Week 4 Recap: Those Winning Browns, Cowboys Collapse, Wentz Back on Track | NFL Deep Dive

Published Oct 5, 2020, 4:34 PM

Conor and Gary analyze everything that went down on Sunday in Week 4, starting with the Browns finishing another win and the Cowboys flailing on the defensive side of the ball. Plus, Carson Wentz looks better as the Eagles find a way in San Francisco, Tom Brady duels Justin Herbert, Nick Foles flops in his first Bears start, and much more.

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Hello, and welcome to the mm QB Monday Morning NFL Podcast. I am Gary Grammling. I am joined by Connor Or of The weak Side podcast. And Connor, there was a lot to be uh, kind of down about this week, a lot of people to pick on, and we will certainly do that on the show, but I'd like to think we're gonna we're gonna get some optimism in here too, and we're gonna maybe start with the Cleveland Browns and and why we should be a little bit uh a little bit pleased but what the Browns are doing right now. Yes, So I we talked about this a little bit before um we started taping, and I grew up as a Browns fan. I've obviously since abandoned that fandom, but kind of always do view moments like this through that lens of the frustrated um eleven year old Connor with his Tim Couch jersey on who uh you know. All of his friends were Eagles fans and Steelers fans, um and and they all had a lot of success Giants fans during the middle school years. So that one playoff game Kelly Holcomb against the Steelers, Bray invited everybody to my house, because you know, as a fan, you just want that attention for like thirty seconds that your team has actually done something. And uh, they obviously lost that game, but uh, this is probably, if I were a Browns fan, the best I've felt since that moment going into the playoffs. Right you, uh scored twenty eight points and a half for the first time since the year the Cold War ended, which is pretty phenomenal. They lead the league in turn points off turnovers, like these are all things that really good teams do, and the Browns are doing those things. And that's thing you can I'm not gonna do it this morning. You can poke holes in some things and say, well, this probably isn't sustainable going forward, they probably won't get this rate of takeaways and that sort of thing. But right now they are obviously that they're running the ball very well. They are ahead of sk Jill every game. They're getting leads and they are keeping leads and they are therefore getting wins. And that just seems like the kind of thing that we said about teams who played against the Browns in recent years. I mean, there's three and one and it's it's been three pretty solid winds here when um. So there's about six minutes to go in the game, and the Cowboys had condensed the lead to eleven yesterday. UM. And then all of a sudden, all that stuff starts happening right Baker Mayfield overthrows Odell Beckham um, the punter shanks one, UM, and it does get kind of a fortuitous bounce, but it was a bad punt, and then the Cowboys just whipped down the field and score. Um on. I think Ceedee Lamb was more open on that fade route than I've ever seen a receiver open on an end zone fade in my life. And then you know, that is when I think the fandom does kick in just a little bit and you say, like, oh my god, I've seen this a thousand times, Like they're gonna lose this game. This is how the Browns lose every game. It's not just um, it's not just a regular milk toast Sunday loss. It's a very public, embarrassing, ridiculous kind of loss. And they didn't do it, but I would say ten times out of ten in the past, that is a game that they blow spectacularly. The other nice thing about the Browns yesterday is look, we saw Odell Belcolm Jr. Sort of a sort of reminder that he is a difference maker. I mean, obviously they've been doing so well on the ground, and it's been a lot of uh uh, you know, Kevin Stefanski taking some of the Vikings playbook here and and you know, very look, it's it's a it's a run based and play action offense, and Odell just isn't putting up monster numbers huge plays yesterday, finishing with the game clinching fifty yard touchdown run on a play that looked like it had just completely busted. Yeah, I mean he was dead to rights in the backfield, but he has so much speed, um, you know, in his change of direction ability is so good that you know he can kind of negate that right and it will not go down as a horrendous play call or is a bust on the offensive lines part, however you want to call it. I would say it was a bad play call because I don't know where that guy who got so deep into Cleveland's backfield where he ended up kind of being blocked in that scheme. I think he was kind of designated to kind of pull him upfield and get him out of the way, But man, uh Odell can negate stuff like that. But I keep thinking to myself, and I'm curious kind of your thoughts on this is, like why doesn't every team like why isn't Bill Callahan like the Durrell reev Us of uh of offensive line coaches, Like why isn't he like a year to year mercenary that is just holding out for the best salary and going everywhere. Every team that hires him is better at running the football, like markedly better. And I would say that, like that was probably the biggest acquisition that the Browns made this offseason, bar none, because his ability to streamline their running game, Like they were just gaping holes yesterday and there gashing people with Kareem Hunt in a third string running back with Nick Chubb out, And you know, as much as everyone wants to talk about all the other things that are going on in Cleveland, and you're always gonna be waited to do that because the star power on the roster, I feel like just the fundamental run game aspect of it has gotten so much better than it ever has been in the past. Offensive line coaches just in general, it's it's kind of fascinating to me outside of your head coach and your your two coordinators there sorry, special teams coordinators, but the offensive coordinator, defense coordinator, offensive line coach is the most important guy on the staff. Seems like there are uh eight to ten maybe, and that's probably a stretch, really good ones, and if you have one of them, it's like you just can't let them go. But if there's like a regime change and one of them gets loose, I mean there should there should have been, like you said, there should have been like a a monster bidding war for Bill Callahan this offseason. Yeah, and I mean imagine if Dante Scarneckia had become available through some sort of I don't know, uh, intense rift with Bill Belichick at some point, like he could be if a team was desperate enough, and like I'm I'm looking at the Giants who have a bunch of developmental players that aren't developing. I would pay him more than some teams are paying their head coaches. I mean, it's that important of a position. And uh yeah, I mean Bill Callahan just everywhere he goes, you know, well what you know, that offensive line was so great and Ezekiel Alli was so great in Dallas, Well, you know has a lot to do with Bill Callahan pulling the strings and organizing that. And you know that the same thing in Cleveland, Like just because you add um, you know, a free agent and a rookie first round pick doesn't make your offensive line immediately better. It's having someone developed them and teach them how to do stuff. And you know that's what we're seeing in Cleveland right now. Let's uh, let's talk about what's going wrong with the Cowboys, because there's a lot going wrong with the Cowboys, specifically on the defensive side of the ball right now. Uh, this is the part of the show where I make a bunch of excuses for what's going on there, and I'll lay out a couple of numbers here. Uh, Cowboys defense has been on the field for right around thirty four minutes per game this year, around seventy one plays per week. Uh. Each of the last three weeks, the offense has turned it over three times and sort of put the Cowboys in in a bind here. And uh, stepping aside from that, we knew it was going to be a transition to Mike Nolan after all those years under Rod Marinelli and and and chris Ter Shard later. But you know, it's been that sort of Marinelli you know, sort of fast flowing, uh, relatively simple run to the ball defense for years and years, and now it's Mike Nolan who has always run uh some of a little more multiple, some of a little more complex, and there was going to be a transition. A lot of the issues you are seeing with the run defense all are related to tackling people, and that is an issue that went back to last year. The Cowboys did not tackle people who also you know, had the football at the time, and that was kind of why they had so many struggles late in the year. That said, there is a lack of just basic competence from this unit right now, and