NFL Writer Michael Silver, Jayden Daniels Is Incredible, The Jags Are Dead, College Football Talk + Guys On Chicks

Speaker 1 Hey, Pardon My Take listeners. You can find every episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube.
Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music.

Speaker 2 This season, transform your space into an entertainer's dream with Wayfair. Everything ships fast, right to your door.
Shop everything home today at Wayfair.com. That's W-A-Y-F-A-I-R.com.

Speaker 2 Wayfair, every style, every home.

Speaker 1 On today's Pardon My Take, we have a great, great interview with Michael Silver.

Speaker 1 He's got a new book out called The Why is Everything, talking football, the Shanahan Coaching Tree, some awesome stories of behind the NFL. He came in studio, really, really interesting.

Speaker 1 He's been obviously in the game for a very long time. We're going to talk Monday night football.
PFT was in the house. We're going to talk college football Wednesday.
We've got a lot to get to there.

Speaker 1 Hot seat, cool thrown, guys on chicks, pack show for you.

Speaker 3 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 3 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 3 Head to Chevy.com to learn more and build your own Chevy Silverado.

Speaker 1 Okay, let's go.

Speaker 1 Harry.

Speaker 1 More than my tape.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 More than my tape.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 More than my tape.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 More than my tape.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 More than my tape.

Speaker 1 Welcome to Part of My Take presented by DraftKings. Use DraftKings right now pick six app and use code TAKE.
That's code TAKE for new customers to play $5 on your first pick six set.

Speaker 1 Get $50 in Pick 6 credits only on DraftKings Pick Six. The crown is yours.
Today is Wednesday, September 25th. And PFT Jaden Daniels is incredible.

Speaker 4 I don't want to get ahead of myself here, but get ahead of yourself. I don't want to get ahead of myself.

Speaker 1 Get ahead of yourself. He's so good.
He's so good.

Speaker 4 He's so good.

Speaker 5 PFT is holding up a championship pelt.

Speaker 1 Yes. I am.

Speaker 4 I'm not going to get ahead of myself. It's a long season, and it's too soon to say anything definitive about him.

Speaker 4 But what I saw last night made me feel emotions that I have not felt in my cold, dead football heart in decades.

Speaker 4 It was awesome. It was so fun to watch.
And it's not just like the throw he had to Terry at the end was one of the craziest throws I've ever seen in the

Speaker 4 getting destroyed in the pocket and threw it on a dot to Terry, dropped it in the bucket. I'm happy for Terry too, most of all, because he's had some.

Speaker 1 They showed the graphic. I think that was his 11th quarterback.
He's got a touchdown pass from.

Speaker 4 Yeah, there's been some bad names on that list. Yeah.
Some real bad names on that list. And

Speaker 4 it was an incredible moment. That throw was obviously great.
But what really got me excited about Jaden, I heard some people calling a J. Corps stadium now.
Oh, Spru Head. It might be called J.

Speaker 1 Corps. Oh.

Speaker 4 Yeah. So he won the LSU off.
And we'll get to the Bengals a little bit. I think they'll be fine.

Speaker 1 I don't.

Speaker 4 But what got me the most excited about Jaden was how he handled like third downs, fourth downs. He was cool.
He was directing guys around.

Speaker 4 He was calm in the pocket, finding guys downfield on second downs, picking up like six, seven yards to make third down easier.

Speaker 1 Like,

Speaker 4 I think that's the best game I've ever seen a quarterback play for my team.

Speaker 1 He played a perfect game. It was a perfect game.
Like, every big play that you needed,

Speaker 1 whether it be run or pass, because he mixed in runs, but it wasn't like, oh, he's just running. It was just timely, perfect runs and then big-time passes.
And yeah, it was an incredible game to watch.

Speaker 1 Like, he was out of this world good.

Speaker 4 And eyes downfield while he's scrambling to the side, so you can't, the linebackers can't come up too far and commit.

Speaker 4 So he's going to take those yards when they're there with his feet, or he's going to find somebody downfield.

Speaker 4 It was so fun being at that game. I was screaming my head off.
The Bengals fans, by the way, City of Cincinnati, awesome people. Yeah.
Love the Bengals fans.

Speaker 4 They were bummed out, obviously, because their team didn't look great on defense, but there were no punts, no turnovers. It's the first time that's happened since when?

Speaker 1 Like, I don't know.

Speaker 4 Last week. No, no punts and no turnovers in the same game.

Speaker 1 Oh, oh, both for

Speaker 1 the week.

Speaker 6 The commanders did it last week.

Speaker 4 I want to say like 40 years, 50 years, something like that. Yeah.
And then the commanders did that.

Speaker 4 I don't think the commanders have ever done done that. Like two games in a row with no punts and no turnovers is just insane.
So it feels like I'm watching different sports.

Speaker 4 Now, I have to get better as a fan because

Speaker 4 I'm not used to winning. Yeah.
I'm not. So I got to figure out how to win.

Speaker 1 On top of the NFC Eastern.

Speaker 4 How to win with classes. That's a very good point, Big Cat.

Speaker 4 I didn't even pack a second Washington shirt to wear on the Play and Ride home the next day, which is a rookie move. And I know Chiefs fans are really good at this.

Speaker 4 When they travel for a game, you got to pack a victory shirt to wear through your opponent's airport the next next day.

Speaker 4 I didn't have a victory shirt.

Speaker 1 I think you got to, I mean, there's levels to it.

Speaker 1 You got to start with your victory shirt. I think you also have to figure out the victory koozie because

Speaker 1 that's one, you know, pre-gaming at a bar, you got to put on, you know,

Speaker 1 you get the beer, throw on the Chiefs koozie. Yeah, there's all kinds of accoutrements that you need.

Speaker 4 I'm not used to this. He's making all this better.
I'm building a winning culture for myself as a fan right now.

Speaker 1 It was so much fun to watch.

Speaker 1 He was out like every pass was perfect.

Speaker 4 And you know what the best part was? it's just the feeling last night, and then this morning, waking up and watching every single highlight compilation.

Speaker 4 I was watching, I was downloading all these YouTube videos for the Plane Ride Home.

Speaker 4 Even the like foreign ones that are spoken in the robotic British voice where they don't really have the rights to it, and it's like still pictures. Yeah.

Speaker 4 And it's just narrating what happened during those still pictures. I was watching those.
I was reading every article about Jaden. I was overdosing on Jaden Daniels.
I OD'd on Jay D.

Speaker 1 He was so good, it completely overshadowed the fact that Trevor Lawrence might stink.

Speaker 1 That's how good Jaden Daniels was.

Speaker 4 Yeah, he might stink. Yeah.
And I think Shad Khan said before the season, this is the best team that the Jaguars have ever assembled. So to me, that does not sound good for Doug Peterson.

Speaker 1 But sticking on your game, yeah, Jaden was out of this world good. Cliff Kingsbury called a perfect game.

Speaker 1 I do think the Bengals are in trouble.

Speaker 4 Their defense is not good at all.

Speaker 1 Their defense,

Speaker 1 I think they have some injuries because I was reading Bengals fans getting upset. Trey Hendrickson obviously was playing, but I think they were on their seventh, eighth, and ninth defensive lineman.

Speaker 1 But here's why the Bengals, I think, are in trouble. One, their defense feels like it's a very big problem that is going to be hard to fix.

Speaker 1 Also, only six of the 225 teams that started 0-3 in the Super Bowl era have made the playoffs. One of them famously was my pinky team in 2018, the Houston Texans.

Speaker 1 So 2.4% chance of the Bengals statistically making the playoffs.

Speaker 5 Does it help there's an extra game? Does that matter?

Speaker 4 It might. It might matter.

Speaker 1 There's a statistics major there, Hank.

Speaker 4 I'm going to look this up. Yeah, that's very insightful, actually.
I didn't mean to actually. I'm just going to say that was very insightful, Hank.
Yeah.

Speaker 4 But if you look at their schedule, I'm going to do Pete Prisco on you. It's all about the schedule.
It's not easy. They have an easy schedule.
Oh, they do? Yeah, the Panthers.

Speaker 1 Are the Panthers easy?

Speaker 4 Andy Dalton. Andy Dalton, revenge game.
Ravens.

Speaker 1 That's a tough place to play in Carolina now. It It is.
They got the brown bags off their heads.

Speaker 4 Keep pounding. I did see that Dave Canalis tweeted out keep and then went dot, dot, dot.
I don't think he's allowed to say keep pounding. It's not part of his covenant.

Speaker 4 Then they got the Giants, the Browns, the Birds, Raiders,

Speaker 1 Ravens again, Chargers. I don't.

Speaker 4 I think they have one of the easier schedules in the NFL.

Speaker 1 But the problem is when you start 0-3 and you have to get the 10 wins,

Speaker 1 you can't have another fluke bad game. You can't have another

Speaker 1 unfortunate chiefs ending of the game like you can't the margin for error now is so thin for the bengals but this is also what the bengals do it's true i just this is the only reason i think they did kind of get robbed on the the no pass interference yes yeah the the only wait again or no sorry that was the

Speaker 1 falcons they the chiefs got the pass interference yes the falcons didn't get the pass interference yeah the chiefs didn't get a pass interference i'm not going to write off the bengals because joe burrows joe burrow and that offense is elite i just think it feels different because i don't know where the fixes are on defense.

Speaker 1 The only fix I have for the Bengals is Joe Burrow has to change his hair color. You can't be 0-3 with those, without hair.
And we love Joe, but

Speaker 1 I think he deep down knows it.

Speaker 4 That was a very popular sentiment in the section I was at. He was like, get rid of the frosted tips, Joe.
That's a 3-0. You can't lose.
You've got to cut your hair.

Speaker 4 They showed him going into his coach's office after the game. He didn't go to the locker room.
He walked like straight into the coach's office with Zach Taylor, and they had a chat about something.

Speaker 4 He should just walk right into the barbershop right afterwards and be like, nope, can't take it off.

Speaker 4 You can't lose with frosted tips.

Speaker 6 Or like diet jet black.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah, go goth.
Yeah. Go goth.

Speaker 1 It's sad around here.

Speaker 4 He's in a sad boy era right now. Yeah, it was, god damn, it was a fun game to be at.

Speaker 1 I mean, it had to have been so much fun.

Speaker 4 So before the game, I was lucky. I had a couple beers with the mayor of Cincinnati.
Nice. Aptab Purville.
Die who killed Harambe? No, he took over after.

Speaker 4 He's the one that covered up the death of Harambe.

Speaker 5 But you met with him before

Speaker 5 back in the day, right? Back in the day, yeah.

Speaker 4 I don't know anything about his politics. He's a cool guy.
I had a fun time drinking beers with him. And we made a bet because I love the Good Mayor's bets where they do like the dorkiest bets ever.

Speaker 1 Did you get us Rambe's ashes?

Speaker 4 No, I didn't.

Speaker 4 I should have.

Speaker 4 Actually,

Speaker 4 my initial plan was to ask him for all the documents surrounding the death and subsequent cover-up of Harambe.

Speaker 4 But the bet was if the Bengals won, he was going to get my mega jeans. Oh, nice.
He loves the Jinko look. He loves the wide legs.

Speaker 4 And then if the Commanders won, he had to buy me a full case, 24 Skyline chili cans. Oh, so he's going to be shipping some Skyline chili cans.

Speaker 1 I never saw that coming that you were trying to get Skyline chili.

Speaker 4 I mean, I kind of got forced into this bet. So I guess I'm going to have to eat some Skyline Chili.

Speaker 4 I have a hypothetical question. People are trying to drive wedges in between certain people on this podcast based on quarterbacks.

Speaker 1 I would like to talk about that.

Speaker 4 But I have the question of the week.

Speaker 4 Hank, do you have a noise for that?

Speaker 1 Oh, you almost. That was so close.

Speaker 7 That was so close.

Speaker 1 You just edged us. Yeah.
You literally edged us with the nerd nugget of the week. Do it again.
Doot, dude, truth.

Speaker 1 Okay, the question of the week.

Speaker 4 I'll ask Hank.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 4 Hank, I want to be respectful of everybody on this podcast.

Speaker 4 Always. But right now, if you're starting a franchise and take everything like age, contracts, all that stuff into account.
Coaches? Yeah, no, just straight up the player. Just Jalen.
Just the player.

Speaker 4 Would you rather have Jaden Daniels or Jalen Hurts?

Speaker 1 Yeah. Oh, yeah.
That's what everyone wants to say. I like this question, PFT.

Speaker 4 Be honest.

Speaker 1 Be honest.

Speaker 4 Contracts matter. Max, don't interrupt the question of the week ever again.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Well, I mean, don't follow what that was doing. You knew what he was doing.
I didn't.

Speaker 1 I didn't realize. Everyone wants to know the real question.

Speaker 1 No, no, I'll come back to you. I'll talk about the real question.
I don't want to know what you're doing. You're like the fucking Kool-Aid man in the booth.
You're ruining. What memes just said to me?

Speaker 4 You're ruining the question of the week, Max.

Speaker 1 Phillies.

Speaker 7 And all these channels.

Speaker 1 Can we have that as a graphic? Would you rather have Jaden Daniels or Jalen Hurts answer Phillies?

Speaker 4 Who would you rather have? Jaden Daniels or Jalen Hurts?

Speaker 5 If it's contracts and Jaden Daniels, but just purely because of the contract.

Speaker 1 What about no contracts?

Speaker 5 No contract. Jalen Hurts is more experienced.
Okay.

Speaker 4 More experience, yeah.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 More winning experience. Max, would you like to ask the real question?

Speaker 7 What do you say to the haters?

Speaker 7 What do you say to the haters, big cat?

Speaker 1 I say that the Bears have done it again. Yeah.
I say I'm in a fucking no-win situation because if I respond to them, they're going to say that I'm just like trying to cope.

Speaker 1 And when in reality, PFT and I have known each other for a very long time. We've been doing the show for a very long time.
I consider him one of the closest people in my entire life.

Speaker 1 He was at that game. His quarterback history is just as bad as the Bears' quarterback history.
He watched Jaden Daniels perform like that. I felt nothing but happiness for him.
Now, nothing? Yes.

Speaker 1 Can you let me finish, Henry?

Speaker 1 Now,

Speaker 1 this is partially because I am completely undeterred with Caleb Williams. If I were deterred at all, I would probably have a different feeling.
I am undeterred. I think Caleb Williams is great.

Speaker 1 I think he's going to be great. I know people want to fucking nitpick and say, LOL Bears, week three, you know, three weeks of the season, he's a bust.
That's fine. They could do that.

Speaker 1 Me, when I go to bed, when I put my head on my pillow at night, I'm like, Caleb Williams is fucking awesome. Why can't we both have awesome quarterbacks?

Speaker 1 The only part of PFT's situation right now that I am jealous of, and I will be fully transparent for, is Cliff Kingsbury can call a hell of a game as an offensive coordinator, and I got a fucking dumb, dumb, poopy, poopy brain in Shane Waldron.

Speaker 1 That one, like,

Speaker 1 the commanders without Dan Snyder seem like they're running an organization correctly. The Bears still have their head up their ass.
So it's not that I think Caleb Williams is...

Speaker 1 I feel that Caleb Williams is going to be great.

Speaker 1 I still think the Bears are a big problem.

Speaker 4 I agree with that. I think they're both going to be great.
I think they're both really good.

Speaker 1 People can't.

Speaker 4 Daniels is so good.

Speaker 1 If I say it, people are like, oh, you're just coping. But this is my true sentiment, so I don't know what else I'm supposed to say.

Speaker 1 They want me to be mad about something I'm not mad about.

Speaker 4 Here's the issue. If you get down to the offensive coordinator situation, Cliff Kingsbury, he was Caleb Williams' offensive coordinator last year at USC.

Speaker 4 He obviously knows what he's doing with talented quarterbacks. Your offensive coordinator now was hired because he was the guy that would take a job in essentially a lame duck Matt Eberflus era.
Yes.

Speaker 4 So if you had started over again and fired Matt Eberflus this offseason,

Speaker 4 then you would have a good offensive coordinator.

Speaker 1 That's a leap.

Speaker 4 You could potentially have a good offensive head coach. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Or offensive coach. Potentially.
Yes. But

Speaker 4 the fact that they didn't fire Matt meant that Eberflus had to go out there and make phone calls and be like, hey, I really need you to help me turn this thing around or else we're all going to be fired next year.

Speaker 4 So, could you maybe move to Chicago? Don't vibe, but rent a house.

Speaker 1 And then have a clip where they announced it live at a Super Bowl press row, and Jackson Smith Najigba, who is live, was like, oh, they hired him?

Speaker 4 Yeah, good luck with that.

Speaker 1 Yeah, his former wide receiver. So, yeah.

Speaker 4 But listen, I stand with Big Cat. Despite what Big Cat may have thought a couple weeks ago, I am rooting very hard for Caleb Williams.

Speaker 1 No, I believe you.

Speaker 4 I want Caleb. I bet on Caleb Williams big time last week.
I've seen

Speaker 4 the throws and the plays he can make. He's going to be a very good player.

Speaker 1 I mean, he just had the most passing yards for a Bears quarterback since Brian Hoyer in 2016.

Speaker 1 I don't know what, I mean, the Hanks of the world, the Trolls of the world, they're literally going to not, if I say this, they're going to be like, there's no way this is how he's feeling.

Speaker 1 I don't know what else to say. I was very happy for PFT.
He deserves happiness. That was awesome to watch.
Can I just...

Speaker 4 I just want to talk about how good he is again.

Speaker 1 PFT, I would tweet Jaden Daniels is incredible or Jaden Daniels, what a throw. And just all my replies are like, you're so salty.
I was like, what?

Speaker 6 How can I, what do I need to do?

Speaker 1 How do I correct it?

Speaker 4 I don't know. Just say he's so good.

