Transcript of The 49ers Crush the Jet-Lag Bowl, Rams Overreactions, Bills-Texans, and Week 1 NFL Picks With Joe House

The Bill Simmons Podcast is presented by FanDuel. The NFL is here and it's the most rewarding season ever on FanDuel with the all-time FanDuel Rewards Club. Every eligible bet can earn you points. Win or lose, you still get points. The more points, the bigger the rewards you can unlock. Head to fanduel.com/BS To start earning with FanDuel Rewards Club. 21+ select states or 18+ DC, Kentucky, or Wyoming. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER, call 888-789-7777, or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut. It's the Bill Simmons Podcast. We are live on Netflix Thursday night, 4th podcast of the week. If you missed the other 3, go check out my archives. That's Joe House, who seems awake. Do you have coffee, Joe House?

I don't need coffee when we have the NFL, even if it's on the other side of the world. I was consuming everything that the good people of Australia had to give us. Noah Eagle got off every single Australian—

Sure, on the Barbie joke.

Yeah.

He got it all in.

And by the way, we call it Melbourne. Everybody calls it Melbourne. It's not Melbourne, Australia. It's just Melbourne.

Well, a lot of people don't know. We knew we were going about 25 minutes after Netflix's The game ended. They were doing a postgame show. We simulated this with House in 20 different ways to see if he napped before, if he ate before, if he didn't have food. We tried 15 different ways and we landed on this one to get the most awake House. Unfortunately, the Rams, who we found out today from Peter Schrager, who's banned from this podcast—

Banned?

Well, I don't know. He went on Part of My Take, didn't come on here. But we found out from him, he reported that the Rams tried 15 different staffers last 2 years, try to figure out the right sleep science for this. And guess what? It came up snake eyes 'cause they got their asses kicked 27-7 in Australia. I, I don't know where to begin. I'd like to thank the following people though, Haus. Thank you to the Los Angeles Rams for taking Drake Maye off the hook. It was a day-long beating for him in the national media. Now that shifts to the Rams. Drake, enjoy the next 8 days. Uh, thank you to Sean McVay for teaching us about 15-hour travel. Um, thank you to the Rams for— I didn't realize— giving us kind of an NFL villain a little bit here.

Oh, fun. Yeah, the prohibitive favorite, the, you know, the all-star team on both sides of the ball.

You know what? It's just the best defense ever that they traded 3 first-rounders for Myles Garrett and Jared Verse. They had the 13th pick in the draft and they said, we're so good, we're gonna take Matthew Stafford's successor. They were 5-to-1 to win the Super Bowl. Guess what? It's 6-to-1 now. It's already dropping. Yeah.

Kyle Shanahan said, fuck them, fuck them, fuck them boys. Fuck them boys.

You know what he did? He put a shrimp on the barbie. Oh, goddamn it.

Don't do that.

That's what he did. No, no, no. No, that's what he did.

Stop.

He took, he, he put a big koala nap on them. They, they got their asses kicked. And what's funny is this actually could have been a close game and it all came down to 17-7, 3rd down. It looked like Puka scored, tackled at like the half yard line, whatever it was. 4th down, they run a QB sneak with the decrepit Matthew Stafford. who moves like we do.

Why did they—

is it bad back? Does he have a bad knee? What are— like, what's his number one injury now? He's terrible at sneaks to begin with, and they decide to do that. It gets stuffed. The Niners go all the way down the field and end the game. I thought that was an inexplicable decision, House.

Yes, and that was the sequence of the game. The beginning of the 4th quarter, that stop followed by a 99-yard masterclass truly by Shanahan. And Shanahan was, was truly firing on all cylinders in terms of the offensive game plan. This is—

And how he shifts it during the game, right? They come out second half, all of a sudden the fullback and the tight ends are doing these little in-motion like blocking and chipping people. It's really fun to watch.

This is what we get when you get Shanahan and McVay though. They— there is this this chess match kind of thing. I'm surprised we didn't hear more folks getting on the, the 49ers side in terms of, of moving the number. Maybe there was a little bit of action. It seemed like right at the end, folks—

Yeah, it was, it was like 3.5, 3, it was threatening to go to 3. It never did. We had them at 3.5 and all day I was gonna hedge it 'cause I parlayed the, the Niners with the, with the Pats yesterday. to 4.5 each on FanDuel, and I was going to hedge that in some way today. Oh, and I didn't.

Good.

Because the more I thought about it, the sleep stuff, you know.

I'm not so sure though, really, it was about the sleep. I mean, it would, you know, reminder—

Oh, are you gonna do— are you gonna do the talking head thing? Oh, I like to go do this.

When Fred Warner plays football, when you put Fred Warner at linebacker in the middle of this playing defensive quarterback. When you have Nick Bosa rushing, rushing the passer, when those guys are on the football field, reminder that, man, that's, that's a hell of a defense right there, Bill Simmons. Yeah.

The sleep thing is insulting. It's insulting to the 49ers. This is a good football team. They didn't win because the Rams made the idiotic decision to fly in for the fucking game the night before. Now they're leaving.

If we're gonna talk about the sleep, somebody should ask Myles Garrett how he rested because there, that was kind of Those were—

he literally rested.

There were shocking numbers. Shocking numbers.

It wasn't just so he ends the game with 0 tackles and 0 pressures, which was the first time in a while. It was more than that. It was one of those, wait, is he playing? And they would mention him every so often. And I know Trent Williams was out there and I know they were shifting stuff away from him and et cetera, et cetera. But he was also not present in the game. And usually like when you would watch Myles Garrett and the Browns, You'd feel him in the game no matter what was happening, right?

Right.

He was always around. He was pushing his side of the line back. It was not happening today. It made me wonder, you know, we talked about this Rams super team and then the Niners, all their guys played today. They lost too. We'll talk about that later. But you know, Trent, Trent Williams, really good at football. Mike Evans has been one of the most consistent, really good receivers for a long time. Brock Purdy always has been an underrated quarterback. McCaffrey always has been one of, you know, Fred Warner, Bosa. It's like, these, this team's good too. Did you, did you have regrets with the Niners and how we, we approached them in the offseason? Where did you have them? I didn't even have them as a playoff team.

I took them to win this division. If you look at their schedule—

I forgot.

Yeah, you did. Yeah. Because, you know, the way it lines up for them, you know, the, the part of the assessment was if they could win this first game and if, you know, their approach to this rest plays out successfully for them, what they have over the, the next 7 or 8 games, eminently winnable, including the toughest matchup they have still in those first 8 games is Seattle, which is in a handful of weeks. And they might face Drew Lock. They might get Drew Lock because we, we We have an update on the Sam Darnold situation, just that, that he's definitely gonna miss at least one game. Um, and the question is whether it's gonna be multiple. It seems likely.

My guy's missing 4 to 6.

Yeah. And if that's the case, then it might be the case that the Niners catch Seattle with him out. But if you sit down and look at the, the Niners record, and part of why I grabbed the division number for San Francisco was because if indeed they go on this run, you're not gonna get a better price for them to win the division until, you know, much later in the season if they fall off.

Well, right now we have Rams are now +155 for the division. That was basically even, right, for the season. Seattle's +180, they're 1-0, and San Francisco's 1-0, they're +210. They're bunched together. Rams 6-1 in the Super Bowl. They're 11.5 over-under, which had some juice on it for the over, is now the under for 11.5 is -130 on FanDuel.

Yes.

They are to miss the playoffs now only +270, and that before the season I think was +420, +430, something like that.

Yeah, definitely north of 4.

What's interesting is all of us were a little suspicious of this first game and how they were playing it, and I talked about this with the fantasy guys yesterday about were they basically like rolling the dice with this game, but they didn't wanna screw up the rest of the season. Whereas the Niners are like, we're going in early, we have to win the game. And if there's ramifications after, we're fine with that. So we'll, we'll see what happened. I, I thought all the travel stuff was fascinating. I saw some tweet online, somebody tweeted like, if everyone cared about the Steve Ballmer Clippers story for the last year, like we cared about the Niners-Rams travel, this Clippers thing would've been settled a while ago. It's like, No, that's not why. I don't— I think everyone with the Clippers thing was like, just tell us when we know what happened. Give it— when the decision happens, we'll be really interested. This travel thing I talked about with everybody in my life. I thought it was fascinating. Like, how do you play it? Who's gonna be right or wrong? So are you convinced now we learned the answer, or is this just a small sample size?

Yeah, it's impossible to say. The one thing that was apparent from watching the game is that San Francisco really ingratiated itself with the community, was part of the community, engaged with Melbourne. And what do you call the good people who live in Melbourne? Are they Melbournites? Whatever.

They're Barbie shrimpers.

There was enormous support for San Francisco.

There was.

It was supposed to be on the calendar a Rams home game. It definitely was not that. It was a 49ers home game. big pops for the 49ers each time they made a successful play. And I think that did have an impact on the energy. It felt like it did. You mentioned a whole bunch of plays.

Well, the, the stadium was weird too though. Yeah. 'Cause the field was, it felt like the seats were really far away from the field. Right. It was, it's a stadium that's not built for football games.

Sure.

