Predicting NFL Coaches That Will Be FIRED (Hour 2)

Alrighty, hour number two of our radio program. Off and running on a very, very busy Monday. A lot going on in the college football world. We'll connect with Aaron Murray coming up 20 minutes from now. And obviously a whole lot going on from another busy week in the NFL that will conclude tonight with the Kansas City Chiefs taking on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Stu, thoughts and prayers. I know you're very emotional today. I'm surprised, you know, I'm wearing black for the funeral.

I'm surprised you are not wearing black for the funeral. Dennis Allen, who did coach your football team for a few years, now is the coach of the Saints. Or was the coach of the Saints because he got fired today.

And Mickey Loomis, by the way. Remember in the offseason? Right at the end of the season when he's like, hey, here's Bill Belichick's record early on in his career. Here's Tom Landry's record early on in his career. Trying to say that a coach could get off to a slow start and then go on to get greatness and achieve greatness. You know, Dennis Allen losing to the Carolina Panthers is just something that you can't defend.

I don't care. And hey, you look at every Saints fan, they wanted to throw a parade. You know, here comes the Saints come marching in through the first two weeks of the season. They were blowing out teams and they blew out the Carolina Panthers.

And then they smacked the Dallas Cowboys. But going into this season, I don't even know what Saints fans could have been all that optimistic about. You play in the NFC South where you knew that last year it was supposed to be your division. You couldn't beat out Tampa Bay. Tampa Bay was a better team than you going into this season.

And the Atlanta Falcons, deservedly so, had higher expectations for you. So I'm not going to kind of crap on Dennis Allen today. You know, I don't need to pile on that's a horse he was taken out back and now it's over with.

He's done. He's finished as a head football coach in the NFL. But it's like, Stu, even though you can't stand this guy because you didn't like him and he was the head football coach of your team. It's like, what else did Saints fans expect? And I think most Saints fans are knowledgeable football fans and they knew he wasn't the guy. But what I will say about the Saints is I get it. Like last year, they were underachieved.

You know, they were nine and eight. But why did anyone think that last year was going to be better than, you know, this time around? Like to me, I never thought this year was going to be better than what happened last year.

If anything, just logically, they were going to regress. And this team, right, they got to lose as many games as possible. You could argue, hey, maybe you keep Dennis Allen as the coach then just to do that.

But you need to lose as many games as possible. You got to go get a quarterback. They have failed to find a competent quarterback since Drew Brees walked out of that building. And Drew Brees stayed there a few years later than what he should have.

You know, at the end, his arm was clearly shot. You know, Sean Payton tried to sell you on the idea that Taysom Hill was going to be the guy. And I think it was like, I think it was Brady Papinga who once came on the network and he was like, hey, Taysom Hill, you know, he's going to be a top five quarterback in the league in no short order. He had Mike Westhoff, who I love, who was telling me he has a better arm than Lamar Jackson.

I'm like, what are these guys talking about? Like, let's pump the brakes on Slobber and all over Taysom Hill. And Taysom Hill wasn't the guy.

Jameis Winston wasn't the guy. And they did something. This is like, hey, the Saints turned it around.

But if you want it to be the aint's what they used to be back in the day, they did something that falls in line with how we used to view that organization. They overpaid for a rotten Derek Carr. You know, Derek Carr passed his prime. Derek Carr passed the window of, right, him being viewed as a good quarterback in this league. You know, at Derek Carr's best, you could say maybe a top ten quarterback in this league.

But over and over again, whenever he appears to be playing on a two, three game stretch of being a top ten quarterback, he not only falls short of that, he then face plants. So why they committed multiple years to Derek Carr was like a quick fix. Like, you knew you needed to tear down your house. This house was clearly done so. And you were like, oh, you know what? We'll just patch the roof. Even though the roof is about to cave in and the whole house is going to come crumbling down, we're just going to do a little patchwork and hope that the next time, right, there is some bad weather that the whole house doesn't fall down. And that's what they did with Derek Carr.

And they spent a lot of money in doing so. So this is not really, let me slam Dennis Allen today, right? I have a heart. You know, he did get fired. He lost his job.

I know he has a lot of money and he's, you know, sitting and laughing on that bag of cash. But no one wants to get fired. But really, Stu, it's like, what else did I anticipate? The Super Bowl for the Saints was the first two weeks of the season. Whenever you're the team in the first two weeks of the season that everyone's raving about and you have fans that are pulling up old takes from people trashing the entire office. Oh, you're a bunch of morons.

You're a bunch of dopes. You know, we don't usually even have to wait till Thanksgiving. You know, it usually comes earlier than that, that we end up being right and you end up being wrong because bad football teams are bad football teams. And right, like it's one thing when you look at the Texans right from a year ago, what did you see going into the year that people thought the Texans could have been great?

