Folding or doubling down on preseason takes: Vikings, Joe Burrow, Panthers, Rams
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On this episode of Football 301, Matt Harmon joins me as we recap week two. And we do a little take poker, take blackjack.

Take gambling game. I don't know. I should know. I live in Vegas, but that's what we do. We either stand pat, we fold, or we double down on some of our preseason takes. Plus a little rookie quarterback and receiver check-in at the end of the show. See you guys in a minute. Credit Karma is your evolved financial assistant, making managing your finances simpler and more tailored to you. Join us at creditkarma.com to start your personalized financial journey today and continue to grow with our innovations. Credit Karma, evolve your finances.

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Hello and welcome to Football 301. I am Nate Tice. We have our week two recap show here today. Mr. Matt Harmon is going to be joining me for that. We're also at the tail end of the show. We talk about a little rookie check-in, quarterbacks, receivers, the premium positions, as people like to say, the fun positions, the fancy positions. But before we do that, we're going to do a little take blackjack, which is a little

Looking back at some of our takes that we've had the last six weeks, last two months, whether we're going to stand on them, fold them or double down. Raise. It was originally take poker, but we moved it to blackjack. But double down sounds a little bit better. But like I said before, to help me do that, to do the take blackjack, to talk about the rookies is Mr. Matt Harmon himself. How are you doing today, Matt?

Nate, I'm doing great. You know, we were talking this morning, you and I, about how nice it is to actually have some games and some data to really dive into. Two games, baby. Yeah, went back and binge watched a few offenses on film today, a few defensive units as well to kind of really test myself on some of these preseason takes. And yeah, it's a mixed bag, as it always is. You know, sometimes, Nate, I feel like you see week one and immediately you're just, well,

That's enough of that. Totally wrong on that one. And sometimes you got to let things play out and be patient. So there's a little mix of that today. I'm sure a lot of people are saying you're confirming your priors or holding on to your priors. But there is going to be some of that. But there's going to be some I'm casting away and just understanding, cutting my losses. I've lived in Vegas long enough to understand when you cut your losses. So this is a great show to do that. So like I said before, we're going to revisit...

You know, a good amount of our takes. Some of them are going to be more about players. Some are about, you know, what teams and maybe positions and stuff that we, you know, we're playing our flags on. Some are a little bold, maybe a little less. But like I said before, we're going to go over each and every one of them to start.

And this is a relevant piece of news with Bryce Young being benched is one of my favorite takes of yours in the last month or so, which was just because it was just so bold and I loved it. Matt, we're going to read each other's takes too. Just, just to, you know, dig it in a little bit more. So Matt, your take was Deontay Johnson was the most important player acquisition in the entire NFL, not for the Panthers, the entire NFL. Matt,

Are we standing up this unfolding or double downing on the Deontay Johnson take? Never, Nate, let the record show. I will do whatever it takes to have a good show and to be relevant. Okay. I will do things for the good of the show always because I, uh,

made myself the sacrificial lamb here to put this at the, to put this at the top, just so my sacrificial X. I'm just clearing out space for you to get wide open, Nate. I will take that safety up the boundary every single time. Uh, yeah, you want to, you want to throw up the seam. I got him over here on the sideline. No worries about it, but yeah, man, look, obviously I'm going to fold on this take to be fair.

To be fair, it was obviously in our take shopping kind of episode. So more of like, do I really think this? Probably not. But let's be about it anyways.

Because the real thing is that it did not work in the intended use of it here. And that Deontay Johnson was going to be the guy, part of the big reason why Bryce Young made a second-year leap. Bryce Young's not going to make a second-year leap because he's been benched after two games, okay? 3.2 yards per attempt on Sunday. That is .2 yards fewer than the least efficient run game in the NFL last year in the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. I mean, it's just...

Nate, you know this being around the game. Teams can lie to you as fans. Teams can lie to other teams. Teams can lie to players out in the open market or draft prospects and things like that. They'll lie to you about injuries for sure. The one thing they can't do is lie to the other players. And I think as soon as you saw – I don't know if you know this about me, Nate, but I grew up as a Panthers fan. Yeah.

I couldn't care less about Carolina now. I haven't had an emotional attachment to that franchise probably in like a decade. It's good. It's healthy. Very healthy. But I still follow a good bit of Panthers media and keep up with some of the fans on Twitter and things like that. The instant you saw, especially like Joe Person from The Athletic who's covered the team forever, saying after the game on Sunday, they might have to consider benching Bryce Young just so they don't lose the locker room. And when you go back and watch it on film, you see why that is because –

This is not credible football, what Bryce Young is doing back there. So, yeah, I'm folding on this take. I don't think Deontay Johnson will go down as the most important player acquisition in the NFL. But I am at least interested to see what this offense looks like with Andy Dalton under center. Yeah, he's competent. Again, you want to be evaluating some of these young guys they took, even if we are always, what is that guy? Does he work there? With Bryce Young, and this was going back to last year's draft process, and I'm not

even I'm not like trying to victory lap this or anything. I went Stroud and Richardson as one, two, and I had a little drop off to Bryce and I came around on him because I did think he was very smart and very, he understand how to play quarterback and all those things. But this was the head versus heart argument.

my head won out on it, but still I understand why others were like, well, you know, he is a creator and that's what you kind of need in today's NFL. There are size and athleticism thresholds in pro sports for a reason, not just the NFL, just NBA, baseball, whatever sports that you want to look at. And so,

Some of this is, I think some people see the money ball scene with the old scouts with the earpieces and they're like, oh, these old scouts, they don't know what they're talking about. And some of that is true, but some of these things that scouts have discovered about having thresholds for positions matters. Not only just size as far as height, but weight. And that was the thing I just kept coming back to with Bryce Young was his weight was so small that the only historical comparison I could find was Doug Flutie.

Who washed out of the league, ended up in the CFL, and then had a second career with the Bills. A late in the career, and then was drop kicking for the Patriots at like 40 years old. But Bryce Young didn't have, like with the smaller guys that he was compared to, Kyler Murray, Russell Wilson, he didn't have their arm. Like he is an average arm at best. Those guys have good arms on the scouting scale. I would say maybe very good at times, especially with their deep balls. So if you're going to be an outlier, a Devontae Smith,

a Marvin Harrison, junior or senior, all these guys that Aaron Donald, as far as height and weight too with him, you have to be exceptional in other areas. Truly exceptional. You have to have a strong arm. You have to be a freak athlete. You have to be super strong, super quick, and

Bryce was average at best in all those. So, and he was maxed out. He was groomed to be a quarterback since he was like five years old. We heard enough about the S2 stuff. Oh, that's great. I know. And that, that was why I kind of kept us hedging on him. I was like, I'll take him in the back half of the first round. I would never, I never once said I'd never take him in the first round. It was just more, I would rather throw a dart in the, in the twenties than number one overall. Cause that's what you're chasing is the needle mover.

And so, yeah, I, it's just kind of one of those where he didn't get set up for any success, but the thing was there wasn't really that ceiling to chase anyway. So I just want to kind of like talk about Bryce Young a little bit because it, I reviewed him. I reviewed his first year of the summer and it was just kind of like,

i don't see a lot of paths here guys maybe alex smith like 10 chance of alex smith here and that's all i had and alex smith again is 6 3 2 30 and again so i just even when tom pelissero tweeted out the graphic like the first one to break the news yesterday that they were benching price young and tweeted out the graphic of andy dalton and bryce young standing next to each other i know this i don't want to be piling on on the guy no i know i'm not trying to be mean about

this. I'm just going to state that out. He seems like a great guy and obviously wish him the best. I almost kind of wish, Nate, that some team, like the Panthers, would just get rid of him before the trade deadline. Like, trade into Miami. Let Mike McDaniel try to do another reclamation project while Tua's out. Something like that. Just get him out of there, man, because I think it's toxic. But again, even just looking at the

the picture they tweeted out of Dalton, who's 6'2", 220. He's not freaking Anthony Richardson or anything. I'm like, that's a much bigger human being. And yeah, I just come back to something I said on the show this summer, which is that for me, I think about quarterback play less so much about the throws you make and the throws you take. It's the throws that you're leaving on the field. And I think that's been the difference really just in two games.

between what we saw last year where there really weren't a lot of answers on the field for him. There were really not a lot of players separating or windows to throw into. I think so far this year, it has not been perfect in Carolina from a protection standpoint. I don't know that he's always had great answers against pressure or checkdowns, things like that. But I think there are throws that he's not taken this year, which is – that's when it gets problematic. Yeah, he knows what he is, which is the issue. That's kind of –

the double-edged sword of all of it. All right. But moving on for Bryce Young and Deontay Johnson, I do, I do want to have add a buffer to Matt. That was a, that was us tilting our shoulders back for that take. So it wasn't like you were putting your chest out on that one. I just want to make sure everyone knows that, but it was fun to address it again. Here's what I kind of, I had my chest out a little bit on this one, but it was kind of tempered and I,

I'll let you read this one off for me, Matt. Yeah. And of course, man, we're just we're just going down. Let's beat up on Matt here to start the show, which is totally fine. Don't worry. I got a couple. I got a couple common. Nate Tice, you believe that the Vikings will make the playoffs. And we just have in parentheses here. Plus Sam Darnold. So through two games here, the Sam Darnold oligarchs are rising above the crowd. That's for sure.

