Pats Blunder (Hour 1)

What's up, everybody? Guess who's hosting a new podcast? No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith. Listen as I pull back the curtain on everything beyond the world of sports. Interviewing influential guests, outspoken celebrities, and thought leaders across the political, financial, and social spectrum.

You know me, I'll give you my unbiased opinion. A No Mercy episode drops every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith, a presentation of Cadence 13, an Odyssey studio available on the Odyssey app or wherever you listen to your podcast. Is there something really absurd that skeaves you out? Getting a paper cut on my eyeball? A fear you can't shake? I'm going to leak ocular fluid on my cheeks.

It's going to go into my mouth, and I will perish. Whatever scares you, I want to talk about it. Join me, Larry Mullins, on my new podcast, Your Weirdest Fears.

Listen and subscribe to Your Weirdest Fears on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcast from. Live from the police show yet not overly ostentatious. Studios of CBS Sports Radio here in beautiful New York City sitting on top of the 10th floor of 345 Hudson Street. Welcome on in to a Tuesday edition of the Zach Gelb show across all of our great local CBS Sports radio affiliates, SiriusXM, Channel 158, and that free Odyssey app. 855-212-4CBS number to jump on in, 855-212-4227.

And you could always get at me on Instagram where I'm straight flexing or via the good old cesspool of Twitter at Zach Gelb. That's Z-A-C-H-G-E-L-B. We are coming to you live from the Rocket Mortgage Studios.

Whether you're looking to purchase a new home or refinance yours, Rocket Mortgage could help you get there for home-owned solutions that fit your life. Yes, your life. Well, Rocket can in producing this fine extravaganza for the next four hours is no other than Hot Take Hickey.

I don't know about that Hot Take Hickey. I'm starting to learn how to be a regular football fan. Because for 20 years, I did not have to overreact in a positive or a negative way off one game and say, oh, the season's over. Or, oh, that this team's going to a Super Bowl. Because it was always the expectation that at a bare minimum, my football team, the New England Patriots, would be at worst-case scenario in the AFC Championship game, maybe get to the Super Bowl and lose the Super Bowl and most of the times end up winning the entire damn thing.

Now, with Tom Brady no longer with the Patriots. In the first year, I had no expectations. Cam was brought in to be quarterback. There was really nothing that you could actually believe within that football team. And last year, they surprised people with the rookie quarterback by the name of Mack Jones.

And they went 10 and 7. But heading into this year, for everyone that's saying, oh, Zach, you're always so optimistic about the Patriots. Oh, Zach, you're never critical about the Patriots.

I told everyone that would listen that there was no way the Patriots were going to make the playoffs. Because of one reason and one reason only, their approach on offense is laughable. The fact that you have Joe Judge and Matt Patricia both playing an imperative role in developing an offense makes no sense to me. And I know everyone wants today, they want to say, oh, it's a quarterback controversy. Mack Jones, Bayley Zappi, who gives a rat's ass who starts? How can you evaluate either quarterback when Tyquon Thornton, when Jacoby Myers, Devontae Parker is your receiving core?

You just can't. Look at what teams like the Eagles, the Dolphins, heck, even the Jets have done. They have young quarterbacks, Tuatunga Vailoa, Jalen Hurts, Zach Wilson. Going into this season, neither of those three quarterbacks were definite locks like franchise quarterbacks. But the last two years, their general managers put those quarterbacks in a position to at least succeed. Where if you don't succeed, it wasn't because you don't have an offensive line. It wasn't because you don't have a run game.

It wasn't because you don't have wide receivers. And you look at this Patriots offense, you have a guy that was coaching special teams and wide receivers for a year before becoming a terrible head coach in Joe Judge, coaching up the quarterbacks. And then you have Matt Patricia, who was an offensive assistant in like 2003. And then all he was was a defensive coach and a failure of a head coach of the Detroit Lions calling the plays. It's Jack Assery.

It does not make sense. And I love Bill Belichick. 9.9999999 times out of 10 through the last 20, 25 years. Whenever you would doubt Bill Belichick in the slightest of moments or big moments, you were always wrong.

Lawyer Malloy, you could go through it like all the scenarios of they cut Lawyer Malloy, they trade Richard Seymour, go through them all. Fourth and two, like all that stuff that people doubted Belichick about, even if it wasn't right in the moment, eventually at the end of the year it was, aha, Bill got it right. Oh, getting rid of Wes Walker, then Julian Edelman and Danny Amendola become studs.

Anytime you doubt this guy, he proves everyone wrong. But that's also because he had the safety blanket of Tom Brady. And I still think Bill Belichick is a really, really good head coach.

