Darnold Does It, Snow Game II: Mile High, Pats-Seahawks, and the Wild Taipei Climb With Cousin Sal

9:37Cousin Sal:who's probably going to win the MVP? Well, don't sleep on Stidham against May, because that could blossom into a great, great rivalry. We have no idea. We don't know how it's going to go. But both teams were 60-1 to win the Super Bowl. your Patriots and Seahawks right around there going in. So for them meeting up, I didn't even figure out what it would be. But yeah, their overrun, there was eight and a half wins, Seattle. And I wasn't like sold on Darnold. I said, you know what? He really didn't have to do anything last week. That game was over in two plays, which makes it, I think it was five weeks before he had a 200-yard game.

10:10Cousin Sal:The oblique, who knows? So he didn't really prove what he, it's not his fault. All they had to do was run. And Kenneth Walker was amazing last week. But I was like, maybe he doesn't have it in him. He was great. I mean, JSN is terrific, too. We can get to all those guys. But yeah, he did not disappoint at all, Donald.

10:28Bill Simmons:Didn't turn the ball over. I thought he had a couple superb throws. The throw to Shahid in the first drive. Perfect. Even Brady was like, oh, you got to hit that. And then they showed the replay. And he was like, wow, that was a great throw. That was an A throw. Dropped it right over the shoulder. He had that. I thought the touchdown throw right after the kick fumble, I think it was Bobo in the end zone, but he kind of threw it a little across his body at pressure. I thought he stepped around. I didn't see the Sam Darnold panic stuff. I have a good friend of mine, Mark Cimino, who's a diehard Jets fan and has been pissed that they got rid of Darnold ever since they got rid of him and actually roots for Darnold by proxy because he knows the Jets have no chance.

11:11Bill Simmons:And he's like the most vindicated of anyone. He was just like, Darnold was good. We destroyed him. We poisoned him. We had him swimming in our poison pool and he got poisoned and he got out and he learned to swim again. It was basically the Sam Darnold thing. But he was really good. So Jets fans bummed out by it, but also Vikings fans, obviously. That's got to be the other team that's watching this going, wow.

11:35Cousin Sal:Jets fans, a miserable Super Bowl, right? Because you're not going to root for the Patriots either.

11:39Bill Simmons:No, this is awful.

11:40Cousin Sal:Aside from your friend, I don't know how many are excited about Sam Darnold. This is the first time

11:44Bill Simmons:the Jets fans have felt awful during a Super Bowl. Oh, no.

11:47Cousin Sal:That's right.

11:47Bill Simmons:No, it's every time. You're not going to get there. So Darnold was 25 for 36, 346 yards, three TDs. And Stafford was over 300 too with three TDs. But I just thought Darnold was great. And the other fascinating thing was McDonald. So remember week one? Because I had the Seahawks for the division. I had a bunch of Seahawks overs and they lost week one and he kind of coached scared in that game, remember? We came on the pod that night and I was pitching about it and I was like, he doesn't trust his team. Like, you got to be aggressive. They were really aggressive in that last drive. They got that fourth and fourth stop.

12:25Bill Simmons:They had the ball and instead of like being just handing into the line and trying to shoot clock, they did some play action. They ran out. They completed some passes. I was really impressed by that. They got the holding call, but that helped.

12:36Cousin Sal:But yeah, that was, yeah, they weren't laying back, that was for sure. And they kind of came in spurts, right? Kenneth Walker was great in the beginning. He was great. And then he kind of got lost for a couple quarters. And if you've had Kenneth Walker in fantasy, you had like eight weeks where he had under 60 yards. It wasn't pretty. But then JSN steps in. I know we talk about QB1s all the time. Oh, is it Allen? Is it Mahomes? I think we settled on Allen being a QB2 and no QB1. The receivers are really the fun rankings, right? Whether it's JSN or Puka, once in a while we'll throw Jamar Chase in there when he'll have like 15 catches.

13:13Cousin Sal:But JSN is a man. And Cohen over the middle, he got just slaughtered that one shot, that one long pass.

13:21Bill Simmons:When he jumped in the air, yeah, yeah. And he also had a couple catches that didn't count. He caught that ball under the goalpost. That was seven yards out of bounds. Right. He was 10 for 153 with a TD, and Puka was 9 for 165. Correct. And they're just clearly the two best. And it's interesting because a year ago, you would have said Chase and Jefferson were clearly the two best. These two now, I thought they needed all the catches and all the yards. Puka had a couple, like he had a play in the first half when he was like going out to his right, cutting in, like he was going to cut in almost to do like a button hook or something.

13:58Bill Simmons:And he had a step on the guy and then he veered in front of him. It was like a basketball move. It's like what you do in basketball when you're on a fast break and you have the big man behind you and you want to put him on your hip. He kind of did that with that guy and then went deep and Stafford hit him. But he does shit no other wide receiver does. And then JSN, same thing. He's doing stuff along the sidelines where you think he's going out of bounds and he's tiptoeing down for another eight yards, catches over the middle, catches in the corner so he can go deep. Those two guys just can do everything.

14:26Bill Simmons:And they're reliable, too.

14:27Cousin Sal:And they, especially Puka, some D-backs have come out. I think the other D-backs are mad, saying it's kind of not fair what he's able to do in space. Like, it's unguardable. It's not fair. You know, it's like a Euro step or something, but he's getting open. And Jason, like you said, dragging his feet in the sidelines. He can go over the middle. But, you know, I want to get in there. But Cooper Kopp had a huge game at third and three with five minutes left. And the third, like, you know, converting. Obviously, that first down was huge. So they really brought it all. Yeah, all his overs came in.

15:00Bill Simmons:Four for 36 and a TD and a really big third down catch. looked like a little more explosive. It's funny because, you know, they don't have a backup running back anymore. That guy, Helani. Yeah. I watch football every week. I'm not positive I ever remember seeing him. I'm sure I did, but he certainly didn't jump out. And then, you know, they have the Bobo and Barner and these dudes, but it's one of those offenses that you never feel, you feel like they just shut down the one guy and you'll be fine. And then somehow Darwin's a 346. They also have an awesome punter who I thought had a couple big ones and was single-handedly responsible for that guy muffing the punt.

15:39Cousin Sal:Right.

15:39Bill Simmons:That thing just kept carrying and carrying and carrying backwards. And he finally like just, he like tripped. He tripped over his own feet.

15:46Cousin Sal:I do feel bad because I cut away to the new special teams coach. And it's like, all right, what the F is that guy supposed to do? He tripped over his own feet. He can't like hold him up there. But yeah, that is a tough, that is a tough catch to make from your back. And you figured that was it, right?

16:01Bill Simmons:When you fall, you just have to basically spasm forward and try to avoid it?

16:05Cousin Sal:Oh, get out of the way if you can. But I think he'd be so cooked by then. It didn't matter. It was going to hit him.

16:10Bill Simmons:You know what's funny? When I watch football, I'm always thinking of all the things like you and I couldn't do when you watch these games, right? Or like how many times we would just be knocked out or how much certain hits could hurt. Like today, Ramondre in the first game was running and he was pushing the pile and it kind of stopped. And then Hufanga came flying in from behind and just like nailed him in the back. I was like, I would still be down. Like they would have, I would be, pieces of me would be going on three different cards. And you watch this stuff and you're constantly marveling.

16:41Bill Simmons:The thing I'm always amazed by is that, or one of the things is that people don't muff these punts more. Yeah. When you think like these giant stadiums with the lights, how high it is, and the ball's doing, there's wind and these guys make it look so easy. And then when somebody actually, and then plus there's gunners running at you, like trying to fuck with you, like they're going to hit you and then cut into the side. and it's weird it doesn't happen more often, but the irony of the Rams special teams murdering them in a game, this was the problem with their whole season. I literally put them in the manifesto.

17:12Bill Simmons:This was rule number 13. Like, beware of the bad special teams.

17:15Cousin Sal:It should be. Like, you know, you talk about this game all week, these two games, right? And we did it on the pregame show, and it's like, we probably mentioned the special teams out of an hour and a half. We probably mentioned it for 40 seconds. And it was a huge, you know, like some things you can't, you can't handicap missed field goals. Who's going to miss? Who's got the day? Two weeks ago, missed field goals were bad. But the special teams with the Rams, you can almost guarantee that's going to be one play that screws them or they overcome it.

17:42Bill Simmons:It's so weird. McVay is like, I think everybody considers him one of the four best coaches in the league, right? How does he not fix this? Right. This seems like one of those where you just, you do the roadhouse move and you're like, I'm getting the best cooler in the South. I'm bringing Dalton in. Right. Name your price. I'll pay a thousand a week or just take everyone off the field

18:01Cousin Sal:like don't return punts anymore just everyone's gone

18:04Bill Simmons:oh that would be interesting we're not trying to block punts or return them we're just letting them bounce around this game had great QBs great receivers we had multiple goats because we had the Rams punt return but then we had Woolen with the taunting penalty which I want to talk about in one second and it felt like that might flip the game I thought the announcers were excellent I thought Brady has come back for the year. Is he eligible? Oh, really? Interesting. I think he's been really good. I really do. I think he's last year and he said it. There was an article written about him this week.

18:36Bill Simmons:And he basically said what we talked about last year in the pod. It felt like he was so overprepared. He was trying to work all this information that he learned all week and was just like doing. And now you feel like you're watching the game with him and he's weaving in like his experience when he played and the stuff he was doing about like that. I thought his best points today was the JSN, the shoulder pads. Yeah. And he was like, when somebody's running and their shoulder pads don't move, usually if their shoulder pads are going like this, you know, they're going deep. If they're lower, they're going to stop.

19:07Bill Simmons:And he's like, nobody can read his shoulder pads, which makes them impossible to read. I was like, holy shit. I've never heard anyone say that before. Yeah. He's like, shut up, Tom.

19:16Cousin Sal:This is my secret. Don't let that out. But yeah, no, he's good. He's better. He's growing on me. He doesn't get Botox during the games anymore, which I think helps. He could focus now. Yeah, the halftime probably.

