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It is the JR Sport Brief Show here with you coast to coast. On the Infinity Sports Network. We got Monday Night Football. It's underway. It's taking place in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Green Bay Packers hosting the Philadelphia Eagles, a team that They haven't been able to defeat in their last three meetings.
This could be a preview of the NFC championship game. Obviously, we've talked a lot about football today: the firing of Brian Dayball, the Bills' disappointing loss last night or yesterday to the Dolphins. A lot of disappointing losses. The Steelers suffering one last night as well. There's just a lot going on in the NFL to talk about all things taking place in the league.
Joining us right now is someone who covers the league for Athlon Sports. Welcome back to the show, Luke Easterling. Luke, how are you, man? Hey, I'm doing well, JR. Glad to be back, man.
Thanks for having me.
Well, great to have you here. I guess first to give us a little bit of a preview on what's taking place tonight. This could be an NFC Championship Game Preview. What are your thoughts on where the Eagles and Packers currently are so far this season? Yes, it's interesting, man.
At their best, I think we've seen both of these teams look like potential Super Bowl contenders. But at their worst, they've looked like teams that don't belong in the playoffs at all. I mean, just last week, we saw the Panthers or the Panthers come into Lambeau and beat the Green Bay Packers in their home field. I mean we've seen The offense, in particular, in Philly, could be completely stagnant for long stretches earlier in the season. And so.
These teams aren't without their flaws. They have proven that if they're not bringing their A game, they are beatable by just about anybody. But they've got enough talent to rely on to bail them out most of the time. And so that's why I'm excited to see them both tonight. I want to see.
If they both bring the best of what they're capable of to the table, we should be in for a fantastic game. But if either of them Decides to lay an egg, which we've seen them do before. Again, they've got injuries in multiple spots. Hopefully, we get a marquee matchup tonight. We get to see Micah Parsons wrecking the game.
We get to see all those playmakers in Philly making plays. We get to see Jordan Love making deep throws down the field. But I'm hopeful that that's what we get and not some of the disjointedness that we've seen from both of these teams at times this year.
Well, Luke, you talk about the ups and downs of two teams that we might see in the Super Bowl. We've had so much parity in the league this year, there doesn't appear to be one dominant team. What do you think that leads to? Are we just in the Fully now post-Tom Brady era. Is that what it is?
Why is it so much parody? I think there's a lot of reasons. I think part of it is there are more really, really good quarterbacks in the NFL than we've ever seen at one time. I think even at most, You know, down the stretch toward, you know, probably the back half of Brady's career when we had that run of. You know, Philip Rivers and Ben Roethlisberg are playing at a high level while he and Peyton were still putting up big numbers.
Like, we've had. you know, five or six guys at a time, but man, there's there's ten, twelve. 14 quarterbacks that in any given day are playing at an extremely high level. And even some of the ones that are inconsistent, they're so talented that you're still tuning in every week to see what they're going to do if they bring what they're best at to the table.
So I think it starts with Really, really good quarterback play. And obviously, injuries have kind of dinged that a little bit so far this season. But a couple of years ago, you have a draft where you have Caleb Williams and Jaden Daniels and Drake May at the top all coming into the league at the same time. And you got Bo Nix and J.J. McCarthy and Michael Pennix Jr., who have been inconsistent, but they're still so talented, you want to see what they're going to do.
I think that has a lot to do with it, but. I think honestly that the fun part is I think you see offensive and defensive coordinators. Always trying to push the envelope, always trying to stay one step ahead of the other side of the ball. And so you're seeing some of these. These coaches trying to innovate in new ways.
They're trying to find the next big thing and stay one step ahead of their counterparts. And that challenge to try to one-up each other on a weekly basis it leads to what we're seeing, which is the fact that no team has really Emerged as a dominant team this year. We've got the Chiefs who have won nine straight division titles. They're third place in their own division. You know, you've got.
The AFC North, which were supposed to be dominant this year, it hasn't been dominant, but now you've got Baltimore, who was without Lamar Jackson for a month. They've won three in a row, and now they're right back into it.
Now the Steelers are sliding back a little bit. You got Joe Burrow coming back to practice this week, so the Bengals are like, hey, we've been super bad this year. We have a worse defense in the NFL. We still have a legit shot to win this division.
So. I think there's a lot of reasons for it, but I think the winner in all of this is the fan because we're going to get so much meaningful football down the stretch where so many teams are going to be. in the playoff hunt later than we're used to seeing, and I think that's great for the game. And Luke Easterling is here with us for Athlon Sports covers all things football, all things NFL. You talk about how crowded things are in the AFC North.
We saw the Steelers with that ugly loss yesterday. Bad performance by Rogers against the Chargers. Burrow comes back to practice. The Ravens are rolling. what team or what two teams do you think are best positioned to actually come out of the AFC North?
