The Colts Machine, a Giant Disaster, Hock Tua, Baby Doll’s Luck Corner, and Guess the Lines With Cousin Sal

14:39Cousin Sal:Yeah. Why'd they waste that one? That was a good one. That was a fucking works thing. That was great. Yeah. Yeah. That was dumb. So I don't know. Like maybe, I don't know why. I just would like an answer for that, but who cares? they're right back at it at 4-3

14:50Bill Simmons:the toast of the town. It seemed like a little animosity for the Raiders who talked a lot of shit the last couple times. Back to Nuggets Nuggets, I'm already in NBA mode.

15:01Cousin Sal:Stop it, please. Back into

15:02Bill Simmons:Broncos Giants mode. The Giants are 2-5 but probably had including your Cowboys win two of the dumbest losses, two of the five dumbest losses, so they could easily be 4-3 I think of all the 2-5 and under teams. So that's, let's see, Cleveland, Vegas, Giants, Zona, Baltimore's one and five, Miami, Tennessee, Saints, Jets. If there's just a round-robin tournament of all those teams, it's the Giants against the Ravens, I think, in the finals out of all the crappy teams, right?

15:37Cousin Sal:So we have our five cross-offs. And who are you adding? You're adding the Giants and Ravens. I'm just saying those are the teams

15:43Bill Simmons:that are at least minus three for win totals right now. Right. No, well, our new cross-up team is Vegas. I think our cross-up teams now are Jets, Browns, Tennessee, Miami, the Saints, and Vegas. And Vegas. That's six. Vegas is two and five, and it's a wrap.

16:00Cousin Sal:Giants are a different tier for sure. But now, like you said, Giants are two and five. Now they play a Philly team on the road who just wants to murder them, right? Yeah. They're so mad. So they're going to fall apart here. I feel like people are still going to love Jackson Dart, but Brian Dable is a little closer to firing after this game. You know what I mean?

16:20Bill Simmons:Well, a Giants fan friend asked me how many franchises could have believably lost that game. And he said it's only the last 10 years Giants. Because the Giants were, you know, they won two Super Bowls in the last 20 years. But then... Not counting the Washington Generals? I think you're right. Yeah. Well, I thought Jets would have absolutely, that would have happened to the Jets. Right. The first time in 1 ,602 games. Jets, definitely. And I think the Browns are the other one. I don't think, maybe Jags? I don't know. Maybe?

17:01Cousin Sal:That's tough.

17:02Bill Simmons:But I think if we were doing a fantasy draft of who would lose this way, the Giants would have been the third pick.

17:07Cousin Sal:Yeah. Right? I would have taken the Jets first

17:10Bill Simmons:and I would have taken the Browns second. For sure. And then I think Giants third.

17:14Cousin Sal:The Giants could do it again next week against the Eagles. It could happen like two or three more times this year with this team.

17:21Bill Simmons:Dart's fun. I like him. He is. I have no idea if Denver... I just don't know if you're a Broncos fan how you think you can win a couple rounds with Bo Nix with how he's looked this season. It's just been too erratic.

17:39Cousin Sal:I was going to ask you as a Patriots fan, and it's looking more and more certain that you're going to be a playoff team. I know you have your eyes on the division title, but have you thought about the who we don't want to play in the first round thing? I bet Denver's not on your radar for that right now. I bet the Colts are much more right there for we can't play this team, we can't match up first round.

18:02Bill Simmons:Well, the Colts, I would say, are a safe one seed bet right now if the Chiefs would be the two, right? But Buffalo, it just seems like they've been too spotty. The Pats, so if they win the division, which is conceivable, that's probably a three seed for them.

18:19Cousin Sal:All right. My numbers are all different from yours, but that's fine.

18:22Bill Simmons:Where would you have them if they win the division?

18:26Cousin Sal:Let's play this out like we know these teams, and the Pats are at six and the Colts are at two.

18:32Bill Simmons:I think the Pats are going to be in the top five if May stays out. All right. Just because the schedule is so awful. That's true. I mean, it's really like number one with a bullet for easiest strength of schedule. Every week they play somebody shitty or somebody that has some major injury. And I think they're a good team. I don't think they're a great team, but May has been one of the best players in the league for the last four weeks. Their defense, they can rush the passer, they can stop the run, and they can get first downs. I think they're a good team.

19:04Cousin Sal:You were so scared when they were down. I wasn't. Oh, you were terrified.

19:08Bill Simmons:Hench can back me up. I texted him and I was like, we were down 10-3 and I was like, I like this. This team needed a little adversity. Let's see how they respond. May went right down. Yeah, but you were crying when you texted him. No, I wasn't crying. He was good.

19:20Cousin Sal:He couldn't. I was like, oh, this is exciting. I get to throw the nickname at him again. But then he completed like 14 in a row. Son of a bitch.

19:28Bill Simmons:He is throwing the best deep balls in the league. They're consistently like in stride with a guy catching them with their hands up. One last thing on Broncos Giants I just wanted to mention. Thank God we have win probability rates. Because I had no idea if that was an amazing comeback or anything. And then when I saw the charts. You need to see the chart?

19:48Cousin Sal:Yeah.

19:49Bill Simmons:Once I was like, oh, yeah, that really was amazing. If you can combine the win probability charts with how fast somebody ran on Bo Nex, 19.8 miles an hour, that would really be peak.

20:04Cousin Sal:This is stupid. It's the same dude. Do you think like in 1929, like the Great Depression, they had charts of like the stock market bottoming out? Like, yeah, here's your portfolio, sir. Here, so you see this flat line. Oh, all right. Okay. Yeah, your grandfather's dying. There's a flat line and there's an annoying noise going off for a minute and a half.

20:20Bill Simmons:We really need them for marriage.

20:22Cousin Sal:Yeah, right.

20:23Bill Simmons:It's like, my wife's in a lousy move. What's my win probability chart for asking her if I could go out tonight? All right, the other game we have to talk about is the Browns murdering the Dolphins.

20:35Cousin Sal:But let's kill this kicker a little bit. This number 99. Oh, the Giants kicker. This mackinackinanny. Yeah, where did he come from? When a number 99 with a crazy name like that, it seems like it's only Sonny in Philadelphia, like a made-up name or something. You have no confidence. You should just get on Fandle right there and bet the other side.

20:55Bill Simmons:Yeah, you at least need a short guy who's been on a couple teams and kicks the traditional soccer style. and it's like, oh, I remember that guy when he was on the Jaguars. He deprived us of overtime is what he deprived us of. Yeah, definitely. I felt like that game had some more magic in it. It just could have kept going and going. Brown's killing the Dolphins. We were texting a lot during this game. I don't even know where to start. Two of finishes after calling out the team, 12 for 23 for 100 yards, three interceptions, two drop picks, really could have five. Yeah. He had a fumble. He led three wide receivers into just getting obliterated.

21:38Bill Simmons:I think all three eventually got up. And it was just everything you would have expected from him in Cleveland. The weather wasn't as bad. I know. As they thought it was going to be. It never is. So you had that. And then you had DJ Mikey Mack on the sidelines. The best. He had these big sunglasses. glasses. He looked like John Holmes in the mid eighties, like one of his last porn movies when just the wheels are coming off. I don't, I can't even describe how fucking weird he looks. And that guy's supposed to be a leader of men. It's just checked out and then has an insane press conference after like, I actually think it seems like he's unraveling.

22:18Bill Simmons:So he's, there's no way he's going to be coaching them on Thursday. Right.

22:22Cousin Sal:Interesting. Cause I was talking to JJ, John Jastrzemski was a big Dolphins fan and he was really just miserable for three hours, trying to figure out what year they're going to be good. And we got like the 2031 and I was like, okay, stop already. Like he couldn't, he couldn't even pull the trigger on, on that year, but battling for the one, you know, number one pick and everything. But yeah, McDaniel is those glasses. Is that everything except like the windshield wiper things on the glasses? Like, why don't you just go all out? He's a clown, right? Why are you wearing sunglasses?

22:50Bill Simmons:It's raining. It's in here in Cleveland. It's 40 degrees. What's going on? But why are you dressed like that?

22:56Cousin Sal:We both heard 50 to 70 mile an hour wins on Thursday. I'm like, oh, we both went under on a teaser. And that's what made that exciting. It wasn't like a 13-7 game. It was like, holy shit, how many interceptions is Tua going to throw to put this under in jeopardy? And it almost got there.

23:15Bill Simmons:I had a giant 13-point tease that actually won, that took the lineup to 48. Tua throws that pick, basically from his own end zone. Yeah. And all of a sudden it's 31-6. I'm like, oh my God, this game's going to go over 49 points. Like two is single-handedly going to drive this. He was so bad. It just, he didn't want to get hit. He was just flinging the ball up for grabs. It was really one of the worst quarterback games we've seen all year. And we've talked about him on this pod for four or five years. This felt like rock bottom for him. I find it hard to believe he's going to be on that team next year.

23:52Bill Simmons:Don't you think?

23:52Cousin Sal:No, I think they have to move on from him and move on from the, it doesn't have to be either or. I know it's like, well, Tua said this, so McDaniel's gone. It's like, no, it's both of them. But I was, I really hung in there. I was like, I don't want to blame Tua here because they were right in his face for a lot of the plays. Like if the average, you know, you get the playoff in like 2.9 seconds. He had like 0.6 seconds, but even so, but that goes back to McDaniel. Like what kind of game plan? Just run the ball. You got HM, just run, run, run. That's what the Browns did. That's why they weren't getting blown out in the third quarter.

24:25Bill Simmons:Right. As somebody bet on the Browns, I was praying that they weren't just going to hand off to Achan 38 times. It was a very strange performance. The Browns, there's a couple teams that I think are good home bets. I think the Falcons are another one. We saw them tonight. But the Browns at home, I don't know. I just think their defense shows up. They can run the ball. Receivers aren't terrible. The quarterback's pretty tough. Yeah. And he's vanilla. Right. It's pretty mediocre. But they dominated the game. Some of the texts are great.

24:58Cousin Sal:He's like a 7 for a 1 p.m. Eastern slot, sadly. Right. We should start ranking quarterbacks in the 1 p.m. slot. Not this week, but it's on a curve.

25:10Bill Simmons:Some texts that we had. Hench said at one point, if you zoom in on McDaniels' laminate, it's just Zillow listings. I thought that was a good one.

25:20Bill Simmons:there was this one moment where they come out of commercial and Spiro Didis and Adam Archuleta they have the graphic it was their 17th Cleveland Browns game together what memories get them a photo book like out of 17 Browns games how many of those do you think were like fun to announce like two yeah yeah two it's like sorry guys you're going to Cleveland again. And this was just brutal.

25:45Cousin Sal:He probably did preseason too. Yeah. They showed that graphic and they freeze framed on those guys. I'm like, Oh, are they dead now? Are they in carbon chaos? What happened to these guys? They just left this one too.

25:56Bill Simmons:Yeah. They left the booth. Um, I left it on the multi-view all game. It was one of my four, the whole thing. I couldn't get enough of it. Every time Miami was on offense, I'll tell you this. Uh, I think the most wrong I've been all year was my over-excitement for Travion Henderson on the pads. thinking that he could be Jameer Gibbs for them. He has not made, I don't think, a good play this entire season. I don't know what happened in the preseason when he was the most electric rookie they've had in 10 years versus how he's looked this year. Like, he basically got buried today. He was the third-string running back.

26:31Bill Simmons:And then on the flip side, Judkins on the Browns is a stud. And I remember saying after, like, week one or week two, like, this was like a miracle that they took Judkins over Henderson. and Judkins wasn't even training camp. And now it's like, Jesus, Judkins looks like they've just recreated Nick Chubb, but like a faster, quicker version of him. I was going to bring this up to you

26:52Cousin Sal:because I have him. He's 10-1 to win Offensive Rookie of the Year. I was trying to think like what has to happen. You know, they have like... Egbuka gets hurt like three more times. Egbuka darts at the top. So those two would have to get hurt. Egbuka's already hurt, but probably playing. Tyler Warren would have to go away too. So just three guys have to disappear. You know,

27:17Bill Simmons:I had Ibuka as the best rookie that I've seen this year. But Tyler Warren is an absolute destructor of defenses. And they did a good job. At one point, they had a graphic today of all the formations. They used him a lot. He's lined up at all these different positions. But we've said it every week, the Browns taking Loveland over him was just weird. Yep. the whole year he was the best tight end in the draft. And then like two weeks before the draft, people were like, I don't know, look out for this Loveland. It's coming on. It's like, how about the guy who's always been the best guy at the position?

27:51Cousin Sal:What must the Browns think? Like they get shit on for every single pick, every single trade, every single, everything they do. And like, all right, all we need is for this Tyler Warren to be okay, but not great. Like, oh, damn it. Now everyone, now Simmons is calling us out for not taking, for taking Loveland over Warren. Oh, the Bears. It goes on and on. Yeah. Yeah. The Bears. Oh, yeah. The Bears. Yeah.

