Colin Cowherd Podcast - Matt Mosley on McCarthy Credit, Niners Matchup

One of my favorite people, the incomparable Matt Mosley, will be joining me in about ten minutes. Two things to talk about, as I always start with an opening rant on the Colin Coward Podcast. So, Lebron James has been complaining about out officiating recently this year a lot, and he tweeted the other day his quote was, all they keep telling me to my face on the court. I didn't see it. It wasn't a foul. It's not making sense to me, seriously, Lebron said, frustrating as hell. Anyway,

keep going, squad. So the Lakers bigger problem why they're losing close games is because they can't shoot. I think they're twenty fourth in the NBA and three point percentage, I'm close. And this has been a problem in the organization for a decade. As everybody else has moved into the three point shot. The Lakers gave up guys like KCP and Kyle Kuzma who could actually hit three point shots, and they brought in Russell Westbrook, the worst three point shooter.

So this is on them. If they shot better, they win more close games, they wouldn't worry about officiating as much. And also, because basketball is a seven game series, singular calls can't be blamed for losing a series. But I thought about I watched the Tim Donnege special on I think Netflix the other day about you know, he was the rogue official that he didn't change winners and losers. He simply got teams into the bonus faster so they would they would hit the over, the over and under.

He said he can manipulate a game by about six points, but he didn't. He claims he didn't change outcomes, just the total points. So be that as it may. In my life of being a sportscaster, the sport that is constantly under attack is basketball, and I think there's a reason for it. So MLS, NHL, Major League Baseball, NFL. Many of the calls are, say, objective offsides, you're out

at first. What is the most difficult call in football for an official, The one we complain most about, pass interference. In basketball, ninety five sent of the calls are essentially pass interference. Two great athletes leaving their feet, one trying to score, one trying to defend, sometimes seeking one ball. It's hard to officiate. It's a really difficult sport to officiate. Hockey, soccer, football,

you're clearly offsides, too many men on the field. Even the objective calls in basketball three in the key is never truly three in the key. Even goaltending, you have to in a split second judge the arc of a ball still ascending or now going down. So in college this is not really analogous, but in college I officiated innermurals and I took it seriously. I made eight bucks a game. It paid for some of my college books.

My parents were divorced, didn't have a lot of money, so I officiated two in three games a night make twenty five bucks. Thirty years ago, that was something and one of the things I took it really seriously, and one of the things I noticed almost immediately was in basketball, the better the athlete, the more they can manipulate you with body control. And I think it's more difficult for athletes to do that in other sports. You know, a catcher can frame a ball to a strike, but umpires

are pretty keen on that is that. I found myself always giving better players the call. They're quicker, they get a first step. The less athletic players always a step behind reaching in. The better players have better body control, they can manipulate you. And I remember thinking when I was doing this, because for a brief time in my life, I thought about officiating, being a college basketball official, a

pro basketball official. I was twenty one. You know, I knew I wanted to be a broadcaster, but you know, you're thinking about things to what to do with your life. And I remember thinking very early, is man, I'm always giving the best players the calls. It's hard to avoid it. And so I think when players complain about this, this is why basketball pro basketball, the best team always wins. In college basketball, the best team usually wins, but all

it takes is a star player. In march madness, getting into foul trouble off a couple of quick fouls, and the best team doesn't have their best player in basketball. Like last year in the NBA Finals, the Warrior shot forty four and a half percent in the finals. The Celtics shot forty three and a half percent in the finals, and that was the difference. The Warriors, by a slight margin, were able to shoot a slightly better percentage, and that's the difference over the course of six or seven games

winning the championship inches not feet. So when I look at people complaining about basketball officiating, I've been doing this for thirty years. It's always the professional sport we complain most about. And I worried about when sports scambling legalize in America. This is what would transpire, every gambling loss, every gambling degenerate claiming, well, it's rigged. There's too much money in the sport for that. I just think sometimes

add context to sports basketball. Somebody listening to me right now is a college official, and it's very likely a person listening to me because I see my downloads. I know how many people download and listen to this podcast. There's probably five or six people listening that officiate college basketball and football, and if you asked them what was harder? Now you have more ground to cover in football. Basketball's hard.

