Believe in Darnold, Burrow’s Playoff Shadow, Week 18 Madness and Guess the Lines With Cousin Sal
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We just watched Washington Atlanta and you lost your wise wager, which was you were 13 and two for the season. You had what you had at Washington 24 and a half under. Yeah. Which seemed like when Atlanta was about to score in the last minute, you were going to win it. And then Raheem Morris is like, how many timeouts can I take into a overtime? Oh,

Turned out he had the wrong answer and Atlanta blows it. Rollercoaster ride of the game. Washington makes the playoffs. Atlanta is now in a lot of trouble. This is one of my favorite podcasts to do that heading into week 18. We have our playoff scenarios trying to guess the lines, but Atlanta is going to be kicking themselves all week.

Yeah, I was all... Well, first of all, I have too much shit going on, right? I had the under 24 and a half, but I also have Tampa Bay to win the South. So I'm rooting against Atlanta, but rooting for Atlanta to stop Washington and rooting for Raheem Morris to get his brain out of his ass. Those skip timeouts, it's just...

of course you want 22 seconds with one timeout is better than seven seconds and two timeouts. And then he takes one before. And then like, you have a tired defense, except for one drive. They were on the field the entire second half. Start calling your timeouts then too. Like get them a little fresh so that right. And Daniels isn't running for seven yards, but yeah, it was a congratulations. We have a lot of Washington fans, friends in our club here, but yeah,

I don't know. Not, not a weird win, a weird win for sure. Well, our favorite Washington fan is Chang. Cause we were on a text with him and Chang gets so mad during these games that I told him I would, I would do a Patreon subscription for Chang's like text during every Washington game. He was so mad. It was a lot of fuck this team. I hope the guy makes the field goal. We're losers. He's out of control.

I think he's going to send like a poison noodles over to Dan Quinn or something. I don't know what he's up to. He's capable of. So the timeout. So they get, they get basically to midfield. There's 40 seconds left.

And, or 35 seconds left, whatever it was, they had two timeouts left. And it was interesting because Brady, who I thought was good today during the Vikings green bag game, he was talking about this time at the exact timeout scenario at the end of the first half. And he was saying how, when he liked to do it, if he had two timeouts left with under two minutes left, he always thought of it as take one timeout in that one minute to two minute mark, take the second one.

somewhere between 30 and a minute and then save that third one for the kicker.

And I was thinking about that as I was watching Atlanta just completely mangle the same situation and just basically take two timeouts and 12 seconds left in the game. They didn't do that at all. Yeah, I think if they call timeout, I think they would have kicked a field goal and scored. Well, here's the thing. Everything's situational, right? So Brady's theory is right. Add to it. You got a rookie quarterback there on the road. Might want to just get him a couple plays. Stop the clock anyway, if you're not sure. And you have a kicker who can't make it from 35. So you want to get it closer than you even got it.

So what everything points to calling a timeout with like 35 seconds left and they didn't do it. For some reason, I was thinking about you during this whole like fourth quarter because you've been so hot and you've had some luck with these wise wagers. And I've been hot a million dollar picks like we're doing great.

And this had gotten to the point where I was like, Atlanta's going to somehow win this game 27-24. And we're going to be like, how did Sal do it again? How did he pull this out? And Atlanta's driving down and see what's going to happen. Then the other way, Washington had the ball.

And they're driving down, they're driving down. And it felt like they were setting up for the, where they're going to go for it to win the game on fourth and one and not get it. And then Atlanta would either play for the tie or do whatever. But I think the, if I could speak broadly, and I think you had Atlanta plus four and a half on something you were saying before the podcast was upset. There's,

favorites winning and covering. And then there's favorites winning and covering like Cincinnati did and like Washington did today. Like when you're- Well, how about everyone in week 17?

That's what I'm saying. Like there's all of that. And then there's crazy covers like this where neither Cincinnati or Washington deserved it, except for some craziness that happened in overtime and some brain farts from coaches. Bigger picture, the favorites were 14 and one. 17, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday. That's why we're not too upset. That's why we're, that's why we have our chin up there.

Well, yeah, there was some very good money line parlays, all kinds of plays. 14-1 at this point of the season for favorites. If I had said to you heading into this week, somebody's going 14-1, favorites are underdogs. I just would have assumed underdogs, right? This is right around the time of the year when weird shit happens left and right. But that's not what happened. So Atlanta, who's somehow kind of still alive, it feels like they went to Pennix, what, three weeks too late?

four weeks too late. Even though he's up and down, he's still way better than Cousins is. I was going to send this to you and I'm like, maybe this is an overreaction, but when he was like,

flying in the first half. I was like, man, if they had put them in like a month ago, they might be fighting for the one seat. Maybe that's a little strong. Because of their schedule? Yeah, yeah. But for sure, they might have had this NFC South locked up. Yeah, they would be at 10 wins already. I think it's fair to say Cousins probably cost them three to four wins by being unable to move.

What's weird though, we're in this weird situation where Atlanta, Penix I think is the starting quarterback. I don't know if he's ever going to be an all pro or anything, but he's clearly pretty good. He's at least on that, I think has a chance to be on that Bo Nix level, maybe one notch higher. He's older. But you also can't praise Atlanta for this because they spent $100 million on Kirk Cousins and destroyed their salary cap.

So, like, if you're talking to GM Terry Fontenot, who Lombardi always used to make fun of, I'm like, Terry, great Penix pick. You almost can't say that because the pick was so illogical when he did it. And I was thinking today, like, imagine if they had taken, if they had spent that free agent Cousins money

Unlike one other defensive player, two defensive players, whatever. And instead they put off that. And this is what happens. You end up losing this game in OT because your defense can't do anything. This is what we were saying in April when they took Pennix. If you're going to spend all that money on cousins, use the eighth pick on a defensive player. Or if you know you're going to take Pennix, use the free agent money and defensive player. And they didn't do either.

It's a little different what I'm about to bring up, but it's kind of what San Francisco, like you really want to praise everything they did. They will after what they spent on Trey Lance. It wasn't, you know, it wasn't money, but draft capital and might've won the Superbowl. If you had some position plugged in on defense against Kansas city, and now you're paying the price, but yeah, it's there's some odd stuff going on.

I mean, I know you like your quarterback. I feel like you'd need to see two or three years out of these guys. In Sam Darnold's case, seven years, but at least two or three. Sam Darnold, the most emotional Twitter video during the season we've seen all year. Sam Darnold coming back late to the Vikings locker room and it turned into like a sports movie scene. I was waiting for explosions in the sky to play in the background. Playoff picture.

And we'll talk about, there's so much shit to go through. I feel naked not knowing the schedule. You and I love, we love the playoff schedule, right? Well, I want to guess this. We love the week 18 and we're like seven-year-olds waiting for Santa to come down the chimney. We just, I keep refreshing. I don't see anything. I see the Jimmy Carter, Jake Paul fight is rescheduled, but I don't see anything on week 18 yet. This is terrible.

We're on this text thread with our cousin and a whole bunch of people. And anytime a super old celebrity dies, it's always like, what was the cause of death? And we do. Jimmy Carter, my favorite president, by the way. But anytime it's 100, like, what was the cause of death? Anyway, NFC playoff picture. Washington is at least the seventh seed, right? Mm-hmm.

possibility they can sneak into six seed, but Green Bay would have to lose to Chicago. But we're looking at two seed Philly versus seven seed Washington, which I'm not happy about if I'm Washington. Three six is Rams Green Bay. I'm super happy if I'm Green Bay playing the Rams, the way their offenses look. Four or five would be Tampa, Minnesota, which is an awesome game. Or Atlanta, Minnesota, if something funky happens a week 18. AFC,

It looks like we're going to have Buffalo versus Denver, unless Denver completely chokes the big kids Carson Wentz, and we'll go into all those scenarios in a second. Baltimore against the Chargers, and then Houston-Pittsburgh

And I didn't tell you I was going to do this. You're going to be mad, but I already made guesses for the round one schedule and I'm going to throw this at you. I don't do that yet. Yeah. No, I'm doing it. All right. Well, I think we agree on the Shakey's game. There's a lot of shaky quarterbacks that belong in the Shakey's game, but I think we were on the same page with that. Well, we texted about the Shakey's game, which if you haven't seen our list in our pod before, it's the first game on the Saturday of round one.

Our knockout league that we're in, the loser used to have to buy pizza for everybody else for the first game. And we would do it at Shakey's in Santa Monica, which we made plenty of jokes about. Is it still open or no? I think they closed it after we stopped going. I think we were probably the only ones there. We were like the last thing? Yeah. So anyway, Pittsburgh-Houston-

Is the most, I would say that's like a minus 1200 favorite to be the shakiest game with the way Houston's look with Russell Wilson. I don't see how it's not the shakiest game. I'm trying to think who else would be. All right. You're going to give me all of them. Go ahead. Yeah. Well, these are my guesses and you tell me I'll rip through them. And you tell me there's a Monday game in there. You got them all. You're right. Good. So Saturday night is going to be Amazon. Mm hmm.

