Hour 1: Packers-Commanders Reactions + Steelers DT Cam Heyward

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0:56Rich Eisen:This is the Rich Eisen Show. Hey, everybody. Can't get enough of The Rich Eisen Show? You're in luck. You can find us everywhere. Watch us weekdays on Disney Plus from noon to 3 Eastern. Miss the show? We've got a podcast so you can listen anytime. But here's the best part. Our YouTube channel. Subscribe at youtube.com slash Rich Eisen Show and you'll never miss a moment. Now, on with the show. Jordan loves performance. How would you rate it? This is the Rich Eisen Show. And a beautiful play fake by Jordan Love. Live from the Rich Eisen Show studio in Los Angeles. Love takes, looks, throws slant right side, touchdown!

1:41Today's gasps. Steelers defensive tackle Cam Hayward. NFL Network insider Tom Pelissero. Actor Michael Chiklis. And now, it's Rich Eisen.

1:56Rich Eisen:Well, hey everybody. Welcome to this Friday edition of the Rich Eisen Show. One game already into week two of the NFL campaign. College football beckons all of us, along with a full in bulk Sunday schedule of the NFL over the weekend. Getting you ready for all of that. Reviewing what we saw on Thursday Night Football. We say hello to everybody out there streaming us live on Disney Plus and ESPN. The app available everywhere. And also saying hello to everybody listening to us on Sirius XM Channel 80. And of course, ESPN Radio presented by Progressive Insurance. We say hello to our newest affiliate down there in Houston, Texas.

2:31Rich Eisen:97.5 and 92.5 FM. And just me being a Yankee fan, proving George Costanza's wrong, that a Yankee can be sent to Houston. So we're happy. You didn't say it the right way. I'm cleaning it up for the audience. We're trying to make a good first impression, Christopher. I understand. Cam Hayward beckons on our rundown. Tom Pelissera to give us all the information that we require. And then Michael Chiklis will be in studio in hour number three. He's in a new film called The Senior, available nationwide next Friday, September 19th. And guess what? He plays a 59-year-old college football player based on a true story.

3:16Rich Eisen:So it's great when Michael Chiklis joins us. And I'm on pins and needles because the last time he was here, he brought his pug with him because his pug is named tom brady tom brady so uh it's it's gonna be great i hope he brings the dog it's so much fun did you put in the request i did okay i said uh i said are you please bring tb12 and he wrote um i'll let you know and i'm like i meant the dog and he wrote back i know what you meant so that's our three good to see you over there christopher How are you? What up, Rich? I'm feeling great. How are you? Jason Feller, Jay Felly. Good to see you. What's up, Rich?

3:53Rich Eisen:You got your feet up, ready for your Raiders to play the final game of the week, the Chargers and the Raiders. The final game of a Monday night doubleheader on the ESPN family of networks. Candles not lit. What's going on? John Wick 5? What's happening? When are you going to light the candles? I need some new candles, clearly. Okay. But give a shout out to Houston. There you go. Not from Houston, but at Rapid Lock. Fantastic. Good to see everybody where they are. Let's get into it. How are you doing today, Rich? I'm great. Thank you. I'm great, but not as great as the Green Bay Packers. Five days into the season, two games into the season.

4:27Rich Eisen:And I'll call it the way I'm seeing it. The Green Bay Packers look like the best team in football. And that's what they look like. I'll be honest. They play in every phase. I know McManus, every single time he gets up there, I think of the usual suspects. and they play lights out defense and their offense is being run by a quarterback who's a kid no more. They've got wide receivers that probably aren't on your fantasy team for days. And now they got, you know, Rob Gronkowski or Kittle in Wisconsin and Tucker Craft. and uh he was the main weapon josh jacobs keeps scoring touchdowns he now has a rushing touchdown in 11 straight games tying jonathan taylor and priest holmes for the second most all time should uh he josh jacobs crease the end zone in cleveland in week three he would tie ladanian tomlinson for the most such consecutive games heard of them since 2000 including the playoffs Those are the active streaks we're talking about.

5:37Rich Eisen:And so they run it effectively. They throw it effectively. And boy, do they play defense. And they have now taken out the division winner in their own division last year in week one. And the team that eliminated them and then the aforementioned division winner in last year's season in the Lions, the commanders took care of business by taking out the packers and then took out the lions and the packers in the first five days of this season first two weeks of this campaign took them both out and made them look pedestrian in the process made them look mediocre in the process left the lions to go back to detroit wondering if they've lost their two coordinators and thus their mojo And now with the commanders, you know, it's amazing that we're talking about it this way, but making the commanders look like the oldest roster in the league.