We saw that last year. There's a reason why he's one of, if not, the greatest coaches of all time. But Bill Belichick, who I adore and love, he has to adapt to football in 2022. And football in 2022 for him is no longer having Tom Brady. And don't tell me he can't win without Tom Brady. Because in 2008, they didn't have Tom Brady. They won 11 games. When Brady was out because of the play gate, they went 3 and 1 when they had to start your Kobe bursette for a game or two. And you had Jimmy Garoppolo get hurt.

They have just won two games the last two weeks with Bayley Zappi. So don't tell me that this guy can't win. Now, he may not win a Super Bowl again. He may not be an AFC championship again.

But you could win enough games to be a playoff team if you actually put in some effort on the offensive side of the ball. Because to ask Mack Jones or Bayley Zappi to win with this offense when Remondre Stevenson and Damian Harris, who were solid running backs for the focal point, that's not enough. And this is not me just crapping on Devontae Parker. Jacoby Meyers is a nice wide receiver. Those guys aren't number one wide receivers. You look at Miami, they got two number one wide receivers.

I would love to waddle like a penguin like Jalen Waddle. You also got Tyree Kill. The Eagles have Devontae Smith out of Alabama. They just traded for AJ Brown. Look at the Jets.

The lousy stinking Jets have their act together. They just drafted Garrett Wilson. They lose Breece Hall for the year.

They trade for James Robinson. And I can't sit here and tell you that Zach Wilson's going to be a stud. But at least the Jets are putting that quarterback in a position to succeed. And if he doesn't succeed, then you know it's on the quarterback.

The same could be said for Tua, and the same could be said for Jalen Hertz. So I could bore you to death like every other lame show out there today and say, who should start next week? Is it Mack Jones or is it Bayley Zappi? It's irrelevant. Because what are you evaluating this year?

What are you going to learn this year? Yes, I do believe Mack Jones should start. Mack Jones clearly wasn't healthy last night. And I don't want to hear that they were planning on splitting reps.

I know Schefter had the story. That makes no sense to have Mack Jones play three series, and then you yank him for Bayley Zappi. You should have just started Bayley Zappi last night and said, Mack, we'll see you next week up against the Jets in New Jersey. So the whole offensive approach has been sloppy. It's been dumb. It's been stupid.

It's made no sense this year. And to see last night, this was not a great football team they're going up against. They made the Bears in 2022 look like the 85 Bears were crying out loud.

That's how bad it was. You know, Maggie and Perloff, before I got on the air yesterday, said to me, oh, they're laying the 7.5 points. What do you think, you're a Patriot fan? And I go, yeah, the Pats will win the game.

I don't know if they're going to cover it, but they'll win the game. Because I had zero confidence in the Bears. Chicago Bears last night looked like they were a great team and we know they're not. But that's what happens when you don't put your players in a position to succeed on one side of the ball. Yeah, the defense did not play well last night. This is not a great defense. Even though they took advantage of the number one offense in the league and the Detroit Lions, so they actually just suck.

And then they took care of a Cleveland team. That is not good, as you know, and they need to Sean Watson when he comes back from his suspension. So this defense got puffed up the last few weeks, and Justin Fields went right through him like a knife through butter.

That's what that was. They went right through that defense. But on offense, what are they doing?

This is a wasted season. And I'm not going to sit here today and tell you Mack Jones sucks. I'm not going to tell you Mack Jones is a dreadful quarterback. Because last year, even though they put him in a limited role and then have him throw the ball like 45 times a game, they were able to win 10 wins with this guy and get 10 games with this guy. So now you're expecting your number two to take that next step. But how can you realistically expect Mack Jones to take that next step?

You can't. It's impossible because he doesn't have the receivers. And I'm not someone that's a sycophant that's going to tell you, oh, Mack Jones is going to be great. Do I think Mack Jones can be good?

Yes. But right now, he's not being put in a position to be good. Because you don't have a number one wide receiver.

You don't have an explosive playmaker. You have two guys that aren't qualified to be dealing with the quarterback and then coaching up the offense in Judge and Patricia. And this is on Bill.

And I love Bill. But this is on him because everyone said this offseason, Judge Patricia doesn't make sense. Go get a number one wide receiver.

And he didn't listen. And most of the times when Bill Belichick does something out of the box, most of the time when Bill Belichick gets questioned and doubted, he gives the middle finger to everyone during the season. But it's not happening this year. It's not happening this year. And I say that as a Patriot fan because how can you ask either of these quarterbacks to succeed and perform well with this crap on offense? So this offseason, I'll make myself abundantly clear.

I said in the summer, I said after the first few weeks of the season, and I'll say it after week seven of this season going into week eight. Joe Judge and Matt Patricia cannot be involved on this offense next year. They cannot be involved with the quarterback. They cannot be involved with the offensive coordinator. And Bill, in the draft, and I know he has struggled with this, you either have to draft the stud wide receiver in the first round or trade that first round pick like what teams in Miami and then what also what the Eagles did and get a bona fide stud wide receiver.

