Fantasy Football Week 16 Reactions - It's Crunch Time

Week six is all wrapped up and guess who the winner of the fantasy football semi-finals is? It's the consolation bracket. Ashen Genty RB1, Chase Brown, RB2, Kyle Pittz, tight end two, DJ Moore, wide receiver six. And most importantly, yes, for us, Kenneth Walker is the running back six. Everything kind of felt upside down. Some games felt like they were for Tankathon, some games felt like they were for the actual playoffs. Brenley here with me. Josh obviously uh on paternity leave. Congrats to him and his wife and everybody involved. We'll have Sam Sherman back on the show later on, but first the game that I felt like was a playoff game. Jaguars go into Denver to win 34-20. And how I'll sum this one up was it's just a different version of Trevor Lawrence. He felt it the entire time. I think for a while Trevor Lawrence would have moments of athleticism but would not be on display. In this one, we had another one of those roll out to his left moments, throw it down the field for a chunk gain. He's always been able to hit the deep ball. He's always been able to hit these sideline throws. We had some of those in here. A lot of those were going to Parker Washington. The reason being Brian Thomas was being shadowed by Patan. Jacobe Myers had some instances. Brenton Strain had had a touchdown, but Parker Washington was actually the hero in this one. But even late in the game, Trevor Lawrence uh in a key situation, it's like third and eight, was able to get out, dives for a first down. This is a different version. I don't know if it's something Liam Cohen is like yelling at Trevor Lawrence to do because I noticed this with Baker Mayfield last year where he was running around a whole lot more and now Trevor Lawrence is doing that. He adds in a rushing score. So, another monster performance for Trevor Lawrence in fantasy. It was one thing to do this against some of the worst defenses in the league. Whole other thing to do this in Denver. The first part of the game was super loud. There were some like pre- snap operational mistakes, but they all settled in and this offense just felt relentless. So, I was in super impressed with Jacksonville. Denver still in the driver's seat for the first seed, but now all of a sudden Jacksonville has a pathway.

>> Yeah. No, so I watch a lot of this game, Hayden. Obviously, I'm a big big bow guy, but Trevor Lawrence stole the show today, you know, and I I I've said on this show uh earlier in the year, you know, I wasn't sold on Trevor Lawrence. There was just too many instances of him missing the easy passes. You know, he always have the ability to create excellent kind of tough throws. He has the arm strength. He has that physical talent, >> but the down consistency, we always wanted more. Over the past month, this is a new quarterback. I mean, he is playing at a upper echelon type of level. the athleticism, the decision making, the ability to make plays in the got to have it moments, it's all there. And if this is if this is gonna be who he is from now on, we got to start taking this Jaguars team seriously in the AFC because Liam Cohen has came in, his scheme's outstanding. He's brought a toughness to this defense. Mind you, this defense is fast, physical, they don't allow a ton of yards. Like, this is a real team. And if Trevor Lawrence is going to play like this, he has he has an argument to be one of the top three quarterbacks in the conference between him, you know, Josh Allen and Herbert into the playoffs. Like, why can't the Jaguars go on a run if this is this is how he's going to play?

>> Yeah, I I see it the same exact way. This is the first time where I think there's a real argument Trevor Lawrence is a top 10 quarterback and especially once we start dealing with some of the injuries and some of the the top 10 quarterbacks just going through some things obviously with Mahomes. I think Trevor Lawrence all of a sudden on a heater in the last four games that's 14 touchdowns total touchdowns to zero turnovers. I think that you nailed it there. It was always just the turnovers over the middle. There was always just a little bit of that bozo gene with Trevor Lawrence. Obviously the bozo gene comes and goes how the NFL operates. But it feels like Jacobe Myers who had eight targets in this one him being in the offense has been massive. That's why he gets $40 million guaranteed after like four weeks with the team. Brentton Strange coming back. He has seven targets, the touchdown in this one. He feels set settled in. Parker Washington was breaking a bunch of tackles. And then also just throw out Travis ETN, another broken tackle for a touchdown in the receiving game as well. So Travis ETN's breaking a lot of tackles. I think what was surprising for me on this one was Denver's tackling was just really bad. It was all the second level. There was like a backup safety in there. He was getting picked on. Obviously Patrick Certan was quiet because he did a good job taking away Brian Thomas, but everybody else and at the linebacker, safety, cornerback position, they had a very inconsistent game. I thought that the pass rush was doing a fairly good job. There's a couple Malcolm Roach moments at defensive tackle, but the tackling in general just for the Broncos really was a big portion of why things uh went into Jacksonville's favor.

>> Yeah, I mean, I I thought ETN played outstanding. You know, he's just been on a a heater all season. you know, I don't think any of this is a fluke. Uh, but from Denver's perspective, you know, I actually think in the long run this is going to help them. You never want to go into the playoffs on a 13game winning streak, right? That's not >> it's not what you want. So, I I think getting a loss like this out the way Shawn Payeyton will be able to, you know, actually coach with some intention in practice coming after a loss. And, you know, I I I feel reassured that they didn't lose because of Bonix. And I I think Bose's steady play has to have Broncos and Broncos fans feeling really good because yeah, like today it was a lot of missed tackles. It was a lot of blown assignments on defense. I don't think we're going to see that very often moving forward. You know, I think the Broncos clear weakness, if they have one, is when Bo is off, the team is getable. Mhm.

>> Well, Bo has been a lot more consistent over the past month or so, and you know, against a good Jaguars defense, I thought Bo played well. And so, yes, a loss sucks, but I think the way they lost is actually positive because we know in the long run, the defense isn't really going to be an issue moving forward.

>> Yeah, I agree. On the defense, this is like the first time you would say the Broncos have like a bad game defensively and that just, you know, it happens like tackling in the NFL is like, you know, it's difficult to do. So, I think that probably will bounce back. I thought Bo Knicks was pretty inconsistent. It was one of these games where he was making a lot of big-time plays. I think 352 pass yards might be his most in his career out there. Um only one touchdown. The interception was a really bad one. He had no business throwing that to the sideline, but that was also when they were down a couple scores. I think what was more interesting in this one was how lopsided the pass run split was. And that's something that we talked about leading into this one. over the past month, which is basically when JK Dobbins has been out, they've been top three in neutral pass rate. And then Jacksonville's defense, they've allowed the highest neutral pass rate. So, what happens here? We have 48 dropbacks for for Bo Nicks, maybe even a couple more thrown in some scrambles in there. And then the running backs, RG Harvey, seven carries, Jal Mclofflin, five carries. So, this is like a pretty lopsided game plan. So, there was some mistakes from Bo Knicks, but that's also going to happen when you have 50 dropbacks against Jacksonville, which kind of throws a lot of different stuff. has some pass rushers on top of that. So, I think for the most part, I would say Bicks played fine enough. Uh, the game probably should have been a little bit tighter if the Broncos would have tackled. Uh, and before I kick it back to you, R.J. Harvey had a fantastic game. The missed tackles on his touchdown run was something else that he also got him free uh for 71 yards in the pass game. So, it's one of these where Shawn Payeyton just breeds fantasy points to the fantasy running backs. I know the running back split was a little bit closer with Jul Mcofflin, but in terms of the actual production here, R.J. Harvey was running wild. Uh, some of that was because of Shawn Payeyton, but some of that was definitely R.J. Harvey making some guys miss it.

>> Yeah. No, R.J. Harvey's a is a monster. I couldn't be more impressed with him that long run. I know the Jaguars are trying to go for the ball, but you got to get him down. You got to tackle him. >> Uh, but he he's a stud. >> Yeah. And and last night on this one was Courtland Sun was just dunking on everybody. So he had a big touchdown slot fade. I mean the dude just plays wide receiver a whole lot different than most guys. Just more of like a throwback exceiver type. They can move him around the formation. Uh unfortunately on like one of the last plays of the game, Pat Bryant uh when they were down two scores uh gets hit really hard going over the middle there. Boicks was really frustrated with himself for kind of leading him into that, but they had to make a play. Bo Nicks uh watched Pat Bryant go away on a cart. Hopefully that's precautionary, but I'm guessing that he's going to miss down the stretch. So, I think that makes someone like Troy Franklin who had four for 66. He's somebody that you can look at uh in the fantasy finals if you need a wide receiver due to some injuries or for what for whatever else. Uh just to recap, Broncos win both games, you're still the first seed. So, while this was a big, you know, gut punch here, like you said, maybe they needed a little gut punch. uh things were going too smooth. Uh but you get that buy. You still have this defense which will rebound and B Knicks in December even with this one does feel better than the September version. So uh super impressed with Jacksonville Broncos. You still are going to be able to hang in there. All right, let's go over to your first game, Brenley. Uh you had a doozy here.

>> Bengals 45, Dolphins 21. I think this was the most points in the Zack Taylor era after being eliminated. So what happened? And how did they get it done?

>> Yeah, you know, the the game was actually close heading into halftime. I want to say it was 1714 at the half. Uh in the first half, you actually saw Mike McDaniel thought was in his bag. I thought he was really, really good and efficient, super creative. They had a touchdown to Malik Washington off a really nifty reverse. Had the whole defense fooled. Devin Aane had a monster explosive touchdown run. And then early I thought Quinn Yurs was actually playing pretty well, taking care good care of the football, making the right reads, showing some good accuracy. But then the second half happened, the third quarter happened, excuse me. Uh multiple turnovers and the Bengals just smelt blood in the water. Chase Brown was outstanding today. Three touchdowns, two receiving, one running. He was goshing them, hating on the ground. I mean, they had no ants for Chase for Chase Brown. And then through the air, Joe Burrow was just carving him like butter. You know, T. Higgins had a big game, a touchdown. Jamar Chase night catches over a hundred yards. They could do what whatever they wanted, you know, and and when when the Dolphins are turning the ball over against an offense like this, the Bengals and Jill Burrow know how to take advantage of that. So, you know, it was a close and early competitive game early, but the minute Queen UR started throwing those picks, the minute Dolich fumbled, it would the route was on. The g the game was over that in the third quarter. Uh, so really impressive by the Bengals offense. I thought Quinn Yers overall was okay. I thought he was okay. One of the picks wasn't really his fault. It was just a great play by the defender working back to the ball. But overall, I think the Dolphins are in a lot of trouble moving forward and the Bengals I I just think it's unfortunate that we're not going to see Joe Burr in the playoffs this year. I think it's a really big bummer for NFL fans.

>> Yeah, definitely is. That's 98th percentile EPA per play this game for Cincinnati. 96 percentile in the success rate. That was on the ground and through the air. It wasn't like it was just lopsided one way or the other. Like you said, Chase Brown goes crazy. Sama Pron gets in the end zone here. What what what about Chase Brown? Like where's this coming out of? He gets three touchdowns. I'm playing JJ Zachary in the freaking Dynasty semiis. I keep refreshing in the second half after bottling him up and all of a sudden he's kept going uh into the end zone.

>> Dude, he they were just, you know, they were Dolphins were playing off off coverage and so they were just allowing Chase Brown to leak into the flat and Joe's just spamming him. I think he had what, like nine catches or something like that. He was just unbelievable um in in the passing game making defenders miss. He's an explosive running back. He's super efficient, great vision, good contact balance, runs really hard for a running back his size. Like I think he gets pigeon holed to being a, you know, a more of a finesse runner because his his size. No, like he seeks contact. He likes to deliver punishment and he breaks a lot of tackles. I'm a huge Trace Brown fan and I thought today is like his perfect just deployment. Good between the tackles, outstanding through the air. He was he was great today. Okay, on the the Dolphin side, we got a little bit of news before this game kicked off. Ian Rapaort said that sounds like Mike McDaniel's going to be back and then Tua won't be. Now, I don't know if that means they're actually going to cut Tua. I think his contract's pretty tough to to trade. If they do release Tua, that's $99 million guaranteed down the drain. Uh I do wonder if like Tua not returning, might be like not returning as a starter and he maybe does like a Kurt Cousins backup situation. Uh so that leaves us with two options for the rest of the season. Quinn Uers and Zach Wilson with the Quinn Euer stuff. Would you want to see him for another game? Do you want to see Zach Wilson any point for the rest of the season? How would you stack up Quinn Yers with like could he potentially be a backup next year? Was this just kind of a, a little bit of a try out?

