:31
Speaker 1: It's fourth and two for the Lions.

00:19:34
Speaker 2: They have the ball, They're already in field goal range here with one forty seven to play in the game, they're at the charges twenty six. I understand we're in the era now where coaches like to be aggressive, but when the rubber meets the road, there's not many coaches that are going to pass on a very makeable field goal this late in the game. But Campbell was smart. He said, first of all, I believe in my offense. Second of all, I know my defense is having a day. And when you factor those two things in he said, let's go for it, and they passed the ball Sam laporta six yard gain, And crucially that means Justin Herbert, who is lights out with Keenan Allen in this game, does not see the field again. Otherwise, if you assume that they make the field goal instead there, you're giving Herbert about a minute and a half to do damage there and potentially steal the game.

00:20:26
Speaker 1: Here is Campbell on his decision making there.

00:20:30
Speaker 10: Going into that situation. You know, if you don't there can be a lot of time left. You know, you kick field goal, you know. So I just I wanted to finish with the ball in our hands. I liked where we were at offensively, We're playing good golf, was in a good spot, and and I just I felt like that was the right thing to do.

00:20:48
Speaker 2: He explains it greg matter of factly, but that was extremely You have to have like onions, like great big onions to make a decision like that in that game, and it seems like it wasn't even a hard choice.

00:21:00
Speaker 1: That's part of the reason everybody loves this guy. I love him too.

00:21:03
Speaker 3: He's a great coach, and I think the contrast between him and Brandon Staley was so there tonight because Brandon Staley came in. He's misster fourth down guy, and then Campbell hoists Staley on his own fourth down. But Tard, you know, my favorite all time. I don't think Staley would have been ready for that moment. The thing with the Lions is you can see what their situational football reminds me of the Patriots back in the day. And I know I bring a lot back to the Patriots, but Campbell knew before that sequence what he was gonna do in that scenario, Like they get prepared. Brandon Staley, on the other hand, when there was a big fourth and one, just the previous drive, burned a very valuable time out to get everything together before they called what was ultimately an extremely effective fourth and one ended up being a long touchdown.

00:21:49
Speaker 1: So you can't kill him.

00:21:50
Speaker 3: But I always see with the Lions that they're ready for these scenarios. They sort of have it gamed out and like the game not too fast for Dan Campbell in a way that I I think it is for a lot of coaches, including Staley, who's a defensive coach ultimately, and I think this game, especially against another guy who's hired the same year in the contrast and giving up eight point three yards per play and all these touchdowns in on a day where the Chargers scored a touchdown on their last five drives, literally their last five drives. They are the first team. This is again, I think from Josh Dubo the Associated Press. To score a touchdown on their all their drives in the last forty minutes of the game and not win unbelievable. So like, actually, Herbert showed up in the biggest way possible and Staley's defense just couldn't do literally a thing for him.

00:22:42
Speaker 2: And it's funny because they started out they go three and out the Chargers to start the game. They have a field goal drive and then and then Herbert throws an interception. So it starts as a totally different game, but you know, it turns into what we saw, and yeah, I think gets you could look at it two ways with the lines because there's a team that considers itself a true Super Bowl contender and this was a pretty epic no show by their defense to consider themselves as contenders. And you worry how this would look against a team like the Eagles, for instance, in the divisional round or something like that, like you have to have somebody that's gonna show up. I don't think they had a sack in this game that they could not, as Greg pointed out, get any type of spot. They had no answers or adjustments for Keenan Allen, who was just shredding them all night.

00:23:33
Speaker 1: One hundred and seventy yards seventy five yards on eleven matches.

00:23:37
Speaker 2: Unreal, and that sandwich dround by the way, he came out of the game briefly with a shoulder, went back in the game, came out again and went into the locker room, and then every time he was back on the field he was making huge plays.

00:23:48
Speaker 1: So yeah, they.

00:23:50
Speaker 2: Finished the charges with four hundred and twenty one yards, but that almost doesn't tell the story because down the stretch they were as unstoppable as any team you'll see this year.

00:23:59
Speaker 3: Well also because of their defense. They only got nine drives in the game, which is not a huge amount. So to put thirty eight points in nine drives as wild. Then again, the Lions, you know, did forty one and ten drives. It's it's just crazy. And I had I wouldn't say a friend of the show. I'm not familiar with Mike be at Bolt Tweeter, but he asked me. He says, Greg, I need you to spend as much time as possible tearing Brandon's day to shreds. This week, Chargers fans are begging you, we need help, don't I don't think you need help. I think the way this team is going that they just find different ways to lose. It's just like when the offense plays well, the defense doesn't, or vice versa. In the end of games, Herbert can play out standing and then they end up like I think it's gonna take care of it for you, Like if this team doesn't make the playoffs, I don't think you need my help. And I just don't think they're gonna make the playoffs.

00:24:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean you're right, it's there is that frustration.

00:24:58
Speaker 3: Never know, maybe Herbert just like is an FU the rest of the way, like this was a big game for him. Maybe he turns it on, but I sort of doubt it.

00:25:04
Speaker 1: Oh for sure.

00:25:04
Speaker 2: I mean he's coming off a game against the Jets rare he threw for one hundred and thirty six yards, did not have a touchdown. Kem Nowen was all but a race in that game with the exception of a big catch to help lock down that win on Monday night. So on a short week for them to show up and ball out the way they did. And I want to give a little because we brought it up in the newsroom, Greg give a little love also to Aman Ross Saint Brown because he is you know, I do the Superstar club and that seems ridiculous Steven talk about it, but he is the first lines player since Calvin Johnson to record four straight games of at least one hundred yards. He ended with a career best one to fifty six on eight receptions and a touch in this game. It's just I mean, what else can you ask for from a number one receiver. It's consistency, it's the production, it's in big moments, who also played very well in this game, has a real one there.

00:26:04
Speaker 3: And it's also knowing he's the receiver that he's gonna end up by the end of the season. I would guess maybe doubling the number two receiver who's probably will be Sam Laporta on this team. So that's outrageous, but they are running the ball incredibly way. Having Montgomery back is huge. He ripped a long one and Jamiir Gibbs is making big plays. They run for two hundred yards. They ran for one hundred and seventy in the first half, which is just crazy. And you're right about the Lions in terms of contending, like who knows, but they are absolutely contending for the one seed, which seems weird to think about. But they're seven and two, which on its own is contending for the one seed. They do not play a team with the winning record until Week sixteen. They finish at Minnesota, at Dallas, and then Minnesota again, which is a very interesting final three weeks. But their next five weeks are against teams five hundred or worse. They're going to be favored in all those games, even if they lose one of them. They are going to be in the mix for home field advantage.

00:26:56
Speaker 1: And my last note is.

00:26:57
Speaker 2: An apology to the Lions who are hitting all right. Buttons I and I'm not alone on this was questioning why they blew up their backfield because Jamal Williams set the touchdown record and DeAndre Swift was a really nice change of pace guy. But David Montgomery had a gorgeous seventy five yard touchdown run. In this game, he had one hundred and sixteen yards and twelve carries. Jamiir Gibbs had another big game with two touchdowns. They are great, They are a great ten and there are not a lot of holes with this team. Well, the defense got to clean it up, but the offense they can score on anybody. Let's take a break and then bring in the pipe.

00:27:35
Speaker 1: All right, welcome back.

00:27:36
Speaker 2: It's time now for the Sunday Drive, presented by the first ever Toyota Grand Highlander. Let's head to Baltimore, where Gregy's Ravens look to keep it rolling against the Brownies.

00:27:47
Speaker 1: What that's not true?

00:27:48
Speaker 11: A little pause. Here's the snap. It's a good one. Behold is good. The kick is on its way end over end, and it is good. But there's a flag on the field. Hold everything, don't.

00:28:01
Speaker 2: Flag me on the Callil Hamilton jumping over and it looked like he made contact with the brown trying to do the Miles Garrett.

00:28:06
Speaker 1: We'll see, yeah, think of the call like Joe.

00:28:10
Speaker 11: Celebrating from the Browns are celebrating from.

00:28:15
Speaker 1: Still go will this will land the game? And that will land the ball game?

00:28:19
Speaker 11: The Browns have won it thirty three thirty one, and they've come from behind.

00:28:24
Speaker 1: Where's the Siliana. Tom McCarthy with the call w k r K.

00:28:31
Speaker 2: Another field goal the gun, and this one an absolute stunner. Dustin Hopkins makes up for a yanked pat that would have tied the game in the second half after a stunning pick six by the Browns. He makes up for it with that field goal and the and the Browns beat the Ravens thirty three to thirty one. Now we welcome in White, possibly the largest Cleveland brown fan physically.

00:29:03
Speaker 1: I mean he's a beast. I mean, Joe Thomas is a Browns fan now, Yeah, but have you seen him recently. He's you know, trim, and he's pretty strong looking.

00:29:12
Speaker 2: I'm just saying, I don't I would roll the dice with Shook the pipe Nick Shook feeling no pain, I'm sure in Ohio today because a game that the Ravens seem to have completely in hand, they let get away and the Browns are right in the thick of it in the AFC North as a result.

00:29:31
Speaker 12: Yeah, biggest famous Browns fan, John big Dog Thompson. I don't know if he's still with us, but when they came back in ninety nine. He was the face of the expansion of the return to the league. So I don't even come close to that guy.

00:29:43
Speaker 1: But well, that guy seems fine, but I'm still going with Shook. Yeah. Well, plus we don't know if he's alive, so to put him.

