NFL MVP Draft (Hour 2)

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That's BetterHelpHELP.com slash positive. We continue, this is the Zach Gelb show coast to coast on CBS Sports, CBS Sports Radio. Give me a little NFL music right now, because we're going to do a draft, and we're going to do NFL MVPs for this upcoming season between yours truly and Hot Take Hickey. Now, I was reading yesterday, Hickster, before we get into the draft, that Justin Fields is the most heavily bet player for the MVP award. What?

How does that make any sense whatsoever? Now, his odds, depending on what sportsbook you're looking at, I'm seeing, plus 2,000, plus 2,500. Justin Fields is now in a better situation this year, because you would think the offensive line is going to be improved. You have DJ Moore. I don't trust Chase Claypool, but he is your number two wide receiver.

That's not a bad number two wide receiver to have. But this idea that Justin Fields is being bet on and most heavily bet on player to win the MVP, I just don't get it. And it's one of those things where a lot of bizarre things go on in the gambling world, and I don't know how to read into it. But even if the Bears have a good year this year, what is that? They'll double their win total from last year, maybe add one more on to it and get to 7 and 10? They were 3 and 14 last year. I don't think the Bears are going to be 7 and 10.

But if the Bears are 7 and 10 this year, even if that's at best 8 and 9, let's just say, you're not having an 8 and 9 player, a 7 and 10 player win the MVP Hickey. So I don't get all this love for Justin Fields. I'm a fan of Justin Fields.

I like Justin Fields. I know he's talking about being the first Bears quarterback to ever throw for 4,000 passing yards. That would be double pretty much, a little bit doubling his passing yard total from last year.

Then you're going to take away so much from the running game, which then doesn't make him as great as a player and as lethal as a player that he's proven to be so far in the NFL. So there's a lot of times you see things and you go, okay, I don't get it. This one, I really don't get it.

I can't even give you a valid explanation on. That screams value. This time of the year, people are not going to bet on Patrick Mahomes or Jalen Hurts or Joe Burrow because their odds are too high or I guess too low in theory.

So you want value. Where can I bet a guy that runs the ball and gets a lot of attention for doing so, passes the ball, he's going to need to improve. He's talked a big game.

We've seen the Bears put weapons around him, at least try to. He is, I feel like always is one guy that's a little over-hyped going into the year where expectations are higher than they should be. This is for me that Justin Fields is that guy, but I think a large part you're seeing a lot of money right now go towards him for MVP is just strictly value. But if you're looking more so for value and sometimes the MVP comes out of nowhere, like who had Patrick Mahomes winning the MVP the first time he did that? Lamar Jackson, his first two years as a starter, won a unanimous MVP.

So it's possible for it to come out of nowhere. But if you're looking for value, and I'm not saying I believe in these two players to go win the MVP, but wouldn't you do so with a guy that has been in the league and has had a lot more success than Justin Fields, like bouncing back on Deshaun Watson. Deshaun Watson right now, not that I think they'll win the MVP, but at a time he was a quarterback that was a great quarterback in this league. His odds right now are 2,500. So you get better odds for Deshaun Watson than Justin Fields if you're looking to hit it on a long shot. And I don't believe in this guy, but wouldn't you rather at plus 1,600 gobble up Dak Prescott than plus 2,000 on Justin Fields?

Those are just two names for starters. If that's your answer, you're looking for value, where you're like, okay, there's better value or a better chance of Deshaun Watson or Dak Prescott winning the MVP this year than it is with Justin Fields. Justin Fields has no shot to win the MVP this year. I'm not saying he is, I'm just saying in terms of hype this off season, we've not talked a lot about Dak Prescott.

It's kind of at this point we know what he is. Wait, we haven't talked a lot about Dak Prescott? I don't think so, yeah. Oh, I think we talk about Dak Prescott every day. This off season?

I don't think so. People know who he is. There's no reason to hype him up because at this point his career is long enough where he is who he is. Today's Wednesday. We talked about Dak Prescott on Monday, Tuesday, and we just did a segment on Dak Prescott five minutes ago. And what was it about? About Jerry Jones making stupid comments. My point is in the sense that has there been a quarterback more hyped up right now and believed in than Justin Fields' off season?

I'm not saying it's real, but Fields has been talking about himself and putting him in categories he should not be in. He's talked about breaking the Bears single season record. Again, the Bears on the spotlight because of the number one overall pick and we're going to trade down. So they got DJ Moore, an established number one wide receiver.

