How the Defense Can Get Better NOW, Recapping the Bears Loss, and Pumpkin vs Potato!!! | Command Center Podcast | Washington Commanders

Pumpkin or sweet potato? Are these takes that have been circulating around this team and around this game? Do they have substance? Are they sweet potato or are they pumpkin? Which means they got nothing nothing right? And that leads us nicely into Farmer Fred in the pie bake off of the Century.

Fred, you baked what purpose sweet potato? Pot baby?

That's on this episode? Make sure you check it out. Welcome into the Command Center Podcast. I'm Logan Paulson here with Santana Moss who is in a kind of a subdued fit today but still looking good. And then Fred smooth, how are you doing? You got iron kept an America shirt?

I'm most definitely I'm a Marvel guy. You know that I'm most definitely. I love comic books.

Do you have a favorite Marvel? Who'd you say last week? Pool is your favorite guy?

I actually called him.

If I was Ado, I would be Fred Pool, Like that would be my name, most definitely because he's funny, Well because he gonna he gonna say people whow cracking jokes and how would probably be like that would be me totally.

I would do it. And I blurred the line between good guy and bad guys, so I'll be anti. So that's why I.

Think it is Antenna. You're a big movie guy. Are you a Marvel movie guy? I watched them all. Yeah, I watch everything. But you don't, like, you're not super pumped on the Marvel. You were like, that's the least pumped I've seen you about.

It because it's like real like, but that's why you get lost love it, because it's not love it when it comes to just you know, when they bring film out the film at the film but you watch it sometime you get blown away like, Okay, none of this.

Don't really happen.

But like you know with like I don't know, like Armageddon or something like that. You know, like that's not really gonna happen either.

No, But I just love movies. I love anything that's have a great storyline, you know what I mean?

So what's your what's your movie you're watching right now?

Oh? Man, the last movie I watched? Let me see last show I.

Watchcause you were talking about something recently.

Shot I watched No shot calls a great Yeah, it happened that recently. But I was just telling you look like the guy when he got.

His when I painted his face, paint his face with.

The tattoos and yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Great opera. Himan was the last one I watched.

Oh was that good?

So good?

It was so good, so thrilling.

And come on, man, if you the man that designed the Man, the whipping of man, the ultimate whapon of mass destruction, his consciousness eating it's just eating them apart.

Yeah, if you heard that quote that he gave, I'm gonna butcher it. But it's like, you know, I am the harbinger of death.

Yes, most definitely.

Dude, that's got to be such a crazy I haven't seen the movie yet, but I'm just like just.

That been at the nuclear bomb.

So he feels like he is the person that destroyed the world. Like he feel like, if the world ever get destroyed, he's the reason.

You imagine, just like like your life's work and that's the thing that comes out of it.

So smart, so dedicated. But then you created yeah, the ultimate but.

Obviously you give like nuclear energy is a big like positive byproduct of that. But it's like, oh, man, that's gotta be.

Who wants to be the person behind destroying the world.

But I mean, like I think because that's where like he's he's promoting good science. He's promoting but it just show you some.

People in this world.

No, it ain't even up. It's just like you got a gift in a curse like this.

The thing that's the gift of being gifted is it can't become.

But he could put that to better use, you know what I'm saying, Like you gifted, Well he did think about it.

We got nuclear like energy energy coming from So it wasn't all bad. It's just you know, just a situation.

What is so speaking of all bad and all good. Yeah, we gott to talk about the Bears game, and I know we don't really want to talk.

It wasn't that was Openheimer infants.

Yeah it was. It wasn't great. But what I do think comes out of a game like this is there's a lot of kind of like hot takes right, Like a lot of really people being you know, super negative or super positive, and the games aren't. It's not like that when you're when you're playing the NFL, when you're on a team, like we've all been a part of bad losses right there, and there's a it just happens sometimes.

Of substance, full of life. It is totally different, A full of life.

And I guess the important thing to note here is we're not saying fans can't be upset, because you can be upset. We're upset.

We're just emotionally attached to the game.

Absolutely, But we are trying to give like some good detailed analysis here and say, like, sometimes people are just saying stuff and they have no understanding of what's actually going on. So let's talk about this first one. I think this is the first one that really kind of encapsulates this. So I hear fans say this all the time. Go to the grocery store, people say, hey, you know, Logan, what you think of the game, And they say, all, I think you know that. The fans say, I don't

It's so funny.

I can talked to it the grocer store all the time, like people be like, what happened?

What did you what you want me to do? We investable out, No, don't do that to me.

So don't didn't want it enough? Is that a pumpkin or potato? Take? And I'd like to get your reasoning as to why pumpkin pumpkin?

