PMS 2.0 1463 - Watt Wednesday, WWE President/TKO Board of Directors Member Nick Khan, Hayes Fawcett on Early Signing Day, AQ Shipley, & Darius Butler

18:27Pat McAfee:On that note, breaking news. Brent Key just signed an extension with Georgia Tech. Nice. Congrats, Coach. Let's go, Coach. Good move. This is great.

18:37Darius Butler:This is unbelievable. Heartline, Key. Who's left? I like to throw my hat in the ring. I will coach the Penn State Nittany Lions if they need a head coach.

18:46Pat McAfee:All right. In a sentence, let me hear why you are the person to lead the Nittany Lions into the next generation. Thank you, Darius Butler. I have won three national championships on NCAA 2K video game that you play on video games. And let me just say I ran the most efficient offense in history. I had three straight Heismans as well. And I also played five years of high school football. So, I mean, when you look at the entire kind of laundry list of accolades I have, I think I do qualify. And much like what Lane Kiffin said in Louisiana, people want to play for your systems. You win Heismans. Exactly.

19:16You win Heismans. It's high flying. And it's all about the players. Players, players, players. You can probably do it for$3 million a year. Three, look, I'm not going below three, but three is where we'll start. I'd like to get up to five, but again, I will do it for three.

19:30Pat McAfee:You're an incentive-based, Governor Jeff Landry. Exactly. I'll be incentive-based. I'll do what the other coaches have done. As soon as I lose the big game, I want my escalator to activate there once I lose the big game, but I'll get there. Joining us now, ladies and gentlemen, is a man who might actually be a great head coach for a Penn State Nittie line. What do you mean by that, actually be? No, just also. Okay, thank you. I mean, you led your bulls. I was watching. You had a good team.

19:55Darius Butler:I watched you work. I mean, it was a good offense. Different programs, too, gentlemen. I wasn't just rolling with some state, okay? I had different programs, different state, different championships. Different recruiting markets. Bingo. What's your archetype again? My archetype? I'm a motivator, baby. I'll get the boys going.

20:11Pat McAfee:He'll hit X whenever you give motivational speech. He'll give one. Give one. Yeah, bingo, bingo. A lot of this. Oh, you're the floor style. More of a Sark. I saw Sark do this a lot against Texas A &M in their rivalry game. You kind of look like Hunter or Urichek there, too, a little bit with 6-7. Well, if the recruits call for it, I'll break it out. Will you sing, baby, baby, baby? I will draw the line right there. Do you remember that? Oh, yeah. Tom Herman. We were covering the – joining us now, ladies and gentlemen, is a man who might also, much like you, be a great head coach for the Penn State Nittany Lions.

20:44Pat McAfee:He is a future first-ballot professional football Hall of Famer. He's already in the bull ring of honor. He's an incredibly non-biased commentator for CBS currently. Ladies and gentlemen, J.J. Watt.

20:54JJ Watt:Yay, J.J.! Connor, I would be happy to have you as my special teams quality control grabbing the coffee intern. That would be great to have you on staff. Okay, once again, yeah, the price starts at$3 million. So if that's what those coaches make, that's where I would like to enter. But, again, we can negotiate that two and a half with a lot of maybe a house. You know, we can go and kind of discuss. That depends on how many cookies they sell in Pennsylvania. What does that mean? I don't know. I mean,$3 million for a coffee getter. We're going to need a lot of big bags. Yeah, but here I told you what his price is.

21:29JJ Watt:You're the one that gave him the job. I don't know what AQ's given.

21:32Pat McAfee:Well, are you throwing your name into the bag here? Because you could make$5,$6,$7 million a year. I think, obviously, if they were to get a huge name, they'd get a huge name. That's like, what,$10 million is the price, is basically what coaches are getting paid. So at Penn State, at this stage, I think they lose a lot of leverage. Probably a new head coach for college is what we're thinking, probably at this point, unless that rumor about the Alabama, Kalen DeBoer situation is anywhere near real, which we don't know, but that would be crazy if he was to do that. So it's probably somewhere between.

22:05JJ Watt:Brian Kelly.

22:07Pat McAfee:How do you feel about it? Do you think he would be a winner up there in Penn State?

22:10JJ Watt:I mean, I don't know what the pool looks like. There isn't one. of all you're creating you are maybe well then yeah then then check he's a he's a head coach the first qualification made he is a head coach who could do the job uh no college football has kind of lost me uh it's it's i'm kind of with everybody man it's it's uh there's not not because players are getting paid i think that's absolutely right i think uh you know you bring us in don't worry but it's just there's just it's they got to figure it out man just figure it out like you You can't be trying to get a national championship and have a chance to actually do it and then leave for a chance at the national championship.

22:47JJ Watt:It's like, oh, that's pretty wild. I don't know. Just figure it out.

22:51Pat McAfee:Yeah, it doesn't make much sense. The calendar is insane. Head coach Joey McGuire from Texas Tech, who announced an extension immediately upon getting off of our show yesterday, could have been cool to leak that one just about 10 minutes earlier whenever he was talking to us. But we are happy for him. Coach Cignetti, same thing happened to him whenever he was on the show about 10 minutes after he got off the show, announced a mega signing for another deal. Also, Coach Matt Rule got an extension about 10 minutes after he came on our show. So that was a good announcement. So, J.J., what we're saying is you could potentially get a massive deal with Penn State if you wanted to give your—

23:25JJ Watt:10 minutes from now. Could be 10 minutes from now, guys. You have no idea. If I do, I'll call back. I'll let you know. Thank you.

23:33Pat McAfee:Just kidding. Thank you. I mean, we had a coach on the show that got signed to be a senior assistant in the NFL and didn't even find out through somebody else's tweet. It was like, I've got a heads up, baby. You got to have got a heads up before reading this on there? Listen, I didn't know if I was going to. It was a conversation. It was a, I didn't make my decision. Yes.

23:51AQ Shipley:Old school guys are different. Yeah. We're in the new age. Everything leaks out a little early. Old school. They wait till the ink is dry.

23:57Pat McAfee:No, I also think the old school guys say, somebody's leaking this, right? Yeah. Shefty's going to do it. Got it. All right. We'll just let him do that entire thing. I love that again.

24:06JJ Watt:because Chuck is in the booth next door, and he just knocks on the window. He's great. We give a little hey. He's great.

24:13Pat McAfee:He's got such good energy. Obviously a legend. This year's not going how we thought it would go for Baltimore. I don't think how Baltimore thought it would be going for Baltimore, but let's pivot to another team in the AFC that just got a huge win. Okay, just got a huge win this past weekend. I don't know if you saw on Monday, people on the internet were making despicable images. They had Lucas Oil Stadium, and then they were calling it the Stroud House. okay which it's called the lot house you heard it when you were in there what was your takeaway from the game as you were calling it and uh i feel like the colts are in trouble and i love the colts and i will be at the games i'll be supporting the colts but 40 of our offense i think 35 of our offense maybe is really dependent upon at least the threat that danny dimes could run and now we're at the point with this fractured fibula that he can't really move much now houston's defense is remarkable but i am very worried about this colts offense which has been a wagon for us going forward in the most important games as we have a very tough stretch and on the flip side feels like houston cj that defense may be clicking at the right time what is your takeaway from the game

25:16JJ Watt:yeah uh first of all it was really cool to see you and mackenzie there get going crazy in the in the suite that was very sweet to see uh up close and personal from the booth the loud house there were definitely moments where it got loud and they were into it. I think the loudest was the boos. I mean, certainly there were a couple calls that, you know, everybody knows were difficult calls and the fans let them know. So that was definitely loud. But the Colts offense, it's so clear right now that if Jonathan Taylor does not carry this offense, they will not win the games. That is just what you are seeing play out in real time.

25:53JJ Watt:It's when he has over 90 yards rushing, they're 6-0. when he doesn't. I think it's two and four. It's just any stats, any way you want to slice it, if he does not run the ball well, they don't win. They can't do what they want to do, and it all comes down to first down. Shane Steichen will tell you that. Daniel Jones will tell you that. If they can't keep their playbook wide open, if they can't run their RPOs, if they can't run their play-action pass game, their screen games to Tyler Warren, if they can't keep the defense off balance, they are not successful right now, and that's the truth. And yes, Daniel Jones has the fibula or whatever it may be.

26:29JJ Watt:But I don't think that that fully explains where the RPO game has gone to keep the linebackers off the line of scrimmage, to keep Jonathan Taylor's lanes open. So, I mean, 3-4 is tough, and they're dealing with that right now, both mentally and trying to find a way to win. Walsas is now out for a little while, while DeForest Buckner is still out. This is a massive, massive game. I mean, technically the Jaguars are in first place in the AFC South right now, and the Colts have the hardest remaining strength of schedule in the whole NFL. So they have to go into Jacksonville and win this game.

27:02Pat McAfee:I just learned that. I mean, I looked at it and I said, that looks really hard. I didn't look at everybody else's road. We do have the most difficult path down the stretch here. Is that what you just said?

27:13JJ Watt:I believe that's what I was reading in my notes this morning. Yes, I believe you have the technically hardest strength of schedule. And the stats for the Colts versus teams that are currently over 500 and the teams that are currently under 500 is not great. Thank you, J.J.

27:28Pat McAfee:Let's move to Houston. Let's move to the Houston Texans, team above 500 and certainly looking good. CJ made some throws that reminded me of, like, very good CJ. That is certainly possible out there on the offensive side. Colin seemingly available. Offense had some misdirection stuff. And we have a couple injuries, obviously, which is not great. But I thought CJ looked good. I thought the Texans' offense looked good as well. What's your takeaway on where the Houston Texans can go this year?

27:52JJ Watt:Yeah, I mean, I think CJ, he said it himself, D 'Amico said it himself, that he's still knocking off some rust. And there's a couple throws, obviously, that interception that he'll want to have back. But overall, they ran it well. They got in down in the red zone, which they have struggled with all year long before CJ. During that three-game Davis Mills stretch, they started to figure it out. And I think they're continuing that down there in the red zone. but the defense like the defense is unbelievable I mean you got to see it up close and personal it's just the speed and the violence and the intensity that they play with and you look at it they don't even do anything that crazy schematically I mean they had a couple cool things drawn up this week where they had Will Anderson off the ball over the center and he just kind of ran straight down the tracks but other than that like Derek Stingley is unbelievable Kamari Lasseter Aziz like these guys they just fly around and Matt Burke has that defense humming so it's very very tough I mean the Colts had not scored under 20 points all year long as the most potent offense in the NFL and the Texans hold them to 16 now again I'm I very rarely I'm going to bring up refs in a game because obviously the Texans had some too they had a uncatchable ball and a pass interference that certainly who says it's uncatchable you say it's uncatchable I've seen Michael Pittman go up and get something like I don't disagree I think the angles on that are interesting which is part of the reason that it wasn't brought up in the moment but there is that one camera angle that the ball lands in a garbage can 15 yards where we were sitting yeah we had a

29:18Pat McAfee:good angle on that definitely not being catchable but bill belichick has told us i think at the draft that the nfl feels very terrible saying something's not catchable because then we show some highlights of guys making catches and somebody's like so you're telling me that maybe he couldn't get it so what they're saying is that thing has to go into the stands basically for it to be not catchable which that one almost did that one almost did to be clear i do have to

29:41JJ Watt:give credit here because we, I mean, the pass interference, the delay of game, and the field goal that went over, the extra point that went over the upright, we brought in Gene Serator. And it's very difficult for these rules analysts to come on here and say that a call was wrong because those are their officials, brethren. Like, those are the guys, they've been out there. They know how hard this is. They know how hard that job is. And so for Gene to come on with us and be honest and open about what he was seeing was great. And I very much appreciate it because I think it does help us in the honesty and trust with the viewers that we're just calling it like we see it i mean that actual point like in the moment it was just an honest reaction of whoa how did they call that good uh and then you try and slow it down and try and explain all the angles and everything but i get it the ref's looking up directly at it so he saw something there but at in the moment live on tv for us it was that was tight well especially with the timing

30:32Pat McAfee:of it all to your point i mean the delay of game non-call into the phantom pass interference into the touchdown into the missed extra point you call good it's like those are three calls all wrong in a series of like four different plays that lead to them scoring a touchdown taking a huge lead uh in the fourth quarter yeah so that's why you heard the stadium and shane steik it was just non-stop i mean it was through the commercial break it was through the next stop it was an entire thing i was actually pretty proud of the loud house i was like hell yes this this is what it's supposed to do this is what you're supposed to do to these people and now the refs say we're humans and yada yada it's like well you got to be better at calling fucking football games as a

31:07JJ Watt:human then for what you just did i i love that stadium man it's a great stadium everybody in indianapolis is awesome i mean they had a great little the chamber of commerce or whatever it is i assume it was you sending it uh no no they're a good group of people that visit indies good group people they're good they are i mean i had i had stuff for koa and nico in the hotel room when i got there everybody there is phenomenal but there is a guy i don't know if you know this i Ian Eagle knew this and I didn't, so maybe it's just common knowledge and I wasn't aware. There's a man downtown Indianapolis that plays drums on a bucket nonstop all day forever.

31:43Pat McAfee:Well, I don't know if it's all day forever, but yes, there is a bucket drummer downtown who has made a lot of money off of, you know, what's it called? Busking? Yeah, busking. Busking or whatever? Yeah, he has gotten plenty of drunk money from me, I will say, but it's not all day. every day. I mean, he takes a break, I think, whenever there's not a lot going on. I mean,

32:03JJ Watt:my hotel room was in direct earshot of him, and I don't know if there were breaks. I didn't catch many of them until midnight when I was watching the Cal-SMU game and saw that was a wild ending there. But yeah, I was up late thanks to him, and I got to watch college football that I had not been planning on watching.

32:25Pat McAfee:Shout out to him. Shout out to you watching more ball. It's good for your soul. and I feel like you probably got a lot more information through a little bit of heated exchange. Let's go to the tail of the tape, please, can we? Oh, this is good. So this is Walt versus Olsen. Yeah, 40 and 36 years of age. 6 '5", 6 '6", 255, 288. Is that accurate weight for you?

32:49JJ Watt:No, not now. Now I'm like 272.

32:52Pat McAfee:Okay, not to be too exact. I'm on a scale every day, 272. Greg might be a little slimmer, too, so maybe 235 to 272 right now, whatever the case, a little bit more ripped. Three Pro Bowls, five Pro Bowls, Player of the Year's three of them. Super Bowl appearance is one. Opinions on stats, loves them, likes them. Okay, so let's go ahead and let's get into this a little bit. Okay, Greg Olson is talking about the modern world with the modern information that we have with modern strategy. And I think what you saw, what a lot of people saw, is him saying it's not debatable at all. And then you automatically come in like, okay, analytically, it's absolutely correct.

33:29Pat McAfee:But let me debate you here. Now, this obviously spurred a massive amount of conversation, which stats and football people have been happening over the last few years. Where do you stand on all of it right now? And how is the timeline or the mentions since all this has started?

33:46JJ Watt:I mean, the thing that's funny about this is that I agree with his stance. Like the analytics and the stats do tell you that. I am saying that that is absolutely correct. All I'm saying is that there are people who offer counterpoints to that. So I think the non-debatable part is the part. Now, numbers-wise, analytically, sure. You can say that the numbers provide no debate. You cannot debate the math of it. All right, that's fine. But I'm just telling you the reason that I put that out there was because there's obviously a massive faction of the fan base in the NFL that would like to debate that or at least offer a counterpoint as to why.

34:28JJ Watt:And that's all I was doing. I'm not, it's just, you know, the analytics and everything, while maybe 100 % accurate and factual, it's just becoming so hard.

34:38Pat McAfee:That's the issue, is it's not 100%. So nothing is 100%. So therefore it is debatable. And even something that is 100 % that maybe we think could become a non-100%, it is debatable. I think that's what you're thinking about. And the stats people, and, you know, stats obviously have been involved in the real world for a long time from what I've been told. Now it's happening in sports media coverage. And the stats people have a natural instinct because they've been taught this, and this is how their brain functions, that the stat is the end-all, be-all. But every side has a stat somehow. I've realized that every side can pull a stat that makes their argument better, no matter what it is.

35:13Pat McAfee:so it can't be the end all be all ever which is what got everybody pissed off is when greg olsen says this ain't debatable it's like greg don't fucking do it okay you're a football guy can't have you doing that because humans and momentum and vibe and everything matter like that matters in real life in theory it doesn't in numbers it doesn't but greg you know in real life that matters so that's why i think everybody kind of got mad at greg like greg you can't be this this can't be who you are because you know the humans matter but on that note the stats people have a lot of information for us go ahead jj yeah and i agree like on a broadcast you should at least

35:50JJ Watt:mention why they're going for two there and that the numbers support it and that the analytics support as well but i also think that you can mention the opposite side of it and what fans at home might be thinking in that moment and the emotion and the adrenaline of a game etc i mean at the end of the first half of the colts texans game this this week the texans decided basically that they weren't going to push down there for points and instead were just going to kind of settle and ended up getting nothing out of it. When they had the ball with like a minute and 38 seconds left and two timeouts, and they got a successful play on first down, they very easily could have pushed the ball down the field.

36:25JJ Watt:And I discussed that on the air as to why I believe that that would be the right thing to do, to move the ball down the field, try and get points because of everything in this game and how much you trust your defense. D 'Amico Ryans believes that that's not what he wanted to do. He wanted to play it safe and conservative, thrusting his defense and going into the half on a more safe note. He said as much at halftime to Evan Washburn. That's fine. We disagreed with how we saw that. I discussed the reasoning for both sides, and ultimately he went his way. But for me to stand up there and say, this is the only way possible to do it, I mean, come on.

36:59JJ Watt:There's a billion different ways things can go down, and there's a billion different reasons why people do things.

37:04Pat McAfee:But we would like to let Greg Olsen know we love him. Oh, yeah. Like, love Greg Olsen. Greg Olson, we love you. We appreciate what you've done for ball. Let's not forget that you're a ball person, though. Okay? This isn't video game. This is humans. Yeah, nerds are getting to them, man. No, no. The nerds are good. The nerds are good. Sometimes. Well, I guess anybody can be good sometimes. So it's not just a nerd thing. But nerds are good. They have been good for football, I think, and good for the sports world.

37:30AQ Shipley:And some people suck all the time. Skill point, too. Like who? Yeah, you're right.

37:35JJ Watt:There are some. There's no need to. He educates a lot of people. I learned a lot of stuff from Greg. He does a lot of great stuff.

37:43Pat McAfee:But we saw that tweet and we're like, Greg, come on. If you end it with the not debatable, just mute the tweet and then have everybody else debate. And then you just started a great conversation. I did see that he was responding so therefore there was debates happening. So it was technically, I guess, debatable is what people, it was an ipso facto situation. But we would like to let Greg know we love him and we think he's incredible in the booth. and he was part of my retirement video. That's right. I love Greg Olson. Form a team, man. But we see this for D-Bot down there in Carolina. So we read this tweet and we're like...

38:16Pat McAfee:Gee, Reg. Greg, momentum's real too, Greg. Don't even tell me it's not. I don't need you to... Because that's what the stats people...

38:22JJ Watt:They got numbers for that, though. They got numbers for that.

38:25Pat McAfee:What's that?

38:27JJ Watt:They got numbers for momentum. There's... No. No, they say momentum's not real.

38:33Pat McAfee:It does not exist.

38:34JJ Watt:Well, no. So on, okay, they have numbers. They presented me with them, and I read it all. I read it all because I want to educate myself. Maybe I'm messed up.

38:41Pat McAfee:No, because you want to battle. Yeah, go ahead.

38:45JJ Watt:They have numbers for what happens to an offense in each situation. Do they perform better with more pressure on them, or do they perform not as well? They have a number for every single thing that you want to try and throw back at them, which is great. That's fine. That's good. You and I, we've all been on a sideline. We know what it feels like on a sideline. We know what it's like in the locker room. We know that you could present us with every number, reasoning, rationale in the entire world for why a decision is the right decision and the wrong decision and still not get it through to us. And it still won't matter in the heat of battle on the moment on the sideline.

39:19JJ Watt:So all I'm saying is, been there.

39:23Pat McAfee:These numbers are coming from humans. And yes, you can look back on a thousand outcomes and say that. But each individual situation is situational. I mean, that is an actual thing. That is just kind of the difference between in theory and reality. And that's kind of in everything, not just in sports. So we like to tell the stats people, like, we appreciate what you're doing, but that's theory. Everything you're operating in is theory because of outcome prediction. This is reality is what we're telling you. Can have really good insight on this, but each reality is its own thing. You might have, just my position, you know, kicking, punting.

39:55Pat McAfee:there was games out there during seasons in which i made pro bowls in which you didn't see me hit uh many shanks at all where i thought every time i was going on the field i was going to hit a shank imagine if i hit two shanks give a short field to the other team what's the stats on our team winning or losing and i'm just one tiny piece of the the entire puzzle let alone like everybody else having a good day or bad day at positions that matter you know as opposed to what stats are telling you so we're just trying to say let's live the reality is i know i don't know all the

40:23JJ Watt:answers. I know I don't have them all. All I'm going to do on the broadcast is try and present to you the options, and we'll all watch it together and see what happens.

40:31Pat McAfee:You have good energy in that booth. Yeah. It does feel like you're having a good time, which we love. Don't get jaded in there, JJ, even if stats people are trying to take you down. Now, you can be jaded in...

40:40JJ Watt:Nice booth in Indy. Halftime food. Very good in Indy. Very good. They had shrimp with St. Elmo's sauce. Phenomenal. And then did not see this coming. Barbecue board. Mmm. phenomenal there was sausage there was brisket there was burnt ends there i mean it was fantastic lathered in sauce not the best thing to eat while wearing a suit before going back on the air but

41:06Pat McAfee:didn't stop me brother so indianapolis uh indianapolis appreciates everybody coming through here you know you talked about visit indie people even yourself i assume like the indianapolis sports corp corp or whatever also a part of that like very much love ball in sports here and very much set up to host it. Hotels, very easy and close. All the restaurants and shit are all in the same area. The arena's here. The stadium's here. We are, and the city loves ball. They're trying their best. I appreciate hearing that from you. No, it wasn't a gift from me. I want to leave you a bag of flaming poop at your door.

41:41JJ Watt:Texans weekend. I got the Colts again this week, so you'll be able to watch it. You'll be able to watch it on Sunday. I got them at the Jags this weekend. Going to be a good one. Very good one. Jags run defense. Phenomenal.

41:51Pat McAfee:Oh, no. Who, for Jacksonville?

41:53JJ Watt:Jacksonville has not allowed a rusher over 70 yards this entire season.

41:57Pat McAfee:What was the stat you said about the Colts? Yes, perfect.

41:59JJ Watt:The Colts, when Jonathan Taylor rushes for 90 or more, they're 6-0. Yes. So this is like an unstoppable force and movable object 2.0 because that's what Houston was this last week. Jonathan Taylor versus Jags run defense.

42:14Pat McAfee:Yeah, but you said that the injury doesn't make up for all that. You don't think there being zero fear of Danny Dimes keeping and running off the edge does anything to help Jonathan Taylor frontside?

42:24JJ Watt:I think it certainly helps, yes. Okay, thank you, James. I just want to make sure I'm not on Greg Olson's side here. With slants and in-breakers and everything behind to help open it up. I mean, and also it's tough when the game goes a certain way, and obviously Jonathan Taylor's going to rack up yards when the game is. And then it's the fourth quarter and he gets to add.

42:44Pat McAfee:Sorry, there's some breaking news in the college football world that just popped on my screen here. Ohio State commit Chris Henry Jr. has not sent in his paperwork to Ohio State yet. Oh, geez. He's weighing options, according to him, at both Oregon and USC. This isn't a money thing. This is clearly a Brian Hartline thing. He wants to make sure he makes the right decision. It says, at Tom Loy 24-7.

43:05AQ Shipley:Oh, no.

43:05Pat McAfee:Oh, shit. Holy shite. Developing story. Let's go to Hammer. Dad, dad. AP Tone. Tone, it was reported that he signed with Ohio State this morning, and then now he's weighing his options. He was out there on the West Coast, matter day. USC, obviously, giving their pitch. Oregon as well. We know Oregon can keep up with anybody. I don't know about USC.

43:27Darius Butler:Yeah, I think it's very interesting because they said not money-wise, and I kind of believe that because Hartline is leaving for USF, obviously, and then Oregon just lost their offensive coordinator to Kentucky, the only one without changes on the offensive side of the ball, huge offensive side of the ball. is USC, who currently has the number one ranked recruiting class in the country. The first time in 18 years it hasn't been an SEC team.

43:51AQ Shipley:Oh, shit. Okay. Good stat. Thank you. They already got an Ohio State commit. Yes, they flipped one today already. And now they want another.

44:00Pat McAfee:Uh-oh.

44:02JJ Watt:And he's been in Southern California. Brian Hartline gets a ton of credit. I still don't know if it's enough credit. It is just absurd what that guy did.

44:08Pat McAfee:Pipeline. And he's great at recruiting Florida. And now he's going to USF. Feels like that. No offense, USF. Okay. We had good battles with USF. I respect USF. I love what USF's about. Feels like we're one year, two years away from him having a situation pop up with massive school somewhere. Bam. Who knows? Bam. Every year there's going to be a massive one open, it feels like, going forward, which is why, like, Lane, do you need to go now? And then Lane's like, yeah, this is the one to get. Every year there's seemingly one of those. That's big news out of college ball. Chris Henry Jr. is a guy.

