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Episode: The Weirdo NFC West, an NBA Over/Unders Check-in, and Million Dollar Picks With Danny Kelly and Joe House
Author: The Ringer
Duration: 02:02:05
Episode Shownotes
The Ringer's Bill Simmons shares some quick thoughts on the Dodgers' World Series win, before he is joined by Danny Kelly and Joe House to discuss the whacky NFC West, which teams in the division have found their identity, and who they would pick to win the division (6:22). Then
they look at the updated MVP and COTY odds, before running through some fantasy football observations and rookie QB rankings (37:47). Next, Bill and House run through their favorite games from the weekend's NFL slate (1:00:16), and make the Million Dollar Picks for NFL Week 9 (1:24:30). Finally they look at the updated NBA win totals now that the season is underway (1:27:13). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Danny Kelly and Joe House 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
Full Transcript
00:00:00 Speaker_02
Coming up, some NFL million dollar picks, NBA, we'll try not to make fun of the Yankees. It's all next. This episode of the Bill Simmons podcast is brought to you by Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses.
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You can also take hands-free photos, videos, send messages, make video calls, even play music and podcasts straight from your glasses with Ray-Ban Meta. This episode is brought to you by State Farm.
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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, that's a pro move. Just another way you can save on your insurance needs.
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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. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer.
00:00:59 Speaker_02
Availability, amount of discounts and savings, and eligibility vary by state. We're also brought to you by the ringer podcast network. I put up a new rewatchables on Monday. We did Halloween four.
00:01:11 Speaker_02
You can check it out on the ringer movies, YouTube channel as well. We also put up the original Halloween episode that Chris Ryan and I did that is on the ringer movies, YouTube channel as well.
00:01:20 Speaker_02
We have a narrative podcast at The Ringer called Truthless. It's a storytelling show hosted by Brian Phillips about the lies that people tell. It's a little in the vein of like This American Life or Heavyweight.
00:01:32 Speaker_02
Latest episode features Malcolm Gladwell telling a story about being a young journalist and being accused of lying when he told a funny story. Plus a new episode comes out Tuesday, November 5th on election day. So you can check out Truthless.
00:01:46 Speaker_02
You can check out the Bill Simmons YouTube channel because that's where we put all the videos and clips from this podcast. You know what?
00:01:54 Speaker_02
From a karma standpoint, with my Boston teams, I really wanted to just roll around like a pig and shit in the Yankees World Series.
00:02:04 Speaker_02
Let's call it a collapse, because they had a 5-0 lead at home in a must-win game, and they completely blew it in the fifth inning, which I watched on Twitter today multiple times, because Fox was kind enough to put a little montage of
00:02:19 Speaker_02
First you have Judge just botching a fly ball, which was, you know, when you have Aaron Judge in center field, it's the kind of thing that happens. Then you have Volpe just whipping the force out against the runner's legs.
00:02:36 Speaker_02
That was when I was like, this is, I'm having a great time, even though I don't have a team in the World Series. Then last but not least,
00:02:42 Speaker_02
grounder to first base and Gary Cole just decides not to run over and cover it and all of a sudden it's 5-5 and you kind of knew how the game was going to play out after that. Look, man, I know it's spiteful. I hate the Yankees.
00:02:58 Speaker_02
I've hated them my whole life. They were the bane of every Red Sox fan's existence for the first 35 years of my life. I wrote a book about this once called Now I Can Die in Peace.
00:03:08 Speaker_02
I wrote dozens of columns about this on my old website when I was at ESPN's page two. And you're not really truly a sports fan unless you hate a couple teams. And it's not real hate, right? It's sports hate. I wrote a column about that once too.
00:03:23 Speaker_02
I sports hate the living hell out of the Yankees and watching them collapse in game five was honestly like, it wasn't like the Red Sox winning a World Series, but it was like second level. It was very close. I didn't bet a nickel on this series.
00:03:39 Speaker_02
I didn't need to. I really wanted the Dodgers to win. I was actually very happy for our guy Mookie Betts and Dave Roberts as well. But watching the Yankees lose, this was my dream.
00:03:51 Speaker_02
My dream was for the Yankees to make the World Series against some dubious opponents, get to the World Series, raise their fans' hopes up, and then kick everybody in the nuts as hard as they could. That was exactly what happened.
00:04:05 Speaker_02
And I'm just deliriously happy today. Today's a great day. It's Halloween. Uh, one of my favorite days of the year, as you know, my favorite horror movie is Halloween. Uh, my son was almost born on Halloween.
00:04:17 Speaker_02
He was, he missed it by three and a half hours. I was so fired up for him to be born on Halloween night and, uh, he just, he didn't deliver.
00:04:25 Speaker_02
But now he became a November 1st kid, which was great in its own right because it became like a little, almost like a two day birthday for him. But, uh, I love Halloween.
00:04:35 Speaker_02
Celebrating Halloween today with wiping the tears of the Yankee fans off my body was just beautiful.
00:04:41 Speaker_02
And the best part is Soto's going to leave, and you had your one chance, and Judge is hitting his mid-30s, and you missed your window, and we're 15 years and counting with no Yankees World Series. Oh my God, it's so great.
00:04:55 Speaker_02
I can't tell you what dicks the Yankee fans were for the first 35 years of my life. It all changed in 2004 and it all flipped and you've only won one World Series this century.
00:05:06 Speaker_02
And it was with A-Rod, who was such a crazy cheater that he got suspended for a year. And now he's trying to buy the Timberwolves and probably he's cheating to do that. Listen, I'm trying not to gloat, but I really loved all of this.
00:05:21 Speaker_02
And thank you to the Dodgers. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for beating that team. It was great. I had a great time. It was almost like having the Red Sox in the World Series, which
00:05:30 Speaker_02
By the way, the Mookie Betz trade, I've never been the same and I'll probably never care about the Red Sox quite as much ever again because as you saw, it's really fucking stupid to trade Mookie Betz. Just pay the dude.
00:05:40 Speaker_02
When you have a top seven market, I've talked about that a million times, but I was happy for him. I don't think he ever wanted to leave Boston. And that was the only bittersweet thing about last night.
00:05:51 Speaker_02
It's like, man, that guy should have been drafted by the Red Sox, played his whole career with the Red Sox, and retired with the Red Sox. And instead, our owners got super smart, because they just thought they would outwit everybody.
00:06:02 Speaker_02
No, no, no, we're selling high. We're selling high. He's gonna hit his 30s. This is the history of baseball. You hit your 30s, you're not the same. Guy's like a generational crazy great athlete, one of the great baseball players of the last 50 years.
00:06:15 Speaker_02
and we traded them for a bag of peanuts and it still pisses me off. But I wasn't gonna let that bring me down last night because the Dodgers beat the Yankees and the drought continues. 15 years, no World Series. It's so beautiful.
00:06:30 Speaker_02
Anyway, here's what we have for the podcast today. We're gonna bring in Danny Kelly and Joe House. We're gonna talk about the goofy NFC West. We're gonna talk about MVP odds and some other award stuff.
00:06:39 Speaker_02
And then House and I are gonna do million dollar picks. And then House stuck around. And we ended up doing like 25 minutes about NBA over-unders after 10 days. How things have shifted, why they shifted, and who's in trouble.
00:06:55 Speaker_02
And we might have made fun of the Sixers. So, that's all next. First, our friends from ProJet. All right. Taping this on Thursday afternoon before we know what happens with the terrible jets and whatever happened on their Thursday night game.
00:07:26 Speaker_02
Danny Kelly is here. The second gentleman himself. Oh no, that was who you had on the fantasy football podcast. Danny Kelly here. Joe house is here.
00:07:34 Speaker_02
We're going to do a million dollar picks later and I know he loves the NFC West, so I invited him to join us as well. What's up house? How are you?
00:07:42 Speaker_03
I'm fantastic. I, uh, not to take the conversation in the wrong direction, went and watched the Washington Wizards sweep the Atlanta Hawks this week. So what a time to be alive in the Washington sports scene, fellas.
00:07:56 Speaker_02
Yeah, there's some Jordan Pool buzz. I don't know why he had to bring up the NBA when Danny lost his NBA team in Seattle. It feels like a dig for an adversarial to start.
00:08:06 Speaker_02
Danny, we brought you on, well, to talk football, but really the NFC West, which is confounding. It's confusing. It's annoying. I don't know what to make of it. You could make a case for all four teams to win the division.
00:08:21 Speaker_02
House and I like a specific team that we'll get into, but for the division, the Niners are minus 110. So basically even if you said before the year,
00:08:31 Speaker_02
You get the Niners at minus 110 heading into week nine, you would have guessed something horrible had happened. And something horrible has happened, they've had a lot of injuries.
00:08:39 Speaker_02
Arizona plus 290, Seattle five to one, Rams five to one, and Seattle and the Rams are playing each other this Sunday. So when you hear those numbers for the division, A, what's the best value of those odds, and B, where's your lean just in general?
00:08:58 Speaker_01
I think my first thought was I was a little surprised the Cardinals are second even though they are technically in first place right now The the best value to me right now feels like the Rams probably I think the Rams are that team in this division where if they catch fire They've got like the veteran leadership.
00:09:14 Speaker_01
They've got the offense. They've got a couple good pass rushers that really come on they felt like the pieces to just be one of those teams that like makes life hard for everybody.
00:09:23 Speaker_01
So the Rams to me kind of scare me and they're playing my Seahawks this week. So I'm kind of I've kind of got a bad feeling about that one.
00:09:32 Speaker_02
House, he said the magic word, the Rams. It's a team both of us have been staring at all week. 5-1 to win the division, plus 3-10 for the playoffs, and a team that three weeks ago looked like maybe they were just gonna toss the season away.
00:09:49 Speaker_02
Maybe they were Cooper Cup trade rumors, which I never believed. But now there's some Rams buzz. House, where do you stand?
00:09:56 Speaker_03
Oh, they're buzzing, baby. And the funny thing is, just in the course of one week, these L.A. Rams, they were plus 410 on the FanDuel Sportsbook to make the playoffs all the way down. And I think it's because of people like you.
00:10:10 Speaker_03
You're on the pod with cousin Sal. You observed that the Rams might be frisky. I think that's picking up some momentum over the course of this week. And it also kind of fits our mind's eye a little bit right there.
00:10:22 Speaker_03
Forecasted win total was around eight and a half. coming into the season and nine wins would have had them very much in the conversation for the playoffs. We got thrown off the scent because they got decimated by injuries.
00:10:35 Speaker_03
They were obliterated by injuries, especially on defense. So their defensive numbers are abysmal right now, but they're not reflective of what I think they're capable of on defense, which to me would be worrying
00:10:47 Speaker_03
if I was on the Seattle Seahawks side of things with that abysmal offensive line that the Seahawks possess, I'd be worried about this Rams pass rush.
00:10:56 Speaker_02
Yeah, Danny and I, we talked a lot about the Seahawks before the year, because it felt like this division was live.
00:11:01 Speaker_05
Yeah.
00:11:02 Speaker_02
And it felt like the odds were out of whack and the Niners were too highly priced, especially with McCaffrey's injury status. And just in general, Super Bowl hangover. But it was really hard to figure out who the team was.
00:11:16 Speaker_02
I'd like Seattle as the team, that's Danny's team. So before we hit all these other teams, what happened with Seattle? Why wasn't this better? What went wrong? I know they can't block. I know they had a couple injuries to the defensive line at bad times.
00:11:29 Speaker_02
Metcalf was hurt last week. But why isn't this defense better? Why isn't the team better?
00:11:37 Speaker_01
I think that they well, there's just a lot of variables you mentioned that there's been a couple of injuries I think their offensive line has been really bad Like maybe even worse than people were expecting the pressure rates always just through the roof every single game and it kind of makes Geno Smith have to do Heroic type stuff and he hasn't really he's had the ball bounce the wrong way like a few too many times this year I feel like he's been playing pretty well, but like not well enough kind of deal and
00:12:01 Speaker_01
I still think the defense is just learning the system and learning this coach, and they're still just trying to put it together. It's kind of one of those seasons where it just didn't all click like I had hoped it would click.
00:12:10 Speaker_01
You know, you saw a couple of games in the beginning of the year when they played crappy quarterbacks. They looked pretty good.
00:12:14 Speaker_01
But as they've gotten further along into the schedule, you know, and they also had a bunch of injuries on their defensive line. They've just kind of fallen apart a little bit.
00:12:21 Speaker_01
I think the vibes are pretty bad right now with the Seahawks defense in particular. But there's still, I'd say, a plucky team that could probably get a weird win or two the rest of the season, but maybe lose some games. They probably should win.
00:12:34 Speaker_01
That kind of team where it just depends on the week if they click or not. But I'm definitely less confident than I was at the beginning of the season than these guys.
00:12:43 Speaker_02
I think I have them fourth right now in my head. And what is it, FPI? What's the one that does the playoff like possibilities of percentages? And FPI is like way down on them. It was like 17% for them to make it. I think I would have them fourth.
00:13:00 Speaker_02
I'd have Arizona third, but you know, House, there's a slight case for Arizona. To me, they're on the DNB do not bet list. Been burned on both sides with them a couple times, but they have played the toughest schedule in the league so far.
00:13:15 Speaker_02
They have shown the ability to kinda steal some games. They have the third easiest schedule the rest of the way. I think I know what their identity is, and I wanna talk identity with all four of these teams, but, I don't know.
00:13:30 Speaker_02
Like, what if they go five and four this week? Like, could you see a world where they're the NFC West champs house?
00:13:35 Speaker_03
No, I cannot. And do not. Um, I do want to finish the thought, uh, with, with Danny, I want him to help us BS. You have a nice ticket on Seattle getting the eight wins, right? My, that was one of my biggest, uh, Outlays in the in the preseason.
00:13:52 Speaker_03
I still feel like eight wins fits your description Danny of a plucky sort of you know Couple unexpected wins just to get us across the goal It feels like the playoffs are probably Kind of out of the picture especially because I think the rant what I expect out of the Rams this week But can we get to eight wins Danny?
00:14:09 Speaker_01
I? Still think so, you know, they've got They've got the Cardinals twice. They've got the Jets and they have the Bears and the Rams twice.
00:14:19 Speaker_01
So if they split with the Rams, beat the Cardinals both times, which of course is, you know, that's projected, who knows if that will happen. And then if they can beat the Jets.
