Buffalo Blunder (Hour 2)

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It's called The McDermott Problem, and it's a three-part article regarding some of the problems of the Buffalo Bills and their football coach and Sean McDermott, the author of the great column on his great website. golongtd.com is Ty Dunn, who's kind enough to join us right now. Ty, my friend, I appreciate it as always. How you been? Doing well. Doing well. Great to be here with you.

I know we've texted and DMed over the years. I'm a big fan. You do a hell of a job here. So thanks for having me, Zach. Well, I appreciate that.

It means a lot coming from you. So we've all been in these positions where we say things or we write things and write, they blow up, they go viral, and then the teams respond to it. And there's two approaches. They either trash what you say, and they said there's no credence to it, or they accept some of the things. What has your reaction kind of been to the reaction that some of the higher-ups with the Bills have had to this article in the last 24 hours or so? Right.

I mean, this was 21,000 words, 25 sources. We're talking players, coaches, personnel that have worked with Sean McDermott, played for him, coached with him, been around him every day. So it wasn't a positive light, obviously. The question is, what's wrong with the Bills?

Like, how did they get to this point where the Super Bowl window was open? You've got Josh Allen. You've been banging on that door now for five, six years, really. That's kind of what drives the report in here, Zach. And it's going to drive you to some not pretty places, obviously, whether it's treatment of assistants and threatening to fire those assistants, whether it is a speech gone awry, as everybody now knows. So I get it.

It's not pretty. And he has every right to defend himself in that setting. And that's what he did today.

So it's not a surprise, I guess, to answer your question. And I think that the readers can make their own judgment. You read the stories and the substance that is within these stories from the coach perspective, the player perspective, around the league as well. I also chatted with Brett Farr for an hour. He sees a lot of himself in Josh Allen. He kind of knows what it's like when you do have that special relationship with the coach. Had it with Mike Holmgren, then he lost it and he wished he had it a lot longer than seven years.

I think that's kind of the point of the story. You have a good thing going if you're Buffalo right now. You're a 9-10 win team for a very long time. But why not challenge yourself to be something greater given your quarterback? And I think it's fear because you even acknowledge it in the article. And I happen to be a big supporter of Sean McDermott until I read your article the other day.

But even before your article comes out, you know, it did feel like it's time to move on. But I really do think it's the fear of how many coaches they had to go through in the past. And you point out like McDermott did break that playoff streak of not going for 17 years. And they've always been in the playoffs. And it just seems like the Pegula family is fine where they're at, even though we know there should be greater aspirations for this core. There's two ways to think about this, right, Zach?

There is that argument to be made. And I think that is where a lot of maybe older fans are, even some younger fans that kind of remember the Chan Gailey, the Doug Morone, the Greg Williams, the Mike Malarkey, Dick Jaron Daze, Rex Ryan. It was a clown show.

It was bad for every possible reason. But whenever that job became available, and I grew up here in Western New York, whenever the Bills were looking for a head coach, it was not a destination. I remember one year fans thought, oh, we're going to get Bill Cowher.

That's who we're going to get to save this thing. Well, hell, nobody even knew who the GM was. They didn't really have a GM. There was no clear power structure for X amount of years.

You're not getting the best of the very best to apply for that job and under those circumstances. So if you're going to think in that frame of the dark side is around the other corner. If you remove Sean McDermott, it's another 17 years of no playoffs of just dismal, dreary, depressing football. I get it.

You keep them right. Get your 10 wins a season. But if you're going to look at it in terms of Josh Allen is in his prime, Josh Allen is 27. Josh Allen had one of the best playoff games we've ever seen. And the head coach blew it in the final 13 seconds, exactly as he did against Philly. When Josh Allen goes for 400 yards, five touchdowns is playing out of his mind.

You got to think that maybe the other side is not gloom and doom. Maybe you do get an offensive coach who believes in his players late in games and is going to take that chance and is going to have a command of the room in a different way than Sean. And Sean deserves all the credit in the world because this place was a dumpster fire. It was bad and give him credit last year.

I mean, Tamar Hamlin almost dies on a football field. He guided that team through an unprecedented situation. There's a lot of good to Sean McDermott, but I think it was worth raising the context here of you've got a special talent at quarterback. And as Brett Favre knows, these windows can close.