Well, not much, even though that was an improved situation. A head coach who was on the rise and you get the second and third pick of the draft, like you knew they were going to be better. But when you get a generational, I don't want to say generational, when you get a guy that looks like he could be a great quarterback, it could change the direction and the expectations of a franchise overnight and instantly. But the Saints don't have that person in that organization right now that you could latch onto and say, oh, everyone's counted us out.

Now we have our leader. Now we have our guy at the quarterback position where he's going to prove everybody wrong. Derek Carr, if you're expecting that out of him, I don't know what you watch outside of just being a family member of his that would make you think or infer that this guy's going to have all that. And I know he's been hurt the last few weeks and finally just came back. But losing to the Panthers, it gets a jumpstart for them, right? The Saints now, you know, for sure he won't be back, even though you probably knew that anyway. But that job, hey, it's one of 32 jobs.

So I'm not going to sit here and tell you it's the most attractive thing I've ever seen. But you got to be as bad as possible this year. And you got to go hope that with a lot of bad teams in this league, that you're in the top five and you're able to go get a Chador Sanders or you're able to go get, I don't know, like Cam Ward, right? The two top quarterbacks, in my opinion, in this draft.

Or you could maybe get a playmaker and then wait a year from now to be a quarterback. Because here's where we are at the Saints. The Saints, since getting rid of Drew Brees, have never ripped the Band-Aid off. They haven't.

They've been doing patchwork. Now this new coach that comes in, and quite frankly, I think they should get rid of Mickey Loomis, but I wouldn't anticipate that. First year's going to be a wash. Year two, you got to get better. And then year three, you got to go compete for the postseason. This is the first time in the post-Sean Payton era, Stu, where they're doing a full rebuild.

So say a few words about your guy. I know you felt very bad today about Dennis Allen, who tormented you when he was with your Raiders getting fired as the HC of the Saints. Yeah, it's kind of what you said. It's not really surprising.

I thought he might make it to the end of the season, but anything beyond that would have surprised me. They're in that middle. I know right now they're the third worst team based off record, so I guess they're even worse than middle. But just not having any sort of...

I don't think Spencer Rattler is the guy. They're irrelevant with no direction. And you could be irrelevant, and it doesn't mean that you're miserable. I know this year they're bottoming out. But ever since you've seen Drew Brees walk away, they've been a team that their record has been better than the talent that they have. They have just been one of those teams, like eight and nine, nine and eight.

That's what it's kind of been. Drew Brees' last year was 20-20. They were nine and eight, seven and ten, nine and eight.

That's what they were. And I'm not going to sit here and tell you that Dennis Allen was this great coach. He just kind of continued what Sean Payton was doing the year after Drew Brees. And Sean Payton can tell you, oh, I needed to recharge the batteries. He left because he didn't have a quarterback. And he knew he didn't have a quarterback. But that team had a foundation of at least having a good culture.

And you had some older players, right, that are still viewed as good players, but they're getting older. And you had enough to go be your, like, middle of the pack team in the NFL. But that's, like, the worst spot to be in. The two spots I don't like to be in are, hey, we're just there.

And the Saints were just there, like, seven and ten, nine and eight. Like, we're not a laughingstock, but we're nowhere close to being good. And then the other spot that I hate is when you're really good, but you're not great. Like, look at the Cowboys. Besides this year, last three years, they had 12-12-12 when it comes to, you know, three 12-win seasons.

But you know they are never elite. I'd rather just be horrendous so you could build back up, or I want to be great. Anywhere else, it's just a bad spot to be in. Now the Saints can do a full rebuild.

So that's kind of where I look at it right now. In terms of coaches that are also going to get fired, whether it's in season or after the season. We know Sal is already gone. Now we know Dennis Allen is out. So Jets and Saints will be open. Mike McCarthy, his contract is going to run out, and the Dallas Cowboys will say goodbye to him. You know, and now you have the Dak Prescott injury. He's going to be out for a few weeks. To me, it's like, if he's out three, four weeks, let's just say, and this continues to go the rate that it looks like it's going with the Cowboys, I don't even see why you would play Dak for the rest of the season, quite frankly. Now McCarthy, he didn't put him on IR, but there was a case to be made where you could put him on IR, that would knock him out bare minimum four games. I think that's Mike McCarthy saying, hey Dak, even when you get somewhat healthy, we need you back.

Because my job is on the line here. I don't really think there's anything that could happen the rest of the way. Being realistic, that would make Mike McCarthy's job be safe with the drama Dallas Choking Cowboys. And you knew that going into the year.

You know, this team, I picked them to miss the playoffs before the year. It was almost, you got to get to an NFC title game or a Super Bowl to come on back. There was no affair of an expectation for Mike McCarthy. So McCarthy will be gone at the end of the year. Doug Peterson's got to be gone at the end of the year in Jacksonville. Matt Eberfluse has to be gone at the end of the year in Chicago.

