Washington-Dallas Previews & Picks

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2:04That's why trade pros trust Fiber-Sement party backer board to keep tile firmly in place, resist cracking, and help block moisture. Chosen over 40 million kitchens and bathrooms, party backer board, what the best build on. Shop now at participating Home Depot, Lowe's, and floor into core stores. For more information, visit JamesHearty.com slash hearty backer. Al Michaels sounding really good last night I thought on the call in Buffalo for the Bills 41-31 win over the Lions. Josh Allen right now. Come on, he is the best quarterback in the NFL.

3:04I don't think there's much debate about that. As of right now, meantime right now, the Lions defense might be the worst in the league. The show's presenting sponsor as always, window nation 86690 Nation or window nation.com if you need new windows. Jay Grootin will join me on this football Friday as he does every Friday during football season. We'll get Jay to go back to the Philly game and tell us what he thought of that and of course, he'll preview and pick Washington at Dallas. Jay's lock of the week off to a good start. Already at the Bears last week, we'll get his week two lock. I'll have my smell test to finish up the show. 12 picks here in week three of college football week two of the NFL. Two of those 12 are for tonight. The college football card tonight, a few games and I've got two of them in the smell test.

4:06I want to just go back to last night real quickly to open up the show. A couple of things about the bills win over the Lions. First of all, I had no idea that they played the Canadian national anthem at Buffalo games. Yes, they have, I believe, a lot of Canadian fans. Remember, they had some of their games 10, 15 years ago, one game a year, maybe two in Toronto. There was the discussion about if they didn't get a new stadium, they'd moved to Toronto. They opened up that new stadium last night. Washington played a game in Toronto against the bills. A 23 to nothing shut out loss. John Beck quarterbacked in that game. But yeah, I had no idea that they played the Canadian national anthem. Maybe it's a new thing for the new stadium. I don't know. That was one observation from last night's game. The other one, having nothing to do with the game itself, I didn't know that the new

5:07stadium was going to be a grass field. It looked great. The bills have played on turf. They're old stadiums since the day it opened. And by the way, did you know when rich stadium, the stadium that the bills played in from 1973 through the end of last year, when that stadium opened with its first game in the summer of 1973, a preseason game against our team. The redskins were the first opponent in rich stadium, August 17, 1973, preseason week number three. By the way, they played six preseason games back then. And the opening kickoff, the first play in that stadium was a 102 yard kickoff return 102 yards on a kickoff return, the opening kick by Herb Mulkey, who was a walk on for

6:13George Allen, made the team and became a great kickoff returner for the skins in the early 70s. But the new stadium is grass. I had no idea. Third observation from last night's game. Some Michaels who has not been very good. He has been declining as a play by play guy. He's one of my all time favorites. I think he's one of the best to have ever done it, one of the most versatile to have ever done it. And in recent years, I think I've been among many, many who have really criticized our Michaels who for sure was losing his fastball. I thought he sounded like the old Al Michaels last night. He was sharp. He had energy, which has been a big recent criticism of his calls. But I thought he was very good and sounded like the old Al Michaels on the Amazon call

7:17last night. Next observation from the game back to Josh Allen. In absolute freak, I mean, six five, two 40. He's a quarterback. He's a running back. Right now, he is the best quarterback in the NFL. Mahomes is TBD on the recovery from the knee injury. And he looked fine on Monday night. They really won that game because they were able to run the football with Kenneth Walker, the third. But if you gave me the choice right now to play this year with any quarterback in the NFL, it's not even close. I'm taking Josh Allen. And you know, watching him last night, he's got nine total touchdowns in the first two games without a turnover. By the way, nine touchdowns in two games without a turnover with the touchdown mix being throwing and running because he's got four rushing touchdowns in the first two weeks of the season.

8:21Do you know that that has only been done? One time in NFL history, previous to Josh Allen doing it last night. In the previous time, it was done by Josh Allen. So nine total touchdowns in consecutive games with a combination of passing and rushing touchdowns. It's now been done twice in the history of the game, both by Josh Allen. You know, Josh Allen, don't forget this about Josh Allen. There were doubts about him coming out in the 2018 draft. Chris Kouley had no doubts. There were certainly doubts about him after his second year in the league where he struggled in year two with accuracy, with decision making. And then in that wild card game, in that second season against Houston on the road, I mean, he was not very good.

9:22There was no indication after two years that Allen was going to be what he has turned out to be. And yes, that draft in 2018, people were killing the pick. They thought it was way too early for Buffalo because he was not an accurate passer at Wyoming. And I remember Kouley doing the film breakdown of Allen before that draft saying, I don't get it. I think this guy is going to be great. And he said that the completion percentage numbers were low because he didn't have any receivers that could get open. And then when they did, they couldn't catch the ball. Anyway, Josh Allen right now playing at an insanely high level. He is right now the odds on favorite to be the MVP. That's going to change. I'm sure he's going to have a stretch of games that aren't as brilliant. But he is a heavy favorite right now at my bookie to be the MVP.

10:24We are not even into week two in full. No, we're close to it after just one game. My last observation from last night's game, God, the Detroit defense is awful through two games. Now, they are hurt. No Brian Branch, no Kirby Joseph. They're starting safeties. They lost Avanti Maddox. The guy that was starting at one of the safety spots last night because they are so depleted at safety. But in two games so far, the Lions have allowed 71 points, 915 yards and 63 first downs, 63. They closed the gap last night to 34, 24 and finally got a stop. Really was Buffalo that stopped themselves with kind of a drop pass. They got the ball back at their own nine yard line. After not converting on third down, I thought Dan Campbell might go for it from his own nine

11:26yard line on third and ten because there was no chance they were going to get another stop. They needed to score on that drive. They punted from their own nine yard line, which with Dan Campbell, a bit of a surprise. Hey, good news. Steve Souter will be back next week doing film breakdown on the show for the season. Starting this coming Wednesday, Steve Souter will be doing film breakdowns of Washington's previous game. I am looking forward to that. I think I've Steve tomorrow night, he'll be on the call for Maryland Virginia Tech in college park. Not a massive game nationally, but an important game for both teams. I mean, they both started off 2 and 0 without really a meaningful win, you know, a couple of two nubs to start. Maryland fans and Virginia Tech fans have had this game circled since the schedule came

12:29out. And this is, you know, yes, a matchup of old ACC foes, although really Virginia Tech wasn't in the league for more than what, 10 years maybe, seven years or whatever it was before Maryland jumped to the big 10. But yeah, well, they came into the league in 2005, I think, and Maryland went to the big 10 in 2014. So close to a decade of being ACC foes and Virginia Tech kind of owned that when they came into the ACC. But I think both schools, you know, recruiting wise fan base mixes, a lot of Virginia Tech alum in the DMV. Maryland, I think, is number one in terms of alums in the DMV. I think George Mason is two in Virginia Tech is three. Then I think it's Penn State. I think that's what it is. But anyway, big game for both fan bases for both schools.

13:32James Franklin is the coach at Virginia Tech. James Franklin and Penn State played Maryland pretty much every year. And in a recent game in 24, they kind of ran the score up against Maryland. And he and locks had a difficult sort of exchange of hands at the end of that game. It was a very confrontational sort of handshake. I don't think lockslee appreciated the running up of the score. And afterwards Franklin really kind of took a shot at Maryland saying that look, we had our three or two's and three's in the game and even some of our four's and they had their ones in the game. And I can't tell my reserves not to try to score. And Maryland was blitzing if they didn't want us to score, they could have played some too high or some zone and drop back. It was condescending per James Franklin's usual self. And so there is some fire for James Franklin from Mike Locksley and company.