>> I would want to see Quinn yours for the remainder of the season. I I I did think today he operated the offense really well in the first half. I I thought they were moving the ball down the field uh efficiently. You know, he was getting getting the offense in the right in the right protections in in the right um overall kind of calls. I thought the first half was really encouraging. Now, obviously the second half things got away from him, started turning turning the ball over, really started to kind of force the issue when the team got down. So, that obviously wasn't great. But I do think with Mike McDonald or Mike McDaniel, excuse me, and the way he calls plays, the way he can manufacture space and create easy throwing lanes for the quarterback, I wouldn't mind seeing Quinn Yurs to see what it looks like in start two and start three.

>> Yeah. >> On the other hand, Zach Wilson we do know is just more physically gifted than Quinn yours. There's obviously much more of a ceiling with Zach Wilson. Um, so part of me does would would want to see Zach Wilson in this system with Mike McDaniels with uh Jaylen Wadd and that backfield. Like I wouldn't mind seeing Zach Wilson, >> but at the same time, you know, M. McDaniel sees these two in practice every every day. There has to be a reason why they went to Queen and I think simply >> they're more impressed with yours in practice than they are with Wilson.

>> Yeah, Zach Wilson like I think you summed it up perfectly there. his his talent just like arm talent is just significantly better than Quinners. I think that there was a lot of injuries that Quinn Eurers kind of went through and I think kind of just zapped his arm talent in general. So I haven't watched this game so I'm not sure like if that kind of stood out here but I do think this is more of a timing based offense. This is a really runheavy offense at this point. Uh so I wouldn't be surprised if Quinn Eurers kind of fits the Tua mold a little bit more and that's kind of easier to kind of play out. What I would like to see though for next year let this is going to be a terrible cap situation. They're not so bad that they're going to have a rookie quarterback. They're not going to be the Mendoza sweep stakes.

>> Like I want to see a dual threat quarterback. We get Devon A1 yards on the ground touchdown. Jaylen Wright 35 yards uh in a score. Malik Washington, you talked about the end of round. He's doing this with like two good offensive linemen and then no rushing threat from the quarterback. What if we just said let's go all the way throwback and let's get a dual threat type back there. I think that would be a lot more interesting than Quinn or Zach Wilson to any of this stuff.

>> Absolutely. Malik Willis, I mean, I thought he played great yesterday. I mean, >> him in MDaniel system, I think would be awesome to see. And let me just say, like, look, >> Mike McDaniel, he wears stupid pants. Like, we get it. Like, he's he's easy to hate. Like, I I take shots on Twitter, too. Like, I'm guilty as well. But we can't deny that he is a great offensive coach. I mean, he he really is. I mean, like I do think >> he has a secret sauce that other coaches secret just quite frankly don't have >> and I think sometimes that gets lost because 20 has just been genuinely that bad. Like a lot of this is beyond his control. Um, so I I I do think bringing him back is the right call for Miami. Again, I understand he's easy to hate. He wears stupid pants. He's weird on at the mic. I get it. It's definitely the pants for me, man.

>> It really is. But I I I do think bringing him back makes a lot of sense. He he he's a great offensive play caller and I I just don't think you want to let that out of your building till you really have to.

>> Okay. Uh last question. Darren Waller, he's kind of like on the the tight end one two border in fantasy and looking at the the routes. He ran 19 routes out of the 32 drop backs there, which is kind of in line with what he's been doing. He goes three for 45 targets here. Anything stand out about Darren Wallace?

>> No, I mean he he made he was clearly uh you know your's go-to guy for at least early in the in the first half. He made a couple contested catches uh early early on, but other than that, nothing nothing super noteworthy. I do think you can trust him in in fantasy moving forward. Clearly yours sees him as a guy who's a big target, large catcher radius, and a reliable reliable weapon in the passing game.

>> All right, moving on to a game that felt like a playoff game, but probably more of a wildcard one and done playoff game at that. Tampa Bay Carolina. The Panthers come back for this one 23-20. Josh Norris made sure to tweet out this was Bryce Young's 12th fourth quarter comeback uh of his career and he actually had I think a pretty decent game. Nothing really stands out. They weren't like really driving the ball down the field. There was nothing too crazy about this, but Bryce Young had a very a couple very clutch moments in the first half going into halftime. The Panthers had the ball with about 15 seconds left. They're about the 25 yd line. No timeouts. So, it looks like they're going to get a field goal. What does Todd Bulls do? Let's rack up the Heat. Brings up a lot of pressure. Cover zero. Man coverage on the backside. Bryce Young, it's very obvious what's happening. Like before the snap, you and I could have been this is cover zero. I'm throwing the ball to who? Tedo McMillan and what easy touchdown for Tedo McMillan. Stacked and blew by him. Good ball by Bryce Young to score a touchdown. So that was a pretty like maybe questionable call for for the Buccaneers. I'm sure they can pro and con that. If they get a sack there, then they get no points allowed. So there was just a riskreward, but Tedo McMillan blew right by him. Later in the game, Bryce Young has a nice moment in the red area. Was able to scramble kind of back outside the pocket to his left and that's where he finds Sanders. So, those were two really nice throws. He had another couple shots to Jaylen Coker down the sideline. So, I thought Bryce Young uh was like battling through a little bit of an ankle injury, but he showed a lot of uh toughness, couple clutch moments there and enough to win. On the Buccaneer side, it was just one of these offensive days where they wanted to run the ball. They were doing it like moderately effective. So, like Rashad White had a 39 carry. Bucky Irving was like fairly consistent.

>> But you just miss Liam Cohen watching the Buccaneers, man. You miss both their guards. You miss the Liam Cohen. There's not like 50 yard screens popping up out of nowhere. You hit a Mecca Buuka for a post route late in the game, but aside from that, like there was not another 15 plus yard pickup through the air. It's just like one of those where Baker Mayfield is not himself, but really the there's no like identity uh with the pass game. Like there's like not a single trait I can talk about that says this is what the Buccaneers are really good at this year. For a moment, it was the post routes to Amecha Igbuka to start the season. Since then, we've only seen a couple of those. Amecha, by the way, 48% route participation in this one. He was actually running behind Jaylen McMillan. But it's a super frustrating game for Tampa Bay. On the final drive, they have two minutes. Uh if they win this game, they're going to be for sure the uh NFC South winner. And then miscommunication to Mike Evans, interception for Baker Mayfield. So, just one of those games where like both teams were fine. The Panthers I did think were the better team. Uh, so shout out to them. They have to go win the week 18 game. This gonna be a rematch for the division. Uh, so that'll be a fun one. But man, out of this game, Tampa Bay just they're just not a a very good football team this year. You can just really feel the losses, I think, from the coaching staff and some of the injuries.

>> Yeah, it's it's super puzzling. So, I I had Mike Evans starting in both my fantasy semiis. Thank God he got that one little goal line touchdown because other than that it was a completely just inept day for the Tampa Bay passing offense which with an offense with Mike Evans, Chris Godwin early on in the year with the rookies Amecha and TZ Johnson showing out like this is inexcusable and it it's the it's not a personnel problem. It's c it's a scheme problem. It's a fit problem with Baker. He's not comfortable playing in this system right now. And I don't know if it's because there's there's l lack of chemistry with so many guys in and out of the lineup all year where maybe that's what's going on, but something is clearly not right. Baker hasn't looked good really over the past five weeks really. Yeah.

>> And you know, you know, even if they somehow squeak by Carolina in week 18, it's very clearly this is a oneanddone playoff team. uh with the way this defense is playing and again that the the inconsistency this offense shows to your point they have no identity. You know they're not they're not a smash now football team that that hangs their hat on running the football and playing time control foot you know type of football but they're also not good enough through the air to be a spread it out sling it offense. You know they're caught in the middle and then when Baker's not himself when he's not accurate throwing on time they have no shot. And I I thought I thought they lost the game more than Carolina won it. That was my ultimate takeaway watching this game.

>> Yeah. Yeah. We see this one the same exact way. It was super fresh. Like you said, Mike Evans, he gets a goal line uh fade classic Mike Evans stuff. They go back to it another time, but for the most part, like not a super explosive game by anybody. A Mecca one post route busted coverage. Like nothing that Amecha even did for that one. That was just kind of free yardage. Uh, and that was 40 of Baker Mayfield's 145 total yards in this game. Uh, and then unfortunately Bucky Irving, he gets 19 carries, easily the leader in the backfield. No one even close. But on the second time they get down to the one yard line, Shawn Tucker is in there for those snap. He ultimately scores a touchdown. But it was a lot of Shawn Tucker at the the goal line. On that one Mike Evans touchdown, Bucky was technically in there. Uh, but for the most part, this is back-to-back weeks where Bucky Irving is kind of like a trap in fantasy where do I believe he's going to get 50, 70, 100 yards? I do think that's totally possible. He can rip off a big play, but the big plays are just not there as often without Liam Cohen. And Liam Cohen had Bucky Irving absolutely cooking in the screen game last year. Just don't feel that. So, uh, we'll see Tampa Bay and Carolina in a couple weeks in the rematch here. um on on the the Panther side real quick in terms of fantasy. Whenever Tedoro and McMillan gets a bunch of targets, Tedaroa pays off in fantasy. So, this was a situation where you get Vea, no one even tries to run on Tampa Bay. Rico Dow and Chuba combined for just 15 carries in this one. Everything was uh through through the air and when that happens, Tedo goes crazy. So, six for 73 and a score. He's certainly in the mix for the offensive rookie of the year right now. Uh, nobody else really stood out to me. Uh, in terms of the other secondary pass catchers, Jaylen Coker makes a couple big time plays like on third down. So, I think that he's kind of passed uh, Xavier Legette for me. Xavier Legette definitely had a huge drop in this one. I think it's just be T-Mac and Coker as your one two moving forward and then kind of just Smorgesborg the rest of it out there. So, quality win. Happy for Bryce Young, happy for Josh Norris here. Uh, this game felt like the worst playoff game on Wildard.

>> Absolutely.

>> Okay. Uh, going on to your game. This one was a lot closer than I thought it was going to be. Texans hold on 23, Raiders >> 21. How did this game end up being so close?

>> The NFL, man. The NFL, it's just it's just so great. You know, I I thought the Texans were going to come in here, blow the Raiders out. I mean, the Raiders literally didn't score a single point last week against the Eagles, but credit to the Raiders, man. I thought they battled today on both sides of the ball defensively. They're really making life hard for CJ Stout. I thought Max Crosby was outstanding today. Really disruptive at the line of scrimmage. I thought the Raiders were. And then offensively, Ashton Genty, welcome to the party. I mean, honestly, it was his best game as a pro. I mean, he had, I think, 128 yards on the ground. Broke off a 50 or 60 yard run late in the game in the fourth quarter. Touchdown. He had a really cool uh passing receiving touchdown through the air. The Raiders had a great play design. They they singled him up isolated on Henry Toto down the field and you just see Genty just run right past Toto who's not really fast catches the ball receiving touchdown. Like that was a type of playmaking and explosiveness that we have been yearning for from Ashton Genty.

