Voyage Ep. 50

Hello and welcome to the 50th episode of Voyage where we've said sales seeking validation, vindication, and Vikings victory and also twins victory. All right, I'm your host Cam Erickson. I host the show. I'm joined by my co host Johnny Dittman and a very special, uh, interim co host and friend of the program, HD. Very happy to have you, sir.

Um, thank you for stepping in in this time of need when Kane is out on, uh, his celebrations, you know, we just celebrated his wedding and, um, he's out celebrating his honeymoon down South in Mexico. So thank you, HD, for, uh, um, being the interim co host of Voyage. Very excited to have you.

And yes, I say, we said sales seeking twins victory as well, because we did all right, despite what people are going to say, um, despite all the negativity regarding this club that has been deliberated on this podcast. This is why we are here. The twins did it. They want a playoff series at target field 13 years in the making 18 years since their last playoff win. Uh, and their first playoff series win since 2002, you boys were boots on the ground though. So how the fuck are we feeling?

We're feeling, yeah, we're feeling fucking great brother. And listen, I, on this podcast, we're known as. Would someone say twins haters? No, we're calling for twins justice and we got a little taste of that tonight And I said before the game I said if we if we sweep the blue jays I might be back in And I'm thinking about being back in and we'll see what happens. But it was electric Erickson, a packed house, bases chucked, Carlos Correa comes up. I mean, it was deafening.

It was like you were at us bank stadium. Everybody was cheering. It was great. Exceptional. Yeah. To echo that, um, you know, I've, I'm probably, um, the biggest twins fan that I know, um, in terms of being Like locked in watching games and listening to games and everything. And, you know, I've tried to get my friends into it. Um, the majority of my friends are not like huge baseball slash twins fans.

Um, and just to see so many people just kind of get invested in like being a part of it and understanding that, you know, this has been a long time. I mean, I remember watching the, you think about the movie money ball, right? Moneyball was released in the early 2010s. It was about the 2002 Oakland Athletics. If you watch that movie, you know, it comes to kind of a screeching halt because that Oakland Athletics team lost in the playoffs to the Minnesota Twins. Right. That was 21 years ago.

Yeah. I was seven. Yep. Yep. It's so it's, and I was thinking about it, um, you know, walking back from the stadium, um, I live stones throw away. And I just said, you know, it felt so much like, I really liked the comic strip, the peanuts, and it felt so many times, every time the twins would go to the playoffs, it was like Charlie Brown, he's going to kick that football. And then last second, Lucy would always pull it away.

Yeah. That's when they would lose in ways that are just like, how does this happen? This doesn't happen to any other franchise and obviously it doesn't happen to like the Yankees, but the Yankees are the Yankees, right? It doesn't happen to the Red Sox or the Dodgers, but even think about it. Like it doesn't happen to the Orioles when they were, when they were good or good.

Like it's just, this team was so they would get there so many times and they were oftentimes they were not the favorite, but even just because you're not the favorite doesn't mean you can't win a game. Right. A game, right? And, you know, sometimes they were the favorite and they still lost. And it's just, it's almost like vindication. Um, it's like, you know, as this, I remember after the 2020 series, um, I was in the process of looking for a new job. I was really unhappy at my old job.

And I remember just, that was agonizing and that was just defeating because the twins never even had a chance. Yeah. Looking back on it. And it's like, is this like, When is the payoff? Like when is all this like watching games in June when they are like barely like above 500 or they suck or, you know, listening to games or going to a game and spending, you know, 20 bucks on a ticket and then like 40 bucks on beer and you only get like two. It's like, when is this going to be worth it?

And all those. Beers I've purchased at Target Field, all of the Ubers I've purchased getting to the games, all the tickets I've bought, all the, merchandise, sweatshirts, everything, all the hours I've spent watching it, it just is like, that's why it's worth it. And that's why I did it. And it feels like I didn't play today. Um, you know, my, my baseball career was not good. Um, you guys were way better. And it's just like, you know, I, I, I felt like almost like I won today in a sense.

You did. Hey, listen, listen, listen, the people of Minnesota won today. All right. And I I'm happy for them. I'm, I'm happy for, look, I'm in the same boat, man. I promise you as much as neg, as much as negativity is out there on Twitter from me personally. Be rating this club and asking for more from this club. I understand why people are mad at me. I get it But look I was just I just wanted more I was in your same boat man.

Baseball is my one true first passion You know, I love the twins from day one man, and I remember those scarring moments early I can barely remember the watching the 2004 playoff game that we won at Yankee Stadium and game one of the ALDS. This is special. This, this really truly is special. Um, I'm glad that they were able to get it done. Let's, let's get into some analysis here though. And Johnny, I'll, I'll, before we do that, Johnny, I'm back. I'm back on board. I'm back on board.

I don't care what you say. I'm all in on this team and going into Houston. Uh, I'm going to be tuned into locked into every pitch. They can go in Houston and win this series and go to the ALCS. They can do it. They've got the, they've got the horses. I like this club. Um, let's talk about game one. All right, let's step back to yesterday. Remove our, remove ourselves from the high of the, uh, the series clinching win today. Game one. Right? Royce Lewis, two homers, three RBIs.

He was our offense. Unbelievable. Carlos Correa, hoses Bichette at home and, and really one of the best chances that the Blue Jays had all day. But we got to start at the beginning, you know, Pablo Lopez, he was magnificent, magnificent. Um, I mean, he, he commanded the zone is a fantastic outing that I really can't remember too much, uh, solid contact from the Blue Jays.

And I think it's a credit to him and what he can do, you know, looking back, uh, prior to the start of the season and, and obviously the Lou, Louisa rise trade. We, we all wanted, and we're begging for the Minnesota twins to come across quality starting pitching, however, it may be, whether it was developed through the minors or come across in free agency or through trade. Um, but you know, people were skeptical of the fact that we traded away the defending American league batting champ. Right.

Um, I think yesterday was vindication for that move. Um, and, and granted, there's been a lot of, uh, moments throughout the season that have proven that Pablo Lopez is probably a front end starter, but yesterday, starting in game one of a wild card series and getting the job done, pitching an absolute gem. It's fantastic. Um, the bullpen was very good. Theobald had a 1, jacks, uh, pitched out of a lead off double in the 8th, Duran shut it down in the 9th, just.

A solid, solid baseball game and watching that game is like I can't believe what I see, but then it starts to become like I can actually believe what I'm seeing this team is good. This team has good pitching. This team has something that we haven't seen a twins team have in in decades and that's quality starting pitching and quality pitching out of the bullpen and that's what wins ballgames in October. So, um, what are your thoughts? Id Go ahead. I, no, I'm gonna go before.

Okay, John, I'll ahead. I'm gonna go before HD because he's gonna go off and first off, I wanna give full credit, and I was not on the wrong side of this. I totally agreed with HD from the beginning. Pablo Lopez for Luis Rice was a solid trade, and for anybody that saw my tweet that said I missed Luisa Rice, it was, I was fully trolling. It was clearly no. Yeah, for sure.

No. But um, yes, it was a hundred percent hd was right and I want to say before we go any further Me and erickson took the easy route. We've been hating on the twins. We've been asking for more Hd has stood strong and that's why we have them on the podcast right now. Hd should be the general manager and You know i'm dead serious you should be Cause you, you've hit it on the, you see the nail on the head, but you know, the Royce Lewis thing, I mean, it's just really insane.

I mean, he, he is literally hobbling around out there. Watch him, watch him after the game. I mean, I was like, is he going to play today? I had no idea. He ran a bit better today though. It looked a little bit better today. I was a little bit worried when I saw that he ran, he ran that swan out today. That was not great. It was not great. It was not great. He, he ran powerfully, which is not in baseball. You don't wanna run powerfully.

He looked like Alexander Madison running You, you know what, you know what car Correa today? Uh, was it in the eighth or the ninth he did this, or, uh, yeah. In the eighth. He, uh, he ran powerfully from first to third on the strides were. But he's got, he's battling the plantar fasciitis man, but I, I can't speak highly enough of Korea. Go ahead, Johnny. No, but I think, and I think that nobody deserves beyond everything in terms of the game.

Nobody deserves more credit than the players themselves. Not Rocco, not Falvey and Levine, not the pole ads. Throw that all out the window. The players won the game, Sonny Gray. You disagree? I disagree. I think they all deserve credit. Well, yeah. I mean, Pop him in. Pop him in. Go ahead. Who made, who makes the Pablo trade?

Follow me and Levine who, who pulls out after, um, the giant said no to Korea after the Mets, it's a note of Korea who says, okay, we'd sign this guy for a three year deal, but it was only one let's. And they said like, yeah, his lower leg is going to be, it's going to be causing issues, poll ads, the Fabian Levine said, let's get it done. And the poll ads approved it. And they never really open up their pocketbooks really all that much. That's where I give them credit.

And Rocco, I think Rocco deserves credit. So I was going, let me just because he out managed a thumb of a manager of the Blue Jays. Well, lemme get to that quick. So one thing, and I think we noticed this earlier in the season, is that he was overmanaging games, you know, pulling guys when he shouldn't have and everything. And he, you know, I was, I was going to the restroom at the game and I came out of it and I was like, Wait a second.

Why would they take out Jose Barrios, who's throwing so well? And that's overmanaging. And I think that it's really easy for managers to do that. And Rocco has, and I think that he's done so in the past where it's, oh, he has to make a move. He feels like it's like, no, you don't, you don't have to do anything. And the, the specific choices of in the bullpen, you know, this pitching staff, one run in two games.

And it's selecting and it's, you know, Varlin went yesterday, he went today, he didn't have it. I think you only face one batter. Um, you know, you tap on field bar again, you tap on Jacks again, you bring in Brock Stewart who had not pitched any meaningful game. I'm not counting the end of the season as a meaningful game. They're playing Colorado and like the ghost of the Oakland athletics.

You tap on those guys, you know, you could have thrown a Chris Paddock, you could have brought in Pagan, you could have brought in somebody else. I'm just completely fresh, you know, multiple days rest and he went to his guys. So I think it's, and some of the moves they made, I mean, and it was stupid because they bring in, so they bring in a left hander, they pull burritos, they bring in a left hander, you say cacuche, and what does Rocco do?

It's like, all right, that's a stupid of Toronto's manager to do so. And then B said, well, if they're going to pull a left hander, then I'll just grab a right hander. And play the matchup. So it completely mixes out that move. If you're looking at the matchups. And I think, it's like, that's so stupid. When he made that move, it's like, what did you think Rocco was going to do, you dumbass? Like it was just, yeah, and yes, but going back to, no, you're good.

I just, I just want to agree with you real quick. I just want to say, listen, I tip my cap entirely to Rocco. This is the best man in series he's had in a long time and he knew it was at stake, but he came in with a plan. With that plan, he knew exactly where he was going to go in certain situations with his, with his bullpen and with his pinch hitting opportunities, et cetera, et cetera. And he managed it beautifully. And look.

I'm not going to overextend things and say like, he's the reason no, but I mean, he did a very fantastic job. Like this group of guys, like Korea as a leader of this club, I think everybody was ready to go. Everybody knew what their role was going to be. And I credit Rocco for coming in with a plan and, and, and having guys prepared for what their role was going to be. And. Being deliberate with it. He didn't let the, the emotions of the game affect him at all.

And granted the twins were playing with the lead for most of the, the two ball games, but he just, he knew what he wanted when he wanted it and he fucking went out there and did it and was deliberate with his moves. And I appreciate that because that's something that I've been critical of Rocco for, for a long time. So I, I, I, I hope that continues. He was great this series.

And going back to what you had said about the Pablo trade and I realized like being a fan for the team of a long time they had like one front end guy. Um, and then after that, it was a hodgepodge of just like whatever you can throw together. It was basically the rest of their pitching staff was back when you were in high school doing a worksheet 10 minutes before it was due for the class after that. They just threw it together and set up, this is going to work. Just throw it in, submit it.

Um, and it takes stones to trade away. Not only the. AL batting champ last year, the NL batting champ this year, but really a fan favorite and a younger player. Um, and hats off to them, but they understood that, you know, the reason why you make that trade is for a day like yesterday or the reason why you trade for sunny gray, um, going into last season and you gave up your number one or your first round pick chase petty in like 2021 or 2020. One of the two years.

The reason why you do that is for a day like today. And the fact that it's baseball or probably playoff baseball, when it comes down to it, it's so much, it's like a game of chess. You know, if a manager is playing, if it's like a June, Tuesday, it's like a Wednesday afternoon game at like 110 start time and the stadium's a third full, you know, you're not really managing it all that greatly.

Today is where it's, you know, it's a lot more of a high stakes poker game and that's where pitching comes into play way more. I mean, you saw like the twins, their offense wasn't like stellar. Uh, I mean, they scored what three runs yesterday, two runs today. They're averaging two and a half runs a game, but they gave up half a run per game. They won the series five to one and that's it. Like that's all you need.

You could say that they won the game five to one yesterday and that's not outlandish. Um, so I think just. The moves that they made and you know, I, I was trying to tell people, you know, I, I feel, uh, you know, just trust in this. Like I know it looks bad right now, early in the season, the offense was terrible. When I first came on with you guys and I was like, yeah, the offense sucks, but I'm telling you, the offense is going to come back. Which it did in the second half and the pitching.

I think the pitching took us like an ever so slight step backwards, but the bullpen got forward, like a guy like Joe Ryan was nearly as good in the second half, but a guy like Kenta Maeda came back and kind of backfilled it. So I, I'm, I. Like, I'm still, I'm so confident today and watching what I saw, you know, giving up one run in two games against a very good lineup. I'm confident in that, but then it's the other side of it. It's Houston. They're really good. Um, their lineup's great.

Their pitching's great. They're rested. They've had post season success. They have guys with post season experience. And then it's also, well, the twins, the twins have been the twins. You know, they've been the, it just got over an 18 game losing streak yesterday. And today they got over 21 years without winning a series. So it's trying to like, take those thoughts out of my head.

Like, you know, I think the only players on the team when they were in 2020 was like, it's like Jeffers, Polanco, uh, Buxton, who's not even playing and. And there's maybe, I don't know if like field bar was on the team or anything, but very few guys, um, they don't care. Like Royce Luce doesn't care that, you know, he wasn't there. Um, Matt Waller wasn't there. Pablo Lopez, Sonny Gray, they weren't, they weren't here. They weren't on that team.

