Maye Vs. Stafford, Week 18 Picks & the 21 Best 21st Century Sports Movies With Peter Schrager, Joe House, and Sean Fennessey

(upbeat music) The Bill Simmons podcast is brought to you by Fandall Sportsbook. We are also brought to you by the Ringer podcast network. I put up a rewatchables on Monday. It was my 50 most rewatchable movies of the 21st century. It was my list. There were a lot of caveats to it, including, they were just movies I had seen the most times because of family, wife, because I liked having just a movie on the background as I was working whatever it was. It was my most rewatchable movies. Needless to say, people had some opinions on it, but I loved it. Anyway, you can check that out on the rewatchables on Spotify, on YouTube wherever you get your pods. We have another episode coming. I think we have two next week. Stay tuned for two. I think we're gonna do a mailbag episode on Monday and then a movie episode on Wednesday. So be ready for that. Coming up on this podcast, we're gonna do week 18 picks, Joe House, Peter Schreger, we're gonna talk about the MVP and a whole bunch of NFL stuff heading into the long weekend because I think most people have Friday off. And then, special segment, just recorded today with Sean Fantasy, my 21 best sports movies of the 21st century. This was not a me personally. These are the movies I genuinely feel like are the 21 best sports movies of the 21st century. As you know, I love sports movies, care about them, have been writing about them. My entire career back when I used to write and have a lot of thoughts. So Sean helped me do, we helped me basically react off the top 21 and then came up with a key save for the list. So stay tuned for that. Anyway, this is a very fun podcast. I hope you had a great New Year's Eve. I did as well. I think I don't know if my wife has showered yet. She's in rough shape. Shout out to her for surviving last night. Anyway, Pearl Jam's coming up for a second, we're going to take a break and then Peter Shreger and Jojas. The Bill Simmons podcast is presented by Fandall. Fandall's got it all. Same game, Parley's quick bets for jumping in lives. They have your way. Go check out your way. You can build the bet that fits your play your way. Plus don't miss out on the NFL playoffs. One of my favorite times of the year, all month long, download the Fandall app or head to fandall.com/bs to get started. Get ready for the playoffs. Let's go. Let's be 20 and plus presidents, like states 18 plus DC Kentucky and Wyoming. Game prom, win, out again, we're a visitor. rg-help.com call 888-789-777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut. (upbeat music) ♪ Go away, change your name out ♪ All right, we're recording late New Year's Day afternoon. There's probably some college football blowout happening right now. We apologize. We can't comment on that. Joe Hauss is here as always trying to figure out our week eight team picks some other stuff. Peter Shreger demanded to join us. He's in Tampa Bay in a hotel room. You just, you wanted to be out there. Explain why. Why did you have the eye of the tiger? We had such a good experience two weeks ago, but the pang in my stomach and in my heart was no Joe Hauss. And I said it there when we were doing the pod after Ramsey Hux, no Joe House. Well, we go on. We have a great pod. Maybe a favorite pod with you that were done. And just about every text I got was, it was good, but no Joe House. So this week with MVP voting being done, midnight on Sunday and coach of the year voting and a full slate and me being in lovely Tampa for the panthers, buck and ears. I'll be the side on reporter. I begged you can I get more airtime and you were so kind to open up the door just a slipper. Oh, it's always available. Yeah, that and so you don't have an MVP vote. I recused myself. You did. Why'd you do that? Did you, did you still have one for NBA? Yeah, I love having one. Zach got ready. And I call him a whistle about it every year. I love the responsibility. It's great. It became too annoying. Like I had a whole of fame. I was a whole of fame alternate voter and I would get. I would get. From like family members of. And like I was just a lot. The MVP thing once. Once I came over to NFL network, I was like, huh, you know, it's just. My ego says shit. I don't I don't I didn't need to do it. So now I could talk freely. I could throw any hot take and no one's accusing me of buying. Or anything. Well, how so you don't have a vote? I don't have a vote. I think it's wise. It's probably for the best that I don't have a vote. But it's the same thing as the NBA. I mean, it's like. And I'm not knocking any of their voters. But people think this is some, you know, it's not an algorithm. It's not. It's not like based on stats. It's literally guys like me and guys like Kyle Brandt. And yeah, I think like Diana has one. Like it's not it and it's really a narrative based thing where there's everyone puts work into it. But it's not like it's such a science. They could go anyway, man. Well, I think House, I think you would agree with this. It feels like the NBA MVP matters more. I think to the history of the sport, how we remember things, how we remember seasons. NFL, maybe maybe it's just a blind spot for me, but Brady has a bunch of them. Like I couldn't tell you whether he has five, six, three, three, that's it. Manning has a bunch. Rodgers has a bunch. It's just a little different. Whereas like an NBA, I know like Kobe had his MVP season was 08. Shacks was, do you feel the same way House? I understand the point that you're making, but I think it's still pretty important in the NFL. It does. I agree. I think it is important. I just, but from the history standpoint, do you feel like it matters in the same way? I kind of do. I absolutely do. It still tells us. I was met. I'm wrong. It tells us a lot. I will tell you this. You could define the season and you can remember the year exactly. Exactly. For example, Monday, I was in Atlanta for Rams versus Falcons and I head over to the Rams hotel in the morning just to say what's up to those guys and Matt Ryan's there. And my son's with me is nine years old and what do I identify Matt Ryan as not the guy who lost a Super Bowl, not the guy that's a former MVP. MVP. Right. That's right. Yeah, that's fair. I'm an NBA hole. I guess it's just a blind spot for me because you think like with Lamar, he's got his two, right? And it's a big part of the case and there's some, I don't even think it's like rampant speculation at this point. It seems like there's some serious Lamar Raven stuff. I thought that piece in the Baltimore Sun last week was pretty illuminating and had a lot of bread crumbs coming from the Ravens organization time. Maybe think like just saying Lamar Jackson's available versus two time MVP Lamar Jackson is available. It does feel like it has more weight. Did you believe that story? Do you believe there's real problems or shrinks? Mike Preston's been working in Baltimore for 30 years and is a respected columnist. That was the first negative piece on Lamar that we've gotten since Lamar has gotten there, especially from the Baltimore media. So, look, I think everyone's pointing the finger at everyone. I believe that organization is fully behind Lamar Jackson as their quarterback. So, you don't think he's available this spring. I do not. What do you think, House? Why would he be available? How can you do any better than Lamar fucking Jackson? What are we talking about? There's like eight good quarterbacks in the entire NFL and four that are MVP level. And he's one of them. The whole thing is nonsense to me. They're some running QB stuff that I think, if you look at the history of this, we have, I feel that by the way, the same way about Victor Roman Diyama and tall basketball players. There's some stuff with the history of the, when you think about running QBs, like the hits that they just take the wear and tear of. -So you're saying, like a Ralph Sampson, you know, like there's a similar comparison. -Yeah, me. -Like there's career is the most successful talk. I we've ever had. But there's been a lot of talk guys who their careers were in the short. It's just there's a, you know, it's like a very tall building that you have to worry about. -You can do this with running quarterbacks in the NFL. You can talk about how Michael Vick eventually went off the cliff. You could talk about Dante Kohlpepper like famously like falling off the cliff. -The question will be whether Lamar can be a pocket passer. -I would say Cam Newton. I'm just talking about the accumulation of hits, which I think for quarterbacks, running backs, tight ends. But you could say that would be the case for sacks too, right, Triggs? -Yeah. -Somebody took a bunch of big sacks. -Look at the difference in outlier in this respect. I don't understand why he's all the hits he took in the Lions. The fact that he's still kicking is pretty crazy. -Yeah, but then there's David Car. And there's, you know, those guys that got the shimp on them early, Jim Colingham. -Yeah, and eventually, Tase, it takes his toll. One more thing on the MVP. I don't know if the NBA is like this, but you have to fill out a ballot, one to five, and you rank them. And your first place is five points. Your second place is three points. Your third place, whatever. So it goes down. So even if a guy gets a lot of first place votes, if there's a guy who's just swept all the second place votes, that guy might be the MVP, which makes it interesting because first team all pro could be very different than MVP, which is a head scratcher in itself, same voters. This has happened a NBA most famously with Charles Barkley, I think in 1990 where he had the most first place votes, but I think he finished third. Who got it, Magic? Yeah, Magic got it because he had the totality of the votes, I think. But it was same thing where he just, he just was on more of the ballots. I don't mind it. So it's, it's relatively the same no the way they count it. House, you have no dog in this race. Jake May, after the Matthew Stafford falling apart game on Monday night, Drake May was minus 700 on Fandall and point now is minus 340. And he's going to win the MVP unless they lose to Miami. I think it's how this plays out. Do you think Drake May is MVP House? I disagree with you. I don't think he's going to win the MVP. I don't think it's a fail to complete. I think it's going to be razor thin. And I do want to take advantage of this moment that we have with Shreggs to give us a little lumenate exactly what we're talking about here. He hinted at it a tiny bit there. It is voters. It's mostly media folks, right Pete? Yep. Most of the folks, if you can't, nobody's ever called him Pete. He's not a Pete. We're boys. Boys, boys, we, I feel like I can go a lot of way with Shreggs here. Pete Samper is Pete Shreggar. He's horse sitting there together. It's a great happy year. 20. Usually you do like PS or you have like, anyway, go ahead. But let's shed some light on this because I do think that the voting constituency is important to, I mean, in the first place, the betting odds, this market is insane to me. The idea that, you know, the implied probability of Drake May at minus 340 is like, you know, all north of 80% and Matthew Stafford, you know, in the, whatever, 50, I don't think it's those, those probabilities line up in any way, shape or form because you said this your own self, it's a narrative kind of a who has built some, it's just made the case who's taken more hits in his career and still playing at an absolute near MVP. Now, Matthew Stafford, this is, if this is going to be an award where we recognize in a year where nobody's really distinguished themselves, a career achievement, then that's Matthew Stafford. Because Drake May is going to have his turn. He's going to have his chances down the road. And when you do the strength of schedule stuff and you see it all over the Twitter machine, when you do that, even when you put common opponents, performance versus common opponents, it's a lot of questions. The last question. I mean, that was Drake May beat the Falcons and Matthew Stafford didn't retouch this stuff like that. You mean the miss extra point that the Falcons, the buffoonery, out of Falcons, the worst special teams in all of football. Yes, yes, that is one difference. I never remember a strength of schedule being this important to an MVP race before it. Because there's nothing else you can ding Drake May on other than, you haven't played enough people. It's not his fault. He's put, first of all, how many actual good defenses are there? Shrinks. Well, you got to be that guy. He's in Seattle. Those are your three and maybe Philly of Philly, right? Yeah, Philly. So he hasn't played those four teams. But other than that, like if he played San Francisco, guess what? Drake May would have put up awesome stats against San Francisco. If he had played and picked all the playoff teams, there's a bunch of them that he would have had really good stats on. You go through the advanced metrics. It's so convincing for May. It's almost like you have to look twice because the other piece that everybody forgets, this is what I was texting you about Shrinks. That's that sound like a Boston Homer. I honestly think this is crazy. His legs. The rushing. May has over 400 rushing yards. He's rushed for four TVs. He's rushed for 35 first downs. He's kept plays alive. I sent you all these EPA stats where pads have the number one offense by EPA. May is at the top in every category or in the top three in EPA. And then you look at like protection and the Rams are top three. The pads offensive lines like 26. May's had to scramble like I'm 10% of his place. Stafford's had to scramble like I'm 2%. Like May is running for his life and a lot of these games. He's threading the needle on these long bombs. He's had 12 of the greatest throws I've seen in the history of the Patriots this season. And Matthew Stafford has Pukka Nakua, the best receiver in the league who catches five yard passes and runs for 60. He's had Devanti Adams for most of the season. He's a much better offensive line. He plays the doors. He's Sean McVeigh. Like what are we talking about? So if you switch these two guys. If you switch them on different teams, are you telling me Drake May would have worse stats to Matthew Stafford? Like are people really think this? So House nailed it when he first said the thing about the bedding odds and the lines and the odds makers throw that shit out the window. They have no insight on this. None. They conspendulate. But I will tell you this Monday night, I'm in Atlanta and I'm doing the rounds, whatever. I'm kissing babies doing my thing. And some fan comes up to me and is like shrinks. Matthew Stafford minus 450 for the MVP is before the game was and he goes, he goes how much should I put on it? I go, whatever, move on. At half time, after three interceptions and being down 21, nothing. He was second in the odds to Drake May, who is now the favorite. That's how turbulent this is. Now I would also I had to staff for it sucked in the game. He was terrible. And that was an amazing way. Not a small game. I'm going to give it to you because of the narrative parts. Why I mentioned that thing with narrative. We're all journalists or it's boomer, a science and Troy Ackman. It's people in media who are voting on this thing. We love a story. And as much as you're giving the EPA numbers and you're saying strength of schedule shouldn't matter, it never has. We're looking for a story. So for Stafford, two prime time games in a row, his team lost. Now game where it was a easy slam dunk, go into Atlanta, his home, he's got all these friends from UGA, pretty comfortable setting indoors. Zero 21, nothing at the half looked awful. Offensive line was a nightmare, but he got sacked a bunch of times through the three picks. The voters right there, it doesn't feel right in a big spot to say he's the most valuable player. Now, Drake May has only played really two big games. He won one of them on Sunday night before anyone was even like attuned to any of this stuff. And then when they're up 21, nothing in a game that everyone's watching, no fault to his own, he dropped the ball. They have nothing to gain the two of them the next two weeks. So the next week. So Stafford could throw for 6,000 yards against the Cardinals. The Pats have something again. They do. They start to make a game as sneaky and they got to lock down the two seed. Yes, they've the two seed, but the one seed with Trayland starting is probably going to go to Denver. I don't think they have anything more that Drake May can do. And the stats last week against Brady Cook and the Jets. They look great on paper, but the voters aren't like blown away. The guy that I'm going to insert right here because it's not a two horse race. And on Fandall or draft Kings or one of them, it was 500 to one last week. Is the running back out of San Francisco, Christian McCaffrey, who in two back to back prime time games has been underlie the one on Fandall 500 to one. So I'm telling you now, don't believe any. If he against that defense in Seattle in a third straight prime time game goes for like 200 yards has two touchdowns. We're going to lose house. House is going to leave the pod so he can go bet on this. I'm telling you now I have another screen. Remember this narrative narrative. Everyone in America is going to be watching that Seattle San Francisco game. Nobody in America is watching Arizona Rams. The last taste they have in their mouth, whether you think it's fair or not, it is a three interception game against the Falcons. And for poor Drake May, the schedule thing matters in that. It's kind of like, yeah, that's been the story all season, but he didn't really do any slam dunk stuff to us in the big spots. In the one big spot, they go up a 21 to point lead. I have a huge, I have a massive counter and everything. Shrek said, but I need houses take on everything. Shrek said first. I agree with everything that he just said. I do think you house. I don't have a rebuttal like the problem for for Drake May is they just played one of the easiest schedules in the last 30 years. Like they did this. It's not. It's not about fault. It's a narrative award. That's all jerks. All right. If you pumped it into an algorithm and all this stuff, you might say it's a no brainer, but you could also say it's a no brainer for staffer. The