44:44Pat McAfee:yeah ooze yeah it's got the he's ooze and chris henry so and he's six six or something where did

44:52JJ Watt:you come down on lane on them either letting or not letting lane coach the games for us i never

44:59Pat McAfee:so this is a theory reality thing again you know which we do a lot of in theory because we in day to day sports get dunked on a lot because we have to deal with theory and reality right we're trying to project what the future is while what's happening right now so i think we kind of get exposed to that you look like a doofus for saying this this is not real life on a more regular basis than maybe other people so i think like herb street saban i think a lot of the people that were saying he should be allowed to coach his team he recruited that team he built that team they've had the best year like in theory in a movie that's really good like that is a really good thing signing day is happening right now okay so this is early signing days taking place transfer portals in the middle of the playoff run so lsu which i assume lsu would have been good with him coaching old miss has kind of been the conversation i don't think lsu wants him to be focusing on old miss either he wants him focusing on transfer portal signing day and lsu as a whole in old miss you got to get recruits in here and potential transfer portal guys and they potentially see the building or talk to the building and it's lane that's running the building he's in the office of the head it's like uh i just don't think i don't think it would have ever been a good situation so i didn't think it was ever going to happen now in theory though good movie story guy six years turns it around does this whole thing gets offered this dream job he needs to stay with his team and shit like that like that's the angle that they're going from but like in reality i with the way signing day is and with transfer portal and with the amount of tension and storyline that's on all these college football playoff teams it's like in reality i don't think it would have ever been good for anybody like i think it would have just been would have not been great so i didn't think it was ever going to be able to it's in the same

46:42JJ Watt:conference and it's like it's not like like like i look at uh summerall going from two lane to florida like that's two lanes a great program but that's clearly going from one level to a different level that's just a fact like old miss to lsu old miss is in the same conference and currently going to be in the playoff and the team he's going to is not so like the fact that it's I completely understand why you'd... I do not understand how it was even a possibility of disgust. I just... I can't. I don't even... I understand everything. He built it and everything, but to leave and then want to stay to coach it, that was just crazy.

47:18Pat McAfee:It never made a lot of sense to me either, but there was... I think there's people that are pulling for like, those are his boys. They did the training camp together and blood, sweat, and tears together. Then stay with him.

47:29JJ Watt:That's it. That's the option.

47:31Pat McAfee:Well, but those boys can go with him, So that's kind of a part of the – which LSU or Ole Miss was saying, like, okay, so now you guys are going to go through a playoff run and what? At the beginning of every game, you could potentially say, remember, boys, this is happening in a new place next year. Let's go. And just all of it never really would have worked.

47:47JJ Watt:I love to have my cake and eat it too. It was great.

47:50Pat McAfee:Which I never really understood that. So people were getting cake and then they weren't eating it. They were just allowed to look at it. So then at one point somebody was like, you're actually allowed to eat it too? And they were like, whoa, what an asshole. I don't really understand how that all came about.

48:04JJ Watt:No, you have a plate of cake. You either eat the cake and it's gone, or you have the cake and don't get to eat it. Those are the only two options. You can't have a piece of cake and also eat that piece of cake. Now, if you have multiple pieces of cake, then you have options. But if you only have one piece of cake, you can't have it and eat it too.

48:23Pat McAfee:Okay, and you can't have two cakes in this situation, which is what he was trying to do. He was trying to eat some cake down there at LSU.

48:30JJ Watt:Do a double fist in cakes. Do a double fist in cake. While holding this cake still, which he already nibbled off of.

48:36Pat McAfee:Already nibbled off. Six years he's been nibbling on this one. Now he's got a new one over here. It was never going to work. How do you keep everything balanced? You don't have enough plates or forks. Can't do it. Oh, he's a yogi, so he's pretty good in balance. Well, you're right. Let's talk about forks and spoons and soup. Let's talk about the Pittsburgh Steelers. AQ Shipley has a question for you, Jage.

48:56Darius Butler:All right, JJ. Pittsburgh Steelers, when I came up, When I grew up, the standard was you can't let a running back run for over 100 yards. This week, they ran the same play. It wasn't creative. It was two tight ends, downhill runs over and over and over for 250 yards. What's going on in Pittsburgh?

49:15JJ Watt:Yeah, unprecedented. I mean, trust me, I landed at home, and I checked the score, and I looked at the box score and I was like, holy shit, what happened? And then I found out that it was duo just over and over and over and over and over and over. And it's like, no, you guys couldn't figure it out? Like nobody figured out? Like, hey, maybe we – so, I mean, there's some gap integrity issues. There's some tackling issues. There's all sorts of different things there. And clearly, I mean, you listen to the comments from the locker room after the game and they've got to figure it out. They're sitting there, and it's kind of one of those situations where them and Baltimore this weekend, they're both tied for first in the division, and so whoever wins this one is actually going to be sitting in a pretty good spot, but I'm not sure either of them actually feels all that good about where they are right now.

50:14JJ Watt:Pittsburgh just seems like the same situation year after year after year. For some reason, the offense can't quite get it going. The defense hasn't been performing that well. They're either feast or famine. They get takeaways or they just get roasted. That's just kind of what it is. It feels like every single game they're waiting for one massive play to split the entire game. And if that doesn't happen, then they really, really struggle.

50:38Pat McAfee:Ben Roethlisberger was on football and he said, I'm just kind of spitballing here. Maybe Tomlin just goes and beats the head coach at Penn State. There's an idea. Maybe he gets a new fresh start. And I think his name was floated for USC a couple years ago.

50:50JJ Watt:and he talks about how you think he wants to go do recruiting lsu it was lsu okay so a couple

50:56Pat McAfee:years ago it was lsu i guess which was being described as the best job in college at that point because that's how tomlin's name was even mentioned it's like do you think mike tomlin with the amount of years without a playoff victory without the fans are starting to kind of soil uh turn and everything like that would he want to take this massive job in college then he got a press conference said i have the best job in football i'm the head coach of the pittsburgh Steelers and he walked off and I kind of put it to bed. But now it's really loud. It seems louder than ever about this entire situation.

51:24Pat McAfee:More stats are getting thrown out. And Ben Roethlisberger was like, everybody's talking about the Steelers fans wanting a refresh and a reset. It might be good for Tomlin to get a reset as well. And then he just threw out the Penn State job because he's in Pittsburgh around a bunch of them. And there were some people saying, why would he ever say Tomlin wants to go to Penn State? And it sucks that that's how people are viewing Penn State, by the way. Penn State is just like, I don't think Penn State people love that they're being talked. You guys are being talked about as if you were too late.

51:48JJ Watt:Well, no. Why would anybody want to go to college over the NFL? If you're an NFL head coach, there is no reason why you would rather be a college football head coach.

51:57Pat McAfee:Who do you think potentially could be good at Penn State that you just thought of? I mean, it just feels as though everything is going south in Vegas and that Pete Carroll is going to get fired and he would be perfect at Penn State. Now we've got to wait until February to get to head coach, which would be pretty late in the entire cycle there. They're already there. They're already there.

52:14Darius Butler:We already missed the day. It's too late. No, there's transfer portal coming.

52:16Pat McAfee:The big one's a transfer portal that's coming up. You can't hire an 85-year-old.

52:19Darius Butler:You might as well hire Joe Paul. Thank you. They would if they could. They're going to end up getting a guy like Matt Campbell from Iowa State, who is a good coach, but who people at Penn State will go apeshit and be like, this is the guy we waited to hire. That's where it's tracking. Don't give them an extension. It's Campbell or Braum or Dayball. Or Matt Nagy. I still think Matt Nagy's a top tier option. Chip Kelly's free agent.

52:42Pat McAfee:All right. Let's go back to the Pittsburgh Steelers. They might have figured it out, though. Adam Thielen has signed with the Pittsburgh Steelers. Congratulations to the Demon. Yeah. Adam Thielen. That's what they're calling him on the internet. And, you know, there was a tweet from a few days back that said, Mike Tomlin will say something like, we can't eat soup with forks. We need spoons. And the Steelers will sign a 2018 Pro Bowler to the practice squad. Well, we don't know if the Demon Thielen's on the practice squad or not, but we didn't hear the spoon and fork with the soup line. could be on the way.

53:15Pat McAfee:It's a great metaphor, actually. And also, Tomlin would say something exactly like that, but we know this guy was a monster in 2018. I mean, an absolute demon in 2019. There's a chance Adam Thielen gets a resurgence out there with Aaron Rodgers, one of his really close friends. Obviously, they're golfing friends. And the Pittsburgh Steelers are making yet another play as the Minnesota Vikings say, yeah, Adam, you can go finish your career somewhere else if you want to. Now, let's pivot away from them. Let's talk about a couple teams that are real. Go ahead, D-Budge.

53:43AQ Shipley:Yeah, talking about teams with fresh starts new head coaches uh vrabel first year in new england ben johnson first year in chicago both the young quarterbacks going to week 14 now pat's obviously on a bye week but going to week 14 both these guys on top of their respective conferences how do you feel about the team right now and kind of i guess what's your trust level and confidence level in these both teams making a real run in the playoffs i think it speaks to what a great head coach can

54:09JJ Watt:do for a team with the requisite roster to start with. You obviously have to have a certain talent level to be able to start with, but these two coaches have come in and done a phenomenal job with their new teams. I mean, I've talked about Ben Johnson multiple times, but just the things that he does and how blunt and honest he is about correcting issues that are wrong. This week, he talked about the passing game. If you go back to their bye week, he talked about fixing their running game and ever since that bye week their running game has been on fire it's been unbelievable so now he's talked about fixing their passing game and you would imagine when he says something he's going to get it fixed because that's what we've seen before just his players respect it and not only is he fixing things he's doing it while winning like they are in first place in the nfc that's the chicago bears who last year had a complete collapse and fell apart he came in and has done this, and he hasn't even had that full second offseason to do everything he wants to do.

55:08JJ Watt:So I think the sky's the limit there when he continues to get Caleb to develop. And then Vrabel up in New England has obviously done an unbelievable job. I think everybody knows he's a great football coach. I would imagine that there's some people in Tennessee wishing that they hadn't let him out of that building because of what he is able to do. It's just they're good. Everybody points to their schedule. You can only play who you can play. who like that's you just play and win and go out there and do what you do um he's he's a great coach and he's disciplined and he teaches these guys how to play hard he talks i loved his answer about that hit when jackson dart was going out of bounds and ellis laid the hit on him and he was like i i we show our guys every single week we show drake may the plays of other quarterbacks getting hit and we tell him if you stay in bounds you're gonna get hit that's football and i love that and i think that the players love playing for a coach that says stuff like that and publicly goes out there and defends them.

56:03JJ Watt:Phenomenal.

56:04AQ Shipley:Hey, real quick on the run game. Can we talk about you put those clips up real foxy with the Chicago Bears run game? How does the impact that Caleb Williams, like the fake play action, him rolling out, holding that fake? How does that impact the D line?

56:16JJ Watt:Yeah, you see 50 Phillips right there on the edge. He has to stay out there that extra second because you know what Caleb is capable of. You see him take that tiny little jab step up the field like a just in case. Did he keep it? Because Caleb can do anything. and that's what Ben Johnson has done best with the Bears in my personal opinion. He knows that their passing game isn't where it needs to be right now, so he has schemed up that entire offense to minimize the negative impact the passing game can have.

56:44Pat McAfee:And if you look at what Detroit's run game is whenever they have bad days and you watch what Ben Johnson does with Chicago, it's like, tell you what, man, maybe that guy did do it all. All right, we appreciate the hell out of you. That was great. That's J.J. Watt. We'll see you on the other side. Goodbye.

57:01Darius Butler:And we're live from the living room as Doug eyes up the matchday spread. He's reaching for the Buffalo wing. Perfect. Hang on, what's this? Oh, he's going for a can of Pepsi too. Incredible. What a finish. Sensational combination. Look at the delight on his face. There's no doubt about it. It just tastes better. Matchdays deserve Pepsi. Food deserves Pepsi. Grab a pack of Pepsi Zero Sugar for today's match. It's poetry in motion. MLB.tv on ESPN is your home for every out-of-market game, live or on demand. Catch your favorite teams and players, plus MLB Network and ESPN app features like Multiview, syncing your stats, key plays, bets, and fantasy all in one place.

57:49Darius Butler:Sign up now for MLB.tv in the ESPN app. Separate subscriptions required, blackouts, and other terms apply. Visit stream.espn.com slash MLB TV for more information.

58:05Pat McAfee:Football is magical. The Toxic Table is here at Boston Corner and at Ty Schmidt. Nine-year NFL vet Darius J. Butler is here. Yes, sir. And 12-year NFL veteran and Super Bowl champion coach Penn State Coltis. Maybe he's the guy that should be leading the Nittany Lions AQ Shipley. AQ, we're going in the trenches later. What should we think about as we kind of look ahead to your segment spotlighting the big boys on the offensive line?

58:30Darius Butler:It's the most inconsistent group all year long. There's not one dominant group. Until recently, the Chicago Bears have taken the most consistent position.

58:40Pat McAfee:Okay, so the Chicago Bears with Ben Johnson have just become the most dominating offensive line in all ball.

58:45Darius Butler:I think it's a part that, and I think it's also a part the scheme. The scheme really does a great job, but the offensive line, they revamped the group, got all new guys this offseason, and drafted well with Darnell Wright. They've been fantastic.

58:57Pat McAfee:Good for the Chicago Bears. Seems like they've got it going on. And I saw some Hembo stats while we were talking about the Chicago Bears and Ben Johnson, Caleb Williams passing woes. And it is – I didn't know this was the case. Did you know this with the Chicago Bears? Yeah. Caleb Williams accuracy woes rank among 33 qualifiers, 22.1 % off target, 58.1 % completion percentage, and negative 8.5 % CPO, which we – CPO is big to have. Completion percentage over – all right. Who's first? Well – I think we know. Oh, yeah. Who's that? Drake May, baby. In the CPOE? In all of them. Oh, okay. You knew the CPOE, though?

59:35No, I mean, I just figured that's some fake stat. I mean, which it is. But once again, this is what I meant by the stat paper when we were talking to JJ. I get that they're necessary and I like them. I hate them. It's just too much, okay? They just do too much. I know it's necessary and I like them, but I hate them.

59:57Pat McAfee:You just said you like them, but you hate them? Exactly. It's a like-hate relationship. Yeah, well, you love to hate them, and you hate to love them. It stinks, but they're necessary, I suppose. Oh, yeah, look at that. He's the leader in all of them. I don't see the CPOE in there. It feels like there was another stat maybe created to showcase that Caleb can't complete a pass, is kind of what that Hembo stat was appearing to be. But that means the Chicago Bears are only going to get better, so good for them. Speaking of getting better, ball is only getting better, more meaningful games. Conference championship games are this weekend.

1:00:26Pat McAfee:Again, we'll be down in Atlanta with College Game Day for the SEC title. Alabama will be battling a very hot, maybe best team in ball, Georgia. Alabama beat Georgia in between the hedges a couple months back, I guess. Stopping Georgia's longest home winning streak at 33. Since then, Georgia has really become quite a wagon. Alabama as well. Alabama's won a lot of big games. Their worst performances have come over the last couple weeks. They might be worn out because of their tough schedule. So when Georgia is looking to make another run, not only obviously at an SEC championship, but a national championship.

1:00:58Pat McAfee:Let's go to Hammer. Don, Don. AP Town, Georgia Bama happening down there in Atlanta. And then one verse two happening here in Indianapolis in the Big Ten championship game. There was a chance. Actually, there probably was never a chance that College Game Day would be here in Indianapolis for one verse two. But I do know it was at least thought about and talked about amongst people that I was in a conversation with. It doesn't end up happening because I think we all expected to be heading to Atlanta. And once again, it's really cool down there. Be part of the SEC Championship, being at Convention Center, Alabama and Georgia.

1:01:35Pat McAfee:Obviously, two titans of college ball take each other on. Indiana looking to do something that it's never done before. Indiana in such close proximity to Indianapolis with so many Hoosiers in Indianapolis. It's going to be a scene, downtown Indianapolis. And then the Ohio State Buckeye faithful just three hours away whenever you talk about hopping on 70 and traveling directly to Indianapolis. So this is going to be insanity here in Indianapolis. What should we expect from the game? Obviously, Julian Sane is a Heisman favorite, as is Mendoza. We assume they'll get their touches in. Defensively, Ohio State's supposed to be historic.

1:02:12Pat McAfee:Indiana better than they were last year on the defensive side, much better than they were on the defensive side. Over under 47.5. What is the expectation and thought for this one on Saturday night?

1:02:22Darius Butler:Yeah, I think this is going to be a large, large Hoosier contingent, obviously, it being in their state, in their town. Obviously, Ohio State coming off a national championship. They go to the Big Ten championship literally every single year. I think it is going to be a heavy, heavy Hoosier crowd on Saturday because it's the first time they've been in the Big Ten championship, I don't know, I think ever. But there's only two teams in the country who are ranked top five in both scoring, offense, and defense, that being the Indiana Hoosiers and Texas Tech Red Raiders. Obviously, Ohio State is number one on defense and then really good on offense, just not in the top five.

1:02:57Darius Butler:Obviously, Carnell Tate, Jeremiah Smith come back last week. Julian Sane is a Heisman favorite. Both defenses are incredible. Both offenses are incredible. They are the two most complete teams, a lot of people think, in all of college football. That's why they are number one and number two. It's going to be a very, very – remember, Indiana went to Ohio State last year and was kind of overwhelmed by the crowd. There was a muffed snap punt situation that happened, a punt return that happened, and things kind of got out of hand. And Indiana was never tested before that game last year. Like, they've had some good tests.

1:03:30Darius Butler:They went to Oregon, to Iowa, played some close games. Obviously, at Penn State, played a close game. So they've been tested. They've won all of them. I think it's going to be a really good game.

1:03:39Pat McAfee:I think so, too. I think it's going to be worth the price of admission, which we did pay, and it is a lot. and hopefully there won't just be a jib sitting in front of our suite again there better not be there definitely will be and uh that entire thing just becomes a character of the story because they are choosing to charge us the amount of money that they're charging us to put us in that seat and then they are choosing to put a 15 foot tall jib directly in front of our uh seats so they're doing that on purpose it's malpractice but to be clear it is kind of cool to not see a portion of the game it is and not really know what's happening in those things even if you try to get to the jumbotron we'll just wait the top is actually blocking the whole jumbotron so it's actually a fun little game keeps you on the edge of your seat yeah and it trying to dance around the it's coming at your head actually because it's trying to get a shot over top so it was you know i felt like i

1:04:28AQ Shipley:felt like i was felt like i was a boxer sweet science it was a sweet science wasn't it you know

1:04:35Pat McAfee:sweet science has a lot of good things the cardiovascular conditioning is just second to toughness, quickness, being able to defend yourself. But the business seems to be out of sorts, doesn't it?

1:04:45AQ Shipley:For a while.

1:04:46Pat McAfee:And that business feels like it's out of sorts all the time. It feels like it's chaos. It feels like if there was something that was a little bit more structured, a little bit better managed, maybe something that was about the development and hopefully about the heightened spotlight on the sport, that'd be a great thing. Fat chance. No, it's happening. What? From my understanding, it's happening. now i do not have a contract with any company currently that is about to be represented in this conversation so before people start saying that this is a biased conversation because i'm getting paid by these people i've certainly been paid by this company in the past because they do business with business that we do business with and i don't want people to think that i'm contractually obligated to have this conversation because there is a congressional hearing i think about what we're about to talk about tomorrow what i will say though is the people or the person i'm about to speak about and speak to are people that i have immense respect for that are incredible businessmen and everything i've ever seen them touch has had success so if they're looking to get into a sport that we all love that could potentially thrive in the future better we are certainly going to be in support of that ladies and gentlemen joining us right now representing the zufa boxing promotion founded by tko the current president of the wwe ladies and gentlemen nick hahn yeah how you doing buddy gentlemen thank you for having me back did you see me do the suit thing there i'm not getting paid by this guy but i do know this guy so i don't want people to think that i'm out here lobbying for a guy but if i was to lobby for a guy it would be this guy in whatever he was doing so thank you for joining us but this does feel like a pretty pivotal moment for a sport that i know you've loved since you were a child can we dive into this a little bit You, born and raised Las Vegas.

1:06:31Pat McAfee:Las Vegas didn't have any professional sports teams because obviously they were worried about the gambling aspect and all that type of shit. But boxing was obviously hubbed in Vegas. You lifelong boxing fan, is that accurate? And then whenever you learn of TKO getting into the boxing business, how excited are you to kind of showcase that knowledge and also maybe change the sport that you love for the good in the future? thanks for the question and first and foremost congratulations on the post that sam uh put up the other day thank you uh to you her mckenzie love everything going on in your life especially your personal life so congratulations on that thank you so much nick yeah baby boy on the way hopefully happy healthy everything like that i'm scared to death on how big of a pain in the ass this thing's going to be but i am honored and pumped to obviously meet the baby boy but let's get back to the conversation about you changing boxing because you know wwe obviously you've been a wrestling fan you understand wrestling i think you were a uh ticketer a ticketing person at uh wrestlemania way back in the day like you've been a fan you've been able to implement you've been able to be a part of it you've been able to utilize your massive business brain to help that particular business tko obviously doing it with dana white ufc him being able to now you're getting into boxing and kind of relaunching boxing as a whole do you feel like a personal thing with this because of your lifelong fanhood and i don't want to share too much personal stuff but i get gifts from nick con every once in a while they're usually boxing references either a boxing book or a boxing photo or a boxing quote i think you have posters all over your shit that are boxing people it feels like boxing is really the home of your heart how does it feel getting involved with it and what is kind of where you're at in the whole process right now so i'm going to answer your question right now i don't see the most recent gift on your studio set anywhere the one that you received pre-Thanksgiving.

1:08:19Pat McAfee:No, we got one right here, brother. Oh, there we go. By the way, that's the limited edition black box set compared to the blue box set. Of course. Hulk Hogan in the black box. Yeah, and this thing will stay up here until the end of the world. Yeah, we know that brother. Says the man who dressed like Hulk Hogan at the last Wrestlemania, which we greatly appreciate. in terms of boxing number one keep in mind i did grow up primarily in las vegas as you said there were no professional sports at that time dana white also grew up primarily in las vegas so as a kid who didn't have or as kids who didn't have a lot of money in a pre-cable world in a three network world so before fox even existed there was boxing on nbc abc and cbs almost every weekend.

1:09:15So the local paper would cover it. The local news would cover it. I used to be a paper delivery kid also, which enabled you to get free newspapers in the morning and afternoon. So grew up a huge fan of the sport and progressively over the last 40 years or so, saw the sport start to die in the United States in particular, where if you look around now, outside of our announcement, Zufa's announcement with Paramount Plus, alongside UFC's big announcement with Paramount Plus, boxing does not exist on any major media conglomerate outlet, again, outside of Paramount. It's time to put some effort in.

1:09:54We think there's a chance to bring it back to where it should be, and we'll see if we can get that done.

1:09:59Pat McAfee:Okay, so let's talk about the chance and what you need to happen, basically, in your guys' eyes for this to really take place. I think what you're looking to do is put together obviously your own promotion develop boxers develop fighters and also have your own ranking system and kind of run your own boxing world a la what UFC is doing in mixed martial arts and WWE does with professional wrestling but obviously we're talking about very different things here with when it comes to boxing and all that but that is basically the goal right from my understanding what TKO is trying to do which is why you guys are kind of the ones that are going to be heading this this is also something that you both understand very mightily.

1:10:32Pat McAfee:And then that leads to what's coming tomorrow. And I just really learned about this and read up about this. I guess the Muhammad Ali American Boxing Act is in act right now. And I guess there's a lot of holes, a lot of flaws, a lot of different things that people take advantage of. There's a story this morning where Terrence Crawford was stripped of his titles because he didn't pay a fee back to the World Boxing Confederation or whatever it is for$300 ,000. So they stripped his title because he didn't pay them that amount of cash afterwards. And so he's not the champion because he didn't pay them.

1:11:06Pat McAfee:They stripped him, whatever the case. It seems like really odd timing that this news gets released right now when tomorrow, I believe, there is a conversation happening in Congress about a little bit of an evolution of this or a revival of this particular act. And I know Zufa is a massive piece of this, but you're not the only ones. There's a lot of boxers that are backing this. There's a lot of people in the boxing business that are backing it. There are retractors, obviously. Can you tell me about what you guys are trying to do and why people would not want you to do it that are in the boxing world?

1:11:35Of course. So, first of all, on the Terrence Crawford side, you watched that fight on Netflix on September 13th. Terrence Crawford, amazing effort against Canelo, who also had an amazing effort. Terrence Crawford unanimously won that championship. championship. So how in fact is it two and a half months later that he's no longer the champion of the World Boxing Confederation because he didn't pay a fee? That would be akin to the Los Angeles Dodgers, whether you're a Dodger fan or not, having won a grueling seven-game World Series in one of the greatest game sevens of all time. It would be like if Major League Baseball came to them and said, well, you didn't pay us a fee, so you're no longer the World Series champion.

1:12:17It's only in this sport of boxing where you see nonsense like this. So with the Muhammad Ali Enhancement Act, what we're looking to do, everything that the act already has will stay the same. If you're a fighter and you want to do it the old way with the World Boxing Confederation, and by the way, the gentleman who runs that organization, this is supposed to be a non-profit organization, going into Canelo Crawford, said he couldn't stay in a regular hotel room. He needed a suite. He wanted to make sure that his tickets were front row. He wanted to make sure there were ample number of tickets. It all seems quite odd to me that a sport would be run that way or quite odd to us.

1:12:55So in the Enhancement Act, all of that, if you're a fighter and you want to continue with it, nothing changes. This is presenting an or, a different option, where if you want to come into a unified boxing organization like Zufa or anyone else who wants to create a unified boxing organization, come here fight with us we'll have our own ranking system the champion will fight the number one contender just like in the ufc and if the number one contender is not available then the champion fights the number two contender so rather than 17 weight classes and 15 different championships and people getting stripped for no reason let's do it in an incredible way okay so i love the thought

1:13:35Pat McAfee:of that common sense seems like it should be able to happen because right now there's what the wbo the wba the wbc the ibf and the ring all have their own rankings and then they kind of are the ones who decide who gets titles who doesn't get titles they kind of run it all what you guys are saying is yes we would just like to add a new ranking system as well like what what would be the detractors of this why would people not want this to go through if you're just adding to something as opposed to maybe eliminating things so number one the ring magazine uh is does it right Right. So it's the ring model is based on the model.

