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Reaction: NFL Week 9 + College Week 10 · Unicorn Football Talk

• Emily: Hillary, hey, we are back to talk NFL week nine and college week 10. But I want to let people know this will be our last reaction together for a few weeks. in your absence, Hillary, I will be on with a guest Unicorn next week. And we also have some deep dives ready to publish while you're out. so should we get to it? Hilary: Yeah, let's get to it. I'm excited. We got a lot to talk about this week. Emily: We do. Let's start with the NFL like we always do. The Chargers are still winless. They are and eight. Wow. next up Ravens and Jets. So there's some hope for them, but The number of teams in the history of the NFL that have gone and eight. After winning 11 or more games the year before is zero. So the Chargers are making history this year. Hilary: Not in a good way. Emily: Not in a good way. But I didn't want to just pick on the Chargers. they do suck, but there are two other seller dwellers down there with them. Just as a reminder, the Dolphins still have one win, and the only win was against the two and seven Jets. And the Titans still only have one win against the two and seven Colts. So, there are some other teams that aren't looking so good. Hilary: There are some other teams struggling. Emily: All right, now let's move on to talk about QB injuries. This is something that we started doing week one because there were so many injuries and I keep thinking that this little segment's gonna drop off. And I don't remember a year like this before Hillary. The injuries keep piling up. Hilary: I think our segment length on this is probably tripled this week. Emily: Yeah, so I'm just gonna just for completeness, I'll go through them. I don't know how much I'll comment on it. But after recording last week, Deshaun Watson was ruled out and did not play last weekend because he went into concussion protocol. I do believe he'll be back this weekend. The Seahawks, Sam Darnold, was ruled out after we recorded. that was reported last Wednesday. He had a quad injury. he missed a game and will also miss this weekend. Drew Locke and here's this is just crazy. Drew Locke went in for him last week and also got injured. More injured, because he was injured before the game and he got more hurt. Hilary: Okay, so Drew Locke is starting for the Seahawks or undecided for Sunday? Emily: I think he will start, but he's not doing well. He's got an oblique, so I don't think he'll be practicing. So I think no, no, Hilary: Okay, Jalen Milrow, next guy up. Emily: no. Let's just let's just keep our fingers crossed for Drew Locke. All right. Moving on, because I'm not done. Justin Herbert had a possible fracture in the left middle finger, but imaging showed no fracture. I don't know if he'll start. JG McCarthy he you think he starts? Hilary: He starts. I think so. yeah. Emily: they're 0 8, so I I don't know if he really needs to start. JJ McCarthy left the game for the Giants, but he went back in and he did return to practice. So I think he will play. Mahomes hurt his elbow but kept playing and they had an MRI post game and said no major injury. But I was watching that and it looked really scary. He looked like it was hurt, like for real. And I thought maybe he'd really be out. Cardinals, Gardner Minshew, backup quarterback is likely out for the season. He's definitely on injured reserve, which is four games to be missed. but he got hurt during the Cardinals Seahawks game. third round rookie Carson Beck is the only other QB on the roster as of I think recording. And he presumably will start. And we're not done, Hillary. I'm just gonna keep rolling. Hilary: We're not we're not. Emily: The Dolphins, I read this morning, Malik Willis is now an injured reserve. I just that was as of this morning for a groin injury. Next man up is somebody named Kyle McCord, a sixth round pick of the Eagles in 2025. And the Vikings, Carson Wentz was hurt in Monday night football. so There you go. That was the new ones. I haven't even updated you on the I don't even know if we have time for updates. Hilary: Okay, my only comment on this is one or two comments. One, it's a lot. And two, interesting that a lot of those are upper body injuries this time around, hands, fingers, things like that. A lot of times with quarterbacks, we see knees, ankles, lower extremities. So don't know what's going on there. Maybe just a fluke, but man, that's that that's a that's a lot of hurt. Emily: It's a lot of hurt. And I won't update you on the current ones because I don't really have much of an update, but I did go through and I started thinking what are all the teams that have started their starting quarterback all season? And I counted only seven NFC teams that have started their starting quarterback all season. And if you count the Malik Willis injury, it would be now 13 AFC teams. So I've never seen a year like this that I can remember. Hilary: So in the NFC we're below half. Emily: Yes, we're below half. We're at 46% that have started their starting quarterback all season. And some are Hilary: Wow. Emily: on their third string. So what a year. Okay. I'm gonna move on from that topic. and