PMS 2.0 1409 - BA Day with Bruce Arians, Derwin James, WVU Head Coach Rich Rodriguez, Darius Butler, & AJ Hawk

19:18Pat McAfee:Hey, I know you just had to listen to Connor say all that, but I'm happy you got a chance to do that. That's how we feel watching you play ball, man. It feels like whenever Harbaugh gets there and Mentor gets there as the DC, and the way Coach Harbaugh spoke about you being one of the pillars of the team immediately upon arrival, does it feel like a perfect culture for you to be in? And does it feel like the best culture you guys have had over there in a long time? Yes, sir. Definitely one of the best cultures we had. But just the way they go about it every day, Coach Harbaugh, Coach Minter, just setting that standard.

19:53And, man, wouldn't rather have no other guys, man. They truly the best, man.

19:57Pat McAfee:From running Brock Byers down 60, 70 yards to the D-tackle play that we see there at the end on fourth down to win the game and then having to chase him out of the pocket, is there a level of exhaustion that comes with your style of play, every play, every single position? Like, how do you even prepare for that in the offseason? and what has it been like this year thus far playing everywhere on the field? It's been a lot of fun. I feel like Coach Mentor, like I said, the best defensive coach in this league, does a great job moving me around every week. Not just moving me around where I ain't doing my job, but moving me around where I can do it at a high level.

20:34Like you said, man, it's still early in the season, man. We're getting that cardio up, man, so I can't wait. I think we had a 20-play drive this game too, so, man, it was a lot of fun, man.

20:43Pat McAfee:It was a lot of fun, man, yeah. Yeah, we're going to have to keep working on this. D-Bud has a question for you. Yeah, Dern, I was talking about it earlier. Outside of yourself and probably Khalil Mack, y 'all are easily the most known defenders, the household names. But outside of you guys, bunch of dogs. Tell me about these other guys. Still, Henley, all these – heart. Like, you guys just fly around and inflict pain. What's the mindset going into every week with this mental defense? And then tell me a little bit about your running mates. I just say I start with Deion Henley man in that middle man with the green dot my brother man he's special man had a flu game last night man I don't even know how he played but man he gives us everything he got every week every week day in and day out definitely man a pro bowl all pro player man Tarhee still another young guy man making a lot of plays and like you said we got a lot of a lot of guys it don't really matter who step step out there with coach mentor honestly man I feel like man the standard is the standard and whoever out there, they're going to make plays.

21:43What is it about his system, though? Because you guys, I mean, that shit jumps off tape, how you fly around. I think they had less than three and a half yards per play last night. I think they ran 58 plays total. What is it about that defense, and I guess to think, that he prepares you guys for going into the game? I say, man, just getting hats around the ball, honestly, running to the ball. And then when the ball in the air, you see two, three guys around the play. That's why we're making tips on the ball. guys popping it up, making plays. And I feel like coaches always adjusting, man. Coach is always one step ahead.

22:17And, man, he always preparing us. And I feel like it's just on us as players to go out there and just do our job.

22:22Pat McAfee:We've been talking about Justin Herbert. The reason why Darius Butler is a fan of your team, I believe, is not only because of you, obviously. Massive fan of yours. I mean, the all-everything DB team was not easy to put together. It was tough. Obviously, you're on there. I know you've probably found out about this. You probably cried, had a moment with our family. Congratulations. I appreciate that. I appreciate it. No problem. It was hard to crack. People were really advocating for other players as well, including yourself. It was tough. A lot of politics. A lot of politics. And D-Bud stuck to the film.

22:59Pat McAfee:He said, I'm not worried about any of the politicking. People were offering him a lot of stuff. Shoes. People were offering him up shoes. His BA even saw it. He said no. He said no. He said no. I don't want that. He had to do it. But on that note, since the beginning of this run in L.A., Justin Herbert has been a guy that we've all seen, I think, the potential and, like, the possibilities from outside looking in, just the way he handles himself. Even last night, him flipping that camera off, awesome. Yeah. Like, I think that is – everything he does I think is awesome. Yeah, like, he's humble, everything about him.

23:34Pat McAfee:It feels like this might be the year. Go ahead, Ty. Yeah, Durbin, on that note, obviously you're insanely competitive, one of the best players in the league. But how happy are you that you don't have to play against Justin Herbert? And do you guys look around and say, like, wow, we knew how good this guy was, but he just continues to take his game to another level? Yeah, I just can't wait for y 'all to get to see what he already been doing at OTA's training camp going against our defense. I feel like he's been giving us great looks. Some of the throws he made, man, in the red zone from just in the pocket, outside.

24:06Man, I just feel like he's just growing into his own, man. One of the best quarterbacks in this league. I wouldn't rather have no other guy. I love Tim. We love Tim as an organization. And we always feel like as long as we got him that quarterback, we always got a chance, man. Are you in the Silver Bells Club? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. 150, man. I'm in there. I'm in there.

24:23Pat McAfee:Hey, tell us about the entire culture of that building because we were in there. Oh, yeah. Beautiful building. I say, man, our sports performance team, first of all, the facility's amazing. And then And it's the sports performance team. Shout out to Coach Herb, man, Coach Dev, all the guys, man, out there. I feel like Coach Herb, he does a great job setting the culture. Man, and we got a civil bell club in this. It's the dumbbell club. It's circled off like a ring. We got the red part around it. And if you're 150 or plus on the dumbbell, you get your name in there so everybody don't have access to that.

24:57So it's a lot of fun. Just being able to bring a culture, I feel like, man, they're some of the best in this league.

25:03Pat McAfee:it's definitely in the sports performance well you guys are in la obviously that's a draw for some guys you know around the nfl very talented guys and then you get that building brand new building brand new facility we got a chance to go see it it's not 2025 ownership invested in 400 500 million in a practice facility especially in los angeles yeah not normal like that is not a normal thing to happen so you guys got brand new facilities you talk about coach herb his vibes were immaculate down that weight room. If you have a good weight room and like a hard-working, let's have fun while working our ass off type culture, which I think Harbaugh is going to bring everywhere, it's like it feels like you guys are set up for the long haul.

25:41Pat McAfee:It has to feel like that in there, that we are – first, we've got to go on a run. Obviously, this year is the right year to do it. Every year is the right year to do it. But it has to feel like you guys are set up here and the culture is already put in place, yes? Yes, sir. And I say definitely with the defense. Last year we kind of got our feet wet a little bit, but this year we're definitely trying to take that next step and just make this who we are, make this our culture. I feel like Coach Harbaugh, Coach Mensah, like I said, doing a great job instilling the culture. And just make it tough where you want to play the Chargers, man.

26:10You know what you're going to get is going to be tough. So we're just trying to keep it going, not for one game or one practice one day, but like you say, let it be the culture.

26:17Pat McAfee:And also the uniforms are cool. So cool. All of them. There's like 100 of them. We saw them all lined up at their facility. It's like, yeah, we have the best uniform of every era. Don't worry. Boom, bang, pow. Here's all our different uniforms. We'll use them. We're in Los Angeles. The weather, you know. They can really sell some shit to free agents. Oh, yeah. Especially if they win. Especially if they have a tree company. Especially, I mean, we've heard about that in basketball. I don't know. Yeah, yeah, we don't know. We don't know. I don't know. We don't know. We heard it. Pablo Torre sold us.

26:49Pat McAfee:Okay. That was not us saying that. No. But it does feel like you guys are building something very special. We're very happy for you, especially for how much work has gone into all of this. Season started internationally. Go ahead, Con, man. Yeah, Derwin, this week was the second game. So you guys have kind of stacked them up two weeks in a row now. How was the Brazil trip? It felt like a massive victory for you guys. Probably didn't have to wait on the tarmac. That was awesome. How was the strength and conditioning team, though? Just because Mekhi Becton was pooping his pants the whole time. So what was that like in Brazil?

27:21So first of all, man, it was a lot of fun. Shout out, hats off to everybody in our organization, man. It felt like we still was at home. We had all our same equipment, everything we needed to go in and have success. And I feel like, man, it really allowed us to have time to bond as a team, grow closer. You got the offensive guys hanging with the defensive guys. So, man, it was a lot of fun. And we wanted to come back with a W, start the season off right. And, man, we did that.

27:48Pat McAfee:How many Jim Harbaugh sayings do you try to, like, all right, I'm going to write that one down. Is it like an everyday thing? Like yesterday after the game, two minutes and 40 seconds, he spoke about you. I don't know when your contract's up next. I got everything you need for the negotiation. It's two minutes and 40 seconds long is exactly what it is. You can find it on the Chargers social media is all you need. I love Coach Harbaugh. I love his organization. I love everything about him, man. And, man, I can't wait to go out and practice tomorrow, man. So I'm excited. Can you tell me about his messaging, though?

28:22Pat McAfee:Because he is very – it sounds like the way he delivers his messages is what makes us all love him so much. His press conferences are electrifying. I mean, like every time he speaks, it's great. Can you talk about his messaging a little bit and how he's either different from any coach you've ever had or – Yeah, he's one of a kind. There's nobody like Coach Harbaugh, man. He's different in his own way and in a good way. He's not going out there with some script Or some powerpoint Or like none of that He's giving you real life advice Real life situation It could just happen to him in the hallway And he's just going to come off And tell you what it is He can be going off with a story And then a thought will come to his head He'll switch it up So just him being that We love him He always got great stories It ain't one thing you can just write down Because he's going to give you something every day So, man, great coach, man.

29:15Pat McAfee:So I was just walking in the hall. I saw our lunch lady. She said, Coach, great job. And I just thought to myself, wow, this lady. Yeah. Is that what it's like? Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. So he'll give you something or anything, man. And he'll tie. It's good. What make him great, like he'll give you like the analogy and it'll tie it to football, which make it make sense to us. So I'm like, man, you got a gift with that, honestly. because everybody will be looking like what and they're like man when he really is playing and you really get you like oh he lands the plane he lands the plane everybody be like yeah yeah bring it back okay where are we going with this where are we going with this and then and that's why when i tell you guys we oh pretty good pretty good pretty yeah he's he's electric we see that at the press conferences i couldn't imagine behind closed doors when trying to motivate.

30:06Pat McAfee:Speaking of doing that, I've been a coach ball for 47 years, big fan of yours. Coach B.A. has a question for you, Derwin. Derwin, yeah, man, I'm a big, big fan, and prayers out to Cleo Mack. Hopefully he's okay and it gets better, but with all these quarterbacks running around right now, did you get your choice of intercepting or knocking one of them out? What do you want to do? Intercept, man. You know, the rules change, rules a little different. I got to get that ball now. I'm trying to get the ball. I don't know. Some of these quarterbacks are trying to run people over now. I'm trying to get the ball for sure, Coach.

30:38Pat McAfee:Hey, Darwin, let's talk about that, though. Let's extend that point because it happened against you guys. Patrick Mahomes obviously doesn't go out, lowers his shoulder. Who is the – 27. I forget the number on your guy. That immediately led to everybody on our show saying, okay, if that's what it's going to be, now it's going to be open season. But we're seeing a lot of running from the quarterbacks, like a lot of running from the quarterbacks. How much are you guys thinking about that, obviously? Man, we obviously think about it because, like I said, the quarterback, especially red zone, man, they legs come alive, man.

31:07These quarterbacks running more. And you got to count for them. If you don't, you're playing 10 on 11. So being able to know where they are, we got to tackle them like running backs in space if they're going to run like running backs, you know? So once they cross the line, we got to go tackle them like running backs, honestly. Yeah, but don't you even think about going close

31:25Pat McAfee:to the shoulder. Oh, no, no, no. Not on the sideline. No, no, no, no. Not on the sideline. And play if he running, if he ain't sliding, then they running. Some of these quarterbacks not even sliding. They shaking, making moves. They trying to get yards. So, you know, we'll see what we get. That's probably why we have three or four of them aren't playing this week. Five. I think it's five. Some of these quarterbacks ain't flying, man. They just going in there. So, we'll see. Hey, get that ball, man. Get that tape. And it took enough money out of your checks. Yeah. Suspended my dog. So, yeah, they got him on the list.

31:56Pat McAfee:Hey, man, those are good stats to have, too, whenever you put that two minutes and 40 seconds up there. Then also, yeah, I got this many picks. I think I'm going to be a charger for life. That's what we've got going on. That's awesome. You're the man. We appreciate you joining us. I appreciate y 'all, man. Y 'all keep killing it, man. We're going to try. Not as much as you, obviously. Good luck against the Broncos. Great win last night, ladies and gentlemen, Derwin James. Yeah, Derwin. What a win for them. Three divisional games out of the gate. Yeah, they started scheduling that. They did a lot of division rivalry games there week one and I think it's because of lackluster start last year.

32:28Pat McAfee:Remember last year, kind of slow out of the Gates. Very. So they, I think they wanted the schedule maker, wanted that to have bigger games. How do you feel about that as a coach with that, as important as the games are that early? Yeah, I'm not a big fan of it. Especially three in a row. Yeah. You know, I mean, now if you get to three wins, like they got a chance right now that you're owning a division. As long as you don't get killed with injuries. But if you can get three up in your division, that's hard to overcome. Yeah, especially because that's not happening normally until like week 14. Yeah, exactly.

32:56Pat McAfee:Now you have that at the beginning of the season get all the out of division games come and find your team get even better than whenever they get back into it because they're always going to end with division games as well because they want to have big time football towards the end of the season which the nfl has gotten right yeah every single end of season weeks there have always had very meaningful football games stacked up so i'm not saying that the schedule makers get it wrong but last year there had to be a conversation about how slow they were out of the gates and college football was actually last year carrying it yeah That was carrying football for a while because there was – so them having the division games right up front, did it make it easier for coaches to get teams prepared, do you think, because there was more important games early?

33:35Pat McAfee:Or do you still think teams have no idea who they are at this point and they're playing very meaningful football? I think the ones that have veteran players know what it means. The ones that are playing with younger players have no clue. The division is how we get to the dance. This is how you get to the dance, baby. You've got to win these. People always say football doesn't start November. September games come back and bite you in the ass. If you start losing in September, that's a hard road to overcome. And, yeah, I mean, it means so much more in training camp. And I think if they continue it, you're going to see more guys playing in the preseason.

34:07Okay. That's kind of like what Lombardi said. You know, Michael Lombardi, when he was coming on last year every week or the year before, he always said, like, hey, you can have a lull. And the teams that go to the Super Bowl, like, they might look bad a couple weeks. But if you look at it after every season, they start really well and they end really well. And then in the middle, there might be like two or three games where there's a lull or someone misses a game or something. But like those first six weeks and the last six weeks are the most important time. But like when you won the Super Bowl in Tampa, you guys didn't get going until week 11, week 12.

34:40Way later against the Falcons. We're down 17-0 in half. Yeah. And, you know, that big second half was huge for us and it just continued on. But that was such a crazy year because we had no OTAs, no training camp. Tom was there for the first time and learning our way as we went week to week. But in the past, it's sort of break it down into four segments. Try to go 3-1, 3-1, 3-1. If you win 12, you're going to have home to the advantage. And just break it down that way. Keep it in those four quarters. And injuries happen and other things happen. And you've got to readjust and adjust because you're always adjusting in the National Football League.

35:18Always.

35:19Pat McAfee:You've got to stay healthy, though. Health is the number one thing. You're going to get hurt. Go ahead, Ty. Well, that's what I was just going to say. Fans aren't complaining because you get a divisional game early and it's sweet because you're more invested than maybe whatever. But if you're playing a division game week one and you play that opponent again week 15, it's like those are two different teams pretty much. Oh, yeah. Both of them have changed so much. Exactly. The injury report coming out of week two here, a lot of quarterbacks. You talk about three or four quarterbacks. Joe Burrow, he's out three months.

35:49Pat McAfee:J.J. McCarthy, what is it, two to four weeks. Yep. Jaden Daniels sprained knee. I don't think we've got a full. They said he might not play Sunday. Okay. Brock Purdy, Mac Jones already played a game. And then Justin Fields' concussion. It's like that's inevitable with the way we were watching that entire thing kind of happen. It goes back to B.A. points about how much running the quarterbacks are doing. But that's one of Justin Fields' biggest upsides is he's the fastest guy on the field. Then obviously Aaron Jones, Jalen Johnson, Calvin, Noy, Highsmith, B.B. Terrell and Baker Mayfield, we assume.

36:20Pat McAfee:Yes. We assume his left knee. It was shown in the final two minutes, the hit that he takes where he gets upended by CJ GJ. That was the third hit to his left knee that was pretty nasty. It started early. Here's the Neil Hunter against the starting center who's playing left tackle. Centers and tackles two very different body types and two very different positions. Kind of gets rolled up on his left knee there. Then there was this run happening in the fourth quarter where he goes and he's kind of an awkward landing. Boom, gets up. That's that left knee again. Ah, ah, ah, ah. CJ GJ talking his shit right there, which CJ GJ will do.

36:53Pat McAfee:I mean, that is CJ GJ football. I believe Bruce Arians and he have gotten into it a few different times. A few times. Yeah, exactly. It's part of the beauty of CJ GJ. And then once again, here's Baker Mayfield later in that fourth quarter. Boom, takes another huge shot to the left leg. And his leg was planted. That's CJ GJ as well. We assume that left knee is going to be the size of a basketball. Yeah. We assume that thing is going to be gigantic. Well, we would also like to assume there's a chance he's not practicing tomorrow. And there's a chance he's not practicing on Thursday. But we assume Baker Mayfield will be playing in the game.

37:27Oh, there's no doubt. There's no doubt he'll be out there. And Maral Javid Farr, who heads up their rehabilitation, she is outstanding. One of the best there is. She'll have him ready.

37:36Pat McAfee:He's going to be like Ed Monix. Yeah. He's going to get that thing drained. That's right. I'm assuming his knee is going to be. Oh, yeah. Just, I don't know how he finished. Yeah, how bad was it for you when you were playing? Well, I'm just – I don't get any of these shots. Like twist, obviously, that's just like a little irritation there. Okay, that's just a little irritation. That will spur some inflation. Okay, the irritation in itself will do that. Then him – this is a bruise. Boom, into the ground. Okay, right underneath that turf cement. Go ahead, D. Right there with that one. This is a perfect example of kind of how injuries work in the flow of a game.

