Transcript of NBA One Guy (the West!), an Eagles Mess, MLB and WNBA Playoffs, a Mini-Mailbag and Ringer 107 Picks | With Rob Mahoney, Tom Pelissero, and Joe House New

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Today's episode of the Bill Simmons Podcast, brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network, where I put up a new episode of the Rewatchables on Monday. We did Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Yeah, and we have another horror movie coming on, uh, Monday. We did Friday the 13th, the original, the first one, um, because we've not done a Friday the 13th yet, so we figured we had to do the first one to set up the ones we really want to do, which is Part 4 and Jason Goes to Manhattan, which is one of the funniest movies of the 1980s. So you can go check all those out. You can check out a couple of our new podcasts, including Jesselneck Book Club and What Chaos, our NHL podcast. Crazy NHL season already, a lot of stuff going on. Uh, Brian Curtis launched a new newsletter this week as well, um, his version of The Press Box in print. It's called Now They Tell Us. He's written 2 pieces this week. They're both fantastic. Um, that's what we got going here at The Ringer. I have a really, really, really stacked podcast. It's about as good as I can do.

First off, we have Rob Mahoney because I had to play NBA one guy for the West, and we talked about 15 players in the West. Went right to Tom Pelissero. He gave us the 6-pack of NFL information and all kinds of storylines going on right now. And then last but not least, House and I talked about the MLB playoffs. I forced him to talk about WNBA again. It was actually pretty fun. And then we did Ringer 107 picks and we also did mailbag. Yeah, that's why this podcast is almost 3 hours long. It's all coming up next. We're gonna take a break, Pearl Jam, and then Rob Mahoney. This is the Bill Simmons Podcast presented by FanDuel. Make every NFL week more rewarding with FanDuel. Rewards Club. You heard me. Just bet like you normally would, earn points on eligible settled bets, win or lose. Keep collecting points, level up, and unlock bigger rewards. So keep an eye on your Rewards Club progress and see what you can unlock. This is your most rewarding season ever, and it's with FanDuel. 21+ select states or 18+ DC or Wyoming. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER, call 888-789-7777, or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut.

Rob Mahoney's here taping on a Thursday. We are less than a week away from the 2026-27 NBA season. Are you ready emotionally? Where, where are you standing these days?

I hope so. I'm, I'm ready intellectually. I'm ready philosophically. I think the emotions— look, we're going to be riding high coming into opening night, but I hope I can get there by then.

I didn't think I was ready, and it felt really soon because football feels like it started a little late this year. Baseball playoffs are going. WNBA playoffs have been fun. Yeah, I have a college football team. And then 3 things happened. One was I saw a 2-minute montage of Darren Peterson just cooking in some preseason game and making all these different shots in the half-court offense that felt— looked like he was 28 years old. And I was like, oh, okay. So that happened. Then there was a 2-and-a-half-minute montage of Darius Akuff using Domantas Sabonis' picks and either faking like he was going to use the pick or not.

Yeah.

And getting all of these good shots. Did you see this montage?

I did not see that montage. Should I make time for it? Is that—

Your priority?

Time for it. I was delighted and excited about it. And he looked like the guy that I thought he might be in college. That was the second thing. And then the third thing was we're still less than 3 weeks away from the season and we've already had a Philadelphia controversy. about whether or not Joel Embiid was late for practice. Yes. Involving Mike Breen having to basically recant something that he said. And, and then Nick Nurse seemed like he was kind of admitting it was true. I'm all in. I can't wait for the Philadelphia roller coaster.

Rob, should we get the Believe Mike Breen shirts printed up? What do you think? How do we want to stoke this?

I'm trying to think, are there 5 more honest Americans than Mike Breen? That's the thing. You would just trust with all information at all times.

Our nation turns its only eyes to Mike Breen on many occasions, and I would trust him with my life. I am shocked that that's the list, though. I thought you were going to say you saw Digger and you were just going through, like, a what does it all mean kind of phase.

No. Have you seen Digger?

I have not, but that's the impression I've been left with from everyone who has.

Van Lathan saw it and talked about it on my pod on Tuesday and was doing the Van Zag. So I didn't know how much of it was true and not true, but really did like it. And then got a text from Wesley Morris saying— to me and Van saying, so glad somebody is defending Digger. I'm so glad these movies exist. So I already feel like the Zag is in full zoom. So I got to decide where I'm going to land on that. I'm really not sure yet.

In a world where the zags are already zagging, like, do you now zig? What is your move?

Is there a zog? There might be a third. There might— we might have to create a new one. What's the biggest NBA zag this season before we get into our little gimmick that we have?

Well, how do you mean?

What is the thing where the consensus seems to be going one way and you're just looking at it going, I really want to go the other way on this? Do you have one yet?

I'm trying to— I'm trying to figure out where the consensus is. 'Cause the West does feel a little cut and dry up top, but I feel like it probably will be a little cut and dry up top. And so I feel like if there's a place to zag, it's gonna be in the East. I'm inclined to say the Pacers. I'm inclined to say I, I see the Pacers consistently underrated in terms of over-unders, in terms of place in the Eastern Conference pecking order. I would make this pick, but I would be very surprised by the end of this year if they're not one of the best teams in the conference.

See, I thought you were gonna zag on that because it feels like the zag is already a lot of people going how much they like the Pacers-wise. That's true. And this to win teams.

But you asked me for a zag and not a zog.

Well, maybe the zog is actually the Pacers are gonna have a lot of trouble this year because Haliburton. But I'm with you. I, I'm with you on the Pacers. I think there's— I like the zog we just came up with 2 minutes ago. I think there's a really interesting zog with the Orlando Magic.

Okay.

Because I think even in the preseason, they've been running actual plays and offense that has delighted basically everybody. Like, wow, you're, you're using your players in a way where they complement each other and don't just stand around. And now there's a lot of Sean Sweeney. This is what they needed. There's some Coach of the Year buzz with him now. So we should learn with Orlando to never trust Orlando at all times. Should be the move. So Tuesday, I had your group chat co-host Kyle Mann on, and we played a game of NBA One Guy for the East.

Okay.

And I made him the same offer that I made you. I said, I made a list. I want to talk about one guy from each team that I'm fascinated by for some way. Do you want to see the list or not? Rob Mahoney said, no, no, I'm a professional. I've been potting for years and years. I don't need to see your list. I'm ready to, ready to bounce off whatever you have. So we're going in alphabetical order in the West, and the first team is Dallas. And my one guy is Kyrie Irving, who turns 35 years old in March. Rob, does that make you feel old or young?

It makes me feel quite old, but I suspect his knees feel a little older than I do.

Well, he's 39.5 this year, player option for 42.4 next year. Year 15. He has missed 305 games since the 2020 season, including all of last year. He's played 61+ games twice since 2015. And yet these stats are last 10 seasons, he's 26 and 6, almost a 50-40-90 guy. I don't know what team he's going to be on. I don't know what's left. I don't know how many games we should expect from him. If there is a team to trade for him, I don't know who it is. I don't know why Dallas wouldn't keep him. I don't know what Dallas's game plan is. I just have all questions and no answers with Kyrie Irving.

Yeah.

Do you have any answers at all?

I think the best thing we have, or the closest thing we have to an answer, is that he's gonna be really good. Like, I fully expect coming off of the ACL, Kyrie has the game, has the mechanics, has the, like, the efficiency of movement to come off of an injury like that, even at that age, and be a really formidable scorer as we would expect. But again, like where he ends up, I'm with you that a lot of teams could talk themselves into it. And so forecasting Kyrie season is basically impossible. I do think it will serve the Mavericks to trade him though, and will probably serve Kyrie to move on despite the fact that he's done very well there. It seems like his relationship with the franchise has been pretty strong overall for most of that time.

Yeah.

You know, barring a Luka trade here or there. And so, but he's so useful in so many contexts. And like, if you're a contender that's even close to the borderline, and these are 2 conferences where The East is gonna be so dense in the middle, and the second tier in the West is gonna be so competitive. I think one of those teams should absolutely talk themselves into trading for Kyrie.

Yeah, I mean, he signed up for Luka and Nico Harrison and Jason Kidd and contending and trying to rebuild his career and his life, which he did. And I, I think he, he's the last 2 years or so, he's been as normal as he's been since his early years in Cleveland.

Yeah.

I think teams would not be afraid to trade for him. I just don't know what the team— I wrote down Houston question mark, Toronto question mark, Denver question mark, Golden State 3 question marks. 'Cause Golden State, I think, is in that move where it's like, can we just get one more guy who can do basically anything? Who is it? Where is that person? How do we find them? And I do think now that Curry's locked in, they'll be rolling the dice. But yeah, I, I mean, the problem with Kyrie, there's some other guys in the league that are like this too. You basically are hoping he's healthy April, May, June, or there's no reason to trade for him.

Yeah.

'Cause he's gonna play 50 to 60 games. That's just who he is. He's another guy like Embiid who it's almost better if he's once a week or if he's used like some WWE uses some wrestlers where they're like, he only wrestles pay-per-views. And is it better to have Kyrie like that? I don't know. And I don't know whether he wants to stay or go. He's been pretty, pretty elusive about— he seems like he wouldn't be opposed to it, but he hasn't come out and said, I'd like to go.

he's had that like politician polish when he's been asked.

Yeah.

You know, like a little too rehearsed, a little too like buttoned up in terms of his responses about his place with the organization. So I think it'll make sense for everybody though. I mean, one team that you didn't mention that I think could be on the board is Detroit, depending on how their season goes.

Ooh.

That's another one where it's like you see who Cade is when he has any ball handling help at all, like a Dennis Jenkins level ball handler. makes a world of difference for him. Good Lord, if you put someone like Kyrie out there, if you could swing that trade where you're giving Dallas pieces for its future without compromising Detroit's present too much, if that's even achievable, I don't know. But I would, I would be looking into it if I were the Pistons.

Toronto was the one I was thinking, like a, a team that could be close, that has contracts, not a lot of picks left.

Yep.

But things to basically make a move on, but more importantly would set us up for Kawhi and Kyrie being on the same team, which would basically just ruin my podcast. I would get that wrong all the time. I would I would be just calling them by each other's names. I can't even get Zoe and Ben, my 2 kids. I call them by the wrong name. So Kawhi and Kyrie would just be a disaster. Denver. Who do you think I have for Denver?

I think you have DeMar DeRozan.

No.

Interesting choice though. DeMar DeRozan as 6th man. I did think about it. I have Aaron Gordon. I just think this— the sun rises and falls with Ashley Judd in Heat and Aaron Gordon in Denver.

Yeah.

And they're just not even a contender if he's not 100% healthy. I'm not even sure if they can swim in that deeper pool with San Antonio and OKC this year, even if he is healthy. But they have no— they'll drown without him being healthy. 31 years old, 13th season, 3 years, $103 million left, which is not a disaster. Last 2 years, 51 games, 36 games, and he was hurt. In the playoffs last year. And, you know, the more I look at big picture, the NBA and the career longevity and all this stuff, it really, once we get into the 30s with these guys now, it just seems like there's so much wear and tear. Guys have longer careers, but I think from a durability standpoint, way worse bets, especially when there's been recent injury history. And I, I just really am concerned that he's gonna ever be the guy that— You know, in our head we think he does, right?

What do you think? I think we have that conversation about where your prime is these days a lot more around stars, right? It's like, how long can you really carry a team? Can you do it even at 32 anymore? Or do you need to be in that more like 26 to 30 window? Aaron Gordon's a different case, and I think he's a different case in part because the Nuggets found themselves in a position where they relied on him for literally everything. They're like, oh, you're our best perimeter defender, and you're our best backup center, and you're our best spot-up shooter, and you're our best dunker spot finisher, and you're our best connecting passer who isn't Nikola Jokic. I guess just do all of that stuff all the time until your body breaks down. And they, they tried versions of that, even trying to moderate his usage over the course of the year. But he's too important to everything they do to use him in any kind of minimal way. And so I'm with you. He's one of the best kind of supporting role players in the league if you want to, if that's not too much of an insult to lump at Aaron Gordon, one of the most important players in the league for that reason.

I just, I think Denver has too many ifs stacked on top of each other. You know, if Gordon is healthy, healthy, if Christian Brown bounces back, if Cam Johnson continues to to play well as he did at the very tail end of last year's playoffs. There's, there's just a lot riding on a lot of different factors that makes me pretty nervous.

So you're telling me you don't want a condo on Whitmore Island? Because we do have electricity and running water again. So nothing for you yet.

I, I sold out hard when the Washington Wizards said you're not fit to be a Washington Wizard.

No interest in Whitmore Island?

No.

So you've unsubscribed to our mailing list?

Yeah.

Okay. Respectfully, you know, I've been in there for a long time. They did Good work, question mark, I guess. But that ship has sailed for me.

I can't quit. I mean, I saw some of the highlights.

Saw one sweet dunk, one backdoor cut.

I was like, oh, what if he could just carry the offense for 5 minutes? Yeah, DeRozan as an overqualified 6th man to carry an offense for 6, 7 minutes. We— I went on a group chat for a couple teams with you guys for the previews. We talked about New Orleans and we talked about Memphis. And we talked about Zion as like, maybe that's just what his destiny is, to be the most overqualified 6th man of all time who comes in for 8 minutes a half and you run all the offense through him and the other team is actually like, oh, fuck, this is now the Zion stretch of the game. We don't really— and that's just kind of who he is. Way too overqualified. DeRozan is not as overqualified as that, but it is a good, I think, thing for this point of his career. I would say.

I think it was a great thing for 2 seasons ago, probably. Like, if you think about DeMar coming off of his Chicago Bulls run, and if he would've gone straight into a 6th man role with a contending team, that would've been perfect. He's, he's still very good. He's still, look, he's still very qualified to do all of the DeMar stuff as far as like one-on-one moves, manufacturing tough shots in space. You're gonna be hard pressed to find any bench player who's as good at that stuff as he is. But is, is he gonna be able to fit into the movement of Denver's offense? Do they even want him to fit into the movement of Denver's offense? And is he, is he going to be capable of, you know, say like Jamal Murray misses a significant amount of time, which he last season accepted is ought to do.

Exactly.

He probably will. Like, is that a good second pillar to counterbalance this stuff off of Jokic? Like, that might be too much to ask of him at this point.

Maybe they should, maybe we got to figure out a name for this type of player. Because the season is so long and guys miss so many chunks that you need these extra guys who can carry the offense.

Yeah.

Basically the best version of what Peyton Watson did last year for them when they had all those injuries.

Yeah.

And he's like, all right, I'll drive the car.

20 a game.

And then did a really good job for 2 weeks.

Yeah.

But there's a lot of guys in the league who can do that now. Golden State. I hate doing this, but it's gotta be Porzingis just because it was such a weird contract to begin with.

Bizarre.

And this was a team that did not have a lot of bullets in the holster for summer movement. For— I don't think anybody knows what they want to be. Their over-under win total is in the high 30s. Curry's basically made it clear, I'm never leaving, which gets tough because now you're the spouse in a bad marriage who's like, well, I'm never leaving. We're never getting divorced. It's like, okay, I don't know what happens now. But they gave him $20 million this year, $20 million next year, but only $3 million guaranteed. A, who were they bidding against? No idea. B, he's 31 years old. He's played 60 games once since 2017. He's only played 28 playoff games total. How many total minutes do you think he's played in his career? Oh my God. Good guess.

It's really not that many.

It's a brain buster.

What? What? Sorry, what is his total career length? How many years?

Total career minutes and total career length is, I think, 2015 draft.

Oh my God. Something like that. I have no even bearing for how to guess it because he's missed full seasons or most of them. I think he's— God, I don't even have a benchmark for it. Where is he?

16K.

Andrew Wiggins has almost as many points as Kristaps Porzingis minutes.

Wow.

It's an actual stat. And he has this mystery illness again.

Yeah.

That he's now had for the 3rd straight year that I don't— they went through this last year with him, but I just don't think they could afford to waste a bullet on this. And they did. And now it's like day to day, like they were with usual. They're spending $122 million this season on Porzingis, Draymond, who just looks like he's outta shape, Moody, who's hurt, and Jimmy Butler who's hurt. $122 million and the cap's like $180. So I don't want to cross this team off or as a playoff team, but I, I don't see a roadmap where they're a playoff team. Do you?

I think they're gonna have a really hard time getting through the regular season in one piece and getting through all of those injuries without overtaxing Steph in the process. And so whatever you think of Kristaps Porzingis, and I think the Warriors are pretty guilty of over-indexing on like the best version of the healthy guy that they think they're signing, right? Like the good version of KP is a player who really helps Golden State.

They did this with Horford too, by the way.

That's the thing.

It's like once a week.

Great.

And Horford, again, Horford at his salary level is one thing. KP at his is another. Signing Porzingis under these circumstances, when you knew Butler was out and you knew Moody was going to be out probably until January, and you still decided to do this, I just, it's inexplicable. And then it's even more inexplicable for Mike Dunleavy to sit up there at media day and in some of these availabilities and talk about you know, waiting for the right opportunities and the conservatism of not using all their bullets at this point in time. Like, if not now, when? Especially when you're using one of your bullets, one of your salary slots, some of the investment of this roster and its resources in a guy who we just literally do not know. And I mean this in no way to disparage Kristaps Porzingis, if he is going to be healthy enough to contribute to the team.