>> Um but unfortunately the Raiders defense at the end of the game wasn't able to do enough to stop CJ Strat who finally got it going. had a few crucial passes to Daltton Schultz throughout the game. Late in the fourth quarter, found him in the end zone and then late in the game, Nico Collins came up huge on a deep pass, kind of a deep over route. Nico adjusted the ball, essentially ice iced the game. Um I I thought for the most of the game CJ Strat was just okay if I'm being honest with you, Hayden. Definitely missed some throws down the field. Should have Nicoin should have had a bigger day today. Uh CJ Stride just missed him barely multiple times down the field. And then again with that Woody Marks, the running game just wasn't super efficient. I thought Jawir Johnson actually looked explosive on some of his carries. Not quite sure if there's a drop off in talent between him and Woody Marks, but just overall thought the running game wasn't that great today. And that kind of made the the Texans play um in kind of longer downs at distance. And then again, that's where Max Crosby kind of teed off. But overall, credit the Texans. Not not every game is gonna be easy. You know, this was an easy trap game, >> but CJ Scrap did enough to get the win at the end.

>> Yeah, just looking at the box score, it was just the pretty much two big plays to Genty here. The 60 y and then Ashen Genty did all of the rushing stuff of looking like his yards before contact were still really bad, man. He just averaged four and a half yards after contact. Bless his heart. So, that was really cool to see. Jack B has I think one nice play. Brock Bowers touchdown. Just real quick, how did that happen?

>> Yeah, so essentially it was just a coverage bust. He's he's uncovered in the back of the end zone. Nothing nothing too crazy. Uh and then Gina was able to find him in the back of the end zone, but he he didn't do too much at all in the game as well. Did did want to mention Texas defense. Derek Stingley had a great great pick six. I mean, outstanding catch and then was able to crib it to the house. Um so that was great to see. I mean, this is this this defense, while it didn't wasn't at its best today, similar to the Broncos, like this is a unit that can win you a Super Bowl. Fast, ferocious, violent, plays technically sound. Again, I I think even though the Texans kind of play with their flute a bit today, they got a win, moving on, and this is still a team I think that can make a run in the playoffs.

>> Okay. Yeah. Speaking of the playoffs, I just want to kind of dig deeper into the Texans offense here. um just because it was kind of a sloppy performance. Not that many standout guys. Uh the backfield split. So we get Woody Marks ruled out. We'll see if he's able to go next week. He was a limited participant I believe. Yeah. On Friday. So hopefully they were kind of precautionary holding him out and they'll get him back next next week. But it's Jaro Jordan leads the backfield over Nick Chub. Not that like Jordan did anything too special, but he does catch five passes and kind of ran away versus Nick Chub in terms of the touches. Was there anything about like either one of these backs that stand out? Uh, this is once again a situation where the Texans looking at it, >> both backs had negative yards before contact. This is just the Texans offensive line has improved in the past game, >> but they just get no push ever. It doesn't even matter. The Raiders, it does not matter. Their ground game is going to be the weakness. So, we're kind of like stacking these teams up for the playoffs now that they're 10 and five.

>> They just have no ground game, man. It really just does not matter at all. So, I'm not sure if there's anything between Chub, Jar Jordan, just in case Woody Marks misses next week.

>> Yeah, I mean, if if Woody Marks were to miss next week or even the week after, Jaw Jordan's definitely the back you want in this offense. I mean, Nick Chub had what, six carries for 35 yards. 30 of those yards came on one carry, you know? So, like >> it was a great carry. >> It was a great carry. It looked like kind of vintage Nick Chub, but >> he's just, you know, not an efficient runner at this point in his career. And again, I did think Jaward Jordan when he got the ball, you see a level of explosiveness that Nick Chub just simply doesn't have in the bag anymore, >> right?

>> And then also Jaward Jordan was featured in the passing game. You mentioned five catches. So I I think the Texans like what he brings to the table. Now didn't truly yield a ton of stats today, but if Woody Marks were to miss time, I think he would be the featured back. And I did I think he did show enough to warrant some optimism that he could do more with with his touches and move in future weeks.

>> Okay. Yeah. All great notes there. Yeah. Nothing really about this game like really stands out. Like you said, Texans, you get a close win. Every win in the NFL counts the same. Uh but if you're going to beat the big boys, the the pass game's got to look a little bit smoother. I thought CJ Strat was on a hot streak before this one. So yeah, I want to go back and watch this one. Thankfully, we got that Nico Collins play at the end to kind of save his day a little bit. All right. Uh the final game I watched on Sunday was was pretty bad. Let's just be honest here. I was intrigued to watch this one, but it's the Vikings 16, the Giants 13. Now, I'm a true sicko. And the reason why I wanted to watch this game is because we always talk about it on the program. Brian Flores against rookie quarterbacks. It could be quite the spectacle. And guess what it was? It was quite the spectacle here. not in a good way. Early in this game, the Giants, and Mike Kfka, keep in mind, is trying to coach for potentially the New York Giants uh head coach and job, open the game with 15 carries to one drop back for Jackson Dart. And in that drop back, Jackson Dart gets absolutely smoked. So, I would say that Kfka did not trust Jackson Dart to read out the Brian Flores defense. And guess what? He was absolutely right, man. Jackson Dart was seeing Ghost. There was a bunch of times where he would slide left and then the unblocked guy who Jackson Dart is totally responsible for comes and just lights him up. Uh he took a fourth and five sack in the red zone where he was holding on to the ball way too long. There was an uh an interception on a drop. Uh but also other times where there was just dropped interceptions like on a second and 18 for example. And then down the stretch here, fourth and three to end the game, down three. Like I said, he takes another one of those sacks. So, he finishes with about 16 more yards than you and I did today in the pass game. And that was after the coaching staff openly admitted that Jackson Dart was not ready to Brian Flores. So, uh that was the sicko thing. I wanted to see Jackson Dart, Mike Kfka, they both failed the test like miserably. And then on top of that, everybody else was dropping the ball.

>> Yeah, I I watched a little bit of this game, Hayden, and it it made my eyes bleed. I thought Jackson Dart was atrocious today. The min I mean, the Minnesota defense kept him in this game because I I mean, truthfully, the Vikings had no business winning this game either, you know, if we're being honest. Uh but but it was just really bad football across the board. Um, you know, Javon Holland had a pick six that was called back. That was a cool play. Abdul Carter flashed a little bit for for the Giants, I thought.

>> But overall of the Giants, I mean, it it was pretty pretty brutal overall for the team. God, >> they they had five sacks. Jackson Dart took five sacks and they completed seven passes. So, when you're getting tackled for Loft and there was a couple times where Jackson Dart got sacked, but it was like >> head-to-head contact penalty, he's getting first down. So, there was sacks that didn't even count in this one. That's how bad this was. Also wanted to mention Theo Johnson, two bad drops. Darius Sllayton, an automatic drop for him no matter what. Juan Delale Robinson running the seam. So, there were drops. This was a disgusting performance by everybody. This is like another one of these these games where that Vikings team is not very good. We'll get to their their problems on the other side. But the Giants just looked completely helpless. And the depth on this team defensively, the depth at wide receiver right now is pathetic. It was Tyrone Tracy for most of this game. Deon Singleary got some touches, but this is one of those games. Jackson Dart, no quarterback design rush attempts in this one. And when you remove that, I know people want to remove that for Jackson Dart for a safety or whatever.

>> The offense can't function, man. Like, in order for him to like be a little bit better than the normal drop back game, you got to be able to stay for a couple years as a starter. And the only reason he's going to be able to do that is if he's the Jackson Dart that I loved at Old Miss and that times of this rookie season. You got to run around and make some plays. So this one blind floor is way too much for the Giants. Uh quickly on the Vikings, >> pretty frustrating first half for Minnesota in general. JJ McCarthy did make a couple plays. Uh he did have a touchdown in the red area where >> his burst like as an athlete, he really man like that quickness like he can absolutely run. He can also throw the ball on a line. Absolutely. Couple throws were a little bit sprayed. There's lots of balls off of hands which definitely you can count as drop. So like the wide receivers need to be making these plays but also like an interception to JJ McCarthy that's like on the back uh arm against like off coverage I think it was quarters look leaves it inside the only place you can't leave it. So there were some really bad moments for JJ McCarthy and then going into halftime throwing hand uh just hits the top of a helmet. He plays for the next couple snaps goes into halftime a little bit early gets X-rays. X-rays come back clean, but they ruled him out immediately. He just stayed in the locker room for a while as they came out. So, his Max Brosmer at that point, he looked, I guess, a little bit better, but the caveat being the Giants defense has just been a complete train wreck in this one. So, Justin Jefferson made two high-end toetapping plays by the sideline. Aaron Jones uh becomes the Bellcow as Jordan Mason leaves, but there was a couple plays in that first half where they really could like ran this thing open, but the Vikings just made too many mistakes. And like you said, they were really lucky that Abdul Carter was lined up in the neutral zone because that was a pick six that got called back. So unfortunately, man, the JJ McCarthy stuff, we'll see if he's going to come back. It was not a broken hand, but is his throwing hand side if they're going to go back to JJ McCarthy, but this would be another injury for him. So I think at the minimum whether he comes back or not, >> they're going to be in the sweep stakes to bring somebody in as a veteran next year. I think that this was like another one of those games where some cool moments, also some pretty frustrating moments, delay the game, that type of stuff uh for the Vikings. So, I think frustrating on both sides. They're I'm sure happy that they got out of the with the win though.

>> Yeah, not too much more to add. I think you covered it perfectly. I I did tweet and like look, I don't mean to be a McCarthy hater. I really don't like I just kind of try to call like I see it. And certainly to your point, Naylor, even I think it was JJ, like it does hit the ball hits their hands. Like there's no denying that fact. However, >> I genuinely think when you break it down, McCarthy's ball placement consistently is terrible.

>> And it's not good enough. And you know, there's some quarterbacks who are able to put the ball in a in a in a in a area where you can have catch and run opportunities where the receiver doesn't have to make a difficult adjustment to catch the football. And again, the receiver should have caught the ball. I'm not I'm not denying that. And a couple and his interception, you know, like that one that got called back, it went off N's hands. Not really his fault, but still it was high. It was a tough >> and it's coming in hot. You know, like these line drives I'm talking about like there's not a lot of touch and sometimes he's a little bit late and then that's why you got to throw it hard. So, I think it's like all comes down to the feet and reading things out and then he wants to throw cuz he's an explosive athlete like that. I am sold on that. But like you said, the balls start bouncing off wide receivers's hands. Partly if it happens too much partly on the >> quarterback like at the velocity he throws. He he has a cannon low key. He has he has a cannon. And I just feel like he lacks touch and he lacks consistent ball placement. And >> without those things, you can't be an efficient NFL passer. Add on top of that the durability at this point. I mean, there's simply no chance the Vikings can go into next year with him as their unquestioned starter. You can't do that.

>> One, he's not good enough. Two, he's he he gets hurt too much. So, I think whether that's M. Jones, they're trying to trade for M. Jones, sign Marcus Mariota, whatever it is, there needs to be competition or at least a highlevel bridge quarterback they can have in the bag, >> right?

>> Because this McCarthy experience, you can't have faith that this is going to work out. You You just can't.

>> Yeah. I think that sometimes he's like kind of stepping into the pocket like super aggressively and that's when he's like banging his hands a couple times. There's also one in the flats where he takes a sack and like he just needed to get the ball out and kind of just like stood there took an extra hitch. So, I think all these things just kind of work in tandem with another and it comes back to just not playing on time, not having the proper feet and that's what uh that's why the coaching staff has been just been grilling them and making sure to like go on these rants to tell us like this is where he's at in the development. It's a development. So, there were some flashy moments here. Also, some some JJ McCarthy moments

here. So, we'll see if he's going to go down the stretch, but at least JJ M or Justin Jefferson, six for 85 on eight targets.