Because these are the one percent alf of males in the world losing.

Option all right.

We don't like to lose. We don't ever want to go out in the place and be dominated a right, So it's most definitely empty catteries. There's nothing there these guys, if it was up to them, they'll go sim teaming up like this how they feel, all right, So they'll never show up on the field and not want.

To win a game.

That's I totally agree. I mean, I mean, how do you feel too?

I agree with it too.

I also just think know when it comes down to when a fan or whoever may say they didn't want it enough, it's all about just the energy that you showed that show that. It's not necessarily saying that didn't want it. But as a player, if you show that kind of effort, then that leads up to that kind of conversation. You didn't You didn't want it because you came out there flat. You know, you hear these guys saying, yeah,

It was a short week.

I think that fifth quarter, the fifth quarter in field of death, you meant more then people think it meant.

So now that goes back to ship run have went for two?

You don't know until you know, like you do that If you don't.

Yeah, but I do think. You know, guys wanted they want to win the game, whatever your option.

You want to win one only one. One goal we all come come here to play this game is to be winners. We don't come here to say, okay, man, hey I want to.

And I don't work Monday through Friday to just sit here and not try to win the game.

Like at the end of the day, what.

People need to understand is what we do every week, every day. The time we put into this game.

Is a piece of us. We leave a piece of us every time we come.

I think about it, It's like when I was playing, and this is maybe just my personal experience, my identity was being tied to being a football player and a good football Yeah, you know, like I want to go out there and beat the man across from me, Like that's what it is. I'm not always going to do it, but my goal, my prep, the countless hours, it all goes into that. So I don't think anyone goes out there and says, man, you know what I want to do this week. I want to get blown out.

But I want to lose.

Now.

I will say this player too, as a football player, because you know, everything that we do is predicated on how the team.

Yeah you know what I mean. We can't you can.

You can, you can be flawless, you can have no no catches caught on you, no touchdowns, and we lose and we like Fred didn't have a good talk. You go out there and watch the femily like, well damn Fred showed up.

Yeah.

Yeah, if you're on a team where you used to having those kind of outputs from your team, but you're you're the stud, You're the guy that's always showing up, then you kind of get lost in that.

Hey, you get as long as I handle my business, but that's not.

No one goals just to be like, I'm going to do my job and we went on and lose. You have to sometime we live up to that because you're like, because I've been on those teams before, you've been on those teams if you were, Look, I got to go out here and shine regardless because we don't know. We can't dictate what happens when that score.

I think people forget that we are independent contractors. We independent contractors, but we're also a team and that's the difference in it. And we win and we lose together, so therefore it don't matter. Like you just said, we're grouped together.

We lost. We all stuck like we balled out.

Some guys go out there and stink it up on the games that we balled out. They get just as much love as the rest of us for that game. So it's just one of those things where fans please understand, we won't win every week.

And to that point, I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. I think if you go out there and are trying to win your individual matchup, like that's good for the team. It's good for you and it's good for the team. So I think fans say, oh, you know, like that guy cares about himself. Like no, like if he's playing his best football, he cares about everyone, cares about everybody.

It takes eleven of us to go out there and get the job accomplished on on both sides phases. Yeah, but if you're that guy that's just continuously putting that effort above everybody else, it's.

Going to stand out. So it's like Chase, we need everybody to be having that same kind of energy, you understand.

He's like Chase, Like Chase Young probably had the best game of his career against Chicago, right, Yeah, he had. I think he had fifty percent pressure rate and so on. Every pastor said he was in he won half the time. Yeah, and that kind of gets lost in the sauce here. But if everybody plays like that, yeah, you win, you win.

You're gonna win the game. You have to do it. It's a union.

You have to be organically put together that you play off each other. And that's why I think we fail in it right now, Like we have these individual bursts. Everybody's starts to make these plays, but I haven't seen us play that total game.

Like prime example. I don't want to cut y'all. Want to get this in before we move on. As a receiver, you can win. You can win every rep. You can go out there. And I used to go home and get in the car. My homeboys, they sit right in the stands. You know them, Well, Tanner, I got you. I'm recording this like you're beating your guy the quarterback.

Matter ain't done nothing. Like you look at the stat sheet, Tanna, you ain't do nothing. You ain't show up.

It's three weeks now, you ain't show up. It's not my fault getting the ball. So it's a team effort. And that's why at the end of the day when it all balls down, you look at it and say, well, you didn't do anything.

Whether you did something or not, we didn't win.

Yeah, And that's what it's about.

So I think I think just saying they don't want it, it's kind of lazy.

It's lazy.

