The Dan Patrick ShowDan and the Danettes try to figure out what's wrong with Fritzy. Eli Manning discusses what it was like doing his Manningcast with Bill Belichick. College football insider Ross Dellenger breaks down the new additions to the Pac-12, and speculates about which schools could be next. And NFL insider Ross Tucker explains why it's a must-ish win for the Dolphins tonight.
You are listening to the Dan Patrick Show on Fox Sports Radio.
Gang's all here.
The Minister of Humor is a little under the weather, and we're trying to debate if having a cold means you're sick. But Fritzi is here. He somehow made it and it's heroic.
It's a miracle.
Yes.
Uh, give me the audience a little bit of what they can expect to hear today.
I have a little bit of a froggy kind of voice. Okay, knows this stuff and it's affecting my.
So it's a cold.
It's a cold with with a chance for to advance to being sick.
Oh, it could have advanced like a player to be.
Named later cold with the prospect of it becoming of course, of being said, hopefully I'll just stay a cold.
All right, Well, you got your Peyton Manning colds jersey on today day Elie's.
Coming on today. I don't have an Eli Manning jersey, so I put a Peyton Manning jersey, not even a Bronco when I put a cult one on it.
Right, So Todd is a little under the weather. Although we're not sure of having a cold means you're sick. Could go either way, but.
We do have the glass partition between seatan and Fritzy. He's not going to fall for a banana in the tailblike either.
No, No, he's not.
He's not.
So PAULI may be concerned about getting a waft. Is it because I'm coming.
Straight to well, there's no glass.
We have enough distance, I think?
Okay, never enough distance?
Okay, yeah, So Seaton's here, Marvin, Paulie, yours truly the back room guys as well.
We're already in mid show form. Here is Todd.
I thought Todd, I mean, not many people limp when they have a cold, but it felt like Todd was limping when he came in today.
I think that's just a hemorrhoids thing. But they try to, you know, make it sound like it's a bigger deal.
No, we're not doing that too.
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Good morning if you're watching on Peacock, Thank you for downloading the app. In our radio affiliates, iHeartRadio, Fox Sports Radio over four hundred cities carrying this program. A little bit later on the aforementioned Eli Manning will stop by our good buddy Ross Tucker as well. It's the Bills at the Dolphins and the Dolphins favored by two and a half.
It's a big game. It's a big game.
Early Week two, and this is a perception win for the Dolphins if they beat Buffalo. Now they're supposed to, but still they're one in six against Buffalo. Here's to a tongue of ioloa on that perception that the Dolphins can't beat Buffalo.
That's going to be what's written out there until we do something about that. That's going to be the narrative that we can't beat the Bills. And until we do beat them, and we beat them consistently, like, none of that's going to change. And we have an opportunity to do that this year. We have an opportunity to do that this Thursday.
Okay, I'm not gonna say must win, but it kind of is inching closer to a must win against this team who you're going to be going against again. Now, the must must win for me is December when you face Buffalo. I think that's the next time the home at home. That's what I want to know. Can Miami win a game in Buffalo late in the year. They should win this game in Miami. They should win this game.
Yeah, Pauline, are you doing the must ish winning of the weekend in Week two?
I week two mustish win? Okay, Okay, that'd.
Be a record, But I'm doing a must ish win for the Jets against the Titans as well.
Keep going, bringing in Big Fella.
The Bengals against the Chiefs.
I can't say that's a must ish win because it I mean, there was a touchdown underdog in that game. But it's like a semi semi m I must ish win.
I'm comfortable saying that the Ravens must win. They must beat the Raiders ish. It feels like a mustish win. Well, how many mustish wins are there this weekend? I mean, I would say Miami that's a mustish win against Buffalo definitely, definitely. And I think the Jets going on the road, just the fact that they start over and two.
It's an avalanche. It's just everybody's waiting their way. And now Aaron Rodgers says, hey, if you're jumping off the bandwagon, we don't want you back on later in the year. Like we don't need to hear that. Just play football. Don't worry about who's on a bandwagon and who's not. And then you know, the timing aspect of Aaron Rodgers is going to put out a documentary on Aaron Rodgers by Aaron Rodgers, and it calls it a enigma. I mean, come on, like you, I would never call myself an enigma, but Aaron is calling himself an enigma in this spiritual journey, and let's put out a documentary.
God, we're not even two weeks into the NFL season.
Yes, Todd must win Cowboys home against the Saints, even though the Saints blew out a terrible Panthers team. Don't doubts they have to win that game. No, take them really, no, no, they lose to the Saints at home. And they're supposed to go to the Super Bowl every year and this.
