49ers Winning the NFC Is Inevitable (Hour 2)

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Former Eagles linebacker Ike Reese gonna stop on by coming up in 20 minutes from now. You know, I remember it was two years ago where we got a great late season game between the Bengals and the Kansas City Chiefs, and then they played the last two years, I think both times in December, and this year they're playing at the end of December again, but it doesn't have the same juice. But the reason why I bring that up is, you know, that was basically the appetizer for the main course where those two teams would meet up once again in the postseason, and it happened in back to back years. Coming up this weekend on a Monday night, actually, so that's Christmas Day, you have the Baltimore Ravens going to San Francisco, and that has a Super Bowl preview type of feel, where in the NFC, the Baltimore, or the San Francisco 49ers, it would be a shock if they don't get there. Because like you go through this, yeah, you have some contenders right now, like the Eagles, even though they've just lost three in a row, they still have a chance, I guess, to get to the Super Bowl, even though I don't believe they will. The Detroit Lions have a good record, but is anyone expecting the Lions on the road to go win a big playoff game?

Probably not. And the Dallas Cowboys, they're synonymous with in the big game just coming up short. So I have no doubt in my mind that the 49ers are going to the Super Bowl. The only way the 49ers don't go to the Super Bowl, and anything could happen in a one-game-and-you-go-home type of sport, is if they get injured. And there's a possibility that they could get injured.

But where the injuries occur, is it big enough to take away from the team? And we saw it in their three-game stretch where they lost three games in a row. They were without Trent Williams, they were without Deebo Samuel, and even Christian McCaffrey was dealing with a lingering issue, even though he didn't miss the game. And when you took those players off of that team, and Williams was out and Deebo was out, that team looked vulnerable.

And I remember, it was on the show where I said, and it's ironic that it was me of all people that said this, that let's pump the brakes on the 49ers' criticism. Because at that point, people were saying, oh see, Brock Purdy's not that good, oh the 49ers are not that great, they're invincible. And I'm like, guys, it's really important that we all acknowledge who they were playing without. Because not only is Trent Williams the best left tackle in football, not only is Deebo Samuel one of the biggest nightmares to guard defensively with what he could do in the run game, and also the way that he could physically beat you up in the pass-catching game as well. You know, playing both wide receiver and kind of being used on some running back plays as well, they're big time leaders on that football team.

Where you see they set the tone before every game, walking out with the boombox, and that's Trent Williams and Deebo Samuel right in front of that line. So as long as McCaffrey and Deebo and Trent Williams, and also you have to acknowledge Brock Purdy are healthy, like those four guys, if they stay healthy, I don't see the Eagles, the Lions, the Cowboys walking into Santa Clara, assuming the 49ers have the one seed, and beating them in the playoffs. And even if the 49ers have to go on the road, like even if the 49ers somewhere had to go to Dallas, or they had to go to Philadelphia, or they had to go to Detroit, I think the 49ers have beaten anybody this year in the NFC.

Now, we'll see a lot more about those teams in the games whenever we get there in the division round or the NFC title game. Because the Cowboys, each and every year they lose to the 49ers. The last three times they played them, they lost in that playoff game, where Dak Prescott couldn't snap the ball after the dumb approach to slide and then get back up to the line. Then after that, they got blown out, or they didn't get blown out, but in the NFC title game, their defense played really well, but Dak couldn't get the ball in the end zone without Tony Pollard.

And he made a fumbling mistake, had an interception mistake as well, but then this year, they just got rolled, absolutely rolled by the 49ers. So I don't believe that the Cowboys in a big spot are going to beat the 49ers. The Lions, it seems like their apex and their ceiling for this year is winning a playoff game for the first time since the 1991 season. So they should get a wildcard victory, right? Whoever they're playing as the two-seed, the three-seed, whatever it is, they should get a wildcard victory. And then after that, if you had to have the Lions go to Dallas or the Lions go to Philadelphia, the Lions go to the 49ers, I don't trust Jared Goff outside of Ford Field.

And I know two of those places are outdoor environment and then Jerry's World is not. So maybe it'd be a more favorable matchup going to Jerry's World for Jared Goff. And then you look at the Eagles, it's tough for me as someone that really liked that Eagles team. It is tough for me to lead this campaign and lead this charge that the Philadelphia Eagles are going to turn it around. Because my biggest problem with the Eagles right now, and there's a lot, right? The offense only put up 17 points last night with all that talent. They tried to be too aggressive and, you know, sometimes you want to see teams be aggressive, but there's a difference in being aggressive than just being stupid. The Eagles were stupid last night with the two long passing attempts that they took.