fact of the matter is there is a small window for door number three. And we haven't given this award to a running back since 2012. And if you're comparing Sequan to McCaffrey last year's Sequan, Sequan season was better but Lamar and Josh Allen had historic seasons. Do you think Drake May, I know it's been a great story. Do you think it's an all time historic season from a quarterback? Well, I've watched every snap of Drake May's career. His team was terrible last year. Yeah. It couldn't have been worse. It couldn't have been worse coached. The offensive line was bad. He had no weapons at all. He dragged them the four and 13. I don't know how they won four games. So I'm going to this season, look at the receivers and the weapons he has compared to the Rams. Like everybody's like, well, he has Stefan Diggs. Guess who doesn't play every down? Stefan Diggs. Stefan Diggs runs, I think, 22 routes a game because they've been, he was hurt last year. They've been really careful about how they use him. So his one weapon, the most reliable guy he has, isn't on the field, maybe 50% of the game. I don't know if he has you care about other than maybe Hunter Henry. Henderson was the running back who didn't do anything for two months and then finally came on. And Andre felt like he was going to get waived six weeks into the season. And then the offensive line has been really rough. And then he lost his left tackle. And he lost his right tackle. And all he's done is just carried the team and been incredible week after week. And I don't know why that doesn't matter. When you talk about narrative shrugs, we've had this narrative with like the young QB turning a guy. >> A guy. >> My home. >> Yeah. >> It seems like 18, Lamar and 19. >> Dan Moreno second year. >> Rogers 2011, although that team was awesome that year. >> Kurt Warren. >> 2000 or 99. >> Yeah. >> When we've had the, I'm now here. I'm now one of the guys that sometimes has been rewarded with MVP. But the bigger thing to me that I can't believe is in part of this, the Rams are fucking sick seed. The MVP always comes from the one seed or the two seed. We've kind of established that. Like Shield did his MVP pod before that. He did another one halfway through the air and wring her NFL and it's like you have to pick the pool of candidates who will either be the one or the two seed because that's who usually wins. So if the, if the paths are a two seed and staffers a six seed, then what are we arguing about? >> Here is. >> His schedule was tougher and he threw for more passing touchdowns because he's Pukin and Kuhl on his team and Devonta Adams. If you, this is what we use for the NBA. How should I have used this forever? Switch the players. What happens? What happens if staffers on the Patriots? What happens with the offensive line they have without the weapons with the new offensive coordinator? Does he do as well as Drake May did? I don't think he does. >> I mean, the argument could also be pushed back to you and say that last year's Patriots were awful. They also spent more money than any team did in the history of free agency. >> Yeah, finally. >> We didn't spend money for 20 years. >> No, it's just that it's not like it's the same roster. It's not that bad. >> They're getting tray Von digs. They didn't spend money on anything. Kraft, do you have another 500,000 Bob? >> No, I don't, sorry. >> The keg is tapped. No, I just made myself a coffee, so I'm fucking flying right now. >> I see you. >> I'm flying a few. I just want to go for a coffee and go on through it. >> I want to let us shrug this. If indeed the McCaffrey thread rises to the four, who does that hurt more? Does it hurt Drake May's candidacy? >> Or does it hurt Stafford? We have a third party candidate who's going to siphon away some boats. We both, none of us here think that McCaffrey is going to win. I can't imagine. >> Running back, Moons last running back. >> 22. >> Adrian Peterson. >> It was Adrian Peterson, right? >> So I think that impacts, so if the Niners win, and we're going to do picks in a second, the Niners win on Saturday night. >> Saturday night, right? >> Yes, Saturday night. >> With everyone watching standalone game, I personally think that should slip coach of the year. >> Brable is the favorite right now. Brable's been amazing. He took a shit team that was really even worse than 413 and turned them into what he turned them into this year and completely changed it. What Shanahan did with that San Francisco situation is bonkers. >> Unblued. >> This is where I even have money on Brable. And I think if they win the one seat, I think Shanahan should win coach of the year. And this is like Brables had won the best coaching jobs I've ever seen of any Boston team from a first year guy. I just can't believe the Niners are even in this. It's impossible. I had the Niners two weeks ago in Indianapolis and I had breakfast with Robert Salah at the team hotel beforehand. >> What a fucking name drop from Pete. >> Pete Sneaky Pete. >> Going in again. >> For Pete's sake. Here's a name drop. >> Did you serve the one that the producers yet? >> I've been trying. I've been pushing. I think I think Pete's good. >> Anyway, I don't think so. Anyway, we need a sound something from like a radio, when I do a name drop. >> Sneaky Pete. >> Yeah. >> And he was like so proud of these guys. And then I'm like, yeah, no Warner, no Bosa, no, McEl Johnson who is their rookie. And I'm like, I don't know a single player on their defense. >> They have Kean White who we gave to them. >> Like a conditional seventh round pick. He plays every down. >> And it's not me insulting like Bryce Huff is their top pass rusher. >> Yeah. >> And that's not an insult to him. It is completely the truly no name defense. And they're not exactly the 2000 Ravens or the 76 Steelers. But when they have to, they make a stop. And they did that with the D Winters pick six. And then of course, last week with Caleb, where I hated the hook and ladder call because it eats up all the clock and then all of a sudden they're scrambling. But either way, that Niners team has been so ravaged by injuries that I think it has to go to jail. >> They were on like backup defensive backs on top of all the best guys they lost. That guy Williams was awesome for defensive rookie of the year before the year. >> I say John, I meant Williams, yeah, or whoever. >> Well, whatever. And then you have offensive line injuries. You have the quarterback switcher, Rue. You have some of the close games, save one. House, this, how much money have you lost on the Niners this year? >> I actually haven't been, you've been in the Niners. >> Yeah, you haven't been wearing that. >> I haven't been jumping in there too much. >> But Bill, I think there might be like seven worthy contenders. It's not a two horse race in that conversation. How do you tell, how do you tell Ben Johnson that, no, you're not in this. >> For coach of the year. >> Yeah. Liam Cohen. >> The Jaguar. >> So I would have Liam Cohen third right now. >> First year coach, first year offensive coordinator, first year defensive coordinator, first year. >> Other day. >> Re-abilitated, a guy, you give it up on. >> Re-abilitated, save that man's career. >> Yeah. >> Same travel horse's career. >> Yeah. >> Mike McDonald and Seattle, if they're the one seed, after firing the offensive coordinator after one year and bringing in Sam Darnold, are like suddenly they're the ones, it's, it's, and Sean Payton has an argument too with that Russell Wilson salary cap hanging over that team and they're the one seed. It's a great year. I mean, any other year, there's usually two coaches and it's like the team that came from nowhere to win this year. I think there's six or so, like the Miko Ryan's has an argument. It's a good year for it. >> Well, also a great year for the new coach there he has, one of our future staples. We had Jags, Pats, and- >> Don't tell Jets fans that. >> No, what was the third one? There's, and Shaggy. >> There's. >> Jags, Pats, Chicago. That was the premise for I love the Pats every over. I like the Chicago overs. The Jags were the one I couldn't get behind because of Lawrence and the Lawrence that we seen the last couple weeks. We'll see this week. This, we'll talk about it when we get to the picks. This Jaguar's Tennessee game is like pulsating. It's like a stay way to me. Throw it in every parlay. You feel great. I end the Jags money line and then, you know, Kim Ward hits somebody for a 78 yard touchdown. Lawrence throws a pick six. It's 14-nothing. It's just, something scares me. I think you made a really good case for McCaffrey. Just because of the core of the one seed. >> Grabbing us. >> Yeah. Also, like, what he was doing in that last game where he's clearly not 100% either. He's going to be what? Is any of our 400 touches house? >> 400 touches. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. That's like 400 touches is nuts. >> And a plus touches is nuts. >> A thousand receiving yards. It doesn't seem like he's going to quite get there, but- >> He's got 890. >> Yeah. >> I said, it's like what we were talking about with the Lamar thing. Like, when you're up on the 400 touches for a running back, whoever, it's just not a long shelf life after that. I remember when Aaron Schatz wrote about that. He called it the curse of 370 about running backs. >> That's cool. >> And the running back that he wrote it about, I can't remember who it was. >> Kim all Lewis. >> It was like, Chris Thomes, Jamal Lewis, somebody. And he wrote the piece and the guys career died in like a year. And it was like, we think this is the number. So I feel the same way about these quarterbacks to take big heads and then McCaffrey. Like, he's not going to be playing football in three years. Do you think? >> Well, see if he's healthy. I mean, I'm watching Derek Henry still run for 200 something yards. >> He's a physical freak. I don't. We compare anyone to Derek Henry. >> Jim Brown. >> I played Madden with my son who now can just kick the shit out of me and Madden. I'm actually going to have to go- it's like Rocky III. I'm going to have to go back in the lab. Get the eye of the tiger back. He put Derek Henry in a shotgun and just ran to the right. >> To grab the QB draws with Henry. With stiff harming Robert Spalane who's slower in the video game than he is in real life somehow. And was just cackling as he kicked my ass. And I'm like, Derek Henry is like eternal as a video game guy, much less a football guy. All right, so you have McCaffrey. What's your ranking right now? You don't have a vote. So you could tell us, one, two, three. >> I'd probably go Stafford May McCaffrey. I can't believe the staff. What would you have house? >> Same. >> Same. >> Stafford's numbers are astounding. >> You need both. >> He is Pukinacu and Devatea. >> You need both of them. >> How does that not strike strength of schedule? >> BS, you need Baltimore and Carolina to win so that the Patriots have three wins over winning teams. Right now they have one win over a winning team this season. >> One win. >> We play who's in front of us. >> I understand that. >> I hate the strength of schedule stuff too, Bill. It's literally the easiest strength of schedule in the league. And Stafford has the hardest strength of schedule of all the playoff teams in the league. I hate that it's becoming, it's like the 17th tiebreaker, but they're neck and neck. >> But wait, but that's the first time we are. >> I get confused with strength of schedule versus defenses you've played. I think are two different arguments. >> That's fair. >> There's only four defenses that have mattered this year. And how many of them has he actually did the Rams played Denver? They did no they didn't no, but they played the Texans They played the Texans they played not a huge production game. You played the Eagles Play the Eagles pretty early put up 26 on them If he's wins the MVP is a succeed That would be different than anything that's happened with the MVP He's a five seed because that's the wild card guys don't usually win They don't ever and here's my last case for my Drake May argument. It's like third and 70 on Monday night And they have to run a player where they were somebody catches it out of bounds. No staffer throws it Pukin a coup is so good. He saves it almost Makes the greatest catch in the history of football and actually makes the catch but didn't get a second foot in This is who he gets the throw to every week and build the play before Xavier Smith was open and Stafford missed them Yeah, I think Stafford's been good. I would have voted for him two weeks ago I even thought maybe last week I would have voted for him All right, I might change my loss. I might honestly listen. I might you made a great case I just think the switch to teams. How does the guy do? I think matters in this and the fact that May can move around and Stafford can't It's you can't say Stafford throws the ball better than May you can't if you watch May all year You can't say anyone's throwing the ball better than him this year. Oh, Completion numbers are insane. He's complete 70. Yeah two percent of his passes But he's also like nailing deep throws and he's throwing the guys that mostly aren't really open Stafford also had two awful halves. I mean that Falcons half was off in the first half against the Panthers was horrendous Yeah, it's hard for me to say that's an MVP season. I with you. It's hard It's so difficult. I'm so glad I don't have a vote But I also hope that the voters put as much time and thought into it as the three of us are right now because I don't know if they do Yeah, this is gonna be a two-hour pod now You know really you know as means house pretending he cares about the history of the NFL MVP house who won the 1997 NBA MVP know 97 it was the year after MJ left. I don't know Carmel one remember yeah Carmel one one who won the 1997 NFL MVP Nobody knows I'll tell you right now far I could do it. Yeah far I could do that What NFL? Yeah, NFL MVP two thousand tit manning Rich Ganon That's the thing with the NFL MVP has some stinkers Let's be fair. I'll do respect to Rich Ganon, but come on. We have Steve Nash on back to back in Shack was in the fucking league. Let me just remind everybody. Yeah, that was tough All right, we'll take a break and then we'll do picks shrinks. I thought of another name for your running is pants segment. Yeah Shraggs to riches We'll be like your name, but two riches and it'll be like you as like a rich guy and then a poor guy just like a popper Popper on the street Shraggs to riches. We need to riches. I already have a richer eyes and can you get rich pop all there's two riches right there Bunch of riches the best one. What was the one we said was the best one Peter's principles Oh Pete. No, there was another one. What was the one where you're doing this? Uh for Pete sake Can Alabama play the kids his his you've been moss for Pete say where's Christian McCaffrey in the MVP odds guys 500 to one for Pete sake. Why didn't make he row haus his moment win moment of the year What are we doing Uh any before we do picks any other topics you want to hit yes I just watched this Indiana team kick the shit out of Alabama 38 really in the rose I wanted to I want to present two two prong question you won What is the comp for what this sygnety has done with the Indiana program Is there one and two if you're an NFL team are you not Breaking down the doors to get this sygnety as your next head coach if you're one of these teams that are looking to hire Uh, there's three there's three culture setter of college coaches right now, right? removing lane kiffin because he just took the job landing landing Notre Dame guy and then Indiana guy Freeman's going back for three Freeman's already reupped and And said some new contract them, but those three guys you would go after Indiana signed sygnety to an eight year deal, but like the money to me is when NFL coldens call and like these guys listen Um, well, it's interesting that there's no kickass candidate this year. It's not Because even last year was like basically you knew the variable sweepstakes were coming well then Johnson and Brable were she's coming This year, so I'll tell you because I talk to these folks the four names you're going to get are Jesse Minter the defensive coordinator for the chargers Jeff Hathley the defensive coordinator Uh For the Packers Um, Chris Hula defensive coordinator of the Rams these are the hot names and then of course You'll get you know other guys that have coach before or whatever you go through it, but like this is not last year where it's been Johnson Lighting up the league and it's variable and it's the whole thing. So this is the perfect year for a team to think outside the box and say You know what fuck it. I just watched as Indiana coach in two years bring this team from the most decrepit Program in sports to one of the best coached most disciplined teams. I would I would I wouldn't go young here. I would throw the bag at them Hmm Well, I would have said Atlanta was gonna have a job open, but Reheans fight and keep the job We're doing one of the teams are in a cover. Oh lord he's over here. Oh no Reheans is in control of the NFC South My question my question is who is the last great From college directly into the pros to make an impact on on the professional team Yeah, and Harbaugh almost doesn't count because he was a NFL quarterback ship went to the playoffs his first year, but he wasn't sensational after that Well, he was sensational this year is the Raiders offensive coordinator, but it's a different use of sensational He's now the higher him again North Western higher them. Didn't they watch it watch it and work with magic with Vegas Yeah, to me it's apples and oranges the best one ever with this was Spurrier who took over houses. That was forget what year that was 2001 and we knew it was done when it talked about how he worked for me to four they could go play and you wanted to go play golf Yeah, I had a facility by four were like this guy's fucked In 2016 there was a day it's over very relatable. I understand where Steve's coming from Um, yeah, I'm a poor guy with the comparison with signetti the name that I thought of and I I bring it to you because you guys are obviously sports fishing out of them bill especially you as a connect guy Jim Calhoun with you Cons what I came up with Hmm or Gina. I guess would be the other one If Gina had done the crossover like Bill