Speaker 1: Little Monday night football on the radio station tonight. Don't
Speaker 1: forget we are your home of the NFL in this market.
Speaker 1: We've got the Niners and the Lions. Right after we
Speaker 1: say good night, Let's do some football though on a
Speaker 1: Monday with one of our favorites to start the four
Speaker 1: o'clock Gower, Austin Gale back on the Drive on a Monday, Austin,
Speaker 1: how you doing, man? To a great I'm well, well,
Speaker 1: I appreciate the time. So I think I've told you
Speaker 1: this before. I certainly have talked to my producer about it.
Speaker 1: As a long suffering New York Jet fan, I thought
Speaker 1: that we had found the solution with Sam Darnold. You
Speaker 1: thought I was gonna Saron Rodgers. I know you did,
Speaker 1: But I thought we had sound found the solution with
Speaker 1: Sam Darnald back in the day. So look, I'm not
Speaker 1: going to take a victory lap because nobody saw this coming.
Speaker 1: This is obviously a good problem for the Vikings. But
Speaker 1: what sort of questions has Sam Darnald answered with his
Speaker 1: performance this year?
Speaker 2: And what do you think is next for him and
Speaker 2: the Vikings.
Speaker 3: I love how you framed, man. I think that's exactly
Speaker 3: how we should be Sam Donald this offseason. What questions
Speaker 3: has he answered? Not? What could he answer? Could he
Speaker 3: also do similar things in Las Vegas? Oh, they also
Speaker 3: play in at Dome. Oh they have rock towers. Like
Speaker 3: he could answer those questions. But what we know is
Speaker 3: he works in Minnesota. He works with Justin Jefferson, He
Speaker 3: works with TJ. Hockinson and Jordan Addison and Kevin O'Connell
Speaker 3: and that offensive line. I think Minnesota knows they can
Speaker 3: have a deep, playoff competitive team with Sam Donald at
Speaker 3: the helm. It is a good problem to have to
Speaker 3: have J. J. McCarthy, who is going to be coming
Speaker 3: off with significant knee injury, in a position to sit
Speaker 3: again behind Sam Donald. Yes, that would require them to
Speaker 3: pay Sam Donald's some money. But a fourteen and two season,
Speaker 3: potentially a fifteen and two season winning the North, there's
Speaker 3: something you know it's not at and like, if he
Speaker 3: doesn't have success in the playoffs, those questions become harder
Speaker 3: to answer because but if he wins one game even too, like,
Speaker 3: I think the answer becomes obvious. I think they have
Speaker 3: to bring him back. At worst, they have to tag
Speaker 3: him and then consider trading him. But I just don't
Speaker 3: see an outcome unless they get blown out in the
Speaker 3: playoffs where where that happens.
Speaker 1: Are you surprised at how effective he's been because I
Speaker 1: don't have a frame of reference for whether or not
Speaker 1: because we're out here in the former Pac twelve foot print,
Speaker 1: so we saw Sam up close playing the utes, and
Speaker 1: like I said, I always thought that I thought my
Speaker 1: Jets had finally found a quarterback. But are you taking
Speaker 1: back at what he's done or did you kind of
Speaker 1: see the potential on him all your or all along
Speaker 1: in his career.
Speaker 3: I think with Sam Donald is said everyone has seen
Speaker 3: the potential, every team that has signed him, every fan
Speaker 3: that wanted him coming out of USC, every team. So
Speaker 3: everyone that's watched Sam Donald play has seen the potential,
Speaker 3: has seen the flashes. It's been whether or not he
Speaker 3: could get over the hump and be consistent. And I
Speaker 3: think a lot of the blame was put on him,
Speaker 3: and a lot of the blame was put on the franchises.
