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Speaker 1: Welcome to Not So Fast with Andrew Perloff and Paul Pabst, where two.
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Speaker 2: Longtime friends challenge each other on the biggest sports stories of the day.
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Speaker 3: Here's Andrew Perloff and Paul Pabst.
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Speaker 4: Not so fast, my friends.
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Speaker 5: Welcome to Not So Fast. I'm Andrew Perloff. He's Paul Paps. Hope you're having a fun Halloween weekend already. No one's having more fun than the state of Wisconsin, Paul.
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Speaker 6: No, Wisconsin beat USC last week. They win the World Series. Last night, the Packers do it. Before we move on, though, Halloween, you're notorious as a Halloween guy. Coach Harbaugh?
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Speaker 3: Of course. Nobody's got it better than us.
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Speaker 6: You got a nice crisp pair of khakis on with that?
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Speaker 3: Yes, I do have. You can't really see. I'll just sort of go. Got khakis. I got the headset.
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Speaker 5: I mean, this year I have to have a little bit of a befuddled look like I can't figure out why Justin Herbert's not any good.
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Speaker 2: Right.
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Speaker 6: You can't be a positive kid. Could be in years past. Drink some vitamin D milk, though.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, no.
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Speaker 5: Well, Jim Harbaugh has maintained his positivity. If I was him, I'd probably fire my offensive coordinator. Wow.
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Speaker 3: Just facts, reality. All right. Let's get into the game last night. The Packers. Hold off the Panthers. It's funny because that game got weirdly close at the end.
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Speaker 5: I picked the Panthers yesterday as an upset. I felt bad the entire game. I'm like, that was the dumbest pick ever. Then it's a game at the end because Jordan Love will give it up, but he's also brilliant at times, and the Packers come away with the win.
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Speaker 6: Yeah, like you said, it's all feel-good in Wisconsin right now. I think if you're a Packer fan, you've got to feel pretty great about that game. What you've got to like is that your skill position guys, Watson, we'll talk about him in a second, Matthew Golden, Kraft, all healthy, lots of targets. Jordan Love had that one ugly pick, but otherwise he was dicing them up.
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Speaker 3: The guy has to throw it 50 times a game.
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Speaker 5: I've never seen a contender with a worse running game in my entire life than the Packers.
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Speaker 6: I don't understand. I thought this would be Josh Jacobs back. You're facing the Carolina Panthers. Their defensive coordinator is gone and literally gone. But they gave it up last week to Tampa Bay. 1.9 yards a carry for Josh Jacobs. That was the opposite of what I thought was going to happen.
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Speaker 5: So here's what happened, I think. They, by the way, just fired their defensive coordinator about an hour ago.
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Speaker 3: Wouldn't matter.
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Speaker 5: They got run all over by Tampa Bay. Then they just put everyone up in the box. So the Packers had no choice but to throw over the top, which they did. Josh Jacobs, by the way, got hit about three.
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Speaker 3: Yards behind the line of scrimmage on every play.
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Speaker 5: The Packers cannot run block, but they were amazing in their pass protection. So I think it's one way or the other they're going to get you.
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Speaker 6: Also, the Packers got to the quarterback without Micah Parsons, who, like we say every week, should be back next week. We don't know about that.
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Speaker 3: Right. He's supposed to practice starting next week.
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Speaker 4: Right.
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Speaker 6: But they look good on defense. They look great on offense. Not the running game. But I think the Packers, if you're a Packers fan, you have to think, we could have just won five in a row. They should have won the Lions game. The bigger picture. The kicking situation, they missed an extra point. Trey Smack, they have to move on from this guy.
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Speaker 5: I know, and there was a situation at the end of the game where they probably could have trotted him out for a long field goal attempt and chose not to. This is going to cost them Ws. If you're this good of a team, Paul, you have to cut your kick right now.
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Speaker 6: Well, I think it's also a really risky move in the preseason. You go with a young guy, a guy who's not even 23 years old yet, as a contending playoff team that's almost irresponsible to have a kicker with that little experience.
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Speaker 3: I mean, his name is Trey Smack. You would think that he'd be awesome. Great name.
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Speaker 6: Sounds like a wrestler name.
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Speaker 3: I believe he was the only kicker drafted.
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Speaker 5: So when you draft a kicker, that's why you don't draft a kicker, because then you have to commit to him and not do the preseason. But I will tell you one thing, though. I, I'm putting the Packers back in my Super Bowl mix.
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Speaker 3: I'll tell you why.
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Speaker 5: It's not because Micah Parsons is coming back.
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Speaker 6: I think you're cloudy because of the whole Brewers thing.
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Speaker 3: No, maybe.
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Speaker 5: Jonathan Gannon, former Arizona Cardinals head coach, is killing it as defensive coordinator. Poor Bryce Young last night didn't have a chance. A, he was pressured. B, he was fooled all the time. The Packers defense without Micah Parsons is one of the stories of the year to me. They were all over this guy. Can you imagine if you add the best pass rusher in the NFL to this defense? I think it's a real interesting development for Green Bay, who you don't think of as defense.
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Speaker 6: No, you don't. And with Parsons out, none of these guys, Van Ness, they don't get a lot of pub. And so it's all soaking up Micah Parsons. The other thing I would say, though, is... that if they can now run the ball. Now, I don't know if they would. I look at them as a team that should have traded for Quentin Nelson. I don't know if they need a running back, but that's a team that should have done it. The other thing last night that was wild, and that's going to be one of the legends of this game, Matthew Golden, the wide receiver, he's had a really good game, but Christian Watson, who's notoriously fragile. What do you say his reputation is?
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Speaker 3: Oh, my God, he's always hurt.
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Speaker 6: He's always hurt. Last night he gets hurt, goes down, has a rib or chest injury. They cart him off. And they had to take him literally to the hospital.
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Speaker 1: St.
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Speaker 6: Vincent's Hospital is three miles away from the stadium at Green Bay. They needed more than just the courtesy x-ray. But then they check him out, they give him the thumbs up, and he comes back and gets out of the ambulance. Great camera shot here of him getting out of the ambulance. It was like The Undertaker back in the day. It was like Mick Foley back in the day.
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Speaker 4: Watch this.
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Speaker 6: This is fantastic.
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Speaker 3: Okay, it was really cool, but I have to tell you right now. I mean, look at this.
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Speaker 6: It's like a WB movie. Here comes the star receiver straight out of the ambulance onto the field.
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Speaker 5: We're laughing about it now. This is actually quite messed up. Because they said he was coughing up blood. I've seen enough movies to know when the guy is coughing up blood at the end of the movie, he's a goner.
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Speaker 6: That's if they get shot.
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Speaker 5: You can't cough up blood and play in a football game. So somebody either misspoke... or there's a major problem on our hand right now.
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Speaker 6: I think they're going to love this. This is old school tough guy football.
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Speaker 3: Internal bleeding, Paul. That's the only reason you cough up blood.
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Speaker 6: It's internal. It's not external. No one can see it. The kids can't see it.
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Speaker 5: You know, this is Friday morning or Friday afternoon. Wait until next Tuesday when Pro Football Talk gets a hold of this because Jalen Hurts, there was a... very weird situation. He was in London. He was riding the bike between plays. No one knew what the injury was. Then it turns out the Eagles are.
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Speaker 3: In big trouble.
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Speaker 5: If the Packers, if he was really coughing up blood, they cannot put him back out there.
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Speaker 3: So I don't think he was really coughing up blood.
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Speaker 6: You're probably right. It's probably an exaggeration or that become urban legend. But he was taken to an actual hospital. He didn't just go to a blue tent, like a Coleman tent on the sidelines. And they had to bring him back. So I think it's one of those situations. Not a head injury. It's not a knee injury. It's a tough guy injury. And he toughed his way through it. I wonder if his reputation... played part of this, like, hey, man, this is national TV. I want to get back out there.
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Speaker 3: Oh, yeah, I hope not, because I would think safety is more important.
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Speaker 5: Is that like Caleb Williams was worried so much about his reputation after he looked like he got shot and went down with a hamstring injury that turned out to be a two-week injury?
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Speaker 6: Four-week injury.
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Speaker 5: I mean, I think Caleb was really worried about that because he talked about it in two or three different press conferences. If that's the case, that's idiotic because you are a key player on a Super Bowl contender.
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Speaker 3: I don't care if you're a tough guy or not a tough guy. You've got to stay healthy.
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Speaker 6: Oh, I actually completely respect what Watson did last night. This guy has to win this game. He knows his team needs to win this game. And he said, I'm going to have a broken rib. There's nothing you can do for a broken rib. You can't tape it up. You just have to sit there and eat it. And he went out there and said, I'm going to play and had a really nice second half.
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Speaker 3: He had two catches. He made no difference. First of all, he played in a Panthers team.
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Speaker 6: Willis Reed had two points.
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Speaker 3: But, yeah, I mean, it didn't matter if Christian Watson was there or not.
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Speaker 5: Bryce Young was running for his life every time he called hike.
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Speaker 6: Bryce Young probably has broken ribs.
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Speaker 3: All right.
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Speaker 5: Let's do some helmet stickers for the last night's game. Every big game, we do helmet stickers. I will start us off, and I'm going with a rookie. I believe he's a rookie. Deny Dennis Sutton, former Penn State defensive end. Now, this guy was supposed to be the next in a long line of first-round Penn State defensive ends. Chop Robinson, Adafi Owe, Micah Parsons, obviously, Abdul Carter. And he totally fell apart because the entire program at Penn State fell apart.
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Speaker 3: Now, guess what? He's awesome.
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Speaker 5: He might be as good as any of those guys. Fourth-round pick had a sack last night. and is leading what it turns out to be a ferocious Packers defensive line.
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Speaker 6: And it's one of those things where, because Micah Parsons is out, you discover a new guy.
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Speaker 5: Yes.
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Speaker 6: And now you decide, this guy may be a game player, you know, like a guy who shows up in the big light.
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Speaker 5: And he's a little different than Parsons. He's not just a pass rusher. He's big enough to set the edge. He is going to be a real factor for them.
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Speaker 6: Okay, here's my helmet sticker, and this is wide receiver Matthew Golden. Matthew Golden, remember when the Packers took him? We were at that draft, and the Packers fans were like, finally, a first-round wide receiver out of Texas. This guy's an all-purpose player. He started really slow last year. I don't think he had a catch in the first 10 weeks. Then he kind of stepped it up later in the season, December, and in the playoffs. Matthew Golden's hitting his stride. I've talked about his drop season. They're happening less every week, fewer times every week.
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Speaker 3: He leads the league in drops.
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Speaker 6: But you know what? He could always go from there. If he set the bar really low for himself, high, low, either way, he's now in a position where he's recovering his career that started slowly.
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Speaker 3: I love that.
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Speaker 5: He had a big drop. It was a hard catch. And then he came right back and caught the next pass. It doesn't get in his head when he has dropped. So I don't mind dropping the ball if you still are going to get open on the next play.
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Speaker 3: And the other thing is he's always open. He must be faster than we realize. Oh, yeah.
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Speaker 6: He was a burner in college.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, huge fan. He's great, even though he does definitely drop the ball.
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Speaker 6: Yeah, less so, less so. Last time we had two last nights. How do we not give a helmet sticker to Christian Watson? The guy actually broke a rib and was coughing up blood and was given the last rights.
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Speaker 3: Because he really wasn't that important in the game.
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Speaker 6: First half he was. Let's stay with the NFL weekend a little bit here. Let's stay in the NFC a little bit here. People are talking about the Bears because of the trade the other day. People are talking about the Packers because of the nice win last night. The Lions, they always get some love. The Vikings are fighting for relevancy at 6-0.
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Speaker 5: Well, 6-0, that's about to be 6-4 according to Dan Patrick and pretty much everybody else. Come on, we're sophisticated fans enough to know this 6-0 is against awful teams.
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Speaker 6: But you remember a generation ago, look at the Vikings here.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, they edged a Dolphins, 15-10. That's worse than a loss, Paul.
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Speaker 6: It is worse than a loss.
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Speaker 5: They edged a terrible Saints team. They beat a backup quarterback in Tampa Bay. They beat the Bears in the rain. And 16-10 over the Colts.
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Speaker 3: That's another indictment. They need to show me something against the Lions.
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Speaker 6: The next two weeks, they're at the Lions who have a high-end offense, and they're at the Bills who have the greatest quarterback people think in football. If somehow The Vikings squeak out two victories, defense first, over the next few weeks. You can't ignore them anymore. I know it's unlikely.
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Speaker 3: Well, yeah.
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Speaker 5: I mean, listen, if the Miami Dolphins go on a nine-game win streak, I won't be able to ignore them. What does that mean if somehow they're not going to win these.
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Speaker 3: Two games in a row?
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Speaker 6: Right. We can't compare them anyway.
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Speaker 3: Well, they were playing real teams. They were not playing the Dolphins, Saints, Bucs.
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Speaker 5: The NFC South wasn't so terrible back then, so you couldn't rack up wins.
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Speaker 6: So they get no credit for 6-0, but the next two weeks decides everything.
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Speaker 3: Absolutely.
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Speaker 5: And I will tell you, Brian Flores famously has given Jared Goff, the Lions quarterback, some trouble.
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Speaker 3: I checked it out.
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Speaker 5: Flores was definitely the D coordinator when Goff was terrible in that Super Bowl against New England. So I'm very curious. You know, Brian Flores has been, quote, unquote, dialing up blitzes galore.
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Speaker 3: Is anyone going to figure him out?
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Speaker 6: Well, if you blitz every time. Kurt Warner was on the Dan Patcher show years ago, and he said great quarterbacks love when you blitz because they know someone's open. Jared Goff, the stat we heard today, also on the Dan Patcher show, Jared Goff has the best quarterback rating against the blitz this year.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, but, I mean, listen, he was 0-2 against Flores last year. Those guys have a lot of history against each other. I think he mixes it up. But still, I'm not buying. I'm in the closer to what Dan said, 6-4 than 8-0.
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Speaker 6: I almost want the Vikings to win just to mess with people.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, that'd be awesome.
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Speaker 5: All right, coming up next, DP shows up to talk about the Halloween costumes in the back.
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Speaker 3: If you didn't see it on the Dan Patrick Show, it was amazing. We'll talk about that next. Not so fast.
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Speaker 2: Paul.
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Speaker 3: There were a lot of people dressed up as you.
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Speaker 6: Yeah, rolled up sleeves, carrying around my big cup and my pad, walking really fast.
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Speaker 3: Everybody has your shirts, too, it turns out. Yeah, it turns out a lot of nice button-downs.
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Speaker 6: Back on Not So Fast, Paxton Perloff, NBC Sports. Time for the Midday Pick-Me-Up. Let me set the scene, Perl. Madison, Wisconsin, one week ago, Caleb Williams from USC, going to see his old team play against the Badgers. He's walking down the street, sees a lemonade stand, and I'm buy-in. What should Kayla Williams tip on a $ 2 glass of lemonade?