Is it just going to be one team, nobody gets a wild card? Like what do you think this is going to look like? Yeah, it's going to be interesting, man, because some any team that emerges from that, obviously somebody's going to win by default. But if there's a second team that's going to have to emerge into that playoff one, Every one of those teams has a fatal flaw that they have got to figure out an answer for down the second half of the season, right? For Baltimore, you're getting Lamar Jackson back, so you should have the offense running on all cylinders, and that's great.
That defense has been awful for a lot of the first half of the season, and we haven't been able to say that about a Ravens defense in decades. Most of their existence, the Ravens could at least hang their hat on a dominant or at least a stout defense, and that just hasn't been the case this year. If they want to be the team that runs away with this division, that defense is going to have to get things figured out really, really quickly. If you're the Bengals, yeah, that's great. Joe Burrow's going to come back.
Even before he got injured, that defense was so bad that it didn't matter that he was throwing for all those yards. We just saw it a couple weeks ago with Joe Flacco. He was throwing for 400 yards and four touchdowns, and they still found a way to lose. Like, there's so many things. that each of these teams needs to do.
Cleveland dominant defense at times. But they traded away Joe Flacco because they wanted to go with these young guys. Dylan Gabriel hasn't shown them anything at all. He's looked like the late-round pick most of us expected him to be and thought he should be. I don't know how much longer they're going to kick that can this season before they at least give Shador Sanders a shot to show something.
Because if this is the best we're going to get from Dylan Gabriel, they need to give Shador Sanders at least a shot to show something so that they know going into next year's draft, hey, Both of those picks didn't work out. We need to spend another one higher to get a quarterback. They got to see what they got in that room. But that defense is great. It doesn't matter because they don't have the quarterback.
And then in Pittsburgh. Again, Aaron Rodgers playing way better than we ever saw him play for the Jets in the time he was there. But they've got DK Metcalf, and that's about it on offense. There's no like secondary playmaker that if everybody's going to focus on taking away DK, There's nobody else that can step into that void. And at receiver, there's nobody that can take advantage of the one-on-one opportunities that he presents.
The running backs have been okay, but not great. The offensive line has been okay, but not great. The defense has been inconsistent. TJ Watt is still doing his thing. They're still getting after the quarterback, but they've been banged up.
They haven't created enough takeaways. There's always something that it's like, yeah, but. with all four of those schemes.
So somebody's gonna win it by default, but if somebody else wants to emerge and take one of those playoff those those wild card spots, they're gonna have to figure out that that other part of the game that they just haven't figured out so far.
Well, Luke, you talk about figuring anything out. I mean, we see the Buffalo Bills, they've.
Now been jumped by the New England Patriots who are on a seven-game winning streak. You talk about wide receivers. Do you think the Buffalo Bills might finish second to the New England Patriots due to their lack of weapons? And what are your thoughts on what's going on in the AFC East? Listen up, football fans.
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Loyalty program subject to terms and conditions. Details at lowe's.com slash terms. Subject to change. This episode is brought to you by Progressive. Most of you aren't just listening right now.
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To run with a lot of these high-powered offenses. They don't really have a true shutdown corner. I really haven't had one since Trey White before his knee injury a couple years ago. They haven't had that type of presence. They really miss Von Miller's ability to close games as a pass rusher.
They have some guys that have, again, flashed at times and at moments, but there's just nobody that can take over a game, can get that clutch third-down sack and get them off the field.
So some of that responsibility falls on the defensive side of the ball, but on offense, I mean, it's. It's just the inconsistency. Josh Allen seems to be able to rise to the occasion and elevate everybody at times, but the Dolphins game was a prime example. That just didn't happen. If all of it continues to fall on him, he's proven that he can do it at times, but he's not going to do it every time.
And if you expect him to do it week in and week out, A couple of times a season, you're going to have a game like we just saw against the Dolphins, where he's not enough by himself to do that. You've got James Cook. as a as a way to balance out the offense. But Khalil Shakir is a is a number two type of wide receiver. He's not a takeover the game type of guy.
Keon Coleman was kind of drafted in hopes that he would develop into that guy by now. And while we've seen moments from him, we saw one from it from him on Sunday in that game where he made a nice play on a deep ball, made a great touchdown. But It's the consistency that they're chasing with those playmakers that they still just haven't been able to find.
So it's, I mean, the Bills' plan is literally: hey, Josh, go save us. And if that doesn't happen, then they're not going to be able to do it. And if you look at, if you contrast that with what New England is doing right now, New England is just a more complete team. Mike Brable is getting more out of his defense than Sean McDermott is getting out of his in Buffalo. And Drake May.
I if I had an MVP vote, which I don't, I'd probably give it to Matthew Stafford right now, but Drake May would be 1B. He is playing out of his mind in his second NFL season. He's playing like seasoned veteran, and that offense is starting to hum, and he's a big reason why they're doing so well. They're just a more balanced, more well-rounded team than Buffalo is right now, and they are ascending. They're moving in the right direction.