00:14:28 Speaker_02
Well, but that's the case for them, right? They've only played one NFC West game. So you got five left. Let's say you go four and one in the NFC West all of a sudden. Yeah. All of a sudden that's possible. And also playing Arizona twice is great.
00:14:42 Speaker_03
When you ask me B.S. of what I think about the Cardinals, who the hell knows? There are three game winning streak where they won games by one point, two points and one point. And
00:14:52 Speaker_02
If we're winning games where people are fumbling the ball into the end zone and they're touchbacks, when that shit starts happening, I don't know whether you're lucky or whether that's a sign you're just destined to go 10-7 and have us bet against you in round one, which is what we'll be doing if Arizona makes round one.
00:15:08 Speaker_02
I'm already excited about that house.
00:15:10 Speaker_03
I mean, the crazy thing is, I think their defense is significantly worse than the Seattle defense, sort of talent-wise and scheme-wise, except Gannon's a pretty effing good coach, and they have remained competitive, you know, over this stretch, so.
00:15:27 Speaker_02
Well, from a DVOA standpoint, Niners are 9th, Seattle's 11th, Arizona's 20th, and the Rams are 22nd. But that's not entirely fair, because there's a couple weeks there where they we're basically holding a team by Band-Aids and scotch tape.
00:15:44 Speaker_02
Danny, talk identities with us. What is Seattle's identity right now? Just flinging the ball and hoping Kenneth Walker's healthy and then you're just gonna give up points on defense and that's it?
00:15:54 Speaker_01
Yeah, I think they want to be like the Seahawks of old, the smash mouth team that plays defense and can run the ball, ball control, but they've sort of been forced into being a super heavy, super pass heavy team that relies on their offense to make plays and their defense hasn't been all that good.
00:16:12 Speaker_01
It comes down to their offensive line. They can't block. They're really terrible this year on early downs, running the ball on early downs and in the first half.
00:16:19 Speaker_01
And then they tend to get into these game scripts where they're throwing a lot, either because they're coming from behind or just the run game isn't really working. Yeah, I think it just their identity, they don't really have one.
00:16:31 Speaker_01
And that's probably kind of the problem here this year is they don't really have the identity. I'm disappointed.
00:16:35 Speaker_02
I felt like their identity would be McDonald's and then Chuck and the ball. And then maybe a little Kenneth Walker if he was healthy, but it seems like. through eight weeks, they're not sure.
00:16:45 Speaker_02
House Arizona, their identity is do not bet for or against them in any game. Stay away.
00:16:51 Speaker_03
I mean, other than figuring out ways to get teams that they're going against a double digit score, like you can put them in teaser pieces, whoever they're playing against, because they're not going to win by margin. That's not who this Arizona.
00:17:06 Speaker_03
team is. So if you can get whoever they're playing against up over a touchdown, by all means do that, but otherwise stay, stay away.
00:17:13 Speaker_03
I mean, part of the challenge also, you know, we know the history with, with Kyler or coming right up about to the point in the season, right, Danny, where, you know, that, that poor little guy, he is crazy talented, but the wear and tear starts to take its toll.
00:17:29 Speaker_03
And there are dramatic splits over the entirety of his career between the first eight games and the remaining now, now nine games.
00:17:37 Speaker_02
Well, so you have that. I can't back them in good faith. The Rams, they've only played seven games. They're three and four. They're not even 500.
00:17:48 Speaker_02
So to me, if you like the Rams, you could do those long shot bets, but really you should just play them this week against the Seahawks, right? And the feeling should be they should be able to run the ball down Seattle's throat.
00:18:01 Speaker_02
They should be able to throw the ball to Kupp and Nakua. and they should take care of business. Now, if they lose that game, all of a sudden, I would say their playoff odds would be like 12 to one.
00:18:13 Speaker_02
What have been the matchups with Ramsey Hawks over the years, Danny, that you remember?
00:18:21 Speaker_01
This is not necessarily like the last couple of years, but for a long time, the NFC West is, I think you put it, it's like rock, paper, scissors. The Seahawks used to dominate the 49ers. The 49ers would dominate the Rams.
00:18:30 Speaker_01
The Rams would dominate the Seahawks. And then the Cardinals were kind of just all over the place. And it's not been quite as clear the last few years. The 49ers have started to dominate the Seahawks over the last few years.
00:18:40 Speaker_01
But the Rams have always kind of seemed to have the Seahawks number. for whatever reason, it's just like even going back to the days when the Rams were like a two or three or four win team, the Seahawks would always drop one to the Rams every year.
00:18:53 Speaker_01
This is a team, these two teams like hate each other. It's a rivalry that goes back and like none of the same players are still around, but they still like hate each other.
00:19:02 Speaker_01
And so, yeah, every time I, if you talk to any Seahawks fans, I think they're just like, oh God, we have to play the Rams. Hate playing the Rams.
00:19:10 Speaker_03
Well, McVeigh owned Carroll and it seemed like that might have been, I know the respect is there, but it did feel like it might be personal in the sense that McVeigh used those games against Carroll as a referendum, as a measuring stick.
00:19:22 Speaker_03
Like, yeah, I respect you Pete Carroll, but I'm going to come in here and innovate your ass to death. And I feel like that's, that's the way the Rams have done it.
00:19:30 Speaker_01
And you could make an argument that Carroll's inability to compete against McVeigh and Shanahan the last like three or four years was the reason he's gone now. It's just like he just couldn't really keep up.
00:19:42 Speaker_01
It's like they were playing like a different era of football for some reason. You know, these two offenses just, the Seahawks could never really stop them in the last few years.
00:19:50 Speaker_02
That's a really good point. Well, and that's one of the reasons, like when we talk about identities, to me the Rams' identity now that they have their guys back is McVeigh, that they're always gonna be super well coached in any type game.
00:20:04 Speaker_02
I always feel like they're gonna get third and seven, third and six, third and eight, like they're just gonna keep the chains moving. And they look a lot like where they were last year when they started to come on, right?
00:20:16 Speaker_02
And the problem is, you have to approach it almost game to game, which is like, I like betting them game to game more than some of those future odds, because I don't know how many games in World Cup's gonna play.
00:20:27 Speaker_02
I don't trust Puka, like even yesterday, you looked at, or last week when you looked at the way they're using Puka, like, he's like the lead blocker for them. Like, that dude takes, that dude's in 20 collisions a game.
00:20:38 Speaker_01
He gets the absolute shit kicked out of himself every game, I swear to God. It's amazing.
00:20:43 Speaker_01
He's like, there's at least one shot every game where it like pans to Puka on the ground and he's like slowly like doing like a push-up off the ground like, oh God, that really hurt.
00:20:53 Speaker_02
He's like peeling himself off the field.
00:20:55 Speaker_01
Yeah. I mean, he's a tough, tough guy, but like he just takes some shots because he plays wide receiver like he's a linebacker. Totally.
00:21:03 Speaker_03
He is seeking contact. He looks to impose his physicality with the football. That's what makes him such a such a unicorn.
00:21:11 Speaker_03
One other thing with the Rams that really will sort of tilt their fate is the health of that offensive line, because it they have restored some health. B.S. Guess how many sacks
00:21:25 Speaker_03
the sack happy, the blitz happy Minnesota Vikings had against Matthew Stafford and the Rams last Thursday night. It was a low number, right? If you think zero is a low number, you are correct.
00:21:38 Speaker_03
No sacks for that offensive line against that floor is defense. That's getting the job done. And if Matthew Stafford, he doesn't need very much time when he has those two boys. The other aspect will be Karen Williams Remaining healthy.
00:21:54 Speaker_03
I said his name right, right? Kyren. It's Kyren.
00:21:57 Speaker_02
I've gotten it wrong for two years. It's Kyren. You just have to think it's like Kyrie, but Kyren. Okay, great. Kyren. I got it. Kyren Williams. I really like him. Me too. Yeah, I think he's good. You like touchdowns?
00:22:11 Speaker_01
He'll give you touchdowns.
00:22:12 Speaker_02
Yeah, he scores. He's one of those guys that just swings a fantasy league and you don't totally realize it until the champ, you realize that that guy's on the team. Ram's schedule.
00:22:23 Speaker_02
They have some stinkers left, which I think is one of the reasons people like them as a sleeper. They still are playing everyone in the AFC East. So you have the Buffalo game, but then you also get the Three Stooges in there as well.
00:22:37 Speaker_02
They're playing New Orleans. They still have Arizona at home, and they still have Seattle at home, and their only road game in the division is San Francisco.
00:22:46 Speaker_02
And we're gonna talk about the Niners in a second, but a big question to me is, is it gonna be nine wins for this division or 10? because 10 means they have to go seven and three down the stretch.
00:22:59 Speaker_02
But if you look at the schedule, seven and three seems realistic to me if they're healthy. If it's nine, now it's six and four. That seems way better and we don't know. All right, San Francisco. So they're four and four.
00:23:10 Speaker_02
I officially gave them year from hell status two weeks ago. IU just out of nowhere, he's out. Greenlaw, Lafanga, Hargrave, Jennings is now out for a couple of weeks. They're claiming McCaffrey might be back soon. McCaffrey was on a four.
00:23:32 Speaker_02
I think he was in Germany. I think he went to Iceland. I think he went to Mexico. I think he went to Argentina. God only knows just to get his Achilles fix. I don't trust him at all. Jordan Mason lasted a couple of weeks. He got hurt.
00:23:46 Speaker_02
Is it more realistic for you that they write the ship or that this is the year from hell, Danny? If I only gave you those two options, that in mid-December they'll be fine and we're like, oh man, remember when we counted out the Niners?
00:23:59 Speaker_02
Or mid-December we're going, why didn't we know this was gonna happen? Everybody in the team's injured. Which scenario would you pick?
00:24:06 Speaker_01
Uh, I would pick they'll write the ship probably I think I just think they're still too talented on both sides of all I know they've been hurt a bunch Um, but even with like the skeleton crew that they're running.
00:24:18 Speaker_01
They still they're still really good. They're still um, I think I saw their sixth and devia way right now like Yeah, that's despite all the injuries. That's despite missing McCaffrey.
00:24:27 Speaker_01
I think Shanahan can still call a hell of an offense And you know Purdy's actually been playing Better than I would have expected given all the injuries and given the fact that they're like basically putting it on his shoulders I think last year
00:24:39 Speaker_01
they led the NFL in yards after they catch it was basically like pretty just give the ball to your guys and let them do all the work and this year he's doing like the heavy lifting for the offense and so you know he's not going to be like perfect what it by any means but I've actually been more impressed with him this year than I was last year just because
00:24:55 Speaker_01
He just doesn't have as much help.
00:24:57 Speaker_02
By the way, I feel the same way. The three pick game was really bad. I thought that was the worst game he's played.
00:25:02 Speaker_02
Now he's missing a lot of weapons, but I was really all in on him even as maybe a sleeper MVP candidate if he could keep them around 11 wins. But I think that game knocked him out probably.
00:25:14 Speaker_01
Right, I think but but generally speaking they still have like all the pieces to dominate this division. I think and Despite the injuries. They've got guys coming up like Ricky Pearsall looked pretty good in this last game.
00:25:24 Speaker_01
Yeah coming back from getting shot like rats wild And you know Devo he's in and out but he gives them a different element when he's healthy and he can line up in the backfield and obviously when McCaffrey comes back like
00:25:37 Speaker_01
He just makes it so hard to defend that offense. Anytime they're in third and medium, it's McCaffrey just getting them first downs. Kittle is playing the best tight end in NFL right now.
00:25:49 Speaker_01
I just think they still have enough pieces to be the best team in this division pretty easily.
00:25:57 Speaker_02
What he just laid out, House, Are we going to feel stupid if McCaffrey comes back in week 11 and looks awesome? And we had this one week window to buy the Niners on a bye week at minus 110 to win the division.
00:26:09 Speaker_03
We won't feel stupid because we'll just buy them. Like, why? Why not go ahead and do it? It's a cheap price. It's not going to get any better than this.
00:26:17 Speaker_03
And I do think on the defensive side, especially they still have Fred Warner, Fred Effing Warner, like he he should be in the defensive player of the year conversation as long as he's upright and Bosa.
00:26:28 Speaker_01
Yeah.
00:26:29 Speaker_03
And Bosa and Greenlaw is supposed to come back still this season, right? Isn't that still on the cards, Danny? Yeah.
00:26:35 Speaker_02
No, I don't know. It's one of those. Yeah, we could see him again.
00:26:39 Speaker_03
But, you know, well, what about who fungus supposed to be back? He's not done for the season, is he? They're concerned about it.
00:26:46 Speaker_02
I was researching that today. He's definitely gone for a while, but he I mean, he could be back for January, but it's not going to help them for the season.
00:26:53 Speaker_03
I want to ask this question because it was curious to me. Why weren't the Niners in the bidding for Deontay Johnson from Carolina? Why did he go so cheaply to the Ravens?
00:27:05 Speaker_03
And why wouldn't a team like the Niners who is, you know, they're always around the hoop in terms of like strategically grabbing assets when they come available. Where were they on this and why weren't they in the mix?
00:27:18 Speaker_01
My guess would probably be that he's kind of a knucklehead and he's probably not the best blocker. The 49ers ask a lot of their running backs. They really ask them to stick their face in the fan in the run game and really get up there.
00:27:31 Speaker_02
The receivers, I mean.
00:27:32 Speaker_01
Sorry, the receivers, yes. They're out there blocking and clearing lanes. doing the dirty work.
00:27:38 Speaker_01
And, you know, we saw Ayuk was in the doghouse for like a full year early on in his career because he wasn't like working hard enough in the run game and doing the things that he the little things.
00:27:47 Speaker_01
And I think that generally speaking, like when you see a guy go for peanuts like that, there's probably, you know, off the field stuff that's happening. I'm just guessing.
00:27:56 Speaker_01
But like, I don't understand because he's doing enough production to like you'd think it would warrant a bigger price than that. But like.
00:28:01 Speaker_02
House, I have a I have a less diplomatic answer. He sucks.
00:28:06 Speaker_03
I don't think he sucks, but I do think that it has to be something.
00:28:10 Speaker_02
The Steelers were like, we would rather not have him and roll the dice with Isaac Austin and these other random dudes on our team, other than have this guy again. All of that speaks... I stand with Mike Tomlin at all times.
00:28:22 Speaker_02
I think that means he's a knucklehead.
00:28:24 Speaker_03
Or that his experience in Pittsburgh, there's still a growing up element that needs to occur and it didn't happen in Carolina.