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Speaker 3: Well, he's in enemy territory.
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Speaker 6: They loved him, though.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, I think you've got to drop a $ 20 if you're a quarterback. That's a lot of money to those kids.
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Speaker 6: Would you drop a $ 20 and just get yourself a glass, or do you buy lemonade for the neighborhood?
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Speaker 3: Buy lemonade for everybody. All of Madison. I love it.
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Speaker 6: That's just what Kayla Williams does on or off the field. Just a straight good guy. Let's bring in our guy, Dan Patrick, from right down the hallway. D.P., Thanks for joining us from right at your desk. We got a question for you. Now, I know you know the history and I know the history, but go back to your rationale about Halloween and not dressing up as the host of The Dan Patrick Show.
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Speaker 1: I would watch The Today Show and I'd see Matt Lauer and he'd be dressed up like Little Bo Peep. And I kept thinking, what if something happens that you've got to get out of that costume and now you have to talk about a serious story? it's never happened to me on every Halloween, but I do worry that something could happen. And then I'm dressed like, you know, somebody from Game of Thrones, just not going to go well.
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Speaker 5: So you had the backroom guys dress up like Dan and the Danettes and they were unbelievable. If you didn't see it, go back and watch it. I actually was a little nervous for the guys. Dan Gardella in the back dressed like you, Dan.
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Speaker 3: He was unbelievable. And a lot of people did Pauly.
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Speaker 5: I was wondering, do you think those guys should have been nervous? Because there were people saying, oh, I don't want to make Paul mad or I don't want to make Dan mad. But they absolutely nailed it.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that we wear certain things on a regular basis. I love corduroy. And Dan G tapped into that with the glasses. And then he had Dan Patrick's show sweatshirt. And then he had cords on. I mean, not really going out of his way to do, you know, like Dylan and Big Day Ray. They had on the Blades of Glory outfit that, you know, channeling John Heeter and Will Ferrell. There were some fun, fun attempts there. And even Paul, who normally likes to have a little cleavage showing Mario, who is the director. When he put on the shirt and I realized that he was playing Paulie, he even had Paul's walk down.
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Speaker 3: Yeah.
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Speaker 6: He nailed the lean in walk, very purposeful. I was laughing my butt off.
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Speaker 3: It was great.
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Speaker 1: They had a lot of fun. And I mean, that's the environment that hopefully is here on a daily basis.
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Speaker 6: The other reason we want to bring you in, yesterday we had Ernie Johnson on. You had Ernie Johnson on a day after him announcing his intentions to retire. And that interview, as it went on, changed directions. And It went to talking about his family and his son who passed away. When you're in the middle of an interview like that and you're seeing the direction it goes, how do you handle that?
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Speaker 1: Well, I knew that there were some places that I'd like to get to with Ernie. And we're similar age. And I thought about those questions you have with your wife about now what do you do? And I have those conversations with my wife. I wanted to tap into that. And he shared with me that he has had those conversations with his wife. And then he also talked about how it's kind of a bittersweet moment. And I knew that his son died on my son's birthday is the same day as his son passing away five years ago. And, and I did reach out to him, not sure what to say. I just said, Hey, I'm thinking of you. And that was it because I don't know what you can say in something like that. But Ernie shared of what his son meant to him means to him. And, you know, I think it was a conversation. That's always the goal, not an interview. Because an interview is, I'm going to interrogate you. A conversation is, we're just talking. And I think allowing people to listen to something like that, maybe it felt different. And that's what I was proud of.
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Speaker 5: I said to someone, I'm like, does Ernie know he's still on air? Sometimes I'll say that when it's like, it feels like he's talking. By the way, so Barkley cried when Ernie announced it on air.
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Speaker 3: Do you think Paul will cry again? At your last show together.
00:15:51
Speaker 1: No.
00:15:52
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think you're right. Choked up?
00:15:54
Speaker 6: Does that count as crying, DP?
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Speaker 1: Yeah, for you, yes. Yes. I think, I don't know if anybody cries when I say goodbye. I mean, Todd will because he doesn't know what he's going to do with his life. But does Marvin, and maybe Marvin views me as a father figure, so maybe he cries because of that.
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Speaker 3: I don't know.
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Speaker 6: Dan, before I get choked up, we're going to let you go because I know you have a beer and a nap in your future.
00:16:21
Speaker 5: Yes.
00:16:22
Speaker 4: Yes. In that order. In that order.
00:16:24
Speaker 6: Of course.
00:16:24
Speaker 3: Thank you, guys. Have a good weekend. Yeah, you too. Great week.
00:16:27
Speaker 6: Yeah, that was DP talking about the Ernie Johnson interview. And that was one of mine that when we when I heard that going on as a producer, I just go, Dan's got this and let him handle it. He knows exactly where it's going, where it's not going. and how to deftly handle a touchy situation.
00:16:41
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, it's interesting. The parallels, obviously, between Ernie Johnson and Dan talking about retirement.
00:16:46
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:16:46
Speaker 3: Two legends. Great interview.
00:16:48
Speaker 5: By the way, Paul, I've never seen you cry.
00:16:51
Speaker 1: No.
00:16:52
Speaker 6: I got choked up on Al Michaels when I sat and ate steak with Al Michaels on the set that time because I was like, I can't believe I'm sitting with Al Michaels at 9 in the morning having a steak. So that's about as close as you're going to get.
00:17:01
Speaker 3: What if Caleb Williams leads the Bears to a title?
00:17:03
Speaker 6: No, no tears.
00:17:04
Speaker 5: You saw me cry in 2018 in person in Minnesota, whatever that stadium's called, when the Eagles beat the Patriots. Called my dad from the 50-yard line and said, Dad, we made it.
00:17:13
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, you were very choked up. You were curling on the phone, little tears down little Andrew's face.
00:17:17
Speaker 3: Then you said, we didn't do anything. He's like, your team did it.
00:17:19
Speaker 6: I was getting a beer at the concession stand. All right, it's time for a couple warm takes before we take a break and get Jack Collinsworth in. I'm going to go first with my warm take, and this one, a little obvi, but I want to get this on record. Ohio State, USC, NBC, Saturday night, Huge stage. Lincoln Riley the other day has press conference, and he felt a little defensive. I'd like him to be more defensive on Saturday night, if you know what I mean. But this game has everything you need, Lincoln Riley. All the eyeballs, Ohio State, you're facing a backup quarterback. You're facing the Heisman contender or Heisman favorite right now. You want to shut everybody up, win that game by one point, ten points, whatever amount of points you've got to do. You walk in Monday to your press conference, and you just go scoreboard. Because that's all real people care about. It's not that they like you or don't like you or have a problem with you or don't have a problem with you. It's just wins. Fans don't care about your tone, where you came from, this or that. They just want to win. They just want to get 10 plus wins and be in the playoff picture. USC's got this great freshman class, a lot of talent. Now that takes a while to get going, but now they're not freshman, freshman anymore. They've got eight games under their belt. You're a weird six and two. The other thing that's going on, though, with Lincoln Riley, and I'll bet you what's going on behind the scenes, is his representatives, his agents, are kicking the tires in the state of Texas. TCU, Baylor. But that is just the business of the sport. And it's not him being disloyal to USC. That's him finding a landing spot if things go south the next four weeks. So you're serving two different things. But all you've got to do is... Beat the Ohio State Buckeyes and point to the scoreboard on Monday morning.
00:18:48
Speaker 3: You know, it's funny.
00:18:49
Speaker 5: Usually schools and teams go to scout players.
00:18:52
Speaker 3: And, you know, say there's 30 scouts in the NFL.
00:18:55
Speaker 5: Are we going to have Baylor and TCU administrators in the stands on Saturday night watching Lincoln Riley?
00:19:00
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, because there's going to be a bidding war.
00:19:02
Speaker 6: Think about that. If you're Baylor or you're TCU.
00:19:04
Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:19:05
Speaker 6: You both want Lincoln Riley and maybe want a couple of his players.
00:19:08
Speaker 5: Oh, I was going to say, I hope that freshman class likes barbecue because they are headed to Texas.
00:19:12
Speaker 6: It's a very possible thing. At a smaller level, look at James Madison when Kurt Cignetti went to Indiana. I think he brought 12 James Madison players.
00:19:20
Speaker 3: That's the deal.
00:19:21
Speaker 5: I mean, obviously, Lincoln Riley, one of the reasons he got USC is he could bring Caleb Williams from Oklahoma to USC.
00:19:26
Speaker 6: Fair point.
00:19:27
Speaker 5: I'm going to stay in college football for my warm take. The Florida-Georgia game.
00:19:30
Speaker 3: Has me thinking this weekend.
00:19:32
Speaker 5: They're moved to Atlanta instead of Jacksonville because of renovations at the stadium.
00:19:36
Speaker 3: It's always a great game. But the SEC has.
00:19:38
Speaker 5: A major problem on its hand. They have too much depth. They are too good. Now, I know a lot of people say the SEC is not good. But when you add an extra SEC game and you have to play this bottom half, you look at these teams. some of them are ranked highly and they are in the bottom half of the standings. So you have a major problem because all your teams are losing. Now, in the spring, Kirby Smart saw this coming with the extra game, and.
00:20:01
Speaker 3: He openly complained.
00:20:02
Speaker 5: He said the committee who chooses the playoff does not understand strength of schedule. They do not care about quality of wins, and even if they say it, they absolutely will always go with a team with less losses. Now, Kirby was very, very adamant. in the spring saying this is gonna happen. Then what happens this year? You get Florida beating Ole Miss and Texas. You get South Carolina beating Tennessee, and Auburn beating Kirby, Spart, and Georgia. If Auburn can beat Georgia, anyone in the SEC can beat anyone. Meanwhile, UCLA is playing absolutely nobody, is going to storm to the playoff, and then get killed in the first round. I'm just saying like it is, UCLA. We know what's gonna happen because we've seen it a million times. Maybe they're Indiana and they'll win it all next year, but right now the system is so unfair And there's going to be upsets all fall long in the SEC. I guarantee A & M is going to knock somebody off, too, because they have.
00:20:51
Speaker 3: A $ 100 million payroll. They have tons of talent as well. The bottom of the SEC is just too good to help this conference.
00:20:58
Speaker 5: And it feels unfair to me that a conference is too good, therefore it gets less playoffs.
00:21:02
Speaker 6: Yeah, and this is so obvious. It's a great take by you because the people on the playoff committee should know they can't judge a team with zero losses like a team with two losses in the SEC. If you're Oregon and you played Portland and scored 70 on them, that win doesn't even count to me. It doesn't mean anything. A good loss in the SEC is more impactful. And so if you're on the playoff committee, you have to look at resumes. You absolutely have to look at resumes like you're looking at a student's resume and you're hiring them. And I hope that they're doing that. The AP rankings, I think, is different than the playoff committee.
00:21:32
Speaker 5: I hope. Well, the playoff committee actually went down to SEC, and because the coaches were all concerned about this, and said, don't worry, we're looking at different metrics this year. They can promise to look at different metrics for the next 100 years. They will never look at a different metric. They will always choose a team who has one or two losses. Last year, Texas deserved to get in with three.
00:21:50
Speaker 2: 100%.
00:21:51
Speaker 3: The only other thing, though, is.
00:21:55
Speaker 6: These teams, though, are still incentivized to occasionally put a cupcake in.
00:21:59
Speaker 3: Occasionally?
00:22:00
Speaker 6: Well, that's what's happened to the SEC. They took away a cupcake weekend when you used to play Wofford.
00:22:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know.
00:22:05
Speaker 6: You used to play East Carolina. Actually, East Carolina is pretty good. But now the cupcake is not available to the SEC.
00:22:10
Speaker 2: Right.
00:22:11
Speaker 5: So the ninth game is a killer. And the committee said that they would account for that. I guarantee they won't.
00:22:16
Speaker 3: All right.
00:22:16
Speaker 6: Coming up next, our guy Jack Collinsworth of NBC Sports will join us to talk about the NFC North, the NFC West, and the other teams that could be in it with the NFC.
00:22:24
Speaker 3: Stick around.
00:22:25
Speaker 6: Not so fast.
00:22:28
Speaker 2: Dang, man.
00:22:28
Speaker 6: You're flamethrowing.
00:22:30
Speaker 3: I hate the way this schedule works. You know that.
00:22:32
Speaker 6: I should be on the playoff committee. We should be on the playoff committee.
00:22:35
Speaker 3: Oh, I'd be amazing. We'd be great. We're thoughtful. You try. Welcome back to Not So Fast. Andrew Perloff, Paul Paps. All right. Week 8 in the NFL, big week. We're going to bring in Jack Hollingsworth to break it down.
00:22:47
Speaker 5: NBC Sports ranks on NBC Sports Now and, of course, part of Sunday Night Football final on Peacock.
00:22:54
Speaker 3: Jack, how are you doing?
00:22:55
Speaker 5: And Pauly's a Bears fan. Just tell him right now that Jeffrey Simmons is the greatest player on earth.
00:23:01
Speaker 7: I think they got a big hit with this one. A lot of teams may go two first-round picks. I don't know if that's the price you want to pay at the moment, but just watch in Chicago what they're doing on offense. the way Ben Johnson's coached him. I mean, since Caleb's come back, he's playing with a little of that edge and anger, and I think he heard some of the things people were saying about him. Now you pair a guy that I think is just hungry to win in Jeffrey Simmons. He's been at that high level of defensive tackle his whole career. He just needs to be on a good team, and now finally he's going to step into a team that needs him at that position, that has other good players surrounding him, especially on the offensive side of the ball. I think this team may be fit for a deep run here.
00:23:44
Speaker 6: You know, when we look at trades, they don't live in a vacuum. You have to look at the situation of that player. Jeffrey Simmons is under contract, 29, pretty expensive. But the Bears, cap room-wise, Caleb Williams still is on a rookie deal. They've got to pay him next year. And those draft picks are going to be, ideally, 25, 26, 27, 28. When you guys look at PFF, do you kind of grade trades by the semantics around them?
00:24:08
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think you take everything into consideration. And the nice part with this one was that the Titans picked up a large portion of that bill as it relates to Simmons, especially in 26. So they didn't have to take the full brunt of it in terms of the signing bonus. And really the hefty part of the salary was paid there. So it still frees them up to spend a little bit in free agency. But when you just look at what Ben Johnson's done, he wanted to fix the lines of scrimmage in Chicago.
00:24:36
Speaker 4: And he did.
00:24:37
Speaker 7: And he fixed the offensive line of scrimmage. And it's been a huge part of the success they've had because they're the number one run game in the NFL. Now all of a sudden, Caleb's dropping back and he's rhythm, timing, passing, which is something they've been trying to get out of him going all the way back to USC. So now to see Caleb's magic paired with some of that timing, and just make it easy on yourself, make it easy on our offensive line, easy on the receivers. It's been a formula for that offense, and now I think you'll see the defense get much better.