One, when they're up by four, they're moving the ball, they're on the Seahawks 45, and they throw an interception trying to go get a home run call, a home run play, and take a kill shot when it was unnecessary. And the way that you saw that drive was slowly building up with a nice pass, short distance to AJ Brown, then over the middle to Devante Smith as well. They should have just kept on doing that and mixing in the run as well, and I do believe they would have got the final 45 yards and wind up in the end zone. Instead, let's just throw the ball up deep, and then it got picked off by Julian Love. And at the end of the game, when Drew Locke takes the lead for the first time in the game with 28 seconds left, Jalen Hurts gets a big run. If he would have just went to the check down option of Kenneth Gainwell, Gainwell runs for 20-25 yards and probably puts him in field goal position. And I know there's only 10 seconds left, so we gotta see how long that would take him to run down the sideline, but he's getting out of bounds and he's putting him in a more favorable spot than just chucking the ball up deep down the right sideline and it getting picked off once again by Julian Love. But my biggest gripe with the Eagles, outside of the defense being soft, you know, that's under consideration, the offense not finishing off drives, it's really not those two things. It's a lack of team chemistry with this team, because last week it was Darius Bigplay Sly in embarrassing fashion, getting on his podcast after they got torched by Dak Prescott and the Dallas Cowboys, and saying, oh, I actually played a great game. How dare a fan put my name on a trash can, which you could have a problem with, and then attack me for my performance when I played great.

I don't care how great you think you played. That means Jack. It's not an I-sport. It's a team sport. It's a we-sport. So you could go have this great game, and that gets me so annoyed. Like, you know when Emmitt Smith joined Dustin Student and he's like, oh, this makes me hot, knowing the fact that Ezekiel Elliott's no longer on the Dallas Cowboys.

So like, one of my favorite quotes ever, just the way that Emmitt Smith said that. You know what makes me really annoyed? You know what makes me hot? It's when players just post their individual accomplishments when the team loses. Like, I just don't understand that. And I get it, right?

You're trying to grow your brand and do things like that. And you know, maybe if you're playing in Tampa Bay, you could get away with that. But when you're in Philadelphia, a passionate city like that, where those fans eat, live, sleep, they live and die by the team success of the Philadelphia Eagles. Like, you're in Philadelphia when the team is buzzing, even when they're not buzzing. Everyone, it doesn't matter what sex you are, what race you are, what religion you are, everyone is wearing Eagles gear.

Like, I went to the playoffs last year on a Saturday, you know, right before conference championship Sunday, every single person was in green. So that's a fan base that sometimes gets a bad rap, right? They boo their players and all that stuff.

They only boo their players when it's deserved. And for Darius Slay last week to basically say, I played great, how dare you criticize me, when the team got carved up, that was embarrassing. And then you had Jalen Hurts the other night, right? Him talking about the commitment issues. Let's play that one more time.

I know we played it early, but I want to play it again. Here is Jalen Hurts talking about the commitment issues that the Eagles teammates are having right now. I've been talking about execution all year, been on the same page, everyone been on the same page, and we didn't execute. I don't think we were committed enough. You know, just got to turn it around. You know, it's a challenge that we have to embrace, just continue to see it through. What do you mean by that, about being committed enough? Commitment. I don't know that I have a dictionary on me now. Excuse me. I don't know how else to say that.

I guess, how are you seeing that? Just, you know, it's a matter of being on the same page. It takes everyone being all in, in all aspects, and you know, it starts with me. So after hearing that again, the last 10 seconds are the most important part.

Like, forget about all the jokes at the dictionary and he didn't know what commitment meant and all that. But what he's saying at the end is not everybody is all in. And that's the leader of the Eagles saying that. And this isn't week two. This isn't week three. You're not fixing that in the final three weeks of the season when everyone's banged up. And if you can't get committed and if you can't give it your all, the moment you have a little adversity hit, that's alarming.

It is. For a team that got to the Super Bowl last year as a bunch of veterans, a bunch of youngsters, they've had experience, they got teased with almost winning the Super Bowl last year, up by 10 at halftime, and then they blew it. And this group now, after getting blown out by the 49ers, after getting blown out by the Cowboys, they didn't put in a great week of effort.