And so it's, it's kind of a, and I appreciated that they took kind of that stance, just like, yeah, we, we understand it that like, yeah, the fans are upset and we're kind of sick and like a guy like. You know, let's take a look at Joe Ryan, for instance, Joe Ryan is probably sick of it. Like why haven't you guys run a playoff series? Well, he got here in 2021. They haven't made the playoffs prior to this year since then. Um, and now they can kind of take that monkey off their back.

That really even shouldn't have been there. Like Pablo Lopez is probably getting asked about it. He's like, guys, I just got here in like February. Like I just got. Yeah. So. Um, it, I'm ecstatic. I am going to the gopher football game on Saturday though, against Michigan. So I'm trying to figure out like, how did the schematics work of like catching the game and also watching the gophers most likely get smoked by Michigan. So we'll figure that out. Yeah. Well, you'll, it might be an early exit.

I have a question for both of you. We're going to start with cam and it's the same question. Who starts game one? Against the Houston Astros in Houston, Cam, uh, well, I mean, um, I think presumably it's going to be Joe Ryan. Um, you know, I think that, uh, it depends on, I don't know how many, how many days rest would that be for Pablo Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. Yeah. I mean, you gotta go with Joe Ryan, right?

Um, I think, and you go try to steal one in Houston, you got to try to steal one in Houston and then come back and then you, uh, come back home and you have, uh, you got Pablo and Sonny gray on the mound in games three and four at target field. And if they can replicate what they did, you know, in this series, then you're going to give yourself a chance to win. And I think that to HD's point there.

You know, if you're a skeptic still, and you want to overanalyze this situation, I think you can and say like, this offense needs to be better. Uh, we're not going to beat Houston unless we score more runs, this, that, and the other thing. That's fine. I mean, like, yeah, we need to see probably more from this offense if they're going to make a continue to make a deep playoff run. But, but at the end of the day, this pitching staff is going to be what's going to carry this club.

And this is the pitching staff is kind of what we've been, uh, begging for more of. Since we've been grabbing about the twins, since we've experienced all these playoff losses, um, it felt like this club was not really willing to address that issue for a long time. And finally, we have a staff and a bullpen that's ready to go and can win you any ball game.

So. Um, to answer your question, I mean, I think it's probably Joe Ryan, but, uh, you know, I, I'll, I'll leave that up to the decision makers that be, I'm not sure, but I think if you come back here, whoever you throw in three and four, that's fine. Try to go steal one, try to go steal one in Houston.

And if you can do that, you come back home in three and four Pablo and Sonny at home, the, the, the environment is going to be electric and, uh, and you're going to give yourself the best chance to win this team, this team with the staff that they have. Gives themselves a chance to win any ball game. So credit to them. I would say, I agree. I think you started your Ryan and then I think that Bailey over is going to get promoted to the active roster before this next series. And so I would say.

I don't know the schematics or how likely this would even be to happen. It's easy for me to sit in my bedroom and concoct this plan. But if you were to win game one with Joe Ryan on Saturday, I would say game two, you would go to Bailey over with Ken to my aid or kind of as a, if he gets, you know, has any issues. You throw Kenta in there if they lose, I would seriously consider starting Pablo Lopez. That's what I would do.

And if you, if you can go back to Minnesota, if they win Saturday, let's say they lose Sunday and obviously this is a big hypothetical and you go back to Minnesota with, you know, two games confirmed that you will play three and four and you can start Pablo Lopez and Sonny Gray in Minneapolis. That's a huge advantage. Now, I don't know the feasibility of that. I don't know if they're going to go to a fourth starter or restart with Lopez. Um, but that would be a really added benefit, I think.

Um, but yeah, I think you got, I think you do have to throw Joe Ryan. And the thing that stinks is that, you know, he's been so good, but At times, but also at times he gives it the long ball and Houston plays like everybody talks about Yankee Stadium is so small. Houston plays in a cracker box. It is very small. Like at least the looks of it on TV. It is that left field porch is very short. And there's some guys that can rake it.

Um, like Altuve, Bregman just, and then even right field short like Alvarez, Kyle Tucker can, yeah. Knocks them out as well. So that's where I'm a little bit nervous is that Joe Ryan going in but I mean he's Spun some gems. I mean, I, I can't remember who he, he had that nine inning complete game shutout against, I can't remember who it was, but then the following game, I think it was in San Diego. He got absolutely toasted for like five bombs or something.

Yes. Yes. I remember a game early in this season. Like I think it was over Memorial Day weekend down in Houston against the same Houston Astros club. And, uh, and Royce Lewis, I think he just got called up, uh, he had his moment. He, he, I think he went deep to right field. He hit, he had a nice, uh, oppo taco and then, uh, uh, Ryan Jeffers came through with a big top of the ninth inning game winning Homer. Like this team, our, our team has it in them too. Like I, I. I'll stand by that.

Go in, go into Houston and steal one. Let's do it. Okay. I was driving home from a cabin that day, screaming in my car, as Royce Lewis tied it down. I was listening. I was listening on the radio and Ryan Jeffers fucking two, I don't remember, two run tank maybe in the top of the ninth that, that gave him the win. Beautiful. But, but look, this, this Houston team hasn't been the same Houston team of past.

Like, I know that they have the playoff experience and playoff baseball is going to be a little bit different, especially down there. They've got a big home home field advantage, but they got beat up a little bit down the stretch. They were battling for this spot that they're in currently, uh, with the Texas Rangers and the Seattle Mariners. And I think they're, I think they're vulnerable. I really do. Okay, so here's why I think you guys are wrong.

Joe Ryan, Joe Ryan, Joe Ryan. The Houston Astros have been looking forward to Joe Ryan since the playoffs started. Okay. We are the United States. We are in the Revolutionary War. We are the underdogs. We are outflanked. We're outmanaged. Dusty Baker is a better manager than Rocco Baldelli. They have the horses. We don't. We go in there and like you said, we need to steal one. We don't need to be predicted. Predictable. Start Kenta Maeda. Yeah, right. Right playoff experience.

He's got experience against the Astros. Screw it. We were I mean game one We're already predicted to lose that right like if we lose game one, we like it's going aggressive Throw your fucking knuckleball who cares? And if Rocco has any nuts, he'll throw Kenta Mayeda game one, and that'll screw everything up. I mean, imagine the announcers talking about Kenta Mayeda starting game one of this. It's serious. I love it. I love it. That's the, that's the move. That's the move you need to make.

This team, listen, you see him against the Blue Jays. Look at their roster can play to ours. We are underdogs. We're going to be underdogs the rest of the way. Start Kenta Screw everything up, all the plans, everything, and to Maeda. Joe Ryan may not get a start in this playoffs. So, I disagree with that. Um, I'm looking at, so, Maeda has not thrown against the Astros this season. Perfect. Perfect. Joe Ryan has thrown against the Astros. Yeah, he has. Two games.

His, uh, ERA in the two games was, wow, eight point. Penta Myta. I'm telling you right now, hd. I'm telling you and hits. But here's the strange part. His batting average against was 180 9. He gave up three home runs. Wow, right? Yes. He gave up three home runs, 16 strikeouts to four walks. He just was susceptible to the long ball. Nine. Nine hits, nine earned three. 'em runs four walks, 16 strikeouts. 42 batters faced. So it depends.

I mean, the type of Joe Ryan you're getting, are you getting the guy who can strike everybody out or are you getting the guy that gives up, you know, a 400 foot tank and all of a sudden. You're hearing that train go across the, uh, top of the state. God, I don't want to hear that. Right. So you might as well start Kenta Maeda. You're going to throw him anyways. I think, I mean, I think you start to Orion and you see how it goes.

And then if Ryan is like the wheels are falling off or you kind of pull like what, this is where you manage it. And you say, okay, if Ryan is thrown well, then you can go to my, then you, you know, you have my aid on, on. So you blow your, you blow your load game one. Well, then if, I mean, if they lose on game one, then I would say you throw Pablo Lopez game two on what is, I mean, I was, I was logged on yesterday, um, in the morning.

And this is the twins had already announced the starting Pablo Lopez and Sonny Gray game too. They didn't even have, it was like 10 a. m. games at two games at three 30, excuse me. And Toronto hadn't even announced their starter. Now it was obviously going to be Kevin Gossman, but they hadn't announced it. So you don't need to make that decision after game one. You don't need to make that like, and tell the public about it like that.

You don't have to write it in, you know, pen or permanent marker, a Sharpie that your game one starter is going to be a, and your game won't two starters going to be beat. You can kind of see how it plays out. So that's why I say you would still go Joe Ryan game one. I mean, he, he kind of has. Like the intangible of being a, if he gets going, I mean, he has the, the little, that gene in him that can, you know, kind of, uh, it sounds, it's so cliche, but like Joe cool, I mean.

He's just a cool guy, I guess. And I, I think that you look at, yeah, he has that type of persona where I don't think he gets rattled all that often. Well, yeah. I mean, he probably smokes a lot of pot and he's like, he's just chill, bro. Like it might be stoned on the mound. It's fine. Like, okay. I just want to say one more thing about this, my question. I want to talk about this. Just one more thing. Start Kent to my ADA.

Don't blow your load, Game 1. You, you're playing with house money right now. Roll the dice, Rocco. Have some nuts. Start Kenta Maeda. Maybe you steal, Game 1. And then you have Joe Ryan, Game 2. Roll the dice. Gotta roll the dice. Listen, I like it. So what if they, what if they lose game one and then they go to Ryan Game two? Yeah. Why would you not start Ryan game one and then go to Lopez game two?

Because I was born a contrarian hd, and I respect your opinion, but I'm just telling you, I was born a contrarian and that's what I. Is the best option because nobody's thinking about it. And I think it's the right thing to do. I do not think you go into thinking Joe Ryan, Kenta Maeda, you blow your load game one. You just need to steal one game. Yeah, exactly.

And what if you lose Joe Ryan starting game one, and then what if you lose Pablo trying to chase game two, and then you go into, you go into target field and you're already down and you got, then you start Kenta Maeda or Randy Dobnack, but like, I'm going to log off. It's been nice talking to you guys. I'm going to, I'm going to quit out after dropping a rainy day. I can't say I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I can't say when he pitches gross. No, I'm, I'm kidding. I'm kidding.

But, but, but Hey, but, but I think Pablo Lopez and Sonny gray games three and four, if you can line that up. Give yourself the best chance to steal one in Houston, and then you still have those two guys lined up in three and four. That's, that's perfect. That's what you want. Um, now, hey, I want to say something real quick, though, too, before we move on, but Mike A. Taylor. All right. His defense in her field was.

Immaculate this series and granted, I know the, the diving play was pretty good. Um, the, the play he made at the wall in game one, and then the, the, the play that he made on a, the Vlad, Vlad Guerrero, uh, line drive to center field in game two was nice as well. Those are kind of routine. I mean, like any quality center fielder should make those plays, but those are not easy plays by any means.

You can back up to the wall and get a little bit confused or like have a misstep and, and that ball goes off the wall. And this series is totally different. So I give a lot of credit to Michael A. Taylor. Um, great signing in the off season by this front office. Is he a world beater on offense? Absolutely not. He's a guy that steps in and makes those plays for you defensively when you need them.

And I tip my cap to Michael A. Taylor, cause he made outstanding series saving plays, um, that we needed. And, uh, he's not the only one, but, but credit to Michael A. Taylor. Yeah, their, their outfield defense was good. I mean, hopefully in the next, and this is by the pie in the sky, but by Saturday, Louis is good enough to go play a third base Polanco is just, it's nerve wracking every time. I mean, he had the ball, he had the ball hit to him game one yesterday, first inning made an error.

And then today it was ruled a hit, but I think somebody that's more talented or skilled, um, makes that play at third base. And the thing that is nice about having these players that play multiple positions, it offers you a lot of versatility at the same time. You know, third, just because Polanco, you know, he's a natural, technically he's a natural shortstop. If you really think about it, that's where we started right now.

And, you know, Kirov at first base, I mean, he's not a natural first baseman. And that's the thing that's a little bit nerve wracking is these guys can play. Another position, but it's not their natural spot on the floor. And that gets a little like, uh, yikes. So, so that's where, that's where it gets a little nerve wracking.

That's why Kepler having Kepler in right field and him being a very reports have said that, you know, they've asked him to play center and he said, I'm just going to stay in right field. Um, that's where it's kind of nice to have, like, you know, he has, how many games has he played for the twins at target field?

You know, hundreds, hundreds, that area of the field, which I don't think is necessarily one of the things that's top of mind when you're thinking about a defensive outfielder, but he knows, you know, this is generally speaking, I know how far I am away from the wall here, or I know this way the ball ricochets or things of that nature. You know, I think there's something to be said about having a guy, not only just versatile, but also just playing their natural position is so important.

Yes. I agree with that too. And like, when I've, I have watched, I've gone to a couple of twins games this year and when I've watched Royce Lewis play third base, he's a natural at third base. He's so good. And I was telling my dad and my brother who were at the game, I said, if we can get him back playing third base, who plays second? I would put Polanco there. 'cause he is, I agree. He is actually, he's an okay second baseman. Yeah. He's not a good third baseman. He's an okay second baseman.

Julian doesn't have it. Yeah, no. Yeah, I agree. Julian's a dh. Yeah, I agree with that. So then do you DH Julian and or Buxton? Julian? I think you have, I mean this, I don't know much about Andrew Stevenson. He kind of sounds like they're. Um, but I don't think, I think Buxton, if he does get added to the roster, which I doubt he does. Um, but if he gets added to the roster, he should just be treated as a pinch runner, pinch hitter.

I mean, he hasn't faced any meaningful at bats since I believe August 1st is the day and he's had a terrible season. And you can say a lot of that's probably been to his injury. Um, but still, I mean, he's still probably not a hundred percent right now. I mean, he isn't a hundred percent right now. So who's to say that all of a sudden he comes back and it's just. Tale of new Buxton, right?

So I would say he kind of becomes your pinch runner, but at the same time, it's, would you rather have a hobbled Byron Buxton who's fast, but not as fast as he could be. Or someone who understands that his role is probably just going to be pinch runner on the team. And I feel bad for Byron. He seems like a great dude. Um, you can tell that. It's not him being, uh, you know, I don't mean to say that he's like, yeah, he's not soft. He's not a woman. It just is.

His body has just failed him numerous times. And it sucks to see because he has the talent. Um, and when he, he can play, you could tell that he's not 100 percent when he is playing and he wants to be out there. And it just sucks to see that he has all the talent in the world, but his body just keeps it sucks. Betraying him in a sense. Yeah. So yeah, it does sucks. Uh, I mean, we just won our first playoff series. No, but I want to add on, I want to add onto that a little bit.

