Transcript of Did Rod Wave Save Bryce Young's Career? | Hour 1 New

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Okay.

All right.

Fine.

Nobody needs to say anything.

Bad start from you today.

In that studio, people are fighting through it. Yeah.

I, uh, something got a hold of me last week that's in my lungs that I have not been able to get out of my lungs. Uh, I think it might have been last—

The McMecton?

Last week's, um, witching hour. Uh, and this week's witching hour was also exceptional because you had all of this happening at the same time, uh, from 3:45 to 4:15, which I will remind you is one of the worst takes ever had around here, where, uh, Tony once said that the best time to nap is on a Sunday afternoon from 3:45 to 4:15.

the worst take in the history of talk football.

Well, what I meant was right after the witching hour, right before you start, you know, Raiders-Colts. That's a nice one to take a nap at. Or first half of Broncos-Niners, which was terrible.

Right.

You meant the difference. You meant something different, but then when we came back and hammered you for it, you just kept doubling down.

I stayed my course.

At the end of yesterday's 1 o'clock hour, you had the Patriots and Bills going back and forth, a shootout toward the end. You had Jags and Bengals. The Jags tried to figure out a way to give that game away. The Jags had 100 yards, 10 penalties in the first half alone.

But those refs, by the way, need to be looked at.

I am curious what you guys think of the following, because I don't know how I scrub off of Joe Burrow some of the stuff that you— that he has attached to him. Since 2024, Joe Burrow has 13 turnovers, more than anybody in the NFL in 4th quarter and overtime. He's not actually good late at drives, and he's got the reputation as of being someone you can trust in that circumstance. And he doesn't win very many games late with the football.

I was really surprised to hear that, that he does not come back late in games. He also turns the ball over a lot.

And more than anyone in football in the 4th quarter and overtime. It's 13 of those since 2022.

Also, the stat that we read last week about him not being a 4th quarter quarterback was a fake stat.

Really?

Yeah, it was totally fake. Made it up. It said like he had 34 losses in the 4th quarter. I don't think he has 34 losses in his career.

The— no, it was Zach Wilson or not Zach Wilson, Zach Taylor related. I'm surprised you guys didn't jump in there and find me immediately. The, the Joe Burrow reputation, though, when I get this stats not made up, Mike, he's got more turnovers in the 4th quarter and overtime, 13 of them since 2024, than anybody in the sport in a situation where you cannot have those turnovers. Look, I cannot tell you the amount of value that the NFL places on protecting the football, but Matthew Stafford can undo all of his MVP greatness simply by turning the ball over at the rate he is doing so, so far this season. He can, he can play otherwise just as good offensively. But if he turns the ball over at this rate, he ceases to be the MVP because these teams are so protective of the football. So when I give you that Burrow is worse than anybody in the 4th quarter and overtime since 2024 turning the ball over, it's a damning stat like that. You can't have that happen in those portions of the game.

People don't like to read. Scott Kacmar did like a whole breakdown on all the Burrow games. And there is something to it. Like when you contextualize where he built up this reputation, a lot of it was Evan McPherson. A lot of it was Joe Burrow getting the ball at midfield. just making a throw to get them in field goal range. So it is a little overinflated. But then that sack came around and the narrative was really wacky. There's truth to parse.

I mean, it happens. So, you know, it may not be fair to do it like this, but imagine if he didn't make that run to the Super Bowl that one time. Like, what would we be saying about Joe Burrow right now when you preface it with the record in the 4th quarter and all of the turnovers? And on top of it, The Bengals, who spent a lot of money on their defense going into this year, their defense is pretty good.

Like, now after all these years complaining about the defense, and we're looking at the guy who's been doing the complaining, we're looking at Burrow kind of looking like Marino, right, of this generation, where you're like, man, he's got such talent, he's got these great wide receivers, he's got all this stuff.

The beginning of his career, one Super Bowl, and it's like, where is he?

Like, like, this might be their year if they can figure it out defensively, which I think they can, but it's like, man, Everything's in front of him, yet he doesn't execute when it's time to.

