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It's always good to know your options and they can be your partner in possible. Hello, welcome in to Troy Aikman's three favorite writers talking about Troy Aikman. I'm Joshua Briscoe with Seth Kaiser and Nate Taylor. We have Seth back after not having him on Tuesday. We have a whole lot of things going on around the Kansas City Chiefs that bear discussion. But I don't think we can begin there, fellas. I'll get the clip rolling in a little bit. But before we fully hand this show over to a three-time Super Bowl winning quarterback, the only stat that matters. How do you do it on this fine Thursday? Seth, you had a good headspace. Didn't have you Tuesday. Missed you. Show was good. We missed you, though. I missed being here. The show was excellent as per... What was your favorite part? My favorite part was really hard to pick. I think Nate's closing as ever was... I mean, I laughed, I cried. So people know my son Lucas, my youngest son, who's eight, is now officially a white belt in Taekwondo and got earned his uniform by doing his four-step thing. You are not a white belt. I am not. And he did a terrific job, and I'm super proud of him, and I got to watch it all happen. Thanks to you guys carrying on somehow some way in my absence, which is great because I'm on vacation next week. But I'll probably bring him Mike with me anyway, so. Hell of a time to find that out. Nate, you're in all blue. Maybe, you know, we were able to soldier on without Seth with the Royals. Be able to soldier on tonight, how are we feeling right now? I feel optimistic, you know. Hey, what's the signal? What's the signal to swing away? Got a bit seated. Have a look at it! Nate's currently signaling for those of you in an audio-medium checking your podcast app, Choice. Nate's delivering the swing away signal. Well, let's just swing away today. Swing away. I know, Nate Dog, I know. Nate Dog saves, what's the steel side? I very much want to talk about this for 30 seconds. The reason Dave Roberts is in forever lore in baseball history, with the 2004 false-risk site, the false-risk rock says, "Ladies and gentlemen, there was no tomorrow." He had to steal. I think it's Mariano Rivera. The Royals were not in the same situation last night. It was game 3. They were not down 3-0. We did not need a pitch runner. I know Bobby Whit is the fastest man in baseball. But Salvador Perez is at the plate. He and if you let him swing, he could potentially give you a two-run home run. So I understand my Macchitrero didn't have the steel sign on. Now, obviously everybody knows the steel sign. It's somewhere in the earring, you know, looking for a piercing. Pierce that infield. But tonight, if given a similar situation, our backs are against the wall. We are on the brink of elimination. There is no tomorrow. So, yeah, he'll steal that base. I want everybody to swing away. I want everybody to go steal. Hell, get some buns down, fellas. We're in a bunch of territory already? Is that swinging away? Hey, if somebody gets on base in the first inning, put the butt down. All I'm going to ask for, not to get too greedy, all I'm going to ask for is a respectable number of base hits. Maybe three runs and just throw a few strikes. Maybe just don't play Yankees on base for free. That would be my suggestion. Yes, but I'm out of base pocket. Also, I think they're going to need more of the three runs. I just, I wanted to be realistic, but yeah, I mean, I think just, you know, just throw strikes and get on base. That's, that's the signal that I'm trying to give today. Throw strikes, get on. That's right. Hey, who's the manager here? Yeah. Okay, if people understand that reference. No way. One, one issue, Nate, is that, you know, hits are just stats. Walks are just stats and steals are just stats and they're not, they're not wins. And, and one thing historically speaking, no baseball game ever has been a Super Bowl win. And I think that's important as we have this discussion here. No plate of food has ever been a Super Bowl win. No hug from a child has ever been a Super Bowl win. No, no dog frolicking through a yard. That's never been a Super Bowl win. And you can, you can get rings in your life in other ways, but those rings don't really matter. The only type of ring that matters, of course, is a Super Bowl ring. Now, Patrick Holmes has three of those. It's not this ring. I thought it was this ring, except. Unfortunately not. No, the other two, there's two. Put it up. We have three total. I'm just saying that the, you know, sacred covenant of marriage, spit on that if you have a chance to get yourself a Super Bowl ring. Patrick Holmes does have three of those. In fact, the triacement in recent appearance did not seem to directly address. But our dear friend, football player, broadcasting legend, one of the members. Of those 90s cowboys. Troy, a commit. We've had our history with him, but I figured that that was largely in the rear view, but he was on pardon my take. And yesterday morning, show goes out. Social videos go out. And we're going to go ahead and play a clip here of Tragman being asked a question about the old tweet of his referring to one particular jackass who didn't think that that was going to be how his Wednesday went. Has Patrick Holmes brought up the tweet, the famous tweet because that was, that was bad Troy. But so here's what happened. I, I don't even hardly get on Twitter, but in 2019, I just happened to get on it. And I was looking at my replies and, and, and this, and, and I could, this one comes up. I don't know what this writer was. Like, why would he compare Patrick Mahomes, his stats to me? Like, I was never known as a stats guy. Why, why wouldn't he compare Mahomes's stats to Dan Marino or Joe Montana or somebody like that? So when I read it, I felt like the writer was taking a shot at me. You know, I thought, I, I said, I like this jackass. I mean, like what, what, and does yards or any of that even matter to touchdowns even matter at the end of the day for a quarterback, the only thing that matters is, is winning championships. I mean, that's all that we're ultimately judged on. So at the end of the day, the, the championships in my opinion, and I know that sounds self-serving because I was able to win three that, but that's what matters. So I thought this writer was, I, I just thought, what is the, what do numbers mean? It's, it's irrelevant. So my reply was, was really a shot back at the writer to say, hey, this is what matters. I mean, it was never a shot at Patrick Mahomes. Interesting. And I'm googling, what do numbers mean? Interesting. You know, one of you find out if touchdowns are an important part of winning football games, I'm just curious, but that's not, that's not even the thing. Something that struck me the most direct hit through the chest, Nate has fully left