Yeah, I'm standing pat on this one. Not double downing because like we talked about Sam Darnold last week a little bit was that he was solid plus. And again this week, solid plus. He had one little Sam Darnold moment on a pitch. Two guys were on motion. And I didn't see that live. I finally just watched it on all 22 and I was just like, oh my God. See, that is so classic Sam Darnold. And usually what would happen would he'd followed up with another interception because he was just trying to overcompensate for it. And it was kind of cool to see him kind of

calm down do some things but that's sam darnold experience you're gonna get one maybe two of those a game where you're just like what why are you the way you are like that that's what i always want to ask him but then you get to see the seam throws the jalen nailer that breaks a cover two pole runner and it's just beautiful and it's like that's why you chase sam darnold but

Looking at the Vikings, and we talked about the run game last week on the Film Room Show and Aaron Jones. And this run game really has me optimistic. Along with Justin Jefferson, along with Sam Darnold being solid plus, this offense line I think has been solid so far. But the Vikings right now are first in rushing success rate on design running back runs. So take out QB runs.

54.8% on 42 runs. That is outstanding. Anything over 50 is excellent. So that is crazy good. They had the fifth lowest stuff rate, which is zero negative yards. Last year, they were at 19%. This year, at 9.5%. I get sample size, all these things, but it is looking better. The eye test is matching this. 10 or more yard runs. Last year, 8.9%. This year, they're at 19%.

Runs where the running back reached 15 miles an hour or more. And this was the big thing about why we had some optimism on this, because Aaron Jones and Ty Chandler have way more juice than Alexander Madison. They had 30 of those runs total all of last year where a running back reached 15 miles an hour or more. They have 13 of them already this season through two games.

30 all of last year, 13 through two games, one eighth of the season. We're not even at one eighth of the season. So I am optimistic about that offense. And I think it's, again, I don't know if it's going to be like a top five, but really what they're looking at right here. Okay. This is, this is good enough to be a playoff team.

The defense is fun. The defense is the equalizer. Brian Flores really gave Purdy a lot of issues. He really struggled against the blitz. He had a couple of answers, but there's a couple of times he was really guessing. Um, ironically, the whole seeing ghost thing, uh, was Sam Darnold in there, but, um,

Yeah, I'm really liking it. I don't think the Vikings defense is going to be excellent. You can run on them pretty easily. For an hour showed that. But if you get in passing downs, they have your number. They're going to have a lot of teams numbers unless you have a dude at quarterback. So they're going to be in a lot of games. I don't think they're a contender or anything, but I think this is in the wide open NFC. They have a very valid chance of obviously being to know, but a very valid chance of making playoffs now.

Yeah, I'm definitely folding on some of my Viking skepticism overall, not just because honestly of the Sam Darnold stuff, which almost more of a bit than a real take here, because what's what's really impressive about the Vikings, I think, and an area where I missed on them so far through two weeks is that, first of all, my big concern about Darnold and just the whole thing of it is.

they don't have their full deck, right? Because like TJ Hawkinson is not playing. We don't know when he's going to be out there. You know, Jordan Addison hasn't been active for both games. Justin Jefferson even missed some time at the end of last game. Aaron Jones even missed some time at the end of last game. And yet still the machine rolls on, which I think is a huge credit to Kevin O'Connell. And I think the most impressive thing of Kevin O'Connell's tenure so far is because we just talked about

Bryce Young and the Panthers moving on very quickly, which I give Dave Canales a lot of credit for that as well, even if it may not have totally been his decision. Still, the biggest thing is that we see teams do all the time is get stuck in sunk cost, you know, and for head coaches, it happens all the time, especially with your guys. You know, Kevin O'Connell comes to Minnesota. He hires Ed Donatel in year one, and they win a lot of games with him as defense coordinator. They still move on. They hire Brian Flores, who I mean, that that's got to be one of the buyer choice.

It really was. An inspired choice. It's got to be one of the best hires of the last couple of seasons. It really is. That's where I probably... I liked a lot of what I saw out of Brian Flores' defense in year one. It was like a chaos creator. I always said they put bad quarterbacks in a blender because they would...

just throw you, they would throw stuff at the wall almost just to see what sticks, you know, they'd show one look pre-snap and then back off into something completely else. Uh, they would show pressure looks and then play coverage behind it. And I was like, are they still going to do that once they get better players?

Or are they going to kind of go a little more conservative? I think they've still leaned into it, which has been incredible to see even more because now they have better players. So that part of it, I think is O'Connell's quietly. We'll always talk about offense and elevating quarterbacks and all those things, elevating the run game, which you're so right to point out. Ty Chandler and Aaron Jones are both top six in success rate on zone rushing plays among guys who have 10 plus or 15 plus carries. So,

just incredible work there. But really, I think his best move might have been to hire Flores as the defense coordinator. It really, yeah. And it's really cool when you get the same characters in the defense or the offense and you can see them adding layers. They had a third and extra long where Brock Purdy ended up checking it down and, or just kind of throwing it hot to George Kittle. And on that play, they're waiting, the Vikings defenders, Purdy checks and taps his helmet and you can tell they had something planned. And every Vikingsman

Vikings defensive player just started, and you could tell at the Metrodome, oh my God, the US Bank Stadium was just going nuts. The camera's shaking, and you see them all yelling and communicating, but no one hesitated. It wasn't like, what? What? It was everybody knew exactly what to do. It's those little things that you look for. It's like, okay, that's a really good sign that you're doing something really funky, and everyone knew what to do. The signal's eagle, by the way.

That was the signal. And I think they call it Eagle front. So that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. Also Brock pretty against the blitz. He went 10 of 15 for 91 yards, a pick and you sacked four times. Four sacks, man. That's crazy. I did you see the clip of him after the game where he went up to like went up to floors and said, man, scheme is the scheme is crazy. I thought that was that was pretty cool. That's a yeah, that's saying something. That's pretty cool. I love that. All right. Here's a good one for you. This one you got to be feeling pretty good about. A

Aiden Hutchinson. All right, this is a mad take. Aiden Hutchinson will win defensive player of the year. How are you feeling about this one right now? I'm 100% doubling down. Yeah, I love it. Almost because I recognize that he has been a bit of a backup tackle killer so far. He's definitely preyed on that. But that was almost part of the calculus here is that whether or not

The film rose and all of it's a voter award, whether or not we can go in there and criticize like, okay, yeah, he's just kind of spamming the spin move, which was pretty cool that he even said, I'm, I'm spamming spin move and they can't stop me. Uh, in, in week one against the Rams. Um, he went to work, uh, in, in week two against the bucks. I thought he was extremely disruptive. And again, yeah.

level of competition, whatever. That's a whole separate thing. Whether we can criticize some of those things and nitpick it from a film perspective, the reality is that the production is going to be there at the end of the year. And now he's already got one game with four and a half sacks. So the production almost is certainly going to be there at the end of the year. The only thing that I have a little bit of hesitation about on this take, and like I said, I am doubling down on it for sure. I feel really good about having that one. You come to Matt Harmon for edge rusher expertise always and forever. I know.

You coming out with that one. Yeah, that was a great tout. Yeah, that's more about knowing the field, honestly. And the reason, though, I might have some skepticism is I think the Lions defense has been okay.

