Dieter's Riding Solo and Telling State Secrets

[00:00:00] Foreigner right here. Hutch elsewhere. He's on a fact finding mission, but we're gonna talk. I guess. Moose is here. Moose, you want to say hi? [00:00:16] Now he wants to lay on the ground and complain because he hasn't gotten a walk yet. We'll do that right after the show. We'll see how long this bad boy goes. [00:00:26] Not the normal setup without Jake here. Bring insanity and clarity to all who ask of it. But we could try out a little something. We'll see how many people jump in. It might not be a well attended midday stream. Can't blame anybody. A lot of stuff going on. You're coming off a buy. You let your guard down for a little bit. For being honest, you stop taking 49ers football in at the quantities you were taking it in before. [00:00:51] It's hard to ramp it back up. It's hard to ramp it back up. I'll. I'll be the first to admit it's been hard to ramp back up. Some of this tape watching of the Tennessee Titans. [00:01:00] Ooh, I was forcing my way through it. Forcing my way through it. And let me, let me just give you the lowdown on, on what I saw. Now let's be, let's, let's lay the groundwork here. Niners coming off a buy. We've talked a lot and we will continue to talk about the Niners and the possibility of a one seed going into these final four games. NFC west is a possibility. The one seed is a possibility. [00:01:25] Not making the playoffs is technically a possibility, but I don't think we're going to be living in that universe. And frankly, I think that the 49ers by dinner time on Sunday could be effectively locked into a playoff spot. So that's what's on the line here. It's a 12 and a half point spread for the 49ers at home and then 44 and a half over under. [00:01:48] I won't lie, having watched the last three and a half Titans games, I kind of get it. But this feels disrespectful to Tennessee. [00:01:58] It really does. I like a lot of what Tennessee has now. I hate a lot of what Tennessee has going on. [00:02:03] But with Brian Callahan no longer running the show, it looks like they know how to play football, which is a really dramatic turn from the start of the season. [00:02:13] And there are some players on this team now. So let me just give you the quick lowdown on the offense. I think Cam Ward sees it. I think Cam Ward has some real moxie to him. I think Cam Ward Has a chance to be a really, really good quarterback in this league and he'll give you flashes of that in this game. Do not underestimate his ability to run the ball. [00:02:34] They had a pretty nice offensive performance coming off of the heels of the 49ers win in Cleveland. The Titans went to Cleveland, snow flurries, all that jazz. They put some points on the board now and I will say that two of those came off of something we talked about a lot in the build up to the Cleveland game for the 49ers, which was the read option that's there and that's something that can definitely get the 49ers in this game. They scored two touchdowns off of Reed option. But this is a really good offensive line for the the Tennessee Titans. They got Latham, they got score, they got some Zeitlers in there. They got some really good offensive linemen. And the Niners defensive line, which has four fewer sacks than Miles Garrett, has its work cut out for him in this game. Because not only can Cam Ward run it a little bit, I'm not telling you he's Lamar Jackson or anything, but he can definitely pick up yards. He's waking. I think he's in the purdy range of scramble ability. Is that a word? Did I just make that up? Yeah, he's in that purdy range where he'll get you now. And they can run some read option stuff when the moment calls for it. More than the Niners certainly did when they played the Browns though they did get a touchdown on a read option call, as we somewhat predicted. Somewhat. We'll take half credit for that one here on the show. [00:03:47] I really like Cam Ward. I really like their offensive line. I think Tony Pollard is just fine. Chiga Kwanwu is a pretty good tight end. They're using a lot of gunner helm lately and you might remember gunner helm from the University of Texas. He tested horrifically. [00:04:02] But don't get it twisted. This guy can play a little bit of football now. He's done some really nice stuff in the run game as a block blocker. He's good in the flat. They're going to use a lot of two tight end sets in this game. A lot of similarities to to what they do did with the Cleveland Browns, not the Titans. I'm talking about what the Browns did offensively with those two tight end sets. Moving guys around sort of quasi jumbo. They also have Eric IO Manor from Stanford and they line him up as sort of a third tight end at times because they like to run drag routes with him over the middle and he's got the kind of frame where he can kind of hold up in that traffic. So there's something there. Here's the issue with the Titans offense. [00:04:42] Their wide receivers suck. [00:04:46] They are awful. [00:04:48] I think Van Jefferson is a nice guy and a serviceable fourth or fifth wide receiver. He knows how to block, he knows how to run the routes. This dude cannot get open. He's their number one receiver. They run the same play to DK on the goal line anytime they get a chance which is just a little drag route out to the flat and if that doesn't work, good luck. And then you get IO Manor who's a big body but has no traits to beat anybody one on one. He's winning with sort of hesitation moves and hopefully the defense takes their eye off him for a second then he'll take advantage. He's getting by on on cunning and smarts and he's a lot closer to modern day Cooper cup than anything that's actually going to help you win a game in the year 2025. I mean it is, it is a bog standard average offense until you get to the wide receivers which are unquestionably the worst in the league that I've seen so far this year. And because of that this offense just gets dragged down. It is just pulled down to the bottom. It's actually somewhat enlightening for me because I haven't seen anything like this in, in quite a while where everything else seems like it actually does pretty well. But one position group is so bad and it's not an offensive line that it just creates a bad offense and it's. This is why I was so impressed with Ward. I mean he's working out there with nothing. It's reminiscent of Brock Purdy 2024 season nothing where guys couldn't separate and he's having to force it into things and he's having to buy a lot of time and he's a rookie and he's gotten so much better. I tossed on weeks one and two just to kind of get give myself a comparison and first off Brian Callahan should be tried for war crimes. Second, he has gotten so much better and this is why I'm a believer in we kind of know what we have with the quarterback by the time you get to Thanksgiving for Cam Ward from from week one to now it's night and day and I'm buying the Titan stock that, that I wanted to get rid of at absolute rock bottom prices early this season until they fired Callahan like this is why I've been kind of a Titans champion for the last two years on this show and maybe even beyond that. It's certainly not because I enjoy the Nashville nightlife. What do I want to run into a million bachelorette parties with the worst people you ever met? Hard pass. Though I do think third man record is pretty awesome spot regardless. By the way, do they have any hot chicken? Is anyone. What would that economy in Nashville do if they didn't have hot chicken? My goodness, we get it. You guys like to put so much spice that it's not even flavorful. But I digress. I would not underestimate this Titans offense in their ability to move the ball so long. [00:07:35] And that is on the strict caveat that the Niner secondary doesn't have a good day. [00:07:40] It's hard to not have a good day against the Tennessee Titans, but it's on that caveat. And don't underestimate Cam Ward's ability to make something happen here. I'm really impressed by him and I think they're going to get a couple touchdowns in this game. Because while they are not a team that is specifically built to attack the 49ers in the area where I feel they're most susceptible right now, which is over the top, which I think we've seen. I think if you've been watching all the games you've seen, you can get them over the top. It's just that the quarterbacks they've been facing can't get over the top. [00:08:10] Cam Ward can get it over the top. I don't know if the receivers can separate there, but this guy's a shot taker. Now. This guy does not care if these guys have separated. He has figured out that if he waits for someone to get open, he ain't going to throw the ball and he can create time in the pocket. He can really do something here. I don't think it's enough for them to put up the kind of offense offensive points that they're going to need to win this game. [00:08:33] But there's something there. There's something there now. And I think if they can get a really good wide receiver, I can only imagine what would have happened if Calvin Ridley was anything like the prior versions of Calvin Ridley we had in the NFL. Like if they, if they can get a wide receiver here, they got something to be average, a little bit better than average and the sky being the limit moving forward because again, an offensive line that's going to protect. That's bad news for 49ers defense that can't get home. They got a run game that's sound but not terribly explosive. Again, people will point to the Cleveland game saying, oh, they ripped off two big runs. Well, they ripped them off in read option. That's like the one way you can get the Browns. The 49ers defense can't really sell out the way that the Browns defense can to get sacks. So I don't think they're susceptible to a read option. I think we've seen that over the course of the last few weeks, so I'm not as concerned about that. And I think Pollard is just fine. He's good. He's fine. He'll get his. I don't think he has a chance to take over this game even with a good offensive line. [00:09:38] I think, you know, with a defense right now for