- 2 months ago
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00:00The AFC, to me, because we're sort of ish at the halfway point.
00:04I know next week is a little bit more like the halfway point
00:07because most teams will have had their bye,
00:08and so then some teams will have played eight,
00:10and some teams will have played nine.
00:12But anyway, we're kind of close to there,
00:14and I think it's taking shape.
00:15Like, the Bills and Patriots, to me, are both going to the playoffs,
00:19and then obviously the Colts are going to win the South,
00:22and then the North is now, especially with Pittsburgh losing last night,
00:27not as clear as people think.
00:29Like, I still, God, this is going to be crazy to say,
00:32I still favor the Ravens to win that division.
00:35They're 2-5.
00:36Well, the odds, I was telling you during the break,
00:38the Ravens are minus 122.
00:41The Steelers are plus 118.
00:43Yep.
00:43So the Ravens are still favored to win the division.
00:45Yes, according to FanDuel, they're favoring the Ravens,
00:48and just the Houston Texans are plus 260 to make the playoffs.
00:53Right.
00:53And the Colts are minus 2,500.
00:56So you'd have to lay $2,500 to win 100.
00:58So the expectation is, Colts, you win the AFC South.
01:02Sure.
01:03Way to go.
01:04And so if you're the Texans now, you're having to worry about either the Patriots
01:08or the Bills, the Chiefs, the Broncos, or the Chargers, two of those teams.
01:13And then, I mean, the South, Jacksonville, is another team that is in the mix.
01:19They're 4-3, no doubt.
01:20So let's say, even if we, let's pretend, because the Ravens have a really favorable schedule
01:24for the next five weeks, and they do have Lamar.
01:27Officially, John Harbaugh just said, Lamar Jackson is expected to play on Thursday night.
01:32Full participant in practice today, and Lamar is going to play on Thursday night against
01:36the Dolphins.
01:37Pretty winnable game.
01:38Favored by 7.5.
01:39There you go.
01:40On the road.
01:40All right.
01:40So let's say the Ravens make their move, and they end up still winning the AFC North,
01:47Colts in the South, Bills and Patriots are both a division winner, and one of them is
01:52a wild card.
01:53And then that leaves the division winner for the AFC West, and then that group going for
01:59the other two wild card games.
02:00You mentioned Jacksonville and Houston.
02:02There's Pittsburgh also at 4-3.
02:04There's the Chargers at 5-3.
02:07There's the Chiefs at 4-3 with a game later on tonight.
02:10So that's a big group, and basically two of those maybe five teams will get in.
02:17And Houston right now is at the bottom of the group, even with their win yesterday.
02:21Yes.
02:21And if you look at NFC, AFC, what's it going to take kind of a conversation, in the AFC,
02:2811 wins might not be enough.
02:30You might lose a tiebreaker at 11-6, because as you mentioned, the Chargers, Chiefs, and
02:36Broncos, those are all going to be 10 or 11 win teams, I'm afraid.
02:40And our Chiefs bet with the midday show, not looking good.
02:44No, no stress.
02:45Well, I'm not stressing.
02:46I'm just telling you what the odds makers have it right now.
02:48The Chiefs are minus 800 to make the playoffs.
02:51Right, but that's...
02:52Heavy, heavy, heavy favorites.
02:53Fan perception.
02:55I get it, but...
02:56And they're very good, but I'm not going to...
02:58Okay, they whip the Raiders.
03:00That's fun.
03:01First of all, play the game tonight.
03:02I expect them to win, but play the game.
03:05How will you feel if they were to lose tonight?
03:08Depends on what the pick is.
03:10I mean...
03:10The pick is in.
03:11No, I know, but understand that...
03:13Oh, for sure.
03:13Let's say they ended up at 4-4 tonight.
03:16Have you all looked at the next three games for the Chiefs?
03:18Not easy.
03:19Buffalo, Denver, Indy.
03:21Yeah.
03:22Yep.
03:23All right.
03:23Go ahead and tell me that they're a lock.
03:26Like, I...
03:26No, they're no lock.
03:27And my point is that I think 11-6 is no guarantee in the AFC.
03:32Because Buffalo at 5-2, they're in second place.
03:36And you mentioned the Chargers at 5-3.
03:38There's a lot of teams, I think, in the AFC that are going to win 11 games and not win their division.
03:45Jacksonville could be an 11-win team.
03:47I don't know if those are 11-win teams.