But the Niners had been there for 5, 6 days, so maybe they won over some people when they were there. Yeah.

Right. Yes. Demonstrated a commitment to the whole thing.

I'm gonna give you 4 possible overreactions, 'cause it is usually we have Overreaction Monday after week 1, but now we have Wednesday and Thursday games, so we get more overreactions. 4 overreactions. Pick one. Pick, if you had to put your hat on one, gimme 'em. Matthew Stafford looks washed. Myles Garrett is actually overrated. Rams super team momentum is already dead, or the 49ers are the best NFC West team. Out of those 4 possible overreactions, which one do you like?

The super team being dead one. That's the one. That's the one that feels closest to the, to the truth. I, I, we were skeptical from the get-go about this. I mean, you know, the super team for the Rams, we're not gonna see it until it gets to be playoff time and we'll know by then How healthy they are.

The Rams are an NBA team. Yeah. This is like what we have in the NBA where it's like, judge them in mid-May. We'll see how that goes. In the NFL, it's judge them in round 1.

Judge them in January. That's right.

Yeah. They left Aaron Donald home. I will say out of those 4, Matthew Stafford looks washed. Myles Garrett overrated. Rams super team momentum already dead. San Fran's the best NFC West team. I thought Stafford was terrible. I thought he missed a bunch of throws. I thought he looked old. I didn't like the way he was moving around.

He had 9 completions through 3 quarters. Is that good?

He missed a couple wide-open guys on some big throws. I thought he put Puka in danger a couple times. And just in general, I didn't, you know, it's week 1. He'll probably be fine. I remember last year, the beginning of this season, he also looked a little shaky, but that was one of the many things to worry about with this Rams team, the 38-year-old quarterback and the, you know, who's had some injury and some wear and tear, things that are against him. Okay, couple more things. I underestimated Mike Evans and Deebo. I was going glass half empty on those 2.

Mm-hmm.

Mike Evans, who get— plays 11 to 13 games a year, and you catch him at the right points of the season, he looks awesome. You had Deebo last year in Washington. It looked like he was semi-washed. Maybe it's just one of those things where he has to be on this team to look like Deebo.

Yeah, and I wouldn't say that Deebo looked washed here in Washington. He just— the role that they imagined for him, they— he couldn't fulfill and they couldn't really put into place because they had injuries right away.

Yeah.

Austin Ekeler got hurt at the very beginning of the season, and that completely changed how Washington wanted to attack the ball on offense. So we never really got to see the version of Deebo that Washington had in mind. I will say this, he was smaller and he looked more spry tonight than at any point during his time with Washington. He was much bigger in, in size and playing a role that, you know—

You think he's doing hot water and lemon?

Among other things, for sure. Yes.

And Mike Evans looked great. Somehow the, uh, the 49ers electric substation, even though they were across the world, it still claimed 2 victims tonight. Oh, they lost— Stribling hurt his ankle and it looked like Ton just got hurt. But Tom Pelissero from The Ringer, who did the Netflix game tonight, he was saying, uh, didn't look like either of those are season-enders. So people were worried the Stribling thing was an Achilles, um, injury. Twitter was in rare form with slow-mos of non-contact, but it seems like it was an ankle. So, okay.

Let's knock on wood for that.

Unless you took him on your fantasy team. Uh, I thought McCaffrey's backup.

Oh, electric. His name is Black. Is that his name?

Yeah.

They, yeah, Black.

They just keep finding these guys. You're like, who's this guy? It's like, oh, this guy's good. It was like when they got Mostert that time and they, Jordan Mason, like over and over again, they just find these guys.

Oh, you say like Emmanuel Wilson, right? Jordan Wright. Exactly. That's, that's what they do.

So this guy came in, he had a big, I think he played like 16 snaps in the first half. They kept McCaffrey fresh. They unleashed him, leashed him at the top of the 3rd quarter when Deebo has a big kick return. McCaffrey breaks off 2 runs. All of a sudden it's 17-7 and we feel like we have, we have a game.

Yeah. Then just to, just to put a quick, you know, side note reminder, Rams special teams still suck. Like, you know, another game-altering play from the Rams special teams. They're coming out of, of the halftime tunnel, they kick the ball off, and Deebo has a huge return to keep the momentum for San Francisco.

I wonder if the Rams special teams staff also did the travel preparation for— no, no, we'll go right before, it'll be great. The 49ers D with Warner back was— I wanted to see it. I wasn't against him. Like, I was like, oh no, he's not gonna— but I just wanted to see him look like Fred Warner again. And he did.

He did.

Both solo.

11 tackles, 5 solo. That's pretty good. Yeah.

The big, the big revelation from today, they ran an ad at one. My wife joined for a little bit 'cause I had the tennis on the, on the small left TV.

Mm-hmm.

Coco Gauff honestly like left it on the table there in the, in the third.

I hate to see it.

Third set. Tough one. But they ran an ad for the Wednesday night Netflix game before Thanksgiving.

Okay.

Did not go over well at my house. Oh, no.

Because she didn't know that there was a Wednesday night game.

I literally wasn't going to tell her. I was going to hide it. I was just going to hide it the whole time. So she was like, wait a second, didn't they have a Friday game a couple of years ago, the day after Thanksgiving? I was like, yeah, they did. And she was like, so now there's a game on Wednesday? I was like, apparently I didn't know. I tried to pretend I didn't know. And then she's like, but then there's also the Thanksgiving games. And I was like, yeah. And then she's like, but then they're also going to have Sunday and Monday. I'm like, yeah. And she was like, fuck this. Fuck football. Football can fuck off. Say this on your podcast. Football can fuck off. Furious.

That Wednesday night is one of the great nights in America. I mean, it's one of the all-time best. It's where everybody's coming. has arrived from out of town. Everybody's getting together. It's, it's joyous because of what's on, on tap for the next day.

So now we need a football game playing on the TV during all this. That's what I said to her. I was like, it's really for the people in bars.

It's kind of true. And the bars are—

It's a happy day.

It's a very happy day.

Well, she didn't like it. Yet another reason she doesn't like Roger Goodell. Um, other than that, I don't know. San Francisco looked like they were in midseason form already and the Rams looked like they were still in the preseason. So I don't know what to make of these games. And the season is now 18 weeks and takes forever to play. There's gonna be a million injuries. I think the one thing that today did for real was it threw some water on whatever this super team people had in their heads with the Rams. I thought it was outta control.

Yes.

The whole offseason.

Yes.

They need a lot of things to go right from a health standpoint. They're a top-heavy team. And there's other really good teams and 2 of them are in their division. So that's right. So that's, those were my big takeaways. Do you have anything else? Did you win money?

I did win money because I had teased the Patriots and under 50.5 yesterday with the San Francisco 49ers plus 9.5 today. So that was a big fat winner. That was a good one. I liked that one.

Yeah.

So I did win money.

You know what wasn't winning is putting the Rams in anything.

I didn't do it. I, I—

Like, literally anything, any sort of points thing, any sort of tease. If you had any of their fantasy guys, I'm sorry. It was just across the board, not great.

It was too many points for what we've seen out of this matchup over the years. And I understand the question marks surrounding the San Francisco defense. But man, Kyle Shanahan, whatever injuries he suffered from his car accident, he is over them cuz that man cooked tonight.

I parlayed the Niners +3.5 with Schrager not coming on the podcast this week, but going on a different one. My friend Shregs. Come on, Shregs. He, he shouldn't text us for a while. I'll just say that.

No, he can't. I want him to.

No, it's—

he went on the golf pod this week. He tagged me this week.

He went on the golf pod. He's on the shit list. He's on my shit list now. He's gotta really make it up.

He's gotta— if he takes us out to a great Italian meal, we'll be back. I'll be back.

That's all it takes for me. Really upsetting.

I'm so easily upsetting.

He had a new thing to promote. I'm not even gonna promote it now. You know what? Whatever. Schrager's up to stuff. Good luck to him. Uh, we are gonna take a break.

Sure.

We're gonna come back. We have Ringer 107.

Yeah. Oh, let's go.

By the way, we, so we're 2 games in in week 1, 2 underdogs and 2 unders. So what does that mean?

It's an all-time under week.

Yeah. 'Cause there's no preseason anymore. Everybody's learning how to play football.

Almost 70% to the under. So yeah, beware as, as you look at, at the Sunday slate. Beware of, of jumping in on overs.

Yeah.

Proceed cautiously.

Okay. Well, I'll give that, that, that, uh, that Australia game, I'm gonna give a C-. Only one team showed up. Oh, I, I mean, it's still, it, it was mildly entertaining, but it was, it was, the Niners were prepared and the Rams were not.

I give it an A+ because why? I don't know if the referees, when they arrived, 6 total penalties in the whole game. Do you rec—

right.

Do you like very quietly in the back of my head, I was really enjoying No goddamn yellow flags anywhere to be seen. Just let them play. 2 very good teams, no penalties. Last, the, the, the Seattle-New England, false start here, illegal shift there. Come on, man. Let's, let's play football. We got that tonight.

Well, you know what the other thing with the Netflix, for some reason there were, I felt like there were less ads. I thought the first half moved fast.

Yes.