28:12Bill Simmons:Well, the funny thing is, so the Browns end up with Mason Graham, who's been awesome because they did this trade back. And then watching that Jaguars, I tweeted this today. And of course, Travis Hunter had a couple garbage time catches.

28:25Cousin Sal:Yeah.

28:26Bill Simmons:But that trade is just like, you watch Mason Graham and it's like, I wouldn't trade Mason Graham for Travis Hunter straight up. I would make Jacksonville throw in a number one pick. You can find receivers. It's like what Mason Graham is doing for the Browns already. It's really hard to find.

28:41Cousin Sal:Yep. Yeah. Yeah. I had the same take that I had to cross out that Travis Hunter is, we don't give him enough crap or the Jags for that. But yeah, then he scored. You had the Jags. Did you have the Jags? You said you didn't have the Jags.

28:54Bill Simmons:Did you? We didn't. We house made us back off in the, in the Arab thing. But no, it's just, it's frustrating because after that Chiefs game, I was kind of hoping that they would be good. so I'd feel better about it and I still feel terrible about it. We're going to take a break and then we're going to play a new game. The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by FanDuel and basketball is back. Finally, the NBA is upon us. FanDuel, putting you in control right from tip-off. Every day to start the season, you get to choose your reward. Play it safe, go for it, feeling bold. It's your move. Whatever your style, you're in control.

29:30Bill Simmons:What kind of better are you? You'll be doing same game parlays. You're going to be doing money line, underdog bets. or you're going to try to put, I think this team's going to win with somebody scoring 30 plus points. You should go to the ringer futures that we have. Whole bunch of our favorite future bets. Try to get those in before tip off on Tuesday. However you play, FanDuel is giving you the power to choose your reward and own your game every single day to start the NBA season. Head to FanDuel.com slash BS to make your choice. Must be 21 plus presidents like states or 18 plus and president of DC, Kentucky or Wyoming.

30:02Bill Simmons:Opt-in required. Rewards are non-withdrawable. restrictions apply, including bonus and token expiration leg requirements and max wager amount. See terms at sportsbook.fandle.com. Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLE or visit rg-help.com. Call 1-888-789-777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut. This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra, the official beer partner of the NBA. So the NBA season is starting. I'm excited about a bunch of different things. We have a lot of a lot of teams up in the air. Boston, Milwaukee, Indiana. What are we getting from these teams? The Lakers, can they hang on and still be a top six team?

30:42Bill Simmons:I think I'm most excited for the Texas teams. I want to see Duran in Houston, Cooper Flagg in Dallas, and Wemby and Dylan Harper in San Antonio. I feel like I'm going to be spending a lot of time in the state of Texas with my basketball choices. There are a lot of moments worth playing for. The ones that taste best are sort of cold, unlike in Texas where it's usually hot. Whatever happens of the season. Catch every moment with Michelob Ultra, the official beer partner of the NBA. Getting fans closer to the game with a chance to win courtside seats. You heard me correctly. A trip to All-Star Weekend, custom merch, and much more.

31:17Bill Simmons:Michelob Ultra Superior is worth playing for. Enter now at Michelob Ultra.com slash courtside. Michelob Ultra courtside 2025 to 2026. No purchase necessary. Open to U.S. residents. 21 plus. begins on October 1st, 2025, ends on June 30th, 2026. Multiple entry periods. See official rules at michelobultra.com slash courtside for free entry, entry deadlines, prizes, and details. All right, this is a new gimmick for us. Very excited about this. We're calling it Baby Doll Corner. So the background is for years and years, I don't know when this started. How far back when he started wishing people luck?

31:57Bill Simmons:Is it before I even knew him? When did this start?

31:59Cousin Sal:Probably before we knew him, but very, very early in on our acquaintance with him.

32:04Bill Simmons:So one of Babydoll's favorite things to do and the thing that has brought us the most joy is if somebody's like, their show is about to get canceled, they're about to get fired, some relationship is going to go, something bad is going to happen professionally, Babydoll would be like, I wish him a lot of luck. And that has turned into, when we sniff out that something might happen, We'll text baby doll, baby, get the luck ready. Baby, you got to go into the reserves and get some luck. You have something in your back pocket. And it's just, it's probably the running joke we do the most, right?

32:39Cousin Sal:Even if something seems good for them at the time, like, oh, this one signed the deal with Tubi to be the vice president. Like, yeah, okay, great. Yeah, I wish you a lot of luck there. Like, oh, all right.

32:49Bill Simmons:You know. So anyway, we have some luck we want to hand out in honor of baby doll. I'm not sure he's watching football. who's probably playing golf. Let's start with DJ Mike McDaniel. I think on the baby doll corner, he's a solid 10 out of 10. I think he needs a lot of luck, like a lot. For sure.

33:08Cousin Sal:I mean, I wrote a lot of things down in his voice. Go ahead, you do it, you go. All right, yeah, thanks Mike McDaniel for another shitty game and an even shittier press conference. And I quote, this is from his press conference, you ready? Because we're not, I mean, if you are negatively affecting the football team routinely assess another player. You know what, Mike? You're as lousy a motivational speaker as you are a head coach. Good luck to you and your Lululemon pants. So that would be something you would do. Yeah. Yeah. That would be a long... It would be a voice text with a couple of misspellings.

33:45Cousin Sal:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Capital letters. Almost all capital. Almost everything.

33:49Bill Simmons:Yeah, that he's doing on a bridge. Right. And maybe you should give your sunglasses back to Marvin Gaye.

33:59Bill Simmons:I think he'd have some luck for Tua.

34:01Cousin Sal:Yeah. Well, first of all, wasn't it funny every time they showed Mike McDaniel, he was looking down at the play chart. He was looking down. It was almost like he knew the camera was on him and he knew everyone was staring at him and he couldn't bear to look up. Like if you know someone's walking on a plane that you don't want to see and you pretend you're sleeping, like that's what he was doing. He's like, yeah, we see you, Mike. What are his other options? Where could he look? He could cover his face with it. I don't know. Like, what if he just went in the blue tent and just kind of peeked out from the place?

34:32Cousin Sal:Mike McDaniel is in the blue tent. Nothing physically wrong with him. He's just hiding. He's probably mad he didn't have darker sunglasses.

34:38Bill Simmons:He should have had, like, the Ray Charles glasses. Tua would definitely have some luck.

34:44Cousin Sal:Yeah.

34:45Bill Simmons:We told Baby we were doing this, and he demanded that Aaron Glenn, Aaron Glenn was number one on his list for luck. so I don't know if you want to do. How many of these do you want to do?

34:57Cousin Sal:I have like seven or eight. Do it to her. Go do it to her. You know what, Tua? I wish anyone over 65 luck trying to pronounce your name, but good luck in the workforce, throwing your boss under the bus and then shitting all over yourself every Sunday. Yeah, that'll work in the real world. Good luck. Good luck to you. I guess they should all end good luck, yeah.

35:19Bill Simmons:Well, he wanted to wish Aaron Glenn luck. So I looked this up. It was hard to figure out, but I think I'm right. Aaron Glenn started out 0-7. So the worst start by a head coach, again, somehow Hugh Jackson not involved. Cam Cameron, that one Miami Dolphins year for him, he started out 0-13. And then our guy Dan Campbell was 0-11-1. You know, I looked at it here. So he'd have to go 0-14 to own the record. They're at Cincy, bye week, home Browns. That could be, I don't know, maybe their two-and-a-half point underdogs, something like that. At-Pats, at Ravens, home Falcons, home Dolphins. Dolphins is it.

36:05Bill Simmons:So basically, Browns, Dolphins are the ones to get him to avoid that record.

36:09Cousin Sal:Yeah. So we'll see what happens. Dolphins, December 7th. That was the team they lost to. That's the only team the Dolphins beat. That's going to be spectacular. Yeah. I don't know. So with these guys, off the baby thing for a second, But these guys, you want to cut them some slack if they don't have the quarterback in place, right? But he wanted Justin Fields, right? This was his guy. So he can't kind of ride out the string and go like 0-16, 0-17, right?

36:35Bill Simmons:See, that's the thing where these guys, I know they have to get people with football backgrounds and people have coached and coached in college or been a coordinator, QB coach, whatever. It really does feel like they need to hire somebody who watches football for 14 hours a day like us. Right. Just as a consultant, be like, hey, Bill, what about Fields for two years, 20 million a year? Just give me your blink test thought. And I've just been like, dude, the Steelers quit on that guy in five weeks. Right. And he wasn't even playing that bad. And they were just like, there was that one game, that Sunday night game, and they were like, we're out with this guy.

37:12Bill Simmons:If he's behind, you can't do this. Justin Fields will never be the answer. Don't do it.

37:18Cousin Sal:Hey, Justin, guess what? We figured it out. You lied on your fucking resume. You can't throw the ball forward. Ty Taylor is more capable than you are. Good luck getting back on the field. You're going to need it.

37:31Bill Simmons:I think that might have been it for him, by the way. So he was, what was it? What were his stats today? I have him here. 41 yards. 40, I guess that's better. Six for 12 for 45 yards. Benched at halftime. And then Taylor came in. It's like Taylor gave him some life. If he gave the other team some life, he threw two picks.

37:52Cousin Sal:Yeah, that was bad.

37:53Bill Simmons:He finished with six points. I have one piece of luck that I think Baby might wish Tom Brady getting inside info from his Fox gig and giving it to the Raiders. I think we need to wish that storyline luck. You think it's bad info he's getting? It's like this is such an advantage for the Raiders. The Raiders have gone backwards more furiously than any team in the league. I'm pretty sure Tom Brady's not helping them out. How about our buddy Carson Wentz, who was playing all the hits today and even had like a blooper reel at some point that was floating around on social media. I think if he played better, they would have won that game.

38:34Cousin Sal:Yeah, if he played better, if Hawkinson doesn't slam that into the turf slightly, they were right there. They got behind too early. That wasn't a catch, though. I don't know why he was mad. He's really pissed off.

38:45Bill Simmons:The ball got loose after it hit the ground. I thought it moved enough. every time.

38:49Cousin Sal:Yeah, we've seen that enough to see that that's incomplete. But that's how close everything was, right, with them. He just got... Yeah, the Eagles, I guess as boring as we think they could be for three hours, there's always going to be two or three big play capabilities. It's weird they're not coming from Barkley, and they came from A.J. Brown, but it's good enough to beat a lot of these teams, that's for sure. That was the most exciting

39:12Bill Simmons:they've been all year. Yeah. The Eagles. They actually had some explosiveness. this.

39:18Cousin Sal:I think it would have been embarrassing, right? If Carson Wentz like that, the embarrassment factor is never, never, you can never put enough emphasis on it. Just like if Rabel had lost to the Tennessee, those are the two games.

39:29Bill Simmons:Right. Well, I think with Wentz there's a lot of like he's close to being a good quarterback, right? When you watch him like you can actually see the potential like he'll have some nice throws and there's like that one, that ad-lib piece is just missing with him. Like when a play goes wrong and he's got a and that's just when it unravels for him. Do you have luck for Geno Smith? Because it feels like his career is on the precipice.

39:53Cousin Sal:How did I miss that? Go ahead. Yeah, go ahead. Do your...

39:56Bill Simmons:Well, I just think he's in range. The only reason I would give them grace is, and this is why I thought for him... Grace is my daughter's name, by the way.

40:05Cousin Sal:Go ahead.

40:06Bill Simmons:The Chiefs' money line, I thought, was the safest money line parlay ad of the year today. Because the Raiders, scratch Bowers, Like they're clearly just get us to the bye week. We'll be two and five. We'll get Bowers something. Bowers hasn't been healthy since week one. So I don't want to write off Gino yet, but it's not been great.

40:26Cousin Sal:Jacoby Myers was solid last year. I think he's like the last three games, he barely went over 100 yards. Gentry, if you bottle him up and there's no Bowers, like you said, there's going to be not a lot of offense out of this team. Who else did you have on the baby doll? I have, let's see, I have Brian Dayball. Hey, oh, wow, Brian, you broke a chair in the locker room. Listen, you have no talent and no hair either. And look at me. I have a head of hair a 25-year-old would covet, baby. Good luck to you, Dayball. You're going to need it. Let's see.

40:57Bill Simmons:Do you think he's in range? Like if they get killed by the Eagles next week, would they be like?

41:04Cousin Sal:It could be. They have a few. It's not just the Eagles, right? The 49ers are decent. They play them. They're at the Bears and Packers, Lions, your Patriots. It's like, that's a mess. That could be like three and nine. So I don't know. Do you keep them at that point? Well, one thing he doesn't have to worry about

41:19Bill Simmons:is Bill Belichick stealing his job.

41:22Cousin Sal:Bill's another one, by the way. And I'd like to wish Hulu luck for giving millions to Bill Belichick to create a reality show. And they made a shitty pilot and kept the money. Yeah, that money is gone, Hulu. You're not getting it. Jordan squandered it on designer purses and graphic artists.