That effort's getting questioned by Jalen Hurts. And this one's actually the most damaging because they had the game basically won. And then they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. So I look at this Eagles team. It should have been obvious after they lost to San Francisco. Not that they just lost, but then they fouled it up with getting rolled again against the Cowboys. So what Hurts is saying isn't wrong, even though I don't know, was it just caught up in the motions after the game?

Is it just quarterback speaker? He actually feels this way. But let's take it for a second with them actually feeling this way.

And I don't think it's that far stretched to say that that's an accurate way that he views some of the teammates right now. Because after the 49ers game, you think a veteran group would at least give a good effort. And a team that has had playoff experience at least give a good effort against the Cowboys and said they got embarrassed two weeks in a row. So long story short, I look at the NFC. Don't trust the Eagles. Don't trust the Cowboys. Don't trust the Lions. The only team I trust are the San Francisco 49ers. And then you get into the AFC and it's like, okay, the Ravens are the best. This could be a Super Bowl preview this weekend, but the Ravens still have to get their playoff problems of previous years corrected. And you would hope the health of Lamar Jackson puts them in a better spot to do that.

But we'll have to wait and see. And you know, some people will buy stock in Miami. Some people buy back in on the Kansas City Chiefs.

If you listen to this show, you know I'm buying in on the Buffalo Bills. And I ultimately think it will be the Bills going up against the San Francisco 49ers. But it would be pretty damn cool if we get a great classic game on Monday between the 49ers and the Ravens. Let's say one of those teams win, I don't know, 27-24. And then, Sam, you see that matchup coming up in Las Vegas in the Super Bowl. It would feel very similar to the Chiefs and the Bengals, what we've seen the last two years.

It happening, though, around earlier. Great matchup in the regular season and seeing them meet up in the AFC title game. It's gonna be interesting. I mean, at the end of the day, I'm curious to see if what Jalen Hurts said, like, wakes them up. You won't see that, though, in the rest of the regular season, though.

Well, I mean, we might. We might see, I mean, listen, we've seen teams that seem like they were falling apart and then they kind of came back. Look at the Bills, right? The whole thing with Sean McDermott could have torn that team apart. Losing their offensive coordinator could have torn that team apart. Instead, those two things have galvanized them and now they're maybe the best team in the AFC or one of the best teams in the AFC and they came out of the dead. So this could either be the wakeup call that the Eagles need. Championship teams go through adversity and championship teams rise to the top when the adversity hits.

This is adversity. It's the perfect time to have it. It's towards the end of the year.

It gives you enough time to correct it, but it doesn't also need to actually, like, destroy the season. This could be the wakeup call that those veterans and those players and that coaching staff needs to beat the 49ers. Well, that's when we'll find out. That's when we'll find out, because they play the Giants and the Cardinals the final three weeks of the season. No public perception is going to change about them in the final three weeks of the season, even if they get a wildcard win. It's not public perception. It's inside that locker room and how they... So we might, you might be right.

We might not see it, but it might be happening underneath the surface without us knowing it. I don't think it would happen until the divisional round. Like, they go get a big divisional round victory, let's say, against the Lions or the Cowboys, whoever it is, and then they, like, blow one of those teams out.

It could quickly recreate that momentum that could carry over into San Francisco. The problem is, I don't think San Francisco is, and nor should they be, they're not intimidated at all by the Philadelphia Eagles, and maybe that overconfidence will lead to their downfall. But if you put that ball in the field down, coming up at the end of January between the Eagles and the 49ers, right now, I just don't see a way I could predict an Eagles victory. Alright, this is Zach Gelb's show on CBS Sports Radio. Ike Reese, former Eagles linebacker and host on Sports Radio 94 WIP, will join us next to talk about the Eagles' problems. We continue this is Zach Gelb's show coast to coast on CBS Sports Radio. Seahawks stunned the Eagles last night as Drew Locke completes a touchdown to Jackson Smith and Jigba for the Seahawks' first lead of the game with 28 seconds remaining.

Let's go out to the guest line right now. Welcome in former Eagles linebacker and special team star, and now does a great job in the afternoons for a while on Sports Radio 94 WIP, and that is Ike Reese. Ike, how you been, my friend? What's up, Zach? Thanks for having me, brother. Now, I know the sky is falling in Philadelphia today after another Eagles lost their third straight.