I I don't know if it gets fixed. You know, everyone's bringing Earl Thomas, bringing Earl Thomas. Well, Earl Thomas is kind of out there right now for a reason, and I don't think there's really a quick fix to being made to this defense right now. Yeah, and we knew that offenses, you know, in general, were probably going to start a little bit ahead of the curve this season with the pandemic, with the lack of a preseason all that kind of stuff. But there are some defenses that just can't get it together, and Dallas is one of them. And you know, uh, it pains me especially to say this after you know, writing a little Alden Smith pump up column on Friday, you know, talking about how good everybody looked there. Um. But yeah, this is it's just not coming together it fundamentally. Just it looks like they are broken aspects of it. And I will say this, in their first three games, there were a lot of dropped interceptions, like almost an abnormal number of dropped interceptions, like if you went back and you looked at every defensive snap. Um. And so I do think that they're you know, they're gonna start to get some of that back, right, I mean, I think that they're bad luck in the takeaway category is not sustainable. That said, they're not playing complementary football. They're leaving their defense out, like you said, way too long, and they just don't have the horses to sustain that. You know, this is not, um, you know, as deep of a Cowboys defense as we've seen them have in the past. Yeah, they're like you said, Connor, they are on the wrong end of the takeaway giveaway thing over the last three weeks. It's nine to one. The one was the dk metcalf for getting to run into the end zone. Uh, punch to the end zone last week. So, uh, those will come. They they even if you don't have a ton of talent, they typically come. Uh you usually get a couple. But they're just getting nothing right now. The last thing I want to say here and look, I don't want to be the guy who sits here and pretends that I am smarter than everyone on the Cowboys staff, because that is that is nowhere near the truth. I would completely embarrass myself if you asked me to draw up a single player concept for a for this team right now. But Uh, one thing that I I can't I can't get my head around it. Um. Undrafted rookie Terren Steele gets the start at at right tackle a lot Lyle Collins is now out for the season. Tyron Smith was back for this game, but Terrence Steele is starting on the right side. Uh. They just left him singled up on on Myles Garrett. And there are Look, there are ways you can help a young right tackle. Uh. Besides sliding protection or chipping a guy, you can get the ball out quicker. I I thought the strip sack might have been a case of Dak holding onto the ball too long and uh. But I just I could not wrap my head around the fact that they just put Terrence Steele out there and we're like, okay, yeah, you can handle Myles Garrett, and then they benched him, uh in the first half. And it was just I don't know what the thinking is, because it's like, it's like, when we signed you as an undrafted rookie three months ago, you said you could handle Myles Garrett one on one, but it turns out you were like, so get on the bench now. Like it just seemed absurd, uh and and kind of uh again, sometimes teams just get out schemes. Sometimes the the opponent just has a better plan and they create those matchups. But that didn't seem to be the case. It seemed to be the plan that Terrence Steele was going to handle Myles Garrett one on one, and I just I couldn't believe it. And it's weird because Myles Garrett does get that J. J. Watt treatment right where he's allowed to move around and he's allowed to go seek out those favorable matchups and then blow everything up. And you know, normally that involves kind of picking and choosing and testing. But as a Cowboys team, like, why aren't you challenging him to find those matchups? Why are you putting a big neon sign to the best matchup and saying, hey, come here and just keep coming back here, and don't worry, We're not going to do anything to stop you. Like, it was a very strange thing. And you know, I I guess you could go back to Mike McCarthy's days UM in Green Bay, and you know, talk about great offensive line coaches. They had great offensive line coaches back then, UM, and they had great offensive lineman. But this is not that team. Dak Prescott doesn't get the ball out faster as fast. He's a little bit different of a quarterback than Aaron Rodgers. Not any worse, just different, And so you have to adjust, and there seemed to be no adjustment made yesterday. And if you just continually invite a guy who's in the running for the defensive MVP Award right now into the backfield, it's it's complete chaos. Alright, Connor, Before we move on, I I do owe you and apology I was a little distracted during that first segment because I was in the middle of subscribing to the new week Side podcaste featuring featuring Connor Or and Jenny Prentis uh. For those of you who haven't been paying attention to our promotional language over the past couple of weeks, we are splitting up the MMQB podcast feed on this feed you're listening to you right now. You will continue to get the Monday show. You will continue get the MMQB Gambling Show on Friday. However, the week Side podcast again Connor and Jenny. Wonderful show. You all love it. It has its own feed now Albert Brier has his own feed. You would have thought I would have subscribed to that, you know, maybe after the show when when we weren't doing a podcast. But it was important enough that I felt I should do it right now before I before I forget, and all of you out there should do the same. Absolutely, Thanks Gary, and don't think of it. You know, I was telling Jenny this the other day. It's kind of like we're moving into our own place. You know, our parents have kicked us out. Um, we've we've soaked up enough of the resources is of the feed. We are, we are ripe enough and it's time to go out on our own. It could be great, you know, um, or it could be a spectacular failure. So either way, subscribe and and follow along with us and see what happens. It's not gonna be a failure. It's gonna be great. We're gonna be great. Find out if it will be horrible. Is uh is not a bad promo? Actually, but the show is gonna it's it's gonna be the same show. It's just on a new feed now, So you have to subscribe to new feed and you just get it in your feed. It's really not a big deal, you know it. It sounds like we're doing something seismic here by splitting up the feed, we're really not. We're just making it easier for you all out there to see what shows are coming into your feed. Now. That's right, a totally customizable experience. Imagine if cable providers thought this way. Rights, it's it's a it's a skinny bundle or something. I don't know. All right, let's go, uh, let's go Sunday night football here. Uh. The the the NFC East leading Philadelphia Eagles now Uh, this was encouraging, and we'll get into why. You know, Yeah, they caught some breaks during this game, and quite frankly, maybe they were due for a couple of breaks. But uh, Carson Wentz looked like he looked at the end of last season when uh they were completely decimated. He had known to throw too, but he was still sort of patching this together and making it work. Uh early this season. Yeah, it's I mean, scattershot is an understatement with the way he was throwing the ball. In terms of accuracy. He was good on Sunday night, made plays with his legs. We've been seeing that this year, but there were no just completely melt down, Oh my goodness, what is he doing out there type of throws And that's that's that's a big step in the right direction. Yeah, and you know, just kind of sniffing around on what was going on in Phil. I mean, it seemed like the first three weeks, whatever the plan was going into the off season, it just felt like they weren't going all the way there. And you know, if you want to get to be you know, a rate whatever it is outside zone team, whatever you're kind of core offensive philosophy, is there it seems like they were sort of just tap dancing around the idea of it. They were sprinkling in concepts when really you kind of need to uproot this entire thing and you need to go at it from one direction. And this isn't like Carson Wentz's breakout year where they went thirteen and three and you know, went to the Super Bowl. Um, they're gonna kind of have to start from scratch a little bit with no talent right now, no healthy talent right now. Um, you know, everybody's banged up. And so I think it was good that they got this win over the forty niners when they were still beatable, especially when you know they gutted the giants um the way that they did. I think that that gives them a little bit of confidence moving forward. And UM, I don't know. I mean, I