2021 Turkey Day Recap

really in the interest of the greater good. And I've had pushback from people on Twitter and other places that say, how dare you? How dare you even bring that up? Why would you take that away from the Lions or want to take that away from the lines? It's the lines. Fans have nothing. Why would you want to take the only thing they do have. You're a Jets fan? How dare you? To which I say, maybe you have not

been thinking of it the right way. Perhaps taking Thanksgiving away from the Lions is for the greater good of Detroit. Maybe that would make Thanksgiving better. Maybe moving the lines to the Sunday of the holiday weekend saves the state of Michigan. Think about it. Dan Hans is here. Happy Thanksgiving to everybody. One of my favorite days of the year. It's about friends, it's about family and being together, and I like to be with you the listeners um to

talk about the first game of the Thanksgiving schedule. We've got three games to talk about, and the way we decided to do it as a group was split it up. So the old Zooser will talk Bears, Lions, Mark Sessler will take Raiders, Cowboys, and then Greg will bring up the rear and handle Bill Saints from the super Dome being played tonight p m. Eastern. So that is the setup, and let me get into this game. And this this first game is gonna be remembered, of course, for what

happened at the end. I mean that is and otherwise forgettable game between two bad teams, one of them winless, the Bears on a five game losing streak, and with a coach who is even one foot out the door. Would not even accurately sum it up. I would say, it's both feet half his torso his entire head. It's like an arm still in the door as head coach. But he's still there now and he gets the win and he looks good. Because Dan Campbell looks so bad,

let's just talk about it. It is third and nine for the Bears, who had fallen behind fort into thirteen on a Lion's touchdown late in the third quarter. But they march down the field, burn up most of the fourth quarter clock. But the lines are in pretty good shape here. They're still up a point. It's a third and long for Chicago. Knowing the way that team operates on offense, they're probably playing for the field goal. Let's face it, probably a past short, maybe even a run.

Who knows. They kicked the field goal and then asked their defense to close the game out, and then Jared Goff gets to come back on the field and maybe magic happens and everybody in Detroit, at that building in Ford Field get to go home happy. But you gotta get off the field first. It's third and nine at the line, sixteen on the clock. The lines have two timeouts. They call one, they stopped the clock. Then Andy Dalton comes back to the line, and then that's when things

get screwy because the Bears call another time out. It's granted by the officials. They're not supposed to grant u a time out. Back to back because you're not allowed to do that. But if an official does grant that time out and it stops play, you have to assess a five yard penalty. Terrible back to back time outs called by the lines. You can't make this stuff up. Twitter on fire, Lions fans booing um in the stadium at their homes. So a third and nine becomes a

third and four. That's manageable. And guess what happens. Dalton converts first down pass and they then do what they need to do to run out the clock. Cairo Santos, as you heard through the uprights. As time expires sixteen fourteen, Chicago moves to four and seven and their five game losing streak. The Detroit Lions are now oh ten and one, and then I don't know, I mean, we all love

Dan Campbell, The Lions fans love Dan Campbell. I mean you you He's really engendered a lot of goodwill, goodwill because of his passion and his humanity, uh and his high energy nature. He's really everything that Matt Patricia was not. That was a dour guy that did not inspire um, passion or confidence um from the people that he coached. Campbell's not that guy. And that's why, you know, Jimmy Johnson said in the pregame show, you know when he took over the Cowboys, that was a team that did

not have um passion. Uh, it didn't have talent. Uh. He got one side of it up and then that he let Jerry Jones uh build the roster out and that's how they became a winner. So the idea that there's chemistry in that building with Dan Campbell at the front, that's all good. But you can't have things like this happen because these are the type of losses that people

remember that. These are the type of losses that make you think, maybe this guy is not suited for the big chair uh as a head coach, because that is grim, back to back time outs and you become it becomes comical. I mean that is and as a Jets fan, I know what that's like. This is the same guy that nine years ago Thanksgiving night, UH watched with horror as the butt fumble um unfolded before my eyes. Uh. It's it's one thing to be a fan of a bad team.