That's what they need to do. So I'm not sitting here today and debating should it be Mack Jones or Bailey Zappi. Because it doesn't really matter. Because you can't even evaluate those quarterbacks properly because they got nothing, nothing at wide receiver and incompetent coaching on the offensive side of the ball around them. No quarterback in this league is walking into Foxborough this year with this crap around them on offense and is winning games and taking this team to the playoffs. No quarterback in the league. All righty, I got that off my chest.

It is the Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio. You know what, Hickey? Not that I like this. I usually enjoy my team winning and winning and winning and winning. But now I know what it feels like to be the other 31 teams in the NFL when my team was on this run of just domination and excellence for 20 years. Now I know what it's like to just get on the air on a Tuesday after a dreadful performance and then just shred everyone.

You can now welcome me to your fraternity. Yeah, it's not very fun. It's a league where being a fan is, you know, for the last 20 years you had very few downs. Where most time for almost everyone else, it's mostly, you know, mostly down, mostly frustration.

Not a lot of highs, not a lot of things to feel good about. So yeah, it's sports are not fun. Like I'm sorry, like being a fan is not fun.

I've sat there many times saying, what am I doing in my life after yet another weekend is lost or another night is lost for my team not playing well, but here I am, keep coming back to the well, but it's not a fun experience. Well, I say this politely and I don't want to get off to a contentious start in a very busy Tuesday edition of the Zach Gelb show, but you're a sucker for your teams. Like when your teams even aren't supposed to be that good, you talk yourself up into the Colts being good when it's obvious that they weren't. You talk yourself up into Penn State being good when you know that they're still a year away.

You very easily fall for the bait or you get your hand caught in the mouse trap going for the cheese over and over and over again. I think I'm a little bit more realistic with my teams. You get caught up a little bit too much in the moment, but maybe that's going to be me three, four or five years from now after I get some more exposure to life as a regular NFL fan. Now, I told you I'm not going to do much of this Mack Jones, Bayley Zappi debate because to me it should be Mack Jones. And I can't even tell if Mack Jones, what he is because he's not being put in a position to succeed. But let me ask you this, next week, if both are healthy, if Mack and Bayley Zappi are healthy, this upcoming Sunday, who is starting up against the New York Jets at MetLife Stadium? Is it Mack Jones or is it Bayley Zappi?

I will say Mack Jones just because he started yesterday. It was so weird how they pulled him. So stupid. It's also stupid that Bill is saying that everyone's on the same page and almost every single player, including Bayley Zappi, is saying, ah, not really. We didn't really know what was going on. Something was lost.

Someone's lying somewhere, obviously. Either it was planned and it was not communicated well, or it was like, oh, Mack Jones is not healthy. He's not good.

And we got to just panic move here and make the move. And I said it to you early on last night. He didn't look healthy. I said that early on in the game, when he got hit, there was two penalty flags ago. This guy is limping.

He does not look healthy right now. And they rushed him back onto the field, whether that was Bill or whether that was Mack, your guess is as good as mine. I was just going to ask it. That almost feels like more like Mack. Probably. Worried about his job slipping.

It's like, I got to get back out there. But he's Mack Jones. Like, you're Bill Belichick. Bill, if you don't think the kid's healthy enough to play, we're not playing you.

It's that simple. And if Mack's feelings are going to get hurt and it's going to ruin your relationship, then he's not the guy. Because yeah, I would respect the fact that he wanted to play, but he clearly wasn't healthy last night. And this plan of, oh yeah, we were going to play both guys. I know it ended up playing on out.

If that's your approach from the start, it shows you every reason why you should not have started Mack Jones last night. It is the Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio. When we come on back, we've known about Bryce Harper for a long, long, long time. He's been in the national spotlight. He is now four wins away from hoisting his first ever piece of metal trophy as the commissioner, Rob Manfrod always likes to say.

When we return, we want to look back the last 20, 25 years and give a player in Major League Baseball, NBA, NFL, and hockey, NHL, that never won a ring that you really wish was able to get a ring and get that moment, basking in the glory, raising their respective sports championship trophy. Coming on back, Zach Gelb shows. What's up everybody? Guess who's hosting a new podcast? No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith. Listen as I pull back the curtain on everything beyond the world of sports. Interviewing influential guests, outspoken celebrities, and thought leaders across the political, financial, and social spectrum.

You know me, I'll give you my unbiased opinion. A No Mercy episode drops every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith.

A presentation of Cadence 13 and Odyssey Studio available on the Odyssey app or wherever you listen to your podcast. What makes your skin crawl? No matter how absurd, I want to know.

Tails without fur on them, such as rats or possums. I'm Larry Mullins, the host of a new podcast called Your Weirdest Fears. You send me your fear.