Just how did you process it last night? Because there's losses and then there's really bad losses. And to see what Drew Locke did go in 92 yards in less than 90 seconds, I couldn't believe that. Yeah, I thought it was probably the worst loss from a feeling standpoint that I've had under Nick Sirianni, you know, as a head coach. You know, they've lost some games during his time here, but expectations and circumstances matter. And when you look at that game last night after losing two straight coming into that game, the expectations and circumstances, in my opinion, was that the Eagles needed a win last night, almost in a must-win fashion, just from a psyche standpoint, and to come out and play the way they played. And I'm not going to say they played great football last night, although I thought the defense showed a lot of promising things last night up until that final drive. But I like the way they started the game. Opening drive, they ran the football effectively. They went down and got a touchdown. You had a 10-point lead at some point. And then, you know, I don't know if they took their foot off the gas or things just stopped executing or they stopped executing the way they were early in the game. And particularly at the quarterback position.

And what happens is you let Seattle hang around. They just chipped away at the lead. And even when you have control of the game late, you know, those turnovers, you just can't have them. Like, you can't have those two interceptions there. You know, you got a four-point lead, and with about seven to eight minutes left to go in the game, you're at midfield or a little past midfield. It's first down.

The drive is moving smoothly. Looks like you're about to go down and get points while taking more time off the clock. And he throws the ball up to Quiz Watkins.

And I understand what he's thinking there. Be aggressive. You see a one-on-one situation.

But you got to know your personnel. It's not A.J. Brown you're throwing the ball to. And then secondly, I got to put a little blame on the wide receiver because when a quarterback does trust you like that, you have to reward his trust by not allowing the worst-case scenario to happen, which is an interception. If that's an incomplete pass, it's second down, we run something else, we still have the ball. So to me, that's a play where Quiz Watkins, you have to go up and at least make it a tenth of the ball, and you certainly can't allow the DB to make that interception. I don't care if they call an offensive pass interference. You can't allow that interception to happen. Yeah, I actually thought that was the most egregious play last night because like you were saying, they hit A.J.

Brown, they hit Devontae Smith, they're moving the ball down the field. It's a four-point game. You're looking to put that one away, and I thought it was too aggressive in that spot. But Ike Reese, how about at the end of the game, it looked like he had Gainwell open, and it looked as if Jalen was trying to play hero ball when all you needed was a field goal limited time. Yeah, and when those plays work, everybody loves you for it. You know, you're being aggressive and all those things, but this is the flip side of that coin, is that there's times when that play is not going to work, and you have to be situational aware.

Right? And Jalen's a smart quarterback. He's heady. He understands in-game situations. I'm a little baffled that he really rolled the dice with the game on the line there. You're in a manageable situation with two timeouts still left. You got the entire field to use.

You can use the middle of the field and then call a timeout. You get about 10 to 15 yards at the most to get Jake Elliott in reasonable field goal distance. You got one of the most, if not the most, outside of Justin Tucker. You got one of the most clutch field goal kickers in the entire game, and that has to be in the back of your mind. Not only Jalen, it has to be in the back of the coach's mind when you call a play. At least remind me, hey, we don't need to be greedy if it's not there.

Take your check down. We got two timeouts. We're just trying to get in the field goal range, and I just thought that play, the risk wasn't worth the reward. It just wasn't worth it because, A, there is safety coverage over the top of AJ there, and B, I mean, even if he catches that ball, okay, you still have to kick a field goal. We're not going in for a touchdown there because it's going to be about, what, five seconds left on the clock, six seconds left on the clock, so you're still probably going to wind up kicking a field goal.

I just think it was an unnecessary risk, and I know that's probably the play that Jalen wishes he had back because you really basically robbed yourselves of an opportunity to at least send that game into overtime. I agree, Cyr, with Dust. I know the answer is probably a mixture of both. It's not one or the other, but if you had to put the blame more on one side or the other, is it the coaching without having Shane Stike it anymore and changing both coordinators, or is it more so this is just on the players they have to execute better? Yeah, I'm more of a it's the players guy. I put the onus on the players. Unless something is egregious as far as we can all obviously see things wrong from a schematic standpoint, I think we have the ability to have hindsight and look at plays and say, okay, we should have did this or we should have did that, and some of that's there. Some of that is true where you can scheme up some things a little bit better and put your players in a better position, but if I'm going to tip the scale one way or the other, it's to the players. It's to the players, and you're in a position, like take for example, you know, we just talked about Jalen in those situations.

