Well, there you go. That was weird about thirty seconds late starting always
good to be sitting chatting with Evan Wilsmore for twenty minutes and they get ready
to go live in the internet goes out. We are here alive. I
am no longer evicted. I was evicted from the beer snake section. We'll
get into that today as well as lots of other XFL and USFL stuff.
I'm still in DC. We have Evan Wilsmore joined us here. Evan,
how are you. I'm doing good man. I was disappointed that Houston lost
this weekend, obviously, and we'll get more into that here in a couple
of minutes as the show goes on. But I'm doing all right, man.
You know what, we had a fun weekend. There was lots of
football, obviously. I probably don't need to say that. Yeah, man,
I'm having a good time. Yeah, I'm on Hotel WiFi. So
God Willie and everything goes. If we have some glitches today, you know
that's what it is. Yes, Evans Houson Roughnecks lost and the seattlec Dragons
lost Cracking, though Cracking in seven beat the Avalanche, So if it was
a soul for us soul if if the c Dragons had to lose for the
cracking to a move on, let's take that, Evan. Overall thoughts at
the weekend, crazy football both in the USFL. We'll talk about mccab Beldo
Thomps as well. But what did you make of everything? Yeah? Man,
it was a lot. I mean, between the XFL playoffs and the
USFL kind of getting into their groove. I mean, we really have kind
of hit that point now where you know, there's more football than maybe we've
ever had in the spring, at least it feels that way, and we've
only got more common, you know. I mean the XFL season will obviously
end in two weeks and next weekend we're on a buy in the XFL,
so it'll be a full slate of USFL games for people to enjoy, and
then you know CFLs coming up right around the corner. I mean, we
still got a bit to go, but you know, there's a lot like
it's uh, you know, football season never really ends. So it was
a crazy weekend. I guess we'll talk through the two XFL games, so
we'll do some USFL talk. Arlington, I mean, they did it,
They came back. It proves, you know, we were just talking about
the Bruins ahead of time. Here in the NHL, that doesn't matter what
you do in the regular season, you got to go to the playoffs.
I watched the game at the bar with some actual ESPN employees. That was
exciting. I sat down at the bar and I said, oh, the
game's on, Okay, I'll just watch the game here. And I realized
everyone at the bar knew what was going on in the game, and I
thought, oh, this is kind of interesting. So watched it with some
of them. That was fun. And what did you make you were there
with Anthony Miller, you know, with news as well. What did you
guys make of the game? What was surprising? Well, we can just
start with that. I mean, I don't think anybody expected Arlington to win,
let alone win in that manner, I guess. I mean, they
came out fire and man, you know, shout out to Louis Prez.
I mean, what an insane performance. You know, I had put in
my articles previously, I said, Louis Perez really does change this offense.
And even if they haven't, you know, even if they haven't won a
ton with him yet, you know, it's gonna matter, I think in
those key moments, and it sure did. I mean they turned up in
the playoffs and you know they beat the Brakes off Houston. You know that's
for sure. So I mean that was just crazy to see him do that,
and it was very again, you know, I talk a lot about
full circle moments, and you know, seeing Louise after he's been in you
know, the USFL last year, in the Spring League, and the XFL
in twenty twenty and the AF in twenty nineteen, I mean, I think
we call him a spring King now. But to see him do that and
to see him just go out there and kind of you know, just chuck
the ball around and have such a fun time doing it and you know,
make some incredible plays, it was very fulfilling in that sense. I again,
I was a bit disappointed that it was happening in the playoffs and that
it was going to eliminate Houston, but you know, hats off to him.
That was a truly phenomenal performance. Well, we I didn't even put
two and two together. We were, you know, obviously texting after the
DC game last night that here we had joined Tamu, you know, with
BattleHawks twenty twenty here back now leading the defenders. And then he had the
Luis Perez with the New York guardiansing at two of the original XFL twenty twenty
quarterbacks getting now to play in the championship game. I just think it's tremendous.
Oh, it really is. I mean, again, for people who
watched the league in twenty twenty, this is very special. You know because
Tamu in particular was really good in twenty twenty. You know, Perez was
kind of up and down, and you know, I'd have to go back
and look at some Guardians games to kind of jog my memory from that era.
But the bottom line is like, yeah, I mean, both of
these guys are have very impressive spring football resumes, and they really know what
they're doing, and it's clear that they can lead their teams to victory,
Like Louis came in late from Vegas and kind of rallied Arlington to you know,
a couple wins. I guess down the stretch, even if they didn't
win a while. I mean, like they had that game against DC which
is now going to be a rematch in the championship where you know, they
went to overtime, and you know, like they really kind of started battling
things out with Louis and then team who again was kind of one of those
guys who hit his stride late in the season as well. You know,
it started off where they were very run heavy with with Abram Smith and a
bit of Deeric King. But now you're kind of seeing like once they opened
up the pass the game with tam who you know, taking shots to Chris
Blair and Lucky Jackson and a couple of their tight ends. I mean,
once that opened up, I don't want to say it felt like game over,
but like you saw it. I mean, DC has has not slowed
down since then. What do you you know, you've covered the Rathnex all
season, a tremendous job. I was telling you, you know before we
recorded with the newsab and all the time spent flying out to all the games
and everything. Was this a Houston collapse or did you know the Arlington Did
they just outplay them here? Well, whenever a team loses in that scenario,
it's always more than one thing. You know, There's so many factors
that go into that. I think I think one of the major issues was,
you know, Houston. They played I would say better last week against
Arlington when the game didn't matter with their you know, sort of altered you
know, dumbed down playbook, then they did when it was supposed to matter,
and Arlington was the exact opposite. You know, Luis Perez was talking
in the press conference, he was kind of saying what we all thought and
knew about how you know, last week obviously they weren't trying to you know,
pull out all the tricks in the book and everything like that. They
were trying to have a very simple and vanilla offense, and clearly, you
know, Houston maybe wasn't ready for that. I think the one thing on
Houston's end that was kind of uncharacteristic because we've had a slower offense, you
know, ever since that, I guess Week five game against Seattle. You
know, it's kind of I don't want to say gone downhill entirely, because
we've had a couple of good games running the ball, but in terms of
passing, which is supposed to be sort of our strong point, I guess
it hasn't quite been up to par. But yeah, I mean, you
know, you look at trying to think of where I was going with that.
But anyway, you know, I think the one thing that you know,
Houston did that was a bit uncharacteristic was, you know, there was
a lot of separation on some of those plays and shout out to the Renegade's
offensive line to I mean, Louise had so much time in the pocket to
make those throws and make those decisions. Again, that was a lot you
know of Arlington just kind of getting things together, like they haven't done anything
like that all year. I mean for Houston, it was, you know,
it felt not like a normal Houston game. I mean, that was
definitely, you know, one of the I guess most poor performances of the
year. There's there's no other way to put it. I mean, it
was not exactly fun to watch, and you could tell even by the second
quarter it was kind of like, you know, you've got to start making
some adjustments before halftime or us this thing's going to get out of reach,
and unfortunately, I think it did. But yeah, I mean, you
know, the one thing that was I guess uncharacteristic too was just I think
I said the separation, but there was that it was in particular on that
fifty nine yard touchdown to Javonte Peyton. I mean, man, that was
just an uncharacteristic plan R and giving up such a deep touchdown like that,
you know, and to a guy that had already had a touchdown in the
game previously. You know, it just again it felt very I don't know,
I just I don't know what happened. Maybe it was because we only
practiced once that week, and you know I had found that out before the
game, and I figured that was the case from the injury reports that we
had got. But uh, yeah, you know, unfortunately, it was
just sort of a you know, didn't get things together at the right time.
And you know, Arlington I had said in the articles, you know,
they were kind of trending upward, like you can't count them out despite
the record, despite everything that's against them, and yeah, that's what happens.
So it's so weird. You know, we had this whole controversy last
week in the playoffs, and you know, we had even Anthony back to
tweeting this weekend coutch back seven and three sitting hole watching football. I tweeted
back off of me at Addie Field, I said, you know, not
me, but you know, we have all of this and you know,
Renegades don't deserve to be here. Is it better or worse now that they're
in the championship game with the losing record and everything else. Yeah, well
it's a great question and great point. You know, I think now that
Arlington is kind of uh, I guess you could say silenced a lot of
people who said that they were just gonna, you know, be written off
in the playoffs and he would, you know, win by twenty plus points.