These are the world's best athletes battling for basketballs. Twitchy leaping, it's past interference every play. It's really really hard, and I think by and large, NBA officials do an excellent job. The Lakers issue. They don't have any easy baskets. They don't get any easy threes. Therefore, those critical near the basket calls become very punitive when they don't get them. They don't get a lot of easy baskets. Teams that

shoot poorly don't. So I saw where the Chargers decided to keep Brandon Stalely and instead fire their offensive coordinator and their passing game coordinator. I rolled my eyes at it because seven of the eight remaining head coaches in the NFL playoffs, seven of eight are offensive coaches. Last year, all seven NFC teams that made the playoffs had offensive coaches. Folks, It's not an offensive coordinator issue for the Chargers. It's

a defensive head coach issue. If you go look at the Chargers first and second half splits, they were a horrible second half team offensively and defensively. What does that tell you? It tells you they have a young coach who is struggling once off the script, game time decisions, situational play calling. They're a bad second half offense. How they have Justin Herbert, Keenan Allen, Mike Williams, Austin Eckler, above average offensive line. I went and looked at the

second half offensive numbers for the Chargers. Their bottom six in the league. The other five teams surrounding them are all anemic at quarterback. Justin Herbert is the only top ten quarterback in the league that is in the bottom of second half offensive statistics. That's not your offensive coordinator, that's your coach. The only defensive coach left in the playoffs is Sean McDermott. He can't figure out the Bill's

old line for five years. Their run game is not substantial outside of Josh Allen, and Alan has regressed as a quarterback since Brian Dable left. It's a defensive organization and culture, I mean the Chargers. Sometimes you have to take a deep breath and look at how a business landscape is changing. Football now is rewarding offensive head coaches and offensive cultures. Look at the Patriots. Bill Belicheck feels

out of touch. Bears defensive coach, last place, Washington defensive coach, last place, Jets defensive coach, last place, Houston defensive coach, last place, Chargers. You made a mistake. You could have hired Brian Davile. You hired Brandon Staley. And my sources tell me at times he can be a notable. At times he can be stubborn. They basically gave an ultimatum, make coaching changes or you're out. He made coaching changes, but I don't think in the end it will change anything.

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F six seven three six nine in New York, Tennessee Redline one hundred eight eight nine nine seven eight nine, Tennessee visits one eight hundred Gambler Dot in West Virginia. All right, I bring in my longtime friend Matt Moseley, co host of the Doomsday Podcast with Ed Werner. How is Ed? I haven't seen Ed in sometime. How is the old gent doing? Doing fine? Doing fine? Put in a full day of work on that playoff game, and certainly let me know about that. That was out there

for about twelve hours. So the man loves to get to a game early, stay late, and he was shutting it down with the Doomsday podcast from the from the stadium there with the ship with the pirate ship in it. Last night at about one or two in the morning, he was podcasting, So he's a he's still getting after so. Um. The bad news, let's just get that out of the way, is the Niners were done Saturday afternoon. The Cowboys have almost a two and a half day preparation debit going

into this game. I bet they're not happy about it. No, and I don't think it'll happen again. I do think the league will address it. But everybody, including people who are not with us anymore, Lamar Hunt being one of them, are looking down and think at the Cowboys over this because he fought for years thinking they had a Thanksgiving, you know, the whole Thanksgiving and how that went and how they got to be home every game on Thanksgiving.