14:37Make no mistake about that. Look, these two teams are pretty even roster wise. Virginia Tech is a two and a half, three point favorite. I like Maryland, but I will tell you that this is one of those spots where we've seen either Maryland get run out of their own building, Penn State in 2019 in a big spot. Iowa in 2021, I believe it was in a Friday night, you know, sort of hyped up game. Or if they've been competitive in this spot, like they were last year against Washington as an undefeated team at home, they've kind of beaten themselves, you know, Maryland under Locksley, they've had talent. They've had some explosive talent at skilled position players. They've also had a lot of self inflicted losses or opportunities to be more competitive in games where they weren't because of self inflicted mistakes.

15:37Penalties have been an issue throughout the Locksley era, unnecessary, you know, penalties, you know, 15 yarders, false starts. And that is just not going to fly in a game like this tomorrow night. You cannot end up with 11 penalties for, you know, 110 yards of lost yardage. You got to be buttoned up, you got to be disciplined. And I think Maryland actually has a chance offensively to do well tomorrow night. They've got some speed at wide receiver with some of their transfers. They've got Malik Washington who I've been a little bit down on. I love the size. I love the arm strength. I love the athleticism. And I think their new offensive coordinator, Clint Trickle is going to do a good job with him. He's only a sophomore here. So, you know, the criticism is certainly not loud criticism because he's only played one year. But I did not like his accuracy in touch last year.

16:39I thought he was lacking in sort of the ability to throw short with touch or deep with touch. Everything was a fastball. And we saw some of that even in the opener against Hampton, not as much last week against Yukon. The Terps have talent on defense to Sydney Stewart is a freak. Wingate's great. They're going to miss, you know, for the season, Zahir Mathis, which was a devastating blow during the summer, torn ACL. But I like Maryland tomorrow night. I can tell you this. They're not in this melt test. But I like the Terps. And I think if they can get this win, it really sets them up for a good season. If they can get this win and look impressive, they get UCLA. Next week at home, UCLA is not that good. Then they're on the road at Nebraska. I'm not sure about Nebraska yet. Before Ohio State comes to town, but this may be the difference between tomorrow night may be the difference between a season where they could win seven games, go to a bowl

17:42game, maybe eight, or the season starts to get away from them if they lose the game. Go Terps tomorrow night in college park. All right, let's get to Sunday and Washington's week two game at Dallas. Both teams are O and one after division road losses in week one. Dallas in New York against the Giants, Washington, of course, in Philadelphia against the Eagles. The Cowboys are three and a half, four point favorites. The totals right around 50 and a half, 51. Dallas was in an odd game against the Giants that they lost 28 to 20, a game in which they only had six real possessions in the game, same for New York, but they couldn't get the Giants off the field. Although they did have four forced fumbles in the game, but they could only recover one of them, recover one more and it may have made the difference in the game.

18:46Offensively, they had some drop passes. They weren't smooth early, but too long touchdown drives in the second half. That was it. That's all they had in terms of possessions in the second half of that game. Washington was in a high possession game. Lots of punts both sides and really didn't get it going offensively until late third quarter and in the fourth quarter and defensively just gave up too many explosive plays. Avoiding O&2 is the goal here. Although I would caution all of you to not be so dialed into or be doom and gloom if Washington loses to fall to O&2. Because a lot of those percentages, O&2 teams to make the playoffs over the course of 50 some years since the merger. It's like a 10 and a half, 11% something like that.

19:47But since they went to the 17 game schedule, I'll give you the last two years. The last two years, last year, there were 10 teams that started O&2. Three of those teams made the playoffs. 30% made the playoffs. Carolina, Chicago and Houston. And then in 24, there were nine teams that started O&2 and three of those nine teams made it. The Rams, Denver and Baltimore all made it. So six out of the last 19, O&2 teams over the last two seasons have made the playoffs. That's 31.5%. That's not the percentage that people will point to for all of the O&2 teams when we get to Tuesday morning and we know who all of those O&2 teams are. Yes, I don't want them to be O&2, but I am not going to believe that the season is over

20:51if they don't beat the Cowboys. It feels very important. It feels because it's a second consecutive division game like you got to get one of these, but they're both road division games and they'll get both of these teams Philly and Dallas at home. Hopefully in meaningful games. Now the Philly game comes on November 1st on Sunday night football. The second Dallas game is the season finale and they'll play two giant games within about a six week period of each other mid October to mid November, about a five week period between those games. But yet feels like it's a need to have game. I totally agree with that sentiment, but the season's not over if they lose to the Cowboys on Sunday despite all of the percentages of O&2 teams making the playoffs that you'll hear about on Sunday night.

21:52Now keys to a win Sunday over the Cowboys. Number one for me, you've got to be patient on offense against that Dallas defense that plays like a Vic Fangio defense because Christian Parker, their new defensive coordinator, came from Philly. He's been with Vic Fangio. They play a lot of too high. The giants were successful in running the football and being patient and checking it down and going to the quick game offensively. To me, you've got to be able to run the football. You've got to use short quick game as part of your run extension throws. I do think that Jaden Daniels needs to be a part of Sunday's run game. I think that that's going to be a big part of it. You Jackson Dart pulled it a couple of times. I told you that I watched the condensed version of the game, a couple of zone read keepers.

22:55Even if Jaden doesn't keep it on a zone read, the presentation of Jaden as a potential runner on zone read plays will really make it, I think, easier for Croskey Merritt, for Rashad White, for K-Tron Allen, whomever is in the game, whichever of the backs are in the game. But I think Jaden's got to be a part of the run game. I do. And I don't fear that. I think he's got to do a good job protecting himself. Let me just say this about Jaden and the zone read during his first two years. I don't think he's been a consistently great decision maker on that. It's not easy to read that end that end can fake as if he's crashing down and stay home or vice versa. But I do think Sunday patience, not attacking deep against the too high. You don't want to get in trouble with that. I thought they were patient against Philadelphia. But that patience has to require Washington to run the football like the giants did. And for me, I think a big part

24:01of that will be Jaden as a part of the run game. Not designed runs. I'm not talking about running him, you know, off tackle or running him on counters or powers. He's not Josh Allen. All right. But certainly zone read and against that Dallas defense upfront, Quinn and Williams and Kenny Clark that those are two good defensive tackles. That's the strength of their interior line. Yeah. I think Jaden's got to be a part of it. So that's number one patience on offense, which, you know, really for me means you got to stick with the run. You've got to be successful with the run. You've got to use the short quick passing attack and you've got to use your quarterback in the zone read game. You got to hold on to the football and you've got to make them get out of that we're not get, you know, that too high where we're not going to let you throw over the top. Number two, Washington wins on Sunday. If they limit the explosives, you know, they gave up six big explosive

25:04plays. I pointed out earlier in the week, they gave up six big explosive plays to the Cowboys in that October game in Dallas last year. Tackling is going to be critical in this game. You've got to tackle when CD Lam catches a short pass or pickens catches a short pass. So the tackling has to be up to snuff. I didn't think the tackling was that bad. Sunday against Philadelphia, but I didn't think it was overly consistent. There were some misses and certainly the third and sixth touchdown to Goddard on the play where everybody kind of stopped. That's not a great play for them. Limit the explosives. Dallas, very capable of explosive plays. Next up, you got to stop the run, you know, limiting the explosives is going to be something they'll be able to do if they get Dallas into down in distances where, you know, they're forced to throw the football, forced to throw the football down the field. Javante Williams is a really good back.

