NFL Fantasy Football Podcast artwork

Brett Kollmann & Trevor Sikkema's Week 2 Preview | NFL Pro

STACKED extracted the fantasy-relevant player signal from this podcast and kept the full transcript here for context.

1 hr 16 min
Duration
Estimated from transcript
Sep 17, 2026
Published
Thu, September 17, 2026
36
Player insights
30
Players mentioned
Topics
Matthew StaffordBo NixCaleb WilliamsKenneth Walker IIITrevor LawrenceA.J. BrownCam WardCarnell TateDaniel BellingerDeVonta SmithDrake MayeDrew LockIsaiah LikelyJa'Marr Chase
Player analysis

Player insights

36

A.J. Brown

NegativeInjury70:51

A.J. Brown was lost in week one against the Ravens during Drake May's poor performance; this injury has longer-term ramifications for the Eagles' offense in week two against the Steelers.

Insight page

Bo Nix

NegativeProjection14:00

Nix struggled against Kansas City's man coverage paired with pressure, averaging just three yards per attempt against man coverage in the fourth quarter. The source notes that Nix with a sped-up clock isn't able to make the tight window throws required to beat tight man coverage, and his panic plays led to interceptions when forced to throw downfield.

Insight page
NegativeMatchup63:59

Bo Nix struggled significantly against man coverage in week one against Kansas City; however, the Jaguars defense favors zone coverage and quarters packages under Anthony Campanelli's influence, which theoretically should be better for Nix on paper; the source remains worried about the matchup and only ranks the Jaguars at sixth confidence, suggesting concern about Nix's ability to execute despite the favorable defensive scheme.

Insight page

Caleb Williams

PositiveProjection59:59

Williams had an incredible performance in Week 1, with the source noting how well he looked and how impressive the Bears' ground game was; the source is confident in the Bears' offense and has them winning Week 2 against Minnesota at the seven spot on the confidence meter.

Insight page
PositiveProjection60:15

The source has high confidence in Caleb Williams and the Bears offense after week one, citing how well he looked and how effective the ground game was; this confidence supports the Bears being ranked seventh in the source's week two game predictions despite Chicago's defense giving up 37 points to Carolina.

Insight page

Cam Ward

NegativeProjection27:54

Cam Ward looked hesitant in week one against the Eagles despite some good moments. He was 19 for 32 for 140 passing yards with one touchdown, no interceptions, and a QB rating of 80 with completion percentage below 60%. The source describes his performance as a mixed bag with inconsistencies, noting there is still so much going on in his head and he is not playing super free. The Titans' offensive line had a 41.0% pressure rate (8th highest in NFL), and the team played 10-11 personnel on 85% of snaps with frequent empty formations, which did not work given the weak pass protection.

Insight page

Carnell Tate

NegativeRole27:54

Carnell Tate was drafted fourth overall by the Titans as a vertical threat for Cam Ward's offense. However, the source criticizes the pick, arguing the Titans should have prioritized an offensive lineman at fourth overall instead. The Titans' offensive line struggles (37.1% pressure rate in 2025, 41.0% in week one) and reliance on 10-11 personnel and empty formations made it difficult for the passing game to develop, suggesting Tate's role may be limited until the line improves.

Insight page

Daniel Bellinger

NegativeUsage30:00

Daniel Bellinger was signed by the Titans but played only 14 snaps in week one. The source questions whether he will be a meaningful presence for chip blocks and pass protection help, noting that using him more would require taking a receiver off the field, which the Titans may not want to do given their offensive philosophy.

Insight page

DeVonta Smith

PositiveProjection70:05

Devonta Smith is listed as a key offensive weapon for the Rams alongside Matthew Stafford and Puka Nacua; the source cites the Rams' talent at receiver as a reason the team should bounce back in week two against the Giants after a poor week one performance.

Insight page

Drake Maye

NegativeProjection70:15

Drake May had the worst game of his career in week one against the Ravens, described as 'almost like sophomore level UNC Drake May'; McDonald's blitzing in the second half forced May into poor decision-making where he tried to make plays despite being up 10-0, leading to turnovers and an A.J. Brown injury; however, the source views this as a valuable learning experience that could help May in week two against Pittsburgh.

Insight page

Drew Lock

PositiveProjection65:45

The source picks the Seahawks to win against the Cardinals in week two with Drew Locke at backup quarterback, citing the Seahawks' talent and tremendous coaching staff as reasons for confidence despite the quarterback change.

Insight page

Isaiah Likely

NegativeMatchup43:04

The source questions whether the Giants have a Mike Evans-type receiver to attack the Rams' man coverage weakness in Week 2, mentioning Likely as a potential candidate alongside Malik Nabers and Malachi Fields.

Insight page

Ja'Marr Chase

PositiveUsage63:03

Jamar Chase had only 12 total receiving yards in week one against Tampa Bay, which the source views as an anomaly unlikely to repeat; the source expects Chase to be more involved in week two against Houston, supporting the Bengals' momentum and confidence in the matchup.

Insight page

Jalen Hurts

PositiveProjection26:54

Jalen Hurts put the team on his back in week one against Washington, converting a third and 18 late in the game with a scramble. He had five scrambles for 48 yards (third most across week one, most in a single game for him since week one of last year) at 9.6 yards per carry. The source credits him for making excellent plays to bail out the offense when the Eagles run game was ineffective due to offensive line struggles.

Insight page

Jayden Daniels

NegativeProjection32:06

Jaden Daniels held the ball for 3.41 seconds on average in week one against the Eagles, suggesting hesitancy and lack of trust in the game as it developed. He had 3.2 average separation at throw and 14.7% tight window throws (bottom 10-12 in NFL). The source notes the Eagles did not respect the Commanders' run game, dropping seven or eight defenders, which made it easier for them to cover Daniels' receivers. The main issue is that Daniels needs to establish a run game threat to open up the passing game.

Insight page

Jaylen Waddle

NegativeUsage11:44

Waddle was used as a decoy in Week 1 against Kansas City, with the Broncos employing orbit motion and out-of-backfield routes to test the Chiefs' coverage focus on him. Despite not receiving significant targets, his presence out of the backfield contributed to touchdown plays, indicating strategic deployment rather than ineffectiveness.

Insight page

Joe Burrow

NegativeUsage66:08

Joe Burrow had the highest quick throw percentage in the league in week one against Tampa Bay, getting the ball out 'basically instantaneously'; the source uses this as a comparison point when analyzing Jacoby Persett's quick throw rate and questions whether the Seahawks will allow similar quick-release opportunities.

Insight page

Josh Allen

PositiveProjection55:12

Allen is described as 'an absolute superhuman' and one of only a few quarterbacks capable of beating elite defenses like Houston; the source is confident in Allen's ability to perform well against strong defenses and is backing the Bills in Week 2 against Detroit.

Insight page

Justice Hill

NegativeMatchup18:59

Hill was lined up out wide against a corner in a Chiefs formation designed to reveal the Colts' coverage type; the source identified this as a zone look (fire zone) that Lamar Jackson exploited with a pump fake and throw around the safety for a 54-yard catch-and-run touchdown.

Insight page

Kenneth Walker III

PositiveValue20:02

Kenneth Walker is worth the investment for Kansas City despite running back salary cap devaluation across the league. He led week one with 14 missed tackles and 114 missed tackle yards, demonstrating individual value independent of offensive line quality. The source argues that backs who create yards after contact and force missed tackles elevate offenses in ways that justify premium contracts, and Walker exemplifies this profile. He will be a focal point again against the Colts, who struggled to contain Derrick Henry.

Insight page
NegativeUsage66:58

Kenneth Walker's absence from the Seahawks' backfield in week two against Arizona is noted as a factor that makes the game closer and less explosive for Seattle's run game compared to when Walker is healthy; the source still favors the Seahawks despite this limitation.

Insight page

Kenyon Sadiq

NegativeUsage51:08

Sadiq was used in the Jets' jumbo personnel packages in Week 1, running a 4.4 forty-yard dash; the source notes he got a carry in the game and expects to see more of him in future weeks as the Jets experiment with heavy tight end and running back packages.

Insight page

Lamar Jackson

PositiveProjection18:59

Jackson executed a brilliant pump fake against the Colts' zone coverage to get the safety to jump into lane, then threw around him to Justice Hill for a 54-yard catch-and-run touchdown, demonstrating elite decision-making and arm talent in exploiting defensive schemes.

Insight page

Malachi Fields

PositiveRole44:25

Fields impressed as a run blocker in Week 1, described as 'burying people' and displaying strong physical play; the source noted he was particularly effective in the run game and joked about his 'dad strength' after becoming a new father.

Insight page

Malik Nabers

NegativeMatchup43:04

The source questions whether the Giants have a Mike Evans-type receiver (big, strong slot archetype) to attack the Rams' man coverage weakness in Week 2, specifically mentioning Nabers as a potential candidate alongside Malachi Fields and Isaiah Likely.

Insight page

Mark Andrews

NegativeMatchup18:08

Andrews was targeted on a play where the Colts lined up jumbo tackle personnel, which the source uses as an example of how Kansas City's formations and motions forced the Colts to reveal their coverage (zone vs. man) through personnel matching.

Insight page

Mason Taylor

PositiveUsage51:34

Taylor was open for a touchdown in the Jets' 0-5 personnel package in Week 1, though Geno Smith did not take the throw; the source notes the play worked and expects the Jets to continue using heavy tight end packages.

Insight page

Matthew Stafford

NegativeProjection38:01

Matthew Stafford had a negative 0.52 EPA per play on his dropbacks versus San Francisco in week one, his worst single-game performance since 2016. Nothing was working for the Rams offense, and they failed to put their best foot forward in week one, falling well short of Super Bowl standard expectations.

Insight page
PositiveProjection43:25

The source expects Stafford to bounce back in Week 2 after the Rams' poor Week 1 performance; the offensive line was still effective in the power run game, and the source attributes Week 1 struggles to travel fatigue and preseason rust rather than fundamental issues with the offense.

Insight page
PositiveProjection70:00

Matthew Stafford, the reigning MVP, is cited as a key reason the Rams should not lay an egg again in week two against the Giants; the source expresses confidence that the Rams' talent (including Stafford, Puka, Devonta, and the run game) will lead to a bounce-back performance after a poor week one showing.

Insight page

Mike Evans

PositiveMatchup43:01

Evans was a man-coverage neutralizer against the Rams in Week 1, consistently beating coverage when lined up in the slot; the source watched the man-coverage reps and noted that no matter who was playing in the slot, the Rams could not handle Evans when playing man coverage, making him a key weapon in Tampa Bay's attack.