Like, could you see Byron Buxton game five and Houston coming for a pinch hit? I mean, HD, you've been on this podcast before talking about every time he puts the ball in play, it's hard. And I understand the stats and everything, but yeah. If you come, if you bring him in against a left hander in the fucking top of the ninth inning in Houston, like that would be electric stuff. It really was.

There's no doubt that his bat is much better than some of the other guys, but when it's on, that's the thing. That's like the qualifier, right? When he's on, I mean, when Byron Buxton is healthy and on, he's the best player on the team. He's better than Royce Lewis. Correct. He's better. Um, but the thing is, it's such a large qualifier. If he's healthy, if he's on, it's that, if the so massive, so, and it's a high risk, high reward, you know, you could either get the guy that's.

I can just close my eyes and picture off Speed. Pitch low and outside. Nowhere near the strike zone. Yeah. Byron, strike three. And I can also close my eyes and see, you know, screaming line drive over the left field wall. And then the buck truck is being hit extraordinarily hard by Byron. Yes. Yeah. The tail of two I, uh, yeah, I, before we move on from the twins, real quick, I just wanna bring up two things that happened at the end of game two.

Um, Carlos Correa got jabbed in the hand by a inside fastball right off the, right off the knuckle top hand x rays x rays are negative. So looks like we came out of that unscathed, fantastic news there. But I was definitely holding my breath because Carlos Correa has been everything that you could have hoped for from a guy that you brought in to be your leader in the clubhouse come playoff time.

And. His performances has matched, um, coming up, coming up clutch today with the bases loaded in area that the twins have struggled in all year. Um, and then his defense, obviously like throughout the series was, was priceless. So that's what you pay for when you bring a guy like that in fantastic stuff. And then. Wander on with the, uh, with the, uh, little thumb action. He had a little issue with his thumb. He had to get seamed up, whatever the deal was.

I'm not really sure, but, and then he throws, and then he throws two fastballs wildly high and it's like, what? Hold on. Hold on. Like, we don't need to see Emilio Pagan here. Johnny texts the group and he says, live bet the Blue Jays. Live bet the Blue Jays. Wander on, dude. It's fucked. And, and Emilio Pagan's coming in. I'm like, dude. I'm like, you know, things were starting to look a little bit shaky, but credit to those, both those guys.

I mean, Wanderan figuring it out and, and finding his form. Hopefully, hopefully he doesn't have a laceration on the inside of his thumb because that could be lingering, but. Yeah. So, yeah, your breath was holding for a bit. My dad was listening to the radio and by the way, he listens to the radio while at the game. Yes. I love that. Beautiful. Yeah. That is he brought, he comes in with, so I went with my dad obviously, and he comes in with his binoculars case.

And it has his binoculars and then, and we can be sitting like fourth row and he's still bringing his binoculars in. And I'm like, okay, all right. Sounds good. We can be sitting in the champion's club and he's just looking at it. Um, and then he always brings the rose. Yeah, he's, uh, he's got his headphone in. And, uh, so it's amazing. Cause he listens on an AM on his pocket radio and the AM it is. Instantaneous.

It's, it hits like, it's like somebody is, it's automatic in terms of the pitch is thrown and when you can hear it, it's literally right on to the point where I'm like, I might have to go buy a, buy a pocket. There's no delay. It is a good. It's good. Yeah. And so they said that he split his nail on the radio broadcast. And my source is my dad, um, through the twins radio broadcast. And, uh, they were putting liquid cement on it to like iron it out.

So, and I mean, I was getting nervous there too, guys, but then I saw him just throw once he started hitting his breaking pitches and that's where it would really aggravate it. Um, once those were starting to fall for strikes and guys were swinging and missing, I was like, okay, yeah, he's fine. He dropped that curve ball into someone. He threw three in a row. He threw three in a row to John. Was it Matt Chapman? He threw three in a row to Matt Chapman. Three straight strikes.

He got him to chase the last one out of the zone. It was nasty. Like, that's the stuff that you expect from this guy. And this is a guy that, by the way, struggled a little bit down the stretch too. Or he had his moments, but... That is like what gives you confidence in the back end of this bullpen.

And that guy, when he closes out, it's like, it's it, that, that is, that's what you need at the back end of your bullpen when it comes out, October baseball, that's electric stuff from, from wandering. And I don't care if he split his, if he split his, uh, thumb or if he split his, if he split his penis hole, I don't, I mean, that the guy has. The guy has nads. The guy has stuff. The guy, the guy doesn't give a shit.

The guy's going to lock back in and the guy's going to be ready to go when it matters. It's electric. Let me ask you something, Erickson. If you're at the Can I interrupt you, Johnny, for a second? Sorry. Yes, yes. I went to grab a fresh beer, and my bedroom is right by my fridge. Did I just hear penis hole? Yeah, yeah. Yes, if Wanderan split his penis hole, it wouldn't matter. He'd be going out there. He's gonna find his own. He's gonna strike you out.

It doesn't matter if he had a, if he had a blown up, if he had a, yeah, if he, if he had a blown up right nut, it wouldn't matter. He's going to go out there and he's going to compete because that's the type of guy that he is. I was grabbing another Pacifico and I just hear penis hole clear as day and I kind of perked up like a dog. Did I hear that right? I'm going to ask that. And for new listeners, welcome to Voyage. But, what I was going to say is, let me ask you something Erickson.

If you say, if you see a meeting on the mound. Duran makes his, makes his entrance. Big deal. Game over. Done. I mean, I was like, I'm, I, I mean, I am bought back in on the twins, but I'm like, I'm bought back in on the twins. You see a meeting on the mount with the umpires. Rocco comes out there. You see Pagan warming up in the bullpen. What do you think? Hahaha. I don't blame you.

Listen, dude, I I mean, I'm seeing these things and I'm looking at the live Brian and it's plus 800 and I'm like, well... Yeah. I mean, everything I've seen, everything I've, you know, and now granted I'm a, I'm a football guy, but geez, I mean, I was like, but, but, but you know what? Wander and wander and would be a football guy and he'd be a hat on hat football guy.

He'd be a, he he'd love the defensive side of the football and he'd love hat on half football and he'd love fucking he'd be an offensive guard. He'd get in a good three point stance football guys. How about Griffin Jacks getting absolutely Decked. Yes. How about that? Yeah. Come on. I was like, wow. How did I not see that coming? He looks like Harrison Smith out there. Get the guy low, wrap him up, dude. It's fine. He looked like a, you know, he should have bounced back up and ran to the dugout.

You got ran over. Big deal. Yeah. Were they like, were they going back and forth at all? I don't know. I didn't really think so. It was just like, I don't know. That's just a baseball play. Yeah. Yeah. When you're watching slow mo on the broadcast though, it did look like Biggio gave him a little one of these. His elbow extended a little too far from me. And I didn't like that. But, you know, it's a baseball play at the end of the day. It's fine. Guys are competitive. It's fine.

I didn't have to It's a baseball play and I'm just going to say, I'm going to say the last thing about the, about the game too, or the series, the broadcast was terrible. The broadcast was piss poor, uh, HD, you were at both ballgames, uh, Johnny, you were, you were watching presumably game one, right? A rod, the broadcast, it was bad. It was bad. These guys are not meant to be announcers.

Uh, A Rod couldn't stop talking about how, uh, the, the twins were picking up Kevin Gossman's splitter so well. Yeah. It's like, buddy, buddy, maybe they just, maybe they just know if it's low, let it go. Like, they have a good approach. Like, I don't know. He's not necessarily tipping it. Gossman, the twins came out and said, Gossman was tipping his pitches. Well, maybe they weren't, maybe, maybe he was, but, um, yeah, that's what he was kind of alluding to.

But you know who the guy that the play by play guy, do you know what team he covers? What team does he cover? That's the Yankees play by play guy. That's Michael Kay. Okay. Yeah, he's, he's there like their home broadcaster. That's where the, see ya. And so it's nice to hear a see ya from him that wasn't against the twins and for the Yankees. That was refreshing.

I went back and watched it, but yeah, I mean, if you really, if you wanted to get a good broadcast, you should have just come down to target field, grab the pocket radio for, I don't know, 1999, and then brought some wired headphones and. Yeah. Listen on WCCO. Hey, that's such a good bit. You're a fucking old man going into the game with the pocket radio. I love that bit. Here's where it's even gets funnier not to derail the conversation.

So my dad has been a 30 plus year season ticket holder for St. John's football games. Yeah. And obviously, obviously, you know, Augsburg just lost St. John's, but it was close. And like ST john's football, like that's obviously like a big thing for division three football, um, for whatever that's worth. But, um, you know, he has primo seats 48 and it's a, it's a natural bowl. So you want to be high up. It's only like the grandstand is built into the side of the hill.

So you want the Ground level, you want to be high up. So he has perfect seats, been there over a hundred times, and he will listen to the St. John's radio broadcast with that same pocket radio headphone in every St. John's football game. They don't make him anymore. No, he's locked in and he, he, uh, we were watching the Vikings Colts game. It was me, four buddies and my brother at our old apartment. Um, with the big, the big comeback.

And my dad is sitting in our living room with like four of my high school friends watching the game and he has pocket radio headphone in. Like with other people, he is committed to the pocket radio bit and even made a joke and he's like, you know, I know you make fun of me about bringing this thing and, and, you know, it's an old man move, but it is really actually very nice to have. I said, Oh no, it's great. It is an old man move. He goes, yeah, I know.

But I said, it is also, you know, nice to have. Yeah. Oh, it's a great move. It's a great movement out there listening. And you know, he's got his, uh, Oh, I respect the move a hundred percent. Yeah. Well, anyways, dude, it's a, it was a fantastic, uh, series win for the Minnesota Twins. They played about as good baseball as you could ask for, um, the pitching staff look phenomenal as we kind of recapped, uh, and we go to Houston, we go to Houston for the ALDS. It starts on Saturday in Houston.

And uh, let's see if we can go there and snag one and then come back to target field. And, uh, and continue this thing. And I think the sky's sky's the limit for this club. Um, if they can continue to get the pitching that they have through two games so far and, um, um, you know, the skeptics out there can say, you know, the blue Jays didn't manage the series properly and that's a team that paid a lot of players, a lot of money as well, too. They expected to win that series.

Um, but you know, the twins got it done. Yeah, I think so. Do you think their manager gets fired? Yes. He has to. He should. That was horrible. I was standing next to a Blue Jays fan, right after they pulled Perillos, and I said, Do you think it was a wise call to pull him? He goes, And he was Canadian. Um, and I mean, you could just tell, I said, Oh, no, I, here's what I said. I said, I said it was a bad idea to pull burritos, I think. And I met the guy and he just goes, Oh yeah.

Fucking rights. Yeah. Burritos is shutting you guys down. And then all of a sudden they pull a guy out of the bullpen and he's not, he hasn't pissed very well. His ERA is over five in the month of September. He goes, this Schneider guy, I mean, he's got to go if this does not work out very well. He got outmanaged by Rocco Baldelli. He, he deserves to be fired. Period. I'm a Rocco guy. Like I've done fine, but I'm a Rocco guy. I think Rocco is the best coach you have in Minnesota right now.

He's better than hold on, hold on, hold that's coach. He sounds like Chris Dittman now. I mean, this is okay. All right. Well, Hey, let's forget about Chris Finch. Chris Finch is pretty good. We can get into that another day, but yeah, I think that's okay. Well, I hope so. I hope you're right. I mean, I hope this team can go on a deep run. So, but let's get into the purple. All right. This is, this is the platform.

This podcast was built on and the Minnesota Vikings got their first win of the 2023 campaign. And, uh, uh, down in Carolina in Charlotte and we got our first one of the season. So sound the gala horn. Come on, come on. Sound the gala horn for me. Sounded. All right. The Minnesota Vikings got their first one of the season down in Carolina against a bad Carolina club.

But look, this team needed something, this need, this team needed some momentum, some sort of something to hang their hats on and, and to realize that this, this season still has something to play for. Because look, if you, if you go on four, if you start to the season on four, it's going to be bad. It's going to be hard to get guys back on board. Um. And I want to start with this, because this was the biggest takeaway for me from the football game. It was Harrison Smith.

It was a vintage number 22 in purple game in Carolina, 14 tackles, three sacks, two tackles for loss. Just incredible stuff from your guy, the hit man, number 22 Harrison Smith. And, and look, I think that. I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna speculate as to what adjustments were made by, um, Brian Flores, but, but he really did. He really did, uh, make all the necessary, uh, adjustments and he kind of let Harrison Smith roam free in this defense. Harrison Smith knows his defense.

Harrison Smith knows ball. Harrison Smith knows where he needs to be. Harrison Smith beat their starting left tackle off the edge for the sack. On the game winning play basically, right? Hat on hat.

Yeah. It's just, yeah, these are the things that you cannot, like, you can talk all the analytics you want and talk about all these things, but like when you have a guy like Harrison Smith out there that knows football like that and has been there and done that and can make plays like that, um, at his old age, he's long in the tooth a little bit, but he gets out there, he makes plays. That was the biggest difference in the game to me. What are your guys thoughts on 22?

Um, If I told my brother this, J. D., I said, J. D., if Harrison Smith Had, and this isn't a knock on him personally. I think he's just generally a low key guy, but if he had a bigger personality, he is a first battle Hall of Famer. You look at him and you compare him to a guy like Troy Palomaro. And obviously Palomaro has won some super bowls. Um, I mean, when it comes to safeties, you think about Super Bowls in terms of a Hall of Fame requirement, that's more of a quarterback thing.

Whenever we talk about running backs and the great running backs, you don't say, well, how many Super Bowls did they win? So that, that argument is a little thin to me in terms of the Palo Malo versus. Smith. Um, uh, when you're talking about their overall career achievements, uh, Harrison Smith has better stats than him in pretty much every single category. If he had a larger personality, he would be way more talked about.

Um, he would be, I mean, he is my opinion and obviously we're all biased. We're all big Vikings fans. He's a first ballot Hall of Famer. I think he is. The longevity, the production, it's, it's, he's been the best safety, there's been safeties that have come and gone. People have thought, oh, Cam Chancellor up to right now? Or Earl Thomas is better than him. What's Earl Thomas up to right now? Or Jamal Adams, hit boy. You know, that's just, that's it. I prefer the hit man.

