The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Cousin Sal to discuss the game of wild-card weekend: Buccaneers-Commanders (2:55), the Round 2 schedule, the Eagles beating the Packers (20:34), Broncos-Bills, Steelers-Ravens, and Chargers-Texans (35:24) before guessing the lines for the NFL divisional round (54:35). They then discuss the devastating Southern California fires (1:13:55). Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Cousin Sal Producers: Kyle Crichton, Chia Hao Tat, and Steve Ceruti The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
What's happening? It's Todd McShay, and I'm back with a new home and a new show at The Ringer and Spotify, The McShay Show. It's a video and audio podcast coming to you year-round with all my NFL draft information, big boards, mock drafts, and player movement. Plus, I'll be chatting with some of my best friends in football, including some of your favorite football analysts.
During the week, we'll have episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays that'll include discussions about my player rankings, who's rising, who's falling, and who your NFL team should be keeping an eye on. Plus, we'll be reacting each week to the college football playoff polls and giving you previews and picks for each Saturday slate.
In addition, I'll have episodes on Saturday nights with my immediate reaction to the full day in college football every week. So if you love the college game, the NFL, the draft, or all of it like me, make sure to like, follow, subscribe, and get ready for the McShay Show on the Ringer, Spotify, and wherever you watch or listen to podcasts.
It's the Bill Simmons Podcast presented by FanDuel. Super Bowl 59 is here, and you can bet on America's number one game with America's number one sportsbook any way you want. Fun markets. who have the most yards, tons of same-game parlays, offensive titties in the next drive, so much more. It's the most fun thing about the Super Bowl for me, other than watching the game.
I love the Super Bowl props. You can also check out their Super Bowl squares, pick your own numbers, and... Make your pick for a kick of Destiny 3 between the Manning brothers. I'm picking Peyton Manning every time because Eli Manning took two Super Bowls from me, so he can screw off. When you win, you'll get paid instantly.
Download the app today and bet the big game with FanDuel, an official sportsbook partner of Super Bowl 59. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and help lines available and listen to the end of this episode for additional details. Must be 21 plus and present in select states. Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com.
This episode is brought to you by Vrbo Private Vacation Rentals. With Vrbo, you always get the whole house so you and your fellow fans can cheer on your team In peace. What's worse than watching a game with somebody who's not rooting for the same team you're rooting for? Nothing. But that's why if you book a vacation house with Vrbo, you know all the people in your house. They'll be friends.
They'll be family. Ideally, they'll be the ones who also root for my teams. Plan a winning vacation. Make it a Vrbo. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. I did not have a podcast for you on Tuesday and Thursday last week for obvious reasons. It was the worst week ever.
In the history of Southern California, there was just so much devastation, so much heartache, so much fear, so much terror. And ultimately, everything about it was awful. And some people stepped up, fire department, police department, first responders, TV reporters on the ground, helicopter pilots dropping water.
all of the people in various communities who banded together to get toiletries and extra clothes and all kinds of things people need if their house has just burned down or they've been evacuated. So there was some good that came out of some awful. And it was as awful as it gets. And I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. I wasn't sure that we should do a podcast today.
Sal and I have reacted after round one, really since 2007. And I don't know if we should have done a podcast, but we decided we wanted everything to feel normal again for an hour. So we decided to talk football and we talked about California at the tail end. But I wanted to just give my best to everybody out there who's been affected by this in some way because... I just can't believe it.
And I don't think, I know you can see it from the video and the pictures, but I don't think you can fully believe how awful this is. So hopefully we can get through it. Hopefully we can rebuild it. Hopefully there's a light at the end of the tunnel here, but right now it's hard to see. So anyway, we're going to talk some football. We're not going to start with Pearl Jam.
We're just going to get to the five games. Then we're going to talk California at the end of the podcast. So that's the plan. Here we go. We're taping this a little after 8.15 Pacific time. Definitely the worst week either of us have had since we moved to LA. And we're going to talk about all the awful California stuff later.
We'll start with football and then we'll circle back around because there's a lot to cover on that. But we want to hit the... The football first, as weird as that sounds, Sal. We had four really lousy games and then a really good one. Tampa-Washington. Washington wins their first playoff game in 20 years and it ends up being a doink that puts it over the top.
That did not make up for the other four games from an entertainment standpoint, but really entertaining. I'm wondering, is Washington this season, they're not the best team, but they're kind of the Daniel Bryan team Uh, Brett hit man heart. Like you always have a good match when you're in a, in a match with Washington. They're one of those teams.
They're not going to win the title, but they've been the most fun team this season, right? They've been in the most fun games.
Not so fast, Bill, with them not winning the title. I, Jaden, Jaden Daniels, his face is bleeding. I just, I just want to lick that blood right off of him. No, that's good for Joe House. Yeah, like you said, somber week, shitty week, but I feel good for Joe House. One of our freaking teams is going and advancing, but he was awesome, Jaden Daniels. He was really, I mean, they were coming after him.
For that guy to not turn the ball over once with the heat he was facing and just big play after big play, good for him and good for us from finally getting a good game 36 hours later.
House did not have the cojones to actually take Washington in the ring or Sunday pregame show. He did some bogus Tampa over. It was his way of covering his bases.
Tampa over 27 and a half points. And he said Washington would win 28-27. Yeah, he was really threading the needle there.
I think the Washington fans were believing that they actually had a real chance to win this one. And the line reflected it. It was Tampa by three. But this came down to a couple plays for me. So... Washington, they're down four. And Tampa gets the goal line stand, right? And it goes to fourth and five. There's like, I don't know, less than 10 minutes left.
And I always think the team should kick the field goal, take the points, make it a one-point game. Tampa doesn't do it. Fourth and five is a lot when you're inside the 10. I just didn't trust that they were going to get it. I thought it was a mistake. Tampa gets the big stop. They have the momentum going the other way. Fumble. Now we're going back again. Now it's fourth and two.
And it was like on the 11th, fourth and two, a little more manageable. I was okay with them going in second time, plus there was less time in the game and Daniels delivers, comes through, right? So now Washington's up three. Tampa goes all the way back down. They have this great drive. Baker has a scramble. It's second and one on the 11th. And there's like less than five minutes left.
They run this like QB option run with Baker gets stuffed. Then the next play, like fumbled snap, Bucky Irving always tackled four yards behind the line. All of a sudden they're kicking a field goal. And it was like, it just like tush push it. You have first down, first down goal to go. And you have a chance to control your destiny. Then Washington comes back down. Two huge plays.
That little weird screen pass flick play.
That almost could have been intercepted. Yeah. Yeah.
But it was a really nice play. They get it. They go down in the field goal territory. Then that awesome third one by Daniels, which is that was the play of the game. That's why he's special. But Sal, like over and over again in the last like five, six, seven minutes of these games, he's just pulling them out. I'd be scared of them if I was Philadelphia. Yeah.
I'd be scared of anyone if I was Philadelphia if the plan was to play like they did today. But they're not playing Philadelphia, right? They're playing Detroit.
No, and I got all excited. I actually looked this up because I thought it was Washington-Philadelphia before I realized I was confused by the standings. Do you know how many times Washington and Philadelphia have played in the playoffs?
Has it not happened a lot? I'll say four.
One. Really? One. It was the Mark Rippon year. Washington beat them 20-6. When they won the Super Bowl.
Yeah.
Interesting. That was the only time they've ever played in the playoffs, which is weird because they played twice a year. I would have guessed it was like... And they've been in the league this whole time. I would have guessed... It would have been like eight, seven, ten. I don't know.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, they're not going to play again. So that's good. But yeah, that's... They're solid, Washington. As far as the coaches go with the fourth and two, I was with you. I like... Just take the points in a lot of these situations. I know they proved me wrong, but the plays that were running for Jayden Daniels weren't great.
They were making him a pocket passer there on like fourth and two and fourth and four. So I was all for taking the points in most of those situations. It's a different story when it's the Eagles and it's Hurts and Barkley. And if I have Lamar, if I have Henry, you know, if I have Josh Allen. But other than that, fourth and two is still fourth and two. You can kick a field goal.
And I was okay with them leaving that field goal on the board too.
What did you think of Tampa potentially going for a down three with like four minutes left? That would have been like a fourth and three after they got stuffed twice. Yeah, it was like fourth and three.
I don't like it. That was the play where there was disarray at the line of scrimmage, right? I never liked the next play after that. I don't know what it would have been. I know there was easy stuff happening with Evans, but I kind of get it. There's so much to go after bowls for. That's not one of them.
Well, especially the end of the first half when he was mismanaging everything and somehow they scored anyway. I thought they should kick the field goal. And yet when they kicked the field goal, I thought Washington was going to come down and get the game-winning field goal. It was weird.
I didn't think they should go for it, but I also thought they were going to lose because they didn't get those two plays.
I just like saying Vita Vea, Bill. I'll say Vita Vea over and over and over.
I tried to order Vita Vea at Peter Luger's. They didn't have it. I mean, big picture. And we know a lot of Washington fans. This was the official fuck you Dan Snyder game.
Oh yeah. Yeah.
