Week 10 Preview: Steelers-Bengals for the inside track in the AFC North tops the slate

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2:11Robert Mays: Welcome to The Athletic Football Show, brought to you by the U.S. Bank Smartly Visa Signature Card. I'm Robert Mays. Week 10 is here. Got some good ones on the slate this week. Bengals, Steelers, Game of the Week. A little bit of a mini-game of the week with Packers, Vikings. had a great time chatting through all of this with Dave and Derek. Let's get to the week 10 preview right now.

2:40Robert Mays: It's the week 10 preview. Several games that we're going to hit from this slate, but we do have one game of the week that we're going to kick this off with. The Sunday night game is a banger. Steelers at Bengals. The winner of this game is in first place in the AFC North. And with the Jacoby Percet era starting in Baltimore, these are the teams in the AFC North. And so this is a massive, massive game to get the inside track to win this division. I kind of love this for a number of reasons. I mean, if you look at the schedule, there's a number of really good games here that we would have predicted coming into this season would have been really good.

3:12That could have been like Game of the Week's Lions-Patriots, which we'll talk about. Packers-Vikings has a lot to it.

3:19Robert Mays: Packers-Vikings is probably 1B among all the games. this week coming into the season especially this one has a little bit less punch now but like Niners Cowboys could have been like awesome coming into this game you know Chargers Ravens for a number of reasons we thought coming into the year could have been funny yeah this should have been the best week on the slate yes but the fact that like we're here in week 10 and Bengals Steelers is the game of the week is like it's kind of a cool place to have arrived for these teams I think

3:42Derrik Klassen: and I'm legitimately excited about it I know like you know we kind of we've we've taken our jabs at the Steelers over the years and sometimes they wind up in these games and you're like is this actually interesting I am actually really interested in this the Steelers have already beaten the Bengals this year feels like a lifetime ago it was so early in the season but this is this is a Steelers team that feels like it has legitimate teeth and this is this is like an AFC North grudge match that is worthy of this sort of spotlight when that hasn't always been the case

4:11Robert Mays: the feel to this to me is one of the more notable parts of it and just what these teams are in this moment the Bengals even we could have anticipated the Bengals scrapping the under center stuff and getting back to this version of the offense the Bengals right now are the ideal version or like the 25th percent 75th percentile outcome version of what the Bengals could have been in the preseason they have arguably the best passing offense in the league the defense right now is like 19th in defensive DVOA which is like perfectly acceptable it's like all right that that's the bar the Bengals needed to clear the Bengals are who we thought they might have been if they were a good team.

4:45Robert Mays: The Steelers are nothing like I thought they would be. I mean, you could draw a line to this Steelers team with the offensive line quality, understanding if that group came together, would they be able to run the ball? But I think how well that's happened and the fact that the passing offense, especially after the first two weeks, ended up looking like it does and is so much more watchable than I ever could have anticipated. I didn't predict we would get this type of Steelers team by week 10 in this sort of game, even if I could see the Bengals coming.

5:14Derrik Klassen: Well, you didn't know you'd have Jeremy Bernard just tying it all together, just making everything look so funny.

5:19Robert Mays: That I could have predicted. To me, it would be the quarterback actually playing. Being willing to do it. Listen, you were on the other end where you were like, Jeremy Bernard might be awesome. I don't know if we're going to get enough out of the quarterback for any of that to matter. And I do think that's the cool part of it. I think there were a lot of reasons to be excited about the offense. Like Jeremy Bernard was coming in. The offensive line has been in this state for two years where it's like, God, they have like so much young talent. Are they ever going to like actually get it over the line?

5:41And now they clearly have. And the quarterback is not, you know, he's still imperfect, obviously, but he is actually allowing. But it's way better than I anticipated it to be cool.

5:50Derrik Klassen: I know we've talked plenty about the Steelers offensive line in the last few weeks, but I was thinking about it previewing this matchup that the Steelers started this season trading Broderick Jones. And it was, you know, kind of an example of no matter how many resources you spend on a unit, you can't guarantee that it's going to click the way that you want it to. And it's refreshing to see that actually happening now. Like those, those guys are hitting like Fautanu. Obviously Frazier speaks for himself. Maxi and I'm not sure has gotten better every single week. Mason McCormick probably doesn't get enough love either for like the attitude that he brings for this to the Steelers offensive line.

6:26Derrik Klassen: So, and Brock Hoffman's been good.

6:27Robert Mays: That was like, it's under the, under the radar move, but like going to Brock Hoffman, he did not start the season as a starter. And Mike McCarthy special, right? That's right. And so, I mean, that's an under, that's it. That is not a big splashy signing, but it was a depth signing that ultimately became became pretty important because they changed the entire right side of the line three or four weeks into the season it's made a difference it's just cool that it it feels it feels like it's been about

6:48Derrik Klassen: a two-year wait for all of the talent to click the way that you wanted it to and it finally has and uh the other two things of it one they moved a lot of those guys around this year like the left side like a lot of those guys were playing on the red side you know with like Fautano and stuff like that and then also like their sixth offensive lineman Spencer Anderson is like pretty good he was a starter yeah he was the starter to be in the season exactly so their their offensive line talent and what they can do because of it is pretty awesome.

7:11Robert Mays: All right, let's dig into a few things specifically that we're focusing in on this game. Derek, why don't you start us off? The one thing that you were looking for in Steelers Bengals is what? We just talked about how talented this offensive line is, and I think that's absolutely true. I think specifically in the run game, they've been incredible. Like just the movement that Fautonu can get, McCormick, Frazier, all those guys. If people have not gone back and watched the video that you did on the Steelers run game last week on our YouTube channel. I would encourage them to go check that out after they're finished watching this.

7:41Funny enough, Dave and I did not talk about what we're going to do our videos on. I did Steelers run game and he did a Zach Frazier video. So both of those you should go check out.

7:47Derrik Klassen: They wrote a poem in that game against Cleveland. It was fantastic. They were amazing. And I think that game is important. And part of what I highlighted in my video, the talent's great. The running backs have been playing at a really high level. The way they're scheming it up in game planning this year, I think is pretty phenomenal. Like, I think they really like a lot of duo, but they get to duo to, like, keep them on track so that they can throw these really cool curveballs. Like, they'll do some of these, like, double insert plays, or they'll just get to, like, in the Cleveland game, they just ran a bunch of trap.

8:14Because it's like, well, Cleveland plays in these four down fronts where everybody's spread out. You know where you can just move these guys. And so I just think that they've done a really good job with understanding who they're playing against, getting a lot of that movement. And they brand the ball pretty well against the Bengals the first time at these two plays. And I would say in some ways, you know, the Bengals defense has settled in. I would also say the Steelers offense and run game is better than it. It's better now than it was in week three. And so they ran the ball well in that game, which, by the way, they had this like double split zone where like two tight ends were moving over to the left hand side.

8:45They run zone to the right. It's a toss. Warren bends it back. It's an 87 yard gain. Gets called back for like an extremely bogus DK Metcalf holding call. And like if that doesn't happen, like they just kind of like more easily run away with that game. And so I do think that this, the Bengals deep run defense specifically has been very good against a lot of opponents. I do think the Steelers are pretty well equipped to give them some trouble again.

9:06Derrik Klassen: I mean, to your point, they have. They had a 40 % rushing success rate in that first game. They ran for 138 yards. And you brought it up in the production meeting. What was the gain that Jalen Warren had? It was an 87 yarder that gets pulled off because DK Metcalf. It's like they call him for holding. One, the flag is thrown like way late. And then two, like, he just kind of is bigger and stronger than DJ Turner. Like, that's it.

9:31Robert Mays: Would you have anticipated the Steelers run game schematically being this interesting based on what Mike McCarthy's stuff looked like in Dallas? I don't think I would have. Because they did, like, weird shit in Dallas. Like, they would do some of those, like, the full, like, they would do, like, full house with, like, two jumbo offensive linemen. Like, they would do some stuff that was more like a curiosity than, like, wow, I think the run game is incredibly well designed. I think what they're tapping into right now is is really something different and maybe that's you know Dallas offensive lines have usually been good this this Steelers offensive line truly does allow you to do some some crazy stuff I just the combination of I was I was looking at their staff earlier today like is there a run game coordinator?

10:08Robert Mays: There isn't looking at it. I think that the main component parts I'd be curious to ask like how the how they plan it there But Brian Angelico is the offensive coordinator James Campin is the offensive line coach and Mike McCarthy Brian Angelico came from Minnesota, where they've struggled to find an identity running the ball for a long time now. James Campin was out of the league over the last couple years. He was a consultant for the Packers front office. And then we have Mike McCarthy. And so them being able to tap into what they have on the ground, just in terms of what it looks like and how it's put together, I think is notably impressive.

10:40Derrik Klassen: And I think it leads to a really exciting matchup in this game. I might be oversimplifying it, But the Steelers are a physical, they want to use the size of their offensive line. They want to bang it inside. I think I got this from our friends over at For the Numbers Fantasy. But according to their advanced stats, the Steelers are running between like duo concepts and inside zone. Like between the tackle stuff. That's like 70 % of what Jalen Warren is doing this year. Go watch the Falcons game against Cincinnati. and not surprisingly, they were doing everything they could to get away from Dexter Lawrence.

11:16Derrik Klassen: I mean, they're good at that stuff anyway.

11:17Robert Mays: I believe they have a bottom five success rate the Bengals do on outside runs and a top five success on runs between the tackles, which is, I mean, it makes perfect sense.

11:25Derrik Klassen: I hope the Steelers just lean into it. I just want to watch Dexter Lawrence go against these guys. Like, I want it to be— The way out is through. Yeah. Yeah. Screw you. We're good at this. We're going to do it. And the Bengals saying, screw you. We have Dexter Lawrence. That is what I hope this turns into. Sure, it'll be a little more nuanced than that, but that is how the Steelers have found so much of their success, and that's what Dexter Lawrence is doing here. And he was impactful in that first game. He had a couple sacks. He got the better of McCormick a couple of times. So how that plays out is, I mean, that's must-see TV.

