Latest / Chuck in the Morning / Chuck in the Morning 9/10 H3: MMQB with Hugh Millen
Transcript
- 0:03Speaker 1: Thank you. Alright, here we go.
- 0:20Speaker 2: 8 o'clock hour here on this Thursday. The opener is
- 0:25Speaker 2: in the books. It was low scoring. It was a
- 0:29Speaker 2: bit sloppy at times. We had a bad injury last night,
- 0:32Speaker 2: but in the end, the Seahawks win. They begin the
- 0:37Speaker 2: defense of their crown with a 13-10 thriller. Last night
- 0:41Speaker 2: at Lumen Field over the New England Patriots. Don't normally
- 0:44Speaker 2: call 13-10 games thrillers, and yet that kept you on
- 0:49Speaker 2: the edge of your seat, certainly throughout the entire second
- 0:52Speaker 2: half of the football game. And joining us here this morning,
- 0:56Speaker 2: it's a Monday morning quarterback session on a Thursday. It's
- 1:00Speaker 2: our QB1 and the star of this here section of
- 1:05Speaker 2: the show. Hugh Millen is with us here on the
- 1:08Speaker 2: radio program.
- 1:09Speaker 1: Good morning, sir. Good morning. Great to be with you.
- 1:11Speaker 2: Yeah, well, it's great to have a regular season football
- 1:14Speaker 2: game to dissect. Uh, and I know, uh, you can't
- 1:17Speaker 2: wait to chop it up with us here. So, um,
- 1:20Speaker 2: let's just go ahead with your big takeaway from that
- 1:22Speaker 2: game last night.
- 1:24Speaker 1: Well, I think the definition of a team win, uh, uh,
- 1:28Speaker 1: you know, just being able to, to hang in there,
- 1:31Speaker 1: find a way to, uh, you know, you knew it
- 1:35Speaker 1: was going to be a mutter once your quarterback goes
- 1:37Speaker 1: down to, to figure out a way to, to, uh,
- 1:41Speaker 1: finally get something going offensively. And then, uh, Let's face it,
- 1:47Speaker 1: it got a little bit fortunate for Romeo Dobbs to
- 1:49Speaker 1: have dropped that corner route leading to the interception and
- 1:54Speaker 1: on the next play. And for Drake May to commit
- 1:59Speaker 1: not three interceptions but three high school level, like not
- 2:03Speaker 1: even Friday night. The JV plays on Wednesday. Those were
- 2:07Speaker 1: kind of JV type of mistakes for a quarterback that–
- 2:15Speaker 1: that had accomplished as much as he did a year ago. And,
- 2:17Speaker 1: you know, but the Patriots, you know, I'm going to
- 2:19Speaker 1: just give you two thoughts about the Patriots. You know,
- 2:22Speaker 1: if you go through all the stats and you go
- 2:24Speaker 1: average yard per play success, which is, you know, formula
- 2:27Speaker 1: on the needed yards, you can Google it. And then EPA,
- 2:31Speaker 1: the new expected points added, you go, you know, run defense,
- 2:36Speaker 1: pass defense, run offense, pass off like 12 categories. Are
- 2:41Speaker 1: there any teams that are, in the top 10 in
- 2:46Speaker 1: every single category from a year ago. Well, it turns
- 2:48Speaker 1: out there's two, the Seahawks and the Patriots. And, and then,
- 2:54Speaker 1: and then one more point on the Patriots. You know,
- 2:58Speaker 1: I was looking up the, the college football game this week,
- 3:01Speaker 1: Texas and Ohio state. That's the fifth ranked team against
- 3:05Speaker 1: the first, when you go preseason and you go five
- 3:07Speaker 1: plus one is six. That means that game that we're
- 3:10Speaker 1: going to see this Saturday is the, is the best
- 3:13Speaker 1: matchup of September. Well, then I said, well, I wonder
- 3:17Speaker 1: about in the NFL, if you go by preseason Vegas
- 3:20Speaker 1: odds to win the Superbowl and you do this exact
- 3:23Speaker 1: same formula, the best matchup in all of September in
- 3:29Speaker 1: the NFL was last night. So, uh, you know, just
- 3:34Speaker 1: to find a way to get any win, right. Let alone, uh,
- 3:39Speaker 1: when you're starting quarterback only throw, um, plays five games
- 3:43Speaker 1: and you got to just, you know, put this thing
- 3:45Speaker 1: together with bubble gum and bait, bailing water wire. It just, uh,
- 3:49Speaker 1: you know, Michael Dixon, have a day, young man, uh,
- 3:52Speaker 1: Julian love, have a day, young man, on and on
- 3:54Speaker 1: a lot, a lot, a lot of great play out there.
- 3:56Speaker 1: But really, I think that, um, it's, it's an old cliche.
- 4:00Speaker 1: People talk about team wins, but when your backup quarterback
- 4:03Speaker 1: has to go as long as he did, it's going
- 4:06Speaker 1: to be a team win when you've beat a team
- 4:08Speaker 1: as quality as the Patriots.
- 4:09Speaker 2: Put that into perspective for us, how difficult that is.
- 4:13Speaker 2: Four games into a regular season, your starting quarterback goes down,
- 4:18Speaker 2: you're the backup, and you have to run out on
- 4:20Speaker 2: the football field and try to guide your team to
- 4:22Speaker 2: an opening night victory against a very good football team.
- 4:27Speaker 1: Well, you're probably running plays in a game that you've
- 4:30Speaker 1: never ran in practice. You know, hopefully they try and
- 4:34Speaker 1: reduce the play sheet and give you stuff that you
- 4:38Speaker 1: ran in the summertime. So I'm not saying that the
- 4:41Speaker 1: bulk of what he ran, he hadn't ran in practice
- 4:46Speaker 1: at some point. But I can promise you there are
- 4:48Speaker 1: several plays that he had to execute, talking about Drew Locke,
- 4:52Speaker 1: that he didn't have a rep in practice. And then
- 4:57Speaker 1: you've got the added specter of The entire world's watching,
- 5:00Speaker 1: and there's a certain juice to that game and pageantry
- 5:06Speaker 1: to it that kind of added to it. So I
- 5:08Speaker 1: think it was very difficult. And I thought he played
- 5:10Speaker 1: a good game last night when I did the postgame
- 5:13Speaker 1: show with Dick. Then got up at 325 this morning
- 5:19Speaker 1: is when I had access. Fun, isn't it? Yeah. So
- 5:22Speaker 1: I've been watching tape since 325 a.m. with no coffee.