When it's time to is the witching hour, and you had Pats-Bills, Jags-Bengals, you had the Cardinals-Giants. What was Jacoby Brissett doing at the end of that?

Gotta make a play, Dan. Come on, you know how it goes.

No, come on. You got— you're inside the 5-yard line with— what are you trying to make a play?

I'm trying to make a play!

He's inside, he's at first and 12.

Is that one of your observations or no?

Well, I have 112 of them today.

Oh, you've already done 36.

We've done an hour!

I, I've— I'm not ranking them anymore. I'm just spilling them all over the place. I'm not going to numerically assign a number to each of them. I'm just going to tell you there are 112 of these in the show. But I have only gotten through half of the games that were in the witching hour being decided all at the same time. So you got a pick 6 with the Giants where Jameis Winston is producing his first touchdown drives in 9 quarters because that's another field goal team before yesterday. So you got Pats-Bills, Jags-Bengals, you got Cards-Giants, you got Packers-Bucs. Make me talk about that game. You got Rams-Eagles and then you got Cowboys-Texan. All happening at the same time. All, all of it just total, uh, total lunacy. And, uh, getting back to that, uh, Giants game, let's hear Jameis Winston's postgame sound as they win it at the end with a pick-six.

Man, I, I'm so grateful for the word of God. You know, one thing I do is forgetting that is behind me and reaching forward To what is ahead. You think that I'm joking, but Philippians 3:13 states this, and you have to do it no matter the circumstances, conditions, or facts. Desire what you would love. And I wanted this team to win a game, and it looked like the odds was against us. It really did. But God found a way. How great is he? His thoughts are higher than our thoughts. His ways are better than our ways. Oh my goodness. That's only his grace.

And what about the Giants? What is it about this team's resilience that it won't wave a white flag?

Our head coach is tenacious. Our head coach is a kingdom man. Our head coach is instilling every, every one of these qualities in us. And it's really a beautiful thing to see, man. So, so shout out to the defensive line. Shout out to the defense again. Shout out to the offensive line, man. And man, praise God.

Thank you.

It's a play on for me.

Uh, why would you wish that game upon God?

High scoring.

I do have a question.

Go ahead, talk to me.

Why does God love the Giants more than the Cardinals?

Are the odds actually— were the odds actually against the Giants in that game? Uh, weren't they— were the Giants favored?

Cardinals, I think, were 2.5-point favorites.

So you're not gonna answer my question. You don't know either.

He loves to talk in the sing-song wise voice of the preacher while saying things that are in no way wise. I think I'm done with Jameis now.

I think I'm done with him because to me—

I will say same.

So this is what did it.

It feels completely canned. It's— I think he's doing a thing now and he's, he's trying to do a thing and it's, it's not funny anymore. And I think it's very transparent.

I was like, I saw the headline of like Jameis postgame interview. I was like, put my seatbelt on. I was like, let's go.

It's so canned.

And I was just like, oh, okay.

Yeah. Mad on him.

Michael Wilson, a big sinner.

I will tell you, though, it's a smart move by Jameis because he started talking about like how godly the coach is.

Kingdom man. Yeah.

The coach that just traded for your likely replacement. You got to make sure you pump up the coach so he doesn't replace you.

So the thing that Jameis is trying to do is God. That's what you're saying?

Yeah. So when you say J.J. McCarthy is likely replacement, I was thinking about this the other day because we didn't cover this all that much. I really do think that J.J. McCarthy represents a new timeline for young first-round quarterbacks. quarterbacks. You get 10 games. Like, I think that's where we are when Minnesota decides that their first-round pick is now someone that they can discard for a 5th-round pick. Basically, the new numbers are you get 10 games to prove that you can be our quarterback because that's all that J.J. McCarthy ended up playing. It ended up being over 2 seasons. But that's, that's where we are now with how quickly a team can move off of its first-round quarterback now that there's not a financial penalty to sort sort of force patience upon somebody.

I think that would be a huge mistake if that is what's happening.

It is what's happening. It's what happened.

I think it's a huge mistake, especially coming off of, you know, the Sunday Night Football game we watched last night. You know, by all accounts, Bryce Young, we thought he was a big bust and he's pretty good.

