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Speaker 1: The Volume. What is going on, everybody? John Middlecoff, Three and Out Podcast. How are we doing? Hopefully everyone is doing well, enjoying life, living life. I've had 24-plus hours to let Monday Night Football, Ben Johnson, Sirianni kind of marinate. A couple thoughts there. Something that happened in that game that I think relates to the Patriot situation at quarterback. Lincoln Riley, and he's all over my Twitter feed and Instagram feed because of these videos from Dan Lanning. And... Not an ideal spot for him, to say the least. We'll do some mailbag questions as well. At John Middlecoff. At John Middlecoff is the Instagram fire in those DMs. You guys know the drill. If you listen on Colin's feed, subscribe to 3 and Out. We're up on Netflix. You can hit the alert, never miss an episode, and put a bunch of content on YouTube as well. So my top five teams so far through week three will be on YouTube tomorrow. So go check that out today. Go check that out, and let's just dive right into the podcast. Obviously, if you're a Bears fan right now, you are really high on the hog. You feel great. Not because your team is 2-1. Not because, you know, your offense has proven that they can score 59 points with Caleb Williams. They can win a game with the third string quarterback. It's just the franchise is coming off a season where they won the division. But it's really because of the head coach, who... let's face it, is a star who is excellent at his job. And if I was hiring a coach in college or in the pros, I'm kind of looking for a football nut job. I saw Saban say this. He's doing a promotion for his documentary, six-part documentary that's going to be like the last dance for Michael Jordan, but the version of the Alabama program. It's probably going to be really, really good. And he made a comment, I think it was to Greenberg, who was doing an interview with him. They're like, football coaching is not a normal job. It's a lifestyle. Because you work an insane amount of hours. You spend all your time, especially if you're a play caller, developing game plans, developing plays, and mentoring, coaching players. and being around your players and your assistant coaches. And it's not the healthiest lifestyle. It really isn't. But balance during the season isn't a big part of the gig. And I spent several years working in the office in Philadelphia. I saw it firsthand with Andy Reid. His competitive football stamina was unlike anything I'd ever seen. The amount of hours he could put in was nuts. And you obviously have to be addicted to the sport. And I would say most guys are, right? Even the coaches that aren't winning a lot are putting in crazy hours. But what Ben Johnson brings to the table, and Case Keenum talked about this after the game, was throughout the week, and Case even said, he said he silenced his phone, that the only two people that would buzz if they called or text were his wife and Ben Johnson. And he's like, you can guess who I heard from more. I think he was alluding to the coach. And he said throughout the week that Ben Johnson was really high on some of the plays, some that worked and led to touchdowns or were touchdowns. The case was like, I wasn't really that comfortable with. And I was like, I didn't quite see it the way he saw it. But he would keep talking to me. He would convince me and I would get on board. And looking back, he was right. And I think the power of an offensive coach is their ability to work with the quarterback, make him believe in what he's selling, because what he is selling, he knows will work against that defense. It doesn't mean that every play call is going to work, because obviously they will not. Sometimes it could be your own error, even though you scouted the defense correctly, or other times it could be Their defense that you thought they were going to play, they did not play, and the play ran right into defenders. There's a lot of different variables here. But when I watched Ben Johnson, and you saw him last night, it was the polar opposites of the two guys. Because when I see Ben after the game in the locker room, you see his emotions, you see his intensity, even for the brief two-minute conversation I had at the combine. He's a very serious cat. I would guess around the halls of the Chicago facility, not a huge bullshit artist. Not just shooting the shit. Quality I have. I enjoy BSing. You want to talk some ball? You want to talk stock market? You want to talk whatever? I'll shoot the shit with you. I enjoy that in a lot of different settings. Ben Johnson doesn't give off those vibes. And when I watched him last night after he, I think he would admit like the play call, the not executing at the goal line, they get stopped, they get stopped and they don't even get points, right? They choose not to kick a field goal. He's mad at himself, but he's not showing it because the entire team takes your personality, right? So if you start freaking out on the sideline, everyone freaks out. I think you learn having a young child, if he bonks his head or injures himself, if you make it a bigger deal, he will make it a bigger deal. But if you keep your composure, and again, my kid's not even nine months old yet, but we've had a couple instances where it would be like, oh my God. But if you start doing that, the cries even get louder. If you start acting like everything's okay, he can mentally just follow your lead and not freak. It goes back to the play where Malcolm Butler intercepted Russell Wilson in the Super Bowl. It's that famous video of Bill Belichick where it looks like the Patriots are going to lose the Super Bowl. And his pulse rate looks like 75. Completely unfazed. And the Patriots, because of his even keel nature, feels like they always took that on. Look at Andy Reid over the years with Patrick Mahomes. Does he show much emotion on the sideline? I'm not even factoring in their ability to develop plays, get guys open. I'm just talking about their mannerisms. Even though Ben Johnson, unlike probably Bill and Andy, is more likely to want to just go nuts. But from a psychological standpoint, he knows all these guys looking at him. If he does that, that can be a problem. Where on the flip side, you had Sirianni, who is not developing any of these plays. He is the CEO, culture setter, tone setter, leader of the team. And he is going nuts. Losing his composure. Losing his emotion. And listen, I'd be a hypocrite if I said I have not been in situations and still battle that where I can't control my emotions. And as you get older, you realize, whether it's just your family looking at you, whether it's a professional setting, whether it could be a personal setting, a lot of times you're like, I got to be calmer in that situation. Because absolutely freaking out doesn't do any good. And one thing I noticed last night and throughout his career so far with the Bears is Ben feels very in control. And Sirianni does not. Sirianni can't control his emotions. And it goes back to some of their big wins. When he freaks out on the sidelines. Even last week against the Titans. When they won, he went nuts running off the field. Which again, I'm not anti-celebrating the victory. A lot of coaches just do it in the locker room. They don't do it, you know, on a road stadium on the sideline. And I think when you look at those two guys, obviously Ben is in a different stratosphere when it comes to offense. Because it's his. It's clearly not Sirianni's. But emotionally, like, That matters. And I think one thing, and I'm sure the Eagles have talked to Nick, and Nick probably understands, it's like you can't be a hothead on the sideline, good or bad, because that doesn't benefit anybody. It really doesn't. And I can't even imagine being a Bears fan and thinking of all those years where you're just stuck kind of like Andy Dufresne in the tunnel of shit And it's like, I don't see any end in sight. We just keep crawling. This is miserable. No matter what we do, we can never get the right coach. We can never get the right quarterback. We can never get the franchise. to be like, every single year we're going to matter. And now that you have it, it's called football heaven. It's as good as it gets. It doesn't mean you're guaranteed to win every year. But when you get in that situation, you go, this is pretty fun. this is pretty awesome. And you can go into games, because I would imagine most Bears fans, their expectation for the Monday night game when Case Keenum's starting was pretty low. But after you have a moment like that, you go into basically every game, unless there's catastrophic injuries all over the place leading up to it, we're like, we can win this thing. Why? Because we got the right head coach. And speaking of right head coach, The Patriots hiring Vrabel and then year one going to the Super Bowl was a major success. An incredible accomplishment, even if their path was a little easier. And despite their quarterback playing bad in the playoffs and getting a backup quarterback in the AFC Championship game, who cares? You won those games, you celebrate it, and you go, been here before, back again. But this year, it is unraveled for Drake May. He is statistically, I mean, leads the league in turnovers. And the eye test is just atrocious. And I can only imagine what the talk is in Boston like, what's going on here? Was last year the fluke? Because what we're witnessing, it doesn't get much worse. And I was thinking about Case Keenum last night. Because I watched the post-game press conference for Ben Johnson. And he said, every... it's typically Saturday night, but because they played on Monday, it was Sunday night. They do a quarterback meeting with the coaches. And I think they go over the game plan, go over the first 15, and they just rattle through everything they've done throughout the week, play-wise. And he said, the crazy part about that meeting is Case Keenum ran the whole thing. We didn't even talk. Like, myself as the OC, the quarterback coach, like, he just ran it. And Clearly, he, again, played an incredible game, awesome moment, and we'll see how it plays out this week if he keeps starting. But I started thinking, because I had a buddy yesterday send me this tweet from ESPN Stats and Info, and it said that teams who started their non-week number one quarterback, so the Bears, Case Keenum, The commanders, Marcus Mariota, Jameis got his first start against the Titans. All the backups that started, Drew Locke, week two against the Cardinals, are 6-0. And... Anytime you win a game with your backup quarterback, it feels like two wins. It's better than a normal win with your starting quarterback. It is an uplift for the entire franchise, especially in the fashion that Drew Locke did it or Case Keenum did it. The confidence that that builds in the organization is unquantifiable. But I also, I'll never go back, or I go back all the time to the Chiefs. When they got rid of Alex Smith and they were going to insert Patrick Mahomes as their starting quarterback, one thing they were dead set on is to get a backup that was older and married. Because they wanted to get a mature guy who would be comfortable in his role, but would be a great mentor for a young player. Not only to show him how to study, how to prepare, just to be a good example, but to just be a grown-up in the room. And that kind of matters. Because think about when you're young, and even if you're in a job with zero pressure, let alone the pressure that some young quarterbacks have throughout the NFL. Most human beings can't relate to that. But I don't care who you are. When you get hired out of college and you're 22, 23, 24 years old, and you get a real job, whether it's a corporate setting, whether it's a smaller business, whatever, and you're like, this is a, you know, a role with some responsibility. It can be daunting. It can feel like there's, you know, I don't want to say the weight of the world on you, but it can be overwhelming. And it's the first time, you know, you're just kind of on your own and other people are depending on you. And, you know, we all have had bosses at one point in time, a little like parents. After a while, you're like, okay, I get it. The message, sometimes you do better learning from other people. Why do you think kids sometimes listen to their friend's parents more than their own parents? Or their coach more than their dad? Because sometimes that other voice, even if the message is the exact same, resonates more. And I don't think it's any different when it comes to it's why any good coaching staff, any good organization wants to have a veteran player around a young quarterback. Because that guy isn't just an extension of the coaching staff. It's someone for him to lean on when he goes through hard times because that individual he can relate to. And Caleb Williams, the moment Ben Johnson got the job, what did he do? He convinced Case Keenum to essentially not retire and be in the room. And he wasn't even going to be the backup quarterback. What did the Raiders do when they got Fernando Mendoza this year? They said, we need to have a veteran player. Kirk Cousins, come on down. Fernando Mendoza was the number one overall pick. The Raiders have been a joke. And they're like, we need someone to mentor him. We need someone for him to watch. We need someone around him, in his vicinity, every single day. And obviously, you know, ideally he's a good player