Jets fire Saleh, fixing broken offenses & defenses: Bills, Bengals, 49ers, Browns
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Get 80% off your impression kit when you use code WONDERY at Byte.com. That's B-Y-T-E dot com. Start your confidence journey today with Byte. This episode of Football 301, Matt Harmon joins me, as always, to review, to recap week five of the NFL. We're doing it through the lens.

of whether the unit or the team is broken or whether we think we can put a band-aid on it to fix the problem so they can keep going. Send them out on their way. Give them a lollipop. We also check out Monday Night Football. We have Jets, Robert Salah takes, all that and more on Football 301. See you guys in a sec. ♪ music playing ♪

Welcome back to Football 301. I am your host, Nate Tice. We are going to be recapping week five through the lens of some struggling teams or units. A couple of them won, but we still want to talk about it. And we're going to be looking at, do we think these units or teams could use a band-aid or are they just broken? There's one team in particular that we were going to talk about anyways that kind of

led us to our answer, which is going to be pretty nice. But to help me do that, to determine whether these teams or units need a Band-Aid or if they are just simply broken, a tape job will not do. Mr. Matt Harmon will be joining me to do that. How are you doing today, Matt? Nate, I'm good. Yeah, this is...

You're almost destined to be wrong in some way when you're doing an exercise like this because, you know, look, there's only two paths, right? Band-Aid or broken. I normally don't have a good sense of where I'm at from an injury or health perspective anyways as a stupid –

maybe egotistical man. I'm like, no, no, no, no, we're, we're fine. Like this is no big deal. Nobody like we can play through this. We can, we can keep on pushing. And then I inevitably make myself either more sick or more injured than I already was. So I might not be the best person for this, but maybe it'll be easier to criticize people on the outside instead of being introspective. I love that. You say that right after the pre-show, I go, man, I just can't shake this runny nose. I don't know if it's a cold or, you know, whatever it is might be allergies. Oh, well,

We'll see how I end up. So yeah, if you hear me throughout the weekend, worse, it's not getting better, but no, that's what's fun to only giving two options with this. It is kind of, there's no rub some dirt on it option. So we're just saying a bandaid, you know, just determining how, if that bullet hole is a little too big, that the bandaid doesn't work, that you might need a little bit more, you know, a little bit more gauze on it. We did an autopsy last week with one of these teams. So really just all the medical terms, we're just going to just bring them all in for some of these units and teams.

On this week's Thursday show, though, we are going to be answering some mailbag questions. So make sure you send in those questions. We'll answer them here on Thursday at the end of the show with Charles. Football301mailbag at YahooSports.com to send in those mailbag questions. I'll tweet something as well. Send in those emails. Reply to the tweet. Let's hear from you guys. It's been a little bit. I think it's going to be a lot of fun now that we're into October. So, like I said before...

We're going to try to fix some broken units, see if we can fix them or some broken teams, just determine maybe what some of the causes for this and whether they can be fixed. But before we do that, we're going to do real quick Monday night football recap with the Saints and the Chiefs. The Chiefs won this game 26 to 13. Plenty of

of Taylor Swift. Plenty of Taylor Swift backup dancers, which actually was relevant. Holy crap. They probably, that package was Saunders' brother. And then with Taylor Swift, couldn't have happened at a better time. The timing of that, they must have just been, the producers just must have been freaking out with Monday Night Football. So, interesting game. Mahomes was

Totally control. The run game for the Chiefs continues to be a super strength for them. They were one of the few teams over 50% on running back runs going into that week, and they still maintained a good run game with Kareem Hunt and Carson Steele and Samaj P. Ryan. Just guys off the street. Sure, we'll just get a good run game there. But when you watch this Monday night football game, Matt, did you have any takeaways other than that the Chiefs just keep churning along? Anything on the Saints?

Well, yeah, the Saints in a second. Yeah, the Chiefs keep churning along with dudes from like the 2018-2017 roster. And then, I mean, obviously the Juju Smith-Schuster stuff is so interesting because I think you and I, Nate, have talked about Rasheed Rice and how from a reception perception standpoint, he profiles so cleanly to early career Juju Smith-Schuster. Now, I didn't necessarily think we could just

We could take the new model and put in the right. We'll call it vintage.

original model in Juju Smith-Schuster and just get that same production, but we did. Those are some replaceable routes that Rishi Rice can run. I know Juju had a couple of big plays. He averaged over 11 yards after the catch per reception in this game, which is, again, very much like the calling card of his early career, but I think that Rice gives them more juice probably on a full season basis than Juju does, but

he can still run those routes. And again, those are some replaceable routes in, in, in the playbook. Like as long as we have dudes clearing out space, which they do in Xavier worthy have, he's not a guy that's getting a ton of footballs thrown his way on like base NFL routes, but he is clearing space for this team. And as long as they have that, like Juju can be a productive player for this team. So that was definitely interesting from that perspective to, like I said, take,

Take the new model out and put the OG vintage model in Juju in that power slot role for the Kansas City Chiefs. On the Saints side, man, it definitely feels like the first two weeks of the season was like a different lifetime. Yeah. You know, unfortunately. And I was excited about what we saw, but after offensive line injuries and just, you know, I think this happens, Nate, right, with these Shanahan trees that –

They push the right buttons, right? They push the motion. They push the play action, the under center stuff, a good zone based run team. You know, I mean, look, that works, but teams know how to defend this stuff. Eventually, these are not cheat code plays like they're presented as. And when you do it against the Panthers and then you go against a Chiefs defense that's well coached with a bunch of physical players up front. And again, you have had offensive line injuries there.

that can start to kind of trickle away pretty fast. Yeah. Start with the juju stuff. All last year, I kept kind of, oh, what's the issue with the Chiefs? We're passing. First off, I was like, watch the offense align. That'll lead to a lot of the issues. That was also happening with the pass catchers. I just kept saying, they need...

They need a Juju Smith-Schuster. They need just that zone beater, that guy that's just the big body over the middle. They'll get the simple yak yards. I thought even this year, if he came along, even in a game like this, there'll be a four catch for 38 yards and three first downs. That's how I picture those, not 100 plus yards. Of course, some of that was some of the situations that he ended up getting the ball, but

He's going to have a role in this offense, and I'm glad he brought up Worthy. And this is something we talked about where Worthy's not going to be a one-to-one replacement for Rice. Worthy has...

really some gravity in this offense that really opens up things if you travis kelsey being wide open in the middle of the field early on the game yeah what do you got four four two guy taking two guys that really helps out everybody else i mean they trot out tight ends every single snap which is which i honestly thought was good coaching from reed just like hey we don't got the guys don't use them let's use the guys that we can trust um my homes was a machine underneath

NextGenStats had a great tweet about it. Mahomes accumulated near all of his passing protection on attempts under 15 air yards. 300 of his 331 yards were under 15 air yards. Did not throw a single tight window throw on 39 pass attempts. It felt like easy pickings for them. And again, when they have a sustainable run game, they can figure out the pass game as long as that run game kind of keeps them above level. But what you're talking about with the Saints, though, that

O-line injuries, if they get a negative game script like that early turnover where Carr was throwing it kind of away, I think, that didn't get there all the way. Yeah, if he said he was throwing it away, I might give it to him. But I don't know. That was just a little iffy. I think he was trying something there.

And you can't have that. They need to be in a positive or a neutral game script so they can keep running the ball, keep running zones. The Chiefs' run defense is actually pretty good this year, which is usually a thorn in the side for a Spags defense. That's usually how you kind of pick at them. You just jab them in the run game.

getting that negative game script, you're not really turning the ball outside of, you know, or running the ball consistently or moving the ball consistently. You're relying on Rashichi deep balls. It's going to feel like that. That's exactly how that offense felt. And really after the first couple of weeks, it was like, all right, how do they adjust when defenses adjust? Cause now that you're off that summer scouting of the first couple of weeks and

Now it seems like defense is going like, oh, yeah, we know the formula. Get them to third and long and then just really funky it up. But Chiefs are a good team. The whole line's playing real well. Mahomes is Mahomes. They'll figure out the passing game. The run game's good. And they still have Spags in that defense. Like this is still a classy team. I'll put them at. Obviously, they're 5-0.