Okay, I'm guilty of that, but I warn you about making too many jumps based on what's happening with the Detroit secondary. They're playing a bunch of mechanics in their secondary. They are a god-awful defense. This has never happened before. Jared Goff's the only quarterback ever to have 1,200 yards through 4 games with no turnovers, and he's got not a winning record.

Number 75.

I mean, that's not something that's ever happened before, and it's because their defense is god-awful. They're allowing 30 points a game, and their secondary is hugely injured.

Right, but to take less away from Bryce Young, this has been a couple-game-long thing dating back to, you know, Canales taking over. He's totally reshaped himself and Honestly, it's the only thing I hang my hat on as like a Cam Ward fan, is that there's several examples right now in the NFL of people figuring it out.

You've been hanging your hat on a lot of things over the last couple of weeks. There have been a lot on that coat hanger or on that hat hanger.

I buy a lot of hats. IG's got me. What can I say? I think I average like maybe 25 hats a year purchased. I give a lot away. Give a lot away.

So I want to go back to October of 2024 when hip-hop artist Rod Wave put on his story, Bryce Young, call me, bruh. And then since then, he's thrown for— let me get the stats here for you— since that callout on IG, and I don't know what Rod Wave said to Bryce Young, he has a passer rating of 90.2. He's got 6,300 yards, 47 touchdowns, 19 picks in 30 games in that span and completely revitalized and changed his career.

A fair point by Mike Ryan. And I was among those saying that that Bryce Young experiment was over, at least in part, What do you laugh about? What about me?

You said something about Mike Rod Wave.

I gave you the actual point.

Rod Wave said something to him. We don't know what he said.

Bryce Young was asked about it. Doesn't matter how we got there.

Gone.

Like, he—

Bryce smart.

The, the media asked Bryce Young, what did Rod Wave tell you? And he's like, a lot of good things. I can't explain it. I can't tell you about it. And all of a sudden he goes on this completely revitalizing streak and, and you got nothing?

Usually when one person stops talking and the next person says fair point, they're talking about the person that just got done talking.

Train McBride to just worship the devil or something.

The reason that I did that was to take inventory of the fact that I was one of the people who was wrong. I thought it was worth noting that I was one of the people who was loud wrong on Bryce Young. And it is wrong of me to simply take last night's game and say, Don't get carried away by the fact that Carolina could go up and down the field on that defense because everyone's doing it.

Dan Le Batard.

I don't think it's strange for me, but like—

Mike Ryan.

Oh boy.

This is the Dan Le Batard Show.

But since you mentioned Trey McBride, I wanted to ask you guys what you thought of the entire back and forth he had with an NFL linesman where an NFL linesman Evidently, line judge— the man's name is Jeff Seaman. That's his name. And he's been picked on since he was a young boy. Yes.

The Navy.

Do what now?

Jeff Seaman is the lineman's name, and he lit up Trey McBride. He's got a radioactive nuclear red face, and he's just hitting him with F-You's when McBride's asking for, you know, please, how can I get a pass interference?

And then Trey McBride sees that. I love it. caught on camera and he gets— and he laughs. He's like, points like, haha, look, they caught you!

I love it. I love it so much. But the funniest part of this is— and obviously you can't defend the line judge, all right?

Jeff Seaman.

Because you're not supposed to use— they are supposed to be above the players. Like, they are supposed to be, you know, a lot more respectful than that. But it always makes me think about when you have those hockey shows like the 24/7 and everyone's mic'd up on the ice, and you could hear the language that the referees use to the players in the hockey game. It is stunningly foul how the referees talk to the hockey players during— like—

Even in Carolina?

Every other word is the F-word. They tell players, F off, get the F off the ice, go to the effing bin. Like, the way they talk to players is crazy. And you hear something like that in the NFL, and it's like, oh my God, the union's putting out a statement.

I want to talk very briefly, because it was not one of the interesting games yesterday, about Jets-Bears.

73.

The Bears outgained the Jets by 335 yards and did not punt. That's happened 5 times in 25 years. And the Bears had more first downs than the Jets had plays, but The Jets did have their first interception in 637 days. Their first interception. They had 2 interceptions. They had another interception that—

The first one was called back.