41:41Bill Simmons:they really they really rope-a-dope Tulu they really did that's the only one he can beat he can't beat anyone else they filmed it and then they're just like nah actually we're gonna take the money

41:52Cousin Sal:I got a couple more yeah let's hear it all right oh London yeah good luck London you didn't get a good NFL game today or last week or ever in our eyes you're barely worthy of the Jaguars you'd be fortunate if we named you our 51st state I wish you a lot of luck I might be mixing egomaniacs here, but that's it. Yeah. Oh, whoever designed the Chargers uniform. I got news for you. The Savannah Bananas look is not working for you. You want a designer? Hire whoever designs for my girls, the Nader sisters. Love Dynader, a show which I happen to be an executive producer on. They dress all classy and shit.

42:30Cousin Sal:They're sweet girls, you know. Never embarrass themselves like the Chargers team had a wardrobe or whatever. I wish you luck.

42:40Cousin Sal:we should mention baby doll does represent the nader sisters he's branched out we'll give you his number at the end of the show if you want to contact them for any reason the next time we do

42:50Bill Simmons:this we should just have baby doll on camera for the segment yeah yeah you should show a picture

42:55Cousin Sal:in the five yeah just at least a picture just whatever one more andrew luck i wish him a lot of luck you were locked for first ballot hall of fame and oh then oh you retired because you fell out of love with the game. Oh, that's too bad. And now you're the GM of Stanford football as if that's even a fucking thing. Well, guess what? Your team's a 30-point underdog to Miami this week. Good luck to you. I could do this for like three hours. I'm done. I have no other stuff.

43:24Bill Simmons:I thought you might have had some belated luck for Brian Callahan and his dad. Oh, boy. Yeah, go sell your coaching.

43:34Cousin Sal:Go sell your shitty tires somewhere else, Callahan. We don't need you.

43:41Bill Simmons:I want to put, in case we do this again, a luck watch. I think Kyler Murray might be on luck watch. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Percents look pretty confident, two straight weeks. I know they're two and five, but... He does seem to have that offense in a better rhythm than Kyler. And Spencer Rattler, who has moments and is moving the ball, I think would also be on Luck Watch because if they're going to be one and eight, like at that point, you got to put in Tyler Shook and see if he's competent or not. Do you feel like...

44:15Cousin Sal:Radler was bad today in the weather. Well, those 1 p.m. Eastern games, you're just going to get a slew of bad quarterbacks, right? Or new quarterbacks or struggling quarterbacks, whatever. Is it like hate-watching a bunch of shows now? I feel like it's like hate-watch binging five shows at once. Like, okay, there's the bear. I know I'm not going to laugh. I know it's best comedy, everything else. But it's like, I feel like that's where it is. Are you with that? Like, why do we do this to ourselves?

44:41Bill Simmons:It's to me, it's like those, it's the latest seven hour serial killer show. There's a John Wayne Gacy show.

44:48Cousin Sal:Yeah.

44:49Bill Simmons:John Wayne Gacy, worst Rotten Tomatoes serial killer. Like I think the lowest Rotten Tomatoes rating. Just like not a fun hang. It wasn't a fun hang in the moment. Like there are other serial killers just eclipsed him. there were more fun ones, more entertaining ones. Gacy's just weird. And him and Ed Gein were the two that Hollywood kind of laid off because it was like, man, there's just nothing to work with here. And now we're making eight hours about these guys. We've just run out.

45:19Cousin Sal:I love it. I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about, but I love it. They're the 1 p.m.

45:24Bill Simmons:Eastern serial killers? Just running out of them. Speaking of the Jets, the Panthers are four and three. Had to mention that. Of course, Bryce Young hurt his ankle in the game. Dalton had to come in for a little bit. But Panthers over-under, I think, was, what was it, six and a half? Six and a half. Yeah. So they're going to get there, it looks like. Yeah. I mean, there's a couple over-unders that are almost done. Like the Colts, that one's done. You know, I was in Boston the last couple of days and I had made some future bets on Fandle in August when I was there, all stuff we talked about on the pod.

46:02Bill Simmons:Right. One of them was a pretty sizable Pat's over seven and a half wins bet. And Fando was like, do you want to buy this out now? And they were like, you can basically buy it out for like 80%. It's really interesting. I was like, no, no, thanks for the offer, Fando. I'm going to ride this out. But they give you the buy it price, which I think is fun for the futures because I had a Minnesota one where I was like, oh, maybe I should just get out of this now. Do you get out of future bets? No, I never do.

46:35Cousin Sal:Once you're in, you're in. We should. I have friends that do that, not even with future bets, but just regular bets. They'll cash out. I feel like it's a loss, but I also feel like FanDuel should be as if you're leasing a car and you're like, yeah, yeah, I don't like this. I'm going to go somewhere else. And they're like, let me talk to my boss for a second. I'll be right back. You know what, Bill? Well, I'll give you 88 % for that Patriots. Yeah.

46:58Bill Simmons:How about that? Would you take 90?

47:00Cousin Sal:We should take 90 right now. We don't ever do this, but don't tell anyone. We're going to lose money. Yeah, I had another one.

47:06Bill Simmons:I had a Pats Denver one that they were like offering 90%. Like the ones that are, but the reason I bring that up is like, if you had the Colts over. Easy. You're at like 97 % for the FanDuel buyout. Like you're not even getting value of that anymore. Packers-Cardinals yet another weird Packers game there was a couple notable things Parsons finally got going we called him out last week we had nothing to do with it but we did point out last week that he was not jumping out of the TVs I really liked something LaFleur did in this game that we've talked about in the past in different pods where they brought the field goal kicker out to tie it with like two and a half minutes left on fourth and two I think they're on like the 27, 29, somewhere there.

47:52Bill Simmons:Like two minutes left. And then changed their mind. Went for it on fourth and two. Got it. Long pass, right? Like wasn't even

47:59Cousin Sal:a... Yeah. It was good.

48:01Bill Simmons:It was like a ballsy call. They get it. It's one of those where if they don't get it, I think he gets criticized. But the reason I liked it, I just felt like the Packers needed something like that. They needed some sort of like, hey, are we good or not? Because I feel like they were in no man's land for three, four weeks. And it was the kind of thing you do when you have a good team. So they did it and they got it. I think it's going to help them. I still don't know if they're good. What do you think?

48:22Cousin Sal:Well, they're good. I mean, listen. No, but I mean good, good. I'd be surprised if they didn't make the playoffs. I think we talked about on the pregame show, what was your confidence meter with the Packers after they beat the Lions? Like a 9 or a 10, right? What is it now? Like a 7 right now in terms of like right there?

48:39Bill Simmons:How many NFC teams do you like more than them?

48:42Cousin Sal:Well, that's yeah. That's probably it. Probably three if it came down to it. Even though they spanked Detroit, I would still say Detroit. Is Dallas one of the three? Dallas is, well, we tied them, so they have to be on the same level, I guess. No, it's probably Tampa, Detroit, do I say Seattle yet? I don't know. I don't know. Well, I mean, they're right in there. They're good.

49:00Bill Simmons:I still think Philly has to be in there.

49:02Cousin Sal:Yeah. They beat Flacco and Jacoby Brissett in the last couple weeks, so but Parsons is back. He's right there. Three sacks, ten pressures. He's good.

49:10Bill Simmons:It's weird because when you watch it in the game and it's like, I like that guy. Really like Tucker Craft. Wow, Golden's really good. Ah, Jacobs is excellent. Wow, what a play by Love. And you watch them and you're wondering why they don't have like 40 points. Yeah. And meanwhile, it's like, you know, 16 to 13 with eight minutes left. And they have weapons everywhere. Every time they throw to Tucker Craft, that's 15 yards. He's basically LaPorta or Tyler Warren for them. They never throw it to him.

49:37Cousin Sal:And they get Watson and Jaden Reed back soon. So it's going to be like 10 guys they could throw it to.

49:42Bill Simmons:Cards a cross-off range for you? Two and five? I think so.

49:48Cousin Sal:Yeah, two and five. They've lost four in a row. They probably should have lost five in a row. So I haven't seen their schedule in a minute, but it looks like they're not going to be favored in a lot of these games, right? They're at Dallas after their bye. They're at Seattle, San Francisco, Jaguars, Tampa, the Rams. I mean, that's one or two wins in there.

50:09Bill Simmons:So I think 10 wins for NFC. So that means they have to go eight and two last time. Oh yeah, no, that's not happening. Listen, I got a lot of things wrong. I was up and down on the over-unders. I'll probably end up over. I'll probably be like 18 and 14, 19 and 13, something like that. The cards, there were a lot of smart people really on the cards this year and I just didn't understand it. I didn't get it. I didn't think they had the talent.

50:36Cousin Sal:Good luck, Sal, getting FanDuel to cash out. your NFC West Division Cardinals bet. Yeah, good luck.

50:43Bill Simmons:Yeah, they're offering you like 7 % for that one. Philly, Minnesota, we talked about earlier. The big one was the Philly receivers had 304 yards catching today, which I think people got excited about. I did have to ask you about Minnesota, though. This McCarthy ankle sprain does not pass the Bill Simmons stiff test. Oh, interesting. I watched that game. I wasn't positive that he was hurt at any point in that game. Then they said he was. And put it this way, I don't think Tom Brady in 2012 was out for six weeks with this injury. And I wonder if this was a soft benching. I know I'm not the first one to speculate this, but if you had to bet soft benching or his ankles really fucked up, what would you put the ratio for that?

51:35Bill Simmons:because to me, I'm like way on the soft benching side.

51:38Cousin Sal:Is it even soft? I mean, what was his performance? I know it was the ankle that did him in, but he was terrible.

51:45Bill Simmons:He had one good quarter. The fourth quarter of that Monday night game, that first house that I lost on. No, it was Minnesota, I thought. No, not Minnesota. Chicago? Was that it? Yeah, okay. Yeah, right. Oh, the good quarter, yeah. He played that one good quarter in that game. Other than that, it was bad. And then this very fortunate ankle injury popped up out of nowhere, and we haven't seen them since. And I just, I don't know. It doesn't pass the sniff test to me.

52:15Cousin Sal:I think you're right. And, well, they had once their bye. Now I can't see. We're 23rd. Did they have their bye? This dumb thing I'm looking at. I think they had their bye. They had their bye. They did. Yeah, they're three and three. Yeah, I don't know. They have to bring them back sooner rather than later. The one thing I saw in that game that I liked out of Minnesota, this guy, the Vikings batty laying down on the tush push. Yeah, explain that to me. Why did that actually work? I don't know. I think it threw, first of all, I think it just threw them off. Like when Chosen blocked Daniel La Russa's crane kick.

52:51Cousin Sal:Like, holy shit, this is happening. They're going to have to figure something else out. All anyone has to do is lay down. I mean, I'll be the guy who lays down if they want to do that. But good for them if that continues to work.

53:04Bill Simmons:Yeah, so he gets hurt in that Falcons game, week two. Since then, they've played the Bengals, Steelers, Browns, and London. By week last week, Eagles. And then they're at the Chargers Thursday night at Detroit week nine. And then week 10 against the Desperate Ravens team. We're running out of spots to just slide J.J. back in. Right. And if they missed on that pick, that's pretty significant. Sure. What was he? What was he? The seventh pick?

53:34Cousin Sal:Well, even Schefter is like, hey, do I have to report on him every Wednesday? Like, what's going on here? It's fine. It's fine if you want to take him out. Tenth overall, right? Right.

53:49Bill Simmons:Ankle sprain for a QB? This debilitating? Like, you're out for over a month? I don't know. He's got to step up the excuse, I think. You think we need the NBA countdown crew to come in and tell them to step up?

54:02Cousin Sal:Yeah. J.J. McCarthy.

54:03Bill Simmons:They let Sam Darnold go. But I was thinking if they had paid Sam Darnold, who I think has been pretty good on the Seahawks and was really good for them last year, they... They gave him a lot of money, though. Yep. They probably win that 21-18 Steelers game. I think they win today. arguable that they win that week two Falcons game, but they probably have two more wins that they just kept Sandaro. They put some of that money toward defense, and I get it. They spend it differently. At least four and two.

54:37Cousin Sal:Yeah, if that's a sprained ankle. Meanwhile, I have a cramp. I'm such a pussy. I have a cramp in my ribs. I can't wait for the next break so I could stretch. But yeah.

54:46Bill Simmons:McCarthy's got to step it up. No, it's fine. You want to wish your ribs some luck? The Bears have won four straight, and the Patriots have won four straight. What is crazier to you? Wow. The Bears. How about this? I didn't even know they won four straight until I watched the Ben Johnson post-game locker room thing and he was talking about four in a row. And I'm like, four what? Oh, four wins? Four wins in a row. They beat Dallas, Vegas, Washington, and then New Orleans today. I know they went over. 16 takeaways.

55:16Cousin Sal:They were the only team to go over their point total every week before this week. and then they only had 26. I don't think they did it this week. But yeah, he had some bad numbers too, Caleb Williams. Didn't he? He had like one interception, two fumbles, like 160 yards. I can't remember how many yards. I got to be honest.

