2026 Week 7 Recap: One Unbeaten Remains, AFC North Race and Paris Reaction!

Welcome to NFL Daily, where we brought American football to Paris, and we live to tell about it. I'm Greg Rosenthal, and I am here in a conference room in a beautiful hotel that we don't really deserve, with my friend Jordan Rod Reig, working overtime, much like the Houston Texans, to kickstart week seven in the NFL. How are you feeling after calling in your first NFL game on the radio overseas with yours truly, and then being forced to watch some more games so we can recap them on this very show.

Bonjour, Greg. Très bien.

I feel so good. I'm tired, but great. This is so worth it. Can we do this all the time, every week? Can we go somewhere else every week?

That would be great. It would be tough on the family life. I think it would be tough on the Game Pass watching and just our general energy, but I feel great right now, and it's going to be a little bit different of a show. So everyone listening, here's the run of play. Jordan and I will recap five games to start off the show, including... The game in Paris, of course, won by Aaron Rodgers, who just conquers new lands every year. I saw him win in Dublin last year, and now in France. We'll wrap up with that game.

Once we're done with our five recaps, we will kick it across the pond over to Los Angeles, where Patrick Claibon and Nick Shook will take us home with the rest of the recaps. In our early window, Jordan, we claimed two... of the remaining undefeated teams in the NFL left, and we're gonna start with one of them going down.

Purdy the snap, looks left, gonna throw left, batted away, intercepted!

Down the near sideline, Kendall Daniels.

He's still on his feet, and Atlanta got the turnover they needed. Second interception of the day by the Falcons, and the biggest play of the young rookie's career.

Oh, what a moment.

Just one week after Daniels was unfortunately taken off the field in one of the most sobering moments of the season. We thought the young linebacker could have a serious injury, could be out for a long time. Instead, he's back on the field today, picking off Brock Purdy with a game-sealing interception. Nick Foe kicks a field goal a few plays later to make it 29-20. Daniels picks up his second turnover of the day just a minute later with a fumble recovery. And yeah, the 49ers go down for the first time this season falling to six and one.

This frisky Falcons team gets it done, getting to three and four on a day where they didn't look dominant, Jordan, They got out gained by about 100 yards in this game. They had a yard and a half less per play than the 49ers, but they were opportunistic picking Brock Purdy off two times, forcing a couple fumbles from running backs not named Christian McCaffrey, who left the game for a while with a thigh injury. He was able to return.

But in that sequence where he was out of the game, their offense went on four straight long drives, 10 plays, 14 plays, 10 plays, 11 plays that resulted in 24 points. It went from a 14 to three lead for the 49ers was all San Francisco early to a 26 to 14 lead for Atlanta. And despite a lot of 49ers fans.

in Atlanta, just like the Bears fans a week ago, making Michael Penix go to a silent count. Atlanta holds on late because of that interception and enough clutch plays by their offense.

They can win in different ways. I guess we would call it reverse Falcon this time, which is that they weren't the ones to give up a lead. Instead, they overcame a deficit, 11-point deficit in this case. Michael Penix was the player they leaned on today. Quarterback 25 or 34, 213 yards, the three touchdowns completing 73.5% of his passes. Meanwhile, Bajon Robinson, obviously the 49ers game plan. So all out toward trying to figure out a way to bottle him up just 63 rushing yards on 20 attempts. So this is a Falcons team. We've seen it in a small hints, but certainly the case in this one, in this win.

They can win in different ways, and they showed that.

Well, when they win, they just remind you that Drake London is better than your cornerback. And he made some difficult catches, whether it was getting a penalty called on Jack Jones on the other side or winning in some tight coverage and just mossing defenders. Ends up with seven catches for only 66 yards, including a big touchdown to make it 26-14.

But John Robinson, the running back, he'll cut out here to the near side with Pitts on this right side. Now here comes Hoopover. First and 10th, the 21, Pennix from the pocket, throws, London.

Touchdown Atlanta!

Right over the top of Renardo Green goes Drake London. First touchdown of the year for London, and he caught a seed from Michael Pennix.

Oh, I love it when West Durham proves my point for me, talking about Moss and WZGC on the call. Bajon catches five passes for 59 yards. Some of his receptions were really crucial while he was a little bottled up in the running game. He made a few 49ers missed tackles in those four straight drives, and they were just absolutely efficient. Kyle Pitts with a nice catch. It's been a quiet year. It was a relatively quiet day.

For Kyle Pitts, no way. Yeah, 22 yards total on five catches, but did make a nice catch for the touchdown. All that said, a lot of things had to happen for the 49ers to lose their first game. Number one, Michael Evans, you know, didn't play. Debo Samuel didn't play. We know Nick Bosa is not back. This has just been an absolute mass unit. They didn't have a wide receiver yet. catch a pass, including a couple of touchdown drives, until the middle of the third quarter. At the end of the game, you know, it's Jordan Watkins and Jacob Cowing, is it? Catching passes late. And despite that, the offense looked pretty good early until McCaffrey left the game. And then Kalen Black, who ran the ball well, you know,

he had a touchdown run in this game, had a fumble. The very next play after Jordan James left, fumbled the ball two straight punch outs and you could see Kyle Shanahan just losing his mind a little bit they lose the second fumble and that's when like I said the Falcons did a really good job in the middle eight of the game playing keep away with their long drives Brock Purdy as I mentioned also turns the ball over twice there was that late interception I thought Purdy played really well in the game except for the two interceptions in the second half in the first one and this is my long way to get to the point of, you know, sometimes it's about the players. AJ Terrell returned for the Falcons in this game. And Purdy was trying

to throw the ball away on a third quarter drive where they could have taken the lead away. And Terrell had... maybe the prettiest interception all year on a throw that was supposed to be going out of bounds. And it was in Terrell full extension, dragging his toes initially called out. Cause I don't think the official could believe what a good play it was makes the interception and they respond with another long drive. So it just felt like for a middle section of this game, it's all Atlanta and they get out of there with the wind.

Can we ever count? Interceptions as catch of the year candidates. I feel like we should be allowed to do that. I feel like that would be a good little twist on our, on our ongoing experiment.

I like where you're going, or we could just have interception of the year.

We can, but I like, I like them competing with receivers. We can do whatever we want. We're in Paris.

You, I think are starting to feel the power that is being. co-host on NFL daily. Jordan was incredible on the call of escape. We'll get to that. She's had a monster week, but yes, it's your world. We can make that happen. Great win for the Falcons. I don't think it's that big of a loss for the 49ers.

They're going into the bi-week. They've managed the beginning of the schedule so well, they ran out of gas a little bit here, but they can try to get healthier and get better after the buy. So that's one undefeated team that did not survive on Sunday for a while. The Vikings were also in great peril.

Two receivers left and right.

Jones back to pass.

Sacked four times.

He just threw away the game. And Harrison Smith has picked off Daniel Jones and run the Minnesota Vikings.

To a 6-0 start. He's the pickman.

I never know what is coming from Paul Allen on K-F-A-N. I just know it's going to be gold. If you told me before Sunday started that the Vikings would win a game while only scoring 16 points and Harrison Smith would provide the highlight that we would listen to, I would say, yeah, that's about right. That's the 2027. Minnesota Vikings.

Greg, women will let you down. Men will let you down. Your children, your friends, your colleague, your peers will all let you down. But the Minnesota Vikings defense will never, ever let you down.

How dare you say that about my children? It has not happened yet.

With a minute 34 left down six points, Daniel Jones and the Colts looked for a glimmer of a second that they might put together promising, maybe even a comeback drive started with the chunk play to Josh downs, but the Vikings defense said no freaking way. Harrison Smith intercepts Daniel Jones to ice the game. Obviously the Vikings say undefeated and minus a big Jonathan Taylor touchdown run in the first quarter all day long, this group was as excellent as they simply have been all year, including a sequence.

in the fourth quarter that featured big stops on back to back second and third down by Blake Cashman. Blake Cashman had a freaking incredible day. And then Kyle Van Noy setting up what would be a missed field goal attempt by Spencer Schrader. And then of course the game starts, the game concludes and it is Harrison Smith at the end, putting the ice at the end of this iced game, like pretty, Stunted the whole way through other than a couple of good connections from Kyler to TJ Hawkinson, which we'll talk about, but this defense, it just, it, I don't understand how they can keep doing the things that they're doing because. They just hold the line the entire game.

Yeah, we're in the cab on the way home from Stade de France. And the first big moment of the day we're watching on Red Zone is Jonathan Taylor busting for that run. And you're thinking, oh, maybe things are going to be a little different. I know they had a long field goal drive to end the first half.

then at the end of the day, Daniel Jones, 108 yards on 22 attempts, they average under four yards per play. It's like even the few little moments. And I know it's the Colts that they're playing, not the greatest offense in the world that they'll like give up something. They just snap back to it almost right away.

And it's interesting because when you are playing a defense like this, you need every other phase. Understanding your offense is probably not going to be productive. You For parts of the game, it was mutually Kyler and this run game still struggling to put consistent staining drives together or plays together, getting some long down distances, a couple bad sacks, bad hits or sacks at times. And you also need your special teams unit to be excellent. You need your kicker to make field goals. And Spencer Schrader, who has been so excellent for most of this year, misses two big field goals in a game that's like inching along three points by three points at a time.

Yeah.

I'm looking forward to watching this closer on our flight home. You know, we can, we can download the game and find out why ultimately Kyler Murray and the Vikings offense had a little bit of a disappointing performance to only end up with 16 points against one of the worst defenses on paper. You don't have the excuses because Justin Jefferson's back. You have Jordan Mason back coming off a buy, but Kyler Murray did have a key highlight. And like the, the Vikings quarterbacks, whoever it's been this year, he made just enough plays to get it done starting out the fourth quarter with this score.

Murray from under center, play action, throws left, caught TJ Hawkinson, touchdown!

Murray to Hawkinson and the Vikings have the lead.

It's a five-yard touchdown to TJ.

12-10 Minnesota.

It was the lone touchdown for the Vikings because real will Reichert of course was mostly nails. Grover Stewart actually blocked a kick by will Reichert in the second half. What was super interesting is, you know, Ross Tucker, who was great on this call, um, Nat for the national crew, they kept jinxing the kickers. And then the one time they didn't say anything before a Spencer Schrader kick, and you could almost audibly hear them thinking it out loud, how they weren't going to say anything because. in back-to-back sequences, they had complimented the kicker and then they had missed the kick or had it blocked. That's when they were quiet.