Did you notice that?

Yes.

They were like scoring or like somebody would kick a field goal. Kickoff. We just stayed on the field. We're running plays again. Yeah, it was, it was pretty good. Okay. All right. We're gonna take a break. We're gonna come back with Harlan Coben's Week 1 NFL picks. I just said that to help with the Netflix algorithm, but okay. Now we're gonna take a break and come back, and House and I are gonna bang out some picks on Pump Buddy. The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. You know how NFL Sundays go. Start with the early games, roll into the late ones. Before you know it, Sunday Night Football is kicking off, and then you're watching me and Sal do Guess the Lines that night. You know the drill at this point. FanDuel has something for you every step of the way with the Sunday Spectacular. We're talking rewards throughout the day from the first games kicking off all the way through Sunday night. And if you're listening to our Thursday night podcast every week, House and I are going back and forth our 4 favorite bets of the week for Ringer 107, our big contest that we're having.

Heading toward that Sunday. And then we're going to post one extra last-minute Saturday. We're going to post on social as we get closer to the kickoff. So feel free to ride us. We're feeling really good this year. Wherever the NFL Sunday takes you, keep an eye on the FanDuel app to see what's waiting for you. Maybe take the Steelers this week. That— I think that's my favorite bet. It's a full day of football with more ways to get rewarded along the way. Download the app to check out the Sunday Spectacular. And make this your most rewarding season ever with FanDuel. 21+ select states or 18+ DC, Kentucky, 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 PNC Bank. In today's sports, everyone is constantly trying to outdo each other. Trick formations, infield shifts, constant rotation changes. And yet it's proven time and time again that strong fundamentals are the thing that will lead you to victory. And banking is no different. While everyone tries to outdo each other, PNC Bank just keeps going right down the middle with steady, calculated money moves.

And the financial wins, they just keep coming. PNC Bank, brilliantly boring since 1865. Brilliantly boring since 1865 is a registered mark of the PNC Financial Services Group Incorporated. PNC Bank, National Association member, FDIC. Today's Ringer 107 Picks are brought to you by FanDuel. Make this your most rewarding season ever. That's what we're, we're going to try to do. Download the FanDuel app, check out all of our 107 Picks and our boosted teaser every week this season. All right, House, we've been waiting for this all spring, all summer. We've been waiting for redemption. We are doing Ringer 107 again. We're changing the rules in general, but also for this podcast, you're getting your own 5 picks. I'm getting my own 5 picks. We're doing 4 today. One has to be a teaser. And then on top of that, we get to do a social media pick on Sunday. That's our 5th pick, which is hilarious because we told Raheem this today. And Raheem, who is the reason we added this rule, because all he did all weekend was would be complaining about how the lines moved and it changed. And he hates locking in these picks on Thursday.

and 2 people on Twitter said something to him and he's upset. And then we tell him we're doing this. And then he asked on our text thread today, can I put in all my picks on Friday morning? And it was like, we created the rule for you. So the Raheem rule, the Raheem rule, and he didn't even wanna use it. So Raheem was teasing himself through the zero. Anyway, shout out to Raheem.

Shout out to the Dream. Love the Dream.

So we added the teases because we brought the teaser back on FanDuel this year. They're gonna do a whole teaser promotion. 6-point, -110 juice.

There we go.

Up to $50 bets and we're doing it.

Old school, baby.

So that's gonna be one of our things.

For a teaser. Goddamn, let's go.

So for us, we were talking about going back and forth and if somebody makes a pick, the other person can't use it. But we also wanna win this Ringer 107. There's gonna be prizes. So what we're gonna do, even if you take a pick and I decide I like it, I'm gonna say I'm gonna piggyback on yours and we're gonna keep track of the piggybacks all year. And that's just going to be a code of honor. Yeah. Who piggybacked the other guy's picks more?

Oh, okay. Good, good.

Because I'm going to try not to piggyback your picks.

But we want to give the people lots of things to consider, lots of, uh, ways of looking at the world. We, as we've advanced into our, uh, you know, AARP stage of life, we see the world the same way quite a bit. You know, quite, quite often. So we'll probably—

You and I see the world the same way.

That's what I just said. You and I see the world the same way.

Yeah.

I didn't know where you were going with that.

I got nervous for a second.

No, we, we, we're, we're more aligned than not these days.

So yeah. Like we see a story like Aaron Rodgers complaining on a podcast that he proposed to Shailene Woodley, but she has to have sex with somebody one more time. And you and I are probably gonna have the same reaction to that, which we don't need to share in a podcast.

That's right.

But I think you and I are on the same wavelength on that whole story.

The whole thing's a little suspicious, that's all.

So every week we're gonna alternate. This week, because it's Week 1, you're gonna go first with your first pick, then I'll go with mine, and we'll keep going. We should mention, I really like this season. I like the Week 1 slate. I remember last year being not just like trying to talk myself into certain matchups. This one It's an embarrassment of riches. I had multiple things for the tease. The lines line up to like teams I really liked heading into the season going against teams I didn't like that much heading into the season. And we had on Wednesday, I thought was a good example of the Pats line seemed a little high. They covered this Australia game. Just throw it out. I think with the travel and stuff where we've learned nothing from that, we are gonna learn stuff from these Sunday games. House, you have the first pick. What are you gonna do?

Let's go. So this will be— you, you just hit on this. I want to bet immediately on teams that I have a favorable opinion of for the entire season. I just wanna get right into— not a lot of foreplay. We're going right to the meat of the matter. And that's why the first pick here is the Houston Texans at home catching points from the Buffalo Bills, which is Really just a wonderful opportunity. Couple ways of looking at this. In the first place, Josh Allen has had a problem with the Buffalo Bills and especially the Buffalo— no, Josh Allen against the Houston Texans. The Houston Texans. Yes, that's what I meant to say.

Was it 1-4 lifetime?

1-4 and 0-4 when they play in Houston. I think that this Houston defense is absolutely magnificent coming into this season. They're the best defense in my opinion. even with the outstanding performance that we saw last night from the Seattle Seahawks. That's pretty good defense. Even we have the—

Your Wise Guys Show, and on this podcast, we were all in on the Texans across the board.

That's 100% correct. And, and part of that is on the offensive side of the board for me. And I think that this Texans offense has an enormous, uh, you know, space to, to improve into. You have to remember that they had new offensive coordinator Nick Kehley last year, and he had in mind a rush attack that never materialized. It could not come together because Joe Mixon got hurt at the beginning of the season and didn't play a single down. I think—

And by the way, the guy they replaced him with is no longer playing football, Nick Chubb. He is retired.

And, and, and Woody Austin's a fine 3rd down.

Woody Marks. Yeah.

Marks. Yeah. Austin Marks. I'll get it.

Hey, we're up to— it's a week 1 start. Yeah.

Yeah.

But now they have David Montgomery, who you and I both love, who is both kind of a sneaky fantasy guy and he's a move the chains, 4 yards a carry, good around the end zone. He's serviceable.

Yes, exactly. So I mean, in making the case for Houston, the one unit that I trust in this game is, is the defense. And, and I, they've done a really nice job. They have exactly the right personnel. to cabin up Josh Allen. And we've seen it, you know, with our, with our own eyes. And I think that there's tons of potential for this Houston offense. I, I think that I wouldn't mess with this game if Houston was favored, and I think they should be favored, but there's just too good of an opportunity here.

It's in the tic-tac zone. It's Buffalo by 1.5. I think Houston should be favored by 1.5. So I'm with you. There's also the Ke'Shawn Booty where the Pats trade him, AJ Brown gets hurt, they don't have Ke'Shawn Booty to put in for AJ Brown, and I just know he's gonna do something in this Texans game.

Yeah, there's a giant question mark surrounding this Bills defense. New defensive coordinator, oh yeah, Jim Leonard coming over from the Broncos. There's a personnel question at all 3 levels with this Bills defense. And if the Texans— How about this?

They sucked last year.

They They did.

Whenever people wanted to go down the field on them, they did. And what's going to be better about it this year?

One of the worst run defenses in the NFL last season. Um, I kind of expect to see the same. So if Houston comes out and establishes the run, then I really like what they can do. Obviously the Houston offensive line, you don't, you're not going to go crazy for that. The only pushback for this is, you know, um, you're betting against Josh Allen numbers.

Yes.

The numbers are incredible. And interestingly, CJ Stroud, 3 seasons, 0-6 against the spread in the first 2 weeks of the season. So, but that, you know, that, that's, that, that's the counterbalance to, you know, this, this Houston angle. It's just some, some trend stuff.

There's some good, there's some good football nerd stuff with this matchup too. Like the kind of defense the Texans have where they can spy Allen and they can, They can basically just make him for— DJ Moore will be the big X factor that they didn't have last year. Can he get open? But I don't know, I just, I think Texans, I think they have the best defense in the league and this is the perfect defense to go against Josh Allen.

It, it's Patriot, the super nickel. He's like, not just nickel, he's super nickel. So I love that. That's what I, that's what you're getting at.

And I, and I— So the fear would be CJ Stroud would be the, would be the fear that he just basically does what he did in the playoffs last year. I, uh, I had them down as a straight up as well, but I moved them into the teaser section. Oh, which, which, um, I might as well just do now as my first pick.