I thought they really had a good plan against Stafford, and I thought they harassed him. I think Stafford's just a great quarterback, and I thought in week two it was okay against the Bucs. They certainly put Mayfield into chaos mode. I give Mayfield credit for scrambling out of the pocket and making some plays on his own. I also think that Bucs offense, we'll talk about the Bucs later on, why I'm really high on them is I think that offense gives Baker a lot of answers, even when the defense takes something away.

But again, like I said, defense has been okay. I think there's been a leap there for Detroit. They're not a sieve, but I'd love to see that just even more improvement there. And I think the lines will be fine over the course of the year. That's the only like minor hesitation I have here. But from in terms of Hutchinson, the player, defensive player of the year candidate, I definitely think that's there. No, it's a good one. I mean, shoot, standing out right now. He's,

to me, the leader, just because of just, I know it's two games, but him and like Fred Warner, it's like, those are only two I can think of, which is kind of a quasi tout. I had, that's my lazy dark horse defensive player. They pick every single year. Just take it off. Yeah. Just take it off. Come on. Corner safety linebacker. One of those guys has to win. No, but it's been scouting sometimes. It's like, Oh yeah. Level of competition and everything. But you know, going against a backup tackle and everything. Good.

He dominated a backup tackle. That's what you want a guy to do. That's what you want a good player to do. So yes, he's getting the production right away. They're a little predictable on the back end right now. That would be my flaw. It's like the running man coverage. You know it. So it's like, all right, if you have the guys to beat it, a Mike Evans, a Chris Godwin, yada, yada, you're going to beat it.

Especially from a slot perspective, too. Look, they've gone against two of the best, in my opinion, slot receivers in the league, Cooper Cup and Week 1. Chris Godwin, he's moved back. He's taken over 60% of his snaps from the slot this year, which is almost double what he did last year. And he's mostly been a slot player. That was a big storyline in the offseason. When he's in that position, he's going to be one of the best slot receivers in the league, too, especially because I think Godwin looks...

more explosive this year than he did last year, even though I thought he was fine last year. He looks more like the Chris Godwin of old this year. So that's just something to pay attention to with the Lions going forward too. They've got the Cardinals on the docket this week. They have Dortch, but they don't have a dude as a slot receiver. But then they get JSN. Dortch with an eye roll. I know. I'm so mean to Greg Dortch, but you and I are on the same page about the Cardinals. We love that they're a big, explosive group, and it's like...

Then there's Greg Dortch back there somewhere. But he's a fine player. But like JSN in week four looked really good. I think he's going to emerge as one of the better slots. Then they go and buy CeeDee Lamb in week six. So that's the area that I think they've got to clean up a little bit because you're right. They play so much man coverage, especially then that slot receiver. If they're a good player, they're going to have a matchup advantage every time. Yeah.

Yep. Teams are creating picks and all that. So, yeah, we'll see. I like the lines. All right. Should we move on to your next one? Because this one is definitely spicy. I don't think I was on this show for sure when you said this, but Nate Tice, Joe Burrow might be cooked. Are you staying on this one? Are you doubling down? What's the deal? I am standing pat on this one. I'm staying, you know, holding my hand on this one because –

Again, I said this with Charles and it was tongue in cheek. And then the tongue is slowly moving out of my cheek as I kind of have watched the Spangles offense and watched Joe Burrow. He just doesn't look right. He doesn't look comfortable. And that

It's really throwing me off is that they are doing the nickel and dime offense that they have, you know, moved to the last two years, but it's even more, it's more pennies and pennies. They're not even getting nickels and dimes. Now the run game, of course, is efficient. They'll get some light boxes because the receivers, even with T Higgins out, Jamar chase gets a lot of respect. But the thing is, is,

Two-thirds of his throws, 64.6%, have been 0-5 air yards. Jacoby Brissett is the only other quarterback that's above 60. The league average is 45%.

but two thirds of his throws are zero to five. And that's what he's, they've moved to this offense. Don't get me wrong, but nothing is getting attacked down the field outside the one bomb. And then he had one seam throw on week one to Jamar chase. That was really nice. But that used to be about a once a drive thing. Now it's like once a half. And that is what's missing in this offense. And it's eye test, but just the stats are just showing this 33% of his throws are even reaching the sticks last over the last two years. It was 38%. Uh,

he's getting pressured on fewer times this year. Like his time to pressure is 2.78. It was 2.4 the previous two years. And even things like he's moving in, he's thrown beneath the sticks. He's kind of passing some things up that I feel like are there. And he's such a smart player that I'm kind of,

All right, what's kind of going on here? And again, they're not pushing the ball. They're not. It just feels stagnant. And I'm fine because the run game is efficient and Burrow can make it work. But this is a step down from what he showed the last two years when they ran this version of the hyper-efficient Bengals offense. It was, okay, on 2022. So when they moved to this type of offensive tack.

He had a 48.4% success rate. That's what you need. If you're going to take five yard gains, you have to be Philip fricking rivers and you have to hit every single five yard gain or late career drew breeze. You have to, this is my Bo Nix conundrum, which we'll talk about later. But right now this year, he's at 43.4%. And that is a big difference. That 5%, that's, that's a handful of throws a game where you're not staying ahead of chains. Only team that has fewer explosive plays than the Bengals this year are the Panthers.

Bengals have six. Panthers have five. You don't want to be there. No. There's 10 teams with 20 or more, and they have six.

I know T. Higgins is out. I get it. But how they're... But I think they have some other useful players, you know? I know. But Burrow is the issue. And that's the thing. I know, because there's Kosicki, who's actually looking decent in this offense, and who's the Princeton guy. Yoshibas. Yes, thank you. A couple of sick plays in the red zone. He did. They gave him a stool route, which is... They only give that to the top guys, so... Yeah, that was pretty sick. Okay, I'll keep my eyes on that. All right. But it's just...

They can make this work. They have shown that they can make this work and Burrow can make it work. It just doesn't have the teeth that it did the last couple of years. And that's when you lose Boyd. Higgins has been banged up. I get that.

They're still creating the same amount of yards after catch, though, as they did in the last couple years. And that's... It's just... We need just a couple more explosive plays out of Burrow because I think this run game is what it is with Zach Moss or whoever's going to be back there. But I think pass game-wise, we have to attack the intermediate field. We have to push the ball. Maybe Higgins helps that out. I assume it will. But it's just...

He's making me feel antsy and it's just kind of, yeah, he's just doesn't look all the way right, all the way comfortable. And so I'm kind of standing pat on this until proven up and he's proven me wrong before. So I just want to wait, but right now kind of just, yeah, I'm holding this hand.

Yeah. Next two teams they play are Washington and Carolina. So that'll help. That'll help. That'll help. We'll see if we can get more Jermaine Burton in the offense. I know he's been like, they totally trust him, that whole thing, but pretty impressive route and trustworthiness on his part to go out and win that go route in that game against Kansas city. That was great to see, but.

Yeah, I almost don't want to take anything away from the Chiefs-Bengals games on either side because nobody backs Pat Mahomes into a corner except Lou Anarumo, but not at the end of the game. There's always got to be something at the end of the game. Something happens. The refs get involved, the whole deal. I agree.

Right call. It was right call. I understand why people are frustrated, but it was right call. So, yeah, I almost don't want to take anything away from those games like macro takeaways. I certainly don't know if I want to have big takeaways about Cincinnati when they go and face Washington and Carolina. But certainly at the end of the year, I think that'll be sort of the litmus test of where Burrow is, because I'm with you that.

Sometimes it does feel like the offense, they want to run with him and where they are, they need these two alpha receivers on the outside. I don't even know if I necessarily consider T. Higgins in that class of player, but big dudes that can just go dunk on you on the outside. I think Chase is frustrated. He's playing frustrated. He seems frustrated. So that's a whole other thing too. Yeah.

Is all this going to get sorted out by the end of the year? And then long-term, Nate, there's almost a 0% chance that both of these guys are back here next year. So what,

what does that mean long-term if that's what you need to run this offense with Burrow? I think those are all outstanding questions. And last year he, it looked the same at the beginning of the year. Of course they faced the buzzsaw. That was the Browns defense early, but then he came back, he got banged up again, came back healthy and it looked okay. It was the 49ers game was an exceptional game. That was great. But again, it's like, it's got to look like that every week, you know, not just a couple of weeks of the year, especially if you're going to be the guy, you know, the, the, you know, one of these top tier quarterbacks. So,

Yeah, it's just the Bengals' offense is just kind of like, oh, okay, this is what we're doing again, huh? All right. All right. Let's see how it goes. But we're going to take a quick break, and then we're going to come back with some more of these takes, whether we're going to stand, fold, or double down on.