Speaker 1 He is so good. There we go.
He's so good.

Speaker 1 The thing is, everybody knows it. And my power retains today.
He was Jaden Daniels is incredible, Washington Commander's next to him.

Speaker 4 You know what I, okay, so also having like a tiny bit of success, and I fully realize this is one game.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 4 I'm not going to overreact, and I'm not going to get ahead of myself.

Speaker 4 But now I can,

Speaker 4 I can't wait for, I don't like that look.

Speaker 1 The tongue is out. The tongue's tongue is out.

Speaker 1 Put your fucking tongue back in your head.

Speaker 4 It's like Steph Curry when he's about to put up a three from the moon. Hank's got a troll thought that he would like to ruin the podcast with.

Speaker 1 MJ's tongue and Hank's tongue, the two most famous tongues.

Speaker 5 Not a troll thought, just a thought, because you said, you know, it's been a long time.

Speaker 5 A lot years, whatever.

Speaker 5 You did have

Speaker 5 an electric run with a quarterback.

Speaker 5 Not too long ago.

Speaker 1 Right. Fitzpatrick?

Speaker 5 RG3. RG3 versus the Vikings.
Primetime game. Electric.

Speaker 1 Oh, this is mean.

Speaker 1 I'm just saying.

Speaker 4 Listen, go back.

Speaker 5 That was a similar

Speaker 1 change. Hater Hank.
What are you talking about? But that was a 2KQB.

Speaker 5 Unbelievable game. Great performance.

Speaker 1 You thought you had the QB? What do you mean?

Speaker 4 Unbelievable game. It was an unbelievable season from RG3.
Yeah, it was very good that season.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 4 But, okay, Hank, two things can be true.

Speaker 5 You said that you haven't felt this in a long time, but did you not feel the same way with RG3?

Speaker 4 Hank's over a decade ago. Okay.
That's 12 years ago.

Speaker 5 And did you not feel the same way?

Speaker 4 Listen, two things can be true. One, Hank's speech is shit troll.
And two, I mean, that's just

Speaker 1 had multiple decades, but that. Yeah, you did.

Speaker 5 No, he definitely did.

Speaker 4 You won't let me even say point two. That's how big a troll you're being.
My point two is

Speaker 4 Hank is actually correct.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 4 That, like, it is, there's a lot of similarities between Jaden Daniels and RG3. They're both electric athletes.
Jaden is already more developed as a pocket passer than RG3 was.

Speaker 5 His deep ball is incredible. Learn ball, Hank.

Speaker 4 Yeah, learn ball, please. Oh, and by the way, Taylor Britt, the cornerback on the Bengals, he is the.
Yeah. Who's the LeBron stopper? Dylan Brooks? Yeah.

Speaker 1 Lann Stevenson.

Speaker 4 He's like the Dylan Brooks of

Speaker 4 the NFL. He loves talking shit before games.
It's crazy.

Speaker 1 He was right about Xavier Worthy.

Speaker 4 He was, but he also didn't have a great game against the Chiefs. I think he gave up a big touchdown that game.
But he was talking shit about the offense.

Speaker 1 He did have that crazy interception.

Speaker 4 The interception was.

Speaker 1 Bengals fans are going to get mad that we didn't say that.

Speaker 4 Yes, but he's also addicted to talking shit correct He's so he talks shit about the the college style offense Yeah simple offense and then he he got cooked so um

Speaker 4 oh back to Hank yeah the troll

Speaker 4 there's a ton of similarities like there are a lot of similarities between the situation I'm in right now and where I was in 2012 mentally

Speaker 4 the difference is I think that Jaden is built to last in the NFL.

Speaker 4 As long as we don't fuck him up with a weird, creepy injury, I think what I saw from last night, that tells me I got 12 years of happiness. I think the organization

Speaker 1 helps no Dan Snyder.

Speaker 1 That's the answer. No Dan Snyder.
No Dan Snyder.

Speaker 5 I was just trying to clarify what you're talking about.

Speaker 1 Thanks for asking for a clarification.

Speaker 4 I know we're grass guys, but I'm thinking just like, please, maybe just bulldoze the thing and put in some really good turf, like keep them healthy.

Speaker 4 We can't figure out how to keep a grass field healthy for people. I also don't appreciate Max's little grin.
Like, he knows that I'm

Speaker 4 getting too happy.

Speaker 1 No, commanders are too much. commanders are top of the NFC East.
Yes, they are. Yes, they are.

Speaker 4 Wave up at him.

Speaker 7 No, I wish Jaden Daniels

Speaker 7 was not in the NFC East. I'm willing to say that.

Speaker 1 He looks good. He looks very good.
He looks.

Speaker 7 I wish he wasn't in the NFC East.

Speaker 1 Not only in the New Year.

Speaker 7 That is the biggest compliment I can get. Yeah.

Speaker 4 Yeah, I appreciate that.

Speaker 4 And what I feel a little bit is like, maybe, maybe one day Eagles fans will hate the Commanders again. Maybe one day Cowboys will hate the Commanders.

Speaker 7 I was thinking that.

Speaker 7 It was TV too.

Speaker 7 What?

Speaker 7 Monday Night Football.

Speaker 1 You had Jaguars Bills on TV one? It was a blowout. Oh,

Speaker 1 you were watching Love Actually? Yep. No.
Yeah. I was watching.
You were doing Smoochie Face to Love Actually?

Speaker 6 Nope. Oh, well,

Speaker 1 the only answer you can say right now is Monday Night Raw. No.
You weren't watching Monday Night Raw? I never watched Monday Night Raw in my favor.

Speaker 4 Were you watching like Southern House or something?

Speaker 1 Which was a movie.

Speaker 4 I was watching Twisters.

Speaker 7 It was a fine movie.

Speaker 4 Okay. That's pretty sick.
You didn't see it in theaters?

Speaker 7 But I was watching it on my laptop.

Speaker 1 Oh, that's TV2. That's TV2? Yeah,

Speaker 1 I don't have two TVs.

Speaker 4 Would TV3 your phone?

Speaker 7 TV3 would be phone. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Correct.

Speaker 7 Well, actually, to be honest, it was Phillies. And then when the Phillies started to put it away, then it was.

Speaker 4 I love it. You're overlooking us.
I love it.

Speaker 1 No. No.

Speaker 1 I'm not overlooking it. Is Jalen Hurts the third best quarterback in the NFC East now?

Speaker 4 Well, if we're doing the question.

Speaker 4 Like, which quarterback would you take? Given the salary, age, and all that.

Speaker 1 I would take Jaden Guy Mills.

Speaker 1 Thank you. Thank you, Melissa.
Oh, wow. Yeah.
Any rookie contractor. On a rookie quarterback? Yeah.
On a rookie contract?

Speaker 4 But yeah, he's, I mean, I don't know. It's one game, but he's the best quarterback in that division, maybe even in the entire league.
It's one game. And I'm not going to get ahead of myself.

Speaker 5 He's right about the one game.

Speaker 1 How many touchdowns did he score against the Giants? He's right about the one game.

Speaker 4 How many drives? How many touchdowns?

Speaker 4 How many punts did he have against the Giants? That's the real question we should be asking ourselves. Two games in a row, no punts, no interceptions.

Speaker 7 Yeah, no, he looks very, very good, and I do think he's going to be a very, very good quarterback.

Speaker 4 I'm also excited. He scored zero touchdowns against the Giants.

Speaker 4 Okay, well, that was a long time ago that was last weeks that was weeks ago weeks ago decades ago yeah just as weeks decades no i jaden daniels is it looks incredible i'm excited i'm excited to also get mad at at hypothetical quarterback lists now too what did you say earlier before hank interrupted you you said that you said that you're very excited about something yeah i'm excited about getting

Speaker 4 uh angry yeah life everything i'm excited about getting angry at people that i think are slightly disrespecting my quarterback okay like becoming full stand.

Speaker 5 What is your schedule looking like? What's your projection now after last night?

Speaker 1 I think it's soupy.

Speaker 4 No, no, not thinking soupy.

Speaker 1 Yoffs?

Speaker 4 I did fire off a tweet at like 3 a.m. as I was.
I got back from the casino. I had a couple cocktails, C.J.
Abrams style, and

Speaker 4 I said that I think he's going to win a Super Bowl in the next five years.

Speaker 5 Whoa.

Speaker 1 And I think he is. I like it.

Speaker 4 Maybe even two. But

Speaker 4 Yoffs this year.

Speaker 1 Love that. We're thinking Yoffs.

Speaker 4 Yoffs is realistic. And I do think that the Bengals can make the Yoffs given their schedule.
I think they'll Louie Maruno is just how do you say his name?

Speaker 1 Yeah, you got it.

Speaker 4 Anarumo, he's so good. He's going to figure out

Speaker 4 he's going to figure something out.

Speaker 1 I don't know if they have the dudes, they lost some guys on defense.

Speaker 4 Yeah, and then Trent Brown going down was bad, too. Bad.

Speaker 1 Best tattoo ever. Yeah.
Two girls sucking him off on his arm. Yeah.

Speaker 1 We should talk about the other game real quick. Josh Allen is incredible.
I know people will be like,

Speaker 1 he's a leader for the MVP right now. He basically

Speaker 1 beat the Jaguars in 30 minutes. Trevor Lawrence helped to beat the Jaguars.
He looked bad.

Speaker 5 Commanders had a perfect game. Josh Allen had a perfect half.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 And the game was over. It was over.
It was over. I mean, Tamar Hamlin picked off Trevor Lawrence and it was over.
But Josh Allen was, he was toying with them.

Speaker 1 That wasn't, it's so, I'm very happy for Bills fans that like the angst of having to reset the roster and everything.

Speaker 1 You have Josh Allen. And Josh Allen is what a franchise quarterback looks like.
And we've said it a million times. Just because he's not Patrick Mahomes doesn't mean

Speaker 1 he is the second best quarterback in the NFL. And this is why you see it.

Speaker 4 And it probably is addition by subtraction, losing Diggs. Oh, definitely.
And Gabe Davis, who you never knew if he was going to actually be alive on a week-to-week basis.

Speaker 1 Yeah, Keon Coleman.

Speaker 4 Got a touchdown. Keon Coleman, it's...
It feels like Josh is like, he's turned a brand new page, clean slate for this team. So he doesn't have any any of that excess baggage that he used to have.

Speaker 4 And so now he's just going out there. He's like, I have to win these football games.
And also, Cook is looking really good at running back.

Speaker 1 Cook looks awesome. Shakir looks awesome.

Speaker 4 And as the games get further into the season, it gets colder, they're going to lean on that running game. Yeah.
And Joe Brady loves to lean on the running game when it works.

Speaker 4 They're not going to abandon it. I think that the Bills are for real.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 It looks awesome.

Speaker 5 It was Brady at like a... Five touchdowns to five different players is a sign of a great team.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 And yeah, just Josh Allen just seeing the game better than anyone right now.

Speaker 1 He is a leader for the MVP. I think odds-wise, I mean, he's playing better than Mahomes through three games.

Speaker 1 Trevor Lawrence might suck.

Speaker 1 Now,

Speaker 1 I haven't thought Trevor Lawrence sucked because I'm like, it's the Jaguars and also he was really good at Clemson and like that guy's somewhere.

Speaker 1 When he did the spin to nowhere, that was the first time where I was like, oh, no. Or the pick to DeMar.
I mean, the pick was to DeMar, but the spin to nowhere. By a dead guy.
Like, bad picks happen.

Speaker 1 That was a really bad pick. But the spin to nowhere made me, that was a Sam Darnold scene ghost moment where he's literally just, it was, he spun with to nowhere.
It just made it worse for him. Yeah.

Speaker 4 And so I feel like he spun into his own guy.

Speaker 1 Yeah, it was. I don't know.
I feel bad for chaps. This is an ugly situation.
And then, I mean, we did get to see Mac Jones first play fumble, which was very funny. It was perfect.

Speaker 1 I just punched it out of his hand.

Speaker 1 I don't know where to go if you're the Jaguars.

Speaker 4 Yeah, it seems like... London.

Speaker 1 Yeah, go to London.

Speaker 4 You're right.

Speaker 4 When the owner says before the season starts that this is the most talented team he's ever assembled, then that means that it's on the head coach. That means that Doug Peterson is not long fast world.

Speaker 4 Might not be. Bring Urban back.

Speaker 1 I don't know.

Speaker 1 It was also one of those games you've seen a lot of.

Speaker 1 Nothing would look weirder

Speaker 1 than Bill Bella's. The weirdest fit ever.
I just want to say that.

Speaker 4 In a Jaguars outfit on the sideline.

Speaker 5 Well, we can talk. I mean,

Speaker 5 what he's doing with the Cowboys is so funny. Have you seen that? No.

Speaker 5 He does McAfee every week, and he just

Speaker 5 is over-complimentary about how well the team is built. And they have all the players and all the tools.

Speaker 1 It's just like

Speaker 5 something to

Speaker 5 figure it all out. He's just openly, you know, essentially applying for the job, being like, their roster is really constructed great.
Like they have all the tools.

Speaker 4 He's got a little bit of Hank Lockwood in him. He's got some of that troll going.

Speaker 4 Like, when he was talking about the Falcons on the Manning cast and saying, yeah, he's one of those guys that they got in trouble for because they tampered with him. Yeah.

Speaker 4 He's just going scorched earth on. I got a text from Cheps.
I just read it right now because I think he sent it during the game, and I was drunk and preoccupied.

Speaker 1 He was in hell.

Speaker 4 He said, oh, yeah, same thing. Kind of cool that Trevor Lawrence is the first guy picked off by a former corpse.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 4 So DeMar's back.

Speaker 1 Yeah, DeMar is back. Happy for DeMar.
First interception.

Speaker 4 Very happy for DeMar.

Speaker 1 I love the

Speaker 1 clone. I love the double Monday night, header, Monday night football, double-header Monday night football.

Speaker 1 I know we had the discussion, but that was exactly why, because the Bills Jags game was over in 10 minutes, and the Commanders Bengals game was awesome.

Speaker 1 If we had just Bills Jags, that would have been a really disappointing Monday night.

Speaker 4 Yeah, something I'm going to... Get a backup plan.

Speaker 4 I like having the standalone because it's good to just, especially after watching all your screens all day on Sunday, it's good to have one game that we can all focus on together.

Speaker 4 But if there's a blowout, it's good to have the backup plan.

Speaker 1 And this was a great backup. And we we have it again next week.

Speaker 4 Oh, who do we got?

Speaker 1 I believe Seahawks.

Speaker 4 Yeah, Lions Seahawks should be great.

Speaker 1 And then I think it's like Dolphins, which is actually, it's good because

Speaker 1 if they could ever do like flex scheduling to schedule it this way, it would work where you're like, this is the game that's going to be a bummer. And this is the game that should be great.

Speaker 1 Titans, Dolphins, bummer.

Speaker 1 But then Seahawks, Lions to save the day.

Speaker 1 That would be great. Yep.
So it's like you just basically start your Monday night football a little bit early. And

Speaker 1 yeah, you get the Lions Seahawks, which is going to be awesome.

Speaker 4 Yeah, it's going to be a very fun game.

Speaker 1 Okay, should we talk a little college football before we do hot seat, cool throwing, and get to our interview? Let's talk.

Speaker 1 I don't know where we want to start. We could start.
Actually, you know what? Let's start with Tennessee. Tennessee goes down to Oklahoma,

Speaker 1 throttles Oklahoma. It's very weird watching Oklahoma play football without a good offense,

Speaker 1 but that's not taking anything away from Tennessee's defense because it feels like Tennessee finally has a defense.

Speaker 4 Yeah, and it also feels like the backup quarterback that they put in is probably going to be the starter for Oklahoma. Yeah.
He looked a lot better. What's his name?

Speaker 1 Ah, fuck.

Speaker 1 He was shifty.

Speaker 4 He was twice as good as the starter.

Speaker 4 So I think Oklahoma will improve based on that. But yeah, Tennessee is for real.
And Oklahoma officially on the Michael Hawkins.

Speaker 1 Jackson Arnold was the one who got benched.

Speaker 4 So Oklahoma, they're supposed to be SEC now.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 4 They ain't SEC. Not yet.
No. It's weird.
It is very strange.

Speaker 1 I mean, it's all strange. I watched on Friday night, I watched a vaunted ACC matchup of Stanford versus Syracuse.

Speaker 4 That's so crazy, isn't it?

Speaker 1 So crazy. So, Tennessee is for real.
They have

Speaker 1 some big-time games coming up. I'm excited because it does feel like Tennessee under the Hypo era.
Who Hypal seems like a pretty good dude.

Speaker 1 He had a video where it was nice. It was touching because he obviously went to Oklahoma.

Speaker 1 Venables was his coach, all these things. Got fired from there.

Speaker 1 He had a video where he's like, it meant, I know you guys brought a little extra juice juice for me.

Speaker 1 The social media guy was doing a memes angle because he was just standing underneath Hypel's double chin.

Speaker 4 So I've thought this about Hypel for a little bit. He desperately needs a beard.

Speaker 1 Dude, I don't know if a beard could save it. The problem is he was a really good quarterback and was very skinny then.

Speaker 4 Yeah, he was very athletic. Yeah.
And now

Speaker 4 great coach. Yeah.
Great coach. And his offenses are fun.
If you're a Tennessee fan, you're probably, he's the exact perfect coach that you would want, I think,

Speaker 4 because he's such a college head coach. Yes.

Speaker 4 He runs such a college offense that you're not going to be in danger of him leaving for the NFL, I don't think. Yeah.
Because that's not, it's not going to translate.

Speaker 4 Money, probably. But I'm saying, like, if you're a, there are a lot of dumb owners that would probably make that gamble, but he's an awesome, awesome head coach.