Speaker 3: He kind of like muddied his way through. But they're
Speaker 3: everyone in the back of their mind going into the season,
Speaker 3: and they would be lying if they didn't say, Okay,
Speaker 3: maybe Sam Donald should have success here. And I think
Speaker 3: that's what we're learning about, not just Sam Donald, Baker Mayfield,
Speaker 3: Gino Smith, Like like there's this reclamation project thing happening
Speaker 3: in the league now, where if you have a good
Speaker 3: offensive play caller and you have some weapons you can
Speaker 3: go get you know, a Baker Mayfield and Gino Smith,
Speaker 3: the Sam Donald, some of these other guys that can
Speaker 3: come in and be competitive, Russell Wilson and Pittsburgh. Like,
Speaker 3: if you have a good offense and you have good
Speaker 3: play call and you have good good playmakers, it's quarterbacks
Speaker 3: with experience that can come in and make play.
Speaker 2: Do you think Sam will be in consideration at all?
Speaker 2: Friend VP? Or is that Lamar and Josh Allen those
Speaker 2: two or maybe it's only Josh. What are your thoughts?
Speaker 3: No, I think it's two horse race. I think that's
Speaker 3: where betting markets have it right now. It's probably gonna
Speaker 3: be Josh. That's where betting markets are leaning. But it's
Speaker 3: a two horse race between Josh and Lamar. I think
Speaker 3: statistically you'd lean Lamar, but Josh better, you know, better
Speaker 3: record on a hard team. They lost Stefan Biggs and
Speaker 3: the ravensdad a, Derrick Henry. I feel like kind of like,
Speaker 3: you know, what else do you need? I think Josh
Speaker 3: is more important to the Bills than Lamar is the Ravens.
Speaker 3: That's not by a wide margin. And Lamar Jackson has
Speaker 3: had a ton of success. Hello, he has two MVPs,
Speaker 3: but he almost can't kind of kind of give the
Speaker 3: Career Achievement Award to Josh Allen and you know, as
Speaker 3: a tiebreaker, and that he hasn't won one day. He's
Speaker 3: been one of the league best players of the last
Speaker 3: few years. I think it's okay to overlook that maybe
Speaker 3: Lamara had more statistical success than Josh Allen in this case,
Speaker 3: especially with the mark coming off with MVP. That's how
Speaker 3: I think voters are going to feel as well.
Speaker 1: I will ask you selfishly what you think comes next
Speaker 1: with the New York Jets. Look, I gave up hope
Speaker 1: on this team long ago, but I'm not one to
Speaker 1: jump ship.
Speaker 2: I will be a Jet fan for life. And I
Speaker 2: was never on board with the Aaron thing.
Speaker 1: I understand why you do it, but all of the hype,
Speaker 1: all the hope, it never landed with me.
Speaker 2: I've been out on him for a long time.
Speaker 1: I just feel like he's on authentic and outside of
Speaker 1: all the weird you know what, off the field, he
Speaker 1: just is not near the quarterback he once was, which
Speaker 1: is more important to me.
Speaker 2: I don't give a rip. Go do ayahuasca, Go talk
Speaker 2: to a caterpillar.
Speaker 1: I don't care. Just show up on Sunday and play ball.
Speaker 1: But I feel like they need to move on.
Speaker 2: I don't know how they do it.
Speaker 1: So what's next as far as the coach, the quarterback
Speaker 1: and everything else with the Jets.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's tough, right. I think it's a mess,
Speaker 3: and it's a hard one to even think about how
Speaker 3: you clean it up. I know that some have said
Speaker 3: that maybe they run it back and you see if
Speaker 3: you could get this work again, because there aren't maybe
Speaker 3: a lot of other options. I know they're currently slotted
Speaker 3: to maybe draft around like sixth or seventh to eight
Speaker 3: depends obviously how Week eighteen ends up, but like probably
Speaker 3: not gonna have an opportunity at Shitur Sanders or Cam Warre.
Speaker 3: You cannot bring Sam Darnold back, even in a tag
Speaker 3: and trade in the fairy tale situation where Minnesota lets
Speaker 3: them go. There isn't really a lot of other reason
Speaker 3: talent you're gonna go get kirk Cousins. I've seen that
Speaker 3: name floating round. You think Jets fans are gonna get
Speaker 3: up for Kirk Cousins after the year they have with
Speaker 3: Aaron Rodgers. I think Jeffs fans might be burning jerseys.