- 5:26Speaker 1: So I got to produce my own caffeine, but I'll
- 5:28Speaker 1: tell you what, what I watch on the TV or
- 5:31Speaker 1: on the screen, watching the coach's tape, not the TV copy.
- 5:36Speaker 1: But I thought he was better after I studied the
- 5:41Speaker 1: tape than I thought he was last night. And that
- 5:46Speaker 1: just had to do with the plays that, that he
- 5:50Speaker 1: didn't make when you look, there was very few opportunities.
- 5:53Speaker 1: Now I have, I have a couple of minuses. There
- 5:55Speaker 1: was a couple of times where, where he, he missed
- 5:59Speaker 1: plays that I gave him a minus on. I mean,
- 6:03Speaker 1: he had, he missed a touchdown pass on a now
- 6:06Speaker 1: slant to Rashid Shaheed going into the North end zone
- 6:10Speaker 1: that was wide ass open. He ended up throwing the
- 6:12Speaker 1: corner out to to Jackson Smith and Jigba for an incompletion,
- 6:16Speaker 1: and they kicked a field goal. But the way he
- 6:21Speaker 1: managed the pocket, there were a lot of free runners.
- 6:24Speaker 1: That offensive line did not have their best game. I mean,
- 6:28Speaker 1: Abe Lucas, he really struggled in pass protection and guys
- 6:32Speaker 1: in his lap and what have you. So I thought
- 6:34Speaker 1: his handling of the pressure, I'm not talking about the
- 6:39Speaker 1: pressure of the game. I'm talking about the pressure from
- 6:42Speaker 1: the defensive lines. I thought that that was better under
- 6:47Speaker 1: tape review than I had had the impression that it
- 6:49Speaker 1: was last night. And so, um, so he, you know,
- 6:53Speaker 1: there's no question he gets a game ball. Um, you know,
- 6:56Speaker 1: if they're into giving game balls, he'll get one. Yeah. And, uh,
- 7:00Speaker 1: and so, you know, just, you know, if this had
- 7:04Speaker 1: happened against the Cardinals, they'd say, okay, you won the
- 7:08Speaker 1: game with a backup quarterback, but, um, You know, for
- 7:11Speaker 1: this to happen against a team that won the AFC,
- 7:15Speaker 1: good on you, Seattle Seahawks. Well done. Yeah.
- 7:17Speaker 2: Give me a couple of the pluses then from Drew
- 7:20Speaker 2: Locke that you had written down or a couple plays
- 7:22Speaker 2: that stood out to you. And then who gets the credit,
- 7:27Speaker 2: Cooper Cup on the catch or Drew Locke on the throw?
- 7:30Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, I've got eight pluses for him.
- 7:34Speaker 2: Oh, wow.
- 7:35Speaker 1: And, you know, three– we'll go with the three– like
- 7:40Speaker 1: El Marco, really dark black ink, almost double pluses. Yeah,
- 7:48Speaker 1: you're talking, okay, first of all, in the second quarter,
- 7:50Speaker 1: he throws that X dagger, the in route to Shahid
- 7:57Speaker 1: for 21 yards on third and 22. So he's got
- 8:02Speaker 1: three receivers to his left. He's got Njigba on his
- 8:06Speaker 1: right running a deep in route. Well, The coverage, that
- 8:10Speaker 1: was what's called a Tampa 2 coverage. There's a safety
- 8:13Speaker 1: to that side. There's a hole player in the middle
- 8:15Speaker 1: you have to watch out for. And you want to
- 8:20Speaker 1: make sure that that safety doesn't come down off the
- 8:23Speaker 1: roof on you. But then if you look in that area,
- 8:26Speaker 1: then you're going to bring the underneath defenders into the area.
- 8:30Speaker 1: So a hell of a job with his eyes. And
- 8:33Speaker 1: he even did, I wrote down in my notes, he
- 8:35Speaker 1: did a shoulder shimmy. He moved what's called the curl defender.
- 8:39Speaker 1: which is one inside from the flat defender. He moved
- 8:44Speaker 1: him with his shoulders to get to the outside, just
- 8:46Speaker 1: moved him a yard or two and then throw it.
- 8:50Speaker 1: That is extremely high-level quarterbacking. You talked about the corner
- 8:53Speaker 1: route to cup that he threw to the right sideline.
- 8:57Speaker 1: That was cover one. Oh, man, I forgot to get
- 9:00Speaker 1: the Patriots. No, who's number 25? Hopefully you have the rosters.
- 9:04Speaker 1: 25 for the Patriots was– I would know.
- 9:08Speaker 2: But I watched from the stadium yesterday, so I didn't
- 9:11Speaker 2: get to watch it the same way.
- 9:13Speaker 1: Covered as well as you can cover. Usually when you
- 9:19Speaker 1: throw in a corner route, you say, okay, I can
- 9:21Speaker 1: take him on the angle that he's going and just
- 9:24Speaker 1: keep him on that same track, or I can flatten him.
- 9:27Speaker 1: I can pull him to a flatter angle towards the sideline.
- 9:33Speaker 1: What you never want to do is throw it up
- 9:35Speaker 1: on the opposite shoulder. Because now you're making a guy
- 9:40Speaker 1: catch almost like a Willie Mays type of thing, but
- 9:43Speaker 1: you can't get a higher level of execution with a
- 9:45Speaker 1: pass and a catch, a one-handed catch that they had.
- 9:50Speaker 1: And the touchdown, the ball was only in the air, what,
- 9:56Speaker 1: five or six yards? Mm-hmm. The one to Njigba for
- 9:59Speaker 1: 45 yards?