And Harrison Smith has just been consistently productive since he was drafted. Uh, I think it was in 2012, I think it was his first season. Yep. Yes. And, you know, that's off to him. And the fact that he's, as you said, Cam, he's long in the tooth. He comes out and has, he took over the game on defense. When do you hear of a safety taking over a game?

He forces a fumble, he gets sacked, and when you talk about Flores, I saw a screen grab on Twitter the other day, it had, uh, it was on the Viking side of the field, I think it was around like the 25, 30 yard line, right around there, they had nobody, everybody was on the line of scrimmage. I don't know if you guys ever played Madden, but it was essentially, they were calling Gage 8, you know, send three safeties back, or three defensive backs back, and bring everybody. That's what they did.

He just dialed it up, right? And, uh, in terms of the Vikings, I was, I was trying to explain it and I'm friends with a few Packer fans, obviously, and at work, I know I have, um, you know, business contacts across the country and they're Packers, they're Lions, they're, you know, one guy's a Titans fan. And I was like, the Vikings aren't bad. They're not a bad football team. They just do stupid things. There's like the, they're like the Timberwolves.

The Timberwolves could go out and beat anybody. Think of they were, they had a, uh, road trip when they went to California, they took down the Lakers. Good. They took down the kings better. They took down the warriors on the same road trip. And what do they follow that up with? They lose to the goddamn Portland trailblazers and the Washington wizards who both suck ass and that's the Vikings. They just keep shooting themselves in the foot. They are better than this.

They turn the ball over so many goddamn times. It's unbelievable. That one throw by Kirk was And as you know, I'm a humongous Kirk fan. I will defend that man until the day I die. It's basically. Uh, you know, number one is, is Jesus, uh, number two, number three is, you know, my direct superiors at work. The people who signed my checks every other Friday, uh, my friends and then it's, and then it's Kirk right after my friends. That's what it is. That's why. Yeah, no, it's Jesus family.

People who sign my checks, Kirk friends, that's the, that's the five. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's like, what are you doing, dude? What it's just all these turnovers and this turnover is like, they're happening like in the Viking. Sorry for going on this rant, but they go, they happen when they are so close to scoring even a field goal. Greg, I don't know. Greg Joseph, I think he's only kicked. I don't know. Did he kick any field goals last game? Because he only had two coming in?

No. Yeah, no, he didn't kick any mess. The two, because he turned the ball so goddamn much. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And well that's, well, no, you should get that off your chest. I mean, we've had weeks now to get that, to get that exact thing off your chest. Like you said, Kirk Cousins dummy. I mean, you guys really said it all. Now, here's my thing. I got two things. Number one, Marcus Davenport is good. When he wants to play football, he is good and he's a difference maker on our defense.

You watch him play. He really is that good. Yeah. Number two, KLC's had a rough year. Well, well, look, I, I was going to go into this. So the, the, I wanted to bring this up because it was, it was, um, it was apparent in Sunday's game and it was the new contributors that we have. Right. Marcus Davenport finally straps up finally, finally buckles his chin strap. Finally makes a difference. KOC said as much after the game that he was disruptive. He was disruptive.

And I think that's exactly what he was. He didn't necessarily fill up the stat sheet. But he had four tackles, a sack, a tackle for loss. He was good. Uh, he won his one on ones. He made a difference out there, and that's kind of what this defense was lacking. We needed another, uh, edge rusher, and we needed another guy to get after the quarterback, but sending Harrison Smith free was absolutely crucial in this football game. Uh, and then Cam Akers. And in limited touches, he excelled.

Five carries for 40 yards. He had a couple receptions outta the backfield. Um, he looked very nice. And yeah, the turnovers were still an issue. We lost the turnover battle. But, um, the, you know, the Kirk throw to KJ in the end zone, they've done that so many times. The pilot on route for KJ Osborne, Kirk took too long with the football. He didn't make his decision quick enough.

And then he forced it and, and, and our first drive stalled out and not only stalled out, but it was a 14 point swing in that they got a 99 yard, uh, interception return for a touchdown. And at that point, it's like, what are we doing? And then we, and then we, uh, right before the end of the half. We're going down to try to score, uh, uh, cut the lead a little bit. Kirk throws another pick to Addison on the right side.

Um, and you know, no, not really, but, but at the end of the day, you've got to take care of the football. And when you're going down there at the end, just to try to score before the half, you can't have momentum swings like that. I just want to say, like, I think that this. This football team is starting to come around a little bit. Although this, this game didn't really look like that.

There's a 2113 when you eked it out against the Carolina Panthers, but, and the Carolina Panthers may not be all that either. Like, like Bryce Young is, is who he is at this point in his career. Um, I think he's going to be a good player, but. It's just, I, my feeling throughout most of that game was here we go again and we were looking for a big play from somebody and it came on that 51 yard scoop and score by DJ want them to start the second half. And that's what this team needs.

Like we, we need something like that to go our way. And finally it did. And, uh, I loved it. I loved it. Um, Johnny and I, and his pops were sitting up there in Cape Cod watching the game on, on, uh, in the sports bar. You know, and, and we were negative for most of the game. It, it got quiet for a while, but then when that happened, it was like all of a sudden it changed. That's completely foreign to me. You guys being negative about a Minnesota sports team.

Oh, dude, it was bad because we had tied one off all weekend. And then we go to the, and then we go to the sports bar and it's like, what do you want to drink? And it's like, the old man orders a screwdriver and we're like, well. I guess we just continue to tie one off, tie one off for the game. And it's like, and then that this happens and we're like, I don't even know what to say anymore.

I mean, we sat down, it's just like, so I think, and I just thought of this right now, a lot of games can be decided by two words. You either have, it's like a fork in the road and I'm, I'm creating this take as I'm talking it out. So if it sounds stupid, let me know. You have despite. And you have, because the Vikings lost their first three games because of dumb turnovers because of sloppy turnovers or sloppy just play in general. The Vikings won on Sunday, despite their turnovers.

You need to turn the causes into despites and yes, you know, the Vikings still haven't played a good four quarters yet. And. It's last year, you know, it was a big roller coaster. It's a weird franchise to root for. And I think just going back to my Timberwolves analogy, they're the stupidest team in terms of they can beat anybody and they can lose to anybody. Right. They always say, like, an injured wolf is a dangerous wolf, and the Vikings can literally probably beat anybody in the league.

They were toe to toe with Philadelphia, and despite, you know, or because of, you know, despite three tourers, they were, they were, they were right there. I mean, I thought it was over and I am a huge bias fan. I mean, I've had bad takes, but the Vikings, you know, long enough to like fill up the old Testament and same with the gophers, but the chiefs don't look like stellar this season. I mean, yes, threw on them. Yes. And this is, this is exactly where I wanted to go.

Yes. I mean, I, I made a big dinner on Sunday. I'm talking steaks were seasoned them for probably five hours. And it was real simple. I'll give you guys a steak recipe. If you want it at a later time, Brussels sprouts, I made French bread. Um, there was another, Oh, potatoes. Um, and then I bought a bottle of red from North loop liquors, the most expensive liquor store I've ever been to in my life.

Um, and I had, yeah, I had, you know, a couple of glasses of red and I was like, the Vikings can beat this team. I'm like, the Vikings can definitely beat the Kansas city chiefs. And I would have never thought that, um, and I mean, they can, they can like the offense is just so high power and the chief's defense sticks. What it comes down to is, you know, can you neutralize Travis Kelsey? Is what it comes down. Yes, absolutely. And, and it comes to Kelsey.

And it comes to Pacheco because how did the Lions beat, um, what's it called? How did they beat the, the chiefs? Excuse me. Well, a, I don't think Travis, did he even play that? No. 'cause he hyperextended his No, he didn't play. Yeah, he didn't play. How did they look against the Detroit Lions and No Chris Jones either and no Chris Jones. True. But how do they look against that def and the lines defense is not good, by the way. I mean, it's better than last two.

They had the worst defensive belief. It's fine. It's it's okay. Their defenses made some, but it's no, it's, you're not talking like the Raiders of yesteryear or that steel curtain. So that defense held him in check and I and could come back. I could, if we, let's say we recorded another podcast right after the Vikings game on Sunday. And I could say, you know what guys on Wednesday night, I talked to you ended the thinking the Vikings could win.

And I just drank a gallon of dumb bitch juice because they lost by 50. I don't see, but I'll, but I'll want to, I'll want up. You dude, the Vikings will. Beat the Kansas city chiefs on Sunday. They are going to win at us bank stadium. And here's why the Kansas city chiefs offense has not been that great all year. All right. They struggled to get Travis Kelsey going against the New York football jets. They let Zach Wilson and company move the ball throughout the games.

I would argue that the New York jets lost. That football game, the Kansas city chiefs did not win that football game. The New York jets were given every single opportunity to win that football game. And the New York jets are not really a good football club right now. They have a good defense and they found a way to, to neutralize Travis Kelsey. Um, and that's a challenge. That's going to be a challenge for the Minnesota Vikings. Um, but I love the ship that Brian Murphy is talking.

Um, I really do. A lot of people are, are either way on that, but I love it. Uh, I think this, this Minnesota Vikings offense is good enough to go out every single Sunday and beat any given team on any given Sunday. And, um, this Kansas city chiefs defense is really not all that great. Um, look at what Christian Derosa did on Sunday against Brian Burns and company against a pretty good Carolina defense. Christian Daris on manhandled Brian Burns. And we also shot ourselves in the foot twice.

That's we talked about it already, a turnover in the red zone on our first drive of the game, and then a turnover just outside of the red area, uh, going into the half, um, the Minnesota Vikings will beat the Kansas city chiefs on Sunday because we're going to be the aggressor and we're going to dominate the football game and. We've, we found a way to run the football a little bit better against Carolina, who I think has a pretty good front and I, I'm, I'm just excited to see it.

Um, I'll be there. I'll be there. Boots on ground. We're going to change the mojo. Johnny and I are going to change our attire. We're going to wear red wings. We're getting back to our roots and we're going to play smash melt defense. All right. I'm excited for it and all this. You know what, you know what this comes down to too. And I didn't want to get into this yet, but it's a Taylor Swift bullshit. All right. I like it.

Taylor's Taylor Swift has no business being in the national football league and no business being the attention of the national football league, right? These, you can't, you can't be telling me that Swifties all over the nation are tuning in on Sunday just to get a couple of glimpses of their goat Taylor Swift. I don't care. All right. I don't care. The Minnesota Vikings are winning this football game at U. S. Bank stadium. We're going to be the dominator.

We're going to be an aggressor and we're going to go on win. JJ is going to have a good day. We're going to execute on offense. We're going to take care of the football and we're going to give Patrick Mahomes a hard time. I like the Swifty stuff, by the way. I think it's really cool, honestly.

Hey, I don't mind people being fans, but and so, and honestly, so my, my, uh, dad parked a couple blocks away and I was walking back over here and obviously I've been, you know, tweeting a lot and putting on Instagram about like, you know, I've been, I think I've come to accept that within my Of my friends and like the friend groups I'm in, like I am the twins guy, like a lot of people, whether it's at work, um, whether it's in friend groups, things like that, they will ask me pretty much about

the twins, you know, not, you know, where I get my, you know, who cuts my hair, me, uh, you know, what do I do in my free time? And anyway, it's about, you know, what do you think of the twins today? And I just thought like, man, I've been laying it on pretty thick with just like all the twin stuff. Right. And I thought, you know, it's really cool. Like we, as a society have kind of. Look down on people and like made fun of them for like liking things and liking things is cool.

Like I'm not into rock climbing or biking or knitting or anything like that. That's not my hobby, but there are people that are so diehard about that stuff. And I think a lot of people will look at them and say, oh, they're weird or like they're creepy, whatever it is. Or like, that's annoying. No, liking things is good. Like, and like Swifties, I understand that it's like way over the top at times.

But the fact that somebody like just this one girl who was born in Pennsylvania's music, like speaks to so many people, I'm not, I have two Taylor Swift songs on my phone and it's. Uh, Breathe featuring Colby Clay, Ripper, and then also Fifteen. Um, and I've had those on my phone since like 2008. Uh, the fact that like her music speaks to so many people, I used to rip on Swifties, but I'm like, you know what? I don't understand it, but I can respect it.

And so now flipping that into the NFL, it's, you're exposing the NFL to a bunch of people who are like our age. They're 28, 29, you know, in their twenties. That have just like never gotten into football. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I understand that HD, but Swifties don't understand the difference between a four, three and a three, four. And that's what you teach them.

No, I don't got time for that because I got time for, there was Johnny Young, Johnny Dittman when Johnny Dittman was a five-year-old kid watching the Vikings play for the first time back when they had Chris Carter and Jake Reed. And Randy Ross. I was nine. You were, when you got into the Vikings, you were nine when I could comprehend a cover two. In a cover three. Yeah, probably nine. That's after a few years of watching it there. This is like week three for them of their lives.

We've been watching football for decades and that's when you teach people. That's like how I people were had to ask me about the twins and like things like that. I said, well, you know, playoff baseball is a bit different than regular season baseball. Well, why is that? And then I explained, oh, okay. Well, that makes. So HD, let me ask you this then as a follow up to that, do you think that, are you a conspiracy theorist in regards to this?

Do you think that the NFL is ploying the, the, uh, the Taylor Swift bit to attract more of viewers and, uh, get more people involved who may or may not have been involved in NFL football before? And I mean, it's obviously worked at this point, right? But again, I don't understand it because what am I going to do? My, your favorite artists. I don't know. Pick them. Would you tune into an NFL?

Yeah. Would you tune in an NFL or an NHL game if they are sitting in the box just to get a glimpse of them a couple of times? It's a little confusing to me, but I understand where you're coming from, but do you, are you a conspiracy theorist at all? Do you think that the NFL has something up their sleeve with this?

No, I would say it's like if you're asking me if it's arranged by the NFL that like Travis Kelsey and Taylor Swift are dating, no, because that like gets out, it would get out if there's so many people that would have to be in on that, that somebody loose lip says one thing and then all of a sudden the entire world knows. But in terms of the NFL, like trying to capitalize on it, absolutely. And they're wise to do. Yeah, they're extraordinarily wise to be so like that's marketing for them.

The NFL has always, I think within the last like 10 years, they've tried to market more towards women. And I would venture a guess that the majority of Taylor Swift's fans are women.

Not to say that there aren't like You know, male Swifties, but I'm speaking as a, I guess, an assumption and a generalization that I would assume that most Taylor Swift or Swifties, I should say, are women and, you know, the NFL spent all this time like marketing football to women, and I'm sure it's definitely, you know, gained momentum, uh, in terms of their marketing of the league and the game. However, you haven't seen an explosion of just like an infusion of interest.

