I just need one thing from you all.
Just one. Alright, I need one right now. I'll probably be asking for something else soon. You know me, I can be a little demanding. I have a high standard. But can you just do me one favor, please?
Whoever you are, you know who you are. Only 272. Did you know that? There are 272 NFL regular season games. We have played one of them. Can we please pump the brakes on the Super Bowl Preview Storyline? Please. That's all I'm asking. There are so many other topics, so many other angles. There are so many other ways that we can break down the game, the first one of the NFL season.
Do we really have to jump to Super Bowl Preview on the very first night? I'd rather talk about The Rock. I'd rather talk about Michael Jordan making fun of Tom Brady's two month retirement.
It wasn't even two months. I'd rather talk about the throngs of Bill's Mafia in L.A. at SoFi Stadium. I'd rather talk about Von Miller making the Rams life miserable.
I'd rather talk about the Pink Smoke Monsters. Anything but a Super Bowl Preview. Knock it off. It's September 8th. We do not, on this show, talk about Super Bowl Previews on September 8th. Alright, I got it off my chest.
I'm good to go now. Let's hope this is just like riding a bike. I mean, me getting annoyed at people talking about the Super Bowl in early September is definitely something that is never far from me. It's near and dear to my heart. But this is our first football show of the new season. It'll take me a bit. Just like it takes the players. Just like it takes the officials. Just like it takes the game announcers.
Probably not Kevin Harlan, though, because he woke up, rolled out of bed and started calling football play-by-play. It takes even broadcasters a little bit to find that rhythm and that flow. Just like a player coming off injury or even Steph Curry now and then.
Got to find that rhythm. It was a long offseason. So let's hope I can find my midseason form quickly. There were definitely guys on the field in Los Angeles mere hours ago that appeared to be in midseason form.
Or maybe it was guys taking advantage of the fact that their opponents were not in midseason form. Oh my gosh. Bills Mafia, I'm sure you are thrilled.
You know who you are. I actually have friends who have been longtime Bills fans who are annoyed at the number of people who are jumping on the bandwagon. Enough that it's about to crash and collapse. That's what happens. Sports fans with no real convictions. Sports fans with no real rooting interest.
They tend to gravitate and flock toward winners. And the Bills have all the hallmarks of a winner. Everything's coming up Buffalo. So it's our first football show of the new season and it kicks off right now after hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. We've got one game in the books. One game and then our first NFL Sunday is on the horizon. We are live from the Rocket Mortgage Studios.
Do you need to know what it takes for a home to fit your budget and your family? Rocket can. You can find me on Twitter, ALOL Radio. You know you want to. If only to troll me about some stupid Super Bowl preview in early September. Spare me. That's all I'm asking. Just spare me.
Spare me that. If you want to talk about how your team is going to win the Super Bowl, fine. Because you know that I'm just going to roll my eyes at you. But to hear actual broadcasters calling this a potential Super Bowl preview, are you kidding me? And I'm not going to out anyone. I just feel like you guys are old enough to know better.
Know better. It's certainly standard that every year the defending Super Bowl champion gets, we'll call it quasi-respect, gets respect because they're the team to beat. And it's super easy to look at their roster and go, oh yeah, that's got to be the favorite. Well, in this case, it was the Bills who were the favorite in Los Angeles. On Thursday night to kick off the season, there's a lot of people looking at the Bills and all this built up, unrealized potential of the last two seasons, culminating now in 2022.
And boy, did they show it early and did they show it often. So yes, find me on Twitter, ALawRadio. If you have not yet signed up for Survivor Island, you still have time. I don't want to be a nag. I really don't want to be a nag.
But you're running out of time. And we have tried a bazillion ways. We've had guinea pigs. We've had lab rats.
If the lab rat can do it, so can you. All you have to do is find the link on my Twitter or our show Twitter after our CBS. And then find yourselves a login, create a new login. Jay's tried seven different logins. So J1, J2, J3, J4 may all be eliminated in week number one, but J5, J6 and J7 will still be alive.
Yes, that's totally cheating. But you all are having so many problems with the, well, not all of you. I shouldn't say all of you. Some of you are having problems with finding us on either Isla Nublar or Cocos Island. Or what are we going to name our third island if we need it, Producer Jay? Oh, I forgot. We had talked about this. We had come up. I forgot the name that we came up with. Something. That's because you were half asleep.