00:29:50
Speaker 12: To the side, of course, I texted somebody do a show with longtime friend who is older than me, was around for the Browns hated in the eighties, and I said, when was the last time that you saw a Browns team fight back in a game that looked like they were surely going to lose and actually finish the job, get to the precipice of it and come through, because typically they botched that he texted me back nineteen eighty eight, which, of course was a bit facetious, but that just goes to tell you how rare this is for the Browns for them to go into Baltimore and win a game in this fashion where they were down seventeen to three before they could blink in the first quarter, where they were down by fourteen points on four separate occasions, and he raced that every single time and didn't hold a lead until there were no seconds left in the clock.

00:30:36
Speaker 13: What a game in Baltimore.

00:30:37
Speaker 12: The fight I saw from this team I have not seen from a Browns team in my life, and it's remarkable. It starts with their defense, but the offense did its part too. Deshaun Watson finally had a moment that, you know, kind of made Browns fans think maybe.

00:30:50
Speaker 13: The trade was worth it.

00:30:51
Speaker 12: He was nearly flawless in the second half, passes of over ten are yards, a perfect fourteen for fourteen, extending plays with his feed, even if he did suffer a bit of an injury during this game. Just a remarkable performance on both sides of the ball and one that I sat back and thought, Wow, I cannot believe that they won that game, because it was a statement against a team that looks like one of the best teams in football, and the Browns went toe to toe with them.

00:31:14
Speaker 1: Sugary.

00:31:14
Speaker 2: It's twenty four to nine late in the third quarter in this game, and I had said on the Thursday preview show that I thought this was was the end of excuses for Watson.

00:31:25
Speaker 1: He needs to be a guy that these type of games.

00:31:27
Speaker 2: Is one of the biggest Browns games in a long time against the Ravens, in Baltimore.

00:31:31
Speaker 1: There's a lot on the line. We all know, as.

00:31:33
Speaker 2: Cestog is known to say that they ripped from the belly of Cleveland, the Ravens. There's always going to be a lot of bad blood for that reason as well. And Andrew Ciciliano, who I mentioned minutes ago, longtime Browns fan, he told me, texted me today we're texting about the game. He said, he's screaming at his phone on the podcast that I would even say that Watson needed to step up in this game because they were down three offense of linemen and he was in a very difficult spot.

00:32:03
Speaker 1: And you saw that in this game.

00:32:05
Speaker 2: How I there were not many times where Watson has a clean pocket to work with and he's taken a beating, and the stats reflective he throws a pick six Greg immediately his numbers are terrible. They just seemed dead in the water. So the fact that the offense with Watson were able to steady themselves in the second half, it really was kind of a growing up type game for them.

00:32:26
Speaker 12: Well yeah, you know, at one point he was two for eleven in this game. I mean, he looked pretty bad and they looked bad. As an offense.

00:32:32
Speaker 1: The offense.

00:32:32
Speaker 3: He finishes twenty for thirty four, So do the math. There was barely an incompletion after that.

00:32:37
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's fourteen to fourteen in the second half. But yeah, he looked, he looked jittery. The Ravens pass rush was going nuts, David Clowney was having another big game, and then it all kind of shifted.

00:32:47
Speaker 1: Well that.

00:32:47
Speaker 3: Yeah, the helmet interception pick six by Greg Newsom was massive in this game. And this is the third week out of three I believe where all bouncing off a helmet has turned into a huge play for the Browns. They're now two and one in those scenarios, two.

00:33:07
Speaker 1: Three touchdowns right right, No one.

00:33:09
Speaker 3: The J Paul Adams wasn't a touchdown. It led to the game winning touchdown for the CX. But it's good. Maybe that shows that it's going the Browns way. But I am I'm with you on the excuses. Forget about the tackles. It's like C. J. Stroud was lighting people up without an entire offensive line earlier in the season. The Texans lost seven starters last week and just beat the Bengals. So yes, if you're gonna be a great quarterback, you do have to overcome things like that, and it sounds like Watson did today kind of talk me through the fourth quarter there where where they do have those drives. There was a seventy five yard drive that ended with the Elijah Moore touchdown, the game winning field goal drive, and even before that, a seventy five yard drive to get at to twenty four to seventeen, Like, what what did those drives look like? Was it like the Kevin Stefanski offense. Was it the Deshaun Watson offense? What what are they doing?

00:33:53
Speaker 12: Well, it was kind of vastly different from drive to drive because the first one you talked about, the May twenty four to seventeen was a methodical drive. I think it was the law uest drive the Browns had put together in terms of time and play.

00:34:02
Speaker 1: Ten minutes, like in like ten fifteen years.

00:34:05
Speaker 12: I can't remember exactly what the stat was, but it's been a very long time since they'd put that type of drive together. They ended it in classic Browns fashion, pounding on the ground with Kareem Hunt after failing to do so on the doorstep of the end zone earlier in the game. So that was refreshing. But then the next drive, you start to feel a little desperation creeping because you realized, look, it's early fourth quarter, we're running out of time, You're still down two scores. They go seventy five yards and six plays, and the key play being Watson rolling away from pressure as he'd been under pressure all day, looking like, oh no, what's gonna happen?

00:34:34
Speaker 13: Is he gonna get stripsacked? Is he gonna fumble?

00:34:36
Speaker 12: Is he gonna make a mistake, And just as he's about to cross the line of scrimmage, he finds Elijah Moore wide open in the end zone for a touchdown. A connection that has not been there all year. Was refreshing to see as well. So there were two very different drives in terms of style. And then, of course, as you said, the pick six that's really what changed everything. But even then they get the ball with like four and a half minutes to go, and I'm thinking, I don't know, man, full field, like, all you gotta do is getting field goal range. It'd be a lot nicer if you're the Browns, if you were TI right now than being down thirty one to thirty.

00:35:02
Speaker 1: And yet they followed through.

00:35:03
Speaker 3: They came through, and they killed the entire clock, which is very difficult to do.

00:35:07
Speaker 12: At one point, I was like, they need to speed up a little bit, and they didn't. They it was a measured drive they made. You know, they connected on pass as David Joki played a big part in the second half for them. And then the play that I think he explained it all was who wants this win more? And off to Jerome Ford going to the right side and almost the entire offense gets him to scrum with him and pushes him forward for an extra six yards. That right there to find who this Brown team could be because they do play hard and definitely play hard to the end.

00:35:33
Speaker 2: And on the flip side of that, Greg you have the Ravens, who, by the way, were banged up in this game as well. Cornerback Marlin Humphrey goes out left tackle Ronnie Stanley, he limped to the locker room.

00:35:43
Speaker 1: He did not return. It is now that's three.

00:35:49
Speaker 2: They've had a great year over all, the Ravens, but that's now all three of their losses have been bad ones, like tough ones, ghastly and that that run that Nick is referring to is like who wants a more moment? In the cruci bow of the game. And it's that DNA that I just wondered about with Baltimore. I know they're gonna be okay. I know they're probably I don't want to say they're probably gonna win this division because it is wide open.

00:36:08
Speaker 1: All of a sudden, they have a half game lead on two teams.

00:36:11
Speaker 2: But can they really avoid this type of blow up in January because it pops up periodically this team.

00:36:18
Speaker 3: This is a two year trend. Now, no team in the NFL has lost more ten point leads since the start of last season than John Harbaugh's Ravens. So you know who's second, Like he doesn't have a coaching job anymore. It's Josh McDaniels and the Raiders. So it's like there, it's crazy that down this game they got out gained the other two that they blew earlier in the season. They totally outplayed their opponents and managed to lose this one. They have a monster lead and get out played. They couldn't run the ball nearly as well as the Browns. There is two things canna be true. I think they have the the ingredients to go win a Super Bowl because they're very balanced, and yet there is something about them that clearly is blows games with leads, and that's that's very worrisome.

00:36:58
Speaker 12: It's it's the fourth quarters. It was the case against Pittsburgh. The game against Indianapolis was just a weird one where they had like nine opportunities to win it and just couldn't do the job. It's been in the margins, like they're just not winning in the margins, and it's leading to these not like collapses or meltdowns, but somewhere in between the descriptive word I can't come up with right now. That's what they've been is just like slowly falling apart and letting the other team that kind of doesn't have any business being in the game. The Pittsburgh game was like that, even today was like that. They let them back in the game and then before they know what, they look up and they're about to lose or they are losing. And that's a concerning sign because if you're a contender, you really want to win a Super Bowl, you don't make those types of mistakes against the better opponents in that hall, against.

00:37:36
Speaker 3: The lesser Yeah, now you got the Bengals, Like this division race is ooh, it's fun insane.

00:37:42
Speaker 2: Guess what Bengals are in last place? And who do you think the Browns have? They got the Steelers. So Week eleven is going to be a lot of fun. And that was the Sunday Drive presented by Toyota Let's Go Places. Learn more at toyota dot com. Slash Grand Highlander Shook. Let's head to Seattle, another game that went down to the very end.

00:38:01
Speaker 1: Here we go.

00:38:01
Speaker 9: It comes down to this, Jason Myers between the hash marks from forty three.

00:38:06
Speaker 1: The kick is going to.

00:38:07
Speaker 9: Be long enough.

00:38:08
Speaker 1: The Chickens god another one Buyers went on the last play of the game.

00:38:14
Speaker 9: But Sehawks facing all kinds of issues in the fourth quarter, they come back, they score and now they win it on the last play from forty three yards.

00:38:26
Speaker 2: Out deeper Abel Seahawks Radio Jason Myers at five field goals, including that forty three yarder you heard his time expired and the Seattle Seahawks survive. The Washington Commander is a twenty nine to twenty six when shook, we heard there that exactly how it was phrased. There all kinds of problems or obstacles.

00:38:49
Speaker 4: Is he is?

00:38:50
Speaker 1: What is he referring to for Seattle today.