Speaker 4 And I think that what he's put in is pretty repeatable. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah. I'd agree.

Speaker 4 Obviously, Nico is a game changer.

Speaker 1 Nico's awesome. Nico's awesome.

Speaker 1 I'm buying Tennessee stock.

Speaker 5 Also, the clip, if you're a Tennessee fan, you're just, you know, Tennessee porn, the

Speaker 5 Peyton Manning coming out with Morgan Wall and in a full Tennessee jersey with the pants and helmet was, I'm not a Tennessee fan or Peyton Manning fan, really, but that clip was hilarious.

Speaker 4 What was Morgan wearing?

Speaker 5 Probably just, I don't know.

Speaker 1 I think he just wears a jersey. Yeah,

Speaker 4 the Harrison Bucker jersey every time.

Speaker 1 Yeah, he wears a jersey every single time.

Speaker 1 Speaking of coaches, Josh Huipel, we have two coach things I wanted to talk about. One was your JMU

Speaker 1 almost got Mac Brown resigned, but he didn't, which is one of the funniest

Speaker 1 things. So JMU put 70 on UNC.

Speaker 4 Hung 70 on it.

Speaker 1 70. They got paid to put Hang 70 on it.

Speaker 4 A first half 50 burger. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And they lost so bad that Mac Brown after the game told his team in the locker room that he was retiring.

Speaker 1 And everyone believed it. And then after the game, there was someone from inside the UNC

Speaker 1 program said he's not retiring. He will be in the office tomorrow and getting back to work.
That source said Saturday night, going in and having a normal Sunday.

Speaker 4 Sometimes you just got to say things. He just says it.
Sometimes you just got to say it. And then you have almost a post-nut clarity afterwards.
And you're like, oh, that was stupid. I shouldn't quit.

Speaker 4 He's driving home. He's like, I really like getting paid.
Yeah. He liked being the head coach.

Speaker 1 He said afterwards, he said he was

Speaker 1 disappointed in himself in his reaction by saying that he was going to resign, which I'm all for. I think it's a hilarious reaction.

Speaker 1 I think that's like, if you get beat by that bad, just being like, you know what, guys, I'm done. Especially when you're old.

Speaker 4 Yeah, when you're old, because it's like, you guys are going to kill me, so I'm quitting.

Speaker 4 I think in a weird way, he definitely wasn't doing this on purpose, but it's kind of like the Phil Jackson move of you've got a bad team.

Speaker 4 And now the entire story is about Mac Brown, and it's not about his players.

Speaker 1 He also said, he clarified afterwards that he didn't fully resign. He said, if you all don't feel like I'm the leader you need, then I'll go do something else.

Speaker 1 And then everyone was like, no, we still want you to coach. So he rallied the troops after a 70-point loss.

Speaker 4 Yeah, he quit, and then the team elected him coach again. Correct.
Which tells you

Speaker 4 tells you he hasn't lost the locker room yet.

Speaker 1 Is he the interim coach now?

Speaker 4 I think he's interim coach Mac Brown, yeah.

Speaker 1 Taking over for Mac Brown.

Speaker 4 And then the team will decide whether or not to promote him full-time. But yeah, that was an ass-kicking.
I think JMU is really good.

Speaker 4 I think they're going to be, I thought this was going to be a down year. I think they're going to be right there competing for the Sun Belt.

Speaker 1 Yeah, it looks really, really good. I just, I love, I mean, beating a team that bad to have a coach fake resign.
Yeah, that's got to feel awesome.

Speaker 4 It's pretty good. And their offensive coordinator at JMU is awesome, isn't he, Hank?

Speaker 5 Dean Kennedy, Situate Kid. I've known him forever.
He's like two years older than me. He's my sister's age.

Speaker 1 That's scary. That was

Speaker 1 a good one. And Hank knows someone who's an offensive coordinator, like he's running your team's offense and he knows Henry Lockwood.
Yeah.

Speaker 5 He's a stud. I mean, that that was...

Speaker 4 Absolutely stud.

Speaker 5 It's the Holy Cross effect. I was doing some research after because I was like, Dean Kennedy, offensive coordinator, JMU, but he went with the Holy Cross coach.
He was there.

Speaker 4 Bob Chesney.

Speaker 5 And now he's at JMU killing it. I mean, people are saying he might be looking at some NFL offers.

Speaker 1 Who? The other.

Speaker 4 Who's saying that?

Speaker 1 Me just right here.

Speaker 1 The other.

Speaker 1 So the other coach story was Hugh Freeze being an absolute idiot yet again. He had a double whammy.
He had a ex-player, Bo Wallace, come out and just say he's the most selfish guy ever.

Speaker 1 It's always the quarterback's fault. It's never his fault.
And then he said on Monday,

Speaker 1 I love Sam Pittman, and I hope he wins the rest of his games. But I'm telling you the hard truth is we play Arkansas nine more times.
We beat them nine times, and that's what's hard to take.

Speaker 4 That's loser talk.

Speaker 1 They lost 24 to 14 in his quarterbacks through four interceptions, including Hank Brown. Sorry, Hank.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 He was the next up Hank.

Speaker 4 Yeah, Hugh Freeze, I feel like

Speaker 1 the rope's running a little thin. Yeah.

Speaker 4 I think they're getting a little sick of old Hugh Freeze down there in Auburn.

Speaker 1 Well, I think also Hugh Freeze,

Speaker 1 not that any of these guys are good losers, but Hugh Freeze has won a lot everywhere he's been, and getting used to losing is, he's not going to deal with it well. No.

Speaker 4 I mean, he won from a hospital bed. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah. So

Speaker 1 that was funny. Auburn feels like they're in a tough, tough spot.
Basically, they just need to lose by two to Alabama and the Iron Ball. Be like, all right, we're building something.

Speaker 4 It'd be an ultimate football guy move if instead of like inspiring your team from coaching from a hospital bed, you actually dig your own grave and put up a headstone and then you lower, you're in a casket with an iPad and you're coaching, you guys have killed me.

Speaker 4 I like that. I like that.
Go out to save my life, boys.

Speaker 1 We should probably talk about the big Michigan win, which was old school smash mouth football that didn't work for the entire second half. So Michigan beat USC.

Speaker 1 It looked so Michigan's starting Alex Orgy, who can't throw, and they were like, we're just going to run the ball. USC made, they were down early, made some good adjustments at halftime.

Speaker 1 Going up to the final three minutes, Michigan had nine yards and zero first downs in the second half, and then Khalil Mullings had a 63-yard run, and Michigan survived. And now,

Speaker 1 like,

Speaker 1 I know it's obviously a cliche, but it is very funny that USC's first game in the Big Ten, and you could basically say, well, they just punched you in the mouth and played bully ball.

Speaker 1 And those soft California boys couldn't handle it.

Speaker 4 Yeah, they couldn't handle the fullback at the end. That was a good block by the way.

Speaker 1 Holy shit. Max Bredesen.

Speaker 4 Yeah, he gave him the old chicken wing and posted them up almost. Yep.

Speaker 4 Yeah, they can, Michigan, you can spin this very easily and be like, yeah, we beat you playing old school Michigan football.

Speaker 4 But

Speaker 4 you probably got a little bit lucky at the end, too. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah, because that was a play where they just couldn't do anything and then they broke a couple tackles. But you know what?

Speaker 1 You know what you say if you're a Michigan fan, a response to what you just said? We leaned on them. Leaned on on them.
You lean on them till they break.

Speaker 4 They got tired. You keep running the ball until they break.
Those California vegan legs didn't have the fast twitch. So Alex Orgy was 7 for 12 for 32 yards after being named the starter.
Yeah.

Speaker 4 So, but that might be the formula for Michigan. Just like, maybe even don't let him pass the ball.
What's the point of having 32 yards passing? Just have zero yards.

Speaker 1 They were going to, I felt like they were going to maybe put in Davis Warren again, who had thrown three picks against Arkansas State last week.

Speaker 1 And they were still like, nah, we'll go with Alex Orgy here.

Speaker 4 Did you

Speaker 4 hear this one?

Speaker 1 Did you hear about this? You seen this? You read about this? Just tell me, tell me, tell me.

Speaker 4 They call him Orgy because when he's on the field, you got to put eight dudes in the box.

Speaker 1 Ooh, nice. That's a lot of dudes in the box.

Speaker 4 That's a lot of dudes. It's an orgy.
Yeah, that is.

Speaker 1 Well, that's not, that's a gangbang. That's a good point.
Yeah, that's not an orgy. That's a good point.
That's definitely not an orgy. Okay.
Yeah. You got to.
You got to clean that up.

Speaker 4 Yeah, I'll clean it up. Yeah.

Speaker 4 We're still workshopping that one.

Speaker 1 All right. Last story I had.
I don't know what else you had, PFT, but Travis Hunter should be the Heist.

Speaker 4 Thank you.

Speaker 1 Thank you. And maybe it's because I bet on him preseason, but Travis Hunter should be the Heisman.

Speaker 4 Thank you. That was the other thing I want to talk about.
I said that on Twitter during the game, and then everybody was like, well, he is the front runner for the Heisman. No, he's not.
No.

Speaker 4 He's not even close to being the front runner for the Heisman. But if you look at what the Heisman trophy is supposed to be,

Speaker 4 he is the best football player in college football.

Speaker 1 The best football player in college football. Maybe the best football, if you said best football player alive right now, you could maybe say that.

Speaker 4 I think Jaden's got him.

Speaker 1 Travis Hunter, and I think he gets a little knock on it because people have Deion fatigue and all that stuff.

Speaker 1 If you actually voted for Heisman, how it should be voted, best player, not how every award now gets voted on, which is essentially best teams quarterback, which happens in the NFL and in college football, which sucks.

Speaker 1 Travis Hunter should be your Heisman trophy winner because he is the best football player in college football. He is averaging 131 snaps per game.
131 snaps per game.

Speaker 1 He ranks fourth amongst all receivers with 37 catches and six with 472 yards. And he's also on defense is allowed 11 receptions for 75 yards in 142 coverage reps.

Speaker 4 It's crazy how good he is.

Speaker 1 He's Shohei for football.

Speaker 4 And what he did at the end of the game was insane. He forced the fumble at the goal line, won them the game.

Speaker 1 PFT,

Speaker 1 he forced the fumble at the goal line to win them the game, but he also had seven catches for 130 yards. Yeah.
And on the forced fumble, that was his 144th snap of the night.

Speaker 4 It's crazy. Now,

Speaker 4 you could say, is this sustainable? Will he be able to play this many snaps?

Speaker 4 I think it might be.

Speaker 1 I know he got hurt last year, but it's fucking insane that a dude

Speaker 1 is one of the best wide receivers in college football and the best cornerback in college football. How is he not the Heisman?

Speaker 4 Yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 1 I don't know.

Speaker 4 He is the Heisman. He should be the Heisman winner, but the haters out there, like Brandon Walker, would say it's not sustainable.
I think Brandon Walker doesn't know college football.

Speaker 1 That's beyond fatigue.

Speaker 4 That's why he's not our college football expert on this show.

Speaker 4 But yeah, Travis Hunter is the best player in college football.

Speaker 4 But he did, Brandon did walk me through a mental exercise, and I think he's right, which is just close your eyes and think about an undefeated SEC team.

Speaker 4 How is the quarterback of that team not going to win the Heisman Trophy?

Speaker 1 I mean,

Speaker 1 if it's Jalen Milro,

Speaker 4 Jackson Dart, he

Speaker 1 win it.

Speaker 1 What if it's

Speaker 1 Quinn Ewers and he missed a few games?

Speaker 4 That's a good point.

Speaker 1 That could easily happen.

Speaker 4 Do you think

Speaker 4 if Texas runs the table, it could be Arch?

Speaker 1 No, I don't think you're going to lose your job. The Mannings even came out and said it, which, of course, they did.

Speaker 1 They're like, we believe in the process. We believe you can't lose your job to an injury.

Speaker 4 Very classy. Very classy of them, yeah.

Speaker 4 I think that they're going to bring Ewers back unless Arch lights up a real SEC defense.

Speaker 4 If Ewers is out long enough, and I'm not talking about Mississippi State, I mean a real SEC defense, if Arch Manning lights them up, then I could see Stark saying we can't really go back right now.

Speaker 5 They could also do like a Jalen Hurts Tua thing.

Speaker 1 Well, Arch does have, I mean, he does open up the game because his legs.

Speaker 5 That's what I'm saying, but they might have the option where it's like if things are going south, throw Arch in.

Speaker 1 turn it around.

Speaker 1 He did have one bad, he had a bad interception to start the game, maybe, because I bet over 13.5 points in in the first quarter, and I was watching intently, but then he came back and was awesome.

Speaker 4 But also, so back to Colorado real quick,

Speaker 4 they just play the craziest games all the time.

Speaker 1 The Hail Mary, I've never seen anything like it. Dave Aranda,

Speaker 1 I mean,

Speaker 1 he was going to be fired probably if he won this game.

Speaker 1 It doesn't really matter. He's running out at Baylor.

Speaker 1 How do you have back-to-back Hail Marys that both one was completed, the other should have been completed,

Speaker 1 where you have one guy on a receiver.

Speaker 4 Yeah, it was bizarre. But that's what Colorado does.
They play in these crazy, crazy endings. And it's so much fun.
And it's so much fun to watch.

Speaker 4 And then you have the Deion factor, which is, if you love him or if you hate him, it's going to be very interesting. It does feel like the Netflix reboot of Teebo Mania.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 4 Like, they just win. Yeah.

Speaker 4 Against, yeah, sometimes some bad teams.

Speaker 1 I think the winning might

Speaker 4 come to an end.

Speaker 1 Turn this weekend because it feels like I think they're going to UCF and they're pretty good this year. And then they they have some Big 12.

Speaker 1 Oh, shout out, by the way, Utah, back to their old tricks, Cam Rising.

Speaker 1 I can't quit him.

Speaker 1 Cam Rising was, they wouldn't tell us if he was going to play or not, and then he played one stat.

Speaker 1 That's just what they do. Kyle Wittingham loves, he's addicted to injury reports being vague with Cam Rising specifically.

Speaker 4 Keep him guessing. Yeah.
We got some good games coming up this week.

Speaker 1 Oh, yeah. Georgia, Bama.

Speaker 4 Georgia, Bama. I like Bama.

Speaker 1 I haven't decided yet.

Speaker 4 I don't think Georgia's. Pass.
Does Does Georgia have the horses, big cat?

Speaker 4 Specifically in offense?

Speaker 1 I

Speaker 1 yeah, I

Speaker 1 pass. Okay.
I passed. I'm passing.
Hang on.

Speaker 4 I'll give you an answer on front. You watch a lot of college football.
Georgia.

Speaker 1 You're taking Georgia? Yeah. Do you know where the game's being played? No.
Bama. Bama.
You're taking Bama.

Speaker 1 Georgia. Okay, so.

Speaker 7 What about the shit guy getting off easy?

Speaker 1 Oh, yeah. Burrito guy.
So this is just the new trend. I think we touched on it on Sunday, but Florida State.
Florida State won. Yeah, I know.
Florida State did win. They beat Cal.

Speaker 7 So the guy who said he was going to, there was the curse of the guy who was going to be a woman.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 4 Yeah. That would have been such a great loss, too.
Cal was like the memes going into the game.

Speaker 1 Oh, Cal Twitter is awesome.

Speaker 4 They were going to turn into Callahassee, and they were making these AI-generated images of a bear at the gates of the stadium confiscating people's guns. Yeah,

Speaker 1 Cal Twitter has been so funny because they just leaned into all of the clichés about the University of California, Berkeley. They said they were going to rename it Woke Campbell Stadium.

Speaker 1 This is Doke Campbell Stadium. When they beat Auburn a few weeks ago, they said that they renamed,

Speaker 1 it's no longer War Eagle. It's like Peace, Diversity, and Inclusion Eagle.
It's so funny.

Speaker 4 They said that they were going to turn, it was not going to be like a checkerboard pattern like Tennessee does, but that Florida State was going to have a rainbow. Yeah.
So

Speaker 4 if you're sitting in certain rows, you have to wear a blue shirt, indigo, violet. It was very funny.
It was great.

Speaker 1 It was great.

Speaker 1 Great week of college football, though. Great week of college football.
Yeah. Love college football.
Anything else from college football? Travis Hunter should be the heisman. Everyone should

Speaker 1 tell two people.

Speaker 1 If everyone tells two people, that's a lot of people we've told. Yeah, paid forward.
Yeah. And again, this has nothing to do with what we did.
Did you bet him?

Speaker 4 What's his odds right now?

Speaker 1 No, he should. 20 to 1.
I just looked as he was.

Speaker 1 I will bet him.

Speaker 4 I will bet him before the second comes out.

Speaker 1 Bet it. Bet it.
He should be.

Speaker 4 And

Speaker 1 he he did it last year with you. I know.

Speaker 1 I was going to say. We shouldn't really, we don't really, like, we don't know the power of this podcast.
I'm not saying that we got Jaden Daniels the Heisman, but we didn't hurt it. Yeah.

Speaker 4 We should make sure it's that, say, Travis Hunter should be the Heisman one. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And just every week, just even if he has a bad game, just like, well, he played 130 snaps. Yeah.
No one else did that.

Speaker 1 Okay, let's do hot seat, cool throne. Then we'll get to our awesome interview with Michael Silver and his new book on the NFL.

Speaker 8 Fall's here. Kids are back in school.
Vacations are over, and cozy season is officially on. You know what that means? Bombus season is on.

Speaker 8 Bombus makes the most comfortable socks ever, and they even make slippers, tees, underwear, all crafted from premium materials. Perfect for this time of year and cozying up for football watching.

Speaker 8 Their slippers are also Sherpa lined, which feels like you're walking on the clouds. Bombus really has it all.