Insight page

Patrick Mahomes

PositiveProjection68:29

Patrick Mahomes did not complete a single pass beyond 10 air yards in week one against Indianapolis, yet the source states 'sky is pretty much the limit at that point,' indicating confidence that the Chiefs' offense will be even more effective once Mahomes begins attacking downfield; this supports the source's eighth-spot confidence ranking for the Chiefs in week two.

Insight page

Puka Nacua

PositiveProjection70:05

Puka Nacua is listed as a key offensive weapon for the Rams alongside Matthew Stafford and Devonta Smith; the source cites the Rams' talent at receiver as a reason the team should bounce back in week two against the Giants after a poor week one performance.

Insight page

Saquon Barkley

NegativeUsage25:51

Saquon Barkley got the vast majority of his yards after contact in week one against Washington because the Eagles offensive line was ineffective. Removing his one long run, he had 14 carries for 41 yards, getting nothing done in the run game. The Eagles allowed a 36.4% pressure rate (12th highest) and the run game was particularly poor, forcing Jalen Hurts to play on hard mode.

Insight page

Trevor Lawrence

PositiveProjection5:05

Lawrence demonstrated exceptional decision-making and arm talent in Week 1 against Cleveland, executing absurd downfield throws with tight windows and no separation required. The source highlights his ability to anticipate throwing windows and complete difficult passes early in games when not trailing, showing elite-level execution and confidence in his reads.

Insight page
PositiveProjection64:36

Trevor Lawrence is described as one of the early MVP candidates after one week of play and was 'absolutely unassailable' in week one; the source ranks the Jaguars at second confidence for week two against Denver, reflecting strong confidence in Lawrence's continued performance despite the Broncos' defensive concerns.