Called back, yes. But that's basically, you know, you're talking about 2 years without an interception. But that was a— that was a game afterward. The Bears defender Devin Bush had this to say after the game.

Holding the ball for, uh, was it 42 minutes?

It's kind of wild.

Probably one of the easiest NFL games I didn't play in. I'm not sore at all, so it's great.

I mean, in fairness, doesn't soreness come like the next day? I don't know.

I'm sure it's that day too. I don't know if you've played tackle football before.

Whoa.

And you have.

All right. Dan, more—

Invisible football guy.

More first downs than plays? That's crazy.

Yes, that doesn't happen very often. I'm going to say it again, 335 more yards and they did not punt. And there isn't another occurrence of more first downs than plays, 34 to 32, since the year 2000. Like, that was a— that's as lopsided as you're going to see a beating because it was at one point it was like 270 yards to 33, but the Bears were only up 10-3. And the Jets couldn't do much of anything yesterday. That was one of the only games where one of the teams isn't in it.

On one of the goal line stops, Geno Smith tried to get the Bears defenders to go offsides because they were at basically the half-yard line, and then they took a delay of game and then moved it back 4 inches and then ran a play.

I saw that. That was very smart.

It was.

That's a smart play.

He was just sitting there like, set, go, go! And then it was like, all right, let's move the ball 4 inches.

That the hard count thing hasn't worked since Belichick beat TCU in the first week of the season. Every team is trying to do that. All these coaches think they're smart on 4th and 4 going out there. Look, I'm on my own 39-yard line. They're not going to actually go for this, are they? And then they just fake it and take the delay of game and punt it. It hasn't— it hasn't been actually working. But you guys dispute what it is that I'm saying when I say that the game that if If, uh, throughout the sport people are leading their newscast or sportscast with one game from yesterday, you guys don't think it's Bills-Patriots?

Cowboys-Texans. America's team.

I mean, the Texans—

That was a big game, Dan.

The Texans are 0-4.

It was a great game. The Patriots were about to go 1-3.

The Texans don't get to count in this discussion because they're one of the worst teams in the league.

Chiefs-Raiders.

People had the Texans going to the Super Bowl before the season.

They're one of the worst teams in the league. They have a good pass rush. They've got a good—

Stroud isn't playing bad though, Dan. If you look at what he's done the last couple weeks, like, he's playing good.

And Nico Collins came back. He dominated last night.

They're 0-4.

I know.

Yeah, I know.

There was nobody dominating.

Will Anderson though, Dan.

He's good.

I like him. And Danielle Hunter.

I enjoy watching him, but they're 0-4. What are you guys talking about?

That's the part that doesn't make sense. They got good offensive pieces. They got good defensive pieces. They suck.

Their season's over. You cannot start 0-4.

And if they win yesterday, they're still in it. That's why it was so big. That's why it was a big game.

The Cowboys being able to throw that way, I don't understand how it is that CeeDee Lamb has 17 catches in that game and the entire game they just keep throwing to CeeDee Lamb without what appeared to be any defensive adjustments.

He had 21 targets. So many.

And at the end, they're targeting him. The Cowboys were down double digits at the half. Dak never wins that game. Like when, when the Cowboys are down double digits at the half, there is no coming back for the Cowboys. There are very few resume games for Dak Prescott in which, in which he ends up coming back from that kind of deficit. Can I ask you guys this, though, at the, at the risk of ruining your Mondays?

Go on.

The number of injuries and the specifics of the players being hurt. Lamar Jackson, Saquon Barkley, Ja'Marr Chase, and Tee Higgins. Like, it, it's not just that you're getting rid of your explosive plays. You're getting rid of the people that will make Burrow special. Like, he's not going to be able to do the same things with Gesicki. Like, that's not— you got Thornton hurt and then you get the Chiefs reaching out to Tyreek Hill out of nowhere because Thornton was the only one getting deep down the field for the Chiefs. You guys keep mentioning Chiefs-Raiders. I mean, The Chiefs had a double-digit lead in that game and then the Raiders were throwing, but an onside kick at the end doesn't really put you in the game.