Speaker 3: You have to do something that inspires the confidence in
Speaker 3: the fan base. Do something, do their testing, Talk to
Speaker 3: the fans like, obviously they don't know what they're doing.
Speaker 3: They don't know what they're doing. It's not a bad
Speaker 3: idea to talk to maybe one hundred Jet fans or
Speaker 3: two hundred Jet fans like where are we at here?
Speaker 3: Like they're in a bad plate. I think they more
Speaker 3: than they need wins, they need buying from from the
Speaker 3: fan base. I mean, there's a lot of I think,
Speaker 3: a disappointment in the direction that they've been and a
Speaker 3: lot of question marks obviously very fairly on where they're
Speaker 3: going to go.
Speaker 1: All right. I've been asking all my NFL guests this
Speaker 1: over the past few weeks because I come from a
Speaker 1: split family where me and one of my brothers we
Speaker 1: pull for the Jets, and I have two other brothers
Speaker 1: that love the Giants, and we've been debating, and I'm
Speaker 1: asking this for real Austin. If you combine the Jets
Speaker 1: and the Giants roster, they does that roster make the playoffs?
Speaker 3: I'm dead serious, Oh man, I don't know who's playing
Speaker 3: quarterback right, Aaron Rodgers, It's tough. It's tough. I think
Speaker 3: that I'd like to say yes. I'd like to say
Speaker 3: yes in any situation, even the two worst teams in
Speaker 3: the league, which I think maybe we do have here
Speaker 3: with the Jets and the Giants that combining their rosters
Speaker 3: it would be a playoff competitive team. But I don't
Speaker 3: know it would be tough. I think it would be tough.
Speaker 3: I think depends on who's healthy. I do think that
Speaker 3: the Jets and the Giants have talent. It's the coaching
Speaker 3: staff and obviously the quarterback that they haven't been able
Speaker 3: to solve.
Speaker 1: Who do you think is the best coaching option on
Speaker 1: the FRA And maybe there's something that opens up between
Speaker 1: now and the offseason. But if you're Woody Johnson, if
Speaker 1: you're the Jets, who do you think is the number
Speaker 1: one potential possibility to coach them next year?
Speaker 3: I think the number one possibility on everyone's list is
Speaker 3: going to be Ben Johnson, the Lions offensive coordinator who
Speaker 3: not just has you know solved Jared Goff another one
Speaker 3: of those reclamation projects, but also turned the Detroit Lions
Speaker 3: offense into one of the best offenses in the league.
Speaker 3: Obviously they've hit on a lot of picks as well,
Speaker 3: but I think that offense unlock Sing's for golf and
Speaker 3: those other players that other play callers aren't Caleb b
Speaker 3: Love and with where the league is going points points points,
Speaker 3: I think he's going to be top of everyone's listen
Speaker 3: more about does he wants to go to this place?
Speaker 3: You have to like you know him going back to
Speaker 3: Detroit two seasons when he's had hey coaching interviews. I
Speaker 3: think it's something to think about if you go back
Speaker 3: to Detroit, does he wants to stay in offense? Courtier
Speaker 3: He'll be, He'll be an interesting name. And I think
Speaker 3: the number two list is Mike Rabel. He has to
Speaker 3: return you to the NFL sideline. I think this this season,
Speaker 3: I think a lot of teams are gonna look for
Speaker 3: Able to come in, build up his own staff again,
Speaker 3: build up everything, and like for an owner that wants
Speaker 3: to just hand the keys off again to someone who
Speaker 3: wants the autonomy that I think Mike Brabil wants. I
Speaker 3: think they're going to jump at that opportunity too, because
Speaker 3: people forget how well coached those Titans teams were. They
Speaker 3: just traded away Ajy Brown couldn't figure out quarterback and
Speaker 3: there he went. All right.
Speaker 1: I want to ask you about one of the teams
Speaker 1: that we have on the station tonight, because in our market,
Speaker 1: it's interesting. Some of it's based off proximity, some of
Speaker 1: it's based off of college players that went to play elsewhere.