Maybe this, well, nobody has them going to the super Bowl this year.
But they think that they should be right there.
Well, yeah, they've thought that for thirty years. But this is it.
I don't think this is must winish mustish win for the Cowboys. You know, the Saints played really well. Now, do I think the Saints are a playoff team?
I don't.
But would I be surprised if the Saints won that game. I wouldn't, not the way they played, and they do have weapons. They got you know, both sides of the ball. But I don't think that's mustish win. Yes, Marvin, what about the Browns at Jacksonville? Oh boy, I don't know if that's well, Jacksonville's favored. I think if you're a home team like Miami's home tonight, favored by two and a half, you have to win this game. Perception wise, you have to win this game. I'd say that's the most mustish win so far of Week two.
Yes, I would throw in Colts at Packers mustiche for the Packers. No, Jordan Love, stay afloat. You don't want to go oh and two and that you know you have a bad month.
I'll give you that mustache ish.
Yeah, I'll give you an ish a lot of issue, absolutely any other issues, Yes, Tom.
Do the Giants have to win at Washington or just not get blown out and look absolutely horrible against hut Garnet.
They mustish not look terrible again. Washington has to win this game. Yes, this is must lose ish for the Giants. The Giants are doing exactly what they need to do. They want the first pick of the draft. It's over Johnny. They can get out of their quarterback situation at the end of this year with Daniel Jones and comfortably draft his replacement.
So you think they're already thinking about tanking.
Not tanking, but the best thing that could happen for the Giants. They're not competing for anything this year. If you get the number one pick of the draft, you get to reset your franchise and calmly move on from Daniel Jones.
Do you think Brian Dable has the latitude to walk into ownership and say, hear me out, I got idea, just listen to me. Hear me out once again. We're just gonna tank this season. Trust me. I'm gonna do better with the next guy.
But look, you gotta keep me though, because not many guys gonna sit through a season like this where we're gonna win three games like, promise me, I get to keep my job, but I'm gonna do a really good job of not putting a quality.
Team out there.
Trust me, it's gonna be so good.
I'm gonna put the game plan in Danny Dime's hands.
Okay, Yes, I'm not sure the Giants have to try to tank this.
I think it could happen organically. See, I think they're going to be better than what people expect out of them.
Now.
I don't know what that means.
It might be five or six wins, but they they got a good receiver. I don't know, they got some defensive players. I like your doubting yourself. I know I am, I am, I'm mister doubt fire. Yes, Marvin, they changed their throwback uniforms. They'll be in perfect shape.
They go back to the Lawrence Taylor phil Simms whoa perfect.
Celebrate one hundred years. Let's go, Come on, Johns. Who is with me?
Nobody? See what's Paul questioned today? Well, we're gonna.
Start with two that I thought were fairly obvious answers. Maybe I'm wrong, Okay, one of which we've already hit on. Do you consider having a cold being sick?
Yes or no, Let's go around the road.
I thought that's fairly obvious.
Seton.
Do you think Fritzy having a cold means Fritzy is sick?
Yeah, of course, okay Marvin, Yes, Paulie.
No, a cold means you're under the weather, which is the little brother of sick. But you're not sick.
It's sick.
Is that is such a nonsense.
A cold is not the flu.
I'm I'm going to agree with Paully from the standpoint of you can have a cold.
I don't think you would feel sick.
It's sick ish.
You sound sick.
So if you were under the weather, okay, that would be akin to being more or less healthy.
Less healthy than the normal day. Okay, Well, we're talking about sick. So if you were to look.
Up under the weather, what comes up is uh, if you say the phrase under the weather, that means you are feeling slightly ill, slightly okay. However, then the word ill, unwell, poorly sick, those are all cinnamon.
Illish ill. I think todd is ill is.
We're all technically under the weather unless you're on a plane above a certain number of feet.
Now, I think under the weather stems from you you're going to bypass.
He's just let's not spend any more time on that.
Yeah, I just I blue by that.
But if you don't have a fever, do you have to have a fever.
Yeah, that's sick. Yeah, then you're sick.
But if you don't have a fever and just have a stuffy nose.
No, you just sound like you're gotta stuck. Yeah, I don't like you're sick. Could you stay home from school?
Yeah, you can probably finagle that.
No.
I wasn't like that, though. I like getting the one hundred percent attendance.
Yes.
Over the seventeen years of just this version of working with Todd plus the three at ESPN, so it's almost twenty twenty. Now I know his patterns of feeling under the weather like the back of my hand. In three days from now, this is going to turn into the most horrendous guttural cough we've ever heard, because it's going to move from his cute little button nose down into his hellish lungs. And at that point on Monday, when we hear Todd doing the is he going to be more or less sick or is it still just going to be like what he's just coughing.
