Dianna Russini On Coach Firings/Hirings, Brandon Walker On CFB, Who Is Under The Most Pressure Wild Card Weekend + Guys On Chicks

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Speaker 1 On today's part of my take, we've got a two-fer. We're talking Black Monday firings, hirings with our good friend Diana Rossini.

Speaker 1 And then we're going to do a little college football playoff preview with, unfortunately, our college football expert because he won the

Speaker 1 duel with Tom Ferneli.

Speaker 7 Has it been won? It has.

Speaker 1 He's got three out of four of the last teams. Brandon Walker, he also, we haven't taped Brandon yet, but he will be in this show.
He said to me before, is it my coronation?

Speaker 8 So basically, our worst case scenario.

Speaker 7 Wait, so is Tom totally out of teams?

Speaker 1 Yeah, he's got one team left, but statistically, he can't.

Speaker 7 But we should put some stock in the team. Okay, maybe if he picked the champion.
Yeah, maybe. That should mean something.
That should mean something. We're winners on this podcast.

Speaker 7 We haven't decided yet.

Speaker 1 We're going to do Hot Seat, Cool Throne. We're going to do some pressure rankings.
We're going going to do Guys on Chicks. We got a great show for everyone.

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Speaker 1 Okay, let's go.

Speaker 1 Martin My Take!

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Speaker 1 Today is Wednesday, January 8th, and PFT Black Monday has occurred. And we just want to remind everyone that those guys have families.
Kids have to change schools.

Speaker 8 Yeah.

Speaker 1 Getting fired is not fun.

Speaker 8 No,

Speaker 7 it's a very somber day. Thoughts and prayers? Anyone that takes joy in their coach being fired is a sicko.

Speaker 1 See you, Doug Peterson.

Speaker 7 Adios, bitch.

Speaker 1 So it was crazy. We're going to get into more with Diana Rossini about it, but that was, I think, the most shocking news: Trent Balki staying and Doug Peterson going

Speaker 1 because Trent Balki is a cocker roach. He just sticks around forever.

Speaker 1 He has been the GM of two teams, and he is now about to hire his sixth head coach. And I looked it up.
Trent Balky,

Speaker 1 as the GM of the Jacksonville Jaguars, is 26 and 58. Or sorry, he started as like a, I think he was a senior player personnel or whatever, and then became the GM.

Speaker 1 So his time in Jacksonville, 26 and 58. Doug Peterson's time in Jacksonville was 22 and 29.
So, Trent Balky, without Doug Peterson, was 4 and 29.

Speaker 7 22 and 29 sounds pretty good.

Speaker 1 Yeah, it does. But so, Doug Peterson got fired, but Trent Balky didn't.
Yep. And you separate those, and you're like, wait a second.

Speaker 1 Now, I'm not saying Doug Peterson should have kept his job, but it seems like the Jags should have hired both of them.

Speaker 7 Yeah, so Trent Balky, he was there for the 49ers, the Jim Harbaugh, Jim Tomsula days. I believe he hired Chip Kelly.
He hired Jim Tomsula. He hired Chip Kelly.
Yep.

Speaker 7 And he was part of that whole scene where, allegedly, Harbaugh may have told some high-up people when they walked into the room, sorry, this room is for men only. Yes.

Speaker 7 And then that, you know, you know what he's really good at? He's really good at sitting next to the owner. Yeah.
And being the one with the most face time around the owner.

Speaker 1 Even how he got the job in Jacksville, he started as a, like I said, senior player personnel or something, and then they fired their GM, and then he was like, I'll be the interim GM.

Speaker 1 And then after a while, he's like, wait, I guess I'll just stick as the GM. Yeah.
He just, he's, he's a survivor.

Speaker 7 Sitting next to the owner during games is actually worth a lot in terms of job security and he's very good at that. Yeah.

Speaker 1 So that was a big news. Then the Giants also big news keeping both Dable and Joe Shane

Speaker 1 crazy.

Speaker 1 I mean, I guess John Merritt deserves credit for being a man of his word.

Speaker 7 I guess so. He also really kind of threw him under the bus while saying that he's keeping them.
Yeah. He's like, this is one of the hardest decisions I've had to make, but we're not firing him.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 it's a dumpster fire decision in this respect. One, you have a GM.
They both are on the hot seat, the hottest seat possible going into the season. So what is the GM going to do?

Speaker 1 He's probably going to spend as much money as he possibly can

Speaker 1 in free agency. I think someone posted it last night like Gettelman spent the most money in his hot seat year.
Who is their GM after Gettelman?

Speaker 1 Can't remember his name, but he spent the most money in his hot seat year.

Speaker 1 And now you have the coach and GM in their hot seat years going to just try to spend as much money as possible and hope that it keeps their job.

Speaker 7 And also probably draft a quarterback. And then maybe

Speaker 7 I would say that the pressure would be on them to play that quarterback on the early side rather than on the delayed side. Yes.

Speaker 7 So I'm not saying that if they get like Cam Ward and he's great, they put him in too soon.

Speaker 7 But if they get Cam Ward or Shador or somebody like that and they wait around for, you know, four weeks in the regular season and he doesn't look great in practice, they're going to be more likely to be like, fuck it, let's just pull the emergency start rookie quarterback lever so that we can save our own jobs.

Speaker 7 Correct. But I do think that Dayball, I think he's a,

Speaker 7 I've changed a little bit as the course of this year went on, but I still think that he is a guy that can be a very good head coach. I agree with you.

Speaker 7 If he had the right tools around him, they got to do a lot of other stuff. Like the roster is not so great.

Speaker 7 But yeah, they're going to be sticking around. And Mr.
Mara, I would have, I would feel so bad if

Speaker 7 I was the head coach. And the owner gave a press conference being like, I know everybody in the world wanted me to fire this guy.
Yeah.

Speaker 7 And I wanted to fire this guy, but I'm not going to fire this guy. Yes, yes.

Speaker 1 By the way, it was Jerry Reese before Gettelman. So he had a hot seat year where he went max in the free agency.
I think they made the playoffs, and Gettelman did the same.

Speaker 1 So it's going to be, they're going to be all in.

Speaker 1 Also, I saw this. So Jordan Renan said, How rare is it for a coach to get another season after winning just three games in their third year? It's only happened twice since 1980.

Speaker 1 Bruce Coslett in 1999 and Dave Schula in 95, both with Cincy and both crashed out. Definitely a weird thing for year three.
Like year one, three wins. You can keep your job.
Year two, maybe even.

Speaker 1 Year three, three wins usually is you're gone.

Speaker 7 I think they both made such an equal amount of mistakes that it was hard to pin most of the blame on one of them. It's kind of smart.
It's very smart. To cover each other's up.

Speaker 7 If they both get a little bit better, then we're in a good spot. Yeah.
But I can't identify which guy is the issue.

Speaker 1 And then the names are piling in for each job. The Bears

Speaker 1 are going to interview every single person ever. Mike McCarthy, David Shaw,

Speaker 1 Kafka.

Speaker 7 Robert Salah.

Speaker 1 The list just goes on and on. I did see an old friend, though.
Memes, are you excited for Matt Nagy era in New York?

Speaker 5 He's just getting an interview.

Speaker 5 He's not the nice coach.

Speaker 7 What's wrong with talking to guys?

Speaker 1 Yeah. Who do you want? Because Ben Johnson is not going to the Jets or the Saints because those teams did not offer him an interview, which means he basically was like,

Speaker 1 Don't even bother interviewing me.

Speaker 5 Ben Johnson would have been Adam Gates 2.0 on the Jets.

Speaker 1 Nice spin zone. That's good.
I'm sure.

Speaker 7 He's very, I don't like his attitude when it comes to taking meetings either.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I don't either. It's kind of crazy.

Speaker 1 We got two teams in the playoffs and three teams looking for new head coaches here on this podcast. So who do you want?

Speaker 1 Either Vrabel. Okay.

Speaker 1 I mean,

Speaker 1 Hank just went like this.

Speaker 1 You sad, sad boy.

Speaker 7 Yeah, I mean, it's still possible.

Speaker 5 Aaron Glenn.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 5 Brian Flores. I'm sure Dolphins fans are probably like, yeah, take him.

Speaker 1 Well,

Speaker 1 I'll take him.

Speaker 1 That's pretty much it.

Speaker 7 Sounds like you're thinking about kidnapping.

Speaker 7 Like, yeah, I'll take that guy.

Speaker 1 Yeah, it doesn't seem like you're very enthused about this.

Speaker 7 I think you should want Rex Ryan. I think you should want Rex Ryan more than anything you've ever wanted.
Because at the very least, it's going to be a fucking blast.

Speaker 5 Yeah. Yeah, but the end of the Rex Ryan days weren't great.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 1 But the beginning were, and what would you be doing when you hire him? You're going back to the beginning.

Speaker 5 Back to the beginning, but he's old now.

Speaker 5 You don't know how he deals with the new players.

Speaker 1 He's thinner.

Speaker 1 No, we need no

Speaker 1 fat.

Speaker 5 If Rex agrees to put on 200 pounds, fat Rex back?

Speaker 1 Yeah, fat Rex. See, I'm the reverse of Mike McCarthy.
If Mike McCarthy, if the Bears decide to hire Mike McCarthy, it has to come with Ozempic.

Speaker 7 He's the first person ever to move to Chicago and lose weight?

Speaker 1 Yeah, he'd have to do it. He'd have to do it.

Speaker 1 Because I was talking with Eddie, our good friend, and he was like, he basically was like, I don't want Mike McCarthy because of the face he's going to make.

Speaker 1 And I explained to him, well, there's no big jumbotron in Soldier Field, so at least you won't do that. But I agree, you got to lose weight if you're Mike McCarthy.

Speaker 7 I want Mike McCarthy to the Bears just. Because

Speaker 1 you're rooting for my demise.

Speaker 7 No, not for your demise specifically. Torture.
He's a good coach.

Speaker 1 You know, the honesty is that Mike McCarthy to the Bears would be a disaster.

Speaker 1 It would be funny to watch.

Speaker 1 I'm fine with people wanting to be a coach. Anyone to watch the Bears would be a disaster.

Speaker 4 That's the reason why.

Speaker 1 I think he's a good coach.

Speaker 4 A coordinator is not a proven good head coach. There's been many examples of stud offensive coordinators not working out as head coaches.
Mike McCarthy has at least proven himself as a head coach.

Speaker 1 Like, you have a better chance

Speaker 4 with Mike McCarthy than Ben Johnson. I'm not even joking about that.

Speaker 1 You'll at least be honest, you just want to see my pain. And

Speaker 1 what makes it funny?

Speaker 4 But yeah, I think, honestly, if I really want to see your pain, Ben Johnson would be more painful because you'd get so much higher up. And then when he sucked, you'd

Speaker 1 never get higher than six out of ten. But that's a lie.
If you got Ben Johnson,

Speaker 7 if I really wanted to take glee in your pain, I would root for Ron Rivera to the Bears. But I'm not.
And I'm rooting for Mike McCarthy.

Speaker 1 But you would also love that.

Speaker 7 No, I actually, I don't think that I would. I don't think I would.
You'd find a way to love it. No, because he's so nice and he'd probably stop in, probably have to be nice to him again.

Speaker 1 Yeah, that would be too close to us.

Speaker 2 If you get Ben Johnson,

Speaker 2 that's such a lie. That's such a lie, and you know it.

Speaker 1 I'm like, that's awesome.

Speaker 2 So if you get Ben Johnson six out of ten, you get Mike McCarthy, where are you at?

Speaker 1 Two?

Speaker 7 Two out of ten? I'm rooting for Mike now because I feel bad for the way he's been treated in Dallas. I think you got a raw deal.

Speaker 2 You'll be more excited than

Speaker 2 if you got Mike McCarthy. You're going to be excited if you get Ben Johnson.
I want you to get Ben Johnson just because I want to

Speaker 2 see you walk back this take.

Speaker 7 So if it sounds like they're going to get Ben Johnson, then Big Cat gets to watch the rest of the playoffs and see every play and be like, oh, fuck yeah, he's mine.

Speaker 1 But it stays six out of 10.

Speaker 1 Hank, what are you guys going to do? You got it set? Vrable? Vrable.

Speaker 1 You don't even have to worry about it. Did you give him backup plan? That's so annoying.
He's just like, he's. Look at his smile.

Speaker 1 Are you a little bit worried about Tom Brady?

Speaker 7 How much joy would it give Tom Brady, the guy that demanded his release from the New England Patriots, to then take their potential next coach and put him in Las Vegas.

Speaker 4 I think Tom Brady and Mr. Kraft have a good relationship.
So I don't think it would give him that much joy.

Speaker 1 Like, there's not bad blood. He's not even thinking about anything.

Speaker 4 The release with the Patriots, that was a Brady Belichick thing.

Speaker 7 Give me a backup plan, though, for Boston, for New England.

Speaker 1 Probably Ben Johnson. Yeah.
He's a UNC quarterback. Drake Mays a UNC quarterback.
There's that connection.

Speaker 7 That's your backup, is Ben? I would take Mike McCarthy.

Speaker 1 Proven winner.

Speaker 1 I

Speaker 4 don't know a lot of ball, but I would rather take a proven head coach than an unproven coordinator.

Speaker 7 You are rolling the dice a little bit.

Speaker 7 There's a lot that happens.

Speaker 1 It's not

Speaker 7 that you don't get practice for as an OC, and he has the best guy ever to manage that team and be the leader of that team in Dan Campbell. Well, he gets to try all his fucks.
Josh McDaniels.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Hank keeps saying this thing where it's like...

Speaker 2 You've seen head coaches. How often is it that a head coach goes to his third team and is more successful?

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Because there's just as many instances as offensive coordinators, good offensive coordinators being good and going to a new team as there are head coaches going to another team.

Speaker 2 Your whole thing of like, yeah, offensive coordinators going to a new team sometimes doesn't work. Sometimes head coaches going to a new team also doesn't work.

Speaker 7 What about Andy Reid?

Speaker 1 What about Sean McVay? What about Kyle Shanahan? What about that was

Speaker 1 his second, not his third.

Speaker 7 I know, but I said he just said going to a new team. Right.

Speaker 4 Remove the Redskins and then let's do it again. Huh? Remove the entire Redskins coaching tree.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 4 Like, you just named one organization, and that's just because the Redskins are.

Speaker 7 We build coaches. I just said Matt.

Speaker 1 Malafour. He was on the team.
He was on the team. He was on the team.

Speaker 7 Say Kevin O'Connor.

Speaker 1 Kevin Svanski.

Speaker 1 Coach of the Year twice.

Speaker 1 No big deal.

Speaker 1 No, I mean, I'm talking. I'm basically just.
John Harbaugh was a special teams coordinator.

Speaker 4 I'm basically just talking specifically about McDaniels. I'm obviously have a Patriots bias, but that is how I see it.

Speaker 1 You have to have already coached before.

Speaker 7 Sometimes it doesn't work.

Speaker 4 I'd rather take a proven winner.

Speaker 1 Okay. I mean, I think it's probably the same.
Like, it's probably the same success rate. Proven winner.

Speaker 2 Doug Peterson was a head coach. I went to another team and did not work out for the second team.

Speaker 1 Max, let me give you one because we'll adjust it now.

Speaker 7 We'll not go second team. John Fox.
We'll go third team, Bill Belichick.

Speaker 1 UNC. No.

Speaker 1 Oh, you're counting the Jets.

Speaker 7 Yeah, Browns, Jets, Patriots. Okay.

Speaker 1 Third time's a charm. Yep.

Speaker 7 I guess.

Speaker 1 Whatever. I don't want Mike McCarthy, but I'm probably going to end up with him.
Did you guys? I'm going to end up with Brian Forrest.

Speaker 1 They're interviewing 100 people just so that Ryan Poles can hire the guy he played college football with.

Speaker 7 Did you guys see Jerry Jones on Land Man?

Speaker 1 No. His acting job.
What is Landman?

Speaker 7 It's a show. It's got like Billy Bob Thornton, John Hamm in it.
It's a crazy show. But Jerry had like a 90-second cameo.
Was it good? It was incredible. Whoa.
Like, this guy can fucking act. Whoa.

Speaker 7 He started to tear up and like have sniffles during it. He gave it a passionate speech.
He out-acted John Hamm and Billy Bob Thornton in the same scene.

Speaker 7 That's what Jerry should be doing. Yeah.
Be an actor. More time acting, Jerry.

Speaker 1 Be an actor.

Speaker 7 But it made me think Mike might be coming back. Like, if this, the emotion that he was able to demonstrate.

Speaker 1 He was thinking about firing Mike McCarthy?

Speaker 7 He was talking about just life and family, having people around you that you care about deeply.

Speaker 8 And it made like he meant it.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 7 And obviously he feels that way about his son.

Speaker 7 But, yeah, it made me think, I think he's not cut out for firing guys anymore.

Speaker 1 Yeah, he hasn't. He doesn't fire guys.
Jason Garrett was there for way too long.

Speaker 1 You guys want to do some pressure talk? Who's got the most pressure?

Speaker 1 I also did a rankings of

Speaker 1 which QB I'd want in this playoffs. I don't know if you guys wanted to pick apart my rankings or we could do it together.
I could rip through it. You could could tell me.

Speaker 1 I think you would like it, PFT. Okay.

Speaker 1 My rankings are Patrick Mahomes, one. I don't like it.
Josh Allen, two. Lamar Jackson, three.

Speaker 1 Matthew Stafford, four. Jared Goff, five.
Justin Herbert, six. Baker Mayfield, seven.
Jaden Daniels, eight.

Speaker 1 Jalen Hurts, nine.

Speaker 1 Jordan Love, ten. Sam Darnold, eleven.
C.J. Stroud, 12.
Bo Nix, and then Russell Wilson, last.

Speaker 7 You're ahead of Jalen Hurts.

Speaker 7 It's a lot of names to try to remember the exact order of them, but there's also a difference between quarterback and quarterback in the system that they're currently in.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I'm just saying which quarterback I want. I just want who I trust.

Speaker 7 My trust rankings. I think

Speaker 7 that's pretty good.

Speaker 1 Would you go any different than Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson in your top three? Maybe not, Lamar.

Speaker 1 Trusted Lamar.

Speaker 7 But based on how good Lamar has been, I understand.

Speaker 7 His interceptions aren't really interceptions.

Speaker 1 We could do a a quick snake draft of drafting the quarterbacks. Four quarterbacks.
Yeah, let's do that. All right.
Hank, you ready? We'll do a three-man draft because

Speaker 8 we'd each get four quarterbacks.

Speaker 1 No, wait, it's 14, right? Yeah. Yep.
It's 14. So, shit, that's a number that doesn't work in this.

Speaker 7 We could do two just left out.

Speaker 1 Two left out. Yeah.
Okay, I like that. All right.

Speaker 7 That's the do not trust.

Speaker 1 Hank, do you want to start? No. Okay, PFT, do you want to start?

