Giants take down Cowboys on SNF

0:00Coming up today on PFT live. This guy joins me to go over all the games from week one. Talk about the GM. Yeah, I don't have time to get to all of them because we did talk a lot about the John. Yeah, he did. And we did talk a little about the bike and we did and we hit the we got a lot of good stuff to talk about. We saw some explosive quarterback play in offense yesterday and it all starts right now. Second and go. Fake to Barrios. The throw it's at like we're getting touchdown giants. I don't know who drew that play up but that was good. Little short motion down looks like it's going to be a crack back block right there. Oh, okay. No, I'm just making this throw it to me. Now I'm going to walk in the end.

1:03Matt and Maggie drawn up the plays for John Harbaugh, John Harbaugh getting his first win. Oh, jeez, man. I'm glad I saw you picked him. I tend to write at the end of the show. They were like, Florio picked him, right? So I saw that. I was happy about that. I was happy too since almost everybody else picked the cowboy. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Got a game made there. Way to believe in the jeez, man. I believe in Harbaugh. Yeah. I believe in Harbaugh. I know what he did in Baltimore. Yep. Instantly turned around a team that had a job opening for a reason. Most of these teams who are looking for coaches are looking for coaches for a reason. And Harbaugh came in and he had an immediate impact. And we've been hearing the stories and the examples. The Isaiah likely comments from not that long ago about how. Yeah, 11 days, 10 practices, putting on my cleats every morning. He was stunned by the reaction from the guys who were already on the team and the extra work, the construction.

2:03They banned camp anymore. That's right. They talked about it. They talked about it on the broadcast last night, the conditioning, the sprints, all the stuff that you do. They quoted Bill Parcells. That's why you lift all them weights. That's right. That's right. That's right. You do get your body ready to hold up for four quarters. That allowed the giants to slam the door when it got a little dicey. Yeah. When it got to 28, 20 should have been 28, 21, but you want to have that ridiculous taunting penalty that pushed the extra point back 15 yards and Brandon Arbery missed it to just put a little more pressure on the cowboys because they're going to have to get the ball back and score a touchdown and score another touchdown from the two yard line. But the giants didn't wilt. They did not will. They did not. They slammed the door and they got to victory formation. And that's the best outcome for any team when the final two minutes of the game consists of taking three knees and calling it a night. And that was a big night for the giants. And I think it was a hell of a stunner for the cowboys who have delusions of grandeur

3:06every single year. And we spend every single offseason hearing about how this is the year the cowboys are finally going to turn around and it's just one game. It's a week one. The games is their best possible record could be 16 and one. And all it means for the giants is their worst possible record could be one in 16. That applies to every team winner lose on Sunday. But it I think was the turning of a page for the giants who have been lost in the wilderness for the most part since Tom Kaufflin was fired. However many years ago. Yeah. Yeah. No, I agreed. I mean, one thing's not easy. I think the one thing you realize and I think I've told you this before when I went to the Denver Broncos to play for Josh McDaniels. And of course, he was bringing the New England way. We would run sprints after practice all the time. We would run sprints in the middle of practice. You know, then I went to work for New England and you'd go, Hey, I mean, the defense is out there in Brady in the office or over there running gasses like so. Yeah, you go to Kansas City. That's a high tempo practice, right? You know, we know that.

4:06I mean, the teams that win and and have that type of culture. Usually there's a reason for it. They're putting in the hard work. I think that is a huge part of it. It gives you confidence in the fourth quarter to be like, Hey, we've, we've, we've been working hard. Like we're made for this. This is what we've been doing it, right? Then to the Bill Parcells point, but it felt like the giants, a giant football team, I think to what you're talking about, big overpowering. I felt like I was watching 1990s New York Giants. I don't know if you remember that team. Of course, you know, my dad got hurt. They beat the bills in the Super Bowl. My dad was the number one rated passer in football. Not because they were Dan Marino or L way thrown the ball over the field, but because they played this extremely efficient way of football, like you saw last night with the Giants run for five, run for four, pass for eight, run for four, pass or seven, and just always being in good positions as far as the, the chains are concerned and managing the game and having all those situations just be manageable because you are efficient

5:07and you're executing. I mean, it was remarkable. The way they held onto the ball. I mean, the Cowboys couldn't get off the field. We saw two drives in the third quarter, one by the Giants, one by the Cowboys. Then the fourth quarter came and we saw another really long drive by the New York football Giants. And that to me is what hardball and company want to do. We're going to wear you out. We're going to lean on you. All right. We're our defense. We might not be perfect there, but if we control the ball that much on the offensive side of the ball, the defense is going to be fresh and be able to fly around. So it was awesome to see it. It felt like a new era for the New York Giants. That is 1990 Giants. Yeah. Super Bowl 25 playing exactly. That's what I mean. And post that will took over and they continue to kind of do that exactly. 10 plays 83 yards for the first touchdown. They scored the second touchdown a little more quickly. 655. What? This is the second half. 12 play. 74 yard drive that took up eight minutes and then they had a 13 play 65 yard drive that