You're understanding. You don't understand the guys. He the players, be the coaches, like they all want to win, like they want to win this game. It's not because they don't want it enough, they're putting time in, they're getting after it.

This one.

I think it's kind of interesting. And I think so the short week when someone says it's a short week, is that a pumpkin take? Or is that a sweet potato?

No, that's this sweet potato. Because but I watched team play bad Thursday night football. Ah, I watched guys play Thursday night football all year and all of it is bad football. And you talk about playing on a Sunday, we played five quarters. You come and Monday ain't off. You got a half day Monday, you come back Tuesday, Wednesday.

What you walk through I mean?

And then Thursday you're playing, like, come on, man, it's a lot of the human body. And I think because we play the game the way we play it, and we so free spirited and wild doing it that people think we could do it every other day, you cannot. It's a reason why it's only seventeen games in the season.

It's a reason I didn't care about the Thursday because I knew I had the people that to repair everything that I lost or left on the field.

Everybody don't have that. Chicago had it. I don't know what what I don't know what they had, they did something they.

Got doctor doctor Wilson.

It was a different it was a different type of energy with them because they just knew Man. Everything relied on that game they was on for and they had nothing to lose.

They had lost fourteenth straight. Like you don't want to fight the wounded animal.

I say, I would say for us it was kind of a gift and a curse for us to play us was we did in Philly because those guys kind of got you know happy, they kind of was satisfied with what they did and allowed. And I'm not saying this is this is really this is just my opinion. They allowed that to trinkle over into the next week. And when you watch them practice a little bit, you watched a couple of the you know they was happy they was out there.

Okay, we don't have to This is why I don't believe it.

More of why that word we used to hate when Coach Gibbs made us put on pass and made us hit if they after you know what I mean, We used to hate it. But now I look at them like certain guys need that You need to understand, this is not a what you call a country clubs come out here and baby you, Yeah, we're gonna push it through rigorous times, hard times. So come Thursday or come Sunday or come Monday, when it gets hard, it's gonna

So yeah, I would just add a little bit more analysis to the short week. So one, I think the level of opponent was a big deal. I think playing Philadelphia division rival is a big deal. I think the physicality of that Eagles offensive line and defensive line is something that can't really be measured, but it definitely shows up. Like last you know, last season, they had the opponents following Philly games were like eighty percent losing. You know

They were gassed. Yeah, they would, let's be honest.

And I think it's not just the short week. It's the short week in conjunction with the travel, in conjunction with the extra quarter, in conjunction with playing over the four over the first five games of the season.

And then one thing you can say too from last year, just what stands out to me is the one thing that we did well on defense last year was getting off the field.

On third down. Yeah, we're not at the percentage rate.

I don't know it. I don't know about it. I'm pretty sure you good with those numbers. It's glaring different. No, no, it's terrible.

And the thing is, anytime we're playing double digit drives meaning ten plays, eleven plays, twelve plays, it don't work well for us.

Like on defense, it wears us down.

And that when we start to mistackles, this when we start to not be in the gaps. This is when we start to not communicate. This when we get in self survival mode. And when anytime defense is in self survival mode, we're not working together. We're gonna get butchered just the way it goes.

Yeah, no, I agree with that, and I think The other thing is that the offense didn't play very well. I think they went three and out the first two drives. Yeah, that just being an offensive player sitting in those meetings with Kyle, with Jay, with Sean talking through that is tough on the defense when that's happening, Right, You're adding a level of fatigue to a group that's already fatigued if they're struggling, and we can kind of settle down going a nice eight, nine, ten play drive even if

Logan, you brought some up right there and did what you don't realize when the defense plays that many snaps don't forget the defense is eighty percent of the special teams. So now you got two groups scruggling, two groups trying to trying to wear the game out, trying to wear through it.

So I think it's one of them things where it's just a carryo.

Yeah, absolutely, So I do think short week is a is a sweet potato take. But once you add a little bit of context to it, it becomes a true sweet potato take. So again, it is a It is a factor for sure. So this is one that I've heard a lot, and you know, on our shows and all the stuff we've got on the comments on the YouTube page. Get this a ton The defense is bad. And so I'll start this because I think I know what you're both gonna say. I think this is a

They did not.

But what I am saying is, I don't think Tanny, you said this on the show the other day on the Command Center, this the Bears game is not reflective of this team. The Philly the the the Bills game are more reflective of what this defense can and it's capable of doing. And this, to me is the outlier. It's not the rules. So when they say defense is bad, I think they didn't play well against the Bears.