55:34Bill Simmons:I thought Caleb was pretty bad in this game. Yeah. They won today because their defense was excellent. And Rattler had a couple of bad throws, but their defense was really good, really lively. They're leading the league in takeaways now. So they had an interesting moment at the end of the game. Now I'm just scouring for the post-game speeches. It's my favorite thing to do during this Sunday night game. And Ben Johnson is just trying to step it up. And he does this very aggro. He's almost like a South Park character with his post-game speeches.

56:10Bill Simmons:But then he gave the game ball to Dennis Allen. We forgot it was a Dennis Allen revenge game, the defensive coordinator of the Bears. Gives the ball to him. And Dennis Allen comes in and gives this speech that's way better than what Ben Johnson's speech was. He almost sounded like a preacher. And the guys were locked in. They were really excited for him. And I was like, dangerous move when you're the coach to hand off the speech to somebody who's better than you at the speech. Interesting. So maybe that speaks to the camaraderie of the coaching staff. I don't know.

56:40Cousin Sal:It's either that or Ben Johnson knows how bad a head coach Dennis Allen would be. It's just not threatening. There's no threatening at all. I was like, go ahead, take the mic, whatever you need to do.

56:49Bill Simmons:He looked at his record on pro football reference. He's like, ah, this is fine. Go do karaoke. You're fine. Whatever you want to do. I'll give it to him. I am not a believer in that Bears team. So they are 4-2. Next week, when we do Guest Alliance, they're at the Ravens, which is our first playoff game of the year, basically. Because if the Ravens lose, it's over. Yeah. You're not making the playoffs 1-6. No doubt. so this will be our first actual playoff game stakes for one of the teams uh and then my team the patriots who beat carolina buffalo new orleans and tennessee tennessee three stinker team well two stinker teams carolina is okay uh and then buffalo is the big win there but um everything's going great couldn't be happier with may the lions all that stuff the one thing is may he keeps taking these hits.

57:42Bill Simmons:Yeah. And I thought he got concussed today and the head bounced off the turf. And he shook his head too.

57:49Cousin Sal:Yeah.

57:49Bill Simmons:Yeah. And then I was like, fuck. Because I think he had two last year and I'm reasonably confident I've seen every single play of his career for the Patriots. He's had at least four of these now where it seemed like he got concussed. Some guys just seem like they take hits, but I'm starting to wonder, should he wear like the Grogan neck brace? to protect his head. But it's just like, that's my one fear with this is these hits that he takes. Of course. He's such a good scrambler, but the protection broke down a couple of times, which was atypical for this team. But for the most part, this is a really good, at the very least, a really good bad team.

58:28Bill Simmons:And they might even be a good team. I'm leaning toward that. I think they're actually good. Oh, you're trying to get me to say they're a good team? Yeah, of course they're a good team. See, I knew that would work.

58:35Cousin Sal:They're a good team. They're a playoff team. We are a good team. They're fine. I just thought you said it. You're going to beat a bunch of bad teams that you're not going to get credit for still. You're going to have 11 wins, and two or three of them are going to be good. But I almost feel like everybody's right there with you as I look this over. But I was wondering how many good quarterbacks have fans that are worried about them like you are, like in terms of their quarterback is going to take a beating. Like Jackson Dart isn't there yet.

59:03Bill Simmons:But I think the Giants fans are probably terrified he's going to get concussed over and over again with the way he plays. May has at least been more cautious this year. The one today was a little bit of a fluke. Yeah, look. If you look at the past schedule, the at-Buccaneers game week 10 is probably the toughest game left on the schedule. And they're playing a bunch of crap teams. There's a chance. I mean, they might play four teams this year that will have fired their coach either during the season or after. Yeah. but they can keep piling up wins I mean the one thing with them is Rabel has had big win total seasons before he kind of knows you just kind of move on next week move on next week the one thing that was interesting about them this week some of the quotes I was surprised like they were talking they're not talking about like well if we can make the playoffs that would be great they're like look we got to measure ourselves they're talking about themselves like they're a playoff team already sure yeah they should it's crazy because they were one and two four weeks ago.

1:00:05Bill Simmons:But now I think they know that they're good.

1:00:08Cousin Sal:Well, they knew they couldn't lose to both the Raiders and the Titans, right? Like then it doesn't even matter if you end up in the playoffs. No one's going to remember. That's the point of it.

1:00:16Bill Simmons:They have two losses. They lose to that shit Raiders team. And that was the worst game May played all year. And then the Steelers game, they turned the ball over five times. The one thing with Vrabel, who I've been fascinated with how he's changed the culture, that what he did for Ramondre this year, I thought was really notable. Because Ramondre had all those fumbles. And it's just he had this fumbling issue for a couple years now. And then he had a couple big ones. He cost them the Pittsburgh game. And Belichick, I mean, the guy, his body just would have been found in Rhode Island, like on the side of a highway with missing a head.

1:00:51Bill Simmons:Cops would have had to take him task. Don't tell me. Cops would have ID'd him two weeks later. He just never would have played for Belichick again. Sure. and Vrabel was like you know Ramon J the next game and in the when they gave the game balls out and he was basically made it clear like I'm not quitting on somebody who fumbles couple times did the same thing with the kicker he set the kicker up for when that kicker made the game winning field goal set him up it was like I knew you were going to make it like he doesn't bail on these dudes and I think they really like that because you have all these coaches and all these people just they'll bail immediately on whoever and he's like the opposite so I don't know it feels like there's something really actually happening here.

1:01:32Cousin Sal:Well, I hope you have the same sunny outlook next week when Ramondre fumbles and he loses to the Browns. Let's see. Well, you know what, Ramondre,

1:01:40Bill Simmons:you're part of this team and everybody makes mistakes. Is that what Dennis Allen said? You have a culture guy too in Dallas. Yeah. Let's take a break and talk about that quickly. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Countless hours in the gym, a thousand shots before tip-off, day after day on the same court with the State Farm stanchion right there. That's right, the best players put in the work. And State Farm is the same way with insurance experts who put in the work as well. Whether you get a digital quote or reach out to a local agent, State Farm is there to get to know you and help you select the right coverage that fits your life and your budget.

1:02:23Bill Simmons:Putting in the work is what separates the good players from the great, and that's why you want State Farm on your team. So get the coverage that's right for you. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability and eligibility vary by state. This episode is brought to you by Netflix. The World Cup is finally here. And the coolest thing right now, FIFA World Cup launch edition on Netflix, a fast and fluid game where your phone is the controller and your TV is the stadium. Play as any of the 48 teams in 16 real world stadiums and it's included in your membership.

1:02:57Bill Simmons:Yeah. Go to the games tab on your TV and play FIFA World Cup launch edition now. Only on Netflix. So here's the thing with the Cowboys season, which seemed pretty grim when you traded Michael Parsons. You now have a top three most fun team in the league. Yeah. Really, really fun to watch the Cowboys. And the attitude is just that something's different. So what is it other than that you have two good receivers?

1:03:26Cousin Sal:If you don't move for them, it's fun, right? They're going to score a lot of points. If you had to have a fun Super Bowl or NFC Championship, you'd probably have Dallas and Tampa and forget the records, right? You know that would be probably a fun game because Dak is playing out of his mind. I think he's plus 115 for comeback player of the year. I didn't see odds for offensive player of the year. They won't be good enough for him to win MVP, but I don't know. I was trying to think. They're like Krispy Kreme donuts. Great taste, but you'll get violently ill if you have to have them every meal. They're going to disappoint your bowels.

1:04:00Cousin Sal:So, yeah, 44-22 is a gigantic win over the Commanders. We'll take it.

1:04:06Bill Simmons:Tough one for the Commanders. Daniels gets hurt. The defense looked awful. Yeah. some real dark moments on a text thread with all the people I bet the commanders versus the Pats I gave everybody two wins dark moments who was it

1:04:24Cousin Sal:David Chang what's the thing

1:04:26Bill Simmons:Chang we did a separate bet where it's a certain dollar number per win over one way or the other so if the Pats go like 13 and 4 12 and 5 whatever and Washington goes like seven and 10. Plus I have the plus two because they were two wins lower than the Washington over under. So it could get up there. Chang offered to do a buyout.

1:04:54Cousin Sal:Like a FanDuel buyout?

1:04:56Bill Simmons:Yeah, he wanted to do a FanDuel buyout. And I'm like, he's like, we got to talk about some sort of a deal. And I'm like, the only deal I'm making is with Venmo or PayPal. Wow. So Chang's mad at me now because I won't do a deal. What kind of, what percent? I'm sorry, I thought I was doing bets with men.

1:05:14Cousin Sal:Right. Oh, wow. Look at that. So he's not a man because he offered you a deal.

1:05:19Bill Simmons:He wanted to weasel out of his Washington past thing. Be a man. Stick to 18 weeks. Come on, Chang.

1:05:27Cousin Sal:Now I have to leave for Washington. This is weird. Why do you think he's not a man all of a sudden?

1:05:35Bill Simmons:I don't know. Yeah, I'll probably end up making a deal. I'm going to stay friends with Chang. He was really upset about the Washington game. He feels like this bet has ruined the season that they put bad juju on Jaden Daniels.

1:05:49Cousin Sal:Well, he does look... I know he's also injured, but he looked like he was playing injured up until then, right? Like the rushing yards are not coming easy.

1:05:57Bill Simmons:Honestly, he hasn't looked healthy once this season.

1:06:00Cousin Sal:They look very slow. I know their receivers are out, right? Like they have no receivers. But last year, they looked so much faster than everybody. And now, like to a man, and I get it, Some starters are out, but they just look very average. I mean, now they're below average. Are they three and four? Yeah.

1:06:17Bill Simmons:This was a hard under for us. Yep. Because there was a lot of regression stuff. Their defense was old. Every year we see this, that there's always an old team that thinks they can buck the system.

1:06:30Cousin Sal:Well, and they were very lucky. Guess what?

1:06:31Bill Simmons:Old guys get injured. This is how it goes.

1:06:33Cousin Sal:That's what Chang should know. That's a lesson you should teach him as you collect 100 % of your bet.

1:06:40Bill Simmons:I mean, I guess I'm willing to talk a deal with him, but I feel like he should ride it out. Get me next year. Oh, and then Jacksonville. You have nothing else than the Cowboys? You're playing it cool. You're 3-3-1.

1:06:54Cousin Sal:I want to play it cool. I would have been a lot more excited, I promise, if they had beaten Carolina last week because now it gets kind of ugly. At Broncos, we'll go over the Lions in a second. They'll have the Eagles, the Chiefs, the Lions, and the Vikings in consecutive games in November, so not pretty. You're minus 340 to miss the playoffs.

1:07:15Bill Simmons:It's a good bet. I'm going to bet Chang on that. Your win total. Now, Chang, if you start winning the bet, he won't give you the satisfaction. Oh, interesting. He demands to settle it. Okay. Seven and a half. What's our win total? Seven and a half, but some juice on the over. Minus 125. Okay.

1:07:36Cousin Sal:Yeah, they're exciting. I'd rather bet the Dak award stuff. I mean, it was great seeing C.D. Lamb back, right? And George Pickens, I'll say a little more. I feel like he's going to lead the league in defensive pass interference calls, right, against him. Or for him, rather. Yeah, and they all are, like, they're all legit. And also, he's a great, great number two receiver. Like, the Steelers lift on that. Like, maybe he doesn't fit in their offense. He fits in Dallas' offense really well right now.

1:08:07Bill Simmons:The smartest thing about that trade, and it's something you should always be thinking, is that guy was never with a good quarterback, ever. You're getting this guy who clearly was talented. I wouldn't have gone near him. I just thought he was so erratic on the Steelers, but maybe he was erratic because he was losing his mind because his quarterbacks were terrible. Now he's this quarterback who throws. He'll go down the sideline, jump up, and put his hands up, and the ball is right where his hands are, three feet over his head as he's flying. Like, it's all the stuff he's good at. So he must be, like, delighted.

1:08:40Cousin Sal:You think he should be a benchmark for receivers or, like, their agents? Like, they go out and, like, hey, my guy, whatever, he doesn't put up the great numbers, but he's never been with a quarterback who could throw a ball. Take a look at George Pickens, what he did. I feel like there's a bunch we could hold off on a couple of those, but they're probably all on the Raiders.

1:08:58Bill Simmons:Devontae Adams right now. Yep. So Dallas, does that tie count as half a win? I mean, no. How does that work on Fandle? So if you go 8-8-1, you still would have to be over 8-1 wins.

1:09:15Cousin Sal:So it doesn't count at all? No, but for the playoffs, 8-8-1 is better than, I don't know, 8-9, right? Or 9-7-1 is better than 9-8.

1:09:30Bill Simmons:I don't think you're excited enough about the Cowboys.

1:09:32Cousin Sal:You killed Washington. You hate Washington. Come on, the Panthers. That was just unbelievable garbage. They lost that game.

