Latest / Mac & Bone Podcast / Mac & Bone Show - Jim Szoke Interview
Transcript
- 0:20Speaker 1: Sports Radio 92.7 WFNZ. Mack and Bone with you. It
- 0:26Speaker 1: does need to be noted, Bone, and shame on me,
- 0:29Speaker 1: noted Panther Homer, for not pointing this out, Bone, until now.
- 0:34Speaker 1: And thanks to the multiple texters who have pointed it out.
- 0:37Speaker 1: We need to focus on the fact that as horrendous
- 0:39Speaker 1: as it was defensively yesterday, we are tied for first
- 0:42Speaker 1: place right now in the NFC South.
- 0:43Speaker 2: How did we go this long, Bo? That's the headline.
- 0:46Speaker 1: Yeah, how did we go this long? Jim Zoki joins us,
- 0:48Speaker 1: Panther Radio Network. Zok, I'm not on my Homer game today.
- 0:52Speaker 2: How did it take this long for us to acknowledge that?
- 0:54Speaker 3: I mean, the lead was right there in front of
- 0:55Speaker 3: you the whole time. The first place Carolina Panthers had
- 0:58Speaker 3: to Atlanta for a tough division game this week.
- 1:00Speaker 2: First place battle.
- 1:01Speaker 4: Also fourth in the league in points scored right now,
- 1:04Speaker 4: by the way. Offensively on a roll right now.
- 1:06Speaker 2: There you go. Behind, well... I don't want to tell
- 1:09Speaker 2: you who's number one in points.
- 1:11Speaker 4: Baltimore and Minnesota, a very high-scoring Week 1 yesterday.
- 1:15Speaker 1: It was.
- 1:16Speaker 2: It was.
- 1:16Speaker 1: And our matchup was the most high-scoring Week 1 matchup ever.
- 1:19Speaker 2: 96 points. And we were glad to help out. The
- 1:22Speaker 2: Panthers 37-0, I guess.
- 1:24Speaker 3: Yeah, without our help, that game would never have been
- 1:26Speaker 3: the record-setting performance that it was.
- 1:28Speaker 1: If we played our regular Week 1 offense, 59-10, that
- 1:30Speaker 1: wouldn't have set any records. It could be worse, y'all.
- 1:34Speaker 1: Our offense could play like it normally does in week one.
- 1:37Speaker 2: That would have been a really bad Monday. Oh, man.
- 1:39Speaker 2: You ain't kidding. You ain't kidding.
- 1:41Speaker 1: What did you, I mean, as you're watching this thing,
- 1:45Speaker 1: what are you thinking about that defensive performance? Because it was,
- 1:48Speaker 1: we spent the last few weeks stressing out about the offense,
- 1:51Speaker 1: and I couldn't say enough about the top 10 defense.
- 1:55Speaker 3: We spent most of last week in our conversations, including
- 1:58Speaker 3: in here last Thursday, about Should Bryce Young's contract be extended?
- 2:01Speaker 2: And he was literally.
- 2:03Speaker 3: The highlight of the Panther day was the way Bryce
- 2:06Speaker 3: Young played. And, again, no, that's not the greatest defense, Chicago,
- 2:11Speaker 3: despite their retooling of it.
- 2:13Speaker 2: It's still not a great defense.
- 2:14Speaker 3: And we knew on the other side that's an explosive
- 2:16Speaker 3: Chicago offense. Ben Johnson famously said they want to be
- 2:19Speaker 3: the highest scoring offense in the NFL history. And, well,
- 2:23Speaker 3: they're off to a good start on that, almost a
- 2:25Speaker 3: point per minute, one point away from 60th. So, again,
- 2:29Speaker 3: but I just look at what we've done this offseason
- 2:32Speaker 3: to address the things on defense. And not everybody's healthy
- 2:35Speaker 3: at the same time, but you got the main characters
- 2:37Speaker 3: are out there. I was just floored that it never turned.