Snyder, a Kansas major NBA out of nowhere Yeah, I remember how's that another one letter Hamilton they hired for the was From where University Miami or somewhere Florida state what the tremendous one like a year after year of super competitive teams at Florida state He's a college guy Jimmy Johnson's pretty good. Oh shit. Think about those. Those are yeah, they're going way back. Yeah I think if for NFL I would rather take a chance on a guy who's two or three years too young Then do a college guy. Okay. That's your Christian. I think there's a higher success now There's always like where he more is a Tampa where he was like too young he was 30 Yeah, but there's some other examples of getting the guy early and you'd rather be early than late Because at least you know like it's like a 15-6-hour job. What do you think is the best job that's gonna be available though Out of all the jobs well we at the first decide which ones are available because I think there's a couple wild cards right now I think we know the giants and we know the Titans like I have no assurance that that That Atlanta's gonna be available. I have no assurance that Mike McDaniel's coming back to the dolphins And I have no assurance that Pete Carroll's well, yeah that Pete Carroll and then Stofansky I think is a wild card tip Yeah, so out of those teams of the maybes and then you know if Tampa loses people here I'm reading the local newspaper when I was coming down here like I didn't even think of Todd bowls Which people are like how could you lose this season like that's a total wild card if the glazer is decide You know what let's start a new we got Baker or whatever If Todd bowls loses this game On Saturday that's gotta be it for him. He's one four string division titles I know but you lose eight of nine to end the year with a pretty talented roster I don't know. What do you think house? Come back after that. Yeah, and to me it's not if I don't I don't think about Tampa this weekend as an if they lose I think no chance huh? Oh house Things out they haven't covered in in in nine games. I mean what Five's like bad tricks. You're there. You're your feet on the ground. Well, we had our meeting with the Buccaneers today on via zoom and obviously you're gonna get You know the optimistic team but Baker said and I don't know if I'm revealing anything You know, it's like there's rules against what you can share. So here I am Baker said he's like, you know, we've had Control of our own destiny since week one suddenly we don't So today's vibe at practice was good. It was like loose. It was like fuck it. Let's just go and let's go do our thing like the pressure of Losing that finally they've lost that Carolina now controls their own destiny. So So they're going to play Lucy hoping to get back collage of can see hoping Tristan Werf's plays. And if you know either one of those guys, if they're hoping there, I imagine they're both coming on the field. That's a better team than they had last week. I think Baker is like, how so get this because he's an actual hockey fan. When the hockey playoffs, the series ends and the team gets eliminated. And it's like Brad, Brad Marsham was playing with a torn labor and five broken ribs. You'll find that out after an a herniated disc at his back. And it's just like all these injuries you didn't know. I can't wait to find out what Baker's injuries were. He has at least two. There might be something wrong with both of his shoulders. And there's something wrong with one of his legs. He can't run any more. Is that accurate? I don't want to be a dick. But like, you know, the gentle response to Baker is it's not suddenly you're you're you're you're two and eight over your last ten games. It didn't happen all all of a sudden. Right. Many, many, many, many winnable games in there. They were six and two. We're gonna we're do oh god. They were six and two and they had they beat the 49ers, the Texans and they beat Seattle in Seattle. Can you imagine they're missing the playoffs? And it's crazy. I want to get to the picks. But when we're talking about the coaching vacancies, what's just to assume more jobs are going to be available than you think? Last year, Vrayble, who I think could have had his pick, was like, I want to coach Drake May. And I think even use the Jets as like, you know, a little bit of a straw man because he was trying to get craft to get to the right place. And we're using a lot of people behind the scenes to hopefully get craft to see the way. And he did and it worked out great. What do you think's the best job that might be available? Because I think it's probably Baltimore. Oh, wow. If the Ravens lose on Sunday night, or if they get killed in round one and they decide to stick with the Mar, they something's got to change. And Harba has been there forever. If you could argue New Coach, you could see it differently. I would say Baltimore, would you say somebody else? I know you're going to say this is the bias in me, but there's a team with an elite pass rush, a franchise quarterback, and a left tackle on the roster in New York with elite neighbors at wide receiver. You can argue that you step into that. And the roster is there. And you can be a lot further along than some of these other teams that have salary capital for a pick in another top four pick, maybe a top two pick like, giants. And it's the, it's that logo and it's that market. People do gravitate towards that. You can hear that. Harbaugh and for the giants makes sense to me. And I honestly, Pete, Pete, Pete, you know this. I'm calling you Pete because this is. I've never been called Pete in my life. To boy. Cliff Kingsbury. First of the Pete main. I don't know about Cliff Kingsbury here in Washington. I don't know that that's a lifetime. They just signed into a lifetime contract. Did you see the stat Washington, the schedule makers gave him eight standalone games this year, oh and eight in those games. Oh, I watched. They did when they did the schedule. And by the way, I would even say this with my own team. Although I think we're set up a little better than Washington was because Washington, an old roster. There were some predictable pieces about it. But they should take into account the year after when you went from the super easy schedule to my dad and I were talking about the past schedule next year or the other day. We're like, oh my god. That's right. It's coming. It sure is for a firm thing that happened. Since an adi's mildly interesting, but they've won their last four and they'll probably they're cheap. But I can't say them paying two coaches, but I think they'll keep like they kept Marvin Lewis all those years. I want to go back. So Cliff, you're saying out you would say he'd be head coaching candidate. You would say that what the offense is there's no head coaching candidate. Well, yeah, offensive is an incredible situation. Atlanta is amazing. I'm both out of the ball. Holy shit. That's a good team. I couldn't agree with how I think that's the perfect talent. If they could do it, these special teams, what's the way the stupidest to how are they not a 10 and five 10 and 16 right now? Who's your corner? And the cooler next year's first round pick for another another pass for me. I don't have a first round pick. So who's your quarterback? Malik Willis. Lamar Jackson. Guys on the fence. Two greats. Two great answers. I think I think I think it has a ton of talent. They're very good on both sides of the ball. It's ridiculous that they're not going to be the winners of the NFC South. I can't believe they're not going to win it. They don't get a lot of credit as like a fervent fan base. That place was rocking if they just if they just had a team that could like I mean, it was amazing. Those years when they were going with Julio and Matt Ryan and all that. There was that place was on fire on Monday night and gosh, if Lamar was their quarter back and B. John in the backfield. Are you serious when my team played them? First of all, they were way scarier. Like to me, they they felt like an 11 win team when we were playing them. People. We couldn't stop. Was terrified of Robinson. You know, it just it's just hard to believe. You watch them last week at the Rams. I was scared of that game all week because I had had the Rams in the money. I didn't have to do in a giant head. She either way, but it felt like just a live spot for Atlanta. And yet they went full Atlanta in the game. The game was over all of a sudden it wasn't all sudden. It seemed like they were going to blow it. It's classic. I have seven games to discuss for Ringer 107. And I'm just going to list the games. And if there's a game missing, tell me, Bucks Panthers, Falcon Saints, Seahawks 49ers, Raven Stowers. We have to talk about those four. I want to talk about Bengals Browns because I have some hard thoughts on that Vikings Packers and Chiefs Raiders were the seven I was looking at for picks. Is there anything else house? I wonder about the bills just because I so Alan sitting I don't know what the Jets motivations are Mitch Trubisky. Doesn't it matter to the bills though? Doesn't wouldn't they prefer they can go from five to six, right? Or seven. Yeah, wouldn't they? It's a it's a question. I'll put it it's a high line though. So I don't know what even what you do with it. I mean tease it. That's one thing you could do. I know, but we can't do that for Ringer 1 7. Great. I before we even get into it, week one, my old colleague and dear friend Kyle Brent on a good morning football, you should say, week one is a liar. Stay away no matter what you don't know what the hell we're getting stay away. I think we gave team as a liar as well. I have no you have no idea what teams with nothing to gain are going to come out and play with their hats on fire like the dolphins did to the Patriots all those years and those meaningless, you know, you don't know, but I like to find teams that have something to play for and play in those paramet parameters. I don't know what the hell to do with Chiefs Raiders. Well, so the case you just laid out is actually the case for this game because we do know what one of the teams wants to do. That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right. And the Chiefs are five and a half. It's in Vegas. The Raiders points the last eight weeks. They scored seven, 16, 10, 14, 17, zero, 21 in the Houston game, which included a pick six and then 10 against the giants. And my question is, is it just Casey Moneyline Parley with an under 42 and a half thinking the Raiders can't score more than 10 points and that Chiefs have Michael Olo, a candy is their quarterback. It's all a doke. Is that just a game we should be looking at knowing that Vegas is not going to try to win the game. They do not want to win. I don't want to have anything to do with it. I really don't. How many Chiefs starters on defense are going to say that's fine. Well, we'll cross it up. You've also seen these games. I mean, I remember the Jets Rams a couple of years ago where the team has nothing to play for, but the number one pick, but the players don't play that way. Yeah, but they keep sitting all the players that could impact the game. I know. They must have cut a deal with Pete, the other Pete, the other Pete Schreiger. Yeah, they must have cut a deal. We're going to get rid of the rest of these games. Please, let's lose. We'll get Mendoza next year. And you could spend some money. You can stay and maybe they'll double cross them. I don't think I'm very used to that. Packers, Packers locked into the seven seed starting Clayton Tune. Yep. I had to sign Desmond Ritter. Yep. Vikings laying seven and a half. That's good. One four straight. Can lock down nine, let's go get it. Let's go get it. That's one. That's one. Love. Shrinks and the Packers playing anybody in this game. No, and their defense. There was. Their defense has been ravaged to the bone, and they're not going to try to play any of those guys on defense. I would imagine with a playoff game coming up the next week. They just signed Trayvon Dicks, didn't they? They did. I can't imagine. Yeah, I'm telling you in the football field this week. Can't imagine he's going to be picking the key with the passes off. My cowboy's fan, friend, seemed to think he was like genuinely terrible for the cowboys this year. Is that true? Yeah, there's a lot of stuff. Apparently, I don't know all the details, but there was off the field and on the field. Okay. Love the Vikings. Who's playing quarterback? I'm going to bold the Vikings. No, is it is JJ plan or is it our guy as a bro? Is it bro? Is it bro? My man bro? Sam. All right. Bengals brands. On the same side of this one too. I know already. Let me hear. First of all, Cleveland saw this in Aaron Schatz's thing. Cleveland now has the ninth worst debiolate offense of all time. And they have the tenth worst special teams of all time. Let's go. Then you have pretty like frisky at home. Not always reliable, but frisky and on the road, one of the worst road teams in a while. You have no Harold. fan in this gamehouse. He was like their one target. Since he waited DVOA, which they do that it's kind of favors the second part of the year or the last two thirds. They're 17th. They look good last week. This feels like a run it up. Let's try to end the season with good vibes. You know what sucks is yes, we are absolutely positively betting the Bengals at the last seven and a half, make it 10 and a half. I don't give a fuck. We're letting all all of a 13 and a half fine. Whatever you want. Let's all what happens if they go up 10 nothing. The Browns are how are they going to score? No chance zero chance. Yeah, we're all spreading the hell out of that one with my real pocketbook. But here's what I hate. Here's what I hate. The beginning of next season when we're sitting and looking at how the Bengals finish the season especially games. Yeah. Well, their defense got much better like that from week 10 till now. It is it's noticeable when you watch like they actually have a little bit of a pass rush now. They stop the run. They're different. Yeah. I agree. I know time 2021. They have won by 20 points two games in a row. They had that crazy ball. 24 nothing loss. Yep. Well, actually that their defense played pretty good in Burrow like single handly killed the game. And it was like sad. It's not the Smith burrow. Now he's happy again. There's some like Chase Brown has some incentive stuff in this game. There's some money incentive stuff on the Bengal side that you got to watch for. Yeah. All right. I'm going to mark that lock step. All spread. Raven Steelers. Where do you? It feels like a stay away, but it's also a playoff game. And I feel like cowards if we're not bidding it. It's Ravens three and a half in Pittsburgh. Winner gets the four seed. Um, there's a little Lamar definitely playing. Yes. The thing for me house is the no Mac half piece. And how how impenet the Steelers offense looked without Mac half. It was like nothing around in the red zone works anymore. Plus they lost the giant tight end. He broke his arm. That's right. They don't get the Rogers. Third and nine bail out wrong shoulder throws to Mac half anymore. This just out of the offense. And all you have to do is basically stop the run. And what are they going to do? I don't. Shrigs. I don't, I don't see a case here for the killers. Okay. Let's hear it. Well, there are underdogs, which is dangerous. Home underdogs. Rogers fucking lives for these moments. Whether you think he's clutching these games or not. He, this is this, he's not going to lay an egg here. And they are in the same exact situation before they played Baltimore the last time came out swimming from the jump and Baltimore didn't have an answer. Like this is the season on the line. It's, it's Tomlin. It's everything. And last week was horrendous and down the stretch. You know, here's, here's what kills you down the stretch. In February, you go to the combine. You spend, you know, a hundred thousand dollars sending your entire staff there to do scouting and March you do free agency, April you do the draft, you get Rogers and they, they signed Valdez scantling a week ago and he's getting the pass for three straight plays at the end of the game. It's like they were running the mechath plays for. They thought he was mechath and he hasn't been on the team and he hasn't been playing football. So it, that's what for now. It's like, all right, take a breath. We're home. TJ Watt will see if he plays the hope is he's back. And after he got stabbed, he got stabbed by Tyrone Taylor style. Yeah. So I, and here's the other part of it. It's such a wide open AFC. And I know you're saying the Patriots and we're talking about the Broncos and the Texans. It's like I could see the pep talk before the game. Rogers looking around the quarterback room of the rest of the AFC and seeing Drake May and Bo Nick's and Trevor Lawrence and saying, are you fucking kidding me? Like get me in that dance and, and let's, let's see what we can do. I've been there. And I, you know, so all this stuff is could be moot if Derek Henry runs for 200 yards and Lamar has run all over them. But I kind of like the Steelers in this one. Well, that you're supposed to because in the first place, when the line in this series is three points or more and it's three and a half right now, the underdog is 24, five and three against the spread. And, and on top of that, as an underdog against the Ravens, Mike Tomlin 14, four and two against the spread when the line is three or more. She's supposed to like the Steelers here. Man, does it hurt? I don't like any aspect of it. Might be a stay away. Yeah. Can I redo the receivers? The Steelers had last week me some Scotty Miller. Give it to me. Fire Moot led the team three catches for 63. Scotty Miller was three for 25 Valdes, Gantle and three for 21 with nine targets, three for 21. Jay Smith, John, oh, that's John, you're Smith. Forgot he played Adam Thielin get one. Washington, two for 50 and then he broke his golf for the year. Adam Thielin, two for four targets and then gain well three for 12. Yep. Are you serious? How are they going to move the ball? For pizza. For pizza. So, House, can I at least offer you a life raft with not having to go against the Steelers as a home dog? Let me hear how you do Ravens. Money line under 50 and a half points. Gets us eligible for Ring or one of seven stuff. They would have to score 51 points to beat us with Steelers