Did the NFL fail Tua?

This is the best of the Adam Gold Show Podcast brought to you by Coach Pete at Capital Financial Advisory Group.

Visit us at capitalfinancialusa.com. This is the Adam Gold Show. The Durham Bulls are like the UNC women's soccer program from like the 90s. Yeah. Still like that to an extent. It's ridiculous.

Yeah, it's true, but it's not quite what it was. UConn basketball. UConn women's basketball. Yeah.

Holy mackerel. Welcome to Friday. Can you say UConn women's basketball around these parts now? I think that might upset some people. No, it should. It should upset people.

We always get the home game. It's too bad. It's too bad. Shouts to Wes Moore, my friend. It's the Adam Gold Show on a Friday. Here you go. Dennis Cox is here.

Who? Victoria had another baby shower? It's fine. It might have got canceled. I don't know. It's true.

It's true. I hope everybody's doing well. We're hurt all across the state. Those of you people up in Asheville, I don't think anything has necessarily gotten there yet. If it has, I've looked at Asheville weather.

I know that the coastal area, we're on Wilmington. That place is that they know what's coming. They're used to it. But we have all over the state of North Carolina, there's going to be rain and I hope that we'll be spared the worst of it. But I just hope everybody is taking the proper precautions and we'll try to keep it fun and light for the most part. Except some of the stuff today is not fun and light.

Like the first thing that we're going to talk about isn't really fun and light. You can watch this on TV though. And I apologize for my appearance today. But I am wearing a Mets shirt.

Yeah. I'm very excited. A big baseball game today. I've decided to practice what I preach in that I have always told state fans to embrace fandom. Don't be afraid of losing.

Don't. Because the way you talk about games does not impact the outcome of games. Doesn't. Us predicting things doesn't change the outcome of games. It doesn't alter the outcome.

But we do. So Mets Braves big weekend series starts tonight. Mother Nature clearly a baseball fan. Ian completely left. Missed Atlanta.

Yeah, just went completely around. It's beautiful today in Atlanta. I think there's a little clouds based on what I saw in the weather report today. And then sunny the rest of the weekend. Like perfect.

Mid 70s. And all three games in primetime. 720 tonight, 720 tomorrow and then I believe it's the ESPN game on Sunday night. So this is the huge series. Braves likely need a sweep.

Likely. But I think if the Braves take two out of three, then they'd simply have to outperform the Mets in their first three games in their three games remaining each next week. I believe the Braves are home to the Marlins and the Mets are home to the Nationals. So nobody's playing anybody great. So but that doesn't matter because you can lose to anybody as both teams have proven over the last several weeks. There have been opportunities to take advantage of the others failures and neither team has done it.

So this is where we should be. There's not much to choose between these two teams. And we have a three game weekend series.

Talk about it and we'll get into a little bit. But you can watch us on TV at WRAL Sports Plus. We're here. Android, Apple, Roku, Fire TV. 34.1 on an antenna. Spoke to somebody the other day who watches us on the antenna all the time.

And the picture is great. So should we go? Let's go. All right.

This is the the not necessarily fun stuff, but it is stuff that needs to be discussed. Remember back to last weekend and the injury to to a tongue of Iowa just before halftime against the Buffalo Bills. Right. If you remember that, we all thought it was a concussion. Head snapped back, hit the ground after he was shoved to the turf, you know, going backwards. Got up, wobbly, tried was shaking his head to unwobble, but then he kind of stumbled and fell. The Dolphins said, well, he went through protocol, but it was really a back injury and an ankle injury that caused him to stagger and almost go down again. Really? Last night, very scary stuff to a was ragdolled in the second quarter and was out. Well, but he's open, so he's going to be sacked back in his own territory at the 47 yard line to his down down. I mean, he was body slims like a wrestling move.

Yeah, he was body slammed to the ground. I just don't understand. First of all, I don't understand why that's not a conversation that way.

We were all talking about protocols and anything. How come you can't get anywhere near quarterbacks anymore? You can't tackle quarterback low.

You can't I mean, if you come close to accidentally hitting them in the neck or the head, it's a penalty. We saw that happen. Brian Burns got called for a terrible penalty, right?