think that Carson Wentz is better than this. I think we all know that he's better than this. But UM, time will tell in terms of what exactly was its scheme that was bothering him? Was it? Um? All the injuries that were bothering him. It's it's kind of an interesting sort of case study right now. Yeah, he finds a guy Travis fulgum practice squad guys sort of bounced around the last year or two out of old dominion. He uh, he makes a big catch down the left sideline for the go ahead touchdown. The rugby guy Jordan Mailata filling in for Jason Peters, uh held his own pretty well. And and again it is a we talked about the Eagles injuries. The forty niners are are just completely uh been devastated by injuries on on the defensive side of the ball this year. It's not the same pass rus ship it was a year ago, but uh, it was good enough. It was certainly good enough offensively here for the Eagles at this point. On the other side of the all, I mean, look, Nick Mullins has done such a nice job just operating this offense when he's had to, uh, you know, going back to eighteen and going back to the action he saw out in East Rutherford this year. But he was, boy, he was a killer in this one. I mean he had he had three to over. His two interceptions were both devastating. One came in the red zone and then he threw the late pick six where he just absolutely did not see his own defender, uh sitting under a little comeback route there. Yeah, and all of a sudden opens the door for the biggest quarterback controversy in football, Mullins versus Beth Third. You know, you really gotta you gotta wonder what's gonna happen there. You know, it's phenomenal that this is probably the first time and Nick Mollins has done a lot of spot duty right over the last couple of years that we're talking about him being a problem when you know, look at how many you know, Mitch Drobisky for example, you know guys that were drafted number two overall that you know kind of had less of a um, you know, less of an easy time being out at as a target here. But you know, I think this is just a bad game, right, And maybe there's enough of a complete package of film on him to be able to make some determinations. And remember Nick mollins first quarterbacks coach, um an offensive coordinator Rich Gangarilla is now over in Philly, Um and you know, probably could have helped them out with the game planning process a little bit there. Um. But yeah, you know it's one of those things where I still think he's one of the better backups in the league. Um, and just kind of looking at the landscape right now, could probably be effectively starting for one or two teams this year. But you know, every once in a while, you're gonna run into a bad Nick Mullins. Yeah, and you you know you mentioned during the Cowboys uh segment here, at some point a defense is just gonna start getting a couple of takeaways, just get a couple of breaks at some point. Eagles had one takeaway on the year, and it's actually a special teams takeaways a Cooper Cup fumbled punt return back in Week two. Uh, the defense had no takeaways going into Sunday night and they got three. And that is how you win a game in which you are out gained by hundred fifty yards or so on on offense. So, you know, no glaring problems for the Eagel's offense. And uh, they catch some breaks on defense and they go out to Santa Clara and get the win, then if they can just sort of treadwater until they get a little bit healthier, still still still hope here. I mean, they're they're in the first place in the division and as of this moment right now, They're the only team in the NFC East just based by virtue of their playoff berth alone, that would not be picking in the top six of the NFL draft right now. So it's a it's a good year for the Eagles to have struggled early and uh, you know, tried to figure their crap out down the line. Unfortunately for them, I think the one thing that is going to bother them throughout the year is that lost to Washington, right, because that's you know, this game, this division is gonna come down to one or two games and that's that that. Those are the tap ends on your schedule. Those are the guys that you need to beat. Let's go down to Tampa where I mean, look, Tom Brady looks really good. Uh. They put it up against the Chargers. This was uh, this was a little bit dicey early on the Chargers. Actually, uh the Chargers never blitz and they blitzed a couple of times early opportunistic blitzing here by Gus Bradley. I think that caused some issues for the Bucks as far as protection goes. But this is why it was so encouraging. One. No, Chris Godwin, so you're you're working without you know, sort of your one a receiver here. But on top of that, look, we have seen the Chargers pass rush and just the four man pass rush the bossa Ingram Uh, Jerry Tillery has had a really nice year there. Uh. We've seen them take over games. We saw them almost completely wreck that Chief's offense, uh in a near upset earlier. Uh. The Bucks held up protection wise when it was a four man pass rush for the most part. And if they're going to hold up protection wise, it looks like that Brady receiver rapport is it's it's working now. It looks like they are ready to just put up numbers here and we know the defense is good. So I don't know, Bucks, Bucks Chief, Super Bowl is is what's going to happen? And if you know, if you want to, if everyone wants to just sort of take some time off and not watch football between now in February seven, I mean, that's that's where we're headed towards. It's already spoiling. I'm just curious, you know, I'm gonna do a little bit of googling here. Um, the Tampa Bay Rays and the Yankees start tonight. As we taped this podcast, um. And so there's a chance that as an infantile um and sort of largely irrelevant sports town, Tampa Bay could sweep the major championships during the pandemic, which should be kind of hilarious, right, Like nobody is allowed to celebrate publicly, and you win the Stanley Cup, the World Series, in the Super Bowl in the matter of like three months and nobody cares and nobody is allowed to celebrate. That would be amazing. The new Boston. Yeah, it's it's the sports nexus of the universe right now. I guess titletown. Former uh excellent, wonderful MMQB editor bettmore Austin was really enjoying the Lightning victory when I caught up with their recently, but have not talked to me yet about my Tampa Bay theory in general, that all of their success might be funneled into arguably the darkest year of our history in the last like since a very long time ago. Oh, it's it's some it's some monkeys paw type stuff going on with uh with Tampa I guess, uh the other side of the ball here. Look at the Bucks that they just look really good, and I think that's gonna be the storyline with them when we talk about them every week. But uh, the other thing from this game, Justin Herbert was was fantastic. In this game, they they are attacking down field. Uh, it's big plays. He is under constant pressure, but he just delivered big play after big play and sort of went shot for shot with Brady and this one and um again, I didn't think there was any realistic chance they were going back to Tyrod. I I do very much highlight the fact that Anthony Lynn would would use quotes like when Tyrod is one how because there's a lot of healthy, there's there's a lot of there's a lot of leeway with our present. He could have a hangnail, he could have the sniffles and and you don't put it back out there. But uh, at this point, I mean, not only is Justin Herbert's job, it's I mean, gosh, I realized the guys oh and three in the QB wins department, but uh, he is. He is far ahead of where I think anyone thought he would be. Uh, even the most optimistic projections of where people thought he would be in the first quarter of his rookie season. And this is what really just chaps Hima. You know what about the Chargers is of his throws, Um are coming on second and seven plus or third and seven plus. Right, you have to Pepper in early down throws and allow him to take his shots. They're being so obvious and they're telegraphing their place. This is a pro style ideology, Um, when they have all this talent, and you know, especially yesterday, so I was looking up, um. One of my favorite stats for quarterbacks is completion percentage above expectations. They have their actual completion percentage what it should be, and then your plus or minus differential. Justin Herbert is one of the best in football right now. Um. You know, he's behind Russell Wilson, Derek Carr, Joe Burrow, and Gardner Minshew as guys who are completing way more passes than they should. Keenan Allen was a monster yesterday, like Pepper in some early down throws. Make yourself harder to defend. This is a really really good Buccaneers defense, and you were scoring on them, you know, And and it bothers me that