It's another thing when you're a fan of a bad team that also kind of embarrasses you and becomes the butt of jokes, the butt fumble of jokes. Uh. And that's what the lines were on Twitter immediately after this game. So that's just it's a bummer all the way around for Detroit. Uh. If you're a Bears fan, hey man, you get a win, you gotta win. That's nice. Andy Dalton filling in for Justin Fields. He's a very good

backup quarterback. Dalton is probably going to hit free agency again and he's gonna look to get that one last chance as a starter. I don't know if that's really his trajectory going forward as a someone's full time starter, but if if he ends up being more in this mode, uh, he could be the one of the better backups in the league for several years. I really believe that he

is quality quarterback. He through for three hundred yards that averaged over eight yards per attempt, had a touchdown pass, did have an interception as well in the end zone. Was not pretty, but in general, I think he did very well in a backup capacity and got no help from his running game the Bears twenty nine carries for sixty eight yards. That's two point three yards per clip. He did get help from Darnell Mooney, who was stepped

up and emerged. Allen Robinson has been banged up and out of the game plan all season long, so the Bears desperately need someone else to emerge, and Darnell Mooney has He was five or one three in this game. Colt Comet had a nice game. Jimmy Graham had his touchdown. Jimmy Graham is going to be good for three touchdowns and about a hundred and forty four yards receiving, uh too, you know, one forty four to nine um every year.

Uh for the next like twelve to his thirteen years, and then he'll retire at age fifty eight and people back, Oh wow, Jimmy Graham, that was pretty long career. He played for thirty years. Huh, that's strange. Uh So the Bears yet they win. They lost Roquan Smith uh too, I believe a hamstring injury. So that's not good. And and the bad news keeps coming for the Lions as well, because they lost DeAndre Swift with what looked like a

very painful shoulder injury. He left the game in the first half did not return, so we'll see what his long term status is. I know, if you're tracking DeAndre Swift, you're either a lines fan or you're a fantasy manager, uh knowing the playoffs are right around the bend, and that is not good. He did not look like he was um feeling too hot. Football players, it's a tough game, especially when you have to turn around on Thursday. So

that's where we're at the lines again. They play hard, they play hard every week, but you gotta find a way to win some of these games, and they're just not finding a way. And when you compound loss after loss after loss after loss with the type of spotlight game here and the spotlight moment of the line looking inept and unorganized and not sharp like they did late

in this game, well, it's tough. It's tough. But I hope the people of uh Detroit and the Greater Detroit ERA area still have a great Thanksgiving and um everyone else as well. It is my honor to do this show and to do this podcast and to connect with all of you guys, So thank you to everybody. Now let's reset. As I said, this is just the first game of a triple header. Up next, we have Mark Sessler talking the middle game on the schedule. That is

the Raiders against the Cowboys. Do or die for the Raiders, it feels like uh. And then Greg on Saints Bills. But like I said, Mark Sessler take it away quiet, so I know he had And Mark said he was having an apple for his solo Thanksgiving fees. So I don't know if he's had the apple yet or if that comes after the game like he treats himself. I have no idea how he plays that. But God bless

Mark as well. Um, after these highlights, you will hear from the quiet storm, all right, everybody bass play down the middle they go, and it's there. Match the shot tracks and check chime for the touchdown from the two second and nine down the field they go and shults as both teams have so much on the line, with one kick, there we go this time for real, it

is delivered. The Raiders win it on. Those were just some of the moments from a game just packed with moments, game that morphed into really nothing short of a thriller. Here on Thanksgiving Thursday in America, as the Las Vegas Raiders top the Dallas Cowboys thirty six to thirty three in overtime. Thank you Dan, Hansas. This is Mark Sessler. Let's go through this game. Let's kind of unpack it to some degree. Um, we could spend fifty five minutes

on it if we want. I think they want me to do this in about seven, so we'll do the cliff notes version if we can. UM. I want to start in overtime though, you know, Dallas wins the toss. They're backed up essentially deep in their own territory there at their own seven. They get into a third and fourth situation and it really became I thought, the first ill advised throw of Dak Prescott in the entire second half into overtime, and he just was lights out down

the stretch. But miss Noah Brown, a reserved wide out on third and four, underthrew them flat out, just kind of under threw them a little bit off target. They have to punk the ball. The Raiders get it back. And I wanted to mention this because it wasn't just driving down the field to kick the game winning field goal by Daniel Carlson that we just heard. It was on a third and eighteen after a big Micah Parsons sack on Derek Carr that could have been you know,

the highlight we would play. Instead, it was Anthony Brown, Cowboys owner back getting flagged for his fourth past interference of the game, and this theme. Each of them were big. They happened on third downs, and they cost Dallas points. And if you're Anthony Brown, I I just I you almost like I watch a player like that on an island game like this on Thanksgiving and you just want to run away. You want to get in your car and drive to like Deep Mexico. If that's him, I