Um. Yeah, this changes things a bit because you know, had
Saint Louis, you know, had to play DC like in DC, like
essentially taking Seattle's place. You know, they lost to DC twice, Um,
you know in the in the regular season, and Arlington did the same
you know with Houston, and Bob Stoups mentioned in our press conference, he
goes, well, I guess third times the charm and you know, maybe
it could have been the same for Saint Louis. But again, Arlington was
on such an upward trajectory there at the end of the year, and I
don't know, like Saint Louis, they finished their season on a high.
No obviously, you know, with their fifty three point game against Orlando you
know a J McCarron, I mean, boy with his you know, four
hundred yards and six touchdowns, I was phenomenal. Um. But I just
I don't know, like DC DC really is that good. I mean,
I'm not trying to you know, make championship picks too early and count anybody
out, because clearly I was, I was maybe counting some people out this
weekend. I don't want to make those picks too early, but like gonna
be hard to stop the defenders. Man. So the fact that you know,
the Renegades were able to you know, take down a seven and three
team in the playoffs, again, that's hats off to them. They came
out and they really you know, they really performed well. And part of
that too was you know, if Anthony was here, he could talk about
a lot about this. But Donald Payne kind of coming back and it was
almost a strategic thing. I felt like again Stoops in the press conference said
that Payne had a misdiagnosis or you know whatever that means. He had a
misdiagnosis with his injury and he was able to come back, and we kind
of agreed. I don't know how accurate that is. Maybe it's just strategy,
right, Like Donald Payne is one of the best linebackers and all the
X one of the best defensive players. I mean, he was a game
changer. I think he had ten tackles in that matchup against Houston. So
having a guy like him come back on short notice, I mean that could
throw off the game plan a bit. I just didn't figure out. You
know, we're watching the game and we didn't have sound down, We're at
the bar, But I don't know, like, did we just give up
on Brandon Silver's Like why Cole McDonald's out there? I mean, obviously athletic,
obviously a great story, but not making tremendously great throws that I found
and we without watching and you know, missing and throwing into coverage, Like
why why did we go all in on called McDonald here for the last game?
Well, this is a bit of a difficult thing. And the way
I looked at it is, you know Brandon, you know Brandon's obviously he
has not played as well over the second half of the season. It's a
tale of two worlds really. I mean ever since he you know, got
that injury, I think it was in DC, Like that injury has been
lingering and he hasn't been practicing UM and that's definitely played a role into why,
you know, things haven't been as good for him. Again, I've
said many times, not having John Trey Kirkland there is the deep threat down
the field. You know, that hurts, right, It's it's harder to
move the ball. UM. The offense clearly does not function as well without
him, and there was never a clear replacement found really even over six or
seven weeks. UM. So I think what happened was, you know,
Brandon effectively got benched. I don't know, I don't I don't really like
using that term, but it's kind of true. You know, he started
the game and then pretty quickly it was clear like Cole was going to finish
it. UM. But in that moment, and here's the thing about Cole.
You know, I love Cole McDonald. I've gone on record saying great
things about he was one of my favorite players in college. And then once
he came, you know, to Houston, I was so excited and I
you know, I thought he was going to be the starter. He ended
up doing a lot for us this season, even though he wasn't in a
true starting role like it was a two quarterback system, you know, because
they ran the ball a lot with him. But I think what happened is
they wanted to give Cole the shot because you know, he mean, he
looked good last week in Arlington, and again maybe that was a bit of
a different playbook whatever, but he you know, did some cool stuff against
Arlington. It wasn't a ton, but I think he did enough to make
the team feel comfortable about his abilities going into this playoff game, so they
played him, you know, for the rest of the game. But I
think what happened is, you know, Cole is a bit, maybe further
behind in his development than I initially thought going into the season. And maybe
that's just the offense he's playing in. Maybe it's not the exact version of
what he had in college where he found a lot of success. And you
know, obviously now you're playing against maybe higher level defenses, especially the Renegades
defense. I mean, that's an extremely tough challenge. Excuse me, But
I think what happened again and is just you know, he needs a bit
more time and there was probably a bit of pressure on him in that game.
And I don't want to say he made a lot of forceful throws downfield
or anything like that. But there were a lot of balls that, you
know, we're missed. And I kind of saw that coming from a while
away, you know, just even as the ball was leaving his hands,
I'm like, I don't know if you should be throwing that, man,
Like, maybe we should go a bit more to the run. And I
think he ended up finishing with like nine to twenty five completion. I mean,
whatever the line was, it was not good at all. But obviously
I wish the best for Cole and I don't want this again, just like
I said in that Saint Louis game in Week seven, to be a reflection
of who he is as a person and you know what his capabilities are as
a quarterback. Yeah, I just you know, I get wanting they do
reps and want and they do all this kind of stuff that you know,
it's it's the damn playoffs and it's Yeah, that's where I just didn't get
in shutting down not given Brandon. Yeah, I think it was like his
he had an elbow issue or something like that. And it was right after
right, Yeah, I try to try right after I talked, and it
was right after he was on the show. I think it was that,
you know, the game that weekend at DC. I think it was the
Monday night game, right, And so I don't know anything else on Arlington.
All that. We'll talk to DC here and we can do either wide
ranging thoughts at the end, anything specific on the game. Yeah, I
mean, you know, I again, I was a bit, uh shell
shocked. I guess it's kind of the term watching that, and you know,
I was up there with Anthony and there was a couple of Arlington guys
there, and you know, I just remember Anthony telling me, He's like,
we might actually go to the championship. Man. He's like, I
did not expect this at all. I came to Houston, you know,
you know, ready to lose and you know, ready to just go home.
And I was kind of just hoping for a good time. But yeah,
he was even he was surprised, you know, especially I mean for
Arlington, it was just such a jump in expectation and from what they were
used to the entire season. I mean, if you go back before Perez
was there, when it was like the sloat Or era, I don't think
that kind of thing would have been possible. You know, and I don't
want to try and you know, knock anybody in particular, whether it's play
calling or the quarterbacks themselves. But you know, they just could not get
in their groove and they tried a lot of different things. I felt like
it just never really got going. Then suddenly in the playoffs, I guess
they had a different type of hunger and I mean they came out fire and
it worked. That's the bottom line. So well, good for Stoops.
You know, obviously we were going to have a Texas team most likely in
there. Anyway, say for the Guardian, see you know you have Arlington
there. You know it could have been san Antonio. I don't I don't
know if I see san Antonio playing the game against Houston that Arlington did you
know. I think I think if if san Antonio is in there, I
would give Houston the edge. So you think going in you know, sliding
doors, different world. Yeah. I mean, look, I again,
I had really said the whole season. I mean I expected the running Gates
to be good. Obviously their record didn't really reflect that. But now that
they've beaten us in the playoffs, like I kind of have to say they're
good. But even on the end of the year, I said, Houston
Arlington are probably gonna be the top two teams in the South, and it's
gonna be you know, it might be a toss up, Like I obviously
want to give Hughson the advantage. Excuse me, given that I know everybody
on the roster. I know the coaching staff better like I cover that team,
I just know them better in general. Yeah, you know, you
can never counts and out. And it was good, Like it's good to
see. I mean, we've talked about it all year. You know,
teams like making changes a coordinator and quarterback, like you know, they care.
Like it's not just about you know, showcasing people's talents and getting the
film. That's certainly a part of it, but like teams really care about
winning. I mean, you saw, you know, san Antonio making some
changes in like week four, you know, and then the Renegades were kind
of you know, later in the season again they were like, you know
what, like we need a boost, like we're gonna go trade for pres
and you know, they kind of revamped the offense a bit, and I
mean, man, it's it's just so great to see that. In the
XFL, where people care that much, even in a short season, to
make those adjustments to become better teams. Well, that's good. We'll talk
to DCC out here. We can do any other thousands. At the end,
I do have some funny I have some funny stories from my time here
in the nation's capital. Uh. First and foremost, I was watching their
cracking game last night. I was at the bar, and you know,
I was there all night because the game, you know, games are going
on and whatever. And I go to the restroom when I come back,
and there's four people sitting there and then d Nucci's brother, sister, and
cousin, and so I ended up watching the cracking game with the de Nucci
family. Ben was not there, you know. Obviously, I think Ben
was probably you know, reflecting, kind of doing whatever back in the hotel
room. So they were not nearly as invested in the cracking game as I
would have liked. But it was fun that Ben's brother looks and sounds exactly
like Ben Di Nucci was pretty while to be sitting there. That's cool,
man. I yeah, I know you would say. You texted that yesterday
and I thought that was pretty interesting. How do you know it was like
his family. You asked him her no because yeah, they they had Seattle.
