Reasonable NFL Expectations (Hour 3)

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Call 562-314-4603 for details. Alrighty, our number three of our radio program. It is the Zach Gelb show, Coast to Coast on CBS Sports Radio. Now we're going to play a little NFL music. Stu and Samter have compiled the list of some teams with how NFL free agency has already started and some of the big moves have made. How does it alter with the additions or subtractions that those teams have had my expectations for those squads.

Stu, take it away. The Baltimore Ravens. My expectation for the Baltimore Ravens heading into this upcoming season, Super Bowl or bust. You made it to an AFC title game last year. Your offense didn't show up.

Now you have your number two of Zay Flowers. You have Lamar Jackson who's a two-time MVP. You just added Derrick Henry. You probably need another pass-catching option.

Maybe you explore that once again in the draft. You have Mark Andrews. Hopefully he stays healthy this year. And sure on defense, you lost to Patrick Queen. But this is a team that when you're playing football for the next three years or so, it's Super Bowl or bust. Because now you have proven you could get to an AFC title game. Now you got to show up in that AFC title game and then move the ball over the goal line in the Super Bowl. Because now, regardless of what you do in the regular season, I don't care if you're the number one seed again.

People are going to look at you and they're going to say, okay, that's fine, but can you get the job done in the big moment? Because last year, it was the easiest road to a Super Bowl. Win two games in your backyard, you go to the Super Bowl. Kansas City's offense didn't even show up in that AFC title game.

You still couldn't get the job done. So Super Bowl or bust for the Ravens. The Pittsburgh Steelers. It's kind of sad what the Steelers have become. They haven't won a playoff game since 2016.

That's a long time ago. And it used to be for the standard for the Pittsburgh Steelers, Super Bowl or bust. You win the Super Bowl success, you don't. Failure of a season. But now it's just making the playoffs. And if I had to give you the absolute high point for the Steelers this upcoming season, it would be winning a playoff game.

But anything more than that, I think you're a delusional, terrible towel fan. Yeah, this defense is great when they stay healthy. TJ Watt we know is the best defensive player in football, or I think he is. Alex Highsmith is a stud. On offense, you just got rid of Deontay Johnson, but you still have George Pickens. You have the two-headed attack of Anaji Harris and Jalen Warren.

And Russell Wilson will be the day one starting quarterback, and he's an upgrade from Kenny Pickett. And you have a good coach here, Mike Tomlin. But the standard for the Steelers now isn't, yeah, let's go win a seventh Lombardi. Let's go get another Lombardi trophy. Hasn't been that way for a while.

It's okay. Be a tough, gritty team. Make the playoffs, and then you hope to win a playoff game. But once again, that's something they haven't done since 2016.

So I guess the high point expectation? Win a damn playoff game. The Philadelphia Eagles.

Super Bowl. That's the expectation for the Eagles. You look at that team. You add Saquon Barkley. You already have Jalen Hurts, who has to have a bounce back season. You have A.J.

Brown. You have Devante Smith, Dallas Goddard. That's a team on offense.

They are loaded. Even with after losing Jason Kelce, that line is still loaded with pro bowlers. Defensively, there's some concerns. I don't like that secondary, but you bring back C.J.

Gardner-Johnson. And then on the defensive side of the ball, you also got Bryce Huff coming in. It feels like Hassan Redick will stay there, and they'll trade away Josh Sway. There's enough there in Philadelphia in an NFC where it's the Niners are the strong team and that everyone else is fighting to contend with the Niners. We know that the Eagles can still be that team.

I have questions about the coach, but they have a loaded roster and a talented roster. And you once again throw them in the Super Bowl or bust hopper. The Green Bay Packers.

Hmm. It's a good one. NFC championship game. I think the Packers showed you what they could be in the last few weeks of the season.

They took advantage of a Cowboys team that does not know how to show up in a big moment, but they took it to them in their own building. And now you look at Green Bay, it's year number two of Jordan Love as a starter. You bring in Josh Jacobs, which I think makes them slightly better than having Aaron Jones. I have to see Christian Watson stay healthy.

I need to see more consistency out of Romeo Dobbs. You bring in a new defensive coordinator, but you were a team last year that overachieved. It wasn't crazy to be a playoff team, but no one thought the Packers were going to be in the second round of the playoffs and they choked away that game up against the Niners. But now it's about taking that next step and getting to an NFC title game. I'm not saying they should win the division because you still give the edge to the Detroit Lions, but they can win the division. I would still give the edge to Detroit, but I think it's safe to say for a team that went to the playoffs and won a playoff game last year, now it's about winning two playoff games and being in an NFC championship game. The Atlanta Falcons win the division and win a playoff game.