And on top of it, I, you know, Quinton Post isn't going to the Hall of Fame, but Memphis squeezed them with this RFA for Quentin Post. They had to let him go. And it was only like $7, $8 million. I can't remember what the exact number is, but it was less than $10 million. So they let him go because they'd already committed this money to Porzingis. I can't remember what their mid-level situation was, but when you think that somebody like Mitchell Robinson got $15 million.

Sure.

You know, and Porzingis is just— $20 million is a lot of money in the second apron NBA. That's what Io got per year. That's what Peyton Watson got. That's the range you're swimming in. And those guys are much better bets to get minutes. Houston, Reed Shepard. And Houston, by the way, could have had 8 guys.

Yeah. I think Fred has to be in this conversation too.

Yeah, but Fred, I, I had him and I was like, this is so obvious. It's too clear. It's like, can he come back from an ACL? Reed Shepard, he's 22. They're almost on the Jonathan Kuminga Warriors timeline with him where there's 2 different teams and you could trade him and maybe get the asset that helps this veteran team with Durant, Marcus Smart, all these guys. Or you bank on You're trying to build his value up. But like in the playoffs last year, he was 29%, took 9 a game from 3, 29%. He was just terrible. One of the reasons they lost series last year, he made 227 3s and Houston was still 25th in made 3s. So they actually need his shooting.

Yeah.

But they have VanVleet back. They got Marcus Smart. Is he even gonna play that much? Like, I, I liked what I saw in stretches from Reed Shepard last year, and I think he's kind of what they need. in some ways, but then in other ways was one of the reasons they got in the mess they're in the first place. So I, I just don't know what happens with this guy this season.

I'm hoping that needing him less makes him play a little better, right? Like if he was feeling a little pressurized in that role of like, this is my one year when Fred is hurt and the team is, is desperately looking at me to hit shots.

Right.

'Cause so few guys on this roster can, maybe something about that, that mix just like did not bode well for him or led to some of the inconsistency, but The things we saw in the playoffs were decision-making issues as much as anything. It was, it was inexperience. He was not ready for those moments for a team that, again, like to your true timeline point, there's, there are lots of young elements of this Houston roster. There are a lot of guys who are still coming into their own. And then there's your 38-year-old best player who has to be leading a team that's good enough to compete now. And Reed Shepard was not good enough to compete now.

Yeah.

I, the way college sports is now, I wonder like, would he have just stayed in college for a couple more years? Made some NIL money. He ended up being a top 3 pick. So the rule is you have to come out your top 3 pick.

Hard to turn that down.

Yeah.

But I look at somebody like Pritchard, who was in college for a while and came in, then was on the bench for a while and turned into who he turned into. And it was a slow bake. It took forever. Reid's the other way. He just gets thrown in, but I think has some of the same kind of skills that would succeed with that, like Pritchard did. And I don't know. And it's also, I went through it. I was like, there's gotta be some awesome trade match for him. It's really hard to find a team that would want a young point guard in that $11 to $14 million range that's got a big extension coming up that isn't already messing around with a point guard. Sure. You know, and it's like Memphis, but also Golden State. I don't know.

Do we really think Houston should be doing that? Like, why wouldn't they just hold on to him and see if he can pull it together a little? Like, it's not like he was a disaster in the regular season. He was a really important part of their offense, some because of deficiencies elsewhere, but Yeah. His shooting and the impact of it is pretty unique. And I think there's going to be, it's going to ebb and flow. It's going to come and go. The question is, is he going to have the rest of the game to sort of stabilize his contributions on the floor? Is he ever going to hold up defensively? Is he going to be able to run a team of his own? Is he going to turn into enough of a threat as a movement shooter where teams start freaking out when he's flying around the floor? To me, those are the bigger questions. And if you can get 2 out of 3, that would be gold. If you can get 1 out of 3, that would still be pretty good.

I'd love to see him be Pritchard for them, like where Pritchard was in 2024, Rich.

Yeah.

You know, come in, instant offense. You're not counting on him, but when he, when he does well, it's a bonus. And that's probably where he should be. But the problem is, the reason I mentioned Kuminga is this is kind of the Kuminga thing, but, but you end up losing your value because you're in a situation that doesn't fit you. And yeah, 2 years later, all of a sudden nobody knows what to do.

Well, and a, and a coach who doesn't fit you most of the time.

Right.

Clippers. I had Garland for the Clippers.

Yeah.

We can, we can zip through this. He's, you know, he averaged a 24 and 8 for the 2025 Cavs and shot 40% for 3. This is a really good basketball player. First time he's really ever had his own team. The team's not gonna be that good, but everything I'm seeing, hearing, watching, even like his reaction to when Max Strus got hurt in preseason, like this is his team. I'm excited for him. I want to see what's there because I've always been a huge fan. But it feels like a career year on a bad team would be, would be my guess. And then how do you fit in with Wagner would be the thing to look at if you're them. Can, can those 2 guys play together? And if they can't, what do you do offensively?

I have very few doubts defensively, just a world of them.

A tsunami of doubts.

Too small and too slow is a really tough combination to put out there on the wing, but Yeah. I, I think with, with Garland, like I've been a believer in him as a playmaker for a long time. And some of what he was asked to do in Cleveland was, you know, find really elaborate solutions out of like tough spacing problems, possession after possession after possession, working off Donovan Mitchell. Great to draft off of the attention that he draws, but also kind of difficult for another ball handler, especially if you are a more traditional point guard type like Garland is. I think he is an elite, elite shooter who has only kind of shown that in flashes so far. And so if, if he kind of pulls it together there, And most importantly, can stay healthy. That's the part that I think makes all of us pretty apprehensive is like he just hasn't played many full seasons at all, if any, at this point. And so how do you build around a guy like that? How do you let him be the leader of your franchise and your team? I know the Clippers are short for alternatives, but it's just, it's, it's tough when you have that kind of baked-in unpredictability of how much time is this guy gonna miss between 10 and 30 games this season.

Yeah, it's the Garland defenders would say some of the injuries were bad luck.

Yep.

They were like getting hit in the face, like things like that.

Absolutely.

They're not, it's not like a Zach Eadie situation where you're worried about, you know, this guy sprained his ankle, had stress fractures, like what, he's 7'4. Actually, we'll skip ahead because Zach Eadie was on my list for the, as my Memphis guy. We talked about him on group chat.

Yep.

11 games last year, 77 total. He's 7'4, £300. And I don't know what happened with going from a high ankle sprain to basically a year of injuries and surgeries trying to fix it. But the history of that, when we go basically 7'3 and up with centers over the last 50 years in the league, when we start operating on ankles and feet—

Yeah.

I get super nervous. And yet, as we talked about in group chat, because we all like Memphis this year, The ideal situation for Zach Edey next to Boozer with those guys just pounding the glass and then athletic swings jumping around. And it's a team I'm really bullish on as like a better than a 29-win team, which is what they're being predicted to. What are you expecting from Edey though?

I think when he's on the floor, he changes almost everything that happens. Sometimes good, sometimes bad, right? Like you have to work around the fact that he's not the most mobile center. But when you think about their group and kind of what their guards can and can't do, having a giant center who everyone has to pay attention to because he's, I mean, less a lob threat than like an over-the-top pass into a tasteful layup threat.

Yeah.

But like having that guy where you have to pay attention to how he's positioned, you have to take away those passing angles as much as possible. I just think that makes Ty Jerome's job that much easier and makes Scottie Pippen Jr.'s job that much easier. Guys who are like really good scorers and high-effort players, but not visionaries as far as like running an offense goes. And so Memphis is at that stage where they're trying to cobble together talent. They're trying to figure out who the pillars of this franchise are going to be. And what they're lacking is that sort of like all eyes on me talent. And I'm not saying Zach Edey is that in terms of the production, or he's going to be a future MVP or anything like that, but he demands your full attention. He demands a place in the scouting report. And that's something that's really valuable for them, even for as great as Cam Boozer is going to come in. And I think we expect him to be right off the bat. He's a different kind of player.

So you're all eyes on me guy, isn't Quentin Post?

Somehow not. I think you may be the foremost Quentin Post supporter.

I always like stealing guys from other teams, and I just wish the NBA was way more cutthroat with that stuff. As I've talked about many times, I never understand why everybody's so helpful with everybody else. To me, if I was in the NBA, it would be a zero-sum game. I'm just trying to drive up contracts and make my competitors worse off.

But if you're stealing guys from like the 10th best team in the Western Conference and they're like, I don't know, you know, like, it's like $8 million.

Whoa.

Quentin Post is fine. I really, I mean, he's honestly more important to Golden State than he is to Memphis because Memphis has so many bodies. Golden State has near— doesn't have nearly enough of them. But Zach Edey forces you to be a little bit more cautious in terms of your 2nd and 3rd picks.

I'm excited to watch them.

All right.

Quick break. Then we'll finish. The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Here's something to look forward to between kickoffs this Sunday. With Sunday Spectacular, FanDuel Rewards Club members can unlock exclusive rewards throughout the day with offers tailored to their Rewards Club level. Depending on your level, you can unlock things like profit boosts, reward boxes, points boosts, challenges, choose your reward offers. Those are really cool, by the way, and much more. The best part. New awards drop throughout Sunday games, so there's always something new to discover as the day unfolds. Check out Sunday Spectacular in the FanDuel app, only on FanDuel Rewards Club. Make this your most rewarding season ever on FanDuel. 21+ select states or 18+ DC or Wyoming. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER, call 888-789-7777, or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Football has a play for just about everything, and whether it's a flea flicker or a tush push, you need a plan that fits your unique situation. That's why State Farm takes the time to get to know you so they can help personalize coverage for your life and for your budget.

Now that's a solid game plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. All right, coming back. I told you if you had any back pocket guys, Mm-hmm. to bring them to the pod. I don't know if you want to do that at the midway point here or at the end. Your call.

Well, how deep do you want to go with these cuts? You know, I think we—

Listen, this is just Rob Mahoney's list.

Okay.

You can have it.

There's—

I have no parameters. It's 2 or 3 guys that you're just, just looking at.

Uh, Edy was on my list as well. Uh, Jaren Jackson Jr. on my list, another former Grizzly.

I have, I have him on my list as well.

Should we save him for when we get to Utah or you just want to go to it?

Yeah, let's save him.

Okay.

Keep the alpha thing in place.

A lot of thoughts about Jaren. De'Aaron Fox on my list. I think we, we talk all the time about when is Dillon Harper going to straight up take his job and maybe not enough about how does a veteran off of his first significant playoff run deal with the failure of blowing it in crucial moments? And is he a guy who can put it back together on the fly and maybe stave off Dillon Harper at least for one more season? I'm eager to see. So he's on my list as well. And Deni Avdija is on my list as a guy who had all of the control, all of the reins last season, all of the opportunity to drive to his heart's content, and now will probably be asked to, you know, clean up after 2 guards who can't really defend anybody and also kind of go back into his box. I'm sure he'll still drive and be plenty involved, but a much more complicated pecking order in Portland this season, to say the least.

We'll be discussing that in a second. Minnesota. Oh no, Lakers.

Yeah, he skipped.

I just had Kessler. We don't have to dive into this, but you know, he played 5 games last season. He had torn labrum, probably couldn't come back for the end of the year. To me, this is why stars shouldn't be GMs, because Luka was basically like, I wanted this guy.

Because he was crushing Jazz tape, like the 5 games and the previous seasons. Luka was like, I'm locked in on Walker Kessler.

He must have liked him on NBA 2K. I guess my question is, would you rather have Kessler for $30+ million a year for the next 4 with your fingers crossed on his health?

Yeah.

Or you just keep DeAndre Ayton, sign Mitchell Robinson. They're making less than Kessler.

Yeah.

And you keep both firsts and both swaps. I get to keep both of, all 4 picks basically. Is that enough of an upgrade to make me, am I trying to win the title with this? Like what? It, it just felt a little Hail Mary-ish and the kind of thing you do when you're trying to appease your star who has decided, I like somebody, get this guy here.

So I don't know that Walker Kessler is like 100% worth the full extent of that contract. And most importantly, the draft consideration that went on.

The draft collateral.

That's, that's a lot. That's a lot for Walker Kessler, who I quite like as a player, but it's putting a lot on him. That said, I think appeasing your star is probably the single most important thing you can do as a franchise. And so DeAndre Ayton is not a good basketball player, does not give you really anything of note in games that legitimately matter. Maybe in the, like a regular season matchup that's on TNT, sure. But an actual playoff series? He's not a guy I want in my particular foxhole. And Mitchell Robinson, for as much as I love him and as much as he just showed in terms of the Knicks run, like, you kind of want him in that sort of supporting role. You want to, you know, ride the incredible highs of the surges of his offensive rebounding and the energy and live out the lows where he's not available because of his own injury considerations. And so I get wanting to bet on Kessler, who's younger, who has a much higher ceiling than any of the guys we're talking about. And most importantly, if he makes Luka happy, even like 5%, I think that's genuinely the most important thing the Lakers can do.

See, this was the same logic of the Paul George trade.

That's the part that worries me.

It's like, you got to make Kawhi happy.

Sure.

This is what he wants.

Oh, I thought you were talking about the Celtics Paul George trade.

Oh, no, no, no.

I was like, who's being teased here?

The Kawhi one. Sure. Because if I was running the Lakers and Luka was like, I'm going to go to the Celtics.

And they would let you, I'm sure.

Yeah, maybe new ownership might have a chance. I just would've been like, look, dude, we're not gonna win the title this year. Our goal is to sign Reaves, to put you in the best possible situation to win, and try to strike for a 3rd star. And we don't really love the summer market right now, so we can do this Kessler thing. But once we do this, we have no assets left.

Yeah.

It's gonna be really hard for us to make another move after this. So once we do this, this is our team. So just so you know, we think that's a mistake. We can patch together center. Let's keep the picks and let's wait. There's gonna be a lot of unhappy teams in January, February, and let's wait and let's strike for a star. We have some expirings, we have some trade stuff. Let's do that. That's what I would've said, but what do I know? Who knows? Kessler might be awesome.

I think the 3rd star would be great. I look, there is a, there is a legitimate chance that Kessler becomes an all-defense level, or at least fringe all-defense level guy for a good chunk of his career, that he turns into that sort of force of nature holding down the middle in the exact way that they need. And those guys don't come cheap. They don't come easy. Like, teams fight for them. And so that chance might be worth it, especially when, like, I don't want to pretend like Luka is 22 years old, right? Like, he is in it now. We were just talking about what is the contending prime for a superstar.

Yeah.

Luka's in it. And so you need someone who's right here, who's able to contribute in a way that a pick swap simply can't. And this was not a great market to go hunting for that, but it's the market that the Lakers had.

I guess we'll see. Minnesota, we can go quick. I have IO for this. Um, LaMelo would be the easy choice, but LaMelo's also averaged 50 games a year for his career.

Yeah.

2 things with IO. One, he's LaMelo insurance because LaMelo's not gonna play 82 games and play 2,400 minutes. And if anything, you wanna do what Charlotte did with him. Ease him in 28, 29 minutes a game. Please don't get hurt. You're on a little bit of eggshells with LaMelo trying to get him to the spring. And Ayo really helps with that.

Also probably Kuminga insurance too, because he lets you kind of slide Kuminga out if you have to put Jaden at the 4 and then play a bunch of guards out there together.

So I don't know if you can get Kuminga insurance. I haven't called, but I think, I think it's impossible.

But you don't think they're offering rates?

I don't think they're offering rates for Camingo Insurance.

Yeah.

I had what written down though, what you just said. The biggest question for me, and Io's so important in this, can they play Melo, Ant, Io, McDaniels, and Rudy as their crunch time 5? Can that work? How do you guard the Tatum type? I guess you use McDaniels to guard all the bigger forwards, but if somebody has 2 post-up players, now that gets a little interesting. But can those 5 guys play together successfully for 8 months? I'm not ruling it out. I like those 5 guys together. It makes sense for me. They're shooting, there's spacing, there's some defense. Rudy can clean some stuff up.

Yep.

And that would be, if you're talking about the Minnesota upside, that and the threes would be where you say like, I like that crunch time lineup. I like the threes would be the case. I'm still not there.

I think that lineup will be a frequent part of their crunch time rotation and should be. for all the reasons you laid out. And plus, like, I trust Ant's ability to guard up, especially in those spots where, yeah, you're gonna have Jaden chasing around really whoever the top perimeter threat is regardless of position or the, or if they play the 4. And then if you need Ant to pick up a stockier forward, it's almost one of his better defensive, like, utilities at this point. Like, if something to be hyper-focused on, like, stop this guy, this go-to scorer.

Yeah.

He's actually pretty good at that. He's less good at the, like, lock and trail a Steph Curry type as they run around the floor.

Chase people around picks.

Yeah, not his strongest suit, but I think that kind of focus he could be really well used. And what I like about that lineup too is it gives them a good opportunity to have a really productive sort of chaos where if Rudy can, can hold down the defensive boards, which is a big if for this team in general and a big if with that lineup especially, then you think about the transition possibilities of like these playoff games that are decided by one long rebound that a team is able to convert into a, a crucial basket. And you have LaMelo Ball, Ayo Dosunmu shooting like a rocket out in transition, Anthony Edwards, one of the most explosive athletes in modern NBA history, and Jaden McDaniels. Like, I just think there's a, a good chance for that Wolves team to pick up a lot of the low-hanging fruit that will make the rest of their stuff feel like, feel a little more free and easy.