03:48The Chargers could win 11.
03:50Yeah, they could.
03:51You know, they're allowed to.
03:52Yeah, a lot of them feel more like, you know...
03:56Jacksonville feels more like a 9-win team, maybe a 10-win team.
04:00Yeah, those teams are both going.
04:01They're going.
04:02Right.
04:02They're going to go.
04:03But if you look at, like, how they're going to go, you're probably going to have Buffalo and New England.
04:08They're both going to win 11, you would guess.
04:10At least.
04:11Right.
04:11And then I think Denver and the Chargers are both going to win 11.
04:14And if the Chiefs get thrown in there, I'm just thinking that in the AFC, the bar to make the playoffs is going to be higher than the NFC.
04:22No doubt.
04:22And this goes to your earlier conversation about the Niners.
04:25I do think that they could go 10-7 and be the 7th seed.
04:29I think 11 wins in the NFC absolutely guarantees you a spot, whereas the AFC, I think it'd be tougher.
04:3510 might even do it.
04:36And again, that's why, if you're a Niner fan, I'm sorry to say it, but you're rooting for the Chiefs tonight.
04:41Knock Washington down to 3-5.
04:44The Cowboys are 3-4-1.
04:46They've given up the most points in the conference, and it's not even close.
04:49And then the other contenders, like, you know, the Bears are 4-3, the Vikings are 3-4, the Panthers are 4-4, the Falcons are 3-4.
04:58You have a game in hand against them.
05:00Like, I truly believe if this goes the way I think it'll go, and I'm going to assume relative health for all of these teams,
05:11and I mean that from this as a starting point.
05:14Like, the Niners are not going to have relative health this year.
05:17Their two best players on defense are gone.
05:19But relative health from this point going forward, which means no earth-shattering, season-ending injuries,
05:26to me, having watched all of this, it's very clear who the seven teams that have the inside track in the NFC are.
05:35And it's Philadelphia, Green Bay, Detroit, Tampa, Seattle, the Rams, and the Niners.
05:40Those are the teams.
05:42And that's who I think is going to go to the playoffs.
05:44And the Niners may well be the seven seed.
05:47And yes, you want that.
05:49Yes, you do.
05:49As opposed to the eight seed, I'm with you.
05:51Of course.
05:52Get in the tournament, you never know what can happen.
05:54And also, even if the worst happens, which is you play one game and you lose,
05:59all these young pups you have on your defense, especially, they get playoff experience.
06:03And that's not nothing in my book.
06:05No, I agree with you completely.
06:06Plus, you never know what the hell's going to happen when you get there.
06:10You never know.
06:11And I think we said as recently as two weeks ago, if the Niners were to make the playoffs and win one playoff game,
06:22I would consider that a very successful season when you consider the circumstances of where we sit right now.
06:30You know what I mean?
06:30If anybody was surprised by yesterday, my response to you would be, were you more surprised by that than you have been by the wins?
06:43No.
06:43If you want to look at the most surprising games of the year, the Ram game is the most surprising game of the year.
06:50Yesterday was not surprising.
06:52It was a little disappointing.
06:54No doubt.
06:54Because, you know, the narrative all week was, Kittle's back, and so now you can run the ball again.
07:00And, well, that wasn't the case yesterday because Houston's defense turns out to be maybe the best in football.
07:06And so, yeah, even George Kittle being back isn't enough for you to get that done.
07:12And so, I look at yesterday and I tip the cap and say Houston was better.
07:17Houston was better in the trenches on offense.
07:20They were better in the trenches on defense.
07:22And that's the way it goes sometimes.
07:24But you sit here after eight and you're five and three.
07:27And if you want to talk about tiebreakers and dream scenarios, for the wild card, if it's not a team in your division with whom you're tied, it's head-to-head.
07:37And you've got Carolina coming up.
07:39You've got Chicago coming up.
07:41The second tiebreaker is conference record.
07:43You have the best record in the conference.
07:45You and Philadelphia are five and one in the conference.
07:49So, even as you get down the road, if you wind up 10-7 in a tiebreaker, you're probably in a good spot tiebreaker-wise.
07:57And even if it's a team in your division head-to-head, let's just say you lose to Seattle and you're tied with them for the final playoff spot.
08:06Well, then it goes to conference record.
08:07And as I mentioned, you've got a better conference record.
08:10Yeah.
08:10Seattle's already got two losses and they've only played four games in the conference.
08:15They're two and two.