in that has no receivers and a Ravens team that's just going to run the ball with the Mar Jackson. And they're not even sure I want to do that. But I'm just I would be here as Baltimore Money line over 32 and a half if you think the game can get the 33 points. I don't want to do a combination because we just did this. We just we just did we got a horse. Yeah. And how are Malik will us and Snoop huntly going to score 50 points? Well, there's a stay away. Yeah. I saw Shraggs on ESPN and his for Pete say segment doing the don't count out Aaron Rogers for Pete say. It's true. His MVP last year. Well, think is if they get in. So Rogers and Locker, I'm like, oh, if there's been this game. Yeah. They will have back next week home. Probably everyone card in the league. Let's go. So there's a case where everyone has money in the Ravens like everybody. And it's like the classic like January Lamar. Can I can I request think or follow what happens in the future? Can I get Chris Collins worth from you after a crazy Aaron Rogers touchdown pass in the fourth quarter bill? Can I get the impression? I mean, Adam Thielin should be able to be out of the league five years ago, Mike. Here he is catching back shoulder balls in the end zone. All right, we could stay away. Seahawks minus one and a half in San Francisco. Winner gets the one seed. They played a week one. It was San Francisco 17 Seattle 13. And then the sports movie version of this game. Mike McCarthy watches the video of him being a coward. Mike McDonald. Mike McDonald. Yeah. Sorry, Mike McCarthy. Mike McDonald watches the video of him cowarding out and kicking the field goal when he should know when he should just gone for the fucking fourth and one kill and cost him the game. Now is a chance to avenge it. I just want to point out San Francisco has the 27th rank defense in DBA. I know we talked about them a bunch earlier. But if there's ever a team to light the wick on Sam Darnold's candle, it's this nine years defense. Sam Darnold's under been under siege a couple games against good defenses. Now finally some subspace and being able to see things and they'll be able to run the ball and they have a really good defense, which San Francisco has not faced in a while. I am leaning pretty hard. Seattle here, Shrakes. Nobody has played quarterback better the last two weeks in the NFL than Brock Purti. I get it. This this offense is as good as it is as good as anybody has put on the field the last few weeks. And I you know Seattle's traveling all the way back from Carolina. They have a short week. Have to play Saturday night on the road. There's a lot of things to like about San Francisco. And obviously like San Francisco has a home field advantage in that weird Santa Clara stadium. Yes, that place was rocking last week. And I would ever see a football game there. No, and it's not candlestick. Trust me. It's not. But it's also not met life where you walk in and you feel like you're at a dentist's office. I would I would say the carrot at the end of this thing is the first team ever to be the number one seed and have a suitable at home. So it's like if we just can win this game, we don't have to sleep in another bed other than our own the entire way. And we could be suitable champions. And that's the message there right now. Like get through this game one win at a time. But she has to be the opposite. House to be like I'd love to be the 7 seed. I'm just on the road for a month. This is great. I love living out of her ribs or straight. That's that's what's your first. I don't think anyone needs a carrot in this game. It's for the number one seed. You have to play in round one. I'm not trying to guess incentives. I'd also add Cupiac former Shanahan disciple Sam Darnold Shanahan had him for the year like Shanahan revival. Rebuild it. Rebuild it. So there might be a I mean you could say that okay. that means they're going to be okay, but or the Niners know what's what the pros and the cons are of that. Can I add one thing here? McCaffrey looked fucking banged up by the end of that last game. That's that is such an X factor. I totally agree with this. The number one reason I want to take Seattle. That did not seem like the kind of guy who wanted a 35 touch workload in this game. He was doing it. So what do you think, House? The plank with the stretches where you try and get your hamstrings into your glutes. He's on the sideline doing that in the end of the third quarter. The poor man. I felt so bad. House and I are old guys. We know all the old guys back. We have done all of that. Hit me in the heart. I am pretty strong on Seattle here. I really think that this defense that can put pressure on without blitzing and drop guys back into the middle of the field. Brock Pernie lives in the middle of the field. He's what we just watched and he's going to have Kettleback. But man, every time they need 3rd and 6th, second, he goes right to the middle of the field. And he is incredible at it. But like if you look at the defenses, the success rate of the defenses since he came back from injury, all they've done is beat up on questionable defenses. The two best defenses that they've played were Cleveland, who they took care of with, with Cleveland being buffoons and Carolina, who also had their own version of buffoonery. And there were not incredible like yards per play numbers or success numbers for the San Francisco offense against those defenses. This is an entirely different level of defense. And Mike McDonald now with his ability to put pressure on, especially with Trent Williams. The news doesn't seem good. If he's out, then give me Seattle all day. >> You see if Kettle playing hurt, you're McCaffrey playing hurt. If Trent Williams probably not playing, you have a defense that I'm looking at the >> No name, bears last week. >> They gave up 38 points to the bears. And by the way, it should have been 45. Caleb Williams kind of gacked that last throw. He did. Guy was open. >> One of those touchdowns was a pick six. So they was 31 they gave up. >> But still they could have had if they scored in that last drive, they would have had six scoring drives, five offense touchdowns. >> Yes, yes, yes. >> And there were guys open all over Luther Burden by the end of that game. You thought he was jerseys. >> They did it more. >> They jumping. >> He's crying. >> Open. >> So you have Seattle who can go, they can go big, they can go smaller, they can control the ball. I don't want to bet on Darnell that I play off game when he's going against an awesome defense. I'm just telling you now, I'm not doing that. >> Me either. >> That is a throw. >> No, sir. >> For me, no thank you. >> But when he's going against a flimsy defense, I don't mind Sam Darnell. Sam Darnell's put a big stats against bad defenses. And I just think with the health shrinks, I think you're getting out voted on this one. >> All right. Winning in last year's, if they win against Detroit in a big spot, Sam Darnell's team gets the one seeding, gets a week off and then can just rest everybody. And you remember what happened on that Sunday night to Detroit? I'm not, I'm a Sam Darnell fan and I think he is, he is, I mean, look at his wins the last two years. This guy can play. But Purdy and these games. >> But we're getting the Darnell's redemption. >> Brock Purdy's a robot in these games. He is like from another planet. He's, he's, he's terminator two. I, I don't know, man. Look at the quarterbacks. I look at the coaches. I look at the big game experience. Give me San Francisco at home. >> Pretty good. Pretty good. >> All right. We'll see who's right. Because House and I are jumping on Seattle. Jumping on him. Atlanta and the Saints. >> Such fun games. >> Three. Two best teams in the NFC South. >> Unbelievable. >> If Atlanta wins, Carolina quenches the NFC South. Now, Carolina Tampa, that's the last game we're talking about. I love the Falcons in this game. When they scratched, I love them before they scratched a lobby. When they scratched a lobby, he had to be kidding me. Because I've actually watched a lot of the Saints. House and I have quietly been betting Saints games and mostly in the Saints. They lost Vela who was actually really coming up for them. >> Yeah. >> And then everything moved to a lobby who all of a sudden looked like a top five guy again. Now he's out. I just, there are no weapons anymore. And Tyler Schuck, it's like, I didn't know how he was doing it to begin with. And then that's Atlanta team. This would just be the most Atlanta game ever to beat the Saints. By the way, with the Saints, they proved what they want to prove. They have hope for next year. It actually makes sense for them not to care about this game. I love Falcons by three. This is a classic Falcons gamehouse. >> Sure. >> Thanks. >> Sure, thanks. I want you to help us. Because the only thing that concerns me is, Schuck has played his way legitimately into the offensive rookie of the year conversation. >> He's winning it. It's over. He won. >> Wow. Okay. >> Wow. >> Well, there you go. >> Who would be the alternative? >> All right, everybody has it's tent. You know, tent, tent, no. It's Schuck. >> I'm just telling you, like, let's look, I'll look at the market while we're talking this through. >> I thought they were, they're like co-fabric right now. >> But that, right. This is what I mean. So, but Shrek's telling this. >> By the way, I left that one case for Atlanta Shrek's. >> Yeah. They're not the first one pick. >> No, I know. There's nothing, there's no tanking here. And their coach is literally have that to play for and their coach is trying to keep his giant. >> Yeah, like I am to meet their, because he's the nicest guy in the world. Yeah, and I also think they have way more talent than the Saints as good as House of the Buddy Shae-Jung has been. >> Yeah. You made it a great point, though. They've proven what they wanted to. I could see them saying, all right, that was awesome. Here we go. >> Yeah, great job. >> There also is a big difference between a fourth-place schedule going into 2026, 2027, and a third-place schedule. That's not like to be dismissed out of hand. There's a bunch of injuries. You keep seeing defensive guys for the Saints on the injury list. Like, you know, we're doing this on Thursday night. So, we'll have to see how that plays out. Because the defense has quietly been the thing. They've covered five straight games in one four out right now. >> And they've been good in second half. >> Yeah, yeah. >> And stuff too. Yeah, they're like shut down drafts. So, I'm looking at the stats from last week. They beat Tennessee Bay. Bolavi was eight for 119 at 11 targets. The next guy was Juwan Johnson at four targets. Pettis had three. Austin Jr. with five. Mata Vello with two. I mean, they got no guys left. If I lay in a can't win this game, give me a break. The other thing, it's just the most NFC South thing ever. If Tampa beat Carolina and they knocked out by it. It's just like, no, I think it's the other way around. >> It's hilarious. They need Atlanta to lose, right? >> Who? >> Tampa needs Atlanta to lose. >> Yes. >> But it would be hilarious if Tampa won. And then Atlanta won. And they got knocked out even though they won. But I think the Carolina Bucks game, I know where I'm going to go. >> I'm sorry. I have to make sure. >> No, it doesn't matter. >> If Atlanta wins, Carolina clinches the NFC South. No matter what happens in Carolina. Every bucket near his fan is a Tyler Schuck fan. >> Yes, that's right. That's what I said to myself to get this right. Bucks minus three Panthers is the last one. This is an I'm so stupid game because no matter what happens if you're on the wrong side after this game, you tell yourself how stupid you are. Bucks, we covered all the stuff with them. We saw this game in week 16. Carolina 23, Tampa 20. It felt like Tampa should have won the whole game and they just kept doing dumb shit. Carolina kept having drives. And then as House loves to point out, House's favorite zigzag team, the Carolina Panthers. >> Good. >> Six week seven. >> Bad. >> Win. >> Loss. Win. Loss. Win. They've done this for almost three months. How's you love this when this happens? >> Every one of their wins. They have eight wins this season has come as an underdog. What are they this week? An underdog. It's time to play the Carolina Panthers. >> It's an even week. They're unstoppable in even weeks. Yeah, look, this isn't either team could win. You might as well grab the points. It would be. And also like with the Bucks. Because I started the week and even like started this podcast, you probably could have talked me into the Bucks. But as we laid out how awful they've been for two straight months and how we don't know if Baker may photo-selfie. This would be an I'm feel stupid game if you lay minus three with them. >> They just lost the Quinn fucking yours. Their playoff life was on the line. Their destiny was in their own hands. Their defense has been horrendous. >> They're strong. And their defensive backfield, which was the strength of those teams with Brady in the last couple years of Baker. Their defensive backfield is just completely ravaged with injury now. I would add this from the Tampa side of it just having talked to bulls. >> Okay, okay, let me just say. >> He did and I talked to bulls. >> On a production meeting call. >> Big P. >> I just talked to bulls. >> Here, I'm sticky. >> They've got Mike Evans. They've got Tristan Werfs. They've got Baker Mayfield. They've got Levante David. These guys are like things who have been there and done that and to just completely shit the bed and let the season go to waste. There is pride in that room. And if this is Levante David's last game, there's something to rally around there. There's just- >> But why didn't they rally the last five weeks? >> I know. Exactly. back against the wall. I happened last week. All right. That was my that was I tried. Why didn't that happen in week 16 when they played Caroline. They should have been very proud to be Carolina. Exactly. That's why this is such a great game because you can totally talk yourself into the one. By the way, I don't really want to take Carolina. What's so crazy about it. I don't trust price. They were, you know, remember a book was like the rookie, the year lonely. Yeah. He was the only guy healthy. Everyone's healthy on that receiver's room. Now they got Bucky Irving. They got Tucker. They got, like everyone's healthy on offense. Right. They've completely gone into the waist baskets. 17 points against Miami. 20 points against Carolina. Here's my only other favorite this gamehouse when they played two weeks ago. Tampa had the ball for almost 35 minutes. Carolina, the ball for 25 minutes. Tampa rush for 169 yards. Do they just like run the ball down? Carolina's through its and bake just tell Baker don't be crazy here. That'd be my fear. This is why this is an I'm so stupid game. Carolina only ran for 101 yards in that game, which if you're going to make the case for Carolina, they're going to be able to run the ball. Mcmillan's back this week, right? Yeah. And it's an even week. Let me ask this. And Tampa has proven that home field advantage means nothing because they keep losing games at home. Should we just stay away? Oh, oh, oh, should we because these are two stupid teams. I mean, we've just established that they're neither one of them is the best team in the FC South, but they're playing. If we stay away from this, then that means we have to either take to Raven Steelers or chiefs Raiders. Why are you afraid? We just have to take the chiefs minus five and a half. Let me, why wouldn't why don't you like Houston? What are you afraid of with Houston? They still have a chance to win the AFC South and they're playing at the same time as Jackson. The Jags. Yeah. Now the Jags have Tennessee. And so Houston will be looking and seeing the Jags up 21 points, you know, you just lay in the case. I'm afraid of them because they in the second half, they could just not give a shit about the game, but they are also playing were highly Leonard. Riley Leonard is traveling to Houston to play football against the Houston Tex. I can't if the quotes have a lot of good dudes though. They still have like talent on offense. I just worry about Houston at half time going cough the dogs time to see what we got. Fair enough. Fair enough. Fair enough. Can I either one I was obviously looking at was the Dolphin? Shrek Shrek has a point. Let's listen to dolphins. Plus 11 and a half in New England with with I don't know. I just think that lines way too high. I agree with you, but the the Patriots keep covering those big lines. I'm not a stride with it. This is unrelated to the games this week, but it is something I've thought through the Texans right now would most likely be the five seed. Okay. Yeah. The four seed would most likely be the winner of the rate. It is the Raven Steelers winner. It's the Stairers hosting somebody or the Ravens right or the Ravens. Now the four five matchup is traditionally the wild card Monday night game. Yeah. I don't think back to back weeks ESPN is going to get Carolina or Tampa. As their Monday, you know, as they're on their slate, they have it this week, which leads me to Texans Ravens on Monday, Texans Ravens or Texan Steelers. I tell you this three minute soliloquy. I think the shaky's game with the Texans is in trouble, guys. Oh no. She tell Sal. I'm not told so. I don't think they're playing on Saturday afternoon this year, guys. All right. I'm going to have to make an executive call with one of one of the picks that you're allowed. I think we're right to stay away from Carol. It's such a stupid game. All right. Today's ringer one of seven presented by a fan duel. And here's what we're going to do. We've agreed on four of these picks. And then I'm audibly on the fifth one. Sea hawks minus one and San Francisco. Shrakes made a very strong enticing case for the four downers that was overruled by House. Thank you. Because we think the Niners are too banged up. We like the Sam Darnold against the fluency defense and the sea hawks D and we just think they're worthy one seed. By the way, incredible DVO A team Seattle. San Francisco 27th DVO A defense. So that's one. House and I both love the Bengals in a smash spot against the Browns minus seven and a half against one of the worst offenses in the history of the league now playing without Harold Fanon. And the Bengals just pouring