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The Bill Simmons Podcast
Is the NBA Too Afraid of Football? Plus, Jets Dysfunction and Million-Dollar Picks With Wosny Lambre, Joe House, and Peter Schrager
02:23:18
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- [00:00]
Bill Simmons
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- [00:35]
Joe House
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- [00:38]
Bill Simmons
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Peter Schrager
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Bill Simmons
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Joe House
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- [00:56]
Bill Simmons
Shop gameday essentials@oldelpasso.com the Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network where we put up a new rewatchables on Monday night. It's the Gambler with me and Chris ryan. It was a one for us. We had a great time, 10 minute serial conversation there. You can find all of it on the Ringer Movies YouTube channel this Monday. Coming up, we are gonna do a Christmas movie. We did Home Alone 2. It was with Kyle Brandt. It was the first time we'd ever done a podcast together in the same room. So that part was fun. But this is we had a blast doing this one. So that's coming on Monday. You'll be able to watch that actually on Spotify and you can watch that on The Ringer Movies YouTube channel as well. You can watch all the videos from this podcast on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel. And we just launched the Ringer TV YouTube channel. That's got the watch, it has the prestige TV pod, has a bunch of fun hall of Fame stuff and like direct to video stuff that we did. That's where we did the Landman thing last week. So please go subscribe to that as well. We're also brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook where we've been doing these 30 on 30 profit boost tokens every Friday. I've been boosting 30 point scores for you. If they get to 30 points and you bet it, you get boosted. I tweet out my picks on on Friday and I was there. I did really well the first three weeks. Last week was not well, but it was weird. It was one of those weeks where there wasn't a lot of scoring. So be sure to claim the PBT place your 30 on 30 bet for Friday. Just look for 30 on 30 on the FanDuel Sportsbook app. Coming up, going to talk to House and Big W about the NBA Cup. Big, big picture. Did this work? How can we fix it? What should it look like next year? So we did that. And why is the NFL cast such a shadow over the NBA? It makes me mad. Anyway, we talked about that too. Then House stayed for million dollar picks. Then Peter Schrager came on to talk about dysfunction with the jets, the weird Christmas schedule and all the strange coaching stuff that might be happening pretty soon. It is all next. First, our friends from Pro Chip. All right, it's 2:00pm Pacific Time. Joe House is here because we're do million dollar picks in a little bit. Big Woz is here. He was just in Las Vegas for the NBA cup. Which is it still going or is it finally over? It's.
- [03:38]
Big Woz
I mean, I was only there for the semifinals. I got back on Sunday. But it's done. The Bucks, I heard the Bucks won and Giannis played well.
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Bill Simmons
Oh, is that what happened?
- [03:48]
Big Woz
Yeah.
- [03:49]
Bill Simmons
So walk us through the Vegas piece of this and whether it's a good idea because I really, I really want us, the three of us to help the NBA. I think the NBA needs help in a bunch of different ways with their scheduling and some of their idea generation. But what worked for you in Vegas and what didn't work for you?
- [04:08]
Big Woz
I think I like the idea of having two games in one location. Sort of an all day kind of basketball extravaganza. Like I personally enjoyed that aspect of it. The arena is, you know, pretty much up to snuff in terms of any normal NBA arena. So like just the kind of logistics of how it works as a basketball venue is completely fine.
- [04:36]
Bill Simmons
So you felt like it was like March Madnessy a little bit. Like you go, there's two games in a row. The house is nodding happily 100%.
- [04:44]
Big Woz
I thought that was great. I think you know what it reminded me of, honestly, especially early on in these games as they sort of getting going was being at the dunk contest and the three point contest in Indianapolis last year. It's like, you know, I'm here to watch. But like nobody, it feels like nobody there is very impassioned. It's like, you know, neutral observers basically. But as the games get going and the result gets closer to being finalized, people got into it. It's Just because there's not a lot of partisans there. Um, that's. That's the at. That's what the atmosphere felt like. It felt like, you know, when I was watching the three point contest last year, until Steph and Ines school got to the finals, there wasn't that much juice watching it. But like, once it's like, whoa, Steph might lose to a WNBA player, the energy sort of got ratcheted up. And I think that's kind of what it felt like. Being in Vegas is like, early on in the game, the crowd is like, everybody's sort of getting settled in. And then when you notice that, like, all right, the games and the balance.
- [05:55]
Bill Simmons
People were really into it House the finals, watching on tv, it reminded me, not a little of the bubble.
- [06:04]
Joe House
Oh, interesting.
- [06:05]
Bill Simmons
Where the crowd was, like, blacked out. I couldn't really tell if the audio was bad or if people were just in a coma. I couldn't tell how many people were there. And Giannis was just killing it. Obviously he killed it the whole time he was there, but it just. Something about it doesn't work. I'm sure it works if you're there, if you work for the league, if you're in the teams, it's like, this is great. We're all here, but I feel like there's a better idea. So where'd you stand just on the semis and the Finals?
- [06:32]
Joe House
Well, there's. There's two things at work. In the first place, the games were rock fights. I mean, the shooting across the board in the semis and the Finals was bad. And, you know, Oklahoma City going 5 for 32 from 3, that's not pleasing to the eye. They were all Unders. If you were gambling on this and playing on the unders, you. You're quite happy with outcomes, but was really hit the key point, which is how can you get the partisans there? How can you get the fans that will show up with the passion? And this is the difference between this year's iteration and last year with the Lakers. The Lakers had an easy, easy, easy way to import, you know, a bunch of enthusiasm. And it was very cool because it was the one. How can you get. This is why I was shaking my head enthusiastically around the idea of this being kind of like an NCAA deal. The difference is there's big chunks of fan bases that have traveled to that place to root for their team. So it's live. It's live from. From the tip. How can you. How can we get that. That's the part BS that I want to.
- [07:38]
Big Woz
Part of it for me is, like, you know, I've read and I've heard all of the hand wringing. Like, the bottom line is if the Knicks and Warriors were in this final, they would have been an. It would have been, you know, a huge deal. But we didn't get that. We got the Bucks and okc. These are not two national brands. These are not two, you know, fan bases that have massive, like, fan bases all over the country the way the Knicks and the Lakers do. Like, you know, if you've ever been to a Hawks game when the Knicks are playing them, it's half Knick fans in there. You know, same when you go to when. When the Lakers play in places like Phoenix and Denver, it's like a bunch of Laker fans there. Right. And so, you know, the two teams in there, I think, was problematic for me personally. And I'm not somebody who's ever like, you know, given Adam Silver his props. I think the teams played hard. The teams played like, as if there were stakes. All the ancillary stuff, I think needs to be figured out. But the most important thing, that the players cared and tried their best. I think that's the biggest sort of takeaway for me.
- [08:48]
Bill Simmons
Well, that's why I care about this as a topic. Because fundamentally, the premise behind the tournament works because the games were more fun to watch. So you start there. You said something that I think is a bad sign for the league and maybe ties into the stuff I did on Tuesday on my pod. Oklahoma City is the best team in the west and they have Shai, who's the fourth best player in the world or the fifth best player in the world, depending on what your rankings is are. Giannis is the second best player in the world, maybe the first best player. If you want to have the yoke Giannis conversation, I don't want to do that here. And is playing out of his mind and is the most fun version of him that he's been in a game. So on paper, it's a great matchup. Oklahoma City, Milwaukee. And yet you laid out like, oh, it's too bad the Knicks weren't in there. It's too bad the warriors aren't in there. Maybe that's just what the league is like. And even when I was going back and trying to figure out all the unicorn situations that have happened over the years, almost every time it's somebody in a big market, right? It's Magic and Bird, Boston, la, It's Michael Jordan in Chicago, Shaq, it's Kobe and Shaq in la, it's Curry and the warriors happening in San Francisco. In the Bay Area, the only real time where we had a marquee kind of thing was LeBron and Miami and Cleveland. And LeBron almost became like his own franchise to some degree because he became so big. But House just structurally, if we put the semifinals in New York in, either you had both games at MSG or you had one game at Barclays and the other game at msg. And it had to be you could hustle back and forth and potentially get both. And then you had the Finals two days later at msg. And now we have celebrities now. It's way easier for people to come in and out now. There's like, vibe and energy and we're playing it in the most famous basketball arena we have. Isn't that just better?
- [10:48]
Joe House
Maybe, because we were very, very close to having this be the Hawks against the Rockets, like Saturday. That was a viable possibility.
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Big Woz
New York fans would have showed up for that.
- [11:01]
Peter Schrager
Yeah.
- [11:05]
Joe House
I'm not sure. Like, I don't think that Vegas is a bad choice as a venue because it delivers the promise of other entertainment. You know, New York is hard, especially.
- [11:19]
Bill Simmons
Is that what we're calling it now? Entertainment? You mean like adult entertainment?
- [11:24]
Joe House
We're old enough now to talk about these things in ways that keep it light. But I don't know, New York in December, like, that's a whole thing, right? Like, everybody's up in New York right now because time is marvelous.
- [11:39]
Bill Simmons
But that leads to the second part of the question is, is December the right time to have the NBA Cup?
- [11:46]
Big Woz
Well, you know, I think that's a great question, honestly. I think part of the thinking is, like, we want to really juice and goose attention on very early NBA games, which traditionally people just didn't, you know, gravitate towards. Because obviously, and like, people need to understand that, like, no matter what the NBA cup does or is it's not gonna be as popular as football. Like, we need to. We need to let go of that as a. Even a concept or an idea. Like, Americans love football more than they do basketball. And that's okay.
- [12:20]
Bill Simmons
A lot more.
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Big Woz
A lot more. And that's okay. I just think it's about one. The Giannis and Dame thing. I mean, the Giannis and Shay thing. And I've talked about this on group chat. I think David Stern's dream of these hyper, corporatized focus group to death athletes, they don't get busted for weed. They don't scare corporate America. They are the perfect Corporate automatons. But guess what? People are not attracted to that. They're not compelling figures. Even Nike and Giannis like, selling Giannis as this cute, cuddly teddy bear. That's just a mistake. Nobody knows a single thing about Shea Gildrich Alexander except that he wears funny clothes.
- [13:05]
Bill Simmons
Oh, and he does. And he does interviews with 11 of his teammates.
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Big Woz
That's it. Nobody knows anything about these guys.
- [13:11]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, Giannis had that. Had that clip when he. That from 2015 when he, the Bucks and the Bulls had that series and he got mad at Mike Dunleavy and He did the 50 foot charge and just knocked him into the first row. Like, Giannis is not, like, just a cuddly dude. That dude has an edge that they try to pretend he doesn't. I don't know why they would pretend he doesn't.
- [13:33]
Joe House
Well, this. That's the angle to play up. I mean, part of the thing that you guys are talking about is the league's affirmative choice about how it's going to market this this season, which is, you know, a transition season. And you captured it BS on your pod earlier this week. They have chosen, as a, from a marketing standpoint, to give glory to this exiting, exiting, quickly class of superstars that have defined the league over the past 10 to 15 years at the expense of a player like SGA like, you.
- [14:05]
Bill Simmons
Know, or Tatum or Tyrese Halliburton or all these dudes in their 20s that they should be trying to elevate. Yeah.
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Joe House
Yes, right. Exactly. You know, what's. What's SGA's defining moment? Ask. And we're. We're NBA heads, but ask anybody in an NBA kind of community. Tell. Tell SGA's, you know, the clutch thing that's happened. Giannis, I love there's a moment here to really go ahead and lean into where he's at, which is averaging 21 and a half points per game in the paint, which hasn't been seen since Shaq in 99, 2000. We talked about Giannis and his potential of replacing Shaq at that. Let's do that. Let's make that be Giannis. Giannis. We know Giannis has a ring. Let's go with Giannis.
- [14:50]
Bill Simmons
It just feels like there's two things that they did, Woz, that I just. The more I look at it, I just don't like. One is they could have used the Olympics and even like the Netflix starting five show. Like, just push new people, push. Like, put the fucking Wagners on starting five. Let's hang out with those Goofy Germans and see what their life is like. Let's try to develop new people. And then the Olympics, same thing. Should anyone over 30 even be on the Olympic team? Maybe we should have. It should be all, like, you know, younger players are in their prime players or guys trying to have a moment. Because we were in this situation in the beginning of the 2010s with Durant and Russ, and remember, it was the same conversations about, well, who wants to watch okc? That's a whole bunch of young team. They should be putting LeBron on and Kobe and the Celtics and Carmelo, and meanwhile, all the real basketball people are like, I fucking love watching that OKC team. Right? And then it took a while. Took a while. Finally, 2014, when they played the spurs, it felt like we had enough history with OKC and they became a thing. But I don't know why they don't push the younger guys more, why they're so beholden to the guys who have already done it. And to me, it's just about ratings. But the ratings are going down, so it's not working.
- [16:03]
Big Woz
Yeah, look, I agree with you on the Netflix front. Look, sorry, Bill, but Jayson Tatum went on that damn show and said, he loves his mom, he loves his son, and his dad.
- [16:14]
Bill Simmons
I could have told you he was gonna be born on that night.
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Big Woz
I mean, that was just misery in terms of selling this product and being like, these are compelling guys, interesting people, great athletes. This man went up there and said he loves his mom, his son, and he hoops really hard, like, it's just not gonna work. And, you know, again, and I'll say this again, their most popular young guy was who? John Morant.
- [16:39]
Bill Simmons
Right? Yeah. We talked about all this.
- [16:40]
Big Woz
And bottom line is, Nike and them did not get their hooks into him and turn him into a corporate product since he was 12 years old like they have the rest of these guys. These dudes are so anodyne. They don't say or do or. Look, nothing is interesting about these guys. I enjoy watching them hoop as people. I'm completely un. Like, bro, uninspired. There's. There's just nothing there. And, you know, again, the guys who are willing to be a little bit out there and different don't comport with how the league sees itself as.
- [17:16]
Bill Simmons
Got Kyle Kuzma.
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Big Woz
Hey, Kyle Kuzma is willing to say stuff in public.
- [17:22]
Joe House
That's what.
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Big Woz
I like that about Kuzma. He's willing to say shit. These other guys, like, I don't know, man.
- [17:28]
Bill Simmons
They're just so afraid of money at stake.
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Big Woz
Any backlash?
- [17:32]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, they don't want to jeopardize it. It's just not fun. So I'm thinking like with the cup, this ties into. Another thing that makes me mad is they're so afraid of football to the point they take inside the NBA, which is just the Thursday show. On Thursday nights I watch the NBA and they're like, we have to move it away from football. Football's eating our lunch. They move it to Tuesdays, doesn't feel the same. They have this NBA Cup. They decide the semifinals are going to be Saturday because it's the one day we can kind of get away with not going against football. And then they keep everybody there for three fucking days because they don't want to go against a Monday night doubleheader, which by the way was Minnesota against Chicago and Kirk Cousins corpse against the shitty Raiders team. It's like, why are you afraid of that for maybe go try to beat him head to head. But they're doing all this stuff where they're just retreating and they're so scared of the NFL. And meanwhile it's like, maybe, maybe you should try to throw some counterpunches. Like the NFL is going to beat you either way. Like even the wnba, which we thought it was all crazy, the WNBA playoffs are going head to head against the NFL. Guess what? They did okay. They had fans like people had. They had their own fan base and people watch that shit. So I house, why are they so scared? I just feel like when you operate from fear, you're going to lose every single time.
- [18:51]
Joe House
See, I don't know that I subscribe to the idea that they're operating from fear because they did stick this cup into the portion of the NFL season that is like, really, you know, we're deciding playoff outcomes now and they are on nights of the week when there, there isn't necessarily NFL. Now I don't like the fact that inside the NBA is on Tuesday and you know, the Amazon games are fine, but none of that Thursday night football is musty TV for me. Hold your spot. But here's the real problem. And they're never going to do this. The stupid season shouldn't start until Christmas and the NBA cup in February would be effing magnificent because football is diminishing. Starting on, you know, Christmas Day, basically we're getting less and less games. The playoffs start and during the week you, you have full run to go do whatever you want. So taking the whole thing and starting in Christmas time New Year's and let's let's take over, you know, the, the season as football goes away. That's the most sense.
- [19:55]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, you're talking 70 game schedule. Instead of starting near the end of October, you're starting maybe like third week in November. You're easing into it, and then you really kick into gear on Christmas. Cause one of the things I was thinking with the cup wise, you made the point earlier. The games are. The games are all really fun, the courts are fun, but we only had four games in this super complicated scoring system trying to lead to. Oh, and then these four teams made it. And this team didn't make it because their point differential was plus 36. How about this? Have more fucking games. Like, instead of four NBA Cups, let's have six, let's have seven. Let's get it so that it goes all the way through. And then we get to January and then the week to do it. In my opinion, there's that week between the conference title game and the Super Bowl. It's a dead week. Nothing's happening. Football has finally calmed down, basically starting Sunday night and just try to own that week. Right? You have like, you basically have a clean slate. You're going against nothing. You're going against. You're not going against college football. You're not going against anything. And make that the signature week. They're going the opposite way. Not only did they wrap up all this stuff, but the trade deadline is on the Thursday of Super bowl week. That's another one I don't get. The trade deadline's one of the most fun days of the season. You're just burying it in the super bowl when all your media members, all your corporate everybody is just talking football, football, football. So wise. I just, to me, this is just easy structural stuff I don't get.