He knows if Mike Holmgren didn't want total control and wanted to be the GM and the coach and went to Seattle, they would have won multiple Super Bowls because they had a really special thing. Take me behind the scenes, Ty Dunn, because there's sometimes, right, we do rants on the radio and then the segment ends and it's like, OK, you go on to the next segment. But yesterday, when I'm reading about the analogy he used of the terrorists with 9-11 and their communication skills being someone that lives in the city now, you know, grew up on Long Island when 9-11 happened, it hit home. And, you know, I was really heated even after saying what I said yesterday during the break and it carried over into the next segment. You're well sourced.

You have so many great connections. When that story was told to you, how did you react to it when you were trying to uncover everything? The jaw just hits the floor. I think that unbelievably inappropriate, inconceivable, unforgivable. It's terrible.

It's terrible. And he did try to explain his thinking to the team. So right there in training camp, St. John Fisher College 2019. This is the third year of Sean McDermott as head coach, second year with Josh Allen. So they're starting to think, OK, now it's time to become a playoff team. I'm sure that was the year that maybe he's really feeling some pressure. We got to get this thing going now with now that we have the quarterback. And he overthought it right.

It wasn't like this was on a whim and he just misspoke. It speaks to who Sean McDermott is as a coach in a good sense, too, in terms of being maniacal and meticulous and obsessed with the details when it comes to situational football. He has everybody prepared for, you know, red zone, third down, you know, second and medium with four minutes left, whatever the situation is. That's what the team needed. Postreqs, Ryan, they needed discipline and order and all of that. But he takes it to an extreme, and this was the extreme of all extremes to somehow try to articulate to your team that if evil can come together for it, it can come together, do something as heinous as the 9-11 terrorist attacks.

Imagine what we could do trying to achieve something great. So he overthought it. I think that is just a flaw that he has late in games, overthinking situations, and it came back to bite him. I mean, granted, the team has changed a lot since then, but I know in the moment there were coaches and players that were like, what the hell just happened? They couldn't believe it. And Kyle Williams had just retired the year before, one of the more trusted veterans that the Bills have had the last two decades.

He's the one, I believe, that really kind of went to Sean and was like, dude, you got to talk to the team. You got to smooth this over. So then an hour later, he comes out to the practice field and apologizes.

But it did expose a blind spot, I believe. Ty Dunn here with us. When I'm reading your article, I also couldn't believe just because you're a well-respected reporter. You've been doing this for a long time. That's right, the Bills don't credential you. Why is that? It's their prerogative, right?

Every team is going to be different. And I live 15 minutes from the stadium, and for whatever reason, they said that they're just not credentialing new media. This is multiple times over the course of the last few years. As I told the Bills then, it's not going to stop me from doing my job because the Bills fans have an appetite for long form, for columns, for podcasts, just like any rabid fan base does. So I did a podcast with Isaiah McKenzie for two years. I've sat down with players through agents, through themselves, Tamar Hamlin, Deion Dawkins, Naim Hines, Quentin Morris, all kinds of players. So when it comes to this team, this season, all the questions that people have, what's going on behind the scenes, I just wanted to call as many people as I possibly could on my own to get answers. And you know what just naturally happens when you're not credentialed by a team and you have a piece out like this, Ty Dunn, people that don't like the piece are going to say, oh, well, Ty just has a vendetta against the Bills organization and Sean McDermott. How do you respond to people that are just saying you're just doing this because you don't like the Bills because they won't credential you? What can you say to anybody that isn't interested in learning about what happens with any team in this league behind the scenes?

Isn't that why we get into this? There's press conferences and there's poll tested narratives that are established and set and the NFL is a big, big, big business. I think that if you're a fan and you're pouring your paycheck into tickets, into parking, into $18 beers and all this stuff, you deserve to know how this league is really run behind the scenes.

And guess what? It's not always going to be pretty. It's not like this is the first palace entry kind of story that I've done covering pro football. I've done stuff like the Green Bay Packers after covering the team, the relationship between Aaron Rodgers and Mike McCarthy, the Minnesota Vikings with Mike Zimmer. I was just in Jacksonville this last training camp and the Urban Meyer days were not pretty. I think probably large fans want to know what the hell's going on behind the scenes, beyond a press conference.