Yeah, that day, that day, they was bad. I don't think they bad as a whole. I mean, you hit a spot right on the head. I mean, if you look at certain things, what caused them to be you know in those situations you spot on Philly, the explosives killed us, killed them. And I mean just before the half, I said that, me and me and be misters sitting there and I'm they Devontae Smith quarter or didn't catch it.

It wasn't whatever it was they ball hit.

The ground, but those three points. I said, that's right, Doug, gonna come back up what we lost the game by.

You see what I'm saying.

So like you have to look at certain situations and what lead up to it.

That that Bears game. It was.

It was.

It was sitting right in front of our face.

The office wasn't on the feel long enough that defense kept coming back out there and they was hitting them with daggers. It wasn't like no, just okay, we're gonna trinkle now. It was like boom, yeah, boom. So you know, as a whole, I've seen this defense play better. You know, we've seen this defense play better. But I do I truly believe whatever was going on Thursday week, that fifth quarter and Philly, whatever it was, that's not who you hang your hat on. So that's the team that we

Well, here go, I gotta keep it one hundred.

I'm going totally left from what y'all hear them think about it.

The defense is not bad paying bad.

At the end of the day, if I told you at the beginning of the year that Sam Howe a week five was gonna have more passing yards than Patrick Mahomes, more passing hall yours, Jalen Hurts more passing yards than Joe Burrow, what would our record be. We would all say four to one, five and oh something like. We hung our hat on this defense. We said, this defense is gonna be what makes this team go.

It's gonna do it. They haven't showed up.

And the thing that's making me so mad about it is, I haven't seen them play as a unit.

I've seen them.

Make plays individually. I've seen them like to come together as a unit. That's the one thing I can say about the defenses I played with. We played together, all right. We understood how to have each other back. We weren't leaving nobody hanging. It was eleven versus eleven, and we understood that. I'm just saying, if we had to say at the beginning of the year, with a new offensive coordinator in a young quarterback who was gonna lead this team.

This year right now and said we are who we are.

And I agree, like I agree with everything that tennis. I agree with my thoughts obviously, but I also agree with you, like there is a there. They are underperforming expectations while not being a bad group. I think they're underperforming what we thought they would be, and I think that's tough. That's tough to negotiate that kind of that gray area. But saying they're terrible, saying they're not good, I think it's somewhat of a mischaracterization.

Well, just the one thing about sports, we keep score.

Yeah, and right now the thirty, the thirtieth rank, thirty first ranked defense.

They haven't been.

Playing wheel and somebody got to hold him to a standard, like come on, dude, now, y'all got to show up.

But I also think again, like this is and we're just talking shop here and I'm not again not making excuses here. They've played good teams, the Bills, Eagles, good quarterbacks in the elite, top quarterbacks in the league. And when you play top quarterbacks. Like again, that's this is something I think we I brought up in our analysis this offseason. But when you're playing good quarterbacks and good offenses, defenses just can't keep up. It's very rare that a

But when you turn the ball all over four times, you lose it five times.

They'll turn it over five times.

You know what I'm saying, You're going to lose the game.

But at one point does the defense say, you know what, we got your back. Because we knew y'all was going to start off the little slow. You got a young quarterback, We got this. We were supposed to be the big brother yea and were supposed to protake the house.

I think the question was, or whatever the statement was, is the defense is bad.

I don't. It still leads to them. They're not bad as they look.

They're not good.

They haven't played. Yeah, they're not bad.

They just haven't got things together because like you can see different different you know, I guess you can call it groups playing well.

The back end. Has they been great? No, No, They've probably been the reason why a lot of this stuff in a situation.

But then you can say the front end hasn't gotten to the quarterback and that might be the reason why we haven't played.

So with all that being said, defensively.

As a coach, now the coach had to come in and say, Okay, I want to do this, I want to do that.

I can't. I gotta switch it up. I gotta switch it up.

I gotta I gotta protect them back in the back end a little more, and I gotta let these.

Guys here play a different style of play. I thought they can get to.

The quarterback a little better than that this year, and it hasn't been getting done.

Now, I have to do a little more. That's all you have to do. Make adjustments.

Yeah, And I think like that's something that you know, like I coach high school football, you go in with the season with like, this is what I think we're good at, and you do the scrimmages, the practices, your training camp, you're like, man, we're pretty good. That then

Play it enough. Like if you're gonna play man, play man.

But you can't play man now, Like right now they're playing man like thirty four percent of the time, which is like third in the NFL. Teams just don't play man with that same level that you used that you used to play because it's just not a tenable solution long term.

You can't play man and be passive. Though you're gonna play man, you gotta play man.

You got to you have.

To have to man.

Yes, you have to off man work.