19:26Bill Simmons:He was as good announcing this year as he was bad at running the Raiders. So we'll see if he can pull out both of them next year. But I thought those guys, I thought they had good chemistry. So we had the Cup Revenge game, which you mentioned, and then we had the Darnold coming out of it, outdoing the guy who's probably going to win the MVP.

19:48Cousin Sal:Wait, let me follow. Oh, yeah. Yes, probably. Yeah, we had that as well.

19:52Bill Simmons:Mm-hmm. It'll be weird now if May... Stafford was going to win it anyway, but May has been just shaky enough in the playoffs and Stafford was good enough that... Yeah. I don't know.

20:03Cousin Sal:Speaking of shaky, how embarrassed you and Hench going off on Stafford, how he sucks, and then, oh, my God, May's the MVP. And the Carolina game. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

20:12Bill Simmons:You're just being good fans. My God. That's all I remember. So Seattle threw for 201 yards in the first half, kept it going. let's talk about the big the big swing plays the taunting penalty what's your take? because I do feel like they were reffing a lot of this stuff differently in the playoffs than they do in week 3 week 3 they're calling that we're now in the NFC title game they just got this awesome stop it's 31-20 they're about to punt guy runs over, talks to the bench of course the officiating guy they have in the booth, he's got to agree with it. Thank God we have those guys just to agree with everything.

20:54Bill Simmons:I think those guys were trying to think of one useful moment. I can't think of any today. Yeah, they had the one on the fourth and one Drake Mays sneak. They go to whoever it was there for, nothing. Offered zero. They could be AI

21:10Cousin Sal:at this point. I mean, you know exactly what you're getting for that. But yeah, the taunting, my thing is who cares? Like, I don't care. The fans don't care. The people getting taunted don't care. There's no way the Seahawks were, like, insulted. Like, this is why they do training camp. That's why on hard knocks, they'll sing songs and embarrass themselves and everything, right? Like, so that they can get used to getting taunted. Because emotions are going to run high in a football game, let alone the NFC Championship. So, whatever. Flags are going to go one way or the other. If you get a tug on the shirt, you can maybe call holding.

21:43Cousin Sal:But I don't like taunting at all to change a game.

21:47Bill Simmons:I don't know who it's for. I don't know if they're trying to teach sportsmanship to younger people. They felt like something was going on a line. Here's where it falls apart for them. It's the same sport with the same rule that after a turnover or a safety or whatever, all of the defenders can run into the other end zone and fucking do snow angels and stuff. So it's like, that's not taunting. But Wolin getting excited that he just made a great stop and he's in front of the bench and he yells at a couple people, like, I just don't understand why do you have these two different outcomes for things that you're just governing completely different?

22:23Cousin Sal:You could instruct the bench to look away. Don't look at that end zone. There's some stuff going on that you may not like. It might hurt your feelings. They're pretending they're bowling pins right now. You might not be able to get over it. If you're more than 20 yards away, you can taunt. Yeah, that's right.

22:37Bill Simmons:And then it's like you can't take off your helmet on play, but yet we see it all the time as the guys are walking off the field. but they'll take it off. They don't care. I've stopped trying to figure it out. Did you think the Seahawks were the best team in the NFC?

22:52Cousin Sal:I thought it was the Rams. I lived and died with them. And I thought actually like, you know, it's like this team, maybe that Carolina road win wasn't great. Maybe the Bears road win wasn't great. But the fact that they're winning these games, you know, means that, I don't know. I just thought they were a smidge better than Seattle. But I have no problem with Seattle going to the Super Bowl. It's the other conference that's sort of messy.

23:16Bill Simmons:Seattle had three. I'm not going to ignore that. Seattle had 396 total yards. The Rams had 479 and lost. And Stafford was like nifty too.

23:25Cousin Sal:Like he had that Fernando Mendoza type run, right? Like to get that first down. He like had a weird pass to Nakua when nothing was going on left. He was about to get sacked. So it was a different kind of Stafford that we saw.

23:38Bill Simmons:I was surprised that they were able to run on Seattle like they ended up doing as it felt like as the game went along. What did they go for? Corham was 9 for 55. Williams was 10 for 39. Corham's longest was 19. Williams' longest was 11. It's not like they were getting huge plays. It just felt like they were constantly getting 4 or 5 every play. I thought after last week, the reason I picked the Rams in this game, I mean, I'm sorry, the Seahawks. I just thought the Bears should have won last week. I didn't think the Rams were good enough. And I thought the Bears left a ton on the table from a passing standpoint, which the Seahawks kind of bore out this week.

24:15Bill Simmons:It really feels like the Rams peaked in the first, I would say three plus months of the season as an all around team. And then as the longer we went along, it just kind of became Stafford and the running game in these two receivers. But that was kind of all they had. Everything else was sloppy. Special teams was bad. and I didn't feel like they could get stops. Yeah, I mean... That's why they lost.

24:38Cousin Sal:It's so close, right? They lost that overtime, that game on the Thursday night. They win that, they're home. Maybe it's a different story. By the way, 30 ,000 tickets sold at SoFi today for people to just go in and watch on the large screen. 75 % Seahawks fans. No, I don't know. No, I don't know. I want to get cut. I know, but would that be more disgusting than actual Seahawks fans showing up to a real game? It's more humiliating. Yeah. I want to count on that if anyone was there. I would like to know.

25:06Bill Simmons:Well, if the Seahawks win, this would be the first time they've ever won the Super Bowl. Yeah, I know. I heard that last week. Good luck to them. How about... Or the second time. It'll be the second time they've won the Super Bowl because they beat the Broncos 40-8 in a game that we bet on. And I forgot last week. And you didn't correct me.

25:27Cousin Sal:I know. I love Schrager, the suck-up, blaming me, throwing me under the bus. I started the segment saying three of the four outcomes are rematches of the Super Bowl. What am I supposed to do? I don't know. Trigger the suck up. He knows it. No, it's okay.

25:42Bill Simmons:Just leave Tony Romo alone. These things happen, you know? I was excited. I was excited that I apologized last week. You know, heartfelt apology to Danny Kelly and the rest of the Seahawks fans, because that really could have come back to haunt me these next two weeks. Definitely. You don't even remember. We won a Super Bowl, motherfucker.

25:59Cousin Sal:I don't know. Some people, Mina Kimes is not accepting the apology. A lot of people, Joel McHale, a lot of Seahawks fans don't want anything to do with your apology. Tall John just doesn't like me either way. Yeah, he's unhappy regardless.

26:13Bill Simmons:Well, when they played the Broncos, the Broncos were favored, right?

26:17Cousin Sal:Yeah. Slight, but yes, I'm pretty sure they were favored.

26:20Bill Simmons:When they played the Patriots, who was favored in that? I'm going to say we were favored.

26:28Cousin Sal:I'll look it up as we're talking. It was like three or three and a half. Right? I think we were favored. They were going to cover.

26:37Bill Simmons:I don't know. That was 2015? Yeah. Yeah. It was three, wasn't it? Yeah. I think we were favored. So this will be the first time they've ever been favored in the Super Bowl.

26:51Cousin Sal:I guess. I'm afraid to say anything anymore. Seattle was minus one against... Oh, that's right. Yeah.

26:58Bill Simmons:And I think it tic-tac'd around a little bit. And I think the Pats were favored at one point.

27:04Cousin Sal:And then the other one, Denver was favored by two. And the one that Seattle loved.

27:08Bill Simmons:We watched that Super Bowl in a group of people that will probably never gather again at our cousin Jimmy's house.

27:15Cousin Sal:The Seattle, the New England one? The Malcolm Butler game. That was a really tough watch there. Yeah, anyone, any mass hole you can imagine with celebrity status.

27:22Bill Simmons:We had Affleck and Damon, Tony Kornheiser, Dickie Barrett. Yep. Who else was there? It was just a hodgepodge. It was basically the cast of RIP. I think Whitey Bulger. Yeah, Whitey Bulger was still hiding.

27:35Cousin Sal:He left at halftime. Yeah, he was still hiding.

27:38Bill Simmons:I think Seattle's really good. I think they've been good all year, and I haven't seen anybody kick their ass yet. No, you have to say that. I mean, even they have three losses, and they, it's not, like, the Pats sucked in week one against Vegas. They sucked in the second half of the second Buffalo game. They kind of sucked offensively for the entire game today. There are other reasons for that, which we'll get into, But Seattle's a much sturdier team. That's why I was so surprised to see the Rams kind of go up and down the field on them.

28:03Cousin Sal:I think you, deep down, you can't say it now because now you have a lot of negative mojo for Seattle. No, I'm fine. I think you're happy. Seattle loves me. I think you're happy that the Rams are out of this. I don't think you wanted to see Stafford. I'll tell you what. I think the Rams' pass rush was a little better than Seattle's today. And you know that, too, and you like that. And you don't trust Sam Darnold as much as you do Stafford.

28:28Bill Simmons:So I'm just telling you things that you know. That's where I landed for most of today. That ultimately I would rather play Sam Darnold on a neutral field than Stafford and Puka and Devonta Adams. And they're running again. So the Rams, you'd think like the McVeigh stuff starts in 2017. They lose the wild card to Atlanta. The next year they win the NFC title on that ridiculous Saints call. Although it did go to OT and the Saints did choke. Lose to the Pats 13-3 in a game that nobody could remember four plays from. Can you remember four plays from that game? It was a big wrong play. Jared Goff was bad enough that they had to trade him.

29:15Cousin Sal:I had the over, so I think I might have napped at halftime. I don't think I even saw the rest.

29:20Bill Simmons:2020, they lose to the Packers and they end up moving on from Goff. 2021, they win the Super Bowl and they win three straight three-point games against Tampa and Brady, San Francisco and Cincy. But then there was a couple, they didn't make it the next year. They lose the tough Lions wildcard game. Yeah, that one in 23. And then the Eagles game last year when it felt like they were coming on down the stretch and they had a chance to steal it. So this has been almost a decade now. McVay has been pretty relevant. Yeah. but 1-1 in the Super Bowl. Maybe it's the home field. This is a good chance.