No, I think he's on the doorstep of being sick, But then it feels like he's always on the doorstep of every six weeks pretty much.
Once you start flirting with stepdoat and pneumonia, that is more sick. I would agree.
I think you just sounds sick. I think you're fine.
You know what.
I think part of it is too. I think that Todd, when he does get sick like this, is the precursor.
Right.
He's not fully blown sick yet, but he will be soon. His lips turn white, his whole face goes gray. He is No one goes from having a cold to within forty eight hours being on death's door faster than Todd.
I'm not even kidding. I'm not kidding.
He goes right, He's going to have a horrendous fever sometime in the next forty eight hours. I mean, we all know how this goes. We've seen it a hundred thousand times.
I can't argue.
I can't.
But since I am hr I'm the boss here, I have to be you know, aware of Todd's feelings, how you know how he's feeling, and who thinks Todd should be sent home.
That's nice.
Wait, do you want them?
No, I'm I'm happy that no one thinks that I'm in a situation where I get away from me go home. You should get no business being here, though.
I would only send you home if I thought other people could get sick.
That'd be it.
Which you keep saying that it's just you got a stuffed up nose and that's it.
Yeah, And the last thing I want to be is incentitive to thinking that, like I, who cares about everyone else? I just want to go to work and if I get anybody stick too bad? You don't want to do that. I do not like you and that I help my presence here. Doesn't you know suggest that like I don't care about other people catching a cold or something, because that's not my intention by being here today.
Not your intention, not my intention.
Like you didn't say, hun, I'm going to work and I'm gonna get everybody sick.
All right.
No, I keeped you from the get go and said I'm gonna sit further away. We have the partition up and something. I'm trying to make sure I'm not near anybody and still doing.
The other poll question today.
This is also what I thought was fairly obvious, but maybe it's more up for debate. Is it the quarterback's job to make sure his top receiver gets more touches?
Yes, Okay, we're going to talk about this with Kyler Murray because they have Marvin Harrison Junior the third and he got three targets against Buffalo.
And that's not his job.
Apparently it's not the quarterback's job at me.
Okay, the quarterback, Yeah, Kyler talks about this. You know, let's take a break. We'll bring that to your attention if you haven't heard it. But I love that guy.
Man.
Do you want some vitamin C?
Todd?
Is there anything this morning?
Okay?
I take my supplements and my vitamins, and I have little sucking candies to the off drops's halls, all that stuff.
Okay, all right, give you some chicken noodle soup.
If you're offering it. If you're I know, sometimes you're busy in the kitchen making stuff.
I am busy. I mean, I'm entertaining a nation.
But if I have to worry about making me vicount make some soup for you, some chicken noodle, maybe I could have, you know, one of the backroom guys, go out and get you some chicken noodle.
I know they have other roles, they do.
Everybody has other roles here today, but uh, you know, just to get you through thoughts and prayers.
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Hey gang, this is Jay Glazer, host of Unbreakable, a mental Wealth podcast, and every week we will have on leaders from sports entertainment like Sean McVay, Lindsay Vaughn, Michael Phelf, David Spade, Got Fiery, and also those who can help us in between the ears, anyone from a therapist to someone like Ed Milett for John Gordon. We've all been through some sort of adversity to get to the top.
We've all used different tools.
Listen to Unbreakable with Jay Glazer and Mental Wealth podcast on the Ieart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get podcasts.
He's Eli manning two times Super Bowl MVP, and today hundreds of New York City street cart vendors are ditching their New York pretzels for King Jawaiian Soft pretzel bites. They of course are big sponsor King Jawaian. They're going to bring us meet Friday coming up tomorrow. But uh, look who's in the heart of New York City. It's Eli Manning joining us on the program. How are Eli? I'm doing great?
Dan?
How are you? I got to get you to come visit my card. You know you gotta get some soft pretzel bites here.
Well, we're gonna have that tomorrow. Kings Hawaiian is coming to us and then they're going to bring that. It looks like you're running a lemonade stand here.
It is. That is the idea, except it's Kings of Wan soft pretzel bites instead. And I'm in the middle of New York City and this is what I do. You know, New Yorkers brought me so much joy and their support. I want to give back by giving out some self pre bike.
Look at you, you're just a man of the people. Okay, But do you ever run into a fan who's mad at you for something that you may have done during your career?
You know, I think five years being retired, they've forgotten. So maybe how they forget about all the interceptions, the terrible games the losses, they always remember the good stuff, and so.
I you know, the same thing happens to quarterbacks.
You know, five years of my I lost the game, a game I thought we won.