They had yeah, because I'm trying to remember that they had like one
of them had a sea dragging shirt on. I was like, oh were
you guys, Like are you from Seattle? Like are you because you know
there wasn't a lot of us there and oh yeah no, like our brother
plays. I'm like, oh, okay, like I know all of this.
I guess he's been the Bensmen on the show and you know, we
really the other story. I just wanted to give out. So I have
my my Xcel ticket here, so so excited to go to Audie Field.
I've been there, we were there for the kickoff back in twenty twenty.
Bought a ticket for the beer Snake section because you know that was obviously I
just wanted to be a part of it and be a part of the beer
Snake and they were cheaper anyway. It was like twenty bucks. So I
get there, it's like pouring rain and everything. I go out into the
section and I've got like my Dragons you know shirt on, and I've got
like an orange jacket and everything, and you know, I get I'm getting
a few gears. As I walk in there, and you bo, I'm
like, oh, you know, I'm laughing, and you know, I'm
a watching Commanders fan, so I'm like talking to them about the Commanders.
We're talking about the Redskins and everything else, and we're just you know,
people are giving me crap, but it's funny. I wasn't there more than
five minutes Insecurity comes over and I'm just talking and he tapped me on the
shoulder because I'm kind of talking behind and he goes, uh, sir,
you know we're gonna, you know, need you to leave this section.
This is first you know, supporters only, and everyone in DC is so
nice, like they're everyone here and the staff and the bar, you know,
everyone is And I'm like, oh you ah ha ha, Like that's
so funny, like good one did. He goes like, no, I'm
serious, like we saw you and camera. You need to leave this section
immediately for your safety. It's like, that's a wild So they went they
gave me a ticket. I ended up sitting in front of Jared, who's
one of the listeners at the podcast. It was it was going to be
connected that way, but I was not able to partake in the beer snake
section. I was evicted from the beer snake section. Evan, what do
you make about Yeah. I mean when you told me that, I thought
you were joking too. I was like, oh, you know, classic
classic read, you know, good one whatever. But then yeah, then
then that kind of thought about it. I was like, oh, like,
what if he's serious, you know, And then it turned out you
were and you you got moved. I guess it was closer to the fifty
yard line it looked like. But yeah, that's a that's quite interesting.
I mean, you know, I understand the DC fans are a bit routing.
You know, they were throwing lemons yesterday and everything that we know,
and of course there's the beer snake. I don't have to talk about that
anymore than ESPN has already mentioned it. But I mean, what you know
that, Yeah, that was just uh, I would I was not expecting
to hear that from you. That was kind of one of the last things
I would have thought, you know, would happen. Again. I can
understand it, but it seems like a bit a pretty serious measure given that
there's only what eighteen thousand people there. I mean, that's still a healthy
number, but I don't know. I think you would have been fine personally,
Like people know who you are, man, you know you're not there
to cause a problem. Well that was the thing, Like I absolutely get
it. I absolutely get it, like MLS and people getting like I absolutely
understand, and it was more just to samety they get any retrospect. I'm
like, well that probably makes sense, but you know, I just figured
for the XFL. And because I go over to the ticket thing, They're
like, well, do you like, do you want to leave? I'm
like, no, I'm not. I'm not able to. I'm not.
It doesn't seem like I have an option here. So it was fun.
I was able to admire it from afar and that the beer sneak was great.
I will say eighteen thousand there it was. It ended up not you
know, stopped raining during the game, but it was absolutely horrendous all day.
So I give a thousand percent credit to DC for showing up as they
did with the eighteen thousand. Yeah, I mean the crowd looked great.
You know, that was extremely impressive and you could hear it during the game
too, And I mean I'm very glad the weather opened up because I was
kind of worried it was going to be a bit of a slug fest,
you know, with the rain coming down. But yeah, I mean clearly
the field conditions we're still you know, not adequate. And again we'll get
into that in terms of performance, especially on the Seattle side, but I
mean, yeah, like the crowd was great. You know, that was
a fantastic atmosphere. It was a great send off for DC because that's sort
of one of those venues too that's become very uh I guess famous or well
known within the XFL community or XFL lore or whatever you want to call it.
You know, with all the beer snake, you know, the people
coming in, the outfits, and then the Lemons were a new thing you
know that came around in week one or week two whenever they had the home
openers. So it was fun. That was fun to see. So what
did you make of this from it? You know, an actually a football
perspective? Really to me felt like a collapse of Seattle. I know,
Matt Lyons has his article out right now, and I'm sure Evan Evan as
well on the News had that. I was just reading through mats before we
got on here, you know, over at News have doing that reflection of
all that. You know, Seattle can't run the ball, We're throwing the
ball in the rain, people can't seem to catch the ball. DC doesn't
seem to have a problem catching the ball. What did you make of the
game. Yeah, well, you know, you're right, it kind of
was a Seattle collapse because you know, people despite that score, you know,
this game was tied nine nine at halftime. You know, it was
a very slow first half, and you know that's when you saw a lot
of the drops. Um, you know, I think it was nine nine
if I'm not mistaken. Yeah, I'm already already kind of jogged my memory
even though it was yesterday. I was so busy anyway. Um, yeah,
no, so you know Seattle, Yeah, I had a couple of
uncharacteristic drops. Not sure if that was with the gloves or the field conditions,
but it was very odd. I mean, you know, there was
I mean it got to a point where, you know, I don't want
to say comical, because those guys really are trying, but it was just
like, look, there's a drop, like you just know it's coming,
you know, like the balls are bouncing off people's hands and that was very
unfortunate because there was a lot of opportunities. I think of that one catched
on third down where Juwan Green had it, you know, just passed the
line and it dropped like it was in his hands and he kind of juggled
it and then it fell and then he went back to the sideline and you
know he had his head down and everything, and you know, teammates were
trying to lift him up. Yeah, it was very, um, very
uncharacterised. But I think what really, you know, killed Seattle in this
game, besides the late penalties, was Greg Williams and his defense because June
threw the ball so much in that game that I think, you know,
I don't want to say Greg really ever had to catch up because he always
plays you know, aggressive. He was saying that to the COMMENTATY. He's
like, yeah, you know we're gonna I think unleash hell was the term
that he used, and that he always does, you know, Greg Williams,
That's what he's been known for, you know, throughout his entire tenure
in the NFL. But yeah, man, I mean DC's defense really brought
it coming, and you know, I guess Seattle's defense had a couple of
turnovers off tip balls too, But I don't know personally, I was more
impressed on the DC side with their you know, Greg Williams, you know,
making those adjustments, and I mean he kind of exposed June. You
know, this is a defense that has worked at the NFL level. And
keep in mind, I love June Jones. I think he's a great offensive
coordinator. But in this game, again, it was sort of like what
I thought about Houston. You know, maybe just try and give it to
Philip Lindsay and see if something happens. I mean, typically if you're running
the ball late, it's kind of a sign that you know, you're just
trying to burn clock or get things over with. Like I get passing the
ball, but I mean, you know it's only to a certain point.
I mean, hell, Ben had fifteen pass attempts in the first quarter or
something, and I'm just like, you know, at this rate, like
you know, you're gonna put too much pressure in certain areas and something's not
gonna go right. And especially again against the defensive coordinator of the caliber of
Greg Williams, you know, it's only a matter of time before things slip
away. And that's exactly what happened in front of my eyes. So,
yeah, it was crazy. The cl defense played decent. I thought we
gave up obviously some big, big gains, but they had that one.
It was that that they like tifted in the air and then the other guy.
We saw that in the end zone. You know, DC came back.
We just weren't able to do anything with it. I mean, we
get down and you know, you ended up kicking field goals and stuff.
I just we have a lot of questions here, the same question demanding the
run. You know, Gary's checking in. Knew they were down to one,
right, but yeah, like why do you bring in Philip Lindsay and
then you throw on the ball. However many times it was forty eight times.
It's crazy. It was a lot. I mean, yeah again,
you know, I think June like that offense. You know, that offense
is extremely successful in college and it is extremely hard to defend. You know,
keep in mind, like you know, they've had a couple pretty successful
games running that this year, the running shoot. But at the same time,
you know, I keep giving credit to Greg Williams here, and I
should give credit to Fred Kaies, the offensive quartator in DC. As well,
but we'll talk about more on DC's offensive side at a minute, and
maybe Seattle's defensive side too. But yeah, I mean Greg Williams, like
he you know, this is why I think DC is, you know,
in part ten and one, because Greg Williams again just has that pedigree.