29:59Cousin Sal:You know, sometimes home field doesn't matter. Didn't matter in the AFC game today, but, you know, if that game's not in Philly, maybe the Rams do win that. If that game's not in Seattle today, maybe they do win.

30:09Bill Simmons:Three road games in a row is pretty hard. Yeah. So the big question, the reason I brought that up is Stafford's going to be 38 next year. He allegedly had a bad back this year, although he seemed fine all year, but I just wonder how long he can keep this train together, right? Puka takes a million kajillion hits. I have no idea how long his career is going to last, but I'm guessing it's not going to be a 15-year career for him.

30:33Cousin Sal:Yeah, I don't know. 30 giant hits a game. If he goes out for any substantial amount of time, this Rams team, even Stafford at his best, is not a 13-14 win team for sure.

30:44Bill Simmons:Last thing I'll say before we throw the break, I do like the Seattle fan base in general. It's probably my favorite non-Boston one. I always hate. No, I like the... Their basketball team got stolen. I like the Seahawks fans. They go way back to that Zorn larger poster when they're wearing the terrible jeans. Did you have that one in your room? Yeah, I remember that one. Depleted jeans. Yeah. But, you know, checkered history. And then it all came together in the beginning of 2010s. And then they were the afterthought for most of the season. Everybody was so focused on the Rams. Then it was Rams or Niners.

31:19Bill Simmons:People were picking the Cardinals as a surprise team. Yeah.

31:22Cousin Sal:I mean, you and I made a list of, after that Caleb Williams crazy to hell Mary, that didn't matter. Like, we made a list of, like, the most, the greatest, most inconsequential plays of all time. Caleb Williams won. That Jermaine Kers catch. We forgot about that one. Yeah. That was, I mean, that might be one and one A, those two. So, yeah, these poor fans. Just let them win.

31:44Bill Simmons:There was also three minutes where it seemed like the helmet catch that was, like, an official curse for the Pats. Like if it's like we're going to lose on the helmet catch and that we're never going to the Superbowl in my lifetime. All right. We're going to take a break. We'll come back. Talk pets. Oh, the Bill Simmons podcast is presented by FanDuel. Playoff mode is on. FanDuel's got it all. Same game parlays, quick bets for jumping in lives offers to boost your winnings every game day. You do not want to miss out on the playoff action. The remaining playoff action we have on FanDuel. Download the FanDuel app or head to Fanduel.com slash BS.

32:21Bill Simmons:To get started, 21 plus and present in select states or 18 plus and present in D.C., Kentucky, or Wyoming, get in a problem, call 1-800-Gambler, or visit rg-help.com, call 888-789-7777, or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats, which has become a good friend to me during the football season. Big news, Aldi is now on Uber Eats, and you get 20 % off your first grocery order with code NEWALDI26, A-L-D-I. two six. So whether your fridge is empty, you're too tired to shop, or you just ran out of essential ingredients in the middle of meal prep, don't worry.

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33:15Bill Simmons:2001. Maybe it was January or December. I can't remember. Tom Brady's first playoff win, round two, Raiders in the snow. The last home game in the old stadium, which had really had... Why don't you want to take a talk? I'll just talk to the camera.

33:33Cousin Sal:Let me say something, because I want to let you

33:35Bill Simmons:have your fun. I just want to give the Blizzard's history.

33:37Cousin Sal:Blizzard's history of the Pats. You can have your fun and you can gloat, but so that this isn't a completely miserable situation for me. I have brought in a prop here. I have a Rosa Pizza Pie from Bianco Pizza. Can you see that? Oh, that looks delicious. Well, I know. This is your favorite. Yes, you can't have pizza. My current diet allows for it. So go ahead. You go talk about your snow game, Vinatieri and everything. I'm going to eat some pizza while you do that.

34:04Bill Simmons:You got the Rosa?

34:05Cousin Sal:I got the Rosa, right? Your favorite. Oh, you're going to have a sleigh.

34:07Bill Simmons:Yeah, eat a sleigh. So I'll do the snow. That looks delicious. That looks really good. So snow game, come back from down, I think 10. Ugly like this one was where they couldn't get any offense going for a long time. John Gruden chokes on, I think, second and short, third and short. Doesn't get it first time. Punts it back. We get the field goal of Vinatieri and everything starts. This was snow game two. The mile-high revenge. We've never won in Denver in the playoffs. We're owned for. Rulon Jones. Jake Plummer, Champ Bailey, 2005. Still mad about that one. Two Brady Manning losses in mile-high.

34:46Bill Simmons:and then it decides to be a giant blizzard today and they go up 7-0 Jared Stidham makes his only good throw of I think probably the entire day hits Mims in stride they end up scoring 5 minutes in the game it's 7-0 and I'm just like I can't believe this is yet another decade where we're going to get our ass kicked in Denver and then Denver never scored again and the Patriots won 10-7 I'll start with Rabel you know you didn't like this game I'm gonna go there no from an entertainment standpoint you didn't like it

35:27Cousin Sal:from an entertainment standpoint

35:28Bill Simmons:you didn't like a lot of people didn't like it they talked about how bad it was let me defend it if you go back and you look at like pro football reference in the playoffs in the 60s and 70s there were a lot of football games like this where it was like bad weather field position making some defensive stops, fourth and one plays, don't fuck up on special teams, like really hard field goals. A 45-yard field goal is not like an easy one anymore. And everything is about positioning and not turning the ball over. And it was a chess match and Vrabel won it. And Peyton not kicking a field goal to go up 10-0 was the biggest mistake of the day in either game.

36:05Bill Simmons:Take the points. We couldn't do anything. Let me say this.

36:10Cousin Sal:First of all, the mix of pistachios and red onion and Parmesan Reggiano, virgin olive oil. I mean, you wouldn't think it's a great marriage, but it really is better than chocolate and peanut butter. And then the back is so charred and crispy. I should review pizza. That's another key. Does anyone do that for Netflix? I thought Peyton, I'm not going to say that he was happy with the Bo Nix injury. Of course, it was a big bummer. But I think eventually he convinced himself. He's like, this could be my game. This could be my game. I'm the hero. I'm the hero. You know, there's only a certain amount of games, maybe you know of more, where the coach is remembered for the game more than the players.

36:45Cousin Sal:I think Parcells winning Super Bowl XXV, the Giants beating the Bills. That was a great game plan. Parcells being carried off that. But Peyton himself, when the Saints beat the Colts, right? And this could have been another one.

36:58Bill Simmons:Belichick's first Super Bowl in 01. Belichick's first one, right? It was a Belichick title.

37:02Cousin Sal:Against the Rams, for sure. So I think he thought, he's like, I'm going to do this. And I actually believed him when he said, I'm not worried about Stidham. I'm worried about everyone else. That's like a kind of a great way to give your quarterback confidence and not piss off the rest of the team. But I had a lot of problems with his game plan, mainly that there was no trickery involved because you would need it with Stidham. But you thought that was like a 90-10 play, like going forward versus kicking? I thought it was like close. I thought it was 64.

37:32Bill Simmons:I could just tell you what my texts were. Yeah. because I think there was a little bit of a break because they had to measure it first. And I'm watching it going, I pray to everything that they go for this. And I have multiple texts to back it up because I thought if they went up to nothing, I didn't know if we were going to be able to come back because their defense, both sides, both tackles were already getting annihilated, right? May looked skittish. You know, he looked combination of nervous and like he didn't think he had enough time. Booty was just, Patrick Sertan just took him out. First time they threw deep to him, he was running side by side with him.

38:07Bill Simmons:So it's like, all right, cross off that half of the field. Right. And I just thought, and especially with the weather coming, it was like, man, I don't, if it's 10-0, I don't know if we can come back, but I think we can get a stop if it's fourth and one.

38:19Cousin Sal:But if it's 14-0, it's lights out, right? Don't you think like that takes all the air out of it.

38:25Bill Simmons:Didn't guarantee they were going to score a TD though.

38:28Cousin Sal:Well, I know.

38:29Bill Simmons:I don't know. Listen, we talk about this all the time in the pod, these fourth and one. and it's like situation says, it says it's 72 % of the time, whatever. I think you throw that shit out in a game when there's a fucking blizzard coming in the second half and you have a chance to basically just, basically my thing is, what's the final score of the game? How many points do I need? If I'm the Broncos, it's like, I just need to get to 14 to 17 and I win the game. Give me the field goal. I can go up to nothing. Yeah. Let me try to get a turnover. So that was one mistake. And then the other one was sit him on that third down, throwing the ball backwards.

39:04Bill Simmons:Why are you putting him in the position to do anything like that? He's your backup quarterback. He hasn't played quarterback all year.

39:10Cousin Sal:I mean, if a guy is, I mean, that's the punt return of falling down. Like, what are you going to do? I mean, he should know to get rid of that ball. By the way, can we talk about that one for a second? There's a couple plays, right? Look, he probably deserves to turn it over because it was so awful. Such an awful decision. Such an awful play. But why aren't they stopping that to review it? They first called it an incomplete pass arm going forward and everybody has to stop. It should have been a, if it wasn't the Patriots would have scored on a touchdown. I can tell you on that.

39:41Bill Simmons:By the way, I'm going to take a bite all year. All year. They've been letting the play roll and not calling it dead. And then deciding after whether it was a touchdown or not. That was one of the only times this year. I remember them just calling it dead when it was like in the moment. It was like, I think you threw it backwards. Anyway, go ahead.

39:56Cousin Sal:Right. Let it, let it go. That's fine. Let it go. We learned that lesson this year. Could they review it? Couldn't they review it? Why is that a lot different? If a guy throws a pass and it's batted down behind the line of scrimmage, I know that's more obvious, but couldn't this have been that? Couldn't the ball have been going forward and it had been deflected backwards? Should we have looked at it for like a minute? Can't we just look at it? I think they did, though. It's the play of the game. Oh, come on. They barely. I thought they did, though. I mean, it was clearly backwards. It was backwards because it was deflected, though.