I guess Hilary: Let's move on. Emily: for kind of like what caught my eye in the NFL, we don't have a ton of time because I spent so much time on that, but Just following that theme, just think about this, Hillary. Some starting quarterbacks from last week were Gardner Minshew, Drew Locke, Joe Fagnano, Carson Wentz, Joe Milton, and Shador Sanders. It's just not great football and not great for the fans. Hilary: Okay. There's a lot of season left. Let's be hopeful. Emily: Let's be hopeful. All right. So then before I move on to the real NFL topic, I just I saw some interesting stats that caught my eye, thought I'd share. Brock Bowers, tight end for the Raiders, is now the all time leader in receptions for a tight end in the first three years. I know a lot of these stats are all like all have these funky qualifiers, but that's pretty impressive. Hilary: That's great. Good for him. Emily: also since you love the kicking game, I don't know if you saw that we had a very long punt last weekend. Hilary: I did see that. Yeah. Emily: yeah, the Eagles, Braden Mann, booted an 86 yard punt, the longest since 2001. That's a very long time, and the sixth longest in modern history. so wow. Well, well done, Okay. All right, two more stats for you. The Packers Hilary: Good. Okay. Emily: scored 45 points in Gillette Stadium, the home of the Patriots, which was the most Ever by a visiting team in that stadium. Hilary: Really? Forty five? Emily: Forty five. that is a lot of points for a visiting team. Hilary: Lot of points. I I'm just surprised you'd think at one point or another somebody, rolled in there and put a monster game up. But okay, good for the Packers. Emily: Okay, they had a great game. All right, my last stat for you. the Monday night football game last night, Bills, Vikings, the Vikings had the lowest time of possession for any Vikings game in their history. They had the ball for seventeen minutes twenty eight seconds. They have played in one thousand sixty four games. and given how great their defense is, what a waste. If they don't get it together offensively, that's all I will say. Hilary: That game was awful. That was awful. Emily: Was awful. It really was. There's more to come on that. We've got s I got some threads to pull on that. All right. So one more big topic for the NFL this week. Today, trading deadline. we talked about some key trades last week, and I won't cover every single trade that's happened since we talked last week, but let's call out the most, most interesting ones. First of all, Jonathan Taylor was not traded. That's kind of a headline because everybody thought, That he would be. Hilary: Yeah, that was a surprise to me. Emily: all right, moving on, the Ravens, the four and five Ravens, traded for a quarterback, Brissett from Arizona, plus a fifth rounder for a fourth and seventh. now when I list these trades out, I'm not gonna say which year they're getting the picks. I don't think it really matters from for this summary, just the Hilary: No. Emily: broad theme of what they're getting. but the headline for me on this is that the Ravens are still competing. They're four and five. They're in a division led by the Steelers and Bengals at six and two, and they don't feel out of it. All right, next, the Jags. the Jags, the headline. They are all in on this season. They think this is their year. they grab defensive tackle Jordan Davis from the Eagles for a first and second rounder, and defensive tackle Davin, I don't know how you pronounce his last name, from the Saints for a conditional sixth rounder, and safety Jesse Bates from Atlanta for a second and fifth rounder. Hilary: Okay. I am going to jump in and talk about this one and the Jags and their all in mode because Trevor Lawrence is playing some of the best football of his career. And as you said, they obviously think this year is the year to make a run for the Super Bowl. And these are kind of aggressive moves, the two defensive tackles and the safety to kind of shore up their defense in support of that effort. They gave up some serious draft capital to make those trades happen. I'm on board for the Jesse Bates acquisition. He fills the hole at safety when their starter Eric Murray had a season ending injury. And the other two are also replacing injured starters, but even if the Jags are better off, they sure paid a lot, maybe overpaid for the two defensive tackles. We'll see. I understand why Emily: We'll see. Hilary: they I understand why they did it. It's kind of a, you know, mortgaging the future for the short term push. Emily: Yeah, they they made the moves for sure. can't wait to see how it plays out. All right, moving on, the Lions, boy, they're in the most competitive division, arguably, in the NFL. They need the help. They traded for a safety, from the Jets. Andre Sisko for a sixth rounder. And forty niners, wide receiver. They need some wide receiver help. Keenan Allen from the Colts for a sixth rounder. Just gonna keep going. The Vikings. my gosh, the headline of the day. Hilary: The headliner. Emily: I mean, think we all knew that they were gonna go for a quarterback, but trading for Kirk Cousins. It's a reunion in Minnesota for a third rounder. the Vikings