00:25:07
Speaker 5: Jack, by the way, loving the Pro Football Focus podcast with your dad, you guys chopping it up. It's funny, you don't defer to your dad at all, which I like. It's taken many years to get there. I want to ask about one PFF grade. Quentin Nelson goes from Indianapolis to Seattle. And when the trade happened, I said to myself, well, he must have fallen off because he is the most effective interior lineman in the football.
00:25:31
Speaker 3: How could he be traded? What does pro football focus say about Quentin Nelson?
00:25:35
Speaker 4: He's a monster.
00:25:36
Speaker 7: I mean, I'm looking at his grade right now, 85.7, which in our system is extremely high. It'd be a top three mark in terms of guards anywhere in the league. Third out of 75 guards. He is just a force of nature. I remember him all the way back to Notre Dame. I was at Notre Dame at the same time as him. He's just an offensive lineman's offensive lineman. He will lead that entire room. He'll be one of the favorites of guys like Zabel and Jones and Lucas and Sundell. And so I think he'll just make the whole group better. And now you'll start to see them getting their running backs back to and Price and Zach Charbonnet, the guys who are supposed to be leading that running back room and taking the pressure off Sam Darnold. So I think that will only enhance that. And Quentin Nelson is just a locker room guy that people will love, which I think will only add on top of.
00:26:28
Speaker 4: The player they got, the person they got.
00:26:30
Speaker 7: And clearly they're trying to win championships right now, and that's the piece they needed was another guard.
00:26:34
Speaker 6: Now, Jack, I know you're a pretty strong guy. You're in good shape. But when you were at Notre Dame with Quentin Nelson, you guys weren't rotating on the bench together, were you? You were kind of with the receivers?
00:26:43
Speaker 4: Quentin Nelson is one of those guys, if he's benching, you just leave the weight room.
00:26:47
Speaker 7: He's been that for the rest of the team, and I wasn't even on the team. He was just an absolute monster. He could hold his own on a Friday, Saturday night, too, if you know what I'm saying. He was just somebody that people liked to be around and just loves football. He loves being an interior offensive lineman. He's had that kind of success in the league. It's similar to Simmons, where He's always been a really high-level player on a team that just doesn't have enough to be a winning team. And now all of a sudden, he's really deserved and earned this chance to put together a run like he's going to be able to do here in Seattle. So honestly, I'm happy for both these guys. They've always been high-level players, and now they're on a high-level team.
00:27:30
Speaker 6: I want to stay with the NFC North for a little bit. Packers looked pretty good last night. The Bears looking better, as we talked about. The Lions, we're going to know more this weekend. Their offense looks good. Nobody will give credit to the Minnesota Vikings. And we were talking about it earlier on the Dan Patrick Show. If they had a dominant offense and a subpar defense, we would fall in love with them. But it's like there's nothing exciting about the Vikings' defense. But how do you look at the Vikings right now? Should we be in, all in, or all out?
00:27:57
Speaker 7: I don't know that they're as dominant as a record might tell you. If you just, you know, looked at it and said, well, this is the best team in football. I don't know that I'm necessarily sold on that point. But the interesting thing to me is that they've been able to blitz 80 plus percentage of the time and get away with it. At some point, they're going to get caught on that. And then what does Flores go to next? What is his change up? What is his curveball? I mean, this guy's been around a long time. So believe me, he has those. but the pressure they've been able to get and quarterbacks are, they're under siege after dropbacks. And so, I mean, I was talking with Jason Garrett about this on Sunday. It's hard to plan anything offensively. When the first thing you got to think about is who's going to hit me. And that's the first thing you got to worry about. Every time he gets a lot of scrimmage is going to be, because they'll put six, seven, eight guys on the line and you got to decide who are the four or five or six that are coming. And it's always a different guy. It's always a different guy in a different position and, he's just so creative with how he lines it up and how he chooses who he's going to bring. And then he's got a guy like Harrison Smith on the back end that he'll let be that Troy Polamalu factor of, hey, you just go do whatever you want to do and find a way to have somebody cover you when you do it. And so it just makes the whole thing so much more unpredictable because he's changing things at the last second on the field in addition to that.
00:29:18
Speaker 5: All right, Jack, so Sunday Night Football is Eagles commanders, not what we wanted out of that game, but somebody has to win the NFC East, technically.
00:29:25
Speaker 2: They do.
00:29:26
Speaker 3: If you have to pick a favorite right now, who do you got?
00:29:29
Speaker 4: I still like the Giants.
00:29:30
Speaker 7: People have kind of thought I was crazy about that, even when they lost their star quarterback in Jackson-Darden. It was Jameis Winston, but less about the quarterback position. for me on this one and more about just the style, the rugged style of football that Harbaugh brings. I grew up watching AFC North football. I know that he just wants to come hit you in the mouth. He wants to give the ball to Cam Scadamu 30 times and rotate through the running backs and just keep hitting you over and over and over again. But now to see some youth, some energy, some legs, some excitement.
00:30:02
Speaker 4: J.J.
00:30:02
Speaker 7: McCarthy has just looked awesome in a Giants uniform. Do I think he will do nothing but play perfect football?
00:30:08
Speaker 3: No.
00:30:09
Speaker 7: I think at some point you're going to see some of those same mistakes come up. But they have enough young star athlete pass rushers on defense. And their secondary has gotten better to where I think they have a variety of ways to beat you.
00:30:22
Speaker 4: And J.J. just becomes another piece of that.
00:30:24
Speaker 6: All right, Jack, before we get you out of here, we do a thing. Such thing as a dumb question. You played the sport in college. Now, when you're on the road, you're often doing your shots on the field. What's the worst turf you've ever seen played on NFL or even as a reporter? And what's the best, most luxurious turf grass you've ever played or been on as a reporter?
00:30:46
Speaker 4: Oh, that's a good question. That's a really good question.
00:30:49
Speaker 6: Because Notre Dame has gorgeous grass.
00:30:51
Speaker 7: Yeah, well, Notre Dame did. They ended up going away from that too. I mean, Notre Dame back in the day, they used to, you know, there was all the rumors that they would put a little extra water on it, grow it up a little bit, certain games. Yeah, there was all those rumors. And then they would have tons of muddy games. I mean, South Bend, it's either raining or snowing or ice cold. It's always some form of element when you go to school.
00:31:13
Speaker 6: How about NFL fields? You've walked on a lot of NFL fields. We see them on TV. Are there any where you're like, oh, man, this is a little choppy?
00:31:21
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean, honestly, I don't think there's one that jumps out that's bad.
00:31:26
Speaker 4: I think sometimes when you.
00:31:27
Speaker 7: Go to different places that haven't had them, it looks different than you're used to. We did the game overseas a year ago, and that field looked a little different, felt a little different.
00:31:37
Speaker 4: But they were still able to play on it.
00:31:39
Speaker 7: The one that I think is pretty nice is the Vegas field, where they'll roll it out, roll it back in. Arizona does something similar where they'll take it out and just treat the field perfectly all weekend, then roll it back in. like some of those grass fields where it still feels like turf, it's spongy and just tiny little pieces of grass. Like it was like you could lay on and it would be comfortable for me. Those are, those are sort of the world cup caliber fields that I think really every field should have in my eyes.
00:32:05
Speaker 5: I grew up in Philly. Ask your dad about the vet. Thank God they don't do fields like that anymore. All right, Jack, thanks for your time. We'll talk to you later in the season, bud.
00:32:14
Speaker 4: Great seeing you guys.
00:32:17
Speaker 6: That was fun. Good to have Jack Collinsworth on the show. Yeah, I went to Notre Dame to a game years and years ago, and I swear it was like four inches of grass. And I think they did it. They said they did it and watered it to slow down the opponents. But wouldn't it also slow down the home teams?
00:32:32
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, but that's your style of play. Plotting? Yeah, you want to go with a big running game.
00:32:37
Speaker 5: Think about traditional Notre Dame teams.
00:32:38
Speaker 3: Other than Montana, you've got to run down their throat.
00:32:41
Speaker 6: Did you ever go to the Philadelphia game, like a home Eagles game? And I used to watch it as a kid on TV. You went there a lot. It looked like there were seams and little parts.
00:32:50
Speaker 3: It looked like they painted with spray paint on concrete. It was an awful field. And that's interesting that Jack said they're all pretty good right now. And you're right. Even the bad ones are way better than when we were kids. I mean, Soldier Field was ridiculous, too.
00:33:02
Speaker 6: It's still occasionally pretty choppy over there at Soldier Field. I can't lie to you.
00:33:05
Speaker 3: All right.
00:33:06
Speaker 5: Coming up next, we go to the clip joint. Jason Garrett, aforementioned, was on the Dan Patrick Show. Had some really interesting comments that got Dan going.
00:33:13
Speaker 3: We'll have that next. Not so fast.
00:33:15
Speaker 6: I used to watch Eagles games, and you could see, like, large seams.
00:33:18
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely.
00:33:20
Speaker 6: It looks scary.
00:33:21
Speaker 3: Remember, there was a Bears receiver, Wendell Davis, I believe. Wendell Davis. Yeah.
00:33:30
Speaker 1: If you're running the Eagles, are you buying or selling?
00:33:36
Speaker 4: I'm still buying.
00:33:39
Speaker 2: You know, it's really a shame because they're a good football team, and they're absolutely decimated. And Lane Johnson retiring. They trade Juergens. The receiver's been out. The quarterback's been out. I still think, though, there's a lot of games to be played in that NFC East. And there's two and a half months left in this season. So if they can right the ship, I still think they got the people capable of winning that division. The disappointing thing for me with them is their defense. They're really, really banged up on the offensive side, but their defense has not been playing to the level that they have.
00:34:19
Speaker 6: Back on Not So Fast, Paps and Perloff, NBC Sports. That's Jason Garrett, the former Cowboys head coach, now works for NBC Sports. He convinced me. He convinced me, and here's why. I know the Eagles aren't playing that well, and that's being very nice. They're really banged up, but that division, you have to think to yourself, J.J. McCarthy is not Tom Brady anymore.
00:34:38
Speaker 3: Went to Michigan. Yeah, I know.
00:34:40
Speaker 6: That's even my point. That doubles the point. I would let this play out a little bit. If I'm the Eagles, I'm not sellers. They have too many good players to let go on a whim.
00:34:48
Speaker 5: Well, I think Jason Garrett, I think the cowboy blood runs deep. He's trying to sabotage my Eagles. Of course you're selling. You're 2-5. Your best player, arguably, just retired, Lane Johnson. They never win without right tackle Lane Johnson, and they're not winning now. I don't care if Jalen Hurts is there or not. With the offensive line being decimated, they traded Cam Juergens. They're 100% sellers. They're already selling. The fact that they were reportedly in on Quentin Nelson makes no sense to me. They have to sell what they can now and get back and rebuild.
00:35:16
Speaker 3: It's time for a rebuild. This team got old, Paul.
00:35:18
Speaker 6: But they could win three games in a row, and next thing you know.
00:35:22
Speaker 3: With Tanner McKee, a quarterback, how are they going to win three games in a row? He hasn't done anything.
00:35:26
Speaker 6: Six months ago, you were telling me they had a great backup of Tanner McKee.
00:35:28
Speaker 4: No, no.
00:35:29
Speaker 5: Andy Dalton was there six months ago. Then they cut him because he threw a pick. They have no idea right now. Here's the other thing. You saw that game last week. That defense has quit with a capital Q. I can't believe Garrett said that they should buy.
00:35:41
Speaker 3: I don't understand. Or you, too. How can you not rule?
00:35:44
Speaker 5: I mean, the Cowboys and Giants can't hold off Tanner McKee. What is wrong with those?
00:35:48
Speaker 6: What's the thing? I guess standing pat, I'm saying don't buy nor sell. Just let the season be bad.
00:35:53
Speaker 3: All right, let me ask you this.
00:35:55
Speaker 5: Minnesota Vikings call and say we'll give you a second-round pick for Saquon Barkley.
00:35:58
Speaker 3: Would you do it if you're the Eagles? I know his hamstring complicates things.
00:36:01
Speaker 6: A second-round pick from the Vikings?
00:36:03
Speaker 3: Yes. No, I would not.
00:36:05
Speaker 6: No, I would not because Saquon has too much left in the tank. He's too big of a star. He will be healthy, and you have three more very good years from him.
00:36:13
Speaker 3: Okay, so you're counting the future.
00:36:14
Speaker 6: It's worth a discussion.
00:36:15
Speaker 3: It's worth a discussion.
00:36:16
Speaker 6: It's a good point. Joe Thomas, speaking of trades, the great Joe Thomas, the offensive tackle who played a long, long time, with the Browns and didn't taste the postseason too often. Dan asked him when he was a Brown and he was at the top of his game, did he ever kick the tires about a trade? I never did.
00:36:31
Speaker 4: I was always happy in Cleveland.
00:36:33
Speaker 8: I always felt a great pride in building something special. I always felt a great connection to the city of Cleveland. You know, my three of my four kids were born there. And for me, I love the franchise. I love the organization. And I wanted to do it there. To me, it wouldn't have been worth doing if it wasn't building something great in Cleveland and giving the fans that Super Bowl title. And so even after I'd broken down in year 10 and realized we ain't doing it, we're not good enough. I'm fooling myself. We can't do it here anymore. I think at that point, you know, my career was already almost over. I mean, I only played one more season after that. And I felt that, okay, I'm not going to win a championship here, but what can I still do here to leave a mark and leave a legacy and be part of building something? And so we had a lot of young guys. And so at that point forward, my mindset was How do I help teach these guys the right way to do things to build the process for these guys so that when I do retire and I'm on the greener pastures, literally green pastures raising cattle, that I can look back on these guys and know that I had a part in helping these guys build the foundation of someday winning a championship.
00:37:39
Speaker 5: It took Joe 10 years to figure out he wasn't going to win a Super Bowl.
00:37:43
Speaker 3: I wouldn't say that to him because he's obviously terrifying. Yeah, he'd kill both of us. But he was dressed as someone from the love boat.
00:37:48
Speaker 5: So, you know, actually, I had a take on Quentin Nelson, who just left Indy.
00:37:52
Speaker 3: Got traded to the Seahawks.
00:37:53
Speaker 6: And he did not ask for a trade.
00:37:54
Speaker 5: No, he did not ask for a trade. Apparently, he loves Indianapolis. It's a great town. I totally get it. What if he was a rental, spent the rest of the season in Seattle, contended for a Super Bowl, then he's a free agent, and re-signed with the Colts? So he knew he wasn't going anywhere this year, got to play for a contender, and helped his old team.
00:38:13
Speaker 3: Maybe he goes back. I do get that loyalty.
00:38:15
Speaker 6: So you're saying Quentin Elkin could be such a team player that he consciously says, yes, I'm going to go to the Seahawks, do my best. I'm not hurting the Colts this year. I will not take a contract extension. And I'll come right back, keep my seat warm.