on trying to confuse us for next July as we're looking at their division odds. House, is this your favorite game? I really love it. Yes. Okay. Next one Vikings minus seven half at home against the Packers and Shrakes is guy Clayton to let's go. Minnesota could lock down 98 for the season. They could lock down a five game winning streak. They could talk themselves into a half this had an happen this had an happen blah blah blah maybe we would have won 11 games. They had a professional quarterback. Right. And Green Bay locked into seven. They don't care. This is a let's not get anyone hurt. Let's get the fuck out of Dodge game. So that is one two three. Oh, then we have Falcon Saints. Falcon's minus three. Can you imagine it's going to come down to a Falcons game. The most perplexing maddening vexing team in the NFL. The Saints have just run out of playmakers kudos to them for a spirited second half effort, but they have nobody left for Taylor Schuck to do anything with Falcons. This would be the most classic thing ever. If Tampa wins and then the Falcons knocked them out of the playoffs, but don't win the NFC South. Falcons minus three. That's our fourth one. And then our fifth one. We're going to do the Baltimore money line in a parlay that house hates Ravens minus three napkins the steers. I don't trust it. Steers home underdog house laid out all the case. I just think the Ravens have a better team. And you take DK Meckoff out. I have no idea how the steers would ball. Shraggs warned us. He begged us. He told us to listen to him. Technically not listening or not listening to him because we're not doing the minus three five. We're going to Baltimore money house. You pick over 32 and a half or under 50 and a half. And I want responsibility for this. Which one you pick means that there came a 10 game. It's a 13. Do all right. So we're going Ravens money line under 50 and a half points. Yeah. How is this game going to have 51 points? How do any of these games do this? I mean, they're coming as new puntley last week. You know exactly. Those are the ringer one of seven picks for week 18. All lines are lines that could potentially change unfandle wanted to mention that. What was your favorite picture? Eggs Cincinnati. I like to Cincinnati. I feel good. They're they're vibe in the right way. And I think Cleveland had their had their moment last week. Beat the Steelers. Super bowl. Yeah. They'll get the sack too. The Joe Joe fee will go down. We'll get the sack for miles. As an aside, I am getting text from everyone in my life that this rewatchables top 50 movies of the 2000s that you just sprung on your two code 21st century. That's the blind. You just blindly dropped on these two cinnophiles of yours. Yeah. Arguably your greatest podcast episode. Oh, wow. It may be a deck. People enjoyed it. There's a lot of talk online that you have you are right now in the zone, like a Steph Curry zone last few months. They know it's their H. She H rumors yet. No, this is this is heat check Bill Simmons. And I know you don't have I know you don't respond to the Reddit thing, but they tag me in everything. And the pendulum has completely swung back that they're all in. They're all in on. They don't know how that gave up sugar. They don't know six can be my best year. They don't know that we went to Germany two weeks ago. Yeah. We went house and I keep flying in Germany and get in there. Sneaky Germany. That's pretty good. It was like blood spinning blood spinning. Yes. That's my next move. I think I'm ready to say that I was a split image with Lena Dunham last time. I was on the podcast, which I don't know how to take that's I just don't like the meanness. I mean, that's funny. That's funny. I like it too. Did you wait? When does your no sugar? No, when is all that started five days? Why do you think why do you think I've been on fire at the sole podcast? What'd you eat after all the drinking yesterday? What do you mean? You were on a bar crawl. What did you eat at the end of the bar crawl? You didn't have a mother fucker. No, we ate some stuff. It wasn't but no dessert. Nothing. It was fine. What about? I will say I did have a slices. I did have a margarita last time. I should have a sugar in it. Yeah, that definitely has sugar in it. It's good. It was not skinny girl. It's good. House. You're just jealous. I'm not jealous. I'm not jealous. I'm not jealous. I'm just a piece of the three. For four years, I was so focused on eating and being careful. House came out in December of 2017. We had launched House of Carbs, the Food Podcast, the episode with House. And we wanted House one to go to all these L.A. spots has to take a little bit of time. and I gained five pounds in four days with house. Beautiful. Including with that pastrami place. Oh, so goddamn good. We went to the patty-mail place, all of a sudden, I went off the wagon. It was like the guy in the sopranos started gambling again. That was friends of Christopher Maltesante. The guy who's not the guy who's working in the sporting goods store. No, that's another guy who went off the wagon. But yeah, house like I was doing so well. And then house was like, well, we gotta get a milkshake. Well, forgetting the pastrami, we gotta put cheese on it. And then I just have never, I've always been focused, but never quite the same. So how's your not getting anymore? Like you're having, you're in the zone right now podcast. I don't want to jinx it like a perfect game. But you've been in the zone. You've been fucking hot lately. I just think there's been good stuff to talk about. Fantasy, the thing fantasy and I have coming up in the second, we do the 21 best sports movies of the 21st century is just good talk. Can we pretty good talk about good content? A lot of good stuff. I'm gonna listen to it. 2026 football playoffs. The basketball has been great. We got winter Olympics. I care about the hockey. Have you been falling the rosters? Yeah, Adam Fox, my guy from the Rangers, did not get put on team USA. They have stuff Connor Bredard in Canada. I was like, wow, wow. I'm used for like 100 points. More Connor, what do he do? Marshaens on there, but it's like that your potential is gonna be incredible. Then we got World Cup. We got basketball playoffs. World Cup's gonna be insane. We'd WNBA lockout. Hopefully they'll fix it. No, it's like that we'll have like labor stuff to talk about. And so this is yours gonna have everything. Pusla Marjaxi can he trade in the Falcons? Drake Megone for a second MVP. Kirk's a knitty. The coach of the Giants. Have you talked to House at all about how the Wizards passed up, Cedric Howard and take trade Johnson? Don't do that. Go on. That's not appropriate. And Dare Queen. Dare Queen was available. Was it? The game literally grew up in the DMV. Taking Danny Wolf. My guy on the nets. My favorite player in the league. I like trash talk by Jimmy Butler. Call them white boy over and over again. Better say what he do. We know literally true. Why was that an insult? The nets are like in a panic trying to trade Michael Porter right now. Because he's ruined in their draft. But yeah, he's too good to believe that. It's with that a career reticence. All right guys. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. Great to see you. What do we want to do? We would offer bets. Shrinks, maybe for the playoffs. Maybe you could just pop on. I would love to. Is that a, you know me? I am a, I am a total glutton for the punishment. I get online when I come on this podcast every time I name drop. I cannot wait to join. Sneaky P. It's sick. Thanks guys. All right, recording this on New Year's Day. We just finished the first quarter of the century. Sean Fantasy is here. Pops on the rewatch. Almost time and time. Pops on this podcast from time to time. Host a big picture. Just did his 25 best movies of the 21st century. Always complicated with the 2000. 2000 doesn't count. It's not part of the century. People get mad about that, but it's just not the case. Well, you know, we did a pod on the rewatchables as well for your favorite, your most rewatchable movies of the century. And you, you shared that rule. But then you did pick proof of life. And I fucked up. I thought it came out on like 2003. It was December of 2000. So it was really the cutoff line. Now I would have I would have bumped it. Well, Zodiac can go right in that spot because we forgot to put in Zodiac. So you had social network at number one, which is what I was figuring because we've talked about that movie a lot over the years. But you had if you consulted me, which you didn't, you did the one filmmaker. One filmmaker movie for the West, that's it. You couldn't get to. So what was the big regret of did anyone qualify for? They should have had two movies on the list if you were doing it. If you had a two movie rule, I think part of the reason we did that was because I was, I personally would have put like five PTA movies on there. And if you if I was being honest about what were my favorite movies, you know, PTA, Fincher, Tarantino, you know, like Nolan, Wes Anderson, there's like a handful of people for Amanda, Sophia Kobla, who like our favorite filmmakers comprise like a lot of our favorite movies. So we did the one filmmaker thing, you know, as with all ringer projects, universe rising. No, universal acclaim. We've been told we're the greatest podcasters of all time. Everyone's really proud of our work. And yeah, we're being celebrated at the Rose Parade. We were on a float. I don't know if you saw 25 or 25 float and they were really cheering us on like big picture, big pictures. Those great congratulations. Yeah, everybody just really appreciates these lists and they don't get mad at all. They do. They do. People were really mad at a couple of things that my most through even though I explained the premise over and over again in the beginning. And people are still furious that movies like just go with it and a lot like love around there. Limitless, I stand by at number 16, even though it drew or borriest laughter from both you and Chris. In the moment it was extremely funny because you were naming you were naming a lot of movies that we know you love that are like sentimental favorites. And then you were also naming all-time classics, you know, Darryl Nied and and so yeah, Limitless is in that weird nether zone of just like bill. It's 3 30 on a Tuesday afternoon and he just puts on TNT and Limitless is there and it's like a warm bath for you, you know. There it is. Yeah, he just started taking the pills and waiting for basketball to come on and ready to roll. One thing I was thinking with the with the uh with the century from like not a rewatchable standpoint but from a best movie standpoint. I feel like five movies are kind of anyone can have their own list. The one that surprised me that wasn't on your list was broke back because I felt like the five movies from the first quarter that I just feel like would be on most people's lists. Our social network, dark night, there will be blood, no country and broke back. And then everyone else's list is probably going to look different but I feel like most lists would have that. Those were the five for me that I think as I thought back and then you start getting into like the spotlight zodiac op and I mean then it becomes a little more personal preference. But then it really social network dark night and there will be blood or probably the three because I think there will be blood as you talked about on the pod. It has the best performance of the 21st century. And then social network is kind of culturally maybe the most significant and then dark night is the most ambitious from IP. We kind of blinked at the last minute and flipped dark night for Oppenheimer because of the One Director rule but I think they were like neck and neck the whole time. Yeah. We didn't do broke back. I kind of psyched myself out on that one because I crouching tiger hidden dragon is the other Ang Lee movie and they're like 50/50 to me. Like those are two really big movies for me and you know a man and I didn't really get too deep into that conversation but you know like you guys just did broke back on the pod. That's just like a classic movie. It's just an amazing film. So I don't know what's top. You're right that there's some films that feel like totally canonical but also we're in our own bubbles right? Like we're in our own like to me the social network the age that I am the people who were involved in it what it meant to like what my career was going to become are all so feel so important. Other people see that movie and they're like this is like a biopic about a dickhead. It's not that important. You know it is what it is. Now that's a steep co-instory. Hey hey hey hey we don't know that we don't know that we're that positive yet. Let's see if Kyle Tucker or Cody Belinger come to New York then we can say that. I think one of the things when I think of best movies it's a combination of was to say great movie but also could this reach a bunch of people I think is this sweet spot which is why social network was so interesting because it was such an awesome movie but it also could appeal to almost everybody and was also rewatchable like it checked like every and it was well acted and it was perfectly written and perfectly executed and it just I mean it was one of the first rewatchables we did I think we did that in the first year. Yeah we did it was. I think yeah it was a huge hit it made like $250 million and it was at a time it's only 15 years ago but that feels unusual for like a docu-drama to make that much money and the rewatchable thing we felt that immediately going back for this project because the second I put it on I was locked in like just put my phone on the other room. Oh yeah. Just totally focused on it and engaged even though I've seen it dozens of times so but that's a hard needle to thread though like this is a great and important film that is also fun is really challenging. Yeah because I thought fan and thread was great but I don't think it has the same legs because I don't think it was for everybody it's kind of a weird rewatchable movie but it's like just impeccable it's impeccable we done it's perfectly acted it's really unique and original there's no movie like it but it kind of got lost as the years passed. But you think just go with it just like inches above it right just in terms of it you know you'll be watching it with your kid how old's your kid now she's almost five or you're going to be five years of age seven watch what happens and day of day Lewis actor of the first part of the first quarter of the century. I think the number one I think he is right I think who do you think is the star of the century I guess the easy answer is Leo but we were we talked about that a bit too like Denzel has a case cruise has a case you know Damon there's a couple of people who had like incredible 25 years street I would say yes street ped you'd probably have to break it down with Oscar nominations box office batting average I think would be big. So it's probably Leo from a batting average standpoint so every single movie that he put out either made money had an audience was done well done with a good director they he didn't have a lot of like those clunkers like that Jennifer who's that Jennifer Lawrence Darren are an after movie mother mother was called he doesn't have like a mother. in the 25 years. It's just like all either bangers are really interesting choices or like Shutter Island. There's no there's no like weirdo movie for him. They all had some purpose. They all made a lot of money too. I mean, even like revolutionary roads, probably the smallest movie he made this century and it's still I think it's still made like 80 million dollars or something because it was a reunion with Kate Winslet after Titanic. So yeah, I think he's probably the biggest for the future. I mean, it's Timmy's time then. It's happening. It's happening. Minis awesome in that movie. Yeah, but you move his head just covered. Moves the head. People, people like great performances. They do. I was thinking for actress. It's it's probably Streep and Kate Winslet and Emma Stone are probably the three that would be in the combo from success box office number of good projects they were in. But I but they all kind of had different areas. It was almost like basketball like whereas Leo was like all the way through remained about his relevant and never kind of lost it. Yeah, and none of them none of those three were like consistent box office killers. Like we did a key blanchet episode at the I think earlier this year and it's like she's made a ton of movies. Most of which most people haven't seen. But when she's good like when tar comes along, right? You're like, well, this is clearly the best actor in the universe when that movie happened. Yeah, but she picks a lot of artistic projects in smaller films. So it's a lot harder to say on the actress side. Well, you're here to talk about sports movies with me. I love sports movies. I wrote about them a lot when I when my fingers worked when I was in page two and even at Grandland. It was what it was part of my when I was trying to figure out what my column would be for page two in 2001 trying to figure out how do I be a national columnist because they was really like no roadmap for it. And I was like, well, I'll do to culture stuff. I'll do running diaries. I'll talk about fantasy football. I'll talk a lot about pop culture. But in the sports movies, I'm gonna try to be like Roger Rebert. Every time there's a sports movie. I was I did reviews of like summer catch like terrible movies. I remember man. I was reading them. I was reading them and I was like, no one else is writing about these movies. But then occasionally there's some really good ones. And obviously developed a lot of opinions. It's something I care about something we cover a ton on the rewatchables. We've not done all four Rockies. AMC Rocky Marathon on tomorrow by the way. So I asked you to come on. I sent you the alphabetical version of my 21 best movies of the 21st century, which goes from 2001 to 2025. You do not know what the actual order is. But I wanted to at least be a little prepared. And some caveats here. This is not like the rewatchables list was like these are just the movies I saw the most. I've no explanation for it. Some of them have to do with my family, my wife. Just what was on. What is what are like comfort movies. That's