1:09:39Bill Simmons:And then Jacksonville, 13 penalties, zero sacks, two for 10 on third down, one lost kick return TD on a bogus block in the back. They allowed five touchdowns to Stafford with no picks. And yet another horrible game where if you woke up a half hour late, you heard Rich Eisen and it's already 14-0 and it's like maybe I should just roll over and go back to bed.

1:10:06Cousin Sal:It could put you in a bad mood for the rest of the day. It's a long NFL day, right? And you're probably going to pick the game wrong whoever you take. So if you could afford to stay away from it betting-wise then do so.

1:10:20Bill Simmons:Staying away from the London games this year was a great idea. Week 8, guess the lines. we have six bi-week teams so yeah this is a fantasy from hell week right including Jacksonville I'm not sure if there's any Jacksonville fantasy guy you'd be excited about Brian Thomas Jr. is just pulling a John Wayne Gacy on two of my fantasy teams Las Vegas they had 95 yards this week so maybe we don't miss any of those but we are going to miss some of the Lions we are are going to miss some of the Rams. Arizona, probably not. And then Seattle. Those are our sixth ones. So we're losing almost all of the NFC West.

1:11:04Bill Simmons:Yeah, we're losing three NFC West teams. I don't know if that's happened before and why they did that, but I'm sure there's a reason.

1:11:10Cousin Sal:Guest lines, what's the record right now? Four-three. You're up four weeks to three. I think I scratched out a win to cut the deficit, but I don't feel good about this. I know. Short week.

1:11:22Bill Simmons:Yep. Thursday night, Chargers home for Minnesota. We'll see if J.J. McCarthy recovers from his high ankle sprain. I have the Chargers minus three.

1:11:36Cousin Sal:You're going to get it. I said one and a half. I just felt like that's where all these fall with the Chargers. It's two and a half.

1:11:45You know, we probably didn't talk about that Colts game enough.

1:11:51Bill Simmons:we can talk about it when the Colts when we do their game people get mad if we don't talk about their team enough no but that one we should have talked about what was notable to me with the Chargers was I mean Herbert especially in the last like two hours of the game they were really moving the ball but their defense was helpless like the Colts would get like incomplete shayner running to the ground on first and it'd be second and ten you'd be like they're gonna get eight yards they're gonna get 12 yards It's like, oh, they're going to get 20 yards. They were moving. It wasn't just that they were getting yards.

1:12:23Bill Simmons:These guys were like wide open. Taylor was just slicing through. It felt like if they could have had the ball more, they could have had like 50 points.

1:12:31Cousin Sal:That's what we're missing from this Chargers team, right? From the first couple of weeks, the toughness, the Harbaugh toughness on defense. Like, where is it supposed to be? I know there's some injuries there. But they, yeah, I mean, they couldn't get off the field on third down. And those Colts, like, I'll say that. I'm no longer expecting the hammer to drop on them. They'll lose games, but you don't feel like, oh, wait till they go to Kansas City. Well, wait till they go to Buffalo. Those are all could be one-score games. They outscore everyone.

1:13:00Bill Simmons:I thought we had the Chargers. The Colts had had a couple injuries, and I really thought that House and I both thought it was going to be just a Herbert MVP game. And he was really good in the game, and it didn't matter because the Colts were awesome. they have nine two touchdown quarters in the season. Wow. Where they've scored two touchdowns in a quarter. Wow. They don't punt a lot. So I think Daniel Jones, so if we have Geno in 22, Baker Mayfield in 23, Darnold in 24, now Daniel Jones in 25, this is the fourth straight year with a...

1:13:36Cousin Sal:Has to be.

1:13:37Bill Simmons:A QB redemption. Like, if you watch Jones in this game, you would think he's one of the five best quarterbacks in the league. Yep. He was doing everything perfectly. Every guy was hit on stride. Every deep ball was the right throw. I thought he was fantastic.

1:13:52Cousin Sal:Really good. They can't stop scoring. I couldn't really ignore it because Anthony DeBundo is a Colts fan and why he wasn't at that game, I have no idea. But screaming, screaming in our ears every touchdown, every first down even.

1:14:09Bill Simmons:My Indiana sports cluster theory. Sunday Marquis so just a weird one because the Ravens are 1-5 but I think this is the game of the weekend Ravens Bears in Baltimore playoff stakes for the Ravens I think they have to win a couple in a row and Lamar's back for sure Lamar's back after watching that Bears team that's a team they should be able to beat at home I don't care how banged up their defense is and I think they're going to be favored by 3.5 that's exactly at what I said, and those are

1:14:43Cousin Sal:amateur guesses, Bill. It's six and a half. Wow. I mean, it's kitchen sink written all over it.

1:14:51Bill Simmons:That has to be a record for a 1-5 team against a 4-2 team. Yes. A spread that's almost seven is just nuts.

1:15:00Cousin Sal:That is nuts. Just because Lamar comes back doesn't mean the defense is fixed, right? Chicago could throw the ball all over the place this game. I'm not taking Chicago don't worry about it

1:15:18Cousin Sal:this is going in your 107 this is going in your 107 parlay this is bet number 5

1:15:23Bill Simmons:I'm scared of the Ravens because I think not only Lamar thing but I thought Harbaugh had a really really really rough year so far and I just don't like the look of them

1:15:32Cousin Sal:so you could probably stay away from it you could bet to miss the playoffs Ravens minus 128 or you could bet the Ravens on a teaser here you know, or I guess I just said that the other way around. You can bet the Ravens to make the playoffs at like plus 105, or you can bet a teaser here.

1:15:51Bill Simmons:I was already looking at a Ravens-Pats combo with the Pats and the Browns. Only one watchable game. Texans home for the 49ers, who, despite all the injuries, we didn't talk about them either. We jumped the Sunday night game. We didn't really talk about that patchwork defense they threw together and then how bad Penix was. Yeah. Just a bad spot, right?

1:16:21Cousin Sal:Penix was awful.

1:16:25Bill Simmons:I don't know what to me. To me, he's like Tua. When it's bad, you just know it right away and you know it's not going to return for the game. But the Niners, like, you know, Kittle is back. The receivers are going to slowly come back. Purdy will be back I think next week McCaffrey is still one of the five best offensive players in the week and somehow they're going to win 10 games

1:16:45Cousin Sal:those are a great spot for San Francisco right we talk about let's just talk about our five cross off teams which is now six aside from those teams no one is good or is as good or as bad as they looked the week before right so Atlanta just throttles Buffalo cuts off all of Josh's Allen's lanes he can't run he can't do anything Bijan is going to go for 400 yards if there's like another five minutes in that game. There's no way they're going to be as good as that traveling to San Francisco on a short week and the 49ers aren't going to be as bad as they were. So that was a nice spot for us. But yeah, so now that division, we'll pick the line in a second.

1:17:20Cousin Sal:Who do you think is favored to win the NFC West?

1:17:25Cousin Sal:I would say the Rams. Barely. Plus 140. Niners 45. Jesus. Seahawks 310.

1:17:34Bill Simmons:You know, the one thing that sucks about doing the picks on a Thursday is I wanted to see who was going to be playing for the Niners. Yeah. Definitely like them. But you just don't know. Like, we had the Chargers, and Joe Walt, I don't think, ended up playing. But on Thursday, it seemed like he was going to play, and I'm not positive I would have been jumping on the Chargers without Joe Walt. Right. It's almost like we should, I guess we can't do it.

1:17:58Cousin Sal:Who'd you want as quarterback?

1:17:59Bill Simmons:You wanted Purdy or Jones? What would have made you commit? I think, no, we didn't know if Kittle was playing. Oh. We just, we didn't know who was playing for the Niners. There was like still stuff. We didn't know what receivers were playing. I don't know.

1:18:14Cousin Sal:All right, Bill. It doesn't matter because let's take a look at our 4K Skycam delivered by Walmart Plus. It's Christian McCaffrey who makes a difference on this team. You can't stop CMC, man.

1:18:25Bill Simmons:They made it National Running Back Day. We need another national day. What is the cutoff for running backs? I have to congratulate. I don't know. Yeah, I guess. Like, is Harrison's flag football team? Do you have to congratulate all the running backs?

1:18:40Cousin Sal:I think you should. Next week's tight ends game. Yeah, Vrabel didn't cut, what's his name? Ramondre. That was what he gave him as a gift for a national running backs guy.

1:18:48Bill Simmons:Yeah, you get to keep your job in your locker. This is so weird. We gave, we gave, who did, who did Mickey give Rocky's locker to?

1:18:57Cousin Sal:Oh, who was it? Yeah. And Rocky won? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The other Italian, right? Who was it? It wasn't Spider Rico. No, I guess not. We'll look that up. Can't remember.

1:19:09Bill Simmons:All right. Well, I have Texans minus two and a half in Houston.

1:19:13Cousin Sal:I got this one exactly. It's one and a half unless it moved. It's Houston. TikTok zone.

1:19:21Bill Simmons:Well, listen, we're going to find out about Houston tomorrow because Seattle is a tough place to play. I'm not convinced they can run the ball, Houston. I'm not convinced they can block. Seattle's defense their front seven is going to be really good and it's the kind of game if Houston has a chance to come back and try to be a playoff team it should at least be a good performance tomorrow night.

1:19:44Cousin Sal:I think if they win it's got to be a low scoring game. They've averaged 12 points on defense a game. Like a 19 of 14 type? Yeah, they play shitty teams but they are one of the top defenses and maybe Darnold isn't so successful throwing downfield for one freaking game. I don't know.

1:19:59Bill Simmons:Fairly watchables. Falcons Dolphins. I have this as a fairly watchables just because I don't know who's coaching. It could be DJ Mikey Mack could be back for another week wearing dressed like John Lennon. I have the Falcons minus 7.5.

1:20:15Cousin Sal:Imagine I, no paycheck. 7.5 is exactly right. I said 6. And it actually opened at 6 and it's 7.5. So they saw what did happen. Is someone out? Who the hell could be out from Miami to make that go up.

1:20:32Bill Simmons:Probably just people betting it because I think... People saw highlights? People saw Miami highlights, but Atlanta's a home team. Pats, Browns. I had trouble with this. It's either 7.5 or 8.5. But I went with 7.5 because I'm not sure people believe in the Pats yet.

1:20:51Cousin Sal:I wish it would have gone to 8.5. It's 7, so you get that. What'd you have? I had eight. I had eight and a half. I went higher. That's a teaser. Oh, you're loving it. I mean, I'm over under 16 and a half teasers you have with the Pats on it next week.

1:21:09Bill Simmons:I just think Dylan Gabriel on the road is a non-starter. Like, he's really going to come in to New England and outdo with Drake May. He's literally a non-starter. Two incommissions today. There's a lot of non-starters in the league. What's the deal with Deshaun Watson might come back? that he's there. Does that help them? I don't know. I can't figure it out. By the way, I just noticed I have my hot rod glass. Oh, good for you. You have a hot rod behind us. Right there. Wait, right. Yeah, right there. Double one. I miss Roddy. There's some Twitter account that posts old wrestling matches from the 80s and 90s.

1:21:48Bill Simmons:I want to say rabbits in the title, but they had the Roddy, the strap, what was the match with Valentine? when he busted his eardrum? Dog collar match. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was even too far for wrestling.

1:22:02Cousin Sal:That was a lot, yeah.

1:22:04Bill Simmons:Having two guys with dog collars on. I just don't know there was any way to fake any of that. And apparently there wasn't because he lost most of the hearing in his ear.

1:22:11Cousin Sal:He claimed he had permanent ear damage, and it was true because I'd have conversations with him and he'd snap by his ear to try to rejuvenate it. Wrestling's real, guys.

1:22:21Bill Simmons:Yeah. Eagles-Giants in Philly. Yeah. I couldn't get to seven. I did six and a half.

1:22:30Cousin Sal:We're going to split it. I could get to seven. I went seven and a half. It's seven. God damn it. Oh, man. It might be simple. I mean, why not Philly? I'm not putting the Eagles in that. They're going to lose twice to the Giants?

1:22:45Bill Simmons:No. Really? I don't trust them at all. They have to be pissed off. I can't do the Jalen Hurts. I can't do the Jalen Hurts in a tease.

1:22:52Cousin Sal:Do we think? I mean, isn't it possible that that Giant loss was like that Bears lost to Washington and it just everything tumbles now. Even though it might be a decent team, like they just can't now scratch together when after that Denver collapse, it is possible.

1:23:07Bill Simmons:Bills at Carolina. Minus five and a half is my guess with the Bills being favored. I put it right in the Vegas zone unapologetically.

1:23:17Cousin Sal:I think I get this. I said six and a half and it is seven and a half. That, come on. Why? they have to if they're all the teaser idiots like us. They have to. So when they win 21-20. They haven't played

1:23:34Bill Simmons:a good game yet. Now, I do think they get their two suspended D linemen back this week, right? Yeah. And probably at Oliver back. So they have a full defense for once. Bryce Young is hurt. You just think

1:23:48Cousin Sal:the line's big. You don't think Carolina's going to pull off an upset and go four and three, right? I think Carolina's

1:23:54Bill Simmons:a pretty good home team.

