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Episode: The State of Fantasy Football, 25 Best NBA Players, and Million-Dollar Picks With Danny Heifetz and Joe House

Author: The Ringer
Duration: 01:58:51

Episode Shownotes

The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Danny Heifetz and Joe House for a fantasy football check-in after nine weeks, then discuss the surging Ravens offense, the rise of the running back, and the biggest fantasy disappointments (2:13). Afterward, they get into some stealth waiver wire and trade candidates and

fantasy booking Bill Belichick's next coaching gig (26:23). House and Bill later run through their favorite games from the weekend's slate before making their Million-Dollar Picks for NFL Week 10 (53:16), Finally, they talk some NBA, including the Warriors' win over the Celtics, NBA awards odds, a check-in on their win total picks, and Bill's updated top 25 NBA players list (1:27:51). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Joe House and Danny Heifetz Producer: Kyle Crichton The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Summary

In this episode of 'The Bill Simmons Podcast,' host Bill Simmons, joined by Danny Heifetz and Joe House, examines the state of fantasy football after nine weeks of NFL action, focusing on the performance of the Baltimore Ravens and the resurgence of running backs compared to underperforming wide receivers. They discuss strategies for managing fantasy teams, identify potential trade targets, and reflect on their own experiences. The conversation transitions to Million-Dollar Picks for NFL Week 10 and an analysis of the NBA, including Golden State's strong performance against the Celtics and a discussion on top NBA players.

Go to PodExtra AI's episode page (The State of Fantasy Football, 25 Best NBA Players, and Million-Dollar Picks With Danny Heifetz and Joe House) to play and view complete AI-processed content: summary, mindmap, topics, takeaways, transcript, keywords and highlights.

Full Transcript

00:00:01 Speaker_01
Coming up, a lot of football and a little basketball as well. It's all next.

00:00:06 Speaker_01
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Always monitor traffic and weather conditions. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. State Farm helps you score an affordable price when you choose to bundle home and auto insurance with the Personal Price Plan. Bundling home and auto?

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That's a pro move. Just another way you can save on your insurance needs. Talk to a State Farm agent today to learn how you can bundle and save with the Personal Price Plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

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Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts and savings, and eligibility vary by state. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network.

00:01:33 Speaker_01
Put up a new Rewatchables on Monday. We did Body Double, and you can watch it on the Ringer Movies YouTube channel, and you can watch all the videos and clips from this podcast on Bill Simmons' YouTube channel.

00:01:44 Speaker_01
And if you like our bets that we do on Million Dollar Picks here, which has been doing pretty well lately, on the Ringer Sunday pregame show on YouTube TV, all of Sal's podcast stuff, the Ringer Gambling Show, we are now putting all of that stuff, our favorite ones,

00:01:58 Speaker_01
on our own Ringer section, which is within FanDuel's NFL section. We have a page or a little tab that you click called the Ringer Specials. And we launched it last week. It went great.

00:02:09 Speaker_01
And that's where Million Dollar Picks, a whole bunch of other stuff are going. So if you need ideas for parlays, features, teasers, whatever, go check that out because we're doing it every weekend from now on.

00:02:18 Speaker_01
Coming up on this podcast, Danny Heifetz joined Joe House and I, talked about the state of fantasy football, through nine weeks. Who are the winners? Who are the losers? What did we learn? Did we learn any big picture lessons for future seasons?

00:02:33 Speaker_01
And then who should you pick up? Who should you try to trade for? We just deep dove fantasy, because why not? And then we talked about the Giants. We talked about who Bill Belichick is going to coach next. Howe stuck around. We did million dollar picks.

00:02:44 Speaker_01
And then last but not least, we did some basketball, because I think we're going to start doing that after a million dollar picks. Just a little nightcap NBA section. There were a lot of good games last night, a lot to talk about.

00:02:56 Speaker_01
I also wanted to run my Ringer 100. my top 25 past house because we got to turn those ballots in soon. I'm not going to talk about the election today. I'm probably going to do it at some point over the next couple of weeks.

00:03:07 Speaker_01
I want to do it with the right guests, but I'm still sorting my thoughts from, you know. Let's bring in Pearl Jam. All right, we're taping this on Thursday afternoon. Joe House is here, as he always is, for Million Dollar Picks.

00:03:44 Speaker_01
And Danny Heifetz is here from The Ringer Fantasy Football Show and TheRinger.com, a great website. Also, a big New York fan. Interesting month for New York. Have you recovered?

00:03:56 Speaker_00
Yeah, it's great.

00:03:57 Speaker_00
I mean it started well when the the WNBA title was handed by the referees to the Liberty So that was really cool and frankly ever since then there's been a lot of karmic retribution on every front So it's been strange after that, but it was at least we got a hint the title handed that was kind of cool House, where's our karmic retribution for links 5 to 1?

00:04:15 Speaker_03
So later I think Josiah has it Josiah has it

00:04:23 Speaker_01
We're gonna talk fantasy because we are at the sweet spot of the fantasy season. We have nine weeks in the book. We have some winners and some losers and some disappointments and some surprises.

00:04:33 Speaker_01
And then more importantly, we have the stretch run coming. House and I are in a keeper league together. House, how's your team doing?

00:04:42 Speaker_03
Terrible I have a one among the worst receivers in the league and you can't win if you have bad receivers Oh, well, I can't wait to talk about him.

00:04:49 Speaker_01
My team's doing great in that league and terrible in the other league, but Hi Fitz Lamar not only the MVP for fantasy But every year there's a theory just pick an offense and grab all the best guys from it

00:05:03 Speaker_01
When you're doing all your shows with Danny and Craig, did Baltimore ever come up as the team that would be the team to do that with? Because they have the number one QB, the number one running back, and then Flowers is in the top 10 receivers.

00:05:15 Speaker_01
But did anyone see that coming?

00:05:17 Speaker_00
Yeah, it did. So, I mean, you know, I live in D.C., you know, just like house.

00:05:19 Speaker_00
And I went to Baltimore camp and I just remember coming back from OTAs the first time just seeing, you know, they're not wearing pads or anything, but just the first time I saw Lamar Jackson stick the ball at Derrick Henry's gut for like a read option, even on air, I was just like, this is this looks iconic.

00:05:32 Speaker_00
It feels iconic. It's like a thunder lightning backfield at the same time.

00:05:36 Speaker_00
And I wish we had gone in on it even more, because if you would just stack Lamar, Derrick Henry and Zay Flowers, like you'd be cooking, even you could have survived the Mark Andrews stuff. I mean, the Ravens are amazing.

00:05:46 Speaker_00
And yeah, every year there's an offense that you want that you can see coming. And then there's offense you probably would not have seen coming that maybe, you know, you could take a shot on.

00:05:53 Speaker_00
And yeah, Baltimore is absolutely that team this year that you wish you had been, you know, got the lightning in a bottle.

00:05:58 Speaker_01
Lamar would, at least in normal leagues, Lamar 249.5 points. Now he hasn't had a bye week yet, but he's 23 above the next guy, Baker Mayfield, ironically. And then Daniels and Allen are the only two over 200.

00:06:13 Speaker_01
Henry is 35 points higher than any running back, which is Saquon Barkley. Kamara's after him, but Henry's almost at 200 points. And then Zay Flower's almost at 100 points. House, is there a chance

00:06:29 Speaker_01
The Washington Seawords could be a team you would want to have the guys from down the stretch here with McLaurin and Daniels and whatever the hell you got going on running back.

00:06:39 Speaker_03
I think just Daniels and McLaurin, I think maybe some Zachert sprinkling a little arts. And then if you're really desperate, you know, depending on the size of your roster, there could be a flex spot for Austin Eckler here and there.

00:06:53 Speaker_03
You know, he gets catches and occasional runs.

00:06:56 Speaker_01
I had him last week. He was good last week. He was sneaky. Yeah.

00:07:00 Speaker_03
Well, cause B Rob was out. So there have been, you know, they've been swapping injuries the weeks that Eckler are out and if B Rob's healthy, you get him going, but that, that would be it. It's not an expansive list.

00:07:11 Speaker_03
I honestly, I was hoping that Washington would get another receiver at the trade deadline, but it's okay. We're good. I like where we're at.

00:07:18 Speaker_01
Heifetz, out of the win-your-league guys, which you always talk about, which I think is a good way to look at it, I think Lamar became a win-your-league guy, and I think Derek Henry did too, based on what you paid for them versus what they've actually produced.

00:07:33 Speaker_01
Saquon, borderline, especially if he keeps coming the rest of the way. Who else? Who else is a win-your-league guy this year?

00:07:40 Speaker_00
I mean I mean I mean Saquon absolutely because I mean think where you got him. I think the big picture look at fantasy this year because I don't know if it's a player as much as a position.

00:07:50 Speaker_00
I think the defining story of fantasy for the first half of the season all the wide receivers are hurt and all and honestly all the running backs are healthy. The first two running backs off the board Christian McCaffrey. Obviously it's a catastrophe.

00:08:00 Speaker_00
Breeze all we know we call him fleece all he's been disappointing. The next like 16 running backs were pretty good picks outside of Travis at the end. And then you look at receiver.

00:08:08 Speaker_00
I think that I mean we can go into receivers in a minute but the short answer to your question is every receiver was almost except for were like bad picks this year.

00:08:16 Speaker_00
And so it's really I think it's less like if you hammered running backs in the middle outside the first round then you're probably in a pretty good spot.

00:08:23 Speaker_01
Right, well, it's funny that the running backs are doing that much better than even the best receiver, right?

00:08:31 Speaker_01
If you just look at, Chase has 115 points, which is the highest right now, which is pretty low in general for receivers, and Jefferson's second at 110. Nobody else has over 100.

00:08:41 Speaker_01
But then you go to running backs, and like, Henry Barkley, Kamara, Gibbs, Kyron Williams, Bijon's at 123, he's higher than any receiver, so I wonder,

00:08:53 Speaker_01
Are we moving back to the model where you have to get the two running backs first and then you worry about the rest of the team after?

00:08:59 Speaker_01
I'm just trying to figure out what this season means big picture for a draft because it feels like we keep changing strategies. Quarterbacks don't matter. Now it really matters if you have Lamar. It's better to lock down these number one receivers.

00:09:10 Speaker_01
Now that doesn't matter as much because you need to get running backs.

00:09:13 Speaker_00
Where are we now? No, I think the receiver thinks a total one-off fluke year and that next year everyone's going to be like tech running backs and next year receivers will be a value. I just looked at the top 30 receivers.

00:09:23 Speaker_00
You just go through them, like the ones that were in the order they were drafted this year. Tyreek Hill, the Tua situation was awful. CeeDee Lamb has been great, but he's hurt now. Amonra St. Brown's been good, but he hasn't been great.

00:09:34 Speaker_00
Justin Jefferson and Jamar Chase were fantastic. After that, A.J. Brown's been hurt. Garrett Wilson started slow, but it's been good. Pukanuku, I missed two months. Marvin Harrison Jr. 's had two good games. Deebo Samuel's been hurt and had pneumonia.

00:09:44 Speaker_00
Drake London is solid, but just hurt his hip. Devontae Adams missed multiple games. Nico Collins is on injury reserve. Crystal Lobby's career may be over. Brandon, are you son? I are Mike Evans out multiple weeks. Cooper Cup missed a month.

00:09:53 Speaker_00
DK Metcalf's hurt. DJ Moore has 33 yards more than he hasn't once in six weeks. Jalen Waddle is invisible. Stefan Diggs torn his ACL. Michael Pittman has a back issue. He's got over 37 yards twice the whole year.

00:10:04 Speaker_00
Neighbors has not been the same since the concussion. Amari Cooper had to Sean Watson. Pickens has one touchdown. Teagans has a quad injury. Tank Dell hasn't had 62 yards in a game till this week where she writes out for the season.

00:10:13 Speaker_00
Chris Goblin off the season. Who were you supposed to take? And I think that's the thing. It's just weird. Like a top 30 guys all but four are bad or hurt.

00:10:23 Speaker_01
Yeah, the league that I'm not in with House, with Sal, the knockout league, I built around Cooper Cup, DJ Moore, and Garrett Wilson. That was like 120 bucks, right?

00:10:32 Speaker_01
And Garrett Wilson has a ton of targets every week, and he's actually been a little bit better than maybe you'd think these last few weeks, but just, you know, Cup got hurt, and Moore's been a disaster.

00:10:42 Speaker_01
House, do you have a strategy when you go into a fantasy league, or is it just how many drinks can you have and stay coherent on the Zoom? What is it?

00:10:48 Speaker_03
it's both, it's both things. I didn't get off a few dick jokes. You know, that, that's always a, a, an obligation and a requirement.

00:10:55 Speaker_03
Um, but I look, you know, the, the receiver thing, I was bullish on Dalton Kincaid as a tight end who might get receiver like looks that hasn't come to pass, but my own receiver core, we, we just, you know, you hear him right out of Danny's mouth, Jalen Waddle, sucktastic Devante Smith, second fiddle,

00:11:14 Speaker_03
makes a spectacular play once every three games. Great. DJ Moore, that DJ Moore, Caleb Williams was supposed to be a real thing. B.S. I paid. How much did I pay for him? I don't even want to. Too much.

00:11:26 Speaker_01
Yeah.

00:11:27 Speaker_03
He was 30s and 40s. 28 I paid for in our auction league. Yeah. Just take that 28 and stick it where the sun don't shine.

00:11:35 Speaker_01
That's all it fits. It feels like more and more these waiver wire guys going above what you feel like you should be spending.

00:11:44 Speaker_01
Like I have in the knockout league, which I'm probably going to get, you know, I'm not going to even make the playoffs, but I overspent on Hopkins because I just liked the matchup with him and Mahomes and I felt like

00:11:57 Speaker_01
you know, if he's ever gonna succeed on a team and look like the Hopkins from four years ago, it's with Mahomes.

00:12:02 Speaker_01
And then you watch the Monday night game, and now if you're redoing who you'd want on your fantasy team going forward, Hopkins would be this amazing guy. But the point is, he was on the fuckin' waiver wire, because he was on the Titans.

00:12:14 Speaker_01
So, you know, and Tampa had the same thing with like that Jalen McMillan was hot for a week. Now this week it's Sterling Shepard. What's that guy's name? That's who it is, right?

00:12:23 Speaker_00
Yeah, Sterling Shepard. Yeah, who had to play Thompson. He sealed Achilles out of the Giants and now he's playing for Tampa. It's crazy. Right.

00:12:29 Speaker_01
So every week there's a receiver and it's like whoever kind of looks out with one of those guys or, you know, whoever drafted Chubba Hubbard for a dollar.

00:12:38 Speaker_01
The big picture point to me is I really continue to just hate fantasy with every fiber in my body. And I really don't know why we do it to ourselves.

00:12:47 Speaker_00
It's really stupid and dumb, a huge waste of time, and I think the answer is it's a chemical addiction I have. I don't know about you guys, but I think that I... Oh, it's like vaping? Yeah, basically. You know it's bad.

00:13:00 Speaker_00
Exactly yeah, I don't really want to be participating in it anymore, but I can't stop but no it's the whole thing's ridiculous I think that honestly going into a season.