I pushed back on that a little bit because I think, like with with like no Tanne, like this is what we're talking about. I think, like with off coverage, when you got guys who can track the ball, like Forbes as an example, Like I'd rather him be off because he can see the quarterback. I want I want him to see the quarterback.

I don't want him to see the quarterback because then his eyes started playing tricks on him, and and I want him to I don't want him to have to check the whole route tree.

When you play off man. The whole route tree is open when you play.

When you play with good leverage.

I don't care about your leverage.

If you play press man, the rape tree shrinks to two routes fade and they slink like them the only routes you run it.

I'm a receiver, you're tight end. You mostly get guys up in your faces. You're on the line half the time as a receiver. If you had to ask me, if the god planning you man, what you prefer off or press, I would say off every test, because I have all the routes to my hand every day. If you press me, I have to release a certain weight. I have to run this route a certain way. Everything kind of counters now, Like if I had a post corner on press, I have to run it a different way.

I have to get inside the corner.

It's the one Mississippi, it's the clock is running.

I guess my question would be is why One of the reasons you don't see as much press stylistically now is because there's much more emotion offense.

You see so many other teams doing it and do it well Kansas City Press, but they don't do it all the time the situational.

But I need, I need to show the quarterback this the shehlle from the start.

So I think I think that's one thing is like we speak in these kind of absolutes as analysts and and so what I would say is that there are situations where you need to press and where this team does press and where other teams do press, but you can't do it all the time because if if if I'm Kyle shanahanah, I'm gonna say, oh you want to you want to press? Check this out. Let's get in a bunch real quick. Yeah, let's motion to a bit. I'm chick and I'm gonna pick the heck out of

But my thing is what that is that has to be a game time decision for you, because if I see you coming out in a certain formation.

I'm gonna bring my man down. If you ain't in bunch, then okay, we're in your face obviously.

Now I know you because I now I want you to get the bar at your hand fast enough knowing that my guys are front going.

To get to you. You see what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. We have reaction.

We have to find ways to disrupt these guys game plan or whatever they set out to do.

But when we sit out there and just be soft.

Now apart dark, I think I think what we're saying, I think we're both saying the same thing is you have to add a little bit of diversity to what you're doing in terms of how you play man this show, play Massah, you disguise your covered shelves, like even like even we're going to talk about Atlanta on the preview show on Thursday or Friday, when does that come out? Jason Friday comes out on Friday, and they run a

Goods, why do they why it needs to be balanced, Like the game is about.

What do they not do?

We you and we're going to attack it if we get down by twenty points, we're not running the ball, Like that's all thirty two teams were.

Don't pass them ball.

We're scrapping that whole game play.

The game players through the football is so situational that I'm sorry.

The ballots don't.

Matter and the balance is even like a little bit of a snowmber. Like I think San Francisco has the highest run rate in the NFL, and I think they're right at like forty eight forty nine percent, which is close to fifty, But everybody else is like in that forty one thirty eight range. Because analytically it's easier to throw the football, so you're never gonna be balanced running

And they did that, and that's what they don't realize. Screens, quick passes, I run.

Yeah, that's the many ways it's getting cat And especially when it comes to the run game. You can nowadays this NFL we live in now, or or football period, you know, all over across the world, they find other ways to get to the run game instead of just

I'm like, we come into the game plan with the first fifteen.

Yeah, but as the game go on and you see things going on, you got to scrap that.

Sometimes you gotta say hold on, you know, run there.

It ain't we can't run this because of whatever's going on defensively because Fletcher.

Hot tonight is that they cannot run hit him like. So it being's the wheel of the coaching.

And you know, we were talking about Atlanta. We're just watching a lot of Atlanta film last couple days. All of a sudd have been like they run the ball a ton and they haven't be run the ball superficially, but they can continue to run the ball because they're in a one score game.

Yeah, they can kind.

Of stay what they want they want to the game, stay with that game flow.

Right Yeah.

Here, I mean I've been I'm trying to think of a game. I can't remember a specific example where we were down a couple of scores when you were here, and it's like, we gotta go two minutes and we've run two minutes for like for threequarters. Yes, everyone's tired, people are thrown up on the sideline. It's terrible, but we gotta score points. Ye yeah, well yeah, so I think like that's something that I don't think.

He was here, but I did it a lot with Jason Campbell bro we ran so many too many with Honestly, it wasn't even we was down at times.

He ran that well like he was better and just like get to the because.

He was better when it wasn't thinking, just like give me.

All that stuff.

You know, too many makes you getting a certain defense. Yeah, you know, so when he makes us play south beingo. So when he got that defense where he could just say, Okay, I know I gotta come back.

