Hour 1: Kurt Warner Breaks Down NFL Week 1 QBs + Rich’s Top 5 Surprising Teams

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1:27Rich Eisen:This is the Rich Eisen Show. Let's do this. This is the Rich Eisen Show. J.J. McCarthy. The Vikings did that to the Bears. From the Rich Eisen Show studio in Los Angeles. Because they had a resilient champion of a kid. I couldn't be prouder. Today's guests. Pro Football Hall of Famer, Kurt Warner. Comedian, Frank Caliendo. Host of the Paul Feinbaum Show, Paul Feinbaum. And now, it's Rich Eisen. Welcome to this Wednesday edition of the Rich Eisen Show, live on Disney +, live on the ESPN app, everywhere, live on ESPN Radio, presented by our friends at Progressive Insurance. 844-204-RICH is the number to dial.

2:14Rich Eisen:Hall of Famer Kurt Warner is going to join us in 20 minutes time to turn the page on week one, turn the page to week two. What did he think about what he saw with me in Brazil? What did he think about what he saw on the bulk of week one Sunday activity before he called the Monday night game in Chicago, along with Kevin Harlan on Westwood one radio between the Vikings and the bears eight four four two Oh four inches. The number to dial. We'll take your phone calls as well as Frank Caliendo stops by in studio. He always makes me laugh, makes me laugh quite a bit. And hopefully that'll be the same with you when he joins us in studio.

2:50Rich Eisen:in hour number two. And then Paul Feinbaum joins us in hour number three when the only way that you're allowed on the show is to have a show with your name on it. So the Paul Feinbaum show host will be on the Rich Eisen show with me, and there'll be a lot of us talking about ourselves in hour number three. And college football. That is one. Good to see you over there, Christopher. How are you? Chris Rockman. Hey, Rich, what's up, man? How are you, DJ Mikey? I'm doing well, Rich. Mike Del Tufo, good to see you. Mike, you've been here a lot lately. Are you all right? Guys, the plane gets kind of in good orbit at this point.

3:22Rich Eisen:No, we all know what it is. He's looking for free tickets to Disney World. Wow. That's what it is. He wants to go to Disney. My brother is actually, he owns a timeshare in Disney. He's coming to Disneyland in the spring. Who is it? Frank. Frank. He's going to make a studio appearance again. Here? Yeah. Okay. The family. Has he never been to Disneyland? Never been to Disneyland. That's why he's here. You're here, so by the time he ramps up to Disneyland, you can get in for free. Yeah. That's what you're looking for. Yeah. He wants Star Wars. He's a big Star Wars fan. We're happy to have you whenever you wish.

3:50Rich Eisen:Thank you, Rich. TJ Jefferson, the candle appears to be lit. How are you, sir? Candle's lit. So does that mean hour three we're getting Jimmy Kimmel on the show? People who have a show named? Well, he'd be eligible. I don't know if he's going to show. Oh, okay. I'm just. But yes, thank you. He's eligible. He's third hour eligible. Is he coming in like this, Rich? He's third hour eligible. Good to see you. Be careful. Be careful. You don't want to be mean that way. 844-204-RICH is the number to dial. So I'm sitting in the old living room last night with Coop, my 14-year-old, watching the Yankees on Yes with our buddy Michael Kay, who's on ESPN Radio 1050 in New York, just like we are.

4:37Rich Eisen:So we say hello to everybody back home for me. Kay and Cone and Paul O 'Neill, great lesson. Taking on the Detroit Tigers. and then the Yankees give up nine runs in the seventh inning. And it was right around then where I stopped following baseball. And I realized this isn't the only reason why I've got a depressed feeling on this front. The reason I finally found it, there's no football last night. There's no live game for us to talk about today. I mean, think about it. There was football on Thursday last week. We had five days in a row. And then there was football on Friday in Brazil. And then on Saturday, all sorts of college football.