26:07I've been a big fan of Javante Williams for a long time. He just had injuries in Denver. In Dallas last year, breakout season and he's a good back and he is a guy that can do everything. He's a three down back. They've got to stop him. You got to wrap him up. Look, I think part of the key to Sunday in Dallas is to do what they did against Philadelphia minus the explosive plays that they allowed. And that is a lot of negative plays. They had the 10 TFLs in the game. Tackles for loss. You've got to create some of those negatives. I think that's the Dorente Jones scheme. Now I don't want it to be, you know, one of those schemes in which you either, you know, it's feast or famine. You either have a big TFL minus four minus five or you get beat for 60 yards down the field because it's hard to overcome that many explosives. There were a lot of reasons that they lost the game to Philadelphia. But to me, number one was six 30 plus yard plays

27:13in a game like or 20 yard plus plays in a game. You cannot allow that, you know, and expect to beat a good football team on the road. TFLs negative plays caused getting Dallas into down and distant situations, which are not favorable for them. A big key in Sunday's game. More from the defense. You got a pressure deck. You got a rattle and hit deck. You got to get deck off his spot. You got to get him out of his rhythm. This has to be a game where you are the more physical team. I feel like in recent years, Washington's lost eight of 10 to Dallas and the only two wins were two meaningless end of season wins. You know, the game against the Sam Howe game, you know, at the end of the season in 22, I mean, meaningless game. Washington hasn't won a meaningful game against Dallas since Thanksgiving during COVID in 2020. So I think in those games, too, Dallas has been

28:21not only the better finesse team, but the more physical team as well. You've got to take it to them. You've got to hit deck. Press got you got to get him to hurry. I like their style of play. Washington's the style. I think they're going to play. So hopefully that is a possibility. I don't think they need to win the turnover margin. I don't think you can lose it and expect to win. But man, it'd be nice to get a takeaway or two. God, this team just cannot take the ball away and hasn't for a while now. And they didn't get one Sunday in Philadelphia. They didn't give one away either. They tried to with Crosky Merritt's fumble. But you got to you got to get some takeaways. You got to win the turnover margin. I could see an even turnover margin in Washington still winning the game. But man, plus one plus two would go a long way towards a W. You can't give up points in on special teams. I mean,

29:23they had a blocked PAT. They missed a 54 yard field goal. Remember that missed 54 yard field goal also results in a flip in field position because Philly takes over in great field position after with great field position after a missed long kick. So you can't be on the wrong side of that. And then I do think this is one of those games where Jaden may have to go into the phone booth and put on a cape. He's going to have to make some plays. They're going to have to stay on the field offensively. Their best chance is to keep Dak Prescott CD-Lam, George Pickens, Javante Williams on the sideline. And you're going to have to get Jaden to make some plays and perhaps with his legs and perhaps really trying to stretch it out and trying to get a first down on a third and sixth, you know, to keep the football. I think he's going to have to have a big,

30:24big game. It's, it includes being patient and not forcing it. He didn't do that last week. Fourcing the football when people weren't open and Philly wasn't giving up anything deep, that could have made the game go sideways a lot earlier. And you can't do that on the road against Dallas. I know everybody's going to point to Dallas's defense who is terrible against the giants. It wasn't good, but they do have players. It's a first year coordinator now in week two. We saw a little of that with our offensive coordinator last week. And they did force four fumbles last week, even though they didn't recover three of them. So I don't think that this is the easy, easy defensive soft team that you may think you saw Sunday night against the giants, but it's also not Philadelphia's defense. That's true too. All right, there you go. Be patient

31:25offensively. You know, got to run the football, use the short passing game, have to limit the explosives explosives on defense, stopping the run, negative plays, takeaways, hitting and pressuring back. You can't give up points on special teams. You got to make every point after touchdown, every extra point, every field goal that you're that you should make 54 nowadays. They went with Stevens in part because he had the big leg. He made a 55 yarder. He missed a 54 yarder. And then I think Jaden's going to have to put the Superman cape on a few times on Sunday. I like Washington to win on Sunday. I know I picked him against Philadelphia to win 27 24 and over time. This one feels like 24 21, something like that. I think it's going to be another close down to the wire game. And I could see Washington pulling it out and being one in one through two games.

32:25It would make next week a lot easier if they can win. One other thing real quickly, the injury report in Quinn actually announced not that long ago. Frankie Luvu and Chigacán, quote, both out for Sunday's game. I didn't think either one of them would go. I definitely didn't think that Luvu would go with a groin injury. You're usually not back a week after a groin injury. Same thing with the hamstring. Let's hope that these are one week injuries and that they're both back against Seattle next week. But Luvu's loss to the defense, I think is a significant one. Going to put a lot more obviously on Leo Chanel on sunny styles. But I know that they believe that Luvu can have a year similar to the one that he had in 2024 in this system. So those are two big losses for Sunday. Javán Kenlaw was limited at practice. He's been listed as questionable

33:26for Sunday. But I would guess that he will go. Dallas, both guys that Mickey Spagnola talked about on Wednesday are out. Malik Hooker and Demarvian overshown both ruled out for the game. So two defensive starters out for Dallas and at least one offensive starter, one defensive starter for Washington. One more thing that I want to just mention here in the open to the show before we get to Jay Groot. And that is the passing of Georgetown great Michael Sweetney. Mike Sweetney was one hell of a college basketball player at Georgetown. And his sudden passing at the age of 43 years old is so sad. This was a much beloved person in the Georgetown community. People in college basketball, people in the NBA, they loved Mike Sweetney. You know, 686926270, soft hands, an unbelievable motor.

34:31I remember Mike Sweetney being one of Coach Thompson's favorite players. Mike's wife, India, worked at the station for a period of time, you know, about 15 years ago. And my heart breaks for her and their three kids and sympathies out to the family of Mike Sweetney who at Georgetown, I mean, he had a game against Carmelo Anthony the year that Syracuse won the national championship. Carmelo Anthony's only year 2002 2003 31 points 19 rebounds seven assists and seven blocked shots. He was a double, double machine in his sophomore and junior years before he went into the NBA draft and was drafted ninth overall by the Knicks in the first round of that 2003 draft. But he was, you know, CJ Chris Johnson, longtime program director, a real close friend of mine and a

35:37real close family friend of the Thompson's. He told me this morning, he's like, look, no one outside of the Georgetown family would probably put Michael Sweetney on an all-time top, you know, five starting five in Georgetown basketball history. But he said he's close to it. He's really close, if not on it. He's like Patrick and Michael Graham are probably the greatest rebounders. Patrick certainly is, Michael Graham gets credited for being one of the great rebounders. But he's like, I'm not sure there was a better rebounder in Georgetown history other than other than Patrick than Mike Sweetney. And in terms of the combo of points and rebounds and some of the games he played against phenomenal competition, you know, I remember being told how great Mike Sweetney, I'm not a Georgetown guy as you guys know. I remember him on those Craig, Craig Asher team, though, they didn't have a lot Kevin Braswell maybe. They went to the sweet 16

36:41in a one lost in Maryland in that sweet 16. You know, he really kind of was the player that bridged the gap between coach Thompson's teams and then JT3's teams. JT3 took over the year after I think Sweetney went to the pros, but a very kind of underrated maybe or just not as much discussed. Great college basketball player out of Georgetown with all the great players that Georgetown had over the years. In part because he didn't play during an era that produced deep tournament runs. Sweet 16 is freshman year, but that, you know, that year he averaged 12 and 7. His sophomore year 19 and 10, his junior year nearly 23 points per game and over 10 rebounds a game. And by the way, 3.2 blocked shots a game in his final year at Georgetown as a junior. He did not have the NBA career.