And I think that's Green Bay Rams and they keep it in LA. Al Michaels is super happy. It's like a 35 minute drive for him. Amazon in LA. Amazon is in LA. So I was going Green Bay Rams for that. And then Sunday, Denver Buffalo, the Chargers versus Baltimore, and then Washington Philly as the Sunday night game. But you could flip that and you can make Washington Philly the Fox game with Brady.

And then Chargers, Ravens, Sunday night. And then my last prediction, Bucs versus the Vikings in Tampa Bay, Monday night, Monday night football. Oh, Monday? Yeah. What are your thoughts? The only thing with that is I'm not ready. I feel like I'm not ready for this. I know, that's why I didn't prepare. I didn't tell you to prep. I wanted to throw this at you. Well, here's what could throw it off.

I really think the Chargers want that five seed now. I think they're going to fight for it. They're in a good spot if they get that five seed. Of course you want to go to Houston now. By the way, if they get by that, I know the Chiefs, we're going to have to praise them. We have to.

but that's not a bad deal for Harbaugh. They played him twice. They lost by two. They lost by seven. What a thing that would be for Harbaugh to go into Kansas City and win. I think that's the ideal spot for the Chargers. So I think that would throw off a little. The only thing I would say about a Saturday night, I think they like an outdoor game there. They had the Chiefs Dolphins. So I'm not sure what that would. I know that doesn't agree with Al's habits, but.

What would it be? We got to look out for Al. So Chargers, to get the five seed, the Chargers would have to beat the Raiders and Pittsburgh would have to lose to Joe Burrow in Cincinnati. And that's the path. I wanted to, I was going to do this later, but I'd rather just throw this at you right now. And I know the Ravens aren't going to tank week 18, but if you're the Ravens, just fundamentally looking at this big picture, we're trying to make the Super Bowl. If you're the Ravens, would you rather be the five seed or the three seed?

because if I'm the three seed, I have a home game against almost definitely the Chargers. It's either the Chargers or Pittsburgh home game. And then round two, I'm going to Buffalo if I'm the three seed. I'm going to Buffalo unless Buffalo shockingly loses. If I'm the five seed, I play Houston, and I'll be favored and I should beat Houston. And then unless there's an upset,

I'm going to KC for round two, who hasn't played a meaningful game in a month. And if your goal is to make the Super Bowl, I'd rather, we always talk about this. I'd rather catch KC in that round two game when they're a little rusty. So I know Baltimore is going to try to win. I know it's better to be at home, but you could argue it's a better path for them to be the five seed. Well, first of all, we'll go over the lines in a second, but maybe this will clear it up. And there's so much speculation. The Saturday games are out and there's two of them. Were you right? You had guesses on this. I had one right.

It's Browns, Ravens, and Bengals, Steelers. So...

The Ravens go. The Ravens are first. The Ravens are 130. I don't know why they're doing this, actually. It doesn't benefit. So the Ravens are 130. The Bengals Steelers are five. These are Pacific times. If the Ravens win and they should, then the Steelers could lose and the Chargers do get that five. And we're talking all different things here. Well, you have for the Steelers Bengals game, Bengals trying to keep their playoff hopes alive. Yeah.

Steelers trying to either be five or six, but you want to be five. So that game actually becomes meaningful. So that's probably why they did it that way. Oh, I guess so. Right. Yeah. I mean, is it so meaningful that you would want to not rest your starters for the following week? That's always a thing. I don't know. When we think it's meaningful, it usually isn't. Well, to me, who is the worst playoff team to you other than the AFC 7th seed?

Because I think you could make a case it's the Rams. And the Rams are going to be the three seed. But if I'm Green Bay, I'm 100% delighted to play the Rams in round one.

The Rams can't score 20 points anymore. And they got, I thought, dominated by the Cardinals on Saturday night. I can't believe we had to sweat out that L.A. L.A. parlay like that. That was, it ended up coming down to Kyler Murray whipping a 130 mile an hour pass off his tight end's head that bounced up in the air for an interception. But the Rams did nothing offensively to win that game.

And I would want to play them over anyone except the AFC 7 seed, I think. They are a bizarre team. I mean, it was four weeks ago they scored 44 against Buffalo. And then the next three weeks they scored 44 combined.

And Cooper Cup just... Feels like they ran out of gas. Cup commits mass murder on fantasy owners all over the nation. Like, so... Yeah. Yeah, I think they did kind of run out of gas. I don't know. McVay, that was some questionable calls by him. But you're right. Like, Kyler just... He did his thing. He got too excited. He's now 13-29 straight up in November-December games. And 1-17 in the division. Jesus. So Rudy just texted us that

And you know what? I did a shitload of research for this podcast. I really thought I was prepared. Somehow I missed this. Green Bay is not guaranteed to be the sixth seed. It could actually be Washington because Washington wins the tiebreaker. So if both of them win, Washington is going to be the sixth seed. Oh, I thought Washington needed it. Oh, yeah, because they have the win now, right? They're the same record. Yeah. All right. So who's going to try? Well, if you're Washington, I mean, first of all,

They're going to have a lot of fans at that Rams game if it's Washington at the Rams. But if you're Green Bay, that's a disaster. You go from, you know... So people didn't know how much that Minnesota game meant today. It actually meant a shitload because it's different than potentially playing the Rams or playing Philly, who's the two seed. And you're going to have a 13-win team as a wild card. I don't think it's ever happened before. The Vikings. Let's talk about that Vikings game.

Packers game. Good one. A lot of people love the Packers. Yeah. It turned into an everybody believes in us, nobody believes in us situation, which I didn't fully know on Thursday, but by the time we got to Sunday, I was betting on the Vikings. And that line was moving. That line was the most erratic line of the year. It was minus one and a half, plus one and a half, even, back to minus one and a half. By game time, it was even, which is, I think,

What, three times this year we've had an even line at game time? Yeah. So now we know now that I guess they have something to play for with the six seed, five seed. But really, compared to Minnesota, they didn't have as much to play for, right? And Minnesota's fighting for the one seed. They have the better record.

They were a one and a half point favorite when we did guess the lines. Then it moved to Green Bay, like you said, as favorite. Then Minnesota settled in. I'm like, I'm staying away. They gave us six free Moneyline wins going into Sunday, which was insane. But why is this? Why is everybody taking the Packers here? And, you know, I can't do a lap because I won by two points, but I think they did.

It was perfect what they did because I think all these NFC North teams are able to catch up. They're eventually going to get to 25, 28, 30 points. But the defense played great for three quarters. They really did. Like Flores had them, like Cashman, Shaq Griffin, Van Ginkle. They're all locked in step. And KOC did a great job with 220 left, bleeding the clock. We'll talk about it. He did it better than anybody's done it, really.

Yeah, he's coach of the year. He has to be. It's crazy that Harbaugh completely rejuvenated the Chargers, made chicken salad out of chicken shit. I did it. I nailed it.

and he's not going to win coach of the year. You think like where that team was last year, all the stuff he did for them. They had some injuries too. It wasn't like it was like the easiest season. And he has no chance. Yeah. JJ McArthur was supposed to be a guy. Yeah. Well, so KOC, I think he gets it. The Packers, you know, there are five losses, two against the Lions, two against the Vikings, one against the Eagles. And this was everybody's Super Bowl sleeper. It'd be nice if they beat

One of the top three teams in their division or conference once. I'm also not positive. I really like Jordan Love and I think he's good in spurts. And I've watched the game that they played today, I feel like six times in the last year and a half, where they kind of suck. He misses a couple throws.

They're a little erratic. All of a sudden they're behind. And then they do this furious rally with like a quarter left or half a quarter left. Right. And then the score that they played this, this exact Minnesota game happened already in the first month of the season where they were way behind, rallied back and the final score they lost by two. This was not a two point loss. Minnesota dominated the game. Field goal kicker missed two field goals. I just felt like they, this was a double figures win. Now it will say they won by two.

Yeah, I agree. Yeah, and they pressured him the whole game, and Green Bay couldn't really pressure Darnold, right? So that seemed like the difference. The one thing I'll say is I wonder if Watson really makes a big difference for this offense. I think he does. Yeah, like him not being there...

I don't know. It's some nice spots in there. Jaden Reed's a fun player, but he'll disappear for like quarters at a time, right? Yeah. I mean, he had a one reception five yard game a couple of weeks ago and today it took him a while to get going. But I thought it might be a double tight end game for them. Oh, yeah. Like just being more physical. They were like Brady was really bullish on

them riding Jacobs and he's comparing McCory Dillon and all these different running backs. But the bikes played great and darn, they've been underestimated all year. I really regret on Thursday, not going all in on them because I think they're really good. I like, I think they could absolutely beat Detroit. I could absolutely see them in the super bowl. I'm watching them today. I was thinking, cause I felt that same way watching that Cincinnati game and I had Denver plus seven and a half and that one. So I actually ended up hitting it, but yeah,

Since he's so scary when they have the ball and they just need eight yards or it's third and eight, it's third and six, it's second and 10. And they have those two receivers. And it just feels like anytime Borough wants, he can hit somebody for eight yards on and out, or he can hit them down the sidelines or cross or whatever. I think Minnesota has the same thing. Those two receivers, when they really, really need to complete a pass, they can find one of those guys. It seems like.