Speaker 8 And if you head over to bombus.com/slash audio, you can use the code audio for 20% off your first purchase. That's bombbas.com/slash dot com slash audio.
Code audio at checkout.

Speaker 7 Pink.

Speaker 1 Hot sequel to it.

Speaker 5 Hot seed is Erling Holland.

Speaker 1 Oh,

Speaker 1 soccer. We're talking footy.

Speaker 5 Talking footy. Did you guys see this?

Speaker 1 No.

Speaker 5 Man City beat Arsenal.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 5 And Erling Holland, they scored, and he, which I liked, but people are very upset with him. He took the ball out of the goal and was running back.

Speaker 5 And then, you know, there's a defender basically standing in the box facing the other way. And he just threw the ball at the back of his head.

Speaker 1 An Arsenal guy. Ooh.
Okay. I like that.

Speaker 5 So people are. No easy buckets.
Yeah, people are fired up. There was a little scuffle after the game.

Speaker 5 That's shit. People are calling him a scumbag.
But I think it's like if you're one of the best players in the world, that's kind of what you do. Yeah.

Speaker 4 It would be an honor to have somebody throw a ball at my head if I was beating the shit out of them. Yeah.

Speaker 5 No,

Speaker 5 Erling Holland won and then just kind of threw it at the back of the head.

Speaker 1 Oh, Holland's. He threw it at his head.
Yeah, at the other end. He sought the injury.
Oh, okay, okay. Classless.

Speaker 1 I like the move. More bad blood than soccer.
Yeah, listen, Man City.

Speaker 4 Man City, you've got to stand up for yourself. It's a gritty, scrappy neighborhood in London, and the people that live there...
Beatles are from there.

Speaker 4 Yeah, they probably like having a player like that who will embody the culture of their city. Agreed.

Speaker 5 I have another one. Yeah.
Travis Kelsey.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 4 This, I think, is also.

Speaker 1 Contract?

Speaker 5 No, I think, and I don't really have the hate that I had for the Chiefs when the Patriots were good, but so I think it's easier to say that

Speaker 5 people are getting on Travis Kelsey. He hasn't had a good start to the year.
They're saying he was going to retire if he didn't have a podcast.

Speaker 5 But I think when you're the Chiefs and you're back-to-back champs and you know who you are, it doesn't matter that much.

Speaker 1 Yeah, Mahomes has not played great.

Speaker 5 But they're still winning, and as long as Travis Kelsey is healthy in the playoffs,

Speaker 5 he's going to be fine. Correct.

Speaker 1 They're going to be fine. Yeah, he'll be okay.

Speaker 5 But I think it's more maybe the Swifties,

Speaker 5 them getting involved and being like, why isn't Travis playing well? Is creating a narrative.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 5 And they're showing shots of him on the sideline looking sad.

Speaker 1 Oh, so is it Mahomes' fault?

Speaker 5 There's a lot.

Speaker 1 Wait, no, hold on. I would like to do a message real quick.
Swifties, are you listening to this? Yes, you are because you are a big-time AWLs.

Speaker 4 This usually goes well.

Speaker 1 So, Swifties, let's talk heart to heart. You love me.
I love you.

Speaker 1 PNV, we'll just pretend that never happened.

Speaker 1 Travis Kelsey is being blackballed by the Kansas City Chiefs. He is, they're basically shutting him out.
They're not letting him play. They're not letting him score.
They're not letting him be great.

Speaker 1 And the name and culprit behind all this is one Matthew Nagy. Okay? Go find him.
Actually, don't do that. That's bad.
Matt Nagy was the problem.

Speaker 1 Swifties.

Speaker 1 I went a little too deep there where I was just. They won't.

Speaker 1 They actually are listening to this right now.

Speaker 4 My theory, Swifties, is that Britney is telling Patrick not to throw the ball to Travis anymore because he's a liberal.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 1 But I thought

Speaker 1 isn't Brittany she's back with T.

Speaker 4 Swift oh she's back with T

Speaker 4 got it T Rump oh

Speaker 1 I think

Speaker 1 I think I think Trump told Brittany to tell Patrick to not throw the ball to Chelsea because he's a liberal again though I don't know if we're clear if Trump hates Taylor Swift or not He might like her.

Speaker 1 The tweet just said, I hate Taylor Swift.

Speaker 4 That could mean anything. In like a six-year-old teasing way, he might love her.

Speaker 1 Gum in her hair. Yeah.

Speaker 1 I like the Swift. The Chicks love that.
So the Swifties are mad. I like this.

Speaker 5 I think the.

Speaker 1 It's fucked up the Swifties literally, they've done one football season, they've won a Super Bowl.

Speaker 1 Yeah. I'm going to stop right here.

Speaker 5 She explains the. I did see it, and it's like, I think he was going to retire if you didn't have a podcast.
It's a funny,

Speaker 1 ridiculous narrative, but you laugh. Yeah, that is funny.
Okay, good job. Oh, Cool Throne.

Speaker 5 My Cool Throne is Celtics, NBA.

Speaker 4 I saw this quote.

Speaker 5 Celtics had, there was a bunch of quotes. It was Media Day.

Speaker 4 I was just.

Speaker 1 You have to say the Jalen Brown quote.

Speaker 5 Taking it all in. What's what the Jalen Brown Pistons won?

Speaker 1 The Jalen Brown said about the Pistons.

Speaker 1 We're going to play through Peyton, let him go for 30, play through Sam, let him shoot 10 threes tonight. We're going to still win the game.

Speaker 1 That is the most disrespectful thing you can say about another team. Just being like, yeah, our offense is going through Peyton Pritchard tonight.

Speaker 5 We're just a stacked team. They're a deep team.
They did all the pictures with the Olympics guys.

Speaker 5 Jason Tatum was more upfront, being like, yeah, it pissed me off that I didn't play. I was mad.

Speaker 5 He basically said he's like, no one was happier about the Olympics than Joe Missoula because he kind of knew that he was going to be able to use that as motivation. Of course.

Speaker 5 They asked Missoula if he enjoyed celebrating the summer as a champion. He said, I didn't really enjoy the summer.
I enjoyed the parade, which I can agree with. The parade was great.

Speaker 4 It was a highlight of his summer. Yeah, me too.
Spending time with Hank.

Speaker 5 But yeah, it's just great. It's great, you know, when your team's coming off a a championship and it's gearing back up.

Speaker 5 I can't wait for that. I don't really have the excitement of a championship potential team with the Patriots, but it's good that the Celtics are back.

Speaker 1 How was Tatum Zora?

Speaker 5 It was great. He's got some new shoes that are released.

Speaker 4 I was going to ask you about the shoes.

Speaker 1 He's got the MVP, all-star MVP tattoo.

Speaker 5 He also, you see, he got a tattoo of himself.

Speaker 1 Oh. Oh, like

Speaker 4 he's kissing the trophy. Big time aura.

Speaker 1 Yeah, Steve-O.

Speaker 4 I was going to ask you about the shoes.

Speaker 1 The shoes are so sick. I'm not getting a pair.
Okay.

Speaker 1 The

Speaker 4 Hank, we had a picture pulled up. There's also one that's way more green and blue.
Yeah, that one.

Speaker 1 This is.

Speaker 4 No, Hank, the way I would talk about these shoes is by saying they look like a pair of shoes that I would wear. That's correct.

Speaker 1 The way you were about to say that, Hank, was crazy. Yeah.

Speaker 1 PFT comes in with like

Speaker 5 purple shorts,

Speaker 1 a t-shirt that doesn't match the purple shorts, a brown t-shirt. No, and those shoes.

Speaker 5 If they send them to PFT for free, he'll wear them. That's his

Speaker 1 barometer of wearing shoes.

Speaker 4 Those are the type of shoes, exactly the type of shoes I would wear.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 4 That's not good. Yeah.

Speaker 1 They're hot.

Speaker 1 Good job, Hank. Thanks.
PFT. All right, so

Speaker 4 great job. I don't know if I can follow that up.
Hank had two hot seats.

Speaker 1 He was on fire.

Speaker 4 My hot seat is Penn State Students.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 4 Because you got called out twice by Burt Bielema, coach of Illinois.

Speaker 1 4-0, Illinois.

Speaker 4 4-0 Illinois.

Speaker 1 Ranked Illinois.

Speaker 4 Ranked Illinois. They won the tie against Nebraska last week.

Speaker 4 Burt said that Nebraska is a tougher environment than Penn State, than Happy Valley. And then he doubled down on it by saying that they're going to be doing a white-out.

Speaker 4 And he said, bringing the white-out energy, whatever the hell that means.

Speaker 4 So he's fired up.

Speaker 7 Well, James Franklin said that. James Franklin in his post-game said that I need the white-out energy.

Speaker 1 I need the white-out energy. Yeah, but I need the white-out energy.

Speaker 1 What is Brett doing? Yeah, I mean, that's...

Speaker 7 I mean, they're also 17.5-point dogs.

Speaker 4 Yeah. But then he said, whatever the hell that means.

Speaker 7 Well, I mean, that's just what James Franklin said. He's just like,

Speaker 7 James Franklin said at his post-game press conference, he was like, next week's a big game. I need the fans to come out.

Speaker 7 I need white-out energy.

Speaker 4 Does that mean that they're going to cover up their mistakes? That is a Penn State thing.

Speaker 7 No, you see, in college football, Penn State has this tradition where they do the white-out one game a year.

Speaker 1 The whole stadium is white. The whole stadium air is white.

Speaker 1 It's like a really big thing in college football.

Speaker 4 I'm well aware of the whiteout, Max.

Speaker 4 We've discussed it on this show how you guys burn your whiteouts on lame games.

Speaker 1 Minnesota last year.

Speaker 7 That's Fox's fault. Big 10, fucking Big Ten kickoff is Big Noon kickoff is bullshit.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 4 So, but

Speaker 4 I guess he's kicking the hornet's nest. We'll see what happens.

Speaker 1 No, I will. Yeah.

Speaker 1 What?

Speaker 1 Want to finish that? Penn State loses, you'll shove a burrow up your ass? No. Want to finish that sentence?

Speaker 4 If Penn State loses, you have to tear a statue down somewhere.

Speaker 1 What? No.

Speaker 1 No, I'm not saying any of this.

Speaker 1 I'm not nearly

Speaker 1 big enough. Phillies.
Philly.

Speaker 4 That's your answer.

Speaker 1 Philly worried about that right now.

Speaker 4 Then my cool throne is just lists in general because with the Diddy stuff coming out,

Speaker 1 Hank's been deep into it.

Speaker 4 Yeah, Hank is really, really deep into it. Would you ask me, like, do I think Tom Hanks is involved?

Speaker 1 No, he said, no, his direct quote was, what are your thoughts on Tom Hanks, PFT? Yeah.

Speaker 4 I don't know. He's a good actor.
Forrest Gump rocked. That's pretty much the start.
Oh, Captain Phillips was good, too. Actually, he's been a lot of good stuff.

Speaker 4 But there's some speculation that there's going to be lists coming out

Speaker 4 about

Speaker 4 who is at the freak parties. The lists never come out.
They never come out. They tell you that there's a list, and it's a distraction so that you can come up with your own fan fiction

Speaker 4 lore universe that you make up. And you're like, here's who's going to be on this list.

Speaker 1 There'll be some fake lists that come out. They look like real lists.

Speaker 4 I think there's already been some fake lists that come out.

Speaker 1 But yeah,

Speaker 4 there's some weird stuff. And what's crazy about the Diddy thing is you can go back and watch Diddy admitting to be a weirdo

Speaker 4 in real time. And everybody was just like, yeah, Diddy's kind of crazy.

Speaker 1 It's crazy that everyone knew this. I feel like I was the last to know.
Yeah. I had no idea.
You think we'd know about Biggie?

Speaker 6 What?

Speaker 4 He might have killed Biggie.

Speaker 1 I heard that. Oh, no.

Speaker 4 Is that your theory? The Streets were saying.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I don't think the list will ever come out. They never do.

Speaker 6 But

Speaker 4 they love making you think that there's a list that's going to come out. Yes.

Speaker 7 Also, other celebrities have been coming out denouncing P.

Speaker 1 I denounce E. Diddy.

Speaker 4 I denounce P. Diddy.
Denounced.

Speaker 1 His podcast denounced.

Speaker 7 This video came out with something that was like,

Speaker 7 I had nothing to do with P. Diddy or any of his parties, which is kind of a weird thing.

Speaker 7 It makes you think that.

Speaker 5 Meek Mill, the funny, Meek Mill, who's like.

Speaker 1 Yeah, he's going through it.

Speaker 5 He's in a million pictures videos. He's definitely

Speaker 5 was in P. Diddy's circle.
Tweeted, like, I'll pay $100,000 if someone can figure out why I'm always getting brought up with the P. Diddy stuff.
It's like,

Speaker 1 I would like to defend our wall for five years. I would like to defend, maybe this is a mistake, but

Speaker 1 there is that one video that's going around where Diddy does a cheers with Jay-Z and a bunch of people and Leonard Fournette somehow in it. That's always makes me laugh.
Playoff Lenny.

Speaker 1 I'm going to back playoff Lenny. Yeah.

Speaker 4 Yeah, until proven otherwise.

Speaker 1 Until proven otherwise. Yep.

Speaker 4 He's our friend. And also, Meek Mill.

Speaker 5 That was a Rock Nation brunch, not a Diddy party.

Speaker 1 Oh, there we go. Boom.
Back playoff Lenny.

Speaker 4 And for the record, Meek Mill is 100% straight. His quote, when I got a girl around me, I'm fucking her twice a day.
Oh, hell yeah. Ask some of your favorites.

Speaker 4 Pussy don't control me, but it's like a high. One love to the gay people, but that juicy pussy, do it for me.

Speaker 4 I done ran red lights to get that feeling. Y'all weird on here.
Hell yes. So

Speaker 4 suck on that one, haters.

Speaker 1 That is sick.

Speaker 4 That's the straightest thing he would ever say.

Speaker 1 That's so sick. That reminds me of the old Diplo tweet, doing girls is cool, but doing work lasts way longer and more fulfilling.

Speaker 4 I like that. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Doing girls.

Speaker 4 You remember when Mike Piazza had a press conference to announce that he was straight? Yep. That was funny.
That was funny.

Speaker 1 All right, my hot seat is anyone who's ever bashed Dylan Rayola because I'm all the way in on him now.

Speaker 1 He's got a brother who committed to Nebraska, Dayton Rayola, and he looks like Jackson Mahomes. Are you serious?

Speaker 1 In this one picture, he looks like Jackson Mahomes, PFT, and now it's the funniest thing I've ever fucking seen. I'm all in on these guys.

Speaker 4 That's what I was wondering.

Speaker 1 When he dropped the Jackson Mahomes. I'm like, fuck yes.

Speaker 1 It went from this is weird to, I'm all in. Yes.
I'm sorry for everything I've said.

Speaker 1 If this guy can start doing, if Dayton Rayola can start doing TikToks and looking more and more like Jackson Mahomes, it is one of the funniest things that's going on on the internet.

Speaker 4 So I wonder if Dylan is making his brother participate in his fantasy world and telling him like how to dress. You have to look like this guy, or if it's just natural.

Speaker 1 It could definitely be.

Speaker 4 That would be so funny. Yeah.

Speaker 1 I'm all the way in. All the way in.
And then my cool throne is.

Speaker 4 Don't let Mr. Rayola drive a car.
That's all I'll say.

Speaker 1 Yes, that's true. Dominic is his name.
He played in the NFL.

Speaker 1 He was a fucking mean,

Speaker 1 mean guy.

Speaker 1 Player, that is. Center.

Speaker 1 My cool throne is memes.

Speaker 1 Memes, you're on my cool throne. Because Rogers, you see Rogers on McAfee.

Speaker 1 He said that Hassan, the report that there was chaos in the locker room for the Jets before the season was from Hassan Reddick's agent, which now makes more sense. So that was just never a true story.

Speaker 1 Hassan Reddick's agent basically planted that to try to create chaos. And I even saw there was a guy who said

Speaker 1 when it first came out, he just... a random Jets fan said, shut up, bitch, and then at Tori Dandy, the guy's the agent's name, and then the agent blocked him right away.
So

Speaker 1 that's proven guilty in the court of the internet.

Speaker 4 So no problem.

Speaker 1 No, it was Hassan Reddick's agent.

Speaker 9 No problem. Aaron Rodgers also might have leaked that ex-agent

Speaker 1 fired. Oh, he did? That's what Aaron Rodgers said.

Speaker 4 That was the exact quote.

Speaker 1 He said ex-agent.

Speaker 9 He's just like, probably, he said former agent.

Speaker 1 Oh, so you might be back. Might be all the way back.
Oh, you're double cool thrown.

Speaker 9 So people think Aaron Rodgers might have leaked that and stuff's going on behind the scenes, but nobody's actually reported anything.

Speaker 4 Shout out to Hassan Reddick because it sounds like he's a very loyal guy. Like his agent was costing him millions of dollars for not playing, and he didn't fire him until right now.

Speaker 1 It feels like his agent was like, I know what we'll do. We'll say the locker room is bad, and they'll give you all the money.
That'll be good. This will definitely work.

Speaker 4 My master plan. My genius plan.

Speaker 1 Okay, should we get to our interview? Great interview. Michael Silver in studio with his new book talking about football.
Give it up for Chicago.

Speaker 10 Sebastian Menascalco'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

Speaker 1 coming.

Speaker 10 Sebastian Maniscalco, It Ain't Right, premieres November 21st, streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus for bundle subscribers. Terms apply.

Speaker 4 Hey, it's PFT here, reminding you that Boarshead makes game day entertaining elevated and effortless.

Speaker 4 Whether you order catering platters ahead from your 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.