00:13:09 Speaker_00
I think it's important to just figure out There's like four lessons to take or maybe there's two lessons to take and four lessons people think they should take and I think half the key is like for example come you know going into the next season people gonna be like oh well the receivers are bad take running backs, and it's like yeah

00:13:22 Speaker_00
Yeah, they all got hurt with hamstring injuries. It was kind of weird. Right. Don't zag too hard. Yeah, don't zag too hard. Similarly, with the waiver thing, everyone had Kyron Williams and Puka Dekua.

00:13:30 Speaker_00
The biggest waiver additions of the whole year were made in week one. So everyone this year was like, Isaiah Likely. And it's like, well, actually, some years it's a lot more like two years ago.

00:13:38 Speaker_00
Jarek McKinnon from December 1st on in 2022 had led the league in receiving touchdowns.

00:13:42 Speaker_00
and like every now and then there's two or three waiver guys who shift the whole season but you don't but everyone just thinks about last season and has amnesia about anything before that so it's just like paying attention to what's happening right now it's honestly half the thing let me recommend this i i'm i'm in a fantasy league

00:13:58 Speaker_03
that is literally called the no one gives a shit league. And we every single person in the league sets up auto draft. The draft takes two and a half minutes. Nobody does one thing. All we do is get the thing set up. There's 10 teams.

00:14:14 Speaker_03
I don't know how big the roster is. You know why. Because I don't give a shit. But it does give you the opportunity against those those nine buddies to do the waiver wire. And you know we have like a standard waiver wire thing.

00:14:27 Speaker_03
And really it's just an opportunity as I go week to week. It's like, uh, this guy, Oh, I love this guy. I haven't seen him in a while. Let me send him a funny note right now. Oh, this guy F this guy. I'm going to stick it to him.

00:14:38 Speaker_03
Let me try and, you know, get in the way of the wire and steal the great defense this week. But really that's that to me, that would be my recommendation. If you, if you insist on playing fantasy, that is, that's one way to approach it.

00:14:51 Speaker_00
Craig Horlbeck's greatest take of all time, shameless plug here for the Ringer Fantasy Football Show, Craig's best take ever is that prepping for fantasy football is a huge waste of time.

00:15:00 Speaker_01
It's almost like William Goldman's nobody knows anything about Hollywood. It's probably true. Well, we see it every year because there's, like I'm in a draft with Brad, who by the way, beat me last week.

00:15:09 Speaker_01
Crazy Brad in the Sal draft, who took nine running backs out of 18 players in the draft. And by the way, I don't think he's traded any of them yet. And now everybody's trying to trade for his running backs.

00:15:20 Speaker_01
He looks like a genius, but as he was doing it, we thought he was completely insane because he is insane.

00:15:25 Speaker_00
But I actually think, I swear to God, I actually think that that might be the best strategy in fantasy. You know why?

00:15:30 Speaker_00
Because when people do all these like advanced statistic modeling and everything you could do with fantasy football, I actually think what people forget to include is the value of trades.

00:15:39 Speaker_00
And I think what people forget is that, oh, in theory, you know, receivers are worth this and quarterbacks are worth this, running backs are worth this.

00:15:47 Speaker_00
But three or let's say four weeks into the season when there are injuries and you start to get bye weeks, everyone in the world is like, I'll give you a receiver for a running back.

00:15:55 Speaker_00
And no one wants to trade a running back for a receiver three weeks of the season. You take a little risk that someone gets hurt week one or two, or, you know, you take a risk that you have a Zamir White who just immediately sucks.

00:16:04 Speaker_00
But for the most part, if you make it three weeks, you can flip David Montgomery or Joe Mixon for someone who was drafted 30 spots higher if you wait three weeks, which if you look at it by the principles of any other form of real investing is like incredible.

00:16:17 Speaker_00
You really probably should just take 10 running backs and then just keep four and flip the other four and no two will get hurt.

00:16:23 Speaker_01
See, I was ahead of my time back when quarterbacks, it was harder to find 10 of them when I was just drafting up quarterbacks.

00:16:29 Speaker_01
And you guys made fun of me for that, but there was one year where I had like five quarterbacks and it was like, guess what? Anyone gets hurt, the road goes through me.

00:16:37 Speaker_01
But now it's like, you can freaking pick up Bo Nix for a dollar and all of a sudden he's starting. Feels like there's 25 quarterbacks.

00:16:43 Speaker_00
Drake May! Drake May ran for 95 yards last week.

00:16:47 Speaker_01
Yeah, Drake may like, might be a borderline starter. All right. So biggest disappointments this year, and I'm going to rule out injury guys. I don't think it's fair to be like, I'm so disappointed in Nico Collins that he got hurt.

00:16:59 Speaker_01
These have to be like, Dak was disappointing before he got hurt. Right? Yeah. It's disappointing if You, like what I did in my league with Sal, I thought Nick Chubb was coming back sooner and it was gonna be healthier.

00:17:13 Speaker_01
So I'm like, I'm gonna lock down this Nick Chubb-Jerome Ford combo. And then it turns out, hey, Nick Chubb lost every ligament in his knee. Maybe it was gonna take a little longer for him. I can't get mad at him for that.

00:17:23 Speaker_01
But you start looking at like Brees Hall, who was the number one pick in the draft, right? And maybe that wasn't his fault. Maybe it's like how House's team took Alex Saar with the number two pick in the NBA draft.

00:17:36 Speaker_01
Oh, are you going to defend Alex Saar now? Why are we firing shots? I'm not firing shots. It's like the draft wasn't that good. And it's like, we take Alex Saar. You have to pick somebody.

00:17:47 Speaker_03
The fantasy draft was good. And Brees Hall wasn't supposed to be just anybody. It was supposed to be a top five offense with this incredible offensive line.

00:17:56 Speaker_03
And the 40 year old, you know, lightness and darkness drug experimenter was supposed to lead them to the promised land.

00:18:04 Speaker_01
Well, so it was Bijan. It was Brees Hall. Who's the third?

00:18:10 Speaker_00
Brees. So, I mean, well, McCaffrey and McCaffrey was supposed to be first and he got hurt for the year. But to your point, you know, I actually I would pat ourselves on the back.

00:18:18 Speaker_00
I think Ring of Fantasy football, you know, our rankings, I think we were one of the only sites to really move McCaffrey down off the first pick. We moved him to 12th and then back to fifth.

00:18:26 Speaker_00
But we moved him off first, which I would pat ourselves in the back. But then we moved Brees Hall to first, which meant it was like one of the worst picks you could.

00:18:32 Speaker_00
Not one of the worst, but I would say, honestly, the most disappointing running back relative to where you take him, I'm putting the Caffrey to the side.

00:18:38 Speaker_01
If you had said, you know what, we have Derrick Henry first and Saquon Barkley second, people would have thought you were on drugs with Rogers.

00:18:44 Speaker_00
We joke all the time. I'm I'm curious. I'm curious what you think. We joke all the time that we we make that we want to tattoo things on our body like that movie Memento, where we forget at the end of the season and then we get to July.

00:18:55 Speaker_00
And like we literally had a tattoo at the top of my notes for twenty twenty four. I had don't rank Reese Oliver, Kyron Williams. We did it anyway.

00:19:01 Speaker_00
And I feel like our rankings at the end of last season, if you told us Derek Henry, go to Baltimore and say, go to Philly House, wouldn't you? You should have just ranked up one, two. I'm like, yeah, we talk ourselves out of this.

00:19:10 Speaker_03
Yes. Yes. I mean, that's right. Because both of those situations were incredible situations. They were all upside situations for, for both players. And, and let's, you know, again, give credit where credit's due.

00:19:22 Speaker_03
The incredibly handsome Craig Horlbeck, Bill Simmons and I in August were together. Craig came on and gave us his top five. Derek Henry was his number one under the radar fantasy selection. So, You guys were on it. I mean, America should have been on it.

00:19:36 Speaker_03
All of the models should have been on it. Those two guys have been the best. And look at the numbers. There they are.

00:19:42 Speaker_01
Well, maybe Derek Henry should just be treated like LeBron at this point, where it's just like, just assume he's going to keep doing this until he gets hurt. You're better off betting on it happening versus it not happening.

00:19:52 Speaker_01
But if we're talking real disappointments. We're talking about where you can get mad at somebody, as we do in fantasy, even though it's all fake and it's not these guys' faults that we drafted them.

00:20:05 Speaker_01
If you were all in on Anthony Richardson, which I think people really spent on him, right? And they're like, I don't care if he's accurate, he's gonna run the ball, he's Cam Newton. And that's a disaster.

00:20:17 Speaker_01
Now, you can audible at the quarterback position. You can audible if you're spending $28 to $40 on DJ Moore. So I think he has to be up there. If you're talking about first-team all-NBA fantasy football disappointments.

00:20:33 Speaker_01
And then Travis Etienne is another one because he was somewhere in the 7 to 11 range for running backs. Maybe 12, I don't know. But he was like in that second tier. He killed me in one of my leagues.

00:20:46 Speaker_01
He hasn't been good any week, and he's always got the red flag with him. You never know what's going on. He's on a shit team. Tank Bigsby kind of took a lot of his plays and his minutes, and that one is just like a sunk cost, right?

00:20:59 Speaker_00
I think ETN quietly might be the answer here, which he's not nearly as famous as, or as interesting, frankly, as Anthony Richardson, but you're right. Like, you know what? If you have Richardson, it sucked.

00:21:08 Speaker_00
You're probably angriest at Anthony Richardson, but you can add Bo Nix. ETN has, I actually think ETN's the single most frustrating player, Fantasy maybe entire season, because you probably took him in the second round.

00:21:18 Speaker_00
You might've taken him either before or just probably right, like if you, you know that there has to be like, we need a value over replacement. We need like anger over replacement. Like you look back at your drafting cap.

00:21:27 Speaker_01
Fantasy over, yeah.

00:21:28 Speaker_00
Yeah, because you look back at the draft recap and you're like, oh it went Derek Henry, Saquon, Kyron Williams, and then I got Travis Etienne. Like that's the worst thing you can look back at and see.

00:21:39 Speaker_00
He's better when he's out because then you play someone else. When you play Travis Etienne, he gets two and a half points. It's the worst possible thing. It's a FARP.

00:21:46 Speaker_03
It's the fantasy anger replacement level.

00:21:49 Speaker_01
Yeah, exactly. This is good. So Etienne had the highest SPARP? Oh yeah. I think Devontae Adams has to be on there too. There's still a chance for him to salvage it, but I was surprised that he was going where he was going.

00:22:02 Speaker_01
One of the things I've noticed with fantasy, and especially because I've been doing it since 1990, House is probably somewhere in the mid-90s, but we always discount the awesome receiver who's got shit quarterbacks.

00:22:13 Speaker_01
And it's like, well, no, it'll be fine. It's Devontae Adams. And it's like, It actually won't be fine. He's got Aiden O'Connell and Gardner Minshew throwing the ball. Guess what? It's not going to be fine.

00:22:24 Speaker_01
And then you watch that quarterback show and he's bitching about Garoppolo the whole time. And it's like, he's probably not going to handle this well either. So I was, that was one of the ones where I was amazed people were talking to him.

00:22:34 Speaker_01
I think Debo, and I know he got hurt.

00:22:37 Speaker_01
But I also feel like that's a buyer beware when you're spending money on Debo because he gets hurt every year and the position that him to me, him and Puka are, if you take those guys and you watch them play football, those guys are in car collisions 10 times a game, whether they're blocking or going over the middle.

00:22:54 Speaker_01
I don't want any part of that stuff. So I don't, I don't feel bad for that. Here's the other one I have for you. Laporta. Laporta is being treated like Kelsey, right? What happened?

00:23:05 Speaker_00
We joke on our show that there are certain players that are like, did you know that there's a fourth Jonas brother? There's actually four. Is there really? Yeah, I know. Right. I didn't know this either. Craig told me.

00:23:15 Speaker_00
And we joke that there are certain players every year that are like the fourth Jonas brother. Like you look at the Detroit Lions and every one of that team's incredible golfers.

00:23:21 Speaker_00
I mean, they have more touchdowns than golfing completions in the last six weeks. You have Jameer Gibbs and David Montgomery are crushing a monorail, St. Brown, Jamison Williams, when he's not suspended is incredible. And then

00:23:31 Speaker_00
Oh yeah, I forgot Sam Laporta's on that team. And it's like, you watch the Lions game, they put up 49 points. You're like, Laporta must have done something. Nope, he's blocking.

00:23:39 Speaker_01
It's brutal. It really upsets me. I was a believer in the Kelsey thing, but we did... Kelsey's another one in that Derrick Henry-LeBron conversation where we always look for guys to take over Kelsey. New up-and-comers.

00:23:51 Speaker_01
Did it with Kyle Pitts for a couple years. And, you know, Laporta, super disappointing. Kincaid's on there. Waddle and Tyreek, I think, Both have to be on there, but you can't blame them with the Tua thing.

00:24:04 Speaker_00
Dude, Waddle hasn't had 50 yards since week one.

00:24:07 Speaker_01
Waddle, you watch the Dolphins and you forget he's on the team for like two hours. And then they'll throw him like a bubble screen. You'll be like, oh my God, it's Jalen Waddle. I forgot he was on the Dolphins. Mahomes. Now,

00:24:21 Speaker_01
He's the best player in the league and they're undefeated. Well, he's one of the best players in the league because there's a real Lamar case.

00:24:26 Speaker_01
But it felt like his fantasy value started to bleed over with his real life value in a way that didn't really make sense because he's running less and less every year.

00:24:37 Speaker_01
Did you notice though, because in all my drafts he was more expensive than he probably should have been. Is there something to that?

00:24:43 Speaker_00
I think that Mahomes is so famous that, yeah, it affected, I mean, just to give you an idea, Mahomes, I got this from Ian Harden, it's at Fantasy Life, Patrick Mahomes and CJ Stroud have fewer top 12 finishes this year, weekly.

00:24:56 Speaker_00
Mahomes and Stroud, fewer top 12 weekly, combined, than Daniel Jones. Oh my God. So that's what Patrick Mahomes and CJ Stroud are doing.

00:25:07 Speaker_03
Well, if you took my homes, that's on you. Because all you had to do was watch football last season. Like, you know, it's a different offense, a different system, a different set of weapons.

00:25:18 Speaker_03
Like, you know, if you took my homes and paid for it, you get what you deserve.

00:25:23 Speaker_01
Well, and then the other disappointment was if you backed Caleb over Daniels. Right? If you're like, I believe in a rookie QB. Caleb. With weapons. All these weapons. And you just kind of overlook all the Daniel spuzz, which House did not overlook.

00:25:38 Speaker_01
And you, Hype, that you probably noticed too, because that's where he lived. But there was real breadcrumbs with Daniels the whole preseason. And yet there it was. He was 6-1 for our offensive rookie of the year.

00:25:48 Speaker_01
He was like a one or two dollar guy in fantasy drafts. Everybody kind of overlooked it.

00:25:52 Speaker_00
And I think the other thing with fantasy, I think sometimes I think the simplest way to explain why we forget the lessons we thought we learned is that it's that it's kind of like basketball.

00:26:01 Speaker_00
You look back at a game and you see a score, but actually that, you know, especially I feel like now it's a game of runs, right? Like someone was up 18 and then it gets erased and then someone's up to one. And it's like, oh, and it's like fantasy.