maybe think about doing that. But look at it wasn't just on him. But the Dallas Cowboys mistakes were indicative of something much larger that happened in this game. The Zebras, the refs, the umpire guys, these dudes. I don't know what was up with these people, but the the officials in this game were about as camera hungry and attention

seeking as one could imagine. Uh. They threw no less than fourteen penalties on both teams, twenty eight flags total for two d and outrageous two hundred and seventy six yards, and so many of them came on pass interfears penalties and Anthony Brown, who had four of them, as I mentioned in this game, all of them on critical third and long's third downs. Um an early one where DeShawn Jackson caught him on a deep route right into deep Dallas territory near the goal line set up a quick

Raider's touchdown. I mean that was on him. You know. It was DeShawn Jackson who opened the scoring earlier with a fifty six yard catch and run. I mean looked great on that. You know, they only got him a couple of weeks ago. If he can do that for him every game, it helps a lot after the loss of Henry Ruggs, no way around it. Hunter Renfrow had a huge fifty four yard catch late in this one as well. They really, I think tired out the Dallas defense.

They owned the ball for nearly forty minutes, and it wasn't your typical run the ball left and right. This team cannot run the ball, the Raiders, but it was big shots, that's who they are, and Dallas let them back into over and over. But Dallas's offense as well got very hot down the stretch. It was not easy out of the gate. And you don't have a Maori Cooper. Uh, there's no Seedee Lambs. You're passing game. Obviously, if your Dallas was completely changed coming into this. It helped to

have Tyron Smith back at left tackle. But I thought they came out doing what we thought they'd do, which was trying to run the ball with Zeke Elliott with Tony Pollard, and you know, Zeke Elliott wasn't really the

primary guide to because he's dealing with that knee. They kind of gave it to Pollard and it worked here and there, but it put them into too many tough third down situations early, and at one point it seemed like they kind of just ditched the ground game and said, you know what, We're gonna believe that Cedric Wilson can do this. Michael Gallup, we already know what he can do.

Cedric Wilson had a huge fifty one yard grab in this, Michael Gallop of forty one yard or Tony Pollard I thought had one of the biggest plays of the game with an electrifying a hundred yard kickoff return that lifted the Cowboys entirely. As this thing became kind of insane to watch from the eyes, it was not easy out of the gate for Dallas. I mean, you don't you don't have a Marii Cooper, you don't have Ceedee Lamb.

That totally calm remises what you want to do. With their explosive passing attack, they just didn't look explosive early on. It helped to have Tyron Smith back at left tackle, but they came in doing what I think a lot of us thought they'd do against a bad Raiders run defense, which which was trying to try to use the ground game. It just didn't really work. It kept putting them into third down situations, and at one point I think they just ditched that whole plan and said, let's just start

throwing the ball. They showed faith in Cedric Wilson a hundred plus yards today and Michael Gallup, of course, we know what he can do. He had a huge forty one yard grab that set up a field goal. Wilson had a fifty one yard or of himself. I mean, it wasn't really until like you know, second half that these big plays started to happen. They started to form up and creep up for the Cowboys and for the

for the Raiders. Both teams zero turnovers. It was a clean game on that front, not penalties wise, and a lot of holding penalties killed killed last Las Vegas, but Derek Carr played a wonderful game down the stretch. They themselves lost Darren Waller, their star tight end, one of the biggest security blankets in the league. For their quarterback, Derek Carr. I mean he was gone by mid second quarter. Hunter renfro steps up with a hundred plus yards to

Sean Jackson. We talked about the fifty six yard touchdown, the huge pass interference. I mean they got him a couple of weeks ago to essentially mask over the loss of Henry Ruggs. Uh. You know, if you can give him that every week, you're fine. I don't think it's you're gonna get that every week. But today he was huge in that game for the Raiders offense. It's the kind of game that makes you wonder what the Raiders are capable of because they're now six and five, smack

dab in the a f C playoff race. This was the good version of their offense. We haven't seen that every week. They can't run the ball. They still can't run the ball. It just I'm tired of that experiment. All that you've gotta keep trying. I guess the Cowboys right now said it's seven and four. Um. You look at Washington, you look at the way the Eagles are playing, and the NFC East is no sure thing. But tough

loss for Dallas. They've now lost three or four. Um. This was not a no show like we saw against the Broncos. This wasn't the limited offense we saw against Kansas City. From one angle, I think it was encouraging against It was the Raiders defense, but they got hot down the stretch. So I'm not totally freaking out about Dallas.