40:28Cousin Sal:If it's deflected backwards, it's incomplete. isn't it? Whatever.

40:32Bill Simmons:It's fine. It didn't deserve it. Whatever. I thought he threw it backwards. Well, it seemed like the Pats were going to get screwed. And then on second down, May does the QB draw that I was screaming for because you could see with their defensive line was loaded one way and it was sitting there. My son thought I was like clairvoyant. I was like, run it! Run it! And then he did the QB draw because you could see Denver just didn't have a guy in the right spot. But those two plays cost them the game because once the second half started, they couldn't move the ball. They couldn't. If I had the lead and the Pats can't do anything, I'm doing what the Patriots did in the second half.

41:10Bill Simmons:And this is why I wanted to talk about this because I thought of Rabel in the second half, he just managed the situation, right? We have a lead. We don't think that they can go 40 yards. They're not going to be able to kick a field goal that's more than 37. And we don't think they can make plays. I'm not taking any chances. The third down was third and eight. and May just rolled out and threw it out of bounds. They didn't even go for it because he didn't want to commit a turnover. I thought that was so smart. I thought he did a great... I didn't think he did a great job in the first half, but I thought second half he was great.

41:40Cousin Sal:It's because he got the version of Jared Stidham that most of us thought he would get this time last week, right? I was talking about... We were talking on the pregame show. It's like when there's two games left, you could really convince yourself during the week by overanalyzing. You know, analysis leads to paralysis. That Stidham's not a... You know, Stidham-Knicks, it's the same thing. What was interesting, though, is he had that 52-yard, 54-yard pass to Mims, whatever, right? And then they call timeout. And then I think to give him a trophy or something, I don't know what they did. Participation trophy.

42:10Cousin Sal:Exactly. But then they score. So, like, in Peyton's defense, he must have thought, all right, this guy's got, like, more than one first down left him the rest of the game. And not that horrible pass play, whatever drop forward that it was.

42:23Bill Simmons:He did. I wrote in my notes, Stidham kind of sucked them in a little bit, thinking that maybe he could do a little more. I thought you made the key point on Peyton. This was a hero ball performance by him. Yep. Like, if you're actually just trying to win the game, take the points, go up 10-0, don't have Sidham do anything that could put himself in harm's way for the rest of the game until we have proven that we can do a long drive. Even the beginning of the third half, or the second half, third quarter, we have like a 10-minute drive to chew up the clock. I'm going to say we like I'm on the team.

42:58Bill Simmons:You are. And we can't even get a touchdown out of it. We had the ball for 10 minutes. We couldn't compete with complete 10-yard passes. I thought their defense was excellent, and we had a lot of trouble blocking them. Really good. Yeah.

43:12Cousin Sal:Look, the biggest asset either team had on offense was Drake May's legs in the second half, right? You were going to scramble for first downs. It looked for a second that Stidham could do the same thing. But what bummed me out about Peyton is you guys had that flea flicker, which kind of got you in field goal range. Yeah, we missed the field goal, but it was a good play. Yeah, who's the quarterback that hasn't taken a snap in two years versus who's the MVP caliber quarterback? I think you need some flea flickers in there if you're Denver. I think you need an end around for Mims or something. Something to juice it up to create a missed tackle or something because they had nothing at all in the second half.

43:47Bill Simmons:Well, they were missing two receivers, which hurt them because Franklin was scratched for the game. Bryant got hurt during the game. So all of a sudden, Humphrey's out there in big spots. I think I saw, was that Sky Moore out there? There was a Moore. Is that Sky Moore? It is, right?

44:00Cousin Sal:Yeah, I think it was Demi Moore. Yeah, they were really... Demi Moore was a Moore.

44:05Bill Simmons:I thought they ran out of guys. It was a good matchup. They couldn't run the ball. I mean, the big thing for us is the run defense has been awesome. The Patriots defense, I know they're going to take shape for the next week, and that's fine. Your defense is good.

44:19Cousin Sal:I like your defense.

44:20Bill Simmons:Defense has given up 26 points in three games. It's good. They've given up two touchdowns, one of which was this touchdown the first five minutes of the game. The other was that one in Houston off the Drake May fumble or whatever it was where they had to go 10 yards. Other than that, 26 points in three games and pretty close to dominant.

44:38Cousin Sal:I think they had two bad plays in the last three weeks, right? The one, the Mims play, right? The Mims play. The one last week, like you said. And I don't think any really against the Chargers. No big ones, so.

44:51Bill Simmons:Yeah. Well, I thought Vrabel, it's funny because Belichick, like when he flipped stuff around in the 2000s. And a lot of it was like defense, game management, like just out thinking the other team, good game plan, strategy. And Vrabel, ironically, the last game of Brady's career was that Tennessee game. When Vrabel like outwitted Belichick. And it was like, oh my God, the pupil has become the teacher. It was one of those. And now Vrabel's the coach. And this flipped in a year. We had Jared Mayo last year, who was one of the worst coaches we've ever had in any Boston team. and now we have this guy who I really felt like MacGyvered this game.

45:28Bill Simmons:You know, I don't know.

45:30Cousin Sal:They gave him too much credit. I know. You beat Jared Stidham. You outwitted a five-year-old when you put a coin behind his ear and pull it out like, oh, look what I got.

45:39Bill Simmons:You're on the road in a blizzard and we didn't turn the ball over. That's the key, right?

45:44Cousin Sal:I think your first half, what did you have, 48 yards in the first half? It was terrible. They had about the same in the second half. The difference is you guys were locked at seven. You got the points and you didn't, he didn't. Then we got the field goal to start third quarter. But for God's sakes, 28 quarterbacks beat Drake maybe today. 28 beat him last week, maybe 20 the week before. What the heck is going on?

46:05Bill Simmons:It was the worst throwing game he's had since the Vegas game in week one. I thought he missed seven open guys and throws that he's made all year. Sertan broke up that one bomb that was perfect. He threw another bomb that was a good one. But he did have the naked bootleg to finish the game. And he called it himself, I guess, right? Yeah, I sent it to you. I thought McDaniels called it. He didn't tell anyone on the team he was doing it. If you watch the clip, Hunter Henry's blocking his defensive end out to try to keep him from coming toward the line of scrimmage. And meanwhile, May's running toward the guy, and Henry's blocking him toward May, but May just audibled it.

46:47Bill Simmons:But for the old-school Pats fans, the pre-2001, that was like the famous Grogan play. which he used to do. He most famously did in the 85 season when they went to the Super Bowl against the Jets. He had this old naked bootleg where he's limping into the end zone. And it was always the Grogan play. So he does that. This team has pieces of that 85 team. Did Grogan also have

47:10Cousin Sal:10 completions and a win? I think he probably did. If you go back to Grogan's stats, they were not good. I'm sorry. You like bringing up Colby in Game 7 against the Celtics. What was he? Seven for 28 or six for 24. I hate to always bring it back to basketball. This, this is, this had... You always, you always do this.

47:28Bill Simmons:I know. Go ahead. He wasn't great. The defense carried him. His legs made a couple of good plays. And then the naked bootleg. But, you know, I said this last week, it feels like the 96 season, Parcells' last season when it was like, oh, I guess we're in the Super Bowl. I don't think anybody believed it. I think Vrabel believed it. but when you look back at who they beat, they beat three top five defenses. I think it's the first team ever in playoff history to beat three top five defenses. He was terrible in the three games, though. He wasn't terrible.

48:00Cousin Sal:He had 15 sacks. He was good in the second half of the Chargers. He took three interceptions. He took 15 sacks. He wasn't terrible. I'm not going to defend him. Okay, but you're going to go crazy about what he did against his three defenses. Six fumbles, 15 sacks. I'm just saying they beat three top five defenses. I know. I'm very... Now they're playing another one.

48:16Bill Simmons:18 points a game I should have another piece of pizza

48:18Cousin Sal:I didn't finish the first one the happiest you were

48:21Bill Simmons:when you were finishing the pizza do I think this is the Super Bowl team it's hard for me to believe we had some in the 80s and 90s where it's like wow they made it I love that you're eating like the the Titans Ram Super Bowl that year it's like wow the Titans are in this is weird but we don't usually have these.

48:48Cousin Sal:Let's rank the worst Patriots Super Bowl teams. I'll make it quick. Number one is this year's team. 12-way tie for the number two. That's all I'm going to say.

49:00Bill Simmons:The defense is really good. They are good. And they've been with Milton Williams. They've been really good this whole year. So I think the recipe would be a little like 01 where they won the Rams game in 01, I think 2017. Yeah. it's probably a score like that. Keep it down. There's a really interesting Darnold element to this that I forgot to mention in the previous segment of. The Patriots are basically the team that ended his Jets career. So he had that ghost game. He never recovered from the ghost game. Remember that? When he said Belichick and he was like, I was seeing ghosts out there and it became a week-long internet thing about how Sam Darnold was seeing ghosts.

49:40And I don't know.

49:41Bill Simmons:He gets revenge on that. So here's the good fortune.

49:44Cousin Sal:This is no good. They're saying Kenneth Walker got run over by a snowmobile, and he's listed as doubtful for the Super Bowl. I mean, all good news for the Patriots, always. Not even snowing in Seattle.

49:54Bill Simmons:Hench and I were trying to figure out the highlights for the Patriots in this game, like actual highlights. Fourth and goal stop. Stidham backward pass. May draw. Touchdown. The QB draw. Flea Frickin' Hollins resulted in no points. Leonard Taylor blocked the field goal. I guess he tipped it. A guy that I didn't know he was on the team because they just added him. Literally, they didn't know he was on the team. The Patriots punter who was terrible today. Like, really, like, he would have been the villain of the game if they lost. That's the guy that angles it out of bounds normally, right? He was terrible.

50:28Bill Simmons:I mean, he skunked one. He was just so bad. His last punt was a 33-yard punt with no return when they were in the 40. And it was actually like he came up a little bit big, so that was fun. Gonzo's interception and then the naked bootleg. It wasn't like a bevy of highlights, though.