Uh, and then also Jordan Addison, man, like it's a lot more drops this year than I ever remember. Like going back to the Kenny Pickett days, going back to the USC moment that he had, going back to that awesome rookie season. This another one, uh, JJ McCarthy threw it really early. That one actually threw with touch and just right in Jordan's hand. So, that was a pretty tough outing for him.

But, yeah, this game didn't matter at all. 16. Whenever you see a game end 16-13, you know something has occurred. And indeed it did. Uh, also with this score, Saints 29, Jets six. This is a three-game winning streak for Tyler Shuck. Uh, defense also stepping forward with the Saints here. It's not a good football team. Not going to say that, but the defense is better than I thought I was going to be. And Tyler Shuck is definitely better than everybody thought he was going to be. How did this one happen? And what I, this is what I'll say. There's bad, bad football teams, and then there's good bad football teams. The Saints are actually a good bad football team. They could beat a good team. We saw them beat Carolina and Tampa, you know, in recent weeks. Like the Saints have legit talent on this roster now. There's certainly, you know, there's there's a lot, there's some holes that need to be fixed before they're actually consistently winning. But I like a lot of the pieces they have. And it starts with Tyler Shuck.

Man, Tyler Shuck, I admittedly didn't think he was worth that high of a second-round pick. He's 26, you know, was was never truly a dominant college player, but you watch him, Hayden, the traits jump off the screen when he has time in the pocket and he likes what he sees. This kid had not, not a kid. Yeah. But he has a freaking rifle like a cannon. The the ability to fit the ball into tight windows. He can make throws to all levels of the field. He throws with touch, timing, accuracy. I love what I saw from Chuck today. Make good decisions. His chemistry with Chris Lave, who might do 10 catches, 100, what? What do you have? 148 yards and two touchdowns. Just overall monster day from Ave. This duo could be really problems next year. I mean, because they, they have some legit, legit chemistry and a lot of those these routes he's running. Deep overs, corner routes, post routes, uh, after the catch, you name it, he's doing it all. Jawan Johnson, huge day today as well. He clearly has a rapport with Tyler Shuck. I just thought the Saints passing today was was clicking on all cylinders. Hayden, they threw the ball 49 times today. And I get their riding their riding backs were banged up. Taysom Hill led the team in carries. So, I get it. You want to throw the ball out, but with a rookie quarterback throwing the ball 49 times is nuts. Yeah, absolutely insane.

But I thought the Saints were really good today and the Jets, man, they were equally as bad. I, I, I, I thought it was just an atrocious outing from both Jets offense and Jets defense. Brady Cook, get him off the field. Jets offensive line was terrible. Sacked eight times. I just thought night and day difference between the two teams. And if you're a Saints fan, you have to be feeling pretty good.

Yeah, let's stick with the Saints here because this seems like a team that could be like, they can win the division next year. You know, you hit on a couple of these draft picks. You kind of clean up some of the depth. I think their offensive line's really bad, partially due to injury, but also some kind of mispicks throughout. They definitely need to replace uh Rasheed Shahid to some degree, but Jawan Johnson's under contract. Chris Olave should be getting a big deal anytime. By the way, Chris Olave, really cool, Jess. He hasn't missed any time. Remember, like people thought he should like retire because of the concussions, and obviously concussions are scary, but he's played every single game this year to my knowledge. And the and the trade rumor and the trade room, you know. Yeah. Which I never understood. No, no, you don't trade Chris. He's just steady, consistent, shows up every day and balls out. Like, yeah, he's doing what we hope Garrett Wilson would do for the Jets, but Olave was actually doing it.

My Tyler Shuck comp, and I floated this one out as a prospect, kind of like more like an upside comp for him, and I'm seeing it more and more. It's It's Ryan Tannehill who kind of went the same range, both kind of tall, linear athletes. They that could run in a straight line. Like, there's definitely some weird moments on Tyler Shuck as an athlete. Kind of reminds me of Trevor Lawrence would have some weird moment like clearly a good athlete but also like maybe he's too tall. Yeah, he's too tall for his being he's an awkward athlete. Yeah, but he could throw the ball over the middle. I put out the the cutup last week. I mean against the Panthers it was just like dig out backside dig dig dig dig dig dig. I was like, oh my god, this is like 10 plays throughout the game just like thrown over the middle and that's just kind of hard to find as a rookie. I think that you calling out the the it's 52 drop backs for Tyler Shuck in this one in a game that they won by a lot. It almost feels like an experiment that Kellen Moore is like, let's let's see actually what we got here. Like I, I know he's he can he's a decent player here. Like let's actually put some damn film out there so we can go uh read things out this offseason, get back to the lab, but he's clearly going to be the starter next year. Three-game win streak. They're not going to be in the mix for a quarterback sweepstakes. I think there would be a handful of teams that would easily trade next year's first-round pick for Tyler Shuck. That's just the name of the game right now. So, pretty cool for the Saints.

Uh, on the Jets side here, I don't care about the Jets offense at all. My question is, is there anything about the Saints defense that's now all of a sudden top 10 in EPA allowed this year? It's not that they're like loaded with talent here. It's like Chase Young, they got like a couple young uh pieces in the secondary. Is this like Brandon Staley kind of back from from the dead our boy from the Chargers? Like what what's going on with with the Saints defense, man? I mean, just the the veteran players of the Saints are kind of balling. You know, Cam Jordan, two sacks today. Um, you know, you you mentioned Chase Young. I mean, they uh Brian went out for injury, but before that he was balling. Like, I'm a big fan of PC. The Saints, they're just they were just flying around, man. They were just flying around making great tackles in open space. Uh Brandon Staley has a unit playing inspired football and and I think McKinstry bowled out today. Absolutely. I mean, he jumps off the field. He's been outstanding all year, really. Uh so they hit on him. I just think that they have a really nice mix of young and kind of veteran talent and they're clicking right now. And yes, the Jets really couldn't move the ball. No one on offense could do anything. But a lot of it was because the Saints defense was playing really, really good. You know, I mean, Brady Cook couldn't do anything. Yeah. He was under pressure all day today. And so, I think this this Saints defense is one of the more underrated units in the NFL. I think they've been playing really well over the past month. And if you're heading into next year with these young pieces that the Saints clearly have, like there is a path they can add some pieces and be a really competitive team next year, you know, in year two under.

Yeah, really, really exciting for for them. This could have looked like a complete disaster. And uh they have their first, second, third round picks, uh their own picks. They have a couple fourth round picks as well. So they're they got their normal assets in the draft. Uh they're starting to kind of get a little bit out of that era where just the dead money situation was just so bad. Now they still have like Kamara on a big deal. Taysom Hill will just he'll be under contract forever. But by the way, Taysom Hill though, he had what a 50-yard bomb. Do am I reading that? 38-yard bomb uh on his lone pass attempt. That was to right. And then uh he also had 12 carries. We're back to 2023. Taysom Hill, dude. Yeah, Taysom Hill was just really the focal point of the offense outside of Olave and Juwan Johnson. They're giving him the ball. They're they're really treating him like an a proper running back. You know, you know, Deon Neal missed the game and everyone thought it'd be Audry Estime, but no, it was Taysom Hill just getting all the carries and then uh, you know, late in the game just just showing no mercy. They wanted to unleash Taysom Hill and he just had a huge just dime to K'Lavon in the end zone. Just exclamation point already a beatdown. Let's let's let Hill air one out. And I think it was a really cool stat on that throw. He became the first uh player in NFL history to go over a thousand rushing yards or thousand receiving yards and thousand passing yards in a career. So just pretty pretty remarkable stuff from Taysom Hill.

Um, to ask actually like a serious question here. Taysom Hill, like on Yahoo, for example, he's listed as a tight end. Now, yeah, we are losing some bodies at tight end, like Travis Kelce types and stuff. It's been a little up and down. Cole Kmet, I'm sure he's going to be hitting the waiver wire plenty right now. Taysom Hill has six targets, 12 carries, and has the potential to hit a 38-yard touchdown through the air on top of that. Let's assume. So, Deon Neal is gonna be out. Alvin Kamara, they're gonna keep calling him. It's just it's just not picking up the phone, you know? It's just one of those situations. It is what it is. Audry Estime, he's been cut by a million teams. They only give him five carries. Guess the guy. Am I gonna have to rank Taysom Hill like really high in the finals next week for for tight ends? Like, is this an actual reality that we're going to be living in? I wish I could tell you no. Unfortunately, I think I think I think the answer is yes because he usually was wasn't gimmicky, wasn't fluky, like they were really giving him the ball. You know, they were lining in the backfield and treating him like their bell cow running back for majority of the game. Yeah, the pass late in the game that was a little haha. Let's let's unleash the playbook. You know, we're already up like let's let's have some fun with it. But early and throughout the game, Taysom Hill was a featured player on the offense. Not a give committee to touches. They were properly lining lining him up in the backfield and giving him the football and we know what he can do as a receiving threat. You got to rank him, you know, and I think when you go back and watch the tape, you know, that will kind of dictate how high you rank rank him because there is a risk that it scales back a little bit, but with Deon Neal out, he's going to be a featured player in this offense. He just is.

Yeah, man. Like he he was getting some like outside zone touches in this one. I mean, once you start getting that at tight end and you're catching passes, man, I I think I'm he's going to be one of the first players I'm going to go back and watch kind of get a good feel for this one. But yeah, if Alvin Kamara is not going to pick up the phone, then man, all of a sudden, here comes Taysom Hill. One last ride for old Taysom Hill, who by the way, I believe he's got to be what, 36, 37 years old. Oh, yeah. He's been been around for been around for a minute. Yeah. Yeah. It's insane stuff. Okay. All right. Let's rewind back to Thursday Night Football. Seahawks, Rams. This felt like the game, at least the regular season game of the year. It had pretty much everything, like things you've never seen before. You had like comeback Sam Darnold mode. You had Puka finishing as one of the guys you absolutely needed for the fantasy semi-finals. But let's start this on the Seahawks side as they came back uh from behind in overtime. The first half of the game, they only had 20 plays and you felt it. Sam Darnold was just like not himself. Chris Shula, the defensive coordinator for the Rams, fooled Sam Darnold a couple times. Uh, one of them, he drops a defensive tackle in the red zone after bringing some pressure. Sam Darnold throws a slant route right into him. There was another awesome play for uh the the the Rams defense. They looked like they're going to be in cover one. They drop into cover two. Sam Darnold throws it right to a linebacker there. So Sam Darnold was spooked early on. JSN was catchless. I noticed that they had safety kind of shadowing over the JSN side, but they did make a nice comeback in the second half. Obviously, you get super lucky with whatever we're calling that Zach Charbonnet uh two-point conversion, but everything was breaking their way for Sam Darnold uh late in that game. Uh Cooper Kupp came up huge despite having a fumble in the uh in the red area earlier in the game. That huge huge corner route from Sam Darnold was really probably the throw and play of this entire game. Walks it off super late. So really promising stuff for the Seahawks. Not because they were the better team in this one. They certainly were not, but just because Sam Darnold, despite getting rattled early, was able to come back and throw some huge, huge plays down the stretch there. So uh I'm a little bit nervous about the disguise looks for Sam Darnold. They still were up and down running the ball. Kenneth Walker breaks contain a couple times. Uh so that was really cool to see. Uh we had not seen that in a very long time. So gutsy win on the Seahawks side.