1:14:09We're basing our model in part on the rings model, which, again, the champion fights the number one contender, the lineal champion, if you will, to be the man. You got to beat the man not to make this about Ric Flair, but that's exactly what you have to do for the ring championship belt. It would be the same thing in Zufa. So detractors, anyone and you know this, you've seen it with your own show on ESPN. when someone comes in to disrupt, the people who aren't by nature disruptors don't like it. So what do they do? They say, hey, he doesn't do it this way or why is Pat McAfee not doing it that way?

1:14:45Whatever the things that have annoyed you over the course of time, many of which we've had private conversations of, sometimes it's multiple things in one day, that's all normal. So you've disrupted. And by the way, your viewership numbers and your ratings are reflective of the great disruption that you've caused.

1:15:02Pat McAfee:come on significant viewers hey that means a lot coming from you you know that the boys you know that we we really feel you yeah nick you are held in high regard around here because you are an absolute dog so we appreciate you saying that but yes uh we understand that anytime you rattle or shake some shit up a little bit that has been the same way for a long time people that are bums and don't have brains and don't know how to kind of evolve or get better are going to be upset that their cash cow is potentially getting ruined is that what you were saying because that's what i kind of experience.

1:15:27That's exactly right. So what you've said and what we've said to each other about your collective show, you and the boys, it's the same thing with Zufa boxing. But I also say what I've said to you in private, what are they supposed to say? The establishment? Oh, Dana White's coming into boxing. Let's just go out of business. Let's just give up. Or hey, Pat McAfee's coming in here to disrupt. Let's just go away because our model is not as good as his model. Of course they're not going to say that. They're going to say any negative thing they can. That's expected. We don't care. If we care about you, as I care about you and your team, then by nature I care what you think.

1:16:04If we don't know who you are and you're simply upset that we're coming in, we don't care about this. Go on and live your life and we'll do our thing.

1:16:13Pat McAfee:Okay, I love you. And I love what Zufa is seemingly about. From everything you're saying just makes perfect common sense. I'm not from Boxing World, though. I couldn't even imagine the voices that are going to come out and say, well, it kind of ruined my life, though. I did see you doing some boxing moves in your warm-up there. You look like you've actually, you know, by the way, you're very lean right now. We probably put you in, you know, 147 pounds, something like this. Very lean. Yeah, I don't know. I don't think the real one's for me. I'm Oculus boxer, but I am. I got it, but all I know is when Sam was pregnant with McKenzie, you weren't lifting up the shirt like that yeah you're right you told me you said hey you know it's tricky you know sometimes maybe a little extra this extra that now you got it fully in shape yeah we're locked in we got a morning routine we're working out i went and saw those drill instructors you know for that uh for that movie i went and watched these drill instructors operate and then now we're around a former drill instructor on like a weekly basis and boy you really change the standard in which you kind of view yourself uh with how they operate like in the morning as you i'm a shaver now i shave my face now which was never a thing maybe because i have a jawline currently and that could go away at any time i'm irish that thing can go right there uh very quickly but it's like watching these drill instructors they like look at other people's face like 5 a.m 5 15 a.m see if it's like oh you lost this morning because you didn't shave like you you immediately woke up and you lost like because there's always that kind of looking at you like do you want to wake up shave and go out or do you want to snooze for another 10 minutes or whatever.

1:17:46Pat McAfee:So it's like the way they... There's also another thing about not shaving. And you can see, I don't fully shave with a razor. I have some stubble here. And some of the gentlemen on your show may not fully shave. Those of us who aren't as naturally handsome as you, we got to cover it up a little bit. Exactly. No, no, that's where I was. Thank you. Everybody needs to relax, okay? I was a bearded man, okay? Believe me, I've been hiding a lot for a long time. You changed, bro. I did not change. I did not change. I'm still a bearded man under there, but what I'm saying is, watching these DIs operate, it's like I've forced myself to almost be like, well, I'm a piece of shit compared to these.

1:18:24Pat McAfee:So it's like I've tried my best to become better for myself, but also for like, I would like to live. I would like to live for the good of Mackenzie and obviously Baby Boyd is coming, so I've tried my best, man. I'm trying to stay in shape and do it right now. And for your eventual return to WWE, I know you're trying, I'm focused on college football. I'm building out my empire. This and that. When are you, I've already gotten six text messages since we got on this five minutes ago. When's McAfee coming back to WWE? Look at you. Six text messages. You probably got one, maybe. And now you're working.

1:18:57Pat McAfee:That's good. Kayfabe, baby. That's good. Kayfabe, baby. Many, many, many. This is just since we got on. Yeah. Yeah. But those are all world leaders. That's Nick Khan football, baby. Don't you worry. I am in shape and obviously huge Survivor Series. Congrats to you guys. Heard 48 ,000 people at Petco for that thing. That's awesome. Unbelievable. 48 ,000 people. And by the way, some of the things we do at WWE and what Dana and Lawrence Epstein and the team do at UFC, we actually schedule events so they make sense for a city. Boxing doesn't do this, by the way. You'll see boxing consistently up against college football, against NBA finals games.

1:19:33This past Saturday, yes, big rivalry college football Saturday. But keep in mind, we go in the evening. Michigan, Ohio State was a long-distant memory by the time we started. We did it from the San Diego Baseball Stadium, Petco Park. They were amazing hosts. Why did we do it there? There's currently no NFL team there. So if the San Diego fans have been at home watching stadium events, wishing they had an NFL team still, and saying, hey, I'd like to go to a big stadium event, well, guess what? WWE had one for you, 46 ,000-plus people in attendance, and we think great matches across the board.

1:20:06Pat McAfee:You said a couple names. One name I think I knew, but I didn't know the person there. He kind of snuck it in there. Lawrence Epstein. Oh, Larry. No relation? No, yeah. I understand what you're saying. I think I know that. No, I don't know that name. So, Lawrence Epstein, you've met before. He's a senior, senior executive at the UFC. Listen, sometimes now because you become so famous, Pat, you meet people, and then two days later you might say, I've never met this person. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Definitely there. What did he say? Hi, I'm Larry? I don't think I heard full. I hope so. I don't think I heard.

1:20:42Pat McAfee:So we just need to clear the air here on who the hell Larry is. Who is Larry? First of all, Lawrence Epstein, by the way, is on the board of trustees at Vanderbilt. Very strong football season for Vanderbilt, as you know. Right. So with Lawrence, who's an excellent executive and has impeccable credentials, now not only are we talking to him about UFC and boxing, but we talk about Vanderbilt football. And you saw the obviously rankings last night, you know, strong season for the Big Ten, strong season for the SEC. We'll see what happens. Either way, Lawrence will be in front of one of the subcommittees in Congress tomorrow presenting the proposed addition to the Muhammad Ali Enhancement Act.

1:21:22Everything that we just talked through. And anyone there can ask him any questions that we have. this is a bipartisan bill introduced by a republican congressman and a democratic congresswoman as you know that's very rare in today's political environment and we think we have uh really strong support we're going to get more support people want to see the sport fix yeah i think so and

1:21:44Pat McAfee:it sounds like you have the people to get it right we need to say though old buddy no relation right larry no relation no no different thank you yeah because congress you know we're doing the whole thing. That's a bad time to have that name, but he's a good time to have a good brain, it sounds like, because he's obviously a band of UFC and everything like that. Okay, so tomorrow, let's hope everything goes well. Bipartisan's a big deal in the world that we're in right now. It doesn't feel like that happens for anything. I'm happy that it seems like our government is coming together to hopefully make a sport that we all can fall in love with be lovable yet again and understandable.

1:22:19Pat McAfee:Now, to that note, D-Bud has a question about the operations.

1:22:22AQ Shipley:Yeah, I know AJ will have a ton of follow-up questions but I'll move back to boxing uh real quick so you said uh or you said uh being a disruptor in this space and the first thing came to my mind is Liv because I'm kind of a casual boxing fan and got into golf a few years ago and and once they split a lot of the golfers are kind of shunned the world rankings got misconstrued so how would this impact I guess boxers ranking overall and all the different you know WBC and all the different uh ranking systems Yeah, so look, Liv came out, and by the way, our partner in the Zufa venture is Turkey Alsheikh, who you guys know.

1:22:59God bless him. God bless him. Different than the group that was backing, different group than the group that backed Liv Golf. So what we're going to do here, we're certainly, if Terrence Crawford's a super middleweight champion of the world, you're never going to hear us say, well, he's not the super middleweight champion of the world. So all of that will be acknowledged. we're just simply going to focus on what we're doing, which is let's have the best fight the best. So rather than matchups, there's an upcoming fight where there's 11 to one favorite in the main event, not our fight, of course.

1:23:30We're not going to do anything like that. Let's do it the way the UFC does it, where you go in and it's either 50-50 or 60-40, and let's have competitive fights. And by the way, if you lose, no problem. We'll bring you back if you made a game effort, and if you showed for the fans, you'll come back, you'll fight again. And why only fight twice a year? When did this start? Sugar Ray Leonard coming out of the 1976 Olympics, gold medalist. The next year he fought nine times. And three years later against a gentleman named Wilfredo Benitez had a massive fight. It only took three years because the frequency of his fights.

1:24:06And obviously he knew everything to do in the ring and had charisma and all of those things. That's the better model than just show up twice a year and then go away. We'll continue with our storytelling year-round. We want to build characters, and certainly we'll build those characters based on their actual personality.

1:24:22Pat McAfee:Now, finding these types of guys or girls to be able to build these stories is obviously not easy, so I think it's going to be a lot on you guys to potentially develop. Go ahead, Ty. Yeah, Nick, do you think this new model and the new revival of this act, will that help create stars easier? Because I think casual boxing fans, that would be their argument. It's like, hey, I'll always watch a Canelo fighter or whoever the biggest fighter is, but then a lot of times that guy is fighting someone who clearly is not game, does not belong in the same ring, so we don't really ever get the opportunity to see stars built.

1:24:54There's just three or four guys at the top, and they're kind of just fighting everyone else. Do you think it's possible with this that we'll get people that we can see rise up the rankings, and it's like, oh, this guy, he's a verifiable star, and he's risen up the rankings, and we've followed that rise? That's the absolute goal here. So one of the many problems in boxing is what you just articulated. So if there's three or four boxers that the general public knows, and that might be stretching it. If there's three or four boxers, why not try to make that 20 to 30 to 40 to 50? So it's not that only three to four boxers are skilled.

1:25:30It's only three to four were showcased properly the right way. And of course, they have to have the skill in ring to do it. But for us, we think we have a promotional machine. That's what we are at our core. You have UFC and Dana, promotional muscle. In my opinion, the greatest fight promoter in the history of the fight game, Dana. You have the WWE's promotional muscle, which you guys have lived through it. We know how strong that can be promoted. What you can't do is just put together a fight, do a couple of boxing interviews and say, hey, please watch my fight on a network that people have not heard of.

1:26:05You got to have some promotional muscle behind it. we think will provide that and we think we can develop more stars with that stars move the

1:26:12Pat McAfee:needle you know that everybody knows that stars move the needle but you got to be able to have supplementary you know as you're kind of freeze up there as you're talking about changing the entire sport there welcome back i uh i'll be pumped to watch you guys do all this because you would think with how busy you both are running these multi-billion dollar companies and having to deal with all the things that you have to deal with trying to expand globally both of you dana and you do business in every city in the world basically a lot of time for you both to have to pick up now not have to get to i guess is how you guys would describe it because how much you love a whole new promotion how does that change your life how does that change dana's life like how are you guys well here's what i would tell you for the people who are busy in this world let's take you for example i've never heard you complain about i gotta go shoot this movie now i gotta get Oh, now I have to go to game day.

1:27:06Oh, now I have to go. Like the reality is if you want it and you clearly did you, Pat, and your team did, you go and get it and you don't complain along the way. So we are willing participants in this. We think we, the one thing that we can do at TKO that we don't believe anyone else in these spaces can do, we can outwork you. so there's no issues in terms of that stuff and it all starts with that here and if we're willing to answer i don't know that there's ever been a time and you correct me if i'm wrong that you've called me and i haven't either answered or texted hey give me an hour i'm on a flight or this or that i'll get you right back right the same applies across the board and you do business

1:27:46Pat McAfee:and you live your life the same way no i do not you know that i i am a okay not answer i'll answer you yes yes i will answer you and your entire tko group as you freeze up there uh all act the same way that you're talking about the business minds that are at this tk group tko group are second to none outrageous it is absolutely outrageous and uh congrats to them coming together and being able to work together you know because obviously ari and mark shapiro yep okay aria manual mark shapiro incredible prowess, not only in deal-making, but in business across the board. If you look at the good fortune that we've had in the TKO stock, if you look at that good fortune, it's up and to the right, not jinxing anything.

1:28:32You got Dana White. You got a whole plethora of people at the UFC who work with them. You got Triple H. You got all of our executives at WWE, and you have a really strong executive group at Zufa. You'll never hear us complain about, oh, we're tired. Oh, we have to work so much. I watched a reality show on Netflix about some other boxing promoter and all I heard in the show was oh my god I'm exhausted. I need to go play golf now. And it's a great hobby for people who do it. But please don't tell me you're exhausted if you're going out to play four or five hours of golf. Tell me you're exhausted.

1:29:04By the way, tell your mama if you're tired. Don't tell me.

1:29:09Pat McAfee:That's a dog. You just heard a dog talk. And that is why we respect the hell out of you man. and we assume this is going to go great. We cannot wait to get to your fights. We cannot wait to experience what you guys build over there with Zufa and congrats on it all. And tell Larry, good luck tomorrow. That's a crazy last name to have. That's crazy. I'll tell you. I understand. I'll tell Lawrence, who's good people who accept my representation, you like when you see him. You'll be like, oh, yeah, I do like this guy. And as you know, the Pat McAfee, I like somebody. That's not the easiest hurdle to get over.

1:29:43so he's one of uh your guys he's one of our guys and he's gonna do great nick you're the great he

1:29:49Pat McAfee:literally hears everything about everything so whenever i'm in war with somebody which happens a lot of them dress like how he dresses you know because of what we talked about here at the beginning so i'll say something to somebody that they have never heard before i assume right nick i assume some of these people have never heard anything that i am telling them i would assume I said, I all I know is I'm not going to mention any names. Certain there are certain executive changes that happened at ESPN. Other executives reached out to you sort of trying to, you know, form some sort of bond. But executives who had already by you not done right.

1:30:24And I think your response to one of them when they said, hey, I'd like to sit down together, this and that. Your response was you're next. Like the Goldberg. I know people would need more context to fully appreciate that, but I know you know what I'm talking about, and the boys know what I'm talking about. So, yes, Lawrence Epstein, friend of yours, friend of all. He's going to do great tomorrow.

1:30:49Pat McAfee:Okay, good luck to him. Good luck to you. And shout out to you guys celebrating Cena, man. That should be a massive ordeal next Saturday. You're talking about GOAT and basically all aspects of it and his career post-WWE because of how damn good of an actor he is. is about to be gigantic as well so you're talking about legend out there i think you guys have uh truly celebrated him next saturday should be insane right i think that's what we're all kind of assuming that's right next saturday december 13th that's heisman day you got army navy during the day you have no college football at night you have no nfl they have not moved to saturdays yet as of december 13th and you have john cena's final match uh exclusively on peacock uh in the united States, and it's going to be a great show.

1:31:32By the way, you talk about people who work their behinds off, who never say that they're tired. Cena, you know him. You never hear him say, I'm so tired, I can't believe this, I have to do this or that. He just does it. And when you talk about the GOAT, that's GOAT mentality. He deserves everything that he's earned in his life, and it's our honor to help see him out.

1:31:52Pat McAfee:It's either Gunther or LA Knight. If I was him, I'd be trying not to be in there with Gunther. what were the grouper chops like brother my first one first one i took okay because you can't i was running around slapping myself in the chest just seeing you know i was in the lead up to it i was just seeing what i could do you know kind of like matthew mcclonee but as hard as i possibly could in the shower a little bit of wet i'm like let me see i'm smacking the shit out of myself there trying to see what it's going to be like when i realized i would never be able to hit myself as hard as he's about to hit me and uh that first time i go up over ropes i stumble a little bit because I see him almost, he's almost ready.

1:32:27Pat McAfee:Then I go to get him, and I'm exposed completely like this. That's a big mistake. I had not felt one of those. My entire body's like this. Yeah, it felt like I was going to die. As soon as that thing hit me, it felt like I was going to die. The sound popped into your drum, okay, off my own chest, and then my sternum just kind of deflated my lungs. So it was a cool time. It was a lot of fun. Everybody enjoyed St. Louis out there. It was a lot of fun. Listen, we're going to bring you back. I know you and I are going to sit together once college football slows a little bit. but by the way how weird is it in the shower why does it hurt less the self chop in the shower than it does out of the shower is there a film of water i don't know yeah i don't know i don't know what that is it sounded like a shotgun when he hit me though that first time yeah it was violent and remember i had that bruise here because his elbow yeah his elbow hit me here on one of them while he's out here and i had a bruise for like a week and a half that was a contusion not a bruise Yeah, he's vicious.

1:33:21Pat McAfee:Oh, jeez, I'm dying. Oh, I hit a boot to the stomach. I hit a boot again. McAfee's getting his ass made by Gunther, who's the most violent champion in the history of the W. Yep, yep, I wanted it. It looks like a little Triple H right there, doesn't it? It looks like a little Triple H right there. Nope. Down. Dead. Dead. Those things. Those tremendous, tremendous match. Yeah, so we'll see. LA Knight, Gunther, who's going to be John Cena's final opponent? Either way, it'll be a great show and a great match, and we'll see Cena out the right way. All right, we appreciate you. Please tell Larry we said good luck tomorrow.

1:33:51Pat McAfee:Please tell Dana we said congrats on now officially running a boxing promotion. Had a great launch with Canelo and Crawford. Now we'll see what you guys can do in building an entire organization to make boxing a sport that is consistent and hopefully great for the next, what, 100 years. Let's see what we can do. Thank you, gentlemen, always for having me and for being so gracious with me. I really appreciate your time. Please tell Suit we said what's up, and he did great here. He did great setting this whole thing up. suit did a great job we like shout out i know we like we hated suit at the beginning at one time at one time we met suit he was working for another company and he had all the answers and i think he was forced to have all the answers and boy i did not like his answer so that was uh that was an immediate nope i'll leave some go ahead please no no that's what i said to chris nope that's what i said to him when i met him some people maybe you i'm not saying this but some people when they meet new people may not necessarily like them at the outset and trust has to be earned over time rather than other people who embrace people right away and then get disappointed by people so suit as you know has proven himself over time to you that's pretty gentle to the team to the team to the team yeah suit suit came into our house a long time long time ago suit came into our house when he was working for a different company and he sat he sat at my one of my desks and then he was you're welcome using my internet with my heat and drinking my cold water okay cooking bacon in my kitchen and then all of a sudden he had all these answers i'm like who the fuck are you why are you talking yeah right i don't talk about the internet how about 2022 wrestlemania dallas you show up you're running 15 minutes 20 minutes late i'm so sorry i'm late what we said what what happened what are you doing he said oh i'm setting up the internet in my Airbnb.

1:35:41And our question was, you're still setting up your own internet? Can we get someone to do this for you? And boom, here you are now. You're not setting up your own internet anymore.

1:35:51Pat McAfee:Well, our internet needs fixed now. If you have any answers, we are currently in the middle of it. But Nick, we love you, man. We appreciate you. You're the best. Good luck with everything. See ya. Thanks again. That's Nick Khan. Yay, dude! I'm not getting paid by any of his companies right now, at this exact moment. I'm not under contract under any of his companies. I might take a UFC fight. I mean, shit. Yeah, you might be boxing. Yeah, maybe I'm in Zufa. Yeah. You versus Michael Cole. I need one round. He climbs mountains. He does like, he runs like six, seven miles a day, that guy. Yeah. I don't know if he's still doing that, but the last time I was around him, he was running like six, seven miles a day, like relentlessly doing it.

1:36:32Pat McAfee:That's what boxing is, right? Oh, yeah. That was the whole Conor McGregor. You have to know how to box. but Conor McGregor, Floyd Mayweather, whenever that fight was happening, my entire take was like, Conor McGregor right now is not going to take on something he's not good at. Like, why would he do that? He is on top of the world. Why would he sign up to get his ass beat? Like, I don't think that's going to happen. And then I was watching videos of him, which I will do for any sport if I see a couple highlights and I know what's possible. It's just like golf. Like, I'll hit one good shot and I'm like, that's golf as opposed to all the other bad ones.

1:36:59Pat McAfee:I'll see a highlight and I'm like, that's possible. So if that's possible, that's what I want. I saw Conor working it. I'm like, Conor McGregor's going to win this fight. He's bigger than him. Conor McGregor's going to win. He's younger than him. And then every boxing person was like, in what world does Conor McGregor beat Floyd Mayweather? Floyd Mayweather doesn't get hit. And I'm like, yeah, but Conor will get hit. Conor, he's pinpoint accuracy. Brings it. I mean, there's no problem. And they're like, this is going to be 12 rounds, I think. It's going to be 12 rounds. What do you think happens around like 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12?

1:37:31Pat McAfee:I'm like, Conor McGregor's a fighter. He'll be able to figure it out. they're like no boxing is just a different animal it's like if you have the stamina that is a part of what your boxing weaponry is that's why floyd mayweather can hop out of bed right now off of a plane where he's counting a bunch of money get into a boxing ring and beat the out of anybody because he can last 15 20 rounds for the rest of his life if he wanted if he wanted to just get out there that's a that's a tough sport to be good at like if you have to earn it oh yeah like that's shitty there's no pill to get better at cardio there's no like you can't take an injection to get better at conditioning.

1:38:05Pat McAfee:You actually have to earn that shit. And that's why boxing is special, I think, because it is so damn hard. It's obviously changed a lot of people's lives and trajectory. It's a spectacle. It's an event. And hopefully it becomes great. Because I'll watch a couple of boxing a year. You need the stars.

1:38:21AQ Shipley:Bud and Canelo, you need the stars. You need star power. You need the big fights multiple times a year. I'm not sure about actual boxers fighting three, four times a year. You need heavyweights, ideally. Yeah. Ideally.

1:38:34Pat McAfee:You don't think they're going to fight three times a year? I hope not. Just for their own good being? Yeah. Nine times sounds crazy. Well, that was before anyone actually knew what, you know. You probably shouldn't box nine times in a year, but. Yeah, I assume the sell will be, here's the amount of money per fight. If you want to do three of them to move up our rankings, you can do that now. If you want to do two fights, cool. But you're going to lose out on this opportunity to get these fights. These guys are going to be doing this amount of fights against these people. There's going to be a point system.

1:39:03Pat McAfee:Hey, you do whatever you want to do. They're just telling you it's possible if you would like to do it. And if you're losing fights, they're not going to have you continue to fight, I think, a lot. Only going to be for the winners. But I do appreciate that I say if you do lose, you're not just necessarily kicked out of the federation. That's because they're probably going to have to sign contracts and pay these people for a long time. So then there's a minimum salary, it would sound like. Yeah, probably. I mean, I'm sure there is in the UFC, too. Right? That would sound like there would be a minimum salary, at least.

1:39:26AQ Shipley:I don't know how that would work, though. Could have worked like the PGA. where you're making X amount of money no matter what, and they have not a retainer but money for some of the other things that you would need while traveling.

1:39:39Pat McAfee:That guy's last name's crazy. He's got a big conversation tomorrow at Congress for the good of Zufa going forward. Just snuck that in there. I didn't hear that coming. You got me, you got Dana White, and you got Lawrence Epstein, and he'll be talking tomorrow. You know him very well. Yeah, you met him before. You like him. I met him. I don't remember meeting him. Oh, wait, wait, wait, wait. So much things. This guy's name is Larry, right? That's not that other one. No relation. Yes, no relation. Thank you. Just needed to hear that. So he will be going in tomorrow for a big deal. Hopefully they'll be able to figure it out.

1:40:07Pat McAfee:Today, big deal for college football. Early signing day. We've had so many flipped commitments both in the recruiting process. I'm going here publicly. Actually, no, I'm going here publicly. And then now even on signing day, we have people choosing different schools. It's always been like this, but it's spotlighted and highlighted even more with all the different business opportunities and what schools can maybe provide at the very last second if somebody goes to another school all of a sudden we got an extra 75 000 that just opened up hold the phone where do you want to go here's this could be chaos ladies and gentlemen joining us now is national recruiting reporter for on three sports ladies and gentlemen hayes faucet

1:40:48Pat McAfee:hey great how are you thank you so much for joining us obviously insane day let's talk about some of the storylines that we've seen here early. West Virginia's eating. Is that basically what's happening here with the Penn State recruitment and decommitments? Penn State is kind of reaping the benefits here. What are you seeing from West Virginia before we get started into all the national stories?

1:41:08AQ Shipley:Yeah, no doubt. West Virginia's doing a great job. You know, obviously a few weeks ago, Kevin Brown, rival's number two interior offensive lineman, came on the show and committed to the Mountaineers. He was previously committed to Penn State this morning, we saw four-star safety Matt Sieg flip his commitment from Penn State to West Virginia. Coach Rich Rodriguez is doing a great job. And also behind the scenes, there's a recruit to watch. Four-star running back Amari Latimer from Georgia. He's currently committed to Wisconsin, but there's some talk behind the scenes that West Virginia's working to flip his commitment.

1:41:47AQ Shipley:We like Amari!

1:41:50Pat McAfee:That's what we would like over there at West Virginia. Come on. He's a running back, you said, from Georgia?

1:41:55AQ Shipley:We're so running back, yes, sir.

1:41:56Pat McAfee:Look at the offensive line that we're getting, brother. Look at everybody that's coming in. This is for you. We need Amore up there at West Virginia. Wisconsin? Yeah, right. Now, I feel dirty kind of even doing that on signing day. You know, it sounds like, you know, kind of trying to steal somebody's commitment to somewhere else. But there's been a lot of that. Can you tell me a little bit more about the Chris Henry Jr. story? Because I think either on three or Rivals reported it. We follow along very closely. We love what your guys' business does. we appreciate what you contribute to college football that Chris Henry Jr.