37:47Obviously that some thought he would, but very sad for sure. And again, sympathy's out to the family. All right, Jay Gruden next after these words from a few of our sponsors. Football's finally back in price picks is bringing out their best offer yet new users who sign up will get $150 in lineups if you win your first $5 lineup. That's right. If you win your first $5 lineup, you'll get $150 in lineups. Price picks is my go to daily fantasy sports app. And it's the best way to win real money this football season. And it's so easy. You simply pick between two and six players, then just pick more or less than their projected stats. You can make these picks in a minute or less and it adds so much more interest on game day. And tonight's Monday night game, the MVP from last February, Kenneth Walker, the thirds rushing total of more or less is 63

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42:05And you'll get your lowest rate from their network of trusted carriers. Take 10 minutes to get covered today with life insurance through ethos. Get your free quote at ethos.com slash sheen. That's ethos.com slash sheen. Application times may vary, rates may vary. All right, every Friday, Jake Bruden, the former head coach of our Washington Fred Schens joins this podcast to share all of his insight on our team and the league. And, by the way, give us his NFL lock of the week, which has started off well. Want to know, he gave out the bears last week, laying the short number in Charlotte. We'll get his pick for this week in a bit. Jay is doing the Bruden family football show with his brother, John, which comes out on Wednesdays on YouTube through barstool. So check that out. So I just want to start with going back

43:09to the Philly opener. Give me some of your takeaways from the two point loss to the Eagles. Yeah, I thought the Washington obviously started out a little sluggish, but you know, he kept it close and did some good things both offensively and defensively. We have a game that's going to be that close. Your kicking game has to be on point. And that's one of my biggest concerns. Certainly, I want to talk about the past rush, your secondary, your protection, all that stuff. We got to get our kicking game underway, because these close games are going to come down to a field of extra point and all that stuff. So that's number one, number two. I thought the offensive line held up decently. I think they give up a little bit a lot of push. Jay didn't really have a lot of clean, clean pockets for each step in the throws, but I think they did pretty good against Jay and the Carter and the rest of the Eagles group. Defensively, they made some plays. You know, the Cormor has got to play better. There's no dead about it. The Cormor's got to step up and make some plays, especially this week. You get to Cowboys with kickers and CDLAM. But overall, you know, they took it to the wire. Two point play that was a

44:13nicely drawn up play. It just didn't work. Unfortunately, we missed a block. I'm a back block, but I thought the first game coming out with a new offensive coordinator, a new defensive coordinator. I thought they performed admirably and gave himself a chance to win. I thought you can ask for. Jaylen Carter blocked. I think it's his fourth blocked kick of his career. I'm just curious. Is there a way to find a guy that's like six nine or six 11 seven feet that you can put in the middle of a field goal or PAT rush and really get your hands on kicks consistently? Like has anybody thought outside the box of trying to find that one guy that would just be totally disruptive to another team's kicking game? No, I don't think there's, I don't mean, let you want to go sign, you know, starting center for the Cavaliers, maybe. Yeah, well,

45:14I mean, there's got to be some six 11 dude out there that's not playing in the NBA. There are plenty of them. But I mean, long armed six 11 guy, even if he's not a football player, isn't that going to be disruptive to a kicker? It could be, it could be helpful if the kicker gets the ball up in a year. We need to hit a sand wedge every now and now we need to hit three irons on an extra point. Now that that that hurt a little bit. I think that was a low line drive that I think you and I could have blocked that one. So the kicker's got to get the ball up in here. All right, let's do that first. Now we'll figure out a seven foot six minute bowl to come in here and he's available. The new ball will be perfect. I'm being serious to a certain degree. I've always wondered why that is such an important part of the game. As you said, and maybe I'm being a complete idiot that, you know, if the guy's not a football player, he's going to be chopped down. He's going to be taken out of it. He he wouldn't be impactful. But, you know, it's the same stupid fan thing that the, you know, fan that says, let's get some fat guy in goal in the NHL, like where

46:21he's basically taking up the whole goal. And you can't get a puck by him. I'm sure it's idiotic what I'm saying. But at the same time, some long armed six 11 freak. I, yes, the ball's got to, then it's imperative that the ball gets up quickly. Yes, yes, but he's going to be far enough back. You got to be able to get pushed to you got to go forward and it'd be hard for a six 11 guy to get, I mean, okay. I don't know. I'd rather get like LeBron James and have him just jump over the center and then he'd block it. You know what I mean? I think the better chance to do that one guy is used to jump over the center, but if you make any contact at all at the center, right? At the long snap for them at the penalty for whatever that's all of 18, whatever it's called. Yeah, I mean, it's been interesting to see, but you know, your thing is these teams, your depth is so important. You know, you need the rotation on the defense line. You need to have extra alignment in case people get hurt. Two or three quarterbacks. You know, so the secondary for special teams running down on kicks and all that stuff. So it's very hard to just waste a position

47:24on a seven foot guy to stand there and try to block a kick. I mean, you can say it's an idiotic idea. You're not, you can't hurt my feelings. I promise you. I don't like to say idiotic. Kevin, I mean, you're nice enough to have me on this show, but yes, that's an idiotic idea. Okay, thank you. Really stupid. Do you have a three iron in your bag? No, I have my lowest of five iron. That's when I use under trees. You have my mother there a lot. So how many hybrids do you have in your bag? I get three. I get a six hybrid, three hybrid and four hybrid. Wow, you've got a six hybrid. Wow. So what do you, what do you use your six hybrid for? About 180. It took the place of my six iron. Yeah. But five iron, six hybrid, seven, eight, nine, pitching wedge, gap wedge, 54 or 60. Got it. Yeah, well, that's a good, that's a good hit with a six hybrid, 180. Because that's what I use my five guys are going to the seven wood nine wood. I know.

48:27I know. Seven wood at nine wood. How many people are going to that? Well, I and I know guys that have a seven hybrid. You know what they'll hit that thing like 150 instead of hitting a seven iron or an eight iron. I mean, that is, it is a sign of becoming an older golfer, right? When you have, when you're taking a three, four and really a, because you just said you don't even use your five iron unless it's a punch out, right? Oh, hell no. I don't get that thing. I don't either. I'd much rather hit. A hybrid. It's so, it's so much less forgiving. It's so much more forgiving. Excuse me. The hybrid. Yeah, I used to think you couldn't hit hybrids out of rough, but you actually can't. Oh, yeah. That works as good or better. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They're just a lot easier to hit. They are a lot easier to hit. All right. Back to the game last week. So you said the two point play was a good play. The argument from, you know, the couch is that if you're going to have an

49:33option, which apparently Jaden had, you know, he was playing that edge defender. If the edge defender crashes down, he throws it to the flat or keeps it himself. The edge defender hunt played Jaden, so he shoveled it to baits. The from the couch view would be, why do you want one of your options to be John Bates? Is that fair? That's fair. I think the other argument is, you know, we're relying on two of our most fun athletic guys to make critical blocks. You know, your left guard Paul's got to get up and block your hot Campbell. Then your right guard Cosby who's probably their best lineman at the pull around there and try to get the linebacker who's out of the play anyway. 53, whatever thing, was a bond. Bond was out of the play using coverage, so really we had a next reporter up there for nobody. I would have loved to see Cosby stick his foot in the ground and go back and try to pick up any trash. It was coming from the week side, but well drawn up play. They had a long time to talk about it too because they're a challenge. Antonio Williams touched down, right? So they had to be on the same page and ready for this