I like the point you made about Ant. Marcus Smart was like that. You wanted him guarding the 6'9 scorer guys. He was always better, like, playing up with those guys. Do you have Minnesota 3rd?

I think they are probably the 3rd best team in the West.

I will be revealing my choices on Tuesday. It's— you can make a case for a bunch of different teams for 3 in the West. It's pretty difficult.

Who do you believe in least of that group?

Right.

Who's the safest pick?

Like Minnesota, Denver, Houston, Lakers. That might be it. There may be one more team in there that sneaks in.

Knowing me, I'll talk myself into Jokic by Monday. You know, just like, what am I doing? This is generational, generational superstar. He's not gonna be 3rd, 3 seed. New Orleans, Zion. We talked about it a bunch on group chat, including playoff game 0, average 39 games a year, career averages 24 and 6, 5.7 rebounds last year. You're just not getting rebounds with him. The only thing I'd add, The Zion Zone. I think we could name this.

What is the Zion Zone?

You're too talented for me to want to trade you, but you're not reliable enough to get a good trade offer. Oh, you're just in the Zion Zone. There's not even like— if you're doing trade calls, nobody even knows how to start. Like, well, you're gonna have to blow me away. And then the other team's like, I mean, honestly, you're gonna have to blow us away.

Yeah.

And it's just It's just like going back and forth trying to figure out what his trade value is, which I don't think he has any.

I thought there were a lot of like league conversations I would want to be a fly on the wall for, or a bug on the phone call for, you know, starting with, you know, the Clippers under investigation. Yeah. You know, the failed Chris Paul trade to the Lakers. There are many moments in NBA history, but honestly, the exact sort of like awkward foot-dragging small talk that would lead into the Zion Zone negotiation might be worth it alone. That might be a contender for me.

It would be, I think, my favorite part of being a GM. Like, I'm the GM, you're the assistant GM, you're in my office. It was like, uh, hey, uh, Joe Dumars is on the line. Like, oh, okay. And then it's like, hey, what's up? Hey, how's it going in New Orleans? Oh, it's good. How's the family? Oh, it's great. And then he goes, so, I just want to talk Zion for a second.

Mm-hmm.

And then we look at each other like, oh, put him on mute.

Oh, here we go.

Joe, let's talk Zion. Let's do it.

Okay.

I think my— the guy on my list I'm most excited to talk about. Okay. See, who do you think it is?

Oh my God, who could it be?

Well, we've talked about so many options.

We talked about a lot of injury guys, so I mean, J Dub is right there, but I'm gonna guess you did not pick him.

I'm gonna—

based on the way you've been talking about your preseason consumption so far, I think you might have snuck a Dymara into this list.

Did you do that? I did check out his, uh, His— what is he, 15 for 15?

I mean, just all lobs. I mean, like, if that's real, that's gonna be terrifying. I have no, I have no bearing to know whether it is or not, or that's a thing the Thunder are actually gonna call on. But even the fact that we have to talk about it is ridiculous.

At least he's not gonna be a bust just from the preseason. Like, he's moving around nice and I'm sure he'll play. No, my guy's Kayson Wallace.

Sure.

I think I have the most, the most floors in the Kayson Wallace building between ceiling and floor for where I think this season could go for him.

Okay.

What? Hold on.

What does that metaphor mean?

It means I'm prepared for this.

Okay.

And I'm prepared for, oh, we're in this same exact spot we were in last year. Gotcha.

Okay.

I thought we would've gone higher. I think he's like a 22-story building. 23 in November, contract extension looming if things go well this season. Lou Dort's gone. Isaiah Joe's gone. They're low on wings that can defend. It's really just J Dub and Caruso. I mean, but those are 2 of the best in the world. But I'm just saying, like, you're talking about a series and 48-minute games.

Yeah.

So I think they're gonna need him a little more. Will he finish games over Mitchell and McCain? Is there more offense there? Is this somebody who should be playing 35 minutes a game? How are they gonna use the minutes around? And if he was at 25 minutes a game last year with Dort gone, could he be at 32 to 34 this year? And is he one of their 4 best players? I just, I have no answers for any of those questions. Do you?

I think he probably is their 4th best player, but I think—

That's where I landed as well.

And I think a lot of that has just to do with Caruso's body and what you can reasonably expect of him. I think, I think Wallace is probably just a little further along in terms of comprehensive impact than AJ Mitchell is, who I also quite like. But I'm with you about the offense. That's kind of the one I'm looking at because clearly they trust him defensively. They should. He's a first-team caliber perimeter defender. And, and to go off of last season and say, you know what, Lou Dort, we actually feel pretty solid here with Kasin taking this job full-time.

Thanks for everything.

Thanks for everything. An incredible vote of confidence and a deserved one. Offensively, he will have games when like Shai is out or Shai is just kind of like, you know, on the bench because the Thunder are kind of blowing somebody out and he'll just rattle off like 8 assists in a game like it's nothing.

And remember that month he took over or 3 weeks or whatever?

That's what I'm talking about.

looked like a, like a legitimately high-end offensive guard for 2 weeks.

He makes you dream of a time where he could be like the, the lead point guard on the Sacramento Kings or whatever before you realize that's a horrible thing to wish on anybody. But can he show any like capacity to, to walk the middle ground? Like what is the zone of offense he gets to participate in that's between Shai over here and J Dub there and AJ Mitchell here? And it's like operating out of the corners 'cause you need the spacing. but also just a little more dynamic than he's shown so far in that kind of role.

And is this team gonna play 3-guard a lot?

Yeah.

I'm such a huge fan. I really, really want, I wanna see more from him. And we've seen guys in the '80s be in situations like this. Like McHale was in a situation like this. James Worthy was in a situation like this. Rodman was in a situation like this. I'm not saying he's on that level, but guys where you watch them and they were on such a good team with so many players and They're playing half the game and you know that they would be starting on a lot of different teams.

Yeah.

And the irony is Harper is in this situation too, where there's just so much more there. So I don't, I don't know how it plays. And it's interesting 'cause they've already won and he's already sacrificed and there's money coming and they've already paid 3 guys. And I do wonder, are they gonna pay him? So next one, Phoenix, just really quickly, Devin Booker, who has 4 years and $250 million left on his deal. This is his 12th season. And, uh, he was first team All-NBA in '22 and third team in '24, and he's been 26 a game for the last 9 years. 3-point shooting got worse last 4 years for some reason.

It's so strange.

He's like the number 1 guy that you just assume in your head is shooting like 44% from 3, and it's 34% last 4 years. But is this just it? This is just what the rest of his career is going to be like. He's just going to be on mid-level teams averaging 26 a game and then later in his career he'll go chase a ring somewhere. Like, do you kind of feel like we're mapping this out the way it's going to go, or is there a surprise in here for you?

I wondered if there might be a surprise. And then, to be honest, like, the scale of that contract might have sealed it just because, like, I think it's every guy's right to chase after and want to be overpaid, right? Like, get as much money as you possibly can. Devin Booker, like, get it. At the same time, it's going to be really hard to build a contending team around him because I think it's, he's kind of on that cusp of if he's your number one offensive player, the ceiling feels pretty, pretty strict. Like you could maybe build an elite defense around him with just enough like supplementary playmaking. And then he's the killer who sort of like Allen Iverson style wheels you to the finals.

Yeah.

I just think that's a really tough life. It's maybe a recipe for like a one-off run. But maybe Phoenix already had its one-off run, you know, like maybe him and Chris Paul, Mikal Bridges, that was it. And from here on out, it's just gonna be pretty good.

That's where I landed as well. He kind of had his run. He proved that he could be on the biggest stage and came really close to winning the title.

Yep.

2 games away.

That's a little different than ring chasing. There's so many guys who were just never even on that stage playing in those games. And he was, you know, one of the best 5 players in the league.

Yep.

He was number 4 in MVP one year. So The chops are there and he obviously likes being in Phoenix, so that's that. We could skip over Portland, but Ja Morant is my guy for Portland. I just— he's 7 years, 327 games.

Yeah. Who genuinely, who is he as a basketball player in 2026? I really don't know.

Last 3 years, 79 games, 29% from 3. He's saying how he doesn't want to attack the rim in the same way because he wants to protect his body. It's like, well, that was the whole point of Ja Morant.

No idea.

Sacramento, mentioned Darius Acuff earlier. Not a lot of guys to be intrigued by, by Sacramento, although I know you're a big Maxime Renard guy. Acuff and Sabonis, I wanna see that, how that goes. I feel like that's gonna suck me in on random, like Monday nights at 9 o'clock at night. And my hottest take of the season is just keep Sabonis. I wanna see these 2 guys together.

Yeah.

I know he's pricey at 45 this year, 48 next year, but perfect, perfect guy for Akuff. You're going nowhere anyway. Let's let the young kid cook with somebody who knows how to pick and roll.

I think, look, as far as training wheels go for a young point guard, especially a young scoring point guard, playing with Domantas Sabonis seems super fun.

Sounds great.

Perfect. If the Kings front office also gets pulled in in the way that you have, I, I think you just have to wonder about where, where it goes, right? Like cool for a year. Maybe for 2, but you're kind of idling in place so long as that is the case. And when do you want to move on? Like, I, I'm kind of ready for that to be over. And not just from like a person who watches and talks about the NBA and we kind of get bored of things. I just think it's run its course emotionally as much as anything for like him in that city with that team. Like, speaking of teams that kind of had their moment and had their time, they had it, they blew it, and everything fell apart.

It's barely a moment.

I mean, a real blip, and it's hard to find a good suitor for him and like a great landing spot. But I, I just don't know that much good is going to happen so long as Domantas Sabonis, for no real fault of his own, is a member of this team.

Sounds like these— the, the Kings don't really light your beam anymore. Oh, sorry, had to. Um, hey, Sabonis, next year is an expiring. This year's a bonus. Use him as the A+ security blanket for a year. He's, it's a sub-bonus.

Yeah.

Next year expiring. San Antonio, Dillon Harper. We could talk about this for 10 hours or, or 1 minute. Just what, what, what month will he be the 2nd best spur in your opinion? What month of this season? And will it be this season?

I mean, you think, you think he's that far along?

I could see by April we're just like, shit, he's the 2nd best spur.

Yeah.

I guess this just happened.

I could see it, but Stephon Castle is great. Yeah, I know. I, I, maybe Dylan Harper, to your point, like climbs that far that quickly. I think with him, I'm still kind of waiting to see, and it may be a long time before we get real comprehensive answers to this, but like, how, who is Dylan Harper when he has to kind of manage the reads and the variables of a game? And he doesn't just get to be the off-speed pitch guy who comes in and looks like one of the best drivers in basketball, but that's kind of his only job.

Right?

Like, yeah, it's, he's very focused. He's very precise in the way he operates. All that stuff is super valuable to them, but he doesn't have to make the hard decisions that Cassell or Fox or Wemby do. And until that's the case, I don't know how comfortable I am calling him their second best player.

I wonder if it's got young Kobe potential. So Kobe, his first year is basically Harper's college year. Second year for Kobe when he got voted into the All-Star Game was was last year. And then the 3rd year with Kobe, that was when they traded Eddie Jones halfway through the year. They're like, oh shit, this is happening.

Yeah.

Gotta, we gotta get rid of Eddie Jones. We gotta just, this is Kobe and Shaq is our destiny. Will that happen this year or next? We're with Harper, but it will happen. Last guy, we were both excited to talk about Jaren Jackson.

Yeah.

All 4 years and $205 million of him. And he has to play the center for the first month for the Utah Jazz without Nurkic, which means he's gonna have to grab some rebounds, which have been a problem since he grabs less than a rebound and a half a quarter. for the last 3 years of his career. What intrigues you about Jaren Jackson?

I think just looking at his last 3 seasons, obviously had the trade last year also for a Grizzlies team that just was kind of a mess, a kind of blip intermediate season in between, and then the weird, like, absolutely lost season for the Grizzlies the year before with Ja and everything else.

Yeah.

It's just been, it's been a minute since we've gotten to see him be in a stable competitive context, and it's weird to think that the Jazz are going to be that, but He's a huge reason why. Like, I think the glimpses of who he could be within Will Hardy's offense are very interesting. This is a coach and a style where I think if you're a ball-handling big in any way, it just really suits you. It really locks into the way you can kind of tap into so many different actions, so many different movements. Like, Jaren Jackson Jr. as like a stretch big is one thing. Jaren Jackson Jr. as a stretch big who's also running dribble handoff, who's also attacking the basket off the dribble. who has like the funky intermediate game. That guy's an awesome player and that's his worst side of the ball. And so I, I hope we get a real spotlight on that and I think we're going to, especially with Nurkic's injury, which is a huge reason why I think he has to be the pick here.

Peterson. It's, there's so many league pass teams this year. I'm just like, I just wanna watch these guys for a couple games, see what the fuck's going on.

Do you think, I mean, with the, with the lottery odds shifting, how do you think that's gonna change our league pass diet? Like, Obviously later in the year things could be dramatically different.

I think it's gonna make February and March a completely different sport.

Do you think it'll make December and Jan— like, like at what point do you think we'll see the payoff of that, I guess is what I'm asking.

I think it'll be, yeah, December, January range. The model for me would be what happened with New Orleans last year where they had nothing to play for, you know, from a tanking standpoint because their pick was gone.

Yeah.

And they kept playing hard and they actually started gaining momentum. That's what we're losing, or that's what we lost with the tanking stuff. You, you weren't building momentum near the end of the season because you were trying to bench all your guys or come up with fake injuries for them. And you weren't having that like late charge. And I think that's going to happen with a couple of teams this year.

When, and Utah, I mean, Utah could be the team to watch in that regard. Like they've been on the brakes for so long and we'll see what they're capable of.

Favorite TV show right now?

I mean, we're, we're still finishing up Slow Horses, so I think it's still got to be that for me.

Okay. Say hi to Joanna. Say hi to the group chat guys.

Will do. What, Bill, what are you watching though? What are you locked in on?

I just finished Last Scene because, as you know, I watch every kidnap show. Yeah, uh, there's a dramatic season finale, um, and, uh, and that was the one. And then I really liked War. I thought War was good.

I've heard amazing things about War, honestly.

Anytime you guys do it on Prestige, I'm available. Okay, just send the bat signal. I'm ready to go.

We got you.

Rob Mahoney, thanks. We're gonna come back with, uh, Tom Pelissero after this.

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This NFL segment brought to you by Uber Eats. Tom Pelissero is here. You can hear him on the Ringer NFL Show. You can read his Fantastic newsletter, The Sweep. Uh, I got an email question I was gonna throw at you.

Sure.

Before you do the 6-pack for us. This is from Rob in Plymouth, Massachusetts. Wants to know why the Vikings don't get enough credit for their horrible quarterback situation since 2010. And since you're in the heart of the beast there in Minnesota, he listed all the quarterbacks since Brett Favre.

Do you want me to try to— You want me to try?

Hold on.

You want me to try to get 'em? I, I can go down the list.

It's 18 guys. Can you do this?

All right. Yeah. All right. Joe Webb, you said 1. Donovan McNabb. Christian Ponder.

First-round pick Christian Ponder.

We're talking only guys who play.

You've done this out. You've done this in order now. So who's next? Yeah, they had to have played.

They had to have played.

They had to have started a game for the Vikings.

Right. Uh, Matt Castle.

Still in a row. That's 5.

Teddy Bridgewater.

There's 6. Another first-round pick, although his leg did explode.

Correct. Which then begat Sam Bradford.

Ooh, you missed one.

Well, hold on, let me go, let me get through the starters, then we gotta cycle back. Bradford and then Case Keenum.

Yep. Let him walk.

And that brings us to 2018, which was Kirk Cousins.

Yeah.

Kirk was mostly healthy, then when he got hurt, We saw, um, this is really impressive, uh, Jared Hall.

Yep.

There's a couple others you missed.

Um, uh, Sean Mannion.

I don't see Sean Mannion on this list, but this was a list from a mailbag listener.

I think Sean Mannion— I want to say Sean Mannion started one game in like Week 18. We'll double-check it. Okay. All right, let's get through the modern day ones. Obviously, Kyler Murray, Carson Wentz, Max Brosmer.

Yeah.

You also had obviously Sam Darnold, JJ McCarthy.

Yep.

So how many am I at there? Is that like 13?

You have 15. You're missing 3.

15. I'm missing 3.

You're missing the guy between Teddy Bridgewater and Sam Bradford.

Between Bridgewater and Bradford. So this had to have been like, oh, who was the backup in—

His name is 9 letters total, first and last.

And it's not Jaren Hall. That, that came later.

No, it was the great Sean Hill. Sean Hill.

Sean Hill. That's right. He started the game in between. That was after they traded for Bradford, but before he was ready. And then, so Sean Hill started one game.

Cup of coffee with Sean Hill.

That's right.

And then the other 2 you missed were The, uh, one and only Josh Dobbs.

Oh, of course.

And Nick Mullens.

And Nick Mullens.

So Robin Plymouth wants to know, why does Minnesota not have better PR with the terrible quarterbacks they've had and Cleveland gets all the PR for this?