offense was so sad last night. and Wentz had a QBR of two point three and Hillary, that's not good. I think everyone knew they'd trade for a QB, but it's not easy to trade for a quarterback. Hilary: Yeah, I think the Raiders did a smart thing here. They knew that the Vikings were desperate. So they really leveraged that advantage. They know they've got Fernando Mendoza sitting there, so we are gonna get a chance to see him start next week, I'm assuming. and cousins is probably as good a fit as anybody to roll into the Vikings. He played there for six previous seasons. He was last there in 2023. And he's probably got a partial mastery at least of the playbook. So he should be functional. Come, I think their game is Sunday, right? As a matter of fact, it is Sunday because here's my piece of trivia for you. Kirk Cousins' last game with the Vikings was versus the Packers at Lambaugh Field. And guess where he's playing on Sunday? Emily: Lambeau Field against the Packers. Hilary: He sure is. He is. Emily: Wow, yeah. I I think this is feel good story. I really hope it works out for them. I I don't know what's gonna happen, but I think it's a really cool story Hilary: In the future, deep dive on a bio of Kirk Cousins because he's a fascinating guy. Emily: He's made a lot of money, Kirk Cousins. Hilary: He yeah. Emily: Okay, moving on the Bills, shoring up some of their defense. They traded for a safety, Armani Hooker, and a fifth from the Titans for a second round pick. Hilary: Okay, I love this one because I watched the Bills game against the Vikings, and there's been some buzz building for the last couple of weeks about is the Bills defense really good? Or did they just look good the last two weeks because they played Carson Wentz and the Vikings, which was the horrible game? And then the prior week was Joe Fagnano and the Ravens. So I think this move acknowledges and addresses the fact that they have some areas of weakness in their defense. And I think that safety is one of those places. And so this is a this is a good trade. I'm in I'm in on this one. Emily: Yeah, I agree with you. The last two weeks was not really a fair test, I think, for their defense. So, all right, I'm almost done. just really quick ones. Broncos trade for a linebacker, Henley from the Chargers, they trade in division for a fourth and fifth. And the Chiefs get Josh Downs and a seventh round from the Colts for a fourth and fifth. I think for me, headlines when I think about where we ended up. if you think about the beginning of the season and who would surprise me the most to be sellers at the deadline, I think it's Indianapolis and the Eagles. They were both sellers and I don't think anybody expected them to be sellers at the deadline this year. Hilary: No, I I didn't. I we talked about this last week. I did expect some sales or trades from Indy after they let their general manager go and after the poor start to the season. The Eagles is still a surprise to me, but this is a bit of a lost season for them. And I just their GM Howie Roseman and their personnel office is just doing their thing. They now have. 10 draft picks in the 2027 draft, two first rounders, three second round, and they are loaded up through the twenty twenty nine cycle. So they are masters at making those trades come out in their favor for the future. Emily: Yeah, for sure. I don't think it'll take them long to get back All Hilary: No. Emily: right. That was a lot of NFL. Should we talk some college? 'Cause it was a big week in college too. Hilary: It was a big week in college. Let's go. Emily: All right. Well, I used up so much time on the NFL. I am not going to talk too much. I just grabbed a couple of tidbits that I thought interesting. I love when I learn something new. I've been watching football for a long time, so when I learned something new, I have to call it out. In the Clemson Syracuse game, gosh, who was it? It was Syracuse, was seemingly trying to get a spike of the ball off with two seconds left to kick a field goal before the half. So they were like, Rushing up to the line, everyone, everyone, their offense and the defense on the other side were expecting them to spike. and the quarterback takes the snap, and he's dropping back and he throws it to a teammate that runs the ball, and everyone is like, What is going on? Why didn't you spike the ball? And it was the end of the half and they didn't get a field goal off. Well, the reason he didn't spike the ball. Is that there's an NCAA rule that you can't spike the ball with less than three seconds left. Yeah. So he was Hilary: What? Okay. Emily: seemed to be the only one that knew that. No one else knew it. And so he was trying to get an actual playoff. So kudos to him. But if the whole offense was on board, I feel like they could have pulled one off on the defense. It was it was interesting. Hilary: Yeah. Yeah. I had no idea. Emily: It's worth going back and watching the replay because everybody was really confused. All right. one other quick stat or tidbit for you. I had talked about this in another episode. Tennessee's Arian Carter donates to charity for every tackle, sack, or turnover, or defensive score he was suspended three games by