Sam Darnold doesn't seem like he's going to blow a game. The coach doesn't seem like he's going to blow a game. The defense seems like it's going to play good enough for long enough. I don't think, like, going forward, are they going to be an underdog at any point by more than two points or three points? I don't think you can make it. Who would have to be home? Detroit? No. No, no way. Well, we'll see. You should have said today they should have been at least like a one and a half or two point favorite. Right. The market said otherwise. I just think people...

Sam Darnold, three years in the Jets, two in Carolina. He was on the Niners last year. And I just think people are slow to come around on this, but he's been doing this all year, really consistently. And I said last week to you, I felt like when I really needed to make a play and that come from behind game last week, I was like, I think he's going to do it. I believe...

I believe he's going to make the play. I felt the same way in this game today. I just felt like he was going to come through. He has one shaky throw a game, but I think you could say that about literally any quarterback in the league. Yeah. I don't think it's fluky at this point. I think like we can move on to the next argument, like with, oh, JJ McCarthy, keep him or trade him. Like this guy, you're not going to have results like Sam Arnold put out there. And it's not, it just feels different from the team two, three years ago, whatever it was, where cousins won every game by one score. It's

It's just something about it. Like, yeah, this guy fits in this offense and it's going to work for a little bit. Yeah. Raheem, not Raheem Morris guy who took two timeouts into the overtime. Our friend Raheem is on the ringer Sunday pregame. He had a good tweet about this one score win loss record, which has become a really fun way when we talk about teams after the fact or during the season, is this real? Is this not real? Yeah.

And the theory is like if you're 8-1, 9-1, 10-1 in one score games, there's something fluky about that. We've talked about this a lot for years. And there was that Cousins Vikings year a couple years ago when they just had crazy luck in one score games, but we knew they weren't good. I don't feel that way at all about this Vikings team. I think they're legitimately good. And I actually think they shouldn't have been in as many one score games as they were because they just had these dumb games that all of a sudden in the last five minutes, the other team scored one.

This was whatever. So to me, they're not like to me, they're a legitimate, awesome contender. And I think you could make the case. I think I would bet against them in any against any NFC team. Wait, say that again. You would do. I think I'm sorry. Yeah, no, I screwed up. I think I would bet on them against any NFC team. I like them the most. Yeah.

I think so too. It's really tough. That coach just showed me so much. Two minutes, 20 seconds. Green Bay has three timeouts. Almost anybody just runs it into the line three times. And you have to treat it like you're losing the game at that point. That's exactly what he did. The next four plays, three of them were throws. None really like to Jefferson or Addison or like Hawkinson. It was all just nice plays, but they made it nice and easy. And Darnold's just so comfortable in that situation.

Yeah. And the second down, it was like second and nine. Jefferson was cutting across and Darnold just whipped it. And it was, it was a great throw, but it was probably four receivers in the league can get that extra like split second of a step and also make the catch in traffic. And then the game ender, they ran the classic fake. Everybody runs to the left. Oh, the quarterback circles around to the right lofts over the screen pass. I it's one of the best plays.

I almost turned into Collinsworth when I watched that. I just love that. I just love when teams do that. Bill, you know, there's only one Lamar Jackson, but there's another one here with Michael Pennington, maybe even a third one with Jaden Daniels and the referees are Lamar Jackson. Everyone's Lamar Jackson.

I can't believe the JJ McCarthy thing is even a question at this point. There's no way that Darnold's their quarterback. Now this is, this is done. It's a wrap. It's like, this is Brady blood. So multiplied by 17, Brady blood. So even heading into the playoffs was still an argument. There's no argument anymore, but they keep McCarthy for a year and just, you know, keep them as a backup and then figure out what to do. But considering the quarterback class is pretty shaky and,

Beyond the top too. I feel like they could get like a mid first round pick for him or late first rounder or whatever.

high second runner. Somewhere in like the 15 to 35 range, right, for him? Well, the best part is there's teams like the Giants dropping out of the top two quarterback slot, right? Yeah, can't wait to talk about that. Who may have to trade up to get like a J.J. McCarthy now. The NFL playoffs are almost here. It's not too late to get in on the regular season action with FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook. You knew that already. Right now, new customers can finish the season strong. $250 in bonus bets.

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All season long. Uber Eats, official on-demand food delivery partner of the NFL. Order now for game day. Terms, taxes, and fees apply. See app for details. All right, switching gears. There's some big questions left. Can the Bengals make the playoffs is one of them, which I think everybody wants just as football fans because Borough's been so great this year. The scenario is this. They have to beat Pittsburgh. Denver has to lose to Carson Wentz and the Chiefs.

And the Dolphins have to lose to that hot garbage Jets team, who was just a complete train wreck of an embarrassment until Tyrod Taylor came in in the fourth quarter. And now granted, it's garbage time, Buffalo. They won the game. It's a wrap. Tyrod Taylor, all of a sudden, it was a little like the Panics Cousins thing. He can move around. He was making plays.

I think they'd be crazy not to start him next week unless they, if they want to protect their pick, which is probably like top seven, top eight at this point, you play Rogers. Cause he's just, he's, he's a sunk cost at this point. But if they play Tyrod Taylor, I could see them beating Miami. I mean, Miami was, you know, it doesn't seem like two is going to play next week.

They, Cleveland's so bad and Thompson Robinson is so bad. Miami, like they, they had no choice but to win that game, but the Jets could beat them. I'm trying to look at it. So then it comes down to Carson Wentz. Yeah. So that obviously they, they put all these games together. Chiefs, Broncos, Chargers, Raiders, Dolphins, Jets. Yeah. Uh,

Those are the late afternoon games. Yeah. So I think you're right. I have no idea with Tua. You and I were like, what the hell's going on, JJ? John's a big Dolphins fan. Give us a heads up about Tua. We don't find out until Thursday. He may not play again. So you might end up with a garbage match like that. But it was so fun watching Tyrod being better than A-Rod. Really, really great. Unbelievable stuff. Rodgers was just horrible.

I had, I did a 13 pointer, which I think I lost three legs of. It was my one losing bet today other than this last one at the end. Um, Rogers was so bad and it was so hopeless from the moment. It was like, I don't know, 12, nothing, 19. It was just that you just knew that knew it was over. It doesn't seem like the teammates like them that much. Wilson, there's stuff about like, if Rogers is back next year, please trade me. That's starting to float around. Um,

And it'd be really funny if Taylor came in and the Jets were awesome next week. Miami is... Let me read a couple of Rodgers things. First of all, he goes in there. He's supposed to go for his 500 touchdown pass. I'm like, oh, this is going to suck. Not that they'd stop the game in Buffalo, but he's going to get 500. Devontae Adams is like, I'm playing. I want to be there. I want to catch the 500. I'm like, shit. Instead...

he sets the sack record. He's the most sack quarterback of all time. And my favorite of all, it was early in the first quarter, maybe middle of first quarter, third and one, driving right to left. He rolls right

And he's got nothing but daylight. And Romo even is like, run it. And Romo doesn't do that. He does a lot of what people might think are annoying things, but he wouldn't like, he definitely like blurted it out when he didn't mean to. He had 15 yards of daylight, maybe too scared or whatever to take off. He fires the ball at his receiver shins and then yells at the receiver. Like the receiver's like, oh, I'm sorry. I wasn't paying attention. Me and the other receivers are watching, thought you'd walk the ball into the end zone here. But yeah, 1.2 QBR today.

The lowest QBR in a game since Davis Mills, .8 in 2021. Good job by you, Aaron Rodgers. You ruined Peter Schrager's season. I didn't do it. Our guy Schrags. There was a tweet that had over 3 million views at the time of this taping by somebody on Twitter named Steakfriend.

He said, Jets getting Aaron Rodgers is like finally banging your high school crush when she's 40 and has four kids. That's great. It's over 3 million views at this point. Lost in how bad Rodgers has been is how bad Jeff Ulbricht's been as the Jets interim coach. Yeah.

Today they had 16 penalties for 120 yards. That's like, that makes the Patriots look like well-behaved by contract. He's horrible. One thing we've learned this year is that the interim coach isn't necessarily this magic elixir because the bears are way worse. Right. The, the jets, I think if they had had Salah, they, they at least with Salah, their defense was better. We had the clogger. We were enamored, enamored with the clogger for a minute.

And then that went to shit, ironically. Yeah, Spencer Rathler. Hard to say with the fogger. Yeah. But yeah, rough Jets season. I feel bad for the Jets fans. One thing with the Bengals. I think they're about 16-1 if you put those three possibilities together to make the playoffs.

If you're KC, do you lose intentionally to Denver? Is the question somebody texted me today that I thought was intriguing. I don't think teams lose intentionally in the NFL. I guess you could play like your third string QB and not give a shit. But they're just much better off if Denver is the seventh seed than Cincinnati, I think. Well, let's think about this. Wouldn't they want Cincinnati to play Buffalo? I mean, I think they want Buffalo out.