a different list. These are just the best sports movies in my opinion. So in eligible all the 2000 movies, which include love and basketball. Remember the Titans. The replacements. Bring it on in 61, which is a really good really good HBO movie that I'm throwing in there. Directed by Bill Crystal. All right. Honorable mention and you stop me if any of these were like, whoa, he didn't put this on. What the fuck? See biscuit? Million dollar baby. Keep going. I kind of hate million dollar baby. I know it did well in the Oscars, but I just can't believe people weren't more upset about the last 50 minutes. It's just so dark and awful. It is very well made, but it is impossible to get away from that feeling that you had when she just falls and hits the ring chair. And I break certain acts. You're just like, what the fuck? And then she's in tubes for 10 minutes. Then suffocates her to that spoiler alert. I don't care. I get about 20 years ago. It's the most depressing movie I think anyone's ever made about sports. It is a very weird movie. And so it was a very weird movie in the time. I remember specifically because it came out really late in the year and it didn't play fall festivals or anything. And it came out around Christmas and it was a big hit. It did really well. And it was like, you got to see it. You got to see it. And so it kind of like came in really late in the Oscars door. But now it's like, it loops forever as the best picture winner from that year. And I think Clint won Best Directed that year too. And it's like a fine sports drama with a painful twist. If we ever do five year Oscars, that's one of the first ones we have to redo. We've always talked about five, the five year role for Oscars. That's one where I just don't think that one wins again. And there were other good ones that year, right? What did it win? Oh, four. It was the O five ceremony for O four. I think that's right. Right? Is it right after Lord of the Rings? Yes. So it's, I mean, it's not the greatest year in the world. It's the aviator finding Neverland, Ray and sideways for the other nominees. Well, now if you did that again, sideways man, sideways would win here. Okay. Keep it going here. Bend it like Beckham, which I don't know if you've recene. And it's a, it's a good movie. It was, it came in a time where there were no, weren't a lot of girl sports movies. It's a movie I've watched with my daughter. It's soccer movie. It just has some major sports flaws. The, the lead of the movie, not care nightly, the other one, it's just not good at soccer. Parminder, it just, it just jumps out and every scene and they have to do these cuts. And it's like almost like when they have like a lifetime TV movie or like a bad cable movie or something. And there's like a high school soccer scene. And it's like it have to like cut it together because none of the actors come. I just have never gone over it. I couldn't put it on the list. Goon is a movie I like, but I've only seen once and has like, has a huge fan base. They made a sequel. It's fine. I think it it outpunched its cover, outkicked its coverage. I think you put on the rate 21. I've told you this before. I think this is the one on your honorable mentions that I'm like, this is the one that I think is really, and I'm not even a hockey guy as you know, but I think it's really funny and really like involving. I think it's good. I think you're right. I already have regrets. Okay. Coach Carter, a movie I've seen at least five times. It's a half hour too long. I really enjoyed it though. It's a basketball basketball movie. It's Sam Jackson. If it's on, it kind of gets sucked in. Big fan is the one with Pat and Oswald. It's like a crazed, was he an Eagles fan? No giants. Giant fan who hated the Eagles. I like that movie. It's dark. Invincible with Mark Wahlberg just throwing it on because it's got a bonkers Elizabeth Banks performance. She's just lights out in that movie. She's playing like a Philly blonde bartender. It's definitely a captain on the Chris Ryan for your life away. And all starts. I don't think I've seen this movie. I think I just saw Mark Wahlberg as a Philadelphia eagle and I was like, I would sooner drown myself. There's no chance I'm watching this. Well, it's one of those based on a true story. It ends with him blocking a punt and running in for a touchdown, which I'm sure it would have been happened. Yeah, it's one of us. Why don't you mention the hammer without him, Corolla? That's my friend Hedge, but that movie's good. Go check it out. If it's ever on cable, Corolla plays a boxer. That's a very fun movie. It's a good one. The blind side, which has a great Sandra Bullock performance, is a ridiculous movie and is now when we do on the rewatchables dramas that have turned into comedies month. I think the blind side will be on it, but I've seen it multiple times. I seem to recall thinking it was pretty funny. The day came out, but that's just me. Yeah. Win-win. Paul Giamani. Yeah, quality wrestling movie. Yeah, not quite enough wrestling in it, but I like this movie. The Fire Inside, which is a recent boxing movie that we both liked. A little underrated, I think. It kind of came and went around Christmas last year, but if people haven't seen it, it's a pretty good film. Yeah, I think it's worth watching. Finding Forester, I guess technically, is a basketball movie. You're the man, now Bill. Another drama that's now a comedy, but is surprisingly fun rewatch. And then last one, Grid Iron Gang, which you know, I wrote a call when it came out about this. It's just what Hollywood's giving us now. I'm comparing Grid Iron Gang and the Wire. Like Hollywood wants to give us this. Meanwhile, over here is the Wire. Please watch the Wire, not this, but it's still a solid movie. Anyway, toughest cuts. I have five Ford vs Ferrari. Where do we stand on this movie now? It came out a few years ago. It's elite and it's shocking that it's not in your list. I haven't spent enough time with it yet and it probably should be on the list. It's extremely good. Now, I know that there are other racing movies that we have to consider for your list. And it would be a weird to put like several Motorsports films on a list for you know, you're not a Motorsports guy, right? Like it's obviously gotten a lot more popular. We talked about this in the F1 rewatchables. I'm not a F1 or Motorsports anything guy, but I love the movies about those sports. Oh, it's delivered. I think they have the highest batting average of any sport. And they were also really like an interesting portal for movies in the 60s and 72, right? Like there was like winning and grand prix and Bobby Deerfield. Like they were great star part movies for versus for us a double star part. It's bail and Damon both in like the this guy is at the center of this movie. I think it's really, really good. You should check it out again. Yeah, I like I almost had it. I kept moving stuff around. If I did it top 25, it would have been on there too. For the money probably wouldn't have made it either way, but from a rewatchable comedy, gambling standpoint, we just did it on rewatchables. It's hilarious. It's the definition of a sports movie. It's just turn your brain off and go for an hour and a half. That's sometimes what you want. So next one, board versus Mac and Row. We shyla buff as Mac and Row. I don't know if you've seen this one. I have. I have. It's kind of excellent. I don't know how rewatchable it is because it's almost like you'd wonder like with the documentary of this, it just had been better. But I think it's really well done. Oh, I know you have a really big relationship to tennis from this time too. So I wonder if still like the amount of money. that you know about the matches and their rivalry and the the way that that'll play to who played board was a just Swedish actor. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I remember seeing it and thinking it was fine, but that's interesting that you it's pretty good. I'm cutting that one. Hustle Adam Sandler the same man. Um quality. Good movie. I just liked it. Anthony Edwards is great. Yeah. I haven't spent enough time with it. There's a chance like five years from now. It might move into the top 21, but for now it's on toughest cuts. And then Boide's a glory was another one that I think I have a couple other comedies over it. I didn't want to have too many comedies, but that was a tough one for me. A movie you like, I think. I do. There's a trilogy of Will Ferrell sports comedies from the from the 21st century. And you got kind of everybody has their favorites, but I think there's one that is superior. Yeah. I probably could have thrown semi-pro and honorable mention. I'm going to do that right now, even though we've already done that part of the podcast. I think it's the least of the three. Yeah, it's still watchable though. It's fun. Yeah. But yeah, it's it it goes sideways a few times. I have some casting questions. It's right in that hot, how hard can we go for the hard hour era where it's kind of like they might have been better off just going PG 13. Ferrell's really funny in it, but it feels like at that point he was playing the same character in a lot of different movies. And it was it's just I don't know. Maybe it's age better for some people. Okay. We're going to take. Go ahead. Do you want me to share any other that you left off or do you want to wait until we get to the end? Oh, let's do that now because then now then we can take a break. Let me let me give you your fantasies left off list. Let's go. The iron claw. Now I know you have some issues with it. Yeah, but I think if you pulled the universe yeah of recent sports movies, that would be pretty high. I was a very big fan of it. I'm not it's not perfect, but I thought it was very effective. So I thought it was well done. I had just huge issues with how they bent the facts. I don't I thought they went leaned way too hard and I know this is a true story. And then just completely left shit out to the point that I was enraged as somebody who actually knew the story that they were doing. And I could never get over the guy from the bear is Carrie Von Eric. I thought that was one of the craziest cast and decisions of all time. I asked like it's just just bockers. It's like if we were doing the Victor Wimbledon Yama story and we cast somebody who was like 511. Yeah, it's like what are we doing? Carrie Von Eric's whole thing was he was this larger than life kickass dude who could go against Hogan and whoever. And then cast the guy from the bear. It's just unbelievable. They did that. I was like roughly 5.5. He is not a tall man. He was too short to be Bruce Springsteen. Much less Carrie Von Eric. Good actor. Come on. What are we doing? I think if you remove, you know, your your intellectual relationship to that wrestling history, then the movie maybe works better for you. It didn't they merge together two deaths into one death. That was another one. There was an extra brother. They just caught one dead out. I mean, which that's just how crazy that story is. Those that completely left one brother an entire brother out of the movie who also died. I don't know. I was like that's why I was left off. Okay. Keep going. There were two. Well, okay, one, I know you hate this movie, but I would a million percent put challengers on. I think challengers is great. I know you and Wesley tore it apart. I'm I can't stand it. I never thought you would put it on your list. But for me, I think that's a really great. I thought that was like an interesting modern take on a sports movie. It was like this is we're moving to go forward. You know, it's like broadcast news, but in tennis. That was I thought the ending was maybe the worst ending of any sports movie I've ever seen. Also, I mean, to be fair, a couple of years later, challengers walked so he did rivalry could run. There's a lot going on there. There's definitely some continuation in terms of I haven't really gotten it. I only watched the first episode he did rivalry. I got to keep going on that. I skipped it, but my wife, my hungover New Year's day wife is currently ripping through her right now. And I think is I don't know if she's showered yet. Anyway, keep going. And then there's two from this year. Okay. One, I don't know if you've seen yet is called the EFIS, which is a movie about like a wreck a wreck league baseball team, which is a really solid movie. An indie film that came out directed by Carson London, which I liked quite a bit. And it's kind of making a lot of the year on list for the movie fans. I was okay with it. I liked it. I didn't love it. And maybe I wasn't in the right mood for it, but it's more of a hang. It's not like a propulsive narrative movie. And then Marty Supreme. Oh, fuck, you're right. I mean, is this not the best sports movie since one? Like, you know, it's, I know you have another few more recent films that we'll talk about. No, you're right. But Supreme should be on here. Oh, you screwed me up. I was going through ahead all these lists forever. And I forgot to add one that came out on December 25th. You're right. It got it under the wire. It's pretty good. I mean, I think it's a very effective sports movie too. Because when, man, when you're engaged in the sports movie aspect of it, the ping pong matches, that to me feels like watching a rocky when I was a kid. All right. You know what? I'm going to have I have some bad news for one of the top 20. You're going to cut one? Yeah. I got to put Marty's Supreme in. It's such a good call. I can't believe I missed that. I'm glad we're doing this in real time. Listen, we're not perfect. No, everyone makes mistakes. No, admitting your mistakes and moving forward are some of the best things you knew. Marty Supreme came out on Christmas day 2025. It should be in the list. This is why I'm here on the pod. Just to say this shit. Well, draft day. I'm sorry. Oh, no, draft day. It wouldn't have been funnier to cut Maricopa because it could have been like the Ralph Cox. It's just like, wait, I thought I was going to the Olympics. draft day sadly is going to have to get cut a movie that she probably shouldn't have been in the top 21 to begin with, but it's so enjoyable has the cost. There's last great sports movie. It's got Chad with Boseman playing out playing. What's the playing Alvin Mac? I can't remember the name of the linebackers. It's actually a program. It's on. Yeah. It's got Jennifer Garner inexplicably as like a owner's daughter. Love it. I can't remember that, but I like that move in. I've watched it a bunch of times. It's not good though. And I'm happy cutting it out. I think it's absolutely terrible, but it's kind of enjoyable to watch. Yeah. Late period Ivan right man. Well now it's out. Okay. We're going to take a break. Hold on. I have to ask you an important question before you go to the break. Why 21 movies? Because 21st century 21 for 21. Okay. I don't know. So one for each century. I can cut one more and just make it a top 20. Want to do that? It's your list. I'll just ask in questions. There was a reason why I did the 21 because I wanted to do a pyramid graphic for my sports movie pyramid. There it is. And it was one, two, three, four, five, six, and it was 21 movies. I thought that looked better. And I'll make sense now. Okay. We'll take a break into the top 21. All right. The top 21 was some important help from Sean Fantasy. He reminded me that Marty Supreme was eligible. So draft day sadly got bounced as did all the 2000s movies. We just went through all the honorable mention coming in at number 21 Dodgeball. A movie we have done on the rewatchables. I was done on the episode. We let the fantasy boys handle that one. Very funny movie. I think culturally it's had some it's it's had a nice tale. People like the the stiller piece in this and it just feels like it's lived on. It's always on it's always on a streaming service or on cable. And it's just had a nice shelf life. It's it's Bill Simmons history core as well with the Ojo joke. You know, I feel like it's connected to your mythology. And you know, for me peak Bateman, you know, some people might say Ozark rested development. Bateman is it lead in that movie. I remember writing a calm about it. I didn't like it as much the first time as it did probably the fifth time, but I remember writing a calm about it. And it saw it in Hollywood and it felt like everybody was high. People were just dying laughing. But as the years have passed, I've kind of get it. All right. So that's 21 number 20 is the fighter. came out 2010. It's a it was a boxing passion project movie, which it seems like every male actor has had except Leo and maybe one other one last 30 years. The rock had one this year. Christopher bail Mark Wahlberg your girl Amy Adams. She's fine in this movie. She's great. I think this is probably the my favorite Amy Adams movie. Deep Massachusetts set in low. You know, we have like the deep South. This is like Massachusetts low is like deep Massachusetts. Like you're just everyone's got an accent. Right. Everyone has though you think you better than me. Look to them. And they do a really good job of just hitting Massachusetts in the right way. This is this is when it shifted in the last 15 years of if you're going to make a movie of Massachusetts use some locals. Make sure your actors really know how to sound like they're from Massachusetts and act like it. And this is part of the Renaissance. I have two questions about this movie for you. One, do you think bail passes the Massachusetts test? He's good. I mean, he lot. What do you this was another one where he lost a lot of weight? He did. He did because he's like a painter drug dude. The big issue for me with this movie and I watched it in the last year is they never really messed with the Goddy word trilogy in it, which I never understood. Just felt like the easiest IP. I remember seeing it for the first time, being so confused that they never dove in there, but it's this a very well acted well done sports movie. And probably this might be David O'Russell's last good movie. Yes, possible. I'm a fucking drought for him. I'm way more down on this movie than you are. This is like to me. Well, let me ask you this. The movie was set in Boise, Idaho instead of Lowell, Massachusetts. Would you like it? So, it's a fair question. I think when it came out, it was very well received. It was. It was. It was a Oscar nominations. It was a hit. I think the