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The NFL podcast.
Thanks fumbling makes the game more fine. Welcome to another edition of Around the NFL. My name is Dan hansis coming to you from a virtual room filled with heroes, Mark Sessler, Greg Rosenthal. It is a super packed Monday Night show. Quick note you heard at the very top of the show. Live show from London. Get your tickets this week or miss out. Also a little shift to
our schedule. We are going to be doing our Monday Night program, Monday Night Recap, and we're adding our news to this show, so a little different than the schedule that maybe you saw last week. We're figuring it out. That's how it works around here. Greg. Trial and error, baby.
And this one is jam. Not just the two Monday Night games which were wild and ugly and weird, but like a lot of big news around the league, unfortunately, the biggest one happened in this game. I'm feeling a little bit of a flashback to last Monday Night in terms of the vibes of losing one of the best players in the league.
Yeah, Cleveland Brown's running back Nick Chubb suffered a terrible knee injury, one of those type of injuries that you know The telecast does not even show replays of After the game, a win, a narrow win by the Steelers. Coach Kevin Stefanski confirmed that Chubb is done for the season with a significant injury. According to rap Sheet, that injury includes multiple torn ligaments. He'll have tests done. But Mark Chubb, who's a guy that everybody loves to watch,
one of the very best players in the league. To see him go down like this completely undercut tonight's football.
Yeah.
Absolutely. I mean I think if you looked at how you organize offenses, almost all of them are around a quarterback. And Cleveland can say it's around their quarterback, but it's been around Nick Chubb for years. And it's pretty telling to me that when he was taken off the field, that you're in Pittsburgh Stadium and Steelers fans, the number one rivalry to Cleveland, hate the Browns in many ways, like and what do you get you have Steelers fans
chanting his name as he's taken away. Because I think the Nick Chubb, if you've watched football for a long time, if you watch sports like he harks back to something a little bit different than the mouthy athletes you might get from today. He's silent. He just goes about his work, he punishes people, he's consistent, he's the heart of that offense. And he's gone.
And the crowd there saw the injury, which a lot of people at home didn't watching the ESPN broadcast, and they mentioned Joe and Troy doing the game just how
they gasped. And we had a second monitor up at work while I was watching, so I see it too, And it's just unfortunate that it's so similar to a week ago that this guy who's a franchise player, and to me, if like you needed one person on planet Earth to get six yards for you in a given play and he was playing fantastic tonight, he was the best player on the field while he was on the field tonight, to me, it would be Nick Chubb. So
it's just really disappointing. And then the way the game played out, and we'll get to that, really reminded me of that too, where the team that couldn't get a first down, that was kind of outplayed for most of it ends up coming back and winning that game. The difference here is the Browns, you know, lost Chubb and they lost the game too.
It's just a nightmare situations. It's the football is a you know, a beautiful game, but the injury side of it, it's just you can't he just almost can't fathom that somebody as talented as Chubb suffers an injury that gruesome. And now we only hope that this is something where doctors in modern science gets him right and he's back on the field and he's a comeback player the year type guy next year. But for now, Nick Chubbs season
is over, and let's now get to the games. We're gonna do both the Monday night football games and then we're gonna do news, just get you caught up on the other things going on around the league. But let's start with what happened at whatever the hell Acroshore is.
What I need?
Neil showing blitz here he comes.
Prush up, all out, picked up, who touchdown Steelers.
Wow, that place was going bonkers. Even leading up to that play, that place was going bonkers. And then a huge play there. Alex high Smith outside linebacker, beats Jeddrick Willis off the edge, chops the ball out of Deshaun
Watson's hands. TJ. Watts scoops it up, takes it in seventeen yards for the go ahead touchdown midway through the fourth quarter, and that was the difference for the Pittsburgh Steelers, who behind two defensive touchdowns, beat the Cleveland Browns twenty six twenty two on Monday night and a game that, you know, it's just unbelievable, the Browns against the rival Steelers, losing Nick Chubb and then you lose this game on top of it. It's just terrible for the Steelers. They
needed it. They needed this game greg from their defense because once again the offense with you know, there were moments here and there in this game they were better than Week one, which isn't saying much, but they needed multiple scores from their defense to take this game and they just happened to get it on Monday night.
Right, they had the seventy one yard touchdown to George Pickens on a slant, pretty routine play that he just took off and there was a hole in the brown Beyond that, they only had other eight other first downs and basically no big plays other than eight. Other than that one, they were nine total. They had like that
thirty yard dump off to a running back. They just couldn't get yards and once you got into the fourth quarter and the Browns had retaken the lead and their offense had their share of struggles, certainly, but they were moving the ball a little bit better. You really thought that the Steelers, who pinned Cleveland back inside their five yard line twice, we're gonna have to score to win this game. The defense was gonna have to score to win this game. And they actually did it. And TJ.
Watt gets the glory with the touchdown, but Alex Highsmith was part of both touchdowns. He had the pick six early on the deflection and he had the force fumble and it wasn't because of injuries. It was against the left tackle Jedrick Wills, their first round pick, and high Smith has turned into maybe the premiere second pass runner
rusher in the league. One of them DeMarcus Lawrence. There's other great ones, but he was fantastic to night and he was part of a Steelers defense that had eleven quarterback hits, six sacks, nine tackles for loss, and eight passes defense. They just were all over the place making big plays and that's what they needed because their offense wasn't gonna get it done.