Those aren't play designs. That's the quarterback having the option to go where he wants to go with the football and understanding the in-game situation. Take it to the other side of the ball. You know, James Bradbury, the play he got beat on that touchdown, that just can't happen.

I mean, it can't happen. You can't allow a receiver to get behind you in man-to-man coverage. And his explanation last night that he was playing the sticks, I mean, you're not trying to keep them from getting a first down. You're trying to keep them from getting a touchdown.

The score is 17 to 13. Not even a field goal beat you, so you know they had to score a touchdown there. I say all of that to say that if you're situationally aware of what's going on, you know how to play that coverage.

And you give yourself a little more cushion. By the way, he was lined up 10 yards off the ball. But you still allow Jackson, Smith, and Jigba to eat up your cushion, excuse me, and then run by you when you know you don't have any safety help. Now, he's the one who said he wasn't expecting any safety help. He said that last night, so I don't know some question out there as to whether or not Sidney Brown had been over the top of him and wasn't expecting safety help.

Well, according to James Bradbury, he was not expecting safety help. He just played the coverage poorly from a technique standpoint, and that's really what allowed that touchdown there. But that's another one of those situations where you're saying, okay, even if he catches the ball underneath you or what have you, you make the tackle. They don't have any timeouts.

They don't have any timeouts. So even if you make the tackle and bounce, they're still in a hurry up rush panic mode, and let's see if Drew Locke can make a decision correctly under those circumstances when he has more pressure. To me, he made two easy throws that his guys just went up and made a play. DK Metcalf made a great catch in between double coverage. Again, Bradbury was over there, and then they went back at Bradbury with Smith and Jigba, and that was one-on-one. And for a guy who's a former All-Pro, you expect him to play that coverage in man-to-man a little bit better.

I agree. The press conference Jalen Hurts had after the game was so bizarre when he said they're not committed enough, and then when pressed on it, he's like, I don't have a dictionary to define commitment. What did you make of that?

Is there something more there? Is that just a player after a game frustrated just saying things? I lean a little bit towards that. You know, Jalen hasn't been one in the past that has thrown out inflammatory comments to where the next day he's making headlines for saying something. He usually plays things by the book. He's going to usually keep things close to his best, and he's going to take responsibility of his own play and not necessarily point the finger. So I look at that situation, Zach, and I say, maybe he misspoke.

Sometimes you're up there and you're searching for answers, and things are going through your head, and you already have the emotion of how that game just ended. He's human as well. I just think he misspoke and didn't really have a clarification of what he was trying to say in that moment. At least that's what I think.

And you know what the bizarre part is, though, Ike? This team last year, they had such great team chemistry. And just in the last two weeks, and I know it doesn't help when you're losing, but you basically have Darius Slay going on his podcast saying, hey, I played perfect. The rest of the defense basically sucked.

And then you just have this commitment quote. I don't know if there's more to it, but it doesn't seem like the same team chemistry is there this year. And it's bizarre because it's not like they've changed that many players from last year to this year. I have to agree with that. Not having the privilege to be in the locker room amongst these guys is hard to pinpoint where there could be some sort of chemistry issues, but when you are playing this way and you lose to San Francisco, how you lost to San Francisco, and then you come back the next week against Dallas, and then you have a game like this, yeah, first thing I'm thinking, man, there's got to be more behind the scenes that's going on.

Something doesn't seem right. It doesn't seem like everybody's pulling in the same direction. And that's the making of a bad football team. Certainly when things seem to be going awry, you're either going to pull closer together and unite as a team like we saw in 2017, or you're going to pull apart like we saw in 2018, 2019 when things weren't going well for the Eagles. And we know the drastic season that happened in 2020. So I don't want to push the panic button and feel like that's where we're headed, but when losses continue to mount up, you can't help but wonder, is there more to it than what we're just seeing on the field?

Is everything okay behind closed doors, behind the scenes? You know, sometimes when you win games, it masks certain things, you know, the way people may be feeling or what have you. And then as soon as you start to lose a game or two, that's when it rears an ugly head and it shows itself. And to your point, I thought it was curious to comment Fletcher had, I think it was after the Cowboy game or maybe it was after the Niners game, when he talked about, we're going to see what we're made of right now, who we have in this locker room, who's going to be willing to fight. Like that doesn't come out of nowhere. Like that came from a place where Fletcher is directing something to his teammates. He's not just speaking to us as fans, he's really speaking to his teammates and he's speaking to maybe an issue that could be going on as far as people being committed. That's where the Jalen Hurts comment comes in at.

