Scott Sloan show back Friday morning seven hundred Wow, not just any Friday morning. We lead off and will not bury the lead this morning the big store, of course, super Bowl sixty coming up Levi Stadium in San Francisco six thirty. By the way, on Sunday, the pregame started I think three weeks ago, if not mistaken, Seattle and the Patriots in a rematch from well over a decade ago. Patriots won that one on a I believe it was
the Malcolm Butler interception game is what that was. And this time around Seattle favored by four and a half points, and the total by day total points lois total since twenty fifteen set at forty five and a half on this and more is the living legend himself, the voice of your Bengals. That would be our good friend Dan Horde, Dan welcome, how are you? Everything is well here in Cincinnati, Ohio where I am. I don't know what sunny climbs
you're in right now. Probably still you're on a beat somewhere with a my tie.
You just cut out there. I didn't hear it.
Sorry, I'm sorry about that. I said, you're probably on a beach somewhere with a my tie.
Right, I wish. Unfortunately that is not the case. You know, we both have Upstate New York in our background, having lived in the Buffalo area. When I moved to Cincinnati, I thought I was moving through a tropical paradise, and more often than not, the weather here is quite mild. But this winter winter is kicking my tail. Unlike you, I do not enjoy shoveling.
I don't mind it. I got the snowblower that broke, and I'm working with broken. So I'm thinking about getting a plow for my truck because I got a couple of properties. I got to take care of them. Like, maybe I get a ply She think I should want a.
Plow, Dan, I think you should get a plow, and I will give you my address. I've got a big day and I appreciate if you would make regular visits.
I mean, my wife told me, she said, you know, I tell her about it. I'm like, I'm doing the math. I'm like yeah, I'm like, for you know, a couple two three years pay for itself. And she's like, I know you You're gonna go plow everybody's driveway. Your plow ours and you'll go do all your friends, will do all the neighbors, and you're not. It's not going to pay for itself. You're going to wear it out because
you like doing this stuff, because you're stupid. I said, you know what, that is the best analysis I think you've ever offered me in the last year. That she's spot on too.
I do everybody so her she's very wise. However, what she didn't say is that all of those friends whose driveways you are about to shovel when you get this plow are going to love you even more than they already do. And what's more important than.
That that's true? Well, I mean I get certainly I abuse them, and so the karma comes back and I'll have all all evens out even I'll never have to buy a drink again for the rest of the year. It'll be fantastic. Let's get in the super Bowl. The biggest star of the Super Bowl, Dan of course is and I'm sure people are hanging on this your take on the Bad Bunny halftime show.
I have no problem with Bad Bunny performing, and I don't understand why this is a controversy. Right, he is a huge international star. I don't care that he apparently sings some of his songs in Spanish. I mean, I'd never really listened to Bad Bunny. But why is this such a big deal. I mean, the NFL has been trying to pick popular acts for at least the last ten years or so. Prior to that, I think they
went for the old time legends. But they're trying to appeal to a younger audience by picking acts that you know, younger folks listen to. Now clearly they're listening to Bad Bunny. Why is that a controversy? It actually kind of annoys me.
Yeah, I'm with you on it. I mean, I think I know one of his songs. I can't say I'm a huge Bad Bunny fan that I'll go and download his music because of this.
I won't.
But it's fifteen minutes and it's time for me to go to the bathroom anyway, because I'm watching the games and commercials. You can't take a break. The only time I could take a break is halftime. I got to go my blatters full and I'm old. If you look at the TV ratings, which are still a thing, NFL is still in the top one hundred, like most of the top one hundred shows are NFL football games.
Yeah, yeah, the top ninety.
The top one hundred, right, And you can't get any more saturated. You cannot get any more market share in the United States than you already are with the NFL. So the only way to expand and make more money is to go intional to Latin America. And so you put bad Baby on, who's a Grammy winner, who also is the most streamed artist. It's a slam dug. It's not about you know, old white people in America watching football anymore. It's about women, it's about young people. It's
about emerging markets. That's why they're doing this.