I'm just so weirded out about the texture and how they can just move around and flop. And then I go to the experts to learn how to overcome them. Listen and subscribe to Your Weirdest Fears on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcast from. What's up everybody? Guess who's hosting a new podcast? No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith. Listen as I pull back the curtain on everything beyond the world of sports. Interviewing influential guests, outspoken celebrities, and thought leaders across the political, financial, and social spectrum.

You know me, I'll give you my unbiased opinion. A No Mercy episode drops every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith, a presentation of Cadence 13 and Odyssey Studio, available on the Odyssey app or wherever you listen to your podcast.

You're listening to the Zach Gelb Show. It's amazing how athletes just don't know when to walk away. And I never usually tell someone when they should retire, but whenever someone does retire and then they quickly walk it back, I never really get why they then retired in the first place.

And we've talked about that at nauseam this year with Tom Brady and all the theories that people had when Tom Brady left and then quickly did come back. Here is the latest athlete who we thought was retiring, who had a big send off, and then not even a few months later in this case, because the US Open was in September, August. Serena Williams, according to Front Office Sports, Serena Williams says that she has not retired from tennis.

At a conference to promote her investment company, Williams said the chances of her returning to the sport are quote, very high and close quotes. Hickey, I guess now whenever someone retires, we need to see them. I guess you could say a full year, but Gronk did take a full year off and then he came back.

So maybe it's not a full year. I think we need to see a full season and then when it's the start of the second season, that player or that person still be retired. Because at this point, we have all these social media posts, all these moments of appreciation for athletes that are goats and are well deserving of the send offs, but then it's, oh yeah, let me have a take back. Let me retire one month and then the next month. Yeah, I was just kidding, guys.

Ashton Kutcher running out, you just got punked. I'm coming back and I'm gonna be playing the sport that I love. I guess it feels like it never also goes well for players that kind of retire than un-retire because the first time you retire, everyone thinks it's the last time. So, oh, this is the last time I've ever seen Serena. So the US Open, the three matches she played were emotional and they rocked us because everyone thought, oh, this could be the last time we ever see Serena.

So it was amazing. And then now it's like, okay, she comes back and like you said, you find out less than two months later that she's coming back. Then it's just like, okay, then her next match, I'm sure people will be excited, but it's just, it feels like it loses a little juice because you kind of, so already she's gone, you kind of accept it and now it's like she's back, right? It just feels weird.

Well, you know what it is? We already said our thank you and poured out, write our heart into appreciating and praising a person that is deserving of so much praise. And then it's like, oh, we have to do it again when you retire again. Like when Brady retired for what, 40 something days, you know, I made an emotional post for Tom Brady because that was my favorite football player, eventually growing up and then in my early twenties into my late twenties.

And you make the post, you say the goodbye and then, oh, it's, you come on back. And I really think that it just shows that, and it's most of the times these great, great, great athletes that retire and then come back, just how much they're addicted. And even though they have everything set in life and they have so many business opportunities, there's just nothing that equates to getting that fix of playing the game that they love. Like just off the top of my head, in recent memory, Brett Favre retired, he came back and I know that was two stints, right? One with the Jets and the one with Minnesota, like when Minnesota got to the NFC title game and then through an ill-advised interception in that NFC title game. Gronkowski retired, came back, won a Super Bowl, had two touchdowns in that Super Bowl.

For Serena, I don't know what level she could take it to. And for Tom Brady, and this year it's been a disaster. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are three and four. Now, it would be hypocritical, right? Because it happens in all professions, like in radio, we've seen people retire and they come on back. I guess it's like that in every business, but in sports, sometimes it's better, and maybe in all business, to leave a year or two early rather than a year or two late. And sometimes you leave a year or two early and then you come back and then, not that you get exposed, but it's a bad ending to your career. And not everyone gets a ride off into the sunset with the championship trophy after winning the big game. It's not realistic. And people go, oh, you can't end your career on interception, you can't end your career on a loss.

Yeah, you can. And will anyone look at Tom Brady or Serena Williams differently? If Brady, let's say, goes nine and eight this year and they lose in the first round, no. Serena Williams comes back in her next match. She's horrible. Is anyone gonna look at her differently?

Absolutely, no. But it's almost as if you've had these perfect careers, you barely have any blemishes, any big blemishes, either of you, on your resumes. It isn't like enough, enough. And when is enough? And clearly they thought it was enough, and then for whatever reasons, probably addiction to the sport, you get pulled back in. And there's a reason why the phrase, die the hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain, like, exists, because it's not exactly that, like I said, Serena or Tom Brady would become the villain per se, but kind of going back to what you said, it's like the emotional genie is like out of the bottle. The initial reaction when they first retire, it's emotional, it's sad, it's all, this is, you know, what a great run. And it's, you can't put those emotions back in the bottle and then save it for the next time they retire. Like, if Tom Brady retires after this year, you could put a post out again, but it's not gonna feel the same. It's not gonna be the same emotions like you felt last year when he retired for the first time. So you kind of lose that and just kind of like, you almost become jaded then to like, oh, they're back and here we go again, and now we gotta worry about their future.