And the rest of the names just become intriguing. Like there's no doubt in my mind, you got two jobs already open, Jets and Saints. Cowboys will be open. Jaguars will be open. Bears will be open.

That's five jobs. Then you get into could be open. I think the Giants could be open. I believe that the Giants won't be open. There's a difference in being bad and then embarrassing.

And I know they're sometimes synonymous. As long as the Giants aren't embarrassing, embarrassing, like you could be bad, but not embarrassing, embarrassing. I do think John Mara would prefer to keep Brian Deball and Joe Shane. They need a quarterback.

They don't have a quarterback right now. So Brian Deball is a name to monitor. If you put a gun to my head right now, I would say he's back with the Giants. Kevin Stefanski. I think it would be a raw deal for Kevin Stefanski if he gets fired. This is a guy that has took that team to two playoffs.

He's a two time coach of the year award winner. I think he deserves another year. But you got to say, hey, Deshaun Watson is no longer the guy. You can't go into next year, even though there's two years left in that contract and it's guaranteed money, with this idea that Stefanski is going to fix Deshaun Watson and Deshaun Watson is going to be a great quarterback once again. You either fires Stefanski and you have a new quarterback next year or you keep Watson and you fire Stefanski. I would hope Stefanski is back next year, but I can't give the Cleveland Browns the benefit of the doubt.

I think that's a job to really monitor. Here's a surprising one. Mike McDaniel. The last two years have been good this year, and I've always been a little skeptical of McDaniel, but this year the genius tag of Mike McDaniel has really been taken off. The question is, is an older owner like Stephen Ross going to just say, you know what? We need a new GM. Chris Greer, it's long overdue. Mike McDaniel, we're just going to get rid of you as well. I wonder if that is going to be something that Stephen Ross does. I'm not going to say I expect Mike McDaniel to get fired because I think McDaniel and Tua are partners together. But I think it's a name to at least monitor and the other name to monitor.

And it's kind of crazy, right? Because there are at least fair Super Bowl expectations for this team. You know, you look at any of the Super Bowl contending teams. It's like, you know, McDermott's not going to get fired with the Bills. That ship has sailed in terms of him getting fired. Harbaugh's not getting fired with the Ravens. Reed's obviously not getting fired with the Chiefs. Campbell's obviously not getting fired with the Lions. LaFleur's obviously not getting fired with the Green Bay Packers.

Shanahan is not getting fired with the 49ers. But the coach that has Super Bowl expectations that you question the most is Nick Sirianni, because I think they win in spite of their coach. I don't think they ever win because of their head coach. And he has overachieved in Philadelphia early on. But now when that organization, after losing in a Super Bowl, is trying to go get that second Lombardi Trophy, a mitigated disaster last year after being spotted a 10-1 start.

And this year that team doesn't look like the team that they should be. And yesterday, even when they win, it felt like it was a loss because he passed up on two field goals. And then also went for it for a two-point conversion three times.

It's like you leave nine points off the board. That's football malpractice. You make one decision, right, that cost you a field goal, cost you a touchdown. You know, those things happen. But multiple different decisions.

That's a bad job. I would get rid of Sirianni at the end of the year, but Jeffrey Lurie and Howie Roseman, they're like a coach that they can control. So definitely, we know Saints and Jets open, Cowboys will be open, Jaguars will be open, Bears will be open, and then you monitor the Giants, the Browns, the Dolphins, and the Eagles. That's where we're at right now, almost nine weeks through the season, as you do have week nine concluding tonight with the Kansas City Chiefs up against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Alrighty, we'll take a timeout. We'll come on back. What's going on with Carson Beck? What do you think you'll see from Alabama this weekend?

And also, is there any hope for Dabo Swinney at Clemson? And we'll also touch on Ohio State, Penn State, a whole lot to get to from this past weekend and previewing the weekend ahead in college football. We'll do so with one of the best, Aaron Murray, next. Alrighty, this is Zach Gelb's show on the Infinity Sports Network. Let's welcome in the former Georgia quarterback, now does a great job for ESPN and Sirius XM, and that, of course, is Aaron Murray, kind enough to join us once again.

Aaron, appreciate the time. How you been? Yeah, man, always happy to jump on, doing well, and just excited for a fun November where these playoff games really get ramped up for college football. So let's start with your Bulldogs, and once again, I appreciate you jumping on board with us today. I still believe they're one of three teams right now that I view as a team that could go on to win the national championship, but I've been concerned the last few weeks with the quarterback in Carson Beck.

There was so much hype, there was so much expectation, right? Talks about him potentially being the number one pick of the NFL draft. What's going on? Because when I keep on watching Georgia, even when they win games, he has a lot of turnovers, man. Yeah, overall, it's not been a very fluid, smooth season for Georgia, but defense kind of really has gotten going the past few games, going back to the Texas game, but offense is just a lot of inconsistency, and it does start with the quarterback spot. And I'm not here to really make a ton of excuses for Carson, but I will say this. It is you lose Brock Bowers, who I think is still leading the NFL in receptions.