5:24Rich Eisen:Full slate. Full slate. Sunday. Week one. Week one. The NFL season. In bulk. And then Monday night. More. Monday night football. More. And then last night, Fernando Cruz can't throw a freaking strike. And I'm like sitting there thinking to myself, this doesn't have the same juice for me. You know what? I just now realized why that is, Rich. Tuesdays are meant to keep marriages together. But what about for those who are not married? I've got a never-married man here. And a never-again married man over there. And a man who's got a beautiful relationship with a mother or a child who is not technically married.

6:03Rich Eisen:I'm the only married one here. The non-married ones, they don't care about. It's you guys. It's all good. The family bond we've got to keep together. Are you going to show up one day just like Stone Street and go, I got married over the weekend? Am I going to get one of those things? Yeah, that would be awesome. Yeah, it would be. That's not while we're starting this program, though. But I thought to myself, self, I miss football. And Wednesdays, as you know, are for days to take one last look. This is like the last chance you have to look back at week one as a Wednesday. Because tomorrow, it's yesterday's news.

6:37Rich Eisen:You've got another week that's starting. It's kind of like, what's the analogy here? Okay, here's the analogy. You don't play golf. And you don't play golf. I watch golf. But Chris, you and I, right? Locked. What would you say when you play with somebody you've never met before? Like you're just hooked up in a force. A random stranger. Somebody that you're playing with. That's awkward to me. It's actually amazing. But by what? T-box of the third hole, you've now reached the point where if you don't know this person's name, you can no longer ask. Yeah, you can't really ask. You know what I mean?

7:10Rich Eisen:And then they're just like, great putt, man. All right, guy. Good job. Good shot, dude. That's not just golf. That's life, though. Back in my early ESPN days, very long time ago, I played at a golf course called Tunxis. T-U-N-X-I-S. I'm wondering if our friends in Bristol know if it's still around. Public course. Got hooked up with somebody and I missed a putt by like a foot short. And I said, just hit it, Sally. Is what I said out loud. And the person I got connected with, a woman, she goes, what? and i thought to myself oh i shouldn't say that stuff out loud it sounds you know misogynistic and no her name was salad so so i'm just saying that um this is the last day where you can actually revisit you know what i mean like this is like the the t-box third hole right because if you play two holes and you don't know the person's name yeah because two holes is like 20 25 minutes At least more.

8:11Rich Eisen:Yeah, sometimes more. More than that. So you're on the tee box in the third hole. It's the last chance you could say to somebody, I'm sorry, what was your name again? After that, it's now... Even tee box third hole, you're pushing it. Do you see green leaving green second hole? Is that it? Walking to the third tee box? Yeah, walking to the third tee box, you're probably like, hold on, what was your name again? Right. But in the football coverage world, it's clearly delineated. Right today is the last day we could start talking about. Because we're page turning. Who's hurt? Who's not? All that sort of stuff.

8:39Rich Eisen:So I've got a top five list to commemorate. And maybe we'll make this a regular. We haven't done this before. I'm like wondering why we haven't done this before. Top five teams better than we thought. Presented by Hyundai. So this is the, I guess, the reverse Dennis Green. They're better than we thought they were. Hit the podium. And we, you know, we're putting them on the hook of having to be better than we thought they were. right that's it matt leiner does not next kurt warner's next by the way same team interesting enough same team kurt warner wound up being next after matt leiner people at home and think we planned this it's just organically i did not it just we just stepped in it i love it when we do that top high five one two three four five riches top five these teams were better than we thought they were.

9:36Rich Eisen:Here we go. Number five on the list. I'm just going to go half of the team because I think the defensive side of the football we didn't have much of a concern since their new head coach. That's his technically side of the football. Okay. The Jets offense is number five on this list. I think they are better. The Jets offense. Better than we thought they were. Yeah, sure. Why not? Brees Hall runs for 100 yards. Right? That was pretty impressive. The Jets have not had a 1 ,000-yard rusher since Chris Ivory in the middle of last decade. What a name. It's the longest such 1 ,000-yard rusher drought in the NFL.