Yeah, that is very true. Do you remember? I do not, but it'll come to me soon. We did have a third island. In our archipelago. Alcatraz. Alcatraz. That is right.
So for those of you who are finding no space on either of our previous islands, we've added a third island to our archipelago. It is Alcatraz, which by the way is freaking amazing. Plus it goes by The Rock.
That's the nickname for it. And The Rock was there in L.A. to start things off. It's his thing now, I guess, to be at Rams games. Coming up at the top of next hour, Michael Duarte of NBC LA. Frequent guest here on the show. All things L.A. for us. He was at the game.
And I'll ask him whether or not this is a new thing. The Rock being associated with the Rams. Or if that was just for the Super Bowl and for all the nationally televised games. He is the owner of, is it the USFL? The reboot of the USFL?
I'm pretty sure that that's him. XFL. Oh, maybe it's the XFL. Crap.
I can't keep them all straight. Rock. X. F. L. Maybe that's what it is. Yes, he's bringing the XFL back into our lives. So yes, sorry USFL. I really missed it. Not for you. We can't miss you if you never go away.
We definitely saw you go away and forgot all about you. But The Rock can make anything exciting. I'm an unabashed fan of Dwayne The Rock Johnson.
He did a couple movie trailers throughout the game. He's so over the top outrageous. And yet I hear everyone raves about what a good guy he is. How nice he is. How kind he is.
I'm a big The Rock fan. I think we should try to get him on the show. Is that possible? That would be amazing. Yes, well.
I'm sorry, who's the producer on the show? Maybe we can work on that. Let's get a shot. Yes, let's do that. Try to court The Rock.
I feel like that's something you'd be really good at. So The Rock started things off as did Odell Beckham Jr. Did you see him? He makes a little cameo there next to Andrew Whitworth, the longtime offensive lineman who was holding the Vince Lombardi trophy aloft. And so the pregame was raucous. It was a little bit crazy. It was a lot of fun just to feel the energy and electricity.
I also have a brand new TV and boy does the football look spectacular on my new TV. So I was soaking it in and then we got to the actual snaps. The first snaps. Bills had the ball first and they wasted no time. Snap Josh hands it off. No, keeps it roll to his right.
Fires a man wide open. It is caught. It is caught by Davis runs into the end zone. Touchdown Buffalo. A beautiful play action pass.
Amazing. A twenty six yard touchdown pass on third down to Gabe Davis. Touchdown Bill. Oh, remember Gabe Davis. Remember that Gabe? Gabe Davis, the guy who caught four touchdowns or had four touchdowns in the divisional round.
That was pretty amazing. So he picks up right where he left off and so does Josh Allen. Five minute opening drive for the Buffalo Bills. John Murphy with the call on Bills radio.
And I hear there were prop bets about this. How quickly Von Miller and Aaron Donald would have sacks to start the season. On second and six L.A. is going to throw it again. This time Stanford surrounded by Bills and dropped.
He is sacked. Back at the forty nine yard line. Von Miller got him and brought him down the former ramp. The future Hall of Famer with his first sack in a Buffalo Bills uniform. In addition to being an unabashed rock fan, the rock fan, I don't think you just call him rock. The rock. I am also a total shill for Von Miller. Bills mafia.
What's good? He's one of my favorite professional athletes ever. Just his personality, his quirkiness, his fashion, whatever you would describe that as. The way that he dominates when he gets out there. And the fact that he's so real. He just is who he is. And when you see him pregame or you see an interview with him, he's so unassuming.
He wears those glasses. He doesn't look like he can wreak havoc on a defensive line. And yet he gets out there and the man is so athletic and he can anticipate the moves of his opponent.
I mean, it's a chess match mentally for him, but he can also beat his opponents physically. It's amazing to watch. So Von Miller first sack as a bill wouldn't even be his only sack in this opener. It's after hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio.
Strangely enough, that's total sarcasm. It is the first game of the year, which means, of course, we're going to have turnovers. It was the Bills with three turnovers in the first half. But despite that, they were still sporting a 10-0 lead until the Rams found a little something something in the first half. Stafford has it, sets the laces, throws right side, end zone, Cooper Cup! Touchdown L.A.!
Nine to ten for six. The Rams first score of twenty twenty two belongs to the NFL's Offensive Player of the Year, the Triple Crown winner and the Super Bowl MVP Cooper Cup. That was late second quarter, and then the Rams were able to tack on a field goal after a Josh Allen interception.