and you're winning games. It's gone pretty well so far. But it wasn't about week to week winning and losing. It was honestly, I would imagine, 80% about Fernando Mendoza. Because that matters. and having someone who can relate to the things you're going through, even if they weren't the number one overall pick. They've just been in a situation where they weren't starting, tried to learn this league, what it takes, what the expectations are. And I look at Drake May, who you go, well, he's got veteran coaches. He's got Mike Vrabel, former player. He's got Josh McDaniels and coached Tom Brady for 20 years. Okay. A lot of these staffs have that. Patrick Mahomes got Andy Reid, who had been a successful guy for 20 years. And they still value get Chad Haney in here. And so I look at Drake May, it's like, well, who's his backup? Tommy DeVito. Think how crazy that is. Like, that is mismanagement by the Patriots. To not have some version of a veteran player who used to be a longtime starter and now is just a backup. You know, Mariota, clearly the commanders valued him on the field because they have to have a little contingency plan. Because Jaden's injury history, they re-signed him this year after being the backup. But he also fits that bill. Actually to perfection. And Jaden Daniels can ask Marcus Mariota anything. You know why? Because Mariota's kind of seen it all. No different than Caleb with Case Keenum. And I just look at the Patriots situation that no one could have foreseen it being this bad. I would agree with that. Like this is the worst case scenario. But they put themselves in a situation where it's like his own room can't even help him out. What's Tommy DeVito? I mean, to me, when I think of Tommy DeVito, he is most famously known for the agent that looked like a guy that would have been either in Tony Soprano's Crew or someone that Tony Soprano would have put in a lake. So I think that's an underrated part about the NFL, building a position group the correct way, and nothing is more important than the group of the quarterback room. Look at the Oregon Ducks. They truly valued having a backup quarterback, despite having a guy coming into the season that had a very, very good chance to establish himself as the number one quarterback. And they went, we need to get a veteran guy. Obviously, it costs a lot of money, but no one would have batted an eye if they're like, well, just have our four or five star young guy as the backup. Like, no, we're not doing that. And it came to fruition against USC and dramatically benefited potentially the outcome of their season. So I think if I'm a Patriot fan, I go, how does Tommy DeVito, like, how do we not have internal help? Like, how do we not have a Flacco type guy, someone in that room beside the coaching staff who could help the kid out? Because right now he's swimming upstream without a paddle. He's drowning and nothing that those guys seem to say works. And the other thing is the confidence, how it goes. Who's going to help him get that back? Well, think about when you're going through it as a young employee somewhere. You hate your boss or, you know, something going on weird at work. Who do you usually talk to about that? People you work hand in hand with. People in the military talk about this all the time. I don't fight for the general back at the base. I battle for the guy next to me that's hand in hand down in the trenches. Just like, basic human, the way we're wired, right? So I think the Patriots and Elliot Wolfe and Mike Vrabel, they could have done a better job of having that room a little more situated just to benefit Drake May emotionally. I need to tell you about this new sports trading app called Polymarket. It's the best way to trade in sports. In the past, if you wanted some action on the game, you'd put some money in. And if your team was doing well and you wanted to cash out, they'd lock the trade and take a huge fee. But Polymarket is a prediction market. It's a stock exchange for sports, buying in and selling out on your terms. When your team goes down to 20%, you can buy in. and sell it off at 40% when they come back, double your money. I've tried them all. Polymarket is simply the best. We're talking DraftKings, FanDuel, Couchy, you name it. Polymarket's better. They're so confident you'll never go back to the other guys. They're giving you a free $ 50 on your first trade when you deposit just 10 bucks. 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It's easy to find. But I'm used to the branding, the sounds, and it's no longer like that. Sunday, teams are all over the place, which is what it is. CBS had the opportunity. I mean, there are two big games on Sunday afternoon coming up. And it's the Chiefs, the undefeated Chiefs, and the undefeated Raiders, and the Broncos and the 49ers. Now, the Chiefs, once they got good with Patrick Mahomes, passed the Cowboys as the number one rated team. But like for 20 plus years, the Raiders haven't been good. So if you're playing the Raiders, obviously the Chiefs brand is really strong. But you'd go, eh, I'll just go with the two really good teams. But that's not the case right now. And the Raiders would not be the number one draft pick by the networks in a primetime game, at least of right now. They can earn that if they keep playing well and have turned into a real franchise moving forward. But CBS chose this because of Kansas City and the power of their brand, the amount of eyeballs that come to their games is real. I mean, it speaks for itself. The numbers are well documented over the last six, seven years. But this is an incredible opportunity for the Raiders to get Jim Nance and J.J. Watt to get the game of the day, to get the national game in Vegas, and you're undefeated. Because I think a lot of people go, yeah, this team's kind of interesting. Jenty, really good player. We know Crosby's a stud. Brock Bowers is a favorite of anyone that plays fantasy football. N'Kobe Dean's crushing it. But are they really that good? Are the Raiders really... Are we talking a 10-11 win team? Or is when the dust settles, they're going to win seven? I don't know the answer right now. Because when Kirk Cousins plays better defenses, is this going to be sustainable? As the season goes, I don't know. But I do know what we've seen through three weeks has been extremely impressive. And now that Bauer's back, their offense, I mean, they got two legit tight ends, a running back. I know Beck, I think, broke his arm, which is not ideal. Their wide receiver group is very questionable. And I think there's some question marks with the overall secondary slash pass rushers. Actually, their secondary's playing pretty good. But beside Crosby, like, do they really have a lot of juice? This is an incredible moment for them. This is one of those where it's like you could really announce yourself to the league. Because we saw the first two weeks the Chiefs got up for those games. Prime time, trying to reestablish themselves. Little bit of a sleeper against the Dolphins. I don't know if you've seen the viral clip of Jeff Halfley going to the press conference. And I never saw the clip of how many people were at the press conference. My guess would be less than five. And I think it really rattled Halfley. He's like, where is everybody? And one of the reporters is like, well, it's Miami Heat media day. So it was clear, like, yeah, you're not that important right now. And if in three years the Dolphins are a legit squad, they got a star quarterback, that won't be the case. But I think for a guy that had just spent the last couple years for the Packers, that had to be like, God, we're not the number one option in this town. You got to earn that. And the thing with an NFL team, if you get good, it will matter. And that's the interesting part about Vegas. Like, I think I read a headline today that the NBA is looking for $ 12 to $ 13 billion for the NBA team in Vegas, which to me seems pretty nuts. But Vegas is a very, very hot market when it comes to sports teams. Obviously, the A's are moving there. The Raiders have been there for a while. The stadium's awesome. the concerts, the commerce that comes through there, even if it's kind of been up and down for us normal people that used to just travel there to hang out. I maybe was more my single days, but I'm not as inclined to do that. One, I don't need to go to a sports book to dabble. Two, the prices in what used to be, especially for younger people, when I was in college, one, I'd get like a $ 59. 99 flight to Vegas. And two, you could stay at just random hotels for under $ 100. And you didn't need that much money to gamble. You could easily find $ 5 blackjack tables and food was relatively cheap. That is not the case anymore. So the dynamics and the economics of the areas change because they're all Fortune 500 companies now and they're trying to squeeze every dollar and it's like $ 25 coffees. But people will still fly there for these big events. I've done it before. I've been to multiple concerts just flying to Vegas. I know a ton of people that have gone to the Sphere. I have yet to hear anyone not have the time of their life and be blown away by the power of that thing. And, you know, the Raiders were kind of the first. In terms of, you know, I know they have an NHL team there who's actually pretty good. But the NFL is in a different stratosphere. And this game's at Allegiant. I'm going to be fascinated, like, is this 80, 90% Raider fans? Because the one thing with this stadium is a lot of people travel from out of town to make a weekend of it. And whether it's Bronco fans, whether it's Packer fans, Steeler fans, Chiefs fans, it's a pretty big moment for this franchise. And I can't wait to watch this game. Last but not least, before we do the mailbag, Lincoln Riley, clearly Saturday afternoon slash night did not go well. I would say it ended in an embarrassing fashion with the player taking out Dante Moore, the celebrating and him staying on the sideline the entire time and it being so ugly. Within the next day, they had to suspend him for a game. And he did not get suspended for the hit. He got suspended for acting like a clown. Losing sucks. When you put a game on a pedestal, which the USC Trojans did, and then you lose in front of millions of people, when people already question you, it is even worse. I'll use Ole Miss as an example. If somehow they wouldn't have pulled out that game against LSU and LSU would have made enough plays and lost, it would have been tough because there's no disputing that Ole Miss had put that LSU Lane Kiffin bat on a pedestal. I don't even disagree when Lane says that was their Super Bowl. It kind of was. And when it is your Super Bowl, you got to win it. And Lane, or excuse me, Lincoln, with all these articles, all these statements, had put that game on a pedestal. I didn't feel like Oregon put that game on a pedestal. it mattered because college football, you only get so many of these, they already had a loss, but USC put all their chips in the middle of the table. And then by the end, it felt like they were getting clowned on the field in the second half, especially the fourth quarter. I would say what I, and I got this DM and this kind of sparked me thinking about it because I've seen a ton of these clips online today said, uh, John, uh, As a Ducks fan, I'm curious if you've seen the Oregon vs. Them video montage vs. USC and what are your thoughts on the contrasting styles of the two programs? If not, wow, it's an amazing 22 minutes. I haven't seen the entire 22 minutes, but I've seen a ton of different clips. Two-minute clips of his pregame talk on Monday or Tuesday addressing the team. I've seen the four-minute clip of him, Dante getting KO'd, him being on the field, him corralling the group and kind of doing a football version of a prayer, getting their mind right. I've seen his second-half speech. I know this. If I was a super rich guy who was stroking checks to USC to buy these players, to build this massive suite facility, the last three or four days, Saturday night, up until all these videos, my money would stop. Because part of spending all this money on Lincoln Riley was to get to the point and have a program equivalent with Oregon. Yet I think we all have to acknowledge, and I say this all the time about tough guys. As an offensive guy, you know, Steve Sarkeesian or Lane couldn't beat up like Mike Vrabel or D'Amico Ryans. But I think those two guys are good examples because they're both offensive guys like Lincoln. Their careers were created in the 2000s under Pete Carroll at USC. And we talk a lot about Reggie Bush and Matt Leiner on those USC teams. I would say the defining attribute of those teams is they would break you in half. Because all their guys on defense looked and were NFL players. And even as those guys left in the next group of Clay Matthews, Ray Maluga, and Brian Cushing, which were on the front page of Sports Illustrated, It was like they were looking for violence every single Saturday. So while Sark and Lane, I wouldn't consider like Kirby Smart, crazy-ass former defensive guy, they do value the defensive player, what it takes to be violent, physical, and future NFL bodies on that side of the ball. And they use their money now with NIL to buy those guys, right? Lane did it, he's doing it at LSU, and obviously Sark does it at Texas. And I watched Lincoln versus Dan Lanning and I go, the gap between these two programs, emotionally, mentality-wise, if