You know, not, it was one thing. It's a cute story. They had a Hail Mary. They got into the playoffs. Yeah. You know, Dan Quinn, it's a family atmosphere. They have a front office that actually knows what they're doing. Adam Peters, like they've turned the organization around. That makes them look bad enough. But now you have this awesome playoff win.
Now they're playing Detroit, a team that doesn't have the most awesome defense, at least until week 18 when they look pretty good against Minnesota. But Darnold also left a lot of throws. If I'm Washington, I feel like I can go in there and at least match points with Detroit. Who the fuck knows, right?
Hell yeah. Yes, you got a rookie quarterback that didn't, like I said, didn't turn the ball over at all in many instances where he could have. I mean, that's got to be his, you know, I don't know. They might be banged up and the Lions are more rested and everything like that. But I think this for now, now that we're talking like a week before, I think this is closer.
They do get screwed with the Saturday thing though, right? Yeah. Six days. Yeah.
Well, you knew somebody was going to get screwed with the Sunday to Saturday. I guess it would be worse if it was the Monday game. But yeah, first playoff win in 20 years. And like, you know, the Patriots hired Mike Vrabel this weekend, which was felt like it was headed that way for five days.
But I was getting intel that it was getting a little hairy on Friday night and Chicago was making a run at him. And, you know, and you think like, oh man, if we don't get him and we don't get better, all of a sudden we're looking at the Pete Carroll range of guys. But they get Vrabel, they have Drake Medealvo, there's Capspace, they have the fourth pick.
And, you know, they had probably one of the worst rosters in the league, if not the worst. They're in a division with Buffalo. There's all these reasons not to believe. But I watch a team like Washington. I'm like, they turned it around in a year. That team was a fucking, you know, shit can. And they drafted the right quarterback. They changed the coach.
They brought in a really good coaching staff. And all of a sudden they have 13 wins. So it's not like they're like a nine and 18 that snuck in. Like this team's won 13 times.
And another strike against him was the ownership, and there was defecation in the stadium. We can go on and on and on. It doesn't really make sense. Dan Quinn's done a nice job with this team. And like you said, this is just a... They call it lightning in a bottle with this Jaden Daniels. It's terrific. But congratulations on Vrabel. I think that's fun for you, right? Good news to end the week?
Yeah, it feels like...
You need the coach, you need the QB. And I can kind of figure out everything else, right? But if I don't have those two things, where am I going? And you need at least like a solid coach, maybe better than that. And you need a top 10 QB potentially. And now they have the two things. And now they can try to build their roster. But I thought the way Washington did it was the blueprint.
They had a lot of really smart second-level free agent signings, kind of going after the B-list guys, like the best of the B-list, and they spent a lot of money on their coaching staff. So it seems replicable. The Pats have a really super easy schedule. Anyway, I was inspired by Washington. The difference is Daniel's in his mid-20s. He was in college for...
nine years you know there's a reason he looks like a veteran he's almost as old as Joe Burrow I was thinking that with Bo Nix too I was like maybe I was wrong about all this and the rookies if they have like 60 college games under their belt and they've all played in like high profile bowls and you know they don't really get shook but we'll talk about that game that's a whole different story but listen I think part of you is saying Vrabel did this with Tannehill he could do it with Drake May isn't that the bottom line he's never had an elite quarterback ever
and hopefully Drake may can get there well I'm hoping now I thought I mean I've talked about Vrabel a bunch of times on the pod I just felt like he was hands down the best coaching candidate available we'll see with Ben Johnson but there's a big difference between calling plays and actually having to run a whole team and build a whole culture I think I thought Tampa Washington was the hardest game to pick who'd you have in that game
I picked it right at Washington. I actually went four and one. My playoffs have been terrible over the last few years. Did you get three and two or four and one?
What'd you do? I just, I had all those, I never did million dollar picks this week, but I had all those anchor teasers with Buffalo and Baltimore, eight, eight and a half point teases. So Green Bay covered by half point. The Tampa covered today. I had a lot of trouble with the Chargers lost yesterday. I had a lot of trouble with Washington-Tampa because I like the same thing about both teams.
I like their offenses. I like the way their quarterbacks were playing. And I thought that both of them were really these close-knit teams. You know, I was reading the stories about Tampa heading into the out of the week 18 and like that Mike Evans play that we were joking about last week about, oh my God, that was kind of risky to go for it, to go for a thousand yards.
You have the game, you're like the playoffs are on the line. And you read the stories about it and guys were saying it was like the highlight of their careers. Like they all love Mike Evans. And they were like, this record meant a lot to him. He got hurt. He didn't think he was going to be back in time to try to break it.
And there was just all this stuff and you could just feel the love coming out of that. They love Baker Mayfield. They play hard for him. So I was like, man, this is almost two teams. I wish these two teams were playing two other teams so I could pick both of these teams. It was one of those because everything you read about Washington is the same thing. Dan Quinn, he's turned the vibes around.
The mood is completely different. And they end up winning the mood ball, I guess.
I think we felt the same way about Rams Detroit last year. Remember, I watched your place and I go like, why do they have to square up in the first round? This is good. Yeah. So yeah, Baker's great. When he takes off, you have no choice but to root for him. Somehow he's got legs. There's like 200 more rushing yards this year than he has in the previous five, any of the previous five or six.
Like it's really, it's spectacular. And Mike Evans just diving backwards for a first down. It is really tough. Irving runs hard. Defense plays hard. It's a good team.
I had written down, because there seemed like they were going to possibly win at one point. I was researching them. They had a case for being the best 2020s NFC team. And they still might have the case even now. Because they're one of the only two NFC teams that won a Super Bowl. They've had four division titles. They were 6-3 in the playoffs heading into this game today.
Over the last five seasons, the 2020s, they're 51-33. It was like, you would never think if you said to somebody who is the best team in the NFC this decade, I don't think they would have been a top four guest for anybody, but I think they are. It's either them or Philadelphia. They have a better record and more playoff wins.
And then the loss today, like, you know, I think they would have had a chance in round two against whoever they played. But the Mayfield thing, When you think about, he goes to Cleveland, plays for four coaches his first three seasons. He wins their first playoff game with that franchise, right? Since they came back.
He tore his labrum in his left shoulder, second game 2021, has the year from hell. They end up paying him to go away, 11 million in Carolina, and go into the Sean thing. And now Baker, he's not a top five quarterback, but he's in the top 10 or 11. And you just think, like, this whole thing is one of the biggest disaster decisions start to finish in the history of the league.
It's so hard, I think, for us. I don't want people to feel bad for us because we're doing what we love. But we look at football and players, I think, through all different lenses, right? We look at them, like, historically. We look at fantasy-wise. Like, Baker's great. Exciting. He's top three or four, five exciting.
And it's like, okay, but where does that put him actually, you know, in terms of building a team around him? So I don't know. I don't know if I want to say he's top four or five or anywhere in there, but I love watching them and I love everything he brings to that team. And I feel like he's in the prime of his career. Don't compare him to Flacco. Don't compare him to any of these other guys.
I hope people don't do that anymore. And I think you're right. They were one of the best teams in the NFC. I think they get a bad rap because it's the South that they keep winning.
And we make fun of the South every year. It's our fault. Yeah. The thing, if you're talking about just QB assets and we always talk about a rookie QB, how that's the best asset you can have, but they have him, his contract compared to the other monster contracts where every other superstar is making 50, 55 million a year, whatever they're on the cap for.
And I think he signed for like 30, 30 plus a year, something like that. So definitely a better asset. Anyway, that was a great game for for the weekend because up until that point, it felt like it was the worst weekend ever for a variety of reasons, real life reasons, the actual games. It was just one of those weekends you're like, Man, I used to love round one.
And this time I feel stupid watching football.
Here's the thing. Once the college games are really good, I'm like, oh, the NFL is going to suck now, isn't it? We can't just have all right. The college games are excellent. Yeah, they were very good. And then coming into this weekend. But a lot of people all over.
can we just accept the fact that we're probably not going to get good competitive games in any sport in the playoffs for the first couple of rounds? Can all we really hope for is a good final four as sports fans and not like tear each other's eyes out, arguing over who has the better system. Like the NBA might actually have the best. There are some good four or five matchups. every year.
But then they have some finals that suck too. So I think you just have to hope that the final four is good and let the cream rise to the top.
Yeah, weirdly the NBA might be in the best shape for a round one this year because they have so much talent and they have some teams in the 7, 8, 9, 10 range that the play-ins will be fun. Now you're mad at me about the Sacramento.
Yeah, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to talk about the NBA at all. I was just using that as one of the many examples.
No, because I saw your mind go to the Sacramento, Indiana, Minnesota bet we made.
House's team is going to win for the first time in 20 years. And you're talking about this stupid parlay we have with Sacramento and Indiana.
The Sacramento under, Indiana over, and the Minnesota under. And after we did it, Sacramento fired their coach. And now they're just pulling games out of their ass. Game after game after game. Let's take a break and we'll talk about the other games. I hope you're using FanDuel for the NFL playoffs right now. All customers can get a no-sweat NFL same-game parlay for the Vikings versus Rams game.