- 9:59Speaker 2: Right.
- 10:00Speaker 1: That's, you know, you technically call that a hitch route.
- 10:04Speaker 1: You know, you just turn around, button hook at five,
- 10:06Speaker 1: six yards. Like, you did that when you're in third
- 10:08Speaker 1: grade playing in the street. Like, all right, just a
- 10:10Speaker 1: button hook, right? But that degree of difficulty... So you
- 10:16Speaker 1: get into I-formation, you got two tight ends, and Njigba
- 10:20Speaker 1: has his split tight. He turns to his left, okay?
- 10:24Speaker 1: So he's coming out as a right-handed quarterback. He's going
- 10:26Speaker 1: to turn to his left. Now you take Gray Zabel.
- 10:31Speaker 1: He blocks down, and they totally jailbreak the B-gap. So
- 10:38Speaker 1: he's got a defensive tackle after having– gone to his
- 10:40Speaker 1: left and has to wheel around. He's got somebody completely unblocked,
- 10:44Speaker 1: not even like throw a traffic cone at his ankles,
- 10:47Speaker 1: totally unblocked in the B gap. Um, the, you know, Bradford, um,
- 10:52Speaker 1: he took an L also. So, so there's also a
- 10:55Speaker 1: guy coming from the other side, you know, so two guys, um,
- 10:59Speaker 1: bearing down on him. And when he turns around now,
- 11:05Speaker 1: the way the Patriots played it, you had a, uh, uh,
- 11:08Speaker 1: the corner took the flat. And the safety took the
- 11:11Speaker 1: corner out. This is a very common progression. He probably
- 11:17Speaker 1: ran it in high school. He certainly ran it at Missouri,
- 11:19Speaker 1: and he's run it ever since he's been in the NFL.
- 11:21Speaker 1: It's called Z Spot. A lot of people call it
- 11:23Speaker 1: Snag and what have you. So it's a common concept
- 11:29Speaker 1: with Njigba just sitting there. But there's so much traffic,
- 11:33Speaker 1: and with guys bearing down on him, He had to
- 11:36Speaker 1: turn and in one step, he had to go sidearm
- 11:40Speaker 1: to get it around the defensive lineman. And I'm going
- 11:44Speaker 1: to pause on this thought because when you watch him,
- 11:49Speaker 1: there's basically two kinds of backup quarterbacks. You can put
- 11:54Speaker 1: them in two categories. One is the kind of guy
- 12:00Speaker 1: that you look and you say, He just doesn't have
- 12:03Speaker 1: starter physical traits. So there's going to be a lid
- 12:06Speaker 1: on what he could ever do. But he's got a
- 12:08Speaker 1: really good feel for the game. That would be like
- 12:12Speaker 1: a Sam Howell, the Gramp. Tyler Heineke. Yeah, exactly. That
- 12:20Speaker 1: brand of guy. Or you just say, he's a little
- 12:22Speaker 1: too short, doesn't move great, he's got a lollipop arm.
- 12:26Speaker 1: And then there's the backup quarterback that has starter traits
- 12:31Speaker 1: that And when you, if you look at him for
- 12:33Speaker 1: five minutes, you'd say he looks like a starter. It
- 12:36Speaker 1: takes a long film study to realize that his decision-making
- 12:41Speaker 1: doesn't consistently match starter quality decision-making, but he's got the traits.
- 12:48Speaker 1: And Drew Locke is in the latter category. Drew Locke
- 12:51Speaker 1: is six foot three. He moves great. He's got a
- 12:54Speaker 1: quick release. His, uh, He's got velocity on the ball.
- 13:00Speaker 1: Even the plays that looked easy, he had another one
- 13:05Speaker 1: to Njigba on a little option route where Njigba lined
- 13:10Speaker 1: up in the backfield and then hooked up. He had
- 13:12Speaker 1: to put enough velocity on that to beat the inside defender,
- 13:17Speaker 1: and he did it with his feet going all the way,
- 13:20Speaker 1: his weight coming back because he had guys right in
- 13:23Speaker 1: his face. Again, that's what I was saying. His response
- 13:26Speaker 1: to pressure... was damn good. In the first quarter, he
- 13:31Speaker 1: moved unnecessarily. He closed his throwing position. Throwing position is what?
- 13:36Speaker 1: Hips perpendicular to the line of scrimmage. Left hip closer
- 13:41Speaker 1: to the line, and then again, your hips aligned perpendicular.
- 13:44Speaker 1: If you close it off and get your right hip closer,
- 13:46Speaker 1: now you're out of the throwing position, and the defense
- 13:49Speaker 1: has got an advantage. So he caused a sack where
- 13:52Speaker 1: he could have stayed in the throwing position, found the
- 13:55Speaker 1: check down. It's like he went back to the sideline,
- 13:58Speaker 1: he watched it, they talked about it, and they say, hey, hey,
- 14:01Speaker 1: let's be stable in the pocket here. From that point on,
- 14:05Speaker 1: his pocket navigation and RTP, response to pressure in front
- 14:11Speaker 1: of him, making those kind of throws, he's got the
- 14:14Speaker 1: physical traits. And he showed plenty of that last night. Well,
- 14:20Speaker 1: I think we need to ask that question now.
- 14:21Speaker 2: You knew I was going to ask it eventually, but
- 14:23Speaker 2: it feels like you've put me right there on the
- 14:25Speaker 2: doorstep to ask now. Sam Darnold's injury going forward and
- 14:30Speaker 2: whether or not Drew Locke can pull off the things
- 14:32Speaker 2: that this team wants to accomplish if he's asked to.
- 14:36Speaker 1: Can he take them all the way?
- 14:38Speaker 2: Is he that good of a backup quarterback that if
- 14:42Speaker 2: Sam Darnold can't play for a while or maybe not
- 14:45Speaker 2: again this year, that you're okay with Drew Locke?