And when I remember when the XFL first did their hires and Greg Williams was
a name that really stood out, and um, I think it was kJ
Sayles, who plays for DC, put on Twitter yesterday he said, this
is the best coach I've ever played for. You know this guy, I
mean, you know, he knows so much and he plays so aggressively that
it's so even with an offense where you're you know, trying to get big
games or even short gains through the past, you know, even you know
how many times we're trying to do that, Like you know, Greg can
stop that. And clearly like like after the it was really after like the
middle of the first quarter, I mean, Seattle just like that felt like
it was it. You know, it was like they had a bit,
you know, a couple drops and then you know, maybe had those gone
their way, they would have sustained more momentum and you know, not had
to settle for some field goals. But you know, like once like I
don't know even if though it was todd nine to nine and a half of
you could clearly tell where the momentum was swinging. Well, that was the
thing because Dorothy was watching the game. Obviously Dorothy didn't come with me this
weekend, and she was. She turned it on and she goes, oh,
yeah, how's the game. I said, oh, it's you know,
Seattle's just playing like garbage. And she goes, I thought it was
tied a half. I'm like, yeah, but it didn't really feel that
way. I mean, they had plenty of opportunities. It's just weird that
Ben, you have three tds. You know, no interception's played. You
know, played the clean this game probably of the season, and it just
couldn't get help from the wide receivers. Like you said, you don't want
to make fun and say it was comficult. They were dropping, but I
mean we were counting him in the stands. I was sitting with the DC
fans that yeah, that's four, that's fine, that's sexy. It's crazy.
Yeah. No, I mean look again, I mean hats off the
DC. They got the job done, and they really came out in the
second half and you know, put that one away. I mean, that
was a very complete performance. You know, Talmo again, maybe it wasn't
his best game. I think he had two interceptions off those tip balls,
but other than that, like you know, he still had all those big
plays again, things that we didn't see from him earlier in the season.
And I think the big debate now and I don't want to really bring the
NFL into this because they've been talking a lot about you know, XFL,
NFL, the whole opportunity bit. But you know, you start to wonder,
it's like, well, if Talmo goes out in two weeks and wins
the XFL championship after this kind of late season rise in DC's passing game,
you know, does he get that NFL shot again? And I think I
think there's a chance that he gets invited to a camp, you know,
especially this way. It didn't look like that at the beginning of the season.
And at this point, you know, in his career, he's been
with you know, bounced around the NFL so much. You know, I
think it'd be okay if he kind of stayed in the spring football realm.
But yeah, I mean, you know, hats off to Jordan and the
receivers. And again I think I mentioned Fred Kais earlier, the offensive coordinator
for DC. He's been fantastic all year and I mean without him again,
crowd to the players, but the coordinators too, play such a big role,
especially on that DC team. You know, Barlow kind of rallies everybody,
and he's had experience as a head coach in the lower levels of college
before. But like fred Kiss you know, the last time he coached I
think he was offensive coordinator alcorn State in like twenty seventeen. He's been out
of football for what I know, for a while. So for him to
come back and do this and just kind of make it look effortless to an
extent, excuse me, you know, for him to kind of make those
adjustments going from like heavy run at the beginning of the season, the sort
of opening up the passing game and so now where they're really more pass heavy
and Abram Smith, you know, doesn't really need to be the main part
of that offense to have more options now, to see him kind of put
that all together, hats off to Fred Kais too, man. Yeah,
it's cool here. We have a question I was going to pull up at
Mike was asking about the atmosphere and everything you did. DC live up to
the hype and this relates as well to the team. But I will say
tremendous. You know, ADDI fields great. We were there for the kickoff.
You know, the way it's built, it goes basically like up vertically,
so you're you're almost always on top of the action, right if you're
whether you're in the standing section, you're sitting. It kind of caves around.
But what was so cool to meet was it feels like DC, just
like Saint Louis has done with the BattleHawks, DC fans love that team.
They are channing for Reggie. You know, he's on the sidelines, he's
got respect. You know, you can see him kind of going back and
forth and talking to players, and it just feels like they've so bought into
that team and the respect that they have for everyone. And obviously DC has
earned it. But I thought the tremendous atmosphere, a tremendous crowd, but
they love that team and they really like that is you know, Washington Commanders
are not great right now, and it feels like DC has really adopted.
I saw hats and shirts everywhere at the hotel. I was staying that they
had signs up all the staff headshirts and hats on game day. It really
feels like the area around here is built into it. It's really cool,
absolutely, And I mean I think it's a similar scenario in Houston where a
lot of people are out on the Texans now. I mean, you notice
there's a lot of people who are you Roughnecks fans who are also Texans fans,
but you know they're not pleased with the state of the Texans organization,
both internally and externally. You know, you look at performance on the field
and everything that happens inside the building. You know, they kind of wanted
to be refreshed. And obviously in twenty twenty, Houston was the best team
in the XFL, even if the season didn't finish, so people bought into
that early on. And again, you know, you want to talk about
sort of fan atmosphere. I mean, you see a lot of like the
twenty twenty jerseys, you know, in the crowd in Houston, and I'm
sure it's the same in DC. I've seen a couple when I'm looking at
the TV, you know, and again in Saint Louis. All these returning
markets you kind of see, you know, it's not all new fans.
Like there's people you know who were there in twenty twenty and who kind of
were like us, you know, sort of committed to just riding it out
and seeing what was going to happen. And you know, now here we
are and you know, people have bought in, and that's the importance of
you know, I guess like being in a home market and kind of established
yourself the XFL again, you know, their marketing budget was pretty slim this
time around, but you know, again having that those twenty twenty connections I
think really helps with sort of um those fan atmospheres, especially in a place
like DC. So what do we make here? You know, and obviously
we'll premium the championship game a lot, but just initial thoughts. We'll be
live, you know, at the championship game. I'm getting all that set
up. I assume Evan, you know, you'll call in. You're certainly
welcome to. I know Andy and Anthony and I believe Frans going to be
there as well. H initial thoughts here DC versus at Renegades and maybe people
in the check and kind of drop you know who you got here in the
matchup having the initial thoughts. Yeah, well, I mean, you know,
looking at the last time those two teams played each other, it was
very it was exciting. You know, it was not a game. Again
many people would say, oh, well, DC is gonna blow the brakes
off a team like Arlington. But that was kind of right when the Renegades
were starting those late season adjustments and the DC game kind of showed like,
hey, you really can't count this team out and they probably are going to
make the playoffs even with their record, and they you know, they could
do something, and you know, as time would tell, they did.
But I go back to that game. I think it was week eight,
maybe week nine, week Gate something like that. You know, I go
back to that game, and you know, I think, I mean,
there was a couple of things that you know, went in the Renegades direction.
I think the one the big reason they won that game was because Bob
Stoops on that last drive challenge something. He saved his challenge you know till
late in the game, and then he called a challenge. It might have
been passed interference or a hold or something on the defense and he got it,
you know, and then Arlington gets a couple of extra yards and that
keeps the drive going or else that would have been the end of the game.
If I recall correctly, it might have been on fourth down. So
you know, that kind of made things exciting again. The fourth and fifteen
conversion played a role in that. We've seen a couple of times this season
where that's worked and you know, maybe kept teams and games. I think
the best example of that was, you know, very early on the Saint
Louis San Antonio game, which feels like a billion years ago now, after
everything you know, we've been doing and you know, all these leagues kind
of happening. But yeah, I mean the bottom line is, I think
this is an intriguing matchup and I would still favor DC obviously, and DC
did end up winning that previous matchup. It went to overtime. You know,
again, very exciting game, a lot of stuff going on, but
you know, DC is just so complete and you saw yesterday, i mean
against Seattle, like the favor was certainly swinging, you know, the momentum
was swinging their way even before halftime when they were tied but like I mean,
DC closed in just tremendous fashion. And I get that was at home.
They won't have that this time around. It'll be a neutral site.
But like I mean, they just came out in the second half, and
I mean, you know, even if Seattle had played a perfect game and
they didn't have the penalties or the drops or whatever, it was still going
to be really difficult to catch up with that. So again, you know,
DCS are really tough out And again I understand Arlington is still I mean,
after their game against Houston this week, they're still trending upward, right,
like they're still you know, clearly worthy of being in that championship spot.
I think, after you know what I saw. But yeah, you
know, we we'll just we'll see how it goes. Like I'm very interested
to see, you know, if it's like the same sort of flow as
it was the last time, or if one team kind of dominates early and
then another player kind of comes back into it. There's a lot of things
that could happen, as is the case in any championship game. Definitely the
one. The last thing I'll say about that matchup is it's interesting. I
don't think anybody expected DC versus Arlington, especially Arlington. I mean, that
side of it is, uh, you know, I think a lot of
people would have said Seattle Houston, or do you see Houston, or if
you want to bring Saint Louis, you know, into that sort of playoff
talk, you know, maybe you incorporate them into a couple of scenarios.