38:08Something could be hurting, but that adrenaline. and when you like when he literally was probably would have laid there for another 15 30 seconds if cj gj didn't come over and start talking shit he immediately popped up like oh no i'm not gonna lay here like a lame duck while he's standing over me because he knows that defense and number eight specifically feeds off that type of energy so as a competitor that's what gets you going now when he he's probably still in bed right now to tomorrow it'll feel even worse but when it's game time like when he runs out of the tunnel again i expect six to be out there and take the field But when you're, when you, a lot of us deal with those things, but when that adrenaline is flowing and it's pumping, almost like anything else, kind of like fight or flight.

38:47When it's going, you got to lead your team. Like, the team's feeding off you as well. So, yeah, I think that was the perfect illustration of kind of what happens for the athlete when they're in the middle of it.

38:57Pat McAfee:That's kind of Baker Mayfield's MO right there, right? Just tough, gunslinger. Yes. Comes down, two-minute drill. Here I am. Like, that is everything Baker Mayfield was heralded as coming out of Oklahoma. Okay? Remember, we remember him at Oklahoma, the coin toss with Kansas, I think. The dance. Everything. The doggy. The doggy. Filthy. Everything. The. Uh-huh. Yeah. Everything. Sure. It was like, yo, this guy's gunslinger. Yeah. Outlaw. Okay, that is what Baker Mayfield is. And tough guy. Go ahead. That last one, when he gets flipped, he comes up immediately calling a play. He knows he's in two minutes.

39:32He bounces up. He's giving the signals for the next play. He's not even thinking about that knee. Yeah. You know? and he comes right out, boom, takes him right down the field and scores. That's what I love about the kid.

39:42Pat McAfee:You are a huge Baker man. I'm a huge fan, brother. Yeah, like this morning, he's texting during game last night about Baker. Then this morning, the things he was saying about Baker. Tampa, the perfect place for him as well? Oh, he owns his town right now. And that, you know, when people talk about reviving a career, he got an opportunity, he has taken advantage of it, and he is the franchise. Mr. Glazer has already said he is the face of the franchise, will be for a long time. Tampa loves him because he's that type of guy. He's wearing this badge of honor. Go ahead. And that's what separates him from all the other guys.

40:16The other guys, if you will. We talk about Gino being that guy as the first to kind of have a beginning of a career that maybe didn't play as much and then revive it. He got ran out of Seattle. So he revived his career, but he was never picked.

40:32Pat McAfee:He was offered a contract. Okay, but he was never hailed as the franchise guy. I know the owner never came out and said he's the face of the franchise like they did for Baker. And then you think about Mac Jones, you think about Danny Dimes, you think about every quarterback now forever. If they do have a tough start to their career, in their mind, they're just thinking Baker Mayfield. That is going to be the face of, hey, sure, I had a bad start and I got ran out of town. But at the same time, I might have a couple years here and then be the face of a franchise again. He was on scout team punt block in Carolina.

41:05Pat McAfee:The Carolina Panthers. Yeah, man. With Frank Wright. The Carolina Panthers. With that rule. Who, to be candid, stunk at football that year. They got Baker Mayfield rushing the punt. Now, obviously, he goes to L.A. He has those multiple weeks with Sean McVay. And I assume whenever Baker Mayfield is finished and he looks back, he'll say, like, those days in Carolina was on the scout team and he was just on the sideline headbutting guys with helmets on. He didn't have helmets on. He'll probably talk about the amount of opportunity he had to grow as teammate and leader and everything like that. It all makes sense.

41:37Pat McAfee:But looking back on it, crazy. Insane. That they kicked him out of Cleveland with everything that Cleveland's gone through. Went eight and nine. Kick him out of Carolina with everything that's going on. And then obviously L.A. and Sean McVay giving him an opportunity. It's like what a perfect ending for him to be in Tampa Bay with that team, especially with Mike Evans and all the weapons that they have. Yeah, everybody they have going on. But, boy, you start looking back on some of those things, and it's like, was it the right move to maybe give up on Baker and kick Baker out of here? Ran out of Cleveland, ran out of Carolina.

42:06Those organizations, you know, historically got it figured out. But we've made – I think curse forever. You can make that argument. Both those teams are cursed forever. That's it. But we always paid attention to all the other shit. And, you know, some of it was a little extra or you'll call it whatever. But, like, for me at least, especially with the quarterbacks, we've seen other situations. Quarterback gets benched. Hey, I don't want to be anymore. Trade me. Get me to a new place. I'm not doing scout team. I'm not doing this. So to do that, not only scout team for the offense, doing the punt rush stuff, we pay attention to all that.

42:34Even going back to college for like Jalen Hurts when he was benched for tour. Everybody paid attention to that in the evaluation. And then when they get another opportunity, all those character things, they continue to show themselves. But I want to ask B.A., Jalen Hurts, Justin Herbert, now Baker Mayfield. We talk about him being a head coachmaker. How tough is that on him, you know, continuing to learn? I'm sure he does some of the same things, but continuing to learn a different offense year in and year out. And at what point this season will he get comfortable in this offense, do you think?

43:03Well, I think this year is real easy because Josh was there. He did all the red zone. He did all the third down last year. They were number one in the league. So that was an easy transition this year. It's the same stuff, same terminology. Now, going from Dave Canales to Liam Cohen was different and two different systems. But that just shows how tough he is and how smart he is and how much he invests in it. And that's one of the things I love about him because it's not easy to follow Tom Brady. Yeah. All right. Tom Brady wins the Super Bowl and here you come and you take over a city. Now, granted, this might be the best team he's ever been on.

43:35But don't forget now, he was rookie of the year in Cleveland. Yeah. He beat the Pittsburgh Steelers in Pittsburgh in a playoff game. All right? So he was no bust, bro. Number one real bust. Take him out, though. Yeah, that's...

43:47Pat McAfee:That's Cleveland. Yeah, classic Cleveland. I got a coach there and somebody that grew up in Pittsburgh and just watched them kind of do their thing. And we all are pulling for the Cleveland Bronx. Good luck. I'm not in Cleveland. No, no. So, Tony needs you here. We're not all pulling for the Browns. Let's head to Hammer. Don, Don. AP Tone will say, doesn't matter if you pull for them, we're still the Browns. Is that what you're going to say, Tom?

44:08Darius Butler:Browns is always the Browns. It's like the Chiefs is always the Chiefs, Pat.

44:11Pat McAfee:That's exactly. Hey, last night, money. What happened with the money last night? What happened with sportsbooks for week two? Anything we should be paying attention to as the market settled itself or as sportsbooks still beating the hell out of everybody right now?

44:23Darius Butler:So week two as a whole, the totals market, the over-under market kind of reset itself. Obviously week one, it was 12-4 to the unders this week. The overs, obviously we talked about the second highest scoring 10 games on a Sunday. The overs kind of waterfined its level in the over-under total market there. But as a whole, it was a little bit better of a week. I think two and three, the public went against the spread in the top five games. Obviously, the weeks before that, it was either 1-4 or 0-5 in college football and NFL. So, the betters got a little bit better, but the sportsbooks are still winning.

45:00Pat McAfee:Okay, sportsbooks are always going to win, we assume. Chargers are a good team to beat sportsbooks with. What's that for saying? 14-5-1 against the spread since last year. Shout out. We appreciate you guys. Appreciate you guys doing that. Keep going. Making people happy. Making people happy. Now, as soon as you stop doing that, they'll let you know. That's right. To hell with this team. Any other maybe gambling greats that we need to pay attention to? Any other wagons that have really done well that we maybe need to say, remember, Chargers, this is kind of their thing. They cover the spread, they win.

45:32Pat McAfee:Is there any other teams we should think about?

45:34Darius Butler:This would probably be obvious, or maybe not. The Eagles and Ravens, I don't have the exact stats off the top of my head, but I know that they have been quite a bit of a monster against the spread.

45:45Pat McAfee:Okay, in tone, we didn't get to talk college ball as much. yesterday what are some things that came out of the college football weekend that we need to be paying attention to and shout out to college ball kicking a lot of ass and we'll have coach rod uh rich rodriguez of the west virginia mountaineers on at 1 30 eastern time to talk about the massive win in the backyard brawl but what are some college football stories that we need to talk

46:09Darius Butler:about or haven't talked about yeah i actually have uh five takeaways from this weekend um that i wanted to talk about there's a couple teams up at the top of their miami oregon utah vandy florida state oklahoma i just love the cut of the jib of these teams okay i'm not saying these are the the best teams in the country but like the vibe these are all vibe teams right now miami has been unbelievable obviously dominating florida in a big win against notre dame oregon anyone that that is on the field with them they are just absolutely pummeling uh gundy found that out when he tried talking shit a bit about oregon and dan lanning they just put it on them utah obviously with the new OC and Devin Dampier coming to you.

46:47Darius Butler:They've just been like these teams, Vandy right here. They, sorry, excuse me, got a coach fired basically at Virginia Tech and then just put it on South Carolina last week. And then obviously from week one from now, Florida State has just been putting on teams. These are teams like it doesn't matter who they're playing. They are just going to put it on them and they've looked incredible. And the last one there, Oklahoma, obviously was a big one this week against Auburn. Number two, we watched them week one against Ohio State, and we're like, oh, it's okay. They played Ohio State. They're a great defense.

47:18Darius Butler:But does Texas stink? Whoa! Tony! Tony! Whoa! Tony! Now, they've won. You see Arch running in here against UTEP, and they've won since Ohio State, but it still hasn't looked pretty. You'll see a couple throws mixed in here from Arch with the touchdowns where it's like things are just still off a little bit for this offense, which we did not. Nobody expected this coming into the season. Maybe we expected it not to be the quickest start, but not how it's looked so far. Things have not looked great for Arch in that Texas offense. They're winning games. They are winning games. They're winning. They're beating UTEP.

47:57It's not good on the internet for all Arch. A lot of people are saying he's more Archie, not Peyton, and the real one is – Archie's a first overall Peyton. Archie is right. Archie's set the table down there. And so will Archie. I love him. But Archie ain't never won shit. Okay? And neither am I. But I'm just saying when we're talking about it. He was on the ain'ts, brother. He changed the entire franchise. Exactly. And maybe Arch ends up going to Cleveland and they go 4-12 for the next 10 years. And it's cool. And then the real prince who's promised Peyton's boy comes and everyone doesn't hype him up.

48:33Marshall? They don't hype him up like Arch because it was a mistake.

48:37Pat McAfee:Listen, Arch has a lot of pressure with that last name. It's tough. And we're part of the problem. Exactly. I'm part of the problem. I'm part of the problem. Because I honestly was like, Arch is going to get dropped into this number one team in the country. And they're going to be even better than they were at the end of the year last year with a guy who was starting there for three years or whatever. You know, that was a lot. I was really excited about the Arch man. Bet on the one Heisman. Let the boy have some time. Let's let the boy have some time. No time. Okay, we know Stark's offense is going to be good, and I know, even though a lot of others seemingly have started to let doubt creep in and maybe even win the conversation, I know Arch is going to be a player.

49:16Pat McAfee:Now, there are some alarming little things we see. There are some throws maybe in the first row on the stand. There are some little skip passes that we don't expect. There's a little pain in the face because the throw is so bad. There's a lot of those moments happening right now, and we're seeing all of it because it is Arch Manning. He's got a lot of deals. We're bringing a lot of eyes We're bringing a lot of attention Let the boy figure it out Dude There ain't time No that's why Archie said Hey listen He's going to be back there next year as well I mean just you got to eat Did he know? Did Archie know?

49:47Did he know what? Did he know? Let the boy figure it out Did Archie know? B.A. will you tell him Did he know what?

49:54Pat McAfee:Let the boy figure it out Now Would I be saying that if I didn't have such close connection to the family? Absolutely not But with that being said Watching it It does feel as if this is going to be a situation that is going to have to take some time to figure out. Will they figure it out? Oh, definitely. Definitely. There's no time. He's too good. Just like John Senna said, the time is there. That is not his day. Chris Berman. The time comes in the Red River Shootout. John Senna. We love you, Senna. What the hell did you call him? John Senna sucks. Chris Berman called him John Senna last night in the past three minutes.

50:29Pat McAfee:Fowler. I'm sorry. Chris Fowler called him John Senna last night. Yeah. That's not... It's Chris Berman. We can't get those two. Speaking of, actually, we got some ideas for Berman as well. Yeah, he had a bar for Berman. I had a bar for Berman. It's going to work for as long as we need it, Berman. Yeah. His father, okay. Give him a test or a call. He didn't tell him. It's Vegas. He needs an emergency. What's that? He needs emergency. You're talking about vitamin C? Yes. We have had that shipped into the office in droves. I'll have everybody know. We forced BA to take one. It's a fun time. I used to always take it, yeah.

51:05Pat McAfee:Yeah, it's just a little gummy. We've set it up in a position, though, here where it's, hey, grab your vitamin C gummy. Get your emergency, guys. Get your gummy. Have a couple of them. Maybe OD on vitamin C. Maybe have too many here so we can fight. And we're going to find out if this works or not. Yeah. That is what we're going to do this fall. Every fall, everybody, including us, get something. Especially when the weather changes. Everybody gets it. Every time. I don't even think my allergies are that crazy. Maybe they have grown as I've gotten older. but during fall, during football season, all of us always get something.

51:34Pat McAfee:Maybe Fowler is having that right now. I'm not 100 % sure. We all get it throughout the season. We are going to OD on vitamin C this year. Have to. We're going to see. We're going to see how good this vitamin is. We're going to find out. There's been some moves made to a couple different foods that might help us going forward as well, but we're excited for that. What else should we be chit-chatting about?

51:53Darius Butler:Let the boy develop. Speaking of vitamin C, let's go to number three. Notre Dame needs the same run that they had in 2024. If we go back about a year, they lost to Northern Illinois, who was just a MAAC team, not a ranked MAAC team. I believe they were 27-point favorites against that MAAC team. And they went on a run after everyone said, hey, you cannot make the playoffs after losing to Northern Illinois. And they won every game by 40, and they made the playoffs, and they went to the national championship. Now they start 0-2. Very close games. They only lost by three points and one point, but they are still 0-2.

52:27Darius Butler:and everyone's saying they can't make the playoffs. But I think personally, if they win every single game by 40 points, just like last year, I think there's a chance they can make the playoffs. Last year, after Northern Illinois, the only ranked team that they played that was good was Louisville. That's it. This year they have USC. They got to hope USC keeps winning and they beat USC. But if they go on a run, it's going to be hard to keep out a two-loss Notre Dame team that only lost by four total points to those two good teams.

52:53Pat McAfee:Okay, you're speaking to me because I said two save and I actually bet a Ferrari or a Mercedes, which Saban owns dealerships for both of those, that Notre Dame was not going to make the playoff because I thought Texas A &M was going to beat them on Saturday. And I thought with the way their schedule looked, even though USC, who I think a lot of people are saying USC deserves to be ranked much higher. People are kind of disrespecting USC is what people in college ball think. They think Lincoln Riley's offense all the way back. They think they are underappreciated right now. So I guess if USC, to your point, continues to go and they have a good performance against them.

53:26Pat McAfee:And then that tough Stanford team last week of the year. They're salty. TBD, you have no idea how that's going to go. I guess to your point, if they beat everybody by 40, there will certainly be a conversation, and they can. They certainly can, Tone. We'll see. And we're going to watch it every week on primetime. Big opportunity this week with Purdue. Purdue's a tough team. That could be a big statement win for the Irish. Not only Purdue, they also have an opportunity against Boston College. Keep them out. Don't let them in. Pittsburgh's a great football team, too. Let's not forget that. They are.

53:58Pat McAfee:Pittsburgh's a great football team. Syracuse, Fran's got the boys running sprints on game day after game day. That's true. Okay. This is the worst schedule or the easiest schedule in college football, right? Which is why they lose their two big ones at the beginning. I immediately thought, I don't know if they have enough traction to get back. No way. But then I forget Notre Dame's on national TV every week. And if they win by 40, it's going to be hard to keep them out at the end. So I texted Coach Saban after Texas A &M gets that win. I go, I would like that Ferrari SUV that you were talking about.

54:28Pat McAfee:Okay, I guess there's a Ferrari SUV. Oh, yeah. Because none of the cars he sells would survive in Indiana. No. None of them. No. Because we got an SUV, right? And I looked at it. I don't think it's going to survive here. But since Texas A &M won, I immediately thought, you owe me. Get one. Yeah. He said, hold on now. He thinks the same thing Tone's thinking. There's a chance at the end Notre Dame does get favored. because they're on national TV, and if they kill everybody, there's a chance. That ruins it. What do you mean that ruins it? That ruins it if that happens because that's bullshit. They're a different team now than they will be at the end of the year.

55:02Darius Butler:They were favored in both those games, though, too. They weren't dogs in those games. They were favored against Miami and A &M. They were favored against Northern Illinois, too.

55:10Pat McAfee:That was one. Now they're a bone.

55:13Darius Butler:You're not keeping out a two-loss Notre Dame team that lost by four total points to Texas A &M. I agree.

55:19Pat McAfee:I have come around to that thought. I just want to let you know. After Saban says it and you say it, and then I look into it, and I think about myself watching them on primetime every single week, and if they were to win by 40 every single week. Which they can. Which they certainly can. There will be a lot of people that are like, put them in. This team's not one of the top 12 teams. What if one of those teams that beat them is 8-3? That's not good. I'm paying the 8-3 team over Notre Dame at 9-2. No, what they need, they won't take any of them at 8-3, especially ACC, Miami, A &M, SEC, Texas A &M, maybe.

55:54Pat McAfee:A &M, maybe. Like if A &M is 9-2 and Notre Dame is 9-2, but Notre Dame beats. But listen to what we're doing right now. We're talking about what the conversation is going to be around the time. Just put them all in the playoff. That's right. Give us 16 teams.

56:10Darius Butler:Give us the Mac champ and three more. Give us 100 teams.

56:14Pat McAfee:Put 100 teams in there. Never going to get it right. But if Notre Dame does dominate on national television every week, you're 100 % right. What are the other two?

56:21Darius Butler:Four doesn't matter. That team is done. And number five, more importantly, the Mountaineers are back.

56:26Pat McAfee:I don't think Clemson deserved that. Good luck to them. What was the team that said we never talked about them last week? They got a big-time win. 44 Connors is the guy that said it.

56:34Darius Butler:Houston. They beat Colorado Friday night.