Yeah, but double-digit— I think the surprise was that they had a double-digit lead because they, they had to fight to come back to take the lead and then the fumble on the kickoff right away and they scored. Kenneth Walker's in the MVP conversation. Did you think that we'd be a month into the season, Mahomes would have started all the games, and the guy you're talking about is MVP? Is it? Well, the Super Bowl MVP, so it does make some sense.

I just don't expect him to last the season. I'm at the point now where I expect all of these people with high usage rates to get hurt. I expect De'Von Achane to get hurt if the coach is telling me before the season that he's going to have 40 touches a game. And I'm just asking you, Zazz, do you care when the Falcons are on their 4th quarterback a month in, when Washington is on their 3rd quarterback a month in.

What's his name?

I don't know. The young fella. The young Greek fella, as Jason Kelce kept calling him. They had the emergency quarterback on the screen. His name was Yankov. Their emergency quarterback was Yankov. I also, by the way, I'm sitting here talking about the Washington quarterback, but I cannot tell you how much Daniel Jones frustrates me because it's all It's just all shallow slants and checkdowns and he just won't look down the field.

It's not all that, especially if you look at Alec Pierce's season last year.

But now—

He's— well, Pierce is out.

I know, but I'm saying Daniel Jones— I'm saying, is Daniel Jones somebody who can only do it when he's got— because Thornton wasn't somebody I knew before Mahomes made Thornton Thornton.

Pierce appears to be an elite downfield threat, and if he's not there for them, that aspect of their Their game is gone.

Athan Kaliakmanis.

That was wild. Thornton, like that deep pass, gets up to celebrate and realizes he has a broken ankle.

Oh yeah, that was—

I saw it live.

It was tough.

Broken was one way to describe it.

No, seeing it live, you're not better than me.

No, no, no. I'm just saying—

That's the second time today I've referenced that. You keep saying I saw it live.

I disagree.

Me watching it in replay, just as good as you.

No, because I was watching it live and I was a little bit later.

Just a little bit late, Chris.

You know what?

I disagree. You watched something live. That means you know more.

Exactly right. Yeah, I saw when it happened. I got— I was like, whoa, his ankle's out of place.

I was talking about that at practice the other day.

That's a good one too.

You guys don't have any opinions on all the injuries?

No.

Yeah, I do. It's weird, right?

Very— I mean, sport—

not injury, but Kirk Cousins still got a little left in the tank.

Yeah, he does.

I mean, that final drive.

So no thoughts on Dan's throat?

That was Dan's throat.

Oh damn.

That was Dan's throat. And look, we're good teammates. We usually walk right past those. But this one, I mean, there was no sound around it.

It was a—

it was a Stereo guttural noise.

The phlegm yelling in there, please get me out!

There's no sound around it, kind of like my point about injuries the first month of the season. There's no sound around it because I'm asking you guys whether or not you care, but you're right. I have bad things happening inside of me. I'm ill. I've told you guys that I'm not— I've been ill for a week.

You're a sick man.

And I— yes, well, I'm— the cough that I have is way too wet. It's uncomfortably wet. Like, yeah, well, I had that too, Dan.

I think you gave me that.

I may be giving it to others here as well. I think Greg Cody got a little bit sick as well. So my apologies.

Feel good about that?

On whatever, whatever sounds come out of me.

With a preexisting lung condition. Yeah, I asked you last week, are you worried you're going to kill Greg? You said no, but now he's got that.

I haven't talked at all about college football. Uh, it's taken me too long to talk about college football today. What happened to Florida? How is it that Jayden Baugh has 13 carries for 12 yards?

Well, there are theories out there.

Jayden Baugh, 13 carries for 12 yards. Uh, you say there are theories out there as if anybody would get that, that joke. Like, I, I laugh. No. Yeah, you made you laugh with an inside joke because a caller to a Gainesville radio station said he wasn't having enough sex. And so Zazz decided to make that as a joke, as if everyone's listening to Gainesville radio, it was better when my body was making sounds amid silence than when you talked.