6:08took up eight minutes and 11 seconds. That's more than a quarter. That's more than a quarter on two drives. Exactly. So you want to stop a high powered offense like the Dallas Cowboys who we know can light up the scoreboard. You keep him over there by the Gatorade bottle and they don't get in rhythm. They don't get to get going. They start to feel the pressure like, oh my gosh, when we get out there, we got to go score like we don't have any choice here. Like we're in trouble. We're not going to have the ball that many times. So that that to me, the management of the game, the Giants went once the last time we watched a Giants game and went, they're running at will. I don't remember the last time, but when Cam's got a booze in there, you're like, we're going to run up the middle for four yards guaranteed. It's been forever since we've had to say that about the New York Giants. It's probably back to Kauffling, like you said, and I'm on Bradshaw and Eli Manning days almost where they played like that. I still don't know how sustainable it is for Skataboo. I know he's going to find a watch though. Well, it's funny because I got an email last night from a viewer. You know my whole stick when we get into the summer, especially when we get the flurry

7:09of 100 days until football tweets, I always say don't wish your summer away. Enjoy your summer. So the person who emailed last night said, I agreed with you until I saw Cam's Skataboo score the touchdown and do the back flip. I will always wish the summer away. Get out of here. I will always do it now. And I thought Skataboo was out of the back flip business. I thought that after he did the thing, it fanatics best and Harbaugh said what he said, I thought that was over, but the adrenaline takes over. And it's just fun to watch. He could help it. It's fun to watch. And nine for 11 on third downs and extends those drives. And I think you tell me from the perspective of a defense, you know, you give up a one play 75 yard drive. Okay. Yeah. Something happened. We made a mistake. We did this wrong. But when you're just constantly getting pushed and pushed and pushed and nothing is nothing you do is ultimately giving you a win. And it's just this gradual suffocation every time you're out on the field, that has

8:10to be far more demoralized. Hey, it's actually for an offense. It's amazing. But yeah, you can see the demoralization of the psyche of the defense. You know, you start to see, oh, it's the seventh play. And it's our seventh positive play in a row. And you start to see linebackers like, man, I mean, and now they're starting to talk to each other like, hey, I mean, you got to get down in there. Hey, you got to take on that block and you can start to sense the frustration. And yet that's what wears teams out. And the giants with their big online and the way Scataboo runs like you talk about, it takes its toll. And then Jackson Dart, of course, just being so efficient, making plays with his legs when he's got to. And then he just doesn't miss any place. That's the thing with Jackson Dart. You just feel like you're not like, oh, whoa. That was a laser beam there. Holy cow piss missile there. It's just like, hey, if it's open, it's hit it. Hey, the guy, if he covers here, go here. He goes to the right place for the ball. He just has a great natural feel for the game. And I think that's what really jumps out to me about Jackson Dart along with that running

9:13game of the giants. Chris Connler said on the air last night that one of the changes he's seen in Dart from last year to this year, last year, it's the one read. If it's not there, it's happy feet, scramble. Run the ball. Now he's going through the progressions. He's got the understanding of what he sees. He's got the understanding of what's there. And I know Jason Garrett, when we were talking last night about this during the first half, he was impressed by just the speed of the decisions processing. And then when it's time to get rid of the ball, boom, it's gone. Boom, it's gone. Boom, it's gone. And there's such a value in that as part of just the total package, 11 players keeping the defense on its heels. And that gets into the whole conditioning thing you were talking about is the defense gets to moralize. They get tired. They get worn down. You get to that point where you just accept that it's not your night. And I want to go home. It's that accumulation of adversity that you can't ever push back against. I give the Cowboys credit. When they were down 2014, Dak Prescott became determined. He's talking to everybody on the sideline. We can do this.

10:13And they did their part, but then that's when the door got slammed and they pushed the furniture in front of it. The Cowboys weren't getting that ball back after they saw what Dak in the offense could do quickly when they needed to. Hey, the solution. We're not giving them the ball back. Yeah, yeah. I think that was kind of the plan that felt like all night. Let's see if we can make it second and six, third and two, first and 10, second and five, you know, third and one, first and 10. That's kind of that it felt like all night with the New York Giants. And that's again, where, you know, when you hear phrases like, oh, it's good quarterback play or good offensive play. That's what you're referring to. A dart knows where to go with the ball. You can see one of the last things I feel like I wanted to see from him before you, you know, throw him into maybe the top 15 or 16 quarterbacks in football was more of that high level pocket play. And we did see that last night. So I thought it was really a well managed football game by John Harboh. The combination of offensive coordinators.

11:15All right, Matt Nagey himself. One I love him being there because yeah, he just coach Patrick Mahomes and we know Jackson Dart has some of that color outside the line. So you don't want to lose that. That's for sure. But Matt Nagey's offense by itself as I was on record when it first happened. I wasn't like, oh, man, this is awesome. There's a lot of like about Matt Nagey for sure. But I think with the first off, that didn't look like the Kansas City Chiefs and Matt Nagey, right? That looked like it was a concoction of, hey, it's Greg Roman. It's Matt Nagey. It's John Harboh. It's Brian Callahan. It was a lot of really good, well thought out run game design to tight end sets. We're going to be underneath the center. And that's not what we saw from Kansas City and Matt Nagey. So that to me was another thing. Their offense and how they put it together. And you could tell and listen to Chris and Mike Toreco last night certainly seems like it's a team effort. And I think it's really cool. Catalan as we know with his dad being one of the best offensive line coaches in the history of football, he does know run game football and he knows offense.