00:38:52
Speaker 12: I think this game was a perfect example of how football is very much a four quarter sport because this was a snooze fest going and a halftime. Guys, just field goals left and right, one touchdown, and an extra point that wasn't converted, so it made it look like two field goals on the scoreboard. I thought, is this team? Is this game ever gonna wake up? One of these teams actually going to start to find some success offensively. Now, Seattle's defense has been young and hungry, good, you know that and everything else. We've been around that block a few times. But it was more an example of these two teams that just couldn't hit their stride, and then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, the points start coming in bunches. The last five possessions between these two teams they went like this, field goal, touchdown, touchdown, touchdown, field goal, end of game. That's where all the points came from, because before that it was punt, punt, punt, field goal, fumble, end of half, all that in between, nobody could get the job done. It's like they just woke up and when, oh god, we're playing football. It's the fourth quarter. It's a tie game or it's a very close game, maybe we should do our jobs. And Seattle ended up being the one because they had the ball last. They did their job better well.

00:39:50
Speaker 3: They had twenty seven first down four hundred and eighty nine yards. It didn't feel like it, you know, even in the first half they had over two hundred yards. They were sloppy. I think it was a big second half for Gino. Look, there were there were some booze at what is it, what do they call it now? I believe yeah, yeah, yeah, there were some booze, which you know, you don't hear it. There's certainly been a lot like I, I know you've been talking Gino, and I've been pushing back, but you're not the only one. Locally, they've been talking about whether they should bench Drew Locke and everyone pushing back on that. And he was uneven. Even though his numbers weren't bad, Gino was very uneven. Was missing some throws and he wasn't on the same page with his receivers in the first half, which is why I think the second half was huge, because he basically played perfect. Him and Lockett connected ended up with eight for ninety two. Like that was a great touchdown past to him. DK Metcalf who didn't really like use his physicality. I think sometimes like he doesn't play as big as he is and let a few balls like contested catches. He didn't get him in the first half. He's a monster in the second half, including on the game winning drive, a couple game winning drives, and Gino had had a couple total dime so to finish the game the way he did to quiet it down on. Really, their defense has been fine this year. It's been their offense that has concerned me. They needed a big offensive game and they got it. And there's six and three, even though that hasn't felt like a great six and three.

00:41:14
Speaker 2: I would have two drives by Sam Howe that in the fourth quarter there to tie the game.

00:41:20
Speaker 1: I would have went for two maybe yeah.

00:41:24
Speaker 3: The Ron rivera one, And maybe he didn't because he thought there was too much time left. That is sort of the analytical way to look at it is Actually, when there's a minute left, there's such a good chance they could get a field goal anyways, that don't even bother to risk it. But Ron Ron's got like the riverboat Ron of quarterbacks, right, now.

00:41:43
Speaker 1: You might as well go after him. He really is like Minie Russ.

00:41:46
Speaker 3: I was thinking that because he was in Seattle, like Sam Howell is poor Man's Russ Wilson. Like everything today that was good was out of structure. It wasn't any like timing throws.

00:41:55
Speaker 2: But they were talking about the good Russ Wilson from Seattle.

00:41:58
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely good, and there were a lot There was a lot good from how today.

00:42:02
Speaker 12: It's weird because I watched Sam Hall and I'm like slowly falling in love with his play style. Even though there's like a boneheaded mistake or two every game, you know it's coming. He did it in New England and threw a pick in the end zone. He did it on Sunday when he tried to scramble too far and ended up fumbling. But that fumble didn't end up hurting them because Seattle couldn't do anything with it. But at the same time, it's the out of structure stuff. It's the way that he just finds ways to make plays. And it's the touchdown drives that he had in the fourth quarter of this game, including the touchdown pass to Dianni Brown that tied the game.

00:42:26
Speaker 1: I mean that was like, oh, that was a gem.

00:42:30
Speaker 13: Strike over the middle.

00:42:31
Speaker 12: It was so stunning that I think the defense was shocked he had the ball and then he's in the end zone and the stadium stunned and they don't know what to say because they were pretty much trying to put away a win right there.

00:42:40
Speaker 13: So I love watching him play. I very much agree with.

00:42:42
Speaker 3: It ended up working out well for them that they gave up the score of that quickly and.

00:42:47
Speaker 2: They sold at the deadline. So this is not the same team that broke camp. But you know, Washington's defense was supposed to lift them this year and it's been bad.

00:42:54
Speaker 1: They get the Cowboys twice.

00:42:55
Speaker 2: Still, they get the Dolphins, and the Nine are still in their schedule, So I think Washington is going to make a quick exit from the playoff picture, but maybe they'll be fun watching it as they do it.

00:43:06
Speaker 1: Let's move on one more show. You want to hang around for one more do it.

00:43:10
Speaker 2: Let's head to Tampa where the Bucks are looking to get off the sneide.

00:43:15
Speaker 1: Heere's makefield shotgun? Look looks right? How back to his left? Those towards left caught Baull Evans at the five three two. It stops. Have a burg there you go, fire the cannon.

00:43:24
Speaker 14: Spike Evins really nice, John A.

00:43:27
Speaker 5: Baker, he had those happy fi He looked to his left, who's right, But then he was able to find Mike Evans coming on an in row right in the.

00:43:35
Speaker 1: Middle of the field. I love my Jean dagger off w f U S.

00:43:44
Speaker 2: Mike Evans atoned for a hideous drop earlier in the game.

00:43:50
Speaker 1: I'm a short touchdown with.

00:43:51
Speaker 2: That bulldozing TD score provided the Bucks with some breathing room in an eventual twenty to six win over the Titans, shook e Bucks snap a four game losing skid, and the Titans are back to being one.

00:44:03
Speaker 1: Of the most boring teams in the world. That about right, Uh yeah, that's absolutely right.

00:44:08
Speaker 12: Look we'll go winners first, because the Buccaneers finally experienced the sweet taste of victory for the first time in a month, something that they probably felt they should have had once or twice prior, and it was Baker Mayfield leading the way. I my buddy, longtime best friend since college, was in town this weekend. He works in Tampa. He said, the discourse down there is that they should consider going to Kyle Trask, and I said, are you crazy?

00:44:29
Speaker 13: Have you watched this team? Baker's one of the only good things stopping with this offense right now.

00:44:33
Speaker 3: And Mike Evans, literally every fan base does like if you lose games quarterback, no matter what.

00:44:39
Speaker 13: There's no context, it's the worst the exactly.

00:44:42
Speaker 2: Baker basically won a game last week before I got stolen away by the kid.

00:44:46
Speaker 13: It was his fault that they gave up thirty nine points.

00:44:48
Speaker 12: But it was also his fault that Mike Evans couldn't catch a pass today, right wrong. Mike Evans was going through it on the sideline emotionally. He walks over to the sideline, he slams a cooler with his fist, he puts a towel over his head that is in his hands. He's emotionally distraught because he can't figure out how to catch passes, and then suddenly he finds it again. And that's how they just cruise to a victory. And I say cruise because it was only twenty to six. But if you watched his Titans offense last week or this week, you know their ceiling is very low. And that's not a knock on Will Levis.

00:45:17
Speaker 3: I didn't know that even after watching it last week, I thought they were showing some promise last week.

00:45:22
Speaker 13: Yeah, there's finished the drives. This is the problem.

00:45:25
Speaker 1: This is a big Yeah.

00:45:26
Speaker 2: Levis had the four touchdown game, and then even on Thursday night against the Steelers, he was throwing some balls that were like, okay, you see what Yeah, see what's there? So I was kind of bummed to be watching this one from a farm and be like, oh, where is the sizzle?

00:45:39
Speaker 1: We thought maybe we had a stake on our hands here, but apparently not.

00:45:41
Speaker 13: Well, you know, you know what the problem is, guys, is they can't run the ball.

00:45:45
Speaker 12: Derrick Henry two point two yards carried at an eleven attempts, Like, that's not going to get the job done. You have a rookie quarterback. What's the best way to help him out? Get some easy targets to your tight ends and establish a running game. They don't have that. I think it starts up front for them. It's not Levis's problem. He's a rookie. He's still trying to figure it out, and he's showing off his arm and all that stuff. He's doing all right, but the offense, just their potential is not there. It's why they had six points in this game today. It's not that Tampa's defense is suddenly great again. It's that they're playing a team that was much less capable offensively than the opponent they faced last week. So it's gonna be tough for the Titans. I hate to say it, because I was not a Will Levis fan coming out of the draft, but I've been pleasantly surprised by how he's played.

00:46:20
Speaker 13: It's just that, you know, one stat really defined it to me. Tampa's sent the.

00:46:23
Speaker 12: Blitz all afternoon at him because they had no fear that he was going to make them pay for it. Because they had no reason to fear it because he's a young guy and they're just they lack talent in certain areas. So gonna be a tough one Titans fans. I'm sorry, maybe he's your future, but this year is not gonna be an easy one to.

00:46:39
Speaker 2: Swazn't shook have that that little boy on Christmas Eve glow is like at the family party. Christmas Eve party where it's about six pm. Everybody's you know, had their dinner or whatever, and now it's becoming real that we're going home soon and it's off the bead with the milk and cookies and Santa's coming that shook today around.

00:47:01
Speaker 1: He's just in a great He's in a great happy place.

00:47:04
Speaker 2: He's in that good little boy or girl on Christmas Eve place, and you deserve it.

00:47:08
Speaker 1: Shooky.

00:47:09
Speaker 12: I'm already formulating my strategy to convince my mother to let me open a gift early.

00:47:13
Speaker 1: Oh. I love it, I love it.