Yeah, I mean if you told me five hours ago that Pittsburgh at home would have six sacks, four takeaways, and two defensive touchdowns, I wouldn't suggest the Browns would win that game. They were one in twenty two coming into this game under Kevin Stefanski in games where they trail by four points in the fourth quarter. That tells you a lot. The Steelers have won twenty one games in a row on Monday Night football. Cleveland and Pittsford have a Yeah, they.
Won twenty one games in a row and Monday Night football.
Yeah, they have a pretty ingrained DNA against Cleveland, And like I would say that that. You know, obviously I have my own complicated relationship with the Browns right now, but I found myself getting worked up. And it wasn't just the Chubb injury, just the way that you got into the latter stages of this game, and you've kind of sold your soul to surround yourself around Deshaun Watson
who continues to not play very well. You know, Amari Cooper, what a gutsy performance to go out injured with a groin injury and play the way he did, to even suit up and go in there. I watched this Browns team on offense, and it's like I'm watching Jim Schwartz on the defensive coordinator, like he has dialed in and this defense is special, and it kind of Dan. It
kind of reminds me a little bit. It's not to the same degree, but the Jets on defense give you a chance to win, and the Browns defense does the same. And I just have no faith that this quarterback in this offense is going to pull you out of a hole. And it's just like they look lost to me on that side of the ball, and I don't know. It was very a very frustrating watch. There's so much talent with Miles Garrett and everyone on that side of the ball.
That's why I think that I have faith that they can still go win nine or ten games without Shove. I think Jerome Is seems like a competent, potentially competent fill in for Chubb, But you've lost the heart and soul of your offense, and I don't trust the quarterback.
The parallels mark on a personal side here are not lost on me. And I'm sure many listeners that like, you know your history with the Browns, my history with the Jets, and what happened last week at the Metal Lands. It was like this special defense that has this star on the other side of the ball, that if you put these two things together, special things could happen. And
Cleveland that's what Chubb represents now. Deshaun Watson is the guy that they, like you said, on some level, you could say, sold their soul to get that QB one they've been searching for since Bernie Coozar. But it was
Chubb that was the engine of this offense. And yeah, I think there is something if you're a Browns fan to take out of Jerome Ford who had that beautiful sixty nine yard run where he almost took it to the house, and you can say, Okay, we still have an offensive line that can maul in the run game,
and maybe Watson puts it together. But the Deshaun Watson side of it, I think he struggled here in one I think the first big kind of showtime primetime moment with the Browns where you got to make the play. He was kind of holding that ball out like a loaf of bread on the big strip fumble recovery and then was not able to make anything happen on the ensuing drive to dig him out of it. That's what they're paying him for to make a play on one
of those possessions, and it just didn't happen. So a night of epic frustrations for Cleveland Watson not getting it done is just was kind of like the reverse cherry on top.
Yeah, it almost felt like the Steelers defense at the beginning of that final drive. Watson gets the ball back, needing a touchdown to go win the game in Pittsburgh. Tough spot, you know, especially the way that they had looked and the Steelers started dropping coverage and actually was protected pretty well and made a couple of nice stories. That's the thing about the Watson experience, especially this year, so far as there are nice throws. He's obviously a
talented player. Had five or six throws tonight that were excellent or they were just out of balance, like the timing was off, But there were more plays that just spoke of a quarterback who wasn't confident in what he was seeing. Troyyigmann pointed out quite a bit where he was just late on everything you thought of the first couple plays of the game, not a miscommunication on that pick six. We don't know who's in at fault, but it was ultimately a bad throat where they're not on
the same page. He's late on a wide open kind of hitch route where a guy's over the middle and that's just an unforced era. And then on the last drive, this is an effect of a good defensive coordinator started sending the heat and they got a lot of pressure on him, but you saw his eyes coming down really fast. There was a play around midfield where he was actually protected well on that final drive, and almost immediately after
he didn't see someone open. He just sort of started running around in a circle when actually he was protected and he ran into his own pressure and then wound up getting sacked. And there were just many of those moments where you could tell he's not comfortable in this offense. He doesn't seem to know what he's seen in the same way that he used to when he was in Houston.
You saw some cutaways to Stefanski on the sideline, including one late in the game. I believe it was the kind of the last sack he took before the fourth down.
I think that might be the very play I'm talking about.
Yeah, and they cut to stefancy. You had to kind of look on his face like, man, we need to be a little better than that. And so there you have a lot of work to do obviously on offense, and it's gonna be more difficult without Chubb. And like we said, Mark that Pittsburgh totally flatlined on offense in Week one, so you could look at in some ways progress, but like Greg said, eight first downs, like this is a problem. This is now two weeks in where you
have one of the worst offenses in football. You got totally bailed out by your defense that had an all time primetime effort. Otherwise you're own two and you're asking questions that you don't want answers to.
Potentially yep, I would say a bright spot George Pickens, who probably had the best game of his career. But I'm looking at an imbalanced attack that had two yards rushing in the first half. Everything that we heard about in the summer that I wouldn't say that. That's what I fell for with the Steelers. I just kind of liked the idea of their talent growing up together. They're not there yet, and you know, you're relying on TJ.