00:26:14 Speaker_00
It's like, I don't know, the guy I keep thinking of is like DeAndre Swift, who looked like he should get benched for the first three or four weeks of the season.

00:26:21 Speaker_00
And then in September and then in October, DeAndre Swift's like a top eight running back in fantasy. And it's all kind of like that. And you look back and you look back and you remember it a certain way.

00:26:30 Speaker_00
But the reality is DeAndre Hopkins is someone, like you were saying, who was released by a lot of people. And you know what?

00:26:35 Speaker_00
Going forward, Kansas City's the first player who's actually an A or an A plus at catching the football Patrick Holmes has ever played at any level his entire career.

00:26:43 Speaker_00
And you're like, he could be a top five receiver going forward purely because he could catch the ball from Holmes. And so, but we don't think of it that way when we look back, you know what I mean? We see the whole thing, we remember it a certain way.

00:26:55 Speaker_01
Let's take a quick break and then I want to get guys you're looking at the rest of the way. What's better than touchdowns? Touchdowns with a boost. With FanDuel, you can make your next touchdown bet an even bigger one with a 30% Gronk profit spike.

00:27:09 Speaker_01
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00:27:21 Speaker_01
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00:27:48 Speaker_01
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00:29:10 Speaker_01
Make sure your home is safe this season. Once again, simplisafe.com slash bs, SimpliSafe with two i's, simplisafe.com slash bs. There's no safe like SimpliSafe. All right, Heifetz, we got like four weeks left until the playoffs.

00:29:25 Speaker_01
Are there waiver wire, deep stealth waiver wire guys you like? Are there guys we should be trading for that hopefully other people in your league aren't listening to this podcast?

00:29:33 Speaker_01
Is there anybody arrow pointing up that you're just staring at right now?

00:29:38 Speaker_00
Yeah, I mean, if you wanted to trade candidates, I think it's Devon Achan, the running back for the Dolphins.

00:29:41 Speaker_00
It's a little tough because you're gonna have to pay a lot more than you would have three weeks ago because two is back and he had a good week last week.

00:29:46 Speaker_00
But the thing is, I don't know if you could give up too much because I think Achan's probably the best bet, along with Derek Henry, would be the number one running back in fantasy the rest of the way, the veal chop.

00:29:53 Speaker_00
And I basically, it's never too late. Change your order, the veal chop. Just do it. It's a little awkward to call over the waiter, but just go get the veal chop.

00:30:01 Speaker_01
You know, House didn't like that veal chop analogy. Because House always likes the veal chop.

00:30:06 Speaker_03
Yeah, well wait, I misunderstood. I thought you were saying it was a good thing.

00:30:10 Speaker_01
Well, I was saying the veal chop, it's an order where half the time you love it and then half the time they didn't cook it perfectly and you're mad you spent $89 on it.

00:30:19 Speaker_03
Oh, well then you're ordering it from the wrong place. Never, never, never risk a veal chop. Never risk a veal chop. Do you never go in and play veal chop roulette? No. You must know that it's magnificent and then you go have it and it's magnificent.

00:30:31 Speaker_03
But then how do you know if it's magnificent? So you get the veal chop. You let the fools before you go.

00:30:37 Speaker_01
What if I'm just at a steakhouse in Chicago that I've never been to and they have the veal chop?

00:30:41 Speaker_03
What do I do? Get a steak. Unless you walk in and they say it's the famous veal chop.

00:30:46 Speaker_00
But that's exactly what we did. We let someone else get a chan. They're the fool. And then they had the whole thing, which deal went to trade farm and we 10. Yeah.

00:30:54 Speaker_01
House is incredibly excited. This is not an ad for the deep fried turkey sandwich. Oh my God. In time for Thanksgiving. There's an ad. I sent house a picture. You haven't had it yet though.

00:31:04 Speaker_03
The nearest Arby's to me is like 40 minutes away. You think that I haven't budgeted time in my schedule for later this evening to go out to that Arby's. But I have. Yes, I have.

00:31:16 Speaker_01
I'm going to go.

00:31:19 Speaker_03
It's November. It's all Thanksgiving food all the time. I made cornbread stuffing over the weekend just to get it going, just to get the gooses, the juices and gooses flowing. Both of them.

00:31:29 Speaker_00
Can I get the cornbread stuffing recipe?

00:31:31 Speaker_01
Send that to him. Send him after the pod. Who else do you have? If it's AJ, who else?

00:31:35 Speaker_00
If you need a trade target, Jameson Williams for the Lions is someone who people might be frustrated with him because he was suspended, but I mean, man, the Lions often just get a piece of that.

00:31:42 Speaker_00
And then if you want waiver ads, this isn't the most sexy advice, but I would say, again, every year there's five players that just triple your odds of winning the championship and then three are drafted and two are added on waivers.

00:31:53 Speaker_00
And this year it was like Derrick Henry, Lamar, Jin Daniels. They didn't get hurt, Chris Godwin, Rishi Rice. But then waivers this year, I don't think it's happened yet. I don't think those players, maybe Kate Otten for the bucks with that guy.

00:32:02 Speaker_00
But going forward, if Kyron Williams for the Rams gets hurt, Blake Corum is the guy that I think could just be the top five running back for the month of December. And only if Kyron Williams gets hurt,

00:32:12 Speaker_00
And then similarly, Braylon Allen, Fabrice Hall, where I actually think Braylon Allen has become a better fit in this specific Rodgers offense. That's not fun to sit here and be like, oh, you're trying to arbitrage an injury. It sucks.

00:32:21 Speaker_00
But that kind of is how things get decided all the time in fantasy. So those are the highest upside players. And also weirdly, Xavier Leguette, the Panthers Carolina receiver with the greatest accent of all time.

00:32:30 Speaker_00
I also just feel like he's going to get a ton of garbage time targets over the last two months of the season.

00:32:35 Speaker_01
You know, there's been some quarterback injuries, like Lawrence is out, right? Bryce Young is playing, which almost counts as a quarterback injury.

00:32:45 Speaker_01
But one guy that I thought had a chance to really come on, but now that Lawrence is out, and I don't think it's going to happen, Mack Jones, is Brian Thomas Jr., who's been surprisingly good.

00:32:55 Speaker_01
from a fantasy type, but I also feel like there's been times when he's been open, that Lawrence has overthrown him, or there's been a PI, but I was kind of looking at him, I have him on a team too, but for him to like make a jump, I was trying to figure out, every year right around now, a rookie receiver makes a giant jump, right?

00:33:13 Speaker_01
So 10, it could be Leguette, it could be, what's his face, I don't think it's gonna be Roma Dunze,

00:33:21 Speaker_00
Well, I think Roman Dunzey, it could be because he's the guy that if you've had Roman Dunzey this long, like you're fed up with him. So he's cheap. But Lad McConkie, but to your point, you're totally right. It's always like rookie receivers.

00:33:30 Speaker_00
It's the opposite of Ricky Wall. They get better as the season goes on over and over. Any rookie receiver, frankly, is a good bet. Ryan Thomas is a good one, too, because he's been good. But now he's banged up and Trevor Lawrence is banged up.

00:33:39 Speaker_00
So if you're going to make the playoffs. Yeah, maybe Lawrence comes back in December, though.

00:33:43 Speaker_01
I'm staring at Xavier Worthy as a possibility, too, because it feels like he's open three times a game, but it's too risky. House likes him.

00:33:52 Speaker_03
I like it because that's what Hopkins delivers to that offense. Right now that, that Patrick has his possession guy, the guy, he knows that if he puts it within a five yard radius, the dude's going to get it.

00:34:03 Speaker_03
Now you can try and spring those big plays and we'll get worthy for those, those explosive touchdowns. Speaking of explosive touchdowns, I want to ask about my guy. Amari, they, they Mark Otto.

00:34:17 Speaker_01
Yeah.

00:34:21 Speaker_03
Look up the name and you try and say it, you son of a bitch.

00:34:25 Speaker_00
You're like, you of all people, look up the name and you try and say it. House, do you know that's actually how I got hired here is I'm the only person in the world worse at pronouncing names than Bill.

00:34:35 Speaker_01
Yeah, Heifetz is really abominable.

00:34:37 Speaker_00
I always like to have one guy on staff that's worse than I am. I didn't even submit a resume. I submitted a resume.

00:34:43 Speaker_03
He's a supermarcado. That's what I'm going to call him because he busted that run at the end of the first half that really sucked all the life out of the Bears. And every week I look on and James Cook has something next to his name. Connor Cook.

00:34:57 Speaker_03
I did it again. James Conner. There's always something red next to that dude's name.

00:35:01 Speaker_01
Last year it was James Cook who in the second half of the year went nuts and then I watched that Ray Davis and Ray Davis was another one. Before we wrap up fantasy,

00:35:12 Speaker_01
So I told you I was in this guillotine league, and I sent the Dannys and Craig the lineup, but I'm still alive heading into week 10. This is by far the best football league I've been in.

00:35:24 Speaker_01
It really gets fun when the players get weeded out, when everybody starts running out of auction money, when there's big-ass players on the table, but nobody has money left. Everybody has a good team now, so you really have to put time and care into

00:35:38 Speaker_01
who you're starting as like your two receivers, your two running backs, your two flex. We've had Lamar, so it's been like, you know, we've been kind of cruising, but Lamar has the bye week coming up, so you're looking ahead.

00:35:50 Speaker_01
We both of our starting running backs are out on week 12, so you're looking ahead, trying to patch together. But I do wonder, is this just the future of fantasy? And it ties into where our society is now.

00:36:02 Speaker_01
where we need everything to be decided fast and we don't, we don't want to, you know, you watch a show and it's like, I didn't, I watched one episode of that Hulu show. I didn't like it. Oh, I tried disclaimer. I'm out.

00:36:13 Speaker_01
Maybe this is just how fantasy should be. Like in the league I'm in with house, I think I'm eight and one. And I, and I'm like, Oh, whatever. I'm going to make the playoffs. Like, I don't really care. This guillotine league.

00:36:22 Speaker_01
I'm like, Oh my God, what do we do? We have $39 left. Is this just where things are going Heifetz?

00:36:28 Speaker_00
Yeah, it's you kids these days just need enough dopamine, you know what I mean? You never get enough. It's a dopamine league. Yeah, exactly. You know, I mean, maybe that's why, you know, you're never winning these leagues, Bill.

00:36:36 Speaker_00
You're eight and one and you're not fine tuning. You know, you're moving on. Like that's not good enough. Like you got to calibrate for the class. I think, no, I think you're right, though, because you know what the real answer is?

00:36:44 Speaker_00
I think that everyone, you know, you have one fantasy league, it's great. Maybe you have two fantasy leagues and that's awesome. I do this for my job and I actually find three or four plus and it's hard to like care and manage for everything.

00:36:55 Speaker_00
Four is my number and it's my job where I'm like, oh, I would say that it should be the future of work fantasy leagues. Because if you have an office league, no one's office league is like, their number one fantasy league.

00:37:07 Speaker_00
And so the people who are going to check out, your co-workers checking out, Guillotine is a perfect office fantasy football league because it's never going to be your primary, but that way you can check out once you're out.

00:37:17 Speaker_00
But when you're in it, it's still pretty fun.

00:37:19 Speaker_01
House, I think it solves the basketball fantasy problem that we've had. House and I just left another basketball league we were in. We've been in a bunch of different NBA leagues really since the 90s.

00:37:30 Speaker_01
And we've never really been happy with any of them because you have situations like, well, you have this week where there's already five guys out. And it's like, oh, I started Tyrese Maxey and he got hurt on a Monday and now I'm screwed.

00:37:39 Speaker_01
And I wonder if NBA guillotine is like a way to do this.

00:37:46 Speaker_00
The problem with fantasy basketball, that's good because you can't be streaming power forwards on Thursdays and that's how you win a fantasy basketball league. That's just ridiculous. But that's not a bad idea.

00:37:56 Speaker_01
Especially in the rest management era, I don't even know how you, nobody plays Basically, you have to take Tatum or some of these dudes that are going to play 70-75 games a year.

00:38:06 Speaker_03
Respectfully, I'm never playing NBA Fantasy again. Not season long.

00:38:10 Speaker_01
You're done.

00:38:10 Speaker_03
I mean, it's preposterous. You can't put guys in your lineup and then find out two days later that he tugged a hamstring or whatever. They're going to sit him for three games. I mean, not even real injuries. I'm out.

00:38:22 Speaker_03
But I think what you are describing as the potential go forward for fantasy football is kind of brilliant. It's it's to me it's one or the other.

00:38:31 Speaker_03
It's either the no one gives a shit where everybody auto drafts and it's super fun and we just you know you only pay attention to waiver wire stuff try and build a team through the wire or it's guillotine where literally you chop the head off.

00:38:45 Speaker_03
I love it so much. I wish the league that we're in together, BS, the large spot league that my head was already chopped off because I'm just, I'm trying my best. I want integrity. I'd prefer to be out. I don't want to watch DJ more anymore.

00:38:59 Speaker_01
I'm done with that. I forgot to mention that part. High fits the guillotine league. It's brutal when you get knocked out, right? Everybody says goodbye. It's basically like The Bachelor. You're out. I'm sorry.

00:39:10 Speaker_00
Please say your goodbyes.

00:39:12 Speaker_01
You hug everyone. You get walked out to the limo. But then you don't have to ever think about the league again. The league I'm in with Sal and those guys, I'm two and seven. I still feel like I have to make moves. I have two running, so $5 a move.

00:39:26 Speaker_01
I'm mad I'm spending $10 so I can try to go three and seven. I'm like, I just want out of this. Please. And then if I don't make moves, I'm an asshole, right? People are like, oh, you're not filming a competitive team. I was just like, fuck this.

00:39:38 Speaker_01
I hate this league. Heifetz, before we go, we're about to do Million Dollar Picks. Your favorite team, the New York football giants, are playing the worst team

00:39:52 Speaker_01
in football, a team coming off a win last week, that for the Panthers to win two games in a row with the shitty team they have would be improbable and unbelievable. The Giants line is, I think, six and a half. And nobody's allowed to tease them.

00:40:10 Speaker_01
My question is, could the Giants beat the hell out of the Panthers? Because, like, right now I'm in Boston. there's some adjusted line Giants on FanDuel. Giants to win by 14 or more plus 240. Giants to win by 17 or more plus 340.

00:40:28 Speaker_01
Giants to win by 20 or more plus 480. Or the Giants to win by 24 or more plus 840. Could the Giants run up the score on the Panthers in your opinion?

00:40:42 Speaker_00
Yes. Yes, they could. I don't know if eight to one is good enough for a 24 point win, but yes, the Giants absolutely could. Because first of all, let me tell you something.

00:40:50 Speaker_00
If I know one thing's going to happen, it's going to be that the Giants are going to screw up their chances to get a quarterback. The Giants had the sixth pick in the draft last year. They beat the teams ahead of them four times.

00:40:58 Speaker_00
They beat your Patriots once, and you got Drake May. They beat Arizona, got Marvin Harrison, and they beat Washington Twice and if they just hadn't done that they would have gotten Jane Daniels.

00:41:08 Speaker_00
They're gonna do it again There's like nine teams that have two wins the Giants are gonna win this game and also I know you guys do million-dollar picks and I know that you every week you're like Oh, we're not supposed to do teasers.

