Welcome to NFL Daily, where we're always going back for seconds and thirds. That's right, a trio of games on this Thanksgiving. I'm Greg Rosenthal in my garage, joined for the first time by an Intercontinental Thanksgiving guest. Yes, it's Will Gavin. It's It's already Friday in the UK. Will Gavin from Talk Sport. If you listen to what some people called the most insane recap of the year back in week 6. Thank you for staying up early or late, whatever it is, Will, and talking about these games with me.
No, I absolutely love it. Thanks for having me. I do feel like mentioning going up for seconds or thirds feels like a direct shot at me before we've even started the show. But I can take it on the chin. That's fine.
No, it is absolutely not. It's what I did tonight, and we We just had a lot of great bread products. I think we overloaded, which you got to have, but we had two different types of cornbread because my daughter wanted to make one. Then we had some biscuits, and just I did not feel well a couple hours ago, but I feel better now. We have three fun games to talk about. Maybe at the very end, we'll talk a little bit more about our Thanksgiving. I'm curious what it's like to be a Brit watching these games. But first, let's start with the night game because maybe it wasn't the best game of the day, but I think it's the most important to Lambo. Loving the shotgun to the setback, Josh Jacobs to his right. Snap, fake to Jacobs, quick toss, Reid, left side, breaks. Touchdown. Five, ends of, TD. Jaden Reid, his second TD of the night. It's 20 to 3, Green Bay. Yes, Jaden Reid getting it done. Can he just dial up all the best plays for Jaden Reid. That got it to 21 to 3 in the second half. The packers go on to win 30 to 17.
That was Wayne Larravie, of course, from W-R-N-W in Green Bay. Packers get that big lead. And maybe I'll just start with Reid, because as I was watching this game, Will, I had a theory, and it's like, Jaden Reid is Matt Lafleur's muse. He He always comes up with the good stuff for Jaden Reid, and Jaden Reid always executes it. They showed a stat that Jaden Reid now has as many touch downs or more than any packer in history in his first two years as a receiver. You think of that, touch down? Beautiful. Blocking the receiver. Do a great job blocking all season long. They get Reid into the end zone on a nice swing pass, and they have the first Reid shutdown on a play where he makes it like he's run blocking for a couple of seconds I don't know if I'd call it trickery, but very creative. Then he spins out and Love puts it perfect timing for that breakdown. Reid had a nice run earlier in the game. I know that's not the biggest big picture take here, but Matt Lafleur always seems to know how to use Jaden Reid in such a way to make him at his best.
That's Lafleur's magic with his entire team. This offense was humming tonight.
Yeah, look, just two catches in that first half, but both of them, touch downs. You mentioned the blocking down You do feel like this is a receiving core and an entire packer's offense that finally starting to look like it actually has a real identity over the last couple of games. A lot of that has to do with the rushing, and a lot of that has to do with Josh Jacobs, I'm sure we'll come on to. But Jaden Reid, I went into this season being very doubtful, and it was very much like a fantasy thing where people are taking him mid-runs, even earlier rounds. I'm like, Okay, so this guy was good last year, but he had what? 12 plus touch downs. If you're just relying on that, that's That's never going to happen. But he is a guy who can have two catches and just two touch downs. Apparently, I was horribly wrong. He did have the great end-around play as well, that 23-yarder on the ground, which really helped boost his night. But it's amazing you come out of this game talking about him despite the fact that what? Just three catches for 24 yards plus that.
He's what your guy, Debo, used to be. Not to bring up any subjects for a 49ers fan, but he really reminds me of him. Obviously, he's a lot lighter and a different style of player, but there aren't that many players that can impact a game like Jaden Reid does on special design plays. Like you said, have four touches tonight, two for touch-outs. One, that run was the best run that anyone had all night just in terms of pure talent. Now, my theory is that Jaden Reid is Matt Lafleur's muse. He always comes up with the good stuff for Jaden Reid. Christian Watson, on the other hand, I believe is Jordan Love's muse. Because two catches for Christian Watson tonight, that's it, on four targets. But those Those two throws were absolutely incredible by Jordan Love, the deep one down the sideline that just shows off Love's arm strength. And then another key one on the drive late in the second quarter that helped set them up into a tight window, the turkey shot that John Gruden used to talk about between the zone, the deep defender, and the underneath. Jordan Love always seems to make his best passes to Christian Watson.
Watson doesn't always catch him. There was probably a PI on a late target hit that they didn't give to the packers, but it shows off what Love can do. It's just this group of players that are very cohesive. I think you're right. They have an identity. Even on a night where they didn't have Romeo Dobbs on the field, they had more than enough with Tucker Kraft. And those two receivers.
Yeah, that deep shot on the third and sixth in the third quarter where he hit him down that right-hand sideline was not only was it like a proper ballsy play call, the way he stepped up in the pocket, the way he kept calm as it was collapsing around him and just absolutely He hit Watson in stride was sensational. I'm glad you mentioned the defensive pass inference because what a dreadful call that was. Matt Lafleur made it clear. I love that when you're up by three clear scores, you've still got Matt Lafleur on the sideline giving the referees just that much stick was lovely.
No, because that was his moment. That was the Lafleur moment. If you didn't watch the game and you're tuning in on Friday to listen to this, thank you very much. We love you. It's 30 to 17. Yes, the The game seems all but over. It's 2 minutes and 10 seconds left, probably when they snap that ball, something like that. But they're going for the kill shot. Almost anyone going into the two-minute warning is just going to run the ball there and punt and try to kill the clock or whatever, maybe throw a short pass. But they're like, We've got this howitzer. That's just this thing of beauty. Let's take our shot right now and give the fans something fun to leave and stick it to our old friend, Mike McDaniel. I love coaches like that, like Matt Lafleur, who was going to let his players have some fun. It didn't work, but it was worth it. I'd get mad, too.
I did thoroughly enjoy. When I say thoroughly enjoy, I mean that with as much dripping British sarcasm as humanly possible, because I didn't enjoy much that Jason Garret did on co-coms tonight. But I did love him when Seran Neil came across and contacted him horribly early for one of the most obvious defensive passive interference. It was textbook. It was like teaching tape passive interference for officials. He went, Oh, yeah. He did maybe get there a little earlier. That's just like...
What else didn't you like about Gareth? I have a lot to get to with this game because what a no-show for the Dolphins in a big spot, and we're going to get to that while we're giving the packer some credit off the top. But what didn't you like about Jason Gareth?
I think after three hours of Tom braided, just hating life of watching one of the worst quarterback matchups we've had in the NFL this season, but doing it with a lot of fun. I just needed Jason Gareth to be just in a bit of fun, Thanksgiving mode or to just give us the tiniest bit of insight. But what he did on almost every play was took exactly what the comms said and just repeated it in a more flowery way. Not once did we see anything that was actually delivering you anything that you learned. This is a guy who was a head coach in the NFL for many years and just gave us absolutely nothing about game management, absolutely nothing about the play design. I I found it a tough question. I love it.