Speaker 2: We have a lot of forty nine er fans in
Speaker 2: this market. I think a lot of that Steve Young
Speaker 2: back in the day.
Speaker 1: And of course we have a college football team here
Speaker 1: with the University of Utah that has been so crestfallen
Speaker 1: and just hit with injuries on an intense level over
Speaker 1: the past two years.
Speaker 2: It's hard to explain.
Speaker 1: Is there anything other than health that has caused this
Speaker 1: Niner season to go south? I mean, we talked to
Speaker 1: you preseason Austin when it was Kansas City and San
Speaker 1: Francisco and everybody else as far as the Vegas ods.
Speaker 1: Is this simply a health thing for the Niners or
Speaker 1: should nither fans be concerned for the future.
Speaker 3: I think it's I think the start of this fire
Speaker 3: is obviously health right. They went into the season with
Speaker 3: the number one overall pick and every fantasy football draft,
Speaker 3: but completely not even remotely ready for the season. He
Speaker 3: had Achilles ten and nine ers in one calf, and
Speaker 3: then four weeks later it's in another, and then two
Speaker 3: weeks later he's in Germany, Like what was going on?
Speaker 3: They're hiding secrets. Jordan Mason in that Week one game
Speaker 3: was like, oh yeah, they told me on Friday. Oops.
Speaker 3: I wasn't supposed to say that. Things started unravel, Like
Speaker 3: as soon as Christian McCaffrey was ruled out in that
Speaker 3: money in that football game, and you can just feel
Speaker 3: the brand that you contract, the vibes with the Niners team.
Speaker 3: I think their heads is just elsewhere coming off that
Speaker 3: Super Bowl, lost the emotional hangover. It was a team that,
Speaker 3: like Kret Borders had said, he was playing on a
Speaker 3: broken ink all season, Like this is like they're guys
Speaker 3: playing for injuries. Their guys are obviously hurt, their guys
Speaker 3: that are upset. Deebo Samuel doesn't look like the same player.
Speaker 3: It's hard to find where players improved on this roster.
Speaker 3: I think Rock party has in some places, Mustafa has
Speaker 3: had to the safety there has replaced his song that like,
Speaker 3: it's had some improvements. But Devondre Campbell, veteran linebacker, literally
Speaker 3: quit on this team and the Niners couldn't be louder
Speaker 3: about it. Every player is like, you know, hating on
Speaker 3: Devondra Campbell. It's just a weird roster. It's a weird
Speaker 3: right team. They need to get healthy, obviously, so does
Speaker 3: every team in the NFL. What they need, in my opinion,
Speaker 3: is a culture shift. You don't have players quitting on
Speaker 3: football teams if the culture is gravy. I think they
Speaker 3: need They need to make some changes.
Speaker 1: I referenced earlier that we are in the former Pac
Speaker 1: twelve footprint and once upon a time the quarterback for
Speaker 1: Arizona State was Jayden Daniels. And I'll just say when
Speaker 1: he was there, he looked fine, right, He didn't look
Speaker 1: like one of the best quarterback conference and certainly didn't
Speaker 1: look like this.
Speaker 2: And it's not just that he's affected. He's just so
Speaker 2: fun to watch.
Speaker 1: What stands out to you Austin year one for the
Speaker 1: Commanders in Jade and Daniels, I.
Speaker 3: Think it's I think it's how well he's I think
Speaker 3: taken to coaching in Washington. And that's just assumption. So
Speaker 3: I haven't had the opportunity to talk with Jade Daniels
Speaker 3: had a talk with Washington's coaching staff, but I know
Speaker 3: hearing from reporters who have been in those locker rooms
Speaker 3: just how much the team loves Jane Daniels, how much
Speaker 3: the team is like leaned on him, and he's been
Speaker 3: able to withstand it. And his key key notes coming
Speaker 3: out of college is like you can't take facts, and
Speaker 3: you can't take it's like this, and I feel like
Speaker 3: that there's anything he removed from his game out of
Speaker 3: the gate. I don't know if you remember those week one,
Speaker 3: week two games, it's like, oh, my first read's not there.