All right. But going on, don't think any of them. Chiefs are not broken to me. I don't think they even need much of a bandaid. I think they figured it out. His name is Juju Smith Schuster for a while. Juju Smith Schuster is the bandaid. He's the bandaid. And Kareem Hunt. Again, Nicole Hardman, all the old faces. I mean, the Bills have too many wide receivers. They might as well call up about MVS at this point. See what he's got going on.

Reliable there. I know. Yeah. It's the, yeah. Let's have Johnson and Johnson. It's Juju and Juju, uh, uh, band-aids speaking of Johnson and Johnson. How about that? Talk about the jets real quick. Yeah. Just shoehorn that segue. And so the jets all the way coming from London, which happened, you know, Sunday morning, American time, uh, East coast time. It was nine 30, uh,

lose the game to the Vikings. Some interesting moments happened with the Jets offense, I would say. Thought the Jets defense played well. And then here we are Tuesday morning, all waking up to Robert Sala, head coach of the Jets, now fired with a career record of 20 and 36.

They are entering week six with a chance for the lead in the AFC East against the Bills. What are your thoughts? I'll just go there. What was your first takeaway about Robert Sala now entering the unemployment line as a coach, even though the defense, which, you know, I know he's not a defensive coordinator, but he has a lot to say on that defense doing well. So what do you think about this, Matt?

Yeah, so in a weird way, my first reaction when I saw the notification pop up on the phone was literally out loud. I said, holy, I mean, because it was definitely a surprise at the same time, though. Like I said, this is a I'm going to contradict myself there and say it's not that surprising, even though the initial reaction is one of shock. Just because, like, for one.

The second that Rodgers in the press conference, you know, kind of pushes back on Sala and the whole cadence comment right away. I'm like, oh, this is not good. This is something like when there's smoke, there's fire with the Thursday night game where they're blowing out the Patriots and Rodgers kind of like pushes off Sala like that, like hug. He tries to give there's there was obviously something going on there. And again, when

Clearly the most powerful person in that building beyond the owner is the quarterback is Aaron Rodgers. You look no further than who the offensive coordinator is, who's the number two wide receiver. We know the deal with the Rogers stuff. Like we don't need to rehash everything that everybody already knows. He obviously has more sway in that building than Salah. So if there was any sort of like, Hey, we need to put a bandaid on this. It's not let's,

pick it what Aaron likes to do it's let's get rid of the head coach so I'm like in that way I wasn't all that surprised and also just again you look at Salah's record I'm with you like he obviously the Jets defense is fantastic but you are the head coach I think we get I think we get stuck on this too much on the outside of like well the side of the ball that he is

responsible from like that's why he got this job is good like why are we firing this guy well and again I realize what I just said there that the reason the office coordinator is in place is because of the quarterback and all of this stuff it's very that's a tangled knot but regardless of that the buck does stop with you you have the you have the record

That you do, you're performing the way that you do. I think this team looks like a poorly coached team, mostly on the offensive side of the ball. But still, again, you are the head football coach. You are accountable for the entire operation. The entire operation has not been good under the Robert Sala era. And like that is just a fact, whether it's all his fault or whatever, is kind of a separate question.

But just like in that reality, it's not that surprising to see this head coach get let go. It's a tough situation because you, yeah, you want a talent like Aaron Rodgers in there. But then, you know, we think of like,

Sometimes guys have a posse or they have a group with them, an entourage with them. Rogers is more like his auxiliary characters around him. The Hacketts, the Alan Lazards, the Malachi Corley, the third round pick that obviously is a Rogers favorite because he won't stop talking about him. Who was a healthy scratch this past weekend? I might add. So you said it's kind of all tied together. It's hard. It's a knot. It is very knotty. And

how I kind of determined this. Like, cause I want to say Salah has an influence on the defense and it's like, yeah, as a head coach, you have to say something on the offense. Sean McVay having a bad defense. I don't let Sean McVay get away with it. You hire the defense coordinator. You do this. You have Sam personnel. You actually have influence on this.

there with the Jets is just so interesting because it's truly Joe Douglas has a lot of say, the GM, and he's still there. But then they bring in Rodgers and he brings in all of the guys that he wants to play, callers, auxiliary players. They get a lot of vets to kind of patch over things. I don't know, like,

How much I put on Salah there, because I could tell it all went over his head. Like this, this is just how it goes. Every building, the politics are different. If you're in new England for the last 20 years, it's bill Belichick and then bill Belichick, you know, and then the third command is bill Belichick. So it's easy to just, you know, go through that hierarchy there. Every team is so different. Every team, how they treat their quarterback is so different. Some quarterbacks like Matt Ryan, when I was with him in Atlanta, uh,

He has, you know, he's the God of the building. Everything is to protect Matt Ryan and Matt Ryan could do whatever he wants there. Great guy too, but he could just do whatever he wants there. And yeah, that makes sense. Cause it's Matt Ryan Rogers comes in. It's not like he's been there for 15 years. These are, this is a new head coach. This is for him. This is new interactions with other players that he's, you know, it's not him that's established himself from day one there. So it's just the chemistry of that and just the relationships there. It's hard to,

you know, pick apart like who I want to blame. I just think Salah's in a no-win position unless they won games. Like, I mean, but again, that reflects on him. And I still, again, I thought the defense was doing some good things and I want to

kind of take take a moment to rant about this rogers hack at offense that is for sure running stuff from 2014 they're acting like the nfl hasn't evolved in 10 years like it's it's it's kind of crazy to me actually i should say 2016 17 but anyone watch the game against the broncos rogers gets hit blindsided against cover zero look they go against the vikings this past week he throws a pick

against cover zero to Van Ginkle, pick six, and then he gets hit blindside again against the same blitz luck. If this were a rookie second-year, third-year quarterback, I'd just be like, oh, man, that's tough. You know, it's tough. I get it. You double clutch.

This is Rogers, who I think is one of the most cerebral players to ever play the game that I've witnessed. So just as awareness, he wants things where everything's static and set it, forget it. So he can, you know, find his options and work from there. Use his mind to find the answers. This is the battle that LaFleur had with him. Matt LaFleur would have them green Bay. Like, let us use motion. It's going to help you out.

It ended up working out and they merged their offenses and one, two, he went to MPS with this, but he throws the pick to Van Ginkle on the hot dropper. This is a staple of this defense. This covers your blitz with the hot droppers on it for 15 years since the first iPod came out with Belichick. Like, like seriously, this, this, they have run that. Like it used to just drive every offense mad. Like no one had answers last few years when floors went to Miami and

And he ran, remember when they played the Ravens on Thursday night and the Ravens couldn't even operate an offense. Like it was, it was actually like embarrassing. Non-functional. Yeah. Non-functional offense. They literally ran cover zero every snap and the Ravens could not run an offense. That was the next year. Greg Roman of all people came up with like an answer to figure out how to beat this blitz and others copied it.

But why I'm getting frustrated, why I'm bringing up all Greg Roman and years, there's answers for this blitz out there that other offenses, including the Mac Jones, Matt Patricia Patriots, figured out how to beat this blitz.

And that is what's just is kind of, you know, when he was on offensive call plays for Mac Jones. But this is honestly, I just motion the tight end across. There's other answers to this. They use the traditional answers that this defense is going to beat. Throw it hot. Let Aaron Rodgers just beat it with a hot throw. Well, they drop Van Ginkle right to where the hot. He's called literally a hot dropper because he's going to where that's what it's called. It's called a hot dropper going to where the hot route is.

And then the last one where he gets whacked again from the blind side, that one is on Rodgers completely. And that one is more frustrating to me because now you've seen this look last week. You saw this look earlier in the game. They run the same blitz.

And even me watching this, I know that there's answers to it. Protection sense and throwing sense. You have to know you're hot there as a quarterback. You have to know that, hey, there's four coming to the running back side, four pass rushers. We only have three over here. We have the left guard, left tackle, and the running back. As a quarterback, I know, hey, Harrison Smith blitzes. I have to either drift away or I have to throw it right away. Rogers does neither. He just stands flat foot in the pocket and just takes the shot.