Great.

Um, nothing more fun in a teaser than taking a home team you'd like to possibly win anyway and bringing them over the 7. So with the 6-point teaser, you can bring them to +7.5, which is just wonderful because This is either— I think this is either a one-score game or Houston kicks their ass, but they'll— I think they'll hang around. I think they're gonna win, but I'm happy to take the +7.5. Um, and in general, I think they're the best AFC team.

I wanna pat you on the back for this Houston tease leg, especially because these games are always super low scoring between these teams. They don't combine for many points when they play. So that +7.5 is very valuable in that context.

And they have a top 5 field goal kicker. They're home. I just, I'd like getting that many points. And I'm gonna put that with the Jaguars -2.5 with the caveat, I know this is an obvious pick. They're home, they're 8.5-point favorites against the Browns. It's Deshaun Watson. I have a bunch of reasons I like this one. I don't really like the Jaguars that much this year. I, they'll be somewhere 9-8, 8-9, whatever. But this is a nice spot for them. 2 things. One, we have 2 more chances in our lives to bet against Deshaun Watson. This week.

This is one of them.

And next week. And then we'll never have the chance again unless it's a situation where he's like the third-string quarterback on a team that has a situation like what the Falcons had this week where the top 2 guys are out. So I just wanna enjoy this and enjoy our, our, our last stretch here with having money against him and watching him throw grounders to guys crossing the middle and fumble and scramble at the wrong times and throw it in triple coverage. That will be fun.

It's so sad because the Browns actually have some weapons and talent on offense, right?

And maybe by week 3 they'll unleash them. The other thing, and we talked about this, um, maybe Sal and I talked about it Sunday, it— the weather is going to be hot and humid in Jacksonville. They're saying low 90s with the humidity way higher than that. It might be a little drizzle. It's just gonna suck. It's gonna be like, uh, you know, like a Miami Vice episode basically. So You have a road team that normally is, you know, playing outdoors in Cleveland, dealing with the humidity. You have Deshaun Watson, who's already got enough obstacles against him. You have a brand new coach. You have no Jim Schwartz for the Browns defense, who always seemed like he was worth a couple wins.

Yeah.

And this is one of those, if the Jags can't win by 3, punt the season with them. Like, that, then that, that tells me they're gonna be like a 7-10 team. So My teaser is Texans +7.5, Jaguars -2.5. Jaguars keep it a 1-score game and the, and the Jags just have to win by, by 3. Feeling pretty good about that one as my first.

So this is an incredible segue because, shocker, I also have the Jaguars as one of the legs in my teaser for all the reasons you just laid out, but most prominently one of our last cherished opportunities to bet against Deshaun Watson. That's the number one thing here for sure.

They should have a ceremony before they go game.

Well, we could—

people should walk— all the, all the different people who run the online sportsbooks, the CEO should come out. Christian could come out from FanDuel. He could give Deshaun a watch. Thank you for your service. You've made so many bettors money over the years. We know you have 2 weeks left. Here you go. Um, I just— it's, it's, it's somewhat emotional. 3 weeks from now, we'll never have this chance again.

It's emotional to our pocketbooks for sure. Other leg for me of the, of the tease, and there are many, many good candidates. I love your Houston leg. I'm putting it with the Lions where the line has moved from 7.5 down to 6.5. So not getting the benefit of moving through, but the Lions down to a half point from 6.5 down to a half.

Yeah.

So Lions winning outright. at home against the New Orleans Saints as a teaser leg. It's a kind of a must-play. I mean, for sure the Saints have a lot of pundits blowing smoke up their skirt for this upcoming season. I understand all the reasons that Kellen Moore seems like he's a pretty damn good coach.

Wait, do, do you understand the reasons? Well, because I don't really understand the reasons.

It's the Shuck and Kellen Moore when they went on their little mini run over the last portion of last year against a bunch of bad teams. Yeah.

You could Pick apart easily with the schedule they played.

Bad teams and bad quarterbacks. And, and, but New Orleans did beat them. They did. And they did beat the Buccaneers, which really had a big role in keeping the Buccaneers out of the playoffs and kept them from winning the stinky NFC South. I still have questions about the Saints defense, and I think this Detroit team is absolutely loaded on offense. There is some moving parts on the offensive line that are a tiny bit concerning, and it's fine to point at the holes in the secondary for Detroit, you know, with, with, um, Branch and Joseph both out. And well, there's going to be—

and Terron Arnold gone. Yeah, there's going to be a week abroad. There's going to be a week in these first 4 weeks when they get absolutely torched by a QB. I don't think this is the week.

And, and even if this you know, kind of ends up a shootout kind of thing, uh, I'll just take the, the half point. That'll be fine. All I'm asking them to do is win the football game in this tease context. And the, the, the, the, uh, Dan Campbell record is, is wonderful. I mean, he's, he's great against the spread. He's great in the opening part of seasons.

Yeah.

He has one of the strongest against-the-spread records in season openers. Uh, this Lions team has something to prove. They're forecasted to get to 11 wins. This better be one of the wins. So I'm playing them as the, the other leg of my teaser.

I thought it was curious that the line dropped.

Uh-huh.

And I think it dropped under a touchdown because of the cheap touchdown potential with Shuck, who we watched do in the second half of last year against a Lions team that the secondary is shaky, where this is like Lions are up 14 with 3 minutes left and Shuck does the drive and all of a sudden And I think that's why it went down. I think the way you played it, this was my backup choice for a tease. Mm-hmm.

Okay.

The Lions. So there's 3 teams that could really fuck you on a, on a big-ass tease. One is the Lions who you took, one is the Jaguars who I took, and then the third one would be the Chargers if you wanted to bring them down to 3.5.

Mm-hmm.

I gotta be honest, I looked at that Chargers game. The Cardinals were the other team I was looking at for a tease, and I backed off because they're the Cardinals. But that line is -9.5. I have no— are we sure the Chargers defense is— I kind of like the Chargers, but are we sure their defense is even gonna be that good this year? And getting that up to 15.5 with the way the Cardinals had some of the garbage time shit they did last year, I was like, that seemed kind of appetizing.

They might be the king of the kings of the backdoor this upcoming season with LaFleur. I mean, this is why I've been cautious with my Arizona exposure this season. They have talent on offense. I mean, they still have weapons across the board and they still have, you know, running backs.

They can block a little bit too.

Yeah. Yeah.

Wasn't bad last year. I don't know. A lot of running backs, like they have big play potential with 2 receivers plus Jeremiah Love, receiver room plus Trey McBride.

Like, I don't, I don't wanna be on the wrong side of the backdoor with that one.

I thought +15.5 was enticing, but ultimately I didn't wanna do it. All right, so you have 2 picks. I, I gotta do this one next. I just love the Bucs this week.

Okay.

And I like the Bucs in general this season. They're +3.5 in Cincinnati. Cincinnati has been a very sexy preseason team. We've talked about it for the last couple weeks of pods. I like this spot for a couple reasons. One, this line is basically saying they think Cincinnati is 2 points better than the Bucs 'cause the, the -1.5 is a neutral field. I just completely disagree with that. I think these 2 teams are— I would, I would have them even. And I think the Bucs might actually be a slight, slight more talent proficient. What's the opposite of deficient? Proficient?

Sure.

Talent pro. talent loaded. I'm still—

talent affirmative.

Talent affirmative. I don't know. I just like their team more. This feels like a back and forth game. There's some unbelievable stats with the Bengals in week 1, which we just forget every year with Zach Taylor.

Yeah.

Every year they, they look awful in week 1. Last week they almost lost to the Browns. Was that 17-16 game, which I think they fucked everybody over on the tease if I remember correctly. I think they were favored by like 8 or 8.5, and somehow they won but didn't cover the tease. I don't trust Zach Taylor at all. This whole Joe Burrow is gonna be under center a lot more this year when he's the— all the stats say he's bad when he's under center. That worries me. And I like the Bucs. I just, I think this team's pretty good, that they had a great draft, and I think they can go in there and throw some punches. It feels to me like an either-or 3-point game. Somebody's gonna have the ball at the end with a chance to win. And I think the Bucs could win. I like the money line too in this game, House, but, uh, for the purposes of our contest, I will go Bucs +3.5.

That's interesting. You will— part of the thing also that I like, you know, the Buccaneers are coming in off of a failure-to-cover streak. They haven't covered 9 straight games. So I like this one coming in, you know, sort of angle-wise. Um, but the, the real compelling thing is these, these, uh, home openers.

With Zach Taylor.

Yeah. And he's, he's 4-8 against the spread, uh, in terms of, um, the first 2 games of the season. So, right, right.

Um, so Bucs, they're +168 for, uh, for the money line if you wanted to potentially put them with another dog. And we'll talk about some of the other dogs. All right, you have the 3rd pick. What is it?

I am going with, and this is against one of your rules, but I don't know if it applies in week 1. I'm going to a shit game and it is the New York Jets at the Tennessee Titans.

Listen, you think I'm surprised that you're doing this? You have 9 Jets bets. You might have 10 Jets. How many Jets bets have you made in the last 3 months?