They're gonna retire, you know, unretire for a third time, it's, it doesn't really ever go well. Like my voice wasn't important in the Mike Francesca retirement, but I did have a publication reach out to me and they wanted a comment when Mike Francesca at first retired. And I gave a comment and I made a post because I grew up listening to Mike and through my dad producing his show, right?

I grew up around Mike Francesca. So I gave a comment and I also had an emotional post and then Mike comes back and then he retires again and people like reach out, oh, we're doing another retirement. I was like, I already said what I need to say. And you say something that's from the heart and that hopefully that you mean and things like that. It's like, then we have to repeat it.

So it does make it a little bit awkward. Do you think Tom Brady, by the way, regrets coming back now? Because for him, that's like a little bit different. You're talking about maybe his marriage was lost because of him coming back to play football because of for years and years and years, Giselle Buncheon for really like the last 10 years kept on saying to Tom, Tom, when is it enough?

You got four, now you got five, now you got six, now you got seven. It's time for you to be full-time dad, not full-time football player. And then from the months of pretty much July to February, we don't see as much and you're not as present as much because you have to put so much into being a, not only a star NFL quarterback and the greatest of all time, but being a leader of a team. You think Brady regrets coming on back now? I would say no, because I would have to think that the possibility of divorce, he knew like that was a chance when he decided to un-retire. Like I don't think this is a total surprise. He knew his wife wasn't gonna be happy, he was gonna be in the doghouse.

To what extent maybe you thought you could climb out of the doghouse, sure, clearly that was not the case. And like you mentioned, she's been like, what, a decade now? She's been begging him to retire, so he's almost been pushing her to where she almost had no choice but to like- It went from 35 to then 40, then oh, to 45, and then he's talking about playing until he's 50.

Yeah, if I was Giselle, I'd be pissed too. And there's no doubt about it. He regrets it because that's a guy that is literally married to the game. Some people say they love the game and they will die for the game and they are married to the game.

Yeah, a lot of people are full of crap. Tom Brady is not full of crap when it comes to that. And I think he doesn't like this playing out publicly, but he gets it because he's a huge public figure. And he's even acknowledged that my personal life does become public information. I don't have really a personal life and he's saying some uncharacteristic things, like the whole military thing, it's like going off to war, like that was a dumb comment.

I think we could all realize that and he even apologized for it. But it's one of those situations where maybe he's doing some things that add a character, but I don't think Brady puts his head on the pillow at night and is like, man, I really screwed up coming back, even though right now it's not looking to his favor and in his advantage because they are three and four and not many people are believing that that team can go to a Super Bowl this year. But if you ask Brady, do you think this team could still win a Super Bowl and you shoot him up a true serum, I still think he would say yes.

Because every time that dude steps on the field, he thinks even when there's been some adverse moments before like getting off to bad starts and people announcing that the death of Tom Brady in a football sense was here, he's always have found a way in the 11th hour if it looked like Father Time is catching up to him to go, yeah, Father Time gonna kick you back to like eight or seven o'clock before you get right to midnight and strike. Anyway, World Series, we do have that starting up on Friday between the Philadelphia Phillies and the Houston Astros. For the Astros, I think the storyline is very simply this, this is the championship that could shut up everyone about the cheating scandal because to me, I don't care about the cheating scandal anymore because they've been every year bare minimum back in the ALCS and into a few World Series, they just haven't won another one. So if you do win this one and now not having some of those guys that were part of the team there and they've just been able to reestablish it with the new GM and a new manager, that would be a slight little okay. The cheating scandal, you guys can knock us all we want.

We showed that we're better than the cheating scandal even though it was their own fault. And then it's a Dusty Baker factor as well. I think it's a feel good story if Dusty Baker who's going to be a Hall of Fame manager finally gets that championship trophy. But from the Phillies side, it's really the story of Bryce Harper because Bryce Harper, we remember when we were young and Bryce Harper was on the magazine when he was in high school. And Bryce Harper has been in the public spotlight since he's a teenager and now he's 30, 31. And he wasn't a part of the Nationals. He was part of all those chokes and all those bad playoff performances with the Nationals. He wasn't a part of the Nationals when they did find the way to eventually win a World Series. So the Phillies win. Yes, it's a huge story about a turnaround fire and Joe Girardi, Rob Thompson, getting promoted to the interim manager, now the full-time manager for the next few years as he signed the contract.