00:47:14
Speaker 3: I mean, the Calves beat the Warriors the other night. It is uh, it is Cleveland time, and Bucks fans like like your buddy or I don't know, maybe he just lives there and he's not a fan. They're tied in the lost column for the lead in the NFC South. There is no reason that the Bucks can't win this lousy division. I mean, I give them, I give them just about as good a chance as as the other two contenders. At least they have, you know, Mike Evans having this nice browback season.

00:47:44
Speaker 1: He reminds me of t O.

00:47:45
Speaker 3: No one makes more tough catches but drops easier catches than.

00:47:51
Speaker 1: You guys.

00:47:52
Speaker 12: I can even sit back and enjoy Baker Mayfield's play and have no disdain for him whatsoever.

00:47:56
Speaker 13: Like I'm enjoying watching him play quarter.

00:47:58
Speaker 1: You're in a good place. You're in a very healthy mind.

00:48:00
Speaker 13: This morning I was feeling pretty dangerous and we.

00:48:03
Speaker 1: All love it. Sure, all right, Chokey, Thanks Bud, See you next week.

00:48:05
Speaker 13: All right, guys, thanks, all right, Let's.

00:48:07
Speaker 1: Keep moving to the field formerly known as Hines.

00:48:12
Speaker 6: Three seconds left, first and ten at the sixteen, they're in cover six.

00:48:18
Speaker 1: Here's the snap. He's back, he looks, he fires for the goal line. Peter stepped in, head down his table.

00:48:26
Speaker 5: This game.

00:48:27
Speaker 1: Don't kill the special teams coach. You killed the special teams coach tended to watch him. Oh, it just got a little heavy over there. Some people got rocked. Packers got rocked. They sure tough year Green Bay.

00:48:43
Speaker 2: The Steelers got scoring runs from Jalen Warren and naj Harris for the defense closed it out with that interception. It was a twenty three nineteen win over the Packers in Pittsburgh, Greg.

00:48:54
Speaker 1: This feels like a lot of Steelers games this year.

00:48:58
Speaker 2: They're out gamed at times, they seem like an undercooked entity, but then they make the play when it matters, and they get the big stop at the end, and all of a sudden and they got another win.

00:49:07
Speaker 3: You took the words out of my mouth that I didn't feel like I learned anything about either one of these teams. They both continued on the path. I guess I would say both offenses have shown some signs of life the last couple of weeks, and that continued. The Steelers ran for two hundred and five yards, and they when they ran that well against the Titans, who are pretty good run defense, that okay, maybe they got something near. Warren goes for one oh one, Naje Harris goes for eighty two. They both have the touchdowns, as you mentioned, so they had a running game. Pickett still had his share of struggles, but it's something even for them. Getting over three hundred yards is something. And the Packers actually moved the ball pretty well all game. They just kind of ran out of time and couldn't get that winning touchdown.

00:49:52
Speaker 1: Go ahead, log it up?

00:49:54
Speaker 4: What?

00:49:54
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's right, I did lock it up. Give it to me, Eric, Eric, I'm having a down year in the Locks. At the very least. You you shouldn't have me engineering.

00:50:04
Speaker 3: I mean, I sort of forgot. Mark also locked this up. So double it up here we were talking about it earlier, and uh, I just want to say thank if Nick Westling, if you're listening, I was absolutely planning to lock the Ravens, but you sort of shame me out of taking these six the six and a half point spread.

00:50:21
Speaker 1: So you you got me a win today. Thank you. I'm not even joking. That's one hundred percent what happens.

00:50:27
Speaker 2: I mean, you're just that just shows you what living in a blessed existence in the picks this year. Let's let's let's face it. You're like the Falcons at the beginning of the year.

00:50:34
Speaker 1: But this is what the Steelers do.

00:50:36
Speaker 3: I mean, I think there it said AP said they're the twenty second team. I believe Josh Dubo of the AP to be out gained, I mean nine straight weeks to start the season, and the other teams that have done that are combined thirty three two.

00:50:52
Speaker 2: And so that suggests, okay, let's let's let's stop there for a second. That suggests that this is regression coming for this team, because it's not like they play in a bad It's not like, using the Falcons as an example, they're playing in some dog division and steal in a bunch of ones. They are in the best division in football, and yet they have found a way each almost every week. Here there's six and three now, and you mentioned Pickett, like he is not making the strides that they expected into at a certain point you think this is going to catch up with him, or if you want to look at it as a positive side of things as a Steelers fan, they're still figuring things out and winning and if they ever actually lock into something offensively in terms of actual some type of style, maybe they can you know, this is just the beginning.

00:51:39
Speaker 1: Well, that's so I've been looking at that.

00:51:41
Speaker 3: At some point, if they keep winning these games, they're kind of bound to start playing better and then actually deserve to win me games. And I actually think Pickett, although he was very lucky, there was a call Packers fans will be going crazy about where it appeared he threw a backwards pass that was a total that would have been a change of possession. They rule that it was not there was There wasn't like a perfect angle that was right on the on the right spot to see it until someone on Twitter, I don't know if they were in the crowd or what it was, did sort of have the right angle and it did.

00:52:15
Speaker 1: Like a scoop and score or what.

00:52:16
Speaker 3: No, but they would have been a change of possession and ball ball in the Steelers end.

00:52:21
Speaker 1: And I actually was I was encouraged late in this game.

00:52:26
Speaker 3: I wanted to point out it was third and nine with just over two minutes to go and uh and the Packers did not have a time out, and actually with exactly two minutes to go, it was after the two minute warning, and I stunned that they called the pass there so instead of running the ball, they actually trusted Pickett to throw the ball and he threw a dime for twenty eight yards and it got called back because of an offensive pass interference. I did lead to that play, but it was a very aggressive, extremely aggressive play call, I would say, considering the situation, they hit it, the penalty didn't happen, and then they they ended up making the spot. They're not a great defense right now, but they have been playing well like when they've needed to, including this game.

00:53:07
Speaker 1: And the Packers.

00:53:08
Speaker 2: Was it Lafloor or was it the GM that kind of put Love a little bit on the spot in the second half, saying they need to see something still waiting for him to kind of to break through here. There's been an issue for Love with Christian Watson, which has been a surprise. I think a lot of us saw Watson as a guy that could take the next step this year because of how well things ended last year.

00:53:31
Speaker 1: Love has ten interceptions this year.

00:53:33
Speaker 2: Five of them are when targeting Watson, and you're seeing almost every week where they just not on the same page.

00:53:40
Speaker 1: Well Watson, it wasn't.

00:53:42
Speaker 3: It was a tough throw to try to attempt, but Love's first interception went off Watson's hands in the end zone. It would have been a great catch, but ultimately it was a pretty good throw. He got it to Watson's hand, it got deflected. That was one of the reasons they lost. I thought this was I would have to watch it even closer, but I think this was Love's best game of the season. They said they wanted to see more out of them. A third and seven play, touchdown, third and sixteen play, touchdown, fourth and six play. U picked it up with the pass that they went. It was very A third and seven play late in the game forty six yards, third and ten play late in the game thirty two yards, and the two interceptions. You could almost understand you know, you hate the end the game that way, but one hit Watson's hands.

00:54:24
Speaker 1: One was kind of at the very end. I thought he showed some progress. All right, let's keep moving here.

00:54:29
Speaker 2: The Niners went into their by with a bad taste in their mouth, a three game losing streak. Who saw Dak coming? And they go to Jacksonville to face the Jaguars, who were on a winning streak. Would the losing streak continue? Not even close?

00:54:42
Speaker 1: Chucking down one a play called losing streak, a five step drop Jack's winning streak. Oh he's gone touchdown.

00:54:53
Speaker 7: Oh he's strutting, said Fred six level killed the beast on a wheel route and George Kittle's wheels.

00:55:04
Speaker 1: There is nothing wrong with him.

00:55:07
Speaker 2: They feed they know, Yeah, that is great, keep feeding the beast. They don't do that really with Kittle. Typically he only gets a few opportunities in this offense to make an impact most weeks, and.

00:55:17
Speaker 1: He always seems to Greg popping Tim Ryan with the call rock Purdy.

00:55:22
Speaker 2: Okay, there's another theme Greg that can go by the wayside. Because he played great on Sunday, throwing three touchdown passes, including that sixty six yarder to George Kittle and the Niners snap that three game losing skin with a thirty four three beat down of the Jags, who deliver a comprehensive stinker.

00:55:42
Speaker 1: To end their winning streak at five games. Greg, you won't hear any talk.

00:55:47
Speaker 2: About what's wrong with Brock this week, all of a sudden, all is well with the Niners.

00:55:51
Speaker 1: No, you won't hear that.

00:55:53
Speaker 3: I'm torn which side to start on because both sides dominated so thoroughly. Let's start with Brock, and I think he played outstanding. But I also think we knew the forty nine ers are back early when they were running the ball well. This is against one of the best run defenses in the league. On paper, maybe we overrated the Jaguars defense, but the numbers were great. CMC gets one hundred and forty two from scrimmage. The forty nine ers run for one hundred and forty four. Perdy was throwing the ball well right off the bat, but they were in good down and distance situations. I think Trent Williams being back was huge, like he was particularly blowing open huge holes. He did it, I believe. On the Deebo Samuel touchdown as well. Debo had a rushing touchdown so part of it was just like they're healthier. Drake Greenlaw looked a lot healthier than he has at earlier points of the scene. But when they can run, it all makes sense. And there was like two plays where Perdy did kind of what I'm talking about, where it's like, I think he's been the same guy all along, and like sometimes his crazy plays work, sometimes they don't. His first touchdown was a wild throw and it was a really good throw to Auk but it was into like double coverage in the end zone and he hit it. That touchdown to Kittle, I think was an underratedly great throw. Yeah, Kittle like got open late, but Perdy just stood in there and took a hit. And if it was just like a half second earlier, it's like that hand hits his arm, it flies up, it's an interception, so he can take risk. But I actually think he played a little safer other than those plays for the rest of the game, and they just looked freaking amazing. I mean, they look like the best team in the NFL.