I think they could do more than that, but I think that's the fair expectation for the Atlanta Falcons. And Kyle Pitts, I think, is going to have a big turnaround. Bijan Robinson is going to have the season that we all expected him to have last year. Tyler Auger will still be effective.

Drake London going to be really good. They've taken Stu's favorite player Darnell Mooney, and they also got Rondell Moore today in a trade too. So they're taking some flyers and putting more offensive bodies on that side of the ball that have some potential. So I look at that team bringing in Captain Kirk, even though he's coming off the injury, they should win that division. They don't win that division, they're the saints of really last year.

And that everyone's saying they'll win the division, they didn't win the division. But I do believe Atlanta wins a division, and they should be able to win a home playoff game. That would be my expectation for the Falcons. The Tennessee Titans I would say if they're an 8-9 football team, I'd be happy with Tennessee. The big thing for Tennessee is kind of like where we were at with Green Bay last year. Now, Green Bay overachieved. But what I said about the Packers heading into last season was, I don't care really what their record is, I just want to be able to, at the end of the season, walk away thinking that Will Levis could or is the guy. With the Green Bay Packers, you walked away at the end of last season saying Jordan Love is the guy. For Will Levis, you're in a young quarterback division with CJ Stroud, Trevor Lawrence, and Anthony Richardson.

A lot of people are doubting you. You got humiliated at the draft, you fell out of the first round, and then you ended up going in the second round to Tennessee. But Tennessee has put you in a position to succeed this year with Brian Callahan, an offensive-minded head coach, even though I think Vrabel should still be there. But now you have DeAndre Hopkins, Calvin Ridley, and Tony Pollard.

That's enough to evaluate what Will Levis can be. At the end of the season, my expectation is just for Tennessee, say that you have your franchise quarterback in Will Levis. The Dallas Cowboys. Oh boy. Oh no. Oh no.

Oh no, no, no, no, no. Can I even have an expectation for the Dallas Cowboys? Like, I would just say win your division.

And outside of that, I have no more expectations for you. I don't even think you're going to win your division this year. There's been no, like, repeat NFC East champion I think since 2004 or something like that when the Eagles did it. But why should I expect even the Cowboys to win the NFC East? You know, it's kind of crazy, Sam. You know me.

I'm never at a loss for words. I'm at a loss for words for the drama Dallas Chokin' Cowboys. Because what expectations should I have? Oh, they'll be a double-digit win team? You know, I have my expectations. They'll be a double-digit win team, they'll finish second in the division, and then the wild card weekend they'll get blown out or they'll lose a game in heartbreaking fashion.

Right? Like, wouldn't I be a dummy to expect anything else from a team that has had a good roster the last few years, has had a good record, and they've had opportunities to win playoff games, and they have one playoff win in the last three years, and the one playoff win was to an 8-9 football team. So I can't expect this team to actually do more than what they've been doing the last three years. I mean, with the moves that they've made in free agency, how could you not? I mean, they've been all over the place, all in. Signing after signing after signing after signing. You know, here's the weird thing also. Jared Jones said that not having Dak signed yet doesn't impact how much money they're going to try to spend and what they're going to try to do in free agency.

That's a lie. They've done nothing. I mean, they did sign their long snapper, and they did bring in a pass rusher. Kendricks, who was supposed to go to the 49ers, and then he flipped to the Cowboys. He did the, uh, who was the player that did that to the Jets and then went back to Minneapolis? Anthony Barr, maybe? Bill Belichick?

I don't know. Everybody does that to the Jets. I think it was Anthony Barr.

Yeah, that's certainly possible. Anthony Barr, I do remember the Jets maybe had a shot with him. But yeah, so it seems like, it seems like they're afraid to invest money in anybody because they are waiting to hear how it's going to work out with Dak. And that's troublesome, because if you're Dak and you're, you know, playing hardball here after, you know, going one and done again in the playoffs. Well, Dak has all the power. But my point, yes, he has all the power, but if he wants to win and silence the critics, you have to sign a deal that will at least be semi-team friendly so they can go out and bring guys in. You're making sense, but you're wasting everybody's time, and here's why.