Again, I'm with you. I would not put any of my money, my hard earned money on Justin Fields to win the MVP, but trying to at least explain why he is right now the guy who has the most money on him to win the award. Part of that is people trying to buy into the hype. And I don't know right now off the top of my head, a quarterback that's been talked to more than we don't normally talk about in a positive way than Justin Fields. Plus 4,000 Russell Wilson plus 5,000 Kirk Cousins. It's like if you're looking for value and I know what you're saying that a lot of people have been talking about Justin Fields.

I think they are setting this guy up to fail with how much people are going delirious over Justin Fields. So I think could be a good player this year, but an MVP candidate, give me a break. Alrighty, let's start this off. We'll do one pick each back and forth until we get to five. One little caveat here, you have to pick one non quarterback because you would agree probably if we just did quarterback, if we just did MVPs, it would be quarterback, quarterback, quarterback, quarterback, quarterback until you got to five quarterbacks each.

Yes, so four QBs and one non QB. Alrighty, I will start it off and it's tough when you are the man and the guy to go win the MVP because everything has to go right and people try to take it away from you, but I will go with Patrick Mahomes. Your pick? I will then go with Joe Burrow, guys not won one.

People love giving awards to new players. I've not won one big year for the Bengals. He escaped big injury with just a calf strain and not anything worse with the ACL or with the Achilles, Joe B. My next pick, I think this is an easy one, a guy that almost won the MVP last year. I know it ended up going to Patrick Mahomes, but I will take Jalen Hertz because the Eagles should be the one seed in the NFC. If he didn't get hurt last year, he may have won the award, but Jalen Hertz to me is set up to have another monster season where you know he's gonna have a bunch of rushing touchdowns and then throwing the football. You have AJ Brown, you have Devante Smith, who they call a skinny Batman in Philadelphia. And then you do have Dallas Goddard, who if I'm a fantasy football player, Dallas Goddard is one of the better tight ends in the league.

And I feel like he still is underrated doesn't get enough credit. If he stays healthy, he's gonna have a monster season. So I will go Jalen Hertz here as the next pick. My team so far is gonna have a common thread that is guys nipping at the heels of Mahomes looking for their first MVP. I'll take Josh Allen in the bills.

Wow. Now I think that's the right pick for what was available, what was on the table. But I'm surprised, Ticky, that you did go with Josh Allen because you haven't been the biggest supporter and the biggest advocate for one Josh Allen.

That is 100% right. And right now I'm trying to win the game. I'm trying to pick the winner and he's always someone that's been talked to on the conversation. He's come close. So I'll take a guy that's been knock on the door, big year for the bills, a lot of attention on them.

Maybe now that the attention compared to last year subsided, maybe that will loosen it up a little bit and have them play a little better. So I'm coming up with some new sound effects that you're not made aware of yet, but I was going down the Twitter or X, whatever we're calling it these days, rabbit hole. And I was Googling or Twitter searching your name. And I came upon a video of you saying that Carson Wentz is going to be a better quarterback than Josh Allen. That's how far of a progress you've made where you have now totally ditched and done a 180 on Carson Wentz. And now you're hyping up a guy that used to not be able to stand in Josh Allen.

Now he may be your guy. Well, I'm not hyping Josh Allen up. I mean, again, I'm just picking a guy right now out of a lineup to win an MVP award. I'm going to pick him to win the award, but I'm just going to play the numbers game of guys behind him.

I think it's a higher chance of winning than the guys left, but also Carson Wentz made it easy to go turn to 180. He did it to himself. It took two weeks. That's it. Alrighty. My next pick.

I'm going to hold off on one. And I think you're going to snatch him up next, but I will go with Aaron Rogers. The last time Aaron Rogers was really motivated. He won back to back MVPs and just with taking $75 million or $35 million less.

I think he's trying to stick it once again to his old team in Green Bay. I will go Aaron Rogers as my third pick here to win the NFL MVP. Your third pick. Trevor Lawrence, Calvin Ridley now adding to the mix, very successful second half of the season.

Once he got comfortable and Doug Peterson's offense, I think he's going to be in for a big year this year. I like Trevor Lawrence a lot. And I have a big time defense of Trevor Lawrence coming up later because one, I guess we could say reputable outlet didn't even have him as a top 10 quarterback in the NFL, which is a big fat disgrace. Final one here.