I have said, and you know, the Jets is, I have the Jets a million ways on teaser legs as well. So yes, I have the Jets all over the place. Many of those bets that I'm referring to when I'm making the references in our threads about having Jets exposure, it's in this, the tease context. I have them teased with Houston. I have them teased with the Jags.

I have them teased with a lot. I just can't put bad teams in a tease. I'm going to really try not to do that this year. I like the straight up, the, the Salah revenge game is funny because I don't, does he even have revenge in him? I don't know. No, no, they looked—

he has, he has semen in him. I mean, he does have that.

He has, yeah, his 9 kids. Right. But they had probably the worst buzz of any AFC team in the preseason.

Right.

Like they, at the beginning of August, people were seriously looking at them as like, could that be a worst to first? Right. Could that be the Patriots this year? They fit a lot of the profile. by the end of the preseason, people were wondering if they could win 4 games. So, um, I like this a lot. It scares me. I would— it's a stay away for me because of, uh, what we saw from Geno last year, which is now— it's funny, is the— we get amnesia with all this stuff, but Geno was really reprehensibly awful last year. And now it is because in September of the new year, it's like, well, his offensive line was terrible and he didn't have any weapons and Bowers got hurt half the year.

And it's like, All those things are true.

Or he was awful. I don't— or maybe it's both. Maybe those things were true and he was awful.

Both things could be true. Um, it is—

he might be completely washed though.

He might be, but they have a vastly superior offensive line with the New York Jets than, than what he experienced with the Raiders. This, this might even be— and, and, you know, folks can look it up and see— this offensive line for the Jets Might be better than the offensive line that Geno played with in Seattle before he jumped over to the Raiders. You can go back and look. That Seattle team was, was decent, but that offensive line could not establish the run. I think that this offensive line against the Titans— and the Titans front 7 is good, and that's the strength of the team— but I think they're going to be able to establish the run very quietly. The Jets did something that was curious. They, they gave us the indication they were going to be in rebuilding mode. And then they went out in the offseason and got a bunch of talent. They got talent on both sides of the football.

We all like them.

Especially defensively.

Yeah, we had like 7, 8 wins possibly for them.

Yeah. So I, I look at this, uh, offense and, you know, you, you, they establish a run with Breece Hall. Um, they, they have, uh, A.D. Mitchell joining, you know, opposite, uh, Garrett Wilson.

Looks like Cooper— it didn't seem like Cooper had a good preseason. That was one where they thought, 'cause it was like the Jets have 3 first-rounders and it's unclear if Cooper's gonna play. So counters to the Jets buzz here, they're the Jets. That would be my biggest counter.

It's a good counter.

You just have to keep your guard up at all times. I like that you're playing them straight up and that you're not putting them in a tease. I'm with you. I think they should be favored in this game. I think when Sal and I did Guess the Line Sunday, I think I was off by 4 points on this 'cause I just assumed the Jets— why are the Titans favored Against anyone other than Miami. Yeah, Miami is the only team, right?

Right. That's, that's the point here. That, that, and it was, there was a time I think this line opened at 2.5 and it's, you know, bet down to 1.5, which tells you a little bit of something directionally about the market. But the, the Titans over the last 3 seasons haven't been favored very often. They're 1-8 against the spread as a favorite. So I'll go ahead and take that. I, I like this, uh, Jets team. If we are going to get to a Jets over, then this is one of the wins, right? And that's part of the priors.

They're not going 7-10 or 8-9 if they don't win this game. I think that's fair. All right, we're gonna take a break and then we're gonna do the rest of the picks. And now it's time for a special part of today's episode brought to you by our buddies at NFL Sunday Ticket. With NFL Sunday Ticket and YouTube TV, you get every game every Sunday all in one place, and I cannot recommend it highly enough. YouTube, as you know, has crowned me their CMO, their Chief Multi-View Officer. It's my job to tell you which 4 games deserve a spot in your multi-view this week. Well, obviously Tampa-Cincinnati, fantasy guys galore. I love Tampa just in general this season, and I don't like Cincinnati that much, so you can guess where I'm standing on that one. Buffalo-Houston is the best game of the week.

Cleveland-Jacksonville.

Just from a what's going to happen with the Cleveland quarterback situation, plus Jacksonville scores a lot of points. I have my eye on that one. And then my last pick would be Baltimore at Indianapolis. Baltimore as road favorites. Indianapolis, all the signs pointing toward them being frisky, at least for this one. So those would be my 4. Also keeping an eye on Atlanta-Pittsburgh as well for financial reasons. For You can guess what I'm talking about there. That is the beauty of multiview. You don't just have to watch Houston-Buffalo, which is gonna be awesome. Fit 3 other games in there as well. Instead of flipping channels every 2 minutes, you just build your own Sunday slate. New users can get NFL Sunday Ticket for 8 payments of just $30 a month. Get every game, every Sunday, all in one place with NFL Sunday Ticket and YouTube TV. New users pay $240 or 8, 8 non-cancelable payments of $30 a month, first charged at purchase. Availability varies with NFL Sunday Ticket for out-of-market games and YouTube TV TV for local national games. YouTube TV required. Terms, restrictions, and embargoes apply. Commercial use excluded. No refunds. All right, coming back.

I have 2 picks left. You have 1 pick. This one is easy. I can't believe it's still on the board. It might be our first piggyback. Cowboys Sunday night, -2.5 against the Giants. I think this line's inexplicable. It's been between 2.5 and 3 all week. By the time when we locked down the lines on Thursday, it was Cowboys -2.5. I'm grabbing it. Dak has had a lot of success against the Giants and in general this whole division.

Yeah.

This isn't the Giants team that I think we're gonna see probably in Week 8 when they have all their dudes back. Like, we're not getting, you know, 70 plays from Nabers in this, in this game. They don't have Wandale Robinson this year, which I think people forget. He, he had 1,000 yards for them last year. He's on the Titans now. And look, this is a classic. I was high on the Cowboys, I was low on the Giants, and it's a borderline miracle that they're playing each other and that this is the line. I honestly do not understand the line. I think the line should be Cowboys -4.5. This is a case of people are like, ah, suspicious of this Cowboys thing. And it's like, I think they're gonna be really good. I don't love that they lost their All-Pro guard right before the season. That's my only fear. Especially against this Cowboys defensive line. But, uh, but man, if you think the Cowboys are gonna be good this year, you have to take them in this game. So Cowboys -2.5.

I'm taking 'em.

Is this a first piggyback?

This is a piggyback. Oh, all right. Looking at my notes, I had them right here. I could not agree more vigorously with the proposition that this, this is, uh, underpriced. And it's, it's a market that is reflecting sentiment that is not in alignment with reality. This is a, a, a Harbaugh-driven, he's going to come right the ship. Look at the offensive coordinator. This is the thing that really pushes it. I know. Go ahead.

Let's do it.

You're gonna put Jaxson Dart in the hands of, of, of Matt effing Nagy? Show me the last time that we saw Matt Nagy Give us anything that looked like innovation, that looked like modern football. I mean, this is a wonderful opportunity. So if this Dallas defense has any of the potential that we've come into this season anticipate, we better see it because their offensive line remains to my way of looking at it shaky. It is not a top half of the league offensive line.

Yeah.

Neighbors, who the hell knows? It's a, it's a, it's a receiver room. Wandale, Wandale going abroad is not helpful to Dart. He was Dart's safety blanket. Go, go take a look.

Yeah.

Scadaboe coming off of, you know, that, that bad injury. This is not a team that, that is built to hang in with the, the Dallas Cowboys within a field goal. unless Dallas's defense looks like last year. And that's the big open question.

Yeah.

The other element of this, they've made trades, they've spent money. Yeah.

They've spent draft picks. Like, and as the Bundo pointed out on Ringer Wise Guys, 17 of the 26 guys from last year's defense no longer play professional football. That seems relevant.

That's interesting.

But they, look, their defense, I mean, it's, you could say the same about Cincinnati and you could honestly say the same about the Lions. Their defense just needs to be somewhere between 14 and 17 for them to be a 10-win team. I think that's gonna happen, especially with the schedule they have. Yeah.

Giants secondary is, is super gettable. You're, you're gonna let Dak cook with the weapons that he has. I mean, this is— they better get the, the pass rush. No Dexter Lawrence. Okay, well, let's see what, what this, this, when Dexter Lawrence isn't occupying 2 linemen, let's, let's go ahead and see what these other guys have in 'em.

You also have the Brandon Aubrey factor. That's worth 3 points.

Yes.

You have a Giants home game, but you know there's gonna be Cowboy fans there. You know it.

100%.

I don't know how many Cowboy fans, but they're gonna be there and they're gonna be loud.

So, um, the one thing that we'll just confess upfront, we are putting ourselves in harm's way with one of the most compelling Week 1 trends.

Go ahead, talk about this.

Divisional home dogs. You go back 20 years when 2 teams inside the same division are playing each other. And one of them is at home as an underdog. They are 27-16 against the spread. This is from the good people at Action Network, 11-4 against the spread since 2018, 19-6 against the spread since 2012, 25-9 against the spread since 2000. So all of the more recent vintage reflects that that home dog is valuable, that home Yeah, but I think the line reflects that.