- [21:23]
Big Woz
Yeah, the thing about more cup games, it will make it so that it makes it easier for the best teams to actually play in the further rounds, to actually advance. And so you probably wouldn't get in Atlanta in there, although I love watching Atlanta.
- [21:39]
Bill Simmons
Or would you? Because maybe Atlanta is one of the best teams in the east wise. Maybe you would get Atlanta.
- [21:45]
Big Woz
Hey, that's fair. And yeah, again, I do think, you know, fixing the window that they put it in, but to me, it's like it's a promotion issue. Like, Adam Silver needs to get his Don King hat on. Like, this guy's just not a promoter. He does not know. They just don't know. And maybe it's the networks. I don't know. You know what? I Mean, they don't know how to eventize these products. And that to me is the main issue. People don't see these things as essential viewing. They know that. They know the season is 82 games long. They know that effectively a loss in January is just like, ho hum, who cares? Every single game doesn't matter. And the league just needs to be better, more effective at promoting their product. Getting people to feel like this is essential because like the idea that people aren't interested in the NBA I think is bs. I think plenty of people are still interested, obviously, like the highlights, the recaps, they do numbers online. People still want to know about the results and all of that stuff. It's just the NBA needs to impress upon people that these games are worthy of their time, worthy of their commitment.
- [23:03]
Bill Simmons
Well, House, I mean, we go so far back. We remember when like USA and ESPN started showing cable games, right? And we were like, oh, it was amazing. All the teams, oh my God, that's what Equippers arena looks like. You just, you had no idea. And then the sports center highlights are taking off at the same time. We were just so starved for any sort of NBA action. Now it's flipped the other way where, you know, it's like having the most full fridge possible. I was telling somebody the other day, I feel like I watch as much basketball as I ever did, but I watch it completely differently now. I don't care if I see the ESPN game on Wednesday night as it's happening, but what I do is I try to watch as many fourth quarters as I can. Or if like, I'll look at the game recap and it'll be like, oh, Houston did had a 37 to 10 run in the second quarter on Wembley. I'm like, all right, I'm gonna watch that and I'll just queue it up. And it's, it's so much more on demand. And I House, I don't feel like that reflects in the ratings. So when they say the ratings are down, I'm not positive I believe it. I do think that they have a star issue is which I talked about Tuesday. They don't like we House and I didn't miss Michael Jordan in the 90s when he played a playoff game. We, it was just, it was non negotiable. You didn't miss Jordan in the playoffs period, unless like you had a substantial event that superseded it. Otherwise you watch Jordan. They don't have a guy like that now.
- [24:33]
Joe House
Yeah, I mean it's LeBron. It's supposed to be LeBron.
- [24:37]
Big Woz
Except for LeBron at 40, not at.
- [24:39]
Bill Simmons
It's not LeBron 22. It's. And it's not really Curry either.
- [24:43]
Joe House
That's right, but those are the guys on television. Look at the schedule. Look at the ABC schedule. I think, you know, the, the hard thing is nobody sits down and watches basketball games. You don't sit down like, oh, the game's about, let me go get in my, my chair. Right. It's not football. And you know, using linear TV ratings as a measuring stick for overall success is clearly outmoded, outdated, makes no sense whatsoever. The fact that the league signed an 11 year, $76 billion deal means that those folks who are paying that money have ideas about how to capture eyeballs in the interest of those consumers to push their stuff that makes sense to them. And they don't think that people are going to come sit down in their chairs and watch a goddamn basketball game in February. From the beginning of the game to the end of the game. It's all the ways that we watch it. It's what you and Derek Thompson talked about. People consume the hell out of basketball, but they don't consume it by sitting in a chair and watching it. So it's a little bit of a, of a false description to false assessment to say, well, yeah, the ratings are down.
- [25:59]
Bill Simmons
Well, Wise watches, Wise watches every Hawks game. So he's.
- [26:03]
Big Woz
I kind of do at this point.
- [26:04]
Bill Simmons
It's kind of got a Dyson Daniels bedspread.
- [26:10]
Big Woz
So I'm also like a bit of a radical thinker on the schedule and stuff. One, I think, I don't even think 70 is enough of a cut. I think it should be literally round robin. You play each team one time at home, one time away, two times a week.
- [26:27]
Bill Simmons
So like 60. So when we get expansion, it's like a 62 game schedule. That's it.
- [26:33]
Big Woz
One and one.
- [26:33]
Bill Simmons
So I sign up for that. Everyone I've ever mentioned that who's in any sort of decision making ownership, they're all like, don't even talk about that on a podcast. It will never, ever happen. It's too much money. There's no way. And it's like, you guys already made all this money.
- [26:48]
Big Woz
That's. And that's, and that's the point. Like all of these owners who were told of the most visionary business people ever because they ran some hedge fund, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, they can't figure out how this extra shortfall in money that they got from this big, big ass 11 year contract from all of these networks, as House mentioned how reducing inventory and making it more scarce, they can't figure out a way to monetize that. I find that to be just, just baffling.
- [27:19]
Bill Simmons
It does, but it does. The competitiveness of, of the games just, there's more urgency because whatever goes with it also makes the end of the regular season more interesting because if you have like a situation Phillies in now, you might not even make the playoffs. So like every game matters. Starting game 20, you know, 100%.
- [27:39]
Big Woz
And also I'm a bit radical on league pass. I think we should abolish it.
- [27:43]
Bill Simmons
Like this is my favorite Woz take. Get rid of.
- [27:47]
Joe House
I haven't heard this.
- [27:48]
Big Woz
Look, if you have to watch the NBA for work, if people say, oh, that's self serving for you, Woz, whatever. I'm just saying if people have to watch it for work, all right, we'll give you league pass. If you want access to it, we're charging you a crazy premium. Which to me that means like whenever people want to watch the NBA, they gotta watch it with the league's partners. I like, I don't see what's so bad about that as an idea. Cause again, I grew up in a context of no league pass and was completely fine with Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and NBA on NBC. Like I don't know, like I said.
- [28:22]
Bill Simmons
So you're saying like national games, you get your own team. Like if you live like house in Washington, he gets to still watch the Wizards and then maybe lead your own.
- [28:31]
Big Woz
Team in your market. Yeah, just like maybe jets and Giants got forced down my throat when I was living in New York, but maybe.
- [28:38]
Bill Simmons
You get to pick like three other teams. And then if you want the whole package, it's like a thousand dollars and it's just like completely prohibitive. I there's some idea there that make it scarce and I'm not against that House.
- [28:53]
Joe House
Or maybe they're just.
- [28:54]
Bill Simmons
That's it. You get your own team. You could pick three other league pass teams other than giving them three other teams. You watch, you're going hardcore.
- [29:04]
Big Woz
You watch your local team and you watch your national team. Okay. There's two days a week that NBA games are.
- [29:11]
Bill Simmons
Sergeant wise, he's laying down the line.
- [29:13]
Big Woz
That's it. That's it. And also they do need to do something about the bootlegs. I was talking to somebody who works in this sort of area in terms of how young people consume sports, specifically the NBA. Like how it was explained to me, it's like how people of my age viewed napster where it's just like once we found Napster and Limewire and all this other stuff, we literally stopped believing in the concept that we would go to Sam Goody and buy a cd. It's like, no, I get this for free. I'm not paying for it. I don't have a ESPN subscription. I damn sure don't got Warner Discovery. Um, I am just pilfering an illegal stream. They need to find something to do about that. And I know I can hear people right now saying, how many people could possibly be streaming stuff this way? I'm telling you, it's a sizable amount of folks.
- [30:04]
Bill Simmons
I think he's right. I remember we did the, the Juice WRLD doc for HBO and Max and it was just like it, it just got pirated out of control. And that was the first time I was like, oh, wow, this still was happening on like a major level. But you're right, especially as we head to this next era where you're going to need Amazon, you're going to need Peacock, you're going to need cable to get ESPN or whatever the ESPN package is. And you'll have to pay for the league pass stuff too. I mean, it's our job. So we get all this stuff. But yeah, I've said it a thousand hundred times. The schedule is the number one way to fix this. And they won't with a bullet. They just won't. It would make it more special. The guys would be playing, they'd be healthier. They wouldn't even. What they did recently with this, this weird bye week where there were no games and stuff, it actually made me miss the NBA. I was like last night, where the fuck is the NBA, dude?
- [30:58]
Big Woz
And Doc said this in the pregame availability. He said one of the cooler things about this is we had time to prepare for our opponent. Almost like a playoff game. Again, everything gets better when we're not stuffing all of these freaking games together. Playing three games in five nights in three cities. Yeah, like this is a no brainer schedule. It's a no brainer. Everything would be better with less games, everybody.
- [31:29]
Bill Simmons
So maybe they'll get, maybe they'll give some of the money back. 76, maybe it's 60.
- [31:35]
Joe House
I mean this, this is the issue, right? And I don't have a good solution for it. It's easy for us to talk about less games. The, the 41 home games for places where people actually go to the games. Not here in Washington, but in bed. Places the team is relevant. That's real money. That's Revenue in. That's people walking into the door, buying food, buying merch, you know, populating the surrounding restaurants and bars and stuff. It's an ecosystem that.
- [32:05]
Bill Simmons
That.
- [32:05]
Joe House
That matters. And, you know, how do you walk away from that? Where's the. You're right.
- [32:11]
Bill Simmons
It's beyond the franchise. There's Sportico did this thing in the franchise values, which I always think are corny because there's no real way to know. It only takes one dumb person to be like, here's. But they had the pie chart of how the Celtics. I think it was Sportico. Maybe it was somebody else. They had a pie chart of all the Celtics revenue. Cause they don't own their own arena. And they had it earmarked for the Celtics making $102 million from the playoffs.
- [32:38]
Big Woz
Wow.
- [32:39]
Bill Simmons
Assuming they made, you know, got to like four rounds, and you could see it was like, Jesus Christ, that's a crazy amount of money. But, you know, that's part of why some of these bigger market teams, they go all in on luxury tax because they feel like it's almost like a bet, you know, can we make that money back? The longer the rounds go, if they put me in charge, I would at least go to 70 games. I mean, you could talk me into the. 60 would be even better. 62. But they won't. This is something Steve Kerr has been Steve Kerr. At one point, I think he, like, hand wrote a long letter to Adam Silver, like in the last year. Like. Like, it was like the 1840s. Like, he's. Dear Adam, it is Steve Kerr. I'm here on the outskirts of Wyoming writing you a letter with a feather and a pen. But he wrote a letter just basically begging him to cut the schedule down. And I remember talking to Doc about this last year when he got back in, and he was trying to take over the Bucks, and he was just like, we just don't practice. I just got here. Our staff's changed.
- [33:42]
Big Woz
His docs teams just don't practice.
- [33:45]
Bill Simmons
Generally. He's like, we just don't get to practice, and I don't get to play as much golf. No. But he was saying, and this is something any coach I've ever talked to, they always talk about this. There's these schedule bumps where you just can't work on anything. And you end up in a hotel conference room, in some banquet room, running through how you're gonna do, how you're gonna charge the guy with the ball and shit like that. So I don't know. All right, so short term, Vegas next Year for this or no us.
- [34:20]
Big Woz
I'm fine with Vegas, but they need to figure out a mechanism by which they can get the. The fans of the actual teams in those buildings. Um, I don't know. I'm like, I haven't really put too much thought as to how they would go about doing this. I'm. Again, I'm biased like you guys. I love Vegas, so I think it's a great place to host something. Like this past weekend, it was also the freaking Rodeo Championships. Shania Twain had a concert. There were cowboy hats everywhere.
- [34:50]
Joe House
Entertainment.
- [34:51]
Big Woz
It's just a great place to entertainment and event.
- [34:55]
Bill Simmons
So maybe the answer. If they. If they strung it out to six games instead of four, they moved it to January and they really. This is going to be a direct contradiction of what I said about not being. Being wusses, about going against football. But you target that week between the conference championship and the super bowl, which we know is open every week. We know when it is. So this year would be February 2nd.
- [35:19]
Peter Schrager
Yeah.
- [35:20]
Bill Simmons
And February 9th.
- [35:21]
Big Woz
And you make it tweak. We could make the tweak be. If we're going to spread it out, we can make the tweak be the semis, end up being home. Home arenas. And then the final. You know, you make it a. Not only do you make it, you know, the destination or whatever it is, there's enough space. Because I don't know why the semis and the finals have to be so freaking close to each other. Like, they don't give you a solution league.
- [35:47]
Bill Simmons
How about Tuesday's the quarterfinals, then we go to Vegas Friday, Sunday, the week before the super bowl, and it's just Friday night doubleheader. Sunday's the final. Everyone just goes to Vegas one weekend. You're in Thursday or Friday morning, you're out Monday.
- [36:04]
Big Woz
Yeah.
- [36:05]
Bill Simmons
You're not going against football at all. You have six games instead of four to determine. Exactly. You know, you're going to get the right order probably of the teams in some form. You might have one outlier. And the only thing we would know for sure is that the Washington Wizards won't be there.
- [36:19]
Joe House
Well, the reason that's great is because the buildup to it is occurring in the month of diminishing football. We're not having 16 games on Sunday.
- [36:28]
Bill Simmons
Two more in January after Christmas that lead up to the quarterfinals.
- [36:32]
Joe House
Yeah. And in terms of fans, like, how much would it cost to just. Here's 5,000 tickets. If your team makes it. We're going to give a. You know, we have a five five thousand free tickets, please. Take the ticket and go. I mean, you're not going to pay for people to go, but where you at least have access to the arena. It can't be. It can't, like, really be.
- [36:52]
Bill Simmons
You know, Emirates Airlines could fucking get private jets for everybody.
- [36:57]
Big Woz
They got the money.
- [36:59]
Bill Simmons
Planes, yeah, the PJs for the fans.
- [37:03]
Big Woz
The money.
- [37:04]
Bill Simmons
Okay, all right.
- [37:05]
Joe House
Party plane.
- [37:06]
Bill Simmons
Did we lay it on this for a fix? 6 instead of 4? Target that weekend before the super bowl weekend and maybe have the trade deadline right after on, like, the Tuesday.
- [37:17]
Joe House
I mean, here's the thing. The trade deadline sucks now. They ruined it.
- [37:20]
Bill Simmons
The collector green, they aproned it.
- [37:23]
Joe House
There is no trade deadline that's relevant anymore.
- [37:26]
Bill Simmons
They differed the hell out of him.
- [37:28]
Big Woz
They're always bashing Adam Silver. Like, the guy did a good job. He went and got the enriched the players and the owners with this new TV deal. He is an absolute magnet for corporate money. Like, they invented the NBA cup the next year. They like, oh, we got the Emirates. The Emiratis are paying for it. Like, he is a master at that. But this whole thing about we want to be like football and have parity, and so let's make it impossible for good teams to stack talent, and trade's just an impossibility now. This was a mistake, guys. It was a mistake.
- [38:06]
Bill Simmons
The Nuggets can't even trade for Jimmy Butler, who would probably be dying to go there, and they. They can't do it with the fucking apron. It's like, well, Zeke Najee has to be in it. And please don't look at Michael Porter's back. X rays and we have no picks. Yeah, it's really sad. All right, W. Great to see you. Who. Who's winning the title, by the way?
- [38:28]
Big Woz
Um.
- [38:29]
Bill Simmons
Uh.
- [38:29]
Big Woz
Oh, I picked. I picked the Dallas Mavericks before the season. I don't know if I've unleashed this take on you. I. I saw the Celtics as the 2016 warriors coming off a championship, smoking everybody all regular season. Face the Cavs in the finals the year before, just like the Mavericks. I think the Mavericks and the Celtics are going to rematch in the finals. And luka Doncic, like LeBron before him, is going to find a way to win his first NBA championship. Y'all.
- [39:04]
Bill Simmons
What do you think of that?
- [39:04]
Joe House
Love it. It's incredible. I think that's a great way to give. No, I. I mean, as a guy who is an early embracer of that Dallas Mavericks, they really changed the entire trajectory of their franchise at the trade deadline last year. Speaking of trades, not mattering anymore. Daniel Cafford and P.J. washington. And that's a final. And then they did an incredible job in the off season building up around those guys and getting rid of some pieces that didn't 12 and two in the last 14.
- [39:33]
Big Woz
Bill.
- [39:34]
Bill Simmons
I don't. I think unfortunately for them, I think OKC might be their kryptonite team. That's the one team that just too much speed athleticism. I guess what they have going for them is just Jalen Williams and any game that means anything.
- [39:47]
Joe House
I need to see the first SRA mod.
- [39:49]
Big Woz
They gonna be in your mentions, Bill. Oh, mercy.
- [39:52]
Bill Simmons
Just. Just have one awesome game when. When there's a real spotlight on. Come on. We all believe in Jalen Williams. Jalen Williams.
- [40:00]
Joe House
Yeah, right.
- [40:02]
Bill Simmons
Another one. He stunk in the Dallas series last year. He stunk in the second NBA. I just, I have a lot of Jalen Williams stock. I'd like for him to. I mean the other reason they lost, they just couldn't hit a three, which is now half the league. You think he's going to be all right?
- [40:16]
Big Woz
Yeah.
- [40:17]
Bill Simmons
I have okc, Dallas. I still feel like I want to see what happens with the Butler trade because see Butler's clearly this is happening soon and if Houston got him without changing too much. What I like about them, I'm intrigued by them too. Can you House, can you imagine Eme and Jimmy Butler? How fucking alpha that team's gonna be if they keep doing Brooks? Like that's. It's like they're like a biker gang.