So I liked the way that you said it earlier. If you're looking for someone to try to dethrone and knock off Patrick Mahomes, which is so tough to do. Burrow already off the board. Allen already off the board. Trevor Lawrence already off the board.

Aaron Rogers already off the board. Just inside the AFC, I think there's two names that you could go with. And the name I'm going to go with, I don't think is the better quarterback. But if he could stay healthy, we've seen him win an MVP award before.

And if you want to talk about a guy that could put up stupid stats and still win the award without winning his division, I do think it could be Lamar Jackson. Now there's a layup name here that you should take. If you're thinking Justin Herbert, I'm not taking him. That's what I thought you were going to take. No, this is tough.

I'm actually between two names. Because the reason why I would think you would take Herbert here is he is a top six, seven, eight quarterback in the sport, plays directly in the division of Patrick Mahomes. If they lose that division by, let's just say a game or two, and you have 11 wins or so, and Herbert with those many weapons on offense with Eckler and Quinton Johnson and also Keenan Allen and Mike Williams, I could see him putting up like 40 touchdown passes this year or something like that.

And that could be MVP type of stats right there. So I'm surprised you didn't go Herbert. Because Herbert's a better quarterback than Lamar Jackson, in my opinion. But I look at the stupid stats also with running for Lamar that he could put up and how they started to bring in more pieces for him where I could see maybe there being a push for Lamar.

That's why I ended up going Lamar. I do not think Herbert is going to make the play, or I should say the Chargers are going to make the playoffs. So I'm going to, I don't think you can win the MVP without making the playoffs. So I'm going to go here a little bit on a limb.

I get it. It's a little bit of a wild card here, but I'm going to buy into the hype part of the MVP's narrative. AFC or NFC? NFC. NFC.

That's right. I'm taking Jared Goff. Jared Goff. Building off of last year's strong finish. You bring back your offensive coordinator.

You got a lot of weapons everywhere. The division is open. People are talking highly about the Lions. They go 11 and six.

We're talking 12 and five. I think Jared Goff's going to be getting a lot of MVP love, rightfully so. So again, I'll go a little bit of wild card here. Give me Jared Goff. Wouldn't it be great if a running back won the MVP this year? After the last few months of just all this running back conversation, how the running back position is now devalued. Imagine someone like Nick Chubb, let's just say, goes wins the MVP this year and the Browns make the playoffs. That'd be crazy. It would be Saquon Barkley, Josh Jacobs or Jonathan Taylor.

Oh no. The three most vocal. Austin Eckler. Austin Eckler would be phenomenal. Pay Justin Herbert all this money.

Look at me winning the MVP. So for my non quarterback, because we're going to make five picks here and one has to be a non quarterback. So far I have Mahomes, Jalen Hurts, Rogers and Lamar Jackson. My draft choices.

Hickey has Burrow, Josh Allen, Trevor Lawrence and Jared Goff. What a sentence that was. I'm going to go with, you know what? I'm going to change this and it's risky. I was going to take Justin Jefferson because Justin Jefferson, he's going to put up monster numbers again. But the guy I'm going to go with is Christian McCaffrey. And here's why. Yes, the health is a concern.

Absolutely health is a concern. But no one knows what you're going to get out of the quarterback position. And sure, there's some other stars on that offense. Deebo's going to have a bounce back year.

I like Brandon Iuke a lot. You got Kittle, but you now get a full year with Kyle Shanahan. And we saw McCaffrey throwing the ball, running the ball, catching the ball with the 49ers. To make a pick here, you can't have a strong quarterback if you're going a non quarterback to win this award because a guy like Justin Jefferson could easily go have an MVP type of season. And right, I was talking about him maybe winning the war last year, but Kirk Cousins stats are going to be good enough where maybe then people start making the case for Kirk Cousins. So for the Niners, no one really believes in their quarterback.

These are going to be solid, but he's a game manager. And you may see multiple quarterbacks for the Niners. Big year coming for Christian McCaffrey. I will go run CMC. I like it.

I like the philosophy. I think you're spot on with that 100% and that's going to be the guy you think would be the mainstay and the main face of that 49ers offense. I know you're taking here. Who do you think I'm taking? You're taking Derek Henry from your favorite football team, right? Mike Vrabel will coach his ass off this year. And we'll get Derek Henry to win the MVP award and stiff arm hickey and those lovely, pathetic Indianapolis Colts, right? Not going to happen. No, no, no, no.