And yeah, it's tough to get the ball in one and a half seconds, everything. But this is why you bring Aaron Rodgers in. So he's supposed to figure out the answers. And that was just really disappointing to me because that's a scouted look from that game. And even I know what the answers are. And again, if there's ways you can block it out, there's other answers you can do.

But it was just like he was like, no, I got it. And you don't got it anymore. And I don't know. That just shows a lack of detail, shows just a lot of faith that Rodgers will fix it. Rodgers will fix all this. You watch him against the Broncos. The Broncos knew all the changeups. They knew all the counters. They're like, okay, you're going to do this like pump and go. We got it. So I just think the run game is limited. The pass game is just from 10 years ago. They only have one real receiver in Garrett Wilson. So if you just double team him, no one else is beating you. It's just not –

a good operation right now on the offense, which is so crazy. Of course, that's how it gets set. I know he's the head coach and everything, but this is hacking Rogers all the way. And it's just right now they don't have a ton of great answers. It's kind of disappointing when I watch it. I really just nice. No, I really wanted to let you cook there and you cooked. You cooked the whole dish and every bit of it was as tasty as the last. Four meals. Four course meal there. We're stuffed after that one. But you're so right to point this out and

Like all this stuff that the Flores and the Vikings are doing, it is difficult. You know, it's tough to play against. And we've talked about that on the show, but that stuff is on tape, like nothing that they did against the jets on Sunday morning, uh,

Was a shock. And the fact that you the fact that you are bamboozled by it as a veteran quarterback and a veteran offensive coordinator, it's just it is embarrassing. And it's I would say that the thing that stood out to me most, as you were saying, there is it comes back to there are poorly coached team. And that's another thing, too, is like they walk into every game.

at a disadvantage because of who their offensive coordinator is. And we all know it. Everybody knows it. And then they can't stop shooting themselves in the foot with what would be like little tiny mistakes. Like,

drop the passes from Alan Lazard. Like, okay, a missed assignment up front and you're just running straight into a brick wall in the run game. Or like Garrett Wilson, who's a player I really like, but he does every now and again have a bit of a tendency to

all right, I got to run this route. Like I'm open. I'm going to keep getting open. Like I'm going to keep drifting myself open. And he's not quite where Rogers wants him to be. And Rogers is obviously very particular. So like, yes, he is open. That's charted as a successful route. You know, like he's, he's getting separation, but,

The way he maintains the separation might just not be exactly what Rogers wants. But like all this stuff are little tiny things, but they do all of them on top of coming into it with a, with a coordinator who does not have them set up to succeed. And you bring up like the routes and the, the way the passing game is designed. That was driving me. I mean, Oh my God, it was, it was driving me nuts in the Patriots and the Broncos game. And it was having me about ready to tear out what little hair I have left during the Vikings game, man, because it's like,

These are the routes that Garrett Wilson ran in weeks, the Patriots and the Broncos game. 62% of his routes are out routes.

are slant routes and nine routes. And that is it, brother. Like we got nothing in the intermediate deep middle of the field. Like, and you look at the next gen route chart from the Vikings game, he had 22 targets and like three of them are over, are, are the middle of the field, like short and intermediate over the middle of the field. It's like,

Yeah, that's how you take 22 targets and get 101 yards out of them because there's no runway routes, yards after catch opportunities, any of that stuff. And it's just wild to me that Aaron Nagler made this point, who obviously covers the Packers, when we were talking with him on Twitter this morning. It's so bizarre that Aaron Rodgers clearly grew so sick of Mike McCarthy and the Mike McCarthy offense that

and the ISO routes and all this stuff that belongs in 2016 or whatever. And that's exactly what they're running with the jets. It's so weird. Yeah. He like rebelled against the structure of that offense before it comes in and, and doesn't even do the full Gary Kubiak, the Shanahan bus button pushing that we just talked about with the saints, but just like sprinkles that stuff. And he wins two MVPs. And now like, obviously he got sick of that. Now he's back to doing what he hated before. It's, it's bizarre. He wants to have full. And I get,

I struggle with this because I get around quarterbacks and the best ones and you want to trust them because they're so freaking good and special and amazing. They're superhuman. Seriously, guys, some of these guys are just insane. What they see and how they're able to take advantage of it.

And so you want to trust that and give them confidence in what they're doing. But the thing was, this was an advantage 10 years ago. And now teams caught up. I tweeted it, but there's a sequence against the Broncos that was so telling. That classic tight and flat thing. The Broncos defenders teed off on it because they're just like, oh, we know this play. We scouted this. We even know the signal. And then they tried the changeups on it and they countered that.

And that's where I'm like, okay, this is the second year you guys were with the Jets. So even if it's just Rodgers and Hackett who have been together for a while, but this is your second year. So even these guys that have been there for two years now, Lazard, Garrett Wilson, Conklin, I know he's been banged up, but all these guys –

Where's the layers? Where's the next step for this offense? And I just don't see it. And even the run game gets eliminated because he wants full control and be able to check into runs. Everything's zoned. So because that's just kind of an easy run to get to no matter what formation you're in. So because he wants full control, he's limiting the run menu now. That, oh man, it's just...

I'm curious what happens. This is probably to rattle some cages and shake things up, obviously, but it's just, I don't know. It's not like they fired the OC and that, that that's going to be an interesting thing because I don't know what changes for them. I don't see Jordy Nelson walking through that door. Yeah. I mean, even I, this was definitely the case watching it on Sunday. It was like there, this team is not a Devante Adams away from salvation. Like, you know, I, I get it. You, you pluck Alan Lazard off the field and you put,

You put Devontae Adams in there, although are you taking Lazard off the field? Who are we taking off the field for Devontae Adams? Because we know that's Rodgers' guy or whatever. Theoretically, you put

Adams in there, this offense will be better. Band-Aid or broken? I do think this is broken. I do not think a Band-Aid or this Band-Aid certainly is not what they need to apply to this to heal the flesh wound. This turned into kind of like a middle ground for the Band-Aid broken superlative game we're doing. But yeah, it does feel just more broken. The Band-Aid's not just going to save us. This needs rehab and maybe surgery to fix up what's going on in this offense. Maybe an injection of talent.

Just one last thing on the run game because you're right to point out the zone stuff. Last year in 2023, this is from Fantasy Points data, Brees Hall, 3.06 yards per carry on zone run concepts, man gap concepts, 6.3. He's always better at it.

Even at Iowa State, this is where he got some Le'Veon Bell comparisons. It's because he was so good on duo. Because he has such good vision and he kind of has that stop-starting run style that can really play games for the linebackers. So when you're not... He's one of your better players. Run the runs that are better for him. It's just... I don't know. But again, you can't only...

the Pat weight Packers with the floor with Rogers, they implemented more duo because it just had tied in some other stuff they did. They stole it from the box. Even look for told that he said they played them. So they stole some area and stuff. Hey, coach admitting that he still stuff. I'm like all four. Cause so many guys act like they just came up with it in a dream or in the shower. It's like, come on. I watched that offense too, guys. But, but again, that was a merger of ideas right now. They're just kind of doing the base ideas. And I, I don't know who's going to tell them that you have to evolve and

And it'll be interesting as everything is with the New York Jets. But that was our first, first team that we're talking about for Band-Aid or Broken. We're going to come back after the break with a few more teams and we're going to determine.

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All right. We are back and we are going to continue with our bandaid or broken little game that we're doing. We're going to go to the bills offense who just lost to the Texans entertaining game. Kind of went back and forth for a little bit. I know score was in the highest scoring game, but there's some interesting stuff.

Before we talk about the Bills offense, CJ Stroud's incredible. I'm going to be writing about him this week. Oh, my God. He might be my favorite player in the league. Holy crap. Yeah, I'm writing about him this week, though, so check that out on Yahoo. CJ Stroud's incredible, so look for that. But let's talk about the Bills offense and that performance.

Matt, this is some things that we've talked about before, but are you saying, do you think this Bill's offense is broken, or do you think there are some band-aids that they could apply and keep this thing going? Yeah, this one's tough because...