12:19And then Greg Roman's the same way. I mean, Greg Roman, let's not forget some of his creative run game stuff. It goes back to Kaepernick and the 49ers and things we hadn't seen in the league before. So then you add that with Matt Nagey and some of the passing ideas he has. I think that's where it's really exciting for the Giants right now. Isaiah likely finally having a chance to break out too. He had a couple of touchdown catches last night for the Giants. Eight catches 78 yards. And really the key play the key moment. Third and nine on that drive that could have resulted in the Cowboys go to all back quickly. Third and nine. Dart connects to likely for 12 yards. And that's the moment where you're like, oh man. Yeah, they're going to guys got something. They're going to close this out. Close this out when they converted that one. And you just felt kind of like a little bit of the Cowboys souls leaving their body when they gave that one up because that was their opportunity to get the ball back and maybe force over time. And Isaiah likely he's a weapon. One of the guys that John Harbaw brought from him from Baltimore and never felt like he was being used enough because they have Mark Andrew.

13:21Exactly. He's at a spot now where he gets to be the showcase guy. And I would say and no disrespect to Mark Andrews who's in all time legend of the tight end position. But Isaiah likely is better than him right now. He's more talented. He's in the prime of his career and Mark Andrews who's done so so much there. But we know he's kind of a staple in Baltimore and that was the contract all of that. So Isaiah likely gets out there and gets to a team that it's really the perfect fit for him. And they were missing somebody like this and we've talked so much in the past that hey, when you have a good tight end, it is a comfort zone for a quarterback because you're moving in the pocket, you're moving the pocket and your eyes are always down the center of the field. And when you have a big body that you can trust that knows where to kind of react or sit or separate the light right time, it is a great like get out of jail free card for a quarterback when you have that type of weapon. And that's where I think Jackson Darts going to fall in love with Isaiah likely. Let's hear a little bit from the victorious head coach after 18 seasons with the Baltimore Ravens fired and quickly hired by the Giants.

14:24They did not hesitate to make their move and it paid off. John Harball 1 and 0 here he is on the victory. My dad always says that he goes, he always says he'll say this in the car in the way home. He'll say, he'll say, John, you've never had a better win than that. He says it every time, you know, and I'm going to tell you, I think this time it might be true. You know, but this was really special because these guys, these players, these guys who have believed from the beginning, who don't bad and I, who just try to do the right thing every single day, who try to be on point. And even when they're not on point, they're willing to bounce back and make it right. It's just a different mindset. It's a basic understanding of what football is. That's the thing that I think binds John Harball and Mike Tomlin. An understanding of what football is and a keen appreciation of what it is. It's still blocking, tackling violence.

15:26Exactly. We're not allowed to say violence. Mike Tomlin said that halftime last night, violence. Yeah. And explaining why there was so much scoring in the afternoon windows because you don't have that in camp anymore. You don't have the violence. You don't have the hitting at the quarterback. It's a great observation. And I've heard and make it a couple of times, both off the air and on the air when you have the defensive players who spend all the training camp don't touch the quarterback. Now all of a sudden go get the quarterback. You haven't practiced that. There are things you don't practice anymore that all of a sudden you're expected to do. And for the Cowboys, for example, the 11th time since last season, they've given up 28 or more points. So defense not fixed. And I think defense throughout the NFL has to play catch up now because of the more seven on seven nature of training camp than the old days. Crazy. It used to be the other way around. I even said a few times last week, the defense is usually farther ahead in the offense

16:28and the right, but I do think I got to change my thinking there because yeah, offense, it's everything's favored around that. And the defense as we saw with a lot of defenses, you know, the great Houston Texans defense, not in shape, can fly around, not used to play in physical football, a little bit off some of the details about, oh, what people do to us, right? So that's where I don't want to judge too harshly on the Cowboys defense or some of these teams. You're right because it's a different error in what we are right now as far as week one. That's what I'm saying. I'm just concerned. And I do think we saw a number of teams and defenses that I would go, yeah, they're not in game shape. They look good for a quarter and a half, but you could tell they started to wither away. And teams were having to rotate into second and third stringers quicker than normal. So that is something that you certainly see. I mean, you go back to this one and yeah, Dallas has made some nice moves on the defensive side of the ball. You're, I'm excited. I like the Cowboys. I want to see them do good too. But at the same time, I'll go back to what I said a few minutes ago.