50:43Cousin Sal:I do think, well, by the way, all those runs of the naked bootleg, all those, the one that they converted, that he might not have converted, ended up being the biggest run, wasn't it? Like, you kicked the field goal after that. Yeah. And they had the eye in the sky. We're never going to know what gets reviewed and what doesn't.

51:00Bill Simmons:Staten sucked for the last two hours. And if I'm a Bronco fan, I just feel like I would have won that game.

51:08Cousin Sal:He's not the franchise.

51:09Bill Simmons:Yeah, I'm not like we don't have a QB controversy in August. but I think I would have I would have left that game thinking we win with Knicks like just we win Knicks gets us to he uses his legs he probably rushes 10 times like I think Drake was 10 for 65 right I think Knicks is probably like 9 for 40 9 for 50 probably extends 3 drives with his legs and he's a

51:34Cousin Sal:fourth quarter comeback quarterback you could say what you want about him he might have been able I did like you know you talk about what's cool about the weather. Like, Romo was two minutes left. Patriot is like, better hurry up. You're going to lose the wind in the fourth quarter. I think they did a good job of figuring. Even the sideline reporters were excellent today, I thought.

51:53Bill Simmons:I thought that was the best sideline reporter performance in a while. When Tracy Wolf said to the watch, the snow come into my face. Now watch when I turn. I was like, ah.

52:02Cousin Sal:Yeah. By the way, they're going to isolate that as what you just said for sure.

52:08Bill Simmons:What do you mean?

52:10Cousin Sal:I mean they're going to make it filthy that people do that kind of thing oh you think I'm in trouble now with social media? No no watch the snow come in my face it's fine it's good

52:20Bill Simmons:I just see what now I see what you think oh man somebody's going to film a winter porn with my face in it damn it

52:31Cousin Sal:Blizzard Bill says watch the snow

52:34Bill Simmons:come Blizzard so the defense gave up zero points in the last 55 minutes of the game. Yeah. I thought, I wrote that in my notes. The game was like Game of Thrones because they kept telling us the snow was coming and it was, I've been re-watching Thrones. It was like, winter's coming. Winter's coming. And that was another reason why I can't believe Peyton didn't take the field goal. Because they knew, in the first quarter, yeah. They knew around halftime, snow was coming in for real when they did that little stop thing. Anyway, things I have left I think Drake has to probably play two-thirds of a good game in the Super Bowl for them to have a chance to win, which in the regular season, he would play 75 % of an awesome game, but he would always start out slow.

53:24Bill Simmons:I think they have to figure out how to start him faster and use his legs, get him involved in the game with his legs, and then for some reason that opens things up for him.

53:37Stidham, is that it?

53:39Bill Simmons:Do we ever see him start a playoff game again? What more do you want to say? Or do you blame the Blizzard? Or do you say it's the Blizzard that was really hard to throw?

53:46Cousin Sal:No, Blizzard made it hard to throw for sure. But I don't think we've ever seen anything like that where a backup comes in and immediately, like, how nervous were you? Like, oh my God, if they do get to 10 or 14 to 17, we're kind of done. Like, I think the agreement with the defense would have been like, just let me get 23 points. Just stop them from getting 23. Like, no, you needed less than half of that. and still. And then just like nothing the rest of the way. It was actually shocking. Went from this makes sense to this makes... I don't even know what I'm watching anymore.

54:18Bill Simmons:So you don't think Stidham's made himself a$25 million contract this year? No. No. I think CBS needs to offer Tomlin like$50 million a year to join their halftime show. Really? I don't know if you saw the halftime show.

54:32Cousin Sal:Yeah. It's rough.

54:33Bill Simmons:I would try to get Tomlin. Sertan, I think, was the only Broncos winner out of that game. We tested him once, and it was like, no more.

54:42Cousin Sal:He was great early on.

54:43Bill Simmons:No, thank you.

54:44Cousin Sal:You never see a D-back have his head turned, running for 10 yards with his head turned, which almost definitely, you know, calls off the pass interference if you do that.

54:53Bill Simmons:Pat's ran the ball, if you include the Drake Mace Grambos, 38 for 141. And I think the Rams unlocked a little bit of a running blueprint with the Seahawks, because I thought they were over and over again able to gash them in the middle and move the ball. So we'll see if that's a thing. So we have two weeks now to think of the Super Bowl. Have you gotten sad yet that the NFL season's almost over or more sad that the Patriots are back?

55:18Cousin Sal:I don't know. It's very, very hard for me to separate those two. But, you know, I don't like that I can't make a two-team teaser anymore. I guess I could use the total and the line. And I don't really love the Super Bowl. You got, you know, you're stuck at someone's house. You watch. You got your wife's friend's dumb husband asking you what the spread is every four minutes. Can you put a bet in for me? Can I bet one side? You guys want to bet this? Yeah. I don't know how this works. Can I bet the Rams? Can I bet the Seahawks and the Patriots? Then I won't lose, right? Oh, geez. Just killed me.

55:49Cousin Sal:So yeah, this isn't the best.

55:51Bill Simmons:We'll take a break for the podcast. We'll keep going here on Netflix. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Imagine a game where you're on the court solo. No coach, no teammates. No one in the stand. Stressful, right? Sometimes life can feel like that too. That's when State Farm, they show up. They're on the bench, ready to help you find the right coverage when it matters most through an agent, online, or even on the app. State Farm with the assist. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability and eligibility vary by state.

56:27Cousin Sal:For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters.

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57:16Cousin Sal:Ask your doctor about Tremphaya today. Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit TremphayaRadio.com.

57:27Bill Simmons:This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. March is here and Uber Eats is delivering deals all month long, every game day. And we got some games coming up. Score big savings on all the delicious food you need to turn your couch into center court and fuel your fandom as there's some tournament games coming. Whether you're ordering in or hosting the whole crew, Uber Eats is serving up deals on wings, burgers, pizza from your favorite restaurants, plus game day snacks from top stores. Bracket busted, still holding strong. Cinderella story, top seed. well, however the madness unfolds. These deals will keep going all month long.

58:03Bill Simmons:Visit the Game Day Hub on Uber Eats for all the latest deals. Start saving today. Let's guess the line. I haven't seen it. I don't know what it is.

58:14Cousin Sal:I swear I haven't. Now let me just, let me set, can I set the stage? Can I build some heat here? Yeah, build some drama. Alright. So where are we? Okay, so after 21 weeks, you're up 11 to 10. You have the lead. I have an opportunity to tie. Tiebreaker is Zoe Simmons takes penalty kicks on us for three and a half hours until one of us gets lucky and blocks one. Or you could win it right here. Even a tie wins it for you. Let's see what happens.

58:44Bill Simmons:I have the Seahawks favored in Super Bowl LX by four points.

58:57Cousin Sal:it's going to be hard for me to win now.

58:59Bill Simmons:What did you guess? You didn't even tell me. Did you guess four?

59:03Cousin Sal:I guessed four. Oh, you win. You're off the hook, Zoe. The actual line... I almost won four and a half. Well, that would have won two. Seahawks minus four and a half, over under 46 and a half. Vegas zone. Yep.

59:20Bill Simmons:Wow, won another year. Now I get to hit you with a rose of pizza.

59:25Cousin Sal:This is a hard bros and pizza crust. It is damn good. I'm sending the rest to you.

59:30Bill Simmons:That looks really good. Well, I had some other stuff I wanted to hate with you before Parent Corner. A new coach got hired for the Pittsburgh Steelers, and it was Mike McCarthy, who was your coach on the Cowboys for a few years. Right. Am I wrong thinking that's now he's an underrated hire, Mike McCarthy?

59:54Cousin Sal:No, I don't think you're wrong. Like, I think there's two ways to look at this, right? Like, compared to Mike Tomlin, maybe not better, you know, maybe in ways a little worse. But compared to the pool of coaches that was available, I think he's good. I think he's solid. I think it's weird to take a chance on these 35-year-olds, you know, and just like, you know, I know you don't want to sign old guys to five-year deals, but I think to get a steady guy in there, it's going to be better than rolling the dice, which the Steelers don't do anyway.

1:00:26Bill Simmons:20 coaches have 10-plus playoff wins, and only four of them started coaching this century. Mike McCarthy, Harbaugh, Sean Payton, Sean McVay.

1:00:37Cousin Sal:His numbers are very similar to Harbaugh. So there's a lot of people who love the Harbaugh hired.

1:00:42Bill Simmons:So McCarthy was 174 and 112, 11-11 in the playoffs and won a Super Bowl. Harbaugh was 180 and 113. It's almost exact. 13-11 in the playoffs and won a Super Bowl. Peyton is now 184 and 108, 11-10 in the playoffs, 1-0 in the Super Bowl. And Tomlin's 193 and 114, 8-12 in the playoffs, won a Super Bowl. So if you just covered those four guys up, you wouldn't know who was who. Right. And yet everyone's like, oh, John Harbaugh restoring giant. It's like he was about to get fired before Lamar became Lamar. McCarthy was on the Packers, kicking ass with Aaron Rodgers, and then eventually it became, oh, it's only because he had Aaron Rodgers.

1:01:22Bill Simmons:Like, why isn't that what we say about John Harbaugh? Absolutely. I don't get it.

1:01:26Cousin Sal:Yeah, I think that comparison's good. Yeah, it's Giants fans just getting excited, I think. I will say this. If he brings Rodgers in, no personal bias. I know that's impossible to think, but I don't think that's a step forward. Right? If he's guaranteed to have to bring Rodgers in, McCarthy, I think that's a couple more years of just nothingness.

1:01:44Bill Simmons:It's a tough one. Well, I think it seems like some of the assistants will get poached because there's still some jobs left.

1:01:50Cousin Sal:Yeah.

1:01:50Bill Simmons:Hilariously, nobody wants the Browns job, which I thought was funny. A couple of mailbag questions. This came from Jack in Saskatchewan. He suggests a new manifesto rule. Can you picture the QB holding the trophy? The Malcolm Gladwell blink test for when you're picking the Super Bowl. Seattle has the best shot. Picture Sam Darnold holding a trophy with confetti coming down. Can you see it? I thought that was pretty interesting. Sam Darnold kind of looks like Theon Lovejoy. Ooh, you really are watching this game of thrones.