the 49ers that is clearly just getting by on guile and toughness and the power of friendship and smoke and mirrors, frankly, or Robert Sal is having to come up with something new and exotic and strange and bespoke. And every week, that bye week, plus a clear deficiency like unquestionable deficiency should put the 49ers in a position to hold these guys under 28 points. And I think that it could easily be in that 12, 13, 14 point range. [00:10:12] It just depends. If they have a bad day, it's not going to be a catastrophic day. And if they have a good day, it could be a catastrophic day for the Titans offense. [00:10:21] Again, that rest is huge and I would imagine we're going to get a clunky first quarter out of that. But if you're able to just, you know, kind of hold the line, don't do anything too crazy, don't let this thing get away from you early, they might be down 7 nothing. I wouldn't panic at that point, but I do think that the Niners will ramp it up and feel better about it and they're going to throw some stuff Cam Ward's way that he doesn't handle very well. I'll be specific. That means a gap pressure. [00:10:46] Cam Ward really does not like AAP pressure. He's so good at handling defensive ends, crashing in from the side. He has a feel for that. Like, I don't know if there's a rookie quarterback that I've seen recently that has a feel for the pass rush on the, on the edge like Cam Ward does. He knows exactly how to operate on that. Step up in the pocket, cut through the pocket. He's really, really good at that. You bring Guys up the middle now. And he's like, I got to get rid of this thing. I. And he's a big boy. He's six, two. [00:11:16] I think he is. He's. He looks a lot taller than I. I think that a lot of people think. I think he put on weight, specifically coming out of Miami and certainly going from wazoo where I first watched him to Miami. He's put on weight. He's a thick boy now. He is. [00:11:34] I. I'm really bullish about Cam Ward, but agat pressure, as with most quarterbacks, maybe as with Brock Purdy, there's a lot of similarities here with Brock Purdy and Cam Ward. [00:11:45] He doesn't, he doesn't like it. He wants to get rid of the ball. And that's where he really makes his mistakes. He's a shot taker. Of course there's going to be mistakes on that. Those are 50, 50 balls that his wide receivers are never going to get the 50 of. But he's got to do stuff like that. Those are heirs of commission, the heirs of omission or the just the ones that leave you scratching your head a little bit are guy coming up the middle, Ward saying, ah, that's where I escape from. I escape up the middle, so I better get rid of this. And he throws it right to a linebacker. I got four or five cut ups of exactly that. And I would imagine that Robert Salah has seen that. I would imagine that Robert Salah will scheme that. So expect a gap pressure. Expect the Niner secondary to be bend but don't break because they're going to have to dare. They're going to get some yards. They're going to have to dare Tennessee's defense or offense to just do it like 12 times in a row. And I'm really interested to see what the pass rush can do. If in fact, you know, they're bringing that a gap pressure, you're getting that extra guy a little bit more pressure on the defensive secondary. [00:12:47] But I'm very interested to see what the pass rush can do here because if they can get anything, they're going to win this game by more than 12 and a half. But if that pass rush isn't there now we're getting into, oh man, they might cover territory or, oh man, this game is closer than it should be territory and should be meaning like we're in the fourth quarter and this thing is still in the balance. So a lot of respect for Cam Ward, a lot of respect for the offensive line. I like the tight ends. I Like the running back just fine. It's these wide receivers. And if the, the, the ultimate concern is if we get into halftime and the Titans wide receivers look like they're having a good game, that's a red alert. Let's flip it to the other side. [00:13:32] This is technically a chaos defense. [00:13:35] You, you, if you're new, this is a term that Jake and I like to use to describe sort of the Mike McDonald, Brian Flores School of positionless motion defenses. This is theoretically a chaos defense. It's Denard Wilson, he ran the rate. You know, he was with the Ravens. He runs a Raven style defense. He was a, he was an assistant for Mike McDonald. [00:14:00] It is not that at all. What it is is a two man defense and it's sweat and Simmons in the middle. That is. And this is again kind of the frustration with the Tennessee Titans when you watch them from a neutral perspective. That is, if it's not number one. [00:14:18] I'm having a hard time thinking that's the best defensive tackle combo in football. [00:14:24] Simmons is unbelievable as a pass rusher against the run. He is the most underrated player in the game. He's going to get his, he's going to get his. I know a lot of people are going to be out here saying, oh, Brendel's about to get worked. He might actually. [00:14:41] I think that Brendel's played really well as of late. I think that all of this early season anchoring. How about I do an aside here real fast? [00:14:50] I was talking to my man Ethan Stress, and he was wondering why it is that the national media hasn't caught on to the fact that the 49ers are almost certain to make the playoffs and have a really great offense and look like a team that could very well be dangerous come playoff time. And my theory on this as someone who's worked in national media is pretty straightforward. [00:15:18] National media doesn't put in the time, effort or frank frankly concern to anything. But maybe one or two teams, they don't watch any of the games. [00:15:27] That again, general national media, the talking heads on ESPN, if you are one of the seven people that watch FS1, you know what I'm talking about. [00:15:39] Sports center, right? Like why don't they, why aren't they talking about the Niners? Why aren't they recognizing that the Niners are doing something pretty impressive, making me look like an asshole every day. [00:15:50] And it's simply because they don't have to. [00:15:55] And everybody in national media in football, and this is a wild thing, locks in their opinions after about six, seven, eight weeks, they lock them in. [00:16:05] Because that's right around the time that these generalists, and I consider myself a generalist in my day job. But here it's, it's all about getting nitty gritty. And I think that in this world you should be able to be nitty gritty on everything you cover. But that's just me being a loser. [00:16:22] They need to start getting NBA takes out. They need to start talking about the College Football Playoff baseball World Series. The only time that the national media ever talks about baseball is during the World Series. That all happens right around week six, seven, eight. Right? That is just the absolute raging hot fire of sports. That's, that's the epicenter of we got a lot going on. [00:16:47] And so whatever had been learned to that point gets locked in until Thanksgiving. [00:16:55] And then the things. So you get like a month and a half of no new opinions unless it's like the Cowboys and you have a reason to talk about something because it's hot and buzzy and it's interesting. The Niners have not been hot or buzzy or interesting during that period of time. They are to us because we're watching them and, you know, diving into them week in and week out. But on a national level, no one's had to consider the San Francisco 49ers, even though what they're doing is pretty incredible during that period of time. Then they come back for Thanksgiving. [00:17:26] All right. And by the way, I would argue that the Monday Night Football game against the Panthers was right on the fringe of, hey, maybe we could start making an opinion about it because that's a national TV game. National media people only watch the national TV games. They might have a quad box going on on Sunday ticket. More likely they have red zone happening on the 10am Pacific window. Then they'll watch the five box game of the week or the CBS game of the week, whichever one's better. Sometimes slipping between the two of them. But that second window is typically a one, one game on the TV sort of a thing. Then they watch Sunday Night Football. [00:18:04] You'll notice every morning, every Monday morning, it's Sunday Night Football, whatever the Fox game was. And then maybe either the Chiefs or the Bills or the, you know, the Cowboys, if they weren't the Sunday game of the game. That's all they talk about. They never go into, you know, the Browns and the 49ers at 10am on Nov. 30. They don't talk about it. They don't talk about when the Niners Play the Cardinals on November 16th or that game against the Giants, and they're sure as hell not talking about the Houston Texans and whatever the hell that game was. [00:18:33] So no new opinions get formed. And then they all start coming back because you get three national TV games on Thanksgiving, one national TV game on Black Friday, and then Sunday is a tighter slate. [00:18:49] So it's mostly national TV games where, you know, everybody gets more. I mean, the early window, Fox, CBS was a little bit split up, and this was a weird one, in fact. [00:18:59] But even then, there's really one game that's getting disseminated across the country to most people. There's one obvious game that everyone wants to watch on either of those networks. There's one obvious game, and this was only the Fox game this past week, which was Bears and Packers. Then you get Sunday Night Football. Then you get Monday Night Football. That's when new opinions start to get formed. And the Niners were sitting at home. So no one's caught in. Caught on to this yet. No one's caught on to the fact that the 49ers are sitting here and, yeah, they go, oh, wow, they're the seventh seed. That's really impressive. The last time they thought about the 49ers was maybe. [00:19:33] Maybe the first half of Monday Night Football. You'll also notice in national TV that not a lot of people talk about the second half of Monday Night Football. Huh. Wonder if it's just because everyone lives on the east coast. 