So to those people who genuinely are interested in learning something, go on TD.com. We're going to try to deliver unfiltered, unvarnished football coverage. Not a bad segue, right? But I get it. Hey, if people just want, you know, the slop served up on a platter at a podium. And don't get me wrong, there are some coaches who are awesome at the podium. Dan Campbell, Mike McDaniel go down the list. But I think that the fans deserve more.

They deserve us in the media sitting down with guys one on one to learn something. So when McDermott says today that this is an attack on his character, how do you view that statement from Sean McDermott? I don't think it's an attack on his character when I've got Isaiah McKenzie and Naeem Hines and Lee Smith and Patrick DeMarco and Taiwan Jones. Like so many players in this series saying really nice things about Sean McDermott.

I get it. You know, that's kind of what they want to set and that's where a mob will potentially follow. But there was a lot of points made in this series of what Sean McDermott is getting at with this culture and why it was needed to a large extent post Rex Ryan.

But it's not all going to be pretty, right? I mean, these assistant coaches that worked under him had some pretty specific examples to share. Chad Hall declined comment for this story. But I had heard through multiple people what happened there were the wide receivers on the team in 2020 who are setting all kinds of records chip in to buy him a truck. And it's unheard of.

That's amazing, right? Your receivers are chipping in to get a dude a truck. And that's looked as that's looked down upon as a negative by Sean McDermott behind the scenes that it was a dark day at one Bill's Drive. They said there's a lot of detail in this series that I think does kind of speak to itself. The threatening to fire coach is kind of on a whim. That being said, look, just just read it. People can make their own judgment and they can listen to Sean McDermott.

He has every right to to defend himself 100 percent. And I would absolutely welcome the opportunity to chat with him at any day, any time. So the door is closed. They will give you a credential. I don't think they're letting you speak to the coach. It would be fun. You never know.

Hey, if the door is closed on their end, it ain't closed here. I'll just say that before we let you run on zero to one hundred on that scale. Zero. No chance.

One hundred. He's fully gone. Where do you think it is that McDermott is back next year as the head football coach of this team?

I think he's back. I don't think that the wheels are going to completely fall off this team. They've got a hard schedule. You've got Kansas City, Dallas, Miami down the pipe.

You know, I think that Chargers and Patriots in between. So it won't be easy, but you do have one of the best players in the sport. And Josh Allen, you do have a team that offensively is playing really, really well. So I think that they'll win two games, maybe three, maybe sneak into the playoffs.

But barring a complete meltdown, I would think he's back. I'm not saying that's right or wrong. Just everything. I hear the ownership.

They don't want to make a change if they don't absolutely have to. Last thing, just because I know right, you've covered the Packers for a long time. You've done a lot of work covering the scene of the legendary fans at Lambeau Field and everything that comes with the Packers. Jordan Love, I know that you're a fan.

The last few weeks is looking pretty damn good. What would you say about the Packers future with Jordan Love at the quarterback position? Man, the future is unbelievably bright with Jordan Love, and he was raw out of Utah State. Obviously, it was a major gamble, major risk when you also factor in the personalities involved.

You know Aaron Rodgers as well. He was not happy at that at that night when they drafted Jordan Love and a lot happened after that. But they got to this place eventually, and they got to it at the right time. Look, they probably, in retrospect, would have loved to have taken the unlimited amount of picks and players and whatever you could have gotten a trade for Aaron Rodgers a year before they did finally trade him to the New York Jets. But the timing was probably right in terms of Jordan Love's development because he finally got his feet wet. There's been some ups and downs, but he all along had those characteristics, I think, Zach, that you just can't coach and inject into a quarterback. Mentally tough, athletic, can improvise, big arm, throws at different angles. Now that he's getting experience with all these receivers that are the same age, by the way, I don't see how his arrow points the wrong direction any time soon. And the Packers, they got a really winnable schedule the rest of the way.

They could even sneak into the playoffs and be a threat. He is Ty Dunn, does a great job. Make sure you check out his website, golongtd.com, for pieces about Sean McDermott and many other NFL happenings as well. Ty, always great to connect with you. Thanks so much. Thanks so much for having me, Zach. Appreciate you. There you go. Ty Dunn joining us on the Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio.