Insight page
Full transcript

Episode Transcript

937
0:00Welcome to the NFL Fantasy Football Show and thank you for listening on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
0:07Be sure to follow and subscribe to the show.
0:10Two-point conversion to tie the game with 101 to go.
0:13The Eagles did not care about the Commander's run game at all.
0:17They basically said, sure, okay, try to run the ball.
0:20And the Eagles stop them! When you look at this game, you know what really stood out to me?
0:25The offensive line. My goodness, Will McDonald burying Cam Ward.
0:28I think running backs have been devalued, erroneously even.
0:31Erroneous on all accounts. On every account! 60-yard run by Ken Walker III!
0:35It's time for Week 2. We're going to tackle all the game previews you guys have been begging us to get to
0:41for days on end, which is good, because now at least somebody's going to be tackling something.
0:47Rushy Rice! Breaking tackles on the near side! Touchdown!
0:49We're sitting here talking about, oh, abolish the preseason.
0:52Preseason games don't matter. Let's just cancel the preseason and go straight to the regular season.
0:57The lack of execution, the lack of physical football, the lack of good teams that were ready to play in Week 1 and fell flat.
1:04Dude, I think that tells us the exact opposite.
1:07The missed tackle rate was the highest that it has been in seven years.
1:1114.8% missed tackle rate across the NFL in Week 1.
1:14That shows me that we didn't play enough football in August.
1:17That these guys weren't exactly ready for the physicality of the regular season.
1:21And man, it was eye-opening to watch, especially in that Monday night football game with the Broncos.
1:26And, you know, practice habits have changed and we used to have two-a-days back in the day.
1:32I'm not advocating for going back to two-a-days, you know, in like 100 degree heat.
1:36Back in my day! But, like, guys did tackle better in September.
1:40At least it felt like it. So, I don't know what the solution is here.
1:44I'm sure there's a way to fix this issue.
1:47I don't know what it is yet. I am not an elite football coach.
1:51But, clearly, like, tackling donuts aren't cutting it right now.
1:54The way that you get better at playing football is by playing football.
1:58And there's a physical part of it that goes into it.
2:01And we're going to tackle a lot of league trends as the year goes on.
2:06But, honestly, this is the biggest league trend after Week 1, in my opinion, is just the sheer number of teams that
2:12weren't ready for the physical demands of playing a regular season football game.
2:16I've got some more NGS stats here for the people.
2:1961 explosive plays after missed tackles allowed in Week 1.
2:22Last year was 36. 36 to 61? That is a league trend.
2:26That is something that I am very, very curious to see what the numbers look like Week 2 versus Week 1, right?
2:32I mean, are these coaches just absolutely getting into these players?
2:36Are these players like, OK, I thought I knew what it was going to take to perform the way that I know
2:42I can perform in Week 1, and it clearly was not there.
2:46How quickly can we solve this? Is it a flip of the switch?
2:50Is it going to take a little bit of time because these guys didn't play nearly as much as the preseason?
2:56So, another number, 17.7% of all scrimmage yards in Week 1 came after a missed tackle.
3:01That's the highest share of any opening week since 2018.
3:04So, again, we're breaking records. This is a trend in the worst way, and I just think that, man, the missed tackle
3:11stuff, it was an epidemic in Week 1. And it feels like it's such a simple thing, right?
3:16Like, this whole game, this entire sport is just blocking and tackling.
3:20It's one of the oldest platitudes in football. It's just blocking and tackling.
3:23And if you can't do half of that, then what are you as a defense?
3:28Like, it was just disgusting. Every defensive coach on planet Earth hated watching football this week.
3:33And that's probably a good segue, by the way, to talk about Broncos-Jags because these two teams are coming in from complete opposite experiences in Week 1.
3:41And of all the teams that couldn't tackle in Week 1, Denver was by far the worst.
3:46Nine months after ACL surgery, Patrick Mahomes runs it in from 15 yards out!
3:50Yeah, historically bad rate here for the Denver Broncos.
3:53And I remember we were texting in the show group chat, and you and I were kind of like, wow, like 23% missed tackle rate.
4:00And we were kind of pointing that out to each other because we said, there's no way it goes up, right?
4:07And the fourth quarter happened. Dude, that was when it was like 22%, 23%.
4:11And I could see the tweets now. The tweets would have been, at one point, the Broncos were missing 22% or 23%
4:17of a tackle rate throughout the game. No, it got worse.
4:21It absolutely did not get better. The Broncos had a 29.8% missed tackle rate against the Kansas City Chiefs.
4:26248 missed tackle yards allowed. That rate was the highest in the league in a single game since Week 3 of 2023,
4:33when the Broncos also had a 29.9% missed tackle rate.
4:36Not ideal. And that was the most such yards given up from missed tackles since 2018.
4:41Travis Kelsey! Inside the 20! Down to the 5!
4:44So, yeah, I mean, it was terrible. And you mentioned as a good segue going into this game, because the Jags offense, man, it looked fast.
4:51It looked confident. Liam Cohen had these boys ready.
4:54They put their foot on the gas pedal, and they did not let up until, you know, you got well into the fourth quarter of that game.
5:02Okay, let's break down the absurdity of this Trevor Lawrence touchdown here.
5:06So, we're setting things up, and we see that we've got one running back in the backfield.
5:11We've got two tight ends on the line of scrimmage.
5:14So, we have 12 personnel total. That's what we're talking about here.
5:18So, 12 personnel here for the Jacksonville Jaguars. And when you look at things from the defensive side of things, it looks like it could be cover one.
5:26You've got one single high safety right here, and you've got a handful of these defenders that are sort of right in
5:33front of where these receiving options would be. But when we start this play, we'll motion this wide receiver in.
5:39Once we get to a condensed set, yes, this defender did travel with this wide receiver, but then he backed up.
5:45He didn't get into a press coverage look. So, it tells you, okay, we're more likely looking at cover three here and not a cover one set.
5:53Now, it's in the red zone, so everything kind of plays like man eventually because anytime a guy gets in a zone,
6:00you're probably playing him in some sort of man principle.
6:03So, you know you're going to get some sort of man coverage type of look somewhere, and you do get that on
6:09this side of the field right here, but it just does not matter to Trevor Lawrence.
6:14Okay, here's a little quick play action, and he already knows where he is going to go with the ball, which is
6:21absolutely absurd because there's no separation here from the wide receiver.
6:24The safety was already creeping in this direction. You have this zone defender, this zone defender, and yet Trevor Lawrence goes, nope, right here.
6:31I see the throwing window. I'm absolutely making this happen, and I want you guys to remember, this is the first quarter.
6:38They're only up 7-0. It's not like this game is 30-0 and it's way out of hand, and Trevor Lawrence just says to himself, nah, I don't care.
6:46This doesn't really matter. He's going for this absurd throw because at the beginning of the game, there was a sound bite
6:53from him, and he said, hey, we should not feel pressure at all in this game.
6:57We should be the ones applying the pressure. We shouldn't feel on our heels at all.
7:02This is the definition of that. Look how he rips this throw in there.
7:06That is absolutely absurd. To not just see that potential throwing window, but actually have the guts to throw the ball and then the talent to complete it.
7:15Unbelievable stuff. And, you know, we had to give you another angle because here at NFL Pro, you know, we got flexed.
7:21We've got all the angles that we can show you guys.
7:25This is the perfect angle here when you get to see all of these defenders.
7:29So I'm going to let this play start a little bit here.
7:33You're going to see the quick play action from him.
7:36And then right when Lawrence sets up, this is his point of view here.
7:40This wide receiver is barely, I mean, he's barely open right now.
7:44You can anticipate, hey, he's got the break. He's got the inside leverage.
7:48He's going to have a little bit of room.
7:50But this safety is looking at him the entire time.
7:53This underneath defender could absolutely get in the throwing window.
7:56Depending on where Lawrence releases this ball, that zone defender could be a factor here as well.
8:01And the fact of the matter is it just simply did not matter.
8:05Look at where that ball is. You cannot see the wide receiver.
8:09You can only see four Cleveland Brown defenders. You can see the football and that wide receiver is totally behind the coverage.
8:15Again, this is Trevor Lawrence's point of view here.
8:18It's an unbelievable throw. And to be honest with you, we are all this guy.
8:23We are all this guy right here after watching the absurdity of that passing touchdown for Trevor Lawrence.
8:28The good news for Denver is that the Jags offense is like the polar opposite of what Kansas City did to them in week one.
8:36If you're looking at yak percentage, right? It's the total number of passing yards, the total percentage of passing yards that was after the catch.
8:43Kansas City easily, you know, and obviously number one across the league in week one, the Jags were the lowest.
8:49They were very much a downfield passing game. Like no yards after catch required.
8:53They were getting them all through the air. And so I'm curious to see if that's actually a better matchup for Denver
9:00because if they did one thing well, it was not really allowing Kansas City to even go vertical.
9:05They tried one time and it resulted in a miscommunication and interception by Mahomes that wasn't really on Mahomes.
9:11But maybe that's the saving grace for Denver here is that they're not really going up against a team like even last
9:18year that was good at yards after catch. Jacksonville had the sixth lowest yak percentage in all of 2025.
9:23So this wasn't just like a one week thing.
9:26But even then, I don't know how any Broncos fan can look at what happened in week one and feel any sort of confidence right now.
9:34Like that was just ugly. Yeah, I mean, it has to be night and day.
9:38I don't really think there's any way around it.
9:41There's no like, all right, well, if we tweak this little thing here and there, I think that we'll be okay.
9:47I mean, it just has to look completely different.
9:50I am very curious to see if the Jags can sort of change it up a little bit here, right?
9:56Like, do they throw the ball a little bit shorter?
9:59Do they lean on yards after catch a little bit more?
10:02Because I think if there's been a critique of Trevor Lawrence, that the highs have been phenomenal for him when they've been there.
10:09But can he within a game change himself or change what they want to do?
10:14And I think Cohen's a great coach and he's going to be able to sort of have that at his disposal.
10:20But can Trevor execute? Can you go from one game plan one week to something maybe completely different to try to take
10:27advantage of the weaknesses of a defense out there?
10:29And also, you know, the Broncos defense does play different structurally than the one they faced against Cleveland.
10:35About 70% of every single coverage call by the Browns last week was either cover three or cover one.
10:40And the majority of those were cover three. It kind of looked, you know, earmuffs, Jags fans, kind of look like a Gus Bradley defense a little bit.
10:49A lot of cover three. And whenever it was cover three, they just tore apart the linebackers.
10:54When it was cover one, they tore apart the corners.
10:57Like nobody could cover in man in this game.
11:00It was really disgusting. But Trevor was so dialed in against these single high structures and it just felt like Cleveland didn't have an answer.
11:07I'm really interested to see if Denver kind of leans more into that.
11:11Not even cover two, more like quarter, quarter, half kind of lifestyle here.
11:15You know, take away that deep ball down the boundary.
11:18And then you have Sertan backside just being Pat Sertan.
11:21Again, structurally a little bit of a different defense here for Jacksonville.
11:25That's why this matchup fascinates me so much is because it's such a slingshot between styles that they're facing from week one to week two.
11:32And, you know, to kind of mix metaphors here, styles make fights in the NFL.
11:37For sure. Yeah. I do want to touch on the other side of things when the Broncos offense goes up against the Jags defense.
11:44Because I went back and I watched all of Jalen Waddle's snaps and routes from this game.
11:49And I was like, okay, what happened here? Like, could they just not get him the ball?
11:54Were they really honed in on him? Honestly, Brett, my number one takeaway was just Steve Spagnuolo.
11:59Masterclass. Genuinely. A masterclass from the defensive coordinator. Because I noticed early on that the Broncos wanted to use Jalen Waddle as
12:06a decoy to get a lot of other people open.
12:09They wanted to see how the Kansas City Chiefs defense was going to focus in on him.
12:14The very first play was orbit motion with Jalen Waddle.
12:17It's like, okay, let's see. How are they going to adjust?
12:20How are they going to focus on him? Obviously, the touchdown that they had at the front pylon, that was also from
12:27a Jalen Waddle out of the backfield type of route.