- 2:41Speaker 3: Like sometimes a team will get a heater for a
- 2:43Speaker 3: couple of series and then you make adjustments and things
- 2:45Speaker 3: settle down. And we, you know, we get it to
- 2:48Speaker 3: 31-31 in the third quarter. This could be like a
- 2:50Speaker 3: real all-time fun game. Like this could be like The
- 2:53Speaker 3: Rams playoff game, but even more points. Let's go be
- 2:55Speaker 3: in the 40s. This is going to be like a
- 2:57Speaker 3: memorable game. And then it was just all of them
- 2:59Speaker 3: the rest of the way after that. We just never
- 3:01Speaker 3: did have an answer. And the thing that is discouraging
- 3:04Speaker 3: is it wasn't in one category.
- 3:05Speaker 2: It was running. It was passing. It was self-inflicted wounds.
- 3:09Speaker 3: I mean, Derek Brown, our best defensive player, and nobody
- 3:12Speaker 3: was beating himself up more than Derek Brown was beating
- 3:14Speaker 3: himself up, basically led directly to 14 points with the
- 3:18Speaker 3: alignment that took away the interception down in the end zone,
- 3:21Speaker 3: then the roughing the quarterback. He had third and 20
- 3:23Speaker 3: coming up. So basically, those were two touchdowns handed there.
- 3:27Speaker 3: Muff a punt by Jimmy Horns. That sets him up
- 3:29Speaker 3: for a short field. So we helped with it.
- 3:32Speaker 4: But even.
- 3:32Speaker 3: Even when you factor all that in, it's still like
- 3:34Speaker 3: 40 points they would have scored. But I was stunned
- 3:37Speaker 3: that it never turned at any point in the four
- 3:38Speaker 3: quarters away from that.
- 3:39Speaker 4: What do you think is real, legitimate, long-term concerns defensively?
- 3:44Speaker 4: And what do you think is some of it week one,
- 3:47Speaker 4: the Bears being awesome and stuff that can definitely be
- 3:49Speaker 4: fixed relatively soon? With Atlanta and Cleveland coming up, some
- 3:53Speaker 4: things will look a little better.
- 3:54Speaker 2: The schedule's going to help a lot.
- 3:55Speaker 3: I mean, honestly, to be that way, it's like Atlanta
- 3:57Speaker 3: and Cleveland don't– have the ability to put up 59
- 4:00Speaker 3: points in this season. So that's not going to be
- 4:03Speaker 3: a concern. So that helps that the competition gets easier.
- 4:07Speaker 3: It felt like there were probably, based on, it was
- 4:09Speaker 3: very collegiate. I thought the game had, sometimes you watch
- 4:11Speaker 3: college football, you go, well, you don't see plays like
- 4:13Speaker 3: that in the pros where the quarterback drops back to
- 4:15Speaker 3: throw and he runs 30 yards. It's one thing to
- 4:17Speaker 3: run 30 yards, but to run 30 yards and not
- 4:19Speaker 3: see a jersey for 30 yards, as Caleb Williams did,
- 4:22Speaker 3: that's very collegiate. college where the breakdowns are that severe.
- 4:24Speaker 3: We played Big 12 defense is what you're saying.
- 4:27Speaker 2: It was like the old whack days with BYU or something.
- 4:30Speaker 3: But it's like, I felt like that leads to the
- 4:32Speaker 3: fact that it's like, that's not like technique and tackling.
- 4:35Speaker 3: That's just like missed assignments and people not in the
- 4:38Speaker 3: places they're supposed to be. And so obviously it burned,
- 4:42Speaker 3: it's going to burn them. The fire is going to
- 4:43Speaker 3: be lit and they're going to be working at correcting
- 4:46Speaker 3: all those kinds of issues, which are self-inflicted, correctable things.
- 4:49Speaker 3: And again, give credit to Chicago by the end of
- 4:51Speaker 3: the year, they very well may be, uh, the highest
- 4:54Speaker 3: scoring number one yardage team in the NFL. So a
- 4:57Speaker 3: rough opponent to start with. But again, that was a
- 4:59Speaker 3: ridiculous number, 550 yards, 59 points. And, uh, As we said,
- 5:04Speaker 3: record-setting Panthers have never given up 52. I knew because
- 5:06Speaker 3: I looked up during the game. I was thinking, oh, yeah,
- 5:08Speaker 3: it's right, 52 with the Raiders back.