So yeah, when you start to put things together there, yeah, you know, maybe that's me hoping that there's no issues behind the scenes. But to your point, it was a weird comment and statement to make, and then even when asked to clarify it, he didn't know where to go with it versus, oh, that's not what I meant to say, this is what I was saying. It was almost like, whatever. And so, boy, I tell you, it would be a shame because this season isn't over with. The season isn't over with. They've already qualified for the playoffs.

You hit a rough patch. If you can get things together, we know the one team they have to gear up to beat. And that's the only team, yes, that's the only team that I'm concerned with is playing San Francisco. Are we good enough to beat them?

Right now, we're not good enough to beat anybody. But ultimately, that's what you're trying to work towards because you know that's the monster you're going to have to take on if you want to get to the Super Bowl. Last thing I'll ask you, because you were a respected voice when you were in the locker room.

Let's say you were a Brandon Graham or a Lane Johnson, a Jason Kelce, Fletcher Cox right now. What would you be saying to your teammates to prevent this ship from sinking because it's looking like it's going down the wrong road right now? To me, and I'm pretty sure these guys have already tried different methods of talking to the teammates and rallying the troops here. But to me, it's about enough of the talking, enough of saying this is what we're going to do.

We know we're a good team. The lesser said, the better off you are. Put your head down, get to work. Put your hard hat on, put your boots on, grab your lunch pail, and we got to dig ourselves out of this. Nobody's going to help us. Nobody's feeling sorry for us. Quit blaming the coaches. Quit blaming this. Quit blaming the schemes. We're beating ourselves with penalties at the wrong time, with turnovers at the wrong time. That's stuff that we can control as players. And if we clean that stuff up, and at the end of the day, we can say we did those things, more often than not, you're going to come out victorious. So for those four, I call them the forefathers.

Ledger, Brandon, Jason, and Lane. Yeah. You know what it's like to be a Super Bowl champion. Not everybody else on this team does. You know what it's like to play here when things aren't going well. Not everybody else knows. They have to be able to get that resonated with their teammates. But you have to wonder.

Here's the thing I'll say, Zach, before I get out of here. Especially on defense. There's so many new faces, you wonder if everyone is connected. You just wonder. Because sometimes you can preach that message and it doesn't hit with everybody.

It doesn't resonate with everyone. So from a mixture of the youth movement they had through the last two drafts, to the guys they brought in to help the Julio Joneses, the Kevin Byers, the Bradley Robies, the Shaq Leonard, guys like that. They brought in to try to help. These guys don't know what it's like to play here in Philadelphia, to wear that uniform, what it means. And to try to get them to all be on the same page.

Man, it was amazing they were able to do that last year and get to the Super Bowl, and they did it in 17 and won the Super Bowl. But then there's plenty of other instances around the league of history where this doesn't work. Where, you know, you can get a collection of talent, and it can only carry you so far.

But you need character. You need guys that will fight through the tough times and stick together versus looking to point the finger when things aren't going well. And I didn't like the Derek Gunn stuff, you know, that leaked out to him. Whoever did that to me was pointing the finger at somebody else.

That type of stuff is not conducive to a winning culture, and it certainly isn't conducive to winning a championship. He's the voice of Philadelphia Sports Afternoons on Sports Radio 94 WIP. Of course, it's Ike Grease. Ike, always great to see you.

Thanks so much. All right, Zach, thanks for having me, brother. All right, this is that Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio. The studio smells a little bit weird, and the newsroom smells a little bit weird.

So the reason why I say that... Sorry. Well, I don't think it's anything you did. We would tell you if you smell bad, Samter. So there's two different smells in the newsroom right now. I guess one of our bosses, David Mayernik, had some tuna salad, and I don't know, he's looking good.

He's eating healthy. But I love tuna when I'm eating tuna. But when somebody else is eating tuna fish, I think it just smells absolutely disgusting. Like, when I'm eating it, I never think it smells disgusting. But when somebody else brings in, like, a bowl of tuna or something like that, and they're eating it and walking it around, I think it smells gross.

So that was the bad smell that I got. But then someone during the break ordered Katz's Deli, and I got a whiff of pastrami, and I may have, during the break, had a few slices of pastrami from Katz's Deli. And even when Katz's Deli gives you pastrami and it's cold, it's still delicious. So right away, that horrific smell that our boss brought into the office, and David Mayernik bringing in tuna, it got wiped away, and he got saved from whoever was the genius in the newsroom that ordered pastrami.