00:57:27
Speaker 2: Again, I think one of the things working against Perdy beyond just this overall, Oh he was mister irrelevant blah blah blah, is he doesn't have great arm talent in terms of strength, so it doesn't come out of his hand like some of the guys that have, you.

00:57:40
Speaker 1: Know, Howitzers to use that.

00:57:44
Speaker 2: Adjective that's been thrown around for decades in our league, which is a very large gun.

00:57:49
Speaker 3: Greg, it's kind of funny, I get old, like World War Two, Like, I mean, there's you could write a term paper on the war. Like lexicon in football, there's there's a.

00:58:00
Speaker 2: Lot, right, because you could be a basic and say, oh, he's got a canon for an arm right, But.

00:58:04
Speaker 1: If you say Howitzer, it's like, oh, that gout, Now that's a man. That's just the way this country is. Anyway. On the other side of the ball, yes, we should get there too, the Jaguars.

00:58:16
Speaker 2: And here's something very rarely happens for me, But got this one wrong, Greg, I really thought this was a Trevor Lawrence big step forward year.

00:58:24
Speaker 1: I thought I had him as a dark horse for MVP.

00:58:27
Speaker 2: And I'm not putting all of their issues on Lawrence, but the Jacksonville offense, even during that five game winning streak, you're just not seeing that big step forward. And this was obviously a flame out at home against the big contender. They have four turnovers and there just isn't enough consistency and really big plays in this offense.

00:58:45
Speaker 3: Three turnovers from Trevor Lawrence, you know, individually, two picks in a fumble Like the first half, I thought it was you know, it was thirteen three at half time, and I actually think that it was closer than the score indicated, but they were just making big mistakes. Lawrence then sort of collapsed in the second half, and you're absolutely right, there's going to be a Trevor Lawrence. How come he's not making the leap. He's been a little bit part of the problem this season.

00:59:14
Speaker 1: Conversation this week.

00:59:15
Speaker 3: I don't know if I'm ready to go there yet, but he's not elevating everything around him like I think he avoids mistakes. Well for the most part, he didn't today, but he hasn't been making enough special throws and today, especially like Nick Bosa and Chase Young, they combined for a sack early in this one where Bosa just literally just takes the ball away from laur like Lawrence, and that's what you know, they imagine when they traded for Chase Young. He was quiet otherwise, but the rest of the defensive line really ate. So I think it's a combination of things, as it often is. Their offensive line for the Jaguars definitely lost that matchup.

00:59:49
Speaker 2: Today, And it just it's expectations were so sky high for Lawrence coming into the league that you expected at this point he would be in full flight, and yet he's taken a bit of a step back. And I think it's just it also shows why sports are great that you had this matchup where the final pick of the draft, Rock Party went against the first pick in the draft and Lawrence, and you saw the guy who's picked last easily outplay his.

01:00:17
Speaker 1: Ill him a rival.

01:00:20
Speaker 3: Well, they weren't the same counterparts, weren't the same draft right now that I think about.

01:00:24
Speaker 1: It, Howard Serve Howitz, who comes.

01:00:27
Speaker 3: I I just I think like two things could be true with people should not be like crushing Lawrence, but we have people.

01:00:33
Speaker 1: Are ready to crush though, Like if he has one, it's it's gonna be.

01:00:36
Speaker 3: I can kind of think I can kind of see it out there. It's like I saw Richard Sherman was talking about and I and I think what Richard Sherman is saying is right, is that we were told he was generational, and to this point, on balance it hasn't been generational. But even this year, I would say he's been good. He's not the first thing. I just was a little surprised that both their lines what were dominated. It kind of reminds me of that even Seahawks game last week, where it's like, yes, Gno played bad in that Seahawks Ravens game, but both lines were just so dominant for the Ravens on both sides of the ball. That's like, well, it's hard to really just talk about the quarterback, like the team was just so much better. And that was the case. This was a measuring stick game in Jacksonville. They were talking about it and they got whacked with that stick. Forty nine ers took that stick out and Nick Wesseling had a great lock here. I would give them credit for that. This is this was the game two lock, thirty four to three.

01:01:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is sane.

01:01:29
Speaker 2: I don't know if the Nick's lost the lock in quite a bit now, so the Zoo is starting to feel itself led by Nick. I think he called himself the keeper, which.

01:01:38
Speaker 1: Is I mean he lost branding.

01:01:40
Speaker 3: I still remember that Jets one maybe that was that was the win that really turned the Zoo's season.

01:01:45
Speaker 1: I mean, you should talk. You've been falling into locks this season every week. Please none of it.

01:01:50
Speaker 2: I was gonna lock this and then I accidentally locked that. It all worked out for me. How many times do I have to hear the same themes?

01:01:58
Speaker 1: So my math is correct, it would be Greg at nine and one.

01:02:02
Speaker 2: Now see I didn't ask either, But no, I'm saying, because you're talking about the West Bros.

01:02:07
Speaker 1: They are I think that would put them two behind.

01:02:09
Speaker 2: Okay, seven, I know, Dan, I'm sorry, but we don't need to dwell on my failure.

01:02:15
Speaker 1: You know, I'll just clip this together. We don't even have to bring it up again.

01:02:18
Speaker 2: We'll just neatly just clip this out in the edit and no one will have ever heard it. All right, let's keep moving, uh and head to the desert where Kyler Murray's back.

01:02:27
Speaker 1: How about that? Here we go.

01:02:32
Speaker 14: The snap's good, the balls down, the kick is up, and the kick is good, and the Cardinals win it.

01:02:39
Speaker 1: Twenty five twenty four. Now, welcome back Kyler.

01:02:44
Speaker 14: Kyler Murray engineering but game winning drive and Arizona gets its second win of the season.

01:02:50
Speaker 1: It awesn't get any better than that. For Kyler Murray's return. I like that. That's like an actual human being, like go to the grocery store, but get me off a polarm.

01:03:05
Speaker 2: Like he lives his entire life talking like that, and everyone around him has to act like it's normal.

01:03:11
Speaker 1: Who is that Wolfley?

01:03:12
Speaker 9: Oh?

01:03:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, which Wolfy? Because we got a rotten Ronnie wolf Yeah. They're actually surprised me today. I didn't notice making up our little call sheet. There are quite a few.

01:03:20
Speaker 2: Wolf Lees in the Uh yeah, that's in the color commentary business.

01:03:23
Speaker 1: I think.

01:03:24
Speaker 2: See, because we automatically say, oh, game winning field goal, let's use that as a highlight.

01:03:28
Speaker 1: We should have went with.

01:03:29
Speaker 2: Some Kyler magic there, because who wants to watch a twenty three yarder in any capacity?

01:03:34
Speaker 1: Matt Prater's still getting it done. Big time production meeting after the show today. Here we got one Eric Roberts in a big spot. Randy got me here, give it to me.

01:03:45
Speaker 14: Funk shotgun snap. Murray backs up to fifty Yeah, near side.

01:03:50
Speaker 5: It is undercrof homa bang at the ten yard line by McBride. He gets up to run and he's tackled at the nines McBride the first Cardinal tie in thirty four years with a one hundred yard receiving game and the Cardinals goal we need will flee uh ooh on lock time one quarter pound of swets.

01:04:16
Speaker 1: That was good. I like that.

01:04:18
Speaker 2: Kyler Murray threw for two hundred and forty nine yards, including that big tight end hookup to set up the game winner by Matt Prater. Kyle also ran for a touchdown in his return from reconstructive knee surgery, and the Cards snap a six game losing streak, edging the Falcons twenty five to twenty three. GREGI watching the highlights here reminded me how much I missed. I didn't think I would feel this way because he's never been my favorite player, But I miss seeing Kyler Murray, those tiny legs and a China helmet, just wreaking havoc on the second level of defenses.

01:04:52
Speaker 3: I know I was gassing Kyler up on Twitter today and so many of the responses are just like, he looks so small out.

01:05:00
Speaker 1: I think people just like weren't youth. They forgot not seeing them. And it's the helmet.

01:05:04
Speaker 2: The helmet, really, it's seven times the size of a standard a helmet in the league.

01:05:08
Speaker 3: But he's a legit, you know, top ten talent at quarterback and I would say a borderline just top ten quarterback period. And it was really exciting because he was just back. There was like maybe there will be rest in future weeks. But he did the things that Kyler did, like that throw to McBride not a great throw, but the decision was awesome that they he decided to be so aggressive in that spot. He saw the matchup that he liked, he went for it, and I think he made really good decisions throughout the game, so that that might be a good sign moving forward for this offense. Drew Petsick, who did such a nice job with Dobbs that like it's gonna be a match like the offense made sense, they moved the ball.

01:05:44
Speaker 1: I thought they looked like the better team.

01:05:46
Speaker 3: And he also had a thirteen yard scramble during that game winning drive to keep it alive, and to me, that was you know, the play of the game where Murray traveled sixty eight point nine yards on that scramble. He essentially ran back thirty yards then ran forward about forty and he had a top speed and.

01:06:04
Speaker 1: It's not going to get to what do you like? You wantant it? Well, it's everybody's twenty one. I want twenty.

01:06:08
Speaker 3: I mean he'd even got close to that. He only got to twenty point one seven.

01:06:11
Speaker 1: But it was his Skyler. This is Kyler. We actually have the sound of that play. Let's go to it. We got all this sound. Fake me out.