Everyone I was watching the Manning cast and I was wondering, with your brother and Bill Belichick there in the same room, who is more of a football nerd Peyton or Coach Belichick.
Ah, Man, I gotta I mean, I think I gotta go with Belichick. Just I mean, he's just an encyclopedia of knowledge on on football and everything. You could hear him in the TV timeouts. There's someone in his room that he's talking with. He's like, hey, wow, they're going like bear defense. This is not real sound I don't like this move Like he is. He is, you know, constantly just game planning, analyzing, looking at everything, seeing things that are unique or different or oh this is a really good and so I mean he is just right in the middle of it. Peyton during the during the TV timeouts, he's eating like a chicken parm sandwich or like, you know, he's buffalo wings. Just you know, he's always got sauce on his face. He's a disaster.
But he was offended when Brandon and Auk dropped that ball like it it was if he was still playing it. It hurts him sometimes to watch bad football.
It does. It does hurt him.
And especially when a guy's get out of training camp, you sit out, you sign this big, great, big contract, and then you drop you drop past this like what you know, Hey, let's get the contract done. I think he's just mad at the whole situation that that the idea of like missing training camp blows his mind to him. He he looked forward to training camp. He's like, finally I get to go. I think it should be a longer training camp. We'd have longer football season. And that's his mentality. So I think if he sense it, if someone doesn't have that same mentality, he just can't resonate.
There was a sneaky line that you know, Belichick talked about going to those super Bowl parties after you lose the super Bowl and then you go I never went to one of those, and it was it was an awesome line just to see Belichick's response to it.
Yeah, I was I almost say like, hey, you know, Bill, were you invited.
The Peyton's Loser, you know, super Bowl party? But I bit my tongue.
I can't say that to Coach Belichick, too much respect for him. He won to me the other you know, super Bowls, and but yeah, I mean Peyton, I was surprised, like you know, about having everybody had to lost the championship to get invited to this party.
So I guess I'm glad I wasn't invited.
He's Eli Manning, two time Super Bowl MVP, joining his courtesy of Kings Hawaiian their new soft preencil bites, and he's in the heart of Manhattan's Flat Iron District. Today, Connor Murray talked about, hey, you know, the game plan didn't call for us to get the ball to Marvin Harrison. He said, you know, like pointed the finger at the offensive coordinator. He said, it's not on the quarterback, okay, And I criticized him because even if it's not on you, it is on you. You're the quarterback, you own it. It's your team. But how do you get the ball to somebody who everybody knows that you want to get the ball too?
Well, I think there's always a couple staple plays where you can put them, you know, put your receiver to a certain spot, you know, and this is a no matter basically, no matter what the coverage is, no matter what the defense, you know, we can get him the ball on the outside, on a short end or on a hitch route, on a slant route, and it's not guaranteed it's going on there.
They could dictates the coverage to take you away.
But you know, I don't I don't think that Marvin Harrison Junior is getting double teams on every play right now. I don't think you know, a rookie hadn't played a game. I don't think you're gonna draw that attention. And sometimes it's just it is truly just based on you know, we want to get them the ball.
If they're playing Manda man, you're going to go to your guy.
But it just depends on what the coverage is, or you have some special plays to get them on some play action. Those are the ones a little harder and we have a play action a two man route, maybe they play a different coverage or he gets covered up by the by his zone coverage. But there are a couple of plays in this you know, three step five step passing game where you can't get the ball to you know, to certain guys.
How often would receivers come back to you in the huddle and say I'm open?
They you know, we have pretty good receivers.
If you it's one of those feels if you ask them, hey, were you open on the last play, the answer is always yes, Like that don't I don't even think about what the play was. They don't even say yes. That's just their mentality. But there are there are, you know, times we're on the sideline, they'll come up and they'll be like, hey, this guy cannot hang with me. They're they're pressing it. I'm running by him. Or they'll come and say, hey, this guy's getting antsy. We need to double move them. Like normally, they have pretty good suggestions, and you know, there and there were times there were maybe a few times on the sideline where I worked, you know, worked the other side of a man. The man I threw a you know, a fade stop to your team mix, and I would ask like Victor, hey, Vic, did you get open on the fade on the other side, And sometimes he would say like no, not not really, not really. He kind of covered me up on that one. But you know, next time, I definitely don't beat him. I'm prepared for the next one. So they don't want you to think don't go to him by any means.
Patients for rookie quarterbacks like, at what point do we get a sense of what kind of season it's going to be for these rookie quarterbacks.