12:30Which, by the way, anybody who watched NFL Pro, you watched that happen live.
12:34You saw Jalen Waddle out of the backfield. And even though he didn't get the ball, his presence out of the backfield
12:40is a big reason why that was a touchdown.
12:43So, that's why you watch the show, people. Make sure you subscribe.
12:47But when I watched him be like this decoy, the Chiefs just had the perfect defense for it.
12:52They played so much two deep and three deep coverage in this game.
12:56They said, okay, sure. You want to throw it deep?
12:59We got the numbers for it. We got the bodies for it.
13:03And if you want to throw it underneath, because that's sort of the give and take, right?
13:08All right. We're going to put more bodies in the deep portion of the field.
13:12Well, that means there's less to cover the underneath.
13:15That means that you're probably going to give up throws and completions underneath, which then requires what?
13:20Rallying and tackling. Okay? 8.7% missed tackle percentage as a team, despite the fact that Bo Nix had 20 passes of 10 or less air yards.
13:28Legereus Sneed, he is back. He's the perfect player for this defense.
13:31He had four solo stops himself. I watched Drew Tranquil and Nick Bolton rally to the ball and be so reliable.
13:38These underneath zone defenders were so ready to do their job when those short passes ended up coming.
13:43Okay. You can't hit anything deep. Sure. The underneath stuff is open, but it's not going anywhere.
13:48Now, all of a sudden the Chiefs are up 10.
13:51Now, all of a sudden Chiefs are up three scores.
13:54Now, what do we do? Now we've got to force it.
13:58And that's, I think why you see the Bo Nix panic plays.
14:01Intercepted by the rookie Delane. Real quick, I think the question that Jags fans have is, do the Jags and Anthony Campanelli
14:08have this recipe to sort of do the same thing and frustrate Nix the same way?
14:13I mean, that was their calling card last year, right?
14:16Campanelli, he has both a Vic Fangio heritage and a Jeff Halfley heritage kind of mixed together.
14:21And I think if you're looking at the specific matchup between the Broncos and Campanelli's defense in Jacksonville, they're probably going to
14:27see a lot of the same stuff this week that they saw last week, specifically with, we're going to build that umbrella
14:34over the top, rally and tackle and anything underneath.
14:37We're going to try to use rotations. We're going to try to use disguise, anything to slow down his clock so that
14:43our great pass rushers can get there. The one key difference, and this is what I'm really fascinated by.
14:49If you're looking at the changeup that Spags had in week one, it wasn't just that aggressive man coverage.
14:55It was man coverage paired with pressure. However, 50% of all the Chiefs man coverage calls had six plus rushers attached to it.
15:01It wasn't just we're rushing five, we're rushing six with man coverage.
15:05And when you have receivers not getting attacked, but let's say scuffed up a little bit.
15:10You play a little physical. A little physical. You can't let them just have the yards for free.
15:15Ain't nobody gets anything for free I work for in this league.
15:19Was it a penalty? Eh, who's going to say?
15:22You know, didn't get called. Not a penalty. I will say though, with those tight windows from man coverage paired with pressure
15:28and it sped up Nix's clock so much and Nix with a sped up clock isn't necessarily going to be able to
15:35make the tight window throws that are required to beat tight man coverage.
15:39And we saw that over and over and over in this game.
15:42At one point in the fourth quarter, he was averaging like three yards per attempt against man.
15:47And that was largely because those man coverage were paired with pressure.
15:51Campanelli doesn't really do that in Jacksonville. Like not only do they not call a lot of man, they also don't call
15:58a lot of six man pressures with man coverage.
16:00So that's part of the reason why I'm so interested in this matchup is a lot of the stuff that really tore Denver to pieces last week.
16:08The Jags don't necessarily do it on either side of the ball.
16:12That ball is caught! The fourth touchdown pass of the day for Trevor Lawrence!
16:16How good is that? So let's stay with the Chiefs because the Chiefs also play the Colts and we want to talk about this game here.
16:24Specifically the Colts defensive side of things. It's something that I'm worried about here, Brett, because I think that they're trying to play a defense.
16:32I think Lou Anarumo is trying to play a defense that fits one of his players, but not most of his players
16:38on defense and that is how often they play man coverage.
16:41So they played man on more than 50% of their snaps in week one.
16:46Obviously it didn't work well versus the Baltimore Ravens, but you could take things back a little bit further because since the
16:52Sauce Gardner trade, they have the fifth highest man coverage rate in the NFL, 35.2%.
16:57That's a plus 6.7% man coverage rate before and after the Sauce Gardner trade.
17:01When you look at this past game, Sauce allowed one catch for 12 yards in man coverage.
17:06Brett, the rest of the team, eight catches for 180 yards.
17:09For me, this defense, I'm worried about it because it just feels like they're trying to play a coverage that fits one player.
17:16They're a prized player, but it doesn't really fit the other guys that are on the team.
17:21And defense, man, it's so much about all 11 guys working together and playing well.
17:26So I'm worried about this team on defense, especially for a Kansas City Chiefs offense that knows how to attack man coverage like that.
17:33And one of the things that Declan Doyle did in that game that I think was super underrated was he was using
17:40motions and formations, not just to dictate that man coverage in a sense, but also to identify it, to confirm that that dictation worked.
17:47What I mean by that is they had a 67.2% shifted motion rate, which is a good way to see if they're
17:53in man coverage, if somebody's going to be moving across the formation, is their defender following them?
17:59Usually means it's going to be man. They had a 37% nub rate, which was third highest in week one.
18:05And a significant chunk of that was six offensive line looks, right?
18:08Getting that jumbo tackle on the field. And what they were doing a lot was either they were putting a tight end
18:15in a nub to one side and then three receivers to the other side, or they were putting that jumbo tackle to
18:21one side and three receivers to the other side, because you had snaps.
18:25Like there was one, it was a first down to Mark Andrews, where you had the jumbo tackle on the field and Sauce was lined up on him.
18:34So obviously it's zoned because Sauce isn't going to cover an offensive tackle in man coverage.
18:38I mean, he would preference wise. I mean, he could.
18:41Yeah, probably. Yeah, right. But, you know, he was using formations and basically being like, either you match it with corners and
18:48tell us you're a man or you match it with, you know, a safety or a linebacker or whatever.
18:54And you tell us you're in zone and then we just know exactly what you're doing.
18:59Like that was half the reason that 54 yard catch and run touchdown.
19:02They had Justice Hill lined up out wide with a corner on him.
19:06Well, now we know it's zoned and we're pretty sure it's going to be a fire zone.
19:11And it was. And Lamar gave like a brilliant little pump fake to get the safety to jump into lane and threw it around him.
19:19So they caught it, ran for the touchdown. Like just all the formation and motion stuff they did to them, they made
19:26it not just hard on them to disguise. They made it impossible to disguise what they were doing.
19:31Now let's talk Chiefs offense because we got to have the Kenneth Walker conversation.
19:35You and I in the season preview, we highlighted Kenneth Walker and how much of a difference maker he could be on this team.
19:42Well, early returns say pretty dang good. Walker III.
19:45A backfield presence that this team hasn't had since Priest Holmes.
19:48Wow. Jamal Charles erasure. Oh my God. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
19:52You're sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. That is Jamal Charles erasure.
19:55I was excited to get a Priest Holmes shout out here in the show.
19:59Jarek McKinnon erasure too. But let's talk about Kenneth Walker.
20:02Let's talk about running back value because he gets paid coming over from the Seattle Seahawks.
20:07Anytime a running back gets paid, it's always like, ooh, I don't know about that.
20:11Even if they're really talented. Well, we saw their returns on the field, but just overall, let's have the value conversation about
20:18running backs here, especially coming off a great performance from one who just got paid.
20:23So if you go back to 2015, a little over a decade ago, if you take the average of the top 10
20:29contracts at running back at that time and the average of the top 10 contracts among edges at that time, and you
20:36look at the percentage of the salary cap that those averages came out to, the difference between running back and edge was about a percent.
20:43The average of the top 10 running back contracts took up 10.04% of the salary cap.
20:48The average of the top 10 edge contracts took up about 11.17% of the salary cap.
20:53Quarterback, meanwhile, about 15.35%, which was already up significantly from a decade before that, right?
20:57When Peyton Manning signed his big deal. Fast forward to 2026, running back has steadily decreased as far as the percentage of
21:04the cap that the average of the top 10 contracts taking up.
21:08Now it's at 7.47%. Edge has climbed up to 16.6%.
21:11So you're adding more than 5% to the average of top edge contracts.
21:15You're taking away about 2.5% from the average of running back contracts.
21:18Quarterback has gone up to 21.25%. So they're just taking more and more and more.
21:23And I look at it as, you know, not that running backs are being properly valued now.
21:28I think running backs have been devalued erroneously even at the expense of- Erroneous on all accounts.
21:33On every account. But all these other positions have just taken money from these running backs.
21:38Yeah, right. And then you see these offenses that have highly paid quarterbacks and highly paid receivers and they can't move the ball.
21:45And it's because they're consistently in third and long because they can't run the ball.
21:49You're just kind of lighting money on fire when you do that because you have all of, you know, this massive percentage
21:56of your salary cap, let's say in the Bengals case, in quarterback and two receivers, if they were the worst run game
22:02in the league and they were consistently in third and eight because they couldn't run the ball.
22:07If you're looking league-wide at third down conversion percentages, third and one to three, league-wide average conversion is 60%.
22:13That's pretty damn good. League-wide average conversion on third and four to six to go is 43.7%.
22:18Still pretty good. Once you get to third and seven to 10, drops like a rock down to 31.3%.
22:2411 plus is 14.5%. So when you're bringing in a running back that can raise the ceiling of your running game, even
22:30by like a yard per carry, and you're a good early down run team, and you can get to more third and
22:37four and six rather than third and seven to 10, naturally your third down conversion rate is going to go up, which
22:44means your offense is staying on the field, which means you're getting more value out of the rest of your offense.
22:50Just by paying a running back seven and a half percent of your salary cap, like it is the most undervalued position in the sport right now.
22:58It's been devalued wrongly, erroneously, and we're starting to see these offenses realize that.
23:02You bring in Kenneth Walker, who's raising the ceiling of your running game.
23:06Pat Mahomes started the night, what, like two of 12?
23:09But it didn't matter because you had a running back that could still keep you on schedule and break off explosives by himself.
23:16Baltimore brought in Derrick Henry, elevated their run game.
23:19The Niners traded a bunch of picks for CMC.
23:21You think they regret that? No. The Texans traded for Dave Montgomery.
23:25They had a good short yardage game for the first time in like years in week one.
23:30So don't tell me running backs don't matter. You have to pay them.
23:34Not anybody can do this. And the fact that we were gaslit and thinking like, oh yeah, Alfred Morris is the same as Adrian Peterson.
23:42No, he's not. All respect to Alfred Morris. It's not the same.
23:45But that's always been the conversation is the ones that are worth it are worth it.
23:50To like oversimplify everything into one sentence, you have to find the running backs that individually can elevate the offense.
23:56Because there's a lot of running games where most of the success is credit to the offensive line and how potent the
24:03passing game is and how easy things can be at the line of scrimmage.
24:07But when you get a back like Kenneth Walker, who led week one with 14 missed tackles and 114 missed tackle yards, that is that super valuable.
24:15Because wherever you force a missed tackle, you're bringing individual value to a play.
24:19It's independent of your offensive line. It's why when I look at scouting, there's so many backs who rush for a crap
24:26ton of yards when they're in college. But the ones that become great pros are the ones who, whether it's behind the
24:32line of scrimmage, at the line of scrimmage, beyond the line of scrimmage, if you are making guys miss and if you
24:39are getting yards after contact, that is you. That is individual value.
24:42And that's when you really start to elevate an offense.
24:45And that is why Kenneth Walker was worth it for the Kansas City Chiefs.