1:42:26Pat McAfee:staying at Ohio State or going with Ohio State then an hour or two later it was reported he had not signed his paperwork yet Chris Henry Jr. is a game changer Brian Hartline obviously leaves Ohio State today are he's still there throughout the playoffs but leaving Ohio State to go to USF what are you hearing about Chris Henry Jr. and USC has the number one recruiting class in the country and maybe going to add Chris Henry Jr. to it or is Oregon going to do their thing

1:42:51AQ Shipley:yeah so as far as chris henry jr goes he had a announced a ceremony at a school this morning and he announced that he was going to stay with ohio state however he hasn't officially signed his letter of intent it hasn't been sent into ohio state so it's not officially done until that happens um behind the scenes i'm hearing that oregon and usc are both making a push um again like i said it doesn't really mean a thing to that pin hits paper and i'm hearing that both of these schools are continuing to push really hard to make that happen.

1:43:23Pat McAfee:All right, Hayes. We need you to stay in it and on it. We got questions for you. Go ahead, Ty. Yeah, Hayes. After Jared Curtis, who was either the number two or number one quarterback in the class. Everybody's like number one or number two. Exactly, depending on who you look. After he flipped from Georgia to Vandy, is Vanderbilt slowly kind of becoming a destination in the SEC? Do you anticipate their class being very very good this year especially with Clark Lee signing an extension

1:43:49AQ Shipley:and being there for a while yeah no doubt no doubt about two hours after Jared's um flip from Georgia to Vandy I had a 2027 wide receiver reach out to me and we uh committed him to Vandy and then today about 10 minutes before joining the show um Vanderbilt flipped three-star wide receiver Owen Cabell from Alabama. So that's two big-time SEC program flips, you know, flipping Jared from Georgia and then Owen from Alabama. Vanderbilt's doing a great job.

1:44:21Pat McAfee:Yeah, I'd say Vanderbilt locked in Clark Lee. Obviously, I think Diego last week with Bustin' with the boys alluded to Curtis becoming the next quarterback, and I don't think everybody kind of knew who it was or what it was. And then whenever this flip happens, obviously it's just another message from Vandy that they're for real, because obviously financially you have to be able to keep up with everybody else. And maybe Curtis is the next one to continue to lead Vandy into the promised land of the SEC. Let's go up to the Big Ten country, shall we, Hayes? You know, as we started this show, Penn State ranked 138th in the recruiting, early recruiting and signing day here.

1:44:55Pat McAfee:They were just above Akron, which we were mind-blown by, and right behind Montana State. Well, now there's an update. They are now currently sitting at 150th. Yeah, CFP Kings report that with yet another flip to Virginia Tech, Penn State's recruiting class now sits 150th overall. So obviously things are going well for the team that fired their coach earliest this season and still don't have a coach. But on that note, AQ Shipley, Penn State cultist, former Remington Award winner for the Penn State Nittany Lions, has a question for you about where they sit now versus maybe later.

1:45:28Darius Butler:Yeah, back when I came out, there was no early signing period. Obviously you see where they're at right now, and obviously the transfer portal plays a major role in what goes on now. But how much usually changes between the early signing period to the final signing period?

1:45:41Pat McAfee:Yeah, who's not signing right now? Yeah, so in terms of that, pretty much 95 % plus of these high school recruits

1:45:49AQ Shipley:are signing in December because they want to go and enroll in the school of their choice in January so they can get ahead of spring practice, get in the weight room, learn the playbook, all that good stuff. So in terms of that, there's not really many recruits that sign in the late signing period anymore. I mean, I would say 1 % to 2%.

1:46:08Pat McAfee:So it's 99 % hay in the barn. You guys are ranked 150th right now. Still got some hours left, though. Still got some hours left. One of the schools reaping the benefits recruiting-wise with a brand-new head coach, the former head coach of Penn State, James Franklin's squad down there. Tone has a question for you.

1:46:26Darius Butler:Yeah, Hayes, I do. a lot of that Penn State dropping is because I saw I see all over your Twitter timeline is James Franklin flipping commits from Penn State to Virginia Tech and also I've seen like the hashtag be great Virginia stay great Virginia or something like that how has James Franklin done in his short time at Virginia Tech and do you know where they're ranked right now or where around where

1:46:45AQ Shipley:they're ranked right now yeah Virginia Tech is recruiting at a very high level under James Franklin obviously he had those built-in relationships with those recruits that he had committed to him back when he was at Penn State. There's been 10-plus recruits that were committed to Penn State flip to Virginia Tech, and now the Hokies stand at the number 25 class in the 2026 Rivals team industry rankings.

1:47:12Pat McAfee:West Virginia also moving up the rankings. Virginia Tech obviously moving up the rankings, good for them. I have no idea if this is football or basketball recruiting here, this particular page, but West Virginia is moving up, so is Virginia Tech. So go ahead. What are you looking for, Ty? Slide up. Illinois is up there. Ole Miss 24. Okay, let's talk about recruiting every single year. Hayes, this is your life. Go ahead, D-Butt.

1:47:38AQ Shipley:Yeah, we know the hotbed of talent that Louisiana is, and that was the reason, big reason, why Lane took that job there. What is that LSU class looking like since Lane has taken over? yeah the uh the lsu class is looking great since lane took over they've already flipped three recruits yesterday they flipped four-star tight end jc anderson they flipped four-star wide receiver cory barber this morning and then yesterday they flipped three-star interior offensive lineman ryan mirrett um lane kiffin and company you know showed up in baton rouge and started recruiting right away um i think the tigers have one of the best classes in the country they're headlined by the number one recruit in the 2026 on three um rivals team rankings lamar brown who's shown on camera there with kiffin um i really like where the the tigers class stands and i think kiffin's going to continue to recruit well in baton rouge all right hayes we

1:48:37Pat McAfee:appreciate the hell out of you when's this end they can sign anytime i guess it just started this morning and this can go on forever?

1:48:44AQ Shipley:Yeah, so the signing period started this morning and it closes December the 5th, so people can sign from today to Friday.

1:48:52Pat McAfee:Alright, today's the third. Chris Henry Jr., will he sign them pipers or what? We'll find out. Why doesn't Rich Rod give old Chris Henry Jr. a call? I think he might have, actually. Maybe we should be giving it. Maybe he ends up in West Virginia. Oh, wait a minute. Let's not get crazy. We got a more. We got a more. You're right. He's coming from Georgia. You're right. He's seeing the big guys up front. Yeah, we're going to win this thing. Thank you for telling me that. That's Hayes Fawcett. Thank you. Hayes' Twitter account, Hayes' X account has been very active. He lives in it. Oh, yeah. Which we appreciate.

1:49:26Pat McAfee:Probably from that exact seat that he's in right there. I would assume. We're in his bedroom right there. We're at his computer. Yep. And that is where he is just. That is his workstation. That guy is plugged in in the recruiting. Because recruiting is so vast. High schools everywhere. where two stars three stars our stars their stars every star could potentially be there you said i think the number one or number two recruit because there's like number at a position number nationally for this particular website the wbo the wba the wbc the ibf there's so many different ones and tone even gives out his stores so yeah i mean it's a whole different yeah uh tone what were you going to ask about lsu because i wanted to ask him there uh the follow-up to the lsu thing but he kind of said they got a good class i kind of we got it out of there feels like louisiana in the recruiting in the signing day is a big deal to kind of stake claim of where your organization is at or viewed transfer portal seems like the much more important time right now for your team like right now but i think like the stability of your culture is kind of viewed upon the recruiting signing day is kind of how i'm looking at this right now like west virginia getting people to flip from penn state is strictly because there's chaos up there.

1:50:36Pat McAfee:What's the culture? They have no idea what it is. Rich Rod, what's your culture? We want tough football players down here. This is exactly what we are. Okay, recruiting is like high school kids believing in your culture. So like LSU, I guess they're just going there regardless. But hearing somebody's leaving from Alabama to go somewhere else, crazy to me. That's like crazy to me that they would even, because if you're at the point where you're saying, I want to go to Bama, it feels like you've already made up your mind. Like, hey, this is what I want to do. So for them, for you to change your mind, go elsewhere, it's like, does that worry me about Alabama a little bit?

1:51:03Pat McAfee:Or does that just mean somebody else opened up a little bit more money because one of their recruits that they thought they had ended up going somewhere else? Flipping from Bama to Vanderbilt is crazy. That actually is a massive... Penn State to West Virginia. Yeah, same deal. That's a big fucking deal. That is a big deal. Bama coach! I know, but that's what I'm saying. That sucks for you, but it's great for us. But Penn State, that's Big Ten recruits. Penn State guys end up in the NFL. That's an NFL pipeline. They all went back. What's that? All those Penn State guys went back just because of the tradition and everything.

1:51:38We're two months removed from Penn State having the most money, having the most attractive job. Number two. Number two in the country. And being the premier place to go. They put all this money into every single sport, not just football. They're all in on sports. And now two months later, we're at a place where Penn State is like, you don't even want to touch it if you're a coach. It's like, I don't understand how the hell we got here. It is insane. Well, and I guess I don't know if we maybe just got too ahead of our skis because, like, the reality is Penn State is the third best job in the Big Ten.

1:52:13Like, it is never going to be better than Ohio State or Michigan. Or? I guess, yeah, you could throw Oregon. USC has the number one recruiting class. Like, you know, so it was like, yeah. I don't want to – you're right here. So you're having to hear all this? No, no, no. Let's lay it on a little bit here.

1:52:29Darius Butler:You guys all have constant bias, which is fine, but at the end of the day, like Oregon's won how many national championships? How many? You tell me. Zero. Zero, but they've been to one. How many times have they had 150th recruiting class in the country? Who cares? It doesn't matter. You've got to win a national championship. That's what it's all about nowadays. The reason Nick Saban pops up there every day is because he's got seven titles next to his name. Correct? So Dan Lanning can be great all at once and tell all the great speeches and go out, recruit USC, and bring in this quarterback. And guess what?

1:52:59Darius Butler:go play in the Insight Bowl or play in the college football playoffs and lose in the third, second round. It does nothing. It means nothing anymore. You win or you don't, period. Penn State pissed off the wrong guy. Yeah, I watched it. Well, not just you. No, no, I wasn't talking about you. They're saying big deluxe, brother. Yeah, I was talking about a bigger guy.

1:53:16Pat McAfee:They're saying big deluxe at week five.

1:53:19Darius Butler:You want to fire my guy? Okay. Okay, we'll see if anybody comes, coaches for you guys.

1:53:22Pat McAfee:We don't know if that's real or not, but that is certainly a theory that has been out there, and maybe Penn State has had an idea all along. We're skipping signing day. 95 % of the signings happen. We don't want to be a part of it. We like to be a part of the 5%. They zig, we zag. Maybe that's where they're at. Or maybe Penn State's about to fall back 10, 15, 20, 30, 40, 50 years. But if they did that, they'd be good. Oh, no, maybe that's what the next 30, 40, 50 years look like. Oh, no. West Virginia's taking all your recruits. Oh, no. We'll see you tomorrow. Goodbye. That's a great way to sign off.

1:53:56Pat McAfee:Oh, no, for Penn State's just a couple big ones.

1:53:58Darius Butler:The guy's still there. The guy we've all been talking about, or at least I have. Terry Smith? He's still sitting right there. Terry Smith, yeah. Dayball sitting right there. Looks just like me. A little bald white guy right there. He's sitting right there waiting. Right there. Go get him. What if he doesn't want to do it anymore? Yeah, he might have his back turned. He might. You tap him on the shoulder and get the fuck away from me. I don't want to do that. He might.

1:54:18Pat McAfee:I'd rather just go be an offense coordinator in the NFL. You remember what I did when I did that? Five Super Bowls. Or the head coach somewhere else. I mean, he might get a head coaching chance. What are the coaching changes that are going to happen in the NFL? Raiders. I would like to. Certainly. Okay.

1:54:33Darius Butler:Maybe Miami. Well, Tennessee already is open, right? AFC North across the board?

1:54:40Pat McAfee:That Tomlin stuff is crazy. You're from Pittsburgh. You don't really, you know. No, he's not. He doesn't claim it like I do. Pittsburgh in my blood. Pittsburgh in my roots. Okay. All right. Okay. I appreciate that. He is a legacy. Hall of Famer. Yeah, he's a lot of things. He is. He's a Whippo Hall of Famer. You're right. Western Pennsylvania, Scholastic Athletic League Hall of Famer because how great he was at basketball over there in Western Pennsylvania. Certainly a good thing. Coach Tomlin, your friends and your family, obviously Steelers fans, they are a very judgmental bunch. They expect to be great.

1:55:13Pat McAfee:They want to be great. And even if you are great, it needs to be great in the way that we see it to be great. They liked the killer bees there for a while because it was fun. But inevitably, that wasn't really like what Pittsburgh Steelers football is. We need to control line scrimmage. We need to be tougher. We need to fight. That's what we need to be. And what they've been seeing from Coach Tomlin and this particular regime is above average football. So they have a winning team. They can win any game. But they prove and they can lose any game as well. And now this year, three home blowouts, okay, in Accrashire.

1:55:44Pat McAfee:They booed Renegade. You heard about this?

1:55:47Darius Butler:I heard all about it. I saw it too.

1:55:50Pat McAfee:Oh my, I'm anything.

1:55:56Pat McAfee:Boom! Fucking save it, dude. Sticks don't deserve to be played with this horse shit football team. That's what they're saying. It's getting louder than ever. Fire Tomlin. Fire Tomlin. At the game. I know. I heard it. On national television. They're chanting that. They've done that before. It has worked because they are relentless with their chance in Pittsburgh. What are your thoughts with everything in Pittsburgh as a former Pittsburgh Steeler, as a person that grew up in the area and has friends all around you as Steelers fans? Because every time I speak, I just try to reflect what I'm hearing from the streets of Pittsburgh.

1:56:36Pat McAfee:Same. And the people that I know from Pittsburgh might all be too similar and view it the same way. So maybe there's a little diversity in thought in Pittsburgh that I'm not hearing. But, man, they are pretty bummed out about this entire thing. in. I think it's actually your first takeaway. Ladies and gentlemen, AQ Shipley's first takeaway coming out of Week 13?

1:56:54Darius Butler:The Silk Curtain.

1:56:55Pat McAfee:Oh, no!

1:56:58Darius Butler:Silky soft. Silky soft.

1:57:00Pat McAfee:That's what the Ingers think of the Steelers team. It's a soft team. We're not supposed to be a soft team. It's a soft team. They're the Silk Curtain. The softest of them all. You think that's where their biggest problem

1:57:11Darius Butler:is? I do. I think you have to be able to stop the run, and I think the standard has always been set in Pittsburgh that you have to stop the run you have to get off a block you have to play stealers defense which is steel curtain not silky curtain if you get what i'm saying here so if you take a look right here steel hard silk soft look at the holes that are here nobody's getting off a block and let me tell you when i say this and jj said they just ran duo duo duo duo they ran duo they ran inside zone which if you look at it on paper they are you end up on the exact same people the blocking scheme is the exact same the difference this play right here is going to be duo so he's going to open up to his left hand off to his left.

1:57:46Darius Butler:If it was inside zone, it'd be going to the open side right here. Look at the holes every single time. These two are the smallest holes of the four I got on tape. Let's go to the third one. The third one, where do you see this one? This is unbelievable. Again, send the motion. He's reading the safety. He's pointing it out, making sure we're on the same page. Josh Allen, come down. This is a hole right up the middle of the Steelers defense. That's a big gaping hole. Right down Broadway. And they keep running the same play over and over again. This plays on third and one. Look at that. That's inside zone there?

1:58:21Darius Butler:That's inside zone. You're running it to the open side, bending it back right up the middle. You get a one-on-one with a safety. But again, third and one with a 15-yard wide hole.

1:58:30Pat McAfee:Okay, can you tell me a little bit more about football here? Yeah. Duo, you don't know what hole is going to bust open, but a hole is going to bust open to the right is what they're thinking whenever they're running it. So listen.

1:58:39Darius Butler:This is inside zone. So let's see what he opens up. Let's see what he does here. So this is inside zone. So he's going open side, inside zone. But if this was duo, he'd open up to his right, hand it off, and you end up on the same exact people.

1:58:50Pat McAfee:No, but the running back, though, any hole that's available.

1:58:53Darius Butler:So it's for both plays, whether it's inside zone or duo. Yes, there is an aiming point. There is a landmark, and you are meant – so that inside zone play, you are starting at the inside leg of the tackle. And then you can make the cutoff of there, and you can hit either frontside, you can hit frontside A, you can hit backside A, backside B, or bounce it out the backside. side. So you're literally just reading how they block it up front and find in the hole.

1:59:15Pat McAfee:Okay, can you go back to the duo, which was the play beforehand here? Yeah, so this one's supposed to go tackle right side?

1:59:21Darius Butler:Front side A-gap. This should hit front side A-gap, but again

1:59:23Pat McAfee:Which is in between Josh Allen and 64.

1:59:26Darius Butler:Correct. And if you see TJ Watts stand up, he's trying to close this down. He probably recognizes that's what it is, but they do a good job. Jackson Hawes, the rookie tight end, closes him down, you fill in the safety, and now he can bounce it outside.

1:59:36Pat McAfee:So he's just looking for space, basically. That's it. This is desired spot, but if you're an offensive lineman and you're getting beat, just carry him that way.

1:59:44Darius Butler:The whole thing as an offensive lineman is take him where they want to go. That's the whole thing they teach you. Hey, listen, my aiming point is this. I'm going to get my head on the inside. I'm going to be heavy with my backside arm and I'm going to drive. But if he's going to flow heavy this way, now I torque him and I take him that way and you cut off my backside.

2:00:00Pat McAfee:Okay, so there isn't necessarily there's a goal like, hey, this is supposed to be an A-gap run, but every run could be wherever the fucking hole is. Correct. Got it. So an offensive lineman can't be judged just specifically if he opened the hole that it was supposed to be, even though in that case, he certainly did. But there's other times where he doesn't, but he creates a massive hole the other way. That's still a successful rep.

2:00:19Darius Butler:Absolutely. And you will see later in the trenches, Green Bay Packers play, actually. Just there's a little... Spoiler. A little spoiler. They're going to be in there somewhere. Don't know where. But you will see... First time this year. Let's fucking go. Wow. A lot of guys. A lot of guys. Yeah. But you will see them basically take guys where they want. Guys will move. Defensive linemen will move. and now, okay, I was supposed to block him, but I put the brakes on and now I work back and I work with this guy, right? So it's what it looks like on paper versus what it looks like on film are two completely different things.

2:00:48Pat McAfee:Because I played peewee football over there in Plum for a few weeks. I was on 10 Diggs' team. It was a good time. I was running back, safety, linebacker, offensive lineman, D-tackle, and punt returner in about three, four weeks of action. It just so happened to be in the middle of cup soccer, which is the most important part of soccer. I made a tackle and then slid onto some cement at one field. So it was kind of like a hay. I think the national team's looking at you for soccer. How are we doing here? Are we doing okay? Are we league MVP? Are we doing okay over here? But it was a good time. I forget what it was.

2:01:16Pat McAfee:24 or something is to the right.

2:01:19Darius Butler:Yeah, so even numbers to the right, odd to the left.

2:01:21Pat McAfee:But smaller is closer to the center. Yeah, that's right. Because I always assumed that there was a hole that is exactly where we're all aiming for. But after watching James Cook do his thing, it's like, oh, he's just going anywhere. Saquon, he's going anywhere. Jameer Gibbs, he's going anywhere. And it's still a successful rep by the offensive line. It's not like the offensive line is bummed out that it didn't go through the desired gap, right?

2:01:42Darius Butler:That's exactly right. And if you look at that play, Fox, you run the play that just ran, right? If you watch James Cook, a lot of running backs bend it back even before they get the ball. But what James Cook does such a great job, and the good backs do such a great job, see how he stays frontside, setting up the block to get the seal. It keeps the backers on that side, and then that sets up the block of your offensive linemen, and then you know where the cut is.

2:02:02Pat McAfee:So whenever guys can't find a damn hole, that's problematic for you guys.

2:02:07AQ Shipley:Yeah, very. The offensive linemen go, we had one. The good ones can create them. Correct. That's it. Because we're, as defenders, we can see the bat. So we're trying to beat him and kind of get there. O-linemen can't see him. They know how to play his design. But the good ones, they'll kind of bend lean this way, get us on that, and kind of give that leverage to AQ, and then just, boom, hit it, get north and south. That was Gibbs' overtime touchdown against the Giants. Like AQ broke that down. Like the whole reason he set it up is because he leaned to the right, safety came down, went left, and then Gibbs just went the opposite way and it was a touchdown.

2:02:40Pat McAfee:That's returners on kickoffs as well. Returners on kickoffs, if they set up a block for somebody, life's a lot better. You'll see young guys just kind of hit one way, and it's like you're not helping anybody here. That's right. You're not helping anybody. We need a little bit of leverage, a little bit of help on this entire thing. Actually, a huge reason Trevion Henderson didn't play very often early on in the season is because he was getting the ball on tosses and then just running past linemen and getting tackled for two yards. That was something he had to learn. Like, hey, you need to slow down and wait for your guys to actually block.

2:03:09Le 'Veon Bell. Oh, my gosh.

2:03:11Pat McAfee:He was the best. For you guys. The best. Oh, that guy's the greatest.

2:03:15Darius Butler:I mean, he was the best. He had the best stop and start in football. He'd sit there and just hide behind guys. He'd lean his head this way. Somebody go there, and then, whoom, gone. See you through the gap.

2:03:24Pat McAfee:Yeah, they showed 45 of his plays the week we were playing the Steelers. I didn't see a single Ben Roethlisberger throw. He could do that, too. We were prepared, I think, for Lev.

2:03:36AQ Shipley:Yeah, that was – I mean, you had to be because he was dominant in the run game. And at that point, he could have been a number two wide receiver for anybody at that point too. So when he got split out, he was a problem. But, yeah, those killer Bs, obviously you had A.B., who was the best wide receiver in balls. And Martavis. Martavis was a freak. Oh, they had one more guy too. I can't remember who, but yeah. Tone probably knows. Mike Wallace.

2:03:56Darius Butler:Tone, who was it? No, it was number 11. Drawing a blank.

2:04:01Pat McAfee:Emmanuel Sanders? Wheaton. Marcus Wheaton. Marcus Wheaton. Le 'Veon Bell in the back. Antonio Brown. Martavis Bryant. Heath. Heath in the middle. Ben Roethlisberger spinning it. And I'll tell you what, we watched the highlight. Don't forget them boys up there.

2:04:16AQ Shipley:Yeah, I was about to say it. Dog.

2:04:17Darius Butler:DeCastro. DeCastro. DeCastro. DeCastro. DeCastro. DeCastro. DeCastro.

2:04:23Pat McAfee:DeCastro. DeCastro. DeCastro. Curtain's saying they're soft. Saying they're soft. Pittsburgh's saying the same thing. That's why they're asking for maybe a reset.

2:04:33Darius Butler:I wouldn't have chose silk. Silk's like a very strong thread. I wouldn't have gone soft feeling. Soft feeling. You know, it's soft. Shite. That's very soft.

2:04:41Pat McAfee:What would you say? Cotton? Curtain? Cotton would have been good. I don't like... Cashmere?

2:04:46Darius Butler:Cashmere. Super soft.

2:04:47Pat McAfee:That's the furry stuff, right?

2:04:49Darius Butler:Like spider webs are made out of silk. Those things are strong.

2:04:52Pat McAfee:Not really. Every time I bat them, they're gone. But they do wrap around my hand, I guess.

2:04:56Darius Butler:In perspective to what's hitting them.

2:04:57Pat McAfee:Well, yeah. Yeah, in comparison, I guess. But silk, too, I guess it can catch you if you really wanted to. But when you put your face on, it's like, well, this feels like it's expensive.

2:05:06AQ Shipley:Yeah, you've never been hit by Peter Parker. Boom. Miles Morales. That's a problem.

2:05:15Pat McAfee:Mine's Toby. Is that who you're talking about? Yeah, Toby McGuire. Peter Parker. Yeah. Is that who you're talking about? That's who me, too. Who's the other one? Toby did the upside-down suck on the face. Yeah, Andrew Garfield. With that lady. Tom Holland. A little respect to Tom Holland.

2:05:26AQ Shipley:Yeah, yeah. I think Tom Hollis.

2:05:29Pat McAfee:Okay, who's your Grinch? What's the animated one? Boris Karloff. No, Benedict Cumberbatch. Well, the original is Boris Karloff. Okay, so you're talking about the cartoon. The one that started it all, yeah. I'm talking about the anime. Yes, I understand what you're talking about. Oh, OG, thank you for being a classic for us. And thank you for having that name. There's no way you're supposed to have the original Grinch's cartoonist name. You're not supposed to have that. But Cumberbatch is his name? He's pretty good. I'll tell you what. I wanted to hate it because I like the Jim Carrey Grinch the most.

2:06:01Pat McAfee:That's like maybe the Santa Claus with Tim Allen and the Grinch with Jim Carrey, for me, must watch. Home Alone, too, you can throw in there. Jingle All The Way, I think you can toss in there. Obviously, there's others. But for those, I think the Grinch with Jim Carrey and the Santa Claus are the two for me that are at the top of the class. So then when the new Grinch comes in, I don't want to see this shit. It's already been done. Jim Carrey's the Grinch. That's all you see. watching with my daughter, obviously, because songs and animation and everything. It's a good movie. He's really good. And Pharrell, I think, does the music for it?

2:06:33Pat McAfee:Tyler the Creator. Pharrell might have a song, but I know Tyler the Creator was a massive part of the soundtrack. The music is really good, too. My daughter obviously loves it. So, hey, those...