That was a huge deal over the year. So some people think the Cowboys have been getting favors from the league for many, many years. So if one team needs to a franchise needs to suffer this fate, it should be the Dallas Cowboys. But I think in the future you won't see a team finish up more than forty eight hours before another team who's then coming to their place. I think the league will find a way not to

have that happen again. And I think it is somewhat of a factory and it provides it provides a built an excuse if the Cowboys lose to the great Brock Purdy. One of the things about Dallas, you know, I said this today in defense of Mike McCarthy, this is a top five offense in the league. Building the old line. Still don't have a clear number two. Tyron Smith out for most of the year, Dalton Schultzmith's two games and really wasn't good until post Thanksgiving. All that said, Aaron

Rodgers red zone poor, Aaron Rodgers offense poor. That divorced the more and more you look at it. Mike went four and one with Cooper f and Rush that it's easy because Aaron's on every commercial. He's a star quarterback, he's an MVP to weigh in on that breakup and favor Aaron. But I look at this season for Mike. They're playing their best football now. Dalton Schultz is now a real factor. I didn't think he was eight weeks ago.

Do you think has there been anything that you, Matt, have changed your opinion on regarding McCarthy this year where you may have been a tad cynical and you've come to appreciate him. Yeah, I think I was more than a tad cynical. Colin, you're being kind to me to say just a tad cynical. I don't know if really I ever had the full respect that I do now.

And you mentioned it. The Cooper Rush aspect of this weighs heavy on Jerry, and it weighs out everybody, and a lot of lately people are trying to figure out, Okay, what was going on with Dak I mean, what happened last night with the way Dak played was the enormous story coming out of this game. And I do think Mike McCarthy one thing he did, and I think he did a pretty good job with aaron of this boy. He takes care of his quarterbacks and he takes care

of the relationship. And early on when Dak had some injuries and was coming back from some things, there's some stories about Mike McCarthy going over to his house and spending hours upon hours with him. So he's sly, you know, it is funny. Sean Payton a guy you like a lot, and i've pretty pretty well over the years. He's a sexier choice. I mean, is he a better coach, Sure, sure he is, just because he's a brighter, more innovative

offensive mine. But McCarthy has sort of a way with these players, and I don't know if we ever fully give him credit for that. But I thought you saw it with a Cooper Rush thing, because on this very podcast, when they opened with that awful loss a deck injury, he was already playing poorly before the injury. It looked like there was no hope for this team. So who

else do you give a credit for? I mean, you gotta give us some to Cooper Rush, maybe to Kellen Moore for maybe the way he called some of these games, but Mike sort of presided over all of that, you know, and I think that's I think the thing that's been tough for him over the years is, you know, not calling plays because a lot of these guys is there a whole identity is tied up in that, and it's why sometimes we don't even know what the chiefs right.

It's like, wait, who wait, who's calling plays? Its Andy is? You know? Is bingemy? I mean, there's there's some debate because some of these head coaches have such a hard time giving that up. So there have been coaches for the Cowboys that have been told, okay, you're not doing anymore. Jason Garrett had taken away from him. McCarthy just said, you know what, this is what it requires of me to become the head coach there. I've got to give this up. And he's done a pretty good job with it.

And he's certainly you can't accuse the guy of micromanaging like you can, you know. I mean, he's he's got the laminated chart. He likes to fold it over, but he's not even like think about that. Last night we talk about how great Dak was. How did he start that game? Two? Three and out stories oh for three? He looks shaky, Akman, Sandy looks jittery. To him, it's not going well. And I think Mike McCarthy's just kind of like he's a stay the course kind of guy.

And I think that's, you know, for now, it seems like what the Cowboys need. You know, there's always been turbulence associated coaching the Cowboys that other coaches don't face. Your owner goes public every week you have more national TV games. Those are often game times are disrupted a lot of Sunday night, Monday night. It's a very you know, Jacksonville doesn't have to deal with that much. Dallas has to deal with at seven to eight times a year.

That's why there's now a limit on how many times you can play in primetime. It's the Cowboy rule. So the Cowboys don't have to have a night game. I know when the Giants had Eli manning and were pretty good for multiple stretches, I knew somebody inside the Giants he's like the organization hates these night games. We all get home at two. They're just r of all week. So Mike hasn't done himself favors through the years. You know, he's just you know, at the podium, he's pretty average.