12:00Derrik Klassen: You called it a kaiju fighter. It is a kaiju fighter, which it absolutely is. And we've talked plenty about Zach Frazier at this point. He's the frontrunner to be all pro, first-team all pro at center. Zach Frazier and Dexter Lawrence, like, let this be the focal point of the game. Even though it would be smarter to not do that, that is what I hope this turns into.

12:19Robert Mays: It's so funny that Jonathan Allen, who has, in my estimation, the most physical play style of any three technique in the NFL, is like the small slasher on his defensive line. I do love that when they get into odd front. It's Dexter Lawrence, TJ Slayton, and John Allen. And John Allen is like the skinny guy on that group.

12:44Derrik Klassen: Dexter Lawrence, especially, he wears orange now. He looks like Jupiter out there. It's unbelievable.

12:49Robert Mays: Jonathan Allen's two go-to pass rush moves are the hump move that he does and then what I've heard people call his bear rush, where if he just plays straight through you and literally wraps his arm around the offensive lineman and pushes him back into the quarterback. Like a sled drill. Yes, he has truly the most like bludgeoned, blunt force pass rush plan of any defensive tackle in the league. And he's like the nuanced, like speed player on the interior of the defensive line for the Bengals because of who's playing next to him. There's something really wonderful about that.

13:23Derrik Klassen: Another thing I do think is interesting. I got this from True Media and I kind of struggle to believe it, honestly. But according to them, the Steelers have faced a loaded box on only 37 % of their attempts. which is low. Like they're like, according to that's the face I made personnel. That is the face that I made too. I was like, what do you mean? How, how are teams not trying harder to stop this? And I w I would hope that the Bengals do something about that. Why do you think that would be? I don't know. I think that that's really interesting. Cause obviously the, the passing game is like, I mean, they do throw a lot of vertical stuff, like when they want to go to it, like a lot of, they try to run a lot of shot plays.

14:02And so maybe that's some part of it. But I will say, too, like a lot of the Steelers there, I mean, you brought this up, like 70 % of their run game basically is like duo and inside zone. But they do that so they can chip away, chip away. They get into second five, and they call some crazy change-up run to the outside. They love some of these boundary tosses. They love some of the trap stuff. They'll do a little bit of pin pull every now and then. And so when you get into some of those loaded boxes, you are kind of exposing yourself to getting out-leveraged on the perimeter. That's why a lot of like the outside zone teams for a while were really good against loaded boxes.

14:33if they just win the leverage game. So maybe that's what they're worried about, but that does seem a little bit bizarre with as much jumbo as they play, with as much like 12 personnel as they play, all that stuff.

14:43Robert Mays: Because that was going to be the question for me is that a lot of the... So there'd be two things I would throw out there. So they still are... Typically, if you look at those numbers, like box numbers are often driven by personnel choices from the offense. Like even if you're a good rushing offense, if you're going to play a ton of 11 personnel, you're probably going to see lighter boxes than you would. it's not necessarily an indication of the running back that you have or the run game that you have but they're in 11 personnel i looked that stuff while you guys were talking it was the first thought that i had obviously with the receiver concerns they're not doing it as much as you would assume a mike mccarthy team would be they're they're 14th in the nfl and 11 personnel usage dealers are they're using 12 personnel on 23 and a half percent of snaps which is the 15th highest rate in the league so all like pretty normal across the board so you'd think with the quality of the run game and just standard personnel usage would be higher than that the one thing i will throw out they are still in spread formations at the second highest rate in the entire league so that's possibly the reason is because it's a little bit more spread out than some of these other like the niners run game is very good but the niners are condensed all the time and so you can load the box maybe a little bit more consistently and feel good about it that's the only thought i would have about why that number looks the way that it does which that makes sense when you think about some of the stuff that Aaron Rodgers is still good at.

15:57Like, if you're getting into these, like, 12 or 11 personnel, like, spread under center formations, he'll just, like, if you're playing off coverage, he'll throw a bubble, he'll throw a smoke, he'll throw whatever. And if you try to play press, they'll just chuck a go ball. And so there is some amount of, like, those are simple answers. But this offense, I think, is very good at, like, five yards at a time, five yards at a time, five yards at a time, insert play-action corner route, and they just hit it. And I do think that they're scheming it up pretty well in that regard.

16:22Derrik Klassen: It's worth saying as a last bit, it's easy and obvious and good to focus on the Steelers run game. They hit the Bengals in like throwing the ball really well in that week three game.

16:32Robert Mays: They were just gashing them on like deep play action shots consistently. And I wish the Steelers offense passing game was just made up of those more than it is. But they still like the Steelers are scheming up shots. Well, like that is I think that's the best thing that they're doing. And that's we joked about it on the season long award show that the midseason award show that Mike McCarthy is like incepted Aaron Rodgers into doing certain things. And like them scheming up shots that are worth taking, I think is part of that. And the Bengals game is one of the best examples of that all year so far.

17:00Robert Mays: My thing I wanted to focus on is on the other side of the ball. You know, we know what the Bengals passing game is at this point. It is, God, it's so good, man. Like it's just, it's so incredibly good. Like what they're doing, the different levers they're pulling and some of the window dressing that they're using to really elevate and accentuate this style of offense that we've seen from them for a long time, just how much motion they're using compared to previous years, some of the condensed sets that they're using, just making it, the guys are moving around so often, and they're just making it so hard to play against them.

17:34Robert Mays: And then the Steelers, on their side of the ball, we kind of know what the Steelers' front is, right? Like when we talk about the Steelers' defense, that's really all we talk about is the guys on the front. So I wanted to just look at what the Steelers even have been on the back end of this year and what that means against this Bengals team. So coming into the season, talking about Patrick Graham, his background, they didn't play a ton of man in Las Vegas, but he's a New England guy. He, in his core, I think does love playing man coverage. And we thought they might do a decent amount of that with Joey Porter Jr., with Jamel Dean.

18:06Robert Mays: That was an assumption that they would kind of tap back into that with him getting to a group that maybe had that skill set a little bit more than the Raiders guy just do. They lose Joey Porter Jr. They move on from Joey Porter Jr. the Steelers this season are 30th in cover one rate. The only teams who have played less cover one than the Steelers are the Cardinals and the Vikings who are playing an idea of defense. It's a riff on the thought of what defense can be. And so the fact that the Steelers are down in that range is a little bit surprising. They've been like a super zone heavy team. It's mostly quarters in cover three.

18:38Robert Mays: It's nothing like overly crazy. They're playing from a ton of two high shells for the most part. It's not a lot of ton of crazy coverage rotations. it's really just we're going to sit there in a quarter show we're going to play a little bit of four we're going to play a little bit of three we're going to communicate really well and that's how we're going to go and for the most part it's been pretty good you know the safeties are still it's not a good group i think that you know juquan brisker um they're good in the box but they're like in coverage it's like a little bit they don't give up a lot of explosives yeah but i still like it's not a great group back there but collectively cohesively patrick grama of talking to him in the preseason, it was probably two weeks into training camp.

19:15Robert Mays: And he said to me that some of the situational kind of communication that they were already doing two weeks into training camp was the most advanced of any defense that he had ever coached in his entire career. And that's not necessarily surprising. Like, think about the guys on the back end. Jamel Dean's been playing in this league for a long time. Jalen Ramsey's been doing this for a long time.

19:36Derrik Klassen: It's a benefit of being an old team, I would hope.

19:38Robert Mays: It is a veteran-laden team. And when you watch them on defense, you feel that kind of characterization of who they are on the back end. One of the other things that really jumped out to me is that we've talked a little bit about this, where the Bengals for years saw so much cloud coverage, so much either cover two or cover six to kind of take away some of those outside the numbers vertical shots that were a centerpiece and really the foundation of the passing offense. Teams have gone away from that a little bit this year just because the Bengals have spent years and years and years devising an offense designed to pick apart those exact coverages and the Steelers game this year is maybe the most pronounced example of that so far all season in that first game the Bengals saw their sixth lowest cloud coverage rate of any game since 2022 of the five games that were less cloud coverage almost all of those teams played at least 35 percent man so they either man heavy teams or it was just like a game plan curveball that they were trying to throw the Steelers are essentially the only team to play not a lot of man coverage and less than like 10 cloud coverage against the Bengals in the last five or six seasons and so it's it's notable and I think makes sense in terms of how teams are approaching them but if you're thinking about how they're going to do it this this time I would assume it's a similar approach based on like what the Bengals have been able to do this year really the only thing that the only other thing I wanted to mention is that the the pass rush is still like what makes this thing go and the stat that really jumped out to me because it's anecdotally I was watching what they look like when all three of those guys were on the field and I was like holy shit they're just so dynamic with Watt Herbig and Highsmith out there together this year the Steelers have a 70 % defensive success rate so if you do the inverse that's a 30 % offensive success rate they're allowing 3.4 yards per drop back teams are 20 20 of 44 for 168 yards and five sacks.

21:3520 of 44. That's tough. They've been really good. Like, some of their, they're interesting as a defense, too, because they, they don't blitz a lot, actually. It's like 28%. Yes. Very middle of the road. But when they do, their stuff is good. Yeah. Especially, like, when they're in some of those packages, I think they do a really good job of that. I do think what's interesting is, like, they don't blitz a lot, but they're always in a blitz look. Like, they always have someone mugged up on the line of scrimmage, whether it's Galen Ramsey's down, Briskers down, Peyton Wilson, like somebody. And then they just always pop out of it into a sim pressure.

22:05That's kind of what they do.

22:06Derrik Klassen: Doesn't that kind of feel like the league now? Like not to like take – They're just doing it – They're bringing those guys less than other teams. Yeah, for sure.

22:13Robert Mays: I would say Peyton Wilson is a guy that when you watch him now versus watching him in coverage in the first Bengals game, I think he's gotten much more comfortable in what they're asking him to do within the defense. He's moving well. Like I'm actually impressed with the range he is showing in coverage and just what sort of coverage player he's kind of become.

22:30Derrik Klassen: I know. We talked about it two or three weeks ago. Queen and Wilson both, I think, are. They're not going to be all pro, but they, like, for how much shit they've taken over the last couple of years, like, they are playing well in this defense.