It's kind of it really is in the middle to me. And it's like, I think they need they definitely need a bandaid. But it's one of those, you know, big ass patch bandaid. Right. When you have like this cut, if I put if I put a bandaid on it, I'm going to irritate the actual wound when I rip this thing off. Like, I for sure need a patch over this thing. And that's like road rash that might get infected.

Yeah. Yeah. A hundred percent. Just want to patch it up. We got to like shave the hair down in the area to apply this patch because otherwise it's going to be a really, really unfortunate thing to take off. I may or may not have dealt with this situation. I know. I can see. I just had a situation like this recently. Anyways, that I did. I, like I mentioned at the top did not take seriously enough to, to quickly. So, you know, this is my life, but anyways, the tough thing with this here is,

I mean, yeah, Josh Allen in this game against the damn Texans has like a box score that you keep like thinking the API has the information wrong. You know, nine for 30. You're like, wait a second. Like,

refresh, obviously Yahoo, Yahoo sports.com refresh the box score. Like why is this not updating? And, and no, he really did complete nine of 30 passes. And a lot of it are the issues that we have talked about with this team before. Is it, they do like any, anyone out there, the, the, the small vocal minority that's like receiver separation or route running doesn't matter. What matters is this watch the bills offense right now. Watch the outside wide receivers. They are getting,

I know Keon Coleman had a 49-yard touchdown, kind of a catch-and-run play, which was pretty sick. That was a good moment by him. He's a young, growing player, not a guy that is ready to rock right now. They're getting like nothing from a down-to-down basis from these perimeter wide receivers. And the reason that I think it's hard to say whether this is broken, because sure, that sounds like a broken problem if it's broken or band-aid, is because I think this is going to show up against good teams and good defenses like it has the last two weeks. I mean, the Ravens' pass defense is not what

We're used to seeing from like an efficiency perspective. I think they're 20th and drop back success rate. They're still great at defending the run, but they have corners that can come up and beat you up. If you don't have good receivers and these bills guys right now on the outside Coleman, certainly Matt Collins, MVS, like they're not getting separation. They're not where they need to be. It really dawned on me, Nate, actually watching this game and I had it on the ISO screen here and,

There's a third down play where I think it was like a slot fade thing to Matt Collins. And he either is I don't think he's where he's supposed to be. He's not really like again, it's a it's a effed up play one way or another, however you want to put blame on.

incomplete pass. They go to punt on fourth down and you know who's the punt gunner on the play? It's freaking Mac Hollins. Like they've got a dude who's gunning punts down as one of their almost every down wide receivers at this point. Not what you want, man. And like I get what they are kind of trying to do with Mac Hollins, but it's also kind of like we're at enough already with Mac Hollins at this point. So teams like the Ravens, teams like the Texans that have Derek Stingley and Kamari Lasseter playing really good ball for the most part as a starting rookie corner.

I think these issues will really crop up. The Jets in week six, Titans in week seven, those are problematic matchups potentially for this particular issue because otherwise I think there's a lot of good and good things we've highlighted on this Bills offense. But if you don't have Khalil Shakir available, a player I really like, and then you, for whatever reason, cannot get Curtis Samuel on the field, which is personally killing me. I have no investment in the Bills, and this is driving me nuts that they don't have Samuel as a full-time player

You've got these guys on the perimeter. I do think that's going to be a big issue against good defenses. Yeah. No, it's a great point by just talking about

You got to think of the matchups that each team has, especially when they are trying to be a contender. And even if I thought that the Bills maybe take a half step back this year, I still think they're a good team. I like both units. I like the coaches and everything. Like Matt Collins is I'm going to compare him to a basketball player. And that's Robin Lopez, not Brooklyn. It's Robin Lopez, the guy with the throw, because all he was known for at the end of his career was setting great screens.

Like that, that's, he's a really good at setting screens. Like that's what he was known for. Some offensive rebounding, but yeah, that's really why you had him in. He was just this great auxiliary guy. That's Matt Collins at receiver. You want him blocking, use the term sacrificial X. He's sacrificial just period. Like that, he's just a guy out there to do other things to help out the offense. He's not even playing X for them either. No.

They just basically got Coleman. He got a double move dialed up for him. I couldn't believe it. It was a great concept too. It was Hank curl flat, ran the curl. He actually ran a good route and I was, and then unhitched the wagon. Alan throws a decent, he just can't get under it. Oh man. I, yeah. So it's, there have, they have a lot of snaps and a lot of targets and a lot of plays designed right now. And I hate to use this term, but I'm going to use it to losing players.

Just using it like it's even like Curtis Samuel goes in and he has a, he runs a seam route. And I think he was supposed to run a dig on this play. And again, I don't want to blame it on Curtis Samuel, but again, that just shows the miscommunication that's happening in this offense. It's like a real big moment. You could tell Alan is excited to give him the ball on this play. And then something happened where he either ran the wrong route, the defense was a different structure, like it was a read route or something. James Cook and Samuel on a different play, both run a bubble route,

And I think there's James Cook on that one. But Keon Coleman doesn't look at a now throw, which is like the quick slant. It doesn't look. It hits him right in the face. There's a bootleg concept where Dawson Knox –

gets too deep and he's supposed to be the hot route. So if Josh Allen gets, you know, pressured, that's where you can dig the ball. So Josh Allen gets pressure right away. And all of a sudden he has to throw it away. Cause he has to like, Oh, kind of try and create something. So you have a lot of these plays where it's, no one feels reliable. And that isn't that the best compliment we can give Khalil Shakir. That's why I like to come out boys. You say he's Mr. Reliable. I mean, he catches every football, but just even from a, a assignment standpoint, he does everything really well. He is reliable. Um,

And when a quarterback doesn't have that guy, we always talk about the explosive guy. Oh, man, we don't have this guy that can create the explosive play. Sometimes you just need the guy that's like, I know he's going to be here at seven yards. I can hit him. And I know he's going to catch the ball and quarterbacks. And Josh Allen looked antsy this game. He looked really antsy, like some pressure got there early, but he was bailing early and.

After what he looked like last year and early in this year, it was like, oh, we're back to this, Josh. We're back to this version of you. He just looked very antsy. And I think this is the first game where I feel like the play callers and his teammates maybe got a little spoiled by how much he makes their life easier. And I think now they're like, oh, we have to do this now? Oh, we have to sort everything out? Oh, we actually have to get open and...

everyone dropped the ball. It felt like around him. Not just Josh wasn't great either, but he was pressured 16 times. He only took one sack, which is impressive. He went one for 14 against pressure. Josh Allen at one point in his career was better against pressure than he was not pressured, which is just shows how off this whole game was that he couldn't even hit a single completion. He had one, which was a check down.

They actually went for a good game. But I just think that their best looks were jumbo personnel where they had the six offensive linemen, less receivers. The run game still looked good. Like, so I'm not saying that's why I think this. I agree with you. I think it's a big bandaid. But there until they clear Khalil Shakir back, they just have no one they can rely on the passing game. Even Dalton Kincaid. It's like he's just there.

Like, yeah, he's just fine. Yeah, but they're not like it's not like we're like, wow, this guy's a real matchup issue. Like, wow, this guy, he can get open on a double move or something like that. So, yeah, it just feels like this is the one where they didn't have a lot of teeth and it really felt that way. And I think it's going to feel that way sometimes with this offense. And that so that's why it is tough. Broken Band-Aid. I don't know, but I never want to see a team struggle, especially I really like Josh Allen. I'm a big fan. So it's just it's

I don't want to see this unit struggle, but not having Kalusha Keir out there and how we just had this conversation on the fantasy film room about him being like a quarterback settling receiver and like why that archetype is so important, especially against...

good defenses, modern defenses that will throw a ton at you. And the Texans have been throwing a lot more at teams than D'Amico Ryans usually does, which has been pretty cool to watch. Definitely put the Bills in the blender a couple of times on this. That was very validating for that conversation. But yeah, I think in terms of actual fixes, though, like if I want to be solution-based, the one thing I would say is

You know, it's tough when you come into the season and you're thinking like our most dynamic pass catcher will be our tight end. I always and how often is that? This was actually a big struggle for me with Dalton Kincaid and like fantasy this year and his very aggressive ADP is like, how many times has that really worked? Like it does. It's when you have Kelsey and Gronk. Yeah, but for the most part, it doesn't that doesn't really work.