And I think, you know what, I think Mike deserves a little more respect. I guess that's my takeaway. Yeah, I think I think you're onto something. And where he'll ultimately get it is if he wins this game. Oh my next next Sunday. Um. You know, I hear people say and I even heard Troy say something to the effect of, you know, Dallas is only measured on Super Bowls. Well, yeah, because of course Troy won three of those things. It's been so long. And you and I talked about this

before you go back to the nineteen nine season. They that's not how people think around here anymore. Cowboys win that game on the road, and it is winnable. That is a winnable game. Like I know, Brock Party's undefeated, but Brock Purty still a seventh round draft pick. Who's I mean his second playoff game. I mean that we can't just coordinate him and go like it act like I mean, is he surrounded by really good coaching and

really good players? You bet he is. But the Cowboys have a guy with seven years experience, twenty nine year old peak of his career, and the Cowboys have possibly one of the best schematic and one of the best defensive thinkers in the game on that side of the ball. I mean, if you want somebody to take on a rookie quarterback in disguise things, I mean, all you have to do is look at last night. Tom Brady was

just like baffled. I mean, and we can blame it all whatever, but he blame it on the offix line. But something happened to cause him to just that that weird. I mean, think about it. Think of all the people calling that game last night. They were trying to give him an excuse. Was he wanting the receiver to come back. Was he trying to throw the ball out of the out of bounds? He threw some kind of crazy ball in the red zone, you know, And so I think

that's a huge advantage for the Cowboys. Still, as much as I like rock Perty and by the way, I've watched him a ton because I watched a lot of Big twelve football, so I have a sort of a body of work to but I can't because I've watched him so much, I can't buy into They're just so good they're gonna kind of carry Brock with them. I think dan Quinn will have something for him in a big way on Sunday Afternoon. You watched a lot more

of him in college than I do. When I saw him, I thought he was talented, because Iowa State doesn't have nearly the talent of Baylor, TCU, Oklahoma Texas. So when I saw him, I thought of he's a gamer, average arm, but kind of a gamer, pretty athletic. Iowa State went into the tank without him this year, and that's with a good coach. So the knock on him was, and I didn't see enough of him to have an established opinion,

was that he was a little erratic. Yet with San Francisco, he's not a radic at all, So go back to him. There's a reason he fell to the seventh round. He's not a big guy, didn't have a huge arm. Was he an a ratic college quarterback? Yes, yeah, he was someone who elevated them in a lot of ways and had a great career. But the head scratching where in the world a debt turnover interception come from in the red zone was absolutely part of his back. That was

part of that was part of Rock Purty. And there's no Iowa State fan listening to us that doesn't know what I'm talking about. Now. Again, he had great moments. He here's what he was great at doing, and it has a little bit like dak At times he would fall down like twenty one nothing. I saw some of these Baylor games. It's like they had him and then Purty one by one. Now, of course he had some of those guys that are in the NFL now, like Kohler.

You know that, you know that tight end, Charlie Kohler. He had those guys. He had those big, huge tight ends. Those Iowa for some reason creates these monstrous tight ends. And so he was good. He would lead you in a comeback. But boy, the crippling mistake, even as he got way into his college career and it was a mature senior quarterback, still made some really bad mistakes. So it's in there now. They may be coaching around that

and think about it. You can think you've coached that out of somebody, and then it crops up seven eight years into their career. What happened with Dak the last seven weeks, although last night Dak was unbelievable. After being extremely shaky first two drives, he played arguably the best game of his entire Cowboys career. So Brett Mayer had a very good year. He had an awful night. And Mike Silver pointed this out. When kicking gets into a kicker's head, you don't turn around in a week and

become Jon stener Route or Morton Anderson. Is that these things It usually takes weeks. It's like a golfer when you get the yips. You don't fix it in a tournament. You got to go to your coach. You gotta slowly get it back. So if you go to his go back to his season and his Cowboy career, good kicker, pretty good leg. What do you think happened? Well, absolutely,