Really good stuff and really an intriguing piece and kind of paints a picture of the Buffalo Bills organization. And Ty has said this in the article, right? Even heard him here a few moments ago. He thinks McDermott's going to be back.

I just think it's time to move on. And I wanted Sean McDermott to be a head coach before anybody did. And I believe I thought the Eagles should hire him before Doug Peterson. I worked out with Doug Peterson, but I was a big fan of his and he's done a really good job in Buffalo. But I use this analogy, like when you are building from the ground up, you may hire someone that builds most of your house, but then someone has to put the finishing touches on. And I just don't think Sean is ready to put the finishing touches on the house and he's not ready to put the roof on top of the house.

And I think he's done a lot of good work and all the work he can do. And now you need someone else to get this ball over the goal line and make sure that you give those Buffalo fans a Lombardi Trophy, their first ever something that they're definitely deserving of. Alrighty, this is that Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio. We will take a time out when we come on back, how this week will tell us all we need to know about the Dallas Cowboys. When you need a hand powering, connecting, or maintaining your operations, join the thousands of professionals who rely on Graybar to help keep them up and running.

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Maybe we'll get it by the end of the weekend, if not today. But let me just give a quick take here on Major League Baseball and we'll get back to the football on a very happening football Friday in the Zach Gelb show. I see a lot of reporters today, like Major League Baseball reporters that are like, it's such a disservice what Otani's doing to Major League Baseball, a sport that doesn't get a lot of publicity. And he's been so close to the vest and he's not really embracing like the public in this free agency chase.

Like, am I so lost on this one? I think it's intriguing when we don't know for three days where someone is going to sign and then out of nowhere, this report's going to come down, whether it's from Otani or whether it's from like a reporter that he leaks it to, that we find out that way. Like, don't get me wrong. If this was public, and I know he's the biggest free agent, right, the sport has seen, or the most hype free agent the sport has ever seen, if this was public and we knew necessarily where he was going on every single move, I don't know, I kind of get fatigued with this story. And I don't think we're sitting here for two weeks on CBS Sports Radio, that's for sure, when we're in the midst of the college football season towards the end of it. And yeah, the NFL as well, just because like, let's say Otani goes to Boston, and then Otani does like a public tour, and he goes to LA, and then he goes to Toronto, you know, yeah, we talk about it, but it's not going to change the landscape of Major League Baseball.

Now where he goes, what team he picks to play for, that's going to change. But I think you have a lot of reporters that are caught up in their feelings right now, that they're not getting this access, and the Otani camp is trying to restrict any leaks, and he's basically throwing it out there that he may not sign with the team if they leak out, which way he's leaning or not. It's like, how much into yourself do you have to be as a reporter or as a fan to be so annoyed that this guy wants to keep it quiet? And here's the thing, I guarantee you this, if Otani was out there parading himself around from city to city, and he made this a big public chase, you'd have the same losers that would get up on their platform and would say, oh, he's being too public. You know, shouldn't you respect the game?

Shouldn't you have some class to the process? So I think it's a lose-lose. You're out there in the public, you get ripped.

You want to keep this a secret until you make your decision, you get ripped as well. So, Samter, you've been in the national scene for a very long time. Do you feel similarly to how I do, that if Otani was more public with this process, that it really wouldn't change much for Major League Baseball? Ultimately, where he signs and where he goes is what's going to change Major League Baseball because of the excitement that is surrounding this player.

Yeah, 100%. And to your point, we ripped LeBron for being too public with how he did his decision. And that's the free agency move that I kind of compare the most to this Otani. I can't remember a free-agent frenzy in any sport that had this kind of buzz. Maybe Tom Brady, but that was so quick that it didn't really build up. And there weren't a lot of teams interested.

Right. So this Otani buzz is as big as it's been for a sport in a long time since LeBron in 2010. And we ripped LeBron for what he did. Even though he donated all that money to the Boys and Girls Club in Connecticut, we ripped him for going public and how he said it. Otani's doing the opposite.