On the Rams side, just everything that went wrong totally did go wrong here. Uh one player that definitely went wrong was the Cole Kmet hype. Uh was out there enough. Matthew Stafford goes absolutely crazy in this one, but still does not get home. He had like a flea flicker screen, but otherwise was not really heard for heard from. It was all Puka Nacua as usual. Uh 16 targets, two touchdowns, uh without Davante Adams, who they've already ruled out for week 17. We'll see if he's going to play in week 18, but it's going to be all Puka Nacua. He should be projected for like 120 yards in the pick lobby. I'm sure it'll be one of the highest we've had in a very long time. One of these kind of offensive player of the year potential games for Puka Nacua. Matthew Stafford, despite losing this game, I think helped himself in the MVP obviously going 457 with three touchdowns. Uh the running back group going to the finals, nothing changed. Kyren Williams 70 yards on 23 carries. Blake Corum, he's able to score a touchdown, but had about a third of the carries from Kyren. So Xavier Smith, Mumfield, you know, Ferguson, Jordan Whittington, Kmet, super secondary to Puka. Uh, it's going to be the backs. It's going to be a bunch of Puka Nacua for the finals. And I'm sure there's going to be a lot of Puka teams in the finals. Uh, I really hope we're going to see these teams again. At this point, the Seahawks uh are likely to have the first seed. It's not a gimme at obviously at all. Uh, and the Rams, if they aren't going to be the first seed, are probably going to be the fifth seed, which means that they would go face the Panthers or the Bucs down there. So, we'll see how this winds up. This game felt like a playoff game. Two of the best teams in the league. I have not changed my opinion on the Rams at all. This is one of those games where you can't even make up how they lost. Like, everything at the last second broke against them. Happens, man.

Two games on Saturday. First one, Eagles versus the Commanders. This one was kind of a runaway game on the Commander side. They've dropped to four and 11. Marcus Mariota leaves early in this one. That means we get Josh Johnson for that game in prime time. And then potentially Josh Johnson on Christmas once again in prime time. Once we get to like quarterback threes on teams, the offenses look really weak. So Terry McLaurin, he had a couple plays down the field. Interesting enough, Quinyon Mitchell did not travel Terry McLaurin. They kept Quinyon Mitchell to the field side. So, they were able to move Terry McLaurin for at least three receptions for 53 yards. Deebo Samuel broke a couple tackles, but only for 35 yards. The pass game is going to look really, really iffy. If it is going to be Josh Johnson next week, the ground game, Chris Rodriguez is the lead back when he returns. 15 carries, goal line touchdown. Jaka Krosky Merritt, he at least scores a touchdown, but only on eight carries. They're just going to be projected for so few points next week that I'll be ranking Chris Rodriguez ahead, but it's going to be a pretty iffy situation once we look at the implied team totals.

More importantly, the Eagle side 29 points. There was definitely some like kind of weak moments throughout the game. This is once again the Commander defense. They had players on in the secondary on into reserve. Not even a fun scheme. They can't really rush the passer. But this has been another week here where the Eagles superstars are looking like superstars. So he had that stint where A.J. Brown was not getting targeted. Now he is again 9 for 95, 12 targets against a terrible secondary. He was making plays. DeVonta Smith rocks a corner to sleep. Uh, even though he had outside leverage, was still able to beat him to the outside. That was a superstar play. The Dallas Goedert touchdown. Jalen Hurts, a little bit of a duck, we'll say, but was able to step up, throws it up and away to Dallas Goedert, who's able to bring that one in. When Dallas Goedert's like your third weapon in the pass game, life is pretty good for the Philadelphia Eagles, I would say. Most importantly, the big difference in this one, the Saquon Barkley 48-yard spin in the backfield with unblocked pressure up front and then breaks it off. That was his superstar moment. It's been a while since we've seen that from Saquon. Obviously had like tush push variant where he just kind of wants to race down the sideline. This one actually making guys miss. That's going to happen when you're facing the Commanders defense. But just one of those games, man, like Eagles defense with Vic Fangio, once they get everyone back, which is another big storyline for them. Jalen Carter is expected to play. Lane Johnson's expected to play, I believe in week 17, week 18, then the playoffs. So, they're largely healthy moving forward and hopefully all the superstars come to play. It's still a very scary team to me with the Philadelphia Eagles are able to win the division once again.

Another one of these crazy games back in prime time. Packers Bears goes to overtime 22-6. We obviously got to start with the Chicago Bears. They had absolutely no business winning this one. I think that their valley they had like a 2% chance of winning this one. You had to score late. On top of that, you got to get the onside kick. Romeo Doubs kind of shortarms it. Doesn't read it right. Leaves with a wrist injury. Bears ball. You're able to score then. And then in overtime, just a massive, massive swing there. Once again, we had Malik Willis with an under center fumble. I believe one of the first times Malik Willis was under center in a very long time. Of course, fumbles it and then the play everyone's seen. But my god, Caleb Williams climbs up. I think it was like 57 air yards, according to Next Gen Stats. Stats. You could not have put that ball more on the money for DJ Moore. Big post route. They talked about it. They schemed up with Ben Johnson. They knew they had this one. And then DJ Moore was able to to hold on to this one after having a little bit of a DJ Moore moment, if I'm being honest, not getting back to the line of scrimmage for a Cole Kmet reception earlier on, but had enough gas in this one for that big post route. It really is just Caleb Williams making plays, man. The second half, this offense was really stuck in the first half. They were they just didn't have the ball pretty much at all going into halftime. They were not trying to pass the ball very much early on, but when Caleb needed to make plays, he made a ton of them. Had 30 yards on the ground, was able to extend plays. You felt no Micah Parsons late in that game. Him stepping up, had all the time in the world. It's just the arm talent, man. It's like his speed and the arm talent. This Bears team, I worry about their defense, certainly, but Caleb Williams and Ben Johnson long term, I know where this one's going to end up. They're going to be awesome together for a very long time. And doing that with DJ Moore instead of Luther Burden, instead of Roma Dunns, all of that super promising. Uh, Cole Kmet, he ran 40% of the routes. He had a reception or two called back. He was not as involved as I thought he was. So, I had a pretty aggressive ranking on him. That one did not turn out. He only had four targets not called back on 34 drop backs, but was out there a lot. Lots of two tight end sets. He was split out wide, just the ball did not go his way and truthfully he had a couple free targets towards the end after all the chaos kind of ensued there. So we'll see about Roma Dunns' foot stress fracture and then Luther Burden, I'm guessing is going to come back in this one, but Bears hold on in overtime over there on the Packers side.

I mean, just super unlucky. I mean, there's just no other way around it. Jordan Love, just super unfortunate for him. Takes a huge hit kind of as he was falling down. A Bears defensive end was not able to get lower than him. Head-on head concussion. We'll see if he's going to play. But obviously, you move move Jordan Love, you're going to have a different style of offense with Malik Willis. Malik Willis carries the ball 10 times for 44 yards. His athleticism just so obvious. But he was also nine of 11 passing the ball. Had a touchdown, 121 yards. He was not the reason why they lost this game. Obviously, the under center fumble was really bad. But I thought he played really, really good football. Unfortunately, towards the very end of the game, lands on his shoulder, and then Matt LaFleur since then said like they don't know if he's going to be ready to go or not. I thought he had one of the best throws of the week that Romeo Doubs won. 33-yard up the sideline. It was so windy in this game. The fact that Malik Willis and Caleb were able to throw the ball downfield just shows you how much like arm strength they have. So, we'll see if Jordan Love can return. We'll see if Malik Willis is going to go out there and start. If it's a neither of them, the Packers just really take a beating because they need to win some games. I think they're currently the seventh seed. They definitely need to win a couple games down the stretch to hold on to the playoffs, but I'm interested with Malik Willis. We talked about this earlier in the episode. Like there's something to this. There's not that many good free agents. He at least has the traits of being an NFL starter and his numbers in very small sample sizes, they have stood out. So I, I do wonder if that was the only time we're going to see Malik Willis, but that was a pretty awesome performance by him. Uh, lots of injuries for the Packers. Uh, Christian Watson in his return with that chest injury. He has six targets. Playing time was like about the same. It's just a full-blown rotation. The Packers secondary, it's hard to trust. Jaden Reed, he has 35 yards. Romeo Doubs is the one to to go crazy here. And then even like in the middle of the game, their other tight end, Fitzpatrick, he pops his Achilles. So now it's Luke Musgrave out there. They were running out of offensive linemen on top of that. They were running out of, you know, third-string quarterbacks at one point. And then Josh Jacobs, he was gutting through that knee injury. He only has 36 yards. He loses a fumble at the goal line. After that, he's like subbed in for one play, but he was like lined up at wide receiver. He was basically a decoy. He does not go back in the game. Emanuel Wilson was running pretty well there. So, we'll see about Josh Jacobs. Unfortunately, tries to go out, just does not look like himself and they lose and there might have been a setback and Jordan Love is out. So, everything just went wrong for the Green Bay offense in this one, but it was at least exciting to see Malik Willis go out there and ball out.

Sam Sherman out of retirement, back on the channel. We knew he couldn't stay on the streets for too long. We brought him back in here to do a couple recap games here. This is one where to be honest, I didn't even watch the end of this one. Brennen and I were recording. Steelers 29, Lions 24. I'll call this one an upset. Lions were seven-point home favorites here. They needed to pretty much win out to stay in the playoffs. What an upset. How did this one unfold?

Yeah, and I'll jump to the end of the game here because really with, you know, 30 seconds left in the game, the Lions had a chance to score a touchdown, win the game. They were down five. The drive actually started with Chris Boswell on the Steelers side, dinking a field goal from about 30, 35 yards out. So that gave the Lions a chance to get the ball back, drive down the field. They had a couple big plays combined with some penalties that took them down there. But nevertheless, fast forwarding, they had the ball in the one-yard line. First and goal with four chances to score a touchdown, win the game. First play, it actually looks like they win the game. They get Amon-Ra St. Brown a touchdown. It looks like game's over. Then a late flag comes out. They called an offensive pass interference against Isaac Su'a-Filo. So that gets called back, pushes them back 10 yards, and then successive plays that just don't work out. It ends with actually another controversial penalty. Amon-Ra on Amon-Ra St. Brown catches the ball around the one-yard line, and actually like gets kind of pushed back and pitches the ball to Jared Goff and it looks like Goff runs in and scores again. But they call that offensive pass interference on Amon-Ra as well. So, the game ends there with the Lions coming up short. And yeah, like you mentioned off the top, I think really hurts their chances of making the playoffs. I think they're not mathematically eliminated yet, but they really needed to win out to have like a real fighting shot to make the playoffs, I believe. So, yeah, tough loss for the Lions.

The Athletic simulator has the Lions odds to make the playoffs at 6%. So even if they win their next two games against the Vikings and Bears, which aren't like absolute layups, it's still only a 25% chance. So they need a lot of help down the stretch here. If you would have said one team's going to rush for 230 yards and two scores, and then the other team is going to rush 15 scoreless yards, I would have told you that's probably the inverse of what happened. So I find the Detroit's failure on the ground far more fascinating. Jahmyr Gibbs has two rushing yards. He does catch 10 passes. PPR scams his way in the second half here. David Montgomery only 14 yards. What the hell happened for the first, you know, three quarters when they only had 10 points?

Yeah, it's kind of hard to describe, but the, you know, the Steelers, I really thought with T.J. Watt, he was he missed this game with injury. I really thought that the Lions would run all over the Steelers. I think that's what a lot of people's expectations were going into the game. They were just stuck in neutral for most of the the first half of this game. Really didn't come alive until the end. And yeah, like you mentioned, like Gibbs still got there in the receiving game. He was peppered with targets down the stretch. I think he had like 13 targets on his 10 catches. So, he still got there in fantasy, but they really could not get anything going on the ground. And yeah, was was exactly the opposite on the Steelers side of the ball. Jaylen Warren ripped off two 45-yard touchdown runs in the second half. He looked really explosive out there. And then Kenny Gainwell, which has really been, you know, kind of an underrated fantasy story I think over the second half of the season. He's been he's been a really good asset for this team. He leads the Steelers in receiving five catches for 78 yards and a 45-yard touchdown catch of his own, which which I should actually highlight. I don't know if you you saw that one, but that was Yeah. One of the catches of of the day he had pass interference. Kind of gets the and one with the touchdown. He's getting torn to the ground by I believe it was Anzalone on the Lions and he fights through contact, catches the ball while he's lying on the ground and gets up and and scores. So yeah, Gainwell has been awesome for the Steelers. Um, and it was again today.