56:36Pat McAfee:Houston beats Colorado. And they said nobody even mentioned our game on the Pat McPherson show earlier. I want to let Connors know. We apologize. Yeah. You were awesome to watch. The Colorado team is going to have to figure it out. but maybe Houston does have it. I think they got money too behind them. They do. Nothing to think about there. That quarterback's pretty legit too. Agreed. Yeah, Wegman, great story too around him. So we're pulling for everybody to have great years. But if you don't, we got to say it. As you know, managing maintenance, repair, and operations is never easy. But for the ones who always rise to the challenge, Granger has your back.

57:10From professional-grade products you can count on to fast, dependable delivery, they're there to help you keep things running smoothly. Plus, their technical product specialists are here to help answer your toughest questions. And because Grainger knows safety is always a priority, they're committed to being your partner in protecting both your people and your facilities. Call 1-800-GRAINGER, click grainger.com, or just stop by. This episode is brought to you by Facebook. So you were scrolling on Marketplace, and there it was, the bike you'd been searching for. You sent a message and it turned out the seller was super chatty, kind of funny, and an avid cyclist.

57:47The next thing you know, you're in a cycling crew.

57:50Darius Butler:Well, a community cycling group. The thing about Facebook, you might find more than what you're looking for. From a browse to a bike ride, this summer, find more on Facebook.

58:06Football! Good job, coach.

58:08Pat McAfee:Head! There it is. That's 47 years in football as a coach, B.A. The Toxic Table's here at Boston Corner and at Ty Schmidt. Good cadence there. I think you got a couple to jump there. Nine-year NFL vet, host of Everything DB, good D, bad D, ladies and gentlemen, Darius J. Butler. And live from Hammer. Dad! Dad! is one half of the hammer. Cowboys AP tone. Tone, good to see you. Cheers. Great college ball breakdown. We appreciate the five stories that we need to know. Another story you need to know, Cal quarterback, Songapolitelli, real deal. Good guy. He's going to get paid so much money this offseason.

58:46Pat McAfee:I apologize to the Calgorithm. Maybe Cal's able to keep up, though. Maybe. After an offseason of losing a lot of their guys to other schools, it would suck if the Cal Bears just became a feeder system for other schools, but there's a chance that is what Cal currently is because Sanga Politelli, their quarterback, who was an 18-year-old out of Hawaii, who was originally committed to Oregon, I believe, then he saw that he wasn't maybe going to have an opportunity to start as a freshman, whatever the case. Transfers in the NIO era before his freshman year even started. First person to ever do that.

59:15Pat McAfee:A lot of people probably wanted to judge him quickly. I would like to commend him on that decision after originally judging him because I thought to myself, this guy's transferred before he even started. This guy doesn't want any adversity. What is this guy's... Well, I think what he and everybody around him knew is this guy needs to be playing football. The boy needs to play. This guy needs to be playing football. And that is the right decision. This dude is phenomenal. He's tall. He's athletic. He's a lefty, obviously, which in 2025 isn't as big of a deal as maybe it was back in the day. But it is a – he might have one of the most beautiful lefty strokes that there is out there.

59:48Pat McAfee:And his ball somehow either spins slower or faster. Whatever it is, it is beautiful going through the air. And he throws dimes. He can move, and he's seemingly – I mean, he's in Cal. So, brain-wise, we're talking it has to be a big deal. This guy might get the biggest of all time. Actually. After this season. Might get the biggest of all time after this season. You're talking about upside and potential. That's what college ball is right now. What he has earned for himself and his family just here in the first few weeks, unbelievable beat. It's going to be a big, big job for GM Ron Rivera, who I love to death, to keep him.

1:00:23I mean, they're going to have to come up with a lot of cash.

1:00:26Pat McAfee:And we're not saying that's a good thing. We're just telling you that is the state. That's the game. That's the game. We are in right now. That is the game. And he is special. Yeah. He is special, special at quarterback. And that's something to look for now going forward. Like, if there's a freshman that transfers, the first thought you mentioned, like, this guy must be a bum. There's a chance there's some 17-year-olds out there right now looking at the team that they might be going to, and they're like, well, I could maybe go to Stanford or Cal, play year one, be the best player, and then go to the big school for even more money.

1:00:56Pat McAfee:See, also, having some Cal connections or Stanford connections is not a bad thing. Yeah, not a bad thing. Berkeley, I did not know what to expect going there, obviously. I think I had a natural thought of what we were walking into over there. Based on the state. Well, not just the state, just everything that's ever basically been said about the university, the campus, the city, you name it. It's all like, I thought, not sports people. Sure. Not really like sports-y people. You know, I think there's, in some places, and maybe I'm wrong in this, especially Berkley proved that, is there is like people that are not, anti-sports people.

1:01:33Pat McAfee:I don't know what the fuck they do. I have no idea what they do with their time. But I thought that's what it was when I go there. That morning in game day is one of the most memorable life experiences that I have. just being mind-blown by what the expectations were and then what it actually was. And I think it actually has helped me, like, almost not judge as quickly or, like, assume as quickly. They love ball out there. Oh, yeah. And with that coach and the way they're able to do their thing, and Ron Rivera's the GM, it's like I think they're going to get some special talent in there. Are they going to be able to retain them?

1:02:04That's the hard part.

1:02:04Pat McAfee:Quarterback last year now at IU. Yep. Wide receiver last year now out at – where's the – another big-time transfer.

1:02:11Darius Butler:He went down to – oh, my God. Oregon. Maybe Florida State, Oregon, maybe.

1:02:15Pat McAfee:Yeah, but their roster last year got plucked. Ott went to Oklahoma. O-T-T-T-O-G-O. He's out. It's like that cow has become like a feeder. I'm not saying that's a good thing for cow fans, but I am saying cow is coming on the board quickly, and this song of Pull It Color Kid is legit.

1:02:33Darius Butler:Their schedule is also pretty cake as well, if you want to talk about some schedules. So look out for cow.

1:02:39Pat McAfee:Okay. Who else are some schedules that are pretty cake?

1:02:42Darius Butler:North Carolina has a cake schedule. Wake Forest. A lot of ACC teams have some cake schedules out there. What's that mean? What are you saying? That conference sucks. Yeah, honestly, kind of great news for the Big 12.

1:02:55Pat McAfee:Well, West Virginia's head coach, Rich Rodriguez, will be joining us in about 24 minutes. We understand what's happening in the Big 12 right now. Okay? Arizona State goes down there in Mississippi State. They have problems with the Cowbells. Feels like it's about to be a two-headed monster in the Big 12. Feels like 34-year-old or whatever the hell he is over there in Arizona State. Oh, he's a good one. He's great. He's a good one. Great. He's restored, I think, faith in the entire community. He wants to empower the Valley, light up the Valley or something like that. He loves that area. They've really gone around.

1:03:25Pat McAfee:Toph lost to Mississippi State. Toph. Toph lost to Mississippi. They took the goalposts out on him. That was one of those. Stark Vegas, baby. Yeah, exactly. Great time down there. That place loves ball, too. New light show down there. New everything. Yeah. In the stadium. You could tell. Herbstreet, I think, said he thought that that was going to be a problem. New light show, new everything. I don't know if this Arizona State team has any idea what they're walking into. And then, lo and behold, he was right. And that's why he was doing the whole, oh, Mississippi State won that one? I didn't know.

1:03:54Pat McAfee:I didn't know that he was really excited about that. Oh, yeah, of course. As he should be because he basically called it to a T. He's also called a couple guys' stats to a T going in. Feels like he's on his shit. But Arizona State and West Virginia seem like on collision course about to run this entire place. What about Utah? Yeah, look out for Devin. I hate it. Don't forget about Texas Tech. What about Iowa State? Texas Tech has a lot of money. Oh, yeah. Rocco. Rocco's so good. He's supposed to be a Western Indian Mountain here in Neil Brown. Kansas, Jalen Daniels. Neil Brown just let that one out of the fucking backyard.

1:04:22Pat McAfee:Anthony Beck. His dad's in the WVU Hall of Fame. Yeah. Get the kid a scholarship. Yeah, yeah. What are we doing here? You can blame, you know, rocks in the backpack on that one. He is holding a backpack for Texas right now. He's working hand in hand from what I've been told with Arch Manning. Neil Brown had a lot of good efforts. Wait, wait, wait. Oh, no. Joining us now, ladies and gentlemen, live from Anaconda, Ohio. Oh, my God.

1:04:48Darius Butler:He's only in charge of his breakfast. That's it. Oh, yeah, that's right.

1:04:51Pat McAfee:That's how you start the day. Yeah, what's he serving him? Poop. Ladies and gentlemen, joining us now, I don't think he's serving poop, but I assume there's people out there that would say poop, actually pretty good breakfast because the nutrients and everything like that. there's a chance that some sports scientist is bitching poop for breakfast. And that's where we're at now in this world. Joining us now is a guy who actually – Yeah, good point. Yeah, he's in Connecticut, Ohio. He's a college football national champion, Super Bowl champion, Ryder Cup winner, potentially a poop eater. We don't know.

1:05:22Pat McAfee:Ladies and gentlemen, A.J. Hawk. You know about the urine? You know about the urine? Have you ever taken down your own bowel movement? No. First off, yeah, the urine thing has never happened, never tasted my own urine, never tasted anybody's urine. And if there's a nutritionist pushing poop for breakfast, you might want to check out somebody else. Because I don't know if there's any nutrients in it that you eat your own. You don't know that. I don't think. You don't know what these super geniuses are. I guess you've got to test it. Somebody's got to test it for us. And maybe Con Man can be the guy.

1:05:52Eat poop for two straight months and see if he feels good. It doesn't help.

1:05:55Pat McAfee:There's definitely an Instagram. Connor sounds like he's already found this guy. I assume it would be a guy. I'll be sexist. I know a guy, yeah. It was a guy, I assume. It was a guy, I know. Instagram, if I had to guess, who's an influencer on being the healthiest you you could possibly be. There is a slew of them. And I am sure that one of them was like, moose poop, actually. And did an entire thing. For sure. That is no questions asked. Sounds like you are not one of those guys. We take that back. Once again, that's judging. Just like I did with Berkeley. I should not have done as such. AJ, we're just talking about Cal being maybe a feeder system for schools like Ohio State or any of these other big, big Czech schools.

1:06:36Pat McAfee:Do you think the people at Cal hate that? And or is there just kind of a kind of an understanding that that's the modern world we're in right now? I mean, I'm sure you can you can hate it, but you also probably have to accept it at the same time until you are able to come up with the funds that it takes to keep these these stud players around. Yeah, I guess it's a good problem to have. Hey, this guy is so good. These other you know, he's looking at going and other teams may poach him and take him away from us. Yeah, we have the good player. What do we got to do to keep him around? It's like a lot of coaches say, hey, I don't have to love the NIL situation and all of it going on, but this is where we are.

1:07:09I got to find a way to navigate through it.

1:07:11Pat McAfee:He's going to Penn State next year. Oh, shit. Probably. Lock that in. Can you bet on that somewhere? Is there a predicting market? Need that. We could potentially put that on. I assume that is where he ends up at, if I had to guess. Miami. Miami. Maybe Miami because Carson Beck. Will they be able to keep up cash-wise with Penn State? Yeah, he's an ooze. What about Alabama? I mean, I wonder if... Maybe Kalen DeBoer. Yeah. Maybe Florida. Maybe Texas. Florida. They might be in the quarterback market. Excuse me? Just don't. What, he's leaving? Maybe he might want a fresh start. I mean, shit, if he wants to stay...

1:07:53Pat McAfee:West Virginia is not a bad place. Arch Manning wants to transfer out of Texas. get away from Neil come back to Rich Rod's hard edge we would certainly take him everybody needs to stop giving up on Arch let the boy develop AJ let's talk about last night what is your big takeaway from the big win for the Buccaneers Baker Mayfield absolute dog and then for Chargers Raiders what are your thoughts on maybe the new Kings of the AFC West yeah first off with the Chargers D-butt hit it right on if you're sitting there and you are the Raiders you're Geno Smith good luck there does not seem to be any they didn't have any room to even breathe.

1:08:29They were on them from the jump. These white shirts just swarming everywhere you looked. You could tell when defenses start to feel, when they start to play well together, 11 dudes playing as one, they all know where their help is. They all know what proper leverage. And they just fly around and have fun. That's what it looks like when you watch this Chargers team. They turn Geno over three times. When you do that, you've got a great chance of winning that game. I'm impressed with Herbert. I'm impressed with Coach Hardball, how he speaks about his players as well. Obviously, we've heard him praise Harbaugh.

1:08:57Listened to him praise Derwin James. I thought it was great when you said, hey, I got all the ammo you need when it's time for a new contract because the head coach has said all of this great thing's about you. I think it's cool to see. I think Harbaugh also knows, hey, my guys can handle it. There's some head coaches I think that are almost scared to praise their own guys during the regular season, actually.

1:09:16Pat McAfee:Well, I think Harbaugh would – if he didn't think that this was the right way to go about it, he wouldn't do it. I think Harbaugh probably thinks his Chargers team, Maybe these guys have been beat up pretty good publicly, you know, for the lack of living up to expectations. Maybe his strategy with this group is somebody needs to go to bat for these guys. Like Herbert mostly. Like, hey, I want to build these guys up publicly so they know that I got their back. That might be Harbaugh's actual strategy going into there. Is that something to think about, or is that just what Harbaugh's always like, you think?

1:09:44No, I think that's a good strategy. And like you said, from where they came from, San Diego to StubHub and where they've been, hey, we're damn good, man. We're damn good. and believe it and throw it out there. Don't be afraid. All right, expectations are beautiful. All right, let's raise them. Let's raise them. Let's make sure, hey, we're a goddamn Super Bowl team. Hell yeah.

1:10:06Pat McAfee:We got the Golden Goose, a quarterback. I took this job. Yeah, Justin Herbert. Oh, my God, I saw him. Yeah. Did the football gods craft a human for me to coach? Yeah, they did with Justin Herbert. I mean, these are. Joe Allt and his dad. Yeah. Hey, you two, take your hat off. Stand back. He's so tall. So tall. Joe Allt is the tallest guy I've ever talked about. Toughest guy of all time. Friendliest guy of all time. Just like he cuts promos for all of his players. And that 241 for Derwin James, let alone Quentin Johnson, they were saying that guy can't catch. Now he is one of the best weapons in all of sports.

1:10:35Pat McAfee:Herbert's finding his groove. Chargers are special. The AFC West going to be tough. I will say I got Travis Kelsey's new hat. I'm not giving up on a Chiefs just yet. Okay. The Moxies got to be – the vibes got to be high as the American Eagle True Colors collab arrives over there in the kingdom. They got to feel good about that. Hats great. They got a three-quarter zip I'll wear in December. Oh, man. I got a little flannel thing. Oh, boy. Yeah, there's a lot of options in there. Catch the damn ball. Yeah, B.A., maybe they got a little too much going on. Catch the damn ball. Yeah, but pretty cool merch.

1:11:10Pat McAfee:Oh, he got that now, bro. And a resume. The brothers are killing it. And they're in the middle of a dynastic run right now, obviously. But, yeah, B.A.'s big take. I said, how do you feel about Travis Gillis' new stuff? He goes, he got to catch a damn ball. That is not a Travis Kelsey thing. No. That is not like Travis Kelsey at all. I think that's why. That's been a touchdown forever. Okay, so let's get to one of our favorite segments. Hell yeah. Ladies and gentlemen, it is time for BS or no BS with BA. We will present statements of fact that have been made by people thus far in this football season.

1:11:45Pat McAfee:And BA, it'll be your job to tell us if those statements are BS or no BS. Yes. Sounds good? Sounds great. Let's go to the first one. Baker Mayfield has won his way into the MVP conversation. Special night on primetime. Is that BS or no BS, B-A? Oh, that's no BS. You know, the last two weeks, winning ballgames on the last play, willing your team to win. All right. We're talking about he's playing with five starters out. Early. Two top receivers, both tackles. I mean, what he's doing is amazing. And he's got to be in the conversation right now. And my hat's off to Jason Light because, obviously, they've got some depth losing Kylian Jekansey on defense and still stopping him.

1:12:29That Bucs team is, I think, for real.

1:12:31Pat McAfee:We had some breaking news here during the show. Kylian Jekansey that you were talking about out for the season with a torn pec. Damn. That comes just after week two after a primetime game and obviously a big-time dub. That sucks on the defensive side. But you talked about wide receivers, talked about your tackle. Tristan Warp's one of the best players in all of the ball. Out still. So this Tampa Bay team only going to get better seemingly. Has Baker ever been in the MVP conversation before? Has he been a guy that's been left out of it every year? I don't think everybody's getting since his rookie year.

1:12:59And he was too young for it back then. But he's got to be in it right now. Will this end up being the best, do you think, trio of wide receivers between Evans, Godwin, and then Buka when Godwin gets back? Do you think that is one of the best? Well, you've got Jalen McMillan too. Yeah, and McMillan. They're both out. Is that best in the league? I think when you talk about four, it might be the best four in the league.

1:13:19Pat McAfee:Buka, I mean, I put a tweet out last night. Is he going to win Offensive Rookie of the Year? He's scoring touchdowns all the time. Has three through two weeks. He's a rookie, and they're talking about him being like a vet on the field and off the field. They love him down there. So good. And then, obviously, everybody was like, excuse me, does Tyler Warren play football still? It's like, you're right. I have boots on the ground. I see eyes on Tyler Warren. But this guy might have 45 touchdowns this year. Yeah. And that's going to be a number, especially with Mike Evans still being there. And you talked about four wide at wide receiver, and then they still got a run game.

1:13:48Pat McAfee:It's like he's going to get one-on-ones. He's going to get a lot of favorable matchups, and him and Baker are on the same page already. Yeah, because you still, even though Mike Evans is late in his career, he's still a game worker. He is the guy. You saw they had one of the highest paid corners in the league. Derek Stingley Jr. matched up on him. He did a pretty good job. But that's where you're going to put your number one attention with Mike Evans, and that's where Ibuka can definitely thrive and eat. AJ, you obviously have always been pro-Baker Mayfield, as we all have basically on this program.

1:14:16Pat McAfee:It's great to see him doing this. I mean, Connor talked about it earlier. Every quarterback that has high expectations, that doesn't work out in their first place, is going to hope to God that they have a career like Baker Mayfield. You're talking about the depths of hell, brother. We're talking about scout team punt block in Carolina for a shit team. Come on. For an ass team, he was doing that, willing, and then he kind of evolves, find his home, and then the owner comes out and says, this guy's the face of our franchise forever, for the foreseeable future, basically. What a time for Baker. What a run.