And I'm not saying this to, like, go after you, because like I just said, what you just said makes sense. But how many times do we sit here and have you said, or have I said, a quarterback should take less money to give their team more of a window, and it doesn't happen. The only time it's ever happened, and this annoys our boss, by the way, any time we bring it up, because our boss, David Mayernik, is not like Tom Brady. But the only quarterback who's really done it has been Brady, but Brady also had, at the time, a supermodel wife in Gisele Bunchen.

Yuck, not a fan of her anymore. He was basically, supposedly had her eyes wandering in a different direction with somebody else, and she was still married to the greatest quarterback of all time in Tom Brady. But that's really the only quarterback that has done it. I guess you could say Mahomes too, but what Mahomes did was smart, and he's now on a bargain. He just took a long deal, and then they could just spread it out and renegotiate that thing like already two or three times like they've done it. But you see, Dak Prescott, he won the last negotiation, and that took several years to get done, and he's going to win this negotiation. But at this point, you know what I'll say about Dallas?

What can they really do now? Free agency from the big names are pretty much over. So maybe you could go trade up in the draft, or you take someone in the draft that brings in excitement at the wide receiver position.

Now maybe that's a possibility to complement C.D. Lamb, but at this rate, with knowing that you have a good but not a great quarterback in Dak Prescott, I think you have to ride it out now. Even with the salary cap and the cap at being $59 million, if you didn't already restructure that or give him an extension where now you can move around that number for this season, at this stage, what does it help you now at this point? Not that free agency is over, but the big names have all fallen. I saw Adam Schein had Derrick Henry on today. He said he would have loved to play for the Cowboys, but the Cowboys didn't even call Derrick Henry. So what are the Cowboys doing? Oh, they're doing what the Cowboys have done for a while.

Just create headlines, create drama, and then disappoint. The Miami Dolphins. It's fine. I'll get to the Dolphins in just a second. He's like, move it along, buddy, move it along. He just Oscar'd music me. He was fading up the music in my great acceptance speech. But the last thing I'll say about the Cowboys, I don't think anyone should be disappointed with the Cowboys anymore.

Because if you're taking the beat still, you're just a damn fool. Stu, play this team's name one more time. The Miami Dolphins. I hate to say it, just be a playoff team. I think the Dolphins are ready to regress from what they did this past season. Last year was their season with the AFC being wide open, and they had so much talent, and they had so many opportunities to win big games.

And outside of a victory up against the drama Dallas Chokin' Cowboys, they didn't win Jack last year. And I look at this team, sure, you still have Tua, yeah, you still have Tyreek Hill, yeah, you still have Jalen Waddle. Defensively, you have guys now coming off injuries, which are so unfortunate, with Phillips last year and Bradley Chubb as well. You lost some pieces on the offensive line.

It's like, all right, why did you do this offseason? You brought in Shaq Barrett and Jordan Poyer. Those guys are getting up there in age. Like, Barrett could still be fine, but Poyer, I don't expect much out of him with all the injuries that he suffered. I just look at this team and I'm like, all right, they're stuck in that fine team that because of their offense, they could win 10 games, but I don't think they'll ever be a threat. I actually expect the Dolphins to be one of those teams that made the playoffs a year ago that will miss it the following season. The Houston Texans.

Super Bowl. I think they are a team that can be a dark horse Super Bowl team entering next season. And you look at the quarterback with C.J. Stroud, they have the quarterback that you look at his projection for the next five to 10 years.

He's a top five quarterback in this league. You still got Nikko Collins, you got Tankdale coming off an injury. Joe Mixon, that run game can be big, and they're going to need to rely on Joe Mixon. But defensively, you have Will Anderson Jr. and Daniil Hunter. Hello, that's going to be a great one-two punch. And people believe in D'Amico Ryans.

I'm not saying that they're a lock to get to a Super Bowl, but they are one of those dark horse contending Super Bowl teams. All righty, there we go. He doesn't have to cut me off anymore.

Sweet Stew being Rude Stew here on the Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio. To get your family sick day essentials delivered in as fast as 30 minutes, press two to keep working. Do not press two. Just use Instacart, Brian. Celebrate and save at Ashley's Anniversary Sale with Hot Buys, your choice of colors starting at just $3.99. Ashley Sleep mattresses starting at $2.50.

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Minimum monthly payment, down payment, tax and delivery may be required. See store for details. Old Man Winter here. If I had it my way, it would stay winter all year long. Short days, wind chill, black ice, and a good polar vortex.