acting is so good. I don't think you can have a list like this and leave this movie out and a million dollar baby. I feel like I had to have one. Okay. So that's why I had a 20. You've got other boxing movies on here though that are better. I know, but this is like the prestige sports movie. We got to feel like I had a picture, but that's fair. Remember 19 King Richard. This is a weird one because I think this movie has a completely different tale if the Will Smith Oscars thing doesn't happen. This was like his moment. Finally it happened for him. And I think if he doesn't slap Chris Rock, this movie is just remembered differently. It's probably on TV more. It's kind of gone. It's kind of gone. Yeah, you're right. There's not a lot of legacy around the movie itself. And there wasn't as much at the time because it came out during COVID and it was part of project popcorn and went straight to streaming and all that. I saw it at a film festival. I saw it at Tell You Ride. And it was like rapturous. It was like, this is Will Smith's best performance. It's his time to stop. The daughters were great. His wife's great. This movie's good. Yeah. I know that was Taylor's great in this movie. Yeah. I came on the big picture and broke this down with you. You did a really big picture stages. I don't remember. What was it? 2020? I was 21. I can't remember. Yeah. But between the slap and the fact that it was like a streaming movie, ultimately it's what it kind of what it felt like. It feels smaller, but it's really, really well made. Number 18, Taladega Knights, the legendary Ricky Bobby. Just a really good sports comedy. That is a little low for this. It might be a little low, except, I mean, the stuff that's coming here, I don't know. This is hard. It's 21 years of sports movies. Sasha Baron Cohen's great in this movie. We haven't done it yet. I'm rewatching most, but I think he would win the movie. Is he sponsored by Perry A? I think he is. He's really good. This movie is really fun and they did a nice job of actually diving into NASCAR and, you know, using all the sponsors. NASCAR and Brae State very smartly and it caught Will Farrell and all these guys at the right time. It's just really good. How would you power rank anchor man, step brothers in this movie? Exactly how you just said it. Yeah. Okay. Me too. That's number 17. A movie that's gotten a little lost in the shuffle. It was this stretch from maybe 97 to 2005 where we kind of had these adult Disney sports movies. And you kind of always knew what you were getting when you saw the poster and what started they picked. Some of them were good. Some of them weren't as good. You would have your glory road with Josh Lucas, which was not good. You would have the rookie with Dennis Quaid, which was excellent. I think this was other than Mariko, probably the most successfully executed after I remember the Titans, which I think crushed that blueprint the best. But not eligible for this list. But the rookie really good Dennis Quaid. He immense his legacy is sports movie Hall of Famer first ballot, which I think he didn't even really need it, but he was like, fuck it. No, this is a really, really good performance based on a true story. Yeah. It's not just that this era of Disney original sports movies is over. It's like Disney doesn't even really make original movies anymore. I remember when they would pretty consistently was this, was this release under Boone Vista or Touchstone? I can't remember what the sub label was, but there was a time when you would get five or six movies a year like this from Disney. And now that's, that's also all straight-distreaming. Yeah, this was quite an era. And they all made money. That's why they kept going through gridiron gang and invincible. They kept going for 10 years, they spent 15 on it, they'd make 30, they'd make 40, sometimes like blindsided, which is crush. But you just had to make sure you got your one star, you had your good story, and you go through. I wrote a piece in '09 or 2000, maybe 2010 about, because you could feel sports movies starting to die. And we were moving to another era and I didn't know what was coming. But I was, I was wondering if documentaries were ruining sports movies in some ways that as documentaries were getting better, was that going to be bad for sports movies. And I think the next 15 years kind of proved that that might have been true. We also might have run out of ideas as the other thing. Well, sports documentaries are getting shitier, so maybe we'll tip back to sports movies. That's what we're hoping. Yeah, we've, there's no question. Sports documentaries have got a way worse. But continuing like our, now decades long conversation about movie stars, this is something that like, there's not a lane for Glenn Powell or Austin Butler to make movies like this. You know, like Chadwick Boseman did get his sports movie. Like a handful of these guys got their sports movies. But once you remove this from the menu for what you can do as a young star, like you lose, you lose something pretty significant. It's weird because they, the blueprint they were still trying even the 2000s. Like Josh Lucas was like a lot of guys now. It's like, could he be a guy? Maybe here's a bit and then he wasn't. No, he's a guy who is the voice of car commercials during football games. Right. We've a lot of Josh Lucas's now. He's been in some good stuff. Next one, number 16, air, the, the Michael Jordan shoe movie, which he's not in direct to by Aflac. It's a really, really good, mad, Damon performance. And my favorite part of this movie is the Ville Davis performance as Jordan's mom. It's just great. And it's just, this is, this movie is a really fun hang. I, you didn't like it as much as I did. No, but I do like it. I don't think it's a bad pick here at all. I think it's really good. It is really more of a movie about the world of marketing, more so than sports like athletics. It doesn't mean that it's not a sports movie because it clearly is because you kind of have to know what this milieu is to get the movie and get all its nuances. It's just, it's like, it kind of can decide to me whether it wants to be really funny or really serious. And like, athletics performance is hilarious as Phil Knight. Yeah. And it's kind of happening in a different movie than the rest of the movie where Matt Damon is giving this release and see her performance and Ville Davis is released and see her. But it is a fun watch. They, they did a good job of capturing the mid 80s, even with the decorations in the office. I remember just appreciating stuff with that. You're right. I felt like one of the Judd Nelson, New Jack City or the movie award. Number 15, Hardball. A movie that was hilarious in the theater for all the wrong reasons when I saw it. I think with Jack O right after 9/11, it was one of those where it's like, what's going to the theater? It's one of the craziest things I've ever heard Bill. Yeah. Yeah. Let's go to the theater. We're up both, but that, but, but this movie is aged perfectly. And we already did a rewatch of all his G babies death. I think is maybe the most iconic sports movie death of any of these movies. On this list. Yeah. Okay. And any sports movie in this century. Okay. Like Apollo Creed. No. Okay. No Apollo dying. Brian Sons. You know, there's a few there. Although Apollo's death did lead to the end of the Cold War. So maybe he died. G baby died for nothing. It's a really good point. Apollo at least had something good come out of it. What's more tragic? G baby's death or the fall of the Berlin wall. You know, it's dead even. This movie is very enjoyable. I also love and I've seen it a few times in my kids like it. Diane Lane just being in this movie is hilarious. She's just she can't believe she's in the movie the entire time. You have no idea why she's attracted to Keanu. John Hawks is great as like a scumbag. Anyway, this is a good sports movie. Number 14, Ali, a movie we have not done on the rewatchables. It's a great movie. It's it's on the rewatchables 2026 level. It's weird. It's a movie that could never decide what it was. It tries to basically hit why Ali was so important. But then it's compressing years together. It spends a lot of time of him trying to not be in the champ. But then all of a sudden we skip through fights. But you know, you weren't in two and a half hours. You couldn't cover everything. I think the first 10 minutes in the last 15 minutes of this movie are genuinely great. I think there are several, you know, chill inducing moments throughout the movie. And it is man trying to do something a little different than what he usually does, which I really appreciate. I do, I have thought in the past that if man and Will Smith made a pact to make a new 90 minute Ali film every four years, you might have gotten a boyhood thing. Yeah. That you might have gotten like a better version of this movie because there are times when it seems like Smith is too old. There are times when it seems like he's too young. Like he's an incredible shape in the film. But he's also trying to capture somebody who's uncapturable, right? It's just like the Elvis movie where it's just like you're not Elvis man. Like the icon of icon that person who is so inimitable. But Smith is good. You've now got two Will Smith movies on your list, which is great. I know. I know. You know, this came out in 2001. I was writing for page two at the time and wrote a bigger view about it. And it was Ali was still so fresh. I mean, he had been the 70s, we're only two and a half decades earlier than that. So it was really tough for Will Smith to compete with that. But he did feel like Ali in a couple scenes. Like he had that one thing when he's yelling at the reporters and he just kind of becomes Ali. I think as the years have passed and we have less of a memory of Ali or at least there's new generations that don't really remember and all that's probably better for this movie. It's really good. And it's Michael man. And that's why it'll be on the movie watchables this year. Number 13, damn, do you night it? Never seen it. Yeah. Michael Sheen. Just an awesome soccer movie. This would be my one if you listen to anything on this list that you have. and heard of, and you're like, what's that one? Let me mark that down. This one's great. It's like a Rags to Rich's English soccer movie. A Chris Ryan favorite. - I know, yeah, I know among the soccer heads, it's a big movie. It's a, I have an allergy to the filmmaker Tom Hooper, who made the King's Beach and Les Mis and Cats, and this is one of his movies. - It's a very well done movie. Number 12, everybody wants them. Your guy link later. - Yeah. - If not done this time, rewatchables yet either. This is where we all bought Glenn Powell stock. We had it for basically, what was this, 2016? We had it from the beginning of the ringer. We were like, Glenn Powell, circle on. - I think it was at a wrong time. - It was a 14? - I think it was 14. I think it was still in the grandland days. - Oh, one of the other. This movie's great. And it's weirdly not a days-to-dazed and confused sequel, but kinda operates as a days-to-dazed and confused sequel. - Yeah, oh no, you're right. - 'Cause it's 16. It's March of 16 right before we launched. - High school to college. Days of views, high school, 1976. This is like around 79 to 80, I think. Really well cast. There's some really good people that went on to do some good things, including Zoe Deutsch. And I forget, the lead guy, I don't think, made it. - Yeah, Blake Jenner. - He was involved in some controversies. - Yeah, he, uh, this was the peak for him. - In front of a whole Wyatt Russell in that movie. Wyatt Russell is outstanding as the like 33 year old guy trying to join the baseball team. - Oh yeah. - That's my favorite part of the movie. - This movie's great. The wrestler number 11, used to be number 10 until Sean Romani, Marty Suprem was eligible. This was, Mickey Rooks big comeback movie. Aaron Opski just killing it. It tapped into, if you liked wrestling at all, it hit this theme that was really important. And I think it way close to home for a lot of either dead, dead wrestler families or wrestlers that were still alive or wrestlers that were in the business that were kind of headed for this. Rista Tomay's great in it, but this is just an excellent sports movie. - I love this one too. Part of the reason, I hold this movie against the fighter a little bit where I felt like it was kind of using a similar tone and approach, even though the stories are different. It's kind of felt like he was kind of glomming on to some of Aaron Opski's style in this movie, but I really like it. - Interesting. - And work is great. - He worked again a little bit more, but it wasn't the massive comeback that we were promised. He didn't make like 10 award winning films after this either. And this kind of a great document. Also got to think about the shape he got himself into for this movie at the age he was as crazy. - The steroids all that stuff. All right, we're into the top 10. Number 10, Miracle. We did this on the rewatchables as well. Great Kurt Russell, great Kurt Russell speeches. This also made the 50 most rewatchables list. I did not like the idea of them making this movie 'cause this was the most important sports moment in my life, Namboston. But I thought it helped out. And it's a fun one to watch with the kids or people who don't know what the story was. It's just, it's an eternal movie. It'll be on 50 years from now. - I thought this would be in your top five. - Yeah. It just had that had someone's higher. - Okay. Was it in your top five? - No, but it's up there. I mean, it is like, it's kind of the platonic ideal of a movie that feels like it came out when you were 11, even though it didn't. You know what I mean? It just gives you that that feeling of like sports sentimentality, emotionality, where it kind of like just hits you when the moments happen. Kurt Russell's phenomenal in the movie too. Yeah, I like it a lot. - Sugar is my number nine. This movie's just awesome. I'm not even going to tell people about it. They should just watch it. - Baseball movie. - Baseball movie. - Yeah, it's a baseball movie. And there's never been a movie quite like it. And it feels like a documentary, but it's not. And it's just a really unusual movie. It's really good. It's kind of, I kind of came and went. I don't even think it did that well. - It was a small indie. I think it was a Sundance film. I, you know, the same filmmaker who made half Nelson and Mississippi Grindt, another sports movie. They also made that movie too. I think of your baseball fan and you see that there's just, Latino players kind of dominate the sport now. And you don't necessarily think about the roads that they have to travel to get to major league baseball. It's a really good insight into what some of them have to experience. - Number eight, Barty Supreme. Oh, no, that's number nine. Number eight. - Number eight. - Nice. - It's a good spot. - Number eight, Marty Supreme. - Was Draft Day a number eight? - No. - Okay. - No, I'd bump the wrestler from the top 10 for this. - Right. - We'll see if it gets higher, haven't spent enough time with it. I've only seen it once. It has this Shalame performance that if you're looking at all, the sports movies of this list has to be in the running for a best one. And all the actors, all the lead actors are pretty good. As I spend more time with this movie, I'm gonna know whether the supporting stuff and some of the gimmicky casting stuff, I wonder how I'll feel about it five years from now. It was fun the first time, five years from now, and I'd be like, ah, why's this person in? - Well, I've seen it twice. And all that stuff held up perfectly well to me, 'cause I think it just makes the movie feel a little bit more real. I will say to your point about it being a sports movie. So I lean watch it the other night, and I was doing something else. But I told her, call me in during the two big ping pong matches, 'cause I wanna watch them again. And the last one especially, I feel like it's just a lot of fun and really effective at this sort of stuff that we're talking about. - Well, it's one of those sports movie lessons in general, where if you're gonna do it, you have to almost be a psycho about the sports scenes. And Safty, you talked about it with him when you did the pilot. He was just a psycho about ping pong. Like really cared, really wanted to get every aspect of it, right? And most of the movies that end up lasting as sports movies, they go the extra mile. - They do. - That's where I'm gonna sit together. That's why I bend it like Beckham, which would have been on here if they had gotten the soccer stuff better than making it. Anyway, go see Marty Supreme. Really good, 2025 new IP out of nowhere movie. - Do you think that with all this consolidation in Hollywood, there will be finally an opportunity for the sports consultancy business that you've been trying to develop over the years? - But wait forever. Wait forever, if there's just somebody's come. - Even this one, I was waiting to have like a ping pong nitpick. Even though I don't know anything about ping pong, but I thought they handled everything really well. - I have no, I don't know anything about ping, but there may be like several guys on ping pong reddit right now, who are just like, "Marty Supreme is bullshit!" Nobody has that grip. - Number seven, Warrior, did this on the rewatchables. It's weird that there haven't been more really great MMA movies. When we figure MMA is 30 years old now at this point, and we've had so many boxing movies, and we're still coming out boxing movies, with Sydney Swini as a boxer, and yet we've had barely any MMA movies. We had this masher machine this year, which did not make this list, and did not make honorable mention either. - What about Never Back Down? Was that in contention? - Who's in that one? - There've been like nine of them. The original one. - Who's in the first never back down? - Never back down, so familiar. - Is it Sean Ferris? Is that the guy's, Sean Ferris, is that the guy's? - Yeah, Sean Ferris. - It's John M. Hansu's in it, Amber Heard. - Remember this in 2008? This has also been like nine sequels. - You've never seen these? - I probably saw it once, but it did not, in my prep, did not make it. - They're kind of terrible, but they're entertaining. - Warrior has Tom Hardy and Joe Edgerton. We covered this when we