2:06:46Darius Butler:Yeah, it's the same company as Minions and stuff like that. Illumination. Yeah, Illumination. Pharrell's highlighted. And they have a great lead-in for the movie. Oh, yeah. With the Minions. Oh, yeah. So good.

2:06:56Pat McAfee:Yeah, with the little rabbit from the dog searching movie. Yep. I'll tell you what. My daughter's locked. This is my first time watching kids' movies. I'll tell you what. These things are pretty good. Not bad. These things are pretty good. Good stories in there.

2:07:07Darius Butler:Foxy just went to the movies to see Zootopia, too. He said it was great.

2:07:10Pat McAfee:Yeah, it was very good. Who's in Zootopia?

2:07:14Darius Butler:Jason Bateman.

2:07:14Pat McAfee:Yeah, Jason Bateman. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, sick. It was good? Yeah, it was very good. My nephews loved it. Popcorn? Popcorn. I got an ice cold beer because you can do that now. We got all the candy you can get. Yeah, it was great. So there was little fox boys around, and we just said, hey, this is what you do. You get beer and you watch movies. Yeah, exactly, and they got water, and then we did 3D. And we steal their water because obviously the beer and the popcorn kind of leave us a little dehydrated. Yeah, you got to do that. Yeah, why don't you give them a little mop and do it? They all had huge popcorn buckets, and they each got a full candy thing.

2:07:49We didn't need to add popcorn.

2:07:50Pat McAfee:Who took them on this trip? Who was all there? The whole family was there. We haven't done this literally since I was probably like seven years old. It was awesome. That does sound awesome. I didn't know if it was under your orders that they're drinking water while watching a movie at a movie theater. Something. Something. Jeez Louise. Water's good for you. You got to drink water. Of course it's good for you. We're at a movie theater. They're giving you the amount of butter they're putting on the popcorn. So good. You're drinking ice cold tall beer out there. What? Movie thing was supposed to kind of indulge a little bit.

2:08:21And it was 3D, which I really enjoyed. Wow, you're in there.

2:08:25Pat McAfee:Yeah, you put the glasses on? Yep. Did you return your glasses safely? They don't make you do that anymore. I thought you had to do that. No wonder the environment's going to shit. People are wondering about the movie business dying. Maybe they need to start recycling the fucking glasses to turn a little profit in the entire thing. Shout out to Christmas movies, though. It's a good time to make good Christmas movies. It's nice to watch them. They always feel good. And shout out to Arnold Schwarzenegger getting it all done there. Without a doubt. Shout out to Sinbad. There's a lot of asshole parents out there around Christmas as well.

2:08:55Yeah, and to hell with that neighbor. Rest in peace. Yeah, Phil Hartman.

2:08:58Pat McAfee:Trying to slide in. This guy's just trying to work, make a living. Yeah. You're trying to bop his wife. It's fucking Christmas, dude. Exactly. Back off. No kidding. Jingle all the way. What's your second takeaway from week 13 of the NFL season, AQ Shipley?

2:09:16Darius Butler:Ben's bully ball. Oh. Yeah. And it always starts with the run with Ben Johnson. I think we always think, oh, he's so creative in the pass game and all these different things. No, it starts with the run game, and it always starts with the run game and the creative and the deception, all the stuff. Send Komet over. Send DJ Moore back. All it does is occupy the backside end. Creates the big gaping hole. You're going to see a lot of them on this one. Here we go again. Send him back. Guess what we're going to do? We're going to leave that three tech unblocked. He's getting his way. It's called split zone.

2:09:44Darius Butler:This is huge right now. All you're doing, you're stretching the front side, sending the backside tackle out, sending the guard through and cutting him off. This one's awesome. Look, the tight end in motion falls down right here. They send Darnell Wright out to the right. Jalen Carter's lost. What's going to happen? What do I do? Okay, cool. I get back up, still get the block, and walk in touchdown. Easy.

2:10:03Pat McAfee:So that's all repped, obviously. What else? Mindset? Like, in Ben Johnson's scheme and strategy is just one that these boys want to demolish people in?

2:10:10Darius Butler:He's so good. He was one step ahead this entire game. If we can run this one back in the beginning. Watch when they send the motion. and watch what it does to the safety. Okay, well, let's rock and roll. He just took the guy out of the gap and where they're running. You see what I'm saying? So the whole entire game plan is how can I create one less on defense to where I want to go? And that's what he's done.

2:10:28Pat McAfee:And he's like the best of all time at it? Because remember McDaniel was super smart on the motions and pre-shifts and everything like that. That certainly was revolutionary. They hung 70 on the Denver Broncos defense. It was special between he and Tua. I think a lot of the defenses maybe caught up to what he was doing. What does he do differently? He just does his shit with intent and purposes that are specific and a little bit different than maybe anybody else that has done it before.

2:10:50Darius Butler:He's so good at doing this stuff right here. When you put DJ Moore in the back, you make this look like it's going to be play action out here to the right, and you're going to throw a little naked hide to him. Well, it occupies that guy. Or you're going to send this motion when you know what the coverage is going to be pre-snap. You send the motion. They rock and roll the safety, and then all of a sudden, guys disappear. Look at it. Go back to this one real quick. Go back to the beginning. Watch this. So whenever he comes across, goes there. Now look. All these guys are fitting outside. so Cooper DeGene comes outside or Blankenship or whoever these guys, they all come down.

2:11:17Darius Butler:They don't know where to fill. They have no idea where to fill, but he's creating and manipulating everything to create the holes that he wants. Ben Johnson.

2:11:24Pat McAfee:You guys, I'll tell you what, man. I'm going to say something right now. I miss this. And I mean no disrespect to our O-line, Gibbs, Monty, we're running the ball. Fine. But it's not like this. And this is why everyone's like, you guys suck on fourth downs. Well, on fourth and two, fourth and three, when you've got to have it, last year, two years ago, we had some cool creative motion, run off the tackle, you know, deception, easy first down. What do we do against the Packers, Ty? Fourth and three. Just fucking go get it, man. Shotgun, hand off to Gibbs, stuffed. It was disgusting. And I was like, that's the Ben Johnson difference right there.

2:12:06Pat McAfee:Well, here's some stats to your point about fourth downs. Maybe you guys ran out of plays. Weeks 1 through 10, you were 13 of 18. Wow.

2:12:14Darius Butler:An 0 of 7. How many weeks has Campbell been calling the plays since week 11?

2:12:21Pat McAfee:It's not Dan's ball. What's your problem?

2:12:24Darius Butler:I'm just throwing it out there.

2:12:25Pat McAfee:No, yeah, interesting stats and information to drop at key times. Yeah, just throw it out there. Yeah, they're going for it a little bit. Yeah, they're going for it. Maybe the plays are already – maybe the well has run dry in four down plays, but it does feel like Ben Johnson's a special play designer. The Bears also getting Kyle Menungai in the seventh round. I think a lot of people would have just been like, whatever. But if you watch Big Ten football, him at Rutgers, he couldn't have went to a more perfect location. All right, let's go to the third takeaway here for AQ Shipley of Week 13. America's most dangerous.

2:12:57Pat McAfee:Wow, they're wanted, huh? Every team's looking for this. Instead, it's Dak, CD, and GP taking over all the highlights, AQ. It's special to watch them, isn't it?

2:13:08Darius Butler:It really is. They're so good. And it starts with Dak, obviously, because he is leading the league in passing yards. But guess what? He's got two weapons now. Just doesn't have C.D. Lamb. He's also got Ferguson as a tight end. But look at this. All these plays are on third down, by the way. Up top, you're going to see a little deep dig route. Third and six, I think it is. Third, whatever it is. Third. And he gets a 16-yard gain. Deep dig. Now check the next play here. Let's watch this. Watch this stuttering go up top. Boom. That's on McDuffie. Leave him. Go get it. Make a play on one of the best corners in the league.

2:13:37Darius Butler:Third down. Those are both on third down. Now let's get to Pickens. Okay, one of the best gets of the offseason. Again, third down. Cover zero, right? They bring everybody. They pick it up. Enough. Get it to Pickens. Get back outside. Watch this. Beat him. Now hurdle him. I mean, this guy's an absolute weapon. Absolute weapon. Now, money time. Three-point lead. Fourth quarter. Can't give the ball back to Mahomes. Third down. Go to Pickens when you need it. Winner, winner. Chicken dinner. Game over.

2:14:05Pat McAfee:Okay, so anytime you have two ones, D-Budd, obviously it's a numbers game all of a sudden, changing of the math.

2:14:10AQ Shipley:Absolutely, and they have a good running back as well, good offensive line, good running back. So they have the weapons, you mentioned it, but when you have that number one, when you're going in the game plan on Wednesday, you remember the game records that you put on the board, 88 and 3 is going to be on that. So if I'm a free safety, where do I lean? George Pickens, we saw a couple big-time post routes, and that's kind of been the conversation, take away the slant routes, take away the slant, take away the slant. But everybody knows his kind of number one thing is that deep ball. So when you have that ability and he does most of his damage on the outside, that slant is almost always going to be available because a lot of these corners are terrified of getting beat deep down the sideline.

2:14:45AQ Shipley:And then Dak, I mean, Dak is playing at an unbelievable level. Like he's not going to miss these throws. These guys are going to be open. Got a chance to watch some hard knocks last night. Like his leadership, obviously from his starts at the head coach position with Shadi. And then Dak, just seeing him on the sideline and the guys, they love each other. They're playing great ball right now on offense. Hopefully they can pick it up on defense and make a real run.

2:15:05Pat McAfee:I really like Dak. I think I forgot that about Hard Knocks they had a couple years back. It was like, oh, Dak's a dude. Like, Dak says, fuck. Dak is a guy. Like, Dak is a dude. Like, that is what I remember. I think that's why we enjoy Hard Knocks so much is because we get a chance to kind of see who they actually are, even though it's highly edited and everything like that. They're not going to bury anybody. It's an NFL Films production. But once you see the interactions and how he responds to situations and how he decides to talk to people, it's like Dak's a guy. Dak's a guy. And Shottie might be too.

2:15:35Pat McAfee:Yeah. You know, it's his first year as a head coach. There's a moment in there. They're down 21, right? And Shottie goes over to Dak and just simply asks him a question. Yeah, they're about to go on the field, and Shottie just says, like, do you still love football? And Dak says, yeah. And Shottie just turns around and says, I fucking love football. And then they cut to, you know, them driving the ball down the field. I mean, it really is just an incredible little peek into what their building's all about. And we have the clip. you still like football i fucking love football let's fucking go down 21

2:16:21Pat McAfee:it's back hard knocks is back they're covering the entire nfc east obviously there's a lot of storylines. And the Dallas Cowboys might be for real. And they might be the best team in ball. Good timing, right? Yeah, no, I mean, tomorrow's an absolute must-win. What's tomorrow? We got Lions, Cowboys, basically. Lions can't lose, right? All the analytics are saying that whoever loses this game will not make the playoffs. And with how Dallas looks and how we have looked the last couple weeks, I'm very nervous for this game right now. Well, Detroit, I'm sure there's some good stats coming out, even though we saw some bad ones, the fourth down ones.

2:16:58Pat McAfee:There's some stats coming out about the Cowboys offense that seems to be okay. Last couple weeks, they gained 473 yards and 457 yards. Oh, boy. Yeah, and obviously all the highlights we just watched were from one week. We assume that maybe continues. Amon Ra might play though. Might. We like Amon Ra. Looking like he won't, but he might. We like Jared Goff. We like Sonic and Knuckles. Oh, yeah. Those guys have been fine. Actually, the last couple weeks, it's really been the defense and terry on arnold just went on ir so that's no good pennies i i'm sorry it's just it's for me i'm a lions fan so like it's not a big deal if we don't make the playoffs i'm used to this but it has been like three years until i've seen a team be this bad so it's been quite some time yeah and i'm still holding on to hope a lot of injuries last year too so you didn't really get a chance to really fully believe last year two years ago we're this close to the super bowl bummed out about that now.

2:17:52Pat McAfee:Yeah, still going to be bummed out of that for a long time, I think, especially if the Bears are doing what the Bears are doing, and that guy was in your building, so you're going to have to see him. Maybe that's why everybody in Detroit was so mad. Whenever Ben took the Chicago job, he could have took any job. He stayed in the division. Fuck you, Ben Johnson. Lions says, well, we're going to be okay anyways. And Peter Schrager's like, I don't know if the fucking Lions make the playoffs. And you know what? That's what he said. You know what? Out of everything, fuck I don't care that we aren't making the playoffs I don't care that we don't look that good the fact that him and all the haters are right that's what pisses me off that makes me mad Schragg said I'm not doing a victory lap but you look at Ben Johnson leaving there was a reason everybody wanted him you think that might have a little bit of an impact and then defense coordinator as well once again I'm not taking a victory lap but whenever I said the Lions weren't going to make the playoffs obviously a lot of people were calling me very mean names people were saying very mean things from Detroit about me and once again this is not a victory lap, but they lose Thursday night.

2:18:48Pat McAfee:They're probably not going to make the playoffs. That's basically what Shrag said the other day. Yeah, and then he's got Ben on his show, and clearly he has no one in the building in Detroit, so I know his angle, okay, Shrags? But it still pisses me off. Does anybody have anybody in the building in Detroit? No. It doesn't feel like that. Whoever released the Ragnar thing, was that Rapsheet or Garofalo or something? That was my only thought is the Ragnar news. Detroit keeps it pretty tight up there. Keep it pretty tight up there. Should have did a physical first probably. Probably. Before the post?

2:19:16Or they should have just cleared him. I mean, he wanted to play. Let's just clear the guy and it gets hurt. That's on him. Yeah. Let's think about that for once. I mean, Patriots, you guys probably would have did that for sure.

2:19:25Pat McAfee:No, that's not how the medical works in the NFL, brother. Oh, really? Because I've seen a lot of guys go into that blue tent and come out and they're looking cross-eyed but they're still playing for it. No! Oh, yeah. No! Those are unaffiliated neurological consultants. We were going back to the Super Bowl just one week ago today and now we're not. I'm pissed off. Don't give up yet. Remember, Jack White and Eminem fucking killed it. They won Thanksgiving. They were awesome. Do you know much Jack White? You do. I do. I'm a big Jack White fan. I kind of know Jack White as well. I didn't know the new song though.

2:20:02Pat McAfee:I guess that's a brand new song.

2:20:04Darius Butler:Didn't know that song either.

2:20:05Pat McAfee:Watching him just do his shit, I was like, who cares if you're watching a fucking show here.

2:20:10Darius Butler:like that is bro there's a documentary i forget what it's called but it's one of my favorite scenes and it's him the dude from u2 and the dude from led zeppelin all the guitars the edge there there it is and then is it uh jimmy page okay so all three of them sitting there and they just start like talking about so they they bring up white stripes and they talk about like how it came about and then all the other two jump in on the guitar and they have a little session and then And this guy talks about Cashmere from Led Zeppelin. Talks about how it was like a part of another song that they didn't use.

2:20:43Darius Butler:And then all of a sudden, and then this guy hops in, and then they're all just sitting there and just jamming. It is awesome to watch.

2:20:49Pat McAfee:Yeah, real talent. It's unbelievable. Yeah, you're watching like actual talent at work here. And that's what that show was. It was good. It was a fucking great show. It was. Lions got to stink. Yeah. We'll find out tomorrow. Tomorrow's it. Thank you. We're going to find out a lot tomorrow. out. You know, Foxy, I don't love where we're at, you and me. We're both in the same position.

2:21:11Darius Butler:You guys are better off than me. No, we're tied for first. You guys are all fucking shit, so I don't even know why you were even talking about your guys' teams.

2:21:19Pat McAfee:Well, that's kind of what I was getting to. I think Foxy and I understand, see the right on the wall with our particular teams right now with how we are and what is happening. And then we see the other teams that we think probably do have a chance to go, So, yes, your team is one of those teams. Oh, yeah. And the buys right now. So we're going to be very fresh. Exactly. So I think whenever I look at the Colts team, I love. Team that I am a season-taking holder payer for. Team that I support. Friends with the people that run the fucking team. Actually. Love the city doing well. Very grateful for that.

2:21:56Pat McAfee:I had eyes on that team this weekend. And Houston Texans defense is number one. They are. No doubt. They're so good. They are so good. They're going to make a lot of teams not look good. But then you go back to the Chiefs game as well, and then you add in the fracture fibula. And the reason why I think people didn't think Daniel Jones would work in this offense, only Anthony Richardson could work in this offense, is because I think people didn't fully understand the athleticism of Daniel Jones. Daniel Jones, whitest milk. Maybe the whitest. He might be fucking whole milk white. Yeah. Nerd. Yeah.

2:22:36Pat McAfee:Dresses. Very, very man is. Old Navy model. Whitest. So I think people immediately think, this guy came from the Eli Manning school, quarterback school, Peyton Manning quarterback school, and he appears to look immobile. This guy can't be that athletic. Daniel Jones is freak athlete. Very, very fast. Very, very strong. Jumps high. all those things that's a huge part of his game actually being able to run extend to play and do it is why i thought if not anthony daniel jones same offense here actually same offense i don't think a lot of people are viewing it that way and now that he can't you saw that video from thursday practice i mean that is that was when i knew immediately the reason why i like daniel jones is because his mobility because what he's able to do and now i don't think he can move and Do those things just heal?

2:23:29Pat McAfee:We need to get on the vibrate. How do fractures, hairline fractures heal? I don't know how they heal. Just time. We don't have it. It'll be all right. The answer's in the building.

2:23:38Darius Butler:The answer's in the building. You put them out wide any time you want a threat of a running quarterback, you motion Tyler Warren into quarterback. You run the zone read with him.

2:23:49Pat McAfee:So then what's Daniel Jones doing?

2:23:52Darius Butler:Blocking out on the edge. He's just chilling until we're doing a drop back pass. We keep him in the park.

2:23:57Pat McAfee:So Daniel Jones is in there. He's a shotgun. Yep. And then he goes motion. And he goes out to wide receiver. Tyler Warren comes in. So who's respecting him out there? Corner?

2:24:08AQ Shipley:Don't need him.

2:24:08Pat McAfee:Got to. Corner has to respect him. Got to go out there. Even if the guy can't really run. Got to go out there. So we're taking one for one out there. Yep. And then now we got, once again, 10 on 10 in here.

2:24:18Darius Butler:That's right.

2:24:19Pat McAfee:And Tyler Warren's quarterback. Listen, let's dump that. We need to send that to Shane Steichen immediately. I'm assuming he already thought of this.

2:24:26AQ Shipley:Well, we had a fumble on a 4-1. Yeah, and Tyler Warren already completely fuck it when he was playing quarterback this week. This guy's a rookie. There's going to be moments where it's not great. Tush-push, though.

2:24:37Darius Butler:I mean, let's give him the ball in like a zone read thing. Let this guy just run quarterback power like Josh. He is Josh Allen in the backfield.

2:24:44Pat McAfee:Yeah, but Josh Allen can throw the ball. Can Tyler throw the ball?

2:24:48Darius Butler:He's a high school quarterback. He was a high school quarterback. That's exactly why we should only be talking about the Packers and the Patriots. And we can throw the Bears in there. All these teams are so fucking bad compared to our teams. It's not even funny. Yeah, but what about fucking Tyler Warren, a quarterback?

2:25:00Pat McAfee:We're just learning of this possibility. That's true. What if you put Danny Jones out there, but somehow he gets rolled up on and that compound fracture or that hairline fracture turns into a compound fracture. Don't want that to happen. He's got fibula sticking out of his leg. I don't want that to happen. We can't have him out there then. I don't want that to happen. But if that was to happen, all of a sudden we got another Riley Leonard out on the field. and he's not where he might supposed to be. You got to put him out there. Then we'd be fucked.

2:25:27AQ Shipley:At least you got the first runner. If we got Riley Leonard on the field, we're fucked. Oh! Scott Clayton and that's what I can do. It's not personal shot to Riley. It feels like it was. Putting a rookie quarterback in in week 14. Did you see our schedule? Did you see those defenses? It's the worst that we got the worst schedule down the road. The Brats just put Shadr in in week 14. Exactly. They look pretty darn good now.

2:25:51Darius Butler:Oh, I saw someone tweeting the watch emoji, D-Butt. What's the difference? It is still up.

2:25:56AQ Shipley:Did you see the other rookie quarterbacks that got thrown into the fire this week? I won't name any names. It was brosmer didn't look great. I'll grant you that. That doesn't count. Why? We aren't naming names.

2:26:05Pat McAfee:This guy got thrown into the fire this late. Yeah, right. He did have some Carson Wentz in him. He did. But that's going to happen with rookie quarterbacks. Everyone's going to have your moments. And Riley Leonard getting dropped in there, I think he would be pumped for the moment. Now, would it be much better, especially with the road that we have, to have somebody that maybe understands what the defenses might do and maybe put us into a better play and maybe set up the whole thing to be successful? Yeah, but we might not have that capability at this stage.

2:26:32Darius Butler:Guy went to Duke and Notre Dame. He could read a defense like nobody.

2:26:36AQ Shipley:That's right.

2:26:37Pat McAfee:There's a lot of Duke quarterbacks out there just fucking.

2:26:39AQ Shipley:That's the same guy that told me Brosmer could fucking spin it. He can.

2:26:43Darius Butler:It's Max Brosmer. A lot of people are saying it's KOC's fault. Who's came out? Can't develop a quarterback. Okay. All right. Hard enough to argue that. Let's go. Guy in a top 10 quarterback and turned him into mush. J.J.

2:27:00Pat McAfee:McCarthy has not looked good a quarterback, but he's been hurt. He hasn't had time to develop in the system. Okay. Kevin O 'Connell, every quarterback he's ever had has had success seemingly. One coach a year already. Every single one, but a lot of playoff wins or? but what you're doing right now we don't like okay it sounds like you're being a little condescending about kevin o 'connell's greatness and uh this vikings team having a little bit of

2:27:24Darius Butler:a good run right now sounds like you're a hater you're having a good run this year well the last

2:27:29Pat McAfee:couple years they're they're playing for the number one overall senior nfc last year like

2:27:32Darius Butler:last week and the year before that they were under 500 in the year before that good year they lost in the first 100 playoffs to daniel jones and giants yeah but they also came back

2:27:42Pat McAfee:down 33-0 in that season.

2:27:44Darius Butler:Who was the coach of that Giants team? All right in front of us.

2:27:49Pat McAfee:Let's get to a break. We'll be back on the other side. Penn State still hasn't hired a coach. Signing day ends December 5th. Hayes Fawcett of On3 tells us from his bedroom that 99 % of the high school recruits are signing in this particular signing day. Penn State doesn't have a coach. And they're currently ranked 150th in the country in recruiting. Hard times in Happy Valley. Sorry, AQ. Tough. You guys might be ass, but hockey team's going to be good. Women's volleyball team's going to be very good.

2:28:28Darius Butler:Wrestling.

2:28:29Pat McAfee:Lacrosse is going to be good. Wrestling's going to win everything. It matters. All eyes are on wrestling right now. Can't wait. Butch. Can't wait. National champions.

2:28:41Darius Butler:the last 12 years, I think.

2:28:43Pat McAfee:I don't think you guys have lost a match.

2:28:45Darius Butler:Yeah.

2:28:45Pat McAfee:What's his name, Mr. Kale Sanderson? There it is. Dog. Dog. He was undefeated in college too, right? Yeah. And then he moves over to coaching, and then now he's the same thing as a coach? Yeah. He's the greatest of all time. Yeah, since Dan Gable, pretty much. Speaking of Gable, you see Gable Steveson? Yeah. Mm-hmm. I saw Joe Rogan basically send a video of his last fight to Dana White and said. Do you see what he did to the last guy? Oh, yeah. Left hook while going in for a tackle. Knockout. So knockout while tackling guy to ground. So guy out, basically, and then he ends up on top of it. I mean, it was.

2:29:21Pat McAfee:Oh, shit. Yeah.

2:29:22Darius Butler:Yeah.

2:29:23Pat McAfee:That guy's out. So hook, knockout. And he almost overshoots the wall. He's 255 pounds or something like that. Almost overshoots it. And remember, this was the dude that just won all the time. And then he lost one time. Yeah. and everybody's, you know, a lot of people wanted to hate this guy because of how much success he had and he did have a lot of moxie. I got a chance to chat with him a couple of times. He's a dog through and through, a freak athlete, an incredible wrestler, which a lot of college wrestlers obviously go into mixed martial arts. And it appears as if he does have lightning in his hands.

2:29:54Pat McAfee:And if he's going to smoothly transition from hooks to tackles in the same with knockout power in that, that's going to be, he's going to be, he's going to be a problem in there. I think that's pretty evident. And Rogan was like, hey, need him. No, this guy's the guy.

2:30:09AQ Shipley:He's on TV. Yes. For sure. So speaking of, he crushed it. Hayes Fawcett crushed it today. I think that's my first time seeing him on TV. Is that his first time on TV? I would venture to guess that it is.

2:30:20Pat McAfee:Did he shit himself? I'm about to. I think he was super excited about recruiting. Let's get to a break.

2:30:33Pat McAfee:Hello, beautiful people. and welcome back to our humble abode, the Thunderdome. On this Watch Wednesday, December 3rd, 2025, our three of the program begins right now. Football! It is magical, and we hope you're having a great Wednesday. We just had an incredible little snack session. There's a little sausage over there. There's a little, you know, we got some good mixings and fixings in the Thunderdome at this exact moment, and it's a good conversation ever. Also, there's a good 20, 30 pounds being added, I think, to some people through this winter over there at that snacks. The readily available Oreos that are happening right now, six packs.

2:31:14Some people, or is there any standouts?

2:31:19Pat McAfee:Every time I go over there, I do see. You can say it. We've all seen it. But it leads me to do it. It leads me to do it as well. So I don't want to judge. I don't want to cast a stone upon in a glass house. Because every time I go over there, I see it and I go, oh, that looks like a good idea. We got the six pack of Oreos in here, like 150 of them. Just sitting there. Just slide that thing out. It's right there. It's the greatest. And then there's obviously some fruit gummies underneath. Real fruit. Some other options, of course. 100 % juice. Of course, that's what it says. I read it. That's what it says on there.