Remember that, right? But because we are so hypersensitive that apparently not last night. So now the football world is wondering how, how could this have happened?

Why do we bury our own heads in the sand and act naive about this? The players are cattle. That's just it. The players are there's going to be another player. No matter how good the player is, there's going to be another one. There's an I'm not saying there's an unending supply at some point. Maybe there will be an ending supply.

There will be a finite number of these people. But for the time being, nope, we're making more every single year. The Dolphins said they followed the protocols. Here's Mike McDaniel, Mike McDaniel McDaniel, the head coach of the Dolphins. I don't think that his an injury from last week. Made hit made him fall the same way this week, you know. But yeah, I do not have any like absolutely zero. Patience for or will ever put a put a player in a position for them to be in harm's way. That is like not what I'm about at all and no outcome of a game would ever influence me being irresponsible as the head coach of the football team.

All right. We do know that concussions beget concussions. If you get a concussion, it's just easier to get the next one. Also, I'm calling BS on it wasn't a concussion last week.

Anyway, next the doll. So the Dolphins said they followed the protocols. Here's NFL PA head Damaris Smith on the process. Our job with respect to a case where we are questioning whether the protocols were followed starts with an investigation and a interview of the team doctors. We follow what's happening with the treatment protocol to ensure that at least the player knows that he's getting the best medical care.

If it means us providing free second opinion, third opinions, doctors that he or she wants to look or talk to, we do that. And then going forward, it's a review of exactly what happened under the circumstances. And again, in a game situation, we built this to be a multi-layered matrix of people who can protect the player, everybody from the referees to both team doctors to the neutrals to the spotter to everyone else.

We want to know what happened. And then after that, any player who is in this situation has to be cleared, not only by the team doctor, but a neutral unaffiliated doctor that we both pay for. Right. And that's that's the problem here.

The problem is the protocols, because I think the protocols eliminate common sense. I was watching the game on Amazon last night. There was almost a really good discussion after the game, except that it was had by basically all former players. And we'll get to get to that element in a second. Now, one more here from Demora Smith before I want to explain something. Here's Smith on the responsibility of the teams. Every employer in the country has a duty to provide a safe workplace or is as safe a workplace as possible. But when an injury occurs, they have a duty to treat that injured employee as a patient. So what I would say to fans and look, I get it.

You love your football. The idea that tackle football and playing with concussions has to go hand in hand is simply a lie. We've seen this game do tremendously well economically. We've seen this game do tremendously well with a fan following since we put in strict protocols in 2011. So the idea that somehow these two things have to go hand in hand is simply not true.

All right. It's the responsibility of everyone, not just the team. It isn't just the team's responsibility. Because you can't trust the team.

But you know who else you can't trust? The player. Players are always going to want to play. Football is a game of toughness, man. Playing through injury.

Doesn't matter where the injury is. But this this might be alarming to some people. But for decades, players, it was like a badge of honor for the player to come by.

Just got my bell rung to come back. Shake the cop. Right. And you saw two and doing it against Buffalo like there's no way that he wobbled because his ankle was hurt or his back hurt. There's just no way if you if you watched his body language against Buffalo, first thing he does is shake his head because clearly he needed to shake his trying to shake himself straight.

And then as he's not just going to the ground, but kind of slumping back on another player, you can tell he's still foggy. So don't hang that on back and ankle. And I'm going to move on here. But we either need to eliminate the team and the players from this and have somebody completely independent, not somebody who works for the players, somebody who works for the league, somebody completely independent, has no, no skin in the game at all. And these people are in charge of these situations. Either that or we need to stop caring to the level we care today because nothing that we do is going to make the game safer.

Nothing. It's a brutal game. And the players understand it. They have understood it forever that it's going to be a brutal game. So let's move on.

Adam Gold in studio with my friend Coach Pete DeRuda with the Capital Financial Advisory Group. We are talking retirement. Coach, how does longevity risk figure into our retirement and income plan?

This is the best of times and the worst of times, Adam. The longevity risk means we're going to live too long. But to me, every day I live is not too long. Right.

Absolutely. So we want our money to outlive us. And unfortunately, many people have seen you out there listening.