I don't know if that changed after yesterday or not. Lad McConkie's killing it in L.A. or at the moment. And there's just been a lot of ups and downs from the receivers and tight ends. You go to the beginning of the season, a lot of drop passes. Arian Smith, you had some tight ends dropping balls as well. So there you had all this trust in the receiving corps a year ago.

A couple of those guys leave. The guys this year, I just haven't seen the chemistry really click. And I think that there is a lack of trust going on a little bit right now with Carson.

Those guys think prime example this past weekend versus Florida. It's third down and 10. It's a simple dig route with the check down and you're reading the backside linebacker. If he gets any sort of depth, you check it down. If he comes up at all, then you're gonna have that window to throw the dig route. Linebacker drops and the tight end sitting there wide open. It's a catch. And you have to trust that that guy is going to get you the first down.

You create separation. You got to go get it. And said he tries to force it and should have been his fourth pick of the afternoon. So plays like that were Carson feels like he has to be the hero.

He has to create the big play because if not him, then who right now is a problem. You have to trust the guys around you. Are they Brock? Are they lad? No, but they are good enough.

And they have improved this season. You just put the ball in their hands and see what they can do with it. And at the end of the day, guess what? If they can't get the job done, if you don't turn it over, let the defense win. You don't have to be. This isn't Miami. You don't get to score 40, 50 points per game in order to win.

So he's just two things. Trust, take care of the football. If he does that, I'm with you. There's one of the best three teams in all of college football with the pieces that they lost, right? You would expect a quarterback to elevate. And I know it's not always easy to do so. But if he's going to be that franchise quarterback at the next level in the NFL.

You know, it's funny, you know, after hearing you lay it out the way that you did. I'm not saying he's going to fall this far because I still believe he's going to be a first round pick. But, you know, similar conversations were had about Sam Howell when he was at UNC. Like, you know, at one point first round pick then fell all the way out of the first round when he lost his running backs and wide receivers. Does Carson come off to you as someone that could still be a franchise quarterback in the NFL? Or is this one of those years where it's like, man, he's showing you he's not as good as what we thought it was? No, I still think he could be a franchise quarterback. Listen, he checks off a lot of box.

He's great size, incredible arm strength. And I'll say this. You know, I even texted Bobo, the offensive coordinator, yesterday morning, you know, watching the game live. And then I woke up the next morning, Sunday morning, and went back and watched the coach's tape. And it was one of those moments where you hear this saying all the time. It's not as bad as you think it is. It's not as good as you think it is. And then this is one of the moments where it felt really bad in the moment.

It just it did not feel smooth. It didn't feel obviously the turnovers were bad. And then you go back and watch the tape and you're like, there's a ton of good, a ton of good, especially from Carson. And even even Kirby said that after the games, like he's making big time throws.

We just have to eliminate these mistakes. The throws he makes. And he's done it all year long. Very few guys in college football are making those throws.

So it's not something that's like in his DNA, these turnovers. A year ago, he was great. He took care of the football. He was efficient. He found the check down. He's pressing a little bit right now. I think it's an easy correction to where instead of 75, 80 percent of the game, him playing at a high level, we're like, oh, my God, that looks like a top 15 pick.

But then, you know, 25 percent of the time, it's like, what the hell is he doing? I think that 25 percent could easily be corrected because we've seen him do that. So will he be a top 10 pick? Probably not. At this point will be a first round pick.

I don't know. Maybe he falls into the early second round, maybe third round. But I do believe he has all the intangibles to go and be a franchise quarterback at the next level.

Aaron Murray here with us. You know, the last few years, Ryan Day was trying to tell us his football team was tough. And when I would watch him play, I didn't see that toughness that the coach would be talking about and going after, like Lou Holtz and write all that nonsense before and after the Notre Dame game. I saw a toughness from Ohio State that I haven't seen in a long time on Saturday up against Penn State with that offensive line, a makeshift offensive line, all the injuries that you had, the moving around.

That was a tough effort. And finally, I look at Ohio State and I go, OK, that's a football team that I'm starting to see actually be a tough football team, like their coach has been trying to sell us on the last few years. No, they definitely have. I mean, the defense has been there for a couple of years now. It's been more the offensive side of the football. And, you know, it's good to see Quinn Sean-Jutkins and that run game get going.

But to me, the big there's two question marks in the season. You know, one, as you look to the offensive line, could you be physical? You know, we didn't know that that Michigan was going to completely fall off the face of the earth. But, you know, like, OK, listen, if you're going to want to be Michigan, you're going to be tougher.