- [40:48]
Joe House
It's exciting. I do love. I love that. I mean who knows what the. The outcome would be this season's playoffs, but it would be much.
- [40:57]
Bill Simmons
They're more interesting.
- [40:58]
Joe House
Yes.
- [40:59]
Bill Simmons
Looked at LeBron and called him a bitch and asked him what he was going to do that happened last year. Put him and Jimmy Butler. I just think that's. That's happening imminently. So we'll see. We'll see where he goes. All right, Woz, great to see you later. Take a break. Come back with million dollar picks. Sometimes in basketball, 30 points can be worth more than 30 points. Right now you can get a 30% profit boost from the Ringer with Fanduels 30 on 30 during Friday's NBA action. We've been doing this for the last few weeks with America's number one sportsbook. A 30% profit boost. Either pick a player to score more than 30 points or bet on our new exclusive 30 on 30 special markets line. Like you could bet on both teams to score 30 plus points in the first quarter. If you wanted to look for 30 on 30 in the FanDuel Sports app or head to FanDuel.com BS for your chance to score a bigger payout on Friday. I'll be tweeting out my picks on Friday. Had a great first three weeks. Didn't do well last week, but hopefully we'll make a little bit of a comeback. It's really fun to bet these. Don't miss your chance to find out how much more 30 can be worth with Fanduels. 30 on 30 must be 21 plus in President Select States or 18 plus in President DC. Opt in required bonus issued as non withdrawable profit boost tokens Restrictions apply including any token expiration and max wage or amount. See terms@sportsbook fando.com gambly problem call win 100 Gambler or visit rg-help this episode is brought to you by NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV. It's December. It's the season of giving. But let's be honest, you deserve a gift too. And what better gift than NFL Sunday Ticket. All the bye weeks are done. You need multi view. You need the four games at once. Especially with the early games. You got all these playoff implications, fantasy playoffs, whatever else you're doing to make the season more exciting. I always have the four games on the giant tv. And then I try. I'm lucky enough to have a couple other TVs because I do this for a living. I try to have six games going at once so I can see everything. But as we get later in the year and the games become even more meaningful, sometimes I'll get wacky. I'll just put one giant game on and then two smaller games on the TVs. Everyone's got their own thing. You can skip the candles and the ugly sweaters this year. Gift yourself NFL Sunday Ticket. Get the rest of the NFL regular season for only $49. What a deal. Sign up now at YouTube.com bs you can get the Ringer Gambling show as well the Sunday Ringer pregame Device and content restrictions apply to multiview local and national games on YouTube TV. NFL Sunday Ticket for out of market games excludes digital only games. All right, house week 16 is here. We had a rough week 15. First time I got my ass kicked by a weekend in a while. Lost 510,000 for million dollar picks but we're still up for 1.254 million and I like a lot of the stuff this week. The only thing that really changed for me last week and I Was just wrong. Like Pittsburgh, Philly, whatever. Like some. Some of the losses, like, whatever. I just had the wrong side. I get it. Seattle, Green Bay. I had way wrong. I. I thought, like, this is the time Seattle is going to show everybody that they might actually be, like, a little sleepery. And instead, Green Bay absolutely kicked their ass. And Green Bay, I almost wish I had gone into that game thinking one of these two teams is going to emerge as the NFC sleeper. I was shocked by how they got their ass kicked. What did you think of that game?
- [44:29]
Joe House
So here's my overreaction to the entire week. And it really does. You know, it's expressed most perfectly by that game. I will confess, just for myself, I got lulled into a sample size that wasn't really reflective with that Seattle defense. And throughout the card in week 15, I chose the defense over the offense. And in each instance, the superior. The team with the superior offense beat the crap out of the team.
- [44:59]
Bill Simmons
Like Philly. Pittsburgh. Yeah. Green Bay. Seattle.
- [45:02]
Joe House
Yes. Tampa winning. Buffalo Chargers.
- [45:04]
Bill Simmons
Buffalo, Detroit. That was another one.
- [45:06]
Joe House
Right, right, right.
- [45:07]
Bill Simmons
Tampa Chargers. I stayed away from that, thank God. Yeah. The Seattle defense, they had. They had done Arizona twice and the jets and the Niners, when they were banged up, and it made us. Kind of threw us off a little bit. So I was.
- [45:21]
Joe House
They were good numbers. They were like, you know, look at all the ways that they've improved and they're. They had health and, you know, they were very. It was a compelling case. It just didn't hold any water.
- [45:32]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. So when I was going through the games this week, you know, look, if I'm going to lose a week, I'm going to go back to the drawing board. I'm going to. I'm going to get back in the lab, try to figure out how I can get better. And I was really looking back, really trying to go over some of the numbers versus the schedule and who played. And so, like, we have these Saturday games, Texans, Chiefs. Mahomes isn't playing. Texans are favored by two and a half. Mahomes comes back. It seems like now it's Chiefs by three and a half in Houston. And the numbers would say, hey, watch out for Houston in this game. They have the number one defense in dboa. Like, they're going to be able to really pressure the Chiefs, and they just haven't played enough good teams and they haven't looked good in the games they played. And I'm just looking at this going, are the Chiefs really going to. They're really just going to lose in Houston to this Houston team that can't seem like they can stay out of its own way offensively, that can't really block and definitely unquestionably has a good defense. But I don't want to say they're the good bad team, but they're kind of one level above that, but below the Chiefs, Ravens, Bills level. You know what I mean?
- [46:43]
Joe House
So this game to me was the most confounding and the hardest for me to try and choose a path. And I'm halfway inclined to bet on Houston and grab the Houston money line on the possibility that all of the Mahomes stuff is smoke and mirrors every because Kansas City is smart enough to try and get it give itself an advantage on, on everything. So part of the advantage would be having Houston's defense prepare for Mahomes and then come out with a Wentz game plan. I wouldn't put it past Kansas City in any way, shape or form. The challenge is the chief defense stinks, their secondary is bad and they haven't been able to do anything since week eight. I mean it's, you know, look at the numbers. They're a bottom 10 pass defense.
- [47:32]
Bill Simmons
So it's a stay away from you.
- [47:34]
Joe House
It is. I mean, even though I think in the second half, especially Joe mixing these nuts, Joe mixing these nuts, like that's, that's the pathway. Houston can't score in the second half. So if they get up, you know, 17 to something and then they, they do what they do, which is score a touchdown or a field goal in the second half and they try and run mixing these nuts, you know, to 15 times, that's their, their, their path. And you're up against Carson Wentz. But I just don't trust that we're going to see a healthy Mahomes. And I don't like that since that, that Kansas City defense one bit.
- [48:13]
Bill Simmons
The other thing that worries me about it is just when the team also then has to play on Wednesday. I just don't know what that does. We talked about this a little last week. I don't know what that does mentally for like how you have an edge for that game, any of that stuff.
- [48:26]
Joe House
They're planning, right. They're planning for Saturday and Wednesday. The Chiefs are doing that right now. How can it make sense to have Mahomes in any kind of diminished capacity Saturday game?
- [48:38]
Bill Simmons
And yet I don't want to stay away from the other Saturday game because I think we see it the same. The Ravens minus six and a half Steelers. I want to. There's A lot of like stuff with Lamar and watch out if the Steelers own him. And I think without Pickens, I just, I just don't see the Steelers getting there. It would have to be almost the greatest hits of bad Raven Steelers games from a Baltimore perspective. Missed field goals, Lamar doing something dumb, the, the tipped interception, all kinds of stupid shit. The 50 yard pass interference that the Steelers get to give him a new drive. And as we, we stayed with, we stayed at the craps table with the Steelers. I think one week too long. Last week. Yeah, they're 10 and 4. I think if they're 10 and 5, that's fine.
- [49:28]
Joe House
I don't know for them is that they go to Wednesday against the Chiefs.
- [49:34]
Bill Simmons
Right.
- [49:34]
Joe House
10 and 5, that's hard.
- [49:36]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. But they're still a play. They're making the playoffs and.
- [49:39]
Joe House
Yes they are.
- [49:40]
Bill Simmons
I mean Baltimore lost them already. So now. So if you're taking Pittsburgh, you're saying we're almost taking their touchdown underdog on top of it. They would be beaten Baltimore twice in the same season. They'd Baltimore be 9 and 6 after this. So they wouldn't, you know, they'd be like a six or seven. I don't know. I just think the Ravens win and I don't, I don't want to lay the points. I just want to take their money line and put it with stuff.
- [50:03]
Joe House
Yeah. Because every trend that's out there says that against the spread this is a great opportunity to get in on, on Pittsburgh. I don't want to have anything to do with Pittsburgh with no T.J. watt. Let's see what, what like T.J. watt. That's their record without T.J. watt is abysmal and every number goes out the window. If he doesn't play now, it seems like he's going to play. The practice reports, you know, kind of have him in the mix but if he's diminished at all, then I don't, I don't love it against this Ravens offense. And like you don't be cold.
- [50:39]
Bill Simmons
That feels like a Derek Henry game.
- [50:41]
Joe House
The front seven for, for, for Pittsburgh didn't really get home against the Eagles offensive line.
- [50:47]
Bill Simmons
I mean that's the other thing. They got, they got their asses kicked last week.
- [50:51]
Joe House
Their asses kicked.
- [50:52]
Bill Simmons
And that's.
- [50:53]
Joe House
I think the Ravens offense is as good as the Eagles offense.
- [50:56]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. All right, so we're marking down Ravens money line.
- [51:00]
Joe House
Raven's money line. That's the way to play it.
- [51:04]
Bill Simmons
So I have news flash for you. I want to do either all money lines or adjusted underdog lines this week and tie them with a couple games. But let's, let's hit the games really quick. Eagles minus three and a half against Washington. This is another one where I think I just like the money line.
- [51:19]
Joe House
Yeah, great.
- [51:20]
Bill Simmons
I just want to grab the Eagles money line and put it with something else. I don't trust the hook. I don't 100% trust this Eagles team. And I bet in this situation before, as have you, where you bet the Eagles and Jalen hurts, just has a super weird game and has some weird injury that they're not sure how hard, how much he's hurt. And he's throwing in triple coverage.
- [51:39]
Joe House
Well, he's got the busted finger on the non throwing hand.
- [51:42]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. This comes down to two things other than the Philly being way better than Washington. They have the best running attack in the league. Your team is 28th against the run. Washington is the third best running attack in the league. Philly's number one against the run. Your team hasn't looked really that good in six, seven weeks. And you've been calling it out week after week talking about like, yeah, the schedule's catching up to these guys a little bit. They were overachieving early. It's starting to come back to earth. I just don't think they're in the same ballpark as Philly. I don't trust the hook. I don't trust the cheap td. I'd rather do Philly moneyline and make you nervous.
- [52:20]
Joe House
Your instinct is lined up with, with my instinct because I've seen enough of these Philly Washington games. Even in seasons where there's been dramatic difference, much more pronounced difference in the quality of the team.
- [52:30]
Bill Simmons
That Monday night game that, yeah, Washington.
- [52:33]
Joe House
Ended the Eagles winning streak that season. There's just, you know, 20, 21, I think, whatever handful of seasons ago. But I, you know, the, the right way to play it is to take the team that has the better players. I want to be as, as, as reductive as possible and it's something to play.
- [52:52]
Bill Simmons
They're playing for a one seed. It's like they're like, oh, I don't know, should we try this week? Like they were trying to get a bye week.
- [52:58]
Joe House
I mean, again, Washington, I'm so happy. I, I love this team. And they did get right. They looked awesome against Tennessee. They kicked their ass. They looked awesome in the first half against the Saints, but they still like that defense. It's the thing why when you called me last summer, you're like, can Washington make a run here And I was like the only problem is the defense. Now they've made a run. It's really incredible. But Philly on the money line is the right way to play this.
- [53:23]
Bill Simmons
And you're basically in the playoffs. You just got to win the Atlanta game or the Dallas game.
- [53:28]
Joe House
I agree.
- [53:28]
Bill Simmons
Those real two games. Although taking Kirk cousins corpse out of there probably you've probably said I'm trying.
- [53:35]
Joe House
To think I might want a workshop. Can I. It's penix d. No, it doesn't work. It doesn't work.
- [53:40]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, Kyle's gonna have to boot that. Viking Seahawks in Seattle and this isn't a reactionary. Seattle sucked last week so I want to now go against them again because we really try not to do that. If anything that's like the worst thing you can do.
- [53:56]
Joe House
We try. I am a petty better.
- [53:59]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, me too. And Seattle, I'll be honest, Seattle hurt my feelings last week. I was wounded. They weren't saying that's wrong. I was like Seahawks hurt my feelings.
- [54:08]
Joe House
That game was over. I said I just lost this. I just. I watched the first seven minutes gone.
- [54:13]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. You knew it by it was. It started like 4 1:00 West coast time by 1:30 I was like all right, cross that off.
- [54:20]
Joe House
Yeah.
- [54:21]
Bill Simmons
So I just think this is a horrible matchup for them. I don't like the matchup at all. The Minnesota's defense, the Minnesota's ability to throw to either receiver, have explosive plays, mix the running game in and I also think Minnesota is good and the line is Vikings by two. I think this is. Vikings are a top five team. Seattle's we learned last week is somewhere in the middle and this is just bad luck. They played Green Bay and the Vikings back to back at home and those games are just really hard and I think the Seahawks are going to lose.
- [54:57]
Joe House
Well it would be hard enough if Gino wasn't hurt. You cannot under any circumstances countenance even a 5% chance that Sam Howell will be playing quarterback for Seattle. Right.
- [55:09]
Bill Simmons
Or how about. Or like injured geno doesn't sound great to me either. I don't even like hundred percent healthy geno that much.
- [55:16]
Joe House
This is another test of the thesis. We just did this with Baltimore and Pittsburgh. Take the team with a better offense. Minnesota, Seattle. I'll take the team with the better offense. I know who it is. Minnesota secondary Gettable. We've been watching some teams, you know, quietly pass the ball on them especially in second halves. Seattle can't do it. We haven't seen Seattle's offense really do anything for feels like six weeks now.
- [55:38]
Bill Simmons
You know what happened Met.
- [55:40]
Joe House
Yeah.
- [55:40]
Bill Simmons
Metcalf got hurt and just hasn't looked the same.
- [55:43]
Joe House
Yeah.
- [55:43]
Bill Simmons
Lockett I guess is at like a different point in his career. I'm not sure what happened to him. Kenneth Walker got hurt. So now it's like just one running back and then, you know, JSN's been there, awesome receiver. But that's only going to take you so far. All right, well, so we agree we'll take the Vikings are minus three and I don't care because we're going to use the money line for them too.
- [56:04]
Joe House
Yeah, fine. Great.
- [56:06]
Bill Simmons
So we'll pass on the Raiders, pass on the Lions. I looked long and hard at Rams jets for the jets side. I thought when it was three and a half. The jets have actually been playing like pretty well lately. Yeah, I don't trust like the Rams a lot of momentum behind them going west coast to east coast. But I just don't want to bet on the jets, especially with all the dysfunction this week that I'm going to talk about later with Peter Schrager. This athletic story that came out and Garrett Wilson today gives a quote later in the afternoon about do you think you'll be with the jets last year? He's like, honestly, I don't know. Like it. There's a dysfunction smell from them that I don't like. So I feel like that's a stay away. But what's not a stay away from me is another dysfunction team. The 49ers in Miami.
- [56:54]
Joe House
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [56:55]
Bill Simmons
49Ers plus one and a half.
- [56:58]
Joe House
Which one is the dysfunctioning team?
- [57:00]
Bill Simmons
Both of them. The Niners. I feel like probably should be favored in this game. As weird as their season's been adjusted on FanDuel to plus four and a half. I think we can get a little frisky with some people I want to put them with. But just fundamentally Niners plus four and a half. Does that sound appealing to you?
- [57:25]
Joe House
So what's weird is to me why are you going in that direction? I'd rather lay points with the Niners because I think that they're the best. I'd like to be like, do it like Niners minus two and a half. Like, you know, something that's going that direction where the underdog because right now they're the underdog in that game. The money line is minus 106. It's like, you know, I'm not going to disparage my, my great friend my the host of the Sunday Pregame show ringer Sunday, pregame. I'm not going to say that's a JJ underdog moneyline play, even though JJ does, you know, sometimes get close to the line in terms of his dog, but minus 106 isn't even a dog. So let's go. If he's going to get on San Francisco, let's get on him. Let's lay little points. Let's, let's take it in the direction that we think it's going to go.
- [58:15]
Bill Simmons
San Francisco first half game is plus 1. 65. Just mentioning that. Let's see. So minus. The odds just aren't great for those. It's on fandom. Minus 112 for the -2.5. They don't. Well, they. Christian's gonna get mad at you now.
- [58:37]
Joe House
I know. We just can't get any value.
- [58:39]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, well, they know that's like a smart move to bend it, so they want to keep you. So the money line is +106.
- [58:47]
Joe House
+106. So it moved a little bit.
- [58:50]
Bill Simmons
It moves it a tiny bit, but not enough to make. You're just better off doing the plus 106.
- [58:55]
Joe House
Yeah.
- [58:55]
Bill Simmons
But I can also offer you plus four and a half at minus 215. That we could put with Usyk. One of the many things I want to put with Usyk.
- [59:04]
Joe House
Oh, okay.