And I— and the Seattle-New England line on Wednesday night was the same thing because it was 3.5. And I think, I think it was as high as it was because of the Super Bowl and the loser and all the— it was basically an extra point toward the Pats, which ended up helping them cover. So for— in this case, it's the other way.

Well, also Drew Luck as quarterback helped them cover.

Yeah, that did help us cover. That we lost to them anyway.

You did.

'Cause our quarterback threw 3 interceptions.

That did happen.

He became the first quarterback since Cordell Stewart in 2001 to throw 3 picks in the 4th quarter of a game he had a lead in.

Are you feeling half full or half empty? Glass half full, glass half empty about the Patriots again after— you've now had 24 hours to kind of process it.

First of all, thank you for asking.

Yeah.

I've landed here. Drake had no preseason. AJ Brown got hurt halfway through the game. The game plan was awful, and the Seahawks have an awesome defense, and we're at home. When we started the podcast last night, I felt like we were gonna go 6-11. Now I'm like, you know what, the— there was a Pats Super Bowl '03 team, maybe '04, one of those ones where they got killed by Buffalo 31-nothing in week 1.

Mm-hmm.

They ended up rolling off a— so I'm just trying to calm down. But Drake was really bad, and I don't really have an explanation for it. He was just really awful.

Well, I have an explanation for it. The Patriots couldn't establish the run. And so you were like, that's—

Well, they kept trying. We kept running it on every first down and getting stuffed.

And Seattle was like, thank you, thank you, thank you so much. I mean, there is a tiny bit of a mismatch there. That offensive line for the Patriots, isn't quite up to that elite level to take on a front 7 like, like Seattle. And the innovation of, of Seattle, what McDonald brings to the table and stunts and simulated pressure and all that stuff. What you saw out of Byron Murphy all game long moving side to side, they couldn't locate him. Yeah. And he was, he was awesome. Yes.

I, I think it was an awful, awful, awful game plan. And it really, it honestly concerned me because it was just the opposite Like, Danny Kelly was on the pod. He was like, everything the Pats did, he was like relieved and excited. That shouldn't be the case. It's like, please, please don't throw deep on our, on our precocious cornerbacks with AJ Brown. They never did it. They never went to him once.

Here's the surprising thing to me. The single best weapon and the thing that keeps that Seattle defense off, uh, kilter, off of being able to just load up, is, is Drake running. And he's so good at it. Yeah, Drake May running, not scrambling. Scrambling, he's very good at it.

Semi-designed runs.

Yeah. Yes.

Almost like you would do in video games. You send everyone deep and roll them out.

If you can't establish the run, then let the quarterback run. They can't account for it. That's the one position that makes it a challenge. I'm sure Josh McDaniels is, uh, in the lab cooking up some, some stuff to respond.

It was, it was a It was a horrible, horrible, horrible game plan, and they were not aggressive enough, and they lost the game in the first 2 hours of the game before Drake Maye ended up actually losing the game. I agree with all of that. They, they played like 10 points was good enough to win. They did the same thing in Denver last year, and it actually worked because they played the odds right with their backup quarterback. But the Seattle defense is a different animal at home than Denver was in a snowstorm.

Also remember the, the weather in Denver, right? Went from like, you know, perfectly solid, and then all of a sudden we're playing in a blizzard. Like, the weather produced that outcome as much as the backup quarterback, as much as Jarrett Stidham.

The Super Bowl— making the Super Bowl really threw off all of the expectations and everything about this Pats team, which was a young team that last year that probably shouldn't have made the Super Bowl. And now it feels like they should be a contender on par with some— I think they have as much talent as Buffalo. But I don't, I don't defensively like Seattle and Houston, possibly Philly. Like I wanna see this Philly defense, especially this weekend. But for sure, there's a defensive class of teams that's just a whole level above the Pats anyway. I don't like that it's 10 days till the next game too, 'cause in Boston everyone's going, oh, losing their mind. Everyone's going crazy.

But it's a home game against who? Somebody decent?

It's Pittsburgh. They, they have a good front 7.

Yeah. Ooh.

Okay. And speaking of Pittsburgh, I thought about holding this pick because we get one extra pick on Sunday and holding this pick, hoping that Tua was gonna be cleared to play and that the line was gonna go down. 'Cause this was 3.5, this was 3, 3 beginning of the week, got to 3.5. It was still too low because Tua was the quarterback in Pittsburgh against a team that has a really good pass rush and Tua's not a starting quarterback anymore. He gets hurt. Now it's Cooper Rush. Line goes to 4.5, which is in the Vegas zone. And you have this weird Steelers team with Aaron Rodgers that inexplicably doing this super candid podcast right before the season. I don't know what he was thinking.

Inexplicably.

Inexplicable podcast. Although I did enjoy the shots at Danica Patrick. It worries me to lay this many points with them, but I think before the year I had the Steelers at 10 wins. I actually like McCarthy. I think they're gonna be a playoff team, and I think the Falcons have a chance to be the worst team in the league, or at least the worst team in the NFC. And this is -4.5, and I wonder in 5 weeks, is this line -8? Mm-hmm.

-8.5.

So I'm gonna hold my nose and I'm gonna lay the 4.5. I think in real life we don't have a parlay option for this, but to me this is a natural moneyline parlay with something else.

Terrific. Terrific.

Just take Steelers moneyline, put it with another game. Like if you like the Ravens, maybe you like the, the Bengals moneyline, but I, I like that Steelers moneyline with something else. I thought about teasing them through the zero and putting them in the tease. Don't do it. Just to lay the smackdown with Raheem just right away to show him.

That's not a smackdown. That's a dumb down.

Don't do it. Yeah, that was a dumb down. That's why I didn't do it.

Too many good ones out here.

So I'm gonna hold my nose and I'm gonna do Steelers -4.5 against a Falcons team that looks like it's starting Cooper Rush.

Well, I, I'm putting together a parlay, a moneyline parlay. Oh boy, do I love this one.

What is it?

I came dressed in my team's garb. Today, uh, to show my respect, to show my enthusiasm. No games have been played. Hope springs eternal. It's a divisional game. Washington has demonstrated an ability to be feisty with the Eagles. They've also gotten slaughtered by the Eagles, but they— look, it's, it's week 1. Nobody knows anything about this Washington defense.

Oh, so you like their money line for this?

I sure do not. No, sir. Why are you bringing up Washington?

You already made your 4 picks.

I'm— I'm not. I'm just saying you, you raised the idea of a little moneyline parlay. Why wouldn't we just go ahead and give the people a way of looking at some other games? Um, this Philadelphia Eagles team is so good in the trenches.

Yeah.

And on paper right now, on paper, the Washington team is very bad in the trenches, especially with the absence of Larry.

I know where you're going. See this?

I'm not playing.

I, I've already looked at this.

Any numbers. I'm not playing the numbers, but look, the Eagles on the money line parlayed with the Steelers on the money line is dead even money, +100.

Yeah.

I am betting that. I'm telling you right now, Philadelphia Eagles at home beating Washington on the money line, Pittsburgh Steelers at home beating the Atlanta Falcons at home, even money, uh, money line parlay. Let's go. That's one that I'm getting down right now. Okay.

I really like it. And I wanted to talk about some possible options for the 5th pick. And one of these was the Eagles, which is 5.5 right now. And I think the way to play them is the money line with the Steelers and hold your nose and bet against 2 bad teams on the road. Basically, my fear with the Eagles and why I didn't put them in a tease other than it would've teased them through the zero. How many times have we been fucked over by an Eagles-Washington game one way or the other? It's once a year.

Fair. Yes, sure.

It's once a year something weird happens, right?

Yes.

And yeah, I don't understand for the life of me why this line isn't 7.5, right? Other than these divisional matchup underlay, all that shit. That's really the only reason. But the Eagles have way more talent. They're dominant in the trenches. Washington is gonna be the opposite, especially 'cause you don't have Tunsil. And I, I just, I'm dumbfounded by this line.

Is it 'cause the Eagles The line is telling you, well, it's an unknown quantity with the offense in its entirety, right?

Wicks is the number 2 receiver for them now because Lemon, I guess, wasn't good in the preseason.

Well, he's hurt. He has a hamstring problem.

Well, yeah, but I think he's playing week 1.

I understand, but I'm just saying we barely saw him because he was— he missed a big chunk of preseason.

But you could see it in the fantasy drafts because I had 2. I had one on Monday and one on Tuesday, and Lemon— I don't even think Wicks got drafted. Lemon was like $1 at the end of the draft. Like, this is not nothing. So, yeah, you know, if DeVonta Smith is, oh, he was a number 2 all along, right? What's the basketball analogy for this?

Well, not Bradley Beal. Not Beta Beal.

Bradley Beal took Chris Paul's number. The Clippers are like, they had a, they had a staff meeting.

Gets a number. Chris Paul's number 3. I know, but so what? Bradley Beal was number 3 for the Wizards.