6:43Rich Eisen:And it is, again, Jordan Love in a quarterback-driven league. Jordan Love, with the performance on Wednesday night, getting this team to 2-0, and in so doing, took care of business to a considerable tune with his 14th career start with two or more passing touchdowns and no interceptions. Only in the first 35 career starts out of active players, Patrick Mahomes and Brock Purdy have had more. And when you look at his numbers now,

7:30Rich Eisen:similar to Aaron Rodgers through his first 35 career starts. That's funny. He's 20 and 15 through his first 35 career starts. Rodgers was 19 and 16. his passing completion percentage Rodgers through his first 35 career starts 64.6 Love is 63.6 the yards per attempt Rodgers 7.8 Love 7.5 passing touchdowns to interceptions Rodgers 23 touchdowns to 23 63 touchdowns to 23 interceptions Love 62 touchdowns to 23 interceptions the passer rating of Rodgers of 98.1 Love 96.6 I mean right there and what did Rodgers do when he was 27 years old? Won his championship in Green Bay. Love turns 27 in November.

8:15Rich Eisen:As the Packers have started 2-0 for the first time since 2020, when they made the NFC Championship game and got bounced by Tom Brady and the Bucs. And Tom Brady's not walking through that door, except to call their games, which I imagine he will be calling a bunch of because the Packers look like the best team in football and Fox has the NFC package and will be no doubt showing a ton of Packer games because, again, I just gave you love's excellence, but the defense is balling out. This was the head coach about his defense after the game last night. Relentless. Just physical, aggressive attacking.

8:59Backing, the play style is exactly what we want from these guys.

9:05Rich Eisen:And it always starts with the energy and effort. That's going to get you through and can overcome for some of the mistakes. So I just thought, like, I think our front is extremely disruptive, getting after the quarterback. I don't even, it didn't seem like they ran the ball very effectively at all either. So, you know, I think half's done a hell of a job. I think our players are doing a great job feeding off one another. And it's definitely exciting to watch our defense go out there and perform because I think they allow us to get up on somebody. Half being Jeff Halfley, the coordinator he brought from college football, and he's coordinating it up.

9:49Rich Eisen:I mean, after holding the Lions to the fewest yards per play in a game in four years and Jared Goff throwing his first red zone interception in three years and holding the Lions to their fewest rush yards in a game in two years, they go ahead and snuff out Jaden Daniels and the commanders with just 18 points. It's tied for the fewest points scored in any of Jaden Daniels' 22 career starts, while also in all of Jaden Daniels' 22 career starts, this was the fewest total yards, yards per play, rush yards, and first downs. That's what they did. and again we're talking about the commanders having the oldest roster in the league and boy do they look old and they have maybe the best young quarterback in the league in the unicorn right that's what the defense did that's what the packers are up to and major major reasons why are all over the place i've given you all but the thing that makes them feel that much more special is because they field Micah.

10:57Rich Eisen:Micah Parsons. Jeez.

11:05Rich Eisen:Dude, 29 snaps is what he played five days ago, and they got him up to 44 last night. And in his 44 snaps, he led the team in eight quarterback pressures. Eight. okay he played two-thirds of the snaps on on uh thursday night and just dominated yeah he was everywhere everywhere it was funny that was what happened because coop went out to dinner came back in we're watching the fourth quarter and the packers are on defense and he says where's micah parsons and i responded everywhere what was that movie everywhere all at once everything everywhere all it was. Yeah, that was Micah last night. And like that movie, Micah is award winning.

11:52Rich Eisen:Yeah. He's now the betting favorite for defensive player of the year. Well, I mean, because he's hardly played, you know, 29 snaps, 44 snaps they did in five days. And he's ready to play more. I mean, he sounded upset about playing on a snap count. I do believe we have that soundbite from Micah Parsons, if I'm not mistaken, after the game, after he hung out with the Amazon Prime Video postgame. Yeah, that was fun. Had this to say. Man, I just hope I'm a full go. Honestly, it's pissing me off. I tell him it's more worse than good. I get tight and stuff. Hopefully, they just let me off, man. I can't hold a dog back forever, man.