Sorry, Derek. Tyree kill you going? I'm going with Mr. 2K himself. Tyree kill, who is self proclaimed. He's going to go for 2000 yards.

We have 1800 last year. He was sort of close ish. Not going to happen.

You got to a hopefully fully healthy. He goes for 2K. Good luck trying to rip that MVP award out of his hands. I'll take Tyree kill the cheetah. Tyree kill, please. I've had enough of Tyree kill. Great football player, but what a royal pain in the ass. Patrick Mahomes, Jalen Hurts, Aaron Rogers, Lamar Jackson, Christian McCaffrey are my five.

Hickey goes with Joe Burrow, Josh Allen, Trevor Lawrence, Jared Cobb, and Tyree kill. Alrighty. What are you trying to get a job in Detroit? Is that what you're doing? I actually, I like that. I'm excited about that pick. Where I got him value wise, kind of a sleeper right now, rising up. I love that Jared Goff pick myself. How about them Cowboys? We do a little first and goal, even though Hickey says we never talk about Dak Prescott with the Cowboys next, and we'll be talking to RJ choppy.

You're listening to the Zach Gelb show. The NFL season is inching closer and closer. Who are the contenders and who are the pretenders? We have four downs to figure out your team's future. It's time now for first and goal on the Zach Gelb show. How about them Cowboys?

We'll preview the Dallas Cowboys with one part of the great duo of Sean and RJ on the legendary one Oh five three, the fan in Dallas from Oxnard, of course is RJ choppy. RJ, how are you? Zach doing well, man. How are we doing? You sound tired, my friend.

How is it waking up and doing a show at training camp at 3 30 AM Pacific time? You know, it's, uh, I think it's taken a toll. It's taken a toll on me more now as I, as I get older, I'm 43 now when I was 33. I mean, I did this so easy. I was able to go out at night. Now it's like, let's go to dinner at five o'clock. Let's get to bed by eight. Let's go to the show, but it's, uh, it wears on you. Last night we had the big media party at Nobu every year. Jerry Jones has the media party at Nobu, uh, which is such a treat, but it's like 45 minutes from here and we don't get home.

So it's very, very late. So we're, we're on fumes today. Any drama go down with the drama Cowboys at that party? Now, you know, the players aren't there. The coaching staff usually isn't there. We saw coach Garrett here one year, but usually it's just Jerry and Steven. They kind of hold a off the record round table. You know, you can ask him anything.

They tell you anything, but it's all off the record. Um, you know, and then occasionally like, yeah, Al Michaels will show up or, and then in the restaurant, there's usually celebrities from Vince Vaughn. The, you know, yesterday was, you know, Fonzie was there. Henry Winkler was there yesterday just in the restaurant. So it's pretty cool.

It's good people watching. Yeah. I can't really see McCarthy who seems like a good guy and you guys have a good relationship with going to Nobu and just devouring sushi with the media. I mean, you don't see him getting that much.

Uh, he's an early riser, so he's not getting that much. All right. With the Cowboys. I saw the Jerry Jones DAC friendly comments last year. It was, we go as Zeke goes this year, uh, simplifying the offense.

What did you make of it? Well, you know, you gotta, I think at some point you gotta learn Jerry speak and he will, he is the ultimate salesman. So he is going to try to sell things.

So last year he was trying to sell. This is going to be a run first team. And you know, McCarthy keeps saying, it's going to be a run first team this year, but you know, Jerry now is looking at it from the perspective. Okay. You know, DAC is, you know, dad, we got to simplify the offense for DAC.

We want to streamline it for DAC. Um, you know, I just think that Jerry is, is, is selling. He's always, always be selling. That's his mantra.

If he had a t-shirt that he wanted to wear, that would be it. Um, you know, this is, this is a good football team and he knows it. And he knows that the thing that's holding this team back is elite quarterback like that's a really good quarterback, top 10 player as a position. Um, you know, but, but you know, the guys who make it to that next level, the guys who win multiple Superbowls are elite players.

You got to get there. And really DAC to me is kind of like Kirk cousins where statistically, I know it wasn't the case for DAC last year with all the interceptions, but usually those numbers are down. You throw enough touchdown passes. And at times people be like, Oh, I really believe in the Vikings. I really believe in the Cowboys. And this Cowboys team is really good, but I can't see DAC Prescott winning three games in January to get this team to a Superbowl. Well, the issue, and I think this was, I think this is where you're right in general, but the NFC, I think is, is such a wide open, easy conference this year.