the NCAA. for he ended up appealing to make it two games for accepting a plane ticket from an agent worth four hundred and twenty seven dollars because he thought he was gonna go to the combine and declare in the draft. He decided not to. He paid the money back and the NCAA suspended him. Like this is crazy town given like it's just like the Wild West in college football, but he was suspended. He didn't really do anything wrong. And then he decided to make a good story out of it. So he donates four hundred and twenty seven dollars, the amount of the plane ticket per tackle, five hundred dollars per sack, a thousand per turnover and five thousand for a score, to to a cancer charity. And so far this year he's tallied up twenty seven thousand one hundred and ninety three dollars for charity. Pretty good. Hilary: Amazing. That is a that is a great story. I love that he turned something negative into something positive. Emily: me too. I'll share the final tally at the end of the year and then hand off to Hilary: Yeah. Emily: you for more college. Hilary: Okay, here we go. More college. There were a lot of really good games this weekend, including the Utah versus BYU game, which lived up to the hype. Final score Utah 28, BYU 20. I'm gonna talk about that a little bit in the numbers section. But what I really want to talk about in college this week is the mess that is Michigan. They lost at home this week to rival Michigan State. The score was six to fifteen. And I want to be clear. Yeah. Okay. In the big house, they lost at home. Okay. And I want to be clear. This is a matchup of two fairly poor offenses in college football right now. This is a really long-storied rivalry. They've met 118 times since 1898. And so the first is the good for Michigan State. Pat Fitzgerald is a first year coach for them. He was formerly at Northwestern and they entered the game two and six record, and five in the Big Ten and a 13 game Big Ten losing streak. So win is good. Yay! Emily: Yay. Hilary: Also good. They scored 15 points, all by their kicker, Liam Boyd. He was five for five on field goals. the defense had four. Forced turnovers and five sacks. They held Michigan scoreless through three quarters and held them to 54 yards rushing on 25 carries and a total of 192 offensive yards. They recaptured the Paul Bunyan trophy and the bragging rights for the rivalry, which they last won in 2020. So congratulations to the Michigan State Spartans on the win. They're at the bottom of the Big Ten, but you've got to start somewhere. So Good for them. Emily: Yeah, congrats to Pat Fitzgerald. Yeah. Hilary: Okay. The it the issues at Michigan are so way bigger than this one game. They were ranked number 16 in the preseason polls and they have an estimated top 10 roster expense. You know, in terms of how much they're putting out in nil for their players and everything, right? They're five and four. They're two and four in the big 10. Their last three games are at Oregon, home versus UCLA, and at Ohio State. And they need to win one of those to even be bowl eligible. Yeah. So let Emily: boy. Good luck. Hilary: that well, let that sink in for a minute. Ohio, maybe Ohio State. I don't know. Anyway, yeah. Emily: That would be hilarious. Yeah. Hilary: Okay. Their heavily recruited multi-million dollar quarterback Underwood is sitting on the bench for poor performance. Estimates say he's making $3 million. And rumors are out that he will enter the transfer portal when it opens in January. He's been replaced by true freshman Tommy Carr, who's playing okay, but just doesn't have the experience. They're currently ranked number 126 in scoring offense and number 132 in total yards. And both of those numbers are out of 138 FPS teams. Okay. Emily: Yeah, that's pretty bad. That's really bad. Hilary: yeah. Sunday they fired their offensive coach Jason Beck. Who followed Coach Whittingham from Utah? And he is reportedly the highest paid OC with a three-year nine million plus contract and a 1.75 million signing bonus, all of which was guaranteed. So rounding numbers, 12 to 13 million walking out the door there. Emily: And they're all new this year, right? So this is not his third year or anything. This is his first year. Hilary: They no, no, no, no. This is your nine games. He's he's coached nine games. coach Kyle Whittingham is in his first year from from Utah and he's falling way short of expectations. And the most puzzling and concerning part, if I'm a Michigan fan, which to be clear, I'm not, but it's his press conferences and the comments he's making, he doesn't seem to grasp the urgency of the situation. After the game, he was asked if it was time to hit the panic button about offense. And his reply was, seems to be, yeah. Emily: Okay. Hilary: Right? And when asked what gives him confidence about fixing the offense, he cited the 2027 recruiting class and the transfer portal. And then went on to say, I'm very confident we can get things fixed. Not right away, maybe. And then later in that same session, he adds, I promise you, eventually we'll get this right. What the heck are the current players supposed to take away from that? I mean, that's not very inspiring to them or fans. fan sentiment