I mean, he's only saying the ones since Favre. Favre lasted like a year and a half until he broke down. Prior to that, it was, uh, Tervaris Jackson was a primary starting quarterback. Uh, Spurgeon Wynn was a starting quarterback at one point. I mean, you can honestly go back to basically since Daunte Culpepper. Daunte had a good 5-year run and then suffered that.

Randall, Randall and Culpepper back to back.

Yeah, Randall Cunningham, who took over for an injured Brad Johnson early in '98 and didn't give it back. The Vikings' best runs have always been when the guy they thought was the guy got hurt and was replaced. You had a long run with Cunningham through '98 and into '99. Then he got hurt. Jeff George took over. 2009, I guess 2009 was Favre all the way, but '17 was Case Keenum taking over for Bradford. So more often than not, yeah, they've—

Lightning in a bottle, which is not happening with Kyler Murray so far. Which brings us to the 6-pack. You had 6 things you want to talk about.

Bring it on.

The Vikings are 4-0. They are headed for the classic. They'll go 12-5 and be underdogs in round 1, and nobody will believe in them the entire time. And there'll be 14,000 advanced stats saying, why they shouldn't have the record they have. Um, how do they make this team better? Is there anything in the works? Do they believe in Kyler Murray? Like, what, what, what are the next steps here? Because you're 4-0 with a really good chance to go 5-0 this week. So what— how seriously do you take this?

I take this Vikings seriously because they do play really good defense. Now, you know, some aspects of the schedule or even the weather in Chicago kind of timed up really well for them, but I do anticipate that they'll be you know, selectively aggressive in terms of pursuing at other positions. I mean, I think there's some obvious needs on the team, you know, setting aside the quarterback where I think that at this point it's Kyler and Carson unless something just plops in their lap, you know, running back, it's Aaron Jones and then a bunch of guys that nobody's ever heard of, De'Mond Claiborne, but he's young, you know, offensive line.

I mean, think about that.

Quarterbacks, quarterbacks bottom 5. I would say the running back situation is also bottom 5, and their only impactful receiver, you know, their superstar, has been hurt, right?

I mean, there's, there's a lot of, uh, ancillary factors to why this hasn't been good. If you go back, you watch like the, the end of that game last week, that was the first time that Kyler kind of started to get in a rhythm, like especially with TJ Hockenson. Yeah, he made some good throws, he made some good reads. Like, that's what you're betting on is this guy's only played like 3, 2.5 games, right, as the starting quarterback of the Vikings. You're hoping that gets better. But, you know, look at what they did this week, bringing in Odell Beckham Jr., uh, in the wide receiver room. I think that that's a— it's a fascinating thing because this isn't like a favor to Odell. It's not like, ah, it's a flyer and he'll be on the practice squad for a week and then, you know, get us through to make sure everyone's healthy and then we'll move on. Yeah, I think there's a real chance Odell Beckham Jr. is playing actual snaps for the Vikings.

Oh my God.

This Sunday. against the Saints. Like, people have watched the tape, say like he still moves pretty good. He's 33 years old, but he still can run. Um, he knows the system because he was with Kevin, um, and Sean McVay out in LA where he was the best player on the field in the Super Bowl till he blew out his knee in that game. That he's a guy who can step in potentially as a veteran. I'm not saying he's going to go for, you know, 10 for 100 this week, but he's going back to his, his hometown. And there's a real chance, depending if all the numbers work and how put together the roster. Is Addison ready? Because he had a hamstring, didn't practice yesterday. Is Jefferson ready? I think Odell may be up.

And Hockenson's not exact— not exactly Cal Ripken Jr. from a durability standpoint.

So he was a bit—

what do you have?

He was all over the place last week, like 14 catches or something.

Yeah, last week. So yeah, I mean, he took that helmet to the knee a couple of years ago and that, uh, that sufficiently derailed him. He's a good player though, you know, out in space.

I love when they, uh, after 4 weeks, I, I was devouring all the advanced metrics this week and you always get, 'cause you now have enough to look at for like havoc rate, DVOA, stuff like that. The Vikings had one of my favorites, 31st offense in DVOA and 2nd in defense, which sums it up.

Mm-hmm.

They have the 2nd best defense and the 2nd worst offense. And guess what? If you're watching the games, that's how it feels.

Um, which is also hilarious. If you go back to week 1, Carson Wentz comes off the bench cold and throws 3 touchdowns. I don't think they've got 3 passing touchdowns total.

It's unbelievable.

Been an interesting year.

Speaking of broken offenses, Sean Payton. If you bet on FanDuel that Sean Payton would be taking over the play-calling reins before Halloween, you won handily. So I guess he's doing it. I've watched a lot of Broncos and I've been shocked by how bad their offense is for— I don't know, I kind of like some of the guys on the offense. And there was this passing chart that got sent around last week of Bo Nix. And it was like, you know, all the dots all over the field.

Mm-hmm.

And every dot, it was just these 2 clusters on the left and right side of the line of scrimmage going back, and nothing at all over the middle of the field. And I was thinking like, I know this is the hardest professional league we have, and there's all this science and all this thought and strategy put into how you stop. But if I'm a defense going against the Broncos, it's like, well, he only does throws to these 2 spots. This is gonna be pretty easy. So how do they fix it?

You know, you have a confluence of things happening there too around him, because Jaylen Waddle, they traded a first-round pick for him, and like, he's had the drops. He hasn't made the impact that they were anticipating him making. Courtland Sutton's been kind of invisible. Evan Engram, they're not really running him downfield, which is what he does best. These are all reasons that you would think Sean, who from, you know, the halftime interview in Week 1, you could tell was biting his tongue to say what he would have done in those situations. Like, you're right, I had so many people this summer— I mean, honestly, all the way back since the Combine, probably 50 people in the league been like, how long is that going to last with, uh, Sean not calling the plays in Denver? Like, everybody knows Sean. He controls everything. He's involved in everything. And I think it's a misnomer to say that he hasn't been involved at all. Yes, he'll be calling the plays this week, but he's been in the meetings.

Yeah.

Davis Webb had the hardest job in the entire league for the past 4 weeks of knowing that guy is standing there. If you have one of the best to ever do your job standing 20 feet to your right at all times, how good are you going to be able to do your job? I'm not making excuses in any way for Davis Webb, but like everyone could see where this was probably going to go. If you want to spin it positive for Davis Webb, he had to call plays for 4 weeks. He got that experience. And next year, if he's calling plays somewhere else or he's in the head coaching circuit again, he can say, at least now, you know, I've done it. But Is it a surprise? No, I, I thought it would last longer. I did. I did think Sean would give them more runway. But when they're— I mean, I think they're 27th in yards this season. You said 31st in DVOA. Like, that's the type of stuff that makes you go, you know what, we can't go on like this. Yeah, they are.

Well, weirdly, they're 15th in offense for DVOA, which I don't really fully understand. Um, but I think a lot of it has been red zone stuff and The game last week, you know, that was a 3-3 game. Guy blows the punt return, right?

Right.

All of a sudden it's 10-3 and it felt like an insurmountable— it was like, oh no, the Broncos are down 7 points. I don't know if they could get this back. I see, this is, this is why I like having you on because sometimes Conspiracy Bill and, and Hot Take Bill comes in and you're just, a nuts and bolts, you know, you black and white kind of information, you know.

Good balance.

You talk to a bunch of— we're a good balance. The Machiavellian Sean Payton being like, I don't want this guy to leave, so I'm gonna pretend he's gonna call plays, but I'll just take him back in October. It did cross my mind. Yeah, yeah, no, no, you're gonna call the plays. It'll be great. You should stay. But he just didn't want him to leave and then zagged on him. in a month. Like, I can't say I'm shocked.

Well, and I think that we talked about too, like, this was— the organization wanted to do this. I don't think that Sean just came and said like, hey, I got a great idea, right? I'm not going to call the plays anymore. It was much more, all right, David Swab has head coaching interviews, he's got OC opportunities, he's a really bright young coach who's— he's really close with Bo Nix. We don't want to let this guy out of the building. Like, Sean's what, 62 years old at Yeah. Like, not gonna be around forever. But then after, all right, we agree, we're gonna name him the OC, we're gonna give him play calling. But then they signed Sean to an extension a few months later. So anybody who thought this was like the coach-in-waiting and this was Sean kind of shaking the hand and, and moving into the distance, like, it was never gonna be the case. He's, he's still a really good football coach. And part of his, you know, superpower, for lack of a better term, is he does have his hands in everything. Every aspect of the program, every trade, he is involved with all of it.

And that's why it worked for as long as it did with the Saints. That's why he was a pairing with a, you know, a Mickey Loomis. George Payton, it took a little time, but those guys have forged a really good relationship. You know, I'm always skeptical, honestly, of when— if you're— if your superpower more than anything is calling plays, the thing you do best is call plays, giving that up, it hamstrings you.

Yeah.

You know, like there's some cases, sure, you get to a certain point in your career and you want to pass off, but Sean's tried it twice. He did it once with Pete Carmichael. He did it now with Davis Webb. Shouldn't surprise anybody that he wants to get his hands back in it.

Well, that's a good segue to the Chargers because the, the bigger concept, which some people have talked about on different shows, is Harbaugh is the CEO coach. But I don't actually— I'm not actually involved in one or the other, but I, I set the culture and I do all these things and And does the CEO coach even work anymore in 2026? Is football too complicated? Like, 'cause we saw DeMeco Ryans, he's taking the defense back this week. Payton's taking back the offense. If you're the head coach, do you have to have a specialty? Or can you just be like, I'm just here to run the ship and set the culture? Does that work anymore?

Well, one point that's been made to me is that financially, it's a lot harder. The top coordinators are getting paid so much money that if you come in and your pitch is, I'm just the figurehead, I'm going to set the culture, we're going to hire a bunch of really good people, that costs money.

And then they leave if they get a job.

And then they leave if they get a job, and you've got to replace them. I mean, there's coordinators now making $4, $5, $6 million a year. So that's one more coach that you're having to give a big contract to, and you can't control it. And now you have turnover. I mean, John Harbaugh got a job last year. He's very much a CEO coach at this point. I think the challenge— I mean, there's many challenges that Jim Harbaugh has right now, but one of them is you brought in this offense that you don't know at all. You have no foundation in the, you know, the Shanahan style, the Mike McDaniel scheme. And when— so when shit goes wrong, it's not like Jim can step in and go, I got this, here's what we're going to do and we're going to fix it.

Right.

The way they— the play style Isn't what Jim has done in the past. They've been like big guys, we're gonna mash you both sides of the football. Mike is very much like a finesse, we're gonna outrun you, we're gonna have tons of motion, all these things going on. It's like philosophically they never really, and personality-wise, never really seemed like a match. So now you're sitting there at 0-4. I just don't know. I think we've talked about this, like what, what you do. There's not a simple solution. If you fire Mike McDaniel, Now, who, you know, is Adam Gase taking over the play calling?

They're starting a new offense.

You're basically like trying to start a new offense in the middle of the season. You could go back to running your old concepts, but that's, that's so hard to do at like a global scale. Shane Day, the quarterbacks coach, has been there a long time. He's close with Herbert, so maybe you could try that. With—

well, you know what fucked them up is they're down 21 in that last game. I watched it. Yeah, game's over.

And all of a sudden they start moving it.

Yeah, Seattle just is like, we just don't want to get beat by a big play. So they're just taking everything short. They're going 6 yards, 8 yards, 7 yards, 9 yards, and they have this super long drive just to cut it to 14 and got a little momentum. But Seattle was never nervous and they lost by 7. And then I knew it. I knew I was going to be the dialogue the next 2 days. Well, the Chargers might have found something that second half. It's like they found nothing. Seattle was, was basically just trying to get through the game without having an injury, you know? So I think, I think they're a mess. I don't think it gets better.

I've talked to people who know like that offense, know Mike really well, who say like they don't recognize some of the plays that are being run in the games. That's not to say Mike has totally changed his offense. It's more—

Yeah.

Everything is so disjointed. You know, they kept a lot of the same position coaches that were there before who maybe didn't have that same background in the offense. So, you know, whether it's a guy getting hit running by on a shotgun snap or it's guys not, you know, hitting their landmarks in the receiving end, like it's a precision offense. and they are super imprecise right now. Um, they're 0-4. They very well could be 0-6 at the bye. And then so the next step for the Chargers, if you get there— and I'm sure that they're thinking, Jim's saying we're going to work harder and we're going to more effort and all the, you know, usual things that he says— but if you're 0-6, look at their defense. Like, half their defense is older veterans who are all in contract years. So whether you're talking about Khalil Mack, Bud Dupree, Denzel Perryman, Dante Jackson. Like, these are the guys you're gonna be getting calls on, all of them. And the Chargers—

Trade machine team. It's time.

Exactly. The Chargers, who never— with a coach you're paying as much as Jim Harbaugh, that won 11 games each of the last 2 years, you're gonna have to sit there and go, we probably need to do whatever deals make sense here, and because we got to rebuild this thing. And then at that point, does it even matter if you fire Mike McDaniel? Like, at that point, ride it out, which I think is the default position here. Just go through it. Maybe you're playing better by the end of the season. Right now they're not, right?

You didn't even mention Keaton Mitchell because that's the guy that I think would be interesting. I think a bunch of pretty good teams to good teams need running backs, and like Keaton Mitchell, Kenny Gainwell, guys like that, I think those are guys that are going to be, you know, looked at by some of the, some of the teams that actually— I, I look at Houston Who was it? Were they on your 6-pack list?

No, I don't think so. Surely.

But I look at Houston, 0-4, but with a chance they could be 4-4 in 4 weeks. But I don't really like their running backs anyway. Um, I don't know what happens to Chargers. I don't know how they fix it. But I do— if I had to bet on Mike McDaniel making it to Christmas, my bet is no. You agree?

2, 2 big weeks ahead. I just, I don't know what you do, like what the point would be of firing him. You could.

Well, it's one of the only moves you can make. It's bad for him. Like, he wants to be a head coach again at some point in his life. This is not a good situation for him. Uh, the Eagles were in the news a lot. Lane Johnson retires. I don't know if you watched that go through the ESPN cycle, but it was a doozy even for them. Then they trade Juergens to the Ravens for a 2nd round pick, which was just unbelievable because they were playing him at guard and he wasn't even doing that well, but he's better at center, but they already have a center. And somehow Howie turns that into a 2nd from the Ravens who needed a center. And now it feels like they might maybe be a tank team. I can't tell. But there's some Jalen Hurts stuff here too. I thought Chris Long, friend of the ringer, was, uh, on a Philadelphia radio station talking about, hey, Jalen Hurts, they gave him like the best offensive line possible and 2 awesome receivers and an all-world running back, and maybe he's gonna have to start doing some stuff. Where do you see all the pressure points going with the Eagles the next couple weeks here?

Well, Jalen Hurts, he does have those things, but last week he had no Saquon because he got hurt. He had no DeVonta Smith. Lane Johnson retired basically hours before kickoff, right? there were a lot of things. I don't think Jalen Hurts has been the— has been the issue so far. He's played okay for a guy who—

This is why you pay a guy $50 million though, because you're hoping through thick or thin he can carry you.

But he's also on paper not a fit for the offense that they're running. Like, Sean Mannion's running that LaFleur-Shanahan style of offense, and like, that's never been Jalen's game. And so, you know, from adaptability, like, you want him under center a lot in that offense. Well, they're kind piecemealing it where he's on in shotgun more than you would normally be. Like, they're trying to find that balance. I think under the circumstances, Hurts has played okay. In the macro with the Eagles, Howie Roseman, other than, you know, maybe getting into the final game of the season and you decide you really need to see Nate Sudfeld because you can move up a few spots in the draft order, like, they've never punted on a season. They've never gone, all right, this year we're taking a step back. Like, he's always going for it. He's now got 2 extra high picks in 2028, a first and a second. That could be because you're thinking you're going to draft a quarterback sometime in the next couple of years. Also, knowing Howie, it could be he still thinks if they can figure some things out here, you got the opportunity to go make a big splash and bring in a player.

Did Jerry Jones zigzag back and forth with the trade asset, give it for a different player?

Jerry did it to an extreme degree. Yeah, but it opens up a lot of flexibility, like the Jurgens trade. Which, by the way, Eric DaCosta called Howie. They have a good relationship. Called him after the game on Sunday. This wasn't like some, like, master plan thing happening here. I think it was coincidental that it happened at the same time, uh, as Lane Johnson deciding to retire. But interior offensive linemen never get traded for high draft picks. It just— it doesn't happen. And so you have—

They don't get drafted as high draft picks either. You can find them unless it's like a home run pick.

Right. A lot of those guys, because you figure like we can find a serviceable guard or center in the 4th, 5th, 6th round unless you're, yeah, an All-Pro, future All-Pro, then maybe you go in the 1st or the 2nd. Everybody else goes later. But you had the perfect thing line up for this trade to happen, which was the Eagles are going— this is basically for them, it was a negative asset. He's owed $16 million through the end of next season. He's playing out of position at guard because they really like Drew Kendall.

Yeah.

who's on the minimum playing at center. He's not very good or comfortable at guard. He's got an injury history with his, you know, he had the back surgery back in 2025. Um, and so it was like, for them, you're gonna give us a future 2nd-round pick. Once it got to that, it made a lot of sense for him. But on the flip side of that, the Ravens had lost 3 centers in 5 weeks.