And then he of course misses the last kick attempt that he had, but to the Hawkinson and, and Kyler connection, that is one of the small, but very bright spots I've been taking away from watching this Vikings offense over the last couple of weeks, because when it's on, he's one of his favorite targets. He's really steady. He was also blocking really well on a couple of the gotta have it moments. on catch and runs. And this sort of dependability is something that you can build around because the rest of it was just tough going. And the run game was really difficult to gain any ground for the Vikings. And then Aaron Jones left the game in the second half with a knee injury. And as of this recording, we're not sure what's going on with that.

That's bad news. Jordan Mason returns. Aaron Jones then maybe gets lost. Look, Sometimes the box score does tell a story when Keenan Allen and Laquan Treadwell are your two leading receivers with 31 and 19 yards in the year 2026. And Daniel Jones barely cracks triple figures. And Jonathan Taylor's wife is sending out Instagram stories about this is what it feels like for your husband to be on the trade block. And you fall to two and five in the week that you fire your GM. Everything feels a little different. Bankrupt. I think we know this is heading to a fire sale, you know, that might take a week or two more of losing for them to fully get there, but I don't want to spend too much time on the depressing Colts, but just the summation of

everything you saw from them.

Well, I mean, it's just not enough and nothing looks easy. I actually thought their defense played better than I thought they were going to play considering. I thought coming off a buy, the Vikings would look a lot better on offense. And, you know, without sauce Gardner, you know, they're, they're still there.

I just, they're so overmatched and outmanned and in so many ways, the really key element for the Vikings that you catch this thing that you just want to hold onto and build off of, but you don't quite know how, and you don't see it week over week, Kyler Murray gains really the true first, you know, real big explosive that swung this game with a 35 yard scramble. Right after that, he sets up the Hawkinson touchdown. So when it's, you know, boom, boom plays like that, that completely flip a field and swing the game. That's what these Vikings are envisioning. It's just that through most of the game, it is start and stop. And as for, you know, Daniel Jones, that interception was bad. It was a bad decision.

You know, he was, it was Brian Flores doing Brian Flores things. And there were plays where you could tell he didn't quite know what he was seeing. Shane Steichen was getting really frustrated on the sideline too. Just wasn't enough, as usual, from the Colts.

There's a lot of bad vibes around the NFL. The vibes in Indianapolis are tough right now. And they might not be changing anytime soon. Whereas the Minnesota Vikings, we kind of know who they are week after week. I think they want to be a little more. But if you're 6-0 and you have a chance to improve, that is a great place to be.

You know where else is a.

Great place to be, Jordan, if you're the New York Giants? First freaking place in the NFC East.

Still.

Pistol formation with Ricard the fullback to the right.

They hand it off for Singletary. Dashes up the middle. Cuts it to 25-20.

15.

Breaks left to the 10.

To the 5.

Dibble Singletary walks it off. Touchdown Giants. In overtime.

30 yards.

Scalaboo with the 42 yarder and the former.

Houston Texan Devin Singletary finishes him off and the Giants have won in overtime.

Twenty seven.

Twenty one.

The New York Giants not just went into Houston and won. They did it in overtime. with two consecutive runs for a total of 72 yards to walk it off, and the running back position, which has had a lot of attention, Najee Harris gets cut, Cam Scataboo gets benched, Tyrone Tracy at one point gets benched this year, They finished the game, I don't know if you saw this, arm and arm and arm, the three of them waving to the camera and dancing like we are the men and they are.

The New York Giants were extremely unlucky in my mind to even get to overtime. It would have been a little bit of a crime against football even if it would have helped our picks out here, Jordan, our Super Bowl team, if the Giants had lost this game, because this did not look like a game on Sunday between two even teams. It looked like an offense that was ready to push Houston around. And on the other side of the ball, It was a scattershot Texans offense that was struggling with their own self-inflicted problems like it has for much of this year. The Giants almost double up Houston in total yardage, and they get a very deserved overtime 27-21 victory.

I don't know that I can remember the last time the Giants have nearly doubled yardage or doubled production from a team. And certainly with a backup quarterback, I mean... you know, we come in here, Greg, and you are positively gushing about JJ McCarthy.

Okay.

Yeah.

Let's get to it. I think maybe the two most shocking aspects of this entire season right now, the Texans defense is legitimately bad. It's gone from like, they're not playing as well as they could. No, they're bad. They're, they're bad every week.

J.J.

McCarthy played awesome today. And it wasn't just because, you know, the Texans have been giving up a lot of big plays, although they did in this game. He was making difficult throws throughout the first half especially, but he also, in the second half, avoided making any big mistakes, stayed aggressive, didn't hit as many throws. But he hit on his first 16 runs. attempts, Jordan, six explosive plays. I mean, that's more than half of some that some teams have all season. He had 240 plus plays in the first half.

And these aren't fluky plays. They're outside shoulder, deep down the field, Malik neighbors beating Stingley, like without having a big window. It's a deep out to the right side that lets Malachi Fields run down the field. There wasn't a schemed up throw to Tommy Fedoni. I mean, If there's ever a New York Giants, it's Tommy Fedoni. That was one where Matt Nagy really helped him out. But for the most part, it was going deep and aggressively to his receivers, neighbors and fields especially, and allowing them to make plays. And he was under control and he was on point. I honestly couldn't quite believe it because I felt like last week was a little bit of a fluke where he got away with a lot of throws.

This was a legitimately... Just very good performance out of the young quarterback.

Here's why I'm not necessarily surprised by this. It has very little to do with JJ McCarthy as the football player. It is more so, we've talked about this all year so far, Greg, on these preview shows. The Texans are so susceptible to the explosive pass play. If a quarterback is willing... to push the ball against this defense and come what may devil may care about this pass rush.

That is that still can be as good or better than any in the league. But if the quarterback says, I don't, I'm just going to not care about that. I'm going to put it out of my mind and I'm going to say, F it. We ball and throw and push the ball down the field through the air in that way, almost with disregard to the consequences, almost with this naivete. I think you beat this Texans team every time if you play like that because of how susceptible they are. And so this might seem like maybe a backhanded compliment. I assure you, I just think J.J.

McCarthy has the correct level of naivete to throw the ball this way against this defense.

Look, he played confident, aggressively sometimes with Minnesota, and it just didn't work out well. The quarterback that got away with a few in this game was C.J. Stratton, who– could have had two or three interceptions, played well in spurts, but got away with a bunch.

J.J.

McCarthy really didn't. Even the sacks he took, I felt, were the right sacks to take, where he just, like his offensive line, gave up pressure immediately.

You have to be a risk taker against this defense. You will profit as a risk taker. Quarterbacks are told not to take risks. Quarterbacks, like J.J. in his last offensive system, were told not to take risks. And that's all fair. That's a good coaching point. But the Giants are in effort mode and he is in effort mode because what do they have to lose? This is the backup quarterback in a season where the NFC East is an absolute tire fire. So absolutely, they are going to push like this. This is the way you beat the Texans.

They want to make you think that you have to play by your rules as a quarterback. And if you just break them at will and say, no, actually, I'm going to be aggressive every single time, you can beat this Texans team.

No Jalen Petrie in this game. No Reed Blankenship. That definitely hurts their back end, although Blankenship had been struggling, but that doesn't account for everything. And I think the Giants coaching staff has done a really good job. On the other side, the Texans had 10 first half penalties. I mean, they just kept shooting themselves in the foot.

A lot of them on the offense, a lot of second and longs. The running game, you know, inconsistent. This was not one of C.J. Stroud's best games, even though he ends up pretty clean with two touchdowns. no interceptions. Tank Dell returns. That was a cool moment. And that's sort of what I'm getting at. Like in terms of luck, there were a lot of lucky plays. Tank Dell looked really fast on a punt return. He had one run, but he also had a 43 yard catch that was like a tipped pass that was supposed to go to another receiver. Deontay Banks completely shut down Nico Collins. Deontay Banks is really playing well for this team. And I think you just have to give John Harbaugh, a ton of credit, and Matt Nagy and his defensive coaching staff also,

a ton of credit because I think they're doing a really good job. The tone was set in this game by being aggressive, going for fourth downs early in the game, and getting them to get that early lead. Cam Scadaboo ends up with 124 yards on the ground, including A great touchdown run for 16 yards where he broke a few tackles to take the lead in the fourth quarter before C.J. Stroud had another hero drive to send it to overtime. But ultimately, I think the right team won, even if it wasn't the team that we wanted. Tough one for the Texans heading into their bye. At 2-5, Giants get to 4-2-1 in first place. Let's go from one.

Ugly division, the NFC East, to another one that got a little bit uglier on Sunday.

And now third down and 15 for the Panthers. Here comes four rushers.

They hit young. He fumbles the football. It's scooped up by Kalijah Canty.

And it's going to be a big man touchdown as he does a flip into the end zone and silences Carolina.

16 to nothing. Tampa Bay with the lead. And Kalijah Canty.

At 300 pounds, does a flip into the end zone and flips the script to make it 16 to zip in favor of the Bucs.

Ooh, we haven't heard from him much this season, but that's Tony Castricone there on the Bucs radio network, WFUS. We get a big man touchdown, Jordan. We're putting it on the show. Kalaji Kansey scooping score, one of a few abnormal scores there. in what was a preposterous first half. What was it?

33-6.

3-6 in the second quarter for the Buccaneers. They end up rolling 43-13 over Carolina.

Yeah, Dave Canales summed it up pretty well in his halftime interview with the broadcast crew. Everything that could go wrong pretty much did. First, Bucky Irving scored a rushing touchdown on the opening drive. He would score again before halftime on the way to 258 rushing yards combined for the Buccaneers in total, put a pin in that there was a muff punt that eventually leads to a Bucks field goal. Kalijah can see recovers that sack fumble by Bryce young scores. The touchdown, the Panthers score a touchdown on a Bryce young pass to Darren Waller, but the extra point is blocked and becomes a two point conversion for Tampa Bay. When Zion McCollum comes down with it and returns it to the other end zone.

Ryan Fitzgerald on for the extra point from the left hash mark.

It's blocked.