I was a USC booster, I'd be embarrassed. And I just, you don't change that. Because ultimately, Lincoln trained from Mike Leach, who obsessed over offense. And when I view Lincoln, that's what he cares about. Discipline doesn't give a shit. Defense doesn't give a shit. And ultimately, when those things don't matter that much to you, the message you have for your team can never be the version of what Dan Lanning tells his team. Because when you watch Dan Lanning lead the group, you're like, this is kind of how I'd want my football coach to operate. Like, if I had a kid I mean, I do. But if he was good enough, if Jack was 18 years old right now, was a massive football recruit, and could go wherever, I'd be like, ideally, West Coast, easier travels. And it was Lane Kiffin, or excuse me, well, Lane Kiffin. But let's say Dan Lanning and Lincoln Riley desperately wanted him. It would be a no-brainer. I don't care what position he plays. I'd want him to go play for Dan Lanning over Lincoln Riley. because of everything I've witnessed on those videos. We've been seeing him for years. But Lincoln can't do that. He can't create that because that's not who he is. You hear coaches talk a lot about being authentic. And I think that matters in every walk of life. Now more than ever. In a day and age where frauds and phonies and political acts, and I don't mean actual political acts, I mean people operating for like... playing politics on TV in the sense of like a newscaster. I've used this example before. If you turn on the news in like 1992, everyone kind of looked the same, smiled. They're completely fake. It's like they did not actually talk or operate like that in the real world. I think what the consumer demands now in 2026 is like, act how you actually are. I don't have to like you, but like at least just be true to yourself. And it's why I think, you know, whenever you hear like a podcast or someone's like, yeah, their whole thing's scripted. You're like, are you serious? It's scripted? Like, I respect the business Call Her Daddy built, but I saw this clip of this actress that went on a bunch of shows to promote. She's like, yeah, a couple of the shows, we just sat down and started talking. Call Her Daddy was completely scripted. It's like, listen, I respect the money you're generating, but I don't view you the same, you know? And I think there's something about Lincoln that's like, just doesn't have it. At the highest level. You know, and you watch Dan Lanning, and who was he around? Saban, Kirby. Those guys aren't faking shit. They don't have to pretend to be a tough guy. Because of their standard, what they demand within their program, how they think, how they're wired. You know, Dan Lanning went on this long kind of rant, long would be strong, couple minute rant in front of his team early in the week about the USC juice boxes. And he's like, how fake is this energy? Like, what is this? We don't do that here. We just create the energy. We just create the mayhem. And I think Lincoln's trying to manipulate it because at his core, he's They say that if you just walk George's campus during a football practice, like you're just walking the campus, you can hear Kirby Smart because he is going apeshit. He's been doing that for 25 years since he's been coaching. He's not faking and manipulating his energy at practice. He's a nut job. His players know it, and they demand it in terms of what is expected to play for their program. Well, USC's offense is great. Well, this isn't just offense. I mean, this is football. So how's your defense? How's your team discipline? How's your program operate? And I think this all gets back to... I've said this forever. There are some outliers. Culture and proximity where you're born and where you coach matters. And if I think about most of the best coaches... at least over the internet era, in college football on the West Coast, they've been from the West Coast. Pete Carroll was born in California. He went to the University of Pacific. Throughout his life, he feels like a California guy. Jeff Tedford, Southern California, born and raised, played at Fresno State, coached at Oregon, coached at, obviously head coach at Cal. It kind of worked. Chris Peterson, Boise State and Washington. Where is he from? Northern California. Went to UC Davis. And if you think about the South, Nick Saban's from West Virginia, but kind of felt like a Southern guy. That's why he fit in at LSU and obviously fit in at Alabama. Kirby Smart, Dabo Sweeney forever, Jimbo Fisher. Just listen to their names. You know, and I think that matters. Urban Meyer was a guy that kind of bounced around. Coached at Utah, coached at Florida. Obviously, Nick Saban has success at Michigan State. He could have coached anywhere. Sark probably feels like Texas is as far east as that guy can go. And honestly, Austin, I've only been there for less than three or four days throughout my life, but definitely has more of a West Coast city type vibe than like, Texas South, you know, and Lincoln's a small town, Texas guy who became a star at Oklahoma. Does that feel LA USC to you? So I, I do think those videos coming out make Lincoln, and listen, are they going to pay him $ 67 million to go away? I don't believe that. He's going to be the coach for several years. But pretty embarrassing little stretch that doesn't really seem like anyone's going to have any ability to change. Starting with Lincoln Riley. Because you can't change who you are. I can't change. I can adapt some the way I do certain things. And you kind of have to as you get married and you have a kid. Like you got to change your ways a little bit. But there are certain things about me that are never going to change. Just like if you're listening and you're 35, 40, 45, 50. Certain things about you that are never going to change. And at this point in time Lincoln Riley ain't changing anything. being more disciplined, being more of a hard ass, being a tough guy, because you can't change that. Okay, let's do a couple of mailbag questions. At John Middlecoff, at John Middlecoff is the Instagram fire in those DMs. Get your questions answered here on the show. Mailbag. Why don't people believe in the Vikings yet? They're exactly what everyone thought Houston would be before the season. Below average quarterback, mediocre run game, one elite wideout, and a game-breaking defense. A lot of people were high on Houston going into the year, and many bet them to be the number one seed. But now that exactly what's supposed to happen in Houston is happening in Minnesota, and we're not getting any love. Fair question. Listen, 3-0 is 3-0. You never apologize for it. I do think it's not sustainable to throw for 150, 175 yards and win all these games. You know, you do play in a division with– you can beat the Bears in a rainstorm. If you played them in more of a normal September game, like are they scoring three points? You know, you just beat Tampa. I mean, you're going three and out. It felt like every series. That game was a tough watch. Flores has been incredible. Incredible. I'd say the difference you and Houston, like, ironic because Daniil Hunter used to be on your team, but Turner from Bama looks good. But, like, Turner and Will Anderson and Stingley, like, they got some high, high-end guys. It feels like you guys are manipulating it more, which is coaching, It's like, how sustainable is this? Are they really about to win 10 or 11 games? Or is this going to come somewhat stabilized a little bit because their offense is so bad? And now Jefferson's out. So even just the threat of him, I mean, I'm assuming he's out for this week. Who knows? Maybe it's, we'll see. I mean, I'm recording this on Tuesday. We'll know the next couple of days. Like, is he probably out this week? Is he out two weeks? Is he out, is he a game, you know, week to week? Is he day to day? Time will tell. But 3-0 is 3-0. I think the Vikings are a little like the Raiders where people are going, is this real? The difference is the Raiders are like scoring a bunch of touchdowns. After Case Keenum's stellar performance against the Eagles, who do you think the Bears will start versus the Jets? The staff loves Tyson, but should they ride the hot hand? I talked about this last night. and you watch Case's post-game press conference, he kind of tiptoed around it a little bit too. You could tell he's not 100% confident he's ever going to start again. That's why I think this moment was so big. And he clearly loves Tyson. He's been around him now two years, so they've become very, very close. It's a unique relationship when you're not playing at that position because it's not like you can rotate. If I had to guess right now, I would guess that Tyson starts. I would guess Tyson starts. If we're doing like polymarket percentages, it's not like 80-20, it's probably 60-40. You know, a young player who, if he starts and does well, you also have in your back pocket the value of the guy. that this offseason, if he goes out, if Caleb's out a couple more weeks, and Tyson balls out, could you flip him this offseason for a second round pick? So I think you've got to take that into consideration. I mean, at the end of the day, he is the third string quarterback. And you knew he's the third string quarterback for a reason, because I bet Ben would tell you, Tyson's just a better... More just skilled guy we think could be better player. Now, can he, could he have played like that? No guarantee. And that's the hard part about these situations. But I would guess that Tyson, if he's fully healthy and can, you know, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, I think they would go with him. against 60-40, which seems a little crazy. Like, why would he just go with the hot hand? Well, listen, there are economic impacts of this. There are draft impacts of this. Like, if over the offseason you could flip Tyson, if he has a couple sweet games for, like, a top 40 pick, all of a sudden you can use your pick and the top 40 pick. to add to the defense, to trade for a veteran player. So there's like a balancing act here. And if you're Ben Johnson, like you're going to be this head coach for the foreseeable future. A lot of coaches live day to day, week to week. I do think when you are Andy Reed, Sean Payton, Kyle Shanahan, Sean McVay, it's easier to balance the short and the longterm. And you can have a conversation with your GM where some places they, it'd be hard to have that conversation. So my guess would be in, would be Tyson. As someone who was born in 02, and I began watching football after the Packers won in 10, what was the physicality like in the 90s and early 2000s? Well, son, let me tell you. When I used to strap it up against Elway and Marino, it was, you can YouTube it. I mean, it's just YouTube big hits from the 90s. It was, I would say the best way you could describe it is on any given pass play, someone could get stretchered off the field. And the reason they used to call balls over the middle, balls the go-route shot against the hole between the corner and the safety, potential hospital balls, because the guy would end up in the hospital. Now as a quarterback, you don't really spend that much time thinking, I'm laying my guy out to dry. Where the NFL that I grew up on is if you laid a guy out over the middle, he was going to get knocked out. Now, the differences back then is there was no concussion protocol. There was no blue tent. They'd come to the sideline. They'd give him some smelling salt. He'd shake it off and he'd go back in the game. And then years later, he'd be like, I don't even remember the second half, which clearly from a safety standpoint, not great. But that's how it was. There were no protective measures. There was no such thing as defenseless wide receiver. You know why? Because the wide receiver knows when he went over the middle that the defenders can hit him. There wouldn't have been a penalty when Jalen Hurts got decleted yesterday. Patrick Mahomes would have been slammed in the ground and the referee wouldn't have thought about throwing the flag. So I think the emphasis of flags on these hits is something that didn't exist. There were not flags when guys got killed. You were just killed. I would say that is the number one biggest difference now. When you see a big hit now, the first thing you think is that's going to be a penalty. And for the majority of time, whether you're talking quarterback or you're talking skill guys down the field, a flag gets thrown. I just don't think it was very often at all flags were ever thrown. I look at Kirk Cousins, who is thriving for a relatively low price, and I ask, why do teams still succumb to the pressure of starting these first-round rookies ASAP? We have several examples of redshirt situations working. Mahomes, Jordan Love, Carson Palmer, and many examples of young quarterbacks getting immediately thrown to the Lions and struggling. What really drives me crazy is when we're told that certain players are projects, yet they barely get time to, quote, develop. We knew that Cam Ward was rough around the edges. Everyone is crapping on him 20 games into his NFL career. He's had three head coaches and a meddling owner already. And he's not Steve McNair. What a shocker. Can we just wait a minute before handing out the bus labels? I get the media pressure to throw them to the Lions, but who cares what they think? I wish the coaches in front offices had the balls to say, quote, he's not starting