Speaker 7 Yeah, I'll start.

Speaker 1 All right.

Speaker 7 I'll take Patrick Patrick Mahomes.

Speaker 1 Okay, good pick. Thank you.
Good pick. I'll take Josh Allen.

Speaker 4 I'll take Jared Goff.

Speaker 1 And then you also have one coming back.

Speaker 4 And I will take

Speaker 4 Lamar Jackson. Okay.

Speaker 1 I'll take Matthew Stafford.

Speaker 4 Super winner. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 7 Okay. I will take

Speaker 7 Jaden Daniels.

Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1 Baker Mayfield.

Speaker 1 Okay, I will take Justin Herbert

Speaker 1 and Jalen Hurts.

Speaker 4 I will take Super Bowl winner Russell Wilson.

Speaker 1 Oh, wait, no, I only have one.

Speaker 8 Sorry.

Speaker 1 Justin Herbert.

Speaker 1 I don't know why I picked two there. That was really stupid.
Justin Herbert.

Speaker 4 Jalen Hurts. Okay.

Speaker 1 Super Bowl winner.

Speaker 1 You got a pick up? Didn't you just take Jalen? Yeah, I took two by accident. Justin Herbert was my pick.

Speaker 4 We're doing a great job. Russell Willis.

Speaker 1 Okay. Okay.
My last pick.

Speaker 1 CJ Stroud.

Speaker 7 I kind of wanted to take Sam Donalds.

Speaker 7 Damn. Seems like you guys have a last pick.

Speaker 1 You guys certainly have

Speaker 7 my last pick. What's our type?

Speaker 1 Well, I wasn't going to take Jordan Love.

Speaker 7 I'm going to go Malik Willis.

Speaker 7 Good pick. No, can I change it? Yeah.
Tanner McKee.

Speaker 1 Malik Willis and Tanner McKee. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Malik McKee. We'll put it up for vote.
Blind vote. And loser has to do an hour stand-up?

Speaker 1 Nope. Loser has to go to a bachelor party.
Yes. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Okay. You want to talk pressure rankings or who's under the most pressure? I have a few that I had listed.

Speaker 7 I've got a 1-1, and it might be different from what you had talked about. All right, so give me your one-on-one one.
My 1-1 is Sean McDermott.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 7 Are we doing individuals or teams?

Speaker 1 It could be individuals and teams, but make your case for Sean McDermott because I have a different coach that I think might have more pressure.

Speaker 7 Okay,

Speaker 7 because Josh Allen has been an alien this year. He's been incredible.
It's his best year ever. He might win the MVP.

Speaker 7 And he's probably going to be incredible in the playoffs again because Josh plays very well in the playoffs. The playoff losses, you can look at all of them and say, That's not really on Josh.
Like

Speaker 7 he played good enough to win 99.9% of games.

Speaker 1 He played two perfect playoff games the the year that they lost to the Chiefs in the 13 seconds.

Speaker 7 Right. So who gets the blame for those losses? Sean McDermott.
I think deservedly. I don't think that.
Obviously, there's a narrative out there because he wants to beat Mahomes.

Speaker 7 He wants to say, okay, I'm the guy in the AFC. I can lead my team to the Super Bowl.
I get that. But in reality, it's a lot more on his head coach than it is on him.
Yeah. And McDermott,

Speaker 7 I thought this after the heartbreaking loss last year, and it would be shocking if it happened.

Speaker 7 But if they get bounced in a terrible fashion again, I wouldn't be surprised if the Bills moved on for McDermott, even though he's been a great coach for him.

Speaker 7 He turned the entire franchise around along with Josh. But at some point, these wins or these losses add up.
Yeah. And you just, you become that guy, and then it breaks your brain.

Speaker 7 And you spend all your time thinking about how to get over this one little hump, and then things just fall apart.

Speaker 1 It's a good point. I don't know if they'd fire him.
I don't know if they'd fire my coach that I picked, but it's kind of similar vein.

Speaker 1 I think Mike Tomlin has a ton of pressure because Mike Tomlin, he hasn't won a playoff game since 2016.

Speaker 1 And if you look at his playoff record, because he's been in Pittsburgh in forever, his first four years in Pittsburgh, he was 5-2 in the playoffs, including a Super Bowl.

Speaker 1 And his last 14 years in Pittsburgh, he's 3-8.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 it's not been good. And I think the way this season has ended, I know there was some murmurings last year.
Like, I don't think Mike Tomlin's going to get fired.

Speaker 1 But this is just another year where it's like, hey,

Speaker 1 you have not won a playoff game that we're going to be going on almost a decade of you not winning a playoff game. What's going on here? We're Pittsburgh.
We're the Steelers.

Speaker 1 We need to win playoff games. Yeah.
So that was my coach. And also, I think Russell Wilson, there's two guys that are under pressure in terms of money.
Yes. Russell Wilson and Sam Darnold.

Speaker 7 Sam Darnold was going to be my next pick. Yeah.

Speaker 7 Because the difference in how much money he's going to make next year based on how he performs in the playoffs is there's probably a hundred million dollar difference. Yes.

Speaker 7 If he stinks, he could get franchise tagged. He could get picked up and signed for some team, if he hits the open market, some team will overpay for him.

Speaker 7 So it probably won't be in the $25 to $30 million range. They'll probably pay like a little bit more.

Speaker 1 But

Speaker 7 if he plays really, really well in the playoffs, now we're talking about like...

Speaker 7 $150 million. Yes.
$175, $200 million. The way quarterbacks get paid, you don't know.
So this is like, it's $100 million difference based strictly on how he plays, I would say, in the next two games.

Speaker 1 And like,

Speaker 1 you know, you can't just take a small sample size, but that's also the reality of it. Like, the game on Sunday was, you know, a very consequential game, playoff atmosphere.

Speaker 1 If he comes out and has a dud in the actual playoffs, that's two pressure games where you're like, what just happened?

Speaker 7 Yeah, and the most recent games you've seen.

Speaker 1 Right, right.

Speaker 1 And yeah, so Sam Darnold and Russ, I think Russ is the same way. If Russ comes out and he's just awful again, like, who's going to sign him? Yeah, no one.
No one's going to sign him.

Speaker 1 As for the quarterbacks, I had a little pushback when I said it on Sunday from people online, but I do think Lamar is under more pressure than Josh Allen, and that's because something that you said, Josh Allen has not been the reason why the Bills have lost in the playoffs.

Speaker 1 He's been an absolute alien. He's 24 touchdowns, four interceptions.
He had those games. The Chiefs game, he played perfect.
Their defense couldn't get a stop in 13 seconds.

Speaker 1 Lamar, Lamar's 2-4 in the playoffs, and he's had some really good teams, and he's had some years where, I mean,

Speaker 1 his passer rating is 75 in the playoffs. He's had interceptions.
He's had, I looked it up last night, four out of six of the games. He has not gone over 200 yards.

Speaker 1 Two of those games, like the other two were catch-up games. Remember the game when they were the one seed against the Titans and he was just throwing the entire second half?

Speaker 1 And then last year when they were down against the Chiefs, I think there's just a lot of pressure on Lamar just because this is, you got to, like, another insane season.

Speaker 1 If they get bounced by the Steelers, especially, it's like, what is going on here?

Speaker 7 Yeah, I actually agree with that. I disagreed with you, I think, on Sunday and thought that it was mostly on Josh.
But that's a good point.

Speaker 7 I think that Lamar, yeah, especially the season he has, especially if he wins MVP.

Speaker 7 If you lose in the playoffs, if you're Josh or Lamar and you lose early on in the playoffs, you probably don't want to win MVP, right? Yeah.

Speaker 1 You're like, yeah, maybe Josh. Maybe Josh hasn't got one.

Speaker 7 But if you're Lamar, you're like, oh, well, I got a third one. But again, it almost serves to like magnify your playoff losses.

Speaker 1 Right. And Josh definitely has pressure on it.
The Bills have pressure on it. Sean McDermott, like you said.

Speaker 1 It's just that if you look at both of those guys and what they've done in the playoffs, and obviously it's not all on the quarterback, but that is how it works is if the quarterback doesn't elevate their game.

Speaker 1 Josh has elevated his game in the playoffs. Lamar has not.
So Lamar has to do that that this year because this is like, if not now, when?

Speaker 1 The good news is, have you guys seen that I believe it is every 12 years the Ravens win the Super Bowl? Yeah. And it's always with a 28-year-old quarterback.
And Lamar is 28.

Speaker 1 So Trent Dilpher won it in 2002 as a 28-year-old quarterback.

Speaker 1 Joe Flacco won it as a

Speaker 1 28-year-old quarterback in whatever year that would be.

Speaker 1 Oh, no.

Speaker 7 Flacco won it in 2012.

Speaker 1 Trent Delpher won it in 2000. Yeah.
Flacco won it in 2012, and it's 2024. All 28-year-old quarterbacks.

Speaker 7 All right. So we've got right now a sample size of two for that.

Speaker 1 Correct.

Speaker 7 But this would fulfill the pattern.

Speaker 1 Significant sample size.

Speaker 7 It's like 17 years from now, there will be another Darts champion. Yeah.
Because that's how the prophecy has been foretold.

Speaker 1 How sick would that be if someone was just guaranteed, like, hey, every 12 years you can win a Super Bowl? I can wait that long.

Speaker 7 I would easily take it. Great.

Speaker 1 Easily take it. That's about when you would get restless for the next one.
You kidding me? Yeah.

Speaker 1 Second.

Speaker 7 I think Cam Dicker, the kicker for the Chargers, has a lot of pressure on it. Just because Harbaugh.
Yes. If you blow a kick, and you should, Justin Herbert would be my actual pick.

Speaker 1 Yeah, Justin Herbert, also the kicker for the Vikings, Will Riker.

Speaker 7 He's got a lot of pressure on it. Yeah, but Herbert.
Herbert definitely has pressure. He's got pressure.

Speaker 7 They were beating the Jaguars at one point, but the narrative will be out there that you can't win the playoffs.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 7 Even though he's a very good quarterback. Also, fun, I just found this out yesterday.
Game in Houston, the annual wildcard game there. You know who's leading the the Texans out onto the field? Who?

Speaker 7 Arian Foster. Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1 Hell yeah. Yeah.
So that's awesome.

Speaker 7 I don't know if that's good or bad for the Texans. I think it's good.
I think it's good. To wear the jacket.
I need to get in touch with him.

Speaker 1 They want.

Speaker 7 No, they lost that jacket. They lost.

Speaker 1 They got fucking killed.

Speaker 7 Yeah, they lost. That was J.J.
Watts' jacket. It was his idea.
But yeah, Arian Foster will be leading the Houston Texans onto the field for this playoff game. Tyrox.
I'm pumped for him. But yeah.

Speaker 7 In this game, I would say there is some pressure on C.J. Stroud, but not nearly to the extent as Herbert.

Speaker 1 And C.J. Stroud also has the,

Speaker 1 as weird as it is, and the Texans going into the season were Dark Horse Super Bowl, and it looks like that's not going to happen.

Speaker 1 With the amount of injuries they've had on offense and C.J. Stroud just having not a very good year overall, it can be like, hey, even you could tell yourself, even his floor is playoffs.
Yep.

Speaker 1 So we're going to be okay. And yeah, there's gravy teams.
There's teams. I mean, the Commanders, I actually think the Commanders are going to win on Sunday night.

Speaker 1 We'll do all of our picks and analysis on Friday.

Speaker 1 But the Commanders, you know, everything's gravy. The Broncos, everything's gravy.

Speaker 1 I even think the Chargers, Justin Herbert has pressure on him, but this was a lot quicker to get to the playoffs than they might have expected. So it's a little bit of a gravy.

Speaker 1 The Rams, like, you got to... Matthew Safford's getting old, but that was another one where they had a bad year last year and they were able to flip it pretty quickly.

Speaker 1 And then the other two pressure teams I had, one was the Packers. That was simply because, like, there's word out that maybe the Bears broke the Packers.
Blueprint. Copycat League.

Speaker 1 I hope that's not the case because I want to have, I don't want to just be one of those teams that just beats their rival all the time.

Speaker 1 And that's unfortunately so far this year, that's exactly what's happened.

Speaker 7 Sometimes you see that happen, but the opposite way.

Speaker 7 This might be a Michigan-Ohio State thing. Yeah.
Where you beat them.

Speaker 1 And then they get

Speaker 1 really, really good. Yeah.
But

Speaker 1 they literally can't beat us as of recently.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 the Packers have pressure because we might have just broken him. And then the Eagles.
Nick Siriani's got some pressure.

Speaker 1 I actually don't think he has as much pressure as he did in the beginning of the season. You think he has just as much? No, I agree.

Speaker 2 I'm just saying I'm nodding in agreement.

Speaker 1 So what's the pressure count on Nick Siriani? Like, if you guys flame out,

Speaker 1 what happens?

Speaker 2 I mean...

Speaker 1 Nothing. Nothing.
So he might not even be.

Speaker 1 He's not going to get fired. So he might not even be under pressure.

Speaker 2 I mean, it's still pressure from - there's always pressure from the city to win.

Speaker 11 And

Speaker 2 the team is so.

Speaker 2 This is the most talented Eagles team that I've ever seen, I think.

Speaker 1 Whoa.

Speaker 1 Shot at Jason Kelsey.

Speaker 2 No, I think most movies.

Speaker 1 Who, by the way, has another show. Shout out.

Speaker 2 I watched the whole thing. Good show.

Speaker 1 Of course you did. Yep.

Speaker 4 What was your favorite part?

Speaker 2 I liked one of the.

Speaker 1 You watched watched the whole thing.

Speaker 2 No, he had a nice panel. He had Lil Dickie, Charles Barkley, and Baldy on it, our guys.
I liked when they were just.

Speaker 2 There was a couple bits that they did in the beginning.

Speaker 4 My favorite part was the other piece.

Speaker 1 Yeah, that's what's happening.

Speaker 2 I liked when they were just talking ball.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 2 I wasn't a fan of. They did a lot of bits that I wasn't a fan of, but I did like when they sat down.

Speaker 7 Okay, so you liked Charles Barkley and then you didn't like the bits?

Speaker 7 I loved the whole show. I thought it was great.
Yeah, me too.

Speaker 2 You asked me my opinion.

Speaker 7 My favorite part was when it was just Jason. Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1 No, when it was Jason and his wife.

Speaker 11 Yeah, yeah,

Speaker 2 his wife was great.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Queen.

Speaker 7 She has a name.

Speaker 1 Kylie. Queen.

Speaker 2 Queen Kylie. What?

Speaker 1 What are you doing?

Speaker 1 All right, so not a lot of pressure under Nick Siriani.

Speaker 2 I mean, there's just pressure to win in Philadelphia, but

Speaker 2 there's no job pressure, if that's what you're asking.

Speaker 5 Right.

Speaker 1 Right. Okay.

Speaker 7 Do you think there's any job pressure for Kevin O'Connell?

Speaker 7 No, I so not in the sense of he'll be fired, but kind of in the sense of this is he's getting a new contract.

Speaker 1 He's getting a new contract. I don't think so.
I obviously saw the Kevin O'Connell could be traded report. That to me just, I assume, was his agent writing that, you know, telling someone,

Speaker 1 hey, can you report this? Because we want to put some pressure on the Vikings to actually sign this guy for what he deserves.

Speaker 7 It'd be insane if you're the Vikings and you traded Kevin O'Connell.

Speaker 1 Yeah, so

Speaker 1 i i don't think he has that type i think they're gonna give him a lot of money no matter what the i think that there might be some truth to what you just said because he was upset that he didn't get a contract extension earlier right and so he's like telling his agent yeah it's okay if you leak this yeah make some make some noise because there are probably some teams that would line up to trade for him yeah now i the the last one i had was the lions if ben johnson accepts a job i don't know if he'd accept a job while they're still in the playoffs but he might like,

Speaker 7 I don't know how that would work.

Speaker 7 So I do think that there is some pressure on

Speaker 7 the Lions. Yeah.
There is.

Speaker 1 Well, you might lose both your coordinators.

Speaker 1 So you never know how long that's going to, you know, it's not that the Lions will all of a sudden be bad, but any team that has success and loses talented people in the organization, it makes it a little bit more difficult to get back there the next year.

Speaker 7 And if Dan Campbell, if he makes one of his super aggressive decisions and it doesn't work out for him, then there's a lot of pressure on Dan campbell yeah then people start talking yeah uh but he is like he will make super aggressive decisions a hundred percent that's what's going and he's a winner he is a winner he's a winner did you see the post-game video it was awesome in the locker room awesome when i grew up i want to play football for dan campbell yeah this is like all the roads through detroit like all the the entire thing was you understand why those guys will just do anything for him

Speaker 1 and why Alex Anzalone will rush back with, you know, a broken arm and they'll die for him.

Speaker 7 That quote from, what was their cornerback's name? The guy that said, they tried to bury me, but you can't bury what came from dirt? Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's great. Great quote.
Yeah. Great quote.
I'm just excited for the playoffs. This is one of my favorite weekends of the year.
I'm excited to get into it.

Speaker 1 We're going to break down each game on Friday's show, but it was good to set the stage. I'm also just excited not to, I'm sure memes, you agree, just to not have our teams playing, to make

Speaker 1 football look worse. It's nice to watch some good teams play.

Speaker 1 Where's your confidence at right now, PFT?

Speaker 7 Midweek. It's actually pretty high.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 I agree.

Speaker 7 So sometimes memes gets pissed at me for not being as super confident about my team as I should be, but I feel like I'm also realistic.

Speaker 7 Also, this is the result of decades of scars of being disappointed by my team, where I think most normal people,

Speaker 7 they take that forward and they are less likely to get excited about things. Memes is not a normal person.
No. So he's just like, yeah, Jets will be great next week.

Speaker 7 I think that we have a very good chance against Todd Bowles and the Bucs defense.

Speaker 7 I'm now back big time thinking that Jaden Daniels is going to put on a crazy display where I'm talking, I think he's going to run all over the Bucs.

Speaker 7 And I know they have a good rush defense, but I think I know what Todd Bowles is going to do. I think I'm one step ahead of them.

Speaker 1 Hell yes.

Speaker 1 That's got to feel good.

Speaker 7 And I've got an answer for it.

Speaker 1 That's got to feel good to know it's Tuesday and you're already one step ahead.

Speaker 7 I've got the game game plan. And guess what? I've got an answer for it.

Speaker 1 When we do our picks, I like the commanders in this game.

Speaker 7 I like them too. But again, like you mentioned, it's

Speaker 7 really no risk. It's a free roll, where if we lose in the playoffs, still great 10 out of 10 seasons.

Speaker 1 You just don't want to look bad.

Speaker 7 Yeah, I don't want to look bad, and I would like to see... Jaden play well in the playoffs.
I would like to see Dan Quinn make good decisions during games. Yeah.
And I would like to see

Speaker 7 some spark out of a run game.