Speaker 3: I gonna run. First reason, not there, I wanna run.
Speaker 3: And then weeks one through seven it was like a
Speaker 3: top five offensive all time in terms of EPA for drive,
Speaker 3: Like they did the simple things well, they really flowed
Speaker 3: things down from him out of the gate. And then
Speaker 3: as he's obviously got more comfortable and as obviously he's
Speaker 3: got more confident, save up things in the offense, and
Speaker 3: they added wrinkles and then next thing, you know he's
Speaker 3: on fourtune seven making like two duo Smiths like he's
Speaker 3: It's allowed him to play comfortable. I think it's a
Speaker 3: very impressive, not just with Jaye and Daniels. How a
Speaker 3: lot of these rookie quarterbacks have been handled with some
Speaker 3: of these coaching staffs. Obviously the Bears excluded what they're
Speaker 3: doing with Caleb Williams. Your guest is started than mine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I do want to get there in a moment,
Speaker 1: but I want to stick with the rookie quarterback theme
Speaker 1: because obviously, due to proximity, we are littered with Bronco
Speaker 1: fans in this market. And I will admit because I
Speaker 1: was on the sidelines and Oregon rolled up to Utah
Speaker 1: last year and smoked them, But I don't know that
Speaker 1: I saw anything like this with Bonix coming. I you know,
Speaker 1: I credit Sean Payton, I credit Denver, and there's plenty
Speaker 1: left for them and they still have some work to
Speaker 1: do to make make the postseason. But from a macro standpoint,
Speaker 1: does it feel like Denver has their quarterback in a
Speaker 1: good future?
Speaker 3: I think again, one of my big like memento tattoos,
Speaker 3: it's not sure if you saw that seen that movie,
Speaker 3: the famous member he tattoos on his body so he
Speaker 3: remembers what I remember. What I want to remember for
Speaker 3: next year is that coaching matters, and Sean Payton's a
Speaker 3: good coach. He's won a Super Bowl, like there are
Speaker 3: decisions that that guy's made in his career that even
Speaker 3: though not every season has been a winning season, he's
Speaker 3: been a very accomplished coach in the league. And bo
Speaker 3: Nicks with not a lot of support supporting cast talent
Speaker 3: and Rossavan objectively needs help both offensively and defensively. I
Speaker 3: think he has been put in a position to succeed
Speaker 3: by a coach that has given ll a ton of confidence.
Speaker 3: He compared Sean Payton compared bo Nicks to Patrick Mahomes
Speaker 3: because there's a certain way of like handling quarterbacks, especially
Speaker 3: coming out of the gates like not but look what
Speaker 3: compare what the Colts have done with Anthony Richardson. I
Speaker 3: think that guy that do you think that guy's confidence
Speaker 3: is great? He has no idea if they like him
Speaker 3: or don't. Who in up building supports them and who
Speaker 3: doesn't Bo Nicks, I would imagine given just how Sean
Speaker 3: Payton talked about him and just the opposite he's constructed
Speaker 3: for Knicks, everything's different. The game plans are always constantly changing.
Speaker 3: That's why no one knows in fantasy football if they
Speaker 3: should start Courtland Sutton or Vley or the tight end
Speaker 3: or whoever. Like they're always distributing the ball to the
Speaker 3: new players, constantly making things different for the defense. The
Speaker 3: defense are the defense on the other side of all,
Speaker 3: in Denver two is very well coached. I didn think
Speaker 3: he just went to a good situation. I think we're
Speaker 3: going to go into this draft and we're going to
Speaker 3: compare Cam war to Shader Sanders for like five months,
Speaker 3: Carson back Quin you weres and at the end of
Speaker 3: the day, it's like where are they going, who are
Speaker 3: are they going to be supported? And that ultimately determined
Speaker 3: where we deal with them.
Speaker 1: You referenced Caleb Williams and I actually do want to
Speaker 1: talk about the upcoming draft class a little bit too.