Watt kind of like week after week, and he went up against a rookie right tackle tonight and that was not a bad matchup for him at all. But like I'm watching this office now, you played San Francisco and you played Cleveland. These may be two of the top three four defenses in the league. So there's that, and you can keep resetting. It's early in the year, and I do think that, you know, Picket in general has
a lot of chance to grow. But it's two weeks in a row where it's like, Matt Canada, you got a lot of pressure on you that kept cutting away to him, and it's like then they're cutting to the crowd and they're shaking their head because they can't convert X, Y and Z, and it's like, it's a frustrating situation when one side of the ball it's not living up to the other side. It creates problems. I trust the defense one hundred and Pittsburgh's offense is absolute TBD.
Every time they get a couple of running plays going, you can almost smell that Matt Canada is gonna do some wonky end around to Calvin Austin that's gonna lose like four yards or they needed one yard in that final drive to maybe put away the game, and they do this crazy complicated play that you could, you know, with motion and handoffs and pickets like faking it almost like it's an option, and it's like something the Eagles would pull off and or the Chiefs would pull off,
and they look great, and they just completely botch it and lose three yards and they just seem to not know what to count on. But I do think they're talented enough to eventually get there. I just don't know if the coaching is there.
One last note here Mike Fitzpatrick standout defensive back of the Steelers. He also suffered an injury in this game as a chest injury and it handed up at a local hospital undergoing avaluation. Also, you know that the play, it's a it's interesting just as from a pure uh now just watching you know, sports fan on TV. I don't know where you guys come down on the don't show the injury side of things they used to in
the old days. I remember Napoleon McCallum on Monday Night Football thirty years ago suffered a grotesque knee injury for the Raiders that they would show over and over and over.
Again, jan they would always show that.
Joe Thaismand I mean, how about this Super Bowl Sunday when you've got you know, Grandma and Nelly watching Tim Crumbrae. They shut his legs snap into you know.
And now we we've kind of hit the point where we treat these serious injuries as if how how broadcasting treats fans that run on the field, like don't show it. I'm not saying I need to see it, but like I'm seeing a bunch of tweets here, like people coming after Mika Fitzpatrick for a low hit and everything. I just didn't I didn't see enough of it because of the way the telcast handled the injury. And I understand why they do it, but also it is a sports telecast.
It's kind of a very it's a news event for the league. They just not seeing what happened was kind of interesting. But that's how it's done now. It's just more an observation rather than me.
Yeah, it's it's new. I think that's really just the last couple of years that that's come up. But that was a condensed play in the box where yeah, he dove at him to tackle him. I think that's a typical football play, and it's part of the reason why. Like there's a little bit of a downbeat note tonight. It's like that injury happened. There were just injuries everywhere. Greg Knwsom, the great slack cornerback for the Browns, had
an elbow injury, left this game. Denzel Ward never came back from the locker room as far as I knew when he left the game with an injury. So it's just Zadarius Smith left at one point, was carted off or was helped off the field, and then he did return to the game. It was just like an endless sea of misery with these injuries.
You just three of their top four defensive players.
Right, and the whole the Browns situation for me like Mark getting to know you all these years and understanding the kind of shared dna of pain and what it feels like to be a fan that your team is cursed,
like the Deshaun Watson situation really did. Like Cloud what remains a great fan base and a team with proud tradition that is trying trying to get over the hump and back to being competitive team year after year and set up so well everyone has their feelings about Watson, but I feel for Browns fans, just like I know a lot of Browns fans and other team and fan bases that never seem to get over the hump, felt for the Jets on Monday Night. I don't know if you had anything else you want an ad mark.
Well, all I'd say is like the one thing about these seasons because as you know, you got to ride the wave, and like, do I want to be like the seventh grade me that goes into some sort of a shell and doesn't emerge again. It's like they have another game with Pittsburgh in Cleveland, and like, so you want to you want to split with the Steelers. And if you go in any season then knowing you're gonna split with your number one rival, arch enemy, you'd be
all right with that. And so there's another chance for this. Can the offense become more Watson esque because it's not so Nick Chubb focused. I don't like the idea of that, but maybe that helps him. He doesn't seem comfortable in this offense right now.
Uh.
That's that's sort of the huge the thing that we just don't know. It's extremely frustrating because I think if you're a Browns fan, and if you're a if you're been following a struggling franchise, there's always gonna be one or two teams that just pound you, like you know, year after year. And the Brown Steelers rivalry has not been one outside of that Baker Mayfield playoff game. And frankly,
Baker Baker Mayfield's played better than Deshaun Watson right now. So, like these fortunes that you se, you don't know where they're going to take you, and so we'll see what happens. I think if you're a Browns fan and you're died in the wall, you've got a great defense, and you see what happens. You kicked the butt of the Bengals a week ago, you're one and one in the division.
At play the Steelers tonight. It should be mentioned by about one hundred and fifty yards. They did.
But that's where I that's where I start to push back, because they did. But I mentioned that stat Under Stefanski, they don't have the DNA of a team that finds a way in the end to win it. They find a way to just not win it. And it's like you've got to switch that you cannot be that team, and they went and got the quarterback, thinking that would change all that, and in fact it made it more emphatic. He seems more lost. They seem more lost than at
any other time on some level considering the talent. And I don't like that.