I know, but Chris Paul, I mean, Chris Paul's legacy isn't the Clippers. Well, whose legacy is he then? What, what team is his legacy? The, the New Orleans Hornets? He played for the Clippers the longest, like, like he had most of his good years there. All right. I just think if the Clippers were ever gonna retire a number, it would be Chris Paul or Blake Griffin. They have no retired numbers.

They, you, they showed us what they think of Chris Paul.

I know.

They kicked him to the curb. I know. Unceremoniously.

So on top of that, they gave his jersey number to Bader Beal. What a fuck you that is. They should have given it to Uncle Dennis. We've, we've given Uncle Dennis number 3.

Well, he, yeah, that, I mean, that, that 3 is one worse than 2 and he took a giant number 2 all over that organization for those years.

They should retire Kawhi's number. The Coopers, they have staff meetings trying to figure out how their fans can possibly hate them more. They haven't apologized to their fans. They've said nothing. What about the lawsuit? Oh, we're gonna sue. What happened? This whole thing was 9 days ago. What are you guys gonna do? The season's starting in, in a month, in 5 weeks. What are you gonna tell your season ticket holders?

Look at the other teams that cheat, cheat the salary cap. Look at, look at That, yeah, I'm not gonna name teams or players, but I mean, I guess that's it. I, I, anyway, DeVonta Smith might be just a number 2. You're right. That's the, the problem is we have no idea what the hell's going on.

I'll tell you that Clippers are definitely a number 2. Okay.

So yeah.

So here's some possibles for my 5th pick on, on Sunday. Right now leaning toward Broncos. +2.5 against the Chiefs. I, I didn't do it in the Ringer 107 now 'cause I'm really hoping that goes to 3. I wanna take the Broncos +3.

It's a super cheap, it's a super cheap 2.5. It's -105. So the, the 3 is right around the corner at a fair, like -118, -120 at to get the 3. That's super fair. That's a very fair price. What, what time?

By Ringer 107, it's midnight Saturday night, I think.

Oh, I, I, I got it. I'm not, I'm not gonna circumvent. I'm gonna play by the number. That is the number. Do we have a piggyback rule for the 5th pick or no? Yeah, everybody— okay, so it doesn't matter. Yeah, so that's who I, I already— I mean, that's who I'm, I'm 96% there already with Denver.

I thought about them long and hard for the tease too. That was the other one. They were one of the runners-up.

Amazing teaser leg.

I don't understand how this isn't a one-score game one way or the other. I think Denver— both of us think Denver is just better than Kansas city. So that was one. I'm still looking at that Panthers-Bears line. There's a lot of good things toward the Panthers in that, especially the weather.

Yeah.

Is gonna be really bad.

Yep.

It's gonna be hot and humid. I think that's gonna be an advantage for them.

The Bears— The Panthers are, are a very live teaser leg also.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But they, they did have the bad juju preseason, which worries me. So I'm gonna stare at that a little longer. I'm staying away from Ravens-Colts except for the over. I thought it was enticing. The over's 47.5 right now. It's indoors.

Yes.

And I don't really trust either defense, and I wonder if that is gonna be a, a point bonanza. So we're allowed to take overs for the 5th one, right?

I don't know.

We're allowed to take over— Oh yeah, it's for teasers. Sorry.

Oh yeah, right, right, right. Yeah, I mean, I like that over quite a bit also. That, that game is fascinating. I decided to stay out of it, um, just like you, but I don't like the hook.

It's Ravens 3.5. I don't like it.

And Ravens have cooked. Lamar has absolutely cooked against Anarumo defenses. Yeah, he's annihilated them. Um, but I can't get into a game with a guy coming off an Achilles at record speed. I just Yeah. You know, the, the, oh, he's, he looks fine. He's been fine in practices. We haven't seen him under center. We haven't seen him try and play proper football against it. I'm, I'm very skeptical, uh, about Danny Dimes coming out and just boom, slotting right in and staking in that offense being, you know, but maybe modern miracle medicine. Maybe so. I just need to see it before I'm gonna bet on him.

Any of it. They're a 4-team 13-point teaser candidate. That over-under too. You bring that down to 34.5. So 35 points covers. They'll have that at halftime.

Yeah. When do you— it's back. Are you putting out Sunday? Sunday morning?

Fanduel would not give us juice on the— yeah, no, I'm gonna send it to you guys. Fanduel would not give us the juice on the 13-point teaser. Maybe we could talk to Christian. I don't know. But yeah, the getting that down to 34.5, I think there's gonna be, plus it's in a dome.

Yeah.

I just think there's gonna be points in that game. And then the, the other one I was looking at was that Titans-Jets game that you already took. The, the 2 stayaways for me, Raiders-Dolphins, especially with Bowers out. It, it's what really annoys me about this is it's one of the late games and there's only like 4 late games and I know we're gonna all end up betting on this game. I don't wanna bet on this game.

I'll be, I'll bet. I'm betting on it.

I don't wanna bet on it. I wanna stay away from it. It's stupid to bet on it and I know it's gonna suck us in, but Raiders -3. Now without Bowers, I don't think they have a single receiver or tight end on their roster that would get like a 70 in Madden, right?

That's true, right? Yes. They have 2, they have 2 running backs. But right, not a receiver or tight end. Right.

And then the Dolphins, who the F knows? But then the other stay away to me, Vikings-Packers. I really wanted to talk myself into the Packers. I just can't. There's bad matchups everywhere.

Yeah.

You have Kyler in his first start going against Jonathan Gannon, who coached him last year. That's a red flag for me. You have the shitty Packers offensive line against Brian Flores, even though I can't name 5 guys in their defense anymore. I'm staying away from that. I don't wanna bet on Kyler. I don't wanna bet on Green Bay with the bad offensive line in Minnesota. I, I'm just out.

I'm out on that game. I came like not this close, but this close to taking Minnesota cuz it kind of fits my narrative coming into the season, which is I think Minnesota's gonna be a slight tick better than their forecasted win total. Yeah. And I have Green— I'm very pessimistic about Green Bay this season.

The only other one I was looking at from a parlay standpoint was something trying to keep something in the same game with the, with the Chargers and the Cardinals and doing some alt, alt stuff, like getting the Chargers down to -2.5, trying to get the over-under as far down as possible with the over so that it could get to like +100. But, um, 'cause I just feel that game has cheap touchdown potential to me. I think the Chargers are gonna be pulling it out Dirk Dibbler style.

Yeah, I agree.

They're gonna be slapping it on the table and, and flapping it around and, and doing every— and it just feels like they're up 15 in the 4th quarter and Brissett, oh, Michael Wilson, the Cardinals aren't dead. Oh, they're going for 2. And now it's like, oh my God, could the Chargers— it just has all the makings.

Chargers under Harbaugh, early season, they come out and they look ready. They look ready to rock. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Last couple seasons, like, they, they're like the— there have been an early season, they've impressed us even with the offensive line situation of last year. Um, I, I like the, the Chargers, but I, I see what you're doing. I don't mind it.

They're saying Harbaugh's like a young Bob Chesney.

Um, wait, you know, the other way around. Chesney's much younger than Harbaugh.

I know, I was kidding.

Um, I'm a dummy.

That's the other, uh, one for parlays. UCLA is minus— UCLA is -12.5 and -480 this weekend at home against San Diego State. The coach made this— coach of San Diego State made a mistake, um, took a couple like light shots at, uh, UCLA about polos and tried to make it seem like they were the rich kids and San Diego State were the gritty. Yeah, it was—

Popped the collar.

It felt sour grapes-y. He was also up for the UCLA job and didn't get it.

Oh, interesting.

I do not think there is any chance UCLA will lose this game.

Wow.

And I would put them in a parlay.

Final thing.

Yeah, I think, I think on the money line. Yeah, on the money line.

Okay, hold on, I'm gonna put them in.

Put them in at their -480 in New Orleans.

What time do they play on Saturday? Do you know yet?

They're playing at— it's a night game, it's 7:15.

Okay, so let me get there.

I was debating about going since I'm an unofficial UCLA booster, but, um, I didn't want to go to the Rose Bowl and spend my entire day going back and forth to to Pasadena.

I mean, that's understandable.

Today's Ringer 107 picks were brought to you by FanDuel. Download the app now to find all of our 107 picks and make this your most rewarding season. We're trying for you. FanDuel, play your game. Odds subject to change. I didn't get a chance to talk about the US Open and how stupid it was that the best match of the entire tournament started at 11 o'clock. And then people defend it. What?

Who's defending it?

People are like, well, you gotta understand people in the night.

No, you don't. Don't gotta understand anything. It plays nighttime.

There's 2 matches.

People pay.

It's gotta be— No, nope.

Don't have to understand any of it.

Can you imagine if they started the Eastern Conference NBA Finals Game 7 at like 11 at night and it just ended at 2 in the morning? How fucking stupid that would be. It was like, hey, or when's, when's Spurs-Thunder game 7? Oh, the other games ran late. It's not gonna start till 11:30 tonight. What are you guys doing? You have Alcaraz against Shelton. This is like the best possible matchup you can have in the whole tournament. You're trying to establish Shelton as American superstar. You got Trinity, Trinity Rodman in the stands. You have this awesome, incredible 5-set matchup, which by the way, took 4.5 hours as usual. And the games at the— the matches ending at 3:30 in the morning.