I'm not going to lie. I love it. If we're going to keep Will up till 4:00 in the morning, give him something. Yeah, exactly. I like the cutting criticism here.
We'll get back to the- Can I just say there's one other Christian Watson play as well I wanted It was a highlight. It was early on in the game when it was still a single score, where Dontabian Wicks had a horrendous drop, and Christian Watson went full defensive back to stop the tip ball interception. I don't know, it was just one of those plays that It doesn't show up on the box score, and it doesn't show up in a two-score win late on. People don't pay attention to it later, but it just told me a lot about the way that this offense is coached, about the way that they're always never giving up on plays, about we talked about it, the way the receiver's blocked downfield. It just said to me, this is an offense that isn't going to switch off. I don't know, I've not really been excited about the packers before tonight, and now I feel like even on the road in the playoffs, I'd fancy them to have a chance against even the best teams in the conference. So, yeah, I'm getting on the packers hype train a little bit.
Okay, so I don't think the packers have played to their potential. They haven't played many complete games. This was one of their best games of the season. But I have been excited to watch them because Love, he's a roller coaster. Now, this is Two straight games for him without an interception, and he had one in every game before this, so that's a positive sign. Their running game is so dynamic, so diverse, and it really didn't get going today. Josh Jacobs talked about it afterwards. He was held to 43 yards on the ground on 19 carries. Had the big reception that we'll mention in a minute. But Chris Brooks had some runs. Emmanuel Wilson had some runs. One of the biggest plays of the game, actually, I thought, was they trusted their running game enough to hand it off to Emmanuel Wilson, who's been great this year on a third and four outside the 20-yard line. I think the score was 7-3, and he runs that thing all the way inside the 10. They can run power, they can run duo, they can run zone. They can do it all. They're very cohesive. It's a good offensive line.
That brings me to my criticism of the Dolphins here. I got some more love for the packers, but you're not beating the allegations, Dolphins. This is it. This is the same thing. We just keep saying the same thing, and their fans are like, Well, it's not fair. It's not fair. This, that, and the other. It's just the same thing. It's not a narrative that they play worse late in the season or that they can't play in the cold. It's just the facts. Maybe they'll play better down the stretch here because they have a good schedule, and they certainly were playing well into this game, coming into this game. But their pass rush lost repeatedly tonight. Did not bother Jordan Love at all. Jordan Love struggled against pressure all season long. His numbers actually were pretty good. I checked next since that's 4 for 5 for 38 yards in a breakdown tonight. But the key number there is five. He was barely pressured at all. So that's showing a lack of toughness there. You can't run the ball. This was a Dolphins team that was able to run the ball, and they just can't. And the key sequence to me, Will, in the entire game is they're down two scores, 27, 11, and they get the ball down to the one-yard line after an eight-yard run to get it there.
They get stuffed on second down, and then McDaniel gives up on trying to run. They were inside the one-yard line, two straight plays. They run these crossers that they're known to run for, and the defense is absolutely ready for it, and their offensive line loses pretty quickly on both plays. Green Bay knew it was coming because this is a team that loves to run those plays on the goal line. This is the exact same thing that the 2022 and '23 Dolphins had trouble with. They couldn't run in short yardage in big situations. And that's got to be so frustrating as the snow is falling down that they're just living up to what everyone has said about them in the last couple of years.
Yeah, it was a bit of a weird second half from the packers defense in terms of that they softened up a lot in the middle of the field. But the shutdown drive just before that, and then the drive that you're talking about that went down to the one-yard line, The tour goes 11:00 or 12:00 over the course of those two drives. First one, eight plays, 70 yards. That second one, 12 plays, 77 yards. You're thinking, Oh, this is actually a bit of offense from the Dolphins. We're starting to see them. Jelen Waddle made a couple of catches. Tyric Hill finally They started warming into the game a little bit. Johnny Smith was by far the most targeted guy on the day. You got into that short-yarded situation, and they threatened on that play like a quarterback keeper with Alec Ingold running across the formation. I don't know whether it was the offensive line collapsing. I don't know if it was just the way that Green Bay read it. I thought it was a brilliant play from Quay Walker, who also had a big pressure on the third down as well. I thought it was one of the real bright spots of that Green Bay defense all day.
But you're right, it's It's been amazing this year to watch guys from that same tree. I think you've had the same problems with Shana Khan, the same problems with McVeigh. Just absolutely lose all creativity and lock up when they get in the red zone. I don't understand how they haven't developed this brilliant... Even if you just do something really simple there with two, like run a naked boot, try and open up one side of the field, have a couple of guys in the end zone who might get open, you've got more chance of completing it than just that bizarre mishmash clash of two or three different plays that they tried to run and just failed miserably and ended up with the sack. There was a little brief moment there. It was like 3:30 in the UK at that point. I'm like, Right, we've got a game on our hands. Let's go. Then they fail on that conversion. It's the normal time where I would turn the TV off, catch the highlights later.
Actually, I'm not going to apologize. We're having fun. Look, at this pace, this is going to be a long one. Look, I get it. Two of us playing great. I came into this game saying, Two Tatua is going to be on Cuby Island. He ended up throwing for 365 yards and two touch downs in this game. I say thank you to Tua as a representative for all his fantasy owners. You've been beautiful the last three weeks. Yeah, I'm keeping Kyler Murray on the bench for you, and you're coming through. It's not that he's playing poorly, but tonight, the running game, Mosterik goes 5 for 19, Echan goes seven for 14. They're one of the worst running teams in the league, and that is such a difference between the last couple of years and this year. Mike McDaniel, that's where he made his bones, and that's where I think the lack of talent on the offensive line comes through. For one of the first times all season, their pass protection, at least on a couple of key plays, didn't come through either. It wasn't terrible all night, but there was the play in the first half where Armstead didn't get out of his stance, and then Iqbari got a sack that was actually back-to-back plays with the sack, and they had just enough failures.
They have such little margin for error, Will. I think that's what gets me. I've been enjoying this Dolphins team. I wanted them to win this game, to maybe go on a run because they're five and seven now. They have to win out, basically, to have a chance. They have a schedule that you could win out against, but that's a tough ask at five and seven. I don't think they can do it. They have such a small margin for error. They don't really run the ball well, and they don't throw the ball vertically anymore. They're probably the best in the league He got everything else, at throwing the ball short, essentially. They are the best at the ball handling and the timing and all that, number one. But it's just hard to keep winning with no verticality and no running game. That's a tough combination.