- 14:50Speaker 1: Well, I think we've got to talk about the law
- 14:53Speaker 1: of large numbers. If you flip a coin 10 times,
- 14:59Speaker 1: it's very probable you'll get seven heads or seven tails
- 15:02Speaker 1: or maybe even eight. That would not shock any statistician.
- 15:07Speaker 1: If you flipped it a billion times, every stat professor
- 15:10Speaker 1: in the world will tell you, well, you're going to
- 15:12Speaker 1: get about 500 million tails and about 500 million heads.
- 15:17Speaker 1: Google it, the law of large numbers. So here's what
- 15:20Speaker 1: I would say. The longer you play, if you played
- 15:23Speaker 1: a 17-game season or if a computer, an all-knowing computer,
- 15:27Speaker 1: ran a 1,700-game season, you're going to win more with
- 15:31Speaker 1: Sam Darnold. There's no question. Absolutely. In fact, you're going
- 15:34Speaker 1: to win probably a significant amount more because Sam Darnold's better.
- 15:40Speaker 1: But can you beat the Cardinals?
- 15:43Speaker 2: Yes.
- 15:44Speaker 1: Can you go on the road and beat the Commanders? Yes.
- 15:48Speaker 1: So I think that that they're feeling OK about it,
- 15:56Speaker 1: given this, you know, if he has to play, you know,
- 15:59Speaker 1: I think if if he's going to miss the probability
- 16:03Speaker 1: is that he's going to miss a week or two. Right.
- 16:08Speaker 1: Or maybe even maybe he even plays against the Cardinals, Darnold,
- 16:14Speaker 1: but they can afford to be a little bit conservative, right,
- 16:18Speaker 1: based on. what you saw from Locke last night. Now,
- 16:22Speaker 1: the part about this that has me concerned is if
- 16:27Speaker 1: you go to the potentials, you go back to the
- 16:37Speaker 1: injury that Bo Jackson had, he had a very similar,
- 16:40Speaker 1: his knee went into the ground, and now there was,
- 16:44Speaker 1: I think there was some kind of dislocation, but the
- 16:46Speaker 1: MRI for for Sam Darnold may show that there was
- 16:51Speaker 1: this slight subluxation last night. And, and there's a few
- 16:54Speaker 1: joints in the body. Obviously any orthoscopic surgeon who's listening,
- 16:59Speaker 1: you know, dwarfs me in terms of the knowledge, but
- 17:02Speaker 1: you know, if you play 25 years and you coach
- 17:04Speaker 1: 24 seasons, you end up learning more about this stuff
- 17:08Speaker 1: than you want. Cause you've had players or, or in
- 17:11Speaker 1: my case, you know, you know, I've, I've been injured enough.
- 17:14Speaker 1: But the, what you're really concerned about is there's a
- 17:19Speaker 1: few bones in the body. The ankle, there's a bone
- 17:23Speaker 1: in your wrist right underneath your thumb. There's one in
- 17:26Speaker 1: your shoulder. There's a handful of bones in your body
- 17:31Speaker 1: that it's very delicate how the bone gets its blood supply.
- 17:36Speaker 1: And if you sever that, now you're talking about a
- 17:42Speaker 1: major catastrophic injury. Now, I don't think this is afflicting
- 17:46Speaker 1: Sam Darnold whatsoever, but you are always aware of the
- 17:51Speaker 1: specter of that. And Bo Jackson had a very similar,
- 17:58Speaker 1: and he suffered from a vascular necrosis is the term.
- 18:05Speaker 1: And that's what you would hope. It's very low probability,
- 18:08Speaker 1: but you can't rule it out because these are the
- 18:10Speaker 1: facts we know. We know that he never went back
- 18:14Speaker 1: in the game, that he went into the locker room,
- 18:20Speaker 1: that he still has to have an MRI. An MRI
- 18:24Speaker 1: can always show things that an X-ray, I don't want
- 18:28Speaker 1: to get over my skis and profess knowledge that I
- 18:30Speaker 1: don't have. But what I've learned along the way about
- 18:35Speaker 1: some of these injuries that have delicate blood supplies is
- 18:39Speaker 1: it's no joke. Yeah. And we're probably fine. We're probably fine.
- 18:45Speaker 1: I want to emphasize that. But the degree to which
- 18:48Speaker 1: we are concerned about an unwanted event is the product
- 18:51Speaker 1: of two factors, probability times magnitude. equals your concern. And
- 18:56Speaker 1: so until we hear about the imaging, then we just
- 19:00Speaker 1: kind of hold our breath. Yeah, I'll hold my breath
- 19:04Speaker 1: and you hold your breath. As long as you don't
- 19:07Speaker 1: hold each other's. I would recommend finding other breasts to hold.
- 19:12Speaker 1: Mine are nice. You do you. Yeah, mine are nice.
- 19:15Speaker 2: It's Hugh Mellon with us, our QB1. We obviously have
- 19:18Speaker 2: a lot more ground to cover. and we will get
- 19:21Speaker 2: to Brian Fleury and Jadarian Price's debut and so many
- 19:25Speaker 2: other things and so many other plays and moments in
- 19:27Speaker 2: that crazy game last night, but I do want to
- 19:30Speaker 2: talk about the secondary, how they responded against Drake May
- 19:33Speaker 2: in the second half, and what went wrong with Drake May,
- 19:36Speaker 2: so we'll do that next.
- 19:37Speaker 1: Sports Radio 93.3 KJR FM. Seahawks bring a twisting four,
- 19:45Speaker 1: Ney fires in the middle, intercepted, Julian.
- 19:53Speaker 2: Love's got it, Love 40, Love to the 32, Seahawks
- 20:01Speaker 2: in business, back-to-back picks.
- 20:06Speaker 1: Oh, we.
- 20:08Speaker 2: Last night, one of three interceptions thrown by Drake May
- 20:12Speaker 2: in the fourth quarter last night as the Seahawks come
- 20:14Speaker 2: from behind a 10-0 deficit to win the opener 13-10.
- 20:20Speaker 2: And we recap it all here this morning on Sports
- 20:23Speaker 2: Radio 93.3 KJR FM with our QB1 top analyst, Hugh Millen,
- 20:29Speaker 2: the Monday morning quarterback session on a Thursday night. And
- 20:33Speaker 2: let's talk about their quarterback here in this segment, Hugh.