08:15Yeah, don't forget that 3-0 division record.
08:19That 3-0 division record, I see no way that that's not going to come in big-time handy down the road here at the end of the season.
08:29I just, I really, I go back and forth right now about how the 49ers should handle the next eight days.
08:36The trade deadline is coming, and I'll say all this to say that the front office seems to view this year the lack of going all in on the offensive line prior to the year, the lack of doing anything to this point.
08:51Although, I will remind people, major trades don't usually happen two, three, four weeks before the deadline.
08:58I know there's been some little ones.
09:00People are moving from the fifth to the sixth round to grab a guy.
09:02But, like, whatever, if the Niners had done that, would you be all excited?
09:06Probably not.
09:07The real deals are going to start here in the next seven days.
09:11And I think the Niners will be involved, and I do think they should be involved, but I think they should take a very, very measured approach.
09:19It's why Kyle answers that question every time by talking about not just this year, but next year as well.
09:26Like, that's code.
09:27That is code for we're not winning the Super Bowl this year.
09:33We're allowed to.
09:36Something bananas could happen.
09:38All of those quarterbacks you just mentioned that are all up there in the top seven quarterback rating, they could all get hurt.
09:45So, yes, if Jalen Hurts and Jordan Love and Jared Goff and Baker Mayfield all get hurt, Matt Stafford too,
09:52then maybe the Niners can go to the Super Bowl this year.
09:54But I don't think that's going to happen.
09:57That's why they keep saying we will try to help this group out, provided that it helps us next year too.
10:04Exactly.
10:05That is code for next year's the year.
10:09We're hoping.
10:10Right.
10:10It should be.
10:12It's not the year.
10:13It still can be the year.
10:14And if you get in the tournament and stuff, you never know.
10:16But you talked about trades and just looking back at the Niners' significant trades of the past.
10:22Jimmy Garoppolo, October 31st.
10:25Emanuel Sanders, October 20th.
10:27Christian McCaffrey, October 22nd.
10:29So we are in that window of now being a time where you can make those deals.
10:34And as you were talking about, trades that are going to help you now and in the future.
10:39McCaffrey's still here.
10:40Garoppolo, you got him and you signed him to a huge deal, a record-breaking deal.
10:44And Emanuel Sanders was not a rental.
10:46He was here for a couple seasons.
10:48So I think that you're looking at something more along those lines.
10:52But then, like you're talking about, if you were to make a trade right now for one player,
10:58whatever player you think that you would want to go out there and get, even if it's Quinn and Williams.
11:02So you get Quinn and Williams and you think, we can afford him and we're going to keep him.
11:06Great.
11:07You plug him right there in the middle.
11:08Are you now a Super Bowl team?
11:10No.
11:10You're better.
11:11You're deeper.
11:12Sure, your defense got a lot better.
11:14But I think that if you wanted to go from where you are to being a legitimate Super Bowl-type team,
11:20you're talking about adding four players or five players.
11:23Yeah, and two of them better be Fred Warner and Nick Bosa, by the way.
11:27Type players, sure.
11:29But...
11:29No, like I don't even, I don't think type players like that exist.
11:33There's no Fred Warner.
11:34He's 101.
11:36Oh, for sure.
11:36That's part of what I'm saying.
11:38I'm sorry.
11:39This isn't, this is not their year.
11:42We can still have a blast, okay?
11:46They can still go to the playoffs.
11:48I will still sit down with red and gold on and root my ass off.
11:52You should too.
11:53I think there's value in all of that.
11:56I've never been a Super Bowl or bust mentality.
11:59I don't even understand it.
12:01Does that literally mean you're only happy at the end of a year when your team wins it all?
12:07Are you pissed 98% of the time?
12:11No more than that.
12:11Like, what are we doing here?
12:13So there's tremendous value in trying to be a good team and running a good program.
12:20But this is not a Super Bowl year.
12:23I don't even think it necessarily was prior to the injuries.
12:29But that's not a crazy opinion, is it?
12:33I don't think they can win it all without Fred Warner.
12:36I just don't think that.
12:37Well, just go back to where before Fred and Nick got hurt.
12:41If you had them healthy all year, you would think differently about whether or not you could still be a Super Bowl team.
12:47And you get into the soft underbelly of the schedule, as you and I have talked about.
12:52You come out of the bye, and you've got Indy, and that's about it.
12:55You do have Seattle last week.
12:56But by and large, you've got some easier opponents.