So like you said, damned if you do, damned if you don't. You're probably right that there's a lot of people who are frustrated, but I think as fans, we kind of appreciate it. I think most people who are part of this, you're right, it's football season. Basketball is starting now. College football is getting to the playoffs soon. The Heisman is tomorrow.

Army-Navy is tomorrow. We don't need to hear daily minute-by-minute updates on where Otani's flying, who he met with. And the fact that he kept it secret, I think it's kind of cool. It's kind of like a pressure test for all the coaches in GM to see who can keep their mouth shut. Yeah, and I'm actually intrigued now without, like so many times in life now, we get told the answers to the test before having to actually take the test. And now I like that we don't have the answer. And they're like, I can get on the radio and say he's going to the Giants, or he's going to the Dodgers, or he's going to the Blue Jays. There's a lot of speculation out there, but it's fun, and it's almost a mysterious way that we don't know. It's like you're watching a really good movie, or you're getting ready to go watch a good movie.

You get a few reviews of what may happen, and then you sit down in the theater, and it's go time whenever he does make that decision. Now, just to go off what you said, Sam, there are two things. One, the other big-time free agency chase that I remember was Kevin Durant. When Durant ended up going to the Warriors, and you had the members of the Warriors going out to the Hamptons, and Durant was basically stationed in the Hamptons. I think Tom Brady went with the Celtics to go visit Kevin Durant as well.

That was the other one. But the thing on the LeBron part, because you bring up a good point how LeBron, that's outside of the NBA Finals against the Dallas Mavericks. The lowest part of LeBron James' career when people think of ways to criticize him with actual criticism is the decision.

Now, the decision, like you said, was for a good cause, the Boys and Girls Club. I actually think a lot of people advise LeBron to not do it in that manner, like a lot of smart basketball people. But LeBron didn't listen, and he wanted to go about it his way. The way that I will say this is this, I don't think it was the reaction to the decision by LeBron about him doing it publicly and all that stuff. It's that you were so loyal to Cleveland, and that was your home, and you were leaving that team. It's how long you dragged that out in a public setting. Like, Otani is not dragging this out in a public setting.

He just wants us to be private. LeBron, if he would have just got up there and did the decision, it would have been one thing, but there were speculations and leaks coming from the LeBron camp, and they used Chris Broussard throughout that whole process. It is so clear that someone close to LeBron camp was using Chris Broussard through that process, because Chris would get on SportsCenter, I think he was working on SportsCenter at the time, and every day he would have a new destination. He'd go to the Nets, he'd go to the Knicks, he'd go to the Heat. Every day Chris Broussard was coming up with a new destination.

So that's where I think it differentiates here. Yes, LeBron ended up having the rejection done publicly, which looked bad, but he also embraced the public persona of this, whereas Otani, he wants this to be a secret and kept under wraps, and the whole baseball world really is waiting for him to make that decision, and it's done in a secret way, which I think is pretty damn cool. And how the heck is he going to announce this?

You've been around a long time here, Samthor. How do you think he ends up announcing it? Do you think he just releases a statement? Do you think the team releases a statement, or does he leak it to maybe a trusted reporter? I think knowing Otani, like you said, he doesn't need a lot of fanfare. And we really don't know Otani, too.

Well, I think that's part of it. I think he intentionally keeps us at arm's length so we don't know him, so I think it's going to be somewhat muted. The first LeBron was the decision on TV. The second LeBron decision to go back to Cleveland was in the Tribune, was in the Players Tribune with Derek Jeter's company.

Coming home. Yeah, and so it was a lot more understated. I think that it's going to be either a leak or maybe we're going to get a report, like some breaking news from some insider who's going to get it. But I don't think there's going to be a big announcement. It's going to be something semi-muted that's going to spread like wildfire.

Yeah, the only thing that I would knock Otani for, and I know this could be an old-school way of thinking, but you have so many of these media companies talking about if you want to grow the game and things like that, and ultimately Otani will grow the game when he gets on his new team and plays for his new team, assuming that he leaves the Angels. It is kind of unfortunate this decision comes down on a Friday or a Saturday. I think at this point, once 6 o'clock hits, the traditional media cycle, it's over for the week. Yeah, I get it. There's Twitter, there's Instagram, there's social media.