Speaker 4 My favorites like oven gold turkey or blazing buffalo-style chicken, paired with their classic Vermont cheddar or creamy Munster 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 4 Seriously, guys, it's a game-changing flavor for every gathering. Boarshead, committed to craft since 1905.

Speaker 1 Okay, we now welcome on a very special guest in studio. It is accomplished NFL writer, big J journalist, Mike Silver, Michael Silver, drinking buddy, drinking buddy.

Speaker 1 There's some questions we got to get to about Hugh Jackson, but let's talk about your new book, which is called The Why is Everything? A story of football, rivalry, and revolution.

Speaker 1 It's out on hardcover October 1st.

Speaker 1 I'm going to buy it on Kindle, just so you know, I just want to get that out there.

Speaker 1 I know it's a little cheaper on Kindle, but that's how I consume books. I just want to let that out there.

Speaker 6 I think any way you want to consume,

Speaker 6 as we established the first night we met,

Speaker 6 any consumption that we're not judging.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 4 Audiobooks, that's fine. Now, can you say I read a book when you listen to the book?

Speaker 6 It's like saying, it's like the reporter trick where you say, I talked to Jared Goff, but really we texted.

Speaker 6 Sometimes I'll go, well, we've communicated or Jared Goff said,

Speaker 6 but I think I talked to is Kai Deskewigen. So I think you just go, that book was great.
I loved it. I enjoyed that book.

Speaker 4 Yeah.

Speaker 1 I enjoyed it. All right.
So The Why is Everything is the name of the book. So let's start with The Why.
Why did you decide to write this book?

Speaker 6 Well,

Speaker 6 you know, there's,

Speaker 6 You got to, I'm old, so

Speaker 6 go back to me covering the 49ers as a young beat writer. Mike Shanahan showed up as George Seifert's offensive coordinator, really trying to resurrect his career.

Speaker 1 What year was this? 1992.

Speaker 6 And he'd been fired by Al Davis ingloriously after a couple of years as a young head coach. He'd been fired by Dan Reeves in Denver and accused of insubordination.

Speaker 6 Basically, he and John Elway, Dan Reeves charged, had gone behind the head coach's back. It was kind of this big scandal.
So he was a broken man. And meanwhile, Joe Montana hurts his elbow.

Speaker 6 Steve Young's there. And even though the rest of the country is like, God, this guy's an incredible quarterback.
Everyone in San Francisco is like, he's not Joe. He runs too much.

Speaker 6 He doesn't read defenses. It's a mess.
He literally won the passing title. And fans would be like, get rid of him.
He stinks.

Speaker 6 And Mike Shanahan kind of...

Speaker 6 taught Steve Young

Speaker 6 that offense in a way that changed Steve Young's career, changed Mike Shanahan's career, and vaulted Mike Shanahan to the head coaching job in Denver, where he took that Bill Walsh offense and did outside zone.

Speaker 6 Now you have the modern Shanahan offense. And so then we pick up in Washington.
And I've always been fascinated by that coaching staff

Speaker 6 in the early 2010s with

Speaker 6 Mike Shanahan. And no one in football history is going to look back and go, wow, the early 2010 Redskins, what an incredible run.

Speaker 4 We had

Speaker 4 10 weeks with RG3. That were pretty good.

Speaker 1 Thank you.

Speaker 6 But in the football community, that's always been this mind-blowing thing, what they did. They took a guy who had no pro-style experience or link to it in RG3.

Speaker 6 They took their existing offense and morphed it into a pistol on the fly and caught everybody off guard.

Speaker 6 I mean, you remember, you know, they gained a third of their passing yards that season on one play called Drift, where he like fakes a handoff, turns, kind of throws blindly over where the linebackers would be, but the linebackers have come up.

Speaker 6 And

Speaker 6 he, you know, he was the rookie of the year, not Andrew Luck, not Russell Wilson. It was revelatory.

Speaker 6 So, yes, the dysfunction of the Redskins ultimately took that staff down and Mike Shanahan down, but it was seismic.

Speaker 6 And so the five people on the cover are Kyle Shanahan, who was the offensive coordinator, and fellow assistant Sean McVay, Matt LaFleur, Mike McDaniel, and Raheem Morris.

Speaker 6 And obviously, they are now all in very prominent positions. So that's the jumping off point, kind of.
But then you get all the petty and the rivalry and the dysfunction and the love occasionally.

Speaker 6 And I know all, you know, you know, these guys. I've known these guys for so long.

Speaker 6 And I've been around it and been out drinking with them and heard all of their various idiosyncratic ways of looking at things. And I've just always felt like something's going on here.

Speaker 6 They're doing it a different way.

Speaker 6 That's what they did with RG3 to instead of just say this is our system and we're going to run it, but just deconstruct and kind of think in an abstract way really goes against the tenets of old school meathead football, which really

Speaker 6 permeated the NFL for so long, which was we do it because it works.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 6 It's what Bill Walsh did. Right.
And why do we call it the flanker? I don't know. That's what Bill Walsh called it, you know? Yeah.

Speaker 6 So they ask why a lot, and then they want to be able to explain why to their players constantly.

Speaker 1 So, yeah, I mean, it's interesting because this book basically is why the NFL is the way it is today, because it's, you know, whatever it is, a third or a quarter, 15% of the head coaches all are part of this system and everything that's come off of it.

Speaker 6 And really more because Kevin O'Connell, Zach Taylor, Robert Sala. You know, I mean, you really could make a case that's like a third.

Speaker 1 Yeah, the coaching stream is crazy.

Speaker 4 Jamico Ryan's, although on the defensive side, but yeah, Jamico Ryan, and Bobby Sloick. Bobby Sloick, he was on that staff too, wasn't he?

Speaker 1 He was.

Speaker 1 Shane Waldron, right?

Speaker 6 Yeah, Bobby's Shane Waldron.

Speaker 6 Probably, you know, rough start for Shane Waldron this year, but I think he's, you know, I think he's a shrewd guy who will will figure it out.

Speaker 4 Yeah, it does feel like NFL offense has changed so much that year, and it rippled across the league, like you said.

Speaker 4 I don't think that we've had an offensive innovation that's been that pronounced since 2012, have we?

Speaker 6 No, you know, the innovation off that immediately was McVay kind of speeding it up and then going,

Speaker 6 you know, 11 personnel and using the receivers as blockers on the outside. But, you know, they've had to innovate from that.

Speaker 6 And it really was a way of thinking, though, that has now permeated the NFL more, which is instead of we have always done it this way, it's let's make everything, let's just deconstruct everything and be willing to innovate and be creative from a

Speaker 6 new starting out point. And

Speaker 6 the willingness to do that is definitely new.

Speaker 4 Yeah, amongst these guys, let's get to some of the juicy stuff. Amongst these guys in this room, it seems like it was a very collaborative effort and they all root for each other.

Speaker 4 I know they've done podcasts together, they've done media together. At the time,

Speaker 4 were there any rivalries between these two, or was it all just like, okay, let's work towards this common goal?

Speaker 6 Well, first of all, there's a chapter in there called Enemy Friends, which is how Raheem Morris describes Kyle and Sean.

Speaker 6 And, you know, enemy first for a reason. Like, they're friends, but like uh, they definitely,

Speaker 6 you know, have there's, there's an edge to it.

Speaker 6 There was a big falling out with Kyle and Matt LaFleur that I get into that is an incredible story that is, you know, centered around that, the drama leading into that draft, the night of the draft when they took Trey Lance.

Speaker 6 One of the Zach Wilson 2, Trey Lance 3. Anyway.
Yeah.

Speaker 6 But yeah,

Speaker 6 you know,

Speaker 6 in Washington, I I kind of liken it to like, you know, I'm a Northern Californian.

Speaker 6 Imagine like Silicon Valley in the early days, and you've got, you know, Steve Jobs and Andy Grove and all these visionaries at one company, young, kind of hustling, all rushing, hey, what if we try this?

Speaker 6 Nah, I got this idea, where it was encouraged to make these suggestions, and they'd kind of all run to Kyle Shanahan, and he'd decide what to use and what not to use. So there was a,

Speaker 6 it was a collaboration and kind of a healthy competition back then.

Speaker 1 It's fascinating because these are always like just going back to coaching staffs when you had, I think the other one is like the Packers in the 90s when they had every, you know, when they had what Gruden

Speaker 1 and all these guys on the staff.

Speaker 1 Yeah, and you read and just like going back in these time capsules along the NFL and you look at these coaching staffs, you're like, holy shit, that this type of brain power that then goes out and spreads everywhere in the the NFL.

Speaker 1 So my curiosity about how we've evolved in the NFL is why did it take so long for everyone else to kind of catch up and be like, hey, these guys are really smart.

Speaker 1 Is it just an organization failure across a league where it's like,

Speaker 1 we want to do the thing that's always been done. And now this new age shit is kind of scary.
It feels like we're there now where everyone's starting to think outside the box, but

Speaker 1 there's a little bit of tension that goes along with anything new.

Speaker 6 Yeah, and they have flaws, right? Like Kyle Shanahan has a very brusque style that wasn't very conducive to bonding with players. He's gotten a lot better.

Speaker 6 And so they were very sure of themselves and sure they were right and didn't really like, you know,

Speaker 6 hiding that. Right.
So that could be cool if it's working. But the other element of this, and I know Eric will be excited, but

Speaker 6 the dysfunction seemed to find them, right? Like

Speaker 1 you

Speaker 6 had

Speaker 6 them all at Washington. Well, enough said, right?

Speaker 6 Dan Snyder, etc. Then Kyle goes to Cleveland.

Speaker 6 Talk about our Hugh Jackson Association. A lot of people have gotten caught up in that hellhole.
He famously fought his way out after a year. And remember, that was the Ray Farmer texting scandal.

Speaker 6 The general manager was texting assistant coach Dowell Loggins to tell Kyle, among other things,

Speaker 6 you should play Johnny Benzel, right?

Speaker 6 So Kyle had Mike McDaniel write up a 32-point memo of reasons he should be let out of his contract. And it ultimately worked.

Speaker 1 Holy shit.

Speaker 6 And so then he goes to Atlanta. And after that first year with Matt Ryan in Atlanta, there's a question about whether he's going to get fired by the Falcons.

Speaker 6 They end up having this summit meeting in Southern California, which is described in the book. And it was, it's been called, Matt LaFleur called it our Kumbaya sessions.

Speaker 6 Somebody called it marriage counseling. But basically, they're gathering at Tom House and Adam Dato's place.

Speaker 1 And who's gathering?

Speaker 6 This is Matt Ryan, Kyle Shanahan, who are the two guys who need to work stuff out, Dan Quinn, and Matt LaFleur, the quarterback coach, with these two quarterback gurus, Tom House and Adam Dado, that Matt Ryan's working out with.

Speaker 6 And famously, a few things were said, but at one point,

Speaker 6 Tom House is trying to describe Matt LaFleur's role as getting caught in the middle between Kyle Shanahan and Matt Ryan. And he says, Matt, you're the taint.

Speaker 1 That's a good analogy, yeah.

Speaker 6 No one wants to be the taint.

Speaker 1 Yeah,

Speaker 1 yeah.

Speaker 1 That's fascinating, though, like that tension that works, and then you get success out of it because like having having that meeting they get to the super bowl obviously they were up 25 and super hard to do were they hard to do

Speaker 1 it's hard to be up 25

Speaker 1 i heard you could say you could say that dan quinn is a super bowl winning head coach he was winning by 25 i heard it was 28 to 3 yeah yeah and they and they and matt ryan wins an mvp and that kind of launches Kyle Shanahan and then Matt LaFleur, right?

Speaker 1 So that meeting obviously worked.

Speaker 6 It really did.

Speaker 6 and so, yes, eventually they have all ascended, um, and now they just fight it out amongst each other and try to keep their prodigies, you know. I mean, look what the Saints are doing.

Speaker 6 That's a Kubiak.

Speaker 1 Yep, that's part of the tree as well. Yeah.

Speaker 6 Um, but in Washington, that RG3 year, even amid the rest of the league being kind of blown away and defenses not being able to stop it. Uh, even so, you'll remember the Cleveland game that year.

Speaker 1 Yep. Kirk Cousins.

Speaker 6 RG3 gets hurt, and now Kirk Cousins, who they'd also drafted that year, which was a Kyle Shanahan

Speaker 6 favored pick, has got to play in Cleveland. And they run a more traditional Shanahan offense game plan with a lot of boots,

Speaker 6 the fake handoff and the rollout. And Kirk Cousins goes wild in that game and they win.
So now, here's the post-game scene.

Speaker 6 Dan Snyder barrels through the locker room, goes right past Kirk Cousins, who is having this glorious moment, almost steps on him to get to Robert Griffin and say, hey, don't worry, it's okay.

Speaker 6 You're still my guy. And Kirk is just standing there.
It's super awkward.

Speaker 6 While this is happening, RG2, Robert's father, who was very involved, has managed to somehow get in the locker room and he's all over Mike Shanahan. Man, why didn't you call any running plays?

Speaker 6 And Mike's like,

Speaker 1 he can run on those boots.

Speaker 6 He just chose to throw.

Speaker 1 We want to run those plays with Robert.

Speaker 6 And Robert comes back too early, probably, because he's threatened by that.

Speaker 4 All in for year two. I remember that.

Speaker 6 Yeah. And so it gets, you know, we all, I think,

Speaker 6 you know, that playoff game where he ends up tearing up the knee and that's the beginning of the end was horrible.

Speaker 6 But in most people's minds, well, he'll get surgery and they'll come back and they'll build on this and it'll be amazing.

Speaker 6 There's a scene in the book where Mike Shanahan, at the end of that season,

Speaker 6 because of how he feels about Robert, because he thinks Dan Snyder is so

Speaker 6 invested in believing that Robert's really a pocket passer and we're going to change him and we're going to show and he's my guy.

Speaker 6 Mike Shanahan ends up recommending to Dan Snyder, Bruce Allen, the the GM, and the other owners,

Speaker 6 we should trade Robert now.

Speaker 6 We know he's not really what people think he is. The league's going to catch up and it's not going to work out the way you think.
His value is amazing.

Speaker 6 We might get back the three ones we gave up and we can play with Kirk and Mike Shanahan has it all figured out. He's like, this is the best idea ever.
And it did not go over well.

Speaker 4 So in retrospect, that would have been a good play.

Speaker 4 That would have gotten a lot of people on their ass if they'd done that. It seems insane to actually do something like that after you win Rookie of the Year, though.

Speaker 6 It would have been viewed as insane, including, in fairness, even by me. Right.

Speaker 1 But those are the type of moves, too,

Speaker 1 where

Speaker 1 you're like a Belichick was famous for it.

Speaker 1 get rid of guys a year early except instead of a year late and stay ahead of the curve.

Speaker 6 Here's another weird thing.

Speaker 6 Peyton Manning was free before that that 2012 season

Speaker 6 coming off the next surgeries, and

Speaker 6 Mike Shanahan absolutely had interest, and Peyton was going to be in Denver anyway, meeting with the Broncos. So they set up a meeting at Mike Shanahan's house with Mike and Kyle.

Speaker 6 And Kyle, who is a football nerd and thinks Peyton is, you know.

Speaker 6 the all-time best at the line of scrimmage, the general, you know, he's so fired up. So Mike Shanahan flies to the Bahamas to meet with Dan Snyder, presumably on his very small boat.

Speaker 6 I'm sure it's tiny.

Speaker 6 So, they're off on the boat. Kyle's at his office prepping for his meeting with Peyton Maddie.
He's so excited.

Speaker 6 They both get in the air. Mike is flying to Denver from the Bahamas.
Kyle is flying from Dulles. While they're in the air, and this is pretty good Wi-Fi,

Speaker 6 Bruce Allen, at Dan Snyder's behest, trades

Speaker 6 with the Rams way before the draft for all those picks. So now we know they're picking RG3.
Right. So Kyle Lands finds out about it.
He's like, oh, well, there's obviously no meeting.

Speaker 6 And Mike says, no, no, no.

Speaker 6 We could still get Peyton Roberts for the future. And so Kyle preps.
Peyton comes to the house. He and Kyle watch film for a couple hours.
They're totally vibing. Like, it's the greatest meeting ever.

Speaker 6 Kyle's so fired up. Peyton leaves and Kyle says, Dad, do you really think we still have a chance to get him? And Mike goes, no.

Speaker 1 Like, we're drafting Robert.

Speaker 6 So he just let Kyle down easy. Yeah.
And so, yeah, history could have been way different.

Speaker 4 Just so many sliding doors moments for my happiness that we're going over right now. Yeah.

Speaker 4 This could have been so different.

Speaker 6 And then the funny thing is, you know, 2013 is one of the all-time dysfunction junction seasons.

Speaker 6 That was my first season at NFL Network, and I was doing Thursday nights at halftime and then game day morning with Ian Rappaport.

Speaker 6 doing

Speaker 6 I was being like his mort may he rest in peace

Speaker 6 for his Adam and we were all over the Redskin dysfunction and I remember laughing I'm like dad Snyder's used to dealing with like Jim Zord he has no idea about the Mike Shanahan you know ability to navigate this feud and so he he ends up getting fired and Mike goes in for his exit meeting with the other owners and he says okay I'm I'm going to give you guys some advice.

Speaker 6 Take it or leave it. You need to trade Kirk Cousins.
And they're like, Huh? And he goes, There's no coach who's going to come in here and believe ultimately that Robert is better than Kirk Cousins.

Speaker 6 So trade him. Yeah.
Because it's going to be an issue.

Speaker 1 It's going to be a problem. That's fascinating.
So are you surprised that Mike Shanahan never got another job? Because

Speaker 1 it does feel like he's such an innovator and such an accomplished coach that

Speaker 1 you'd think a team would want him. I remember even, I think it was 2015-ish.
16-minute. Is it 15 or 16 when the Bears hired John Fox?