Right? You're not going to play both those teams. Oh, so you're saying, so beat Denver to try to get Cincinnati into the seventh seed. Yeah, I think so. You don't have to, you're not going against Cincinnati in the first round. So you're going against one of those two teams. I think they'll slap Cincinnati around if they have to go to Arrowhead. I mean, that's a flawed team. We like rooting for them. I think you could have it both ways, like we said. Like, we could talk about how bad they are and how they can't get out of their own way and also not want to meet them in the first round. So...

Their defense is pretty awful. It was interesting because that game feels like it happened a hundred years ago and it was yesterday. But I don't think Sean Payton covered himself in glory yesterday with some of the calls. Right. Some of the clock management, just in general. And it's something I've noticed over and over again with him where people seem to think he's this...

You know, like he's just like kind of what we were talking about with Kevin O'Connell earlier. But instead, it just feels like, I don't know. Were you happy with how he coached yesterday? No, I don't know. I was a little confused. Right. But I think he people wanted him to go for the two point conversion at the end of regulation. Well, he needed the tie, right? Yeah. So they needed the tie as good as a win. Tie was as good as a win. So it didn't make sense to go for the win because in overtime, a tie would have.

And also Bengals kicker sucks. He was probably factoring that in that too. And Chase Brown got hurt. And Chase Brown got hurt. And also they went three and out Cincinnati. So they had the ball Denver with a chance to win with a field goal. They did twice. They had two series in overtime and they were just, they had that second and nine or it was like second and seven. They ran the wide receiver screen. The guy got tackled for two in the first series. Bo Nix tried to throw a deep.

for some reason, didn't get it. It was weird. I just felt like they could have run the ball on Cincinnati all day. They ran the ball for five yards a carry. It was a bad loss. I did too. I mean, I felt the same. It was a very similar game to tonight's, right? Like, you know, B. John Robinson could have run the ball and they could have done that. And I thought it was like one of the luckiest covers of 2024. Maybe tonight changed that. But I don't know. Cincinnati is a weird team. Like, Burrow's great.

And like you said, they have that pitch and catch thing going for seven yards. Higgins is going to get Juan Soto money next year. Good for him. Hopefully from the Patriots. There you go. MVP race. At least when I checked it this couple hours ago, Allen was minus 300. Lamar was plus 250. And Burrow and Barkley were 15 to one. And the thinking was if Burrow somehow got

the seven seed for the Bengals, he has to be in the MVP consideration. I just don't agree. Burrows 30 to one now. Yeah. Oh, he's 30 to one. I don't think you lose eight. You can't lose eight times in a season to be the MVP. That's absurd. That's absurd.

It's dead money. Yeah, that's a waste. I think it's got to be Josh. I think it's fair to say, all right, whoever gets the seed, the two seed, it could be the, I mean, it can't be Mahomes. His numbers don't support it, right? So it's got to be the Josh Allen or Lamar Jackson and give it to whoever has a two seed at this point. It's tough. There's some stat stuff that's a little more favorable for Lamar. I test was a little more favorable for Josh.

I would say the infrastructure of the roster is you'd probably want Baltimore's a little bit more. Buffalo had a lot more uncertainty heading into the season. I don't really know. Does that just crack your brain when you hear like Josh Allen broke Thurman Thomas' record for like the Bills touchdown rushes? Like for someone who watched football and loved it and got in college in the 90s, like what the... Really? He really did already. Like that's spectacular. I mean, right now...

And I don't know if there's a 100% right answer. I like when people get so upset about it. It was like when, like we've had some NBA MVP, things like this too. Right now, I think it could really come down to something as stupid as Baltimore's five losses and Buffalo's three. Cause it's really close. And it's just like Buffalo's had a better, they've had a better, better team. I've been a little more impressed with their season. I think both guys are equally important. He doesn't have anything like Derrick Henry.

He doesn't have the coaching infrastructure that the Ravens had. Even though McDermott is a top seven or eight coach, the Ravens have been doing this forever. I would just have slight edge to Josh. So he's asking, does the head-to-head matter?

So Baltimore beat them 35-10 in week four. So that's a case for LeBron. I don't know. I don't know the answer. So, Rudy, shut up. We've been doing this for like 37 years. We don't need your help. No, it's a good question, but I think here's what matters more. They beat the 1C, right? Baltimore didn't. They were a total away from beating the 1C. They have the only KC win. Yeah, they have more wins, and they beat the 1C. And you're not giving it to Mahomes. Another thing off this, off Josh Allen.

I won our Keeper Fantasy League today. Yeah, congratulations. I saw that. Easily, right? You know, it was an emotional time for me and my fans because we had Joe Burrow. We've had this league four years. I had Joe Burrow year one. We had this rule where you could keep him for a maximum of four years. So he's been with my team the whole time. Oh, he's gone. And then he really came through.

In the, uh, in the last game. And it meant a lot to me and my fans to watch him do that for my fake fantasy team and his fake teammates. 41.1 points. The question though about fantasy, is it possible to win a league if you didn't have Alan Lamar Burrow or Baker this year?

Kind of feels like you had to have one of those four guys. Who did Tony have? He said Barkley, right? Did you mention Barkley? No, I'm saying one of those four quarterbacks. Oh, I see. Yeah, yeah. Did you have? Because it was unusual because normally we always talk about our quarterbacks don't matter that much in fantasy. And then this year, yeah, who did Tony have in our knockout league? He had Lamar Jackson. Yeah. I would love to know percentage of leagues won by those four quarterbacks has to be like 80%.

Yeah, it's off topic, but I did see 50% of all leagues that had teams that had Barkley made the finals, at least. I did see some kind of ESPN stat, but that's Barkley. I know you're talking quarterbacks here. You're going to bid for, how much will you bid? So I know now. Burrow? I need Burrow. Well, I'm going to have to figure. I got him back. I can see it. Joe, four more years, Joe. I asked Craig Horoback from the Ringer Fantasy show.

about who were the guys you had to have this year that seemed to be around the most titles. And he said the guys that tripled your odds of making the finals were JJ, Jefferson, Chase, Amon Ross St. Brown, Saquon, Gibbs, Lamar, James Conner, and Brock Bowers, who was wasted on my shitty team in our other league. Well, just like...

Whatever you paid for them or wherever you drafted them, whatever the return was, was way higher than what you got. But Brock Bowers was a good example. Like if you had him, like he's going to be the number one tight end next year. Forget that. I'm looking for him for, well, they don't have him, but he should maybe win MVP. I mean, that junk squad of quarterbacks have been thrown to him. He's setting records. He's made Aiden O'Connell look like a possible keeper. That's crazy. Maybe they don't need a QB. Yeah. Oh, that's it. That's a good pivot.

The Giants. So we have the Raiders who win two games in a row and completely knock themselves out of a possible Sanders or Cam Ward. I got to say, I didn't like Cam Ward leaving the bowl game at halftime. No? No, I didn't like that. Nobody's going to care. I didn't like it. I just don't think Drake May would have done that in North Carolina. I think he would have stayed. I think he would have played both halves. I think... All right. So the Giants... Nobody's going to care. Go ahead. Yeah. We had the Drew Locke game today. You could feel it immediately. Yeah.

The Colts were in a coma. I don't know what happened to them. This murdered, I think, 80% of the teases and parlays that people made today because they'd already made all their bets that they'd already won. It's like, what do I do on Sunday? All right, I'll throw the Colts in something. And the Giants in my way. So now the Giants are four. Pats are one. Tennessee's two. Cleveland's three. And most important, the Pats are one. I was going nuts. Why are you going nuts? Why? I was going nuts. Why?

What are you going to do with it? We're going to trade down. We're going to get a fucking haul. I want to make that Carolina bears trade. Let's do that. Let's get like, move back seven spots, get somebody else's first, get a player, get a second. Like let's, let's fucking cash that thing in. I'm so excited.

All right. I mean, it's not like great if you have your quarterback or you, well, you're not out on May, right? You, you have your quarterback. So now you're going to trade it and you're going to get, you'll get something. I don't know. I feel like I say good for the giants. I really do. Like, I don't, I don't love the tanking talk. I think it's a bad word. It should only be used for the NBA.

This is one of the reasons, many reasons the NFL is infinitely better. But like, you know, half these guys are playing hard because they don't know if they're going to be on the team next year. Like Malik Neighbors is the only one safe. And Drew Locke gave him probably his best game of the year so far. So good for the Giants. Earn your paycheck. I know it's easy to burn down the fledgling local tavern and collect on the insurance. But guys out there trying. I'd go for that every time.

This giant season was so depressing that it was kind of hilarious that it was like, all right, we're at the top. We're the number one pick. Just two more games. And then all of a sudden they have a fun three hours and completely ruin it. But you're right. This is the difference between football and basketball is you can't really tank when in a sport with like non-guaranteed contracts where they change half the roster every year. It was...