Heaven. Wait, is it getting warm in here? Your cold snap is over, Old Man Winter. Spring has arrived.

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Call 562-314-4603 for details. What a picture I'm seeing right now, tweeted out by Alex Lewis, who covers the Minnesota Vikings for the athletic. They're doing a joint press conference today. Sam Darnold and Aaron Jones are getting introduced at the same time. Isn't that disrespectful to Aaron Jones?

You put the guy known for seeing ghosts and having mono in his NFL career next to a running back that has been pretty damn successful in this league. Sam Darnold and Aaron Jones next to one another at a press conference? Like Aaron Jones, he's got the shades on, he's looking real cool. And Sam Darnold, he looks like he's getting ready for kind of like a business happy hour. I don't think he has, I don't know what kind of pants he's wearing, I can't see, but he's got like one of those sweaters on. Santer, should Aaron Jones be offended that he has to do this press conference with Sam Darnold?

No, I don't think so. I mean, oftentimes what teams will do is they'll line guys up, like if they have two or three guys and they'll do Darnold first and then Jones right afterwards, like once he's done. But at the end of the day, you have two guys there, you have the media right there, why waste everyone's time to make them sit there for an hour and a half rather than for 45 minutes?

You have them both there, you can ask them all the same questions. As of right now, they're the quarterback and starting running back of the Vikings. Oh yeah, Aaron Jones started running back for the Vikings. Darnold, we don't know if he will be the starting quarterback week one, but at least for now, he is.

So like this is the backfield team, so like you put them together, like it's camaraderie. I'm okay with that, I don't think that Aaron Jones has done enough in this league. It's not like we're talking about Derrick Henry.

Aaron Jones, very good player. He hasn't done enough in this league to be like, oh I can't believe I'm here with my own quarterback, my new starting quarterback is sitting next to me. Come on dude.

Do we have to dump that by the way? You said sitting next to me? I thought I heard an H there, potentially. I mean, that would be really funny if Sam Dornan was doing that next to him. I don't know, that was a little too close for me just hearing that. Well it was definitely sitting, because if I tried to say the other word, it would make no sense why Sam Dornan was doing that at a press conference. So Aaron Jones led the league in rushing touchdowns in 2019 and made a Pro Bowl.

I'm not saying like ready he's Earl Campbell, like I understand that, or Barry Sanders, but I was just not expecting to see him sitting next to Sam Dornan. Now, here's what I will say. You asked me this the other day, and I told you that I had an answer that was kind of having a fight with my heart, or excuse me, my head and my gut. And I was just giving you the gut answer because I didn't want to use my brain here.

In all likelihood, my brain is going to win out. And I hate to say it, but Sam Dornan is going to be starting in all likelihood week one for the Minnesota Vikings. The Vikings are sitting there at 11 in the draft. So they're in the conversation for Drake May, J.J. McCarthy, you're in that realm, Michael Penix Jr. If Drake May falls to 11, I would be shocked.

Well, or trading up also is what I'm saying. Like, I think right now I could say it pretty comfortably that Caleb Williams is the number one overall pick, and Jayden Daniels is going to be the second pick of the draft. I pray that the Washington commanders mess this up and they don't take Jayden Daniels. Please, please, please, please, please, because I want Jayden Daniels on the Patriots.

All right. But I don't think the commanders, if they were, if they were under Snyder, they're definitely taking the more flashier player. So it probably doesn't matter who the owner is, but I think they're going to take Jayden Daniels in at number two. So you have the Vikings as a team that could wait for someone to be there at 11 or they could move up in the draft. Still, with any of those names, whether it's Drake May, J.J. McCarthy or Michael Penix Jr., I don't know of any of those guys with the way that Kevin O'Connell may view Sam Darnold are going to be starting week one.

Like out of those three, I would say the best chance to start week one would be Michael Penix Jr. Like I don't think if you draft Michael Penix Jr. that you should not play him week one as long as he's ready and show signs of being ready. But if they end up getting McCarthy or they end up getting Drake May, I think they're going to try to do what the Steelers did when the Steelers drafted Kenny Pickett. And that's going to be you play the backup quarterback, the veteran quarterback first and see how long he could weather that storm now. The problem is Mitch Trubusky was Mitch Trubusky.

So he wasn't able to do that for more than a few weeks. Could I see Sam Darnold maybe having like a good two or three game stretch with Justin Jefferson assuming he's still there? Jordan Addison and T.J. Hopkinson?