Speaker 1 He was a name that was being thrown around. And it's like, why is this guy who knows so much about football, who has all this incredible resume, why has he not gotten another job?

Speaker 6 Yeah, I agree with you. He did talk to the Raiders of all teams at one point, post-All, and the Niners.

Speaker 6 He should be in the Hall of Fame right now. There's no question.
I hope this book helps make that case.

Speaker 6 There is something at 49er headquarters referred to as the Shanakam, which basically means Mike Shannah needs to watch meetings and practice ASAP virtually. That's awesome.

Speaker 6 So he's, some people think he's the shadow GM. I think that's an exaggeration, but this is incredible.

Speaker 6 So because I was doing this book full force, I spent a bunch of time with him in May and June of 2022. And so so in those conversations, I would ask about Trey Lance, of course, and Jimmy.

Speaker 6 And he kept talking about Brock Purdy because he'd seen some minicamp tape. And I was like, God, he's kind of weirdly into Brock Purdy, but, you know, whatever.
He's the 260-second pick.

Speaker 1 Now

Speaker 6 they open against the Bears. It's Trey Lance's first game as the unquestioned starter.
The day before, I go to Mike Shanahan's room, and I'm sitting up there, and I'm asking him about Trey Lance.

Speaker 6 And he again brings up Purdy. And he says, when you have a guy like that in your building, you don't let him out.
And I'm like, are we talking about, you know, thinking

Speaker 6 and, you know, so he's still got it.

Speaker 1 Yeah, this is why I'm saying, like, how is he not, like, Brock Purdy

Speaker 1 is a guy who

Speaker 1 it took him going to a Super Bowl for everyone to be like, okay, maybe he's actually really good. And Mike Shanahan, before he even takes a snap, the NFL is like, this guy is going to be good.

Speaker 6 And in fairness, even Kyle, who's great at this, didn't really know he was what he was.

Speaker 6 Obviously, I don't know if Mike thought all this before the draft to this degree, but when I was seeing him, he'd seen a few of the OTA tapes. Yeah.
And he was just like. I don't know.

Speaker 6 And then, you know, meeting the kid, he's just, you know, for all the, he looks like he's going to class at Iowa State right with the backpack.

Speaker 6 And he's very polite and very personable. I don't know if you guys have met him yet.
We haven't. Yeah, I think you'll really like him.

Speaker 6 But

Speaker 6 he's a stone cold killer, too.

Speaker 1 That's fascinating. So

Speaker 1 why hasn't a team hired Mike Shannon as a GM?

Speaker 6 I think that's also,

Speaker 6 I think if, you know,

Speaker 6 I'm in the rare position where I have receipts.

Speaker 1 I have this tape.

Speaker 6 He's talking about Brock Purdy in so many of 2022, like he's, you know, an elite NFL starting quarterback. That's incredible.

Speaker 4 It also sounds like, I mean, his son's the head coach. It'd be hard to hire him as a GM for another team.
Like the 49ers essentially got just a great asset that's going to work for free for him.

Speaker 6 What if, like, um, the Harbaughs, what you know, like, and the Shanahans somehow, you know, all got crossed up.

Speaker 4 I think, I think the Harbaughs would murder them if there was like an actual family rivalry. Yeah, I'd take Jim Harbaugh over any of those guys, yeah.

Speaker 6 Yeah, I think

Speaker 6 you know, it would be hard for me to imagine

Speaker 6 a less tense atmosphere, yeah, than a Harbaugh family versus any any other family competition in anything.

Speaker 1 True alphas.

Speaker 4 Yeah. So you spent a lot of time around the league.
I know that you were around New Orleans. You knew what was going on during Bounty Gate.

Speaker 4 And I feel like that's something that we don't talk about enough anymore. It's kind of been, it hasn't been forgotten, but we don't talk about it as much as we used to besides the Kevin James movie.

Speaker 4 So what was your knowledge of Bounty Gate as it happened and how it came out and all that aftermath?

Speaker 6 Well, I did get caught up in it, and it's funny because this story is going to ultimately lead to Jeff Fisher, who I know we share in a few years.

Speaker 6 And before I was too

Speaker 6 close to Hugh Jackson, I was also too close to Jeff Fisher,

Speaker 6 who also got turned into a cartoon character by

Speaker 1 America.

Speaker 6 And

Speaker 6 so it's 2012. Greg Williams has already left to go to the Rams as the St.
Louis Rams as their new defensive coordinator, a couple years removed from the Super Bowl. Sean Payton has been suspended

Speaker 6 along along with Greg Williams and

Speaker 6 others because the NFL has decided that they have evidence that the Saints allegedly, I would say allegedly based on the evidence now,

Speaker 6 you know, we're paying players explicitly to injure opponents.

Speaker 6 And this is as the concussion lawsuit's going on and the NFL is looking for a way desperately to say, man, we care about health and safety.

Speaker 6 They had some other issues with Sean Payton.

Speaker 6 Great stories that don't have to do with that. So it was already weird.
It's also Tom Benson. I think you could do that to Tom Benson easier than you could do it to Robert Kraft or Jerry Jones.

Speaker 6 Easy owner to pick on.

Speaker 6 So Sean Payton gets suspended for a year. While this is all going on,

Speaker 6 I

Speaker 6 learn of the existence of this audio tape that documentary filmmaker Sean Pamphilon had in his possession.

Speaker 6 He was working at the time with Steve Gleason on what ultimately became a documentary because he'd been diagnosed with ALS, a former Saints player.

Speaker 6 Steve Gleason was a guest of the team in this meeting before a playoff game against the 49ers in 2011, 2011 season.

Speaker 6 And Greg Williams is caught on audio tape saying things like, kill the head and the body will die. And Greg Williams is one of those guys that if you take him literally,

Speaker 6 I relate.

Speaker 6 If you take him literally, it doesn't go well.

Speaker 6 He's very over the top. He says things for effect.

Speaker 6 But he did seem to, according to Pamphilod, be literal in that he made the money sign with his hands at one point, like, I got the first one, meaning I'll pay that fine, which will cross the line. So

Speaker 6 it was the smoking gun the NFL felt it needed to show the world. See,

Speaker 6 this is out of control in New Orleans.

Speaker 6 I

Speaker 6 get ready to write this blockbuster story for Yahoo Sports. Unfortunately, I had just

Speaker 6 finished with Jeff Fisher in Indy at the Combine asking and receiving permission to be in the Rams war room in the upcoming draft, which is a big get, you know, for Yahoo and me. And I'm all excited.

Speaker 6 And now, Jeff Fisher's defensive coordinator is going to be even more,

Speaker 6 you know, disciplined because there was a chance that suspension was going to get reduced. I'll never forget.
So when Jeff called me back, I had to tell him what was going on. He just goes, how bad?

Speaker 6 And I go, well, given that it's Greg, it's about as bad as you can imagine.

Speaker 6 So at that point, I just assumed that if not Jeff, his owner or somebody would say to him, we're not letting that guy in our draft room. He just ruined our life even more.
Right.

Speaker 6 But amazingly, Jeff calls and says, when are you coming out? He said, why don't we have dinner the night before? So now we're outdoors in Clayton, Clayton, Missouri, having dinner, drinking wine.

Speaker 6 He's telling me about what they're going to try to do in the draft. By the way, that was the Michael Brocker's Brian Quick draft where they got too cute.

Speaker 6 I was there, tried to wanted Bobby Wagner, but thought,

Speaker 6 Let's get him with the second of our two picks in this round because we want to get Isaiah Peed, the immortal running back, and then lost Bobby Wagner to the Seahawks.

Speaker 6 So Jeff says to me with a twinkle in his eye, you know,

Speaker 6 I want you in the room, but I also want you to have a workstation. And for times where we really need to have a sensitive conversation to kick you out, I do have a vacant office.

Speaker 6 And literally, I set up shop for three days in Greg Williams' vacant office somehow after breaking the kill-the-head body.

Speaker 1 Oh, my God.

Speaker 1 New Beyond Raw Lid V2,

Speaker 1 GNC's number one pre-workout. Now with harder-hitting energy, an intense mind-body connection, and enhanced endurance support.

Speaker 1 This isn't just a pre-workout, it's precision engineering for your body.

Speaker 1 Supercharge your workout with new Beyond Raw Lid V2. Available now at GNC and GNC.com.

Speaker 1 That?

Speaker 12 That's the sound of extremely processed dog food, which is the norm at most pet food companies. But at the Farmer's Dog, we do things differently.
We gently cook our food without ultra-processing.

Speaker 12 It's developed by our team of board-certified nutritionists, made to human-grade safety standards, and portioned for your dog, then delivered right to your door. How does that sound to you?

Speaker 12 Get 50% off your first box, available only at thefarmersdog.com.

Speaker 4 So back to Bountygate, though, the smoking gun that you said. At a team meeting, he said, kill the head, the snake will die, or whatever, the body will die.
And then he says, I got the first one.

Speaker 4 Does the money sign?

Speaker 4 Implying, I'll pay for your fine

Speaker 4 if you hit the quarterback too hard.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 4 I think almost every defensive coordinator around the league has said and done stuff like that in meetings, at least at the time. Maybe they've been more careful since then.

Speaker 4 So what was it about Greg Williams in particular that made the NFL target the Saints?

Speaker 6 I think it was Sean Payton.

Speaker 6 There had been another scandal that had quietly gone away because of the arbitration clause that kept it from being public. But there was a scandal

Speaker 6 that involved missing pills at the Saints facility,

Speaker 6 Vicadin, I believe,

Speaker 6 if I'm not mistaken. But there were a lot of pills missing, and there was some

Speaker 6 word or accusation that Sean Payton had been involved in that and trying to cover that up.

Speaker 6 I think there was a general feeling that Roger Goodell believed

Speaker 6 these guys are out of control.

Speaker 6 And Sean, who I love,

Speaker 6 was Bill Parcel's train. So there was the secrecy and the kind of the weirdness in general.

Speaker 6 Again, it was Tom Benson, someone you could make an example of.

Speaker 6 There was another incident during one of the London games at Wembley where they did a walkthrough the day before, and and the security people told Sean Payton,

Speaker 6 you guys are going to come out before the game, and you guys are going to go through this tunnel. And you know how NFL coaches are.
Like, it's gospel. That is the tunnel.
We were told.

Speaker 6 And on game day, when they tried to go through the assigned tunnel, it had been changed. And they really wanted Sean to go a different way.
And he didn't want to.

Speaker 6 And I believe the story goes that he just kind of pushed through a security official, may have been a British security official.

Speaker 6 You know, not like he beat him up, but it got a little physical.

Speaker 6 And that got back to Roger. And I think that was another instance where he was like, this guy.

Speaker 6 So

Speaker 6 again,

Speaker 6 it's disturbing to me in that

Speaker 6 they did a, you know, they kind of did a Mueller report independent commission thing,

Speaker 6 you know, to try to prove that they had it. And they used Paul Tagliabu of all people, the former commissioner, who was a lawyer.
And the report was not real,

Speaker 6 you know, friendly to the NFL.

Speaker 1 It was kind of like, yeah,

Speaker 6 there's this audio from a game where somebody, was it Bobby McCrae? Somebody allegedly says,

Speaker 6 give me my money, Bobby. But it's not really

Speaker 6 clear that that's exactly what he said.

Speaker 4 There's flimsy evidence at best.

Speaker 6 Or that he said it.

Speaker 4 It was a witch hunt.

Speaker 6 If you're a Saints fan, you go, they had it out for our team. And again, there were some other reasons that might have been true.

Speaker 6 If you're a cynic like me, who then went to work for the NFL, but if you're a cynic like me, you say they were looking at an existential threat with the head trauma, which they were culpable for.

Speaker 6 They had to beat their chest and show the world. Yeah.

Speaker 1 We care about safety. Players' safety.

Speaker 4 Let's do 17 games, but we care about

Speaker 1 safety. That's right.

Speaker 1 Yeah, let's play in random stadiums across the world that are not good playing surfaces. Yeah, right.
We don't care about safety. Oh, World Cup we're hosting?

Speaker 6 FIFA Needs Grass?

Speaker 1 Yeah. Oh, yes, FIFA.
Yeah, we're going to change it to grass. Right.
Oh, NFL guys think.

Speaker 6 Nah, sorry. Yeah.
Yeah.

Speaker 4 So you were talking about that Rams War Room. I don't think about this guy at all, but it sounds like that's the same draft that they drafted Michael Sam.

Speaker 6 No, I actually repeatedly got in the Rams War Room

Speaker 6 because

Speaker 6 I was a friend of the code. You're such a good guest.
Yeah, I was a guest. So now at NFL network nfl.com,

Speaker 6 I was there the year they took Michael Sam. So they had two picks at the end of the seventh round.
And so Michael Sam had been the SEC Defensive Player of the Year.

Speaker 6 So to a casual fan or to someone like me, even it was like, well, that guy's going to get drafted.

Speaker 6 He's that edge rusher who

Speaker 6 was the defensive player of the year in the best conference.

Speaker 6 But Scouts didn't love him for football reasons. And so he was also openly gay.
The NFL had never had an openly gay player. And things have changed a lot.
But at the time, that felt super heavy. So

Speaker 6 Jeff Fisher

Speaker 6 is on the phone as their picks are coming in the seventh round. And he kind of looks a little serious and he hangs up, but he stands up.
And the Rams have one of those war rooms that everybody's in.

Speaker 6 Like the Patriots, it would be like Bill Belichick, you know, Scott Pioli, and only two other people.

Speaker 6 Maybe we'll let the running backs coach come in for five minutes. But the Rams are like, it's the Scouts,

Speaker 6 it's ownership, it's

Speaker 6 all the front office people and me. And so

Speaker 6 Jeff tells the room with pick 240, whatever, we are taking Michael Sam from Missouri. And people kind of get chills because it's history.
And at that point, you're pretty far ahead of the telecast.

Speaker 6 So

Speaker 6 we have a few minutes to kind of be the only ones who know, like, this is going to be cool. And it's historic.
And we're waiting and waiting. And the pick gets officially turned in.

Speaker 6 So now we know it's happening for sure. We're waiting and waiting.
And then the pick is made. And it's kind of like everybody's just kind of looking at each other like, we were there.

Speaker 6 It's pretty cool.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 6 Well, then they cut to, they had cameras on Michael Sam at his house. I don't know if you remember this, but Michael and his boyfriend at the time, I think his name was Vito, Vito,

Speaker 6 celebrated the moment, and there was like a cake, smushed face licking off of fingers situation going on. And it definitely changed the vibe in the Ram War Room.

Speaker 6 Not judging in like a homophobic way as much as just,

Speaker 6 yeah, that's not very football. Right.
And it just kind of freaked people out. And

Speaker 6 I don't want to, I'm not even sure of the person who said it, and I don't want to ID him,

Speaker 6 but one person broke the tension by saying

Speaker 6 something to the effect of, damn,

Speaker 6 usually you got to be in the league a minute before you start getting the white bitches.

Speaker 1 What a story.

Speaker 1 Oh, man.

Speaker 1 All right. So I got a big football question for you.

Speaker 1 Someone once told me, and it's stuck with me ever since, that in the NFL, there are a handful of teams that are actively trying to win a Super Bowl, organizations that are actively trying to win a Super Bowl, doing the right things, investing in the team.

Speaker 1 And then there's like 20 organizations that basically are saying, hey, if we catch lightning in a bottle, cool, but otherwise we're just going to print money. Is that a fair, accurate thing to say?

Speaker 6 Yeah, and it's been a thing. And so it's weird because for all my lefty, Berkeley, you know, grateful debt, all my heritage, I'm super free market on the NFL, like I'm Adam Smith, right?

Speaker 6 And I used to call these old owners Pullet Barrel bosses because they would take, they'd stand in their breadline and they would take their guaranteed TV revenue, which guarantees you a profit.

Speaker 6 And the NFL has like a lot of communist-like sensibilities. Worst shall be first, the draft, the schedule, the salary cap.
They control costs.

Speaker 6 They share all the revenue. And so there was not a lot of incentive back in the day to market.
And, you know, the Bears are traditionally undermarketed. Yes.
The Chicago Bears. Yeah.

Speaker 6 The Raiders just were like, why would we market? We're the Raiders. You know, the Bengals still don't.

Speaker 6 And so

Speaker 6 Eddie DeBartolo, Jerry Jones, Robert Kraft ended up being the new guard of owners who got it a lot more entrepreneurial and started hustling. And,

Speaker 6 you know, there was this famous owner meeting where Jerry Jones says to

Speaker 6 Mike Brown, you know, I'm so touched that you want to name your stadium after your late father. That's really awesome.
But because you won't take a naming rights deal, I have to subsidize you

Speaker 6 on this revenue sharing thing.

Speaker 6 And so I tend to be on the side of those more aggressive owners. So yes,

Speaker 6 you would think in such a highly competitive industry, everyone wants to win desperately.

Speaker 6 There's some guys who want to win desperately, but they don't know how and they sabotage like Dan Snyder, David Tepper, right?

Speaker 6 But then there's some people who are just like acting like they want to win because every once in a while they will. Yeah, they get,

Speaker 1 oh, we got lucky with this quarterback or this random year happened. And then we'll just have everyone live off that for the next 10, 20 years.

Speaker 6 Right. So if you're a fan, you want your owner to, and I, and I did owner rankings at SI.com and Yahoo.com for years and years.

Speaker 6 And what I really valued the most was aggressive pursuit of revenue and and aggressive spending to try to get wins.

Speaker 6 And so Dan Snyder having players on his helicopter is well-intentioned, but it screws the authority of the coach and messes it up.