1:14:45Pat McAfee:What a story. And what a football life. Yeah, isn't it easy? I guess Baker's an easy guy to root for. Is it because he's relatable? Because we see how fiery and how intense and how much he cares? I guess, at least for me personally, when you know that somebody truly cares this much, he's pretty damn passionate. And you can tell on the field, and his teammates love him. I guess that's why we all love, it's not a redemption story. Like B.A. said, he won rookie of the year. The guy wasn't a bust ever. But for some reason, he hit a rough patch, and Cleveland will do that to some people, and he found his way back, and here we go.

1:15:16He's in Tampa, I know. And I just – I don't know. He's easy to root for because he's a fun guy. If you threw that guy at linebacker, I think he'll make a few tackles or break his net trying for sure. He's a football guy.

1:15:26Pat McAfee:You know, he told the story to us a couple years back whenever we were at the Texas State Fair before the Cotton Bowl or Red River rivalry. he said that in high school he's playing in front of 45 ,000 people. Like in high school, Texas football, he's playing in front of 45 ,000 people. The only reason why I know that he said that is because SportsCenter Next just posted that yesterday. I forgot he had said that. I listened to it. It's like this guy loves ball. He's out of the movie, the Texas movies about loving ball. So whenever he has to go on that journey of being a pump block team and then back up third, fourth string, and then he gets kicked out of a town, it's like an obsession with ball kind of leads him through it all.

1:16:04Pat McAfee:And I think you can see that with the way he plays. Guy's not scared of contact, not scared to talk shit. Everything that football is, Baker Mayfield kind of loves and embodies. What a football player. What an absolute football-playing stud we have here. The character you're thinking of is Mike Winchell. He's essentially Mike Winchell, who is the Permea Panthers quarterback in Friday Night Lights, if he made it, all the way to the NFL. But even in that stat, like we're talking about all these guys, He threw a touchdown to a guy named Ryan Miller. I do not know. I should have known. I should have done my research.

1:16:36Furman. Yeah, of course. Furman. Great school. Love Furman. They always have some noise in the March Madness. But even him just throwing it to anybody, I assume it's pretty easy when you have Abuka and Mike Evans to have tunnel vision. Since he's come to Bucs, he's led the NFL in touchdown passes. He's led the NFL in touchdown passes in the fourth quarter. He's the guy. He's the guy. He's the guy. I also think that maybe it's a little bit recency bias because of the last two weeks, but I think he's firmly entrenched himself in that camp of like there's always like the handful of quarterbacks where it's, oh, you left too much time for blank.

1:17:08And like now it feels like that's Baker. Like last night, just watching that game, it was like there was no doubt in my mind. Baker's driving down the field. They're scoring a touchdown here and they're going to win.

1:17:17Pat McAfee:Fourth and ten. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, right. You think Baker – Breaks the tackle. Yeah, gone. In the pocket. And then he gets blown up. His knee, AJ, we talked about this in the first hour. three shots to that left knee, including this one. Well, that's the first one. That's early in the game, first quarter. Then the fourth quarter, two massive shots to that knee, both one off the turf whenever he falls awkwardly, and then he gets upended, flipped with a shot directly to the same. Ah, ah, CJ, GJ's. You just got your ass kicked by the turf. What you... That's him, baby. The whole thing, you know, Baker's up there and at him.

1:17:53Pat McAfee:We take him back all the way to college. Baker's going to be fiery. and he knew going in, Baker knew CJ GJ's on the other side. Don't let him get you. Don't let him get you. Well, not only does he pick up the first down, but also, that's a shot right to the knee when they do the follow-up. Still playing it, kind of hyperextended. That thing is going to be this big, and none of us think at all that he's going to miss any time with that. No chance. Like, that's a badge of honor, and we hope he's okay. And if he does have to miss time, completely understandable. Which is another reason why we thought Cleveland was so perfect for him.

1:18:22Like, he's an Ohio guy. Everything you just said about Baker is like Ohio guy when you think of an Ohio football person when we mention like Ohio folk. Like he's just a hardworking dog. What the hell happened? What the hell happened in Cleveland, honestly? You guys kicked him out. Cleveland happened. Guys, I grew up a Cincinnati guy. You know that. The Browns, yeah. Bernie Kosar, I watched him play as a kid, but I was a Bengals guy. Shout out Bernie Kosar.

1:18:45Pat McAfee:Shout out to all the great Browns of the past. And shout out to the Browns currently trying to make it work. but you had the guy that won a playoff game against the Pittsburgh Steelers. And then you run him out of town and keep everybody else. The head coach wasn't on the sideline. He had COVID when Baker won. Get him out. He was out, yeah. Get him out of here. All right, let's go to the next statement of fact on BS or no BS with B.A. Yeah, speaking of another tough, gritty quarterback, some people are trying to write him off. And now I'm looking at the silver lining because J.J. McCarthy will be missing the next few weeks.

1:19:19Is it good for him for missing this a little bit of time? Is that BS or no BS, Bia? Oh, that's total BS. Okay. He's too young. He needs practice reps. All right? He threw 35 passes in the fourth quarter as a senior in college, and he needs reps. Now, he is a dog. We know that. He showed that against the Bears. But he's also too much of a dog at times. These young kids better learn how to slide quick. All right? Can you put yourself in harm's way? Harm's coming, baby. A lot of quarterbacks running. Oh, a lot of them got hurt this week. They probably played one linebacker in college that ran 4-5.

1:19:53They all run 4-5 in the National Football League. You ain't getting away. You better get your ass on the ground.

1:19:58Pat McAfee:How do you feel about him maybe getting a chance to watch, though, like a Kevin O 'Connell office? I don't know how much he was in the building last year. We assume he was there. He's got a year to watch. Okay, so. To me, you don't learn shit holding a clipboard. Mental reps, what are those? You better get your ass out there. Do it in practice. Peyton Manning never, Kelly Holcomb never got a rep. One of the greatest statements ever, Tom Moore said. What would you do if Peyton got hurt in your backup place? He said, we'd be fucked and we don't practice fucked.

1:20:29That's great. We're not living in our fears, all right? We're worried about right now. You need those reps, man. You've got to be on the practice field getting reps.

1:20:37Pat McAfee:What about that guy right there, though? What about Kevin O 'Connell? Do you think it's his offense that J.J. may be? Do you think it's going to take some time for them to be speaking the same language? And obviously this time away from each other is cutting into that time. What do you think? No, they need to get their tackles back. They had no tackles playing in the game. And they couldn't run the football. That was the difference between, I think, the Bucs with no tackles. They ran for 150, 60 yards. Vikings couldn't run the damn ball. And it was all on. Now the pass rush had him up. So you're saying time away from the game, not good for J.J.

1:21:09Pat McAfee:McCarthy. Not good at all. What we need right now is rips, rips, rips, rips. We got to be on the practice field. All right, get healthy, JJ. What do you think, Bruce, just because you have been doing it for so long, what do you think about the VR stuff? Because that's like what the – It's fantastic. Yeah, because that's like what – We were on the first ones to start using it way, way back when it first came out. And it's great for your backup quarterback. You do all your blitz drills in a room this size, just drop back, see all the reads, see all the blitzes. So it's great for your backup. Carson Palmer fell in love with it.

1:21:39It really helped his career.

1:21:41Pat McAfee:So JJ might be able to do that. Yeah, it's like the reps. Can also box in there, too. Yeah, true. Thrill of the fight in VR. Freaking Beat Saber. Yeah, you can play drums, too. Yeah. You can also swim in the ocean in there. Oh, that's cool. I got sick. Yeah, I wouldn't want to do that. Oh, yeah, the roller coaster. Yeah, roller coaster was bad. I got sick. What's that? Yeah. How do you swim? Do you lay on your stomach and somehow swim? No, so it's a stationary thing. Kind of tread in water. But you got to do this number here to go get to places. It gets really dark in there. I got kind of scared, to be honest.

1:22:13Pat McAfee:The roller coaster one, that one made me puke. There's a new one. It's like, I don't know if it's a new one, actually. It's new to me. Where you walk out to the edge of a building. Oh, yeah. And then you see how far you can get out there. Yeah, it's like a plank. Yeah, it's a plank. And you're in your living room, bro. What's the goal, though? To jump and kill yourself? I'm in my living room, bro No! In the game The goal is to get to the edge Get to the edge of the thing So you're like walking out this thing And then literally you look down and it's in like I'll say 720 It's not 4K, but it's good enough

1:22:54Darius Butler:It's cartoony, but it's good enough

1:22:56Pat McAfee:But it's not It's nicer than cartoony It is kind of realistic, but it's not 4K And you rely on that whenever you start Getting really freaked out Does it go – like if you actually fall off, are you free falling off that thing? Oh, yeah. That building. There's a video of a guy doing this game, and he jumps into the TV. Yeah. I don't doubt it. There's people that are hanging up, trying to hang on. I'll pass. It's pretty real in there. It's what we're saying. Good reps for JJ. And if he wants to get a little cardio. And ping pong. Boom, boom. And ping pong. They've got ping pong figured out. It will mess up your actual ping pong.

1:23:32Pat McAfee:Sure. but you can play real you can play good VR ping pong in there with 11 I believe is the game and you can play against people from all over the world it is fantastic, good exercise, good workout AJ and I played against each other but the real life ping pong game will suffer from it because you lose the touch of the real paddle so you gotta commit to one or the other I've become a full time virtual reality ping pong player I now suck in real life, I don't like it because in virtual reality I'm very good so I'm real cock on a walk and I come into real life. Everybody's like, why don't you come play in real life?

1:24:05Pat McAfee:And I can't find the fucking table. It's like, well, I need the... I just met a guy from Germany who's ranked 15 in the world, gay in virtual reality. But JJ's going to get better out there. In virtual reality, I think it's something just like the NIL transfer portal. We just need to understand this is now life. We need to get in there. JJ's in there. We can be in there too. Bruce, walk that plank. Let's see if you got it. Let's go to the next statement of fact, shall we? Yeah, B.A., a lot of people are saying that the Chiefs are ass cheeks, unfortunately. They're dead. We just talked about it.

1:24:35Hey, listen, the AFC West is now the Chargers division. You know, they don't got anybody who's doing anything other than Patrick Mahomes. So I ask you, is that BS or no BS, B.A.? I think that's total BS. This coaching staff's way too good, man. And, you know, they lost to Super Bowl champs and the Chargers who, you know, they had to travel to Brazil and all that. Those are excuses. But this coaching staff's too good. This team's too good. and Patrick Mahomes is too good. Now, if Patrick Mahomes continues to be the leading rusher, they got problems. That is the big problem because he's going to get hurt sooner or later.

1:25:08I mean, he just – now that he ran a DB over, people are going to take some shots on him, whether he slides or not. And they've got to get a running game going to help him out. He's just taking way too many hits.

1:25:21Pat McAfee:I mean, that's three guys hitting him from the Philadelphia Eagles defense that are very physical. Your big takeaway is they're not Cheeks because they're still the Kansas City Chiefs. They got too many good people in that building to be cheeks. So maybe we're putting Cart way ahead of horse in that particular column. But if he keeps taking these, these all add up here. Now, these are just shots that just kind of add up and add up and add up. Second quarter. And I think he maybe doesn't trust everything in front of him at the exact moment potentially. So maybe he's getting a little bit more eager to run.

1:25:48Pat McAfee:And then he knows he's much more athletic than a lot of people give him credit for so he can make a play himself. But that's normally the mindset of a younger quarterback as opposed to a guy who's already being called the GOAT. How do you kind of stop that? What do you think they try to do to get him more in the pocket or maybe not as vulnerable to massive shots? I think they've got to find a running game, first of all. And then they've got to protect him better. You know, their tackles have not played well for the last couple years. And they've been searching for a tackle. And now this stuff is going to get him hurt and end his career.

1:26:18And nobody wants to see that. No one.

1:26:20Pat McAfee:No one. And they're making – you talked about Travis Kelsey earlier. They're making mistakes that they very rarely – Yeah. Like, I don't – I think the Chiefs are still the Chiefs. Now, did I pick the Philadelphia Eagles to beat the Chiefs? Yes. That's because I believe in the Philadelphia Eagles. I think the Philadelphia Eagles are a very good football team. But I still believe in the Chiefs. It sounds like you do as well. Yeah, I believe in Andy Reid and Spags and the whole crew and Patrick Mahomes. Okay. Yeah, what's crazy is just like that you didn't really expect this massive of a drop-off.

1:26:46Like when Tooney leaves, they still had Creed Humphries and they still have Trey Smith. And the fact that they can't run the ball with two of the better players at their position, right? Isn't that kind of weird? Like, why is that happening? Josh Simmons, rookie left tackle, and he made a great play. Actually, he stopped to pick six against the Eagles. But, like, why are they struggling if they have, you know, two all pros in the middle of their own line? Yeah, it's in your scheme a little bit. Pachanko, get him going again because, you know, he's a fireball. When he gets going, it kind of sets the tone for them.

1:27:19And they haven't been able to get him going. All right, last one here, Con Man. Yeah, B.A. Steel Curtain. more like soft pillows. The Steelers defense absolutely stinks!

1:27:31Pat McAfee:We don't know if anybody actually said this other than Connor. Correct. Yeah, this is my brainchild, B.A., and was I maybe jazzing it up a little because the Steelers are going to New England this weekend? Maybe. But sue me. What's going on in Pittsburgh, though? Everyone kind of thought, hey, maybe the offense will start slow, and then the defense will kind of carry them. They'll be okay. It's kind of been flipped. Why does the Steelers defense stink out of nowhere. Or does, hold on, the question, remember. Oh yeah, excuse me. Steel Curtain, though, more like soft pillows. The Steelers' defense absolutely stinks.

1:28:05Is that BS or no BS? That's no BS, brother. Yeah, that's no BS. Wait a minute. That was the hardest watch for me on Sunday. To watch that defense. Knowing that Casey Hampton and Aaron Smith and James Harrison, all the guys that have played in that defense for all the years, going back to Joe and all the rest of the guys, but... Troy. That was – Brian Clark. They get stoned by a fullback and knock both linebackers down. The safety can't make a tackle. Seattle just ran it down their throat at home. That just doesn't happen. Yeah. I mean, it just happened. And it didn't happen once. That's third and 20.

1:28:40Do a soft toss playing for a field goal and you run in for a touchdown. That isn't Steeler defense.

1:28:44Pat McAfee:What is it? What happened? How's that? Because that was 10 a.m. local time kickoff for the Seattle Seahawks. I don't think anybody gave the Seattle Seahawks any hope at all in this game. Aaron Rodgers, home opener for his Pittsburgh Steelers era. Defense, how much money? Let's go to Hammer. Don, Todd. How much money is on that defense? A lot of money, right?

1:29:00Darius Butler:Number one in the NFL. I think it's like$150 million or some shit.

1:29:03Pat McAfee:Okay, so they've got$150 million on that defense. Not only well-earned, by the way, by the boys for how great they've been, and the expectation and the standard is the standard. I mean, two guys get knocked out of one. I think Jeff Saturday gave some pancakes out earlier because of this. But why is it? What is it? Is it just attention? Is it focus? Is it scheme? What do you think it is? You know, I think some of it is scheme. Some of it is reading press clippings. and they can't stop the run then TJ and Highsmith can't tee off. They're the finishers. But you've got to stop them first to be able to finish.

1:29:34And they're not stopping anybody in the running game right now. And Highsmith too now. Highsmith I think is out four to six weeks, right Tone? Yeah, they're banged up already so Jack Sawyer gets thrown in there. He's first year. It's going to be kind of an interesting watch for the Pittsburgh defense going forward for the next six weeks. They're going to see a fullback for a few weeks, I know that. Yeah. I'm putting one in right now. See, old Bob play. He's 100 years old. Run it down the weak side linebacker's throat. Knock two linebackers down.

1:30:01Pat McAfee:And until they put that fire out. It's coming. Everybody's just attacking right there, right? It's a copycat league. So, next week you're going to see it, too. I hit that with some leverage, man. Yeah, two guys there. Same. AJ, coach him up. Yeah, AJ, what the hell's going on with Pittsburgh Steelers defense, brother? You see that moving late. Look, right there. Cam Hayward's moving late. He's standing up. He's already screwed. So, they can knock him down, create a huge gap. And then, here we go. We're off to the races, missed tackles. Yeah, what's 22 doing, D-Buck? Or six. That's that open field, man.

1:30:28These running backs, they get paid a lot of money, get drafted hot, and this is why. They're not paid to get tackled in open field by anybody. That would not be fun. That would not be fun. It was like what A.J. mentioned earlier with the Chargers defense. Playing defense and tackling – the only time we tackle in the National Football League is on Sundays, or on game day. So tackling these guys, it's a team effort. It's trust. is literally firing your gun. Hey, if I got outside-in leverage, I trust my guy to be inside-out because if I'm taking on this block, and he talked about Hayward, but Wilson, if he boxed that outside-in, it looks like, you know, Queen would come over and make that play.

1:31:05And then once your guy isn't there on play 8, on play 18, now you're hesitant. Now you don't necessarily trust him. He doesn't necessarily trust you, and he just kind of piles on. But with the guys in that building, with the players in that building, and they played a lot of good football with the coaches in that building, I do think they can fix it. What did your leader say, your supreme leader say, Tone? It's only week two. Talk about Aaron Rodgers, I believe.

1:31:30Pat McAfee:In the long run, this will be good. I don't know if he's supreme leader or Coach Tomlin would be considered that. Both of them may be supreme leadership positions over there. Is that practice? Trust? Confidence? Why are people not? It's practice. It's meetings. is walk through and then it shows up on Sunday on game tape. But it only – you know, you have that little inch of doubt and then it can kind of grow. But once you start making it – like that Chargers defense, that team, like you know everybody regardless. We don't know all the names. The guys outside of – they trust each other. They trust, hey, Hart is going to be out there.

1:32:08Gilman, James, like all these guys are going to be in their position, in their place so I can go and fire my gun. because one-on-one, me and Walker in the open field, it leans to him. Two-on-one, three-on-one, now it's in our favor. How about B.A.