00:28:32 Speaker_02
That trade, you get a compensatory pick. In the offseason, if you sign somewhere else, it's like Baltimore literally didn't give up anything, but they were like, all right, we'll roll the dice. Why not?
00:28:43 Speaker_01
They literally gave him, they gave Deontay Johnson to the Ravens. Like, you can't find like a smaller trade package than trade up from the sixth to the fifth or whatever. It's like 15 spots.
00:28:53 Speaker_02
Yeah, and by the way, Panthers, you didn't need to make a tank trade. You're already one of the worst teams of the last five years. Danny, is this the worst team since you've been working for us, the Carolina Panthers?
00:29:04 Speaker_02
Because House, we're doing Million Dollar Picks later, and House wants to put the Saints in a tease against the Panthers and doesn't even care who the Saints quarterback is. And I'm like, hold on.
00:29:14 Speaker_02
I actually, I can't put Spencer Rattler in a tease just to add a principal. But the theory is just like Rahim said, his model had them 16 points behind every other team in the league. Are they that bad?
00:29:27 Speaker_01
Yeah, I think they are. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity! They make every quarterback look like his future Hall of Famer. I mean, they made Caleb Williams look incredible, and then I think the next week or whatever, he really, really struggled.
00:29:41 Speaker_01
Or maybe it was a two-week stretch, but... Yeah, I mean, every time a quarterback, Bo Nix, looks like his future Hall of Famer going up against this team. So... Yeah, I'd say they're pretty bad.
00:29:52 Speaker_02
If you had to pick... So every year between week eight, week nine, there's some team that looks like they're dead in the water, right? Last year it was Green Bay. I think they were like three and six after nine games. This happens all the time.
00:30:07 Speaker_02
It's a two and six team. It's a three and six team. It's a three and five team. And People would just look at it this year and go, oh, it's gotta be the Bengals. Oh, that's the team. They're three and five.
00:30:20 Speaker_02
When Tee Higgins is actually playing, their offense can move the ball on anybody. Don't count them out yet. They had that dumb loss to the Chiefs. It's not really a three and five team. That's the team.
00:30:32 Speaker_02
Is there another team you would point to that's under 500 that you think has a little bit of a sleeperish vibe?
00:30:40 Speaker_01
Um, that's a great question How we feel about the browns with this new like the browns renaissance fucking have the conversation?
00:30:48 Speaker_01
That is the answer the answer is the browns the vibes the vibes of the browns I don't think you could find like the panthers vibes were better than the browns vibes for like the first However, many weeks that to sean watson was starting like it was like this can't get worse
00:31:03 Speaker_01
every stat you looked at it we make the joke on our on our fantasy show that like austin gale is is taking down the power grid running these searches trying to figure out like how bad deshaun watson is compared to every other quarterback in history um just like the stats were incredible and jamis winston is like the polar opposite in terms of vibes like he's lifting everybody up like i don't know i think he just gives them an opportunity kind of like what we saw last year with flacko where it just gives them opportunity to
00:31:28 Speaker_01
to play defense and have more energy and kind of do the things that they want to do on offense.
00:31:33 Speaker_02
And not have your soul sucked out of your body as you watch them play offense?
00:31:37 Speaker_01
Yeah, like no one wanted to play with that guy. He didn't want to play. This just completely changes everything for the Browns. I don't know if they're in too big of a hole now to take it out of it.
00:31:46 Speaker_02
Can I counter this? Because I was right there with you and then I was doing the research this morning. Denzel Ward had another fucking concussion.
00:31:54 Speaker_02
He had one in the preseason, and it was like I think his fifth reported one, but it might have even, God only knows how many he's actually had. And when he had one in the preseason, I was like, is he gonna retire? That seems like too many.
00:32:07 Speaker_02
Now he has another one. So he's out, and he's obviously incredibly important to them. And then they lost J.O.K. too. He's out for this Chargers game.
00:32:16 Speaker_02
So I wonder defensively, because I like the Browns at home, and House and I, especially last year, that Browns defense at home, we were riding them a few weeks, but if they don't have those two guys, I'm a little more nervous.
00:32:30 Speaker_02
House, you're bullish on the Browns, I can tell.
00:32:33 Speaker_03
on a week to week basis.
00:32:35 Speaker_03
And, you know, part of the thesis here is they finally have restored health on their offensive line and their offensive line in the preseason forecast was part of the rationale for why they could, you know, kind of threaten once again.
00:32:51 Speaker_03
I mean, they were always the third team at best in the AFC North. but still an eight to nine win team, potentially because of that offensive line, because at some point Chubb will come back.
00:33:04 Speaker_03
And because, you know, the forecast was that Watson would just be league average. Well, he wasn't league average, but that restored health to that offensive line.
00:33:13 Speaker_03
timing wise occurring simultaneously with the return of Nick Chubb, who's still getting his legs back under him. And then you layer on top of that, the immeasurable impact of, of Jameis, which is going to cut both ways. Let there be no doubt.
00:33:30 Speaker_03
He will throw them into some losses a thousand percent. So the right way to play the Browns is not any futures about it. Maybe it's like, yeah, you just look for opportunities to play them game by game.
00:33:42 Speaker_02
The other problem with them, they have five road games left at New Orleans, which might be a little tougher than it seems right now of cars back. But then they're at Denver on a Monday night, at Pittsburgh, at Cincy, at Baltimore.
00:33:53 Speaker_02
But then they also have a home games against Pitt and Kansas City in the Miami Week 17, who might actually be a little better than they are now. So it feels like there's been too much damage with them.
00:34:05 Speaker_02
I think if they had their defense, I'd be a little more excited. I'll tell you the other team I was looking at, and then they traded their left tackle, was Jacksonville. The freaking, the team that keeps sucking you in.
00:34:17 Speaker_02
You know, like they had a couple dumb losses. The schedule gets a little easier second half. But when they traded their starting left tackle, I was like, oh, they're done. This is this is a wrap. Minnesota's like we need a left tackle.
00:34:29 Speaker_02
And Jacksonville's like, would you like our starter? And once they did that, I thought I was out. Does Indy count for this conversation? I know they're four and four, but.
00:34:38 Speaker_01
Yeah, I thought about them. It's almost the exact same situation. It's like Flacco did this last year with the with the Browns.
00:34:46 Speaker_01
Yeah, rejuvenate an offense that's been stagnant because of the either the struggling rookie or struggling second year guy or, you know, obviously last year was Deshaun for a while.
00:34:56 Speaker_02
How about, can we go with floundering instead of struggling? Yes. When you're completing 44% of your passes, I need floundering.
00:35:04 Speaker_01
as my adjective. That works a little bit better. But yeah, I mean, I think, you know, they've got a ton of talent on offense. And if Flacco can do the thing where he's just like distributing the football. Jonathan Taylor looked awesome last game.
00:35:16 Speaker_01
Like they could marry the run game with the pass game. Josh Downs, I think has been a revelation. Michael Pittman hasn't done anything this year, but he could maybe, you know, do a lot better with Flacco feeding him the football.
00:35:27 Speaker_01
And, you know, I think they're the type of team that could Scratch their way to nine wins. Probably. I don't know. What do you think?
00:35:36 Speaker_02
Well, I wish they weren't playing Minnesota this week, cause I keep getting flashbacks to that Browns playoff game when Flacco was just under siege and completely fell apart. House is nodding. Did you, were you thinking the same thing?
00:35:48 Speaker_02
I really wanted to take them this week and I just couldn't get that game out of my head.
00:35:52 Speaker_03
It's literally the reason that has me tapping the brakes entirely on my forecast for them for the rest of the season.
00:35:58 Speaker_03
Because if Joe Flacco gets beat up, gets beat to all hell in this next game against Minnesota, who was going to blitz the daylights out of it. And the Colts all have a great offensive line, but this is a different animal.
00:36:10 Speaker_03
What Minnesota is going to bring to bear. And we just watched, you know, Houston did a good job of, of, of applying some pressure. Joe Flacco can't move. Anthony Richardson at least was able to evade some pressure and maybe not great decision-making,
00:36:24 Speaker_03
but for sure able to work his way. Flacco is immobile, as immobile as they get. If he gets dinged up one time, what if we're back with Anthony Richardson against our will? That is not a ticket that I want to have in my hand.
00:36:38 Speaker_02
I do like the Colts talent. Me too. I like their receivers. I think they can really run the ball. Even their backup running backs can run the ball. Their defense has gotten much better the last few weeks.
00:36:50 Speaker_02
I've watched them in these games feeling like they should be winning the games. And Richardson was just so atrocious last week. I mean, he just, that was it. They had to bench him.
00:37:00 Speaker_01
Their schedule is tough. It makes it tough. You can kind of like look at their schedule and say like, oh, I kind of see why they benched Richardson at this point, because they have the Vikings next week. They have the Bills after that, the Jets.
00:37:11 Speaker_01
Defense which you know hasn't been as good as I think we expected, but they can still play and then the Lions the week after that So they got they got a tough month ahead here that against some really good opponents that could make like maybe they're just like trying to trying to preserve Richardson's Sanity a little bit here as well.
00:37:28 Speaker_02
Well, cuz especially with some of the Houston injuries and Houston's a huge favorite at least on Fando to win the division. I was like, I don't know and
00:37:39 Speaker_02
Danny, stick around, because I want to go over MVP odds with you in-house, but we're going to take a quick break. The Bill Simmons Podcast, brought to you by FanDuel. What's better than touchdowns? Touchdowns with a boost.
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00:39:11 Speaker_02
Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts and savings, and eligibility vary by state. All right, MVP odds. So Dabundo and Rahim talked about this on the Wednesday episode of The Hook on the Ringer Gambling Show.
00:39:28 Speaker_02
Good title, by the way. I love when we have good titles for our shows. We were talking about MVPs a week ago, and I thought Lamar was in the driver's seat, and then they blew that stupid game on Sunday, and I think that knocked him out.
00:39:42 Speaker_02
And yet I don't know who the MVP is. And Fandel doesn't really seem to know either. Josh Allen's plus 270, Lamar's plus 310, with a harder schedule coming.
00:39:50 Speaker_02
Mahomes is 5-1, having probably the worst season of his career, even though the Chiefs are winning. Goff's 6-1, Daniels is 9-1, C.J. Stroud is 13-1. Dabundo made a really interesting case for Hertz.
00:40:04 Speaker_02
at 20 to one, because the next six defenses he's playing are all terrible, and he might be able to actually cook the next six weeks, and if the Eagles go on a little run, maybe. Brock Purdy's 22 to one, goes on down the line.
00:40:20 Speaker_02
As you know, defensive players aren't allowed to win this award. But we don't really have somebody I would go, oh, that guy's probably gonna win. Is there anybody you're looking at at this point?
00:40:32 Speaker_01
I mean, yeah, the one guy I think that I kind of just like circled there is James Daniels just because of all the narratives around him, you know, like I don't know.
00:40:40 Speaker_02
I don't think he'll actually just ejaculated. We have to take another break.
00:40:45 Speaker_01
I mean, I don't think he will win, but.
00:40:48 Speaker_01
just you know the it's like they feel like they're the team of destiny this year almost uh that that wild you know game-winning throw the other day like just the way that they're playing the the way that they're executing on third and fourth down like at truly historic rates like it's probably not going to last but right now just narrative wise and excitement wise and you know
00:41:09 Speaker_01
All that. He kind of was the one that stood out there.
00:41:12 Speaker_02
I think the obvious one, you know, thanks for sucking up the house, by the way, that was. Yeah, I'm so mad I don't have them to win the division. I stared at it all summer and you asked me, I asked you, you know what I said?
00:41:23 Speaker_02
I can't name more than two players on our defense.
00:41:26 Speaker_03
I mean, I could name them and I would say they suck. I mean, I could have named them. I told you the defense isn't any good. You can't invest in the team in that preseason.
00:41:35 Speaker_03
With that, yeah, I started off this show talking about the Wizards as a joke because I am still coming down from the high of the miracle in Maryland. What are we talking about? It's the C words all day, baby.
00:41:47 Speaker_03
But in these betting markets, BS knows this. It's a house tradition to have tickets, multiple tickets. And I absolutely must have some Josh Allen because that's the best, that's the most likely, that's the narrative. He has deserved it in the past.
00:42:05 Speaker_03
That makes it easy for everybody. I also think Jared Goff, if Detroit ends up at 14 and three and lands the one seed, I think there's a decent case. And he reels off a couple more of these games where he's nearly 100%. completion.
00:42:21 Speaker_03
Now we have to get indoors this week, outdoors. Yeah. No Saree, but we will get back indoors for golf. And then I love the Hertz case. I think that, that the Eagles are super live. It's a great price. And I have them. I'm a bum.
00:42:37 Speaker_03
I bought them at 16 to one in the summer, 20 to one might as well double up. Look at that secondary for the Eagles. That's the thing for them. That's going to turn that is slowly coming together
00:42:49 Speaker_03
They are understanding a little bit of what Mr. Fangio wants out of them. And I think that defense is going to be a propulsive kind of force for them down the stretch. David seems disgusted by this.
00:43:02 Speaker_01
No, no, no. I think that's fine. I have a question.
00:43:05 Speaker_01
about fine 30 to 1 Jordan love is he has he missed too much time already to win it or if you like because isn't this like typically Kind of a how you do down the stretch award have to win He'd have to have a huge game this week against the Lions at home and beat the Lions and throw for 340 yards I just think that now get it going the way that he plays the kind of like he's like effort there He's down there somewhere, you know type of attitude he has
00:43:30 Speaker_01
Um, it wouldn't be all that surprising to see him go on kind of like a tear down the stretch.
00:43:33 Speaker_02
Do you feel like he's been playing that well though? Cause I don't.
00:43:36 Speaker_01
No, not, not particularly, but I think he could put up stats. I think like, and he has such a, he's in such a good system with so many good weapons around him.
00:43:44 Speaker_01
Um, and I think he's been really banged up and if he gets healthy and then starts to like put it all together down the stretch again, like it's kind of like how you finish. I think a lot of the time kind of influences this.
00:43:54 Speaker_01
And if I think the Packers are really good, I think they have one of the best play callers in the NFL and they have weapons. So it's such a good point.
00:44:02 Speaker_03
Yeah. It's such a good point because literally last season, the MVP was decided on Christmas when the Ravens went in and beat the hell out of every week for like five weeks in a row.