- [59:05]
Bill Simmons
That's what I was thinking. Well, I, I, I was going to do this later, but let's just say that, that, that niners plus four and a half with USYK is plus 1.41.
- [59:17]
Joe House
Cause USYK is like a minus 1.50 favorite.
- [59:20]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, it's like minus 145 range. Okay, so. All right, we'll, we'll come back to them. We both like the Niners. I really like the Bengals, but I refuse. I'm just not doing it. I just not. I don't trust Great instinct.
- [59:32]
Joe House
Great instinct.
- [59:32]
Bill Simmons
Just stay away. Good luck to them. I know they have a chance to make the playoffs depending what happens with Denver tonight.
- [59:38]
Joe House
I will tell you, I'll confess right away.
- [59:40]
Bill Simmons
I have the Bengals in a tease already.
- [59:42]
Joe House
I know. I have them in moneyline positions. I, they are a leg in as a moneyline.
- [59:47]
Bill Simmons
Well, that was my question. Do we do Bengals moneyline? I just don't trust their defense.
- [59:51]
Joe House
Oh, you can't trust it.
- [59:53]
Bill Simmons
It's, it's CTR is the quarterback now for the Browns. I don't know what that's going to look like.
- [59:58]
Joe House
Oh, I have an idea.
- [60:00]
Bill Simmons
Suspicion cards minus four and a half in Carolina. I watch the Cards Pretty closely against the Pats. They're not very good.
- [60:07]
Joe House
I don't like. That's ridiculous.
- [60:10]
Bill Simmons
Bucks Cowboys another stay away with that bucks defense. And then the two big ones for me. The Bills to beat the Patriots and the packers to beat the Saints on Monday night. No camara Rattler's gonna put. I think I want to devote week 16 to just that. Being in every bet that we have. Both of them are -1100 on FanDuel. And could we use those teams together as swing bets with other money lines that we like? We haven't done this all year. Oh.
- [60:42]
Joe House
I mean, I feel like we haven't done it in five years. This is like it's an old school old. Like get the anchor and then you build around the anchor.
- [60:50]
Bill Simmons
We've got anchor strategy.
- [60:52]
Joe House
So the old Moneyline parlay. Welcome back to my life.
- [60:56]
Bill Simmons
Pat's home for the Bills laying are getting 14 and a half de bundo today. And the ringer and his excellent gambling column recommended the Pats plus 14. Cold weather, blah, blah, blah. I just don't see any scenario like Barmar got scratched. I don't see any scenario where the Patriots beat the Bills. Like none, zero. All they've been doing all week is talked about the coach and then Packers, Saints Monday night Packers still playing for stuff. Saints. I don't know what they're playing for, but they're, you know, they, you got to watch them firsthand last week. Did, did, did they impress you in any way?
- [61:32]
Joe House
No, no, they. They got. They did a great rope a dope by. By having Washington prepare for boudoir photo. Haner, you know the guy who, who's. Whose real attribute is an NFL quarterback are his. The pictures of himself getting him out and putting Rattler in.
- [61:47]
Bill Simmons
It messed up the Washington defense one by 10. You had first down in the nine yard line also.
- [61:56]
Joe House
The game was 60 minutes and four seconds. So if we're gonna mess with the clock, we're gonna give teams extra time to get touchdowns. Then you're in trouble.
- [62:04]
Bill Simmons
All right. So going back to where we were before Bill's Moneyline. Packers Moneyline is the anchor that we're using the anchor strategy this week.
- [62:11]
Joe House
Love it.
- [62:12]
Bill Simmons
Put that with The Vikings moneyline minus 104.
- [62:14]
Joe House
Okay. That's a nice even money play.
- [62:17]
Bill Simmons
Put that with The Eagles moneyline minus 120.
- [62:19]
Joe House
Fine.
- [62:21]
Bill Simmons
You put that with Usyk minus 104.
- [62:24]
Joe House
Yep. See, we're doing it.
- [62:27]
Bill Simmons
And we laid out the manic strategy with on Tuesday about Usyk just all in on him. We could also use Usyk as an anchor with the Ravens moneyline. Ravens moneyline Usyk plus 121. Niners plus four and a half with Usyk plus 141, jets plus seven and a half and Usyk plus 128. My bad. Ravens money in Usyk was plus 121. So all of those are plus and now we just get to move that shit around. I'm going to take the jets off for reasons we discussed, but we do have the other two.
- [63:04]
Joe House
Can't do the Jets.
- [63:05]
Bill Simmons
Um, so Niners plus four and a half, Usyk plus 1:41 and then the Ravens Moneyline. Maybe that's the move. And I think that's, I think that's it. We just use anchors of Usyk. Undefeated. The best, the best boxer of the last few years. And then Bill's Packers Moneyline parlay and we just go, I mean, this is great.
- [63:27]
Joe House
You, we took an unwatchable slate of games on Sunday. Cause it really is one of the worst slates, you know, of, of the season. And look at all the fun ways we have this split up. Great.
- [63:38]
Bill Simmons
So you don't want to put the Chiefs in with the Bills and Packers?
- [63:41]
Joe House
I don't. I, I mean, I, you know, I, I, I'll take the L for thinking that the Browns were, you know, going to not turn the ball over six times against the Chiefs at home. I'll take the L for that. But the Chiefs weren't very impressive. Their offense really didn't look great. And that was with Mahomes, you know, most of the game healthy and you don't.
- [64:01]
Bill Simmons
And we're going to stay away from the Bengals. Moneyline.
- [64:04]
Joe House
I don't know.
- [64:05]
Bill Simmons
I've already bet right now as I queue it up. Make the case for the Bengals.
- [64:10]
Joe House
The heart wants what the heart wants and what the heart wants is the Bengals to be in the playoffs. I want the Bengals to win out. I want Denver to lose out. I want both the Colts and who's the other team that has to lose a game? I want the Miami as the seventh seed. I want the, the Cincinnati Bengals as a seven seed. I want us to wake up with them on, on wild card, you know, weekend up against, you know, the, the, the, the two seed in the form of who, who's going to be the, the, the two seed. Is it going to be. It's either Buffalo or the Chiefs, right? And it's that.
- [64:47]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, it's, but it could be.
- [64:48]
Joe House
Yeah, it's Buffalo, Buffalo or the Chiefs. That's an incredible wild card weekend.
- [64:54]
Bill Simmons
Buffalo, Cincinnati. That's our Saturday night Amazon game.
- [64:56]
Joe House
Can you imagine how good that would be?
- [64:59]
Bill Simmons
So Cincinnati, I honestly think it's going.
- [65:00]
Joe House
To be the Chiefs because I think that Mahomes, you know, they're going to make a decision about it.
- [65:04]
Bill Simmons
But in any event, Cincinnati with USYK. Minus 102. Great, great, great. All right, so we're putting a lot on Usyk. Jesus.
- [65:19]
Joe House
If these lose, this is on you and Chris Maddox. It's not on me.
- [65:24]
Bill Simmons
I as I'm on the record Usyk and Pereira in the ufc. I'm just betting them every time they decide to to do combat until they lose. I'm doing the blackjack. I'm stacking my bets on those two guys and it's been working for multiple years.
- [65:42]
Joe House
Okay.
- [65:42]
Bill Simmons
Usyk hasn't lost ever.
- [65:44]
Joe House
And I'm knocking on wood.
- [65:46]
Bill Simmons
So much fun to bet on.
- [65:47]
Joe House
This would be the wipeout.
- [65:50]
Bill Simmons
Million dollar picks week 16. We are up $1.254 million coming off a bad week where we learned some lessons. Looked in the mirror a couple times.
- [66:00]
Joe House
Don't take bad offenses.
- [66:02]
Bill Simmons
Explain the anchor strategy to the audience one more time.
- [66:05]
Joe House
House old school Bill Simmons, Cousin Sal. You find a team that you like on the money line and then you start building around them. We teams that we like on the money line this week, both Buffalo and Green Bay, huge money line.
- [66:21]
Bill Simmons
Minus 1100 each. Massive. So you don't get a lot of value, but on fandom you get some.
- [66:26]
Joe House
Value and then you start grabbing, you know, teams at lesser odds that you like. Again, just on the money line and try and build up around even money or to a plus side and try and build up a little bit of bankroll for those last minute Christmas gifts. Bs because I still got some shopping to do.
- [66:44]
Bill Simmons
So we're using two anchors. The first one are the Buffalo Bills just to beat New England in New England and the Green Bay packers just to beat the Saints, two of the worst teams right now though. The Pats are one of the four worst teams. Saints are one of the 10 worst teams. Putting those two money lines together with the Vikings with their money line. So the Vikings are minus three in Seattle and we're just going to something about the minus three. We're just going to take the. Let's just take the money line on it.
- [67:17]
Joe House
Take the money line. Sam Darnold's due to throw a pick. I mean, he's been looking outstanding.
- [67:21]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, they might win by one. We're just covered. Just win the game, Minnesota. So that's minus 104. No offense to Seattle. We still have a bunch of bets with them. Nice little hedge against our bets to the. That's right. And then the other one is the Eagles money line which if you put with the Bills and the packers, the Eagles just to beat Washington, they're minus three and a half point favorites. You put those three together. Minus 120. So we are going to put 200k down.
- [67:47]
Joe House
Yes.
- [67:47]
Bill Simmons
On those two events. 200k on each bet. Next one, the Ravens money line on Saturday against Pittsburgh. This will probably be a weird, ugly, strange game. We both.
- [68:00]
Joe House
The weather's going to be freezing cold.
- [68:02]
Bill Simmons
Bad weather. It's a Derek Henry game. We don't like the Ravens minus six and a half. Just the money line. We're putting that with Alexander Usyk, who hasn't lost in his life as a parlay. Plus 121. Excellent.
- [68:17]
Joe House
Excellent.
- [68:18]
Bill Simmons
We're going to put 200k on that. Niners plus four and a half adjusted in Miami. We get to bet against two again. What's more fun than betting? It's DJ Mike McDaniel. It's great.
- [68:35]
Joe House
Yeah.
- [68:37]
Bill Simmons
Niners adjusted plus four and a half with USYK is plus one. 41. We'll put 150 on that. Put a little less.
- [68:46]
Joe House
Fair. Fair enough.
- [68:47]
Bill Simmons
And then Bengals Moneyline with Usyk. That's minus 102. Bengals just to beat the Browns and whoever the hell is on their team this week. No Nick Chubb. They have. They're on their third quarterback. I don't know if they're trying to tank. I do don't know. They had their first round pick. What do you want to put on that one? 200 or 100?
- [69:06]
Joe House
100. Enough like let's not really bet on Cincinnati.
- [69:10]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, we'll do a little 100k just for fun because it's Sunday and there's.
- [69:13]
Joe House
No games and it starts the momentum for Cincinnati to get to the playoffs. I mean we'll, we'll know from the Denver outcome whether or not that's reasonable. Denver and the Chargers.
- [69:23]
Bill Simmons
But the anchor strategy. You don't want to put Chiefs plus three and a half in this.
- [69:31]
Joe House
Chiefs plus three and a half. Little 100k flyer that I will. Yes. So that. What's the number? Let's. Let's hear the number. All right.
- [69:40]
Bill Simmons
I just looked it up when we're doing this House Chiefs adjusted to plus four and a half with USYK to win plus one. 12. That's 100K.
- [69:52]
Joe House
Well, the only thing that you know gives us any challenge at all with that is is Carson Wentz. If Carson Wentz ends up being. But the four and a half. That's. That's Wentz protection. We'll call that Wentz protection.
- [70:05]
Bill Simmons
You know what's great about that House? I kind of believe in that little redheaded former assassin Carson Wentz to be good for one game and to try to get himself like a three year, $50 million contract as next year's Baker Mayfield with somebody.
- [70:20]
Joe House
Yeah, no way.
- [70:22]
Bill Simmons
I'd actually be excited if he played. All right, that's our last one. Chiefs plus four and a half with USYK 100k in that. Those are the million dollar picks for week 16. So you did a fairway rolling end of the year awards with our guy Nate.
- [70:38]
Joe House
Yeah, the Rollies. We had a handful of categories. We wanted to sum up the year. Our good buddy Brendan Porath from the Shotgun Start podcast came on and we just ran through all of the big events. I mean, Bryson as the. As the breakthrough performer of the. We call them the. The comeback because you know, he's been on the outs. And look at, look at Bryson king of the golf world. Our Dirk Diggler stud of the year went to. I'm pretty sure it went to Xander Schoffler for winning two majors. Right?
- [71:10]
Bill Simmons
I sure would hope so.
- [71:12]
Joe House
He had that. Had that in him. And then we had the Hawk to a creator of the year and we gave that to the Louisville Police Department because that was the viral moment in the golf world. Nobody knows who Scotty Scheffler is, including the Louisville police Department. The dudes at the front door of the golf course trying to drive in, they don't know who he is. That was the biggest moment in the entire world of golf. So yeah, we had a good time with the Rollies. We got to get a trophy for it.
- [71:43]
Bill Simmons
Did you give the Hawk to a here's my bitcoin I'm going to take all your money award or was that. That wasn't handed out.
- [71:49]
Joe House
Well, there are some candidates for that for sure in golf, but you know, we, we that that can make the list for next year.
- [71:56]
Bill Simmons
Well, how about the new live commissioner is the brother of somebody who was our favorite basketball player we ever played with at Holy Cross, Shawn O'Neill.
- [72:04]
Joe House
So, so many great times with Shawn O. And every interaction I've had with Scott O'Neill. What a great dude.
- [72:09]
Bill Simmons
He's a great guy.
- [72:10]
Joe House
Tremendous.
- [72:10]
Bill Simmons
We really, really love playing with his brother. I wonder he's got to be retired at this point.
- [72:16]
Joe House
Who? Shawn O. Yeah.
- [72:17]
Bill Simmons
There's no way he's still playing his mid-50s. Was so great to just see him and be like, oh yeah, let's get on Sean's team. Let's get on Sean's team. Figure out how you nice little bounce passes on the break. Yeah.
- [72:29]
Joe House
Properly. Yeah.
- [72:30]
Bill Simmons
All right, house. Happy gambling. We will see you, I think next. Yeah, we'll be. We'll be here next week for a million dollar pick.
- [72:37]
Joe House
Fingers crossed.
- [72:38]
Bill Simmons
This episode is brought to you by bank of America. Money decisions don't have to be either or. With bank of America, they can be yes. And as in yes to grabbing the latest merch and building up your budget for next season's tickets. Our digital tools help you create the future you want and help you keep enjoying today too. Do more with the bank that asks what would you like the power to do? Explore tips and more@bankofamerica.com yesend this episode is brought to you by Peloton. Life's always changing. One season you're trying to break personal records and the next you're just looking for a solid routine. Peloton is here for all of it. With workouts that flex to fit your schedule. Whatever. It looks like you've got options from four week strength programs to running, cycling and everything in between. Peloton's got the tools to adapt to whatever goal you're chasing in this season of your life. And here's the real kicker. With Peloton's all access membership, you can work out wherever you need to at home, on the bike, tread or row or even on the go with the app. Take your favorite classes with you to the gym, on the road, wherever. So whatever you're aiming for, that 5am club or squeezing in a late night session, Peloton is ready whenever you are. Find your push. Find your power with peloton@onepelaton.com all right, we're taping this. It is 2:30 Pacific Time. Peter Schrager is in our New York Spotify ringer studios looking super snazzy. It just fits. It's the most professional we've felt in a while. Really weird stretch of the schedule right now we have two Saturday games with teams that are also all going to be playing on Wednesday. Do you think the league will ever do anything like this again? Is this a one time thing?
- [74:21]
Peter Schrager
I think they're hoping to do this every year. It's unprecedented in how it all worked out, Bill. So when they first thought of this Christmas Day extravaganza, they were like, we'll have two games and we'll give it to a high bidder. Netflix got involved, obviously, and gave a lot of money. And it was like, all right, we know we have a Wednesday game and they're going to be, you know, premier teams because Netflix is paying top dollar. But how do we account for player safety? The best way we possibly can? Like, well, you can't play Sunday, then Wednesday, let's make it Saturday, then Wednesday. Which means now four of these teams in the AFC, who just so happen to be four of the top seven teams, are playing three games in 11 days in late December. Unheard of. And it, the way it worked out. And we're, we're recording this on Thursday and it doesn't matter who wins tonight, but originally it was supposed to be Bengals vs Browns on Thursday Night Football. And Amazon has the ability to ask to flex out. And a month ago they went to the league and said, can we flex out of Bengals, Browns? That's a terrible game. Can we get out of that? And the league said there's no game to really put there. The only option would be Chargers, Broncos in la, but we can't do it because of league bylaws. The Broncos have already played one road Thursday night game. And one of the major rules was you will never play two Thursday night road games. So they go to Sean Payton and they say, look, you're going to say no, but we're going to present it to you. And Peyton was like, fuck it, put us on Thursday night. We want to be on primetime. We want to go into that building. I want to play them on a Thursday night. Now the result of all that a month later is six of the top seven teams in the AFC are going to be playing two games on five days rest. And three of the, and four of the top six teams in the AFC are going to Be playing three games on 11 days rest. Meanwhile, there's a team up there in western New York, the Buffalo Bills, who play the Patriots on a Sunday, the jets on a Sunday, and the Patriots again on a Sunday. And already looking at that playoff run.