1:32:23Pat McAfee:saying, that's no BS, brother. It's a little bad out there. Didn't expect that. That was another segment of, is it BS or no BS with B.A.? Hey, we almost got through at that time. No, it's on me. Hand up. No, but the first three times it was me, so don't you worry about it. We always want to ask a question, but it's a statement. It has to be a statement because then the statement's either BS or no BS, but we always want to turn it into a quake. Then it's not. So we've ruined the segment the first few weeks. This week, smoothest we've had. Hell yeah. By far. No questions asked. B.A. did great. You know what else was great?

1:32:57Pat McAfee:Watching West Virginia beat the hell out of Pitt. What a game. What a moment. What a time to be alive. Hard Edge is seemingly back in Morgantown, West Virginia, and we're all thankful for that, that our Mountaineers fans. Ladies and gentlemen, the head coach of the Mountaineer football team, Rich Rau-Rigas. How you doing, Coach? Boy, you look good, Pat. You look great in that sweater. Good to see my friend B.A. as well. We go way back to our days in Arizona. Back in Lake Oconee, Georgia. You know, going over to Gabby's, having a cocktail or two, playing a little golf. Yeah, it's great to see you.

1:33:32You too, brother.

1:33:33Pat McAfee:Hold on now. So I know B.A. is a noted club thrower and club drowner, okay, if it has to happen. I couldn't even fathom you on a golf course. What is the spirit or the mood in golf? Do you try to be good? Are you actually good at golf, or are you just out there having a good time with BA? No. I mean, I don't know what BA. He probably lies on his handicap like all the other coaches do. I don't know. I mean, I was okay. But probably if there's a little money at stake, I'll get a little ultra competitive. I've only broke two clubs, just two, and one of them was an accident. But I hadn't, you know, that's the worst part about, you know, taking a new job, Pat.

1:34:16Hell, I ain't got time to golf, which is ridiculous. I got to make time to golf. So I'll find time if we get to a bowl game and win some games. I'll find some time next summer for sure. Come on down in February, bro. I'm not giving you any strokes either.

1:34:28Pat McAfee:Okay, see, he's hustling too. He just shot his age twice already this offseason. I mean, he's balling right now on the course, obviously. He's balling. He is balling for sure. Well, I appreciate you not golfing and focusing on turning around that program there. watching along this weekend. The emotional journey that you were on throughout the entirety of it all, I assume, was a lot. Afterwards, we saw some tears. We saw some real pride, some real fulfillment it felt like out of you. What was that for your team, and how did it feel in that locker room afterwards? Yeah, you know, Pat, I didn't, you know, it obviously is not scripted, but I probably didn't realize it until I watched some clips of it afterwards.

1:35:04I was a lot more emotional than you'd think after 300-some games as a head coach. you know it all kind of feel the same but i was a little bit more emotional and i think it's maybe you know it wasn't just because we won it was arrival and all that and there were 60 some thousand people in the game so important and everything like that i just think it was a combination of a lot of stuff it was you know being gone for 17 years you know seeing seeing what uh everybody put into this program people like yourself how important it was uh for us to to play well and to represent west virginia the the way we need to be represented and so it was I mean, they say every game counts as one.

1:35:41This one might be counting a little more than one. You know what I mean? And the folks started tailgating last Tuesday, and hell, they haven't left yet. So it's been a wonderful few days. You know, obviously we've turned a page now, and I'm moving on to Kansas on the road this weekend. But for 24 hours, it was a hell of a time.

1:36:01Pat McAfee:Yeah, I know you're just trying to get a first down against Kansas. I know that's what you've got to think about. And I appreciate you acknowledging how big of a game that was because I think to everybody that was following along with your journey and our journey as Mountaineers as a whole and our story and our team and everything that has happened, that game was huge. Also, being on September 13th, 9-13, the whole – it was a massive weekend. And especially for you reinstating who you are and what your team is. I think it was a big weekend, man. Legit. You know, when we play them again in three years, we're going to be a whole lot better football team in three years than we are now.

1:36:36So this is the toughest time for us. you know, is we got 77 new players, only have one guy that started any football games. And so, you know, this was good for us to try to, you know, to get a win because we got to wait three years till we play them when we know we're going to be pretty salty. But it was a physical game, too. If you noticed that, Pat, they had an inordinate amount of people that got hurt all the time. I saw that. I don't know, some snaps, there was two or three guys that were getting hurt. And I was like amazed at that. And then their training staff must be the best in the country because they all came back in the game.

1:37:07I saw that. It was phenomenal how fast that medical staff of theirs got them healthy again to get back on the field after all those injuries.

1:37:15Pat McAfee:And we will certainly take their information that they have to become a better medical staff everywhere else, I think. If they have any secrets to take care of these guys so quickly, we would like them to share that for the good of them. I'm like, yeah. I'm like, they got the worst luck in America. There's a guy falling out on every snap. I mean, I've never seen nothing like that. Hey, hard edge. That's how hard edge is back. You know, I can't keep up with it. That's good news. Something else. Yeah, was it? Yeah, okay. Watching your team, you talk about it being super physical. You had like a super jumbo package.

1:37:46Pat McAfee:When did this come to mind? How long have you been doing this? I don't think I've seen this in a while. Yeah, we had like 3 ,000 pounds of beef going in. We actually did something similar the last couple years at Jack State. But then we had – I got a couple. One lineman that Donovan has when he's two cheeseburgers away from 400. and then another linebacker is a cheeseburger away from 350. I'm like, hell, let's just – you know, B.A. will tell you this. Football is a game with big people moving other big people against their will. So I'm like, well, the more big people we can have in there, the better we have.

1:38:18So the formation is called heavy, of course, right, heavy. I could call it just fat. They actually like it. It's just our fat package. But that may not be politically correct, but hell, who cares. But we called it heavy to be politically correct. and so we have nine guys, but I'm trying to get ten guys. I might have one where if I could find one of those fat guys that could actually carry the ball, I'll have ten guys in there. So that would be the fat package. And we'll hand it off and block with all fat people.

1:38:55Actually, Nico's not slim. He's 225 pounds, so he's on the borderline of a quarterback being, like, fat. I say that in a kind way.

1:39:06Pat McAfee:Yes, we all know you, and your players all understand at this moment, too, what that is. Anybody that's ever played for you understands exactly what you're saying. That fat is spelled P-H-A-T. Yeah, yeah. It's powerful. Yeah, yeah. It's powerful. Yeah, fat is super cool, too, to do something new out there. Yeah. And if you get a 400-pounder with a ball in his hands, I'll tell you what, college football people will celebrate that. And I hope you're, you know, that heavy package through the holidays might You know, Thanksgiving, Christmas, let alone Halloween. Holy shit. Beast packing. And there's a lot that we can sell from that and T-shirts we can make.

1:39:43You can imagine the marketing thing. Like, you know, let's get fat, you know. Let's go Mountaineers. Let's get fat. And then, you know, let's put it on there. P-H-A-T.

1:39:50Pat McAfee:P-H-A-T. Yeah, AJ has a question for you, Coach. Yeah, Coach, winning a big overtime game against a rival like that, I guess for some of the younger guys, like you said, so many new players, what does it do for you guys' confidence? I think great teams have to find ways to win. You have to win many different ways. You can't just be front runners. You've got to learn what it's like to come from behind or win these close ones. But what can you guys take from that? Can they build a bunch of confidence winning like this? I think so. Obviously, any time you win, you're going to get a little bit of confidence.

1:40:18And then when you lose, you maybe lose a little bit of confidence. But I tell everybody, what we have to rely on is what we do every day, the way our practices go. I tell our guys, we're a little unique in how we practice. and then we had good practices last week. You couldn't tell the difference between last week's practice and the week before's practice. And I think that's got to be who we are every day. We do what we do. We go how we go. And hopefully we can play well enough to win a game and keep playing. And then, you know, a typical coach speak that, you know, I tell the guys, I told them before the game, this is going to be a game.

1:40:49Don't look up at the scoreboard. All right, just keep swinging. Keep playing as hard as you can. Then after 60 minutes, you can look up. Well, shit, that was wrong. It'd take more than 60 minutes. So I said, it takes 60 minutes in overtime, then look up at the scoreboard and see what happens. They truly, I think they really did that. They just kept playing hard until the final whistle.

1:41:07Pat McAfee:Tell me about Nico. He's obviously big, strong QB, stuck around from last year, which I think we all appreciate. Then also, Scotty Fox gets some burn at the beginning of the second half there. I don't think he played the week before. All those decisions, what goes into it, and what are your thoughts on the quarterback room? Well, and that's the other part, Pat. You realize, like, you know, most people say, well, you take your quarterback out and put another guy. you're going to destroy his confidence well yeah maybe he destroyed my confidence too you know so i think there's times where our quarter but people don't realize in practice this is the way we roll our quarterbacks and we roll in and out and i tell them if you make a mistake or two i'm not we're not going to pull you out just because you make a mistake or two sometimes we we're just going to try to make a change and make a spark or maybe it's a certain number of certain plays that this quarterback can do really well and so nico understood that you know when he when he was taken out it was to try to get a little spark with scotty but it's also because a couple different plays we wanted to run and i wanted nico and all the other quarterbacks to stay engaged well he did he didn't go pouting like gee whiz you know he stayed ready he stayed engaged and then under six minutes ago whatever was in the game said hey nico you're in it's your time to go get it he he attacked it like like the like the person he is and and it was a great lesson for all of us for all of our players to see how engaged he stayed in made a couple great throws and like that seam throw right there and led us to victory.

1:42:26Pat McAfee:Yeah, you know, you've been very open, seemingly, about liking the whole quarterback room. Anybody that knows you, though, with how competitive you are, you want somebody in that quarterback room to take that job. You would like somebody to become the guy in that room. I would assume. Not 100 % sure, but I would assume that is the case. Oh, yeah, you're 100 % right. You know, somebody to kind of seize it and grab it and, you know, we hadn't really seen that yet, but maybe in the last six minutes, Nikos is taking that step, you know, which is really neat to see. But I want those other quarterbacks, you know, Pat, to be as competitive.

1:42:57Like, shoot, I'm not done competing with this thing. We got a lot of games, a lot of football left. It's still going to be wide open. But at least for one day, Nico took charge. At least for one quarter, Nico took charge. And that's a positive sign.

1:43:10Pat McAfee:Yeah, it definitely is. Big-time win, a big-time moment. I think it was the most people that have been in the stadium in years and years and years. Obviously, the checkered was awesome. The environment looked electrifying. I wish I could have been there. Ollie Straw, your punter, did you see that catch he made? I knew it was a bad snap, and he had made a great catch. Then after I saw a picture of it, it was like, that's got to be like a specialist poster thing kind of deal going on. Yes, definitely. All football players, not just specialist asshole. That's two points right there. You almost lose Ollie Straw.

1:43:43And he changed the field, too. They had good returners, and his location on his punts was next level. So it was, yeah, it was really neat. And what was neat about the crowd, I tell everybody, there were 60 ,000. That's what the stadium holds. I think there was actually about 65 ,000 there because there were like 4 ,000 in the end zone. But 10 years from now, there will be 600 ,000 that say they were there.

1:44:09Pat McAfee:That kind of atmosphere. On that note, B.A.'s got a question for you. Yeah, Coach, do you think this is going to be the hardest week you have as a coach? I know going back when I was at Temple, we had a big win. and, you know, the guys didn't come down until Thursday. Well, that's too late. We just missed two days. And get your guys – I know you probably already had one good practice. How's the practice going the rest of the week? Yeah, that's the perfect point, B.A. It's like yesterday we go – we have one day off this Monday for them. So Sunday we had a walkthrough, and I could tell they were still high off the game kind of deal and excited.

1:44:42And we turned the page a little bit. But Tuesday and Wednesday, today's practice, tomorrow's practice is get after it. And so I may, I don't mind yelling anyway, but I, as you're probably feeling that I'll probably be, I'll be into today's practice in their grill a little bit. If I need to, it doesn't bother me at all. But so today and tomorrow will be the true test, but you're right. This will be the challenge. And, and I didn't bother me at all.

1:45:05Pat McAfee:I can't wait for you to the patent on your back. They can stab you with it. Yeah. The whole. Had him on the ass, sitting in hand, that kind of deal. Yeah. It's going to be one of those days. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Get pissed down my back. Tell me it's raining and all that kind of stuff. Yep, yep, yep, yep. Headlines. Oh, look who's good. Someone's a good football player. Oh, Nico. Oh, yeah, I cannot. I hope you're mic'd up today. Obviously, Raquel will control what gets out and what does not get out. I think she's doing a great job, by the way. You should tell her that. And I saw Miss Rita celebrating thereafter.

1:45:35Pat McAfee:I think that was probably a big win for her as well, if I had to guess, for the entire family there. Yeah, the family was there. And we, you know, the family was here was nice. And I had some buddies of mine that came from Arizona, some buddies of mine from in town. and we smoked uh ba we smoked some good cigars till about midnight and then we all realized damn we're hungry i hadn't ate since 8 8 a.m and like what the hell's open and so there's an applebee's like a mile away at 12 o 'clock and then thankfully the chef was still there so we kind of barged in there and ate some applebee's at 12 o 'clock at night had a grand time i'll tell you what if you have an applebee's that has a chef yeah okay a cook maybe yeah and a bartender to me yeah yeah bingo man hey we should be pit we're having a good time out here hey who sent me somebody sent me a video from your cigar smoking session i don't have the number saved but uh it looked like it was a great time you guys were literally i i got a video from it from a number i do not have saved i was so happy you were enjoying the moment though i want to let you know that yeah you know i probably i was coaches you you You try to move on to the next one, but, like, shit, for four or five hours after that one, I wasn't thinking about anybody or anything other than my friends and what just happened.

1:46:48Pat McAfee:Yeah, let's go to Applebee's here. Hell yeah. It's good enough for MCDC. It's good enough for me. Let's go to hammer. Todd, Todd. AP Tone has a question for you, Coach.

1:46:58Darius Butler:Yeah, Coach, earlier we were talking with BA and how he kind of split up the season into quarters. You guys just ended non-conference. You're about to get into your tough conference schedule. So does your thinking, how you're coaching the kids, does that change at all? How do you break up the season now that you're into the conference schedule? Yeah, for us it worked out just perfectly with our three non-conference games being in the first quarter. I said the first quarter is over. There was some good, some bad, a lot of stuff that we're learning to get better from. Now we have our conference play on the road and we play a team that's really athletic, has had an open day, two weeks to get ready, and a home opener for them in the conference.

1:47:37So it's going to be a big challenge. So maybe being on the road, I think somebody already said we're like 14-point underdogs or something like that. So, you know, why don't we go out there? Got something to prove again this weekend.

1:47:48Pat McAfee:Oh, I think somebody said we're two touchdowns. I think somebody said. Did somebody say that? Somebody said that, yeah, the boys will know that, that we got no chance this week. Yeah, we got no chance, you know. I hope we can get a first down, you know. I hope that, you know, everybody comes out of the game healthy, that kind of deal. Be a fun trip out there. Beautiful campus, too. They've got a great big investment from their boosters. They have a huge investment. You can tell, what,$300 million donation or something, and they're putting it back in their athletic program. So it's neat. Yeah, hopefully you guys will be able to compete out there.

1:48:21Pat McAfee:Ty actually has a question about that. Yeah, Coach, on that note, Pete Thamel put out a tweet, I think, yesterday that basically said, hey, West Virginia has – they've pledged that they're going to be in the top funding tier of the Big 12. Like, obviously, as a coach, that's a big part of it now is, you know, not only the recruiting, but the fundraising. Was there a conversation there where it was just like, hey, listen, we can we can say whatever we want. But at the end of the day, like if we can't compete money wise, then guess what? Like we're not going to compete for Big 12 championships. And how good does this feel knowing that you have the pledge from the university?

1:48:55That's like, you know what? We're going to take care of that aspect. Yeah, you got to be as a coach. You want everybody to be aligned in the same thinking. whether it's your administration, your board, your coaches, your players, and everybody like that. And we're running a business now. Let's be honest. It's a business, and it's an expensive business. And if you want to compete at the highest level, you've got to make an investment financially. And that's why I feel good about our administration. I feel good about our board is they know that that's what's got to happen. And you're seeing what's happening at Virginia Tech, and they're trying to get everybody aligned the same way.

1:49:29I'm just blessed that we're aligned here and that we got great support and we got people like Pat and everybody else that loves this school that's going to help us compete in this new era that we're going to be in because we're running a business now. And we've got to have the financial resources to compete at the highest level.

1:49:46Pat McAfee:On that note, this logo is beautiful. It goes great on a hat. You can certainly buy any of these hats. They are available everywhere. And the fat package shirts, P-H-A-T. P-H-A-T. Yeah, that will certainly be available as well around the holidays, maybe some Black Friday specials if you needed. You have had that mindset, though, and I think it's maybe because you're at Jack State or whatever, like, hey, we've got to drum up. We've got to do this. We've got to run this as a business. I think you've been very forward-thinking in this entire thing, and is that because you had to go through a smaller school in this era and keep it all, or why do you think you are that way?

1:50:19I think just more than anything, Pat, every coach would say, what do I got to do to win? You know, what does it take to win? It used to be, well, you've got to recruit at a high level, which obviously you've still got to do. You've got to evaluate a high level. Now you better make sure you evaluate the right ones if you're going to pay them a certain amount of money. And you've got to be able to have schemes that can help you win. If you're competitive enough, like what's the rules? What are the rules that we've got to have to follow? And then how do we take advantage of these rules to be as good as we can be?

1:50:47What does it take to win? What does it take to win? It's as simple as that. What does it take to win? And if you don't press that part as a coach, you can just say, well, tell me this is all we've got and just accept it, then you're not going to be coaches that think they can outsmart people and win because they're going to be smarter than you are going to be the ones that aren't going to be doing it for long. You better know what the hell you're doing, but you also better have a whole lot of help to get you there, if that makes sense.

1:51:11Pat McAfee:Yeah, absolutely. And I'm excited to see what you grow out there. Hard Edge is back. Printed this past weekend. And on that note with the ever-changing everything, it's a whole new world than it was maybe 30 years ago, 20 years ago, 10 years ago. Go ahead, D-Bud. Yeah, we're talking about much more of a business now than ever, But more important than anything, we talked about it kind of with the Pittsburgh Steelers and that defense is the trust and kind of that team building. How do you kind of expedite or speed up that process with all these new players? And now, like you said, entering into this conference play now, how do you do that in this era?