50% of the country lives on the east coast and goes to bed. So the Niners are winning at halftime, but Brock Purdy has three horrific interceptions. Okay, store that in the bank. I don't need to worry about the San Francisco 49ers. And then you get the Brock Purdy of it all, which just brings back all of these priors that everyone wants to talk about ad nauseam, as if nothing has ever changed with Brock Purdy before that. The last time that anyone had formed an opinion on the 49ers was probably the Monday Night Football game. This is national. Was probably the Monday Night Football game against the Falcons. [00:20:15] And that was a sicko classic because it was boring as hell for a casual fan. And me and Jake are over here just buzzing, oh, my God, Are you seeing this? Are you seeing this? Because the coolest thing that happened in that game is the lamest thing to somebody in the national media, which is, wow, they went with a lot of gap scheme in this game. Oh, man, you guys wanted. Look at all this gap stuff. Look at. Oh, There's a trap block. I mean, come on. They're not talking about that on first take. They're not doing that. That's why you come here. And even then we should probably talk a little bit less about it because we want to have more people. So I will say, I will say that no one has really taken note of this 49ers situation and what is coming down the pipeline. They're going to be playoff bound come Sunday evening. Sun goes down Sunday. The Niners should, if they are in fact the team that takes care of business, as they have been for the last three games they've played, they should be in the playoffs with all reasonable certainty. And then they get the Colts. And I don't actually, I had a couple texts today. I don't think it'll be Philip Rivers for that game on December 22nd. I think Philip Rivers is sort of a one week stop gap for them and they think Riley Leonard will be back for that Monday Night Football game. But I'd expect bad quarterback play from a Colts team that is just falling apart and they're feeling it over there in Indianapolis that it's falling apart. Then you get the Bears. Now you'll notice that a lot of people are talking about Caleb Williams and, oh, I think Caleb Williams is doing a hell of a lot better. This is my other issue with the national media. They're watching the game, but they're not watching the All 22. You watch the All 22 as I, a depraved man in my 30s, did, and he doesn't see the field. [00:21:59] And Jeff Hathley had him in prison. A mental prison, but prison nevertheless. [00:22:04] I'm not buying Caleb Fields. I do think that the Bears have the potential to put up some serious points, but I don't trust Caleb Fields whatsoever. In a game like Sunday night football week 17, where there's a lot on the line between two well recorded teams, one of which actually has the chance to be really good. The Bears don't have a better defense than the 49ers right now, and the 49ers defense right now is susceptible. They don't. They just straight up don't. And their offense is still very much a work in progress. And I'm starting to wonder if 18 might be the thing holding it back. [00:22:40] Week 18 with the Seahawks is an entirely different kettle of fish. We'll see what that all brings in. But I would imagine this is just my guess. This is just me having worked in this space, tried to separate myself in this space and understood that if you were two weeks ahead, you were way ahead of everybody else when it came to, you know, sooth saying or whatever. I would imagine that come December 23rd, a lot of people are going to be talking about the 49ers as are they the hottest team in the NFL. They're going to want to try to tap into this fan base, which is way bigger than they it ever gets credit for. And I'm not glazing anybody here. I'm strictly saying that the 49ers fan base runs deep and it is passionate and it is woefully underserved. I don't think locally, but certainly nationally. If you want people to talk about your team, good or bad, on the national level, the 49ers become an afterthought unless it is right up in your face. And I think that after Monday Night Football it will be right up in their face. Let's talk about the 49ers offense. Let me get back. Sorry. That was a wonderful and ridiculous aside and I probably scared away every single one of the viewers. But I did want to kind of get that off my chest. I had a much longer conversation, if you can even imagine that to be possible, with Ethan on the subject. [00:23:56] 49ers offense against this Titans defense. It's supposed to be a chaos defense. It's supposed to be moving parts coming from every which direction. You're having to guess last second. [00:24:07] One thing I noticed when I when I was watching the Titans defense over the last couple of weeks, a Titans defense that made Shador Sanders look really, really good. [00:24:15] So that might be the end of the need for analysis there. [00:24:20] They talk a lot. They do a lot of waving. [00:24:25] I don't see them ever actually changing the play. It doesn't seem as if they're communicating anything in particular. It seems like all the chaos is on their side. It's never manifesting towards the offense and because they have really questionable edges. And I think their secondary is woeful, just woeful. Like their best secondary player is Xavier Woods. I don't think Xavier woods is very good as a free safety. I know Amani Armani Hooker has been over the hill for quite a minute now. They're running in a bunch of different dudes at corner because everyone they've played there has just been dog. [00:25:03] I don't there's no nice way to. But their corners suck and their linebackers are really fast, which could be cool if they knew what they were doing. So again, it feels like all the chaos is on Their side, they don't have the players to run the kind of defense that they want to run, yet they're still running that kind of defense. And because they have Simmons and Sweat up the middle, they feel like, hey, maybe this is the week where we get away with it. And it's not. It just isn't. [00:25:33] I'll put the gauntlet down here. If the Niners can't get four or five touchdowns against this Titans defense, we got to have some serious conversations about if this 49ers offense is as good as some of the numbers indicate they are. And as, you know, maybe we thought they could be, right. We keep talking about the potential of them. I don't think it really show. I mean, it showed up to a degree. I don't know. Depends on how you feel about it. You can throw it into the comments. Like, did you feel like they had a great offensive game against the Browns? I thought they had a really good one. [00:26:02] I don't know if it was great. I feel like there's a separation there where they didn't feel inevitable against the Browns. And that's a credit to the Browns, without question. They certainly weren't great against the Carolina Panthers. [00:26:13] They were damn good. [00:26:16] Never felt like, yeah, maybe Cardinals, maybe Cardinals was a great offensive game, but that was the Cardinals, and I guess this will be the Titans. [00:26:27] But it would be nice if the 49ers could do what they did against the Cardinals in this game where it's just immediate and obvious and just, hey, you guys can't play with us. You can't. What are we doing out here, you know, get out of here, little kid. You can't play at this level. And that's. [00:26:43] That's the formula. I think that the Niners can win this game in a bunch of different ways. Right? There's not one script that's not one script that can. That can win this game for the night. They don't have to do X, Y and Z. If they fall behind early, they can win just fine. If they get up big, they could let it up a little bit and it can get a little hairy towards the end. They could also run away with the whole damn thing and they could be so damn rusty that, hey, it just never gets going on offense and Cam Ward finds those two touchdowns and. And suddenly, oh, man, these field goals didn't stack up the way we thought they would. [00:27:15] I'd venture to say that the Niners are able to put up 30, 35 points in this game just because again, this secondary is Woeful. Brock should be healthy. Brock, I think, really took to heart following the Carolina game. We saw this in the second half, and I thought it translated into the game against the Browns. Like, hey, you know, maybe we pair it back. Maybe we handle the foundation of the offense, and then if we get a chance, we can ramp it up. I think this is the week where he can ramp it up. I think they come in early. Long, sustained drives, running Christian McCaffrey, even if it ain't working. Just sort of classic 49ers December, January football. And then as the game goes along, Brock can get to a point of comfortability that I don't think showed up in Cleveland because that defense is too good. And I know wasn't there against Carolina because he had to pair that thing back. He was comfortable to start, he stayed comfortable. And then it was three interceptions, and it's like, okay, we're done with you being comfortable. How about you just run the damn offense? How about you take some Mac Jones pills and just do the damn thing? And if you need to scramble once or twice, we'll take that as the bonus. Compared to number 10, this is the kind of game where Brock can ease into it slow and steady, and he could just stay at that pace the entire game and they should win. Or, hey, you guys want to see something cool? And they can bust that out and we'll see what happens when they do that, because there's no guarantee that that works out because of Brock. But against this defense, you should have those opportunities for big play gains. Also, special teams is going to be a big, big advantage with. [00:28:47] With the 49ers in this one, which is just an absolutely crazy, crazy statement. All right, I've rambled for 28 minutes. I now have a real issue in having to go back through this entire