And the Steelers nineteen ninety one, October fourteenth, nineteen ninety one, the last time they lost Monday night football? Is am I crazier? Is that? Actually? Like we had fun with the Ravens preseason winning streak. Isn't that even crazier?
It is? It's crazier. I don't know how that one slipped.
I mean, it's a testaments how incredible they in terms of consistency, from Chuck Noll to Bill Coward to now Mike Tomlin. But to never lose once and they play Monday night every year a couple of times.
Dude, I was getting like a hard C minus in algebra two the last time they lost a Monday night football game.
So it's like Vanilla Ice was like on the top of the charts. That's nineteen ninety one. All right, Let's move to the other Monday night game, this one played in Charlotte.
Ian Jones makes a cut hand scores from that practice squad to the end zone. What a night for Tony Jones Junior stepping up after Jamal Williams went down and the Saints stretched the lead two possession, Game three, four, team to play.
The annoying thing is that Chris Olave had a really great play. We just stepped out of bounds, so it gets Mark back and then we have a fairly routine touchdown run by Tony Jones.
But you know what, that kind of night there, that's kind that kind of game, that kind of night.
You're right the way, does anybody want to hear the fact that I needed three points in Jamal Williams tonight in my fantasy league? No, probably.
Another injury.
The Saints take care of business on the road, beating a Panthers team that is still searching for it on offense twenty to seventeen.
Uh.
Derek Carr and the New Orleans offense. No great shakes in this game. Again, playing without Alvin Kamara suspended and losing Jamal Williams early on, that doesn't help a lot. You got a lot of Taysom Hill in this game. And just like last week, Derek Carr maybe the overwhelmed with a great quarterback play, but when he needed a big play, he hits Rashid Shaheed for forty five yards.
That was a major, major conversion in this game. And from there Mark it was about the defense of the Saints, which pretty much that this looks closer than it really was. It was twenty ten, and then they played this like crazy prevent d which drives me nuts. To give up eight more points. It was twenty to nine. But Carolina did nothing in this game on offense.
Yeah, Like so I would give credit to Derek Carr because I think that the opposite of what I just talked about with Cleveland's offense is that two weeks in a row, you know, car seems emotionally unaffected by the slow start and finds a way to make plays and get the Saints out of trouble. In this you're helped by playing a Carolina offense that is, you know, underdeveloped and lost at sea. Their offensive line play is rough.
Got at feeling in DJ shark as your wideouts. They had forty four yards rushing like midway through the third quarter, eighty five yards total in the first half. Bryce Young is just sort of figuring it out and the Saints defense comes in and takes advantage of that. I kind of watched this and felt like, why is this on prime It's not feel like a primetime game to me. It did not feel like a I mean, there's two islands tonight, but it didn't feel like it belonged on
any island to me. It was a bit of a rough watch. But it's like you're gonna get that because you're throwing Bryce Young on national television in week two and like, I like some things I see, but it's like, that's just sort of that's the Saints. Just it's a sitting duck for the New Orleans Saints.
Well, not all prime time games are created equal, certainly not they You know that they the ESPN, ABC chooses which game to send the A team to. That was the first game we talked about. And then it's a spot where you get the number one overall pick in primetime before they might have a bad record later in the year. This is only one oh and one. Unfortunately, a lot of times early picks aren't really putting a
good position to succeed right away. Now. CJ. Strouds looked okay and Anthony Richardson's had his moments, it hadn't stayed on the field, but Bryce Young you mentioned it is just surrounded by so many things that aren't working. His offensive line, a lack of explosion at receiver, and he's not able to overcome that either. And it's largely because he's playing a defense that seems almost built for this moment.
They built for this season because I was thinking the Saints didn't give up a touchdown in their first one hundred and eighteen minutes of this season until that garbage time, and I was like, wow, well, it's not going to be this good though, when they start playing real teams and I look at the schedule and it's like there aren't many good offenses on this Atlanta will be a challenge and there'll be other challenges. Certainly they played Green
Bay next week. I'm not saying they're a favorite for that, but you look up and down, you don't see them play a murderer's row, and they seem like the type of defense it's been together a long time. It's players, not plays. Marshall Latimore is giving up fifteen yards this year to Mario Davis made the biggest play of this game with a big time sack on Bryce Young. They're just in tune. Pete Warner's making plays all over the field,
Cameron Jordan's there. It's just it's a good defense that I think is gonna beat up on some bad offenses. And they got a lot of bad offenses on their schedule.
Yeah, and that's what kind of just from a purest standpoint of I want this game to match, the score to match with the game was. I wish they would have played real defense on that last drive because they let the Panthers dnk and dunk seventy five yards for the touchdown two point conversion. Bryce Young finished with one
hundred and fifty three yards passing. I think I think virtually all, if not all, those seventy five yards on the last drive were on checkdown passes through the air, a little dumpoffs, so he threw for about seventy five yards. In the first fifty eight minutes of the game. They did nothing. They couldn't really get anything going on the ground. Carolina only nineteen carries, so they kind of took that out of the realm of things as well. And Yeah, for me, what you're saying is right, Greg I don't
see the Saints. I picked the Saints in the division because you just don't see a huge level of competition around them. So, like, the Saints and the Falcons are two teams that stand out to me as groups that can win ten or even eleven games.
Yeah about those two and oh Bucks, we got three undefeated teams in this division. Wow, you're not there. I'm not really putting that if that's true too.