- 5:10Speaker 2: In the day and another time, I think. The Pittsburgh
- 5:13Speaker 2: 2018 Thursday nighter where Cam got hit on the shoulder
- 5:17Speaker 2: was 52 to Pittsburgh. Yeah, that's right. And 52 is plenty.
- 5:21Speaker 3: But when they got 59, I was like– Dang it.
- 5:23Speaker 2: When they put up a Luke Keekly on the damn scoreboard,
- 5:26Speaker 2: I'm just like, this ain't right. This is sick.
- 5:28Speaker 3: This is how we celebrate Luke Keekly?
- 5:31Speaker 1: Somebody texted Willie P and said, you did this to
- 5:34Speaker 1: Luke in his Hall of Fame year.
- 5:36Speaker 2: How dare you play defense like that?
- 5:38Speaker 3: I bet it wasn't a day like we raised the
- 5:39Speaker 3: 59 banner or something.
- 5:41Speaker 2: That's true. Could have been worse. Could have been worse.
- 5:43Speaker 4: That game, Zoki, as you know, broadcasting the game because
- 5:46Speaker 4: of how high scoring it was. At one point, Jacksonville-Cleveland
- 5:50Speaker 4: was done with their game, and the Panthers were still
- 5:53Speaker 4: in the third quarter. Yeah, that was a long game.
- 5:55Speaker 4: The end of that game was just the longest game ever. Yeah,
- 5:59Speaker 4: the length of a college football game. Back to Zoki's point, man.
- 6:01Speaker 2: My God. Oh, my God.
- 6:03Speaker 1: Jim Zoki with us, the Monday view from the booth
- 6:05Speaker 1: that he joins us for. Zok, so you said, OK,
- 6:10Speaker 1: we have so much talent on this defense. It's clearly
- 6:13Speaker 1: the most talent we've had since Avero's been here. But
- 6:16Speaker 1: I think that leads to people saying, we bought you
- 6:20Speaker 1: all this talent. Why the heck do we play our
- 6:22Speaker 1: worst defensive game ever? Does that mean it's coaching? What
- 6:28Speaker 1: do you say about that? Because that's the whole thing.
- 6:30Speaker 2: Is it coaching? I guess it's everybody when you get 59.
- 6:33Speaker 3: Again, this was extreme, 59 points. But there were times
- 6:35Speaker 3: last year where we had games that were almost that extreme.
- 6:39Speaker 3: If this is 10 out of 10, we had some
- 6:40Speaker 3: 8 out of 10s last year. where we've had these
- 6:42Speaker 3: same conversations. And I feel like last year in finishing
- 6:45Speaker 3: kind of middle of the pack defensively, it was that
- 6:48Speaker 3: like they'd have a really bad showing and then they
- 6:50Speaker 3: would show up and go, okay, now we see it.
- 6:52Speaker 3: We just had six quarterback sacks in the game following
- 6:55Speaker 3: that and we held them to 17 points. So again,
- 6:58Speaker 3: I think people will probably settle down on that aspect
- 7:01Speaker 3: of it over the next couple of weeks. Doesn't excuse
- 7:04Speaker 3: what happened yesterday. And I'm sure the coaching staff always
- 7:07Speaker 3: points at themselves first before the players out there. But again, like,
- 7:10Speaker 3: you know, Will Lee did have the fumble recovery early on,
- 7:13Speaker 3: but he talked about obviously giving up a good number
- 7:15Speaker 3: of yards out there.
- 7:15Speaker 2: So you're trusting a rookie.
- 7:17Speaker 3: And so maybe, you know, do we do we dial
- 7:20Speaker 3: that back a little bit more for the first part
- 7:22Speaker 3: of the season.
- 7:23Speaker 2: And get J.C.
- 7:24Speaker 3: Where we need him the most, maybe more on the
- 7:26Speaker 3: outside and and doing some things schematically that are, you know,
- 7:29Speaker 3: putting your best players in their best position more often.