it got in his head. And we've even heard a story today that they lost a couple of what they call the k balls, the kicking balls, because he kicked them so poorly they ended up in the stands. They didn't even hit the net, and the Cowboys literally were down to one caball over there on the sidelines trying to figure out kind of like how to get through the game because for some reason they couldn't get the kick the kicks out of the stands. That's how bad

that was. He overcorrected on the hook, remember that. And then I mean, to miss that mini in a row is just unthinkable. Four and then of course the game before, so it was actually five. Dak was very nice after the game and said, hey, I've played horribly the week before. He'll be okay. But it has to be a concern. It has to be a concern. I mean, used to

you played in Candlestick the wind was going crazy. I don't know if that's the case really at Levi, but it's a huge concern for the Cowboys to somehow hopefully get him right. And how could you how could you feel great about your kicking game going into it? And I'll tell you this, you're talking about McCarthy earlier. He already is a guy who likes to go for it and has really bought into some of the fourth down analytics, and with knowing what this kicker's going through, I think

he'll lean into that even more. And you saw it last night. They get down there and it was fourth and four on like the eighteen yard line and they could make it twenty seven to six, and he went for it and they got they got to score, and then by the time he finally made an extra point, it was like a big joke. It was like everybody was laughing about it. But I think Troy was onto something last night, like if Jimmy were the coach, he would literally be holding kicking tryouts this week. I think

this era, it's not just McCarthy. I think this era of coaching. It's like, Ah, this guy's been good for us. He's been really consistent, he's got a huge leg, he's been good from over fifty. Let's just ride it out. We got more to lose than we have to gain by bringing in some kind of kicking competition, because there's that going to even plant more seeds of doubt if we bring more kickers in. I mean, as I say this, I kind of think back about Jimmy, and you know,

I go back over some of those moments. I don't think maher would be kicking in that playoff game next week. We're Jimmy the coach, and he's not the only coach. Some old school coaches and most of those coaches back then, you know, they just couldn't. Who else modern day can't stand their kickers. Mike Zimmer, for instance, had a really tough time finding a kicker and he couldn't trust anybody. And I think it's an issue, and it is. When you start losing your kicking balls in an NFL game,

you can't track them down. That's a problem. The line is surprisingly low Niners minus three and a half. That tells me dan Quinn brought pretty your theory. Vegas sees it that they think it's going to be lower scoring, so do I. Seattle's a bad defensive team. Dallas has some spectacular players. I still think they need another corner and that will be at some point exposed against Philadelphia or San Francisco. UM. I think I think it has a twenty seven twenty feel to it. What do you

what do you think the game looks like? You know, with it being three and a half, I would lean toward betting the Cowboys getting those points. Um. I saw it open, I thought about four and a half and I was really thinking, okay, I would lean that way. I agree. Um, I think it's gonna be interesting because the Cowboys at times have been susceptible to the run. You know they've they've struggled with the group. The thing the Cowboys have, it's they've got a versatile group on

the line. Two guys that were inactive last night, Bohannah and Neville Gallimore, are big, huge plugger types. Last night they got Hankins in there, and so that was their big, huge guy. But the rest of the people they went with all thin, long pass rushers. Cowboys can go either way, and so I think what you'll see him do is really load up to stop that run game. I think the fastest you think about this, I think you maybe leaning the right way. I think it's a low storied game.

I think it's rare that San Francisco finds somebody that will play as physical as they will. I don't normally think we think of the Cowboys like that. I've heard you over the years say finesse, speed, all those kinds of things. The Cowboys team that showed up last night, yeah, was incredibly physical, Yes, and the safeties were hitting like crazy. Vander Esh was a good edition. He came back Bjory. He helps in the run against the run as well, and I like, I mean, that's where Purdy's gonna have

to watch it because they're gonna use Parsons. Quinn loves to do what he did last night. Move him back off the line a little bit, sometimes get him outside, line him up, maybe in the middle standing. You never know where he's gonna be. And right now, he's the biggest defensive weapon in the NFL. He's there's just not there's not a game wrecker like him. There are people that may have more sacks or may even put up

bigger numbers, but there's no one. And he used to have somebody like that, DeMarcus Ware there's no one there. They spend more time worrying about. And that's a great thing when you have somebody like that, and it's great for those other players. DeMarcus Lawrence, Dorance Armstrong. I mean, think about we kind of beat up on the Cowboys for not being able to land Randy Gregory in the offseason. What did Randy Gregory do this year for Denver? Nothing?