year one, end of discussion. What do you say about this? Well, it's twofold. The coaches, like J.J. McCarthy didn't get traded to the Giants because the media said he sucked. The team thought he sucked. So Anthony Richardson didn't get benched for Daniel Jones last year because the media didn't think he knew what he was doing. The media does not influence decisions like that with coaches or front offices during camp and during the season. Not with that position. It just doesn't. Because that position is not only judged by those guys, it's judged by the rest of the locker room. Which is also a factor of it's easy to not start Mahomes when you have Alex Smith and your team has been making the playoffs with him at quarterback. It's easy to not start Fernando Mendoza when you have Kirk Cousins, who's been a starter in the league for 10 years and made $ 300 million. You know, the Carson Palmer, John Kitna thing probably wouldn't happen now. But who was Cam Ward's backup last year? Will Levis? Cam Ward was probably the best quarterback they had on the roster. So this gets back to not having a veteran guy around. where it's like, he's the best quarterback, for me to address the team, I have to name him the starter. Because the rest of the team, you can't go with a veteran quarterback when everyone knows the young quarterback's better. Now, when the guy, or it's close, it's easy to justify it. And when the guy is clearly better, no one thinks twice. But you have to do a good enough job of having that guy on the roster, because if like, I don't know why I keep using this name, but Joe Flacco. If the Titans just had Joe Flacco. Could Cam Warda beat him out as a rookie? Probably not. And I also think it's easy to say he's not playing year one end of discussion. Well, what happens? It's one thing when you're 3-0 or Alex Smith and you're going to the playoffs. But what about when you're losing every week? And it's you're 1-7. And yeah, the media and the fans. Like, okay, the fans pay the bills here. So people start getting mad. People start showing up. That impacts the owner. They go, what are we doing? I want to see the guy. There are a lot of variables with this stuff. The Mahomes example is the easiest one to not play him. They were literally good. They hosted a playoff game, which they lost to Mariota and the Titans. Kelsey got a concussion in that game, if I remember correctly. But I don't think it's as easy to do when your team sucks. Or if the guy is legitimately just good. You know, I mean, if the guy is legitimately ready to go, you just play him. And we have seen examples of guys struggle. Peyton Manning was terrible early on. And then by year three or four was elite. CJ Stroud, probably the best year of his career. Jaden Daniels potentially as well. So you just... There's a lot of unknown. And this gets back to the violence of the game. It's never been easier to play quarterback. You're not... They're not going to kill you. In theory. Physically. And you can throw the hospital balls and you'll get a pass interference. Michael... This is from Michael. Wouldn't John Gruden to Tampa be kind of sweet? I know I'm a dumb Raider fan, but he had Carr playing great football, top 10 offenses, and I'm telling you, between the 20s, the ball was moving. He struggled in the red zone because Derek and the O-line is glaring weaknesses personnel, which the GM Jason Light would cover. A thing Gruden is still great. I think Gruden is still a great offensive guru. Would love to see him with Baker and Jason Light running personnel. Gruden's YouTube last week going, or two weeks ago, going to Auburn, Florida, is, he's made, like, the one unique part about John is, like, he's better at this than me. He is just so... secure like selfies with random guys doing things on camera unfazed by it all he if there's a camera around he becomes just his natural self and i've known people that work for him with the raiders they say he's no different cameras off the way he operates the gruden we've always seen on tv coach is the same guy no matter where you go And he clearly loves football. The YouTube video he did going to the Auburn game, he's taking tours of fraternities. He's with the basketball team sizing them up. I mean, it's just entertaining. I do think there's some complication. He's suing the league over the leaks of Dan Snyder that got him fired. But the Buccaneers made him call a preseason game. It definitely is not the... craziest thing to think about. I would say it would be on the table for sure. Wouldn't shock me. You know, depending on what their options are. That John Gruden is the next coach. I wouldn't put it at a high percentage, but... After seeing, you know, he's suing the lead and the Glazers not only let him call a game, he was the play-by-play guy with Rondé Barber. And if you remember, Raider fans do, when he was coming back, it was basically choosing between the Bucs and the Raiders. It would be pretty nuts if his four NFL jobs were the Raiders, traded to the Bucs, he returned to the Raiders, and then he returned to the Bucs. I do think he values, he's making a lot of money, he's having a good time. He lives in Tampa. Be a pretty easy transition. I wouldn't bet on it, but I wouldn't say no chance not happening. He's bad at personnel. And from what I was told, I think he can be really stubborn with that. So if he's just like, hey, I don't pick the players, which I think is easy to say, because then he's like, well, You want me to cook dinner and you won't even let me tell you what to get at the grocery store? That's always the pushback. And it's like, hey, I'll let this guy do it. But he loves Baker Mayfield. That'd be fun. My guess is still Tomlin, but it wouldn't stun me. Long time listener. When a team commits a personal foul like the Bears did on Hertz, and the player is then required to be evaluated for a concussion, shouldn't there be a stoppage that gives the player being evaluated a chance to reenter? It seems like under the current rules, you could potentially be rewarding a cheap shot. Not that I'm saying the Bears hit was necessarily a cheap shot, but you could certainly argue it was. I do not think it was. It was a football play. He got decleted. He's a quarterback. That guy's a linebacker. And if you're going to go shoulder to shoulder trying to get out of bounds, you might not make it all the time. I got no issue with the shot. You throw the penalty, whatever. I hear what you're saying. The problem is the league's business model is to play football. And if you stop, one, there's no guarantee that he's coming back into the game. So I guess what you are kind of hinting at is you stop the game until I get clarity. Can he reenter or is he out and I got to go with the backup quarterback? I think Sirianni's going nuts. It's like, bro, you could have manipulated the situation a little bit. Blow a timeout. Just slow everything down. Now, I don't know what the exact time was once they yank him off to when Jalen was ready to come back because he threw the interception. And it didn't feel like even when he threw the interception, Jalen was ready to come in or they would have ran him back in. They're just not going to stop the game for five to ten minutes while the consumer's sitting there and they're just standing on this island. It's just not going to happen. I hear what you're saying, and there's definitely a competitive advantage. If you're a defender and you do that and you just get a 15-yard flag and the backup comes in and then the outcome is the backup throwing a pick, but the league is not going to just halt the game. Which sucks. It's where I would defend the Eagles last night. That was a pretty big blow. They were kind of humming right there. Now you could also come back and say, well, they cut it pretty close on the touchdown before half. You often say the defense is about the Jimmys and the Joes. And I tend to agree. But is Brian Flores the exception? You go guy for guy in the Vikings defense and they're average at best. I can't remember the last time I've seen a defense this good while lacking any real top elite talent. Do you think he gets a head coaching job next cycle? I know a lot of fans in Green Bay would be happy to see him replace LaFleur. Maybe Minnesota keeps Flores over KOC. He's had one of the great three-game stretches you'll ever go see. That second half against Green Bay, what he did to the Bears in the rain, and then what he did to Baker the other day. I mean, Sam Darnold, I'm seeing ghosts. Baker was 100% seeing ghosts. Because guys were coming from everywhere. His offensive line couldn't block it. He was all out of sorts. That game was atrocious to watch, but also awesome to watch because of just the pressure Minnesota was putting on them. And the speed in which those guys land their blitzes. Like, you know, a lot of times you blitz from back where the linebacker's standing or like a safety or corner kind of creeping up. Their guys, ball snap, they're on the line, they're all going. And you don't know where it's coming from. So I think it just gets back to... I'll never forget an assistant coach told me years ago. I'm like, what's Flores' deal? And he's like, bro, the relationship he had with the offensive staff and the quarterback room, it was not great. The way he treated that kind of unit. When that unit is where your bread's buttered. Right? As a head coach. So as a defensive coordinator, all he has to worry about is defense. But when he's the head coach... His offensive coordinator and quarterback, clearly he hated Tua, which, you know, clearly Tua was never going to be what they hoped he would be at number five. But before the concussions, like Tua was a capable NFL player. And I think you got, if you tell me you can't treat or function with the quarterback position very well in 2026, I can't make you my head coach, no matter if you're the best defensive coordinator going. I think that's a knock on Fangio. It's like their mentality, their gruffness, their intensity. It's not very quarterback friendly. When you watch hard knocks with Mike, he's kind of got a lighter demeanor. You watch fans, you're like, God, how miserable are you, Vic? And I think Flores can be a little bit like that too. So that to me is the only question. In terms of understanding defensive football, he's elite. Elite. Elite. But to make you my head coach, like, well, what are you going to do with an offensive coordinator and my quarterback? And can you get along with them? Because if you can't, we just, we can't do this. And I think it's hard for the defensive mentality. The offensive mentality is different. They're not looking to kill you physically. Looking to run a sweet route, gain seven yards. Get a little leverage here. Run a fake route and get an easy little wheel route here for first down. Then do some high fives. It's a good question, though. I mean, two things can be true. And I don't know. I mean, I think eventually he'll get a second chance. This probably happens more with defensive coordinators than offensive coordinators. Like, how many guys are all-time great offensive coordinators but just suck at head coaching? I mean, I would have said Josh, but this year it ain't going well. It's pretty rare. It feels like most of the best offensive coordinators are pretty good head coaches. Even on the floor, we can nitpick. I'm like, he's had a pretty good career. Pretty good career. Defensive guys, though, it's hard to balance because a lot of them are curmudgeons. Just look at the last 10, 15 years. Like Mike Zimmer. You think Mike Zimmer's an enjoyable guy to be around every day? Does that look like a fun guy? Like, do I want to come to work and hang out with Mike Zimmer? I'm like, fuck no. Jesus. You know? No chance. Fangio, like, is he the most enjoyable human being to be around 24-7, 365? Probably not. Maybe floor is a little bit different, but I think the defensive thing, like, guys can be great defensive coordinators. And their personality. I think Spaggs, people really like him. He's very likable. You know? Quarterbacks like him on the team. Everyone likes him. That's a quality that you have to have as a head coach in this modern day football. It's very, very important. And that's a huge, huge knock on Flores in his time in Miami. Now, Josh McDaniels pulled this. He's like, I started journaling. I know my flaws and I've worked on them. I've looked at myself in the mirror. I'm a different guy. And the Raiders were like, you are? Six years, $ 60 million. Josh is like, I'm the head coach of the Raiders. And by like the end of year one, people were like, what is going on here? He didn't even finish year two. I think he's the only guy in league history who, to have two head coaching jobs and not make it through year two both times. Think how much management has to hate you for that to happen twice. Guys get second chances, they're not good enough. Robert's solid. Maybe he's just not meant to be a head coach. Maybe he's just not a head coach. But it does feel like people like him. Dan Quinn. Maybe Dan Quinn is just not a head coach. Seems like a likable guy. If you're not going to be a head coach and not good enough and you're like a dick, it's tough. I think it's really hard. Not every day is kumbaya, rainbows, butterflies, and just having a party. It's football. It's intense. But there has to be some. Guys are kind of excited to come every once in a while to work. We'll end on that one. Have a great day. Adios. Talk to you soon. The Volume.