Maybe one of them. Your money is not designed to outlive you. You might outlive your money. And that's not what we want to have happen because when we get to that day after you run out of money, it's not going to be a fun time. So let's design a plan that guarantees you'll never run out of money. We call it the GPI plan, Growth Protection Lifetime Income, for the next 10 people. This is a golden ticket, Adam.

A thousand dollar value. We're going to do it at no cost or obligation. And all you have to do is call. We make it so easy.

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Or you could text Adam to 21000 for Coach Pete DeRuta. 31 and a quarter hours away. Almost that time. Actually, kickoff I'll bet you is 742 in Clemson. Oh, yeah, I guess.

So 31 and a half hours away from kickoff in Death Valley. How's everybody feel? Everybody feel good about it? Look, we live in an age of hype, over-hype, super over-hype. I actually think that we haven't completely gone to the mat for this one yet. We haven't.

I don't believe this is something. It's only 10 versus 5. It's not like it's 1 versus 2.

So it hasn't gotten tons of national run. But this is an enormous game for the Wolfpack. And in this era of college football, and how we hype everything to the nines, the fact that State is playing in their first ever game between two top 10 teams in the regular season is awesome. And I know what the ramifications were from 1967. You win it, you're playing for a national championship.

Yeah. They didn't win it. But honestly, there's no hype in that game. It's 1967. It's 1967.

Not many people were around for that. Let's be real. We haven't even put a man on the moon yet. Now we got a Space Force.

That's true. I love that show. I don't love it. It's fascinating to me. That was fun.

This show is fascinating to me. Anyway, it's also the first ACC game of the season. Yeah. So... For State, that is, yeah. State wins. Right, Clemson already played. Clemson played too. State wins. Now what? Oh, we got seven more of these.

Mm-hmm. Including next week against Florida State and then at Syracuse. Still got the game against Wake Forest to come. This is just the first step. Good luck.

All right. What does last year's win over Clemson mean? In the grand scheme of things, I asked that of Dave Doran yesterday. Well, I think we believe we can beat these guys and I couldn't always say that. You know, I think there was certain guys that did.

There was a lot of guys that thought they could. There was a belief in our locker room that we were better than them. And not, you know, as people or any of that, just as a team that we could go out there and out execute them and win. And when you have that and then you finally do it, I think it does matter.

It means something, you know. I mean, there was a time here when we couldn't beat anybody. I mean, my first year we didn't win a single league game and everyone we played was like, how are we going to beat these guys? Like, no one thinks they can win and it's the opposite. We expect to win, you know, and so I think that's the biggest difference in that closing second to that game.

Getting the W, I think it really elevates confidence within a team that they can beat anybody. I mean, Clemson's a great program. They're two-time national champions under Dabo and we respect them.

And so when you knock someone off that said get a program, it means something to your confidence. It was a fun game last year. I would argue that last year's game, State probably should have won comfortably. Yeah. Right? But one nonetheless.

Getting it done just teaches you a lot about it. That was a big game, although we all understood that Clemson wasn't the same Clemson, right? DJ Uyong'olole had not yet developed into a good quarterback, I believe over the last couple of weeks we have seen DJ look like the quarterback that Dabo Swinney kept touting for two years. And as we talked to, I think it was Kelly Gramlich from the ACC Network yesterday, like we go back to the game at Notre Dame where they lost but he threw for 450 yards.

He's playing better now, much better now than he did in that particular game because they had different personnel in that particular game. Well, there's something else about Dave that Dave Dorn said I want to get back to, but let's move on to the Panthers and Cardinals because I'm a little, look, there's not a lot to say about this particular game. I don't think the Cardinals are all that good. We know what the Panthers are. I do think that when the Panthers win this game on Sunday, and I believe they will win this game on Sunday, it might create a sense of false hope among fans, but whatever.

Enjoy the moment. It's been a long time since we could have been able to enjoy Panthers moments. Honestly, a lot of losing and also not playing a fun brand of football. To me, that's an issue for this team. They don't play a fun brand of football to watch. I mean, the first three games this season have been kind of, you wouldn't want to sell the game by showing people Panthers games.