the screen. And frankly, I respect it. Seth, if I say anything that needs you to phase one where you can keep that move in your pocket, you're welcome to stay, but if you need to leave, I understand right here with you, buddy, you and me, you know, said, I don't get on Twitter very often, but when I do, I get in there and I make it about me. I just happened to be on Twitter in 2019 and I saw the only time I'd have, I just checked my mentions, you know, since we tagged a Troy Aikman. We didn't. Not at the Danielle who was a legacy here will never be lost as she put out the clip, then then put out the tweet that turned into this, I, I for new listeners, for new listeners, I am the jackass. Hey, man, that, that, hey, Troy, this cap, I both, I both tip my cap to you. And also, Hey, bro, that's cap, you know, that's cap. He just happened to be on Twitter and see this, a totally avoidable, unavoidable part of his life as he just managed to be on, it happened to the best. Why would he compare moans to me? I'm not a stats guy, I'm a rings guy. Why wouldn't he compare him to a better quarterback like Dan Marino or Joe Montana, or just a more statistically successful one? I, does Aikman want to compare himself to Joe Montana? I don't, that seems bad to me if I was in Troy's shoes. We can have a lot of fun about a touchdowns matter or what numbers are, or if Troy Aikman has ever been on Twitter, or if he only logs in to find something to make it about himself. The one part of this though, that does seriously bother me just as smidge, bothers the appropriately sized word, I'm not going to lose sleep over this. But the part that does just irk me just as smidge is the fact that Troy Aikman, by pure happenstance, was on Twitter.com, saw this tweet, and his thought seeing this tweet from at the time the athletic Kansas City Twitter account, his thought was, why they taking a shot at me, they're talking about two quarterbacks here. The options are either a, Patrick Mahomes is being compared to a Hall of Fame quarterback and a statistic that absolutely makes Mahomes' start mind-bogglingly insane, or, this little podcast in Kansas City is just out here to create beef with Troy Aikman. I will admit that this show has accepted the beef with Troy Aikman, frankly, I would accept a conversation with Troy Aikman, I tried to call him after 33%, had not returned my calls. I would welcome that conversation, because frankly, I think I could clear the air by just saying excuse me Troy, I just want you to know this is honest to goodness, this is the truth, I want you to know. That was going to be a Joe Nameth stat, because as I was trying to figure out who I could compare this start from Patrick Mahomes for, that well, Joe Nameth, like sort of famously, probably has the least impressive resume of a Hall of Fame quarterback, but in the era that he played in his part in that era of the NFL, he gets in because he's Joe bleeping Nameth. I've never had any problem with Joe Nameth nor Troy Aikman being in the Hall of Fame, but I think we should be legally allowed to read their stats. But otherwise it's a Nameth first, but Nameth had a better games to touchdowns ratio, he just does. That is a silly stat, but as Patrick Mahomes began his career the way that he did, the most outrageous part of Mahomes's stat line was how productive he was throwing touchdowns at the very beginning of his career. So that stat, that stat existed solely to highlight, underline, italicize, how hot out the gate Patrick Mahomes had been. He went on of course to win 33% of Aikman Super Bowls a few months later and then 100% of his Super Bowls several years later. The reason the Troy Aikman got that quote shot at me that this jackass in Aikman's opinion took a shot at him was because he was the quarterback with the least impressive stats who's in the Hall of Fame. That's why I didn't use Dan Marino because it wasn't about Dan Marino. That's why I didn't use Troy Aikman because it wasn't about Troy Aikman. It just so happened that as the research was being done, those stats stood out as a real outlier among more productive quarterbacks who are in the Hall of Fame. Also it's been five damn years. We are at 100% of the Super Bowls. And I had to explain my Aikman history to someone on Monday. On Monday, oh yeah, no, it goes back, it's this whole dumb thing, but it was five years ago so we probably have it in the rear. I would love to have a chat with Mr. Aikman about how we arrived here. I won't tweet him about it though because he won't see it because he's never on Twitter except for that one time. Seth, what are numbers? Touchdowns matter? You guys can talk about it now. I took the opportunity to do a little bit of research because I think the analysis is important here. And it turns out that touchdowns are actually, and I don't want to get too technical here, touchdowns are actually the way you score the most points in football. What? And it turns out that... Huh? Hold on, hold on. What's that? No, no, no. If you score a touchdown, you get six points and... Hold on, hold on. Before you freak out about that, you actually get six points and the opportunity to kick an extra point, seven total, which, you know, the other way is the scoring points. One's called a field goal. That's only three. Less than a... I thought that's why those uprights were at the end of the field because like soccer, you want to get the ball through the uprights, right, that's the objective of the game. Look, I was trying to explain to my daughter once why running the ball in from one yard out is worth more than twice as much as kicking a field goal from like 60 yards away. And I was actually like... I actually don't really have a good answer for that because that is the word press. She's like, "But that seems harder." I'm like, "You're not wrong, but we can't do that." So that's actually the most... The way to score the most points is touchdowns. Look, I think it's a good example. You should always just be willing to ask yourself, "Why should I care?" And Troy, who obviously has never heard of me, never will, he should just understand there's literally no reason to care what I say, what Josh says, what Nate says. You're in the Hall of Fame, man. You're supposed to be about it. You what? Because you just happen to be and it's not Josh's fault that you happen to have the least impressive statistical resume. That's why he picked you because you were at the bottom of the ladder, dude. And that doesn't mean that your career is at the bottom of the ladder. You had an exceptional career, not a tragically, a chore than we wish it could have been because of injuries, but you had an incredible career. Most football players would give anything to have your career. That's the reason. But don't ask questions, this is a good lesson here. Don't ask questions you don't want to know the answer to. Why