00:44:13 Speaker_02
Right. Yeah. Right. I have a Kyle. Turn the turn the camera on, even though it's already on. What is Kansas City's record? How high does it go before Mahomes just has to be the MVP? Like, what if they go 17 and 0? Yeah. 16 and one. 16 and one.
00:44:34 Speaker_02
Does he just automatically have to get it? What if they have a four win advantage over every other team in the league? And then we look at their actual scope position players and we're like, oh, they have 45 year old Kelsey.
00:44:47 Speaker_02
Um, a rookie worthy, the wide rice was out the whole year. Here's Hopkins. He can't get open, but it'll catch stuff in traffic.
00:44:56 Speaker_02
Uh, Juju Smith Schuster way by the paths, a bunch of random running backs that were either on the waiver wire or not drafted. Like maybe it should be my homes.
00:45:06 Speaker_01
No, he has eight touchdowns and nine picks this year. I mean, he's going to end up much better, I'm sure, but It would be funny. It would be funny if that was the case. It's annoying.
00:45:16 Speaker_03
It's too stupid. The MVP for the, the, the chiefs is the defense. Spags should win. MVP is give it to Chris Jones as a player in spags. It's just called the award, the MBO. It's not, there's no P it's not for the most valuable player.
00:45:33 Speaker_03
The most valuable players for the chiefs are on the defensive side of the ball. They've been effing dominant and there's no, as long as they have health and I'm going to knock on wood, They're for sure going to be right. You know, absolutely fine.
00:45:45 Speaker_03
It's how they won the Superbowl.
00:45:47 Speaker_02
I mean, that plus the seven fumbles schedule here because I didn't realize this till I was doing the research last night and today they're playing Tampa Monday night. Big favorites. Denver home, they're at Buffalo week 11.
00:46:01 Speaker_02
So that's a red flagger, that's a possible one. But then they're at Carolina, home Vegas, home Chargers, at Cleveland, home Houston, and then at Pittsburgh four days later I would say would be the other really dangerous one.
00:46:13 Speaker_02
And then home Denver week 18. But we haven't had one of these in a while where the team, I remember in the 2000s it felt like this was happening every year. Like we would have these Colts years where they were like 12 and 0, the 07 Pats.
00:46:28 Speaker_02
I don't remember us having one of these in a while. And I don't really know the reasons for that other than maybe there's just more variance with the games now. But this Chiefs team, I don't know.
00:46:38 Speaker_02
I could see them being like 13-0 and us kind of looking at each other going, wait, what does this mean? Does this mean he reads the coach of the year now and Mahomes is MVP? I don't know. I don't know the answer.
00:46:48 Speaker_01
What's the stat that you really like where it's like when he's down 10 points, he's like, undefeated or something like that in the fourth quarter. Mahomes has, like, that magic about him that, uh, you just can't really figure out what's a pure stat.
00:47:01 Speaker_02
—Well, the underdog stat's the best stat, where he's only not covered once when he's been an underdog, since he's been in the league. Like, Brady used to have the same shit. It's like, don't make these guys underdogs, it's stupid.
00:47:12 Speaker_02
That's what we're going to say.
00:47:13 Speaker_03
The league ruined this. The league ruined the possibility of any team going undefeated because of the stupid Wednesday Christmas game. There's no chance.
00:47:22 Speaker_03
In fact, if I was involved with the Chiefs and we, you know, we were coming into that game undefeated, I might seriously consider resting everybody on Christmas.
00:47:32 Speaker_03
I might seriously consider taking the starters, letting them have Christmas with their effing families, grab 10 guys from the practice squad and tell the NFL to go over. The point is not to win on Christmas. The point is to win the Super Bowl.
00:47:46 Speaker_03
The point is to be successful in the playoffs. And coming off of, what is it, Saturday to Wednesday? It's goddamn preposterous. It's terrible for the players.
00:47:58 Speaker_02
Remember the dialogue about this? I remember writing multiple columns about this in the late 2000s. Because the Pats played it one way, they went for it. And then they really wore down over the end of the season in the playoffs.
00:48:09 Speaker_02
And then the Colts did it the other way. And they were like, we're throwing it away, we don't care. And then that backfired too. And it's like, there's basically no way, you're basically best off losing in like week 11 is the way to play it.
00:48:21 Speaker_02
So maybe they just have to throw the Buffalo game.
00:48:24 Speaker_02
But yeah, I think the schedule for some reason isn't that hard, especially when you have, you're in the same division as Vegas and the Chargers and Denver, you know, not to mention all the other stuff. So coach of the year is another one.
00:48:40 Speaker_02
where it just seems like it has to go to the team, like the Dan Quinn. It's like, oh, they won five games last year. They've won 11 this year. He's the coach of the year.
00:48:50 Speaker_02
But that's another one where it's like, well, why shouldn't Andy Reid win this if they go 15-2 or 16-1? I would make a case for Tomlin, though, if they're in the 12s. I mean, his quarterbacks are Justin Fields and Russell Wilson.
00:49:04 Speaker_02
They're paying two and a half million dollars combined for their quarterbacks. Nobody else in the league is doing that. So they would be in there too. Who else would you have, Danny?
00:49:15 Speaker_01
Give me that give me like the favorites right now, so it's like Dan Quinn KOC for the Vikings.
00:49:20 Speaker_03
Yeah, I have KOC up there the real KOC How do we feel about like I don't know doesn't have it right now.
00:49:30 Speaker_02
Oh there it is Dan Quinn's favorite plus 195 Sean Payton Plus 650 Tomlins, plus 750 Campbell, 9-1. O'Connell is 9-1, but he's dropping, and Andy Reid is 9-1, even though he doesn't have a loss yet. So, LaFleurette, LaFleurette 15-1 is intriguing, too.
00:49:50 Speaker_02
They beat Detroit in their, you know, 7-2, with some, the Malik Willis games. I think he's done a great job this year.
00:49:59 Speaker_01
Yeah, I think he he might have been who I picked in the preseason to win this I think because um, I've been saying this for a few years It's like he kind of like got ignored for a long time because he had rogers and he was you know He I think right now he only Jim harbaugh has a better winning record among active head coaches in the nfl and he's just been incredible since he was named the head coach there and people kind of just overlook him because you know for a number of reasons, but um, I think he's proven to be
00:50:26 Speaker_01
On par with like the McVay in terms of just coaching excellence scheme getting the most out of your players having like all these Sort of random guys and getting the most out of them on offense like not not to say that they haven't like invested as receivers But it's like second third fourth round fifth round guys And they're all really good and they're they're all getting production out of those guys and so You know, they're kind of talent man.
00:50:47 Speaker_02
That's the game of the week on Sunday that really could be the NFC title game and in a couple of weeks. Um, fantasy MVP for you for the year.
00:50:58 Speaker_01
Right now it's Henry Derrick Henry. I think.
00:51:01 Speaker_02
Interesting.
00:51:01 Speaker_01
I mean, it's either Lamar or Henry.
00:51:03 Speaker_02
I would have said, I would have said Lamar, but I see the Henry case too. Cause so you got Henry, you're paying.
00:51:09 Speaker_03
We're Saquon. What happened to Saquon?
00:51:11 Speaker_01
I mean, Saquon's up there as well.
00:51:13 Speaker_02
Henry's got 1,000 yards and 14 TDs already.
00:51:16 Speaker_01
Yeah, Henry could break 1,000, I think, this week. But he's also just lapping the field at the running back position in terms of points. I think his worst game this season has been 10 points. He's not giving you any bad weeks.
00:51:30 Speaker_01
And he's given you a bunch of spike weeks. You know, right now he has 30, almost 30 more points than Alvin Kamara total and in total points, then that's the second number two running back. And I think just that, that value, that value over.
00:51:42 Speaker_01
You know, the general replacement running back is so high. I think Lamar would be another good one. And I think you could throw Jane Daniels in there if he can stay healthy for the rest of the year.
00:51:52 Speaker_01
Right now, he's not probably because he missed a game. But, you know, he's in terms of value because he got him relatively late and he's just been incredible.
00:52:04 Speaker_01
He was like kind of an afterthought in the preseason because people weren't really sure like what he would do passing. He's been incredible passer in addition to you know, running almost as much as any quarterback this year, so.
00:52:16 Speaker_01
But I would pick Henry just based on the consistency and the spike leaks that you get from him.
00:52:22 Speaker_02
Well, and also, I don't think he was a top eight, like, spending running back heading into an auction, right? He was kind of in that second level.
00:52:31 Speaker_01
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because people were a little uncertain about, number one, the age, number two, he's going to a new team, new offensive line.
00:52:36 Speaker_02
And also, like, podcasts like ours where you guys are all blowing Devin Achan.
00:52:41 Speaker_01
Well, Craig, Craig, to his credit, Craig Horlbeck was all in on Henry this year. And that's like, that's really aged well.
00:52:48 Speaker_02
Henry's turned into like, just, just keep taking him until the year when he doesn't have it anymore. Cause it usually happens with the receivers, but not. not a running backs. He's the extreme outlier in every sense. House.
00:53:00 Speaker_02
I didn't even tell you my knockout league. The one, I mean, not the league you're in, but the league with Sal, which no, no, this is the knockout league with my team's a disaster.
00:53:12 Speaker_02
I had Kirk cousins as one of my quarterbacks and after week one, when he looked like a mannequin in an apartment store window, I cut him. I had to pick somebody else up. Now I'm two and six.
00:53:25 Speaker_02
Basically I'm, I'm probably at the playoffs anyway, but it's like, nobody's finished me off yet. And now I'm going against Kurt cousin. It's the rare fantasy, the guy I never shared a wave. Now I'm good.
00:53:36 Speaker_02
So I fully expected him to have four touchdowns and 700 yards.
00:53:40 Speaker_03
You missed out on his 900 yards and 15 touchdowns against Tampa.
00:53:44 Speaker_02
It's amazing. So upset. Danny, who has provided the most content on the fantasy show this year? What single player? Oh, that's a great question.
00:53:53 Speaker_02
If you had to do a usage rate for players on the show that you've spent the most time talking about, who is it?
00:54:00 Speaker_01
That's a really good question. I mean, it's always kyle pitts pretty much every year for some reason.
00:54:04 Speaker_02
We just can't This guy he's he's the third highest tight end right now.
00:54:08 Speaker_01
I know he's been back. He's been playing well He we have a whole category dedicated to him.
00:54:12 Speaker_01
Usually it's uh, Two tight ends and a lie basically two tight ends that outscored kyle pitts and a lie and it's always just these random guys that outscore kyle pitts But we retired the category because he's back.
00:54:23 Speaker_01
He's actually good now, and I think we're actually kind of in on this I would say um
00:54:29 Speaker_02
If any one more thing on pits, not only is he really good he's had a couple long plays called back Yeah, I don't which I don't know. Is there a website that keeps track of that?
00:54:38 Speaker_02
I I I know because I have him in my guillotine league and one other league but he He's had two like long ones where he was like celebrating and they're like, ah flag on the play Yeah that the king of that is george pickens.
00:54:50 Speaker_01
Yeah, no question. The cow pits is probably second cow pits I think that play last week where he caught a pass, he like did the reverse stiff arm, you know, the Larry Fitzgerald style reverse stiff arm.
00:55:00 Speaker_02
He kept the ball out and almost fumbled it.
00:55:02 Speaker_01
And then he almost fumbled it going over the... Right up to the point where he almost dropped the ball too early, or maybe he did actually.
00:55:09 Speaker_05
He definitely did.
00:55:11 Speaker_01
Yeah. I was like, that was the first time in like years I'm like, oh, there's the Kyle Pitts that like we thought he was going to be. That's the guy that, you know, the Falcons took before Jamar Chase. And so, Yeah, it's good to see him back.
00:55:24 Speaker_01
He finally starts to look a little healthy, but you know, he's still kind of, his target rate isn't really where you want it to be. He's still kind of like a tertiary option in this Falcons offense.
00:55:32 Speaker_01
Like Darnell Mooney is probably, I think, outscoring him still. So can't get too excited about it.
00:55:37 Speaker_02
How, so are you excited for Brock Bowers to be a $35 tight end next year?
00:55:41 Speaker_03
he deserves it. He's incredible.
00:55:43 Speaker_03
I want to ask Danny a question as we formulate strategies for next year and what we're seeing over this season in terms of running back performance, are we going to go back to where we were maybe a decade ago where receivers, you know, cause we're in this era now where there's three receivers going in the first round of, of all drafts and
00:56:06 Speaker_03
There are no receivers now who's the top like fans like, you know It would have been nico and nico was incredible what he was doing all season, but this is the issue now the receivers get hurt I mean running backs do too, but uh, are we gonna go back?
00:56:20 Speaker_03
Is it just gonna be 10 running backs and then everybody's gonna scrap from there?
00:56:25 Speaker_01
Yeah, maybe I mean this I I want to say I don't have the stand in front of me, but I think the And receiver production across the NFL is down dramatically this year compared to most years. And I think it's just like, there's a lot of these variables.
00:56:37 Speaker_01
Quarterbacks are not playing as well, not nearly as efficient. Like all these passes are so much shorter. Basically teams are, you know, using these little swing passes and short passes to replace the run game more or less.
00:56:48 Speaker_01
Now the problem is on the other side, running backs are not being used at a high rate as they used to. Like, you know what I mean? There's like every team almost now has a pretty strong rotation. There's a handful of guys
00:56:58 Speaker_01
that are, you know, the quote unquote workhorse type players. But, you know, it's give and take. I would say next year we're probably going to see because of all this, we're probably going to see like a running backpack first round.
00:57:09 Speaker_01
It's just going to be those guys that are going to get like 20 carries a game. And those they're so scarce, you have to go get them.
00:57:15 Speaker_02
How about this? Maybe Lamar should just be the first pick in the draft. I know, right? Like if you're just trying to, if you were calling people and asking to try to trade for guys on their team, I think Lamar is the quickest hang up. Yeah. Fuck you.
00:57:32 Speaker_02
I'm not trading Lamar guys. Guys. Amazing.
00:57:35 Speaker_01
When, when he's, when he spent all that or when, when he lost all that weight this off season, I think that should have been like the biggest sign to be like, okay, he's back.
00:57:44 Speaker_01
He's going to be, you know, doing his thing, running around, like making guys look stupid. I think when he gained a little bit of weight, he wasn't quite as elusive as a runner. Um, but, but yeah, he's, he's been absolutely incredible.