And I've never seen food go away as quickly as what I just saw. I was lucky to get a few scraps in the newsroom. So I do apologize in advance, guys. I got the back end of the pastrami. There was nothing else left for you guys.

Uh-huh, sure. This guy who made such a big deal about me not getting him food during the holiday party didn't get me Katz's Deli pastrami. I'm very upset with you. I guess it's do what I say, not what I do.

The Zach Geld show on CBS Sports Radio. You know, the dinner I owe you is off. I don't know about that. We are going out for dinner on Thursday. We're doing a little show dinner holiday party, which should be fun. And I do find it funny that Sampther's getting dinner out of me before he's giving me the dinner that he owes me.

So I do find that quite funny. I'm not holding my breath when it comes to you actually paying up on this dinner bet. I think you're going to weasel this way, weasel your way out of this one, and I'll probably never see that dinner ever.

Or maybe like five years from now. You'll be like, oh, you know what? I'll give you the dinner. No chance you and I are still friends in five years.

Oh, wow. No, it's not about me and you. It's more about you're not going to stand me for five years. And about like three years from now, you can be like, we're done with this relationship. Maybe Brandon Tierney had a point about you. That was eight and a half years, though.

Or nine. No, I'm just kidding. I've always had a good relationship with Sampther. You know, there have been some people that have been like, oh, Sampther's rough, rough, rough, a little tough to deal with sometimes. But I've always had a pleasant experience with Sampther. And the other person that people said that about was Taz. When Taz worked here, I had a great relationship with Taz. So I don't know what that says about people evaluating people that way or what it just says about me.

But I don't have many people in this building that I know of that don't like me. So there's that. But pastrami wiped away the bad smell of it, too. Anyway, without further ado, I'm not talking about Freddie Undo. It's time to update you on some of the biggest stories in the world of sports with some audio. That, too, on News Brief. People who are fake analysts who somehow got jobs on TV saying there goes your boy like, oh, there he is. That's the person we've been waiting for.

It's almost to the point where it's like almost sick. Former players are waiting for other current players to fail. So that way they have something to talk about.

It's not even to just get into names. I mean, I feel like at this point you kind of know who you are and it's like, why do you want a person to lose so bad? It seems that a lot of people are just waiting for people to fail. So at first I thought he was talking about like regular media people, but it's clear he's addressing LaShawn McCoy when he says that you have former players that are just waiting to see current players fail. Now, I'm not saying that Micah Parsons should enjoy some of the hate that his team receives, but they also get a ton of love from their own fans. But this is what happens when you play for the Dallas Cowboys.

And I'll simply say this. You don't like what's being said about you. You could control what you could control and that's what happens on the football field. Go have your team win the Super Bowl this year and then everyone have to give the Cowboys a mea culpa.

That's like the one part about Micah Parsons who gave my love. So one part I don't like where whenever they lose, it's like, oh, everyone's going after my quarterback. Everyone's going after my team. It's ridiculous. It's silly. I'm not saying you have to win every game, but you guys don't win the big games.

And that's the problem. Here is Jerry Jones on one of the 9,000 times he does an interview this week. This time with Sean and RJ on 105.3 The Fan. And Jerry was asked if he still has faith in Mike McCarthy. Well, he's coached three playoff teams in a row. I think he's done an outstanding job. The fact that he's your offensive coordinator as well as your head coach puts him in a higher stead than when he was the walk around coach.

I didn't spend my day in there looking grumpy or looking however you might look, even though we were all disappointed. The best part of our team this year has been the coaching set. I do think Mike McCarthy gets disrespected. Now, the last two years, he's won 12 games and his team has come up short in the postseason.

They'll win 12 something games again this year and they'll come up short again in the postseason. He's a good coach. I would not say, though, he's done an outstanding job. He's done a fine job.

He's done a good job. An outstanding job would be taking the Cowboys to the NFC title game, something they have not done since the 1995 season. Here is Christian McCaffrey on the Manning cast. And we all talk about how the Eagles offense has been bland and has been very predictable. He predicts the Eagles play calls as they happen. Jalen Hurts is running a QB draw to the left. The tight end's going to pull. Tight end's deep, so he's sifting backside.

There you go. Ooh, look at that. Look at that.