2:31:56Pat McAfee:It tastes like it's not the case. and then on the other side we have all the chips you could possibly ask for it is a little problematic especially in this cold weather where you kind of want to comfortably and then we got a blimp out there that is just kind of going through all of this and i uh d-bone you're becoming an influence on me and i don't know if it's a good thing or a bad thing big pop out of somebody over there that's good uh that wasn't his life it's a good time to be in a thunderdome and we're thankful to do this show. The Talks at the Table is here at Buzz Connor and at Ty Schmidt.

2:32:26Pat McAfee:Nine-year NFL vet Darius J. Butler is here. Twelve-year NFL vet and Super Bowl champion AQ Shipley is here. And live from Hammer, is Tone Diggs. Tone, we didn't like what you were trying to do last hour. You told us during the break that you were basically trying to manipulate some things with the platform that you have. And I certainly don't appreciate that, but I respect the nod. I hope the Vikings

2:32:47Darius Butler:front office is listening. And the Steelers front office, let's take

2:32:51Pat McAfee:advantage of it and what do you think the vikings front office should know if they were listening

2:32:55Darius Butler:right now ko sees he just he can't get it done he can get it done pittsburgh okay and by the way

2:33:02Pat McAfee:that was mitt big pop big pop on a minute okay he's in the same room over there with tone tone is trying to uh talk ko see out of minnesota so that he can hire him in pittsburgh pittsburgh still has a head coach okay yeah has been a head coach for a long time there he's going to penn state well that's what ben rossberg said a lot of people are here so why why the fuck would my

2:33:21Darius Butler:A lot of people on there that don't know that seven is our God. So we listen to him.

2:33:26Pat McAfee:That's Ben Roethlisberger who he's referring to. And Ben Roethlisberger still lives in the area. Ben Roethlisberger obviously still very dialed in. Footballing with Ben and Spank is obviously an absolute heater of a show. We appreciate it. We respect it. He did throw some things out about maybe a reset in Pittsburgh. Nobody that has actually been in the building at that particular level, coaching level or anything, says if Mike Tomlin wants to be there, Mike Tomlin will be there. He's kind of earned that. I think a lot of people feel that that should be how it is. And then, you know, maybe he does move on.

2:33:53Pat McAfee:And then maybe he does go to Penn State, who doesn't have a coach. So, AQ, it feels like Penn State's at a big L right now, but they can turn it all around with one hire and one signing and one win next year. But let's talk about teams that turn it around through their offensive line. Let's go in the trenches with AQ Shipley for the top five performing offensive lines coming out of Week 13 of the NFL season. Number five, the Dallas Cowboys.

2:34:17Darius Butler:Crazy to hear week 13. It is crazy how fast this season is flying, but Dallas is trending up and to the right. This is old school counter. You got two tight ends. Let's take a look. 40 ends up being the F, and then the tight end comes across to fill in on the linebacker, and then if we can run that back one more time, check this out. Check the left guard, Tyler Smith, one of the strongest. There's a butt. Check out the center. There's another butt. Find left guard and center, and go find the back of the end zone and just run your ass off.

2:34:46Pat McAfee:We talked about the Big D having the Big 3, you know, in Dak, CD, and GP, but didn't really get a chance to dive into their offensive line being good again.

2:34:55AQ Shipley:And you were shaking your head. What were you shaking your head? You know, I'm always looking at the defense. One of the best defenders in the game, probably has ever played a game, Chris Jones, just jumping out of a gap. And this is kind of what you live with with great players. Sometimes they dance around blocks, jump out of gaps, and then somebody behind them has to kind of adjust. And they didn't, but that's tough, especially right down the middle of the defense. And I believe I saw him mic'd up, go up to the other guys on the defense, say, hey, that's on me, boys. That's my bad. But can't have it in this situation.

2:35:22AQ Shipley:14-10 game right here.

2:35:23Pat McAfee:Dallas Cowboys offensive line, top five in the NFL, says AQ Shipley. Let's go to the number four performing offensive line in week 13, a New England Patriots, number one team in the league.

2:35:33Darius Butler:The New England Patriots are showing up every single week. They're missing the left side of their offensive line. Ben Brown, I believe, is his name at left guard, number 77, and number 59, Viderian Lowe, who has spent some time at the shipyard. Wow! So there is definitely some bias in this, but they are the number one team. They are the number one team. No, no, no, no. When you step up, I mean, you could argue that B.A. could have given a game ball to the left side of this offensive line. Yeah! Two young guys who step in for two other young guys, and look at that blocking. I mean, how easy is that whenever Travion Henderson gets to see that hole, kick out, torque, find the other young guy in Brown, and go follow it for an 11-yard run?

2:36:11Darius Butler:I mean, it's incredible.

2:36:12Pat McAfee:That's a special thing to happen on a primetime game for a very, very important part of your offense, the entire left side of the offensive line, having to fill in and show up. Good for them. Good for you guys. Yeah, it just gives you a bunch of faith, too, just because the Giants say what you want about their team as a whole. They have one of the better defensive lines in the entire NFL. And then when you think about longevity going into the playoffs, the one position, the one group that gets hurt, that might cause you some concern would be that offensive line. We're going through it right now, and the backups are stepping up.

2:36:38It really does kind of reaffirm your faith in the team.

2:36:40Pat McAfee:How many do you have to have, offensive linemen?

2:36:42Darius Butler:So you dress eight, typically. You typically have your five, and then you have a backup center, you have a backup guard tackle, and you have a backup swing tackle. So you've got your eight that you normally have, and they're basically playing number six and seven right now, right? Yeah, six and seven. And our backup center is kind of our starting rookie left guard, Jared Wilson, who's out right now. He played center at Georgia for most of his career, playing guard right now for New England. So it's very incredible just to think about the Patriots. That's why don't even be a fan of your own team.

2:37:11Just come on over to the dark side, start rooting for the Patriots because there's no real point to root for anybody else aside from New England and the next team on In the Trenches.

2:37:19Pat McAfee:Yeah, but you're saying that because you're also thinking that maybe this Patriots seems likable too? Well, they're likable. Because Vrabes is funny. Yeah, he's a funny guy. Vrabes is funny and he's had success and he's from Ohio. So, like, I think everybody just kind of likes Vrabes. just all of it. Drake May, this guy, he's so damn likable. I don't think there's anything about him that's – the way he talks is so humble. He's so casual on the field. And he has the moxie to be a leading man. And then obviously going through the decision-making process that they went through to fire a coach after one year and move along and say, nah, this isn't right.

2:37:54And then bringing in a big name, doing some big-time signings,

2:37:57Pat McAfee:keeping it moving and then being where you're at. It does feel like it's a likable team somehow. That's crazy because it's the Patriots. Yeah, but that won't last long. nobody's going to like us after we win the Super Bowl this year. It's going to be kind of like, wow. Yeah, because it wasn't supposed to happen this year. Yeah, and it's going to be like, wow, we wished away the Chiefs. Like, we wanted some other team. And then, oh, no, we wished away the team, and then we got back the other team we hate even more than that team. So it's really a conundrum for everybody. That's why it is kind of a, hey, ditch your team.

2:38:25Your team fucking sucks compared to New England. Just come on over and be a Patriots fan. Doesn't hurt having fucking Chesney in the owner's box every week either. Chesney, Cardi B. I mean, shit, who's next? T. Swift might start dating Will Campbell. I don't know.

2:38:42Pat McAfee:I do, though. Okay. T. Swift is with Travis Kelsey. But then you start thinking about what the Chiefs' future looks like. You know, what does the future of the Chiefs look like? I will say this about Travis Kelsey, who we are big fans of. New Heights' number one sports podcast of the year. That's right. Congratulations. Happy for them. They've been a good show since the beginning, obviously. very clearly going to be a good show since day one pardon my tank i think is still number two and you're talking about they've been doing it for like forever oh geez of the game at the top of it all shout out to them uh still doing it big cat pft hank the entire crew what a wagon and has been for so long it's a grind you know that's a the podcast world is just uh you know never ending you have to just continue to create and there's a a lot of podcasts and sports podcasts and a lot of people deciding to get it on microphones and it's like to be able to do it for as long as they do is just the brilliance of their minds obviously and james madison supporters are obviously sure watching very closely to what's going on over there the new heights podcast jason and travis like you can have brothers just talk you can have people that play sports just talk like there's a lot of that they're special both because they're potentially goats at their positions both of them Good arguments for both of that.

2:39:58And then they got the shit.

2:40:01Pat McAfee:Jason Kelsey's got the shit. He will do it. I mean, he will do it. He will sing Queen. Oh, yeah. You bet. He will chug a beer. What? He will shoot a gun. What? He does not take himself seriously at all. And Travis Kelsey, for how famous he is, he is still a human somehow as well, who is obviously electrifying. That's a cool duo, those two. Now, for the future, what does it look like for the Chiefs if there is a future beyond, you know, the Travis era and what they are? If this is the end of this particular era of this Chiefs dynasty, what does the future look like? Especially with a young New England Patriots over there.

2:40:42Pat McAfee:Most money in the NFL. Yeah, there's a few players that you can just kind of list right off the top of your head that you know are coming to New England next year. AJ Pratt. That's one. You think A.J. Brown's coming up to New England? Oh, I don't even think it's a question. I think the Eagles will probably lose in the first round. It'll be a, okay, we've got to get rid of some of the bullshit that's going on. Hard to argue that A.J. Brown hasn't been somewhat of a distraction, you could say. And who's the guy that he still talks to damn near every week who drafted him? Who got up and walked off whenever he was traded on draft night.

2:41:18Pat McAfee:Do you remember that scene? Yeah. Vrabel reading the timeline or reading the...

2:41:28Pat McAfee:The whole scene. In the background, in a suit. And then coming back to the table, sitting back down. And people say it was at that moment where Vrabel was like, this is not where I need to be. It would still go on to win, then he would get promptly fired after going into the New England Patriots Hall of Fame and giving a speech about how great this place is in comparison to other spots. and then now the New England Patriots are the number one team in the NFL and the Tennessee Titans have no idea what to do with football. And who's A.J. Brown's childhood football team? Oh, yeah, he grew up a New England Patriots fan.

2:41:58So, I mean, add A.J. Brown to this offense, see what the fuck happens next year. Okay. I just hope Matt Stafford wins the MVP this year because if he doesn't, we're looking at three straight for Drake Mann. Three? And that worries me. Wow. Why is it worrying?

2:42:13Pat McAfee:Just how people are going to talk about you guys? No, no, how I am going to talk to everybody else.

2:42:21that's why yeah because i didn't really get good at this shit while the patriots were good you're too young yeah i was too young and we were really bad the past couple years and i'm kind of good at this and if the patriots get good again it's i won't you guys will fucking

2:42:34Pat McAfee:hate me even more no it'll be a problem if you have a reason to talk shit that's what i've always said that about the patriots fans like they are a good shit talking fan base and if they have a reason to do it that's just like a catastrophe for everybody else exactly and that's what it was like playing in foxborough whenever they're doing their run yep it was an actual home field advance well why was it well the weather obviously was controlled by the patriots somehow it sucked it was always going to suck somehow and it was always going to be wind in your face i don't know how that always happens but then also their fans are good like the fans know what they're doing and also the little side combos that happen from fans and players all of them have a good bite to all of them.

2:43:12Pat McAfee:Eight-year-olds are shit-talking. Ninety-year-olds are shit-talking. That's like true football town, a shit-talking fan base. And they had a lot of reason to talk shit for a long time. And it does appear as if they are back. It does feel like that. And we got to live in that reality. Hey, it's not their fault. No. But how did everybody else let it happen? It's not everybody. Ladies and gentlemen, who's the number three performing offensive line? coming out of week 13 of the NFL season, AQ. Green Bay Packers time. It's about fucking time. Here we go. Go Pack! Go! Go Pack! Go! Go Pack! Go! To number three.

2:43:53Pat McAfee:Wow, good for them.

2:43:54Darius Butler:Yeah, they took the fight to Detroit. It was good to see. It was good to see them fight. They got some injuries as well. They're missing Jenkins, their center. They move Ryan into center. They got a new right guard. They pick up Wiley off Minnesota's practice squad playing tight end number 81. We're just going to run a simple zone play, but watch. The defense moves. That's what I was talking about earlier. So Aaron Banks can continue to run. Then that linebacker makes a play. Nope. Turn it into a double team with Walker. Climb. All you got to do is make one person miss, and there goes Jacobs.

2:44:20Pat McAfee:Wow, so beautifully orchestrated. This guy's coming off a practice squad. He knows all this stuff. That is actually a fake report. That is a false report. He has been on the Packers practice squad, but he just got activated November 5th, so he's only been up for a few games. Okay, so he's been in the building. He understands what he's doing. Hasn't been getting the reps, though, to be able to be doing this type of shit, because this all has to be planned and calculated, right? Because if not, you step on each other's feet immediately. Absolutely.

2:44:42Darius Butler:And the other thing that's huge too, yeah, well, first of all, with 81, what you're saying, yes, exactly, you have to be able to read that out. But if you go back one more time, 63, Walker, when you have the man outside, he's leaving that guy for 81, but watch him. He recognizes they just moved the defense inside, slows it down, pulls the defensive end across, and now he has to adjust to that and then gets up on the linebacker. Good tackle by Jack Campbell, 25 yards on the field. That adds to his list.

2:45:06Pat McAfee:Yeah, he's chasing the guy. That's a ball hawk. I agree. I love him. Great last name. What's going on here, Fox? I don't know if Jack Campbell's the one we have to go after, but, you know, that's okay. Well, I don't – just in general, the Detroit Lions now are on the wrong side of these segments on our show. This hasn't been how it's been at all. This was a weird game. I saw a stat that, like, rush yards were pretty much the same between the Packers' lines. Pass yards were pretty much the same. Time of possession was pretty much the same. The only difference, we were 0-2 on fourth down, and I believe you guys were 3-3 on fourth down.

2:45:39So it's just like that close. It's that close. We are that close.

2:45:43Darius Butler:And zero sacks allowed by this unit. Big one. Sacks allowed on the other unit.

2:45:49Pat McAfee:Against Aiden and it? Mm-hmm. Yeah, was Hutch just thinking like, what am I going to say on game day tomorrow? Allegedly, yes. No, that is not alleged by anybody other than some people on the internet that were pissed immediately upon hearing that Aiden Hutch it was going to be a guest picker ever just losing the game on TV. We all just watched it with our families. Speaking of watched it, Chiefs boys, what was the number? Oh, yeah, Cowboys Chiefs hit 57 million viewers on Thanksgiving. Yeah, the new record. It's a new record. They thought it was coming. They thought 50 million plus was coming.

2:46:24Pat McAfee:Turns out 57.2 million viewers making it the most watched regular season game in NFL history. the previous record was 42.1 million so the record was shattered by whopping 15 million if you want to talk about access to games being a big deal obviously being able to see it is a massive piece of it but then also the game just being in such a healthy spot you know for a long time the game was being uh i don't want to say attacked because it sounds like a victim mentality but i think there was a little bit of a negative onslaught of shit towards football that was certainly happening and scaring people away from either playing the game as kids or having your kids play the game and maybe even watch the game because of how yada yada it is and then obviously there was a lot of political stuff that was potentially happening and then the way the game was changing what the rules was pissing people off and then there was a uniform police time that everybody was going to get mad there's just like a lot of things that the nfl was kind of battling both self-inflicted and things that were just going to happen inevitably anyways because of the growth of a league and things happening like that so i think that all kind of has settled down and now people who are just kind of appreciating the opportunity to maybe cheer for their team and watch great football.

2:47:31Pat McAfee:And I think football is in such a healthy place, and I think it's very good for society whenever the sports are in a good place because I think sports are really the only thing we have left that really unifies people. You know, within a city, there's obviously people that see things differently, but whenever a football team is great in that city, the city normally sees the same thing, and that is we would like to this team to go ahead and win it all for the good of all of us. So I think it's special whenever these types of numbers come out that this many people are watching our game, and I think it's a great thing obviously for our sport and for society whenever more people are in on ball as opposed to less people in on ball yeah I don't know if there are very many other things I mean people would probably say there are but like the people's lives revolve around the NFL season and college football when that's on like you you everything that you're doing you go to work your family all that shit it's all just to get to Sunday to watch your favorite team play and then And on top of that, they've done such a good job just to like massive holidays.

2:48:27Like there is going to be a game on, and that is what you are doing with your family if you're like a sports family. And now it's getting to the point where even if you're not, it's like, oh, yeah, you know, the Cowboys and the Chiefs are playing. Like let's put that on.

2:48:39Pat McAfee:Go. Ball. Go. Go. Ball. Go. We're going to do that for Christmas too. Yeah, exactly. Roger Goodell already did that to the NBA. And we've tried to tell the NBA, the highest level, Mr. Silver, hey, you need to move Christmas Eve. Christmas has always been our day. I understand. In theory, I used to watch too. I loved it. I loved the Christmas showcase. It was a cool thing. You know, NFL had Thanksgiving. The NBA had Christmas. It was cool, holiday sports kind of doing their thing, showing up. Then the NFL said, we want Christmas. And they just did it. And they got it now. And I don't love that for the NBA, obviously, because that has been a storied showcase thing for.

2:49:21Pat McAfee:Just move to Christmas Eve. No problem. The issue, though, is just like what happened with Red Zone. If the NBA goes to Christmas Eve and has success, the NFL is going to say, whoa, whoa, whoa, maybe we put a couple games on. We'll take that, too. Just like they did with Red Zone. Did you see what they did with Red Zone channel? Yeah, there was like 400 commercials on Sunday. I was part of the problem. Because when I was told that there was going to be a couple commercials, 30-second commercials, I think I was told 90 seconds maybe of commercials at the time. And I said, we don't care, meaning that we will still watch, which I think every Red Zone watcher still watched.

2:49:56Pat McAfee:I think it's still something because of how good it is. They're saying now they've upped it all. They're just doing it. You give them an inch, obviously they're going to take a mile. That's why I'm an idiot for not understanding that in the moment whenever I said we do not care to Scott Hanson because I'm still going to watch it. And I want to let them know, it does feel like they're taking advantage of us right now, doesn't it? Yeah. Don't be doing it.

2:50:17AQ Shipley:Fat Cavs. Don't do it. Red Zone's awesome. If they get up to 45 commercials, I'm out. 46?

2:50:26Pat McAfee:Definitely.

2:50:27AQ Shipley:I draw a line there.

2:50:30Pat McAfee:But where are they at right now? Do we know how many commercials they're doing right now? I think they said there was like 16 on Sunday or something like that. Slow down. Okay, so you got some time. But, yeah, they better slow down. Does feel like we're – the Red Zone, this is from Sports Business Journal, the NFL Red Zone channel ran 16 sponsored elements. Okay, so that's LRAP's two Sunday slate of games. According to an SBJ analysis of the broadcast, the telecast ran eight 15-second double-box advertisement, two minutes total over seven hours, evenly split across the early and late windows. Once play wrapped up, Red Zone also ran a 30-second double-box ad with DraftKings that closed the broadcast.

2:51:05DraftKings ran a commercial maybe last week, earlier in the day,

2:51:09Pat McAfee:not just at the end, that I thought was a really good idea. like whenever they announced the playthrough model that they were going to do with the ads i immediately thought of a sports book in there being like hey second half of these games about to take place there is this available this available this available this is currently available i immediately thought like that would be the right move and then it's not really a commercial it's kind of just like added information about gambling i did see that they started doing that i thought that was smart the l wraps they started last year before they were saying seven hours while they're still saying seven hours of commercial free football they were running out reps which i guess what do you describe as a commercial i think it's why they probably technically had to get away from that to seven hours of red zone football or commercial free football and then they do the entire thing but you're right d but if they up this thing that's where they're at two minutes right now if they even think about getting that thing to an hour or two hours of this seven hour window.

2:52:05Pat McAfee:I'm fucking out, dude. What I'm saying is you don't have to watch Red Zone Channel. If you want to be pissed off at him, you can. I'm going to watch it. It is so fucking good. It's really, for our particular professions,

2:52:15AQ Shipley:the best.

2:52:15Pat McAfee:We have to.

2:52:16AQ Shipley:Top right box every time. Sound.

2:52:19Pat McAfee:Okay. Sound on that one. All the other games are floating through the other three. In the quad box. Fucking A. Mm-hmm. Fucking A. Think about people that did these jobs before that shit. I don't know how you did it. Honestly. How did those people do it?

2:52:38AQ Shipley:Well, now you see why they just talked about the Cowboys every fucking segment, every week.

2:52:43Pat McAfee:Like, actually, I think.

2:52:45AQ Shipley:There's no way you could have watched. Like, after that one o 'clock slate, like, and you have the red zone as well, like, you feel like, okay, at least I kind of kept up with the theme of the games, the big plays, the scoring plays, you know. somebody gets injured, you know, big time replays or controversies, like you kind of keep up with all of it. Like just watching one, maybe two games or a couple TVs, like I don't know how people did it.

2:53:08Pat McAfee:Yeah, you literally could only talk about what was on national TV, I guess at one point, and then asking for film from people. But then you're just listening to the words of the people that are local reporters, which is why local beat reporters had such an important job for so long. It's because they were literally the only ones probably telling people what it was like for the telephone game there. So, crazy times. But we would like to say to the Red Zone, NFL, don't ruin fucking Red Zone. Let's do it. People are scared you guys are going to ruin it. And every new report we get, it sounds like you're trying to ruin it.

2:53:38Pat McAfee:Don't ruin it. It's great. Maybe the greatest invention in it. I mean, the first down line, really good. That's a great invention, TV invention. Skycam was sick. XFL created that.

2:53:53AQ Shipley:Replays.

2:53:54Pat McAfee:Replay system, incredible. Super slow motion, incredible. But when it comes to TV technology and, like, entertainment technology, the Red Zone channel might be – I mean, it's March Madness every Sunday. Mm-hmm. Fucking brilliant. Don't ruin it. Get to the number two performing offensive line coming out of week 13 of the NFL season. The Buffalo Bills, what a huge dominant win they had.

2:54:16Darius Butler:Yeah, they were incredible. And the first three teams in this top five had a great week. Very good week. These next two, there's levels to this shit. Buffalo was insane They had two backup Tackles in the game, they had Vandermark in at left Tackle, they had Alec Anderson In at right tackle, and then Take a look at Dawson Knox Right here, I love this move right here, if you watch him On the end, 88, run this back one more time Watch his outside arm Watch this little swipe, it's a little Vet move, pull him up the field And then that creates the Big gaping hole And then James Cook does what he does But the boys, this was what they did all game long.

2:54:54Darius Butler:This one's your inside zone. Hit the backside cut, and there it is. They couldn't get off a block to save their lives, the Pittsburgh Steelers' defense. Was there business decisions being made or just bad play being made? I think it was really good offensive line play. I think that's what it was. I think you start to see T.J. Watt right there. He knows the play's coming. He's starting to take the inside gap, which forces it to the outside. But guess what? When you try and force it to the outside, your buddy's D-butts, somebody's got to come make a play, right?

2:55:19AQ Shipley:Yeah, man. I mean, you talk about business decisions. If you watch, run that back. You watch. Watch your safety. Two nine. What's five doing? But five's got to go, especially with that guy on the outside of him. You got to take your shot. The thing about playing defense, you got to take shots. Like, you can't wait for blocks. Like, we talk about the running backs setting you up. But, I mean, the second and third level right there, that's just – that's horseshit. Horseshit effort. I'm sure they're having the same conversations in the meeting. I would assume so. Does Jalen Ramsey have to engage with Keon Coleman, or could he maybe fly in and just try and make the tackle instead?

2:55:52AQ Shipley:No. So, James Cook kind of slowed down and kind of ran at him. and I know we can see it easily, but I don't know if Jalen knows that that corner is out there, but he kind of – we talked about James Cook being one of the best running backs when it comes to that. So he's kind of setting them up and then he gets straight back upfield. But, yeah, so – and then Keon Coleman, you don't want a guy to just, you know, blindside you or do a dirty shot like Juan Jennings or anything. So you got to protect yourself out there.

2:56:17Pat McAfee:Hey, they were saying some stuff about Juan Jennings.

2:56:19AQ Shipley:Yeah, he got lost things on TV that you don't hear often. I love what he's doing, though. I bet you do. That kind of confirms everything that was said then.

2:56:28Darius Butler:Yeah. I love what he's doing. He's baiting the shit out of everybody every week. He's getting somebody to fall into something and do something. He plays the game the way I like to see it. He likes to play the game through the whistle, not to the whistle, through the whistle, and then even like a little extra, like be that gnat, be that prick after the fucking – you don't see that from receivers. Yeah. And I love to see that from them.

2:56:50Pat McAfee:Yeah, you don't need that from everybody on your team, obviously, is what you're saying. No, you need it from some guys, though. You need a couple guys. You need a couple guys. So this is why you won't be a head coach at Penn State or something like that. But you certainly need that. I think that sets a tone for your team is what you're saying. And you just expect him to get punched in the balls and maybe the jaw, if you will, at some point during the season. And he understands that that's his style of play as well?

2:57:13Darius Butler:Absolutely. That's the way I tried to play. I tried to always, like, just give a little extra just to let everybody, like, no, hey, I'm fucking here. I'm here and I'm going to be here. And if you take it even a step further, you guys remember Ryan Jensen, One of my favorites. I mean, that dude, he was trying to put you into the bench two seconds after the play. He was flirting with what was legal and illegal every single play. I love that. He had the first ever, what was that call that got put into the game that we weren't happy about? It was the first one that ever got called. It was opening night, Bucs versus Cowboys.

2:57:41It was at the old office. Fuck, I can't remember it. It wasn't unnecessary roughness or taunting or anything like that, but he got the first ever whatever prick flag they basically put into the game. Instigating or something like that? Something like that. I forget. It only lasted like a year or two, but Jensen was the definition.