Yeah, I'm really glad you mentioned the verticality because it's exactly like Devon Hachan had a great game in the receiving today, as much as they didn't run the ball well. He was 8 of 56 with the shutdown as well. I haven't got the ADOT on his targets yet, but I bet that it's about two yards because it was all checkdowns that he did something phenomenal on the back-end. They were well-designed, that it was the right choice of Tua to take the check-down. Check-down is this dirty word, but anyone who, like you and I, loves Philip Rivers as much as we do, know that check-down offense is a legitimate offense, and it can get you yardage, and it can win new games like it almost did for them today. But the big question that I saw all across social media, and I want to ask you about, is what's going on with Tyreek Hill? He had some inflated stats in the end in this game. He had the catch at the end of the third on the comeback, which he slips on it. So many times in the past, hundreds of times in the past, we've seen him on that catch, turn up field, break a tackle, make a guy miss, and take a six-yard gain for 25 yards.
As I was writing that down, in fact, he did have that big 24-yard gain as I was making that note, and I nearly deleted it. I thought, No, because it still highlights how- It was garbage time.
It was garbage time.
Exactly, as was his shutdown, garbage time. If you take out that final two drives of the game when they were already pretty much out of it. Toto had absolutely nothing to show for today. He is carrying this wrist injury. He says he's not going to have surgery till the offseason. Don't know how much that's affecting him, but I don't see any of the separation. I don't see any of the burst up field. I just like, all that stuff that made him really special just wasn't there today and hasn't been there enough this year.
I totally agree. That's been on my radar. They gave him a monster extension before the season. He is now How old is he? He's 30 years old. He'll turn 31 before next year. That's not a death sentence, but he's, I think, on the way down. I think it's safe to say his peak, which was an extended peak and was peaking last year through most of that year. Since about this time last year, through now, the production and the explosion just hasn't been quite as good. You pay him that much money. They're such a top-heavy team. Yeah, you want more than 650 yards through this point in the season, which he had in 80 of those. He had tonight where a lot of them were in garbage time. It's just been a little off. It's hard to get him and Waddle going at the same time. John Smith, speaking of fantasy, he goes 10 for 113. Those drives in the second half, that was the Dolphins team that I've seen. It's not like they were awful in the first half. It was more that Tua was 10 for 11 at one point or 8 for... I remember he had one completion, and the packers were driving to go up three scores.
It was like they had only had the ball a couple of times, and their defense let them down. That's part of the thing I've pushed back a little bit with Dolphins fans this year, too, is your team shouldn't collapse that hard when you lose your backup quarterback. That's on your coaching staff that everything fell apart that bad for now. But I'm doing the math roughly in my head. I believe they are now 4-4 in Tua games. You also can't tell me that they're some great team with Tua. They're literally 4-4. They were 1-1 when he got hurt because they were losing that game 31-10 in the middle of the third quarter. The last first couple of games when he came back against good teams, one three straight, and now this one. And so that just speaks to a team that's in the middle of the road. They probably should be six and six, not five and seven. But a team The Jets in the middle of the road probably isn't going to win the rest of their games. They have the Jets, they're at the Texans, they have the 49ers, who knows what they'll look like, and then they are at Cleveland and at the Jets.
The Texans are actually at home. Yeah, I actually would make the Dolphins slight favorites, at least in all those games. I think they're favorite in all those games. Sure, you could win them all, but the odds on doing it are pretty slim at this point.
Andrew Bryant, who I know is famed for being slightly favorable towards the packers, let's I'd say, but did tweet- It worked for them. It did tweet, pointing out that Tiger Kill is getting $26 million dollars this year. Jalen Waddle is getting $20 million dollars this year. The packers leading seven receivers are getting $8 million dollars between them. I know those guys are going to now be getting paid as we get towards the end of the season. There was so much talk for so long about them not taking a first-round receiver and just taking these mid-round guys, but it's showing out. It just shows that play design and coaching makes a huge difference. You're absolutely right, Mike McDaniels deserves more. I'm a football nerd. Of course, I love Mike McDaniels. All football nerds do. But him and the front office deserve a lot of stick for not making this team work without to, for not having a backup option for a guy who is so injury prone. This is a season where they could definitely be a playoff team based on everything they've got on their roster, and they're probably going to peter out and end up what, 8, 9, 10, somewhere around that point.
It's disappointing.
It They missed a lot of tackles tonight. The packers had 132 yards after missed tackles. The success rate for the packers on the ground actually managed to be 40%, which is fine, and the Dolphins were much, much lower. Again, you're not beating the allegations. You know who is? I don't know who has allegations for Josh Jacobs right now. Probably no one. Let's listen to the call of his big reception in the second half. On first and 10, Love under center. Two tight ends in the game, Melton in motion to the left.
Love takes, fakes the hand off to Jacob, steps up in the pocket, dums it off left side, and he's got Jacob still to the defender, 40, 45 on 10, but every 50 to the 45, 40, breaks a tackle, 35, 30, and taken down inside the 20-yard line.
My goodness. Josh Jacobs would not go down. That's a great call. It's just one of my favorite moves I've seen all season, the way he made Dotson. That was who it was, Fly. David Long was involved there, too. No, David Long got cut. What am I saying? I saw David Long earlier in the day on the Lions. That was just a sweet, sweet play by a packers team who came together at this time Last year, Will. I know they haven't been great all year, but they've been winning while being a little confusing. They're nine and three. In any other year, they'd be like, Hey, maybe we'll get the two seed. They got some work to do just to be the number two team in their own division. They're at Detroit Detroit next week on Thursday night. Jordan Rodriegue is going to do that recap with me. That is one of the games of the year so far, and they absolutely have the pieces to get better and play their best down the stretch. And they'll need to because they have some tough road games Mayans, Seahawks, and Vikings all on the road down the stretch.
I'm aware we're going super long on this game, but Josh Jacobs, unreal contact balance, sensational to break that tackle. And obviously, I saw what he did to the 49ers last week. In a season where we got Derrick Henry and Saquon Barkley, it's hard to look beyond those two as free agent runningbacks. When you consider how well he's done there, how well Aaron Jones has done over in Minnesota as well, the runningback's back, baby.
It is absolutely back, and he has been a huge part of that team. I can't wait to watch this team the rest of the way because I think Jordan Love is getting more and more confident. There's a couple of throws. He was under control today, but that throw he made when he was on the run to read, all it did was set a field goal to be shorter, to take a three-score lead in the fourth quarter and move the ball down to the four-yard line. But that is one of the best throws you will ever see, the arm strength he has while throwing on a total run and then read one hand. That's just like, Hey, our athletes are better than your athletes. The packers have some great athletes. They're not the only ones in that division. Let's go to Detroit, where, yes, the Lions were trying to get off a seven-game game losing streak on Thanksgiving. Surely they do it against the bears, right?
Williams with 10 seconds to go in the game.
Williams with seven. Williams with six takes the snap. This could be the final play of the game. Throws it deep downfield. It is under the brems and incomplete. That's it. That's it. That's it. What in the world were the bears thinking? This game is over.