You know, Bad Bunny is hosted Saturday Night Live. That's my only exposure to Bad Bunny, and he was funny. He was good on Saturday Night Live. So, like you, I don't know how closely I'll be watching the halftime show. That's a great opportunity to head to the kitchen and store up on another round of unhealthy food, which is
what I do best during the Super Bowl. But I'm sure I'll catch some of it, and who knows, maybe some of the people that are so offended by the fact that he's going to perform at halftime, will come around and say, you know what, that guy's.
Not that bad, or they'll turn around and watch Kid Rock and Lee Greenwood or whatever that is, and it's an opportunity, you know, or the Puppy Bowl or whatever the hell it is. I don't know. I'm here to watch football and commercials in that order, by the way, and probably one of the very few times, Dan, you get to actually just a I don't watch a football game without putting your Bengals hat on. So let's get at it. Seattle and New England. I think the big
question here is Drake May. Which Drake May shows up? He has not been good in the playoffs. That's a huge problem going to this for the Patriots.
I think that's the big question for both teams, right, I mean, will Sam Donald turn into a pumpkin? Sam Donald actually accounted for more turnovers than any other quarterback in the NFL this year during the regular season twenty when you add up his interceptions and his bumbles, and then Drake May, as you pointed out, has had some shaky moments in the postseason. He's fumbled six times in the playoffs. So which of those two guys makes a
couple of big mistakes that hurts their team. I think that that ultimately could be the key to the game.
Well, we saw Donald in the NFC Championship performance against the Rams, and they're very aggressive in the co And you know, I guess the question is does he reverted to his second half struggles against New England. Was that a one off in the NFC Championship game or was he able to maybe turn that worm turned a little bit for him? We'll find out.
Yeah, he was awesome in that game. That might have been his best game all year. I'll say this for Sam Donald, I've been a skeptic really for two years now. He led the Vikings to fourteen wins last year, he led Seattle to fourteen wins this year. Now, he had the benefit of really good defenses on both of those teams. But still I think he's the only quarterback other than
Tom Brady to ever do that. That's pretty impressive. So I guess at some point we have to say, you know what, maybe that Donald guy is pretty good after all.
All right, So who's less questionable for you then, Drake may or Sam Donald.
I probably still have more doubt about Sam Donald. But I still think Seattle will win, just because Seattle is the better overall team and much more battle tested. The NFC was vastly superior to the AFC as a conference this year, and Seattle was in a division where two
other teams won twelve games. I mean, they made it through the NFC West with the Rams and the forty nine ers, and at the end of the day, with the number one seed in the NFC, they went fourteen and three, and their schedule was much tougher than New England. New England's had one of those years where everything seemed to fall right into their credit. You still got to go out and win those games, and they beat good teams in the playoffs. But Seattle, week after week, it's
facing really good teams and beating them. I find it hard to imagine that Seattle's going to lose. The one thing that kind of creeps into the back of my mind is the fact that the underdog is one four out of the last five Super Bowls. So strange things happen on Super Bowls Sunday. But I still think Seattle's going to win.
Yeah, And if you look at like even the last three, well, how you can go back to like the last five years their record is, you know, they're twelve and four and twenty twenty nine, couple nine and eighties and ten and seven. This season they come out and it feels like New England. Dan, It was like the Bengals when we went to the Super Bowl, right, you know, they're terrible and all of a sudden, nowhere they just go
on a heater, they go on a run. And we saw the Bengals, as you know, in that Super Bowl against the Rams, a blank of an eye. It could have been a Bengals world championship had had things fall into place, because it was literally an eyelash away from winning that football game and they didn't. Lost by three. But it reminds me the New England team come out of nowhere, reminds me of the Bengals.