1:23:56Cousin Sal:They are 4-3.

1:23:57Bill Simmons:They're going to be 5-3.

1:23:59Cousin Sal:Bill's 4-3.

1:23:59Bill Simmons:No, I'm not saying they'll be 5-3. Yeah. You know what I like? They have two running backs now. Mm-hmm. They had Dowdle and Hubbard today. They were kind of doing the one-two punch. It wasn't bad.

1:24:09Cousin Sal:Yeah. They would have lost if they played any other game, any other team today.

1:24:16Bill Simmons:Bucs at New Orleans. That's another one. Yeah. I had Vegas on this. I had Bucs by four and a half in New Orleans. So I get it. I said seven and a half. It's six and a half.

1:24:30Cousin Sal:Ooh. A little pricey. Well, five and one versus one and six. They didn't play yet this year, did they? No. I'm trying to remember.

1:24:40Bill Simmons:Has there ever been a normal Bucs-Saints game in New Orleans? Has that ever happened? It's been a normal Bucs game in years. I mean, there's no way that game's not coming down in the final two and a half minutes. Just lock that down. Oh. we're redoing the 1977 Super Bowl. Broncos-Cowboys.

1:24:58Cousin Sal:Yeah.

1:24:59Bill Simmons:Let's do it. It's in Denver. So I had this as a fairly watchable, and I'd like to apologize because this should have been the watchables. Yeah. Denver's offense might not be watchable for a couple hours. Your team is an automatic watchable against any decent team. I had the Broncos in Denver favored by four.

1:25:18Cousin Sal:I had this exactly. It's three. All right. I'm doing okay here. Two, three. 6 '5", me. This is the Super Bowl. Wow, so you ever see Butch Johnston catch the touchdown pass and just put it on the goal line? Yeah, they called it a catch. It's a phenomenal example how 70s football is different.

1:25:36Bill Simmons:I remember thinking, what am I, seven years old at that point, really being upset that it wasn't a catch. It was a catch. It was a touchdown. When he dropped the ball, I thought he dropped it too soon. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. I thought something was fishy about it. Now a coach would beat him up for that. The one that really made me mad was the Mike Renfro play. The Houston-Pittsburgh game. Oh, right, right, right. Because that was basically the play that created replay. Yeah. He definitely caught it. And they just like...

1:26:06Cousin Sal:Was that the play or was it years later with Testo Verde?

1:26:10Bill Simmons:That was when the replay stuff started. I don't know when they actually came up with it. But the Renfro thing. Wasn't it Renfro? That's who it was, right? Yeah. I felt like it swung that one. Poop Factor, two games. Bengals-Jets. Joe Flacco against Tyrod Taylor. I think they might have played together at some point in life. I put this right in the Vegas zone. Bengals by five and a half.

1:26:35Cousin Sal:Yeah, you're going to edge me out here. I said six and a half. It's four and a half. Oh, still Vegas zone. Hold on a second. Every team should give the Jets seven points. I mean, come on. Enough.

1:26:50Bill Simmons:What did you think of that Bengals performance on Thursday night? Pretty good, right?

1:26:54Cousin Sal:Like they, I think Flacco, well, first of all, I think we switched. Like when we say Puka Nakua is the greatest wide receiver in the game, if he's not playing, I wouldn't think of betting the Rams. Now it's Chase. Now he's like right at the top and like doesn't matter. Like, was he going to have like 22 catches in two weeks? It's phenomenal. So as long as those two are there, they're going to score points and they're not on the Jets. that should be a touchdown. Well, it reminded me of what I said 11 minutes ago

1:27:25Bill Simmons:about Dak and Pickens.

1:27:27Cousin Sal:Watching Flacco, I don't think Flacco's

1:27:30Bill Simmons:a very good quarterback anymore, but he is good at that little 20-yard throw down the sideline. And it just, I don't know. It's just he had come through those guys. I thought it was funny that Tomlin complained about the trade and then got beaten by it. Right, I didn't get the point of that at all anyway. I got to hand it. I mean, they're about to come up when we do this Sunday night game, but I got to be honest. I thought Rodgers was awesome in that game. It was good. I think the last two weeks, Rodgers has, I thought he was done, unabashedly thought he was washed. I thought he's looked awesome.

1:28:03Bill Simmons:He's very good. Really, really good. It hurts me to say. To the point that, yeah, it makes me wonder, like, what's the ceiling of that Steelers team? Because, I mean, he hasn't looked this good for three years.

1:28:17Cousin Sal:Yeah, but he looks great. It's a great fit for them. He's hitting everybody in stride. But again, this team goes as far as the defense goes, right? I think they had like 14 or 15 sacks over the previous three weeks, and they only put Flacco down twice. So that's it, man. It's going to be a game every time if that happens.

1:28:38Bill Simmons:Kyle Brand had a really funny thing I saw on TV about how he identifies with Rodgers at this point in his life because he's like the typical frustrated guy in his 40s working with a bunch of younger people. He's just always put out. Like when that lineman knocked him over, he's like, Jesus Christ.

1:28:54Cousin Sal:That was ridiculous. Yeah, it was so. You should see the few seconds before that because he like pats him on the head, which even that was like a little rough. And then he like chases him down. Like he's like trying to pull his wallet or something. Yeah, I don't know.

1:29:08Bill Simmons:But yeah, no, listen, I did not expect to have an entertaining Rogers,

1:29:13Cousin Sal:but I thought he was really fun to watch in that game. It's fun, but they're not a lock anymore, right? Like that made you think, like that division, you probably talked about it Friday, right?

1:29:23Bill Simmons:No, I didn't. We didn't. I taped before that game, so I never talked about it. I think the Steelers' defense looks fraudulent to me. I thought the Pats, we moved the ball on them for three and a half quarters. I just don't think their defense is what people might think it is. And they're both plus 130 to win the North.

1:29:42Cousin Sal:and the Bengals are 5-1

1:29:44Bill Simmons:but good, yeah, we'll talk about it well, one more poop fact of the game, Colts, Titans it's in Indianapolis and I think I think this is the week for the ultimate respect for the Colts a giant line I went all the way up to 13.5

1:30:00Cousin Sal:oh, you're smart I said 12.5 it's 14.5

1:30:07Bill Simmons:yeah, it's time after they did today, you gotta do it You got to treat them like they're a real contender because they are. And they're playing the shitty Titans. They have to be favored by this much.

1:30:17Cousin Sal:On a scale of your mother-in-law tells a joke to pulling a Norm MacDonald clip online, how hard did you laugh when Cam Ward just dropped that ball? Just dropped it. Just flat out fucking dropped. I was waiting for it for two hours. But just the way he flings it like a magician. Just throw it to us, Cam. I know you want to.

1:30:36Bill Simmons:Just drop it here and then get shut out of the way. I loved it. We scored two touchdowns in like 11 seconds or something. Unbelievable. I loved it. Sunday night. Really good game. Steelers-Packers in Pittsburgh. And I'm sure there's going to be a lot of talk all week about what we just said about Rodgers. Not just the fact that he's rejuvenated, but playing his old team. This is a fun one. Has he... I can't remember. Did he play the Packers last year?

1:31:02Cousin Sal:As a Jet? Yeah, I'm pretty sure. Right? Didn't they... Now we've got to look this up. I don't remember. Let's slow this down. We can't keep saying we don't remember. Are you sure he played them last year? He must have. I'm almost positive versus Packers. What are you looking at? Oh, oh, oh. Oh, yeah.

1:31:21Bill Simmons:Maybe not. Wait. I don't think he did. He didn't? No. Well, he's playing them Sunday night. Yeah. Yeah, Mike. I just, I can't believe how good Aaron Rodgers is. Come on, Mike. I can't believe it, Mike. Tic-tac zone for me. Steelers minus one and a half. Ooh. Steelers minus one and a half.

1:31:42Cousin Sal:Yeah. I said Green Bay minus two and a half. It's Green Bay minus three. Then we are tied. Green Bay minus three. Yeah, they're a better power ranked team, right?

1:31:57Bill Simmons:We just talked about how we didn't trust the Green Bay and what was going on with them. They barely beat Jacoby Brissett today.

1:32:05Cousin Sal:Both are lacking. the Steelers are

1:32:08Bill Simmons:Steelers have a little rest advantage you know what this line makes sense because I'm probably going to bet on the Packers there you go Monday night Chiefs wow this game kind of sucks now Chiefs home for Washington

1:32:20Cousin Sal:I was off by two points I probably shouldn't even give you that much but whoever wins this takes the week I have Chiefs by eight and a half what number? eight and a half shit I had seven and a half it's nine and a half you win damn Come on. 8-7. 9-1.

1:32:42Bill Simmons:There's a lot of tees. That has all the makings of a seven-point tease. You love it. You love it. Three-teamer. So we could do Chiefs with the Patriots and the Falcons against DJ Mikey Mack in his last offense game if they don't fire him. That sounds fantastic.

1:33:00Cousin Sal:And just throw the Colts on there just to have fun as a money line.

1:33:07Bill Simmons:yeah I'm trying to think so if Simmons so the best two Titans well two of the best three because I thought sweat was good in the game today but Simmons got hurt and Snead got hurt so if Simmons doesn't play against the Colts like I don't know if you can make that line high enough

1:33:25Cousin Sal:yeah it might as well you could put Bill Simmons in there it doesn't matter you're gonna be fine that's a disaster of a line

1:33:32Bill Simmons:so do we just think that I can't believe it. At no point Daniel Jones is going to turn into Daniel Jones. This is just how it's going to go for the rest of eternity.

1:33:41Cousin Sal:I think you called it exactly. This is, you compared him to those other quarterbacks that stood up, that came out of some pretty much nowhere each year from 21 to 25. And he's Sam Darnold. So what did they win? 13 games last year?

1:33:55Bill Simmons:Sam Darnold turned into a pumpkin in week 18 or week 17.

1:33:59Cousin Sal:Week 18, the last week. And then the playoff week. That's fine. That's still a successful year if that happens.

1:34:07Bill Simmons:Is he a top five MVP for you, Daniel Jones, or would you have Taylor as their MVP? I got to look here. Because Taylor should be the number one offensive player of the year. He is. He's minus 140.

1:34:19Cousin Sal:He's actually minus number now. He's been incredible. Yeah. So Daniel Jones is seventh. Do you put Stafford and Goff ahead of him? I thought Stafford's been great. What's Drake Bay now? What are his odds? We don't have to talk about it. He's 7-1. He's fourth. 7-1? He's fourth? How the hell did this happen? Who's leading? Mahomes? Mahomes plus 175. Josh plus 350. Baker plus 450.

1:34:49Bill Simmons:So why would Josh be second? What has he done? As you know, I think he's the best quarterback in the league. What has he done this year that would make him the number two MVP? Like, why does he have better odds than Drake May?

1:35:00Cousin Sal:No, he shouldn't.

1:35:01Bill Simmons:When the Pats have a better record and they've beaten them already.

1:35:04Cousin Sal:I think they're anticipating. I mean, I guess you could just... They're anticipating a Josh run? Well, what's the win totals for either of those teams? First of all, Baker should have the best odds. Yeah, I agree. I agree.

1:35:15Bill Simmons:And I would argue Drake May should have better odds than Josh Allen.

1:35:19Cousin Sal:What do you think the Patriots' projected win total is right now?

1:35:23Bill Simmons:Oh.

1:35:27Cousin Sal:Ten and a half? That's exactly right. What do you think Buffalo's is?

1:35:32Bill Simmons:What's the record? Four and two?

1:35:35Cousin Sal:Buffalo is four and two. Yep. Don't cheat. Just whatever. Let me say 11 and a half for Buffalo. Yeah, that's what it is. So I guess that's the only reason he's ahead of them. What is it for division? For the division, Buffalo is still favored minus 190. Pats plus 155. So you have to win a division.

1:35:57Bill Simmons:Pats plus 155. is a pretty good bet if you look at their schedule. Because there's a chance. I think 12-5, if they can stay healthy, is conceivable with how bad the schedule is. Which means the Bills would have to go 11-3 and win the game in New England. 11-3? Or 10-3. 4-2?

1:36:29Cousin Sal:No, 8-3. They're 4-2 plus 8-3 is 12-5. I used to be good at math.

1:36:34Bill Simmons:8-3.

1:36:35Cousin Sal:8-3. Yeah. They'd have to go 8-3 and win the game in New England. It's so top-heavy.

1:36:42Bill Simmons:Because if we beat them in New England, they would have to go one game ahead of us with those two losses.

1:36:47Cousin Sal:Right. So New England to win 12 games or more is plus 175. I guess it's about the same thing as the division. Right. It's a little...

1:36:56Bill Simmons:I mean, honestly, Fando having the... I know they have reasons for this, but Fandle having the Ravens plus 130 and the Steelers plus 130 to win the AFC North is just batshit crazy to me. You think the Steelers should be ahead of them? Yeah. Put it this way. If you were going to bet your life on the outcome of that, and it's like you're going to die if you're wrong, would you bet on the one in five Ravens?