I think they're going to be able to be Michigan if they're tough or not this year, unfortunately, for that football team. But the other question was, Will Howard and in through two games on the road into the most hostile environments in the country, in Eugene and obviously there against Penn State, he's played well. And I know that the interceptions suck to start the game. You know, the fumble that was ended up being a touchback, a couple of turnovers. But overall, I walk away saying that this is still an elite defense, probably one of the best defenses in the country. Quinn Sean and Trayvon Henderson still probably the best team of running backs in the country. Jeremiah Smith is a freak of nature. Abuka is still phenomenal. And then the offensive line showed me a lot this past weekend.

And Will Howard has answered the call for me pretty much the entire season. So there really isn't a weakness. I think the big question is like, OK, offensive line, we all challenged you. We all said, oh, my God, you're not good enough from what we saw a week ago to go into to Penn State against that defense line in that environment.

You know, you're talking about 111,000 people. You can't do it. And they did. Can they have that mentality going forward? Because now it's like, oh, well, you're good. You're now you're going to paddle the back.

Now you're saying you are tough. Like, can you keep that chip on your shoulder? Can Ryan Day keep that for the offense going forward? And if he does, man, I look at this team.

There's just really not a lot of holes that you can pick it at the moment. Yeah. Right now, I could only see three teams, like I told you, Aaron Murray, winning the national championship. The United States won after what I just saw from Saturday. Georgia, clearly, even though they've had some problems this year.

And then Oregon. Like, is there another team that you look at and you go, OK, I could see them finding a way to fight through now a 12 team college football playoff and win it at all? I mean, there's a couple of teams. I mean, when you have a quarterback that is having the season that Cam Ward's having, you know, he always gives you a chance.

I mean, at the end of the day, like that's just the way it is. He is capable against all those defenses of going out there and throwing four or five touchdowns. You know, can the defense stop any of them?

You know, that's another question. But like he gives you an opportunity to maybe, you know, sneak in and, you know, not not 100 percent confident. But I am loving what I've seen from him. I still think Texas is a really good football team. I think Texas's defense is elite. I think that that Quinn Ewers is still a very talented quarterback.

I think there's a ton of talent around him. The offense lines may be not as good as we thought they were heading into the season. But I think Texas, because of that defense, to me, I feel very similar about Texas and Georgia. I know Georgia beat them pretty good there in Austin a couple of weeks ago, but they were gifted. Georgia was gifted a lot of short fields. That defense kicked Georgia's butt, I thought, at the end of the day.

So there will be fine in Austin. I think they're going to have a chance to win. And I'm really interested what this Tennessee team ends up looking like. They've got a big matchup against Georgia in Athens in a couple of weeks. Nico had played the most consistent game that he's had in quite some time since probably the first first month of the season against Kentucky this past weekend. They can run the football. They can play defense.

And if Nico can get hot and be as talented as everyone thinks he has. And then in kind of the glimpses we've seen from him, that's another team that that can make a deep run in the playoffs. And I like Indiana, too.

I like it. So I think there's more than we think, like talent wise, probably Georgia, Oregon, Ohio State. But like I can make a case for, like I said, Texas, I can make a case for Tennessee. And I mean, we really don't know about Indiana yet, but like we'll see in a few weeks.

There's a lot to like about them. Yeah, we'll see in a couple of weeks for Ohio State. Aaron Murray here with us. I know you haven't done your full like draft analysis on these quarterbacks, but out of the guys that are eligible for the draft this year, I think Chador and Cam, you know, you could pick those guys one, two, whatever way you want. Those got to be the first two guys off the board for quarterbacks, right? Oh, one hundred percent.

There's no doubt about it. Cam, if he can stop throwing the ball to, you know, across his body. I mean, I've never seen a quarterback maybe even once to it. But he's done it twice this year where he's running out of bounds and throws it to the opposite hash, one versus Cal.

And the one this past weekend both resulted in interception. So I guess it's it's the if I'm going to play that way and make all these great plays, you just have to accept the fact that I'm going to make some of the stupidest ass plays I've ever seen before in my life as a quarterback. But I guess it comes with the territory. But no, I've loved Cam. You know, he's got the size, too.

You know, he's six to over 200 pounds. And I love what you're doing this season as well. And they're going to have an opportunity based on what happened this past weekend to be in the conversation and maybe win the Big 12, which would be absolutely crazy. Would love to see Colorado in the playoffs.

Those two are great. I think Carson still has a chance, you know, depending on how he plays down the stretch. He's got a great opportunity against Ole Miss team this weekend and an SEC championship game if they win that.

And a playoffs to prove that he deserves to be in the first round. I still think Quinn has an opportunity to be maybe a late first round, second round pick. And then it'll be interesting what Jalen does for Alabama, Monroe if he decides to come out or not after the season as well.