I don't mean easy. Like there's no Patrick Holmes. There's no Joe burrow.

There's no Josh challenge. No Lamar Jackson. Like you have to really, if you're the Cowboys, you're, you're, you're, you're have a quarterback advantage against San Francisco. You probably have the second best quarterback at the conference overall, um, behind Jalen hurts. Uh, you know, cause you don't know what Matt Stafford's arm is at this point. So let's just say DAC the second best quarterback. You basically have to pull one upset to make the Superbowl in the NFC. If you think, you know, whoever has a better quarterback is probably gonna win the game.

Like that's really not that difficult. And that's the amazing thing about this team is they've had a good quarterback for 20 years almost. And they've never been able to get to even the conference championship game with Romo or DAC. Like they've got to just pull one upset.

They need a lucky bounce here or there. Um, yeah, I, I, I get the DAC Kirk cousins, you know, Derek Carr, Jared golf, you know, comparisons are kind of all in that same little grouping, but I think, you know, DAC with the, you know, he does put up a lot of good numbers in the regular season. I mean, I think he can win two playoffs games. Um, can he win two road playoffs games?

That's a different story. Like I go back to last year, RJ choppy, and I never believe in the Cowboys, but last year they beat Tampa Bay and even Tampa Bay is eight and nine, but it's still Tom Brady. They're going up against the Niners. They played him in the playoffs year before, right? They couldn't get the snap off. And last year they should have won that game. The defense played championship style football and Tony Pollard goes down and DAC just looked lost.

So my question to you off that is if this happens again with DAC, but do they ever think about moving on from him or is he just going to get that extension and be locked up for a few more years after this? Well, that's another, that's another kind of conundrum. Jerry definitely wants to have a championship in his lifetime.

You know, one that he can call his own, that he doesn't have to worry about answering the whose title is it? His or Jimmy's the smart luck. You're right. The smart move would be like, if you don't have like a top three, four or five quarterback, you really got to try to find one. The worst thing you do, DAC is good enough to get you in the playoffs every year. Um, just like, you know, Kirk's good enough to get you in a lot and, and, you know, when it went a lot of games, Alex Smith kind of with the chiefs.

Yeah, sure. You put it like that, you know, but, you know, and, but never bad enough to where you're going to get the number one overall pick of the draft unless there's an injury. Um, and, and, you know, the Cowboys team, the roster is good enough. Even, even let's just say that does get hurt.

He's missing, he's gone for the entire year. I mean, shoot, they went like four and one with Cooper rush. Like they're, they're not going to be bad enough to get the number one pick of the draft. Jerry's too old to start over.

He's not going to start over. And that's, that's the, the, the great thing is that, you know, the Cowboys are always going to be good and, you know, maybe, maybe you run into one, you know, you get lucky, you get hot run into a title. Um, but the bad side is, is that, you know, you have a quarterback who's going to be very highly compensated is right now, but he's going to get an extension and he's going to get 46 to $48 million on extension per year. And, you know, he's probably somewhere between like the seventh and 10th, 10th best quarterback in the league, you know, maybe seven to 12, wherever you want to put them. Um, and, and you've really got to get lucky to win, you know, you, you, you think you're going to beat Patrick Mahomes, uh, or borough or Allen, if they're on their game, you know, probably not. Let's get to the next down. R.J.

Choppy here with us. What's the latest on Zach Martin? Is there a chance they trade him? I know this line isn't as great as it once was, but they still need him on this football team. We heard whispers that, you know, Jerry said this week, you know, we've got to pay Parsons. We've got to pay CD, got to pay DAC. Um, they're not going to give a third, an early thirties guard, you know, top guard money. Uh, I don't think they're going to pay the guard, a guard, that kind of money anyway. Like that's just kind of the whispers that we're hearing.

I don't know what happens here. Um, you know, Zach is losing $50,000 a day. Uh, he's approaching half a million dollars.

And he's going to get lost already just by skipping out on these camps. And then, and this is not, you know, a couple of years ago where you can, you know, oh, you can wink, wink, just get rid of that money. They'll, they'll, they'll, they'll, you know, write it into your contract. It doesn't work like that anymore.

You've got to pay it. I like, I think there's a real chance like one of two things happens at either he caves and he comes back or he retires. I don't, I don't, I don't, I think last year after the game against Sam Fraley, he was kind of distraught.