10:17Rich Eisen:And Brees Hall's already 100 yards in against the Steelers' defense. That drought's ending this year. Justin Fields looked terrific. Yeah. He didn't look lost. Now, you know, Kurt Water may come on and if we do get to the subject matter, say, well, Rich, I look at tape. you're just a moron with a remote control in your hand. He knows a little bit more than we do. Which is, you know, I don't think he's going to say that. It's too nice. But the way you guys pick on him sometimes on Sunday. That's a step towards Ryan Clark right there. Yes. Yes. I knew where you were going. What's up, everybody? But in all seriousness, Jets offense, man.

10:55Rich Eisen:Yeah. Better than we thought they were. All you need to know is Mike Tomlin at his podium presser this week in advance of the Steelers' home opener against the Seahawks, said, we've got to button up our run defense. I don't recall the last opposing coach to have said that after facing the Jets in a while. That's number five. Number four, top five teams better than we thought they would be. I'm putting the Las Vegas Raiders here. And I know a lot of folks were like, let's see what Pete Carroll can do. But I don't think anybody nationally was saying, oh gosh, yeah, Gino is the right move. 364 yards passing.

11:33Rich Eisen:They got a touchdown out of Ashton Gentry, but the Patriots were basically like, that kid is not going to have a day against us in his first start in the NFL. And Geno's slung it around, and the defense did its job, and Pete was chewing gum and stomping around and doing his Pete Carroll thing, and the Raiders are 1-0, and the autumn wind is indeed a pirate, because technically when are we in autumn? in a couple weeks, maybe? Well, I mean, technically, September 1st, summer's over. Is that right? Listen, we live here, though. Seasons run down. Summer goes until September 22nd. There you go. So in the final throes of the autumn solstice, the final days of summer wind is a pirate.

12:20Rich Eisen:They got it done. The Raiders are fourth on the list. Number three, I'm going to go half here. Another half. Another half. Another half is easier. This team was supposed to start slow again. They were supposed to not do anything. And if Joe Burrow and the offense were only going to come up with 17 points, they were going to lose 15 ways to Sunday. And the Bengals' defense, baby. Oh, the Bengals' defense. The Bengals' defense. Better than we thought they were. Interesting. Better than we thought they could be. Or they played the Browns. Browns, you're the king of, like, the Bengals should have lost to the Browns.

12:58Rich Eisen:The only guy I could have kicked. The only guy I could have kicked one of the two. Just one of them. I mean, you know, they're trying to buy a vowel and a made field goal there. And he kept his job, brother, the other guy did. Moody? Moody. Listen, Bengals defense, man, Al Golden, baby, dialing it up. Here we go. Here we go. So you're going offense, half, defense, half. Are you King Solomon right now? Just cutting stuff. I don't know. I'm just telling you the way I feel, and these are all better than we thought they would be. Number two on the list are the Indianapolis Colts. the only thing that upsets me about this how did I not think of Indiana Jones of course Chris Berman did what a brilliant nickname Indiana Jones and if they keep winning it's going to be and the Temple of Doom right here we go man here we go now I guess we're putting a pin in this to see just how poorly the Dolphins play moving forward?

13:56Rich Eisen:Indy plays Denver this week? Let's see. You can only play the teams in front of you. Exactly. And the team that was in front of them were ready to be, ripe to be beaten 33-8. And they did it. And Jones did it. And the running game and the Alec Pierce toe-tapping and Pittman scoring and here we go. Making Tua you know, turn it over in bunches being asked those questions of him and pissing him off even though he was half salty to a nightmare of a day as Mike McDaniel is calling it essentially looking for any silver lining that they had to sit through that and it was embarrassing and it's going to be better for them maybe moving forward culture two on this list number one team better who than we thought they were you betcha TJ you betcha 100 % Chris and I had them finishing last in the NFC East.

14:54Rich Eisen:That's on YouTube. I understand that. Come on, man. You can't sit here and say the Dallas Cowboys aren't the number one team in last week. Better than we thought they were. They came out and hit the Eagles in the mouth. It helped that, you know, L-O-O-G-I-E, Lugie. You know, like that. As we found out yesterday, a highly expensive Lugie from Jalen Carter. You know, 57 ,000 game check. worthy. Could have been worse. No, it could have been. We'll talk about that later on. But the Dallas Cowboys, there was a run game. Javante Williams was crushing it. Scored two touchdowns early enough for a guy in my Poker League Fantasy League to pick him up and start him over Garrett Wilson.