Yeah, and the Panthers are hanging out there, they're waiting, They're waiting for liftoff mark because this this idea, of course, is that you finally get the quarterback you want. But maybe, uh, David Tepper's learning that. Well, it's not that simple either. You've got to build around the kid, and right now there's just not a lot for him.
Yeah, I think their strength, if anything, you would say, would be a defense that can, you know, disrupt certain opponents. Shaq Thompson heard tonight.
J C.
Horn obviously out for a while. That's a big loss. Like, I know, he's not been on the field as much as you'd want it all, but like he is a fascinating cornerback. That's a big loss for them. So it's like they are another one of these teams, just like you're taking players out of the mix over and over and who knows what their overall like team building philosophy is.
But we're a couple of years into this general manager and like the offense is punchless without a lot of big names, and you got a rookie quarterback in a tough situation and the defense losing guys. So it's like, once again, the Panther's a little there, they're a step behind, and it's like it's a developmental year. And like I like Frank Reich, and I think Frank Reich is Maybe I'm out of maybe I'm saying this incorrectly, but I p Lea's like a little over celebrated where it's like, oh,
it's Frank Reich. So it's security and a great offense. Like maybe I don't know what he's done. That's such a difference making situation. From a coaching level, I think he brings like a Ron Rivera offensive types vanilla security to the organization. But I'm not overly impressed so far. It's like I don't like the I don't like the offense at this point.
The good thing is it's a baseline and they can reset expectations that they weren't maybe going to be this great surprise team. But it is something where you just are hoping in the middle of the season they start having one of those runs where you can see the progress, mostly out of Bryson, because they have played well on defense. I mean, you mentioned Bryce Young had seventy five yards late in the game. I mean Derek Carr wasn't above that.
In the middle of the third quarter. He had about twenty throws for one hundred yards and had been sacked three or four times at one point, and he got Frankieluvu and Brian Burns. And it's very similar to their Week one game where the defense bawled out for about two and a half quarters and at some point they just had to give in. And that's why, again I say players not plays. The Saints have some good players. I mean, Michael Thomas has looked good enough like he
looks like Michael Thomas. He made a big play in the red zone to set up a touchdown. Chris olav had the one of the best catches of the year on the sideline, making a diving catch with that that one hand of that is just unbelievable. And then you mentioned Shaheed. It's like you dial up a Shaheed play every once in a while, Taysom Hill gets in there starts playing running back because Jamal Williams isn't it. Taysom Hill always is good for a few good plays. It's
like they got some good players here. They haven't protected car Well, that's their their number one say.
They gotta be way better on offense to actually be a team that matters, though like they are not like you said, they're not protecting car who's now been sacked eight times in two games. They haven't scored in the first half in either game. Play they they're hitting some big throws late in the game and in general getting the play here and there to beat mediocre competition. But this is not gonna last against big time teams. But to your point, right, there aren't a ton on their schedules,
so I don't know. Maybe they're the Vikings this year.
Mud, I could see that. I see they're like the defensive version of the Vikings. It's gonna annoy people, but especially if the Falcons end up playing one. We'll see about the Bucks. But this NFC South schedule is gonna help everyone, and those teams are gonna have a chance to make the playoffs. You know, multiple teams in this division potentially over some teams that are more talented.
I can't buy into the Bucks being in this equation late in the year, but I totally can see the Saints and Falcon.
I'm not even quite there with I'm not quite there on the Bucks.
You don't need to occupy your mind space with the Bucks at this point, Dan.
I think, in fact, there's too many There's too many teams in this NFC South that I'm potentially supposed to be taking seriously, and I don't know if I could do with any of them. So I'll settle for two right now at this juncture of the season. But I can't go there with the team in Tampa.
Even that feels generous. So that's a little bit character.
All right, let's take a break here and then we'll get you caught up on the news. All right, we're back. Let's dive into the news. Here's what you missed today. If your head was in well, you could have been doing a lot of things, and that's what we're here to do. This will get you caught up to day. Let's start with Saquon Barkley, who exited action late in Sunday's big comeback in Arizona with an ankle injury. It
looked very frustrated when it happened. Reports in the locker room painted him as an unhappy camper amidst a ton of smiles and celebrations and you're just fearing for the worst. However, reports from rap sheet there was optimism that he avoided a major injury, and then a very strange report got out there that the ankle injury is in I think that the term was an ordinary, an ordinary, which is a very strange way to put I guess that means not a high ankle spring.
Think they're saying lower. That's what that means.
Now, why don't we say lower? Then? Ordinary is a very strange way to put it. Anyway, He's expected, according to schefter, to miss three weeks, which is not ideal for the Giants, but it could have been worse.
Well, that's so that obviously we already knew that the forty nine ers on Thursday night was a no go, but the Ians basically already are in a playoff schedule type scenario because you go on to that next game against the Seahawks, then the Dolphins, then the Bills. We'll see if he's there for the Bills. Such a TVD but you know minus uh, you know, twenty five minutes of football on Sunday, the Giants looked like a total disaster.
To turn it around right out of the gate. Coming off with that, you lose Saquon Barkley.
Uh.
I like Matt Brida. It's a major step down from Saquon. Their whole offense is built around Saquon, and it's kind of just like another.
Like Matt Brita.