- 20:38Speaker 2: And look, I mean, I spent a lot of last season.
- 20:41Speaker 2: I think they're giving Drake May a little too much credit.
- 20:44Speaker 2: For what he's doing in New England. And now all
- 20:47Speaker 2: of a sudden I'm finding myself having to defend Drake
- 20:50Speaker 2: May because the critics are coming out of the woodwork
- 20:54Speaker 2: based off of his postseason performances last year and then
- 21:00Speaker 2: last night's inexplicable three interceptions.
- 21:02Speaker 1: In the fourth quarter. I mean, he's getting hammered.
- 21:05Speaker 2: In Boston apparently this morning for his quarterback play. Here's
- 21:09Speaker 2: my conclusion, and I'll let you react to it. I
- 21:12Speaker 2: don't think Drake May has a lot of problems as
- 21:14Speaker 2: a young quarterback in the National Football League, but I
- 21:16Speaker 2: know the biggest one, Mike McDonald.
- 21:21Speaker 1: You with me on that? Yeah, he does. Look, it
- 21:27Speaker 1: happened before then, the playoffs, he really deteriorated. And yet
- 21:34Speaker 1: you're talking about a guy that last year at age 23,
- 21:37Speaker 1: in year two, he was number one in the NFL
- 21:42Speaker 1: in passer rating, net yards per attempt, explosive play rate,
- 21:48Speaker 1: expected point added per drop back, and expected completion percentage
- 21:54Speaker 1: over expected. I watched one of the– these charts that
- 22:01Speaker 1: the NFL put out in their, their stat portal. And
- 22:03Speaker 1: it had a, it was a graph. It was a
- 22:05Speaker 1: visual one on the vertical axis was, I believe efficiency
- 22:09Speaker 1: on the horizontal axis was a big play. And so
- 22:14Speaker 1: the top right corner would be the best in the
- 22:15Speaker 1: bottom lower would, would be the worst. And so you
- 22:18Speaker 1: have these little dots that are all clustered and then
- 22:20Speaker 1: you have to look closely. And I look like, who's
- 22:23Speaker 1: that dot way up in the right corner, like far
- 22:27Speaker 1: and away blowing everybody away? Oh, it's Drake May. And
- 22:34Speaker 1: so those facts cannot be disputed. Now, if you want
- 22:38Speaker 1: to say that he has crumbled, he'll never, ever play well,
- 22:42Speaker 1: that something happened in the playoffs last year that will
- 22:45Speaker 1: prevent him at age 24 from ever doing it again.
- 22:49Speaker 1: And by the way, he rushed for 450 yards. Last year,
- 22:51Speaker 1: he had five first downs by legs yesterday. I think
- 22:56Speaker 1: you're right. He just has a Mike McDonald problem, and
- 22:59Speaker 1: he ends up having three interceptions in the ballgame that were,
- 23:05Speaker 1: as I said, not just Wednesday night high school. That's
- 23:08Speaker 1: when the JV plays. Inexplicable kind of stuff. Let's go
- 23:12Speaker 1: through them. What did he do wrong? Okay, so the
- 23:15Speaker 1: first one, 14-27 to go in the fourth quarter. Second
- 23:18Speaker 1: and nine at the Seattle 45. He goes play action,
- 23:22Speaker 1: and he's going to open to his left, which means
- 23:26Speaker 1: you're now not going odd steps. You're going even steps.
- 23:29Speaker 1: So he's taking not a seven-step drop, but an eight-step drop. Plus,
- 23:33Speaker 1: he's going to hitch-hitch.
- 23:35Speaker 2: And.
- 23:36Speaker 1: he's trying to hit a wheel up the sideline. There's
- 23:38Speaker 1: two ways to get a wheel. You can either, um,
- 23:41Speaker 1: get it right as the, as the wheel wheel route
- 23:44Speaker 1: is where you're going to the flat. And then you
- 23:45Speaker 1: turn up and go vertical. You can either hit it
- 23:47Speaker 1: right off the, the shallow coverage and in front of
- 23:51Speaker 1: the deep coverage, or you can go over the top. Well,
- 23:55Speaker 1: with the timing that he was going eight steps plus
- 23:58Speaker 1: two hitches, there's only one way to get it is
- 24:00Speaker 1: to be over the top of the safety. And so
- 24:03Speaker 1: the safety for Seattle over there who had a pretty
- 24:08Speaker 1: damn good game was Rodney Thomas. And now he can't run.
- 24:14Speaker 1: He's not Kobe Bryant. There's things you saw in the
- 24:17Speaker 1: run support he couldn't do, but he didn't have any
- 24:20Speaker 1: glaring mistakes. And so now he's a half safety on there.
- 24:23Speaker 1: So if you're in the quarterback coaches meet, if you're
- 24:25Speaker 1: Josh McDonald this morning, you're going, dude, you know it's
- 24:28Speaker 1: covered too. Like, how are we going to be that late?
- 24:31Speaker 1: You know the safety is going to get over the NFL. Now,
- 24:34Speaker 1: by scheme, they had a 20-yard hook that was supposed
- 24:39Speaker 1: to hold the safety in front. And that's where... what
- 24:42Speaker 1: can look to be so easy from a camera, the TV,
- 24:47Speaker 1: you actually get at the ground level and your depth perception.
- 24:50Speaker 1: You're like, Oh, I think that the, maybe my 20
- 24:52Speaker 1: yard hook is holding that safety. Well, no Thomas or, uh, uh, sorry. Uh, yeah.
- 24:58Speaker 1: Rodney Thomas, he was backed off enough. Any NFL quarterback
- 25:02Speaker 1: has got to see that. So that that's his first interception. The,
- 25:05Speaker 1: the second one, the Julian one, Julian Love, 925 to go.