1:02:24Cousin Sal:Yeah, I'm really getting in on thrones.

1:02:27Bill Simmons:But I was trying to think of most unlikely guy who held the trophy. It was probably Dilfer, right?

1:02:32Cousin Sal:Yeah, I think so. Dilfer.

1:02:34Bill Simmons:Wow, Dilfer won the Super Bowl. What just happened?

1:02:37Cousin Sal:Doug Williams. Yeah, those are some weird ones.

1:02:40Bill Simmons:I think Dilfer is probably number one for me. But yeah, so I don't know. I could see both of them holding it.

1:02:44Cousin Sal:I could see Mabee's wife baking cookies the whole time, handing them out while the trophy's going around. I could see both.

1:02:51Bill Simmons:The Seahawks fan named Chris was talking with his friend Ryan about signature celebration dances they would do if they're an NFL player. That would be the funniest. And they decided it would be the tuck dance that Buffalo Bill did in Silence of the Lambs. And then we're wondering if somebody could do that and would they get a penalty. So you'd have to kind of push your stuff in and do this. Right. Or maybe put the football in. I feel like it would be a 15-yarder.

1:03:20Cousin Sal:Yeah, I think so. You think that's taunting? You think that's something the sidelines should look at? I think that'd be taunting. Yeah, you do the tuck dance. Yeah, I think Joe Buck wouldn't like that.

1:03:28Bill Simmons:Simon in Australia said that I almost threw a no-hitter with my OJ Simpson Peyton Manning comp. But then when I said that what car would he be driving I didn't make the white Bronco joke that was sitting there. Yeah, right. Denver. Yeah, with Peyton. It's all right. He compared it to Andres Galarraga's perfect game. It was going great. Blake in Nebraska wants to know, is it time to discuss Josh Allen and the Ewing Theory? Hmm.

1:03:57Cousin Sal:Wait a minute.

1:03:58Bill Simmons:How so? He does fit all the parameters. Media loves him. he's considered to be one of the best guys in the league he's never actually won anything so what would have to happen is he would have to have some sort of injury next year the backup would have to come in and then basically do Tom Brady in 2001 and listen he is on the Ewing Theory watch list I think is fair to say

1:04:21Cousin Sal:that's a big part of the Ewing Theory the actual doing it part of it yeah

1:04:24Bill Simmons:but I think he is definitely a candidate Peter Krause was saying how Rams Pat's Super Bowl would be an uncanny 2001 kind of doppelganger thing where the Rams would be the favorite. But that didn't happen. So I don't know if the Seahawks thing is the same way.

1:04:46Cousin Sal:I got to tell you, I do think the Seahawks, I think we'll break Netflix records if the Pats lose the Super Bowl to the Seahawks and we're on immediately afterwards. I think that's going to be like... You think that'll be Stranger Things? That'll be like six Chappelle specials lined up back to back. So if you love the ringer, ultimately it's good for the ringer. You should root for your team to lose, I think. How about I'll eat a roast of pizza if the Pats will win. Do it. Let's do it.

1:05:14Bill Simmons:Pour some extra gluten on it.

1:05:15Cousin Sal:February 9th is long enough.

1:05:16Bill Simmons:Seth Morgan sent me this email before the game today. He said he went to a strip mall dive bar in Littleton, kind of place where only three guys are at the bar talking sports, talked about the Broncos and somebody said, Stidham will be an even more potent threat than Knicks because there's no tape on him. The lack of tape will lead to a 25 % Stidham advantage. And if he's 20 % worse with the 25 % advantage, that might actually give the Broncos an extra 5 % chance to win the Super Bowl. Therefore, we are better off with Stidham. Go Broncos. And then he said, shout out to the Littleton, Colorado bar.

1:05:51Cousin Sal:Okay.

1:05:52Bill Simmons:So listen, that's the kind of thing that happens in a bar.

1:05:54Cousin Sal:I can imagine the Patriots defense. Like, he's throwing it forward or backwards. What are we supposed to do? There's no tape on this guy. He's right-handed. What are we supposed to? Come on, guys. We had no heads up here. He told me he was left-handed. Let's just let it go.

1:06:09Bill Simmons:Tim from Westfield, Massachusetts, wants to know if Stephon Diggs can be called the QB whisperer because Kirk Cousins, Josh Allen, CJ Stroud, all of them blossomed when he was there. I guess today wasn't the day to ask that one. I like it. He's definitely a whisperer of something because I think he's on pace for four kids in the last year. We've called a lot of things, yeah. Yeah, he's whispering something.

1:06:31Cousin Sal:You think it's because of the easy schedule? I haven't seen the women, but being able to impregnate them.

1:06:36Bill Simmons:Maybe if the schedule is harder, it would be tougher. Miles from Austin via Boston thinks the stars have aligned for the Pats to be a generational nobody believes in this team because, and this he sent us before the game, bad schedule. Are we sure Drake May is good? They're so lucky. The Ram Seahawks Super Bowl just happened. I am saying there's a lot of nobody believes in us. You didn't say it for Denver, though.

1:07:00Cousin Sal:That would have been a time to say. I thought that was going to bite you in the ass for not labeling the Broncos and nobody believes in us, team.

1:07:07Bill Simmons:The straight-up pick was Broncos. I thought that line was too high, the plus four and a half, but I thought the Pats were going to be a similar thing here. Here's a question for you from Connor from Minneapolis. Hit it, Connor. What is it? Who was Sal rooting for in Super Bowl L2? AKA Superbowl 52. I imagine him being in a real bind, knowing that the plorable Eagles would win or that he'd have to go in the pot and listen to you go on and on about the greatness of Brady. Which team was a bigger nightmare to win for you?

1:07:38Cousin Sal:I got to tell you, Connor, and thanks for the question. I really like eight out of the last 10, 15 out of the last 20 Superbowls. I'm just a basket case. I don't know who to root for Eagles. I had a problem with every play in the Eagles-Patriots game. Same with Patriots-Giants. I didn't want the Patriots to go undefeated. Definitely didn't want the Giants to win. Yeah, it's disgusting. They had knocked the Cowboys out in one of those years. So, yeah, this is why this is kind of like the last good week of football for me.

1:08:05Bill Simmons:But you like Seattle, though. You'll just go all in on Seattle. You'll do some sort of parlay with Seattle Moneyline with some sort of adjusted under or something. Yeah. Ruben Silva said in the Sunday Night Pod, we wondered what rule the NFL would change to help Josh Allen make or win the Super Bowl. We forgot the NFL has already changed a rule for Josh Allen overtime after the 13 seconds game. They changed the overtime rule. So that is fair. Right. Last email I'll read from Bill. He said, listen to you and Cousin Sal discuss the generational disappointment being shared by Bill's fans and their children.

1:08:47Bill Simmons:As an Atlanta native, I'm 47, part of the first generation to grow up as an Atlanta sports fan and pass it down. He said, you mentioned age nine to 10 as being the critical age for sports disappointment. Consider the nine-year-old that grew up in Atlanta and experienced 28 to three. I have no idea how that will warp them. My nine-year-old cried for 45 minutes in his Matt Ryan Jersey. Well, my youngest proclaimed he's not waking up. Obviously, I've saved the video for his wedding. That has to shape a child's character. And then he says, this small group of Falcons fans are now around 18 years old and will probably have to be studied and monitored.

1:09:26Bill Simmons:It's a really interesting one.

1:09:28Cousin Sal:See, they're just permanently damaged. Yeah, and these people are going into the world, right? They've graduated high school at 18. They're going to probably, yeah, September maybe. They just don't trust anybody? Yeah, it's a mess. It's not funny. It really isn't funny what we do to our kids. I mean, it's not fun what you do to them either. Just winter after winter. By the way, I'm looking at this. Mike McDonald arrested for public urination on a playground an hour ago. He was by a sandbox. He sentenced to three weeks in county jet. Tough break again. Good for the Patriots.

1:09:58Bill Simmons:Listen, the night's not over. There was a rumor today on Twitter that got like two million retweets or something where the guy said that Bo Nix actually got hurt in the locker room. I saw that nonsense.

1:10:08Cousin Sal:That had to be fake, right? Well, we saw him limping around before, right? In the post-game interview and everything. So Seahawks, minus 4.5.

1:10:17Bill Simmons:The over-under is 46.5. Mm-hmm. That seems high. And then Futures, Darnold, plus 130 for MVP. Drake May, plus 230. And JSN is 5-1, which was one we talked about two weeks ago when he was like 18-1 for Super Bowl MVP. And if, by the way, who wins the MVP? That was the Super Bowl today. Seahawks-Rams, who would have won the MVP? I would argue JSN.

1:10:44Cousin Sal:Yeah, I think so. It's a tough one. It would have been like a split vote, right? Right, right, right.

1:10:49Bill Simmons:The fucking one-hand catch? He was amazing. Maybe the guy who taunted. That was a pretty big play. Well, with the way the Patriots have been playing, if they won...

1:10:59Cousin Sal:No, it's got to be maybe.

1:11:00Bill Simmons:He was 5-1 last Saturday. No, but it could honestly be like Christian Gonzalez at 201 getting two picks or something. Yeah. It might be one of those... Who was the guy who won in your last Dallas one? Larry Brown? Larry Brown. They kind of didn't know who to give the MVP to.

1:11:13Cousin Sal:With the Raiders after that. Yeah. And then, not really a lot of stuff on.

1:11:20Bill Simmons:We'll have a lot of time to talk about this. Yeah. Do you like Kenneth Walker? Wow, his rushing, 80 plus rushing yards, Kenneth Walker is minus 102. They have those under on that now. That's the outline, I guess. Oh, wow. Maybe is, I'm just doing that for you. 40 plus rushing yards, plus 174.