12:34Rich Eisen:Well, 10 days from now is when he'll be out there again and on the same field as Miles Garrett. and you know he wants to start proving a little bit more and again it's a team effort i understand Rashawn Gary had a sack Van Ness looks like he's found himself the rest of the team boy that back end of the defense was shutting things down Daniels had nowhere to find anybody and they were rushing for and keeping him in the pocket and didn't let him out to run the football as a Matter of fact, his 17 rush yards, second fewest rush yards in a game in his career. Yeah, and this is what the Packers defense is doing right now.

13:16Rich Eisen:And, you know, who is the one who's somebody we're throwing to right now? Mike Hoskins, if you don't mind me pointing him. Okay, Sean Nixon. He was very direct as to why things are working for the Packers defense now in a way that we didn't see last year and previous years. Is there a difference, swagger or excitement with the defense that you feel when you're on the team? Swagger? You did last year? Yeah. Yeah, we got Michael Parsons. Okay.

13:49Rich Eisen:It's as plain as day. I am directing my comments at you, TJ, because I'm telling you, I told you earlier in the week the way this is going to work. it's every Packer game through week four when they play the Cowboys then pages will be turned okay pages will be turned until the end of the year and if the Packers go on this run that a lot of people are seeing for them rightfully so through five days I don't believe this is an overreaction that they can go deep based on what we've seen what they've done to two of the best playoff teams from last year or at least regular season teams going into the playoffs and one of the best playoff teams from last year final four team last year yeah they beat last night and and handily it's going to then return that micah was the missing piece ingredient accelerant on the flame that was already burning in green bay and i tweeted out last night evergreen tweet i can't believe the cowboys traded micah parsons how do you do such a thing with all due respect to Kenny Clark you cannot dominate a game from his position unless you're as good as

15:06Rich Eisen:Aaron or Donald or Dexter Lawrence or Miles Garrett when he wants to line up in there how do you do that and how do you keep him how do you send him in conference how do you send him to a hated non-divisional rival how do you do such a thing just because you couldn't figure something out and you could see him he's inflamed by it he's outraged by it you saw him dapping up his teammates doing the leadership thing the cowboys were trying to get from him and i guess i don't know if he was an immature guy in dallas this whole business over business is personal crucible that he just went through over the last few months might have aged him up and now he's a grown-ass man we'll see how it goes we'll see when he starts podcasting what he says what he does i don't know how it might great against his teammates or i have no idea but right now the packers look like the best team in football and for good reason they're doing it in every phase and they're doing it to teams that were terrific last year and we're assuming will be good this year we might look back on weeks one and two and say well those weren't all that impressive based on the way that they've come out of the game but i think we can all assume in terms of rosters the lions and the commanders are in the top third of the league and they they played with them like a cat does with a ball and catnip i mean they just they just played He just toyed with him.

16:45Rich Eisen:844-204-RICH is the number to dial. We'll talk about the Commanders later on in this program. It's a What's More Likely Friday. My top five list of other games that I'm looking forward to seeing in week number two. Tom Pelissero with information. You with phone calls at 844-204-RICH. And Michael Chiklis with a movie clip and maybe his dog. What's more likely? What's more likely? A movie clip. Yeah, a movie clip. Because he didn't jump at the opportunity to bring his dog. No, it seemed like he was like, eh. I know. 844-204-RICH is the number to dial here on this busy Friday on Disney Plus, ESPN, Everywhere, and ESPN Radio, presented by Progressive Insurance.

17:25Rich Eisen:Cameron Hayward coming up.

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19:17Rich Eisen:Try Gusto today at gusto.com slash rich and get three months free when you run your first payroll. That's three months of free payroll at gusto.com slash rich. One more time, gusto.com slash rich. the rich is a show podcast it's one of our favorites he's joining us now fresh off a big time week one win you're 15 for this guy uh one of the best in the business cameron hayward of the pittsburgh steelers how you doing cam i'm great i'm glad i get to be on your show you're just doing big things now you know what cam we're just only no one speed around here you know what i mean i'm just i just want to match you and longevity and excellence and all that good stuff but it's good to see sir you have the longevity don't ever take that away that's true i guess i'm i'm you're the og i'm just old um you're the senior as they would okay that's a little offensive but i understand

20:19Rich Eisen:it's good to see you man um okay so are are you are you happy rogers took his time because it kind of worked out you know what i mean like kind of kind of worked out for you right now cam game one hey reverse psychology there kind of there and then he found his way to the steelers oh my gosh i i mean that's what that's what you're talking about right four touchdown passes using whatever chip he had on his shoulder to to his and your advantage um and off you go what What was that like from your perspective, Cam? It was like watching a conductor compose or composer compose an offense or, you know, an orchestra.