Speaker 1: The Volume. What is going on, everybody? John Middlecoff, Three and Out Podcast. How are we doing? Hopefully everyone is doing well, enjoying life, living life. I've had 24-plus hours to let Monday Night Football, Ben Johnson, Sirianni kind of marinate. A couple thoughts there. Something that happened in that game that I think relates to the Patriot situation at quarterback. Lincoln Riley, and he's all over my Twitter feed and Instagram feed because of these videos from Dan Lanning. And... Not an ideal spot for him, to say the least. We'll do some mailbag questions as well. At John Middlecoff. At John Middlecoff is the Instagram fire in those DMs. You guys know the drill. If you listen on Colin's feed, subscribe to 3 and Out. We're up on Netflix. You can hit the alert, never miss an episode, and put a bunch of content on YouTube as well. So my top five teams so far through week three will be on YouTube tomorrow. So go check that out today. Go check that out, and let's just dive right into the podcast. Obviously, if you're a Bears fan right now, you are really high on the hog. You feel great. Not because your team is 2-1. Not because, you know, your offense has proven that they can score 59 points with Caleb Williams. They can win a game with the third string quarterback. It's just the franchise is coming off a season where they won the division. But it's really because of the head coach, who... let's face it, is a star who is excellent at his job. And if I was hiring a coach in college or in the pros, I'm kind of looking for a football nut job. I saw Saban say this. He's doing a promotion for his documentary, six-part documentary that's going to be like the last dance for Michael Jordan, but the version of the Alabama program. It's probably going to be really, really good. And he made a comment, I think it was to Greenberg, who was doing an interview with him. They're like, football coaching is not a normal job. It's a lifestyle. Because you work an insane amount of hours. You spend all your time, especially if you're a play caller, developing game plans, developing plays, and mentoring, coaching players. and being around your players and your assistant coaches. And it's not the healthiest lifestyle. It really isn't. But balance during the season isn't a big part of the gig. And I spent several years working in the office in Philadelphia. I saw it firsthand with Andy Reid. His competitive football stamina was unlike anything I'd ever seen. The amount of hours he could put in was nuts. And you obviously have to be addicted to the sport. And I would say most guys are, right? Even the coaches that aren't winning a lot are putting in crazy hours. But what Ben Johnson brings to the table, and Case Keenum talked about this after the game, was throughout the week, and Case even said, he said he silenced his phone, that the only two people that would buzz if they called or text were his wife and Ben Johnson. And he's like, you can guess who I heard from more. I think he was alluding to the coach. And he said throughout the week that Ben Johnson was really high on some of the plays, some that worked and led to touchdowns or were touchdowns. The case was like, I wasn't really that comfortable with. And I was like, I didn't quite see it the way he saw it. But he would keep talking to me. He would convince me and I would get on board. And looking back, he was right. And I think the power of an offensive coach is their ability to work with the quarterback, make him believe in what he's selling, because what he is selling, he knows will work against that defense. It doesn't mean that every play call is going to work, because obviously they will not. Sometimes it could be your own error, even though you scouted the defense correctly, or other times it could be Their defense that you thought they were going to play, they did not play, and the play ran right into defenders. There's a lot of different variables here. But when I watched Ben Johnson, and you saw him last night, it was the polar opposites of the two guys. Because when I see Ben after the game in the locker room, you see his emotions, you see his intensity, even for the brief two-minute conversation I had at the combine. He's a very serious cat. I would guess around the halls of the Chicago facility, not a huge bullshit artist. Not just shooting the shit. Quality I have. I enjoy BSing. You want to talk some ball? You want to talk stock market? You want to talk whatever? I'll shoot the shit with you. I enjoy that in a lot of different settings. Ben Johnson doesn't give off those vibes. And when I watched him last night after he, I think he would admit like the play call, the not executing at the goal line, they get stopped, they get stopped and they don't even get points, right? They choose not to kick a field goal. He's mad at himself, but he's not showing it because the entire team takes your personality, right? So if you start freaking out on the sideline, everyone freaks out. I think you learn having a young child, if he bonks his head or injures himself, if you make it a bigger deal, he will make it a bigger deal. But if you keep your composure, and again, my kid's not even nine months old yet, but we've had a couple instances where it would be like, oh my God. But if you start doing that, the cries even get louder. If you start acting like everything's okay, he can mentally just follow your lead and not freak. It goes back to the play where Malcolm Butler intercepted Russell Wilson in the Super Bowl. It's that famous video of Bill Belichick where it looks like the Patriots are going to lose the Super Bowl. And his pulse rate looks like 75. Completely unfazed. And the Patriots, because of his even keel nature, feels like they always took that on. Look at Andy Reid over the years with Patrick Mahomes. Does he show much emotion on the sideline? I'm not even factoring in their ability to develop plays, get guys open. I'm just talking about their mannerisms. Even though Ben Johnson, unlike probably Bill and Andy, is more likely to want to just go nuts. But from a psychological standpoint, he knows all these guys looking at him. If he does that, that can be a problem. Where on the flip side, you had Sirianni, who is not developing any of these plays. He is the CEO, culture setter, tone setter, leader of the team. And he is going nuts. Losing his composure. Losing his emotion. And listen, I'd be a hypocrite if I said I have not been in situations and still battle that where I can't control my emotions. And as you get older, you realize, whether it's just your family looking at you, whether it's a professional setting, whether it could be a personal setting, a lot of times you're like, I got to be calmer in that situation. Because absolutely freaking out doesn't do any good. And one thing I noticed last night and throughout his career so far with the Bears is Ben feels very in control. And Sirianni does not. Sirianni can't control his emotions. And it goes back to some of their big wins. When he freaks out on the sidelines. Even last week against the Titans. When they won, he went nuts running off the field. Which again, I'm not anti-celebrating the victory. A lot of coaches just do it in the locker room. They don't do it, you know, on a road stadium on the sideline. And I think when you look at those two guys, obviously Ben is in a different stratosphere when it comes to offense. Because it's his. It's clearly not Sirianni's. But emotionally, like, That matters. And I think one thing, and I'm sure the Eagles have talked to Nick, and Nick probably understands, it's like you can't be a hothead on the sideline, good or bad, because that doesn't benefit anybody. It really doesn't. And I can't even imagine being a Bears fan and thinking of all those years where you're just stuck kind of like Andy Dufresne in the tunnel of shit And it's like, I don't see any end in sight. We just keep crawling. This is miserable. No matter what we do, we can never get the right coach. We can never get the right quarterback. We can never get the franchise. to be like, every single year we're going to matter. And now that you have it, it's called football heaven. It's as good as it gets. It doesn't mean you're guaranteed to win every year. But when you get in that situation, you go, this is pretty fun. this is pretty awesome. And you can go into games, because I would imagine most Bears fans, their expectation for the Monday night game when Case Keenum's starting was pretty low. But after you have a moment like that, you go into basically every game, unless there's catastrophic injuries all over the place leading up to it, we're like, we can win this thing. Why? Because we got the right head coach. And speaking of right head coach, The Patriots hiring Vrabel and then year one going to the Super Bowl was a major success. An incredible accomplishment, even if their path was a little easier. And despite their quarterback playing bad in the playoffs and getting a backup quarterback in the AFC Championship game, who cares? You won those games, you celebrate it, and you go, been here before, back again. But this year, it is unraveled for Drake May. He is statistically, I mean, leads the league in turnovers. And the eye test is just atrocious. And I can only imagine what the talk is in Boston like, what's going on here? Was last year the fluke? Because what we're witnessing, it doesn't get much worse. And I was thinking about Case Keenum last night. Because I watched the post-game press conference for Ben Johnson. And he said, every... it's typically Saturday night, but because they played on Monday, it was Sunday night. They do a quarterback meeting with the coaches. And I think they go over the game plan, go over the first 15, and they just rattle through everything they've done throughout the week, play-wise. And he said, the crazy part about that meeting is Case Keenum ran the whole thing. We didn't even talk. Like, myself as the OC, the quarterback coach, like, he just ran it. And Clearly, he, again, played an incredible game, awesome moment, and we'll see how it plays out this week if he keeps starting. But I started thinking, because I had a buddy yesterday send me this tweet from ESPN Stats and Info, and it said that teams who started their non-week number one quarterback, so the Bears, Case Keenum, The commanders, Marcus Mariota, Jameis got his first start against the Titans. All the backups that started, Drew Locke, week two against the Cardinals, are 6-0. And... Anytime you win a game with your backup quarterback, it feels like two wins. It's better than a normal win with your starting quarterback. It is an uplift for the entire franchise, especially in the fashion that Drew Locke did it or Case Keenum did it. The confidence that that builds in the organization is unquantifiable. But I also, I'll never go back, or I go back all the time to the Chiefs. When they got rid of Alex Smith and they were going to insert Patrick Mahomes as their starting quarterback, one thing they were dead set on is to get a backup that was older and married. Because they wanted to get a mature guy who would be comfortable in his role, but would be a great mentor for a young player. Not only to show him how to study, how to prepare, just to be a good example, but to just be a grown-up in the room. And that kind of matters. Because think about when you're young, and even if you're in a job with zero pressure, let alone the pressure that some young quarterbacks have throughout the NFL. Most human beings can't relate to that. But I don't care who you are. When you get hired out of college and you're 22, 23, 24 years old, and you get a real job, whether it's a corporate setting, whether it's a smaller business, whatever, and you're like, this is a, you know, a role with some responsibility. It can be daunting. It can feel like there's, you know, I don't want to say the weight of the world on you, but it can be overwhelming. And it's the first time, you know, you're just kind of on your own and other people are depending on you. And, you know, we all have had bosses at one point in time, a little like parents. After a while, you're like, okay, I get it. The message, sometimes you do better learning from other people. Why do you think kids sometimes listen to their friend's parents more than their own parents? Or their coach more than their dad? Because sometimes that other voice, even if the message is the exact same, resonates more. And I don't think it's any different when it comes to it's why any good coaching staff, any good organization wants to have a veteran player around a young quarterback. Because that guy isn't just an extension of the coaching staff. It's someone for him to lean on when he goes through hard times because that individual he can relate to. And Caleb Williams, the moment Ben Johnson got the job, what did he do? He convinced Case Keenum to essentially not retire and be in the room. And he wasn't even going to be the backup quarterback. What did the Raiders do when they got Fernando Mendoza this year? They said, we need to have a veteran player. Kirk Cousins, come on down. Fernando Mendoza was the number one overall pick. The Raiders have been a joke. And they're like, we need someone to mentor him. We need someone for him to watch. We need someone around him, in his vicinity, every single day. And obviously, you know, ideally he's a good player and you're winning games. It's