Right.

So they are down to nothing. They worked out every able-bodied center last week. There's just nobody out there on the street. They think they've got a championship-caliber team right now with Lamar. You need to have somebody in front of them to help. They think they've got a really good roster. And so they went in, they did the physical, they passed him on the physical. And they think, like, for them, the way the contract's structured too, he's got really low cap numbers this year and next year. So even though they got to pay him $16 million, he counts like a few million on the cap. So they think Cam Jurgens is a long-term solution for them. It's a huge positive asset. But for Howie, it reminded me of back in 2016 when Howie retook the throne after Chip Kelly was gone. And one of his first moves was he traded Byron Maxwell, who was owed all this guaranteed money because Maxwell was a guy that Chip wanted in there. He bundled him and Kiko Alonso and sent him to the Dolphins. 2 guys they just wanted to be done with, sent them to the Dolphins and got to flip.

I think they moved up 5 spots in the draft to number 8. It's one of the great Howie turning something you— that is absolutely negative for him into a positive. Like, it, it lined up here. And again, for the Ravens, they feel like they've got a solution not just for the rest of this year, um, but fill in a problem spot that's been a problem since Tyler Linderbaum, uh, got all that money from the Raiders in free agency.

Or they could have just signed Tyler Linderbaum and not, not been in this situation.

$23 million for a center. $28— what was the number?

Raiders seemed pretty happy with him.

$27, I think. think it was.

I like how he runs the Eagles the way I run my, uh, AL Keeper fantasy team with my buddy Hench. We'll trade assets, but then we'll also take the assets and go the other way. Nobody knows what we're doing. We're, we're just— we're like one of those boxers that you don't know if we're a southpaw or right-hander.

Every time—

how it could be like he might be diving back in trying to get people in a week.

Every time that a trade gets, gets done, and I always try to have like the, you know, go back and talk to other teams like who else was in it Like kind of how they've come together. And it's always like, well, did anyone else call? And the answer is always, well, Howie called, but Howie always calls. Like, he is in on every single deal. And then, like, if somebody gets traded, they might get a call back being like, I would have done that. Why didn't you call me back? It's like, Howie, we never got there with you. But that's, that's part of his gift is he always explores everything. And so—

What you got to do.

Just call it zigging and zagging. But it's, you know, for him, it's like, You may find opportunities where nobody else thinks, which is trading a right guard or whatever it is, a guard who's actually a center that you don't want, who's making a bunch of money, and getting a 2nd-round pick.

It's amazing he got a 2nd. I know nothing about the trade charts and stuff, but that just seems like that should be a 3rd-rounder. Like, 2nds are, you know, premium guys usually. That's why that one really surprised me. And sometimes I think the Ravens must have felt like their season was gonna fall apart if they didn't get anybody.

Well, yeah, because they were down to— they were playing Ione out of, out of position and they were having to move people. I mean, 3 center injuries is, is brutal. The one thing is like a lot of teams and GMs historically have considered if you trade a pick that's still a year out, you downgrade it by a round. So some people would look at this and go, oh, that's really a 3rd because it's in 2028, not in 2027. But this is the 2nd time in this offseason that Howie has essentially said like, a pick's a pick. I got a 1 for AJ Brown and a 2 for Cam Juergens. And now we got all this ammo to keep building.

Belichick used to do that. Quickly, DeMeco Ryans taking over the Texans defense. I read a bunch of Tex— I have— that was one of my big picks. I picked them for the Super Bowl. I might have a couple wagers on them. And everybody who— the smart football people who talk about them talk about how much talent they have and then how predictable their defense is and why, like, oh man, could you imagine if so-and-so was in— had all of those tools that they have and This was kind of his bones. This is how he got the job. So you talked earlier about Payton, like when Payton wasn't in charge of the offense, but kind of was. But what was missing when it— what made him have to be like, all right, fuck it, I gotta grab the steering wheel? Why didn't he do that sooner?

Well, last year he handed over play-calling duties when they were 0-3 to Matt Burke, the same guy that he just took the play-calling duties from. So there was every reason to think, based on how much they improved after that, that they would turn this thing around. What probably triggered it as much as anything is if you look at their losses, 3 of those 4 losses, they have a 2-minute drive to put the game away.

Yeah, the last-minute choke jobs.

And they blew all 3 of them. And that's really what it was. Now, D'Amico is also like, he is hands-on. He trained under Kyle Shanahan. So Kyle has a ton of influence and is listening in on every meeting. It's the same thing with D'Amico in terms of like how involved he is. So it's not like he's coming in cold and it was just, you know, this is all on Matt Burke. This is one of those, to me, a change for the sake of change. You're 0-4, the owner's asking questions. Last time the Texans started 0-4, Bill O'Brien got fired on the Monday after. D'Amico is still in the job and you're trusting, all right, you pulled out 0-3 last year, you pulled out 0-4 this year. Well, what are you going to do differently? The offense is actually playing decently, especially when Nico Collins is out there. They're completely different teams. Stroud's played, I think, overall pretty well.

Stroud's been good, point blank. Yeah, Stroud's been really— I think he's made really good throws, and it's not like his offensive line is incredible, but I think he's been really good.

All right, so what do you do? Like, the only thing is, all right, I'm taking the play-calling duties back. But it's just hilarious to me that the solution for the bad start is the exact 180 opposite of what it was last year. Last year was Matt Burke saved the season. This year, all right, we're Matt, we're, we're—

Well, you left out the even funnier part. you're doing it when they're about to play the Titans. Well, it's like, let me ride in, let me ride into my horse and save the day against Cam Ward.

And Sean Payton's calling plays this week against the Chargers. Right.

Yeah.

Maybe a good, a good soft landing for that first time out.

All right.

It's time, Drake May. We gotta do it. The last piece of the 6-pack. I have a, I do have an email for you.

Mm-hmm.

And it is from Nico in Andover. Total interceptions and fumbles through 38 games: Tom Brady, 61; Drake Maye, 61. I'm just saying was added to that.

Mm-hmm.

Uh, I will fully admit I was completely panicked about Drake Maye the last time we talked. Uh, Mike Vrabel spent the week being super aggro. And building him up and being aggressive with the play calling in general. And it seemed like the entire theme of the week was, let's, let's go back. Let's, let's, we gotta make you a gunslinger again. How do we do this? And it worked. But is it gonna keep working?

It, it was really just, hey, we're close. It, it wasn't like everything is wrong. That was, that was the theme that I took away. And when I was reporting for The Sweep was just nobody was like, oh my God, this guy's, you know, it's, it's just, it's gone so far afield. It was like, Like that week before, they had 5 explosive pass plays and they narrowly missed. One goes off Mack Holland's hands, you know, like they had opportunities and there's bad luck. Like when the ball's covered in blood, you know, like that's just a weird thing that happens. Like that's not going to happen on a week-in, week-out basis. Now I was a little worried out of the gate when there's a couple of times he gets loose with the football.

Yeah.

But it's just all those near misses kind of started to hit. He just seemed like he was in a better rhythm. You know, a big issue with him just early on—

scrambling was there too. Yeah, he just felt like he was aggressive and going forward, and he was scrambling at the right time.

Like, that was a huge part of it early on, was just all the times where the play's there in structure and he's either getting sped up because he's pressing so hard, or he's throwing to a guy who's not even supposed to be an option on the play. It's like, dude, you can do less. You don't have to do this all yourself. Well, you know, last week, like Drops had been an issue in the early going as well. Like, that stuff got cleaned up. It was a, it was a better overall team performance. I did like it, especially after the whole, you know, the local radio thing of like Mike Vrabel and Drake hate each other and that's the issue. And the postgame, the postgame locker room is, uh, Vrabel saying to Drake like, hey, we don't take any more fucking shit. Like, that's right. That's basically it was like, this was the, this was the bleep you game for everybody. involved. You know, they got another, you know, interesting matchup this week, but it just— it felt like it flipped, that they responded to all the negativity with positivity in the building because there's still a lot of good there.

He's not a turnover guy. I know he had been through the playoffs last year, but that's not his history. And let's see if he can, you know, build on that, build back that confidence, because really the only way you rebuild your confidence in the season is go out and actually see it working.

I said this Sunday night, It— I felt Vrabel in the offseason training camp and all that seemed like a guy, because of all the stuff that happened with him, that had lost his mojo a little bit. And this team, the first 3 weeks just didn't seem like the Patriots from last year. It wasn't about the talent. It was something about the dynamic of the team. And that Buffalo game and all the shit Drake took locally and nationally, but really locally. I think was a galvanizing thing. It was like, all right, we got to go into Buffalo. Like, we got to save our season. And I think Vrabel kind of found his voice again. You can see it from the videos. You can see it from how the sideline was reacting. Um, the other thing was subtle. This is a super dorky Patriot fan thing, but they, they didn't really use motion at all the first 3 weeks. And I think they were at 74, 75% motion in, uh, in Buffalo, partly because they wanted to confuse Buffalo, but also I think they didn't want Drake to like be checking down at the line or any of that.

Like they just kind of wanted people moving around and him having to just do what the play said and not being, oh, should I do this? Should I do that? I think they felt like he was becoming too indecisive about what to do and they were trying to take that away from him. So I'll be interested to see. McDaniels will switch around every week, so who knows?

Yeah.

But I'll be interested to see with Vegas. Are people going to be moving around? Because the first 3 weeks they were very predictable. You could sit from your couch and be like, ah, 2nd and 3, here comes the run. And they didn't do that. They were zagging the whole game in Buffalo, and I thought it was really good.

The other thing that motion does for you is it moves more of your thought process from post-snap to pre-snap, because you're, you're making them declare what coverage they're in and are they playing man or zone. I, I don't know, I haven't talked to anyone about that, but that would be one you know, potential reason for that strategy is, all right, let's let him do all his thinking before the ball is snapped and then just go to the right spot.

Right. Well, I think it worked. We'll see. Every— I'm in Boston this week. The, uh, the mood is a lot better, I would imagine, than it was, uh, uh, a week and a half ago. Uh, we'll see what happens where you are in Minnesota. The Vikings going for an improbable 5-0. Uh, we'll, we'll Watch and listen to on Ringer NFL Tomorrow.

Yep.

And then the sweep's coming Saturday morning. But sneak peek of anything or no?

We, we got a few things going. I just missed back-to-back calls from 2 different GMs, so hopefully they did— they're not making a trade as we speak. Um, but listen, it's that time of year, man. We're getting really close to, uh, when is the trade season being upon us? November 10th. But around week 5, 6, month out, that's when teams— because they start to know, are we good, are we bad? Can we make a move? Should we sell everybody? This is about the time they start to figure it out. And so the phone calls, including to me apparently, uh, ramp up a lot.

We've never been in the breaking news business before. I gotta say, it's a complete rush. I, I feel like I'm a new man. It's like—

I'm glad.

It's like driving on the highway in a convertible and be like, yeah, Palantir broke one. Uh, good to see you. I'll see you next Thursday.

Yep. Can't wait, Bill. Thanks.

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All right, my buddy Joe House is here. We are recording well before Buck Cowboys on Thursday. We decided not to stay up late for that one. And, um, we're dedicating this segment to Eduardo, our beloved producer, social media, um, guy who, um, between the Chargers and the Padres, he's just gone. We don't know where he is.

That Padres—

that was tough.

He's just gone.

That was tough.

We don't know. His family doesn't know where he is. We don't know where he is. He, he's just driving somewhere and hopefully he'll come back. Over the next couple weeks.

A dark place.

Yeah, I think the Machado home run that wasn't a home run might have been the final nail in the coffin after watching, um, Justin Herbert get hit 370 times. So anyway, we— our thoughts are with him and his family as we watch it.

2 home runs that weren't home runs.

Unbelievable. How much baseball playoffs have you been watching?

Decent amount. I've been betting here and there. I had a great, uh, Tuesday. What'd they say? Yeah, I had a great Tuesday.

I think they've been really fun. I loved what the Rays did to the Yankees. It was exactly what I thought the Rays were gonna do to the Yankees, and they did it.

I bet you did.

They did it.

Yeah.

And then they really did it.

Yeah.

And then they swept 'em and the fans booed and Caminaro did the broom thing and then did the, the Yankees lose after the game in an interview. And I was just like, look, my Red Sox decade has not gone great, and it's sad I have to take these little victories, like, spite rooting against other teams, but I had a great time.

You better get— you got to get Jacko on. You got to get Jacko on the pod.

Jacko's been in hiding.

State of the Yankees. We need a State of the Yankees.

Jacko is always invited, and anytime he wants to invite himself on, he's ready to go. Uh, Dodgers-Brewers is an awesome series, and the Brewers, like, you know when you see it, they have that little magic to them.

They have it.

You just feel like they're gonna get the hits The crowd's been great, so we'll see. And it's fun to root against the Dodgers who just ruined baseball. It's fucking outrageous. Like, the fact that we could have a Tampa-Dodgers World Series. Hench and a couple of the guys at my Red Sox thread, we were looking at the Tampa Rays Spotrac, all their salaries. Yeah, it's like you can't even believe it. Grisham would have been the most expensive Ray.

Well, there is— I saw some of this in the the Twittersphere, the teams that are remaining in the playoffs, most of them are like in the bottom 10 in terms of payroll.

Yeah.

The Rays are 26th.

Yeah. So there is an argument that, you know, we really need the salary cap thing, but it's, I don't know.

Well, the Rays, one of the things they, you know, like they have Junior Caminero, who's awesome, who, if you, as an American League fan, he's one of the scariest guys in the league. The Red Sox got Roman Anthony. He was good for 2 months. They're like, here's $110 million, whatever they gave him. They gave same thing to Christian Campbell. He hadn't even played a game yet. The Rays are like, Junior Camanero, you're great. You're gonna stay at $780,000 this year. Good luck. Play for your next contract. But they, whatever they do, they have this secret voodoo contract sauce with it. Um, I have some mailbag stuff for you.

My favorite.

I thought you'd be more excited to talk baseball playoffs, but apparently not.

I faded Chris Sale. I made a bunch of money fading Chris Sale.

Smart.

You know, it's not out, not available anymore.

Mailbag question. First one says, I love House. I miss House seats. Oh, I miss House seats too. And you can't see it because a little after I left ESPN, for some reason, because they were vindictive fucking shithead assholes. They liquidated our Grantland YouTube channel. I still can't believe they did it. There's 4 years of videos that we did that were— a lot of them were ahead of their time. They were just like, fuck it, we'll just, uh, uh, liquidate all of it. So, uh, they can go eat a big fat dick.

Hey.

Anyway, Jack Port from Portland, Oregon said, question, why does Joe House look like a Make-A-Wish kid whenever he wears a hat? I'm sure he has enough money in his pockets to find a hat that fits his head. Is this a shtick? Um, I have some Joe House photos from college. You see that one?

Look at that hat. I know that hat.

You're doing this in the— you're doing this— this is freshman year. Remember this one?

Of course, how could I forget? Is that my Gonzaga cross-country hat?

This is us together.

I can't see that hat. What's that hat?

That was, I don't know what that was, but you were wearing it relatively correctly. So I don't, I don't know. What's the answer here, Al?

My head is, is funky. It's a little bit big, but there's a shape issue with it. I'm constantly finding hats that—

I have the same issue. We're in the same support group.

Where my, it goes like this or it gets askew and I'm not aware of it, but it, it has over the years. My brain believes that when it's askew, that it's in the right place. It looks like a bit, but you just proved dyslexia. You proved to America that I've been doing this for more than 35 years going on 40 years.

And so it's one of the reasons we're friends. I barely know how to wear a hat either. Meanwhile, Chris Ryan put any hat on that dude.

He looks phenomenal.

It's perfect.

Looks spectacular in a hat.

Yeah. We just don't have heads that fit hats that well. My wife always says this to me. She says, why do you wear hats?

In a bucket hat. And that's one thing that I'm going to do behind the scenes. You don't know this yet, but your Christmas present for, for this year is gonna be Ringer bucket hats. I'm getting 'em made.

Ringer bucket hats? That sounds great.

I know, 'cause a bucket hat really works for me.

I think in the early 1910s, when people would go to the baseball games and they would have the— those cool hats, that would've been a great era for us.

Yeah.

We would've been able to find these hats that felt— that fit our weird heads. Here's another Howes question. Howes said he was hoping the Pats— this is preseason— would be 1-3 after 4 weeks so he could get a good number on Pats plus 10 wins. Well, they're 2-2 without AJ Brown, no Gonzo in Buffalo, other injuries, schedule's easier. People want to know, did House load up on the Pats?

Not yet, but there's still time. There is still time.

You thinking about it?

I'm taking a look.

Yes. The over 9.5?

There's a little division interest that I have as well. Oh, I do think—

what are the division odds?

Yeah, why don't you look them up on the FanDuel Sportsbook?

I'm going to look them up as you look them up.

Yeah, we'll both look 'em up.

So you didn't do it. You didn't do what you said you were gonna do.

It's not too late.

We—

that, that bet was supposed to be through 4 games, and we are now officially through 4 games. The, the line arrived, um, you know, early.

Well, the, the team future— I'm on team futures. I'm on team futures also on the FanDuel. So over So you're +200 for the division now.