I'm not saying like the GMs, the front office and the players are on a different wavelength, I think. Right. Like it's not like that in any other sport. And I think it's because of what I said, like half these guys aren't going to be giants next year. So they're just like trying to put together, you know, you think Tracy Jr. is definitely going to be resigned by the Giants? Like, no, I'm going to try their asses off. If the Pats beat the Bills next week, I'm going to lose my mind. I just want you to know right now.

They better. First of all, Gonzalez has a concussion, so don't play him. He's the best defensive player. Like put him on the side. I would not play Drake May, sit him down for a week, 18, play Joe Milton, the third string guy. Like they have to lose this Buffalo game. And if you're Buffalo, I would, I would want the Pats to beat us.

I want that. They're in our division. I wouldn't want the Pats to have the number one pick and trade back and get Mike Vrabel as the coach. This was a huge week for Pats Manzo because there's real momentum now for like, hey, maybe we need an actual coach in a gym. Maybe he's getting worse. Yeah. Getting worse in every part of football over the course of four months. Maybe that was a bad sign. Maybe that we fucked up the draft and free agency and did basically everything wrong. Maybe all that was a bad sign.

And now we hit the ladder with this Drake May guy. I just don't like to lose and going crazy for the one pick. And it just, it's stinking thinking Simmons is what it is. No, I feel dirty, but I'm going to do it anyway. Speaking of dirty, the Colts, four straight years of absolutely horrible and defensible end of the year losses or choke jobs, or like even last year where they had a chance to make the playoffs and they blow it on the fourth down. They had that 2021, uh,

They lost to Jacksonville when Jim Irsay's like, get Carson Wentz off the team. I don't ever want to see him again. So it's four straight years of that. I think Shane Steichen's a secret might get fired after the year guy. Interesting. I have no inside info. I just think that team's pretty ratchet the whole year. I don't think they're well coached. I think they've underachieved.

And, uh, and he's, um, we always have that one surprise firing after week 18. I, he would be my leading suspect. Did he, did he get an extension? I mean, cause that's the key. That's, that's the tell, tell all that he's going to get fired. I don't think so. He's only in a two year, he's in year two, right? He was a first year coach last year.

Yeah, I guess you're right. Yeah, this is second. I'm thinking of someone else. Yeah, it might be the case that there just aren't enough new good coaches out there. He might have been on the bubble and saved himself. But yeah, you're right. They're pitiful. It's absolutely ludicrous that Mike Vrabel wouldn't be getting hounded by like five teams. Right. Mike Vrabel, I think in 21, he went 12 and five with

This banged up Tennessee team, Ryan Tannehill, who I don't think ever started a full season again as a quarterback. AJ Brown, who got traded after the year. I just always felt like that team was supremely extraordinarily well coached. They always overachieved.

I never really understood how they were doing it. And I don't understand, like, if you're the Jets, the Bears, people are like, the Bears need an offensive coach. The Bears need a coach. It doesn't have to be an offensive coach. Just somebody that will give them some sort of culture, which is what the pass is. He's number one. I mean, I think he gets to pick a spot. So if you were him, where do you go? Like, where do you, I mean, he could probably coach at UNC now and steal that job from Belichick if he wants. My dream would be he was in the Patriots Hall of Fame.

Yeah. And you think like you got Drake May, you've all this calf space and you have the number one pick. Like that seems like the best job. I don't know. You go to the bears and their ownership's a complete mess and you're doing everything wrong. And you've built this team. That's you know, this run and gun team to play in Chicago and 10 degree weather. I don't know. I wouldn't want that job. I, the Jets jobs, mildly intriguing. They do have a lot of talent. I,

I just said it's a Woody Johnson thing. I'm not sure I'd want to work for him. Yeah, that's a thing. Well, who would you want? Well, if I'm him, I, I think you stay out of the NFC North. That's a disaster when you have 13 win teams making the great point. Yeah. Why do you want to be in Detroit and Minnesota Green Bay and battle those teams six times too long? Yeah, it's too long. So it's not a sexy team and you, you, you,

You can't be happy with Anthony Richardson at this point, but I think you'd stay in any AFC South job that you can get. I mean, the bad divisions are still the bad divisions. Maybe Jacksonville. Yeah. Somewhere like that. So Matt, a couple other short things I had for you. Mac Jones has as many wins this year as Trevor Lawrence. Just pointing that out. I am 25 and five season future over unders. Thanks to the Atlanta loss today.

I need a Houston win and an Arizona win next week. And I would go 27 and five, which we always, we have all these media accounts where everybody shits on anyone with a podcast or a calm or a feature or whatever. And it's like this cottage industry. There's no like benevolent version of it where it's like, Hey, this person did a really good job. Hey, cousin Sal is 13 and two on why is this wagers? Good luck to him this week. We need like happy version of, of those terrible media accounts. I'm with you. So get, get the ringer people to,

Plug it. 25 and five overrunners. Put that on some fucking tweet somewhere. Make a freaking billboard outside your house. You got my do it. It's fun. 25 and five. We did great on the other futures, right? Yeah. You beat me in that.

Yeah. I had two locks. I had Carolina under, New England under three, and Green Bay over. All those hits. So maybe we should tell people what to stay away from because we hit the mother load if the Lions get the one seed. And I specifically do because I got 26 to one on Chiefs-Lions one seed. Amazing. Again, after how many years, still don't know how to hedge this. We got five to one odds, right? When we get the Lions, let's talk about the hedge for that. You got it.

Dorian Thompson Robinson threw a pick today, no touchdown. Career, one touchdown, 10 picks. I was like, I wonder who else has done that. I wonder what other players in NBA and NFL history have one touchdown or less and 10 interceptions or more. So you have that stat head on the pro football reference. So I went up. How many other people do you think have done that? History. Three. History of football. Five. Five? Nobody since, nobody in the last 40 years.

We had Stan Heath, one touchdown, 14 interceptions. Len Barnum, 0 for 10. Randy Hedberg in 1977, 0 for 10. It's like an accounting firm. Who are these people? Wayne Clark, zero touchdowns, 14 picks in the early part of the 70s. Nice. And then Rusty Lish.

One touchdown, 11 picks. So he's done something that he's done in 40 years. That doesn't sound like a quarterback name. Rusty Lish? You deserve what you get if you're drafting a Rusty Lish. I mean, that's not... Collinsworth would have trouble with that one. Oh, Rusty. Rusty Lish or Pash Rush. Pash or Rush. Yeah. Yeah, the DTR, the...

Did he seem right to you? I felt like something was off. No, he seemed hurt. And I don't think... I'm making a joke. That's what we say about the good quarterbacks. Are we going to find out he was injured? No, I think he actually was hurt. Well, he thought something was good, but he was hurt. One interception, he had one fumble. He had three intentional groundings and a 20 QBR.

And plus whatever you're saying. Yeah. They, now that's a team that is tanking. They want to get a top three pick. They have a chance to get one or two if one of those teams, if Tennessee or the Pats. So they're like, we're not playing Jameis again. Jameis is too unreliable. He might actually win this game. He might actually beat Miami. We can't play him. Hmm.

I don't know what their plan is. I mean, they're going to... They basically announced this week they're going to keep Watson for two more years. I mean, that deal just gets worse and worse. Last thing before it gets to the Lions. Greg Gumbel passed away and they were talking about him in all the games the last couple of days. I was really bummed out. I feel like...

you know, especially people who grew up with the eighties ESPN and he was one of the five or six people, right? It was, it was him. It was Gail Gardner. It was Chris Berman and Tom Lee. Like we had, it was the same six people for an entire decade. And then he went on, he kind of graduated, did all this stuff. He became a studio host. He original WFAN guy too in New York. Right. Going way back. Um, and then has a really important, uh,

he did the tuck roll game, AKA the snow game for Pats fans. He announced that one, but beloved guy by all accounts and feels like he's been in our lives ever since we liked sports. I was bummed. And yet, like a dozen years older than I would have thought. Like 78, right? I mean, I know he helped him. He looked young, but

But yeah, man, I would get very excited. I'm a big Selection Sunday guy. I write it down, even though they have the bracket right on the TV. And when, you know, the Duke Blue Devils are the number one seed in the East region. It's like something cool and you could rely on. And yeah, he'll be missed. Another great voice. Passed through a lot of great sports and sports moments. I was thinking about that whole ESPN crew in the 80s.

That was like our lifeline to all this highlights and information back then. Right. And you had these people and it was like the same way, like the local news anchors mean the most in your dad's house in the seventies, we had these six, seven, eight people that were just the people we found out what happened. And you really felt like you had relationships with all of them. You know, Berman was like the funny one. Tom Lee was the serious one. Bob, Bob Lee,

Um, yeah, it was, he, he was like the professor and then Charlie Steiner showed it. And it's just like, I don't know, Gumball was in those. And when he graduated out of that, it was like, Whoa, somebody hired one of the ESPN guys. It felt like we all kind of made it. Anyway, this message is a paid partnership with Apple card. If you want to take control of your finances, Apple card is where it starts. A credit card that can give you up to 3% daily cash back on every purchase. I have one. I can tell you this is true.