12:59And if you had those guys, you would feel better about what we saw yesterday, which is no pass rush, a lack of tackling.
13:07As my old buddy Whitey Gleason used to say, lackling.
13:10There was a lot of lackling yesterday, lack of tackling.
13:12And your young secondary got exposed because you're asking them to do more than you want them to do.
13:18So there's a ripple effect to it.
13:21I do believe if they hadn't have lost Bosa and Warner, you'd feel a little bit differently about, at 5-3, what this team could still be.
13:28For sure.
13:29Absolutely.
13:30I would still call it kind of an outside chance type thing.
13:32But none of us ever want to admit this.
13:34Going to the Super Bowl is always kind of an outside chance thing.
13:38That's just the way the Super Bowl operates.
13:39Unless you're Kansas City.
13:41Then it's expected.
13:43Because you go every year.
13:44Not this year.
13:45Hope not.
13:46But I said that last year, too.
13:47You're listening to 95.7 The Game, KGMZ FM and HD1 San Francisco and Odyssey Sports Station in the home of the Golden State Warriors and Valkyries.
13:54Always live on the free Odyssey app.
13:55Coming to you live from the Laughing Monk Studios.
13:58Listen, I think Kyle Shanahan and John Lynch tend to be pretty honest with everybody.
14:05They're not going to tell you.
14:06That doesn't mean they're forthcoming.
14:08Those are two different words.
14:10Forthcoming is like, dude, is Brock playing this week?
14:13Yes.
14:14That's forthcoming.
14:15They're always going to be like, well, we'll see.
14:18We'll see.
14:19But the other things that they will do, if you're really listening, I believe, they will tell you what's going on.
14:25And that's what I hear when I listen to this.
14:28Kyle has been trying to tell us that this is not the year.
14:32Nothing changes anything.
14:34It has to do with what's available out there.
14:36And does it help us this year?
14:37Does it help us next year?
14:38So usually as things get closer, you get a little more idea on who's real and who's not.
14:42And we'll evaluate that for the short term and long term.
14:45By the way, go ahead and get ready for next Monday when he says that again.
14:51Whether they win or lose against the New York Giants, Kyle Shanahan will be asked about the trade deadline.
14:58And he will say the same thing he has now said four weeks in a row.
15:03Which is, nothing changes our philosophy.
15:06You still do your due diligence.
15:08We check it all out.
15:10And we're looking for people that can help us both this year and next year.
15:15Because you're always trying to do that.
15:17But he was asked if this felt similar to 2019 when they got Emmanuel Sanders.
15:25And in a moment of true honesty, he looked at Tim Calcami and went, no.
15:32No.
15:33Yeah.
15:34He goes, that team had a Super Bowl defense.
15:36This team, how many rookies or second-year players are starting on the defense?
15:43Probably just at first blush.
15:45Even if you want to throw in third-year guys.
15:47Because I think that Dee Winters is a third-year guy.
15:50Sure.
15:50But he's a third-year guy who almost never played.
15:52You've probably got seven first- or second- or third-year guys.
15:57You got Williams.
15:58And, I mean, depending on who you want to count up front.
16:03Like, is Collins a starter, technically?
16:05Sure.
16:05I mean, he's rotational.
16:07Okay.
16:07And then you go to Bethune and the aforementioned Dee Winters.
16:12And the secondary, you've got Green and Brown and Mustafa.
16:16Upton Stout.
16:17Yep.
16:18I mean, that's a quick seven right there.
16:20What the hell are we thinking is going to happen?
16:23Well, we're thinking that these are the 1981 49ers, Mark.
16:27That's the hope.
16:28When they started four rookies in the secondary, including a guy named Ronnie Lott.
16:32Right.
16:32And they won the whole damn thing.
16:34Who are the other rookies?
16:35Carlton Williamson.
16:36Carlton Williamson.
16:37Dwight Hicks.
16:38Was Eric Wright one of them?
16:40I think that's the fourth, yeah.
16:42Yeah, those are great players.
16:44Well, then these guys should be that great.
16:46What's wrong with you?
16:46Great, great, great, great players.
16:51And how much easier is it to be a rookie or a second-year player and perform great if you have some veterans who are kind of holding it down and allowing you to do your thing?
17:04Like, that's the issue here.
17:07Like, who do these guys even look to?
17:09They're looking at the green dot.
17:11The green dot's a second-year player who's a seventh-round draft pick.