22:43Robert Mays: And this is the number one run defense in the league. Number one. Teams aren't really even trying to run the ball against them. I think they have the second lowest rush rate seen in the NFL so far this year. Which, I mean, makes sense. If the linebackers are playing better, obviously the front is still playing at a really high level. And like, if there was anything that was going to sink this defense outside of maybe just the old guys in the secondary getting hurt, which hasn't really happened to this point, would have been the linebackers playing at the level they played last year, which was flatly not very good.

23:09Patrick Queen was not playing at a very high level. He was just kind of chasing, running around. And I think Peyton Wilson, it's been this happens with a lot of linebackers, especially guys who are not elite premium picks. It takes some time for those guys to really ramp up into the league. And I think Peyton Wilson finally is kind of getting there a little bit.

23:24Robert Mays: All right, before we move on, let's take a quick break. We've got a great Sunday night football matchup this week between the Steelers and Bengals. When you flip on the game, be sure to turn on The Athletic Live on YouTube as well. Watch the game along with hosts Charles McDonald, Max Brown, and Daniel Popper, and become part of the show in the interactive chat. The Athletic Live is presented by Google Gemini. Check it out now and subscribe on YouTube. Football season has arrived, and with the U.S. Bank's Smartly Visa signature card, you earn an unlimited 2 % cash back on every purchase, including at the stadium or at home, watching on a brand new TV.

23:53Robert Mays: Score big with unlimited 2 % cash back on every purchase. Visit usbank.com slash smartlycard to learn more. The creditor and issuer of this card is U.S. Bank National Association. Pursuant to a license from Visa USA, Inc. Some restrictions may apply. Back in the old days of The Athletic Football Show, it was me. It was Robert Mays. It was another host. Now we've got a social producer. We've got another producer. We've got two more full-time hosts. And while that certainly has made the show a whole lot better, It took a lot of work just to get to that point. The hiring process, the writing of job descriptions, posting of jobs, getting everyone on board.

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26:18Robert Mays: Let's hit some other games from the Week 10 slate. One thing from a few more of these. Let's start with Patriots-Lions. Derek, this is all you, buddy. One thing you are looking for in Patriots-Lions this weekend. So the Lions defense, they're figuring some stuff out. They played a pretty good game against the Packers. Obviously held them to, I think, 17 points. And then after that, they, you know, didn't play any great defenses, but they have held them, or great offenses, but they held them to low numbers. And so I've been pretty impressed by what the Lions defense has come. They're getting some of their guys back.

26:47The front is playing a little bit better. On the flip side, this is a Patriots offense that because the quarterback can play at such a high level and, you know, Matt Collins is coming back in this game that like shouldn't mean a lot for your offense, but it kind of does for the Patriots offense. It's an offense that is gettable, but if you're not up to it, can be very good. And, you know, we were kind of talking about this a little bit coming into the show. the Patriots if you're below a certain line on defense Drake may be able to throw for 280 yards they will score 30 points and they will just beat you if you are above a certain line he'll hold

27:18Derrik Klassen: the ball a little bit he'll do that but throw three picks yes he'll throw three picks just like he did against the Packers and like that's a great you said the Packers are obviously above that line when they play against teams that are below that line they kind of just pick you apart and so I'm think this is a good game for a Lions defense that is surging a little bit to be like which side of this line do you actually fall on? We can't call it the Mendoza line. There's a quarterback named Mendoza. What would that line be? It's the May line.

27:43Robert Mays: Are you above or below the May line?

27:44Derrik Klassen: The Foxborough line. Can you make people ask what the hell Drake May is doing or not? I don't know the answer as it relates to the Lions defense.

27:53Robert Mays: I truly am curious where they land and which side of the line. I do have a couple of thoughts. I think one thing with the Lions is I think in some ways that have been impressive, but in some ways that leave me curious is like they've been a very game planning defense like they just do a lot of different stuff versus different teams like against the vikings they were willing to bring a bunch of cover zero because i just think that they thought that they could rattle kyler that way uh against green bay they played a little bit of man against miami they were like all man on third down but didn't really do it on first and second down like they've just i think been very game planning and i think it's been impressive especially over the last handful of weeks the other thing that i would mention and this is where i wonder if drake may can get them The Lions don't really blitz a lot, especially over the last five weeks.

28:32And over the last five weeks, they have the slowest time to sack in the entire NFL at 4.53 seconds. Drake may, even if your coverage is okay, if you give him four and a half seconds in the pocket consistently, he's going to find like an alley to get out and do something with his legs.

28:47Derrik Klassen: I'm a little surprised to hear that because like Liam McNeil's been having a really nice season and obviously Aiden Hutchinson is who he is. Like that's just, that's a slow time.

28:57Robert Mays: They are kind of a read front, though. I mean, for those teams, if you look at some of those numbers, like the pressure time numbers and the amount of quick pressures you get, if you are one of those more read fronts, those numbers are just going to be low. Like Dennis Allen teams are just always going to be low. The Chiefs are just always going to be low. Like if you're an even read front team, those numbers kind of have a little bit of noise to them. And so I wonder if that's some of what we're talking about. It probably is. And that stuff, in theory, is supposed to help you in run defense. And I think for the most part, like Detroit, it does.

29:29Yeah, they are getting there in terms of their run defense.

29:31Robert Mays: And so like, yeah, that's when you look at the Chiefs, like the Chiefs are always a good run defense. Like it's when you're built that way, that can happen. It's in service of something. The Steelers we just kind of talked about are like this. They're not necessarily an even front team all the time, but like they are also like a slower off the ball team. And there are value to playing that way. And I do think that that has helped Detroit in that way. So that probably is a good part of it. Calvin Shepard also, like if you asked him the biggest influences on his coaching career, Steve Spagnuolo was the first name that he would mention.

29:56Robert Mays: And so it maybe isn't necessarily surprising that there's a little bit of shared DNA between how those teams play. One thing I will mention, just in terms of, obviously they get Brian Branch back. That's been, I think, really big for this team. There's a little bit of stability in the back end that they've desperately needed. DJ Reed did not play last week. You won't notice it as much against the Lions. For as much as we love how Caleb Douglas is playing. Against the Dolphins. The Dolphins, excuse me. For as much as we love how Caleb Douglas is playing. Hobbled Malik Willis. Yeah, hobbled Malik Willis.

30:22Robert Mays: The Dolphins don't necessarily have a high-powered passing game. DJ Reed has been playing really well for the Lions. And so this might be a game, even with this Patriots receiving core a little bit banged up, that you might notice that DJ Reed is not out there because he has not been practicing.

30:35Derrik Klassen: Dan Campbell also did us the favor of saying he doesn't think Kirby Joseph will be available for this game, which, so you're still waiting on that. I'm, yeah, I'm, this is, what a great litmus test because you know how good Drake May can look and has looked for a lot of this season. but which certain caliber of defenses have been able to get them and i think this is perfect for both teams i think with new england you can excuse i mean with both of these teams you can excuse some of it away like they're they've been banged up on either side of the ball patriots haven't had a lot of their receivers lions haven't had a lot of their dbs for a lot of this season but at this stage in the season week 10 knowing like where you can separate yourself from the other contender-ish teams is pretty important and so if one of these teams like especially if they win this game by like 10, 12 points or whatever.

31:22It's like, it's, I think that gives us a clearer picture of where we're headed for the next couple of months.

31:25Robert Mays: Just on the back end, no Carlton Davis for the Patriots and why I think that's potentially notable. The Patriots have been like a very bad pass defense when playing zone this year. And right so far this season, the Lions, Jared Goff, this number is crazy. Jared Goff has 37 dropbacks against man coverage this year. 37. In nine weeks. Six a game? In nine weeks, he has 37. Just for context, 37. Aaron Rodgers has 132. Would you want to play man against these guys? And that's the point, right? It's all the motion. It's the fact that you're having to deal with the pass catchers. But if you're going to sit there and try to play a bunch of zone and you're bad at it, again, without Carlton Davis out there, you're going to have to pick one because this team looks a lot better playing man coverage than they do trying to sit there and play zone.

32:16Robert Mays: And so how they end up approaching it will be really interesting. Like that 37 is crazy. The only quarterback with fewer, the only qualified quarterback with fewer dropbacks against man coverage this year is Justin Herbert. And I think there's a lot going into that. Yeah. That's almost like a, who cares all the motion. The fact that the offense is not functional. Like the fact Jared golf is kind of in his own world here. The only, I mean, he's below Kyler, Michael Penix, Jameis, Caleb Williams, Jalen hurts has 52. Holy shit. Hasn't played. We haven't seen Jalen.

32:49Derrik Klassen: hurts since october 4th baker has 53 he's only played half the season so the jared goff is like

32:55Robert Mays: well below all these guys who haven't even played for half the year that's how little man coverage

33:00Derrik Klassen: teams have been playing against the lions this season which is crazy now i'm just daydreaming about like who the lions could go up against that could throw like you know 70 man against the only team that would want to is cleveland probably which we'll get to here in a little bit all right

33:14Robert Mays: our next one here let's get speaking of the nfc north let's get to the vikings and packers this easily could have been a game of the week if we wanted it to be we've talked a lot about these teams recently dave this is all you buddy we're gonna give you like one and a half things from

33:27Derrik Klassen: this game so let's go with number one to that point i'm so mad this is buried in the noon window niners cowboys is the 330 game and of course it is because it's like the two of the biggest fan bases in the league i'm sure it's going to do a huge number but this game should be on at 330 and I shouldn't have to be fighting, like fighting my attention span to keep my eyes on Packers, Vikings. It's crazy. But anyway. I'm very glad the Bears aren't playing this week. This is... So I can actually watch this game. This is going to be sick. I mean, yeah, there's too much to hit in a one thing from. Maybe you heard Kirk Cousins.

34:01Derrik Klassen: I did hear that. What would you call it? Is this a re-debut? Like he's not making his Vikings debut. He played five years. He's making his Vikings return. He's making his Vikings return after several years away. and what a time to be back what an opponent to be back for among players with 100 plus pass attempts this year kirk cousins is third in the league versus the blitz by epa per drop back who's better cj stroud and jordan love by talking it he's he has been checking he also has not been sacked by a blitz this year that's more surprising actually because he can't move so you just got to beat it mentally he has got to get it that's how evolution works baby yeah he has the second lowest By necessity.