It's knocked away and then picked up. Racing is Zion McCollum for a two-point safety. A flag flies as McCollum dashes his way all the way into the end zone.

Tykee Smith is the one who got his hand on the football. But let's see what the flag is for. This could be two points for the Buccaneers.

The flag did not matter. The two-pointer counted. And look, when we have a pick two... That's another rule. It gets on the show. It happens so rarely that when the extra point was returned for two, it's just a rule we have. Zion McCollum, good job there.

A pick two.

And then we got another just pure interception. Bryce Young threw his first interception since week three. Then Baker Mayfield threw a wide open touchdown pass to Tez Johnson. So that's all that happens before halftime. They come out in the third quarter. Unfortunately, they lose Taylor Moten in the third quarter. with a fractured fibula, which is super, super awful.

He just came back from the blood clot injury. It's just awful. Also, all five of their sacks that Bryce Young took came by the third quarter. Oh, and he threw another pick in the third quarter. So yes, Dave Canales, everything that could have gone wrong for the Panthers today did go wrong.

And by the way, Except for the Kenny Pickett drive. He did lead a late touchdown to get into double digits.

How about that?

But guess how many times, without looking, guess how many times Baker Mayfield actually threw the ball today?

I looked.

I looked. So I will be cheating by telling you it's 11 for 64 yards.

64 yards. The Bucs finished with 258 rushing yards, three rushing touchdowns per our friend Lindsay Rhodes at Sumer Sports. Their 81% run share on all plays was the second highest single game run rate Since 2016, and here's the crazy part, it happened in great weather.

Right.

The other game was the Patriots in the snow against the Bills. It was a Belichick game, if you guys happen to remember that, where they ran it about 45 times and just never threw the ball. A fluky game, yes. But I've been saying, the best 1-5 team maybe in NFL history. They now have a positive scoring differential on the season to get to 2-5. I'm... you know, putting a little tongue, you know, firmly in cheek. But I truly do believe there isn't much difference between these four NFC South teams. In fact, I think the Saints are pretty solidly the worst of the four. And I don't believe in my heart that the Bucs are, you know, at some different level than the Falcons and the Panthers.

They do have some ground to make up, but not as much ground as they did coming into today.

Yeah, it just so much coming off the bye to for the Panthers has to be really disappointing. Their defense was really bad and obviously still can't stop the run, which Zach Robinson and the Bucs knew. And, you know, this Bucs defense was more active up front than we've seen for a while. Yaya Diaby, three sacks in a collective effort by all of them to get that kind of pressure on Bryce Young. And then obviously the offensive line issues for them continue.

Yeah, I... want to see the run game, do it more consistently. I think if Bucky Irving and Kenny Gainwell and Sean Tucker could run like this, obviously they're a force to be reckoned with. We'll see what Zach Robinson's offense, but when they are running, it's a good offensive line. They at least have a chance, just a humbling game for the Panthers. This is to this season where the defense just caved in on itself, but ultimately they're still at three and three and just barely ahead of the Falcons who made up some ground. On this Sunday, I mentioned the Saints. In my mind, being solidly fourth in this division, if you didn't happen to wake up early in Paris to listen to us, don't worry, you can

listen to us now.

Aaron Rodgers is sitting in the gun at the 40.

Ball is at the 34. Third and six from there. Drop back.

He's got time in the pocket.

It starts to collapse. He's going to rush it.

He's going to run past the first down.

Marker and oh bad Aaron Rodgers gets all the way out to the 24 yard line of the New Orleans Saints it's a 10 yard scramble on third and six and who knew the 42 year old had it in him to quote the great late.

Chris Wesleyan They've got one move.

They're going to use it.

They go in empty and let Rodgers just run the show, pick his favorite receiver. He gets great protection, except this time nobody's open, and the Aaron Rodgers from 10 years ago shows up and picks up the biggest first down of this game.

This team, and that was our friend Will Gavin and myself on Talk Sport. We'll hear from Jordan soon enough on one of the calls. This team... is my guilty pleasure this year because they just, they won't do what you want them to do enough. In the two biggest spots of this game, even though they're running the ball so well, what do they do? On the goal line, they go and empty. Right on the goal line. And they get a touchdown. They get away with it. In the fourth quarter, trying to run out the clock. They go and empty. And you know what? Aaron Rodgers made it work as he has enough times in key spots this season. It was an 11-play drive that ends with him kneeling to close out a 16-10 victory that really

had better offensive play than the score would indicate, but not a lot of possessions and a whole lot of long field goal drives.

Yes, and what was so notable about this, you hit the nail on the head. First of all, they won't do what you want them to do or think they should, and then they're going to have, like, big feelings about it at all times, which is so fun to watch and burst. Like it's just fun to watch them all freak out at the sideline or each other, but then also it's not dysfunctional somehow. Like it all just kind of works that they're all doing this together, the long possessions and the long drives, even if it didn't always go right for the Steelers, the fact that they could possess the ball for these long drives was such a killer.

ultimately for the saints, because the Steelers were at least capping them with field goals by Chris Boswell on the other side of it, when the saints would get the ball back and, and would put together sustainable drives would put together, you know, long ish to long drives. They were ending in a Tyler shuck interception. They were ending in a missed field goal. They were ending in You know, the turnover, like it just, you can't, you can't do this when a team is trying to go possession football on you and ball control on you. You can't not capitalize on the other side.

Yeah. The Saints did a good job on offense in the first half. They go, you know, field goal touchdown to end it. They only had three drives in the whole game. They only had six. And that does put more pressure on your quarterback, Tyler Shuck, who gets picked off a great play by Patrick, not Patrick Queen, who had the big sack in that game, but Peyton Wilson, who keeps making big plays, and they have had just enough big playmakers each week, whether it's Queen or Peyton Wilson.

Keanu Benton had some good plays in this game. Yaya Black had some good ones as well. Nick Herbig was all over the place. Like, someone steps up to end a drive, and in this case, it was complimentary football. I gotta say, though, I didn't think Tyler Shuck played poorly in this game. That was the one bad throw.

For the most part, Tyler Shuck... is the only part of this team in the passing game that I like right now. Let's listen to his touchdown throw to Devon Bailey.

Fourth and goal to go.

It's very different to being fourth and two at midfield.

What are you calling, Jordan?

Nine carries, 11 rushing yards.

Do you stay on the ground?

Not with this group, no. I do a little outside leak or something with the tight end.

Well, Tyler Shuck will come out initially in the gun with Kendrick Miller alongside him. Two receivers split out on the left-hand side of Chris Olave and Devon Vele. They've got a heavy formation to the open side of it.

And he is going to throw to the end zone, to Devon Vele!

Touchdown, Saints! Jordan called for it, and they delivered.

You get stuffed three times on the goal line.

Let's do what we do well.

Let's throw the ball.

Kellen Moore, are you patched into our headsets up here?

Great call.

Great play by Vele.

I love to see it.

Great call by Jordan Roderig there in a big spot.

It was so much fun.

You got the play call right. Devon Vele acting as their tight end. He's got the big body of one, and... Look, Alave, I think, had a good game. They get some of the rookies involved. Again, it's a limited amount of drives that they even had a chance to go down the field. I watched this team, and I studied them closely the last few weeks on the coaches' film and everything, and I feel like it's all bankrupt except the passing game.

The running game is a joke right now. Here's the comparison. 30 carries, 148 yards for the Steelers. They really stuck with it, especially early in the game.

They were good.

The New Orleans Saints, 17 rushes. 18 yards. It took them 15 designed runs until they had a successful run. You just, you just can't win that way, especially when your defense isn't any good. And it's just not enough for your coaching staff. It's not making up for it.

Pittsburgh's defense accounted for four run stuffs by the time the saints actually had a successful run. So they weren't just neutral. They were getting the runs stuffed, which is a little bit of a different metric. So for me, It is exactly what we thought it was going to be coming into this game, which is everything falls onto Tyler Shuck to do things and create dimension in an offense that simply does not have it. They were so dependent at a certain point on those quick slants from side to side to side to side. They ran, you know, a billion of them. And they don't have a run game.

So that's how they're trying to stretch a defense out and get them and loosen them up a little bit. For me, it was so interesting watching. I thought Aaron Rodgers played really well. At times when he wasn't, when he was missing a couple throws, they could lean on their run game. They could lean on Jalen Warren and Rico Dowdle, who had a great closeout to this game.

Yeah, I really was impressed that they trusted Rico Dowdle late in the game. He had a couple explosive runs last week. That's a nice development for them. Warren goes over 100 yards on the ground. Dowdle gets about 86 yards from scrimmage because he had six catches on the day before. It's funny, you look at the stats and like Rodgers' success rate, because he threw a lot of passes away and he had a lot of short passes, was actually significantly lower than Tyler Shucks. But he made big plays when they needed to. And the throw he had, he just has a couple of these each week that I got to admit I've been enjoying watching because a little more sauce to him this year than a year ago.

And he had that long throw down the sideline to DK Metcalf to end the first half. that ultimately sets up a score there. He had the throw early, of course, to Darnell Washington. Let's hear the first touchdown on French soil.

After Rodgers steps his foot, he looks to the left-hand side for a quick throw to.

The end zone!

On Steelers, and Mount Washington, bienvenue dans le zone de boue, as.

We get the very first touchdown on Parisian soil, and it goes to the big.

Tight end, Darnell Washington.

Darnell Washington made his name last year in Dublin, but let's just transport it over to France. If you get the one-on-one with the big guy, no one's matching up with Darnell.

Why would you even try to cover him at that point?

You're not getting the ball.

Throw it up and Mount Washington is going to get it.

I felt bad for who was it?

Was it Kool-Aid on that one?

I am forgetting the cornerback in coverage, but it just was unfair. And that guy who only had one catch on the day still makes an impact in the blocking game. And I think they're an underrated team. I've enjoyed watching them play. I think they have just enough playmakers on both sides of the ball to make them a good watch each week. They are at five and two, a little better, I think, than expectation. I I keep believing the ceiling just a little higher for this team if they all can come together because the coaching is better.

I agree.

I think they have a real edge there. Mike McCarthy is making really good adjustments with the ones he can get Aaron Rodgers to agree to. through the course of the game, you saw it. We, we talked about it when on that call, which again, that was so much fun. Um, we talked about it on the call a lot. They kept doing different combinations with Pat Friermuth who dropped, who had a great game, dropped an unbelievable pass from Aaron Rogers.