And this short amount of time and just going zero to a hundred more than you've seen in the last few weeks. Um, and I think it's like, you think about celebrities, right? Like for instance, I know Miles, I was thinking about this early in the day, guys, I do a lot of thinking. I have an internal dialogue. That's always going. Sometimes it's great. And sometimes it really blows. Uh, but I was thinking, I was like, I think I actually thought about this in the shower, come to think of it.

I said, you know, Bradley Cooper and Miles Teller are stars, right? And they both like Philadelphia sports. They're stars. You see him at games like, oh yeah, Bradley Cooper's at the game. Or, oh yeah, Miles Teller's at the game. The world stopped when Taylor Swift was at the game. Bradley Cooper, you know, great actor. She, he is not on the same stratosphere in terms of overall, like, fan or, uh, of like fame as Taylor Swift is. She's a top 10, most famous person in the world.

I agree with that a hundred percent. And that's cool. So listen, so listen. So then, so then I'm, I'm glad that the Minnesota Vikings will win on Sunday. Then it would be, it would even, sorry, John, I'll let you get to it in a second, but you don't want to be awesome. I think they've been undefeated since that she's been in the, it's like they've been dating or, um, you know, it's, it's ramped up or anything. Can you imagine?

The most cursed franchise in the NFL, when it comes to like, you know, clutch moments, the Minnesota Vikings come out and slag the dragon that is the Kansas City Chiefs when other teams have tried to. While the Kansas City Chiefs and Travis Kelce and Mahomes are riding this wave of extraordinarily media coverage and Kurt Cousins says, not so fast, my friends, right after quarterback comes. Love that. That would be awesome. Love that. Johnny, go ahead.

No, listen, despite HD's progressive thinking and ideology, which is great, it's growth from him. However, I will say I will be bringing Kodiak Wintergreen to the football game and I will be wearing my work jeans, which are cut at the knee and thigh. Okay. In my red wing boots that are ripped at the toe. I got a mock toe. They're also insulated. So my feet are going to be sweating. I will be wearing those things and bringing those things to the game. The Vikings are winning this game.

It's gonna happen. I know it in my heart. I am. I've never been more sure of anything all year. Yeah. So here's the deal too. Going back to the Kansas City Chiefs and their performance at this point in the season. Um, they're three in one, right? They're a three in one football team. You got to give them a little bit of respect, but my homes has been susceptible to the turnover so far this year. Um, it may be in part due to the lack of weaponry he has on the offensive side of the football.

Um, the New York football jets did a good job of neutralizing Kent, uh, Travis Kelsey, as I mentioned. But I think that the Minnesota Vikings have an extreme opportunity at their hands right here right now. And, um, and it could go one of two ways. You come out flat and screw up and not take care of the football and lack protection. And it becomes an earth beat down. Um, but I actually truly think that this Minnesota Vikings team is motivated, uh, has found a little bit of their footing.

They're going to run the football. They're going to play hat on half football a little bit. They're going to set the tone early. They're going to feed the ball to 18 and they're going to get things going on offense. And Kirk cousins is going to be motivated, ultra motivated, um, against the other guy that he starred in the, the docuseries quarterback against or with, um, in Patrick palms. And he's going to come out there. He's going to sling the football. JJ is going to have a career day.

He might go for two more scores and over 115 yards. And, um, This Minnesota Vikings offense is going to be legitimate and Brian Flores knows what he's doing. He's going to understand how to try to scheme against Travis Kelsey and stuff. Um, he'll get his, he'll get his, you know, that's the way it's going to be. But the other monkey that's on the Minnesota Vikings back right now, according to most casual fans is the Tony Romo broadcast with, uh, with whatever the, the main guy's name is.

What's his name? The CBS guy. Yeah. Anyways. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Jim Nance and Tony Romo. Right. Well, you know, and, and that, but no, but like the last time we played with them on our broadcast, we got smacked down against the Dallas Cowboys 40, nothing. This is an opportunity. This is an opportunity for the Minnesota Vikings to write the ship, get their season back on track more so than they did last week. Take care of the football, uh, make my home's day tough and, and, and all this squash it.

It doesn't happen at us bank stadium. It might happen elsewhere, but it doesn't happen at the purple palace. Love it. I'm ready to go. Get me fired up already. I'm stoked. I'm so stoked. I'm happy I'm going to be there because I'm fucking hyped. I, we, I mean, I, I'm not a big Romo man's guy. I'm not either. I'm not really either, but. People really turned on, I used to love Tony Romo and I think a lot of people did. I, I think the pop, the populace has turned against him.

And it, it just is, he just lays it on so thick. How, how the mighty fall, it's really. Yes. It's, it's, it's something, but I will add, I'm very excited that ham can be at the game with me. I need him there against the chiefs. I do. I, we need our bread and butter Erickson. I know we need to bring it back. We need to bring it back to Teddy Bridgewater, coldest game in Vikings history leads us down to the field. Kyle Rudolph down the sideline. I need that.

I need that grit and determination at this game. Speaking of that, have you guys watched the docu series on the Minnesota Vikings? No. Oh my god, you are going to love this. I mean, I know pretty much everything about the Vikings history, but I love it. It's a season, it's a seven part documentary. This YouTube, these like, I can't remember the name of it, and these guys, they cover a franchise.

Yeah. And they've done the Mariners, the Atlanta Falcons, and their third one they picked was the Vikings. They go season by season and they talk about storylines. They pull newspaper articles, they pull on a lot of stuff. Each episode is like a decade, right? So like what first episodes of the sixties, the seventies and so on and so forth. And they break down like the games that they have footage for, they'll show that. Um, and they go for every playoff game, they go drive by drive.

It is fascinating. And you guys would really like it. It just is like Minnesota complete history. It's I mean, it's at least eight hours. I need to watch that. Yeah. Somebody that watches YouTube for content. That was just not my thing. Oh, it is fantastic. I'm going to need to watch that. Maybe we get those guys on the podcast. Talk about it. Yeah. I mean, if you would, I could, yeah, I'll, I'll see. I'll figure out their name. It's like, uh, they, they do a lot of videos.

One of the things that they do, that's really interesting is they cover a lot of teams where they'll have like a really good season or a couple of stretch of some, you know, extraordinarily good seasons. And then like, they just take a nosedive and how did that nose dive happen? Like what led to that? Like they did one for the early two thousands, Oakland Raiders. They did one for, uh, the New Jersey Nets back when they had like Vince Carter and Jason Kidd and Kenyon Martin, Richard Jefferson.

Um, and so it is very fascinating and it's just like, I left it thinking it is amazing that the Vikings have never won a Super Bowl. Like you just watch everything that's transpired. They have their, they have the third best win differential in the Super Bowl era. I think one is like the Steelers and maybe two is the Cowboys. And it's the Vikings. Yep. And the other stat, and move on after this, but the other stat is the Minnesota Vikings.

Or the only NFL franchise that has never had three straight losing seasons ever. That's crazy. In 60 years, they've never had a losing season three years in a row. That's wild. Wild. They're the best team at not being bad. Yeah. Yes. I've got, I've got the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday, 34 to 24. What do you like Johnny? 30, 10 purple. Uh, 27, 23. You're going to make me sweat up there in section 318. The Vikings haven't had a multi score win since like, you know, Yeah, I know.

2017 or 2019 or earlier. No, they haven't had it. That'd be insane. Let's talk about, let's talk about what's transpired over the course of the past couple of weeks and let's start with college football because we were out last week. Um, we haven't been good at gambling college football. In fact, in fact, Johnny and I texted each other on the side and said, I might be retired. I think I'm retired I want to go back a couple of weeks. I want to talk about week four in college football.

You had Florida state over Clemson in a, in a. Really a classic right? Um, may or may not have decided the ACC, but Florida State, Florida State squeaked out a win at Clemson, the one that you and I were aligned on and that we were so sold on. It was Notre Dame at home against Ohio State. Yeah, great. They lose a heart. They lose a heartbreaker. 17 to 14 against Ohio state. Um, I got a lot of thoughts on that one.

I mean, I don't know why Notre Dame don't run in the football out of the shotgun on these delayed looks. I, I, I, they didn't lean on their offensive line at all. You know what I didn't take into account. I didn't take into account. Ryan day was a better coach than Marcus Freeman. I'm big on coaching just a side note. But I'm not big on Ryan Day either. I mean, I think he's a slouch. So, uh, yeah, I mean, and then he, uh, Ryan Day is just a, sorry, I'll let you carry on.

Um, Ryan Day's ultimate born on third base thinks he had a triple guy. Yes. Yes. Uh, Oregon, Oregon, steamrolled Colorado in week four, 42 to six, uh, we kind of all, we kind of all saw that coming, but, uh, yeah, uh, that Notre game, Notre Dame game was a heartbreaker for us. Um, and then we moved on to week five and that was last week and we were all up there celebrating in the Northeast with the spread inspector, uh, May he, uh, may he, uh, well, I don't want to see rest in peace.

I mean, he's alive and well, but, uh, may he, uh, may he enjoy his time out in Mexico. Let's just say that. Right. Um, but we were all aligned on Oregon state, Oregon state at home against Utah. They won at 21 to seven. They covered, um, Great game. Great game. They covered. They dominated from start to finish, uh, Utah. Tough road test for them. It was a Friday night football game up at Corvallis and, uh, Oregon State won in the trenches. Utah really couldn't do anything offensively.

Uh, and then we move on to Saturday. USC and Colorado. We were all on the under that shit went way over 48 to 41. USC wins a football game. Colorado needed a bounce back desperately. I think what you learned from the past two weeks from Colorado is that. At the end of the day, they still have the quarterback, they still have the playmakers, and they can, they can go out and compete in any football game because of the guys that they have.

Um, you knew they weren't going to be, you know, they weren't going to be, uh, sulking in their sorrows after the, the breaks got beat off them in Eugene. They came out and competed. Had a probably had a chance to win that football game. The score ends up being a little bit closer than the game actually was, but, uh, their defense needs to be a little bit better. But, um, anyways, um, and then Notre Dame, Notre Dame bounced back with a win at Duke 21 to 14. There was not a lot.

There was not a lot of things that I took away from last week. Um, but I'll open up the floor to you guys. Did you guys have any takeaways from, uh, week four or five that you want to get off your chest today? Oh yeah, I'd like to start by saying I was up 40 units going into this last week. I go on the road, I start gambling on the road, I go down and I'm only up 15 units. I got absolutely shredded last week. Shredded. And I had a lock with Oklahoma State. It was bad.

Uh, it's getting to that time, that time of the year now where it gets funky in college football, where you really got to tighten your card and get right as for the Notre Dame game. And my God, Marcus Freeman, get enough guys in the field. What are we doing? You're at home. You're playing Ohio state. This is for your, I mean, it was terrible. They're done now. And last play of the game. Yeah. They had 11 guys, 10 guys. They had 10 guys.

Yes. And, and you know, we're, we're, we say that love blinds you. I fell in love with Sam Hartman and it blinded me to the fact that Marcus Freeman is just not that good of a coach. Trust coaching. Don't trust players necessarily trust coaching. And that's what really killed me last week. Honestly.

The, uh, the few takeaways that I had, um, I would say one, I didn't get to catch most of the week four games because I went to, uh, I had a funeral in the morning and then I went to, uh, St. John's after. And then I was dog sitting that evening and that was the day the Gophers blew a 21 point lead against, uh, the Northwestern Wildcats. Unfortunately. Yeah. Yuck. So I would say, well, I'd say my, my take on the gophers is I'm out on 18, the Catholic mass.

I think he is not the guy he can zip it, but he is. Very inaccurate. And I don't know if that comes with time, but he's taking a step back from last season and I am just so down on this like I'm going to the game. It's fun. I mean, if they beat Northwestern, they go in their loss. They're only losses to North Carolina. Let's say they're Let's say that whether he's what four and one. Yeah, they're, I think they're right now.

So they're four and one, they go into Northwest, they go into Michigan, and they'd be probably receiving votes, they wouldn't be ranked. But they'd be receiving votes and I'd be a little bit more confident. But just after watching that the offense just as looking sputtering. In terms of the overall college football picture, Caleb Williams is ridiculous. I think that Colorado. The way that they played against Oregon and the way that they played against USC.

It was a tale of two teams, completely different. The fact that they were down a lot against USC and clawed their way back. Um, if I was a Colorado fan, my biggest takeaway is that, hey, we understand that we're without our best player, Travis Hunter. However, um, you know, those guys really fought back. And I think that that is something that's would be. Inspiring to me. If I were a Buffaloes fan, um, I think Sam Hartman is being very slept on.

I think he's a really talented quarterback and you watched that last drive against Duke. Um, he just drove the team down the field. I think it was like a fourth down. I think he had a fourth down conversion or could have been third, um, where he just talked it and ran very impressive from him, Georgia, in my opinion, should not be the number one team in the country. Um, you should be able to find somebody else. I think honestly, it should probably be Texas. Seriously.

Yeah. Just. Yeah. Smoked Kansas. They beat Alabama. They're the third team in the country. Michigan might be better, but Michigan hasn't really played any solid opponents yet. Um, and Georgia, I get going on the road and the SEC isn't easy. But you if you're the number one team in the country defending back to back national champions. You should not lose or barely beat, excuse me, an Auburn team by seven points when their head coach is Hugh Freeze in his first season.

And they were losing to the majority of that game. So, I would say my, it's not even a hot take, but Georgia is not repeating this season. They have an easy schedule. Um, the SEC misses. Bad Tennessee, uh, frost sucks. So let me ask, let me ask you guys this then, uh, going into week six, who are your top four teams in college football? I'll start, I'll start. Okay. Uh, and no, and it doesn't have to be in any particular order either.

Because I think I, yeah, I think I agree with you HD because I don't, I don't, I'm not entirely sold on Georgia, but they gotta be in there, Georgia, Georgia's in there, uh, Texas is in there. Uh, I'm going to go with Michigan just because they run the football super well. They take care of the football. They play good defense. I got Michigan in there and this isn't straying too far from the pack because those are the top three teams in the AP top 25.

But then I'm going to throw another one in there and it's Washington, Washington Huskies, the Washington Huskies. Um, Michael panics is everything that we hyped him up to be going into the season. He slings it against anybody. You can say whatever you want against Pac 12 defenses and Washington is going to be tested a little bit later. Um, but he's got all the tools. He's got all the tools. He delivers the football accurately. He's got a cannon for an arm. He makes good decisions.