But, yeah, I think those first two guys you talked about have created an enormous separation from the rest of the pack at the moment. With what Ole Miss's offense finally did last week. Can you see Ole Miss beat in Georgia or do you anticipate Georgia to just find the way this weekend? You know, Ole Miss doesn't have a lot of weaknesses. You look at the team, you know, Jackson Dartz played in this system for three years.

I think he's having a great season. You know, we don't watch a lot of Ole Miss because they haven't had a very tough schedule and we haven't watched them a ton. But, you know, I've had one of their games.

I've seen them. I've talked to the coaching staff. He's having a terrific season. The receivers are great. You know, hopefully get Trey back this weekend if I'm an Ole Miss fan. But, hell, I mean, if Watkins continues to play like that, you don't feel as bad.

But it'd be good to have Trey and Watkins doing their thing and Juice as well and pre-scoring. Then the defense is the difference. Like that defensive line, that front seven is legit.

Can they hold up? Because Texas was the same way. Texas has a really good quarterback, great receivers and a really good defense.

But guess what? Georgia whipped their offensive lines. But Ole Miss, that is going to be what everyone's watching. Can that offensive line hold up against Georgia?

And if they can, 100 percent Ole Miss can win this football game. But as we've seen this year, the teams that win the lines of scrimmage win the football games. We saw that at Penn State, Ohio State this past weekend.

We saw that Georgia, Texas a couple of weeks ago. That is the difference for all the fancy offenses and everything going on. Georgia showed it for two years when they won a national championship. Michigan showed it last year, the way they played football. This is still a game where if you can't win the lines of scrimmage, you will not win big time games. And Georgia right now has the advantage at the lines of scrimmage. So I do think Georgia can go out there and sneak a win out. But if they can't hold up, Ole Miss is more than talented enough to get the win at home.

Who does that, by the way, Aaron Murray, between Alabama and LSU on Saturday earlier in the week right now, getting a thought on that? I think LSU wins a football game. I really like LSU.

I love Garrett Nussmeier. I know he had a horrific second half against A&M, but I think overall right now he's the best quarterback in the SEC. I love the receivers. I like the fact that they've got a run game a little bit with Keenan Durham. And I do think the defense is playing good enough football right now where I look at Alabama and I still don't trust their secondary. I don't trust their pass game. And their offense line has not been as good as we were hoping they would be this season. So we'll see what they look like coming off the bye. Does the defensive backfield improve or take advantage because they are pretty young back there? But I just think overall, LSU at home, that passing attack going against a very young Alabama secondary who has not performed well this season.

I'd give the advantage to the Tigers. Let me just get back to Ohio State, Penn State. Aaron Murray here with us for another minute or two. James Franklin, he's just incapable of winning a big game. He usually wins 9, 10 games a year. But if it's a top 25 team or a top 10, top five or up against Ohio State, he just can't do it. I know he's won 70 percent of his games at Penn State, but I have no reason to believe that he's ever going to make them go from just being good to great.

How about what you're seeing with James Franklin? I mean, listen, there's a talent difference. He's beating who he's supposed to beat and he's losing to essentially who he's supposed to lose. You can't tell me right now that Ohio State or Penn State has better talent than Ohio State or what Michigan's had for the past couple of years. They're in a really weird spot where, like I said, they're beating teams they're supposed to beat. And they're losing to the teams that they're supposed to lose to because they just don't have these not as good of a coach as those guys are. And he doesn't have the same kind of talent as them.

So that's as simple as it is. So the difference this year is they want to play Michigan. Michigan's not as good, obviously, as well. This will be an 11-1 football team. This will be a team that's 11-1. Not going to be in the Big Ten championship game. But maybe, depending on how things unfold, we'll be hosting a first round game in the playoffs.

That's pretty damn good. You win that game, you make it to the second round of the playoffs. I would consider that a really successful year for Penn State. I'll tell you, though, if Boise State played them, I'd take Boise State, who almost beat Oregon this year. I'd take Boise State to go into Happy Valley with Gente and run right through Franklin. I'd take them.

I don't know. I still like Penn State's defense. I really like Drew Allard, the way he's playing this season. Tyler Ward, maybe he's my favorite player in all of college football. They just lack receivers in the outside.

Plain and simple. Ohio State was able to play man-to-man coverage and commit to the run. And they couldn't win. And then, obviously, some just horrendous play calling inside the five-yard line. Just give the ball to Tyler Ward five straight times.

Let him go out there and do his thing. So I still really like this Penn State team because of Drew, because of the defense, because of the running backs, because of Tyler Ward. So I think they win their first round playoff game. Then from there, we'll see what the matchup looks like in the second round.

Last thing I'll ask you. Clemson. So Dabo had them rolling, obviously. Took them to a level that we've never seen Clemson be in. They were elite. They were tugging right on Nick Saban's cape, and they took it for a little bit.