He was hurt most of the time and the Cowboys ended up So your point earlier, though it is the right one. It's a little scary at cornerback, like it really comes down to, you know, whether it be deebo I, you I mean, you know, how deep do they truly go? And your comparison of the receiving units Cowboys, I will say, Gallup, who's not getting much separation, can make plays. So I mean, I do think. I do think he gives them something. He can beat people down the fields. He's a straight

line runner. I feel like CD can get the drops at times. I think he's a pretty average one a stupendous two. I think Schultz's outstanding and they have a one two punch. I think their offensive line and you gotta credit McCarthy on this, it is much better post Thanksgiving. It is a better offensive line. That's what it feels like to me, it to you, does it? Yeah, It's gonna be interesting because you know, they had to make some changes last night. Peters came out of that game

and they kicked Dollard Smith out. He's been good out there, and they had to put McGovern out there. They had to put McGovern in at guard. I think that'll be fascinating to watch. The other thing I would bring up is, and I said this before yesterday's game, Pollard was going to be a huge key and it's like a real bell Weather for this team is if he has seventy five or more rushing yards, they tend to perform so

much better. And and what you have to watch in this game is what did what did Zeke end up for rush in this last game? It's like two point one He's been doing that for several weeks now now short yard, it's still good. He still go get you a yard. But when you find yourself after a game and you look at the stats and Zeke has taken up twelve to fifteen of your carries, you've probably made some mistakes. And I think Kellen called a really good game. But each time you run Zeke, you're taking about a

twenty five yard opportunity away from your offense. Because ye again, Zeke does some good things. He brings some really good leadership. But Pollared is your home run hitter, and you heard him talking about it last night, and it's true. And plus if there's only a small hole, powered is a tougher back than he's given credit for. So he's got great balance. We Pollered. I mean, you have to approach this game like this is our bell cow. And but

they'll treat Zeke like the ceremonial starter. But you better get you better get Pollered in there early. Well, Matt Mosley, you are our bell cow guest. I thought you really crushed it today. Now what Now he really did? So listen, murder works very hard. He gets a little cranky. So are you going to give ad if if the season ends, do you give d some time off to reboot and relax with his beautiful family? Yeah? I mean Ed does not exactly understand like rebooting for Ed is only spending

eight hours a day on Twitter. That's so. But Ed does have wonderful family and he's got grandkids now and that's changed his life, and he spends a lot of time in Colorado. So yeah, he'll I'll give him some time and then, you know, depending on how well he does in this last podcast or two, I may kick in a little extra money for him. But that's the kind of guy you are. You're very giving, you know. That's that's just that's how I'm wired. Yeah, yeah, yeah, same, Yeah.

I love just a giver all the time. I do. That's exactly. That's what I've always heard. All right, Mosley, You're pretty good. Doomsday podcast with Sir Ed, a long time Fox Sports ESPN guy, and just a friend funny. My guys like you a lot. So I'm gonna go now and I'm gonna do some meditation. I do that in the afternoon. Jane Mosley, if you've done meditation, hell, Lee, man, it almost sounds spiritual. Get you down here. I don't even know what spiritual means, but I do that. I'd

meditate about twice a week. Yeah, move down here and you'll find out what spiritual means. Yeah. All right, thanks for having me. Thanks for having me. I've got to do two hours of scintillating radio now, all right, good see anybody. All right, you two the Volume. Make sure

to check out the dram On Green Show. I brought Draymond Green into the Volume because one of the more entertaining voices in sports, unique perspective under stands behind the rope also chops up with guests like Gary Peyton, Zach Levine, Tracy McGrady. Make sure download The Draymond Green Show wherever you get your podcasts, only on the Volume podcast Network.