Just place a three-legger and you'll get bonus bets back if your bet doesn't win. You can do something like take the Minnesota Moneyline, Jefferson anytime, touchdown, Jefferson to get like 80 yards we're saving, put them all together. Boom, you got a bet. Same-game parlay is the perfect way to combine your bets for a chance at a bigger payday.
build your own, or choose from one of the popular SGPs pre-built for you in FanDuel's top-rated sportsbook app, Get your no sweat, same game parlay on Fandle, America's number one sports book. Visit Fandle.com slash BS Fandle, an official sports betting partner of the NFL. You must be 21 plus in president select states or 18 plus in president DC.
Opt-in required, minimum three leg parlay required. Refund issues as a non-withdrawable bonus bets that expire seven days after receipt. Max refund $5 unless otherwise specified. Restrictions apply, including token expiration. See terms at sportsbook.fandle.com. Game prom call 1-800-GAMBLE or visit rg-help.com. This episode is brought to you by the White Lotus season three.
One of my favorite shows, beautiful locations, twisted characters, unexpected scenarios. The White Lotus is going to Thailand. You know, I'm excited. I mean, we're doing prestige TV again, me, Mallory and Joanna Robinson. We're doing right after every show, putting a recap episode on the prestige TV, same luxury, new reservations for all of us. How are they going to make the show better?
The answer is the show's great no matter where it is. I'm excited to be in a new country with our weird, mysterious, probably creepy White Lotus gang, but I love this show. And you can watch a new season of the Emmy Award-winning HBO original series, The White Lotus, premiering February 16th at 9 p.m. on Max. All right, so our schedule before we get to the rest of the games.
We have Houston and Kansas City. That's an ESPN game. On Saturday, it's the first one. We need a name for the round two first game on Saturday. It's not a Shakey's game, but it's a better restaurant that... you know you can probably rent a table for... Get a table for like $20, $25. You wouldn't exactly have your wedding reception there, but it's serviceable and solid.
It's kind of exciting, but not totally. I don't... I also don't want to insult any possible sponsors we might get, but...
Well, Houston was in Shakey's and now they're in this one. So it's like Shakey's opened like a pop up, you know, and like somewhere, you know, and it's like a cool area. Maybe. I don't know. There's still the first Saturday game.
Kyle says the Texas Roadhouse game. Texas Roadhouses are fun.
Yeah, that's good.
I was going to say the Bianco Pizza game, but I don't want Bianco to be mad at me. Because Bianco could do like a pizza pop-up. But you might take that personally.
Right, right, right.
Even though I'm complimenting it because I love Bianco Pizza. Houston at KCESPN. Then Saturday night, Washington at Detroit. Sunday, NBC. Either Minnesota or the Rams playing in Philadelphia. So we get Collinsworth in Philadelphia. Oh, Mike, it's so cold. My nipples are frozen, Mike. I can't even feel my nipples.
Can I feel your nipples, Mike? I can't feel each other's nipples. You might have no feeling, Mike. That's not a night game, huh? So they're doing that three Eastern on Sunday, and then Romo Nance get the good one, the great one.
Baltimore at Buffalo. So the storylines, I guess, would be Casey going for the three-peat. It officially starts now. Jaden Daniels and the exciting, rejuvenated Washington Commanders against the team that's really been America's team this year, the Detroit Lions, where they've just been on every week. We like watching them. We know all the characters at this point.
Dan Campbell's like the dad in a Friday sitcom. Then, I don't know. What's more fun? Minnesota, Philadelphia, or Rams, Philadelphia? Probably Minnesota-Philadelphia, right? For the history of some of the games they've had?
I guess it would have to be. Because Minnesota's never won the Super Bowl. Do you feel like Philadelphia is going to make every game shitty now, no matter who plays? Yeah. Well, hold that thought for 30 seconds.
And then Baltimore Buffalo is the great. That's it. That's what's decided. You rarely get this. You get this in basketball sometimes. You rarely get this in the NFL where it's like, we've argued about this all year. I think it's been a fun argument. I don't feel like it ever degenerated anything bad. I'm still not positive who I think the MVP is. Like I left on the weekend.
I'm like, I don't, I, both of those guys were awesome.
I don't, I still don't know who the MVP was. They're excellent. I'll, I'll stand by Josh Allen, but again, you can't really be mad at what's going on. If some, if some one or the other, uh, wins it, I'll say it seems like Lamar has a little more help with Derrick Henry. But other than that, they did beat Buffalo. They beat him pretty good. Buffalo beat the one seed. It can, you can go either way.
All right, the game before the good game was Packers-Eagles, which was a classic Philadelphia win where they're up 10-0 and their fans are just complaining. And the game has no flow. You don't really understand what's going on. I actually watched with a couple of Eagles fans today and they're cutting to A.J. Brown. He's reading a book at one point because he's pissed off.
He's not getting the ball. Everyone's like, what's wrong with Hurts? Is he healthy? What's going on with him? And they just kind of limped their way to a convincing win that was never in doubt. And they went by double digits and they, you leave the game and you go, what just happened? Are the Eagles good? I'm not, it's just was typical.
Yeah, and I hated the way... This is the one I'm going to get salty about because it's the one I lost, but I had Green Bay plus the points, and I wouldn't say Washington deserved to win as a road team. Fine. None of the other road teams showed up, right? Like Denver, Green Bay, you can't make a case for any of the Pittsburgh, but Get that kickoff right, man. Just get that right.
It's all about momentum when you're on the road. If you're going to lose a call, if you're going to lose the opening kickoff, you're really kind of screwed there. And I feel like there were enough replays, including the overhead to show. Oh, you're going here. Oh, I like this. Okay. I'm not a ref killer.
Every time the Chiefs games are decided by something close, I'm like, ah, it's hard to call it regular speed. But if you're able to replay something and you have all those angles and you have that overhead, he had it for like a two Mississippi count. Like, is it easier now to just start digging your way through the earth to come out the other end?
Is that easier to come out with the ball than it is to come up from a pile above the ground? I don't know. I don't like that. But anyway, I had to get that off my chest.
They've really made it seem like it's now a reality show where it's like season 41 of the challenge. Just put 10 guys in a pile. Whoever has the ball when we pull everybody apart, they get the ball. I texted you a couple of times over the weekend. I watch football every weekend. I feel like I understand all the rules. I still don't understand what an intentional grounding is.
CJ Stroud, that was one of the biggest plays in that Chargers game. It just seemed like a cut and dry intentional grounding. And they're like, Now I got it over the line of scrimmage and he was out of the pocket.
Yeah, who cares if he's out of the pocket? Who cares?
He was two feet to the left. How was he out of the pocket? It just seemed like an automatic. He definitely did an intentional grounding because he was about to get sacked. So they said it wasn't. And then I always felt like if the guy clearly had the ball in the pile before he disappeared into the pile, usually the guy gets the ball back. Of course.
But this time they were like, nope, he didn't totally have it yet. It's like, he didn't? Seemed like he had it.
It also goes against all their crap about player safety. Like, oh, really? We're going to keep this going past the whistle? Because you obviously blew the whistle, and then this guy got it torn from his clutches. So I don't know. Anyway, Green Bay didn't score enough to win that game, and every receiver was hurt, and I don't know who they were throwing to. So good for you, Philly.
But they didn't play great either.
I don't understand. I've said this over and over again, watching them. I don't understand their offense. I don't understand why it's so slow and deliberate and has no pace and has no pep and just seems laborious at all times. I don't get it. I don't understand. We were joking about it in the first quarter. We're watching like, here we go. 39 seconds to the next Saquon handoff.
This would be 37 seconds. And it's just, they play with no pace. They, they play with no unpredictability at all. They never try to put any sort of pressure. You'd think like if you have Saquon as a running back with Hertz's ability to run and pass and the receivers they have, you could almost go no huddle and just put a defense, you know, put them on their back pedal. They don't do anything.
They're just like, don't do all your subs, get all your guys in and out, do what you need to do.
And for the most part, as long as they don't get in a third and long situation, they're fine. If they're third and three or third and one, they can line up for the tush push on third and one and he can back out and throw it long like we saw or hand it to Barkley. It is a huge, huge advantage. What the Ravens do, what the Bills do, and specifically what the Eagles do with the tush push
and third and short. I mean, because you're going to convert on fourth. But yeah, everything this team does bugs me. Now, Barkley, enough with the sliding down. You're an unselfish player. Should you be a social worker, maybe? Like, score touchdowns. People are betting on you to score touchdowns. Enough already. You sound like you over.
It's not like you're up one and you don't want to go up eight because they're going to get the ball. Like, just finish it. It's crazy already.
So, I don't know. I actually rewound it. It seemed like the D-back had an angle and maybe could have chased him down 30 yards downfield. But yeah, he definitely slid a little early. There was a couple moments today with covers and over-unders because you had that play. You had Matt Collins about to go. He's setting up the bills on the two-yard line. Terrible.
Next touchdown covers, every tease and adjusted over if you had 41, 42, whatever. And then what was the other one? Was that the Baltimore-Pittsburgh just ending at 42 points? That felt like that could have been harder, right?
Yeah, the Steelers had like 200 yards in third quarter, and then there was no points at all after that.
Oh, and then the Chargers-Texans game somehow going over.