That would have probably been a highlight on this show had he made the catch. And every time they would sub out different combinations of Friermuth and Darnell Washington, They were in the first half, giving away their tells of run and pass. Then they, then they mixed it up and started putting both of them on the field at the same time in different blocking patterns and formations so that they could detach like, like, uh, Pat Farmer did basically ran the Tucker craft play and chipped a block and shed it and then detached and got up the field for, for a catch that converted.

So.

To me, they're doing a lot of different things, especially factoring in that DK Metcalf, other than that catch, is not a big part of this offense at all. And so they're making things happen. And Patrick Graham, a master class the last couple of weeks in getting the most out of these mostly very veteran players.

The most sane sequence of the game. They're on fire throwing the ball, moving it well in the second half. It's second and five. And, okay, let's give Tyler a break for one play and call like a shotgun delayed playoff. draw to Alvin Kamara. He loses five yards on second and five, sets up a third and 10, and then they get a penalty, which they've had a ton of on the offensive line, moves them back to third and 15.

They end up settling for a long field goal, which Daniel Carlson doesn't get good footing on. I don't know what happened, but it didn't reach from 53 yards and they give the Steelers great field position. We will see. I don't think Kellen Moore will be fired. We've been talking about that. I think it would have had to be an embarrassing day, but it's just more of the same.

This team is not Good enough. You know who is good enough? This crew, this entire time that we've had and the support that we've had in Paris has been awesome. We're going to send it to Nick and Patrick to finish off this show. But we couldn't get out of here without just saying thank Some thanks and maybe some reflections here on the week. And look, if you're not interested, just fast forward and get to the big, you know, AFC North game or whatever is next. I don't even know.

But it was a really fun week here. Our producer who's helping out on site here, Jason Kleinman, helping us out in the conference room. Angela Ellis, our boss, who is a big part of what we do here. It was great to spend time with her. Alex Fregola really helped us out. All week long. And it takes a lot of people to make this happen. And we do not take it for granted, including to our, you know, new, I couldn't call him a new coworker, but I've never really met him before. Roger Goodell, who not only did we interview, but I saw in the gym roughly, what is it?

15 hours ago.

Yeah.

It's a very small gym.

Yeah, and the way you talked about it, I was a little worried about your headspace after that experience.

Well, it's 7.30 in the morning. It's a small gym. It's a great hotel, but it's a small gym. There's about eight people in there, and there's no room. You're like... doing things right in front of people. You're kind of trying to carve out some space unless you're on the treadmill.

Greg lifting heavy weights, of course.

Yeah. And then Roger walks in there, gives me a little bit of a nod. You know, no one wants to talk at 740 in the morning. And I thought, I don't feel comfortable right now. I'm going to get out of here.

I'm going to leave.

I felt much more comfortable interviewing him. That was a lot of fun the other day. And it's been a lot of fun also to see Jordan just living her best life. As you have said many times, Paris Jordan is a totally different Jordan.

Who is she? Right?

Like, I just had a blast. I mean, we went on walkabout the first day we got here, wandered into this beautiful park garden with all these old statues. I loved the dogs here. They're like, I would scream every time I'd see a different dog. I was like, I got to separate myself from all of you guys. Cause I'm, I can tell I'm going to start to annoy you at a certain point, but I just, I love the food.

We didn't have a bad meal the whole time we were here and our crew and everybody with us. I mean, we got so much support. And just the opportunity is incredible.

And, of course, our friends Will Varney and Will Gavin at TalkSport. I jumped down at halftime to have some fun with Sky Sports. It's all a blast. It's all a lot of people helping us live out our dreams. And I know it was a hot topic back in the States, why this game was here. I can only say our experience, which was we had a beautiful week and I know the protests were in a controlled area on Saturday night and nothing happened like, you know, like it did a week ago. It was a very hospitable, peaceful, beautiful week. And the coolest thing was walking around on Saturday and granted in the touristy areas and stuff and actually seeing as a lot of Americans over here and enjoying themselves and the Crowd was great today. It was

about half Saints, half Steelers. They were loud when they would have some plays to be made for. It was a good atmosphere. I do think they're going to be back here. If it's not next year, it'll be soon enough. I think they'll consider this a success.

And heck.

I met two people this week who stopped me on the street that weren't here for the game that were Americans, but they lived over here and they say they're listeners of the show. So we got a few.

I expected this. I was warned about this. Euro Greg getting stopped by listeners is absolutely the most fun thing to see. It's it's great.

It felt great. And so thank you to everyone. And thank you. Maybe more than anyone. to our friend Patrick Claibon, who's filling in and really helping us out this week, in addition to Shook, who is carrying a bigger workload for NFL media than Cam Scadaboo ever will. You will hear from both of them next.

Welcome back.

Here on NFL Daily, Patrick Claibon, Nick Shook, 5,000. 669 yards from Paris, where we are in Los Angeles. This show, it doesn't just span a globe. We appreciate Jordan, as well as Greg's work. Jason Kleiman out there as well. Putting in all this work, but we got the rest here stateside. I am stunned by the math that you did in preparation for that.

That's good work. It's good work out of you. It's good work out of them. We're going to try and put some good work together here.

We can peek.

If you want to peek on my browser windows, I did that search 19 seconds before we started.

And so... No math involved.

Cramming.

We're just going all the way through and making decisions. Decisions being something that was very interesting in our first game that we look back at that ends up in a Lions win over the Green Bay Packers.

Here we go to win it. Jake Bates from 22 yards out. Hash mark left side.

Snap, spot, kick away, it is up and it is good. The Detroit Lions win it by a score of 20 to 17. Jake Bates sends it through on the final play of the game. That drive to win it by Detroit. Clutch, 10 plays.

71 yards, 321 off the clock.

10 plays, 71 yards, but that fully doesn't encompass the amount of hilarity that took place in this game.

There were two high school field goals.

I can only describe them as high school-linked field goals, where that's the last time we were concerned about these being missed by Trey Smack.

And concern on the second to last.

Play where perhaps Jameer Gibbs might have hurt himself intentionally not scoring a touchdown the second time he did that in seven plays.

Yes, he certainly looked like he was a little uncomfortable by the time he went down to the ground and then got up and there was no celebration. There was no I just put us in a position to ice this game and set Jake Bates up for his high school field goal, which we saw him convert. It was I'm I'm I'm uncomfortable. I'm just going to slowly, gingerly walk off. I'm not going to really make much of a demonstration that I may have hurt myself. Regardless, it's one play in the larger picture. Hopefully he's OK. He does finish with 116 yards on 29 attempts. Another classic, I think, game from the Lions offensively. But it was one of those games in which they got sloppy for the first time this year. They turned the ball over twice.

They'd only turned it over once all season. And it felt as if there was a period in the second half that both teams just wanted to give the other team the game. Goff taking risks, the Packers making their mistakes, Trace Mack missing field goals for a decent period of the fourth quarter. I was pretty convinced that nobody, neither team wanted to win this game.

It was in terms of.

A situation and a decision from Dan Campbell, fourth and one from his own 24-yard line.

It's that first thing I wrote here.

And, I mean, next-gen stats, which, again, this is not a real person saying things. I would love to be able to have a full conversation with the model or the people who facilitate the model.

Your algorithm. Yeah.

Why this is deemed as a toss-up, also 25% on.

A field goal, like an 88-yard field goal.

I don't know.

That doesn't necessarily make sense to me. But Dan Campbell elects to go for that. They don't get it.

Yes.

That was me formerly as a shield robot. Now I have ears. And I dip into the mousketools. And I want to pull out the mousketool on the decision. But then Trey Smack, for the second time from within 40 yards, sprays one to the right.

Sprays is the perfect example. It's like a golf shot. Honestly, it looks like my shots with my irons. You know, you get to the 17th hole. It's a hot day outside. I just start opening the club face line up to the ball. Every shot's going right. My iron's already too short for my height anyway. That's a whole other subject.

But he sprays the second one. And that's where I was like, oh, this is a concern because on the first one, if you look at the replay, it looks like kind of hits the turf with his foot a little bit. So it kind of explained it. The second one, there is no explanation for it. Not to mention they wasted a prime opportunity to take advantage of the Lions making one of the more inexplicable decisions that you just referenced there by going for it on your own 24.

It was funny because earlier in the season, Ben Johnson did something similar with the Bears where they did a QB sneak on fourth and one deep in their own territory. They did not convert it. turned the ball over and everyone was like why are you doing that this was even worse it was fourth and one no it was fourth and almost two it was a very long one and it was predictably stopped and yet the Packers couldn't cash in and that was the point where I thought man neither team wants to win this game classic NFC North right here.

Uh over the course of the the full length of the game the the opportunity to get back Brian Branch uh for this secondary because they have been a struggle all around, especially at corner. DJ Reed had a solid performance today, but welcome back to the NFL. Brian Branch with this pick.

Love's got it. Drifts back. Wants to throw. Loads up. Throws downfield. It's up for grabs, and it is picked off by the Lions. Intercepted.

Hey, welcome back, Brian Branch.

I see you.

32 going up and taking that ball away. The Lions have it back.

Matthew Golden and Christian Watson over the past couple of weeks running past people catching these deep passes, especially against Chicago Bears.

It wasn't there.

No, it's because of a guy like Brian Branch returning and playing center field in that play specifically with the green mouthpiece flapping out of the vent in his helmet. I don't know how that's legal, but I don't care. It's part of his swag or whatever. That's fine. And what was really fine is his return to this defense that sorely needed a playmaker like him in the back end because I think that those examples of what the Packers had found success doing against other teams probably would have happened against this defense. It happened to them plenty when they did not have a guy like Brian Branch back there. So for him to come back and make a big play at the start of the fourth quarter, it's a tight game. It's a huge moment. in a

game that was decided by those very small inches types of situations, he comes through right there.

And you talked about the turnovers. I would put both of those on Cade Mays playing his first game at center where one, Jameer Gibbs, is in that situation inside the five where an offensive lineman's trying to push him from behind. He winds up pushing the football out from his own teammate and causing a fumble, goes to the Green Bay Packers. And then there's a snap that never gets all the way to Jared Goff. He's trying to reach, I believe, the three technique. In Mays, he leaves. The ball is just rolling around and goes to the Green Bay Packers. But despite those turnovers, they get enough from Jared Goff. Another solid Jamison Williams game, including an explosive reception down the sideline where he kind of turns it

on and dives into the end zone. Where you start to wonder, Brian Branch comes back. The offense is looking good. Hopefully, Jameer is healthy. The North, in chaos, the Lions were at the bottom. In three weeks from now, they could be at the top.