And so we were nodded at ten at the half. Would you believe those ten points in the second quarter were the only points that the Rams scored in this season opener on their own field? Second half belonged to the Buffalo Bills because nobody circles the wagons like the Buffalo Bills. It is first and goal. The snap to Josh looks to throw, fires caught by Isaiah McKenzie, fights his way into the end zone, touchdown Buffalo! Josh Allen threw a fastball right into the midsection of Isaiah McKenzie for the seven yard touchdown strike. Josh Allen, you're going to hear from him coming up because he's got a brand new offensive coordinator.
Didn't seem to create many issues, did it? Yes, there were some turnovers, but those weren't about play calling. Those were a variety of things, one being a ball that slipped through the hands of a receiver, a couple of fumbles in there as well.
I expect those for every team, really, in the first week, first couple of weeks, especially for guys who did not play in the preseason. But what there wasn't any hint of, a disconnect with Ken Dorsey who's calling plays for the Buffalo Bills for the first time. New offensive coordinator, why?
Because Brian Daball has moved on to the New York Giants. And so Josh Allen has to learn how to not only communicate with a new coordinator, but also to have a new voice in his head. Getting the call in, allowing me to get to the line of scrimmage and see some things that I needed to see. But shout out to our offensive staff for putting in some plays that we saw on tape, going out there, trusting it and executing it.
But again, that first half, a lot to be left out there for us, a lot to be learned from too. Yes, the first half with the three turnovers didn't turn into a lot of points for the Rams, they didn't capitalize on their opportunities. But man, it's a heck of a lot easier when, A, your quarterback is getting rid of the ball quickly, right?
So there's still an Aaron Donald on the other side. But also when your offensive line is giving you that time. Really, the Bills were able to dominate that line of scrimmage. They dominated the ball in the third quarter.
I went back and did the math. It actually wasn't all that difficult because there were only two Rams possessions. Quick possessions, 24 total yards in the third quarter. So even after the Bills turned the ball over the way they did in that first half, they come out, they make corrections, and they don't give the ball back to the Rams in the third quarter. And so it was both sides of the ball and it was big plays, the kind of big plays we know this Buffalo offense is capable of. Shotgun snap, they rush for, moving up, Alan Cox's own, throws long on the run, wide open, falling down, catch, goal line, Diggs, touchdown! Touchdown! What a throw by Alan! And a falling down catch by Diggs, 53 yards!
And the Bills go up 30 to 10. Oh, you know it's football season when we get intense Kevin Harlan on Westwood 1. I dig it. Stephon Diggs digs it.
Somebody stop that man! Oh, by the way, I happened to be listening when the pink smoke monsters hit the field, when the protesters were setting off pink smoke bombs in the fourth quarter. Kevin actually played the straight man. It was Kurt Warner who was making jokes. Oh my gosh, it was fantastic.
We have to go back and get that exchange at some point. It was really funny because it wasn't Kevin. I'm sorry, it wasn't Kevin, it was Kurt. Remember Kevin swore to us on this very show that he was never going to go off the grid again. He was never going to go crazy.
He runs to the 50, he runs to the 40, the guy is drunk! He was not going to do play by play and turn it into a comedy hour anymore. And he actually played it very straight. It was Kurt Warner who started joking about a gender reveal.
And I don't know, maybe Kevin Harlan didn't know what that was because Kurt had to explain it to you. It was pretty funny. Josh Allen goes 26 of 31 for 297 yards, three bashing touchdowns, one rushing touchdown, and okay, a couple of picks. We hurt ourselves a lot in that first half. There's a lot to learn from. But that second half, that's who we want to be, going out there and executing the way we expect ourselves to execute. I thought Coach Dorsey called a heck of a game.
It's his first live action, so I'm proud of him for handling the situations how he did. We were 90% out there down. That's a recipe for success. And again, four turnovers, that's way too many. So we've got a lot to clean up, but we'll celebrate this one. It's hard to win in this league, especially against good teams, and that's a really good team we just played. It's just about winning one game, and that's what it was. We came together in the second half, played good complementary football, starting with the opening kickoff of the second half.
There's still some things we have to work on in terms of taking care of the football. That's the voice of one Sean McDermott. The other Sean, Sean McVay, sees his Rams lose the season opener for the first time.
Matthew Stafford, you'll hear from him coming up, and Von Miller, who has played on both sides of this. We are off and running. Giddy up. On Twitter, ALawRadio, on our Facebook page too.