Unfortunately, I think it takes, like a good it kind of takes to the halfway point. I really do feel it takes that long to get a sense of your offense, of what's going on, the comfort level for the quarterback to maybe have an honest conversation with the offensive coordinator being like, hey, I really like this play, or if there's a play that the coordinator really likes, for the quarterback to be like, hey, I'm just not feeling it yet. Like at first, you just kind of like what the coordinator likes and you don't know any better. And then as the season goes along, you start to you know, kind of get your favorite plays, You get your favorite concepts, you understanding the protections more and the rhythm of certain plays, and you start, you know, getting the nerve to say, hey, let's let's just run this play, Like this is my favorite play, let's run it three times and just change up the formation a little bit so I can get completions, I can get into a rhythm, and I really do think it just takes. It takes about, you know, a halfway point to get that confidence and to get the feel and the speeds of the game.
I look at demeanor of quarterbacks, certainly young quarterbacks, because chances are they had a really successful college career. They're not used to, Hey, I just threw a pick six. Now I got to go back out like you show me more after a pick six or an interception than you do after a touchdown. I want to see how you go back out there after doing something like that. You know, I don't know how important that is for you if you're looking at somebody's head is down or they go out there and they're like, all right, come on, let's go. That was one play, let's get it back.
No, I think it's a good thing to look at.
And also just you know, if they make a bad play, they do a bad interception, that next series, do.
They get gunshot.
Are they are they going to come out and still, you know, rip this this skinny post on time, or are they going to be like a little hesitant to go to the checkdown a little hesitant and not not you know, kate their eyes down the field and said, just you know, bind my completions instead of you know, hey, if something's open, I'm still gonna rip this.
I still got confidence I can make these throws.
And so the you know, being being kind of cautious is not a great thing, uh as an NFL quarterback, and usually leads to more mistakes. Now you're maybe not throwing it to your first read who is open, but it's a longer throw and you're going to check down versus man, which is not great, and you can lead the more problems. So it's something to look forward to and make sure they don't get conservative, they don't get gun shy, and they still feel they can go and and uh, you know, ball get the ball out on Tom.
Are you contractually obligated to say nice things about the New York Giants play this year?
I'm I'm not obligated to say nice things. I think after Week one, just you know, understanding, I've been in this situation. I've had a bad Week one before. I've thrown three interceptions in Week one. We've had losses, and we've we've started going too and in a Super Bowl year we started going to and and I had to go down to Washington and down at halftime and how to come back. When to get on a little wind streak. I also know it can change quickly. You can get your confidence bat, you can get on a wind streak. So that's what I'm always optimistic. And I'm a fan of the giants. I'm the fan of the coaches. I know him personally. I see how hard they work. I'm a fan of Daniel Jones and in this rooting form to do well, and I'm going to be optimistic in that.
Great to talk to you, have fun down there in the Flat Iron District. It's King Sawaiian. These soft pretzel bites the first ever snack by King Sawaiian. Great people that have become one of our favorite sponsors. Good to talk to you, Eli, Thanks for joining.
Us all right, Dan, thanks so much. A lot of fun.
Be sure to catch the live edition of The Dan Patrick Show weekdays at nine am Eastern six am Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app.
Mentioned this earlier. Pac twelve is rebuilding the conference Boise State, San Diego State, Presno State, Colorado State set to join Oregon State Washington State for the twenty twenty.
Six school year.
Ross Dellinger's job to cover college football, and the Younghu Sports National College Football reporter joins us So. PAC twelve is back ish. What's it mean?
Yeah, Yeah, they are back. They're back at six dans to the six pack right now, but they need two more at least at least two more teams to reach eight members, which is the would get them to the NCAA minimum to be designated as an FBS conference, and they need those. They need to get to eight members by twenty twenty six, and then from there, you know, they'll probably be there'll be a reinstated as a guess, a new group of five conference. At that point, you'd have six of them, right, Sunbelt, Mountain West, American Athletic Conference, the MAC, and Conference USA.
So they're back.
They're back for now. It'll be interesting as we go to see what kind of TV deal they get, you know, and what kind of marketability the PAC twelve has as a reband rebranded, kind of reimagined group of programs.
All right, So who would they add to get up to eight schools?
Yeah?
I think plenty of options out there. I think the new PAC twelve wants to be sort of known as the best of the rest, so to speak, all of those outside of the Power Conference schools. So when it comes to brand power DAN television markets on the field success, you look at all those things. I think they probably will look eastward now into the state of Texas, maybe a program like Memphis Tulane, those Texas schools like Texas State, UTSA, North Texas, maybe even South Florida, and that would be a long way away.
Right.
Geography would be would play a factor as well, but there's there's certainly those options. And if that fails DAN, I think they look back back west and they go back to maybe some other Mountain West Conference schools.