Of the division. I think it's the most competitive division. Both of the Norths are. The AFC North and the NFC North are the most competitive divisions in football. They're the hardest to predict exactly how this is going to pan out because another member of that division stayed undefeated today, and you still have Chicago. And you still, you know, just the whole, in its totality, you look at Green Bay at 4-3. The Lions now, you know, one step further with another win to move to 4-2. It it's one of those divisions where I'm like any of these teams can win. And if Detroit gets healthy as they are right now at the right time, because I think the Mace stuff is, you know, he's rusty. He had a wrist fracture. You know, it's kind of tough when

you first come back. You get healthy and stable there. You're able to keep Jameer Gibbs on the field because they're a completely different team without Jameer Gibbs. So he's got to be able to be there. They could very much climb up that ladder, like you said. And next thing you know, we're looking at one of those divisions that could produce three playoff teams. Or four.

Close to it.

Ultimately, depending on the problem in previous years was there was somebody else in the NFC, either coming out of the West or coming.

Out of the East. That doesn't seem to be the issue this year.

So the gate wide open for three teams in the NFC North to make it to the postseason. Josh Jacobs comes back. The impact in the run game not necessarily felt. You could feel it in the passing game as Josh Jacobs has I believe seven targets caught five catches, including a touchdown, where facilitates the offense looks a little.

Bit better, but also the Lions defense improved today as well.

Yeah, heck of a run by Jacobs on that touchdown, by the way. A break in tackles tightrope in the sideline, and you can see the difference immediately between Jacobs and Marshawn Lloyd when they're on the field, even though the running game is still really not getting going yet. So good boost for them. We'll see where it leads them.

Where the rundown leads me is to discuss another fourth quarter, well, just in total, second half collapse by the Baltimore Ravens. Let's see, which touchdown should we toss to here?

Angles are bunched in tight, so are the Ravens defensively. Throw in a long count. Fakes the handoff.

Drops back. Short pass. Caught by a wide open through sample.

Heading for the end zone. Touchdown Bengals.

There is a penalty flag on the near side of the field.

Hits on Baltimore. The touchdown will stand.

And that is coffin nails. Bam, bam, bam.

Tell you, let's get out of Baltimore with some serious butt whipping.

Yeah, it's not just coffin nail. At that point, the dirt has gone over.

The person that's standing wistfully gazing upon, like, that's what I want.

Grass is growing.

Yeah, if I'm zeroed out at any point, I need one of y'all to stand off in the distance at my funeral and just kind of gaze in the distance.

Can I make sure that's raining?

Yeah, so people know.

No umbrella.

Know that I'm a real one. The Baltimore Ravens give up 35 points. Unanswered points. Yes, every single one of those points the Cincinnati Bengals scored against the Baltimore Ravens was unanswered. The sample touchdown was the fourth Joe Burrow touchdown pass. He went 16 of 18 in the second half. He was 6 of 12 in the first half for 43 yards. All of these Ravens collapses have their own unique flavor, but this was a performance where you get big opportunities for Like a big play, a 48-yard touchdown from Zay Flowers. They get two field goals after that.

They're up 13-0. You're thinking, oh, that's great. That's pretty much it. There was a fourth and two at the 12 at the start of the fourth quarter. Josh Cuevas runs into a defender. The ball is thrown at that point.

No flag.

I don't think there should have been a flag. I think they were within five yards. They don't come close to scoring for the rest of the game. And we talk about these collapses with the team. Again, I will say that they're all unique. They're all different. They're all special little snowflakes. But this isn't this isn't like the the Miami Dolphins big comeback where that was a high powered Ravens offense. This was an offense that it does struggle.

It struggles at times with its backup quarterback, which is understandable.

Yeah. And in a defense that did all it could in the first half, just couldn't muster up enough.

So, you know, I have a few things that angles to take care of because. You know how when you order a certain type of food, you order two dishes, they're different, but they kind of taste similar in one way or another. There's some shared qualities to it. That's kind of what the last two weeks for the Ravens have been because last week they jumped out to a 10-lead on the Browns. They don't score again, but at least it's close. They're battling through the rest of this game. Today, they just get a bomb dropped on them by the Bengals who look like a completely different team in the second half as opposed to the first half. They get to halftime and they essentially could have just like, I don't know, participation trophies about what they deserved for the

first half performance. I thought, look, the Ravens, the only mistake they've made is that they didn't build a bigger lead because if the Bengals do wake up, then they're going to be in danger. They referenced it on the broadcast. Oh, last week they jumped out to a 10-0 lead and then didn't score again.

Guess what?

They did it again this week. And it was in probably more depressing and concerning fashion. You do give them a little bit of a break because of Snoop Huntley playing there. But my issue is they cannot generate any sort of sustained drives. Derrick Henry, success rate on the ground is tremendous. near the absolute basement. He finished the game with 17 carries for 45 yards and a 17.6% success rate. That's three successful runs out of all of those.

It's the second consecutive week in which this has happened to him. Happened to him last week. And he only had it happen to him once at all last year. So this is a consistent theme with this offense is that they get off the hot starts and they run out of steam well before the fourth quarter. The Saints game earlier this season was another example of that. And I kind of just want to know if maybe this is how we should reference them now. You know, we talk about chargering.

Yeah.

Can we do ravening?

We can always do.

Because there's got to be a term for this now. It happens too often for us to not give this a term. I understand the limitations that you have when you don't have Lamar Jackson. I don't think Lamar Jackson is going to come back and fix all of this for you right away.

Well, especially the inability to run the game through that capacity where it's, again, you mentioned it, 45 yards for Derrick Henry.

Ali.

had 19 yards on the ground on four carries. Maybe he's the guy that comes in and gives them a little bit of a boost. You know, you kind of manufacture some things. They made a great play on the screen. There's been a couple of, of great opportunities for Josh Cuevas in terms of scheming things up because Doyle moves them all around the field. But other than that, just got to be able to create something. You, have to be able to establish something where you can get Henry downfield in space.

Yeah.

And, you know, as far as stopping Burrow, no player as a receiver has done more damage to a team On a per-game basis, then Jamar Chase to the Baltimore Ravens.

I don't think that's not going to change.

You could go ahead and pencil in the touchdown when the Bengals play the Ravens, but as far as Ravenings go, it's tough for me to feel that way in the Snoop Huntley starts because it's just such a Lamar Central type deal where it's like, well, there's this overwhelming force and accomplishment on offense through this portion of the game and then nothing when it was really just like two or three plays that the Ravens got where anything was happening.

It was a rough game.

Their last four possessions, four plays, one play, that was an interception, four plays, turnover on downs, four plays, end of game, and it doesn't even matter because at that point they were already down. The Bengals scored touchdowns on five straight possessions. Let's go to the good side here real quick.

Yes!

That offense looked day and night different. Is it night and day or day and night?

I don't know.

It doesn't matter. What does matter is that Joe Burrow found himself the offense found themselves and T Higgins went crazy six catches 148 yards in a touchdown and they could do no wrong every this is a big play offense that's what they've been all year when they hit the big plays they're in these games they tend to win these games it's not consistent though because on a per down basis they still can't run the football very effectively so they have to rely on the big plays well they got them from T Higgins today they got them a little bit from Jamar Chase not as often although he cooked Nate Wiggins on that route to the corner of the end zone to catch that touchdown pass And it's one of those teams now that when you

look at them, you see, all right, the offense is capable of doing this. We knew this for a while, but we haven't seen it all that consistently. Well, we saw it plenty today. And then you pair that with a defense that finally got production from all three levels, not just that defensive front. You had Demetrius Knight making an interception. You had DJ Turner making a tackle in space, a key tackle in a key moment as the Bengals were mounting their comeback that became overwhelming. It's a win that you come out of the bye week. You look so bad in the first half. You have some rust.

You're thinking, man, you had an extra week to prepare and you didn't do it. And then they come out and just absolutely an onslaught of points. You got to feel really good if you're a.

Bengals fan, right?

And there were some stops in the first half where there were high leverage situations. Kyle Hamilton gets through, tackles Samadji Piran on a fourth and one. The Bengals able to overcome that. They've got a week eight matchup coming up against the Tennessee Titans where you have to think they might be able to manage a win. They're a happy Joe Burrow after the performance.

Yeah, I think that's who we have to be.

We have too many great players on offense to be conservative in that spot, and credit to our coaching staff for letting us go and do it and giving us the freedom to go and make those plays.

But I think that's who we have to be.

So congratulations to Burrow and the Bengals as they climb up in the AFC North. Let's come out to Los Angeles, California, where the Rams have had some injury issues. It's been a struggle here as of late, but they go to Las Vegas and they have a very successful moment, including a record breaker for Matthew Stafford.

Matthew Stafford throwing left side of missile.

Puka's got it to the five, to the end zone, and sends Stafford to the top of the history books. Matthew Stafford passes Roman Gabriel for the most touchdown tosses in Rams history.

And L.A.

Has opened up a 20-3.

Lead on the road in Las Vegas.

Great call, great moment from J.B. Long there.

The new all-time franchise passing touchdown record holder, Matthew Stafford, gets that with Pukunukuwa in a game where the Rams were running away with it. At that point, the Raiders climbed closer towards the end of the game, but it was a first half that saw what looked like two almost identical touchdowns from Davis Allen. The Raiders looked listless defensively, especially in the run game. Kyron Williams and Blake Corum would lead to a Rams run game that had 199 yards, could have been more with the kneel downs at the end of the game on the defensive side. They had a lot of quick pressures as Kirk Cousins in the first half, two of seven under pressure, even with all the absences, shook the Rams, made it work.

Yeah, they did, and they dominated. This is one of those games that when you first watch the first few series, you're just thinking, this is too easy. I thought this was a Rams team that didn't have an identity. I'm pretty sure Sean McVay said last week that we don't know what our identity is. Well, I found it today.