+200 for over the division and over 10 wins, over 9.5 wins is -125. So that, that price didn't really—

So you're— so FanDuel knew your plan and they, and they blocked it.

They always do. We, I mean, we do talk about it on this program.

One more house question. Can you make it a regular Thursday segment where you force a clearly terrified House to discuss the WNBA?

No.

Could you get it sponsored?

Nope.

No chance. Under no circumstances.

Did you get a few people who wondered why you were so scared to talk about the WNBA? Do you want to explain yourself?

Tell America. I'll tell America. Immediately after that segment was done, I said to you, please, no more WNBA.

I can't take it.

I don't mind talking through the years. All the dialogue about the WNBA is a hornet's nest for you. You're afraid to— you're afraid to step into the nest.

I don't want any part of it.

That—

it's a—

You don't want to talk about Caitlin Clark's press conference today and the ramifications?

I don't want to talk about Caitlin. I don't want to talk about Sophie. I don't want to talk about Asia. I don't want to talk about the fans.

You just want to watch the basketball game. Bet on it. Don't care about any storylines.

How about this? Great choke job by the Aces. This was all set up for this Aces dream and they are choking the thing away. Um, I had a pal reach out and who, who had a preseason ticket on the—

On the Valks?

No, on the Liberty to, to, um, make the finals. And so he's, he's got a tremendous hedge opportunity. That's not a great hedge. No, I understand. But he's like, how should I hedge this? And I said, one of the ways to hedge it, I would think, is to put together— and this was, um, last week— an Aces Atlanta final that was available at +145, but that's not gonna happen.

Oh yeah.

Because the Aces have choked that shit away. You could, the proper hedge was just play the dream at the price that, that it opened up, which was like -125.

I watched that game yesterday with, with Zoe, who was on her phone the whole time not watching, and Hank, her boyfriend, who actually genuinely likes the WNBA. Yeah.

And we were riveted by, it's sound basketball.

We were riveted by Aces Valkyrie. Also how stupid the league is. Like Veronica Burton, who's been, you know, one of the reasons Golden State's been such an upset team and, you know, Cinderella team, basically. She was like the 7th pick in the— the only reason I know this is 'cause her dad was Steve Burton. Like, she's from— he's a broadcaster here. Her grandfather's Ron Burton, who played for the Patriots. So there was always interest in her. She was the 7th pick in the draft, and Dallas just waived her after 2 years.

Whew.

Like, this league— 'cause I think a lot of the teams didn't have the resources to really have proper front offices. They just make these massive mistakes.

Well, I mean, and this is one of 'em.

Dallas had this player who's clearly an awesome playoff player, just got rid of her after 2 years 'cause they're idiots.

It might be the Dallas front office and it might be something in the water. Like all Dallas front offices have the same issue because they drafted Ozzie Fudd over Olivia, right? Dallas, Dallas did that.

Tough one.

'Cause Ozzie and, and Paige were boy— were girlfriends.

So Hank and I are, we're, we're saying the Aces are gonna come back. Game 2, it's a must-win game for them. They're down, you know, 1-0 in the series.

Yep.

Asia's kind of looming in the game like she does, and then she has one of those Asia plays. They take the lead and it was like, oh, here we go.

Yeah.

And Golden State just fought it off and they have easily, they have the best— see, now we're talking WNBA.

I know. We're, do we have a 10-minute stretch on it because we're talking about basketball?

They, they, they, well, Golden State has They have the best, loudest fan base. I do feel like they affect the games. But Burton makes this 26-footer that they needed that basically swung the game in the last minute. You know, in Vegas. Yeah, Vegas just choked. You know what, here's, here's the thing. If you have A'ja Wilson on your team, I kind of need her to have more than one shot in the last 4 minutes, guys.

Has to have all the touches. That's it.

No offense. Announced today the best WNBA player of all time. Yeah. I actually, I was arguing about this with a basketball friend of mine who likes NBA and WNBA. Is she the greatest first overall pick since Kareem Abdul-Jabbar?

Oh my goodness.

So, and listen, so the counter would be, well, obviously LeBron, obviously Kareem, who was Lew Alcindor. She has now 5 MVPs. And she won, I think, 3 out of 4 titles.

This is outrageous. I just want you to understand.

I'm just saying, from a credential standpoint, she's been— this is her 8th year in the league.

There are 12 teams in the league, bro.

But look at her resume.

Who cares?

But the answer is Bill Russell.

Okay. I mean, you can't compare, but he wasn't the first.

Oh, Bill Russell wasn't the first pick in the league. So the answer is Kareem. But Kareem only won 1 title his first, like, 8, 9 years.

There's— this is not— I won't tolerate this. This is not appropriate.

Is she the best WNBA player of all time? Yes.

Sure.

That's fine.

I don't mind that.

I think she's the best number 1 pick of all time. I stand by it.

You're wrong.

That was, that was one WNBA take. And then my other one, I'm not gonna apologize either. I really enjoy watching Angel Reese. I know she's a polarizing WNBA player. I would love to— if I was a player, I'd love to play with her. She rebounds, she defends her ass off, she's charismatic, she's competitive. I genuinely enjoy it.

The—

I am in whatever the Angel Reese, whatever the bandwagon is, I'm on it. And I didn't tell anybody, but I've been on it all year.

Oh, the unintentional comedy of all the misses from up close is also— can't be underrated.

Listen, not all basketball players are perfect.

It is not. It's never not funny when somebody—

you and I are old enough to remember Moses.

There's a clip.

I know, but you and I are old enough to remember Moses Malone.

Yeah.

Who is one of the 15 or 16 best players ever.

A Washington Bullet.

Yeah, he was a Bullet for a while. He was an unbelievable rebounder. And I wrote this thing in my book about how he would go under the basket and then back up and just ram his ass into these guys and knock them backwards and just was around the rim. She re— she's like an, literally an unbelievable rebounder. I just like, I like her team. I'm in on Atlanta. I've been rooting for them.

If she could master the Moses, which is to intentionally miss an up-close one so you get the offensive rebound. So you get the offensive rebound, you get like 3 offensive rebounds. But he would control the ball that way. It was intentional for Moses because it was like, it's a tip to himself so he can control it enough to make the layup.

This goes back to my theory about how stupid the WNBA is, and this will be the great inefficiency as these teams get smarter. They traded her last year for 2 first-round picks. She's one, one of like the 10, 12 best players in the league.

She has—

and they were just like, yeah, oh, we got 2 first-round picks. Oh cool, maybe you could draft somebody as good as Angel Reese, you fucking dumbasses. Can you imagine that? What would be the basketball equivalent of that?

There might have been like, we've traded Cooper Flagg. How about this? We traded Luka Dončić. How about that? How about that? Is that— does that work for you?

That was great. That was Talking WNBA with Joe House. It was brought to you by Deer in the Headlights cologne.

I didn't even get to make a strap Dude, this email is from Andres from Austin.

Do you think every time an NBA superstar changes a team, they should have to take on a new nickname? Should Giannis now be known as the Heat Freak? Not against it.

Not against it either.

I guess that— does that mean Anthony Davis is ADMV?

That's pretty good. Did you do that?

ADMV.

That's pretty good.

Buy that website.

For as long as he's gonna be here.

Tom, Tom, so do you agree or disagree? Change new nicknames. Change if you change teams.

Fine.

Good times.

I don't mind it.

What would you have been in Dallas?

I don't know what the Browns would be. Tom H from Western Australia, Perth.

Love Perth.

He's been listening to the pod since 2022.

Great job, Tom.

He's found myself vicariously following the NFL news through yourself and House and Sal. And this year I'm ready to commit to a lifetime contract of following a team. If you were starting fresh in 2026, who would you sign with?

This is great.

I should have prepped you for this.

Yeah, this is a great question. Who do I really truly enjoy?

So it'd have to be a fun team, stable, and if you're coming from Australia, a fun place to visit, I think would be the 3 things. So I was thinking West Coast. I don't think you want a team that's won titles, 'cause then you become a bandwagon jumper.

Let me ask you— well, I don't know. I'm not sure that I subscribe to that, 'cause nearly all of the West Coast teams have won. I mean, San Francisco hasn't won in recent memory, but they were just in the Super Bowl.

I guess Seattle just won.

Seattle just won. The Rams won within the last 5 years.

I would say the Chargers, but Eduardo's still missing. I just checked. He's still— nobody knows where he is.

No, we like Tom. If we didn't like Tom, we would say the Chargers.

I was thinking the Denver Broncos would be a good one.

Yeah, they, they have good ownership.

They haven't won since—

there's a lot of stability there. Mid-2010s when they were 14.

Denver's cool.

Denver, Denver is cool.

Denver. Good place to visit.

It's 300, there's sun there 320 days a year or something like that. Some crazy stat of how often it's sunny.

Flying from Australia for a game, probably land in LA, then go to Denver. Yeah, I would say Denver.

I'm not dismissing Seattle.

Good owners.

Seattle is like a very different place, I think, geographically, the way it feels, the way it looks, than anything in Australia. I don't think there's anything that rivals it, like the Pacific Northwest compared to the giant continent of Australia. I do think there would be some appeal to being someplace that isn't— doesn't feel like, like home. Denver wouldn't feel like home either, necessarily. But—

Washington too far away?

Yeah, and I wouldn't tell anybody. Washington's got another couple years here to sort of figure some stuff out.

Hmm.

Not sure we've got it figured out.

I would not tell him to become a Patriot fan.

Why not?

The world roots against us. Tired of the haters. The haters, they don't want us to win.

Just gotta have to stop cheating and then it'll be fine.

This is a phenomenal email from Joe O. in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. Kudos to him. I just watched Lane Johnson as the Terminator get lowered into a vat of molten steel by Jalen Hurts and Nick Sirianni for the 10th time, which got me thinking, because it was an AI video.

Yeah.

In 2026, what's more socially acceptable, admitting you enjoy watching AI-generated videos or admitting you enjoy watching porn? Between the two, which admission carries less social stigma? I think clearly AI.

What if you watch AI porn? I just want to ask it.

Theoretically, you blend the worlds.

Theoretically, theoretically, I'm wondering out loud, just wondering.

Um, AI is, is less stigma. And yes, clearly this did inspire me to go find that video and it was phenomenal. And I think it's always funny when anyone, whenever they imitate the Terminator 2 with the Schwarzenegger going down with anything. I hope people do it for me when I'm finally, uh, finally retired in 3 months.

I'm gonna put you in the sauna in that thing.

The sauna.

Uh, another AI email from Alex in Charlottesville. I sent this one to you. I think the future of AI is AI bookies that will generate odds for off-book parlays. The model should be called FanDuel Fantwan. Hey Fantwan, what can I get for Travis Kelce TD, 3 Taylor Swift sightings, and 2 Collinsworth Patrick Mahomes shortles? Processing request. +2159. Add to bet slip. Question mark. FanDuel Fantwan is one of the best ideas I've ever heard.

Phenomenal. There's no reason we can't do this. They give us— give us the Fantwan bet of the week. FanDuel can do that for us. They can write odds for us for this.

You recently played golf with the FanDuel CEO in the last 24 hours.

I really did.

Did you bring up FanDuel Fantwan to him or not?

I did not. No, I'm saving it. We both need— we need to double-team him.

Did you, did you beat him or did you let him beat you?

No, we were on the same team. It was a team event. We, we paired very well.

That's like in real life, how we're rooting for each other.

It's just the way the world wants us, wants us to be.

Speaking of Washington and things that have happened there, this email came from Dallin. D-A-L-L-I-N. He wants us to come up with a nickname or support his nickname for the Lions defense called the Overreaction. Whoever plays this truly awful defense gets to lead the next week of sports overreaction segments. Week 1, Tyler Shuck is a problem. Week 2, Josh Allen is clearly the MVP. Week 3, Geno Smith and the Jets, frisky. Week 4, wait, is Ted McMillan Julio Jones? They get the Cardinals next. My overreaction prediction is Marvin Harrison Jr. He was good all along. Just a great email.

Great one. That's a great one.

It is true.

They—

whoever plays the Lions, massive overreaction right afterwards.

There's some buzz out there for Arizona as a— as an underdog to win outright.

Oh, you're— wait, just wait till we get to Ringer 107. Yeah.

All right.

We talked about what should the Las Vegas NBA team named, uh, be named. The only good email I got was from Adam Schwartz on this. He thinks they should be called the Las Vegas Sharps.

Oh, that's a great name. What's wrong with that?

It's really good. Yeah.

They won't do it, but it's really fucking good. I'd defy anybody to top the Las Vegas Sharps.

Damn. I— we, we talked about this. There were some good ones out there. I can't remember.

What would the logo be?

We put a deck of cards, you know, whatever. Something that, that picks up on that casino theme. The Dealers? Did somebody say the Dealers? I didn't hate that.

I can't remember. Las Vegas Dealers?

Yeah. There's, there's some good ones.

Oh, that's pretty good.

I like that. There's some good ones that people were putting out there.

Owen from DC, another Washington email. He said, uh, Sirianni's seat is heating up, and with them playing in London this week, I'm wondering if he has a chance to take the Left in London title. We joked about this last year. This is great. Did you just leave? We talked about— I think it was Doug Pederson was the first one. Sal and I were talking about how they're gonna fly— fire him and fly him back in the middle seat.

Middle seat, right?

Middle seat Doug. Um, so if Jacksonville kicks Philly's ass this week, Um, will he become middle seat Nick? Pretty good.

That's pretty good.

Himmett from Vancouver, he said, on Sunday's pod I talked about there should be a name for when a player goes down right before the end zone to avoid scoring, to protect the lead. Yeah, like TJ Hockenson did. He thinks it should be called the Michael Douglas because it involves somebody purposely going down instead of scoring.

Hey now.

Hey now, that's a, that's a deep reference, but people—

Michael Douglas—

the people that get it will get it and, and will enjoy it.

It's a deep cut. A lot of people have asked if the Eagles are the year from hell team now. Matt Gallagher, I'll give him the credit, but all the things that have happened, all the injuries— Lane Johnson retires. Lane Johnson's retirement sparks a 24-hour ESPN-led news cycle. News cycle. That was one of the dumbest things of all time.

Completely unnecessary as usual.

They blew a couple wins. Everyone's wondering about Jalen Hurts. Have they supplanted— because it seemed like the Pats were headed for Year from Hell a week from now, but I think in the Year from Hell rankings, unless you think the Chargers just locked it up already.

Yeah, the Chargers are, are kind of the front runners. They haven't won a game yet. At least the Patriots have beaten the Bills and the Eagles have beaten Who? Washington?

The Patriots have shed it. That, that there's hope in Patriot Nation now. There's no hope with the Chargers and the Eagles. I think there was hope. I think it's worse when there was hope and then you get kicked in the gonads.

The, the reminder with the Eagles is that defense can always come around. Jonathan Greenard hasn't really played for them yet. I mean, he came into one game and then went right back out. If that defense comes around, that will be an identity. They can just by virtue of the personnel there, get to 9 wins or so.

That's what, uh, Pelissero said in the previous segment. Hey, even though they traded Cam Jones— well, even though they traded him, Howie could zag 2 weeks from now and use the pick that they got to trade for somebody else. You just don't know what's gonna happen.

Sure.

Mike from Arkansas had a reaction as CR did a book report for us about Manchester City and that scandal on Tuesday's pod. He did a whole segment with me and Van.

I need to listen to that.

So we talked about all these different punishments, and Mike from Arkansas wonders, why can't they just start every game down 0 to 2 for like 3 years? They're just every— it's like, you fine, we're not— you don't have to lose any players, you're just down 0-2 for 3 years.

That's a fun one.

That's not bad.

I don't hate it. I, I mean, because you can't undo all of the injustice that was done. I had somebody explain it to me last— and one of the— in fact, one of the, the people involved with the new ownership of Liverpool, this gentleman was really encouraging me. Should I name drop? I'm not going to name drop.

No, you can absolutely name drop Will McDonough.

Of course, it's our boy Willie. That's who else I was playing golf with. Yeah, me, Willie, Christian, my buddy Nick from the Latham and Watkins law firm. Great foursome.

Now, that was a name drop. Dropping a law firm.

But Willie was walking me through this Manchester situation and all of the success they've had, which is now— it's shit success, but you can't go back and undo it. It's like with the NCAA. Well, we took away the title, so, okay, who cares?

It's the Clippers with Kawhi winning 4 NBA titles.

Right.

Right.

And then us figuring out What to do with that.

How, how do you deal with that? Um, there's no real proper way to, to punish them. It has to be something enormous in terms of salary ramifications and, you know, changing ownership of that.

See, Art said everybody should be murdered. That was his— because he's a Liverpool fan. My goodness, he thinks that everyone should die.

Well, that game is at 11:30 in the morning East Coast time on Sunday. And the, the, the silly thing is that you—

We're gonna be watching it together.

Yeah, we are.

Along with the Jags-Eagles.

So that'll be 8:30 in the morning Pacific Coast time. Our first— my first Bloody Mary of the day. Um, but you, you— the, the fans will be— the Liverpool fans will be out for blood, but it's not like the players for, for Manchester are responsible. It's like that. That's the kind of—

Yeah, the players are the They didn't do anything.

They just took the money.

Yeah.