Yeah, they did basically the exact same thing. The year before the Bengals went to the Super Bowl in twenty twenty one, they won four games. That was what the Patriots did. They've done from four wins to a division title and an appearance in the Super Bowl. Maybe unlike the Bengals, they're able to win one more game and add another freaking Super Bowl to the wall in New England. That doesn't annoy me at all, but we'll see, you know, Seattle to me is the better team on both sides
of the ball, so I'll think they'll win. And part of that I think influencing my decision is when the Bengals played the Patriots this year, New England won, but they didn't play very well march down in that game, Drake May threw a pick six, they settled for a bunch of field goals inside the red zone. They won because the Bengals couldn't cover tight ends really for the entire year. And Hunter Henry Hunter Henry had one hundred
and fifteen receiving yards in that game. But New England didn't allow me seeing them, you know, in person, So that probably has a big impact on my thought that they're going to lose the game as well.
Yeah, that and that spread feels about right to me. Dan Horde, voice of the Bengals. Chopping up the Super Bowl on Sunday six thirty, We'll have it for you here, Super Bowl sixty on seven hundred WLW if you can't watch it on TV. And the other thing I'm going to look up front two is what is Will Campbell the rookie, how he holds up against that interior pressure Seattle has because the throw stunts at the highest rate in the league, and that's gonna be kind of overwhelming.
That's a whole different ballgame for him. It's interesting because adding now, Drake may can certainly scramble for sure, but you can't only do that so much before it comes back to bite you. We'll see how that that part of the line holds up for them.
He's the left tackle. He was helped off the field in Cincinnati, got injured in that game. It looked at the time like it might be season ending. Fortunately for the Patriots, Campbell was able to come back and return. But since he's been back, he hasn't been very good. So we'll see. I agree with you, I think that's going to be a key matchup in the game.
All right on this side of it? Should should New England copy what like the Rams tried to do attack in Seattle with a lot of those in routes and going after the zone really really hard in Typically an NFL team will look at that, watch the film and go, uh, we got to try and figure out if our personnel can execute like the Rams because they're pretty close.
Listen to you, listen to you going all collins Worth nowt.
I mean you you can if you watch it right, you're like, okay, you just basically it's like anything, if it works, you try to replicate it and build office. That's what they're going to do.
That is correct. Yeah, the Patriots are certainly going to look at things that work for the Rams and try to incorporate some of them. Now, the Rams have Puka Nakoa Natua and DeVante Adams and the Patriots don't have weapons like that. I think the Patriots are going to rely on the running game more than the Rams did
in the NFC Championship game. But sure, anytime you see a team have success, you try to find some of those things that apply to your team, you know, when you compare the personnel and see if you can use some of those things to your advantage.
Yeah, and yeah, we can talking much about well Sam Darnold, but Seattle's offense they can beat you a whole bunch of different ways.
Kenneth Walker is awesome, the beast. They call him K nine. He's a great running back. Now, they were able to share the load during the course of the season with Zach Charboney. He's hurt, he won't play in the Super Bowl, so puts more of the load on Walker. But that might be a good thing. I think he's tremendous. He might be top two or three in the NFL and yards after catch, once you get the ball in his hands,
he's electric. And that's going to be a real key for New England in this game because he's the type of guy that could easily put up you know, one hundred and fifty combined rushing and receiving yards.
Right, what about the special teams factor? Do you think that could make a difference in this game? Because you know, you think, all right, Sam Darnold, Drake May, you know, two guys at not the best quarterbacks in the league, certainly not. You know, there was MVP talk for Drake May. That's over at this point. Did this come down a special teams play or Seattle? Just do you see this like as a blowout?
I don't see it as a blowout. Special teams could be a factor. The Patriots have a rookie kicker that could be you know, significant in a Super Bowl. Maybe the collar gets a little bit tight. We'll see. You know, I don't have that circle as like this game is going to come down to a field goal, but I do think it's going to be relatively close, and who knows, you know, maybe a rookie kicker in that moment does not deliver. Yeah.
I keep thinking back to that the Bengals Super Bowls, like, well, that was very close to went by field goal for crying out loud, and could have been the Bengals ball game. If and when we're able to complete a pass there with you just need to you just replay it over in your head, right, you need a quarter more of a second and it's a touchdown. But yeah, of course it feels like the same game.