they're still babing him like a rookie when at this point he's already shown you that he's ahead of the curve, so let's accelerate. I mean, this is what the Bengals are doing with Joe Burrow. They've kind of just you know, they're like, Okay, we're not running r pos like you ran at LSU. We're is gonna We're just gonna gun this thing. And I think that that's what Um, that's what the Chargers need to do with Justin Herbert. That was a winnable game yesterday, Like they should have won that game. But instead it's like, Okay, let's run on first down and then try to get half the distance on second down and then convert on third down and survive. But you don't need to do that. That's why you draft a quarterback in the top ten, because he's going to be a guy that negates that typical thought process and you get kind of you could make the argument like, well, if our running game is cooking, let's let's stick with it on first down. I mean they were I'm looking at the numbers here, U eighteen carries thirty two yards for non Justin Herbert rushing at times yesterday, so they had nothing in the run game. They did not protect Herbert well and uh, um, he's still in spite of all that, just putting um monster performances here free justin Herbert. Ah, you know, and make up the T shirts right now, start the hashtag. All right, let's uh, let's go out to Chicago for Nick fole first start against the Colts. And uh he was not he was not mitched, true risky erratic out there, but he was not accurate. He did not look comfortable with his receivers. You wonder if the Bear should have, uh perhaps anticipated this inevitability and given Folds more first team snaps over the course of the summer and maybe you you get rid of some of these growing pains, or you know, maybe it's not growing pains. Maybe this is just the reality for uh, a nick Foles led offense going forward here. Yeah, twenty six of forty two to forty nine um A total QBR rating UM of forty two point five. Uh, it's just I don't know, it's ugly football. But nobody's helping, right, I mean, you know, David Montgomery is getting two point seven yards to carry. Um, you're basically just hoping that Foles and Allen Robinson can figure this thing out together. And it's it's just not effective. Right, And then you look at the other side of the ball, even though the Colts are only scoring nineteen points, they're just they have so many options. I mean, Jonathan Taylor might finish the season, you know, as a top five running back, and then you know he's spreading the ball around, um, you know, and he's doing a really good job of that as some sort of like auto play Buffalo Wild Wings video blast from my computer for no reason. But you know, they're just so one dimensional. And it was it was surprising to me that if you're Matteggie, you know that going in that your team just kind of leans so heavily in one direction and depends so heavily on a few things that like, why obliterate any remaining confidence that you have in your rookie starter to not get a market improvement at quarterback? Right Like, this is at best like a replacement level swap right now, And I don't think that makes your team any better. Um And with trabiscite, at least you get that mobility aspect. You can probably work out some ways to get them to move the ball a little bit better. But yeah, I think this is the start of Chicago's not free fault, but you know, fall back to a record that makes some sense for their roster. Yeah, and and look, if we got back up the Matt Naggy's system is really good. Uh when Traubinsky had that, they had the Pro Bowl year in Uh, if you go over the tape, if there were still so many just wide open receivers that that sort of you know, whether you overshot him or missed them. Uh, there were so many plays left out on the field. It was kind of like, Wow, if if this thing operates, if you have a quarterback operating it the way it should be operated, this this might be a potentially really good offense. You just you didn't really and I'm not saying Nick Foles it's a guy to do that, but you didn't see that kind of offense yesterday. Uh, as far as folds go, you didn't really see anything. You know, they didn't use a ton of play action, they didn't use a ton of r P O stuff. It just kind of looked like, Okay, we're gonna uh just kind of hang around here. We're gonna try and hit some deep shots every now and then, but we're gonna just try and hang around in this game. And hopefully Philip Rivers throws a couple of interceptions, and it was almost like the formula of uh uh. We saw how Jacksonville beat the Golts and it was Philip Rivers frong bone head interceptions and if we just got a couple of those, will win this game. Otherwise we're just gonna not. Like I I I don't know what the approach was. I'm surprised at how, you know, like you said, offenses that seem so hyper modern, um just and maybe it's because we get acclimated to the more exciting aspects of it, so after a few years it's not exciting or whatever it is. But I mean, I thought this too. When you brought up Matteggie's first year, it reminded me of Chip Kelly's first year in in the frequency of wide open receivers, you know, just like, oh my god, how like this system at the time could have turned anybody. And I'm you know, uh, Nick Foles, Mark Sanchez, Michael Vick into like world beating quarterbacks as long as you could hit the broadside of a barn. And I think that, you know, I'm just wondering, like how that goes away so quickly? When Andy Reid's still doing it right. It's been you know, however long he's been in Kansas City, and it seems like the frequency of open receivers is even better every year that he does this, whereas like some of these other guys, it's like it just compresses a little bit and it gets um, it gets less and less so over time. But I don't know. I mean, is Chicago just sort of trying to play to their strengths and just you know, keep the defense off the field a little longer and they're getting a little more conventional or has it really lost it's kind of that sparkly aspect of it. I think it has. Yeah, it's uh, it feels like they're trying to recapture that magic, and frankly, I don't think that type of magic can be recaptured. They they were fueled by takeaways in eighteen and I don't think you can sit here and say we're going to take the ball away thirty forty times this year and that's how we're gonna win. I just don't think that's that's a strategy. I mean, granted, they took it away from uh, the last couple opponents, but it's it's not something you can bank on on a week to week basis, and certainly not something you can bank on in uh in January here. Yeah, they I mean four takeaways over over four games here for this defense, it's just not going to be what it was in eighteen. So you gotta come up with something offensively. And and again I don't think the answers are on this roster is what will ultimately find out as the as a year goes on. I will say that Matt Eberflus bandwagon is rolling again, that Cults defense looks uh utterly dominant. And I know they haven't played some world beaters the last couple of weeks, but uh, we're seeing what offenses are doing across the NFL where just no one's tackling and uh everyone's getting a million points. And uh they've given up twenty nine points over the last three weeks, and uh sixteen of those points came in absolute garbage time. So really in meaningful football, they are just completely shutting down opponents right now. Yeah, I would say Colds fans enjoy him while you can um and and working up our head coaching shortlist. UM at least for right now in September, and obviously a lot of a lot of that stuff ebbs and flows with the success of the team. But Debra Flus was at the top of many, many people's lists in terms of like, this guy is gonna go um pretty quickly, so enjoy it. Enjoy it well you still can. All right, Connor, get out of here for a second. Is time for the SI Fantasy Segment presented by Draft Kings. I'm now joined my Michael Fabiano of the SI Fantasy Podcast and SI dot com slash Fantasy. Uh. Before we jump into the early waiver wire for Week five, you gotta talk a little Davante Adams at the top here for those of you listening on Monday going into Monday Night football. Yeah, and DeVante it was good enough to tweet out that he's not playing tonight. I wish more players would do that. I guess probably teams frown on that, but he tweeted out that he's not gonna be able to play. So if you're in uh trouble with Adams in your lineup, if you moved him the flex, which you should have, Robert Tonyan's probably the best option to go get up the waiver wire, start him over Adams if you kept him at wide receiver, the options are very limited. I would say DeMarcus Robinson, Demir Bird because Kansas City and New England are playing also tonight, Darius Shepard, and that assumes that a guy like Nikil Harry is