34:41Derrik Klassen: Second lowest sack rate in the league and the best pressure to sack ratio in the league. Fun time to land into this situation where he's going against the Green Bay Packers, who they're not the Vikings, obviously, but we've talked a lot in the last few weeks about what Jonathan Gannon is doing to bring pressure. Packers are blitzing 34 % of the time, which is a top 10 number. And I was blown away when I read this from NextGen. They have the most unblocked pressures in the NFL. More than Minnesota. 43 on the year and they're so good at like they love to overload the weak side you see them do it week after week like they gave the Cowboys Fitz doing it they gave Drake May Fitz doing it so having Kirk Cousins having to diagnose all of that is worth the price of admission and by the way the Packers are uniquely suited to do shit that he does not like.

35:32Derrik Klassen: Kirk Cousins has the best success rate in the NFL and the most passing touchdowns against single high coverage this year what do the Packers like to do they run the third highest rate of too high coverage in the NFL and those safeties are amazing they I mean they got Drake May they did it again I also think that's a Clint Kubiak stat if you think about the Seahawks last year versus like what the Seahawks look like

35:54Robert Mays: this year like he's very good at scheming up an offense that is just picking on those single high

36:00Derrik Klassen: coverages I don't think he's gonna get it this week though they're just straight up even when Even when the Packers show single high, somebody bails out of somewhere into a two-high look. And also, why would you not play that way against this Vikings team? Make them run the ball.

36:13Robert Mays: Yeah, but he's just that. Prove it to me.

36:16Derrik Klassen: Kirk's success rate versus two-high is the third worst in the league. It's a 22-point drop from his success rate versus single high to his success rate against two-high. It's the biggest gap between somebody's performances against those looks in the NFL, and the Packers are so good at doing that. It reminds me of last week where, don't get me wrong, it was fun, but so much of the coolest shit about Pats Packers was like, I think Xavier McKinney just did this, but I won't be able to tell until I can see another angle of it 12 hours from now. And I think it's going to be more of that this week where it's like, I think Evan Williams just dropped here, but we'll have to look at another angle later.

36:55Derrik Klassen: But I know something cool happened.

36:57Robert Mays: I'm just not sure what. The granularity of the matchup is interesting. to me even like zooming out from it i just want to know how different the vikings offense feels and how quickly it feels different yeah like is this a situation i mean this has been a bottom three offense in almost every single metric for majority of the season are we talking about a top half of the league offense are we talking about the 20th best offense in the league like i i truly don't know like i just don't it's almost an experiment like you drop a quarterback who has played at i don't know how you would characterize the way that kirk cousins has played this year because he's 11th in EPA per drop back.

37:33Robert Mays: Like all the numbers are very good.

37:35Derrik Klassen: The numbers are probably a little fudge.

37:36Robert Mays: Those are health of the offense numbers. So like Kirk Cousins is driving some of that, but you're not, you're not saying like I'm taking the 10th best quarterback in the league and dropping him into this situation. It's not that simple. So I just don't know what, let's just for our purposes here, let's just say that right now, Kirk Cousins is the acceptable quarterback play. We talked about the Vikings getting all off season. He's the 15th best quarterback. Let's just like put a number. And so with that, what happens? Are the Vikings suddenly like a the 18th best offense in the league? And what does that do for them?

38:06Robert Mays: That's why you make this sort of bet. But I just wonder how much better it gets and how quickly we see that sort of jump if it happens.

38:13Derrik Klassen: The wrinkle on top of the wrinkle is that he's done all this shit before conceivably. Like he's he's played here for this coach before. And it's still not fair to just expect him to hit the ground running against a good defense.

38:25Robert Mays: But it's fairer than it would be for somebody else. It's fairer than it would be for Gino.

38:29Derrik Klassen: I don't need to use the same number of qualifiers considering Kirk showed up and was like, oh yeah, okay. I recognize this, this, and that. I know these guys. I've thrown however many touchdowns to Justin Jefferson. This is fine. I think what I'm most interested in with both Kyler Murray and Wentz to a different extent, the offense kind of has to live like 10 plus. Like that's just what those quarterbacks are decent at. And like with Kyler Murray, if you were living under that, it was basically like we get into empty or we throw a screen. with Carson Wentz, it was like, maybe he'll get to a check down if he doesn't run into a sack.

39:00Kirk Cousins can like actually like throw quick game and like do the like keep the offense on.

39:05Robert Mays: That's what I mean. How how drastically different does it all look with this quarterback who not even like the area in terms of the area from zero to 10 yards, that part of it changes. And the middle of the field just completely opens up to you compared to what it would look like with Kyler Murray. It's like there. I think it's there. The difference stylistically between what we saw from them at quarterback with Kyler Murray for the first however many weeks he played to Kirk Cousins it has a chance to make a seismic impact for this reason it just like it opens up so much within the offense theoretically just by virtue of what the quarterback is willing to throw that there's a chance it look just looks completely different even when accounting for some of like the structural shortcomings that still exist within the offense to your point a stat that

39:52Derrik Klassen: It really jumped out at me. The Vikings have been top five in play action since KOC became their head coach across all the years he's been there. They led the league with play action when Kirk was their quarterback. They did it plenty under Sam Darnold. They are bang average this year. They're running play action at like the 16th highest rate. They just haven't been doing it with these quarterbacks.

40:14Robert Mays: And I would love to see where the routes and throws are on those. Like how much of that is play action for the sake of throwing vertical shots versus play action for the sake of like, I'm throwing a glance route.

40:25Derrik Klassen: And we know Kirk Cousins can, will, and is usually successful doing that stuff. I think it's going to look different and pretty good. I don't know if that's going to happen this week because this is a nasty defense that's going to be able to throw some weird shit at even somebody as accomplished as Kirk Cousins.

40:44Robert Mays: And then on the other side of the ball, that might actually, we just spent all that time talking about Kirk against Green Bay. We've done the Vikings thing. But it's still like in terms of like styles make fights, matchups in the NFL right now. Jordan Love going up against Brian Flores is like as good as it gets.

41:00Derrik Klassen: It is as good as it gets. And it's just it's a testament to the fact that we did this with Flores against the Lions and Flores against Josh Allen like the last two weeks. Like they're just and by the way, the Vikings next opponent after this is San Francisco. So Flores is just running the gauntlet of all the most fun passing attacks in the league right now. What I like about this is Cincinnati, I guess.

41:21Robert Mays: I love the, we talked about it last week going into it. The matchup between Brian Flores and Josh Allen. Josh Allen, I think we think of as like, again, like big, big goof. Right. But in actuality, there's like a real precision to the way that he plays against the Blitz specifically. And so the Brian Flores, Josh Allen matchup is a quarterback trying to like solve this problem with like a scalpel. The Packers against Brian Flores is the quarterback trying to solve it with like a cartoon mallet. Yeah. Like that's what we're getting here. And that is the exact element of this that I'm very excited about.

41:55Derrik Klassen: It's worth saying that game spiraled away from Green Bay in such a strange fashion. But Jordan Love got their ass. Like he was all over them. They hit so many explosive plays in that game. Well, most teams just aren't willing to do that against them.

42:08Robert Mays: They're just not willing to do this to the with the frequency and the no regard for human life that Jordan Love is willing to do. Because they, the Vikings really against every team, they're making the bet. They won't do that 30 times a game. And like most teams won't even try one. Most teams also don't have the ability to do it. Jordan Love for most of that game did. And I would say now the offensive line is better. Like part of why that game unraveled at the end is the right guard just had no idea what was going on. And the backs were getting picked on. I would say this game too, we probably feel a little bit better about like how Matthew Golden has really like elevated the offense a little bit.

42:44As compared to week one, it's his first time. You know, it's his first game this season. I think that there is a chance that, like, Jordan Love can really just, like, have a game.

42:50Robert Mays: It's really funny that the two best defenses in the NFL right now, I'd probably, I'd say, like, the Bucs obviously have been really, really good. But, like, the two mainstay defenses over the last three or four years, they both are making a bet of they won't do that 30 times. The Seahawks are making a bet of you won't take the easy completion 30 times. And the Vikings are making the bet of you won't try to throw the ball over our head 30 times. and there are very few teams that would be willing to do either and the Packers are maybe the only

43:19Derrik Klassen: team willing to do the second one you won't stand in there against Van Ginkle and Cashman 19 times

43:24Robert Mays: today you're just not going to do it it's going to be hilarious to just watch Jordan Love 25 yards deep in the pocket seeing how far deep how far down the field he can draw I don't even think about it

43:32Derrik Klassen: I feel like we forget to do this sometimes but I'm so happy to be looking at my computer right now and seeing the forecast for Sunday is mostly sunny and pleasant with a high near 47. They're in Green Bay. They already played the Minneapolis game. If this game... Oh, man, that's perfect. If this got bogged down by slop, I would be so upset. Like, I need love in Kirk at maximum capacity.

43:55Robert Mays: It's perfect because you're going to have, like, the smoke coming off the grills is going to be exactly where you want it to be at 47 degrees, but it's also cool enough where the hunting gear is going to start coming out. Oh, maybe. It's just a perfect Lambo day.

44:07Derrik Klassen: Everyone should experience a perfect Lambeau day at least once.

44:11Robert Mays: Might have been hit or miss. There have been times where it's been a little chilly. Yeah.

44:15Derrik Klassen: I thought you meant maybe you saw some unfortunate Bears games up there.

44:19Robert Mays: I never have. I've actually never seen a Bears-Packers game at Lambeau. All the Packers games I've seen at Lambeau have been against other teams and for, like, real stakes.

44:27Derrik Klassen: Yeah. 26 degrees is probably, like, my worst Packer game experience, which is, like, that's good by northern Wisconsin standards.

44:35Robert Mays: The problem is in order to get to the press box, you have to walk on that catwalk. Yes. And so you have to be outside for parts of it. And so there have been games where it's been like zero degrees and you're having to walk outside for like a chunk of it.

44:49Derrik Klassen: You sound a little disconnected right now considering the people that pay for the tickets. Oh, of course. Have to sit in it for three hours. Absolutely.

44:56Robert Mays: I mean, that's but it's still like for the most part when you're going to work, you don't have to endure it. And like in Lambeau, the path is a little bit different. Like you do have to endure part of it.