17:30We didn't hear anybody on their defense aligns name all night. When the, when the hell's the last time we heard that with the giant? Quintin Williams forced the fumble and that was about it. Jackson Darf from the most part of the night. You felt like, hey, he's got time to throw. He's going where he needs to with the football. And again, that's not giant football the last few years. We've, it's been, get the ball and duck and chuck it. And then, hey, if we run the ball, we can't do jacked italy crap. And so that to me, it's signals the new era of what Harbaugh is instilled here with the giants. And yeah, it was surprising that, you know, Cowboys, they do have some star players and some guys that you know that can pop from time to time. But yeah, it didn't happen very much last night. I'm going to pull this thread. You got 32 different NFL teams. And if I'm a viewer, if I'm a fan and I'm both, but I try to process my talking points and my questions through that lens. What makes me curious? And one thing I'm very curious about. We mentioned the Texans, not in complete shape. We talked about the value of the conditioning and the sprint. Well, why, why doesn't every team, I, I know, I mean, it's some of these teams are in

18:33the ret, we're resting them, we're resting them, we're getting ready. But not just resting them, like go out and run, I know, even with that though, all practices hard training camps, hard, we're keeping them fresh, we're keeping them fresh. Yeah, okay. You know, you're keeping them fresh, all right? Will Anderson and Daniel Hunter, you, they, I never saw them yesterday. They got a hundred million dollars and two guys. And they've never made one play yesterday because I was one, there was one late, there was one late. Yeah. Daniel Hunter made that I thought messed up Josh Allen's hand. Yeah, yeah, I saw that too. But they were quiet the most of the day. Exactly right. And I, I think that is something that we'll see here. But week two, yes, another, you know, a week under your belt as far as getting in shape and doing those things. Yeah, I think there's a number of teams you could sit there and point a finger at and go, I think you need to change your approach and how you approach the preseason and training camp. Okay. And then the, where are the opportunities to get in better shape? Is it just the game situations gets you in better shape for the most part? If you're not going to be working as hard during the week, I know. I know. A lot of these teams use it that way. Exile, you're exactly right.

19:34And then yes, it's, it's going to be a little bit of like, hey, we lost Wednesday. We got to practice hard and Thursday. We got to practice hard. We obviously messed some things up. And so it kind of works like that. But yeah, I would tell you that that's backwards. And I would tell you that a lot of the great organizations, whether it was the patriots in their prime or the chiefs, as we know, that are famous for starting fast because if you go to a chief's practice, when they were in their prime, you were going, are they playing a game? I mean, it's as intense and they're flying around like it's a game. And I think that's the same thing you hear from the 49ers. That's why they had people go out there and go, whoa, you guys are practicing too hard. Hold on. We're not going to change the rules. So there is something like that where I would say, yeah, some of these lesser teams and other teams drop the ball in that department. But just that basic concept of what it takes to be in top shape, I vaguely recall, it's been many years. I used to do a lot of running. The harder I ran, the better I ran. And the whole concept of pushups, I remember being very confused as a young person when

20:34I'd see that the punishment if you screw something up in the military is to have to give them 20 or 50 pushups. Like that makes you better. Like do the pushups. Look at her, she'll walk her. Do the pushups. Like embrace those things. And it's viewed as something that is negative. That is the work that allows you to have those moments where you feel great and you feel like you're the confidence. We did this. We're ready. In shape. Exactly. They're not as tough as us. They haven't done what we've done. That's where you get to in your head. And I think those are advantages that like teams like New England and Kansas City felt like they outworked teams. So they were mentally in a psychological better spot there to play the game. Like lead in for the mental question that hovered over the giants specifically receiver Malik neighbors. Uh huh. He seemed to be very concerned as he should be. Yes. Tornacee else suffered week four of last year against the chargers. He's healed, but he hasn't. Yeah, he hasn't come back.

21:35He's not sure he's got confidence. I've had a significant piece of my body relative to how I make my money. A significant joint that has been reconstructed. The key ligament rebuilt. What am I going to be? And he said during the week last week, he's going to let God tell him what to do. He wasn't sure what he was going to do. Yeah, Saturday. It's like well, Jackson Dart total story. I don't know if he saw this. Jackson Dart total story after the game about how John Harbaugh got Malik neighbors ready to play. Here's Dart. Yeah, we were all just chilling on the sideline. It was right before we were supposed to start our walk through. Things were just up in the air. We didn't know exactly what was going to happen. And Meanco Chharb's kind of had some conversations. He's like, you know what? I think that once he gets hit for the first time and realizes that he's okay, then he's going to feel confident. So I think in his mind that triggered, oh, maybe I should tackle him right then and there. So we were all just standing there and then all of a sudden, Leet goes down on the ground

22:38and our team's super protective of him. So we all turned to look and it's coach Harbs tackling Leet and then he pops up and he goes, see you're all good. I mean, that's the classic Harbaugh way. That's awesome. Just rough and tumble. Yeah. Just a couple of big kids, the two brothers, a couple of big kids. Yeah. Ram Bunches, just like they were when they were eight years old. Just go tackle him. See, you're fine now. And he played and he was fine and boy, the roar when he was out in war. Wow. Because nobody knew. I know. I'm for the game. What's he going to do? Nobody knows. Nobody knows. So I don't know that he did it on purpose. It creates a hell of a mystery. It's a hell of a showmanship move to have this. I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't think you can play that card every week. Yeah. But for week one, he played it and it and it had a, I think an impact on the challenge. Oh, I don't think there are any. I think it's an uplifting thing when you, it's the most talented guy on their, on their offense for sure. And he's, he's really one of the, maybe the most talented guy on their team in general. I mean, we know that Abdul Carter and Brian Burns and, and that, those guys are right up