01:06:21
Speaker 3: I mean right after I did my NFL Plus segment on the short Kings of twenty twenty three.

01:06:27
Speaker 1: It's a trend.

01:06:28
Speaker 3: It's his fastest speed though since twenty twenty one, so faster than anything you did actually, so it kind of showed he looked like he had juice and he looked like a good quarterback today.

01:06:36
Speaker 2: And Jonathan Gannon, you know, had a conversation with Kyler Murray before the end. Because the Cardinals, who are a team obviously in big time transition trying to figure out their future, they did have the option of keeping him out of play this season and protecting themselves financially. They instead decide to get a look at Kyler, and apparently they're going to give him very little in terms of restrictions.

01:06:59
Speaker 1: Here's a again after the.

01:07:00
Speaker 7: Game before this week about I think tempering what we said from Kyler when we.

01:07:07
Speaker 1: Saw that out there to day. Did he surprise you at all?

01:07:10
Speaker 10: Or maybe that's why he laughed at me.

01:07:15
Speaker 3: Kyler Murray does not lack for confidence, and I get that that. The Gannon was almost saying, maybe you should temper your expectations. Kyler like, let's not, you know, get carried away, and he was just like laughing. He's like, come on, man, I'm Kyler Murray. I'm no Desmon rhddor I'm no Taylor.

01:07:29
Speaker 2: What happened with the Falcons in this game? Heinikey no, tell me Don riders back in my life?

01:07:34
Speaker 1: He is.

01:07:35
Speaker 3: I think he's going to be the quarterback after the bye week because heinike and the Falcons averaged one point five yards per drop back, one point five under four yards per attempt. When Heinecke actually threw the ball, and it was very ridder like he was just holding onto the ball forever. They couldn't do anything throwing the ball, and it wasted a very nice Bajon Robinson game where he goes over one hundred yards. They gave the football yes and gets a touchdown. They did what everyone asked. They used him in the red zone and they in Heineke had a couple of runs. They ran the ball well, I think they got what one hundred and eighty four yards on the ground, and yet Heinik couldn't do anything throwing the ball, and then he heard his hamstring and he went out. Ridder comes in and Ritter didn't do much, but he didn't do anything negatively, and he did run for a game winning touchdown if the defense had just held onto it. They had a seventy four yard fourth quarter drive to take the lead when they were down five points. And to me, I think Arthur Smith's probably just looking for an excuse to put Ridder back in anyways, and he said he wanted to take the buy and then make decision.

01:08:39
Speaker 1: Heinez go. Who knows how long he might be out anyways with the hamstring injury. So I think it's back.

01:08:44
Speaker 2: And if Heinike could be frustrated. But if you throw for fifty five yards and three quarters before getting hurt, you leave yourself vulnerable to lose that gig. All right, let's take a break here and then we'll finish up.

01:08:59
Speaker 1: All right.

01:09:00
Speaker 2: You may remember the first Sunday night football game of the year. It was a disaster for the Giants forty to nothing the loss to the Cowboys, and it was a sign of things to come. The rematch with Tommy DeVito behind center, it wasn't much better.

01:09:14
Speaker 8: Second and ten back to throw, Tyron Smith locks a guy.

01:09:17
Speaker 1: Up right side of the end zone.

01:09:19
Speaker 8: Lamb, Hello CD touchdown Ceedee Lamb. Lamb now has a touchdown rushing and a touchdown receiving, and Aubrey will line up for the extra point that would make it forty two to seven.

01:09:34
Speaker 2: Oh my goodness, bra had sham the sham got friend of the Show. Amazing Greg, which is one pep talk from tugboat. Then for ceedee Lamb, you take that press. He has been the best wide receiver in the league for three weeks now.

01:09:52
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe you're a little too harsh on you know.

01:09:54
Speaker 2: You go look at look how it's different now, Look at the difference the ends zones being found. He is in the middle of everything and the Cowboys are humming. Dak Prescott through for four hundred and four yards and four touchdowns. He ran for another score. This is one of the greatest stack games you'll see. And I know it's against the Giants, but I'm just saying it is. It was just taking candy from a baby. Cowboys rout the Giants for the second time this season, forty nine to seventeen. The home winning streak for the Cowboys quietly is up to twelve games. And I'm gonna do some quick math here. Nine forty eighty nine to seventeen seventy two point margin, the largest in the sweep of an NFC East opponent ever for the Cowboys. So yeah, if they could play the Giants every week, they would be the greatest team ever.

01:10:48
Speaker 1: As it was.

01:10:49
Speaker 2: As it is, they're six and three, Greg and a couple bumps in the road, of course, but man, when this team is in full flight, they are fun to watch.

01:10:56
Speaker 3: Well, just box score like. And there was a couple of numbers that I was like, is this number right? First of all, you just said it six and three? I was like, oh, yeah, the Cowboys are only six and three. Why does it feel like they're better than that?

01:11:06
Speaker 1: Right?

01:11:06
Speaker 3: They have the same record as the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Seahawks, so that it doesn't quite compute.

01:11:11
Speaker 2: I think the Cowboys had more total yards in this game of the Steelers have had all year, So.

01:11:15
Speaker 3: Right, The other number is six hundred and forty yards right thirty two first downs.

01:11:19
Speaker 1: At one point in this game.

01:11:20
Speaker 2: The six forty twelve yards shy of the franchise record greg today.

01:11:24
Speaker 1: That is crazy.

01:11:24
Speaker 3: At one point in this game was three hundred and sixty eight yards to twenty seven. So there was the proverbial lipstick on a pick.

01:11:31
Speaker 1: Dak got ye.

01:11:32
Speaker 3: I know it was against the Giants, but he's been fantastic for four weeks. I don't know if you can keep this up the rest of the way, but for four weeks, nine point three yards per attempt, twelve touchdowns, I think he's been the best quarterback in the league for those four weeks.

01:11:45
Speaker 2: I was going to say, I think for those four weeks in a wide open year, in this particular race, I think he is in the capital T capital C convo for the MVP now because his numbers are starting to really get inflated. He's playing for a team that is fighting for a division. It's the Cowboys, and I think he really has a chance here. And he saw some things and again you just don't want to get too crazy about it, because the Giants are they're moribund.

01:12:13
Speaker 3: We know that this is this is they're the worst team in the NFL. I guess the Panthers are close, but.

01:12:17
Speaker 2: Now with you have Tommy DeVito at quarterback in addition to all their other issues. And yes, I agree they are the worst team in football. But they got big games, yes from Ceedee Lamb who was a monster eleven for one point fifty one, but Brandon Cooks came to life.

01:12:34
Speaker 1: They've been waiting all season for Brandon.

01:12:36
Speaker 2: Cooks to be that guy that gives their offense balance and somebody that could take the top off nine for one seventy three and a touch on ten targets. Michael Gallup even got in the mix of two touchdown catches in this game.

01:12:47
Speaker 1: Jake Ferguson continues to.

01:12:48
Speaker 2: Flash as a real guy at tight end and someone that they can continue to build around. They're still waiting for Tony Pollard to come around, and that's starting to become a real issue, I think for this team, because even in this bloodbath where they nearly set the franchise record, he's averaging three point seven yards per carry, ric O'Donnell outgained him. At a certain point, they might have to start looking at a timeshare with Pollard to try to see if maybe there's a.

01:13:13
Speaker 1: Way to unlock him. But that's a minor quibble.

01:13:16
Speaker 2: Everything else here tells you that the Cowboys have all the pieces to continue to build on this Texas Coast offense.

01:13:22
Speaker 3: I think the last two weeks and the sham God pointed out in that highlight cost showsway he's so good that Tyron Smith locking down whoever was rushing the passer. The Giants defensive line has kind of fallen apart late for the last two weeks after being good. Tyron Smith and Tyler Smith next to each other the last two weeks, especially like two weeks ago they were outstanding against Philadelphia and Tyron Smith has been struggling with injuries. If they get him back to being I'm not saying like Hall of Fame caliber Tyron Smith, but back to close to what he can be, and then Tyler Smith to me is one of the best young offensive linemen in the entire league. Those two guys next to each other on the left side, like you can build. They got a lot to build around on offense. But that's another huge sort of weapon that they got this Giboys team.

01:14:09
Speaker 2: No, you kind of you want to see that next big test for him, you know, like you want to see how they rise in that situation, and the Giants just want to wait.

01:14:18
Speaker 1: They just want the season to be over.

01:14:20
Speaker 2: They are very much in play for the top quarterback in the draft class.

01:14:25
Speaker 1: So I kind of look into this one, jerks. But what you know, what you just got, we'll see, we'll get to it.

01:14:33
Speaker 3: But I am tracking tankathon and there is a big Giants Patriots game coming up next to next week.

01:14:39
Speaker 1: You know, Bill doesn't want to lose to the Giants. Well, neither team I think is trying to lose, that's for sure.

01:14:45
Speaker 2: But all right, well, last one before Sunday Night football, Let's head to Germany where the international series came to end. It was the I believe fiftieth international game for the NFL, so they celebrated by sending mac Jones to the people of Europe.

01:15:00
Speaker 1: Fourth and one converse with the Patriots. The clock is moving on them though they're out of timeouts, and Zappi fakes He fakes a Crockyeld the goalie fined.

01:15:08
Speaker 12: To that field, picked off by the Colts in by.

01:15:12
Speaker 1: Rodney Thomas Payley.

01:15:14
Speaker 10: Zappe trying to get two.

01:15:15
Speaker 14: He faked bought in the ball.

01:15:17
Speaker 1: He's trying to catch the Colt off guard and feel laser over the middle, but it was picked off and snatched.