And so I think they can kind of move away from him as like the lead receiver. And I think actually simplifying the receiver rotation, because if you look at like their route per dropback rate right now, nobody's over 68%. Khalil Shakir is the most at 67.8% in terms of route participation. And it looks very much like the Chiefs did at the beginning of last year.

By the end of the year, it was, okay, Rice is over 80%. Travis Kelsey is over 80%. MVS is high up there kind of doing the sacrificial X stuff. I think they kind of need to shave out a lot of these pieces here. Even, what's his name, Shaver. Terrell Shavers was running a decent bit of routes. MVS running up a decent bit of routes in this last game. We need to just...

Get Shakir, get Coleman. In my opinion, I think we need Samuel on the field, so let's get him. I know he had the turf toe and stuff like that, and I think that's probably why he's not on the same page, because he did miss so much time. But we need to get these guys on the field and let them all grow together and kind of cut out some of the ancillary stuff here. Totally get it. I'll leave it with

I even looked at personnel stats just for that reason. I think their best personnel grouping right now is 12. Even if defenses match you with nickel, it doesn't matter. Just find ways. I think the run game's good. They have good runs, but you can't just go, all right, we're in jumbo now. All right, yep, get ready for a run. All right, now we're in 11. All right, now we're in jumbo again. It feels very how the Bengals felt a few years ago where everything's very siloed.

depending on what the personnel grouping is. But the last stat I had was 32 plays out of 11 personnel, which is three receivers. They averaged 3.4 yards per play, 22% success rate. They only had seven successful plays. They had nine plays out of 12 personnel, averaged 10 yards per play, 56% success rate. Kind of...

I know there's a lot of variables that go into this, that it's not just run more tight ends, but it's like, it's pretty obvious when Khalil Shakir is out, you need to just keep the tight ends on the field. Even if Dawson Knox can be iffy and don't, don't get cave, maybe isn't as high. They're at least decently reliable. So also the end sequence, chucking the ball three times, like. Don't know what that was all about.

I love Josh Allen. He goes vroom. I'm excited to let him go. He can create explosive play, but sometimes you just got to play fundamental football. Just play the situation, meaning just run it three times. I know that's not sexy. I know you want to win games, but yeah, that really pulled. Oh, my God. They gave back to him with seven seconds, three timeouts, and it's like they can run anything they want, and they did. They got even closer, but yeah. Throwing shots to Matt Collins. I mean, what do you want to do? Oh, my God. I know. Matt Collins got benched.

on the Falcons last year. They'd rather give routes to Van Jefferson and Scottie Miller. Van Jefferson. And anyone watch the Steelers offense recently? Yeah, I know.

I know no one watched the Falcons last year, but he was there. And I was excited, too. But he's a great special teamer. Great dirty work guy. You don't want to get more than two targets, one target a game. All right. So going on to I mentioned this team a minute ago, but another team that, you know, had aspirations this year, and that's the Bengals. I think the Bengals offense. Yeah, you're good. You're fine. You guys got it.

Efficient, explosive. All my worries are gone. Burrow looks like a machine on Sunday. The offense is a lot of fun to watch. I mean, pay those guys, figure it out, because that's the strength of this team. Because look at the Bengals defense, who are bad. And I don't feel, I really don't feel like I have to add any other word there that they are bad right now. But when you watch this Bengals defense, Matt, do you think there's a Band-Aid or gauze or any...

ailment fixer that you can give this defense or are they broken for the rest of the year? And this is going to be a bunch of 40 point shootouts involving the Bengals. No, they're broken for sure. I don't know. They're definitely broken. So they're always kind of banged from a structural perspective here. And like, I think we know the story with the Bengals is like, they've tried to supplement that defense with some draft picks. It just haven't really worked.

totally come to fruition. And, you know, when this defense was cooking, right, when Lou Anarumo was like every football hipsters favorite coordinator, they had so much flexibility in the spine of the defense with the linebackers, with the safeties, um,

group has just really gone to rot at this point. And I mean, even guys that have played well for that, like Jermaine Pratt, I don't think having a great year this year, you know, they're like guys that have played a lot of snaps for this team are not kind of given their best football. And then again, like we're dealing with injuries, undeveloped players, things like that. We kind of knew that was going to be the issue. But then you look at them from like a defending the deep left and deep right area of the field. They give up the seventh highest yards per attempt. Like even some of these perimeter corners like are

aren't necessarily playing that well. So it's just like we've got issue on issue on issue here. I don't really, by the way, they can't rush the passer either. So they just don't have any sort of like, okay, yeah, our middle of the field coverage isn't great, but like our perimeter coverage, we can lock guys up there. So maybe we dedicate more resources to flooding the middle and closing up the middle. Can't really do that. Well, our pass rush is really great. We can lean it. That's not really good.

up to snuff either. Go watch the Jaden Daniels tape from that game. So it's just, I don't really see a solution here and it's pretty problematic for a team that obviously wants to be in contention, but I do think we'll end up just going down as one of those like carnival teams that man, the offense put up a lot of points, but it's because they have to, because the defense has given up so much on the other side. Oh,

I love that. The Carney team. That is a shout out to Scott Pinovsky on the fantasy show. I always say over the years that there is one team every year. That's like the fantasy carnival, which is just the offense is absolutely kicking ass. And it's great because every time they get into a game, they're going to have to kick ass because that defense gets steamrolled on the other side. As someone that grew up with the early 2000 Vikings and then worked with the Falcons with Matt Ryan, Roddy White and Julio Jones, and they couldn't stop a cold.

Yeah, that is the type of offenses after or type of team structure after my own heart. I trust me when my dad got he got fired with the Vikings and he went to Jacksonville after and the Jaguars had those kick ass defenses. I was not used to that. They didn't score here. We're screwed. We're screwed. Oh, my God. We got the ball back.

We just won 17-13? It was like 10 minutes later. It was like, what the heck? We just give up five explosive plays on one drive? Oh my God, this is great. So I kind of know this formula a little bit, but yeah, I really do feel like they're pretty broken. Like last year, they gave up a ton of explosive passes. Tons. Just every week. Doesn't matter who it was. Play action, drop back, just screens, just explosive pass, explosive pass. Now they can't stop the run. Just add it. Can't stop the pass or the run.

What can you stop? You can't rush the passer. I do a combined success rate and explosives play rate. People are trying to bully me calling it sex, right? Yeah. So sex rate, the Bengals defense, 39.9% is the sex rate. Okay. Just for context, league average, average is 51.5%. They're dead last. They've allowed a successful run on 53% of designed runs. Okay.

Okay. The Ravens right now lead the NFL at 51%. They turn every run game. I know they played the Ravens, but they played four other teams. So they let every team, whoever runs it on them, turn into better than the best run game in the NFL right now. It doesn't matter who it is. They have Lamar Jackson and Derrick Henry against this run defense. When they get into base defense, they allow 60%.

rushing success rate for offenses. Easily dead last. League average is 39%. Giants are second to last at 52%.

No one else is below 50 or above 50, I should say. So they let run, they basically let every run play when they get a bunch of linebackers on the field, every run play turns into my homes, Josh Allen, Purdy stats at their, at their MVP levels or the high levels when they have these fake stats, that's what they turn these, this run game into they're predictable, which is what Lou Anna Rumo's kind of calling card is, is that on third down, especially it's like you get some funky blitzes, you get fake blitzes, droppers, all this stuff, drop eight, you know,

Right now, they're kind of telegraphing everything, so it doesn't even make that interesting. They're not beefy up front. Trey Hendrickson is a good pass rusher, but teams are just running at him because now they're not scared of anybody else either. So, yeah, it's hard because I don't know. It's not like where it's like, well, they can stop the run. They just got really short up third down. It's like, no, no matter how you parse this defense, they're bad. They tried to stop the run against Baltimore and actually for a while kept the dam from breaking, but then...