did he choose you because you were at the bottom of the ladder, statistically? So it was utilized to demonstrate a Hall of Fame quarterback's resume against Patrick Mahomes' that was the entire point. And it's not his fault that you were at the bottom of the ladder statistically. That's not anyone's fault. Well, I mean, there's one person whose fault it might be, but I have two questions, fellas. Hit me. "Destroy acements on air and a, you know, broadcast or part of play-by-play, man. Does he know us? Does he know us by name?" He might. He certainly had a conversation with one member of this show before, I mean, I gave him a couple of years back. Rod's tattooed legend, Joe Buck, who I don't genuinely enjoy, Joe Buck knows mine. He knows your name and he knows your name. Joe Buck thought it was hilarious at the time and I would say he's still probably feels that way to the state. Now the second question is this is going to be tough. This is going to be tough because, ladies and gentlemen, I need your help. Please don't tweet, Troy Aikman. He won't see it. When did Troy record this podcast? When did these quotes, when were they questioned, utter, because I'll tell you what fellas, after Monday's game, a couple people come down the escalator, I'm already on the ground level. A couple people step out, oh, that lady looks like a makeup artist, yep, that guy looks like security, that guy looks like, perhaps a production assistant. Is that Joe Buck and Troy Aikman? Get damn like it is. Now I'm going to say something that is 100% fat because, ladies and gentlemen, I wouldn't fool you, I wouldn't. I have no need to go cap, even though I got a cap on. Okay, it's understandable. This is what happened. I'm sorry, Troy, you looked washed and tired after that game. Good Lord. You didn't want to eat that on the out area, you didn't want to be there any longer. I would just note, you know, who didn't sound washed during the broadcast, Joe Buck, because once it was third in Overland Park, and once it was third down and seven index cards, and both of those were just, I mean, 10 out of 10, no notes, it's great to have all of fame talent in the booth like that along with Troy Aikman. I, you know, there's a, such a thing is called punching up. And anytime someone is a thousand times more successful than I'll ever be a little light teasing, it's going to be okay, man. Yeah, you had a great career. It's okay, but you really shouldn't have asked why you were the one used because it was about my homes and you were at the bottom of the ladder. That really is it. Statistically speaking, career wise, you're not at the bottom of the ladder. No, I didn't. I didn't. That's zero percent of his rings and that's just a, and that's, and that's just a fact. That's just, I mean, you can look it up and that's a, it could have been John Elway. He just had better stats than you could have been Joe Montana, Dan Reno, they had better stats than you. So to really emphasize the point your name got used because you're a Hall of Fame quarterback that after, you know, a season and a half, my homes was walking down your stats. That's it. That's all I do. It was about my homes, not you. Again, dear lawyers and listeners, don't ask questions. You don't want to know the answer to like there are certain moments where I will occasionally ask my wife a variety of questions. I don't actually want to know the answer to like, what do you, how do you think Hugh Jackman looked in that scene? I don't, I don't want to know the answer to that. Make sure you talk about it with it, similarly to Trey Eggman, Seth, you sure do protest that pretty frequently. Look, I'm just seeing church. You Jackman shirtless. I don't want to know what jazz thinks of that. Hey, I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't, I've gone to the point where I don't tell Holly when job legend comes out. What a new song. Cause I want to hear that. Okay. I don't want to hear it. Now imagine now imagine if two times a year on Monday night, you had to go commentate at john legend concert. You had to go, you had to go commentate Hugh Jackman doing his thing on stage. Beautiful. That is the acumen problem. You know, you know, you know, I don't, I just can't imagine as he sense, as he sees another ballot, I just wonder where are the lyrics coming from this? This doesn't match his life and his existence and I don't know why so many people are just up in arms about his hit song after hit song after hit song. I don't, I don't know what, I don't know what the, what the, what's the big deal for? Yeah. No, I get it. I hear you. Sure, buddy. Hey guys. Do you know that Patrick Mahomes has thrown a hundred and forty one percent of Drakeman's career passing touchdown? Oh, no. 65% of the games. Oh, no. Let's take a break. Wow. I think Troy could use the one. Shop Chief's tickets and more with no fees plus save big with code KCSN at ticketsforless.com. The official ticket provider of KC Sports Network. I love a great deal as much as the next guy, but I'm not going to crawl through a bed of hot polls just to save a few bucks. It has to be easy. No boobs, no BS. 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With uber reserve good things come to those who plan ahead family vacate reserve your ride as soon as you book your flights to all the planners now you can reserve your uber ride up to 90 days in advance see uber out for details. Well Troy Eggman ever see or hear this episode of only weird games that's a coin toss and speaking of coin toss's chief's fans you we told you this on Tuesday were telling you again today because this is serious and this is a wild opportunity you could be on the field at the 50 inside GHA field for the official coin toss at a chief's home game this season. Here's what you do if you didn't hear us say it last episode hear me now and go ahead and pop this URL in to your browser put it in your phone have this URL so you do not forget in five minutes you go to chiefs dot com slash GHA and you do that right now you can enter to win a chance to be on the field for the march to the three feet plus you can score other exclusive prizes use interfer chance to win at chiefs dot com slash GHA GHA is a proud partner of the Kansas City Chiefs it's an incredible deal an incredible opportunity chiefs dot com slash GHA be out there for the coin toss man that's unbelievable let's talk about the football team that plays in Kansas City and not a quarterback who once played in Dallas although I appreciate you guys giving us the time to really really enjoy the fact that the stray eggman had talked about us more recently than we had talked about him which was an odd thing to reconcile with but let's talk about Seth what you weren't able to tell us on Tuesday already written about this in the chief of the north newsletter and then chief's fan dot sub stack dot com the chiefs