01:15:23
Speaker 2: Up by Rodney Thomas.

01:15:25
Speaker 5: Yes, sir, the Colts will take that thirty.

01:15:28
Speaker 1: One seconds to go and the Colts and Germany are gonna be victorious.

01:15:33
Speaker 2: Matt Taylor with a very enthusiastic call, Hey, you got a free trip to Germany.

01:15:37
Speaker 1: Who wasn't a beautiful game, but he.

01:15:39
Speaker 3: Got to call a win for a five and five team.

01:15:43
Speaker 2: For a five and five Colts team, who uh get there with a ten to six win on over the Patriots. A Patriots team that has all sorts of quarterback questions coming out of this game. That was Bailly Zappi uh throwing a fake spike interception.

01:16:01
Speaker 1: I don't know what was the funniest thing about.

01:16:03
Speaker 2: It, the fact that he tried the fake spike or that he didn't recognize that nobody noticed that he really did it, so everyone in the secondary was in full coverage. And then he throws a balloon ball over the middle that never had any chance. And the reason he was in greg was because mac Jones struggled mightily and threw maybe the worst pass of his career in the previous possession on what should have been a touchdown. Instead it was an interception, and Belichick is so mad and frustrated he benches his quarterback with one series.

01:16:37
Speaker 1: To go with one series. I don't know if I've ever seen that. I haven't.

01:16:40
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm sure it's happened, and maybe I've even seen it, but I cannot remember a quarterback being benched for essentially a two minute drive to win the game. It's crazy, But you don't blame I don't blame him at all. As bad as Bailey Zappi has looked in brief work this year, including the preseason, Mac Jones has just been too much for him. And the offensive line was terrible pass protecting early in this game.

01:17:05
Speaker 1: I get it, that's part of it.

01:17:07
Speaker 3: You know they were without Trent Brown, but he just crumbled a handful of times this season where just like it all just became too much for him. And when you're short arming like a wide open Goseki the interception that you're talking about, when you're skying a throw that that could also could have been a touchdown pass their hunter Henry, they.

01:17:28
Speaker 1: Actually moved the ball well.

01:17:29
Speaker 3: They had three hundred and forty yards in this game on of the It's weirdly one of their better offensive games of the year. I would say, and they and they well just because other things like I'm just saying that they ran for one sixty seven, so they were actually doing something.

01:17:44
Speaker 1: They were moving the ball.

01:17:45
Speaker 3: They looked like the better offense on the day despite their quarterback not being able to do anything.

01:17:50
Speaker 1: But Mac Jones is just like too much for him and they had to take him out.

01:17:54
Speaker 2: Here's Belichick after thing. You would think with a buy coming up the way that game ended that it might finally be Mac Jones running out of lives here.

01:18:05
Speaker 1: But here's what Belichick said after the game.

01:18:07
Speaker 2: Yeah, look, I made a decision.

01:18:10
Speaker 1: That's what it was.

01:18:12
Speaker 10: We'll do it next week.

01:18:13
Speaker 1: Next week. Do you still have Jones quarterback?

01:18:17
Speaker 3: Fifth and order players?

01:18:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean Bill of course isn't going to say anything because he never says anything, but that benching Jones in that way that tells you everything you need to know. And we'll see what happens next for the Patriots. But they are now two and seven, and it will only continue to amplify the talk about not just Mac Jones in the quarterback position. But Bill Belichick and what his future holds with the team. This is another in a you know, a big spotlight game for the organization. It's you know, me, Greg, I live for Patriots suffering after all the years of me suffering and everyone else suffering.

01:18:58
Speaker 1: But it is gotten to the.

01:18:59
Speaker 2: Point where when they were showing those cuts to Robert Craft in his luxury suite and he was looking crestfallen and increasingly frustrated, where it's not really surprising anymore because this just feels like this is now what the Patriots experience is, and all that stuff, all the many years of greatness feel like they're already kind of far in the rear view because they've had so many troubles in the last couple of years.

01:19:22
Speaker 1: Craft really wanted this game. He made it clear.

01:19:25
Speaker 3: He said it publicly, I think he said it privately. He said he wanted this game to be a reset because this season's been so disappointing, like he hadn't given up hope and they've been pushing to be the Germany team for a long time. They wanted to do this game. They've been working on it for a long time. And then you know, Sebastian Vohmer's on the call in Germany. He's a big, big podcaster over there. We're working for our buddy. I hands some hank And they have this game which is the absolute bottom. In the same game that they left J. C. Jackson home, remember that one. Jack Jones was mysteriously benched for the first quarter plus again. They asked mac Jones after the game why they didn't throw a hail Mary on the final play of the first half, which was very curious. Instead, they had their biggest offensive play of the game, Toda Mario Douglas, and he said, that's a good question, no clue, which is like I said that Mac Jones.

01:20:22
Speaker 1: So he threw a wide receiver screen with no trickeration. It was just like Douglas. It was their biggest play of the game.

01:20:27
Speaker 3: It was their only play over twenty yards, I believe, definitely their only throw over twenty yards.

01:20:33
Speaker 1: And he said no clue, which is a little bit of the mac Jones of last year.

01:20:36
Speaker 3: Yeah, their offensive line coach, I wish you know the best firm and he has a health issue, but he left the team earlier this week Adrian Clem So like there's just like a lot happening. And I will remember this game because I watched the end of it with my entire family, you know, me and Walker. We're up in the we're in the garage at six thirty. We're having fun, like we enjoyed. It was taking too seriously and when that play happened, it was great. The entire family actually burst out like in laughter what like no lie when the zappy thing happened, because we were just like it was so we were just laughter because it was it was legitimately funny.

01:21:12
Speaker 1: It was jeople like me are laughing. You usually be laughing about but we.

01:21:16
Speaker 3: Just were like, there's like they've watched enough to know how bad it is, and I don't know.

01:21:21
Speaker 1: They're so young, you know, you're well, but.

01:21:23
Speaker 3: This year, this year's Patriots ellis is not too in Bubba Walker and knows so bad is They're just like, this is gonna go horribly. What's gonna happen? Then you get the fakes like the interception. Everyone just starts laughing, just just.

01:21:33
Speaker 2: For me and for all the other people that you know, did deal with the Patriots greatness for so long. Let's hear the sentient power aid bottle zolac Uh on the mac Jones interception that spelled the end of his Patriots career.

01:21:47
Speaker 1: It is for fun, was absolute Kiff. He gives the Colts so it's not competitive. He had get Sicky running behind in the back end zone. What's he looking at? You gotta make move Bill, pick a move Bie weeks.

01:22:03
Speaker 3: Here, maybe you get the bye week. Maybe Bill was listening to Scott. He's gotta he's listening to the broadcast.

01:22:09
Speaker 1: It's good analysis. Good job Colts. By the way, you know, I know Colts fans. Let's not go too crazy.

01:22:15
Speaker 3: All I'm saying is good job Shane Steichen. You're five and five, you don't, you have no reason to be. That's good coaching. Jonathan Taylor, nice body control on that first touch that it was actually quite a nice run on a fourth down that ended up being the difference of the game.

01:22:26
Speaker 1: You got Buckner, you got some pass rush. Like the fact they're fin Pittman's like that should have been my touchdown, right.

01:22:31
Speaker 3: You just I'm saying, if you're a Colts fan, you're like, hey, we got the coach. Hopefully we got the quarterback. We won't find out till next year. We're you know we were doing some things.

01:22:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, they're hanging around and at the very least you know they're playing for something after Thanksgiving.

01:22:42
Speaker 1: So there you go. Let's head to Sunday Night football. Final point in the game, no timeouts left. I never liked this prevent defense.

01:22:50
Speaker 7: I would like to have a rush, but I get it from the forty four.

01:22:53
Speaker 1: Wilson back to throw. Crosby spins them around. Wilson be chased.

01:22:58
Speaker 5: Crosby's counting back at the forty Else's gonna heap to the ends on.

01:23:02
Speaker 9: Door right, pits up in the air, had cut it down.

01:23:06
Speaker 6: Late.

01:23:07
Speaker 9: Hobbs got his hands on it to knock it down at the gold and the Raiders win at.

01:23:12
Speaker 8: Home sixteen twelve to get to five and five on the season.

01:23:23
Speaker 2: Yes, the Las Vegas Raiders, with Antonio Pierce leading the charge, are somehow, some way in the thick of the AFC playoff race after another win, sweeping the Medlands Meadowlands Occupants Giants first in a blowout and then edging the Jets sixteen to twelve.

01:23:43
Speaker 1: When Zach Wilson's.

01:23:46
Speaker 2: Desperation hail Mary heave toward Garrett Wilson was broken up by Jets tight.

01:23:53
Speaker 1: End Tyler Conklin.

01:23:55
Speaker 2: Nice play, Bud, and the Raiders improved to four and one at home.

01:24:01
Speaker 1: Greg.

01:24:02
Speaker 2: They are not an impressive team. This was at a pretty game, but a battle of also rans. It is the Raiders who have a pulse as we head toward Thanksgiving them the Jets who look like they're fading away.

01:24:17
Speaker 3: Well, it's tough to separate these teams, and if they were in the NFC, you would feel like long term they maybe have a better chance to make the playoffs. But they both only have five losses, so it still feels big at this point in the season and you're just wondering, like, how do the Raiders win these games? Exactly because it's a rookie quarterback and O'Connell, who's looked okay through two weeks, had a bad interception but otherwise some good plays. But no running back in the league dominates the ball more than Josh Jacobs. He is the highest percentage of plays of any one in the on any offense. And then today DeVante Adams had a higher percentage of air yards in this game. In terms of like the targets thirteen targets in this game, and just like air yards I think of any receiver of any game this year. So it's like four different guys and a lot of good speeches by Antonio Pierce and then Max Crosby. If there's one positive I guess about putting the Raiders in prime time so much?