Buffalo's got a lot to figure out if they want to catch them. Yeah, Drake May is moving along. Matthew Stafford with another game where he's out here throwing four touchdowns like it's nothing.
So much for that back issue that he had in the season. These are two teams, Luke, that are moving in a positive direction. Obviously, we learned earlier today that the Giants have gotten rid of Brian Dayball. I didn't expect that one. Do you think there's a possibility that Kafka ends up keeping the job next season, or do you think there are some other candidates that are realistic for the New York Giants' job?
This is what I'll say about the Giants. The Giants have had six head coaches, interim guys included, since 2016. And so what that tells you is and they haven't been successful at all during that time. It tells you that the problem is bigger than the head coach. It's the people who keep picking the wrong head coach over and over and over and over.
These problems are organizational problems that have to get figured out before you're even deciding who the head coach is. Because clearly your process is flawed at this point. That evidence is clear to you that whatever process we're using to come to these decisions, that's what needs to change first. Before we decide what's going to happen, obviously if you're going to allow the same process to keep playing out. You can't expect anything but the same results.
This particular firing is frustrating for me because if you go back and look a couple of years ago, they did exactly what the Chicago Bears showed you you shouldn't do when they drafted Caleb Williams, number one overall. And then they kept Matt Eberflus instead of firing him and starting over at that point. And obviously, it's worked out because they ended up with Ben Johnson. But when you're a team that has on a lame duck head coach that has already proven to you over two full seasons that he's not the guy, keeping him for a third season and allowing him to draft a first-round quarterback, which the Giants did in Jackson Dart this year, and again, Jackson Dart has flashed some great potential and he might have a chance. But he's also been evaluated for a concussion four times in nine weeks.
And so. Those concerns with how they're using him and not necessarily protecting him, maybe it's a coaching thing where he doesn't even need to go to like spring training and learn how to slide or something, like protect this young man's health. All of that to say What should be done eventually must be done immediately. I've always felt that way when it comes to head coaching. Why let a guy hang on for another half a season when you should have made that decision in the offseason?
I think the Giants are finding that out. Regardless of who they get, whether it's Clint Kubiak in Seattle, who's doing a great job with that offense, he's going to be a hot candidate this year. I don't know if Mike McDaniel is going to stay on in Miami. He'll be an offensive coordinator somewhere probably next year instead of a head coach. But there will be options.
But I think for the Giants, there's a much bigger question in, especially it looks like they're going to let Joe Shane, the general manager, make this hire again. You have a bigger issue at hand, which is that you don't know how to pick the right guy in the first place.
So you need to figure that out first before you worry about who that guy's going to be. Yeah, this is uh far off from what the New York Giants are are used to. I mean, they've they've they've gotten used to being uh pretty mediocre and bad over the past several years, but as a history of the organization, uh certainly not. Hey, Luke, we appreciate the time. Tell everybody where they can follow you or your work with Athlon.
Fill us in. Yeah, I appreciate it, man. I always have a good time on the show. You can find my stuff at athlonsports.com. I also have a weekly podcast covering the NFL draft called the First Round Conversation.
You can find that on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you get your podcast, video, audio. We've got it all for you.
So every week we cover the NFL draft so you can see college football stuff, NFL stuff on that show. Every week at athlonsports.com, I have a new mock draft every Tuesday morning. Right now it's expanded to two rounds.
So I'm projecting the first two rounds of next year's draft. every Tuesday morning at Athbonsports.com. You can catch that. I do a stock report every Sunday morning where I look at the Saturday games and tell you which prospects are moving up and down the board, who you need to get to know.
So if you especially if you're a fan of one of those teams that's already disappointed with this season and looking ahead to next year, definitely keep it locked there and get yourself ready for the draft. Look at the players that your team might be able to add next April. And we appreciate your expertise, man. We got a regular season game going on. We're thinking about next year.
Hey, Luke, we appreciate it, man. We'll catch you soon, okay? Hey, my pleasure, JR. Take care, my man. Uh That 365 is paying out before the final whistle.
Check out Bet365's unrivaled early payout offer. When you bet on the team to win and they take a 17-point lead, you get paid no matter the final score. Forget the final whistle and start counting that cash. Hold up, you get early payout on parlays too! Download the app and see why it's never ordinary at Bet365.
Gambling problem? Call 1-877-718-5543 or visit morethanagame.nc.gov. Must be physically located in North Carolina. TNC Supply. At Lowe's, this Veterans Day and every day, verified military members, veterans, and their spouses get automatic silver status in My Lowe's rewards with free standard shipping, plus 10% off eligible purchases with no annual limit.
It's one way we honor and give back to those who have served and still do. Learn more now at Lowe's.com slash military. 10% discount can't be combined with another offer. Exclusions, terms, and conditions apply. Loyalty program subject to terms and conditions.
Details at Lowe's.com slash terms. Subject to change. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Whether you love true crime or comedy, celebrity interviews or news, you call the shots on what's in your podcast queue. And guess what?
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