It's called handing the ball to Kyron Williams and to Blake Corum and saying, run through a defense that clearly can't stop you. They had another touchdown run called back by a penalty when they were up 28-6. That looked easier than all of them, which is maybe because it was a holding call. But still... This is a group that had really struggled to get consistency on the ground, especially out of Kyron. At some points, you know, you thought maybe Blake Corham offered not the same juice because Kyron's the better running back, but just in those situations, he was producing at a decent level. Now they're both producing.

And then you build out of that from there and you're able to control a game in Vegas where you know you're going to have a good amount of your fans traveling because it's not that far of a drive. And you're also going to know that you really need this victory. As much as the Raiders do, you need this victory to try to right this ship because it's been very, difficult for the Rams in recent weeks, and yet they produce a game like this. This is what frustrates me with them, though. They did this, what, against the Giants weeks ago, and now they do it again, and it's like, this is who you can be, and you're banged up. Very banged up. Do it more consistently, please.

Speaking of one of those banged up guys, Pukunukuwa got 10 targets, so he caught 8 of them for 68 yards, including that touchdown, the record breaker from Matthew Stafford.

There was the good tight end situation.

Colby Parkinson had one of the nastiest drops in the NFL this season, which was a... A drop that he tipped up in the air was ultimately picked off by N'Kobi Dean. And then the Raiders would score some of their second half points. It was a touchdown pass to Ashton Genting, who was... apparently the best receiving back in the NFL right now. He got eight targets, eight catches, can't run the ball right now, but Ashton's at least offering something to fantasy managers through the pass game.

Yeah, I mean, what do you do when you can't run the football? You generate running through the passing game. Or you just throw it to him down the sideline for a big game to set up a touchdown. Or you throw it to him down the sideline or another player down the sideline right before halftime, you have to settle for a field goal. That's what really defined this game for the Raiders is they woke up too late offensively and it was too much of a hilt for them to climb back. There was a period there before Corham's fourth quarter touchdown run where you thought, hey, they might make this interesting. If they had hit one of their two two-point conversions, it was a one-possession game. Instead, it's a 10-point game. It becomes a 17-point game. They

never really get any closer other than a Matt Gay field goal. So, fourth straight loss for the Raiders.

Tough.

I think that we're all coming back to earth on the Raiders at this point, including on Kirk Cousins, who is not the problem, but because they keep losing, we're going to continue to hear the murmurs for Fernando Mendoza to try to come in and take over that job as the season takes a turn for the worst. I still believe in the Raiders. They are still a competitive team, but this is the second time in the last, what, four weeks in which they've looked largely overmatched, which is concerning going forward.

Yeah, the schedule has a little to do with it, but Kirk Cousins goes 26 of 44, 295. He has two touchdowns, really looked uncomfortable in some of those circumstances where the Rams were able to provide pressure. Again, five quick pressures in the first half, including one from Aaron Donald. You know, is he still looking for that first sack?

He had one taken away due to a penalty a couple of weeks ago, but it's in the absence with the potential for Myles Garrett, to practice. That was a report from NFL Network Insider Ian Rappaport earlier in week seven that Miles Garrett could practice this upcoming week for the Rams, and things start to look a little bit better for them.

But we are on Fernando watch.

Yeah, we are.

And I think another loss by the Raiders firmly puts us in that capacity here if it happens in the next two weeks.

It does, and you would like for it to happen in the bye, but their bye is pretty late in the season, so I don't imagine we're going to get that point unless they're They start to win some games and kind of delay that. This is never going to be a season in which if you're a Raider fan, you think, all right, year one, Clint Kubiak, we're going to go to the playoffs. But when you start three, you know, your expectations start to change. This is a check with reality. And it's completely fine because this is still the path that you're on. I will say this.

If you get Miles Garrett back for the Rams, that's great. Obviously, it's massive. But I don't know. They're going to have to lean on their tight ends and on their running backs. consistently without Devonta Adams going forward. I mean, they did a good job of it today, but they're not going to get rushing production games like this every year. And that's when they're really going to get tested. But hey, win's a win. They all count the same.

Yeah.

Kyron goes for 99 yards, 6.2 yards to carry. Corum goes for 93 on five and a half yards per carry.

That's the scenario where everybody's happy. There's no weird postgame.

Everybody eats.

But yeah, you're not going to play the Las Vegas Raiders. every single week you know shook talked about finding identity having a process that works for you the process for the cleveland browns is to be close maybe even down in the second half and have andre schmidt kick one at the.

Buzzer 32 yard andre schmidt field goal to get to five and two we're tied at 24 three seconds to go he measures he slides his feet to the left But Horkes looks back to his kicker.

Calls for it.

Tsunahara. Snap. Hold. Hit.

Andre Schmidt has done it!

He's done it again! Game winner! Browns 27! Titans 24! The Browns are in first!

The Browns are 5-2!

They pull it out of the fire again! And they win on the road in Nashville!

Speaking of the fire engine, Siciliano on the call once again.

Another game winning drive for the Cleveland Browns.

Yeah, I cannot. This is a difficult one for me because. Against the Tennessee Titans, you expect the Cleveland Browns to play very good football and beat them by multiple scores. That is not where the Browns found themselves on Sunday. In fact, they found themselves in a 14-point hole in this game thanks to two Tony Pollard touchdown runs. Two very magnificent runs, I might add. Tony Pollard picking up where he kind of left off and started in Indianapolis last week. He finishes with 129 yards and three rushing scores on the day. He was the Titans' entire team.

offense and the Browns they were told that they must overcome this they must dig out of this hole this 14 point hole that was dropped on them in the first eight minutes of the game so what did they do Exactly that. They they put together a methodical response. They end up scoring in actually about three minutes after Tony Pollard's second touchdown run with the Quinn Sean Judkins touchdown run. They score again just outside of two minutes left in the first half with another Judkins run. His best game of his season so far. Schmidt kicks a field goal just before halftime. Before you know it, the Browns have completed the comeback. It's 17-14, but we have so much to go. And that includes a Joey Slyfield

goal to tie it at 17. That includes an Andre Schmidt miss that turns the ball over, obviously, because he missed the field goal and the Titans capitalize. And they score a game-tying touchdown after Watson had run one in in the fourth quarter. And you had 58 seconds left in the game. The least amount of time Deshaun Watson's had in his pocket this year to mount a comeback drive.

But it was the same story. It was a pass over the middle of the Casey Concepcion, a short one. It was a pass to Harold Fannin who broke like nine tackles, not nine, probably about two or three rumbling, bubbling, stumbling all the way down to the 20 to set up the field goal. And they went again. And I just, I had a friend text me. They can't keep getting away with this. And yet they do.

In a similar capacity because the, the game winning drive against the Baltimore Ravens where Jerry Judy crosses the defender's face in the middle of the field, a full from me to Eric to Deshaun Watson, where it's an easy pass. And in this scenario, you've got a, a first and 10 from the 45 yard line. The, For some reason, Gus Bradley and Robert Sala decide to send six people at Deshaun Watson, including Imani Hooker, the safety.

When Fanning catches that ball.

There's four people back there.

Tons of room.

I don't understand these late game scenarios where it's like, oh, we got to dial things up on Deshaun Watson.

Speed up one of the slowest processing quarterbacks in the NFL.

But it comes just in a brutal fashion for the Tennessee Titans, who, of course, Had an emotional week. Steve and I were up there live on Total Access for Robert Sala's impassioned plea for Jordan Elliott. You know, as he, going through personal issues, goes to his car where there's a firearm, the team has to release him. And so all of this, getting to this point with a lead in the second half, they're tied at this point. But just a brutal end of the game situation where, but it's once again, the other team not executing and leaving a slight window for Todd Munkin's team.

And they routinely take advantage of that.

That's all they need. And every time I think that this is the one that they're not going to pull off, they just continue to pull them off. And I have to finally give them respect for their record. They are five and two, and they've earned all of these wins. They add the Titans to a list of teams that they beat with game winning drives that continues to grow with each week. It began with Tampa Bay. It continued with Carolina, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, and now Tennessee. I have a hard time giving them a ton of respect among the league's better teams, but they're 5-2. They are what their record says, and they find ways to get the job done.

Hat tip to Todd Munkin, who has done a great job of coaching, both as a play caller and just as a head coach. He is scripting a really well-balanced offense that doesn't put too much on Watson's They benefited from getting a better running game today. They used their playmakers. They used, you know, today was a big Concepcion day.

Eight catches, 129 yards. It wasn't the Denzel Boston day. It's always a Harold Fannin day. And Dylan Sampson came back and provided a nice little spell back to reform the backfield that they thought they were building when they spent those draft picks last year. So another good win for the Browns. And one more thing I just want to say, Andrew's call was great. I just want to give a shout out to Andrew who lost his father this week.

Oh my gosh.

We're thinking about you, bud.

Yeah, Andrew, we love you, man.

Again, that's, you know, A couple opportunities to be in what feels like the worst club in the world. The world keeps spinning when you're going through stuff, Andrew going through. That, as the Cleveland Browns get a win, again, echoing Shook, we love you, Andrew. A couple great calls in this game. Taylor Zarzor, because I want to be able to play this Tony Pollard. touchdown late down the stretch last season Tony Pollard was one of the best backs in the NFL.

He may be doing that again for a bad team first and.

10 Titans and again to the ground.

It's Pollard Pollard another big old 20.

15 10 5 that is.

A Titans touchdown 36 yards for Tony Pollard how about that on the first drive of.

The game you know he's not a big running back but he he runs like a bigger running like in terms of breaking tackles it's hard to bring Tony Pollard down.

And so if anybody would like to bring an offer to the folks in Nashville to provide Tony Pollard with a team to play for, that opportunity may be available. We will take an opportunity to take a break. On the other side, we've got a couple more games before Sunday night.

On the keeper, Willis on fourth and less than a yard.

I think he gets that.

No signal yet, and they've got it. And Miami's going to win it here in MetLife. Jeff Halfley rolling the dice on fourth and inches.

And the Dolphins....

A winless team at 0-5 is going to come to MetLife and get their first win of the Jeff Halfley era.

Sparrowdeed is on the call for CBS as the Miami Dolphins get their first win of the 2026 season. A quarterback sneak call from Jeff Halfley to try to keep Geno Smith off the field.

The Jets could have been a part of a furious comeback, but 28-1.