Like he was saying goodbye to a lot of people. Um, I, I, I don't think Jerry pays him. Like, I think Jerry paying him is the least likely of the three.

I don't think they go down that road where they give him this extension. They got to pay Parsons. They got to pay that. Um, you know, we don't know what they're going to do a Pollard, you know, lamb, all that stuff. They got to pay these guys. Um, so I, you know, and they just paid digs. So like, you know, they, they've got to pay all these players.

What are they going to do? Are they going to restructure Zach Martin? Who, you know, are you going to add three more years, three, four more years to that deal where he's already kind of into, I don't think they do it.

So I think it's order of, you know, likelihood is he, he put tucks his tail between his legs, comes back. Number two retires over three, Jerry caves and pays him. If it gets to that point that he wants to retire, why wouldn't Jerry then just trade him and he'll go play for somebody else and you'll get, I don't know what you get back, but at least you get something back for him. Well, yeah, that's, that's an option. I, you know, I was thinking from the, from the him, him not moving anywhere, that that's definitely an option. I think if it would get to that point that Jerry would move them. Um, cause I don't know what you get. I mean, what do you get for a guy who was in his early thirties, even though, you know, the players and the coaches just ranked him as the best guard in the league last year on that ESPN poll, uh, or CBS below camera. Um, so I think, yeah, the likelihood is they would, they would, they would trade him, but, you know, short of that, if they were not going to move off of the Jersey to play that hard line stance, because remember they trade them all this guaranteed money, you know, comes to today, all that dead cat money.

Um, so yeah, like that is, that's absolutely a likelihood, but what is the compensation for somebody who's that age at some point this year, will you be hosting a show talking about the return of Ezekiel Alia to the Dallas Cowboys? Why did you have to do that? Why, um, cause you know, it's going to happen. I know, uh, yeah. If you had talked to me two days ago, uh, I would have said no, but with the Ronald Jones news and you know, that that's, that's very short.

It's only a couple of games. I'm going to say no is the more likely one, but it's far more likely than it was 48 hours ago. Like, uh, you know, Mike doesn't McCarthy, I don't think wants the back. He said in the press covers that they, that doors closed. And then Jerry said in our station the other day, um, you know, doors wide open and it's like, you know, okay, which one is it?

The two, the two, the two hands are talking to each other, you know, totally Cowboys right here. He's the ultimate salesman though, right? He's got to keep, he's got to keep everything in the news. You want to stay in the news? I would say no, I would, I would lean towards no.

All right. Jay choppy with us, uh, Tony Pollard, how's he looking so far, uh, coming off the injury? You know, so far he's fine.

Um, it's tough to tell in camp. I mean, you know, you get like, you know, you get one cut, you get to the first line of the defense, then all of a sudden they pulled the whistle and then you see the guy just running out the next 20 yards by himself. It's tough to really tell, but you know, it's, I just look at it like, you know, kind of a, of a bone break in 2023 is, is, is pretty fine. Now, now granted Dak is not nearly as fast as it used to be ever since the injury. So there is, there is that, but no Pollard Pollard's fine.

It'll be the feature back. We'll see, you know, what he can do. The guy to look, you know, look at this year's dude's fall, the rookie out of Kansas state, who is, I mean, if he's five, five, I'm six, three. Yeah. Like come on, man. That is a small guy, but you can't see him, you know, like we're sitting here watching with the sideline.

And if you don't have a good angle, you can't see him get the ball. It's wild. It's really crazy. Yep.

Let's get to the next down. RJ choppy here with us. So I know the coach of the Cowboys. We always talk about him being on the hot seat with Mike McCarthy.

He's won 12 games back to back years. They've had the struggles in the post season. Is there a lot of chatter there locally about the seat being warm from McCarthy or is a lot of that just national media stuff? You know, it's it's a little bit of balls. I mean, there's a lot of national media stuff about it.

And then the locals are, are I think kind of pushing it. He's got, I'm a big fan of his. There are people who are not, and they're kind of pushing it that he has to get to the conference championship game. I find like, did they win 12 games again? Are you, are they really going to fire a guy who's won 36 games?

No, they will. He's actually more patient than what people think. He think about him.

Yes, absolutely. Um, now the question is, is he going to be as patient with quote unquote an outsider as he was with Jason Garrett, who he viewed as a son to him. He wanted Jason to be his Landry.