Pretty soon, we will have the very first, very first of 17, 18, 19, maybe 20. We could probably carry it through to divisional weekend. The very first After Hours Game of the Week poll is on the way, so make sure you find us on social media. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence. The NFL is back, baby, here on CBS Sports Radio.
You are listening to the After Hours Podcast. Second and nine. Rams at the Buffalo 41.
Now the gun. The snap to Stafford. Doesn't see the pressure coming. He gets hit from behind, and he is dropped there. Von Miller from the blind side sacked him all the way back at the midfield line. They lost nine yards on that sack. Stafford takes, looks, looks, fires one into the end zone. It is incomplete, incomplete, intended for Robinson and broken up by the rookie, Benford.
He had terrific position, and he broke up the pass. The Bills take over on downs. There's just 41 seconds left, and let the party begin here in Los Angeles and back home in Buffalo. This is After Hours with Amy Lawrence. John Murphy on Bills Radio.
So good to hear. NFL play-by-play once again. And for Von Miller, a pair of sacks, a couple of tackles for loss. Did you know, and if you didn't, you're about to hear it straight from your favorite host.
That's me, in case you're wondering. The Buffalo Bills accumulated seven sacks in addition to 15 more quarterback hits. That's how much they were able to get into the backfield. Seven sacks and 15 extra QB hits. Matthew Stafford, baby. I haven't gone and looked at the number of snaps that were taken by Matthew Stafford. But that's 22, 22 times in which the Bills were able to get a hand, a pinky, anything on Matthew Stafford. And a third of the time they got to him, they sacked him. They also had three takeaways, all of them via the interception. The pressure on Matthew Stafford, it was evident.
Regardless of what weapons he has, if he's constantly under siege or having to go through his progressions more quickly. Sure, he can scramble every now and then, but that's not Matthew Stafford's game. And so it results in him locking in on one guy or not being able to watch a play develop so that he has more options. Now sure, he can still chuck the ball, we know that. Cooper Cup, he's still wearing the triple crown, all of that is true. But football becomes a heck of a lot more difficult when you are running for your life or when you have to have happy feet back there in the pocket.
Or when the pocket is completely broken down. Vaughn Miller setting a tone early for the Bills. I've always had good vibes and good games here so far. This is the best stadium in our league to come here and have success. It felt good, man. It felt right. L.A. has a special place in my heart.
Super Bowl 56 always has a special place in my heart. And my teammates over there and all the coaches and the infrastructure of the team, they always have a special place in my heart. It felt like I was playing against my brothers over there. I felt the D line. You could feel them make an impact, factor into the game.
When you can do that, it helps you in the back end as well. So I thought, again, within the defense, the rush was helping the coverage and the coverage was helping the rush and it timed up well. And we got those Buffalo fans in that stadium behind us a little bit, that helped too.
Yeah, you think? Coming up at the top of the hour, we'll ask our friend Michael Duarte of NBC L.A. what it sounded like inside the stadium in terms of the balance between Rams fans and Bills Mafia. Because, you know, the hashtag on Twitter is Rams House.
That's what they go with. That's what we heard The Rock talk about. I mean, that's what they were screaming over the loudspeakers. It's supposed to be Rams House. But there were a lot of Bills fans there.
Maybe that's the point. Maybe they're trying to plead for the fans in L.A. to make it more of a Rams House. It's after hours on CBS Sports Radio. Matthew Stafford, 29 of 41, 240 yards, very few quality yards in the second half, a touchdown, three interceptions, and yes, seven times that he ended up with a sack. We can play a whole lot better than that, I know that. And, you know, as disappointing as tonight is, you never want to start the season that way. It really doesn't matter if it's the first game, last game, whatever it is, you want to win them all. Didn't accomplish that goal tonight.
Didn't play well enough to do it. The one thing that gives me a good feeling is knowing the guys in that locker room and knowing how we're going to all band together, look at each other, look inward first, and go, hey, what can I do to be better for the guy next to me? That starts with our head coach.
He's always preaching that to us. And, you know, that's real stuff for us as players, that's how we act, and, you know, we believe in that locker room. When you look at a lot of the ways that this game unfolded, I feel a huge sense of responsibility to this team.
We weren't ready to go. I take a lot of, you know, pride in that, and that's on me. I got to do better.