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Week 18. We're going to go in order of impact. Do you care? So you know what the Saturdays are, right? Yeah, I didn't do it that way, though. I'm just going to follow this schedule I had. Because the biggest game...

The NFC one seed on the line. That's going to be Sunday night, right? That's Sunday night. How can that not be? I mean, it's, they saved it. I mean, honestly, if the Vikings lose that game, I'm not sure what, what NBC does and the league does with that game. I think they maybe have to stop with the, everyone plays a division the last week. I think maybe just go with like the preseason season.

the playoffs from last year and try to mix them up and try to get lucky because now we see that like only one out of eight divisions or two in the, in the, in the AFC North's case, barely matter. But most of these are settled by week 18. Um, I called Tom, Tom means Tom Lee, by the way. Yeah. Yeah. It's good. I didn't mean to rest in peace. Um, lions Vikings. It's in Detroit. I'm giving this the tick tack. So, Hmm.

Lions minus one and a half against Minnesota for the one seed. I think this is a dead even game. You could even talk me into Minnesota being favored in this, but I don't think it'll start that way. So I'm going Lions minus one and a half. All right. I have to now adjust because some of these have moved. I said minus three. It's minus two and a half for the Detroit Lions. Interesting.

I get that. And I'm telling you right now, I might get two more and that's it. We almost shouldn't count this week. Much like they don't count week 18 in fantasy, I almost think we shouldn't count this for guest lines. And I'm not just saying that because I'm off by four points every game. Detroit does not need to beat San Francisco tomorrow. Right.

The game somehow doesn't matter, even though week 18 matters the most, which is just weird. Kornacki was a little, little, he threw me a little bit. I feel like he made it like they did need that this game did matter. And then like, no, no, 49 doesn't, doesn't matter at all. 100% does not matter. Dan Campbell's doing the whole, we're playing anyone anyway. But I think that would be crazy to do that. But sure. Week six, Detroit won 31, 29. Yep.

Somehow we had three two-point games that the Vikings were involved with against the Lions and Green Bay, which is just weird. Right, right. That's where the tic-tac comes into play, the one and a half. Got to get it the right way. NFC South, on the line, not really. Falcons win, they get the fourth seed. They're playing the Panthers in Atlanta. I'm sorry, I screwed this up. Tampa wins, they get the fourth seed.

Right? Yes. Tampa's up a game. They lose a tiebreaker if they lose a game. So Tampa wins. They get it. Tampa loses. Atlanta wins. Atlanta gets it because they beat Tampa Bay twice. Mm-hmm. Tampa is home for the Saints who stink.

And Tampa's offense is really good. And as we discussed earlier, Baker Mayfield, fantasy MVP, at least one of them. I have the Bucs minus 10 and a half. Oh, I'm going to beat you here. I had 11 and a half. It's 13 and a half. Wow. Think about that. We're going to have to, we're going to have to do something here. Can you imagine if I told you in mid-August, week 18, the Bucs are going to be favored by 13 and a half against the Saints? What would you have thought happened?

I would have thought the Saints named Spencer Rattler their starter. And had the clogger as their coach. Yeah. God, they're so bad. This would have been so much more fun if Atlanta won today because we would have had all kinds of scenarios. Washington had to win. There was all different tiebreaker shit. We won our NFC South bet, by the way. So kudos to us. Oh, good. With the under. Nice. Yeah, because they can only have two more. Two more. Yeah.

The highest that it could get to 28. So we made it by two. It wasn't even scary. When was it? It's scariest. I'm trying to think, I guess when new Orleans beat up on Dallas a week ago, it was like a week ago. Carolina started upsetting people and it was like, Holy shit. Like if Carolina won today in Atlanta, I guess Carolina was playing at NFC South. Yeah. There's still. Yeah. But if Atlanta had won, yeah, it got a little closer than I want it.

Falcons against the Panthers. I have Falcons. This is in Atlanta. I have Falcons by seven and a half against the Panthers. You got it exactly. I had eight, but it's not going to matter. Teaser? Well, I just worry that Baker does like he did today and has like 40 points up there and Atlanta calls off the dogs. You know what I mean? They're playing the same time, obviously. I'm going to put the Washington game in this category too.

No, I can't do that now because they lost. I need to put them in a different category. I'm doing this on the fly here. Put them later. The problem with this is, and I'm going to show my hand here, is a lot of these lines don't reflect when Thursday the coach says, we're sitting everybody. And then the lines fly another five points. So just be careful, everyone. NFC West on the line, sort of.

The Rams are minus two and a half against the Seahawks. Oh, no. That was my guess. I screwed that up. The game is in L.A. and I have the Rams minus two and a half over the Seahawks. I should have let you guess first. I had Seattle by one and then Seattle by two and a half. The Rams are in, right? The Rams are in. They're not necessarily 100% in yet. No, they needed like one more team to win. Like 12 things had to happen. No, I'm going to go through it.

Oh, it's crazy what needs to happen for Seattle to win for this game to matter. They need. Oh, no, they're out. You're right. Because they needed Atlanta to beat Washington. Yeah. I think that was the last one. Oh, man. I don't care. I'm taking that win.

Yeah, take it. Go. See, I did all the work for Washington winning. And then when Atlanta came back, I changed all the work. And then Raheem screwed everything up. I was so excited to go through all the things that needed to happen in week 18 for Seattle. It's like two things. It was actually pretty conceivable. They needed Arizona to beat San Francisco, Denver to beat KC, Atlanta to beat Carolina. All three of those things could happen. Miami to beat the Jets. Still conceivable.

Chicago beat Green Bay, not playing for anything. Not inconceivable. Chargers, Vegas. Tampa beats New Orleans. The Saints or something. Yeah. No, the weird one was the Pats would have had to beat Buffalo. That's where the wheels kind of got. That's going to happen. Get ready. All right. Playoff spot on the line. Three teams, one spot. Broncos against the Chiefs. It's in Denver. Wow. I did Broncos minus seven and a half.

You know, I said four and a half, and it was seven and a half. It went to eight and a half. So you get it. Wow. Man, that's high. I mean, I guess if Carson Wentz just plays with all second string, like the whole first string sits, then it's going to be tough. But that's a lot of points for Denver. It's a lot. I don't know. I like...

I kind of like the Chiefs in that game. Yeah. I like the Chiefs. I don't know if I'm buying the Chiefs money line either. I could see them being like, fuck it. We're not playing for two weeks after this. We'll play Carson Wentz. Let's run all our stuff. I don't know. Here's what I know. Because Denver's not that good. How many favorites have Vandal and Vegas gotten walloped on in the last year? I don't know. Four months. Colts today. There's a team. There's a team that's going to blow it for everybody. There's a team.

Could be them. Dolphins are home for the Jets. I'm sorry. Jets are home for the Dolphins, but Dolphins need a win and they need a Denver loss. And two of them might not play. Stu Puntley was like passable today and people are excited about it. Yeah. I don't see how this can be less than Dolphins by four and a half. All right. I got it exactly. It's two and a half. Wow. But I was getting a headache thinking of these. I really were. Who in God's name would bet the Jets?

Well, now if they had Tyrod Taylor, I might bet them. They have a chance. That's it. Because it might be a whole spite game. Snoop against Taylor? I love it. By the teammates. Yeah. Steelers-Bengals in Pittsburgh. Since he needs a win, plus Denver-Miami losses, Pittsburgh gets the three seed with a win and a Baltimore loss. Pittsburgh could drop to six if they lose and the Chargers win. I did Steelers minus one and a half. Wow.

I did since he minus three and it's since he minus two and a half. What? That's honestly, that's stupid. I'm going to bet the Steelers. No, don't bet the Steelers. I'm a hundred percent betting the Steelers. The Bengals aren't good. The Bengals are eight and eight.

Listen, you cursed the Steelers three weeks ago when you named them the best team. You cursed the Steelers and you cursed Drake May. I cursed everybody else in the league, but you cursed the Steelers and Drake May. I said three weeks. I said, what, four weeks ago? I said, I thought the Steelers were playing the best of anyone in the AFC. Pickens immediately got hurt. That bunch of their guys on defense got hurt. And Russell Wilson turned into Denver Russell Wilson.

Yeah. Like I, my words were hanging in the air and all of a sudden you go the other way though. And you could say they just played three really tough teams at 11 days and maybe they're still pretty good. Pickens played last week on Christmas. They, it didn't matter. Russell Wilson, the defense is just average right now for whatever reason. And if you've been, it hasn't been good for like a month, hustle and bustle isn't playing out of his mind. Might as well be anyone. These Steelers team. Yeah.

Steelers are home dogs and they need the game and playing a team that doesn't have a good defense and has a pretty shaky coach, let's be honest. I know he made a Super Bowl. I don't think they start anyone, honestly. I don't think they care. I don't think Tomlin's the kind of guy. You think they don't care if they're two or three? Yeah, I think he's like, give us the Ravens again. It's fine because they play at the same time. The Ravens are going to be up 30 to nothing on the Browns. No, they play the same day, but later in that day. Would you rather play the Ravens or the Bills if you're the Steelers?