2:57:59Pat McAfee:And he always had the visor and his hair was hanging out the back. And it was like, oh, this guy's going to get a late shot. So, boom, there he is coming in. He was submarining, I think. He was doing everything. In the piles. You love that. Love it. See, that's the – you see that? D-butt's on the other side there. I'm the one getting submarining.

2:58:16AQ Shipley:Yeah, I mean, I don't mind it from O-linemen. Like you said, receivers, you don't expect it from, you don't really see it from. So when you get that, and it's not that you have an agreement. Like if the play's coming at you, you're getting blocked, you're getting crack blocked, but you're 30 yards from the play and you're hitting me in the back or you're cut blocking me when it's not. Like that's some bullshit. And then you go and hide behind your O-line.

2:58:34Darius Butler:Yeah, see, that's the issue. That's the issue. If Juwan Jennings is now talking shit to the nose guard, I'm like, shut the fuck up. All right, shut the fuck up. All right, because I don't want to deal with it. That's what I was talking shit about him. Yeah, I saw it. I saw Shelby Harris.

2:58:45Pat McAfee:He's a dog too. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, he's a dog. Taunting. I once got a Ryan Dean, great teammate, incredible offensive lineman, was with the Colts for a long, long time. And I was talking shit to a D lineman. We changed quarters. So the field goal is on one side, and then the end of the quarter goes to the other side. So we're walking length of field with team, basically, and another team. D lineman started saying something to me. I forget what it was, like something. And I was just like, oh, I never get this opportunity. punter never do i get a chance to be on the field i'm actually pretty good shit talker since i've become a kicker not really allowed to shit talk this is a good time right now so guy says something to me i engage i say something back i end with a pretty heavy pretty heavy shot definitely should not have done that guy could have killed me or whatever he did get actually kind of upset or whatever starts talking shit to me through the offensive line while i'm doing the holding okay so this guy's telling me he's going to be my ass guy has to block him okay just got done with a long drive.

2:59:44Pat McAfee:Yep. Turns around. Afterwards, there's a little bit of a give and take. I'm walking out of here. Okay, I'm not going to do anything, but I'm definitely not going to look like a little soft-ass in this entire situation, but certainly don't want to die. So that walking off, I get a conversation. Hey, you don't have to touch that fucking guy, okay? So do that after the play, or don't do that ever again, because I have to deal with that, and my life's already bad enough. You got it, buddy! That's 100 % on me. Jawan Jennings, though, he's willing to fight, I think, right?

3:00:11Darius Butler:Absolutely. He really is. He won't fight anybody. You can see it every single week. He mixes it up. Good player, too. He is a great player.

3:00:19Pat McAfee:Are they going to win?

3:00:20AQ Shipley:The Niners?

3:00:21Pat McAfee:Yeah.

3:00:22AQ Shipley:What do you mean? Like, Super Bowl?

3:00:24Pat McAfee:Yeah.

3:00:24AQ Shipley:Why are you making us do this?

3:00:26Pat McAfee:Because I want to know if a team can do it. Fred Warner and Bosa out. If they were able to do it without them, that would be an absurd feat, right? But every once in a while, we see a solid defense, and we think to ourselves, wait, I couldn't imagine if they had Warner. I couldn't imagine if they had Bosa. But it feels like they have enough to do it. Brock Purdy doing his thing. Jawan Jennings, a wide receiver, is fighting people. George Kittle is a psycho.

3:00:47Darius Butler:CMC is doing something that's unprecedented. I mean, literally, he's going to have 1 ,000, 1 ,000, and he leads the league in touches, and he's as good of a receiver as he is a running back.

3:00:56Pat McAfee:We don't talk about the Niners there, really, whenever we talk about Super Bowl, strictly because of the injuries, but it's like I think they have everything that they would want. I think the Niners have everything other than Warner and Bosa, but I think they think that they're in a spot that can go. Yeah, McCaffrey would be the first ever 1 ,000 ,000 rusher receiver with multiple seasons. This will be his second. I think it was Marshall Falk and one other. And then I believe he just crossed the threshold already for 800-800. He has 800 receiving yards, 800-plus rushing yards. Schefter did a massive tweet about it.

3:01:24Oh, yep, boom, there it is. And there's a few other things in there as well. But, yeah, he's a freak of nature. But the injuries, you guys talk about it all the time. You've got to get lucky sometimes with the injuries. With who gets hurt. And we'll see because they have the Titans this week, but then at Colts, Bears, Seahawks. So, I mean, that's a pretty tough test, you know, going into the playoffs. That's right. That's right. That's right. Everybody's talking about the Colts' tough test. Let's remember, those teams got to play the Colts. Yeah, so if they win the next two, they got 11 wins. I mean, they beat the Titans, maybe, and they beat the Colts in Indy, maybe.

3:01:56Prime time. Prime time, yeah. In the lighthouse. By then, Daniel Jones' leg, I guess, will be healed. Yeah. 100%.

3:02:06Pat McAfee:That's such a bummer that that happened. It sucks. What is the – we'll ask, Wes. Who's the number one performing offensive line coming out of week 13 of the NFL season? Wow, the Chicago Bears. Congrats, Zito.

3:02:18Darius Butler:This is by far the most consistent unit of an offensive line in the NFL right now, and it starts with number 58, Darnell Wright. Now, look, you send the guy in motion. Now, watch. See how he's lined up outside of him right there? He's a five technique. Now, watch. Here we go. Here comes the motion. He just got head up. So, now what that creates is a man on, man outside. So he has to slow it down. And just that little bit. It's going to hold. No, no hold. That's phenomenal with his right hand. Watch how good this is with the right hand. Torquen with the strong outside arm. Pull him across. Dig.

3:02:49Darius Butler:Doesn't ever turn. Stay square. That creates the hole. Obviously, the motion with DJ Moore. Everything else opens up that hole. That's incredible.

3:02:56Pat McAfee:That seemed like he was holding there at the end.

3:02:58Darius Butler:You see a flag on the floor? Was I? You could call it every fucking play. There's no holding there. This is great technique, you're saying. Unbelievable strength. If that's a young offensive tackle right there, a rookie offensive tackle, he is telling himself, hey, I just got to get down to this B-gap. He doesn't recognize that the DB is up outside, man on, man outside, they call that Momo look. So right there, you have to slow it down, pull the guy across.

3:03:25Pat McAfee:Unbelievable work. And Ben Johnson obviously has an offense that sets up the guys to be in good positions to block these people.

3:03:31Darius Butler:It's over and over again. I mean, it's just those holes because it's the motion, it's the deception, in it's get this guy it's rock and roll the safety the guy you think's going to be in the hole now all of a sudden he's back and you just opened up the hole congratulations top five

3:03:43Pat McAfee:oh yeah packers making appearance it's late in the season it's good time to show up here it is good time this is right here who i believe will have a chance to win the super bowl okay if you're on the top five performing offensive lines late in the season in the trenches i guess we have to do a bunch of indicators about your defense being championship defense yada yada yada if your team's not on this over the next couple weeks, you don't have a chance to win the Super Bowl. That's what you need to know. Because in a conference championship game or in Super Bowl, inevitably you're going to run into a D-line that could just take over the entire game.

3:04:15Pat McAfee:So if your O-line is not a top elite offensive line, you're going to lose eventually. And that's kind of football, baby. That's what In the Trenches has been. So congrats to these five teams. Now, ladies and gentlemen, let's learn about those defenses that are championship defenses. Let's also learn about those defenses who might be ass or shite Ladies and gentlemen, it's time for everything DB. Good D, bad D with Darius Butler.

3:04:39AQ Shipley:We'll stay with the Bears. Ben Johnson is obviously doing a phenomenal job with the offensive side of the ball. Dennis Allen is doing a great job with the defensive side of the ball. Took a chance with Kevin Byer, brought him over, and he has been a godsend. Leading the National Football League in interceptions. And it's just single high safety, post safety, keeping an eye on the quarterback. Hurts, breaks the pocket, turns into a scramble drill, throws the ball in the air. Wynn was impacting the ball a lot for both quarterbacks, but this is a great play, finishing the play, diving to secure his sixth interception to lead the National Football League.

3:05:11AQ Shipley:This team, this defense, week in and week out from the beginning of the season, they've been dynamic when it comes to turning the ball over. We got Byard, we got Wright, and also Edmonds, who have missed some time. They're all in the top five. We talked about them yesterday as far as league leaders when it comes to turning the ball over. When you have that combined with an offense that runs the ball well and also takes care of the ball, It's a scary situation to face, especially as the season goes on.

3:05:34Pat McAfee:You run the ball, you can run the clock, obviously. And then if you get turnovers, you take time away from the other team even more. Time of possession, I would assume, for the Bears is pretty absurd this season. And them having three of the top six picks happen in the league is crazy. 26 turnovers, I believe, right? Is that the number? Yep, yep. That's a lot.

3:05:53AQ Shipley:Yeah. That's so many. That's going to help. And we talked about it earlier with the Hembo stats about Caleb Williams, and I've been saying it kind of as he's not where he needs to be as far as the passing game goes. I think he will be there. And once again, if you're having this success, you're at the top of the NFC without your quarterback playing where we think he will be playing. You got to feel good if you are a Bears fan.

3:06:14Pat McAfee:Shout out to the Bears. Shout out to Ben Johnson. That's good culture. All right, who's next on Good D? Whoa.

3:06:19AQ Shipley:Carolina Panthers. Coach B.A. said yesterday this was the biggest kind of statement win for a team. And this team has kind of been up and down throughout the season. but this was a big-time win against who we crowned as the best team in the National Football League coming into this game. You watch Mike Jackson down here in the bottom of the field. Now, the way he plays this, you would think, pause it here, you would think this was a split safety coverage with how he's just squatting on this route from Puka Nakula. Now, Puka Nakula, great route runner, great hands, great blocker. You wouldn't necessarily fear his speed when it comes to like, hey, this guy's just going to run by me.

3:06:53AQ Shipley:He's not Jamison Williams. He's not just a speedster. He's going to be more of a craftsman when it comes to routes. Sitting on the route, understands it, makes the play, and then takes his back to the crib. We've seen J.C. Horn on here a couple times. We talked about Maureen being suspended because of his nut punch last week. So you talk about guys stepping up, making big-time plays against the best offense in the league up until this point, not only picking it off but taking it to the crib. This was a huge play.

3:07:16Pat McAfee:So he was just sitting at the sticks, right? They knew what they were doing.

3:07:18AQ Shipley:Yeah, I mean, this is second and ten. He was definitely sitting at the sticks. He understood the route. I think McVay came out after the game and kind of, you know, try to just have his quarterbacks back. Like, hey, I could have gave Matt a better play there. But, I mean, at this point in the season, you are who you are on offense and in defense. It just comes down to execution, and it's a great execution. Not only from him, too. If you look at the blocking, we always talk about it. You see the old man Matt Stafford giving effort all the way to the goal line, blocking, great coverage on the inside as well.

3:07:46AQ Shipley:That tight end was covered up. But I love when guys picking the ball off and then getting it back to the crib.

3:07:50Pat McAfee:They knew that route combination there. Oh, yeah. Certainly, right? Yep. All over. All parties down there knew exactly what was coming. Probably as soon as the motion happened, they knew or what?

3:07:58AQ Shipley:Just a feel. Maybe he saw something when it comes to Puka's body language. Sometimes receivers kind of rise up at the break points. You know the different break points in every team that you're playing. Just like AQ shows, running schemes, it's the same with the passing schemes. Like, hey, if I'm impressed or I'm off coverage, all right, this team, they run their shoulder routes between four and six yards. They run the deeper ones between 10 and 12 or 14 to 16 or, you know, 22 to 24 yard different teams based on quarterbacks and Matt Stafford with his arm strength and the play calling ability from Sean McVay it's a wide range of different things that they do so it's a great job of taking that chance Ben Fizzlequo at the top too you talked about being able to throw the holding flag on any route you could easily throw an illegal contact here because it's 10 yards down the field but they didn't they let him play and it's a big time play

3:08:49Pat McAfee:we like that they let him play we gotta say that's good reffing. That's understanding the game a little bit.

3:08:54AQ Shipley:Yeah, because he got his hands on it, but he was looking at the quarterback. He was anticipating it. I love not seeing a flag there taking away a big play. Speaking of big plays, another one on second and 10. I don't know how it happened. Just went through here and most of these plays were on second and 10 or second and 9, which is weird. Let the stats

3:09:09Pat McAfee:stack that. The best time to get an interception is actually on second down with 10 yards needed for another first play.

3:09:16AQ Shipley:Yep, and this is a two-minute situation. So a little bit over a minute left and the clock two-score lead here by the Dolphins and Rasul Douglas. So we talked about Mike Jackson on the last interception, playing it like it was split safety. We always talk about split safety and single high safety. And that's all offenses and coaches and quarterbacks want to know pre-snap. Am I getting a split safety look or a middle field closed look? And that lets you know the corner. Because on the outside, if you have a middle close, if you have a free safety in the middle of the field, I'm guaranteed a one-on-one with my outside receivers because there is no safety that can get there.

3:09:49AQ Shipley:It just can't happen. But when there's a split safety, you always have to be aware of a corner that can squat. And if you run it back to the beginning, this is exactly what Douglas does. He's a veteran. He's been around the league a long time. We call this pawns. We call this trap. And his key is literally just the number two wide receiver. Run it back one more time. He is reading the number two wide receiver. He breaks out within the four to six yard range. I'm breaking it and I'm playing the out route. And if you run it back one more time, The free safety, he's also reading him because he knows once he breaks, I got to get over number one right now because they're looking at their whole shot.

3:10:23AQ Shipley:So he's reading him. If number two goes vertical, then it turns into a quarters coverage. And then the safety's on number two deep, and the corner is on number one deep. But with this route, this is a perfect route, perfect execution for the defense that was called. And it's nothing better than getting an interception. I didn't put Minko in here. He had a big-time two-point conversion that he returned for two points, which we rarely see, which gave the Dolphins a four-point lead and pretty much sealed the game for them. But the defense make a big-time play. Hey, the Dolphins. Lurking.

3:10:52Darius Butler:Minka's a dog. He's been so good all year. Happy's back in Miami. He seems happy, too. It's great.

3:10:58Pat McAfee:You seem happy, too.

3:10:59Darius Butler:Hey, we're lurking. We ain't dead yet. We ain't dead yet.

3:11:03Pat McAfee:Lurking.

3:11:04AQ Shipley:And on that Minka Fitzpatrick play, the comms weren't working, so they didn't get a call. I believe it was Jordan Brooks, Gump.

3:11:12JJ Watt:Tyrell Dodson.

3:11:13AQ Shipley:Tyrell Dotson kind of called the play, and then once they got lined up, still, you know, heck, get Minka lined up, so he ran across. We won't be able to see it, but he gets lined up, undercuts the crossing route once again, another veteran player understanding where the play is going to be, where the play is going to be made. What's he doing? And taking it back to the grip. Once again, a rookie quarterback, even though he's, you know, a grown old-ass man at this point is a rookie quarterback.

3:11:38Pat McAfee:Okay, never mind. I'm sorry, I didn't want to interrupt you. I just definitely interrupted you, but to your point, Like Tyler Shuck, like 40 years old, got drafted. J. Will last night calling some college game. He was like 28 is like the average age of college basketball now. He like made that comment like subtly. I'm like, oh, are they going through a little bit in college hoops right now? Oh, yeah. With what has been happening with football. And with the G League. College basketball is going through it because the G League guys, that's not going away. Like there are 20-year-olds. 20 is not that old, but I guess in college basketball kind of is.

3:12:1120, 21.

3:12:12Pat McAfee:A two-year delayed start? Yeah, because then at the end of that thing, you could be, not that you will be, but you could be 24, 25 years old. I believe BYU just got a 22-year-old from the G League. It's like this happened in football. And that's four years of eligibility. So if he does stay, he'll be 26 his senior year. Five, actually, if they're redshirt.

3:12:28Darius Butler:And if he goes on a mission, he'll be 30 when he's done. Bingo.

3:12:31Pat McAfee:Yeah, so there is that worry in that conversation. It has happened in football. Shuck is a story. There's been other baseball guys. Brandon Whedon. yeah there's been yeah older guys in college football punters obviously coming from australia not blaming the australian folks love the australian community and love that their game involves a lot of punting but guys would be finishing professional careers in aussie rules football and then coming over to america to start in college some of them not like it was like a handful but they're like 25 years old freshmen and it's like 24 year old freshmen it's like that's a that's a much better option than a 17 year old kid from america oh yeah now how many 18 17 year old kids from america now are going to have an opportunity if this becomes a thing it was small in the kicking community because it wasn't like we were judging the aussies but it was like this is kind of a crazy yeah setup that this can even happen and then now it's starting to happen i guess in basketball this has been a little bit of a niche thing that could happen if you don't start your clock i think is how it was always described right yeah you had five years once you start your further education secondary education clock so if you never do anything university you never you can just start later it's a crazy setup right now i mean didn't you call a game like when you were calling games in 2018 and it was houston and his kid dane roy who was 30 years old and he was the punter for the team like yeah i think so that that stuff that can't happen and punting is one thing like you talk about all the time like as a punter on a team like that is one separate thing like if there's a 25 year old center on iowa or on florida like that is asinine there are guys thinking about think about anthony edwards right now he's not even 25 and he's already got a max contract it was a tight end in miami

3:14:13AQ Shipley:then he yeah he played nine years football with covid injuries yeah it's too much but uh title shot i think he'll be all right you know getting thrown in that fire uh what we need to take over like week 11 or something like that. So it's still early in his career. He will be alright. You gotta get beat. You gotta get beat by shit. That first pick that Shador threw where I think the flat defender kind of faked in and faked out. You gotta throw that interception. You gotta get beat on double moves. That shit has to happen in this league. And then you learn from it. Orlovsky said Shuck was fantastic.

3:14:43AQ Shipley:He did? Really?

3:14:43Pat McAfee:Yeah, he said Tyler Shuck was fantastic today. Aggressive move, really well, confidence. I saw the field clean. That's what you wanna see. I saw two plays where that ain't true. I was confident. Hey, it's non-debatable, you said. You got to give Charlie Smythe an option. You got to give him an opportunity. You can't be throwing picks anywhere near the red zone. Really on the plus side of the field. Are you tossing around in Gaelic? I'm kind of just waiting to see what's going to happen to Charlie Smythe. I haven't heard anything. Obviously, Blake Group, he's signing with the – Huge. Yeah, that's massive for Mr.

3:15:15Smythe. And for the Colts. That too. Huge? Yeah.

3:15:20Pat McAfee:Well, he's not, but the signing is. No, but he's back in Indiana. Remember, he's Notre Dame legend. That's right. He's got good kicks in him. I'm happy we got Blake. I guess extra points. We've got to make us. You know, we've been searching for a makeable. Got to make them. And the Colts are signing. Captain, too. Guy's a good leader in the locker room. I like that. I like to see the C on his chest coming to town. And also, brother, you make kicks. This could be your job for a long haul. Someone crop him in this photo. Why? He looks real small. Yeah. How big is this guy? What are you guys talking about?

3:15:51Pat McAfee:Yeah, he's not. He hits big balls. I can't all lie. He hits big balls. There's no reason for Bruce to do what he's doing, Doug. Yeah, I mean, that guy's on his knees, and he's damn near halfway up his chest. Oh, come on. Yeah, 5 '7", 155. 5 '7"? Yeah. Bombs, boss. He's a modern marvel, actually. Wow. Blake, I don't know how he's able to do it. He crushes footballs. Welcome to the Colts, brother. Great to have you. Hell yeah, Blake. I would like to say I did what you guys did before watching him kick balls. I say he looks to be way too small to be kicking footballs. I've never seen a guy small that can be explosive enough to move an NFL ball, which is big.

3:16:33Pat McAfee:The Duke is big, far and high enough. His leg speed's insane. This guy's leg speed is absolutely insane. Welcome to Colts, Blake. Happy to have you. Here you go, Blake. Let's get back some good D, it looks like.

3:16:44AQ Shipley:Let's do it. Talk about modern Marvel. Tony Jefferson back in the league, set out a couple years and then came back, and he's been finding the football this season. Up top, you're going to see a double move from backed up. And this is something, if you pause it here, this is aggressive by the Raiders. You know, you're throwing it from your own end zone. You've got to trust your offensive line to run a double move. The cornerback up top does a great job. I believe it's Dante Jackson up top with the double move. But look at where Tony Jefferson is right now. You're talking about covering ground, getting off the hash, single high safety, running to the football.

3:17:15AQ Shipley:You run to the football and good things happen. Dante Jackson tips it up. We talk about tips and overthrows, and this is why you run to the ball. All the way out of bounds, they're reviewing this. Hey, was the guy out of bounds? Did he touch it? Should it be dead? They held it up, and they stayed at interception. Got his knees down in bounds. Great catch. Great rep. You see it? Pause it here. So he's trying to show right now. Run it all the way back to the beginning if you can. They're trying to disguise and show, hey, this is a split safety look. If you see him here, hey, I want to show Geno some shoulders going to the left, and then as soon as the ball is snapped, I'm going to open up, get to center field, read those indicators, read Gino, and just haul ass to the sideline and hopefully something good happens.

3:17:53Pat McAfee:Yeah, I love whenever superstar plays are made by superstar players. You guys obviously talk in your shit after accomplishing this because obviously tip drill is a drill that's practice. This is beautiful, though. This is absolutely beautiful. And also, let's keep it up in the sky as opposed to getting it on the ground.

3:18:09AQ Shipley:Yeah, love that. Just an effort from both guys because him, obviously, you get a PB. He thinks probably at that point when he just bats the ball in there, hey, great play at PBU. and you look up and you see your guy got the ball in his chest. Unbelievable play. And I love these fucking jerseys too.

3:18:23Pat McAfee:Yeah, they look unbelievable. The uniforms. Who's this against? The Raiders. Yeah, but who's the quarterback? Geno Smith. That's what I'm talking about with his interceptions. This exact shit. Very unlikely. He has had some plays made against him that are outrageous. Somebody put on a Batman cape, jumped over a person, levitated and picked it off like this. And Geno threw two picks today. Did you see him? I mean, the guy dropped in from the clouds. This one, you should have seen it. The guy broke it up, falling, bats it up in the sky, and then he just so happens to have a guy there. Guess what?

3:18:53Pat McAfee:His knees don't slide somehow. They stop right in by us. Gino's trying to explain this to people. I know the numbers aren't good, but you should have fucking seen this pick that this guy made. Outrageous. Blame it on me. Yeah, blame it on me. Exactly. I'll blame it. Your kids get sick. You can blame Gino. The guy makes a fucking highlight reel, impossible catch. Blame Gino. It's tough times out there in Las Vegas. Pete Carroll may be to Penn State. I know Braum isn't. Braum, I guess, has now come out and turned down Penn State. Actually, he and Louisville are actually reworking a deal right now.

3:19:27Pat McAfee:I'll stay in Louisville instead of going to Penn State. Now it is being reported by On3 that big-time donors at Penn State are potentially pushing for Terry Smith to be promoted from interim to actually full-time head coach, just like the boys were kind of saying. Bet they want that. It's on three reporting. We do not know. Pete Nacos reported that. I think he works for on three. He does. Okay, we appreciate everybody at on three. I follow the graphics. I follow the graphics.

3:20:00AQ Shipley:Good graphics. Great social.

3:20:01Pat McAfee:Great social. Yeah. So we appreciate that. Okay, Terry Smith, obviously living legend, former Penn State great wide receiver, Western Pennsylvania beast. Damn good high school football coach before going up to Penn State there. AQ, how do you feel if that report is accurate that Braum said, I'll stay in Louisville and Terry Smith hiring from within. Let's go ahead and try to see if we can get over the top.

3:20:25Darius Butler:Well, I never thought Braum was ever going to be an option. He played at Louisville. All his brothers played at Louisville. Brian Braum was actually one of the top quarterbacks in our class coming out of high school. So they were Louisville through and through. I think Terry Smith, Whippewa legend, went into the Whippewa Hall of Fame. same night I did. Ah, Pierce! Do you think he's embarrassed at all being the 25th option or no?

3:20:47Pat McAfee:I think that's not Terry. Terry Smith was the interim head coach. He knew that the AD had to do what the AD had to do. No stone left unturned. I'm going to hold it down here in the locker room. You do what you got to do for the betterment of Penn State. I think Terry loves Penn State. He does. I think he cried because of – like, I think he got emotional because of how much he loves Penn State. Obviously, the locker room rallied around Terry through this entire thing. Still didn't win a couple games, but you did win one, okay? Three. Okay.

3:21:20Darius Butler:You won three.

3:21:21Pat McAfee:Just didn't have a Big Ten win until deep into November. But nonetheless, a lot of turnover, a lot of craziness. Yeah. Quarterback. Quarterback got hurt. Quarterback got hurt.

3:21:32JJ Watt:Yeah, he's great.

3:21:34Pat McAfee:Talking about 15?

3:21:36JJ Watt:Talk about 15.

3:21:37Pat McAfee:Feels like you're... We stopped D-Butts, good D, bad D, to break the news. It feels like we... I don't think that's news.

3:21:44Darius Butler:It's saying some donors are pushing that. I don't think that's news. Donors are... This is embarrassing. Can we just fucking hire the guy we had all year? No one wants to go for us? I got sent a flight path. I think there's other news. Flight path.

3:21:59Pat McAfee:Who's doing flight path?

3:22:02Darius Butler:Someone sent it to me, man. You got Source? The internet. We don't need to put that up.

3:22:08Pat McAfee:I don't like that that exists. But I'm seeing the flight path. You probably got sent to you if I had to guess. Keep your eyes peeled. I think that's what AQ's saying. Head on a swivel. What do you think donors are saying, though, about where that plane's headed? Turn that fucking thing around right now. We're wasting gas. Let's get Terry Smith's family on that plane.

3:22:30Darius Butler:Terry Smith's there. Terry Smith's there. He was in charge of keeping recruits. He's been there. We got two left. I saw you got a quarterback.