1:51:42Yeah, everybody says, well, nowadays you can't coach the guys as hard as they can as you want to because they're getting paid and they can transfer. I'm like, you can coach them harder because they're getting paid. I mean, they got more to lose now if they're not playing or if they're not maximizing their abilities. And so I tell our guys, sometimes you've got to tell them why you're getting on their ass a little bit and all that, where in the past you just tell them and they'd follow you. But our culture, I told our coaches, and it's still true because we know there's going to be some tough moments in this first year or so.

1:52:15I said, we cannot sacrifice our culture. we can't ever have a guy be lazy and soft and not say something or a guy not do his best and let it go because we're afraid to hurt his feelings or afraid of whatever a financial ramification might be but he might be leaving whatever you gotta have the right process and the right culture no matter who it is and once they understand that and they're part of it then they'll be the ones that help you make sure that's help held every day that the new guys that right now they're all new So everybody's got to learn it. But eventually it'll be just a handful of new guys every year that have to learn the way we do stuff.

1:52:54Pat McAfee:Do you have anybody hosting any camaraderie building cookouts at the end of training camp? Any of those types of situations, you know, that maybe the entire city comes to? And, you know, the football team celebrates in the front yard with the entire campus at the end of training camp. Any of that type of stuff happening? No, hell, when our guys get an hour or two of free time, I realize they like to have their free time. I don't have a lot of long meetings. I don't have a lot of long talks or anything like that. It's like most of the guys I talk to is, hey, you got a couple hours free time? That's valuable to you.

1:53:27Go have your free time.

1:53:28Pat McAfee:Yeah, and maybe have a party too. Let the boys enjoy. Don't be setting any couches on fire, though. They're fine in kids. Yeah. All right. They're fine in you, yeah. Yeah, we don't like money being taken out of anybody's pockets. Certainly have a good time, but it's also protect the city. Okay, we appreciate the hell out of you, Coach. Coach, we will continue digitally on YouTube, ESPN +, Disney +, and TikTok Live. We'll see you tomorrow. Have a good one. Goodbye. You see that countdown at the bottom? Oh, good wave. Look at you. You fucking hit a wave. Wow. We're still live. We're still live. Still live.

1:53:57Pat McAfee:That is a good wave, though. That looked very, very natural there. Yeah, yeah. Presidential wave. Yeah, just trying to get a first down and nail the fucking wave on the way out of the entire thing. Coach, I was so happy watching the end of that game. There were a lot of moments where I wasn't. And then Ohio, obviously the week before, like what a gut punch to the entire thing. And I think AJ was trying to reference this as well. After you win and you prove that your style can win, players more naturally buy in, I think. I think it's like our hard work paid off. Like when you see success for all the shit that you're going through, you're more naturally to want to continue to do that, I think.

1:54:42Pat McAfee:So whenever a game like Ohio happens, and I think they've got a great team, Navarro gets hurt against Ohio State. That's a whole different story if he doesn't get hurt. I think they're a good team. But a game like that can be devastating to a build of a culture, I think, from outside looking in, especially with what it was, with Neil Brown versus what your culture is. I think it can create or generate a potential. A lot of people are going, I'm not doing all this shit. It's not working. And after that pick game, was there a sense of, like, justification or fulfillment maybe from the boys from all the hard work?

1:55:11Pat McAfee:Because I know the shit is not easy compared to anything else that they've done in the past. I think so because of just some, you know, being in the locker room. You know, there's nothing like a winning locker room. You guys all know that, the winning locker room. But the number of guys and players that came up to me and was hugging me and saying, Coach, I just absolutely love it here. I love what we're doing. You know what I mean? That was unprompted. They didn't have to say that. And I told her guys, it's not totally ingrained in the program like it needs to be. I mean, it's getting there, and I've got a great staff and everything like that, but it's still a process to get it to where the hard edge, if that's what you want to call it, mentality, is ingrained in our guys every day, every minute of every day, no matter the game or whatever it is.

1:55:54And that's the process that we've got to go through. One game's not going to change that, but one game sure in hell can make a difference and I think that's what this game should be able to do for us.

1:56:04Pat McAfee:How about you hitting the getting after it out there, letting the boys know we got a little wiggle. We got a little wiggle under this West Virginia Southern Hick accent in here. We don't dance on TikTok, but in the winning locker room, we'll dance our ass off. Cheers, beers, Mountaineers, congrats. It was great to watch you and I'm happy you're enjoying the moment while also understanding we gotta get a first down against a team that's two touchdown favorites against us touchdown yep two touchdowns at kansas two tuts two touchdowns we'll be ready you're the man ladies and gentlemen head coach of the west virginia mountain air football team rich rodriguez yeah thank you he's fucking hilarious yeah he's fucking hilarious yes love him the fat the fat thing yeah that was incredible and the reason why i enjoyed it so much is because hearing him say that about somebody in real time in practice is one of the most i would assume scary things for said fat person uh but also from everybody else hilarious delivery and like the reason why i think sports coaches feel this is because being in shape is a massive piece of rich rodriguez's entire thing Like, the reason why those guys were hurt so often is because West Virginia is running.

1:57:24Pat McAfee:Like, you've got to be in good shape to be a part of that offense. Like, that is just what it is. All offseason, I think they only did six hills at Law School Hill. We're doing, like, 12 of those back in the day. Big guys, DN, like, we are conditioned, this team. I stopped playing soccer, okay? Had way more offers to play soccer than I did for football. Only had a few for football after a kicking camp down in Florida after I won it. And I'm like, you know what? Got a strong leg. The thing I don't love about soccer is having to run seven miles. You know, I'm a little heavy in my knees. It's not my, I love kicking a ball though.

1:57:56Pat McAfee:Like I enjoy, boom, football. This is, this is the fucking avenue. Then I get dropped into the West Virginia football strength and conditioning program. Two months, or a month out of high school during, before the season starts. And I'm running more than I've ever run in my entire life. I mean, we are, people are puking around me and I'm still in soccer shape. so I look good at all these things but I remember thinking to myself like this is fucking way worse than soccer ever was this is a fucking nightmare and that's like a part of what Rich's thing is hard edge is like we're going to be in better shape than you, we're going to be tougher than you and we're just going to pound the shit out like that is the mindset that he's trying to create so whenever he calls a guy fat ass that is a, you are fucking the entire team you are right there because we can't depend on you now i assume he's gonna say it's because the modern generation we still got guys that just stay fat somehow so him having to use all right you want to be fat you think that we'll fucking put you in back yeah i want 10 fatzos out here just meat moving meat is what he said i feel like whenever he thought of the idea he had such an epiphany yeah yes all these fatzos are now for good not for bad what he means though is heavy and can move and he's not scared to do that he'll do that right down the entire field that was my first time seeing him do that and as soon as i saw it have success i'm like rich will run that play 30 straight times in from his own goal line all the way to your goal line if it works because that's like what he wants to do what a coach you know him obviously through a lot of different situations and he was out in arizona whenever you're coaching the cardinals and obviously mentioned the lake out there in georgia that a lot of you guys live on and it sounds like a great time.

1:59:39Pat McAfee:But I think in the football world, also a lot of respect for everything he's done. The spread offense that we ran back in West Virginia, I think he started all the way back at Glenville State maybe in the entirety. He invented tempo. People talk about tempo. They're all copying Rich Rod. That's the guy that said we're not stopping. Next play's up. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. And all these young coaches, okay, this is the way to play football. And it kind of just took over college football. And he's always been successful. He's always been a great coach. He's a dog too yeah every day he's a dog 5 30 a.m he's on the stepper in the middle of the weight room so when you roll in there at 5 40 for your 6 a.m workout there's a guy already glistening in the back he's got a towel over his shoulders and it is max difficulty max speed and you just see him back there and it's like that is the one that's leading the pack here he was supposed to be a drill instructor he was supposed to be especially his way with words he can piece swear words together better than anybody in history.

2:00:38Pat McAfee:And I did wonder if the modern era would be good for Rich Rod or not. I thought maybe he wouldn't be able to coach. And the way he talks is like, maybe not all guys, but like our guys, you rally around that type of show. Oh, definitely, man. These kids love discipline. They really do. The guys that are great. Yes. And just don't bullshit them. Don't bullshit them. Rich is always going to say the truth. It's going to hurt. He's going to hug you later. and make sure you're okay. But if you're a fat ass, you ain't going to be one for long. Or you're not going to be a part of the program. One of the two.

2:01:13Pat McAfee:You're going to be a part of the four touchdowns that we score with your package. But literally, you're in there just as a shield, a meat shield, literally for everybody else. But he is. Hey, yo. Almost got 3 ,000 pounds. A meat shield. What's going on? A meat shield is crazy. In his head, when he drew that fucker up, it was a big circle. What is that? That's our fat-ass offensive lineman. What's that? That's another one. What's that one fucker? Three what? 90? Cheeseburger way. Fucking put him right there. Another one. Okay, what's that one rookie that you – Yep, put him there. And then somebody was like, coach, there's six more.

2:01:53Pat McAfee:I fucking know. We're putting them here. We're putting them fucking here. We're putting them fucking here. And then we're fucking stacking them here and here. And then what are you going to do with the ball? We're going to fucking run it. That's what we're going to do. What do you mean? And they did it. Yeah. This thing showed up on my television screen, and I started dying laughing. I'm like, of course. The tush push now is just – it's evolving. Take me out of the field. You. Yeah. Yeah. Get another back room here. Get another safety here. Get me out of here. The beauty would be one of them fast son-bitches will be able to catch.

2:02:24Yes. And he'll catch a touchdown pass if he blocks really well.

2:02:27Pat McAfee:Well, and also, if he got a guy – yeah, he'll give him a little treat. Hey, you do this good. Yeah. On a treat. You do this good. You'll do one of these. It'll be the old fridge. And then all of a sudden, we got one of these right at the back of the end zone because everybody's coming up. But that's going to be a few weeks of just. Oh, yeah. Ponding. A lot of this right there. Kansas, he loves that they're two touchdown underdogs. That's a lot. Just going to try. Yeah, they got$300 million. He knew exactly. Yeah, I think they got a$300 million donation. I think they got Lance Leipold, great coach out there.

2:02:55Pat McAfee:Yeah, they got it all figured out. It's our home opener. It's going to be a great environment. Hell of a quarterback to stop, too. Hell of a quarterback to stop. Six years, Jalen, there. Did he get hurt?

2:03:04Darius Butler:No. I don't believe so.

2:03:06Pat McAfee:No, it was other Jalen Daniels.

2:03:07Darius Butler:I hope not. Other Jalen Daniels. Jaden.

2:03:10Pat McAfee:There's a lot of names. Yeah, it is. Especially, I'll tell you what, game day, beginning of the season. Boy. You're swimming. On slot. Every once, I know the last name, and I think I know what the first name sounds like. And then I'm like, not going with it, going with the last name. Not doing it. And it's like those decisions are happening every single sentence, you know, just as we go. That is a lot of fun to learn about all the new storylines. Like game day, literally. Get the rundown on Friday for what the show is going to be or whatever. And then Friday night is just like, what team am I learning about tonight?

2:03:49Pat McAfee:Or teams. And then like watching all the movement that has taken place and all the things that have happened. It's so much fun to learn all these storylines. I think the NIL and the transfer portal is making the sport more electrifying. And I think free agency, obviously, is something in the NFL that is highly regarded. Free agency frenzy is one of the biggest days of our offseason. It's a Monday. It's at noon. We got counter-programmed because maybe we couldn't handle it or something like that. But that's how big of a day it is in the world. In college, if they're able to get this free agency right, and they have a window that is actually a part of it, now you're talking about college football having a similar to the nfl football of a year-round you know they can they can set up this calendar where college football can start becoming year-round excitement as well i think we're just at the beginning i know college football has a lot of tradition been around a long time it is incredible we are very lucky that we get a chance to be a part of college football at all it we i feel that way we feel that way as a whole with the amount of history pageantry tradition it is different than any other sport in america It is the greatest sports cults in the world is college football.

2:04:58Pat McAfee:Hooligans and soccer, I get it. It's your entire town. I agree. You guys are very passionate and very entertaining. That's like what, 40 ,000 max? 30 ,000, 40 ,000 max? Something like that.

2:05:08Darius Butler:The bigger stadiums, they're growing, but not up to 100 ,000, no.

2:05:12Pat McAfee:We got 102 ,000 is what Tennessee was. It's the eighth largest in the world. It's the third largest in the SEC. So it's like the college fans are just like insane. So I don't want to say that we're just at the beginning of what could be for college football because obviously there's deep history, a lot of it. But it's like in this modern world, I think what college football is going to be, it's only going to, ratings up 21 % week one, probably another 20 % week two. It's like they can all, this free agency has made teams good out of nowhere and has a lot of storylines kind of develop on it. Like Songapolitelli's free agency is going to be must follow.

2:05:50Pat McAfee:Anywhere he wants to go. He's not the only one. There's going to be other guys in there. College football has a chance here, I think, to be... I'm not saying it hasn't had a chance, but I'm just saying it can really cement itself as the number two sport in the world. NFL, soccer, I know. You get it. Number two sport in America, by far, is like NFL football number one, college football number two, and then everything else. I think we're in a good time for ball. Yeah, I hope they made the right decision. I feel like it's kind of right there, very plain and simple. But you mentioned the college football history.

2:06:22I just worry about the NCAA. There has never been a time where there's been like, oh, NCAA has done a good thing again.

2:06:29Pat McAfee:Yeah, but we're in new era. We are with the same people up there. No, new people. Charlie. Charlie Baker. Yeah. Great. I got no faith, unfortunately. Yeah, but they might have no say. Yeah. Hopefully they don't. They don't. They get pushed out. Listen to me. This is the first time he's spoken about this. 20 years as a college coach. They have no say. NCAA is basically toast. I mean, it's going to be the Big Ten, Big SEC, whatever the other two conferences, those commissioners are taking over football. Yeah, but one of those TV contracts up again, we just looked at this. They might be toast, but it's still another eight years.

2:07:06Yeah, but I mean, NCAA ain't telling shit to Sankey. They're running college football now.

2:07:13Pat McAfee:NCAA coming up to Sankey. we're going to need you to look into what's the school? I'm going to need you to look into a lot of other shit. Shut the fuck up. We got it. What do you guys run? Oh, the one that everybody hates. We are the one everybody why don't you let us maybe look into this. Petiti also with the Big Ten. Incredibly, I think good at his job but also knows that he has a lot of say in power. I believe Sankey and Petiti on the same side of a lot of things. A lot of issues. I think they understand that. Big 12 commissioner I think he's in it too. Yeah, he's in it with St. Key and the TD.

2:07:47Pat McAfee:And the ACC commissioner, there was one drive down North Carolina where they were almost the strongest conference in all football. That's right. And he knew that. He's still holding on to that. Still got Florida State and Miami in there. Agreed, agreed, agreed. I don't think Clemson's dead, but they're close. They're dead, Bruce. That boy's dead. I think he can stay at Clemson for however long he wants, and who knows what the future looks like. post-Cade Clubnick. How many years? Is this last year for Cade Clubnick? It's got to be. It's been there for 10. I just hope it's Davo.

2:08:19Darius Butler:To be honest, it's only his third year starting. Did he start as a true freshman is what I'm trying to remember. Yes, he did. Remember? I guess he could actually. DJ, he took over a DJ. Yeah. Let's go one more year down there. It'd just be sweet for a fresh start. I think it'd be not hey, Davo, it's time to go run him out of town, but more so splitting for both of them. Like, hey, hey, this has been fun. I think maybe I should go back home to Alabama and coach the Tide and then see what happens.

2:08:46Pat McAfee:Clemson still has everything in front of them. They're the reigning ACC champs, is what Dabo would say. Can we all relax real quick? And Bama ain't dead either. Yeah, Bama ain't dead either. Bama looking good. We've seen it. Did you see Ryan Williams on that? Yeah. I've seen Ryan Williams do a lot of stuff. Yeah, this. You see him do this right here? I've seen him do this, yeah. Did you see that? Big Ten. Did you see that? They were counting this as a part of the Big Ten SEC football battle. Yeah, and it wasn't. Did you see that, AJ? Yeah. Technically, it is. That's Big Ten SEC class. But AJ knows, too.

2:09:29When he was playing, when I was in school, too, Wisconsin was awesome. They've sucked for five years. They were scary. They were scary back in the day. Their offense was awesome. They were mean and they ran the ball.

2:09:40Pat McAfee:Okay, so I understand what you all are saying. And for that reason, what you're saying about Wisconsin being a perennial, you know, through it all, they're reviewing this as SEC Big Ten. They put it on the stats. They say this is if we're going to keep score here between the north and the south in football. Wisconsin's representing the Big Ten. That's what they said. No, I get it. Let's keep track in December. Okay? Let's keep track when it matters, not fucking week two, week three, you know. I mean, who gives a shit? Well, they're saying the SEC. Oh, man. Oklahoma gets a big win. I get it. Do we want to look back at what Ohio State did to Tennessee when it mattered most?

2:10:15They fucking embarrassed them like you would not believe. And that was kind of our whole thing was, hey, this is cool. This is kind of shit when it's hot outside. When it's negative temperatures and you've got to go up north and there's maybe snow on the ground and maybe the ground's frozen, is it the same thing?

2:10:32Pat McAfee:So that is an interesting conversation piece that's going to start around a college football playoff, and I will certainly be a part of it, where the conversation has always been the SEC team's far superior. Okay? We got 300-plus thousand stadiums down here, places packed out, history of football down here. During COVID, you guys didn't want to play. You remember Big Ten said we're not playing? Kevin Warren, president of the Chicago Bears, said us and the Ivy League aren't playing. Everybody should give us a round of applause. Greg Sankey said hold the applause for me then. We're playing football.

2:11:01Pat McAfee:So that's the difference between SEC and Big Ten. is how people in the SEC feel. Then he started looking at the five stars and where a lot of these recruits come from. The SEC for a long time has said, if they were to play, what would the sportsbook say are the favorites strictly off the rosters? What has now been entered into evidence is, well, maybe you can't have 11 five-star 4-2 runners on the field for Big Ten teams because it becomes four degrees outside. And football is a little bit different. So whenever you're judging rosters, does the 4-2, 4-3 across the board matter as much because the Big Ten team's saying, are you able to run like that when it's frozen?