is super low. Frustration with performance compared to their monetary outlay is high. Local media coverage is just scathing. I don't know where they go from here, but the vibes in Ann Arbor right now are not good. So that's my wrap up on Michigan. Emily: Okay. Hilary: Okay, let's go. College by the numbers. Our undefeated list is down to two. Utah and UCLA, of course, with the Notre Dame win over Miami. Georgia returns to number one in the AP poll. Utah's number two after the win over BYU. Notre Dame at number three, UCLA at number four. And only one team, Indiana, number six. Ironically, on their bye week is the only team again that stayed with their same ranking. So a lot of movement in the polls again this week. AP risers and Fallers. Tennessee up seven spots to number nine. Oregon re-enters the ranking at number 18 and SMU enters the polls at number 25. Fallers, Ohio continues their downward trend after they lost. They dropped another 10 spots to number 21. And LSU is down nine positions to number 24 at the bottom of the top 25. Emily: I love that one. Hilary: yeah, I love that one, right? Okay. Here's my numbers of note. Eight for 303. That is the stat for UCLA quarterback Ty Diffenbach, who threw for a career high 303 yards on eight completions. two separate 75 yard touchdown passes to his wide receiver Aiden Mizzle. And that's the fewest completions in a 300 yard game since 2000. And then another number of note was another big 12 game, Texas Tech versus West Virginia, where the final score was 53 to 48 with 1,220 total yards of offense between the two schools. Eight hundred and ninety of those before halftime. Thirteen plays. 13 plays over 30 yards, 13 touchdowns, three field goals, and a safety. So defense, apparently not much defense. Emily: Wow. Hilary: Wow, right? Okay. North Dakota State Bison are on the bye week again. They're seven and two overall. So this week I'm showcasing a team from the American Conference, and that is the University of North Texas. The mean green are seven and two overall, five and in conference play. And their next game is against the University of Texas San Antonio Roadrunners in a conference matchup. And that leads me into my fun fact for this week. The University of North Texas, their official mascot is an American Eagle named Scrappy, but their sports teams are widely known by the nickname Mean Green. there's a common myth that the nickname honors Pittsburgh Steelers and Hall of Fame legend Mean Joe Green, who it happens was a star defense player there from 1966 to 1968. But in reality, the mean green moniker was used by a local sports caster to describe that defensive unit as a whole, not just Joe himself, because of their green and white uniforms. So it's not specifically about him, but the nickname stuck, and now the official licensed name for all UNT athletics is the mean green, including their mean green machine marching band. And that's college by the numbers. Emily: Okay, thanks for bringing it every week, Hillary. All right, let's get everyone ready for the weekend and what games we're circling for college. I circled Missouri at Georgia. I think mostly just 'cause I haven't seen much of Georgia this year and obviously they're number one now. So really curious to see if Missouri can put up a battle there. Hilary: Yeah, I think that's gonna be a better game than maybe the betting odds and current predictions forecast. I'm riding with Oregon State at Boise State, which is a divisional matchup, and the Boise State Broncos sit at the top of their division with an eight and one record, five and in conference play. if the college Playoffs were held today. Boise would be one of the 12 teams as the highest ranked group of five champion. college game days headed to this game, and I'm really psyched about that because I mentioned earlier in the season how I was hopeful the revitalized Pac-12 would have a successful showing this year. And I'm glad to see this matchup highlighted on the national stage. So I don't really have a, stake in the game as to who wins, but I'm just excited to see this one getting some recognition. Emily: Yeah, that's a good one. All right. In the NFL, I changed the game that I circled because of a trade today. So I am switching to my Seahawks at the Raiders because it is Fernando Mendoza time. I think all eyes will be on Vegas to see what he does, and I hope not very much. Hilary: Okay. I'm going with the Steelers at the Bengals. This is a divisional matchup, and they're tied at the top of the division six and two, both with four-game win streaks. The Steelers are coming off the bye week. The Bengals are coming off a win against the Falcons in Madrid. Steelers won the matchup week 3 30 to 27. But Joey B. Jamar and T. Higgins are rolling. The Bengals offense leads the league in EPA. So Emily: Yes. Yes. We're rooting for Hilary: Go Bengals. Yeah. Emily: the Bengals for sure. Hilary: Yeah. Emily: cool. Well that was a lot for today. It was great talking to you. I know I won't be chatting with you for a few weeks, but I look forward to seeing you in December. Hilary: Yep, we'll be back in December for more unicorn football talk. And I can't wait to hear your guest unicorn next week.