Yes, they're built for October with Castellanos, Reese Hoskins, Kyle Schwabers. Well, they got two really good pitchers in Aaron Nola and Zach Wheeler. But the story that really takes the forefront and goes right to the front of the line would be Bryce Harper finally winning a championship with how great of a player he's been for so many years. So Hickey, I'll just throw out the sport in the last 20, 25 years, an athlete that has not won a ring that you would have liked to have seen a ring.

Most of these athletes probably are not playing anymore, but if you saw someone that's currently playing that's been around for a while that you would love to see get a ring, we'll give you the sport and you give me your answer and I'll give you mine. Major League Baseball, who would that athlete be? Ken Griffey Jr.

It's a good one. I think a lot of people are gonna be annoyed that we're not saying Mike Trout. I hope Mike Trout eventually leaves the Angels even though he signed a massive extension because it's a joke he's only played in one postseason series and it was a three-game sweep. But for me, it's Barry Bonds. I know very controversial because of steroids, but if you take steroids out of it, he's the greatest baseball player that I've seen in my lifetime. He got to that one world series up against the Angels, didn't get the job done, but I would have had no problem with Barry Bonds winning a championship and then selfishly, I could also say Mike Piazza as well. Basketball, who's your NBA guy?

Oh, gotta be Charles Barkley. Oh, that's a great one. Bragging rights over here. Imagine how loud and obnoxious he'd be if he had a ring. Yeah, Shaq would still say, you don't have multiple rings. Well, they're all inside a new way, but at least he can say I got one. Yeah, that isn't a terrible one.

No doubt about that. I would go Vince Carter, Vince Sanity, NFL. Who's your guy?

Friend to show Jim Kelly. You go to four in a row to win. I mean, I couldn't imagine the heartbreak of four Super Bowls in a row and you lose all four.

Oh. Mine is going to be Larry Fitzgerald. He went on one of the greatest individual post-seasons that you will ever see that did not result in a Super Bowl victory when the Cardinals did lose to the Steelers in that Super Bowl. What he did in that four game stretch, some guys would dream to do of in a season. And then in hockey, Henrik Lundquist, one of the great goalies of all time that unfortunately did not get a ring. So in the last 20, 25 years, who's your guy in the NHL? Obviously, I agree with Henrik Lundquist as we were both Ranger fans, but to be different, I'll go Jumbo Joe, Joe Thornton, 24 years in the NHL.

So many cracks at it. You know, got to the Stanley Cup final, the Sharks one year couldn't come through. Great career. Would love to see him kind of culminate with one championship. Well, take a time out when we come on back on the Zach Gelb show, I got five coaches that should be right front and center in the coach of the year conversation, the NFL.

And maybe I'll give you a six, who is really surprising that no one would have said would be a coach of the year candidate before the season, but through the first seven games of the year, he definitely has to be in the conversation. Is there something really absurd that skeaves you out? Getting a paper cut on my eyeball. A fear you can't shake.

I'm going to leak ocular fluid and my cheeks is going to go into my mouth and I will perish. Whatever scares you, I want to talk about it. Join me, Larry Mullins, on my new podcast, Your Weirdest Fears. Listen and subscribe to Your Weirdest Fears on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcast from.

What's up, everybody? Guess who's hosting a new podcast? No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith. Listen, as I pull back the curtain on everything beyond the world of sports, interviewing influential guests, outspoken celebrities, and thought leaders across the political, financial, and social spectrum.

You know me, I'll give you my unbiased opinion. A No Mercy episode drops every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith, a presentation of Cadence 13 and Odyssey Studio, available on the Odyssey app or wherever you listen to your podcast. Is there something really absurd that skeaves you out? Getting a paper cut on my eyeball. A fear you can't shake.

I'm going to leak ocular fluid and my cheeks is going to go into my mouth and I will perish. Whatever scares you, I want to talk about it. Join me, Larry Mullins, on my new podcast, Your Weirdest Fears.

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It is Zach Gelb Show on CBS Sports Radio. Seven weeks into the NFL season, who are your top five Coach of the Year candidates? I'll give you my five right now, and Hickey, I'll get your five as well. In at number five, Robert Salah. The Jets are five and two.

Do I need to say more? Well, I can and I will, because they were without Zach Wilson for the first three weeks of the season. And they were playing Joe Flacco.

So we all know Joe Flacco in the year of 2022 is not when Joe Flacco was rumored to be elite. So that's a heck of a job by the Jets. They have a lot of young talent on that team.

And for them to be five and two is a heck of a coaching job by Robert Salah. In at number four, Pete Carroll. No one could have predicted in their right mind that through the first seven weeks of the season, Seattle Seahawks would be sitting in first place atop the NFC West. They have a four and three record.

Gino Smith is cooking more than Russell Wilson right now. And that has just been a team that has been fun. They've been gritty. I didn't know if they were going to get maybe at most five or six wins this year. And they're already at four. It's a heck of a job by Pete Carroll.