21:02And it was just amazing. Like he would communicate. He would get guys lined up. But the thing I was hearing from the offense was he was never rattled. And when you have a guy who's very seasoned and has been doing it a long time, he's going to make everybody, you know, he's going to show out and make sure everybody shows out with him.

21:22Rich Eisen:And how does that permeate a team and a sideline in a game throughout a week? I think it just allows you to keep battling on defense. I know we didn't have our best game, but to have an offense that was just even keel and match points for points, sometimes get us a lead, and then keep battling back throughout the entire game. We just knew we had to get stops late. And when you do that and have that confidence in your offense, that just makes you a complete team. And, you know, in this game, it's not always going to be the defense dominating. It's not always going to be the offensive dominating.

21:57It's a mixture of both and having each other's backs in those moments.

22:01Rich Eisen:And what can you tell us inside here, Cam, about, you know, narratives, man. You have a podcast of your own. You've been in the league for a decade and a half. That Rodgers doesn't work well with others, that it's his way or other. I know you just borrowed your brow, but honestly, that he that he needs it to be his way alone. And now he's joined a Steelers system that looks like he's very comfortable in. So what do you say to anybody that says, well, it's just a matter of time till it's the other way around? What do you say about that? You know, you look at his way and it's a Steeler way. It's about being accountable.

22:41It's about doing things on and off the field that prepares you for the game. If you can't roll with that, you shouldn't be on the field. I think I've really enjoyed watching him, the way he prepares, the way he challenges guys, and then he challenges himself. There's no lack of accountability there. And so when you look at that side of the ball, having that all the way through, I can respect that. Every one of our teammates can respect that. It breeds competition. It breeds getting better. And it breeds a better team.

23:16Rich Eisen:Cam Hayward here on the Rich Eyes and Show. You referenced it yourself about not the defense's best day. What can you tell Steeler fans about that day and how you're coming out of that day? Hopefully it's a hiccup. We can move past it. I think as a defense, we're just raring to get back on the field. A lot to answer for. But, hey, I'd rather have a win last week and be able to talk about our problems than have a loss and just, you know, say we played okay. So more ball we played. We got 17 games. We've already played one, so we're at 16. So there's more room to, you know, let our work speak for itself.

23:57Rich Eisen:And Jalen Ramsey was lowering booms, man. He was hitting people. And it caused a little bit of a moment, to say the least. I think it was the best moment. You know, the end of the half, he gets chippy, and I think it kind of galvanized the defense a little bit. You know, we love when we're chippy, and sometimes you need to just, you know, break it open a little bit. And after that, I felt like we played a lot better ball in the second half. And then I just love football in its poetic ways that led to Jay Ramsey making a game-winning tackle that, you know, dislodged the ball out of Garrett Wilson's hands.

24:35Rich Eisen:And again, you know, I learned from my guy, Sap, all those years on game day morning, front and back end of the defense must play together. And it's all one big organism on defense. What did you what did you get out of game one from that with Jalen Ramsey now policing back there with the rest of the crew camp? I think, you know, you can't just pass the ball quick and think it's an easy way to get some yards. whether it's you take your time and we get a chance to rush or Jalen or Slay making some big plays. One play that's not talked about enough, Darius Slay, I think it was on the two-point conversion.

25:15He came off of his coverage and knocked out of bounds, saved two points on the board. So you look at our score, we went 34-32. That's one of those big moments we don't talk about enough, But having guys like that on the back end that, you know, help our front end is going to go a long way in the future.

25:33Rich Eisen:And then one last one on week one. What was it like in the locker room afterwards for that one? It was special, you know, because it wasn't a perfect game, especially on defense. But having a kicker who kicks a 60 yarder to win it, that's special. Having an offense continue to just go through a shootout and put up points. and then a defense that made plays late. You know, we appreciate these moments because they're far from few. And when you have guys that do it in different ways and are able to bounce each other out and overcome bad mistakes, that makes for a great win. Cam Hayward here on the Rich Eisen Show, fresh off of a week one victory prior to which you worked something out with the Steelers on a contract.