Yeah, I think the Gainwell stuff was actually I think kind of predictable because I thought they were going to be losing the whole game and then we would do the PPR scam stuff with Kenny Gainwell, not with Jahmyr Gibbs. But he's been such a focal point in the past game. This has like been brewing for weeks. like especially the last two games and then this one they just get the ball to him a lot of different ways. A lot of pony personnel stuff using him in the slots like all those like August narratives when RotoWorld and everybody else is writing these headlines of how the running back's going to be used as a receiver like he's the guy this year like he's pretty much the only running back that's used like Kenny Gainwell has. So I think that's been fascinating. That was an awesome touchdown. All three of the touchdowns by the backs were from literally 45 yards out. Exactly. 45 yards. Yeah. A weird Yeah. 45.

DK Metcalf, have to ask a question. First of all, how does he end up by himself next to the wall? Yeah. And how does he get so mad by a blue-haired agitator that he wanted to do an uppercut against them? I guess like maybe almost like an analogy for the country that the blue-haired agitator, you can simply just walk away, but he has to go throw a punch. What happened with DK?

That was bizarre. I, I tried to do some digging into what exactly happened. What they did say on the broadcast is that the blue-haired fan had a Steelers number four jersey. So, I wonder if they called Metcalf over originally, like under a friendly pretext, and then used that to like lure him into some talk, and then Metcalf got offended. I don't know. That's like a paid protester. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Um, but yeah, he takes a swipe at him and it's like, and also like he misses the punch, which Yeah. We got to keep if we're going to do it. Yeah. Yeah. If you're going to if you're going to take a punch at a blue-haired fan, maybe just hit him in the face. But anyways, I, I wouldn't be shocked if he's suspended next week. That seems like grounds potentially for a one-game suspension, but we'll see there. Metcalf on the field was was pretty shaky in this one. Had nine targets, so was heavily involved, but had one or two drops over the middle. Just wasn't quite his usual self. But yeah, um, obviously, you know, with Arthur Smith coaching this offense, he's got all sorts of tight ends involved. He's got both running backs heavily involved. It's DK Metcalf and then nobody else for for wide receivers. You don't want to touch, you know, MVS or Adam Thielen or the rest of these guys.

Yeah, who knows who Aaron Rodgers is going to call. I'm assuming DK Metcalf's not going to play in week 17. And I, I would probably guess not in week 18 either. We'll see if the NFL is ballsy enough to suspend him for the playoffs, which I now believe the Steelers have a pretty good leg up on the Ravens with this upset win, but you can't punch fans, man. Like, that's a that's a hard line from Goodell and everybody else out there. So, I wouldn't be surprised if it's multiple games. I would be stunned if he's not suspended for at least this next game. So, really disappointing for them. Also just go back to like DK Metcalf's kind of been a knucklehead and like they get rid of George Pickens and just George Pickens like a better version of DK Metcalf like still get the same stuff like George Pickens could easily have hit this blue-haired agitator himself but he at least would have had 100 yards so kind of just a weird thing.

I think Pickens Pickens would have at least delivered you know full contact on the punch. I don't think Pickens is missing the punch. So no. Definitely not. And that that's that's what's important here. Um, quickly on Aaron Rodgers, I think that Aaron Rodgers like the last couple weeks has actually been playing like league average if not better football and like that has been a very long time since I was able to say that. So, how would you grade his performance in particular?

Yeah, I thought he was I thought he was great today. Again, you know, Lions defense hasn't been the best, especially if they got, you know, more and more banged up down the stretch this year. But, I thought Rodgers was great. I think he was, you know, hanging in the pocket a little bit more, like willing to take hits a little bit more than he has been earlier in the season. And I wouldn't be surprised if we see that like continue to that trend continue into the playoffs. I think the main downside, it kind of reminds me of like late career Eli Manning, Tom Brady were, you know, very and like towards the end of their careers, they just really didn't want to take hits, but then once it got to the playoffs and the games started to get important, they were willing to hang in the pocket and take hits again. So, I think that's the main difference with Rodgers over the past couple weeks is he knows these games matter. He can't just dirt the ball and avoid every every contact that he faces. So, yeah, I I was impressed again with Rodgers today. And I think they're a feisty team. If they, you know, if the Ravens lose tonight, I don't know what's going on in that game, and they manage to to sneak into the playoffs, I think they're going to be a feisty team, especially getting that home field advantage. But yeah, at the end of the day, I think the playoff odds for them really are likely to come down to that week 18 game against Baltimore. Like this game, even though this was an awesome win for them, I don't think this actually meaningfully like impacted their their playoff odds. It only shifted them from like 60 to 70% or something like that. So, we'll see.

Yeah, you have that exactly right. The Athletic has it at 77%. If they beat the Ravens in week 18, they're automatically in. Even if they lose that game, they're now at a 54% chance. So obviously it's going to be dictated on if they can beat the Browns next week. And then obviously how the Ravens kind of close out on Sunday Night Football and elsewhere. So yeah, feisty team. You're going to have to go into Pittsburgh if they are in there. And you never know about January Pittsburgh cold and Arthur Smith with all these backs and tight ends and stuff. It's an interesting team at the very least right now.

All right, your next game. Bills and Browns. Let's start here. Unfortunate news. Quinton Johnston gets really twisted up and you never know, you know, it's not a good sign when all the Twitter doctors are naming different body parts that they think has completely torn. So I saw like dislocated knees for a second. I saw broken legs for a second. It sounds like dislocated ankle, broken leg situation. There was a mention of a knee injury on top of that. So bottom line, he's out for the season. Hopefully it's like the Tony Pollard Cam Akers like broken leg ankle situation, but even then that's a long road to recovery. So Quinton Johnston was a standout player for the Browns on tape. I know he's very up and down fantasy, but that was pretty ugly. What else did you see from from the Browns and if you have anything else on Quinton?

Yeah, so Quinton, I don't have anything else on the injury. I saw the same as you. I think the official report was dislocated ankle and broken leg. And then again, yeah, it sounds like ligament damage to the knee is also potentially in play. So, yikes, really a bummer for for the Browns. You know, that's definitely going to put his 2026, you know, week one availability at risk. Um, yeah, and and for the Browns, I guess sticking on on that point before we get to the rest of the game here at at the running back position, it was Raheem Sanders that kind of filled in for Johnston on the early down role and then T.J. Watt, not T.J. Watt. T.J. Watt. Yes. Um, the the old Bengals, you know, scatback who's been around the league a little bit. He filled in on passing downs. Um, so yeah, I'd expect, you know, maybe Dylan Samson has a chance to be back next week, but yeah, from a fantasy angle, I think Sanders would be the one if you have any interest in playing a Browns running back, but it's going to be really ugly there.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think they have um what I say, I think it's just the Steelers next week for the Browns. Um, man, like that team total is going to be really low. Uh, let's just get to the rest of of the Browns here. How did Dorian look? How did my boy Harold Fannon look? Anybody else stand out?

Yeah, so the box score for Dorian looks a bit ugly. 20-29 for 157 yards, one touchdown, and two interceptions. Only took two sacks, but again with Dorian, they're always long sacks. He lost 21 yards in those plays. I thought like relative to the box score results, I thought he played a little bit better than the box score gives him credit for. His two interceptions were both kind of like they weren't great throws by any means, but they were balls. The first one was, you know, off Quinton Johnston's shoulder. He threw it behind him a little bit on a Texas route out of the backfield. The ball just popped straight up in the air for like a pop fly, easy catch for the Bills and an interception. And then a second interception was kind of a similar type of popup. He was rolling out to his right. There was Bills defenders in his face and someone got a hand on it and it popped straight into the air. So they weren't like terrible misfires on the interception, just a little bit of bad luck on not like perfect throws. For the first half, the Browns and Dorian actually moved the ball on the Bills pretty well. And even all the way up to the end of the game, they actually had a chance, you know, they had the ball down three with a couple minutes left and, you know, would have had a chance to to drive and win the game. But towards the end of the game, the offense really stalled out. They started sending more and more pressure at Dorian, just like all-out blitzes and he was not able to handle that particularly well, but yeah, I would say middling performance for Dorian. I think a little bit better than some of his previous performances, but nothing special for other offensive weapons on the Browns. It was the Harold Fannon show on offense. He had six six targets, four catches for 34 yards. Also had a rushing touchdown. So he he put two touchdowns up in the box score. I thought, you know, obviously it's not incredible yardage totals, but every time Harold Fannon gets the ball, he's just breaking tackles, running over dudes. He he looks awesome. If they're ever able to put up like a confident offensive infrastructure around him, I think he's really going to be a special player.

Yeah, he's just been dominating in terms of targets for for a very long time. Um, so it's like Harold Fannon, one of the running backs, which is always kind of a different running back kind of popping up in the past game and then a little sprinkle of Jerry Jeudy, but everyone else can't really do anything. So, y'all go back and watch the Dorian Sanders stuff. I know he survived that that pinky injury. Maybe a little cut or whatever, but we'll see Dorian Sanders once again down the stretch. And Harold Fannon, he's still going to be a top five, top six fantasy tight end for sure over the next couple weeks, assuming David Njoku is going to miss. So, big bummer on Quinton. We'll talk about Rocket Sanders, I guess on the running back ranking show.

I will say he is a he's a big boy. Rocket Sanders, he's he's a fun watch on tape. He's got a little Mike Tolbert in him or or something. Wow. He's a big boy. Yeah, rockets are more like linear. Maybe it's like more like a space shuttle. They have a little bit more girth and kind of density to them. This is not like your modern SpaceX, you know. 6'2, 230 for the big fella. Not not built like a rocket. Interesting.

Um, all right, other side of the ball. Bills, they're 11 and 4, 23-20 win here. I believe it was the lowest fantasy output for Josh Allen since I believe his rookie season, according to Ian Hartitz. Um, how did that happen? Was Miles Garrett chasing him down? I talk about like a little phantom like half sack for Miles Garrett, but more importantly for Josh Allen, like what the hell happened here?

Yeah, I will say first on that that half sack for Miles Garrett. I, I don't, I don't know how they're scoring that as a half sack. Um, but anyways, that I, I'll let people Miles Garrett doesn't need a half sack. Like he's he's going to get the record, man. Like let him just do it with honor. Exactly. We don't need any controversy around that record because he's going to get it. So, it was for people who didn't see the play, Josh Allen basically was running around, spinning in circles. He fell down. Miles Garrett was the

second Browns defender to touch him, but it was like a second after the the first defender did. I guess that counts as a half sack.

Anyways, um Josh Allen, you know, I I thought he played well in this game. It's just that the the Bills were running the ball so well. You know, they got three touchdowns on the ground here to James Cook. uh to two of them to James Cook and one to Tai Johnson and they just had a very conservative approach on this game. They they didn't drop back and throw the ball that often. The game the run game was just so effective. And usually when when the Bills score three rushing touchdowns, like Josh Allen's good to get one or two of those, it just didn't break >> his way today. So >> yeah, I think that's just, you know, I don't have any magical explanation for why Josh Allen had a bad day. I think it was just a little bit of variance, a little bit of uh conservative game plan and turns out he ends up with I don't know like less than 10 fantasy points in your your semi-finals and that's that's a huge bummer.