I'm, I don't know what's gonna happen with you on Sunday, but Chang's making beef stew for us. You're not on my podcast that night 'cause I have Sal, so you can drink and have Bloody Marys and pass out, wake up and do the Full House thing and wear your hat sideways.

Yeah. All day.

Chet, Chet wants to know, what are we to conclude regarding Steve Ballmer's actual business acumen now that his franchise has suffered the death penalty because he lost a negotiation with Uncle Dennis?

This is a great question. And what I—

It does go on your resume.

What I think about—

Lost a negotiation to Uncle Dennis.

It's a great one. What I think about specifically in terms of the business acumen is whatever the instinct is that produced that franchise going to ESPN, they basically had a deal in place. This has now, I think, been reported across enough sources that we can say, you and I know this because we've been told this. The Clippers and the league had a deal. They had a framework for a deal.

They had the framework of a deal, yes.

For something that was going to be a kind of punishment that met the way that the climate and temperature was going, which is to say some kind of slap on the wristy kind of punishment. Not anything approaching this. But the dumbass Clippers, Somebody in that organization, and you have to blame Ballmer because he sits on top of it, just is like, you know what? We're not going to wait around. We're going to go take our victory lap right now. Let's go talk to our good pals at ESPN and have them trot out our victory lap as we sit here.

What do we do?

What are they doing?

Then their victory lap got carpet bombed by Adam Silver.

Worse than that. I mean, they're the worst catastrophe you can imagine.

Incredibly important email from Steve Horowitz. He has a question about the breakfast appetizer.

Oh, breakfast appetizer.

After everyone orders, you say to the waitress, I'd like an order of blintzes, waffles, corned beef hash, whatever, as a starter for the table.

Yep.

And the server will think it's weird, but by the time it arrives, everyone at the table will be excited. Think of a change in sports, replay assist, pitch clock, et cetera, that when it came about, you thought, that makes sense. Why haven't we been doing this sooner? Sooner? That's the breakfast appetizer. Why hasn't the diner industry pushed this? More importantly, why hasn't Joe House pushed this?

Well, you have a short memory. I have pushed this. This is exactly the experience we had at the Waffle House in Augusta, Georgia. When we were assembled there for the Masters a couple of years ago, we went for an evening meal. We got the waffle for the table. We got more than one waffle for the table. Everybody wanted their own.

But we got all the food at once. This is— the waitress comes over and you say, we're not ready to order yet, but can we order the banana pancakes?

That's something like that for the table obviously makes a ton of sense. I don't care about the cadence of it, but you want something that everybody will enjoy. Pancakes for the table is a classic, I think.

Like a side of bacon would be fun.

Well, everybody, I mean—

I liked his idea for the corned beef hash. Just like, hey, can we just get a big plate of corned beef hash?

Yeah.

Everybody dive in. I just don't, I don't want to wait, you know, I don't want there, I don't need courses for, for breakfast. I want it just come when it's ready. And the first, because the pancakes might take too long. But we had waffles for dinner.

Breakfast appetizer.

It's a great— it is a great idea. I don't— I'm not dismissing it. I just think it's a— we don't have to call it an appetizer. It's, it's a shared plate for the table.

Mary Beth, not Chip Cain's wife Mary Beth, different Mary Beth.

She's a great Mary Beth though.

The best Mary Beth.

Yeah.

Um, she says, Bill, I'm a huge longtime female fan. I used to print out your page 2 mailbags back in the day, if that tells you how old I am. How have you not thought of a sponsor for House's Eat a Dick segment? It's the easiest match in the world. Dick's Last Resort.

Oh! I don't know.

They never reached out. We're open for negotiation.

We're sitting right here. Dick's Sporting Goods. Does that still exist or did they go bankrupt?

Dick's Sporting Goods should be the— I don't know if maybe that fits in with their family atmosphere at Dick's Sporting Goods, but Eat a fat dick doesn't work for them. Patrick in Ohio wants to— wants us to either talk him in or out of a Bengals last-place division bet. It's +550 right now. Um, Steelers and Browns are +130, +150. And his case is they have the worst coach in the division. It's not a debate. He's like 1-150 in one-score games. He's brutal. They don't ever play solid all-around games. The offense always saves bad defense or vice versa. Everything seems off with Burrow. He sent this before Jason Higgins got hurt. Bengals +550 to finish 4th.

If they lose to Miami this week, and I am not dismissing it out of hand, I think there's a case to be made, that price will be so far long gone.

Yeah, that'll be like a +140 if they lose to Miami.

Buy it now. Go get that ticket.

Don't—

you don't—

So in Raider Wise Guys, a fantastic Friday show that you're on, When you double dip your content like Jerry Seinfeld going on 2 different talk shows. It's great. You guys do a man's best bet.

Yes.

Underdog pick, moneyline only.

Yes.

Will somebody take the Dolphins moneyline tomorrow, which is like +300 against the Bengals?

It's the most DeBundo, either DeBundo or Cousin Sal. Those would be my, oh no, you know what? Dream would do it too. Everybody, everybody goes for the long. Somebody will, somebody will do that. I do believe so.

Yes.

Josh from Fort Wayne heard our Mike Tomlin Minecraft combo, and he said, house nailed it when he used the word wholesome. It's been around for nearly 20 years. I think of it almost like virtual Legos.

Yes.

And all things done against the background of really relaxing, wordless piano music. That's about it. Very easy to get sucked in. People who are like Tomlin, they spend years building entire cities. That's from Josh in Fort Wayne. So virtual Legos makes sense to me.

I now understand what Minecraft We got a ton of feedback that, that the 2 clips from, from last week's show, for whatever reason, me objecting to Cooper Kupp as Rookie of the Year, I got a lot of feedback on that. Oh, you took shit for that? I got a lot of feedback on that one. It was really for the purpose of setting up the idea of Washington being incented to make, you know, to put AJ DeVonta's best foot forward if their season goes in a certain direction. All of that was just a setup. But I must have come out a little too hot on the— I did say it was a fucking abomination, so I guess maybe I overstated it a tiny bit. The Cooper Flagg—

People got— what, the Dallas fans got upset?

They were not happy.

Oh no.

They didn't like it. They didn't like it.

The Dallas fans are mad at me too because I keep joking about Cooper Flagg going to Boston.

But they, they told me— They told me to eat a fat dick. They definitely did. Oh, but the clips from last week, that, that Minecraft, Minecraft one and that one Got a lot of traction out there. I will say one thing.

Were people upset that we didn't know what Minecraft was or what?

They were calling us, you know, old, which is fine.

Old people?

Yeah, that's totally fine. The one thing—

We're old. Oh, it's so insulting. We were in college in 1988 together.

One element of that that we probably slept on was Antonio Brown. Either he threatened to do this or he actually did it. You can go in, other people who are participating, TNT is an element of this. You can blow shit up. And he either threatened to do this or actually did it, to go into Mike Tomlin's Minecraft world and blow up a hospital with TNT. Antonio Brown, he joined the stream and either threatened to do it or actually did it. And Mike Tomlin banned him. He banned AB84. That's it. You're out. You can't be in here blowing my hospitals up. Incredible.

Well, they called him Minecraft Mike on the NBC show on Sunday. I think this is just—

it's a great name.

Last email from Maurice in Los Angeles. I love the Eat a Fat Dick segment, and the discussion about how to commemorate each week's winner sparked some ideas. I propose a Stanley Cup-style trophy where each winner's name gets added to honor their initiation to Eat a Fat Dick. I'll leave you to decide what the trophy should look like, but the only non-negotiable is the trophy should be called the Stanley Cock.

Who was that?

That was Maurice in Los Angeles.

Maurice, send his address so I can send him a ringer bucket hat.

I have the Stanley Cock.

Good. As soon as I make a bucket hat, I'm sending one to Maurice. The Stanley cock.

Done.

Say less.

I would tell Eduardo to do a social video of the Stanley cock, but Eduardo's missing. He's, he's driving. He's somewhere in the Pacific Northwest now.

Would it be like an image of Nick Foles or something?

Like, you know, I don't know.

What would it be?

Stanley cock would definitely be offensive. All right. Today's Ringer 107 is brought to you by FanDuel. Make this your most rewarding season ever. Download the FanDuel app to check out all of our 107 picks and boosted teasers every week this season. I am .500 for the year.

Great job by you.

10-10. What's your record?

2 games under .500. I thought that I was, I was prepared to lose my teaser last week and I did indeed lose it. I told America that I didn't, you know, don't mess around with Washington. That was done as soon as Mariota went out. Washington was quite competitive.

That wasn't fair. That was, yeah, Washington was gonna cover that game.

game.

They, they were kicking the Colts' ass. Yeah, until you were gonna cover that, until the dopey guy who's about to no longer be the head coach of Washington decided to go for it on a 4th down with a minute left in the half. Terrible. Unnecessary. But I, I've tried to just invest in the teams that I believed in based on my priors, and Cincinnati was one of those teams. Cincinnati laying 2.5 at home against the Jags, um, that did not work out.

Are you giving us a recap of your bets? The worst podcast content possible?

Well, I'm just saying I went 1 and 4.

You have 2 games under .500 and you get uncomfortable when you talk about the WNBA. That's all we need to know. That's 2 facts.

I do love the Stanley Cock.

Week 5. So you go first.

Oh, I go first.

We're gonna make 3 picks and we have a tease. And I wanna mention, even though we brought back teasers this year on FanDuel and the -110 juice, $50 max bets, I was so excited about it, and I'm usually great at teases, and I'm 1-3 this year with my teases, um, and lost the one last week because of my beloved New England Patriots.

Well, that was worth it.

It was worth it, but I'd like to apologize for being 1-3 on teases, and I'm gonna bring it back this week.

Cousin Sal was 3-0. I wonder how Cousin Sal did last week.

He was—

he and I were both 3-0.

Cousin Sal lost because we had the same tease.

Oh, so we're both 3-1.

Your first pick is what?

Taking the Pittsburgh Steelers laying the 2.5.

That was my first pick.

Great, done. So we've got 2 picks under our belts already.

Is it 1.5? What was the official line?

1.5 or 2.5? I thought it was 2.5. 1.5 would be fine.

All right, keep going. Give your case and I'll give you the line.

Um, a lot of folks have pointed this out. Uh, good pal Cleve Thier, um, leading the, the charge here. It's situationally Pittsburgh is coming in on extended rest. from their Thursday night loss to the Browns.

10-dayer.

We have the Colts coming off of international travel. That kind of mismatch situation doesn't happen very often in the NFL.

It's international travel followed by a road game.

Followed by a road game.

You see that like every, what, 4 years?

Exactly right.

Yes.

Inside the exit. So that's a terrible spot for the Colts. Yep. In general, Daniel Jones and the Colts have not been great Outdoors on grass. They have a losing record. They—

We have all the same notes. They don't cover Steelers pass rush.

Yep. I don't— yeah, right. So Daniel Jones against zone defense so far this season is very bad. And I think a function of that is because he still can't really run and he doesn't run and he doesn't run because he tore his Achilles less than a year ago. So taking that element away lets teams just set up and sit in zone. And they don't have the receivers. They have one, you know, receiver in Downs who is an underneath, you know, kind of receiver. No, nothing, nothing vertical.

Yeah.

Um, and you know, there's a bunch of numbers out there that show that the Steelers off of a loss, very good, both straight up and against the spread. But I just like the idea that the, the rest advantage that the Steelers have going alongside with, you know, this Steelers team is gonna be 8-9. We can all see it coming right down the pike. This is them in a home game situation. So Steelers laying less than a field goal, yes please.

I think I have it as well. I'm gonna piggyback your pick. I thought it was a miracle that this line was under 3 by the time our line's locked. I'm grabbing it now 'cause I think by Sunday it goes up. I don't love betting on Aaron Rodgers. Pittman's out now. But I definitely—

Pittman is definitely out.

Pittman's out.

Okay, so we don't have the Pittman revenge game.

No, but I do believe in their front 7. And it's weird, the weaknesses of the Steelers I think are fine for this.

Yes, I agree.

I think you could throw on them, but not— I don't think the Colts are going to be able to.

Me either.

The Colts, so they, they really burned me week 3, the— when they upset Houston. Houston took the lead and then Indy went down and got a field goal. It was a classic, like Texans just rolling over in the last 3 minutes, but I felt like Indy stole that game. And then last week I thought Washington was going to win. I was mad that I didn't bet on Washington, that I didn't wake up in time to remember to do anything. And, and then all of a sudden your QB went out and the game, and then the 4th down and all of a sudden Indianapolis was up by 10.

Yeah.

The bigger, the only thing you didn't mention, it just makes sense the Steelers would win from a record standpoint because are the Colts really going to be 3-2? And the Steelers, you know, are headed to 9-8, so they kind of need this game. And it, I just feel like these teams are around even.

Yeah. Back-to-back road games for the Colts. The Colts are gonna come in and, and Pittsburgh doesn't make sense. I also, I think this line's a point too low as a, as a petty bettor.

Yeah.

I also think it's highly unlikely, highly unlikely that the goddamn Colts have the first penalty of the game. called on them with 9 and a half minutes left in the fucking 4th quarter. You know who can eat a fat dick? The referee crew that, that, that supervised that. The penalties in Washington and Indianapolis, going along with all of the penalties for the week, all of the NFL referees from Week 4, please enjoy it. Have a fat dick.

Oh, I didn't realize we had— I was doing my, my Callie Ursa imitation, writing down notes during your segment, not realizing I was eat a fat dick segment.

Oh, it's an eat a fat dick. We had 4 games.

So that's it. So the refs get the, get the eat a fat one this week.

Horrendous, horrendous job last week. 25 penalties in the Seahawks-Chargers game. Who the fuck is paying for that? Who was watching that? Do you understand the product? Nobody is there to watch you. And we're gonna see it this week.

Well, what was the game that had 30 penalties? That was the Chargers game, right? Chargers-Seahawks.

Did they have— I thought it was 25. Okay. It was 30. No, it was 30.

Okay, great.

I got it wrong.

I can't— I can't—

Didn't they say there were more touchdowns called back in the first 4 games this year than all that shit?

Yeah.

Yes. Oh, every, every single thing. But the, the— it was 10 to 1. Washington committed 10 penalties, the Colts only 1, and their first one and only one was with 9 and a half minutes left in the 4th quarter.

Fuck off. Well, we both have Steelers -2.5. What's your next pick?

Oh, I have to go back in.

You're back up.

Let's go. I'm on the Rams. I don't mind laying the 3.5. I don't love laying the 3.5. It was great when it was 3. I think it did, it might've opened at 2.5.

I can't recall now.

I've been betting the Rams all week.

No, it was 2.5 all week. And then by the time we got to today, all of a sudden it was 3.5. 'Cause I had them at 2.5.

Okay. I have, I definitely have them at 2.5. It was a Monday morning bet for me when I go through the card. This, this Rams team is slowly coming together under the radar because of the, the, the 2 losses that they had. But it's a very tough spot for Buffalo. The cross-country bit is hard. There's a whole bunch of numbers that talk about East Coast teams coming west and playing in primetime games. They've been not very good over the last like dozen.

You know what else is very good? Their defense.

Their defense is one of the worst.

We moved the ball on them that whole game.

400-plus yards for New England missing 3 of its 4 top receivers. So you know who's not missing 3 of its top 4 receivers? The Rams. The Rams offense is starting to look like it could be healthy. The 2 drives—

Williams was awesome last week. You have Williams and Nacua, and you have Davante.

The 2 drives they put together to win that game outright against the Eagles. Now Sirianni the moron definitely was an accomplice in, in in their own demise. And I'll be sad if he gets into the middle seat. I, I like him, you know, all season long. I want him in our lives.

Um, well, we'll bring him on the, on the BS podcast on Thursdays if he, if he becomes middle seat Sirianni.

It's always concerning when you, when you have Josh Allen, um, in a dome, uh, in primetime, um, because we've seen that offense and we've seen him especially. But a lot of people are saying, a lot of people are saying Is he still dinged? You remember there was a 4th quarter before the, the Patriots game, the game they played against the Chargers. He was limping and he was limping in his press conference.

Yeah.

And if you just look at the sheer numbers, the way that they played him under center as opposed to in shotgun, there were far fewer rush opportunities for Allen last week. And if he's dinged at all, if he's compromised at all, I really like the Rams front 7 here. So I don't mind laying the 3.5 with the Rams.

There was, uh, after we did the Sunday pod, the next day when they have all the All-22 stuff, there was the behind the, uh, Buffalo line version of the 2-point conversion, which was the secret biggest play of the game. And Kincaid is on the right. He blocks for a second and then he just pops out.

Yes.

And he's wide open. And you see the receiver running across that Allen threw it. I forget who it was. There's 2 guys on him and they're both in front of him and the ball.

and the—

and he's out of bounds if it's like— there's no chance. And Allen just follows him and throws it to him, and the play has no chance. And Kincaid is jumping up and down like this, and Allen just missed it. That was just an abominable play by him.

Yeah.

Combined with like, he threw that interception to Lasseter that Lasseter dropped.

Yes.

Um, you know, this is, I guess, what we're just gonna do with Josh Allen all year is zigzag on— he's the MVP. Wait, what's wrong with Josh Allen? I guess this is the ride because he's more like an NBA player than an NFL player.