45:05Derrik Klassen: this is setting up to be football nirvana, which all the more reason why it should be the 330 game. But, oh, well. Have you ever watched a game there just as a fan? No. I've done one. Only as a report. I've done one.

45:17Robert Mays: I can't remember which game it was. I legitimately can't remember. But it's like bleachers. It's all like anything. But I've seen – I watched them play the Rams in the playoffs. I was there for the Tom Brady-Scottie Miller game. I watched the Seahawks game where Devontae Adams had the Sluggo touchdown. Like I was at that game. I saw a crazy Jordy Nelson game against the Eagles one year. Like I've seen a bunch of games. I know we're,

45:41Derrik Klassen: things get overhyped in this internet era and people like wax philosophic about things and they don't need to. You should try to go to Lambeau in, in the fall cathedral. Go later in the season. The stadium lives up to the hype. The fact that it's like across the street from somebody's house. And then like in the middle of this quaint little neighborhood that look, is it looks like a suburb. It's just there's nothing like it in sports.

46:05Robert Mays: When they redid the atrium, it truly does feel like a cathedral. It feels like you're like in a European church when you're walking in there because that entrance is so grand now as you get into it. It's really special. All right, let's get to our next one here. Texans at Browns. This one is all me. I wanted to just dig into what the Browns defense has looked like, the Browns pass defense has looked like, because obviously teams have been able to run the ball against the Browns this year. I just wonder if the Texans decide they want to be that team. The Texans just haven't ran the ball very well, and CJ Stroud is balling.

46:40Robert Mays: And so do they just decide, hey, we know that their run defense isn't very good, but we're just going to see what we have to do to throw the ball against this version of the Browns. And this version of the Browns is playing a sport that really no one else in the league is playing anymore. The Browns this season, per NextGen, are playing about 40 % cover one. that is the highest rate in the league and it's the highest rate in the league by almost 14 by almost 13 percentage points no one else in the nfl is at more than 27.6 cover one this year overall the league has just kind of gone away from it this season teams are playing cover one 17.7 of the time that is the comfortably the lowest of the next gen era typically over the last three or four years it's hovered around like 20 and a half percent in 2019 it was at 28 and a half percent so over the last seven years we've seen more than a 10 percentage point fall in overall cover one rates which makes sense like defense offense has just gotten too good at picking on them and so most teams have gone away from it the browns have decided not to and the other thing that they've kind of carried over as more other teams have gone away from it talk about this a little bit with the steelers run game approach against them they're playing four down fronts at the highest rate in the league and that number has also fallen there are only four teams this year that are playing four down fronts more than 60 percent of the time last year was 10 teams so it's half as many wow and the browns really are sticking to like the structure of the defense they had mostly played over the last couple years there are nuances in what they're doing differently they don't run as much cover zero as they used to like there are changes and my grudenberg i think is doing a good job but stylistically they're just a very different team than pretty much any other team in the league right now and so i wonder what that looks like against the Texans specifically.

48:25Robert Mays: Their numbers against man coverage aren't great, but they're still very good. They're essentially right in line with what they've done against zone coverages this year. And just the way that CJ Stroud is playing, like he is playing at such a high level right now. And there are just so many elements to his game. Some of them have carried over from what we had seen from him at his best over the last few years. We were talking about this before we started recording. His sense for like coverage contours and his feel for coverages is really natural and instinctive. It reminds me a little bit of like watching Lamar Jackson play where he can just feel where defenders are going to be in space on the back end.

49:03Robert Mays: That we've seen consistently throughout this season. That's something you could maybe anticipated. The two things for me that really jump out compared to previous versions of CJ Stroud that have made him like really, really potent this year. You said it earlier on the show. He has the highest EPA per drop back in the league against the Blitz. like you can't really blitz him right now and the moment where that clicked for me was watching the jacksonville game in london where the texans understandably we're getting to all these like second and nines and second and tens after inefficient runs and when you get the jack when the jags get you into those modes that's what they want right they're going to turn up the heat when they get you there and so understandably the texans were trying to solve those blitz looks on second and 10.

49:47Robert Mays: Let's get a screen out here. Let's try to do some gimmicky shit to solve these problems. And almost immediately, it was like, stop doing that. Just put him in the gun and let him start going to work. And that really is the feel they've had against Blitz this entire season.

50:01Derrik Klassen: It's really funny to think about because we've noted on the show the Browns' struggles against the run. I mean, even like the Saints gashed them last week. But you're telling me, don't worry about it. But they might do that.

50:13Robert Mays: They might decide, like, we're going to line up and run the ball. I just wonder if the Texans are the team that's going to do that. Right. Or is the quarterback playing well enough where it's like, you know what? We feel okay. I think that's more of what it is for me. Like, I just would not want to take the ball out of C.J. Stroud's hand. That's my thought. I think he's operating at a really high level. They have, you know, Nico Collins, I think, is their only great receiver. But they have depth at receiver. Like, they have, like, four or five guys who are, like, quality NFL players. And that's even without Noel.

50:40Derrik Klassen: Exactly. They lost Noel and Higgins. And, I mean, good on them for doing the booty trade. But getting, we'll see how consistently Tank Dell can do that. But getting that game from Tank and being able to get NFL-level contributions from him. Like, the fact that the receiver core doesn't look hopelessly screwed after losing both of the exciting young guys in the same season is miraculous.

51:05Robert Mays: So when you watch them right now, the Texans offense, really the only way to bother him is by condensing the space in the pocket. If you give him even an escape hatch, that's the other element of his game that's been super impressive to me is that his understanding of when I have to hit the eject button and what I'm doing after scrambling as a thrower is the best it's ever been to me. So I was looking this up because it just seemed like there were so many examples even last week where when he can find a way to step up and out of the pocket to his right, he's been devastating. So this year, among 20 players, among the players with at least 20 dropbacks outside the pocket to their right per next-gen, the only guys with a higher success rate are Patrick Mahomes, Drake May, and Josh Allen.

51:48Robert Mays: The guys who, like, that is the game they play. Like, we don't typically think about C.J. Stroud that way, but that's an element that he has brought to the position consistently all year. which if he's ever going to like consistently be a top eight guy like that part of his game that's what takes it to the next level because when he came out of college i think he was like he's going to be jared goff ish and then we'll see where he can get with some of the athleticism stuff and it's like well if that's going to be a consistent part of his game he is a plus version of that i always my view of him was always is there i said this on our pre-draft show about what his ceiling could be and i remember saying this i was like is there a 25 chance that he could be Joe Burrow.

52:26Yeah. And he's playing at like pretty close to that. Obviously Burrow's playing like his best ball ever. So it's hard to say that he's close to that level, but like they both are like CJ Stroud, I think he's playing his best.

52:37Robert Mays: Stylistically, they do remind me of each other a little bit just in terms of like how natural and quick of throwers they are, like the base that they play with. And even Burrow this year, one of the best, he does it way less often because that's just not how he plays. But some of Burrow's best moments this year are his ability to climb the pocket when he feels a little bit of an alley and so there are more similarities between them right now than i think maybe there's ever been with like the quality and the style that they're playing with stroud is kind of like a a weird amalgamation of like some of what makes joe burrow great and some of like what makes jordan love great because cj stroud has a little bit more like chuck it to him yeah he's got some yeah and i do think that they it's like a fun and even like i would say cj stroud this year he's always kind of had this in his bag but there's like two or three He throws a game where they blitz him, and he just backpedals like four steps and just like chucks it off his back foot, which like that's half the Jordan Love offense.

53:26Derrik Klassen: Yes. So we all agree that C.J. Stroud's playing like one of the best quarterbacks in the league. Jalen Petrie came back. I see that Reed Blankenship is practicing. We're not doing this.

53:38Robert Mays: I refuse to do this. I can't reel you back in. Let's just wait like three weeks. They got to get to 500 first. Let's just wait like three weeks. I think their next three games, right, are against the Browns this week, They play the Colts after that, and then they play the Jacoby Brissett Ravens, correct? I believe so. Okay. If they win those three games, we can start to have like a serious conversation about whether the Texans can make the playoffs. Can we just wait until then? Is that unreasonable? Browns, Colts, Ravens.

54:06Derrik Klassen: I think that's fair. I just don't want to do this again. No, I don't want to be hurt. No, exactly.

54:12Robert Mays: Just keep my expectations low. If they win those three, there'll be six and five going into a Sunday night game with the Steelers. And then we can have the conversation. What perfect timing to have that conversation?

54:20Derrik Klassen: Beating the shit out of the Chargers is not enough for me to want to jump on that train. I was just asking. I just wanted to gauge your feelings about it. I understand why we should be building to a place where we're excited about what this team can be.

54:32Robert Mays: Let's get all the way to that place before we actually have this discussion. Fair. The last part of this I wanted to hit, talking about how good he's been at finding these escape hatches. You have to condense the pocket against him. And the Chargers were able to do that a couple times. Like you can't allow him any space to get to, to create. And so the, but the problem is for the Browns specifically, the guy who in theory should be able to do that. Jared Burst was doing that better than anybody for the first like two years of his career. And he has been completely MIA all season. And we really haven't talked about it.

55:05Robert Mays: And so this week he came out and said that he went and saw like the team psychiatrist to try to figure out what was happening to him and what this mental block was with the way that he's playing. And we were watching some of the clips before we started recording. This is a guy when he was in L.A. that played off the edge with more conviction and violence than really any edge rusher in the NFL. Teron Armstead said he retired because Jared Verse was in the league. He was like, the moment I played against that guy, I was like, it's time. It's time for me to not play anymore. And you watch Jared verse now and there's like a passivity and a level of indecision to the way that he's playing that I truly can't explain.

55:47Robert Mays: And clearly he can't either. I mean, that's the most confusing part because he's not like hurt physically. He doesn't like look anywhere like less athletic or anything like that. And so it has been a little bit tricky to figure out. There's always sometimes I think we love to do the Madden thing of like guy goes to new team. He's an 89 here. He'll be an 89 over there.

56:07Derrik Klassen: Or a guy continues to ascend every year. Yeah, or a young guy continues to ascend. When I sim to the off-seasons in my dinos, all my players get better every year. Every year. I think for a couple reasons, it's understandable why that might be difficult. Like, moving to an entirely new city is going to be difficult for some guys. Especially when you're younger, maybe that's a little bit difficult, and he's having issues trying to sort that out. It also is a very different scheme than what it was in Los Angeles.