Speaker 6 But, you know,

Speaker 6 if you have the best facilities, if you pay your assistant coaches well, if you are

Speaker 1 scouting department, all those things where it's like

Speaker 1 there just seems to be a lot of organizations, and I'm probably speaking about the team I root for here very much so, where it's frustrating knowing the further we've gotten into this job, the more we've seen it.

Speaker 1 It's frustrating to know that a lot of these organizations just don't give a fuck. And

Speaker 1 they honestly are fine, you know, every five years ripping off 10 wins and being like, that was cool.

Speaker 6 I don't believe that there is a more undermarketed entity in American commerce than the Chicago Bears. I mean, the Chicago Bears.

Speaker 6 And I don't know if people know, like, in this city, the Bulls had that.

Speaker 1 The Cubs are the Cubs, but it's a football town. It is.

Speaker 6 And when the Bears, you know, in 85, and like, that was, it was just, it engulfed everything.

Speaker 1 And they've been living off it since. Yeah.
You know, and it's that lightning in a bottle where it's like, hey, we aren't going to do all the steps. We'll do a couple of the steps here and there.

Speaker 1 And if we're good for a couple of years, oh, awesome. But then it never is sustainable.

Speaker 1 That's the sustainable greatness of some of these organizations. Because like, yeah, okay, the Cowboys have not won a Super Bowl since the 90s.
They've still been in the mix pretty much every year.

Speaker 1 So, and it's hard to win championships, but like being in the mix and actively trying to win playoff games matters.

Speaker 6 I've been a Jerry ride or die for so long, but I'm starting to wonder now. Like, I know he's always told me this is all I care about.
I just want to win.

Speaker 6 But, like, his actions the last few years, you know, he could have got Sean Payton.

Speaker 1 Well, this is the weird part. We talk about this a lot on the show about Jerry Jones.
Because of how he dealt with his coaches in the 90s, we think he's one way.

Speaker 1 He kept Jason Garrett for way too long. So he actually is weirdly one of those way too loyal, I don't want to change guys.

Speaker 6 Yeah, or I don't want to pay guys to pay.

Speaker 1 But we think about the 90s and we think about Jimmy Johnson. We're like, oh, he'll get rid of a guy in a second if he has a problem with it.

Speaker 6 I mean, I feel like there have been two inflection points that he could have had Sean Payton, and he knows. He knows Sean Payton would have, you know, in his mind, would have been the guy.

Speaker 6 He didn't do it.

Speaker 6 And then is there anyone on earth that, you know, with respect to Mike McCarthy, who's done a lot of good things in this league, after the first quarter and a half of that playoff game against the Packers, is there anyone reasonable on earth who would have been like, man, Jerry Jones fired Mike McCarthy and tried to get Mike Vrabel or Bill Belichick.

Speaker 6 Like, no one would have said, wow, Jerry Jones is

Speaker 1 enough time. Yeah, right.
That would have made perfect sense.

Speaker 4 So, why do you think that is? Why do you think that Jerry chose to remain loyal to McCarthy?

Speaker 4 Especially, like, when you say the name Belichick, Belichick being out there seems like it would have been the ultimate Jerry Jones move. Correct.
So, why do you think he remained loyal to him?

Speaker 6 It's a great question. I need to have a longer conversation with Jerry, preferably with him buying the red wine, which he tends to do, and he has a little bit more fleshed-out tastes than I do.

Speaker 6 But it just makes me think that he has changed because the Jerry I've always known and defended on this,

Speaker 6 of course, but you're right. You know, you're right in the Jason Garrett thing.
He let that go a long way.

Speaker 1 Way too long. And Wade.
Yeah, and Wade. Yeah, right.
So

Speaker 1 he kind of has become one of those owners that's like, I like what I like, and I'm not going to rock it. And also, I don't want to pay.
Right. And

Speaker 6 I always have said to Jerry, you do better with powerful coaches. Everyone thinks Jerry wants to walk all over people, but the best, you know, even Switzer had some juice.

Speaker 6 Jimmy, Barry, and Parcells, which was a total clash. I have a great story on that one.

Speaker 6 But Jerry did better when strong people were in charge.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 6 There's a story where,

Speaker 6 you know, how Parcells was, you know, wanted to run everything. And the Cowboys are flying out to play the Patriots.

Speaker 6 And they're staying either in Providence Providence or closer to Providence than Boston.

Speaker 6 And so, of course, the assumption is the plane is flying to Providence, and the buses will be there, and they'll go to the hotel.

Speaker 6 And late in the flight, it becomes clear to Parcells that they're going to Boston, which makes no logistical sense until he learns that the Joneses have dinner plans with the crafts and they don't want to go from Providence.

Speaker 6 You know, they're not taking a bus. So the plane's going to land in Boston.
And Bill, who cared a lot about such things, went up and kind of let Jerry have it.

Speaker 6 And Jerry smiled and said, I think the quote was, well, Bill, when you buy your own team, you can have the plane go where you want it to go.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I love it.

Speaker 4 There is a certain type of billionaire. And I think that

Speaker 4 there are owners in the NFL that are definitely doing things the right way.

Speaker 4 But those middling franchises and some of the bad ones, there's some owners that are super competitive, but that doesn't translate to what they actually, the steps that you have to take to winning football games.

Speaker 4 They take more pleasure in like the petty stuff, like getting small victories over the other owners.

Speaker 4 Like if they find there's another owner that really likes this coffee shop, they're going to do everything they can to like have that coffee shop next to their house close down.

Speaker 6 You know, billionaires are absolutely petty, as we've seen.

Speaker 6 You know what, guys? I'm thinking I might, you know, I let go of owner rankings because they hired me

Speaker 1 for ages. Yeah.
Should we bring it back? Yeah, I would love to see.

Speaker 1 Yeah, because it is fascinating, and it also is a really good

Speaker 1 for from a fan perspective, it's a really good way to see where you land.

Speaker 6 I got the greatest feedback because, you know, there were people in Buffalo who said, If you come to the city, I will fight you in defense of Ralph Wilson. I'm like, really?

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 6 That's why you're going to fight me? But the best were, you know,

Speaker 6 you ranked Bill Bidwell number 30 in your owner rankings. I defy you to name two owners that are better or that are worse than Bill Bidwell.
There's no way he shouldn't be 32.

Speaker 6 But yeah, lots of arguments.

Speaker 1 But these are good things. It's like the blind poll that has started about the facilities and stuff.

Speaker 1 It shines light on it where teams are being, that's kind of an ownership ranking in its own right where it's like, hey, here's where they're cheaping out.

Speaker 1 That's good stuff. Fans should know if their owner is not doing everything to win.

Speaker 6 Yes. And what I liked is that I got very personal and punitive.
And so these people are not used to being criticized.

Speaker 6 It's one thing if I, you know, Kyle Shanahan's going to read stuff of this book and want to strangle me, perhaps, but Kyle Shanahan is used to, as am I and you, and you, we're all used to being kind of criticized

Speaker 6 brutally.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 6 So I think we tend to be able to filter that. But like, I don't think like, you know, Mike Brown was used to that.

Speaker 1 Who, by the way, has done ownership rights to naming rights. Well, he's done naming rights to his stadium because he he had to pay Joe Burrow.

Speaker 6 I will give this to Mike Brown. Everyone else would have fired Zach Taylor after year two.
Yeah. And because he's cheap or has a philosophy.

Speaker 1 He's lucky because he's cheap. Yeah.

Speaker 6 But in that case, they got to the Super Bowl and almost won it.

Speaker 4 Yeah, sometimes not firing a coach is the best thing that you can do. Correct.
Back to that Washington, D.C. staff.
Yeah.

Speaker 4 So if you were to do your ownership power rankings right now, do you know who the top five would be?

Speaker 6 That's a great question.

Speaker 6 I should have prepped on that.

Speaker 6 You know, I think that

Speaker 6 I am a big believer that the Crafts are great owners,

Speaker 6 but

Speaker 6 they're in a weird kind of position. I'm heartened by the way the Patriots are playing, actually.

Speaker 6 They're playing harder than I thought, and it looks kind of cooler so far. But yeah,

Speaker 6 I'd really have to deconstruct and take a look because in most of them, the Crafts and the Joneses were kind of right there.

Speaker 1 Jeffrey Lurie at the time.

Speaker 6 Jeffrey Lurie would be very, very high. Green Bay.

Speaker 6 Yeah, Green Bay's weird because, and, you know, they're going to change CEOs coming up. So that's interesting.

Speaker 1 Would the Hunts, or would they just got lucky because they got Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reid? Because the blind poll is very interesting that the facilities there murders them.

Speaker 1 Gets killed, and you're like, dude,

Speaker 1 you're Patrick Mahomes. You should do whatever he wants to make his life great.

Speaker 6 My favorite story with the Hunts was:

Speaker 6 I'm out with Derek Thomas, the late great Hall of Fame edge rusher, who was one of the great social animals in NFL history in an era where it was different and we didn't have cell phone cameras.

Speaker 6 And, you know, I he also

Speaker 6 they didn't have to stay in hotels the night before home games. Marty Schottheimer didn't make them.
So we even had some Saturday nights. Love it.

Speaker 6 Watch the Tupac Bruce Selden fight at his house the night before a game, not Tupac, excuse me, the Mike Tyson Bruce Selden fight the night Tupac was shot

Speaker 6 at his house with one of my buddies, one of his buddies, and Kid from Kid and Play of House Party fame, who was on fire with the commentary. But Derek and I were early on, he was this big

Speaker 6 JFK conspiracy buff, and it stemmed because his father had been a fighter pilot who was shot down in Vietnam and killed.

Speaker 6 And so Derek's whole belief was that the war continued because JFK was assassinated to continue the Vietnam War leading to the death of my father.

Speaker 6 And so he was very, very down the rabbit hole on that. And he started talking about some of the theories publicly.
And

Speaker 6 I finally went and researched it.

Speaker 1 And I'm like, Lamar Hunt, your owner

Speaker 6 is like one of the people in this theory that would be like one of the people who put out the hit.

Speaker 1 Is that a little awkward? Yeah.

Speaker 6 So we started having that conversation. That's awkward because I've seen owner player stuff like go really bad, like T.O.
with the push-ups and all that, but that's a different level.

Speaker 1 You might have indirectly killed my father, yeah, and a president.

Speaker 6 Yeah, and a president.

Speaker 4 Yeah, that's wild. So, um, I also heard that you've speaking of guys that you've spent a lot of time with where they benefited from not having camera phones around.

Speaker 4 You hung out with Dennis Rodman in Vegas.

Speaker 6 Well, I did a book with him.

Speaker 6 So, there was was this Sports Illustrated story. I got there in

Speaker 6 1994. And in May of 95, when he was still with the Spurs, they were in a playoff series with the Lakers.
I got sent down to L.A.

Speaker 6 and a four-day, three-night, three-state bender ensued. And it was amazing.
And I turned it into this cover story where

Speaker 6 he's got the bird on his shoulder and the metallic hot pass, this iconic SI cover that I wrote in real time at his house in San Antonio as he

Speaker 6 engaged in activities with a stripper

Speaker 6 while the birds were all, there were these wild birds squawking. So there was a lot of noise.
And I did manage to focus and write this story. But

Speaker 6 yeah, I spent a lot of time with Dennis here, but that first night in LA when we went out,

Speaker 6 they eliminated the Lakers. I met him during the day at the shootaround.
Wasn't clear we were going to do anything. They eliminated the Lakers.

Speaker 6 He immediately walked off the court and told me, let's go. We ended up at a club in West Hollywood with some celebrities.

Speaker 6 I'm 29. He's 34.
And I'm like, well, I could drink with any 34-year-old. I mean, I could drink.

Speaker 1 Yeah, we know. You've seen.

Speaker 6 So I was pouring out shots under the table like soon after. It was Goldschlager and Jaegermeister.
And, you know,

Speaker 6 he drank me out of the table. But at one point, he took me outside and he started to talk about a lot of things, including Madonna, who was the most famous woman of the world and he had been dating.

Speaker 6 And he said very openly, you know, she wanted me to, she wanted to have my baby. The quote, I think, was,

Speaker 6 she has ways of making you feel like King Tut.

Speaker 6 And so

Speaker 6 this, you know, Robin was basically, as we went to San Antonio, then Vegas, then tried to go to Phoenix to watch game seven of the other series, Courtside, but that got derailed.

Speaker 6 We ended up back in San Antonio. And as all this is happening,

Speaker 6 I was just going to go home straight from Vegas. I had so much good stuff and I was going to fly to Oakland.
So we're having this kind of emotional goodbye at the airport.

Speaker 6 And he looks at me as I'm walking away and he goes, bro, what are you doing? This is the greatest. Like, I'm giving you the greatest.
Like, stay with me. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And he was right.

Speaker 6 And so I just turned around and went to his gate and talked my way out of that plane and went back to Texas. And

Speaker 6 it's before cell phones were really reliable. And I had told my wife, hey, I'm coming home.
So when we got to Texas, I had to call her as Dennis and I were walking to his truck.

Speaker 6 And can you imagine the voice I was using?

Speaker 1 Yeah. Like, so honey, you know,

Speaker 1 I get off the phone and he goes, oh, bro, who wears the pants in this family? Who wears the pants?

Speaker 6 Okay, well, story comes out. No, story doesn't come out.
Story gets filed. I fly home.
They open against the Rockets Monday

Speaker 6 in San Antonio, I believe.

Speaker 6 And maybe in Houston. And no, it was in San Antonio.
And I'm just, I'm still exhausted. The story's been fact-checked.
It's not coming out until Wednesday, but it closes Monday night.

Speaker 6 And I'm just getting ready to watch the game. And I get a call like an hour and 15 minutes before the game.

Speaker 1 And he's like, bro.

Speaker 6 And I'm like,

Speaker 6 what are you doing? Are you at the arena?

Speaker 1 No, bro. I'm at home.

Speaker 6 And he goes, you got to do something for me. And I go, what? He goes, bro, you got to take that Madonna shit out of there.

Speaker 1 And I go,

Speaker 1 who wears the pants?

Speaker 1 Oh, that's beautiful. And then literally, he had me, he three-way called.

Speaker 6 And he was going to have me talk to Madonna and explain to her that he really, you know, he also said some nice things. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Oh, she's going to, she's going to kill me.

Speaker 6 So I'm laughing and it goes to answering machine, not voicemail, answering machine. And, you know, it's like, hey, it's M.

Speaker 6 I'm not here. Leave a message.
And then here's me, you know, leaving a message for Madonna.

Speaker 1 Oh, my God.

Speaker 6 Don't be too bad, Madonna.

Speaker 1 That's incredible.

Speaker 4 That's a great touching moment, though. You're about to give up on the party and go home.
And Dennis Raman's like, come on, man. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Just party with me one more night.

Speaker 4 Let's go.

Speaker 6 And yeah, it was really touching because on the flight, he says to me,

Speaker 6 I,

Speaker 6 so what are you doing after this? You know, after this story, and I said, They actually have me doing this NASCAR thing. It was this weird black and white NASCAR cover story.

Speaker 6 And he goes, This, he goes, Well, it ain't going to be like this. And I go, No.
And he goes, it's never going to be like this.

Speaker 1 And he was right. And I kind of, I kind of knew.

Speaker 1 Yeah, you've always been chasing that.

Speaker 6 I mean, I was on the balcony with John Elway at his hotel after his last game. He won Super Bowl MVP.
He's got a cigar in one hand and a beer in the other, and he's telling telling me everything.

Speaker 6 And I've, you know, I write that story for Sports Illustrated all night. Like, I've had moments where I'm like, this is surreal, but it was never like that.

Speaker 4 Yeah. Yeah.
So what about fact-checking when it comes to like going out and partying with Dennis Rodman? Like, how do you remember?

Speaker 4 all the quotes and stuff that you're getting over the course of the night because they do trust and you are a fun guy to hang out with.

Speaker 6 Yeah, it's such a great question because how we were classically trained journalism capital J, a lot of things, by the way, don't be the story. Don't inject yourself.

Speaker 6 I'm like, I'm too arrogant for that.

Speaker 6 But,

Speaker 6 you know, SI, we had time, it was due, you know, 9 a.m. Monday morning, usually, or sometimes 9 a.m.
Sunday morning. So you could deconstruct and go back and check it.

Speaker 6 But there are a lot of fine lines.

Speaker 6 Interestingly, doing the book with Rodman,

Speaker 6 I did back-to-back books with Rodman and Kurt Warner, very different books and experiences. But doing the book with Rodman was wild because

Speaker 6 his thing was,

Speaker 6 you have to come here and rage and get in my orbit. And after like

Speaker 6 an undetermined amount of time, we'd be on twin treadmills at the Birdo Center.

Speaker 1 And he'd be like, take on that, take a corner.

Speaker 6 And then it would be amazing. But my wife would be like, how long are you going to be gone? And I'd be like, I just don't know.

Speaker 1 Yeah, right. That's how I get kidnapped.

Speaker 4 It's a fair question for her to ask you, too, if like you're writing a story and you're typing it as Dennis Rodman's having sex while there's a bird.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 6 But he was amazing. Like the book came out, and we had gone out in Chicago to a place called Manhole.

Speaker 6 Okay, and Manhole is suggests you know that it would be a bar frequented by dudes who are into dudes, which is what it was. But one of the people, and in fact,

Speaker 6 big screen TV of hardcore

Speaker 6 porn with dude on dudes at the bar, but there was a friend of his called Mimi that went out with us, who was a voluptuous Marilyn Monroe lookalike with a sultry voice who had been named Michael and was in some form of transition, undetermined, but was Mimi.

Speaker 6 And in the book, as Dennis, I talked about Mimi and I said I had been with Mimi a few times, innocently, meaning I'd been out with Mimi. But he goes at Howard Stern and Stern's go, and he's like,

Speaker 6 You've been with Mimi.