chat and answer some questions. So I am going to try to do that right now. I will not necessarily filibuster, but, yeah, we're gonna do our best here. Okay. [00:29:14] Thomas Boyles. Do we actually know what injuries have been keeping yet or out at this point, or the organization just hopeful he didn't have a spine collapse and play 20 snaps, so they kept him out of everything. It. Yeah, it's a back thing and it's a hamstring thing. Those two things are typically tied. [00:29:28] It's a lot. He's just. He's just a tightly tight, tightly wound machine. He's an Italian sports car. [00:29:36] You know, sometimes you just need a Ford F150. And I'm talking about the Ones that didn't have all the electronics in them. Maybe a, maybe a first edition Toyota Tundra is really what you're looking for. Just. It'll run forever. Give me 300,000 miles. Got to change out a couple of belts every now and again, but nothing crazy. So I. I Yetor could be a huge advantage for this team. [00:29:58] But I kind of view yet or gross mottos this is. This might sound blasphemous. I view Yetor Gross Matos as the Ben Bartch of the defensive line. When Ben Bartch is in there, what he can provide is something that no other Niners guard can really provide. Like he had a combo block. I brought this up a couple of times. I'm probably a broken record here. He had a combo block against the Browns where he went 1, 2 and put both of them on their asses against the Browns. And I'm like, hell yeah. This is what I. This is the football that I crave. And you know, he's still going to get caught every now and again in pass pro, but as a run blocker, man, he, he was awesome. You also only get like 15 to 20 snaps of him before he gets injured again. He. He just ain't built for it is. [00:30:42] I don't know if it's a careful Icarus situation or whatever, but the dude just cannot stay healthy. He's on IR again. Yet her gross Madis is like that. When he's out there, you push him onto the interior on a third down, you're like, oh yeah, this is what I'm talking about. But it's just finicky and fragile. So I don't know. I have no idea. I wouldn't take yet to or gross Matos for granted at any point. I think anyone who would doesn't know the history of yet or gross mottos. I don't think yet to a gross Motos is long for this team. In fact, I was talking to somebody about this is a couple of weeks ago. [00:31:17] I was surprised that the Niners kept yet tor Gross Motos in their purge this past summer because I. I thought that even. Even though the contract was a little bit tricky, I thought that that was one of those things where it's, you know, kind of like the. [00:31:31] Forgive me, the. The old ass defensive end that they had last year, Leonard Floyd. I thought it'd be like Leonard Floyd, where it's like, does it make any sense to get rid of him? No, but you'll save a bunch of cash. [00:31:43] I thought that they would do that with yet to A gross mahados. Because, like, what would. [00:31:46] What was the point of keeping him? I think Salah really liked the idea of gross mottos and Mikel Williams sliding into the interior kind of that NASCAR package from back in 2019. [00:31:59] And both of those guys being just kind of game changing. Interior pass rushers, unclear passing downs. You don't have Mikel anymore, obviously. [00:32:08] By the way, I got a comp for you on Mikel having just run some numbers to kind of understand where we were when it was all said and done. How about a Kyle Van Noy? [00:32:17] How about a Kyle Van Noy for a Mikel Williams? Maybe that doesn't sound awesome to you, but Kyle Van Noy. What year is this for him now? 32nd in the league. So if that's our baseline for Mikel Williams is Kyle Van Noy. Because, like, frankly, they're doing the same stuff as prime Kyle Van Noy and Mikel Williams. They're just there, they're winning football players. [00:32:40] And then obviously the ceiling much, much higher for someone who just turned 21. But again, if it never goes any higher, you just have Kyle Van Noy, like, yeah, I'll take that. I know that. Oh, he was 11th. Like, look at all the busts. And then imagine if you just could just take a Kyle Van Noy. Wouldn't you take that every time? I know I sure as hell would. But maybe I'm. [00:32:58] It's not flashy or sexy or fun, so maybe that's. That's why I would do it. And everyone else thinks I'm an idiot. [00:33:05] I. I just would. I wouldn't bet on yet. To her. I think that he could be a big boost. I think having that interior pass rush presence could be absolutely huge for this Niners team that again has four fewer sacks than just Miles Garrett this year, which I'm not an expert. That doesn't seem great. [00:33:23] He might be able to help with that. You're relying on CLE Ferrell just trying real hard right now to. To get sacks. That's not a formula for success come playoff time. And it might not be a formula for success if you want to have a good seed in the playoffs. And it's just putting more and more on Robert Salah's plate. And at a certain point, he might run out of tricks. He might just run out of tricks. So would love to see yet your gross motos. [00:33:50] I think he could be a big boost, but if I see him, I'm just going to be holding my breath, expecting, expecting that he's here for Maybe a good time, but certainly not for a long time. Oh yeah. And then there's also knee injury as Cowacheo brings up. Thank you. [00:34:10] I just sugarnot. I thought war would be great. He stinks on ice. [00:34:16] You should. Well, you know what? You'll find out Sunday. [00:34:20] You'll find out Sunday. Cam Ward's pretty fucking awesome. He's. [00:34:25] The Titans nailed that pick. [00:34:28] They did. He's really good. He's really good. He has no wide receiver help. And we saw this with Brock last year. I guess there are some people out there who think that Brock isn't any good because they watched 24 season and thought, oh, we can't elevate these guys. Well, some guys can't be elevated. Some guys are worse than league average. You know, some guys just cannot separate. And he's got. Van Jefferson's his 1 receiver. [00:34:54] What if the Niner. If people think Niners have a bad receiving core, where would Van Jefferson fit in there? [00:35:00] I mean, he has a. A true sacrificial X as his number one target. Like I'm not. [00:35:09] You'll find out on Sunday. I think Cam Ward looks really, really good. I think he's really dangerous. And I think that folks who think actually he sucks are much like the national media and haven't checked in since before Halloween because you watch him lately and he's. [00:35:26] He's good. He's good. [00:35:30] Yeah. Anthony Big Tone, they do have a lot of calf space. It'll be interesting to see what they do. There is a. [00:35:37] There's an interesting school of thought that was brought up to me pretty recently, which is, you know, everyone wants to talk about maximizing the rookie quarterback contract, but in fact, maybe we're viewing it all wrong and it's. It only ca. It only this conversation I had maybe like six, eight weeks ago and it was just a thought experiment from somebody who has interesting thought experiments. And in that, you know, everyone tells, oh, you got to take advantage, you got the rookie quarterback, all this stuff. Well then it kind of all flattens out, right? Like if Everybody has a 40, $50 million quarterback once they're no longer a rookie. And by the way, like, rookie first round quarterbacks ain't exactly super cheap. [00:36:22] It's the most important position in football. So everyone just gets paid. Whereas with wide receiver there are so many of them and there are so many good ones who aren't paid yet that maybe the right way to think about it, and this is very dependent on a bunch of different factors. But this was the thought experiment, maybe the Way to handle it is how do you take advantage of really good sheep wide receivers as opposed to, you know, trying to take advantage of that window as opposed to being like hell bent on taking advantage of a quarterback window. And maybe those two things are directly intertwined. We've seen what happened with Kansas City, so seeing what's happening with Buffalo, maybe even make the argument now with IUK's contract being voided, you're seeing what's happening in San Francisco. But it's an interesting thought experiment because I know that they had Calvin Ridley. Calvin Ridley. You want to talk about someone who's just completely sucked this year? I was a big Calvin Ridley believer coming into the season. He's not playing anymore. Injured, but certainly did not play, but maybe for a quarter or two at a high level all year. [00:37:27] Like, you have the cheap quarterback. Go get them the wide receivers and then change it out again. The Kansas City Buffalo mindset, but they don't have any. I mean, Eric I o Manor was what, a fifth, fourth or fifth round pick and they're counting on him. [00:37:43] That's not. That's not good. That's not good. [00:37:48] Yeah, math. [00:37:50] Jeff Simmons. Jeff Simmons is so damn good. I. I would say sweat is really good. I would say again, their linebackers are really fast, but I don't think they're very sound. And that secondary is just absolutely brutal. [00:38:04] I have not heard anything about Curtis Rourke's practice performance. And frankly, I will say this. [00:38:12] You know, they want to give them these reps. It was a no harm, no foul. [00:38:17] I don't think, correct me if I'm wrong here, I don't think Adrian Martinez should. [00:38:24] I don't think he signed with anybody else. I think he's still available to the 49ers should they need him again, which, you know, fingers crossed. You don't. You have a healthy backup. I think, actually, we haven't talked about this. If it does come up again, Mac Jones is going to be a lot healthier than the last time we saw him. And that could be huge because we know how high quality a backup, if not the best backup. Mac Jones is in the league right now. So there's that. [00:38:49] But they need to see what Rourke has so that going into this off season they can make a better evaluation on what it is they want to do at backup