not available in most leagues. Yeah, I was gonna say Damante Adams. Good man. It's been a trying week for fantasy managers everywhere, so we appreciate it, Puddy. Uh, Well, let's get into the early waiver wire four Week five here. We'll well, we'll start off with the running backs, I guess, so we have. We have traditional by weeks coming up here in week five starting even though we sort of got surprised in week four, right, and running backs getting thin, like very thin. So the big new news is that Austin Ekeler got hurt and Nick Chubb got hurt. So in l A Joshua Kelly has to be owned in all leagues, like he's already gone in all of my leagues, but if you're in a home league, he could be out there. Got to own him. He's gotta be a hundred percent owned right now. Justin Jackson. Also, uh In l A should be owned across the board now because the Chargers have liked to use two running backs. Right, it was Eckler and Kelly. Now it's gonna be Kelly and Jackson, so Jackson needs to be owned. Uh. The Ernest Johnson had a good game against the Cowboys yesterday, although I would argue that Ernest Byner probably could have come out of retirement rush for hunting yours because of my Cowboys defense stinks and it's disgusting and it makes me sick. But he's worth it out off the waiver wire in case Chubb is going to be out for a long period of time. Chase Edmonds has been better than Kenyan. Drake Kenyan Drake is has got the bust label written all over him right now, right now, we hate to Drake pick Chase Edmonds up and then look at what's going on in Carolina. Like Christian McCaffrey's great and all, Mike Davis has been every bit as good. Okay, he's been tremendous, And if anything, I was Mike Davis. Reggie Bonifan is the next guy up, and yesterday Bonifan had twelve touches a touchdown over fifteen fantasy points, so he is a must add as a handcuff for owners who have Mike Davis because you know, we've got COVID and injuries all over the place. You can never be too safe. I feel like every time I bring you in here, it just turns into a semi roast about your Cowboys defense here. So, oh my god, it's so disgusting. I can't stand it. Man, It's just sickening. And the team that's in first place is one to win one m I mean, it's it's it's awful. I don't know what they're waiting for. Earl Thomas has got stink on him, obviously, because no one wants anything to do with him, even the Cowboys who but he's not going to solve the problem. They're just terrible. NFC East Life. Let's let's go receivers here. Who who you got? More options? More good options. Tim Patrick, who had a very good game on Thursday night against the Jets seven targets, six catches over twenty three fantasy points to Broncos are without Corland Sutton, kJ Hammler's banged up as well, so Tim Patrick's worth a look. Hee Higgins, a j Green. Where have you gone? I mean he's on a milk carton man Higgins over the last two weeks sixteen targets, nine catches, two touchdowns. A J. Green is on the outside looking in in fantasy te Higgins is now in the circle of trust tray Kwan Smith, who had a couple of touchdowns against the Lions on only four targets. Now, Michael Thomas is gonna be back here, maybe even in Week five. We'll see. Time will tell, but tray Kwan should be added in leagues where he is available. Other wide receivers Cole Beasley, Hunter, renfro Uh, Levisko Chanel, Scott Miller for as long as Chris Godwin is gonna be out, and then David Moore in deeper leagues because Russ is cooking and all his wide receivers are benefiting at this point. So depending on how big your league is, how competitive your league is, uh summer, all of those guys could be available. None of those players is owned in more than ESPN leagues right now. How about the tight end picture here. Dalton Schultz was one of my starts for Week four and he played very well. Eight targets, four catches, a touchdown. Oh, for seventeen points against the Browns. He's got twenty four targets in the last three weeks. Twenty four. The Cowboys are throwing at a ton like, if you have Dak Prescott, you're loving things right now, even if you're a Cowboys fan. I guess right, because if if the Cowboys can't win games, at least Dak is loaded up man the fantasy statutes, he's been ridiculous. It's the perfect storm of a great offense and a bad defense. I I didn't want to use a stronger term there, although I kind of feel like that mole a Cox only two targets, but he did have a touchdown. He's averaged nearly thirteen fantasy points in the last three games. The targets share is really wicked low, so he's he's touchdown dependent, but he's been pretty good the last three weeks. Drew sample, if you're desperate, he had five targets. Uh, Joe Burrow likes to throw the football. That was tight ends, but tight end also getting very very thin on the way to wire right now. And any quarterbacks out there to look at, yeah, justin Herbert. You know, admittedly I didn't love them coming out of college. Oregon quarterbacks have not had the best luck in the NFL since, like Dan Fouts. But he's looked pretty good. I mean to ninety twenty three points against the box, twenty plus points and two of his first three NFL games. His next four games Saints winner, Jets winner, Dolphins winner, Jaguars winner. So that's a hell of a schedule for Herbert over the next four weeks. And then Teddy Bridgewater, Like Bridgewater is not like a fantasy quarterback right, He's more of a guy who's going to get fifteen sixteen points. He was very good against the Cardinals, and by the way, the Cardinals were dreadful to Bridgewater twenty six point two points. Look at his schedule next four games, Atlanta winner, Bears tough, Saints winner, and then Atlanta again winner. So Bridgewater could be with the bye weeks here he could end up being a nice streamer in fantasy leagues and dfs for sure. Uh. Some other guys who should be owned but probably aren't, Ryan Fitzpatrick twenty plus points in three straight games, and then Gardner Minshew. He's available at about fifty percent of leagues on ESPN another twenty point performance this win against the Bengals, and uh, you promised me. You promised me a kicker this week because they don't get enough respect. And in most fantashy leads, you started damn kicker. And most people will be like looking at names, So if the name is big, I'll start them. Rodrigo Blanket Ship, all right, I love that name. It's it's almost like the first half of his last name is a swear. So you're like, right, you go blank and Ship thirteen points against the Raiders. He's got twelve field goal conversions on the year. He's ridiculously accurate. He has scored ten plus points in three straight games. And the Colts offense is conducive to kickers getting a ton of opportunities because they don't score a ton of touchdowns. There are run based offense, and they're giving this kid all kinds of opportunity. He also wears the cool goggles. I mean like he's he's I'm a fan, So Rodrigo freaking Blanket Ship, pick him up and start him. If you need a kicker. I love it. If there was ever a kicker to be excited about, it is Roderigo. In fact, I feel like people who pick him up should have to wear the goggles on Sundays like he does. You know, he where's them like with the helmet over it. It's just he's the man. I love it all right, FABS, always a pleasure. You will be back next Monday on our show, but you're here all the time during the week, So subscribe to the Si Fancy podcast. Catch him on st dot com slash fantasy. Uh, you get out of here now, Connor, or you come back in. We still have more Sunday action to talk about. So we got the windless Vikings visiting the Windless Texans and uh, now the Vikings are no longer windless. Uh. And it was very Mike Zimmer, uh sort of game flow here, a ton of a ton of time of possession here for the Vikings, lots of rushing attempts, and uh the defense holds on. Harrison Smith got tossed in this one for helmet helmet And by the way, I know Mike Zimmer was steamed. I know some Vikings fans are seen, but uh, that is if you ear whole a guy with the crime your helmet, even if it's sort of a like, Uh, yeah, he didn't. The guy was going to be dipping his head. Harrison Smiths not a dirty player by any means, but uh, if you your whole a guy with the crown of your helmet, you are going to get ejected this year. That's that's the rule. Now, that's how it's going to work. But let's talk about this Texans team. Uh, the receivers lots of speed, they just don't get a lot of separation, and quite frankly, sometimes when they do get separation, Deshaun Watson is just holding onto the ball because he doesn't uh, he doesn't trust his guys out there. Is what it feels like right now. And they did mount some offense late and they did uh you know, almost come all the way back and force over time, but uh, it's things just aren't really getting better in Houston right now. It brought back