15:37Rich Eisen:I was rooting so hard for Garrett Wilson to be better than Javante Williams just so we could throw it in this guy's face. Was it Murph? No. Murph wanted him kicked out of the league, essentially. But the bottom line is Javante Williams was running it really well. Kenny Clark acquitted himself very We will. Cowboys are the number one team better than we thought they were in week number one. You have one more. I did not know this. Give Brockman the one that he wants. You think we need one more? Thank you very much. All right. We'll get one more. All right. I'm going to go one more times two to make up for the halves that I left on the table.

16:07Rich Eisen:You are King Solomon. The bottom half of the AFC South. Bottom half. Okay. Yeah. Titans and Jaguars. They both. The Titans came close. horseshoes and hand grenades for them. And then the Jaguars guys, I'll tell you this, man. They won. They looked better than we thought they were. Except for me. I picked them to win the division. Good enough. Well, not everybody is as wise as you, I guess. Here, coach. And Cincinnati's defense, that's who's next. That's who's next. We'll see what happens here, man. Travis Etienne, 100 yards rushing. Yeah, we'll turn it on. Your guy, our BT Jr. BT runs one in. Rushing touchdown.

16:53Rich Eisen:What? Right? Travis Hunter. Travis Hunter playing both ways. Here we go. You know, those are the top five teams better than we thought they were. I like it. Presented by Hyundai here right on the Rich Eisen Show. Man, I miss football. When's the next game? It's just one day, Rich. I'll take it tomorrow. It was just 24 hours. Hey, man. Good one tomorrow, by the way. It is indeed. Come in and we talked about what Al Michaels is our first guest of the week. in studio our next in studio guest after bert kreischer yesterday left us in tears is frank caliendo our sides will be hurting when he joins us in hour number two but let's take a break uh kurt warner will be joining us next as he will every single wednesday throughout the nfl campaign my hall of fame friend from nfl network and the youtube booth and more qb confidential on youtube's kurt warner

17:45Rich Eisen:the rich isen show podcast

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19:11Rich Eisen:Back on the Rich Eisen Show. One big happy Disney Plus ESPN streaming family along with those who are listening on ESPN Radio presented by Progressive Insurance. This is my Hall of Fame friend. I've known him forever and a day and thrilled that he's going to be with us every single Wednesday during the football season on the Rich Eisen Show. Everybody check out his QB Confidential, the channel that he has on YouTube. And also thrilled that I got a chance to call the Chiefs Chargers on YouTube with Kurt Warner. Good to see you here, sir. Let's just jump right in because you called the Monday night game on Westwood One Radio.

19:47Rich Eisen:The fourth quarter for J.J. McCarthy or every other drive for Caleb Williams, not the first drive. which is the quarterback we might see moving forward more likely j.j mccarthy fourth quarter or caleb williams outside of the first 15 scripted kurt warner yeah i mean let's hope both um but you know i will say i thought caleb played a really good game for what was available to him i thought his game uh just in terms of the level of difficulty between these two guys His was way harder than J.J.'s was. But I did love the definitive way that J.J. attacked in the fourth quarter and some of the throws down the field and his comfort level in the pocket.

20:35So I still want to see more growth from Caleb. So I'm going to lean towards J.J. McCarthy on this one that he got settled in. And I just liked his demeanor throughout the game, even though it wasn't easy and there wasn't a lot available to him early in the game and wasn't making many throws. He kind of hung in there and made some really definitive big-time throws down the stretch.

20:58Rich Eisen:Okay, and so what do you think are his strong suits? Having watched the tape now, I'm sure you have watched the All-22 of McCarthy. What do you think? I think the first thing is the mental part of it. I think when you hear people talk about J.J., that's one thing they talked about anyways, is kind of mental toughness. having that pick six and the struggles early and nothing really going your way no real throws out there for you to kind of fight through all that be down by you know two scores in the fourth quarter and not really blink and attack I think is probably the biggest thing you know there was some speculation too you know I heard some people talk that maybe Justin Jefferson was short on that out route that J.J.