Could this have been prevented? How could this have been prevented? The dissolvement of the PAC twelve?
Oh man, wow?
Yeah? How many?
How many ways this could have been prevented? I mean, the most recent way I think that it could have been prevented is August twenty twenty two, when the PAC twelve presidents and looking for a new television deal, were presented with an agreement from ESPN and they turned it down. And when they turned it down and went to market. The market wasn't what they expected, DAN, and that led them to down a path with Apple, a streaming obviously streaming platform for their television deal, and that was something that got pushed back and it obviously led to the exit of Colorado and that kind of had the domino effect right of Washington and Oregon deciding to go to the Big ten and then then it all kind of fell apart. But even if you go beyond before that, right before August twenty twenty two, there was July of that year, a couple months before that when USC and UCLA announced they were leaving for the Big Ten DAN, and that really was the big blow. That was thirty to forty percent of the value of the PAC twelve.
Before I Let You Go, we were talking about this prior to the show. Could you see a schedule maker for college football at some point down the road where you know, there being strategic and we're going to have a noon kickoff at three o'clock in an eight o'clock and you're going to treat it like the NFL does that there's not going to be cupcakes that we're going to schedule this. So I just think they're missing out on even more revenue, and that is TV revenue getting these matchups. And like we accidentally had Texas in Michigan because Sarkisian said, I didn't schedule that. But if you have a schedule maker, could you see the top fifty schools where you have a schedule release party like the NFL does, and you get to show these marquee matchups and you can kind of build upon that momentum.
What do you think, Well, this is a great topic, and yes, it is one being discussed at the highest levels. I think right now in college athletics, if you can have some kind of alliance or agreements to have better, more interesting matchups, and I think we're moving in that direction. The problem with college athletics DAN obviously is it's such a fractured group.
Right.
The conferences are only about themselves their conference. The schools are only about themselves their school. So you do need somebody to come in and kind of get every consolidate everything, get everybody together on the same page, and everybody work toward one mission. And that's what we're missing from college athletics. But we're getting closer, I think to that point. So we will see. I think in the future more power conference versus power conference games. I think on the Olympics sports schedule, we'll see more regional scheduling, geography at play, some rearranging of those things. But you know what it will take for schools and conferences to play more of these big games, Dan, and that is the College Football Playoff further expanding to give you the option to have more losses and still the playoff.
Great stuff is always Thank you, Ross.
Be sure to catch the live edition of The Dan Patrick Show weekdays at nine am Eastern six am Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio WAPP.
He's Ross Tucker, our good buddy Westwood one and well college football and NFL analyst host of the Ross Tucker Football Podcast.
Is the running back back?
Ooh, that's a good question, Dan.
I'm Ross Tucker, a middle aged phenom, happy to join the show. Now, you know what, I don't know that I would say the running back is back.
What I would say is that.
We've lost our way a little bit the last couple of years with the value around that position or the market for that position, like for example, right, Dan sat Boon Barkley. A lot of people thought the Eagles overpaid him, paying him twelve million a year. All right, so we've got the left guard for the Eagles, Landon Diggerson's a really good player. Okay, he makes.
Twenty one million a year.
We've got receivers making thirty five and close and soon thirty six million a year. You're trying to tell me that a guy in Saquon Barkley, who gets what.
Did he get?
Twenty four carries twenty I mean twenty four touches, twenty eight touches in that first game, that that guy isn't worth a third of a top receiver, or isn't worth more than half of a top guard.
I mean, I don't know how Sakuon found the Fountain of you.
He looked like Penn State Saqua I mean Dan, He's touring thirty five pounds. It looked like he had rocket boosters coming out of his butt. I mean he was flying all over the field. And so yes, I think the Eagles might have been one of the first teams to realize, hey, this has gotten a little carried away.
We still give the guy, this guy the ball.
Like twenty times a game. You might I want to have someone that you think is really good.
Paul, could you check to see if Saquon had rocket boosters coming out of his butt checking? Alrighty, he had six one yard rushers last year. It was three in the first week now on once again. I don't know if it's an anomaly, but you know, hardball is going to run the football this year. I mean he's going to make that Michigan West. He's going to make sure that they're running the football. If I'm the Eagles, I'm running the football. The Niners, I'm running the football. I always feel like a team is a better team when you were able to run the football. If I'm Dallas, I would have invested in a running back. I know that they had to pay a lot of people and you bring Zeke back in, but just having the option of like, I'm not going to buy into play play action if I don't buy into your running back, like right, yeah.
And here's the thing, Dan, because I know scoring was down in week one. You know, I talk with these coordinators all the time and these production meeting, right the analytics guys, they have figured out that the two biggest determining factors for the outcome of the game, whether you win or lose.