- 7:31Speaker 3: Like we talked about, you know, now do we have
- 7:33Speaker 3: enough work? And Gerald can open it up like you
- 7:35Speaker 3: open up the offensive playbook. Can we open up the
- 7:37Speaker 3: defensive playbook? and be more risky, be more gambling, move
- 7:41Speaker 3: some pieces around, be less predictable. Maybe we need to
- 7:44Speaker 3: be a little bit more best players in best positions
- 7:46Speaker 3: and then go after that as the season goes on,
- 7:49Speaker 3: as we get a little bit more confident.
- 7:50Speaker 1: They did blitz a ton. PFF had them with 54%
- 7:53Speaker 1: blitz percentage. I actually thought Devin Lloyd on the blitz.
- 7:57Speaker 1: was better than Devin Lloyd, you know, back in coverage
- 8:00Speaker 1: or run defense. He is savage when he blitzes. And
- 8:03Speaker 1: we had a little success, but ultimately, Bone, like, it
- 8:06Speaker 1: didn't matter.
- 8:07Speaker 2: We blitzed.
- 8:08Speaker 1: I think PFF had Caleb Williams with a 146 passer rating.
- 8:11Speaker 2: We didn't blitz. He had, like, a 120. Like, it
- 8:14Speaker 2: didn't matter. He's very elusive.
- 8:15Speaker 3: God, that was killing us, the elusiveness. We're walking through
- 8:18Speaker 3: the halls after the game. We got the postgame show.
- 8:20Speaker 3: It says me and Eugene with Pacheco.
- 8:22Speaker 2: And we run into Michael Dean Perry all the time. Oh, nice.
- 8:25Speaker 4: Yeah.
- 8:26Speaker 3: And I had to talk a little Cleveland Browns with
- 8:28Speaker 3: him while we were there, but he and Eugene know
- 8:29Speaker 3: each other well. And they started talking about it, and
- 8:32Speaker 3: in a couple minutes we stood there, and he said.
- 8:34Speaker 2: One word over and over again, which is contained. Yeah,
- 8:36Speaker 2: I knew what you were going to say.
- 8:37Speaker 3: It's contained, contained, contained, because when you have a quarterback
- 8:40Speaker 3: that elusive— it doesn't rattle him because he can make
- 8:42Speaker 3: the freakish plays that very few quarterbacks in the league
- 8:45Speaker 3: can with his feet.
- 8:45Speaker 2: You've got to keep him in that pocket. How many
- 8:48Speaker 2: times they lose that contain?
- 8:49Speaker 3: Yeah, you're not going to surprise. Now, we got to
- 8:51Speaker 3: him a couple times, no doubt. Jalen Phillips with the sack,
- 8:54Speaker 3: and I think Prinsley had one yesterday. So we had
- 8:56Speaker 3: some moments, but you're not percentage-wise going to be able
- 8:58Speaker 3: to hold that up because he's so elusive. And it
- 9:00Speaker 3: may not be that he takes off and runs for
- 9:02Speaker 3: 30 yards, but extends the play with his feet. So
- 9:04Speaker 3: you just kind of want to keep him there and
- 9:06Speaker 3: maybe almost drop and take more counterattacks coverage away from
- 9:09Speaker 3: him as far as not trying to get to him
- 9:11Speaker 3: because he's not easy to rattle out there. He just
- 9:14Speaker 3: invents a new play every time you try to go
- 9:15Speaker 3: after him.
- 9:16Speaker 2: He was killing us when he had to move. Just
- 9:19Speaker 2: killing us.
- 9:21Speaker 4: About 99% of texts coming in right now are all
- 9:24Speaker 4: blaming Averro, which I get it. You give up that
- 9:26Speaker 4: many points, yeah, the coaches will be blamed. But there's
- 9:30Speaker 4: got to be some accountability. And I know there is
- 9:32Speaker 4: with Derrick Brown. But there's got to be blame on
- 9:35Speaker 4: the players just simply not executing also here.
- 9:38Speaker 3: I mean, it's all going towards Averro. No one human
- 9:40Speaker 3: gave up the 59 points. It was a collective effort.
