Speaker 1: Uh, one half of the morning a midday show on
k NBR. The sports Leader the legendary station six point
eighty in San Francisco is Greg Silver.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: Greg would call me Rossi when the Rockets and Warriors
were playing all the time, So I thought it was
only fair that Greg came on the show today. It's beautiful,
the nice symbiosis. Yes, we are the bay we are
the Bay Area sports Leader.
Speaker 2: In the Houston Sports Leader. All on one Greg, how
are things.
Speaker 3: Hey, good to talk to you guys, And yeah, I
certainly am overdue for this home and home So I'm
glad we get to chop it up about the Texans,
the Rockets, and any other intersection between Bay Area and Houston.
Speaker 2: Yeah, real quick, forget the Niners.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 2: What is the reaction of Tony DeVito as the Giants
new manager? I'm just curious. Vitello?
Speaker 1: Is he one of the crime family members of the
Tony Vattello Tony Mitello, tell me about him?
Speaker 2: What do you like? What do you like?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Interestingly enough, we actually had Tony Battello on with
us in the middle of July just because the had
drafted Gavin Keel and as the first round pick. And
this was even before Drew Gilbert and Blade Tidwell other
former Tennessee volunteers came over to the organization at the
trade deadline, so there's a little bit of a slower
time a year. We were looking for ways to shake
up the content and Tony was gracious enough to give
us fifteen minutes of his time, and I loved it.
I mean, you could see the energy, the passion the
Baseball IQ and it is certainly a massive swing and
a roll of the dice by Buster Posey. Now, I
think it's fair to acknowledge that maybe not everybody gets
the leisure in the leeway of getting to roll the
dice like this. But if you're Buster Posey and you're
a three time champion with San Francisco and now you're
taking over as president of the baseball operations, I didn't
expect the first year and a month to be this
active for his tenure on the job. But here he
is hiring a coach who has no prior major league
managing experience coming from the college level. He made a
massive to get Rafael Devers and take on all of
that salary as well. So I mean, now that we've
got the Dodgers in the World Series tonight. I think
it's pretty clear that Buster Posey hates losing. He wants
to do what he can to turn the Giants back
into a contender and the type of team that he
won three World Series with, but doing it in a very,
very different way. And I'm really excited for what it
brings because I think at the very least, it's gonna
be a fascinating story to follow. But yeah, there's no
question that this is a major risk here for the Giants.
Speaker 2: And is Verliner coming back, by the way, in twenty
twenty six, do you know, I.
Speaker 3: Don't know for sure, I would venture to guess not.
I mean, you know, I think the way he pitched
in the second half, he's probably gonna get a deal,
maybe a multi year deal elsewhere. He'll probably want to
be a little bit closer to home. And as we
sort of half jokingly said too on the station, look,
Verlander was probably due for a lot more wins and
for a lot more help on the starts he had
and in the second for the year it picked up
a little bit, but he got a lot of bad
luck here too, So no, on top of that, I'll
also throw in that Tony Vicello his most successful pupil
back when he was on the staff at Missouri is
Max Schurzer. So I think we're all expecting somebody like
Max Schurzer, depending on what happens here in the World Series,
to maybecome still that of Erlander Void in San Francisco.
Speaker 1: That makes a lot of sense. Greg Silver can be
are in San Francisco joining us here on the Matt
Thomas Show with Ross. All Right, look, Ross and I
my partner. We always argue about Vegas and how it's
only a metric, but it's not the most important metric,
as Vegas can be wrong just as much as they
can be right. We are still stunned. And I don't
mean to go to this Vegas card here, but the
Texans are favored. How in the hell are they favored?
Is it because Mac Jones was so poorous last week
against the Falcons. Explain to me why you think that
those folks that do watch these things very closely have
the Texans as a small favorite, especially because of the
fact that Texans have many of their offensive threats unavailable
to them. There's no wrong game to speak of, and
I'll by the way, out a short week. They got
beat up in Seattle last Monday night.