Speaker 1 It's also also a win no matter what just because there's always like so many bad stats about rookie quarterbacks making their first start or just guys making their first start in the playoffs and you get this one out of the way as early as possible.

Speaker 7 Yeah, I mean Jaden he luckily he played in big games in the SEC back when the SEC used to mean something back in the day.

Speaker 7 But I think yeah, I'm confident. We'll talk more on Friday, but I'm I'm going to bet on the Commanders for like the first time in a very, very long time.
I usually stay away from those games.

Speaker 7 And I've got I've got a little parlay cooking to I like it all right let's do a hot seat cool throne hey it's PFT here reminding you that Boarshead makes game day entertaining elevated and effortless whether you order catering platters ahead from your local Boarshead retailer or you create your own spread at home with Boarshead premium deli meats and cheeses you are sure to impress your guests My favorites like oven gold turkey or blazing buffalo style chicken paired with their classic Vermont cheddar or creamy monster cheese are sure to score big and help me elevate my entertainment every time, whether it's for a tailgate or a home gating celebration.

Speaker 7 Seriously, guys, it's a game-changing flavor for every gathering. Boarshead, committed to craft since 1905.

Speaker 12 The Pro Football Football Show is presented by the Chevy Silverado. Built for the hustle, ready for the game, Chevy Silverado is America's most dependable full-size truck.

Speaker 12 Whether you're grinding through the week or gearing up for kickoff, the Silverado is one ride that's always game-ready. Just like football, it's about grit, grind, and getting it done.

Speaker 12 Head to Chevy.com to learn more and build your own Chevy Silverado.

Speaker 1 Hank, Hot See Cool Trump.

Speaker 4 Hot C, yeah, I mean, you said we have the gym now. We also have an in-house golf instructor.
So I was thinking about it earlier and everything, everything's come together in this office.

Speaker 1 I fixed my golf shot. Yep.
People are not going to like the new one.

Speaker 7 I would like to hire a long drive coach. Ooh, I like it.
Kyle Berkshire. If you're out there.
Yeah. Kyle, let's do a video together.
He's out there. Yeah, well, if he's listening.

Speaker 7 Hank, not right now. Hank, trying to interfere with my training right now, Hank.

Speaker 1 How do you think people are going to respond to my new golf shot?

Speaker 1 If it is good, I literally walked up and tested it today, and I hit it four feet from the pin from 100 yards out.

Speaker 1 How do you think people are going to respond to it, though? Listen, people online hate it.

Speaker 1 There's no perfect golf swinging.

Speaker 4 Tiger Woods could post a swing, and the people online would be like, buh.

Speaker 4 But you just got to do what works for you, and that swing works for you.

Speaker 7 Even though it's a drill.

Speaker 4 I haven't seen it. He got told to do a drill.

Speaker 1 He just had a lot of money.

Speaker 1 Steve showed me a drill where you just put all your uh weight on the front foot and you put your back foot all the way back yeah and that's just my new swing i like that like a like a closed stance in baseball yeah

Speaker 4 uh my hot seat are north koreans oh oh you actually took mine hank yeah oh but good pick but yeah if you were thinking about you know maybe moving to north korea you heard some good things

Speaker 4 i don't think you might want to rethink it uh because north korea has banned eating hot dogs oh i'm out yeah yeah cooking and selling hot dogs as part of a crackdown on Western culture infiltrating the hermit kingdom.

Speaker 7 Yeah, they cracked down on some other stuff, too, besides just hot dogs.

Speaker 7 You can't wear jeans, no leather jackets. That's fine.

Speaker 4 That's fine.

Speaker 7 No microwaves. Okay.

Speaker 1 Microwave fryers. What about air fryers?

Speaker 7 I don't see air fryers on here. No weed, Hank.

Speaker 1 They probably aren't. That's fine, actually.

Speaker 4 That's fine. That's fine.
Yeah, you quit. Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's a panic attack.

Speaker 7 No slang.

Speaker 1 No slang? No slang. That's actually good for us.

Speaker 7 Yeah, that is. No new slang.

Speaker 1 Porn.

Speaker 7 No porn. But I think that was already a rule.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 7 That's why the North Korean soldiers that went to Russia and fought against the Ukraine, they all kind of just kind of went away because they got addicted to porn. Yeah.
Which is pretty cool.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 That was your.

Speaker 1 No hot dogs. No hot dogs is a deal breaker for me.
Yeah.

Speaker 4 Yeah. No, it's my hot seat.
My cool throne is WWE.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 4 They are on Netflix now. I'm not a WWE guy.
I think you guys are more wrestling people when you were younger. I was not, but

Speaker 4 I mean, Netflix is the answer getting anything on Netflix. Like, I went on Netflix last night to watch something else and I saw WWE.
I was like, oh, I'll watch this for a little bit.

Speaker 4 That's never happened. I've been on TV a million times.
I've scrolled past it, never watched it, but it was like open Netflix, WWE. I was like, oh, what's this about? And I realized.

Speaker 1 They just own everything. Yeah.
They own our eyeballs.

Speaker 4 But that's got to be great. It's got to be great for WWE.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yes. And I heard it was awesome.

Speaker 1 Did you enjoy it? Yeah.

Speaker 4 I mean, it was, I watched it for like 20 minutes and then turned on Dune. Okay.
What was your favorite part?

Speaker 4 The promo, yeah. A couple great promos.
Cody Rhodes, I think. The Rock.

Speaker 1 That was our wrestling talk. Yeah.

Speaker 1 I've never, I've never wrestled.

Speaker 7 My hot seat is MethStreams.

Speaker 7 The site we all love and have agreed silently to not discuss on the show because you don't want to talk about Meth Streams because it'll get taken down.

Speaker 7 It was a big part of, I'd say, my entire 20s. First, crack screams, then it was meth streams, and the sites have been taken down.

Speaker 7 And there's a note on there that says, I believe it's from the owner of the site. I'll be taking a break from live streaming.

Speaker 7 Reminder that the only domains in which I operate are meth streams and crack streams. So no more meth, no more crack.
Is there, why did this happen?

Speaker 7 This guy made so many people happy by having this website. Did he just get bought out?

Speaker 1 FCC, yeah. By the FBI.

Speaker 4 Dana White showed up to his house and fucking beat beat him up.

Speaker 1 Yeah, this sucks.

Speaker 7 It's a very, very sad day.

Speaker 7 Very sad day.

Speaker 7 I always love the chat on the side of these streams.

Speaker 7 Trying to trick you? That's where you got to really. Oh, yeah.
I was actually,

Speaker 7 I was watching the Caps game yesterday, and for a second, I had to pull up the score app. And I just went over to the chat, and every single comment in the chat on the score app was.
Tie game. Yeah.

Speaker 7 Like people that were like, I'm at the game. They just scored.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's Elio. Elio's in there.
It's all. He does that.
He's a troll in the score app.

Speaker 7 It was very, very funny.

Speaker 7 Then my cool throne is Mayor's Bets.

Speaker 7 They're back on.

Speaker 7 This is the time of year in playoff season where the Mayors come out of the closet and they just make a bunch of bets with each other. It's always for the dorkiest shit that they send back and forth.

Speaker 7 But this time, the Mayor's Bet is actually between J.D. Vance and Ted Cruz

Speaker 7 for the UT Ohio State game.

Speaker 7 So Ted Cruz says, hey, J.D. Vance, care for a wager? Loser brings beer and food from his home state and delivers it wearing the winning jersey.
And then J.D.

Speaker 7 Vance says, all right, which Texas ice cream should I have Ted bring when the Buckeyes win? It's just mirabette season. Wow.
And they're always quirky. The stakes couldn't be higher.

Speaker 1 Can't wait for this. Yeah.

Speaker 7 Also, shout out, fuck you, to Aftab Piraval, the mayor of Cincinnati. He still owes me a case of Skyline Chili.
He also. They don't pay up on that shit.
I'm waiting for my case of Skyline, Aftab.

Speaker 1 Haven't the Bengals not been in the playoffs since he got all cocky?

Speaker 7 Since Travis Kelsey called him a Jabroni? Yeah.

Speaker 1 I think it's been a while.

Speaker 7 Well, they were. Yeah, they weren't.

Speaker 1 No, their last playoff game was a loss to the Chiefs. Yeah.
The AFC Championship game.

Speaker 7 I think there's an AF-TAB curse. Yeah.

Speaker 7 Until you send me my skyline, you're never going to make the playoffs, buddy.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 Okay, my hot seat is Concussion Protocol.

Speaker 1 Oh, why? Jalen Hurts is still in it.

Speaker 7 But isn't that cool throwing Concussion Protocol because they're taking good care of him? That's true.

Speaker 1 Good point.

Speaker 1 I'm nervous.

Speaker 1 It's crazy, Chefty tweeted that when he didn't even have the concussion test that day. Correct.

Speaker 8 Yeah, he's crazy.

Speaker 2 He literally could not have been out of concussion protocol yesterday.

Speaker 1 It's crazy because I needed that tweet to have this.

Speaker 1 It's crazy.

Speaker 2 I told PFT my panic level was at a 4 out of 10 yesterday.

Speaker 8 It's down to a 2 out of 10.

Speaker 1 Oh, the tweet made it go, okay.

Speaker 2 Well, then a lot of people, because I got worried, and then a lot of people were like, he literally cannot be out of concussion protocol until Wednesday. So, yes, that is technically correct, but

Speaker 1 you won't,

Speaker 2 we won't know anything until Thursday

Speaker 8 because he has to practice a full day

Speaker 2 and then the next day wake up with no symptoms, and then you're out of it.

Speaker 1 Sounds like we're running out of time.

Speaker 7 So, if you practice this Wednesday, you want him to play.

Speaker 1 I know I do.

Speaker 2 Like, this is what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 I want you to respect concussion protocol. It just doesn't work.
Yes, it does. It just doesn't work.
I want him to play. Let me play with the Packers.
No, I want him to play. Big cat.
But

Speaker 1 I want you to acknowledge that it's a concern.

Speaker 2 It's not until Thursday. Okay.

Speaker 7 Wait, that's not. You told me yesterday it was a concern.

Speaker 2 But that's because I didn't know the rules.

Speaker 1 But no.

Speaker 2 Sorry, I was concerned of my stupidness.

Speaker 4 You should be more concerned. Max kind of has a point.

Speaker 13 I've been concerned. No, but he's.

Speaker 1 What are you talking about? I'm the one who's concerned. I'm saying get him out of concussion protocol.
This is crazy. I know how the concussion protocol, you don't respect it.
I do.

Speaker 11 Part of you wants him to not play.

Speaker 1 No, no, absolutely not. Because if the Packers win that game, then I got PFT.

Speaker 8 Look at PFD's face.

Speaker 1 I don't.

Speaker 7 I mean, there is a part. No.

Speaker 1 No, there's zero party.

Speaker 2 There's zero part.

Speaker 1 You got some joy out of the concussion protocol. Yes, I told you on Sunday I wanted

Speaker 1 one more day, and then I need him out.

Speaker 2 So what happens on, like,

Speaker 2 what would happen on Thursday?

Speaker 11 We're getting an update today.

Speaker 1 A problem. No, that's true.

Speaker 2 There's no update until.

Speaker 1 We're still not in problem territory.

Speaker 2 You can't get out of Concussion Protocol until you practice a full day and then wake up the next day.

Speaker 1 If he's in Concussion Protocol on Thursday, Max, I will be more concerned than you.

Speaker 2 They're not practicing today or tomorrow. Wednesday is their first practice.

Speaker 1 I will be very upset if he's not in tomorrow. Oh, correct.
Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 7 And today when the show comes out.

Speaker 1 I told you my timeline. I have a timeline for the Concussion Protocol.

Speaker 2 I mean, no, you're Packer Dan.

Speaker 1 No, I'm not. I have a timeline.
My timeline has expired after today.

Speaker 1 I I said this to you on Sunday. I wanted one more day.
And Chefty doing that tweet was awesome and crazy.

Speaker 8 I mean, it was just absolute rage, babe.

Speaker 1 That's all it was.

Speaker 1 How long has it been?

Speaker 2 I think he did that tweet just for you.

Speaker 1 Maybe.

Speaker 7 Has it been, what,

Speaker 7 12 days?

Speaker 1 I don't know.

Speaker 7 It's been a long time.

Speaker 7 Gosh, the protocol's bad. Like, I care about him as a person first and foremost.
Me too.

Speaker 1 Is Jordan Love okay?

Speaker 2 You say he's like the 10th best quarterback in the playoffs.

Speaker 7 Oh, that was trust. It was trust rankings.

Speaker 2 Yeah, because

Speaker 2 all of the quarterbacks ahead of him have played good Super Bowl games, right?

Speaker 1 What?

Speaker 1 Jalen Hurts? Nine. I had him nine.
Yeah. Ahead of Jordan Love.

Speaker 1 Let's call me Patrick Bann again. Jordan Love stinks.

Speaker 7 Also, me, Big Cat, and Hank each took four guys. So the least we could have him is number four.
True. On our personal rosters.
No, I was speaking.

Speaker 1 My cat

Speaker 1 signed.

Speaker 2 He had him at nine.

Speaker 1 Well, that's because he's in the the concussion protocol, you fucking idiot.

Speaker 1 My cool tone is Fartcoin.

Speaker 1 Fartcoin, if you bought Fartcoin a month ago, you outperformed the entire stock market since 1869.

Speaker 7 So is it at the moon?

Speaker 1 It must be at the moon. I don't know.
I'm just pissed that I missed the Fartcoin.

Speaker 7 Are we in a Fart bubble right now?

Speaker 1 Fartcoin.

Speaker 1 I'm an idiot.

Speaker 7 How long has Fartcoin been around?

Speaker 1 1869. Okay.

Speaker 7 Wait, the market cap on Fartcoin is $1.2 billion.

Speaker 1 Love it. Fartcoin's going crazy.

Speaker 7 I might get in on Hoctua Coin.

Speaker 7 Oh. I feel like that's going to pop.
By the dip. That's going to pop.
By the dip.

Speaker 1 Is she just gone?

Speaker 7 No, she was back. She was asleep.

Speaker 1 She's asleep.

Speaker 7 A picture of her came out. She was just chilling on the beach.
Oh. Rocking a $2,000 swimsuit.
Oh. Yeah.
Nice. Respect.
Good for her.

Speaker 1 Okay, let's get to our interviews. We've got Diana Rossini.
We're going to talk some black Monday coach firings, hirings coming up.

Speaker 1 And then we have Brandon Walker, our college football expert, talking about the college football playoffs.

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Speaker 1 Give it up for Chicago.

Speaker 14 Sebastian Meniscalco's new stand-up special, It Ain't Right, is coming to Hulu on November 21st.

Speaker 1 30 years ago, Jeff Bezos, complete nerd. Bezos now ripped to shreds on his super yacht and the boxes keep coming.

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Speaker 1 Okay, we now welcome on our very good friend. It is Diana Rossini, senior NFL reporter.
for the athletic. You can find her on the athletic, also Scoop City podcast she does.
Very good.

Speaker 1 She has her ear to the streets of all the NFL coaching and GM hirings and firings. So Black Monday's done.

Speaker 1 I'll start with this, Diana. What was the most shocking thing that happened on Black Monday that you league-wide, you were just like, everyone's confused as to why this occurred?

Speaker 15 Yeah, it was less about the firings and more about who was being retained.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 15 I would say from the, like, let's just start with the firing category. I'm shocked the Patriots really did it.
There was a lot of chatter about it, but I can't believe they really pulled the trigger.

Speaker 15 But in terms of those that were retaining, like, I can't believe the Giants kept Joe Shane and Brian Dable. I cannot believe it.

Speaker 15 From everything we saw in Hard Knocks to obviously Saquon Barkley having the most ridiculous season to the mess with Daniel Jones to winning just three games.

Speaker 15 All of the drama in New York, it just seemed like this was the time. This isn't working.
And just even from things I know, this isn't working.

Speaker 15 But John Mara sticking with his words that he said in October, which was that he didn't want any change. Yet, did you hear him talking about retaining them?

Speaker 1 Like, it's like painful for him.

Speaker 15 Yeah. It's saying that he, like, these guys are going to have to win every game.
Otherwise, they're going to be walking up the field going, am I getting fired today? And I just think it's a really,

Speaker 15 they're being put on a really, really hard spot. And in Jacksonville, too, with GM Brent, Trent Balkheith.
I think that one was pretty surprising. A lot of people thought he'd be out.

Speaker 15 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 7 And with Doug Peterson being gone, and it shocked me to find this out yesterday.

Speaker 7 Our good friend Uncle Chap sent me a very sad Jaguars stat that Doug Peterson actually has the third best winning percentage of all time for the Jaguars in the history of their franchise.

Speaker 7 And so Balky sticks around. He's a survivor.
You can't get rid of that guy. What does that mean for the Jags coaching search?

Speaker 7 Does that make it like which coaches do you think would be less likely to work with a guy like Trent?

Speaker 15 Bill Belichick.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 7 Jim Harbaugh.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 15 Yeah. That's a good one.

Speaker 15 Look, I think that job is actually more coveted than you'd realize.

Speaker 15 You know, when you take a look at big picture, I would say, let's just put it in order. I'd go Patriots,

Speaker 15 Bears, Jags, in terms of openings of what coaches I know that I've been talking to want.

Speaker 15 And the Jags roster with Trevor Lawrence, there's not this belief around the league that Trevor Lawrence is not the guy. Right.
Even though he hasn't been great.

Speaker 15 Every coach wants a quarterback. You have to go to a place to have success that has a quarterback in place that's decent and that can win you games.

Speaker 15 And those are those three teams, which is why everyone is trying to get those interviews. And you see everyone is off and running.

Speaker 15 But the Trent Balky situation is, to me, that just, I read it as the owner doesn't want to go through the process of searching for a head coach without some guidance. These guys are not football guys.

Speaker 15 They don't know. Look at the Jets.
They hired a search firm of people they fired just to do it so they didn't have to. Right, right.

Speaker 7 That sounded mean. That sounded like that was targeted at memes.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 7 Did you mean to target that at memes? Be honest.

Speaker 1 No.

Speaker 15 Look, I don't like memes, but I don't not like, like, I like the Jets.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 It would be, that's, I don't know about that.

Speaker 7 No, it'd be good for you, I think, if the Jets were good, right?

Speaker 15 People don't know this. I grew up a Jets fan.

Speaker 1 I live. It'd be your own people.
It be your own people like that.

Speaker 15 I want to

Speaker 15 be successful. But it's the same story over in memes.
You feel this. And you're a lot younger than me.
So your pain is different than mine. And mine is much worse.

Speaker 15 They've been making these mistakes that are so ridiculous

Speaker 15 every single year. And it just seems like they can't get out of their own way, as you guys know, and have been following all the reporting.
Yeah.