>> Yeah, just the way the cookie crumbles when you're not feeling pushed on the other side. I know the game was close but going into this they were pretty heavy favorites and you're in Cleveland like weird things happen. It is a good defense after all. Um so yeah, looking at it Daltton Concaid half the drop backs he was running a route. Same kind of split time with Dawson Knox and Jackson Haw. did see Dawson Knox drop a touchdown. So, that obviously hurt Josh Allen's um production. Uh but yeah, James Cook, I mean, once again, just dude is just a regression monster when it comes to the the rushing touchdown stuff. So, uh definitely one of the guys you needed throughout fantasy. Um but I think we can keep that one moving.

Buffalo Bills, they're they're they're watching this Patriots Ravens game right now, which is at halftime, uh pretty closely because they still have a chance. Uh but they I know they have to win out to have a chance of of that division. So uh your last game, pretty big one here.

Chargers 34, Cowboys 17. Uh I mean, how good was Justin Herbert and Quinton Johnson in this one?

>> They were both honestly incredible. I mean, I think Justin Herbert's been playing amazing football all year, and his offensive line obviously has has been what's letting the team down. But in this one against the Cowboys, you know, with uh Quinton Williams out, the Cowboys weren't able to get a lot of pressure on the Chargers, which is rare. You know, this entire season, Justin Herbert's been running to his for his life. And in this game, he was able to sit back in the pocket a little bit, deliver some plays down the field, and that resulted kind of in the reemergence of Quinton Johnson. Went four for 104 and a touchdown in this game. Had a 50-yard catch down the sideline at one point. um also beat a defender for a 25 yard touchdown on a go route. Uh made a one-handed snag in the back of the end zone on that one. So Quinton Johnson, not known for his his hands, but he was making some awesome plays in this one. And yeah, it was a bit of a back and forth battle with the Cowboys early on, but ultimately the Chargers just kind of wore them out in the second half and and towards the end of the game and ended up blowing it uh wide open there towards the end. But yeah, Herbert, I mean, there's not much else you can say about Justin Herbert at this point. It just honestly, it made me like a little bit sad thinking about what this Chargers team could have been if Joe Alt um and the rest of their offensive line had stayed healthy this year. I think we'd be talking about them as like legit Super Bowl contenders. And obviously, they're still, you know, everyone's in it this year in the AFC, but I I do think the offensive line against better defenses is going to prove to be too big of an issue.

Yeah, this is one where I I saw the highlights, but I need to sit back with coffee in the morning and like go in and appreciate this one because all all the film nerds were like losing their absolute mind over the Herbert performance and and I'm looking at it, >> he still was under pressure on 51% of the drop backs like on the initial uh rulings, but doesn't take a sack. So like >> sometimes like quarterbacks feel like they're not under pressure even though they were because they can just navigate the pocket and they have a good sense of what's happening. And I feel like that's probably what Justin Herbert was doing. But 23 of 29, no sacks, and there's a 51% pressure rate. That is that is absurd football. Also shows what this the state of the Dallas secondary was.

>> Yeah. Yeah. He was he was incredible. Yeah. Go ahead, Aiden.

>> Uh I I wanted to quickly go to the running back room because Kamani Vidal leaves with an injury. Omarian Hampton finishes with 85 rushing yards in a touchdown. Was there anything uh to update us on with the Chargers backfield?

>> Yeah, so I will say in this one uh don't know the extent of the injury he was ruled out with uh or he was ruled questionable to return with a neck injury. I didn't see him ever being officially ruled out. So that makes me think that maybe there's a chance he he's back next week. Didn't seem like the most serious injury, but perhaps we'll find out more there soon. I would say even before the injury, the backfield had shifted a little bit more towards Hampton um verse Val than it had the past couple weeks. I don't have the exact uh routes and snaps numbers, but just based on watching the game, Hampton was getting more touches, was in there for more snaps than I think he had been in previous weeks. So, even without the injury, I think it's safe to say that this backfield's going more towards uh 65, you know, 70% in favor of Hampton over Vidal. or maybe it'll be, you know, Haskins or someone else next week. But yeah, I thought I thought Hampton looked good, was breaking off um some some big runs out there. Um getting to the edge uh pretty consistently against this Cowboys defense. So, he'd be someone who maybe he was kind of low-end RB2 the past couple weeks. I think he might creep up and challenge for low-end RB1 status in your fantasy finals if if you made it that far.

>> Yeah, I think that's that's a good shot. It also just makes sense that Vid Doll in the first couple games with Hampton, he was playing well and Hampton's coming off this injury where he missed two months that you would ease him in and then all of a sudden when the games really start to matter, you put more on the plate of Omar and Hampton. The Chargers are going to be in the playoffs, but they do have like playoffesque games for the next two weeks. They get the Texans next week and then the Broncos. So, we're going to see Justin Herbert running for his life against those ones. Uh, but it would be helpful for Hampton to have more of the backfield himself because those are those are obviously two great defenses there, especially next week with the with the Texans.

>> Um, in terms of the the splits for the wide receivers, uh, Lad McConi was out there for the full time and then it was everybody else kind of rotating. So, that's Quinton Johnston, Gadston, Trey Harris, Keenan all played about the same amount of snaps, like right around a half to twothird snaps and then it was Lad McCon in the full-time role.

>> Yeah. Lad, Lad, QJ, these guys are very difficult for me to rank out there. Um, they they were able to beat up on like Trayvon Digs coming back from injury and whatnot. Uh, but yeah, very very challenging. This team's like so inconsistent that it's it's kind of hard to get a good grasp on all of them.

>> Yeah. And especially next I was thinking like, oh, Quinton Johnson showed more life today. Like you can maybe consider him next week. They're they're going back to the Texans defense.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. And Stingley next week. So that's going to be really hard to trust. They're even rotating in um Keandre Lambert Smith a little bit the past couple weeks, too. So, they're they're really getting deeper into, you know, best receivers.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. They're they're in their total bag right now.

>> Um Okay. Yeah. This game you you said there's some back and forth uh especially in the first half. Cowboys score all 17 of their points in the first half. Dak Prescott started out on a heater. George Pickkins and Ryan Florenoi find the end zone here. What happened with the Cowboys first half versus the second half?

>> Yeah, the So, in the first half they were just kind of going score for score with with the Chargers. Um George Pickkins was involved early and often. I believe he had 42 yards uh on the opening drive there that eventually led to that Ryan Florenoi 5-yard touchdown pass. Floreninoi actually did leave uh with an injury in this game I believe in in the second quarter, early in the third quarter. Um and I I think that maybe mildly contributed to to the Cowboys slowdown. Obviously Florenoi is not like the engine of the Cowboys offense, but he has been playing.

>> He's kind of nice. He really is kind of nice.

>> He's good and he and he keeps the you know he keeps the chains moving. He gets a lot of like catches over the middle uh that keeps the offense on track. So, I think that did hurt them a little bit, but um yeah, it honestly was just the Chargers defense stepping up a little bit more in the second half. Dak Prescott was under pressure a little bit more. He still played um well overall in this game. The other thing I'll mention, I guess, on the the Cowboys side is I do think Javante Williams is still a little bit banged up. Um they definitely were mixing in Malik Davis a little bit more than I'd seen uh in the past couple weeks. I think Javante left last week briefly um in that game and it did seem like he was limited today. So I I do think my trust in Javante for the fantasy finals is definitely down a little bit after this week.

Yeah, ironically, like the Chargers play really well in offense and then they get the the Texans next week and then the Cowboys, it's the flip like where the offense falls apart in the second half, then they get the Commanders next week on a short week and the Commanders have a backup, a third string quarterback perhaps and all their secondaries out. So, if Florenoi is out, I mean, we're going to rank Pickkins and Lamb easily inside the top 10 as always. And then it's just the the Javante Williams. I want to go back and watch those because I think it's a good shout out if he's not fully himself. It's going to be a short week. They're going to be playing on Christmas. Um, and I think that Javante did not have full participations in practice for a lot of the week. So, that's one to get right because Javant is just he was so good in the first half and and then the second half of the season just like the explosive runs have like really gone away. I think they're missing a left tackle right now. But, the interior of the offensive line is healthy. So, it's just one of those things where >> the season's long and these running backs just never know what they're dealing with. And then maybe for him it's also just like when you're have you've had all the surgeries on your knee and stuff like maybe second second half of seasons there's going to be a lot to ask for anyways.

>> Yeah. And the Cowboys now too with obviously they lost today. I think even the Eagles winning on Saturday basically eliminated them from playoff contention. So >> they got nothing to play for down the stretch. Obviously, if players are healthy, they're going to still be out there and playing, but you know, wouldn't be shocked if Javante is, you know, rested down the stretch.

>> Yep. Free agent TV, they're gonna have to make a running back decision. I did see a Jerry Jones quote about Ebloose, and he said there's not much of a decision that needs to be made, which means that he gone. He is gone. Might as well fire him today. It's not looking good over there. I just did want to hit on that though, wasting this offense because of this Micah Parson's trade and like waiting two and a half months to trade for Quinnon Williams. It's just it's such a waste because I mean the Dak Prescott numbers with George, you hit on George Pickkins uh in the off season and the offensive line looks good and it's just a total waste like not even be in contention for week 17. It's just pathetic. And and even with the Pickkins thing, they hit on Pickkins, but they don't find a way to extend him during the season, which is classic Cowboys. They never find a way to extend their their players and get ahead of that. So, who knows where that's going to land. I assume they're going to do everything they can to to bring him back, but >> that's not even a guarantee. So, it's it's just a bummer. I agree with you. This offense I would love to see in the playoffs. If they just had like a league average or even like 20th best defense in the league, I think this would be a playoff team. But just can't do it when you're giving up, you know, 34 40 points every week on this Cowboys defense.

>> Jess Bry, I think Pickkins probably played enough to get the franchise tag, which I got $28 million, but wide receivers is like up to $40 million. I do think he's made it into that tier, another seven for 130 in score. Like one of the best picks in fantasy was George Pickkins and uh he he's made it matter in the semi-finals. So once again, thanks for Sam coming back uh out of retirement for for the recap here. had some some good games here. Uh Sam, where could where could we find you? You doing uh PowerPoints and and using AI in the business world? How else could we track down your stuff?

>> Yeah, you can just pop into your local uh cubicle. You might you might find me there.

>> good.

>> I guess I'm still on on Twitter at Sherman_.

>> You're definitely on Twitter. You're throwing out bangers.

>> Yeah. Yeah. I'm put not really fantasy uh analysis usually, but I'm putting tweets out at at a pretty good volume. So, you can find me there. Uh, but yeah, no, I appreciate it. I saw Philip Rivers come out of retirement last week and I thought if if he can do it, why why can't I? So, thanks for having me on.

>> That's right. Yeah, I'm sure I'll lure you back out once again for some offseason stuff. Uh, trying to replace some episodes with Josh as he's uh on a rightful break. So, I'm sure we'll be doing a lot more down here. So, thanks for hopping in.

>> Awesome.

>> All right, time for the games that we didn't like actually cover intently. So, we'll go back and watch these for my running back wide receiver rankings. But Brenley and I back corner of our eyeballs here watch Titans and Chiefs a blowout. I'm not even going to call it an upset when Gardenner Mchu goes down and it's Chris Aludicon as the quarterback. And we'll get into the Chiefs defense side. Titans, I guess, take care of business. Cam Ward statistically one of his better outings. Uh doesn't have a turnover. Uh 228 pass yards, two touchdowns. Uh they go of course to Chinira DK and Chica Quanquo. Uh Tony Pard though another h 100redyard outing. Tai Spears gets the rushing score here. Uh did you see any moments out of Cam Ward Pard or anybody else?