You talk about the world of clock mismanagement.
The game is over. Dan Miller and Lovis Brown. Well said on WXYT. What are the bears thinking? Matt Iberfluce is the answer for Loemis Brown. The lions escape. That game was sitting there for the bears to steal at the very end. 23 to 20. Caleb Williams moving the ball down the field. If you were around a television at all today, you probably know the circumstances, but he was sacked, Will, with 32 seconds left. They had a timeout. They were in field goal range. Kyro Santos said after the game, I was ready to go kick it right there from 58 yards. That's in my range if I needed to. They not only never got any closer for a kick, they never kicked at all. They never used the time out. They all that time, and then Caleb throws it down the field. One of the worst end-of-game sequences you'll ever see.
My gosh. There's a really funny video that was tweeted out by Sean Hammond, the Bear's Beat Right at Half-Time, of Kairosantos out taking long field goals while Shibuzey was doing the halftime show, just out of camera shot. It's well worth going and looking at because it's very, very funny. But Kairosantos, when he meant he was ready, he meant he was ready to go. We get on to, we'll get on to the of it, but I do think it is worth teeing up slightly as we talk. We'll talk about William's performance overall in this game. On the first and 10 from the 25-yard line, he had DJ Moore streaking across the formation. If he throws that with even the tiniest modicum of anticipation, just gets that ball out a second earlier and ahead of his man, it's six points, and they've won this game of football, and none of this ever happens. Instead, he throws it into his feet, he throws it late, and then they get sacked by Cesare Smith on the next play, and We all know now what happens from that point onwards. I think Iba Flush deserves all of the stick that he's getting.
I totally get it. But what I've seen has been, I think, really interesting has been a lot of people saying, Right, I think they had two options. They either take the time out straight away, they get their heads clear, they get their best play to get the ball to the sideline and get it out of bounds, or to the middle of the field and spike it in time so they can go and take the field goal, right? Or they do what they did. They let the play run down, try and get the ball over the middle, and then take the time out. I don't know what the play was they decided to run was. It was absolutely bizarre going for it all. But I see a lot of people saying, Why isn't Iba Fluss calling the time out once it's clear that Caleb Williams is in his own head? He's getting to the line of scrimage at 13 seconds. He's not snapping the ball to 6 seconds. He's trying to read this defense, Payton Manning style. I'm just like, You can't have that middle ground. If he calls that time out with 10 seconds remaining, you're still left with a situation where you've got It still would be better.
You could just kick it. I mean, everyone would kill him there. I agree. That's a weird thing to criticize. You should have taken it with 10, 13 seconds left, something like that. There's a big blame pie here. Caleb Williams, he will be better in that situation in a couple of years, probably in a couple of weeks after going through that. He absolutely deserves a big part of that. He's out there changing the place. They actually lined up with about 16, 17 seconds left. I think, which it's crazy because then they don't snap it for another nine seconds. They sit there with over the ball for 10 seconds, which is absolutely crazy. He lost his mind in that moment, and it is tricky. But that's why you take the time out in the first place. I hope a listener reminds me of what I'm thinking of. There was a very subtle situation that was so similar in the last couple of weeks. If I didn't have my family here, I would have poured through and tried to figure it out. But it was a very similar situation where it happened in so many times in these late-game situations.
I believe that one was with maybe 40, 50 seconds left. But the coach immediately used the time out Because you just know after an unexpected sack like that where you backed up 10 yards, it is very difficult to get everything under control and know what you're supposed to do and know what play to call. You call a timeout right away because you know you have a rookie quarterback and you have 30 plus seconds there. And now you can't spike the ball after a throw over the middle. So that's why what Matt Iberfluss said after the game, in his mind, sounded correct. But let's actually listen to old Matty, maybe his last press conference as a bears coach, we'll see.
I like what we did there.
Again, once it's under seven, you're going to call time out there, or actually under twelve. And then really, you don't have an option because it's third to fourth.
You got to throw it into the end zone then.
To me, I think we handled it the right way. I do believe that he just re-wracked the play, get it in bounce, and call time out, and that's why we held it and didn't work out the way we wanted it to. He's so confident saying it, too. It's not intentional.
You say he's so confident saying it. It is full-blown gaslighting. He's trying to convince us by with this word salad that what he did was in any way right.
I think he believes it. I think he... I don't need to name names. He is a politician that believes everything he says, and that's why the lies work. I think he believes it. Now, what he might not intend to do because he tried to do the whole, I take full of responsibility I'm the coach. He did say that at some point. But saying that is not taking full responsibility because saying that is essentially saying Caleb Williams messed up. Because what he is saying is, I like what we did there. He's saying, Yeah, I thought we were going to get the play off with 20 something seconds left, and the operation wasn't going to be so slow, and that Caleb wasn't going to stand over the ball for 15 seconds. It all would have made sense to, quote, rerack the play, get it off with 17 seconds left or whatever it is, and execute well, but they didn't execute it well. So he's essentially, in my mind, saying the thought process was right. They just didn't do it right. That's how I read it.
Yeah. That's why I wanted to highlight that Caleb isn't completely without fault because I think he has gone blameless on social media, et cetera. But look, they've six losses in a row now, and four of those are the Hale Mary against Washington, the Packers block field goal, where Should they have gained more yardage before they took that field goal? The overtime lost to the Vikings, and then this one. And with all of them, the game management has been absolutely horrendous. And really, for two and a half years and 13 weeks into this season, the game management has been consistently bad under Eba Fluss. I used to bang this drum about being like, You need to have a coach who is just there to tell you what to do situationally, whose their whole job is to know clock management and to be on top of it. But a lot of teams actually do have that now, and they sit up in the booth and they do tell them what to do, and they still get it wrong despite having an expert who's literally in the building doing that.
Or have a coach that's pretty good at it. That's an option, too. A Dan Campbell, a John Harbaugh. Iberfluss was later asked in that press conference, asked if he expects to be the bear's head coach next week, which is a tough question. He just said, I'm going to keep grinding and show up. But the fact that those questions are being asked, it's just there's so many different stats. They're the first team in NFL history to go on a six-game losing streak without having multiple turnovers in any of those games. Just interesting. All Iberfluss talks about is, Don't turn the ball over, don't turn the ball over. And he's showing how you can lose. Keenan Allen said at one point, We did enough as players in that game. So that says it all. He also said he was totally surprised that that was the last play of the game. Everyone on the field thought, Oh, we must have more time. That couldn't be how the game ended. They didn't know. Then he said he looked up and saw that they still had a time out and said, Oh, yeah. Dj Morris said, We We keep coming back in these games, putting ourselves in position, and then we the bed.
Yeah, that's what they do. The worst record in one-score games, to your point, Will, since Iberflues took over, are the Chicago Fairs.