23:40there. But, you know, the giant fan base of the Loves Millenic neighbors, he has a lot of Odell Beckham Jr. in him. He's got that pizzazz and that fire and the waky plays at the fan base jumps onto him. You know, I had Odell on my show a few weeks ago and he, he said, he goes, yeah, I see a lot of myself in him. There's a fire and an intensity in him that is very similar to what ObJ had when he was younger. So I think that was another cool thing about last night. You could tell one Odell, some of the Aurora he got, I heard from people and, and the fact that he was just so happy to be out there. But yes, Millique neighbors being out there is a game changer for the New York giants. And I, and like to your point, I don't think he was even total pedal to the metal last night. I think he was careful still, but you do got to kind of break that ice of getting hit, getting tackled. I know I felt like that after I lost my spleen and I had to play my first preseason game. I was like, man, what's going to happen if I get hit in the chest? Am I going to like split open again? Like I was, you know, what's going to go on here?

24:42And you take a few hits and you're like, okay, it's back to football. I'm, I'm okay. Yeah. I, I, I, I, I can take this again. And it does take some of that even for the greatest athletes in the world like Millique neighbors. Nine targets six catches 69 yards from Millique neighbors. And you mentioned OBJ. What a disconnect between the fame and the production. And it's not his fault if they're not on the field. Yeah. You know, you was only on the field. That was nice. For a live and snaps. Yeah. Well, no targets. Yeah. Nothing on the stat sheet. Yep. And it reminded me of a comment that John Harboh made during the courtship phase of the possible reunion. We're going to have a vision of what his role is. He's going to have a vision of what he wants his role to be. And they're going to need to mesh. And I suspect at some point OBJ recognized at this stage of my career. That's right. I'm going to take whatever I can get. I think that's exactly where he's at. He's so happy just to be back in the league. He had a year off last year. He realized how much he missed the game, loved the game.

25:42You could tell the joy he had last night and how excited he was to be there. Had the blonde hair back, right? Because the fan base has kind of been calling for it. So he did that as well. But yes, he understands his role. And he'll have games where they're going to go, hey, OBJ. This is an OBJ game. We need you in the slot. We're going to have some plays for you the way they play defense. But for right now, it's going to be Isaiah likely. It's going to be Malik neighbors. It's going to be Cam Skatibou. And then, hey, I'm excited about what we saw with Malachi fields from Notre Dame. They're rookie. He's big. He's going to be a pain in the butt. He's a good route runner. He's faster than what he ran his 40 time at the combine. He ran four, six flat. But I would tell you, man, you watch Notre Dame film or whatever else. He runs by people all the time. So there is some things, I think, with the New York Giants. And again, the offensive line play, what I go back to, just go, man, we dominated the line of scrimmage. Our quarterback didn't have to duck every time he dropped back to pass. I haven't watched a giant game like that. And I feel like forever. Giants want to know Jets want to know. Yeah, Vikings want to know, well, but I was trying to do a whole new jersey.

26:45New York thing. The only true New York team is one and oh, too. Buffalo Bills. Right. The New Jersey teams are undefined. Yeah. Screw yourself with all that. I don't know. I was there all day yesterday. Yeah. I know. I was on the Dallas Cowboys, the Fort Worth Cowboys and they'd be really in Texas. OK. We're in New York is the capital of the world. The whole area is here because of New York City. I was just trying to. I was trying to. You're a jerk. You're a jerk. I mean, you're happy that the Giants won. Even though you had no faith in the Giants, I did. I picked the Giants to make the playoffs. I know you did. I picked them just to miss it. But I did pick the Giants to win this football game just like you. I may have picked them to win the division. Oh, did you really? Yeah. Wow. What were you getting my stash that night? No, no, no. But, you know, I picked the Bengals to win the Super Bowl. I picked the Giants to win the division. I picked the Saints to win the division. We'll be talking about them later. Yeah. I picked the Vikings to win the division. So it's only one game. It could all go up in flames for all of them. Here is Bill's Texans. That was the one.

27:47Who would have guessed 67 total points in Bill's Texans? And Josh Allen goes to Houston where he had never won in his career. Oh, and four, one and four all time against the Texans. They go in there and they get the win. And there were like nine lead changes. It was an awesome game. And it was back and forth. But, you know, it's funny. And this is the prime example of the disconnect between seeing the highlights, seeing the scores, seeing the stats, and watching the game. Yeah. Because the Kwame Lasseter. Yes. And the intercepts the tug grabs the ball. They'll have second and last play of the game or the last time the bill's out of the ball. It was a Josh Allen piss down the leg moment. Boy, he got hit in the arm and the ball popped in the air. Yeah. I don't disagree with that. But we've seen too many of those. Yeah. Right. And we love Josh Allen. Yeah. But it's on. It stands out when it happens. And when it happens and it turns a game against the bills, it's a bigger deal.