00:57:55 Speaker_02
This guy might be up there too. And I'll tell you this. My guy Drake May, I hope he plays this week, but I think he's going to put a big fantasy stats because he's running.
00:58:04 Speaker_02
He scoots out and also isn't afraid to run down the middle of the field and take a hit or two, which unfortunately backfired on him last week, but I think he's a big game hunter and also is going to run the ball 30 to 50 yards, but it seems like
00:58:23 Speaker_02
We might've nailed all three of those quarterbacks. I don't know, Dean, if you had to rank the quarterbacks right now for who you'd want, would Drake May versus Caleb in the two spot, who would you pick?
00:58:36 Speaker_01
Probably still Caleb. Maybe that's just take lock from like my draft analysis or whatever, but I don't know, Drake looks really good, man. I think he kind of, for whatever reason, people overlooked how good of a runner he was.
00:58:51 Speaker_01
He put up stats in college as a runner. And he was like scrambling around a bunch. He was really dangerous in the red zone.
00:58:58 Speaker_01
He's almost got like, you know, like a little bit of a Josh Allen to him where he's almost a little too reckless too, which is a little nervous, makes me nervous.
00:59:08 Speaker_01
But yeah, I mean, he looks really good out there and obviously with a little more experience and get some weapons around him. He has like no weapons right now, so that doesn't help.
00:59:16 Speaker_01
But yeah, he could definitely have like an elite upside in the league. I still just I don't know. I just still I still love Caleb for just the special plays he can make out of structure, I think.
00:59:26 Speaker_01
And he'll start to figure it out a little bit more in structure. I think that offensive system is, you know, a work in progress.
00:59:33 Speaker_02
Uh, do your bears rent just for 20 seconds. I can't, I can't, I can't.
00:59:38 Speaker_03
I mean, they're literally the dumbest football team next, next to the jets. It's an incredible slew of Mensa geniuses in charge of both sides of the football plus special teams. But the thing I wanted to share, and I know it's obviously insane.
00:59:56 Speaker_03
Think that if you grab Caleb or you grab Drake May and you put them with cliff Kingsbury this season with this offensive Line and the way that they have schemed up that that any of those guys might look at being incredible this year Yeah in Washington, which is a bananas thing to say.
01:00:13 Speaker_03
I know it sounds insane.
01:00:15 Speaker_02
The only thing with Daniels He's so accurate. It's just outrageous like to to have him on one TV and Anthony Richardson on another TV It was like watching two different sports
01:00:26 Speaker_02
His passes are just always in the perfect spot, whether it's a deep ball, whether it's a little quick out. And I knew that was part of the appeal for him coming out of college, but it's really true.
01:00:39 Speaker_02
There's accuracy and then there's pinpoint accuracy, which he seems to really have. But it really seems like we might have gotten three good ones.
01:00:47 Speaker_02
I was thinking how with Penn X, how unfair it is that Penn X isn't playing this year, that the NFL should have a rule where you can rent out your quarterback. Almost like an Airbnb. Right.
01:00:58 Speaker_02
Like they could have just rented Pennix to the Steelers for like 10 weeks or for the season. But if cousins got hurt, they got to immediately get him back. Don't they do that in soccer? It's so stupid that he's just not playing.
01:01:10 Speaker_01
Yeah, totally. Don't they do that in soccer? I mean, I'm going to sound like an idiot. I don't know international soccer.
01:01:14 Speaker_02
Oh, like little quickie transfer fees or something?
01:01:16 Speaker_01
Yeah, yeah. No, 100%. It does suck for him because there's a world in which he's like carving up teams too. You know, it'd be really fun to see.
01:01:24 Speaker_02
Yeah, you could have put him on House's Washington team. Well, House is the happiest I've ever seen him. All right, Danny Kelly, you can hear him on the Ringer fantasy football show.
01:01:32 Speaker_02
You can read him on theringer.com and you can text him during games if you have his number to wonder what the F is going on with the Seahawks. Good to see you.
01:01:44 Speaker_01
You too, thanks.
01:01:48 Speaker_02
This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. The NBA's back, and you know what that means. So is Michelob Ultra Courtside. It gets fans closer to the game, the stories, the players, the celebrations, and it's a pretty damn good beer.
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01:02:30 Speaker_02
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01:03:45 Speaker_02
We're gonna talk about some million dollar picks. You weren't on the last two weeks, but only because we did four and a half hours of basketball content together two weeks ago. So we gave you a break that one week.
01:03:54 Speaker_02
Last week I was in town with all the L.A. dudes. Now we're back. We held the fort. Somehow only won $15,000 last week, even though I thought I'd nailed the week. Up $178,000 for the year. I think this week's really hard.
01:04:09 Speaker_02
There's only a couple that I liked, but give me your favorite coming out of the gate. I want to talk about a bunch of games. What was your favorite game of all of them?
01:04:19 Speaker_03
It's a tease.
01:04:20 Speaker_02
I mean, this week has incredible tease legs. I should set that up properly. This is tease week. There's teases, there's Bills minus six, Eagles minus seven and a half, Bengals minus eight and a half, Chiefs minus eight and a half.
01:04:35 Speaker_02
There's some going the other way teases. So yeah, anyway, go ahead.
01:04:38 Speaker_03
Yeah. I mean, I absolutely love, um, the chiefs, you know, tease them down to two and a half home against Tampa on a Monday night. I love Philly. I really think that Philly is, is, is going to be coming on here, uh, teasing them from seven and a half
01:04:54 Speaker_03
down to a one and a half. I think it's very viable to tease Cleveland up from, from one and a half to seven and a half. Cause like, are the chargers going to win by margin in Cleveland? I don't think so.
01:05:09 Speaker_03
And then the saints we'll see what the answer is at quarterback. I wouldn't recommend doing anything with them. If Rattler is the quarterback, but all of the signs seem to be pointing at their car.
01:05:19 Speaker_03
And if their car is the quarterback, then we can't continue to miss out on this opportunity of winning money at Carolina's expense. Like, well, we can figure out how to do it. It could be a tease. It could be team total stuff.
01:05:30 Speaker_02
It could be first halves. I did this last week where I crossed my fingers that Marcus Mariota was going to be the DC quarterback. And then I was like, Jane and Daniels is going to play. All of a sudden I didn't have Mariota against that Bears defense.
01:05:43 Speaker_02
So you mentioned the Eagles. And they beat the Bengals pretty handily last week.
01:05:49 Speaker_02
And for me, part of it was, I actually took the Bengals in that game, but I thought I was getting Tee Higgins and I thought they'd be able to throw on them all game with Chase and Higgins, then Higgins doesn't play.
01:05:58 Speaker_02
But that Eagles game might've been more impressive than maybe Maybe I gave it credit for in the moment because I was so mad about the Higgins thing. Like maybe the Eagles are pretty good.
01:06:07 Speaker_02
I feel like we've also been down this road before where it's like time to trust the Eagles and then they completely kick you in the nuts. But as we talked about with Danny, it just feels like this Jag season's over.
01:06:19 Speaker_02
That trade they made, trading their left tackle, I know he wasn't playing that great, but that was just really weird. They're like, ah, we got some other guys. Like, nobody has other guys sitting on the bench to play left tackle. That's crazy.
01:06:30 Speaker_02
Brian Thomas is hurt, might not be able to play. ETN's been hurt the whole season. Um, and it's like, yeah, yeah. Kirk's done for the year. It just feels like the Eagles and a tease at home feels pretty safe to me.
01:06:44 Speaker_02
They're going to be able to run maybe Peterson coming back there. This would be like the nail in the coffin for that. So I'm with you on that. And then chiefs bucks was the other one that it's like, that number is nine is eight and a half still.
01:06:56 Speaker_02
So you can get it to two and a half. The Bucks with no, with no God, with no Evans last week, Mayfield was still moving the ball cause he was playing, but the receivers aren't the same. Their defense is awful.
01:07:07 Speaker_02
And I just don't see, are they, this is going to be the team that ends Casey's unbeaten season on a Monday night. I don't see it.
01:07:14 Speaker_03
No. And remember that the difference between Baker under pressure and Baker not under pressure, Atlanta can has the worst pass rush in the NFL. And so Baker was, you know, try to wheel and deal as best he could.
01:07:26 Speaker_03
They were competitive for as long as, as he could keep them in there. This is this, this chief's thing is a radically different animal.
01:07:34 Speaker_02
Yeah, I agree. And their defense is bad. Tampa's D. You can move the ball on them. You can do whatever. All the advanced stats on them are bad. All right, so we have two. I don't trust the Bengals against the Raiders.
01:07:48 Speaker_02
That was another one I really wanted to put in, but I don't know what's going to happen with Higgins. The Raiders feel like they're good for one stupid, weird, out of nowhere win every eight weeks. They already had one against Baltimore.
01:08:00 Speaker_02
They're kind of due. I think that's a stay away. The bills against the Dolphins is a possible tease. So they killed them in week two, even before Tua got hurt. They have a much better team.
01:08:12 Speaker_02
Dolphins have had a bunch of injuries already, especially on defense. And yet something's holding me back on it. is this a kitchen sink game for the dolphins? They're not kind of out of the playoffs yet.
01:08:26 Speaker_02
Somebody is going to make the playoffs at nine and eight in the AFC. Like they're not done yet.
01:08:30 Speaker_03
It probably is a kitchen sink game for the dolphins. But if I'm dopey McDaniel, the disc jockey is standing at the sink. I don't want any part of it. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.
01:08:45 Speaker_03
I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. any answer for it. And it, you know, we'll see, they, they had no pass rush whatsoever.
01:09:00 Speaker_03
The dolphins last, they were up 10 points against the Cardinals at home and could not get that across the goal line. That is that's diabolical. How, how bad that is that you can't hold on. But they couldn't get any, any pass rush.
01:09:13 Speaker_03
Cause the, what's his name? Siler is hurt. And I don't know if he's going to be back. This week, that's the wrong set of circumstances to go up to Buffalo and try. And the line has gone from six and a half down to five and a half.
01:09:27 Speaker_03
So some folks are are interested in Miami. I am not. I am not one of the people interested in Miami. And I'm just fine with, you know, Buffalo as a money line leg. I don't want to tease, you know, through the zero, really. Right. There's no value there.
01:09:41 Speaker_03
But, you know, I think the bills are going to handle their business.
01:09:45 Speaker_02
So if we're looking at teases, it's Eagles, maybe it's just Eagles and Chiefs and that's it. That'd be fine. I'd be perfectly satisfied with that. Some maybe bets.
01:09:57 Speaker_02
The Colts, we talked about earlier, plus five and a half against the Vikings, and that feels like that should be a three-point game, but I also, as I said earlier, like the Flacco going against Flores and that Vikings, also the Vikings, two losses in a row, 10 days rest.
01:10:14 Speaker_03
uh... people seem to think i'll now that they flackos in there with the colts everything's gonna be fine but something's tell me to stay away from this but i just want to make sure you've got some way yeah i the back door is open and that's the reassurance to be nervous and so that you know some smart people like i've seen and heard folks making a good argument a compelling argument for taking minnesota on the first half line which i kinda like it's like uh... around three years so uh... for the for them to cover where three and a half maybe
01:10:43 Speaker_03
I'm totally fine with that idea. Like Minnesota coming in after that loss against the ramps with that extra time against this Colts team that, you know, is trying to save it season.
01:10:55 Speaker_03
But Minnesota showing again, like we're, we're class we're, we're, this is a, we're a class team in the first half. And then in the second half, Flacco does some of the stuff that Flacco does. So that would be a reason to stay away from the whole game.
01:11:08 Speaker_03
But yeah,
01:11:10 Speaker_02
The Bears are plus one and a half in Arizona. And I know they might be on your DMV list, but they are. I was really impressed by their defense. The defensive stats of them are great. They're a top six or seven defense by any calculation at this point.
01:11:27 Speaker_02
And Arizona as a favorite, just in general, Arizona with any hint of prosperity makes me nervous. Arizona's four and four. And you go through it and they barely beat the Chargers that one time, right?
01:11:44 Speaker_02
I mean, the Chargers really should have won that game, right? So that just immediately makes them three and five. They had that weird comeback against Miami that they somehow won the game.
01:11:52 Speaker_02
I had taken that off of TV, so I'm just not sure they feel like a four and four team to me. So just staring at it going, ah, trying to talk myself into the bears. But I think you're right, I think they're a DMV.
01:12:06 Speaker_03
Yeah. Their, their wins, they have three, three wins in their last four games or three in one again, they beat the 49ers by one point. They beat the chargers by two points and they beat the dolphins by one point.
01:12:19 Speaker_03
And they got smacked by, by the Packers. They got smashed by, uh, the, uh, the bills. Well, the bills actually did it in the second half, but in any event, they're, they're too inconsistent.
01:12:33 Speaker_03
I just can't under any circumstances have anything to do with that bears coaching staff because they have shown us without any hesitation or reservation, they will snatch the feet, write the F out of the jaws of victory.
01:12:47 Speaker_02
I heard that. I heard that Eber flutes was, was working a little background for the Yankees during the World Series. Base running and defense. It's amazing. Giving them some tips. He was an unpaid consultant.
01:13:02 Speaker_03
I took a picture of all of the errors and the base running miscues and all of that, and I thought long and hard about sending it to the group text to JJ last night, and I didn't do it because I love JJ. I'm going to save it for this weekend.
01:13:16 Speaker_03
I'm definitely going to send it.
01:13:18 Speaker_02
The Yankee fans moved into a weird thing where they immediately were like, I knew this was going to happen. They did the finger-pointing thing.
01:13:26 Speaker_02
And it's like, you definitely didn't know it was going to happen when Judge Homer did the first inning and you're up 2-0. And you were like, yeah. That's right, man, our house, we're not going down here.
01:13:35 Speaker_02
Browns Chargers, Browns plus one and a half at home against the Chargers. And I like the Browns a lot more before the defensive injuries. I think I've landed as a stay away on this one.
01:13:47 Speaker_03
I'm with you on it. It'll be fun. I'm going to root for the Browns. It will be a good measuring tape game for the chargers. Cause if we, if the chargers are legit, then they better go.
01:13:58 Speaker_02
They should be able to move the ball in this game. Even though the beds are on. Yeah. I'm with you. Lions Packers. Packers are plus two and a half at home. Oh, two and a half. Plus two and a half. Looks like Jordan Love's playing.
01:14:12 Speaker_03
So that, yeah, because it was three and a half yesterday. So the line is moving in the direction of like, we're, we're, we're feeling stronger about the idea that Jordan Love's going to play.