Another thing that I saw observed out there by smart people is that it's clear that the Bills secondary is not all on the same page, that they're still figuring out the Jim Leonard scheme, and Jim Leonard himself says it's gonna take some time. Well, there's no time like right now to go up against the best offense in the NFL.

Right.

And that, to me, is the Rams when it's properly functioning with all of its tools. Bad timing for the Bills.

I'm gonna have them in some sort of dumb tease. I don't know what it's gonna be.

Don't go through the zero.

I'm going through the zero. I'm reaming it. I'm reaming it right all the way through the zero. I, I'm staying away from that game because of the cheap touchdown potential in the 3.5.

Okay.

I don't wanna mess with the hook and Josh Allen. What I do wanna mess with is a game that I like both straight up, but also I think the money line is enticing. This Cardinals line, the Cardinals line is moving away from the Cardinals. I don't understand it at all. It was 4.5 all week, now it's 5.5. They're home for the Detroit Lions and their terrible defense and their coach who thought it was a good idea to go, uh, go for it on 4th and 20 down 13 in the 4th quarter, which was the one of the 5 dumbest things I've seen.

He's a moron.

Arizona's offense, 12th in DBOA. And that's including a game in week 2 when they got their absolute asses kicked because they were playing a far better team. It was only their second home game. They battled San Francisco. They, they demolished the Chargers in week 1.

They covered against San Francisco.

They should have beaten the Giants. That, that's the one that's inside the 5-yard line. That's, that's fucking Brissett throws a pick 6.

Pick 6 right in the nuts.

I like their offense. I know Love's hurt, but, and I know Paris Johnson's out. I get it.

Yeah.

But I think they're gonna be able to move the ball against one of the worst defenses I've ever seen in my life. We did the mailbag thing earlier about the overreaction. I like that. I think they can win the game outright, but also get the cheap touchdown at the end if they're down 10.

Sure.

Goff in a dome does worry me a little bit. Gibbs and You know, but Gibbs had less touches last week, and I do think they overused him the first couple weeks. Um, and I just like the spot for the Cards. Again, this is only their second home game and it's mid-October.

It's gonna sound silly, um, to point out that, you know, Detroit is leaving points on the board when they scored 31, 31, 31, 26. Yeah, but they did cost me money last week. They should have sailed over the 27.5. That was the team total. So they can eat a, a small fat dick for sure. Not covering that.

Skin—

they can eat a skinny dick.

Yeah, skinny dick. But they had every opportunity, even with the ball at the end of that game last week, to just go get down the field.

Yeah.

You know, just, just be calm, cool, and collected about it. And, and Goff just isn't that dude. I don't know why, but you know, it was a, it was the moment called for poise. The end of that game.

I think, you know how the line changes on Sunday? Yeah, because the sharps come in late. I think this game's gonna go to— the sharps are early and late. I think this goes back down to like 3.5 by Sunday.

It could be, but now's the time to grab it, right?

Yeah, and I, I think the Cards can move the ball, right? They, they played Seattle in Week 2, they didn't move the Seattle kicked their ass. Was that who they lost to?

No.

Now I'm second-guessing myself. They got their ass kicked by somebody in week 2. I'm not gonna make a how edit this because I want people to know that I'm a human being. Yeah, it was Seattle. They lost 31 to 7.

Yes.

But they, they couldn't move the ball at all. And that's fine. I'm not saying they're world beaters, but I think they're gonna be able to move the ball against Detroit's shit defense. Now Detroit's gonna start getting some guys back soon and this might be better.

Sure.

When we get to midseason, but it's not better yet. So Cardinals +5.5 is my second pick. What do you got?

Well, I've already given 2 picks, so this is my third.

You have a pick 3 left and you have a teaser left.

Yeah, I'll, I'll do the pick and then I'll, I'll save the teaser. Gonna go ahead and ride with your New England Patriots. Gonna do it.

Pretty good case.

Laying the 3.5 at home. Um, the Raiders have had a very impressive run. It's been impressive that they've come out from the franchise that they were just 10 months ago to the franchise that they are at the moment. And you have to give it up to Kubiak, and you have to give it up to the front office. Um, you have to give it up up to Kirk Cousins, who pulled the backdoor cover out of his rear end. He shut down America.

Moving around in the pocket.

Incredible.

Big pass rush. Great job by him.

Great job by him. And that, that Chiefs team put us on notice that they can't really be trusted with that defense. I did, I did take note.

I mean, I, I— I do really, really like the rookie cornerback though.

Yeah, sure.

He's, he's been jumping outta the TV every week. Like, they seem like they hit that big—

They did a great job with Delaine Mansour, is that the guy?

Delaine.

Yeah. They're— I'm on notice with the Chiefs. I'm gonna keep an eye on— I mean, I had to bet them after week 1 with the way Kenneth Walker exploded onto the scene. I had to get out of all of my under positions with them and hedge with some overs and some division. But the Raiders, that was a very tough division game. They got the benefit of being at home. They've really sowed their oats against, you know, the, the Dolphins and the Saints and—

Yeah.

The Chargers. They showed it to us. That was good. I just like the idea of the Patriots at home getting reset. There's some great numbers that support the idea of Vrabel, especially after losing to a team the previous year. It's a, it's a funky stat. But he doesn't tend to lose to the same team.

It's funny 'cause I always feel the opposite. I hate playing the team that felt really comfortable beating us in our house the year before and somehow it's happening again.

Yeah.

Makes me nervous.

Vrabel 10-4 straight up, 11-3 against the spread. That's the Action Network pals. Also, this was a shocking stat to me. Drake Maye as a favorite of 3 or more points, guess what his record is against the spread?

It's really, really, really good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

14-0.

14-0.

I looked at it for a long time and I couldn't get there for 2 reasons. I was scared of the hook.

Okay.

Well, 3 reasons. I don't like that they won in New England the year before because they'll just be like, we won in New England last year. But the biggest thing, this is hardcore deep Patriot shit, but I really don't think we're going to be able to cover their tight ends.

Yeah.

It's, it's the weakness of this defense is speedy running backs, like in the flat basically, which is one of the many reasons that was so crazy. Buffalo only barely used James Cook in that game.

He would—

I thought he was the guy that was gonna kill us, but the tight ends, and they didn't throw to Kincaid that much either. I just don't think our linebackers are good enough over the middle, and I, I'm worried the tight ends are gonna feast. So I think of that hook, even if they're up 10, and I feel like the Raiders are gonna move the ball. So that's why I stayed away.

Okay. Fair.

We have this guy, by the way, Yakis, the 2nd round pick.

Okay.

He's, he's an edge rusher. He's fucking lights out. Like, they might've actually really nailed this pick. Go look at the, the advanced stats where they have like the best, like he's in all of that. He bull rushed Dawkins on the Bills last week and kicked his ass. Yeah, this guy's like a legit dude. I'll be interested to see if he can keep it up.

I'll look for him.

Yeah, I'm gonna do a tease. It's the most chalk tease of all time.

Let's see it.

And I thought about long and hard about whether I wanted to go chalk because last week's tease was pretty chalk too with the Bills and the Seahawks. And I didn't, I didn't have a good betting week last week in real life, to say the least. Trying to stick with the process.

You have a—

you can have a bad week every once in a while. You can't overreact.

You can't—

you just gotta— it's like golf. You can have a bad hole, just go back, try to birdie the next hole. The Jags going down to 0.5 against the Eagles in London. This breaks my rule of don't touch the London game.

Oh no, you, you don't get it at 0.5. That line is 7.5.

It's 1.5. Yeah.

Yeah, that's right. Yeah.

Sorry. 1.5 for the Jags. I just, I had the Jags last week. I just believe in the Jags. I don't think the market has corrected itself on the Jags yet. I think they're really good. So combined with the fact that Philly has their offensive line seemingly is in shambles, Barkley, I don't know how much they're getting outta DeVonta Smith this week. And I'm fully prepared to wake up with you at 6:30, 6:45 in the morning and the Eagles will be up 10-nothing.

It's fine.

Good.

Not worried. Jags is one side. And then the other side is the obvious, the Texans at 0-4 with Ryans taking back the defense.

That's right.

Going against this mess of a Titans team. And the— and I don't have to worry about the Texans looking ahead or not caring or, oh my God, we can't— we gotta keep stuff in the bag for the Jags. 'Cause this is like a season is over if they don't cover this. And I think the Titans are terrible. So they're terrible Texans. This is the easiest tease of the year, which makes me super nervous.

Well, you're violating, you know, number one rule.

I get it. I get it.

No international games. Stay away from the— you yelled at me about that last week.

I'm violating a couple rules. I'm going in with eyes wide open.

Okay.

And my clothes on.

It's the most obvious tease in America.

I just think one of these is gonna hit. We haven't had the, the obvious teases have not been doing well, and I get it, it's chalk and you got, but I just think this one, we're overthinking this and this is just gonna hit. Jags-Texans is my tease. What do you have for a tease?

Well, I have the Texans also because that, that 1.5, they're, they have been in, in this situation before where they, I think they were 0-3 last season and then beat the pants off of the off of Tennessee, which is what they, they do. I mean, their second game, they had Davis Mills last season. They still won, Houston did. But the, uh, I just—

Texans, Jags would both be down to 1.5, just to be clear. So the way to get screwed here is missed extra point in the first half.

Uh-oh.

Oh my God. Um, something else weird happens and you end up winning by 1, but you don't cover the tease. That would be That would be classic Jags. I could totally see it.

It could definitely happen.

What's your other side? So you have the Texans, and what's the other side?

I'm, I'm taking the Saints. There's a lot of interest out there. I see people taking the Saints. Um, now it had been 2.5 all week, but for some reason FanDuel has it at 1.5, and that must be because people are plowing into the Saints.

Okay.

Um, I'm just taking them north of a touchdown. They are a backdoor cover waiting to happen, this, this Saints team, um, especially after they were humiliated by Atlanta on a national platform. Um, I think the Minnesota side of this is what's compelling to me. The way that they let—

The fact that they have no receivers, Kyler Murray, and terrible running backs, and then a depleted offensive line.

You like all those things? That Dolphins game, the Dolphins really could have won that game out there.

Oh yeah.

And we know what, what that— and that was in Minnesota.

The Dolphins were carrying themselves in the second half like they thought they were about to win the game.

They sure were. They had their chances.

Yep.

I mean, we didn't need the Hockenson going down. That hurt me. I, I played that in the Ringer 107, of course, when that line went from, you know, under, under 10. On Sunday morning. Of course I went and played that Minnesota -9.5.

Yeah, 'cause you can't really say the Vikings, they couldn't even score a touchdown against Miami. They're— they could have scored a touchdown. The guy just went down on the 1-yard line, but they didn't.

They didn't score a touchdown against Miami.

So this Saints pick, I was alarmed by how bad the Saints were on Monday night. I didn't think that that went beyond just a stink bomb. They couldn't block. Their defense was, was the defense was just awful. There's, it felt like they had no chance to stop the run and the Falcons pass rush, which I guess might be good. I have no idea why, but the Falcons pass rush was in their ass all game. They're missing their left tackle Banks, who they, you know, was a top 10 pick.

Yes.

And I wonder if they've had too many injuries. To me, they're a stay away, but I appreciate your Yeah, I understand your ballsiness throwing them in there.

Just, I mean, this is just trying to take advantage of Minnesota that, you know, their defensive numbers are outstanding because they've played terrible offenses, the worst offenses in the league. And they caught, you know, Chicago in a rainstorm where Chicago, you know, had a turnover on the, on Minnesota's goal line.

All right.

For my last pick, I really wanted to take the Falcons because I loved how they looked on Monday night. And for some reason they can rush the passer and block and run the ball. And I didn't see it coming. And I thought they were gonna suck this year, but there's something really happening with them. Sunday night game, Collinsworth talking about Bijan Robinson, super excited. Sounds great. The 3.5 scares me. It looks too easy. No Lamar.

Yeah.

Huntley running around for the cheap time. I, I just, I can't trust the Falcons with the hook yet, so I'm not doing that.

Good job.

Bears-Packers.

Mm-hmm.

So close to getting there with that one. Minus 1.5 in Green Bay. Thinking long and hard about taking a backup QB in Lambeau, 'cause I think the Packers are just bad.

Yeah.

I couldn't really— I almost took the Packers. I did.

They look like such a great zag pick. There's no— they nothing— they've shown nothing over the first 4 weeks to make you trust them at all. Against Ben Johnson, who's on a fucking heater, by the way. And yet I couldn't do it. That leaves me with a -3, which I hate doing because of the tie potential. And it leaves me going against the San Francisco 49ers, who I'm terrified of during October, Halloween. They're the Michael Myers team. Every time they're dead, they fucking get back up. Well, they're jamming a wire hanger in their eye. They just get up.

They're not dead.

They just keep getting up. They was like, oh, we lost more guys. Okay, we're fine. We lost our fullback this week who we have all our good stuff for. Nah, we're fine. We'll just put somebody else in. Come on, Seattle -3. This is like too much fear of the, the 49ers halo effect. And by the way, they don't really need the game, right?

That's right.

Totally banged up. Seattle actually does need the game because they still have to play in San Francisco. It's only -3. And I'll tell you another thing with Seattle, they really found something with Wilson. I thought Wilson— and I, I have him on both of my fantasy teams because I had Ja'Darian Price, I had to get the backup— I thought Wilson was genuinely good last week, like really, like hitting holes, creating space. They're throwing the ball in the backfield to him. He's a viable NFL running back, unlike the And there's some, uh, some really shaky stats with the, with the Niners that make you wonder how— I mean, the DVOA is good, right? They're, they're 1st in offense, 5th in defense. This, it's a little, little schedule dominant, but like for havoc, that havoc stat that DeBundo loves.

Yes.

28th in havoc.

Mm-hmm.

The only teams worse are the Saints, Titans, Colts, and Giants. Seahawks pass rush win weight through week 4. Seahawks number 1, 69%.

Win rate.

Win rate.

Win rate.

Win rate. We've been podcasting for 3 hours. I don't know. I think Seattle's good due for like an ass kicking against a good team where we're like, oh shit, Seattle, they're here. And I don't think the Niners need the game. So that's gonna be my last pick.

That's a good pick. Shanahan doesn't have a great record. Um, against McDonald. I'm, I'm curious about the 3. What do you think in this modern era Seattle's home field advantage is? Isn't it 2.5? I mean, the standard home field advantage now is 1.5, right?

So you think it's, it's like 2, 2.5?

Okay. Yeah.

So they're only—

I think people are afraid of San Francisco, just point blank.

Okay.

I really wanted to take the Falcons. But the extra point killed me.

The hat, the hook.

Yeah, I really thought if it was -2.5, I think it was so impressed by them last week.

The hook against Snoop Huntley, can't do that.

Also some energy in Atlanta right now with the, the Dream, my girl Angel Reese, right? Um, the, the Hawks season about to start with the— they're thinking about trying to be a top 16.

We're gonna do our, our win totals. I mean, spoiler, I am bullish on this Hawks Oh, interesting. I am bullish on this Hawks team. Okay.

That was today's Ringer 107. It was— oh, I gotta do— I gotta tell you who we actually picked. We both have the Steelers.

Yes.

-2.5.

Good one.

You have the Rams -3.5 against Buffalo. You're not afraid of the hook against Josh Allen. I have the Cardinals +5.5 at home against the Lions. I think they can win that game outright. I also have Seattle -3. Against the Niners. You have my Patriots -3.5.

Not afraid of the Raiders against Kirk Cousins either, even though he did it last week.

You have a tease of the Texans and the Saints. Saints up to 7.5, Texans down to 1.5. I had the Texans as well in my tease, but I put the Jaguars with them. I broke the rule of don't tease the rules or parlay the London game.

I did it.

We'll be watching it together on Sunday. Hopefully the Jaguars won't be down 10-nothing when I wake up. And then FanDuel said you'll be asleep by 3:30 PM.

They're wrong.

That's wrong. They said there's gonna be Bloody Marys and beef stew and you'll be passed out during the second half of these games.

If, if not true, I'm gonna invite them to eat a fat dick. I will be wide awake. I'll be enjoying all the sports of the day.

Well, today's Rated 107 was brought to you by FanDuel. Download the app now to find all of our 107 picks. Make this your most rewarding season ever. Fan duel, player game, odd subject. To change. Haus, I'll see you on Sunday. I can't wait.

I can't wait. I can't wait to show up with the Stanley cock.

All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Mahoney. Thanks to Haus. Thanks to Pelissero. Uh, thanks to Gahow. And thanks to Jack Wilson and Chris. And, uh, and thanks to Eduardo, wherever he is. We don't know where he is. Hopefully he turns up at some point. I'm gonna be back Sunday night. We're gonna be live on Netflix. With, uh, Cousin Sal. And hopefully I'm not in a food coma, but we'll be live right after Atlanta-Baltimore. Come find us on Netflix or just listen to us or watch us after on Spotify. Enjoy the weekend. Don't forget, uh, don't forget to place a wager on UCLA because they're going to beat Oregon this weekend. Right there, UCLA 5-0. It's about to happen. See you on Sunday. Must be 21+ and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino, or 18+ and present in DC or Wyoming. Opt-in required bonus issued as non-withdrawable profit boost tokens. Restrictions apply, including any token expiration, max wager amount. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or 1-800-MY-RESET. Call 888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut or mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelpline.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24/7 support in Massachusetts.

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