00:41:18 Speaker_00
I'm done with the teasers Do some teasers tease the Giants six points, you know, the Giants giving a half a point tease the Eagles and

00:41:27 Speaker_00
to beat the Cowboys by half a point one point have the NFC's Giants Eagles like the Eagles are going to destroy Dallas. I don't know why that's just seven points.

00:41:35 Speaker_00
The Dallas can't stop the run and they set most yards percentage of their yards in the entire league is from passing and Dax out. So the Eagles are going to run all over the Cowboys and then the Giants are going to win this game.

00:41:46 Speaker_00
I know it because the alternative is I'll be happy with the Giants. There's no chance.

00:41:50 Speaker_01
So the Giants, this will be the week when everybody's like, oh, we have the eighth pick instead of the second. It was because we won that stupid Carolina game.

00:41:58 Speaker_00
Yes, a hundred percent. The Giants defense is good. And the Panthers defense is horrific. I mean.

00:42:04 Speaker_01
Can I read you some scores from the Panthers this year?

00:42:07 Speaker_00
I'm here. I'm here to listen.

00:42:09 Speaker_01
Week one, they lost by 37. Week two, they lost by 23 to the Chargers. By the way, they lost the 37 to the fucking Saints. They lost by 23 to the Chargers. They lost by 26 to the Bears.

00:42:21 Speaker_01
They lost by 18 to Atlanta, they lost by 33 to your team, and they lost by 14 to Bo Nix and got mad that they felt like the Broncos were running up the score. So they've already had six games where they've lost by 14 or more.

00:42:37 Speaker_01
Why wouldn't we do an adjusted with the Giants? I could totally see them running it up on this crappy Panthers team.

00:42:45 Speaker_03
The super fun thing to add in there is, like, do you think Carolina, as a franchise, has their shit together enough to really get this travel down? Do you think that, like, all the trains are arriving at the station at the same time?

00:42:59 Speaker_01
Oh, because it's a Germany game, yeah yeah.

00:43:00 Speaker_03
Yeah. They're in Germany.

00:43:02 Speaker_03
Do you think that, that like Carolina's organizational skill, what they've demonstrated in terms of their ability to navigate logistics, it's like, Oh yeah, those guys will all be in perfect shape in, in this game against the giants.

00:43:14 Speaker_03
I like the only thing that makes me tap the brakes in any way, shape or form when it comes to the giants is that left tackle. Andrew Thomas is still out on, on, on IR and he was incredible.

00:43:25 Speaker_00
Panthers are the worst pass rusher in the NFL. It's true. That is the rebuttal.

00:43:29 Speaker_03
I would Danny's right parla You parlay a Giants alt line with an Eagles all line and you get like 20 to 1 Wow I do like this NFC least trying to get in on on a way to cash in a power parlay or teaser I'm fine with it.

00:43:43 Speaker_01
Can I Feel embarrassed to admit this but I kind of like the Giants scope position guys. I Why are you embarrassed? I think Tyrone Tracy's good.

00:43:52 Speaker_00
He's good.

00:43:53 Speaker_01
Singletary is a good backup.

00:43:55 Speaker_00
Neighbors is super exciting. Tyrone Tracy's the argument for why the Giants let Saquon Barkley go.

00:44:00 Speaker_00
And as much as it's been crushing to watch Saquon be amazing and reverse hurdling over dudes, like the reality is he's on a win-now team and he looks better.

00:44:08 Speaker_00
But like Tyrone Tracy's with a fifth or sixth round pick, he's making eight or nine percent of what Saquon makes.

00:44:14 Speaker_01
And he's like, you can't, you can't criticize it with how good he's looked, even though it was a terrible move to let your best guy go. But I agree with you. On paper it makes sense. It's just, it's tough.

00:44:26 Speaker_01
He goes to one of the teams you're trying to beat. Have you talked yourself into Belichick or Vrabel yet?

00:44:32 Speaker_00
I can't tell you how ready I am to hand this entire team to Bill Belichick. I can't even begin to describe how quickly I would hand Dexter Lawrence to Bill Belichick. by sprint. Give me, yeah, whatever. Sure.

00:44:47 Speaker_01
Belichick is on a six month. trying to prove to everybody what an awesome personality he is and that it's actually not true that he's a curmudgeon and here's how much I know about football and look how personable I am.

00:45:01 Speaker_01
Also, he can get one of these jobs in February. I think he likes day ball. I think that part's probably awkward. And it feels like for the Giants, it would have to be a complete house cleaning, right? It's like they've gotten rid of everybody.

00:45:12 Speaker_01
I still feel like Jacksonville is going to be the team for him.

00:45:16 Speaker_00
I think that that makes a lot of sense because the Jaguars, I mean, they did that with Tom Cawthon, right? They gave Tom Cawthon total control of the organization.

00:45:23 Speaker_01
They're building a new arena. Just be like, you hand the franchise to this guy. He's a legend. Here's our new arena. Here's Bill Belichick. Here's Trevor Lawrence. How does that make sense to you?

00:45:34 Speaker_03
It would make more sense to me if he was a big golf guy because there's an incredible resort. Sea Island is right, right, right. You know, like less than an hour away. Like respectfully, respectfully, I'll say this.

00:45:45 Speaker_03
It means you have to go live in Jacksonville.

00:45:49 Speaker_00
I think that was like Talladega Nights with all due respect. You know, you just say whatever you want.

00:45:53 Speaker_01
Anytime respectfully or all due respect is used. Ruiz called out the Belichick Jacksonville thing. I don't know how many weeks ago on this pod. The other one which would be fun from a narrative standpoint is Vegas with

00:46:05 Speaker_01
Um, just like him and Brady being reunited in some weird way with no craft, but... Belichick being Brady, having Brady be his boss, I don't know if that's gonna happen.

00:46:14 Speaker_00
I have a question for you.

00:46:15 Speaker_01
That's a fun narrative one. I can't imagine after what Belichick went through with Cam Newton and with Mac Jones, that he would go to a team that didn't have a quarterback. Look at what happened with Harbaugh.

00:46:28 Speaker_01
Harbaugh went to a team that had good players and a good market with Justin Herbert as his quarterback. And he had an offensive line and he could immediately make that team pretty good.

00:46:38 Speaker_01
I think Belichick's too smart to be like, ah, we'll figure out the quarterback. He knows.

00:46:43 Speaker_00
Here's my question for you. What do you think he wants? Because this is like a Phil Jackson thing where he kind of wants control, but like, you know, he's kind of like a check as you're going out.

00:46:51 Speaker_00
Do you think that there's like real motivation and that like we'll see a level of energy we probably have never seen from a 70 year old coach?

00:46:57 Speaker_01
I think chip on the shoulder combined with the wins record. So he's got to go to a place where he can put together wins. I don't think he wants to rebuild something from the bottom.

00:47:07 Speaker_00
But like 18 wins in two years, like that's that doesn't sound great to me. Like if he's like, oh, we've eked out three 10 win seasons and lost in the wildcard round and then he retires.

00:47:17 Speaker_00
I don't know if that's like necessarily awesome for someone who has literally zero track record of any of his coaches having any kind of like legacy whatsoever. Dallas? You beat me to it. Why not? Zero chance. Why? No, zero chance. Let's gamble on it.

00:47:36 Speaker_00
I will serve drinks at your draft. I'll be like Cabana Boy if that happens. It's an auto draft. I don't have enough minutes. No, like, basically, like Dallas Cowboys.

00:47:46 Speaker_00
I don't know if you saw this great story from Kalen Caller at ESPN this week, but basically, like, just to give you a window into Jerry Jones's mind, they have tours going through the facility just to like like Michael Parsons is limping with his family through the Cowboys facility.

00:47:58 Speaker_00
There's like visitors who pay. They're making like twelve hundred bucks off this to like have people watching. There's like fans like, oh, my God, Michael Parsons doesn't look good. Like, it's the opposite of the Kremlin.

00:48:06 Speaker_00
And then the whole reason Jerry screwed up is because Jimmy Johnson got all the credit for the 90s Cowboys. Jimmy Johnson was the, how about them Cowboys? Jimmy Johnson got all the credit.

00:48:15 Speaker_00
The entire last 20 years has been Jerry trying to get his own credit. That's why he didn't want Bill Parcells. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. It's like that. Like the Bobcraft making the doc. That's every move Jerry's made for 20 years has been like that. That's it.

00:48:27 Speaker_00
And Parcells is not going to tell Belichick to take that job. And there's no way that Jerry can let Belichick get the credit, make decisions. It's like Jerry wants to get attention and get all the control and all the attention for having control.

00:48:42 Speaker_00
I would be I think Belichick would sit out another season before he took the Dallas job.

00:48:47 Speaker_01
The credit is so weird to me when people Like Kraft hired Belichick. That's all he did. There's no other thing he gets credit for. He kept the team in New England instead of them moving to St. Louis.

00:48:59 Speaker_01
He didn't move them to Hartford and he hired Bill Belichick. There's no other thing I can point to that he did other than be cheap the last 10 years. Jerry hired Jimmy Johnson. He gets credit for that. He built that awesome stadium. Great.

00:49:12 Speaker_01
But other than that, they've just been another football team in the last 20 years. House went through this with Snyder. These guys that come in and think people care about the owner, they don't. They just want the team to be good, that's it.

00:49:23 Speaker_01
Can I read you a stat that might color this conversation? Please. Bill Belichick has 302 wins. How many do you think Andy Reid is behind right now? He's at 266, so he's 36 behind. But you figure six, seven more, right? There are eight now.

00:49:50 Speaker_01
They get to 15 and two. So he'll be at 273. He'll be within 30 by the end of the year. And he is 1958. And Belichick is 1952. He's six years younger. That's another reason. That's why I don't think he goes to like, oh, I've taken over the Panthers.

00:50:12 Speaker_01
He's gotta go to a team that he can actually win games the way Harbaugh did.

00:50:17 Speaker_00
That's a good point, because it's kind of like Popovich with getting Wemba Nyama, where it's like, Reed's gonna do this until he's in the grave. Until Mahomes goes, there's no chance. Why would he leave?

00:50:26 Speaker_01
Also, Reed's smarter than everybody. Reed is like, you know what I'll do here? I'll just take the field goal. I'll take the three points so we can go up seven. I have Patrick Mahomes. He doesn't overthink any of this shit.

00:50:36 Speaker_00
The Chiefs actually have a Patriots-like infrastructure because I think there's a weird thing going on in the NFL right now where there's this assumption that youth brings new ideas.

00:50:44 Speaker_00
And in reality, sometimes youth brings new ideas, but you can also bring the cowardice to stand out. And I think one really interesting thing that the Chiefs have is that Andy Reid is the perfect coach, CEO, play caller, stability.

00:50:56 Speaker_00
Mahomes is Mahomes and they work together. The other thing they have going for them is that Steve Spagnuolo is as innovative as any defensive coordinator in the NFL. And if you were 39, everyone would say, hire Steve Spagnuolo to be your head coach.

00:51:09 Speaker_00
But he's like 58. So no one wants to hire Steve Spagnuolo, even though he's a bad head coach.

00:51:15 Speaker_01
15 years ago.

00:51:17 Speaker_00
That was in 2009. You know what I mean? The other guys being interviewed were in high school in 2009. He's had an entire other career. He's the only coordinator that's ever won four Super Bowls.

00:51:28 Speaker_00
And it's crazy to think, Steve Spagnuolo's not going to get another job. And so the Chiefs have this infrastructure of Brett Veach, the GM, Andy Reid, Mahomes, and Spagnuolo for, I don't know, seven, eight years.

00:51:38 Speaker_00
And they're old, but they're still innovating. And so it's everything you need, and they're not going to get disrupted.

00:51:43 Speaker_01
That's what the Pats had. Well, House just went through it. He hired a new coach for the Washington Seawords. Quinn came in. He wasn't Ron Rivera. That was first good thing.

00:51:55 Speaker_01
He actually had a good quarterback, second good thing, but you can see he's definitely changed the energy. That was what he did with the Dallas defense, too, when he was there. That's what he did in Atlanta for a few years.

00:52:05 Speaker_01
But he's like a big chemistry, vibes, motivational, drop and F bombs guy, right, House? a thousand percent, a thousand.

00:52:15 Speaker_03
I couldn't love him anymore. And, you know, the thing that matters is how relevant he is to these players, right? They he he stole some Dallas guys.

00:52:25 Speaker_03
He brought Doran's Armstrong over, who is if you look at, you know, his disruption rates for Armstrong, he's in the in the proper court. He's where you want him to be. But Dan Quinn, they they're playing for him.

00:52:37 Speaker_03
Schefter did a report last week about Washington being a desirable place for Free agents, what? Washington, this place, the football team? F yes, because of Dan Quinn.

00:52:49 Speaker_01
I thought that was a weird report.

00:52:51 Speaker_02
Okay, well it's fine. I'm just saying the fact that it existed.

00:52:54 Speaker_01
Do you also think NFL players are just sitting around going, man, what are the most desirable, like it's like we would do a podcast, like two wide receivers in the wide receiver room going, what are your top five free agent destinations?

00:53:06 Speaker_01
Oh, Washington looks like they have a good thing going. I actually know where that stuff comes from.

00:53:11 Speaker_00
I actually 1000% thinks that that's what wide receivers do is just look around and look at the greener grass. They're just like, Oh, it'd be so cool if I play. It's like, I'd be so cool if I played with Dame Lillard. Then you play with Dame Lillard.

00:53:22 Speaker_00
You're like, Oh, this kind of sucks.

00:53:24 Speaker_01
But, but that's the thing. I'm sure they watched Jade and Daniels on the red zone or on NFL.com and they're like, man, that guy's good. I'd rather have him than Gardner Minshew.

00:53:34 Speaker_00
House, did you see what neighbors said last week? Now what do you say? They just ask neighbors because you're obviously neighbors and Jayden Daniels are really good friends at LSU. And then they're like, hey, how do you feel about, you know, that guy?

00:53:42 Speaker_00
He's like, yeah, that guy. I mean, man, I mean, what a winner. What a football. You know, he's going to go out there and compete. And every single time, you know, it's hard to beat that guy. You know, it's what an amazing guy to play with.

00:53:52 Speaker_00
And he just like looks up and I'm like, yeah, it's like, of course, he's thinking I wish I'd played with Jayden Daniels instead of Daniel Jones.

00:53:58 Speaker_03
Well, part of it for sure. Also, Washington will be in a ton of primetime games next year. Like if you want to be a player that's on a stage, you're going to get a stage with this Washington knocking on wood.

00:54:08 Speaker_03
I mean, you know, obviously we never take anything for granted.

00:54:11 Speaker_01
Would you rather be the Giants or the Cowboys next five years?

00:54:15 Speaker_03
Wow. Definitely. Definitely the giants at that because I, I think that they are going to continue to pro Jerry Jones is singular singularly the most important player in the NFC East because he will continue. It's exactly what Danny said.

00:54:31 Speaker_03
He doesn't give a shit about winning football games. What he cares about is, is asses in seats and it just gets crazier and crazier. It's phenomenal.

00:54:39 Speaker_00
I love that guy so much. Jerry built the NFL, and I think people forget the Cowboys are a side project for a guy whose main job is to make $20 billion in revenue a year for the NFL.