Speaker 3: It's a great question. I was stunned to see the
Lion as well. But what I will say is that
as frustrating as it's looked for the Texans this year,
and particularly on the offensive side of the ball, and
now maybe not having an ego Collins, I don't know
if there's an official ruling, but I know he hasn't
practiced in the last two days. I would just say
that even though it's a cross conference matchup, you can
make the case that this is a little bit more
similar to a division type of game, just because of
the familiarity between these coaching staffs. Now, Robert Sala originally
was the defensive coordinator when Shanahan came over here in
twenty seventeen. Then he went off to be the head
coach of the Jets. To Meeko, Ryans fills in does
a fantastic job. He earns this opportunity in Houston, and
so Shanahan is seeing one of his old assistants. Now, Shanahan,
when it comes to his old assistants, he hasn't had
a ton of experience with it as a head coach.
But I would venture to think that he still probably
has the coaching advantage in this, So maybe it's got
to be something to do with a lot of the
injuries the forty nine ers are faced. I mean, if
we're just speaking about it, logically, logics shouldn't be a
five to two team here in San Francisco with the
injuries to Brock Proty, Fred Warner, Nick Bosa, Ricky Piersoll
now missing time, Brandon Iuk has not played a snap,
George Kittle just came back after missing essentially the whole
season minus a quarter and a half leading into Sunday
Night football. So I think with San Francisco maybe there's
the thought that, kind of like we saw with Tampa Bay,
at some point it just catches up to you. But
I do expect this to be a fairly low scoring game.
So I don't know about the spread in terms of
the Texans being favored, but I feel pretty comfortable with
an underplay here.
Speaker 4: Ross with you here as well, Greg, and you mentioned
all the injuries that are piled up, and then we
talked about Mac Jones as well. How do you assess him?
The last couple of weeks hasn't been as good, just
as at least numbers wise looked really good earlier on
in the season.
Speaker 2: What do you think about the way that he's played.
Speaker 4: Is the book has gotten out on him and how
they want to run the offense with Mac Jones in
San Francisco or do you think it's just a bad
couple of games that he can bounce back this week?
Speaker 3: I think Mac has been spectacular for the most part. Again,
they're not five and two without having two capable quarterbacks
to run this team. And as far as Jones and
the numbers, I mean this last week, guys, this was
the first time the forty nine ers were able to
run the ball effectively. And they got Christian McCaffrey on
this team, and even well before Christian McCaffrey, that's always
been the cornerstone of a Kyle Fanahan offense is that, hey,
at the very least, they're going to be able to
run the football effectively. So it was a really strange
sight to see for a good six weeks where the
Niners just couldn't find a way to crack the run game.
Kittle comes back and Mac Jones just didn't have to
do as much this last week. As far as the
other games, I think he's been getting beat up a
little bit too much, and both Purdy and Jones have
been getting hit way too much when they've been on
the field, so the offensive line has been a little
bit shaky. I do worry about Will Anderson to Neil
Hunter and this Texans defense that they got to go against,
because Mac Junes, for the first time this last week,
finally seemed to have a game to where he didn't
sustain any new injury or find himself not really mobile
at the end of the game, when by the way
to begin, he's not the most mobile quarterback in the
first place. So I think Mac as long as he
can stay upright, goes a long way in terms of
the trust with Kyle Fanahan being able to run the
offenses to get reinforcements. But as far as mac Jones,
it's not to me as much about the numbers as
it is being able to protect him and keep him
on his feed, because that's exactly what they did against
Atlanta and he had his easiest outing by far.
Speaker 4: And you mentioned all the defensive injuries that are piled up,
but only ten points surrendered to the Falcons. Have you
seen Robert sala. Is there any sort of changing in philosophy,
maybe blitzing more, mixing things up, or or a how
are you seeing and how does the defense continue to
win this way?
Speaker 3: It's a great question because I think we're asking ourselves
the same thing every time we watched this unit play.
But they're certainly blitting more because when you have Nick Bosa,
you have the luxury of being able to generate pressure
without having to blitz. When Nick Bosa was healthy, this
team really has never been much of a blitzing team.
So that right there changes it up in a lot
of ways. And then Fred Warner, I mean, for all
the injuries that the forty nine ers have had over
the last five six years, and looking at the stats
of most injured teams in the league, Fred Warner was
still that one constant. He'd only missed one of his
one hundred and twenty two starts prior to that ankle
injury he suffered in Tampa Bay which ended his season.