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All right, we are back. Matt, on to your next take. And I like this one. I liked it in real time. And I like it more now. Sorry, I'm spoiling it. But Matt, your take was the Rams of Los Angeles will finish last in the NFC West.

How are we feeling about that right now? Yeah, let me go ahead and double down on that right now. And I know you come to football 301 for the high level analysis. Here's some real 301 level analysis for you people. If all your players get hurt, your team's going to be bad. It's honestly...

If I was a Rams fan, I don't know how I wouldn't be going insane right now with the way this season is. Honestly, if I was Sean McVay, I don't know how I would be going insane right now. Much has been made, and I think it's been great to discuss. McVay is like,

reinvestment coaching and and and get you know get finding himself as a coach again and and investing in these young players after potentially wanting to walk away from the game after 2022 and he's i had a great interview with with your former co-host robert mays about this in the off season that was awesome to hear um shoot i almost if i was him i'd be like oh god maybe never mind after after the way this season is started man because how could you not be so frustrated that

You remake your whole identity in the offseason as this – on the fly, really, maybe into the offseason of last year and then certainly into the season you double – talk about double down on something as this power football team with these receivers who block, these receivers who are very, very singular. Cooper Cup, I have always said since he's come in the league, has one of the most singular receiver roles in the NFL. Nobody really plays a position quite like Cooper Cup. And then obviously Puka last year.

He has almost 1,500 yards, and it's not doing it in these phenom ways. It's almost being like a dirty work type of player. And then you double down on that this offseason. You get another running back in the draft. You invest into the offensive line. And three weeks into the season, it's all gone to s**t.

Man, I mean, you've got their I.R. list is outrageous. They're going to start running out of spots, man. I mean, Steve Avila is on I.R. Connor McDermott's on I.R. backup, a backup tackle. They're talking about putting cup on I.R. Puka's on I.R. Joe Nopu, who is a backup tackle. He's on I.R. Jonah Jackson's dealing with an injury now, too. It's like, oh, thank God we get a Lark Jackson back off the suspension. We freaking need him here. So.

I just don't know, man. I feel this take is twofold as to why I'm doubling down. One, it is yes. I'm just concerned that the Rams are already out of players and we're walking into week three.

The other part of it is, and I know we'll talk about this team later on, I've really loved what I've seen out of the Seahawks. I know you were higher on them maybe than I was this season. I think you picked them to go to the playoffs. I did not. After the first two weeks of the season, I've definitely been extremely impressed with what I've seen out of Seattle and obviously with the way the Rams are going. Yeah, I think they finished last in the division. And then, of course, our Cardinals. Your Cardinals. No, no, it's ours.

It's a football 301 team. Football 301's Cardinals, for sure. Yes, that's it. But I envision this Rams team, we talked about them in top 10 offenses, we're all excited about them, was, hey, they're just going to add on to what they did last year, bully everybody on offense, and losing Aaron Donald would hurt, but they'll just get a lot of shootouts. They'll control games, it's going to be a race to 30, we'll see how it goes. Stafford's going to be whipping it all over the yard. Who cares? They're going to pound the rock and whip it. We're good there.

When you lose what's supposed to be the focal point of this team and what gets us excited, which, yes, you've mentioned Stafford and Cup and Pukunukuwa, it was, you know, the offensive line being big and burly and just running all over people. So when you lose not only the main guys, but depth, it's just hard. What are you going to lean on? And then when you lose, okay, all right, well, they'll lean on Pukunukuwa, Cooper Cup and Stafford making plays. All right, well, Pukunukuwa is hurt. Okay, well, Cooper Cup will get 21 targets. Okay, we're good here.

Cooper Cups hurt. Okay. What do we got? Demarcus Robinson. Tyler Johnson. Yeah. Shout out Tyler Johnson. My one stock of Tyler Johnson. But no, it's yeah, it's just that was supposed to be the strength of the team. This defense can't stop anybody. They're going to be Swiss cheese. The Cardinals just absolutely had their way with them. They didn't slow them down at all. It was just kind of what I envisioned. Not to say some of their young players aren't interesting. Jared Burse and Byron Young and Kobe Turner, all those guys.

but it's not the strength of their team. They, it's just, they were supposed to be built to run the ball and winning shootouts. And yeah, when you pull that away, that's kind of hard to lean on. Oh man. Oh, this is another fun one. I kind of went like half good, half bad here, but it's about the same team. Okay. Well, I can't wait to hear what you have to say about this. So Nate Tice, you said the giants will get the number one overall pick. Disappointing.

despite having a top 10 defense standing pat on the number one pick i'm slightly i think i'm folding on the top 10 defense they're gonna improve they're gonna be better i still think they're not gonna be bad but they're missing some some some pieces which i kind of figure the younger on the back end they're playing well they do some interesting things i think they're a year away well we'll see with this regime why i think they'll have the number one pick

if they can't rely on a top 10 defense and you got Daniel Jones at quarterback in this offense, man, and that's all you're doing against Washington, who I think will have one of the three worst defenses in the league this year, you know, potentially this is, this is just all in all the, and I, why I want to really talk about this, why I never want to pick thing is it just seems rotten right now. Yeah. And we know that with Daniel Jones and we know that whole, all the stuff, the Saquon Barkley stuff, all the stuff we saw in hard knocks, but,

The little isolated incident here that I want to focus on and why I think the Giants are starting to spiral is the kicker situation with Graham Ganneau. Because this is outlandish. And Dan Duggan, who I worked with at the Athletic, did a great job of highlighting this every step of the way on Twitter. So please check out his timeline. But Graham Ganneau had a groin injury.

Saturday and new NFL rules are a lot more lenient with your practice squad guys calling guys up. You can really do it at the last minute. I think you'd have to call them up on Saturday, make them active on Sunday, but a lot of teams will do that as a contingency plan. Okay, maybe a quarterback or a kicker or a punter, a long snapper, anything just in case that those guys can't go those specialist roles. They did an early warm-up before the game. Well, first off, they didn't call anybody up their practice. They had a guy in practice squad. I believe a kicker did not call him up. So they didn't even have a contingency plan.

Then they get into Sunday. They do a, and this will happen with a lot of injury players. They'll do kind of like a pre-warmup. Hey, how you feeling? Okay. Then we know whether to activate you or not. They needed it because they didn't call up the practice squad guy. So they need a Gano to be healthy. He does a half warmup, doesn't even do a full warmup because he's not feeling good. He has a groin. So they tape up the groin. Then opening kickoff.

They didn't even have the punter do the opening kickoff. They have Gano do it. Austin Eckler, your former co-host, takes it past him. He hurts his hamstring on the play. So he's out. Opening kickoff, kicker, done. Wouldn't matter, right? Shouldn't, you know, okay, the punter can kick everything. He misses the first extra point.

that they have. Then they decide to go for two. The other times, two times they score, fail on those. Then they, uh, a skew, a late field goal because they have no kicker, which would have been like a 45 yarder and can't even do that. So they have to go for it on fourth down with Daniel Jones, like exactly how you want to do it, how you want to win games. Um,

He did complete it. Malik neighbors did drop it. So I do, I do want to, I do want to give him a little, just a little there. Neighbors neighbors is fine though. Don't worry about it. But they will afterwards is just like, this is just him kind of. And, and he goes, we thought Graham would be okay. And this is a quote. He got hurt chasing down a runner. It was a hamstring. He didn't hurt his groin. So it's like, great. And you have your kicker. Awesome. Two leg injuries. Yeah. Terrific. What makes this even worse is they've done it before.

with the same kicker a year ago. This happened. Their kicker got hurt. He left with a knee injury against the Jets last year. They missed two early field goals and they lost in overtime by a field goal to the Jets in week eight. And same situation, same timeline and everything.

And it's just, what are you guys doing? Like these are, if you're not going to have a dude at quarterback and you're going to be like, okay, maybe we will have a defense that will funky it up in the run game. It's the little things you have to win in every little, little way, especially for a team like this, that always kind of feels like they're better than they are. So I just want to talk about that because it just seems rotten there in New York. And this kind of process was a great little canary in the coal mine. I think for maybe that number one pick that might be inbound. You'll never convince me that.