24:50And that's why he's going to be a focal point again in a game against the Colts who struggled to contain Derrick Henry.
24:57It doesn't get any easier this week now that you're facing Kenneth Walker coming off that performance on Monday night.
25:03Also, one note to look at with these Colts linebackers.
25:06Second round pick, C.J. Allen, no snaps. Bryce Betcher, fourth round pick, 30% of the snaps.
25:10Not sure why yet, but something to keep an eye on.
25:14Interesting. Interesting. Interesting. Eagles-Titans. Eagles come away with a win against the Washington Commanders, but didn't exactly look like the Eagles of old.
25:21And I think specifically, Brett, the offensive line. The heart and soul, the true identity of why the Eagles have been so good.
25:28It's been in both trenches. And that O-line did not look the same in Philadelphia against Washington.
25:33Landon Dickerson, he just went on IR. And it was bad.
25:36He needed to go on IR. He can't play right now.
25:39He can't move right now. But it wasn't even just him.
25:43The entire Eagles offensive line wasn't good. They allowed a 36.4% pressure rate.
25:46That was 12 highest. But really, the worst numbers were in the run game.
25:51Saquon got the vast majority of his yards after contact because he needed to.
25:55Right? You took out the one long run that he had in that game.
25:59The rest of his day was 14 carries for 41 yards.
26:02He was getting nothing done. And when you take away that kind of run game easy button from the Eagles, no matter
26:09who their offensive coordinator is, when you take that away, Jalen just has to play on hard mode.
26:14And credit to him, by the way, he did that.
26:17Like, he made several excellent plays to bail him out of trouble in that game.
26:22He had five scrambles for 48 yards, third most across all of week one.
26:26Most in a game for him since week one of last year.
26:309.6 yards per carry on those scrambles. Like, he was damn near getting a first down every time he took off.
26:36There was a third and 18 late in the game that he converted, just taking it upon his back.
26:42Be like, I got to get us this first down.
26:45It's a one-point game. We're late in this thing.
26:47We got to go. And he did it. This was the Jalen Hurts put the team on your back kind of game.
26:54And, you know, credit to him for doing it.
26:57Not a whole lot else worked with this offense because of the offensive line.
27:01But if Jalen can do that until they get this offensive line sorted, maybe Dickerson comes off IR.
27:06Until that, if Jalen can keep playing like this, they have a shot.
27:10But, boy, the difficulty level is just off the charts for him right now.
27:14On the other side of things, I want to talk about the Titans offense.
27:19Because there was a lot of hype for, you know, the new coaching staff.
27:23Brian Dayville being with Cam Ward. Obviously, you draft Carnell Tate number four overall.
27:27But really tough first day. Cam Ward was 19 for 32.
27:30140 passing yards. Had a touchdown. No interceptions. QB rating of just 80.
27:34Completion percentage below 60% here in this game. Ultimately, though, I just felt as though Cam still looked hesitant.
27:40And people want the yearly jump, like the year one to year two jump.
27:44But for Cam, there were the good moments. But then there were the hesitant moments.
27:49And it was still a mixed bag. And there were all sorts of inconsistencies with Cam Ward.
27:54To me, there's just so much going on in his head.
27:57He's not being able to play super free. And I've kind of got to get something off of my chest here, Brett.
28:04I don't understand why we weren't talking about the Titans drafting an offensive lineman at number four overall.
28:09They draft Carnell Tate and everybody goes, and myself included, I go, okay, look.
28:13Is Tate a good fit for the next step for Cam Ward and what this offense is going to be as a legitimate vertical threat?
28:21To me, that was putting the cart before the horse.
28:24To me, that was eating dessert before you're eating your vegetables.
28:27Because when you look at this game, you know what really stood out to me?
28:31The offensive line. This offensive line had the ninth highest pressure rate in 2025 at a 37.1%.
28:37And in week one, oh look, 41.0% pressure rate.
28:39Eighth highest in the NFL. So they're bottom 10 offensive line all of last year.
28:44They were a bottom 10 offensive line in week one.
28:47And this is the thing that baffled me the most, Brett.
28:50They played 10 or 11 personnel on 85% of their snaps.
28:53They played more snaps in empty at the snap than any team in the NFL this week.
28:58You know what happened when they ran those snaps?
29:01Either extremely quick throws or pressures and sacks and terrible plays.
29:04You don't have the offensive line to run 10 and 11 personnel.
29:08You want to know why the air raid and the spread offense works in college and it doesn't in the NFL?
29:14Offensive line. Because a lot of times, the best offenses in college football, the talent gap is so wide, you can play
29:21five-man protections and the other team doesn't have what it takes to cover you and get pressure the way that you need to.
29:28When the Tennessee Titans went empty or when they were trying to spread the field with four wide receivers, five receiving options, you know what the Jets did?
29:36They got home. They blitzed. So, for me, philosophically with this Titans offense, I'm worried.
29:41Because what Cam Ward did really well when he was at Washington State, when he was at Incarnate Word as well, and
29:47then certainly when he was at Miami, is it was a lot of spread offense stuff.
29:52He wants to be in the shotgun. He wants to have multiple receivers that he could go to.
29:58You can only do that if you have the offensive line to protect him.
30:02And if you don't, it's going to end badly.
30:04And especially because they don't really have a blocking tight end on the roster to help them out here.
30:10Like, they signed Daniel Bellinger. Daniel Bellinger played 14 snaps for him this past game.
30:15So, is he really going to be a presence where all of a sudden you're playing him on the offensive line and
30:21he's really helping out and he's in there for chip blocks and everything?
30:25Because then you've got to take a receiver off the field.
30:29And I don't know how much they want to do that.
30:32I'll tell you what. This game is going to be great for fans of excellent defensive tackles beating the crap out of bad offensive lines.
30:39Because we talked about the interior of the Eagles offensive line being bad.
30:43Well, Jeff Simmons is coming to town. Good luck.
30:46One play at a time. Stay in the moment.
30:49You're looking at the platoon of defensive tackles that the Eagles are bringing with them, right?
30:53You're looking at Carter. You're looking at Davis. Moro Joma was sensational against the Commanders.
30:58Like, he's the one who made the play on that two-point stop.
31:02He was reading a pole key. And then, you know, the back block kind of came in from his right side.
31:08He just spun off of it, wrapped around the center, and made the play all by himself.
31:13Like, these Eagles defensive tackles are no joke. And they made the Commanders offensive line look awful.
31:18Moro Joma with the big play. And the Eagles make the stand they needed.
31:22Which is probably a good segue into talking about Commanders Cowboys.
31:26Because I don't know what Washington can do to help out Jaden Daniels.
31:29Like, their offensive line might be the worst one that we're going to talk about today.
31:34And that is a low bar. Yeah, so they do bring Campbell as a five-man rush at the top of the screen.
31:41And they're just late on the kick out there, Coleman.
31:44And as a quarterback, you're feeling that pressure all day.
31:47That's speeding up your internal clock. So I was looking into the numbers.
31:51And obviously, I saw that the offensive line didn't play great.
31:54But I always like to sort of dive a little bit deeper, right?
31:58Jaden was holding onto the ball for a long time.
32:013.41 time to throw. I feel like he just didn't, you know, really trust the game as it was coming to him.
32:08There was one play in particular that I watched where he had all of his receivers to one side.
32:13And he had so much green grass to just run and scramble.
32:17And he didn't take it because I just think there's this overall hesitancy with him behind that offensive line.
32:233.2 average separation at the throw for the receivers.
32:25And a 14.7 tight window throws in week one.
32:28They're not great. They're like bottom 10, 12 in the NFL last week.
32:32But it's not like it was dead last. It's not like it was horrendous or anything like that.
32:37The main takeaway though, Brett, is yeah, the offensive line didn't play well.
32:41But specifically, the Eagles did not care about the commander's run game at all.
32:45They basically said, sure, okay, try to run the ball.
32:48And there were multiple times where I'm watching Jaden Daniels drop back.
32:52And even when there's play action involved, even when there's some misdirection, even when they have a threat to run the ball
32:59out of the backfield, the Eagles were like, dad, don't care.
33:02We'll drop seven. We'll drop eight. If you want to run the ball, go ahead.
33:06Try. We don't respect your run game. But I wonder how much other teams like will the Cowboys and will teams moving
33:13forward not respect the commander's run game until they really prove that they have to.
33:17If you don't have a run game or a run threat, it makes it so much easier for teams to really cover you.
33:24And that was actually what ended up being my main takeaway for the commanders is they got to run the ball better.
33:31And, you know, failing that, if you can't get through the Cowboys defensive line, you should at least be able to go around the Cowboys defensive line.
33:39We saw the Giants do that brilliantly in week one, just hammering the flats over and over and over again.
33:45Chris Collinsworth was like apoplectic during the broadcast about it.
33:48He's like, how are you guys not covering this?
33:51And we actually had some really good sound from Shadi after that game because he was so frustrated.
33:56One of the things, not an excuse, guys. We did not play well.
34:00We don't push three different times to the fucking flat route.
34:03Excuse my language. Those are going to happen. So clearly Shadi none too pleased there.
34:08And I believe I found the exact play that he was referring to.
34:12This was down in the red zone. It's a second and very long.
34:16And the Cowboys are in a coverage here that the Fangio world calls cover nine.
34:20Why do they call it cover nine instead of cover three?
34:23I'm not entirely sure. I bet there's a reason that goes back 40 years.
34:28I just don't know what that reason is, but they call it cover nine.
34:32It's basically just a three deep zone, four underneath, very similar to what we're all used to here.
34:37But there is a little adjustment that they call a site call in the Fangio world, where if the running back is
34:44what's known as fast to the flat, meaning he's not just doing a little like, you know, check release here.
34:50He's not giving a chip and then leaking out.
34:53Like if he is immediately releasing to the flat, then it's the safety's responsibility to push to the flat and take that away.
34:59If the running back is slow to the flat, then it's the linebacker.
35:03And so because this running back was fast to the flat, you actually see the safety, you know, point to him like
35:10he's expecting the linebacker to go with him. But if you're playing this site call here, it's actually the safety's responsibility.
35:16He realizes it way too late. Running back gets an easy catch and run, sets up a third and very short.
35:23And then they scored very soon after that again in the flats.
35:26Entirely different coverage. This one actually was on Barham.
35:29He should have been pushing to the flat there and just lollygag through it.
35:33But you can see why Schottenheimer was so frustrated and why I'm sure Christian Parker was super frustrated is because the Eagles
35:40cover this 10 times out of 10 because they understand that the running backs release is going to change the responsibility between the linebacker and the safety.
35:48Cowboys are still brand new at this. It's a very new system for them.
35:52You have players, especially Barham, who, you know, he's a rookie.
35:55It's his first ever game. I do believe they will get this corrected.
35:59Even the Eagles, you know, when Fangio first started consulting with them, they were kind of out of sorts at first when they started running all this stuff.
36:08That was years ago at this point. But I have to believe that a mistake this minor is going to be fixed in very short order.
36:15It probably already has been in the meetings that they've had since this game.
36:20But I just wanted to explain why Schottenheimer was so beside himself because this is just like cover 9-101 and they failed in their first game.
36:27You could tell he was very frustrated, but he was trying to bite his tongue a little bit.
36:33You know, this is a humbling business and we got humbled tonight.
36:36I think it's a reminder for everybody, myself included, as somebody who loves the draft and you know when these rookies get
36:43selected to these teams, you can't wait to see them out there and play in, it takes time.
36:48It really does take time for these guys to be able to do everything that they need to do.
36:54We have to coach the young players better, but when you play young players, it's part of the deal and they need to learn quickly.
37:02We got to talk about the New York Giants and the Los Angeles Rams really for two extremely different reasons, right?
37:08The Giants are coming off what I think we on this show have to call the biggest upset that we had last
37:15week because we picked the Cowboys as our 10 confidence game last week when we were doing our game picks and we