There was a lot of decisions that I made that I felt like didn't put our players in good enough spots. This was a humbling experience, but we're going to stay connected. I have total belief and confidence in what we can do moving forward.
Whether we won tonight or whether we had a humbling experience like this, we've got 16 games guaranteed left. And we're going to dust ourselves off. We're going to look ourselves in the mirror. We're going to be accountable to the things that we can all do better within the framework of our roles, and we're going to move forward the right way. And that's all I know how to do. This hasn't been the first setback that we've experienced, and we're going to respond the right way.
I do trust that. And all I know how to do is look at this film, correct it, put together a good week of preparation, and be ready to go against the Falcons next week. But there's no way to put it other than didn't do a good enough job. It starts with me, and then we can overall execute better in a lot of areas. First season opening loss for the Rams under Sean McVay. They give up 413 yards to the visiting Bills, 120 of them on the ground. And I've long said this about the Bills. You want to establish the run to be sure. You do not want Josh Allen to be your leading rusher. But that's yet again how it was tonight. Of course if you have Josh Allen as your starting quarterback on your fantasy team, well then you want him to be your leading rusher. But I did hear Mike Tirico, and I guess there was a comment from Chris Collinsworth. You don't want Josh Allen to be in the middle of scrumbles in week one with a bunch of defensive linemen and linebackers trying to haul him down.
It's just not what you want. But he does obviously have the ability to truck people. We saw a stiff arm by Josh Allen in picking up a first down in the third quarter, which was the turning point in this game. So the Bills are 1-0. The Super Bowl champions start out 0-1. And did you all notice that Odell Beckham Jr. was there to start the game? Von Miller and OBJ are tight, so what does that mean, Von? He said whoever won this game, that's where he was going to go.
So I mean, there's truth behind every joke. We just had to see. He's a huge part of our success last year.
And whenever he gets healthy, I'm sure there's a lot of teams that are going to be wanting him. We just got to wait and see. I think we did everything we could possibly do to get him. We just got to wait until he gets healthy. We got a great squad over here, and I think everybody saw it.
I think Josh added another weapon. That's just another guy that we could get the ball to. We got a great group of guys.
Isaiah McKenzie, Gabe Davis, Dawson Knox, Diggs. Running backs went crazy today. Offensive line brought the will. We got a great team.
We're just going to keep going. Whenever he gets healthy, we'll see what happens. Did he say the offensive line brought the will?
I like that. The offensive line brought the will and the can of you-know-what. Running backs went crazy today. Offensive line brought the will. We got a great team. Was it the will or the will?
Crazy today. Offensive line brought the will. Yeah, I would imagine it was the will. I heard an interview with him and Rich Eisen on Westwood 1 pregame because Rich does the pregame before Kevin Harlan and Kurt Warner take over play-by-play.
It was actually really insightful. It wasn't in LA. It was before they left.
It was a few days ago because Rich wished him safe travels and have fun out there. Or here, whatever he said. One line that Von Miller used that I thought was really interesting is that Super Bowl teams are player-led as opposed to being led by the coaches. As opposed to Jerry Jones, the general manager in Dallas. He said Super Bowl teams are player-led so that the leadership comes from the locker room.
It's internal, so to speak. And it certainly does help when you've got guys like Von Miller who have now two rings for two different teams. Super Bowl teams are always player-led, so it caused me to stop and think that insight.
Because you can have different driving forces. You can have strong personalities really at every place. I thought a little bit about the Jets. Do you remember when the Jets were in three consecutive AFC championships and their driving force was Rex Ryan, right? It's interesting to think about because you need the guys in the locker room. Ultimately coaches make the calls, but you need the guys in the locker room who can keep you steady and who can get you back on course when you get off course and all that jazz.
It makes total sense to think about it. These are grown men. As much as you want to say a coach is going to be the guy that's kind of the forefront and he's the face of your franchise and you need a strong leader there, yes, I agree. Bottom line, you've got 53 grown men, and they've got to be able to police themselves and take care of themselves and take care of each other.
Because if they don't play for each other and they don't believe in each other, I don't care how good the coach is, they can stand up there and talk until they're blue in the face. It really doesn't matter anymore if you've got guys that don't buy in, believe, and also want to get it done for themselves. I don't know about you, because as much as I like to think of myself as a company guy, if you will. I know that's kind of a bad term a lot of times, but I'm one part of the team. Yeah, I'll definitely do my part. Bottom line, I'm not doing it for you, I'm doing it for me. I'm doing it for us. I'm not doing it for the boss.