Sure. But I would be kind of surprised if once the calendar flips to October, you get midway through October, if you don't eventually hand the baton off to the youngster. But the Vikings are going to find their guy in the draft because once you bring in Sam Darnold, it kind of feels as if you're now out of the Justin Fields running as well. So that's just kind of my my thoughts with the Minnesota Vikings.

Anyway, I was perusing the good old cesspool of Twitter yesterday. And there's been some rule proposals that have been suggested by a few different teams. One is the Philadelphia Eagles.

And let's just get everyone's thoughts on this. The onside kick is basically dead. There was that time it was the Saints where they had three onside kicks in a game. One was taken away, I think because of penalty or something like that. But they recovered two onside kicks in a game.

This is a few years ago. But outside of that, the onside kick, from what we knew of it, is pretty much dead. So the Eagles are proposing, I think this has been proposed before, but the Eagles are the team that's proposing it for 2024. They would permit a team to maintain possession of the football after a score by substituting one offensive play fourth and 20 from the kicking team's 20 yard line for an onside kick attempt.

I actually like that. And you look at fourth and 20, you could say, oh, it's a long shot of converting it, but the onside kick is such a long shot to begin with. And I know that this is an offensive league and some people be like, oh, maybe it's not that tough to convert a fourth and 20. But if your defense can't stop a fourth and 20, I don't care who the quarterback is. One play, fourth and 20. I don't care if it's Mahomes, Josh Allen, Joe Burrow, Jalen Hurts, Lamar Jackson, C.J.

Stroud, doesn't matter who your quarterback is. If your defense can't stop a fourth and 20 that ensures that you get the ball back, you don't deserve to have the football. So I'm fine with this proposal that you can maintain possession of the ball after a score by substituting one offensive play fourth and 20 from the kicking team's 20 yard line for an onside attempt. And I guess the way they ruled that it would only be one time a game that you could do that, or is that just whenever you're down?

I don't know the clarity on that. Yeah, I'd have to clarify, but it sounds like it's just you have the option to do the onside kick or do that one play from the fourth and 20. And I would say that should only happen in the fourth quarter.

I don't think you should be able to do that whenever you want. Sure. Now, a little bit of some numbers. For example, back in 2013, onside kick attempts were successful 18% of the time.

Right? 2015, 15% of the time. 2017, 21% of the time they were successful. Real quickly, do you have the most recent year? Yes. Okay. Can I guess what that number is? Yes.

So this is from the 2023 season, right? Correct. I'm going to say 2%.

Close, close. 1.5. 2 out of 45% were successful.

5.3% were successful in 2022. So obviously when they made changes to the kickoff rule. There were 40 onside kicks this past year?

And two of them were successful. Correct. And do you have the number from the first year you gave me? Yes. In 2013, there was 61.

Look how much of a drop off from 2013 to 2023. Right. 61 attempts to 40 attempts. Well, part of the reason why there have been fewer attempts is because they made changes to the kickoff rule.

And it's so tough. You can't get a running start. So now that the percentage is lower, teams don't have as much of an incentive to go for the onside.

And you can't over stack one side. Correct. So, as we've seen, the stats were around 18, 15% about 10 years ago.

Now they're down to 5%. If you look at the stats from the past 2 or 3 years, 4th and 15+. Let me guess. 4th and 15, this is conversion? So this is 4th and 15+. So anything over 15 yards. And so this factors in, okay, it's like 4th and 28 with the game on the line.

You're just chucking a ball and it's incomplete. So the percentage on the kicks were 5%. 4th and 20+. 15+. I'm going to say 35%. 13.9%.

Okay. So that was a big number by then. Correct. 4th and 15 is 22%. 4th and over 15 is about 14%. It's a 10% increase right there. So the important thing is, right, 10 years ago we were getting about 14, 15, 16% success rate on onside kicks.

Now it's down to 5% and so it's not worth it anymore. If we go to 4th and 20, now let's say this is 4th and 15+, so this is 4th and 16, 4th and 17, 4th and 18. So I'm assuming 4th and 20 is going to be around 10 to 12% success rate. Right? Yeah.