28:47It happened yesterday. You're right. It wasn't. It was one of those like, and it's funny because Ross Tucker on the call saying, well, you know, the conservative move here would be to run the ball and get the field goal. Yep. Yep. And the end result, you know, let's be aggressive. And sometimes you can be too aggressive. Because even if it is Josh Allen getting hit, that's part of what you factor into the algorithm and your brain to come to the decision to make that pro. But that ball could have been caught, should have been caught. And it would have been night night for the bills. And what are we talking about instead? Yeah. We're talking about Josh Allen, Kent, Winning Houston, Joe Brady can't get the win. Exactly. So it comes down to and then on the next play, it was post-route. It was dismissal. Yeah. I mean, it was shrug it off. Forget that moment. And, you know, there was comments in the trailer about a San Tay Samuel, like when you have that chance to make a play. It almost always happens. And you're just inviting.

29:47And we've talked about that before. How the Dodge bullet creates a looseness for the offense because they're on borrowed time. They're on house money. And the defense is like, oh, no, we can't believe we did that. I can't believe it. You lose your focus, little. Yeah, you definitely do. But that was a great throw. And Josh Allen, I think that was one of the biggest regular season wins of his career just because he hadn't won in Houston. And it's Joe Brady getting off to the right start. And they still have a long way to go. But to score 36 on that defense is one of the most impressive outcomes of the week. No, no doubt. And again, this is another thing that you, I think you can look at Houston. You know, maybe you could check this from me real quick. Houston, I believe, has lost the opener three of the last four years. They were all in three last year. And then the year before that, I believe maybe they won that one and then CJ Strauss rookie year, they, they lost. They've been traditionally a slow starter. Domingo Ryan's would be one of those guys that I mentioned before where I'd go, you know, I think they need to reevaluate their approach and training camp.

30:51Because yes, that was there way too talented on defense to look like that. That is crazy that they looked like that yesterday. And you know, to your point with Josh Allen, like I understand, we all look for those moments and anymore, not going to shut up about it until he wins a Super Bowl. But damn, the whole game has played their hint. There's just everything is Josh Allen. So I want to go, hey, you know, they, they had 52 snaps in the game and 48 of them, they were like, go make magic guy. And so there's going to be some bad stuff that happens right there. What do you think? They have two week one wins in the last 10 seasons. Whoa, that's crazy. That's even, that's the, all right. So that's even deeper. That's, that's deeper into Domingo Ryan. One's a tie. Gary goes well actually. Yeah. I said two wins in the last 10 seasons. Gary, Gary, Gary. Yeah, you lose. Sorry about your command, Gary. Sorry, it's the fun digs decided to try to do something to the goal post. They saw that and they blew the action point. I know, but they, yeah, they had a chance. They go to you're right.

31:51You're right. Exactly right. It's October back 15, you're totally, but back to the Texans thing. Yes, that was horrible on the defensive side of the ball. I mean, Josh Allen made some big time plays. The one thing we know about Buffalo that you look at is they do have a good offensive line and their offensive line stood the test as far as dropping back to pass with Josh Allen, but it was a fun game to watch. In fact, at one o'clock yesterday, I think was the most fun one o'clock opening week I can ever remember. I mean, some of the games were just unbelievable with the plays and just what was going on. And of course, this was one of them. But yeah, these, both of these teams went back and forth and I did not expect an offensive shootout. That's for sure. Josh Allen makes magic and yes, Houston Texas defense very disappointed. CJ Strout played better. He did. He did it. But, but, but, but, it came down to the kind of the same thing we've been talking about with him. Are you going to put your full faith in him to drive you down the field when you got

32:52to have it? And they got close and then it's sacked and it's strip sack. There was one person, particularly in the trailer, who was predicting a pick six. Wow. Well, yeah, I understand that's where we are. CJ Strout. That's where we kind of all expect. He played really good through the football game. Made a lot of big throws. But like you're talking about at the end of the game, he takes what a sack, maybe the third to last play of the game. And then of course, doesn't feel Greg were so coming off the right side there and gets strip sack. And then so now we end going, well, there we go. CJ Strout, not very good awareness and pocket awareness. Just looks like we saw at the end of last year again. So he's not going to dispel some of this talk or anything until they win in those moments. And he plays clean in those moments. And like we talked about with Drake May on on Wednesday morning, it's been a while since we've seen CJ Strout play clean football in those moments. And so that's one piece of the puzzle we need to see there. But you know, they their offensive line played pretty well.

33:55They David Montgomery certainly had some moments. The big issue of the day was just this, yes, that Josh Allen had his way with would would supposed to be the best defense in football. 31 points should be enough. That's right for a team whose defense is good enough to win games all by itself. CJ Strout and the rest of the offense should be able to say today, hey, it wasn't because of us. No, had to come down to me driving down the field. We should have caught the ball in the end zone that would have slammed the door on the Buffalo bill eight yards per play. The Buffalo bills got in the game. That's that's crazy to say that against the Houston Texans defense where you go, wait, it's maybe the best past rushing duo in football. The linebackers are up there with being the best linebacking group in the in football. If you watch the game yesterday with Ross Tucker or any of that, you know, the second area is supposed to be one of the best in football. Like you said, Lasseter is really good. We know Derek Stingley's in the conversation of best corner in football. Bullock, the safety is arguably the best free safety in all of football.