You can go live and things like that. But that is a little bit unfortunate if you get the Friday news dump or the early Saturday morning news drop here where it's like, okay, a lot of people that work Monday through Friday in the sports world don't get to really attack that until Monday. It's going to be selfishly the only thing that I would have a gripe with this Shohei Otani process.

855-212-4CBS, 855-212-4227. Let's go to Mark in Ohio next up on CBS Sports Radio. Mark, what's happening? I compare this to the way Aaron Rodgers found out, found his team, and I think Otani's going about it the right way where he's keeping it a secret, whereas Aaron Rodgers, by the time he ended up in his jets, it was like the only place he had to go because rumors and assumptions had taken over and other teams started filling their rosters and were sort of taking themselves out of the running based on those rumors and assumptions. And so Otani's playing it smart where he's taking the rumors and assumptions out of the game so that he gets to choose instead of being eventually forced somewhere. Yeah, and I don't think that Rodgers got forced somewhere. Once he came out of the darkness retreat where he went into the cave thinking he was going to retire. Remember that bull junk? He goes into the cave and then he walks out and he goes, Oh yeah, I didn't get any response back from the Packers.

Okay, I still want to play. He forced his way to the Jets. He knew the destinations that wanted him and he picked the team that he wanted to go to. Like Rodgers, I know he's good for what we do, but he was an attention whore throughout the entire process. I have no doubt about it. Where Otani wants none of the attention on him.

And I can't really fault Otani for that. Let's go to Nate in Pennsylvania next up on CBS Sports Radio. Nate, what's happening? Nate. Hey, Zach.

Yep, go ahead. Sorry. Yeah, I was talking to, I just said to Santa, doesn't Toronto make the most sense for Otani? Because he's from Japan. Maybe he's just sick of the press coverage in the US.

He doesn't care about it. Go to Canada. They're nicer and you would know better than I do as far as press coverage in Toronto, although I'm from Michigan. But maybe he's just more comfortable there. Maybe, and I don't know Nate, but I'm just going to go out on a limb here. If you try to hide, wherever you go, you're Otani.

You're like a unicorn. You're one of one with the Japanese media that covers him on a daily basis as well. There's always going to be a large contingency at home or on the road. And remember, you know, it's 162 games. Half of them are on the road. Everywhere you go, you're not going to be able to hide from the media landscape as well.

So I haven't really thought of it that way. But I would not have predicted before this process started in Toronto. In the off, or right as the season was ending, that maybe it was going to be the Giants or the Dodgers and maybe it'll still end up being. But it does seem like right now, the Blue Jays are the hot team and the Blue Jays are the expected team from the very little that we know. All righty, Zach Gelb shows CBS Sports Radio.

Come on back with a little news brief. Also delve into the Eagles Cowboys matchup as well. But first up with the latest CBS Sports Radio update, here is the act man, Rich Ackerman. Let's take a look at who's got home field advantage this weekend in our NCAA Football Preview sponsored by Fairfield by Marriott. Fairfield by Marriott is the official hotel part of the NCAA with over 1,000 locations around the country. You'll always have the home field advantage.

Visit fairfield.com to book your stay. And as much as I would love to read the rest of this read, Sam, it's a preview of Alabama and Georgia in the binder. All righty, the greatest rivalry in sports commences tomorrow with the 124th plying of the Army-Navy game at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough. Army last year in double OT and five of the last seven have been decided by a single possession. So there we go.

Fairfield by Marriott. Look ahead for this weekend in college football, one of the great displays of a rivalry between Army and Navy. And right, you have the patentry of that game and just how cool it is. Carlos, you know, better for, instead of me to say, for you to say, just with Army-Navy and the emotions and how cool of an environment it is. And then you have the whole world watching coming up tomorrow afternoon. Yeah, because as much as I want to say go Army beat Navy a thousand times, at the end of the day, America's the winner. Yeah, and it's respect for both sides.

And you come together after the game, after what is an absolute battle on the field. All righty, Sean McDermott on the report about his 9-11 comments. This is from the Ty Dunn article. Ty Dunn joined us earlier in the show when he used 9-11 and the communication of the terrorists as kind of a message to his team, how they should communicate the right way.