They have to address that in terms of being fun. And I've been harsh on Matt Ruhle and I'm going to be harsh on Matt Ruhle here for a different reason. So I'm wondering if there's beef between or in the Panthers offensive meeting room. Obviously, the passing game hasn't been good.

Matt Ruhle was asked about that yesterday. As you've heard me talk about the passing game, it's everybody. It's never on one guy. It's on the coach.

It's on the line to protect. It's on the guys that get open and make tough catches. So I think everybody's just kind of really honing in on, hey, what can I do? It's like I talked about with turnovers last week.

If you talk about something a lot, sometimes guys start to get tense about it. We got to cut loose a little bit. When Baker gets edge pressure, there's not many guys who have a better feel for stepping up. I think it was a challenge in the second game because of the blitz package.

I think, as we said, we just have to do a really good job. The line has to do a good job of just making him feel really confident with the pocket in front of him. Part of it's just the timing of guys getting open and being where they're supposed to be. Every play kind of tells its own story. There's plays where we turn on and someone's supposed to be running into the window and they're not quite where they're supposed to be.

Baker's looking there. All that always falls on the quarterback. It always falls on the play caller. We kind of just need everybody to understand that they're the most important person on every play. They just have to do their job.

I think you'll see those plays start to happen. Say less, Matt. Say less. Now, you heard what Matt Rule said. He was not blaming any one particular group. He was blaming everybody. We can agree on that, right?

Dennis, that's your read too? Yeah. That Matt Rule was blaming everybody. Basically.

Which, for the most part, fair. We'll get back to that. The question posed to D.J. Moore, who I believe caught one pass for two yards in the win over the Saints. The question posed to D.J. Moore was Matt Rule. It wasn't really a question. It was Matt Rule says receivers need to get open better.

What are your thoughts, D.J.? It all go hand in hand. Pretty much what he said is you got to get it on the same page no matter what. But there's really no, I don't really got no in-depth on it. Just got to get open and then catch the ball. So why aren't you on the same page? Why?

Doesn't have to be on the same page. Just pitch and catch. It's still a kid's game at the end of the day. You haven't had any problem getting open in four years. I mean, is it surprising to hear that? Is it surprising?

Y'all got that from him. That don't matter to me. Like, don't matter to me. Getting open is getting open. Open is one yard,.5 yards. Open is open in this league.

Quarterback, if he doesn't see it that way, it's cool. They going to the next read, next person is open. That goes for everybody in our room.

Everybody can get open. Doesn't matter. All right. But if you watched the video of that, D.J. did not appreciate the question or the thought that somehow this was on wide receivers.

Or maybe him in particular. So, and again, I want to make it clear that Rule was not hanging this on any one group. But here's where I believe Matt Rule screwed up again. Don't call anyone out, Matt.

That's why I said say less. But by calling out wide receivers offensive line, you have brought questions to them that they, honestly, they shouldn't even need to answer. And now it looks like we got problems because D.J. Moore was called out by the head coach. Even though that's not what Matt Rule did.

Because here's what Matt Rule should say. It's either only about the coaches. He's clearly protecting Baker Mayfield here.

Yeah. That's his aim here is to protect the quarterback who everybody understands and Baker admits has not played well. Certainly not nearly as well as they were hoping at this point. And they were not looking for Aaron Rodgers because they didn't sign Aaron Rodgers. They have Baker Mayfield. He's not Aaron Rodgers.

They were looking for a better version of what they had, which to this point they don't have. No honest assessment of the quarterback spot for the Panthers tells you that Baker Mayfield, to this point, has been an upgrade over Sam Darnold. He hasn't.

He hasn't been worse, but he hadn't been better. So Matt Rule either wears it with the coaching staff, say we as coaches, we have to do a better job of putting players in position to succeed. And that's enough.

That's enough. Do you want to hear Matt Rule say that? Tell me Matt Rule's saying that. Look, here's the thing. At the end of the day, for us as a coaching staff, we just got to make sure that we are putting our guys in the best position that they can be to be successful. And it really starts with us.