Speaker 7 So let's talk about the Jets. So Mike Greenberg got an interview to be the GM for the Jets.
That sounds like a dream job for him. But who are you hearing in terms of their coaching options right now?

Speaker 15 Well, last week they had Ron Rivera in the building and Mike Vrabel in the building at Florim Park with the team out practicing at the same time. Just wild, but that's what they chose to do.

Speaker 15 They are casting a very, very wide net, as you're seeing,

Speaker 15 almost to a point where I wonder if Mike Tanabaum's getting paid per interview.

Speaker 15 It's just like every, I'm sure you guys were following along yesterday. How many slips went? I must have typed the word Jets 50 times yesterday in terms of

Speaker 15 coaches that are going to be taking and general managers interviews with them.

Speaker 15 Look, I think Aaron Glenn, Brian Flores, Brian Greasy, Arthur Smith, Joe Brady. I mean, Matt Nagy.

Speaker 15 Matt Nagy. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 15 Matt Nagy's going to get a job,

Speaker 15 I think, in this cycle. He's getting a lot of love behind the scenes from teams.
And

Speaker 15 I think Nagy was, I think the best move he made was to go back to Kansas City, sort of reset, figure out where he messed up, what mistakes he made, get that confidence back up by being around the greatest to do it.

Speaker 15 And he's ready to go. So I'm interested to see what his staff is going to look like because that's obviously going to be an important element in all this.

Speaker 7 Yeah, is that an unusual thing to do to have two coaches that are interviewing for your job go out and watch practice at the same time?

Speaker 1 Yes, that is weird. It's very weird.

Speaker 15 it's also like like look at the bears right they technically could have had ron rivera mike rabel come in last week you know they had that ability to do it right they chose not to do it because well first of all the chicago bears their first round of interviews are all virtual okay so you're not like mike rabel and ron rivera are not flying in there um not ron's not going there by the way but yeah um everything is virtual first and then through those virtual interviews then they're gonna pick the guys

Speaker 15 for the next round to come in to meet in person.

Speaker 15 And obviously, the Bears don't think Mike Rabel is too big to interview.

Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 He should like.

Speaker 15 Nice.

Speaker 15 No, no. What?

Speaker 11 No. You reported that.

Speaker 1 I was amplifying your reporting. We've done this.

Speaker 15 We've done this so many times, and it's so

Speaker 1 big.

Speaker 1 If he lost 20 pounds, would he get a job?

Speaker 15 Okay.

Speaker 15 I was thinking about, I was like, I'm not telling them this, but I'm going to tell you. Yes, somebody from the Jets said, Damn, he's really big.
Yeah,

Speaker 1 why not? I've been saying this.

Speaker 1 That sounds like Brick. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Brick was like, damn,

Speaker 1 yeah, Brave standing next to Brick for short.

Speaker 15 And no, Brick and Jack were not in the interviews from what I heard, and they're not participating in the ones that are going down with Rex Ryan, you know, in Palm Beach. But

Speaker 15 the awesome listeners of the show will come up to me and ask me if I've destroyed Mike Rabel's career because I said that teams don't like that he's fat, which is so not what I reported.

Speaker 1 No, we never said he was fat. We never said he's fat.
He's a big man. He's power football.
He's powerful.

Speaker 15 General manager said to me that Mike Rabel is very intimidating to a lot of people, that he, his personality, his size. That's all I said.
And it wasn't just one general manager. It was multiple.

Speaker 1 It's also like, oh, this is my triple. It's true.
It's also, that's on the general managers because Rabel is not that intimidating once you get to know him. He's just a big guy.
He's a strong guy.

Speaker 1 He's a strong, masculine man. He's a leader of men.
I want him as the Bears head coach. So, all right, let me ask you about the Bears.
This is my thought process. You can grade my thought process.

Speaker 1 Tell me I'm crazy,

Speaker 1 whatever you want to go with this. So

Speaker 1 I want Rabel or Ben Johnson. The Patriots are probably going to have Rabel, right? I would assume.
Ben Johnson has not done an he not accepted an interview with the Jets or the Saints.

Speaker 1 They never reached out because he basically was like, I'm not doing it.

Speaker 15 Yeah, people are back channeling.

Speaker 1 Like, hey. Yeah, and so he's not doing that.
So it's down to

Speaker 1 there's two seats, there's two guys, Vrabel and Ben Johnson for three seats, the Jaguars, the Patriots, and the Bears.

Speaker 1 Balkie coming back.

Speaker 1 Does this mean that once Vrabel takes a job with the Patriots, then Ben Johnson might be the target for the Bears or vice versa?

Speaker 15 Look, as someone has had to report a lot of crappy news to you over the last few weeks,

Speaker 15 I think this will be, I think it's good for you. Okay.
I think when the print bulky news broke, you that for you're back. You're back.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 15 I think Ben Johnson still has a lot of questions about management in both of those organizations, which I think is pretty well known at this point. There are questions.

Speaker 15 Ryan Poles is leading the search. Ryan Poles is not going anywhere.
I think there's some Chicago people who believe he's going to get fired at some point here when the search ends.

Speaker 15 Kevin Warren and Ryan Poles are in lockstep in this search, and they 100% have their eye on Ben Johnson and Mike Vrabel for sure as their top candidates.

Speaker 15 So, you know, let's say in this world, and it would be, I guess, Hank's best world,

Speaker 15 Graves goes to New England.

Speaker 15 Yeah, I think Ben Johnson probably, they, the chances of him landing in Chicago are much better now that Trembucky is in Jacksonville, which if you're a Jags fan, it's like, oh my goodness, are you kidding?

Speaker 1 What are we doing? Yeah. What are we doing?

Speaker 15 You know, but I'm interested to hear what happens after these interviews because you find out a lot about these organizations and what their plans are and how they envision themselves and what the philosophies are.

Speaker 15 And when you find out what kind of questions they've been asking, yeah.

Speaker 15 So we'll see what they're after.

Speaker 1 Do you think, what would the percentage chance be? Because I've played this whole thing out, and obviously I want Ben Johnson, but I do think that him staying at the Lions is still a possibility.

Speaker 15 So, what I'm so glad you said that.

Speaker 15 I'm so glad you said it because I had somebody yesterday text me, was like, hey, don't forget there's a world where Ben Johnson stays and looks at this coaching cycle and goes,

Speaker 15 this is not for me.

Speaker 15 This is not what I'm signing up for.

Speaker 1 Damn.

Speaker 7 And weirdly, like, that drives the price up every year that he says no.

Speaker 1 But it's like, oh, I got to get this guy.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 15 Look, he's great. He's an awesome play caller.

Speaker 15 I love his self-awareness, his understanding of, look, I've only been to the playoffs twice in my life.

Speaker 15 I wanted to come back to Detroit to just watch not only this team get back, but watch how they handle success because that's another part of growth as a coach of not just dealing with the problems, dealing with when things are good

Speaker 15 and how to manage your team and how to make good coaching decisions.

Speaker 15 So I appreciate that emotional maturity, but at some point here, you got to jump in the pool. Yeah.

Speaker 15 You got to do this thing.

Speaker 1 Well,

Speaker 1 a good cautionary tale is Lou.

Speaker 1 Anarumo. Annarumo.
Lou Anarumo from the Bengals, who was

Speaker 1 a hot name in the NFL coaching circles three years ago, and he just got fired by the Bengals. So

Speaker 1 it might not last forever. You might not be the guy that everyone's lusting for forever.
So I'm hoping that that will push Ben Johnson to the Bears.

Speaker 15 You look at it this way. The second the Detroit Lions stake, his chances are going to go away.

Speaker 15 That's just the reality, right? How many times have we seen this where the, like you just mentioned, Lou's defense was tremendous in the Super Bowl? He's considered the Patrick Mahogan's killer.

Speaker 15 Right. And you fired him, you know? Right.

Speaker 7 Is he going to get a job somewhere?

Speaker 15 Yeah, yeah. I think Lou's one of those coordinators.

Speaker 15 I don't mean to be insensitive to the process because I'm sure he was hurt and upset about it, but he's one of those, they get fired and you go, all right.

Speaker 15 Which head coaching candidate is going to bring Lou Atarumo on as their DC? Yeah.

Speaker 15 And I can tell you there are several right now who are talking to him to try to see what he wants to do next.

Speaker 1 Ben Johnson to the Bears with Lou.

Speaker 1 They coached together in Miami. I've already done this all in my head.
I've gone way too deep with all the connections.

Speaker 7 I do like that format, though, when you get a younger head coach and then he brings in a guy that's just been around for forever to kind of like show him like what Wade Phillips did in L.A.

Speaker 7 when McVay was.

Speaker 15 He's like the guy for a while there where like you bring that veteran presence of like, nah, look at Brian Callahan in Tennessee, right? He brought his dad.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 15 To help out. You know, Tennessee Titans fired their general manager, Rand Carthon.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 7 So the statement that they put out today was really, really strange.

Speaker 7 They said that Rand was hired to be, like the description of the job was different when they brought him in, which was to be in lockstep with the head coach.

Speaker 7 Now the description of that job has changed, which also implies that now Rand's job is to be like Brian Callahan's daddy and tell him what to do all the time. And he didn't fit that job description.

Speaker 7 What happened in Tennessee?

Speaker 15 Well, he's got a daddy. His daddy's on.

Speaker 1 His daddy's a daddy. He's two daddies.

Speaker 15 Look,

Speaker 15 I'm going more big picture, right? So you just go back one year ago, just one year ago, when they were making a decision of what to do with the general manager position.

Speaker 15 After John Robinson, obviously, was let go, and we know what came with that, with the A.J. Brown trade and all the things with communication issues that he had with the owner.
They move on. All right.

Speaker 15 So they collaborate with Mike Vrabel at the time and say, okay, what do we want to do next?

Speaker 15 Vrabel goes, I want to go with my

Speaker 15 player personnel guy, Ryan Cowden, who's now currently with the New York Giants. Guy kind of understands how I work.

Speaker 15 We view things the same way.

Speaker 15 And he's like a real football guy. He's a true scout.
And the Titans said, no, we want Ren Carthon. He's the guy.

Speaker 15 And from what I understand, Vrabel just made the suggestion of, hey, like, I like Rand too. He's a great dude.
Let's just make him an assistant GM

Speaker 15 and let him grow on the job with Ryan.

Speaker 15 And then when the time is right, you know, he can get a GM job. And they didn't want to do it.

Speaker 15 And then in the end, they obviously fired Mike Rabel, gave the power to Rand Carthon here.

Speaker 15 And now a year later, Rand Carthon is out. Yeah.
So to me, this says they don't know what they want.

Speaker 15 This also says to me that they make emotional decisions, which are the worst kinds, which is, you know, I think there's a difference too in making emotional decisions.

Speaker 15 Robert Kraft was emotional talking about the Gerard Mayo, but I don't think that's emotional. I don't think that's just a reaction to a bad year.

Speaker 15 That's, this is not up to the standard I need this team to be.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 15 This in Tennessee is,

Speaker 15 I have to blame someone. I'm sick of it.
Go, someone needs to fix this. Ran, it's not you.
Goodbye.

Speaker 7 That's got to be such a shitty feeling as a GM. You have the number one pick.
Like, you're excited for a couple of weeks. Like, after week 18, you're like, fuck yeah, okay, now it's Rand season, baby.

Speaker 7 And then it's like, no, you don't even get to make that choice. You don't get to open this present.
Yeah, that sucks. Yeah.

Speaker 7 But yeah, no, I can see that that's there is a difference between being emotional about a decision that you made and then making this the decision because your emotions took over. Correct.

Speaker 15 And look, it's human nature to be emotional about it and be frustrated and angry. But I think they were emotional when they fired their head coach last year, and it sounds like they're emotional here.

Speaker 15 I don't know if that's a great quality to have when you're running a business.

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Speaker 1 What's going to happen with Mike McCarthy? Because his presence, and it's a large presence.

Speaker 7 Is he too large to get ahead coaching?

Speaker 1 It might be. It's messing me up mentally because what the Bears are really good at is

Speaker 1 they're interviewing every single person that's ever coached football. And there's some names on that list that scare the fuck out of me.

Speaker 1 So then I find myself being like, well, Mike McCarthy would be better than this guy. And then I have to take a step back and be like, wait a second, am I talking myself into Mike McCarthy?

Speaker 1 So can he just stay in Dallas so I don't have to talk myself into Mike McCarthy?

Speaker 15 No, I think the chances of him staying in Dallas are fair. Like, I think that could happen.

Speaker 15 Look, I know that they did a little bit of work on some head coaches behind the scenes over the last few weeks. So it wouldn't shock me if they also move on.

Speaker 15 I just don't like how they're going about their business, how they're just kind of hanging them out to dry right now, trying to figure out what he's going to do next.

Speaker 15 This entire year is really hard if you're him of, you know, not knowing what's going to be next.

Speaker 15 Look, I think if Mike McCarthy does wind up moving on or the Dallas Jerry says, yeah, we're going to go in a different direction, I 100% think he has a good shot at getting that Chicago Bears shot.

Speaker 7 That would be the funniest possible action. Yeah, funniest possible outcome.
I think what's the worst.

Speaker 15 I've thought about this about, Dan, I've like David Shaw. Why I'm imagining your pain, but I have.
I'm like, what would make Dan so angry that I don't even want to be around him?

Speaker 1 David Shaw,

Speaker 1 I've like, I don't want Brian Flores, but I've somehow talked myself into maybe the second time around, he'll be better. But

Speaker 1 I just don't want a defensive guy,

Speaker 1 except for Mike Drabel, who

Speaker 1 he's a different cat because he's

Speaker 15 looking at who he's hired in the past at OC. They go on to be head coaches, right? Arthur Smith, Matt LaFleur.
He obviously knows how to pick a good OC.

Speaker 15 So that's a good point.

Speaker 15 Anthony Weaver is a name

Speaker 15 that I'm hearing a lot of teams are putting in for. He spent three years with the Baltimore Ravens.
Right now, he's the DC for the Miami Dolphins coach. He was with the Texans.

Speaker 15 Another large man.

Speaker 15 But he,

Speaker 15 I don't want to say he's like very belight because that's taking away from Anthony's abilities individually, but he has a great way of connecting with players, holding them accountable, but he's just a little bit more lead back.

Speaker 15 Like

Speaker 15 he's cool,

Speaker 15 but he's smart. So, you know, I can tell you people in Baltimore were.

Speaker 15 They think that this is going to be the run he gets. This is the cycle.
He'll be a head coach.

Speaker 15 It's time. So you shouldn't be disappointed if that becomes a real.

Speaker 1 I just don't want a defensive coordinator.

Speaker 1 I want an offensive guy I want someone who's who's gonna come in here and be like Caleb Williams.

Speaker 1 We have to do everything this organization has to do everything in its power to make Caleb Williams great. And so that's all I'm scared about.

Speaker 7 One other name in Chicago is Cliff Kingsbury that people have thrown out. I don't want it.

Speaker 1 I don't want to get myself into that.

Speaker 7 I don't want it because I selfishly want to keep him around in Washington. And I think he's a very good OC.
Didn't work out for him at all as a head coach.

Speaker 7 And he's one of these guys where when they get fired from being a head coach, they immediately say, like, in that moment of truth, after you realize what you just got freed from, like, yeah, being a head coach kind of sucks.

Speaker 1 Like, that might not be for me, but then

Speaker 7 a year later, though, these guys are like, yeah, I want to coach football again. Like, they forget so fast.

Speaker 15 Well, going, it goes back to what we were talking about, how everyone knows there's such a small chance of getting those jobs.

Speaker 15 So you do it, you take it, even if you're not ready, you just, you just do it.

Speaker 15 But I think Cliff has had some time here,

Speaker 15 time off away, as we know. He traveled the the world

Speaker 15 to sort of recenter himself. And now that he's having so much success as a coordinator, and he's told me in the past too,

Speaker 15 I like play calling.

Speaker 15 Like all the other crap that comes with being a head coach and all the headaches that you have to deal with and the things that you have to think about and manage is, you know, it's exhausting.

Speaker 15 So I do think he will take an interview, but I think when it comes down to it, it may be one of those situations where he decides to just stay in Washington.

Speaker 1 Yeah, for a lot of people. All right.
So memes, I think, has some questions for you.

Speaker 1 Before we do that, though, uh, a question on Max's behalf: Is Jalen Hurts going to ever clear the concussion protocol?

Speaker 15 I am not happy about this. This is concerning to me.
Yeah. Um, this has been over two weeks.

Speaker 16 Um, look,

Speaker 15 Wednesday's practice day is going to be the most important part of this process, obviously, because we'll know if he's cleared.

Speaker 15 Uh, but we're obviously starting here, the playoffs, and the starting quarterback is still in concussion protocol. Yeah.
So, yeah, Max, you should be freaking out, my friend.

Speaker 1 You should be freaking out.

Speaker 7 The word I heard was concerned. How are things in your what, Max?

Speaker 1 What?

Speaker 2 This is obviously PFT just texting her ahead of time to say this.

Speaker 1 No, 100%.

Speaker 1 Are you sorry for Max?

Speaker 7 Are you saying that her integrity as a reporter is so low that I could text her and make her put out a false report? You don't respect women.

Speaker 2 That's not what I said. You sound like memes.
What I am saying is that, actually, I don't know. Don't you need to, can't you not clear concussion protocol until a practice day?

Speaker 1 Correct.

Speaker 2 So that there was no way of clearing concussion protocol yesterday.

Speaker 1 But it Schefter did tweet it.

Speaker 15 On Wednesday. But remember, Max,

Speaker 15 this is the news that you have to watch.

Speaker 15 He will get tested again. If he gets tested and fails, he's got to go through the whole thing again.
Oh, no.

Speaker 1 He's got to do the colors. Yeah, that will be better.
Everything.

Speaker 7 Count backwards by seven.

Speaker 7 How are things inside your own house? Is your husband as deeply into the Tanner McKee lore as Max is?

Speaker 15 Oh, yeah.

Speaker 15 Look, I'm at a point now where I manage Kevin the way you guys manage Max. Like, it's the same, they're the same person.

Speaker 15 So, I understand what he's doing, I know what he's dealing with, just all the obnoxiousness and the concerns. And

Speaker 15 my favorite thing to do, because we're always, we have a big calendar in our kitchen because we're busy and the big calendar, you need the big calendar, yeah.

Speaker 15 We're like a 1983 home, like it's just gigantic instead of using phones. Yeah,

Speaker 15 and I will just do this. I'm like, well, if the eagles get bounced out of the first round,

Speaker 15 and I mean, just you want to cause havoc.

Speaker 15 I've been planning things on

Speaker 15 the games. I've been planning things on Sundays and I put them in there.
He's like, I don't know why I'm putting things in there.

Speaker 1 You don't want to know that.

Speaker 1 That's great.

Speaker 1 All right, memes, you got questions?

Speaker 13 I have two questions. Okay.