He wanted Jason to be the coach for 20 years. Uh, he was kind of, his arm was kind of twisted to move on from there, but you know, McCarthy, uh, he came in in a COVID year and lost DAC almost immediately. Um, he had a good record without DAC this past year. They had a good record with that the last couple of years. I mean, if you win 12 games again and they win 36 games over a three year stretch and they lose the San Fran again, the same team, um, you know, they lose the San Fran and it's another poor offensive performance. I think, I think they will, it's a good chance.

They move on from them. If it's a bad offensive performance against the same team three years in a row, I think that would really stick with Jerry. Um, you know, they lose the Philadelphia Eagles on the road in the NFC championship game. I think he's safe.

If they, if they win a playoff game and then lose to the Eagles on the road, um, in a good close game, but the offense does well, you know, I think it'll be okay. Uh, you know, the question is, who do you bring in? It would be Dan Quinn. Yeah, it would be Dan Quinn.

Probably the players love them. Um, you know, or it would be somebody from the outside that we, who knows, but I think he's safe. And I reached these, I think he's safe as I think they're going to win 11 or 12 games again. Like it's just gonna be very hard to get rid of somebody who's won 36 games over a three-year stretch. Let's get to the final down.

Alrighty, RJ choppy. This defense is absolutely loaded. When you look at the ceiling for this defense, what do you think it is? It's, it's a really good, I mean, the ceiling for the defense is probably the best defense in the league. That's the ceiling for it. You know, the floor is much tougher because, you know, defense year to year, like, you know, a lot of times if you face a tough string of quarterbacks, I don't care who your defense is.

You might have some bad numbers. I think it's a really solid defense. The coverage on this defense is, is much better than it has been in the secondary, uh, digs and gives fun Gilmore. They're not even throwing to Gilmore and camp. I don't even, they're not even looking his way.

I don't know if he's found the fountain of youth or what, but like this guy looks legit locked down so far in camp. Diggs has barely been out there, but he's finally out there now. Um, this is a good coverage unit. And if you've got good coverage in the secondary, I can't tell you the amount of times Dax goes back to pads and like had nowhere to throw.

I had to tuck it and run. Um, and with this pass rush with Parsons there and tank Lawrence, you know, you get good coverage and that's how you win. Um, it's a solid defense.

You know, it's not lead you to boom, but it's really good. Name or two, just being out there that has impressed you. I know it's training camp, but a lot of it's monotonous and you get a lot of these ridiculous articles and there's always a darling out there, but are there a few guys that you're like, okay, this guy really poised for a big year. You know, Michael Gallup appears to be back. Uh, and that's big because I think the third wide receiver is one of the most important spots. One of the most underrated spots in the team. You get a really good third wide receiver. You put him up against a third corner.

That's a mismatch, man. And Michael Gallup's a good player when he's healthy. And last year, I think a lot of that was mental. Uh, coming back from the ACL, he, he has stood out. He is having himself a pretty good camp so far.

RJ choppy from the fan in Dallas. Enjoy your a bougie meal at no at no boo each and every night. Okay.

One time, man, I get to go one time a year. It's all important. You're listening to the Zach Gelb show. This is Zach Gelb show on CBS sports radio. Hickey. That's one of my favorite things when the guest calls you hot take Hickey. And I love that in a former NFL running backs mind and someone that played at Michigan, that one of his first thoughts whenever Michigan beats Penn state or when it's happened in years past is, Oh, I got to rub some salt in the wound of hot take Hickey. I love that you become the Penn state guy here where a lot of listeners or, you know, people that work in the, in the industry will go out of their way to text me how, how's Hickey doing, or just communicate directly to you and kind of have some enjoyment in your sorrows.

Well, that's the concerning part. There's a lot more people, majority of the people that look forward to see my reaction when the teams lose, instead of backing me wanting to see me happy, my teams win. There's not a lot of people rooting for my success. And there seems to be a lot more people than not taking joy in my misery and or my team's failures. Can I tell you why? Because I know the Hickey playbook here. The Hickey playbook is someone that is naturally optimistic, and it doesn't take much for you to try to find the good in people or teams, no matter what they do year in and year out.

But you do this one thing habitually that I just don't need to see, or I don't need to hear. When you really get fired up, it always ends with, and I can't curse on the radio, so I got to find a way to make this PG. You always say something on the lines of, and this is what's going to happen with them this year. They're going to win it all. Let's go, let's go, let's go, yeah, yeah. Like you always do that.