Speaker 6 And Dennis just went with it. He just goes, a lot of people have been with transsexual, bro.
They just don't realize it.

Speaker 1 Incredible. Well, Mike, this has been awesome.
The book, The Why is Everything, a story of football, rivalry, and revolution. Buy it on Amazon.

Speaker 11 Man, I'll tell you what. When you're hungry out there, you start acting like a rookie quarterback in his first game, making bad decisions, messing up the basics, being all out of sorts.

Speaker 11 That's where Snickers comes in, man. That thing is packed.
Roasted peanuts, nugget, caramel, milk chocolate. It's like the MVP of candy bars.

Speaker 11 And when you bite into it, boom, it sorts you out, gets your head back in the game of life, satisfying your hunger. Remember this.
Snickers handles your hunger so you can handle everything else.

Speaker 11 Snickers satisfies, man.

Speaker 6 That's a winning play.

Speaker 1 I have to ask Grateful Dead question. How many shows have you been to? I know we've talked about it privately.

Speaker 1 How many shows have you been to total?

Speaker 6 Well, we're only counting Jerry Grateful Dead. Yes.
Because

Speaker 6 I went to Jerry Band and Kingfish, kingfish and obviously anything since 95 doesn't count right um we did it my buddy and i i think at 60.

Speaker 6 um wow they were in you know i went to cal from 83 to 88 so they just played so much kaiser and you know it was mail order tickets or buy one outside it was 15 bucks and it's so weird because we look back now and we're like we should have gone to more yeah um but we also knew and i think you know i i i wonder the same like we knew in that moment we're seeing, you know, not just history, but that Jerry, it was just a different thing that was going on.

Speaker 6 How many did you get to?

Speaker 1 Well, I mean, I've never, I'm too young to have gone to True Grateful Dead. Yes.
Because I'm 39. Oh, yeah.
I've been to every iteration basically since Phil Lesh and Friends in the early 2000s.

Speaker 6 Nice.

Speaker 1 But so you got to see like Pete Brent. I saw

Speaker 1 Pete. I saw Peak Brent.

Speaker 6 And yeah, I know you and I are aligned on that. That is my wheelhouse.
So

Speaker 6 Jerry had the, Jerry almost died in 86 and went into a diabetic coma.

Speaker 6 They took months off. He had to relearn how to play the guitar.
And

Speaker 6 Dennis McNally, their longtime publicist, who was right very close, has told me that he always felt Jerry after that was like a great pitcher who'd lost his fastball, still amazing and hit moments, but the speed, it just wasn't.

Speaker 6 So if I had a wheelhouse, I would say, you know, Brent, like once he started rounding into Forbes, let's say 82,

Speaker 6 to diabetic coma, which is summer of 86. Yeah, but it's all so.

Speaker 1 It's all one song, yeah.

Speaker 4 What about you? Do you have a relationship with Aaron Rodgers?

Speaker 6 Yeah, I just did a, I just actually did two columns on him. One of them, I went out to Jersey and hung with him during training camp.
And so,

Speaker 6 you know, he's a Cal guy. I met him, you know, coming out of Cal.
He almost, you know, gave me my life quest, which is to see my team go to the Rose Bowl, which I think we all agree is even harder.

Speaker 6 Yeah.

Speaker 6 And, you know, he's been really good to me over the years.

Speaker 6 I think we probably diverge now on some certain things.

Speaker 6 You know, I saw you guys at Tahoe. I saw him going in there.

Speaker 6 It was a great interview.

Speaker 6 My favorite part was when you were talking about the doctor's assessment of the

Speaker 6 Achilles, and you said something to the effect of, so you were just trying to get them to make it seem like you could come.

Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah, he was. He did it for the whole season.
He took the, he took the Jets hostage a little bit.

Speaker 6 But how you, you guys did pretty well, right? Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 He's, I mean, he's an interesting cat.

Speaker 1 He's, I, I didn't like him forever because he obviously tortured me, but now that he's on the Jets, I like watching him play now is a little, it's kind of fun being like, oh, he's doing the same tricks where he gets everyone off sides and throws a touchdown to, you know, Lazard.

Speaker 1 It's like, I can't be mad about this anymore. Right.

Speaker 6 I mean, I see Christian McCaffrey in that Nider locker room constantly. And,

Speaker 6 you know, as a Cal guy, I love him. But

Speaker 6 I've always regretted it because I was doing this story on Ed McCaffrey for SI, and they only had two kids at the time. And Ed is a great dude, but not a great quote.
But his wife, Lisa, is hilarious.

Speaker 6 She's the one whose dad was an Olympic spreader. And she said in the story,

Speaker 6 Ed and I are breeding fast white guys, which turned out to be true. It's in the SI store.
You can look it up. So we're in their kitchen, and the two boys are running around, Max and Christian.

Speaker 6 I can remember the scene vividly.

Speaker 6 And I've always kicked myself that I didn't sweep the leg because, yes, I probably would have done some jail time, gotten my ass kicked, and it would have been frowned upon, probably would have got fired.

Speaker 6 Yeah. But God, it would have saved me so much misery.
We didn't tackle that guy for three years. I mean, it was terrible.

Speaker 1 He was so good at Stanford.

Speaker 1 All right. Well, Mike, thank you so much.
It's been awesome, man. We really appreciate you coming by, and everyone go buy the book.
It's football history.

Speaker 1 You're reading football history as it happens, too. That's the cool part about the book is it's not only history, but it's still going on.

Speaker 6 I totally appreciate it. And I feel like this adds to our origin story because we always have the blues bar and Jeff Darlington desperately trying to keep us from feuding.

Speaker 1 Yeah, well, you kept on saying Hugh Jackson got screwed, and it's like he won one game in

Speaker 1 the middle.

Speaker 6 You can say a lot of things about Hugh Jackson, and you can say a lot of things about me, but at least please say that I'm a good friend.

Speaker 1 You are a good friend. Yeah, you are.
You're actually too good of a friend. Yeah.

Speaker 1 It's arguable that I am too good of a friend.

Speaker 4 We get that same criticism. Like, we have guys that are our guys, and we will defend them to the ends of the earth.
And people get mad.

Speaker 6 My favorite part of the whole thing was Jeff is, I mean, Jeff was very...

Speaker 6 you know, we're very close.

Speaker 6 So Jeff was giving me that look like, you are not allowed to not, you know, you and I were already cool, but he was just giving me like, you're not allowed to not be cool with this guy.

Speaker 1 And I kept on just pressing. But

Speaker 1 he was also kind of coming at you.

Speaker 6 But my favorite part was you got so mad and then you said, I could get Jared Goff not to speak to you.

Speaker 1 That's right. I'm just going to cut you off.
And Jeff's like, I don't think that's true.

Speaker 1 He told me afterwards, like, no, you couldn't. I was like, yeah, I took a bluff.

Speaker 6 But I did love the energy. I remember, like, I kind of stepped back.

Speaker 1 I was like, wow, this guy doesn't play. But yeah,

Speaker 6 if we bring Odor of Reiki's back, I will literally credit this moment because I've toyed with it in my I would love it. But I will probably unveil it to you guys first.
I like that.

Speaker 1 You deserve to know. All right.
Well, thanks so much, Mike. Appreciate it so much.

Speaker 6 Thanks, guys. Thanks, Mike.

Speaker 13 This college football season, we are feeling the cheesiest with Cheez-It, the ultimate irresistible football-watching snack.

Speaker 14 Cheez-It brings 100% real cheese and deliciousness to every game.

Speaker 13 Fuel your game day cravings with cheesy, crunchy, salty deliciousness. And fuel your Cheez-It fandom at cheez-it.com.
Use code stool25 for 20% off your order.

Speaker 1 Alright, let's wrap up, guys on chicks. Henry,

Speaker 1 hit us.

Speaker 5 I've been talking to this guy for some time, and I recently learned all his friends call him the roach.

Speaker 5 I really don't like the name, especially when one of his friends yell, how's your roach?

Speaker 5 Which I don't really understand at all. While I really don't like it, it's a strange reason to stop talking to him since I do like him.

Speaker 5 So should I ask him to drop the roach tag or just try to embrace it? Thanks.

Speaker 4 That's a scummy nickname, yeah. It's not

Speaker 1 a bug or it's the end of a joint yeah he might be a pothead that would be better yeah he should lie to you and tell you it's because he used to smoke a lot of wheat i don't do that shit anymore it's kind of a badass nickname to know roach

Speaker 4 yeah roach but roach is a guy that you call in like once every other month to hang out yeah when you really want to go slumming

Speaker 4 roach is

Speaker 4 roach is not a guy that you would trust to be like your best man at your wedding.

Speaker 1 He'd be an usher. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And she'd be be like, here, hand out these, and he'd probably forget. Yeah.

Speaker 5 My girlfriend recently asked me about the typical placement max of

Speaker 5 men at a urinal when she saw an Instagram video. She did not understand the concept.
I explained it to her like each urinal is its own parking spot and you as a person are the vehicle trying to park.

Speaker 5 I had to tell.

Speaker 5 I had her tell me where she would park herself if it was a parking lot and mimic the video. It still did not make sense to her.
Did I explain it wrong or is she dumb?

Speaker 4 You usually want to give if you have an extra space, you take an expression.

Speaker 1 Extra parking spot makes sense. You would never park next to someone if there's two open spaces.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 I do, I mean, every now and then it's funny.

Speaker 5 If you have like a full empty shoe, you go right next to the guy.

Speaker 4 Like one time I was at the Sirius XM studio and Ed Sheeran was taking the

Speaker 4 at the urinal. Wait, the Ed Sheeran? Yeah, Esheer.
But it was like he was starting to blow up. It was 2015.
Holy fuck. And you know who it was, though? I did not know who it was until later.

Speaker 4 But we ended up peeing at the same, like, right next to each other at the urinal.

Speaker 1 Shut the fuck up.

Speaker 4 I lied. We both did not end up peeing.
I was peeing, and I was peeing, like, full stream. And then Ed, poor Ed, couldn't squeeze out any pee.

Speaker 4 So he really was trying to pee, and he started spitting into the urinal.

Speaker 4 I dominated him at the urinal, and then he had to do the fake flush, like he flushed the urinal like he peed, but he didn't pee. And then he washed his hands like he peed.

Speaker 4 He did not pee, pee, and then just left sad. And I knew he still had to pee, but he couldn't do it because he was intimidated.

Speaker 1 How have you never told us this? I don't know.

Speaker 4 Pretty insane. It's a wild story.

Speaker 1 Yeah, parking space, though, that works.

Speaker 4 It's actually a great analogy. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Hi.

Speaker 5 My boyfriend told me to text this number. I saw his fantasy football team name is Hawk Tua spit on my chub.

Speaker 5 I think it's weird to have a sexual name, but he insists it's a normal thing and it's just funny because there's a guy named Tua and a guy named Chubb on his team.

Speaker 1 Should I be concerned? Ah, you should be concerned because it's unoriginal.

Speaker 4 Yeah, I think we predicted right when the Hawk Tua video came out. Yeah, but if you're going to be the top fantasy name,

Speaker 1 everyone's named Hawk Tua.

Speaker 4 You name your team, but he added a little extra to

Speaker 4 get on this Chubb.

Speaker 1 Does he have Chubb too?

Speaker 1 What is he doing with his IR spot?

Speaker 4 He's got a shitty team. That's the big red flag.

Speaker 4 He's very bad at fantasy football.

Speaker 7 My fantasy team name has just been Jim Bob Cooter for the past 10 years.

Speaker 4 Respect.

Speaker 7 Just no, no pun, just his name.

Speaker 1 I've decided that I'm just going to start naming my fantasy teams because everyone's like, oh, you got to change your name every year.

Speaker 1 I'm going to start naming my fantasy teams like I'm six years old. So my fantasy team name is the Scorpions.
That's pretty cool. Yeah, isn't it?

Speaker 4 Or you could name your team just a real name. Like, that's Bob.

Speaker 1 Yeah. I also, you can do.

Speaker 1 I just said I did that. Yeah.
Jim Bob Cooter. Yeah, but just give it like one first.

Speaker 4 But even that.

Speaker 1 Yeah, but you're trying to do sexual. You're doing sexual.
Yeah, but it's Jim Bob Cooter.

Speaker 5 Also, the Cooter is why you named it Jim Bob Cooter.

Speaker 1 It's a funny name.

Speaker 7 And Jim Bob is also a funny first name.

Speaker 1 Some leagues you can just do an emoji. So, like, one year I was just a wolf.
That's pretty sick. Badass.

Speaker 4 Mine's the new T-Main.

Speaker 1 Nice.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I would highly recommend, though, just go back to being like a seven-year-old. Like, next year, you know what? I'm thinking right now, I might change one of my team's names to the fire trucks.

Speaker 7 I just realized we basically just do fantasy football names every Sunday for Boomers.

Speaker 1 That's true. Yes.
It's exactly what we do. It's exactly what we do.

Speaker 5 There's probably a lot of people with fantasy names from Boomers.

Speaker 1 Yeah, remind us to do the Hawk Tua joke this week on Boomers. Yeah.
Yeah. It's about time.

Speaker 4 She's topping us in the charts.

Speaker 1 Actually, Hawktua is a perfect player.

Speaker 7 But neither of those two players are going to play this week.

Speaker 4 It would have been awesome. Yeah, we should do it.
It would have been perfect last week because it was Hawks.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 4 Dolphin. It would have been Hawk Tua.

Speaker 1 Shit. Damn.
Damn.

Speaker 4 We'll never get that moment back.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 Hank, last one.

Speaker 5 this one said, Hey, Mudang Cat, PFT Commanders in autumn of Hank. My boyfriend and his friends have a weekly scheduled FaceTime every Friday night.

Speaker 5 He says it's their time to catch up and cook up something in the lab for sports for the weekend. They just end up taking shots of beer every time the song changes for hours.

Speaker 5 This means we can never go out on Fridays as a couple. And I have to leave the house if I don't want to hear them screaming about fancy football or the Mount Rushmore dipping sauces.

Speaker 1 Is this normal guy bonding?

Speaker 5 I feel like this is just an excuse to get drunk. Should I be concerned? And will I ever get my boyfriend back for Friday night's?

Speaker 5 This guy was in a frat.

Speaker 1 Was this email from 2020?

Speaker 1 Thank you. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Mudang supremacy shirts. The bars shorts.

Speaker 5 It says she. Where is Mudang?

Speaker 1 Mudang Supremacy shirts. China? China.
This feels like an op. Maybe Taiwan? It feels like a psyop.
I love Mudang.

Speaker 4 Have you guys seen Pesto? That's how they get you.

Speaker 1 Have you seen Pesto? No.

Speaker 5 Pesto's. Who is Mudang for maybe the...

Speaker 1 Mudang is a pygmy hippo that is the cutest fucking hippo ever. I think Pygmy pygmy hippo.
I don't know. Little baby hippo.

Speaker 4 I think it's pygmy.

Speaker 7 Laura sent me that shirt last week, and then she told me that the Phillies NLE Championship shirt was also in that box. So unfortunately, I couldn't touch it until today.

Speaker 1 Oh, okay, that makes sense. So go buy it.
Mudang. Cutest.

Speaker 1 Pesto is a penguin that is a baby penguin that is like two times the size of his parents.

Speaker 4 So it's a giant. It's a giant.

Speaker 1 It's a unit. Yeah, but baby penguins are furry.
So he looks different. It's cool.

Speaker 4 Pesto's awesome. Oh, yeah, pesto's.

Speaker 4 Pesto's chill. I listen, I like Mudang.
I enjoy the public of Mudang, but it seems like everybody loves Mudang, and it's a little convenient that it might be Chinese propaganda.

Speaker 1 That's fine. I don't care.
Okay. This guy, this is a COVID email.

Speaker 1 She just emailed from COVID. That was 2020.

Speaker 5 Yeah, like getting a group of guys organized for a FaceTime that often was wild.

Speaker 1 That was, I remember doing it a few times with my friends when COVID was happening, and it was nice, but as soon as we were able to go outside, which was like three weeks later, we're like, all right, that's over.

Speaker 4 Yeah, this is, it's really strange to schedule this on a Friday, too.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 4 And just get drunk staring at your screen.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Very weird.

Speaker 5 Had to be a frat. Yeah.

Speaker 1 It had to be a frat.

Speaker 1 Okay. Good show, boys.
Good show. Friday.
We're going to do NFL week four. Excited.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Let's finish with numbers.

Speaker 4 Five, nine,

Speaker 1 three, five, eighteen.

Speaker 4 Eleven. Number five.

Speaker 1 PFT and memes, you ever gotten this? No, I haven't, but I'm about to get it.

Speaker 6 Help me.

Speaker 6 About to pick five.

Speaker 1 Jane Daniels.

Speaker 1 Six.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 1 Nine? Oh, nine. Let's go.
Shit, you said nine? Dang, yeah. Oh, shit.
Fuck you, Hank. Oh, damn, that turned.
God damn it.

Speaker 4 You fucking suck.

Speaker 1 In your face, PFT.

Speaker 4 Drake May sucks.

Speaker 1 Damn. Good job, Hank.
Mine daughter, baby.

Speaker 5 Nine.

Speaker 1 Hell yeah. Woo.
Happy for you.

Speaker 4 Very happy for you, Hank.

Speaker 1 Thanks.

Speaker 4 Feels good to win.

Speaker 1 Dude, dude.

Speaker 1 What was it?

Speaker 5 No, dude.

Speaker 5 What did you do, Max?

Speaker 1 What? Winner.

Speaker 5 I win.

Speaker 4 And then you lost. That's actually the mark of a true winner, the way that Hank reacted.
He was just like, cool. Yeah.
Cool.

Speaker 1 Oh, nice. Nine.

Speaker 7 Yeah, well, you got to talk some shit.

Speaker 1 Love you guys.