Brian Dayball really wanted the Daniel Jones contract and that was his guy and all this stuff. And, you know, there's, I've seen some interviews. People have, you know, re dug up of him in like Josh Allen doing media availability together. And he's like slapping Josh's arm. And it was so many good, it's just,

I feel like Dayball is one of those guys that, you know, we're not saying he's like a front runner or anything, but when things are good, he's great to be around and he's a good coach. But when things are bad, it sort of becomes this type of stuff. And I just, yeah, I wonder how things are slipping away. I mean, Malik neighbors, the site fantasy points has a stat called first read target share, you know, like the percentage of targets and like first read targets that are received. 68%. That is unbelievable.

obnoxious. I mean, even his overall target percentage from week two, 64%. They're dangerously close to Mike because he had 18 targets and the team scored 18 points. Again, we talked about this with Cup last week. That's not the ratio you want. Not because you don't want to throw to your best players.

You do want to throw the ball to your best players. But you've got to have a second pitch, brother. You don't want ice cream all the time. Yes, yes. And that's great. Obviously, the fantasy bros love it for Malik Nabors. And Nabors is a great player. He's so talented. He's so talented. And he's going to make them right. He's going to make Daniel Jones look better than he is. But even the Daniel Jones thing, man, I know Jones is –

It's bad. But I want to have... I almost want to have this conversation with you when we talk about the Saints tomorrow on the Fantasy Film Room. Like, at some point, if you can't get a functional offense out of a quarterback that's...

top 25 in the league, top 30. Maybe Jones is worse than that. I don't know. But he's had his functional moments. If you can't get a functional offense around that, like the Saints have an elite offense right now from an efficiency perspective with Derek Carr. If you can't get a functional offense with a replacement level quarterback, I think there's something else. There's something, as you said, rotten there. And that's my biggest worry about New York right now. Yeah, Neighbors is awesome. He's going to make Jones look good. He's going to make them right when they're wrong.

they just don't have anything else. And, and the D I, the defense part is interesting that you bring up like potentially one to fold on that thing, man, because the,

The front's been great, but the second half, Jaden Daniels diced them up in the second half. And this is an offense I have people, the Commanders fans hate me for this. I have little to no respect for any of this. Run game's good. Run game's great. That's always good with Cliff Kingsbury. But 37.9% of Washington's wide receiver targets have come behind the line of scrimmage this year. That's the highest rate in the league. The league average is 11.3%. And dude, I didn't say team targets. I said wide receiver. Not like the...

That's throwing out Austin Eckler's targets and Brian, like all these guys. Just this offense is that. And in the second half, Jaden Daniels, again, absolutely carved. Second half alone, 18 dropbacks, 16 attempts, 12 completions, 8.69 yards per attempt and a 100.8 pass rating with one sack. And that's the defense is supposed to be the strength of the team.

And it was, they, in the first half, kept getting him, I watched most of the first half, they kept getting him into third longs and third extra longs, and Daniels was just scrambling and getting him to like fourth and one, and they give up the fourth and one, and

The commanders are not supposed to be a power team. I know they got Brian Robinson and everything, but you know, they're finesse. That's how you kind of picture them. They're smoking mirrors, but they just got every short yardage. They're just like, all right, got it. Thanks for going for a fourth down. Thank you. Except for one in the red zone, which I was very curious about, but I mean, they kicked it seven times. But that is, I thought it was very disappointing to see some of the lack of detail that defense as more as the fundamentals, like the tackling. That's what it was. Cause they had a, they had Daniel's dead to rights a couple of times when he scrambled and,

Daniels is so freaking fast. But that was able to create some stuff, but it was like, I don't know, I thought this Giants defense would be a lot more sound with that. I do think it's going to be an interesting defense. It's just that they're a year away. They need like two more pieces. They need more depth. But they have some cool

you know, baseline here. Like if there's a new head coach next year, they maybe, you know, keep this guy and let, you know, cause they had some cool pieces, but yeah, right now that was, it was just disappointing to see that. Cause I thought it was, they got them in a lot of good situations and they kind of just couldn't put them over the top. So that's kind of why I'm kind of, I'm folding one of my cards there. It's like, can I draw, can I draw more cards? We'll just turn this into a five card blackjack. All right. So, Oh, this was the next one here. I forgot that you had this one.

Matt, your next take bears. The Chicago bears are making the playoffs. Are you standing? You folding? Are you doubling down? I wish I could fold. I wish I could go back and smack myself for this take. And I'd love, I will be folding right now on the bears making the playoffs. I know, I know it's only two weeks, but it was very funny doing, you know, research to talk about Bryce young on, on my podcast yesterday and like trying to just look at, okay, let's talk about how the Panthers are so bad on offense. I,

Bears are down there, buddy, man. Like in terms of adjusted net yards per attempt, they're the worst offense in the league because they can't stop taking sacks. And, you know, I'm curious to get you kind of your temperature on what's gone wrong in Chicago. I mean, where do we start about everything has gone wrong so far from an offensive perspective? The reason I thought this take would be would I thought they'd make the playoffs is because I thought this was a good situation for a rookie quarterback to

I'll talk about the offense in a second, but this is a good team last year that finished the year strong from a defensive standpoint. I think the defense has been good this year. I think they gave Stroud in the second half. Yeah, they gave Stroud and the Texans some trouble in the second half, which is impressive. I mean, Stroud is going to make...

going to make something out of nothing. And he did several times in that game because he's just great. But I thought from a coverage standpoint, especially watching that game back, I thought they did a lot of interesting things and they and they beat him up up front at a couple occasions, too. So that part I feel pretty good about. It's just the offense has been an abject disaster, bro. I mean, and I think it starts with a lot and I'm

I'm not trying to just get you to talk about the Seahawks, but I do want you to talk about the Seahawks at some point on the show, because I watched a lot of their offense this year. And especially watching the game on Sunday against new England. I'm like, man, this team has answers against pressure and has so many layup routes built in for the quarterback. And then you think about last year, Seahawks, where they had no answers, uh,

on third down against pressure and there were little to no layups in the offense this year gino smith is top six in attempts over the middle of the field uh he was and he's 20 he's like 21st and deep throw rate this year where he was top 12 last year again just juxtaposing those two offenses why that's important because oh who's the offensive coordinator in chicago there it is

There it is. Shane Waldron. And I don't think this is all Waldron's fault. I think the offensive line was a little overrated going into the year. I mean, Darnell Wright got his... He got whooped on Sunday night for sure. Those are good edge pass rushers in Houston, but the tackles are supposed to be the strength. The interior is really the problem. And again, Tevin Jenkins did a post-game interview about this, kind of talking about what are we supposed to do? Like, we're just...

we're doing what we're told that that sends off alarm bells when we're talking about the answers versus pressure. And I just don't think, look, Caleb's not perfect, but I don't think there's a lot of answers, um, for him, uh, from a pressure perspective either. And I think they're putting a lot on his plate as well, which is tough too. So, yep. I'm, I'm, I'm,

I'm nervous about the Bears. I'm nervous about how much Gerald Everett and DeAndre Carter and DeAndre Swift are in this. They can't run that. We're not even talking about how they can't run the ball at all. So, yeah, I threw a lot out there, Nate Tice, but I'm curious to hear what you have to say about this. Yeah, I had some thoughts for labor. I'll just share them now because it ties into the whole offense. And it was I did think that that old line got overrated. This whole process where we thought it was a great ecosystem for a rookie quarterback and everything. And weakness in the interior line is always going to be a big

red alarm bell for me, you know, ringing, ringing, ringing, especially with a young quarterback, especially with one that's a little shorter. So, you know, you never know how that affects them. I always thought Caleb did fine over the middle and throwing short and everything, but it's not his greatest strength. It's more of just like he's solid at it. But it had to be solved. And I was very disappointed with what they went with. And they kind of felt like, yeah, we're good here. Maybe in a year we'll address it. And to me, it was,

man, number 18 should be your priority. You know that like I get that you maybe want to push this year because your defense is good and you have rookie contracts and all with your quarterback and everything. But it's like maybe push that on year two and maybe make them comfortable year one. And then you can add those little things like the DeAndre Swift and Gerald Everett signings. Use that money to pay Lloyd Cushenberry and just have a nice solid set. The Bears lead the league and like especially on offense, guys you've heard of

but are not needle movers you know like swift like everett i even look i know keenan allen's hurt but i even think he's kind of he's a he's the solid player but he's not the same guy so i think there's a lot of name brand value on this offense but i don't know dude even even so much like okay i get you trade the pick for keenan allen then you take aroma june see who i think is we'll talk about rookies later i think he's looked fine when like i watch him on film as a route runner but did you need three receivers are we overdoing it though did you need to take a

punter with that, you know, with that, with that pick, like not reinvest in the offensive line. So that, that sort of, I'm looking back on it and I definitely want to fold on the take of, Oh, this is the best ecosystem we've seen for a rookie quarterback, especially, well, you know, and this is just stuff happens, but a lot of it came down to the receivers and, and,