gone pretty well so far. But it wasn't about week to week winning and losing. It was honestly, I would imagine, 80% about Fernando Mendoza. Because that matters. and having someone who can relate to the things you're going through, even if they weren't the number one overall pick. They've just been in a situation where they weren't starting, tried to learn this league, what it takes, what the expectations are. And I look at Drake May, who you go, well, he's got veteran coaches. He's got Mike Vrabel, former player. He's got Josh McDaniels and coached Tom Brady for 20 years. Okay. A lot of these staffs have that. Patrick Mahomes got Andy Reid, who had been a successful guy for 20 years. And they still value get Chad Haney in here. And so I look at Drake May, it's like, well, who's his backup? Tommy DeVito. Think how crazy that is. Like, that is mismanagement by the Patriots. To not have some version of a veteran player who used to be a longtime starter and now is just a backup. You know, Mariota, clearly the commanders valued him on the field because they have to have a little contingency plan. Because Jaden's injury history, they re-signed him this year after being the backup. But he also fits that bill. Actually to perfection. And Jaden Daniels can ask Marcus Mariota anything. You know why? Because Mariota's kind of seen it all. No different than Caleb with Case Keenum. And I just look at the Patriots situation that no one could have foreseen it being this bad. I would agree with that. Like this is the worst case scenario. But they put themselves in a situation where it's like his own room can't even help him out. What's Tommy DeVito? I mean, to me, when I think of Tommy DeVito, he is most famously known for the agent that looked like a guy that would have been either in Tony Soprano's Crew or someone that Tony Soprano would have put in a lake. So I think that's an underrated part about the NFL, building a position group the correct way, and nothing is more important than the group of the quarterback room. Look at the Oregon Ducks. They truly valued having a backup quarterback, despite having a guy coming into the season that had a very, very good chance to establish himself as the number one quarterback. And they went, we need to get a veteran guy. Obviously, it costs a lot of money, but no one would have batted an eye if they're like, well, just have our four or five star young guy as the backup. Like, no, we're not doing that. And it came to fruition against USC and dramatically benefited potentially the outcome of their season. So I think if I'm a Patriot fan, I go, how does Tommy DeVito, like, how do we not have internal help? Like, how do we not have a Flacco type guy, someone in that room beside the coaching staff who could help the kid out? Because right now he's swimming upstream without a paddle. He's drowning and nothing that those guys seem to say works. And the other thing is the confidence, how it goes. Who's going to help him get that back? Well, think about when you're going through it as a young employee somewhere. You hate your boss or, you know, something going on weird at work. Who do you usually talk to about that? People you work hand in hand with. People in the military talk about this all the time. I don't fight for the general back at the base. I battle for the guy next to me that's hand in hand down in the trenches. Just like, basic human, the way we're wired, right? So I think the Patriots and Elliot Wolfe and Mike Vrabel, they could have done a better job of having that room a little more situated just to benefit Drake May emotionally. I need to tell you about this new sports trading app called Polymarket. It's the best way to trade in sports. In the past, if you wanted some action on the game, you'd put some money in. And if your team was doing well and you wanted to cash out, they'd lock the trade and take a huge fee. But Polymarket is a prediction market. It's a stock exchange for sports, buying in and selling out on your terms. When your team goes down to 20%, you can buy in. and sell it off at 40% when they come back, double your money. I've tried them all. Polymarket is simply the best. We're talking DraftKings, FanDuel, Couchy, you name it. Polymarket's better. They're so confident you'll never go back to the other guys. They're giving you a free $ 50 on your first trade when you deposit just 10 bucks. 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It's easy to find. But I'm used to the branding, the sounds, and it's no longer like that. Sunday, teams are all over the place, which is what it is. CBS had the opportunity. I mean, there are two big games on Sunday afternoon coming up. And it's the Chiefs, the undefeated Chiefs, and the undefeated Raiders, and the Broncos and the 49ers. Now, the Chiefs, once they got good with Patrick Mahomes, passed the Cowboys as the number one rated team. But like for 20 plus years, the Raiders haven't been good. So if you're playing the Raiders, obviously the Chiefs brand is really strong. But you'd go, eh, I'll just go with the two really good teams. But that's not the case right now. And the Raiders would not be the number one draft pick by the networks in a primetime game, at least of right now. They can earn that if they keep playing well and have turned into a real franchise moving forward. But CBS chose this because of Kansas City and the power of their brand, the amount of eyeballs that come to their games is real. I mean, it speaks for itself. The numbers are well documented over the last six, seven years. But this is an incredible opportunity for the Raiders to get Jim Nance and J.J. Watt to get the game of the day, to get the national game in Vegas, and you're undefeated. Because I think a lot of people go, yeah, this team's kind of interesting. Jenty, really good player. We know Crosby's a stud. Brock Bowers is a favorite of anyone that plays fantasy football. N'Kobe Dean's crushing it. But are they really that good? Are the Raiders really... Are we talking a 10-11 win team? Or is when the dust settles, they're going to win seven? I don't know the answer right now. Because when Kirk Cousins plays better defenses, is this going to be sustainable? As the season goes, I don't know. But I do know what we've seen through three weeks has been extremely impressive. And now that Bauer's back, their offense, I mean, they got two legit tight ends, a running back. I know Beck, I think, broke his arm, which is not ideal. Their wide receiver group is very questionable. And I think there's some question marks with the overall secondary slash pass rushers. Actually, their secondary's playing pretty good. But beside Crosby, like, do they really have a lot of juice? This is an incredible moment for them. This is one of those where it's like you could really announce yourself to the league. Because we saw the first two weeks the Chiefs got up for those games. Prime time, trying to reestablish themselves. Little bit of a sleeper against the Dolphins. I don't know if you've seen the viral clip of Jeff Halfley going to the press conference. And I never saw the clip of how many people were at the press conference. My guess would be less than five. And I think it really rattled Halfley. He's like, where is everybody? And one of the reporters is like, well, it's Miami Heat media day. So it was clear, like, yeah, you're not that important right now. And if in three years the Dolphins are a legit squad, they got a star quarterback, that won't be the case. But I think for a guy that had just spent the last couple years for the Packers, that had to be like, God, we're not the number one option in this town. You got to earn that. And the thing with an NFL team, if you get good, it will matter. And that's the interesting part about Vegas. Like, I think I read a headline today that the NBA is looking for $ 12 to $ 13 billion for the NBA team in Vegas, which to me seems pretty nuts. But Vegas is a very, very hot market when it comes to sports teams. Obviously, the A's are moving there. The Raiders have been there for a while. The stadium's awesome. the concerts, the commerce that comes through there, even if it's kind of been up and down for us normal people that used to just travel there to hang out. I maybe was more my single days, but I'm not as inclined to do that. One, I don't need to go to a sports book to dabble. Two, the prices in what used to be, especially for younger people, when I was in college, one, I'd get like a $ 59. 99 flight to Vegas. And two, you could stay at just random hotels for under $ 100. And you didn't need that much money to gamble. You could easily find $ 5 blackjack tables and food was relatively cheap. That is not the case anymore. So the dynamics and the economics of the areas change because they're all Fortune 500 companies now and they're trying to squeeze every dollar and it's like $ 25 coffees. But people will still fly there for these big events. I've done it before. I've been to multiple concerts just flying to Vegas. I know a ton of people that have gone to the Sphere. I have yet to hear anyone not have the time of their life and be blown away by the power of that thing. And, you know, the Raiders were kind of the first. In terms of, you know, I know they have an NHL team there who's actually pretty good. But the NFL is in a different stratosphere. And this game's at Allegiant. I'm going to be fascinated, like, is this 80, 90% Raider fans? Because the one thing with this stadium is a lot of people travel from out of town to make a weekend of it. And whether it's Bronco fans, whether it's Packer fans, Steeler fans, Chiefs fans, it's a pretty big moment for this franchise. And I can't wait to watch this game. Last but not least, before we do the mailbag, Lincoln Riley, clearly Saturday afternoon slash night did not go well. I would say it ended in an embarrassing fashion with the player taking out Dante Moore, the celebrating and him staying on the sideline the entire time and it being so ugly. Within the next day, they had to suspend him for a game. And he did not get suspended for the hit. He got suspended for acting like a clown. Losing sucks. When you put a game on a pedestal, which the USC Trojans did, and then you lose in front of millions of people, when people already question you, it is even worse. I'll use Ole Miss as an example. If somehow they wouldn't have pulled out that game against LSU and LSU would have made enough plays and lost, it would have been tough because there's no disputing that Ole Miss had put that LSU Lane Kiffin bat on a pedestal. I don't even disagree when Lane says that was their Super Bowl. It kind of was. And when it is your Super Bowl, you got to win it. And Lane, or excuse me, Lincoln, with all these articles, all these statements, had put that game on a pedestal. I didn't feel like Oregon put that game on a pedestal. it mattered because college football, you only get so many of these, they already had a loss, but USC put all their chips in the middle of the table. And then by the end, it felt like they were getting clowned on the field in the second half, especially the fourth quarter. I would say what I, and I got this DM and this kind of sparked me thinking about it because I've seen a ton of these clips online today said, uh, John, uh, As a Ducks fan, I'm curious if you've seen the Oregon vs. Them video montage vs. USC and what are your thoughts on the contrasting styles of the two programs? If not, wow, it's an amazing 22 minutes. I haven't seen the entire 22 minutes, but I've seen a ton of different clips. Two-minute clips of his pregame talk on Monday or Tuesday addressing the team. I've seen the four-minute clip of him, Dante getting KO'd, him being on the field, him corralling the group and kind of doing a football version of a prayer, getting their mind right. I've seen his second-half speech. I know this. If I was a super rich guy who was stroking checks to USC to buy these players, to build this massive suite facility, the last three or four days, Saturday night, up until all these videos, my money would stop. Because part of spending all this money on Lincoln Riley was to get to the point and have a program equivalent with Oregon. Yet I think we all have to acknowledge, and I say this all the time about tough guys. As an offensive guy, you know, Steve Sarkeesian or Lane couldn't beat up like Mike Vrabel or D'Amico Ryans. But I think those two guys are good examples because they're both offensive guys like Lincoln. Their careers were created in the 2000s under Pete Carroll at USC. And we talk a lot about Reggie Bush and Matt Leiner on those USC teams. I would say the defining attribute of those teams is they would break you in half. Because all their guys on defense looked and were NFL players. And even as those guys left in the next group of Clay Matthews, Ray Maluga, and Brian Cushing, which were on the front page of Sports Illustrated, It was like they were looking for violence every single Saturday. So while Sark and Lane, I wouldn't consider like Kirby Smart, crazy-ass former defensive guy, they do value the defensive player, what it takes to be violent, physical, and future NFL bodies on that side of the ball. And they use their money now with NIL to buy those guys, right? Lane did it, he's doing it at LSU, and obviously Sark does it at Texas. And I watched Lincoln versus Dan Lanning and I go, the gap between these two programs, emotionally, mentality-wise, if I was a USC