We're still crazy. Know who I am, know how I try and do things. You know, it was clearly an attack to me, an attack on my character. And that's important to me, very important. As much, if not more, very clearly more than wins and losses.

Wins and losses are important. Again, doesn't mean that I've been perfect, no one's perfect. Doesn't mean that I haven't been without flaw. But to me, it's most important that I handle this job the right way. Him using the attack of my character, when you're the, let me say this in a nice way, it's a Friday, I'm feeling good.

When you are the dope, that's probably the nicest way I could say it. That use the communication skills of terrorists that killed many innocent lives to try to portray that message to your team, how you should communicate in a perfect way and all work together. Yeah, I don't think that's an attack on your character. It's just showing how stupid you were in that moment. Now, there was other things in the article, I understand that it's not just one incident.

But even as Ty Dunn has said, there is good mentioned about Sean McDermott as well. So I don't love, oh, it's the attack on my character. And he spoke twice now about this. And it's like, yesterday it was more so, okay, yeah, it was true with the 9-11 thing.

And then today it was more of the defense. I don't know, it does not sit well with me. And here's the thing, I don't know if the article, and I don't think Ty is that guy, I've known Ty for a long time, Ty Dunn. Respect the reporter.

Respectable. I don't think he wrote the piece in order to attack his character and to take him down. However, when you do investigative journalism and you find out information and that information is negative, I mean, maybe it comes off as an attack, but it's just the reality.

This is just what the reporting shows. I know Ty Dunn, he didn't go into trying to take down Sean McDermott. He just tried to figure out what's going on with Sean McDermott and all the stuff he was, not all, but a lot of the stuff he was getting back was negative. And so to call it an attack is just, it's a wrong way to look at it, right? You have to look at it and be like, maybe I need to fix some things about myself of all these former players and people within the organization are saying these things about me.

Yeah. And it's not as if Sean McDermott is like the worst human being to ever walk the planet. Like the guy's been a good football coach. You haven't heard a ton of negativity surrounding him in the past, but I like the thing that I struggle with here is that, yeah, I'm not saying he should like it. No one's going to like this article if it's written about them, but it doesn't mean that there's not a lot of truth in that article. Minka Fitzpatrick, great player for the Steelers.

One of their leaders, he rips his entitled teammates after another Steelers loss. In order to see fruit, you got to toil for it. I think too many people don't want to toil for it. They just want to walk out here and think that they're going to make plays and think that they're going to perform at a high level. I think we need to have more people that want to work for it and not expect it to be handed to them because this is the NFL. Nothing's handed to you.

You got to earn everything. I think that, you know, dudes just think that because they're wearing the black and gold that they're going to win games. And I think we need to check their mentality and make people realize that they got to earn that mentality and they got to earn every single blade of grass, every single splash play and every single rep that they get out there.

They got to earn it. So sometimes athletes just say things to say things like there's a lot of cliche in there. And then you could say, OK, is he just addressing the team in general or is there a specific person there?

And Samter said it in my ear and I was fully thinking the same thing. When I hear that, it kind of just screams he's talking about George Pickens, who is so accomplished from what he did in college. But in the NFL, he really hasn't done much and he acts as if he's Jerry Rice or he's Tara Lowens or Randy Moss.

And he's like one of the greatest wide receivers of all time. Now, George Pickens frustrations could be put in the right place and he could maybe, you know, you should be frustrated when you're not getting the ball and the team's not playing well. And this has become like a weekly issue now with George Pickens, can you go do something on the field first? So maybe that's some of the entitlement come from Georgia where you win, win, win, win, win, where maybe that's what Minka Fitzpatrick is talking about and aiming that message to George Pickens. Here is Nick Bosa of the 49ers making it known that they have figured out how to stop Jalen Hertz.

You see it on tape, though. And then obviously we put the blueprint out there, hopefully the Cowboys watch the tape. We made Jalen stay in the pocket and escape outside instead of those big gaps and paid off because Jalen's looking at the rush every play. So yeah, you just have to be disciplined and not give him that quick escape route where he could get to his guys quick.