quarterback. Because if someone. Let's just use an example, the Vikings, which I don't love as an example, but is kind of the clearest possibility, maybe the Colts, another one. Let's use the Colts in Fact, I had this conversation this morning. [00:39:14] So the Colts, Daniel Jones towards Achilles. Who could have seen that coming? That, you know, a guy playing with a plate to keep his broken leg together would then have complete structural failure on the same leg. I mean, wow. What, what an idea. So I don't know what they're going to do with Daniel Jones. I feel really bad for Daniel Jones, who played himself into another big contract in his life only to have it, you know, explode on him. So that sucks for him. Unquestionably, they signed Philip Rivers, who hasn't played since January of 2021. [00:39:49] Yeah, they signed him off the street. He's gonna start this week. [00:39:54] And then there's Riley Leonard, who might not get enough time here because I. It's a real question on if the Colts even make the playoffs at this point. Riley Leonard might not get enough time here for the Colts to figure out if he can do it or not. Right. You need more than a two or three game sample size. He got a half. And then they'll have two more games at the end of the year, maybe three if he's in fact back as suggested for that game against the 49ers on December 22, Monday Night Football, is that enough time to, you know, bet the franchise on Riley Leonard? I don't know. So let's say they are of the mindset that, hey, we're right there, we just need somebody who can hold down the fort. And we don't want Kyler Murray and we don't want Justin Fields and we don't want, you know, go through all of these other toss around quarterbacks right now. We don't want any of those guys. We don't want Kirk Cousins. [00:40:50] So we're gonna, we're gonna go and get Mac Jones, but we're gonna have to pay for him, right? Because he is on a deal that has a $4 million cap hit. So you're not paying him anything. He'd be your starter. And that's going to cost you a pretty penny from the 49ers. Because this is the other aspect that I think people overlook with the Mac Jones conversation. No team in the NFL cares more about comp picks than the San Francisco 49ers. They love them. They can't get enough of them. They frankly are addicted to comp picks. And what Mac Jones was able to do this season isn't going to be forgotten anytime soon. Now, he might get more playing time if he were to stick around with the Niners next year and then maybe some new Information comes in and people are in. But the reason that Mac Jones is probably going to be the best theoretical player on the open market or he won't be on the market. Best one to theoretically be on the market is the better way to say it this offseason, like, that's locked in. [00:41:45] So if this were a conversation about the off season of 2027, so right after the 26 season, well, people would be like, well, Mac Jones looked really, really good when he played in 25, and maybe we could tap into that again. [00:41:58] So I don't think that he would lose anything by just waiting it out. [00:42:02] And the 49ers would, and I think he'd sign a nice contract. Justin Fields is able to get 20. What would Mac Jones get? [00:42:09] 25, 30. That's just on inflation. If we're just starting with the Justin Fields contract as the standard. By the way, Mac Jones wins games. Justin Fields doesn't. So that's going to get you a third or a fourth round comp pick if you're the 49ers and you just wait it out. [00:42:31] So for the 49ers to get a third or fourth round pick, all they have to do is keep the best backup quarterback in the NFL for the length of the contract that he willingly signed and seems totally fine with. He's not pushing to get out or anything that I know of. And then, you know, maybe use him again. Because Brock Purdy has had one healthy season his entire career, which was 20, 23. [00:42:59] Right. Brock Purdy, who is on it, by the way, the 49ers, a team that had a Super bowl chance taken away because of a Brock Purdy injury, had this season go into complete chaos, bringing up the Mac Jones positivity because of injury. And then last year, I mean, I don't think they were going anywhere even if Brock Purdy stayed healthy. But he got injured at kind of the exact wrong time for the San Francisco 49ers. It's like, hey, let's go to Buffalo and Green Bay in December and let's see if we can pull it together with Brandon Allen as our quarterback in that game. That should go good. Well, yeah, okay, that'll be great. So the diners, yeah, they paid him. I have no problem with them paying him. He's a really good quarterback. You know, if Jordan Love can get paid on just Toyota thons alone, Brock Purdy, who had this team in overtime of a Super bowl and got MVP votes, he can get paid. Okay. And if we want to have a conversation about oh, Brock Purdy, you know, you paid him too much. This and that. One, look at all the other quarterback contracts. And two, tell me who, Tell me the guys that shouldn't be paid as well, because there's a bunch of other ones who have been paid. They haven't been paid. And guess what? That's how a marketplace works. And Brock Purdy's himself and his agent are no dummies. And they're not going to go in. And in a way, they kind of did. They did take a little bit off the top, but they're not going to go in and say, like, you know what? We think we're actually really only worth 30. We heard somebody on YouTube suggesting that, you know, they shouldn't pay him more than 30. And we think they're right. [00:44:30] Like, come on now. Come on now. Not. Not with the cap going up 10% every year. Come on. So for the Niners, when we talk about Mac Jones in this upcoming off season, what's the incentive for the 49ers to move on from them? Unless someone wants to come in with what is by definition a godfather offer, an offer they cannot refuse. An early second round pick, a late first round pick, if that comes in now, they got to go, okay, let's. Let's take this to Mack, because they also want to do right by their guy. But if someone's coming in with the third or a fourth round pick and saying, hey, we'd love Mac Jones, what, so that you can have a competent quarterback on a fifth round draft picks deal. [00:45:21] No, we're not doing that. [00:45:23] That's why I don't like the Vikings idea. I know that they just did a deal with the Vikings and sent Jordan Mason their way. Clearly, the Niners don't think very highly of Jordan Mason, which was a mistake at the time, unquestionably still looks like a mistake. But they didn't think too highly of Jordan Mason. There was some toxicity around Jordan Mason. They wanted him out. They had no problem keeping him in the conference. [00:45:44] But the Vikings suck. And you give them Mac Jones and they might not suck anymore. And they're in the same conference as you, so why are you doing them a favor? [00:45:54] You might want to do right by Mac Jones, but I've heard nothing that Mac Jones wants out. It sounds to me as if he's comfortable playing out his contract because again, the hay is in the barn for him when it comes to getting his reputation whitewashed by the Shanahan Shine. [00:46:09] And yeah, there might be a couple other teams that are Interested, but they're gonna. They're gonna have to come correct, and they're probably going to have to then pay Mac Jones a new contract to get him excited about playing there. [00:46:21] And, well, that's somewhat of the issue. [00:46:25] You know, now you're paying Mac Jones. Well, now it's like, well, if people are questioning paying Brock Purdy, now you're paying Mac Jones, you know, pretty good money. [00:46:32] That might be tricky. All the 49ers have to do is sit, stay, stay with the best insurance policy in football that you can get, and then they'll get the exact same draft pick that I think most reasonable people are suggesting Mac Jones could get. Because, you know, not to crap on Mack, but he's the worst deep ball thrower in the league and he can't move. [00:46:53] So those are kind of two big deals if you're looking for a starting quarterback. But for a backup quarterback, those are things you can manage. Those are things that are. Because he's a processor, he delivers the ball accurately and on time. He just can't deliver it deep. [00:47:05] He knows the playbook, he's liked in the locker room. There's a lot of really positive qualities when you view it through the prism of backup quarterback. When you view it through the prism of, hey, he's your starter and we're trying to go to the playoffs. [00:47:16] I don't know. And I do think that Matt got did dirty by the Patriots. Clearly, we didn't know at the time how toxic the Patriots situation was with. Was it Patricia, the offensive coordinator for them in his final year, he was calling up Alabama saying, like, these guys don't know what the hell they're doing, so. [00:47:37] And then he gets burned for that because he's trying to cover his own ass because, well, they didn't know what they were doing. [00:47:43] I just don't see much incentive unless someone comes with a really good draft pick. And I'm not the right team comes with a really good draft pick. And I'm not bullish. That someone is just not bullish. Somebody is. I don't think that there's a better quarterback than him available, but I don't know if these things are all going to line up. [00:48:02] It's also hard to sell a fan base hope with Mac Jones as a starter. It just is. I'm sorry. It is. [00:48:09] It's great when you have a fan base like the 49ers and Brock goes down and everybody's injured and it's like, we have no hope. And then here's Mac Jones Just being competent and you're like, oh my God, it's manna from heaven. This is incredible. It's a totally different thing when you're selling him as the missing piece. [00:48:28] So there's that. [00:48:31] So as it pertains to Curtis Rourke, if the Niners do find themselves in a situation where the right team comes around with the right offer and they, they need to have a better feel for Curtis Rourke on the field, even if it's just a practice field, five reps of practice