25 in probably not probably definitely the best offensive performance we've seen from Malik Willis.

Yes, finally. But the potential of the Dolphins that we always saw that. I mean, look, those of you, if you know, you know that we talk about the Dolphins very positively here, despite the fact they hadn't won a game. Well, they won a game. So allow me to give Malik Willis some flowers because he deserves it. 14 to 21, 208 yards, two touchdown passes, making plays in the clutch, using his legs effectively. They've looked a little different every week, a little bit better every week. This week, first time they got a lead all season. They held on to the lead. There were moments in which they could have given up the lead very easily, but the Jets couldn't capitalize.

And then the Malik Willis sneak that we just heard ends it and ends the losing streak. Congratulations, Jeff Halfley, your first victory. Happy for you.

In fact, why don't we just listen to Jeff Halfley? We'll talk more about the game here in a second. But congratulations, Coach Halfley on a win. Here is a postgame.

I wanted to win for them, Omar.

I wanted them to feel this. All the hard work, all the things that we've been asking them to do since OTAs and just stay into the process. The important thing for me was for them to feel this moment. And that's what I told them.

In the locker room.

I mean, it was really cool being in there with them there. That's one I know we'll all remember as we build this thing, that feeling that we just had in the locker room.

But that's what it was all about for me.

I just wanted it so badly for them because they deserve it.

A nice game for Ali Gordon finishes with over 100 yards. Caleb Douglas had two catches for 70 yards and two touchdowns as the rookie looked explosive there. And you kind of see, as you were talking about, what could be promised for the Miami Dolphins on the other side. That's a rough one for AG and the Jets at home against a winless team.

Geno had an interception.

You could put it on the defense a little bit in terms of pressuring Malik Willis, but There was that's a that's a tough loss.

I mean, what it was is just not capitalizing on your opportunities, whether it was the interception that, you know, through which was down to the Miami 21. You know, you're driving there trying to put points on the board. It's missing a field goal early in the second half. It's, you know, not capitalizing on Miami being unable to extend their drive and bleed clock. You get the ball back.

You go three and out and punt it back to them. it's this is it's too often the story for this Jets team and I'm a big believer in what Aaron Glenn is doing I see the potential with them and I see how competitive they've been in some of these games but these this result is too familiar for this group they have lost too many games like this and this one's the worst of all because of who you lost to it's a division opponent so I get that and division games can get weird but it's a winless division opponent it's a team that is among the worst in the NFL. They are rebuilding. They should not be able to beat you in your home when you're playing well enough to win, but you're not capitalizing. And now

I look at the Jets' schedule, which has been a bit of a gauntlet when you got Green Bay, Detroit, Chicago, the Browns, and the Patriots. So many of these losses are one-score losses. It's 20-17 to the Packers. It's 31-24 to the Lions. It's games where you're like, you were right there. You had an opportunity, and they continue to fall short.

Yeah, there was a third and six from their own 31 in the fourth quarter. 6-23 to go, so it's their second to last. uh, possession Myers jumps off sides. It's a false start backs them up. The next pass is incomplete, uh, to, to aid to Adnan Mitchell. And it's just those types of mistakes, uh, that the jets have had far too many of. And, um, Another loss, maybe you get Brees Hall back. Omar Cooper Jr. has looked good. He kind of got up a little weirdly.

He's been dealing with the injuries in his rookie season, but they dialed him up a play out of the backfield.

A big part of this offense looks great. Just need to be able to stay on.

Yeah, you're getting contributions from guys that you hoped would rise to that level this year. Mason Taylor had a really nice day. Cooper had another nice day. He's been good since he came back from injury. Braylon Allen has quietly been a very good running back, but you're not at full strength in your backfield. You can see how that limits you. And overall, again, it's the details. It's just the little things that they're not doing right that are the difference between a win and a loss.

When Gino was not pressured, he was 15 of 17 through the air, had a couple of touchdowns under pressure. Numbers were good as well. Just have to take advantage of the possessions that they were able to get. And again, not being able to get Malik Willis and the Dolphins off the field, a problem in that circumstance as well as the Dolphins had 24 first downs.

Yeah.

It's just night again night and day gets referenced a night and day difference between the early season Dolphins in this.

Version passer rating is an antiquated metric and I understand that but you want to know what Malik Willis is passer rating was today.

130.7 including a touchdown pass to Douglas Caleb Douglas let's listen to that second eight And that was another one of those plays. An example of random nasty tackling from the Jets. Or where Douglas just gets missed. I mean, he's in a phone booth. Doesn't necessarily make a move. He just hits the sideline. Defender falls down. What's the name of your favorite defender? The most preferential defender that always exists in the field. Sammy Sideline.

Knock him out of bounds.

Try.

Nope.

Not a lot of try there as the Jets fall. To the Miami Dolphins, 28-25. Let's get to the Broncos and the Cardinals in the desert. An opportunity to see Bo Nix back running the ball.

Boy, did he ever. Second and seven from the Denver 38. Shotgun snap to Bo Nix. Protection is good.

Now Bo climbs the pocket and can run forever.

Bo's at midfield. 40, 40, 35, 30.

Bo Nix, 25, 20, 15, 10, 5. Bo Nix to the end zone. Touchdown, Denver.

62-yard run for a touchdown.

When I said climbs the pocket and can run forever, that was the truth.

Also gets a nice blocking from his teammate all the way down the field.

62 yards. The note I had from this game shook. Explosives, explosives, explosives.

The Broncos brought a jar of Simtex to the desert. They hit that scramble. There was another 52-yard reception by R.J.

Harvey.

If it were another season on another team in another universe, you'd be like, oh, nice offensive output for the Broncos. But you pull back a little bit. Nix was 15 of 29 for 222 yards. Even with the explosives, I still have concerns about the Denver Broncos offense.

And 52 yards of that was a screen pass to RJ Harvey, who did all the work. So the devil is in the details, folks. And yeah, I mean, I'm happy that the Broncos put 30 points on the board because this is an offense that was one of the lowest ceiling operations in the entire NFL. And so they did put some points on the board. I'm happy for Broncos fans that they got to see some scoring. They got to see Bo Nix take off for that touchdown that we just played. Well, I thought that play really perfectly defined exactly where both of these teams are right now in this season, which is Bo Nix has not been scrambling. So why would we as the Cardinals defense respect the scramble here? We're going to play match quarters

and we're just going to latch on to the guy that enters our zone and do our job. Well, doing that in the lack of awareness leaves the open space for Bo Nix to go on this long run there. You can see a few defenders. They don't get within four yards of him, but they're there and could make the play take the angle. It's not there. And then on the flip side, it's so surprising for Bo Nix to do that and watch that happen because he just has not scrambled this year. So it's a good sign for them. It's a breath of fresh air and a bit of a relief for the Broncos and their fans who have watched this offense grind through these games and openly wondered, including on this show, whether Sean Payton is just straight up done with Bo Nix because he's run

out of patience. I don't think he's going to be after today. Still not good when your quarterback leads you in rushing. And 62 of his 73 yards come on one run.

Yeah, he had a negative four completion percentage over expected. They were three of 11 on third down. Good thing he had the explosives. And it's always odd when people are like, well, you take away all the great plays that didn't make any good plays. No, that's not specifically what I'm saying. It was just the only thing keeping things afloat. On the other side, my takeaway is for the— the Arizona Cardinals, Jalen Brooks is going to have more targets than Marvin Harrison Jr.

Did through his period.

But one of his catches led us to one of the more frustrating sequences of football I have ever seen. A lot of people were introduced to the small-time author Homer with the story of the Odyssey and Odysseus. In the post-Trojan War, all the trials and tribulations he navigated. So Brooks catches one, and they get a first and goal at the one-yard line. They score here, they get an onside kick, they're right back in.

Because it was getting kind of nasty in a good way.

So they get a DPI on a pass attempt to Trey McBride. Nobody hurt there. First and goal again. Yes.

Play action rollout.

I don't know if the Broncos defense or Michael Wilson or whatever, but he and Trey McBride run in the same exact place. There's nothing for Jacoby to do with the football. So second down. Then there's a straight up fade to McBride again, but that's doomed. Problem is there's a pass interference on Jadae Barron. So it's first and goal again.

Again.

Then they run a sneak. They get zero yards on that. Then they go play action. Nobody blocks Q Robinson. And so Jacoby has nothing to do. He dirts that. Then there's a back shoulder fade to Michael Wilson that's doomed. And then you got sacked on the other play. So they've lost yards.

What is it?

Fourth and what?

Fourth down and six from the six yard line.

And where did you start?

You started the first to go.

You had multiple first to goals.

At the one.

Seven plays, minus five yards, zero points.

It was the most harrowing goal to go situation I have ever seen in a rough one for the Arizona Cardinals.

And the worst part about it is the final play of that sequence, which is Jacoby dropping back, ready to let it rip, knows that there is no tomorrow. I must throw this ball in the end zone. And it gets batted down at the line of scrimmage, which I thought just captured the entire day for the Cardinals offense and what they were dealing against the Denver defense that only continues to improve despite missing some guys in the back end. They're still very good. Their pressure rate. 50.9%.

The pressures generated by some of these players insane. Nick Benito, 13 pressures, nine quick pressures. He's playing at a completely different level than anybody else in the NFL right now. I think so for the most part, Miles Garrett has not played this year except for week one. So that's, To TBD, to be determined there. Zach Allen, five pressures.

Malcolm Roach, four pressures. Jonathan Cooper, four pressures. Quick pressures in this category. Two for Roach, three for Cooper. Two for Q Robinson, two for Alex Singleton. Alex Singleton had 19 tackles. This defense is really good. It's really good. And if the offense could just be average, we'd be talking about this team as one of the best in the NFL.

And so the Broncos, again, a world of concern in Colorado right now.

They've won three straight games. They've got the Kansas City Chiefs.

And it's crisis mode.

At home at 425 next week. And if you're Arizona, cheer up. You got the Dallas Cowboys next week. What do we have next? Sunday Night Football.

Sam trying to get his players aligned. Two tight ends to the near side.

Wilson gets the handoff, looks for running room.

He breaks free.

He's going to go.

10, 5, touchdown Seahawks. And that just might be the dagger.

Emmanuel Wilson behind two tight ends and a backup tackle takes it to the house off the left side.

From 21 out.