At the end of the day, when we go back, check the tape, we should all be on the same page. Beep, beep, beep. That's all, folks. He does have a porky pig thing to him. Oh, yeah. Right. So, yes, that's what he should do. That's what he should say.

He should stammer through that. Or, if you want to hang it on Baker, that's okay. Starting quarterbacks are built, especially Baker, they are built to be the shield.

Because the good ones, the great ones, especially in terms of leadership, willingly take that on. But when you start pointing the finger at everyone and you mention, hey, receivers need to get open. I'm telling you, DJ Moore is going to practice every day and getting in games every day, every Sunday, and going, I'm open.

I'm getting open. So they don't want to hear you say receivers need to help them out. And now they've got a problem.

And the problem is the head coach, because he doesn't get that. Come to learn more about Galaxy Z Fold 4. You're in the Adidas store in Greenville, South Carolina. You're in the Adidas store? Yes.

Are you starting Christmas shopping now? Yes. Yes. I can tell you what I'm doing, but I can't tell you over the air what I'm doing. I'll tell you at a later date. Totally understand. All right.

Let's start with the macro on this. The biggest game, I mean, in the hype era of college football, State's never played a regular season game like this, right? No, this is the biggest game most people are going to remember.

It's a big moment. The big question is, can they handle the big moment? What do we have to kind of point to to give us an indication of how this group coaching staff, maybe more than the players, have handled moments like this? Is last year's game at Mississippi State in any way, shape or form similar to this? I understand where you're going, but I think the familiarity of the opponent helps here in NC State's case. I think they have to take the confidence from last year in the win over Clemson. But yeah, as far as like having one of those moments where you're like, OK, NC State, this is your turn not to play with your food.

This is your turn not to trip over yourself. They have not been trustworthy in such moments. I do think that it is a conference game. And I do think that it's against an opponent they had success against last year.

Definitely helps and points them in the right direction. Dave Doran told me yesterday that last year's game, as they were preparing for it, they felt like they were the better team. And I don't disagree with that. I thought especially the way Clemson had been playing at that point, I thought NC State was the better team.

And the fact that it got to overtime was a little bit of a surprise, but maybe not. How do you think these two teams stack up, just in terms of personnel taking the uniforms off? Yeah, I think NC State has the better secondary for sure. I'll take NC State's linebackers as well. Obviously Clemson's defensive front, they got a couple NFL guys there. I'm not impressed with Clemson's skill players. That includes their quarterback. Their offensive lines are probably a push.

I think it just kind of comes down to, just as it was last year with Devin Carter, having to win some jump balls. Which receiver group is really going to differentiate itself and really step up and make the plays that are necessary to win the game? Credit to Clemson's tight ends and running backs and receivers last week, they did those things. The question is, can they do that again against what I think is a better secondary than NC State? Alright, so before we get to the Wolfpack, in terms of how they have played offensively over the first four weeks of the season, I just want to go back to your lack of confidence in DJ Uyengar Lele.

Which, by the way, now I can say thanks to you. I've heard that promo enough. I've been practicing. I thought DJ looked like he was playing differently and more patiently against Louisiana Tech. And I thought that really showed against Wake Forest. That those two games, certainly the latter one, didn't even alter your opinion on DJ?

He's definitely improved. Don't get me wrong, Adam. I'm always going to believe what I see. And I went to the state Clemson game in 2018. Last time I was down here at Clemson for a football game. And everyone was trying to tell us that Ryan Finley was an NFL quarterback. I had questions about Ryan Finley at the time.

Everyone knows this. And I saw Trevor Lawrence on the first throw of that game throwing out 30 yards across the field. And I go, there's an outdoor press box at Clemson. Believe it or not, you could hear the damn ball whistling across the field when the kid threw it. And I just turned around and Luke DeCock was sitting next to me and I said, that's what the NFL quarterback looks like, not the one they're trying to pass off in Raleigh. So that's my standard.

It always will be. And part of that is covering NC State and Philip Rivers and Russell Wilson. You can't fake certain positions when you've seen it.

Who am I talking to? You've seen enough NBA players all these years in the triangle. You know one when you see him. So to me, he's improved for sure. But that doesn't mean he is one of those guys. Well, I agree.