It's, it's a guy that's a veteran. Um, I put Washington in my top four. I think they're the team to beat in the PAC 12. And I know that Caleb Williams is out there. I know that Bonix is out there. Washington is my top dog in the PAC 12 right now, and I think they deserve to be in the top four right now. So I'll go to you, Johnny, next. Okay, well, here's where we're gonna differ here. Number one, I got Texas. Number two, I got Ohio State. And number three, I have Florida State.

And the reason being is because they've won more meaningful games. Georgia and Michigan, I understand they're undefeated. I understand that they have... You know, their preseason ranking, all this stuff. They haven't been tested at all. And number three, I agree with you, Washington. Washington's look very, very impressive to me. The receivers with Penix and, and to be honest, who's not far behind them. Penn state don't sleep on the Nittany Lions.

It's all I have to say, I would say in no order, Michigan, I think should be, they're not, I don't think they should be number one, but I think they should be in it because you know, you are, you know, they, those players didn't choose the schedule this year, but what they've come out and done so far is exactly what they're supposed to do against extraordinarily inferior opponents. They've whooped them. Every single week. So I would say as of right now, you know, Michigan is in there.

Um, I, I, I don't think it'd be tough to put in Michigan and Ohio State because the loser of that game doesn't win, doesn't even play in the Big Ten Championship. Um, and that's why I think it's also difficult to throw in Penn State. Um, I do like your Washington take a lot. I could see. Do you know, I could see USC maybe, honestly, the way that Williams, uh, like his pace this year in terms of his numbers so far is better than last year's.

Yes. And I know that obviously people will talk about him to the cows come home and people that are starting to like to talk about Michael Penix a bit. Penix, Penix, Penix, um, We love Penix, but it's Penix. But the way that he's been playing has been, has been absolutely stellar.

And what you might see with the Pac 12 is what we saw with the SEC, you know, A seven, eight, nine years ago where a team that they just are so good that they just beat up on each other, where the pack 12, 12 could get a second team with maybe two losses. And I hope that the playoff committee doesn't look at a laundry. And what I mean by laundry is, you know, the colors, the jerseys, the helmets, they don't look at that because, you know, and I think that like, that's what you're rooting for.

You're rooting for laundry at that point. And, uh, I hope they, Oh, well, you know, it's Alabama. It's the numbers on the side of the helmet, the crimson helmet, the crimson jerseys. No, it's, there are a lot better teams in Alabama so far this season. Um, and I, I also hope that they don't see where they play. I hope they, whatever college football voter, um, cause well playoff voter. I hope that they, you know, maybe work in a mid afternoon coffee and stay up to watch PAC 12 football.

That's the difficulty that it's a, and it's a real thing. It's difficult for PAC 12 teams to get a lot of respect because all the voters are generally Eastern time zone and they're not staying up to watch a slug fest of, you know, watch like. Washington versus, uh, Arizona this past weekend, which is impossible to watch, um, but that'll be dead soon. And, and I really hope that they get two teams in. So, so far I have Michigan, um, I have Washington. I said, maybe USC.

I do think you have to throw in Texas. And then I think, I think Georgia ends up getting in because of a laundry and be the fact that they've. Okay. Thanks. One, two championships in a row and their schedule is very weak and I mean, LSU, I mean, LSU just lost a whole mess. They're done. They're done. Yeah. Yeah. And then Alabama, I mean, they're four and one right now and they haven't looked. Quarterback is still a humongous question mark.

They feel like they're finding their footing a little bit though. I mean, I, I. It's going to be interesting to watch down the stretch, but yeah, I still don't trust their quarterback. Um, I, I agree with you on the Pac 12 take.

I think that there's multiple teams that can make it out of the Pac 12 and I think that's going to be a super interesting stretch to watch because Utah, a team that hasn't had their guy, Cam Rising, uh, goes to a tough place to play in Corvallis and loses a tight football game. Um, but I could see them beating USC at home later. Like it's, it's, it's a dog fight and I hope that you're right.

The, the committee doesn't just take into consideration laundry and, and take the teams that are going to get them the best, um, you know, viewership in the playoff. But look, this is the last year that we're going to have to deal with the 14 looks. So it is what it is. Um, I would also venture to say that a team like Notre Dame, despite the one loss, they have an opportunity in front of themselves that they can beat USC at home. Uh, I think that's next week.

That's, uh, that's an opportunity for them to get back in the playoff mix. So it is what it is. Um, I feel like college football is as competitive as it ever has been. So let's talk about week six. Okay? Because week six. It's not a great slate, but there's a couple of interesting matchups. We obviously have the big one, the red river rivalry, Oklahoma and Texas of the cotton bowl. Texas is laying six points. How do you not take Texas? Um, but this game has a lot of implications. This game is.

This game, it has all the meaning it's got, it's got everything at stake, everything's at stake in the Red Ribble rivalry here to, if, if one team wants to be in the playoff mix and the playoff conversation after this week, it's going to be whoever wins this football game. Uh, me personally, I trust Texas a little bit more, but it's going to be a shootout. It's going to be a shootout. I would agree. Um, I think.

The issue with Oklahoma is because, you know, they've been for the better part of a decade, they've been such an offensive juggernaut, and they had to do such a 180 moving Lincoln Riley to Brett Venables, who was the best defensive coordinator for years in all of college football, but now that their team has kind of adopted a defensive and defensive mentality. And I think that's really difficult to do. And last season was a really down year for them.

And then they're, you know, they're undefeated so far this year, but I just don't believe in them. I would, if I were to play the game, I would say you take Texas. Um, and especially with Quinn, Quinn Ewers, just slinging that rock. Um, I would say that that Cam, you're, you're right on there. In terms of other ones, um, L S U and Mizzou, yes. Wasn't a game probably circled on a lot of people's schedules, but that's gonna be an interesting one as well.

Yes. It looks like LSU is playing five and a half. Uh, Mizou is, and I'm blanking on the guy's name. Um, they're quarterback, he's nice. Yeah. Yeah. The, the quarterback's nice and they have a really good receiver who I just, I can't remember his name, but I mean, he. Mizzou could easily win that game. Another one. I love Mizzou with the points. I love it. Another one would be, uh, I'm looking at the schedule U C L A versus Washington State.

Yes, Yes. That's gonna be such a fun game to watch Wazo Plus Wazoo plus three and a half on the road, dude. Yep. Dope. It's a sleepy Rose bowl environment. Don't forget. All right. Cam Ward and that Washington state offense is going to go in there and execute. All right. Yes. UCLA is a little bit young at the quarterback position. I like what UCLA has done to this point. They went into Utah and competed a little bit. It was a gritty football game.

The Pac 12 has been a little bit more low scoring than you'd predict too, because with all the quarterback play that's out there and all the talent they have on that side of the football, it's been a lot of tight football games. Uh, Wazoo's getting three and a half on the road at UCLA. I love that. And last one, um, that I would be given Kentucky versus the number one ranked Georgia Bulldogs. Georgia is laying 15. If I were to play that, I would take Kentucky. Is it on the road?

Is it at Lexington? No, it is in Georgia. Okay. And the reason being is because I just, this quarterback for Georgia, I just don't see it with him. Mind you, a few weeks ago, Spencer Rattler had the Georgia Bulldogs on, not necessarily on the road, but sweating in Athens. Yeah. So this isn't the same Georgia team that we've seen from, and I'm looking at Georgia schedule right now.

I mean, you know, this is probably their Ole Miss at home and this are their two toughest matchups, which is a embarrassing for the entire sec. But I mean, Kentucky, this is, this is a massive game for Kentucky going back to laundry. When you think of the Kentucky Wildcats, you're thinking basketball. Yep. For Kentucky. I mean, reading off some of their scores, 44 to 14 against Ball State, Eastern Kentucky, 28, 17. Not great. Follow that up with a win against Akron. 35 to three.

You do what you're supposed to do in that game. Vanderbilt in Nashville, 45 to 28, and they just played the gopher, gophers, yikes, the Gators, excuse me, 33 to 14. And that 14 points by Florida, that doesn't tell the full story. That game, 50 to nothing. Yeah. I would say Kentucky on the road. I don't, I don't think that they are going to go in there and win, but I would not be shocked if they kept it very close.

This is a game where you look at, and I think use a Penn State, Minnesota, although it's completely flipped in terms of what the game's being played. But in 2019, Penns, that's a rivalry game, right? Minnesota has that circled on the schedule. They were playing the fourth ranked team. Penn State, they, they don't give a rat's ass about the Minnesota Golden Gophers. And those guys in Lexington, Kentucky have had that game circle on that calendar for months.

That's like, we get to play the number one ranked team in the entire country, the back to back nationals, and they are going to get Kentucky's, in my opinion, they're going to get Kentucky's Best shot. I mean, George is going to get Kentucky's best shot of that. See, here's where I disagree with you a little bit on that game. And here's where I would advise stay away from that game. Cause the, the line clearly suggests Kentucky, right? It clearly says it's over two scores. Yeah. Right.

And you have Devin Leary as a solid quarterback. The problem with that logic, HD, where I respect it, I disagree in the terms of Georgia hasn't played anybody till this point. This is their first real test. You don't think the Georgia Bulldogs, Kirby Smart, aren't going to be ready to go for their first big test at home? I would stay away from that game. And we'll jump They're reading the press clippings too much, though. I mean, last week, wasn't Auburn, like, was Auburn even ranked?

Yeah, but that was at Auburn. True. But what is, I mean, I think that matters. I think that matters a little bit more than you think. And I think that it might be a little bit of a look ahead spot. We're staring us right in the face. Auburn was not right by the way. Um, I just don't, I just think that they're kind of like, Georgia this season has kind of been like Jeb Bush in 2017, 2016. Low energy Jeb. I hear ya, I hear ya. No, I respect, listen, I love the nutsack to take Kentucky.

I will be, I will be not putting a, well I will be putting a little, some money on a certain side, the total, but on a side, no shot. I will root for Kentucky. But, um, in terms of the Red River rivalry, I wouldn't be too sure, guys. Dylan Gabriel is a good fucking quarterback. And in that game, the pads crack. Anything can happen. We've seen Kyler Murray lose in that game. So I wouldn't be too quick to judge that. Another game I want to mention too is Bama. Bama's gonna win that game.

Who do they play? A& M. Oh, yeah. Well, duh. It's one and a half. It's one and a half. Oh, everybody's and everybody and everybody's on. Everybody's on the Aggies. Everybody wants the Aggies to win. This is the game that Jalen Milrow figures it out and comes at clutch. And the other game, the other big game I want to fucking add to what we're talking about right now, because it probably won't be added is Fresno State at Wyoming. Fresno State is touted as one of the top.

Mid majors in the, in the country and they're going to Wyoming. Wyoming is a good club. I've seen them play before in Wyoming. It's going to be a night game. I like Wyoming a lot. What's the line? Six, six, six. Yes. I'm telling you. Wyoming is might be my lock of this century. I love that. I love that. I'm going to think if I had to give a lock right now, I'd stay away from college. I, if I was to give a college lock, I would say it's. Excuse me, Texas. My lock of, we do a pick em, uh, at work.

My lock will be The Houston Texans plus two going to Atlanta to face on. Let's, uh, let's get into the NFL then let's, let's do a little bit of recap. I'm going to do a speed recap on week four. All right, guys, stop me. If you have anything to say Detroit Thursday night football beat the breaks off green Bay, Baltimore blasted Cleveland on the road. Uh, Tennessee. Smoked the Bengals 27 to three at home, Buffalo snot bubbled Miami 48 to 20 was never a ball game.

Uh, the LA Rams won an overtime at Indianapolis, Indianapolis tried to make it close late. Um, Kansas city and New York. We, we kind of discussed that Kansas city eeked away with the wind 2320 Seattle snot bubble, New York on Monday night football, uh, Jacksonville last at Atlanta. Atlanta has got a lot of talent. Um, but Jackson and Jacksonville needed that Jacksonville needed that Denver and Chicago was a, uh, uh, embarrassment of hysteria.

If you will just disgusting football, Denver comes away with a win in Chicago, Chicago. There's rumors now that if they lose this upcoming week, they're going to just blow it all up. Philadelphia was on the ropes against the skins. Um, Uh, they won an overtime 34 to 31. New Orleans couldn't do anything at home. They only scored three field goals. They lost 26 to nine against the Bucs. Uh, Houston looks like a frisky club. They look better than a frisky club to be honest. They look pretty good.

They put up 30 at home against Pittsburgh. They won 30 to six chargers win by a score against Vegas. They got a couple of plays down the stretch late. I think Josh McDaniels made a coaching blunder there late with a Devante Adams score that he failed to challenge. Not sure. San Francisco beat the brakes off Arizona and Dallas snot bubbled New England. So, um, the NFL season has been hard to handicap. I'll just put it that way. Um, and we can look ahead to the, to the week five schedule.

Um, do you guys have any, any thoughts on what happened? What transpired last week though? I think, Oh, he's carried by Brady. He just came out hot. I mean, yeah. Yeah, I agree. I mean, I want to think I want to think Erickson's recap there. That was outstanding. That was outstanding. That was outstanding. He broke it down. It's not bubbled as an adjective. That'd be an adverb, I guess. But yeah, an adverb. Yeah. Okay, man. It's kind of a verb. It's just a verb. Adverb. Whatever.

But, uh, I mean, the Patriots. Mac Jones, and I know that, like, I'm not breaking any news to you guys, Mac Jones is terrible. And what people forget about the Patriots is that they don't have a general manager. It's Bill Belichick. He is their de facto person that is picking a lot of those guys. And the team that they have now, you could say, oh, well, they're missing Brady. Well, you know, they had the guy for almost 20 years. So you would have had, you think of a succession plan.

The succession plan was awful. Belichick was so high on his own supply that he thought he could win without Brady. They take Mac Jones. Mac Jones stinks. That is a glaring miss by the New England Patriots. They have a couple of guys. But, I mean, think about it, they have a guy like Edelman, they have Gronkowski, they had Aaron Hernandez before he became a double murderer, or a singular murderer, regardless, and he is no longer with us.

Belichick, the last few seasons has not been that great of a drafter and even worse. He hasn't been that great of a coach. His record is still under 500 without Tom Brady as quarterback and to go and call him the greatest coach of all time. And what does Brady do in his first year leaving New England? He goes and wins a Super Bowl.