It's a really good point because what did that game ultimately come down to. Yep, the Bengals inability to protect Joe Burrow when they had to in the second half. I mean, Aaron Donald wrecked that game. And the Patriots offensive line against this great Seattle defense, that's the biggest matchup in this game. Seattle is number one in the NFL in scoring defense, number one in rushing defense. They're
really good at getting after the quarterback. Drake May got shacked a lot, he'll hold onto the ball, not unusual for second year QB. So that's going to be a huge key on Sunday.
Yeah, well, we'll see how plays out too. As an AFC guy, we're both AFC guys to watch Drake May And I'm just curious and I think the strength of schedule criticism is valid and Mike put into context their playoff offensive struggles. I just want to see, like this is a good test, and I think next season I need a whole nother season to watch Drake made it to see if he's a real deal.
Well, he's the eighth quarterback to make the Super Bowl in the second year of his career, so that's good. Companies on the list with Joe Burrow, Tom Brady, Dan Marino, Ben Roethlisberger, so his career is obviously off to a great start. I'm buying Drake May. You know, I think there's a tremendous draft pick. That quarterback draft is looking better and better. Caleb Williams was the first pick. He was great for the Bears this year. Jayden Daniels was
the second pick. He was incredible last year and then got hurt this year, and then he had Drake may come after that. So I think all three of those teams are really happy with their choice. And Drake may is the first of the three to get to a Super Bowl.
Yeah, no question. Then there's always guys like I don't know, Sam Bradford and Baker Mayfield. So we'll see where he ends up. I mean, you know he's going to be in the league for a while, that's for dang sure. So Super Bowl Sunday it is sixered. What is a food of choice? And don't tell me toast by the way, when you're sitting back, kicking back and just watching the games of fan, don't hit me while I'm gonna have I'm having a toast buffet.
You know how I love toast. I know you're going to be at the grand opening of my Toast restaurant the Coast of the Town. I know you're very excited about that bread bread that's their slogan. On Super Bowl Sunday, I will be beginning my day with some toast as I begin every day. I'm definitely a toast for breakfast kind of guy. But you know, when the Super Bowl arrives, I gotta have wings. You know, we both have Buffalo in our past, in a Buffalo area in our past.
So even though I miss Western New York wings as opposed to Cincinnati wings, I like Cincinnati wings, but they try to make them too healthy. Here. Everybody's baking their wings, you know. I want deep fried, I want a christy edge. But in many cases, yes, there will be wings at my Super Bowl spread.
What do you have a spot? Do you mind plugging like you do? Since he light, I.
Will probably be getting Eli's barbecue wings. I did that last year for the Super Bowl and they were excellent, so I think that's probably what we're doing good. Matt.
I am a huge, huge Eli's Wings fan. I think they're among the best. If you can get to the West Side and get to to well to Mike's that's a different story, but I would say Eli's is definitely definitely up there. Definitely up there. Shooters is okay, but I'm an Eli's guy for sure, unless I'm making my own. But you can't get the big wings like you get in a restaurant. That's a hard but all like like pigeon wings. I hate that. I need some meat. I need some meat on I don't have.
A deep Yeah, I don't have a deep fryer, so I don't make my own. And at Eli's they're not deepried either, but they're really really good. Oh, Tavern's got great ones or town. Look, Tavern's got really good one. So I've got some good offs all right on the east side of town. But I'm leaning Eli's cheese or ranch. Oh blue cheese. God, yeah, this is don't insult me. This ain't Cleveland, I insinuating. Dan Horde, the Voice of
the Bengals. Always love chatting with my man. Thanks so much for jumping on this morning, and uh we'll talk again soon, Dono, thanks for having me on you Well, toast.
And wings sounds like, uh, that sounds awful. Actually together, I have the wings. I'll skip the toast. Sloaney Home of the best Bengals coverage, Home of the Super Bowl six thirty. We got the game for you here on seven hundred WW Cincinnati