- [76:22]
Bill Simmons
Well, and then you have. It works out for the Broncos because he's like, yeah, yeah, fuck it, let's go. We'll go right in. And meanwhile, the Chargers are all banged up. Yeah. So you're giving them three less days to, to heal, which I thought probably was an unintended consequence. Yeah. Over and over again. It just seems like everything's working out great for the Bills. This is, this is.
- [76:41]
Peter Schrager
It worked out.
- [76:42]
Bill Simmons
I don't know how they pulled it off. But the Casey, the whole Mahomes goes down, then Netflix is worried about their Wednesday game, but then Mahomes. I heard Raheem say this on the rear gambling show today where Mahomes is like Lebron where he gets these injuries and it seems like he's going to be out for six weeks and then he's fine two days later. He's just one of those guys.
- [77:01]
Peter Schrager
Yeah, I think he's going to play. I think he's going to play Saturday against Texans. Like.
- [77:04]
Bill Simmons
Well, you know why we know he's going to play? Because the line moves six points.
- [77:07]
Peter Schrager
Did it really?
- [77:07]
Bill Simmons
All right, that's.
- [77:09]
Peter Schrager
That's been the word out of that place all week that the one seed is very important to them. They're not going to fake it and say, well, Mahomes has saved you. Like, they want that one seed and they want that week off. And I've spoken to multiple sources in that building that, you know, if Pat says he can go, he's going to go. He has earned that from, from the coaching staff and they're not looking to protect him physically. I remember a couple years back in the divisional round against Trevor Lawrence, he bangs up the ankle. Everyone's worried, what's he going to do? What's he going to do? He doesn't finish the game, but then he does play against the Bengals in the AFC Championship game and he runs for that first down and he just hobbled through it, but he got through it. I thought we might get a very Carson Wentz Christmas. I think the NFL and Netflix would not have been thrilled. I don't know if Beyonce and Mariah Carey and the rest would have enjoyed it. Bert Kreischer and Nate Bragazzi and the rest, I don't know. But in this case, it looks like you're getting Mahomes and you're going to get all the fix ins with it and it's going to be Chiefs versus Steelers with, with Mahomes. And the stakes couldn't be higher because.
- [78:06]
Bill Simmons
Well, there's one other, one other stake beyond the one seed and all that stuff. It's Mahomes kind of lost his spot in line this season, you know, and he. And now he's turned into this. Well, when the playoffs come, he's going to turn it on. But I think from just from an entertainment standpoint and from honestly, a ceiling standpoint, Allen and Lamar Jackson have just been better. Even Burrow's been more fun to watch. And Mahomes is just grinding these games out it always looks like he has seven injuries and he's having one of those seasons you have when you're 37. But he's still in his 20s and he's played, you know, a lot more games than probably some other quarterbacks the last few years. And the weapons have been in and out. He, the tackle situation has been dicey. I get it. But it's just interesting. Like, I just think Allen and Lamar have, have blown him out of the water during this regular season. But you also feel like we're going to get to the playoffs and Mahomes is probably going to yank it back.
- [79:03]
Peter Schrager
And I think that's why the number one seed is so important. Give us an advantage, give us something over these teams. Remember, the Bills beat them head to head. So if they were to lose two of the next three games, then they succumb and they have to go on the road and they don't want to do that. They want the one seed, they want the week off. They think it's important. The offensive line has been a disaster and they put D.J. humphries in there for one game. He lasted one game. And then Joe Tunney, a guard is playing left tackle for a team that's the 1 seed and 13 and 1, it's, it's pretty not a great sign. And you know, the numbers weren't crazy sack wise, but he was under pressure the entire game last week against Cleveland. And you look at what Houston's bringing this weekend and between Daniel Hunter and Will Anderson, they have the second most sacks in the NFL. That's in Christmas. You, you know, you have this one on Saturday and then on Christmas you think TJ Watts going to play. You assume Cam Hayward and all those guys are out there, like he's going up against two of the best defensive front sevens in the league over the next two weeks. If they win both of those games though, they get a buy and they can rest week 18 and the next week during the wild card round.
- [80:02]
Bill Simmons
So I was, I did a thing on Sunday with Sal about the year Allen's having and how actually it's a bad sign for Buffalo super bowl hopes. When you have these teams with the awesome quarterback having the MVP year combined with a defense that can't really stop anybody. The signs are bad.
- [80:21]
Peter Schrager
You went through the list, I heard.
- [80:23]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, I went through it just in general. But then this week Aaron Schatz had a tweet. What's he got about? Basically in the last 30 years, 11 teams went nine and five and then made the Super Bowl. And the reason he did it was because for dvoa, which has been an essential part of kind of studying following football most of the century, The Ravens are 9 and 5. They're shoved aside a little bit right now, I think, especially as Buffalo's gotten the thing. But 11 out of 30 teams have made the super bowl. And some good teams like 2016, Atlanta was 9 and 5. The 2002 Raiders, you go on down the line, 2023, KC last year. And I don't know, the fact that they're number one in DVOA and not being talked about. They have this Pittsburgh game coming up this weekend. They're six and a half point favorites against Tomlin and the Steelers when Lamar struggled against them, you know, for his whole career, basically. But I do wonder if they're starting to get a little sleepy. Like I was looking at their, their title odds or AFC odds, and maybe they're the undervalued team because everyone's on Green Bay now in the nfc. That was like, I was a week late on that one. Maybe it's Baltimore in the afc. What are your Baltimore thoughts?
- [81:35]
Peter Schrager
I love Baltimore this year. I think they got the perfect bye week. They needed it more than ever. They got it. They come out. They beat up on the Giants last week where Lamar throws five touchdown. And now they're getting healthy and it's, look, the eight of nine, it's real. And you know the last Ravens quarterback to beat the Steelers was Snoop Huntley. And a lot of those games, yeah, and a lot of those games were, were decided by one score or less. And the Steelers just found a way at the end, even the last time they played. You remember that Peyton Wilson interception on the sideline with Justice Hill. They still had a chance at the end with the two point conversion, but there was so much confusion. Lamar afterwards is furious on the sideline and it's like, all right, well, if you can't beat them in close games, like, how do we have our faith in the Ravens? I think since that game they have gotten healthier and I think the bye week was important. What I think is going to be very interesting on Sunday, which, I mean, you're talking about the greatest sports viewing day, if you're a football fan ever, is this is this Saturday. I mean, it's right there smack dab in the middle. 4:30 Eastern. You got Brady and Burkhardt on the call. Justin Tucker's gonna have to make a kick here and Justin Tucker's gonna have to come through. And last week he Made one. And they had a lot of field goals and they had a lot of touchdowns and it was fine. But like, Justin Tucker's gonna have to make a kick or two in some inclement weather against the Steelers. And I think it's important that Justin Tucker gets right. Cause that's how they play football. And especially against the Steelers team, it's always a one score game.
- [82:57]
Bill Simmons
Going against the guy who now has the Justin Tucker championship, he's got the.
- [83:01]
Peter Schrager
He's got the belt.
- [83:02]
Bill Simmons
Chris Boswell headed for 200 fantasy points. Yeah. So Baltimore's first in offense, Pittsburgh seventh in defense for DVOA. And yet Pittsburgh got their asses kicked by Philly last week. And I thought it was a more alarming game than a usual loss because they lost in ways that I wasn't. I just weren't on my bingo card like them just getting manhandled, them giving up a 22 play drive to basically finish the game. But if you're a Steelers fan, you look at it and you go, well, we got screwed on that penalty where there was clear video after of the guy there. It's like punching our guy.
- [83:37]
Peter Schrager
Darnell Washington.
- [83:38]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. And then not they're driving down, it seems like they're going to maybe tie the game. And Najee fumbles and it's like, yeah, than you thought? I thought they got pushed around and manhandled and beaten up. And now they're heading into these next two games. Saturday, Wednesday. This just feels like this all flipped at the worst possible time. What. What are your Pittsburgh feelings?
- [83:58]
Peter Schrager
I think your instincts are right that they have dominated in the trenches and Russell has not made mistakes. And like in this game, Cooper DeJean has the fumble, Hertz makes the early mistake. You're like, okay, here come the Steelers. And then they just couldn't close that gap. And then like you said in real time, it felt like two hours at the end of the game, it was just. And like it was such a long drive that like Brady and Burkhardt are doing banter about Belichick during it. Right. Like you're sucking like.
- [84:20]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [84:21]
Peter Schrager
You snuck in like, like, let's empty the bag. We have to find something to talk about because this game isn't in hand right now. So that's worrisome if you're the Steelers, because their whole mantra has been keep the game close. Russell will make a play at the end and we'll run the ball down your throats and we'll stop you on defense. And they couldn't do that against a More physical team in Philadelphia. But there is a mental edge here. Like, Tomlin's coming into this thing. Like, we've won eight of nine with. We've won games with everyone from Duck Hodges to Mason Rudolph to whoever. Like, we can beat the Ravens. We have no fear going into this building.
- [84:51]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, I. Part of me wonders, and I've been riding them the whole time, part of me wonders if they out kick their coverage a little bit this season, just in general. You look back at some of the games they won, some of the schedule stuff. Their most impressive win was probably that first Baltimore game. Just for really pulling it out and see me. But that it just shouldn't matter this much that George Pickens is hurt. I like George Pickens.
- [85:14]
Peter Schrager
He's their biggest threat, though.
- [85:15]
Bill Simmons
I know, but it just. It shouldn't be just an absolute deal breaker to be able to. You know, because then they're running the ball all the time, but they're running it for three yards of carry because everyone knows they have to run the ball.
- [85:27]
Peter Schrager
Let me.
- [85:28]
Bill Simmons
Cause my. My thought is like, I wonder if this is a Lemar. A Lamar. Oh, I can't be Pittsburgh. No doubt. Here we go. And he breaks again. And it's like, holy shit, Pittsburgh's in a tap. I'm trying to think of whatever narrative comes out of that game, and that feels like the. A likely narrative.
- [85:45]
Peter Schrager
And then it's a quick turnaround because four days later, Lamar's got to go play the Texans. It's like this crazy round robin, but Kyle Brandt and I on Good Morning Football, we always talk about the most valuable player. Industrial industry complex. We did this thing starting in week two. It's like, who's the mvp? Who's the mvp? And I put it to bed last week, maybe a little premature, and I was like, josh Allen's done. It's over. Why even. Let's not just do this for the sake of a segment and the amount of feedback I got from people around the league, not fans, being like, slow down, Lamar's got better numbers. And Lamar's games are all showcase games over the next few weeks. So on Saturday, when everyone's watching, Lamar's going to be able to have that showcase game. And then on Wednesday, on Christmas, when everybody's watching Christmas afternoon, Lamar could have that showcase game. And by the end of it, we're not going to see Josh Allen on national television for the last month of the season. And you might say, well, who gives a shit about national tv? The people who vote are writers who are Usually in press boxes and just looking at box scores afterwards. But on Christmas day and on a Saturday they will be watching and if enough hysteria gets going and Lamar can finish this thing out, it is not over yet. Lamar could steal this and get his.
- [86:57]
Bill Simmons
Third MVP on FanDuel right now Allen's nine to one. Basically he's a nine to one favorite and Lamar is plus 650 and that feels out of whack to me because Lamar having an awesome game against Pittsburgh and then what you said every everything else he's doing is going to be like major games. Josh is going to be on like my top right multi view for the Pats Bills game and that's about it. Like he's just going to be in witness protection with that. With all that said, there is another scenario where Lamar sucks against the against Pittsburgh again and Pittsburgh wins 18 to 16 and Justin Tucker misses a couple field goals. The whole thing. Speaking of awards, I wanted to ask you this.
- [87:37]
Peter Schrager
Yeah.
- [87:38]
Bill Simmons
I hate when people do interviews and they say I wanted to ask you this. I should just ask you. My bad. I'm still trying to get better at this.
- [87:44]
Peter Schrager
Forgive it now. You'll get there.
- [87:45]
Bill Simmons
Coach of the year.
- [87:47]
Big Woz
Ooh.
- [87:49]
Bill Simmons
Do you know the favorite is. Have you looked at this?
- [87:51]
Peter Schrager
I haven't. I would imagine. I'm going to give it to you 12 and 2. Kevin O'Connell is probably the favorite right now.
- [87:56]
Bill Simmons
So he is. He's the only one with minus odds. He's minus 190. Dan Campbell dropped a little bit because his entire team got hurt. Apparently that was his fault.
- [88:04]
Peter Schrager
But. But hell of a locker room speech in an interview on 971 in Detroit.
- [88:07]
Bill Simmons
I guess the pregame speeches only go so far. Sean Payton 6 to 1, Dan Quinn 10 to 1, Tomlin 15 to 1, McDermott 30 to 1. And then you have to press the see rest of the bets link to go on Fanduel to go to Sean McDermott 31 Sirianni bulls.
- [88:25]
Peter Schrager
Where's Andy Reid?
- [88:26]
Bill Simmons
There's Andy Reid at 35 to 1.
- [88:29]
Peter Schrager
So 13 and 1.
- [88:30]
Bill Simmons
Is this like a Belichick thing? He's not allowed to win?
- [88:33]
Peter Schrager
Yeah, he's done. He's three wins away from 300 wins in his career and no one has even mentioned that they're 13 and 1. All they do is win.
- [88:39]
Bill Simmons
How is he not the number two guy to be able to bet to bet. I just don't understand.
- [88:43]
Peter Schrager
He succumbed any any respect for any of that and then we'll see him in January. Like it is. It is. It Is amazing how this award is given out. Usually it's a first year guy who gets his team into the playoffs and it's like a quick bump and we've seen that from McVay and from Matt Nagy and from Stefanski.
- [88:58]
Bill Simmons
It could have been Harbaugh this year if they got like 11 and five or 11, six.
- [89:02]
Peter Schrager
Brian Dabel was that this year. I think the O'Connell thing is happening because people are just like, they keep on winning and if you look at their team, it's a bunch of castaways, whether it be Darnold, Aaron Jones, Jonathan Granard, like you go right down the list. It's all guys who were with other teams last year. But let's not, let's not underestimate just what Andy Reid is doing, their roster every week.
- [89:24]
Bill Simmons
We are underestimating it because this is the 10th best odds on FanDuel right now and apparently nobody's betting on him.
- [89:30]
Peter Schrager
Yeah, and what's going to be amazing, we're going to go through the coaching hires and Spags is not going to get a single look again. I'm just telling you like it is. No one's going to interview Matt Nagy and their GM is going to remain. And the number two GM is Mike Borgonzi. I think he's excellent. I don't even know if he's going to get one of these GM jobs. So it's going to be like, all right, they do it again and they're just going to bring everyone back next year. It's this fine, well oiled machine and they don't get poached. It's incredible.
- [89:54]
Bill Simmons
You think like all the weapons they lost, the fact that they pat, they have the bullseye on them all year, all the close games they played that they had to pull out, I think he would be my number two choice. I actually think what Oconnell's been doing on Minnesota, that team is so well coached and so well prepared. Salvaging Darnold and turning him into a guy that's now probably a 30 to $35 million a year guy in the open market.
- [90:18]
Peter Schrager
He made it a real, a real decision for them. And I would also say, you know, I work on the Sunday kickoff show on Fox and like early on in the season, Michael Vick, my colleague who's now the new head coach of Norfolk State, shout out to Norfolk State. Michael Vick was like, you know, Darnold's kind of like a game manager and then he goes on this run where he threw five touchdowns in a game. He had to take them 90 yards outside in Chicago in overtime. Did that. Yeah. He also, you know, a few.
- [90:45]
Bill Simmons
Fourth quarter, like, they need to drive here, and he's come through.
- [90:49]
Peter Schrager
Yeah, that's not game manager. That is. Okay. We're going to put the ball in Sam's hands and, like, let's let him lead us the way. Interesting one. This weekend in Seattle, I would think they would win. And then they finish up the season with the Lions and the packers, and that's where it's at. It's like, all right, everyone's waiting for that. And those are the two games to end the season. But if the Vikings win out, Bill, they are the number one seed in the nfc, and that's incredible.
- [91:10]
Bill Simmons
If the Vikings win out, regardless of what happens to anybody else.
- [91:14]
Peter Schrager
Yeah, they are the one seed. They would have all the tiebreakers.
- [91:19]
Bill Simmons
I mean, Detroit probably needs that one seed more than any team has needed a one seed in a while.
- [91:24]
Peter Schrager
I don't know how much Detroit right now. I don't know.
- [91:27]
Bill Simmons
Man, would you see that? Somebody had the graphic of all the people on IR by each team, and Detroit had 22 guys. I have it here. Detroit. Detroit had 22. Then the next team was the Browns at 18.
- [91:44]
Peter Schrager
Yeah.
- [91:45]
Bill Simmons
And the Dolphins and Giants at 15. So the Lions had basically, if you go to, like, the fifth most IR team, they have almost, you know, 60% more than, like, the fourth player. I've never seen anything like it. I don't even know, dude. Like, I know you have some Lions connections. Do they even have an explanation for how they have this many injuries?
- [92:04]
Peter Schrager
No, it's. It's.
- [92:05]
Bill Simmons
It's. It's. Is it like. Do you look at the training staff and go, what are we. Are we doing something wrong?
- [92:10]
Peter Schrager
Like, I don't think so. I. You know, I remember the 2029ers had something like this where, like, just early on in the season, it was like, Bosa out and then Garoppolo's out and, like. But the crazy thing is they're still finding ways to put up points. Now, the David Montgomery loss is real. That one sucks. Like, Montgomery's very important to this.