So if that's the case, that seems about right to me. Now here's the other thing that I wonder. What happens, and I don't expect you to know this answer because you're not Dean Blantino and probably Dean Blantino doesn't even know this answer or Gene Steritore, whatever referee, John Parry, all these guys that we should know their names and we do know their names. TV refs annoy me. What happens on 4th and 20? You have an incomplete pass, but there's pass interference. Does that then turn into, you just automatically get the first down? Like that's a, would it just be a 15 yard penalty? Because if you have pass interference on a play, it's a spot foul and then it's an automatic first down. I wonder what would occur in the 4th and 20 if let's say a defender just like mugs an offensive player wide receiver, how they would, would they just give the team the first down or would you end up just getting 10, 15 yards and then you get closer to the first down and you get one more play to try it?

I'm assuming all rules would be the same. Because you would have to think that the penalty would give you another opportunity or maybe you would just get the ball because that would be the part that would suck out of it. Because then you're getting, because offensive pass interference or it should be defensive pass interference is so subjective.

Like we see times where there is a guy that gets mugged, there's no flag and then you sneeze on someone and then there is a flag. And that's the only gripe I would have with the rule is I would need clarity on it because it would annoy me if then we get into the ticky tack kind of the way that the Super Bowl was called two years ago in the final two minutes where it's like, eh, it's not really a foul but then a ref wants to become the story and they take over the game. Well, one positive thing that could help quell some of your fears is one of the other rules that's being proposed that you had mentioned to me that under two minutes, coaches or the booth can replay literally anything. Penalties included. So if this is the case, if you're doing an onside kick with two minutes or below and there is an egregiously incorrect call on a holding or a pass interference, you can review it and get it overturned. If either and both of these rules pass.

Yeah. So that rule is being submitted by the Colts. Here's my only concern with this rule.

I think it's good to have. But remember when pass interference was able to be reviewed and they rarely overturned it. I wonder how egregious the call is going to have to be or how much of a missed the call is going to have to be to overturn it because there was many times from the whole aftermath of the Saints Rams NFC championship game where they allowed you to review pass interference. And you knew that something was called that shouldn't have been called and they still didn't overturn it because they wanted to protect the rest. So that to me is something that you just it triggers from the last time we were able to review a penalty where it ended up being a disaster and rarely did it get over.

Like I remember when it was I think it was a year that that happened. We would sit there and I would say, Yeah, this should get overturned. Your eyes tell you tells you to get overturned. But your brain tells you that they never overturned it because they're protecting the zebras. The other rule that I like here.

I think this one by the lines makes a lot of sense. Protect the club's ability to challenge a third ruling following one successful challenge. That has never been something that's made sense to me in the NFL where you get two challenges. If you win both of them, you get a third. But I think if you just win one challenge, you should be able to keep that challenge with the additional challenge that you already get. Like, let's say I win my first challenge and then I lose my second challenge. I shouldn't lose, in essence, that challenge that I already won, and I should be able to keep it like you win a challenge, you shouldn't lose it and you should still be able to have an opportunity to get up to three challenges in one game. So I love this rule by the Lions that you get two challenges, you win one, you still are able to maintain that third challenge. And then the other one is by the Eagles. Eliminate the first touch spot after the receiving team possesses the ball.

That one I don't really care for. Back to the challenge thing. Do you think the rule should be you get as many challenges that you get right? You get one challenge wrong, you're out of challenges. But you can get like 90 challenges as long as you're all right. Because like you said, you shouldn't be penalized for the rest of mistakes if you're just pointing out the rest of mistakes.

No, and here's why. Because there's a lot of things that could go wrong. And if you get a coach that gets like five or six right, it's too many times that we go to the booth. Like these reviews, I would make this rule too. There should be a clock on the review. Like if you can't figure it out after a certain amount of time, you just got to keep it what it is. Because the reviews do slow down the game, it feels like. I mean, I think you realize a little bit more when you're inside the stadium as well. Hey, it's got to be conclusive to overturn it. After looking at it a few times, you should be able to do so. If you can't get this review overturned in like 90 seconds, let's just say, and I think that's even enough time, then you move on to the next one.

But I would just say the three is fine as long as you win one of the first two, then you do get a third challenge. All right, it is Zach Gelb's show on CBS Sports Radio. This is Thursday, we'll get to Zach Gelb's show, PSA. When we return, update time first. Here is the Ackman.

Rich Ackerman. Yo, next round is about to start. You ready? Yeah, yeah. Just shopping for a car in Carvana. For real?

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State Farm, Bloomington, Illinois. Alrighty, Zach Gelb Show, CBS Sports Radio. We'll get to a Zach Gelb Show PSA coming up momentarily.