I'm not doing it for the guy in front, because if you do everything for them, no. It becomes hollow after a while. Von Miller chasing his third ring with his third different team, and you can see why Bill's fans are thrilled to have him.
He's still got it. All of it. So, find me on Twitter, ALawRadio, coming up before we get back with our next segment. We will have our Game of the Week poll up, right Jay?
And then also on our Facebook page, we want to make sure we get to that pretty quickly, because you know what? We're heading into our first football Friday of the season. Let that sink in for a second.
It's worth celebrating. You are listening to the After Hours Podcast. Here's the snap. Josh looks to his left.
Pumps once. Now he's going to keep it. He's going to run. He's inside the five. He tries to stretch into the end zone. He is in!
He is in! Touchdown Buffalo! Josh Allen stretched it out and crossed the goal line for the Buffalo touchdown.
Wow! Stafford cakes. Back to throw again. Fires one down the middle. This one is intercepted. Picked off by Jordan Poyer at the Buffalo 38, and he is put down by Cooper Cupp at the Buffalo 41 yard line. Interception. Interception. Jordan Poyer comes up with a pass.
He's in the gun. Gets a snap. Pocket collapsing. Gets out of pressure.
Runs to his right. Curls it downfield looking for Diggs. Diggs stops, and he makes the catch, and he's in the end zone! Touchdown Buffalo Stephon Diggs! Adjusted as the ball was hung up high by Josh Allen. He was under heavy pressure. Diggs virtually stopped at the two yard line, made the catch, and fell into the end zone.
Wow! This is After Hours with Amy Lawrence. Josh Allen and all of those offensive weapons. They rack up more than 400 yards of offense, and on the flip side, the Bills defense able to dominate that line of scrimmage and sack Matthew Stafford seven times as well as touch him slash hit him 15 more times. It was a near perfect performance by the offense, and the defense just kept giving them the ball back. Here you go. Here you go.
Here you go. Now I say that even as there were four turnovers by the Bills. So the Buffalo defense gets credit for limiting the damage in the wake of those turnovers. In fact, in one case in the first half, actually it happened in the second half I think too, there were back to back turnovers by each team. So the Bills would turn over, but the Rams turned right around and gave it back to them. Nine of 10 on third down. That's something that definitely stood out. They were extremely efficient, whether it was on the ground, whether it was through the air, whether it was a broken play, or it was a play that was called in from the sideline.
Lots of creativity, but that's something that kept the Rams off balance on defense as well. So we've got one game in the books with more to come on Sunday. It's after hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio, judging by the first few votes in our poll, and it's very, very, very early. This is gonna be a doozy, but I love it when we can't agree on the after hours game of the week.
Are you ready? And no, we don't put Rams and Bills in the poll. That's the great part about it is that we didn't have to worry about this one because there was no way we were gonna be able to narrow it down any further. This was really difficult to pick four games because you can only put four in a single Twitter poll. So on Twitter, after hours, CBS, or on my Twitter, I retweeted, and then our Facebook page too, Jay's putting it up there now, after hours game of the week.
A little bit of vengeance, a little bit of revenge is best served cold, if in fact it turns into that. There was no way we could leave out Browns and Panthers. Absolutely no way. I think the Cleveland Browns are tired of asking what they're gonna see from Baker Mayfield coming up this weekend. In fact, Nick Chubb was the latest answer and did so very succinctly. We all know Baker, so I don't know what to expect.
What does that mean? We all know Baker, so I don't really know what to expect. I'm pretty sure he said don't as in negative, meaning we don't know if he's gonna throw for five touchdowns or throw three interceptions. We all know Baker, so I don't know what to expect. What? That's quite the slight.
Slight how? I think he's saying that Baker could either throw for five touchdowns like we've seen, or throw for five interceptions like we've seen. He's kind of just how erratic he is. Alright, so there's one game that has to be in our poll. Cleveland Browns at the Carolina Panthers, Baker's new team, he is the starter. In fact, behind him, it's only PJ Walker.
There's nothing else. The Panthers don't have Sam Darnold who can step in if this goes horribly wrong. I don't think it's going to, but they don't have anybody. And their rookie, Matt Corral, who's supposed to be using this year to become a starter in the NFL, is out for the season as well because of injury. And so it's Baker or bust, baby.