Rome's playing hurt. Keenan's not out there. And now we're getting DeAndre Carter targets in the year 2024. Oh, yeah, I know. I know those DeAndre Carter reps. That's a huge red flag. I had a more cruel joke that I'll save for off air about it. But my last little stat on this is Coleman Shelton, their center. He's had 26. I looked this up from next gen stats. He had 26 one-on-one pass blocking steps this year. Centers aren't going to get a ton of those. They're usually helping and sliding and all that. He's had 26 this year. He's given up a pressure on six of those.

third highest rate in the entire NFL from your center. That is, it's unsustainable. That's a disaster. The only guy, one of the guys, two guys above him is the right tack backup, right tackle for the box who just got whipped by a nudgeson. Right. That was one of the two people defensive player of the year. Yes, exactly. I guess. Yes. So-and-so right tackle. Uh, but I'll say my last little minor thing with Caleb is the, the,

the pre-snap operation stuff has been excellent already. They, you told you, or you mentioned this, that they give him, they've given him a lot, a lot of reins and controls of the offense. And that's very real. And that's a great sign for long-term stuff, because that means you understand the one-on-one two Oh one three Oh one stuff. And they're like, okay, we trust you to do protections. Coaches do not give that up. Like they are scared to give it to any quarterback and you're giving it to a rookie week two in on the road and

That's a really good sign for some of the long-term stuff. So I'm not going anything crazy with Caleb yet. It's more just the offense was a bit disappointing. All right, moving on to the next one. All right. So I've been, I've been saying this man, but it's time. So Nate Tice Colts and Seahawks as playoff teams. So you can take this, the two for here. Okay.

doubling down the Seahawks folding on the Colts which is not where I thought I would be a month ago uh the Colts defense is just too bad it's just there's too many good offenses AFC even if offense is all down yada yada yada that I I just don't think they have the horses to keep up with anybody and their offense is still working it out I'm still optimistic about the offense though um I think a lot of was just they said miscues Anthony Richardson through that first pick and it was a classic like

basketball player doesn't know whether to bank it or throw it into the just go straight at the hoop so he throws it in between the two guys and it's like dang it and also it's like why you have Michael Pittman on the deep route and Pierce on the underneath route just little minor things there yeah just that wasn't an encouraging game against the Packers I still do trust what the offense is doing the run game is good they are really efficient on first down especially they just need you know Anthony Richardson just can't have a couple of mistakes they can't have eight drops or whatever they had on Sunday 80

A.D. Mitchell swimming a little bit, a lot of it, where he just looks like he just has no idea what's going on. And that leads to drops when guys are thinking so much about what they're trying to do. They can't focus on the playing football. And you kind of see that with him. Opposite for Pierce right now. Like, oh, Pierce is playing good football right now. Yeah, your guy, Alex Pierce.

I sold him too. I was like, I know what he is. Yeah, MVS. And now he's actually doing good things. So the offense, I'm still okay. I'm standing pat on. As a team, as a playoff team, I don't think they're going to be a bad team overall, but the defense is just too scary. They can't really average against the run, which is supposed to be their strength. And who's playing corner for them? Anyone listening right now, I'll give you five seconds to name their corners.

You're not getting it. All right. So that's my take on the Colts. I'll probably have more on Richardson as more weeks go by. He just needs time. They need Josh Downs, man. I'll tell you what, they, I really actually think that's going to help a lot. Cause you're right. Like,

Mitchell has some flashy moments as a route runner, but he's not always in the right place at the right time. I think there's been some communication errors that have been put on Anthony Richardson. And look, Richardson has not been a consistently accurate player ever, and he's not a consistently accurate player right now. But he loved Josh Downs, especially on like second reaction plays when he got into trouble in the very glimpse, very brief glimpses as a rookie. So I do think once Downs is healthy, that could help the offense a lot. But there's some there's some issues there for sure.

Yeah, yeah. They're not going to get there. It's just, yeah, that was not an encouraging game against the Packers. That was kind of, I thought they were going to really take it to them. They did the opposite. They played scared. As far as the Seahawks, though, this is, yeah, this is what it really kind of came down to was I was encouraged by, of course, the head coach and Mike McDonald and just what he could do, but also the offense, Ryan Grubb, who they hired from Washington because he runs a lot of efficient plays. The college to NFL jump

Always gets me a little hesitating a little bit, but this one I was very encouraged by because he did a lot of sound concepts in college and that has applied to the NFL. It's just what you talked about, their third down stuff, just being coherent. And it's run game, it's balanced. He's also adjusted really well. I thought their second half plans in both weeks have been so much better than the first half, which is great. That is such a good sign, especially for such a newer NFL coach.

Gino's been playing well. And I think the defense, while not perfect all the time, is much improved from last year. They have some really cool DBs. Julian Love's playing well. Witherspoon is a star who gets in there on the run. The front is looking good. Byron Murphy's doing some stuff. And

And yeah, it's just the overall situation. Like this is a, this team is feeling more and more complete. Even if the offensive line isn't all the way there, they're showing answers to mitigate the weakness, which is sign of good coaching. It's just, it's happening as quickly as I thought maybe it would take some time. And again, they played the Broncos, uh,

and the Patriots. So I do have to recognize that. Pretty good defenses. Those aren't like, at least from a secondary perspective in Denver, they have Pat Sertan and he did a great job on DK Metcalf. Obviously, I think the Patriots defense looks pretty similar to me. Gerard Mayo was the defensive coach last year and I thought they had a pretty... What impressed me the most against that game against New England for Seattle's offense was just that

What I loved, and I know you felt the same way about Ryan Grubb's offense, it's like the route concepts all made sense together. And that was what was so cool to see was, I mean, we've got DK Metcalf running in breaking routes and getting targets in space, which has just not really ever been his game. And I don't think that's been a DK Metcalf thing. I think just

they were pretty unimaginative about player usage there and running a lot of ISO routes with a lot of go balls. And I get it that like neither one of those guys are middle of the field. Well, lock is definitely not a middle of the field receiver. And, and Dico DK has mostly been that ISO ball player, but then we're getting him working in breakers and JSN working these outbreaking routes too. Again, it just, it makes sense together. That was really cool. Yeah. It's just sound. It's just good football. Yeah. See, I'm just playing good football. I've been, I truly enjoyed watching that Seahawks Patriots game. Like I,

I tweeted that and it was kind of like, I wasn't even kidding. I was like, this is just good football, both sides of the ball. I really like this. So yeah, feeling good about that one. Any of these other ones that you would love to hit? I'm just, I'm just lightning round, double down on the Bucs to win the NFC South. That was, and didn't you pick this too, right? So this is a, this is a take, but I don't know if you're feeling you want to double down on this one too. I feel good about the Bucs. I might be actually just good, like not just good for the NFC South, but like actually,

pretty good. Yeah, they've run good football. Like I said, I will talk about the Saints on the fantasy show in the film room tomorrow, and I'm definitely encouraged what I saw there, and I'm ready to pat myself on the back for being one of the few Saints offense. I'm a little bit sicko excited about it for this, but we'll do my back patting tomorrow. But for this one, yeah, I still think the Bucks will win the South. I love the answers. I mean, like I said,

Buck's offense consistently has, has so much for Baker Mayfield on big, when he throws to his first read, uh, Baker Mayfield has a one, uh, 126.9 passer rating. Uh, the only guys who have started two games that are ahead of him, uh, are Sam Darnold, your boy, uh, and Justin Herbert. So like, again, definitely with Herbert. Yeah. Yeah. And then he's obviously Herbert always makes the right decision. So I,

I just love what we've seen so far from him. He's completing 69% of his passes on his first read. You know, the yards per attempt is really high, 10.46. Again, only Darnold is higher here. So, yeah, making big plays, making good decisions. I think the Bucs are just a good team and extremely sound on defense, which that's just classic Todd Bowles.