But yeah, man, like you know, this is definitely something that I
don't think a lot of people anticipated. Yeah, it's just the game yesterday
really felt like Seattle ran out of his team. You know, I've been
watching a lot of hockey here lately obviously as well, and you know,
you can be down two zero with five minutes left and okay, we pull
the goalie or you know, you get one in and you kind of run
background. It never felt like Seattle, you know, even at the end
that we get the touchdown and we go for the fourth and fifteen, I
think you never felt like they were in this game. After really about the
end of the third corner, it just felt like we're kind of going through
the motions out there, like you might as well just walk off the field
here at this point. It really feels like, I mean, I don't
want to, you know, competitors and all of that, but it felt
like they could have just set the ball down and walked off and kind of
ended the game right there. Yeah, I mean, again, unfortunate for
Seattle, right, I mean, you know, I probably don't need to
say much more about it. It was just one of those things where,
you know, had a couple of things gone right earlier, they might have
been in it for longer. But you know, DC came out and they
you know, pretty much played one hundred percent again despite the weather, despite
everything that might have been against them. You know, like they've played one
hell of a game, and that was you know, again, the second
half takeover really kind of defined. It's like they know how to close.
That's the most important thing. You see teams, you know, oftentimes where
it looks like they're good and then they blow leads. Vegas was one in
particular this year where they would always go up and then a team would come
back, and especially a team with a winning record, and kind of take
it away from under their feet. I think the term is a snatch defeat
from the job as a victory. That kind of thing. I don't I'm
not gonna say that happened yesterday because Seattle had a lot of work to do
really the entire game. But from what I heard in their press conference,
again I wasn't there, but I just I listened to a couple of the
clips that they seem to, you know, be very professional about it and
very you know, Ben was saying, like, you know, this was
the most fun that he's had playing football in a long time, and a
lot of players have said that. I think, again that's a separate kind
of discussion, but you want to talk about like, you know, true
opportunity. I mean, you've had guys again, like Ben's been in the
NFL, he started an NFL game, you know, with the Cowboys,
like and he's here in the XFL saying, you know, this has been
awesome, Like this is the most fun I've had just kind of being able
to lead a team and you know kind of you know, go through all
the ups and downs and meet all these cool people that I wouldn't have met
otherwise. Like that's you know, that's what football is about. That's what
these leagues in particular are about. So that's pretty cool. I guess to
end that sort of you know, Seattle DC game on a positive note from
the losing side. We got a couple of questions here, and I've missed
a lot of the chatter on this. People seem to be upset about these
trophies and art and South Division. Obviously, you know, a chairwoman and
cole Nard Danny Garcia was there for both. I thought that was cool,
right that she was, you know, in Houston, DC. The NFL,
the divisional trophies are not phenomenal as well. Have you've seen those?
Like what did she make of the XFL division trophies? Yeah, I mean
I thought they could have done a bit more, But like at the end
of the day, that's not what you're planning for, right You're playing for
the actual championship, and I assume that trophy is going to look a bit
better. You know, we haven't seen it yet, or I haven't seen
it. I don't know if it's out there. I don't think it is,
you know, but like what I thought those trophies, they really reminded
me of like sort of the whole you go back to when the XFL did
they're rebranding, and like they kind of unveiled the new logos and the whole
black and white scheme. It was extremely minimalist. It's like a very modern
you know, you're not putting a lot of work into it. But I
didn't think it looked terrible. Again, they could have done a bit more,
could have jazzed up a bit. They could have at least put like
a plaque on it, maybe with like the teams like the game you know,
in the year or something like that. From what I saw and what
I recall when they had the trophy in the press conference in Houston, it
was just the XFL logo and then the six sort of bending pieces of stainless
steel or whatever material it was to form the shape of a football. You
know, I don't think it was terrible. Again, that's not what teams
are really playing for. It's a fun thing to have, you know,
but at the end of the day, like teams are going to care a
lot more about the next trophy in two weeks, so I will say,
and I was, if anyone out there in the ethers is listening to this,
I want the Seattle Sea Dragons version of that championship shirt because you know
they made it, because they had a box of them immediately ready for DC
yesterday. You know, you can buy it if you're a fan. Now
you can buy the DC one, but a box exists of the Seattle Sea
Dragons North Division championship shirts, and I would like one of those, if
anyone out there is listening, I think that would be a really cool memorabili
apiece. Yeah, I mean same here for Houston. I wouldn't mind one
of those. I was asking around yesterday, you know, just to kind
of see, like, you know, if I get some equipment, you
know, if anybody's watching this that has ties to the equipment people in the
XFL, I mean, hit me up, because you know, I wouldn't
mind the helmet or you know, practice jersey or something along those lines.
I'm always open to those kind of things. I collect a lot of you
know, weird and cool memorability, like we have. We got one of
those, like the XFL jerseys from when they were doing the showcases. You
know, I think we got that from Russ So yeah, I want be
Yeah, the c Dragons practice jersey looks better than anything may have horn on
the field this year. I will say that the other question here and then
we'll talk to USFL during you know, we get this a lot do you
think they looked at the North Division championship game realize MLS stadiums are the way
to go, except for Saint Louis in San Antonio. The problem is,
like you have to go with it. I mean, not every city has
that, right Obviously, they couldn't have done that in New York, right
with the Red Bull Arena. You know, Seattle, the Sounders play at
Lumen Field. There is no MLS stadium there, you know. I mean
obviously La and Steff has some other options. You know, I think that's
the dream, but that's not really the reality. What do you make of
that? Yeah, I mean I can definitely understand that. I think MLS
size stadiums are are the way to go if you have that option. Obviously,
again, like it depends on you know, which market you're playing,
and not everyone has access to an mL stadium. I will say, you
know, snap Dragon Stadium in San Diego is where the Wave play the football
club, the women's team in San Diego. That's where I'm from originally,
and that's a pretty good sized stadium and they get a pretty good crowd in
there, and it looks good, you know, like it looks like sort
of like an XFL style environment. But I think the other thing too is
college stadiums. You know, like TDECU Stadium in Houston, were the Roughnecks
play. I mean, that's a great spring football venue. And even though
they didn't open up the two hundred levels seating this time like they had in
twenty twenty, like the lower bowl was always really packed for our games,
Like it looked pretty good. And you know, that stadium I think has
a capacity of thirty five thousand. You can maybe squeeze in forty if you
were lucky, maybe added a couple extra seats somewhere. But those stadiums too
at colleges, I think, alongside those MLS stadiums are perfect venues. But
again I mean, venues are super hard to get and super hard to find.
I mean, look at Vegas is like a probame example, you know,
using Cashman Field, which is a minor league baseball stadium, you know,
that's definitely kind of a tier below these you know, nicer college and
MLS stadiums. Again, kind of it comes down more to the markets than
you know, the stadiums themselves, I guess, because like you know,
you could have a stadium, yeah, I mean there's plenty of MLS stadiums,
but if the XFL teams you know, aren't playing there, you know,
then why go. I mean, I'm not going to drag the whole
USFL hub thing into this because that's a that's a separate you know, that's
that has nothing to do with this discussion or argument or whatever. But you
know, I just think, like the bottom line is, yeah, I
mean mL stadiums would be good, but not everyone has those. So yeah,
now they would they all say at last, if I had put up
tearing up the soccer field, yeah, they don't. Soccer people don't necessarily
love the football coming in and tearing up the field. I did know this,
you know. And obviously it rained a lot at DC United played Saturday
night before the you know, before the game yesterday, so you know,
I don't know what those field conditions are. Like I did see some slipping
and we saw band rend and slip and fall like it was wet. I
think the field you can't. It's a lot of work on that where if
you have bay you know, football and soccer kind of playing their simultaneously.
Yeah for sure. Um so anything else XFL I want to talk to McLeod
and kind of we dig Michigan here a little bit deep, you know,
they have to deep dive USFL. But any other XFL general thoughts for the
weekend. Yeah, I mean, you know, I was impressed with the
games. I mean I thought, you know, I don't want to say
both of them were terribly exciting. Again, the Renegades coming out the way
they did was such a surprise. I think that made the storyline interesting and
you know, again that would really kind of put people like I guess maybe
that drag more attention to the game. It was like, oh, you
know, like Allington's really coming out here and doing something, not saying that
they couldn't, but you know, again, they really impressed. I've said
that multiple times. And then Dum Seattle Again, it was like a decent
game in the first half, you know, a couple mistakes from Seattle.
DC wasn't perfect either, but then DC eventually pulled away and yeah, that
game was over before it was over, you know, you could say.