Speaker 5 The first one's from me, and the other's from Tom Lay.

Speaker 1 He's a co-worker, also a Jets fan.

Speaker 5 Mine is, who's your source inside the Jets building and and why do they keep showing up for a job they hate?

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 5 And then the follow-up for Tom Lay.

Speaker 7 What's your fucking problem?

Speaker 1 Good questions. Good question.
Would you like to address either of those?

Speaker 15 Yeah, it's the janitor. Everyone always says it's the custodian.
It's the security guard. It's the cheerleader.
It's actually Salah. He's still at the building.
Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 15 It's Joe Benito. It's any New York Jet fan.
If you come up to me and just tell me a story about the Jets, I'll report it.

Speaker 1 Why not? Memes gonna know

Speaker 1 New York Times. They don't care.
Memes doesn't know sarcasm. He's gonna be like, she said it.
Yeah. She said it.
I knew how. She finally admits it.

Speaker 15 I know. Memes, you do hate my reporting.
I have noticed it.

Speaker 15 And I realize that you,

Speaker 15 I think, I don't think you hate me. I just think you hate the information that I'm putting out there.

Speaker 6 Is that true?

Speaker 7 Yeah, he can't separate it.

Speaker 1 Yeah, no, the whole don't shoot the messenger, shoot the messenger.

Speaker 1 He shoots the messenger.

Speaker 7 To him, you are the news.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 7 Like, it's easier to get mad at you than it would be to like I'm the mad rating.

Speaker 15 I'm the one who did that. Yes.

Speaker 7 So speaking of the Jets, with the Rex Ryan thing, do you think it's a good strategy for Rex Ryan to say, like, I'm going to go in there and tell Aaron Rodgers that the country club days are over?

Speaker 15 It's brilliant. It's brilliant.
I love what Rex is doing right now. I am all behind this campaign.
It's ridiculous, but it's smart because

Speaker 15 he's telling the Jets, I want this job. I'm going to do this job.
You know, when you're so overwhelmed by someone's confidence that you're like, wait, maybe they are good.

Speaker 15 He's telling them what he wants them to believe. Whereas you think Mike Vrabel was sitting there going, I want this job.
I'm doing this job. I know how to fix this.
Ron Rivera wasn't doing that.

Speaker 15 Right. So you're getting a different message.
So he's going to separate himself.

Speaker 15 To me, it's worth the risk.

Speaker 7 Yeah. It'd be fun.
It'd be fun to see. I have one question about the Raiders because we talked about the teams that didn't do anything.

Speaker 7 I'm not sure that we can put the Raiders into that category just yet because I think Mark Davis is kind of just like thinking it over. I don't know.
He's taking his time.

Speaker 7 What's going on with Tom Brady and the Raiders and the relationship with Mark Davis? And is Antonio Pierce safe?

Speaker 15 Yeah, so it's the Tom Brady influence is bigger than I think people realize.

Speaker 15 I know he's the minority owner, and there were some question marks of, like, all right, well, he'll be in the background.

Speaker 15 Tom Brady's not going to be, has Tom Brady ever been in the background of anything, right? Like, he's full on in the decision-making for the Vegas Raiders.

Speaker 15 He talks to Mark Davis all the time, and I think you're going to see tons of Tom Brady ways and just influence on how this team is going to run.

Speaker 15 So, I think the question that we probably need to consider is: is Tom Brady an Antonio Pierce fan? Does he like what he sees?

Speaker 7 I'm going to guess probably not from his personal history with the Giants.

Speaker 15 I don't even think it has to do with the Giants. I just think, look how Tom likes to do things.
It's discipline. It's New England, right? It's the Patriot way.
It's tight. It's accountability.

Speaker 15 It's all the things that we know. It's everything that Hank is.

Speaker 15 This is just... I don't think Antonio Pierce runs his team that way.

Speaker 15 I'm not saying one is better than the other. I just think when it comes down to it, it goes back to that comfort of, I know I can operate with that.

Speaker 15 So who's left that can do something in the way that Tom Brady wants it? Brian Flores, Mike Raymond, right? There's New England again.

Speaker 1 Chiano. Chiano.

Speaker 7 No one's talked about Chiano.

Speaker 15 Are we doing this again?

Speaker 7 No one's talking about Chiano.

Speaker 8 Are we talking about Chiano?

Speaker 1 We should talk about Chiano. Is it Mike Rabel to the Patriots? Is done?

Speaker 1 I don't think so.

Speaker 15 He's meeting with the Bears. He's meeting with the Saints.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 15 I'm curious when he's going to meet with the Patriots.

Speaker 15 That's the one I haven't seen yet.

Speaker 1 Okay. I have to go dig on that.
Okay.

Speaker 15 And Hank is all in on this, right? Yeah, oh, yeah.

Speaker 1 Oh, yeah. He reported it already.

Speaker 7 Yeah, he did.

Speaker 1 He reported it.

Speaker 15 He reported Mike Rabel to the video.

Speaker 1 Oh, based on his feelings.

Speaker 1 Yeah. That's good.
Yeah,

Speaker 1 that's our reporting standard here.

Speaker 15 I actually think that's the least

Speaker 15 interesting hire, though. Like, it's like, yeah, it's great and it's cool.
He returns home, but that's not like a shocking move if that happens.

Speaker 1 No, I actually like expect it to happen. I want it to happen so it's like the chessboard starts to clear up a little.

Speaker 15 Yeah, I mean, if he picks the jags, then I'm like, holy cow, like that came out of the way.

Speaker 7 Yeah, do we have time for one last question? I know that you have another thing coming up to the robot.

Speaker 1 You got a question.

Speaker 7 Roback question: joggers, hoodies, shorts.

Speaker 1 RHOBACK.com.

Speaker 7 Promo code take 20% off. Joggers, hoodies, shorts.

Speaker 7 Okay, so

Speaker 7 is there a college coach that is drawing interest that maybe we haven't heard about as much? Because I'm thinking about two guys.

Speaker 7 Nachiano.

Speaker 1 Dabo.

Speaker 7 Because he hates coaching college now. It seems like he's fed up with the transfer portal, NIL stuff.
And then Sark.

Speaker 15 Fine. Like, those are, I don't think those two are going to be in the

Speaker 1 cycle progressively.

Speaker 15 I don't know what Sark wants to do,

Speaker 15 but every coach in college likes that buzz of the NFL. Bill O'Brien is the name I'm watching.

Speaker 15 I know he loves Boston College, and they love him up there.

Speaker 15 But that's a name I'm watching. Matt Campbell is a name I'm watching.

Speaker 1 Okay. Yeah, I don't know about.

Speaker 7 But Bill O'Brien, I think I said Raiders would make a lot of sense for Bill O'Brien.

Speaker 15 There's another New England connection. I forgot about that.
I didn't connect that. That's great.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Look,

Speaker 15 the question was, could I see these college coaches maybe getting an opportunity? Like,

Speaker 15 yeah, but I haven't heard any of these yet. But those are the names if I had a guess at this point.

Speaker 15 I'd keep an eye on them. Okay.

Speaker 1 Do teams have to announce when they do an interview?

Speaker 15 They just like to do it. It's not.

Speaker 15 But they don't have to.

Speaker 1 They could interview someone that we don't know about, and then all of a sudden it's like, well, that's the coach.

Speaker 15 Yeah, they just like to let the world know. They just like to let the fan bases go, look, we're working.

Speaker 7 Yeah, the Jaguars publishing their list of people that they've asked to interview for the job was pretty strange.

Speaker 1 Yeah, see, I would.

Speaker 15 What about the teams putting out comments that they're retaining their coaches and GMs? When did we start doing this?

Speaker 1 I know. I know.
Yeah, if I were running a team, I would just go like, I'd be like, yeah, we're interviewing the ghost of Vince Lombardi. We're interviewing

Speaker 1 just, you know, George Washington.

Speaker 1 Leader of men.

Speaker 7 I would move in silence. Yeah.

Speaker 15 But that's how I would do it. Like, don't you think if you have to put out a statement, like, do you think the Chiefs are going to put out Andy Reid? Is this the same?

Speaker 1 That would be funny.

Speaker 1 Yeah. if they win the Super Bowl.

Speaker 7 Decided to retain Andy Reed.

Speaker 1 We're going to stick around.

Speaker 15 The Rams are like, we love Sean McVay. He's allowed to return back.
Like, no,

Speaker 1 they. Yeah.

Speaker 1 All right. Well, Diana, thank you so much.
We appreciate it. We love having you on.
And we'll see you at the Combine. We'll see you at Super Bowl week.
We'll see you at the Combine.

Speaker 1 And, you know, don't just let me down easy if you know, if you find out something before I see it. Just let me down easy.

Speaker 15 I am hoping this all comes together on your 40th birthday. That is the hope for me.
So I can't wait to give you that big, big

Speaker 15 Ben Johnson. Dad, Josh McCall's your head coach.

Speaker 1 Bye, guys.

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Speaker 17 Now for something completely different.

Speaker 1 Okay, we now welcome on a very special guest. It is our college football expert, not by choice, but by a stupid tournament that we did and he happened to win.

Speaker 1 It is Brandon Walker, who has already made demands on this studio.

Speaker 1 He demanded the couch couch be put back because Hank was sitting on Vanny Woodhead chair, which Vanny Woodhead's near and dear to our heart.

Speaker 7 Yeah, Vanny Woodhead's our van. Sure.

Speaker 7 And Hank just decided unilaterally that he was going to move the chair, install the chair, and then whenever we'd have a guest off, he'd force me to come in here and move the entire couch back. Right.

Speaker 1 Two things.

Speaker 1 Oh, did you still hook up all the time?

Speaker 1 Two things. Okay.
A, I'm not a guest. I'm part of the show now as the resident college football expert.
And B, the couch has nothing to do with me.

Speaker 1 I'm sitting on the couch, but you guys are engaging in the couch fight with Hank right now. True or false, you sat down on the chair and you said, what's this chair?

Speaker 1 True, but I really wasn't know what the chair was. I rest my piece.

Speaker 1 But Hank is the one. But I'm part of the show.
Shouldn't you know that it's Vanny Woodhead? Aren't you and Hank fighting? But didn't you just say you're part of the show?

Speaker 1 You don't know Vanny Woodhead? I don't know the intricacies of Vanny Woodhead. I'm aware of the show.

Speaker 1 You know who knows about Vanny Woodhead? Tom Ferneli. Well, you know what he doesn't know about college football, and that's why I'm here.

Speaker 7 Yeah, well, Brandon's also, his ass isn't really built for a chair. He's more of a couch ass.

Speaker 1 I sat in the chair. I immediately got concerned I was going to break the chair.
Yeah. There were concerns with the chair.

Speaker 1 But Hank is fighting the chair battle, not me. I don't care if the chair is here or not.
Well, who?

Speaker 7 You should have an opinion one way.

Speaker 1 Well, I do have an opinion. I want our guests to be as comfortable as possible here.
Okay. All right.
So you're here. I'm here.

Speaker 7 Wait, are you a guest on your own show now?

Speaker 1 No, I'm not a guest.

Speaker 7 But you might be a guest on your own show.

Speaker 1 I'm in a pretzel now. What?

Speaker 13 How do I get out of it?

Speaker 1 Triggs, make Brandon really fat in the cover art.

Speaker 7 Yeah, that's how how you get it out.

Speaker 1 Go ahead.

Speaker 1 No,

Speaker 1 I wasn't talking to you. I understand that.
But why would you do that? You don't even have to do that much. I wasn't talking to you.

Speaker 8 I was talking to Triggs.

Speaker 1 Waiting at 273 yesterday. I'm trying to.
I thought it was 265.

Speaker 7 Yeah, Brandon told me that he ordered dark chicken for lunch instead of having the chicken breast meal that we had for lunch for the whole office, thinking it was healthier.

Speaker 7 I think that's actually way worse. So you're probably up to 276 now.

Speaker 1 I love that dark meat.

Speaker 1 Brandon. Yes.

Speaker 7 Jason Whitlock over here.

Speaker 1 Gosh, yeah. I know what I'm talking about.
Watch it. Watch it.
Cans.

Speaker 1 Stay away.

Speaker 1 He said cans. He said a huge rack.
Yeah, he said a huge rack.

Speaker 7 Several times. Got to stay away.

Speaker 1 I've never seen someone cope harder with not being able to get laid. Yeah.

Speaker 7 I wouldn't allow myself around her because

Speaker 7 I knew you'd get me in the same room as that.

Speaker 1 I'll tell you one thing. A huge rack.
You know me. Me and my wife have a deal.
I can never be in the same room as Sidney Sweeney. That's right.
You know. Capable.
You know. What I'm capable of.

Speaker 1 All right, so Brandon, college football playoff. We want to talk about the matchups.
Sure. We're down to four.

Speaker 8 Yeah.

Speaker 1 Overall, how would you say the first college football playoff has gone? Are you one of the

Speaker 1 let me ask this a better way? Why is it that college football seems like there's just an endless amount of fans that just don't seem to like the sport?

Speaker 1 It's the only sport that really gets meticulously picked apart for the quality of its games. It doesn't really happen to the NBA playoffs or the NHL playoffs.
It doesn't really happen to anybody else.

Speaker 1 It's the only sport where if there's a bad game, it is suddenly an indictment of the entire sport. Correct.
Whereas a playoff is just that.

Speaker 1 You are playing off to find out who's the best team at the end. There's no guarantee you're going to have some aesthetically pleasing games along the way.
You've just collected through a

Speaker 1 12-game sample size who deserves to be here. We pretty much got that this year.
I don't know that it was perfect, but we got that. We can't help that.
Some of the games weren't as good.

Speaker 1 The Super Bowl, when PFC and I were growing up, you were in your like 30s in the 90s was always a blowout. Yeah.
It just seemed like you're just going out of your way to take shots at some times.

Speaker 1 Well, you're part of the show.

Speaker 7 I think that because they installed this new playoff, then there are now a bunch of people out there that are looking at it and trying to tweak it, trying to move it around, trying to add things, trying to inject their own ideas into it.

Speaker 7 You've got to be careful with that. You've got to be careful because if you do too much, you're going to become the NBA.
And you don't want that.

Speaker 1 People believe that the playoff was implemented because it was supposed to be some grand fix. Well, it wasn't fixing because nothing was broken.
It was just a better way to determine a champion.

Speaker 1 It's more seats at the table. It's more excitement.
And it gave us an October and November that were unparalleled in excitement. November had games.

Speaker 1 Would anybody have cared about O Miss Florida in previous years? No. Would anybody have cared about certain games? No.
It gave us a great November.

Speaker 1 It gave us a bad first round, but then it also gave us Texas, Arizona State, which was remarkable. But the pushback I always have for people is, so the first round sucked.

Speaker 1 What was the alternative of the first round? It would have been Indiana and Tennessee playing in a bowl game that half the players opted out. No one gave a fuck.
This is Jack.

Speaker 1 So, yeah, it was a blowout, but all the players were playing and they were trying their hardest. And I'd rather watch that even if it's a blowout.
People are nostalgic liars about college football.

Speaker 1 They're like, well, we should go back to how it used to be. 30 years ago, Penn State goes undefeated and gets nothing.
They get nothing.

Speaker 1 There are these times in history where we're just letting sports writers decide. So we've come step by step by step.

Speaker 1 The 12-team playoff, I think, is the best way to do it until we have a 16-team playoff, which would be even better.

Speaker 7 How about we compromise? How about we keep the current format, but the winner gets the old trophy?

Speaker 1 That could work. Now, I will say this year, it might have, and you don't know this, this is year to year.
Maybe eight teams was enough for this year, but you can't go based on you can't do it.

Speaker 1 Yeah, and the fixes that I do think should happen: are you don't do the automatic buy, the seating? That should be, it should just be the four best teams get a buy.

Speaker 1 Yeah, and there should be the first two rounds should be on campus because I do think what we're finding is part of college football, it's obviously the game, but it's the atmosphere as well.

Speaker 1 And when you ask a fan base to travel potentially three times in a three-week stretch, you just aren't going to get the same atmosphere.

Speaker 1 You're just not like the fan, the crowds are not going to be the same as they were when it was like, here's our one big bowl game.

Speaker 7 It also takes time to build up to that schedule, to make it part of a fan base's routine, where if you're a big school that has national title aspirations every year, that you just pencil in, okay, like late December through mid-January, I got to keep my calendar open because it might be on the road.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I mean, if you're a Texas fan, you're in your second straight straight playoff, are you going to,

Speaker 1 I don't even know where they played that last game. Were they the Fiesta Bowl?

Speaker 1 Yeah. No, they weren't in the Fiesta Bowl.
They were in the Peach Bowl. They were in the Peach Bowl.
Are you going to Atlanta knowing that you might have two other trips in the next two weeks?

Speaker 1 Maybe you're not. Maybe you say, well, I'll get them the next time.

Speaker 1 So it creates some issues and stuff, but there are small issues we have to work towards. Overall, this is a better way to do it than we've ever had, and it is going to get tweaked.

Speaker 1 The buys, the auto-buys for conference champions, got to go away. That has to go away.

Speaker 1 It created a spot where the sixth seed had the easiest path to where we are right now, which I think Penn State probably was good enough to get there anyway.

Speaker 1 I'm not going to hold it against them, but they had an easier path than, say, Oregon. Yeah, Oregon got screwed.
Oregon should have just lost the Big Ten championship. Right.

Speaker 1 I mean, they still probably would be alive. Yeah.
Yeah. They would have gotten a home game.
They would have won it. Then they would have gone on.

Speaker 1 They wouldn't have had the rust that they dealt with against Ohio State. No, Ohio State killed them so much, you can't really blame that.

Speaker 1 But still, there were issues, and we'll fix them along the way.

Speaker 1 Yeah, go ahead. Oh, I was going to say, I think the other thing we agree on, Brandon, is that the national championship game should be at the Rose Bowl.

Speaker 1 We don't believe in that.

Speaker 1 You, and you try to make it personal with me about the Rose Bowl, because you try to make it personal with me about a lot of things. No, I don't.
You make it.

Speaker 1 You like to point fingers and say Brandon Walker hates a Rose Bowl, and you turn everyone against me by saying, no, I don't hate the Rose Bowl. I think the Rose Bowl is magnificent and wonderful.

Speaker 1 And it is also absolutely in love with itself and thinks it's bigger than the sport. And the Rose Bowl needs to be taken down a pick.
The Rose Bowl holds up college football progress.

Speaker 1 It's done it before. It stands in the way.
It has to have things its way, and it is not that special.

Speaker 7 Are you describing the Rose Bowl or the SEC? It is special.

Speaker 1 It's not a good one, PFT.

Speaker 1 Literally everything's fine. Not the worst counterpoint I've ever heard.
Yes. Not the worst counterpoint I've ever heard.
But it's better than his counterpoints where he just says, I hate it.