00:38:26
Speaker 5: Yes, and you get a third round and fifth round to help me and get some other linemen around me.
00:38:30
Speaker 3: Because I do get that loyalty.
00:38:31
Speaker 6: That's Ring of Honor stuff.
00:38:33
Speaker 3: Yeah, I do get that loyalty to stay on a losing team.
00:38:35
Speaker 5: We've seen it before. And Joe Thomas was so likable. I don't kill him for doing that at all.
00:38:40
Speaker 2: Oh, no, no.
00:38:41
Speaker 6: I think as a player, you think, I'm going to stick here. I'm going to build a family here. I'm going to build something here. And you always believe your team can get it done. Because otherwise, you wouldn't play the sport.
00:38:49
Speaker 3: Yeah, but in Cleveland, especially when he was there, it might be an exception.
00:38:53
Speaker 6: He was the only show in town he was playing tackle. All right, let's get to, only done on this show, the October VP, the MVP of October for the NFL. Perloff, you go first.
00:39:03
Speaker 3: Here we go.
00:39:03
Speaker 5: Okay, this is a bit of a cheap code, but I'm going to go with Jordan Love, the Green Bay Packers quarterback.
00:39:08
Speaker 3: So he's 4-1.
00:39:10
Speaker 5: In October after a very slow start to the season. Now, he has an extra game in October, so he has more yards than everyone, because the rest of this slate starts on November 1st.
00:39:19
Speaker 6: Oh, he gets a head start.
00:39:20
Speaker 5: Yeah, so I thought that was important because he has these huge numbers. He leads the league in passing yards, leads the league in touchdowns, and he's been actually awesome in October.
00:39:28
Speaker 3: But the real reason he's my.
00:39:29
Speaker 5: October VP is because nobody else on that offense is doing anything. Their run game is so bad. He has to carry them on his right arm. I think he's awesome. Will throw a lot of picks, always has thrown a lot of picks. He's kept it sort of under control this season, and I think he's the reason the Packers are contenders, and he showed that in October.
00:39:47
Speaker 6: Okay, good call by you. I like it. He gets an extra game that does feel like cheating, but there's no rules in October's BP. My October BP is this guy, Aaron Rodgers. No coincidence that we picked these. We didn't know each other's picks. Aaron Rodgers this month, nine touchdown passes. There are some people who didn't think he'd have nine touchdown passes on the season. Nine touchdowns, three picks, three and one now. Are they a contending team? Are they a Super Bowl team? I don't think anyone's confusing them for that. But they could win the division. They could put some distance between them. They're not beating the best teams in the world. But a lot of people question whether Aaron Rodgers should come back at all. And when conditions are good, with Jalen Warren, with the big tight end, with some blocking, yeah, he's still a good quarterback.
00:40:28
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I did not see this coming. He's playing really, really well. Although I am worried about the Cleveland game, Paul.
00:40:34
Speaker 5: So luckily for him, it's in November, so it won't affect his October VP. But Cleveland's got a great defense, and the Steelers, they're not afraid to win 13-10.
00:40:43
Speaker 3: So we'll see if Rodgers' numbers continue.
00:40:44
Speaker 6: It may not be too pretty, but he's getting it done. Let's get to getting the Heisman, the Heisman Trophy trackers we do on the Dan Patrick Show, and here on Not So Fast. All right, Pearl, I'm going to go. This guy had the week off last week, Jeremiah Smith, and he didn't lose a ground whatsoever. Now, some people caught up a little bit, but Jeremiah Smith, the wide receiver of Ohio State, He's got a backup quarterback, but he's got a national TV game versus USC. Did we mention that game yet? It's a perfect late October stage for him. If he can do what he normally does. With a backup, it makes him look even better.
00:41:16
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's a great point. Now, again, if I'm USC, I don't care who's quarterback. I put three guys on Jeremiah.
00:41:21
Speaker 3: Five guys. I still don't understand why teams don't. They do double team him.
00:41:25
Speaker 6: You burger join him. You five guys.
00:41:26
Speaker 3: Bracket that dude.
00:41:27
Speaker 5: By the way, did you see that wide receiver sneaking up right behind him?
00:41:30
Speaker 3: Malachi Toney in Miami.
00:41:32
Speaker 6: You picked him out in August.
00:41:33
Speaker 3: My preseason pick. The odds are up.
00:41:35
Speaker 5: But then again, he might face a tough defense in Notre Dame. So this is a week-to-week thing.
00:41:39
Speaker 6: But Malachi Toney has NC this weekend, which there will be enough eyeballs on that, and he's got Notre Dame next week, which is the big, big stage.
00:41:45
Speaker 2: Right.
00:41:46
Speaker 5: And if they get the W, then he's going to be a real front-runner. Wouldn't it be funny if we had one and two wide receivers? That is unprecedented. We've barely had any wide receivers win it.
00:41:55
Speaker 6: It'd be so refreshing. Coming up next, constructive criticism and the feel-good, plus a little more Halloween questions from you guys.
00:42:01
Speaker 3: Stick around.
00:42:02
Speaker 6: Not so fast.
00:42:05
Speaker 4: I like that.
00:42:06
Speaker 3: Yeah, wide receiver, wide receiver.
00:42:07
Speaker 6: That'd be fantastic. Bowls at the same time.
00:42:09
Speaker 3: And then the Oregon State kid, too. I mean, this could be huge.
00:42:12
Speaker 6: Jeremiah Smith, I think, is going to be the default guy. From 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Eastern, catch the full daily lineup of Sports Talk on NBC Sports Now. The channel is available live on Peacock and free on Roku, Samsung TV +, or wherever you stream. And NBCSN. Sometimes they replay our show later, 5 p.m. Eastern. I saw our show at 11 p.m. Eastern on a replay one time.
00:42:33
Speaker 3: Oh, that's very cool. Don't be afraid to watch it twice in one day.
00:42:36
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's good for you. If you watch it three times, you're a P1, as they say.
00:42:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah. Three, yeah, that's a lot.
00:42:41
Speaker 6: My kids don't watch it that much, but they'll watch two a day. They do two a day.
00:42:46
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, because we're on, I will catch the rear.
00:42:49
Speaker 5: Obviously, it's hard to watch while I'm on the show.
00:42:51
Speaker 6: It's hard to watch while you're on, but later on NBCSN or NBC Sports Network. On demand on Peacock.
00:42:56
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think we nailed that program.
00:42:57
Speaker 6: I think we nailed that one.
00:42:58
Speaker 5: Yeah. Okay, we're going to do something called Down to Earth, much like our intro there was bringing us down to Earth. We're going to look at teams who have big games this weekend and see if they're going to come back down to Earth.
00:43:10
Speaker 3: Fancy graphic there.
00:43:11
Speaker 5: Okay, let's start with the Vikings at the Lions. It's 6-0 Vikings. Is this the weekend that they come down.
00:43:16
Speaker 3: To Earth, Paul?
00:43:17
Speaker 6: I think this game is going to go to the buzzer. The Lions' defense is nothing special, and that's being complimentary. I don't know if the Vikings can generate more offense. They can't generate less. But they're not going to pitch a shutout. I think this is going to be 17-16, win it at the buzzer by the Lions.
00:43:32
Speaker 5: Okay, I'm very confused by this game because I do think Brian Flores has found an answer. But again, the Lions, they're just a better team. I know the Lions defense is not good. Someone had a great point on the DP show. We think of a team that is great offensively, is a great team, but we don't think of a defensive team that way.
00:43:49
Speaker 3: Still, I think the Lions are more well-rounded. Okay, 5-2 Browns at the 5-2 Steelers.
00:43:53
Speaker 6: Too many comebacks for the Browns. They're going to run out of gas one of these days. The defense was really nice. The Steelers are playing better than people think. They play those games overseas, and a lot of people don't see them. You mentioned their big tight end that you love. Jalen Warren is running really well for them. I think they've got a little more sauce.
00:44:08
Speaker 5: You know, I think this game is going to be very tight because I think the Browns defense is going to cause a lot of problems for the Steelers.
00:44:14
Speaker 3: They're going to get after Aaron Rodgers.
00:44:15
Speaker 6: Rodgers doesn't move.
00:44:16
Speaker 5: And I'm not sure Jalen Warren is going to continue this run. Okay, 5-2 Broncos against the Chiefs. Do the Broncos come down to earth? Can I just say this is a funny one because they've won three in a row and they don't feel like it.
00:44:27
Speaker 2: Right.
00:44:27
Speaker 6: When I look at the Broncos, I could see this game being like 21-10 Chiefs at half. And people are like, well, this is over. And the Broncos are never over. They're a fourth quarter team.
00:44:36
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think the Broncos don't even belong on this list because the Vikings and Browns are kind of playing way above their actual talent level. The Broncos are all actually underperforming, even at 5-2.
00:44:46
Speaker 6: But don't you think a lot of people nationally bailed on the Broncos after September?
00:44:49
Speaker 3: They absolutely did. But Bo Nix is not playing good football.
00:44:53
Speaker 5: Even against Arizona, a game where he had moments, he still was only 50%.
00:44:57
Speaker 3: Completion rate.
00:44:57
Speaker 6: You know, it's not good football, but sometimes it's clutch football. It's not like, if you gave him a grade for, I don't know what his PFF grade and things like this or quarterback rating, but his clutchness, if that's a word.
00:45:07
Speaker 5: Right, but that always comes back down to earth. You can't have, last year we had eight or nine comebacks in the fourth quarter.
00:45:12
Speaker 3: You can't do that regularly.
00:45:13
Speaker 6: And Kenneth Walker's probably salty after getting shut down last week.
00:45:15
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's going to be a great game. It's going to be a good NFL weekend.
00:45:18
Speaker 6: All right, it's time for a little constructive criticism. Your feedback, your thoughts, your comments to the show. Here we go. Great week on Not So Fast. Good job by all the crew here. Here we go, Perloff. We asked Halloween is Sunday. We're looking for some advice. How do you balance the Halloween obligations, parties, and kids with watching 13 hours of college football? Here are some more suggestions from you guys.
00:45:38
Speaker 3: Okay.
00:45:40
Speaker 6: Fire pit, outdoor TV, hand out candy to the kids, and beer to the adults. Andy O'Halick, I know this guy. He's from Wisconsin. Clearly a great person and a very smart person. This is what we do, Perloff. We do the fire pit next to the driveway, some music and spooky stuff going on, Lots of candy, and then I put a TV on the side for the dads.
00:45:59
Speaker 3: And how much beer do you have to have on tap?
00:46:02
Speaker 6: Well, you don't give beer to the kids. You have to card.
00:46:06
Speaker 3: We do not endorse that at Not So Fast. No, not at all.
00:46:09
Speaker 6: But I give out really good candy, not the big bars. But one time I had a crock pot of chili, and one of the kids thought, can I have a scoop of chili? And I didn't have a bowl for him, and I couldn't put it into his bag.
00:46:19
Speaker 3: Put it in his hand.
00:46:20
Speaker 6: Yeah, put it in his hand. Give me a bowl of chili.
00:46:22
Speaker 3: How much for a cup of chili?
00:46:22
Speaker 6: All right, here we go. Next one. Great job, Andy. I want to hear your recommendations for absconding, good word, with candy from your kids without being caught.
00:46:32
Speaker 5: That's been a many a fight over the years. I mean, everyone knows that Reese's Pieces are actually not candy. They're a nutritional, protein-packed snack.
00:46:39
Speaker 6: So it's a dad treat.
00:46:41
Speaker 3: Yeah, so my kids know that all the Reese's go to dad.
00:46:44
Speaker 6: Yeah, I just pull the I own the house card, and I just say, Kimmy, let me take a look at your bag. And they complain. But now my kids are going to parties and trick-or-treating less.
00:46:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know.
00:46:53
Speaker 6: I don't get much candy.
00:46:54
Speaker 5: I know.
00:46:54
Speaker 3: I know we don't have time to get this. My daughter is 14 and said, Dad, I'm too old to go trick-or-treating.
00:46:59
Speaker 6: She's retired?
00:47:00
Speaker 3: Yes, which hurts me because then I have to go trick-or-treating.
00:47:02
Speaker 6: What about the pressure from the one house in the neighborhood that gives out the full-size candy bars and makes you feel like less of a man?
00:47:08
Speaker 3: Oh, well, I don't really have that because I live in an apartment. But, yeah, I mean, I'm going to be in line with the kids. I'm like, my daughter's around the corner. Can I have the full-size Kit Kats?
00:47:16
Speaker 6: Nothing says suburban wealth like giving out full-size Twix.
00:47:19
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:47:19
Speaker 6: I mean, nothing. You could have a Mercedes. No, but if you're giving out full-size Reese's, that's it.
00:47:24
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, geez, we never had that as kids. Never. We had apples with razor blades in them.
00:47:30
Speaker 6: Hopefully you're kidding. All right, it's time for the feel-good here on Not So Fast. Let's check it out. What a night in Milwaukee. What a night in Green Bay. Here are the Brewers players coming out with that thing, which you could kill someone with, the big trophy for the World Series. They walk out. The place goes berserk. And they're on full scholarship, the Brewers.
00:47:49
Speaker 3: What a week in Wisconsin. Unbelievable. Did you see the racing guys were there?
00:47:54
Speaker 6: Yeah, the sausage race was going on in the end zone. These guys are doing Lambeau leaps.
00:47:59
Speaker 3: That is a very cool team in a cool city.
00:48:01
Speaker 6: The parade is going on in Milwaukee as we speak. As a Brewers fan, or maybe as a kid. Would you rather have a Friday take school off parade or a Monday take school off?
00:48:09
Speaker 5: Well, I mean, listen, it's great to have Monday off, but the fact that you got a Packers win last night, a parade Friday, and then Halloween on Saturday, that's undefeated.
00:48:17
Speaker 6: Spotted cow for everybody. Thanks for everyone here at the Dan Patch Show and Not So Fast. Great week of shows for both. We'll talk to you Monday. Enjoy the football.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Not So Fast with Andrew Perloff and Paul Pabst, where two.
00:00:05
Speaker 2: Longtime friends challenge each other on the biggest sports stories of the day.
00:00:10
Speaker 3: Here's Andrew Perloff and Paul Pabst.
00:00:13
Speaker 4: Not so fast, my friends.
00:00:16
Speaker 5: Welcome to Not So Fast. I'm Andrew Perloff. He's Paul Paps. Hope you're having a fun Halloween weekend already. No one's having more fun than the state of Wisconsin, Paul.
00:00:24
Speaker 6: No, Wisconsin beat USC last week. They win the World Series. Last night, the Packers do it. Before we move on, though, Halloween, you're notorious as a Halloween guy. Coach Harbaugh?
00:00:35
Speaker 3: Of course. Nobody's got it better than us.
00:00:36
Speaker 6: You got a nice crisp pair of khakis on with that?