did not play their most high octane game against New Orleans we didn't expect them to they are not simply free flowing high flying Tyree kill versions of your but this chief's team set by your estimation here from what I'm reading in the chief of the north newsletter seems like the chiefs may still be just just a little scary just a little frisky here the only undefeated team in the AFC the only undefeated team in the AFC and sole possession of the one seed in the AFC it's awfully early to talk about that stuff but it's still interesting and they will remain in sole possession of the one seed in the AFC this upcoming week as the rest of the AFC there's only one team in the AFC with one loss as of right now correct that being so there's there's a world where the chiefs could come out of the bi-week and lose and still be in sole possession of first place names see it's hilarious everyone looks vulnerable everyone's dropped games um you know the Ravens got beat by the chiefs in a game that really wasn't as close as it should have you know it wasn't as close as it looked in the final score the chiefs kind of let them crawl back in then the raiders beat them now they're the new unstoppable thing the the bills were unstoppable for three weeks and then suddenly they dropped to in a row and everyone's like how about oh no and you know the Texans look good I do need to see Stroud versus a really good defensive coordinator on third down not because I don't think he's a great quarterback Stroud was amazing every time I watch him like holy crap that guy's good but he is offense gets him in trouble on first and second down and then he's got a bill about by being awesome on third down the problem is if you remember what McDonald did to him in the playoffs with sim pressures and zone blitzes it was and I think that could probably happen against anyway long road to a short thought the chiefs of the best team in the AFC I don't know if it's particularly close they have yet to play even really an a-minus game the same scheme is the closest one right that's close to an a-minus game because they moved the ball really well the defense played really well but they did give up a couple of big plays which is not like them on defense um and they couldn't close in the red zone um you know that the drop did you just miss just his trap as much joy as it brought everyone watching Colin Saunders because I was watching it was like I'm pretty sure the chiefs are gonna win this game so I'm kind of happy for him but ting it man like well I didn't even get a single I'm sorry to cut you out mid and analysis I did not have a momentary knee jerk reaction of sadness once I saw the size of the man who would grab a football I am if you can tell it means the game was not that stressful because immediately I was I was that was great to cackling yeah I was just like oh that was sin that was also one hand in it you try to try corners like give me the ball give me the word and then worthy was almost a hero he tried to jab that ball out and against 99% of defensive lineman he would have jammed that ball right out really heads up play by the rook but Colin's not against Gary that's a blind man slash running back Colin Saunders carrying that thing high and hey and so that was great clearly his old teammates it was so fun watching after the game he was surrounded by like four or five his old teammates and I mean you could tell he was having fun with it here's the long and short of it chiefs struggled in the red zone so that execution stuff I mean just is what it is you got to catch that if you're juju but he did go for like a buck 30 so what are we gonna do um they are the the thing I wrote in the chief north newsletter is that something that's commonly said about football as well as actual fights is that styles make fights and it's very very very very true in the NFL is that styles make fights and that's why you know team A beat team B and team B beat team C therefore team A can beat team C is way less true in the NFL than almost anywhere else that's that's a lot of a lot of math that's a lot of math yeah algebra is evil we acknowledge it but I and I apologize for that the thing about the chiefs right now all numbers are evil as we previously established indeed the thing about the chiefs is they have played by DVOA the toughest schedule in the lead now you know the saints DVOA numbers really bumped up because of the way they incinerated their first two opponents um so I don't know how much I buy into that but the reality is they played good teams either Bengals have one of the best offenses in the league sure didn't look like that against spags and company did it um the Ravens looked terrific on offense and and maybe not quite as good on defense didn't look as terrific against spags and company in my homes the chiefs were able to move the ball that the Falcons look like a decent team the saints look like a decent team the Chargers who the bleep knows what they're doing so I don't know but Herbert's a freak of course it was like half their team so when they had no lineman and one day yeah I was correct with me correct they've largely played four out of the five teams they played are decent or better they're undefeated the thing that I like about the the chiefs right now and they've got questions to answer wide receiver and my homes needs to play better um I haven't charted his snaps against the saints I think I'm gonna find that he played a real well against the saints but he was still dropping his eyes too fast the man does not trust his protection right now and he's not just dropping he he's not just like sliding up in the pocket hood things like that he is dropping his eyes and starting to run early like he tried to do a no-scope 360 when he could have just like held still and that's not he he needs to get that under control he always has he always will that's just how it works so he will so with my homes playing for him and like a c plus level at best they're undefeated with rice going down they're undefeated yes what I love about them they can play any style of football right now Xavier worthy gives them just enough for a big player to a game and so that's one thing like statistically doesn't show up but like a 45 50 yard passenger clearance call that's one reason you want deep threats on your team yeah because those are game-changing plays too and although the funny thing is the non-called was worse than the called one I'm glad we said that because I thought and I didn't feel like tweeting it out it is when you watch an all 22 like when they called it on the broad tassels like there's no way he was catching up to that when I watched it on all 22 it looks way more like worthy would of because he was he was starting to go and the defender knew it it's like oh no I tripped it and let sex to fall on him but the one in the end zone was way