Yes. What were the odds of that? It was like 7-6. I mean, the first... I don't know when you want to talk about that. One more thing on Hurts, though. His three winning playoff games, 131 yards against the Packers, 121 yards passing against the Niners, 154 against the Giants. I don't know if we've ever seen anything like this. I know he's not asked to do that much, and he doesn't. And they win.
Right. Well, and he's not even... When they're celebrating at the end, he seems on the side. He's such a polarizing guy within the Eagles... Like I know a lot of Eagles fans, none of them have a handle on him at all, but yet they've been winning and they've been successful with them. Right. But you watch and it's just, I don't know.
There there's, when you look at like what we saw from Allen and Mahomes in somewhat similar offensive situations from a weapon standpoint, and they're just so electric and I guess Hertz just doesn't have that. level in him.
Yeah. When he shoots off to the side, he'll take a hard hit for a two yard game. Right. Like, I feel like I'm like, Hey, cut it up. What are you, what are you doing? I don't know. I'm not good. Right. Whatever. He's gone to the Superbowl and everything, but just read a book on the sideline every now and then Jalen, come on.
Read inner excellence, but borrow a copy from AJ Brad. I was thinking Eagles fans. Cause they've, the team has been successful. But they also love complaining about them, and I don't really blame them. But it's like the friend who's married to the guy that you always feel like they're going to get divorced, and they're never divorced, but she's always complaining about him.
That's kind of the Eagles fans with this team. Yeah, you'd think they'd root for the Panthers all these years.
To a point where you're like, oh, does your team suck? I mean, you keep saying they do.
Didn't you go 13-4? Green Bay was kind of the hipster Super Bowl contender this year.
Yeah.
They were like the alternate pick. I know we had money on them. We both loved Detroit with the one seed and some Super Bowl bets. But then Green Bay was kind of the, well, here's plan B if the Detroit thing doesn't work out. They ended up going 0-6 against Philly and Minnesota and Detroit. And this was more alarming to me. I'm throwing out the Brazil game in week one because that game was stupid.
They're playing it. I don't understand what that field was. In the other games against those three teams, they fell behind by 21 to Minnesota, by 17 to Minnesota. They fell behind 21 to Detroit. They were down 10 to Detroit, and they were down 10 today, 10-0. This was them against any good team. They just immediately spotted 10, 12, 17 points, whatever it was.
And there was a couple of times where they would kind of come back. What changed today was they lost Watson before the game.
Yeah.
And then they lose two more weapons. So they couldn't even do the comeback thing that Love was pretty good at. I thought Love had a really bad year for what my expectations were. If my expectations were an A minus, I thought he was like a C plus.
I agree. I don't know when. I'm trying to think when we loved them. When did we fall in love with that team? When were they peaking? Was it six weeks ago? Because you're right. They never really beat the good teams. But they never really put together good. I guess they were just beating up the crap.
No, they beat up Miami on Thanksgiving. There was that Thanksgiving and the week after. We should remember this for next year because there was a moment where Green Bay looked like the most dangerous NFC team. Pittsburgh looked like they had the one seed locked up. They had already beaten Baltimore. They had a two-game lead. They, I think, were 10-3.
And it just felt like they were going to be 13-3. They never won again. They were 10-3 and... And that was it. I think they lost their last five and just completely fell apart. We can talk about that later. But yeah, those were the two teams that I think really fell off. And then conversely, Washington came back. I think because Daniels got healthy was probably the main reason for it.
And then Houston died. And then... Just randomly, their defense came back at some point during that Chargers game, which we're going to talk about in a second. But I think those were kind of the variance teams. I guess the Chiefs might have been the other one because the Chiefs were looking so creaky there. And we were like, this offense, they're just going to be able to score 20 points anymore.
And then they gradually figured that out. Everything else just kind of went toward what we thought.
Yeah, it's funny. Like after Saturday, I'm like, well, have we learned anything about the Chargers and Steelers other than it's the same team we've been looking at for eight years, right? You can't really trust them. The Steelers knuckleballed their way to the playoffs without a good quarterback and then don't show up.
I don't know what you want to talk about next, but the Chargers were just brutal too.
Well, one thing on Green Bay, because I want to move to Bills and Steelers. I thought their D was good. And I thought they did a good job today. I thought Jacobs was good. Earl Campbell run, his old jersey coming apart. It's fun. I like Watson as a player, but I don't think it should be a dramatic difference. I like their tight ends, Kraft and Musgrave.
I don't know what... I don't remember... I don't know if Musgrave was hurt or if he played or what happened, but...
And then they lost. Doing the tush push, their version of tush push. I don't want to make excuses for them because they got beat. Probably shouldn't have won. But that kickoff is a huge moment. You can't turn it over on the road and you can't miss field goals. It's a bad time. Denver missed a field goal. They weren't going to win that game.
If you pause in a playoff game and the road team is getting the opening kickoff and fumbles on the kickoff. It's almost like the live bet. You almost want to bet everything on the other team no matter. It just feels like the worst omen possible for the rest of the game. But the bottom line is Jordan Love wasn't good.
And there's probably some reasons for it that have to do with some of the weapons being gone. But he made some really bad throws. And I never felt like last year, especially in the playoffs, it felt like he was elevating. I didn't feel that way at all down the stretch here.
You know, I guess the bottom line, the message is don't fall in love with these quarterbacks too much. Jordan Love, CJ Stroud, even though he won, not as good a year. Drake May, you know, I can go on and on. Just don't fall in love with these guys.
Let's take one more break and then we'll do Bills and Steelers. This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. Winning is a great feeling, but let's be honest, it's even better with a prize like Michelob Ultra Superior Light Beer. And that's exactly what you'll get with Play You for an Ultra on DoorDash.
You can challenge your friends to a game racer match and send the winner a Michelob Ultra because Superior is always worth playing for. Participate and play you for an ultra and send the winner an ultra through DoorDash today. Enjoy responsibly. Copyright 2025 Anheuser-Busch McGlobe Ultra Light Beer. St. Louis, Missouri. Must be 21 or older to order alcohol.
Alcohol available only in select markets. This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. Here's the thing about Prime. Whatever you're into. It makes it even better. I love, because we watch a lot of Prime movies for the rewatchables, I love being able to pop up the x-ray thing that tells you what actor is in what scene. I love that.
I love being able to rent movies that just came out or buy them if I'm excited to do that. From streaming to shopping, it's on Prime. Visit Amazon.com slash Prime to get more out of whatever you're into. All right, so I'm lumping Bill's Broncos and Steelers Ravens together because, This whole season. Cause everyone else did on a teaser.
Yeah. Right.
Cause we, we did on teaser. It was the, we call it the anchor tease or the anchor parlay, whatever you wanted. Yeah. My favorite was either these eight or eight and a half point teases you could do with them on a, on FanDuel and basically put anyone else you want, move the line eight points, eight and a half points. It's right around even odds.
And it just seemed like a free way to gain eight points with everybody. It won with Tampa. It didn't win with the Chargers. It won with Houston. It won with Washington.
I thought we were going to lose FanDuel as a sponsor. I was like, is a favorite ever going to lose again? Right. And then when Tampa was winning tonight, I don't even know. But yeah. They gave it to us.
Look, there's a lot of storylines for the year. Washington and Jaden Daniels, the Lions, the Vikings coming out of nowhere, the Chiefs going for a three-peat. There's a lot going on. But this Josh versus Lamar thing ended up being the most fun thing to argue about. And as I said earlier, I never thought it got ugly because both guys have been great.
And what's cool is both guys peaking at the right time. So today, Buffalo rushes 44 for 210. And experimented with putting like the sixth offensive lineman out there as a tight end and just like bully balled their way through the first half. And then Baltimore yesterday, 50 carries for 299. Buffalo had the ball 41 minutes. Baltimore at 39-33.
So two teams that love having the ball, running it down your throats, playing each other with two magical quarterbacks who also in the playoffs run the ball more. This is like one of the best games of the decade.
I'm so excited for it. It's an incredible advantage. Like I said, these two teams have even more than like Detroit. Like I'm wowed by Detroit's offense too. But when you have like Josh Allen, like rolling left, it just looks weird. Variety quarterback rolling left and he could slide slither his way for like seven yards. And then Lamar did that.
I think he probably had like five of the first eight carries against the Steelers. I'm like, oh, this game's over too. They're done too. So yeah, when they go against each other, I was so nervous about that Buffalo game, Simmons. I'm like, we all need this to complete a parlay. I had Ohio State to start it and then anchored with these other two.
And the orange pants were a killer on the eyes for Denver. And then they scored right away. I'm like, shit, this is what we knew.
Denver was going to make us sweat it out in the first quarter. That was just the law. There was just too much. And then I was thinking about if you tease them and Buffalo could win by one, but you still don't cover the tease. There are all these different ways. But then Buffalo was like, we got this.
I think combining the two of them, I think they're the two best how do you stop this offenses we've had in a while. And I'm not ready to talk about them historically, and one of them might score seven points next week.
But just when you're watching the moment in these playoff games, now that these quarterbacks don't have to worry about saving their bodies to the playoffs and can actually run and try to do stuff. Daniels was like this too with Washington. I just don't know what the move is when it's like third and four. It's like you almost have to guess what the play is, Tecmo Bowl style. Charge Allen.