Yeah, shocking. Look, when you look at what they did overall in this game, it's a game that, based on the first half, they had no right to be in this game late on, right? Caleb goes five of 15 for just 34 yards in the first half. Second half comes out 14 of 20, 208 yards, three touch downs. Let's go. Did lead them down the field on that drive. Did look like they were going really positive. This was without much of a running game whatsoever. Deandre Swift had that third and one where he picked up 10 plus yards on that final drive. But prior to that, Caleb had the top three rushes on the team on the day. They just weren't moving the ball particularly well at all on the ground. The lines got a bit soft in that second half. Injuries, I think, really hurt them in a big way as well. There were some It's a really bizarre incidents throughout the game that we'll get into on both sides of the ball, I imagine. But this is a game that shouldn't have been there for the bears, and then very much was there for the bears, and they just feel like a team who don't know how to get out of their own way right now.
No. That game was such a one-sided game, and the lions didn't take advantage because they struggled in the red zone in the first half. At one point in the first half, the lions had 18 first downs and the bears He had nine plays. Now, from that point forward, the bears more or less dominated. I'm not going to say I'm concerned if I was a lions fan, but the bears came back in that game. There were a couple of moments in the second half, Campbell not going for it on fourth and two at about his own 40 to kick it back to the bears that last time. They blinked there where I was like, Oh, that's a little surprising that Dan Campbell is not being aggressive in this moment, the way that they're defense was playing. The way their defense was playing was in large part because of the injuries in this game. Let's go through them. Josh Paschal, their starting edge. They've had so many edge injuries, out with a knee injury. Malcolm Rodriguez left the game. Mekai Wingo, one of their defensive linemen, left the game. Dj Reader and Zedaria Smith both left the game but returned.
Reader actually got a quarterback hit Will on that play where Caleb Williams threw it at DJ Moore's feet. He probably should have made that play, but it was a big play by DJ Reader on that play to get a Qby hit and at least bother Caleb Williams. So he returned. Levi O'Nuzarke, who's been great for them in the middle with Aline McNeill, hurt his ham string in this game. So that is a number of key defensive linemen. It's been just a cascade of injuries at one position, and You could see Caleb Williams getting more comfortable as the game went on and having a lot of time and picking on some mismatches. You got Kendall Vildor out there. They didn't have Carlton Davis and Keenan Allen and DJ Moore. Those were mismatched matches on the outside. You think ahead to next week with packers, lions. If they can't get healthy, they could be in trouble on defense.
Yeah. It's a defense that Aaron Glenn has managed to both scheme up and coach up to do brilliant things without Aiden Hutchinson and without some of their best players. You mentioned missing key piece in that secondary today. Nextgen stats had a tweet that Zadaria Smith, Alkadi Mohamed, and DJ Reader all had seven plus pressures in this game, which means- But they still got after. Yeah. Caleb was pressured on 17 dropbacks without them blitzing, which is the most in the Dan Campbell era. The idea was you lose Aiden Hutchinson, you're going to struggle, right? But Zadaria Smith comes in and they decide not to line him up as the just a replacement for Aiden Hutchinson, which I think wouldn't have worked, but they've got him playing up the middle. He had that brilliant spin move on the inside to force Caleb outside on the pocket on the second drive to He lost the three and out. Got the sack at the end of the game, which obviously caused such huge issues. I thought he was absolutely sensational in this game despite the fact that he's going against a pretty bad offensive line. The The against defense keeps finding ways to win despite everything.
And yet in this second half, there was enough concern from me that goes, if they were playing a really good, organized football team who were well-coached and knew what they were doing, this would be a dropped game for them. And I suspect that the packers are exactly that team next week.
Yeah, it's tough to know what to make of it because, like I said, in the first quarter, it was 145 yards to five, but they kept bogging down in the red zone. They were throwing a lot in the red zone instead of running. And then Jamir Gibbs had that fumble as they were going in up 16, nothing, I believe, at the time, at the end of the second quarter. And that fumble gave the bears a little life where they would have been out of it if they had gone in there 23-nothing at halftime. Instead, Gibbs fumbles, and it was a low possession game. I was thinking, wow, the Lion's offense really struggled in the second half, but they really didn't. They had a countdown drive. And then in the fourth quarter, they did punt two different times, it was a four and out. They missed a field goal on a short field where they had stopped the bears, and Jake Bates could have put it away. Then they had that three and out that I mentioned where Goff didn't even get to make a throw. They just ran it three straight times. They got stuffed on third and two and got backed up a half a yard.
Dan Campbell, at that moment, it's about three and a half minutes left, and I'm thinking, I know you don't want to give him good field position, but I trust your offense more right now than your defense. And he decided to punt it It was almost like, hey, offensive line, you just gave up a yard. You haven't earned the right to go for this fourth down. And so he's always been good knowing his team. He punted it away. And at that point, I thought, wow, I think the bears are going to win this game, which probably not a lot of bears fans were thinking. They're too jaded after all these years to actually think something good was going to happen. Because I really thought the way Caleb was moving the ball at that point in the game, they scored the countdown on a nice drive right after halftime, and then a couple more touch downs before that last drive. I thought they were going to go down the field and win this damn thing, which would have been quite a story. But instead, the lions get to 11 and one, and the bears get to 4 and 8.
Who knows if the bears change coaches? I know there's a lot of focus on the bears, and they're not even the relevant team. It doesn't matter if they change coaches this week. They're going to change coaches at the end of the season. That's what matters.
Yeah, I do wonder how much concern there is for... I know you said they didn't play poorly in the second half, the lions' offense, but it did seem weird. They went away from the run as much as they Jamia Gibbs had nearly 12 yards per rush in the first half. They had 144 yards on the ground in that first half. Then what I think he only had four rushing yards in the second half, Gibbs. I know they've got the one-two punch with Montgomery, and he saw a lot of the ball, but it just felt like that got completely shut down, that part of the game. Monrass Saint-Browning gets two targets in the second half. Jamieson-williams only gets one target, which was on that catch where he had that ridiculous hurdle, which it's amazing. That's not a play we end up talking more about because it's the thing that if it happened at week one of the season, we're going, Oh, my God, that's some of the greatest athleticism we've ever seen.
I've never seen a hurdle like that because it wasn't like a jump up hurdle. It was a sprinting 4-4, 4-3 His speed hurdle. Straightforward. That was incredible.
Like a full-blown just hurdle, like a hurdler hurtling. It was insane. I did actually on the Jameson-William thing, I wanted to know your thoughts on him throwing the ball into Tye Rick Stevenson's face and getting flagged for it. The reason that I wanted to bring it up wasn't so much the decision itself, because Jamey Williams feels like a guy that has that in his locker, like he's got a bit of that to his background and stuff. But it was the moment they showed on the sideline when Antoine Randallel was absolutely just reeming him out like a dad telling off his teenager who's coming 2 hours after his curfew and clearly stinks of cheap whiskey. He's just absolutely... James Williams is desperately pleading his case, and he's basically saying, No, that was stupid. What are you doing? I think it was a real good players as coach moments. We've talked about that a lot this year with Evan O'Neill and Dabiko Ryans and guys like that. But yeah, I love to watch the hands on Randall L just give him two barrels. It was really good fun.