1:11:43Cousin Sal:Yeah, it was so easy today. House was leaning on that. I'm like, yeah, that's such a sexy pick, Drake, man. He missed it last week, his over yardage total. But once he got like in the 60s, like, all right, no kneel downs. I'm going to bring this under. He's good.

1:11:56Bill Simmons:Well, that was the old Mahomes thing we used to talk about every year.

1:11:59Cousin Sal:Right.

1:12:00Bill Simmons:That they use the legs more. This episode is brought to you by Venmo. Supporting your team never gets old, but here's something new. You can now pay for your game day wings and rep your team at the same time. How? By getting your college colors on your card. Score more with the college branded Venmo debit card. Get up to 5 % cash back with Venmo Stash. Sign up at venmo.com slash college card. The Venmo MasterCard is issued by the Bancorp Bank N.A. Select schools available. Venmo stash bundle terms and exclusions apply at Venmo.me slash stash terms. Max$100 cash back per month. This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn ads.

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1:13:18Bill Simmons:Just go to linkedin.com slash Simmons bill. Terms and conditions apply. All right. Parent corner. What do you got?

1:13:28Cousin Sal:All right. So my son, Jack, he's a junior in high school. He's going to be 18 in a couple weeks. And I told you he loves the Steelers basically because of Heinz Ketchup. He loved Heinz Ketchup when he was young. And then they played at Heinz Field for like a year before they changed it to AccuShark. And then anyway, he's a Steelers fan. So I mentioned that there's a local bar slash restaurant that he wears his jerseys and his terrible towels and he's become friends with these 50 year old men and women. So when they lost to the Texans a couple of Mondays ago, he was bummed out and, you know, he didn't come back with any stories that we were doing the podcast, right?

1:14:09Cousin Sal:We did an extra one that day. So, um, I was like, Hey, you're okay. Yeah. It sucks. It sucks. It sucks. So the other day, fast forward to like three days ago, we're on the phone with Archie, my oldest is in college. And we put him on speaker microphone and he's talking to the whole family and uh jack comes in and archie's like hey i didn't talk to you sorry about the steelers and jack it's quirky kid i'm gonna say it that way he's very quirky kid and he says oh i have a story about that like uh-oh here we go buckle in he's like there was a couple when i was over at the bar sitting um next to this table and i sit with all these strangers who have become my friends but then there was another table with steelers fans that we haven't seen before.

1:14:49Cousin Sal:And someone delivered French fries to their table. And one guy at our table said, all right, the fries are here. Everybody go in. And I thought he was serious. And I grabbed the French fryer from this woman and I started eating it. And she's like, oh, you're nasty. Those are my fries. No, you're nasty. And then the guy was mad at me and he was like pointing at me. And I didn't know what to do. So I said, okay, I'll give you$20,$20. And then, you know, and they were still calling me nasty. And then my friend at the table is like 55 year old guy says, you don't know what you're talking about. And he ends up giving the guy the finger and then the guy gives him the finger.

1:15:23Cousin Sal:And then the guy punched him in the face twice. And I took my ginger ale and threw it in the guy's face. And then they got thrown out. And I'm like, what the what did this? Well, this is 10 days later. Where is this coming from? You got in a bar fight, kid? You're 17 years old. They're throwing ginger ale on people. What's going on? And Archie's just dying, just dying, laughing. And my wife is like, are you kidding me? This is what we're letting go on here. He can't go anymore at night. I was like, did you get thrown out of the bar? He's like, well, I don't know my status, but I think I'm going to be all right.

1:15:53Cousin Sal:It was the last game of the year, so we're going to see next year. This is lunacy, though. That's the story of the year. That's it. He threw his ginger ale on the guy's face. His friend got punched in the face twice. Oh, my God. So Jack goes over to the table and just takes a French fry. Just grabbed the fry. He thought it was a community fry for the where fans, your fans. And they took it that personally? Yeah, the woman was like really pissed off. And they were like yelling at the fans. They were not from in town. They're like, don't come back. Don't come back here again. They said to the woman and her husband.

1:16:27Cousin Sal:So yeah, we may need a new place for Jack to watch the Oilers games next year. Probably the basement. I can't believe that.

1:16:34Bill Simmons:And if everyone in your family to get in a bar fight, clearly I would have picked Harrison first.

1:16:39Cousin Sal:Harrison, it's coming for sure.

1:16:40Bill Simmons:He's going to step it up. He would have come over and like punched the guy in the nuts. my parent corner so my son's hit that age where we're just re-watching all these great movies from the past and we've done like we did seven earlier in the week and he watched Fight Club and now he wants to watch Heat and he's just like he's basically just ripping off the classics and I get to relive the classics through him and all the swerves like he didn't know there's the quote unquote seven big turn that happens so we haven't done the mafia ones yet and that there's some pressure on some of the ones that are coming because I feel like and he's like the right ones so far and this is right around the age when you really get into movies but there are a couple that I'm going to get nervous that if he doesn't like them I'm going to really be upset about as upset as anything like if we watch The Godfather and he's like ah it was slow yeah or if we watch or if we watch Heat and he's like, man, why hasn't anything happened since the bank shootout?

1:17:47Bill Simmons:I'm just going to be like, right. So I don't know. There's a lot of pressure here with reliving this. You shut your mouth

1:17:51Cousin Sal:and tell me you're Apex Mountain right now. Who does Vincent Hayden remind you of?

1:17:59Bill Simmons:So you got Goodfellas,

1:18:01Cousin Sal:you got Casino, you got Departed. Yeah, we're doing all of those.

1:18:06Bill Simmons:We've done everything. He even watched Devil Wears Prada with my wife. Rounders, Swingers, like all like the town, all the classics.

1:18:13Cousin Sal:But for the mobster ones, I wonder what the sequence is. Do you show them Godfather first and then the more contemporary?

1:18:21Bill Simmons:Well, so I was thinking about that. So the sequence I think is one and two. Yeah. I think you move to Scarface, almost like a Sorbet.

1:18:30Cousin Sal:Yeah.

1:18:31Bill Simmons:Then Goodfellas, which he's seen, but we'll watch again. And then Casino. So he's seen Brock's Tale and he's seen Goodfellas. He loved those. He loved those? He loved those. Good. Yeah, yeah. But I am worried there's going to be one that he's going to shit on, and then we're going to have some real tension. But every time I think I run out of reasons why it was great to have kids, then it's like you get to relive all the great movies with them, and you're just running it back. Yeah. And you have amnesia for what you experienced the first time you watched it, and you get to live through it through them.

1:19:04Bill Simmons:So that's been fun.

1:19:05Cousin Sal:There's nothing you can do about the slowness of some of these movies, though. There's just nothing you could do. We talked about Rocky 2 and like, it's like, and even Rocky, like, oh man, 3 was perfect. Rocky 1 is a really hard one. Rocky's 1 is hard. 3 is perfect because there's three fights, right? And they kind of get right into each one of them, you know? But then when you go 2 and 1, cinematically, whatever, nicer. But if you've got a 16, 17, 18-year-old, they may not appreciate it.

1:19:30Bill Simmons:Yeah, my wife's been gone for... Oh, yeah. She went away. So it's me and Ben. So we're actually like hanging. I'm starting to see the finish line. because he's going to college next year and then that's it. You were the genius with having the extra kid. Not so fast. That was a great move. That was like signing Jared Siddham to the backup quarterback there. Wait a minute. Just in case you need a really good backup. Not going to be a first down for the last four years. No, that was a great one. The other thing we did last night was we watched UFC at the same time as the Netflix building climb. And also Celtics Bulls was on.

1:20:07Bill Simmons:So I had the three TVs and it was like just randomly one of the, one of the more fun, like, Oh my God, I can't believe these three things are happening at the same time. The building thing I actually think was underrated as one of the craziest, um, things I've, I think it was the craziest thing I've watched that I didn't know was going to be crazy since that David plane special. Oh yeah. He was fucking with all the celebrities, which remember how everybody went nuts when that happened. Then he never did it again. Yeah. Get out of my kitchen.

1:20:35Cousin Sal:His wife. Yeah. Um,

1:20:38Bill Simmons:but I couldn't believe it. And there was a couple, like, are you afraid of heights? Cause.

1:20:42Cousin Sal:Oh God. Yeah. Yeah. I'm afraid. I'm like two minutes. Yeah.

1:20:46Bill Simmons:Yeah. I'm afraid of heights. I didn't used to be, but, uh, over the course of the century. And there was a couple where he's reaching back.

1:20:53Cousin Sal:Yeah.

1:20:54Bill Simmons:Where it was like the overhang. So you have to reach back and then pull yourself up where you're just like,

1:21:00Cousin Sal:this guy's going to die. Some weird stuff. He had to step into like, Oh, that looks complicated to have to get your foot out of. Maybe if you, if you can't, But yeah, so comfortable.

1:21:11Bill Simmons:Just like I'm gonna take a break and sit on this ledge and it's and it's like there's wind. I just didn't understand what I was watching. I almost broke my brain.

1:21:20Cousin Sal:It's great because it's not. First of all, we had we grew up with Evel Knievel, right? But there's a lot of buildup for that. And then it's over in a couple of seconds. Right. But but it's pretty cool. Well, if he makes it if he almost doesn't make any breaks every bone in his body. Like short of that, they've had like trapeze artists walk across a tightrope, I think, for like 20 minutes or so. But that's the kind of the same thing over and over. I think scaling a building, you get to see different weird facade. It was extra gnarly, I thought, for sure.

1:21:51Bill Simmons:Well, one of the crazy things was there was people on certain floors, like taking pictures and waving to them. And I was thinking if you were there, You're the same person who almost ended Jimmy's wedding when the wedding cake was coming out because he saw this chance to push the cake and the baby doll. And I was thinking like that guy, he's climbing up and you just throw yourself into the window to see if you can rattle him. David Blaine, do you remember?