I think the Ravens. Isn't that always like an 18-16 game for the most part? Yeah, and they've beaten them a few times. They beat them earlier this year. They'll figure it out. Still lose, but... AFC seeding kind of sort of on the line. Chargers at the Raiders. Raiders are red hot. Chargers could get the five seed with a win or Pittsburgh loss. What a stupid team. I have the Chargers favored by eight.

I got to find this now. I had seven. Let's see where it is. I got to find it because they're all moving around. Five and a half. So I get it. Wow. Vegas owned us. Are you going to beat me this week? Feels like you're going to beat me. This is crazy. I mean, I have some bad ones coming up. I always suck in week 18. My fans were prepared for it. I take it easy like the Chiefs. You could do this, Jacoby. Hang in there. Ravens are home against the Browns. They get the three seed with a win.

Cleveland clinches a top three pick with a loss. You can kind of guess where this game's going. I'm going Ravens by 13 and a half. Okay. I said 15. 17 and a half. Wow. It's the biggest of the year, right? Jesus. I mean, I can't even put that in of 13 point tees. What am I going to do with that line? You can. It's fine. Like you said, the Browns aren't going to put up a fight. NFC...

Six, eight on the line. Technically Washington is, has the edge right now. They're at Dallas and the Packers are home for the bears. Washington. I have minus three and a half over your Cowboys. So I bet you got it. Exactly. I thought it would be five. It's three and a half. I had a small bet on the Cowboys with the over in that game. Tease Cooper rush was awful.

I mean, your team was awful, but Cooper Rush, like, why don't they just don't want to see what Trey Lance, what's there? They've just given up on him? I think it's an absolute mystery. I think maybe they want to trade him and they don't want to show how bad he is kind of thing. Oh, interesting. Like they're hiding him? They don't have enough makeup. But did you see what the fans did to Jerry Jones today? I'll send you that clip. Like,

I don't know why he ever goes to Philly, but the fans within earshot, they're like, keep doing what you're doing, Jerry. You're doing great. You're doing great for the organization. And he's like, yeah, man. They're like sarcastic praising him. Oh, yeah. And he's, I don't know if he gets it or not, but he's like, I try not to disappoint. And he's like, oh my God, just get out. Why are you ever going there? These old owners. I mean, how old is Jerry? Like he's in his eighties now, right? He's there. I think. Yep. Like we have Bob craft is 83.

That's part of what, with the Pats, I just feel like these guys are old. How many years left do they have? Why do they want to mess around? We have the wrong coach and the wrong GM. Why do they want to leave their house? You're going to be 84 next year. I know. Other one for the six seed, Packers-Bears. The Bears coming off, I think, probably the worst televised national TV game of the year, the Seahawks-Bears game, just a complete atrocity.

Packers can lock down the six seed. I'm going to say Packers by 11 and a half. You get it. I was way. See, this is one of the ones I was way off on. I said seven and a half. It's 10. But again, this is another one like Jordan Love can rest or he could play this game and stay at the six. What's the score? I don't know. One, two, three, four, two, three, six to four. Me might still get this. I think you are going to get it.

Bunch of garbage coming. We only have five games left. Yeah. All right. So we type. All right. Next category is top three draft pick on the line. The bills are at the Patriots. The Pats clinched the first pick with a loss. Buffalo has clinched everything already. And yet I think Buffalo is still going to be favored by five and a half, even with Mitch Trubisky. I went higher than that. It's amazing that you're going to win this and be off by so much. I went bills by six.

It's Bills by one and a half. Wow. So you get it. Mitch Trubisky. This has got to make you nervous. One and a half in a game that you think for sure you're laying down in? I don't know for sure. We don't have a smart franchise. I don't know what to expect. But one and a half. Well, I mean, you and I thought five and six. We ran a play. I mean, the Chargers game was one of the lowest moments in recent Pat's history and brought me back to...

The mid-70s, before things turned around, brought me back to the late 80s. There was a play, though. First of all, it looked like Drake May got concussed five minutes into the game, and then he came back. Then Gonzalez got concussed. But there was a play when Drake May, he turned and it was like... Pitched it. Douglas was coming around on a reverse, and it seemed like he was pitching to the running back, but he was pitching to the wide receiver instead, but the wide receiver wasn't there yet.

Yeah. And the ball, he was pitching because I was wondering for not like, I'm not, I thought it was a play to the wide receiver. Interesting. All right. I feel like it was just like, whoever's there. Just take it. I think Douglas started, started going emotion too late and it was supposed to be turned, flipped to wide receiver, but he was three feet back. And, uh, that was awful. I mean, it was an awful game. The crowd was booing. It was really depressing.

Yeah, man. I mean, I don't know. You love, I mean, he has three wins. Like, you could be excited about him, but he's been just bad enough that you're in the spot to get the number one pick. I love Drake, man. The only thing that makes me worried is when he starts doing things like tiptoeing down the sidelines, spinning into like a guy going 30 miles an hour. It's like, please don't get hit anymore, Drake, man. Eagles, Giants in Philly. Giants clinch a top four pick with a loss, maybe even a little bit better.

Philly, nothing to play for. I'm going to say Eagles by nine. Oh, all right. I get this. I said five and a half. It's three and a half. Yeah. See, I'm always bad in week 18. Look out for the Giants. Eight, two, five. And how many left? One, two. Three games left. Okay, good. You got to sweep them. You could do this. You could pull it off. Texans are at Tennessee. Tennessee clinches the second pick in the draft with a loss.

Did they not cover again? I honestly don't know. Did the Jaguars win that game? They won by seven. And they covered? So they're like two and 14 now? Yeah. Two and 14 against the spread. Beautiful. Great job. I have Texans by three and a half at Tennessee. All right. I had Texans by one and a half. And it is, let me see, because these things change. I love how you have to check because I'm- I do have to check. All these have changed. Tennessee by four and a half.

Tennessee by four and a half. Tennessee by four and a half. So I get that. Tennessee over Houston by four and a half. Yeah. See, this is why this week shouldn't count. We are going to count it. Damn right we're going to count it, but it shouldn't count. What in the hell? Why would Tennessee want to win this game? They don't have a quarterback. Their quarterbacks are Will Levis and Mason Rudolph. There's two quarterbacks in the draft.

Why would they want to win the game and move back in the draft? But they're not going to sit everyone, right? The Texans are going to sit everyone. They're going to be calling guys off the street. Why wouldn't the Titans do that? Like Houston Barbecues and stuff. I don't know. Two more games. These are, in the category, absolutely irrelevant. Colts home for the Jaguars. I did Colts minus seven and a half. You're going to get it. It's five and a half.

What did you guess? I said two. And then Cardinals at home for the 49ers. I need this one for my over-unders. I need Houston to win with their underdogs and I need the Cardinals to win and I could go 27-5 with my NFL over-unders, which would delight me to no end. Cardinals, I'm going to guess minus three and a half.

I said Cardinals by two and the Niners are favored by one and a half. So I get that. What? What a win for me. Wow. What a great week. You win this every year you win week 18. I swear you won for like 11 straight years. All right. So now going into the playoffs, it's nine winning by one. Yeah. Nine to eight to one. One tie. Yeah. It's the closest you've been in a while. Very exciting. Well, you know what I do in the playoffs? I just completely crapped the bed. So.

So have you thought about that Minnesota-Detroit game yet? Well, we're too interested in actually trying to figure out who wins. We have to hedge. We have to hedge. We have to hedge. We have five to one, and we may not have the better team. Yeah, and plus we have a little... I mean, Detroit can win by two. You talked about all the games the Vikings were in that won by two. We could take the points there. We should probably do it now. I'm really proud of us. I like it. It's a great bet.

Yeah, we did. We did it. I did more when I was in Boston on FanDuel. Just making weird FanDuel bets. That was one of them. Had some losers though. On the old fan, I had some flyers on Houston to be the one seed. I had a Green Bay to be the one seed flyer. The teams that, so the five over-unders I got wrong, the two that I got wrong, the worst other than the Jets.

was Minnesota was one of them. I had the under six and a half for them. And then we both had Jacksonville over. I think that was like, what, seven and a half, eight? Yeah, I thought they'd win the division. And they were awful. And the Jets, those were the three that I was the most off on. Tampa I didn't hit. Right.

Yeah, you just feel like some of these teams are going to hit a wall. I'm stupid. I passed like I had the Browns over and the Raiders over all these dumb, dumb ass teams that don't even try. What did you think of this whole gauntlet we just went through with football? Because I actually got conditioned to it by today. Just with all the games we had two Wednesday, one Thursday, three Saturday. Yeah.

And then a bunch today. And it was nice because there was only two late games today. I kind of liked it. I did a little power walk. Really? Had the game on my phone. I just had Brady and Burkhart.

Just walking around LA, watching on my phone. Well, you could do that with the two in the late afternoon. Well, because I didn't Miami Cleveland. I was like, I don't care. I'm out. Yeah. Who cares? But we had six games before Sunday. I think it's a little too many. I don't think you need a Thursday night game if there are two Christmas games. I went, right. Yeah. And maybe you don't need three on Saturday because honestly, it ended up being okay. But we had Rattler O'Connell, Rudolph Mack, Rush Pickett.