00:54:48 Speaker_00
And then also, I mean, one, he's older than Joe Biden, which seems relevant. And then two, and then to bring this all together, Jerry's a fantasy football owner, where it's like good owners are like Bob Kraft, Tyra Belichick, get out of the way.

00:54:59 Speaker_00
The Hunt family, who just hired Andy Reid, got out of the way. Jerry could do that, but instead he wants to tinker with the roster, right? He wants to do all this stuff. He wants to be on camera. Every week he's talking.

00:55:10 Speaker_00
What the fuck are you doing on camera?

00:55:13 Speaker_01
I think my new favorite is Mark Davis, who after this season, I think we'll be paying three coaches that aren't coaching his team. That which might be a record, right? Gruden, McDaniels, and then Antonio Pierce. So have three ex-coaches.

00:55:26 Speaker_00
David Tepper, David Tepper had the record. He was paying, I'm guessing. Yeah, Tepper was like, hold my beer.

00:55:31 Speaker_01
So he had Rule, he had Frank Reich, this new guy.

00:55:34 Speaker_00
And Ron Rivera. think that rule took a job at Nebraska. So I think that offset it. But yeah, there was at one point, I mean, the NFL sent a memo to the owners saying, please, we're losing $900 million a year to active coaches.

00:55:44 Speaker_00
Like basically, it was like David Tepper, please stop firing people. But they had to send it to everyone. But it was like, yeah, three going on four coaches on his payroll at the same time.

00:55:52 Speaker_01
Hi Fitz, sorry we kept you from starting your other podcast. Thanks for hanging out with us. Great to see you. Think about my guillotine MBA suggestion. Maybe get that going and say hi to the fantasy guys for us.

00:56:06 Speaker_00
Thank you for having me. Yeah, we'll get our thoughts together on the guillotine.

00:56:13 Speaker_01
This episode is brought to you by NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV. There's a lot to be thankful for this season. For one, I'm thankful you can get NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV right now for only $209.

00:56:24 Speaker_01
That's exactly what you need as we head right into the playoffs. You can invite your friends over. Maybe you have a multi, you could have four different games, one for you, One each for the three other friends you invite.

00:56:39 Speaker_01
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00:56:48 Speaker_01
The moment one of the games is losing steam, I'm ready to move right in and move it for another one. Build, Your own multi-view, one of my favorite words. Thank yourself this holiday season.

00:56:59 Speaker_01
Get NFL Sunday ticket for the rest of the NFL regular season for just $209. Sign up now at youtube.com slash BS. Terms and embargoes apply. Device and content restrictions apply. No cancellations. This episode is brought to you by PayPal.

00:57:13 Speaker_01
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00:58:01 Speaker_01
The PayPal debit card is issued by the Bancorp Bank, N.A. pursuant to a license by MasterCard International Incorporated and may be used everywhere. MasterCard is accepted. All right, House is still here. We're gonna do some million dollar picks.

00:58:15 Speaker_01
We went 3-0 last week, won $600,000, we're up to $778,000. This is about time some things went right, and some things didn't go right last week.

00:58:23 Speaker_01
We were on the right side of the Rams, which, you know, sweated that one out, but I thought they deserved to win. 50-50 game. Cowboys and the over somehow hit. Last week against the Falcons and then 50-50.

00:58:38 Speaker_01
We hit an Eagles-Chiefs tease that we had to sweat out on both ends. Although, I will say I love sweating when I have Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reid. I still feel like the sweat out was if Todd Bowles had gone for two, we were fucked. The tease was done.

00:58:54 Speaker_01
The tease was done. No matter what happened with the two-point, we're done.

00:58:58 Speaker_03
If he had just done the courageous thing that everybody would have celebrated him for going for, for the win at the end of that game, by going for a two pointer, it would have cooked every cheese in America.

00:59:10 Speaker_01
It did lead to the coin toss video of. Mahomes calling heads or whatever, somebody, whatever, the Chiefs win and Baker Mayfield kicks his head back because of course the Chiefs are going to win.

00:59:20 Speaker_01
Of course on the biggest play of the game, the right tackle is going to take a step back two seconds before the snap starts. Like the Chiefs, It's just great. It's great to bet on them because you know they're going to get 80% of the calls.

00:59:32 Speaker_01
Do you believe in Raheem, our guy Raheem, he has that A-side, B-side thing? Yes, yes. And the Chiefs are the most A-side NFL team we've had in a while. A thousand percent. The Patriots got all the calls too.

00:59:42 Speaker_01
It's like they literally tried to railroad Tom Brady and suspended him for four games for the most dubious thing ever. The Chiefs get more calls than any football team I can remember since like the 70s Raiders.

00:59:54 Speaker_03
Yeah. Nobody wants me to invite you to take another shit on the Lakers, but you just did this.

01:00:01 Speaker_03
You just talked about how many more free throws the Lakers have than any of course they were shooting 10 more free throw attempts a game than the other team.

01:00:10 Speaker_01
Yeah.

01:00:11 Speaker_03
A lot more physical. Oh yeah. Low post Lakers.

01:00:17 Speaker_01
Speaking of physical, we're doing another tease. It feels, especially with the way the favorites have been performing, it feels like a little safer on tease street. Still stopping at the flashing yellows. But I feel like I just can go straight now.

01:00:36 Speaker_01
There's no cops on T Street. I can just cruise through. And Heifetz in the previous segment mentioned the Eagles against the Cowboys with no deck. The Eagles are ninth and DBOA Dallas is 25th. The Eagles have the second in the run, their offense.

01:00:53 Speaker_01
Dallas is 30th against the run. They're 29th yards per play. Lawrence is still out. Philly's defense is 50 yards per play, fifth against first down, fifth against the run, seventh against pass. They got Dallas Goddard back.

01:01:06 Speaker_01
This line has kind of stayed at six and a half because people don't trust the Eagles.

01:01:12 Speaker_03
with good reason. The reason for the tease is Sirianni insurance. We have to buy off all of the moronic things.

01:01:19 Speaker_01
It's Sirianni schmuck insurance.

01:01:21 Speaker_03
It is. It's Sirianni schmuck insurance. I can't say that 10 times fast.

01:01:26 Speaker_01
Sirianni schmuck insurance.

01:01:27 Speaker_03
It literally is that. It's that. It's that. Because that dude is a stone cold schmuck. So you got to have some way to get out of it. I mean, the Eagles teaser is a lock. You don't need to convince me any further on that leg of it.

01:01:42 Speaker_01
Well, the best thing about this, oh, Philly's now seven. That's great. The best thing about this is you can get it to a number that Sirianni can't screw up with a dumb two-point conversion, going for two when he's up 17 or all the weird shit he does.

01:02:01 Speaker_01
So we can get them down to six and then I just, to me, the Cowboys are, I said this to Sal on Sunday night, it just feels like a 5-12, 4-13 team now, and I don't think there's any scenario for them to turn it around.

01:02:15 Speaker_01
I didn't think they were good to begin with. So that's one, and then the other one is Chargers-Titans. And I continue to think the Chargers are just severely undervalued and I'm mad we didn't take them last week against the brands. We backed off.

01:02:31 Speaker_01
Um, there was some couple of chargers injuries. Jamis was hot and it was a home game for Cleveland. There was good defensive stats. I bet it in real life on Sunday.

01:02:40 Speaker_01
Um, but I'm mad we didn't have $4 million picks, but house, did you know that chargers have not given up 21 points yet this season?

01:02:48 Speaker_03
I did know that. And you know, one big element of that and it'll feature in some of my plays on the ringer pregame show on Sunday is they are so deliberate with the football they use up on average, like 31 seconds.

01:03:05 Speaker_03
They're number one in the league in terms of how much of the play clock they use. So they control the flow of the game, which definitely contributes to that. It's a very good defense. Again, I couldn't name six players on it, but that doesn't matter.

01:03:23 Speaker_03
It's institutional. It's Harbaugh and the guy that he brought over from Michigan, and they just play disciplined football. So, I mean, this is,

01:03:32 Speaker_03
the seven and a half down to one and a half against a Titans team where it seems like Will Levis is going to play? Is that is that wonderful?

01:03:41 Speaker_01
Please, please. They've been crushing teams with bad QBs this year. Points they've given up, 10, three, 20, 17, 16, 15, eight, and 10. And if you're gonna make a case for Tennessee, it would probably start with their defense is pretty good.

01:03:57 Speaker_01
The good defensive stats with it. I watched them last week. I thought they did a pretty good job with the Pats. They are first on first downs, first against the pass, second against on third down. The Chargers, some of the stats are just phenomenal.

01:04:12 Speaker_01
I mean, they're in the top five in just about every relevant category. They're anything that's a run. I really like this Chargers team. And I think they're a little better than the good bad team because

01:04:24 Speaker_01
They have confidence now, they're physical, they're getting some guys back and their receivers have gotten better week after week after week. And you watch them and it's like Johnson, Josh Palmer.

01:04:36 Speaker_01
like they have guys that can actually get first down to move the chains.

01:04:40 Speaker_03
Well, you know, what's happening in, in over that same time continuum, week after week after week, Justin Herbert got healthy. He, I think, I think he really was hurt. I mean, he, he sat out chunks of, of games. Did he miss a full game?

01:04:53 Speaker_03
I don't remember early in the season and his mobility is back and they are taking downfield shots And, you know, kudos to Quentin Johnson for getting it together. They took him in a WR1 position, first round of the draft position.

01:05:09 Speaker_03
Good for him that it looks like it may yet pay off. I mean, he wasn't even drafted. In fantasy?

01:05:17 Speaker_01
Yeah. Why would he be? He wasn't drafted. He was a first round pick in his second year and people were like, the Chargers have no receivers and I still wouldn't draft this guy.

01:05:27 Speaker_03
It felt like he was 50-50 to get cut.

01:05:29 Speaker_01
That's how bad his rookie season was. Yeah, they rejuvenated him. So, I think Eagles Chargers is about as good as I've felt about a tease in a while.

01:05:42 Speaker_03
I love it so much. I really do.

01:05:45 Speaker_01
My only fear with the Eagles is they have your Washington C words on Thursday.

01:05:49 Speaker_03
Yeah.

01:05:50 Speaker_01
And we've learned over the years The game before the game is always a little hairy when you have that big game coming. So that's the only thing I'm worried about at all.

01:06:00 Speaker_03
It's a it's a great observation. The other leg that that to me got better is the Chiefs at home against Denver, where that line was in the eight and a half nine range.

01:06:10 Speaker_03
And now it's down to seven and a half because people are giving so much respect to Sean Payton.

01:06:16 Speaker_03
I'm not saying that we necessarily should do anything with it here on Million Dollar Picks, but am I going to play a three leg tease featuring those three teams come Sunday? Yes, I am.

01:06:27 Speaker_01
I looked at that too, and I thought, even though the Broncos got killed last week, I still feel like they were in that game for an hour and a half, and that end of the first half touchdown just killed it.

01:06:37 Speaker_01
Once they fell behind 14 against Derrick Henry and Lamar, it's done. But it was 17-10, I felt like they had more of a chance. Something scares me about that game, and I can't explain it. Okay, fair enough. No, I'm just saying, I'm with you.

01:06:51 Speaker_01
On Sunday, that would be a three-team tease instead of a two-team tease. I built the Broncos. Haven't they played the Chiefs? Well, the last couple of years. Not really.

01:07:02 Speaker_03
Well, there might be some moments of close games, but the Chiefs own the Broncos. I don't have the number handy.

01:07:10 Speaker_01
Yeah, so they split with them last year. They beat them in Week 8, 24-9. I think that was one of the 12 times that Mahomes' crew have been like, what's wrong with the Chiefs? And then, hey, guess what? They're fine. I'm staying away from that one.

01:07:23 Speaker_01
Here's one that I don't want to stay away from unless you talk me out of it. The new coach theory is back. The Saints have a new coach. They are plus three and a half against the Falcons this week.

01:07:37 Speaker_01
And in their first meeting, they lost at the buzzer by two. Falcons are banged up. London's hurt. My play might not. Pitts is hurt. My play might not. Lindstrom's hurt. Jarrett's hurt, he's old, but he's out.

01:07:53 Speaker_01
I like that they already played and the Saints moved the ball on them. Atlanta's defense is the worst in the league, completion percentage, which is kind of ties in.

01:08:03 Speaker_01
So they have no pass rush, and they're not good at stopping completions, which are really the only good things the Saints are good at. Now they traded Lattimore, which makes me nervous, because that means they're quitting on the season, the Saints.

01:08:17 Speaker_01
Their defense is 31st, that was with Lattimore. And yards per play, Atlanta's 7th. I don't know. Do we believe in the new coach theory?

01:08:27 Speaker_01
It didn't work with the Jets, because the Jets ended up not, they lost by three to the Bills and did not cover in a game that we both bet on.

01:08:35 Speaker_01
So you could say the new coach theory is due, or maybe don't do it with the Saints, but I was, I was taken aback by the dialogue from the Saints side about it really seemed like they were delighted that Dennis Allen got fired.

01:08:48 Speaker_03
Well, I do think that they're delighted that Dennis Allen got fired, but I will confess, I am very gun shy when it comes to the saints team.

01:08:55 Speaker_03
I personally feel like I had a hand in getting Dennis Allen fired because I bet on the saints against the Panthers No, it was my wise wager. All I asked them to do was score 14 points in the first half against the Panthers.

01:09:10 Speaker_03
They scored exactly 13 points. They lost by, they had a chance to go for two after, after scoring a touchdown where it would have made sense for them to go for two and get to 14.

01:09:18 Speaker_03
Um, but I, I cannot, after watching Derek Carr, I, I'm going to have to try and figure out how to say this politely. What he did to Chris Olave cash bar, cash bar car.

01:09:32 Speaker_03
What, what, what, like, the Michael Thomas response, I worry, like, is that, do they believe that in that locker room?

01:09:41 Speaker_01
Yeah, you're right. Does Michael Thomas still have sway? I'm taking him off. We can't do it.

01:09:45 Speaker_03
Look, their car might, might shorten that guy's career. He might be responsible for Chris Alave only playing five years.

01:09:54 Speaker_01
Well, that pass was, that's the most dangerous pass you can throw in football. I don't think he did it intentionally. I just don't think he's that good at football. The worse the quarterback is, the more the ball sails.

01:10:03 Speaker_01
It's something that Brady, you know, it's the one thing he'll get mad at as an announcer when the quarterback leads somebody into a collision, because he feels like that's your job not to do that. Right, exactly. We'll take him off.

01:10:16 Speaker_03
They just scare me.

01:10:18 Speaker_01
That's fine. How about the Steelers plus three against your Washington Seawords?

01:10:25 Speaker_03
So I think it's a 50-50 game, because you're gonna go through and look at the Steelers' defense, and it will be true that they have a bunch of very good numbers.

01:10:37 Speaker_03
And then if you consider who they've played, they really haven't gone up against any offenses with genuine firepower yet.

01:10:46 Speaker_01
So can I give you the converse on that?

01:10:48 Speaker_03
Yes.

01:10:49 Speaker_01
I don't think I used that. No, you're right. Washington beat the Giants twice. They beat Cleveland, Carolina, Chicago, Cincinnati, and Arizona. This is the first top 10 DVOA defense that they've played?