37:21thought that the Cowboys were going to win that game.
37:24Obviously, the New York Giants end up winning this game, but they're traveling to LA now, cross country, to take on a
37:31Rams team that are to look worse, honestly, just given everything that the Rams were.
37:35I mean, Stafford had a negative 0.52 EPA per play on his dropbacks versus San Francisco in week one, that was his
37:42worst in a single game since 2016. Nothing was working for the Rams, not only just to the Super Bowl standard that
37:48everybody has for them, just from going out there week one and kind of doing your thing, making sure that you're putting your best foot forward.
37:56It was not there for them. So we're going to talk about both of these teams pretty well, but what do you
38:03think about the Giants coming off of that big win now facing the Rams?
38:07What's sort of the area that you want to preview here for this one?
38:11It was a perfect plan, right? Nagy and Roman together, apparently a double negative makes a positive, I guess, but maybe they just needed each other all along.
38:20I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I've been traumatized by both of them too.
38:23Veterans. Veteran coaching staff, Brett. We'll call it that.
38:26Knowledge. Wisdom. But it worked. Again, I'm being kind of a dick about it, but it worked.
38:31They had a really good plan. And the fact that their entire plan was, hey, let's not go backwards.
38:37That was effective. They had seven possessions in this game.
38:40In the last two quarters, they had, what, 22 and a half minutes time of possession out of 30?
38:45Like, it was suffocating. Yeah. So it was a great plan by them.
38:49The run game wasn't particularly explosive, but it was effective.
38:52They had one of the highest success rates across the NFL, while also having one of the lowest stuff rates across the NFL.
38:59And if you're just consistently getting four, four and a half yards over and over and over again, well, you do that
39:06three times in a row, you got a first down.
39:09Then you do that four times in a row, you're in the red zone.
39:13And on the opening drive of the season, the Giants drive it down the field and they have the lead on the Cowboys.
39:20To me, it was a perfectly executed ball control game plan.
39:23I thought Jackson Dart was awesome in this game.
39:26Didn't have to make the Josh Allen type of throws, but did make the throws that he was supposed to make and
39:33was on point, was accurate, was in rhythm. All the platitudes we love to talk about.
39:37They were just really, really effective. And they took advantage of a Cowboys defense in their first game in a new system
39:44that wasn't pushing to the flat three times in four plays.
39:47We don't push three different times to the fucking flat route.
39:51Excuse my language. And I'll tell you what, if it's not broke, don't fix it.
39:55I thought the Giants obviously did a great job of managing the game the way that they needed to and not shooting themselves in the foot, right?
40:03And if there's a critique that I had of Jackson Dart when he was coming out of Ole Miss, it was sure.
40:10I recognized the great plays, but I felt like there were too many plays where he was hurting the offense or certainly
40:16hurting himself and his cause to move the ball down the field.
40:20And it looked like a lot more methodical. So I loved the sort of progression of even what Jackson Dart was able to do.
40:27If you want to call it an easy day at the office, fine.
40:31But he helped make it an easy day at the office.
40:34On the Rams side of things, I do think that the pendulum has to swing back in the other direction.
40:40There's a lot of things that could have gone wrong here for the Rams.
40:45We talked at the very top of the show of just the epidemic that was missed tackles and missed execution with week one.
40:52And we sort of related it to maybe lack of preseason reps being a reason why.
40:56The Rams don't play any of their starters in the preseason.
41:00It's just not the McVay way. And you tie that into, I'm trying not to be too hindsight with this, but I
41:06always kind of felt like a very strange travel plan for them.
41:10When did they get out here? Oh, dang. Going all the way across the world to play this game and not adjusting the body clocks at all whatsoever.
41:18I mean, this team did not look physically or mentally sharp for this game.
41:22And I have to feel is that within a much more regular environment for them, it doesn't look nearly as bad as it did in week one.
41:31But the area I'm most curious to see what is different in week two from week one when it comes to Los
41:37Angeles Rams is how they play defense, specifically how they covered.
41:40You trade for Trent McDuffie. You sign Jalen Watson.
41:43These guys are man coverage type of defenders. Trent McDuffie played 25.7% of his coverage in man in week one, fourth lowest single game rate of his career.
41:52Like he's a man coverage type of corner or certainly was when he was with the Kansas City Chiefs.
41:57They just didn't ask him to do that. I mean, he's played man on 43.5% of his coverage snaps since entering the league in 2022.
42:05That's the ninth highest amongst all defensive backs with over a thousand coverage snaps during that span.
42:10So I feel as though they acquire these man coverage defenders and they played it some, they played it 19%, but they really didn't play it much.
42:18And it goes back to, is this a little bit like the Colts conversation that we had earlier?
42:23Are you not playing your players to their strengths as a defense as a whole?
42:28Now, I think there are some things that you could look at with this game with context that could tell you that
42:34things might look different in week two. One, Shanahan does do a lot of motion stuff.
42:39And when you play man, like you referenced earlier in the show, you kind of give away that you're playing man when
42:46there's all this motion and Brock Purdy gets a better look at what the defense is going to be post snap.
42:52If you, if you have that sort of reaction to guys who were in motion, when they're in man coverage, there's a
42:59little bit of that, but I will say this.
43:01Mike Evans was a man coverage neutralizer in that game.
43:04I went back and I watched the man coverage reps that they tried to play in that game.
43:10And a lot of times Mike Evans was in the slot for that.
43:14They couldn't handle it. No matter who was playing in the slot, they did not have the answers for Mike Evans when they were playing in man coverage.
43:22So do the Giants have their version of Mike Evans?
43:25Is it Malik Namers? Is it Malachi Fields? Is it Isaiah Likely?
43:29Do they have that version of Mike Evans to attack them from sort of that big, strong slot type of a wide receiver archetype?
43:36I'm very curious. So I think that Stafford will bounce back.
43:39The Rams offensive line was still moving people off the ball in the power run game.
43:44I think those things will be consistent. But what does the defense look like?
43:48I'm not really worried about it without Miles Garrett, to be honest with you.
43:52I'm not. The defensive line was already. Oh no, they have three other good pass rushers.
43:57What are they going to do? That's the thing.
44:00The whole point of conversation was they added Miles Garrett to this defense.
44:04Well, guess what? Now they still have this defense, right?
44:07So it's still that defense. But what does the coverage look like and how different is it from week one?
44:13Very curious to see what that looks like for the Rams.
44:16I will say Francis Malinoa, no pressures allowed on 36 pass blocking snaps going up against Kobe Turner and Braden Fisk.
44:22Super intriguing matchup. And you also brought up Malachi Fields.
44:25I'm going to take my opportunity. Do you watch him as a run blocker?
44:30Oh, I watched him as a run blocker when he was at Notre Dame too.
44:34So he's a new father. Shout out to Malachi.
44:37He's a new father and immediately got dad strength because, oh my God, he was burying people.
44:42I thought you were saying that because he sunned people in the run game.
44:46Yeah, he just picked up a bunch of extra kids in week one.
44:50We got one more game ball. His first victory is at New York Giants.
44:54Okay, we're wrapping up the show here. Getting to you guys, the people, because you guys have been unbelievable.
45:00Since we started this show, since we first announced that we were doing it, you guys have been such a big part
45:07of all the topics that we put together. We've tried to take so many of your suggestions.
45:12And we asked for questions here at the end of the show.
45:15And Brad, I think that once again, we got like 250 responses.
45:19So you guys are so involved and we want to get you guys as involved as possible.
45:24We might even have to do our own separate Q&A show at some point.
45:28But we love you guys. Thank you so much for wanting to get in on the show.
45:33We really appreciate it. We will answer a couple here to round us out.
45:38Real Chris Yonke has the first one. And I think it's one that a lot of people want to know the answer to.
45:44Which outcomes in week one are liars? And which ones are you buying?
45:48I am buying, Brett. The Ravens. Buying their dominance.
45:51I'm buying the new offense with Declan Doyle. How much they were able to just move the ball at will against the Indianapolis Colts.
45:58I'm buying them being a great team. I'm buying the Bears.
46:02And I'm buying the Bears good and bad. I'm buying that the Bears are going to score a crap ton of points this year.
46:09And I'm also buying the fact that they are indeed going to give up a lot of points this year.
46:15So scoring 59. I don't know if they're going to score 59 every week.
46:19But scoring a lot of points every week. But also giving up a good amount of yards and points every week.
46:25It makes the Bears much watch TV every single week no matter what.
46:29And I'm also buying the Cincinnati Bengals. And specifically with the Cincinnati Bengals, I am buying how much better they are in both trenches.
46:36We talked about this in the season preview show.
46:39And it absolutely showed up week one. That offensive line looked great.
46:43Marius Mims looked like a future all-pro. Dexter Lawrence presence was well worth it in the middle of that defense.
46:49And the new speed additions they have on the edge looked beautiful.
46:52So I'm buying those three teams, the Ravens, the Bears, and the Bengals.
46:56What teams are you buying from week one? I'm a little bit more hesitant both ways.
47:01So I have fewer that I'm more definitive on.
47:04But I will say I'm buying the Chiefs because this is what they look like when they have a real run game.
47:10And the passing game wasn't even good. And they were still up by like three scores in the second half.
47:16It's crazy. So I'm buying the Chiefs. I'm buying that defense.
47:20I'm buying the run game. And I'm buying the 49ers because they're healthy for now.
47:24And I always feel good about believing in the 49ers when they have at least 80% of their guys, which they do.
47:31As far as liars, mine are like positives, compliments, I guess, even.
47:34I think the Bucs are liars. Again, coward. Your Tampa.
47:37Whoa, whoa, I'm being nice to you. Well, I didn't know you were going to say the Bucs.
47:43Now you're a man of integrity. Now you're a man who just tells the truth, you know, when nobody else will.
47:49Now, yeah, now I love it. Visionary. How often are they going to turn the ball over four times in a game?
47:56I mean, come on. I mean, hopefully once. I think they're going to be fine.
48:00They got within six points even with four turnovers.
48:03They're going to be fine. And then as for the panic button about, you know, Reuben Bain.
48:08Dude, Amarius Mims is going to do that to a lot of people this year.
48:12I agree. People need to understand how good Amarius Mims not just could be but is now.
48:17Like, Cappy learned how to putt. He's awesome. And then I also have the Texans as liars in a positive way.
48:24They're not going to give up 36 points to very many people.
48:27Josh Allen is one of, I don't know, four quarterbacks on planet Earth that I think could do that to them as
48:34far as the insane throws that he made to put up those points.
48:38I think they're going to be fine. You know, the success rate that they allowed against Buffalo was totally normal.
48:44So Houston, and honestly, if I'm a Texans fan, well, I am a Texans fan.
48:48I'm coming out of that loss as positively as I possibly can.
48:52I'm treating it like, you know, an SEC team losing to Alabama in the mid-2010s.
48:56And they put up yards. They were good in the red zone.
49:00It's like, that's a quality loss right there. Yeah.
49:03I think that my liars, I'm more pointing out sort of their opponent.
49:07Like, I think the Jets overall are liars because I think the Titans were terrible.
49:11So I don't know if it's going to look that good for them moving forward.
49:16We shall see. I think the same thing about the Giants.
49:19The Cowboys just played a horrendous game. So I thought the Giants were great.
49:23I'm not so sure it's going to look that good every single week.
49:27I'm not trying to take everything away from the Giants like we talked about in the preview.
49:32But I don't think it's going to look quite like that every single week.
49:36And then the Rams. So interestingly, I have two teams on this list that play each other this week with the Rams and the Giants.
49:44The Giants, I don't know if it's going to look as good as it looked in week one.
49:49The Rams, it cannot look as bad as it looked in week one.
49:53So we'll actually get to see what the result of that is.
49:57So there we go. That's our first question. Our second question, this one's from Mike Cash, and I think a lot of
50:03people are wanting to know the answer to this one.
50:06The Jets rolled out a 0-5 personnel on Sunday.