You what, I like Brita. You still don't like him much. They're still Yeah, you got Gary Brightwell and Eric Ray if that's your cup of team.
Matt Brida is not an old man or anything.
How old he's been around about forty years at this point.
He bounced around many teams. You are correct, but he is only twenty eight and seven.
Joe Morris, I mean, what else? Who else can we extra.
And two years old or something?
I think it's a difference that you in the Browns, for instance, that we saw Jerome Ford and they were really excited about jerom Ford in the preseason, and we saw two special runs. He also had a run that should have been like an eight yard loss and he ends up having a nice gain on it. The Giants have one of the most lackluster backup running back rooms, I think in the league, so they could even look to pick someone else up. But it's Danny Dimes time.
It's time for the passing game to really carry them. And I gotta say, I know it was against the Cardinals, but I was quite encouraged by his performance in that game. I think it was one of the best games of his career just in terms of the amount of really high quality throws he made. I don't know if he can back that up week after week, but it was encouraging considering the way this season had started, because they're gonna need that passing game to carry them now, or
else they could be one and four. I mean, like the over under on them winning those three games is what one win out of those three games.
I think a Giants fan will tell you, and as dark as hour, he will admit, just give me one, keep my season afloat.
Get to two and three, Yeah, are not that reasonable?
From what I recall in my.
Life, Danny dives he's back. Joe Burrow suffered or aggravated that calf injury suffered originally in training camp. Bengals head coach Zach Taylor, you know, he was pretty open he wasn't sure whether Burrow will be on the field in Week three against the Rams. Here's Zach's that's hard to say right now.
You know, I did it really one of the last three plays of the game, probably so just sore we have done anything on the field yet.
All right, this is this is tough. Now, let's I want to check out this Bengals schedule because I think the move and I know fantasy heads don't want to hear this, and Bengals fans don't want to hear us. I think you got to shut this guy down for a few weeks and see if you can get this thing taken care of before it blows your season. In the second half, they have homing the Rams, then they have.
Y don't want to hear that. They're the Monday night football game next week.
I know these primetime games are getting dinged a little bit with these injuries. Rams at home at Tennessee at Arizona. I'm telling you today's September eighteenth, or taping this game. I'm keeping Burrow out of the lineup until October fifteenth v. Seahawks. That's just me. I'm very concerned about this injury. It's going to be something if they don't really give it the proper time. I don't think it ever heals, and it's it could blow up their whole season. It's kind of a worst case scenario.
It is, but it's like, you know what, you know, what they already did was give them that amount of time to heal from it. It's like, uh, and when he injured it, you know, there were people saying that he had the kind of a sleeve on his calf already, like something had already happened to him.
He alluded to that that, yeah, that he was already fighting through it every day that he got hurt.
So I think so you can unless doctors are saying it's one of those things, well it can't get worse if you play on it. But I don't think that's how calves work. You could rip the thing, or god forbid, the Achilles goes and then all of a sudden, we're talking in an even darker world, It's just one of those injuries. The calf is a tricky one for a professional athlete, and I'd be super nervous in the Midwest.
And it's it's sort of, you know, over the couple weeks of the season, it's it's just yet another team where their destiny just teeters on the brink, on the edge, because it was I kind of was like listening to people saying, like in the lead up to the season, like, oh, we don't know about Burrow's calf, and it's like, well, isn't he healthy, Like he's like not on the injury report, he's fine, like like probably he'll be okay, and like uh bang out of the gate, like he's hobbling after
that loss, and it's just like, man, this thing could go so far south. And it's like you take him out of the mix. And the Bengals are a five win team and they already didn't look good with him in the lineup.
Right, I mean their offense has struggled with him in there you have Jake Browning. This was something I was hammering over and over in the preseason that I didn't understand why they would go into the season with Browning v Simeon, who just both looked terrible, terrible in the preseason. And honestly, it might have been a little canary in the cold mine there because they were playing with the starters at some point and they couldn't move the ball with t Higgins and Chase, so maybe it was more
of a systemic thing. But Burrow talked after the game and he just sounded so downbeat and it's so unlike him, and it was so different than how he sounded after week one, where he was very defiant after week one, saying like, basically, I'm gonna be great and this we just got to work through this. And then after week two he's saying, I need to get some sleeps. I really can't tell how this is gonna be. You could tell he was down about it.
Yeah, I mean, it's got to be hugely frustrating because it was something he thought was in the rear view and for it now to pop back up at a time when the team is struggling. I think he just feels, I would imagine, in a vulnerable, frustrated spot. His rival,
his greatest rival is Patrick Mahomes. There is nothing negative to report around Mahomes on this Monday night because the superstar quarterback in the Kansas City Chiefs agreed to terms on a restructured deal that pays the QB two hundred and ten point six million between now and the twenty twenty six season. That's the most in history over a four year span. According to rap Sheet and the Pell Raiser, the agreement could reach two hundred and eighteen million with
escalators by the end of twenty six. And here's the thing that's kind of interesting about this one, Gregy two hundred and ten all guaranteed over four years, and the deal, the original Mega deal is basically done. It's basically ripped up. So it went from him having eight years left on his deal with the Chiefs to three, which really opens the door wide open for the New York Jets. Let's start from that angle.