Two comebacks on our side. Got these guys, got one guy to know the ball, got this guy doing something. He ran that well.

So I've been in games of situations where just dictating on who you have at quarterback or how the flow of the game is going as a whole, you have to just do certain things. You have to scrap everything else you had going on and say this is what we're gonna run because this is going to make us successful. Getting back to what we was talking about, you don't have to run the ball to be successful.

You would like to have a bound of a tech.

But if it dictates early in the game that we can't do this because of the score.

So be it. Then we got to go ahead throw this ball in a game, So be it what you gotta do.

I think that's so that's kind of a pumpkin take for me. Yeah, Like, I understand you want to run the ball. I understand that's important. It's an important part of football, as much as analytics says it's not. It's important. You can't throw the ball a hundred times, but in this game, if we wanted to win, we need to throw the ball.

Especially why it's warm out. The winder dictates a lot.

You nobody likes to talk about the weather, like when it gets cold.

That's when you run the ball.

And has a weather many First of all, the weather man lies all the time.

It's no different.

But you know what I'm saying is what's the difference between partly cloudy and partly sunny.

It's the same thing. The dude lies all the time.

So you and the weather man are the same person. Shoot, all right, So this is the last one. And I heard this a lot. NFL games are hard to win, and I've said this, you know, and I think this is true. But I do think there's a little bit of laziness to that right, because they are hard, but they're hard every week, so.

I can say, but it's only thirty two teams and it's hard to beat any of them.

They're just what it is and desity. I'm wondering people like this.

I think it's it's more of a game of chess. It's about the person that's moving the chess pieces. That's why I think coaching is the ultimate equalizer in pro sports.

Great coaches make great players, period.

I mean not even making Yeah, you can say you make them, but like you can have great chess on the team and instinct and they can think you'd be like, damn, I do this because because of the coach.

The coaching, Man I had gym's on you.

No, I'll put you in great situations like that. I think that's that's that's key because I've been on offenses where I'm like, man, I tell folks to this day that Mike Shanahan period when you here, Yeah, like I used to look forward to going to practice, Like I'm like, man, we fully get the end of this opportunity.

Look at the coaches. Y'all had vade, but the only thing y'all had six head coaches on one coach.

Is saying, but the thing about that, it's a difference because I you know, I had a chance to play with Mike them from twenty ten to thirteen and we had a slewer quarterbacks.

Yeah, so it's they could put you in great situations.

But that guy with that ball in his hand has to know how to get the ball, distribute the ball to those guys. And if he knows, yeah, man, that thing would be like it'd be like stealing from a baby. Like seriously, I mean your office can go up and down the field like you watched Save Frin right now, it's stealing like the ball.

I'm saying. They have ballers, yes, but I'm saying, but.

The game playing coaching and distrimined that football like probably don't have a strong um, but he knows.

Who they get.

You beat the jimmy and the jaw.

That's one thing about game.

Just to go ahead and counter that.

But like what I'm saying, like like one of the like people don't understand. One of the reasons that Kyle Sean McDaniels are good coaches is because they prep you for what the hell is going on. They give you answers, Hey Tanner versus cover two run it like this versus single high running like this, Hey logan versus this technique on the six, I want you to get your hat inside or on this run, let's get the hat outside. And you're like, I have answers versus different fronts that

I'm a cooker. I'm a cook period, so the fact.

You called yourself a cooker is maybe a demerit.

I'm a cook. Listen my mom be like what you're doing in the kidschen.

I'm cooker, but baking is different than cooking. Man, we actually have a bona fide baker here. No we don't, Yes we do. I am here, I'm hosting the show. He's a bonafide baker, Zachary Selby, who is also our what is your official title? Your senior writer. But also he got a great haird of hair. I'm jealous of his hair.

He got a great head of hair.

Give it so. So Selby's here. Selby bakes Forrest like bi weekly pretty much like every other week you'll bring something and it's not just pies, but you break cakes and mooses.

And out of nowhere, you know, smooth. Just thought of hating on you, Shelby, and.

He will want you want to bring it in. Okay, every week that this competes.

Well.

Once I see him bacon, I was like, not, no, nobody's going out bike me.

So at the end, it's not a heat you've given me unnecessarily. I feel like you just reasact when I see you.

Seeing that you're dead with your head here high like you you just the brown Jesus is caking.

I want to make sure that I want up.

You because Fred can't let anybody get shine. The second someone else getting shined, Fresd's cutting that person down.

And I'm not.

I'm not being mean to Fred. That's just a fact about Fred.

Hate hate.

Okay, So what we're gonna do in order to settle this great debate, this this debate, this battle of Will's Selby being the perennial.