because he's a third stringer. Especially now. They barely practice now. So, like, I'm not even sure how they build it up, but here's an opportunity to see Curtis Rourke play some football and maybe kind of like, you know, Kyle watched Brock Purdy and otas and training camp and said, oh, that's our best quarterback. Which was a very convenient thing to say after he became your starting quarterback, but neither here nor there. Maybe, maybe a little bit of revisionist history, but good lore if you will, as the kids say, but you know, we don't get to watch all of practice. This isn't training camp anymore. I would note from 10 years covering the NFL more ain't nobody practicing hard in December and January. They're too banged up. And not just with injuries. It's just everybody's operating at, you know, it's as if everybody got four hours of sleep every day for the last four months. That's exactly what it feels like in a lot of ways. Everyone's just gassed, everyone's tired. You're trying to conserve and then, you know, get into a game so that you can explode. So I'm not sure how much opportunity Curtis works going to get, but whatever this opportunity is, is, it is somewhat informative and perhaps could be greatly informative if Kyle is that quick of a judge of talent in practices. [00:50:07] So that if a fortuitous Mac Jones situation comes up, they can, they can make the call. But I, I will ask. I know exactly what. Oh, we really like what we're seeing. Really like what you're saying. Well, they're not gonna be like, oh, yeah, we that one up. Yeah, he's not very good, is he? No. Yeah, you guys don't get to see it. But let me tell you, this guy sucks. We're never gonna hear that. So, you know, they keep telling us, you know, Adrian Martinez is so good and we'd feel comfortable starting him if we had to. [00:50:33] They gotta say what they got to say. They can't. They can't be, you know, Throwing dudes under the bus. So all right, here we go. [00:50:39] Titans are gonna throw the bag at Salah. I doubt that. [00:50:43] I think that they could do a hell of a lot worse, but they'll probably go offensive minded head coach. [00:50:49] I know that that's coming off of the heels of theoretically an offensive minded head coach in Brian Callahan, but I believe that would be an empty headed head coach in Brian Callahan. Again, try him at the Hague. [00:51:01] So Salah would do wonders there. I'm not sure their culture is the problem. [00:51:08] Their problem is that they had really bad schemers what they need. And by the way, Salah qualifies for this as a defense defensive guy. But like I don't think Denard Wilson's a bad defensive coordinator. I don't, I don't think he has the dudes. [00:51:22] And on offense I know they don't have the dudes at one specific position, which is really, really important in the modern NFL. [00:51:28] So their issue is building up talent. And I get this. Firing two GMs over the course of a five year span, not helpful for building continuity on a roster. You know, so they had John Robinson, they fire him, they bring in Ran Carthen, they fire him. I don't even know who's in charge now, but they're not doing a great job other than picking Cam Ward. So I would say that they're probably going to go with an offensive minded head coach, pair him with Cam Ward and go for a Ben Johnson. Though there is no Ben Johnson on this market. I would argue go for a Ben Johnson like pairing of head coach and quarterback. And if it fails, well, at least he gave it an honest to God try. But when you have a number one pick, you got to do right by the number one pick pick. And, and you already have a pretty good defensive coordinator on staff which I think you can probably keep around because I do know that he's well respected around the NFL and, and certainly everyone's looking for the next Mike McDonald on the defensive side. Well, I got the guy who worked right under him, so yeah, I had to guess I wouldn't be. I was actually a little bit stunned that there wasn't more buzz for Lane Kiffin. [00:52:39] Or how about this, I'll throw a name at you. [00:52:42] I haven't heard anything on this sort. [00:52:45] I haven't heard a thing about this. [00:52:48] But I have had a bunch of conversations with my old or my old college coaching carousel folks. By the way, Sharon Moore, that that went well, that that started percolating I would say about 10 days ago and the fact that it kind of had reached me at the very bottom of the food chain. I used to be a little bit higher up in that food chain, but then it got me in the bottom of the food chain. I'm like, oh, that might not just be a salacious message board rumor. That might have something there. [00:53:17] I know that a lot of people had been expecting Michigan to come open and you're like, why? They just went nine and three. I don't think Shero Moore is that good of a coach, but like, they're not going to fire him off of 9 and 3 and. [00:53:30] Well, it was because of different reasons, so. [00:53:33] And yeah, luckily it didn't get worse than that. Jesus Christ. But I. [00:53:39] What about Lincoln Riley? [00:53:42] Now, I don't think Lincoln Riley's a very good coach, but he's certainly offensive minded and there has certainly been NFL innuendo towards Lincoln Riley. [00:53:52] That's a good gig. Now, my guess, okay, I'm putting myself on the spot because it was a good question or statement. [00:54:01] If I had to guess who the head coach, next head coach of the Tennessee Titans is going to be. I'm gonna pick Cliff Kingsbury. [00:54:08] And I think that will be a mistake, but I think it will be Cliff Kingsbury. [00:54:14] All right, let's keep going. [00:54:17] I don't know who Dieder is, but I presume that's me. What do you think about replacing lynch at GM with a traditional guy that has a scouting background? No, No, I don't. We could get into the positives and negative of John Lynch. [00:54:33] No, you don't replace him in his position. What you do is if you feel like this team needs a better. Also what the does traditional guy with a scout. They all have scouting backgrounds. If my complaint with the 49ers is that their scouting department had gone to recently, right to the point where they gave the head coaches the scouting responsibilities or not the head coach, the coaches and the coordinators, and specifically Robert Sala, they made them do all the draft prep this year. Now, the scouts were still out there and giving reports, but they didn't listen to those, which they shouldn't have because I don't think the scouting department's in a good place right now. And I think that they need to make some serious changes and bring in some new blood and guys that are on the up. And I think the Niners need to, you know, they don't want to be spending money with the players on the field this year. Okay, fine. You want to set, that's fine. How about you throw some money around on the other stuff. How about you take all these billions of dollars that you've accumulated by selling 2 or 3 percentage points of this team and go out and build an absolute juggernaut out of a front office. My issue isn't with Lynch. There's a lot of responsibilities of GM that are mainly political. [00:55:42] And obviously everyone could treat the GM job the way that they want to treat it. But do you think Howie Roseman is the one who unilaterally makes the picks for the Eagles? No. What he's done is he's built an incredible scouting department and a ruthlessly run scouting department. [00:55:58] Typically scouting departments have a bunch of guys under 25 and a bunch of guys over 45. And it's the ones who will work for nothing effectively interns that then feed it up to the guys who have been around forever. And that's kind of just the way it is. And by the way, when you fire coaches and you know you fired like the scouting department just sort of sticks around. [00:56:19] They're the furniture. They're like the State Department. They just hang and you put a new person in charge, but they're still there. It's bureaucracy the Eagles run, to my knowledge. And I won't say that I'm deeply versed in this like a much tighter ship like they are root like if you're putting out bad evaluations on the regular, they'll fire your ass. It doesn't matter if you're the 45 year old guy with the theoretical tenure or the 25 year old who's making nothing. And if you're a guy who's absolutely nailing it or gal. There's a lot more gals in the scouting world than I think most guys. As I know this channel is like 98% men. [00:56:54] Most guys gave it credit for. [00:56:57] And I know a bunch of them that do a really, really good job and are really, really sharp and kind of cut through a lot of the of the machismo of the scouting community because people think that that title means something. Let me tell you, anyone who, who presents themselves as former NFL scout, it's impressive to the mainstream populace. As someone who knows a lot of NFL scouts, not as not terribly impressive just isn't. [00:57:24] Sorry. [00:57:26] Might might be bursting a bubble there. [00:57:28] A lot of idiots have been scouts. How long are you a scout? That's a better question. And even then not a guarantee that you're not an idiot. [00:57:37] I just feel like the Niners with all of the front office attrition that they've had lost a lot of good scouts along the way, and they didn't replenish them. So if the complaint is that John lynch isn't doing a good job, I'm not going to sit here and tell you that's not the case. [00:57:52] But let's look at why, and let's also look at what John Lynch's initial responsibilities are. Let's also look at the infrastructure around John lynch as it pertains to, specifically here, cash. [00:58:03] What do the Niners need to do to make John lynch look like a good GM again? Because I know John lynch is good at a lot of the aspects of being a GM that don't get publicized, that don't seem to have a connection to the field, and that's a lot of the job. It should really be noted, again, like a lot of this is politics and just being a nice guy and, you know, shaking hands and kissing babies and. But who's doing the grunt work? You