56:30Robert Mays: The irony, though, is that this scheme should be the type of scheme where all you have to do is pin your ears back and go. And the fact that he used to do that and now isn't doing that is just so weird to me.

56:40Derrik Klassen: I really I didn't see this story about him talking to the team psychiatrist until you brought it to our production meeting. I think it's really refreshing between being open and willing to talk about that. And then he also later in the same story, I'm reading from Daniel Oyafusi over at ESPN.com. So I haven't played well at all this season. And I think I've taken a little bit of time looking at me what I could do better because the defensive line goes how I go. Refreshing accountability, refreshing honesty about what might be wrong. He's making a lot of money to do this. He's gunning for a huge contract.

57:16Derrik Klassen: I get that. But not just relocating across the country to a new team and a new scheme, but being asked to mitigate trading away Miles Garrett. Yeah. I don't know if that's what's bothering Jared Verse, but I wouldn't blame him if it was.

57:30Robert Mays: the miles gara trade does not happen unless jared versus involved that is ultimately the thing that pushed it over the top because now you go from a place where it's all mystery box draft picks to there is a hard to find asset that is part of this trade there's a level of certainty to this trade that doesn't come along with the jeffrey simmons trade with the micah parsons trade that's why we're comfortable doing it and the fact that that thing you were supposed to be able to have like be a rock solid thing you could rely on as part of the deal hasn't been that it's just surprising in a way that I never could have anticipated I mean he was one of my favorite players in the league over his first couple seasons and to watch him playing like this is

58:11Derrik Klassen: just kind of strange I think we did the 25 and under draft at some point during the summer and he was a very early pick among the guys that we felt comfortable banking on and it's it's been a bummer watching that storyline through the first half of the year it was funny because when they

58:25Robert Mays: played against Carolina we were talking about how well he was playing and but we've slowly learned like when that's what happens early in the season you don't the context around it is yeah there is none and then so we've just seen Rasheed Walker get blown back into the quarterback 50 times this year and so that was a Rasheed Walker game not a Jared first game and so we've got a little bit more clarity about it as we've kind of moved through the rest of the season last game we wanted to hit here Seahawks at Raiders Dave this is all you buddy one thing you were watching in Seahawks Raiders. I wonder what this is.

58:55Derrik Klassen: If we could afford it, this is where I would ask Katie to play the ABBA. Because it's time for Fernando, baby. What is the licensing

59:03Robert Mays: on something like that? You want to check? No? Where's our budget at? I'll call the bosses. If we're licensing popular music, I'm going in a lot of different directions before I'm going to go. Oh, come on. Letting you go in that little playground would be dangerous. I'm not opening that Pandora's box.

59:21Derrik Klassen: One thing we're not going to do is talk shit about ABBA. We're not going to talk shit about ABBA. Of course not. But we can't afford, if we're going to make an ask, let's not make an ask on playing Fernando by ABBA. Great song though. Fernando Mendoza is making his debut, guys. He's making his debut against the Seattle Seahawks. It always feels like it happens this way where the highly touted draft pick goes in against one of the best defenses in the NFL. It was famously Drake May against Houston a couple of years ago. He didn't come in mid-season, but Cam Ward made his first career start against Denver last year.

59:55Derrik Klassen: And I just want to say for the record, I know organizations fail their quarterbacks long before quarterbacks fail their organizations. Thank you, Kevin O 'Connell. You better hope that's true. How ironic is that? It's a great quote, though. Yeah, it is a great quote. And even if that's true, and even if you don't want to be reckless with your very expensive, talented young asset, I want to say we took it too far. And I'm here to say it's fine. It's going to be okay that the number one pick in the draft is going to play the Seahawks. He's got to do it at some point anyway.

1:00:23Robert Mays: He's like, I just don't. With the Drake May thing, at least they chose to do that in that moment. The Raiders had to trade Kirk Cousins for that price. I honestly think they probably could have gotten more if they wanted to, if they had really played hardball, but that's an entirely different conversation. Hearing about the fact that it started at a two and kind of went from there, the Vikings, I think, were in a place of desperation where I would have really tried to twist the knife if I could have.

1:00:47Derrik Klassen: I would have been like, oh, OK, we'll keep them to I said to be that as it may, whatever it is.

1:00:54Robert Mays: That's a situation where at least the trade deadline was this week. Like what are you going to do? Like you're not going to trade him because you're afraid to play Fernando Mendoza against the Seahawks. Of course not. Even even in cases where guys I just went to look this up because I remembered it being a game like this. Tyler Shuck last year. Do you remember who his first start was against the Rams? No. Oh, wait. That was his second start. I'm sorry. The one before that, they threw him to the Wolves against Todd Bowles. And I know the Bucs defense last year wasn't as good as it is this year.

1:01:20But that's the thing is that even some of the middling defenses, it's like you might

1:01:23Robert Mays: still have to play against Todd Bowles. It's almost like there's just a lot of good teams and you're going to have to play against

1:01:28Derrik Klassen: a few of them. You can't pick and choose. It's insulting to the NFL to insinuate that there's a matchup that is like, oh, this will be easy for him. Like even if Fernando Mendoza was making his first start against Dallas, they could find a way to get after him. It's the NFL. That one, I don't know. You're just hurt, and that's okay. Yeah, hit once by Quinton Williams. You never know what happened after that. I went back and watched Drake Mays dropbacks against Houston just to see what it looked like. And, like, Will Anderson and Daniil Hunter ragdolled him around. He threw some picks. He also dusted Derek Stingley for a touchdown.

1:02:03Derrik Klassen: Like, I think it was his first career touchdown. He just beat Derek Stingley on a go ball. He, like, these guys are drafted. Is that one of the Keishan Booty ones? Yes. Yeah, surely. These guys are drafted where they're drafted for a reason. That's the other thing. It's also it's insulting to Fernando Mendoza to treat him like this fragile thing. I've said this before in the pre-draft process. He's 6 '5", 230. He's got a cannon for an arm. He's athletic. He started almost 40 games in college. Like, I don't I don't particularly expect him to play well against Seattle, but he is ready for this. He can do this.

1:02:34Robert Mays: I also just think that he has the most bulletproof disposition of any player that's walked into the NFL in like 20 years. He's going to smile his way through getting his ass kicked on Sunday. He's going to be like Andrew Luck and say, like, good sack.

1:02:45Derrik Klassen: Yeah, but even more to an even more like cartoonish degree, though. He's going to get up from getting sacked by Demarcus Lawrence. He's like, I'll send you a LinkedIn invite after this.

1:02:53Robert Mays: I have some investment advice for you.

1:02:56Derrik Klassen: I really believe like the fact that the fact that Fernando Mendoza, like you've seen the commercial where he's joking about being in Las Vegas and he's like, I'm going to eat a cookie freezer. The fact that that's his bit like doesn't do justice to what a dog he is, though. Absolutely. He's a badass, and so I'm done wringing my hands about rookies getting playing time.

1:03:15Robert Mays: The other part of this, and I think this is one of the reasons that you feel comfortable trading Kirk Cousins away and getting off of the plan and the timeline that you had established. We talked a lot about this in the preseason. What sort of environment would the Raiders have for a young quarterback, and what would that push you to do or not do with when you were willing to play him? We talked about this with Kirk. They're 11th in EPA per dropback. Like, some of that is the fact that Kirk Cousins is playing well, but Kirk Cousins is still 38 and didn't play very well in Atlanta. Like the overall ecosystem for the passing game for the Raiders, even without high-end receiving receivers, I like Trey Tucker.

1:03:50Robert Mays: He's a nice player. Brock Bowers is Brock Bowers, but like there's a lot of Jalen Naylor and Kobe White earlier in the season and all that stuff. The Raiders, I think, have proven themselves to be a hospitable place for any sort of quarterback that you were willing to drop in there.

1:04:04Derrik Klassen: And lest I'm accidentally giving Seahawks fans bulletin board material, this will probably go pretty poorly for him. Yeah, he'd go 14-30 with three picks.

1:04:12Robert Mays: That wouldn't surprise me. But it doesn't matter.

1:04:14Derrik Klassen: The Seahawks will be able to confuse him and throw shit at him that might not faze Kirk Cousins, of course. Like, that's part of it. In the grand scheme of things, I think he'll be fine. He is not fine China. Even I said this in the meeting, Cam Ward, we don't even know for sure that he's good yet. And he didn't play particularly well against Denver in that first career start. He was driving to tie the game in the fourth quarter. And if Calvin Ridley had caught a ripper of a seam ball, I watched a lot of rookie drop. Calvin Ridley dropped a 20 yard gain that would have gotten them into scoring position in that game.

1:04:49Derrik Klassen: or else. Well, I remember. Yeah. So I think Fernando is going to be fine. The thing about this that is interesting to me, and I think I said this a little bit pre-draft, there is a lot about Mendoza that you can kind of paste on to the way that the Seahawks treated Sam Darnold. Like, I think the arm talent is very similar. I think you can weaponize Mendoza a little bit as a runner, but like especially on the boots and stuff. He's a really good athlete. He throws really well on the move, I think. And so you can obviously, I think, throw it down the field a little bit more than you could with Kirk Cousins.

1:05:16Like, with Kirk Cousins, if you're going to throw it down the field, It has to be a play action, and he's throwing it at the very top of his drop. It's perfect timing. It's perfectly schemed up. And they hit some of those. With Mendoza, you have a little bit more, like, room for error in terms of the timing of this stuff. And the other thing I'll say, we kept saying with Mendoza when they drafted him, it was like, man, they're really going to have to get, like, a back shoulder outside the numbers winner. Because, like, that's what, you know, Charlie Becker was for him in college and stuff. It turns out Brock Bowers is just actually that.

1:05:42So I'm not even worried about that anymore. It's so true.

1:05:44Robert Mays: My only advice to Fernando just moving forward is just know where 89 is. If you want to throw him the ball 20 times a game for the next eight weeks, I'm fine with that. As somebody who is heavily invested in Brock Bowers' fantasy outlook over the next two months.