So Tatum Bethun did a great job stepping in at
the mike linebacker position. You might see a little bit
of Curtis Robinson take on that role. He also is
just coming back from a torn acl So it's a
lot of new faces and they got young guys that
are coached up and got good energy. Case Lucas is
another corner who spent some time with the Lions. He
was on the forty nine There's practice squad, and he
was sort of their preseason hero. He made this incredible
fourth down breakup play to get in front of the
ball and undercut one that was intended for Drake London.
So yeah, anytime you have the defense that's this young,
it's a bit of a wild card. I know that
Houston's offense has really struggled for the most part this year,
but no, Robert Sala has done a terrific job. He's
obviously got the comfort in the chemistry with Shanahan. But
I really do feel like every week is kind of
its own adventure, because, yeah, you held that Atlanta offense
and all those top ten picks in that talent to
ten points, but every single week presents a new challenge,
and these are guys that are not only learning how
to keep up physically, but also all the mental edges
of the game. And that's where I think Robert Sala,
Gus Bradley in this defensive staff has been irreplaceable.
Speaker 1: All right, So to put things in perspective, to wrap
up our conversation here with Greg Silver, at camb are
starting quarterback for this Sunday woman, mac Jones, Is that correct?
Speaker 3: I believe so. I haven't seen an official designation on Brock,
but I just got into the studio and I think
it's very likely that we're going to see mac joseph
sixth time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Okay.
Speaker 1: Now, Christian McCaffrey, we've certainly appreciated him from AFAR. A
lot of us have him been Fantasy football. The number
one thing about him is when he's on the field,
he's dangerous as a runner. He's been an excellent pass
catcher out of the backfield, but attendance is.
Speaker 2: Part of the grade.
Speaker 1: Does that always scare Niner fans about really wanting to
make a deep run knowing that McCaffrey's had these injury
bug hits about once per year?
Speaker 3: Oh one hundred percent, Matt. I mean, this is where
the forty nine ers, when we had all these conversations
obvious leading up to the season, we're getting ready for football.
This was a team we knew was going to rely
on youth and a lot of these draft picks also
had so much invested in their top seven eight players.
And I've seen a couple of these guys go down,
But all the while, before they'd even played a snap,
we had said repeatedly over the air, the most irreplaceable
piece on this team is number twenty three. It is
Christian McCaffrey. And losing Fred Warner hurts in a major way.
Losing Nick Bosa hurts in a major way. But McCaffrey,
as long as he's out there and available, it's been
able to provide some coverage in the receiving game. It's
been able to get you that extra couple of yards
even when the team is not running the ball that well. So, yeah,
this team is going to go as far as Christian
McCaffrey could take him. And that was the case with
or without all these injuries they've suffered. Now, it certainly
hurts to lose some of these other top guys, but
I will always stand by that the most irreplaceable team
number one, sorry, most irreplaceable player on the team number
one is Christian McCaffrey. And so if he has even
a slight injury, all of a sudden, the narrative completely
flips on a sack of San Francisco.
Speaker 1: Well, that will let you go. I saw Steph Curry
last night. I hit a long range bomb. So Warriors
off to a great start. Congratulations on that, really happy
for you.
Speaker 2: Jeez, Jesus, why you bring that up?
Speaker 1: One of the Warriors gonna get old and get go
out to pasture. For the love of God. Please, it's
my time, Greg, It's my time, not yours.
Speaker 3: I mean, I was there last night in the building,
and that felt like the opposite of many times that
the Warriors have faced Denver, where the Warriors seem to
have a lot of control in the fourth quarter and
then jokicch and Denver kind of hang around and end
up doing just enough to take it in regulation or
force overtime. But no, he is the greatest showman in
all of sports. He's an alien. And all I would
say to people out here on the West Coast is
who never ever take watching him for granted, because I
can understand why anybody else is driven crazy by it.
I don't even understand it. I can't put it into words.
But doesn't mean we get tired of watching it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, all right, Greg, thank you for the time.
As always, you know where to find me. I appreciate
your conversation, great guest.
Speaker 2: And we hope to catch up with you down the
road front.
Speaker 3: Thank you absolutely, Matt, thank you.
Speaker 2: We'll see let Greg Saver k NBR Radio