memories of being a beat writer for the Jets and the Giants in the two thousand and ten through two thousand fourteen years, where there's a lot of uh, a lot of meekerness going on, right, and what you do if you're a beat right or your first instinct to when the team is owned four is to call up the members of the San Diego Chargers, who are the only owned four team ever in modern NFL history to reach the playoffs. Um. I went to that well so many times that once when the Giants started the year own four I went to go open my mouth to ask Tom Coughlin a question, and he said, I know, I know the San Diego Chargers. Uh but uh So My point there is that the Texans were one of six teams in ten to start owing three and make the playoffs. They're not making the playoffs this year, and I think everything is a disaster. To the point where I brought this up in a column that I wrote today, is that Laramy Tunsil is a top five left tackle. UM. I think that's for sure true. Um, And it was true last year. He was good enough on his own to UM. You know, if you like p f F rankings, which I do, the Texans were the worst offensive line in football in twenty eight team and they were the twentieth best in en So single handedly he brought that average up so so much so. But um, through four weeks, Deshaun Watson's pressure rate is higher than it's been since before the Laramie Tunsil trade. So if your team, if Deshaun Watson still getting crushed or still seeing a lot of pressure, and you traded all of your assets for one piece of this puzzle, and it's not making a difference across the board. Like I think, all of a sudden, his little house of cards that he's constructed is gonna come tumbling down like a lot of the moves that he's made. Bill O'Brien the GM and desperation to help Bill Obrian the coach, I mean, you know, I kind of broke it all down. It's looking pretty meager. You know this is this is not a good looking roster. And yes, the schedule sucks, but you knew that going in. You knew that you didn't know the order necessarily, but you knew you were going to have to play all these teams. Yeah, it's uh there's a lack of efficiency to the moves they've made. I mean, laterally, Tonsil is a good player and everyone should want him, but it becomes a question of how much are you gonna pay for him? And uh boy, they paid a whole lot. And it's if you're the Miami Dolphins, how hard are you celebrating right now. Like, I mean, it's unbelievable. You're going to have a decently high first round draft pick of your own and then possibly like the number three pick in the NFL draft, do you take Trevor Lawrence? Is the toa is the ta era over in Miami? That's a that's what we get to talk about all off season and gets out there Week ten. And if he does not immediately light the world on fire. Uh, that's the thing though, there's you know, this is a discussion for another day, but I'll just leave it at this. There's going to be a team that does not need him that is going to trip into him at this point. Like if you're looking at the state of play, like unless the Chicago Bears totally tank, you know, and and lose the remainder of their games or something like that, Like the Panthers aren't going to sit at the number one pick, and that's a team that could obviously use a quarterback. Um, you know, none of the bridge teams like the Saints or the Buccaneers or the Falcons are going to trip that far. Um, I don't think. And you're gonna get either the Jets, the Giants, the Texans, like one of these teams that have a franchise quarterback, maybe even the Dolphins that are going to have to choose between keeping their guy and drafting um the best prospect we've seen since Andrew Luck. It's pretty interesting. Let's uh, let's go to uh, Let's go to Las Vegas. How about the Bills four No Buffalo Bills h Josh Allen again? Just I mean, he's he's not missing downfield? Uh, any any any questions about the biggest weakness in his game have suddenly been been answered with the with near perfection as far as his downfield ring goes UM. And look, it's kind of made up for the fact. If you're a Bills fan, I think the thing you worry about right now is the fact that the pass rush, which already wasn't great, UH, has really dried up the last two weeks, or I should say like the last six quarters of football at this point. And Uh, I thought the points they gave up against the Rams was a lot of Jared Golf just playing really, really well. I thought that second half uh in Buffalo was as good as Jared Golf has ever played. UH. But they just didn't really have it going in in Las Vegas. Defensively, Uh, the Raiders did move the ball. You wonder if the past defense is going to be a little bit susceptible, but uh boy, it's it's it's Josh Allen. Josh Allen's just carrying this thing right now. Yeah. Who would have thought, um, we'd be saying that right now. And this is starting to turn into one of those classic twenty things where um, at least this is a successful thing, but where you look around and you're like, yeah, this can't keep going, can it? Like things can't keep going like this? But with the Bills, I do think that we're starting to see some sustainability, you know, and this is a team that might not bottom out and level out like everybody keeps thinking they will, which is uh, man, it's fascinating. I mean, he's a top tier player right now. And shout out to UM Bill's fans, Sam Wagner, who um found my direct messages after I picked the Bills to start the season seven and nine, and he reaches out to me two or three times a week, UM, just to ask me how I'm still employed. Uh. The short answers I don't know, Sam, but um, you know, Uh, it's uh, it's good for you. I hope that you and the rest of Bill's mafia are enjoying this right now. It's yeah, human Resources is is sort of uh dropping the ball there. I mean we we I I keep on flagging Connor for for you know, that's seven nine prediction and it's just forgivable with this one. No. I will say, so Josh Allen and whatever we're going to talk about Josh Allen uh a million times between now and uh. I don't know his his twelfth MVP award, but Josh Allen, look at I think the Cam Newton comparison has always been spot on going back to Wyoming. He just ran a different kind of offense in college than Cam did um he is streaky. Cam is streaky. Josh Allen is streaky. I think you're going to see some some bad streaks. I think you're gonna see some games where he leaves uh, you know, eight to ten throws on the field and and that's that's just sort of the way it's gonna end up being with him. However, I will say Stefon Diggs is a difference maker. Stefon Diggs was absolutely just just A. I mean, he was the perfect addition to this offense. Uh. You know, a guy like John Brown is his speed, Cole Beasley his ability to separate underneath. Uh, he has a collection of weapons that Cam never had in Carolina. So it's almost like you're perhaps you're gonna see over the next couple of years what Cam could have been, uh sustained over a four or five year run had the Panthers provided him with the type of offense that that that the Bills have provided Josh Allen with And uh, you know, you get to max out your guy, and that's a that's a nice thing. The Bills are very very lucky that. I think that owners in large part don't know how to run football franchises and that they were able to hang on to Brian Dable for another year. Like I think that if if anybody was tracking this sort of thing, like all these owners claimed to have short lists of of coaches and that they're constantly studying this stuff, when in reality they just punted and handed off to some search firm at the last minute because they don't care. But you know, if anybody was really looking at what Josh Allen came out as in the in the actual day to day work that was put into bringing him to this point and the understanding of him as a player and how that reflects the scheme, Like there would be no way he would still have his offensive coordinator right now, and I think it would be a different story. But I think it's a it's a really interesting and fortunate that he was able to kind of have that stability at the position when a lot of these other guys um have not been able to have not been that lucky. The other wild thing that dable is he has worked for Belichick and Saban, So you'd think that alone, I know, would very much happen on people got Joe Judge hired as a from a special teams which is like almost impossible to do. And I know you also coach wide receivers and he's a good, good head coach, but like, yeah, the Belichick Saban thing was like, uh, you know, next to uh, next to being Sean mcveigh's valet. In two thousand and eighteen, that was about the hottest thing that you could put on your resume. According to Wikipedia, Matt Patricia used to also work with Bill Belichick his Lions. Uh you know, a little spark of optimism after they go