50:09Sure, why not? With five tight ends on the field, has the love of tight ends gone too far, Brett?
50:15How do we feel about this one? In fact, I had one of our analyst guys see, has this happened before?
50:21Because I was thinking maybe there wasn't. And that's not why we did it.
50:26It was just, we got five good tight ends.
50:28So he went back 20 years and he couldn't find any evidence of 0-5 personnel.
50:33So I like it for those tight ends. I'm still hesitant to call it 0-5 personnel because technically one of them was a fullback.
50:40So if we're counting that as more of like a running back than a tight, like maybe it's 14, but like the
50:47most hilarious 14 personnel group you've ever seen. Well, it ended up being, was it, was it, was it 0-5 personnel?
50:53Because technically they were set up in, I don't even know what to call it, like a jumbo pony package because it was three running backs.
51:0120s. And then, yeah, it was. And then they pre-snap, they moved into what was actually, I think, more of a 14 personnel.
51:08An alert for future weeks on that. Kenyon Sadiq was in the backfield.
51:12They could give him a, he runs 4-4. Give him a carry.
51:15He got a carry in this game, I think.
51:18And it wasn't even that play. Did he? But I think he did get a carry in that game.
51:24Yeah. I think we're going to see more of that.
51:27I think they just wanted to see how defenses responded to it, honestly.
51:30And it was open. I should note that. It was open.
51:34Mason Taylor, like the throw was there for the touchdown.
51:37Geno didn't take it. But like the play worked.
51:39It did work. It absolutely worked. So in 2025, it was the highest rate of two tight end sets on average, more
51:46so than any other year in the NGS era at 33.2%.
51:49And week one, par for the course. League average of 33%.
51:53So we were right there with that heavy tight end usage.
51:56Has it gone too far? No, of course not.
51:59No. It can't go far enough. Can't go far.
52:01What about 0-6 personnel? Take one of the offensive linemen off the field.
52:05Get another tight end in there. Jackson Haas, baby.
52:08He's a tackle. He is a tackle. And you never know what's going to happen.
52:12You never know what's going to happen when he's on the field.
52:16It's time for our game picks. A little bit of a confidence flare here for week two.
52:21We had a lot of fun doing this for the first time in week one.
52:26So what we're doing is we're picking our 10 favorite games.
52:29All right? We're not only picking the game, but then we're also picking a spot of how much confidence we have.
52:35We're keeping score. We're getting points for, hey, if we call this game and they were our most confident game, we're getting more points.
52:42Or if they were the least confident game, getting a little bit less.
52:46So what we're going to do is we're going to keep score throughout the entire year.
52:51And Brett, I do have your score from last week.
52:54I know you have mine. We have not revealed this to each other yet.
52:58So you didn't get your 10-spot game. You picked the Cowboys who went against the Giants, which so did I.
53:04So you didn't get your top points there with the 10 points.
53:08You missed that game. And then you missed your least confident game and then your second least confident game.
53:14So you did pretty good here last week. You got 42 total points when it came to picking the correct team that won the game.
53:21And then also where you had them in the confidence.
53:24But did I do better? That's the question. Because you have my final score in the envelope.
53:29How did I do last week? So your score starts with a 4.
53:33Okay, great. Good start. But it ends with a 0, baby.
53:36Let's go. Week 1 in the books. Okay. All right.
53:39Calm down. Calm down. It's one week. It is one week.
53:43But what we're going to do is we're going to keep a tally and score.
53:47So Brett is up 2 points on me right now.
53:50We're not restarting with every single week. So he is up 2.
53:54So if he's up 2 this week and let's say you get 8 points next week, then you're going to be up
54:0010 points on me on the season. So we're going to keep a score and it's going to be cumulative that way.
54:07Because if one of us gets way ahead on the scoreboard and we get to like week 17, week 18, it could
54:14be a lot of fun because one of us has to make some strong cases for some teams that might not win.
54:20So it's a way where we're going to have fun here.
54:24Picking these games, previewing these games, but also the confidence meter, I think throws a lot of fun.
54:29So if you guys want to follow along and participate on your own at home, feel free to do so.
54:35Fire them off in the comments section. We'll take a look at it.
54:39We'll go back and forth and talk with you guys about your picks.
54:43But Brett, the first game that we're talking about is Thursday Night Football.
54:47Let's get into it here. Lions traveling to Buffalo to take on the Buffalo Bills.
54:51Who do you have winning? And where is it in the confidence meter for you?
54:56I have Bills over Lions for one. Okay. It is my confidence level of one.
55:00Okay. It's a Thursday game. Weird stuff happens on Thursdays.
55:03I think the Lions are a genuinely good team.
55:06Now you're opening a new stadium. I think there's going to be a ton of juice in the building.
55:12But just looking at all the firepower that the Lions have, this is kind of a tough matchup for anybody to have.
55:18Even though the Lions did have to scratch and claw and fight to beat New Orleans last week.
55:24This is just the kind of game that could really go sideways.
55:27And so while I do think the Bills are going to win, just because Josh Allen is an absolute superhuman.
55:33And he's one of the only quarterbacks who I think could have beat the Texans last week.
55:38I'm not super confident either way. So I'm leaving it at my one spot.
55:43Yeah. Understandable. I think you might be smart having them at the one given it's Thursday night football and it's two really good teams.
55:50I also have the Bills winning. But I have this in my four spot.
55:54So a little bit higher than you on the rankings.
55:57I'm a little bit more confident in the Bills.
56:00And simply put, I think you guys are going to hear a theme from my game picks.
56:05When the good quarterbacks are playing good right out of the gate, it's hard for me to bet against them.
56:11Josh Allen was unbelievable against the Houston Texans. You and I talked about this in the reaction show.
56:16We highlighted how much the Detroit Lions kind of want to play man coverage.
56:20And man, if there's somebody with some arm arrogance to really go after when you're not playing well in man coverage, it's Josh Allen.
56:28So I agree. I think the juice is going to be flowing.
56:31You're opening up the new stadium. Give me the Bills in this one and give me them at the four spot.
56:37Saints at Ravens. The next game we're talking about here.
56:40Who you got winning this one? And where is it in the ranking?
56:44I'm actually way more confident in this one. I went Baltimore over New Orleans.
56:49And it's because if you look at what Tyler Shuck did last week, again, all credit to him for that late game comeback.
56:55You know, got three touchdowns against all that man coverage from the Lions in the red zone.
57:01But they really didn't start playing man until they got to the red zone.
57:05And I look at what Baltimore does defensively with Jesse Minter.
57:08He not only calls a lot of zone coverage, he calls a lot of like very, let's say, tricky zone coverage.
57:14A lot of rotations. A lot of I'm showing you this.
57:18I'm giving you this. And Shuck really struggled against that in the first half.
57:22That was actually something he also struggled as a rookie against.
57:25And I just I look at a very potent offense that's going to put pressure on you to score.
57:31And a defense that likes to use a lot of disguise.
57:34A lot of really kind of fancy exotic pressure looks.
57:37I'm not super confident in Shuck to be able to sort that out.
57:41I like the Saints talent. It's just this might be a game that they win next year, not necessarily this year.
57:47So I put that at my seventh spot. I'm a little higher than you on it.
57:52Taking the same team. But I had the Ravens winning and they're at the ninth spot for me.
57:58The ninth spot feels disrespectful. Given Tyler Shuck hater.
58:00How Tyler Shuck and this team played in the fourth quarter in overtime.
58:04But I echo everything that you just said there.
58:07Tyler Shuck really struggled. And I think just the chemistry with the wide receivers, the timing, the everything was just a little off in that first half.
58:15And that was heavy zone coverage stuff. Jesse Minter is great at it.
58:19They understand when Tyler Shuck was playing well. And I think they're going to do everything that they can to sort of
58:25not allow him to really be able to read the field and just say, All right, that guy's in man.
58:31It's just about me putting the ball where it needs to go in tight windows.
58:36And he's got the arm talent to do it.
58:39But when you really got to continuously think, I think that's when he was a little slow and a little hesitant to get rid of the ball.
58:47Vikings at Bears. The Bears coming off 59 points on the road in Carolina.
58:51The Vikings have a comeback themselves. It's Flores. It's Ben Johnson.
58:54What do we think here? Who you got winning this game?
58:58So Chicago scored 59 in a game. Minnesota scored 22 in a quarter.
59:01So this game is almost impossible to figure out how it's going to go, especially because Flores and Ben Johnson have a deep history against one another.
59:10Johnson historically has been one of the only offensive minds that really does a whole lot of anything against Flores.
59:16I am picking the Bears in this game. I am not super confident in it just because, you know, NFC North shenanigans
59:22tend to happen, especially early in the season. And when these two coordinators get together, they're always throwing haymakers against each other.
59:29They do tend to get the best of each other.
59:32It's a tough game to pick. I'm going to go Bears just because I'm not 100% certain who's going to be starting
59:38for the Vikings at quarterback as of recording this.
59:41We don't know. And, man, 59 points. It'd be kind of weird to see them put up that many points in week
59:48one and then pick against them in week two.
59:50Where do you have them in the rank? Two spots.
59:53Not super confident. Man. So we're getting the low confidence games out of the way early for you.
59:59Again, I am picking the same team. I'm just a lot more confident.
60:03And so, you know, this is going to be very interesting if these teams win or lose because we're picking the same teams.
60:10We're just very different in the confidence meter. I have the Bears winning at my seventh spot.
60:15I have a lot of faith in what that offense showed us in week one, how Caleb looked, how the ground game looked.
60:22It was incredible. And, yes, the Vikings moved the ball really well and had an incredible comeback.
60:27I'm not trying to take anything away from them.
60:29Packers' defense was rough. And more than that, they really struggled to hold on to possession at all whatsoever when it came to that second half.
60:37So even though I have my questions on Chicago's defense as well coming off giving up 37 points to the Carolina Panthers,
60:44I don't think there's going to be this lack of possession, this lack of time of possession, this consistency that existed with
60:50Green Bay when they faced off against Minnesota last week.
60:53And I think that was a major catalyst for why Minnesota was able to come back and look as good as they did in the second half.
61:02Because Green Bay just, I mean, they couldn't hold on to the football.
61:05There was no possession for them at all whatsoever.
61:08No efficiency. And I just don't think that's going to be the case with Chicago.
61:13The Cincinnati Bengals coming off a win against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, traveling to Houston to take on a Texans team that
61:19ain't used to giving up 30-plus points. And so you know they're going to be extremely motivated.
61:24But the Bengals starting off the season really hot, and they normally don't do that.
61:29So you know they want to keep the momentum rolling.
61:32Who do you got winning this game? So this is in my four spot.
61:36Okay. I'm taking the Texans. All right. I'm still trying to figure out exactly what these two teams are, right?
61:42Because the Bengals suddenly have a real defense. They have a real pass rush, which helps out.
61:47And the Texans suddenly have a real offense. So it's two very evenly matched teams.
61:52And the fact that Houston's starting out their season with Josh Allen and Joe Burrow, it's about as difficult a start to a schedule as you can have.
62:00Last week, the Texans' Bills was at my one spot because I really wasn't sure who was going to win.
62:06And the game came down to the wire. I think this one's also going to come down to the wire.
62:12I do think the Texans are going to get the better of them just because I don't expect their defense to give up 36 again.
62:20Joe Burrow is capable of many things. There's a couple throws that Josh Allen made in that game that I'm not even
62:26sure if Joe could have done those. So I'm going to go Houston.
62:30I'm only confident at the four spot, but I do think they win.
62:34I'll go opposite side of the coin here. We'll differ for the first time on this show in week two.
62:40I'm going to go Cincinnati Bengals, but I have them in the one spot when it comes to confidence because I really
62:47don't know who is going to win. Whoa, come on.
62:50Somebody's got to be in the one. You were just saving that for no matter what.
62:54But I think this game is going to be really, really tight.
62:58And I'm taking the Bengals simply because I was really impressed with how they were on the trenches, both offensively and defensively.