more egregious right if you watch my homes the way he revs up that pass to the one that actually gets the call I was like who on earth is catching that you see that cameraman in the back pile on I'm throwing it in the third row behind him yes so they can do just enough a couple times a game and they're starting to do it from under center with a little bit of play action taking some shots they can stretch defenses a little bit because you have to pay attention to worthy because otherwise you'll be man man coverage and he'll run by someone and get a touchdown or get a deep play so they can do that a little bit they need more of it they need more they have questions in the receiver room but they can line up five wide couple those wide are going to be touched are going to be tight ends they're they can they can only line up five wide because there's not a sixth right now yeah they can they can line up right they can line up in four they can line up in 14 personnel and when they do they can line up in spread from the shotgun or they can line up all in the line of scrimmage they can play can you pay Peyton Henderson can you come back and play you have back yeah yeah who's heard of oh five formation they can they can do the the bully ball thing a really cool stat that I know our colleagues on amateur hour the og shout out to uh to to ride and dirk as ever I love them I'm lukewarm on stats but I like those guys sure um uh dirk pointed out and I thought this was just a great stat that um the chief's longest run by running back this year is 11 yards they only have three runs of 10 plus yards but they're third in the NFL and success rate because they have 11 nine yard runs 10 eight yard runs and 21 five yard runs legged pacheco was pacheco was doing the same thing he's not necessarily an explosive runs guy either maybe a little more than Kareem at this point but it's hard to say both of them are like now we'll get you five yep with good black well we'll get you five now they're not going to run away with it but they'll get you five and they'll get you five where other guys maybe couldn't they can so you can ground and pound you can throw the ball down the field you can absolutely slice up zone coverage I don't know what the saints were thinking by the way I've gone back and looked they're playing zone constantly and I'm like against Travis Kelsey and juju smoose shuster at a year of our lord 2024 you're playing zone hey coach uh yeah just one just one just one remind you some things yeah I'm on the field right now it's hard covering this man I know he 35 coach but I yeah but also I think Patrick is throwing the ball less than 10 yards to the perimeter because there's another McColl-Harmon target and also coach I gotta say hey dog can we cover the middle of the field can we just try it can we just alright you know leave juju smoose shuster wide freakin oh that was man coverage that was that was man covered wait we left you on juju and man and you fell down which that was great and also though gave an example of because they were playing I want to say single high there yes with the man across the board they're playing deep single and then and that single eye safety was like up saviour worthy's running this way I'm gonna go that's why when that's why when juju's guy fell down that's something you don't hear about often enough with the dangers of man coverage what if your guy just falls down there's no one around him I have never I should ever last time I stopped after most throw to someone that wide open like when he caught it and it zoomed in there's no one in the frame everybody in the press loss was like hey yo what you like yo what you look better hey he fell down great athletes they're just like us so they can dice up zone coverage that's one thing juju's smoose shuster honestly at least for one game looked a lot like how he looked in 2022 like we're not expecting 2019 or 2018 juju's smoose shuster but the band's 27 he's not 35 injuries have stabbed some of the explosiveness but that was true in 2022 what have you seen his knees I actually have that I keep asking they won't let me yeah and then they'll yeah they said that's creepy so he's not terribly explosive but he he knows where to go against zone coverage mohomes clearly trust him so they can they can win against zone and Andy Reed has been calling all sorts of pick plays and mesh concepts and stuff to penalize teams for playing man and a few shot plays down the field to save your worthy and mohomes scrambling those are those are their weapons against man coverage you need another receiver who can win against that they just do but so the overall point there's on offense they haven't been great but they've been and relatively efficient when like mohomes isn't throwing in an inexplicable pick or whatever they've been relatively efficient relatively consistent moving the ball better than they were last year and they can play kind of any kind of game the defense same thing they can play any kind of game they don't really have and what I wrote was they don't really have an identity and normally that would be a bad thing but they don't really have an identity because they can do it all like I one thing their identity could be you know they're very fundamentally sound overall they tackle really well they fly to the ball you turn on other games on Sundays and it's so much fun we talked about this a few weeks ago where it used to be I'd watch other teams defenses like man why aren't the Chiefs flying to the ball like that now I watch other teams I'm like man those guys do not get to the ball the way the Chiefs do and it's fun to watch but they really can they can get after the quarterback by rushing for because Chris Jones is a metahuman and that's even before a minute who's back now that's not as consistent as it should be but they figure it out you know they make it work they find those lineups Chris Jones makes he is he's the straw that stirs the drink when they're rushing for they can blitz they can run sim pressures they have all kinds of crazy stuff on the back end oh you know what we need to just rush for and we need to trust our two top corners to lock down on the perimeter they can do that because Jalen Watson is taking his step forward and it's beautiful they really can do anything against any type of team oh you're a ground and pound team well we're gonna light up Leo Chanel on the as of the same he's gonna be right on the line of scrimmage and your your tackle in tight ends can't move him it's like having Reggie Raglan there but one who's got sideline to sideline speed oh you want to spread out and pass so that means that you're spread out without a lot of protection there and Chris Jones is gonna end up one-on-one sooner or later in room that play oh and the mean to oh okay okay yeah you're gonna bring it all together but then try to pass