So that's kind of where I'll leave it with the XFL. We can talk
a bit about the USFL now, because I did look at those games and
there are some interesting points that I want to talk about. Yeah, just
we're just wrapping up the conversation here with Addie and all of that. Cashman
Yeah, I mean they're selling tickets for Cashman Field next year. So the
preliminaries, Yeah, I think seven hundred thousand for the USFL on Fox there
Saturday night. What did you make? Let me see if I can share
this year, I was flying. I saw many of the highlights. Mccott,
Bethel Thompson really having the game of his life here against with the New
Orleans Breakers here forty five to thirty one and in the absolute shootout. Yeah.
Well, first of all, I think this was kind of a marquee
matchup sort of in the USFL. I mean, these are two very good
teams, you know, from just roster perspective, coaching. I mean,
you name it right. Going into the season, I think I looked at
the Breakers is probably the favorite to win, and I've kind of been,
you know, quietly rooting for them between all the other stuff that I'm doing.
But yeah, I mean, man MBT has been fantastic. You know,
he kind of had a bit of a slow start in Week one,
you know against Pittsburgh when I recall, but ever since then, he's kind
of, you know, been on this like insane trajectory. And you know,
I said going into this season like MBT was a massive pickup for the
USFL, Like that's a guy you know that the XFL could have had or
wanted. Again, we're not going to start this whole argument here, but
you know, MBT was huge for the USFL. Is the bottom line,
and he's played like it. You know, he's lived up to every expectation
again despite age and despite you know, not playing the CFL game for the
first time in several years. I mean, he has been he has lived
up to every single expectation I've had for him and then some and also too,
you know West Hills, the running back, another CFL guy who was
previously with Hamilton. I mean, he has been fantastic too, not just
this game, but really the entire season. And he's more interesting because while
MBT was kind of well known up in the CFL, and he's coming off
a great Cup win, even if he didn't finish that game, you know,
Chad Kelly was the one who kind of rode that out. But again,
MBT was good in Toronto, was the bottom line there. With Hills
you know, I think he only had like four hundred rushing yards over two
seasons in Hamilton, Like he was not the future back there, and to
see him do this in the USFL clearly seems like this might might be the
better opportunity for him. I wanted to get your thoughts on this, and
I've seen a lot of you know, I get CFL people on my Twitter
and USFL and XFL like, obviously McLeod should come into the USFL and run
circles around everybody because you know, CFL talent is so much better than USFL.
Like what do you make of that? Because I don't really know how
to process that well, I mean, I don't know if that's entirely true.
I will say this, like again, I'm not comparing the CFL and
the USFL is hard because the CFL, you know, has some homegrown talent
from Canada, you know. And again, the CFL has been around for
longer, but I have been I think the USFL has, you know,
I can't like again, I don't have every single roster from twenty twenty two
and twenty twenty three in front of me right now, but just doing a
compare and contrast off the top of my head. There's a lot of new
players to the league this year, like the Corey Coleman's, the Ruben Fosters
that I really think Breland speaks is another one too, you know, some
of these bigger names. Um there's a lot of talent this year in the
USFL, maybe more than it was last year, and I liked that a
lot. I think that's good for the growth of the league, especially because
they're not in their home markets yea. You know, they're kind of you
know, dragging that part of it out from the operations perspective. So it's
hard to say. I mean, look, I figured, you know,
MBT I think it comes down to just MBT has been playing for so long,
you know, in a league that is you know covered with um you
know, some guys that are maybe a bit newer to football and really haven't
had these opportunities. Again not saying that's everybody in the usflum, but to
see a league you know where there's so many you know, young guys that
are up and coming, you know, newer like Udfa's that type of thing.
You know, MBT is like what thirty four years old. I mean,
he's been doing this he played like in the original AFL and the UFL
Like this guy has been around forever. So I think what it comes down
to, you know, why MBT is so good in a league like this
at this point, it's hard for him not to be good anywhere he goes,
just because he's got so much experiences. I mean, he's coming off
a championship win in Canada again that he's had, a he's been with,
you know, a good handful of NFL teams, you know, through camps
and practice squads and things like that. You know, I love MBT man.
That's the that's the bottom line. I think he's great and it's good
to see him, you know in New Orleans, you know, doing that,
and especially again from that personal perspective, you know, him coming down
to the States to support his family, you know, to support his wife
and taking a pay cut. You know, I thought all of that was
again he could have easily. I mean, I don't know what Toronto was
going to offer him, and you know, obviously he's at a point in
his career where he might be getting a veteran discount um. But you know,
I think him coming to the USFL has a lot of benefits, I'll
put it that way. Uh, in the I didn't think I would get
blocked by this person so quickly. R J. Youngley had this big article
aud on McCaw Buffletopson this week and said, uh, McLeod playing stayed side
for the first time since whatever. And I said, well, McLeod was
actually in the you know, in the Spring League, which is the predecessor
to the usfl at which you are currently working for for Fox Sports U.
And that was a quick block from R. J. Young. So RG
young not not a fan of being corrected online from his mistakes about mccabel Thompson
articles. I mean, look, I you know, I'm not gonna I'm
not gonna get involved in that. I mean, I think it was a
bit weird when he was saying, you know, MBT was the you know,
most outstanding player in the Great Cup when he didn't even finish the game
and Chad Kelly was the one that you know, wrapped things up one that
game for Toronto, not a sweat against MBT. But that's just sort of
a you know, a quick Google search could probably tell you that information.
You look at a couple of stat lines, you know, and that's That's
all it really takes. So I'll leave it at that. Any thoughts here,
I will be honest. I did not watch much of this game.
I was watching the Arlington Houston game. Any thought Showboats? Oh and three,
Todd Haley yelling. He's yelling after the game. That was probably the
biggest highlight I thought to me was Todd Haley refusing the handshake. Yeah,
I mean, you know, I haven't Again, I haven't been too in
touch with Todd Haley and the Showboats this year. I covered the original Bandits
with Haley and taym a bit last year. You know, look, Memphis
has had a tough go at it like they had that I mean just awful
game against Birmingham where they scored the only points they had won a fricking safety,
and then this game, it felt like was right in their grasp.
But I mean this was probably, you know, from the entertainment perspective,
like the best game, the better game of the weekend really came down to
the wire there. Again, I don't want to really stick to just quarterbacks,
um, you know, because there's obviously other players on these teams who
have an impactum. But like Cole Kelly, for the show Boats. Like,
I think he got his first start this week. I mean they've had
you know, Brady White in there, and then Ryan Willis came in for
a bit at one point. But I mean, Cole Kelly, you know,
I've been waiting a long time, you know, for him to get
this sort of opportunity, and I'm really glad. If I'm Memphis, I
might consider starting him for the rest of the season because in this game,
you know, he wasn't perfect, could have completed a couple more passes,
but had over three hundred yards, you know, only turned the ball over.
I think, yeah, one interception, but two touchdowns, like,
you know, pretty good performance. Again, fifty five percent completion. It
looks like, um so not terrible. You know, he might want to
get that up to sixty or something. But yeah, he looked up.
He looked so far like the most complete quarterback for that team because they're still
trying to figure out some things, you know, identity wise. I think
they're owing three now, so you know, looking at that, I think,
you know, Brady White has been a bit you know again we joke
because he's got that Memphis connection. You know, now he's playing in Memphis
it kind of feels like he has to be the guy. But uh,
you know, Brady's been sort of spontaneous, you know, like he hasn't
really you know, like there's I don't want to say he can't hold down
the starting job, but there's so many guys behind him. Like again,
Ryan Willis Cole Kelly is like, you're gonna have to play those guys at
some point. And you know, here we are in week three of the
x USFL season, and you know they're already they're already playing him, They're
already playing They've already played three quarterbacks. So yeah, it's just I'm gonna
think the comments here, Max Hacking be an anti Dan Stick at some early
USFL games, Yeah, Todd Haley cutching himself out of another football league,
and good, this is a good comment from Gary. And then we'll talk
to the other games. We'll get out of here at the hour. I
do like the USFL not playing the next level angle and selling itself as the
develop in the league. That's something I think has been overplayed in the XFL,
I would say internally, I mean, we can see from what they
did last year after the season, Hey, you know, we're gonna come
out to Turpen all these guys to the NFL. You know, obviously they
care about getting doing this, but I think in season correct, I think
XFL plays up way more at that. Okay, this guy's going to be
in the NFL next week. Like any thoughts on that, Oh? Absolutely,
I mean I was talking about this with Anthony over the weekend at the
game. You know, I mean the XFL their whole you know, player
fifty four initiative, Like player fifty four is a term that comes from the
NFL, like a fifty three man roster, and uh, you know,
god forbid I say the term player fifty four more than a couple of times
here else we're all gonna go crazy. But you know, um, I
think, yeah, they've definitely focused on it a lot. And even if
you look at it from the broadcast angle, you know, ESPN will be
like, oh, there's a guy that might be going to the NFL,
and then that's kind of the first one of the first things they say.