Yeah, I know. I'm really enjoying watching them. I'll give my last one and I'm folding on this one. And this was, this was a hotter take, but it was Jets going to have a top five offense and Jets fans weren't happy with me after the fantasy film room where I said, oh yeah, I'm a little lower on Brees Hall. At first I said I was out. I meant to say I was lower, but I did. I didn't rectify that, but the run games did have some moments against the Titans, but this has not been efficient so far. They're 31.6% success rate on running back runs, six worse than the NFL through two weeks. Also,

Braylon Allen does look really good. Go Badgers. Yeah, that is exciting. That is exciting. The passing game-wise, I think this offense is more average. I'm not saying bad. I think that's more like the 14th, 16th, 18th offense, somewhere around there. Rodgers still has some zip on the ball, but he's not really pushing it as far as he needs to hitch up to push the ball. He's a little tentative on it. There's one where he ended up having to bail out, but he was hitching up to hit a wide-open Garrett Wilson on a corner, and he kind of just didn't throw it.

And it was just, that's a little bit of an alarm bell because it doesn't get more open than that. The secondary pass catchers is just why I'm kind of a little hesitant on all this. They're running one man bubbles for Alan Lazard in 2024. And it's like, yeah, that's not really moving the needle for me. So yeah, I would just say, I do think they're going to be fine, but I just don't think it's, yeah, I don't think they're going to hit maybe that upside ceiling I thought they would hit.

All right. We're going to take one last break and then we are going to come back with some rookie check-ins on quarterbacks and receivers.

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Learn more at klaviyo.com slash BFCM. All right. Closing out the show. Rookie time. The money making time right here. Matt Harmon. Who's the first rookie quarterback receiver that you want to check in? We touched on Caleb and Jaden a little bit so far, but any other guys that you want to talk about to start this off?

Yeah, I definitely wanted to point out what I mentioned in passing earlier that Roma didn't say, I think looks really good on like, especially in week one from a route running perspective. I thought he settled into zone coverage extremely well. I just think Caleb has no time to operate back there, which is, which is tough. And,

it's definitely on my radar how frustrated DJ Moore looked in week two only because he really went to bat for keeping Justin Fields. And I'm not trying to cause drama here about like, no, no, no, you know about, oh, he, he doesn't like Caleb or anything like that. But yeah, he went to bat for Justin Fields and you just got to wonder a guy that was so productive last year,

I know he just got paid and the whole thing, but these guys are judged off their numbers. They're judged off production. If people are going to come out of this, you'd be like, oh, DJ Moore had a down season. I guess I'll just never understand. I'll go to my grave wondering why nobody wants to give the ball to DJ Moore in space when I think he almost always makes the first defender miss. He's getting these vertical routes and back shoulder stuff that Caleb's just not ready for. I almost think they kind of need to involve Rome Moore in these intermediate routes against zone coverage. Definitely, I think he's

He's not healthy right now. You could see that in week two where especially downfield routes against zone particularly. I think he got off the line of scrimmage well. His work against press still impresses me. But when he's healthier, I think he needs to be more involved. He's one I think is worth pointing out on. Yeah, he's getting stuck in third and fourth gear. He can't hit that last little burst out. I noticed it early on. He had to catch on it.

route smooth. You know, he's a smoother route runner for a big guy, but he kind of just didn't burst out of the route. It was kind of a booze out. And I was like, Ooh, that's different. That's not you. I've seen you in college that I know what this is. And especially in week one, I thought he looked great in week one against the Titans. And he was banged up in the summer and, and we knew this. And, uh, but yeah, no, I'm, I'm super high on him. I love Rome. Uh, I,

one of my favorite college receivers I've watched in recent years, just because he does all the dirty work stuff. He, he had power slot potential, which, you know, I always love. No Roman Dunes days ago when we talked about Malik neighbors a little bit earlier as well, had some really nice moments. I'll talk about Malik neighbors, his LSU teammate, Brian Thomas jr. Who the receiver for the Jags, who has come out of the gates strong. I thought he might take some time, but he, uh,

already is a little cleaner than I was expecting. It turns out when you're a really good athlete and you like football, you can really work on these things. But he might be one of the fastest players in the league period at six, four, 210 pounds. His adjustment on that deep ball to Trevor, what Trevor was so good just

Just not only burned the guy, but it just looked like a Willie Mays catch. Yeah, he's not only winning deep, coming down with it. That's a big, big thing. Route running is already looking cleaner. He's already adding stuff, and he just needs to keep adding. It's not like exceptional or anything, but he looks great. He looks how I was hoping to see him at the end of this year, and this is week two. Rest of the Jags offense, not so much, but Brian Thomas Jr. has definitely been a standout guy where it's like, oh, this guy –

This guy's a real deal one, like not now, but down the road, like he has a path building to that where it's, it looks very legitimate. I think Trevor Lawrence leads all quarterbacks in deep throw percentage this year. And you can really tell that's what they wanted to do in getting Gabe Davis, which I,

Okay. Gabe Davis, Gabe Davis, but like, and then especially Brian Thomas jr. They wanted two guys, you know, a couple of big receivers on the outside to run the ball. Well, do play action and rip these, especially seam routes with these players. I love Brian Thomas jr. Running those deeper routes down the middle of the field. I agree with you. He's looked great. Uh,

same thing exceeded my expectations thought he'd be a player in the long term but he's been just a dude right off the bat i think they got to get him more and more and more involved more trust with him and trevor is a good thing so um yeah i don't have a lot of faith and i'm with you i don't have a lot of faith in jacksonville at all at this point i think i sent you the clip of uh doug peterson you know in a press conference when they were talking about trevor bank field he's like i liked it when he's ever bank field and just deadpan it's

Something's up there. Yeah, I know. He hates him for some reason. It's the weirdest thing. Someone tweeted that, right? Like when your head coach is your quarterback. Is your franchise quarterback's number one hater? Yes, that is very weird. But yeah, I do love what I've seen out of Brian Thomas. I'll throw out Xavier Worthy here in sort of a...

I know you and I kind of had some of the same hesitations on Worthy. I'm not trying to hyper-focus on one play, but when Marquise Brown went out, the common sort of thought was,

Oh, who cares? Like, you know, Xavier Worthy showed in week one. He's right. A rock two touchdowns in week one. You got to remember one. Those one touchdown was on a rushing play, which classic Andy Reed vintage stuff there. You know, he had to be flying high that that was Xavier Worthy's first touchdown. And then the second came on definitely a coverage bust from the Ravens. I think when you have to watch this, obviously on film to see and appreciate it. But, you know,

He is creating space for this offense. That alone is a value add. And there's a reason that Rasheed Rice is just gobbling up. And Rasheed Rice had a really nice deeper catch in this last game too, which is nice to see. That's a little bit of a development. But for his archetype of receiver, he's going to eat with this space underneath. I just, I think we do kind of have to ask some questions about Xavier Worthy from like an out

outside against press man coverage standpoint. Look, I get it. That's not going to be the strength of his game, but they tried to line him up against Cam Taylor Britt, who talked crap all week long and get him against press coverage on a go route. And I mean, he just got smoked on that. You know, he basically is getting pushed out of the boundary. And then Cam Taylor Britt shouted to him, makes, you know, one of the best interceptions you'll ever see. But that was a microcosm of, I think, like, that's not the usage for Xavier Ward.

He's going to stretch the field horizontally. He's going to stretch the field vertically, and you're going to have to kind of manufacture ways to get him space on these deeper routes for himself. And,

I do think there's just going to be something missing from this chiefs offense once again. And like, I don't know that Xavier worthy is going to be the one to solve that as much as I like him as a player. Yeah. I think some people are misconstrued that even when we, we gave her the first fancy filmer and we gave her Thursday night football shit, the touts for props. And we were both kind of came without receive rice. It was just like, yeah, worthy is going to open up space. And it's like, yeah, that's working great. The, the,

My hesitation with Worthy, especially in this offense, was because he's better off ball moving around because of his size, his lack of size, is that that's how they use Kelsey too. And that's also kind of how they use Rice sometimes too. And so it's like only one of these guys gets to do that. And so, okay, sometimes Worthy's going to have to be outside versus press. And I'm not comfortable with that with a 165-pound guy doing that. And that's what we saw in the interception is you can't hit your 4'2".