50:35staff had to be on board. Players had to be on board. They had to practice that play quite a bit because you want to make sure in red zone day that your practice and two point plays because, you know, obviously they could be very, very important, which it was. It was a well drawn up play. It just really executed. Man, dang, so unfortunate. It was wide open. It looked like the Red Sea was partying in all of a sudden the sharks came in. How many two point plays would you have going into a game? Typically three or really, you know, when you do in your red zone, you do it in you go plus 20 and you go plus 15 and plus 10 plus five. Then all the plus five plays are technically two point plays. And then you try to circle the ones. Okay, we're going to save this one for two point play. But anytime you get at the five yard line, third and goal to three, third and goal to four, third and goal to two, those are technically two point plays. So you have about five or six of leaf passes from the five yard line going in. And then you have probably a couple star that you're going to try to save for a two point play. And would you get enough reps during the course of the week to, you know, I always find it interesting during the days that I was out at the park

51:41a lot. Just how, how little you guys rep everything? Like I think the normal fan thinks you guys are out there for hours, you know, practicing and repping plays. And there really aren't a lot of reps during the course of the week. Do you agree with that or not? Yeah, yeah, definitely. But you have walkthroughs, you know, every, every morning before practice, you'll have a walkthrough. So you're going to hit situations there as well. Then you go to practice, you hit them there. So you it's basically at two days every day. So you have the walkthroughs. Then you're also pulling from playsy trunks since OTA. So you're not putting in brand new plays every week. You're going to put it a few obviously for the defense. People play different leaf passes in the red zone. But typically in the red zone, you're going to get a lot of cover zero, drop eight, standard covers, double, double, you know, mandaman, whatever it might be. So you got to have a plan for all the different covers you see. And hopefully you're drawing from plays that you guys have run before, you know. So shouldn't be that hard. You know, sometimes a play like a shovel pass, though, that's one where

52:42you're going to rep a lot during week. So through walkthroughs and through, you know, some team periods, fun Friday, probably maybe Thursday late. So you get the reps on the special plays that you're going to call it. You probably haven't run a lot. Do you, um, do you know which team was the first to sort of use that shovel pass as part of their offense? I know Kelsey's running a lot. There's been a lot of teams that have run that play. It's a it's a value you said. I'm talking about go go way back in the day. Who was the who was the first team to introduce the shovel pass, you know, which by the way is an incomplete pass if it's dropped. Um, I don't know this for sure, but I think I know the first team to do it. I was curious if you thought back to when you first saw that way. You can do it with a full back of the full backs off set. You can do it with the tight end. You can do it with a half back. You can ship. There's a lot of,

53:44you can do it with a receiver. There's a lot of different ways to hit the shovel pass. I don't know who the first one was. I think it was Denver and I think it was L way and I think, um, it was probably Dan Reeves would have been the coach. It was before Shanahan, but I remember Denver in the 80s, you know, Gerald Will Height and a couple of the backs that L way had. And I remember seeing that play going, wow, that's an interesting play. And then, you know, here we are, you know, 35, 40 years later. And it's a staple play in the NFL. I don't know if I'm right or not. I just, that's the team that I remember being the first time that I saw it as an NFL thing. Yeah, I don't know, but it's a, it's a good play. You just got to stay on your block. I'll great. You've got to stay on that free technique. I'm a back block. I'm not an easy thing to do because you got to make sure you don't get up to feel, but if he gets up to feel the left, the right tackle is supposed to help him and then it's back out. Um, so I'll great. I lose to that three technique on that spin move was just unfortunate. It was tough to watch, dang it. Yeah. It was a good play, though, by a

54:47Joe Moe, didn't you think an athletic play for a detackle? Excellent play. You know, a lot of times when he feels the puller, when he sees Cosme pull, he knows it's some kind of week side pop or punch, whatever it might be, whatever he calls it. So a lot of those guys try to spin back into the play and he did a great job of recognizing the guard pole and making a great play. The play that I thought was the worst of the game for Washington, um, at least situationally, was the Eagles first touchdown on a third and goal from the 17 when they had seven guys on the line of scrimmage. Now they dropped three, but Goddard got a jump and hit the seam and, you know, it's the first read it looked like for Jalen Hertz. And it just seems to me and I said this on Monday after the game, third and goal from the 17, how long have we been watching football? You rush three, you drop eight and you keep everything in front of them. You rally to make a tackle and you make the field goal kicker come out and kick a field goal. And they, I thought were way too aggressive in

55:49that spot. I want to hear your thought on that play. 100 percent. What do we disguise them? You can't get caught in the disguise and lose your responsibility to cover judge number one. I mean, forget the disguise. Let me get back and I'm not going to let Dallas Goddard run down the middle of the field. There's absolutely no way that's going to happen. That year exactly right now is my father was played in St. Louis, this judge in the corner out the Wix was another bad play. Um, but yeah, I threw down a 17. That is impossible down to get unless you throw a jump ball in the back corner and zone. I mean, it's impossible. I don't know what you call. And that was way, way too easy. You can't get up. Dallas Goddard. Now the middle of field. That's Jalen Hertz. Number one guy forgot to say. I think that the only times I see touchdowns on that play is when the quarterback runs around for a while and then eventually you just lose somebody and cover a Jeff to the quarterbacks extended the play for several seconds. Like that's usually the only way it scores. It never scores the way they scored on it. Um, with that said, I thought Dorente Jones

56:52had a pretty decent first day. What did you think? Yes, except for the big place, the big play served up the one that got it, the one that wicks and then third and 18 were Jalen Hertz scrambled. Funny styles look like he's a little dast on that play. They lose contain and let Jalen Hertz run out there for, you know, they held the 10 first downs for God's sake. They played pretty good on right. Yeah. The big plays and that's the difference in the game. No turnovers for Philadelphia and the big plays in Washington really didn't get any big plays, you know, a couple 20 orders, but you got to limit the big plays. They played good defense. I like where they're at. Offensively. Well, let me just go back to one more thing. No, I've got to offense. Offensively, they, you know, they, they seemed to have struggled for the first few quarters. There was a question yesterday asked to David Blow that I thought was very interesting that I made a note of that I wanted to ask you about. Somebody asked him about this spacing

57:53for the receivers and he essentially said, yeah, that was not the best. It wasn't great. Man, you schemed people open. I mean, whatever you guys say about Jay Gruden, he could scheme up a passing game and people were open and our team could throw the football and move the football when Jay was the head coach here. Talk about spacing and how important it is and how sometimes even with an average quarterback average receivers, how you scheme up a passing game and you scheme people open. Well, you try to fact cover just high low defenders and zone coverages and that's why spaces in four. You can't have one defender cover two players. Like, if I'm working a hook player, I got a guy sitting five yards in front of him. I got to get a guy about 12 to 14 yards behind him or that hook player bites on the underneath guy. You drop it over said, easy, right? Or you're working a corner on a cover two or high low and a little five

58:54yard out route and a corner route behind him or a bench route which we call he's got to get his depth. He's got to be 18 to 20. It's 15 yards. The neck, corner can cover two. He can sink back and cover the corner and then he'll drive on the flat route for again and two. So you got to have spacing in the zone coverage. Man coverage is very important to work the route. Some people negative angles and running away from people. So yeah, spacing is everything in pro football and in the passing game. You got to have people in the right spot, the right depths of the quarterback and make the reads and look people off and make the throws and then you got to have a protection as well. So a lot of work goes into the spacing in these plays to attack coverage. You got to have answers for man. You got to have answers for zone. You got to have answers for blitzers. So it's a tough deal, man. You can't just, you know, you get on the chalkboard all you want to but okay, what if they play cover three? What if they play mandaman? What if they double the x? What if they bring five? What if they bring six? What if it covers zero? What if you're playing Brian Florey? And I got eight guys with the line of script. What are you going to do to get have options for answers for everything? Yeah, I so one of the things that when I heard the answer