Three, culture change is big. Sometimes it's not necessarily that the old coach was a bad coach, but the message was getting stale. And that's what happened in Minnesota in that transition from Mike Zimmer to Kevin O'Connell. Vikings have started off the year five and one in a very open NFC.

Everything's right in front of them. They destroyed the Green Bay Packers in week one. They have one loss so far, not that they have played great in terms of when you look at their games. A lot of it has been sloppy, but the defense is improving a little bit.

It's a dairy Smith's been a nice addition. But on offense, you could just tell there's an appreciation for their head football coach now, especially with the quarterback and Kirk Cousins. You look at guys like KJ Osborne who caught a game-winning touchdown against the Lions. Justin Jefferson, who is a stud. Dalvin Cook, Adam Thielen, you go down the list. Kevin O'Connell really is resonating his message with the players in that locker on the offensive side of the ball.

And you could tell they feel a little bit more at ease this year when it was tense last year. And at five and one, they could accomplish whatever they want this year because other than Philadelphia, you don't really look at too many great teams in the NFC for this season. Number two, the lone great team in the NFC this year.

It is Nick Sirianni with the Philadelphia Eagles. Other Eagles are going to win the NFCs. I said at the draft, the moment when they traded for AJ Brown, but to be six and oh, and the only undefeated team after seven weeks.

Yeah, I didn't see that one coming at number one. The Giants have been a mess. They have been a dumpster fire, and that may be even offensive to dumpster fires for the way that they've played in the last five years. This is not a talented roster.

This is not a loaded roster. This is not a roster you say, oh wow, you go into this year thinking they could go be a playoff team, but the Giants are six and one. And when you look at the schedule, they're a lot to make the playoffs. You're only going to need nine wins to get into the post season in the NFC this year. They will get to nine wins. They're already at six and they're six and one, and they're finding ways to come on back, be resilient, grind out games. And you could just tell when you talk to players like I have with Darius Sladen, when you go through Wandell Robinson as well, like a bunch of guys in that locker room that we spoke to throughout the early part of the season, these guys, they go to work now and they're expecting to win.

And you look at the roster, that's not a roster that should expect to win. When you have a coach that believes in you and changes the culture and actually is a competent coach compared to what they were bringing in the last few years, like a Pat Shermer, a Joe Judge, a McAdoo, that does wonders to a football team. It also helps in Saquon Barclays playing well, but just look at the job that him and Kafka, Dable and Kafka have done with Daniel Jones as well. We're talking about a possible contract extension for Daniel Jones. No one, I mean, no one would have thought that was even a possibility before the year, not even the Giants, because they already declined his fifth year option before the season did commence. So my five coaches, Salah, five, Pete Carroll, four, Kevin O'Connell, three, Nick Sirianni, two, and Brian Dable, one. And if I had to give a six coach and I'll get into the bigger part of this conversation in just a bit, Mike McCarthy's gotta be involved in that conversation too. Cause he was a dead man walking before the start of this year. He still may end up getting fired cause we gotta see what they could do in the post-season, but you lose Dak week one and you just got him back this past week in week seven and you're five and two, you gotta give some credit to Mike McCarthy. It's more than just a regular season this year, but to be able to not only weather that storm, but get that team in an advantageous situation after losing your quarterback ever since week two through this past week when he came back, that's a good job there by Mike McCarthy.

Hickey, here are your five. I'm with you at the top, Brian Dable, hands down, like I said, expectations for what they've done so far this season, I think hands down right now, the front runner for coach of the year, I will go Pete Carroll number two, something I did not expect. A guy that you said was basically gonna be forced into retirement after this season, now gonna be a top three candidate for coach of the year.

Look at you. I've said plenty of bad word about Pete Carroll, so I will give him credit cause he absolutely deserves it so far. Is it too late now to say sorry? Will Justin Bieber know? I'm trying to think if Pete Carroll would accept my apology. I don't know if he would or not. If I always said I wouldn't, I'll say that. I'll have some spite if roles are reversed. I think Pete would accept your apology.

Sometimes he's chewing gum 400 miles an hour. That's right, Ryan. Yeah, probably. I can't even do it. Don't be condescending and mocking the guy now. I'm not mocking him.

I was trying to do an impersonation, but then I realized I couldn't really do one outside of just a lot of gum chewing. So you would agree that he is a top 10 coach in the league? He has done a great job so far, sir. Number two coach of the year. I remember there was a culture host that said, oh yeah, he's a top 10 coach and I was told, no, you're an idiot, you're a moron, you're a dope, and look where we are now.

But anyway, continue on your finalist. Number three is the guy you highlighted before, Nick Sheeran, doing a great job so far. I'm the only undefeated team in the Eagles really kind of forming jail and hurts into what looks to be a franchise quarterback. Number four, Robert Salah, kind of thing with the Giants. No expectations for this Jets team. They're playing, as they say, all gas, no brakes.