>> Yeah, I thought Tony Pard again just stringing stringing a lot more consistent just games. You know, he's been doing this for the past three weeks. I didn't think it was it was a fluke. I think I had him the past two weeks and I just said, you know, this looks real. You know, it's like Tony Apollo of old and today I thought he looked really good. Look looked explosive. Cam Ward made some plays today down the field to DK. You saw that. Um, he finally had time today. I wasn't pressured too much. Um, I think you gotta feel good about Cam Ward heading into year two. Get him some more protection, get him some better weapons, get him a veteran receiver. I think there's a lot to like there. Um, and then you mentioned Taj Spears kind of gets the the vulture touchdown. Um, I also know Chica Conquo had a really cool touchdown as well, kind of more on a shovel pass. Um, so overall I thought the Titans offense looked really good. The Chiefs defense, however, I thought they're they're in Cancun.

>> Chris Jones when he's Chris Jones never been eliminated in his life. He's like, "I've been eliminated, man. I'll see you guys later, brother."

>> I thought the effort today was piss poor. Clear clear tank job happening. Um, the tackling was pathetic. And if that's what's going to be, you know, moving forward, then whoever is playing the Chief Chiefs offensively, which I think is Denver next weekend, >> should get upgraded because the Chiefs defense was >> okay.

>> They they had no interest in being in that game today.

>> Yeah, Trent McDuffy was out um their top corner, too. So, yeah, the the Chiefs are going through the motion right now. The Chiefs would have the 12th overall pick according to Tankathon. Uh yeah, they have a lot of issues on on offense. Obviously, we'll get to those. Yeah, with Cam Board, uh, saw some pretty ridiculous throws from him to be honest. And that's like to me when you're playing on a team without a bunch of talent, especially on the receiving end, like I want to grade towards the flashes. There's been a plenty of flashes here. So, I'll go back and watch this one on the All 22, but his arms live and he made a couple downfield throws in this one. He had three different uh 25 plus yard gains through the air. Tony Pard, they're going to have a decision to make contractually. Maybe this one's actually easy for you. Next year, they've already paid him $2 million. The decision is, do we keep him on the team for seven and a4 million dollars next year, which is like low-end starter money? Uh, I think if you would have asked me a month ago near the trade deadline, I would have been like, "Yeah, right." Like, what's the point? You have Ta Spears go draft another young back, sign somebody for cheaper than Tony Pard. But that's a three humongous games to kind of close out this year when he easily could have thrown in the towel as a veteran. So, $7 million. Are you keeping Tony Pard around for next year? Do you think he's kind of earned it?

>> Yeah, absolutely. I I I think one he's earned it and and I think if he keeps going in the next few weeks like clearly like this is Tony Paul who we thought he was >> leadership 100% on top of it because the last thing you want to do is >> take away Cam Ward's weapons. Clearly he doesn't have enough right now.

>> The one thing that's been consistent over the past three weeks is Tony Pard. I'd hate to get rid of that as Cam Ward tries to take that next step in his development year two. And I think there's a lot comes with a veteran running back pass protection, knowing knowing how to run routes well. Like Tony Pard offers at least that veteran stability. I wouldn't want to go out get rid of Tony Pard Spears then a younger back. Like I think Tony Pard at that price is totally fine and worth it at this point.

>> Yeah, I think they have a ton of money. They might even have the most space heading into 2026.

>> Yeah, they have over 100 million. Yeah, you you keep Tony P. The vibes are good. Let's keep this thing moving. Tony P will be back next year. That's an offseason basketball problem that we'll run into. Uh but yeah, good thing we're seeing some moments down the stretch from the Tennessee Titans. Uh all right, Chief side of this. Uh Gardner Mchu really unfortunately he pops his ACL too. He stays in the game for a couple extra plays, but obviously you can't play through a torn ACL. So that's backtoback weeks for the Chiefs losing their the starter. The Chiefs also play. I mean, we're going to have to go through this for the holidays, folks. Like be ready. Like football is not going to be excuse for your families. You're going to have to be hanging out with your families cuz the quarterbacks, it's not looking good for us. Chris Aludakon's going to be out there. Uh Josh Johnson's probably going to be out there. I forget who the last one is, but it's another really bad quarterback uh for for the third game for for Christmas. With the Chiefs, you pretty much can't start anybody, man. Like Travis Kelce, he's like trying to retire on a good note here, but he's going to have to it's pretty bottom of the barrel. Xavier Worthy and Pacheco are the leading receivers with 41 yards. I mean, it's just we're we're throwing in the towel completely. Um, even if like Rasheed Rice comes back next week, like what could we even do with the third stringer? Nothing.

>> Yeah, No, Aludu Kane, I mean, he's just a project and and you know, I thought he had some fine moments today running around a little bit, but it's just going to be brutal. I think they're I think they're at Denver next week. I'm not sure if they're home or away, but >> that game could be anywhere. It wouldn't matter to me. They can play that thing on Mars anybody.

>> It's going to be it's going to get ugly. Um so if you have Denver's defense next week, lucky you cuz Yeah, it's going to be food out there.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Uh yeah, the last quarterback, it's going to be Max Bromer, it's going to be Josh Johnson, and it's going to be this new kid for for the Chiefs. So, it's Yeah. Not how Netflix was uh trying to draw this one up on on the whiteboard.

All right. Well, that game was a pretty much a disaster. Uh this game was actually the next game was actually pretty interesting. the Falcons and the Cardinals. Lots of stuff going on pregame here. We had two wide receivers uh who were uh questionable throughout the week. Drake London returns to the lineup. So does Marvin Harrison who steals the show though. Michael Wilson made one of the best uh just like luckiest kind of coolest touchdown grabs debatably even if he was in the end zone, but he easily outpaced Marvin Harrison who only had one catch. And then on the flip side, Drake London uh probably came back a little bit early. I don't know why they were rushing him back, but they did. He only has 27 yards on eight targets. Falcons hold on 2619. They would This is nothing to play for here. Uh but we got a big Bejian Audi. Did you see anything that stood out in this one?

>> Yeah. Uh so I I you know was bold enough to try to start Drake London in my semis. Didn't work out for me, but I was keenly watching him and I thought, you know, I thought he was moving well. Hayden, but he didn't play the ball in the air very well. You know, on on the interception that Kirk had, it was Drake London slipped and didn't work his way to the football and then the corner had made a great play on it. Um Drake had a drop as well, just kind of like didn't catch the ball cleanly in the in the in the defensive back was able to bat it out at the last minute. Then in the end zone, Drake tried to high point the ball but let their defender kind of get in there as well. Those are all plays I think of vintage in shape. London is are making is making.

>> So I think next week we're gonna see hopefully that version the old version of Drake London.

>> But eight targets I mean you love that. You love that coming back. Eight targets that that's that's what you want to see. Wish wish he converted a few more of those but I feel good about London next week and and so on and so forth.

>> Bejan today different dude >> different dude. I mean, that receiving touchdown, he he's he's a special special athlete in his home state of Arizona. I I thought today he was going to go off today and he delivered. I thought Kirk played overall pretty well. Um and then they really kind of featured Algier late into the fourth quarter, kind of giving him some carries, resting be. So, um overall, thought thought the Falcons offense was good. Kyle Pittz continues to produce at an elite level right now. Um but but yeah, I think vibes are pretty pretty well in Atlanta, I'd say, currently.

>> Yeah, I think those are great notes on Drake London. He he played 32 of 38 uh possible uh routes out there, which is like rock solid eight targets just, you know, stuff happens in fantasy if he makes all those plays right there. We're talking about this way differently. So, those are 50/50 balls >> for a reason. But yeah, that was just kind of a weird outcome because he was like I think it was DNP DNP limited or limited limited DNP in practice. You typically don't see them like coming back from that, but uh what could you do? Uh yeah, huge game from Kyle Pittz. I kept him inside as my top five tight end. I think we kind of going to have to keep doing that because he keeps making too many plays. Uh and then yeah, I think that's all my notes on the Falcons end. Uh with Arizona, we did get the backfield right. It was definitely Michael Carter over Marcado and Cory Ker. Didn't like do too much with it. 65 yards on the ground, does not score a touchdown. That goes to Michael Wilson. Uh, one of the quietest games from Trey McBride. So, I'm going to go back and figure out why he was quiet and Elijah Higgins is the one that ends up with 91 yards. Uh, but Marvin Harrison just probably wasn't the same uh in this one. So, I'll go back and watch this. I'm not sure if you saw anything from Marv or Trey McBride, anybody else.

>> No, I mean, the Michael Wilson catch was unbelievable. really was >> that he's just a special player at this point. I mean, yeah, but I didn't see too much from from the from this offense, though. Dolph didn't move the ball a ton. Only I think it was only one touchdown, it looks like, scored. So, I mean, just not not a ton from Arizona. Um, you know, certainly not's best game. Um, so definitely got to go back and see kind of what went wrong with Arizona's offense.

>> Yeah, Marv played 62% of the the drop backs, so he was more limited than Drake London was. Um, and then yeah, Michael Wilson making some big plays at the catch point. So, uh, yeah, we'll go back and before my rankings, I'll go back and watch all these games I did not, uh, pay too much attention to, but that's going to do with Brenley here. Oregon Ducks hat, I see you guys beating up on a really good James Madison. You guys feel good about yourself? You guys feel good over there?

>> Hey, a win's a win. You know what? Players on our schedule, hey, what can I do? What can I do?

>> Cool. Yeah. Who do you guys get next week,

>> dude? Texas Tech. It's going to be in my opinion I think I think that's the best matchup of of the of the quarterfinals.

>> So that should be should be good at Miami. So Orange Bowl

>> and for content we need the Oregon Ducks quarterback to come out. Uh I hate to break that news but strictly for content he needs to come out.

>> No. Please no. I need another year.

>> If you if you had to guess like put some odds on it. What what do you think?

>> I think minus 150 he's going out.

>> Maybe minus 200. I think at this point the way it's trending he's going to go. I I just feel like well I think he I think he needs another year personally for development he's a lock top three pick. You know.

>> I mean yeah look at it the the the Raiders need somebody. The Browns need somebody. The Jets need somebody. The Cardinals could go grab somebody. You know like all these teams the Dolphins are then the Rams have the 11th pick. Could they go over there? You know there's a lot of options in the top 12 right now. Like >> unfortunately for Duck fans myself, like Dante Moore could really only hurt his stock coming back being being straight up, you know, like >> he's pretty much a guaranteed top five pick at worst. So probably go. Hope he doesn't, but we'll see.

>> Okay. Yeah. Excited to watch him. Texas Tech got a big boy defense over there, unlike uh old James Madison. Bless their hearts. All right,

>> the Dukes.

>> All right, we'll see you next week, Brenley. Thank you, man.

>> All right, with that, uh we're going to be winding down here. different week because we got Christmas on Thursday. It's just me right now. So, I think we're gonna just do rankings episodes on Tuesday and on Wednesday. Uh I'll talk about Waverwire pickups uh in that episode. Hopefully, we already hit on a couple of those names. You know, it's going to be probably Taesm Hill on the damn Waverwire thumbnails uh on other channels. So, expect rankings episodes only this week, three of them. We'll eventually do some sit stars probably on the Sunday. Congrats if you guys made it to the finals out there. Uh huge bummer if you lost in the fantasy football uh semis, but we'll do tons of offseason content. I've already got like free agency stuff uh written up. I'll be diving up into the drafts of course uh pretty quickly. Probably hit on Mendoza, maybe this Oregon quarterback if he comes up. So, still plenty more even if you've been eliminated from the fantasy finals. Uh we still got tons of content on here. And then obviously use promo code the show. Play five, get 75. It's unwrapped. We're doing bunch of specials. Like today, we had a Josh Allen gimme. Uh if you want to draft right now, we got NFL playoffs best baseball. Uh I think I'll have some of your favorite content creators on for an episode there. You draft for the NFL playoffs, get fantasy points as you kind of uh continue on to the Super Bowl. So, still tons of stuff on our end, even though the fantasy football season is winding down. Uh, I'll see you guys back probably on