out of that we're gonna blitz a slot corner I hate to tell you I mean they really can do it all and this year they've gotten way better against outside zone it's been it's been really cool to watch they really can this year in particular it used to be well at least we can run the ball against them and this year no one's running the ball effectively against them it's kind of fun to watch Seth I want to run something by you that we mentioned briefly on Tuesday so I know you've heard me say this already because of course you're listening to Tuesday's show already but just for anyone who might have missed it certainly present company excluded yes there's something interesting going on in the timeline of this too I just want to get your thoughts on since again Nate and I like mentioned it briefly and we can go ahead Tucker so we're finally validating the title I love thou shall not run on the chief's defense Nate can talk about it more because that's new in the athletic but this one little part of it all I think is fascinating throughout the spags era the defense in week war is significantly different less diverse and less good than the defense is in week 14 it's happened every year I don't know that it's going to happen this year not because there isn't more grounds to make up or because they're not going to going to keep improving but this is the most stable the defense has been it's also why we're not seeing Jaden Hicks right now where we might be able to get out there and play some good football sooner rather than later he hasn't been forced to though and it feels like and I don't I don't know if you've watched enough defense defensive films specifically to be able to like definitively land on this but I I feel pretty good about the theory there is no dumbing down to speed somewhat to bring somebody along for the ride Leo has a larger role he's been here warden is playing better football I don't even know if his roles really change but certainly he's been here Dana and Carloff this have certainly been here though a lot the rest of the linebackers this is your two for drew tranquil um this is obviously Nick Bolton's been running the defense through his his headset uh throughout his entire career here yes might be the last year for Justin Reed and the next year Jaden Hicks can take over more of that spot Shamari Connor is not uh uh learning on the fly young player he's now being used as a weapon when spags wants a weapon like that Jalen Watson much larger role much more important not new not a rookie not his head's not spinning at the NFL level and so to me it it feels like we are getting almost a a maximum capacity spags defense early on not that they're they're shooting every shot or pulling every lever but that there aren't growing pains right now and we've become accustomed to growing pains for good reason because spags wants to it wants to install so much in this defense over the course of the year right now it's just it just seems like smooth sailing i just i'm curious what you think of that theory this is something why you were talking about that i'm looking at something kind of interesting here so if you go you know to pro football reference it gives you the snap counts etc yeah to find a guy who wow the way i'm gonna phrase this is not gonna be great so hopefully you can rephrase it in a better way to find a guy that wasn't with the team last year you or in multiple previous years you get to a 4.14 percent of the snaps in 13 snaps and jaden hicks so hence is the highest snapping newcomer on the defense at four percent at the right yep the next the next highest is 12.1 percent that's josh williams 13 above him 14 percent is malike herring and dare naughty at 17 percent uh and it just goes up every one of these guys not in the role players have been here even the role players fau nazi johnson mike pennell leo shanell like dana tomorrow connor now we're just kind of working our way up turtian word by the way shout out to you playing 72 percent of the snaps that dude took a one-year deal he's gonna get more money next year i and he's well on his way to it and that this without a minute is there other dude in the pass rush and so everyone has been around for at least one year and that is so tomorrow connor was the he was a rookie last year he's like the relative newcomer every him and brian no cuz brian cook this is his third year yeah everyone has been here at least a couple of years and that is a huge boon in terms of allowing you to do all sorts of goofy stuff on the back end and and knowing who can do what it really is a cool thing to watch but i thought that was a cool stack cuz i was curious i was like man crazy when when was last time i saw a guy in the field that wasn't here last year and turns out it hardly ever happens it's like 20 total snaps and it won you know jadon hicks with 13 snaps which by the way i saw jadon hicks and jason reed talking like on the sideline on like one of the nfl films thing or maybe the the franchise something jadon hicks is a big dude who like he is a large safety like yeah he's noticeably bigger than reed who was a good size safety yeah so it's just interesting that but they just have all guys who have been here before and spags is just in a fever dream right now yeah i've been able to do whatever you want based in his defense around the best offensive lineman in the world and a guy who's got an argument to be the best corner in the world and i i know there's always like some underlying instinct for a lot of people to take the like absence of a positive and immediately assume it's negative i could not be i could not be less worried about jadon hicks this is a no way about him it is about every i mean there we've seen varying versions of this sometimes it's with newcomers sometimes it's one thorn hill coming back from an acl or whatever but jadon hicks is just getting the spags education right now and he's doing it without having to be in real time so the chiefs have the luxury of having their third safety b shamari corner who's probably gonna be their second safety next year and brian cook played a hundred percent of the defensive snaps like there there's no doubt about him either you can see the rotation plan there a million percent i appreciate justice read uh he's a guy that you'd love to keep around but you know age stuff whatever and i hate talking about this this early because he's a huge part of the defense and i appreciate everything he does but like him and cook play almost every snap connor's in there for probably about sixty three sixty five percent of the snaps and you see what's gonna happen next year it'll be connor and cook and hicks will rotate right in there and this this unending series dave merit please stay in kansas city please like spags ain't gonna be around forever like just stick around because they do you realize the chiefs have