know, if he's the president now, how much is the president actually doing and how much are his advisors and all the people in bureaucracy actually doing? You'd be surprised. From what I can tell, they need to take their big old piles of cash and all the money that they saved this year and not go buy a damn soccer team again. And they need to go out and they need to poach the best and the brightest from other teams. If. If there is a set, you know, there is a salary cap. There is, but there's no salary cap on front office. There's no salary cap on head coaches. I mean, the Niners had no problem giving Robert Sale a big fat contract because they knew he was worth it. They have to recognize that their scouting department is not up to scruff right now. I think I'm the only one yelling this. It is well known throughout the league that these guys have fallen off big time and that they're handing all this to the coaches. And by the way, if they think that that's a policy that can work moving forward, one, well, we'll see what this last draft class, because I do think that it's, you know, been very hit and miss so far. And two, what happens if you guys are good? [00:59:32] This team's going to the playoffs. [00:59:34] That's a couple fewer weeks, A couple less. Fewer, fewer weeks of being able to do that. Scouting, meanwhile, last year, oh, boy, they just had nothing but time. Nothing but time. What if this team is playing deep into January? Well, then you got to give everyone a little bit of vacation. Then the drafts at the end of April, they're going to be able, you're going to let these coaches do all the work that they have to do that they did over a course of three and a half months last year. In the course of like six weeks. [01:00:03] Bob Myers ran into this problem a lot with the Warriors, a lot. They had to make two picks on a good year, you know, two rounds. It's pretty obvious who could play basketball and who can't. By the way. Now there's obviously big point. [01:00:16] NBA draft is hard because the points of separation are so fine that you can get misled. But I, I remember end of the 2022 NBA Draft or not draft, sorry. They just won the Finals. We're on the, the parquet court in Boston and I go up to Bob and I'm, you know, ask him a couple questions for a column, this and that, and then we're all sitting down, we're having a beer courtside. [01:00:38] And he goes. I go, bob, like now what? [01:00:42] Which was kind of a big open ended question I thought he'd get. And he goes, now we got the draft, by the way. I know that you've put more work into it than I have. Who do you like? And I told them, Jake Laravia, for, for the record, and the front office guys around him who did were well in it. He was kind of giving them, kind of went okay. [01:01:00] There was actually some conversations from that point on about that. But the warriors, you know, they would, during the NBA Finals for all those years, be doing draft workouts during, during the NBA Finals. [01:01:14] There'd be draft workouts in Oakland at the old facility during the day. Then they'd have an NBA Finals game at night. And I'm not telling you that they shouldn't have been able to handle it, but it's. Let's just say that their attention was not fully on the NBA draft during the years that they went to five straight NBA Finals. So the Niners had nothing but time to think about the NFL draft last year. [01:01:36] What happens now that they're going to be in the tournament? Who knows? They might be the one seed. Who knows? Like, are they going to take that bye week and instead of preparing for whomever they're going to play. Oh, let's do some draft stuff, guys. Yeah, no, let's, let's shut it all down and do some draft stuff this week? No, no. So it's about the scouting department and what can the Niners do to better insulate John lynch, who goes with his gut a lot, which is fine. Because ultimately, that's what it all comes down to. You got to have a good feel on the guy. [01:02:05] But John is also, and this is both an incredible positive and an incredible negative. He's a big time delegator. That's what John's great at. That's what he's always been around to do. When he took over, it was because he got to do the grunt work for Kyle, because Kyle was actually running the team. That power dynamic has shifted as Kyle's kind of realized, oh, I might not be employed much longer if I continue to pick this team. So he's let John do more of it. When they had an absolute Camelot of a front office, Adam Peters was doing most of it. Ran Carthen was doing most of it. They had really good lieutenants. They get full time jobs, and now, well, they take their lieutenants with them because they know, hey, my success has been built in part because I have really good people around me. And meanwhile, here's John, and he's having to build up the new Adam Peters. He's having to build up the new Ran Carthen. He's having to build up all these other guys, and he has to also find all the lieutenants underneath him. He hasn't done it yet. He hasn't done it yet. So what can the 49ers do as an organization to better put John lynch in a position to have those guys around him? Because that was always the mandate. And yes, he is better at this than when he first started. It's been a minute now, but that's still not his ball game. So what can the 49ers do to build up their roster? Not on the field, though that is always the requirement, but in the front office as well. And I see no reason, much like I see no reason why the San Francisco Giants shouldn't be spending crazy money on free. What's. What's the detriment? You have the money. Go spend it. I don't. I don't care if you waste some money. Spend your money. I'm not paying 26 for a crab sandwich so that you can run out Casey Schmidt at second base. I mean, sorry, not gonna. Not gonna be too interested in buying those sandwiches or those ridiculous tickets. But the 49ers, there's no cap on how much you can spend in your front office. I know that. It might this and that. [01:03:52] Go out there and build the great infrastructure. That's what the 49ers should be doing. Not replacing John lynch or working something. And by the way, there'd be no one that they would want to promote up to John Lynch's job so that John can take on some sort of president of football operations role. Like that. Though that has been suggested both in and out of house. [01:04:10] All right, I'm going to do a couple more here and then we're going to abandon ship. [01:04:17] Dieter, save some oxygen for the rest of us. [01:04:20] It's a solo show. [01:04:27] Yes. I am very much still banished to my basement. You might notice that I'm wearing a coat. Sorry. For the audio listeners. Half dead. Two, one, one. Dieter, are you still banished to your basement? Yeah, yeah, I live down here now. That's okay. Actually, the basement's not that bad. [01:04:41] No, we could. I don't know, we can do a little tour or something some other time. [01:04:46] Yeah. The issue is that the basement's great, save for December. January, February, when it's cold outside. [01:04:55] This is a subterranean basement. It has one heat vent. It steals the heat from our living room. So my wife is like, can you close that heat vent so that it's not so cold in the living room where our children play and we live? [01:05:09] So I have to say yes to that. And I agree. I agree. That's a general good point. [01:05:14] And then also, whenever it rains, which it hasn't in the Bay Area in a minute, and you can see it with the air quality, all the outside shit that can't get rained on has to go somewhere. And so it comes into the basement. So I got it. I got a nice standing desk, I got a 70 inch TV in front of me. I got a peloton. I got my bike. Like I just have to wear a coat. [01:05:34] There are worse things. I'm lucky enough to have a basement. [01:05:40] I miss being in my 30s. Yeah. Yeah. I think Whoop told me that my biological clock said about 40, 43. Did I say Caleb Fields? That's a hell of a Freudian slip. [01:05:56] Interesting. [01:05:59] Interesting. [01:06:01] Justin Williams. That's funny. All right, Caleb Fields. Caleb Fields. Caleb Fields. It's Caleb Williams, but yes. [01:06:09] Yeah, Caleb Fields. It does feel. [01:06:11] It does feel there. FM antenna is getting into some fight here. I'm not dealing with this. [01:06:17] Not pearl Volkswagen. Okay, you know what? If you want to get in something, let's get it in now. Oh, here we go. But now he always brings a great a duder making the case the Bengals shouldn't have caved to Burrow and paid their receivers. [01:06:32] You don't pay both of them. [01:06:35] You don't. [01:06:38] You can see it. I mean, their defense is abysmal. Just Abysmal. I know they've played better because they felt like I had something. Their offensive line is completely crumbled. [01:06:47] And, yeah, it's great that you have two really awesome receipts. They're great. They're two great receivers, but a quarterback into this isn't NFL street. [01:06:56] You know, we're not playing flag. [01:06:58] Like, you need to have bodies in the trenches, and they're going to lose Hendrickson this off season. [01:07:04] Not that he performed well at all this year. Like, I'm. [01:07:09] I'm there. Okay. Adrian Martinez signed with the Jets. Thank you to everybody, including Wood Gravy. I missed that one, but I'm. [01:07:17] I don't think they're too concerned about that. By the way, it sounds like my man Brady Cook from Mizzou is going to start for the jets this week. I'm looking forward to that. [01:07:27] So nice to see the Chiefs and the Eagles struggling. [01:07:30] It is nice watching the Eagles struggle. [01:07:32] I'll say two things on this One, don't write off the Chiefs just yet. [01:07:41] The Chargers are imploding. I know. They just won that situation. [01:07:47] I mean, Justin Herbert got pressured on, like, three quarters of his snaps. Like, that was a tough Eagle suck right now, but the Chiefs have a much easier schedule down the stretch. The Chargers have a tough schedule. If the Chiefs win out and the Chargers go, like, one in three, boom. And I think they play each