I just love all the old friends he has on the sideline. I'm old enough to remember Aaron Glenn as a player. We got Deuce Daley over there. We got Randall L. It's a fun staff to just watch. Sometimes You just got to survive games like this. The bears have given them a lot of troubles, not just beating them on Thanksgiving, but generally, they've shut down the Ben Johnson offense under Ibraflus. I was trying to think, what do they do well? Now, They're a really good situational defense. They've been great in the red zone all year, and they're pretty good on third downs. I checked the next-gen stats. They only give up 5.4 yards per attempt on play action today, and Goff had a lot of play action. They only gave up 5.6 yards per attempt on in-breakers to Goff. I think the broadcast talked a little bit about just they really flood the middle of the field. They're good in the red zone. They managed to take away the middle of the field. I think teams could at least look at what Chicago has done over the years to Detroit and try to gummy it up.
Maybe it's just a matchup issue that's difficult for Detroit, but you give Eber Fluss some credit there because I did not think they would be able to hang defensively in this game. They really haven't been a good defense overall this year. They're not a good run defense. They weren't today, but the lines didn't really have many running attempts in the second half, and they're not a good pass rush. They weren't for most of today. Play either, and they managed to survive. There's something. But that's the Matt Iver-Fluce defense of the things they do well does not make up nearly enough for all the shortcomings.
I wrote down on first half red zone struggles. Kyla Gordon should have picked Jared Goff off on that opening drive. A little bit of turnover luck for him there, but I wrote exactly that. They did a really good job of flooding the middle of the field, taking away those in breakers, stopping them from doing what they do so brilliantly. Actually, Juvon Dexter had that brilliant sack on the third possession, but also had some really good stops early on. They did. They seemed to turn it on in the red zone. I was trying to figure out, watching it back, was it lion struggles and play calling in the red zone? But I thought they were good plays there, and I thought they were decent execution. I just thought the bears tightened up really well when he got into that area. The lions did try and throw a shutdown with Kennei's call, which was one of... When that happened so early in the night, I was ready for one of the greatest Thanksgiving's of all time. I'm like, If this is happening in the first quarter of the first game, we are in for a barnstormer this evening because I'm just obsessed with Ben Johnson.
I'm obsessed with that play call. It was unbelievable.
It got a standing ovation. A three-yard sack has never been cheered louder from the home crowd than that play. I don't know if they were cheering just because of the huevos on Ben Johnson, to call it, or the fact that Panay Sewell, you can look in the box score and see that he got sacked. Now, yes, he's given up fewer sacks, zero than sacks he's taken this year, one. Maybe they were just cheering because four different bears defenders tried to bring him down and none even got him close. His knees didn't buckle. The momentum took him over to the sideline, and the play then ended, but no one was getting that big boy down. I'm a little disappointed, A, that he didn't complete a pass in that play, and then B, the second half went as it did. Because my Panay Sewell for Offensive Player of the Year agenda was everything in the first half of that game. I was like, This thing actually might take off. He is a star of this game right I don't think it's crazy to put him up there almost as a representative, but also because he's Panay Sewell as a potential award winner this year on the best offense, the best team in the league.
But then it quieted down a little, and it made me sour.
Your friend and mine, Ollie Connolly, did a really good piece about Penne Soul this past week for the Guardian, and runs targeted behind Soul this season, over 50% of them, 52.5% go for a first down or a countdown. That's more Basically, it's the most successful play in the NFL. It's just run behind Penne Soul. You mentioned my 49ers fan earlier on. It's reminded me a lot of Trent Williams' season last season, where when Penne Soul isn't in the lineup, they don't look anything like the same offense at all. They just do so much with him and so much behind him. I love the idea that we're under the lights. It's Thanksgiving. We haven't won on Thanksgiving in, what is it, eight, nine years now, and we're going to try and throw a countdown with our best lineman. I It was so on board with it. It's a shame it didn't work, but I love the crowd reaction.
How are the bears ready for that? I guess the players just read that it was a pass play and didn't look up or something because everyone was well-covered on that play. There was nowhere good job, quarterbacking by Panay Soul holding onto that ball. What a season for the Lions, ending that Thanksgiving streak. Who cares if it was close and you have some concerns I know these are champagne problems. The injuries are the issue, but you are 11 and 1. You won on Thanksgiving, and now you got two big games coming up, packers and bills coming into Detroit. For season ticket holders in Detroit to have Thanksgiving against the bears, then packers, and then Bills, as you are unanimously the number one team in everyone's power rankings, the number one team in the NFC, what What a time it is to be a Detroit Lion's fan. Let's take a break. Let's get to a game everyone's excited about, Cowboys, Giants. We'll talk a little bit about our Thanksgiving. It's going to be great. But before we do that, let's listen to Dan Campbell talk about the Lions and their mindset with all the injuries that they have.
We're back right after this. Let me ask you this, does it really matter? Who cares? That's what I go back to, man. It doesn't matter. Like, either it is or it isn't. We get a guy back, we don't get a guy back. Worrying about it and moaning about it and bitching about it, it's like calls, right? It's like the call. It's like Vildor. I could sit there and throw a fit about it. What does it matter? It's called, it's done. So I know this, whoever we have available, we're going to get them ready to play, and we expect them to hold the line, period. Giants are out at the 41st and 10 after the kickoff return. Lock with play action. Screen, tipped up in the air and intercepted by Obersoul. One and right to the goal line. Touchdown over show. Oh, what an athletic play that is. Brad Sam, KRLD. Like having Brad back on the show the last couple of weeks. Demarvian Overshon with an incredibly athletic play, not just tipping the ball up to himself and then running under it beautifully, but coming off a pretty vicious block on the running back even before tipping the ball.
That was awesome. Cowboys defense gets it done. Make Drew Lock look bad. Turnovers galore for the Giants. The Cowboys hold on for a 27 to 20 victory, their second straight win to They get to five and seven. The Giants, they got a pretty good chance here to get the number one overall pick in this draft. They are at two and ten. And well, they found a team in the Giants, Dallas did, that they could push around a little bit. That had to feel good. The offensive line for the Cowboys, I thought, played pretty well. They could run the ball. They protected Rush enough. Then defensively, Micah Parsons and Overshown, and that front got after Drew Locke.