I don't know that he's an NFL quarterback. I 100% agree. The guy I watched against Wake Forest, though, did not seem at all bothered by waiting.

He's been improved, too. I'm not disputing that. They don't have Mike Williams, though. They don't have Travis at the end. I mean, Artevis Scott, Mark Davis, you name it. That's the difference.

Dudes on dudes on dudes. They just don't have those guys anymore. To me, that's the difference between Clemson now and Clemson. It isn't so much the quarterback. They were dangerous with Kelly Bryant, who ain't anything close to an NFL quarterback. Now, they weren't amazing with Kelly Bryant, which is why they went to Trevor Lawrence. But it's the backfield. And I like Will Shipley, but I don't think he's certainly not some of the guys you mentioned. And the receivers are not those guys.

They don't have enough of those guys. Now to NC State. Joe Giglio is with us. He's at the Adidas store in Greenville.

If you're on your way, you can bother him while we're having this conversation. Maybe you're listening on the app somewhere. What has been their – give me an idea of what you think their offense has been for the first four weeks. They haven't been great. I think they've been sharp against lousy defensive teams. I was disappointed in the way that they played in the second half at ECU. I thought they were lucky, obviously, to get out of there with a win, but they did. And then, you know, I do think Demi Sumo is a guy who they can run with. I have questions about their offensive line.

This will be obviously the most difficult test they get in terms of the defensive front that they'll see this year. So, you know, the weather, we don't know. It's not even raining here right now, by the way.

A rain ball morning in North Carolina, but it's not raining here. So do with that what you will. You know, I think it's – just to me, it ultimately comes down to I want to see more out of Devin Carter. He's mostly been absent this season. I want to see more plays designed for Thayer Thomas. I want to see Thayer Thomas targeted, you know, between 10 and 15 times in this game.

This is a game, really, that you really have to die with your fastball. And I hope NC State does that. And if they do, you know, you tip your hat and you say to Clemson, you played better than us today. But you don't really want to leave this moment and this opportunity and say, well, geez, man, if only, you know, all of our 28-year seniors came back. And if only, you know, Devin Leary, you know, didn't go pro.

If only, you know, if this, that, and the, you know, candies and butts. But, you know, this is a 40-year storm, Adam. Yeah. It's a moment they really need to embrace.

All right. Real quick about this is what I said at the beginning of the season going into the ECU game. We didn't see it in that game. We really haven't seen it against competition that is similar. That I wanted to see them trust Leary and let it go.

Let it rip. Be a passing team and then work the run off that. Have they done that or is that what you're advocating for? Like, trust Leary, trust Thomas, make Carter a thing. And because you, they have other good receivers too that we really haven't seen establish themselves. Yeah, I think ultimately they need to be a little bit more creative in the passing game. I want them to be less predictable as well on first down.

That doesn't mean you abandon the run. I actually thought their game plan against Texas Tech reminded me of 2019 when West Virginia really kind of tore apart NC State. Defense in large part because they knew how to play against the three man stack. And I think NC State did that against Texas Tech. They ran the ball a lot in that game. It didn't bother me.

I do think there is a place for that. But ultimately, I think you win games by your quarterback being outstanding by Devin Carter showing you what he did last year at Clemson and by really involving their Thomas in a creative way and not just as a, you know, a trick play passer. All right, Joe, Julia, what is the difference in this game?

As you see it? I think ultimately it comes down to if NC State secondary can have a couple takeaways as they did in that ECU game. And then the offense just needs to make one more play than Clemson defense. I think if they could do that, they can win a low scoring game and get out of here, you know, with their dreams intact.

If not, you know, and the law of the wolf and the NC State stuff says that Will Shipley, who's got 26 family members who graduated from NC State yet is somehow not at NC State, will magically run for, you know, 220 yards and five touchdowns and beat NC State. So, you know, I don't see a whole lot in between on that one. All right, man, don't get me anything at the Adidas store. You're not an Adidas person?

No, I like Adidas. You have a family to take care of. All right, man. I thank you very much for your time. You're welcome. Safe trip back. You're good. Joe, Julia, low scoring game. I don't know. This is the Adam Gold Show.