- 25:09Speaker 1: What was the score on that one? It was 10-10
- 25:15Speaker 1: at that time. And that was right after the Dobbs
- 25:20Speaker 1: dropped the corner out. So it was third and 14
- 25:23Speaker 1: at the minus 22. Patriots get into a formation where
- 25:30Speaker 1: they have a back on either side. That tells you
- 25:32Speaker 1: right off the bat that Josh McDonald is worried about protection.
- 25:36Speaker 1: Cause only got three receivers going out. So from Julian
- 25:39Speaker 1: love standpoint, he is, he is on the weak side
- 25:44Speaker 1: of the formation, but this is the wrinkle. There's always
- 25:47Speaker 1: something detail. And the detail was, is this, there's a
- 25:51Speaker 1: term called will walk. Okay. Can you say that with me?
- 25:55Speaker 1: Will walk.
- 25:56Speaker 2: Okay.
- 25:56Speaker 1: All right. And Will is the linebacker, and when he's
- 26:01Speaker 1: walked out, you can even call it a Will jam.
- 26:04Speaker 1: When the weak side linebacker is jamming the split end,
- 26:08Speaker 1: now that's a form of double coverage. I'm going to
- 26:11Speaker 1: say the Seahawks did it last year because they probably
- 26:13Speaker 1: did it, but they do not have any kind of
- 26:16Speaker 1: a heavy diet of doing that. So they take Drake
- 26:19Speaker 1: Thomas and they jam him over the top of the
- 26:22Speaker 1: split and to the boundary. And there's a safety or
- 26:26Speaker 1: a corner rather over the top of that. So if
- 26:29Speaker 1: you're Julian Love and you're retreating, what am I seeing?
- 26:33Speaker 1: I'm Julian Love. Okay, I'm on the right side of
- 26:35Speaker 1: the field. What do I see? I got the three
- 26:38Speaker 1: receiver side is opposite to me. Um, I got, I'm
- 26:42Speaker 1: on the two receiver side, but I've got Drake Thomas
- 26:45Speaker 1: jamming my split end to my side. So I don't
- 26:48Speaker 1: have to worry about my split end. I just have
- 26:50Speaker 1: to worry about the, the, the tight end who's in
- 26:52Speaker 1: the backfield. He's not going to get vertical on a
- 26:55Speaker 1: third and 14 enough that I have to worry. So
- 26:58Speaker 1: now I can turn and I can poach to the
- 26:59Speaker 1: three receiver side. I, a poach is a term where
- 27:02Speaker 1: you're on the weak side, but you, you, uh, you're
- 27:06Speaker 1: aligned to the weak side, but you look to the
- 27:07Speaker 1: strong side. So now it's a seam route. Um, Drake
- 27:11Speaker 1: May goes five steps from shotgun. He's way late. Five
- 27:14Speaker 1: steps and a hitch. That should be from shotgun. That
- 27:17Speaker 1: should be three steps. You want to hit that ball
- 27:20Speaker 1: between 18 and 22 yards on a seam rock. Anywhere
- 27:24Speaker 1: beyond 22 yards, you're bringing in the deep, you know,
- 27:27Speaker 1: you're late. Well, the ball snapped on the 22. It
- 27:30Speaker 1: was caught by Love on the 47. That's 25 yards.
- 27:34Speaker 1: And so it's very late timing. It's late. Drake may
- 27:38Speaker 1: not understand. And he looked over to his left, uh,
- 27:42Speaker 1: you know, and he had that will walk that will
- 27:44Speaker 1: jam in the person of Drake Thomas, uh, And so
- 27:47Speaker 1: just a bad read, a bad understanding. And it's Julian Love,
- 27:51Speaker 1: who's right now in the prime of his career. He
- 27:54Speaker 1: is savvy enough, knowledgeable enough, but he still is young.
- 27:59Speaker 1: He covers a lot of ground. He takes very good angles.
- 28:03Speaker 1: He's willing to throw his body in there. You know,
- 28:06Speaker 1: just a DB in the dead prime of his career
- 28:08Speaker 1: and playing at a very smart level and made another
- 28:11Speaker 1: big play.
- 28:12Speaker 2: All right, and then the biggest play was the Josh
- 28:15Speaker 2: Jobe interception to pretty much clinch the game. Drake May
- 28:20Speaker 2: had a field goal. The Patriots had a field goal.
- 28:23Speaker 2: If they just don't turn the ball over and instead
- 28:26Speaker 2: he turns the ball over.
- 28:28Speaker 1: Yeah, and a few things going on there. So the
- 28:31Speaker 1: Seahawks are playing a three deep four under zone and
- 28:35Speaker 1: Julian Love is the flat defender. Now the Seahawks are
- 28:40Speaker 1: in the top five in the league. in terms of
- 28:44Speaker 1: defenses with two safeties high. In this case, it's only
- 28:48Speaker 1: a one safety high. And so instead of having three
- 28:53Speaker 1: guys underneath, there's four guys underneath. If Julian Love was
- 28:56Speaker 1: the flat defender, now he'd be a back-end guy if
- 29:00Speaker 1: it was a two high. But if it was a
- 29:03Speaker 1: two high structure, then the flat defender... would be aligned
- 29:08Speaker 1: on the inside of what's called the number two, counting
- 29:11Speaker 1: outside in. He would align inside. But because it's a
- 29:15Speaker 1: three deep four under, now Julian Love, who's close to
- 29:19Speaker 1: the line of scrimmage, he's going to line up outside
- 29:22Speaker 1: of the tight end instead of inside. The tight end's
- 29:26Speaker 1: running an outside breaking route. So Julian Love has leverage
- 29:30Speaker 1: on the tight end. Uh, that was, that was a 85, uh,
- 29:37Speaker 1: Hunter Henry.
- 29:37Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 29:37Speaker 1: That's the best idea. So. but but but now from
- 29:41Speaker 1: a a patriot perspective number 13 the big receiver um
- 29:46Speaker 1: mac holland mac holland's there's a term called morgo m-o-r-g-o
- 29:52Speaker 1: Morgo mandatory outside release go route. If you have somebody
- 29:56Speaker 1: from the inside breaking out, you must do a Morgo. Um,
- 30:01Speaker 1: I was on a team. We called it a bus ticket. Uh, um,
- 30:04Speaker 1: like even if you get jammed into the Gatorade and
- 30:07Speaker 1: you're out of bounds, you have to take an outside
- 30:10Speaker 1: release to take the corner out and get him outside.