Lamar just pop, pop, pop. Yeah. It was like, Oh man, Rashad Bateman's making plays on you. You know, all three tight ends are dropping bombs on this defense. So it's just, that's when I think you really are, are kind of just,

just banged from yeah and i've seen leonardo ramo's scheme enough that i know he could dial stuff up like he they it's always so week to week with him but this was this is the first time i really feel like it's just it's personnel like they just don't have an answer because of who they have the last stat i'll give is that the right the ravens trotted out one or two receivers on two-thirds of the place last week so they're in 11 personnel only on a third of their place they allowed 399 yards

when the ravens had one or two over eight yards per play when they were in 12 or 22 or 13 or any big boy personnel grouping so charlie kolar uh is like making every mark andrews fantasy player hate their hate their lives those who are still holding on because it's like oh big white tight end catching passes nope just somebody named charlie kolar so do you think do you think the bangles can still go to the playoffs though like in with this formula which is crazy to say because

Right now they're one and four, but if they are the carnival team and you look at their next four games, Giants, Browns, Eagles, Raiders, I mean, they could definitely win some damn shootouts against the Giants and Browns and the Raiders, right? So you come out of that stretch. Let's just...

Let's say they're 3-1 there. They lose to the Eagles, which even then, I don't know if I totally feel that. You're probably not going to win the division. I don't think you're going to beat Baltimore, but Steelers, we'll talk about them maybe at the end of the show. I think they can sneak in here. I don't know if it's a true Super Bowl team, but I think maybe they could sneak in. I would say, really, I can say, even look at the back half of the year, okay, Titans is interesting, but even their Titans offense, it's like, all right,

It's not the scariest thing in the world. Levis might give you one. Cowboys, but it's not like the Cowboys of last year. So it's like just even look at their tough matchup. So if they had one more win, I'd be like, oh, yeah, totally. You know, just the math sense. One of four is tough. That's really what it is. But they're going to be in every game. This offense is really, really good right now. It's efficient. And Burrow's seen the game really well. So he got a little weird the first couple weeks. Now he's back to it. Now he's actually pushing the ball a little bit. So I don't know.

I don't know. I think they're going to be in if other things get wacky in the AFC. Like, they could sneak in as a 9-8 team, though. Like, so I'll say that the team totally isn't broken, but just the defense is. But they can overcome it. Points are fun. So maybe just win some shootouts. They get a couple turnovers. Like, you can create that. Like, that's just how every game's going to be. So, yeah, they definitely could be in it. We are going to take our last break, and then we'll come back with a couple more teams for Band-Aid or Broken and wrap the show up.

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Learn more at klaviyo.com slash BFCM. All right, we are back. We're going to hit some more total team stuff as opposed to maybe just units, but it might be unit focused. We are going to go on over to the NFC and the NFC West as the San Francisco 49ers. Division favorites, conference favorites are now two and three.

after losing to the Cardinals in a pretty entertaining game. Some cool plays on both sides of the ball. So when you look at this 49ers team, they're two and three, and I believe third in the division. Do you determine that they are broken or do they need some band-aids to patch up some of these woes right now, Matt? Dr. Harmon is definitely calling in a specialist on this one. I actually want to hear what you have to say first on the 49ers because I...

I could kind of talk myself into a pretzel on this. I know you have notes on this. You tell me first. Okay. I'll start with the defense. Yeah. Teams are just going to keep doing this where they trot out big boy personnel with tight ends and make them match with linebackers. Talked about this plenty the last few weeks. Teams are going to keep doing it. The Cardinals had 12 and 13 personnel, 29 of their plays.

They got a 52% success rate. 10 of their 16 runs were successful. Six explosive plays. And teams are going to keep doing that. Try it out, linebackers. We're going to gash you. And then I would feel better about it.

But if you just look at the other contenders in the NFC, the Lions, the Vikings, the Packers, even their division, the Rams, the Seahawks, the Cardinals, look at that. Every division, it's like, well, every team can do this, though. So that has me worried. That, I think, is broken. They cannot defend out of big boy personnel. And I think teams are just going to keep daring them. On the other side, the offense...

There is, especially in the red zone, Christian McCaffrey sized hole. And that is not just the run game. That is the pass game too, which is part of CMC's talents. This is where they miss him the most. Last year, Christian McCaffrey was the most targeted player in the NFL in the red zone.

Jordan Mason this year, I believe, has one or two targets in the red zone. And you can see where this crops up because the 49ers like to get an empty when they're in the red zone. Empty is a lot better when the running back is a valid receiving threat because then my defense is like, well, we can't do man. We can't.

You can see defenses are like, oh, Jordan Mason's not CMC. We don't really have to worry about that. There was a play early in the game. Purdy had to break out a contain. He threw the ball away in the red zone. It was a choice route to Debo Samuel. Debo's in the backfield. Jordan Mason split out as a receiver. Foreigners do this all the time. CMC's split out. Debo's in the backfield. Gives a lot of tells with the defense. Really makes them antsy. Can't run man coverage because they might run it, all this type of stuff.

Jordan Mason on this play, it's a choice route. He runs a crosser and then Devo runs a choice route, sits in between the two defenders. Technically the read on that play is the crosser one, choice is two, but it's a primary as a choice. So usually quarterbacks just shortcut and get there.

If I on that play, pretty bypasses a wide open Mason goes to the choice route, has to scramble, throw the ball away. I'm not saying like, Oh, pretty. He's not reading it out. I am saying that if CMC is in there, he's looking at CMC and that's a wide open touchdown that walks in next sequence. Next red zone sequence. They go empty. Jordan Mason runs a whip route, which is out and in.

The linebacker doesn't even guard him because he's like, all right, whatever. They're not throwing him the ball. So he helps out and makes it all clouded onto the side over there. So again, it's just that because they don't feel that threat, there's repercussions about what the 49ers want to do once they get in, really inside the 15-yard line. Once in that low red zone inside the 10, when they want to get to these passing concepts where CMC is so good at this feel and opening other guys up,

It's not happening with Jordan Mason. And also Jordan Mason just as a runner is solid, but he still misses some holes too. So there's some meat left on the bone. I think in the run game right now, I think they'll be fine. I think they'll still score points. They'll still be okay. It's just that,

without CMC, there is some venom lost in this offense and they have to find some maybe new answers, especially when they get inside the 10 to punch it home, especially if they have their kicker hurt because they definitely have to score too. That doesn't help either. But I really do think that passing game wise, that is what they're missing because that takes away a big element of what they'd been doing for like the last season and a half with them. So yeah, it's, it's,

broken on the defense i think a band-aid on the offense they'll find the answers kyle shannon always does yeah i think that that's a really well said because i do think the defense is a little bit at a point of no return uh in terms of like that that's not going to suddenly become a needle moving unit it really hasn't been for a while i mean well until robert sala got the shackles off from the jets and he just becomes like a defensive consultant for this team in probably like a week uh maybe that helps but i don't know

Yeah, by Halloween for sure. He's got the 49ers gear back on. Yeah, other than that, I don't really know that there's a lot of fixes for the defense. Offensively,

This is why you can't just look at production and be like, oh, yep, we've replaced this player. Like, yeah, Jordan Mason's second in the NFL in rushing yards, averaging 501 yards per carry. Like, we're fine in the run game. You got to actually, like, watch the game and how these things play out because especially from a past game standpoint, I do think they miss him. They're running a lot of the – it's a great point. They're running a lot of the same concepts without the same players. Even, like –

You know, Debo is always a tough player with him because he's always dealing with injuries and things like that. I don't think he's looked as explosive this year as in previous years. You know, Iuke hasn't been fully dialed in until maybe this last week coming off of the holdout. So that's another thing, too, is like these guys might just take a little time. Let's get healthier. You know, let's get CMC back at some point. Let's get Debo farther away from injuries. And this like might look like the unit that we want.

in November or something like that. That's really when the games are going to matter. But like, dude, you also can't lose close games and be two and three at this point. Like, so it's, that's why I was kind of struggling with, is it bandaid or broken? Because I'm generally not in like panic mode about the offense or any of these players, but yeah,

You know, little things start to add up in a season like, ah, yeah, we lost the game because we couldn't kick. We lost the game late to LA Rams because we weren't ready for Kyron Williams in the run game, which is a little weird. You should be ready for that. I think that these things start to add up and then, oh, shoot, we're in November. Like, we have to be at our best. So that's kind of the hope is that they are their best at that point. But yeah.