Speaker 1: But let's go back there because once again, Pac twelve kid,
Speaker 1: we saw him here. Utah actually had some good success
Speaker 1: against Caleb Williams and that USC team. He just I
Speaker 1: think set a rookie record for past attempts without a
Speaker 1: pick before the prior game which you know he threw
Speaker 1: an interception, and there's certainly our moments of what I
Speaker 1: would say brilliance that were in college that were in
Speaker 1: the NFL as well. What do well, well, First of all,
Speaker 1: do you agree that he has what it takes to
Speaker 1: be good for a long time? And second of all,
Speaker 1: what do the Bears have to do to give him
Speaker 1: a chance to win consistently at this level?
Speaker 3: Here's the answer, here's the honest truth that Bears fans.
Speaker 3: I think some Bears fans are maybe not willing to
Speaker 3: make bits. It's both the coaching staff stinks and Caleb
Speaker 3: Williams isn't good enough yet. There are errors in his
Speaker 3: game that he had at USC that he's carried to
Speaker 3: the NFL. He's holding the ball too long, He's turning
Speaker 3: every play into a superman put my cape on thing
Speaker 3: like it. He needs to be more consistent. He needs
Speaker 3: to deliver ball with more accuracy, more consistent, but work.
Speaker 3: He can get away with alternate angles and scrambling all
Speaker 3: those things because he's uber talented. But if he's going
Speaker 3: to be long term successful, week to week successful, he's
Speaker 3: going to need one an offensive play caller worth their
Speaker 3: salt and going to have to be disciplined and listen
Speaker 3: and have more confidence than trust inside the offense. I
Speaker 3: don't blame him for not having confident and an offensive
Speaker 3: line that's one of the bottom five of the league
Speaker 3: and not having confidence in a offered the cordinator. They
Speaker 3: couldn't get out of the building soon or enough. He's
Speaker 3: going to need an improved situation. But Bear fans would
Speaker 3: be lying to themselves as they think it's just the
Speaker 3: coach that's going to fix this. Caleb needs to fix
Speaker 3: this game too. He could be a coach killer if
Speaker 3: every single time they're blaming the coach because they see
Speaker 3: these little highlights, because they think he can Darnold, they
Speaker 3: think he can Baker Mayfield, they think he can Gino.
Speaker 3: It might get to a point where there's so much
Speaker 3: frustration in the buildings. He's not my guy. I didn't
Speaker 3: draft him that he could be. In the situation that
Speaker 3: the Bears have been improved very long time for one,
Speaker 3: GM drafts a guy and it doesn't really work out
Speaker 3: with the coaching stamps, so they fire the coaching staffs
Speaker 3: and they bring it a new GM like they need stability.
Speaker 3: He needs Caleb Williams and Every player in this league
Speaker 3: needs stability, especially at the quarterback position.
Speaker 1: I certainly did not plan on making this the former
Speaker 1: Pac twelve quarterback interview. And maybe it's still sad that
Speaker 1: we're no longer a PAC twelve market because of the
Speaker 1: leadership of that conference, essentially blowing up a really special thing.
Speaker 1: But year one, Jim Harbaugh chargers Herbert go, what are
Speaker 1: the takeaways.
Speaker 3: The culture each strategy for breakfast? You know, everyone was
Speaker 3: questioning like, well, who they get fun the ball to?
Speaker 3: Who they gonna throw the ball to? Are they gonna
Speaker 3: everage justin her ru enough. You gotta have an high
Speaker 3: average hip to target. But has anyone falls Jim Harbo's
Speaker 3: career that Hede wins football games. He looks at the roster,
Speaker 3: he understands the strength, he knows the kind of brand
Speaker 3: of football he wants his team to play. They set
Speaker 3: a standard and they hit it. They set a standard
Speaker 3: and they hit it. Now now when people don't agree
Speaker 3: to that standard. Who everyone knows about the arguments with
Speaker 3: Trent baal Key. You know they maybe go different ways,
Speaker 3: but he has proven everywhere he's gone he wins by
Speaker 3: setting a standard, not just strategically philosophically but also culturally,
Speaker 3: and they've drafted good players. They've set their standard. And
Speaker 3: you knew if I knew anything about the Charges going
Speaker 3: into the season, some people thought they were gonna be good.