It's obviously turnovers. We knew that one.
The other one is explosive plays, right, Different people calculate that differently. But passes over twenty yards, runs over ten yards.
So what does that mean?
That means everybody is playing with two deep safeties. Everybody is saying, you know what, especially in week one early in the season, why don't you prove you can go on a twelve play drive and not have a false start, not have a holding penalty, be able to convert several third downs.
So if you're gonna keep having.
These teams playing the two deep safeties so that these thirty million dollars wide receivers don't beat them over the top, that is very favorable to run the ball, to do the bath, especially if you have a quarterback that can run it even a little bit. The defenders there's not enough of them. They can't get every gap if two safeties are back deep. That is why, I think, more than anything, why there's a resurgence in the running game. It's kind of what you have to do if they're gonna sit in those two deep safety looks.
Yeah, and once again it's a small sample size, it's week one, but if I'm looking at touchdown passes here, twenty nineteen, there were sixty one touchdown passes in Week one. There were thirty four in Week one this year. That's a big drop, big drop, And the previous year there were thirty seven touchdown passes week one collectively.
Why well, that's the other thing.
If you're going on long drives as opposed to getting these big, long touchdowns through the air, and you get down near the end zone, well, what do they do? Then? I've seen it a million times. They go and they drop in a zone and you're now trying to throw the ball into the end zone when they're seven or eight guys in there.
Good luck. That is hard to do.
I think the teams looked at it and they thought, I mean, Josh Allen, I did the Bills Cardinals last Sunday for CBS Dan, Josh Allen dropped back and thought, I'm not throwing it in there. There's eight guys in the end zone. I'm gonna this will be an interception. People already say I turn it over too much. So he ran and jumped over the guys in for a touchdown. I think they're realizing that is tough duty. Trying to fit a ball when you get down near the goal and there is not that much space.
Talking to Ross Tucker, by the way, Ross on the call for Bill's Dolphins tonight on Westwood One. He also has Colorado Colorado State for CBS on Saturday, and you were there for the Cardinals and the Bills.
I'll go back to that game in a moment.
I said, this is a mustish win for the Dolphins tonight. Perception wise, you're one and six against Buffalo with two of their you know you're gonna face them again in November and go toe to toe for the division at home. How important is well, more important for Miami or Buffalo.
Definitely more important for Miami. It's a short week, They're playing at home. You could argue the Eagles. The Bill's best defensive player and maybe the best nickelback in the league, Tarn Johnson is out. So now the Bills don't have their best linebacker who was probably their best defensive player, Matt Milano. He's out till December. Now you don't have Tarn Johnson. If the Dolphins don't beat the Bills this time, Dan, when are they gonna right? I mean, Josh Allen. The numbers for Josh Allen against the Dolphins are just insane. He averages over two hundred and seventy five yards passing and over fifty yards rushing.
Against them in thirteen starts.
It's by far the most of any player against any team in NFL history. Josh Allen owns the Dolphins. The Dolphins need to end this. The Bill those have won the AFC East four years in a row. I just think it would be so demoralizing mentally for the Dolphins if they lose us. If the Bills lose it, they'll say, Okay, short week, we're without our two best defensive players.
We'll have them later.
We'll see those guys up in Buffalo later in the season, and and we'll be able to beat them and win the division in December like we always do.
I'm going to bring back a comment Kyler Murray made after Sunday's game, and the reporter was talking about not getting Marvin Harrison the ball. You were there, and especially that that last pass that could have gone to Marvin Harrison that would have won the game. He was open, but Kyler Murray is asked about not getting his rookie wide receiver the ball.
Sure, say away, Mark, Honestly, man, I wouldn't say they was taking them away. I think you know, I'm just as a quarterback. Obviously you go with to your red sometimes the ball goes to them, but that's not you know, it's not my job. Obviously, you know I have I have a sense and a feel for guys when they don't get the ball and when they're you know, when they are getting the ball.
But yeah, I'll leave that up to Drew.
You know, Drew always, you know, he tells me, don't worry about that type of stuff. Just keep playing a game and you know, get the ball to where the ball is supposed to go.
All right, So Drew is Drew petsing the offensive coordinator there right and kind of pushing off any blame that it's on the OC. But you still have the ball in your hands. He's not telling you not to throw it to Marvin Harrison for the game winning touchdown. I just I'm trying to understand the mindset and be fair to Kyler Murray, and that is how do I get him the ball? How do I not say to my offensive coordinator, let's get him the ball. He is your best weapon. Why does he have three targets in that game?