21:46threw to him that turned into a pick six. So maybe it was a mistake by the wide receiver. I don't have anything to verify that. But, you know, I use that to say, you know, because the footwork of J.J. didn't mesh with the route of the other J.J. Now, there's a lot of quarterbacks in the league that will take that longer footwork on shorter throws. So I don't know that for sure. And we might never know because I'm sure J.J. McCarthy is not going to come out and say it was his fault or, you know, Kevin O 'Connell, if it was, it would probably have to come down to Justin Jefferson saying, you know what, I was short on that and I hurt the kid with that.

22:19But I don't know if we'll ever know, but, you know, just looking at the footwork to the route. So I'm just throwing that out there because, like, if that was the case and so now you're on a big stage and now you throw a big take and now everybody's saying, oh, you know, boom, JJ. And if it wasn't even your fault, to kind of have that mental fortitude to bounce back. And I thought his first touchdown pass was a phenomenal throw, a lot of bodies in the middle, and to drive that in there. And maybe even the turning point for me of the whole game was the last throw of the first half that he made, that deep crossing throw.

22:53I have no idea why Chicago was playing man-to-man in that situation, but they left man-to-man, and they didn't hesitate. They called a pass play, and he drove that deep over that ended up getting three points before the half. And I thought that's when things really turned around for him. But we saw some really good kind of laser throws. That was something he was good at Michigan, as you know. I thought he needs to work on his touch a little bit, but he can definitely drive the football. And we saw some really good drive throws in this game. So I believe those kind of throws will also be his strength physically moving forward.

23:26Rich Eisen:Kurt Warner here on the Rich Eisen Show. As for Caleb Williams, what I'm about to say is, from my opinion, the fans' point of view, and might be offensive to somebody with your mentality and resume and knowing you. But seeing McCarthy grow, drop his Huggies, if you will, in the fourth quarter, and then watching Caleb go through many of the similar issues as he had last year, gets Bears fans freaked out, man, that he's the one coming after the game saying, you know, it's growth, we're growing, we're growing. And then we watched somebody grow up in one quarter, not saying that JJ McCarthy is now a pro bowler, but the result is enough to crystallize this opinion.

24:14Rich Eisen:And people are freaking out that Ben Johnson isn't going to figure it out with Caleb Williams and vice versa. Your thoughts on that, Kurt Warner. Let me just first say, as I kind of mentioned there is that the level of difficulty for JJ McCarthy in this game was way, way lower than the level of difficulty for Caleb Williams. First start in Chicago on Monday Night Football. I'm simply talking about the way the game played out, the plays that were called, the throws that they had to make. It was just easier for JJ with all the things. Like you said, he didn't have to do anything until the fourth quarter and still had a chance.

24:49How many times can you play a game where you really don't do anything as a quarterback until the fourth quarter and you still got a chance to win that game? I thought for Caleb it was hard work all night long. I have Twitter people telling me, oh my gosh, he had guys wide open all game long. And you already mentioned my YouTube page, but I already broke down the first half and posted it on my QB Confidential YouTube page. Second half is coming later today. And you can get my breakdown of what Caleb was looking at and what he did in that game. So I thought he played a really, really good game. Now, I say all that to say I still have questions about Caleb.

25:27There were things in the game or things that I saw that, you know, continue to lend themselves to my opinion that he's got a long way to go in terms of settling down, slowing the game down, playing at the pace that that he needs to play, you know, seeing things and slowing the mental processes down. I felt, you know, more than I saw that, like when you watch the tape, I didn't see necessarily a lot of that in terms of, you know, he was getting through some reads and he was getting to his third and fourth guy at times. But I just felt it by kind of his body language in the in the pocket where I just want to see that kind of settle down and slow down and make me feel as if he's really comfortable with what they're asking him to do.