booster, I'd be embarrassed. And I just, you don't change that. Because ultimately, Lincoln trained from Mike Leach, who obsessed over offense. And when I view Lincoln, that's what he cares about. Discipline doesn't give a shit. Defense doesn't give a shit. And ultimately, when those things don't matter that much to you, the message you have for your team can never be the version of what Dan Lanning tells his team. Because when you watch Dan Lanning lead the group, you're like, this is kind of how I'd want my football coach to operate. Like, if I had a kid I mean, I do. But if he was good enough, if Jack was 18 years old right now, was a massive football recruit, and could go wherever, I'd be like, ideally, West Coast, easier travels. And it was Lane Kiffin, or excuse me, well, Lane Kiffin. But let's say Dan Lanning and Lincoln Riley desperately wanted him. It would be a no-brainer. I don't care what position he plays. I'd want him to go play for Dan Lanning over Lincoln Riley. because of everything I've witnessed on those videos. We've been seeing him for years. But Lincoln can't do that. He can't create that because that's not who he is. You hear coaches talk a lot about being authentic. And I think that matters in every walk of life. Now more than ever. In a day and age where frauds and phonies and political acts, and I don't mean actual political acts, I mean people operating for like... playing politics on TV in the sense of like a newscaster. I've used this example before. If you turn on the news in like 1992, everyone kind of looked the same, smiled. They're completely fake. It's like they did not actually talk or operate like that in the real world. I think what the consumer demands now in 2026 is like, act how you actually are. I don't have to like you, but like at least just be true to yourself. And it's why I think, you know, whenever you hear like a podcast or someone's like, yeah, their whole thing's scripted. You're like, are you serious? It's scripted? Like, I respect the business Call Her Daddy built, but I saw this clip of this actress that went on a bunch of shows to promote. She's like, yeah, a couple of the shows, we just sat down and started talking. Call Her Daddy was completely scripted. It's like, listen, I respect the money you're generating, but I don't view you the same, you know? And I think there's something about Lincoln that's like, just doesn't have it. At the highest level. You know, and you watch Dan Lanning, and who was he around? Saban, Kirby. Those guys aren't faking shit. They don't have to pretend to be a tough guy. Because of their standard, what they demand within their program, how they think, how they're wired. You know, Dan Lanning went on this long kind of rant, long would be strong, couple minute rant in front of his team early in the week about the USC juice boxes. And he's like, how fake is this energy? Like, what is this? We don't do that here. We just create the energy. We just create the mayhem. And I think Lincoln's trying to manipulate it because at his core, he's They say that if you just walk George's campus during a football practice, like you're just walking the campus, you can hear Kirby Smart because he is going apeshit. He's been doing that for 25 years since he's been coaching. He's not faking and manipulating his energy at practice. He's a nut job. His players know it, and they demand it in terms of what is expected to play for their program. Well, USC's offense is great. Well, this isn't just offense. I mean, this is football. So how's your defense? How's your team discipline? How's your program operate? And I think this all gets back to... I've said this forever. There are some outliers. Culture and proximity where you're born and where you coach matters. And if I think about most of the best coaches... at least over the internet era, in college football on the West Coast, they've been from the West Coast. Pete Carroll was born in California. He went to the University of Pacific. Throughout his life, he feels like a California guy. Jeff Tedford, Southern California, born and raised, played at Fresno State, coached at Oregon, coached at, obviously head coach at Cal. It kind of worked. Chris Peterson, Boise State and Washington. Where is he from? Northern California. Went to UC Davis. And if you think about the South, Nick Saban's from West Virginia, but kind of felt like a Southern guy. That's why he fit in at LSU and obviously fit in at Alabama. Kirby Smart, Dabo Sweeney forever, Jimbo Fisher. Just listen to their names. You know, and I think that matters. Urban Meyer was a guy that kind of bounced around. Coached at Utah, coached at Florida. Obviously, Nick Saban has success at Michigan State. He could have coached anywhere. Sark probably feels like Texas is as far east as that guy can go. And honestly, Austin, I've only been there for less than three or four days throughout my life, but definitely has more of a West Coast city type vibe than like, Texas South, you know, and Lincoln's a small town, Texas guy who became a star at Oklahoma. Does that feel LA USC to you? So I, I do think those videos coming out make Lincoln, and listen, are they going to pay him $ 67 million to go away? I don't believe that. He's going to be the coach for several years. But pretty embarrassing little stretch that doesn't really seem like anyone's going to have any ability to change. Starting with Lincoln Riley. Because you can't change who you are. I can't change. I can adapt some the way I do certain things. And you kind of have to as you get married and you have a kid. Like you got to change your ways a little bit. But there are certain things about me that are never going to change. Just like if you're listening and you're 35, 40, 45, 50. Certain things about you that are never going to change. And at this point in time Lincoln Riley ain't changing anything. being more disciplined, being more of a hard ass, being a tough guy, because you can't change that. Okay, let's do a couple of mailbag questions. At John Middlecoff, at John Middlecoff is the Instagram fire in those DMs. Get your questions answered here on the show. Mailbag. Why don't people believe in the Vikings yet? They're exactly what everyone thought Houston would be before the season. Below average quarterback, mediocre run game, one elite wideout, and a game-breaking defense. A lot of people were high on Houston going into the year, and many bet them to be the number one seed. But now that exactly what's supposed to happen in Houston is happening in Minnesota, and we're not getting any love. Fair question. Listen, 3-0 is 3-0. You never apologize for it. I do think it's not sustainable to throw for 150, 175 yards and win all these games. You know, you do play in a division with– you can beat the Bears in a rainstorm. If you played them in more of a normal September game, like are they scoring three points? You know, you just beat Tampa. I mean, you're going three and out. It felt like every series. That game was a tough watch. Flores has been incredible. Incredible. I'd say the difference you and Houston, like, ironic because Daniil Hunter used to be on your team, but Turner from Bama looks good. But, like, Turner and Will Anderson and Stingley, like, they got some high, high-end guys. It feels like you guys are manipulating it more, which is coaching, It's like, how sustainable is this? Are they really about to win 10 or 11 games? Or is this going to come somewhat stabilized a little bit because their offense is so bad? And now Jefferson's out. So even just the threat of him, I mean, I'm assuming he's out for this week. Who knows? Maybe it's, we'll see. I mean, I'm recording this on Tuesday. We'll know the next couple of days. Like, is he probably out this week? Is he out two weeks? Is he out, is he a game, you know, week to week? Is he day to day? Time will tell. But 3-0 is 3-0. I think the Vikings are a little like the Raiders where people are going, is this real? The difference is the Raiders are like scoring a bunch of touchdowns. After Case Keenum's stellar performance against the Eagles, who do you think the Bears will start versus the Jets? The staff loves Tyson, but should they ride the hot hand? I talked about this last night. and you watch Case's post-game press conference, he kind of tiptoed around it a little bit too. You could tell he's not 100% confident he's ever going to start again. That's why I think this moment was so big. And he clearly loves Tyson. He's been around him now two years, so they've become very, very close. It's a unique relationship when you're not playing at that position because it's not like you can rotate. If I had to guess right now, I would guess that Tyson starts. I would guess Tyson starts. If we're doing like polymarket percentages, it's not like 80-20, it's probably 60-40. You know, a young player who, if he starts and does well, you also have in your back pocket the value of the guy. that this offseason, if he goes out, if Caleb's out a couple more weeks, and Tyson balls out, could you flip him this offseason for a second round pick? So I think you've got to take that into consideration. I mean, at the end of the day, he is the third string quarterback. And you knew he's the third string quarterback for a reason, because I bet Ben would tell you, Tyson's just a better... More just skilled guy we think could be better player. Now, can he, could he have played like that? No guarantee. And that's the hard part about these situations. But I would guess that Tyson, if he's fully healthy and can, you know, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, I think they would go with him. against 60-40, which seems a little crazy. Like, why would he just go with the hot hand? Well, listen, there are economic impacts of this. There are draft impacts of this. Like, if over the offseason you could flip Tyson, if he has a couple sweet games for, like, a top 40 pick, all of a sudden you can use your pick and the top 40 pick. to add to the defense, to trade for a veteran player. So there's like a balancing act here. And if you're Ben Johnson, like you're going to be this head coach for the foreseeable future. A lot of coaches live day to day, week to week. I do think when you are Andy Reed, Sean Payton, Kyle Shanahan, Sean McVay, it's easier to balance the short and the longterm. And you can have a conversation with your GM where some places they, it'd be hard to have that conversation. So my guess would be in, would be Tyson. As someone who was born in 02, and I began watching football after the Packers won in 10, what was the physicality like in the 90s and early 2000s? Well, son, let me tell you. When I used to strap it up against Elway and Marino, it was, you can YouTube it. I mean, it's just YouTube big hits from the 90s. It was, I would say the best way you could describe it is on any given pass play, someone could get stretchered off the field. And the reason they used to call balls over the middle, balls the go-route shot against the hole between the corner and the safety, potential hospital balls, because the guy would end up in the hospital. Now as a quarterback, you don't really spend that much time thinking, I'm laying my guy out to dry. Where the NFL that I grew up on is if you laid a guy out over the middle, he was going to get knocked out. Now, the differences back then is there was no concussion protocol. There was no blue tent. They'd come to the sideline. They'd give him some smelling salt. He'd shake it off and he'd go back in the game. And then years later, he'd be like, I don't even remember the second half, which clearly from a safety standpoint, not great. But that's how it was. There were no protective measures. There was no such thing as defenseless wide receiver. You know why? Because the wide receiver knows when he went over the middle that the defenders can hit him. There wouldn't have been a penalty when Jalen Hurts got decleted yesterday. Patrick Mahomes would have been slammed in the ground and the referee wouldn't have thought about throwing the flag. So I think the emphasis of flags on these hits is something that didn't exist. There were not flags when guys got killed. You were just killed. I would say that is the number one biggest difference now. When you see a big hit now, the first thing you think is that's going to be a penalty. And for the majority of time, whether you're talking quarterback or you're talking skill guys down the field, a flag gets thrown. I just don't think it was very often at all flags were ever thrown. I look at Kirk Cousins, who is thriving for a relatively low price, and I ask, why do teams still succumb to the pressure of starting these first-round rookies ASAP? We have several examples of redshirt situations working. Mahomes, Jordan Love, Carson Palmer, and many examples of young quarterbacks getting immediately thrown to the Lions and struggling. What really drives me crazy is when we're told that certain players are projects, yet they barely get time to, quote, develop. We knew that Cam Ward was rough around the edges. Everyone is crapping on him 20 games into his NFL career. He's had three head coaches and a meddling owner already. And he's not Steve McNair. What a shocker. Can we just wait a minute before handing out the bus labels? I get the media pressure to throw them to the Lions, but who cares what they think? I wish the coaches in front offices had the balls to say, quote, he's not starting year one, end of