two corners playing in other cities at a very high level that they've lost over the course of the last four years and it hasn't affected their defense adversely and in fact they're better they they are just as and those guys haven't fallen off to your point which is also kind of another crazy part of that yeah char various ward has been terrific in san francisco lagerius need has been dominant in tennessee good on you lagerius no one earned it more new but like they they just keep reloading and it's just an astonishing thing watching how they've done it against a variety of different styles of offenses different offensive attacks different types of quarterbacks different weapons early on the year we were like oh man tight ends and then spags again you know talking about that button that bens so like joked about with run defense he just pressed the new one more from the tight ends button and suddenly tight ends have barely been a factor i don't know how he's doing it but it's incredible to watch what about on the ground nate you can read this in the athletic a right now chief's been holding opposing running back just to smidge over 50 rushing yards per game you have written about it you've taken a closer look what jumps out at you and why did you decide now is the right time to highlight chief's run defense um it was something that i was working on last week and of course uh you know even with the bi-week in the fact that they're playing albert kamara i thought okay this will be a good sample size and something to really digest depending on how the monday's game goes um and so as i wrote in the story uh first third down album kamara does amazing things just makes everybody miss it's hilarious and if you're a chief man i wonder at that moment you're like oh boy it might be one of those games because um kamara is one of the more elusive slippery running backs especially out of that you know sort of zone uh shanty hand style that obviously the center now running and then that was it it was a wrap they shut them down they started hitting him harder and i don't necessarily know why um this won't get nearly the same amount of criticism as what happened in the afc championship game but it wasn't like the same for getting blown out yet they stopped running the football because every time they handed the ball to alvin kamara you know who was there either chris jones you know or mike pannell or in one case well i don't know i i don't know the announcer i i was told whoever was doing the announcing i can't recall i was told that chris jones was being largely corralled in that game hey the okay i i'm sorry he was expecting more from chris jones if you know it is way to nine pressures i i feel bad instead of that set set set set set hold on set hold on set hold on set are you about to use a stat because what a number is even mean no i for me it was just the funniest thing because whenever you could tell they get like prepared clips to show something once they start saying something and for aceman and this has nothing to do with everything we talked about earlier for any announcer to be like wow they've large i really like what their plans been against you know jones they've really done a good job taking out of the game and i was like really because that's not what i've been remembering and then the series of plays they showed to show how they took him out of the game he won every one of those snaps every one of them one of them was a double team that he was starting to split despite a hand underneath his face and warden got a sack because of it and then the very next play yeah that's that's the one the one is hey man they're hugging him they're actually tag with him and there's a sack because that's his job his job is to occupy two so that someone wins one-on-one and congrats to tarshan warden he is now rewarded with with the sack um the other thing too is you know there were a couple of moments because again i really wasn't watching the game honest you know because of that whole death you were the only one not a royal screening that at the time including me in the rest box i don't know what i don't know where we were in both games well the chiefs did win that right south i've not yes yes i've managed it i don't look at the numbers because what do they really mean but we're obvious kid right so 26 and 13 are both numbers i so i hear a big roar from my left you know while i'm looking at my last time i'm going wait what what what happened and they're a card through an interception to play okay huh that's weird and then you'll be watching and you're like oh no it's not he's terrified yeah understandably this crystals is going to kill them you know so on one hand i think there's a clear causation that i don't know if people have mentioned yet i couldn't really get too much into the story uh from a written standpoint just because i wanted to get through not only the Saints game but obviously everybody remembers to play on fourth and inches essentially against the Falcons um everybody remembers the fact that it was Lamar Jackson it was actually not Derek Henry who was the bigger concern on the ground um on a on a dreary day in December in Foxborough the cheese made one small friends actually before the game started and we kind of knew what's going to happen it was mostly a formality but in mid December last year on a game where the only thing i can remember from a play is Clyde it was a layer being the first skill position player to high point a ball in the end zone the Chiefs also made a small transaction they elevated mike vanill practice squad to the act of squad in kids you can see it from that day forth they have been an above average run defense yeah he's played well he's 33 and healthy and only playing a handful of snaps but my god they cannot move here whether it's i'll have to remind you guys and i wanted to make this point in the story too on some snaps you're getting you know chris jones and mike panell next to one another so you have to make a decision most times the correct one is yes we have to double team chris jones because he's chris jones what you fail to realize is okay if we're giving mike panell one on one and even if it's a stretch play even if we're trying to cut him off or run away from him jones and chris jones and mike panell combined to weigh 640 pounds a lot of pounds a lot of pounds there's a there's a play where they are running a stretch to albin kamara and he gets sandwiched by 240 pounds for a two-yard game i gotta get off the field okay i gotta get off no more i should have tried just handing it to collins honors honestly that might not have been a bad strategy when you think about it so mike panell since mike panell's been elevated that day i guess the new england patriots they've only given up one running back 100 yards or more and guess what fellas that was the last game