And the Seahawks stretch their lead to 19-3 over the undefeated.

Soon not to be undefeated, Kansas City Chiefs.

Yes, the soon-not-to-be-undefeated Chiefs were actually the soon-to-be, in fact, now just defeated Kansas City Chiefs, at least as it comes to Week 7, as it was the Kenneth Walker revenge game all week shook. We wound up with the Manny Wilson game, as Manny Wilson comes in, has 24 carries for 100 yards, and the touchdown to seal it, but the story was a spectacular performance by the Seattle Seahawks, taking us to a place we haven't been in a very long time.

We're just looking up Mahomes.

Three-point scored games, like where Michael Pruitt scored a touchdown in the Tennessee Titans game, where he was Manny Wilson at this point, where Derrick Henry had a touchdown pass. You got to go a long way back to a performance where the Chiefs were dominated like this from the Seattle Seahawks, the champions revealing themselves once again.

Yep, yeah, and reminding us of how good this defense can be when it's at its best. You know, the last few weeks of the Seahawks have been a little concerning because of Sam Darnold's struggles. because of the concerns that you have about, you know, can they run the football? And tonight they washed all of those away. Now, we still had a Sam Darnold interception in a bad situation.

We still had a heavy reliance on Jackson Smith and Jigba in the passing game, but it didn't matter because, number one, they had more success than they've had in recent weeks. They were able to overcome that turnover thanks to Harrison Bucker missing a field goal, an opportunity that he was given just because of the Sam Darnold interception and return. And it didn't really matter more than anything because the defense shut the Chiefs completely down. You know, there's an old saying, I'm not sure who it's attributed to, but I remember seeing it in our locker room way back in the day where it said, if you score some points, you might win. But if the team, the other team doesn't score, you'll never lose. Well, they came

pretty close to never, you know, shutting the Chiefs out entirely. So it's just a masterful performance by this defense the Mike McDonald unit knowing exactly how to bottle up Kenneth Walker who did not have a great game for the first time in season 14 carries for 36 yards kind of a surprise to some I would imagine but if any team's gonna know how to stop him it's his old team and in a resounding victory for the Seahawks at a time in which I think they really needed it.

And Kenneth Walker honestly Nick especially with the injuries that Kansas City has had at wide receiver has been a tremendous MVP caliber deodorant for this Kansas city chiefs offense, where it has, they've been able to rely on explosive plays in the run and the past game from Kenneth Walker. When they weren't there, you kind of saw what it's going to take sustained offense wise for the Kansas city chiefs.

And even when they were able to get some of those homes and Kelsey magic plays and congratulations to Travis Kelsey now fifth all time in NFL history, in terms of reception, he hit that receptions. He hit that in the second half tonight in Seattle. But he and Mahomes linked up for a nice third down conversion. He extends the play. They make a couple plays and then you get a drop from Xavier where they kind of dooms the drive and in spots where Mahomes is having to make a lot of plays roll into his right roll into his left. seahawks sped him up in the first half leading to an interception where you just see how bogged down this offense has kind of been it takes us to a spots that they've been in the past

couple of years Right.

Deodorant's a good term. I would think just like papering over their weaknesses or their flaws because he's just been so reliable and so productive that they've been able to turn to him in the running and the passing game. And when you take that out of the equation, suddenly you get a game in which your top two receivers on the night were tight ends. It was Travis Kelsey and Noah Gray. Travis with four catches, Noah Gray with three.

Behind them, Kenneth Walker with four catches for 21 yards. You're not getting any production from your receivers. You're not able to move the football. Patrick Mahomes looked very uncomfortable. He looked indecisive because Seattle was taking away a lot of the options that he liked to rely on. And again, it all comes back to if you can't run the football consistently, which has been this Chiefs team's greatest strength this year, which is why they look so impressive. why they look like a favorite to potentially come out of the AFC and go to the Superbowl. When you take that out of the equation, everything gets much more difficult, especially against an elite defense like this. So what this really was, was a humbling experience for the chiefs who

basically looked exhausted and, and more like emotionally just beaten by the end of this game. But the good thing for them is it's only week seven. We got, we got a half the football season to figure this out for them and they'll be fine. It's, it's nice to knock them off of the pedestal of undefeateds now, as opposed to letting it run into November. And then, you know, starting to get the whole questions of, can they go undefeated? Well, no, they're not going to because they ran into a really good team that had a great game plan and was able to execute it well enough to beat them.

The really good team that had a good game plan was coming off of back-to-back losses. They erased that on Sunday Night Football tonight. Of course, some of the concerns over that two-game losing streak were the play of Sam Darnold. Up-and-down type of night where you saw the Prince that was promised in terms of Sam Darnold with a beautiful ball to Jackson Smith and Jigwood, one before the half, one in the second half. But you also saw some mistakes from Sam that kind of summon those memories of where things have been. Your view, Shook, of Sam Darnold tonight against Steve Spagnuolo's defense.

I thought it was curious that the Chiefs kept giving Jackson Smith and Jibbo one-on-ones on the outside and just allowing Sam to throw a beautiful fade ball to him. He had twice, one for a touchdown, one to set up what should have been another touchdown just before half, at which point they would have taken complete control of the game and essentially wiped the Chiefs from existence on this Sunday night. Instead, Sam Donald gets sped up because his first and second options are not there in that goal-to-go situation. He gets the happy feet, you know, the nervous feet that he's been showing when he's about to turn the ball over lately. And he throws an interception in the end zone, which wipes that out and kind of,

you know, again, reminds you, like you said, of the concerns that people have had regarding his performance. But I think overall, you know, they were solid. They were solid because they were able to run the football, you know, with Emmanuel Wilson hitting 100 yards on 24 carries. That really balances out this offense better than most. It's what they've been missing for this entire season. It's the whole reason that the Kenneth Walker storyline was a big part of this, you know, setting the stage for tonight. Because you let Kenneth Walker walk in free agency. You don't have a reliable running back behind him because DeJarian Price now on IR was not consistent early. You're turning to guys like Emmanuel Whistlin, like George Helani. You're praying for

Zach Charbonneta. come back at a level that can produce. These are all desperation moves. So when it's really nice and you don't have to be desperate when you can just get a hundred yards out of a running back that a lot of people had already cast off that balances out the rest of your offense. It makes that reliance on Jackson Smith and Jigba a little bit less like a parent, a little bit less glaring and allows him to still thrive. So I think they did a good job offensively. They took advantage of some matchups and some situations that they, you know, in those situations, they took advantage of those opportunities and cashed them in. And again, it goes back to their defense because if this is

a team with an average defense, just to play the hypothetical for a second, this is a back and forth game that goes down to the wire and they lament the fact that they didn't get any points right before halftime. None of it mattered because the defense shut the door on the Chiefs completely. So it's the mark of a championship winning team. This is who the Seahawks are and hopefully they can sustain it. And the way they got us to stand is by trying to continue to run the football well, which we'll see. And then also, you know, hoping Sam Darnold can cut down on some of his mistakes because they still do pop up.

Yeah, the mistake that you're talking about before the end of the half was just an odd scenario where Spags only decides to rush four from the three-yard line, about 20 seconds to go in the first half. Both Rashid Shahid and Jackson Smith and Jigba are open in the back of the end zone, probably Shahid more so because JSN needs to clear the linebacker. For some reason, the ball gets there late for both of them and they run into each other. And the Chiefs pick that off.

Just one of those weird decisions from Sam Darnold. I don't know, process or just execution there, but just an odd one. But as you said, the Seahawks defense was so superb tonight that it ultimately didn't matter. What do you think it was for the Seahawks familiarity with Kenneth Walker? Just the fact that the Chiefs, you know, on a single window game, I haven't really seen a rush defense like this.

Yeah, I think that's a big part of it. They haven't run into a team in this season caliber of defense against the run uh i thought nbc did a good job of showing some cut-ups late in this game that just showed how they bottled up kenneth walker more than anything it was a clear focus and dedication to getting to number nine getting as many hats on the ball as possible there was a sequence in which there's one play they show where he tried to bounce it outside as he's done so many times so smoothly this year against other defenses and as soon as he hits the edge you just see four seahawks defenders swarm him and cut him off for a minimal gain If you do that consistently, you can stop pretty much any running

back in the NFL, but you have to have the personnel and you have to have the discipline to be able to execute that consistently, which is why they had so much success tonight. I mean, there was never a scenario in my mind in which I thought Kenneth Walker would finish the night with 14 carries for 36 yards.

But that was the clear goal of the Seahawks defense is to take him out of the equation and make them have success elsewhere with other people. And as we know, they're thin at receiver. again, when your tight ends are leading you in catches and one has four and the other has three, that's not a good night for your offense.

And I think it was the first time that we had to see Patrick Mahomes tried to carry this team. And we saw how limited his options are and how he too can be made uncomfortable by a really good pass rush and by a team that can mess up the picture, which is what Seattle does best.

So the Seattle Seahawks with an opportunity, the, you thought it was a fun matchup for the Kenneth Walker revenge game. It is a Monday night football meeting between Ben Johnson and Mike Mack coming up next week in week eight. Cannot wait for that. The Kansas city chiefs after this one are at the Denver Broncos. So a couple of teams with relative offensive woes going against each other in the division in that one shook. It has been a pleasure to take part in this global edition of NFL daily stateside. and in France, Eric working all of it, mishmashing the show together. It's been a fun week seven, man.

It has.

It's been awesome. I don't know how many time zones there are between the two, between us here in LA and Paris, but I hope that Greg and Jordan and everybody else fly back home safely and that they enjoyed their time. And maybe they come back with like a trinket or just a tale of some really good food they had because those experiences are once in a lifetime, especially when it revolves as so many things in our lives do around football. So it was a joy to be a part of.

Yes, it is the wrapping that encapsulates our life and a gift that we get to open every single week here in the NFL for Nick Shook. Greg Rosenthal, Jordan Roderick, Eric Roberts, everybody that's a part of making this show and bringing it to you. We appreciate you, the viewer and the listener for participating here in our.

Week seven recap. And we got one more game.

It's a game that somebody in theory in the NFC East has to win between the Cowboys and the Eagles coming up on Monday night football.

Thanks for listening to NFL daily. We'll see you next time.

2026 Week 7 Recap: One Unbeaten Remains, AFC North Race and Paris Reaction!

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