Speaker 3: Some people thought they were gonna growing paints. They're going
Speaker 3: to improve every week, and they have through injuries, through
Speaker 3: question marks, and through mcconkey's growing paints through his injuries,
Speaker 3: like they but they improved every single week. And when
Speaker 3: you win football games, and that culture is what it is,
Speaker 3: and that standard is very high, very hard, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 3: It's the bell Check of everything, it's the Brable of everything,
Speaker 3: it's the Tomlin of everything. If your culture is very
Speaker 3: disciplined and tough and the kind of brands of football
Speaker 3: he wants to play, and you win football games, everybody
Speaker 3: buys it. And obviously he's proven that in your one.
Speaker 1: It's a good answer for me to segree to the
Speaker 1: Eagles because I feel like I like them and there's
Speaker 1: a lot to like. Obviously, there's talent all over the place,
Speaker 1: and of course, you know Jalen misses the game last week,
Speaker 1: he'll come back healthy. I'm sure are you buying them
Speaker 1: as a Super Bowl contender. What's best case for Philly
Speaker 1: because I think what you just outlined about the culture
Speaker 1: is something that people don't love as far as the
Speaker 1: way the season is kind of manifested.
Speaker 3: They're a hard team to nail. For me, they win
Speaker 3: football games. They have a ton of talent, cut talent
Speaker 3: along the offensive line. Jal It Hurts his talented take
Speaker 3: one Barkley Holy, I mean he's talented, a J. Brown
Speaker 3: like defensively, Cooper de Jean, you know Queenia and Mitchell.
Speaker 3: They find the Georgia Boys like they know how to
Speaker 3: find talent. They've had a talent in this roster. It's
Speaker 3: hard to lose games when you have some of some
Speaker 3: of the key key players they have with Townsey Smith
Speaker 3: hasn't even mentioned Dallas Carter. I mean, they have a
Speaker 3: lot of talent, and I think the coaching staff has
Speaker 3: in a lot of ways maximized that. I think people
Speaker 3: how many games that they've won, a lot of the
Speaker 3: postseason and success that they've had. Obviously they haven't been
Speaker 3: able to win the big one, but like that that's
Speaker 3: the point, right. I think Sirianni starts to becoming a
Speaker 3: very tough media landscape. More of a distraction than something
Speaker 3: wholesale additive when every other media outlet's covering the next
Speaker 3: best play caller, Andy Reid, Shanahan, the flur Ben Johnson, like,
Speaker 3: it gets harder and harder when you feel like it's
Speaker 3: hard to pull holes in the team. It's hard to
Speaker 3: pull holes in the Eagles. They're talented. You have to
Speaker 3: look at the guy that maybe you feel like isn't
Speaker 3: doing anything and isn't isn't adding anything. He isn't the
Speaker 3: defensive coordator, he isn't the opposive play caller, he isn't
Speaker 3: even maybe the tough security guy Big Dom maybe does more.
Speaker 3: Who knows, but I don't know. There's obviously a lot
Speaker 3: of folky storylines around it. At the end of the day,
Speaker 3: they're finding ways to win football games. It's just hard
Speaker 3: right now, especially on the upside looking game, to know
Speaker 3: how much Sirianni is helping this team versus hurting it.
Speaker 1: One of the most talked about teams and hotly debated
Speaker 1: topics right now is what's happening in Cincinnati. Because if
Speaker 1: you're a Bengals fan, you have a generational talent under center,
Speaker 1: and I just love watching Burrow play.
Speaker 2: I always have.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure I've ever seen a college offense like
Speaker 1: they had at LSU a senior year, And there's still
Speaker 1: a small sliver of hope for them. They need a
Speaker 1: bunch to go their way, including they have to beat
Speaker 1: the Steelers next week, and then Colts and the Dolphins
Speaker 1: lose one of their final two games, need the Broncos
Speaker 1: to lose to the Chiefs.
Speaker 2: So there's there's still a sliver of hope.