He sifted, but it wasn't to the left. That's a pretty good prediction. So if McCaffrey was the defensive player going up against the Eagles, I'd be like, oh wow, it's so predictable. But it even does make it more predictable when he doesn't even go up against the Eagles offense and he's able to tell you what's going to happen. Now, as an offensive player, it's probably easier to identify what's going on, but I think the bigger point here is something that Dan Orlovsky was saying earlier this morning. It's like the Eagles are really only running like three things right now.

And when you're only running three things, you don't have to be Nostradamus, the most clairvoyant person in the world, to kind of figure out what they're going to do. So that's even more insult to injury here for the Eagles. Here is George Kittle when asked about Purdy, Brock Purdy, or Christian McCaffrey for MVP, this courtesy of Yahoo Sports. It's the most valuable player. And I know that the quarterback position is the most important position in sports. However, the MVP should not just be the quarterback, who's the best quarterback award.

There's no one on the football field doing what Christian McCaffrey is doing. I have to rank them. So I've got five votes, but only one person can be my first place MVP vote. Who should I vote for?

I'd vote for Christian. Wow. Wow.

I would. The things that he's doing this year are just incredible. So that's not a slight at his quarterback, to be clear. But I think you could have that conversation and saying the most impressive player on the 49ers is Christian McCaffrey and still give praise to Brock Purdy. But we live in this world where it's either one or the other and you have to either, you know, elevate your guy and be all in on your guy or then trash the other guy that you're trying to elevate him against.

But in this case, it's two teammates. And yeah, I do think McCaffrey scares opposing defenses more than Brock Purdy, and that's not taking a shot at Brock Purdy. But you know who throws him the ball is Brock Purdy. So what happens if the next time, you know, maybe, yeah, it's not going to happen up over, you know, down the seam or something. Purdy sees him, but there's IU coming across. You know, I'll go IU instead of Kittle.

Then you know what? Oh, you're talking about the Kittle part. I was just saying that McCaffrey will just run for 1300 yards anyway. It won't matter if he gets the ball thrown or not.

No, no, no. I'm saying Kittle. Kittle, you're picking McCaffrey over me. I'll throw the ball to IU. Yeah, I know you're saying that in a joking tone, but I don't think anything can disrupt the 49ers right now in terms of having a bad team chemistry.

Yeah, I know. Jim Donovan has battled leukemia, and he received some treatments this year. Now he's back calling games for the Browns. Here is Jim Donovan on the Browns radio network on that final Hail Mary call. This just brought a smile to my face.

It was awesome. Third down and ten. From the Browns, 45. Fields back to pass. Up in the pocket. He rolls left.

Times run out. He's going to look. He's going to look. He's going to watch. It's going down into the end zone.

Knock it down. The ball is intercepted. It's intercepted by the Browns.

It's the end of the bell. Got it. He got it. Ball game over. Browns win. Browns win.

20 to 17. It's all over. Thank God because, Jim, that ball was knocked down onto Darnell Mooney's chest who was on the ground and then it popped up into the air miraculously and the Anthony Bell gets the interception. Darnell Mooney had a shot at it.

Oh, my God. The cardiac kids are back, Jim, nine and five, and you remain undefeated. He's 2-0 since coming back after having to battle leukemia treatments, Jim Donovan, and the reason I wanted to play that is a lot of times, right, in sports media, everyone's like, oh, you always only talk about negative things.

You only yell about negative things. That moment and just hearing that call, it's great, but it doesn't really do it justice. They put out a video of the Cleveland Browns and seeing the smile in Jim Donovan's like just face and how elated he was just to be there and how much joy the Browns brought him, it just shows you why sports, everyone can connect to it and why it's so great. The coolest part for me also was just seeing the joy of everybody else's face, how much they cared about Jim Donovan, that he was back and he was happy. It was almost as if what they were calling took a back seat because of how cool it was, the person that was calling the game and knowing what, unfortunately, he's had to been through. I've been through.

All right. Zach Gelb, CBS Sports Radio, James Palmer from the NFL Network will join us live next. I'm Kate Abdo, the host of Kickin' It!, a new weekly show from the CBS Sports Galasso Network, where Clint Dempsey, Charlie Davies, Mo Ado, and I connect with the biggest personalities from global soccer and beyond to learn about their journeys and what makes them tick. This is the place for football fans to hear unfiltered conversations with the game's most familiar faces. So what are you waiting for? Just follow and listen to Kickin' It! on the Audacity app or wherever you get your podcasts.