- 30:14Speaker 1: So 13 bus on that play, he go, he takes
- 30:17Speaker 1: an inside release and he's got a go route. He's
- 30:19Speaker 1: got the clear out what that allows is, is that
- 30:24Speaker 1: Job turns inside, not outside, because of the inside release.
- 30:31Speaker 1: So his eyes are looking at the receiver, but he's
- 30:34Speaker 1: also in a much better position to see the ball.
- 30:38Speaker 1: And then there's a further point on this. You got
- 30:41Speaker 1: Demarcus Lawrence, the right tackle for the Patriots. He tried
- 30:46Speaker 1: to cut him the way you would in the quick game.
- 30:50Speaker 1: He just, he goes right at his knees. Lawrence recognizes this.
- 30:53Speaker 1: He uses his hands. He jumps over. So now Drake may.
- 30:57Speaker 1: So what does Drake may see? He says, Oh, he's
- 31:00Speaker 1: got with, I got with a spoon to my left.
- 31:02Speaker 1: I don't want to go over there. I want to go.
- 31:04Speaker 1: What I want is to go to Hunter Henry against,
- 31:10Speaker 1: against Julian love. Oh, they're in a, they're not usually
- 31:13Speaker 1: in a, in a four under they're usually in a
- 31:16Speaker 1: three under, but I can still beat him. But now, oh,
- 31:19Speaker 1: what the hell, I've got Demarcus Lawrence right in my lap.
- 31:23Speaker 1: So now he can't throw on time against Julian Love.
- 31:29Speaker 1: So now he just says, oh, wait, wait, wait. I
- 31:32Speaker 1: know in my scouting report, even going back to the
- 31:35Speaker 1: Super Bowl, that we can pick on Josh Jobe, and
- 31:37Speaker 1: certainly with a 6'4, Matt Collins is at 6'4, 221.
- 31:43Speaker 1: I got a rebounding advantage. I'll throw it up. this
- 31:47Speaker 1: is what I'm, I'm speculating, um, is going through his
- 31:51Speaker 1: head and it was a horrible play. You know, if
- 31:54Speaker 1: he's going to give him a chance, he's got to
- 31:56Speaker 1: give him a better chance. And yet that's, that's what
- 32:00Speaker 1: happened in that is, uh, is, is, is that you
- 32:05Speaker 1: got to Marcus Lawrence, you got the cover three with
- 32:07Speaker 1: Julian love on the outside. Julian love was able to
- 32:10Speaker 1: fire down on it and, and cover it. And now
- 32:13Speaker 1: he's goes, okay, what's my, my, my next option was
- 32:16Speaker 1: let me try and win the game with a rebound.
- 32:19Speaker 1: And he just, he underthrew the ball just for him. Yeah. Yeah.
- 32:23Speaker 1: And the toe dance by, by a corner, that was
- 32:26Speaker 1: a wide risk. That was Chris Carter. Remember Chris Carter?
- 32:29Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 32:30Speaker 1: Remember him toe dancing and Larry Fitzgerald all day. I'll
- 32:32Speaker 1: be like that. Yeah. I mean, that's, that's doing fresh
- 32:36Speaker 1: Fred Astaire stuff, man, on those guidelines for, for a corner. So, yeah, he,
- 32:43Speaker 1: he would probably prefer to, Think of somebody beside Fred Astaire,
- 32:47Speaker 1: but we'll let that go.
- 32:51Speaker 2: All right.
- 32:52Speaker 1: Hugh Millen is with us. We've got a lot more
- 32:54Speaker 1: ground to cover.
- 32:54Speaker 2: Like I said, I do want to get into Brian
- 32:56Speaker 2: Flory and Jadarian Price. Probably save that for the top
- 32:59Speaker 2: of the hour at 9 o'clock. But there's some other
- 33:02Speaker 2: things that we can cover. In our next segment, so
- 33:05Speaker 2: much to talk about in last night's 13-10 win over
- 33:08Speaker 2: the New England Patriots.
- 33:09Speaker 1: Fascinating game.
- 33:10Speaker 2: And we got the fascinating guy to give us all
- 33:12Speaker 2: the fascinating analysis.
- 33:14Speaker 1: Right here on Sports Radio 93.3 KJR FM. It's a block. Block.
- 33:16Speaker 1: Up top. For Cuff, he made a catch. Cooper Cuff.
- 33:25Speaker 2: Shades of that amazing grab he made in Philadelphia in
- 33:28Speaker 2: the playoff game.
- 33:30Speaker 1: With the Rams a few years ago. That was big.
- 33:36Speaker 2: Now, that's a play that you know impacted the game, right?
- 33:39Speaker 2: That's right before your eyes. That was a big play
- 33:43Speaker 2: in the end. We needed a big play at that
- 33:45Speaker 2: point in the game. But, Hugh, I've got to ask
- 33:48Speaker 2: you about, because I'd like to kind of know in
- 33:51Speaker 2: an alternate universe, plays that don't happen.
- 33:54Speaker 1: And how they impact the game.
- 33:56Speaker 2: I'd like to be able to sit on the cloud
- 33:58Speaker 2: with the Archangel Gabriel and ask him, hey, if the
- 34:01Speaker 2: Patriots would have ran that play last night in that
- 34:05Speaker 2: game against the Seahawks before Mike McDonald called what seemed
- 34:10Speaker 2: to be kind of an odd time for a timeout.
- 34:13Speaker 1: Had they run that play?
- 34:14Speaker 2: Had Mike not gotten the timeout called, what would have happened?