I like those little subtle jokes. Chris had one about the Carolina Hurricanes arena earlier. That was a great joke.

Yeah, that's good.

It's now getting acknowledged online. So I heard— I, I was with somebody at the Clemson game who was glazing that offense pretty good. We all were. And yes, last week I was giving Florida a ton of credit.

They were scoring 50 points a game.

And I was crushing Mizzou. Also, I told you I'm taking Mizzou this week. But the, the one thing that was really interesting about that game was Florida got dominated at the line of scrimmage and Mizzou did that without their 2 starting edge rushers. And the best theory that I heard was no one sees more wide zone in the nation than Mizzou. It's all they run. So they're essentially seeing their practice offense come at them and they are more than prepared for that kind of stuff. So that was the best theory that I heard.

That's awesome.

Also, maybe the SEC as a whole is super confusing right now. We haven't played enough games to figure out what's what. One thing that I do know is Alabama's got a good quarterback.

What's what?

Alabama looks like they're back, Dan. They score a ton of points. They're smoking fools. Even in games— there have been a couple games this year, Kentucky and FSU, where they're trailing by double figures at halftime and like it doesn't matter in the second half. They're still smoking fools. Alabama, Dan, might be back.

Uh, might be? Why would you do might be when they keep putting up 56?

Okay, they're back.

Well, because they have like 7 more tough games and they could lose a couple.

They haven't played any good defenses. They haven't played any good defenses. They're about to play a good one in Georgia.

But that win at Mississippi State, come on.

We, we think Georgia has a good defense, but Georgia hasn't played any good offenses. So we're going to find out who's who this weekend. Classic who's who game. They cleaned Mississippi State's clocks. Taylor got injured. Everyone was, was really hyped on the Kamario Taylor train. And the person that came away with the Heisman hype was Russell, rightfully so. Mississippi State gets blown out at home. They fall one slot in the AP. This is the SEC racket in the top 25. Now Mizzou actually won a game against a top 25 opponent, so they're probably going to be there for the next 5 years.

You look at Mississippi State, it's like they've got the one guy, Kamario Taylor, but that's it. It's Mississippi State at the end of the day, a team last year that was terrible. They just have the one—

No, they were not terrible last year. They were sneaky decent last year. I told you that.

Stark Vegas, tough place to play. But the Tough thing for Kamario Taylor is they got the one guy and he gets pressured a lot and I mean, those are the best edge guys that he faced, but I was still surprised at how that game got out of hand. Now, it got out of hand because Taylor wasn't there in the second half. They were trying to fight back into that, but really curious to see what happens between Alabama and Georgia. 2 teams that look really good so far, but also the context of who they've played. I think we feel a little bit more certain because they won at Kentucky and we think Kentucky's good, but Kentucky—

They're not.

inflated themselves by beating up an SEC team in Texas A&M that we also have questions about.

Wow. That came out of my body.

Not turned up at all.

Happens a lot. In fact, if you were following along closely, it happened again after just people were talking.

Oh, get me out of here. That is horrifying.

It's my life.

Yeah. What kind of animal is that?

That sounds like a demon pig. Like a pig in need of an exorcism.

Sometimes it happens and you blame Greg Cody.

Yeah.

And, and I go along with it because I feel bad for Dan. And, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a bad look. I feel guilty every time because Dan does that 17 times a show.

That's not true.

It is.

Uh, point it out the next time that it happens.

You sure?

Yes. Well, let me get through this sickness.

Yeah, yeah, let's, let's revisit next week. But it happens a lot even when you're not sick.

That's startling. When you speak up— when you speak, if you make me laugh too hard, I'm gonna become Cody coughing, and it's gonna be a wet laugh, like a wet cough.

Like I'm in a swamp. Close your eyes. You're in a swamp and there are frogs everywhere.

Whoa, whoa, a dark swamp. It is late, late, late at night. You can't see very well. And there's something in the marsh.

What?

That's shuffling around. Wait a minute, is that Ed Orgeron?

He's there. Yep.

In the swamp.

In the background.

Oh, tiger.

Dan Le Batard.