Now, I understand that they also create a super team in Tampa, but this guy is what, 44, 45 years old, and he still goes and does it in a completely new team, completely new system for literally the worst franchise in all of professional football, the Tampa Bay Bucs. Look it up. They have the worst 20 percentage. He completely turned that entire ship around. What does Bill Belichick done? Nothing. He hasn't done any. He went to the playoffs with Mac Jones.

I was at Freehouse watching the game and they got the snot kicked out of them by the Buffalo Bills. They're the worst team in that division. Sorry, I sound like I'm delivering like bad news or like breaking up with someone. No, no, no, no, no, no. Now listen, where you are correct and where the Patriots are on the hot seat, the bigger story really is the Bengals. Yes. Because if they lose this week, their season's all but over.

Yes. And they have Joe Burrell, Jamar Chase, T. Higgins, a good defense, and seemingly... One of the best rosters in football. They were in the Superbowl in the past two years for Christ's sakes. What's going on in Cincinnati? I think it's, I think it's Burroughs. Uh, I almost said hamstring. I think it's his calf, but yeah, I understand that.

But like, um, yeah, I mean, but neither, like part of me wants to say that, but at the other, like part of me is like, well, it's his calf and then the other part is. Taking into other factors. I mean, he, he does have the best receiving core in the NFL and he has had one for, you know, ever since he came, like they got Jamar Chase, they have Tyler Boyd, they have T Higgins. Like he's still a void. Yes. Joe Mixon, Joe Mixon, who is. He's overrated.

I think he likes to, he likes to pick on little kids too. Yes. Is it safe to say we just don't know anything about the Cincinnati Bengals and they might be the NFL. No, maybe they lost 27 to three. They, I think you can come out and say, you know about them. They don't know what they're doing offensively. Yeah. I think that they, I would say they missed the playoffs. I mean, that's a, that's not like the boldest take. I know. I don't know what to tell you. You guys paused for a second.

I thought I was like, this one is bad news. Um, I mean, again, I understand they're 1 3, but they just might sink this season. They might just be bad. That's crazy. Yeah. I mean, I guess like you can't start 0 3 every season and just expect to come back. You know, it's the NFL.

So, and like, uh, Ravens, like what Lamar does is he never has like, either he kills you with his legs and he throws for like 150 yards and they win, or he doesn't run the ball that much and then he throws for 303 touchstones. Like he never, he never does like both really well. At the same time, he does one thing really well, like either time, and that's not a knock on him per se.

It's just like, all right, this is a Lamar run game or no, this is a Lamar throw game, and I just think the Ravens are so damn good. They are. I mean, Cleveland, I'm down on Deshaun Watson, obviously as a person, but also as a football player too. I think, I mean, he, I understand he played really well, um, his last start, I know they went with DTR last weekend. Um, but I, I mean, I think that Cleveland is sweating about that deal.

That is a Albatross contract and the, so far the ROI on it has been awful. Awful, awful. I think Pittsburgh also is not that great either. Kenny Pickett sucks. Then I was having a guy like Kirk and being like one of the better quarterbacks in the NFL. You could point out, and Kirk being here for numerous years, I think it's really easy to notice bad quarterback play. Like, can you imagine waking up like, you guys, you're going to the game on Sunday. Cam, you're flying in.

Um, And you have to go watch Kenny Pickett for three and a half hours. Like think of that was the, your case, like you're spending all this money, you're getting tickets, you're going out before the game, you know, cutoff jeans, red wings, you know, and you're going to go spend all that money or a Daniel Jones play an NFL game, right? No, I hear you. You could say, well, Henry, you did the same thing. Like you got invested on the twins playoffs.

In 2019, when they threw an Uber driver in game two in Yankee stadium, I said, yeah, so I know what I'm talking about. I was an idiot. Like I understand. Yeah. Bad quarterback, bad quarterback play in the NFL is equivalent to piss poor, starting pitching in October baseball. That's probably a fair take. Uh, let's do it. Let's do a speed round. On the look ahead for week five in the national football league. All right. You got Minnesota at home plus four against the Kansas city Swifties.

Okay. Uh, that's, that's a late game. All right. All right. Thursday night starts up tomorrow night. We got, uh, Chicago at Washington, Washington's land six is a bad football game, but Washington's not a bad football team. All right. Love, love Sam Howell. Uh, and then, uh, and then we got, uh, the international game Jacksonville state across the pond, I think, uh, maybe, and they're, uh, they're going to play Buffalo in England and they're getting five and a half against Buffalo.

Um, and I do too. I do too. It's very contrarian. I love that play. New York jets or excuse me, the New York football giants are plus 11 New York football giants couldn't have looked worse to this point in the season. Plus 11 on the road at Miami. Uh, you got new Orleans plus one at new England, who we just discussed, maybe a bad football team at one and three new Orleans also might be a bad football team.

That might be a horrible football game, Baltimore minus four at Pittsburgh, uh, Kenny Pickett's health is in question. Sounds like he's probably still going to be able to start. Sounds like he avoided major knee injury. Um, and. We've kind of agreed that he might be bad, but, uh, but he still gives him the best chance to win. Um, and at home that Pittsburgh defense is scary, but I love Baltimore, Carolina plus 10 on the road at, at Detroit. Uh, we saw what this Carolina team is made of.

And we've seen the vulnerabilities of this Detroit Lions football team. Sounds like, uh, I actually, I don't know, I think Bryce, uh, I think Bryce Young is still starting for Carolina, is that right? Okay. Uh, CJ Stroud and the Houston Texans plus two on the road at Atlanta. CJ Stroud has looked great. Desmond Ritter has not looked good. Um, that'll be interesting.

Tennessee minus one and a half on the road, home underdogs, divisional game, Indianapolis Colts, plus one and a half at home, uh, against the Tennessee Titans, um, and then you have Arizona who, who beat Dallas at home earlier this year, a couple of weeks ago. Pretty crazy result there. They're plus three. They're getting three points at home against the aforementioned Cincinnati Bengals. They might be bad. Who knows? Um, Philadelphia goes on the road. My lays four and a half at LA the Rams.

Uh, the Rams might be, might be contenders and then, uh, the Jets and the Jets and the Broncos. That's a piss poor football game, both one and three clubs, Denver's lane, one and a half at home. And then Dallas and Sam Fran in a rematch of the playoff matchup last year, um, in the divisional round Dallas is getting three and a half on the road. Uh, both teams have looked like world beaters, if I'm being honest, other than Dallas's falter at Arizona. This one's going to be interesting.

And then on Monday night, we have Green Bay going to Las Vegas. And Las Vegas is getting a point at home, basically a pick them there. Um, what are you guys looking forward to as we look ahead to week five in the National Football League? I'm just going to give you my card right now. Dallas plus four Vikings plus four Steelers plus four Jags plus five and a half Carolina plus 10 and Falcons plus two. It's the week of the underdog. I'm telling you right now, bet the underdog, something's crazy.

Okay. Except for, okay. Except for Falcons are laying to it all doesn't matter. The Falcons are going to win that game. Okay. No, they're not. Desmond murder is terrible. Going back to me pointing out other bad quarterbacks. I would go, uh, Washington's going to win by a billion. The Vikings, I think the Vikings went on Sunday. So obviously they're, um, Jacksonville. They've been in London for damn near two weeks. So I'm surprised that line is that large. Honestly, Houston's going to win.

Um, I don't like to, I don't like, it's hard to give a pick on. The double digit spreads. Um, why? It's hard, it's so difficult. Uh, and they're not like, I would say, I would say Detroit, honestly. Uh, Tennessee versus Colts. I would actually rather puke than watch this game, um, like vomit during the entire duration of it. Um, but if I had to pick, I would say take the Colts. Um, yes, double digit. One, the giants are awful. So yeah, take Miami.

Um, and then the other one, I, I do disagree with John. I think, I think the Ravens will cover that. I think the Steelers... Just going back to my Kenny Pickett take, I won't go through it again. I think he is god awful, god awful. And then lastly, last but not least, I would say the Packers. Yeah. Broncos, Broncos should not be favored by the way. If you're a team that gives up 70 points in a national football league game, they were favored by three last week. You shouldn't be favored.

You gave up seven in the year of our Lord. Yeah. Yeah. I like the Jets. You're right. I don't care that it's in mile high. Yeah. Doesn't matter. Russell Wilson. I'm Peyton stink. Javante Williams. I do this every year. I find a running back and I'm like, you know what? I'm going to take him in my fantasy league and he's going to be my RB too. Did it with Miles Gaskin, did it with Javante Williams, second year in a row. Sucks!

But it's the battle, but it's the battle of the one in three clubs and ones at home. They're desperate. They're both desperate. They're both desperate. One of them just... Had Kansas City sweating very nervously and the other one barely beat the Chicago Bears and the week prior gave up 70 points to Tua. Irregardless, you shouldn't bet on either club because they're both bad clubs. I understand. Don't bet on bad clubs. You should never bet on a bad club.

I'm just saying just the gun to my head take. Yeah. That but it's like if both are bad but one is. Both are bad, but one is just, like, shitty. Yeah, you're right. And Randy Gregory just like, I don't even, he's left the team, went AWOL. Yeah. He just said, I'm not playing anymore. I'm Not as bad as Chandler Jones, but yeah. All right. Well, uh, let's get into our cards then. Let's get into the gambling corner and let's wrap this show up. The 50th episode of Voyage.

Nothing better than if we give out some winners on this podcast today. All right. I'll start with my card. Uh, and I'll, I'll give you, I'll give you my favorite pick in the college football realm. Thanks. Granted, I've been bad at college football and I understand, okay, so probably fade me, but my favorite play in college football this weekend is the Colorado Buffs minus four at Arizona State. This line is begging you to take Arizona State at home. Arizona State.

Competed until late in the football game at home against USC, but they're starting drew pine at quarterback now. All right. They stink. Okay. If Colorado is going to bounce back defensively at all ever throughout this season, if they're going to pick up their first pack, 12, when it's going to be on the road in Tempe, this Arizona state team is bad. They're a very bad team. Colorado is still not going to have their best player, Travis Hunter back, but I like Colorado minus the points.

At Arizona state. I love it. Um, and then I'm going to stay away from college football for the rest of it because I'm just not good. And I'm, I'm, I'm transparent about that. All right. There's a reason why I retired last year. NFL football. I'm good at. I think I'm in Lee. I think I'm the lead dog in our pick up league. Okay. I know what I'm doing. Vikings plus four. No one's going to be on them for all the reasons we already discussed.

The Vikings are to win this football game at us bank stadium on Sunday. It's going to be electric. The place is going to be rocking. Taylor Swift's going to be there. Don't care. Vikings plus four Jacksonville plus five and a half. Wake up, start your day, drink a coffee, make yourself a breakfast sandwich, crush the England game, and watch Jacksonville go and compete in their second home in England. Buffalo's coming off a world beating win against a good Miami team.

Now they have to travel across a pond. They're facing a... What's been noted as a pretty poor Jacksonville club. They haven't lived up to hype yet. Jacksonville wins this football game outright. Take them on the money line. Plus five and a half Jacksonville. Love it. Baltimore and Pittsburgh. Under 38, this is my favorite divisional under of the weekend. Okay. These hit under 38. It's the lowest total of any divisional game that we've got here. I love the under at 38.

This game is going to be a slugfest defensively. Baltimore is probably going to do just enough to win the football game, but you can't count out Pittsburgh at home. They, they usually find a way. There's a divisional fucking football game, heated rivalry under 38. Yes, Carolina at Detroit. I like the under, I like the under at 45 and a half. Look at how we played Carolina last week and what is, what is Detroit offer up offensively that gives you more confidence in their offense? Not a whole lot.

This game is going to be at Ford field. The turf is fast. Everybody wants to take the over, uh, don't care under 45 and a half Indianapolis plus one and a half at home against Tennessee. Tennessee just beat the brakes off of Cincinnati at home. Now they go on the road to what is supposed to be an inferior Indianapolis Colts Club, Indianapolis home underdog in a divisional game. I love the way Anthony Richardson's looked. I love the way that Indianapolis has been playing, especially at home.

I'll take a point and a half. I also like the under at 42 and a half. And then Dallas and San Francisco, uh, like I mentioned, a re a rematch of the divisional game from a year ago, both these teams have looked like world beaters at this point, Dallas has offenses look pretty good. Have they faced a defense that's anywhere near up to the snuff of San Francisco? Absolutely not. Absolutely not under 45, under 45 Dallas and San Francisco, uh, primetime game.

Um, I think that both defenses are going to be out there. It's going to be pad on pad football to me. I don't have football Brock. Purdy's going to have a tough time out there. Dallas's defenses look good despite the absence of Trayvon digs. It doesn't matter. This game is going to go under the total of 45. It's a primetime game in San Francisco. The breeze is going to be coming off the ocean front in the bay. I love it. Um, both teams are going to struggle.

Dallas is going to compete in this one. So I kind of like them with the points too, because it's, no one's going to be on Dallas. Uh, no one's going to be on Dallas. We all saw what happened last year. It doesn't matter. Under 45 and a half Dallas and San Francisco. So my three plays, my three plays for this weekend. For the 50th episode of voyage, I know I said I'm bad at college football, but I love Colorado. I love Colorado. Minus four. I'm going to lay the points with Colorado.

They're going to go into Tempe and they're going to get the win by a score. They're going to, they're going to cover against the Arizona state sun devils. The sun devils stink. They exhausted all their resources to try to win a football game against USC. They can't get it done. Colorado needs a win in conference play. They're going to go and get it at Arizona state, Colorado minus four. That's my first play. Vikings. Plus four.

Vikings, plus four Vikings, Vikings win this game outright at great stadium in the afternoon slate. They're going to win this game outright. The line is begging you to take fucking Kansas city. Why would it be plus four? We know what Kansas city is. We know how hype it is. We know what the Minnesota Vikings have been to this point in the year. Right. Take them, take them plus four, take them money line. I love it. And then my third and final play is going to be Baltimore and Pittsburgh under 38.

It's a low total in a divisional game, heated rivalry. Both offenses are not going to be able to run, uh, move the football as well as they think they should. I think Baltimore probably wins this football game bounce back spot. Doesn't matter. Under 38, both offenses are going to struggle. So there's my car. I'll give you one. I go, okay. No, let's see. Go ahead. Oh, sorry. Uh, let's keep it short and sweet. I've already touched on it a few times.

I've hired a, you know, pick them pool for work would be, um, plus two Texans. I really like CJ Stroud a lot. Cam, I'm going to be following you on the Minnesota Vikings plus four. Uh, and then to sprinkle college in there, the, uh, excuse me, Washington state going to Pasadena, that stadium is going to be empty as can be. It is about a 40 minute drive from Pasadena to the UCLA campus.