1:37:20Cousin Sal:They're pretty far behind, the Ravens.

1:37:23Bill Simmons:Yeah, a lot has to go right for them to come back. The Steelers are a way safer bet.

1:37:27Cousin Sal:They have to beat them twice. So they play them twice. They absolutely have to beat them twice. And then the Steelers' schedule gets really weird now. Here's the other one.

1:37:38Bill Simmons:So now I'm looking. Colts are minus 240. Jags are 3-1. Good luck there. I need to bring baby back for the Jags at 3-1. Good luck. And then Houston plus 850 is insane. Like if anyone's going to win that division, it's Houston. That's dumb. Yeah. Other than Indy, but I would bet Indy minus 240. What's wrong with Eagles, Colts, minus 109 for a division?

1:38:05Cousin Sal:How about this?

1:38:07Bill Simmons:Eagles, Colts, Steelers, plus 355.

1:38:14Cousin Sal:Yeah, that is good. That is good.

1:38:16Bill Simmons:Now throw in the Pats. Now I'm at plus 911.

1:38:20Cousin Sal:You're a lunatic now.

1:38:21Bill Simmons:Now throw in Tampa, minus 425.

1:38:24Cousin Sal:That's 11-1. Have we ever picked five division winners eight weeks in? I absolutely have. Cardinals, that's 377-1.

1:38:35Bill Simmons:I had a future bet that if I had picked Green Bay instead of Minnesota, I think I'd actually have a chance at it. That was like 23-1. Yeah. Well, you won.

1:38:46Cousin Sal:Let me ask you this. We were talking about it. Patriots and Bills have at least 12 wins. Jets and Dolphins have 12 losses. Very doable, right? Jets and Dolphins would each have to have 12 losses. 12 wins for the top two, 12 losses for the bottom two. I think that's going to happen. I might even say 13 for top two and 13 for bottom two. I want to see if we can bet that.

1:39:15Bill Simmons:Fando has over four and a half for Miami now, plus 110. So that's either 12 or 13, right?

1:39:21Cousin Sal:Yeah. And then the Jets can't be better than that. Yeah. The Jets are... Yeah, I guess we could just bet it. We could just parlay over it.

1:39:30Bill Simmons:Jets are three and a half. Jesus. I'm not betting. By the way, the Jets are going to win four games? Nah. Nah. Jets under three and a half seems like a lock to me.

1:39:41Cousin Sal:We just went over the ones they could potentially win is two of them.

1:39:46Bill Simmons:Something would have to happen. To make the playoffs, the Pats are minus 420 now. Wow. The Broncos are minus 280. How are the Jaguars minus 162? They are, huh? You think the Jaguars are a playoff team? In a million years, would you see them as like a seven seed?

1:40:09Cousin Sal:So does that mean one AFC North team gets in?

1:40:15Cousin Sal:That's a lot. So it would be Patriots, Denver, Jaguars. Those would be the wildcard teams? Yeah, I'm looking.

1:40:23Bill Simmons:So it'd be Indy, Pats, Denver, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, KC. So basically they're saying between Chargers, Jacksonville, Cincinnati, and Houston. Jacksonville is the most likely. I would rather go with Houston. But I guess if Houston loses tomorrow, they'd be two behind them. Maybe they know something. God, I think Jacksonville. I have so... They were just so awful. I love them too. just for the year. And then in the NFC, what's like the perfect... So the Ravens are plus 104, which is hilarious. And the Steelers are minus 122.

1:41:07Cousin Sal:The Ravens aren't grabbing a wild card. You might as well just take them to get the division. Yeah, you might as well just take the division.

1:41:13Bill Simmons:And then out of the longer shots, Houston plus 205. Minnesota plus 390, I'm not against. as like a crazy wild card. I like Seattle plus 132. Yeah. And then your team plus 260. Who knows? Who knows? You can throw the ball, man. Why do we even do this? Yeah. This episode is brought to you by ServiceNow. Look, I already have my dream job. I run the ringer. Argue with Chris Ryan, a.k.a. CR. But even dream jobs have not so dreamy parts. You know, the work that slows you down never seems to go away. That's where ServiceNow's AI specialists come in. They're like digital teammates who actually do the job, start to finish.

1:41:57Bill Simmons:No handoffs, no homework. That means more time for the work that actually matters, which for me is talking about whether the 86 Celtics can beat the 96 Bulls, which they could. To learn how to put AI to work for people, visit servicenow.com.

1:42:10Cousin Sal:For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters.

1:42:17Bill Simmons:Tremphaya offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start.

1:42:22Cousin Sal:Tremphaya is administered as injections under the skin or infusions through a vein every four weeks, followed by injections under the skin every four or eight weeks. If your doctor decides that you can self-inject Tremphaya, proper training is required. Tremphaya is a prescription medicine used to treat adults with moderately to severely active Crohn's disease and adults with moderately to severely active ulcerative colitis. serious allergic reactions, increased risk of infections or lower ability to fight them,

1:42:49Bill Simmons:and liver problems may occur. Before treatment, get checked for infections and tuberculosis. Tell your doctor if you have an infection, flu-like symptoms, or need a vaccine.

1:42:59Cousin Sal:Explore what's possible. Ask your doctor about Tremphaya today. Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit TremphayaRadio.com.

1:43:10Bill Simmons:Today's Parent Corner brought to you by Scout Motors. Parenting can feel like fourth and long on your own 10. No timeouts, meltdowns, and a full-on blitz. You're familiar with that, Sal. Oh, yeah. That's when you need a playmaker. Iconic in the 70s. Reimagine for today. The all-new Scout Tare and Scout Traveler are engineered with advanced four-wheel drive, available lock and differentials, optional 35-inch tires, and the go-anywhere capability gate through life's chaos. Built for the next generation of adventures. Join the wait list at scoutmotors.com. What do you got?

1:43:39Cousin Sal:All right. I want to know, as a parent watching a sport, and I think your parent corner might have something to do with this too. So we might as well, we might want to, they might want to join them together here. But as a parent watching a sport, what's your freak out level on umpires, parents, coaches? Like what has to happen? Like I feel like, I think I have a lot of tolerance because I know how embarrassing it is for my kids and my wife and everybody else if I lose my shit because that's happened. But when we have like a six-run lead and this happens Saturday and then it's a four-run lead and then it's a two-run lead and the opposing coach is screaming at his players and screaming at our players and the team is banging on the fence and banging their garbage can.

1:44:29Cousin Sal:Like, I'm gone. That's it. I'm hulking out. I'm turning green right there. Right there in West Covina, California. That's 830 in the morning. I just can't. Oh, my God. I can't take it.

1:44:40Bill Simmons:That's where the Boogie Nights house was. Is that where it was? West Coast? Yeah. You could have sure stopped there after.

1:44:44Cousin Sal:They should have sent me off there. Yeah. Wasn't there a suicide there? I could, I mean, it was really, like, I just, first of all, in Little League, as soon as you shake a fence or bang it or use a bat to hit a garbage can to root your own team on, the umpire goes crazy, loses his mind. Not in this game. And it went on for, like, a half hour. And, like, finally, I said to our coach, like, you got to do something. You got to say something. like now everyone's looking at me like I'm the bad guy here. And luckily they tie it up and we win in the bottom, bottom of the sixth on an era. And I'm like high five and the shit out of everybody.

1:45:22Cousin Sal:Like it was a big win for me. And like, even my kid is like, I hated those kids, dad. I hated them. And I'm glad you hated them too. I'm like, well, I didn't hate them. I just thought there should be better sportsmanship and everything. But what has to happen? I think this leads into your parent corner,

1:45:38Bill Simmons:but what has to happen for you to know that this, First of all, thanks for asking. This is a passionate topic for me. I think there's two things that you're allowed to get mad at as a parent, no matter what the age group is. One is the coach trying to either yell at players on the other team, intimidate them in some way, or fuck with them, I think is just out of line. It just shouldn't happen, especially if it's like 13 years and younger. Right. The players on your team should never hear anything from the other coach. There should be a respectful thing. And if that's not there, I think you have a right to be pissed.

1:46:15Bill Simmons:The other, I mean, this is more of a soccer thing. I think it's harder in baseball unless they're like throwing at the kids. But if the kids, if there's a physicality where their kids are actually like in danger of getting hurt and the officials aren't officiating it correctly, I think you have a right to get mad.

1:46:33Cousin Sal:Okay. Is that your parent?

1:46:34Bill Simmons:I think I told a parent corner story that time about when we were screaming at the 17-year-old ref and he fled to the tent after. But the other team was like, you know, submarining our kids, trying to hurt them.

1:46:46Cousin Sal:Right.

1:46:47Bill Simmons:And at some point, if you have to like look out for the kids, like the whole goal of any sporting event for kids is can we not have anyone get hurt? Yeah. And if somebody's trying to hurt the other team, like you have to intervene. So those would be my two.

1:47:00Cousin Sal:What about your first example, though, where the coach is just like yelling things and, you know, it's not exactly supportive of the other team. And then you yell shit back. But then most of the parents are like, hey, you got to be bigger than him. Like, I do, because that just means he gets away with it and keeps getting away with it. Do I have to be bigger than him?

1:47:23Bill Simmons:I don't think so. You're talking to a guy who started yelling at the Campbell High Women's High School soccer coach because he was talking shit to our team and we got into it a little bit on the sidebinds. I think there's got to be a respect level that these coaches are supposed to be stewards. They're supposed to be teaching people and setting some sort of example. And if they're doing the opposite, that's when it gets weird. Good.

1:47:49Cousin Sal:I don't think you should feel bad at all. I'll consider that a win. Thank you.

1:47:53Bill Simmons:I don't think you should feel bad at all

1:47:55Cousin Sal:yeah I know I just got a lot of years of this left or maybe not many at all

1:47:59Bill Simmons:what if you got into it with the opposing coach and then you kind of got to a good place then he's like hey who do you like tomorrow that's almost going to happen what's your wise wager

1:48:12Cousin Sal:give me a winner we'll make it square you think you take Simmons tomorrow night and guess the odds I'll give you three losers really love you guys

1:48:20Bill Simmons:who are you wishing luck to My Parent Corner is about my dad and my stepmom.

1:48:32Bill Simmons:They had a dog die last year. They always have two golden retrievers. And anytime one died, because golden retrievers, they go between 10, 12 years old, somewhere in there. They're not really like long-lasters. And they would always get a second one. They're always girls. They always name them IE names. And they've had, since the mid eighties, I think they've had like seven or eight golden retrievers, maybe eight. So, uh, so Sally dies last year, Sally with an IE. So only Winnie's left. And my dad is going to be, you know, 78 this, this next month. So my wife and I are like, you can't get another dog you just can't you can't do it you can't do it they're like no no we won't we won't um so then gets to like january we had some simmons family stuff like you know my my dad's sister passed away so they were like in between that and the dog some other stuff like all of a sudden they decided to get a second dog almost like like uh like the just to try to change the karma of the situation, which I understand.

1:49:43But my dad is 77 and should not have a puppy.

1:49:47Bill Simmons:And so they tell us, we're FaceTiming them and they're kind of excited about it at this point because they're about to get a puppy, which I understand. And they tell us and my wife and I, our face is dropped and my wife's like, you can't, you got to cancel it. This is crazy. And they're like devastated that we're so upset. And we're like, you guys haven't had a puppy in eight years. You forget how hard this is. We wouldn't want a puppy now. We're in our 50s. Anyway, they decide to get the puppy anyway. Then they get the puppy. The name, the puppy Ruby. Super cute. The puppy is a freaking maniac.

1:50:29Bill Simmons:Now the puppy is eight and a half months old. When I was in Boston, I was going to see them. My dad is like, just making jokes. Like, can you take Ruby with you on your way back to LA? Like kind of serious. Oh no. Can you take her? And my stepmother's getting mad about it. And it's just dominated in their life. Like Zoe has a game. They have to like rush out after because the dog's been in the crate for two and a half hours. Dog gets out. I was over there the other day. In 10 minutes, she hurt me three different times. Like she crashed into my knee. She left this long scratch over my chest. She jumped over a couch.

1:51:06Bill Simmons:Like she's an absolute, they're in a condo. Like she's just a maniac. And, uh, and they have to walk her all the time. They got to walk her in the morning and, uh, they just didn't listen to us. And, uh, and I, I think I might have a chance to get this dog. It was my parent corner. Oh, good for you. Yeah. I'm going to, I might just actually just kidnap her and not tell them. Oh, before. Okay. All right. Yeah. Cause I actually really liked this dog. No, it's, I made the joke there and my stepmother got really upset about it and was like, no, no, no. this is, there's no way we, these are our dogs.

1:51:39Bill Simmons:And, and, uh, I could just see my dad. It's, it's like the all time. Why did we do this? Right, right, right. Um, maybe the dog will settle down. I don't know, but I just wanted to say this as a PSA to the, to the parents out there who have parents. Yeah. Um, I think what's the cutoff age for maybe you shouldn't get a dog.