Speaker 1: But if they don't make it in or quite frankly,
Speaker 1: even if they do, what's fair to say about the
Speaker 1: way I perceive Cincinnati has failed a generational talent under center.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think, you know, parts of me wants to
Speaker 3: blame Zach Taylor just given I don't. I don't know.
Speaker 3: I think he's created an offense that works for Joe
Speaker 3: Burrow and Jamar Chase and t Higgins, and when all
Speaker 3: the guys are healthy, this thing works, but it also
Speaker 3: doesn't feel very fit to handle adversity. I think when
Speaker 3: when te Higgins is healthy, it feels like it's humming.
Speaker 3: When he's not, things look a lot harder for them.
Speaker 3: It's why they lose games early in the season. I
Speaker 3: don't think they solve problems. Well, they don't solve problems
Speaker 3: fast enough. I mean, how do you lose this many games,
Speaker 3: even as bad as your defense has been, How do
Speaker 3: you lose this many games of this kind of talent offensively?
Speaker 3: And people are gonna say, oh, Louisnarumo, you have to
Speaker 3: fire the defensive coordinator. You've got to fire Louyennarumo. Why
Speaker 3: wouldn't you fire lul Arumo? Two years ago every pundit
Speaker 3: in this league was talking about how he's maybe the
Speaker 3: only reason they went to the Super Bowl Like that.
Speaker 3: To me, I feel like how we flip flop on
Speaker 3: our opinions of coaches is just too quick. For how
Speaker 3: long they're in this league, how much people said, opinion change,
Speaker 3: how much this, how much the NFL changes every single
Speaker 3: year with all the different rule changes. Like I do
Speaker 3: think that at a certain point, the common denominator and
Speaker 3: why this team has starts, Why this team constantly slits
Speaker 3: under expectations, they play down to their competition. It always
Speaker 3: starts at the top. And Cincinnati is the franchise is
Speaker 3: it very much avoids firing their coaches. They've had a
Speaker 3: lot of long tended coaches. But I think it's where
Speaker 3: the league is now. Like, if you don't maximize this burrow,
Speaker 3: this burrow, Chase Higgins's tandem and win some Super Bowls,
Speaker 3: a lot of Angles fans are going to be disappointed
Speaker 3: in Zach Taylor very soon.
Speaker 1: All right, Austin, before I said, you lose, no team
Speaker 1: in NFL history has won three straight Super Bowls?
Speaker 2: Does that end this year? And if not? Who gets
Speaker 2: in their way?
Speaker 3: Say that again? I missed the team, so I was just.
Speaker 1: Asking no team has won three straight. Obviously the Chiefs
Speaker 1: have a chance. So do the Chiefs get it done?
Speaker 2: And if not? Who gets in their way?
Speaker 3: It's so tough. I think Baltimore is going to be
Speaker 3: very hard to play this this this January. I think
Speaker 3: I think Derrick Henry looks like a problem, a very
Speaker 3: very hard problem to stop and solve for as we
Speaker 3: saw the league, every linebacker is getting lighter, every defensive
Speaker 3: lineman's getting faster, every corner is getting faster, and I
Speaker 3: think a lot of what there is some overcrash I
Speaker 3: think you're seeing here Derrick Henry, This big bully boy
Speaker 3: Ravens offensive line very difficult to stop in cold weather,
Speaker 3: in these games where you play a lot of teams
Speaker 3: trying to throw the ball on you. The Ravens feel
Speaker 3: very fearsome. I think Buffalo's too maybe roller Coastery to
Speaker 3: buy them, even with eleven second stuff, you know, in
Speaker 3: Kansas City or wherever. I think Baltimore is that team
Speaker 3: that I think could knock them off. But I don't know.
Speaker 3: My money's on Chiefs Man. There's a lot of ways
Speaker 3: to make a dollar. I don't need to make one
Speaker 3: vetting against the home Now.
Speaker 2: I'm with you there, man.
Speaker 1: Appreciate the time today, have a great new year, enjoy
Speaker 1: the games. We'll chat soon, all right. Sounds good to soon,
Speaker 1: all right, Austin Gale, our buddy from the Ringer, appreciate
Speaker 1: his top