01:11:03 Speaker_01
They've only played two in the top 16 of the league? You're right. Number 11, Chicago, they scored 18. Number 13, Baltimore, they scored 23. And it's very possible your team is seven and four in a week.

01:11:18 Speaker_01
Cause you got that Philly game on Thursday and it's like, guess what? You would have taken seven and four, but this is a different part of the schedule than they've had to deal with the whole season.

01:11:27 Speaker_03
A thousand percent true. And, and part of the calculus for why you would feel comfortable enough taking the Steelers is just Tomlin as an underdog. on, on the road against a rookie quarterback.

01:11:40 Speaker_03
There are all these numbers you can look at over the span of that man's 20 year career, where he eats up situations like this.

01:11:48 Speaker_03
And, and he will certainly have that defense mindset wise, like guys, everybody's looking to see this rookie quarterback against you. You here's your opportunity to shine. So that would be the reason

01:12:01 Speaker_01
I personally think... There's another reason, though, that the running backs are healthy and it feels like they can actually run the ball on Washington. Now, you like this Washington defense, though.

01:12:10 Speaker_03
Well, I like this Washington defense against Russell Wilson because the Washington defense over the past month has gotten very successful marks in terms of pass, rush, win, rate, and they put pressure. They've been very successful in putting

01:12:26 Speaker_03
uh, good disruptive pressure on quarterbacks and the Steelers offensive line had been rotating chairs, rotating cast a little bit. I'm not sure if that's settled down.

01:12:37 Speaker_03
Um, but if Russell Wilson is in any duress at all, then I, then I like Washington's chances there. Um, to me it feels like a turnover or field goal game. It's a, it's a game where plus three, that sounds great. That's it's totally fine.

01:12:52 Speaker_03
I'm not talking you out of it.

01:12:56 Speaker_01
cards jets. This is the line of the year. The Cardinals are underdogs at home against the jets. I've watched football every week this season. The Cardinals are better than the jets and yet they're on my do not bet list because I don't trust them.

01:13:11 Speaker_01
I don't know why I don't trust them. They're five and four and they've, they've gotten better, not worse as the seasons went along. The jets lost to the Patriots played on a Thursday night against Houston that basically had one receiver in camp block.

01:13:24 Speaker_01
And it felt like the Jets were gonna lose until this crazy Garrett Wilson catch that I still don't understand how it was a touchdown.

01:13:31 Speaker_01
The game flips, the Jets win, and it's Halloween, it's stupid, it's a Thursday night, and now people are like, oh, the Jets are back. I don't think the Jets are good.

01:13:43 Speaker_03
I don't think the Jets are good either, but, and again, to be clear, the Jets are on my do not, I have two teams on my, I will not bet on either of these teams. The Jets are the bears.

01:13:52 Speaker_03
There's no scenario in which you're going to be able to get, I don't care what the numbers are, what they say. I'm just not betting on those teams.

01:13:58 Speaker_01
I would have thrown the Jaguars on there as well.

01:14:01 Speaker_03
that's fine. They all have the same thing in common, which is dunderhead nincompoop decision makers, you know, out there guiding the schemes. I want no part of, of the, the, the jets offensive scheme.

01:14:14 Speaker_03
Think about all the conversation that we just had with Danny Heifetz and what Nathaniel Hackett did to Brees Hall this, this, this season, the number one pick in fantasy can't get off because the Jets can't get off.

01:14:28 Speaker_03
They spent all this money on trying to rehabilitate an offensive line. So to me, this Arizona Jets game, just we don't have to bet on every game. We don't have to bet on that game. I would say let's not do anything with that game.

01:14:42 Speaker_01
Counter. So Arizona's won for their last five. They beat San Francisco. Really nice when I watched it. They got killed by Green Bay. They snuck out that Chargers game that I don't know how they won. I think the Chargers are good.

01:14:58 Speaker_01
They went against a good defense, beat them. They came back and beat that Miami team, a little resilience there. And then they kind of killed Chicago last week. Swamped them. Swamped them. They really gave them problems.

01:15:11 Speaker_01
And I think what I liked about that game going into this game is Chicago has a shitty offensive line, right? And they just, they were in Caleb's grill the whole time. The Jets offensive line is a mess.

01:15:21 Speaker_01
I mean, they're not even sure who's playing this weekend. And Rodgers has looked old. And I just like it. So I want to do it. I know I'm taking them off the DMV list.

01:15:33 Speaker_03
Well look, make it the argue pick. I would say don't bet it, and you're gonna bet it. I won't take Jets. I won't take the other side of it, so it's not the argue pick in that respect.

01:15:45 Speaker_01
Before Drake May got hurt in that Jets game, he was just kinda scrambling around and doing whatever, and the Jets...

01:15:51 Speaker_01
Didn't seem they just see he seemed faster than the Jets which makes me think Kyla Murray against that Jets defense I just feel like he'll be able to move around and do things and what this Jets team I don't understand why we haven't written them off it.

01:16:05 Speaker_01
I don't get the line. It's insulting Do you think it's a rat line?

01:16:10 Speaker_03
No, I think it's the right line. It's a line based on priors. I didn't get a chance to sit down and look at the look ahead. But here's the part of what would help your case going against the Jets. C.J. Mosley, questionable.

01:16:25 Speaker_03
The cornerback, Michael Carter, questionable. Two safeties, both of their safeties questionable. Like, you know, if they're not in perfect health, that defense, we've seen that defense be super gettable.

01:16:35 Speaker_01
I'm taking them. Cards plus one and a half. The Rams are playing the Dolphins. And my first instinct was jump on the Rams. And I thought a lot about the Dolphins the last couple weeks. I watched that whole Dolphins-Bills game.

01:16:52 Speaker_01
I thought they played really well. They did. Their defense isn't very good, but they can run the ball and control the ball and move the ball and they're hard to play. And this Rams team, like they were super lucky last week.

01:17:05 Speaker_01
You know, that was, I still, if you're a Seattle fan, that was one of the worst losses of the year. You're just saying, how the fuck did we lose that game?

01:17:13 Speaker_03
Three possessions in the red zone in the second half, one of which turned into six points for the other team. Not only did they, they didn't go scoreless in the red zone, they gave six points in the other direction.

01:17:27 Speaker_01
And I think the Dolphins can run the ball in them. So I'm wondering, and you kind of like them too, I'm wondering, do we take the plus one and a half? Do we do an adjusted line with the over? What do we do?

01:17:41 Speaker_03
In the first place, Dolphins' money line would be attractive to me.

01:17:46 Speaker_03
And then if you wanted to do an adjusted line where it's Dolphins minus two or something like that, the important thing to me as we handicap this is for sure what you just sort of outlined, which is the Dolphins have been unlucky and they are such a different team.

01:18:03 Speaker_03
with Tua, but they're, they're defensive.

01:18:06 Speaker_01
Barely lost Arizona. They barely lost Indianapolis and last week they really could have beaten Buffalo and I thought they really played well. I was impressed.

01:18:13 Speaker_03
I'm so mad about that Indianapolis loss. They had that game in hand. Zach Seiler's back. That's the, that's the key aspect of this to me.

01:18:23 Speaker_03
their ability to generate some pressure against the Rams and against Matthew Stafford, it really is dependent on Siler being there, and he is, so that's a key element to me.

01:18:36 Speaker_01
Do you see points in this game?

01:18:39 Speaker_03
Yes, yes I do.

01:18:41 Speaker_01
What if I was able to offer you the Dolphins plus four and a half with the over of 42 and a half at minus 115?

01:18:49 Speaker_03
Wow. That's just like a standard. I love that. I love that price. It's the Dolphins plus four and a half.

01:18:55 Speaker_01
Dolphins plus four and a half.

01:18:57 Speaker_03
And over 42 and a half.

01:19:00 Speaker_01
Yeah. Yeah. In.

01:19:02 Speaker_02
That's a great one. Great job.

01:19:05 Speaker_01
Thanks. Um, all right. We're right now and down. Dolphins four and a half over. I'll tell you another thing. And we say this sometimes that the Rams, depending on who's coming in. The Dolphins have a lot of fans, man.

01:19:22 Speaker_01
And I think there's gonna be Dolphin fans. That's a team that's been around since the 70s. They have generations of fans. Some of them live in L.A. I know some of them. I think there's gonna be Dolphin fans in that game.

01:19:34 Speaker_03
So there you go. It is funny to think about people from Miami flying to Los Angeles. It's not, you know.

01:19:41 Speaker_01
It's not like a destination for them. Yeah. All right, last one I have for you is the Lions were a little afraid of Nico Collins, right? Cause he, it seems like he might come back for Houston, might not.

01:19:55 Speaker_01
And I, I looked at this initially like, oh, no Nico Collins, no digs. Like the Lions are going to absolutely kill them. It's in a dome. I think this Lions team is, is great. So there, there's a couple of things we can do with this.

01:20:08 Speaker_01
You do the Lions money with the under 57 and a half. That's minus one 11. So basically, like, anything, any score higher than 30-27 beats it.

01:20:19 Speaker_01
The Lions are favored by 3.5 in this, and something scares me about the hook, and I just wonder, maybe you just lay the points. Maybe the Lions are that good. Maybe we've hit a point and just bet the Lions every week.

01:20:30 Speaker_03
Well, they are 40-15 against the spread over the last 55 games, so that's pretty good evidence. You're going to make money gambling on the Lions. can only come up with, you know, uh, I, I don't have any, um, X's and O's reason to, to, to not do it.

01:20:54 Speaker_03
It is the case for sure that a CJ Stroud over his short career thus far has dramatically better splits at home than on the road. It is the case that Houston's defense has been very good on early downs.

01:21:11 Speaker_03
And the lions are sort of middle of the pack on, on early downs. I, you know, there isn't a lot to do. I think it's just, you know, I like that Detroit Moneyline better than messing around with the points.

01:21:26 Speaker_01
So Detroit Moneyline is minus 184. I was looking at the Detroit wins the first half, Detroit wins the game, but they don't have that on Fandor right now because I think, oh, there it is. No, they do have it now.

01:21:40 Speaker_01
That's plus 105 Detroit first half Detroit game.

01:21:43 Speaker_05
Hmm.

01:21:43 Speaker_01
What are your thoughts? Hmm. Hmm plus 105.

01:21:50 Speaker_03
Yeah, I think I like it. I kind of like the plus money We're just asking them to win though. Yeah.

01:21:57 Speaker_01
Yeah because We're in on that one. Yeah, here's a couple things with the with the Lions Seventh against the run on defense. I think the only way the Texans

01:22:13 Speaker_01
win this game is they run the ball, they do the Joe Mixon thing, but I feel like the Lions can shut that down. The other thing is the Lions are first in quarterback hurries. Guess who's 32nd offensively, Houston. Their line sucks.

01:22:27 Speaker_01
Like even the Jets were getting a stroud. I just feel like the Lions can overrun them. Lions are first in DVOA. They've only scored 23 points once since week two, the Texans. I don't think they're gonna score points.

01:22:39 Speaker_03
Well, and I'm looking, um, I messed up the number. Um, the lions are awesome on early downs and so is the Houston defense. So that, that, those two are neutralized each other, but will Anderson might be hurt. And here's the thing that I'm reminded of.

01:22:51 Speaker_01
I got hurt last week. That's right. Yeah.

01:22:53 Speaker_03
Yeah. Here's the thing that tips it. Zedaria Smith. Do you think that he will be fired up to come in and make a great first impression and put pressure on CJ Stroud in this, in this game? They're it's, it's a, it's an Island game, right?

01:23:07 Speaker_03
And Detroit will want to come out. Yeah. I let's do that, man. Whatever you want to do with Detroit lines first half lines game plus one.

01:23:14 Speaker_01
We're doing great. Okay. Last but not least, what do you want to do with this Giants blowout Panthers game in Germany? It's so much fun to root for. It'll be fun if they go up like 20 to three.

01:23:25 Speaker_03
I don't want to do it. I want to sleep while you're leaving out the blowout that I like the best this week. What is it? I like another blowout better.

01:23:34 Speaker_03
what is the San Francisco 49ers going into Tampa off of a bi-week where Todd Bowles as a head coach is Oh, and six going up against teams. This is the week where the injuries for Tampa finally catch up.

01:23:48 Speaker_03
It's a very, very tough spot for them coming off of that Monday night. And it seems like we keep saying it. Everybody keeps saying it. McCaffrey is going to be back. And it came at exactly the right time. We were not

01:24:03 Speaker_03
that far off this position last year with the record for San Francisco going into there by right around kind of 500 ish. They came out and they beat the crap out of the Jacksonville Jack. I think they won like 34 to three.

01:24:18 Speaker_03
I, I, I tried to look it up earlier. They, they blew the doors off and, and Brock per these nuts is absolutely per these nuts. with this time with Shanahan's ability to scheme and what they just watched Kansas city be able to do.

01:24:40 Speaker_03
I think I'm going to be able to take advantage of all of it. I really, I'm absolutely thrilled to lay the points. Anything under a touchdown for me with the diners.

01:24:49 Speaker_03
This is the portion of the season where the Niners get going and we're all like, Oh, this is why we had them at the top of the NFC. Here's the version of that team. I love, I love this spot against Tampa this week.

01:25:01 Speaker_01
The Tampa defensive stats are absolutely abysmal.

01:25:08 Speaker_01
Offenses are, first of all, they're 31st and first downs, 30th and passing yards, 24th yards per play, and then you flip it the other way, the Niners have some really good defensive stats that I was surprised by.

01:25:21 Speaker_01
Like they're fifth against the pass, they're second and first downs, things like that. So I like your blowout call, so now I'm wondering, Like how much of a blowout are we thinking? Would you go 14 plus? Would you go 17 plus? 17 plus.

01:25:37 Speaker_03
14 plus is in my neck of the woods. Cause you know, Baker is scrappy. Baker's been working. I'm so impressed by Baker. Him and Kate Otten are good for something. I really, my tip I had to Baker this season. You sound like Collinsworth.

01:25:53 Speaker_02
I just realized it.

01:25:54 Speaker_01
I just, I just love this.

01:25:57 Speaker_02
He's, he's really, he's such a gamer.

01:26:00 Speaker_03
He's so dumb.

01:26:04 Speaker_01
All right, so we'll do, how about this? Oh my God. Keep your pants on for this one. Niners win by 14 plus. Giants win by 14 plus. On FanDuel, it is over 10 to one.

01:26:24 Speaker_03
Well, for the record, I'm going to split those two up in my own betting card. And if we're going to put those two together, it can't be for very much money.

01:26:34 Speaker_01
It has to be. I was thinking, could that be a $20K bet at $10K odds? Great. Or we just go separately on both of them, put $100K on each and hope both of them hit.

01:26:44 Speaker_03
Let's do, why don't we do both? 20K on the combo, combo platter, and what would you say on each individually?

01:26:53 Speaker_01
100K on each individually? 100K on Niners plus 230, 100K on Giants plus 240. I like doing that more and forgetting the parlay.

01:27:01 Speaker_03
Okay, okay, that's fun. I like it.

01:27:03 Speaker_01
All right, only other game I wanted to mention, and we're staying away from it, is the Jaguars against the Vikings with Mac Jones. So you can go to, we're not betting this, but you go two ways with this.

01:27:18 Speaker_01
One is this is yet another chance to bet against Mac Jones with a great defense that we know Mac Jones, when you're pressuring him, it's a disaster.