He's still going to stiff arm the first guy, roll out, and try to hit somebody side-armed as he's rolling. And then Lamar is just like, he's like covered in grease. Even if you stop him, he's going by you. So I don't...
Yeah, I can't wait to watch this. Romo said it. He's like, you could have a spy on these guys, but they're just better than all the spies. They're faster. They have a better, keener sense of the field than all the spies. And it's just tough. And you look at the Steelers, whose defense ended up being just average, right?
But I was thinking, wow, if they can't stop Lamar, if this can't be like a 17-15 type game that they're used to, forget it. Who the hell's going to do it?
Allen had a play in the first half when he was going around the corner and the guy knew what he was doing. And it was, I think it was a third down and the guy basically beat him to the spot. And Alan just went around him, went down the sideline and got eight, took a guy on, knocked him over too. Instead of like put his Jersey down over the puddle so that Alan could step over it.
It's getting ridiculous. But, but it's just, both of those guys just have these, oh my God. How do you stop this? Now, Baltimore might not have Zay Flowers next week. That's not nothing. Buffalo seems like they have their full team and they really feel like they've, they've every, I don't know where they got this offensive line from that. You know, we did a lot of prep before the year.
I remember liking certain things about their team and definitely they had an offensive line was one of the strengths. Now it feels like one of the best three offensive lines in the league.
And James Cook is very good and they don't rely on one guy. It's not Stefan Diggs. Like, oh, you don't get him the ball. He's going to be mad. No, you look at the box score. They'll end up having like eight pass catchers.
Yeah, he's had like 15 touchdown catchers this year. I guess the difference is Baltimore is built to stop the run. They're really good at it. They're number one in the league. Buffalo is not. So if you're going to say, all right, both of these teams are going to go bully ball, I think Baltimore has a better chance to do it.
Baltimore yesterday, as they broke Pittsburgh's spirit completely and totally, they had that 13-run, 85-yard touchdown drive where they did not pass, which is just a fuck you. Yeah. Honestly. That's just, you're just pulling it out at that point and just, and waving it around like a fucking lasso. 13 runs in a row. Hey, hey, hey, Tom Lynn, have some of this. Like, it's such a fuck you.
It really is. Like, not one pass. That's just like, you're like, let's break these guys. They're off. Hey, he's telling Harbaugh like, hey, I was thinking about just calling runs over and over again until we score just to fuck these guys. He's like, yeah, do it. Go for it.
It worked. And Tomlin, I don't know. I mean, that's six games in the playoffs. He's gone down by 21 or more. I don't know what you think about this guy. And then I look at the quarterback situation. It's like, this team doesn't have a chance unless the moon ball to Pickens works. It has to work like four times a game now for them to even have any kind of chance.
Well, we were betting on them over and over again, and they were overachieving and looking great. And the Philly game was when it turned. They got their asses kicked by Philly, and we all said, ah, stayed at the craps table a game too long on that one. It felt like that three days and 11 days, three games and 11 days kind of broke them. I was thinking about possible excuses for them.
The three days and 11 days somehow didn't break Baltimore, Casey, or Houston. They all gained strength of it, but I guess Pittsburgh could blame it. Russell Wilson maybe is like a house guest that just kind of stays too long. It's like fun to have in the guest room for two months. Yeah. Month three, it's just leaving the fridge open and you're like, oh man, this guy. Yeah.
Gotta get off the couch. All right. Tomlin, 18 years, the 18 year itch. I don't know if that's a, is that a thing?
I think it is. Yeah. Look it up. I have one more I could add to that. Yeah. Let's hear it. Yeah. You called them the best AFC team back like December 2nd or so. That might be another one. They were. They were the one seed.
No. Was that wrong? Yeah. You were wrong.
Yeah.
Come on. Well, in the moment, was that wrong?
Sure, yeah.
My whole point was they're the best team right now. December or whatever.
They weren't better than Buffalo.
I believe it. All right. Okay.
It's fine.
I'm not blaming you. That's fine. I'm going to wipe my tears. I went 27-5 and over under his handkerchief. Oh, wow. You have that? So I looked at their last six playoff losses for Pittsburgh.
Yeah.
Gave up 36 points to the Pats. 45 to the Jaguars, 48 to the Browns, 42 to the chiefs, 31 to Buffalo last week. And then, uh, 28 to the Ravens this week, which really could have been more if the Ravens wanted to score more. Tom was supposed to be this like awesome defensive coach. We always talk about the ugly 18 to 16 games in January. It just goes away. What happens?
I don't know, but I also know they don't have the luxury of what the Patriots did, right? Because they're not ever going to be in a position to draft a great quarterback, right? So if as long as the streak gets, oh my God, he did it. They went over eight and a half wins again. You went on that. That's great. And then it's a first round exit in the playoffs.
That's not going to change anytime soon. But now you're right. The margins are getting thick. The season is just too long for them. They're losing by too many points in the playoffs. I don't know what happens to that guy. I don't know what happened to their defense.
I thought the first two months, I thought they had the best defense in the league. Yeah. As the... DJ Watt got hurt at one point and it never felt like he was totally the same. They had some secondary injuries. But the first two months, they were like the flying around defense. And that... Who was calling him out? Who was the announcer for that Pittsburgh game? It was... Not Collinsworth.
This week? Oh, it's Herbstreet. Herbstreet, yeah. Was... You know, he's not exactly like Mr. Supercritical. He was like calling them out in the first half. It's like, it's a playoff game. Where's the fight from this team?
Make a play, he kept saying.
Something weird happened. I don't know what happened with this team, but whatever we saw the last five weeks was not what we saw in the first three months from them.
Yeah, I don't want to say he's losing the locker room, but this is the closest it looks to that in a long time. Would you trade Mike McCarthy in a second round pick for him? I gotta say, I was a little annoyed that the Patriots signed Vrabel. I'm like, oh man, Tomlin could be available for them. They just waited like 48 hours. For the Pats?
Yes, for the Patriots. The Steelers, they famously only had three coaches in 130 years or whatever the thing is. Yeah, yeah. I don't know. I think they go in for the after-the-season meeting with the owner, and they're like, what happened this year, Mike? And he's like, I don't know. We paid $3 million for our quarterbacks.
Yeah. Then I won 10 games.
So what's the quarterback situation? Not that I care too much, but what possibly can they do? I know what I would do. I would trade the first pick for McCarthy. But then you still have Russell Wilson or Justin Fields and McCarthy. No, no.
I'm saying J.J. McCarthy.
Oh, okay. Not Mike McCarthy. I know it's been a tough week, Bill.
No, I would trade for J.J. McCarthy.
I got you.
Interesting. Now, if Darnold shits the bed again tomorrow, he might not be available anymore. Right, right, right. Darnold could go from two weeks ago, we were talking about why won't they just pay him now? And now two weeks, safety sucks again. I'd be like, well, at least they have JT.
That's not bad.
There's not a ton of options for them. That's not a bad thought. The other guy, they could trade for Joe Milton. I'll send them some week 18 Buffalo Pats game tape. Joe Milton lighting up the Bill's second string, pretending it, you can pretend it was the first string. Chargers, Texans.
This was beyond Shakey's, right? We haven't gone in a while, but if we did, people would be chucking their mojo potatoes at the screen for the first hour and the manager would threaten to turn the game to reruns on Telemundo.
It was AI Shakey's. AI created a Shakey's broadcast.
Yeah.
6-0, charges are up after they just gave away possible touchdowns on two straight drives. The Texans are an absolute mess. Third and 16, they snap the ball over Stroud's head. And it seems like it's either going to be a safety, a touchdown, something great. This is right after the intentional grounding, they don't call.
And he picks it up, rolls out, everyone's charger stops, throws it to midfield, and immediately turns it to a different quarterback. And from that point on, the Texans never look back.
I, my best bet was the Texans over 19 and a half. And you were making fun of me. Like how are you Texans over three and a half points looking? And I, I deserved it. They were terrible. I still don't think I picked the right side. They went 32 to 12 and I still don't think I got it right. I don't know if there was a right side. Oh, I think it was two wrong sides.
And Herbert's so weird because he'll throw a 22 yard completion to McConkie. I'm like, wow, that's the best throw of a football I've seen in a long time. Yeah. What a cannon. Yeah. Four interceptions later. I think we were going to rank his top 10 bad passes, but they ended up too many. We can't get to it.
So was that for you? Is that a Houston is so resilient there that nobody believes in us game? Or is that a we might never get there with Justin Herbert game?
Oh, man. Can I say both? I'm not allowed to say both? You can say both. I'm going to say Houston, primarily Houston. And they scared me last year. Remember, that's what sent me on a tailspin and some others when we bet against them. I thought the Browns were a better team last year, right? When they went to Houston and Houston throttled them. I was like, you know what?
The Chargers tend to have... I mean, now you got this quarterback, going back to Herbert, He's had, what has he had? Like two teams that had three interceptions and he couldn't, the three turnovers and he couldn't beat them? That's the thing.