It's just that it's a tough pill to swallow. The way this game went back and forth over and over, and to even be either one of the quarterbacks to tumble and fall at the end, it didn't feel fair. Other things happened in this game with a thousand storylines. There was a huge fight that caused the ejection of Kelvin Joseph for the Cowboys and Roderick Teamer for the Raiders. UM special teams play total madness. The halftime show was some man name hold on, let me look this up.

Luke Hombs, a country singer. If you're if, if I don't, I'm not a huge country person, so attack me as you will. Um, But he is singing and drinking um, who knows what out of a Red Solo Cup. Although I'm I think it was beer because he was singing about beer. Um. There are other things we could discuss here, but I you know, I I feel like this was essentially a save the season scenario for the Raiders. And if your Dallas teams have had to do this all

year long, win those games without your star players. We saw that with with the Ravens and Tyler Huntley a week ago. We've seen it almost every week and they fell just short. It would have been a huge, um, moral and tangible victory to get to eight and three without your two best wide receivers. It didn't happen today. Too bad for the Cowboys. They're still around, The Raiders are still around. Everyone's still around. Like all but three

teams are alive and kicking right now. Let's take you to two more of those, the Buffalo Bills and the New Orleans Saints. You know, Greg Rosenthal, I'm at my house and people asked, like, what did you eat for things? Giving I'm getting a lot of those tweets. Um, I ate there was some leftover Indian food. So I had a couple of pieces of non bread um and rice that was like roughly at three days old, two days old. Um. Greg however, is a workhorse. He actually um flew to

New Orleans. He is covering this game live uh from the Superdome, and we're gonna take you right to Greg at this point. Happy Thanksgiving. I just want to say thank you to everyone that listens to this show, to this episode, to every episode, the end season, the off season. I don't care where you are in the world. We thank you, we love you. Happy Thanksgiving. Lee in motion, Allen looking at Diggs Digs Diggs' touchdown Stefani straight touchdown.

It's the same to the ball screech oh, Mike Rico trying to pump some life into that Super Dome crowd at the end of a thirty one to six Bills victory over New Orleans. To end this Thanksgiving recap and a Thanksgiving full of football, Thanks to Mark Sessler for just a wild recap that I'm gonna be listening to on my drive to work Friday morning. NFL Network Around the NFL Show got the plug in early. Everyone listened

to it on Saturday. But before we get to that, we got to talk about, uh, this game, and I'm gonna do it in a list because like lists are easy, and uh, my mind is is not clear always and everyone loves list and so this is gonna be like twelve things if you missed the game to know or to know about, you know, my life on Thanksgiving number one. Like, I actually think you could take some things away from this game, and I'm gonna do this twelve as quick

as humanly possible. I think you can take some things away from this game from the Bills. Not that many, because this was the b team saying incident. It's getting late early for a lot of teams in the NFL, like this Saints team. But one thing I think you could take from the Bills is that Josh Allen running the ball is such a big part of the Bills solving what defenses are trying to do to them. All the defenses are backing up, They're making him go down

with these long drives over and over. You need a running game to beat that. You don't really have one, but you do have Josh Allen. That's Cam Newton from if they really wanted to use him in that way. Sean McDermott knows how valuable that kind of runner is. And you saw more design runs, you saw scrambles on the biggest plays of the game, and I think as you get closer to the playoffs, Josh Allen running is

so important for this team. I know it was only forty three yards on the ground, but it was like the four biggest third down plays of the game. He's either design run or he's scrambling. Uh, and he's getting it done. My second point, Alan was on point though passing. This is one of his better throwing days of the year. I know he had two picks. One of them he was hit while he was thrown, but otherwise he fit the ball into tight windows. He was on point. He

was accurate. If he does that every week, they are tough to be. He is not normally that accurate. That was an awesome performance by Josh Allen. Number three, Stefon Diggs. That route on Marshawn Lattimore, that was filthy, man, Like, why do you gotta do Marshawn Lattimore like that? He not only threw that route on him, he looked at the man afterwards and he's just that's just like ownership. I know, I know Diggs is not the All Pro this year. It's probably Jefferson Um or Davante Adams or