01:14:19 Speaker_02
I think he's going to play. That's my take, knowing nothing and having no contacts in the Packers organization.
01:14:26 Speaker_03
And you know, all the teams lie now. They wait until they try and get advantages, as they should, but we really don't know who's playing in any games until 1255 on Sunday.
01:14:36 Speaker_02
I will say this. I think we have a better sense now on the Thursday, Friday with the practice and what's released on what feels doable and not doable.
01:14:45 Speaker_02
Like even the Daniels thing last week on Thursday, it was like, all right, he's not written off yet and they're not saying he's out, which makes me think he's probably going to play.
01:14:55 Speaker_02
You just have to, you're basically turning into Matlock trying to figure it out.
01:14:59 Speaker_03
It's, it's true.
01:15:00 Speaker_02
But like who had Puka and Cooper playing, right? Right. That's true. So Lions on grass is, Lions on grass outdoors would be the fear.
01:15:14 Speaker_02
The counter would be you're getting the Lions under a field goal and they're the best team in the league and why wouldn't you just take that?
01:15:20 Speaker_02
They're gonna run the ball all over Green Bay and do some play action stuff and the counter to that would be, well no Jameson Williams. you know, take out St. Brown, Packers have a good secondary. To me, it's a stay away. I wanna watch it.
01:15:35 Speaker_02
I don't think I need money on it. Or I can go Packers and a tease.
01:15:38 Speaker_03
Yeah, I'm playing Packers money line, Packers and a tease. Look at the weather forecast.
01:15:46 Speaker_02
What is it?
01:15:46 Speaker_03
Precipitation right now, high of 52 degrees, winds 15 miles an hour or more. Precipitation likelihood 60% or higher. at game time. You know who doesn't like playing in those weather conditions? Jared effing golf.
01:16:04 Speaker_03
You know whose first outdoor game of the NFL season is this coming Sunday, Bill Simmons, Jared effing golf. You know what the numbers show about Jared golf in outdoor games. That's one thing. I think he's around a 500 quarterback.
01:16:21 Speaker_03
All of his numbers are dramatically lower in terms of completion, percentages, accuracy, all that kind of advanced stuff.
01:16:28 Speaker_03
put some precipitation in the mix, put some adverse weather conditions into the mix, add that filter to the Jared Goff scenario, and then see.
01:16:38 Speaker_03
Now look, you can, one could make a very compelling case, I would listen to it, of Detroit trying to run the ball, because they have a multi-headed rush attack, and they have an extraordinary offensive line, and if you wanna make that case, I'll listen and not dismiss it.
01:16:57 Speaker_03
out of hand, but the Lions are not going to be able to put pressure on Jordan Love and the Packers. The Hutchinson thing is really going to be felt this season, in my humble opinion.
01:17:11 Speaker_02
You're going bad weather, golf outdoors with some things going against them, Lambeau, crazy crowd. Crazy crowd. Maybe they stuff to shut the Lions run a little bit, lack of a second receiver. All right. I'm just talking it.
01:17:27 Speaker_03
I just want to make sure the considerations are out there. I hate going against the lions, but I understand they're, they have the best against the spread record of any team in the last three years. We got the T's either way. Tease the pack up.
01:17:43 Speaker_02
Packers minus two and a half is plus one 48.
01:17:48 Speaker_03
Wait, what? Packers minus two and a half is plus 148. Yeah. I want it to be more than that. I want a better price for that.
01:17:57 Speaker_02
Straight money line is plus 124. Yeah. Okay. I, to me, if the weather's going to be super weird and wonky, the over under is out for me.
01:18:07 Speaker_03
Sure. Sure. Yeah. I'm not, I'm not in here trying to argue for a total one way or the other.
01:18:12 Speaker_03
I think the Packers tease two and a half up to eight and a half, even though we know that Detroit's capable of winning by margin, not in these kinds of matchups, not in this matchup, not, it all depends on love.
01:18:25 Speaker_03
Obviously things can change, but if love is a go, I like the Packers.
01:18:30 Speaker_02
Well, we don't know if love is a go. It should be a reason to maybe not do anything with this game. What if they decide on Sunday that he's not playing and Malik Willis is somehow in our lives? Then we lose money. That's what happens.
01:18:42 Speaker_03
Although Malik Willis, you know, in his limited sample size, LaFleur is incredible. Let's just give him some flowers so that he hears it.
01:18:52 Speaker_02
Broncos are plus eight and a half in Baltimore. Baltimore still having some cornerback health issues. Sean Payton, there's back doors are always open in Baltimore.
01:19:07 Speaker_03
Lord have mercy. The back door is always open. Kind of like the Broncos. here's the issue. I do think Marlon Humphreys back. I do think the backup for him that also missed last week is back as well.
01:19:20 Speaker_03
And even with the issues that, that Baltimore has on defense, the idea of Bo Nix going into Baltimore and you know, the, the, the thing that, that Denver has done with, with great success, is, is throw the ball.
01:19:37 Speaker_03
That kid in his last six games has at least four games over 200 yards passing mate and, and, you know, against the Panthers. Now, again, the, the Panthers are, are, are D league. That's not a legit measuring stick, but they went away from the run.
01:19:53 Speaker_03
Neither one of their running backs, I think got to even 50 yards against, against the Panthers. they're going to have to try and establish the run against Baltimore, except for Baltimore is the best rush run defense in the league.
01:20:05 Speaker_03
And then I do think that, that even with what we've seen out of Baltimore in terms of its secondary, the vulnerabilities there, I I'm, I don't know, man. I, I, I like, I don't not,
01:20:17 Speaker_03
Under any circumstances advocating laying eight and a half because we just can't trust Baltimore to keep that door shut in the fourth quarter. But that's another great teaser. Eight and a half down to two and a half for Baltimore.
01:20:31 Speaker_02
You don't like that? What if I gave you Denver up to 11 and a half with the over adjusted at 38 and a half? and that like plus one Oh three.
01:20:42 Speaker_03
I love the over the over part of it is not an issue for me. Baltimore can win by margin Baltimore. That's that's the best offense I think their offense is better this year than last year. And they had that offense last year, made Lamar an MVP.
01:20:59 Speaker_02
And it's better this year cause they have Derrick Henry. We disagree and I'm crossing it off. Okay. Okay. I think, I think both of us could be right. I do like Sean Payton against that Ravens team.
01:21:09 Speaker_02
I also could see the Ravens just running all over them and the Broncos have had an easy schedule and you'd be like, God damn it. Why didn't I realize this is going to happen? All right. My two favorites and I'm probably,
01:21:22 Speaker_02
The Falcons-Cowboys game, which now is Falcons minus three. Oh, it's moving. Yeah, moved from minus two and a half to minus three. And I love the Falcons because I think Dallas sucks. Wow. I think they stink. Wow.
01:21:37 Speaker_02
And yet, this is the perfect team for them to play. because Atlanta doesn't have a pass rush. Exactly. And Dak can just throw the ball basically every down. He can. And hang in the game. He can. I still think the Falcons are gonna win. Okay.
01:21:54 Speaker_02
But I also think we're gonna have a lot of points. And my question is, is there, could you do some chicanery with this one? Where do you stand on the game, first of all?
01:22:03 Speaker_03
Um, I agree with the latter half of your thesis. I do think that, uh, the Cowboys are going to move the ball and there is with Dakota with Dak as quarterback coming off of a loss.
01:22:15 Speaker_03
Um, they're very good as underdogs and, and they're good as, as road underdogs. His record as, as a dog coming off of a loss is like, uh, in the 60% range, um, under some of these, these sort of circumstances that were.
01:22:28 Speaker_03
We're measuring and are relevant to this. The fact that Atlanta can't get home with a pass rush at all. And here's the concern I would have if you wagered on Atlanta.
01:22:39 Speaker_03
We watched Dallas go into Pittsburgh on a Sunday night game and Pittsburgh really couldn't get home at all.
01:22:47 Speaker_02
And they had some injuries.
01:22:49 Speaker_03
They did they back pick that defense apart and it was with a bunch of dudes that coming into that game You know Tolbert had the game-winning touchdown with incredible finger strength like, you know Turpin factored into that the second string tight end, you know, I I just think that that it's a It's a susceptible spot.
01:23:08 Speaker_03
I do like the idea of points in this game though because cousins and these weapons really have been meshing Well, what if I gave you
01:23:19 Speaker_02
What adjusted over under would excite you? What do you mean, in terms of a total? Yeah, like what if I was able to get this to 45 and a half?
01:23:31 Speaker_03
I mean, I'm fine with that over. I don't have any issue with that over.
01:23:34 Speaker_02
Cause you could do a little adjusted Dallas plus seven and a half with the over of 45 and a half. And that's basically even odds, minus 180. And then we root for points and Dallas to hang around. Love it. That's a good one.
01:23:49 Speaker_02
The thing that worries me is Atlanta running the ball on them and just like just running the fucking shit out of the ball. And Dallas never has the ball because Atlanta always has the ball. Fair enough. But I think Dallas is going to throw.
01:24:00 Speaker_02
I had that Pittsburgh game in my head too. If you give Dak time, He just moves the, but he moves the chains. He finds dudes. And that's kind of what you have to do against Atlanta.
01:24:10 Speaker_02
That's what everybody that's beaten them is just throwing the ball on them and move the ball down the field on them. All right. So Dallas plus seven and a half. Maybe I can get that over under toe.
01:24:22 Speaker_03
I wonder if I could, I mean, you could do a basic tease again. You're not supposed to tease totals, but if you tease Dallas up to nine and that totaled down to 46 and a half, I mean, uh, 45 and a half.
01:24:34 Speaker_05
Yeah.
01:24:37 Speaker_03
Dallas plus nine. That's a minus 120 T's. It's not the same price as the price that you have. At seven and a half, that's even odds. That's a better price. Yeah, so we'll do that.
01:24:51 Speaker_02
So Dallas, seven and a half. And then we get to root for Dallas and get mad if they fuck us. Who will send mad texts to Cuz and to Rahim. With the over of 45 and a half. And that's minus 108.
01:25:06 Speaker_03
Great.
01:25:07 Speaker_02
That's a good one. Yeah. And then we love the Rams against the Seahawks. We need to talk that one out.
01:25:14 Speaker_03
I don't know. I mean, it's it's it's Cooper Cup. These nuts on the field, like an amazing opportunity for this Rams team with their offensive line and Seattle's down. The vibes are bad.
01:25:27 Speaker_02
You heard Danny. Yeah, you can see they've lost for their last five. Their defense is 29th against the run. And this feels very Ramsey to me. Puka and Cup Deez Nuts, I love that combo. I also like Stafford as a road QB.
01:25:45 Speaker_02
As do I. Not giving a shit about anything. Not, not. All right, and we're staying away from the Bears.
01:25:53 Speaker_03
that's my humble opinion. Dream is one of his favorite bets. I understand the thesis. I just can't be in the situation of needing the bears to close out a game and watching those dunderheads. I mean, it, it, it like took
01:26:09 Speaker_03
uh, miraculous moronic moronic moronics, miraculous moronics for, for, for Chicago to give that game away. The, the, the handoff to the offensive lineman, seriously, one of the dumbest plays of the decade. I want Chicago to lose
01:26:27 Speaker_03
for the rest of the season so that I can buy them to win the Super Bowl next year when Mike Rabel is the quarterback.
01:26:33 Speaker_03
I mean, the coach, when Mike Rabel comes in with all with his coaching staff, with the talent that the Bears have on both sides of the ball, that team is talented. But those those big dummies and, you know, the players hold their coaches in contempt
01:26:49 Speaker_03
It was hilarious. One of my favorite undercurrents of Hard Knocks this season was the dumb, dumb Eber Flus making Caleb Williams go sit with him in his office and act like they're having one-on-one conversations.
01:27:04 Speaker_03
And Caleb Williams could barely hide his disdain for dummy Eber Flus. I mean, I just enjoyed it so much. But here we are. Those chickens have come home to roost. He'll be a fine defensive coordinator somewhere, by the way. Good defense.
01:27:19 Speaker_02
So we only have three million dollar picks this week. Oh. I think that's fine. Okay. I'm fine. If you're fine, I'm fine. Yeah.
01:27:29 Speaker_02
I don't really love the week and I think you get in mistakes with some of this stuff when you start overcompensating and grabbing stuff. Yeah, we disagreed on on a bunch of stuff, which I think is usually a bad sign.
01:27:43 Speaker_02
I do wish the Tennessee line was like two and a half, because I would take them against the Pats. I can't imagine the Pats would win two games in a row. I kind of like the Pats. Well, we'll see if Drake May plays or not. All right. It's time.
01:28:00 Speaker_02
The million dollar picks for week nine. We won $15,000 last week. And now we are up for the season, $178,000. Not bad after eight weeks. Great job, great job. We're scaling back a little this week. We're not gonna get to a million dollars.
01:28:15 Speaker_02
We are betting $200,000 on the following games. The Rams, plus one and a half in Seattle. We're bullish on the Rams in a whole bunch of different ways. The Rams for the division, five to one, intriguing little flyer if you wanna take it.
01:28:30 Speaker_02
Rams for the playoffs, plus 310. The Cup, Puka, Stafford. Kyron Williams, not Kieran.
01:28:39 Speaker_02
Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky- Ky-
01:29:01 Speaker_02
It is tease week. We're gonna scale it back a tiny bit and just take two games that we love. The Eagles, minus seven and a half against the Jags. You know what's really fun? Betting against Coach Middleseat.
01:29:13 Speaker_02
How many more chances are we gonna have to get? Eagles with six crappy defenses coming up here. Shout out to Dabundo for that one. But Jalen Hurts, 20 to one MVP. We're looking at that one. Anyway, Eagles minus seven and a half. Tease them down.
01:29:31 Speaker_02
six points with the Chiefs on Monday night against a terrible Tampa defense and poor Baker Mayfield who doesn't have Godwin or Mike Evans teasing them from minus eight and a half, six points. Eagles, Chiefs both have to win 200 on that.
01:29:45 Speaker_02
And then last but not least, we can't lose either way because this is fake money and if the Cowboys F us, then we just get to send angry texts to Cousin Sal. Cowboys plus seven and a half parlayed with the over
01:29:59 Speaker_02
With the over 45 and a half in Atlanta, we expect a lot of points in this game. That is minus 108. Do you want to do an anytime touchdown scorer bet too?