Everything was going their way and he still couldn't close the game. Five years, zero playoff wins. He's three games over 500. You include the playoff games, he's one game over 500. I was actually researching quarterbacks who never won a playoff game and the best one ever is Y.A. Tittle.
He never won one, huh? Never won one. As much as we heard about him. Yeah.
Interesting. Had some, was in some big spots, apparently never won one. And then Andy Dalton was the other one. Andy Dalton never won a Shakey's game? Never won. 0 for 5. But the famous one was Stafford. First 12 years, 0-3 in the playoffs, never won anything. So maybe this is a Stafford type thing, but it's really unusual for a guy this talented to, to not win. So you have that.
And then you have, you know, we used to joke about the Delome. The Delome was, was four picks with a, with the fumble. And then the Delome, the full Delome, I think was five picks with a fumble. And one of them had to be a pick six or something like that.
So close.
15?
15.
But I think people used to throw interceptions way more in the old days.
I don't think they passed as much, I guess.
Todd Marinovich had one. Jim Kelly. Richard Todd. Joe Ferguson. Tommy Kramer. The one we watched together, the first Super Bowl we watched together, Tampa, Oakland. Oh, yeah. Rich Gannon, five picks, three pick sixes. So that was, I guess the full Gannon is five picks.
Full Gannon sounds better anyway, I think. Yeah.
So only three guys have thrown five picks with an interception, DeLome, Gannon, and Kramer. The last two to do it were Brian Hoyer in 2016 and Carson Palmer the same year.
Right, I do remember that.
He did the four with the... He had the pick six.
I'll say this about Herbert because I don't want to bury him completely yet. But, you know, I don't know that Harbaugh is as psyched as he was a year ago, right? I don't know. We could stop the comparisons to Joe Burrow for sure. Fine, keep comparing them to Tua. That's good. But I don't know. If you're Harbaugh, What's your thought process now?
It's like, oh shit, this is going to take a lot more work than I thought, right?
I think you move pretty quickly into, I got to get this guy more than one receiver. There's a nerd case for blaming the offensive coordinator and the play calling, but the football nerds love Justin Herbert no matter what he does. Here's the bigger question to me. Quarterbacks you'd rather have for the next eight years than Justin Herbert.
Oh, man.
So take it to 2033. It's really just that? I'll list them to you and you tell me when to stop. Yeah. Mahomes, Allen, Lamar, Burrow. Take all four of those, right? Yeah. Would you take Jaden Daniels?
Sure, right now. But I'm, you know, I'm going to be hesitant with the whole CJ Stroud thing. But yes, right now.
CJ Stroud? I don't know. It's a toss-up for you. That's close. That's maybe where you got me. Wait a minute. There's not more? There is more. Drake May? No. Come on.
Come on. Let's see a little something else. If the charge is off for Justin Herbert, for Drake May straight up, fuck yeah. What are you talking about? Rather have Drake May in a rookie contract 100 times out of 100.
You're not a good businessman. Whoever said you were a good businessman? Here's an interesting one.
Mayfield.
Oh.
Mayfield or Justin Herbert. He's been in the league since, what, 2017?
Eight's a lot of years. If you told me four or five, I think it's easier.
So you'd go four years, you'd say yes.
I think so, yeah. I love Baker.
Dak, you wouldn't say eight years, but if I said four, you would take Dak for four. I think I would, yes. Darnold?
It's so funny. Oh, you paused. We all have to wait until tomorrow to see. Yeah. I don't want to look foolish. I'd say no, probably.
Would you rather have Jared Goff or Justin Herbert? I'd rather have Herbert. Herbert. Yeah. Would you rather have Caleb Williams or Justin Herbert? Herbert right now. Why would I? Yeah. Okay.
So that's it.
The point of that exercise is as bad as he was in that game and he's never won a playoff game, he's still one of the top 10 QB assets no matter what your preference is.
You're still talking to yourself. Yeah, because it'll get you 10 wins and maybe you can get lucky in the playoffs. And they were not lucky or good yesterday.
I don't love the adversity piece with him. Like when it feels like when the wheels start coming off, it doesn't get better for him. Right. You know, it, it, it feels when it's going good, he seems great. And then that's a whole other goes the other way.
Some of those nose, I would rather take some of those guys down 10 than Herbert for sure.
Yeah. Yeah. Um, all right, let's take a break and then we'll do guest lines. This episode is brought to you by Viore. I love sports. I know you do too. I also know that lots of you exercise, but if you're like me and my wife, the beloved sports gal, you're sick and tired of ugly, uncomfortable workout gear, especially, you know, I do a lot of walking. I walk around LA. I make calls.
I listen to podcasts. Here are two words that will change everything. Viore clothing. a line of active wear that is unbelievable. The best thing about Viore is you can lounge around in it. You can work out in it. You can go outside. You can go shopping down in your local wherever, and you never feel like you're either underdressed or overdressed. You're just comfortable.
You can wear it when you're training, traveling, lounging around the house. Go get yourself some of the most comfortable and versatile clothing in the planet. Here's the deal. Our listeners get 20% off their first purchase at Viori.com slash Simmons. Once again, V-U-O-R-I.com slash Simmons. All right, so we're going to do guess the lines round two. We only have three games that have lines.
We're going to come back Monday night after Minnesota and the Rams and do a little short, maybe 25-minute pod where we talk about the game and then guess the line because we like to guess every line. It's not our fault they changed, made it a three-day round one.
I love doing the pod with you, but yeah, it was a little tidier when everything was done by Sunday night. And also, make that game in Vegas. Move everything to Vegas. When in doubt, move everything to Vegas. What's Glendale? Which game? Oh, the Rams-Vikings. Yeah, why isn't that in Vegas? It's an easier drive to Vegas if you're in LA.
If it's a football game, if it's a bachelor party, if it's an intervention, just move it to Vegas. It's an easy thought.
They love Glendale. They love how like middle of the road between the two teams it is for some reason. It's like we put it in Arizona. It's perfectly neutral. The NFL just feels like it's the most neutral territory possible.
I don't know.
It's not the first time they've went to Glendale. I'm with you. Why not go to Vegas? Go to Vegas.
Yeah.
Okay. I'll do the AFC games first. All right. Chiefs Texans in Kansas City. The only reason I was scared of Houston in that... I really liked the Chargers in that Chargers game. Houston had a whiff of nobody believes in us. And then you look at them more and you're like, there's a reason nobody believes in you. You guys have sucked.
The only things that would make anyone believe in you are the models on home underdogs during the playoffs and some of the stuff housed it on the show. There's... gambling nerd metrics that we should believe in you. But from what we've watched from a football standpoint, you guys have sucked. Yeah. So I don't feel bad about missing that as a nobody believes in us.
But in this game, it's going to kick up.
There's always like a two and a half line that they screw you with, right? Like, oh, I just have to pick the winner here? The Chargers are better than the Texans. So that was the one.
You know, the thing with that game, though, I really thought the Chargers offensive line was going to be able to handle the edge rushers on Houston. They have good tackles. And yet over and over again, Houston was coming on the edge and they completely disrupted them. Right, right, right. I just pegged it wrong. Anyway, Chiefs Texans, I have Chiefs by nine.
All right, don't get mad, but I hit this exactly. Seven and a half.
Wow.
That's what I said.
So I jacked it up because I thought they would not want us to tease the Chiefs. Mm-hmm. And I thought they'd put it at nine so that even if you teased them, you still had Chiefs minus three. Chiefs seven and a half.
They're basically opening the floodgates for a tease. They've done a weird, disrespectful thing for the Chiefs and their lines, you know, as much as they can for a 15 win team. And they've kind of done it all season long. The big thing I'm hearing is it seems like it's a disadvantage for And Fandle is also treating it as a disadvantage that they've been off for two weeks.
Like, oh, the Chiefs are off two weeks and they didn't play anyone week 18. So that's really two weeks. Yeah, they do this every year. And they win the Super Bowl like every other year. So why? Yeah, they have a lot of infrastructure.
Yeah, why are we going crazy about it? I can understand it after week 12, week 13 range when we were really worried about the Chiefs and it really felt like... Or were they 12-1? It felt like they could have been easily 8-5 or 7-6 with five different plays. I like the way they ended the season up until when they didn't have to play anymore. I thought they were more explosive.
I thought Pacheco, once he came back, that run the ball better. I just liked how they looked more.
And I think they're delighted in this matchup, honestly. I don't think they want, you know, they wouldn't have been afraid of Harbaugh, but the Chargers played them well twice. I think they had a two-point loss and a seven-point loss, and Harbaugh going to Kansas, you know, I think Andy Reid gets a little freaked out there. But they'll slap this team around, I think.
The only case would be the Houston pass rush again. Casey's tackles aren't great. Some sort of dumb Casey first half where they have three points, you know, 20 minutes into the game. And then... Mixon...
pounding the ball down their throat i don't know listen i'm i'm teasing the chiefs i'm just telling you and i i know it's been a rough week you and i and your financial planner we're gonna sit down tuesday wednesday ish and we're gonna figure out how much you want to put on the chiefs ohio state money line parlay and so you're oh you're still in on ohio state yeah yeah that's easy so let's just do it not have to worry about anything you're not afraid of notre dame
No, no, no. It's a mismatch. It's a mismatch up front. They're going to get bullied.