2:11:41And also, when we start hitting you in this freezing,

2:11:46Pat McAfee:does it matter? Two different footballs. These are two different styles of football completely that have to be judged at the end of the day on who's better. That is a wild scene. Because if Ohio State has to go down to Tennessee, what happens? Yeah, they might get stomped. Who knows? I mean, I doubt it. I think Ohio State's the one. Yeah, exactly. They were the one team. Just look at the two quarterbacks. Yeah. I mean, come on. Will Howard versus. Yeah, but at that time, Will Howard. The forgotten man. Yeah. Yeah, Niko Yamaleava. Forgotten man. He's looking to transfer again. But Ohio State is also one of those teams who could compete in the SEC.

2:12:20You know, like they're an SEC school.

2:12:22Pat McAfee:In the north, yeah, which is what everybody talks about. But it's that northern football. Who gets a home field? It makes a difference. It is a huge ordeal. And we'll see. It's a different world. It's a different sport. Think about playing in September in 72-degree weather compared to what we were at at Ohio State when they played Tennessee. There's some guys that the second they walk out on your team, they walk out of that tunnel for warm-ups, and they're already done. They already quit. Well, I hope somebody else makes a play because I'm sure as hell not making anything today. That legit happens.

2:12:50Never play in those games. Go ahead, D. We almost never had really, really – because season will be over. Once you go bowl season, those are warm-weather states and cities for the most part. So, you never – I played at UConn, and I rarely played in, like, snow. I don't think I ever played in a snow game or, like, below 20 degrees or anything like that. So, yeah, it changes everything. And then NIL as well. That kind of killed the SEC's, you know.

2:13:15Pat McAfee:Coach Saban talked about that, about how the territorial advantage that the SEC had with the amount of dudes coming out of different states. Pockets, South Carolina, Louisiana, Florida, obviously, in a big way. Georgia, Tyler Atkinson. We just met him. He's what, 6 '4", 225 as a high schooler. It's like these pockets of talent across the South that exist, obviously, and obviously the North has places as well. But they used to want to stay home, want to stay home, want to stay around family, want to kind of represent. Now Penn State shows up and goes, home's cool, right? We can build a new home, can't we?

2:13:50Pat McAfee:How much money are they off? We got$2 million more a year. Is that what you want? We can get it. Yeah, sure. We'll build. Yeah, your family can come up. We got a house for them too. Now all of a sudden you're close to home. Yeah. Now you got a new home. It's Happy Valley. Congratulations, we're paying you. Oregon. You ever been west of Alabama? Nope. You ever been west of the Mississippi? Nope. Come on out here. Fly all the way out. Yeah. Come on out. This is Uncle Phil. He founded Nike. These are all the uniforms you're going to be wearing. This is the Nike deal you'll have whenever you become an NFL player.

2:14:21Pat McAfee:And oh, yeah, we can move your family out here, and this is the amount of money that we are willing to pay you if you would like to do that. I don't know what LSU is offering. I know Brian Kelly is a great ball coach and everything like that, But we're just telling you, this is also an option. It has evened the playing field. Oh, yeah. Definitely. It's changed it totally. Changed it totally. Yeah, I think I'm excited for the college football playoff chatter, especially if Notre Dame goes on a run. Yeah. Can't do it. They went out? By 40 every game. They got USC. They got Pitt still. They got Stanford, Boston College.

2:14:53They went out and they win some of these big ones. They're in. What big ones? USC. Man, USC. The Joel Chaleli game. Pitch a big game, right? They're very good. It is very good. USC loses two games and that game is done.

2:15:09Pat McAfee:But they're not going to. People are saying USC not being treated with enough respect. I bet their schedule is much tougher than this if we look at their side of it in the Big Ten. AJ, to what you said there about them getting in, that is exactly what Tone said as well. If they win all these games on primetime television and everybody sees it, it's going to be hard at the end of the year to be like, to win a fight. where there's going to be too many people fighting for the Irish Catholics, I would assume. Yes. But they need a lot of these teams to win games. They've got to score 40 once before they can do it twice.

2:15:40Pat McAfee:That's what they've got to do, though, coach. That's what they've got to do. Carrying the order of names, water. Tone, is that what you're saying? Tone was carrying it? All of us. What are you saying? We're saying no way they get in.

2:15:52Darius Butler:You're saying that. Tone's saying they're in. Yeah, Tone, you're saying they're in, huh? I mean, it's the exact same as last year. I don't know. They made it last year, right? Am I wrong? Who were the two last year that lost it? No, they only lost to Northern Illinois. So, yes, one loss versus two. But I think a loss to Miami and A &M is better than one loss to Northern Illinois. Depending upon how Miami and Texas A &M end up. Let's say Miami, one loss or undefeated, which is definitely doable. And then A &M's got three.

2:16:21Pat McAfee:I like Texas A &M's team. I thought everybody was going to pick them over Notre Dame. I don't know if I told a story on the show or not. I walk into the production room, give picks, and I'm like, Texas A &M over there, damn, is everybody picking that? Like, nobody's picking that. All right. Okay, wait a minute. Nobody? This is, yeah, nobody. I'm like, holy fuck. Georgia Tech ever glimpsing? Everybody's feeling this way? Nope. Holy fuck. Obviously, West Virginia ever picked. There's a couple people that Coach Saban's got to be pulling for West Virginia. Nope. He's picking Pitt, too. What? Everybody's fucking picking?

2:16:57Pat McAfee:Holy shit. Boy, it would have been nice if Tennessee wins that game. Mm-hmm. You know? Because they posted this. Said, hey, he went lone wolf multiple times and actually got it right. And then the comments immediately were just, who's that coming down the track? Oh, what did he say about the Tennessee-Georgia game? Did he pick the Bulldogs? Did he pick Georgia to beat Tennessee? No, he picked Tennessee. Fuck him. That's what everybody said. And they're right. They're 100 % right. We got to make that kick. Oh, boy. I felt so bad for that kid. Heupel, five-yard penalty. Seven seconds left. Just kick it at seven seconds.

2:17:32Pat McAfee:What are we doing? Heupel will learn, obviously, from that situation going forward. But if you go out to run a play with seven seconds, I guess to get it down below five seconds, so it's definitely the last play of the game or whatever, so you have a walk-off, I get it. But if a penalty happens, I think you've got to commit to the bit there. I think you've got to throw that fucker out of bounds. I think you've got to get the bad juju from the penalty away from the field goal kicking operation right there. personally. Yeah, just take the ball, throw it out of bounds, kill four seconds. Boom. Then get the kicker to come out.

2:18:00You don't throw it to anybody. Just throw it out of bounds.

2:18:02Pat McAfee:Yeah, because it's not after a penalty. A penalty backing up is the worst thing that can happen for a kicker. Ball moving further away. You've got a harder shot. So I think you just need to separate that from even if a nothing play. I think you just need to separate from the vibes. But nonetheless, make the kick and they win. Tennessee's still very good at football. That was a fun game. That was an electrifying game. And that kicker bounced back in overtime and hit the same kick. Proud of them for doing that. But that was a great game that I thought Tennessee was going to win. And inevitably, Kirby Smart still got the dogs down there in Georgia.

2:18:30Pretty crazy it happened to Sagapolitelli's team in Cal. They were playing the Gophers, Minnesota, and they were in like a dog fight. It was 0-0 or 7-0 with like a minute left in Minnesota scores. And Cal, trying to score right before the half, they go all the way down. There's seven seconds on the clock, and they just run a five-yard out, get a little extra room and then they make a field goal like barely by doing that. That situation happened on, I want to say it was Friday night, not Saturday night but it might have been Saturday. But just thinking of that and then not happening on the biggest game you would think.

2:19:09Pat McAfee:Yeah, but you gotta remember all that's happening so quick. So quick. All that shit's happening so quick it is like very much in the moment. You don't expect somebody to false start. Like hey, there's seven seconds left, bro. Let's not fucking, what are we doing here fucking georgia tech we didn't even talk about that their fire drill one of the best them running out to beat uh clumson perfect yes yeah perfect execution yeah yeah georgia tech by the way i love awesome what they are cooking out there yeah 23 seconds uh at this time third and fourth fourth quarter you got no timeouts no you got to run a nascar situation fire drill is whenever there's a bad snap nascar here uh gonna have full time to take steps probably yep takes a little steps back.

2:19:48Pat McAfee:Going to be a big one here, brother. To beat Clemson in front of your crowd. 55 yards, snap, hold. Give me that. What a kick. What a win. What a game for Georgia Tech. And I would like to let the world know or reiterate what I said on Saturday. Haynes King doing that interview with us while he was spinning it in the middle of his warmups, keeping his train of thought while also communicating with wide receivers on what routes to run and the person getting him the ball this guy is a sunday guy yeah that felt like a sunday guy whenever i was watching that and i literally was picking clemson and then we did that interview and immediately afterwards i'm like i'm betting on that guy right there to beat them i like the cut of his jib i like what georgia tech has become down there uh coach key's done a hell of a job and uh man just go back to that georgia last year what six overtimes whatever it was yeah that that was almost to get the program changer I think this game's a program changer for Tech.

2:20:47Pat McAfee:I think him coming in on game day and having that interview made me a much – this was awesome. I mean, he was just so casual. I love when you guys do this. One of my favorite parts of the entire show. Yeah, but usually it's ass. Right. Usually – Well, the Tech was really good for this one. Yeah, because usually there's a delay or usually people are a little bit too intense or locked in, and, you know, it's kind of like going around. I'm not saying ass. Like, it's a good conversation, but it does feel, like, very forced. It's very, like – it's not smooth. The way he was just going through his drills, it didn't feel like we were impeding on his pregame, which sometimes it feels like when we're talking to people.

2:21:22Pat McAfee:It's like, oh, he's still getting his work done, still getting warm. And also, how fucking confident is this guy? This is game day against Clemson. This is a huge game for him, and he's just locked in. That close. 103 ,000. Yeah, it was like Billy Napier when you did. I know. Did he almost hit that? It looked close. I couldn't see it. The TV we were looking at was real small. So I was waiting for a reaction from others, and everybody went, whoa! And I was like, is that a hit or not a hit? I was waiting to hear it, but it looked like it was close. Hank's King definitely was close. He probably nicked it.

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2:22:58Football.

2:23:03I love that.

2:23:05Pat McAfee:That's a nice little. It is. That's 47-year football coach Bruce Arians. Nine-year NFL vet, Darius J. Butler, the Talks at the Table at Boston Corner, and that's Ty Schmidt. That man right there is A.J. Hawk. And live from Hammer, Don, Don, is A.P. Tone. Tone, great work on a college ball wrap-up. Thank you, brother. We did a lot of college talk there. Let's do some Tom Brady talk, shall we? Oh, the GOAT. The GOAT. This guy who has obviously seen it all, done it all, and obviously experienced it all. A man who will be remembered as the greatest football player of all time because of how many rings he has won and the way he went about doing his business is that of perfection.

2:23:42Pat McAfee:It's called the Patriot Way, more so the Tom Brady-Bill Belichick way. Now Tom Brady, former player and owner of an NFL team. We, as ex-players, are all incredibly pumped for him. Hey, baby, Tommy. Good boy, Tommy. Tommy, the greatest of all time, also committed to becoming a color commentator for NFL games in a big-time spot. Number one guy for NFL on Fox. We appreciate the GOAT giving back to the sport and teaching us the way he views football. Hey, baby, Tommy! Thank you, Tommy! Now, those things kind of battle against each other when Tom Brady is an active NFL owner. Not just an angel investor, not just a laissez-faire owner.

2:24:23Pat McAfee:This dude is on the horn, a part of game planning, allegedly with Chip Kelly three to five times a week. And then when the interviews were happening for the coaches and everything for this new era of the Las Vegas Raiders, he, Tom Brady, was the one doing the interviews with Pete Carroll, amongst others, to kind of run that team. So in the last night, primetime, Las Vegas, we see Tom Brady up in the coach's booth with a goddamn headset on and a suit. Whoa. The suit is a headset on sitting right next to an assistant on the offensive side. He can obviously drop in at any time and tell Chip Kelly, hey, I don't fucking like it.

2:24:59Pat McAfee:Why aren't we scoring any points? The Chargers defense is really good. Oh, are they? Everybody's really good. It's the NFL. And if he wants to call a fucking play from up there, if he wants to drop in and say some things, he certainly can. It's what everybody assumes as soon as we see him in the coach's booth with the headset on. And we know that that booth, with all those microphones on the sides of everybody's head, speaks directly to the sideline. This guy's a part of game planning. This guy's a part of play calling. This guy's a part of hiring. This guy's a part of strategizing. This guy also was part of the New England Patriots that had how many gates happening at certain times throughout their run of their dynasty?

2:25:33Pat McAfee:A lot of them. We ain't let this fucking guy in our building to let him do his color commentating bullshit. It was a big deal last year. It was a big conversation piece. Then it kind of just got wiped under the rug. Then kind of we move on. He got paid$375 million to call games. He's the greatest of all time. We're going to let him call games. Let him do that. Now it has been reissued, basically, from the NFL. Just a reminder, as everybody starts heating up the conversation, Tom Brady's not allowed in these buildings. remember we we allowed him in the production meetings via zoom or facetime but he's not allowed in the buildings he's not allowed to walk around him because the conversation immediately led to him sitting in that booth with the headset on to all these coaches around the league not wanting this guy to know anything about their team what he's about to call the game he has to know about your team we don't give a fuck okay he's got the bears i guess coming up in a couple weeks guess who else got the bears in a couple weeks the team that he owns and the team that he strategizes for So Ben Johnson is obviously not somebody that is kind of loosey-goosey.

2:26:35Pat McAfee:I think he's pretty – I assume he's not going to say shit to Tom in these meetings. How do you view this all going for Tom Brady? And should we have expected him to be this hands-on whenever he was named an owner of the Las Vegas Raiders? Oh, definitely. That's what Tommy does. I mean, he doesn't do anything half-assed. Tommy's full speed, doing it 100%. Now, when you're coming back to do a production meeting, that's a whole other story. No, hell no. You ain't getting into the building. Okay, so he's not allowed in the building. So he's not allowed in the building. Okay, I think the NFL said that.

2:27:04Pat McAfee:Once again, we haven't had him. You're not seeing Friday practice. Okay, not seeing Friday practice. You're not seeing our best plays. Not seeing what we like the most in red zone. You're not seeing who maybe we're trying to maybe hide a little bit and get in there for future reps. But you are in a production meeting and a Zoom call. What comes from those? And how will people treat those, you think, with Tom? I think it'll be total bullshit. Okay, everybody just be lying. Yep, totally. and he's not going to get any information for that. People really pissed about this, him in the coach's box, I would assume?

2:27:32I would think so. I would think that changed the whole narrative of being allowed to come in, not being allowed to come in. This changes everything.

2:27:42Pat McAfee:D, but I think I even saw the internet being like, this guy shouldn't be just walking around. Last night, I think I saw that kind of happen in real time with Tom Brady. Did you as well? Yeah, I did. I saw it a lot and I understand it. There is a huge conflict of interest and we know, even if he didn't with the Patriots stuff and all the gates that you mentioned, yeah, you're definitely concerned with that. Proving. If you're an opponent. But this, for me, just like B.A., is expected. You didn't expect Tom Brady to half-ass do this ownership thing. If it is a guy that can do it, we always hear it as players, as coaches, hey, it's nobody bigger than the shield.

2:28:18There's nothing bigger than the NFL. It's a guy who won seven Super Bowls. He went to ten of them. This would be the guy that can kind of get away with anything. He's been a part owner of the Raiders. There was another owner there who was a Maverick and kind of did things his way. Al Davis, we saw the Jerry Jones docs. He did his things his own way. Tom Brady, in my perfect football story, he would be the next Maverick and just doing things completely outside of the box like no one has ever done it before. And he's earned their right to do it. So we'll see how long he does both. If I see him giving up one, obviously it'll be leaving the booth and then just being more of a full-timer.

2:28:57Maybe he's on the sideline with a head set up. Maybe he just steps in at halftime and takes overplay calling. Who knows what it'll be, but I'm excited about this next chapter with Tom Brady.

2:29:05Pat McAfee:For the betterment of the game, him being the next outlaw and not just going along with everybody else says will certainly be the case. I mean, that would make the game better. It's like whenever they were changing numbers and changing rules and changing everything, he was very outspoken about, uh-uh, this ain't how this goes. I love that he has that mentality. I like that the NFL has come out and said, we're not letting him in buildings. He's not doing any of that. Pete Carroll came out, I guess. Andrew Siciliano is reporting. Tom Brady's not playing games with us. Is he playing games with Chip?

2:29:31Pat McAfee:Yeah. No, no. He didn't say that. He says he's not playing games with us. But we were told that that's what's happening. And in the offseason before the combine and everything, everybody that was around the situation was saying, Tom Brady, very hands-on involved in all of this. So conflicting reports, I guess. And I'll trust Pete Carroll. Pete Carroll's, I like Pete Carroll. Pete Carroll's never lied. Maybe Tom Brady should be playing games with you, but if he's not, but if he is, which is what everybody thinks, I think it is a huge talking point about him getting access or knowledge or anything like that.

2:30:01Pat McAfee:I think that's why it got so big last night. Well, and Pete's saying, you know, Tom Brady's not game planning with us. Well, Pete, you know, Tom Brady beats your ass. He beat Chip Kelly's ass. He beats everybody's ass. Well, what I'm saying is he doesn't have to game plan with them. He can game plan on his own. He definitely doesn't need the help of those guys to create his own game plan for a team. Breaking, breaking, breaking. Before you go any further, Vinny Bonsignor. Okay. He says, Pete Carroll said, The reports that Tom Brady meets three or so times per week with Raiders OC Chip Kelly to go over film.

2:30:34Pat McAfee:Game plan is not accurate. Okay, so we just got to say. Twice a week. Yeah, twice a week. Yeah, exactly. No matter what the assumption is going to be. Schrags broke this news. He did, yeah. So this is Schrags news. Wait, Schrags broke the original? Two or three. During the game, I think he. Correct. And then this is Vinny saying, no. That Pete Carroll just said. Pete Carroll's talking to reporters, I would assume, either right now or last night. And Bonsignor here, Paisan, he is currently reporting what is coming from the press. And Pete Carroll's saying, who's that? Shranks? Shranks doesn't know.