If you can't even get off the line like that, that's just hard. Like the 160 showed up more than the four or two. He hasn't broken 20 miles an hour yet, by the way. Marvin Harrison Jr. has. I didn't know you could do that. Oh, wow. Even though we have proof of it from previous season. Maybe it's because he played at a small school with no production. Maybe that's. Under the radar guy, too. Like little, not a household name. Small recruit.

No one had eyes on him ever. But yeah, but that's just that interception was kind of the, yeah, the one that like you said, it was just a little sample size or a snapshot of like kind of some hesitations with it where they have Juju with her now to be the side zone beater, but still like, all right, God, you guys need another guy still. All right. Well, speaking of Marvin Harrison Jr.,

Those two touchdowns were fun. I really found that Cardinals offense found their groove. I have some Cardinals stats. I'm using Marvin Harrison Jr. as a way to talk about some Cardinals stats real quick. Go for it. They're averaging over seven yards a play out of three tight end looks, about 13%. 23 of those plays. Sicko ball.

Three, two of both of Marvin Harrison Jr.'s touchdowns were out of 13 personnel with three tight ends on the field where he's the lone receiver, which is something we kind of envisioned this offseason. The rest of the league has one touchdown out of 13 personnel. The Cardinals have three. And I think we're going to see more and more of it as it's gone away. They're using a bunch of 12 personnel, real 12 personnel with their three guys and with two tight ends and run game looks awesome. And Marvin Harrison Jr. really does look like just like a bigger Devontae Smith. Like,

He's just so smooth. It's hard to press him. He's strong. He doesn't care about guys trying to get physical with him. He'll just shove them off. Yeah, Cardinals offense found their groove. Marvin Harrison Jr. found his groove, which is pretty obvious just looking at stats. Yeah, Kyler Murray threw deep on 9.7 of his attempts in week one, went 0 for 3 according to PFF. And then week two, he threw deep on 23.8% of his throws, went 5 for 5 for 156 yards and three touchdowns.

Truth will be somewhere in the middle throughout the course of the season. But I think that version of the Cardinals offense is more of what we'll see often. And honestly, his two catches that weren't touchdowns, which is wild to say, for Marvin Harrison Jr. were almost more impressive and I think indicative of who he is as a player, I think, going forward, which is one. The first one was, again, boundary receiver.

And Kyler just puts it up to him. The little back shoulder one? The back shoulder puts it up to him. That was number one. That's it. People hyper-focused on this quote about him saying it's not his job to get...

Marvin Harrison Jr. the ball, and that got aggregated everywhere. What an eye roll. And clearly you already see the trust in who he knows who Marvin Harrison is on that one. And then also Harrison, I think, returning that trust on the scramble drill play where Murray goes into creation mode and Harrison just immediately starts breaking downfield, finds a soft spot. That was incredibly impressive to see. That's the savviness, the pro-readiness.

of him as well. So yeah, I just look week one was what do I say to you last week? We're definitely going to always look back on remember when people worried about Marvin Harrison Jr.'s one catch for four yards. I feel like two seconds into that game on Sunday. I felt that that was going to be the case. It's up there with Jamar Chase can't catch the football without stripes on it. That was that's going to be up there with one of those offseason preseason takes that McConkie looks good. I'll throw that one in there as well.

uh, Keon Coleman loving the fit and offense. Yeah. He did nothing in week two. They didn't really need him to do anything, but that's, but that's also going to be the way I think this bill's offense goes. Uh, they're, they're leaning into the run game as you've talked about. Um, and they have so many fascinating role players, you know, dude, Khalil Shakir. I, I wrote a piece, uh, for reception perception, like just,

brain dump thought about like why he's the ideal receiver type for the modern NFL, because he's smart. He knows where to go in zone coverage and he's like useful after the catch to me with teams playing so much too high coverage. And Rishi Rice is kind of this guy too, although I think Shakira is a smarter player, but Rice is developing in this way. I'll give him some credit there. You need guys that one or like, I've always prioritized route runners. I'm partial to route runners, obviously because I chart routes.

but at the same time, yeah, I think I, these guys like Shakir and I think Shakir is a good route runner too. I think he's a smart player, but these guys who can do something with the ball, once you get it in their hands, that's how you're going to find explosives and not even just explosive, like efficient offense. And,

I think that some teams have struggled with that. I think him just being that guy for Buffalo, I don't know how much volume he's going to get throughout the course of the season, but he's a guy that will, he will have high yield on his targets because he's just that ideal receiver that teams need right now. But Coleman has his role too. And I think that's going to primarily, I don't think he will be doing necessarily the big slot stuff that I kind of envisioned. I think he will be the dunk on UX that, you know, when,

Josh Allen sees a good coverage look. He's happy to throw it up to that guy. So definitely not. I think if you're wanting to get the most production out of Keon Coleman, I don't think that's the role that you want to use him in. But in this particular offense, I totally see where that comes in. And that doesn't mean long term. That's going to be his role always. Totally. This is how rookies go. And sometimes, yeah, people understand. It's not like you always drop a guy in. It's like, okay, he's the number one. It's like sometimes the guy's the number four. Yeah.

And maybe one week he is the number one or number two and all that stuff. But no, great point about the yak stuff. Tackling is... I'll double down on this take. Tackling has never been better in the NFL than it is right now. And yak yards, that's why defense is so comfortable just like trapping everything underneath. Tackle, tackle. Watch the Patriots play. They just rally and tackle. They'll let you catch something underneath, rally and tackle. And I think it's really good league-wide. Maybe a couple teams, you know, mentioned before, but...

both of them former Legion of Boom defense coordinators, but the irony. But I do think that a lot of teams are just so good at that. So creating yards up to catch is utmost importance. That was the whole Malik Navers argument. If you want him over MHJ was that he can create an explosive play like that. I totally understand that argument. And speed, like obviously speed's important. Malik Navers is fast and, you know, look at what the Dolphins do. Look what the Saints are doing because they have speed right now and how those guys can create yak opportunities. But that's why I think these guys like,

and Rasheed Rice and like I think maybe Amon Ross St. Brown Bud Lake Cooper Cup is kind of the godfather maybe of this newer modern archetype

Like you got to play physical after the catch to say this is why you're I think long term, you know, will be this guy, too. You got to you got to be a bully in the that's what I love about Shakir, man. I just think he's such a badass in the open field. And yeah, because tackling is so true. Tackling is better now than it has been recently. You got to take the fight to the defense if you are a wide receiver. And I think that's why guys like this matter. But yeah, Coleman, I think could thrive in those ways, too. It's just going to take a little bit more time. Yeah.

All right. That is it. That was fun. As we wrap up our week to recap, good to check back on some takes and flog herself a little bit, but that was a lot of fun. Closing out today, Charles and I will be back on Thursday to preview week three, Matt and I will be on fancy film room recording that tomorrow. So make sure to check that out as well. I'm Nate Tice. Find me at Nate underscore Tice on social media, Matt, where can they find you?

Yeah. Matt Harmon underscore BYB. Hopefully don't have to flog myself for Deontay Johnson too much longer. Andy Dalton, you're my only hope. When has this ever gone wrong before? You know, it's funny as you mentioned that Andy Dalton picture, Andy Dalton was like legitimately the average size quarterback, like he's 6'2", 215 or whatever. And that's,

You see the difference between average and Bryce Young. I know. Sorry. Sorry. I throw that one last one in there. We came all the way back to it. Sorry, Panthers fans. If you like this pod, Carolina and everybody else, make sure to subscribe to us, follow us, rate us wherever you get your podcasts or watch us on YouTube and watch us on YouTube. Do both.

Also, follow Yahoo Sports on Snapchat too. If you're into that, send in your mailbag questions. We're going to be checking on those as the weeks come on. Football301mailbag at yahoosports.com. Thanks to Brett, Stone, and Adi behind the scenes. Thanks to everybody for listening. Thanks to Matt. See you guys next time.

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