the chief lost on christmas day to the lost Vegas raiders they have not lost another game because a running back hasn't had the same impact from a production standpoint so if you remove that and you know chris jones is going to give you a certain level of pressure quarterback it's sacks if you know there's crazy blitz is coming if you know as josh so eloquently put last episode we forgot chris alave was on the field cuz from mcduff he's there there's not a lot of holes so then the question becomes okay we're gonna get our playmakers the ball in space or we're gonna ask our running backs to run to the perimeter so that we can have one on ones with smaller bodies so that maybe we can have a mistackle or two it kind of blew my mind that according to pro football focus they've only had 13 mistackles when a running back has ran with the ball on a design run 13 they they are not missing tackles it's layered it happened you know and we'll see because that's something that but i mean you can see it's a point of it's a point of pride and you talk about like trying to get things to the boundary whether it's to running back a receiver the the thing is watson and mcduffy both tackle extremely well um josh williams is not out of nearly as big a role this year he but he's very physical johnson's very physical i am cook read connor all tackle very well connor shout out to to charmer eight of eight of those are our charmerry conners yes eight of those are charmerry connor in the first two weeks and he's arrived more to control because man he man he hits hard just during this old dude i am not just out of criticism shamari connor i appreciate how little he respects his own body yeah they look legitimately miserable to play because there's just a lot of weak points to attack and they have the personnel to if they see a team kind of trying to take advantage of certain things they really can shore that up they can make you as though you know the bellichik then they can make you play left-handed they can take away what you do well and then you got to try to do the other thing and they can just morph into that too it really is a cool thing to watch and it's built around two legitimately elite elite elite elite elite players and then a bunch of multiple really good players and then a bunch of decent players like there's really there's not a bad guy out there on the chief's defense on a snap-by-snap basis there's not a single player like the closest you can get well no i'm not saying that the closest you can get a situational stuff say you know of course leo shanel to be in coverage you have not in the red zone no say those things like that say his name for today or sneak bolt into the boundary in space he ain't that's the best out on the roster right now set say his name come on he's in the ring of otter for a number of reasons say his name i also don't know the name the game they need so sorry i i'm late to i'm sorry you lost it hey hey hey hey he is there's no greater variance i will never it ain't gonna never change okay as well as add a dance orance in the defensive backfield thank you sorry it's a minute thank you said his name's in the ring of honor and i was like I am sorry hey hey hey you may not see it but he up here okay no one no one has given us more with last only weird gaslight this thing the tree what is it is it a trick or is it a tree i don't know which one's a yeah it was the good thing which was the bad thing you don't know either that's the boy he could do anything hey you need a fumble in a playoff game against bill o' brian that's a tree kids or was it a trick hey do you need me to win step on these wide open tricks on you buddy trick it really is the remarkable spot and as you alluded to said there are two elite players on this defense and then varying degrees of guys there is an elite defensive coordinator there is an elite defensive backs coach you you might if you want to talk about joe colin or whatever that's fine i do not terrific job but i can also also there's not a shot of joe colin two defense events have not taken a positive step this year i don't know but there's one warden has not the point the point being two elite players two elite coaches and do you hit with no weaknesses and i i just i i believed in this iteration of the chief's defense being good i was not going to hold them to the standard of great through the first five weeks and here we are uh we are at an hour we have playoff baseball in about an hour um and i think what we should do i have a lot of why to receive your things set is working on a lot of why to receive your things i'm guessing nay it's going to be spent in some bi-week weekend having some chats about some why to receive your things let's go ahead and just and unless another all of them quarterback calls one of us a mean word that i think we should begin tuesday's show the real dive into the wide receiver situation because there's there's still interesting stuff we haven't gotten through all the details of of the saints game which is that they activated five receivers and only asked three to play wide receiver um and the uh the future of that position right now is very very uncertain so seth you're gonna have something in the newsletter about that within before tuesday right is that the plan that is the rough plan love a rough plan concept of a plan from seth uh and then uh nate i i guess you can go ahead and take us you take us out of this show i don't think this needs to be about uh hall of n quarterback i think most probably needs to be about game four of a uh of a must-win game a Kaufman i imagine that's what we're heading right now imagine we're going boys in blue all right now last time i did this anything more not saying i'm superstitious or anything just uh odd incidents now ladies at everybody taking me he said a prayer we win game two all right now our backs are against the wall okay i just want to remind people that you know you're supposed to remember that sports gives you multiple emotions almost at the same time a lot of times and i know the standings suggest that the Yankees are a better team and they will have a chance to prove that tonight at Kaufman stadium or perhaps on saturday in game five okay everybody knows that you look those guys in the eye today tonight and you say this is it it's supposed to be hard if it wasn't hard everyone would do it it's the hard that makes it great well let's get so close to be hard okay you're playing the new york Yankees bob konstiss is making it hard though not to mean that i just are making it hard it's supposed to be hard okay trust yourselves all right baseball's inside you can't deny that warm but lights you up so it lights you up get hard you can tell the difference between those who have seen a league of their own and those who are real curious about why this became some kind of verbal only fans.