I would say three and a half plus, or, uh, getting three and a half, excuse me, for Washington state, that would be my, I love that. I'm going to be taking Washington state on the money line. I love that play. It's going to be a sleepy environment. It is going to be very sleepy. It's going to be, it's going to be the equivalent. Of, you know, I got to be an equal opportunity ripper. You get, you rip the Republicans. You got to rip the Democrats.

It is going to be a Joe Biden presidential rally from his basement. That's what it's going to look like. Yes. My turn? Yeah, my turn. Okay, I'm on it with you with a Colorado minus four. I love Colorado minus four going to Arizona State. I don't give a shit about Arizona State. Dion's gonna have his boys ready. I am a Dion believer. Wyoming plus six at home against Fresno State. As I mentioned before, going to Wyoming is different. You're at the elevation. Fresno State's riding high.

They're one of the best, uh, you know, they're one of the, they think they're the best team in the mountain West. They're not, not so fast. Wyoming's four and one. They're going to beat Fresno State, Colorado or Oklahoma state rather at home. Shout out Grant Martinson, Oklahoma state at home. It's a good club though. They're bad. You're going against yourself. Oklahoma State stinks. I didn't say that I was going to put money on the club. I'm just telling you what I think.

Alright, Oklahoma plus six and a half. Red River rivalry, okay? Dylan Gabriel's a solid quarterback. Pads are going to be cracking. It's not a home field advantage for either team. I love Oklahoma. Take the points, rivalry game. Missouri plus five and a half at home. Yeah. Five and O, LSU. Ryan Kelly is going to give. Fired after this week. Wow. Believe in the tigers. Believe in Missouri. Let's go. Bama. Bama minus one and a half at a and m. Texas a and m. It doesn't matter.

Don't read into the hype. Brad Johnson's kid. It doesn't matter. Bama savings. He stinks. No, they're gonna Johnson's bad quarterback. He's a bad, he's a lefty quarterback. He's a bad quarterback. His name's Atua. I love Bama. Minus one and a half. That's a gift and one of my locks of the week. The under in the Georgia Kentucky game, 48, both teams play similar smash, smash mouth football. They're going to try to beat themselves at the, at that, that, that game.

It's not going to work under 45 or 48 rather moving on to the NFL. Like I said before, Dallas plus four and a half or plus four at, uh, the 49ers, the Vikings plus four Steelers plus four Jags plus five and a half bet all the fucking underdogs in the NFL. Cause they're all going to win. And my three plays are, uh, well, I, one, I didn't mention before, and which is my absolute lock of the week. Michigan plus 19 Wyoming plus six in the under 48 Georgia, Kentucky. That's my card. I love it.

That's beautiful. That's beautiful. I could shed a tear, dude. All right. Well, look, here's the deal. The, the, I'm looking at now, now pivoting, uh, to the rest of the weekend. We got a big weekend ahead of us, right? We got to stay sharp. We got to stay tight on our cards. Minnesota, the twins. HD, uh, okay, never mind. They haven't, they haven't announced the game times on this. So, but Minnesota wins plus one 38 at Houston. Um, series or game one, just game one, just game one.

I'm sure the series, the series lines are out too, but I can't. I can't find that anyways, anyways, interesting stuff, uh, talking around the rest of the MLB real quick, Arizona beat the brakes off, uh, Milwaukee, they're going to LA now, uh, and the Texas Rangers dummied the Tampa Bay Rays who were supposed to be the best team in the league, uh, until they lost Wander Franco, uh, and we don't need to get into that, but, um, yeah, so I, every series was asleep. Yeah. Every series was a sweep.

That's right. That's right. So rest isn't really a factor here. Hopefully, uh, the Minnesota Twins didn't drink too much champagne, crack too many Budweiser's. Hopefully they come prepared, ready to go against Houston on Saturday. Uh, big, big time slate, Red River rivalry, uh, big, big time slate of MLB baseball. Um, The, the Swifties are going to be out in full force at us bank stadium. And I don't know, man, I'm just hyped.

This is, this is the time of the year where things get real nuts and bolts. Uh, the rubber meets the road and, and we've got, we've got big time things ahead. So I hope you guys are ready. I hope you guys are strapped in. I'm going to be watching TCF Bank, probably going to be Hedgington Bank on Saturday, wearing a brand new yellow gopher football sweatshirt, maybe accompanied by a pocket radio, listening to the Twins game, if they're at the same time.

Well, the game is at six 30, Minnesota, Michigan's at six 30, Minnesota is going to have their brakes beaten off. So yeah, that's, I'm, I'm mentally preparing myself for that. So I really hope it's like an, it would be nice if it was an afternoon twins game, like a one, like a one 10 first pitch would be juicy just for that. Um, and then if we could get, or if actually if it was back to back, cause then you could go.

If it was 1 10 first pitch for the Twins on Saturday, then it'll be same thing on Sunday. Then that leads you in, it's a nice little appetizer, playoff baseball leads you in to Chiefs Vikings. Two TV setters, get it locked and loaded. You got red zone on one, you got sound and playoff baseball on the other. Love that. I got news, I got news for you HD. I, I'm, listen, I don't like P. J. Fleck. But the guy wins football games. I respect him.

And I've refrained on Twitter from going at him because I don't want you and your army coming after me on Twitter. He doesn't, he doesn't have the horses this year. No, he doesn't. And I mean, I won't get into it too much, but it's just, it's a down year. And I think the one thing, if you're going to find it, try and find a positive is like, you know, he's raised the ceiling, the ceiling, he's raised the floor of the program and I think it's generated a lot more interest in the team.

And so people that are like, Oh, he needs to go. It's like, who are the gophers going to get that's better. The one thing that I do think a lot of his critics are completely 100 percent right on is that his in game coaching, which is obviously a massive factor is poor. Just to put it very bluntly, plainly, and without vulgar language, it's poor. Well, that's not going to help them too much against the Wolverines. They're going to. He's a CEO of the program, essentially, right? He's a CEO.

You know, the CEO has to be the face. They have to be the name out there. They have to market the program. He's really good at doing that. Like he is fantastic. But when it comes down to the actual in game, which I mean, is really important. He just makes stupid decisions. And for a guy as refreshing in terms of. Approaching college football in a different way from most coaches in terms of their overall viewpoint of a football program and how progressive he's been in that regard.

He is an extraordinarily conservative play caller or game. Like the style of his offense is so conservative and it just doesn't make sense. So. No, well, two things can be true. He can be the best thing for the gophers and they can lose by a billion this week. So yeah, 100%. And that's also credit to Michigan. Michigan's unbelievable this season. They've done exactly what they need to do. Yeah, for sure. Hey HD, let me ask you something before we sign off here. Are you a big oyster guy?

Uh, do you like oysters? Yes. There's a, there's a spot in, um, I think it's called Frog Leg Bar in Chicago. My buddy, Nat and I, when he lives down there, whenever we go, um, they have, I think it's like from two to five happy hour dollar oysters and it's right next to Gibson Steakhouse. So it's in a nice part of Chicago. I think it's actually right by the Viagra Triangle, if you've ever heard of that. No, no triangle.

And if he listens, he'll correct me on this, but it's essentially it's a triangle. It's like a street and it's two streets and they converge on the, on the one. Um, but there's like a, I don't know, like a little like field in the middle of it. And they call it the Viagra triangle. Cause that's where all the old guys with all the money hang out and take out like, you know, 25 year old girls on dates, but it's in the, and.

It's right next to Gibson steakhouse, which if you guys remember the show, the league, the exterior of that bar that they would always meet up was Gibson. Um, and they have the best oysters and we would order, I think we, one time, the last time we went there, we ordered 36. And it's a really nice place. So 36 oysters for 36 and took them down. I love oysters. Well, so I'll just, yeah, I'll share a little, uh, story for you real quick.

Cause, uh, the listeners I'm sure are interested in what happened at spread inspectors wedding, which by the way was phenomenal. Um, but. Johnny and I, and his pops, you know, where we tied one on down in Cape Cod after, after the whole festivities, watch the Vikings, as I mentioned, we're at the sports bar anyways, we ended up back in Boston that evening and we go out for a nice dinner at Capitol grill. We get some oysters cause you're in Boston. We got to get oysters. So, uh, Johnny is like.

You know, what, what am I supposed to do with this thing? And he just fucking dives in, cracks his tooth on the shell, takes a chomp out of the shell. What? I didn't know I wasn't supposed to eat the shell, dude. What are we doing? Like... That is... No, that didn't... Listen, that didn't happen. Okay, good. I was like... But I was... You Farmington kids gotta get out more. Mother of God. But I did take it. I'm like, could you imagine just taking a bite into the shell right now?

Just thinking that's how you eat an oyster. Like how do you know? Yeah, I was gonna see you had me gone there. I was like, oh my god Yeah, we had oysters they had a little chili sauce. It was great I don't know. I don't know what the big hype around the oyster. It tastes like snot big deal Yeah, it's, it's, you're either like really into it or you're like, I don't understand the hype. I mean, I'll like, I'll eat it. Like, it doesn't gross me out. It's just like, I don't know.

Yeah. Well, uh, nice delicacy. Yeah, it is. Uh, uh, spread inspector's wedding. Phenomenal. Cape Cod. The weather wasn't great, but we made the most of it. A live band, phenomenal, uh, you know, the, once the, uh, Bride and Groom got out on the dance floor, started, started tying one on, they wanted everybody to get in a circle, and of course, you know, me, I'm out there gritting through the circle, you know, showing everybody the moves, um. Yeah, it was a great time. It was a great time.

Uh, we tied one on with the fellas and uh, we got some great picks. Uh, di we, our signature dance move of the weekend was, uh, stealing the low strike. So get down, get down on basically a knee, right where Ryan, Jeffs out there, steal the low strike right here. Right here. Yeah. Get down there. I can honestly say I've never heard of that dance room before in my life. Never heard of it. Never heard of it. Never heard of it. All right. Well it's all on the books I guess.

Yeah, well it is, but you know, you're down low too, you know, everybody wants to get low, you know, so you frame a little, well, eon let's not, let's not forget we started at a Chicago wedding. We started the skull chant. The band just so happens to be Viking. You fans there. There you go. There go. And we did the, oh dude, it was unbelievable. So, so we started the skull chant, right? Where just there's kind of a little break in the music and we were just going skull.

So the lead singer looks at us and he's like, wait, are you guys from Minnesota? And she just starts belting out the Minnesota Vikings. Cheers. She's goes skull Vikings. Let's win this game. And we got up there. We got on the stage. Yeah. I got on the mic. Skull Vikings. Let's win this game. Skull Vikings. Honor your name. Go get a touchdown. Rock. Suck. Suck a fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, go. Yeah, dude, it was, it was electric and nobody was having it.

Besides like, like the 10 people. Nobody liked it? No, nobody liked it. I think you're gonna say the whole crowd was into it. No, nobody liked, nobody was. There was a handful of people that liked it, but then like the, the, the bride came up to us, like, I didn't like that Oh. I was like, you liked that, but yeah, no, it was good. It was good. A lot of fun. Shout out to spread inspector. Uh, thanks for having us last weekend. It was a blast. We, we enjoyed ourselves and a HD.

Thanks for coming on man. 50 at that episode of voyage. It's a big time, big time honor for us. Um, we've come a long way. We've, we've put a lot of these things out there. And uh, as I talked about, I think I tweeted something late last week too, when we were tying one on, but I saw like. Okay. Stupid content on, on, on Twitter. And it was a Tik TOK video and just some guy, you know, screaming into his phone, belting out like click baity things about the Minnesota Vikings.

And like, here's why they're not done this season. And, you know, it's just, we would never be about that. We're not about that on this, on this platform. We're not about clout and we're not, we're not out here to push clicks and get people, um, You know, gain a bunch of traction and get clicks on stupid crap. We say shit that we mean, and we have people on that we care about. And you're, you're obviously been, been a friend of the program for a while now.

We've had you on several times, and so we're just glad that we could have you on in this time. And when we, when we need you, man, and hopefully there's, there's more to come. Obviously we'll have you next week too. If you, if you'd be so happy to join, um, as a, as a interim co host, but. But, uh, while Cain's still away, but yeah, man, this, this show has been fantastic.

It's been a lot of fun for us to do and, uh, 50 episodes in, we, we want to just thank all of our followers and thank everybody who's tuned into any or some, whoever's tuned into one or two or, or all of them. We love all you guys and we appreciate you more than, you know, and, uh, just, just happy to do this, man. It's a, it's a platform that we want to share with everybody. So thank you guys. Thank you guys for having me on.

I know you guys, there's a lot more that goes into it than just pressing record. You know, getting your name out there, it's really difficult, especially there's a lot of, uh, you know, there's everybody has a podcast now it feels like, and I think they did a fantastic job.

And I can definitely tell that you're speaking not only from an authentic perspective and being genuine about your takes and not just trying to, you know, be that clickbaity person, uh, but are also doing the analysis that supports it. Um, there's certain beliefs that I have where it's just like, I just believe it. I don't, I had never like dug in and done the research about it. Um, but, uh, no, I, I always appreciate you guys having me on. Um, you know, this is always fun.

I, I was a radio show host for four years at St. John's. So, uh, it's nice to. Dust off the microphone sometimes and spit some takes because sometimes, you know, there's, everybody just needs a, uh, a platform in order for them to just get off. Whether it's about, um, liking things as cool or, um, the Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback is terrible. So it just, it just goes a wide range.

So, um, once again, you know, congrats on the 50 episodes here's to, you know, the next 50, 100, 150, you know, and so forth. And, uh, thanks for having me on. And, you know, I don't mean to. Say that I would say that's the second most important thing tonight. Cause the most important thing you're right. Absolutely. Absolutely. And we're happy for you and we're happy for twins fans across the nation. I'm happy as a twins fan and yeah, it's a great night for Minnesota sports, man.

And we're headed into this sports weekend with, uh, with our heads held high and, uh, just excited to share this with everybody. Johnny, anything else before we sign off? Uh, no, not much again. Thanks HD for coming on. You're a great fit for this show and what we're the authenticity and what we want to really feed out there. And you really hit everything, Kim. Honestly. Yeah. Perfect. Yeah. All right. Well, cheers boys and cheers to the next 50. Thank you guys for everything that you do.

And I appreciate you guys a lot. Love you all. And we'll talk to you next week. Skol Vikings, baby. Skol.