1:22:18Cousin Sal:Would that be murder? Yeah, I think it'd be attempted murder. I think that's murder, yeah. Jimmy sent me to New York when David Blaine was in that tank. Remember he was in like a tank for four days? And he's like, walk up to him with a hammer. And I'm like, all right, this kind of sucks. Like, you know, yeah, I will. I'm not going to, I can't break it. I think that's a felony. That's bad. Yeah. When I walked up to him, we kind of know Blaine a little to our crazy friend Brad somehow. And he's like, no, no, no. Right. Like that would have been it. But yeah, this climbing thing, I don't know that he's one of the greatest athletes.

1:22:47Cousin Sal:Everyone's got to make that great jump now that he's the greatest athlete we've ever seen. You're going to put, you're going to throw him there.

1:22:54Bill Simmons:I just had more questions than answers. Like my son was like, what happens if he runs out of, he had that special powder, like that stick them powder. Yeah. And he had that little satchel in his back pocket. Right. It's like, what happens if he's like, oh shit, I didn't bring enough powder.

1:23:10Cousin Sal:Yeah.

1:23:11Bill Simmons:And now you're like only four fifths up the wall. And then when he got on the top, which was amazing and he was just standing there and he was so comfortable. Yeah. Just like being like, Hey, look at you. I was like having an absolute stroke. I couldn't handle it. I was like, and they were doing these, like, I just couldn't handle it. And then it's like, how's he going to get back down? Oh, this will be easy. He's just going to rappel down. That seemed terrifying. Every piece of it seemed terrifying.

1:23:38Cousin Sal:Yeah.

1:23:39Bill Simmons:We had a zip. Do you ever go zip lining?

1:23:42Cousin Sal:I have. Yeah. I don't know why I did it. We went when the kids had a game. Catalina? You know, it was in Hawaii and the zip lining sucks. That was bad for me. I was like, I'm never doing this again. But worse off, there was this bridge that kind of like shook back and forth when you walk past it. I laid on that bridge for 40 minutes because I could not move. There's no way it's going to break, but I'm like, I'm not moving. I'm not going forward. I'm not going back. I don't know how people do this.

1:24:09Bill Simmons:Did you think he was going to have like a little backpack on that would have been a parachute if he fell?

1:24:13Cousin Sal:You would think, right? You see all these like safety nets or safety something, but some harness, nothing.

1:24:20Bill Simmons:I thought it was incredible. When we were kids, I remember somebody tried to climb the World Trade Center or Empire State, one of those in New York on Wide World of Sports. And I don't remember watching it live, but when they would do the anniversary shows for Wide World of Sports, they would always show. It was like George Willis or a name like that. And he climbed up the World Trade Center and like, this is crazy. He didn't have permits to do this. And that seemed nuts. I think all of this, I don't understand. I don't understand why somebody would want to do this. Yeah. How somebody could be that calm.

1:24:56Bill Simmons:Like, it's almost like, is this the right use of this person? If this person is this calm with this much, like how scary this is, should they, it's almost like goodwill hunting. And it's like, well, hunting, you should actually work for NASA. You're too fucking smart. Right. Like this guy, should he be flying like the scariest planes we have? Or do we have to teach him to be a pilot? What skills could he add that would be better than just climbing a building?

1:25:19Cousin Sal:The parkour guys are especially insane. And I would think that you would be nervous that Ben was going to become one of them. He was on his way for a second. Well, yes.

1:25:31Bill Simmons:I was relieved that Ben was scared watching this guy last night. I was kind of looking over. My worst nightmare would have been like, this looks so fucking cool. I'm so jealous. I'm like, no, don't do this. so if he had just fallen

1:25:46Cousin Sal:would they have cut the feed I'm sure they had some kind of plan for it yeah they couldn't just show that that would be bad times I think they'd have to

1:25:56Bill Simmons:I'm like getting queasy thinking about it now I can't believe so we had that and then UFC we had Gaethje going against Patty and it just turned in and you had the knockout plus 170 but it was just an absolute slugfest that seemed like it was going to end every round and it didn't. And it reminded me a little of the first Leonard Duran fight where Patty was just trying to fight him. And was like, no, no, I can beat this guy standing up. And Gaethje yet again. And like, I don't know how many years now we've been doing it with him. I think he's 38 now.

1:26:27Cousin Sal:I would love to. And we had this with like - He's like Matthew Stafford. Gotti. Yeah, he is. He didn't say he's going to be a quarterback for the Rams next year. He, remember Gotti and Ward, and you're like, oh, I just wish we could watch these guys fight forever. I want them to protect Gaethje's brain because he takes so many shots now. I don't even want to know what that looks like now. But that's a guy I want to watch for the next decade because he just brings it every single time.

1:26:49Bill Simmons:It was a little like Cesar Chavez near the end where it was almost like the blows. His brain wasn't even bouncing back and forth anymore when he took a blow. It seemed like at the tail end he got hurt. Yeah. The other thing that was interesting was the heavyweight fight was bad. And just like what a bad situation the heavyweight division's in compared to where I felt like we were when I started watching it.

1:27:12Cousin Sal:Derek Lewis just holding, I mean, is he still in that ring holding himself? Like that was scary shit too.

1:27:18Bill Simmons:That was number five against number eight and it was awful. So I don't know if like giant people just aren't doing MMA anymore or what was going on. But it was interesting Paramount weekend because they had the boxing on Friday and they're clearly trying to like play the SmackDown. But it was weird not to pay for a UFC pay-per-view.

1:27:37Cousin Sal:I know. I know. They had a few more ads.

1:27:39Bill Simmons:This is unparamount.

1:27:41Cousin Sal:Yeah, exactly. It's not... The way they show the odds is different now. We don't have to get into it, but they've aligned with somebody differently. It's different. But anyway, yeah. I love not paying. A lot of people said, this is the first time I'm going to buy... I'm legitimately watching a pay-per-view because everyone steals for years and years and years. And yet, I thought the climb in the building was better.

1:28:04Bill Simmons:Yeah. That was good. like the Celtics were fucking around with the Chicago Bulls game that kind of neat would have been a nice back-to-back. I was just like watching the building guy having a heart attack. Do you think you could watch that?

1:28:18Cousin Sal:You think you could watch like keep watching? Like, I mean, could they do that once a month and the buildings just get taller and taller? Is there more than a

1:28:25Bill Simmons:I think the next one would have to be not a building. I think it would have to be some sort of summit, right? Yeah. Would have to be some or some sort of mountain that you're not supposed to climb.

1:28:35Cousin Sal:Right.

1:28:36Bill Simmons:Where you have to go like Sly Stallone.

1:28:38Cousin Sal:Yeah.

1:28:39Bill Simmons:Goes for hours. Anything else you want to hit?

1:28:41Cousin Sal:Yeah, I did a couple. First of all, I loved you and Mad Dog. It's the best one he's on. Yes. And can I give you my favorite exchange between the two of you? I'll attempt to do both voices. I can probably guess what it is. I've never done this before. I was like, all right, here we go. This first one's going to be you. All right, Mad Dog, let's talk about the top 10 quarterbacks of all time. I think Elway is in there. Two Super Bowl wins, but he also had some stinker playoff games. What's your take on Elway? Well, first of all, that is an excellent, excellent job by you, Bill. You remember that John Elway's playoff games weren't always great.

1:29:15Cousin Sal:And he, listen, he wasn't always Johnny Unitas out there. So excellent job by you. You did your homework.

1:29:22Bill Simmons:Excellent job. And I was trying not to laugh. I could hear you laugh. We love, we love Mad Dog so much. He was great. We have him on and I didn't prep him for anything. and within a second he's like, well, Otto Graham, 1955. And he just is like banging out. 1955 for reference. That was good. That's one thing.

1:29:42Cousin Sal:Yeah, just to have a plug here. Sal Super Squares on Splash, giving out 25 ,000 in prizes, 10 ,000 to the winner of a grand prize, completely free to enter. Go to SplashSports.com. And also I'm doing a new contest around Bad Beats. Send me a screenshot of your Bad Beat on Twitter. On Twitter. And that's it. Every bad beat gets a free play on Splash. There you go.

1:30:04Bill Simmons:And we didn't talk about the terrible murder of Alex Preddy in Minnesota, but I wanted to mention how awful that was. And we tried on this podcast, try to steer it towards sports and be a place that, you know, is a little bit of a distraction area. If you want some of the other stuff, go there. I thought that was horrible. I remember when we were kids growing up reading about like Kent State and things like that. You're like, man, how did they let that happen? And this felt like that. And I just don't know how we got to this spot. So I wanted to mention that. I thought I was horrified about what happened.

1:30:38Bill Simmons:I don't want to talk. Love Tyburn in Minnesota.

1:30:41Cousin Sal:Absolutely. I'm going to shove pizza in my mouth so I don't say anything wrong. I think Charles Barkley did a good job summing it up and whatever he did.

1:30:48Bill Simmons:I don't know what we're trying to accomplish in 2026, but I don't like it. That's it for the podcast. Sal, we are going live on Sunday night. We're going to be doing Super Bowl props live. on Sunday night. Probably like seven, maybe like six o 'clock Pacific time range. Whatever you want. I'll have the pizza ready for both of us. Thanks to Gahal and Eduardo and Chris behind the scenes for helping us out. I'm going to be back on Tuesday on this podcast. Rewatchables launches tomorrow on Netflix. Still is on Spotify as well. We have Zodiac. What do you think was longer? The movie or the podcast?

1:31:25Bill Simmons:The Rewatchables. The movie was 157 minutes.

1:31:27Cousin Sal:Oh man, Man, you went past two and a half hours. I'll go. I'll go to the movie. Was it close? Podcast was like 250. I think we went 20 minutes longer.

1:31:37Bill Simmons:Your re-apex is just untoppable. Well, we had to solve. We solved the Zodiac murder as well. Oh, you did? Okay. Yeah, that was another great thing. Yeah, we solved it. So that was good. Anyway, that's coming Monday. It will be on Netflix as well, Spotify as well. Sal, as always, good job by you. Good job by you, buddy. See you on Tuesday. day. Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in DC, Kentucky, or Wyoming. Gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER. Visit rg-help.com. Call 888-797-777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland.

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