Yeah, I didn't think stop. He surprised me. It's like, I've got my door key contract point to make and then you hit me with that. It's funny because he said it effectively ends after twenty twenty six, but that's unofficially. Officially, it like goes on beyond that. But it's like these weird ghost dummy years that I'm not totally smart enough
to fully understand. But they did similar stuff with Drew Brees and Tom Brady in the sense that like, we're gonna have control of you, even though we know we have to make you a new contract at the point you're not actually gonna have any chance to get to the open market. But this was a bigger deal than I expected because it's all guaranteed. It gives him more
control sooner in the deal. And I guess it's that point we talked about when he first signed it, that at some point they're gonna have to fix him and make him the highest paid guy again. And it only took a few years until he was like, I'm sick of playing against this dirt bag in Cleveland that has fifty million dollars more guaranteed. And then now like five other quarterbacks have more guaranteed than me. It's time. I'm just saying that contract. Let's not forget that contract.
I just like I would have had a if I owned a house, I would have wagered the fact that there was no way he was just gonna sit pat in that ten year deal or whatever it was, you know, year after year, and just it's of course this was gonna happen, and like I try to, you know, with all the white noise we're dealing with left and where like in this league, like the contract stuff, cool, you got richer, you deserve it, have a nice day, doesn't affect me.
One of my least favorite recurring storylines I've said it on this podcast for the last three years, has been has been the handwringing about, look how underpaid Patrick Mahomes is relative to these other quarterbacks, like these contracts. He signed a ten year deal, but it wasn't like we were revisiting it in twenty thirty. They always make adjustments, they always change it. And look now, yeah, look at all the digital links spilled.
Wait, it's it's because it's like a salary cap. It's it's it's it's socialism inside of a free market enterprise. People like the most American thing of all is capping these dollars. It's the same reason why Lebron James and Jalen Brown make the same amount of money. It's like, you can't give Lebron James any more money.
Well, that's that's a whole broken league over there.
But that's essentially what this league is. The top ten quarterbacks all make basically the same amount of money because like, you can't even go any further.
No, I would say, like Jalen Brown, that would be like, I don't know Jimmy Garoppolo being the highest paid player in the league.
Right, but Rudy Gobert makes that money too. It's like it's totally it's totally ridiculous, but that's that's Jimmy Garoppolo. Dan at one point was the highest paid player in the NFL.
See how I made that point for you.
It was before Patrick Mahomes.
Remember when Joe Flacco got his big payday, right, he was to Joe Flacco, He went to McDonald's after signing his big mega deal. He's just an average Joe.
Sold by the way I saw Joe Flacco in person. I think I told you this couple of times, like during the New York uh Super Bowl with the snowfall coming down on that Monday morning after and Joe Flacco exited the hotel where I was staying, and it was like, in my impression of Joe Flacco was kind of dull, boring, but in person, like dashing far taller than you'd expect, commands a presence like all these like mid tier looking quarterbacks like in person are like five times more.
Like we've heard the Mark has decided Joe Flacco is hot now.
Story I don't, yeah, but you know what, he was just striking. He's not alone. There's actually a subculture on Twitter of like Baltimore people who just like post pictures of Joe Flacco, like at the local McDonald's, because he's
just like always around, walking around to different Donalds. A lot of maybe it's i'm I'm I had McDonald's on the brain, but it's just like random places in Baltimore where he's hanging out and he's like really casual and he's kind of looking more like a surfer now, and it's just and it's all these I think, Uh, I think he's popular. I think he's popular with the ladies.
Well, he's probably gonna be the Jets quarterback in three weeks, so maybe he'll get a haircut, maybe he won't. We'll see the you know, speaking of storylines that need to go away, I don't need to be talking about cam Akers and the rams too much. Longer acres. You know, he disobeyed the culture or something for Los Angeles and was taken out of the lineup last week, and this coming after the drama last season, and there was a culture disobeyment then as well, and the culture needs to
be adhered to and blah blah blah. So NFL Networks Ian Rapaport reports that the Rams have had trade talks centered around running back cam Acres, which we heard last year as well. No trade last year. And guess what, I don't imagine any team is gonna want a malcontent on their team anyway, so he'll probably just get released in a couple of days.
Well, they did a bad job by who ever you know, leaked all this cultural reporting. Why let that get out there about this so called malcontent before you try to shop him for what like a tube of chapstick. I'm not sure we were gonna return. He had twenty nine yards on twenty two carries in Week one? What is the asking price?
Well, maybe the Giants would they give up a seventh round pick that could upgrade to a sixth round pick if he had two hundred carries, or even just swap seventh round picks so that the Rams don't have to have the embarrassment of cutting this guy. But you're right, Mark because that sideline report. I hope all the teams know about that sideline report of like whatever the culture thing was, I think it was that he didn't you have to pledge allegiance to the Rams when you walk in.
It's this whole thing about Les Snead and McVeigh and and he didn't do that when he walked into the building. Mcveig McVeigh tried to say afterwards, Oh, no, it was nothing. We just thought it was best for the team. He's been great. It's like no one, no one's believing you.
You have this little bent the culture. If you this up bad I do not follow our culture, you will be eliminated. Something like that.
Kyrone Williams Fantasy owners, let's go two big games.
I mean, if I'm gonna give up like a Day three draft pick for a running back in today's NFL, I'm gonna go get Jonathan Taylor for a fifth I mean, that's just me. In other news, here's some injury quick injury stuff before we say.