35:00So that's that again to me is where you drop the ball by not playing in the preseason. And you're not on your peas and cues and you didn't cross your teeth and dot your eyes with certain things that Buffalo did. And they messed up certain rules of their offense because they hadn't played against enough live bullets. And that's that's the thing that continues to be a theme, I think early on in the season with lack of, you know, training camp and hours and full time contact practice. I got another take to it relates to week one. You know who your week one opponent is going to be for four months. Exactly. So you're going to have some things there. And yeah, I think the extent to which you decide we are going to skew our preparations, training camp preseason toward week one. There's only so many hours in the day. There's only so many days in the week. There's only so many weeks in the month. You have to choose how you're going to allocate your time and what your priority is. And if you decide we have to beat the Texans, we're treating this like a playoff game.

36:04We'll worry about week two when week two comes. Yeah. But the benefit to the overall psyche of the organization and to turn the page on Sean McDermott to Joe Brady, the best way to do that is to go to Houston and do something that this franchise has never done with Josh Allen as the quarterback that the lift that will give us is worth it. Moving forward, even if we have diluted the time we would spend doing a little advance work week two week three, we're all in week one. And I think sometimes you see that. I think we saw that from the 49ers on Thursday. We're all into week one. Screw the Rams. We're going to beat the Rams. We're about the dolphins later and week three. I think that's the right approach. We want when week one. I think that's the right approach. I do. Now that's why it can be devastating when you do lose a week one at times because you go, man, we've really spent six weeks kind of preparing for them. I mean, it was a let down, but you try to put yourself in the best position that way. I can speak to openers. I had under John Grootan where we were preparing for Jim Johnson and the blitzes he brought

37:09right because we were going to open up at the link the year after the Bucks won the Super Bowl. 17. Yeah. And I remember we were late in OTAs. And I'm like, man, we're. We're having a period of where we're practicing some of the Jim Johnson blitzes already here early June. And yes, so that started right there. And then of course went right into training camp. Training camp. Yeah, we did what we needed to do. But as we got in through a few weeks or whatever about a weekend, we started to practice some Philly things and what we had to get ready for that way. So yeah, I hear you there. And it does give your team a, you know, a schematic old advantage. And like you said, make some feel good and you get off to a good start. We know one win can roll into two and you get that confidence going early on in the season. You start to think you're a better team than maybe you actually are. Okay. As it relates to CJ Stroud and it's funny, you know football seasons back when the Sunday splash reports begin to emerge on Saturday and when they're not really news. The news that came out on Saturday with multiple bylines from ESPN is that the Texans and

38:13CJ Stroud aren't going to reach a new contract before the start of the season. I mean, anybody's been paying attention. No, they weren't going to reach a new contract before the start of the season. My question is this and look, 26 for 38, 274 yards, two touchdowns, two lost fumbles mixed bagged, but better than what we've seen recently. But if he's your guy, if a quarterback is your guy, because we've had this discussion as relates to a tongue of I lower, what are the dolphins doing? They're bidding against themselves. There is no competing market. No one's going to pay him 50 million plus per year. Why are you doing this? There is an argument to be made and look at what the Buccaneers did not that it helped them win in week one. Let's clear out the cobwebs. Let's avoid the distractions. Let's take this off the table. We don't need to have our quarterback have any area of his brain consumed with what's going to happen with my money.

39:14I understand. Let's just get this taken care of so he can be free. So he's not thinking, did that throw just cost me $500,000? Did that throw cost me a million dollars? Did that throw almost like your shrewd bucks on your picks podcast now? Did I lose 20 here? Did I lose 50 here? Did I make some here? You don't want them thinking about that. And the best way to avoid that is just get him signed. Well, I hear you there, but we're not just going to throw money at him and go, where's the extra 15 million a year just to get to where you got to find the right spot? And I would think that he probably didn't like that sweet spot. I would guess where he's going, okay, maybe I thought about taking 40 or 45 a year something like that, but he probably thinks he's worth more than that. Or maybe they see something in him where they go, you know, he kind of had the red carpet rolled out from the last few years and he's declined in his play.