did the rewatchables about it, and a really crazy Nick Deltie, who's just a, just on the alcoholic scale, it's like a 10 out of 10, for him, who's played alcoholics and other movies. Edgerton's really good. And Edgerton's had one of those, he's like a Matthew Stafford type career, where it's like, it just wish he'd been on more 11 and 5 and 12 and 4 teams. And then he's in Train Dreams, who's fucking incredible in that movie. And there's years where he might have won the Oscar for that. It's not gonna be this year. - No, he's fantastic. He picked the wrong year to have that movie. - You know, he's a guy who I've always kind of had a little bit of an issue connecting to. But I think in this movie and in Train Dreams, he's asked to do the same thing, which is like really taciturn quiet. He doesn't have to give big emotional speeches. He doesn't have a lot of dialogue. So all that has presence and him being emotionally open, but not talking. This movie would be in my top three. This is one of my favorites. I think it's amazing. I think Gavin O'Connor is a great director. - I had a lot of trouble with these last seven in the order. This was really like the cutoff for me. Number six, Rush. I probably like this movie the most. - You do. - Ron Howard. Chris Humsworth. I think this is the best he's ever been. Daniel Brull still have his stock somewhere. I think it's on my closet. Oh, he's like that guy. - He's great. And Gloria Spasters. He's a great actor. - I wrote a long, I think this might have been the last sports movie column I ever wrote was for for Grantland and into 2014. I wrote a long piece about this movie because I loved it. And I really connected with it. But it's an F1 movie. It's a movie that I think is because it's in the past. Some of these movies are just like Timeless. This one's set in the 70s and it's just you can just go and go forever. I love this movie. I love this movie too. I know you don't like it as much. The way back. - No, I like it. I'm on board with this. The same director is Warrior. I would prefer Warrior to the way back, but it's really good. I know you love athletics performance in it. I love this movie. I love the choice that they make if you haven't seen it. Sorry, I'm spoiling it. It feels like the big game is the ending and it's not. It just goes, "Hugh." Which is just such a zag. I think this is the best athletics ever read in a movie. It's really interesting because I feel like would you say that addiction and recovery movies are something that you typically enjoy? No. I don't feel like I hear you talk about movies like that too often. No, I think part of the problem is just in a Gabbano Conor movie, by the way, and it was written by Brad Englesby. Your boy. A combo. Yeah, your boy. Yeah. It came out right after COVID started. It was supposed to come out in the movies, I think, a month after COVID, and then just became one of the first VOD test case when the infrastructure wasn't really ready for it. It came and went a little bit, but I feel like it's having a moment again. It's always on a streamer. It's on cable. It's around. I think one of the things I liked about this one was, I liked sometimes the movies when the real life bleeds over into the character. I feel like Aflac was having so many issues in his own life that it just feels like there was an overlap that made it an unusual watch in a good way. Yeah, I love that feeling when you feel like there's some reflection of the person's real life. That's a Marty's Supreme thing, where it's like, "Shall I be the best?" You can feel that in the movie. Aflac's never been nominated for an acting Oscar in his career. Even this movie. This was outrageous. This is actually makes you wonder, is there some sort of weird bias against certain actors in actresses? Even just they dated it for March when it came out in the same month as COVID. It wasn't taken seriously by the studio to make an awards push for it. If it had come out in October, maybe everybody might have thought about it a little bit differently. It's definitely overlooked. It's the best. This was Anthony Hopkins' The Father, Riz Ahmed and Santa Metal, Boseman, Gary Oldman and Mac your movie. Steve Ewan and Minari. Aflac could have snuck in there. I don't understand that. Anthony Hopkins went. I think The Father is so overrated. I've said this a million times. I know you liked it. I didn't get it at all. I only saw it once. I did like it. All right. Mount Rushmore Final Four, 21st century. F1. Just did it on the rewatcher. You loved this. I loved it. I loved it. You liked it more? The second time. So I talked to my dad. My stepmother had to go to New York for a family thing. It was by himself two days ago. And he's like, I need to rent a movie tonight. And I was like, you should watch F1 again. He's like, I never saw F1. And I was like, I was like, what? You would love F1. Have you not seen F1? Oh my God. I was so mad. So he saw it that night. We talked the next day. And he was like, F1 was awesome. He was like, I thought you were kidding. It's just, you know, it's, it's, it could have been number one. Number three in my list, but I put it in for. I'm, I'm very pro. I liked it a lot. I think it's a great popcorn movie. I always think Joe Kaczynski is so creative at how he captures these worlds that he goes into. I will say one of my challenges is that I popped it in a couple nights ago. The 4K 4K looks fucking incredible. By the way, I popped it in and the one of my challenges with the movie is it never really gets over the hump of the first 10 minutes for me when he's in the NASCAR race and a whole lot of love is playing and the fireworks go off. The first time I saw it, I was like, holy shit, this is going to be the best movie of the year. Like this is, this is amazing what they're doing. And that, and that NASCAR wasn't even F1 racing. So I never, because I never could get back up to my excitement around that stuff. And because I don't really know anything about F1, like I don't follow it at all. Yeah. I found myself a little, not disoriented because they narrate through every race like what's actually happening, but I just didn't have as much connection to it. But there's no doubt it's like amazingly well made. You know, Pitt just really flexing the movie star muscle in the movie. Important pit movie for the catalog, which we talked when we did the part about it. Kind of needed it. This is one for the 60s. Yeah. It was like his Tom Brady Tampa Bay Super Bowl. Yeah. So no mental out to you. Well, it did because then I got to say it wasn't Bellicech. It was Brady, you know, then forever more. I got to know that it wasn't Bellicech. Yeah. All right. Number three Friday night lights. We've done all these summary watchables Friday night lights. Number three, I, we did it last year and I just forgot how awesome it was and also how overshadowed it became by the TV show. And actually the TV show never existed. This movie would be talked about even even more reverentially. It's the best high school football movie I think ever. I don't know who it's competing. It's all the right moves and stuff like that. But it's it's it's the best. Scott one of the two best locker room speeches ever. It's Billy Bob in this movie and and Puccino and ever given Sunday or in the finals. It does a great sag at the end where they lose, but that's what happened in real life. And then the way it was cut in 03. Were these fast cuts and it was like a little hard. But now it's like that just fits into the way we watch everything these days. So it actually feels a little more current than it used to. Great cast. Great cast. You're like porting over Connie Britain from the movie to the TV show. Love to see that. I was thinking you as I was watching the family McMullen to ignore my text about. Oh, I was busy. Sorry. I didn't have it gotten into it, but you know, I have I'm like the biggest. The number of brothers McMullen guy. Yeah, I'm the one I went back Irish brothers who are like each other. But love each other. Yeah, surprisingly good movie. A couple people didn't make the cut for the. I mean, John Mahoney's dead. But one of the other brothers just isn't in it. Muglons there though. Muglons, but the third brother's not in it. They just kind of talk about him is like he's not in the room. Maybe I'll fire it up tonight. I don't know. So I haven't seen Connie in like 40 years. Connie is Connie was available and ready to come back. Great career for number two. So I thought that I had the seven. I knew what they were. And I knew what the top four was. But then the top two I kept switching back and forth. Number two is Creed. It was number one. It was number two. It was number one is number two. I finally put it a two because money ball is number one. But I think these are the two best sports movies of the quarter century. I don't really think it's arguable. Except other arguments. But these were the two that they if anyone's making a list and if they're not in your top 10, it's just kind of an invalidated list. They're important for different reasons. They had to agree difficulty of wait, you were doing this again. What's going on? Kugler, the fruit veil, that guy's going to do, he's going to direct. Stallone's going to be in it. What are we doing? And then it was the fucking best. But I'm so glad it happened. But just like the odds of it were almost insurmountable. And then money ball very similar. They're making a movie out of the money ball book. How the fuck are they going to do that? Then they had 40 scripts for it. Oh, wait. Oh, Brad Pitt said, oh, oh, I heard it's good. And then it's like, whoa, that movie is fucking awesome. You told a story and then when we did the 50 rewatch, it was about how you did a big picture, blind screening and the music played up at the crowd just started applauding. So the money ball I think has resonated in its own way. So it was Creed, Creed said two sequels. But I think it's money ball won Creed too. What do you think? So such a tricky one. Because we had money ball on our list. And that's a real shared passion for Amanda and I. She loves M.O.V. too. But when we rewatched Creed for the live show, I did feel like, damn, this like 28 year old kid made this movie. Like how old is Kugler when he made that movie? And he is just able to summon that classical storytelling thing where the way you get invested in those characters that you otherwise just should have no relationship to. Because even though it's based in a world that we already know, it's a whole new layout for a doneness. And also the fight scenes are legit, interesting and new and feel different. You know, like that's a huge plus in that film's, that films register. Because there have been so many boxing movies, you've got boxing movies on this list. Very rarely you see a boxing movie, you feel like you're seeing it a little bit differently. And I feel like he pulls that off there. Plus MBJ, you know, him and MBJ, just being Scorsese and Dineiro for us. I think it's really exciting. The idea of getting another 30 years of these guys making movies together is really cool. And you know, it's obviously the second time that they work together. But it feels like them sinking up in a way that was very kind of mainstream that a lot of people get excited about. So it's legacy. I think it's going to be real strong because sinners isn't going to be the last time they work together. Like he really sees him as like his guy, like his avatar for his storytelling. So that makes them really, really powerful. Moneyball is cool. It's really fun. It's really smart. It's really insightful. It's bizarrely emotional considering the subject matter. But I don't know. Just talking about Creed makes me want to watch Creed. So you go Creed one money ball too. It's a really hard one. It's a tricky one. They're both great for different reasons. you know, money ball is not a movie about getting over the hump and winning it all. It's a different kind of film. It's like a more about an exploration of process and how sometimes you don't, even if you have the right answers, you don't, you don't get an A plus on the test, you know? So that's why there are a couple of reasons I like them as the final two for this 25 year run. Cause sports movies basically start with, with uh, the longest yard in 74, even though they're making them for a million years. It's the first modern sports movement. It's like 26 years of sports movies. And now you look at the final two that are left, creeds like a typical sports movie sequel, but it's not. It belongs to like this new era. But money ball is about where sports went in the 21st century. Right? So I was thinking about that piece of it that this is a movie that just couldn't have wouldn't have existed. It's it's almost like a jigsaw puzzle, putting it together movie, combined with like capturing some sort of movement that would go on to transform how we watch followed and, you know, how teams are put together every single piece about sports. And then it's a really awesome movie. And then and it's accessible to people like my wife, who would normally not care about it. So I feel like the degree of difficulty was probably a little bit higher, but I still can't believe a high of the degree of difficulty for Creed was money ball. It's a good last two. Money ball is your 100% right that it is totally sees the future about how we think about sports and how you know, you you're citing DVOA and you know, expected points per play on NFL pods. Now all because of that Michael Lewis book and the way that the film kind of elevated its status among kind of mainstream non hardcore sports fans. But there's also so many other things that happen with money ball where it was supposed to be Steven Soderbergh. They were really close to production. It didn't happen for whatever reason. It goes to Bennett Miller. It becomes an Aaron Sorkinscript. It becomes a much more kind of romantic and traditional movie because of the Sorkinscript. I think it would have been a much more experimental and like confrontational almost documentary style like sort of are going to make it like reds, but for basically, yeah, you know, where he had the real people in it and there was into camera interviews. It never would have been on this list if he had done that. No, unless he nailed it like unless he made something we've never seen before and it worked. But it just seemed like it was a very high bar. They're both great. I think they're both incredibly worthy of number one. Well, that's the other thing with this movie. It comes out in 2011. I was in, you know, it was peripherally involved with that early wave of the slow-conference, all that stuff. When people are trying to figure out how to use these new wave stats, it wasn't accessible at all. And as you just said, the movie really, really made it accessible in a way that it wasn't accessible before. And it saw the future of team building, even though it was about the '03 A's. It lays down this blueprint that now seems really obvious when you watch in 2025, but it was not obvious to normal people. I don't think in 2011. No, I mean, then it became obvious sports baseball sportscasters who are the most crotchety old school figures in the world have to know what OPS plus is now because of this movie. Right. You know, like they have to use that data to communicate with their audience that cares about the games. That's pretty profound. The way that it shifted, obviously the Lewis book is the biggest, the most significant part of that. But without that book, this, you know, this movie doesn't go to, doesn't become a Brad Pitt level awareness thing. Yeah. Creed, though, Creed is just like a, had the hang glider movie, though, where like once it starts, you're just like, wow, I'm just, I'm, I'm flying off the mountain for hours. Yeah. And the same thing where it has a couple like really, really, really memorable scenes, which is the last piece of a sports movie. Am I getting chills? Do I have like a couple of hook scenes that I'm always going to remember? Is it about something? You look at the last four money ball, Creed, Friday and the lights have won. All capture something that belonged to these first 25 years, too. Right. Friday and the lights becomes a TV show where IP now starts to become confusing with movies and TV. And we don't know really what's the, what's the documentary? What's a movie? What's a TV show? It's like almost like part of trying to figure out what IP is. F1 is the sport that took off this year, other than MMA, which I think started. But I mean, it took off this last 10 years in a way that no other sport did. It became this mainstream, huge sport. Yeah. Creed boxing, all the traditional sports movie recipes tied to this different air and the money ball tied to where sports are going. So pretty interesting top four way to my bio pick of Jim pickle. The creator of pickleball comes out and then you're going to have to add it to your list. I just sports consulting. Hey, see, does that want to work out that one? Pickleballs almost dead. It's like 90% gone. Yeah. What's your beach, man? Why is that? That's when people people, it's what I'm hearing on the streets. The streets have told you you do. Well, you do walk along. So I guess you would probably be running into X now the noise. The noise, the noise stuff is going to kill pickleball. Oh, how much noise is really happening? Yeah. The neighborhoods are starting to rebel against pickleball. What happened? Did you like did some guy like pick a fight with you the first time ever pick it? Like what happened? I cannot like certain things. Well, I agree, but you have a, you got to, you got to be in your bond. I just think people should play tennis. Okay. All right. Just play tennis. Run around. I'm trying to get Brick a sweat. Then don't play sports anymore. Sports TV. They just quietly die on the couch. Sean fantasy. What's your best prediction for this year? Pain. Pain. Good ending. Thanks, Josh. Thanks Bill. All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to shrigs and house. Thanks to fantasy. Thanks to Gahown and Eduardo as always. I will be back on Sunday night live with cousin Sal. The last time we would be live on YouTube with the Sunday night podcast. So get ready for that. Should be a fascinating week 18 with the NFL. We'll see what happens. See you on Sunday night. Must be 21 plus some president select states for Kansas. 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