01:30:10 Speaker_03
Is there anybody like, I mean, Derek Henry every week, what is it? Minus 300 for him to score a touchdown this week against Denver.
01:30:18 Speaker_02
It's probably some preposterous number, but well, we'll, we'll throw, we won't put money on that, but that that'll be our recommendation. Derek Henry. Those are the million dollar picks. for week nine.
01:30:31 Speaker_02
House, before you go, we gotta go quickly through some NBA stuff, so we gotta take one more break.
01:30:41 Speaker_00
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Check with your local retailer for current information. Lincoln and Aviator are trademarks of Ford or its affiliates. All right, House, we wanted to just quickly dive into over-unders with the NBA again.
01:31:57 Speaker_02
It's been, we're in day 10, we don't know what's gonna happen tonight, but there's already been some movement, there's been some regrets, there's been some self-congratulations.
01:32:06 Speaker_02
One of the things that's really moved, Memphis, the over-under for them has dropped from, I think it was 47 and a half when we did the podcast with Vercillo a month ago. It's now 44 and a half. Oh, wow. And it's not looking great for them.
01:32:21 Speaker_02
And we were wondering in that West carousel, who was going to be good, who's not going to be good. It was somebody going to get nudged out that we weren't expecting. And Memphis has had some injuries already. Verno's making just a ton of excuses.
01:32:33 Speaker_02
He's bringing up things that happened two years ago, three years ago. Poor Verno. 45 wins seems ambitious for this team, but that one jumped out at me. What'd you think?
01:32:43 Speaker_03
I, I still, well, we all took the under, I think, didn't we all take the under on Memphis? Yeah. We know nobody locked it though, because it was just too much variance. We haven't really seen jaw get going. He hasn't been up to his level yet.
01:32:57 Speaker_03
We've seen it in, in, you know, fits and starts. But it, it, when is the team going to be healthy? That's the thing we keep saying, well, you know, let's see this team when they have all their guys. When is that going to be?
01:33:10 Speaker_03
When is, you know, triple J's back? Is he, is he, is he good? Like how good is he going to be? Canard still, you know, dinged.
01:33:17 Speaker_03
Like, when are we going to see that, that, that team and with all of its strength, where they're able to get on a stretch and, and, and run it on out. I mean, I play the under.
01:33:27 Speaker_02
Do they seem as special as they did three years ago just because the league's so much more talented?
01:33:32 Speaker_02
Like their nucleus, which seemed really cool three years ago, now I look around league pass and it feels like 15 teams have a cool nucleus and I just don't see them from a talent standpoint swimming in the pool of some of these other teams.
01:33:46 Speaker_02
So that was one. We both had Atlanta over 36 and a half. That's dropped to 35 and a half. You just watched them twice against your Wizards. What were your thoughts?
01:33:59 Speaker_03
I don't know what's going on. If the idea is they're experimenting with lineups, if there are injuries that I'm unaware of on Atlanta, like I need, I haven't gone deep into the Hawks hive to see Reddit. Yeah.
01:34:15 Speaker_03
I don't know what's going on, but David Roddy played 32 minutes last night and had the green light. You had the green light from, from coach coach Snyder. They can't defend anyone. Jonas Valanciutas, what a guy. He already, I'm ready to crown him.
01:34:35 Speaker_03
You gotta trade him now. When can you trade him? He's an amazing stabilizing force.
01:34:42 Speaker_03
He was openly coaching on the floor the young guy So Washington played all three of the guys that they drafted in the first round this most recent draft I mean SAR actually looked pretty good SAR had a couple moves.
01:34:56 Speaker_03
He knocked down a couple threes Bob carried it pretty good like he was able to run in a straight line back and forth No, he made he looked you know decent but this is the Hawks defense
01:35:09 Speaker_03
Why did he score 133 points last night without really breaking a sweat? I don't know what the... They had no answer for Valanchunas and the Wizards, you know, cut them to death. I'm worried about the Hawks. I'm worried.
01:35:26 Speaker_02
I'm a little worried, too, because you shouldn't be losing to the Wizards. Not back-to-back games. Yeah, that's pretty rough. We like Brooklyn. It was 18 and a half when we did it. It's now up to 20 and a half. Sure.
01:35:38 Speaker_02
And it makes sense from what I'm watching. They're super competitive in these games. Cam Thomas, who we made fun of a week ago, the guy's scoring, you know, defenses are like now gearing to stop him, and he's still getting points, so Schroeder,
01:35:54 Speaker_02
I don't know what they're going to do because the team's almost a little too confident, whether they're going to try to figure out how to sabotage that. But they've jumped out at me as like they were in the running for worst team in the league.
01:36:05 Speaker_02
I don't think they are.
01:36:07 Speaker_03
They play hard, and then, you know, Schroeder... And Easy could have beaten Denver, by the way, too.
01:36:13 Speaker_02
Oh, yeah. Their record, they could have a winning record right now.
01:36:16 Speaker_03
Absolutely. No, they're alive. If they keep playing this hard and their guys are committed, they're on the same page. They're playing hard for Jordy.
01:36:24 Speaker_03
I think that, you know, Jordy, at some point, management might step in and say, look, look, look, we need to take it. And we'll start taking some rotations out of that.
01:36:31 Speaker_02
Jordy, here's some Alibaba stock. Can you just play Ben Simmons in crunch time and hope the other team fouls him?
01:36:38 Speaker_03
But right now, they're live.
01:36:41 Speaker_02
It's a weird team, like they bring Claxton off the bench. The Cam Thomas stuff, some of the possessions with him, he looks like a 30 point scorer.
01:36:53 Speaker_02
And we made fun of him on the Over Under pod about how he's a good stats bad team guy, but he was making, I might have to usher an apology soon.
01:37:05 Speaker_03
Let's just let it play out a little bit. We're still in a weird season right now.
01:37:10 Speaker_02
The Bulls are up to 30 and a half, which matches the eye test.
01:37:14 Speaker_02
Yeah, it was I think 28 and a half when we did it, but you know that it's a team that has a lot of professional basketball players on offense and they're kind of a pain in the ass to play. I've actually been pretty impressed by them.
01:37:28 Speaker_03
That's another team that's playing hard. They're not playing to tank and I don't even know that they're necessarily auditioning assets for the purposes of trading them. I think they're going to try and play.
01:37:39 Speaker_03
And I think they're going to try and make the play. And that's how they, that what we've seen so far. And they do have talent. I mean, part of the case that we discussed with Rosillo at the over under pod was like, what's the rebound for Guinea.
01:37:51 Speaker_03
What's what's good Guinea look like. He's got the keys to the car. He looks pretty good to me.
01:37:57 Speaker_02
Yeah. They, you know, conversely, like when, like when you're watching Atlanta and I, I still like that. I'm not ready to give up on the Hawks yet, but they look like kind of a mess. The, the mess.
01:38:10 Speaker_03
Yeah. Right. The interior defense for Atlanta is an abomination. Literally if they, they should trade for Yardas Valanciunas that they might win, you know, 45, they, they're, I don't know if you don't, their defense, they just don't have a body.
01:38:25 Speaker_02
The Cavs, one of our great ones. What did we have them before the year? That was like 48 and a half.
01:38:31 Speaker_03
It was the high 40s, yeah.
01:38:32 Speaker_02
Yeah, it was like 48 and a half. That is up to 52 and a half on FanDuel. And then if you go to the division, which I am proud to say I am a Cavs division ticket holder, because I was in Boston making FanDuel bets like a month ago.
01:38:47 Speaker_02
The Cavs are now minus 140 for the Central. The Bucs are plus 270. The Pacers are plus 340. And I gotta be honest, I don't think those Cavs odds are, I actually think those are pretty good odds. I think they should be like two to one favorites, right?
01:39:03 Speaker_03
Sure, sure. The way that, this was the thing, this was the idea coming in and why we were so bullish on them. We were like, You know, let's see Kenny Atkinson with this team. Remember how Kenny Atkinson had wings, how he nurtured wings.
01:39:17 Speaker_02
Let's see Kenny Atkinson with a healthy garland and a Mitchell who knows he's going to be there and a team that's been together for three years. It looks great.
01:39:24 Speaker_03
Mobley and Jarrett and him empowering Mobley especially. You can't overstate how impactful his assertiveness has been thus far.
01:39:37 Speaker_02
What do you think a division parlay of OKC, Cleveland, and the Celtics is? All three of those to win their revisions. What would your guess be for that? OKC, Cleveland, Boston. Can you get it to even odds? A tiny bit better than even odds?
01:39:51 Speaker_02
What if I told you it was plus 268? Oh, wow. What am I misunderstanding about this? The Celtics odds, they're still only minus 210 for the Atlantic, because people still believe in the Knicks.
01:40:03 Speaker_02
And then OKC, because of Minnesota's in there, they're only minus 220. And those odds seem crazy to me.
01:40:10 Speaker_03
I agree with this.
01:40:11 Speaker_02
What would have to happen for OKC not to have the best record in that division?
01:40:15 Speaker_03
I had both of those teams winning their divisions in the minus 400 byte. Like, we've seen enough. We've only seen five games, but that's enough for me.
01:40:23 Speaker_02
Totally. I was really surprised by that. Alright, a couple more over-unders, because this is really fun. And we haven't even gotten to the super fun one yet, and I can't wait to discuss it. Denver. Still holding tight at 49 and a half.
01:40:41 Speaker_02
Oh, under, under, under. It was 51 and a half when we, uh, when we did the pod. Under. That seems, they're going to win 50 games. I don't see that at all.
01:40:51 Speaker_03
You're allowed to curse on the Bill Simmons podcast. Fuck no, they're not winning 50 games.
01:40:55 Speaker_02
What are you talking about? What would have to happen? Westbrook would have to be, have like a complete career resurgence.
01:41:01 Speaker_03
There is, they, they, they have one of the worst benches in the NBA. They walked in like this is disrespectful. Honestly, it's disrespectful to joker for this tension between, you know, in the, in the, in the GM and the coach. Yes.
01:41:15 Speaker_03
And, and, and the personnel decisions that have been made, you can't use up the joker three time MVP And we're going to just waste away their opportunity to really compete because they gave Michael Porter Jr. a giant goddamn contract.
01:41:32 Speaker_03
And this is the thing that kills teams in the NBA. You cannot pay shitty role good players like super effing stars. And that's what they did. And now they're going to pay the price for it.
01:41:45 Speaker_02
It almost sounds like you have personal experience as a fan with the team doing that.
01:41:53 Speaker_03
10, 15 years worth. Well, the most recent 15 years though, of, of, of, uh, you know, arenas who immediately, I mean, that was my favorite.
01:42:03 Speaker_02
You guys in this, you guys in this thing, Andre Blatch for his extension kicked in was my favorite NBA moment of the century.
01:42:11 Speaker_03
That was only a three year contract. That was, It was still the best.
01:42:14 Speaker_02
What was better than that ever in the history of front offices?
01:42:17 Speaker_03
I mean, Jan Mahinmy got a four year, $50 billion deal. Go back and look there. It's it's amazing. Washington's the best.
01:42:25 Speaker_02
What was the trade when you traded the Steph Curry pick? It was for Randy Foy and Mike Miller.
01:42:31 Speaker_03
Yeah, that's what it was. That was the trade, because we were just gonna add some prejudices.
01:42:35 Speaker_02
And this kick ended up being, you could have had your choice of Ricky Rubio, Priyasi Ellinger, or Steph Curry.
01:42:39 Speaker_03
True, that's true. Those were the choices. Yes, correct. That's right. Unbelievable.
01:42:45 Speaker_02
See, people don't know the NBA history. They think the NBA started when Kobe won his last title in the Lakers in 2010, and LeBron went to Miami. That was the start of the NBA. Other shit happened, including that.
01:42:55 Speaker_02
Uh, Clippers over under one of my locks was Clippers under 37 and a half. Now they did lose to Portland last night.
01:43:04 Speaker_03
Yes.
01:43:05 Speaker_02
But there over has jumped to 38 and a half. And I, I still feel okay with my position. I gotta be honest.
01:43:14 Speaker_03
Yeah. I, look, they, they play hard and they play defense. That's the thing that, that has impressed me the most with the Clippers.
01:43:20 Speaker_03
Well, I mean, you know, they're, you're going to get, have bad spots, uh, schedule wise, um, throughout the NBA season and who knows what kind of uh, mischief folks might've got into. And there are always sub stories about losses.
01:43:35 Speaker_03
But, um, I was so impressed by, uh, the way that the Clippers played.
01:43:40 Speaker_02
They had, uh, yeah, that was, that was for some reason, the Clippers have always played Golden State. Well, there's certain teams. Indiana always, always looks really good against Boston or really horrible.
01:43:51 Speaker_02
Like there's certain matchups that just seem to, for whatever reason, the Clippers do well against them. Lakers are up to 44 and a half. which looked a lot more enticing until they lost by 30 against Cleveland.
01:44:02 Speaker_02
It's like, yeah, this is what happens when you play young athletic teams. I still feel like they're gonna be around that number. I'm glad I don't have that as a lock either way. And I guess it would depend on the AD help.
01:44:13 Speaker_02
Here's one though, Miami, when we did it, I think it was 44 and a half, now it's 43 and a half. They feel very tradish to me. I am on Jimmy Butler trade watch now. Like, I'm just ready.
01:44:31 Speaker_03
Didn't they basically announce, didn't Pat Riley basically say when he publicly called out Butler as the summer arrived that he's essentially available?
01:44:44 Speaker_02
Golden State or Houston, if you had to pick a team for him. Oh, wow. Just for being a basketball fan with no dog in the race.
01:44:51 Speaker_03
Well, who can Golden State give Miami that helps Miami's situation in any way, shape or form?
01:44:58 Speaker_02
It's probably like, uh, it's like Kamingo, Wiggins, one more contract and a couple of picks.
01:45:05 Speaker_03
I mean, those like, oh, we want golden states, you know, uh, afterthoughts. I don't know. Houston is much more viable to me because they have like a bunch of young talent.
01:45:17 Speaker_02
Um, dying to do a three for one too. Yeah. I hit that last week. Uh, okay. The Milwaukee bucks. Oh, poor doc. Their over under is down to 46 and a half. It's still too high. I think when we did it, it was 50 1⁄2 or 51 1⁄2?
01:45:33 Speaker_03
It was right around that 51 50. It might have been high 49s even. It was close.