discussion. What do you say about this? Well, it's twofold. The coaches, like J.J. McCarthy didn't get traded to the Giants because the media said he sucked. The team thought he sucked. So Anthony Richardson didn't get benched for Daniel Jones last year because the media didn't think he knew what he was doing. The media does not influence decisions like that with coaches or front offices during camp and during the season. Not with that position. It just doesn't. Because that position is not only judged by those guys, it's judged by the rest of the locker room. Which is also a factor of it's easy to not start Mahomes when you have Alex Smith and your team has been making the playoffs with him at quarterback. It's easy to not start Fernando Mendoza when you have Kirk Cousins, who's been a starter in the league for 10 years and made $ 300 million. You know, the Carson Palmer, John Kitna thing probably wouldn't happen now. But who was Cam Ward's backup last year? Will Levis? Cam Ward was probably the best quarterback they had on the roster. So this gets back to not having a veteran guy around. where it's like, he's the best quarterback, for me to address the team, I have to name him the starter. Because the rest of the team, you can't go with a veteran quarterback when everyone knows the young quarterback's better. Now, when the guy, or it's close, it's easy to justify it. And when the guy is clearly better, no one thinks twice. But you have to do a good enough job of having that guy on the roster, because if like, I don't know why I keep using this name, but Joe Flacco. If the Titans just had Joe Flacco. Could Cam Warda beat him out as a rookie? Probably not. And I also think it's easy to say he's not playing year one end of discussion. Well, what happens? It's one thing when you're 3-0 or Alex Smith and you're going to the playoffs. But what about when you're losing every week? And it's you're 1-7. And yeah, the media and the fans. Like, okay, the fans pay the bills here. So people start getting mad. People start showing up. That impacts the owner. They go, what are we doing? I want to see the guy. There are a lot of variables with this stuff. The Mahomes example is the easiest one to not play him. They were literally good. They hosted a playoff game, which they lost to Mariota and the Titans. Kelsey got a concussion in that game, if I remember correctly. But I don't think it's as easy to do when your team sucks. Or if the guy is legitimately just good. You know, I mean, if the guy is legitimately ready to go, you just play him. And we have seen examples of guys struggle. Peyton Manning was terrible early on. And then by year three or four was elite. CJ Stroud, probably the best year of his career. Jaden Daniels potentially as well. So you just... There's a lot of unknown. And this gets back to the violence of the game. It's never been easier to play quarterback. You're not... They're not going to kill you. In theory. Physically. And you can throw the hospital balls and you'll get a pass interference. Michael... This is from Michael. Wouldn't John Gruden to Tampa be kind of sweet? I know I'm a dumb Raider fan, but he had Carr playing great football, top 10 offenses, and I'm telling you, between the 20s, the ball was moving. He struggled in the red zone because Derek and the O-line is glaring weaknesses personnel, which the GM Jason Light would cover. A thing Gruden is still great. I think Gruden is still a great offensive guru. Would love to see him with Baker and Jason Light running personnel. Gruden's YouTube last week going, or two weeks ago, going to Auburn, Florida, is, he's made, like, the one unique part about John is, like, he's better at this than me. He is just so... secure like selfies with random guys doing things on camera unfazed by it all he if there's a camera around he becomes just his natural self and i've known people that work for him with the raiders they say he's no different cameras off the way he operates the gruden we've always seen on tv coach is the same guy no matter where you go And he clearly loves football. The YouTube video he did going to the Auburn game, he's taking tours of fraternities. He's with the basketball team sizing them up. I mean, it's just entertaining. I do think there's some complication. He's suing the league over the leaks of Dan Snyder that got him fired. But the Buccaneers made him call a preseason game. It definitely is not the... craziest thing to think about. I would say it would be on the table for sure. Wouldn't shock me. You know, depending on what their options are. That John Gruden is the next coach. I wouldn't put it at a high percentage, but... After seeing, you know, he's suing the lead and the Glazers not only let him call a game, he was the play-by-play guy with Rondé Barber. And if you remember, Raider fans do, when he was coming back, it was basically choosing between the Bucs and the Raiders. It would be pretty nuts if his four NFL jobs were the Raiders, traded to the Bucs, he returned to the Raiders, and then he returned to the Bucs. I do think he values, he's making a lot of money, he's having a good time. He lives in Tampa. Be a pretty easy transition. I wouldn't bet on it, but I wouldn't say no chance not happening. He's bad at personnel. And from what I was told, I think he can be really stubborn with that. So if he's just like, hey, I don't pick the players, which I think is easy to say, because then he's like, well, You want me to cook dinner and you won't even let me tell you what to get at the grocery store? That's always the pushback. And it's like, hey, I'll let this guy do it. But he loves Baker Mayfield. That'd be fun. My guess is still Tomlin, but it wouldn't stun me. Long time listener. When a team commits a personal foul like the Bears did on Hertz, and the player is then required to be evaluated for a concussion, shouldn't there be a stoppage that gives the player being evaluated a chance to reenter? It seems like under the current rules, you could potentially be rewarding a cheap shot. Not that I'm saying the Bears hit was necessarily a cheap shot, but you could certainly argue it was. I do not think it was. It was a football play. He got decleted. He's a quarterback. That guy's a linebacker. And if you're going to go shoulder to shoulder trying to get out of bounds, you might not make it all the time. I got no issue with the shot. You throw the penalty, whatever. I hear what you're saying. The problem is the league's business model is to play football. And if you stop, one, there's no guarantee that he's coming back into the game. So I guess what you are kind of hinting at is you stop the game until I get clarity. Can he reenter or is he out and I got to go with the backup quarterback? I think Sirianni's going nuts. It's like, bro, you could have manipulated the situation a little bit. Blow a timeout. Just slow everything down. Now, I don't know what the exact time was once they yank him off to when Jalen was ready to come back because he threw the interception. And it didn't feel like even when he threw the interception, Jalen was ready to come in or they would have ran him back in. They're just not going to stop the game for five to ten minutes while the consumer's sitting there and they're just standing on this island. It's just not going to happen. I hear what you're saying, and there's definitely a competitive advantage. If you're a defender and you do that and you just get a 15-yard flag and the backup comes in and then the outcome is the backup throwing a pick, but the league is not going to just halt the game. Which sucks. It's where I would defend the Eagles last night. That was a pretty big blow. They were kind of humming right there. Now you could also come back and say, well, they cut it pretty close on the touchdown before half. You often say the defense is about the Jimmys and the Joes. And I tend to agree. But is Brian Flores the exception? You go guy for guy in the Vikings defense and they're average at best. I can't remember the last time I've seen a defense this good while lacking any real top elite talent. Do you think he gets a head coaching job next cycle? I know a lot of fans in Green Bay would be happy to see him replace LaFleur. Maybe Minnesota keeps Flores over KOC. He's had one of the great three-game stretches you'll ever go see. That second half against Green Bay, what he did to the Bears in the rain, and then what he did to Baker the other day. I mean, Sam Darnold, I'm seeing ghosts. Baker was 100% seeing ghosts. Because guys were coming from everywhere. His offensive line couldn't block it. He was all out of sorts. That game was atrocious to watch, but also awesome to watch because of just the pressure Minnesota was putting on them. And the speed in which those guys land their blitzes. Like, you know, a lot of times you blitz from back where the linebacker's standing or like a safety or corner kind of creeping up. Their guys, ball snap, they're on the line, they're all going. And you don't know where it's coming from. So I think it just gets back to... I'll never forget an assistant coach told me years ago. I'm like, what's Flores' deal? And he's like, bro, the relationship he had with the offensive staff and the quarterback room, it was not great. The way he treated that kind of unit. When that unit is where your bread's buttered. Right? As a head coach. So as a defensive coordinator, all he has to worry about is defense. But when he's the head coach... His offensive coordinator and quarterback, clearly he hated Tua, which, you know, clearly Tua was never going to be what they hoped he would be at number five. But before the concussions, like Tua was a capable NFL player. And I think you got, if you tell me you can't treat or function with the quarterback position very well in 2026, I can't make you my head coach, no matter if you're the best defensive coordinator going. I think that's a knock on Fangio. It's like their mentality, their gruffness, their intensity. It's not very quarterback friendly. When you watch hard knocks with Mike, he's kind of got a lighter demeanor. You watch fans, you're like, God, how miserable are you, Vic? And I think Flores can be a little bit like that too. So that to me is the only question. In terms of understanding defensive football, he's elite. Elite. Elite. But to make you my head coach, like, well, what are you going to do with an offensive coordinator and my quarterback? And can you get along with them? Because if you can't, we just, we can't do this. And I think it's hard for the defensive mentality. The offensive mentality is different. They're not looking to kill you physically. Looking to run a sweet route, gain seven yards. Get a little leverage here. Run a fake route and get an easy little wheel route here for first down. Then do some high fives. It's a good question, though. I mean, two things can be true. And I don't know. I mean, I think eventually he'll get a second chance. This probably happens more with defensive coordinators than offensive coordinators. Like, how many guys are all-time great offensive coordinators but just suck at head coaching? I mean, I would have said Josh, but this year it ain't going well. It's pretty rare. It feels like most of the best offensive coordinators are pretty good head coaches. Even on the floor, we can nitpick. I'm like, he's had a pretty good career. Pretty good career. Defensive guys, though, it's hard to balance because a lot of them are curmudgeons. Just look at the last 10, 15 years. Like Mike Zimmer. You think Mike Zimmer's an enjoyable guy to be around every day? Does that look like a fun guy? Like, do I want to come to work and hang out with Mike Zimmer? I'm like, fuck no. Jesus. You know? No chance. Fangio, like, is he the most enjoyable human being to be around 24-7, 365? Probably not. Maybe floor is a little bit different, but I think the defensive thing, like, guys can be great defensive coordinators. And their personality. I think Spaggs, people really like him. He's very likable. You know? Quarterbacks like him on the team. Everyone likes him. That's a quality that you have to have as a head coach in this modern day football. It's very, very important. And that's a huge, huge knock on Flores in his time in Miami. Now, Josh McDaniels pulled this. He's like, I started journaling. I know my flaws and I've worked on them. I've looked at myself in the mirror. I'm a different guy. And the Raiders were like, you are? Six years, $ 60 million. Josh is like, I'm the head coach of the Raiders. And by like the end of year one, people were like, what is going on here? He didn't even finish year two. I think he's the only guy in league history who, to have two head coaching jobs and not make it through year two both times. Think how much management has to hate you for that to happen twice. Guys get second chances, they're not good enough. Robert's solid. Maybe he's just not meant to be a head coach. Maybe he's just not a head coach. But it does feel like people like him. Dan Quinn. Maybe Dan Quinn is just not a head coach. Seems like a likable guy. If you're not going to be a head coach and not good enough and you're like a dick, it's tough. I think it's really hard. Not every day is kumbaya, rainbows, butterflies, and just having a party. It's football. It's intense. But there has to be some. Guys are kind of excited to come every once in a while to work. We'll end on that one. Have a great day. Adios. Talk to you soon. The Volume.