But first, 855-2124 CBS, 855-212-4227. Let's go to Mark in Arkansas next up on the show. Mark, what's happening? Zach, how you doing, brother? Doing great, Mark.

What do you got for me today? Hey, I just want to talk about, we were talking about the rules. You were just talking about the rule changes you want to see. Yeah.

Here's one that I want to see. The defensive holding person, the five yard penalty, automatic first down. That needs to change. I just think that's a ridiculous deal. Yeah, I'm with you because it could be 4th and 25, you have a defensive holding. Then it's, alright, you get basically 25 yards and a first down.

That doesn't make sense. What about defensive pass interference? Do you think that should be a spot foul or do you think that should just be 15 yards? I think that should be a 15-yard like they do in college, 15-yard foul. That's what it should be. It should not be a spot foul. Those two things I think that they need to flip. Because, like you just said, if it's 4th and 25, a defensive holding, and a five-yard penalty, the first down, no, that's not right. I'm 100% with you, Mark.

Those are the rules I'd like to see change. No, it's a great call. Maybe we should make Mark the commissioner of the NFL whenever Goodell does walk away. That wouldn't be a bad one. That was actually, that was a good caller suggestion right there. See, we can be positive with callers.

Callers call up, they say something good. I agree. We don't have to get combative, we don't have to fight. Do you agree with that, Santa? Or are you just going to dump cold water on Mark's take and be the curmudgeon that you usually are?

No, it drives me crazy on like a 3rd and 16 where there's like some incidental quick grab on a receiver who's not even on the side of the ball, the quarterback's looking, and boom, automatic first down drives me crazy. Can I make an admission to you, by the way? This has nothing to do with what we're talking about. But I've been looking at you all day and I feel really bad about it. Really bad about it. What's that snack that you have in your desk, by the way? Oh, you took one. What's the snack that you have? Explain the snack.

It's Trader Joe's dark chocolate covered rice cake thins, and they're delicious. So you told me about them. You let me sample one like two weeks ago. Last night I walked out of the studio and I wanted to walk home, which I did, which is an extra like 25, 30 minutes. But since I was at that conference yesterday, the Barrett Sports Media Conference, I didn't have anything in the morning and I had a very light lunch. So I needed something to hold me over until I got home. And I was like, I know if I go into the Santer drawer, there's a drawer of sweet treats.

And I did pop one of those rice cake, chocolate covered rice cakes. And I felt bad because I don't like to usually go into people's things without asking. But you basically put the cheese out there if I was a rat and you were begging me to get trapped.

And I felt bad that I didn't ask you about that yesterday. You are a rat. Look at that. I put the cheese out there and like a rat, you went right to it, I guess. Delicious. I do have a second confession to make.

What? So I was at Trader Joe's the other day. You bought a new box? I bought three packages because I knew that you liked them. No, I knew that you liked them. And I was like, you know what? Zach is going to want more of these. So I bought three packages. I got two more at home. I brought one in here. So while I'm a little bit disappointed that you didn't ask, they are there for your taking.

And I intentionally bought extra ones because I knew that you liked them and I was trying to be a good producer. Look at Santa being a nice guy. How about that? A benevolent fella.

Who would have thought? I have a good cookie story that it goes with a radio legend. There's never a bad time for a good cookie story. The great Christopher Mad Dog Russo. When I worked at Sirius, I was in a meeting with one of our former bosses, Eric Spitz.

I guess Spitz has a cabinet that has Vienna fingers, which is an underrated, one of my favorite cookies ever, growing up as a kid. Dog knows about that. So when I was working at Sirius, I'm sitting on the couch and talking to Spitz and going in one of these meetings. Dog comes in. He's like, oh, Zachary, great to see you today. Always great to have you aboard on the team.

Triple eight, Mad Dog six. And I thought he was just being like nice, like, oh, welcoming me to the team. I've known Dog for pretty much my entire life. Now he was there to get some cookies. He goes, Spitz got a little secret stash of cookies. I wonder if there was a secret stash of those gummies that he talks about all the time on first take that he pops on the weekend all the time as well. Mad Dog Russo. Well, he was just on today and he got Brian Windhorst's name wrong, Dominique Foxworth's name wrong and Molly Carrom's name wrong.

Back to back to back. He made Dominique Foxworth Italian. He called him Dominique Foxworth.

It was Dominique Windhorst and Molly Carrom. Yeah. Wow.