And I also saw that, you know, Greg Cosell put out a piece that he's given up on the plays too early and trying to leave the pocket too early as well. Cowboys have a good defense, not a great defense, but a good defense. And we know they have one of the best guys that could get to the quarterback in the league and Micah Parsons makes for a fun matchup on Sunday. I think the Eagles are going to win because that's what the Cowboys usually do. They dominate the bad teams, but then they go up against a good team. They have a good showing.

They don't find the way to get the win at the end of the game, but there's a tremendous amount of pressure on the Dallas Cowboys to get the job done. So we talked about Oklahoma's Dylan Gabriel entering the transfer portal, right? Jackson Arnold is also the highly rated recruit who's been there for a year at Oklahoma. And Brent Venables made a little comment on Dylan Gabriel entering the transfer portal.

Didn't have anything to do with Jackson. I think Dylan had every intention to go to the NFL in his mind. This was going to be his last season. He's going to have a great year, put himself in position to go chase his dreams in the NFL. And quite frankly, we did plan to, you know, again, go into the 24 season without Dylan Gabriel. Dylan knows, certainly, you know, he was more than welcome to stay and continue to compete and be, you know, the quarterback at the University of Oklahoma. So Sam, I think we got our answer.

This was great. Gabriel goes in there, transfers in and says, I'm going to come, I'm going to play for you guys. Then I'm going to go off to the NFL. So Oklahoma has to get their next guy ready and their next guy up and Jackson Arnold, right? Highly recruited, may have shown them some things behind the scenes. They feel like he's ready to play. So they probably just wanted competition. And I understand from Dylan Gabriel's side, yeah, you should have confidence in yourself.

I'll beat out Jackson Arnold. But if you don't get that assurance that you're going to be the starter and right, this is your last year, you want to go elsewhere. And that's what I think that this ultimate came down to because he wanted to know for sure that he was going to start somewhere. So it's not like a reverse of the Spencer Sander situation where, in this case, he'd be staying, but like Spencer Sanders left and then you didn't hear from him last year because Jackson Dart beat him out at Ole Miss. Marvin Harrison Jr. was asked about if he's entering the NFL draft. Yeah, so I decided, you guys know, coming into this year, I wanted to beat T.M. North and win a Big Ten Championship and I did not do that this year, so I think it's a great motive to come back if that's what I decided to do because that's something I definitely wanted to do in my Ohio State career and not being done that yet definitely opened the door for me to come back, but I'm decided.

Yeah, he's going pro. I don't think anyone actually believes it. It's like when Caleb Williams is saying things that I don't actually think he's going back to USC.

Now, Samter, let me just run this by you. This could be a little bit of a hot take, but I'm going to give it to you anyway. So Ohio State all throughout the year and especially leading up to the Michigan game, they X out the M's and they refer to Michigan as that school up north. When you lost three years in a row, I think you need to pipe down on putting X's through the M's and also still referring to them like in a disrespectful name as like, oh, that team up north, I can't say Michigan.

They beat you the last three years. I don't know. It's a little cocky. I'm going to be honest.

I think it's the exact opposite dial up that no, I think it's the opposite. I think that when you're winning, right, it's kind of petty to cross out the ends because you're like winning, right? Like as a Yankee fan, we don't care about the Mets, but the Mets fans get on. You're winning. Now you're losing, right? But when you're losing, you hate the guy who keeps beating you. So you want to cross out their name. I get that.

That's like the anger. Like we want to beat these guys who keep beating us when you're the ones winning. We don't care about crossing out the ends.

Why would I cross up the M's? Like we keep crushing these guys. They mean nothing to us. Yeah. Crossing out the M's shows them that they matter.

They don't matter. I think it's very minor league when you do it, when you've lost three years in a row. You know, I think you need to pipe down, uh, on some of the, uh, that team up north and, and putting the X's through Michigan. That's just me, just me.

Maybe Michael Fry has a different opinion. Big Ohio State fan that listens to the show. It is the Zach Keldt show on CBS Sports Radio. Come on back. We've got a few questions. We've got a few answers. We do this every Monday and Friday on the show.

We call it Onside Offside Zach Keldt show CBS Sports Radio coming on back after these short messages. Says here that Graybar is a distributor. Yeah. We support electrical and data com projects all over the country.

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