- 34:17Speaker 1: So I'll ask you, what would have happened? Yeah. Well,
- 34:22Speaker 1: we don't know how the Patriots might have exploited Seattle's
- 34:28Speaker 1: unsound defense. I'll tell you what I can say with 99.9%
- 34:33Speaker 1: certainty happened. The Seahawks were up in a cover zero
- 34:39Speaker 1: look with eight men on the line of scrimmage. And
- 34:45Speaker 1: what cover zero means is there's man-to-man with the eligible
- 34:49Speaker 1: receivers outside. and there's no safety help whatsoever. And so
- 34:53Speaker 1: it's going to be an all-out, some people call it
- 34:55Speaker 1: casino blitz, call it whatever terminology you want. The Patriots
- 35:01Speaker 1: took number 85, Hunter Henry, the tight end, and against
- 35:05Speaker 1: that look, they just said, screw it. We'll put him
- 35:08Speaker 1: up two yards behind the line of scrimmage right there
- 35:10Speaker 1: in the A-gap to block. And that was where Rodney
- 35:16Speaker 1: Thomas was. who's filling in for Okada, who's filling in
- 35:21Speaker 1: for Kobe Bryant, and there's no Bud Clark, so we're
- 35:25Speaker 1: down to a guy literally who was on the street
- 35:29Speaker 1: a week ago in Rodney Thomas, who still played pretty
- 35:32Speaker 1: damn well. Well, his coverage assignment, he had 85, and
- 35:38Speaker 1: he originally lined up, but somehow through some communication or miscommunication,
- 35:44Speaker 1: he then walked out to the edge of Now, everything
- 35:48Speaker 1: would have been fine if the Patriots snapped the ball
- 35:51Speaker 1: and Hunter Henry had just stayed in the block. But
- 35:56Speaker 1: what if he had released? What if he had bluff
- 35:59Speaker 1: blocked and ran right down the middle of the field,
- 36:03Speaker 1: which Josh McDaniels has been known to do? Tom Brady,
- 36:06Speaker 1: they used to pants people with guys that are seemingly
- 36:11Speaker 1: running backs in blitz protection. They step up like they're
- 36:14Speaker 1: going to block, and then they bluff, and then they release.
- 36:16Speaker 1: And Tom Brady has had a number of wide open
- 36:19Speaker 1: walk-ins with that. And so Mike McDonald, he's sitting there,
- 36:23Speaker 1: he's waving to go, cover 85, cover 85. And then
- 36:27Speaker 1: he had to call a timeout because it would have
- 36:29Speaker 1: looked really gnarly on national TV for him, Mike McDonald,
- 36:34Speaker 1: to get pantsed in the manner I just described because
- 36:37Speaker 1: Hunter Henry would have gone right down. I'm going to
- 36:40Speaker 1: go to the way back machine for Seahawks fans. When
- 36:43Speaker 1: Efren Herrera, ran right through the middle of the field
- 36:46Speaker 1: goal formation on a Monday night football against the Falcons,
- 36:48Speaker 1: and Jim Zorn hit him right down the middle. Yeah,
- 36:51Speaker 1: that happened. That's not a dream I had. That's a kicker, right?
- 36:55Speaker 1: That's a kicker. That's this little chubby Mexican guy that
- 37:02Speaker 1: looks like he's had too many burritos, man. Somehow he's
- 37:06Speaker 1: waddling down. He made the catch. It was incredible. But, yeah,
- 37:11Speaker 1: that could have happened had they not adjusted. Yeah. Wow.
- 37:15Speaker 2: Um, another feather in the cap for Mike McDonald then.
- 37:19Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 37:20Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 37:20Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, he just knew, okay, this is a five
- 37:22Speaker 1: alarm fire here. I got to put this out immediately. Yeah.
- 37:25Speaker 1: And good, good thing he had a.
- 37:26Speaker 2: And, and look at timeouts right there were pretty valuable
- 37:30Speaker 2: to have. So, um, to say, Hey, I got to
- 37:34Speaker 2: burn one. I got to burn one of these and
- 37:35Speaker 2: then we'll worry about it later.
- 37:37Speaker 1: You have to have an answer for five eligible receivers
- 37:40Speaker 1: when you're in cover zero. Like, how are we going
- 37:42Speaker 1: to do it? And sometimes it's a defensive end peeling
- 37:45Speaker 1: if the running back happens to peel on a swing route. Like,
- 37:48Speaker 1: sometimes you say, that's not really sound. If they know
- 37:52Speaker 1: how to execute, they're going to beat us. But at
- 37:54Speaker 1: least it's remotely sound. But the way that they were
- 38:00Speaker 1: fixing to snap that ball, there was literally nobody for
- 38:03Speaker 1: an eligible receiver. And Hunter Henry, one of the better
- 38:08Speaker 1: tight ends in the league, right? Yeah.
- 38:10Speaker 2: I just want to say for the record that one
- 38:12Speaker 2: of my favorite football cards as a kid was Efren Herrera.
- 38:16Speaker 1: Wasn't he a delight? Yeah, I loved the Efren Herrera.
- 38:18Speaker 1: He was a fan favorite. We all loved Efren, man.
- 38:21Speaker 1: But we never smiled wider than when he ran down
- 38:24Speaker 1: the middle of the field. Who would even design that play?
- 38:27Speaker 1: If you put that on a whiteboard, you're fired. You're fired.
- 38:33Speaker 1: Just the idea that you think that would work. But
- 38:35Speaker 1: it worked. That's the greatest pass Jim Zorn ever completed
- 38:39Speaker 1: in his life. How do you hit that target? I mean,
- 38:43Speaker 1: you have to just walk it to him, right? Yeah, yeah.
- 38:47Speaker 2: Our Monday morning quarterback session continues. We've got one more
- 38:50Speaker 2: fat segment, and we've got a lot of ground to cover.
- 38:53Speaker 2: We're going to talk about some penalties last night, including
- 38:56Speaker 2: some really dumb ones. Jadarian Price's debut, Brian Fleury's debut.
- 39:01Speaker 2: So a lot more ground to cover with our QB1
- 39:05Speaker 2: here on this Monday morning quarterback session on a Thursday,
- 39:08Speaker 2: Sports Radio 93.3 KJRFM.