1:51:58Cousin Sal:Well, I said that's 75. I wasn't sure where you were going with it. So was it the, the hardship of caring for a puppy was bothering you or that the dog was going to outlast them and you think that would be a bummer? Oh, no.

1:52:14Bill Simmons:I'm not worried about the outlasting

1:52:16Cousin Sal:part because they're going to be fine.

1:52:17Bill Simmons:If they had a four-year-old dog,

1:52:19Cousin Sal:you would have been okay.

1:52:20Bill Simmons:It's the rigors of the puppy. Right. It's like having a baby. This is like dominating your life. You can't leave. You have to constantly... If you're out for two hours, you got to rush back. You're up in the morning. They're peeing all over the place. They get UTIs. It's just never ending.

1:52:38Cousin Sal:So you want to create a sliding scale where like a 60-year-old parent could get a puppy. But once you hit 70, the dog has to be like four or five years old if you're going to even get one.

1:52:49Bill Simmons:So my stepmother's younger than my dad. So that might be the only way they have some wiggle room with this. But I'm going to say if either parent is over 75. No dogs? No, I think there should at least be somebody should come to the house. Like if you're adopting a foster child or something to like meet the family and make sure, like ask my dad, like, well, how many steps do you walk a day? And my dad's like steps. Right. I mean, I walk from the couch to get a ginger ale and I come back. What do you mean steps?

1:53:20Cousin Sal:It's a nice walk for a dog.

1:53:21Bill Simmons:I walked three blocks to go to a restaurant the other day. No, I think 75, I think there should be somebody that comes to the house. make sure. That's a good idea. I like that. I think that's good. They kept little Ruby in the kitchen and my dad would sit in the kitchen with her and this was like for six months and they wouldn't let her out in any other room in the house because she would pee all over the place. So I think that's partially why she's so crazy. So my wife and I, we joke that she's the Brie Larson character in Room. Remember? Brie Larson was stuck in that room for eight years. So anytime time she gets out of the room, she's like, daylight, trees, ah!

1:54:01Bill Simmons:And just loses it. So it's partially their fault.

1:54:05Cousin Sal:She's rubri-lison? Rubri-lison? That's it. But here's the only thing.

1:54:12Bill Simmons:If your mom adopted a dog

1:54:14Cousin Sal:right now, what would your reaction be? Forget it. It would be like it is with everything she does. So I would lose my mind. But some older people want to have their life dominated by something. You know what I mean? Like they don't if you're not active and everything, like, all right, I just want something that controls our lives. This is like a monkey wrench. Let's do it. It's fine. You know, we'll get through it. Even if we have to stay home most of the time or whatever. I don't know that your dad's like that and his wife, but that is part of it.

1:54:42Bill Simmons:I think that's what he thought before, before crazy Ruby got in there on the bright side. Boston blue started on Friday. My dad was pretty excited. Oh, nice. New CBS lineup last week, all the new shows premiered and Boston blue. Donnie Wahlberg. Donnie Wahlberg's character came back to Boston. Nice. So we had that. Anyway, I'll keep you posted on Ruby though. I want to hear about Ruby. I'm going to say she's minus 300 to make it to the end of the year in their house. I might just have to put her in a suitcase.

1:55:12Cousin Sal:Will your dad listen to this? He might listen to this.

1:55:14Bill Simmons:Yeah, he might listen. I'll show him. We're keeping him for another two months. They might get upset. It's fine. There we go. Because we told them. Right. You said this all. You can't. Or if you're going to get a dog, adopt a house trained dog that's like a year old. and then you skip. That seems like the thing.

1:55:31Cousin Sal:Like, why do you think he wanted a puppy? Like he could, it's just a golden, it just has to really be a golden retriever. Yeah.

1:55:36Bill Simmons:Ultimately, right? So when we got Murph, who turned five today, by the way, happy birthday to Murph. It was COVID times and we were home a lot. Right. And we were able, but even that was like a complete nightmare. I don't know if I'd be able, even at my age, go through the puppy thing again.

1:55:52Cousin Sal:Yeah. Yeah. We have a COVID doctor. Same kind of thing. Yeah. It's a lot. How old are your dogs now? Well, I just have the one. And he was a COVID dog and he got hit by a car in Mexico. And my cousin, Katie, Jimmy's daughter, rescued him. And then we took him from her. And yeah, he can't see. He doesn't bark. He doesn't acknowledge us. He doesn't like to be pet. Yeah, that dog's easy. I like that dog. I mean, it's barely a dog, so. But you wouldn't get a puppy though. No, no, no. I wouldn't at my age. What am I? I'm not 70 yet, am I? I might be there. Yeah, but you live in, you're in South Bay.

1:56:23Bill Simmons:I walk around. It's nice to walk the dog around. Yeah. A lot of dogs down there. All right, fine. I'll get a dog. Just get a dog. One of us needs to get a dog just for a parent corner. Because I can't even do it. I mean, if I did parent corners about my son, it would be like about the 30-second interactions I have with him when he's miraculously home. I thought you were going to talk about... Hey, I'm going out. I'm going out right now.

1:56:44Cousin Sal:A certain soccer game you saw this weekend. But you kind of alluded to it. It's fine.

1:56:48Bill Simmons:No, we saw... I came back, saw two wins. Yeah. Oh, you thought I was going to talk about Mount Holyoke strategy?

1:56:55Cousin Sal:Yeah, yeah.

1:56:56Bill Simmons:Yeah. Yeah, they parked the bus for two hours. I've never seen a team park the bus in a 0-0 game just play for a 0-0 tie. Well, they got chippy too, right? Yeah. A little chippy, but, you know, it's college soccer. You think somebody's going to try to score a goal at some point. That's fun.

1:57:11Cousin Sal:You can watch college athletics. You have to fly out there because you murdered that app that would once show the games. They went under. You know that app? Flow?

1:57:22Bill Simmons:First of all, the Flow Sports. What happened? I've definitely heard from some people that work for them or they're urging that they're going to

1:57:30Cousin Sal:you're going to get all Zoey's games in 4K now this is going to be fucking ridiculous

1:57:35Bill Simmons:well it turns out that there were more disgruntled parents than just the parents of my team I think was what we learned listen I'm going to give them a chance to rectify everything we'll see how it goes I think this is how they rectify

1:57:47Cousin Sal:hey Bill Simmons said parents will pay anything to watch their kids so we're raising the monthly fee to$1 ,500. $15.

1:57:56Bill Simmons:Oh my God. We'll see if it works. There's two big games this week. Hopefully, hopefully it's going to work. All right. Anyway, that's it for Parent Corner, which was brought to you by Scout Motors. Join the wait list for the Scout Terra and Scout Traveler at scoutmotors.com. Concept vehicle is not available for sale. Features and performance specifications, preliminary and subject to change. Joining the wait list does not guarantee purchase. Visit scoutmotors.com for details. When somebody tells you they have kids, what ages do you hear that you're the most jealous of for the ages the kids are when you think about your experience having kids?

1:58:29Bill Simmons:What do you think the best ages were?

1:58:32Cousin Sal:I would say 40 and 42 when they say their kids are that old because you don't have to deal with them.

1:58:40Cousin Sal:Like five and seven.

1:58:43Bill Simmons:Yeah, that's what if somebody says I have an eight-year-old and a six-year-old. I'm like, oh man, what a great run that was.

1:58:49Cousin Sal:That's good. Yeah, that's like the sweet spot. They can take care of each other.

1:58:52Bill Simmons:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:58:53Cousin Sal:Dogs is a different story, but yeah, kids. Probably worse is when they're like,

1:58:57Bill Simmons:I have a 15-year-old and an 11-year-old. Yeah, dude. Oh, my God.

1:59:00Cousin Sal:What are you going to do with those? Yikes.

1:59:02Bill Simmons:Or anything under four is a nightmare. Yeah. All right, so your Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday

1:59:07Cousin Sal:ringer gambling show? Yeah, it's been a lot of fun. Then the Sunday pregame show. Let me give you a couple basketball. You tell me what you think here. Oh, let me hear it. Sabonis, 20-plus points per game. He had 19.1 last year, plus 270 for that. I feel like he's healthier. He went from 38 % to 41%. Continued success from three is one of the biggest X factors, I think. That's what you're leading with?

1:59:33Bill Simmons:A Sabonis points per game prop is your number one?

1:59:37Cousin Sal:That's it. Wow, okay. You don't like that one? Plus 270? I saw it. He was at 19. He just got 20. And Edwards, most threes per game, also plus 270. he lost to Steph 4.4 to 4.1. Isn't there a world where Steph doesn't qualify? Give me plus 270. And Edwards. And you were wrong. I listened to all four hours of your thing. Good. Great to learn that Cooper flags a generational talent. Wow. I don't know where you're getting that insight anywhere. But no. Pistons. I like it over. You don't like 50 plus at plus 182? Bickerstaff. This is how he turns a team around.

2:00:12Bill Simmons:I don't. That's your favorite one?

2:00:13Cousin Sal:Duncan Robinson. That's an improvement, I think. right? Cunningham, top 10 player. You really don't like that. You like that under. Someone in the East asked, I know you have your picks for the East, but that was mine to get the gap plus four wins on their total.

2:00:30Bill Simmons:I would rather personally do Milwaukee if you're going to bank on one of those teams from that division as like the better than you think team. I think Milwaukee is going to be good. They put a bunch of specials up. ringer futures on NBA. Oh, yeah. And they have some good ones, like Indiana to win 35-plus games and make the play-in, plus 164. The Bucs and Celtics to both make the playoffs, plus 152. But they had a whole bunch of them. But I sent them a slew of them, and they put our favorite win totals. What did we do? What did you make us do?

2:01:05Cousin Sal:Boy, I don't like the division bets, but the one you laid out was even money, and it really looked good. What was it? Knicks, Thunder, Cavs? next under Cavs

2:01:14Bill Simmons:for the division. That was even? Plus 130 or something? Oh, yeah. That was better than that. Yeah, it was plus 120. I really liked that one. That's good. Yeah, we did that one. I roped you guys into another one.

2:01:25Cousin Sal:Yeah. Yeah, you're excited. This is good. Football's over for you. Look at you. There's your picture right there on the page there. You're wearing a suit. About to adopt a dog.

2:01:34Bill Simmons:This is fun. NBA star, and this is our time right now. Yeah. Who do you have for Game 7 of the World Series?

2:01:40Cousin Sal:We have the World Series? I mean, of ASCS. Boy, it's going to be hard for Toronto to lose now. I know they don't really... I had Seattle, so I'm going to have to hedge here. It's Bieber against Kirby, but these guys are going to go like three innings. I'll take Toronto slightly. I'm going to go against myself. The Dodgers, they're minus 122 Toronto. That's a fun one. You got two Monday night games and the baseball all at once.

2:02:03Bill Simmons:The problem for Toronto is if it's a nail-biter. Yeah. I don't like their relievers. Yeah, yeah. if it's like a 4-3, 5-4 type game. But, you know, I went into the Dodgers pick

2:02:16Cousin Sal:saying I don't like their relievers and it didn't fucking matter at all. We didn't even see the relievers. I don't even know if they have any on the roster.

2:02:21Bill Simmons:Unbelievable. Yeah, crazy. All right, Kuz, good job by you. Good job by you, buddy. All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Sal. Thanks to Gahau. Thanks to Eduardo. I'm going to be back two more times on this feed. You can also hear the new Rewatchables Monday Night Quiz Show and then Prestige TV, Breaking Down, Task. That one is already up. I'll see you on Tuesday.

2:02:58Bill Simmons:Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in D.C., Kentucky or Wyoming. Gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER. Visit rg-help.com. Call 888-79-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplinema.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts or call 877-8HOPE-NY or text HOPE-NY in New York. This message is brought to you by Mariner. It takes the right team to help develop an athlete's talents. Managing your money works the same way. You ever thought, am I getting the most out of my financial plan?

2:03:41Bill Simmons:You're ready for Mariner. With Mariner, you get an advisor backed by a full team of specialists. so everything's working together toward your goals. Take the next step in your financial journey with Mariner. Investment advisory services offered through Mariner LLC and SEC registered investment advisor. For more information, visit mariner.com.

2:04:01Cousin Sal:For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters.

2:04:07Bill Simmons:Tremphaya offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start. Tremphaya is administered as injections under the skin or infusions through a vein every four weeks,

2:04:18Cousin Sal:followed by injections under the skin every four or eight weeks. If your doctor decides that you can self-inject Tremphaya, proper training is required. Tremphaya is a prescription medicine used to treat adults with moderately to severely active Crohn's disease and adults with moderately to severely active ulcerative colitis. Serious allergic reactions, increased risk of infections or lower ability to fight them,

2:04:40Bill Simmons:and liver problems may occur. Before treatment, get checked for infections and tuberculosis. Tell your doctor if you have an infection, flu-like symptoms, or need a vaccine.

2:04:49Cousin Sal:Explore what's possible. Ask your doctor about Trimphia today. Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit trimphiaradio.com.