Say why I startedby stood up for pumpkin.

So as one, so let me Selby can introduce this. Shelby, you said to Fred that a pumpkin pie can be as good.

As good or better depending on who's making it.

I e mean sweep pie.

And I also said that the differences are pretty subtle. Yeah, it just comes down to consistency and taste, a little bit.

A pair of lifts and tail a la. He's wrong. Pumpkin stinks.

Pumpkin is the most useless vegetable tenn in the world, so we.

Should stop growing it as a country.

So, just for the fans or the listeners of the podcast, what is today. Today is Wednesday. When we're recording this, Fred has been talking about pumpkins in the office for the last ten days. That exact speech we've heard on five times of the year.

Right, Windy's just made a frosty a pumpkin spice.

And it's just it's just a cinnamon frosty. Fred. First of all, No, it doesn't taste no Windy, No, I know, but I'm just saying.

Probably ain't even pumpkin in that.

Listen.

Listen to literally mock the taste of something that tastes terrible, is all I need to say.

No, it's ironic. But you say that because a lot of the savings in pumpkin pie or sleep Tanta pie.

But I'm using, I'm musing.

So let's actually talk about that a little bit. Because one of the things like I got a I gotta like, my godfather makes a really good pumpkin pie, and I said, like, what makes it so good? And he says, I just put a lot of other stuff in it, like sugar, sugar, you know, and mustard, like marshmallows and all this stuff. And I'm like, yeah, it's pretty good because it's just it's just candy. Basic.

See, I ain't got to do that to the sweet potato, but I ain't got to mask the taste of it.

I want to bring the flavor.

So so there's not a lot of sugars.

It's sugar brown.

And plus I use purpose sweet potatoes that are naturally sweeter than regular sweet potatoes. And I also use a secret ingredient in Man God bakes sugar liquid.

Look, I've been telling you can bring as many friends of the party as you want. One of us is going coming out of.

That out.

With a black eye. I love it, Like That's what I'm saying it Lee with a black eye.

Look, I'll just say this, in this battle, I'm Randy Moss and you about to get burned.

In the great part about it, I checked Randy and didn't get burned really good.

Yes, Yes, I checked Randy, and.

I'm not on any I always tell people if you want to know if a dB got burned, just check out I receive highlights.

Also, I think it's important to note that Fred made this pie last night and less than ideal suggests. Yes, I was kind of tipsy and then you got hold late, right, qualifying like my dad has to saying it's like, I don't care how you play. It's like how you play based on what you did the night before. And Fred's Fred's.

Sponsored by Jack Dan.

Let's start with.

The okay, start with the pumping the pumpkin first shell. We don't need like whipped cream or just you know, you do however you want.

I had to put a little crust in it, you know, I got it. The crush.

Yeah, that's actually pretty good.

But you know the scene of Rocky three, what he's trying to get ready for a clever lang. Yeah, that was me when I'm rolling out this door for this crust, because it was serious.

You know, you know what, I don't eat pumpkin, and that's pretty good. It's pretty good, right, I was good.

I never I never had pumpkin pud.

If I was in a bunker trapped for like six years, I would eat this bump shut up, I would.

I would. It's actually not bad.

And it doesn't really taste super pumpkin. It's got like it.

It's you know about the balancing of the flavors. You don't want to be too pumpkin forward, you want to spicy. You have the right balance of flavors okay, I'll hit you in the right spot.

I think it's the whipped cream that's doing it.

Also homemade.

He made the whipped cream. Well, when we got I gotta clear my palate.

I've been cant.

I get some water, clem a ballet, you know, damn napkins.

No nothing, yeah, just struggling right now.

I will say this is really good.

No, I'm good. I'm good. I'm good. I'm good.

All right, here we go, you see here we go?

Mm hmm.

That is good. Not too sweet right in? You're right it is. You don't have a lot of sugar in there.

I didn't want to make it too sweet.

I didn't want to kill it.

It's I can taste your guy a little bit. Yes, I like that. I think I think the texture of it. I'd probably go the pumpkin. I think the texture is better on them. You a texture guy, I mean, I think, so tell me if I'm wrong.

Like mine is more, Mine is more.

It is, it's like more. I can take it and taste of sweet potato and it's pretty good.

It's like I'm just gonna be honest.

Well, let it go.

Say I'm a sweep potato guy. So as long as it tastes good. I'm gonna take a sweet potato. It's fine, fine, I'm good. Pumpkin was good, though not exactly what.

I've never had pumped and it's finny. No, look you came to my head. Yeah, you had one leg that was six feet one league.

I would say this, you lost by just because I to within me because I like sweet potato.