Bills-Ravens is our second game. I had this all week, battling back and forth between minus two and a half, minus three. And I think I'm wrong. But I have the Bills and Buffalo favored by three against the Baltimore Ravens.
That's exactly what I thought. And I stand by it. our friends at Fandle have the Bills only favored by one and a half. Ooh, the tic-tac zone.
Yeah.
Did we see a little flipperoo?
Oh, you think the Ravens will get the nod? I'm just, every time we're in the 1.5 tic-tac zone, sometimes by Wednesday, all of a sudden it's like, wait a second, Baltimore's favored a Buffalo now.
Can we talk about what this means? Like why, how they may have arrived at this? Because it doesn't really make sense to me.
Maybe they arrived the same way I've kind of arrived mentally. I like the Ravens. You do? I do. I forgot to do this before. I had this Derrick Henry thing I was going to do with you.
Go ahead. Let's do it. Which quarterback would you want over Derrick Henry?
Oh, no.
I was looking up, I was trying to think of how many guys were awesome from like the first moment they played in high school all the way through and they're still awesome now. Like, I think LeBron's been like that, right? LeBron was awesome as a ninth grader all the way through. He's been awesome for 26 years.
Henry, as a freshman in high school at Uli in 2009, rushed for 2,465 yards and 7.9 yards a carry. He was like 14 years old. He finished his career. He ran for 12,124 yards in high school, 8.7 yards per carry, and 153 touchdowns, right? So he's...
I don't know if he's the greatest high school running back ever, but whenever anybody writes that article, he has to be one of the first people mentioned. It's like Emmitt Smith and you go through. You have to have Henry in the first couple.
Well, week nine against Norwich is junior year. He says he had the flu, but he only went for like 130.
So then he goes to Alabama. They're stacked at running back. He plays anyway. Second year better. And then third year, 2,219 yards, 5.6 to carry. turns pro, and he's rushed for 11,423 yards in nine years. He's had three years where he ran for over five yards a carry, and then another year he was 4'9". This last year, he ran for 5'9 a carry in 1921. It's the second best year of his career.
There's nobody like him. He's a complete 101. We've never seen a running back who does the things that he does. I can't compare him to anybody... we've ever, like there's pieces of like Christian McCoy, Eric Dickerson. I don't know who he is. Yeah. And he's exactly as good as he was when he came in the league.
And I don't know how long it continues, but it's weird that we had that one playoffs when we talked about him, when the tight, when the Titans were like nine and eight or nine and seven, and then they made it all the way to the AFC title game. And it was like, Oh my God, it's Derek Henry more valuable than any quarterback. And, That was the only time he had a moment in the sun.
And now you watch him, especially in that playoff game. And it's like, are we just completely underrated Baltimore? And is this Lamar Henry thing? Are we going to look back at this and think this was one of the most amazing combos we've had in the league this century? Anyway, that's why I like the Ravens.
Oh, I think you could be right about all that stuff. I mean, it's amazing. A guy does so well in high school that he's drafted in college and he does so well in college.
But how are you this great as a running back for 15 straight years?
But his yards per carry went down a couple of those years. But he's unstoppable. I get it.
He's still unstoppable. He was unstoppable as a freshman in high school. 15 years later, nobody could stop him. It's amazing.
Listen, Persia Walker slowed down. FanDuel had Saturday highest rushing yards on Saturday. I was like, it's Derrick Henry. Why is it minus 125? JJ's arguing with me. I was like, just stop. Just bet Derrick Henry to have the most yards on Saturday. He's going to have the most yards for the weekend. What did he end up with, 186? 186 or something. So, yeah, he's great. They're great.
The only thing is, I don't know. Sometimes they don't figure out how to manage the load between Lamar and Henry. Sometimes.
He's 4'9 per carry for his career. Yeah. And then 5'0 in the postseason. Usually we always talk about running backs. It's like a shelf life of four years, five years, maybe six years. This guy's going to, you know, he's floating around in free agency and people are like, I might be too old. And it turned out he was just on a team that didn't have quarterbacks for four years. Right.
I think this guy's one of the all-time freaks. I think Moss was a freak. I think Lawrence Taylor was a freak. We talk about the freak athletes that we've watched since we've been alive and love football. And Henry, it's a short list, but he's definitely on it. He's a one-on-one to me.
I'm not going to argue. I will have to see his stats in Turkey Bowl when his parents played him when he was nine years old and stuff, but I'll trust him.
Senior year, 13 games, 4,261 yards. Wow.
He ran for 4,000 yards. Sign him up. I know, it's stupid. It's really dumb. Yeah, he's got a lot of wear and tear on him. It doesn't make any sense. Or he doesn't. Or he has no wear and tear because he's a freak. Maybe it keeps going.
But it does, like you see, there's like the videos of Lamar from high school where he has like a couple just freaky... You know, he has that one, that run into the end zone where he just stops and the guy goes by him and he just pauses and then he goes in. And it's just like some of these dudes, they just had it when they were 14. Then there's the late bloomer types.
Even Cooper Dijon, have you seen the basketball footage of him? Like doing two hand slams? I don't know. These guys are good athletes. These guys are good athletes.
Yeah.
I still think one and a half's light. Sorry.
No, I just think Henry is one of the all-time freaks since we've been watching football. He's phenomenal. I would put him at the top, top, top freak level of all these dudes. And I wonder, is he the key guy in round two? The reason I brought that up. Is he the key guy in round two, not Lamar? Because the Bills, they're medium-sized. They're not big. I do feel like you can batter and ram them.
And he just softens them up and then Lamar can do his stuff on the sides. But why did you make this line three if you like Baltimore so much? I was just trying to guess what Vegas would have because I think Vegas really likes the Bills.
Yeah. I don't know. Where does the line end up, you think? You're going Ravens. As soon as we hang this Zoom up, you're putting the Ravens on a teaser with somebody. I know you are.
To me, I want to bet them straight up because there's still the Lamar playoff stuff still makes me a whiff nervous. So I wouldn't want to tie it with another bet. I'd rather tease the Chiefs with one of the NFC teams.
Mack Hollins had 13 touchdown receptions in high school. Played varsity in ninth grade.
4,241 yards.
That's preposterous. I know.
It's crazy. I guess he got hurt for like eight games one year in Tennessee, but there's just no wear and tear at all. He's like a car that has 200,000 miles on it that can still go 200 miles an hour.
If he went to our son's high school, we'd be talking about him so much. Our kids would hate us, right? Like, shut up, dad. Pay attention to me. It's like, yeah, but you got a running back in your school who ran for 4,300 yards.
I was on a text thread about this this weekend. I was saying it's like the kid in the little league world series game, the Cody Webster kid, who's just bigger than everybody else.
Right.
And then that kid grows up and he's, that's the highlight of his life, right? Derek Henry was probably that kid at age eight and he's still that guy now and he's 30. He's been that guy for over two decades. He still looks like you watch and you go, how's anyone tackling this? All right. Third game, Detroit home for Washington.
Yep.
You know where this is going. It's going right in the Vegas zone for me. Detroit by five and a half. Ooh.
Wow. I said seven and a half and it's eight and a half. Oh. Wow. You're going to beat me this week. Wait a minute. Do we even have to do Guest Alliance tomorrow? Yeah, we do.
We still have to do it for posterity. You don't have to start your guys. You can be like when the Chiefs rest in Week 18. Yeah. You can look up some Derrick Henry High School footage. You can go over that somewhere.
3?
And Detroit's 8.5.
I think that's ridiculous. I don't understand that at all. With Detroit's defense? Because they look good against Minnesota because Darnold sucked? And sailed like 10 passes. Now we think Detroit's defense is back. They gave up 40 plus points like three weeks before that.
The over-under is by far the highest so far at 55 and a half. So I guess they're thinking it could get out of hand with one score, even if it's close late. Well, this lined up really nicely for the Lions.
Yeah.
They get the one seed. They get a week off. They get Washington in round two that just pulled out yet another crazy win, but still has a rookie quarterback. The leap of just thinking mentally of Washington, I know they won 12 games. They're a good team, but just thinking about them in the NFC title game, that seems like a lot.
Give me, if you're Dan Campbell, and let's say you get through this game, out of the three possible opponents, Rams, Vikings, Eagles, who do you want?
I think I'd be the most afraid of the Vikings, as crazy as that sounds.
Really?
And they might lose tomorrow.
Familiarity. Yeah.
Don't you think? Because I do think there's a world where those were the two best teams, not just in the NFC, but the whole league potentially. Withstanding the whole Chiefs playoff pedigree and all that stuff.
But what if A.J. Brown puts down the book? Maybe he'll finish Inter Excellence by then. He's got a long time.
He's got two weeks. With the way Hertz looks, I wouldn't be as scared of the Eagles as I would have been four weeks ago. Right. Don't you think? Yeah. I mean, he had 39 yards at halftime.
I know. I just read you his numbers and that he's winning these playoff games. It's ridiculous. But it does bug me that third and three, they got you over a barrel every single time.
All right, so we're going to... We'll save the rest of it for tomorrow when we react off. All right.