1:00:01and saw the expression on his face when the question was asked, I just thought to myself, well, would it have helped with especially a new offense? Two of the receivers being brand new in Antonio Williams and stuff on digs out there with jaden having not played football since last December. Wouldn't it have helped if you had gotten more time in games in August? Preseason games are talking off. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know. I don't want. I don't want jaden taking any hits in the preseason game. I guess not maybe I'm a wimp. Maybe a series or something like that, which he played three plays, but he's coming off an injury and I'm not going to have him get hit by a, you know, because my because third, third string defense alignment stumbles into his kneecaps. I know. So, but there is merit to that. You know, I think I like to play our offense some in the preseason, just getting in and out of the huddle, just the process of calling a play, breaking, maybe getting a couple of a lot of bulls in there, working a shot clock. So there's a lot of merit to playing the

1:01:06guys. We lost areas guys. I lost Jordan Reed in the preseason and it's been ruined your year. He's ruined their various guys career and I know and probably Jordan Reed, he got that hit against Atlanta. He said, can I get one more series with Kay's Keenan? Like, oh, sure, let's get a first down to get you out of there. He got hit on the head. He was out the entire year. So that's my reasoning for not playing the really, really good players because those guys will make or break your season. You got to keep those guys healthy for 17 weeks in the regular season. If you should get enough time and you have those, you have the practice games, you know, they have scrimmages against your other teams, the other teams in practice and a lot of live drills and team periods and two a days and all that stuff. So if you should get enough time with them, about putting them in jeopardy in the preseason. I'm telling you that Jordan Reed play is a play that has stuck in your mind for a long time since it happened. You have mentioned that play in sort of a painful way, at least a half dozen times over the years just with me on radio or on this podcast.

1:02:11Yeah, it's not good. Breathe that. And the dirtiest guys want to really make me sick because I think dirtiest guys could have been one of the best back in the NFL. You know, I told him he's going to play seven plays and a seven plays. He's a good knee out. Great. We shall set six. All right. One more question about Sunday against Philly. Tell me why Terry doesn't get targeted more than four times and why he doesn't make a catch until the fourth quarter. Yeah, it sometimes happens. It's hard to explain. Jamar Chase, that two gets his 12 yards. So it happens. You try to scheme up. But the problem is the fond digs and Antonio Williams are really, really good in slot. So it's hard to get them. You know, you want to move them around and try to get them more touches, but those guys are really, really good at what they do in the slot. So there's a lot easier ways to get a guy to ball when they're inside sometimes and outside because you can double them. Big thing I do is defense with Quinion Mitchell and those guys, they do pretty good on the outside receivers for the most part. They cloud them a lot and they play a lot of

1:03:14coverage. They don't allow that big play. So it's hard to get outside guys at the ball. And you saw what Antonio did. He saw what big did. Most of their catches were where in the slot. Right. So if he's not running out in the slot, then it's going to be hard for him to get some balls. You know, he'd like to take some shots down the field with them, but some of the situations didn't, it didn't, wasn't conducive to get them to ball. But he'll get the ball more this week. All right. Let's get your thoughts on the cowboy game on Sunday. We'll do that right after these words from a few of our sponsors. Hey guys, Criatine's one of the most researched and effective supplements available, but as the category has exploded, most brands have focused on things like flavors, formats, and marketing instead of actually making the Criatine itself better. That's why momentous created signature spec Criatine. They're most advanced Criatine ever setting a new standard for Criatine quality. Momentous's signature spec Criatine is one of the only Criatines to be manufactured in a pharmaceutical facility using reverse osmosis water purification

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1:07:37years and no interest charged for two years. If you decide that you want to move forward with window nation, with their bifurcate for free, with their opportunity to pay nothing for two years, know that you're going to be working with the number one window installation company in America Perforb's magazine. Reach out to them today, 86690 Nation. You can also go to windownation.com. All right, let's get to the Dallas game on Sunday. Both teams trying to avoid and oh and to start. Let's begin Jay offensively. What does Washington need to do to ensure a faster start offensively and then ultimate success on the day? Well, when you start to prepare your game plan, obviously they're going to watch a lot of the giant game. The giant set success run on power type football. I mean physical football, Patrick Ricard. They did a really good job with Skataboo and getting balls. They did in the ball, getting them in third and two to four and

1:08:40Jackson's dark basses, great plays with those legs and was very effective on third down, they can critical throws and keep the drives alive and keeping Dallas's offense off the field. That's how the giant's beat them. I don't know if the commanders have that type of loss, I don't know if they can run too tight and they don't have a fullback. So they're going to have to attack them in different ways, but running the football is going to be critical and trying to keep off the field the cowboy offense I'm talking about. So I just don't know if they have the ability to do that. They're going to have to rely on some of the quick game passing wise and getting Jayden on some zone reads with Jackson. Dark had a lot of success with the ramp two of my think for like 35 yards, so I'm sure that'll be part of the game plan. But yeah, they just can have to do what they do best and they should have a pretty good idea with training camp in the first game and getting better and better, getting Antonio more involved, getting things more involved obviously getting Terry involved in the past game and using Jayden's legs outside. But they're going to have to be physical up front somehow. It gets some tough yards with frosty miracle or shot light. With much of the league now essentially playing a lot of

1:09:45deep safeties, too high safeties, whatever you end up having to make sure that everything's kept in front of you. How hard is it to really push the ball down the field? And do you really, I mean, you've said this before, it's a lot easier to get explosives and not have to, you know, depend on 11, 12, 13 play drives. But how do you take advantage of a defense that doesn't want you to get deep? How do you push the ball down the field? Or don't you? Boy, you got a force on to come up somehow and that's the running game. You have to really get some good positive runs, getting stay in second and five, second and two, third and one. Make these guys come out of their two safety look. And if they are playing two safety look and you're having to, looks and you're having trouble running the ball. Then you got problems. Then you got to really be patient. You got to work your check down. You got to work your, you got to be methodical. You got to put your approach on the third. Get pressure. If you're not able to run the ball in a two-safe look and team is getting pressure with the four-man rush, you got big-time problems. We have to make sure that we somehow get them out of their two-safe look, bring the safety

1:10:50down and then get stayed outside the pocket, take some shots with Terry down the field. That's the only way to do it. Defensively, what do they need to do to slow down DAK and CD-LAM and pickings? By the way, I just saw this stat this morning. DAK Press got has won his last 16 games against NFC East opponents at home. He is on, he's 22 and 2 against NFC East opponents at home and he's won his last 16. What do they need to do defensively? Prey, I don't, I have to limit their positions. Like I said, like the Giants did, number one, number two. You want to say Williams is a really good back. Everybody wants to put all this Hey CD-LAM and George Pickens and Jake Ferguson. But really, if they get Javante gone, it's going to be a nightmare because either really good back. So yeah, they're going to have to really, the corners got to step up big time. They have to play better, but I'm sure that they're going

1:11:51to come out and try to limit them and play a lot of two-safe looks, which means Kinlaw, Payne, Settle. These guys got to really play good against the run. So many styles, we got to have the best game ever, which is, you play pretty good last week. Not only a second game, but he's got to really step up and play physical Granite football because they can't get you between the tackles. And then Dak does get outside on the boot legs and they can manufacture big plays out of way. So they can beat you a lot of different ways. That's a problem. They can beat you with the running game. They can beat you with the passing game and back when he's feeling it. They're tough to stop. So can they get pressure with fork? You know, we get pressure on the edge, who's the other edge player? Who's going to get pressure? Is the chase going to play? Is he the guy that can get some edge pressure and four man rushes? Who did you say? Is who is who going to play? Did you say chase, young? Maybe we have K-Levant, K-Levant. Oh, K-Levant chase on. I'm sorry. I thought you said chase, young. Yeah. No K-Levant chase on. That's it. Yeah, chase on. Yeah. All right. Yeah. So the edge guy's got to make some plays, got to get some pressure with fork.