- [92:27]
Bill Simmons
That was when I closed the door on my Lions one seed. Bet they might be to the Buffalo, where they just outscore everybody. But now. But what really made them special was that Montgomery Gibbs combo.
- [92:38]
Peter Schrager
I know.
- [92:38]
Bill Simmons
It was a top three running back situation anyone had. Now they don't have.
- [92:42]
Peter Schrager
I know. And we had. You're gonna love this. We had Taylor Lautner on our Show Good Morning Football. Taylor Lautner of Twilight Time, who by the way is a great dude and loves the NFL. And he has a podcast with his wife who appropriately is also named Taylor. And they had Aiden Hutchinson on as their guest because he's a die hard Lions fan. And we're promoting it and like, Hutchinson's like, if we make the Super Bowl, I'm back. If we make the super bowl, we're back. And that came out the same exact day as Dan Campbell's riveting radio interview. And it's like, on paper, it makes no sense that this team that is down 22 guys, most of them on defense, and are using third and fourth and fifth string players in key positions down the stretch, should compete. And then you talk to anyone there and it's like, why can't we just be one of these teams of destiny? Why can't we be one of these magical teams? And who knows, if you get to the super bowl, somehow you get Aiden Hutchinson back and suddenly you find yourself in near New Orleans and you got a bunch of crazy Lions fans who haven't seen a world championship game since 57.
- [93:42]
Bill Simmons
The Pats had a year like that where like Troy Brown was playing Nickelback and just, it just felt like everything was going wrong the whole year and they still almost made the super bowl, but they had the Brady Belichick infrastructure. It's a little different. Jared Goff, who's never won a Super bowl, and Campbell's number, you know, but we've seen like, teams, The Colts had years where it just felt like their defense had passed the point of no return and they were somehow in the AFC title game. Yeah, I'm not one to rule them out, but that, I, I gotta say, the Montgomery thing, that was the one that made me go up because their defense sucked anyway. Like they were gonna have to win. Like Buffalo's gonna have to win.
- [94:19]
Peter Schrager
That Colts team, I think it was the 06 Colts team that won the Super Bowl. They had the worst defense in the league and they'd given up like 250 yards to Ron Dane and Dominic Davis and the Houston Texans, like the last week of the season and then playoffs come and it's like, we need to win three games. Can we string it together? And they did. And the home field always, always matters when you can get it. So if Detroit can find a way to just hold serve and maintain home field, if they win out, they're the number one seed. So. Yeah.
- [94:47]
Bill Simmons
But you know, you know what's been lost though? I Think if they're healthy, I really do think they win the super bowl and they're the best team. I think starting the year for whatever their talent was in the situation and the guys at the points of the careers they were at, I think they had the best team. And I think that's why it feels so wide open now because sometimes you just remember there was that year, the year Brady got hurt08 when all of a sudden we just ended up with that weird Pittsburgh, Arizona Super Bowl. It's like, what the fuck is this?
- [95:17]
Peter Schrager
Arizona came in with eight wins on the regular season in a run.
- [95:21]
Bill Simmons
Don't you feel like something weird like that could happen this year? I'm prepared for like any super bowl matchup. Right.
- [95:26]
Peter Schrager
The NFC to me is so interesting. The afc, you've got your powers and like they're all nfc. Like, would you be shocked if Baker Mayfield and the Buccaneers upset, you know, a team in the wild and they beat the fight home?
- [95:39]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. They just ran 37 on the road against power.
- [95:42]
Peter Schrager
Of course they scored. They scored 40 points on the number one defense, the Chargers, and put up 500 yards of offense. It didn't punt. And you're like, oh wait, what the hell's going on in Tampa? Like, they. They might be the team. So this could be that year and the NFC, like the Eagles could finish with 13 straight wins and yet I don't know, like, does that feel like the Eagles are going to run away with the nfc? I don't feel that way. I think the Vikings and the packers can give them a battle in the Lions too. So I'm excited for this year's playoffs.
- [96:08]
Bill Simmons
If you're just saying talent now for who's left. It seems like the Eagles have the most talent in either conference. Just all sides of the ball. If you're just going to do ranking of you're grading all the players and yet I don't even think the Eagles fans, even the Eagles fans have like their guard up with it. And there's always seems to be weird stories popping out and chemistry stuff. And so part of me wonders, is that a red herring? And then the other part of me wonders, like every time there's smoke like that, it never turns out well for the team. So I don't know what to think of them either. They. They would have to be the team that if gone through your head you would pick. But I don't feel good about it.
- [96:47]
Peter Schrager
That 2017 Eagles team, they lose Wentz and I was the sideline reporter for Giants Eagles and like Spagnolo was the quarterback, the coach for the Giants as an interim coach, and everyone was off the Eagles at that point. And then Foles comes in, and I remember talking to Foles and Peterson and Brandon Graham and all those guys. And this is right before the dog masks. And it was like, the world is against us. They don't believe in us. We're the underdogs. And like, that really. That really worked. Can you still do it again? And now the thing is, you know, Jalen hurts, throws for a couple, you know, 100 yards to two receivers, and then comes up and he's like, is that what you all wanted? And it's like, no, no, no, no. We didn't do this. The media didn't do this. Brandon Graham, your teammate, went out on a radio interview and said that you guys weren't friends. Like, we didn't do this. And then Sirianni and Clint Hurt are having this really, like, heated thing on the sidelines where Jalen. Jalen Carter is laughing in the. And it's like, no, no, guys. The cameras caught that. Like, that happened. That was real. And it's like the media is trying to pull us apart. So they find a way to galvanize there in Philly, and I'm sure SHIELD and whoever else you have on the Philly special can break it down far greater than I can. But, like, they feed off that tension, but there isn't a lot of joy in the Philly fan, like, world.
- [97:56]
Joe House
So that's.
- [97:56]
Bill Simmons
What's the note.
- [97:57]
Peter Schrager
They don't like it. It's always, like, tense and stressed, and it's like.
- [98:00]
Bill Simmons
It's not.
- [98:01]
Peter Schrager
It's not this fun ride.
- [98:02]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. Even watching the Eagles, it doesn't seem like a team that. Having, like, the most unbelievable time ever together. And I don't know, you notice different vibes from different teams. Maybe. Maybe it'll come together. I wouldn't rule it out, but you did make me think of something. And maybe it's, like, two weeks too early to figure this out, but who is the best candidate for the Nobody Believes in Us team in the playoffs? Cause that Eagles team is a great example that 2017. Wentz goes down, everyone writes them off. Oh, they're done. And then they. It's. It's the. It's the force that has been kind of the most dominant playoff for us year after year after year. Is it Detroit? Does Detroit have the best Nobody Believes in SK State? Yeah.
- [98:46]
Peter Schrager
I feel like everyone's fleeing.
- [98:47]
Bill Simmons
We don't even believe in them anymore.
- [98:48]
Peter Schrager
Yeah. I Think everyone's fleeing that bandwagon. And Dan Campbell's the perfectly nobody, the perfect Nobody believes in us coach. And, like, Chris Spielman's in that building. He's the perfect nobody believes in us guy. I. I feel like they'll feed off that. And, And. And that is your team. And then I think if there's another one of them, like, the other one that you would say is the Houston Texans, who are going to easily win their division. They're going to play the Chiefs and the Ravens over the next two weeks, and they might. They might win two of those games. One of those games, and no one's going to pick them. And everyone's.
- [99:16]
Bill Simmons
Whatever thing with them is they're the. No, no, fuck you. Nobody should believe in you guys. You guys are barely.
- [99:23]
Peter Schrager
I saw you lose to the jets on a Thursday night in person.
- [99:25]
Bill Simmons
Hell, yeah.
- [99:26]
Peter Schrager
It's your fault.
- [99:26]
Bill Simmons
You can't even score 20 points. You can't block. I would say, Casey last year was a good example of this. When they lost that Raiders game. If people are like, I'm out, I'm out. They're not going to do it again.
- [99:35]
Peter Schrager
I'm out. Aiden O'Connell beat him.
- [99:37]
Joe House
I'm out.
- [99:38]
Bill Simmons
And. And. And I thought they used that to their advantage. Yeah, the.
- [99:42]
Peter Schrager
The Vikings are. The Vikings are a candidate, but, like, O'Connell doesn't have that, like, deal with him. Like, I feel like you need a coach who's going to really dig deep. Sirianni does that. Dan Campbell does that. Like, I've heard stories of Sirianni, like, going really deep with film references and, like, showing movie clips. And I remember Dan Qu back with Atlanta would call me on a Saturday night just to bullshit before my Fox show, and I'd be like, give me something. And he's like, well, I show. I showed a. A sugar Shane Mosley fight last night because the situation was this, and I'm like, dude, like. Like, these guys, they go deep. Like, what can motivate these? Like, that's Campbell, that's Sirianni. Kevin Oconnell's more like, guys, we got this. We can do this one game at a time. Like, there's none of that hate and none of that toxicity of, like, us against the world. It's more, I believe in you. Which works also.
- [100:30]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. Because I think Pittsburgh is maybe enter the waiting room for this combo, especially if they, like, lost to Baltimore this week. All right, we're done. They're out. Fun run. I can't believe you won 10 games. You guys are out. Watts hurt now and. And then Tomlin feeds off that. But yeah, I would say Detroit has to be the odds on favor for it. Maybe Tampa too, with just not being considered at all. And Tampa's had some good wins. Their offense is excellent. Like they're over 400 points already, you know, and they dropped 40 in the Chargers.
- [101:02]
Peter Schrager
And you think about it too, they, they lost their offensive coordinator from a year ago. He took the job in Carolina. Then Liam Cohen comes in and Liam's put up better numbers with Baker, which is incredible. And what's fun with this team is they lost four games in a row. Mike Evans was hurt, Chris Godwin was hurt. And everyone wrote them off, but they just went ahead and just kept on winning. So now they're the hot.
- [101:22]
Bill Simmons
You know who didn't write them off? Me and Sal. Because they were in the such a bad division, nobody is allowed to be even. Carolina, you could barely write off seven wins. Going to be our champ in this.
- [101:31]
Peter Schrager
What do you need in that NFC AFC South? 30. You need less than 30 wins. What was the combined?
- [101:36]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, we're getting that. It was. It's under 30. We're getting that. The, the Pennix Cousins thing was coming for a while and I knew when they did that mile an hour stat for cousins was 36 miles an hour was is. You could see it the way they called the game with the Raiders where they just weren't going to let him do anything. Is there any way to spin this? Let's say I'm Arthur Blank. How are you spinning this to me? Is it like, hey, look, this is why we had to invest in Pennx. These are assets. If you go one for two, it's a win. What do you say to Arthur Blank at this point?
- [102:11]
Peter Schrager
Well, I think the first pat on the back goes to Kwesi, Adolfo mensah and Kevin O'Connell up in Minnesota, who had a franchise quarterback and said, we're going to let him walk out the building, something nobody does without a plan B. We're going to go to the draft and we're going to pick up a free agent. But I remember talking to Kevin, he's like, it's heartbreaking. We love him, but he's 36 years old, coming off an Achilles injury. Like, we can't give him $100 million. The Falcons did. And your argument for the Falcons is like, all right, let's see what we get with Cousins. I give him a little bit of credit in that they eventually did pull the plug because he's going to make $90 million guaranteed from the Atlanta Falcons for 14 weeks of football. And they're paying him that. And they're like, we're not going to just play you because we're paying him that. We're going to then go, why did.
- [102:53]
Bill Simmons
They do it before the Raiders game? Why not give that Raider game? I don't understand.
- [102:57]
Peter Schrager
I reported it on Fox couple weeks ago because he would look, he looked horrible. Cousins for three straight weeks. So like the second week of it they were playing the Chargers at home and I reported, I'm like, Penix didn't take any first, first, you know, squad snaps this week. It was all scout team and they were just like, we're going with Cousins, we're riding this out. It's almost too little too late. But this does open things up a little bit. Like Zach Robinson's a good offensive coach. I knew him when he was with McVeigh's staff in LA and he was the quarterback's coach and he does all sorts of cool like QB waggle outside the pocket stuff. And I know how excited he was when they drafted Penix. Cause he's like, that's really cool. And down the line when the time comes, like we'll do really neat stuff with him. I think you're going to see an entirely different offense over the next three weeks. And a lot of stuff with a quarterback that isn't a running quarterback by like Lamar Daniels. But he can move. Yeah, Kirk Cousins cannot move. He cannot move laterally. That game against the Raiders on Monday night, I mean he scored a touchdown early and it was like pump your chest like told you got no like he couldn't move. It was a crazy game to watch. And that was the fourth straight week he's done that.
- [104:03]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, it's weird because week one he looked like that and then everybody took the Eagles in week two, which is now looking back, one of the weird results of the season. The game's over. Somehow they don't. And then all of a sudden Atlanta has the ball.
- [104:14]
Peter Schrager
Saquon dropped the.
- [104:15]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, yeah. Atlanta comes flying back down the other way and it's like Kurt's back and it turned out he wasn't back. But I look, we've seen teams get out of these giant, awful cap hit things. Russell Wilson, Denver, you know, takes a huge hit with him and they're somehow going to be like a 10 win team this year. So it's not, not awful. I'm to me more interested. Like this makes the season more fun now that we get Pennocks.
- [104:39]
Peter Schrager
You suddenly get this new guy with.
- [104:41]
Bill Simmons
All these weapons and it's like, what if this guy's good? This could be like. Because you know, I have a chance to maybe, maybe, you know, it's not a puncher's chance to maybe catch. Tampa of Tampa has a dumb loss.
- [104:53]
Peter Schrager
Can I break a little news here while I'm live on the podcast with you? I just got a text. The jets have completed interviewing Jim Nagy who is the senior director of the Senior bowl for their GM position. So they're interviewing a lot of guys. So I'm just interjecting with a text I got from them.
- [105:08]
Bill Simmons
Does that count as breaking news or like half breaking news?
- [105:11]
Big Woz
It's.
- [105:11]
Peter Schrager
It's news.
- [105:12]
Bill Simmons
They interview news. Yeah, let's take a break and I want to talk about. No, I want to talk about the jets after that because there was a crazy article there. This episode is brought to you by the all new reimagined Nissan Kicks. From the bold new exterior to the performance and tech features like intelligent all wheel drive and a Bose Personal plus sound system. Cars where I live, I live in the Los Angeles area and cars are one of the most important things you can have cause you're in them a lot because you got to drive around all over the place. You know what's fun? To have a nice car for an everyday commute, to have music and the ability to do hands free stuff and just to feel safe you can do it. Drive the all new reimagined Nissan Kicks today. Head over to Nissan USA to learn more. Bose Personal Plus Sound System is an available feature. Bose is a registered trademark in the Bose Corporation. Intelligent All Wheel drive cannot prevent collisions or provide enhanced traction in all conditions. Always monitor traffic, traffic and weather conditions. This episode is brought to you by Workday. Get the whole band together with Workday and pair finance and HR on one platform for an epic performance with Workday AI at the core. You'll make confident decisions faster than ever and you'll drive flawless business and finance operations with an agile platform that constantly evolves to future proof your organization. Be a finance and HR rockstar with Workday. Visit Workday to learn more. So big athletic article today about the jets and the ownership and the Suns and EA Ratings and Jerry Judy. This became an immediate everybody texting everybody the same thing. It's on every NFL team's Reddit. It just became one of the stories of the year. A lot of anecdotal stuff that I think had been floating around plus some new information and guess What? But the TLDR was like, hey, the jets are super dysfunctional, which we knew already. But I think what I didn't realize was how kind of medley Woody Johnson is. And people had always said when he was doing the Ambassador thing, it was nice, and Woody's out. But then when he came back, that's when it got a little crazy again. So in retrospect, both of us were bullish on the Jets. You were even more bullish than I was. But this team was so dysfunctional. It's not like we didn't know they were dysfunctional. So what made any of us think that this team was going to suddenly become functional? And is there any way out of this with this owner?
- [107:37]
Peter Schrager
Yeah, that article dropped today, and it was like, I got a lot of. And a lot of that stuff. Like, I can't discredit a lot of it. That's in Diana's article with Mike Silver and Zach Rosenblatt. And, like, look, when Woody took that UK ambassador job from President Trump in 2017, his sons, Brick and Jack were 11 and nine. And it's like 11 years old. And nine years old, he goes away. Christopher Johnson, his younger brother, takes over. And suddenly the jets building, it was like, all right, they're leaders in social justice, and Christopher Johnson's giving Kelvin Beecham an opportunity to speak on behalf of the team. And it was right through all of this turbulent time in the NFL, and the jets were leaders in the space, and it was like, gosh, everyone was.
- [108:21]
Joe House
Was.