That's for sure, five and two. And he's taking receipts. He is, and you know what? He got clowned for it after week one, rightfully so.

It worked. Also rightfully so. He can go back right now and kind of laugh at everyone else who was doubting him, which is almost everyone, because the Jets right now did at that point stink and he's doing a great job so far, turning that team around. And I'm gonna go at number five. Can I predict? Sure, I don't think you'll get it. I'm just going to assume, so it's not Kevin O'Connell. No, sir.

I think I'm gonna get this one. It's an NFC coach? It is. Arthur Smith.

Arthur Smith. Because it's not just about the record. It's also about how you coach with the talent you have. On paper, the Falcons are one of the worst rosters in all the NFL. And right now, technically, according to the standings, there's seven games, time for first place.

You know what situation I'll equate that to? It's similar to Brian Flores a few years ago, when everyone said that that team was a shoo-in for the number one pick. And I don't know how far the Falcons could take it, but you saw signs early on that season that, okay, Flores is doing a heck of a job, and now you're seeing that with Arthur Smith.

Someone also that was kind of very much similar to Robert Salah. I'm taking receipts and all that tough guy talk, but that sends a message to your locker room. Guys, I don't care what the narratives are. I believe in you. Let's go.

We could do this together. And that's a team that maybe a lot of people didn't give enough credit to some of the talent of the roster with guys like Kyle Pitts and Drake London and A.J. Tyrell and their offensive line is not bad. And that's a group that I don't expect them to make the playoffs. I don't think that they are great, but if they go get six, seven wins this year, that's a step in the right direction, even though it's gonna move you down the draft board just a little bit.

But I think you take that because it shows that you're taking the next step because when you have one of these rebuilds, year one's a wash, year two, you gotta improve. And then next year, maybe since you're able to prove, then you could take that step in the right direction, especially in NFC South for the foreseeable future, it's gonna be open because it seems like this is Brady's last year in Tampa. Then with the Panthers, they have dug themselves into a mega hole. And the Saints, they have all this talent, but that talent's getting older and it's all banged up and they don't have a great coach and they don't have a great quarterback anymore. So that division is wide open for the taking. You need to jockey and position yourself into when Brady leaves to them pounce.

And the Falcons right now probably have the leg up compared to the Panthers and the Saints. So I like Arthur Smith, that's a good one. How about McCarthy? How do we view McCarthy? Cause I think right now he should be in consideration, not that he's gonna win the award, not that this regular season is irrelevant because no NFL regular season is irrelevant because it's so tough to make the postseason, even with the extra added team and the NFC East is playing a lot better than anyone could have thought. Where are you at in terms of a hundred percent that McCarthy's gonna be back next year? Cause before the year, I said, gotta get to an NFC title game for him to be back. Now Dak is back. I don't think Dak wins the Super Bowl with Dallas.

You have C.D. Lamb there. You got Gallup back. Noah Murray Cooper, defense is playing great. Where are you at in terms of a hundred percent that he will definitely be back next year for the Dallas Cowboys?

25%, 30%. Like you said, the regular, it's not about what you do in the regular season. It's can you win playoff game and playoff games? They got to a great start last year, it all floundered.

Got to win playoffs. I'll go a little bit higher. I'm still not at 50-50.

Right now he's deserving of coming back, but it's what can you do in the postseason like we're both in agreement. I would say about 40, maybe 41%, but want to get it feeling a little bit dangerous. I woke up feeling a little extra dangerous.

I'll go 41%, Mike McCarthy back next year. What's up everybody? Guess who's hosting a new podcast? No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith. Listen as I pull back the curtain on everything beyond the world of sports. Interviewing influential guests, outspoken celebrities, and thought leaders across the political, financial, and social spectrum.

You know me, I'll give you my unbiased opinion. A No Mercy episode drops every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith. A presentation of Cadence 13 and Odyssey Studio, available on the Odyssey app or wherever you listen to your podcast.

What's up everybody? Guess who's hosting a new podcast? No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith. Listen as I pull back the curtain on everything beyond the world of sports. Interviewing influential guests, outspoken celebrities, and thought leaders across the political, financial, and social spectrum.

You know me, I'll give you my unbiased opinion. A No Mercy episode drops every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. No Mercy with Stephen A. Smith.

A presentation of Cadence 13 and Odyssey Studio, available on the Odyssey app or wherever you listen to your podcast. Is there something really absurd that skeaves you out? Getting a paper cut on my eyeball? A fear you can't shake? I'm gonna leak ocular fluid on my cheeks.

It's gonna go into my mouth and I will perish. Whatever scares you, I wanna talk about it. Join me, Larry Mullins, on my new podcast, Your Weirdest Fears. Listen and subscribe to Your Weirdest Fears on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcast from.