1:12:53Because we got to protect, we got to protect corners. I don't think our corners can hold up in anything while I say. So what happens Sunday? Sunday, what happens? I think Dallas will probably get the win, but I actually picked Washington on the show. I think, uh, I, you just gave me both results. Taking aim right now to come down to a few goals. Yeah. I think, let's just take Washington. What the hell, man? Just take Washington. James is going to make some plays this week. Where he is, the big plays of Terry McCormick. You know what I'm saying? Let's get the running game going. Let's get Bill Maricone. Let's get the, uh, deep ball of Terry. And let's work in Tony O'Williams in the middle. You know what I'm saying? I love this guy. Let's get it done Sunday. All right. Uh, the rest of the league real quickly. I mean, Chicago offensively last week. And then by the way, on the flip side, defensively against Carolina.

1:13:53But you had the bears and I tried to talk you out of it because it was a major public play last week. Uh, the bears were, but they got it done sometimes the public does win. Um, and you got it, uh, you got it done with the bears last week, but just tell me real quickly how impressed you were with Caleb Williams in that offense. Very impressive. And, and probably equally as unimpressed with Carolina's defense, they couldn't tackle. They couldn't get the run. The states, these were abysmal coming up, uh, trying to tackle these guys. It was, and they ran the same play like 15 times for 200 yards. And they couldn't stop it. They paid these guys Jordan Phillips. They, they paid these guys on defense to make some plays. They got Lloyd from, uh, Jacksonville and they just got get it. So he got a credit. Chicago's offensive line, the running game, obviously been John from Taylor Williams is awesome. They're very, very good offensive football team, but I don't know if they were that dude or a kicker line was that bad. I think it's a combination of both. They're kind of a combination of both. Give me something else from week one that really impressed you.

1:14:58Baltimore, that three headed monster. I don't know if they's going to play this week, but they're Henry and Lamar, one of the Indianapolis and just gutting them. Um, obviously Buffalo playing at Houston, uh, in the hostile environment, doing what they did, you know, CK at 26 yards per catch, DJ more at 20 yards per catch. Uh, but still, I mean, they fumbled it two minutes ago and then luckily Buffalo lineman or Cyrus was right behind the play and then, um, laughter dropped in interception. It would have filled the deal and next play Josh Allen threw a touchdown. So you got to take advantage of those turnovers, but there's a lot of impressive plays. There's a lot of, um, play that was not impressive. There's some really bad teams that tighten the browns, falcons. Um, but yeah, it's week one. You have to be too excited or too down if you lose. So you shut up. Keep going. I'll tell you there. I know they played the Browns, but you talked about them last week and I'm, I'm with you on Jacksonville. This could be a really good football team this year. And that's a big early season game, uh, at Denver on Sunday. What do you make of, of Jacksonville

1:16:00and Denver in that matchup Sunday afternoon? That's going to be awesome because, you know, Sean Fink gave up the play calling and this Davis Web guy's got to be really looking over sholker because they were absolutely horrific. He gets, can't have the city. So I, I, it's going to be an interesting game. You can bow next mouth back. You're going to get the play calling one. They've got to get JK top is gone, but I, I am very impressed with Jacksonville Jaguars. If, if that quarterback can continue to play like he's playing, they're going to be a tough beat. They really are because they have two really good edge rushers in nine, uh, Allen, uh, Josh Allen and, uh, Walker. They're, they're good on defense. They're good on offense. They have three receivers that can hit you, Brian Thomas, Parker Washington. The emergency one of the top receivers in NFL and, uh, they're, they're good. They're very, very good football. How good is Liam Cohen? He's awesome. He's got the pedigree. He's, uh, you know, he's working with Sean McBase. Went to Kentucky for a little while. Went back to the Rams because with the pluckers, I think he was and, uh, with Ditt Gray with Baker. He's a good football coach. He gets Trevor in good situations and, um, Trevor is really doing a

1:17:04much better job protecting the football and he's being more accurate. The running game is pretty good. Two good players. So I might, I might say, yeah, they do get Denver. One of the top defense in the national football league. It'll be fun to see because really Kansas City got it on with, uh, Kenneth Walker running the football. I don't know if Jacksonville has that ability to really pound Denver. They're going to have to fill the ball and Denver's got a really good pass rush in the good secondary. So it'll be interesting. That'll be a great game to see exactly how good Jacksonville offensive is Josh Allen the best quarterback in the NFL. I don't think there's about, I mean, you know, Patrick's great. There's Lamar's great. There's some great players, but Josh Allen, I think in the class by himself. The league took that first drive and made those plays with his legs. He's so big and strong. Somebody texted me. He's going to get hurt if he keeps running like that. I said, he's bigger than the guy's tackle him. Man, right. He's not going to get it. Oh, let's just kind of flip hamster your stuff like that. He's bigger than the linebacker's tackle him. He's almost bigger. He's some of the deep out the lineman. So he's so good. His arm is very talented. Obviously, I don't know how you stop those guys.

1:18:09Yeah. All right. Uh, time for Jay's lock of the week. One and no, um, he has really killed it with his lock of the week. The last couple of years and off to a good start here in 2026. Who do you got? I'm going to take Baker Mayfield to bounce back in a big way. They had four turnovers against this Maddie. They didn't punt. They're pretty good on offense. Defensively, they're not quite as good, but I think Cleveland's offense is absolutely horrific. Uh, so yeah, they Cleveland has one decent drive to start the game against Jackson. The other than that, that game, Jackson pole for starters, yeah, start to force quarter. That game's good. It's good. It's nothing. So I think Baker Mayfield planning his Cleveland again. He's going to really want to just kick this hell out of them, you know what I'm saying? So I think, uh, I think there'll be a three touchdown game. I think, but I think 10 day wins like 28 35 to seven or something like that. There's a lot of awful. That's bad off. Uh, it was really bad. Uh, there's no way Munkin can start him when they come

1:19:10home next week. I don't think, um, I think we'll see shoulder Sanders. All right. Uh, just try to plan because there has been for two weeks. The door eight and a half is the number that I have. Uh, and I'm looking for an eight for you, but it's all eight and a half. So you're laying eight and a half with the bucks at home against the Browns. Uh, thanks. I'll talk to you next week. You got it. Thank you. Jay Grood and everybody will finish up with my smell test next after these words from a few of our sponsors. You're listening to this podcast. So I know you've got a curious mind. Here's a helpful fact that you may not know yet. Drivers who switch and save with progressive save over $900 on average. They make it super simple. Pop over to progressive.com, answer some questions and you'll get a quick quote with coverage options tailored to your choices. Plus you'll see which discounts you may qualify for like the online quote discount or savings for

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1:25:34Florida A&M last week. If you didn't catch this, they were up 77 to nothing and they agreed the two coaches did to cut the fourth quarter clock from 15 minutes to 10 minutes. I think Miami could have scored a hundred plus easily if they had wanted to. Miami's been rolling. They blew out Stanford in week one and they are the fifth ranked team in the country. They've got the Heisman favorite and Darian Monsat quarterback. They have perhaps the most exciting player in the country in Malachi Tony and they are favored by less than three touchdowns and this is one of those numbers where you just when when you see it sitting, you know, at six and a half or at 13 and a half or at 20 and a half and the books aren't upping that number even though there is overwhelming public action on the favorite. It's like they just want the Miami money to keep coming in.