63:05When you can play the way that you did with Jamar Chase, 12 total receiving yards, you know that that's probably not going to happen again.
63:12So you're going to get Jamar involved a little bit more.
63:16I'll ride the momentum here for the Cincinnati Bengals and I'll have them winning this game, but I just have them at that one spot.
63:23Jags and the Broncos. Two totally different week one performances.
63:26The Jags just blew out the Cleveland Browns in a game that was never close.
63:31And then the Broncos laying an egg on Monday Night Football against the Kansas City Chiefs.
63:35What do we think about this game here? Preseason, they tell you that, hey, this is a premier game of week two.
63:42And I think that it absolutely could be. But who do you have winning and where are they in the confidence meter?
63:49I am picking the Jaguars in this game, but I do think it's going to be a tougher fight.
63:54You know, we looked at how much Bo Nix struggled against man coverage against KC.
63:59Well, the Jags don't really play a lot of man coverage.
64:02They do tend to favor zone. Anthony Campanelli, you know, he comes from both a Fangio and a Jeff Halfley influence at the same time.
64:10So he calls a lot of quarters. I think on paper, theoretically, in a vacuum, Bo Nix should be better against this Jaguars style of defense.
64:17I am worried about it. So I only have it in my sixth spot.
64:22But I do think that, you know, if you look at just the difference between how Trevor is playing right now versus
64:28how Bo is playing right now, and it is a quarterback league.
64:32Trevor's one of the early candidates for MVP after, you know, one week of play.
64:36But he was absolutely unassailable last week. I'm picking the Jags as well.
64:40I only have them at my two spot. Where did you have them in your rankings?
64:45Six. Jags. Okay, you've got the Jags at your sixth spot.
64:48I have them in the two spot. This is a game where it's hard to have concrete takeaways one way or the other.
64:55Because, yes, Jacksonville was great, but they were playing what might be the worst team in the NFL this year.
65:01The Broncos look terrible against the Chiefs. But you kind of say to yourself, my goodness, a lot of the issues that
65:08they had were on the defensive side of the ball.
65:11Is that defense really going to look that bad the entire year?
65:14I mean, they were one of the best in the NFL.
65:18They gave up the most yards after a missed tackle in NGS's database history, which goes back to 2018.
65:23So, it can't be that bad again, right? Seahawks and the Cardinals.
65:27A little interesting game. A little closer than some people maybe thought was going to be the case with the Cardinals coming off that win against the Chargers.
65:35But this one's in Arizona. What do you think about this one and where are you putting in your confidence rankings?
65:42Give me the Seahawks. Okay. Go with Drew Locke.
65:45Even with a backup quarterback, I look at not just the talent on the Seahawks team, but also the coaching staff.
65:51I think it's a tremendous coaching staff. I am fascinated to see if Jacoby Persett gets away with doing it again as
65:57far as the amount of shotgun that they were in against the Chargers.
66:01And also just the average time to throw. Like, he had the second highest quick throw percentage across the league in week one.
66:08Only second to Joe Burrow, who got it out basically instantaneously against Tampa.
66:12And I'm not sure if the Seahawks are going to let them do that again.
66:17If the Cardinals start out 2-0, tip of the cap to you.
66:20Cool. I'm putting it at the three spot. Not super confident.
66:24I have it at the exact same spot. We're getting a lot of my low confidence games out of the way here early.
66:30I also have them in the three spot. I have the Seahawks winning.
66:34I love what I saw from the Cardinals. They looked fearless.
66:38They looked ready for that game. They didn't look like, oh, this is a team that could be picking number one overall next year.
66:45They say, hey, screw that. You know, they certainly went into this game, went on the road in SoFi.
66:51And we're not afraid of the charges at all whatsoever.
66:54And we're the aggressors in that game. And so I don't think they're just going to be backing down from the Seahawks
67:00just because of the reigning Super Bowl champs. They're going to come out and give it their best.
67:06All that to say, Seahawks defense is special, man.
67:08I think it's still going to get after them.
67:11I think that's going to be the X factor here.
67:14Give me a little closer, obviously, with no Sam Darnold in this game.
67:18And, you know, with the run game not being as efficient or as explosive as when they had Kenneth Walker back there.
67:24But I'm still going to Seahawks here. And you mentioned if the Cardinals can come out of this game and be 2-0, holy cow.
67:32We're going to be spending some time breaking down and talking about how this team had one of the best surprise starts of any team in the NFL.
67:40So we will see. Colts to the Chiefs. Chiefs, obviously, feeling good coming off that Monday night win.
67:45Colts, man, really reeling from what felt like a blowout against the Baltimore Ravens there.
67:50What do you think about this game? Who are you picking and where is it in the conference meter?
67:56Boy, I was confident in the Colts, you know, during the summer because as soon as we heard Daniel Jones is going
68:02to be back early, I was like, okay, well, I'm looking at what that offense did in the first half of last season.
68:09And they just laid an egg to the point where I was not just deeply concerned about how they matched up against Baltimore.
68:16I'm deeply concerned about how they match up against anybody.
68:19They called so much man coverage in week one but couldn't play man coverage.
68:23Right. Their corners even gave like the corners are supposed to be the thing they hang their hat on in that defense.
68:30They gave up a lot of yards in man coverage.
68:33So if they can't do that defensively, I don't feel great about how they match up against Kansas City who have all
68:39sorts of ways to just break guys open in man coverage.
68:43Not necessarily by being good route runners. I'm talking like formation wise and using motions.
68:47And then defensively, I think Kansas City's defense played so well and I have real, real concerns about how the Colts are going to come out against that.
68:56So give me the Chiefs in this game. I'm putting it basically dead in the middle at five.
69:01But based on what we saw in week one, I don't know if I could justify picking Indianapolis.
69:06I got the Chiefs at the eighth spot here.
69:09I'm pretty confident in this one because if the Chiefs can look the way that they did with Patrick Mahomes not completing
69:16a single pass beyond 10 air yards, sky is pretty much the limit at that point.
69:21I think the first and foremost is the are the Colts going to be able to stop the run game with Kenneth Walker?
69:27And then if you are, OK, well, now you've got to deal with, like you mentioned, Andy Reyes, very, very good at
69:34dialing up these man beaters type of play concepts.
69:37And he's got a great quarterback when it comes to timing and overall arm strength to be able to hit these fast receivers to get them the ball.
69:45I think the Colts are still going to be able to run the ball well, just like they did against the Ravens.
69:52But what else outside of that? That's my question with the Colts.
69:55What are you outside of what we thought you kind of already were?
69:59Can you be anything above and beyond that? Steelers at Patriots.
70:03How do we feel about this game? Who's winning this one?
70:06I put this at my eighth spot. OK. For who?
70:09New England over Pittsburgh. OK. All right. OK. All right.
70:12All right. Really bad picks in the second half.
70:15I get it. Drake May. That was the worst game of his career.
70:18Might be the worst game he's played even going back to college.
70:22It was almost like sophomore level UNC Drake May.
70:25McDonald's started blitzing way more in the second half to try to get them into more second and longs, third and longs.
70:31And Drake was like, I got to make a play.
70:34I got to do something. You're up 10-0. No, you don't.
70:38Right? And that's a young quarterback trying to put the game in his hands when he really didn't have to.
70:44And I think that was probably the best thing that could have happened to him in week one because he learned a lesson.
70:51Of course, they lose A.J. Brown in that game.
70:53So there were some longer ramifications. But he learned a lesson that he really needed to learn again.
70:59And now he's going against a Steelers team that I don't know if anybody watched the Steelers offense in week one.
71:05Not great. No, still not. Still not super explosive.
71:08Defense is great. I mean, they were able to really get a ton of pressure, at least.
71:13Although they didn't play a single rep of man coverage at all.
71:16So it'll be interesting to see if they just have a little bit more respect for what Drake May can do in that respect.
71:24I'm taking the Patriots as well. I'll put them in my sixth spot.
71:28I'll go Patriots over Steelers. Commanders at the Cowboys.
71:30Now, hold on. Before you answer this, if I'm keeping score correctly at home, you still have your nine and your 10 spot open.
71:37One of these two last games. It's your most confident game and then your second most confident game.
71:43Where are the Cowboys at? Or sorry, no, it's the Commanders at the Cowboys.
71:47So this one's in Dallas. Where's that one for you?
71:50That's my tenner. I have the Cowboys. You're putting the Cowboys at the 10 spot again?
71:55Second time in a row. You maniac. I can't be wrong twice in a row, Trev.
72:00Have you not learned? I'm going to be digging out of this hole until Christmas, dude.
72:04I'm also picking the Cowboys, by the way, but they're the five spot for me.
72:09So I'm picking the same team that's a little further down.
72:12So if the Commanders get the upset here, you might be in trouble, my friend.
72:17Dude, if the Commanders get the upset, I am hosed, but it's okay.
72:21If you just look at A, the Cowboys offense in week one, they only had seven possessions.
72:26They scored on four of them. The offense was not the problem.
72:29The defense was. And some of the errors on defense I think are very correctable.
72:34If you look at the Commanders offense in week one, they have structural issues that are not really correctable like that.
72:40They just didn't have the talent up front. They could not block Philly whatsoever.
72:44I'm not confident in this Commanders team whatsoever. And while I do respect the hell out of them for coming back against
72:51the Eagles and almost tying it up, they were down for a reason.
72:55I'm with you, and that's why I'm going with the Cowboys.
72:58But it's going to be worth monitoring very, very closely.
73:01A lot of mental errors and some reps where the effort wasn't as good as you wanted it to be from that Cowboys defense overall.
73:09And you go, okay, hold on here. If we get anything that's close to a repeat performance of those elements, you start to get worried about Dallas.
73:17But for now, I'll think that, hey, those guys probably watched the tape, said we do not want to put that out there ever again.
73:24It's going to look different. I'm also taking the Cowboys, but I got them at the five spot.
73:30Which means Rams and the Giants. I've got it at the 10 spot, most confident game.
73:34You've got it at the nine spot, your second most confident game here.
73:38Of course, you're taking the Giants, right? I mean, the Giants are on the roll.
73:43You've got to be taking the Giants here, right?
73:46Right? Right? I'm backing you in a corner to make you pick the Giants here.
73:50I'm a coward. I can't do it. I'm going Rams, dude.
73:53I am too. If this Rams team started out as the heavy, heavy, heavy choice for everybody to win the Super Bowl
74:00and they start 0-2, that might be the story of the first quarter of the season.
74:05You have Matthew Stafford, the reigning MVP. You have Puka.
74:08You have Devonta. You have a run game that was really, really effective last year.
74:12And on the defensive line, you still have Kobe and Byron and Brayden.
74:16And you bring it in McDuffie and Watson. I can't imagine this team lays that much of an egg again.
74:22I thought it was just a recipe for failure how they handled everything in Week 1.
74:27And I think a lot of that naturally gets remedied in Week 2.
74:31If the Giants win this game, if the Rams start 0-2, boy, that's going to be an interesting breakdown for us on the reaction show.
74:38Because I got the Rams at my 10th spot, most confident game for them to bounce back and get this win.
74:45You got up at the 9th spot. All right.
74:47That's all the time that we had here for this show.
74:51We love you guys. Thank you so much for all the questions.
74:54You gave so many incredible questions that honestly, like, we talked to the staff.
74:58We're like, do we even need to just, like, have a separate show just for questions?
75:03Because we want to get you guys involved in the show as much as possible.
75:08Because we really, really appreciate all the engagement, all the love from you guys.
75:12It makes this a lot of fun every single week.
75:15Thank you guys so much for watching. If you guys want to see, you know, whether it's the film or the data
75:22or whatever it is, we're using NFL Pro for all this stuff.
75:25So that paired with NGS. Make sure you guys have a subscription to those things.
75:30And you can find a lot of this information out yourself.
75:33But thank you for hanging out with us. We appreciate it.
75:36We will be back with you on Monday for our reaction show of everything that we're about to see here in Week 2.
75:43We'll see you guys then. Bye.

More episodes from NFL Fantasy Football Podcast

6