01:25:09
Speaker 1: Like so much?

01:25:10
Speaker 3: Why so much? It has kind of been the Wow. Max Crosby is one of the best football players on earth and is just involved in every play. So a nice couple of months for me.

01:25:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, you get the Crosby Show, and I think Josh Jacobs you're starting to see now as the season, you know, has reached the halfway point.

01:25:28
Speaker 1: It took him a while to get going after that long holdout, but he.

01:25:32
Speaker 2: Had some runs in this game, including a forty yard run and that run where he carried the Jets defense for five or six yards. He also had a big fumble that in the fourth quarter where when it looked like the Raiders are.

01:25:45
Speaker 1: About to put the game away.

01:25:46
Speaker 2: But in general, he seems more like the player he was last year when he was the rushing champ. Devonte Adams continues to be far less productive than he was at any other time in his career, but at least he's in the mix in this game for eighty six.

01:26:01
Speaker 1: And they only had one fifty three through the year.

01:26:04
Speaker 2: Right, So, and you know, going against a stout Jets defense, that that's gonna play. So yeah, I think the Raiders on the Raiders side of the ball, it's it's not gonna be pretty. Aidan O'Connell is not, you know, looking like CJ. Stroud out there. But it gets a little bit messy at the bottom of the AFC playoff picture. And maybe this is one of those teams that hang around even if nobody wants them around. On the Jet side of things, I could be mad. I could be you know, screaming and cursing and and and you know, shaking my fist at the football gods about that last play, because it really was a beautiful scramble to get away from Max Crosby by Wilson to square his shoulders and then throw a beautiful ball to the end zone there and and Garrett Wilson really did come very close to it. I'm not and it's not that's not a Joe Conklin. And you can't blame him. Tyler Conklan, the Jet tight end. He's just thrown his hands up too, and he's the one that actually knocks it away from Garret Wilson, and it would have been a miraculous win for the Jets. And the reason I can't complain is the Jets have already had a couple two or three miraculous wins this year, so you can't just expect them to keep on pulling a rabbit out of the hat. And you certainly can't expect the offense to make a big play when it counts.

01:27:17
Speaker 1: I mean you it came down to.

01:27:19
Speaker 2: That last throw, but really the Jets had a chance here in their previous possession to truly take the game and steal it from the Raiders. And Zach Wilson stares down Alan Lazard and throws an interception to Robert Splaine that really kind of, for all intents and purposes, truly kind of buried the team. They did get it, do a good job getting it back the defense, Greg, But it's the same story with this offense, which is gone.

01:27:46
Speaker 1: What are we up to now?

01:27:47
Speaker 3: I think thirty five drives if my numbers are right, and one hundred in sixty nine minutes of game time.

01:27:55
Speaker 1: Can that be right?

01:27:57
Speaker 2: I mean, it sounds probably I mean, but it is about thirty five to thirty six possessions now without a touchdown, and it just seems like the team's head is in the sand on this, with the quarterback, with the play caller Nathaniel Hackett, with the personnel, with the scheme, like they're not changing anything.

01:28:15
Speaker 1: And I wonder Greg how much of that is.

01:28:17
Speaker 2: And as the season slips away and they lose the tiebreaker out of the Raiders, they lose a tiebreaker of the Chargers last week to conference losses, so very bad for their playoff hopes. Is how much is this is tied into the true boss of the organization, Aaron Rodgers, who again floated something to NBC about a return, and it's like they want to just keep everything in place until he gets here to save us. And it's certainly no way to try to keep a season alive as it all starts to fade away.

01:28:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, he said mid December to Melissa. According to mid Melissa Stark, that that was the goal.

01:28:48
Speaker 2: And it's mid November right now for those tracking, So he says he's about a month away.

01:28:52
Speaker 3: Potentially, and so that would be you know, maybe their game against the Commanders, which would be you know, the only three weeks left in the season. Most likely PFT also put something out that it's more likely that he wouldn't be ready to OTAs for what.

01:29:08
Speaker 1: It's worth, it's tough.

01:29:11
Speaker 3: This game is actually why they can't change off of it, because I understand why they would leave this game thinking, oh man, we're not that far away now. On one hand, we haven't scored a freaking touchdown in almost three games, thirty five drives, I think, And yet Zach Wilson on those final two drives made some great throws I mean, to get the ball in position once they fell down to touch. You know, once Jacobs fumbled that ball, and it was Jacob's first fumble I think in three hundred something touches, So like, that's pretty rare that would happen three hundred and forty six straight top touches without losing a fumble. And then he fumbled it. They get it and you almost feel like, oh, the magic's happened again. Zach Wilson made some really good plays to move the ball down the field. Then he stares down the interception, then he gets the ball back again and and I mean that throat a conkline he had to set up the hail Mary was incredible too, so it's like you're.

01:30:05
Speaker 1: Seeing these little finishes.

01:30:06
Speaker 3: And he started the game five for seven for eighty four yards and he almost ran in for a touchdown. This is actually one of Zach Wilson's best games of the season.

01:30:15
Speaker 2: And think about that though, right, they didn't score a touchdown, and yes, he nearly had a touchdown scrabble but stepped out of bounds and then they shoot themselves in the foot with penalties on that drive. He also had the no look past to Alan Lazard on that an ultimate drive that he rattled at home because Lazard was trying almost to drop the ball, but he held on to it.

01:30:34
Speaker 1: It was probably his third best game.

01:30:35
Speaker 3: He had that two game stretch where he looked okay, this one I was like okay. But they also the defense only allowed two first downs in the first twenty five minute Dan and it was nine to three at that point, and the Jets had a chance to to go down and at least take the clock away at the end of the first half, and they couldn't do that. And that's where they are not taking advantage and they're asking the defense to do so much. They should have been up by two scores at halftime, and the kind of just frittered that part away.

01:31:01
Speaker 1: And that is on the offense.

01:31:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's the same thing I said last week and probably the week before. Like the way this team is now set up, it is the defense is to dominate, and it's not enough to just dominate. They also have to have takeaways that either produce points or set up the offense on a very short field. And they even did have to turnovers, right, but they didn't have the impact. Well, they actually did have one in the first half that set them up with a field goal. But unless the defense does something truly special or special teams, they're just not gonna win games the way they are set up because in addition to the Wilson struggles and the offensive line struggle, the running game now is stuck in mud.

01:31:41
Speaker 1: So it is to me with the Giants, these are the two worst offenses in football.

01:31:46
Speaker 2: So if the Raiders fans right now are feeling happy and refreshed and renewed, that's good.

01:31:52
Speaker 1: That's great. You have something to root for.

01:31:54
Speaker 2: But also keep in mind the two offenses that you just played are quite possibly along with the paid treats, possibly the worst offenses in football. So we'll see what the Raiders look like when the competition jumps up a notch. But yeah, they have the Dolphins next week so that will be a true test and the Chiefs after that, so we'll see where they stand.

01:32:15
Speaker 3: In the AFC is truly stupid. There are seven teams. There's that eight teams, you know, between the seven seed, which is Houston. Houston's five and four, Like we think of them as this great team in Cincinnati's fighting four in Buffaloes.

01:32:32
Speaker 1: So they haven't played tomorrow night.

01:32:33
Speaker 3: But there's seven teams that either have four or five losses, including the Jets, including the Raiders, including the Denver Broncos at least.

01:32:39
Speaker 1: For one more day.

01:32:42
Speaker 3: I'm just like eight teams. I counted it wrong. Eight teams have either four or five losses. I mean that is a big fat middle conference and then New England.

01:32:52
Speaker 2: But they You know, if you're a Jets fan, you're disgusted because you thought home against the Chargers, then you get the Raiders. This have been your chance to kind of put yourself ahead of a lot of these teams.

01:33:03
Speaker 1: Instead, now you're kind of looking up at them.

01:33:06
Speaker 2: It's just very frustrating, and it's I try to keep it in perspective, Greg, because I know in my heart as soon as Aaron Rodgers Achilles popped, it was over. And I said that, I've said that, But they kind of sucked you in with some of those wins and made you think, Okay, maybe this could be like a fun, weird season and we're playing in the playoffs as a wild card.

01:33:28
Speaker 1: But I feel like the last six days.

01:33:31
Speaker 2: Reality is struck and it feels like Midnight has struck, which is also kind of sad because it wasn't exactly a Cinderella story either. They've been a tough watch for the most part this season, but we're kept on coming up with wins. But now they're coming up with losses and that's just the way it goes, all right.

01:33:51
Speaker 3: Got just gotta hold the fort here until Aaron gets back.

01:33:56
Speaker 1: But at Buffalo and then Miami, then Nick's just had.

01:33:58
Speaker 2: A really good home stand beat up on all three of their opponents. So we got the Knicks, and we got the.

01:34:06
Speaker 1: Nick Celtics game this week. Yeah, and the Yankees.

01:34:10
Speaker 11: Different than basketball.

01:34:11
Speaker 2: Part, he's a pitcher that I'm excited about and maybe we make a play bro Tani.

01:34:17
Speaker 1: So there's you know, there is hope, just not about the football team. All right.

01:34:21
Speaker 2: We'll be back on Monday with the Monday Night Football recap and news rundown.

01:34:27
Speaker 1: Also, NFL Plus returns our Game of the Week this week will be Texans Bengals pretty good.

01:34:34
Speaker 2: That'll be fun, so make sure you're there for that. Until then, thank you everybody for listening, and nice Sunday.

01:34:42
Speaker 1: Heath the Call