Speaker 1 No, I don't hate it. I just think it's in love with you.
You can get a rig green if you win.

Speaker 1 The fucking Texas-Arizona state game, they are in overtime playoff game. Rose Bowl.
The Rose Bowl.

Speaker 1 The Rose Bowl will not hold up.

Speaker 1 The Rose Bowl keeps it. You keep saying the farts thing, but the farts smell incredible.
Yeah, they smell like roses. I don't think the Rosebow farts smell that good.
Oh.

Speaker 7 Well, Brandon, they had to kick off because the game is built. It's not...

Speaker 8 It doesn't go by the sound.

Speaker 1 It's about a sunset. It's a fancy box.

Speaker 7 It goes by the sun.

Speaker 1 You don't respect the sun for the sun. What fucking sun?

Speaker 1 Imagine that? Not respecting the sun?

Speaker 7 There was an airplane that was. You don't even know what they fly over for the Rosebowler.
No, you don't.

Speaker 1 You didn't know either, did you?

Speaker 1 You always know. You fucking kids.
What flyover did you not have? Are you fucking kidding me? There was a flyover you didn't know, Rosebury. No, he knows all that stuff.

Speaker 7 Yeah, there was a flyover, but that was like an experimental aircraft. I couldn't.

Speaker 1 What was the stealth that flew over the Rose Bowl, right?

Speaker 7 It's called a B2 bomber. Come on.

Speaker 1 Oh, B2 bomber. All right.

Speaker 1 Maybe you knew we called the stealth?

Speaker 7 Somewhat, yeah, like casualism called stealth bomber.

Speaker 1 People don't respect the Rose Bowl. I respect stealth bombers.
And the Rose Bowl? I respect the Rose Bowl. Here's the problem with it.

Speaker 1 You turned it into this, where you either love it unconditionally.

Speaker 1 I'll admit to one thing.

Speaker 1 My feelings were hurt a little bit because I didn't. Usually I can pick up on your mocking tone.

Speaker 1 And when we were January 1st, we spent the whole day together, and I did not pick up on your mocking tone for about three hours.

Speaker 1 And then when I did, I was like, God damn it, he's been mocking me this whole time. He's kind of on you.
You lived your entire life with me on a mocking tone. I know, but you then also, I found out.

Speaker 1 He bought me two gifts. Guess where the gifts are from, PFT? Spencer's.
The Rose Bowl. He's buying me mocking gifts.
No, and he's mocking gifts. So

Speaker 7 Brandon was nailing you for three hours and you didn't realize it.

Speaker 1 Yeah, if I bought myself Rose Bowl gifts, that's mocking me. He was

Speaker 1 a Rose Bowl, so I got him Rose Bowl gift.

Speaker 7 Honestly, Big Kat, if I were you, I would be fine with that arrangement. If somebody wanted to buy me a mocking gift that I actually enjoyed, I'd be like, okay.

Speaker 1 But I don't know if I enjoy it anymore because every time I enjoy it, Brandon's laughing. And you just pick up the ball.

Speaker 1 You walk up there and you see Wisconsin Badgers 1994 Rose Bowl champs and a picture of the Rose Bowl.

Speaker 1 You don't. I'm like, God damn it, he got me again.
Yeah. Yeah.
That's how our friendship works.

Speaker 7 That's a great friendship. Yeah.
So as an SEC fan, Brandon, how do you feel about the mighty shoulders of Texas carrying the mantle for the SEC? Still Big 12.

Speaker 1 It is weird. It feels weird.
It's been a bad bowl season for SEC. It's been a bad season for the SEC.

Speaker 7 Would you like to apologize for the SEC?

Speaker 1 100% no, because fuck the SEC.

Speaker 1 I'm a fan of Mississippi State University. When Georgia loses, I think it's hilarious.
When Alabama loses, I think it's fucking hilarious.

Speaker 1 So this myth that you guys think that we're all sitting in our trailer parks down south just waiting for Alabama and Georgia to bail us out is wrong. Trailer parks.
It is wrong.

Speaker 7 I was going to say Super 8. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Whatever. wherever we're hanging out,

Speaker 1 down south, the dog fighting ring, wherever we're hanging out down south, we're not

Speaker 1 cousin fucking fans. We're not just waiting.
We would never talk football with cousin fucking Feds.

Speaker 1 We're never talking, waiting for Alabama to bail us out. When they win, we're like, God damn, this is proof of how tough it is down here.
When they lose, it's hilarious.

Speaker 7 I like that, but in a weird way, the SEC school, Texas, going up against Ohio State, kind of built like an SEC team.

Speaker 1 Ohio State? Yeah, they've been the one team constantly, and Clemson touched it for a few years that have been built like an elite SEC team.

Speaker 1 It's not built like an SEC team, it's built like an elite SEC team.

Speaker 1 Because there's teams built like, you know, Florida right now and Kentucky and AM, and then there's teams built like Alabama and Georgia over the last 15 years, which is just take the fivest of the five stars and put them in every position and destroy everybody.

Speaker 1 And Texas is like that. Ohio State's like that.
So if Ohio State wins this national championship, shouldn't we be saying that Georgia's built like an elite Big Ten team? I don't represent the Big Ten.

Speaker 1 I don't have a Big Ten accent. That's on you to start turning around the No, I actually find the whole thing funny, and it's like the Big Ten cat thing that I do.

Speaker 1 Like, I don't actually, I'm kind of with you. Like, I'm not rooting for Ohio State.
It helps you none as a Wisconsin fan. No, I know.
I'm not rooting for them.

Speaker 1 I will benefit if they win at all. I will benefit it by saying, wow, toughest conference.
Look at me. But when you get to the end, I know that I'm not rooting for them.

Speaker 1 When you get to the end of the season, and it's happened to the SEC a couple of times, it might happen in the Big Ten this year.

Speaker 1 And two, SEC team play for a national title, and your team went 9-3 in that conference. You're like, look at what we had to do.

Speaker 1 I'm never winning anything ever again. Neither of you.
It sucks.

Speaker 1 Speak for yourself, buddy. You're talking to a 2021 College World Series champion.
Okay, well, I've actually got a dynasty going with women's hockey. Well, yeah, but you don't really

Speaker 1 ever have to.

Speaker 1 I did. I watched the third period of one of the championship games.
Yeah, but you can't name any of the players. Like, I can name all the Mr.
McClure. Haley players:

Speaker 1 Chad, Austin, Cody. All right, let's talk about the games.
Let's. Thursday night.
Sure. Penn State, Notre Dame.

Speaker 1 Slug. Pat to get here.
Penn State, nothing. Right.
Haven't had to play a big game. Notre Dame acquitted themselves very nicely against Georgia.

Speaker 1 Marcus Freeman pants Kirby Smart. Absolutely pants him.
Pants him. Had him crying like a bitch ass.
He loved it. And Georgia, by the way, is going to be back.

Speaker 1 They're going to be fine long term. Oh, they've already gotten two of the best wide receiver transfers in the country.

Speaker 1 They're fixing their problems now.

Speaker 1 And Kirby Smart is one of those coaches that, like, kind of like Nick Sabin, when they lose, it's actually bad for everyone else because they're just going to come back with more vengeance.

Speaker 1 Well, I kind of say that about the entire SEC. If everybody wants to shit on the SEC right now, that's fine if you want to do the collective conference thing.

Speaker 1 But embarrassing Alabama and embarrassing Georgia, them going through that, it's just going to turn them into monsters this offseason, and it's going to be nastier than that.

Speaker 7 I think most of the shitting on the SEC is because the SEC so vehemently defended itself going into the playoffs.

Speaker 1 And also they openly lobby. They've had a 20-year run where they've just kicked the shit out of out of it.
Yeah, but everybody would lobby in that scenario. I think

Speaker 1 I didn't. I didn't think Alabama deserved it or South Carolina or Ole Miss.
That's why you hate South Carolina. All right, so this game.
Yeah. You've actually predicted the playoffs perfectly so far.

Speaker 1 I have, yeah. That's our college football expert, folks.
Yeah. Who do you have winning this game and why?

Speaker 1 I have Penn State winning this game because I think Penn State and Erdame are very, very, very similar. I think Penn State's a little bit better version of the team they're going for.

Speaker 1 They have a better quarterback. Great defense, better quarterback, both elite running game, both very, very, very physical.

Speaker 1 Penn State just has one more explosive playmaker than Notre Dame has.

Speaker 1 They have the incredible tight end, Tyler Warren, and they have a quarterback who I think is not going to make the mistakes that the backup quarterback for Georgia made. Listen, Notre Dame...

Speaker 1 They're both built to win games the same way. Get a 7-10 point lead, use their defense, ride it out, win the game, right? And Notre Dame pulled that off to a T against Georgia.

Speaker 1 Notre Dame had two plays. They had the sack fumble to get the ball at the nine-yard line, and then they had the kick return.

Speaker 1 That gave them two touchdowns of separation, and they never let Georgia breathe. They never let him get it.
If those two plays don't happen, they had 250 yards of total offense.

Speaker 1 They're playing on more physical defense, and I don't think Aller's going to make the mistakes the backup quarterback made.

Speaker 1 I just like Penn State as a little bit better version of what both teams are going for. It does.
The Tyler Warren piece is a good point because when you watch Notre Dame, Jeremiah I love is electric.

Speaker 1 Riley Leonard can run very well. He's a tough runner.
It just doesn't feel like anyone's getting getting crazy open. No.

Speaker 1 Whereas Tyler Warren is one of those guys where it's like, you just throw it up to him and he'll get it.

Speaker 1 I think Notre Dame had 80 yards passing against

Speaker 1 Faison.

Speaker 7 It's a touchdown by Faison.

Speaker 1 Which was all fine. You know, that's what they needed to do to beat Georgia, but I just don't know if that's going to beat Penn State.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Because I think Penn State's going to get a couple touchdowns from the combination of Aller and Warren.

Speaker 1 I know that a lot of people, it feels like more people believe Notre Dame's going to win than believe Penn State's going to win.

Speaker 1 But I think that's totally due to the path that Penn State has and the path that Notre Dame has.

Speaker 7 Yeah, do you think that Aller is ⁇ do you trust him?

Speaker 8 I think he is very good.

Speaker 1 I've been on the Drew Aller train for two years to my detriment last year when they lost to Ohio State and Michigan. People were like, see, we told you he's terrible.
That was a bad game.

Speaker 1 Penn State was a bad game. It was a bad game, but it was also due to the two best defenses in the country.
Well, this year, he doesn't turn the ball over.

Speaker 1 I think last year he might have had four interceptions. This year, three, something ridiculous.
I don't know if those are exact numbers. But he doesn't turn the ball over, doesn't make mistakes.

Speaker 1 If they had elite receivers, this would be an elite offense. They don't have elite elite receivers, so it's a really good offense.

Speaker 7 Okay, did you plan on this when you're thinking about who's going to win this game?

Speaker 7 It's the 100th anniversary of the Four Horsemen.

Speaker 1 Knut Rockne. I don't believe Ric Flair and Arn Anderson were together 100 years ago.
Yeah. Yeah.
So familiar with Knut. Doesn't that feel? I am familiar with Knut.

Speaker 7 Doesn't that feel like...

Speaker 1 Win one for the Giffer, right?

Speaker 7 Giffer, yeah. Doesn't that feel like Team of Destiny vibes?

Speaker 1 Well, do we know if there's any 100-year anniversaries for Penn State?

Speaker 1 You probably don't want to look in their past.

Speaker 7 Have we checked? Yeah, this is Catholics versus Catholics.

Speaker 1 Uh-huh. Well, or Catholics versus convicts.
Yeah. Both.

Speaker 7 Both of versus convicts. Catholics versus Catholic convicts.
Catholics. Yeah.

Speaker 11 Sure.

Speaker 1 Well, Catholic convicts versus Catholic convicts. Good point.
Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 Question about this game. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Big game James. Sure.
Which I think we should start calling him big game James. Remember when we called James Shield big game James? It's like, well, like, why? It's just

Speaker 1 rhymes with

Speaker 1 great with James yeah so big game James yeah are we worried at all about big game James not being big game James I think about it is it fair to say he hasn't won a big game when he just won two playoff games I understand those aren't big games right Max said they weren't big games isn't that rich okay so is could I argue that Georgia without its starting quarterback no it's still Georgia okay

Speaker 1 so we're really massaging the word big game to to fit our narrative right now it's a team that's like you know he's greatly favored over. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And, you know, it's a toss-up game against a top five team. Penn State has not been able to overcome when Michigan was at the top of the sport the last three years.
They couldn't overcome them.

Speaker 1 And when Ohio State's, they haven't overcome Ohio State. Once.
Can I ask you this? Yeah. Over the last four years, what's Notre Dame's record against those two teams? What would it be?

Speaker 1 Because it'd be the exact same as Penn State. Oh, that's a fair point.

Speaker 1 But that's also a little Brian Kelly in there.

Speaker 1 And Freeman, who I think, again, he pants Kirby Smart. He looked great.

Speaker 1 This is a guy that lost Northern Illinois this year. This guy who has lost

Speaker 1 one of the best Mountain West teams. This is a guy who's lost some games he shouldn't lose.
But suddenly because he beats Georgia, all the questioning is still on James Franklin.

Speaker 1 It's called narratives. I don't think this is all about the coaches here.
I think

Speaker 1 this is one team has a better quarterback than the other. That's what I think.
I agree. I agree with you.

Speaker 1 If you extrapolate, if you go out the whole playoff, it's four coaches. Somebody's breaking through for the first time.
Ryan Day gets rid of his problems. James Franklin gets rid of his problems.

Speaker 1 Marcus Freeman ascends to the top of the sport for the first time. And Sarkesian battles through everything he had to battle through.
So it's a fascinating coach narrative play. I agree.
It is.

Speaker 7 So with Marcus Freeman, the pantsing really occurred on that fourth down. Yeah, the fake go.

Speaker 1 They made him jump off the fake go.

Speaker 7 Did you know that Georgia had a giant banner on the sidelines that said DJO?

Speaker 7 You remember that DJO that was like on the bottom of the screen the entire game because it was boom right there on the sides.

Speaker 1 So what does DJO stand for?

Speaker 7 Don't jump jump off sides. That makes sense.
That's what the banner meant. Yeah.
And then they jumped off sides.

Speaker 1 Well, they also have posted speed limits in Athens, Georgia, and they don't really pay attention to those either. They also should probably have had a banner saying, don't get in the way of refs.

Speaker 1 Don't get in the way of refs. Don't drink and drive.

Speaker 7 But I think that having the don't jump off sides banner makes you more likely, if that's the one thing that you're emphasizing. It's in your head.
If the last words I read.

Speaker 7 Don't hit the ball in the water, Hank. Yeah.

Speaker 1 If the last word you read going onto the field is off sides, it's in your mind to jump off sides. It's in your DNA.

Speaker 7 Correct. All right, so officially Penn State.

Speaker 1 I like Penn State. Would you be willing to put your reputation? I agree with you, Scott.
I like Penn Expert on the line.

Speaker 1 I have already earned that reputation via winning this battle this year, so I don't know that I have to put it back on the line.

Speaker 7 Do you need a banner to hang behind you? Because I don't think you won the Big Game Boomer banner.

Speaker 1 Big Game Boomer hasn't put one out yet. Okay, so you haven't won it.
Right. I haven't won it, but I haven't lost it either.
Okay. If we went through all of 2024 without a new banner, true.
But

Speaker 1 I'm with you. I think I'm going to bet Penn State.
Yeah. What's the current line in draft? Two and a half, I think, or maybe two?

Speaker 1 I think it'll be a pick'em by game time. I feel like the late money's coming in on Penn State.
I also hate to do it, but it, I don't know. Under?

Speaker 1 It's low, 44.5. You can't have a kick return or a college football play.
Something stupid happened, but these teams both want to play.

Speaker 1 I mean, both those things happened in the last game, and the total ended up at 33. I know.

Speaker 7 So the one thing that's been jumping out to me about Notre Dame is their secondary.

Speaker 1 Yeah, very good. So good.
Yeah, Xavier Watts is one of the best players in the country.

Speaker 7 So I feel like, yeah, as much as possible.

Speaker 5 But they're good at every level of their defense.

Speaker 7 As much as you want to trust Penn State and you want to trust Drew Aller, that is going to be a tough battle for them.

Speaker 1 It's going to be very tough, especially because his receivers don't really get much separation.

Speaker 1 But it's not so much just trusting Drew Aller, it's trusting Drew Aller more than you're trusting Riley Leonard to throw the ball down the field and replay.

Speaker 1 So I don't think Penn State is going to go out there and throw for 350 yards and four touchdowns.

Speaker 1 But if you had to tell me, you know, one team's going to win by throwing for 215 yards and two touchdowns, I would say that's Penn State. Yeah.
Okay.

Speaker 1 Max, do you have any Penn State questions for Brandon?

Speaker 2 No, no notes. I think it's a great job.

Speaker 1 It's going to be a great stream. We'll have Max there.
We'll have Chief there representing Notre Dame. I think Frank's going to be here representing Notre Dame.
Connor Griffin, Penn State. Jeff D.

Speaker 1 Lowe Penn State.

Speaker 7 McKinsey, Notre Dame. Yep.

Speaker 1 So it'll be great. It'll be packed house.
Okay. Second game.
Yeah. Texas.

Speaker 7 Ohio State.

Speaker 1 Now,

Speaker 1 the knee jerk is Ohio State looks unbeatable. Right.
And Texas has not looked incredible. I mean, they kind of played a little around with Clemson.
I know that was never really in doubt. Right.

Speaker 1 And then Arizona State probably should have won that. They got right to the edge of losing.
That targeting call, that changes everything. And a fourth and 13, if he overthrows it by an end.

Speaker 1 Zero blitz. I know.

Speaker 1 So.

Speaker 1 Is this going to be Ohio State kicking their ass?

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 if I went by what the two teams have done in the playoff, it has to be that, right? It has to be because Ohio State got the embarrassment against Michigan.

Speaker 1 Three weeks they heard how terrible they are, how big of a train wreck they are. And they came out and their play calling was different.
Their attitude was different. Everything was better.

Speaker 1 They had fixed it. However, I wonder about this.

Speaker 1 Ohio State now, by virtue of their two performances they put on, does the pressure now circle back around to get on their shoulders again?

Speaker 1 Because they had that pressure going into Michigan the last couple years. They've had that pressure, and Ryan Day traditionally doesn't do that great with pressure.

Speaker 1 Now that they have shown they are unequivocally the most talented and the best team in this playoff, does the pressure come back?

Speaker 1 And then do they go into that shell again where their play calling isn't as aggressive, where their play calling isn't as down the field? I wonder about that.

Speaker 1 Otherwise, if Ryan Day and Chip Kelly don't hold this team back, if they call plays the same way they've been calling plays, I think they win by two touchdowns. Breaking moose.

Speaker 1 You got a cow.