Well, so that's what's so interesting about that, right, you know, it's not like throughout the rest of the game, Dan, that he was running wide open. The first time Kyler threw him the ball in the game, it was a back shoulder throw and Harrison didn't look like he was expecting it. He was going for the fade, and after the play, Kyler kind of gave him one of these, you know, shrugging like, hey, what are we doing here?
And then later on.
Second or third quarter, he ran a good route, he was wide open. Tyler put it right on him, Dan, and he just dropped it. One of the worst drops I've ever seen. And I've been watching Marvin Harrison play football since he was in tenth grade in Philly High school football, I honestly don't think I've ever seen him have a drop before. He might have the best ball skills of any wide receiver prospect I can remember. It was a blatant drop. Now, credit to Petsing because the very next play they just ran a five yard out with Harrison and threw it right to him just so that he didn't lose it mentally, but I think, you know, no preseason for these guys, and no matter what the expectations are, he's still a rookie. It was still we asked them the day before the game in the production meetings, you know what do you think he's like?
I got all kinds of feelings going on.
I mean, you know, these are still twenty one year old kids in their first NFL game, and I'm not sure, but this way, I'm not saying Kyler was intentionally not trying to throw it to Marvin Harrison late, but.
He certainly hasn't earned and didn't earn in that game. Hey, this is our guy.
I mean, Kyler was probably looking for Trey McBride or maybe Dorch or somebody else. I don't think Kyler has that confidence in Harrison Junior yet, even though he told us the day before that he.
Did, Okay, now you got Colorado at Colorado State.
Is this a must win for Dion?
Absolutely? Yeah.
I mean Dan last year they were three and zero and then they lost the game and it went off the rails.
I mean, they went one to eight the rest of the season.
And it's one of the things I think that's so interesting about their model and having this many new players every year, and this many transfer portal additions. How does that group overcome adversity? How do they fare when things start to go south? If they lose this game, which, by the way, you know they're telling me it's going to be the biggest event in the history of Fort Collins, Colorado. They haven't hosted Colorado in the Rocky Mountain Showdown since nineteen ninety six. Now you have Dion Sanders and all the attention and CBS Primetime, all that stuff. Last year Colorado was three and zero. What happens if they start this year one and two and lose in Nebraska and Colorado State after beating them last year. You know, their team is made up of a lot of guys that have shown they're willing to go somewhere else, right, I mean, they're all transportal guys. They're willing to go somewhere. I don't know if that's a better team or a better situation for.
Them, or more nil money.
I wonder if if coach Prime will be able to keep this group together the rest of the season and stay resilient if they lose this one. They didn't show last year that they could really overcome adversity.
I'm going to leave you with this, give you something to think about. You had Northern Illinois beat Notre Dame. They got paid one point four million dollars to go in there play Notre Dame.
They beat Notre Dame.
What if I said to Northern Illinois or any of these smaller schools, when you go in and you're basically being paid to be a sacrificial and you can take the money, or you can take half the money and then Notre Dame must go to de Kalb next season, So you get Notre Dame going to Northern Illinois and you get half the money, or you just take the one point four if I if I added a little spice to these games where the big guy's picking on the little guy, and then if you lose, you have to go to their place.
It's a home and home. Oh only if only if win, only if you win?
Oh oh okay, Because I was gonna say, they would all take that in the heartbeat, you know, because even like Colorado's state Dan, they're geniuses.
Right.
You can't buy a single game ticket for this game on Saturday night. It had to be part of a season ticket package. You wanted to go to the CUCSU game, you had to buy some other games as well. That's exactly what Northern Illinois would do.
I mean, I think you know what.
It's like anything else going on with college football these days, Dan, the players and coaches would be all for it. The administrators would say, no, thanks, we'll take the guaranteed one point.
Yeah, thank you.
I know, because I'd like to see these smaller schools get paid because we know that that helps their entire athletic department budget. But if you put that on imagine Notre Dame. You lose the game, you pay them seven hundred thousand dollars, but then it'll be it would be the biggest event in that city's history. If Notre Dame went to DeKalb next year.
That would be incredible. This is what I love about college football.
I love the upsets and stuff like this, which is why there's people talking about how the power for might split off from the Group of Five.
And there's all kinds of talk about all these different scenarios.
I hope that doesn't happen because quite frankly, the college football ecosystem, Dan, they need these games, you know, like the Max schools. They need those paydays from the big boys. And by the way, the big guys, the big programs, they need these games too. They need games where they're pretty confident they can win and all that kind of stuff.
Great to talk to, you have fun tonight and safe travels there Colorado, Colorado state as well.
Thanks Dan, really appreciate it.