down to Arizona and pull off the upset last week. Uh, this defense was it was it was helpless against the Michael Thomas Liss and Jared Cookless Saints. Uh, Drew Brees just sort of feasted on them. A lot of a lot of crossers. Just it's it's a it's a team with the pass rush and it's a team that really struggles to cover to cover. Uh man the man, I I don't know what the answer ends up being here with this Lin's defense. And uh, Patricia taken a lot of heat across the Twitter verse on Monday morning because he was he was asked about you know, why are you still the guy here and he sort of said, uh, you know, there are a lot of things that need fixing. I should have pulled up the exact quote, but uh, you know, he was asked and he said, you know, there there are a lot of things that needed fixing when I got here. And people sort of will point out that, you know, they were, they were, they had winning records under Jim called Well pretty consistently. Uh. I do allow, for h the fact that you can look at a team like that and say like, you know, hey, we gotta get to the next level, and that's going to take a bit of a step back. Matt Patricia seems to he had a lot of guys who didn't buy into a system early on, and therefore you want to bring in the guys that will buy into your system. But you kind of you've had a chance to do that over the last three years here, and you know, you you moved on from a Quandre Digs for pennies on the dollar, you moved on from Darius Lay and you got your guys in the second area, and uh, it's still you know, maybe it clicks in the second half of the year, but right now it is it is definitively not. Yeah. Um, you know, I don't think that he get deserves to have another offseason where he essentially just signs all the guys that Bill Belichick wants to get rid of again and then convinces himself that this is gonna get fixed. This is broken, and like we were talking about a little bit with Houston, and perhaps even worse because they have an a franchise quarterback that's getting up there in years, like this is a roster that's gonna be in really bad shape for whoever gets the job after this too. Rite. I mean it's you know, it's a I guess it's theoretically like a poor man's effort at reconstructing that a me bic Patriots defense, but it's not working. And you know, no other coach can really do that outside of Bill Belichick and put something together like that. Maybe Don Martindale in Baltimore, but and maybe that's who you need to go higher. I don't know. But it's one of those things where, um, you know this this roster is gonna be in bad shape for a little while. And you know, I think that uh, you know, every code lean's on that right that, oh well, it needed so much fixing. I mean, look what the narrative has been in New York ever since Adam Gates has gotten there. Um, but at some point you have to fix it, Like you don't get five years to do this anymore unless you're John Gruden. Let's let's go down to Carolina Matt rules. Panthers go to two and two Matt rule, putting in the uh his petition for uh NFL Coach of the Year this year. Two and two both winds coming without Christian McCaffrey. You're seeing in efficient offense. You're seeing Teddy Bridgewater do occasional things that are very Unteddy Bridgewater like both good and bad. He had a he had a long scramble for a t D. I think it was like his first t D and like rushing t D I should say in five years. Uh he is. He's making some kind of reckless throws as well, which is not what we're used to seeing do. But he got away with them against Arizona on Sunday. But uh, they are. They're making it work in Carolina and Matt Rule deserves a lot of credit for that, definitely. Um. And just the Teddy Bridgewater looks like and I guess you could credit the Saints for that as well, and sort of his time there. But Teddy Bridgewater looks like a good NFL quarterback. I mean, he looks like an Alex Smith. Plus Um, like you said, there's probably a little bit more of variants in the bad throws, the bad decision throws, but not to the point where you know, I would put him anywhere near like destructive, you know, and anything like that. He's and if anything, he needed a little touch of that anyway exactly. I mean, it's it's it's kind of I don't want say it's nice to see you when you put a ball into a defender's hands, but it's kind of like, all right, well, let's let's open this thing up a little bit, let's take some chances. Yeah. No, I totally agree, um, And I think that they've done a great job with him, uh to the point where, I mean, we joked about this, but they were the one logical fit for Trevor Lawrence and they've taken themselves completely out of the race there. And but if if I'm a Panthers fan, I'm okay with Teddy Bridgewater being my quarterback for the next three years. You know, you signed him through the life of that deal, and we probably get to see what he would have evolved into in Minnesota, um, had he not had that horrific knee injury. So I think we're finally getting to get a fuller look at him, and we're also getting kind of a neat picture of what Joe Brady's idea for this team is in the future, and and that that that's a team that I think is is definitely gonna be a pain in the butt. I think for teams throughout the year in Arizona found that out this weekend. I will uh my gut feelings, I will regret saying this, but uh and that Cliff Kingsbury will get this figured out. But I hate this Cardinals offense right now. I hate it. It's all it's it's it's quick strike or it's Kyler scrambling. Uh they were. They were five point five yards per reception in Carolina per reception. I mean that's that. I mean that that's that's unreal for this day and age. And look, they added DeAndre Hopkins. They get a world class receiver. And the issue last year with Kyler was, uh, intermediate and deep intermediate levels. Uh, he just wasn't very good at those levels and and quite frankly, he was being asked to make a lot of difficult throws at those levels. They didn't have receivers who were who were separating. Uh. You do kind of wonder if if vision stuff comes in with him, because you know he is he is so undersized. But uh, I mean it is it is quarterway through the season. It's not getting better as far as I goes, and it's just it's a limited offense right now. Uh, And and Kyler will make play some weeks, but that's not the kind of thing you can bank on. You can't say like, well, at some point Kyler is gonna scramble for sixty yards and we'll be all right. Uh, you can't do that. You gotta come up with something. You can't run an offense especially you know, and I haven't looked. I knew what their percentage of four wide usage was last year and how it was probably about higher than any other team in the NFL. UM. I'm assuming that's probably close to that this year too. But UM, you can't run that kind of offense and attempt thirty one balls a day. Um, and that's on the low end, and and only throw for a hundred and thirty three yards Like it's not Um, it's not the way that works. UM. And you need to mix it up. You need to get the ball down field. I think Hopkins wasn't able to get Uh didn't even have a target in the first quarter of this game. If I'm not mistaken. I think it took him a while to get involved there. So yeah, I don't know. Um, And they have all the components of it, which just doesn't make sense. I mean, your third wide receiver is Christian Kirk. Where you know, if you know the state of the wide receiver around the NFL, if you put him on ten or twelve teams, he would probably be close to their number one or number two. Like you have talent layered throughout the roster there, and I'm just not sure why it's not um taking as well as it should be. Yeah, well, like I said, Clickingsbury has a chance to figure out here. That's the guy that Steve Kin wanted to bring in to run this program. And uh um he probably will. And now sounds stupid, but right now I I just hate it. Uh let's let's go out to l A where the Giants. Giants were game in this game. That's a that's a terrible turn of phrase, but I'll stick with it. Uh they were right there. This this was a this is an absolute dog fight here. Uh. The Giants hung around throughout this one. Rams opened the game with a with a pretty ram like uh scoring drive and it was just kind of like, all right, well here we go. This game is gonna be a seven and uh the Rams did nothing after that. They had a hundred seventy five yards of offense over there, uh nine drives after the opening drive, and that was with a fifty five yard Cooper cup t d folded in there. So off day for the Rams a little bit worrisome there. But um, the Giants just seem uninterested in in scoring points. And I don't, uh, you gotta do something here, you gotta come up with something new. Yeah, Um, I would say that that's a difficult prospect when you've hired Jason Garrett as your offensive