I don't know. I always say it's a long season, but it starts to get late pretty early for a team with a lot of expectations like this. It does, because it's like, where's the reinforcements coming? Usually sometimes it's like, all right, this guy's on PUP, or this guy was on temporary IR, yada, yada, and they get him back off. And here it's not good, too, in the first month of the season when the teams already pick at it.

pick at it because then it's on film the whole year as opposed to you get caught week 10 or week 12 and it's like okay we could patch this up before we hit the playoffs but right right now it's i mean it's pretty obvious what teams are trying to do like that's why i could say it because i just watch these games i'm like yeah all right they're just getting big and running right down their throat i did a cut up of just the 49 or the cardinals running the same zone replay and it was just like

It was honestly like teach tape in the sense that it was zone read, big play, zone read, big play. Nick Bosa keeps getting closer and closer and closer. And then he screams down to knock out James Conner. Kyler keeps on the zone read, gets a huge first down as they burned a clock. And it's like, yeah, teams are just going to keep doing that. They're 24th in explosive play rate allowed when they're in base. It's just, yeah, I know what they're going to do. All right, next up.

I mean, I felt like everybody talked about this team this week. I didn't know how many people are watching this, that Browns commanders game, but apparently everybody, but the Browns bandaid or broken. I,

I think this was pretty easy to determine, but Matt Harmon with the Browns. Is there a bandaid to apply here or are they just completely broken? Yeah, we're broken for sure. Yeah, we are. We're not even broken. We're like rotten to the core. There's no, yeah, we'll put this thing in a cast and we'll be good at some point. There are some obvious and serious questions about the operation in Cleveland and to the point that like

I am with everybody. Yeah, you're right. Like the loud chorus of people on Sunday on your social media feed. They're like, all right, enough already with Watson. And I look, I did have that game up on the screen over here because I'm a sicko. It's like and I was really I was really curious about the Dayton Daniels matchup with which was which was fascinating. So like actually watching this game, it just it's

If I'm a player for the Browns, if I'm any of these guys on offense, I've got to just be going nuts at this point. It's very similar to the Bryce Young conversation in Carolina. It was like, yo, you cannot lie to the players. You can BS to everybody else, but they know what's going on from an offensive perspective, from a quarterback perspective, where Deshaun Watson is. Yep.

There's a small group of very weird Deshaun Watson defenders on the internet, which I don't know why you'd want to be that person. But the one thing I'll say is that I don't think that they're just going to take Watson off the field and put Jameis in here and like, oh, we've band-aided this whole thing up. That's not what's going to happen because there are other problems. And we can go into those problems too. But...

I always thought this was interesting, Nate, from like a football perspective, you know, I, the Watson, you know, addition and all this stuff is I couldn't really, couldn't really care less about like,

I hope it works out for him, but I've always thought it was fascinating from like a football perspective, you know, just seeing them go from the offense that Kevin Stefanski wants to run. And, you know, like the Nick Chubb centric offense to more of a spread attack that Watson's used to and like empty and shotgun and multiple receivers and all that stuff. I had a note on it. I'm trying to pull it up and I'm, you know, a surprise screwing up my, all my tabs here. But you just look at like those plays, right?

when they go into empty, this is, this is coming into, into, into last week. So this isn't updated for the last game, but I can't imagine it's any better going into week five to Sean Watson led the NFL and drop back side of empty. And he averaged 0.8 adjusted net yards per attempt on those plays. 0.81. Only Daniel Jones,

Maybe his numbers are better coming out of this week. Only Daniel Jones was lower among quarterbacks with 20 plus dropbacks at an empty and Watson's 3.12 adjusted net yards per attempt on plays with three plus receivers on the field is the lowest among quarterbacks that played four games going to week five. So it's less like what they want to be under Watson. Like, oh, we'll just make this offense more Deshaun Watson centric.

Even that wasn't working. So it's just I know that you can do the circular arguments of offensive line and all this stuff. You know, Amari Cooper's not having a great year. I get all those things. And that's why it's just like it is broken beyond the Watson stuff. It's even broken, which is troubling. Yeah, it's a team that looks like they were built around their line and running run game, not around the quarterback that they paid. And when the line is faulty and Nick Chubb is hurt and strong forward, and then you go, oh, yeah, we paid this quarterback.

Why did we pay this quarterback if he can't do it? I mean, they're passing, I think, more than anybody right now. Like their pass rate's ridiculous. It's like 70% or something like that. And there's one thing to say, Rust, you know, coming off and why did Deshaun Watson have to miss time? Oh, I know. But a couple of years ago, he came when he finished the year for the Browns after they signed him.

He played against the saints at home and it was just terrible weather. I think it was really windy and cold that day, which happens in Cleveland. I don't know if you heard that. Uh, but on that day, he literally couldn't throw a spiral. And I remember tweeting it. And I was at the time going to go, Hey, I'm going to see how this experiment goes before I say like, Hey, this doesn't look good. So I gave it time. That's how he's looked a guy that can't throw a spiral. Uh,

as opposed to maybe looking better. He looks slow. His arm looks weaker. He looks like he has no idea what the play is being called, even though he gives in the huddle. There's just a lot. He doesn't have answers right now. And the quarterback is the most important position in football. It's not the only position, but it is the most important one. The ball's in his hands every play. If I'm his teammate and I know this guy's not working,

Like, why should I run hard over the middle and get my head knocked off? Why should I block a little bit extra for him? And you can see that with the Browns. And it's not even just the offense. Watch the Browns defense against the Commanders. First quarter, they are taking it to them. They are playing hard. They're playing fast. They got hit with one deep play. Jay and Daniels had a really nice play on structure. But they're playing tough. And then they got a pick later in that drive.

But just they're really taking it to them. Then you see that their offense is not doing anything. And you can see guys just stop rushing, stop, you know, fitting up gaps in the run game, trying to go for kill shots because they want their highlights. They don't care. They're not playing fundamentally sound. It's the human element. When you know you're wasting snaps and wasting your time, these guys have careers that they have to think about. And that's what something with being a quarterback that I think people –

Tom Brady's doing a really good job of emphasizing it. I also thought he did a really good job this weekend. They're very improved. I agree. Way to go, Hall of Famer Tom Brady. You know football. He's really good at it. But he kept emphasizing, he was talking about Kyler Murray and talking about the responsibility of being the quarterback, that you want more on your plate because, yeah, I am the franchise and, you know, it's...

The play-by-play guy's like, oh, yeah, you were in the franchise. You could tell Tom's like, no, I was. That's why I wanted all that. You're paying me this money. I'm the guy. With the Browns, with Deshaun Watson, you could tell he's like, nah, this ain't me. I don't want any of this.

If I'm paying you guaranteed money, you better be taking some ownership of this offense. And that's what's so frustrating. It's just frustrating. It's just like sad to see just all these guys are just given their time and energy and body bodies to this game, their hearts to this game. And they know it's for nothing because the quarterback's really not doing anything. So.

You said Murray Cooper having a slow season. Watch him break the huddle. He just breaks the huddle. Oh, he's slow. He just does not want to be there. He's just like, whatever. He trots out. Was it like week two, I think it was, where you even see him rolling his eyes coming out of the huddle? This is the thing. I know that it's so easy to say, well, look what the offense did with Joe Flacco last year. Look what Amari Cooper did with Joe Flacco last year. He had like a 250.

50 yard game. Yeah, exactly. Like this guy knows he doesn't suck. Like, yeah, he should catch some of these footballs and stuff like that. But the human element can like not be understated here. And it's all of us in the media or all of us watching the damn games on Sunday. No. Hey, yeah, it's been the same product ever since he's arrived there.