1:06:00Derrik Klassen: I am actually, I'm curious about how that's going to go too because Brock, obviously, he plays outside a lot. Nick and Munro was so fun against Trey McBride last week. He had a nice win in the end zone on the last fourth down of the game and just in general looked really good, but I don't, like, how much is Kubiak going to give Nick and Munir the opportunity to cover him? Like, I would just, like, get him away from that guy. Get him outside. I'm very much looking forward to this. Even if it is a little bit ugly. Maybe, maybe not. One other thing I would want to note is just that I re-watched this Cardinals game and eight snaps in, I was like, why are the Seahawks blitzing this much?

1:06:38Derrik Klassen: They've been blitzing north of 30 % in their last two games. Leonard Williams is hurt. Uchenna Nwosu is also hurt. Maybe that's why, but I don't know. The Seahawks have so many guys up front that it was jarring to me to see how much they changed their approach. And I wonder, maybe some of that is like a screw you, Gardner Minshew, we're just going to bring the heat and make you throw the ball. And if that's the case, I would try that again against a guy making his first career start. It looks pretty good. Nick Imanwari looks really fun blitzing through the sea gap. That's the funny thing. They have the guys who are like awesome blitzers.

1:07:13And it's funny that they don't, they use it as like a, we'll get you eventually. They're pointed missile shots. Yes, exactly.

1:07:19Robert Mays: Yeah, they're very focused strikes. They're not doing it with volume. What is this? Are we thinking Yuchenne Nimosu plays this week? That I don't know. I think he was on the practice field yesterday. Yeah, limited in practice. So he's got a shot. So he's on his way back. What's the Leonard Williams situation? Stinger. Not practicing. I'm over this. All right. let's get to sicko street for week 10 this is a good one we had multiple different options for sicko street this week right chargers ravens is one of them the ravens i'm willing to say could be a competent enough football team which go to percent and the chargers not even like in a joking way do i want to talk about the chargers anymore so we're going to bypass that kyle mccord versus this version of the colts that's traded away half the roster that's like too sick for sicko street Like, I can't believe that we had this plucky Dolphins team that we were all enjoying.

1:08:11Robert Mays: They were fun to watch, even with Malik Willis banged up. And then now we've been robbed of that. We were talking about Zach Seeler and singing his praises all during the Hangover show. He was so good in that game against the Lions. He's out. Did you see that he tore his biceps on the first play of the game? What? No. First play of the game. And he played that way, yes. Which is insane. That dude is, I mean, he's been such an underrated player for so long. But now we've gotten that version of the Dolphins ripped away from us. So I'm almost too sad to make fun of the fact of what this could look like with Kyle McCourt against the Colts.

1:08:46Derrik Klassen: Did you see Dan Campbell himself compared the Dolphins to his Lions team when he got there?

1:08:50Robert Mays: Man, that's one of our best takes of all time.

1:08:53Derrik Klassen: As soon as I saw that quote, I was like, aged like a fine wine. That's sick. And that's, they're exciting. It sucks that they don't have their quarterback now.

1:09:01Robert Mays: The real answer for Sicko Street in Week 10 is this 49ers offense against this Cowboys defense. The stat that I wanted to throw out, just to kind of paint a picture of what I think this would potentially look like, this season, the 49ers have averaged 0.24 EPA per dropback, which is the highest number in the league. We've talked ad nauseum about the Niners offense over the last week. I've made the same joke and told the same story on four different podcasts about Kyle Shanahan over the last 72 hours. The Cowboys defense has allowed 0.3 EPA per drop back this season on plays where the other team uses motion at the snap per next gen.

1:09:39Robert Mays: That's against all offenses. The Niners are using that type of motion as much as pretty much any team in the league. So what is the Niners offense going to look like against the Cowboys defense? There is a chance that one of the linebackers, whether it's Damarian Overshawn, Shamar James, whoever, just spontaneously combusts at some point in this game, just like shuts down on the field because of what Kyle Shanahan is potentially going to do to them. The linebackers and the safeties, man, like PJ Locke has not been playing well. Caleb Downs like is getting better, but still a rookie going against this.

1:10:12Caleb Downs had a nice day against the Colts.

1:10:14Derrik Klassen: No, he's a good player. This is not the Colts, unfortunately. Exactly. Like I still think that he's a good player, but he's a rookie going against Kyle Shanahan for the first time. In a similar vein, my note for this was like the Cowboys defense when the offense only has five blockers in And sometimes pass pro stuff is iffy because, like, are they chipping on? They're not. Whatever.

1:10:30Robert Mays: It's directionally accurate. It's directionally accurate. The Cowboys are 31st in EPA per dropback. They're awful when teams get five out. You know who has more five out dropbacks than any team in the NFL? The 49ers by, like, a lot. It might be the best five out team I've ever seen. Legitimately, yes. Yeah. Because what Christian McCaffrey does is so special, which, like, that's why they're allowed to do it. But why it works so well is just how Kyle Shanahan is scheming it up, how Brock Purdy is seeing it right now. Like, they are, they can just get five out, and they don't have problems with the blitz the way that other teams do.

1:11:01Because that would be the issue, right? It's like, when you're doing that, the blitz teams are going to get you. And that's not necessarily, like, a huge consideration against the Cowboys, but they're just not afraid of it, man. They just do whatever they want.

1:11:10Derrik Klassen: The stuff the Niners can do over the middle of the field, combined with what the Cowboys' defense looks like in the middle of the field, is just, it would keep me awake at night. I almost just want it to get as bad as it can get.

1:11:23Robert Mays: Like, at this point, like, why go halfway? dolphins broncos from three years ago four years ago yeah yeah why not i mean the cowboys defense has been better than this by the way over the last few weeks they're not even the worst defense in the league and they've gotten healthier i just think stylistically what the niners are and what the cowboys have struggled with there is like nuclear meltdown potential for the cowboys sake i kind of hope it doesn't happen for our sake i kind of would love to see it just as like an experiment for the same reason that people watch horror movies like i just the way that that makes

1:11:57Derrik Klassen: you feel i kind of am interested in that version of it i mean the score is not as bad as dolphins broncos but well at 2023 these teams played on sunday night football and it was niners 42 cowboys 10 and that was a good team that was like the that was the 2023 cowboys and like and this is this is my lived experience talking but what kyle shanahan has done to dallas over the last five years when they've played is just it it stays with you well what he did to dan quinn for a very long time

1:12:29Robert Mays: it's pretty ugly and so that team even if they were good they were again similar to this even if the cowboys defense is getting better where they are bad is specifically vulnerable against the niners in the same way that any dan quinn team even if against most teams was fine was particularly vulnerable against the Niners. And I think run or pass, like we're doing a lot of like passing game stuff, but if you tell me they come out of this game and the Niners run for 215 yards and three touchdowns, I'd be like, well, yeah, they're just moving the linebackers wherever they want them. And Trent Williams is nuking all the defensive ends.

1:12:58Robert Mays: The only reason that I'm going to be fine with this is that I also have the Niners in the wins pool. It's the only reason that this is going to be excruciating experience.

1:13:07Derrik Klassen: You're so selfish, you know, just self-interest overall. For the purposes of this exercise. You got to look out for number one, buddy. I imagine the sicko street angle of this is when Packers-Vikings is like a 28-27 banger, and then poor Tom Brady. I love the fact that you think the Vikings are 28-27. Kirk Cousins is there now, man. Come on. Hey, you can't rule out an explosive defensive play from that group. Yeah, 28-27, and then Tom Brady and Kevin Burkhardt are just digging through the file in the second half of this game trying to find something to talk about.

1:13:40Robert Mays: Oh, there's a chance that Tom Brady's having the time of his f***ing life, though, watching Kyle Shanahan do this and Brock Purdy. Like I think Tom Brady is going to be having a grand old time, even if this thing is ugly. All right, before we move on, let's take one more quick break. I am a homeowning father of two. I know super cool. And what that means among other things is that my wife and I have a number of monthly expenses. Now we get rewarded for a good number of those, but one of the biggest ones, our mortgage was one that we weren't be rewarding for. And whether you've got a mortgage or you're paying rent, that's going to be one of your biggest monthly expenses and most of us aren't getting rewarded for it.

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1:17:40Robert Mays: All right, let's get to what we want to know coming out of week 10. I'll start here. I want to know what I should think about the Saints passing game for the second half of this season. they're playing against the Panthers team that is banged up on the back end Todd Washington the defensive coordinator they were sitting there and like pre-snap single high looks playing nothing but cover three against the Broncos like they are a team right now with the personnel that they have and the way that they're approaching things if they continue to play that way where you should be able to pick on this thing and I know the Saints had their moments in the passing game last week I mean the throw that Tyler Shuck makes to Chris Olave on that final drive is an incredible throw but i just am a little bit confused about the version of tyler shuck specifically that we have gotten so far this year the number that i would put on it so from week 10 on last year this is when tyler shuck was the starter the saints had 21 attempts between the hashes between five and ten area yards and so that's only this doesn't seem like that many right it's two a game but the hashes is really the only marker to properly say like the middle of the field by according to some of these things because inside the numbers isn't really telling isn't really telling you that much like the hashes to me is like again directionally accurate way to say how often are you accessing the middle of the field those 21 attempts the only teams with more from week 10 on last year of those were the lions and cowboys that's the whole thing that they do with quarterbacks that are just unafraid of whatever that snake pit is for them okay so the Saints were third that was the reason I liked watching Tyler Shuck play is that he was willing to sit in there stare down the barrel of the gun throw some of those in breakers with like very little fear this season through eight through nine weeks okay it was 21 of them last year over the final eight weeks nine weeks of the season through the first nine weeks this year they have four four i mean that's once every other game the only team with fewer is the jets he's right behind bo nicks and deshaun watson i just don't really get it and some of it may be structural offensively i haven't watched a thousand saints drop backs but in going back and watching their game last week there are plays rap routes things over the middle that he's just not really pulling the trigger on And I don't understand that because sometimes you have guys that just aren't willing to do this.