And I don't like measuring these leagues in terms of like who's better or who's
more successful based on you know, which league sends more players to the NFL,
Like I don't think that's the end goal. I think what these leagues
should be determined by in terms of successes, you know, the on field
product and sort of like how they build you know, fan bases in the
culture aspect, because like that's you know, if you're just gonna say,
oh, well, these leagues only exist to send players to the NFL,
well, I think you're kind of missing the point. You know, yes,
they're developmental, is the bottom line. You know, some people say
the word minor leagues. I don't really like that term minor, Like then
you're you know, like, yeah, I guess it's a tier below the
NFL, but like there's players in these leagues who are not minor league players
in my opinion. So you know, again, it kind of just comes
down to how you look at it, and people will debate that till the
end of time, I'm sure, but that's my take on it. Yeah,
I think there's an identity crisis, and I don't know what the answer
is to that because I think both the actually the USFL, you know,
we're trying to find figure out, you know, what are we in this
space? Where do we exist? And I remember back when we had the
ROS mcdonney on back when all the CFL XFL stuff was going on, and
he said, you know what, what is like, what is why would
people want to watch the XFL? Is it to watch you know, people
on the show before they make it to the show, Like what what is
driving? You know? And you don't you don't really have any answers.
It's from football fan because you're like, yeah, we want to watch competitive
games and you know it's exciting, But then every single player there would rather
be somewhere else. I mean, I think the CFL does a better job
of once you're you might be not wanting to go to the CFL, but
then once you get there, you do realize a lot of the benefits and
you're like, Okay, I want to be here. I could make a
career here. It's just weird that would you give what I'm saying, like
the identity crisis, it seems like they have absolutely And I mean, if
you want a bit of a different take on this from the player perspective,
I brought this up again with Anthony over the weekend when we were in Houston
too. You know, in terms of the players coming to this league and
really buying in you know, you look at what we talked about it earlier
with DC, you're kind of buying into the program, and that's why they've
been so successful. You know, I think it really depends on the player,
because some of these guys, you know, they like, this really
is their first opportunity. Like in Houston, you look at a Garrett Owens
or a Bryson Allen who hasn't really touched you know, the NFL before,
Like those guys I would assume again, you know, I know Bryson pretty
well, like those guys take that opportunity to heart because like this really is
their chance, and you know, maybe they'll go to the NFL after maybe
they won't. I'm not really as worried about that from someone who covers the
team and doesn't cover you know, NFL transactions really besides the draft, I
suppose. But anyway, you know, then there's guys that have, like
you know, take a Cole McDonald or Deontay Burnett, guys that have been
draft that have been around the NFL for several years where it's like, you
know, maybe this does feel like a bit of a downgrade, you know,
and you're kind of, you know, your main goal is to get
back to the NFL, and I really hope, I mean my my,
of course hope. And I think the goal would be for everybody to buy
in. And I'm not saying those players didn't. I'm not trying to call
out Cole or or anybody. I love everybody on that team. It's personal,
don't get me wrong, But I'm just saying, like, you know,
people are gonna look at things differently based on their previous experiences in life,
and that goes far outside of football. You know, that's just a
general thing. So that is that whole identity crisis point that you're bringing up
about these leagues. You know, I don't think that's something that's gonna get
resolved very quickly because there's a lot of stuff surrounding these leagues that are just
new. There's a lot of new concepts. You're bringing in things that have
never really been seen before. We're entering a new era of football in the
United States, and you know, I guess you can include Canada too if
you want to talk about the CFL and this mixture of all these spring football
leagues. You know, there's a lot going on, and you know it's
going to take I think a couple of years until we really figure out,
like you know, where every league sort of places and how they really market
themselves and things of that nature. I did think, like, you know,
we make fun, but yeah, fanatrool football, I think really kind
of exists in its own bubble, and they've done a really good job of
like that is our identity, and that's you know, that's what we do
before we get out of here. We have the Michigan games. I did
put the Maller Stars game on at the bar before the ESFL game. I
did have the bar attending to do that. Stars looking not great. I
think case Cookis is probably going to get injured here even more very soon.
It's just scary to see. And then obviously the General's at Bestie and the
Panthers I tweeted out with the USFL here from Michael Michael Cohen sixty five hundred.
They said was at was at for the Panthers game this weekend. Maybe
they took it out now after I tweeted that. Tell the crowd. I
anyway, why did you make of the Michigan games? Um? Yeah,
again, I didn't have too much time to watch. I went back to
look at a couple of highlights. Again for I look at Michigan. Um,
I think it was Trey Quinn, who was a former mister Irrelevant in
the NFL in twenty eighteen or twenty nineteen. I think he was drafted to
Washington, had a pretty decent game for the Panthers. Josh Love, you
know, it was kind of an up and down. Love is one of
those guys, you know who. I think he kind of needed this extra
year in the USFL if you really wanted to develop. Again, He's had
some better games, but he's still coming long and you know last year he
split time between Michigan and Pittsburgh, So I've been in a bit of an
up and down ride for him. But I'll save the Panthers talk for you
know, Pat, because I'm sure he'll have an article out and if he
was here, you know, he'd be able to do a way deeper dive
than you know what I'm to be able to do. But from the general's
perspective, you know, I keep talking about quarterbacks. I know there's more,
Um, I know there's more players on these teams than just quarterbacks.
But Jandre Johnson for the Generals, had a fantastic game yesterday, and I
was really impressed to see that after you know, he's kind of been stuck
in these two quarterbacks systems. Last year, you know, Louise Prez was
carrying a lot of the weight, and this year they've brought in the former
CFL guy, to quote a prukop to take off some of the weight.
But yeah, I mean DeAndre Johnson had a fantastic game, you know,
passing and rushing for the Generals. Last year they used him a lot more
for running. It was a lot. It was reminiscent of what we had
in Houston in the XFL with Brandon Silvers and Cole McDonald, where Cole would
occasionally pass, but he was mainly the guy, you know that we'd have
run packages for, or you'd bring him in third, fourth and short,
whatever the case may be. So yeah, hats off to Deonder Johnson again,
one of these guys that's been you know, waiting, waiting a long
time to kind of find his stride, and I think he definitely found it
yesterday. So I was pleased with that. You know, I thought those
games we were pretty good. I mean I was I will say Pittsburgh reading
Philadelphia was the surprise of the weekend. I mean, I think we were
all kind of shocked when that happened, especially how Philadelphia played in week one
and ever since then, you know, they're starting to slow down. You
know, things aren't looking this great. Maybe they're kind of getting found out
a bit, you know, in terms of their play style. So a
couple of things there that were interesting. Yeah, so I I can't confirm.
So this is the this is the article now that's on us because because
this came out last night, Paul Reid sent the server to me. He
said, hey, we actually have because we never get official attendance numbers from
the USFL against Hey read like they actually put you know, So this is
Michael Cohen, this is Fox Sports usbl dot com, and sit down here.
And that's how I was looking for it. I had, because I
am smart. Here screenshot they had last night on here where they had the
roughly six five hundred. I don't know what my belief is there was there
was more than sixty five hundred people in Detroit. My belief is, and
Mike Mitchell's belief is that was paid tickets and then they paper it a lot
more in the AA to make it look full, So whatever it is,
but it was just funny that we had we had official league attendance and then
they well, but see, the thing is like sixty five hundred isn't an
official number. Like an official number would be like six thousand and five hundred
and twenty six or something, And it says roughly in that article too,
So I feel like, yeah, I mean that that number really is inaccurate,
But that might be the best we get from the USFL this season,
given that, you know, previously in Canton, in some other places,
you know, Birmingham, like we didn't have attendance at all. So I
do think that is a bit strange on the USFL's part, Like I don't
know. Again, they said some long lines of because we're not in every
home mark yet, we don't want to give out attendance because it seems unfair.