- 9:44Speaker 2: Averro's not telling Princely, hey, don't steal the edge. Yeah,
- 9:46Speaker 2: all the edge is not containing. Like, we're sitting here.
- 9:49Speaker 1: I love when we think we know more than football
- 9:51Speaker 1: lifers about football. And I do it, too. I do it, too,
- 9:54Speaker 1: like a dummy. But it's like, I'm pretty sure, why
- 9:58Speaker 1: was I going to call you smoke?
- 9:59Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure.
- 10:00Speaker 4: Zoke.
- 10:00Speaker 2: Zoke, not Smoke. Jim Smokey is a great name. But
- 10:03Speaker 2: we do have a Smoke that works. I'm pretty sure, Zoke, that. Hey, y'all,
- 10:06Speaker 2: how are your mom and him?
- 10:08Speaker 1: That a big focus going in was trying to keep
- 10:11Speaker 1: him contained. But the execution was bad. How many times
- 10:14Speaker 1: did Princely get sucked inside? Almost like the tackles know
- 10:17Speaker 1: what they're doing, definitely, right? Oh, let me get you
- 10:20Speaker 1: in there. Now I got you pinned. Caleb, go outside.
- 10:22Speaker 1: And it wasn't just him. It happened to Gibson. It
- 10:24Speaker 1: happened to Jeremiah Moon. It happened to Phillips. As good
- 10:26Speaker 1: as Phillips was on a couple of those plays, set
- 10:29Speaker 1: the edge. It happened to him. Now, one thing I
- 10:31Speaker 1: will say, and your guy, big time Bernie Bowles, who
- 10:34Speaker 1: you work with over there at WBT.
- 10:36Speaker 2: Wait, we got a Bernie Bowles? I guess this is great.
- 10:38Speaker 2: I can't wait to hear this. Bernie Bowles.
- 10:40Speaker 1: He's usually worried about the Iran war and worried about
- 10:44Speaker 1: culture wars destroying America because he works at WBT. But
- 10:47Speaker 1: he took a minute to talk ball with us today,
- 10:50Speaker 1: and he said, where was the spy? And when I
- 10:52Speaker 1: watched the game back last night— now, I'm not watching all 22—
- 10:55Speaker 1: I noticed one.
- 10:55Speaker 3: Play where I'm like, I'm like.
- 10:59Speaker 1: I saw one play early in the game where I'm like, okay,
- 11:02Speaker 1: Lloyd was spying. Like four guys rushed and he just
- 11:04Speaker 1: kind of stood right behind it. But other than that,
- 11:07Speaker 1: when you talk about Caleb taking off and no one
- 11:09Speaker 1: being there, like there was, there was not much spying.
- 11:13Speaker 1: But again, I don't know. He's probably worried about taking
- 11:15Speaker 1: a guy out coverage. So I don't know. This is
- 11:18Speaker 1: where I probably don't know enough defensive schematics.
- 11:21Speaker 3: It's a little pick of your poison, and obviously there
- 11:23Speaker 3: was plenty of poison to go around with what we
- 11:26Speaker 3: put out there. I was thinking about the fact they
- 11:27Speaker 3: almost scored a point a minute, so I was looking
- 11:28Speaker 3: up the time they actually had. So they actually scored
- 11:30Speaker 3: 59 in 34 minutes of offense.
- 11:33Speaker 2: That got worse. They're more at scoring than the Bulls.
- 11:36Speaker 2: Because usually there's not enough time for two teams to
- 11:38Speaker 2: score that. I mean, think about it.
- 11:39Speaker 3: They didn't possess the ball as much as you would
- 11:41Speaker 3: normally need to score 59 points, which makes it even
- 11:44Speaker 3: worse in that we scored 37. which means we ate
- 11:46Speaker 3: up a lot of clock, spent a lot of time
- 11:49Speaker 3: with the football. It makes it even more impressive they
- 11:51Speaker 3: scored 59 in the bit of time that they had,
- 11:53Speaker 3: which obviously sometimes was scoring quickly. But it's just like,
- 11:56Speaker 3: it's not me. And again, it's like, hey, you know what?