Goodbye Brown's Jonathan Taylor. That would be kind of spacey.
Anthony Richardson and Jalen Waddle Colts quarterback Dolphins wide receiver both in concussion protocol. They have to clear that to play. In week three, we shall see a lines running back David Montgomery. He's out a few weeks. What did he get hurt? What was his malady?
It was a quad injury and he told reporters in the locker room, Yeah, it's gonna take a couple of weeks. And then Dan Campbell went on the podium like twenty minutes later and was said he's day to day. So that's that's one team that like they haven't gotten the injury messaging across to their players because David Montgomery was just being honest, but David Dan Campbell was not right.
He just he walked up to the assembled media. So I got an odd quad. James Houston, their pass rusher, out six long weeks, and Halo Vytai may go to two injured reserve.
So they only have their defense, which you know looked improved against the Chiefs. A lot of questions coming out of the Seahawks game. One sack on the year, You've you've lost Houston, Charles Harris decent player, You've got the Aquaro brother Julian and Romeo are brothers as pass rushers on this team. That's an unusual scenario. That was news
to me. But you're kind of thin there, like, and I thought they didn't really they had a chance where they're playing the Seahawks on Sunday with two backup tackles and didn't impact the game much. So I don't love that for Detroit. Like I I'm a little concerned about the depth at edge.
All right. Also, the Cardinals were without Buddha Baker, their best defensive player on Sunday against the Giants, and get used to it because he's headed to injured reserve with a hamstring injury. He'll be eligible to return Week seven against the Seahawks. And finally an injury news Eagles cornerback of Ante Maddox he'll undergo surgery for a torn peck. That's never a good thing. Many times it will cost
you the season. Also, this is a bad one. Chauncey Gardner Johnson, the man who started the blue mask Troit trend in Detroit, he is out in definitely with a potentially torn pictorial is the report. NFL Network Insarder's Rappaport and Garafolla reported Monday night. Monday night he could miss the rest of the season as well Ouchers. He's an important part of what they do and a leader in that locker room. And finally, I don't know how plugged in people are on this, but in our town where
we live, it is a Mondo deal. There are a couple of different strikes going on right now that have completely shut down the entertainment industry and because of that, networks and streamers and everyone else are scrambling for content and things to put on the air this fall. Well, ABC, they shrugged their shoulders and they're just gonna put the entire Monday night football slate on their I guess, you know Channel seven where I grew up there, so their
network channel. I feel like the ESPN's like, hey wait a second, that sucks. But I guess maybe they get the ratings.
I don't know, right I was thinking like if they're gonna do this and it's the same company, it's like the same you know, four companies that own the entire world, Like, why not just do this the whole time? You could have just had Monday night football. I'm sure it's doing better than you know, the repeats of Elias. I can't think of an ABC show. Was that a show.
I haven't watched an ABC show since the Wonder Years, so let me see ABC hit shows.
Dan, I grew up with Anatomy too, Gray's Anatomy, Like I grew up a Channel seven too. I just wondered, like I was just thinking this, like reading all this, it's like, uh, how many What is the subset of people that if you are attached to cable, which everyone has been for forty years at this point, that you don't have ESPN but you do have ABC. I feel like there's more people that have ESPN and don't care about ABC or have ABC. It feels like a weird uh. I don't know who you're what subs.
Let's bring the satellite back. Let's bring they are kind of coming back. I don't know if you know this. We're bringing it back, Dan, satellite. This is people. People are buying the old Bunny ears and you don't have to pay anything. You just buy the years. You put them up and you can watch some Jake Browning versus The Rams next Monday night. Cool.
Here's some ABC shows. I mentioned an Anatomy, Blackish, I think that's still a show that was that was a hit. Abbot Elementary, that's got good pop. I watched one app it was.
Fine Colleen, Colleen Loves and Keisha Love Abbot Elementary. That that that trip to Tybee, it was like all Abbot Elementary and I fell for it too. I'm a fan. I didn't follow it up after that weekend, but I was a fan.
I I believe it's set in like Philadelphia, so that that I'm sure factors and as well. Apparently America's Funniest Home Videos Mark is still in the air. There's a show, those videos are still funny. Oh the Bachelor, that's a big one.
That's their big Yeah, that makes sense, that's a big I think Elias is set to come back. Jennifer Garner two point zero. Let's do it.
And I guess wonder years is back on again is that they've rebooted it.
They did reboot it.
No, you don't say new situation.
Great, that's great. That's what we do now. We don't have new ideas anymore. We just reboot good idea is from thirty years ago and try to pass them off.
And where society is at big funk in our chat here, lets us know there's a trend of gen z on TikTok using paper clips or staples even as antennas on their TV and they can make it happen. That sounds like a fun thing.
Aren't you plucky underdogs? And also Funk says it actually just got canceled.
Wonder years I believe is gone. I mean everything's getting canceled. I'm glad we're not canceled.
Well just wait, everybody's number gets called eventually. All right, uh, weird night. I hope you're okay, Nick Chubb, I know you're not okay right now. Let's get him back on the field week one next year, Adrian Peterson style Peterson's style, and and that would be nice. And we'll be back on Wednesday with the Great Colleen Wolf. And check out our NFL Plus game of the week which was Falcons Packers. And it's all coming up again around the bend.
Be the call. H