But he's just so stubborn. And even after the opening loss to Georgia, they've won all these games. And then, boom, Louisville walks in not intimidated and smacks them around. What do you say to the Clemson fan about how they should view Dabo Sweeny moving forward? Well, listen, the Georgia game is a Georgia game. And that's Georgia. You kind of didn't expect it, but you don't sit back and say, oh, I'm surprised.

This is so like, I don't know if you're like, oh, my God, we need to burn it, burn the ships and start all over from the sense of our culture and how we, you know, utilize the transfer port or anything like that. This was the moment, though, at home, coming off a bye against Louisville, who's a good football team. I mean, Louisville has been competitive in all their losses this year, whether it was Notre Dame or SMU or Miami. Yeah, and good last year, too. They got a good quarterback.

They got a terrific running back. But to get beat up the way they did, I'm telling you, like that first half, they were running through them. They were dominating the lines of scrimmage.

It wasn't until the second half that Phil Moffa was able to get any sort of run game going. You know, Cade looked hesitant throwing the football early on in the game. And listen, this was not a game that Cade was the reason they lost. I think this was a complete offensive defenses.

They both got whipped. Louisville beat them on both lines of scrimmage. But Louisville's offense was better. Louisville's defense was better. That is embarrassing for a Clemson football team at home coming off a bye with the supposed talent gap that you have compared to Louisville. So, yes, this was a true now after this.

Burn the ships. You've got to start all over and you've got to figure out how to make this roster even better going forward because it is unacceptable to lose by double digits like that at home. He is Aaron Murray. Does a great job ESPN and Sirius XM. Always great to catch up with you. Thanks, Aaron. Appreciate it, man. Have a great week. You got it.

You as well. There he is. Aaron Murray joining us on the Zach Gilb show. We'll take a break. We'll do onside offside.

Next update time first. Here is the act man, Rich Ackerman. Zach's taking on the most polarizing issues in sports. Which side of the line of scrimmage will he end up on? Offside defense number 69. It's onsides offsides with Zach Gilb. All right, the onside offside time.

It is the Zach Gilb show on the Infinity Sports Network. Stu, what do we got cooking today? All right, Zach, the Cowboys lost their third straight falling to three and five after Sunday's loss to the Falcons. Dak Prescott left the game in the third quarter and was seen on the sidelines appearing to mouth the words, quote, we bleep and suck, end of quote. And today was revealed that Dak's injury is worse than expected. He's going on IR, so he will miss multiple games. Onsides offsides, the Cowboys need to blow up the roster and start over.

Offside, here's why. You just paid Dak. So the conversation to me, you can't get rid of Dak realistically right now. You just paid CeeDee Lamb as well.

So it's like, what else do you do? Do you trade Micah Parsons? Even though he could be a pain in the ass with the podcast, I wouldn't say trade Micah Parsons. You need Jerry Jones to no longer be the one deciding this roster.

And he's the owner. And we know that's not going to happen. So the Cowboys need to blow up their roster and start over.

What are you blowing up? You can't get rid of Dak. You can't get rid of CeeDee Lamb. If you want to get rid of Micah Parsons, OK, be my guest.

I would advise against that. So I don't even know what there is really to blow up. This team's just not that good.

And the guys that are your bookends are already paid and the contracts are not movable. So the Cowboys need to blow up the roster and start over offside. All right, well, my Raiders, they lost their fifth game in a row and are now tied with five other teams at two and seven. Do you still watch the games? Yes. So I watched the whole game.

A lot of the second half was muted. A little multi-view? Yeah, that's fair. I was just asking. No, I'll watch them all, unfortunately.

You like pain and suffering. Yeah, exactly. Two and seven, worst record in the league sweepstakes for the number one overall pick. Now, today, the Raiders, who are 29th in yards per game and 26th in points per game, fired offensive coordinator Luke Getze after just nine games with the team. So onsides, offsides, it's fair to blame Getze for the team's offensive struggles. You can, but the reason I'm going offside here is who's his quarterback? You walked into the season with Aiden O'Connell and Gardner Minshew. Both of those guys stink. There's a hot take. So I will go offside here, even though I don't like Getze.

You could put whatever offensive coordinator, you know, put Johnson from the Lions in there. Is he winning anything this year when Gardner Minshew and also Aiden O'Connell have been your quarterback? I don't think so. Offside. Offside. Now, over the weekend, Jason Kelce attended the Ohio State-Penn State game, but went viral for the wrong reasons. Now, before the game, a video showed a fan using a homophobic slur when asking Kelce about his brother Travis and girlfriend Taylor Swift, prompting the former eagle to grab the fan's phone, smash it on the ground, and then yell that same homophobic slur back at the fan before walking away. So onsides, offsides, Jason Kelce was wrong for his actions.