17:15What are we doing?
17:16You know?
17:17So, I don't know, man.
17:19The more I sit here and talk to you, A, I'm, like, not bugged by yesterday's loss at all.
17:26They're actually in a fantastic position.
17:28And I continue to look at the wins, in many ways, as more eyebrow-raising than the losses.
17:35And I wish that I wasn't saying that, because I hate operating that way.
17:39But that is how I feel when I sit down and watch them.
17:43I don't, like, there is so little expectation.
17:47And I don't really know how it could be any other way.
17:52Did we sit down yesterday and expect, well, Robert Sala is going to have him ready.
17:56You don't even know what their names are.
18:00How's he going to have him ready?
18:01What does that mean?
18:02Well, it means you don't allow C.J. Stroud to just chill, Netflix and chill, and pick you apart.
18:09No, that's exactly what it means.
18:11That's not what I expected.
18:13They don't, why?
18:14Dwight Hicks, by the way, third-year player on that team, before somebody calls in and blows me up.
18:17How would we expect, again, be pleasantly surprised, but why would you expect anything?
18:25Why would you expect those players to just snap fingers and be great?
18:29I would expect them to be better than they were, and I would expect Robert Sala to do what he did against Atlanta.
18:36And he tried yesterday.
18:37They did a lot of the same things with zone dogs, where, you know, you show that you're going to blitz six or seven,
18:43and then three or the four of them would rush, and then the other guys would drop back into zone, and you got picked apart.
18:48You had Bryce Huff.
18:50For part of the game, right?
18:51All of it.
18:52You got hurt, like, with, like, a minute and a half left to go.
18:55But you have, like, a high draft capital.
18:57These guys are more than halfway through your rookie year.
19:00Like, Mikel Williams, you're a number, you're a first-round pick.
19:03Go ahead and get in there and wreck the game a little bit, and I didn't really see him making too many game-wrecking plays.
19:10I mean, he's in his eighth game.
19:12You're going up against an offense with wide receivers that nobody's ever heard of, including D'Amico Ryans.
19:18Yeah.
19:18You've got a run game that's just okay.
19:21You've been down on Nick Chubb the whole year.
19:23Totally.
19:24Saying, ah, he's washed.
19:25Yeah.
19:25And, you know, Marks had a couple of nice plays.
19:27A couple.
19:28Woody Marks completely outplayed him yesterday.
19:30Well, and Woody Marks had a couple plays that were absolute breakdowns.
19:34One in the ground game where you had two Niner safeties in corners who just absolutely got sucked up.
19:43Neither one of them contained the edge, and Marks just bounced it out, put 25 on the ground.
19:48There was just some fundamental mistakes that I was surprised by yesterday.
19:52I get that.
19:53Like, I'm not going to argue whether they played well yesterday.
19:56They clearly did not.
19:58But, again, even when rookies and second-year guys perform at a high level, it's usually because they might be, you know, next to somebody.
20:08Like, I felt that way most of the year about Dee Winters.
20:11Didn't you?
20:12It's like, why is Dee Winters performing really well?
20:14Well, he's kind of next to Fred Warner.
20:15So it's easy or easier to go do your thing.
20:19And I don't think Dee's been terrible when Fred went out, but he hasn't been as good.
20:23And that's not surprising.
20:24Like, that's their life.
20:27Like, I'm not going to ask Michael Williams, oh, you're a first-round draft pick, so now you get to wreck the game week eight by yourself with no other good pass rushers around you at all.
20:37Like, it just, I'm not trying to be a wet blanket, but to think that this team in this particular situation is set up in a good spot to go win football games on the road, they're not.
20:52They're just not right now.
20:53They have got to get some people back.
20:56And whether that's Huff or whether that is acquiring people through trade or whatever it is, they're going to keep looking like this.
21:03They'll look like this again on Sunday.
21:06Jackson Dart will not get touched unless something in this mixture is different.
21:13Right.
21:13Well, make it be different.
21:15How?
21:15By scheming things up a little bit differently, Michael Williams had three tackles, and I'm sorry.
21:22You're a first-round pick.
21:23You need to be more impactful than that.
21:26Yeah, by yourself.
21:28Not by yourself.
21:28I'm using your word.
21:30Complimentary football.
21:31Absolutely.
21:31And the defense yesterday, they were on the field a ton, but early in the game, they were bend but don't break, and eventually they did break.
21:40So, you're going to be more effective than that.
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