- [108:21]
Peter Schrager
Was pretty impressed with the jets organization. And then they hire Salah, they hire Joe Douglas, and then Woody comes back, and his sons are suddenly, you know, of high school and college age. And then you go to these jets games and you see the Suns pregame, and they're, like, on the sidelines, and they look cool. Then they got the blazer on and they got the sunglasses on, and they're walking the sidelines, and it's like these. This is a freshman at Harvard and a kid in boarding school, and their dad and mom own the New York jets, and they have all access us to do. Like, I don't spite the kids, and I don't spite the owner. But what it is, it is true. Like, these kids are around, and I actually, I. I feel, like, bad for. I feel bad for Brick, the older one, because everyone says he's actually a good kid, and it's like he's getting lambasted in this article. The Madden thing, I'm not going to discredit that. Like, things like Madden Ratings could come into play. Like, I've spoken to sources like the Jerry Judy trade wasn't happening because the Cleveland Browns offered something better and that's why it wasn't. Because his Madden rating wasn't what it was. But I will say, you know, I, I don't know if this will be breaking it, but like, Joe Flacco was with the team two years ago and Flacco was a good veteran in the locker room for Zach Wilson, they go and they get Rogers and like the plan was let's get Rogers. And like, I could tell you that ownership was like, I, I don't know if we want to go that direction. Like, let's, let's, let's go with Rogers and let's go with Zach and let's figure out else we do. Like, I don't want a big pay Joe. Then Joe Flacco goes on to win comeback player of the year and you're like. And like little things like that where I know the owners. It's true. Like, I know that Woody was like, sometimes in the draft, like, will show displeasure if it's a pick he doesn't like. Like, that is fact. I've heard that from ex employees and that's a lot of this. There are a lot of ex employees from the jets right now, which is.
- [110:04]
Bill Simmons
Always the most dangerous thing for a piece like this. There's 20 people who are like, fuck it, I don't like that guy. Here's what the fuck.
- [110:10]
Peter Schrager
I lost my job. Like, it's, you know, the jets went through a turbulent time in 2014, 2018, and now it's this year. And it's always when they get rid of like a certain, you know, group in the front office and then what do they have to lose? They'll tell stories and a lot of it's probably their vantage point and there's half truths and real truths, but like the end of the day, this ain't the Pittsburgh Steelers. You know, this, this isn't the Kansas City Chiefs. Like, there certainly is some, some fissures, you know what. And issues with like some of the ways things go down. But like, I think all they want to do is win. Like, it's not like they're not giving the GM the green light to go get Aaron Rodgers or to go for Devonte Adams. But I, I can't credit.
- [110:54]
Bill Simmons
Here's the thing though.
- [110:55]
Peter Schrager
I.
- [110:56]
Bill Simmons
And Wickersham and I talked about this last week because I genuinely think one of the reasons Belichick went to college was he was like it's not the right franchise situation. With the right kind of ownership, there's no meddling son of the owner. Anybody kind of messing with me, I probably don't want to do it anyway, right? So. So after I put that pot up, some different people reached out to me and a friend of mine was saying, you should do something on your pod about the difference between NBA owners and NFL owners.
- [111:26]
Peter Schrager
Okay, I would love to see that. You know that world. I know the NFL world. Again, I'll say the jets ownership thing, that's in a lot of buildings, dude.
- [111:34]
Bill Simmons
So that's the thing he was saying, like, what's different about NFL owners versus NBA owners? NFL owners, they own these big giant billion dollar companies. They're in a suite, they're detached from the fans, they get to do what they want. They'll put their son in charge here, they'll do whatever, but there's still a sense of detachment. Whereas NBA owners, they're in the crowd, they're with the game, like they're, they're kind of in the mix for. And the type of people that have been buying NBA teams aren't like these NFL, like just these super rich families passing down the team to different generations. In the NBA, a lot of the owners they have are people that, that either came up with the money themselves because they were rich or you know, they thought outside the box or they were some family that bought in or there's somebody like that Matt Ishbia who's like the self made guy who's like, I know how to do everything and it's like all over the place. And, but the, the point is like there's so many of these jet situations in the NFL and I don't feel like there's the same in the NBA. There's different levels of owner incompetence in the NBA, but it's, it's somehow a different lane than NFL incompetence. The Senate, like the jets have been like this for 15 years, right? Yeah.
- [112:47]
Peter Schrager
I mean, look, I think the NFL has a different structure with ownership. So an NBA, you can be a rich finance guy and you can buy a team. With the NFL, a private equity can only now own up to 10% of a team. They only let six different private equity companies even play a role in that. That's brand new. And, and for the most part all of the owners are majority owners. And it's been handed down family, generation, generation, generation. Like the Bengals or they bought it.
- [113:15]
Bill Simmons
In the 90s or the 80s and got it at a Certain price, and they just have all the power.
- [113:20]
Peter Schrager
But like the Bengals ownership group, like, that's their only. That's their main income, right? Like, that's their business. They own the Bengals. You look around and you go all the way to like, the. The Rams, like, that's a new owner, right? So the Kronkies, like, they obviously have a whole sorts of real estate stuff and they own all these different teams. But there are a lot of teams where the owners are families and it's handed down generation to generation. And like, the Steelers are one of those teams. But over the years, Jimmy Haslam had a minority stake of the Steelers, then he goes and buys the Browns. David Tepper had a minority stake of the Steelers, then he goes and becomes the majority owner of the Panthers. You're not going to be a Johnny. Come lately in this circle and just be like, I got a lot of money. I want to buy an NFL team. That's not how it works. And like in New York, like Gary Vaynerchuk always says, I want to own the jets, and Gary Vee wants to own the Jets. I think in different leagues, like, that's a possibility. But the Johnsons aren't selling this thing. Like, they're just not. And they might give a minority piece to someone here at some point, but, like, they'll always be 51% owners, and that's for most of these teams and the minority piece for it for these owners, like, if you were to be a minority owner and, you know, this week we saw Vince Carter and Tracy McGrady are now minority owners of the Buffalo Bills.
- [114:35]
Bill Simmons
All right?
- [114:36]
Peter Schrager
And Josie Altidore is a minority owner, and Lewis Hamilton's a minority owner and Condoleezza Rice is a minority owner. And you can go all through, what is that? It's nothing other than I could say I own it. I can go to the dinner party. Season ticket, and I get season tickets, and I got a spot season.
- [114:50]
Bill Simmons
I go to a couple meetings. Yeah, I go to a couple board meetings, and that's it. This was figured out in the NBA over the course of the last 20 years because these groups would buy franchises, but really one guy was in charge. And you would have these people putting in real money, and they're like, fuck, I don't. I'm not in charge of anything. This is.
- [115:08]
Peter Schrager
What do I get other than saying I'm an owner and then someone being like, but you're not that guy. And he's like, yeah, no, no, no. But I am an owner. And there's Enough people with egos. You always talk about the rich guy tables. And it's like there's so few of these teams available that to say I'm even a 0.1% owner is. Is some cachet in a Washington D.C. beltway dinner. You know, like there's all these different minority owners of the Commanders. Like that's, that's social equity. It's something like.
- [115:32]
Bill Simmons
Right. But they still. I think the, the newer owners that buy teams like that and have minority groups, they're strategically picked to bring one value thing to the whole equation that they kind of need whoever it is, whether it's somebody who's forward facing, somebody who's really smart, somebody who might know how to build a new arena. I think when I look at some of the NBA stuff, the family that operates the most like an NFL team, like the dysfunctional generation by generation NFL team that just is the Lakers.
- [116:07]
Peter Schrager
Interesting.
- [116:07]
Bill Simmons
That's the team where the dad had the team really from the 70s on. He passed it down to his kids. They'll never get rid of it. They don't have the kind of crazy money to, you know, like basically their money comes through the team from the Lakers. But that there's like 10 NFL teams that operate like the Lakers do. I think the Giants are like that. Even though I know people speak highly of the Maras like that. The Giants have been one of the most dysfunctional franchises for over a decade now. And they don't seem to have a plan like they.
- [116:36]
Peter Schrager
They. Obviously the Tish is bought in as well and that goes generations too. So now you have like multiple generations of Tish's and Maras. But I would say, you know, there's a big enough family there where those people do different things outside of football and have like, like the Arizona Cardinals. Michael Bidwill's business is the Arizona Cardinals. Like he was actually a lawyer by trade and his dad passed the team down and now his ownership is the Cardinals. And the Spanos family, like they all work there. There's a lot of them. And, and I really like John Spanos and I, I've grown to become very friendly with Dean Span. It's like. But that's the family business now. So it's. It's this billion dollar company but it's being operated by families and their families.
- [117:18]
Bill Simmons
It's a multi billion dollar company. But then the other some, some of the people that have come in the last decade. Shotgun. Tepper.
- [117:25]
Peter Schrager
Tepper.
- [117:26]
Big Woz
Haslam.
- [117:26]
Bill Simmons
Haslam. The. And then the Washington.
- [117:29]
Peter Schrager
Josh Harris.
- [117:30]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. Yep. Which is like the new kind of modern owner where they're buying these franchises, but it's just part of a bigger portfolio for them. Right. It's not like Harrison living or dying with the success of the team. Who is the NFL owner that was like, sitting on the bench like Cuban was with the Mavs forever, Right? Arthur Blank.
- [117:49]
Peter Schrager
Arthur Blank was the guy, one of.
- [117:50]
Bill Simmons
The biggest companies in the world, and then he just shows up and he'll come down the sidelines. But it's just. It's funny how the stakes somehow seem lower for the football owners, because just owning a team in this league that is like, one of the best businesses in the world, you're going to make.
- [118:06]
Peter Schrager
You're going to make a profit. I mean, the jets raised season ticket prices this year. I mean, amidst all this, the PSL owners were given an email like, hey, the tickets are being jacked up next year despite season. Look, knowing that process, they're going to interview everybody for a GM job. And I would go in there and my advice to those GMs would be, you have to find a way to finesse the egos in the room of, like, you know, obviously, like, what he's going to want to hear, like, what your thoughts are. But you're going to also have to tell them straight up, like, I can also manage all of this because there is a next generation coming. Like, his kids aren't going anywhere. One of them's a freshman in college, the other one's in high school. Like, they're only going to get older and more power and more emboldened. And it's like, if that's a problem, as a gm, like, you need to have the backbone to be able to say, like, I can't have that around or I don't want that around. And the same for the coaches. Like, that's the truth of it. So the owners aren't going anywhere. I find it so naive for all these fans being like, just sell the team. Sell the team.
- [119:03]
Bill Simmons
Like, they're 100% not selling the team. Even Snyder, who they were, they were basically trying to set his franchise on fire and he wouldn't sell the team. What are some good examples of how it should work that aren't just like, the Steelers passing a franchise down? Like, to me, it seems like the Cronkies with the Rams just realizing, like, hey, we have a good front office and a great coach. Let's just trust these guys. That seems how it should work on paper.
- [119:29]
Peter Schrager
Yeah. So Stan Kroenke obviously owns it. His son Josh, who plays a bigger role with the Nuggets and with the. Josh is great, and he's in his 40s, and he's not. Look at me. Not, you know, hey, I'm in this. He's just. He's there and he operates, and he's very involved.
- [119:45]
Bill Simmons
He's the positive upside of a legacy kid. I would say you'd point to him as, like, that's a success story of a legacy kid.
- [119:52]
Peter Schrager
I would also say Chargers John Spanos, who works in the front office, like. Like, he's also, like. People see him out there and he, like, is in about. Look at me. And very involved. But the Kroenkes, though, their front office is interesting. So you've got those guys. Then the president is a guy named Kevin Demoff, whose father, Marvin, was an NFL agent for many years. And Kevin's been there since St. Louis. And then under him, it's your GM, Les Sneed, and this other guy, Tony Pastors, who kind of manages the Kronkes as well. And it's like they're all swimming on the same thing up upstream. And it's. Demoff also is the president of the Avalanche and the Nuggets and the Rapids. And it's like, there's a lot of different entities, and it's all under this cronky sports banner. But Stan and Josh are never going to come in and tell Sean McVay, I don't like the play call. I can't say that's true for every owner around the league.
- [120:38]
Bill Simmons
Right. Yeah, it's.
- [120:40]
Peter Schrager
And that's something you can't control.
- [120:41]
Bill Simmons
It's. It's.
- [120:42]
Peter Schrager
I own the team. I want to have my voice heard, you know?
- [120:45]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. Because it seems like all of these guys have. Have the son who. Or in Jerry Jones's case, the daughter that everybody likes Charlotte, who everybody thinks is good, but everyone has the son, for the most part. And then if you ask other people, I'm talking NBA, NFL, whatever. Like, so what's the son like? And it could go one of three ways. They could be like, oh, he's good. He's really good. Like, it's almost, like, surprising. Or they'll be like, you know, he's pretty sharp, I guess.
- [121:13]
Peter Schrager
Or he's Tommy Callahan. He's Tommy boy.
- [121:15]
Bill Simmons
Well, then there's the third one where it's like. Like, what's the sun like? And they go, you know. And then you're like, oh, it must be a disaster. Yeah, this guy must be the absolute fucking worst.
- [121:28]
Peter Schrager
Which is why I want to give a pass to Woody's kids who got killed in this athletic article. Bill, they're your son's.
- [121:34]
Bill Simmons
They're under 20. They're my son's age.
- [121:35]
Peter Schrager
They're your son's age. What are you doing? You're telling the kids, like, I remember before the super bowl in Arizona. And I don't know if I should share it, but I will. We're walking around the field. It was a Fox super bowl, so I have all access. And I'm walking around with, with Michael Vick, Charles Woodson and Sean Payton, and Goodell comes over and Jay Z's there and there's this conversation and I like, eek to the back because I know my place in these things. No one wants to see my dumbass. So I'm like. And then like, you know, I see Woody's kids on the field and they're like taking photos with Jay Z and I'm like, I would do the same thing if I was a 17 year old kid at the super bowl and my dad owned the Jets. And like, do you spite him for that? No. It's the job of everyone else to say, okay, we need to put up some walls here and see, like, what we're gonna do.
- [122:13]
Bill Simmons
But, well, where it gets dangerous is like the Jaguars, where Shad Khan, who owns a bunch of stuff and who's just got an incredible amount of money and they've spent money in the arena. Football team's a mess. The sun's kind of running the team, but he's also running AEW full time.
- [122:28]
Peter Schrager
And a soccer team.
- [122:30]
Bill Simmons
And the soccer team. And if you're, if you're Belichick. And even if that was a job, that was, you thought, oh, if I wait a month, maybe, maybe they'll just give me the car keys. It's like, what is that job? I have a weird ownership situation. I'm in Jacksonville, Florida, and I have no idea if my quarterback will ever be good. And those will be my mid-70s. Like, I. The more I think about it, like, I actually really like that North Carolina job for him. Because college jobs these days, unless you're in a perfect NFL situation, like, I think Carbaugh, Chargers, that's like a perfect situation.
- [123:04]
Peter Schrager
Totally.
- [123:04]
Bill Simmons
Right. Or the Broncos being.
- [123:05]
Peter Schrager
They needed him and he wanted them Broncos.
- [123:08]
Bill Simmons
And he's in la. Broncos, same thing. We need you shopping here. The car key. And I just don't think that situation is there for anybody. If you're Vrabel now. And I think Vrabel's the best Candidate of all these guys. If you're Vrabel, what's the situation where you're like, oh, well, that's a no brainer. I gotta do that. Is it even Cincinnati?
- [123:30]
Peter Schrager
Look, going back to Belichick, there could be two truths. I know Lombardi comes on your podcast and we love Mike and I have exchanged texts with him. There could be two truths that, A, this was an amazing situation for Belichick to fall back on, and B, he.
- [123:43]
Bill Simmons
Had no NFL home, there was no NFL job.
- [123:45]
Peter Schrager
And, but also to their self awareness, there was no job that they wanted. So it's, it's, it was a, both ways now.
- [123:53]
Bill Simmons
But that's my question. Like, what's the job this year?
- [123:56]
Peter Schrager
But if you're Vrabel, can you be out for two years? I don't know, like Peyton.
- [124:00]
Bill Simmons
I'm not talking about him, I'm talking about Vrabel.
- [124:02]
Joe House
Yeah.
- [124:02]
Peter Schrager
I'm saying for Vrabel, can you wait two years, like, and just say, well, I'm going to be, you know, pick. I'm going to wait for a better opportunity. That's the problem.
- [124:10]
Bill Simmons
Well, you're waiting. You're basically waiting for the Pats job. If you're waiting the extra year, you're like, this Pats thing's gonna go badly. I'm just gonna wait until it falls apart.
- [124:20]
Peter Schrager
And you're walking into a situation where they didn't give you the decency of an interview last time around when you were.
- [124:25]
Bill Simmons
Well, that's because Kraft hired the guy five years ago and they didn't even.
- [124:29]
Peter Schrager
Go through the process if you're variable. Well, what the, what you know, and the story I got today that I think went out, that Greg Bedard, who I think is very plugged in so that you can get a Vrabel McDaniels and like the whole band can go back to New England. When everyone thought that was the crew go, not Vrabel. But everyone thought McDaniels. Patricia Belichick hasn't hired any of those guys yet. Like, I think they got to work out contracts with those guys. So you might be able to get the band back together up in New England. I, I, I mean, would you want to go back there if you're Vrabel after they didn't even give you the look the first time?
- [125:00]
Bill Simmons
I don't think, I don't think it was a slap in the face that they didn't give him a look. I think the Mayo thing had been done for a couple years. So that was one of my Questions for you actually, to do a little coach watch because we have Jet Saints, Bears open. Watching the last three weeks of the season. Peterson, I'm guessing that's a wrap in Jacksonville, right?
- [125:22]
Peter Schrager
Yes, I would think so.
- [125:24]
Bill Simmons
There's four spots, Day ball seems like he's coming back, and my guess is they'll give him one more year, and then they'll hire new people for the front office, and that's how that plays out. But maybe they won't hang.