Deebo Samuel or Cooper Cup. Like those are your top guys for my money, I think I still take stuff on Diggs maybe over all of them. He can do everything. He's my number one. Uh. The Saints team is driving me crazy though. My fourth point that the Saints play the same damn game every week. It's tough to watch. I saw the craziest stat from Pro Football Focus this week. Trevor Simeon is the last ranked quarterback in terms of their grades out of four seven qualifiers in quarters one

through three. He is the number one ranked PFF quarterback in fourth quarter. Like people got on Jalen Hurts for the garbage time stuff, Trevor Simian is the king of of garbage time, Which gets me to my fifth point, Like, I just want to apologize to Jamis Winston for some blasphemous things I said a couple of weeks ago that they hadn't downgraded at quarterback. I said, yet those first two starts, team trev was like riding the bus. The

bus was going We've gone over a cliff. Trevor's Trevor's rough, like he's not gonna survive without his tackles and without Komara and Ingram, but it's still rough. At some point, we got a we want taste some chant from the crowd, which is like we even got it from Twitter, who who loves clowning on taste, especially after that contract. And I'm wondering, like where he is. Mike Rico said he's

got a foot injury, So the Saints are lying. They're they're either lying that he's got a foot injury to make it sound better that they're benching him for Trevor Simeon and not even playing them at all, or they're lying on the injury report because he's not even on the injury report anymore. They're lying one way or another. Wouldn't be the first time. We we gotta see Tasom next week Thursday Night against the Cowboys. They can't keep

doing Trevor point seven. Sean Payton's aggressiveness very confusing to me, Like no one has taken more cowardly field goals over the last two weeks. One against Tennessee, UH one against Philadelphia when they're down two scores to get to cut it, you know, to ten or two thirteen and those kids. And yet he's going out here on fourth down and he's calling for fake punts, looking for Blake Gillikin to

throw dimes in tight coverage, the little Jordan Humphrey. It's like, you know, it's a problem when Gillikin and Humphrey not being on the same page is a problem for the Saints. Uh. Point number eight, I'm I'm sick of talking about the scene. Sordevious White's injury is a problem for the Bills. It did not look good. He is so important to that defense. They are built to stop the pass. He's a great run stopping corner. Hopefully it's not that serious, but it

looks serious. I just, uh, I feel bad for for the Bills there, but I am happy for the Bills to enjoy this one. Point nine, the Bills mafia taken over and never seen it happen in the Superdome quite like that. That was impressive to go down there and take over a tough place to take over again. Never seen it. Pretty awesome. Point ten. I wanted a little

more from Drew Brees tonight. I gotta I gotta admit, like, I know people are giving him credits like, oh, he he talked about, you know, how to throw the ball accurately, and he you know all this. It's like you would have thought he was Trent Green calling the Jaguars game for half of this game. You wouldn't even know, and he ever played the Saints. Like it sounds like I'm being tough on him. It's his first game and all that, but you know, you're trying to take over. It's like

Philip Rivers when he was a rookie. You know, he showed up late for camp and he's trying to take Drew Brees' job. That's Chris Collinsworth right now. He's Drew Brees. He's on his way to the Hall of Fame. This is a big time, Like you went right into one of the biggest chairs. He was kind of putting me to sleep. He was barely there for a while. So I hope it gets better. Uh point number eleven. And now I'm into my my life just thinking about Thanksgiving.

I'm so thankful for so many things, but you know, I was thankful for the moment today and you know, it happens everything's given. You know, when my my wife Emmaca is just carving up that turkey, she is so good with that knife, like she went to culinary school. You know. I see people clowning everyone putting the pictures out there for Thanksgiving, their pictures, like you wouldn't be clowning the pictures at my house. It's some culinary like. I love my wife no more than when I'm seeing

her with that knife. Hmm. Some good food. And and by the way, I'm not drunk, not stone, I'm nothing. I'm just happy that my Thanksgiving is wrapping up finally. Point twelve. Yeah, I had a great day. Took the kids out early exercise, who played some tennis, and the heat's hot out here in l A. I feel bad for everyone who doesn't live somewhere that's hot hot. I tired him out, got them chill, and then had a great day watching football. Like I said, I ate some

botless food. Uh. And now I'm screaming to myself alone in my bedroom to no one who could ask for anything more. I hope you had a great day too.