Your pumpkin is fine.

I can't say anything.

Never never had pumpkin in my life. Never, I never tried to.

It's aod. It's a really good pie. So you're just actually one like uh like if you gave me like it's like I can taste the it's weird. I've never had a sweep potato like this.

Guess what.

It doesn't shock me because it's me which one logan tailor joke because you keep eating the purpose potato bat.

I've had both. I think it's really just preference. I'm not a big dessert guy. I think i'd have to go. I'd probably go pumpkin here just because it's a little bit sweeter. But but the that's the thing that sweeping. I like the sweet potato pie like I don't. It's not like I dislike it. It's like and I, you know, like it's like but Tanna, like Tanna said, I'm like I said, I I have no I have no dog in this fight. I don't need a lot of pies unfortunately for me. But it's good. It tastes good both

You smell bla.

What does that even mean?

He can't smell.

I can smell better than I could. There was a period of my life where I couldn't smell at all. That's what happens when he breaks your nose at times.

Yeah, he broke his no like seventeen times. He didn't want to say anything.

He basically he's basically, he basically Dewey Cox. He he's Dewey Cox. And he smelled blind and he cannot smell anything. So I know, I'm not shocked that he chills pumpkins.

So I feel like maybe he fut a little more cinema with this. I'd be more in it.

Well, I didn't want to make it over bearing.

It's good though, man. Yeah, I'm surprised, Fred, did you make you really made this yourself?

I made this last night that's about Jack.

Dang.

No.

First, at first I was going to be questioning in this red magging, but after it tastes home made.

Yeah, it's homemade.

Home Yeah, it's homemade.

So Fred, I mean obviously you made it. You or not? Jason, did you have a bite? So what you got? Okay?

So my plate is cleared as you can imagine, a part of me wants to say that the pumpkin pie is a winner just because.

Of friends are back.

Do you like the supertato pie?

There's it's guys, this is really close.

I like the like and I'm a pumpkin I'm not a not a pumpkin hater, but I'm like, I never had pumpkin, so damn.

Pump Yeah, so so you went.

I would have always just said sweeping o punkin but tasting boat though.

I really like the textra. They're both good.

So with the Rocky analogies, yeah, I feel like this is Rocky.

One, Rocky one. It's a draw.

A lot of respect here. So you sweet potato pie was it's pumpkin pie. It's right there.

I don't there's a draw.

It kind of feels like a draw.

So you believe in more victories. What happened to is after the game.

But like see, like I'm having bites of both and I can't be like one of these is bad. Ye, Like I kind of like the texture a little bit better of Selby's, but I do. I like the there's like a some there's some earth. There's a girth, the girth.

The girth that's about.

There.

You go this sept it sewed up, No, And I think they're blown away, blown away by the being purple like usually when people eat sweet with Tata.

Well. And also it's I think there's like a little bit of like, you know, like how you're like my, my, my, my godfather. He used to make his, and the consistency was much more like Selby's, you know what I'm saying, a little bit soft, a little bit more fluffy. Right, So this is different from me, but I still think it's good, you know what I'm saying. So it's like it's probably goes back to like when I was eight years old at Thanksgiving getting after you know sweep or

So so I had gif Fred benefited.

Do you know Fred, good job, man, great job.

No, no, no. The one thing about sports we keep we keep points. I sc seven, you scold six.

No, it's okay, just to be annoying. Seven for Tanna, seven for me, three for Jason, going both ways, you both got ten and.

Then Indian, I'm the tie breaker.

Then well the time breaker. Okay, this is this is this is a great idea, and this is why our producer makes the big bucks, makes the medium bucks. Sorry, Bud, the uh the I think we need to do a tie breaker.

So we need to do a remake.

I think so for Thanksgiving, us want to do something.

Yeah, this is the time he listen, this is the time of pumpkins.

Right, that's my favorite tim Thanksgiving underrated?

So what so like, can we kind of do you guys want to both do a sweet potato po? I mean we've had friends sweet potato by? Do you do a sweet potato by?

Come to your home turn, I'll beat you with you.

How about I make my first pumpkin?

That's a great break. Already, need to see.

Who is just a better baker.

I got to go on his turf.

You gotta come on my tur alright, al right, I'm in Okay. Great, that's the end of the show and I don't know how to end it better than than the rematch than the rematch of the of the Baking Century. Right now. There, You like this, you like this kind of contact, make sure to liking subscribing you guys enjoyed this content. Well, if you do, make sure you check out Get Loud with our guy Friendswood. That's your show friend, always loud.

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Jackson, Bubbles Jackson. He's like, where retired in Florida? I think?

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