other this week. [01:08:10] Don't write off the Chiefs just yet. I'm not telling you it's happening, but they're not dead yet. They could fully undertaker this thing and come right out of the coffin. The Eagles are absolutely dead, done and buried for this year and next year. I'm a little. It's not going to be great next year because this is something that the Eagles do every other year now. So the Eagles have success, and then their coordinators leave because they're good and good, you know, coordinators on good teams get poached, and then when you have success, Nick Sirianni, who doesn't really do anything, gets to hire his own coordinators coming off of a good year, and then those coordinators suck, and then they fire those coordinators, and then Howie Roseman and his staff get to hire their own coordinators, and then those coordinators are good. So then those coordinate, and then the Eagles are good, and then those coordinators get poached because, by the way, Nick Sirianni doesn't do anything. [01:09:13] They say, oh, he's involved in the offense. I wouldn't want credit for that offense right now. Like, oh, it's it's his offense. You know, everything's really run through him. Well, that's a fireable offense. [01:09:23] So they'll fire their, you know, crappy offensive coordinator and Vic will stick around because Vic is still very good, but they'll fire that guy and then they'll bring in like, Kevin Stefanski and next year they'll be fine. [01:09:34] So enjoy it now because. [01:09:38] Yeah. Siriani, man, it's unbelievable. [01:09:43] He's unbelievable. Why is this channel not bigger? We don't want it to be. We want it to be as it is, organic. We're not pushing anything on you. We're not selling a bunch of betting. We're not, you know, we're, here's what we're selling. We're selling a draft guide and a preseason guide and hopefully get some of your attention, but we also don't want to be in your face, clickbaity about it. It's me and Jake doing it the way that we would like to consume it ourselves and doesn't always hit that because of some production issues which are entirely my fault. But we're not going to change the foundation of this. If it gets big, fantastic. It's going to stay the same. If it doesn't get big, that's fine because we like what we're doing and where we're at and we are lucky to be in a position where we're not. We're not desperate to get more attention, more eyeballs and that we're not going to debase the level of content which, you know, some people might consider that would be a positive. Please debase it. We can't handle it. It's not going to be for everybody. It's not. But the people who it's for, we hope that you guys love it. We hope that you're all about it and maybe that's just my entire personality and ID being pushed onto the screen. [01:11:01] Not for everybody. [01:11:03] Jake is roach. Everyone loves Jake and thank God we have Jake because otherwise it'd be like this all the time and no one wants this. But in, In I learn 10 new things from Jake every time we talk and all we do is talk. I haven't talked to him in like a week because he's in India on a fact finding mission trying to get to the basis of what's going on with Pff. [01:11:21] He'll have a slideshow when he gets back. But it's been tough going because we do have. [01:11:30] Well, I'll speak for myself. I have an immense amount of respect for Jake Hutchinson and His football acumen and how he views the game. [01:11:38] And I learned stuff from him. So we'd be having these conversations anyway. We just wanted to bring some people in on it. But we're also not trying to monetize or do anything like this. We're just trying to do the football conversation that we wish was out there in the public that we would consume. And again, hopefully, people like it. And again, I'm not going to pretend as if this is for everybody. It isn't. This is not general audience content. It isn't. It's. It's for the depraved and the sick and hopefully those who can remove the emotion. I mean, listen, it's not like I'm not an emotional guy here and yelling about stuff, but can remove the. [01:12:15] How about the one to one tie of one's feelings towards a team and the outcome of a game? [01:12:23] Like, we can. Like the 49ers, but we don't need the 49ers to win. So that's a long way of saying we're not doing clickbait. In fact, we're trying to do the opposite of clickbait. We're trying to have deeper, more granular conversations, because we don't think that anyone out there was doing those deeper, granular, granular conversations. And we were doing it anyway. [01:12:49] So why not, you know, distill the. The good onto a camera and see if we can bring some people along for the ride? And we're so. I mean, I. I cannot express to you. There's a lot of knuckleheads and dumbasses. I'll be frank, as a misanthrope. Like, the bar is very low, and yet some of you still get under it. But, I mean, the vast majority of people who are consistently with us kind of get what this show's about. And that's been wildly enriching. Not fiscally or anything, but wildly enriching as well. Because much like I Learned something or 10 things from Jake every show, we're learning from you guys, too. I didn't know Adrian Martinez had signed with the Jets. [01:13:27] So we're learning. We're growing together or we're deflating together, but we're having fun with it at the same time. And we do think that there's a. [01:13:38] We do think that there's a place for this, and if there isn't a place for it, that's fine, because we're going to be doing it anyway. [01:13:48] All right, anyone want to get anything? I'm just gonna drop to the bottom Anyone? Oh, my God. Thank God. This is crazy. You guys went absolutely ape. Okay, here we go. Here's the super. [01:13:56] Do you think the Broncos will beat the Packers? Oh, that's a good question. I have actually been toiling with this one all morning. [01:14:07] No. [01:14:09] My answer is no. [01:14:12] But I'm not stamping anything. You know, they absolutely could. [01:14:17] The frame of mind that there's. When you get down to brass tax in an NFL season, you know, there's so many ways that we could break it down. [01:14:33] I want to give you the deep dive. I haven't watched the all 22 of. Of the Broncos lately, so I can't give you that. [01:14:40] I know that the packers leave a lot of meat on the bone. Having Reed back is huge for them on offense. He's like the only guy that LaFleur seems to like on that offense, including his quarterback. And I am. [01:14:54] Ah, here. Here is why I'll pick the packers over the Broncos. Jeff Halfley is really, really good. He's their defensive coordinator. He's been really good for a long time. He was the head coach at Boston College. He left that to become the defensive coordinator of the Packers. I think that with Micah Parsons in there and we starting to see this ramp up a little bit now because there's a lull. There's a lull to be sure. And then Toyota Thon started. [01:15:21] It's Parsons. That's a good offensive line. The Bears had. Parsons just minced them. He just chopped them up. And Halfley had Caleb Fields, Williams just. [01:15:36] He had his head spinning. And if he can do that to Ben Johnson and the Bears offensive line, Broncos offensive line is very good too. Probably the best in league though I think that sometimes that reputation's maybe a bit too aggressive. [01:15:53] What's he going to do to Bo Nix? [01:15:55] I think Sean Payton's a hell of a coach, but what the hell is he? Bo Nix. Bo Nix doesn't have the bag. [01:16:01] Bo Nix. [01:16:03] I just. It comes down to head coach and quarterback a lot. And if you need to expand it, pass rushers and defensive coordinators, Bonito's awesome. [01:16:12] Vance Joseph's awesome. Sean Payton's awesome. Okay. [01:16:17] You know, Jordan Love likes to throw a lot of back foot throws even when there's no pressure. [01:16:22] Not terribly bullish on Jordan Love long term or even short term. But I know, I know the floor is really good. I know Halfley's really good and I know Micah Parsons is really good. And if that's, you know, if that's overly simplistic, I'll take The L. But I'm gonna take. [01:16:40] I'm gonna take Halfley and Parsons to make Bo Nix's life look like hell. That's me. [01:16:47] Yeah, that's how it is. So. Yeah, it's exactly right. I am betting on Toyota Thon, Jordan Love. [01:16:54] Wow. [01:16:56] Bo Nix, king of slop. I believe that would be me. [01:16:59] King of slop. 1 hour and 17 minutes of extemporaneous football nonsense. Appreciate all of you. I do not know if Jake will be back for Sunday or not. Frankly, it would be in his best interest not to do a show because I believe he'll be coming off of about a 24 hour flight. [01:17:16] If his travel was home was anything like it was getting to India, he will not be with us. [01:17:24] He will tell the story. Holy. [01:17:27] And yeah, well, you know what, here's the deal. I will talk to you after Titans and 49ers. That's a guarantee. Will Jake join us? Hopefully. But we'll find out. And then we are off to the races for the rest of the go. [01:17:43] The final three games. We've been circling these for a long time, did not realize that the stakes would be this high. And even if they lose on Sunday, which again, I'm not predicting, but do not sleep on Cam Ward. [01:17:57] Even if they lose, the stakes get even higher. [01:17:59] Right? So one stake is, hey, number one seeds in play. You win a game, you're in the playoffs. Let's go for the big prize here. Let's go for the, the President's cup, if you will, of the NFL season. That's awesome. That's a lot of stakes right there. And then two if they don't beat the Titans. Well, now you got three games in a row against progressively tougher opponents where you got to get that win or two. [01:18:22] And that's some pretty serious stakes too. So I am, I'm looking forward to it immensely. It's going to be a little bit chaotic, but hey, that's what we do here. We, we thrive in chaos. 49ers apparently thrive in chaos. And my God, what a weird, strange ride it's been. Thanks for being along for it and we'll talk to you on Sunday. [01:18:43] Bye.