1:20:03Robert Mays: He was willing to do it as a rookie. Yes. So why isn't he willing to do it now? I don't know why exactly. I mean, part of it I do think is that this comes back to a little bit. The question that we have with him coming out is like sometimes I think his aversion to pressure. He just gets a little bit like I just want to check it down. I just want to rip it to throw a goal ball, which is like some of the Derek Carr ishness from him. this is not necessarily like a saints to saints comparison but like i think when when when the situation is not ideal for a player they fall back into certain tendencies for some guys like drake may he's just gonna chuck it bro like he's gonna wish a route to be open and he's gonna throw it tyler shrug kind of does the opposite where it's like balls just got to come out he is he has the third lowest air yards or throwing to the sticks percentage in the entire nfl this season bo nicks is right behind him like that's kind of what we're getting from him right now and you talked about this when the pressure is starting to kind of creep in a little bit his tendency to try to bail out of the pocket and like find not bail out like from the back of the pocket but like trying to find space outside of the pocket when things start to get a little bit dirty in there i hate that because he is a good the what did we say my the comparison i said for like my best path forward for tyler shuck stylistically was can he be like a version of ryan tannahill and i think they're very similar in a lot of ways tyler shuck is not a bad athlete but he is a stiff straight line athlete.

1:21:26Robert Mays: So we're talking about what, if you look at some of the numbers, like out of structure attempts, things like that, he's not that far off from the way that like CJ Stroud is playing. In terms of how flexible and like explosive of throwers they are, they couldn't be more different. Like Tyler Shuck is like a elongated athlete. CJ Stroud, the ball comes out immediately. So when you see him trying to make plays outside of the pocket, those throws just aren't happening. Those throws can't happen. And so I just really hope that we get back to a place where he is willing to stand in there a little bit more and make some of those throws one just because I like watching that version of him play and two just by how he's built and like the tools he's bringing to the position I kind of think it's the only path to him becoming the guy that he could potentially become absolutely like if you're going to be a guy who has that level of talent you kind of need to weaponize it and I think over the course of most of the season he just hasn't really done it and like the other thing was CJ Stroud CJ Stroud I think has done a really good job like his i'm looking at it right now his pressure to sack rate is the ninth lowest in the nfl right now shuck is more closer to average and like it's it seems like a small difference but like if you're gonna bail that much that little difference matters and i talked about this maybe like week two or week three we did maybe one of their hangover games like you said he's a good straight line athlete he's slow out of the gates yes like he's

1:22:40Derrik Klassen: just with that first two steps he's not he's just not a twitchy athlete yeah was he bailing a lot against the browns a little bit yes curious to know i mean and i wouldn't do this but for a young inexperienced quarterback but hopefully having kelvin banks back will help stabilize some of that jordan tyson now like maybe that helps you a little bit it's not like early career baker or

1:23:02Robert Mays: like some of the worst bow nix stretches where like it almost is like it's a compulsion like it doesn't feel like that it's just it's his answer to a problem more often than it should be because it's not an effective tool for him that that's my frustration and it's there are still five or six plays on the other end I mean the third that you just talked about where it's like you're still getting some positives where it's like he's not like completely cratering as a player no he's been he's been like it's not been that bad exactly the version of him that we're seeing yeah is just so different and far removed from what the best versions of him were last year yeah like the flashes of what made me excited about him are just happening so much less this season than you might have expected because of the player that we saw in the back half of last year that's where i'm at

1:23:47Derrik Klassen: with it yeah travis a-chan is limited at practice this week i mean the saints are healthy-ish closer to what they were supposed to be at least i'm again it's not a situation where i'm like oh

1:24:00Robert Mays: it could never happen it's just one of those things where it's just a little confusing i'm just a little surprised that like and so what does it look like over the back half of the season and how does that start with this game against the panthers all right dave what do you want to know

1:24:13Derrik Klassen: coming out of week 10 in the NFL. Let's keep it in the NFC South. What a perfect trade deadline game because the Kansas City Chiefs are at the Atlanta Falcons and you fixate on the Chiefs because they're the team that's 6-2 and you're like, what is Josh Downs going to look like right out of the gate? How will the Chiefs offense look different against an Atlanta defense that is really good, top 10 in defensive DVOA at home. The Falcons have had success against really good teams. They beat the 49ers and they beat the Packers. That's two of their three wins are against teams that are surging right now.

1:24:45Derrik Klassen: The Falcons also traded Jesse Bates away, though. So a big piece of what makes them look good is gone. So I want to know who feels the effects of that trade harder in this game. Do the Falcons look different bad without Jesse Bates? Or do the Chiefs look different good with Josh Downs? Maybe both. I don't know. I think the other small thing, they traded away their starting center. Yeah. Part of their thing is they completely forgot about it. You're playing against, you know, Kyrgios Tonga, Chris Jones, obviously. Like, that is like a small part of it, too. We spend so much time breaking down the logic of it from the Ravens' perspective, but the Falcons just being like, yeah, we're all set here.

1:25:23Robert Mays: Go. Deal them. All right, Derek, what do you want to know coming out of Week 10? I want to know how bad I need to be worried about the Los Angeles Rams offense. I don't expect them to lose this game. I don't want to think about it. They're going against Carson Beck in his first start. against a really good Rams defense. They're not going to win this game, the Cardinals. But we are looking at a Rams offense now. You underestimate the bullshit associated with the 2026 Los Angeles Rams. Maybe I do. And so we'll see. But, like, this is now a team that is 2-2 Atwell, Kanata Mumpfield, CJ Daniels, Xavier Smith are the only receivers they have on the roster.

1:26:02Derrik Klassen: That's what we're working with. You think that's bad? I think that's the worst in the league bad. Max Clare has to be active for this game, right? Why? They still have six tight ends. Yeah, I guess that's true. Is Terrence Ferguson coming back at least? No, he's going to be out for a few more weeks. And so that's the other thing. They just don't have any explosive players.

1:26:18Robert Mays: The tight end that's actually a receiver isn't even playing. Exactly. And so if you can't put it together against the Cardinals defense, I know they're weird, but they've not been good this year. And they're missing some of their guys on the back end. I'm going to be really concerned if this looks a certain way. And so I just kind of want to see what this looks like. Again, I expect them to win the game because it's Carson Beck's first start. but if they don't show any signs of life against this Cardinals defense, I'm going to be like, I don't even know if I have the words for it for how I feel about this offense.

1:26:47Derrik Klassen: They scored 16 points against this defense a couple weeks ago. And Puka was playing. Yes. A little bit worrisome.

1:26:57Robert Mays: It's so depressing. Again, I don't even really want to think about the fact that it's happening. All right. Hey, guys, can I get in on this? You sure can. You know what I want to know? are we going to be fitting Derek for a Boltman costume at the end of this? Let's do the wins pool. We have not updated the wins pool at all this season. We are at the halfway point. Robert in the lead, 38, 27, and one. Dave right behind, 40 and 31. Derek, 33 and 33. Not even close. What is he, 30 and 33? Yeah.

1:27:26Derrik Klassen: 500. Four and a half back at Dave.

1:27:27Robert Mays: Four and a half back at Dave.

1:27:28Derrik Klassen: Yeah. Okay. Right. Which, by the way, the Rams are my wins pool team. You don't see me boohooing over here. I've had way more bye weeks, but I don't think that's good enough cope when I have the Chargers. Who's screwing you the most? The Eagles? The Chargers.

1:27:40Robert Mays: Oh, yeah. Yeah. We can have this discussion later if Derek ends up losing the wins pool. Yes. Objectively, if we do the same punishment as last year, the Chargers are the team that hurt Derek the most. I still think the most inexcusable choice that he made in the draft is picking the Eagles. Correct. Because he doesn't believe in the Eagles. I disagree with him. he didn't believe in the eagles like at full strength when they were winning super bowls hitching your wagon to the eagles when you you disagree with them them coming back to bite you in the way that they have like that still feels like the greatest crime associated with this even if the chargers record is worse i believe that because there's some amount of like sure jaylen hurts gets hurt bubble they didn't look good before any of that like that's like the most indefensible yeah we both just had to let dave pick the eagles and live with it yeah I feel terrible about that.

1:28:32Derrik Klassen: I probably would have. I think Derek took him like one pick before me. And the Chargers one becomes so bad that it's almost like there is something like cosmic about that one that I just don't even really feel that bad about having picked it. The Eagles one is just like, that's a rake I knew not to step on. And I did that.

1:28:47Robert Mays: Yeah. The Chargers thing is like an epistemological thing. There's no way you can possibly understand like what's going on there. Yeah. Like if the Chargers won six games, I would have been like, yeah, that was probably the worst of it. And this. So arriving here, like, I don't even know. Eagles 2-7, I shouldn't have done that. Kierkegaard wrote books about shit like the Chargers. There's nothing you can be. That's not your fault. You know the worst part of this? I feel so good about all my other teams. Like my other teams, I feel fantastic. The Texans are going to turn it around. The Bills are going to win 13 games.

1:29:17I love how the Texans are the first team you went to.

1:29:19Derrik Klassen: The 3-5 Texans. Because I need them to do it.

1:29:22Robert Mays: We're not doing this. I already said it earlier on the show. I need them to do it. The Vikings are a weird team. They can still get to double digits. The Bucs, I think, are going to turn it around to some degree. The Steelers. This is how down bad he is. These teams are three and five. He's just like, I didn't do anything wrong. I feel great about my choices.

1:29:38Derrik Klassen: The team that just traded for a quarterback and two teams that are below five. I like full-throatedly believe in those teams. The problem, when you're starting at 75 % every week because the Chargers and the Eagles might not win another football game. It's tough sledding. Have you ever seen the Eagles fan that has the baseball hat with like the flappy bird on the bill? It's like battery power. That might keep me occupied. That might be fun.

1:30:03Robert Mays: That's a fun suggestion for a costume. All right. That is all we've got for the Week 10 preview. We'll be back here on Sunday night. We'll also be recapping Thursday Night Football. We've got a little Commander's Giants tonight. If you're watching this on YouTube on Friday, that will be available on the YouTube channel. So please check that out. If you are watching this on YouTube, please like, subscribe, do all that good stuff. For now, that's all we've got. Appreciate you guys listening. We'll talk to you very soon. Thanks for tuning in. Make sure to hit that subscribe or follow button so you never miss an episode.

1:30:31Robert Mays: If you enjoyed what you heard, please like, comment, and leave a rating. We'll see you next time.

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