01:45:40 Speaker_02
It was up there. Where do you stand on the 46 1⁄2?
01:45:41 Speaker_03
I would still take the under. I'm not hesitating. There's no reservations about it whatsoever. You know, every other game, it turns out it's once a week game.
01:45:53 Speaker_02
I named him that last year. Everyone made fun of me. He's good once a week. And then he plays two other games.
01:46:01 Speaker_03
It's too much, and honestly, you know, I kept giving you a hard time when we were doing the over-under pod about talking about the idea of Giannis maybe, you know, looking to take his talent somewhere else.
01:46:12 Speaker_02
Yeah, you made me feel like a dick. That's what you did. You made me feel like a prick.
01:46:15 Speaker_03
I, I, I, they have continued to invest in him. They've given him every extension he's been eligible for. Yeah. But that's not a, that's not a competitive team. They, they have no answers. Their answers are to trade all of those guys.
01:46:29 Speaker_03
They need to start trading guys. Now they can't wait. Like if there's any Brooke Lopez, well, I mean, Brooke, like Brooke Lopez as a veteran, like a three point stabilizing New Orleans. Yeah. Right, right, right, right. Do it now. Don't wait there.
01:46:44 Speaker_03
You have no chance. That team is dead. That is a dead on arrival team.
01:46:49 Speaker_02
Well, it was 50 and a half when we did the pod. So it's dropped four wins, which is a lot.
01:46:54 Speaker_03
Yeah.
01:46:55 Speaker_02
That tells you all you need to know. The, um, Oklahoma city's around the same. Orlando is still the same at 47 and a half, which I was really surprised by. Why? Cause they look like a 50 win team to me. I thought that would have bumped up like a win.
01:47:11 Speaker_02
We locked in on them with blocks for over 47 and a half. So feeling good. Okay. This is another classic. So before the year, the Philadelphia 76ers over under 50 and a half. What do you think it is now? 47 and a half. 46 and a half. God damn it.
01:47:33 Speaker_02
So the Bucks and the Sixers have both dropped four wins in 10 days since the start of the season. And by the way, I think I'd like the under. I understand.
01:47:43 Speaker_03
I went back to look at the sheet and I couldn't believe that I took their over. I don't know what I was imagining.
01:47:49 Speaker_02
You weren't scared of the Embiid thing and I was telling you that there was stuff, there were rumors about his knee in September.
01:47:55 Speaker_03
Well, part of it for me, I'm sure, was the fact that I thought that Paul George and Maxie were going to be enough. I thought Paul George would be playing basketball by now. He's not.
01:48:07 Speaker_02
He had the bruising when we did the podcast to be clear. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a three-week injury.
01:48:13 Speaker_03
And that had just happened. It happened in the 24 hours before we sat down.
01:48:17 Speaker_02
Stop making excuses.
01:48:19 Speaker_03
You fucked up.
01:48:19 Speaker_02
It was a fuck up.
01:48:20 Speaker_03
I did. It is a fuck up. I'm just saying, you know, I imagine.
01:48:23 Speaker_02
You know what else is a fuck up? Pretending that Embiid was on a rest program when he's fucking hurt. Also a mistake.
01:48:30 Speaker_03
It's so weird. Why did they do that? Why say anything?
01:48:33 Speaker_02
Because they didn't want to be embarrassed because they gave him an extension and he's fucking hurt. What was their choice?
01:48:40 Speaker_02
How about this, that they let them play in the Olympics, and it's like, well, it's not their job, it's the player, it's free will, the players get to do.
01:48:46 Speaker_02
And beating Kawhi going to the Olympics is one of the biggest jokes of this decade, that either of those guys thought that was a good idea, and that their teams had to pretend publicly that it was a good idea to go along with it.
01:48:57 Speaker_02
Yeah, yeah, no, it'll be good, it'll be good for you, it's good for your brand. And Beat should have been in a fucking hyperbaric chamber for six months. Literally getting training and altitude like yeah, what were we doing?
01:49:09 Speaker_02
Well here's the things ridiculous.
01:49:11 Speaker_03
It's a it's bad for and bead in the sense of Performing for the team that pays him and performing in the league that is you know the moat the book the the true way to that he's going to be compensated.
01:49:24 Speaker_03
But for his, he played great in some of those games. Um, and, and there were some like genuine and bead moments and he has that, uh, metal now.
01:49:35 Speaker_03
And I do think that there was, um, you know, we've, we've talked about this in the past with these international competitions, some of that winning dust might've rubbed off on him being around those guys and watching how they did it.
01:49:47 Speaker_03
Like he hasn't been around very much winning dust in his career. and seeing him, he's on the floor when Steph goes off. He's on the floor with LeBron. That all could ultimately pay off, because really it won't matter until April.
01:50:03 Speaker_03
But for the purposes of Over Under, this is a dead under. And I'm going to lose my money.
01:50:09 Speaker_02
You and I have been following basketball a long time. A long time. Too long. We remember too many things. I don't know what to do with a lot of the information in my brain at this point. He's had so many injuries that we have just seen this before.
01:50:26 Speaker_02
When we saw it with Blake Griffin a few years ago, it's like you just start counting all the injuries and it's like, oh man, this isn't gonna go great. There's been too many now. And I just wonder if he's at that point.
01:50:37 Speaker_02
And they wouldn't even tell us what the knee injury is now. We don't even know what it is. But he's had problems with both knees and he's gigantic. Right.
01:50:46 Speaker_02
And at some point you pass the point of no return, which is why it's so nuts that A, they gave him the extension and B, it made a ton of sense why he would have wanted the extension because maybe he knew he wasn't a hundred percent.
01:50:58 Speaker_02
It's like, fine, I'll take one more giant, you know, couple extra years.
01:51:03 Speaker_03
Him wanting the extension makes perfect sense. I just don't understand enough about the dynamics for them to say one word about what his health situation is or when he's going to come out.
01:51:14 Speaker_02
I told you, they were embarrassed. I really feel like they thought they could kind of slide around this and have nobody notice. Rest management and have People go, oh yeah, they're doing risk management.
01:51:26 Speaker_02
And people getting mad at that instead of getting mad at the fact that Embiid is fucking injured.
01:51:31 Speaker_03
It's so stupid. I hold the brain trust for the Sixers perhaps in too high a regard. That's maybe the thing.
01:51:43 Speaker_02
Sacramento is down 44 and a half. Actually, that might be where it was. I don't have an opinion on that. San Antonio, who we went under on, is the same at 35 and a half. No. Utah. I still like the under. Which I went under on. And you, what did you do?
01:52:00 Speaker_02
I went under.
01:52:01 Speaker_03
I definitely went under on Utah.
01:52:02 Speaker_02
Yeah, I think we all may have gone under on this.
01:52:04 Speaker_03
That poor kid Hendricks, what happened to his leg?
01:52:06 Speaker_02
No, you went over.
01:52:07 Speaker_03
Oh no.
01:52:08 Speaker_02
For Utah? 27 and a half, it's now 24 and a half.
01:52:12 Speaker_03
Shit. That poor kid Hendricks, I hope he gets back. I hope that his leg, you know. That was awful.
01:52:16 Speaker_02
I know, that poor guy. I've never seen that injury before, the way he did it.
01:52:20 Speaker_03
Yeah, yeah, because it wasn't contact. He didn't come down on somebody's foot. That's what you expect to see in basketball.
01:52:26 Speaker_02
It was almost like when you're watching. Yeah, when you're watching Instagram reels and somebody's going to get their mail and it's icy out and their leg goes a long way. I've never seen just a basketball player. It was just so such a fluke. Yeah.
01:52:39 Speaker_02
Felt bad for that dude. I'm rooting for him. Last but not least, you're Washington Wizards. Over 20 and a half, you know, I'm so pissed Here's the thing.
01:52:52 Speaker_03
This is the team that I thought they might have last season I this is like some professionals mixed with kids the professionals set sort of the the expectation They they lead the kids into you know, the possibility of just just compete just compete.
01:53:11 Speaker_03
Yeah, the number was low last season and They, they added, uh, in the form of, of, uh, yeah, balance Judas. I'm telling you, he was on the floor coaching, Bob Carrington and, and, and coaching, uh, County George.
01:53:27 Speaker_03
And, and it was amazing to see he's pushing star where, where he needs to go. And I saw her and, and, and balance units weren't on the floor very much at the same time, but like you could see him. It was such a beautiful, beautiful number.
01:53:40 Speaker_03
I'm ready to I look if you put him next to the Big E and Bobby Dandridge. He bought all in on. They said we're going to pay you. Come come be this guy for this team. And he bought all in on it. And I just was.
01:53:52 Speaker_03
Now I'll tell you it was very quiet in the stadium and I was sitting you know big thanks to our good friends at FanDuel for the seats. Close enough to hear some of the actual dialogue. But man I was so impressed by that guy.
01:54:11 Speaker_03
So you're thinking, I went under as a lock at 20 and a half. they could win 21 games. They're still going to be one of the three worst teams with, if they win 21 games.
01:54:22 Speaker_02
Um, yeah, it's irresponsible if they don't trade balance soon as before the trade deadline, because they got playoff teams actually need that dude. I can think of four teams right now that could, you know, it could use them.
01:54:34 Speaker_03
The Pelicans. Holy shit. What is going on?
01:54:36 Speaker_02
They're probably not allowed to trade for him. You know, last thing, um, Celtics Pacers last night, You know, the Celts say, no poor Zingas, like you can't get to the rim on them, right?
01:54:48 Speaker_02
So they started playing Keita in the second half to try to change some of that. And the Pacers were playing great, Celtics couldn't hit a three. And it just seemed like one of those games.
01:54:57 Speaker_02
And Joe Mazz, who I don't think I've done a harder 180 on out of any coach or manager I've ever had. Like, I fucking love Joe Mazz.
01:55:05 Speaker_02
Did you see his thing about Katie Banks and Beck wrote about it today for the Ringer that he thinks they should have basketball fighting? Yeah, I mean, Joe Mazz is the best. I agree with him.
01:55:15 Speaker_02
But Joe Mazz was feeling out the game the same way I was watching it, where I was like, I know we're down 18, but I feel like we can come back and just kind of stuck with this lineup, stuck with Cato.
01:55:26 Speaker_02
And the Celts came back and all of a sudden they had a little, you know, we're the fucking champs.
01:55:33 Speaker_02
Last three minutes, huge comeback, Tatum hit a big three, send it to OT, and then the Pacers just made a couple, I mean it came down to like Siakam had a 29 footer at the top of the key, which I will give him a hundred times out of a hundred, and he made it.
01:55:47 Speaker_02
And we got a wide open shot from Jalen, who sucked the whole night, and he missed it. It was weirdly a great loss. It was like a, let's defend our turf kind of loss.
01:55:57 Speaker_02
And the fact that they look this good without Porzingis, um, I just, I like everything I'm seeing from them. It's, it's really like this team is good. Really, really, really good as a defending champ.
01:56:09 Speaker_03
The substory that I like also though is the Pacers as a potential thorn in the side for Boston because that playoff series was closer than what history is going to show.
01:56:20 Speaker_03
They were competitive and their style of offense does give Boston, they're a rare team that can give Boston a little bit of trouble because of how Carlisle schemes up.
01:56:30 Speaker_02
You know what's interesting about them? And it's been the whole year. Like, they didn't have Matherin in the playoffs last year.
01:56:35 Speaker_02
Matherin, if you watch them knowing nothing, like if you woke up from a coma after five years and you just watched the Pacers game, you would think Matherin was like their alpha. Sure. I get that.
01:56:45 Speaker_02
Sometimes he's like, clear out, I'm gonna fucking score here. Right. The Pacers are good, man. They're good. I think you could make a case, Orlando, Cleveland, and the Pacers
01:56:56 Speaker_02
You know, over Milwaukee and Philly, I think I would take all three of those as regular season teams. I don't think there's any question.
01:57:03 Speaker_03
But it was a really good game. Yeah, they're all gonna finish ahead of Philly.
01:57:07 Speaker_02
I'm super happy with the Celtics' season. Then you watch OKC, same thing. Like, just, they have depth, they're athletic, they're fucking competitive as hell. Like, Chet just loves going against Wembley. That game was awesome. It was awesome.
01:57:20 Speaker_03
I love I love so far what we've seen out of Oklahoma City in terms of a tiny click of maturity. I see a patience in them that I don't know that I saw last year. There's the Williams is a little bit better. He might be. Yeah.
01:57:33 Speaker_02
And then Wiggins is a little bit better. And while a second year and then Chet, you know, he made a little bit of a leap, like not not quite the same leap that Palo has been hinting at.
01:57:43 Speaker_03
I saw some of the bench with Hartenstein talking to Chet. They clearly have a nice rapport. I wonder if those guys in their, you know, training camp before Hartenstein got hurt, like if there's like a mentor thing going on there.
01:57:54 Speaker_03
Because, because Hartenstein, he's a big mother effer, a big physical guy. I wonder if he's imparting some stuff to Chet.
01:58:02 Speaker_02
That's going to be an absolute bitch of a team to play in the playoffs. I've seen nothing. We like them as the one seed, division champ, best record. I've seen nothing that makes me think we were off on that.
01:58:15 Speaker_02
I also like when they do the post-games and the whole team is in the post-game interview.
01:58:19 Speaker_03
It's great.
01:58:20 Speaker_02
It's a little 2001 Pat's-ish. But yeah, from everything I've seen, the Celtics and the Thunder just seem like they're up here. It's a drop. Night to night it could be five, six, seven other teams and that's it. All right, House, great to see you.
01:58:37 Speaker_02
Thanks for sticking around for the whole pod. Happy Halloween. Shout out to our guy Michael Myers. Shout out to Kyle Creighton and Steve Cerruti for producing. Thanks to Danny Kelly for joining us as well.
01:58:47 Speaker_02
You can watch clips and videos from this podcast on the Bill Simmons podcast. And we can see you on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel. We can see House on Sunday on the Ringer Sunday pregame show with Raheem and Sal and a probably despondent JJ.
01:59:04 Speaker_03
No, JJ will bounce back. He knew. He knew it was coming.
01:59:07 Speaker_02
I think he knew when you just can't win the World Series when your team screws up that many little things during the course of the series. And that's it. All right. Good to see you have a good time. Yes.
01:59:40 Speaker_02
Must be 21 plus and president select states for Kansas and affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and president DC gambling problem call 100 gambler visit rg-help.com call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org
01:59:58 Speaker_02
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