I'm actually going offside. I was actually disappointed that he didn't smash the teeth in of this dopey guy that was just trying to get a reaction out of Jason Kelce. And, you know, using a homophobic slur to Jason Kelce when talking about Jason Kelce's brother.

Like, it just, it made no sense. You know, the dopey student or the dopey kid is lucky that Kelce only smashed his phone. I would have had no problem.

I know people say, oh, take the higher road, walk away, you know, where's the security? That was probably going on longer than what we just saw in video. Because Kelce is such a gregarious dude, nice guy, you know, kind of man of the people. For him to look as heated as he did, yeah, he probably just had enough. And when you keep on pushing someone, eventually, you know, you fight the ball, you get the horns right, is the saying?

You got the horns right there. So I have no problem with what Jason Kelce did. So I'm not going to say he was wrong for his actions. I'll go offside. Now, speaking of Philly sports stars having physical encounters with fans in the media, Joel Embiid reportedly got into a physical altercation with a Philly sports writer after the writer posted an article intimating that Embiid is doing the memory of his dead brother a disservice by not being in shape and putting enough effort into his career. Onside, offside, you're okay with Embiid going after the writer for that article.

So I know Marcus Hayes. Marcus crossed the line. It was a bad job by Marcus. I read the article and I said the article would have been fine if you just did not include the line about Joel Embiid's brother, you know, deceased brother, or Joel Embiid's son, who he's named his brother after, you know, named after his brother.

To me, to put that in there, you just don't do that. I'm not saying Embiid needed to get up and get in a shoving match with him, but I have no problem with Embiid calling him out and being upset with the writer. And it was wild to follow on social media, I'll tell you, because I saw a late night tweet from Keith Pompeii, and it was like, Embiid just assaulted a reporter and I'm like, he's not playing well, what do you mean?

Like, what's going on? And then you read the article and it's like, you could have wrote your article without putting the line in about Joel Embiid's kid or his brother who's unfortunately no longer with us. So yeah, onsides, I am okay with Embiid going after Marcus Hayes for that article. Alright, now Clemson, they seem destined for the college football playoffs, reeling off their six straight wins, before losing 33-21 against Louisville on Saturday. Late in the fourth quarter, Dabo made a head-scratching decision to kick an extra point with his team down three scores, rather than go for two and make it a two-score game. Now after the game, Dabo admitted that Clemson was, quote, poorly coached and pointed the thumb directly at himself. So onsides, offsides, Dabo is no longer the right coach for the Clemson job. Dabo Swinney's done an incredible job at Clemson, brought them to be an elite program, but they're far away from being that now. Because he is stubborn, he makes fun of NIL, and he doesn't adjust and adapt to the transfer portal. So if you ask me, Dabo Swinney's no longer the right coach for the Clemson job in the year of 2024, moving forward in 2025, yeah, I've been on this train for the last three years, because you need to adapt.

You can't be stubborn, and I don't think he's going to change. So that's why I'll answer onsides for this one. Alright, last but not least, staying in the ACC, Miami overcame an early double-digit deficit to beat former coach Manny Diaz and Duke. The Canes stayed undefeated and moved up to number four in the polls, as Heisman hopeful Cam Ward threw for 400 yards and five touchdowns. Onsides, offsides, the Miami Hurricanes can win the national title.

I'm going offside. I think their defense will eventually get them picked off. Restrepo and Ward were unbelievable up against Duke. It's wild how Duke didn't cover that spread of 21.5 points when it was a one-point game in the fourth quarter. But I don't think the Hurricanes can win a national title this year. I think only three teams can right now. And those three teams, like I told Darren Murray, are Oregon, Ohio State, and Georgia.

So the Miami Hurricanes can win a national title this year, offside. Now real quickly, Stu, can you just play me the audio? This is our colleague Maggie Gray yesterday reacting to Tyler Bass's game-winning kick. Alright, we're going to do this Tyler Bass field goal all together.

This guy's been awful this season. Already missed an extra point. Doinked another one, 60-yarder. Can do a nine-mile-an-hour win. Can he do it? Is he going to do it?

Can he do it? Yeah, finally, finally, finally, finally, finally. You're listening to Maggie and Perloff on the Infinity Sports Network. So there you go. That is, I don't know what the liner was for at the end, but there you go.

That's from Maggie Gray. Onside or offside, is it right to be working out while watching your team play football? Yeah, I know she mentioned last year about the treadmill, but I didn't know she did it during Bill's games. I couldn't do that when my team was playing. I would do that during Red Zone if my team wasn't playing, but not during my team playing.

Yeah, I'm offsides on that. For example, if it was the Monday night game tonight, Chiefs, Buccaneers, okay, you can do it. When my team's playing, I'm worried about Maggie. That's stressful enough when you've got to be on the treadmill for that long. And then it's like, oh, you've got to deal with the ups and downs of a Bill's game. That's just crazy. That's coming on back, and this is that Geld show.