coordinator, who hasn't really come up with anything new, um since two thousand four when he was the hot coaching uh name on the market. And I think it's just, you know, this offense is just it lacks any sort of panash like there. There's just no nothing about it that different differentiates it from the rest of the NFL. And I will say that Daniel Jones is hanging in there. I do think he's playing a lot better than he's been given credit for. But if you know, he's making really good throws. And the drive inning interception at the end of the game when they were down eight points yesterday was a great play, right. I mean the Rams made some great play defensive plays yesterday. UM. And of course there's some bad turnovers too, But um, this offense is just so uninteresting. UM, and it's just incredible, you know. I I don't know what else to say about it. I will say the one nice thing that's going for the Giants that we did see yesterday is that defensive line is very good. Um. You know, is it worth it all the resources that Dave Gentleman's pulled into getting that, I'm not sure, but I mean they did play an effective game against the Rams. They did kind of hold them, um and forced them to do some things that were a little bit more uncomfortable. But that said, if you can't bring your offense around and score twenty one points in an NFL game, I don't know what you're doing there. Uh, Seahawks get to get quite the battle of Miami. This was a one possession game pretty much throughout here, and Miami ended up just kicking a bunch of field goals when they got down to scoring range. And that's that's where this one turned. Uh. The one thing I I wrote about this on Sunday morning, Uh, the Seahawks red zone offense has been just spectacular, at least coming into this game. They were nine for nine, they actually stretched out to ten for ten. Not only that they only had one third down in the red zone. They were scoring so easily. Um, really good play calling, really creative stuff going on down there. And this one that that dried up aloat they had they had a turnal run downs. Uh Russ actually through an interception sort of his first legitimate interception of the year from the six yard line, and uh that's what ends up having the Dolphins kind of hang around to this one. But uh, you know, look, the Dolphins are not a world beating offense. But the fact that the Seahawks defense sort of held on without Jamal Adams is I guess that's a plus at this point. Yeah, you know, they're just this is one of those games that, like I'm not gonna lie if if you were able to, like if you were not in Seattle and you you watched this with a great deal of interest, like, good for you. I mean I I was struggling to come up with things to watch in the four PM hour yesterday. Um, was this a four PM or a one? That was a one? Yeah, I was you know, the back end of that one PM schedule and the four PM schedule. I was struggling and I do watch every game every week. This is on my list, but like, holy smokes, I mean this was if you, if you gutted this thing out without a uh Seattle fandom interest or you know, a very deep fantasy football routing interests, good for you. I mean, there were some just overtly boring games this weekend and the just in from the beginning. This was just kind of one of those weeks. But man, this was good for you. If you watch the this entire thing. Uh, let's Joe Burrow. Joe Burrow gets his first career win here. Uh, a lot of Joe Burrow, a lot of Joe mixing in this one offensive line holds up. I I don't know if that Jaguars front four is really challenging teams that much, but uh, this was another step forward for the Bengals here, so good on them. I think we're gonna look back at the Jaguars win over the Colts is one of the most insane things that happened um in this season that they have not been playing as well. Um Gardner Minshew continues to play really well, which is really interesting for them moving forward. But yeah, good for Joe Burrow. Um, I think we're starting to see a little bit of what the Bengals saw not only in him, but in um Zack Taylor too. I think he's kind of coming into his own as a little bit um and it doesn't have the pressure of you know, that kind of sinking ship. Um, he can kind of start building on something there. So yeah, I think the Bengals are looking good. It was nice. It was that taste of if the Bengals ever get right on the offensive line, here's what here's what you're gonna see going forward. So, uh, nice day for them, and uh, the Ravens kind of kind of get right. The offense still doesn't look like it's it's fully clicking like it was a year ago. And and you know, the absence of Marshall yonda Is is probably gonna haunt them throughout the year. But the Ravens get a pretty easy win against football team in the nation's capital. Uh. The other story in this game, Dwayne Haskins was kind of on call going to this one and was he gonna get bench mid games? He played well enough to keep his job in this one. He continues to uh, you know, sprinkling a couple of really nice big throws. Everyone's sort of getting on him for this fourth and goal throw he made well short of the goal line. That just it was it was a bad decision, but uh, it wasn't the kind of thing that you look at and say, like, boy, you know he's he's not seeing the field or something that he just he made a bone headed decision. And that's just kind of is how it goes. Do you think that Ron Rivera just gives him the season so he can show fans like, Okay, this is the sample size. Now may I go out and get somebody that I like a little bit more. And this isn't an indictment on Haskins, but Rivera wasn't sold on him in the first place, right, I mean, you know he was talking about potentially taking a quarterback at number two. Um, you know, he signed Kyle Allen and wouldn't immediately count him out of the quarterback competition this offseason, and so I think that, you know, it might be one of those things where it's like, Okay, well we're going to give him the entire year. We're going to pour all the resources, and he has a very good offensive coordinator, and we're gonna just let that speak for itself. I will I will take the very pollyanish look and just say I do think Rivera was was very open to give him a shot. I mean, and Dwayne Haskins has the physical traits that you look for in a starting quarterback year and just saying Okay, let's let's see what we have this year. And I do think it was in that Cleveland loss. I think that sunk to a level where you were legitimately going to have a difficult time, uh, basically facing the locker room if you continue to run him out there when he's playing like that. But uh, like I said, he he was certainly above that level against a really good Ramonds defense, and uh, he's gonna make mistakes, and you know, you you try and lessen those mistakes. We can week out and you know this is this is all right for them? Yeah, it's fine. It's good the for once they're not the epitome of dysfunction as they as they once were. Good good for you, that's epitome of dysfunction. Is uh is one of my favorite Dan Snyder solo albums. Uh, Connor or you have your own podcast? Feed now while you share it with Jennie Brentis. I mean, you know, it's if anything, it's it's Jennie Brentis and Connor. Jenny is the landlord. I'm I'm renting, so you guys, guys the week Side podcast has his own feed subscribed to it. Now, I always like when you joining me on the show, and I'm just gonna make you keep doing it for the first part of the season. Here can I get credit by the way for um, I'm in my uh soon to be uh second child's bedroom and because everywhere else is just a noise explosion in the house right now. Um, but I did this entire podcast standing up the entire few did I wasn't gonna bring it up. You were, Uh I felt like you were fading a little bit late. Yeah, but uh, I was like, Okay, can I get through my my Dwayne Haskins rant at this spring but uh, I'm like I was at mild SI there, you know. But um but I got through and now it's time to uh, it's time to collapse and make myself some pancakes. The MMQB Monday Morning NFL podcast is Connor Or and me Gary Gramling We are produced by Shelby Royson. S Ey's executive producer of podcasts is Scott Roadie. Ben Eagle is director of Editorial Projects and product Mark Ravick is Emeritus editor of the MMQB. Andy Benoit is the founder of the mm q B NFL podcast. Keep up with our entire line of the podcast five days a week by subscribing to the mm QB NFL Podcast, the mm QB Weekside Podcast, and the mm QB Albert Brier Show. They are all for free on Apple Podcasts and why are they're to do? With a favor and lead ratings, lead reviews, it really does help other people find the show, which are also available on Spotify Radio dot com, Stitcher, si dot com, and wherever else you listen to podcasts.

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