The players know that too. Like you said, it's like, well, we're not coming back in the fourth quarter or whatever against the commanders because this guy has never showed us that he could be that player. And guys know, players know more than anything. Players know when coaches are frauds. They know when their teammates are frauds. And that's why you got to read kind of, you don't want to be an armchair psychologist, but pretty, it's pretty...

you know, it's pretty out there when you watch this Browns team. And even when like Watson throws a good ball, it's Judy in the face mask and he drops it. Like, you know, it's like, just like, it's just that, but that's, they have no margin for error because the quarterback gives them none. Even when plays are dialed up correctly, he,

he's not looking the right way. He's jumping up in the pocket, trying to create something. And it's like, what are you doing, man? That's a clean pocket. Just like throw it, just throw the ball. But that tells me that he doesn't know where the answer is because he's probably not studying. And yeah, it's just all of it. It just looks so listless right now. And it's kind of not really fun to watch, but yeah. It's not fun to talk about either. Even though we just talked about it for too long.

Broken. If you weren't trying to, if you needed me to emphasize it, they're broken. All right, we're going to go with the last one real quick. Cowboys. Just general Cowboys.

band-aid or broken with them right now even though they're coming off a window at the steelers yeah i wanted to talk about them even though they're coming off of a win because i feel like the tone and the sentiment around dallas is still pretty negative i mean i know that game went on way too late for the those of us on the east coast but like i i'm friends with a bunch of fans who are cowboy fans and they're all like we're going to sleep in like the in the second and third quarter like we are not we suck like we're not staying up for this we gotta watch the yankees

No comment. I know some of my friends might listen to this show, and they're not Yankees fans. I will defend these particular people. The rest of the Cowboys Nation, a little different discussion. But I just wanted to point out that I actually thought, going back and watching the film, and specifically watching a guy like Jalen Tolbert in this game, I felt really good about the Cowboys offense coming out of this game. And I think it's worth pointing out because I know that Dak had –

then are some of the interceptions and stuff like that it was a weird game where like he threw them into a little bit of a hole that you don't want your like 231 million dollar guaranteed quarterback to throw you into but like also showed well that's why you pay him 231 million dollars like he can shoot you out of those situations as well i just thought like this is a great stat that um speaking of cowboys fans my podcast producer for the fantasy show colin sent me um

Dak Prescott's weekly tight window passing rate is so far this year. Week one, 25%. Week two, 21.1%. Week three, 35.3%. Week four, 22%. Week five, 11.9%. 98th. It was very... A lot of the things that we said about the Jets offense, like structurally, conceptually, like some of the ISO routes and things like that, that's

present in Mike McCarthy's offense in Dallas. But I also thought they did a really good job with some of the tight ends, like just quick motions to create a little bit of leverage, like using a guy like Jalen Tolbert in the slot on like 30% of his routes using CD lamb. You can always tell when the Cowboys like, all right, we got to,

We got to get serious here on offense because they just put CD lamb at X receiver. And I've, I've talked to CD lamb about this a lot over the years about how much of a burden he carries. And because he plays all three receiver positions, even to the point that I remember the first time I had this conversation with him, he's like, thank you for saying that. Thank you for pointing out like how hard that is. And then, and not in like, in addition to the fact that he is a guy that then, okay, I can just go out there and play X receiver and,

but that creates the burden on the other players to then know all three receiver positions. And I thought that was impressive with Tolbert going out there and playing a little bit of flanker, sometimes playing X and doing some slot receiver stuff and being just

He's not an explosive player, but fundamentally sound, get nobody against zone. And some of the ways that they use those tight ends, not really Ferguson, but like some of the ancillary players to create a little bit of that leverage. I thought it was a really good Mike McCarthy game against the tough defense. And that was for me coming out of this feeling like, okay, they actually did like talk about bandaid or broken. I think they've already found some of the band-aids, which is encouraging to see.

Yeah, that's a great way to put it. I think even just even their how their offensive line is playing with the young guys. I know Guyton's not always perfect. I know he got banged up too, but Cooper Beebe is playing fine. Like they it's not a true glaring weakness. It's actually like I would say it's more solid. You know, we'll see what happens with Guyton and stuff because Tyler Smith had a kick out there.

But going against that Steelers defense, we've talked about plenty. That's not an easy out. They're going to make it hard on you. And it felt hard. But again, that's why you have Dak Prescott making some good throws, some hero throws, especially. He had one against two man, I think, to Tolbert. No, it was Turpin right down the middle of the field against two man. That's a hero throw. Those are the hardest throws you can make. Two man is...

why defenses are a little scared to run two man right now is because so many quarterbacks can run. But if you can't run, they're going to run two man on you because then they can just double cover basically everybody. And to be as a quarterback, you either have to throw a deep out to the field or you have to throw a seam ball with a guy on the guy's inside hip. And,

that can do that, which is, again, that's why you pay these guys. You're throwing that to Turpin, who looks, I mean, not to be disrespectful, but he looks like a middle schooler compared to some of the other players on the football field. Usually it's Ferguson or some good player that you do that to. That was the Gronk special for Tom Brady for years in two spots, Patriots and Tampa Bay. Everybody ran two man against the Bucs because he knew Tom wasn't

running. He was just going to be chilling back there. The Steelers' offense was a nice little mouthwash, I think, for the Cowboys' defense. I do need to review that game. I saw a TV copy for that side. I watched the other side of the ball, but I'm a little scared of them going against teams like the Lions. But I do like this offense. I think the offense has answers. Maybe some more Hunter, Lepke

uh, in the, uh, get him. Yeah. Yes. It's a football player. He might be getting a couple more carries. I think they have him as a protection back right now. So maybe some more touches to him, but like you said, felt better about the passing game. I love the CD lamb at X talking point, because that truly is. They're like,

Oh, yeah. Window draft saying, all right, here we go. Yeah, we don't have any other answers. We don't have that many good players other than him. Well, let's just throw him at the hardest receiver spot because, like, why not? Such a good point, too. And he's so good at it, too. I mean, I get it. He's a matchup advantage as kind of your slot receiver. Like, I mean, you put him in the slot and have him run a slant route. Him and Dak are going to...

Yeah. All year long. They did it literally all last year. That was like the most money connection was Dak and CD on slants. But damn, like you put the guy who beats press man coverage at an extremely high rate. You throw him out there at X receiver and you don't mess around with like, I don't know, frigging Brandon cooks out there. And I know he's on IR now too. And it's like, yeah, that, that, that way that you are not having diminishing returns with a player like Tolbert, who I do like what I see on film. And like, I do have some,

very very like just look under the couch cushions just a few pieces of jalen tolbert stock left over from that no whisper takes no yeah well might be whispering about that one but yeah like you're not getting diminishing returns like using a player like that at x and it allows you to player exactly yeah no that just to tie it together yeah no i'm i'm glad you brought tolbert too because yeah he did have some nice moments they're they're putting it together there it's

They're such a weird team, man. I feel like I'm just going to talk about them so much, but that's why we have this show because we can, and I'm sure people at Yahoo love us talking about the Cowboys, but we've got the Cowboys and the Jets. We're covered. We'll be closing it out today on football 301. That was a ton of fun.

Checking some wounds around the league. Charles will be back on Thursday to preview week six. I'm Nate Tice. You can find me at Nate underscore Tice. Also find me on Yahoo. I have some articles this week. Matt, where can they find you? Yeah. Matt Harmon underscore BYB on the social media. Yeah. Bring your own ball. So subscribe to us. The football 301. Follow us. Rate us.

I'd like to see, you know, maybe ask a question in one of the reviews. I'll steal one of Mina's bits. Ask a question in there. Yeah. Pro move. Maybe I'll answer one or two of those. They'll jump you to the top of the list. You can follow Yahoo Sports on Snapchat as well. Make sure to send in those mailbag questions. Like I said at the top of the show, football301mailbag at yahoosports.com. I'll be answering a couple of those with Charles. Thanks to Brad Stone and Avi behind the scenes. Thank you to everyone for listening. See you guys on Thursday. ♪♪♪

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