01:27:27 Speaker_01
The other way to think of it is, is there some ewing theory possibilities with Mac Jones this week with the money line? Is Trevor Lawrence even good? Like, we still don't know. What if Mac Jones comes in, he's good, and he actually beats the Vikings?

01:27:41 Speaker_01
I don't think this is gonna happen. I wanted to talk about it.

01:27:43 Speaker_03
No, let's do it. Let's take 5K. No, we're not doing it.

01:27:45 Speaker_01
We're not doing anything. It's funny.

01:27:48 Speaker_03
We're doing nothing. I'm gonna bet $5. I'm telling everybody right now, I'm betting $5 on Jacksonville to win this week because that is one of the funniest outcomes of the week. I'm definitely doing it.

01:27:59 Speaker_01
So right now they are plus 265 to win outright. Fine. Fine. You could do the Mac Jones. You could do the, uh, over with the money line and that would be plus five 68. Do the Mac Mac lights up Minnesota.

01:28:17 Speaker_03
That's a deep fried Turkey. That's a, that's a, um, that's my deep fried Turkey special of the week.

01:28:23 Speaker_01
All right, here we go. It's time. The Million Dollar Picks for week 10. Last week we won $600,000. We're up $778,000 for the season. Joe House and I are hot. House is gonna celebrate these picks with an Arby deep fried turkey sandwich.

01:28:38 Speaker_01
They are not a sponsor for Million Dollar Picks. We just love Arby's. First, tease the Philadelphia Eagles up to seven against the Dallas Cowboys, who stink, who don't have Dak Prescott, who are headed for four and 13 or five and 12.

01:28:53 Speaker_01
Kinda like this Eagles team too, there's some great stats of them. Teasing them with the Chargers, minus seven and a half against Will Levis and the Titans.

01:29:04 Speaker_01
We think it's gonna be Will Levis, but the Chargers have not given up 21 points yet this season. They have crushed teams with bad QBs. All of these bets are going to be 200K. We're putting 200K on that.

01:29:15 Speaker_01
Howson and I really like the Dolphins against the Rams, even though I've been on the Rams all year. The Dolphins can run the ball. They've been super frisky the last three weeks.

01:29:24 Speaker_01
We're doing an adjusted one, Dolphins plus 4 1⁄2 with the over 42 1⁄2 in LA, bunch of Dolphins fans there. You think the Dolphins could win this game outright.

01:29:35 Speaker_03
I do, I do. I think that what we saw in that offense against Buffalo was very promising. I like them very much in this situation.

01:29:44 Speaker_01
We bought ourselves some schmuck insurance there because of the possibility of the Dolphins and disc jockey, disc jockey McDaniel controlling the whole game and then in the last six minutes all of a sudden getting skittish and then there's Stafford going down the field and all of a sudden they lose by three.

01:30:02 Speaker_01
So we have schmuck insurance with the Dolphins. Plus four and a half, over 42.5 parlay. Next one, Steelers. plus three in Washington against a house of C words. We just think this is a three point game. We're grabbing the points. No, that's it. That's it.

01:30:17 Speaker_01
I don't want to not play the top 10 DVO a defense yet. And we like the spot for this.

01:30:21 Speaker_03
I'll tell you what, I'm not rooting against Washington, but that makes sense.

01:30:25 Speaker_01
Three point.

01:30:26 Speaker_03
That makes sense.

01:30:27 Speaker_01
Next one we disagreed on and we're doing it anyway. And then we can argue about it if it doesn't work out the Cardinals at home. getting one and a half points against the stupid jets.

01:30:39 Speaker_01
And this, I'm just offended by this line and I'm taking the Cardinals.

01:30:43 Speaker_03
It's the second funniest outcome of the week. Rogers losing to the Cardinals would be tremendous. So I, that what I will root for. I just can't in good conscience recommend anybody bet on it.

01:30:53 Speaker_01
I don't think the jets are good. Lions first half, Lions game in Houston is plus 105. Both of them have to hit, and we are now at the point of the season where we're just riding the Lions. We believe in the Lions.

01:31:08 Speaker_01
I'm not sure when they lose again, and if they lose, it's gonna be against a team that's better than Houston. Houston's offensive line can just not carry them in this game, and I don't think they're gonna run the ball in Detroit either.

01:31:18 Speaker_01
You love the Lions' safest bet for you right now in the league.

01:31:22 Speaker_03
Yes. I mean, the math supports it. Their performance supports it. The addition of Zaria Smith supports it. Their coaching staff supports it. I mean, I tried to speak into existence, the Packers being competitive.

01:31:34 Speaker_03
That game was over with a quickness because Jordan Love couldn't move. So, and Jared Goff had two gloves on and it was perfectly fine. The ball didn't slip one time.

01:31:48 Speaker_01
And then last but not least, we're putting 100K

01:31:51 Speaker_01
on the Niners, minus 13 and a half adjusted, that's plus 230, because we think Tampa, no disrespect to Tampa, it's been an impressive season, but from a talent, injuries, you're not gonna be able to hang in this game, we don't think.

01:32:08 Speaker_01
And then the Giants in Germany against the Panthers, there's no way they're winning twice in a row. Minus 13 and a half, plus 240, we're gonna put 100K in each of those and try to hit one And hopefully both.

01:32:20 Speaker_03
It'd be awesome. I'll have a Christmas ale for it.

01:32:24 Speaker_01
They do Christmas ale there? Should we put 10K in the parlay at plus 10.22? Yes. Yes. Put 10K in the parlay at plus 10.22 as well. Those are the million dollar picks for week 10. You like these? I love them. That's a pretty good batch. It's so fun.

01:32:40 Speaker_01
It's time, baby. We're going to take a break. Talk NBA really quick. This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn. As a small business owner, every new hire added to your team needs to make an immediate impact.

01:32:54 Speaker_01
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01:33:42 Speaker_01
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01:34:33 Speaker_01
All right, House, we did this last week, people liked it, so we're doing it again. Just like a little nightcap NBA dialogue. You watched Warriors Celtics last night?

01:34:41 Speaker_03
The whole thing, from the opening shift to the end.

01:34:44 Speaker_01
What did you make of it?

01:34:47 Speaker_03
I was so impressed with the physicality of Golden State's defense. It is by far

01:34:56 Speaker_03
the first time I've seen a golden state team really since the 2017, 18, you know, right up into the finals where everybody got hurt in 2019 on the golden state team where they, they, their defensive metrics were always super high over that stint.

01:35:14 Speaker_03
this, this, they have like a bunch of wing dudes who will go get up into your chest and they forced, they, they, they forced double digit turnovers. The Celtics weren't ready for it. And obviously Jalen Brown wasn't there.

01:35:26 Speaker_03
And I know, but you know, the Celtics still with the pedigree, with their preparation, you expect them, especially at home. I think they had 10 turnovers by halftime just because of how aggressive golden States defense was.

01:35:42 Speaker_01
Um, I was still, they were blitzing the shit out of Tatum, which is what you kind of have to do against the Celtics when Brown's not playing.

01:35:50 Speaker_03
I like the narrative of, of, uh, Tatum getting off to get his revenge. But, um, Steve Kerr and, and, uh, Steph Curry are like, eh, Good job. Good job, Jason Tatum. Patted him on the head.

01:36:03 Speaker_01
It was a totally winnable game for the Celtics. And the difference is they actually didn't get stops down the stretch. They still missed Porzingis' rim protection, which is why Cade is playing so much. But then not also having Jalen.

01:36:16 Speaker_01
And, you know, you're losing two of your top five guys. You're not terrible. He's not terrible. But in the last four minutes, what happened happened, which was courage is trying to get him in high screens to try to attack him.

01:36:29 Speaker_01
But I I when I was doing my powerball on Tuesday, I really had trouble ranking the Warriors because I felt like they might be a top five team. And I wasn't ready to go there yet because it was too early. But defensively, they have it.

01:36:43 Speaker_01
And I think they already have an identity, which I think is really hard to achieve this early in the season when they added a bunch of new dudes. But I feel like they know who they are already.

01:36:54 Speaker_03
They're getting a lot out of Hield and Wiggins. They're getting a lot.

01:36:59 Speaker_01
Well, at least Wiggins has done it before. Hield hasn't done it in three years.

01:37:03 Speaker_03
Right. And Wiggins didn't exactly do it in the past year and a half. I mean, Wiggins took off half of a season, a third of a season.

01:37:10 Speaker_01
No, he did. Well, I'll say this with Heald. He's always been in the right situations, really good at just chucking the ball, right? So they're just like, we know who you are, buddy Heald. You're just going to do all these Klay Thompson plays.

01:37:24 Speaker_01
And what's interesting is Klay was so famous and it was so, you were always, your eye was always drawn to him. You always knew where he was in the court. But he can kind of like slide in and out. Like that, the key play of that game, they're up four.

01:37:37 Speaker_01
Curry basically collapses the defense and Tatum loses healed for like a split second and he'll just kind of sneaks off to the side and has this wide open three to quench the game. I don't think that happens with Klay.

01:37:50 Speaker_03
Well, part of it also is Hield gets rid of the ball effing immediately. Like, oh, I it felt very irrational confidence, except for he is a 40, you know, plus percent three point shooter over his career. And he's what is he now?

01:38:06 Speaker_03
He's just under 50 percent so far this season, isn't he? Is he having a great start?

01:38:11 Speaker_01
I mean, he's having one of the great, crazy seasons anyone said he's.

01:38:15 Speaker_03
Yeah.

01:38:16 Speaker_01
I mean, we're 22 points a game through 20. Yeah. He's eight games in. I think the Warriors thing is real. I like the way Draymond's playing too. I think this is, he's, you know, hasn't caused any drama.

01:38:28 Speaker_01
We'll see if that continues, but- He was a role player last night. He still looks good. He's still, they run stuff through him. He always knows where Curry is. I like watching him. I think that the ball movement's great and they can get stops.

01:38:41 Speaker_01
So I'm taking them seriously. And guess what? So is Vegas.

01:38:46 Speaker_03
Well, FanDuel had them all the way up to 49 and a half. Their win total moved all the way up there.

01:38:54 Speaker_01
It's up to 50 and a half now.

01:38:55 Speaker_03
Oh, well, 49 and a half is an under and 50 half is an under because this thing works as long as Steph Curry is upright and healthy. And it's still asking a lot, a lot of Buddy Hield and Wiggins.

01:39:10 Speaker_03
Like those guys have to be able to do it for a full season. It's been a minute since we've seen that.

01:39:17 Speaker_01
The value was before the year when it was 43 and a half. For the division, they are plus 195. And Phoenix is plus 155. I was going through some of the division stuff today because I'm in Boston. I actually made a bet. I did Celtics, OKC, and Cleveland.

01:39:33 Speaker_01
Fun. Which was plus 152 as a division parlay.

01:39:37 Speaker_03
You didn't send that to me. You know, I'm allowed to bet here in Washington, D.C.

01:39:39 Speaker_01
Well, I was going to break the news to you right here. OK. Most shocking division bet is the Southeast. Miami is minus 105 and Orlando is plus 115. I don't see the Miami thing at all. I said it Tuesday, they lost another dumb game yesterday.

01:39:53 Speaker_01
They, to me, they, there's some sort of trade waiting to happen. And I know Palo's out and I know Orlando is going to have trouble scoring, but still defensively, they're so good. You know, they're over unders down to 42 and a half.

01:40:04 Speaker_01
I'm actually, I'm buying Orlando stock. I don't feel like there's seasons.

01:40:08 Speaker_03
I mean, a tank by any means, I'd rather have Atlanta at whatever number they're at than than Miami to win that division. Well, yeah, well, I mean, because of the potential upside, I think the upside for Atlanta is still there.

01:40:21 Speaker_03
There is no upside for Miami. They're there. They're in the what is it? It's not downside, they're in hold side. It's neutral side. They're in no air side.

01:40:33 Speaker_01
Atlanta's 12-1 for that division. But they've had a bunch of injuries already. Right, right. I mean, we're eight games in. I really like that team.

01:40:41 Speaker_01
Conference odds, the only ones that jumped out to me that seemed different and still not adjusted enough were Cleveland still 9-1 for the conference.

01:40:52 Speaker_03
Go ahead. No issue.

01:40:55 Speaker_01
That's a, that's like, let's say they make the Eastern finals and they're playing the Celtics. That line's not going to be Cleveland plus 900.

01:41:01 Speaker_03
No, no, it's a great hedge ticket to have. If that finals comes to pass, like Eastern conference files comes to pass.

01:41:07 Speaker_01
I thought it was going to be like five to one and then golden state is 15 to one in the West. I won't do that. Um, I will say they would match up with OKC pretty nicely in the series. They have the same kind of like depth and athleticism.

01:41:20 Speaker_01
I also think they have a trade to make.

01:41:22 Speaker_03
They do not have the same kind of depth as Oklahoma City. If they have a, if there's a trade, then, then maybe.

01:41:27 Speaker_01
They're playing 10 guys. No, OKC is the best team in the West. I'm just saying they, they could at least have a puncher's chance of,

01:41:35 Speaker_03
I'm not gambling on Buddy Heald and Andrew Wiggins. I'm not doing it.

01:41:40 Speaker_01
Boston OKC is a final. It's still plus 650. MVP odds, which I'm not allowed to bet on. I always feel like I have to say that. But the one that stuck out to me was Duran. It's still 19-1.

01:41:50 Speaker_01
And if you watch these crunch times, he's been the best guy in crunch time in the league.

01:41:56 Speaker_03
Keeps doing it. He just keeps doing it.

01:41:58 Speaker_01
But that sounds like he's going to potentially be a one or a two seed. I was just surprised. I thought his odds would be better. Curry's 150-1. which seems too high too, I wouldn't bet it.

01:42:08 Speaker_01
The rookie of the year, Risa Shea is plus 350, Edie's plus 350, and then your two guys are the next two guys. Bub Carrington plus 550 and Saar is plus 650. The fuck?

01:42:20 Speaker_03
Well, here's the thing. Washington, those guys are starting. They're playing.

01:42:23 Speaker_01
They're getting minutes.

01:42:25 Speaker_03
I'm going to lose my Bozellus bet because Chicago is playing too hard. They're trying to win. They're not letting that kid get the time that I thought that he was going to get. And meanwhile, all your kids are playing.

01:42:36 Speaker_01
They sure are. I wouldn't bet on any of those. No. Rookie of the year is like, you just love gambling if you're betting on that this year.

01:42:44 Speaker_01
Defensive player of the year, Chet's at plus 290, which I thought was notable because Wemby's even odds now, his odds have dropped, but Chet's been awesome as a rim protector, anchor of that defense. So I just thought those odds seemed high to me.

01:42:56 Speaker_03
Well, Wemby, what did he start off? Wasn't he minus?

01:43:01 Speaker_01
Oh yeah, he was minus.

01:43:02 Speaker_03
Yeah, so even odds, but it's probably like, you know, now we're in the territory of a good price for Wemby.

01:43:08 Speaker_01
You know, Jacoby, our friend Jacoby is on the mismatch now with Verno. I love it. It's been a very entertaining podcast, but he's, he's zagging hard against Wim Binyama as like, we're, we're giving this guy too many kudos. Where are the results?