That's it. Baker or bust for the Panthers as they host his former team. Whether or not you believe that he said what Cynthia Freeland reported that he said, well, don't believe for a second that he's going in with no edge and no chip on his shoulder and no extra emotion.
First of all, that's not human nature. And second of all, that's not Baker. We know a little bit too much about Baker to believe that. We've also got Broncos at the Seahawks. I've got some friends who are traveling all the way from New Jersey to Seattle to see this game. So Broncos at the Seahawks and Pete Carroll is hoping that the decade with Russell Wilson may actually give the Seahawks a bit of an edge. We've had a lot of preparation against, you know, for this game. It's an unusual preparation in that regard. And so hopefully, you know, it's the challenges.
Can you take it to the game? And that all shows up for you. But it's exciting.
I mean, you know, we know Russ well and nobody could know him better than we do. And that's been part of the preparation. And it's been exciting to me to try to convey it and make it clear when this is happening, when that's happening, why and all that kind of stuff.
And so it's a fun part of the preparation. Hopefully it'll work out for us. Producer Jay, did we decide whether or not this is still an option for our Survivor Pool pick? It scares me.
Yeah, a little bit now. They all scare me, actually. Survivor Pools in general scare me.
It does. And especially because it's the last Monday. Monday Night Football. Never liked to pick the standalone game because, I don't know, it's just that dread over Sunday.
And then we got Monday, got to worry about it. They all kind of scare me. We haven't locked in our pick yet, but we're getting to that point. How many of your Survivor Island picks have you made so far? I haven't made any of my Survivor picks yet.
Of your seven Survivor Island picks? Yeah, I'm like a cat on that island. No, I'm live. He's cheating, is what he's saying.
No, what he's doing is he's being the guinea cat. Because you all keep telling us that you aren't able to get onto Survivor Island or it's full or your logins don't work or this or that. Yada, yada, yada. Anyway, we have found for the majority of you that you're on the islands. In fact, the islands are, they're actually stacked. Stocked?
Yes, both of those things. Heavily populated. Heavily populated until week one when the Jets pulled upset over the Ravens. And so at that point a lot of us will be walking the plank, I believe. But if you haven't yet joined us on either Cocos Island or Isla Nublar or Alcatraz, if we have to add one, go to our show Twitter after our CBS and you can join.
Either use an existing CBS Sports login or create one. It takes all of, I don't know, 17 seconds and then you're in. I did make my pick earlier on Thursday. I hate it, of course. Just gotta survive.
Survive in advance, baby. So that's pinned to the top of our show Twitter after our CBS and you can also find our game of the week poll and then on Facebook too pinned to the top of our Facebook page after hours with Amy Lawrence. I mean I feel like we've made this as simple and as easy for you as we possibly can.
We have served it up on a silver platter. I actually spoke to a former NFL QB who told me he doesn't have the same high hopes for Russell Wilson in Denver as do many Denver Broncos fans. My experience in Seattle was one of a kind. Ten years, I couldn't imagine those years not being in my life and how special they were and how many games we won and how many amazing thrillers and just the Super Bowl we won and everything else. So I'm going to think about all those memories and everything else and the joy of that. I'm not going to be sitting there worrying about what people say. He actually had another quote that I saw on Thursday in which he talked about how he really believes in himself. He feels like he's still one of the best to do it.
It's unlimited. Right, he didn't drop that but that was essentially the point is that it doesn't matter what people say. It doesn't matter that I haven't played for reals with the Broncos offense yet, meaning he didn't take snaps in the preseason.
What matters is that he can still play this game at a very high level and so whether or not he's defending himself I believe is kind of irrelevant. What matters is what he does on the field and certainly a lot of Broncos nation is thrilled because it feels like this could be the answer to the post-Payton search, if you will. I watched the Broncos go through it after John Elway. It took them years to get Peyton Manning there but it did produce two Super Bowl appearances and another Super Bowl ring. Is Russell Wilson the next iteration of a free agent quarterback who chooses Denver and leads the Broncos back to the promised land? So that's also one of the choices in our Game of the Week poll.
Find it on Twitter, find it on Facebook. Can't wait to see what you all come up with. Next we're heading to LA. Our friend Michael Duarte will join us to talk Rams and Bills next CBS Sports Radio. Virtua Health. Here for good.
Whisper: medium.en / 2023-01-31 10:37:45 / 2023-01-31 10:54:01 / 16