Speaker 1 Like that. Breaking moose.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's good. That's good, Cow.
Because we don't want to have to retape it. Raiders fire Antonio Pierce.
Oh, they do? Okay.

Speaker 7 Interesting.

Speaker 1 So, Raiders fire Antonio Pierce. That is another Vrabel opening.
It is.

Speaker 7 Possibly. Vrabel.
Bring Josh McDaniels back. Yeah.

Speaker 1 So do we have any thoughts on that before we get back to college football? You're not, you've watched one NFL game in your life? I've watched a bunch of NFL games.

Speaker 1 But they play every Sunday still. Yeah, yeah, be sure to Sunday, right? No, no, absolutely not.
Okay.

Speaker 1 How many Vrabel? I know how many openings there are. How many Vrabel openings are? Five? So are all the openings Vravell openings? Whatever opening he wants, he takes.
Yeah. Okay.

Speaker 1 Jacksonville's not a Vraibel opening, right? They're not hiring Vrabel.

Speaker 7 I think they probably want to. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Everyone wants to. Right, but you can't be a Vrabel opening if Vrabel would never get to you.
He would pick another job before you pick that one, right?

Speaker 7 Maybe Ohio State.

Speaker 1 You guys got to be honest about your Vraibo opening.

Speaker 1 This immediate reaction is bad for the Bears because That's your immediate reaction to everything. I I agree.

Speaker 1 But I do think there's a chance that Ben Johnson goes to the Patriots and Vrabel goes to the Raiders. And then.

Speaker 1 Why would he choose the Raiders over the Bears? Tom Brady. No, Vrabel? Yeah.
Why?

Speaker 1 Tom Brady.

Speaker 7 Tom Brady's a part owner of the Raiders now. You probably didn't know that.

Speaker 1 No, I knew that. Like, I needed Vrabel to go to the Patriots so Ben Johnson could come to the Bears.
Now it's back to there's multiple seats open

Speaker 1 for those two. I understand they were longtime teammates, but is there any personal evidence that says he's going to tie his future career into whatever Tom Brady wants him to do?

Speaker 1 I think Mike Rabel's a pretty good coach, and I think he,

Speaker 1 yeah,

Speaker 1 they don't have a quarterback, though.

Speaker 1 Actually, Raiders is not Ben Johnson, so that Raiders could be

Speaker 1 Deion Sanders.

Speaker 1 Why wouldn't Rabel be

Speaker 1 laugh?

Speaker 1 He's not a good enough coach for it. I think he will be Patriots.
I don't know where. I don't think Ben Johnson will be Raiders because they don't have a quarterback.
Okay.

Speaker 1 But I need Rabel to go to the Patriots so that Ben Johnson could go to the Bears. Fair.
All right.

Speaker 1 So that's where I'm nervous because if Rabel goes to the Raiders, then Ben Johnson will go to the Patriots.

Speaker 1 And you believe in the Year of Our Lord 2025, the Patriots are a more appealing destination for Ben Johnson than the Bears would be? I'm

Speaker 1 a big connections guy. I feel like both quarterbacks.
No, they're both good. What I'm saying is, like, it's not.

Speaker 7 So the quarterback, obviously, is why somebody would be interested in New England. Yeah.
Second is Robert Kraft feels like he would typically be a good owner to work.

Speaker 1 But I bet for a coach, an offensive-minded coach, I know whatever he put on the field this year, I bet Caleb Williams is really fucking enticing. Yeah, I bet you think you can unlock the best.

Speaker 1 I do all my coach hirings and firings on connections. That's why Mike Grable to the Raiders, Tom Brady, Ben Johnson played quarterback at UNC.

Speaker 1 Drake May also did. It's as simple as that.

Speaker 1 That's what makes me nervous.

Speaker 7 I also think that the guy who is the longtime offensive coordinator of a team that he's been very committed to the Lions. He stayed out of the coaching search last year.

Speaker 7 He took himself out because he wanted to return to the Lions. He's super close.
I think it'd be,

Speaker 7 it's not impossible for him to do it, but I think it adds another reason why he maybe wouldn't want to go to the Bears.

Speaker 1 But, guys, we can talk about the NFL when the season starts again next year. Season's over.
Yeah, no, I know.

Speaker 1 We were going to have to include this in the podcast anyway, so why not just do it all with the other one?

Speaker 1 Are they doing a playoff this year for the NFL?

Speaker 7 So we actually do our transfer portal after the season's over. I know that sounds weird.

Speaker 1 That is weird. Yeah, and the playoffs, actually, it's not based on just a bunch of old dudes sitting in a room.
Why not? Yeah, it's weird.

Speaker 1 All right, so Texas, so you think the pressure on Ohio State could be

Speaker 1 resurface. I think it could resurface.
And we've seen Ryan Day not be able to deal with that before, right? Yeah.

Speaker 1 If all of a sudden he's the heavy favorite again and you have no excuse not to win, I feel like that could creep back on him, him and Chip Kelly.

Speaker 1 How does Texas win this game? I'm personally,

Speaker 1 I'm kind of done with Quinn Urs. So Texas

Speaker 1 is probably the most interesting team. I believe they have Ohio State ceiling in there somewhere.
Every now and then for like two drives, maybe a quarter, that Texas offense looks like, oh my God.

Speaker 1 Sark will get in his bag, a Mr. Sark will get in his bag.

Speaker 1 Quinn will be throwing darts because every now and then Quinn Ewers just throws fucking darts and then he'll throw a floater into triple coverage and you're like, where did this guy come from?

Speaker 1 If they could for four quarters tap into their actual true potential, which is going to be tough against Ohio State, which I think is the best defense in the country.

Speaker 1 It's going to be tough against them. But if they could, they're as talented as Ohio State.
Yeah. Or, Or, you know what? They're not as talented.
Nobody is.

Speaker 1 But they're as talented as anybody not named Ohio State, and that would give them a puncher's chance.

Speaker 7 Yeah, so do you think that the formula is going to be run the ball, get physical for Texas? They have a very good offensive line.

Speaker 1 No, I think it, I don't, I don't think so. That defensive line is really, really good.
I think it has to be making plays 25 yards down the field. I think it has to be Marcus Golden.

Speaker 1 I think it has to be even maybe get Isaiah Bond involved. It has to be Quinn Ewers hitting at least three or four game-breaking passes.

Speaker 7 Or put on Michigan uniforms.

Speaker 1 Or put on Michigan uniforms, and that causes Chip Kelly and Ryan Day to fucking freak out and want to win the game a certain way that they shouldn't be wanting to win the game like that.

Speaker 7 They do have a golden and a blue.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 7 I know it's not maze and blue, but it's close.

Speaker 1 Well, golden and blue would be Notre Dame, wouldn't it? No, but.

Speaker 1 Blue and gold would be Notre Dame.

Speaker 7 They got two players.

Speaker 1 Golden. Blue.
And blue. Yeah.
But that's not Michigan. His name isn't maze.
That's true.

Speaker 7 That's what I said. Which is Mexican corn.
I said, I know it's not maze, but it's close.

Speaker 1 Maize is Mexican corn, right?

Speaker 7 It is corn, or Native American corn.

Speaker 1 Native American corn. Oh, it's the Indians corn.
Oh, yeah, maize. So your official pick is Ohio State.
I kind of want to take the over in this game.

Speaker 1 Texas defense is good, though, too. It is very good.
It also gave up 510 yards and 31 points to Arizona State. That's the thing.
That wasn't a fluke. Arizona State didn't fluke that game.

Speaker 1 They just bullied him in the second point. The bigger fluke.
I mean, Arizona State had the ball in the red zone in the first half four times, didn't score any points. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Like, they moved the ball all day.

Speaker 1 Finally, Scatabue and Levitt got it going, but they scored 31 points, and it's overtime, so they scored 24 in regulation, but they had 510 yards. That's a lot of yards.

Speaker 7 How do you shut down Jeremiah Smith? You don't.

Speaker 1 Not possible. You don't.

Speaker 1 You either just hope you shut down everybody else, or you hope Chip Kelly and Ryan Day don't force feed him like they've been force-feeding him. You hope that they're fighting.
They probably should.

Speaker 1 Yeah, you're right. They didn't force feed him against Michigan.
Like they didn't force feed him against

Speaker 1 Penn State the first time.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 they kind of pussy-footed around it. They came out in the playoff and realized, hey, we have the best receiver room in the country because it's not just Jeremiah Smith.

Speaker 1 He's the one getting the endlines, but Puka's been great. Like, Carnell Tate's been pretty good, too.
Like, they have their third best receiver would be the best receiver on any other team.

Speaker 1 And you just hope they go away from that.

Speaker 7 Yeah, you got to get inside their brains somehow.

Speaker 1 Against Penn State and against Michigan, Ohio State ran the ball in first down, ran the ball on second down, and tried to be tougher up front, tried to be out and out physical teams, and they couldn't do it.

Speaker 1 As long as they don't try to do that again, I don't know how you stop them.

Speaker 7 So the thing that concerns me is, and I agree with you, I was planning on betting on Ohio State. I feel like they're not going to make the same mistakes that they made against Michigan.

Speaker 7 They just can't. That was like shock therapy where they woke up and were like, okay, we can't do that again.
But it also seems like everybody else in America is saying Ohio State by two touchdowns.

Speaker 1 Well, Texas is a hell of a lot better than Michigan, too, right?

Speaker 8 Yeah. They beat the fuck out of it.

Speaker 1 Yeah, so Texas, I don't want them to get disrespected here.

Speaker 1 I just don't think they have the high-end, they don't have the high-end potential of Ohio State because Quinn Ewers can never be that guy for a full game. They have not played a full game.

Speaker 1 They've consistency. They've consistently, they played

Speaker 1 that SEC championship game. They played Georgia very tough.

Speaker 1 They got killed by Georgia when they played at home in Austin. And then all the rest of their resume is, you know.
Not much.

Speaker 1 Like I said, even the Clemson game.

Speaker 1 They were killing Clemson. Clemson, again, it was never

Speaker 1 14 points. Right, but it was also like, wait, whoa, do we have to look at this game again?

Speaker 1 Yeah, and I can imagine like an NFL scout as they get ready for the draft, and I think he's going to go back to college and transfer somewhere else.

Speaker 1 But looking at Quinn Ewers has to be one of the most frustrating things you can look at because you will see three throws and you're like, this guy is a top five pick.

Speaker 1 I can't, we've got to trade up and get this guy. And then the next three throws, nobody get near this guy.
Undrafted free agent.

Speaker 7 Yeah, the game-winning throw against Arizona State was incredible. That was a great play by him.
Yeah. Like staying in the face of pressure for 113.
But yeah, that was a great throw.

Speaker 7 He's capable of doing great.

Speaker 1 But the interception he threw with six minutes left when they're nursing an eight-point lead was among the worst throws you've ever seen. He throws it into double coverage and he floats it.

Speaker 1 It's just basically an arm punch.

Speaker 7 I I would trust him more if he brought the mullet back.

Speaker 1 I'd agree. I kind of would agree with that, too.

Speaker 1 It at least indicates, you know, some swagger to him that he really doesn't have. Right.

Speaker 7 It would actually transform this entire discussion from, like, oh, he really frustrates me with the interceptions to that's Quinn. He's a gunslinger.
Right. He's going to take his chances.

Speaker 1 What? So Ohio State beats Penn State in the national championship? I think Ohio State beats Penn State. Man, that would be such a imagine James Franklin wins a national championship over Ohio State.

Speaker 1 It would basically

Speaker 1 solve every one of his life's problems. Who's that a bigger kick in the dick for?

Speaker 1 Is it a bigger kick if James Franklin finally breaks through, gets to the national title game, and he has to play Ohio State a team that he just can't beat?

Speaker 1 Or Ryan Day fights or everything, gets to a national title game, and then loses to Penn State, who he's never lost.

Speaker 7 Oh, you know what it'd be? Ohio State fights through, gets to the national championship, loses to Notre Dame, Lou Holtz laughs in his face.

Speaker 1 Oh, I didn't even think of that. When he wakes up the next step, right.

Speaker 7 Yeah, they should actually do, you know, how ESPN always does like the seven different simul casts for Finnati.

Speaker 1 A Lou Holtz cast.

Speaker 7 One should be like the Lou Holtz cast, and it's just him asleep on his chair.

Speaker 1 But to answer your question, I think it would probably be a bigger kick in the dick to Ryan Day only because James Franklin is kind of used to it. Yeah.
Like

Speaker 1 he's been there, done that. Losing to Ohio State, no one would be like, oh, man, James Franklin lost to Ohio State.

Speaker 1 If Ryan Day loses to Penn State in the national championship game after losing to Michigan at the end of the season, and you're already in your January 20th, you can't fire him, that would be very unsettling for Ohio State.

Speaker 1 Whereas Penn State would be like, listen, we just got to the national title.

Speaker 1 We got to stay the course. Yeah.
You know, keep taking shots. James Franklin, yeah, he can't beat Ohio State, but maybe someday we'll get there.

Speaker 1 And as much as I like Penn State and think they're a very good team, their roster is not as good as Ohio State's. Right.
Them losing to Ohio State would. They don't have a Jeremiah Smith.
Nobody does.

Speaker 1 Right, but they never, like, it feels like they're always missing that one guy on the outside that can be just everything.

Speaker 4 Yeah.

Speaker 7 Any home field advantage at all for Texas? I don't think so.

Speaker 1 I think Ohio State travels well enough, and it'll be 50-50. At worst, what, it'll be 60-40, something like that.
I don't think there'll be a home field advantage.

Speaker 7 Ohio State's very concerned about the temperature at game time. We saw that with Tennessee, too.
I think it's going to be very cold, actually, in Dallas.

Speaker 7 It's indoors. It's indoors.
But it's going to be cool.

Speaker 1 It might bump the AC.

Speaker 1 What if someone leaves the door open? They're expecting some snow. Yeah.
Yeah. What if someone leaves the door open?

Speaker 5 What's the

Speaker 1 big door? Yeah.

Speaker 7 There's a giant window with the sun. But you don't respect that.

Speaker 1 Wouldn't Ohio State want to leave the door open? So it could be northern Texas.

Speaker 7 That's actually my favorite sunset in sports: is that like 15-minute window when it's at Jerry World and it blinds all the receivers?

Speaker 1 Yeah, remember, yeah, I guess they still have that. I guess I remember Texas Stadium when I was a kid, too.
They had the hole directly in the roof, and it was just awesome.

Speaker 1 Oh, it was the dumbest thing ever. It was the Leon Leck, one of the Leon Leck games where he this fumble against the Dolphins.

Speaker 7 Yeah, so that God could watch the Cowboys. That's what they said.

Speaker 1 Yeah, it was snowing, snowing in the indoor stadium. That's right, crazy.

Speaker 1 Okay,

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Speaker 1 Who's going to win the 2026 national title?

Speaker 1 That's a great question. Thank you.
Great question. Thank you.

Speaker 1 So Jeremiah Smith will be back. Maybe he transfers.

Speaker 1 To where? Wisconsin? Whoever wants to pay him $10 million.

Speaker 1 He should just do it. Yeah.

Speaker 1 He could probably make more money in college football in the next two years. You think Portnoy would try to get his rich uncle to buy him, too?

Speaker 1 I don't know if he's related to Larry Ellison.

Speaker 1 He's probably going to call him that soon.

Speaker 7 Yeah, how big of a Michigan fan is Larry Ellison's girlfriend?

Speaker 1 Got to be the biggest in the world. $12 million uh who's when the

Speaker 1 texas with arch manning how about texas oh okay i think they're still gonna be a real damn is kalen deborg gonna be okay no oh he will be a two and out guy whoa he will be who's their quarterback next year it is very funny that alabama like

Speaker 1 they're kind of not screwed in nil but They are not the same as Ohio State or Michigan or Texas.

Speaker 1 Like, they don't have the same boosters. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Listen, Alabama, not to brag, but me and Fortnali did sit on his couch before the year and said Alabama is not going to compete for National Rock because Millro is not good enough.

Speaker 1 I also said Travis Hunter win the highsman.

Speaker 8 But you did.

Speaker 1 But Millro was still the best they had. Like, what's coming down the pipe at Alabama? And running back, they've been normal forever.
Receiver, they're normal.

Speaker 1 Well, Ryan Williams. They're just Ryan Williams, sure.

Speaker 7 Good point, Big Cat.

Speaker 1 Not normal wheresoever. They are way closer to a normal SEC team than they've ever been, and nothing is happening to make me think that's going to happen.

Speaker 1 So Mick Sabin's going to have to come back and save him? I don't know. I guarantee you, if they go 9-3 again or 9-4 with a bowl up, he's out.
I got two words for him. They will not let that.

Speaker 1 That's coming down the pipeline at quarterback, Jaden Rashada.

Speaker 1 Jaden Rashada.

Speaker 7 Do you want to in on him?

Speaker 1 No. No.
He doesn't want to in on him. He won't stay anywhere long enough to be in on something.

Speaker 7 He does have a pretty crazy resume.

Speaker 1 He's been

Speaker 1 one year in school. He's been to three schools? Yeah.

Speaker 7 And then I think in high school, he went to two or three different high schools. Yeah, I just

Speaker 1 friendly guy. And Oregon has a guy who signed up

Speaker 1 and transferred and already transferred. Like, these guys don't understand.
Just go somewhere and plant yourself for a year or two and see. Just see what happens and see how it unfolds.

Speaker 1 Don't just leave immediately. My big fix for the transfer portal is because now schools coming up, schools are going to be able to pay directly to the players.

Speaker 1 What you should do is freshmen should get whatever. Let's just say round numbers 50K.
Sophomores get 100K. Juniors get 150, whatever it is.
If you transfer, you go back to freshmen.

Speaker 1 that's not a terrible idea i i thought of maybe maybe if you sign out of high school you have to stay somewhere two years now that's not very american it's not very free but it i think it's better for the players like i do too if you transfer if you transfer immediately you're never going to because it's going to make it it's like a concussion right and once you get one it's easier to do it again is that true like jalen hurts having two this year did he have two

Speaker 1 He might have had one in the first commander's year. We have so many of these transfer zombies that are now four and five and six and seven post-game interview in that game.
It's ridiculous.

Speaker 1 He's wearing glasses. Yeah, it's uh we're doing Jalen Hurts now.
I don't know. He's just in the concussion program.
I don't know. I'm worried about him.

Speaker 7 I don't know what it's going to look like when the schools start paying directly, but you are going to be able to, you can have contracts. I don't think that's un-American.

Speaker 7 If you sign up for a contract and you probably have some sort of collective bargaining with the well, what people don't realize is this is college football.

Speaker 1 It's great that the schools are going to be paying them and everything, but the behind-the-scenes and the under-the-table money is still going to be flowing bigger than ever. Of course, yeah.

Speaker 1 So all these freshmen that, oh, he's only getting 50K, yeah, he's not getting 50K, he's getting 500K somewhere else. So it's all going to be nasty.