01:43:25 Speaker_01
Why do they play him like a point guard? He's doing all this stuff. It's good. It's a good bit. He's called Victor Luz Binyama. Oh. Get it on a shirt. I'll wear it. But he is basically saying we've, his, Jacoby's theory is we've given him too much too soon.

01:43:45 Speaker_01
He's like the favorite kid who the parents are just giving him everything and telling him how great he is. And Jacoby said he's basically like homeschooled. He's like a homeschooled kid that everybody's telling him how great he is.

01:43:56 Speaker_01
And he's had no adversity yet. And there's no repercussions for poor play down the stretch. Listen, I'm just saying I was enjoying the bit.

01:44:04 Speaker_03
It's a great fit, and I'm here for it, and I will wear a shirt that says... A loose banyama? A loose banyama, yeah.

01:44:11 Speaker_01
Wemby doesn't seem any better than last year because they won't put him in the fucking paint, ever.

01:44:15 Speaker_02
There are eight games in. Move him closer to the rim. No, let's let him be. Did you watch the Olympics? Did he shoot 25 pointers?

01:44:22 Speaker_03
He's not a good three-point shooter. He was good in the Olympics. He was because he was near the rim. So let the kid, let the kid just get, you know, we're not out there to win any awards the first 10 games of the EPIC season.

01:44:34 Speaker_01
There's no pressure on me. This is Jacoby's bid. These are not my opinions. Coach of the year, Kenny Atkinson is plus 340 and Kerr is six to one. Those are the two that jumped out to me. All right, the over-under is quick.

01:44:46 Speaker_01
Celtics and OKC up to 59 and a half. Cleveland's 53 and a half now. Golden State's 59 and a half, as we mentioned. The Lakers are holding firm at 45 and a half.

01:44:55 Speaker_01
I don't know if you saw yesterday, but we've already entered the, it's all D'Angelo Russell's fault part of the season, which is November 7th. I didn't think it was gonna be, yeah, I didn't think it was gonna be until Thanksgiving. I was disappointed.

01:45:08 Speaker_01
I had it all ready for Thanksgiving week and Turkey.

01:45:12 Speaker_03
When we did over-unders, I hated the 42.5 because 43 wins is so few. 43 and 39 with those two guys on the team. I am going to buy some under 45.5 now. I'm going to go ahead and do it.

01:45:27 Speaker_03
I mean, because I'm going to I feel like we're going to lose the 42 and a half, but because they're going to win 43 or 44 or 45, which is fine, but not 46. I mean, that's really the wager. And it's kind of dumb, but that's what I think.

01:45:42 Speaker_01
You take Davis out of that lineup and it's a layup line.

01:45:44 Speaker_03
Yeah, that's exactly right.

01:45:46 Speaker_01
I mean, they have just negative defenders all over the place. And the three point shooting is not awesome. And that team's a mess.

01:45:53 Speaker_03
So trade still to happen.

01:45:57 Speaker_01
Nets are up to 21 and a half house. The ones that have dropped, the Hawks are down to 32 and a half, which I thought was fascinating. Utah's down to 22 and a half.

01:46:09 Speaker_03
The Hawks continue to be one of the worst against the spread teams. Like we thought, oh, that was just last year's aberration. It's still the same. God damn it.

01:46:17 Speaker_01
New Orleans is 40 and a half. Orlando is 42 and a half. And then Milwaukee and Philly are down to 45 and a half each. And now Maxi's out.

01:46:24 Speaker_03
I don't know what to do about Philly. Um, I'm taking the L on our season over under thing, but how do you bet Philly now?

01:46:31 Speaker_01
What's, what's the, the angle don't do anything to Bundo texted me today asking if, uh, Philly is now the year from health team. And I texted him back. I think that was the case two days ago, even before the maxi thing.

01:46:46 Speaker_03
well, all of this will be so far in the rear view mirror. If they arrive, come like the second week of March, third week of March. And those three guys are healthy and they're, they're going to be in the play in, right?

01:47:00 Speaker_03
They're going to be like the seven, eight seed, which will be fine. They'll win. And then they're going to be an unbelievable matchup against Boston or Cleveland or the Knicks in the first round.

01:47:15 Speaker_03
Boston has got their number, but Cleveland or the Knicks in the first round against Philly, I mean, we just had that. We had the Knicks-Philly in the first round this most recent year.

01:47:27 Speaker_01
Philly under 45 and a half, minus 120 on Fandor.

01:47:30 Speaker_03
I got it. I mean, I'm going to have to do it. I have to do it. I have to buy out of my position.

01:47:35 Speaker_01
And then Milwaukee also 45 and a half, which seems still high though. Janice will make some sort of point. Yeah.

01:47:43 Speaker_03
You mean a run to another team? Are you finally believe got me believing that.

01:47:48 Speaker_01
FanDuel has the Celtics to record 70 plus wins in 24-25. This is, I think, a Boston-only bet, 17-1. I don't see it with the brownout, Porzingis. OKC you could talk me into. Even last night, that Denver game, I don't know if you saw it, but. I did.

01:48:04 Speaker_01
Denver basically had the game, and then OKC just turned into a bunch of maniacs and cut it to one, and Caruso was running around like he was a rabid pit bull, just disrupting. Absolutely everything. And then all of a sudden they had a chance to win.

01:48:17 Speaker_01
I didn't love the possession. I thought SGA waited too long. and then got this like weird lefty scoop shot that I thought they should have won that game.

01:48:26 Speaker_03
It was a nice block by the Watson kid. It was. But it took extraordinary effort by Denver. It took a throwback Westbrook game.

01:48:34 Speaker_01
Yeah, to almost spoil the game.

01:48:36 Speaker_03
Yeah.

01:48:37 Speaker_01
Well, to take the lead, then blow the game. Yeah, they got a 29-6-6 from Westbrook. Okay, so we have to turn in ringer 100, and I just wanted to go over the top 25 with you, and then we'll go. This is what I have. I sent it to you in advance.

01:48:55 Speaker_01
And I like this list. We take this list seriously. It's not like the ESPN list. We actually put real thought into the rankings. So I have Jokic 1, Doncic 2, and Giannis 3. We're good at this point, right? Yeah. Yes. Yes. SGA 4? Yeah. Still good.

01:49:16 Speaker_03
Still good.

01:49:16 Speaker_01
Tatum has to be 5. I don't care what happened in the Olympics.

01:49:20 Speaker_01
The shit that that guy does night to night as a point forward in that team, his defensive stuff, his rebounding, the fact that he's the anchor of a team that won the title and is a 65-66 win team potentially. I don't know how he's not 5th.

01:49:36 Speaker_03
I'm not arguing with you. It's fine. Curry 6th? Sure.

01:49:43 Speaker_01
Durant 7th?

01:49:46 Speaker_03
So here, here's the thing that I just want to make sure that we, we, we talked through having both those guys ahead of Anthony Edwards, who is, I think still, even with the, you know, the slow ish start for Minnesota, isn't he still the best two way player in the game?

01:50:07 Speaker_01
Yeah, him and Giannis, right? So I have Edwards 8th, and I have Jalen Brunson 9th, and I have Anthony Davis 10th. And Edwards was the hardest one to figure out.

01:50:16 Speaker_01
But I think, to me, it comes down to Durant and Curry have the resume that Edwards is still building, and I just wasn't ready to have him jump those guys yet.

01:50:27 Speaker_03
You know what's funny is, um, and I'm not accusing you of this, but in my mind's eye, having just watched the Olympics and watching them be the big brothers to him, he, he was the little brother on that team and his, his role was vital.

01:50:42 Speaker_03
His contribution was, was tremendous. But watching those two guys when it was night, nighttime, it was, you know, Curry, especially, um, I'm not going to quibble with it.

01:50:54 Speaker_01
I'm not going to quibble. I'm not going to quibble. Jalen Brunson 9, Davis 10. I thought what was interesting about this part of the exercise, that's clearly the top 10.

01:51:04 Speaker_03
Yes.

01:51:05 Speaker_01
And you could quibble about, oh, could Tatum be switched with Durant? You could go through and you could fight me on any of that stuff.

01:51:12 Speaker_05
Fine, yeah.

01:51:12 Speaker_01
I think that has to be the top 10. Like, I have Mitchell 11 and Booker 12, and I don't think they're sniffing that top 10.

01:51:20 Speaker_03
Not on my list. I like both of them. They're not in the top 10.

01:51:27 Speaker_01
Alright, I have Palo 13, I have Jalen 14, and I have LeBron 15. Okay. Pretty incredible. Jalen versus Palo. Palo, I'm not going to ding him because he's hurt. He got an injury. He'll be back. He'll be fine.

01:51:44 Speaker_01
But I just think for what we were watching him do with Orlando, it's a tiny step higher than what Jalen can do. But Jalen has to be a top 15 guy for me at this point.

01:51:54 Speaker_03
He's a Finals MVP. I would say so. Yeah.

01:51:58 Speaker_01
And LeBron, it's like year 22. It's the best.

01:52:03 Speaker_03
He's the coolest.

01:52:05 Speaker_01
Yeah, I don't, you could tell me he should be five spots lower. Nah. It seems right, 15 seems right for him because he could still do what he did last night, he put up 39.

01:52:17 Speaker_03
I want to say it respectfully, but the guys like right behind him in this list, not putting bitch ass, I won't say any names. I had it LeBron, come on.

01:52:28 Speaker_01
So I have, this is another interesting cluster, 16, 17, 18, Wembenyama, Sabonis, Adebayo. and Wembenyama because of the defense and all these on-off stats with just how destructive he is defensively.

01:52:42 Speaker_01
Sabonis, I think, has to be in the top 20 for what he's doing night to night. Adebayo was the one where I was like almost ready to shove him out of the top 20. I don't think he's looked good this year.

01:52:52 Speaker_01
I'm trying to give him the benefit of the doubt, right?

01:52:55 Speaker_03
Well, because he's earned it and because his defensive metrics remain. I mean, I don't know what they are through these first seven or eight games, but like the underrated quiet part of his game, how he inflicts his will on games.

01:53:09 Speaker_03
It doesn't show through box score wise. It doesn't even really show through when you're sitting and watching, except for that. He tilts the floor defensively for them. That's how they ended up winning mid forties.

01:53:20 Speaker_03
I don't know, man, who, who you like the names you have behind him. don't deserve to be ahead of him, in my humble opinion.

01:53:26 Speaker_01
Well, I have Townes six spots behind him, and he kicked his ass last week, you know. Okay. I'll keep him at 18. Okay. Then I have a bunch of guards, Fox 19, John Moran 20, Maxie 21, and Kyrie 22.

01:53:39 Speaker_01
I think Kyrie has been a professional now for two years, and you know, he's 23 to 26 a game and makes 40% of his threes, and you could go to it at the end of the games. You gotta hand it to him.

01:53:53 Speaker_03
The one that I think is going to make a leap and make us really, um, work hard is, is Tyrese whenever he comes back from this hamstring injury. Cause he is sick. What a, what a, I mean, speaking of guys with two way potential.

01:54:08 Speaker_01
Yeah. You put Maxi Moran and Fox and that's a nice little battle for out of those three guys. Who would you rather have Jalen Williams at 23 Carl Anthony towns up to 24. I've been really impressed with him on the next.

01:54:24 Speaker_03
On the one hand, it shouldn't surprise us that it's working, except for on the other hand, it's going to have to be times that it's working.

01:54:32 Speaker_01
But you know what the revelation has been?

01:54:33 Speaker_01
And it's not a revelation because we've seen him do it, but he's kind of, this is the position he should be, is a stretch five on a team like this, not playing with Rudy Gobert, even though the Rudy Gobert thing worked and they almost made the finals.

01:54:45 Speaker_01
But I just, I love what I've seen with him in Brunson.

01:54:49 Speaker_03
Yeah, well that's the you got to the Brunson part the Brunson part is the part to say out loud Yeah, cuz he's playing with the top three point guard point guard real point guard Chet 25, I think he's a top 25 guy now. Yeah, I mean I

01:55:08 Speaker_03
You're not going to hear me argue to the contrary. He came out on fire with a commitment to the defensive end.

01:55:15 Speaker_03
That was the project for the summer when they, when they, when they broke, you know, it's like, Chet, here's what we want you to do this summer. A keep eating, go to, go to Arby's once a week. But B here's, we, we want to see some rim protect.

01:55:30 Speaker_03
We want to see those rotations. Um, so can you work on that? And he showed up, he's like, Hey, I'm here, I'm doing my rotations.

01:55:37 Speaker_01
Watch me coach. Chet, eat this deep fried turkey from turkey sandwich from Arby's. So after that, then it's another drop off and we could argue and I'm not going to go through everybody, but that's you go into this Jimmy Butler, Halliburton and Bede.

01:55:53 Speaker_01
No idea where to put him anymore. I have no idea how many games he's playing. James Harden? I don't know where to put him. Good job by Harden this year. Marketing, Zion, Paul George, like then it gets complicated.

01:56:03 Speaker_01
But I do think that's the top 25 in some order.

01:56:06 Speaker_03
I love it. It's great. When do we get to do this again?

01:56:08 Speaker_01
All right, so you have no notes on this?

01:56:10 Speaker_03
No, because it's so early and we're just sort of like trying to be measured, trying to have a little bit of a, a proper reaction.

01:56:17 Speaker_03
I like that you gave some extra credit to the OGs because of how they, uh, gave, gave, uh, another gold medal to America like that, uh, aspect of it.

01:56:29 Speaker_03
But this is, you know, it's constantly evolving, it's constantly a work in progress, and it's gonna be fun to, like, when we do this again in a month, what's it gonna look like?

01:56:38 Speaker_03
Like, who are the most likely to drop out and who's most likely to jump in?

01:56:43 Speaker_01
So the big storylines coming out of this exercise is that I think the top 10 is unassailable now, at least for right now. That's, we have a top 10. Jokic, Doncic, Giannis, SGA, Tatum, Curry, Durant, Edwards, Brunson, Davis.

01:56:56 Speaker_01
Those are the 10 best guys in the league right now. And then I think Townsend Holmgren moving in the top 25 is significant. I would have had those guys in the 30s this summer.

01:57:09 Speaker_01
And then Wim Benyama, who I had 10 heading into the season, dropping to 16, not nothing either. So there you go. We'll see. Maybe Jacoby's gonna, Jacoby's gonna be a Skip Bayless. He's gonna start every show with a Luz Benyama attack. Jacoby Bayless.

01:57:27 Speaker_01
House, thanks for sticking with us for two hours. I had a good time. Always the best time. Thanks, buddy. All right. Good luck, Gamlin. All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Steve Cerruti and Kyle Creighton for producing as always.

01:57:39 Speaker_01
Thanks to Joe House and Danny Heifetz. And I will return on this podcast on Sunday night with Cousin Sal. You can watch us on YouTube as well on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel.

01:57:51 Speaker_01
Don't forget about our new ringer special section within FanDuel's NFL page as well if you want some last minute bets for the weekend. Try to enjoy the weekend. Hang in there. I'll see you on Sunday night.

01:58:07 Speaker_04
I don't have a few lips with him On the wayside, on the bridge so I never say

01:58:28 Speaker_01
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01:58:38 Speaker_01
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01:58:57 Speaker_01
call 1-877-8-HOPE-NY or text HOPENY in New York.