40:15Maybe he needs the old hot poker next to his ass, a little thing to go. I don't know. They know him better than not. I don't disagree with the point you're making. I understand it there. But I think yeah, the fine line of what it takes to get that done and what he thinks is acceptable for the number he wants and all that is that that's a tricky part. I look at it this way from his perspective, the analysis I would apply, whatever they have on the table for me now will still be there. That's not going away. I can only improve it. I think that's the mindset. You still run a certain amount of risk that they're going to get to the end of the year and they're going to say, you know what, we've, we've tried this. We've been behind him. He's our guy. We've been behind Benchham for Davis Mills in the second half of the divisional round lost to the Patriots. We believe in him. But we've seen this before. They believe in you completely and totally and unconditionally until the moment they don't. And then it's just done. And I feel like it's a riskier proposition for CJ Stroud and maybe it could have been

41:20because there is a chance. There is a chance that depending upon how this year goes, they decide to turn the page. There's a chance. And you remove that chance if you do a long term contract. So you'll find a number that works for everyone and couldn't you build something in to protect the player in the event that he becomes a top 10 top five guy. There has to be incentives and escalators and stuff you can do to pay him more money if he earns it. But you've given him that baseline protection where he's not thinking about this side project of what he needs to do to earn more money. Just look, I know love a sport. Right. But come on. You're trying to make as much money as you can. You should be trying to make as much money as you can. You're out there taking physical risks, short term and long term, long term risk of a increased chance of a less all the other things you're doing get compensated for it. And I just think if you haven't settled that business, you can be unsettled.

42:21And I'm not saying that's what caused him to have a strip sack. I'm just saying let's get all that crap out of your brain so you can just focus on winning game. No, I listen, I understand you all the way. But if I'm the Houston Texans, I didn't I wouldn't want to break the bank or go that way with him right now. I'd want to see a little bit more. I would. I'm just I'm not sure about CJ Stroud and you know, but there's got to be a way to contract I understand where you can protect yourself. 50. I mean, if he plays like a 50 million dollar a year guy, then give him a bomb. I mean, have it all happen or just I think maybe what he should have had was the fake. Let's take the burden of hand because they'll give me the two in the bush. If I play better, go rein to go. I think that I hear you there. That to me is, you know, from a guy who turned down money and then lost a spleen and never saw it back because I bet on myself, I certainly understand that aspect. I think he's going to come up. Oh, yeah, that's right. It is probably in a few weeks. Do you remember the day? September what? I want to say 26th, but I'm not sure.

43:23If anyone would know, it would be you. Well, yeah, but it's also I'm not the kind that really cares that much to remember the day all the way that way. It's not like I'm like, you know, oh, that's the day I almost died. It was a week four. It was week three. That was week three. Week three, two thousand six was September 24. 24. Okay. September 24, the anniversary because the next day was the Saints Falcon. The Saints, Steve Gleason of block. Geez. Moment. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. That's funny. That's crazy. But yeah, it's I understand what you're saying about CJ Stroud. It's going to be on selling. But he's got to prove it. He's had a lot of, you know, not so awesome moments over the last few years. And as you listen to anybody, it kind of feels like he's regressed from the rookie year. And Houston's looking at it going, hey, well, you don't need to even be Superman here. We got the best events in football. And I know they didn't yesterday, but they had a really good defense.

44:25And, you know, they still haven't been able to get where they want to go. I do think we got to hit on Buffalo and the fact that DJ Moore being there was a difference. Five catches, a hundred yards and a touchdown. You know, that, we know Dalton, Concade had a really good day, but they've been missing guys like that. That was cool to see with Buffalo yesterday. They got a new defense, a coordinator. And we just talked about, you know, being a little worried about Houston's defense. I certainly don't feel too much better about Buffalo's defense. You know, they let a team or an offense in Houston where we go, we don't even know how good their offense is, but they move the ball pretty much at will throughout the day as well. But man, that DJ Moore move by Brandon Bean and company, I think is really going to pay off for the Buffalo bills. And then when you get Gregory or so at the end of the game, making a play, those are the things that, you know, you've heard me say that I want to see more from Buffalo. Did they have the guys other than Josh Allen that can make some big plays and some big moments? And maybe this is the year they do. Well, pressure on everyone on the GM who got a promotion after last year, the offense

45:27coordinator who got a promotion after last year, the head coach gets fired. And the pressure will be intense in January. This is all the prelude to what they do in January. First, they got to get there and you help yourself get there if you can be one of the elite teams in the NFL. Now they got Detroit on Thursday night, right? Yeah. Yeah. That's going to be fun to watch. The truck coming up. They look good until they didn't at home against the Saints. And again, I think it could be the Saints aren't bad. I mean, they were booing in Detroit, but it could be the Saints are not going to be the same old Saints or at least not the same. I think there's probably a little both there. Yeah. The post-painting Saints get there. We'll get there. But yeah, that's coming up Thursday night. They opened the new stadium with the new grass because the first field got an F minus. And how about Joe Brady taking off a shirt in the locker? I did see that. You approved that message? I was just trying to be Ben Johnson over there. Yeah. I would have taken off a shirt. I would have taken off a shirt. But apparently he must have said the way that it happened. They gave him the game. Boy, he started to talk. They stopped him. He took off a shirt. He must have said something ahead of time.

46:28I would think so. I would think so. I would take off my shirt. Yeah. I would think something like that. And then again, guys do love that. That can rally the locker room. It can rally the guys around the coach to know, hey, he's kind of fun. He's cool that way. You know, he's down to do whatever or do anything. So I'm all for it. That's excitement to your football team. I let's take a break when we return the Minnesota Vikings. Lose their starting quarterback. But somehow, some way. Oh, they win the game. That's next on this Monday, September 14 edition of BFT Live.