All right, let's get to Zach Gelb Show PSA. Morning. Morning. Morning. Morning. It's a Thursday. What do you have to say?

It's the weekly Zach Gelb Show PSA. Who's with me? Let's go! Come on!

You guys know me. I was already livid that the college football playoff this year is expanding from four teams to 12 teams. I said 12 is way too many. But they had to expand six or eight, and I knew those greedy pigs would eventually go from 12 to more teams.

This has been out there. Now ESPN is reporting that the 14-team college football playoff is expected to be formalized in the next 24 hours, ESPN reports. The new format would begin in 2026. So two years of 12 teams, then we're going to 14. You're taken away from the regular season, you're allowing too many teams that don't belong, and you're ruining the college football that I knew it, that I've known of it.

Ugh. My PSA. When something is working, don't try to fix it. The college football playoff format wasn't broken. You didn't need to fix it. If you need to make an alteration, a minor alteration, all right, I'm fine.

6-8 teams, but eventually going from 4 to 12, then to 14 is an absolute disgrace. So my PSA, when things are broken, don't try to be innovative and try to fix everything. I think that it's worth being fixed.

It's broken, it needs to be fixed. I'm taking more cookies after the show, then. Well, they're not cookies, they're rice cake things.

Tomato, tomato. It's a cookie. It's a chocolate-covered thing, it's a cookie. A chocolate-covered thing, yes.

That's how they should market it. It's a John. If I was in Philly, I would call it a John. Have some chocolate-covered things. Yum. So my PSA today, we heard Cam Newton earlier today kind of throwing shade at Kirk Cousins.

You like that, you like that. We heard Isaiah Thomas yesterday saying that Steph Curry wasn't a true point guard. We had a cut today that we never got to of Shaq basically saying nobody's afraid of LeBron. I'm not saying that guys who used to play the sport shouldn't give their opinion.

Ooh, this is spicy. But man, when some of these old guys are just like, back in my day, or like, guys in today's game can't do, you know what, just give it up. You're done, you're not playing anymore, let these guys play. At a certain point, there's a difference between just being critical of what is happening in the sport that you played, and then there's just sour grapes. And I'm starting to hear a lot of these guys, just sour grapes, just negativity towards the current state of whatever sport they play. Baseball, basketball, football, hockey, whatever. And there's just sour grapes. Well, basketball, I think it's fair, because the basketball product now sucks.

All the other sports, I... But sometimes it's not even about the product, it's about the player. Or it's about, oh, Steph Curry's out of point guard because he shoots a lot. He also passes the ball and he brings the ball up a lot, so it's a position-less kind of game, so you can't really say anything.

Tim Duncan was a forward, but really, he was a center, but he's actually a forward. At the end of the day, just stop being such a curmudgeon and enjoy the sport that you played, and things are gonna change, things are gonna develop over time, and just get used to it and suck it up and deal and shut up. All right, Stu, send us home.

Mine is kind of what we talked about in the first segment of the show. I sat down, I saw a tweet from Ari Mirov saying that the NFL is looking into potential tampering by the Eagles with Saquon Barkley and the Falcons with Kirk Cousins. It's just... It's the worst.

It's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. Yes, they probably both tampered, but guess what? Who cares? Every other team tampered, I'm sure. All the deals that were signed between 4 Eastern and 5 Eastern on Monday, you know what? They were all tampered, I'm sure. I'm sure there was communication with other teams. And this is not just football things, it happens in baseball, basketball, probably every sport in the world.

It's just one of the dumber things. I like that! A little fire from Stu. You know why Stu likes it so much?

And why he doesn't want tampering to be kind of followed through with punishments? Because his Lakers do it all the time. Let's be real. It's also true.

They're always a Lakers tampering issue, it feels like. All right, that wraps up the Zach Gelb show on a Thursday. We'll be back tomorrow. Daniel Jeremiah will stop by at 3 p.m. Eastern, or 20 minutes after 3 p.m. Eastern.

The show gets underway at 3 p.m. Eastern, noon Pacific. I am off to Madison Square Garden tonight. The world's most famous arena for a little Big East tournament. So if you want to follow along on social media, Instagram, Twitter, I'll put some things up there. At Zach Gelb, I know we're on in Omaha, I know we're on in Milwaukee. I get to see Providence up against Creighton, and then I also get to see Villanova up against Marquette.

So we'll get some good content up there. All right, we will wrap up the week tomorrow. See you next week.

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