2:31:07Pat McAfee:Shranks doesn't know. I'm the only Pete around here that knows anything. Is what Pete Carroll said about Shranks' report seemingly. Yeah, but that wouldn't be as weird if they didn't scrub the internet of all the tweets about Brady being in the booth in the coach's office. I believe the NFL deleted a tweet with that involved in it, and there are other things. So that makes it more seem like a spin. And him saying, yeah, they don't meet three times a week to what AJ said, the immediate thought was like, okay, well, they meet once a week. And we can't assume anything. The devil is in the details.

2:31:39Pat McAfee:Exactly, yeah. A lot of things, you know, a lot of things that maybe be conspiracy fodder, if you will. Just kind of putting my hat on for a second. Brady did hire Pete Carroll. He was a huge part of all of the hiring process for the team. Who's the GM? John Spitech. They played together at Michigan. Spitech. Spitech. Great GM. Going to be a hell of a GM. Does he have any assistance technology perhaps? Spy technology? Is it right there in the name? It's always so obvious isn't it? Isn't it? It's always too obvious. It's right there in front of us. And Ben Johnson, yeah, hey, he's gonna, Ben Johnson's gonna give Brady bullshit.

2:32:21Well, guess what? Brady knows what's bullshit then. Hey, Chip, they're not gonna do this, this, and this, because this is what they told me they were gonna do. So, yeah, maybe he will get nothing out of the team meetings, but boy, oh boy, we don't know how the goat thinks. He might think completely different than everybody else, and he might be able to get information.

2:32:37Pat McAfee:B.A., do you, uh, B.S. or No BS. Tom Brady can get a lot of info from a building if he's Keller commentator. No. Terrible. Can't get anything. No, but I'm saying in general. I don't think anybody gets anything in those meetings. That's what I'm saying. In general. Not just Tom Brady. Not just Tom Brady. Keller commentators. I mean, I did those things for how many years? I would tell the truth sometimes because I knew they thought I was lying. You know, and hey, this is going to be the first play. Nah, bullshit. And I would rent it anyway. Okay, so that meeting is a – what happens in those meetings?

2:33:09Pat McAfee:I've never been – I've sat in a couple for the games that I called, but I was always like third person. So they're trying to get info on what your strategy is or injuries. Mostly injuries, who's going to be on game day roster, who's inactive. What do you think this week? And, of course, nobody tells them anything. To me, it was a waste of time. I did it for a year. I was like, I should be out on the golf course. How about walking around the building like those Friday practices? Friday practice is real. That's totally different. Friday practice, you see everything. All the important shit. You know, red zone, two minute, all your gimmicks, your final drive.

2:33:57Some people, they'll go through their script on Friday. Now, that's big. That's big. And seeing who's out on the field. Yep. what the hell are you doing playing that position? Where the hell is Derwin James? I'm watching for that. So yeah, being at Friday practice, that's totally different than a production meeting.

2:34:16Pat McAfee:And the NFL is saying he's not allowed at Friday practice. He's only allowed on Zoom calls in a production meeting. Yeah, but the guys that he works with can. So there's no way those guys tell him anything about what they saw. So now Tom Brady is being paid$375 million by Fox, and now he picks up also spies for him and spy tech for the Las Vegas Raiders? No, no, the guy he calls the game with. What's his name? Kevin Burkhardt. Yeah, does Burkhardt go to the practices on Fridays? So would they not communicate about what he saw? I mean, I'm not saying this is going to happen. I'm just saying this is like the internet.

2:34:51This is what the assumption would be. Do you think Tom would give him a list? Hey, Burkhardt, check this out. Check out who's playing nickel in this situation, who's doing that. I mean, you could do that, but come on.

2:35:00Pat McAfee:How many reps are Badgeant getting? Are they still motioning Loveland? Yeah, what is the thought? Does it seem like there's a little bit of a short leash on Caleb before we play? Let's look around. Offensive line and Caleb, can you get the interaction between those two, in between drills? Can you see how many people are letting trainers kind of squirt the water in their mouth? Can you show me all these things? Kevin Burkhardt, I don't know if he would be able to see all the things that Tom would probably factor. No shot at Kevin Burkhardt. And this isn't a shot at non-player journalists. No, no, no.

2:35:41Pat McAfee:Or non-coaching journalists. None of those things. But I think what they fear, what he fears, is Tom, because of his fucking knowledge of the game and being there doing that, he could potentially see some shit. Oh, yeah. And it could benefit the Raiders immediately. He's what all football people who are paranoid motherfuckers to begin with. Go ahead, D.B. I mean, those production meetings and Friday practices, you know, coaches and players, you're worried about that shit getting out, you know, within that 48 hours before the game. Once the game is played, you're seeing all those different things.

2:36:11So, like, that's the vital time, 48 hours. So, once Sunday happens or Monday, whenever it is, and the game's being played, like, you're going to see who's playing the nickel. You're going to see who's calling the plays. You're going to see these different things. So if you're going into the game, if you're playing the Raiders that week and getting that information, that vital information that, you know, that you don't know that you're not going to see until game time, that's when it matters. But outside of that, you know, it's not that big a deal.

2:36:37Pat McAfee:I like that headset on up there. But I like that he's spreading the game worldwide. Yeah, that was awesome. What do you mean? Huge announcement. He's taking a Fanatics flag football superfest right over there, Saudi Arabia. That's right. Taking it global. Here's Tom Brady yesterday alongside Turkey Al-Azharic and announcing Riyadh season is officially welcoming football to Riyadh. Yesterday, I've always admired the power of flag football, the fastest growing sport in the world and how it connects fans of all ages. And I want to help continue the global movement and momentum that our game is having.

2:37:17So I'm very excited to announce that I'm coming out of retirement and teaming up with His Excellency Turkey Al-Alashek, Fanatics, OBB Media, and my friends at Fox Sports to launch the Fanatics Flag Football Classic, which will bring American football to the Middle East on March 21st, 2026 at Kingdom Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, as part of Riyadh's season.

2:37:47Pat McAfee:Way to go. So I'm taking football worldwide, worldwide. I don't know if every word sounded natural coming out of his mouth or not, but I do know it's a huge, huge announcement for football and also for a lot of guys to... Profit mightily from the sport of football and maybe this does take over the entire Middle East as their new favorite sport. With that being said, the NFL has come out with a statement on this particular Superfest. Fanatics made us aware of the event, but this is not a league initiative. It's up to the individual clubs to provide clearance for their active players to participate.

2:38:21Pat McAfee:I think a lot of ex-players are going to be playing this. A lot of stars are going to be playing this. I cannot wait to see how it all comes together and congrats to Tom getting this deal. He might be owner of a whole team soon, especially if we're heading up a deal with Saudi Arabia. That's a lot of cash. A lot of cash. They got a couple coaches. I assume the super duper professor is going to – She's doing it. Yeah, there's going to be a couple coaches. Great golf out there too. Yeah. Nope. You sure? Why not? I don't know. Pretty good. This is my job now. Okay. We love you here. We love you here.

2:38:52We'll see. This actually might be awesome. I mean, I'd much rather watch this than like the UFL, and that's kind of the same time period. So we'll see. I mean, Saquon's playing in it. With the coming into the Olympics and everything. Yeah. It's going to be big. Huge. Saquon's playing in it. I saw Saquon is one of the names. I think Max Crosby was one of the names. Yeah, McCaffrey. Miles Garrett.

2:39:13Pat McAfee:Look at some of these. I mean, it's huge. It's huge. And I like the NFL has come out and said, the teams are allowed to say no, is what the NFL basically just. We would like to just let everybody know the teams are allowed to say no if they'd like to. That is our stance on it. Big names, big partners, big money. Big for the game. I like that that is happening. Soccer, golf, tennis, other sports. Football now. Yeah, grow it. Getting a chance? Why not? Good for the sport. A lot of money for those people. Yeah, it's going to be real tough when they're playing Dubai week eight. But, hey, it's not me.

2:39:49You're talking about Saudi Arabia's team? Or the Fanatics flag football team? I'm assuming if this goes well, you know, 2030 international game, I assume they send one over there.

2:39:59Pat McAfee:I will say Tom Brady and Gronkowski look good still. Oh, yeah. Every time I see him on camera together, Tom's throwing to Gronk. Had one down in New Orleans, I think, or across the street. Where was it? Yeah, it was in New Orleans. That was like last week or whatever. They did one last week, and then they did one to announce this flag football thing. A little bit of a lower catch. They're going to win. Whatever team they're on, I'm thinking is going to win. Who will they play? What if they just start taking their players? And doing what, flag football, super classics? Yeah, just go over there and play flag football, play four games for$55 million.

2:40:34Pat McAfee:We talked about this for the WNBA. Maybe 100. We talked about this for the WNBA. We got a three-on-three league. Yep. It was like, so they're going to make more money to do three-on-three than they're going to make in the WNBA? How long before the three-on-three thing becomes the thing? They're like, no, they're committed to building WNBA. They're making$50 ,000 a year here for how many games? And then over here they're making$250 ,000 is what you're saying for this money? Yeah, but that's just an off-season thing. It's like, okay, I'm happy to hear that. I'm happy to hear that. Money talks bullshit.

2:41:07Exactly.

2:41:08Pat McAfee:And, you know, Saudi Arabia, obviously, with golf, was able to get a lot of golfers, notable golfers. Not everybody, though. Soccer, they've gotten some notable soccer players. Not everybody, though. I assume all their sports, it's a similar story. For football, this one feels like it is just going to be, like, event-driven as opposed to full league stuff. But what if the crown prince, God bless him, sees flag football and goes, I like this sport. What is this? Let's do this one. All of a sudden, Tyreek Hill, you're not happy in Miami? Boy, do we got a league for you. Here's$150 million for one season, and you're going to be untackleable.

2:41:52Pat McAfee:You're actually playing for the Crown Prince team. Yeah, he's throwing you the football. We're not going to talk about that. We're not going to talk about that. This is good for the growth of the game. It's not going to take over the game. No. Well, no, no matter what, this would only happen in like April or May when they – Yeah, but what we're saying is what happens – No, no, like if they did a season. What we're saying is what happens if the crown prince, God bless him, falls in love with the sport, you know, like he did with soccer, like he did with golf, and says, you know what? I like this one.

2:42:24This is fun because they're airing it out.

2:42:27Pat McAfee:Oh, Tom Brady's going to. Yeah. Yeah. They're rushing in that, don't they rush? They're rushing in that. That's the one thing I said when Tom said I'm going to come out of retirement, Miles Garrett's going to be chasing you. That's going to be an easy catch. No, got to be on his team. Miles got to be on his team. You got to count steamboats or what? How do you rush? Mississippi. No, it's like if you watch the high school kids, it's like, bam, and they're after you. So the quarterback's always running around. And that's not Tommy anymore. What is the high school rules? How many Mississippi? I think it's just one.

2:42:57Pat McAfee:Just one? I think it's like seven yards back. I think if you're like seven yards back. I know flag football and my little kids played. If you're like seven yards back, you can blitz from like a cone behind the line. What if it is they count in Saudi Arabians? What if it is one Saudi Arabia? Two Saudi Arabia. Three Saudi Arabia. Oh, the ball's gone by then. I was going to say. Probably three Saudi Arabia.

2:43:19Darius Butler:The Mississippi of Saudi Arabia is the Wadi Al-Rahma. So they will count one Wadi Al-Rahma.

2:43:26Pat McAfee:Two Wadi Al-Rahma. Three Wadi Al-Rahma. Yeah, so it's probably three Wadi Al-Rahma. If I had to guess. Before they're allowed to rush. Miles Garrett has got to say it, too. Got to get it right. One wall. No. No. Yeah. No. Mad Max. We're going to be trying to do that. Absolutely. Mush it up. No. No. Go back. Go back to the cone. Max Crosby's definitely not wanting to go three wall to old llama. No, he's not doing it. No way. They're going to need to do that, Joe, for Tommy. Wall with a llama? No way. That's not it. That doesn't count. Exactly. No way. Did you fact check that, Tony? Yeah. How'd you get that?

2:44:07Pat McAfee:Did you say what is the Mississippi of Saudi Arabia into?

2:44:10Darius Butler:No, I Googled what's the largest river in Saudi Arabia.

2:44:15Pat McAfee:Smart. Well done. It is smart. Is that why it is Mississippi we count? Is it because of the river?

2:44:21Darius Butler:I was just trying to go apples to apples.

2:44:24Pat McAfee:Yeah, but is that the proper? I always assume. You said one, like Ohio River, one Ohio, two, that's not enough. Yeah, but I don't think they're saying. Monongahela. There you go. Yeah, but they're not as big as that. Allegheny and Monongahead are coming together. Formed Ohio, obviously. Three great rivers are coming together. One point, downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. We all love that. But I don't think it's one Mississippi because of the river. I think it's because of the name. Just because it's so cool sounding. I assume so.

2:44:49Darius Butler:I always assumed it was the river. Fucking ode to the river.

2:44:52Pat McAfee:So it was like one Mississippi river, two Mississippi rivers, three. Too long. So they just got rid of the rivers. One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi. I mean, Brett Favre might have created that. He might have. That might have been his entire thing. Nobody talks about his contributions with the state of Mississippi like that. Well, he might have created Mississippi down here. We don't know. We're not on harm's end. Sure. So, Wadi Holawama, what was it?

2:45:20Darius Butler:Wadi Holawama. But, yeah, I just looked it up. Apparently, they were looking for a four-syllable word that timed out to be about a second, and one Mississippi was about that.

2:45:31Pat McAfee:I thought apples to apples with rivers just ran away.

2:45:35Darius Butler:I still stand on it.

2:45:38Pat McAfee:And that's why we love you.

2:45:39Darius Butler:Except for the river, I can't stand on that.

2:45:42Pat McAfee:Gene's good.

2:45:43Darius Butler:He could.

2:45:44Pat McAfee:He went out there and just...

2:45:45Darius Butler:Oh, yeah.

2:45:46Pat McAfee:The Miami Mississippi. The JC walk. Was he one leg in this thing? Or was he... Oh, yeah, I forgot. Who was the... Jack Easterby?

2:45:54Darius Butler:Yeah. Yeah. One fish, two fish. Red fish, blue fish.

2:45:57Pat McAfee:Walking on top of him. That's what I do fish. I think he's still breaking down the game. I'm going to text everyone some of them. Jack Easterby. I feel blessed. They're very long in depth. He's still breaking down the game. I don't even know what the number could start with. Yeah.

2:46:16Pat McAfee:That's kind of my issue. I don't save phone numbers enough. So then if a text is coming through with a number I don't know, I'm going to say this now. Not enough people are going to hear it. I'm not reading it. Okay. I am so sorry. I should. I know that I should. but boy that one's probably not getting read and i don't like it but every once in a while there'll be like an incredibly detailed stat about football is the first sentence it's a number i don't have i crack that thing open and there's a lot of detail and i get to the bottom hope you're great jack easterby hell yeah i'm like hell yeah god fucking bless you man thank you for all that try 832.

2:46:59Pat McAfee:It's a good text. He's got a lot of information in there. Wait till you guys hear this. He's his own stat guy.

2:47:05Darius Butler:Is there a word that you remember from the text that you could search?

2:47:08Pat McAfee:Maybe Jack Easterby, right?

2:47:09Darius Butler:Oh, yeah. Oh, we found it. It says bless you or something at the end.

2:47:16Pat McAfee:Oh, wow. Look at that. Yeah, don't do that. Jeez, that's on me. Yeah, but it's all stats. Oh, it's a scroller. Yeah. Holy fuck. Like, is Hembo is getting from Hembo or what? Yeah, with ideas, too. And like, hey, remember these people did this. I'm like, holy shit, I think I'm supposed to pay for the information you sent to me. But thank you, Jack. God bless you. Love ball. God bless you, B.A. All right, let's get the fuck out of here. B.A., do you want to do a giveaway or no? Sure. What do you want to do? Do you want to putt? Do you want to throw? Oh, we're definitely putting today. Okay. Here we go.

2:47:55Don't use that big old belly putter. Don't use that Adam Scott. He can do whatever he wants. Watch that Jabba.

2:48:03Pat McAfee:Well done. He's been that good. Look at these shoes. Pretty clean. Doc Martens? Good choice. All right, B.A. Okay. Take the glasses off so you can't see. You can do where that front one is if you want. Hold on. Hold on. Do you want to count this one or is this practice? This counts? Love it. Okay, you got to... No freebies. Move up a little. Yeah, I think you should go up to where the... The black dot is. Yeah, black dot is. Yep. I want... What is he? One of four? 50? 50, yeah. Two of four? Is two of four good or no? Two of four. We'll give 15 people$500 to repost this post. Say something nice to somebody and put the easiest way to pay them.

2:48:51Pat McAfee:All you got to do, B.A., is showcase that smooth, buttery putter stroke. Marry two out of these four, and 15 people will be happier. Those shoes are spectacular. Oh, yeah. These shoes, what are they? Jimmy Choo. Oh, hoody who? Jimmy Choo. 15 people. All you do is hit two, B.A. Rolls that one left. Rangefinder. A little claw grip. I like this little grip. He does have a little claw grip. Forward lean. Oh, he might have found it. Can he split the uprights? Both those potentially off the green. doesn't matter here, though, ladies and gentlemen. B.A. Boom. Great pace. Ladies and gentlemen, this is what you came for.

2:49:34Pat McAfee:Two-time club champion. Boom. Pulled it. Yikes. Oh, no. He looks good, though. That's good stroke. That's good stroke. You can tell he's never three-putting. We'll try it again next week. We'll try it again next week. Good putts. Good speed. That was great putts. Great rolls. Coach B.A., we appreciate the hell out of you. Hell yeah. Hell yeah, Coach. Hey, be a friend today. Diggs, why don't you come out here, buddy? Great work in the back, boys. Great work in the back. Work the place. B.A., great work today. All right. Be a friend. Tell a friend something nice. It might change your life. We're in this thing together.

2:50:07Pat McAfee:Don't block B.A. a little bit here, Tony, so he might give a speech. B.A., anything you say here? Great show. Better next week. Team on me. Team on three. We'll see you tomorrow. One, two, three, team. Goodbye. Legally, we can't say drinking Storm makes you smarter and more focused. But with zero sugar, 200 milligrams of caffeine, and immunity support, you're smarter and more focused for drinking Storm. Storm. Good energy in, good energy out. Energy for life. That refresh you've been putting off until the right deal came along? It's here! Wayfair's Black Friday in July sale is happening now, so you can finally get the style you've been waiting for for less.

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