1:26:38I'll take Wake Forest plus the 20 and a half. I don't see any 21s out there. If I saw a 21, I would grab it and put it out there but it's 20 and a half everywhere. So that is the first play. That is a Friday night, a tonight game. The second pick is also tonight. Texas Tech length seven and a half against Houston. Both teams are ranked. Both teams had similar results against a common opponent Oregon State. The number at seven and a half same kind of thing. The public's like, well, if I get more than seven seven or more, I'm going to take the dog. So they're playing Houston in this game. I'll take Texas Tech and lay the seven and a half tomorrow. South Carolina is playing a Mississippi state team that blew out Minnesota last week is a very, very short favorite. They were impressive doing it. South Carolina really hasn't played anybody in the first two weeks and yet they're laying

1:27:40three and a half public loves and underdog getting three in the hook. They would have hated it. Had they been laying two and a half. They may have liked South Carolina, but the public's lined up right now on Mississippi State. I'll take South Carolina laying the three and a half and then Auburn is playing Florida. Man, this matchup Auburn, LSU Auburn, Florida, Florida, LSU. These games have always been such big games during the season and Auburn and Florida are playing during the Ole Miss LSU game. It's really in on the back burner for the big SEC games this weekend. Auburn and LSU and Florida, I think some people believe Florida is back and that's why the public's playing Florida, laying the two and a half against Auburn. I'll take Auburn and their quarterback, the kid from USF Brown, who I actually think could be a pro quarterback. They were impressive last week after

1:28:42barely beating Baylor on a neutral field in week one. This is another one of those lines. If it was three and a half, the public might be on Auburn, but it's two and a half and so they're on Florida. I'll take Auburn plus the two and a half. I cannot find a three out there. In fact, there are two's out there. Now, I think there's going to be sharp money on Auburn in this game. Let's move to Sunday in NFL week two. Let me just tell you, there's a theme for me about week two and that is after all of the points that were scored in week one, you're going to have a lot of recency bias in people playing Overs in week two. Now, interestingly, even with all of the points that were rolled up in week one, the Overs only went nine and seven in the 16 games. So it wasn't like an overwhelming over day, but the perception is that every game went over and every game is going to go over again in week two. So I'm going to give you some unders here.

1:29:46I gave you an over last week that did not hit on the Jets 10, a C game, one of the two losses that I had, but game number one, I've got a side and the total. Chicago, Minnesota. First of all, Chicago's length five. I see some four and a halfs, but I see some fives. And after scoring 59 last week and looking unstoppable against a Viking defense that definitely is a really good defense, but a Vikings team that will likely start Carson Wentz on Sunday if Kyler Murray can't go and I'm expecting he can't the public's all over Chicago. I'll take Minnesota. There's some sharp money on Minnesota. I'll take Minnesota on the road at Chicago plus the five. And then with Chicago, scoring 59 and Minnesota scoring 39 last week, the totals that 48. I see some 47 and a halfs, 48s. Everybody's playing over in this game. I'll take under the 48 there. All right, the next two

1:30:47picks, you're going to have to hold your nose. These are true, you know, stinkos for real because both teams are horrible, but welcome to the Smeltest. The first one is Cleveland plus eight. And you know what? I'm going to go back because I see some eights right now and I'm going to give J. He's on the favorite in this game. He's on Tampa laying with his lock of the week, laying eight and a half is the number I gave him in the last segment, but now that I'm doing it and I'm looking at it again, there are some eights. So I'm going to give J Tampa Bay minus eight. I'm taking the worst number with the underdog Cleveland plus a Tampa's a big public favorite. J hit on last week's big public favorite. Chicago. I'll take Cleveland plus the eight. I have no idea how they'll cover that number. They stink. DeShawn Watson's terrible. Todd Monkin seems to be delusional when it comes to the

1:31:50quarterback right now. I do think that they're a good defensive team or they should be again this year, Jared verse, a younger player, not Miles Garrett, obviously, but they've got some really good defensive players, but this is a pure, you know, pick based on nobody is going to have Cleveland and every sportsbook is going to need Cleveland. And look, the line just came down in a lot of spots from eight and a half to eight. That means there is some sharp Cleveland action. And then the other one is Philly laying seven and the hook to Tennessee. Tennessee was the along with Cleveland. I mean, I'm taking and giving out the teams that looked worse than anybody in the league in week one Titans plus seven and a half in Nashville against Philly. Saints Ravens under 47 Raven scored a bunch last week 41 points. The Saints scored 30 public pounding the over and that one. I'll take

1:32:51the under 47 there. And believe it or not, the public looks at 44 is a low number just across the board and they're playing the over in the Falcons Panthers game. Of course, the Panthers rolled up 37. That's another Cooper Rush game, I think for Atlanta. I'll go under 44 at Lanna Carolina. Another bad team Miami. There are some 14s out there. I'll take them plus the 14 against the 49ers. And then Sunday night football. This may be the game that I like the most this weekend. Indy plus six and a half against Kansas City. After what Kansas City looked like and what Indy looked like, Reasonsy Bayes says Kansas City, of course, they're back. And Indy's getting less than a touchdown. They're begging you to play Kansas City minus six and a half. I can't find any sevens out there. I'll buy the half point personally when we get there on Sunday night, but the Colts plus six and a half.

1:33:55Now, when I say I like one game more than another, just so you know, I don't bet more on that game. I mean, I don't consider like one game of five star and then the rest of them are four and three star games. No, these are all games in which if you're doing this the right way, you bet the exact same amount on every single one of these games or every single one of your games that you pick. And you hope to go 52.6% or better. So you break even or win a little bit of money. I don't parlay games. I don't tease games anymore. Of course, there was a time in my life where I'd have 15 teases and 22 parlays over the course of a weekend. Those are called profit margin for the house. Occasionally, let me just say occasionally, I'll put together a money line parlay between two NFL dogs just for the hell of it because underdogs in the NFL and sometimes big underdogs in the NFL

1:34:59see Arizona from last week. They do win and they win outright enough for occasionally for it to make sense. But yes, for whatever reason, the cult game really stuck out to me as like a spot that makes a lot of sense. Like I really like the cults on Sunday night. I really like all these other plays too. But that one really kind of like the Michigan game last week really kind of stuck out when they had the win that they shouldn't have had an Oklahoma rolled and Oklahoma was laying less than a touchdown. Michigan wins the game outright. I could easily see Indy winning at Arrowhead Sunday night outright. But I'll take them plus the six and a half. When I get to Sunday, hopefully there will be a seven out there. If there isn't, I'll feel even better about the game. I'll probably buy the half point. All right. Wake Forest plus 20 and a half tonight. Texas Tech minus seven and a half

1:36:01tonight tomorrow. South Carolina minus three and a half Auburn plus two and a half Sunday. The Vikings plus five. The under in the Minnesota Chicago game under 48. The Browns plus eight. The Titans plus seven and a half. The under in the Saints Ravens game under 47. Under 44 in the Atlanta Carolina game. The dolphins plus 14 and the Colts plus six and a half. So what is that? Four, seven, ten, twelve games this weekend. All right. That'll do it back after Washington Dallas with a recap on Sunday evening. Good afternoon. I'm Pat Somerall here at Texas Stadium. This is a game never has really very little build up. It's a dislike. It's extreme distaste. They just don't like each other. These two teams. The Redskins and the Cowboys.