00:00:39
Speaker 3: Yes, I do have. You can't really see. I'll just sort of go. Got khakis. I got the headset.
00:00:45
Speaker 5: I mean, this year I have to have a little bit of a befuddled look like I can't figure out why Justin Herbert's not any good.
00:00:50
Speaker 2: Right.
00:00:50
Speaker 6: You can't be a positive kid. Could be in years past. Drink some vitamin D milk, though.
00:00:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, no.
00:00:54
Speaker 5: Well, Jim Harbaugh has maintained his positivity. If I was him, I'd probably fire my offensive coordinator. Wow.
00:01:00
Speaker 3: Just facts, reality. All right. Let's get into the game last night. The Packers. Hold off the Panthers. It's funny because that game got weirdly close at the end.
00:01:09
Speaker 5: I picked the Panthers yesterday as an upset. I felt bad the entire game. I'm like, that was the dumbest pick ever. Then it's a game at the end because Jordan Love will give it up, but he's also brilliant at times, and the Packers come away with the win.
00:01:20
Speaker 6: Yeah, like you said, it's all feel-good in Wisconsin right now. I think if you're a Packer fan, you've got to feel pretty great about that game. What you've got to like is that your skill position guys, Watson, we'll talk about him in a second, Matthew Golden, Kraft, all healthy, lots of targets. Jordan Love had that one ugly pick, but otherwise he was dicing them up.
00:01:38
Speaker 3: The guy has to throw it 50 times a game.
00:01:40
Speaker 5: I've never seen a contender with a worse running game in my entire life than the Packers.
00:01:43
Speaker 6: I don't understand. I thought this would be Josh Jacobs back. You're facing the Carolina Panthers. Their defensive coordinator is gone and literally gone. But they gave it up last week to Tampa Bay. 1.9 yards a carry for Josh Jacobs. That was the opposite of what I thought was going to happen.
00:01:57
Speaker 5: So here's what happened, I think. They, by the way, just fired their defensive coordinator about an hour ago.
00:02:01
Speaker 3: Wouldn't matter.
00:02:02
Speaker 5: They got run all over by Tampa Bay. Then they just put everyone up in the box. So the Packers had no choice but to throw over the top, which they did. Josh Jacobs, by the way, got hit about three.
00:02:12
Speaker 3: Yards behind the line of scrimmage on every play.
00:02:14
Speaker 5: The Packers cannot run block, but they were amazing in their pass protection. So I think it's one way or the other they're going to get you.
00:02:21
Speaker 6: Also, the Packers got to the quarterback without Micah Parsons, who, like we say every week, should be back next week. We don't know about that.
00:02:27
Speaker 3: Right. He's supposed to practice starting next week.
00:02:28
Speaker 4: Right.
00:02:29
Speaker 6: But they look good on defense. They look great on offense. Not the running game. But I think the Packers, if you're a Packers fan, you have to think, we could have just won five in a row. They should have won the Lions game. The bigger picture. The kicking situation, they missed an extra point. Trey Smack, they have to move on from this guy.
00:02:43
Speaker 5: I know, and there was a situation at the end of the game where they probably could have trotted him out for a long field goal attempt and chose not to. This is going to cost them Ws. If you're this good of a team, Paul, you have to cut your kick right now.
00:02:55
Speaker 6: Well, I think it's also a really risky move in the preseason. You go with a young guy, a guy who's not even 23 years old yet, as a contending playoff team that's almost irresponsible to have a kicker with that little experience.
00:03:05
Speaker 3: I mean, his name is Trey Smack. You would think that he'd be awesome. Great name.
00:03:08
Speaker 6: Sounds like a wrestler name.
00:03:10
Speaker 3: I believe he was the only kicker drafted.
00:03:12
Speaker 5: So when you draft a kicker, that's why you don't draft a kicker, because then you have to commit to him and not do the preseason. But I will tell you one thing, though. I, I'm putting the Packers back in my Super Bowl mix.
00:03:21
Speaker 3: I'll tell you why.
00:03:22
Speaker 5: It's not because Micah Parsons is coming back.
00:03:24
Speaker 6: I think you're cloudy because of the whole Brewers thing.
00:03:26
Speaker 3: No, maybe.
00:03:27
Speaker 5: Jonathan Gannon, former Arizona Cardinals head coach, is killing it as defensive coordinator. Poor Bryce Young last night didn't have a chance. A, he was pressured. B, he was fooled all the time. The Packers defense without Micah Parsons is one of the stories of the year to me. They were all over this guy. Can you imagine if you add the best pass rusher in the NFL to this defense? I think it's a real interesting development for Green Bay, who you don't think of as defense.
00:03:52
Speaker 6: No, you don't. And with Parsons out, none of these guys, Van Ness, they don't get a lot of pub. And so it's all soaking up Micah Parsons. The other thing I would say, though, is... that if they can now run the ball. Now, I don't know if they would. I look at them as a team that should have traded for Quentin Nelson. I don't know if they need a running back, but that's a team that should have done it. The other thing last night that was wild, and that's going to be one of the legends of this game, Matthew Golden, the wide receiver, he's had a really good game, but Christian Watson, who's notoriously fragile. What do you say his reputation is?
00:04:22
Speaker 3: Oh, my God, he's always hurt.
00:04:23
Speaker 6: He's always hurt. Last night he gets hurt, goes down, has a rib or chest injury. They cart him off. And they had to take him literally to the hospital.
00:04:31
Speaker 1: St.
00:04:31
Speaker 6: Vincent's Hospital is three miles away from the stadium at Green Bay. They needed more than just the courtesy x-ray. But then they check him out, they give him the thumbs up, and he comes back and gets out of the ambulance. Great camera shot here of him getting out of the ambulance. It was like The Undertaker back in the day. It was like Mick Foley back in the day.
00:04:50
Speaker 4: Watch this.
00:04:50
Speaker 6: This is fantastic.
00:04:51
Speaker 3: Okay, it was really cool, but I have to tell you right now. I mean, look at this.
00:04:55
Speaker 6: It's like a WB movie. Here comes the star receiver straight out of the ambulance onto the field.
00:05:00
Speaker 5: We're laughing about it now. This is actually quite messed up. Because they said he was coughing up blood. I've seen enough movies to know when the guy is coughing up blood at the end of the movie, he's a goner.
00:05:11
Speaker 6: That's if they get shot.
00:05:12
Speaker 5: You can't cough up blood and play in a football game. So somebody either misspoke... or there's a major problem on our hand right now.
00:05:18
Speaker 6: I think they're going to love this. This is old school tough guy football.
00:05:22
Speaker 3: Internal bleeding, Paul. That's the only reason you cough up blood.
00:05:24
Speaker 6: It's internal. It's not external. No one can see it. The kids can't see it.
00:05:27
Speaker 5: You know, this is Friday morning or Friday afternoon. Wait until next Tuesday when Pro Football Talk gets a hold of this because Jalen Hurts, there was a... very weird situation. He was in London. He was riding the bike between plays. No one knew what the injury was. Then it turns out the Eagles are.
00:05:42
Speaker 3: In big trouble.
00:05:43
Speaker 5: If the Packers, if he was really coughing up blood, they cannot put him back out there.
00:05:46
Speaker 3: So I don't think he was really coughing up blood.
00:05:48
Speaker 6: You're probably right. It's probably an exaggeration or that become urban legend. But he was taken to an actual hospital. He didn't just go to a blue tent, like a Coleman tent on the sidelines. And they had to bring him back. So I think it's one of those situations. Not a head injury. It's not a knee injury. It's a tough guy injury. And he toughed his way through it. I wonder if his reputation... played part of this, like, hey, man, this is national TV. I want to get back out there.
00:06:09
Speaker 3: Oh, yeah, I hope not, because I would think safety is more important.
00:06:12
Speaker 5: Is that like Caleb Williams was worried so much about his reputation after he looked like he got shot and went down with a hamstring injury that turned out to be a two-week injury?
00:06:20
Speaker 6: Four-week injury.
00:06:21
Speaker 5: I mean, I think Caleb was really worried about that because he talked about it in two or three different press conferences. If that's the case, that's idiotic because you are a key player on a Super Bowl contender.
00:06:31
Speaker 3: I don't care if you're a tough guy or not a tough guy. You've got to stay healthy.
00:06:33
Speaker 6: Oh, I actually completely respect what Watson did last night. This guy has to win this game. He knows his team needs to win this game. And he said, I'm going to have a broken rib. There's nothing you can do for a broken rib. You can't tape it up. You just have to sit there and eat it. And he went out there and said, I'm going to play and had a really nice second half.
00:06:48
Speaker 3: He had two catches. He made no difference. First of all, he played in a Panthers team.
00:06:51
Speaker 6: Willis Reed had two points.
00:06:52
Speaker 3: But, yeah, I mean, it didn't matter if Christian Watson was there or not.
00:06:55
Speaker 5: Bryce Young was running for his life every time he called hike.
00:06:58
Speaker 6: Bryce Young probably has broken ribs.
00:06:59
Speaker 3: All right.
00:06:59
Speaker 5: Let's do some helmet stickers for the last night's game. Every big game, we do helmet stickers. I will start us off, and I'm going with a rookie. I believe he's a rookie. Deny Dennis Sutton, former Penn State defensive end. Now, this guy was supposed to be the next in a long line of first-round Penn State defensive ends. Chop Robinson, Adafi Owe, Micah Parsons, obviously, Abdul Carter. And he totally fell apart because the entire program at Penn State fell apart.
00:07:23
Speaker 3: Now, guess what? He's awesome.
00:07:25
Speaker 5: He might be as good as any of those guys. Fourth-round pick had a sack last night. and is leading what it turns out to be a ferocious Packers defensive line.
00:07:32
Speaker 6: And it's one of those things where, because Micah Parsons is out, you discover a new guy.
00:07:36
Speaker 5: Yes.
00:07:36
Speaker 6: And now you decide, this guy may be a game player, you know, like a guy who shows up in the big light.
00:07:41
Speaker 5: And he's a little different than Parsons. He's not just a pass rusher. He's big enough to set the edge. He is going to be a real factor for them.
00:07:46
Speaker 6: Okay, here's my helmet sticker, and this is wide receiver Matthew Golden. Matthew Golden, remember when the Packers took him? We were at that draft, and the Packers fans were like, finally, a first-round wide receiver out of Texas. This guy's an all-purpose player. He started really slow last year. I don't think he had a catch in the first 10 weeks. Then he kind of stepped it up later in the season, December, and in the playoffs. Matthew Golden's hitting his stride. I've talked about his drop season. They're happening less every week, fewer times every week.
00:08:11
Speaker 3: He leads the league in drops.
00:08:12
Speaker 6: But you know what? He could always go from there. If he set the bar really low for himself, high, low, either way, he's now in a position where he's recovering his career that started slowly.
00:08:21
Speaker 3: I love that.
00:08:22
Speaker 5: He had a big drop. It was a hard catch. And then he came right back and caught the next pass. It doesn't get in his head when he has dropped. So I don't mind dropping the ball if you still are going to get open on the next play.
00:08:32
Speaker 3: And the other thing is he's always open. He must be faster than we realize. Oh, yeah.
00:08:36
Speaker 6: He was a burner in college.
00:08:37
Speaker 3: Yeah, huge fan. He's great, even though he does definitely drop the ball.
00:08:41
Speaker 6: Yeah, less so, less so. Last time we had two last nights. How do we not give a helmet sticker to Christian Watson? The guy actually broke a rib and was coughing up blood and was given the last rights.
00:08:50
Speaker 3: Because he really wasn't that important in the game.
00:08:53
Speaker 6: First half he was. Let's stay with the NFL weekend a little bit here. Let's stay in the NFC a little bit here. People are talking about the Bears because of the trade the other day. People are talking about the Packers because of the nice win last night. The Lions, they always get some love. The Vikings are fighting for relevancy at 6-0.
00:09:10
Speaker 5: Well, 6-0, that's about to be 6-4 according to Dan Patrick and pretty much everybody else. Come on, we're sophisticated fans enough to know this 6-0 is against awful teams.
00:09:19
Speaker 6: But you remember a generation ago, look at the Vikings here.
00:09:21
Speaker 3: Yeah, they edged a Dolphins, 15-10. That's worse than a loss, Paul.
00:09:26
Speaker 6: It is worse than a loss.
00:09:27
Speaker 5: They edged a terrible Saints team. They beat a backup quarterback in Tampa Bay. They beat the Bears in the rain. And 16-10 over the Colts.
00:09:35
Speaker 3: That's another indictment. They need to show me something against the Lions.
00:09:38
Speaker 6: The next two weeks, they're at the Lions who have a high-end offense, and they're at the Bills who have the greatest quarterback people think in football. If somehow The Vikings squeak out two victories, defense first, over the next few weeks. You can't ignore them anymore. I know it's unlikely.
00:09:52
Speaker 3: Well, yeah.
00:09:52
Speaker 5: I mean, listen, if the Miami Dolphins go on a nine-game win streak, I won't be able to ignore them. What does that mean if somehow they're not going to win these.
00:09:58
Speaker 3: Two games in a row?
00:09:59
Speaker 6: Right. We can't compare them anyway.
00:10:11
Speaker 3: Well, they were playing real teams. They were not playing the Dolphins, Saints, Bucs.
00:10:16
Speaker 5: The NFC South wasn't so terrible back then, so you couldn't rack up wins.
00:10:21
Speaker 6: So they get no credit for 6-0, but the next two weeks decides everything.
00:10:24
Speaker 3: Absolutely.
00:10:25
Speaker 5: And I will tell you, Brian Flores famously has given Jared Goff, the Lions quarterback, some trouble.
00:10:29
Speaker 3: I checked it out.
00:10:30
Speaker 5: Flores was definitely the D coordinator when Goff was terrible in that Super Bowl against New England. So I'm very curious. You know, Brian Flores has been, quote, unquote, dialing up blitzes galore.
00:10:40
Speaker 3: Is anyone going to figure him out?
00:10:41
Speaker 6: Well, if you blitz every time. Kurt Warner was on the Dan Patcher show years ago, and he said great quarterbacks love when you blitz because they know someone's open. Jared Goff, the stat we heard today, also on the Dan Patcher show, Jared Goff has the best quarterback rating against the blitz this year.
00:10:54
Speaker 5: Yeah, but, I mean, listen, he was 0-2 against Flores last year. Those guys have a lot of history against each other. I think he mixes it up. But still, I'm not buying. I'm in the closer to what Dan said, 6-4 than 8-0.
00:11:05
Speaker 6: I almost want the Vikings to win just to mess with people.
00:11:07
Speaker 3: Yeah, that'd be awesome.
00:11:08
Speaker 5: All right, coming up next, DP shows up to talk about the Halloween costumes in the back.
00:11:13
Speaker 3: If you didn't see it on the Dan Patrick Show, it was amazing. We'll talk about that next. Not so fast.