Ahoy, it's Captain Slappy.

Jonathan Sasslow.

Is this Chum Bucket?

This is the Dan Le Batard Show.

When you talk about the AP vote, can you guys start getting some imaging for me on AP a-hole? Because every week we should announce a new AP A-hole because of the sheer number of stupidities that you'll find in the polls.

It's every week! Every week there's some A-hole. AP A-hole, that's good. Every week there's some A-hole who— like, look, you have a vote. You could vote however you want. Your opinion is your opinion. But I have a problem with When you vote one way one week and then what your ballot is the next week makes no sense compared to the way you previously voted. So this person, he's an AP voter, he's called Greg Luca. All right, make this make sense to me, Dan. Last week, for instance, Mississippi State, who had all the hype around them, who ranked 18th in the country. Now, when you're ranked 18th in the country, Dan, And you lose at home by 33 points, do you think you should move up 8 spots to number 10? I'm asking you a question.

Of course not.

Of course not. Of course not. Now again, it's your poll. You can have what opinion you want. I, I don't care about that, but it's not okay when you have a team ranked 18, they lose by 33 at home, and you move them up to number 10 in the country. That's not okay to me.

Well, I'm just looking at the Miami stuff because obvious bias, and I see Alabama is now ranked ahead.

Yeah, Miami went down.

Uh, yeah, ahead of Miami in his ballot week to week. But you understand why? It's because they, they just throttled number 10 Mississippi State. All this stuff is reverse engineered to benefit the SEC.

Notre Dame has won 15 straight games by double digits. It's 15 straight.

It's a tougher time in that game than I anticipated.

Yep.

Yeah, that was it.

After that kickoff, I was like, oh, wait a second, we got something there.

Against North Carolina? What was there? What was—

there was an opportunity there.

It was 7-20 at some point.

It was there.

They've won 15 straight games by double digits. I don't want you taking away the credit from them when they've won 15 straight games by double digits. There haven't been that many streaks that are like that. That's an unusual streak. It's an unusual—

let me see who they've played and I'll get back to you. How about that?

This, uh, Greg Luca guy covers UTSA, so it's not like he's like in the SEC, but still, just biased.

Uh, that may be who he covers. Let's, let's keep digging. Who does he love?

Who does he love?

Where did he go to school? What— who's his in-laws' family?

Uh, something that bears watching in the NFL when we talk about the Chiefs, as you guys mentioned, the Raiders and Kirk Cousins. Kirk Cousins. Patrick Mahomes versus man coverage the last 2 seasons. This is from Next Gen Stats. In 2025 against man coverage, says he was 5 yards per attempt. It was last in the NFL. In 2026, it's 11 yards per attempt because he's got a running game and everything they're doing out of play action. It leads the NFL. And now they're calling Tyreek Hill because they want some deep help. But this is a This is Patrick Mahomes reverting back to 2022 form because he's got Kenneth Walker to offset a bunch of things offensively. They're playing offense differently than they have the last 2 seasons.

There is, there is no world where anyone was saying that the Chiefs were going to be 4-0 to start this year.

I mean, you don't think so?

I don't like— who did you—

with getting Kenneth Walker, it felt like, all right, wait a second, they may revitalize the offense.

No, but the conversation was, is Mahomes going to look anything like he used to. We didn't even know if he was gonna be ready at the start of the season. And to say that the Chiefs at 4-0, I think it's the biggest surprise in the league right now.

I don't think so.

Greg Luca went to Florida. Is that a Jim Tomsula?

What are you saying is the biggest surprise in the league?

The Chiefs at 4-0.

There's no way, Zazz.

What's a bigger surprise?

The Vikings at 4-0?

The Chargers at 4-0? The 49ers at 4-0? What's happening to the Chargers?

Texans and Chargers.

The 49ers is a good one.

You want to—

well, I'm giving it away. You want to take a guess as who's lost the most games to injury so far this year? It's not a surprise. It's always the 49ers, and they're still unbeaten.

That substation, they keep making fun of it. There's something there.

Saz, I don't know how surprised you can be about that. Why would you be surprised about the Chiefs being 4-0?