I even saw it in the shower no cap video that you did the other day. Now you're the same jackass that a month and a half ago was laughing at me in the newsroom with your friend Pete Hoffman. When I'm telling you the Mets stink, they're not good. And I even said to you, and this is coming from me, a Mets fan that the Phillies are better than me. Like, no, no, the Phillies suck. The Mets are going to go on a run. They have all this talent, blah, blah, blah. And I ended up being right. The team has been embarrassing.

And after a few trades yesterday for some prospects that you won't even see next year, all of a sudden hickey is back in on the Mets. So that's why I think people don't root for you to succeed because you do that. Let's go, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kind of thing. And also it doesn't take much for you to every year buy into your team. There is not a year when you have your teams outside of maybe this year being the first one with the Colts, but you always pick the Colts to find the way in. You always pick Penn State.

You always pick the Mets. And I think when everyone hears the same playbook over and over again, they're like, can't you just realize that they stink and go the other way? Now for football this year, Penn State's supposed to be good.

So you have a reason to be optimistic, but there's a lot of times you shouldn't be optimistic and you go overboard and you make these guarantees that your team is going to find the way to win. I'm just warning you right now. Don't let Penn State. Shut up. Be 8-0 or 9-0 going to the Michigan game. Okay. That's all I'm going to say. Fans out there that want to see my demise, want to see me upset.

Leroy, I'm sure he's listening. Do not let 9-0 Penn State host 9-0 Michigan. You think I am bad now or you think I'm bad at projecting teams' possible success in a year from now. What are you gonna do though?

That week. You're going to send out a video. I told you folks, Leroy, suck on that hell, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. If Penn State beats Michigan and Ohio State this year and it's 10-0, boy, boy. There's going to be a lot of text sent, a lot of tweets fired off, a lot of videos. I don't even know what I'm going to say. I don't even know, but let me tell you, it's you you're probably going to hate it. And a lot of listeners of all my demise are going to hate it. Well, here's why I wouldn't hate it. And root for the Wolverines.

Here's why I won't hate it. Because then that means the great athletic director in Pat Kraft will get another win added to his resume and I'm a big Pat Kraft fan. But I may need to text Pat, full disclosure, Pat, I need to see your football team just come nowhere close to meeting expectations this year because you would be insufferable. And you still want to win a national championship. You would make the college football playoff, I get that, but you would throw a parade like we've never seen a parade before. And you should be, well, I don't want to say you should be undefeated heading into that game, but heading into the Michigan game, you should only have one loss bare minimum. You should crush West Virginia, Delaware, Illinois with this JV schedule, Iowa, even though it would be funny if Mack the Marite, he's the quarterback there, if he finds a way to get the job done with Iowa beating in a 10-9 game. Northwestern, UMass, Ohio State, you don't have a legit game until October 21st. Picky, you could enjoy yourself on college football Saturdays until October 21st.

Yeah, you don't need to watch any of those games. You should be, if you're not undefeated heading into that Ohio State game, the season's a disaster. I would agree and they should beat Ohio State, so I definitely agree. Well, I wouldn't say you should beat Ohio State because James Franklin, I know that they've played Ohio State well, but he sucks against top five teams.

He's horrible against top 10 teams. It's a game you could win, but I'm not saying that you're definitely going to win that game. You should find a way to split Ohio State-Michigan this year with the talent you have.

Mike in Abilene, Texas, I hope you're listening. I ain't worried. We are coming. You say that every year, though. Every year you say this. There's no CJ Stroud.

Okay. There's no Dwayne Haskins. There's no plenty of other quarterbacks.

JT Barrett, who is not even that good, that still haunts my dreams. This is the year. Penn State matches up very well defensively.

Great defense led by your guy, Manny Diaz. Going into the shoe this year. I can't wait. I can't wait. Okay, great. And that's the thing. You just did it right there. I can't wait.

You sound like a prepubescent boy. I can't wait. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Baby Bob's going to let me go to the movies tonight. Yeah, yeah.

Oh, give me a break. I hope, you know, I don't like Ohio State. I hope they beat you by 45. Actually, be undefeated going to Michigan.

And then have Manny Diaz, that snake, that fraud, just get exposed by McCarthy and Coram and Edwards and on and on and on. You can think about all the parts where your car care needs get guaranteed. Low prices and excellent customers. Service from the professional parts people at O'Reilly Auto Parts. We will do a news brief next. We'll update you some of the biggest stories in sports with some audio.