00:11:18
Speaker 2: Paul.
00:11:19
Speaker 3: There were a lot of people dressed up as you.
00:11:20
Speaker 6: Yeah, rolled up sleeves, carrying around my big cup and my pad, walking really fast.
00:11:26
Speaker 3: Everybody has your shirts, too, it turns out. Yeah, it turns out a lot of nice button-downs.
00:11:33
Speaker 6: Back on Not So Fast, Paxton Perloff, NBC Sports. Time for the Midday Pick-Me-Up. Let me set the scene, Perl. Madison, Wisconsin, one week ago, Caleb Williams from USC, going to see his old team play against the Badgers. He's walking down the street, sees a lemonade stand, and I'm buy-in. What should Kayla Williams tip on a $ 2 glass of lemonade?
00:11:54
Speaker 3: Well, he's in enemy territory.
00:11:55
Speaker 6: They loved him, though.
00:11:57
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think you've got to drop a $ 20 if you're a quarterback. That's a lot of money to those kids.
00:12:01
Speaker 6: Would you drop a $ 20 and just get yourself a glass, or do you buy lemonade for the neighborhood?
00:12:05
Speaker 3: Buy lemonade for everybody. All of Madison. I love it.
00:12:08
Speaker 6: That's just what Kayla Williams does on or off the field. Just a straight good guy. Let's bring in our guy, Dan Patrick, from right down the hallway. D.P., Thanks for joining us from right at your desk. We got a question for you. Now, I know you know the history and I know the history, but go back to your rationale about Halloween and not dressing up as the host of The Dan Patrick Show.
00:12:27
Speaker 1: I would watch The Today Show and I'd see Matt Lauer and he'd be dressed up like Little Bo Peep. And I kept thinking, what if something happens that you've got to get out of that costume and now you have to talk about a serious story? it's never happened to me on every Halloween, but I do worry that something could happen. And then I'm dressed like, you know, somebody from Game of Thrones, just not going to go well.
00:12:56
Speaker 5: So you had the backroom guys dress up like Dan and the Danettes and they were unbelievable. If you didn't see it, go back and watch it. I actually was a little nervous for the guys. Dan Gardella in the back dressed like you, Dan.
00:13:07
Speaker 3: He was unbelievable. And a lot of people did Pauly.
00:13:10
Speaker 5: I was wondering, do you think those guys should have been nervous? Because there were people saying, oh, I don't want to make Paul mad or I don't want to make Dan mad. But they absolutely nailed it.
00:13:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that we wear certain things on a regular basis. I love corduroy. And Dan G tapped into that with the glasses. And then he had Dan Patrick's show sweatshirt. And then he had cords on. I mean, not really going out of his way to do, you know, like Dylan and Big Day Ray. They had on the Blades of Glory outfit that, you know, channeling John Heeter and Will Ferrell. There were some fun, fun attempts there. And even Paul, who normally likes to have a little cleavage showing Mario, who is the director. When he put on the shirt and I realized that he was playing Paulie, he even had Paul's walk down.
00:14:00
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:14:01
Speaker 6: He nailed the lean in walk, very purposeful. I was laughing my butt off.
00:14:05
Speaker 3: It was great.
00:14:06
Speaker 1: They had a lot of fun. And I mean, that's the environment that hopefully is here on a daily basis.
00:14:12
Speaker 6: The other reason we want to bring you in, yesterday we had Ernie Johnson on. You had Ernie Johnson on a day after him announcing his intentions to retire. And that interview, as it went on, changed directions. And It went to talking about his family and his son who passed away. When you're in the middle of an interview like that and you're seeing the direction it goes, how do you handle that?
00:14:31
Speaker 1: Well, I knew that there were some places that I'd like to get to with Ernie. And we're similar age. And I thought about those questions you have with your wife about now what do you do? And I have those conversations with my wife. I wanted to tap into that. And he shared with me that he has had those conversations with his wife. And then he also talked about how it's kind of a bittersweet moment. And I knew that his son died on my son's birthday is the same day as his son passing away five years ago. And, and I did reach out to him, not sure what to say. I just said, Hey, I'm thinking of you. And that was it because I don't know what you can say in something like that. But Ernie shared of what his son meant to him means to him. And, you know, I think it was a conversation. That's always the goal, not an interview. Because an interview is, I'm going to interrogate you. A conversation is, we're just talking. And I think allowing people to listen to something like that, maybe it felt different. And that's what I was proud of.
00:15:39
Speaker 5: I said to someone, I'm like, does Ernie know he's still on air? Sometimes I'll say that when it's like, it feels like he's talking. By the way, so Barkley cried when Ernie announced it on air.
00:15:47
Speaker 3: Do you think Paul will cry again? At your last show together.
00:15:51
Speaker 1: No.
00:15:52
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think you're right. Choked up?
00:15:54
Speaker 6: Does that count as crying, DP?
00:15:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, for you, yes. Yes. I think, I don't know if anybody cries when I say goodbye. I mean, Todd will because he doesn't know what he's going to do with his life. But does Marvin, and maybe Marvin views me as a father figure, so maybe he cries because of that.
00:16:17
Speaker 3: I don't know.
00:16:18
Speaker 6: Dan, before I get choked up, we're going to let you go because I know you have a beer and a nap in your future.
00:16:21
Speaker 5: Yes.
00:16:22
Speaker 4: Yes. In that order. In that order.
00:16:24
Speaker 6: Of course.
00:16:24
Speaker 3: Thank you, guys. Have a good weekend. Yeah, you too. Great week.
00:16:27
Speaker 6: Yeah, that was DP talking about the Ernie Johnson interview. And that was one of mine that when we when I heard that going on as a producer, I just go, Dan's got this and let him handle it. He knows exactly where it's going, where it's not going. and how to deftly handle a touchy situation.
00:16:41
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, it's interesting. The parallels, obviously, between Ernie Johnson and Dan talking about retirement.
00:16:46
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:16:46
Speaker 3: Two legends. Great interview.
00:16:48
Speaker 5: By the way, Paul, I've never seen you cry.
00:16:51
Speaker 1: No.
00:16:52
Speaker 6: I got choked up on Al Michaels when I sat and ate steak with Al Michaels on the set that time because I was like, I can't believe I'm sitting with Al Michaels at 9 in the morning having a steak. So that's about as close as you're going to get.
00:17:01
Speaker 3: What if Caleb Williams leads the Bears to a title?
00:17:03
Speaker 6: No, no tears.
00:17:04
Speaker 5: You saw me cry in 2018 in person in Minnesota, whatever that stadium's called, when the Eagles beat the Patriots. Called my dad from the 50-yard line and said, Dad, we made it.
00:17:13
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, you were very choked up. You were curling on the phone, little tears down little Andrew's face.
00:17:17
Speaker 3: Then you said, we didn't do anything. He's like, your team did it.
00:17:19
Speaker 6: I was getting a beer at the concession stand. All right, it's time for a couple warm takes before we take a break and get Jack Collinsworth in. I'm going to go first with my warm take, and this one, a little obvi, but I want to get this on record. Ohio State, USC, NBC, Saturday night, Huge stage. Lincoln Riley the other day has press conference, and he felt a little defensive. I'd like him to be more defensive on Saturday night, if you know what I mean. But this game has everything you need, Lincoln Riley. All the eyeballs, Ohio State, you're facing a backup quarterback. You're facing the Heisman contender or Heisman favorite right now. You want to shut everybody up, win that game by one point, ten points, whatever amount of points you've got to do. You walk in Monday to your press conference, and you just go scoreboard. Because that's all real people care about. It's not that they like you or don't like you or have a problem with you or don't have a problem with you. It's just wins. Fans don't care about your tone, where you came from, this or that. They just want to win. They just want to get 10 plus wins and be in the playoff picture. USC's got this great freshman class, a lot of talent. Now that takes a while to get going, but now they're not freshman, freshman anymore. They've got eight games under their belt. You're a weird six and two. The other thing that's going on, though, with Lincoln Riley, and I'll bet you what's going on behind the scenes, is his representatives, his agents, are kicking the tires in the state of Texas. TCU, Baylor. But that is just the business of the sport. And it's not him being disloyal to USC. That's him finding a landing spot if things go south the next four weeks. So you're serving two different things. But all you've got to do is... Beat the Ohio State Buckeyes and point to the scoreboard on Monday morning.
00:18:48
Speaker 3: You know, it's funny.
00:18:49
Speaker 5: Usually schools and teams go to scout players.
00:18:52
Speaker 3: And, you know, say there's 30 scouts in the NFL.
00:18:55
Speaker 5: Are we going to have Baylor and TCU administrators in the stands on Saturday night watching Lincoln Riley?
00:19:00
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, because there's going to be a bidding war.
00:19:02
Speaker 6: Think about that. If you're Baylor or you're TCU.
00:19:04
Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:19:05
Speaker 6: You both want Lincoln Riley and maybe want a couple of his players.
00:19:08
Speaker 5: Oh, I was going to say, I hope that freshman class likes barbecue because they are headed to Texas.
00:19:12
Speaker 6: It's a very possible thing. At a smaller level, look at James Madison when Kurt Cignetti went to Indiana. I think he brought 12 James Madison players.
00:19:20
Speaker 3: That's the deal.
00:19:21
Speaker 5: I mean, obviously, Lincoln Riley, one of the reasons he got USC is he could bring Caleb Williams from Oklahoma to USC.
00:19:26
Speaker 6: Fair point.
00:19:27
Speaker 5: I'm going to stay in college football for my warm take. The Florida-Georgia game.
00:19:30
Speaker 3: Has me thinking this weekend.
00:19:32
Speaker 5: They're moved to Atlanta instead of Jacksonville because of renovations at the stadium.
00:19:36
Speaker 3: It's always a great game. But the SEC has.
00:19:38
Speaker 5: A major problem on its hand. They have too much depth. They are too good. Now, I know a lot of people say the SEC is not good. But when you add an extra SEC game and you have to play this bottom half, you look at these teams. some of them are ranked highly and they are in the bottom half of the standings. So you have a major problem because all your teams are losing. Now, in the spring, Kirby Smart saw this coming with the extra game, and.
00:20:01
Speaker 3: He openly complained.
00:20:02
Speaker 5: He said the committee who chooses the playoff does not understand strength of schedule. They do not care about quality of wins, and even if they say it, they absolutely will always go with a team with less losses. Now, Kirby was very, very adamant. in the spring saying this is gonna happen. Then what happens this year? You get Florida beating Ole Miss and Texas. You get South Carolina beating Tennessee, and Auburn beating Kirby, Spart, and Georgia. If Auburn can beat Georgia, anyone in the SEC can beat anyone. Meanwhile, UCLA is playing absolutely nobody, is going to storm to the playoff, and then get killed in the first round. I'm just saying like it is, UCLA. We know what's gonna happen because we've seen it a million times. Maybe they're Indiana and they'll win it all next year, but right now the system is so unfair And there's going to be upsets all fall long in the SEC. I guarantee A & M is going to knock somebody off, too, because they have.
00:20:51
Speaker 3: A $ 100 million payroll. They have tons of talent as well. The bottom of the SEC is just too good to help this conference.
00:20:58
Speaker 5: And it feels unfair to me that a conference is too good, therefore it gets less playoffs.
00:21:02
Speaker 6: Yeah, and this is so obvious. It's a great take by you because the people on the playoff committee should know they can't judge a team with zero losses like a team with two losses in the SEC. If you're Oregon and you played Portland and scored 70 on them, that win doesn't even count to me. It doesn't mean anything. A good loss in the SEC is more impactful. And so if you're on the playoff committee, you have to look at resumes. You absolutely have to look at resumes like you're looking at a student's resume and you're hiring them. And I hope that they're doing that. The AP rankings, I think, is different than the playoff committee.
00:21:32
Speaker 5: I hope. Well, the playoff committee actually went down to SEC, and because the coaches were all concerned about this, and said, don't worry, we're looking at different metrics this year. They can promise to look at different metrics for the next 100 years. They will never look at a different metric. They will always choose a team who has one or two losses. Last year, Texas deserved to get in with three.
00:21:50
Speaker 2: 100%.
00:21:51
Speaker 3: The only other thing, though, is.
00:21:55
Speaker 6: These teams, though, are still incentivized to occasionally put a cupcake in.
00:21:59
Speaker 3: Occasionally?
00:22:00
Speaker 6: Well, that's what's happened to the SEC. They took away a cupcake weekend when you used to play Wofford.
00:22:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know.
00:22:05
Speaker 6: You used to play East Carolina. Actually, East Carolina is pretty good. But now the cupcake is not available to the SEC.
00:22:10
Speaker 2: Right.
00:22:11
Speaker 5: So the ninth game is a killer. And the committee said that they would account for that. I guarantee they won't.
00:22:16
Speaker 3: All right.
00:22:16
Speaker 6: Coming up next, our guy Jack Collinsworth of NBC Sports will join us to talk about the NFC North, the NFC West, and the other teams that could be in it with the NFC.
00:22:24
Speaker 3: Stick around.
00:22:25
Speaker 6: Not so fast.
00:22:28
Speaker 2: Dang, man.
00:22:28
Speaker 6: You're flamethrowing.
00:22:30
Speaker 3: I hate the way this schedule works. You know that.
00:22:32
Speaker 6: I should be on the playoff committee. We should be on the playoff committee.
00:22:35
Speaker 3: Oh, I'd be amazing. We'd be great. We're thoughtful. You try. Welcome back to Not So Fast. Andrew Perloff, Paul Paps. All right. Week 8 in the NFL, big week. We're going to bring in Jack Hollingsworth to break it down.
00:22:47
Speaker 5: NBC Sports ranks on NBC Sports Now and, of course, part of Sunday Night Football final on Peacock.
00:22:54
Speaker 3: Jack, how are you doing?
00:22:55
Speaker 5: And Pauly's a Bears fan. Just tell him right now that Jeffrey Simmons is the greatest player on earth.
00:23:01
Speaker 7: I think they got a big hit with this one. A lot of teams may go two first-round picks. I don't know if that's the price you want to pay at the moment, but just watch in Chicago what they're doing on offense. the way Ben Johnson's coached him. I mean, since Caleb's come back, he's playing with a little of that edge and anger, and I think he heard some of the things people were saying about him. Now you pair a guy that I think is just hungry to win in Jeffrey Simmons. He's been at that high level of defensive tackle his whole career. He just needs to be on a good team, and now finally he's going to step into a team that needs him at that position, that has other good players surrounding him, especially on the offensive side of the ball. I think this team may be fit for a deep run here.
00:23:44
Speaker 6: You know, when we look at trades, they don't live in a vacuum. You have to look at the situation of that player. Jeffrey Simmons is under contract, 29, pretty expensive. But the Bears, cap room-wise, Caleb Williams still is on a rookie deal. They've got to pay him next year. And those draft picks are going to be, ideally, 25, 26, 27, 28. When you guys look at PFF, do you kind of grade trades by the semantics around them?