But I'm like, is it really going to hurt? Like what difference
does it make? You know, there's people there. Why not accept the
fact that there's people there and kind of corporate that as part of the league's
growth. You know, last year you only had one hub. Now you're
expanding to four, Like, you know, let's try and champions sort of
the attendance growing because last year, the reality was outside of the Stallions games,
you know, the crowd was extremely sparse and that was just kind of
I guess what was expected. Because you have eight teams playing in one city
in Alabama and only one of them is actually connected to the city. You
know that people want to root for. So I feel like with this expansion
now and the other thing I'll add here too. I mean, this is
kind of maybe a bit off topic from the attendance part of it, but
uh and Mike brought this up in our chat to Mike Mitchell. You know,
they really should have rebranded one of the teams to Ohio this year.
I mean, I know Tampa became Memphis, but I think had they I
think, you know, Pittsburgh was one of the ones that was brought up,
like take the Pittsburgh Mallers tournament to like the Canton Mallers or the Ohio
Mallers because the reality is you have a hub in Canton, Ohio, and
I get why they have one there because of the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Like that's you know, that's great. Like they had the championship game
last year. I can understand why you'd want to have that as a hub,
but you know, if you're not going to have a team there,
then the attendance is always going to be less than what you want it to
be, you know what I mean. Like, I feel like if you're
gonna have a hub in a city, like you know, Birmingham has the
Stallion's, Memphis as the show Boats, now Detroit has the Panthers, but
Ohio is like the odd man out and it's just kind of a weird.
Again, It's one of these like weird quirks in a way, I'm like,
well, why didn't you, you know, consider like putting in Ohio
team there to at least, you know, get more fans in the building,
which is what a lot of people are focusing on when it comes to
USFL discussion. It's weird. I just had a question. We'll get out
of here because I don't want to keep you too long, and I'm gonna
I gotta go get lunch before I hit the airport. It just in my
name is really thinking. But I get called Mark a lot. I got
called Mark a lot yesterday see the Defenders game. I don't I don't know
why attendance is down, and I don't know, I don't think. I
don't think x L or USFL has done a tremendously good job marketing for new
markets. Right. We saw San Antonio come out really saw in the first
week, and I know their season hasn't been what it wants to be.
You know, if you look at the mark kids, DC Saint Louis,
that's carryover, right Seattle, carryover UM USFL, they really I think struggled.
They hit that balance of like, we want to be a TV product,
but then we also need people like invested in the stands. I will
tell you every single person in DC and not that there's not not that there's
not invested USFL fans, but like every single of those eighteen thousand people there
yesterday for the Defenders were there to watch that game and cheer and you know,
throw throw lemons at me if I was in the beers, like they
were all wanting to do that. And and I don't think the XFL is
an instrumentdously good job at doing that outside of the original markets, and I
don't think the USFL. I think they're both struggling in that regard that that
makes sense. Yeah, well, I mean Look, we talked about the
xfls you know, somewhat lackluster marketing budget this time around. Um, you
know, I mean I personally, I think the USFL has done a better
job with marketing. But again, for them, it comes down to,
you know, if you don't have you know, eight teams playing in eight
stadiums, well, there's always going to be a loss of attendance. And
I expected, you know, the XFL attendance to go down for what it
was in twenty twenty. Again, it's the same with viewership, right,
I mean, viewership for both leagues is down. And again now that spring
football isn't like this new crazy concept, you know, we're kind of getting
used to it, Like I can understand, you know why there's a drop
off in that. But again it goes back to my point earlier about how
these leagues are still growing and there's still a lot of kinks to work out.
There's still a lot of unknowns. It's going to take really some time.
And I mean even you know, it's hard because you have such a
long offseason where you still need to kind of you know, garner interest and
I mean well for US obviously, you know, it's kind of our life
in a way, so I'm always tied in with these leagues even when they're
not playing. But for other people, it's like, you know, this
is only a short part of the year, and it's again it's a very
experimental thing. It's a new concept to a lot of people. A very
niche market is the term I always like to say. And until this kind
of becomes normalized and you sort of have more time to you know, figure
these things out, you know, build the brands, build the fan bases,
everything like that, you know, you can't expect, you know,
a ton of interest, especially again now that like this is USFL season two
and XFL all season two, well technically season three, but you know,
kind of I'll say season two. You know, for given that the twenty
twenty league was a lot different from two thousand and one, Well, I
think this is good. We didn't have too many angry comments there. I
don't know. I think it's that I think, Kurt, I don't know,
I view differently. Kurt Manafee saying roughly thirty thirty thousand people in Memphis
as a side note on the broadcast and it being on the USFL printed thing,
maybe that's me I don't know. I just I take we're taking the
time to write this. This has been vetted from USFL about obviously not because
they took it out. So I don't know what the issue is with that,
but I do I don't live by like Kurt Menefee saying thirty thousand in
Memphis Week one. It's like, you know, that is an official attendance
number, but that's just me. Anything else, USFL, XFL anything before
we get out of here, I appreciate your time to they haven't. Yeah,
man, I mean I think the last thing I'll say is just like,
you know, again, we're entering a period now where it's like,
I mean, well, the past couple of weeks we've had the XFL USFL
crossover per se, and I just think that's really been interesting to see because
again, you know, we had talked about for a long time, and
this goes back years. I mean you even really after XFL twenty twenty and
then kind of like when the USFL was starting to get talked about in twenty
twenty one, it was like, well, you know, imagine if we
had two leagues here in the US competing at the same time, two outdoor
leagues, Like it was just again for the people like us who really follow
these leagues closely and analyze them and really know what's going on, you know,
that was a very um like that that was just a concept that didn't
really seem like it was possible. It was like, oh, like that
would be crazy, you know, like imagine that, and here we are
living that, you know, And I know, again it's a very short
kind of crossover time and you know, the XFL seasons winding down whereas the
USFL season is picking up. But it's been fantastic to see, like there's
been so much to follow and there's so much to talk about. I mean,
you know, I could probably go on for another hour here if we
had it, you know, if we brought up more players in certain scenarios,
and I wouldn't have a problem with that. But yeah, man,
like it's just so cool to see this all, you know, come together,
and I mean, man, I'm to be a part of it.
I'll leave it at that. Yeah, it's exciting. I think Evan has
done a tremendous job this year covering the you know, Houston if you guys,
obviously, I assume everyone here that's watching follows Evan, but make sure
you go fallow Evan on Twitter and he's just done the really and I just
that's what with the USFL and the XFL, like, you know, realizing
the people that are spending the time the money. I mean, I just
game this weekend as a fan here, you know, but but seeing you,
know you and the time you spend every weekend and taking time away from
you know, I mean, living your life in college and doing what you
could be doing to you know, cover this because you love it. It's
something that you want to support the players and do all that. I think
it's tremendous. It should be good. Well, we have the bye week
this week, I have a good show coming up. We'll get ready for
the championship game. I'd be curious that if the USFL ratings bounce back this
week, and obviously we'll have our ratings news tomorrow. I don't think I'll
go live though. I got to talk with one of our guests tomorrow around
the time that ratings are going to be coming out. Anything else, Evan
before we get out? Oh no, I think that's it, man.
I've again thanks for having me on as usual. This is really fun.
Glad, I could, you know, talk football and all these different leagues
that are going on now. It's just such a crazy time, man,
And I'm so grateful for everything. And I will say this too again kind
of like last note, even though I feel like I always say, you
know, last note, and then I keep saying things, But um,
you know, anybody who puts time and money and effort into covering any one
of these leagues, whether it be you know, there's the there's like the
USFL xfl CFL here. But then you look at guys below that, like
Sam you know, he does a lot of the arena ball, you know,
the more again, those are even more niche leagues, you know,
more semi pro whatever you want to call it or classify it. You know,
all those people deserve credit. You know. You can sit here and
you know argue and I know Anthony put out a tweet about, you know,
not having conflict on either side, and I completely agree. You know,
I think, you know, we're at a time now where we just
we need to appreciate this because we don't know how long it's gonna last,
you know, from either side, or you know, like this is just
such a unique time and really a place where we never thought, you know,
we would reach. I mean it was I think there was a lot
of people in this field who were pessimistic after the af collapsed in twenty nineteen
and then Covid shut down the XFL in twenty twenty. Like it was all
these times where we were finally getting there, finally getting to a place where
it felt like we could do this. And then you know, last year,
yeah, the USFL, you know, kind of sealed the deal and
had you know, a full season with their you know, and the XFL
is going to do it now a year later alongside the USFL, and I
mean, man, you know, it's just so cool against the seal.
It's like, can't stress that enough. Look for US Friday as normal,
big, big, well, you know, our normal Friday show, and
then we will be live there for the XFL Championship game, getting that all
set up on the river walks. If you're in the area, you'll be
able to come by and say hi, but we'll be online for everyone doing
that. So appreciate everyone, appreciate Evan. I'll play the outre music and
we'll get out of here. Thanks. Everyone likes its cred in UNIS