- [125:39]
Peter Schrager
Oh, you think the G. I think the GM is safe in New York. I think Joe Shane is safe. I think the gm.
- [125:43]
Bill Simmons
So Gabal's not safe.
- [125:45]
Peter Schrager
I don't. I don't know if he's 100% safe. I would think if it's up to the mayor, as they would love to just get the season over with and keep both of them. But there have been.
- [125:52]
Bill Simmons
Let's pencil that in.
- [125:54]
Peter Schrager
There have been planes above, you know, MetLife the last two home games saying, please end this misery fireball. Like, that's the one thing like. Like the Mares can't stand, like, when the fans are, you know, not in the building, or it's an embarrassment. So it could. Joe judge was, say, 14 weeks through the season two years ago, and then he ran a quarterback sneak with Jake Fromm and lost it in his press conference. And it was like, we have to fire you. That's. So that's where Dable's at right now, I think, like, you just can't melt down.
- [126:18]
Bill Simmons
That's a big talking point right now with the Pats fans. Cause if there's. If you really are completely all out on Mayo, and I was a hundred percent out, and then a couple of the players stuck up for him this week. So now I'm like, all right, I'll give it one more week. But Drake May stuck up for him. Detroit west stuck up for him, but he's been just awful.
- [126:35]
Peter Schrager
And he talks. There's this, like. There's this meme of like, oh, Gerard Mayo.
- [126:40]
Joe House
Yeah.
- [126:40]
Peter Schrager
He says something, you know, J. Mayo makes terrible decision, says something at press conference and then backs it and then, you know, back walks it back, but sort of also puts a foot in his mouth. Like, it's been.
- [126:49]
Bill Simmons
I think he said four times this. This year in the preseason, where he said something that everybody's like, wait, what just happened? And then the next day, he had to do that to. To clarify something I said yesterday.
- [127:01]
Peter Schrager
Yeah.
- [127:02]
Bill Simmons
And I don't know how many more of those he gets. The Arizona game was alarming. But, you know, they got Buffalo this week. They got Buffalo in the last week, which might actually mean something for Buffalo. So I, to me, Mayo's on the coach watch list, even though I, I don't think Kraft will fire him after that.
- [127:17]
Peter Schrager
I don't think they want to either. I think that's a. They would love to not admit a mistake. You know what I mean? And, like, they would love to ride this thing out one more, one more season.
- [127:25]
Bill Simmons
But the thing is that's fine that they don't want to admit a mistake, and maybe he deserves a second year. The difference is Vrabel. I just think Vrabel is a great coach. If that's going to cost you variable, you're in the same situation like the jets were in, where they could add Vrabel a year ago, probably, and they brought back solo, and it clearly wasn't going to work. Pierce on Vegas.
- [127:47]
Peter Schrager
Interesting pro. I mean, look, I've been depending on.
- [127:50]
Bill Simmons
How the next three games go. Like, I can't say I'm, I, I, I'm positive he's coming back.
- [127:55]
Peter Schrager
Same. But I also can't say I'm positive he's gone. I also think it was reported by Ian Rapoport this week, and I know it's, it's, it's accurate on the quarterback spot that Brady's, like, not just going to be a silent owner and, you know, posing for photos. Like, Brady's going to have a voice in this and is going to play a role. And so I know there's no, like, great connection, but they are former players, and obviously Brady and Pierce have a relationship from their playing days. But, like, I think Brady plays a role in this as well, and they're going to value his opinion.
- [128:23]
Bill Simmons
All right, here are the three I got to get your take on, and I'm watching this for the next three weeks. There's always a surprise. I can't believe they let go of that guy. Coach. The nominees, Mike McDaniel in Miami.
- [128:35]
Peter Schrager
They just give him a huge contract extension. But Steven Ross. Money's not an issue. So. Okay, go on.
- [128:40]
Bill Simmons
Shane Steichen in Indianapolis.
- [128:42]
Peter Schrager
Okay.
- [128:44]
Bill Simmons
Kyle Shanahan in San Francisco. Those would be my three. I'd be shocked if they, if they were let go one day after the season. But I also wouldn't be shocked. And then I guess maybe you could put Zach Taylor in there.
- [128:58]
Peter Schrager
But I think, no, I think there's.
- [128:59]
Bill Simmons
A chance the Bengals could make the playoffs if.
- [129:02]
Peter Schrager
And also, not to talk about finances in that kind of way, but, like, the Bengals are not ones. Yeah, they're not, they're not looking to pay two coaches at once, right?
- [129:10]
Bill Simmons
When you, when you decide to have a team of like half rookies and undrafted free agents, maybe you don't want to pay two coaches. So, McDaniel, Steichen, Shanahan, rank in order of. What would surprise you the most?
- [129:23]
Peter Schrager
Shanahan would surprise me the most. I know it's been an. It's a very, very dark year there in San Francisco. Like, knowing Jed very well, knowing John lynch very well, knowing Kyle very well, they're trying to be upbeat, but, like, this season started with the lockouts, which was sour as it was, and then their first round pick got shot and it was like, okay, that's a major adverse situation. Let's try to work through it. Then they proceeded to lose their running back right before the season. That was their offensive player of the year in the league. And then, like, I don't want to be, you know, like, you've had players have real tragedies in their life. Like Trent Williams lost a kid this, this, this season, like, real dark stuff on top of all these injuries, and it's like, just get to the finish line and I don't think Kyle Shanahan's going to pay the price for this year. It's one of those truly brutal, the.
- [130:13]
Bill Simmons
Official year from hell teams.
- [130:15]
Peter Schrager
It's the official year from hell team that, like, as bad as things have been in New York with the jets, like the Niners, like, that's real life stuff and it has been so bad and they're just trying to stay above it. When they beat the Bears in that game, like, there was like a feeling of, like, great relief and like, just that we gotta win. And last week was atrocious. On Thursday night at home, in front of their crowd, losing 12, 6 to the Rams, like, it's just get to the end. I don't think Kyle Shanahan, unless he has some major blow up with Jed, which I don't think is happening. Steichen and Ursa, I don't know enough. I know Ursay had it, had his was just absolutely sick to his stomach over Carson Wentz losing to the Jaguars in a week 17 game a couple years ago and it's like, he's out, like, get rid of him, like. But I don't know if that's the relationship with the coach here that he would make a rash decision, but disappointing season there. And then Mike McDaniel, they gave him a monster, monster extension before the season. But Steven Ross is one of the wealthiest owners in the league, and this thing has gone way off the rails. And nothing would surprise me because that's the same. Same owner who fired Brian Flores when no one thought that was a possibility a couple years ago.
- [131:21]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, and that goes back to what we were talking about earlier with these. These owners are just so different than the NBA owners. Stephen Ross is like, ah, fuck.
- [131:28]
Joe House
Yeah.
- [131:29]
Bill Simmons
How many. How many coaches am I paying? Ah, fuck it. I don't care. Just what does he care? He's got a gajillion dollars. Some of these guys are.
- [131:35]
Peter Schrager
And that's a really, really attractive job. As. As. As attractive a job as there is is living in Miami and. And being the coach of the Dolphins, because you have an owner with endless money and you have a really nice place to live with no taxes, like these hot coaches. Like, that's a really attractive place to go.
- [131:54]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, I mean, that's for the Pats fans who have been horrified by how sloppy the Pats have been and the terrible strategy and just how awful they look. The thing that a lot of us have focused on is that Kraft's just in his 80s, and you don't have a ton of these seasons left. Right. And you can't be like, yeah, let's see, one more year. They're in such a unique situation with Drake May on a rookie contract where it's like the single best asset you could have in sports, and they have a lot of work to do. And do you want to set that back a year? I don't know if you do.
- [132:28]
Peter Schrager
Yeah. And it's. Jonathan plays a big role there. Like, Jonathan Kraft plays a major role there. Another son of an owner. And I think they really, really were. The way that whole thing went down with. With Belichick at the end, I think they really wanted this year to work out in some way, like. And it has absolutely gone terrible.
- [132:50]
Bill Simmons
Off top of your head, how many teams have benched a quarterback this year?
- [132:57]
Peter Schrager
Benched or injury? Benched.
- [132:58]
Bill Simmons
Benched.
- [132:59]
Peter Schrager
Four.
- [133:00]
Bill Simmons
Ten.
- [133:01]
Peter Schrager
Okay. It's a lot.
- [133:04]
Bill Simmons
Cousins, Levis, Daniel Jones, Brissette Fields, Jameis Richardson, Flacco, back and forth, Bryce Young, Minshew, and I'm counting that Hayner guy. Hayner, Rattler. Somebody got benched in that. I don't know. There's bench exalver with that's one third of the league bench their quarterback this year. How are we getting worse?
- [133:26]
Peter Schrager
Not good. Not good. And yet you could say that at the top of the league with Burrow and Lamar and Allen, you've got some of the best quarterback play we've ever seen. There's such a gap between the great and the bad, and it's, it's, you either have one or you don't. And that's just where we're at.
- [133:42]
Bill Simmons
Am I crazy to think Zach Wilson should have gotten one more chance with somebody to at least start a game?
- [133:47]
Peter Schrager
Yeah, he had that whole year last year and stunk.
- [133:50]
Bill Simmons
Is he like 24? I don't know.
- [133:52]
Peter Schrager
He's a third string in Denver.
- [133:54]
Bill Simmons
How is Wentz not quarterbacking a team either? That's another one. I mean, even the Chiefs. There's been a lot of dialogue with the Chiefs where they're like, how does he, how is this guy a backup? He's so good. Yeah, it's like, well, you got to look at that Indianapolis game. All right, next topic. The Calais Campbell release we rarely see, so Miami is officially out of it. You rarely see. This happens in basketball right before, like, the March 1 deadline. You rarely see a guy get released by a team who could actually hop onto a playoff team and have a dramatic impact. But I feel like he could.
- [134:31]
Peter Schrager
He could.
- [134:32]
Bill Simmons
Have you heard anything on this?
- [134:33]
Peter Schrager
The last one was like, I think the Chiefs, like, signed Terrell Suggs at the end of the season and he won a Super bowl with them back in 2019. And it was like, sizzles on our team. Let's go. Kalas is like the ultimate ambassador of the league. Walter Payton, man of the year. And I think he was done right here. And I think he will sign with the Ravens, likely, which is a team that I think he was.
- [134:48]
Bill Simmons
Or you think it's the Ravens?
- [134:49]
Peter Schrager
I think it's one of these teams. Like, he played with the Ravens and was a beloved Baltimore Raven. And if there's, what if it's the Bills? Like, what if Bills could be the Bills? He'll go to a contender and he'll play a role and he'll make a big play in a big game. You know that.
- [135:01]
Bill Simmons
What if it's like the Packers? I, I, I'm just, I'm on pins and needles wondering where he goes.
- [135:06]
Peter Schrager
Watch.
- [135:07]
Bill Simmons
The hardest asset to just stumble into in week 17 would be a guy in your defensive line who could push it.
- [135:13]
Peter Schrager
Defensive tackle. Yeah. And he's a great teammate. I have no insight. I got, I mean, Rosenhaus is his agent. I could probably get some info in a quick moment, but I as now, I would think Baltimore to me, always with Calais Campbell. That's where, that's where he was such a Badass for them if he actually.
- [135:29]
Bill Simmons
Wants to win a ring. Go to the Chiefs.
- [135:33]
Peter Schrager
Go to the Chiefs.
- [135:34]
Bill Simmons
Just go to the Chiefs. Just be next to Chris Jones. Just bang some bodies around. Okay. You watched Aaron Rodgers entire Netflix stock?
- [135:42]
Peter Schrager
No, just the first two episodes. Did you watch any of it or.
- [135:45]
Bill Simmons
No, I refuse to watch it.
- [135:46]
Peter Schrager
Why? Okay, I know your team, Jimmy Kimmel and Cousin Sal, but you won't even have it.
- [135:50]
Bill Simmons
Nothing. I would actually watch it, despite Jimmy. It's my friend. No, I just don't want to spend. I don't want to spend, you know, valuable TV time with.
- [136:03]
Peter Schrager
But you're a filmmaker. I watched Rock Doc. I texted you. This is a good doc. I'm not trying to.
- [136:09]
Bill Simmons
My friend. Gotham made it. Those guys are really good at what they do. I'm sure it's well done. I just don't want to hang out with Rogers for two hours.
- [136:16]
Peter Schrager
I would tell you this, and I know we've had a lot of discourse on the player producing, editorial control. Look, this isn't Ken Burns baseball. This isn't an objective look at this thing. It's Rogers Story. But the second episode, he goes on this ayahuasca trip with Jordan Poyer and Adrienne Colbert and Poyer's mom. And it's like, it goes to places that I don't know exist. And it's interesting. The first episode, it really is good football shit, man. Really? Yes. It is a football doc, too. I am telling you. You go and you forget how close he was when he was with the packers and all those games. And packers fans will say, like, no, no, we know. But like, you know, the Giants, they beat him when he was a 151 quarterback, 19 straight wins. He loses to the Giants in the playoffs, the Falcons in the NFC championship game. All those 49ers losses. The Buccaneers a couple years ago. But what was really interesting is that you get into Rodgers and he's always searching. He's, like, seeking for something that I almost feel just a lot of empathy and sympathy. Like, he's a single guy in his 40s right now, and he's like, I'm searching, I'm searching, I'm searching. And there's this whole. But he says he wins the Super bowl in 2011, and his whole life's goal was proving everyone wrong and proving all those Division 1 schools wrong. And he mentions Purdue. Said, like, you're just not athletic enough for Purdue. And he couldn't win a playoff game. And they show a clip of Mooch on NFL Network being like, until Rogers wins a playoff game. He's not one of the elite guys, wins the playoff game, wins Super Bowl. And he says he wakes up the morning after the super bowl and it didn't fill his cup. And he's like, what now? And that was 2011, and he's still searching. And I feel like that's a side of Rodgers I haven't seen. And there's no, you know, there's no love lost amongst him and the family. And there's all this sort of stuff that you're like, dude, like, it's hard for me to really rationalize why you feel this hole in your life. But, like, I don't know, it's pretty vulnerable and it. And I think the football is pretty good.
- [138:11]
Bill Simmons
Jesus, you almost made me want to watch the first Enigma.
- [138:15]
Peter Schrager
It's only three episodes, too. It's not this seven episode, you know, thing. Like, there's been a lot of bad sports docs, you know, this. And a lot of them are like this. This could have been a nice 60 minute, 60, 60 minute piece that ran on the NBA TV network. Like, I don't need to watch this. But I'm telling you, this one was well done. And you come away and you're like, pretty good football. And whether you like Rogers or not, you're like, that's an interesting deep dive on a dude who gave you all access.
- [138:40]
Bill Simmons
Well, so you're saying I should watch this over La Palma, the Norwegian disaster flick where everything's dubbed that or series. That's the number one TV series on Netflix right now.
- [138:50]
Peter Schrager
Is this the number one? I don't know. La Palma. I gotta see it.
- [138:52]
Bill Simmons
I like when you start watching those, and then five minutes in, you realize their mouths aren't moving with the words. And you're like, oh, it's. We're. Oh, now I get it.
- [139:00]
Peter Schrager
These people are watched based on like. Like what? Like the. The guys from the Watch a couple years ago, it was like 1973, about, like, German Dutchland. And I'm like, I'm gonna watch this show. And I'm like, I can't do it. I tried, like, Andy Greenwald loved it.
- [139:14]
Bill Simmons
What's the show?
- [139:15]
Peter Schrager
Do you know what I'm talking about? It's like 72 in Germany, and it was like this show that ran on German television. They're like, it's the number one show. I'm like, all right, I trust these guys. I like Chris Ryan. I like Greenwald. And then I gave it, like a minute. I'm like, I can't I tried.
- [139:27]
Bill Simmons
Those guys love it. They love getting super weird with those. Ben and I were watching. We were both working at the kitchen table last night watching Halloween 6 with Paul Rudd.
- [139:36]
Peter Schrager
Yeah, that's a classic movie.
- [139:38]
Bill Simmons
He's just going for the whole movie for it. Just really, really, really into Michael Myers. It's just an incredible performance.
- [139:45]
Peter Schrager
The best part about that, Paul was on, like, he was, like, doing like, Cider House Rules and, like, went from Clueless to doing just Broadway and all these things. And he, like, did that movie. And he did a movie that was, like, filmed in Japan over the course of two weeks where he had to bleach his hair blonde. And he's like, those are my movies of like, all right, I'm gonna go for it a little bit here.
- [140:03]
Bill Simmons
All right. We have to go. Cause my computer's about to run out of batteries.
- [140:06]
Peter Schrager
It was fun.
- [140:06]
Bill Simmons
Schrager, great to see you, as always.
- [140:08]
Peter Schrager
You're the man, dude. Thanks.
- [140:09]
Bill Simmons
All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Peter Schrager. Thanks to Joe House and Big Woz. Thanks to Kyle Creighton and Steve Cerruti for producing. As always, I'm gonna be back on Sunday live with cousin Sal. You'll be able to watch it on YouTube as we're doing it. It'll be on Spotify video afterwards. Words as well. Enjoy the weekend. Enjoy the greatest, greatest sports day in a while on Saturday, too. It should be super fun. Can't wait to talk about it Sunday. Have a good weekend.
- [140:50]
Peter Schrager
On the wayside.
- [141:01]
Bill Simmons
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