Yeah, Micah Parsons against Evan Neill might be the biggest mismatch we see in the NFL all season. It felt like abusive by the end of that game. I was just, rotate them out. Just what swing tackles have you got? Just anyone. Just please, please just put him out of his misery at this point. I thought they were much better in the trenches on both sides of the ball over the last two weeks than they have been. There was a standout defensive performance, but Rico Doudal's first career, 100-yard rushing game. I still felt that Mike McCarthy made some weird play calls. There was a point where Rico Doudal had an 18-yard pickup when they were up two scores and could go and kill the game off. Then he ran three consecutive passes for Cooper Rush, and you're just thinking, it's all working. The Giants are giving it up to you. Why are you just not absolutely running the ball down their throat in this situation? I totally get targeting Adori Jackson. That makes complete sense to me. But outside of that, It didn't quite feel like it completely clicked on that side of the ball, but it felt like they're getting enough out of Cooper Rush and a really good defensive performance.
The Cowboys aren't back, but at least they've got something to enjoy as the season starts to reach its- No, they're going to win in just enough games to ruin their draft pick and all that.
Hey, Michael Parsons was a late pick. Zack Martin was a late pick. Who was their center back in the day? Travis Frederick. I mean, they've had plenty of good late picks, so they can make their picks, and they'd much rather win on Thanksgiving, especially after the first five games that they had at home, which rivaled any team in NFL history in terms of point differential. That's how bad the Cowboys were at home. Daudo goes for 112. He gets 44 rushing yards, over expected. And Cooper Rush, not a great or pretty thrower of the football, but he has gotten a little better each week this season that he's played. He ends up with 195 yards, 21 One for 36. But there were a lot of drops. Ceedee Lamb had three drops on the game and then left with an injury, only two catches. And one thing Cooper Rush does a lot better than Drew Locke, who got the start over Tommy DeVito because DeVito was injured, he avoids sacks. The pressure rate for the Giants was actually 24%, which is low, but it's not comically low. And they did not get any sacks on Cooper Rush, whereas the pressure rate on Drew Locke was 44%, and a lot of them were quick in his defense.
But six sacs, one and a half from Micah, like Carl Lawson was in there, O'Diggy Zua was getting in the mix, and he was full lock in. A couple of fun runs in there, but a fumble on one of those runs in interception. Yeah, man, this giant season just can't end fast enough.
Yeah, he was by far their leading rusher on the night. But you look at They only orchestrated two plays of 20 yards or more in the whole game, and they were both drew lock scrambles. This is just not... It's not working. It's not difficult to look beyond that. At half, he was eight of 17 for 55 yards. Actually, of his 178 total, 68 of them came on that garbage time, TD drive right at the end, where they were just giving him 18-yard pickup after 13-yard pickup after just letting him move on the field. Although it wasn't quite garbage time.
I always struggle with what is garbage time, what isn't. They had a chance to win that game there. They kicked it off to the Cowboys and made the Cowboys get a first down. If the Cowboys went three and out, which is a very normal thing for 2024 Cowboys to do, they would have to punt it to the Giants with a chance to win the game. Just saying.
Don't you feel like the defense then actually goes, Oh, we should start playing again now? Right.
That's why why did defenses do that? I don't get that. I I appreciated actually the packers after not playing well for most of the second half tonight, got very aggressive actually during Miami's deep garbage time drive and just didn't let them move the ball at all. I was like, Yes, that's how it should be. Just do that.
Giants fans are going to absolutely hate that. I'm going to point this out, but I'm going to anyway. The money they saved from Saquon Barkley, they spent on Devon Singletary and Drew Lock. You can draw the direct line because of how they paid all their contracts They literally freed up $5 million, and they went and spent it on a backup quarterback, and that's what they got out of it.
Or they spent twice as much money on Brian Burns is another way to look at it. Brian Burns has been fine. He's been about what you would expect Brian Burns to be, but it's not changing their life.
Yeah. Look, the De Mareno-Riva-Shon play is a freak moment, an unbelievable just piece of athleticism, one of the best plays we'll see all season, it'll be on highlights all year round. So you can't necessarily throw that back in their face. But other than that, they just didn't put anything together on offense at all. And I think it did highlight that Cowboys defense, eight takeaways in their last five games now. Overshawn, he actually recovered the fumble from the Eric Kendrix on the Tyron Tracy fumble as well. So what a game for him and what an emergence he's had. And it's why I keep going back to the fact that Both of these teams, well, are they actually? I was going to say both these teams are going to be having a reset this offseason, but suddenly this past week with back-to-back wins, with some murmurings from Gerry Jones on local radio, with suddenly people writing think pieces about it. Or suddenly, it might be that Mike McCarthy's staying in Dallas.
I don't buy that.
I can't buy that. I can't buy it anymore.
I guess they'd have to keep winning. Now, they're five and seven. They have the Bengals at Panthers, home for Bucks at Philly, home for Washington. I mean, if they win two of those games, that would be outstanding. Even that would only get them to seven and 10. It's more likely they win about one of those games. Tom braided is with you. Tom braided spent about three minutes at one point talking about that Mike McCarthy is one of the greatest coaches in the NFL. I'm less high on Tom braided than you are. He always seems a little angry. It's not just because of those quarterbacks. I think he wants to be good, and he's frustrated. He's not good. He's trying to have a good time. Maybe he's just not comfortable, and I think he will be more comfortable in the future because I do think he wants to be good, and that's it. But I even... Man, we're picking on him. They came back from break, and Kevin Burkart was saying, Happy Thanksgiving to everyone. I saw braided just mouth, Happy Thanksgiving. But it wasn't his turn to speak, so he actually didn't say it, but it's just little moments like that.
The Paul, Kevin Bergham, to go from last year watching Greg Olson tear that to duck and apart with his bare hands like he was an animal. That was great. To this year, and shout out to Ollie Hunter for this line on Twitter. But going to Tom braided looking like it's the first time he's eaten human food.
I know. And then he tried to do like, Hey, what would a cool, tough guy do in this scenario? And then went hard at it.
It was a little weird. He was He was astonished at how good meat tasted. It's the first time he's had it in 25 years. It was one of the weirdest moments. I am higher on braided than you overall. I think he has improved over the season. When they give him a chance to be a football nerd, I really enjoy it. I like his anger. I think I liked his anger in this game, but actually, the bit of anger I liked wasn't about the quarterback play going on the field. Actually, him going quite hard after Daniel Jones in the build-up, basically saying that by requesting a release, that's him giving up on the team who have invested so much in him. I don't agree with him, but at least it was a bit of honesty and a bit of forthrightness from braided. I'd rather interesting opinions I disagree with than Jason Garret. I agree with that.
That's a good take. I don't agree with it really either, but I hadn't heard that, and that's more compelling. He isn't afraid to be critical, which I'll give him credit for that. It's more just broadcasters, they need to be a good hang, right, on some level, unless they're really teaching you a lot. I don't feel like he's a good hang yet, but maybe I got there.