Speaker 1 My

Speaker 1 take

Speaker 1 on the whole transfer portal and NIL stuff is the pendulum has swung.

Speaker 1 For the longest time, guys,

Speaker 1 couldn't even fucking get a job. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Now we've swung all the way the other way, and we're going to find somewhere in the middle. I just feel like some players, you know, I like player freedom.

Speaker 1 I like guys going to find an opportunity, and some of these schools lie to players.

Speaker 1 But sometimes when you go to a place and you leave immediately, you never give yourself a chance to grow into anything.

Speaker 1 And if you're always looking for the quick fix, the school is too, and you're never going to find anything.

Speaker 1 And you're just going to be that guy for the entire five years you're in college and it's never going to work.

Speaker 1 And if you don't have an NFL career, having a college career at one school that means something is very valuable.

Speaker 7 You look at a guy like Jalen Hurts, he stuck around, right? He stuck through it, showed that he is a good teammate. Then he got out of there.

Speaker 1 And then he got concussed twice.

Speaker 1 Packer Dan. He went to the school that valued loyalty the most.

Speaker 7 He's probably a great backup quarterback.

Speaker 7 That's That's what you can say about that man.

Speaker 1 So you guys have just transitioned fully into messing with Max right now? Okay. Well,

Speaker 1 would you say it's

Speaker 1 if your quarterback's in concussion protocol the week of a playoff game? That's not great.

Speaker 2 Big cat's trying to play this game that like he's huge.

Speaker 8 I just want Max.

Speaker 1 I am.

Speaker 2 I need the Eagles.

Speaker 1 I need him out of concussion protocol. I need to beat the Packers.
I need him out of concussion protocol.

Speaker 11 He's not telling me about Jalen Hurdle.

Speaker 1 Well, Max, Packer Dan.

Speaker 1 You would admit, Max, the Monday of a playoff game here in the word concussion protocol is troubling. Thank you.
It is

Speaker 1 a technicality.

Speaker 8 It's a bad technicality.

Speaker 1 It was impossible for him to get out of concussion protocol yesterday. But is that not a troubling technique? Because he's concussed? No.

Speaker 2 He would have had to have gotten out of concussion protocol last week if he was going to ⁇ because he wasn't out of concussion protocol last week, he had to still be in concussion protocol

Speaker 11 Monday. I think

Speaker 1 I'll just say this. I think the fact that Max is talking so much about the concussion protocols.
You're talking about the concussion.

Speaker 11 I'm not triggered. I know what you're trying to do.

Speaker 7 Why Packer Dan when Barcelon Big Pack was right there? Yeah.

Speaker 1 Because Yankee Dan packed. Get him out of concussion protocol.
And he did have, that is his second. If you look at the video after the Washington game, the first one.
Sorry. Sorry, Ben Concussed.

Speaker 1 I was just hearing. Oh, yeah.

Speaker 2 So PFT just is a constant state of concussion.

Speaker 7 No, we just hit guys hard. We played three.

Speaker 2 You said that AAA because you were still wearing sunglasses in the concussion.

Speaker 1 Well, yeah.

Speaker 7 You wear sunglasses inside. Actually, PFT up with your brain.

Speaker 11 You did have a concussion at the salt shed.

Speaker 7 Yeah, Yeah, I had multiple concussions. I also may have gotten bit by a rabid bat.
Still came out, did the show the night. Bang.

Speaker 1 Brandon, thank you so much for joining us. Appreciate it.
College football asked.

Speaker 7 Do you have any questions for us?

Speaker 1 No, no. I just, as my first official appearance as the official college football expert on this show, officially, I had a good time officially.
Okay. Okay.
Officially,

Speaker 1 good job.

Speaker 1 And we never did actually say, but the contest that I won, I had three schools left in the college football playoff. Fornelly has one.
He He has Penn State. Okay.

Speaker 1 If Penn State wins at all, I think Fornelly should probably win.

Speaker 7 That's what I said.

Speaker 1 But no, even if they win at all, he is still short of my point total.

Speaker 1 But if you don't get the champion, it's kind of unclear.

Speaker 7 That's not what we said.

Speaker 1 We'll have to review the team. You can review the team.

Speaker 2 You just type two buy schools.

Speaker 1 That's him. That's him.
If you choose buying.

Speaker 1 That's a lifestyle choice.

Speaker 1 Those are wins, too. But yeah,

Speaker 7 USA Rugby does the same thing. You finish in second place long enough, you get first place.

Speaker 7 It's like Kobe Bryant's career. It's like he was never the best player ever in the NBA, but he was always like number two, three.

Speaker 1 Guys, I have officially already made an appearance as the expert. I don't know what we can't unpack.
We're going to bleep that out.

Speaker 1 Clip what out? We're going to bleep out me saying expert.

Speaker 7 We can bleep out the Kobe stuff, too. I don't have time for the Kobe stands.

Speaker 1 Bleep out Concussion as well, and then the whole entire podcast will just be a bleep.

Speaker 1 All right, thanks, Wayne. Yep, you fat bleep.

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Speaker 1 All right, let's finish up with guys on chicks. Henry?

Speaker 7 Hank, how many of these questions are, hey, as a female AWL, I was greatly disappointed to hear that Max would not attend my bachelorette party.

Speaker 1 A lot. A lot.

Speaker 7 And that's sad.

Speaker 2 I didn't.

Speaker 2 I was just abiding by the rules.

Speaker 1 I was obliging to oblige. Did anyone tell you that you were saying that word incorrectly? Oh, yeah.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 7 Isn't that disgusting, Hank, that we have a producer that can't pronounce words?

Speaker 4 Yeah. It's sickening.

Speaker 1 Did you guys hear the other day?

Speaker 4 If I lost that bet, I would be at so many bachelorette parties. That's the thing about that.
Yeah, you would.

Speaker 1 That's the thing. thing about him.
That's the thing about me.

Speaker 7 He loves women. Did you guys?

Speaker 4 He had to respect them. Yeah.
Unlike Max.

Speaker 1 I have a girlfriend.

Speaker 7 Yeah, so you can't respect women if you're a woman.

Speaker 1 She could go too.

Speaker 7 If you're in a relationship, you can't respect women.

Speaker 1 What are you? Mike Pence? Can't be in the same place. Some room with the most respected women are your girlfriend.

Speaker 7 Max is afraid of getting in a room with some of that peanut butter skin.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 You just know what you do, so you got to stay away from it. Oh my God.

Speaker 1 Those cannons.

Speaker 7 You know what you're capable of max

Speaker 1 i i i meant to bring this up i don't know it's like maybe i think it was over christmas maybe uh

Speaker 1 charles do you charles i think it was charles davis we had a uh because i was talking about oblage and how you said that wrong he said it was a nick claus situation he said knut rockney oh yeah and he was like that's actually if you if you look it up that's actually how it was pronounced that's how he wrote the word yeah so hey canute rockney am i am i wrong but is this the hundred year anniversary of the Knut Rockne?

Speaker 7 I don't know.

Speaker 7 Was it the Four Horsemen of Notre Dame? Yeah.

Speaker 4 What are you guys talking?

Speaker 4 I'm pretty sure that was.

Speaker 7 Knut Rockne is a famous football player. I'm pretty sure that was 1924.
Way back when.

Speaker 1 If so. Or coach, sorry.

Speaker 7 If so, that would be like, I mean, Team of Destiny, Notre Dame, right? Yeah, not

Speaker 7 literally getting woken up.

Speaker 1 He coached from 1918 to 1930.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 Knut Rockney, shout out the legend. Yeah,

Speaker 1 the Four Horsemen, 1924, included the Four Horsemen. Backfield, the Harry Stoll

Speaker 1 Dreher,

Speaker 1 Don Miller, Jim Crowley, and Elmer Layden.

Speaker 1 Don't see a lot of Elmers in the backfield anymore.

Speaker 7 Elmer Layden was a problem.

Speaker 1 Elmer Layden. All right.
Hey, guys on chicks.

Speaker 4 Speaking of pronunciation, this actually kind of plays into it. We also got a note about this.

Speaker 4 K-E-T-O.

Speaker 1 Keto? Keto? Keto. Keto.

Speaker 4 That's the correct pronunciation. Okay.
Fun fact.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 4 My boyfriend decided he was going on a keto diet to start the new year.

Speaker 4 I always thought it was keto, too. Ketosis.
Yeah.

Speaker 7 Yeah. Is it ketosis?

Speaker 4 I guess. I don't know.
Keto.

Speaker 7 Keto Kalin?

Speaker 4 My boyfriend decided he was going on a keto diet to start the new year.

Speaker 4 I thought he was kidding, but when I came home from work the other day, he filled almost the entire fridge and freezer with meat. Yep.
Like a fridge almost entirely of fish, beef, and chicken.

Speaker 4 He's not crazy chunky, and I never said he had to lose weight. I actually like the little plump.

Speaker 1 I actually like the little kids. Oh, that's mean.

Speaker 4 But he's fully doing this, and it's kind of annoying. Probably piss smells bad too, right?

Speaker 4 Am I a bad girlfriend if I tell him to stop because I don't want our entire fridge and freezer filled with meat? Do I let him go for this? I'm thinking this resolution will end soon, anyways.

Speaker 4 That's the answer.

Speaker 1 You got to just ride it out.

Speaker 7 He's going to want carbs by Friday.

Speaker 1 Yeah, every diet goes the same way.

Speaker 4 Especially the January 1st one.

Speaker 1 Yeah, in the keto, you're like, damn, this is awesome. I can eat steak.
I can eat bacon. All I have to do is eat meat.

Speaker 1 And then you do it for like two weeks and you say shit, you know what I would like Die for right now is a piece of pizza.

Speaker 4 Yeah, guys see like an influencer who's in tremendous shape He's like all I have to do is eat as much meat as I want all the time and it's very easy for a guy to say yeah that sounds like the easiest diet ever but at the end of the day he's gonna want a bag of chips I went through this with the dunk when I was like looking up the easiest and or no the fastest ways to lose weight without you know losing like muscle or strength and it's key but it's then I looked into actually how you do it and I was like I'm not that's not possible.

Speaker 1 Yeah, no, it's kind of one of those trick diets where if you like. It's a Google, like, how do I do this? Yeah, and you say, hey, do you like steak? Yes.
Oh, do you like chicken? Yes.

Speaker 1 Well, I have a diet for you.

Speaker 1 But then you eat it, and you're just like, this sucks. Yeah.

Speaker 7 Also, you know what else I really like is all the sides that come with steak. Yeah.

Speaker 8 Yeah. Give me the, give me the cream of corn.

Speaker 7 Give me the twice-baked potato. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Give me the mashed. Give me the sweet potato fries.

Speaker 1 Give me all that shit. Give me the lobster mac.

Speaker 7 And it turns out that everything has carbs in it.

Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1 And sugar.

Speaker 7 And sugar, which is a carb.

Speaker 1 But I'm not eating candy. But you're right.

Speaker 4 Grapes, when I found out grapes were carbs, blew my mind.

Speaker 1 It did. Yeah.

Speaker 4 Hey, guys, my husband is a huge Baltimore sports fan. We are expecting our first child, and he is adamant on naming the boy Jackson.
Well, I do love the name Jackson.

Speaker 4 He wants to name the middle name either Lamar or Holiday.

Speaker 4 Is enough enough, or do I bend the knee? Has his sports fandom gone too far? He's going to run for the Hills?

Speaker 1 You got to go Holiday.

Speaker 1 I mean, that's because you cover both. Or does that then take away the Lamar?

Speaker 1 What's the question?

Speaker 2 I don't think it covers. I think it's just Jackson Holiday.

Speaker 1 Yeah, he's just naming him his name?

Speaker 2 And Jackson Holiday is also, he's a great prospect, but.

Speaker 1 Yeah, you might want to be... Lamar Jackson would be a safer bet.

Speaker 2 What if Jackson, like, it happens a lot that good prospects should be. Yeah.

Speaker 1 What about Jackson Gunner? That would be good.

Speaker 2 I like Gunner. I think Gunner Jackson flows.

Speaker 1 Gunner Jackson is great. All right, yeah, Gunner Jackson.
Jackson's cool.

Speaker 7 If you want to go with like a tried and true Baltimore guy, you could go Calvin Jackson. Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1 Then he sounds like a future president. That's true.

Speaker 1 Jackson's actually not a bad first name because you can do things with it. Like you give them chances.

Speaker 1 If you're naming your son something after a sports player or something weird, give them a chance. Give them a chance to change it if they want.
So if they become Jack, that's not a weird thing. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Also, don't do the X. I don't think you would, but the J-A-X-O-N is crazy.

Speaker 7 Also, Jackson to me sounds like more of a southern name, doesn't it? Yeah. Like if you're from Georgia, you're named Jackson.
That's different from if you're from Baltimore.

Speaker 1 A Nashville suburb. Yeah.

Speaker 7 How about this? How about

Speaker 7 Jackson Stavros?

Speaker 1 That's good. Jackson Stavros, the wire.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Okay, yeah, I think Jackson, though, is a good name.

Speaker 1 Maybe don't do Jackson Holiday because then that's just, then you're naming after jackson holiday not lamar jackson and also like max said prospects don't always pan out also the one jackson that we know sucks what's the jackson mccarthy mccarthy oh he's jackson that's i should know that because i'm his dad also there's something weird about naming naming your son after like a 21 year old that's not related to you right yeah you want with lamar at least he's got some age and he's he's become a part of baltimore yeah at this point it's like you're naming your son after a 21 year old who's good at sports Yeah, I think you were right with the Cal thing.

Speaker 1 Like, you want to name it after a guy whose career is over because you can't change it. Now,

Speaker 1 you could change it in, like, I don't know, hypothetically, like a double murder kind of situation.

Speaker 1 So maybe don't name it, name Mojay, but you can't, you can't change what they did, what they did after they retired.

Speaker 1 So maybe go Cal or Lamar Jackson's safe just because at bare minimum, he's got two MVPs. Yeah.
And he was electric.

Speaker 1 Like, if he never wins a Super Bowl, you still would be like, he had an insane career.

Speaker 7 But would that, like, if you were from Miami, you named your kid Marino? Hmm.

Speaker 1 Yeah, maybe go Joe. Flacco.
Flacco Jackson, the wire.

Speaker 1 Flacco Jackson. Gunner.
Flacco Jackson, the wire gunner. Last name.

Speaker 4 All right, we'll end with a part in your take.

Speaker 4 Hey, boys, new take. Why hasn't anyone tried to block a field goal at the crossbar?

Speaker 4 Obviously, it would never have to be, obviously it would have to be a long field goal so the kick has a chance of landing short, but I feel like there's enough there to at least give it a try.

Speaker 4 The Lions could have tried against the Ravens back when Tucker kicked the 66-yarder. The crossbar is 10 feet above the ground, and anyone who can dunk could give it a shot.
What do you guys think?

Speaker 4 Much love, Gohawk.

Speaker 1 I agree with this. I don't know if it's legal.
Can you

Speaker 1 have goaltend? Field goal rules right now.

Speaker 7 Okay. I'm not sure, but we're going to find out.
What would make it illegal?

Speaker 1 I don't know if there's goaltending.

Speaker 4 What's the difference between five inches

Speaker 4 and 50 yards?

Speaker 7 Because if not, why not you sign Wimby for a playoff contract and just put him back there on field goals?

Speaker 4 I'm guessing you can't put your hand on the crossbar, but if you're just straight up jumping up.

Speaker 7 All right, so the ball must pass through the vertical plane of the goal, which is the area above the crossbar.

Speaker 7 If the ball passes through the goal and returns through the goal without striking the ground or some object or person beyond the goal, the attempt is unsuccessful.

Speaker 1 So I'm reading right here that Morris Stroud of the Chiefs used to do that, and then they changed the rule. Rule 12, Section 3, Article 1, formerly known as the Stroud Rule.

Speaker 1 Goaltending by any player leaping up to deflect a kick as it passes above the crossbar of a goal post is prohibited. The referee could award three points for a palpably unfair act.

Speaker 1 That's bullshit. That is bullshit.
I think you should get... What would be interesting is if they changed the rule where you can goaltend.
You have to catch it, though.

Speaker 1 Or it's a live ball.

Speaker 7 That'd be hard.

Speaker 1 I know, but it would be, you know, at the end of a game, like, hey, we gotta, this guy's got it, because then how electric would be if the guy tipped it to himself and dropped it, and then it became goaltending.

Speaker 7 And if you, if you reject it above the crossbar and catch it and return it for a touchdown, that's worth 10 points.

Speaker 1 I like that. That's automatic Super Bowl.
Yeah. I like that a lot.

Speaker 7 This is a weird penalty for them to implement because the chance of this happening got to be very, very rare, right?

Speaker 1 Yeah, I'd agree. It doesn't.
I mean, I guess someone was doing it, but uh,

Speaker 1 yeah, yeah, so it sounds like they made it illegal. That sucks.
That'd be fun. I also wish that the Arizona State field goal counted.
People were trying to say that it did.

Speaker 7 The one that bounced in? Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 That'd be cool as well.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 Numbers.

Speaker 1 What? We're like a week into

Speaker 1 2025, and memes still has never gotten it.

Speaker 7 I'm going to go with five.

Speaker 2 Eleven. Three.

Speaker 1 Do you want three? No.

Speaker 5 I'm thinking.

Speaker 4 33. Let me find a number in here.

Speaker 1 Memes, what are you most worried about?

Speaker 1 PFT getting it for a second time or Jack getting it and then you being literally the only one to never get it?

Speaker 5 PFT has never gotten by himself.

Speaker 7 Oh, that's actually not true. Yeah, he actually has gotten it

Speaker 1 by himself?

Speaker 7 On this machine, I've gotten it. On the old machine, I get it several times.

Speaker 1 You've never gotten it on any machine, ever.

Speaker 4 That's crazy.

Speaker 1 I also think memes like someone.

Speaker 4 People underestimate the fact that you never got it in the old office either.

Speaker 1 Yeah, they never got it. I also think something's up with memes.
I think he like got concussed over the break or something because he seems like a little bit happier. I don't know what it is.

Speaker 1 It's the jumpsuit. Oh, really?

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 8 He's really excited about the jumpsuit.

Speaker 1 Like he was smiling to me today. I was like, this is weird.

Speaker 7 Memes got hacked.

Speaker 1 He's never done this before. Yeah, and the jet season is over.

Speaker 5 Yeah. And we're winning the Super Bowl next year.

Speaker 1 Nice. Okay, three.

Speaker 1 Eight.

Speaker 1 21.

Speaker 13 ninety-nine Pug

Speaker 1 48 48's Jack. What was yours, PFT?

Speaker 7 Five

Speaker 1 Max, what was yours?

Speaker 1 Eleven. What was yours, Hank?

Speaker 4 33

Speaker 1 57

Speaker 1 57.

Speaker 4 Love you guys.