This was supposed to be a down year for them, and they only won 5 games last year. We didn't know if Mahomes was even gonna be ready at the start of this season. I think it's completely reasonable to say this is, this is very surprising. Not just 4-0, but looking like a championship team again.

Yeah, but last year was the outlier. Every year before that of Mahomes' career, other than the year before that, it's looked like this. Like, it's, it's, it hasn't been constipated. The surprise was that Patrick Mahomes would look like check-down quarterback, 5 yards per pass, but they are now throwing the ball downfield. You guys see the injury list yesterday, from yesterday? Because it's I mean, it's a crazy list from just yesterday. It's Naylor, it's Hollins, it's Mariota, it's Humphrey, it's Alt, it's Bixby, it's Mitchell, it's Rice, it's Surtain, it's Nabers. It's the whole league. It's Janty, it's Tee Higgins, it's DJ Moore, it's Ladd McConkey, it's Ja'Marr Chase, it's Saquon Barkley, it's Lamar Jackson. And you get the weirdness yesterday of— how often have you guys seen this? How often? Tell me. Lane Johnson suddenly before the game, personal reasons. Out when I'm telling you that what Jalen Hurts' numbers are when Lane Johnson plays and doesn't play, Jalen Hurts is one of the best quarterbacks in the league when he plays and is one of the worst when he doesn't play. And it's that easily tied between the two if he has his right tackle.

How often do you guys see right before a game a guy's just not out there? He's personal reasons. What, what could those personal reasons be? And do we respect that sort of stuff?

Yeah, let's go around the room and guess. It's a great question. I'm going to say ghost.

Again, I'm saying it's unusual. It's, it's super unusual for a guy to just— you only get 17 of the game.

You think he saw a ghost or he became a ghost?

I think he got a call. We got ghost, coach. I got to go.

Because he might have become a ghost.

You think?

It's not out of the question.

You think he died? You think the personal reason was he died and became a ghost?

It's not out of the question.

You've been terrible today.

No one's confirmed that it's not that. Tony, I got things to ponder. Check out what's going on with Vinicius.

Oh, okay.

Really? Outside of the chin job?

They're saying he got cloned.

Whoa!

He's gonna come out and have to address this. There's tattoos missing. He can't play well against India. It's a people— it's a thing. Check it out. He doesn't look anything like himself anymore. He's missing tattoos. His muscle definition is different. He's not playing well.

Funny enough, to help Zaz's point, in the Things to Ponder file, the first thing was, will Mahomes be the same post-knee injury?

What else is in the Things to Ponder file?

Fauci for prison.

I put that one in there.

That one is—

that one's still—

this one's still— we're still working on that one.

When he plead the fifth so much.

Is there a higher level that Caleb Williams can reach, or have we seen his peak? I think that Case Keenan played better in the system than Caleb did. That's another story for another day.

Zazz, how do you feel about the fact that you were alleging publicly to an international audience that it's not out of the question that the reason that Lane Johnson missed the game yesterday for personal reasons is because he had become a ghost?

Hold on a second. Mike Ryan offered up the theory that the reason he missed the game was because of ghosts. But your problem was me coming on top of that saying maybe he became a ghost.

Okay.

Yes. And all of this is a deflection from you definitely wanting to play guess the personal reason.

I'll grant you that this is the outcome of me wanting to guess the personal reason, which is irresponsible. I will grant you that. But you have to grant me that as he points to you and says that I did not dismiss your point, and the only reason I didn't dismiss your point is because you were clearly making a joke. Whereas when I came to him for his point, he doubled down. He wanted to go further than you and say that Lane Johnson had become a ghost. And then as I'm staring at him in the silence, he says it's not out of the realm of question.

You're complaining about guys being good teammates here. Yeah, we were just trying to help.

Yeah, but not good teammates. You helped poorly. That's not helping well. That's helping poorly.

Anxiety. Look how fun this is.

I so badly hope that—

He pooped himself.

I so badly hope that he was a ghost.

Someone's sick.

How is that your analysis?

You're gonna triple down?

How is that your analysis? You have been terrible today.

You're a sick man.