3:22:40Pat McAfee:What was Terry supposed to say to these recruits? Am I going to be back? I have no idea. There's no reason for you to say that about Terry Smith right now. There's no reason for that to be your reaction. I'm bitter right now. Terry and Brian, I'm in a bitter place. Well, Brom said to hell with Penn State. How about you saying, well, you want the Louisville, so his brother is Louisville.

3:22:59Darius Butler:We keep announcing these extensions, expecting Brent Key or Brom to leave. I mean, these guys were legends at their own school, and they're going to pay him$10 million a year to stay. Don't have to move your family. Don't have to move your kids. Don't have to switch schools. Don't have to listen to your wife bitch about having to move the whole family and all that. It's a win for all of these guys staying at these schools to get$10 million plus to stay at these schools. Of course that's what's going to happen. College football is a shit show right now. No, it's not. Everybody's having an AOK time.

3:23:24Pat McAfee:West Virginia signing three stars and four stars. We've never done this before. College football is great right now. Hire Neil Brown. Neil Brown did get hired in North Texas. Congrats to him. He's off the market. He doesn't even want Penn State. He's going to coach them if they get into the playoff. That's a decision they've made. Tries to climb. Dead serious. Good photo they used. Neil Brown is finalizing a five-year deal to become the next coach at North Texas. He brings 10 years of head coaching experience, including a 35-16 mark at Troy. He was great there. In a 37-35 mark at West Virginia.

3:23:53Pat McAfee:Felt like we were always getting closer. Just always getting closer. Just really never really climbing. So we move on from him. He goes down to Texas. Works alongside Steve Sarkeesian as an assistant to the head coach. and now he's the head coach at North Texas. He was always first class with West Virginia. He was always super kind to our people. I feel like he did his job the way he did his job. I don't think his style would work at West Virginia, but it did work at Troy. We assume it'll work at North Texas for him. And they got a good team. You're saying he's coaching in the playoffs? Yeah, I believe so.

3:24:23I believe once this was finalized, they basically said, hey, you can go to Oklahoma State, pal. We got fucking Neil Brown now. So get to stepping.

3:24:31Pat McAfee:Was that reported here? Where's Ty seeing this from? Didn't Hayes Fawcett say that? I don't know if Hayes said that or not. Hayes on the recruiting beat. I don't know if he's on the coaching beat.

3:24:40Darius Butler:Might have been Nacos. Could have been Nacos, you're right. But I'm pretty sure Eric Morris is going to coach North Texas through the playoffs.

3:24:45Pat McAfee:Well, is Neil going to ring?

3:24:47Darius Butler:He should.

3:24:48Pat McAfee:If they win?

3:24:49Darius Butler:They win what?

3:24:50Pat McAfee:I appreciate the whole thing. North Texas winning national championship.

3:24:54Darius Butler:D-Buds, whether you like it or not, that team's going to be in the playoffs. I don't mind.

3:24:58Pat McAfee:Oh, really? It didn't sound like that yesterday. I don't mind.

3:25:01AQ Shipley:It was me. It was me in war on X. Who was it? I don't mind.

3:25:05Pat McAfee:Who was it?

3:25:09Ty, you were in the middle of it with Tulane. I didn't think they'd get that upset because I thought they'd just see it my way. And you know what? Maybe that was naive of me to think. I didn't think they would get upset because I thought they would see it my way.

3:25:27Pat McAfee:I thought they had brains. That's what you just said. Well, and then they started trying to say, like, you know, Tulane would run right down Iowa's throat. So I just went and I said, hey, hypothetically, if we were to play a game between Iowa and Tulane on a neutral site, well, it's Bradby. And a lot of places had Iowa's 10-and-a-half point favorite. And I said, well, that's the problem right there. Iowa's fucking 8-and-4. And if they're a 10-and-a-half point favorite against Tulane on a neutral field, what do you think a fucking team like – one of these teams that's really fucking good, what do you think they're going to do to them?

3:25:55That's all I was saying.

3:25:56Pat McAfee:And then in that case, the Tulane people said, you don't know what's going to happen. Anything can happen on a football field. That's college football. Is that what they said to you? Actually, I don't think a lot of those comments were even made. Just a lot of mean stuff. This guy looks like he plays Dungeons and Dragons. He doesn't know anything about football. I said, you know what I do know? You're not going to like what happens if you get into the playoff. But we'll see. That's why we let the Hunter Uracheks of the world deal with that and decide. There's a lot of people turning against a smaller school champion.

3:26:25I hope they get a shot to shine. That's not what you said yesterday. You agreed with me. Huh? I agree with you, Ty. Thank you. You all were kind of agreeing. You all were. 100 % agreeing. I don't remember. I mean, if Tulane. I don't remember. One day at a time. Be where my feet are. You were starting to agree, you said, comment? Oh, not starting. I've always agreed. I mean, if Tulane plays Oregon, I'll watch the first drive. Oregon will walk down the field, score on them. Then they'll get a stop. Then they'll walk back down. It'll be 14-0. And I'll turn off and play Battlefield.

3:26:52Pat McAfee:Battlefield is a good game.

3:26:53AQ Shipley:Great set.

3:26:54Pat McAfee:Remember, Tulane did play a team, UTSA. They were 4-4 at the time. I don't know where they're at now. 48-26. Teams have bad days, though, is what Tulane would say. James Madison people say, what? We are told top five champions get in the dance. What do we even have a conference championship for? This is what we're playing for here. Championships matter. Conference championships matter. and everybody now is starting to say, well, they're going to fucking take, whose spot are they going to take? And it's not just them, because like this year, I don't think the ACC conference championship matters.

3:27:31Pat McAfee:Duke and Virginia. Yeah, that's bullshit too. Got a lot to figure out. Somebody will. We'll see. Good luck Tulane. Good luck Tulane. I'm all for, you know, having more teams get a shot to shine. And North Texas. And North Texas, especially if Neil Brown's coaching, which I've heard rumors that he will be. You were the only one who heard him. Yeah, I don't know. Fucking Hayes Fawcett may have led me astray. That was Faze Fawcett. That was Faze Fawcett. You got to watch that. It might have been. You're right. The internet's so good. You know who it does kind of seemingly sound like we're on the up and to the right for?

3:28:06Pat McAfee:Penn State. That's what I'm saying. Nope. Donors pulling the trigger on Terry Smith. Yep. Penn State's a hockey school.

3:28:16Darius Butler:Wrestling. Sorry, excuse me. Yeah. They paid the most NIL to a hockey player ever, to this McKenna kid. That's because he's the one. He's the one. How are you guys doing? I think we're pretty good. Top five, I think. You don't even know? Wow. Disgusting. Well, hockey, they change the rankings every week, you know? It's like you lose one, you drop to seven, you win two, you go back to three.

3:28:38Pat McAfee:Oh, like college football. Oh, so like how rankings work? Like kind of how rankings work?

3:28:42Darius Butler:Yeah, the fucking deal goes. You lose, you drop down, you win, you drop down. I don't know what they did. I don't know what they did last week.

3:28:47Pat McAfee:Every once in a while you tie and they just kind of move along. Sure. Penn State is currently in ninth. Oh, man.

3:28:55Darius Butler:They dropped down. They're 11-5-0.

3:28:58Pat McAfee:They beat Michigan State. Oh, Duluth. Michigan State 11-3-0. Not bad. Good team. Michigan 15-3-0. Jesus, they're playing a lot of games. Dartmouth's 8-0. Yeah, Dartmouth's pretty good. They don't have as many games as everybody else. People are scared to schedule them. Yeah, Ivy League too. They got to go to school. Yeah, North Dakota, it's cold as shit out there. A lot of ice. They're playing outside mostly. 10-4. No, they got difficult ice outside out there. Oh, yeah. Yeah, so you got to come into the real prairie out there. Skate on the wood. And then Penn State's down there 11-5. They'll get hot later.

3:29:29No doubt.

3:29:30Pat McAfee:Volleyball team will win. Yeah. Wrestling's going to win. Yeah. Soccer will probably be good.

3:29:34Darius Butler:Awesome.

3:29:35Pat McAfee:Football, you guys are good too. Yeah. Brom doesn't want to go. No. Brent Key doesn't want to go. Nope. Cignetti didn't want to go. No. Ruler didn't want to go. Lane Kiffin didn't want to go. No. Summerall didn't want to go. Morris.

3:29:48Darius Butler:I was okay with that.

3:29:49Pat McAfee:Galesh.

3:29:50Darius Butler:Laura can have him. Auburn can have him. Pat Fitzgerald. Spartans can have him.

3:29:55Pat McAfee:So that's what we're saying. What human is out there? You guys are looking

3:30:01Darius Butler:I don't think I need to say it anymore. We know who's out there. Who? Brian Dayball. He's there. He lives in New York. He's unemployed. There's no coach or no booster at some school that's going to give him an extension right now. He's the guy. Who's that old Dolphins O-line coach? He's cooking with the Niners, bro. Yeah, maybe we bring him in. He's a great offensive line coach. He's a big fan. Got him on speed dial. He's a great offensive line coach.

3:30:40Pat McAfee:Get him into Happy Valley. Turn everything around. All right, let's get some bad D's, shall we?

3:30:44AQ Shipley:Yeah, so this is actually kind of bad. Starts off bad, ends up good. You talk about playing, you know, the snap all the way through. And we always say on defense, defend every blade of grass. So Isaiah likely makes a big-time play. Lamar Jackson steps up, makes a throw. And AD's going all the way. Bop, bop, bop, bop, bop. Jordan Battle all the way to the goal line. Punched it out. Stripped right at the wrist, at the forearms. Knocked this ball out. Turned it into a touchback and not a touchdown. So it starts off as a terrible defensive play and a great offensive play by Likely. But we always talk about defending every blade of grass.

3:31:20AQ Shipley:Defensive back coach, you're going to talk about it. Even the other guy coming in, Davis coming in with a punch out. But this is unbelievable effort, diving over the block, making the strip at the goal line. Just an unbelievable play. Started off as bags, was a terrible rep. But it's all about how you finish as a DB.

3:31:34Pat McAfee:Cincinnati Bengals have a chance.

3:31:36AQ Shipley:Hey, this was obviously a huge play. You see the score. You know, if they go up, you know, obviously eight or nine points at this point in the game, depending on how they feel about the analytics and great play to get the ball back in Burrell's hand. They're in playoff mode right now. So all these plays matter. So you love seeing this from your safety, Jordan, battle.

3:31:52Pat McAfee:How do we feel about the rule? You know, the ball going out. I like it. Yeah, defense players like it. I kind of do, too. I think it's great. I think it's like attention to detail, you know, through the entirety of it all. Obviously, this one was a great play that was made. But when the guys, even when the guys bobbled, I think it's like, yeah, you're about to enter the most important part of the field. You have the most important thing in your hands. Figure it the fuck out. Yeah, I genuinely, they were trying to overturn that, remember? Like ball goes back to where you fumbled it.

3:32:20AQ Shipley:What play was it? It was a specific play, maybe on a primetime game, where that conversation got loud again. Maybe last season. I can't remember. Obviously, we saw Jeremiah Smith. Yeah, that situation I think is different. Like Jeremiah Smith, where he had it. He has it, just kind of changed his hands a little bit, but still has it. I was going to be so mad if they didn't call it a touchdown. Here, this is just a great play. And if you drop the ball before the goal line, you're a fucking idiot. But in a Jeremiah Smith situation where he makes the catch, he's running in, and then in the snow, he's changing hands and bobs it a little.

3:32:53Pat McAfee:And he still controls it, though. That ball is going with him where he's going. I think he's still in control of the ball. He's influencing the ball after he's already clearly had possession. And caught it, yeah. If he didn't have possession before that, I don't think we could give it to him. Agreed. But since he was already ball carrier, he was still in control of ball. I don't think he ever fumbled that ball, to your point. He always had the possession. If you're changing hands with the ball and it moves a little, I don't think that should be considered a fumble. I thought there was a chance they were legitimately going to call it.

3:33:26But if I'm Michigan, I have a real argument, I think.

3:33:28Pat McAfee:Absolutely. Yeah, I think you have a real argument. That's why I think it was going to get really loud. but in my head as soon as I saw it and I had picked Ohio State I'm sorry Wouldn't do that Have you seen the updated rankings? With what? It got better No you guys have fallen out of rankings entirely You're tied for 164th with William and Mary

3:33:52Darius Butler:To be quite honest with you I'd rather be there than have one Just put a fucking dash next to us That's what I want

3:34:00Pat McAfee:You're tied for 164th in the country. Looks like you might need three recruits to qualify. Love that. Colgate's got some junk. We got a quarterback tone telling me, though.

3:34:11Darius Butler:We got a four-star committed to scoring. I didn't have a fucking coach. This guy sounds brilliant.

3:34:19Pat McAfee:He's a believer, dude. He's a believer in the brand, in the logo, in the name. I want that guy. That's a good thing.

3:34:28Darius Butler:It's unbelievable. It's not a good thing. Oh, shit. I want a critical thinker playing quarterback.

3:34:39Darius Butler:This guy's like, they're going to figure it out. They haven't figured it out for the last fucking month, but they're going to figure it out. Penn State it is.

3:34:48Pat McAfee:Now, to be clear, Terry Smith played a key role in signing four-star quarterback. Falzoni. Baiting Falzon. I didn't know this was a Falzon. That's a whole different ballgame. Foul zones, Cal zones. All over. See you on the NIL trail. That's right. Terry Smith signing four-star quarterbacks. Doesn't even know if he's a coach yet. This guy is committed to the brand.

3:35:12Darius Butler:Yeah. He's so committed. He was committed to Penn State once before and Auburn previously as well. Who? This foul zone guy.

3:35:19Pat McAfee:Why don't you like him? He's a four-star quarterback. He believes in Penn State. He's your quarterback. You got to take what you get. You should probably pipe down and just accept the fact that this is the only fucking guy you're going to get. Foul zone. There's a transfer portal coming up. That's who we got. Yeah, and Terry Smith's going to be like, hey, look, take one with me. Fuck it. I don't know why, but you should go with me too. Terry Smith is good. Hey, he's a good baller. No doubt. Yep. More like we aren't. Oh, my God. What a kill shot. What an absolute kill shot.

3:35:51Darius Butler:You know what the kill shot's going to be? This motherfucker and that motherfucker back there. These guys are Big Ten guys. so when Penn State doesn't have a fucking coach or a recruiting class and they beat Iowa and Michigan State next year, I'm going to come in here and drop my fucking balls on the table. Okay. Okay. Okay. He's getting jacked up. We're in a rebuild right now. Okay. And we beat you this year. You know? So, I mean, hey, I got to see it. Without a quarterback and without a coach. So what you guys do? And that's how you guys.

3:36:17Pat McAfee:And what you guys do, you guys refuse to schedule West Virginia for the next few years, right? You guys are scared of West Virginia? Oh, so scared. So scared. So scared. I mean, Penn State's terrified. You guys don't have a recruiting class, dude. You guys are basically Northwestern. No, we got two. Northwestern is like a top 50 class right now. That's true. Foul zone, though. It's better to be a dash than a number right now, right? 164th. Who's last in the NFL in defense? Not this team. This is the first time we've seen them on Bad D?

3:36:46AQ Shipley:Probably, yeah, because once again, going into the last week, not only were we talking about the offense, we were also talking about the defense. And I think that actually played a factor in this. I believe it was Kobe Durant. We talked about, you asked about, hey, is he sitting on the sticks because he trusts the pass rush and he trusts the stunt and he trusts those guys to get home? And I was like, yes, most likely. Same thing with Forbes here. And, you know, this is the life as a DB in the NFL. You have great weeks, you have bad weeks. And this was definitely a rough week for Forbes. You got T-Mac running the crossing route, and he's ready to undercut it.

3:37:18AQ Shipley:He's like, hey, I know the quarterback. I know young Kent just sit in the pocket and pat this ball until he runs all the way. That timer goes off. He looks back and T-Mac climbs and he throws the ball right over the top. This is a big time fourth down play. He played great on the high leverage situations. Go ahead, shout him out, A. Kush, in the pocket. I see you pulling. Chuba Hubbard. You see Chuba Hubbard? Watch this. Boom! On Braden Fisk. I like that. And that's a big boy. It's 7-4, securing that middle of the pocket. We always talk about protecting the middle of the pocket, especially, you know, shorter quarterbacks, but all quarterbacks.

3:37:50AQ Shipley:He had time to sit in there, sit in that pocket, and throw a great ball over the top on fourth down to take the lead in the fourth quarter.

3:37:56Pat McAfee:Carolina Panthers is a good football team. They're a good football team.

3:37:58Darius Butler:I mean, they're playing their seventh right offensive guard. Jake Curhan was not even – he was on the Arizona Cardinals training camp. Then he was on a practice squad. He wasn't playing. They pick him up, playing right guard again. One of the best defense in the league. It's pretty good.

3:38:11Pat McAfee:Yeah, Carolina Panthers.

3:38:12AQ Shipley:Let's go football team. Let's go football team. Great win. And I think the best front four in football, just straight front four. Houston, I think they have the best edge. and I think just all around pass rush would be the Broncos because of all the different things that they do but if you're just talking about a front four getting home it was the Rams so for the Panthers to step up with guys that you know not front line guys for Bryce Young to step up big time win at home ugly weather game back and forth game everybody showed up complimentary football big time win big time throws

3:38:41Pat McAfee:hell yeah that's good D-Bad D appreciate you D-Bunch great work this week

3:38:45AQ Shipley:you too brother

3:38:45Pat McAfee:hey Kish great work this week great work to you guys Talks to a really good day today, boys. You too, man. Boys in the back, really good stuff. GDBs, good work. Zit Mitt, phenomenal stuff. YouTube coding, Bill, really doing it. What a time here. Meaningful football. I have some breaking news. Thursday at midnight, I'll be releasing my first song, Dookie. Okay. Hell yeah.

3:39:19Pat McAfee:Yes, the Open from Oregon the first time this year. Got flipped into a freestyle, which got made into an actual song, which then led to a conversation with a couple people who are really good at music. And then all of a sudden, we're recording some songs. And then all of a sudden, Dookie's ready. Then all of a sudden, we're going to put it out on all platforms. And then how about all the other songs that you got? Yeah, let's do those too. So there's about to be a crazy addition to, I think, my life here over the next couple weeks, months or whatever. And this has been a lot of fun. This has been a journey into music, which I've obviously always been a huge fan.

3:39:56Pat McAfee:And for like the last 15, 20 years of my life, I've just like kind of gone through life in my notes section. Just like I guess they call it journaling. And for me, it would just be like writing poems or bars or choruses or verses or melodies or songs just throughout different portions of what I was kind of going through. And I asked Jelly Roll one time. I think we were, it was back when Jelly Roll was still big. Back when Jelly Roll was still big. Now he's. Very slim. Yeah. He's just Jelly. Yeah. He's just Jelly now. There's no more Rolls in there. I told him, I'm like, hey, I love writing. How do you go about writing?

3:40:29Pat McAfee:Got a chance to kind of meet these guys and talk to Jelly a little bit. And he was like, let me introduce you to Ernest. Ernest, obviously, is one of the biggest music minds that is even out there right now. The amount of number ones and the amount of talent he has just radiating through everything. So then I meet up with him. And then all of a sudden, I'm in a studio in Nashville. And I'm watching these geniuses do their thing. And I'm sitting in the middle of the show Songland, pretty much, in real life, watching these musicians do stuff. And then they're asking me questions. And then my lyrics are being turned into actual songs.

3:40:57Pat McAfee:And then I'm singing. It's like this whole thing is kind of become its own little journey in and of itself in reflection. because I'm visiting old lyrics in old times of my life. And yeah, it just felt like it was the right time to kind of start something. So the dookie freestyle that comes as a song is the first one we're putting out. But there's like some real life messaging coming out in songs, I think, from me over the next, I don't know, I want to say couple months, I think, because it's like an interesting process in the mixing, the tracking, the singing, the vocals, the editing the i don't know what this last version was do you remember the version before this one and then this one that came out they did something to the audio i have no idea what in there everything was just like cleaner and more pristine it's been fun so thursday at midnight dookie's dropping and uh we'll be doing some contests you know with the dookie song i think it'll alley open set up for some good uh you know content i think the lyrics and the song and the vibe will set up for some good content.

3:42:00Pat McAfee:So obviously we'll have to do a contest of some sort for the people. And I hope you get a chance to listen. And for all the other songs that end up coming out, it's like, know that I've been writing for a long time and watching it all come to, I got like emotional multiple different times, like actual tears falling. And I think it's pretty good that, you know, my daughter Mackenzie and baby boy on the way, if I was to die, which a lot of these songs are about, you know, like if not a lot, but there's a lot of trends about me dying young and I think I've always expected that and if it was to happen I think through these songs my kids will know exactly who the fuck their dad was and when he was and what he was and uh it's been a really cool thing that I've been lucky enough to do here Ernest and Seth from Big Loud have been like a tag team partner for me Holman obviously you guys got to meet Holman one of the greatest vibes of all time and uh it's been a cool journey to kind of pick up a whole new thing that I'm such a big fan of and learn about and uh hopefully hopefully it'll be some good shit i gotta find out if they suck or not dookie what a hilarious song to be the first one to drop honestly and uh the boys have been forced to listen to all these songs not forced over the last go kind of though you have definitely been forced it's like uh boys sorry i gotta turn this i gotta hear what this is and you know learning my singing voice has been an entire thing because i'm not a big singer i'm a yeller and a talker you know so like singing is not necessarily my forte and then there's a couple songs where you know you write it and then they create it with the music and you hear the melody and then it's in a key or something that's like too high it's like oh i don't think that's where this thing should be so then you got to kind of redo it bring it down a little bit do the entire process and watching like the scientists the music do their thing you know it's been like fucking sick and i think we got some here i think there's some bangers coming i think there's a very intimate stuff though like there's a lot of like you're gonna learn a lot about me i think you know it's a lot of me and myself thoughts that we're kind of finding out if they're dookie or not.

3:43:55Pat McAfee:And it should be a fun little experience. And I appreciate you guys. Congrats, bro.

3:43:59AQ Shipley:It was a big deal. Yeah, it is. I've seen the grind behind the scenes. So to see, be on the cusp of it dropping, like, I'm excited for you. It's dope, man. You guys have been here through the whole process of this thing.

3:44:09Pat McAfee:Because it's literally been since, what, when Jelly and Ernest came in here. You can actually go back to the exact day. Summer. That jacket. This jacket was left here by Ernest. Not on purpose. Some things left in the pockets as well. a little treat for you from old uncle erne but it was like from that day on it was like the conversation just kind of one thing led to another and i think they were expecting potential shite from my writing and then it's like i think i got some bars in there i think i got some real shit and if you write for like 15 20 years there's enough to create so maybe you piece some together and then all of a sudden it's like hold on a second i think we got like a meaningful song here with a fucking real bang bang behind it.

3:44:51Pat McAfee:It's like, yeah, this is music, brother. It's like, man, thank you for allowing me to do this. And Dookie is hysterical. It's got fucking real bop on it. I'm really singing on that thing too. Oh, yeah.

3:45:06Pat McAfee:That's funny. Sitting in a room with people that are actually talented in music and I got headphones on, microphone, they're hearing without, because my ears are hearing this, they're just hearing me but yeah their actual talents listening to me sing first time i'm doing that i've i haven't felt like that in a long time like i can normally walk into any situation and in my mind make myself feel like hey supposed to be here just act like you're supposed to be here why not like just kind of do whatever it is i can kind of act as if you know like let's just kind of get through this thing here be confident when you're just sitting in there with a microphone like this and you got some of the most time number one hits just like sitting all around you and they're just waiting for you to kind of record your vocals now and it's like fuck me this is quite a this is quite a this is a it was a you know a lot of anxiety and then the amount of positivity from the music world that it has been down there in nashville it's like really really cool really really cool so it should be a fun little experience sports obviously always going to exist but i think you know having words that exist past 24 hours would be cool too you know certainly and maybe people learn a little bit more about who i am could be nice and if you still want to murder me don't worry i'm murdering you in some of these songs tone why don't you come on out here brother out of hammer done done and uh let's enjoy the hell out of this life let's enjoy the hell out of it all it's crazy though that it's all coming together it's really crazy oh yeah it's an insane thing yeah the process is has been so cool to kind of just watch the different ears at work, if you will.

3:46:43Pat McAfee:You know, you talked about them sitting around Jack White and Led Zeppelin. Yep. The Edge. The Edge was in there. You're talking about that. Like, I got to do that for, like, my, like, hey, here's my lyrics. Here's how I think it could potentially go. And then, like, the actual genius is being like, oh, we can. It's awesome. And then we can add. So cool. And then we can add. And it's like, fuck, who's that guy? Oh, he has 40 number ones. Yeah, he's like one of the greatest session players of all time. Oh, thank you so much. Who's that guy? Oh, he's one of the original Rascal Flatts he's playing.

3:47:13Pat McAfee:Whoa, what the fuck? Why is that guy doing this? Who's that? Oh, that's Post Malone's band leader and a guy who has, I forget how many, all the number ones. Whoa. Why is it? Yeah, dude. Everybody's like kind of pumped that you're doing this. They kind of want to. Now granted, we are paying these people to do this. Okay, this is a payment process. They are working. but like they are all like the amount of like creative uh input and like effort it felt like from the music community for this entire process has been fucking so cool to feel it's been a very cool thing so hopefully it's good and if if it's dookie just know i want for it and that's fucking in a couple of these songs as well great work tone you're the man you look like real cowboy right there hell yeah uh aq anything to say before we get out here buckle up world these songs are good.

3:47:58Pat McAfee:That's very cool of you. Dookie drops Thursday night at midnight. More on the way. Shout out to Big Loud, Cadillac Records, DeVille Records, Jelly Belly, and everybody else that was a part of the process. I'm living a dream. And the only reason why is because you people allow us to do as such. Thank you so much for letting us talk about sports and do it for a living. You're the greatest. Be a friend. Tell a friend something nice. It might change your life. We're in this thing together. Team on me. Team on three. One, two, three. Team. Goodbye.