We'll get that up. You're right. I'm up three to one. I won the week. I'm up three to one. We'll do it for fun. What's the... Are we tied now for the season? You're up now? We were tied heading into the week. Yeah, so I'm up by one.
This is great. This could be your first title. This could give hope to Buffalo fans, Minnesota fans, Washington Commanders fans, Lions fans.
Hold on. Let me read you my guess the Lions record in middle school. I went 16 weeks in the road.
How many great high school to their 30s athletes can you think of who were great the entire time all the way through? Because I guess like in basketball, basketball happens way more easy to figure out. Football happens with the quarterbacks, but the running backs and the receivers, I would argue it doesn't really. Emmett was like that. Emmett was awesome. Emmett was great.
He was awesome.
He was a high school college pro guy.
Yeah.
But other than that, I don't know. So Rudy, are there other guys that I'm not thinking of? How many guys were awesome high school college pros? So we just got to turn his zoom on.
Oh yeah, there he is.
I mean, Arch Manning, Trevor Lawrence were big, but Arch Manning didn't play.
Yeah. Oh, Peyton's a good one. Was Peyton awesome like ninth grade on?
He couldn't get over the hump though in college, right? Wasn't that kind of the knock on him? Right.
He's still putting up stats.
Yeah, no, he's great.
He just couldn't beat Florida. Yeah. I guess Randy Moss, but then Randy Moss had to transfer when he was in college and the college went a little sideways for a second.
Oh, Adrian Peterson, right? That's a good one. Obviously, you slowed down in the last couple of years, but yeah, a ridiculous recruiting class.
So Rudy, when Henry got when he went, fell to the second round after the Alabama season, did that seem like the right range for you or did you think everybody was a big mistake?
No, you remember, people called that like a terrible pick because, you know, he's like big, was he fast enough? There were people that really didn't know if he was too slow. I don't know, but yeah, which is weird because I think he did, I don't think his 40 time was terrible, but yeah, like there were people that crushed that pick as a second round pick and, I don't know.
It's always weird, though, with the Alabama running backs because sometimes, you know, like they're just, they play with the best offensive line and yada, yada, yada. That was a knock.
Yeah, right. Yeah, the whole thing. I'm sure the listeners will come up with a couple. Yeah, I know. They're going to kill us for missing an obvious one.
Well, you know, I was looking at one of those lists where they had the 50 best. Tony Dorsett was apparently one of the great high school running backs of all time. And then he was really good at Pittsburgh too.
Pennsylvania. So he might be another one. How long was this?
His Cowboys run was probably eight or nine years. Pretty great. Yeah. Yeah. Right in there. All right. Thanks. Suri, who do you like in the title game?
Ohio State.
Oh, wow. What's the line in the Ohio State?
It's like, is it six now? What is it? Oh, I'm sorry. Eight and a half. No, it's eight and a half. So tease them with the Chiefs. You could tease it. Like I said, we're going to sit down with your financial planner. Okay. All right. Can't be taken away.
Thanks, Rudy. All right. Should we skip parent corner this week and talk California? We could, yes. We should mention that as we're recording this on a Sunday night and we got noticed a couple hours ago that there's like a severe wind thing coming on Tuesday. So... It's hard to say where we're going next, but this was already the worst week since I've been in LA. By far, not even close.
One of the biggest natural disasters in American history. And I can't wrap my head around it all of these days later. And you're over in the Manhattan Beach area. I don't know how much you've dealt with some of the areas that were affected when we're talking Palisades and Malibu and Eaton, Altadena were the big four.
Um, we knew, we knew a lot of people from friends of friends, people, my kids went to school with who lived in different parts. And, and, uh, I, it's, I don't even know how to describe this to people who don't live in California, like the wide swath of devastation. Um, the Palisades just basically being gone, whole parts of Malibu just being gone, eating all to Dina.
Like I, I, it's one of those things when you see it, when you watch it on TV, um, and it's happening in other areas and it's like, man, that seems awful, but you don't really fully understand it until you live there. And I don't, I know Ella come back. I know everybody bounces back eventually, but, uh,
man, it's really hard to even understand how the rebuilding is going to happen and how long it's going to take. And you just see those wide overhead shots of these different areas. And it's just like, it's just so awful. And it's just been an awful week. And it just feels like it's not going to get better.
Yeah. And that's also part of it. And so I know this goes on in like Maui and other places and we should be thinking about that. But yeah, when it's in your backyard and like people are checking in with me, I'm like, I don't know. I'm good for now. I'm all right for now. I have no idea. And it depends on the wind. And somehow, did you know they could predict wind for three days?
I didn't even know they could do that. But so we know like there's bad shit ahead. Yeah. and we know a lot of people who got devastated and it's really rough. It really, I don't want to bum everyone out, but it really is like, Oh my God, you feel like you have so much control over your life. And then, and then you don't, you really don't with like something stupid like this.
And we don't know how it started and we don't know how it's going to end. And, uh, and that's, uh, and we need football as a distraction and it, it's hardly ranks as important, but, uh, I mean, for God's sakes, I wish we could like talk about this as if it's going on in the past, but it's not.
Yeah, it doesn't seem like it's over yet. We'll see. I mean, we've been here, I've been here since 02 and you've been here a few years before that. And there's been wind events and it's been windy. And I remember over and over again, especially like even taking my daughter to soccer tournaments and it would be like 35 degree, 35 mile an hour winds in Lancaster and stuff like that.
For some reason, these winds seemed a little, they were pointing them out a couple of days before like, hey, this is pretty scary this time around. And then everything that happened was so much worse than you ever, ever could imagine. Even heading through Tuesday, like it was starting the Palisades. And then all of a sudden by mid, early Tuesday night here, you really felt like this could go on.
in a, in a direction you just never could have been in your worst nightmare imagined. But, um, first responders, fire department, police department, um, the helicopter pilots dropping the water, all the, all the TV people who were out there braving the elements. I mean, that, that one of the things that was, um,
really inspiring was how many people were trying to get out there, trying to tell us what was going on. And for a lot of people watching TV, not knowing if it was their neighborhood, their house. Um, and it was, you're just relying on all these people, these Twitter accounts, like that LA scanner account.
Um, but, and it turned out to be just a 10 out of 10, the worst case scenario that we could have had.
Yeah, like you said, even the reporters and these firestorms that are going on 100 feet behind them. It's like, what is going on? And like I said, I wish that the worst is behind us. But then we have a mutual friend that's a doctor at UCLA, and he's like... Yeah, man, they have to evacuate this hospital if the if the storm, if the fires come within two and a half miles of this place.
And it's right now it's four. I was like, are you kidding me? What the hell? What does that look like? Evacuating a whole giant hospital like that's that's my God. That's going to be something that's just even more outrageous and right up there with anything else.
So, yeah, just, you know, plenty of GoFundMes out there, plenty of places to look to help plenty of fucking scammers too that are assholes trying to take advantage of this. But just be careful and be diligent and, you know.
Yeah, I'm going to, I wanted to really kind of dive into it and see which ones I trusted. And maybe on the next podcast could talk about some of the, some of the possibilities. So, you know, some of the stuff's going to get rebuilt. And I'm sure it's going to take a while. There's some other stuff that I don't know how stuff comes back.
Houses that were from 1940, 1950 that you would never build the same way. And some pieces of California that just had real special characters. Certainly one of the reasons I wanted to live here. Being near the ocean and just some of the coolest parts of the country I'd ever seen. And then on top of it, just...
I think losing your house and having no power over that and just knowing all the stuff that you kept and everything's gone. Like I don't, there's very few worse feelings than that. So it's just so much pain and so much heartbreak out here. We try to do podcasts, try to talk football and try to keep people's minds off it for an hour, but it's really, really horrible.
And I really hope we've hit the end of it and that it's not going to get worse. Yeah.
That'd be nice, right? That'd be nice. Not too much to ask.
After all this parlay and teaser talk, let's just get everyone safe.
Well, that's it. Best of luck to everybody out there. We're really sorry about everything that happened. On one of the later podcasts that we do, hopefully this week, we'll try to have some, maybe even tomorrow when we come back tomorrow for that last game, maybe we can try to figure out a couple of good things that we actually trust and a couple ways to get the word out to try to help people.
I like that.
I mean, it was just, it's crazy. Your week started with one of the Bella twins twerking four feet from you. I mean, I think.
I know that was a Monday night. It feels like it was a hundred.
That was minus 65,000 to make parent corner. And, uh, too many terrible things happen.
So anyway, well, we're really feeling for everybody out there and it's, it's just really heartbreaking. I really come to love LA too. And, uh, you know, it's just, uh, it's just hard to wrap your head around, especially places that you've been to a million times. And now you think, well, wait a second, what's that going to look like now? But hopefully we can all get through this and figure it out.
Sal? I will see you tomorrow night. Let's do it tomorrow. Good job by you, Billy. Good job by you. Thanks to Kyle and Saruti and Gahal for producing. You can watch this video on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel as well. And we will see you on Monday night. Please, everybody, stay safe.
Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in DC. Gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. Call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here.
Visit gamblinghelplinema.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-877-8-HOPE-NY or text HOPE-NY in New York.