00:24:08
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think you take everything into consideration. And the nice part with this one was that the Titans picked up a large portion of that bill as it relates to Simmons, especially in 26. So they didn't have to take the full brunt of it in terms of the signing bonus. And really the hefty part of the salary was paid there. So it still frees them up to spend a little bit in free agency. But when you just look at what Ben Johnson's done, he wanted to fix the lines of scrimmage in Chicago.
00:24:36
Speaker 4: And he did.
00:24:37
Speaker 7: And he fixed the offensive line of scrimmage. And it's been a huge part of the success they've had because they're the number one run game in the NFL. Now all of a sudden, Caleb's dropping back and he's rhythm, timing, passing, which is something they've been trying to get out of him going all the way back to USC. So now to see Caleb's magic paired with some of that timing, and just make it easy on yourself, make it easy on our offensive line, easy on the receivers. It's been a formula for that offense, and now I think you'll see the defense get much better.
00:25:07
Speaker 5: Jack, by the way, loving the Pro Football Focus podcast with your dad, you guys chopping it up. It's funny, you don't defer to your dad at all, which I like. It's taken many years to get there. I want to ask about one PFF grade. Quentin Nelson goes from Indianapolis to Seattle. And when the trade happened, I said to myself, well, he must have fallen off because he is the most effective interior lineman in the football.
00:25:31
Speaker 3: How could he be traded? What does pro football focus say about Quentin Nelson?
00:25:35
Speaker 4: He's a monster.
00:25:36
Speaker 7: I mean, I'm looking at his grade right now, 85.7, which in our system is extremely high. It'd be a top three mark in terms of guards anywhere in the league. Third out of 75 guards. He is just a force of nature. I remember him all the way back to Notre Dame. I was at Notre Dame at the same time as him. He's just an offensive lineman's offensive lineman. He will lead that entire room. He'll be one of the favorites of guys like Zabel and Jones and Lucas and Sundell. And so I think he'll just make the whole group better. And now you'll start to see them getting their running backs back to and Price and Zach Charbonnet, the guys who are supposed to be leading that running back room and taking the pressure off Sam Darnold. So I think that will only enhance that. And Quentin Nelson is just a locker room guy that people will love, which I think will only add on top of.
00:26:28
Speaker 4: The player they got, the person they got.
00:26:30
Speaker 7: And clearly they're trying to win championships right now, and that's the piece they needed was another guard.
00:26:34
Speaker 6: Now, Jack, I know you're a pretty strong guy. You're in good shape. But when you were at Notre Dame with Quentin Nelson, you guys weren't rotating on the bench together, were you? You were kind of with the receivers?
00:26:43
Speaker 4: Quentin Nelson is one of those guys, if he's benching, you just leave the weight room.
00:26:47
Speaker 7: He's been that for the rest of the team, and I wasn't even on the team. He was just an absolute monster. He could hold his own on a Friday, Saturday night, too, if you know what I'm saying. He was just somebody that people liked to be around and just loves football. He loves being an interior offensive lineman. He's had that kind of success in the league. It's similar to Simmons, where He's always been a really high-level player on a team that just doesn't have enough to be a winning team. And now all of a sudden, he's really deserved and earned this chance to put together a run like he's going to be able to do here in Seattle. So honestly, I'm happy for both these guys. They've always been high-level players, and now they're on a high-level team.
00:27:30
Speaker 6: I want to stay with the NFC North for a little bit. Packers looked pretty good last night. The Bears looking better, as we talked about. The Lions, we're going to know more this weekend. Their offense looks good. Nobody will give credit to the Minnesota Vikings. And we were talking about it earlier on the Dan Patrick Show. If they had a dominant offense and a subpar defense, we would fall in love with them. But it's like there's nothing exciting about the Vikings' defense. But how do you look at the Vikings right now? Should we be in, all in, or all out?
00:27:57
Speaker 7: I don't know that they're as dominant as a record might tell you. If you just, you know, looked at it and said, well, this is the best team in football. I don't know that I'm necessarily sold on that point. But the interesting thing to me is that they've been able to blitz 80 plus percentage of the time and get away with it. At some point, they're going to get caught on that. And then what does Flores go to next? What is his change up? What is his curveball? I mean, this guy's been around a long time. So believe me, he has those. but the pressure they've been able to get and quarterbacks are, they're under siege after dropbacks. And so, I mean, I was talking with Jason Garrett about this on Sunday. It's hard to plan anything offensively. When the first thing you got to think about is who's going to hit me. And that's the first thing you got to worry about. Every time he gets a lot of scrimmage is going to be, because they'll put six, seven, eight guys on the line and you got to decide who are the four or five or six that are coming. And it's always a different guy. It's always a different guy in a different position and, he's just so creative with how he lines it up and how he chooses who he's going to bring. And then he's got a guy like Harrison Smith on the back end that he'll let be that Troy Polamalu factor of, hey, you just go do whatever you want to do and find a way to have somebody cover you when you do it. And so it just makes the whole thing so much more unpredictable because he's changing things at the last second on the field in addition to that.
00:29:18
Speaker 5: All right, Jack, so Sunday Night Football is Eagles commanders, not what we wanted out of that game, but somebody has to win the NFC East, technically.
00:29:25
Speaker 2: They do.
00:29:26
Speaker 3: If you have to pick a favorite right now, who do you got?
00:29:29
Speaker 4: I still like the Giants.
00:29:30
Speaker 7: People have kind of thought I was crazy about that, even when they lost their star quarterback in Jackson-Darden. It was Jameis Winston, but less about the quarterback position. for me on this one and more about just the style, the rugged style of football that Harbaugh brings. I grew up watching AFC North football. I know that he just wants to come hit you in the mouth. He wants to give the ball to Cam Scadamu 30 times and rotate through the running backs and just keep hitting you over and over and over again. But now to see some youth, some energy, some legs, some excitement.
00:30:02
Speaker 4: J.J.
00:30:02
Speaker 7: McCarthy has just looked awesome in a Giants uniform. Do I think he will do nothing but play perfect football?
00:30:08
Speaker 3: No.
00:30:09
Speaker 7: I think at some point you're going to see some of those same mistakes come up. But they have enough young star athlete pass rushers on defense. And their secondary has gotten better to where I think they have a variety of ways to beat you.
00:30:22
Speaker 4: And J.J. just becomes another piece of that.
00:30:24
Speaker 6: All right, Jack, before we get you out of here, we do a thing. Such thing as a dumb question. You played the sport in college. Now, when you're on the road, you're often doing your shots on the field. What's the worst turf you've ever seen played on NFL or even as a reporter? And what's the best, most luxurious turf grass you've ever played or been on as a reporter?
00:30:46
Speaker 4: Oh, that's a good question. That's a really good question.
00:30:49
Speaker 6: Because Notre Dame has gorgeous grass.
00:30:51
Speaker 7: Yeah, well, Notre Dame did. They ended up going away from that too. I mean, Notre Dame back in the day, they used to, you know, there was all the rumors that they would put a little extra water on it, grow it up a little bit, certain games. Yeah, there was all those rumors. And then they would have tons of muddy games. I mean, South Bend, it's either raining or snowing or ice cold. It's always some form of element when you go to school.
00:31:13
Speaker 6: How about NFL fields? You've walked on a lot of NFL fields. We see them on TV. Are there any where you're like, oh, man, this is a little choppy?
00:31:21
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean, honestly, I don't think there's one that jumps out that's bad.
00:31:26
Speaker 4: I think sometimes when you.
00:31:27
Speaker 7: Go to different places that haven't had them, it looks different than you're used to. We did the game overseas a year ago, and that field looked a little different, felt a little different.
00:31:37
Speaker 4: But they were still able to play on it.
00:31:39
Speaker 7: The one that I think is pretty nice is the Vegas field, where they'll roll it out, roll it back in. Arizona does something similar where they'll take it out and just treat the field perfectly all weekend, then roll it back in. like some of those grass fields where it still feels like turf, it's spongy and just tiny little pieces of grass. Like it was like you could lay on and it would be comfortable for me. Those are, those are sort of the world cup caliber fields that I think really every field should have in my eyes.
00:32:05
Speaker 5: I grew up in Philly. Ask your dad about the vet. Thank God they don't do fields like that anymore. All right, Jack, thanks for your time. We'll talk to you later in the season, bud.
00:32:14
Speaker 4: Great seeing you guys.
00:32:17
Speaker 6: That was fun. Good to have Jack Collinsworth on the show. Yeah, I went to Notre Dame to a game years and years ago, and I swear it was like four inches of grass. And I think they did it. They said they did it and watered it to slow down the opponents. But wouldn't it also slow down the home teams?
00:32:32
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, but that's your style of play. Plotting? Yeah, you want to go with a big running game.
00:32:37
Speaker 5: Think about traditional Notre Dame teams.
00:32:38
Speaker 3: Other than Montana, you've got to run down their throat.
00:32:41
Speaker 6: Did you ever go to the Philadelphia game, like a home Eagles game? And I used to watch it as a kid on TV. You went there a lot. It looked like there were seams and little parts.
00:32:50
Speaker 3: It looked like they painted with spray paint on concrete. It was an awful field. And that's interesting that Jack said they're all pretty good right now. And you're right. Even the bad ones are way better than when we were kids. I mean, Soldier Field was ridiculous, too.
00:33:02
Speaker 6: It's still occasionally pretty choppy over there at Soldier Field. I can't lie to you.
00:33:05
Speaker 3: All right.
00:33:06
Speaker 5: Coming up next, we go to the clip joint. Jason Garrett, aforementioned, was on the Dan Patrick Show. Had some really interesting comments that got Dan going.
00:33:13
Speaker 3: We'll have that next. Not so fast.
00:33:15
Speaker 6: I used to watch Eagles games, and you could see, like, large seams.
00:33:18
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely.
00:33:20
Speaker 6: It looks scary.
00:33:21
Speaker 3: Remember, there was a Bears receiver, Wendell Davis, I believe. Wendell Davis. Yeah.
00:33:30
Speaker 1: If you're running the Eagles, are you buying or selling?
00:33:36
Speaker 4: I'm still buying.
00:33:39
Speaker 2: You know, it's really a shame because they're a good football team, and they're absolutely decimated. And Lane Johnson retiring. They trade Juergens. The receiver's been out. The quarterback's been out. I still think, though, there's a lot of games to be played in that NFC East. And there's two and a half months left in this season. So if they can right the ship, I still think they got the people capable of winning that division. The disappointing thing for me with them is their defense. They're really, really banged up on the offensive side, but their defense has not been playing to the level that they have.
00:34:19
Speaker 6: Back on Not So Fast, Paps and Perloff, NBC Sports. That's Jason Garrett, the former Cowboys head coach, now works for NBC Sports. He convinced me. He convinced me, and here's why. I know the Eagles aren't playing that well, and that's being very nice. They're really banged up, but that division, you have to think to yourself, J.J. McCarthy is not Tom Brady anymore.
00:34:38
Speaker 3: Went to Michigan. Yeah, I know.
00:34:40
Speaker 6: That's even my point. That doubles the point. I would let this play out a little bit. If I'm the Eagles, I'm not sellers. They have too many good players to let go on a whim.
00:34:48
Speaker 5: Well, I think Jason Garrett, I think the cowboy blood runs deep. He's trying to sabotage my Eagles. Of course you're selling. You're 2-5. Your best player, arguably, just retired, Lane Johnson. They never win without right tackle Lane Johnson, and they're not winning now. I don't care if Jalen Hurts is there or not. With the offensive line being decimated, they traded Cam Juergens. They're 100% sellers. They're already selling. The fact that they were reportedly in on Quentin Nelson makes no sense to me. They have to sell what they can now and get back and rebuild.
00:35:16
Speaker 3: It's time for a rebuild. This team got old, Paul.
00:35:18
Speaker 6: But they could win three games in a row, and next thing you know.
00:35:22
Speaker 3: With Tanner McKee, a quarterback, how are they going to win three games in a row? He hasn't done anything.
00:35:26
Speaker 6: Six months ago, you were telling me they had a great backup of Tanner McKee.
00:35:28
Speaker 4: No, no.
00:35:29
Speaker 5: Andy Dalton was there six months ago. Then they cut him because he threw a pick. They have no idea right now. Here's the other thing. You saw that game last week. That defense has quit with a capital Q. I can't believe Garrett said that they should buy.
00:35:41
Speaker 3: I don't understand. Or you, too. How can you not rule?
00:35:44
Speaker 5: I mean, the Cowboys and Giants can't hold off Tanner McKee. What is wrong with those?
00:35:48
Speaker 6: What's the thing? I guess standing pat, I'm saying don't buy nor sell. Just let the season be bad.
00:35:53
Speaker 3: All right, let me ask you this.
00:35:55
Speaker 5: Minnesota Vikings call and say we'll give you a second-round pick for Saquon Barkley.
00:35:58
Speaker 3: Would you do it if you're the Eagles? I know his hamstring complicates things.
00:36:01
Speaker 6: A second-round pick from the Vikings?
00:36:03
Speaker 3: Yes. No, I would not.
00:36:05
Speaker 6: No, I would not because Saquon has too much left in the tank. He's too big of a star. He will be healthy, and you have three more very good years from him.
00:36:13
Speaker 3: Okay, so you're counting the future.
00:36:14
Speaker 6: It's worth a discussion.
00:36:15
Speaker 3: It's worth a discussion.
00:36:16
Speaker 6: It's a good point. Joe Thomas, speaking of trades, the great Joe Thomas, the offensive tackle who played a long, long time, with the Browns and didn't taste the postseason too often. Dan asked him when he was a Brown and he was at the top of his game, did he ever kick the tires about a trade? I never did.
00:36:31
Speaker 4: I was always happy in Cleveland.
00:36:33
Speaker 8: I always felt a great pride in building something special. I always felt a great connection to the city of Cleveland. You know, my three of my four kids were born there. And for me, I love the franchise. I love the organization. And I wanted to do it there. To me, it wouldn't have been worth doing if it wasn't building something great in Cleveland and giving the fans that Super Bowl title. And so even after I'd broken down in year 10 and realized we ain't doing it, we're not good enough. I'm fooling myself. We can't do it here anymore. I think at that point, you know, my career was already almost over. I mean, I only played one more season after that. And I felt that, okay, I'm not going to win a championship here, but what can I still do here to leave a mark and leave a legacy and be part of building something? And so we had a lot of young guys. And so at that point forward, my mindset was How do I help teach these guys the right way to do things to build the process for these guys so that when I do retire and I'm on the greener pastures, literally green pastures raising cattle, that I can look back on these guys and know that I had a part in helping these guys build the foundation of someday winning a championship.
00:37:39
Speaker 5: It took Joe 10 years to figure out he wasn't going to win a Super Bowl.
00:37:43
Speaker 3: I wouldn't say that to him because he's obviously terrifying. Yeah, he'd kill both of us. But he was dressed as someone from the love boat.