- 11:59Speaker 3: This is probably the best scoring yardage team by the
- 12:03Speaker 3: end of the year in the NFL. Probably number one
- 12:05Speaker 3: in both those categories, if not top three. So again,
- 12:07Speaker 3: that doesn't excuse the fact that we are supposed to
- 12:10Speaker 3: be much improved on defense. I'm not saying that, but
- 12:12Speaker 3: it's just like, Anyway, for week one, maybe if we
- 12:15Speaker 3: saw them later in the year, we would contain it.
- 12:19Speaker 3: Michael Dean Perry, but for this one, we didn't contain anything.
- 12:21Speaker 1: We definitely missed the two edges that were out. I'm
- 12:23Speaker 1: sure they could have probably helped us.
- 12:26Speaker 3: About Ben Johnson, fourth and one is on 21. It
- 12:28Speaker 3: was actually, even though he lost the moment, vindicated overall
- 12:31Speaker 3: in his approach that we could overcome that, even if
- 12:34Speaker 3: we don't get it, and you score a touchdown.
- 12:36Speaker 2: We still got enough to be able.
- 12:37Speaker 1: To blow this game open. Well, I was ripping him
- 12:40Speaker 1: because I'm like, what the arrogance to do that? And
- 12:42Speaker 1: I'm glad we stuffed that and scored a touchdown off
- 12:45Speaker 1: of it. And that brought us back into the game
- 12:47Speaker 1: at that point. Someone texted in and said, Mac, he
- 12:49Speaker 1: wasn't proven wrong. He was able to do that. and
- 12:53Speaker 1: still put up 59. You know what I mean?
- 12:55Speaker 3: Even though he lost that individual moment, it was still
- 12:58Speaker 3: like overcome by plenty.
- 12:59Speaker 1: And I hate bone. The fact that, and yeah, it's
- 13:02Speaker 1: fire of arrow radio. No, no, not today. It's definitely
- 13:07Speaker 1: fire of arrow all over the text line.
- 13:08Speaker 2: And we'll talk.
- 13:09Speaker 1: I mean, listen, he's got to be shredded today. There's
- 13:11Speaker 1: no doubt about it. His defense gave up 59 points.
- 13:14Speaker 1: The fire guy after week one is where y'all lose me. Um,
- 13:17Speaker 1: I do want to say this though, the facts Oak,
- 13:20Speaker 1: that he talks such a big game in the off season,
- 13:22Speaker 1: Ben Johnson, we want to score the most points in
- 13:25Speaker 1: NFL history. And the fact bone that we sat here
- 13:27Speaker 1: and laughed at him for that. And he went out
- 13:29Speaker 1: there and validated against our defense. God, that hurts, man.
- 13:34Speaker 2: Well, in our defense, he still has to do it
- 13:36Speaker 2: 16 more times. It's true.
- 13:38Speaker 3: I mean, it's a short sample. It's a good sample,
- 13:41Speaker 3: but it's a short sample of proof of that. But
- 13:44Speaker 3: they're off to a very good start.
- 13:46Speaker 2: Yeah, they are. All right, Zoke, you are the man.
- 13:47Speaker 2: All right, guys. Zoke, next week will be more upbeat.
- 13:49Speaker 2: All right. More of a beat show next week.
- 13:51Speaker 3: And next week, if it doesn't go better, we're going
- 13:53Speaker 3: to bring Bernie and have him talk about it.
- 13:54Speaker 2: Yeah, send big-time Bernie Bowles in. Our defensive coordinator, Bernie Bowles.
- 13:57Speaker 2: Is he called big-time Bernie or is that a back-to-back? No,
- 13:59Speaker 2: that's a first-timer on that big-time Bernie. Let him know
- 14:01Speaker 2: and report back what he thinks about it.
- 14:03Speaker 3: I will tell him that in about three minutes when
- 14:04Speaker 3: I go back in there.
- 14:05Speaker 1: Yeah, let him know he's got a new name over here.
- 14:06Speaker 1: Big-time Bernie Bowles talking schemes.
- 14:08Speaker 2: Talking spies.
- 14:09Speaker 4: Spies.