Right. 3:30 in the morning.

It was great for me. I had nothing to do at 12:30 at night on the West Coast. I came home from my fantasy draft and watched the 4th and 5th sets. I loved it. But guess who didn't see it? Everyone I know on the East Coast, including you.

Most of fucking America. Like, it is stunning. It's beyond stunning. How can you be so disrespectful to your own product? Like, this is a moment in American tennis that we haven't had in a couple generations.

We haven't won since '03. Roddick won in 2003. That was the last American US Open winner for men.

And the 3 greats have cleared the space. Nadal, Federer, and Djokovic are all out. And so it's wide open for Americans to take the stage. And Big Foe is doing his part and Shelton is doing his part and Fritz is doing his part. This is an amazing moment in American men's tennis, and they have come up with an arrangement where they have marquee matches going off after fucking 11 o'clock at night on the East Coast.

The marquee match. This is the best match you could have, Shelton against Alcaraz.

Do you want people to watch? Do you care about—

Like, how dumb as fucking shit.

How does ESPN tolerate this? ESPN pays a fuckload of money to have this tournament on its station and then ultimately on ABC. How can you go along with the number one player in the world playing one of the very best American prospects going off after 11 o'clock at night because they had to accommodate 2 very talented American women, Navarro and Pegula playing in primetime. We can't have that match happen simultaneous with Shelton and Alcaraz playing in primetime. They can't be on ESPN and ESPN2. That's impossible.

Is that what you're telling me? How about do a poll? What do people— would they rather watch in primetime, Navarro and Pegula or Shelton against—

It's batshit crazy. It's otherworld crazy. They tell me as a sports fan who tunes in because it's our national championship, what they're telling me is to fuck off. We don't care what you think. We don't give a shit about you. Who cares whether you watch or not?

The matches are too long anyway. And I said this last week, I planted my flag on it, and I knew the tennis people, they get mad when the outsiders come in. But the reality is Nothing before like the quarterfinals should go for 4.5 hours. And I think it's arguable that the quarterfinals should go for 4. Like in basketball, when we had the best of 5s, the best of 5s are great. Sometimes you'd have an upset, but it would shorten the series. Then there was too much money at stake and they didn't wanna do that anymore. And the tennis, these guys are, these rallies are just longer. The sport's harder to play than it was 20 years ago. The equipment's better. The conditioning's better, everything's better, and the game and the matches are just longer. They're all like heading toward an average of 3 hours now, and they have to figure out some sort of fix and they just won't.

Well, I don't mind long, dramatic matches. It does heighten, like the Mikkelsen-Big Foe match that ended up going 5 sets.

Yeah, but that, but that was the reason that the Alcaraz match didn't start till 11 o'clock. Well, no, like that was what the Bundo said. He was like, well, you had 4 matches on Ash. And they played the maximum 16 sets. And it's like, well, this is dumb if you didn't have that variable that, oh, if there's 16 sets, everyone's going to be here till 3:30 in the fucking morning. No, without a way to get home.

By the way, the Pegula Navarro was the reason. That's why those guys came on at 11:00.

Also, if you have Alcaraz Shelton, that match has to start on Ash, I would say at like 9:30 at the latest.

At the latest.

Because guess what? It needs to be on television. for everybody like you on the East Coast to watch it.

This sucked me in.

This is like fucking—

Get invested.

Sports 101. Like, are you trying to build your sport or not, dumbasses?

It was a Tuesday fucking night. There was nothing else on. I would've watched it. I would've been all the way in from not— and by the way, you know what the schedule said? That match was supposed to start 9:30 at night. It didn't because the other matches went long and then you had to— and the Pagula Navarro—

The matches go long, have the ability to take that other match with Pagula and move it to The stadium that, what, has 14,000 people? Push it over.

That's fine. That would've been fine. We could've lived with that. I mean, whatever. It's ridiculous. It's, it's up to, to tennis can, can do, do whatever they want.

I do really love Big Pho.

Big Pho.

Because it's like rooting for one of those teams that, you know, you know, they're, they're gonna, the, this, the tire's just gonna blow at some point.

You don't know when it is. It could be right around the corner at any moment.

It's just, and, It's almost like he needs to go down so that he can have the comeback and yell to the crowd and do fist pumps. Like, he, he just can't have it easy. He can't cruise.

Oh, you know, he's my guy. He's from PG County. He's from DMV. I mean, we go thick. We're very thick with Big Foe love here. Yeah.

So, and then Shelton, I, I can't believe how good shape these guys are in is the other thing. Shelton's doing like the hardest possible serve to do. Like, he's jumping up in the air and fucking hitting 140-mile-an-hour serves for 4.5 hours. Like, these guys— I don't think anyone's— maybe soccer players. Who's in better condition than some of these tennis players?

Well, that, that's also part of what really adds to, um, the drama of it. They're incredible athletes. Yeah. In these marathon contests. Um, if they were playing at the appropriate time of day, right, then we could enjoy it.

I think I wouldn't mind if it was like 3 sets, 2 or 3 sets, and then maybe the, the 3rd, 4th, and 5th sets just have less games or something. Like, it's like you have to get to 4. That—

I like best of 3 up to quarterfinals, and when you're in quarterfinals—

Or do that.

That's fine.

Best of 3 to quarterfinals is great. Yeah, that sounds awesome.

Let's get through it.

I also like— I think there could be a mercy rule where if you're up more than if you're up 3 games in a set, you won the set. Like you went to the 5 sets, but if it's like you're up 4-1, you've won. Now let's flip to the next set.

All these innovations you're talking about in terms of shortening up, that makes sense for lesser tournaments. When we're playing in the majors, then let's have a rule where we can have 5-set, you know, competitions for the majors.

Or best 2 of 3 until we get to the quarters.

Yeah. Because there are these, these, the 500 series, tournaments that only play best 2 out of 3 sets anyways, but tightening that up so that we get our best players not coming in injured. Right. Like, you know, there has been a lot of scuttlebutt in that tennis world about the guys, the schedule's too compressed. The guys are, you know, and, and gals are not coming in healthy.

It's single, it's similar to basketball.

Yeah.

I just think the sport's harder to play than it used to be. And the, and what's happening is not sustainable to me.

Right, right. Yeah.

Unless you use PEDs and cheat in various ways.

I'm okay with that.

By the way, did you see the pictures of Sabatini?

No.

Did I send those to you? She looks great. One of the heroes of the '80s for us.

Whew. I'm relieved.

Yeah, no, she looked awesome.

I'm glad to hear that.

Okay, good. Yeah. Very important, very important person for us in the '80s.

Very important person for us. Yes.

I don't even think we knew each other. My buddy Bish from high school, we, we just, Just completely in love with Sabatini.

But you were a big tennis guy back then too. Still a big tennis guy.

I was.

Yeah.

All right. Anything else before we go?

Just this 4-leg parlay that I wanna make sure America hears. Okay. We're gonna take the Eagles, the Steelers. We already put those 2 together. Yeah. If you add the Chargers and your, your UCLA Bruins, +192 on the FanDuel Sportsbook, almost 2 to 1.

Will they put that on the 4-leg? I'm gonna, I'm gonna ask, I'm gonna ask Jack to put that on the, uh, FanDuel for us. +192.

+192.

That's juicy price.

4-leg moneyline parlay. What are those? We must be playing some fucking football. It must be football season. It must— 4-leg moneyline parlay must be football season.

What happens if we take Philly out of that? Just out of curiosity.

Oh, we can do that for sure. Yes, we can.

Because I still don't know if I trust Philly.

Okay, fine.

How many times with Philly, like, oh, Jalen Hurts slow to get going, and it's like, what? Uh, I have a parlay on him.

+108. +108 if you take Philly out. Still plus money. That's Steelers-Chargers- UCLA. Yep.

Oh man.

Steelers-Chargers-Bruins. Steelers-Chargers-Bruins, +108.

House, you're an American treasure. It's great to see you. Uh, I will see you next week for Week 2. of Ringer 107. Don't forget, we have our bets coming. Uh, our 5th bets will be online. We'll tweet them out on Sunday morning. And, uh, here's to a whole year of winning. Thank you, House. Thanks to Eduardo and Jack and Chris and Gahal as well, our guys. Uh, we're gonna be back on Sunday, and it's going to be live on Netflix with the dastardly Cousin Sal, who I'm really starting not to like. Coming off this Cowboys-Giants game.

He'll be coming off the Cowboys-Giants.

Right. So I might put as much money on the Cowboys as, as I can put on a game and feel good about it.

Well, how's Hank feel about that?

On the Cowboys? Yeah, I'll talk to Hank.

Yeah, talk to Hank.

Hank's doing great. Hank says hello, by the way. Uh, thanks everybody. Have a great weekend and we will see you on, uh, Sunday night here. Must be 21+ and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino, or 18+ and present in DC, Kentucky, or Wyoming. 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 gamblinghelplineMA.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24/7 support in Massachusetts, or call 877-8-HOPE-NY or text HOPE-NY in New York. For Louisiana, call 877-770-7867.