It's funny because obviously, coming from a radio background, We're broadcasting cricket right now, which is a little bit like baseball, this insanely long sport where you're just hearing the same 2, 3, 4 voices for what can be 8 hours at a time. It needs to be driven by interesting people. Actually, even It's like the NFL in this country, when you compare it to our football, soccer, if somebody comes and listens to a talk sport broadcast of one of the London games or Germany or the Super Bowl, and they listen, we have their company for 4 hours. If you are very straight down the line or if you are boring, then or you don't say anything interesting- That's why you need to get Will Gavin on the mic. The thing is, it's not the reason- Throw in a little Nat Cooms. Wonderful. I'm glad he got a mention because he would have been angry if he hadn't. It's not going to be the reason you turn off because you've tuned in for the game, not for the individuals necessarily. But it does elevate it when you do get a Kevin Harland or a Kevin Burkert or somebody's really good.
It does make a huge difference to your enjoyment of a bad game.
Yeah, this was a tough one because the Giants and Cowboys are great draws in the US, and I'm sure a lot of people will watch this game. This is traditionally the most watched game of the year, actually, the Cowboys' Thanksgiving game of any football game all season long. But over there, it's like, I don't know if the Cowboys and the Giants are as big of a draw. I didn't feel good that this is the product that they were given out there for everyone. Although the Fox, I did like they had the Cowboys and the Saints in their In the Hunt playoff graphic. They're small victories. I was like, Wow, okay. They're still in the Hunt, five and seven. Let's put them in there. Saints are in the hunt.
If they're not mathematically out of it, you have to call them In the Hunt.
Nobody's mathematically out of it. I don't think even the Giants are mathematically out of it. This would have to do it, you would think. Going into this week, they weren't. Maybe some other games to eliminate them. Just some other really small things in this game. Malik Nabors, very Meleke Neighbors game. A couple of bad plays. He's had some mental errors this year, but three really tough grabs in this game, different types of ones, one on the sideline, one with a diving catch, one on a ball behind him. I mean, he is just a beautiful catcher of the football. The offensive line for the Giants just made that offense unplayable, but he's awesome. And then Jonathan Mingo. It's not going to happen, I don't think, but they're just like a hope ball after hope ball to Jonathan Mingo. And then welcome back, Brandon Cooke. He actually made a big difference. He made an outstanding catch on that third down with about under two minutes to go to put the game away. If Cooper Rush doesn't make a pretty good throw there and Cooke doesn't make that catch, the Giants get the ball back with a chance to win.
I have no faith the Giants would have gone down the field and actually scored. But that play coming out of the two-minute warning. Welcome back, Brandon Cooke. He had three catches for 16 yards on seven targets. Mingo, by the way, two yards on four targets. There's your Cowboys. How was your Thanksgiving? Did you work the whole time, Will?
Yeah. Normally, we try and do a bunch of us will get together at a bar in central London or something. A lot of the American-themed bars will do a big roast dinner and put a turkey on and they'll put pumpkin pie on or something like that. You can get a little sense of americana on the day. But actually today, I knew I was coming on, so I was professional and I stayed at home and I made notes and I watched the games. Definitely nothing to do with recently becoming a dad and having to help out with feeds or anything.
It was very much me. I thought you were up working on Talksport till 5:00 in the morning. My first thought was, Well, who do I ask to work on Thanksgiving? How about someone that doesn't technically celebrate Thanksgiving? Then I thought, But that's making them stay up till 5:00 in the morning, which is almost torture. Will Gavin, that's the man for it.
I did do a few updates on Talksport, so I did do a little bit of I had a bit of a side hustle, but the point is, Greg, that you were the main reason I'm still awake and it's 5:00 to 6:00 in the morning. So just know that.
I appreciate it. Let's get Eric on here. My Thanksgiving, we picked up from an amazing barbecue place, Maple Block. I highly recommend it if you're in the Culver City or Los Angeles area. They smoked that turkey. Smoked turkey is the way to go. It was so tender. It was delicious. My lovely wife Emeka made some stuffing, made some cornbread, made dessert. We had some sides, but it doesn't hurt to order the sides. I mean, to order the turkey, it's fine. If you don't have all the time in the world. My parents were over, my friend Anthony was over who I do the Jesselnick and Rosenthal Vanity Project, JRVP, with an everyone should check out his- Such a humble brag, my friend Anthony. I'm just saying he was over.
I can't turn on my TV right now without his face showing up and being like, Go on Netflix, watch Anthony Jesselnick's special. Eventually, I'll have to do it.
This was a long-winded way to say, Yeah, go check out his new special. I looked and they had the Netflix top 10 or whatever, and my guy is right there, number three. People are sick of watching two and a half hour long movies. It's a nice 53 minute special, and it is absolutely hilarious. It was a great Thanksgiving.
I'm going to go and see if he's top 10 in the UK.
Okay, let's come down. Then Eric I think it was there, right? Your first Thanksgiving with the baby, you went over to your mom's. How was it, the first Thanksgiving? It was great. Lots of people around to hold the baby, so we're not on full baby duty. But once we got home, it was very much, Hey, I have not napped today. It all caught up to us once we got home, and there was nobody else to just, Hey, be an aunt, be a grandma, be an uncle, hold the baby for us. It was just, Hey, dude, I am pissed and tired, and But no, he's sleeping now, so that's always good. That's always great when you bring me on and there's no baby crying in the background. Oh, yeah. I should have thought about that, too. That didn't even cross me. That's great. I don't even know. How deep is the Roberts family going here? I'm always fascinated by people's family. I come from a very small All family, not just our size, because we are quite diminutive. Older brother, younger sister, one nephew, nine and seven. So not a huge crew over there. Yeah. Well, that's good.
I'm glad that we were all able to do it. We all be able to manage it. Brought my parents back. They're staying out of place a couple of bucks away. Then headed back here to talk to you, Will, and to work with you, Eric. We'll end this thing because it's longer than I expected, and Eric's got to go edit out I swear at some point.
I need you to know that Anthony Jesselnick is in the top 10 on UK Netflix.
Let's go.
He's at 10, but it's still top 10.
You didn't need to do that. You didn't need to do that. No, but that's still strong. In the UK, that's strong. He had a nice show in London. If you just give it the first 10 to 50 minutes. If you don't like that part, I don't know what's wrong with you. It's pretty hilarious, but you probably won't like the rest either. All right, that is it for our show. We are back on Friday. Special guest with Cynthia Freeland and I. It might be someone who is at my Thanksgiving dinner table today, who I also played tennis with. And thank you, Will. Again, thank you, Eric. Yeah, the season starts at Thanksgiving, right? So I guess it's official. Like, football is back. It's over.
Gregg Rosenthal is joined by Will Gavin of talkSport to break down all of the Thanksgiving action from around the NFL. 00:00 ...