Flacco, Locke. Those were four of the six games. Aaron Rodgers was going into the morning games early afternoon. He was like the third best quarterback going into them. He was like Baker and obviously Josh Allen. And then Aaron Rodgers was third. I don't know. It led to a funny ringer Sunday pregame show where half the games were games nobody would have wanted to bet on in a million years. You just kind of had to come up with stuff. All right. You want to do parent corner? Yeah, let's do it.

How's this go again? We say terrible things about our kids. Yeah. You know what I'm going to say? I'm going to say a good thing. It's like the last one of the year. Right. And we're usually trashing on them, but I'm proud of my kids for all different reasons. Everyone's home. Right. You have Zoe's home from school. Archie's home from school. They each did something that made me proud this week. Archie, for instance, the oldest took his younger brothers out for a family portrait.

And they all wore like ties and button down shirts. And they went to Sears or wherever the hell you go now. And they paid for it. And they got, he got like wallet sizes for his grandparents and all different options. It was like the three kids. Yeah. And they're like all different fun poses, like a real Brady Bunch moment. I mean, he made his mother cry, like, which is a big plus. Different from the way I make her cry. Making Melissa cry is not an achievement. That's true. It's good that he made her cry happily.

Exactly. It was a different kind of, uh, tears. Um, middle guy, Jack made an audio clip of our friend Brad screaming. Um, and he plays it on a loop and has driven everyone nuts. So I'm proud of him for that. Like he replaced, it replaced Mariah Carey song on the Spotify top hundred. So good job by you, Jack. And perhaps the winner. Yeah. My little one, Harrison, we went to Florida for a couple of days. We had to visit Melissa's father. Um,

When you go through TSA and the grown-ups have TSA check and the grown-ups show their ID, and then the little guys, what they do is in a very stern way, they ask, what is your full name? And you have to say it. They'll point to the kid. And he's put on the spot. And I swear, Harrison, without missing a beat, how's it go? Without missing a beat, the guy says, what is your full name? And he says...

in a very, as deep a voice as an 11-year-old could do. He says, Creed Humphrey, Alabama. And I was like...

You're my fucking guy. I love it. That's the best. Now it sidelined us for a couple minutes. Melissa was not happy at all. And the guy is not a football fan, as you can imagine. He's like, I need your real name right now. It's Harrison. It's Harrison. It's Harrison Icano. That's my name. So we got through it. But I was like, that's Humphrey. I don't know. It might be something he and his friends say, because, you know, it's like the Monday night football thing. But good job by the three of them.

Wow. So how many, how many times for tears for Melissa in 2024, do we have a final count? Is it on wifereference.com? A lot, man. It's, it's, it's the age. I don't know. You going through it too? No, more tantrums. Oh, tantrums. Oh, I wouldn't mind a tantrum every now and then. Well, it's, it's, you know, the, the Zoe and my wife just being in the same house. It's great. Yeah. Right. Wow. It's a,

Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of tears since this Brad recording has gone viral in the house. But other than that. Can you put the Brad recording like on Instagram or something? I think I will. I think I will. It's pretty good. It's going to be a little out of context. People don't know him, but it's good. My parent corner. So I had Zoe on the last 40 minutes of my podcast on Thursday and she did her teen culture awards for the last time because she turns 20. Both of our kids turn 20 next year and they're not teenagers anymore. Have you

Really thought about that? No, I haven't. Shit. Is that true? Come on. You're still a teen at 20. No, no, you're 100% not a teen. I don't know what you are. It's not 20. No, 20 is 20 is that limbo year before you turn 21, where you're just kind of like, ah, I'm not a teenager anymore, but I can't legally drink either. What am I? Oh man. Um, so anyway, we went to the Clipper game on Friday. We saw the Clippers against the Warriors. You know, she wanted to see Steph Curry.

It's great. And then Friday morning, Steph Curry's not playing tonight. The NBA just, it's like, I wonder what's wrong with the league. Well, it's because shit like this, because Steph Curry's in town and then he's not playing. And, you know, we don't need to litigate that for the hundredth time, but it was just kind of funny. And she, it's funny with your kids to go through the stages of the stuff that we've all like kind of litigated as sports fans for years and years where she's like, I don't understand.

I thought we were seeing Steph Curry. Why isn't he playing? Like, how hurt is he? And it's like, well, they're playing Phoenix tomorrow night. They played on Christmas. Yeah, but still, I don't, but he should play. I love it. You deserve it. All these people are coming.

All these people are coming to the arena to see Steph Curry and he's not going to be there. What if he got it for a Christmas? I'm like, yeah, this is a conversation for 10 years. This is one of the many reasons why the schedule should be 60 games. So Steph Curry would actually play in all the arenas. Right. Anyway. He wouldn't, but you're right. Yeah, I know what you're saying. So I really love the Clippers arena. They did a great job.

And my daughter had a great time and the places, they really did it. They figured out how to create this arena where the, they have good fans. It's loud. Um, you feel like you're on top of the court. The fans feel like they're affecting the game. There's like real energy going on in between. It's just cool. And when you go to get like a drink or food or anything, there's no TVs anywhere. He wants people in, in the stadium. So anyway, third quarter timeout, uh,

And Zoe runs off to get a candy. And the guy behind me taps my shoulder. He's like, Hey, um, anyone ever tell you look like Bill Simmons? And he starts laughing. He's like, Hey, how are you? He's like, I'm a fan of the pot. It's like, I didn't want to say it. No, it could have been. Oh, that would have been exciting. So he goes, I didn't want to say anything until your, your wife went. But when your wife went to the bathroom and I was like, that's not my wife. That's my daughter. She's 19. And

And I was just completely for the rest of the game. First time somebody has thought my daughter was my wife. So I really wanted to kill myself. That's all right. Let's think about this. Yeah. That's a, that's a huge compliment for you, right? I think there is no compliment to be taken from any aspect of this. It was, it was a dark moment. If he had said granddaughter, that would have sucked. Right.

Granddaughter would have been tough. Okay. So the granddaughter would have been really hard. Wife is not as bad. Not as bad. Wow. Did you tell them this? Of course. I was thinking girlfriend would have been even more logical. Wife is like, what is this? Like a child bride? Like when she turned 18? You're not going to commit to this soon to be not teen right now? Wow.

Oh, that's good. I could see Z looking like she's like 22, 23 to somebody, but just like, I'm old. I don't know. It threw me off. But you're in LA also. It's not inconceivable. Well, that's the thing, right? It's an indictment of LA, right? If you had a Thunder game in Oklahoma City, they would have gotten it right, I think. Yeah. Good for you. Congratulations. Did she laugh? Did she laugh about it? She was horrified. Yeah.

Just flat out, flat out horrified. Anyway, thanks to that guy. What did he say? Did he apologize or did you just pull it off? No, he's like, oh, my bad, my bad. He did one of those. Nice guy. But yeah, anyway, that's it for Parent Corner. What else do we have to hit? What do you want to plug? What do we got? Against all odds, the fellas and I will be doing the college football picks Monday night for the Tuesday and Wednesday games. It's fun.

Four big playoff games and the ring. What's your favorite playoff Sunday? You know what? I'm taking Boise to upset Penn State. I think that's it. I think that like the running back. I like John Day. I think there's going to be a few moment for the committee who has been told they've screwed this up. And God damn it. Of course, they have screwed it up. But I think they're going to be like, aha, told you this is going to be a good matchup. And so at least take the points. I'm excited for it.

Casual college football fan Bill likes the playoffs. I like that there's more teams, even though the first round of games suck. And Archie's going to the Rose Bowl because Oregon's playing Ohio State there. So it's nice and convenient. So he's gone. Oh, no, it's Rose Bowl. It's here. Yeah, Rose Bowl. Yeah. Yeah. Couldn't have worked out better. So how long did he stay for the break? He's here until the day after he leaves. The second? I don't know. When does your wife Zoe go back?

My wife, Zoe, is going to Miami to see the boyfriend. Oh, yeah. On the 5th of January, 6th of January, somewhere in there. There you go. This is another thing. Her boyfriend's turning 21. Oh, really? Okay. Interesting. We're getting old, Sal. I don't know how to stop it. I know. Saruti's one of the producers. He's...

Got this tiny kid, her whole life in front of her. Meanwhile, we went through all these stages. It sucks. It's just sad how fast it goes. I almost missed my flatest sprint. I don't think I've ever run this fast. I made it. One of those things where they're about to close the door. I had to sprint to the... I think I sprained both my hamstrings. I just sat in my seat and cried for the five-hour flight. He blew out your Achilles. Yeah, I was like, fuck. How do you get this back?

It's over. So you didn't have any wrestling tournaments or anything over the break? No, not yet. No, we're good. We're good till next week. All right. That's it for the pod. Thanks to Saruti and Kyle and Gahal. Cuz, good job by you. Good job by you, buddy. Thanks to everybody. We'll be back on Tuesday.

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