00:37:48
Speaker 5: So, you know, actually, I had a take on Quentin Nelson, who just left Indy.
00:37:52
Speaker 3: Got traded to the Seahawks.
00:37:53
Speaker 6: And he did not ask for a trade.
00:37:54
Speaker 5: No, he did not ask for a trade. Apparently, he loves Indianapolis. It's a great town. I totally get it. What if he was a rental, spent the rest of the season in Seattle, contended for a Super Bowl, then he's a free agent, and re-signed with the Colts? So he knew he wasn't going anywhere this year, got to play for a contender, and helped his old team.
00:38:13
Speaker 3: Maybe he goes back. I do get that loyalty.
00:38:15
Speaker 6: So you're saying Quentin Elkin could be such a team player that he consciously says, yes, I'm going to go to the Seahawks, do my best. I'm not hurting the Colts this year. I will not take a contract extension. And I'll come right back, keep my seat warm.
00:38:26
Speaker 5: Yes, and you get a third round and fifth round to help me and get some other linemen around me.
00:38:30
Speaker 3: Because I do get that loyalty.
00:38:31
Speaker 6: That's Ring of Honor stuff.
00:38:33
Speaker 3: Yeah, I do get that loyalty to stay on a losing team.
00:38:35
Speaker 5: We've seen it before. And Joe Thomas was so likable. I don't kill him for doing that at all.
00:38:40
Speaker 2: Oh, no, no.
00:38:41
Speaker 6: I think as a player, you think, I'm going to stick here. I'm going to build a family here. I'm going to build something here. And you always believe your team can get it done. Because otherwise, you wouldn't play the sport.
00:38:49
Speaker 3: Yeah, but in Cleveland, especially when he was there, it might be an exception.
00:38:53
Speaker 6: He was the only show in town he was playing tackle. All right, let's get to, only done on this show, the October VP, the MVP of October for the NFL. Perloff, you go first.
00:39:03
Speaker 3: Here we go.
00:39:03
Speaker 5: Okay, this is a bit of a cheap code, but I'm going to go with Jordan Love, the Green Bay Packers quarterback.
00:39:08
Speaker 3: So he's 4-1.
00:39:10
Speaker 5: In October after a very slow start to the season. Now, he has an extra game in October, so he has more yards than everyone, because the rest of this slate starts on November 1st.
00:39:19
Speaker 6: Oh, he gets a head start.
00:39:20
Speaker 5: Yeah, so I thought that was important because he has these huge numbers. He leads the league in passing yards, leads the league in touchdowns, and he's been actually awesome in October.
00:39:28
Speaker 3: But the real reason he's my.
00:39:29
Speaker 5: October VP is because nobody else on that offense is doing anything. Their run game is so bad. He has to carry them on his right arm. I think he's awesome. Will throw a lot of picks, always has thrown a lot of picks. He's kept it sort of under control this season, and I think he's the reason the Packers are contenders, and he showed that in October.
00:39:47
Speaker 6: Okay, good call by you. I like it. He gets an extra game that does feel like cheating, but there's no rules in October's BP. My October BP is this guy, Aaron Rodgers. No coincidence that we picked these. We didn't know each other's picks. Aaron Rodgers this month, nine touchdown passes. There are some people who didn't think he'd have nine touchdown passes on the season. Nine touchdowns, three picks, three and one now. Are they a contending team? Are they a Super Bowl team? I don't think anyone's confusing them for that. But they could win the division. They could put some distance between them. They're not beating the best teams in the world. But a lot of people question whether Aaron Rodgers should come back at all. And when conditions are good, with Jalen Warren, with the big tight end, with some blocking, yeah, he's still a good quarterback.
00:40:28
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I did not see this coming. He's playing really, really well. Although I am worried about the Cleveland game, Paul.
00:40:34
Speaker 5: So luckily for him, it's in November, so it won't affect his October VP. But Cleveland's got a great defense, and the Steelers, they're not afraid to win 13-10.
00:40:43
Speaker 3: So we'll see if Rodgers' numbers continue.
00:40:44
Speaker 6: It may not be too pretty, but he's getting it done. Let's get to getting the Heisman, the Heisman Trophy trackers we do on the Dan Patrick Show, and here on Not So Fast. All right, Pearl, I'm going to go. This guy had the week off last week, Jeremiah Smith, and he didn't lose a ground whatsoever. Now, some people caught up a little bit, but Jeremiah Smith, the wide receiver of Ohio State, He's got a backup quarterback, but he's got a national TV game versus USC. Did we mention that game yet? It's a perfect late October stage for him. If he can do what he normally does. With a backup, it makes him look even better.
00:41:16
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's a great point. Now, again, if I'm USC, I don't care who's quarterback. I put three guys on Jeremiah.
00:41:21
Speaker 3: Five guys. I still don't understand why teams don't. They do double team him.
00:41:25
Speaker 6: You burger join him. You five guys.
00:41:26
Speaker 3: Bracket that dude.
00:41:27
Speaker 5: By the way, did you see that wide receiver sneaking up right behind him?
00:41:30
Speaker 3: Malachi Toney in Miami.
00:41:32
Speaker 6: You picked him out in August.
00:41:33
Speaker 3: My preseason pick. The odds are up.
00:41:35
Speaker 5: But then again, he might face a tough defense in Notre Dame. So this is a week-to-week thing.
00:41:39
Speaker 6: But Malachi Toney has NC this weekend, which there will be enough eyeballs on that, and he's got Notre Dame next week, which is the big, big stage.
00:41:45
Speaker 2: Right.
00:41:46
Speaker 5: And if they get the W, then he's going to be a real front-runner. Wouldn't it be funny if we had one and two wide receivers? That is unprecedented. We've barely had any wide receivers win it.
00:41:55
Speaker 6: It'd be so refreshing. Coming up next, constructive criticism and the feel-good, plus a little more Halloween questions from you guys.
00:42:01
Speaker 3: Stick around.
00:42:02
Speaker 6: Not so fast.
00:42:05
Speaker 4: I like that.
00:42:06
Speaker 3: Yeah, wide receiver, wide receiver.
00:42:07
Speaker 6: That'd be fantastic. Bowls at the same time.
00:42:09
Speaker 3: And then the Oregon State kid, too. I mean, this could be huge.
00:42:12
Speaker 6: Jeremiah Smith, I think, is going to be the default guy. From 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Eastern, catch the full daily lineup of Sports Talk on NBC Sports Now. The channel is available live on Peacock and free on Roku, Samsung TV +, or wherever you stream. And NBCSN. Sometimes they replay our show later, 5 p.m. Eastern. I saw our show at 11 p.m. Eastern on a replay one time.
00:42:33
Speaker 3: Oh, that's very cool. Don't be afraid to watch it twice in one day.
00:42:36
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's good for you. If you watch it three times, you're a P1, as they say.
00:42:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah. Three, yeah, that's a lot.
00:42:41
Speaker 6: My kids don't watch it that much, but they'll watch two a day. They do two a day.
00:42:46
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, because we're on, I will catch the rear.
00:42:49
Speaker 5: Obviously, it's hard to watch while I'm on the show.
00:42:51
Speaker 6: It's hard to watch while you're on, but later on NBCSN or NBC Sports Network. On demand on Peacock.
00:42:56
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think we nailed that program.
00:42:57
Speaker 6: I think we nailed that one.
00:42:58
Speaker 5: Yeah. Okay, we're going to do something called Down to Earth, much like our intro there was bringing us down to Earth. We're going to look at teams who have big games this weekend and see if they're going to come back down to Earth.
00:43:10
Speaker 3: Fancy graphic there.
00:43:11
Speaker 5: Okay, let's start with the Vikings at the Lions. It's 6-0 Vikings. Is this the weekend that they come down.
00:43:16
Speaker 3: To Earth, Paul?
00:43:17
Speaker 6: I think this game is going to go to the buzzer. The Lions' defense is nothing special, and that's being complimentary. I don't know if the Vikings can generate more offense. They can't generate less. But they're not going to pitch a shutout. I think this is going to be 17-16, win it at the buzzer by the Lions.
00:43:32
Speaker 5: Okay, I'm very confused by this game because I do think Brian Flores has found an answer. But again, the Lions, they're just a better team. I know the Lions defense is not good. Someone had a great point on the DP show. We think of a team that is great offensively, is a great team, but we don't think of a defensive team that way.
00:43:49
Speaker 3: Still, I think the Lions are more well-rounded. Okay, 5-2 Browns at the 5-2 Steelers.
00:43:53
Speaker 6: Too many comebacks for the Browns. They're going to run out of gas one of these days. The defense was really nice. The Steelers are playing better than people think. They play those games overseas, and a lot of people don't see them. You mentioned their big tight end that you love. Jalen Warren is running really well for them. I think they've got a little more sauce.
00:44:08
Speaker 5: You know, I think this game is going to be very tight because I think the Browns defense is going to cause a lot of problems for the Steelers.
00:44:14
Speaker 3: They're going to get after Aaron Rodgers.
00:44:15
Speaker 6: Rodgers doesn't move.
00:44:16
Speaker 5: And I'm not sure Jalen Warren is going to continue this run. Okay, 5-2 Broncos against the Chiefs. Do the Broncos come down to earth? Can I just say this is a funny one because they've won three in a row and they don't feel like it.
00:44:27
Speaker 2: Right.
00:44:27
Speaker 6: When I look at the Broncos, I could see this game being like 21-10 Chiefs at half. And people are like, well, this is over. And the Broncos are never over. They're a fourth quarter team.
00:44:36
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think the Broncos don't even belong on this list because the Vikings and Browns are kind of playing way above their actual talent level. The Broncos are all actually underperforming, even at 5-2.
00:44:46
Speaker 6: But don't you think a lot of people nationally bailed on the Broncos after September?
00:44:49
Speaker 3: They absolutely did. But Bo Nix is not playing good football.
00:44:53
Speaker 5: Even against Arizona, a game where he had moments, he still was only 50%.
00:44:57
Speaker 3: Completion rate.
00:44:57
Speaker 6: You know, it's not good football, but sometimes it's clutch football. It's not like, if you gave him a grade for, I don't know what his PFF grade and things like this or quarterback rating, but his clutchness, if that's a word.
00:45:07
Speaker 5: Right, but that always comes back down to earth. You can't have, last year we had eight or nine comebacks in the fourth quarter.
00:45:12
Speaker 3: You can't do that regularly.
00:45:13
Speaker 6: And Kenneth Walker's probably salty after getting shut down last week.
00:45:15
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's going to be a great game. It's going to be a good NFL weekend.
00:45:18
Speaker 6: All right, it's time for a little constructive criticism. Your feedback, your thoughts, your comments to the show. Here we go. Great week on Not So Fast. Good job by all the crew here. Here we go, Perloff. We asked Halloween is Sunday. We're looking for some advice. How do you balance the Halloween obligations, parties, and kids with watching 13 hours of college football? Here are some more suggestions from you guys.
00:45:38
Speaker 3: Okay.
00:45:40
Speaker 6: Fire pit, outdoor TV, hand out candy to the kids, and beer to the adults. Andy O'Halick, I know this guy. He's from Wisconsin. Clearly a great person and a very smart person. This is what we do, Perloff. We do the fire pit next to the driveway, some music and spooky stuff going on, Lots of candy, and then I put a TV on the side for the dads.
00:45:59
Speaker 3: And how much beer do you have to have on tap?
00:46:02
Speaker 6: Well, you don't give beer to the kids. You have to card.
00:46:06
Speaker 3: We do not endorse that at Not So Fast. No, not at all.
00:46:09
Speaker 6: But I give out really good candy, not the big bars. But one time I had a crock pot of chili, and one of the kids thought, can I have a scoop of chili? And I didn't have a bowl for him, and I couldn't put it into his bag.
00:46:19
Speaker 3: Put it in his hand.
00:46:20
Speaker 6: Yeah, put it in his hand. Give me a bowl of chili.
00:46:22
Speaker 3: How much for a cup of chili?
00:46:22
Speaker 6: All right, here we go. Next one. Great job, Andy. I want to hear your recommendations for absconding, good word, with candy from your kids without being caught.
00:46:32
Speaker 5: That's been a many a fight over the years. I mean, everyone knows that Reese's Pieces are actually not candy. They're a nutritional, protein-packed snack.
00:46:39
Speaker 6: So it's a dad treat.
00:46:41
Speaker 3: Yeah, so my kids know that all the Reese's go to dad.
00:46:44
Speaker 6: Yeah, I just pull the I own the house card, and I just say, Kimmy, let me take a look at your bag. And they complain. But now my kids are going to parties and trick-or-treating less.
00:46:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know.
00:46:53
Speaker 6: I don't get much candy.
00:46:54
Speaker 5: I know.
00:46:54
Speaker 3: I know we don't have time to get this. My daughter is 14 and said, Dad, I'm too old to go trick-or-treating.
00:46:59
Speaker 6: She's retired?
00:47:00
Speaker 3: Yes, which hurts me because then I have to go trick-or-treating.
00:47:02
Speaker 6: What about the pressure from the one house in the neighborhood that gives out the full-size candy bars and makes you feel like less of a man?
00:47:08
Speaker 3: Oh, well, I don't really have that because I live in an apartment. But, yeah, I mean, I'm going to be in line with the kids. I'm like, my daughter's around the corner. Can I have the full-size Kit Kats?
00:47:16
Speaker 6: Nothing says suburban wealth like giving out full-size Twix.
00:47:19
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:47:19
Speaker 6: I mean, nothing. You could have a Mercedes. No, but if you're giving out full-size Reese's, that's it.
00:47:24
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, geez, we never had that as kids. Never. We had apples with razor blades in them.
00:47:30
Speaker 6: Hopefully you're kidding. All right, it's time for the feel-good here on Not So Fast. Let's check it out. What a night in Milwaukee. What a night in Green Bay. Here are the Brewers players coming out with that thing, which you could kill someone with, the big trophy for the World Series. They walk out. The place goes berserk. And they're on full scholarship, the Brewers.
00:47:49
Speaker 3: What a week in Wisconsin. Unbelievable. Did you see the racing guys were there?
00:47:54
Speaker 6: Yeah, the sausage race was going on in the end zone. These guys are doing Lambeau leaps.
00:47:59
Speaker 3: That is a very cool team in a cool city.
00:48:01
Speaker 6: The parade is going on in Milwaukee as we speak. As a Brewers fan, or maybe as a kid. Would you rather have a Friday take school off parade or a Monday take school off?
00:48:09
Speaker 5: Well, I mean, listen, it's great to have Monday off, but the fact that you got a Packers win last night, a parade Friday, and then Halloween on Saturday, that's undefeated.
00:48:17
Speaker 6: Spotted cow for everybody. Thanks for everyone here at the Dan Patch Show and Not So Fast. Great week of shows for both. We'll talk to you Monday. Enjoy the football.